Final Reflection- Stanley Suter

1- What are the three most important things you learned this year?

          The most important things that I learned to do this year were how to format an extended response, how to format an extended response, and how to format an essay. These will be essential in high school because they make us write a lot.

2- What is something we did this year that you think you will remember for the rest of your life?

         We watched "Life is Beautiful." I will remember this, simply because it is known as a very good movie teaching major lessons about both people and the holocaust. In 20 years I'll say to my children "Oh, yea. I watched that in 8th grade Acc. Lit. 

3- What was the nicest thing someone in our class did for you this year?

         The nicest thing anyone did for me this year in class was that Leanna taught me how to "nae nae." I don't think this needs an explanation. 

4- What is something you taught your teacher or classmates this year?

         I taught my classmates how the world works logically. Not everything had to be completely by the books, and anything can happen.

5- In what area do you feel you made your biggest improvements? What is something you accomplished this year that you are proud of?

          My biggest accomplishment of this year was making a butterfly out of wood. I have made obvious improvements in the ways I take notes and the effort I put into some of my work.

6- What was the most challenging part of this year for you?

          Dealing with others (you know who you are.)

7- What was the best piece of writing that you did this year? Why do you think it is your best?

          My best writing was in my Algebra class, only because I like writing the obvious in ways that are hard to follow. This is easily done when thinking logically and it made the piece very good if I do so say myself. 

8- Of the books you read this year, which was your favorite? Why?

          I really enjoyed reading TKAM, the connections throughout the book were very well placed, and the theme was respectable. 

9- What advice would you give students who will be in this class next year?

           DO YOUR WORK AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE. It is a very good life skill to control the time you spend, and invest it wisely.

Final "Tuesdays with Morrie" project, Aphorisms.

          The aphorism I have been given is "Once you learn to die, you learn to live."  Morrie's main message in this aphorism is that you really will not understand how to spend your life properly unless you "believe" that your time is limited. For example, as a normal person, later in life I would go for the job with the highest wage and the most opportunity to earn money. If I knew that I was going to die soon, I would much rather be doing something that I enjoy doing, and be spending much more time with my family, rather than my associates.

         This aphorism relates to something my dad once told me. He said, and I quote "people are so eager to grow up, that they don't realize how much nicer it is to be young." This sort of Nostalgia is what makes people cherish what time they have left as they realize they aren't to far from the end. It makes them realize that they may only have so many looks at nature left, almost forcing them by human nature to savor the final moments of a certain kind.

          I completely with Morrie's Aphorism "Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live" because as I've said before, when you realize your time is limited you are going to cherish the moments you have left. It's the same with eight grade. As I feel my time running out, I feel the nostalgic feeling and the sadness from having to separate from the rest of my class.

          "Life is like a roller coaster, it has its ups and downs, but in the end we all exit it." -Stanley Suter.

Tuesdays with Morrie Bucket list, Stanley.

         What is on your Bucketlist? You can write a paragraph leading up to a bulleted list of what you would like to do/accomplish in your life.

        I obviously do not want to spend my life without purpose or in vain, so below is what I would like to do before I "kick the bucket." These are items that I hope to do in the next couple of years, but I would still like to have them completed by the time I die. I would like to feel the thrill of falling from thousands of feet in the air because I've heard it's phenomenal. I want to go completely beast mode in a Ferrari because it's just amazing, and one of my highest life goals is to be able to slam dunk. At Nazareth we may be looking at an oppourtunity for another state championship in baseball or football next year, so we really never know. Heavy Metal Concerts are crazy. 

Bucket List-

-Skydive
-Blow too much on a nice car.
-Cross-Over slam dunk.
-Win a state Championship.
-Go to another Heavy Metal concert.

"Life is Beautiful" Blog, Stanley Suter

         There are many similarities between "Night" and "Life is Beautiful." This starts with the "Father-Son" bond, both father's death directly before liberation, and the hope that they would both in fact leave the concentration camp alive. You can really see the father-son bond in the movie because Guido goes to great length to cover his son from the evil that surrounded him. Even on the way to his death, he was brave and looked his son in the eyes to insure him, he was going to be all right. Just like in night, Guido dies almost directly before the liberation and hope stays with Guido that he will find his wife and son, to escape the concentration camp.

          Some of the differences between "Night" and "Life if Beautiful" are really just the mood and tone. If you generalize the plots of both stories they are basically the same, Jews are being separated into concentration camps and a family is divided. A man struggles to keep both himself and his son alive. But when you get into the atmosphere of the movie you find that "Life is Beautiful" is a much lighter tone, having many jokes and the main character being a sort of jester. When you look at "Night", you find that it is very solemn.

           Life is beautiful throughout the book because even though Guido knows that they are being taken away to a camp, he stays happy and makes a game to protect his son. He knows they are likely to be hurt, but he says that the ride to the train station and the train ride itself are both birthday gifts for his son. He also tells his son that he got the last available tickets. At the beginning of the movie, the color of everything was amazing. It was bright and fast, however you can see as the movie progressed to the final scene exactly how destroyed everyone was. The Jews were just limping out of the camp slowly, and there was very little variation in the colors until the end. When Joshua reached his mother, you could see the field behind them, and life seemed to be "Beautiful" again.

American Sniper, by Stanley Suter (4/22/15)

          Prompt-How well does the title fit the story?

          This week I have continued reading "American Sniper" by Chris Kyle. It is very well written in the sense of accuracy and detail, considering while these events took place Chris was in the middle of a war zone. The main setting of the book is in Fallujah, where Chris was stationed for three out of four rotations in his career and the place he met his best "buds" from the Marines. He is currently near the end of his rotation on one of the biggest missions of his career, ground sweeps. He provides watch for the patrolling marines with searching for the highest ranked sniper in Iraq at this point. This is where he obtains the highest kill amount of his entire career.

          I actually have a couple of problems with the title. First, the name is way to general. I feel like if I bought this book not knowing what it was about, I would think it was a complete fiction about some unknown average sniper. The writher was a living legend, and I think the book about his days of glory should reflect that. Titles that could replace "American Sniper" could be "American Legend" or "Lethal." It would be better just to show he was a successful serviceman. 

          The title fits perfectly in the sense of Chris being both American and a sniper, even though he was so much more than that. I feel like he could have based it off of both his career in the Navy (he was in both technically the Marines and Navy, Marines being a sub-group below the Navy), and his life at home. He had two growing children and a wife during his time in action, and I felt like they could have used that to say he had a double identity of sorts. Maybe "Working man" or "the Soldier with a family", but "American Sniper" is just fine.

"Night" Wiesel's Changes, By: Stanley Suter

 How has Wiesel changed through the book?

          In the beginning of the book, Wiesel could be seen as a perfect person. He was religious, devoted to his family, and dedicated to education. Proving both that he was religious, and that he was dedicated to school, "By day I studied Talmud, and by night I would run to the Synagogue to weep over the destruction of the temple." The Talmud being a religious teaching, religion was his life. His father supported him in his studies, but when Elie want to study the Kabbalah, his father explains that "First you must study the basic subjects, those you are able to comprehend." Regardless of what his father tells him in the beginning of the book, he finds a master to guide his studies.

          The middle sections of the book are really where we see change in Wiesel's personality. He had just arrived at Birkenau and he sees the German cruelty through the crematorium, "Never shall I forget the small faces of those children whose bodies I saw transformed into smoke under a silent sky." This first camp was when Wiesel started to lose hope. He practically gave up on his religion and turned on a mindset of only his survival. Wiesel explains that an SS officer "was striking my father on the head: 'Be quiet, old man! Be quiet!'" Wiesel had stood still, afraid of the blows and angry at his father . He had a mindset that he was alone, there was no God and that he had to fend for himself. Still, he is very ashamed for abandoning his father.

          Towards the end of the book, Wiesel seems to regain many of his morals and values back. I think this is because he learns to cope with the constant abuse in the camps, and he no longer can only fend for himself. "Elizer, my son, come here... I want to tell you something... Only to you... Come, don't leave me alone... Elizer..." Elie even pretended to be sick, and gave his dyeing father his rations so that he may live longer. Even when an SS officer said that he should be receiving his father's rations, he dismissed the idea and continued to aid his father. Over the course of the book, Wiesel lost his morals and religion. He only managed to regain his sense of charity and life, but his religion was lost to him after he discovered the cruelty that humans could commit against one another.

"Theresienstadt's Hospital" Butterfly, Stanley Suter

Once, happier people lived here
in the gray building
Now, death moves silently towards other creatures,
those with typhoid, who moan and writhe
in their own diarrhea,
who lie and don't understand
why they are being fed bread and margarine.
I enter and become silent.

"You shiny new doorknobs,
you pretty painted walls in the bright ward,
can you make up for the stench of excrement?
Can you appease the hunger
of those who are ashamed of their underwear,
and brought here to die,
day by day?

The paint looks at me
and doesn't answer.
"Why? I don't understand why!"
It seems the doorknob would say,
when it opened for me,
a free soul, with a full stomach,
"I can tell you
and then you will come to me!"

Night, By Stanley Suter

          Prompt- Who is your favorite character and why? Who is your least favorite character?

          This week we have started to read "Night", byt Elie Wiesel and so far I really like it. It is about this child who was taken away from his home at the age of twelve, and is going to be sent to a concentration camp. He lives in a town called "Sighet", where German forces have recently struck a deal with hungary allowing them to controll many of their cities. As the Facist party takes control of Sighet, they group the Jews in Ghettos in order to segregate them from the general public after making laws specifically for Jews by penalty of death. I have only read the first chapter, but so far I really like the book.

          My favorite character so far would be the main character. Even though I haven't read much of the book, I can tell what type of person he is. He studies hard and gets education outside of both school and the permission of his father. He has strong respect for his father, and refuses to be seperated from the rest of his family when they have the chance to escape and be free. They deal with the oncoming danger without getting on anyone's nerves. He is helpful when he is requested to wake up his neighbors, warning them of the movement to a concentration camp away from the front lines of the war. He is a strong moral character.

          My least favorite character is "Moishe the Beatle." He has a cool name, but his attempts to warn everybody of the German's wrongdoing are in vain. He acts insane, seemingly over exadurating and giving up after a while. However, he does inform the Elie that the Germans were forming a genocide, and that he only survived because he broke his leg and had been left to die. Regardless of this, if I were him I would have tried harder to stay calm and warn them of the German hatred towards my religion in an attempt to save them.

Holocaust Remembrance Blog, Stanley Suter

          This week I chose an article about how survivors of the Holocaust have a higher rate of PTSD and other mental Illnesses. This is because of lower levels of Cortisol that they have adapted because of the Holocaust. Cortisol is a chemical in your body that eliminates Enzymes, and the extra Enzymes would allow these people to store a much higher amount of protein and sugar, allowing them to survive a much longer time without food. However, this means that the children of survivors are more susceptible to mental illnesses. So this is where you decide, become un-killable (but insane), or stay un-mutated but mentally sound.

          Some of the other Aow's that I viewed today were about how we have recovered from the Holocaust, and how others celebrate it. In Israel, they don't have a designated Holocaust remembrance day because they feel that one is essential. They think that they will continue to remember the death and cruelty shown through human nature, and that the Holocaust is really depressing and shouldn't be celebrated. Other articles showed reuniting of Liberators and Jews from the death camps, explaining how indebted that the Jewish were to these American saviors. The article also focused on how this could have been the last reunion, because many of the survivors and U.S. soldiers are getting old or may have already passed on.

Stanley S, Jewish Memorial

1- What did you learn?
         
          I learned the masses of laws that the Germans strategically placed to weaken the Jews, to an extent that they could not fight back. For example, right at the beginning the lawyers and Judges that were of Jewish decent were removed from court, so that they could not deem German laws un-german constitutional.

2- Why do you think this monument was built?
          
          I think that this monument was built because they needed to remember what their hate towards a type of person completely based off of religion has done for them.

3- What did you notice about the number of laws passed in certain years?
          
          I noticed that they would pass a few laws, then go slow for a year, then put a couple of more laws, then skip a year, then in 1944 or so they dumped 20 or so laws on the Jews so they couldn't fight the Nazi's back.

4- Which restrictions do you think you would have the most trouble dealing with and why?

          The restriction that I would have the most trouble dealing with would have to be the having to leave my school. So much of my life is based off school, my friends, my education, and many of my extracurriculars are all at school, so taking them away would make my life pretty boring (or maybe more fun.)

3rd Quarter Reflection; Stanley Suter

- Of the books you have read this quarter, which was your favorite? Why?

          I think the best book I have read this quarter was American Sniper. It is so different from any of the other books that I've read that it's unique. It tells the story of the most lethal sniper in U.S. history from his point of view through the wars.

- *In what area do you think you made your biggest improvements in English Language Arts? 
           
          I think the biggest improvement that I've made was the amount of content that I packed into my righting. I have been looking at my work from the beginning of the year, and I really have improved from turning in small 4-5 sentence paragraphs to having 7-8 full sentences in my righting.

- *What is something you have accomplished since the new year that you are proud of?

          I am proud of having obtained a scholarship commemorating my leadership at school and in my community.

- *What has been the most challenging part of 3rd Quarter for you?
     
         The most challenging part of third quarter for me has been getting enough sleep. After school, I can't even start my homework until about seven, and I am taking on an extra class from a high school that gives homework every day that we don't have tests.

- How have your blogs been progressing since August? 

         My blogs since last August have improved in the sense that my use of vocabulary and using proper symbols in my righting has improved after Mrs.Larson gave us the website that gave us the rules when to use them.

- What strategies have benefited you? 

          The strategies that benefitted me the most for school work are to not procrastinate, but still take my time while I work. It has improve the quality and allowed me to do better in school overall.

- What have you learned about the world? 

          I learned that I should listen to others and be more open to suggestion about my work.

- How have your research skills improved?

          My research skills have improved because I am now able to differentiate a reliable source from one that cannot be trusted, and so I can get information that I can now trust.

Bio-Poem of Chris Kyle, By: Stanley Suter

      Chris Kyle
      Brave, tough, loyal, and knowledgeable.
      A character in Chris Kyle's story
      Lover of family, country, and God
      Who notices traps, dangers, and Insurgents
      Who feels strength, happiness, and detachment from his family
      Who learns to never give up, to be vigilant, and to stay calm.
      Who says "The army isn't thank enough"
      Who used to think God before Country, before Family, but now knows Family should be before Country.
      Main character in "American Sniper"
      A book that brings you through the life and knowledge of the most lethal sniper in U.S. history.

AOW Interpretations, Stanley Suter.

          This week during the AOW Interpretations, we focused on what we seem to do every week. ISIS. They always seem to be making big news because they are aggravating so many different countries. Just last week they were being bombed for having killed christians, and this week they are releasing 19 because they want to "follow the law." They have also been luring children from America to try and get them to join. Earlier this week, two teens were spotted in Turkey after having talked to the ISIS recruiter trying to cross the border into Syria. After listening to the class's articles, I think that ISIS is finally stepping down from what they were doing before because some countries have finally caught notice and attacked them.

         
          Some other articles had to do with how parents were refusing to get vaccinations for the flu and other common diseases. Measles have had recent outbreaks and California, and a lot of rumors are going around claiming that the vaccinations create a higher chance for autism in children. This is a rumor, and vaccinations are being promoted by the recent outbreaks, however many children still do not get the vaccinations that they need to stay safe each year.

Zebra Forests, Stanley Suter *SPOILERZ*

         Prompt-List conflicts.

         This week I have been reading "Zebra Forests" and it gets much better the further you get in the book. The children and their grandmother are still hostage to their criminal father, but Ryan wrote a letter to notify the chief of police about their location and when to come where Andrew would least expect it, and his sister sent it when she was on a trip to the grocery store. They think they will be saved in about two days when mail is deleted.

          The major conflicts that pertain to the children and their grandmother is that first, they are being held hostage by a murderer and they have no way of escape. Also, they are conflicted to whether or not they should turn in their father, regardless of him being a killer and holding them with no outside contact possible. Their grandmother is psychologically damaged from the death of her husband (which I have a strong feeling had something to do with her son), that affects her to the point that she stays in her room for days on end.

          The largest conflicts for Andrew Snow is concerned about would be the fact that police are looking for him to no end, and have actually come to his door, where his mom saved him with her extreme lying skills. He also has to worry about the siblings trying to escape, while taking care of his mother. He walked in on Ryan trying to pick the front door lock with a knife, and he bent his wrist to disarm him. I really feel like he is in a pretty bad spot for what he has done in the past.

Aow Impressions for 2/20, Stanley Suter.

          Prompt- What did you learn from our Aow Gallery walk?

          My Aow was about how ISIS has taken Egyptians, over two different times, and how Egypt sent an air strike against them. But this was the Libyan authorities fault. They didn't complete the proper search protocol and many of them are thought to be ISIS members that have gone corrupt. The Egyptian leader is currently trying to hold their "police" responsible for the deaths, and we have names of suspects that are believed to have aided ISIS. That was pretty much my entire three page article.

          The most reoccurring article that I viewed was about how ISIS has recently killed 21 Egyptian (Christian) citizens, and how Egypt has bombed ISIS. I think things are near a peak for ISIS, mainly because they have shown themselves at almost every major country in the world and are acting out of line for most countries that will put a stop to their power. After hearing the articles that everyone else choose about ISIS, I have made the prediction that this was the straw that broke the "camels back", as the Truman Doctrine states fairly vaguely that anyone that wants to be free may be backed up by the U.S., meaning that we are going to wage war on ISIS.

Zebra Forests By: Stanley Suter

          Prompt-Who is your favorite character? Who is your least favorite character? Why?

           This week I have been reading "Zebra Forests" and so far I really like it. It is about a house outside of a town where two siblings live with their grandmother. They realize that they have been lied to since birth, thinking that their father was dead and their mother had run away. They find out, after "Andrew Snow," their father, excapes from a nearby prison and hides at their house, whether they like it or not. Oh yea, and their mother is dead.

          My favorite character so far is Ryan, the younger sibling. He loves the evil people in the stories, and he tries to fight his father when he barges into their lives. His creativity is the leading spark that allows them to escape from their now seemingly crazy grandmother, and their fugitive father. I disagree with how he feels towards his own family, but I give him credit for staying on his toes.

          My least favorite character is their grandmother. I hate her. She is a senile, uptight, lieing, rule making, son of a gun. Senile because she defends her criminal son from the cops and keeps the children inside the house. Uptight because she doesn't let them fight, or she freaks out and goes up to her room for days at a time. Lieing because she lied to her own grandchildren about their parents, and rule making because she won't let the children go out to the "Zebra Forest" while it is raining.

         

Book Talk Blog, Heat by Mike Lupica

Heat, By "Mike Lupica"

Gallery Walk Assessment

       I learned, in the Gallery walk that people are still talking about the death camps and the Holocaust. I also learned that scientists are concerned about the temperature of our climate and that it has risen by almost a degree in the last 100 years. A lot of Domestic abuse has been removed, and domestic crime has decreased significantly in the last year. On a less happy note, ocean coral is dyeing because of chemicals that have been released into the ocean. South Korea is sending "The Interview" on balloons into North Korea, the movie that they hacked and got into a big fuss about.

       In the class period I learned that ISIS continues to grow stronger, and domestic violence has cut down in the past year. These are important for the world to hear, both good and bad, because they can teach us a lesson about the struggles for certain causes and the people that live in this world. As a child, you aren't worried about terrorists coming to kill Americans, or the str
uggle for women's rights in the U.S., and unless we read articles like we have in class we will never learn. By those standards, the class period served a great way to get snippets of information on these topics.

Heat, By Stanley Suter

          Prompt-Does the title fit the Story?

          This week I have been reading "Heat" by Mike Lupica, and I find myself being pulled further and further into the book. We finally get to view a first person view of the game, and we see how good Michael really is. He pitches next to a no hitter on another team, and his team wins by a point. I have a feeling that he will be recruited to a higher league and leave his team, because he is going to have to achieve something or recover from something before the end of the book, otherwise it is going to be a very pointless book.

          The title fits the book if you think of heat as pitching. I have a feeling it may have to do with his emotions, or the way he makes it to the major leagues, his highest dream. After he goes into details about his fathers death, and what he wished for their building owner to take care of his children so they couldn't be sent back to Cuba, their original home. He was a taxi driver that saved a woman from her ex-boyfriend after she left the car, and due to that small excitement he has a heart attack. Refusing to go to the doctor, he dies on their couch. This was shocking for Michael and Carlos because they had played baseball and talked to him the day before, and it really pushed Michael to become a good pitcher.

          The title is a horrible fit for the book because I feel that it wasn't as clear or as explicit as it should have been. For example, in "Harry Potter and the Sorcerers stone" it was really clear what was going to happen in the book. I mean, Heat? Is there going to be a drought? I only was pulled into the book because last year in Battle of the Books the sports books were very good, so I figured this would probably be good. It is very uplifting to read when he plays. Overall, I think that they named the book "Heat" because of Michaels emotions towards his father's death, and the competition on his way to the top. It does fit.

I commented on Steven, Gabe, and Nikolas.
         

Heat, by Stanley Suter

          Prompt-Who is your favorite character? Who is your least favorite character? Why?

          This week I have been reading "Heat" by Mike Lupica, and so far it is really unrealistic. The book starts out with a robber taking an old woman's purse, and being too quick for the cops to catch him. So a kid named Michael hits him (with a baseball) with enough force to knock the robber out from home plate. As you can see, a teenager being able to do that is so slim that it seems impossible. But he goes home to where his brother is getting ready for the three jobs that he works, and his brother flips out on him for saying that they couldn't afford baseball tickets to a yankees game. The whole thing seems over dramatized and more that a little corny, but Lupica writes well.

          My least favorite character so far would have to be the old lady that owns the floor. She purposely was carrying around a purse that was meant to look much more expensive than it was. She was also flashing over 100 dollars, so it is no surprise that she was robbed and knocked over. I know it wasn't right to be robbed, because it sucks if your the one it's being done to, but she was asking for it. She goes senile screaming "THIEF THIEF" and i'm sorry for picking on the old woman, but that was obnoxious and I can't stand things like that.

          My favorite character would be Michaels brother, Carlos (I don't know why but when I think of him I picture Carlos). He refuses to give up to poverty and instead of working off of our poverty system he works his hardest to support for Michael and himself. It is clearly stressing him out that he can't afford to buy anything nice for Michael or himself and he can barely keep up with his rent, bills, and food. None the less, he promises to take Michael to a baseball game before the season ends, making him a very respectable character.

Nadrian, Citlalli, Sarai.

TKAM Movie Anylisis, Stanley Suter

 Prompt- 1.     How would you prove or disprove that one version of To Kill A Mockingbird is more affective in delivering its message than the other? Be sure to provide specific pieces of evidence to support your opinion.

          To start off with this week's blog I need to go straight to the book. I really enjoyed reading this, so my opinion may be slightly bias, just putting it out there. The main point of the book was racism and social bias put into something along the lines of "I'd rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you'll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird." The theme was that Tom Robinson and Boo Radley where both mockingbirds (I felt proud of myself for making the connection) because they were innocent, but they were misjudged (and in Tom's case killed.) 

          The movie was a very good visual interpretaion of the book. I believe that for people our age, without as much attention and detail to specific quotes and actions in the book, it was easier to understand and was faster moving. However, it was like a "Sherlock Holmes" movie, peices of the puzzle were missing and the end of the movie was completely unpredictable. The main plot line was pretty much left alone, excluding the change of scenes and some characters not being present (such as when Jem meets the adults in front of the Radley house, in the book Dill was with him, in the movie he just went back to get them.

          All in all, you have to read the book before you read the movie. You don't get all of the details in the movie, and you cannot properly anyilize characters behavior at an efficient pace in the movie. In the book, important scenes that developed the children (i.e. Ms.Dubose) were erased, so you do not get the idea that they are seeing the world differently at all, instead you just think that they are a bunch of rambunctious children on an adventure/mystery to defend a black man and find the ghost of the town. While looking at the book, you can clearly see that the trial and Boo are the main plot, and are therefor explained much further than the Movie. Book wins.

My Adventure, Stanley Suter

 When was the last time you did something for your first time?

          The last time I did something for my first time would be the first time I have played "Godzilla, destroy all monsters" since I was in first grade (I think this counts because I had no idea how to play, and I didn't even remember the game until we found it.) The entire game is basically a 1990's anime throw down where you have characters such as "Megladon" and several different versions of "Godzilla" (mega-Gozilla, 1990's Godzilla, etc.) After playing this with Reese, we couldn't stop laughing.

          There were several unfair advantages to certain characters. For instance, Gigan can fly, teleport, and can't be hit by other characters while crouching. There are no blocks to being picked up and thrown. Megladon can go underground, stay under for almost a minute where he can't be hurt, then give an extremely unbalanced blow to other monsters. But it was a blast to the past, and surprisingly good.