Business letter: Lights on baseball field

1821 6^th Street

Las Animas, CO 81054

26 October, 2010

Carl Lindauer

300 Grove Ave

Las Animas, CO 81054

Dear Mr. Lindauer:

I think lights on the baseball field would benefits the school greatly. It would help the baseball program and make the field look better. Students would miss less school and you wouldn’t have to postpone games because you can start the games later when it is cooler. With starting the games later more people might come. We could also have more tournaments because we could fit more games into the day. You could accomodate more teams because you can have more games during the day.  

I know this is more difficult to say than do. Field lights do cost a great deal of money to install and use.  I understand how hard this will be to put these up. The time from when summer baseball ends and when spring baseball starts is cold and hard to work in the conditions. One solution could be that they work on the days when summer baseball is not being played. Summer baseball is once every week and few games at home so they would have plenty of time to work on the lights.

I know having lights on the baseball field will have some problems while trying to get them but i think it will benefit the school and baseball program greatly. I appriciate the time you are taking out of your day to read this. I hope you take this into great consideration and try to get lights on the baseball field.

Sincerely,



Justin Thaxton

The Birds movie review

Justin Thaxton
Mr. Armstrong
English 1// 4^th hr.
12 October, 2010

The Birds

The Birds did not meet expectations. The movie, based off of the book written by Daphne du Maurier, was directed by Alfred Hitchcock. It was projected to be an academy award winning movie but was quite frankly atrocious. This was definitely not one of Hitchcock’s best work. It was meant to be a horror film but turned into a comedy because of the inadequate special features. He has some serious work to do if he wants to keep being a director. The special effects are outdated and the script is monstrous.

Alfred Hitchcock’s movie takes place in San Francisco in the early sixties, where bachelor, Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor), meets your typical movie blonde named Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren). The two flirt with each other and Melanie is very interested in Mitch. She suddenly decides to go see in his home town of Bodega Bay which is just north of San Francisco. Mitch visits his sister Cathy (Veronica Catwright) and his mother (Jessica Tandy) on the weekends. Mitch’s ex-girlfriend, Annie Hayworth (Suzanne Pleshette), also lives in Bodega Bay. When she arrives with two love birds to give to Mitch as a joke, the towns people are giving her weird looks because the birds in their area were acting strange. When Melanie decides to rent boat to drop the love birds off at Mitch’s house then return to see how Mitch would react. They would soon meet and start to like each other, even when Mitch’s mother doesn’t approve of Melanie.  This is when things go bad. The birds start their attacks, the first one at the service station on an attendant. He then drops a gas which spreads over the area. A civilian watching lights his cigar and drops his match in the gasoline. This then causes an enormous explosion. The birds then taunt the people. This is only one of the many attacks.

This films special effects were ghastly. They were obsolete compared to other movies of this decade. Some of the birds were clear to the viewer that it was phony. There are many ways that I believe he could have made this movie better just with newer special effects. It was quite humorous seeing the special effects because they were so dreadful that you couldn’t even call them special.

Alfred Hitchcock needs to improve his script and cast. The script was mediocre in some places. He could have the movie more about the birds and less about Mitch and Melanie’s Relationship. His cast was not up to standards either. Their acting was appalling throughout the movie. You shouldn't be able to tell it is an actuall movie. It should feel like you are really in the storie.

I don’t deem The Birds worthy of winning any kind of academy award anytime soon. They might have a chance if they got more sophisticated special effects, a revised script, and a new cast.

"The Most Dangerous Game"

            In the story General Zaroff finds a new animal to hunt. He became bored with hunting animals, so he decided to hunt humans. Rainsford disagrees and General Zaroff says in the story, “If I wish to hunt, why should I not? I hunt the scum of the earth- Sailors from tramp ships- Lascars,blacks,Chinese,whites,mongrels-a thorough bred horse or hound is worth more than a score of them.”(Connell 27), which makes you wonder how Rainsford will respond. This quote also makes you a little anxious to see what Zaroff will do to Rainsford. It will make you think, why is General Zaroff such a demented man? Zaroff hunting humans makes it suspenseful because that never happens. Do you like suspenseful stories? Then you are going to like “The Most Dangerous Game”. It has suspense and mystery. It’s a story about a man named Rainsford who is a great hunter. He falls off of his ship and swims to an island. He wonders the island until he came upon a mansion. The owner of the mansion was General Zaroff who also loves to hunt. General Zaroff made a new animal to hunt, humans. He tries to persuade Rainsford to hunt humans with him, but Rainsford declines. Do to this Zaroff hunt Rainsford.

    Zaroff hunts Rainsford because Rainsford thinks what Zaroff does is injustice. Rainsford tells General Zaroff that he wants nothing to do with it and wants to leave the island immediately. Zaroff has another idea for him and Rainsford observed, “… the dead black eyes of the general on him. General Zaroff’s face suddenly brightened’, (Connell 30). This quote ties into the main idea by creating suspense. It creates suspense by making you wonder if Zaroff is going to kill Rainsford or not.

            In the story General Zaroff finds a new animal to hunt. He became bored with hunting animals, so he decided to hunt humans. Rainsford disagrees and General Zaroff says in the story, “If I wish to hunt, why should I not? I hunt the scum of the earth- Sailors from tramp ships- Lascars,blacks,Chinese,whites,mongrels-a thorough bred horse or hound is worth more than a score of them.”(Connell 27), which makes you wonder how Rainsford will respond. This quote also makes you a little anxious to see what Zaroff will do to Rainsford. It will make you think, why is General Zaroff such a demented man? Zaroff hunting humans makes it suspenseful because that never happens.

After almost three days of being hunted, Rainsford has decides he is trapped. General Zaroff keeps playing with him when he could have killed him already. When he decides he is trapped he hides and waits in General Zaroff’s room. When they meet Rainsford says, ““I am a beast at bay,” he said in a low hoarse voice, “Get ready General Zaroff.””(Connell 36), which really sets the mood and makes it suspenseful. It makes it suspenseful by making you think of what Rainsford will do to Zaroff. It makes you think how he got into Zaroff’s mansion with all of the security. It never really tells you what he did to him, but you can imagine the possibilities.

To hunt or be hunted?

I am indecisive about being the hunter or being hunted. If I was the hunter I would have the luxury of having a meal and a good nights rest before hunting. If I was the hunter I don’t think I could be able to carry the burden of killing another human being. If I was the hunter I would get search dogs that would make the searching a lot easier On the other hand of being hunted I wouldn’t have to kill anybody. Being hunted I would also get to challenge my survival skills. It would be a great test of character to have to go through those challenges. Truly I wouldn’t know whether to be the hunter or to be hunted.