Three Things I Can Change to Use Time Better

There are things in my daily life that kind of slow me down with being more productive but I do have to recognize those distractions and cut them off to help me focus. I think everybody has that problem because there are other things that people would rather be doing than work. But work (of course) has to get done. I am going to explain three things that are a pretty big distraction for me and three ways that I could change that. Yes, it’s going to be hard for me to accomplish getting these NOT to be a distraction for me but I have to try my best.

One of the first things is technology. Now, I’m not saying my computer because I need my computer to complete my schoolwork, but I’m talking about my phone, television, etc. Those things personally can distract me very easily. The simple thing to help that situation is to turn them off. Of course, (easy as it sounds) that’s kind of hard for me. But another good way that I thought of is if I am going for the TV remote then I could just put it in a drawer so it’s not where I could see it. Then, if I’m doing something productive, I won’t think about turning the TV on so much because it isn’t in the vicinity. For my phone, that’s kind of a different story. I really kind of don’t want to turn that off because I also use it for emergencies. So, I have to really tell myself not to go on it because that could distract me for a really long time. Another great way for me to think about is if I get all my schoolwork done, I’ll be able to go on it! So that could be a great thing to look forward too. That goes for the television too because you can do all the fun stuff you want after your all finished with your schoolwork.

One of my struggles is math. My Mom says I’m pretty good at it but sometimes I have a lot of trouble understanding it. When I don’t understand something or I don’t get it right then I kind of stress about it. I start thinking about it too much and then I start getting setback. So for example if I did a math problem, and I got it wrong, then I somewhat give up. I don’t want or mean to give up I just do it automatically. I’m going to set a goal to not give up and try my best to figure it out. If I don’t get it right even then, I tries my best so that’s all anybody could ask for. It just means I have to go back and really get an explanation on how to do it. So basically, I want to just keep going even if I hit a few bumps on my path and see if I can understand that math lesson before I give up at all.

The last problem I face with not using my time as good as I should is taking my time. I face this one specifically more than the others. Usually I tend to take my time through each subject and that could be good to some extent. It’s good to take your time to fully understand what you’re learning but it’s not so good when you’re doing it for no reason. Sometimes I do it to fully understand stuff but a lot of times I take my time for no reason and I don’t even realize I’m doing it. Like it math, my Mom notices that I drag the lesson on for a while and sometimes, I don’t even realize it. To change this so I can manage my time better I am going to really pay attention to how much time I spend on things. Maybe I can even put a stopwatch on (which is on my phone) and I’ll look at it every once and a while to really notice how much time I’m actually spending on each subject.

Those are the three things that I can change to use my time better and from now on I really want to focus on these goals and achieve them on a daily basis. Now that I have told you my three things, what are yours?

Continental Congress's Grievances Against Parliament

So much taxes! Parliament is practically going to make everyone poor! All of these acts cause chaos with the colonists. The Continental Congress needs to help go against the British before things get way out of hand.

First of all, Parliament didn’t even have the colonies put their opinions on what acts were going to be given out. One of the acts is called the Navigation Acts. That’s one that needs to be completely abolished. Those Navigation Acts state that colonists cannot trade with anybody EXCEPT Great Britain! So they can’t trade goods with any other countries. That frustrates the colonists of course because that was a way that they could get revenue and now it was taken away from them. People should be free to trade with anyone that they want to trade with. But Parliament thinks otherwise. In fact, there’s not just one but MORE acts that were added to the Navigation Acts that made them stronger but didn’t agree with the colonists. But, this of course leads to people going against the law. Smugglers secretly trade with other countries and try their best not to get caught. Sometimes that could lead to success…But others, not so lucky.

But what we really need to stop is Parliament making more of these! That isn’t the only acts that are frustrating the colonists! There’s tons more. Like, the Molasses Act. This act involved a lot of tax. Parliament decided to tax on sugar, which of course is a common good that people use so for them, it’s a smart way to go. But, this wasn’t for just sugar in general. This was for sugar that was being imported from the French West Indies. So again, Parliament is forcing the colonists in America to get all their goods from Great Britain. Doesn’t this look a little similar to the Navigation Acts? I thought so. But that isn’t the end for taxing sugar since Parliament made another act called the Sugar Act! At first I thought it was a break since Parliament lowered the tax on the sugar. I was wrong though. They started enforcing strict rules and improved from the last act and tried to make it easier for them to receive their tax money. But throughout all this, they’re not even thinking about how the colonists feel about all this and that has to end.

The Currency Acts are another handful of acts that weren’t made for the colonists’ well-being. It was made for the British Merchants’ well-being. These acts protected the way that those merchants were getting paid. They were getting paid with colonial currency and that wasn’t really the best form of money around so these acts helped them out. But there was no plus side for the colonists yet again. Not one bit of all these acts worked in America’s favor. It basically helped Great Britain out a lot.

The Quartering Act is what is really frustrating me and we need to stop this so the colonists can stop being taken advantage of. Parliament is forcing colonists to provide a home and food to soldiers that are local. Colonists have their own family that they have to worry about and now they have to feed another body taking up their home? It just doesn’t seem right.

All of these acts need to end and the Continental Congress needs to step in and do something to help save the colonists from this disaster. Fast forwarding to this next act called the Tea Act. This had a lot of controversy. The colonists were actually outraged when this was put into place. This act put a large tax on tea. And of course, they drink a lot of tea so it was a great product to get revenue on.  But Boston MA had enough of this craziness with all the taxes. So, a small group of American Patriots got together and decided to create a plan. And throughout all this everyone refused to drink any tea or take any of it from the ships. So the group sneaked onto the ship that contained a lot of the tea that the colonists of Massachusetts refused to drink. So instead of having it sit there, they just simply threw it overboard into the water. This shows that Parliament isn’t getting anywhere with the colonists with all these acts.

This event is now called the Boston Tea Party. It really started an uprising with the colonists to go against Parliament. All of the colonists soon realized that New Britain wasn’t really acting and making all the decisions good for them.

Wreck This Journal: Random Numbers Everywhere!

Yay! This is the first post for my new journal series! So, because I just got the book I didn't really get that many pages done. I have also decided that I will be posting this series every Saturday! 

This first page I kind of messed up a little bit. But I mean, it's a wreck it journal you know? I messed up where I was suppose to write each one. So for example where it says write your name in white, I wrote the, this book belongs to one. So that basically pushed each one down one line but I wrote arrows so hopefully it makes sense. Also, I haven't really figured out how I am going to write my name in white so leave me ideas in the comments! But the rest of the page is pretty self explanatory:

The next page was actually pretty fun! It says "add your own page numbers". I did just that but in a weird way. But weird fits me because...well I'm a little weird :) what I did differently was are random numbers to every page. So for example I would write 2 on one page but on the very next page I would write 100 or something like that. It was actually pretty relaxing and it took me a couple days to complete the whole book only because I was taking my time with it. 

The next page I actually completed before I even turned to it! It says "devise a way to carry the journal everywhere". I already figured out how by putting it in my purse that I carry around everywhere. So this page was really easy for me.

So those are all the pages that I have completed so far! I'm sorry if this first post for this series isn't really that interesting but hopefully when I get further into it it will be more exciting. I can't wait to complete more pages to post! 

Wulf the Saxon Culture Summary

In the book Wulf the Saxon the culture was completely different than today. Most of the setting in the book surrounded this one big battle between the Saxons and the Normans. You could definitely tell that there was some tension between each other. Obviously, they didn’t have cars, and cell phones, or anything of that sort during that time. They had to write letters and wait much longer to receive a message unlike now where we send a text to someone and they get it right away. They had to ride by horse or just walk, but now we have cars that transport us to the places we want to go much quicker. So unlike now, the people back then weren’t just handed these technological things that would make their lives easier. Instead of driving to the grocery store they had to grow their own food. But, if you were wealthy that was a different story. Back then, there was an obvious difference between the people that were poor and the people that were wealthy. In the book, sometimes it took place in a castle or with wealthy people and you can tell that they got given everything rather easily compared to the people outside of their circle.

During the time that this book took place the wealthy people were all about their status. There was an Earl, Thane, and of course the King. They took their places very seriously.  When they were given a job they knew when to get it done and how to get it done, especially when they would prepare for battle.

Wulf was the main character in the story and he played a great part. He was courageous and independent. He seemed to me that he was very helpful and well prepared for anything. Even when they were in the middle of a shipwreck, he still pulled it together. With any battle in that time of history they were very gruesome. Lots of people would get killed and there was even a main character in the story that died during the battle. During this fighting fiasco people would try to of course kill King Harold. Many tried but died before they could. That shows how much people risked their lives over something they believe should be done.

The tension between the Saxon and Normans were very obvious. They just wanted each other out of the way. And that’s understandable knowing that they are two different cultures that believe in diverse things. The one thing that I found interesting in Wulf the Saxon is how the author pulled different historical aspects that were nonfiction and created a fictional story at the same time. Even though he did that he still kept the culture and historical facts accurate.