Ncaa men's basketball champinship

         Min's basketball in the NCAA (national Collete athletic association) national championship is determined by a national tournament in which every team that qualifies is invited. Every team in the tournament is given a seed number. That number is how the experts predict that team will finish. Before the first ball is tipped every expert decides which of the four regions each team will play in. East, west, south east, and south west, the regions depend on the location of the school. There are a few ways in which a team may earn an invitation to the tournament. When a team wins their conference tournament they automatically earn a spot in the national tournament. There is also what is called an at large bid, which means if a team beats other teams that are bigger and more have a higher rank that team will also earn an a bid. The first round starts with 64 teams, but the national tournament is a win or go home tournament, so half of the teams are cut every round. The second round starts with 32 teams, then down to 16, 8, 4, finally the national championship game is played. Although the teams with a number one seed have the best chance to win but, there are some surprises every year. One of the biggest surprises of last years tournament was the small college of Vcu and Butler, Butler who played Uconn in the national title game. Vcu which made it all the way to the elite 8, before losing to 2011 champion Uconn (41-53). Although Butler made it further than anyone expected they were defeated by another power house school University of Connecticut. The fact that the small college of Butler made it to the final forces the public to wonder should more small schools be given the opportunity to show the country that they can play competitively with the powerhouse universities. Although it will not happen mostly because the major powerhouse schools bring in a larger audience to their games and also donate the more money, than a small school can.
 The final outcome of the national championship would have been different had Butler been able to shoot the basketball a little better.  But the fact is the game was taken over by the Connecticut big men, Kemba walker and Jeremy Lamb.  Butler had only one player who could score as much as the Uconn big men and that was Shelvin Mack, who led his team in points, (13) and rebounds (9).  But that is compared to Uconn's Kemba walker's (16) points and Alex Oriakhi (11) rebounds.
     Had Butler had a big man that could score and play defense they might not have needed so, much from their star Shelvin Mack who must have been extra tired having too lead Butler in Scoring and rebounding.  The fact is though that Butler did better than anyone had expected them too.  But the fans of the University of Connecticut would say the biggest story of the tournament was the fact that for the first time a school,Uconn, who did not receive an invitation too the NCAA tournament the year before, came back as an at large bid and won the entire tournament. Never before has a school been able too accomplish that goal.
    

Quote of the Day

Jumping for joy is good exercise.  ~Author Unknown


Posted by Ben

Moneyball Review

The Oscars are this Sunday, so this will be my last review of an Oscar nominated film before the show itself. In my Hugo review, I mentioned Moneyball being one of the films competing with Hugo that I am rooting for.  Moneyball was nominated for Best Picture, Actor in a leading role, Actor in a Supporting role, Film Editing, Sound Mixing, and Adapted screenplay. I really hope Moneyball wins one of those six awards, because it’s an outstanding, worthy film, and not just for baseball fans like me.

Moneyball is an adaptation of the 2003 book which covered several subjects, most importantly the true story of Oakland Athletics General Manager and former player Billy Beane, who shook up his team and consequently the world of baseball around 2002. In The film, Beane is played by Brad Pitt, whose nomination for best actor is well deserved. Pitt steals every scene in this movie, when he’s not sharing the spotlight with fellow nominee Jonah Hill, who plays Beane’s assistant GM Peter Brand. All of their scenes together are delightfully fun to watch, even when they’re just sitting behind a computer talking strategy and statistics.

The film goes to great lengths to appeal to those in the audience who are not baseball fans. For one thing, all scenes dealing with the intricacies of how and why Billy is rebuilding the Athletics are easy to understand, and in most cases, are enjoyable to watch.        For another thing, the film is foremost a character study of Beane. According to the film, much of Beane’s motivation for rebuilding the Athletics by disregarding conventional wisdom comes from his past as a failed #1 prospect. The scenes of young Billy (Reed Thompson) choosing to sign with the Mets and subsequently  struggling on the field before finally giving up playing are powerfully dramatic and I would go so far as to call them the glue that holds the film together.

As  I said, I will be rooting for Moneyball in The Oscars, but it’s long shot since it’s competing against Hugo  in 4 categories and other Oscar favorite The Artist  in 3. Still, Moneyball is definitely worthy of it s nominations and absolutely worth watching.

By Colin V

Romance this evening at Acadia

I think we're in love

I'm falling head over heels

With you this evening

By: Robyn and Ben

A Stray

                                   LOVE IS A LONG WALK:                            

                                                           WAS IT LONGER THEN WE THOUGHT ;
                                                                  CAN WE SIT AND TALK ;

Acadia News

Hugo Review

When I was seeing Tintin with my mom and little brother, my dad and sister went to see Hugo. While I loved Tintin, eventually I decided to see Hugo myself because of the rave reviews. To put it simply, Hugo amazed me. Apparently, it also amazed the Academy, being nominated for Best Picture, Cinematography, Art Direction, Costume Design, Directing, Film Editing, Original Score, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing, Visual Effects, and Adapted Screenplay. That makes 11 nominations, the most since Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2004). What made LOTR  so special is that it swept all 11 categories, and while I’m not really rooting for Hugo to also sweep because it’s competing in some categories against films I saw and liked this year (Harry Potter, Tintin, and Moneyball), I wouldn’t be at all surprised if it does. Hugo is a nearly perfect film.  

The two things that stand out most about Hugo are the beautifully simple and captivating story and the intricate, out of sequence way in which it’s told. Throughout the film, the audience follows the tale of orphan boy Hugo Cabret (Asa Butterfield), who lives and works in a Paris Train Station after WWI. All he wants to do is fix an automaton, the last relic of his late father. This leads to him “fixing” much more: The life and dreams of a retired filmmaker he didn’t even know. It’s a simple and beautiful tale. What makes it unique is that all the details of the story--How Hugo became an orphan, why he lives in the station, what led him to the filmmaker—aren’t made clear until the end of the film. In two incredibly well written, well acted, and beautifully directed scenes at the end of the movie, the plot comes together and all the character’s actions begin to make sense.  Until then, we get snippets of plot, like the scenes  detailing Hugo’s back-story, and him meeting and befriending Isabelle ( Chloë Grace Moretz) , the filmmaker’ s niece , trying to uncover the mystery  of the automaton,  but we don’t know what it means yet.  By the time it all comes together at the end, everyone is smiling—the characters and the audience. Hugo deserves all 11 of its nominations, and it definitely deserves a look.

By Colin V.

Here are some Valentine quotes that I found,I thought you might like.

It is estimated that 15% of the women in the United States who receive flowers for Valentine’s day send them to themselves. There are no figures that tell how many of these women are married, single or in a relationship.

Teachers receive more valentine cards than anyone else, even children.

More than 650 million valentine cards are exchanged by children from ages 6-10 each year. Most of these cards are bought in the last 6 days leading up to Valentine’s day.

Each year the city of Verona Italy receives more than 1000 valentine’s addressed to Shakespeare’s Juliet. It really is amazing how much affection a dead fictional character can attract.

It was once believed that if a woman saw a flying robin on Valentine’s day she would end up getting married to a sailor. If a sparrow was the bird she saw she would end up marrying a man that was poor and live a happy life, if she saw a goldfinch then she was to marry a man that was a millionaire. One can only wonder who she would marry if she saw a crow.

Found from http://itthing.com/10-interesting-and-weird-facts-about-valentines-day on 1/30/2012

Posted by Jackie.

Veggie Valentine

Below is aValentine's Day poem that I found and thought you might enjoy!

You may not 'Carrot' all for me,
The way I care for you,
You may 'Turnip' your nose at me,
When I plead with you.

But if your 'Heart' should 'Beet' with mine,
Forever 'Lettuce' hope,
There is no reason in the world,
 why we two 'Cantaloupe'.
AUTHOR ANONYMOUS


Poem retrieved from http://www.brownielocks.com/valentinepoems.html


Post created by Ben.

Tintin Review

It’s Oscar season. For me, that means it’s time to talk about good movies. The full list of the nominees was released Jan. 24, and because this is the sort of thing that gets me thinking and writing, my next several posts will probably be related to the Oscars. Personally, the only category that I really pay attention to besides the big 5 (best movie, director, actor, actress, original screenplay) and the ones pertaining to movies I watched that year is Best Animated Film. In recent years, that category has been dominated y the excellent Pixar animation studio. Unfortunately, even though Cars 2 was a good movie, it wasn’t up to Pixar’s usual standards of excellence, and it didn’t even get nominated. Instead The Academy chose a couple of DreamWorks films (Kung fu Panda 2, Puss in Boots) and Rango, completely ignoring the Golden Globes’ pick and mine, the Adventures of Tintin.

Unlike recent movies that were adaptations of ongoing comic books, Tintin requires no prior knowledge of the source material to understand or appreciate. Like any good film, all you need to know about the plot or characters is shown through the actions and dialogue of the characters themselves. The rest of the story is told by the stellar motion-capture animation, which beautifully depicts all the action, adventure, comedy, and drama this movie has to offer. The film begins when Tintin, (Jamie Bell) buys a rare model ship from a market stall, just looking for a story for his newspaper. What he finds is wild, captivating adventure well worth writing about.  Go watch The Adventures of Tintin, and see for yourself what The Academy missed.

Colin V.

Murder Mayhem at Acadia

By Bill B, Ben, Jonathan, Dan, Kathy, Robyn, Gary, and Maggie

Written in a Cognitive Skills Group on January 10, 2012 

Three days passed before they found the body.  Detective Bill B, who was in charge of the investigation, was resultantly fired.  “But the leads they gave me were gnarly.  They sent me every wrong direction,” he protested, as he packed up his office in shame.

Bill’s assistant, Laura, suddenly saw a snake on the ground where the body was found.  “Oh my gosh, guys, get over here and take a look at this!”

 Ben, Jonathan, Dan, Kathy, Robyn, Gary, and Maggie rushed to the scene.  There was a gut-wrenching stench.  Kathy yelled, “this is doing wonders for my appetite and I had a gourmet pizza for lunch.  I think I’m going to hurl.”  She proceeded to puke. 

Everyone leapt back due to the pungent smell.  While hopping back, Dan stumbled and fell over something fleshy.  “Are you okay?” Laura yelled. 

“I’m okay, but why am I covered in blood?”

Gary peered at Dan and asked, “is it because you’re so blood-thirsty?”

“Forget that,” yelled Robyn, “what the heck is that body doing there?”

Ben acclaimed, “Oh my gosh, that’s Donald Duck!”

Jonathan looked down at the corpse, threw himself on top of the duck and exclaimed while bawling, “that’s my brother!”

The Muppets Review

It’s hard to mess up a concept as simple, engaging, and fun as the Muppets. Unfortunately, the American public seems to have forgotten that fact a little in the few decades since the Muppets were at the height of their popularity, choosing instead since the ‘90s to focus on less wholesome aspects of pop culture such as MTV, Comedy Central, and juicy celebrity gossip. The latest Muppet movie is aware of this, and the majority of the film is the juxtaposition of the more family friendly Muppets with modern day cynicism, with wildly entertaining results.

The movie begins with a montage showing the lives of brothers Gary and Walter. The fact that Gary, played by Jason Segal, is a man and his brother Walter is a Muppet is not ignored by the movie. That Gary and Walter can be brothers raises more questions than it answers, but the movie has little time to wax philosophical about the existence of Muppets in a world of humans, because soon we are introduced to Gary’s girlfriend, Mary (Amy  Adams) which leads us to our first musical number. Yes, The Muppets is a musical, which shouldn’t be surprising since music has been a major part of The Muppets since the ‘70s, and almost every Muppet movie since The Muppet Movie has been a musical. What surprised me was the scope and scale of the musical numbers in The Muppets. Every song is big, fun, and very well performed. They pulled out all the stops to make this movie big.  

After our first number explains in grand fashion how content the characters are with their lives, the movie finally gets a around to having a plot. Gary, Mary, and Walter are taking a trip to Hollywood to meet the Muppets. They finally meet Kermit, but not before Walter discovers a plot to tear down the Muppet studio and drill for oil. The plan is to save the studio by putting on one more show.   Hilarity ensues. The Muppets is definitely worth seeing.

By Colin V.

Meteor Shower Tonight!

For those night owls, there is a scheduled Meteor Shower at 2:00 AM on January 3, 2012. What exactly is a meteor shower? A meteor shower is magnificiant dazzling display from a neighboring constellation. This occurs when there are a large number of meteors at a particular time. Meteor showers are created by debris that fall from comets.

Examples of meteor showers are given below. 

Painting by Jonathan Whitock

Jonathan D. Whitlock

Self-portrait III, 2002
Oil on Canvas
20" x 16"
Collection of Deb Good-Zeiner

 

 

This was painted at SUCCESS Rehabilitation, in Milford, PA.

I was living there soon after my car wreck...

I enrolled in a painting class at Bucks County Community College (BCCC).  It was years later that it was bought at a show I had, at Red Raven Galleries, in Lancaster.

Mr. Holland's Opus

"Mr. Holland's Opus" is my favorite movie because he struggles with so many different obstacles in his life. He becomes a teacher because he seems to have nowhere else to turn to. Then he learns that his son Cole has a 90% hearing deficiency which is ironic because he is a music teacher. He works for 30 years (until 1995) when the entire music department at his high school is cut. Over those 30 years he's been working on his "American Symphony" and some of his former students perform the piece much to his surprise at his "encore" appearance. I believe that the title has a double meaning: 1. his symphonic masterpiece which at the movies end finally becomes a reality. 2. the positive legacy he left with so many of his present and past students! I think that students, fellow teachers and others were influenced positively just by knowing him as a teacher, a composer and an overall person!

Daniel

Mr. Holland's Opus

Tender was the Night

            Tender was the night this past Sunday night when I had the privelege of seeing Mr. Jackson Browne in concert in York.  He came out and opened with the rememberable "Barracades of Heaven" and a hearty round of applause.  Later in the show he sang a classic hidden favorite "These Days" where he says, "today I sit on cobblestones, and count the tones in quartertones".  His last three songs were in this order: "Doctor My Eyes", "The Pretender" and the expected "Running on Empty".  Of all the concerts I have seen, this was one of the most memorable.  Now I can finally say, Jackson, my eyes have seen the years, and the slow parade of tears."
            Daniel

October Birthday's

October 3rd:  Lydias's Birthday
October 14th:  Dale's and Teresa's Birthdays
October 19th:  Ray's Birthday
October 21st: Josh's, Duane's, and Andy's Birthdays
October 23rd:  Stew's Birthday




October Birthdays are shared by both Libra and Scorpio. Libra in the first half of the month, and Scorpio in the second half.
W
Libra (September 23 - October 22)

Libra is the only zodiac symbol that's neither animal nor human -- but surely that doesn't make you any less human. In fact, Libra is among the most sociable of the signs. As scales of old were really "balances," so to do you seek balance in all that Libra does. You respond to situations with grace as Libra attempts to put others at ease. Artistically, Libra tries to balance form, content, colors and elements, and for this reason can be drawn toward creative endeavors.

Scorpio (October 22 - November 21)
Scorpio is the only sign that has three animal totems. First, there is the well-known Scorpion with its active tail. Second, as the Scorpio learns to master its passion and hold its instincts at bay, it changes into the Eagle. The Eagle has more perspective, for it flies high above the surface of circumstances, swooping down with its power only to kill prey for food. In its third form, the Scorpion becomes the always-peaceful dove. The real meaning of Scorpio is thus shown. Scorpio is about metamorphosis. Scorpios transform the painful poisons of possessive passion into a higher consciousness based on universal love.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/horoscopes/astrology/libra/

Cut Footloose!

           As a devout music lover, I have had the opportunity to listen to and analyze many albums.  That being said, I think that one of the best soundtrack albums of the early 1980s is  "Footloose."  There is a very wide array of similar yet different songs on it;  everything from the almost gleefully thematic-like "Let's Hear it For the Boy," to Ariel Moore's desire for her "Hero," to the reality-checking "Somebody's Baby" to the movies' love theme song done in duet-form harmony, "Almost Paradise."   The extended version of the soundtrack also includes John "Cougar" Mellencamp's "Hurts so Good" and Foreigner's love song, "Waiting For a Girl Like You."  I am a fan of both the movie and the soundtrack so next time you have a "Footloose" experience; cut loose!

To Kill a Mockingbird

            When I was in 8th grade, the book we read for English class was "To Kill a Mockingbird."  The story is about a lawyer, Atticus Finch, his two children, Jem and Scout (Jean Louise), their friend Dill, and other selected townspeople such as creepy Arthur "Boo" Radley.  In the story, Mayella Ewell is murdered and negro Tom Robinson is arrested for it.  Atticus Finch does his best to defend Tom, but in early 20th century Alabama, the somewhat prejudicial people of the town find Tom guilty despite Atticus' valiant effort not only to clear Tom, but also to almost undeniably point the guilty finger at Mayella's father, Bob Ewell.  This should be, I believe, required reading for all American students.  I, for one, very much enjoyed the classic American novel and highly recommend it to all.

10 Ways To Destroy The Earth Answers

10) Smack Down From Space

  9) The Big Burn

  8) The Big Freeze

  7) Stopping The Spin

  6) Turn Off The Gravity

  5) Torn Between 2 Black Holes

  4) Devoured From Within

  3) Anti-Matter Annialation

  2) Transformed Through Strange Matter

  1) When Parallel Worlds Collide

  0) You Decide On This One


By Dimentions

Acadia Annual Summer Picnic 2011

As the summer comes to an end, we are reminded of the good times we had. Specifically, we can't believe we never posted pictures from our annual Acadia Summer picnic. The picnic was a much needed break from our normal routine. It was great to be around good friends, playing games, having good conversation, enjoying the weather, and eating great food.  We selected some of our favorite photos for you to enjoy.

Post created by Acadia News Group