IBM Day #1 (Starting Economics Online)

       Monday was the first day that I went to IBM with Clea for my week of Work Experience. I woke up at 6:30 AM, and I got my lunch ready that I had bought Sunday. I had bought a sandwich, some apple slices, and a bottle of water from Tesco for 3:50 Euros which is their lunch deal. I got my lunch ready, packed my laptop in my backpack along with my mouse and passport for identification, then walked out the door. I had on my school uniform. I met Clea next to the Shelbourne hotel by St. Stevens Green. We walked down to the Spire by the Liffey, and took the private bus to IBM.

       At IBM, I talked to a German man named Nikola. He was very smart, and we talked about things like Artificial Intelligence, and global population problems and other things like that. I also spent time with Maeve who showed me a software that uses nodes and I made an american flag on raspberry pi, which is what this thing is.

       For lunch I had my ham and cheese sandwich that I got from Tesco, along with my apples and kitcat. At 3 PM, I got all of my things in my backpack and packed up my Alienware laptop so I could catch the 3:05 PM bus that went back to the city centre so I could walk home. 

         Monday night I worked on MVS which is Michigan Virtual School and it is what I am using to take Economics currently. I just started it and I am currently working through chapter 1. I got past lessons 1.1 and 1.2 and I am currently on 1.3. I went to bed early so that I could get enough sleep to go to IBM tomorrow. I went to sleep at around 9:30 PM.  

           -Febuary 27, 2017 

Italy Sestriere Ski Trip Blog!

       Today I just got back from a week in Italy of skiing. Me and 70 other students in St. Andrews College and in Transition Year all went to Sestriere in Italy for a week to Ski. We flew to Italy on Saturday, and we skied every day from Monday to Saturday. Each day we had lessons from 11 AM to 1 PM, and then again from 3 PM to 5 PM. The lessons for my group were not really lessons, but our instructor Roger just took us on the hardest hills and we skied down them.

      When we got to our Hotel which was called Cavalieri, we got sorted into our rooms. I was in a room with Dominik, Jack, Stephen, and Alec. There were 5 beds, a small kitchen and a bathroom with a shower. It was a 3 star hotel but I really enjoyed it. Each day we would get up at 7:30 AM, and go eat Breakfast at 8:30 AM each morning, then meet downstairs all geared up at 9:30 AM. Then from about 10 AM until 11 AM, we could free ski. At 11 AM we had our lessons. At 1 PM we had our lunch. Our lunch break was from 1 PM to 3 PM, but we could free ski after we were done eating if we were back by 3 PM for our next lesson.

      Out of all of the 70 students, we were all organized into groups of how good we were at skiing so that each group was about equal experienced. The names were Seaweed, Jellyfish, Mackerel, Stingrays, and Sharks. The Seaweed were the new people to Skiing who had never skiied before, and Sharks were the most experienced, and I was in the sharks along with about 11 other people. The Sharks went on a lot of hard hills, they were very steep. Sestriere is way bigger than Cannonsburg in Michigan which I had skiied at before. Here are some pictures of Sestriere from our hotel and what the ski pass looked like.

The 2006 Olympics for Skiing was here in Sestriere. This is the sign. 

View from the Balcony of my room. 

What the pass looked like, I kept it in my glove. 

        To get on a ski lift or button lift, we had to have our ski pass scanned electronically. I kept my pass in my left glove zipper, and it was very handy because It would always scan very easily. Our instructors name was Roger, and he was Italian. He was very good at Skiing, and he took us on some crazy hills. One of the crazy hills we went on was on a button lift, which is basically a little seat you put in-between your legs and it pulls you up the hill. It looks like this. 

        So this button lift that my group went on with Roger was a very steep hill, and it is where the Olympic skiiers started and went all the way down the hill. The sign said only experts and the hill is more than 60 degrees down hill, which is very very steep. It was very fun once we got going down the hill, but at the top, we were about 2500 meters above sea level, it was very cold and windy. It was very high up.

     Here are some pictures of Sestriere that we skiied on. I took a ton of pictures.

The trip was amazing overall, and the slopes were awesome. I brought my coat with me but I did not wear it, because every day, it was very warm, like 30-40 degrees each day. I usually only wore 3 shirts and a sweatshirt. Each day for lunch, I would get french fries and a big square slice of pizza. It was very delicious. I would usually ski from about 1:45 PM - 3 PM for free ski after I ate Lunch. I usually went with Alec, Jack, and Stephen. 

Each night we had a night activity. We had Karaoke night one night, a swimming night, a night where we went Ice Skating also. I became a better Ice Skater in that hour. Dominik is a very good Ice Skater. 

Each night for dinner, we would usually have a starter, which was usually a pasta dish, then a main dish like chicken or something like that, then dessert. At 5 PM, our skiing would be done for the day, and each group would meet up then ski back to the hotel. We had to walk back to the hotel from a certain area with our ski boots on each day to bring the skis back to the hotel. Each night from 5 PM until 7 PM, which was Dinner time, we had free time. We would usually just take showers, hang out in the room, or go to this shop that is a little bit away from our hotel to get snacks. We would get things like chocolate and chips and water and drinks. 

Roger taught the Sharks about how to turn better while going faster. Roger always wore no helmet because he was so good, and a pair of orange sun glasses. He had a huge tan around his face except his sunglasses because he always wore them so you could see he was more white around his eyes. 

Saturday morning we woke up at 5 AM to eat breakfast really early so we could fly back to Dublin. We took the buses for an hour and a half to the Airport. We all checked our bags and got to Dublin at 11:45 AM. Then Dominik and I each went and took a cab home. 

-Febuary 25, 2017 

Past Week, Going to Italy!! SKI TRIP

       Monday, I handed in my last thing that I had due before my trip to Italy, so I was very relieved. It was an English Book Report on the book Paper Towns by John Green. It turned out to be 8 pages long and I was very satisfied with it. I turned that in on Monday in my English Class. I was going to go to Badminton with Alec, but Alec said that it was canceled so I had to skip it. Tuesday, we watched 'Sleepless in Seattle' for the last 3 periods of school. It was a great movie, and we watched it instead of our Lectures we usually have on Tuesday. Ms. King talked to all of the Uganda people who applied and told us that we would be notified Friday at 4 PM who got into Uganda. It is 3:30 PM right now, but I will wait to post this until I know if I got in or not.


     I put 100 Euro in with my Uganda form. Everyone who wanted to go had to research some things about the school, and orphanage, and hospital that are involved in the Uganda trip. There are 50 people in all, more than half are girls, probably 2/3 of the 50 people are girls. Me and Chance both applied and we probably have maybe a 45% chance of getting in, pretty much 50 50.


     I have not gotten my 'Career in Detail' project back, hopefully I will get it back soon after I am back in school, which will not be for about another month from now. I have one week in Italy, I fly out tomorrow at 6:15 AM, so I have to get up at 3 AM. I will then have 2 weeks of work experience right after I get back from Italy. My first week is at IBM and my second week is at Gamestop. March 1 is my birthday and I will be in the middle of Work experience when I have my Birthday.

      Wednesday I had my Piano lesson after school. I packed throughout the week, and pretty much finished Thursday night after school. I packed my Moms Duke laptop, because I dont want to bring my Alienware to Italy. I also packed all my clothes, snow pants, helmet, goggles, gloves, and my coat. I also have some Ibuprofen just in case. I also have a huge adapter for American plugs because they are not the same in Italy.

     Friday, (Today) I got to wear what ever I wanted along with everyone else in the school, but we all had to bring in 2 Euros. It went to some charity. Friday was a half day, and I got out of school at 1:10 PM. Friday morning at 3:30 AM, my Mom, Oma and Levi left for Croatia, so I got up at 3:30 AM to say good bye to them. Then I went back to sleep. After school Friday, which is today, I went to Subway to get some lunch, which I did not have to pay for, because I had 1000 points on my Subcard which is enough for a free foot-long Sub. You gain points when you buy subway.  I got home at about 2:15 PM, and then I took out all of the trash, and cleaned all of the Bathrooms in the house. I bought a Bluetooth Speaker from Argos Wednesday after school for 30 Euro and Oma gave me money on Wednesday, so I will not get paid for the chores, which would have been 30 Euro because I used it to get the speaker. Here is what it looks like.

      I just got an E-Mail and I did not get into Uganda, but that's okay because I helped raise a ton of money for Uganda during the Winter Fair, the U-Live concert and the 100 Euros I put in with my application. Chance did not make it in either. Its good because some people probably wanted to go a lot more than I did. I am going to go over to Mily's house at about 6 PM. They will be able to take me to the airport Tomorrow morning since they will be on the same flight. They are the parents of levis friends. It is very nice of them! It is 3:45 PM right now so I am going to download some movies and music for the Plane trip tomorrow and the 2 hour bus ride from the Airport to Sestriere (The Ski Place in Italy)

                -Febuary 17, 2017 (FRIDAY)

Went to 'Pickle"

          Today is Sunday. Levi had his friends over from last night, they had slept over. I got up at about 8:45 AM to Levi barging into my room asking me to help him plug in the xbox 360. I told him to let me sleep and he went away. Then he came back 2 minutes later asking again and I just woke up at that point. I went downstairs, and worked on a song until about 10:30 AM. My Mom made Pancakes for Levi, his friends and I. It was very delicious with peanut butter and syrup on it. I started to clean the bathrooms at about 11:40 AM, and I got finished at about 12:20 PM.


      All of the bathrooms were cleaned, so I decided to do piano next. Levi and his friends were in the piano room watching YouTube videos so I asked them to move to the next room and they did. After I did piano, I worked on my Paper Towns book report that was due tomorrow. I was basically finished with it, I just made it look better, and edited it some more. I printed it out and it was 8 pages long. It was about 3 PM, and I was bored. Levis friends parents were over talking to Mama and Oma downstairs. I went down to the room where all of them were.

      We were talking about how I was going to Italy soon, and Levis friends parents said they were going to Italy also soon to go Snowboarding. It turns out, that we are both on the same flight flying out Saturday at 6:15 AM. They offered to drive me there at 4 AM and it was really nice of them. It was perfect because Mama, Oma and Levi were flying out Friday to go to Croatia and Montenegro. I was going to take an Uber Saturday but now I have a ride. I am going to spend the night at their house Friday, and then we get up at 3 AM or so and go to the AirPort.


       I took a shower at 4:30 PM, we were going to an Indian restaurant named 'Pickle' at 5:15 PM. After my shower, I got in some sweatpants and sweatshirt and we were all ready to go eat dinner. We walked to Camden street where 'Pickle' was located. We went in, and there was 2 floors, but the 2nd floor was kind of a balcony looking over the first floor. We sat on the 2nd floor seating area. This is the view from where we sat.



      We ordered food, I got Buttered Chicken, which came with Butter Naan bread. My Mom got a spicy vegetable dish. Levi got a Tandoori Chicken dry dish which was amazing according to my Mom. My Oma got Riesling called 'Sweet Agnes" and she really liked that. She got a Duck dish for dinner. We got a ton of Naan on the side including plain naan, garlic naan and buttered naan. They were all amazing especially the Garlic Naan, my favorite. We got a picture in front of the Door.

        We got dessert also. Levi got a Chocolate Tart with Vanilla icecream. I got a strawberry sorbet, which was amazing. Oma and Mama shared a Pistachio Ice cream thing which had a bunch of interesting things in it. The meal was amazing, and at about 7:20 PM, we were finished eating, and we took some of Mamas spicy vegetable dish home with us. We got home, and I continued to work on Ableton for a little bit. Tomorrow, I am going to Badminton with Alec and Gonzalo.

            -Febuary 12, 2017 (SUNDAY)

Working with Ableton Live! (SUBWAY VALENTINES DAY)

       For Christmas, I asked for Ableton Live 9 which is a Digital Audio Workstation software that you can use to create music. My Dad got it for me for Christmas, and I have been working with it lately, trying to create beats or little pieces of music. I have made 2 songs so far on Ableton. One is like a beat, and the other one actually has a melody.

      I created a Soundcloud where I can upload all of the music that I create. The first song I named "Marimba Song" because I started off with some chords from a Marimba that I just thought up. Here is the link to the song if you want to check it out.

https://soundcloud.com/user-501787484/marimba-song-jax

    So the first beat I made, I was using like bells, and space type sounds. The Marimba Songs I just used a bass line, Violin, Marimba, and some kicks and high hats and the melody. I made the Marimba Song last night and It took about 3 hours to make. It turned out pretty good but if it was a real song it would be too short because its only like 1 Minute and 40 Seconds.

     Friday at school, for outward bound, all of the Transition Year students were going to take a dart to Shanganagh Park which is all the way down the coast of Ireland. It is very far away from where I live. At 1:10 PM we all took the Dart to Shanganagh Park and then we ran around the park 5 time which was equivalent to about 4 km. I walked a lot of the time with Change but I finished in like 27 minutes. It was fun, and it was very cold, and my hands were freezing after that. I had no gloves, and after the run, Me and Chance walked straight to the Dart to take it home. We had about a 30 minute Dart ride because we were so far away from where we lived. Chance got off the Dart about 3 stops before I did to walk to my house. I walked to my house, and then did Piano. After that, at about 6:30 PM, I walked to Subway to get a sandwich.


       I walked home after I was finished eating, and then worked on the song I was talking about earlier the "Marimba Song". Once I finished it late in the night, I called my Dad to show him the song I had made. I emailed it to him and he said he was very impressed. I went to bed after that because It was late, and today is Saturday. Levis friends are coming over at 3 PM, so we get to get on Electronics early so I will probably end up making another song tonight. I am trying to get some free Dubstep packs for Ableton Live so I can make Dubstep sounds also.

           -January 11, 2017 (SATURDAY)


     Also, I heard that on Febuary 14, Valentines day, if you buy a bottle of water, you get a free 6-Inch Sub with it, so I might want to take that offer.

U-LIVE CONCERT!!!

       Wednesday was the U-Live Concert. The U-Live Concert is a Concert that is put together by Transition Year students to raise money for Uganda. There were 3 committees that people could join to help put together the U-Live Concert. I was on the committee that figured out who all was going to perform on that night. Everybody from 1st year to 6th year was allowed to perform in the Concert. (6th Grade - 12th Grade)

      We put together about 30 acts that were going to be in the concert. The other 2 committees advertised the U-Live Concert, and did behind the stage things on the night of the Concert. There were posters that got put up for U-Live, and a ton of parents of Transition Year students came, including my Mom, Levi and Oma.



       Me, Levi, My Mom, and Oma all took the bus to my school after we ate dinner on Wednesday night. We got there at about 7:10 PM, and everybody was looking for me behind stage. Everybody was glad to see me because they said that I did not show up for my 'sound check'. I told everybody that I did not know I was suppose to be here for a sound check, and nobody told me. The concert started at 7:30 PM. I was act 12 out of 29 acts. I was able to practice my piece on a keyboard that was not plugged into the wall. I played my song out of memory. Levi, Oma and Mama were in the audience.

      Papa called me about 3 acts before I was suppose to go on and I said that I would call him later, because I had to go on soon. I told my Mom to record it so that my Dad could hear. I went out on the stage when it was my turn, and played my song. I messed up a lot but at the hard part I did not mess up so I guess it was ok. I thought it was really bad but everybody said good job. I probably noticed more of the mistakes since I studied and learned the music for a long time.

                There were a ton of people there at the concert.



                   Here are some other pictures my Mom got of me.

There was a cool backdrop that said U-Live when the bands were performing that you could see behind them. It had the flag on there also. My Mom bought a Lino Print that I had made in Visual Art class. A Lino is where you have a rectangle of rubber, and you carve into it to take away some of the rubber from the surface of the rectangle. Then, you take ink and a roller and roll ink on top of the rectangle, and everything that you did not cut out gets printed onto a piece of paper. It is like making an office stamp in the way that everything that is sticking up when you put the ink on it, gets stamped onto the paper. 

Here is a picture of my Lino print, printed in black in a frame for 5 Euro that we bought. 

The concert ended after 10 PM, so it was very late after it was done. Oma and Levi had left after my piece was over, because Levi had to get to bed. Me and Mama took the bus home after it was done. I got home, and I went to subway because I was hungry. 

After I had subway I went back home and went to bed.

-January 8, 2017 (WEDNESDAY)

Friday Hillwalk, Career in Detail, Paper Towns book report

      Friday, I went back to school. I was feeling much better Thursday, and Friday morning when I woke up at 7:30 AM. I took my Amoxicillin in the morning and then I got my stuff and took the bus to school. I had Hill-walking again for my outward bound trip today. I thought it was not going to rain, so I brought my huge sweatshirt to school to wear during hill walking.

     I had my 4 Main classes on Friday, except American Studies because Ms. Gavin was not there. We had to go to supervision. I had Critical Thinking before by Outward Bound, and we talked about more critical thinking stuff. I walked down to the bus at about 1:20 PM to go for my Hillwalk. It was raining when I walked down to the bus and that wasnt good because it meant I could not wear my giant hoodie unless I wanted to get it soaking wet. We took the bus to a hill, and I left my backpack and huge sweatshirt on the bus. It was raining the whole time we walked through the Forrest on the hill. My St. Andrews Sweatshirt got soaking wet and so did my pants, but not as much.

     It was not the best hillwalk, but I eventually got home.

     Saturday, I continued to work on my 'Career in Detali' project, and I decided to make a separate blog just for how that project turned out. I have about 15 pages in it and I think I might not even get 20, but thats ok because it has a lot of work put into it. I tried to start my book report for 'Paper Towns' but I was having trouble trying to organize it correctly, so I will try to work on it a lot today. My Book Report for Paper Towns is not due until Thursday, which is after the U-Live concert, so I will probably only have today, Monday, and Tuesday to work on it. Monday, I will finish my 'Career in Detail' Project.

     I am really excited to go to Italy for my Ski trip, I leave in about 2 Weeks.

     Saturday night, I put my Laptop and TV together to watch some youtube videos.



      Today is Sunday, hopefully I can just work more on my Career in Detail project and start to write my Book Report.



              -Febuary 5th, 2017 (SUNDAY)

Sick Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday

       I went to school Monday right after I just got back from London. It was a good day, but when I went to sleep, my throat felt a little bit dry and I had a small headache, but I thought it was not a big deal, so I just took some ibuprofen and went to sleep and set my alarm for 7:30 AM. When I woke up to my alarm sounding on Tuesday Morning, I felt completely horrible. I felt like I was very hot, and I felt like I had a horrible fever. My head was hurting, and my throat was very very dry, and it stayed like that most of Tuesday. I told Oma, and I stayed home from school Tuesday. I went straight back to bed and got back up around 9:30 AM.


       I felt nauseous a lot of Tuesday, and I slept again from 10:00 AM to 10:30 AM. I took a bath in my Moms bathroom since she has a really nice bathtub and put some Epsom Salt in the hot water since it is suppose to help your body or something like that.

     I stayed in the bath a while than got out. I tried to eat some soup but I was not really hungry, and still felt a bit nauseous. I was laying down in bed most of Tuesday morning, but I tried to walk around. That helped me to feel less nauseous because I had a lot of air in my stomach. I was feeling a little bit better at night time. I went to sleep Tuesday and still had my alarm set for 7:30 AM. 

      Wednesday morning I woke up and did not go to school either because I felt the same way, except my throat was more swelled up and it hurt to swallow. I did not have a runny nose or anything so I thought it had to be strep throat. My Mom texted my Piano teacher and told him I would not be there for a lesson today, since my Lessons are on Wednesday. My Mom booked me an appointment for an appointment at a clinic near our house, even though she was in Grand Rapids. She left for Grand Rapids Monday, and she is back Thursday Morning.    

      Oma and Me walked over to the clinic at 3 PM, when my appointment was. The guy wrote me a prescription for amoxicillin which is what most people get to treat Strep Throat. I was to take 3 pills each day for 7 days straight, which is what I have done in the past. I took my first one at like 4 PM when we got home. 

     For dinner Wednesday, we got some Indian food from Sanai, which is about a 3 minute walk from our house. It is right next to the Tesco we always go to. I went and brought it back home. I got the Chicken Tanduri Tikka since the Chicken is soft and easy to swallow, and thats what I had got last time, and it was very good. We also got some Naan bread and also some Garlic Naan. 

        I did not finish all of my Naan or Tanduri Chicken, so I saved it for Thursday night Dinner. I decided to stay home Thursday also to let my throat heal, and so I did not get anybody else sick, because a ton of other people at St. Andrews have been out for being sick, and they probably have just been passing it from person to person. This way no one else would catch it from me. I set my alarm for 9:30 AM for Thursday morning, and I took another pill at bed time, and went to bed at 10:30 PM Wednesday night.

       Thursday morning I woke up at 9:00 AM, and I felt better, but my throat still hurt. I took a pill in the morning, and went downstairs. I had to get new colored ink for the printer today because it was running out and I was working on my 'Career in Detail' project for St. Andrews. I walked over to an Ink store by St. Stevens Green. I got the Colored ink from that store, than got some subway for lunch than walked back home. I worked on my project from then on. I am currently working on 'What a career in Music Production Entails' so I talked about what you have to do, and how you also have to know how to sell yourself because you are the product, you make the music and you have to network with other artists to grow. 

      It rained the whole day Thursday, (Today) but by 2 PM, it was not just windy and rainy, it was insane. You could hear the wind hit against the house, through the chimneys, and just through the walls. It was raining so hard also. I tried to open one of the windows in my Piano Room while it was raining, and just an inch of lifting up the window, a ton of wind blew into the house sweeping all of the little pieces of paper that were on the ground from working on my project all over. Also got a little bit of rain on the window sill inside, but I immediately shut it so it stopped. Here is some pictures of the rain and wind.

       I will go to school tomorrow, and it will be Friday, and I have Hill Walking again for my Outward bound so that shouldn't be too bad. Also my Ski Trip to Italy is Febuary 18 and that will be amazing! I am going to be in a room with Dominic, Jack, and Alec. 

           -Febuary 2, 2017 (THURSDAY)