You Know Your Hair is too Long When...

...your friends try to strangle you with it.

...you manage to only smack yourself in the face when you try to do a hair flip in the water.

...you see a loose hair on your shirt, pull it, then realize it's still attached to your head.

...your Physics teacher says it's too long. :)

...it takes two friends 20 minutes to flat iron it.

December 30, 2010. I walked into the Sears hair salon at Ala Moana, and sat down in the chair. An hour and ten minutes later, I walked out with a much lighter head, and a plastic bag full of a whopping 18 inches of hair. 18 INCHES!

Where was my hair going? Locks of Love, an organization that turns the hair into wigs donated to children suffering from long term or permanent hair loss. My sister and I have donated hair for the past 8 years alternating every year. This year was my turn. I cut off much more hair than I had anticipated (or wanted...), but I think my hair came out nice, and the layers are a change from my normal straight across cut. Do I look older, Doc?! :D

I admit, this will take some getting used to. Instead of using three pumps of shampoo and four pumps of conditioner like I used to, I now have to use one pump of each. Plus I actually had to figure out how to wash my hair. Brushing my hair takes two seconds instead of two minutes, and drying is so much faster!

Last Blog!

Well, this is bittersweet. :( I don't know how I feel right now. Anyways, yeah. Here goes my LAST BLOG along with some cherished pictures and quotes to help you remember Period 7/8 AP Physics B 2010 (although you may want to forget us. Haha).

When one of my friends came back from Texas, she brought me back a Hexbug. It's a cute little robotic bug that reacts to sound and touch to find its way around. Freddie set it up for me and surrounded it with folders and such. Whenever it hits a folder, it backs up and changes direction. Whenever it hears a noise like a clap it does the same. I wondered how it worked, so I looked it up. It has a little microphone which turns pressure from the sound waves to electrical impulses. When a loud noise is "heard," the circuit sends signals to the motor which tells the bug to turn around.

The bug's antennae allow it to figure out when it needs to turn around. There is a coil of wire surrounding an electrode protected by an insulator at the base of the antennae. When the antennae move if it hits something, the coil will touch the electrode and complete a circuit which signals the bug to turn around. Isn't that amazing? (On a side note, WOW. One full year of physics and I can't spell the word circuit...FAIL)



PERIOD 7/8 YEARBOOK!!!!! (I'm gonna cry...)
It's been a good year working with everyone in period 7/8. Lots of laughs, lots of stress, and lots of fun (and lots of failed quizzes. Heh). We might be your least favorite class and we might eat up all your cookies, doc, but I think we love you the most. :D. Anyway, here are a few pictures and quotations that sum up the entire year in our (lovable) class.

Calvin's meterstick project after the lab about it.
"You're making a mess..." ~Bobby
Thanks for letting us play with your board, doc! Danielle and I had fun with your letters as you can see. Hehe.
Wannabes...Haha.
I think this picture pretty much sums up the entire year you had with Greg, doc! :] Thanks for making a face.


QUOTATIONS:
Mark: Why'd you stop teaching, doc?
Doc: Because all of a sudden, I had a pain in my (censored haha)
Mark: WHOA, Greg, what did you do to him?!

"20 meters per second, that's huge! That's why it hurts when you fall off a building!" ~Doc

"Weight is always always always always always always always always ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYSSSSS down." ~doc!

Doc: How did you ride a seesaw when the other person is heavier than you?
Dylan: Guess and check!

"We should move Hawaii to the equator..." ~Mark

Doc: Overthinking and getting a 2 is like overcooking sashimi!
Dylan: ...But...That doesn't make sense...
Doc: EXACTLY.

"Important things happen in Kindergarten..." ~Doc! (eg: CUTTING AND PASTING!)

"Computers aren't apples, doc!...Wait..." ~Mark

"Things that are in current...wait...." ~Doc!

"Aren't you glad Greg's not graduating this year, doc?" ~Mark. Haha.

"Do we have to wake up the photogates?" ~Bobby

Doc: Are Ashley and Ian an item?
Danielle: No, Ashley has a boyfriend, why?
Doc: Because she's always beating him up...
Steph: Better watch out, doc. If she hears that, she'll beat YOU up!

"That's always been my life goal. To die while teaching and all the students will freak out." ~Doc.

"We used to go to the pool and try scuba-ing with a long hose. Then you'd hear the air leaving the person's lungs and some gasping! But we don't do that anymore..." ~Doc.

"SAME HOSE!" "Sometimes trying your best just isn't good enough." ~Mottos of period 7/8


Last, but definitely NOT least, our lab group's Arduino win! Haha. Counting in binary for the win! :D Relive it over and over. Love it. Worship it. :]



Happy Mother's Day, by the way, everyone! I made fail breakfast for my mommy today. Haha. What did YOU do for your mommy? Anyway, good luck on APs. I'll miss you all. Thanks for a great year, everyone! I hope we lived up to your expectations of your last AP Physics B class, doc!

Time is Running Out...

My title is true. But as my time in AP Physics B ends, and I write my last blog, I reflect on the year with mixed emotions. Anyway, back to my topic. Time. I took an SAT this Saturday, and that wasn't fun. But my proctor said something that got me thinking about Physics. He was talking about the analog clock on the side wall of the room. He said, "I wouldn't rely on that clock because it's a little fast going downhill and a little slow going up." I thought of why that would be, and before I knew it, the test was starting.

I came to the conclusion that it has to do with gravity! Well, obviously. I realize now that this is a fail blog topic. But it's late and I'm tired, so I'm sticking with it. Sorry, doc.

Anyway, the force of gravity is greatest in magnitude when the minute hand is over the 3 and the 9! There is the most surface area and force on the hand when it is at those points (plus the force doesn't have to be componetized). When the hand is going "downhill," gravity works with the movement of the hand, so it goes faster. However, when going "uphill," gravity works against the hand, so it goes slower.

Thus ends my lame blog. Oh well. I think I also used this because I'm subconsciously really happy that my dad bought me a nice watch this weekend. :] Thanks, Daddy.

Anyways, have a really great week everyone! Good luck on AP exams and especially our Physics final! Couple more weeks, and we'll all be good!

Stars!

Okay well, time for another edition of Steph's AP Physics blog! Yay! I think I'll combine two blogs into one because I don't think either will be very good. Alrighty then. That being said, let's start. Today's topic is: STARS. I love stars and I think they're awesome.

So this weekend, I uploaded a song on my iPod called "Airplanes." I really like the chorus which goes "Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars? I could really use a wish right now." I like stars and wishes, so it got me thinking. What are shooting stars? I found out that meteoroids get caught in the atmosphere and burn up as they fall to earth, hence the awesomeness that is a shooting star. Though the name is very inaccurate. The reason they fall to earth is GRAVITY! And the earth's gravitational field! OH MY GOSH! 9.8 m/s^2!!!

The other star I'm going to talk about is a balloon. :] One of my balloons from my birthday is deflating, but still has some helium in it. Right now, it looks super cool because if I were to cut it off the string, it would float in midair! So yeah, the weight (MG!) of the balloon points DOWN! Like ALWAYS! Buttttt, the helium inside the balloon keeps it afloat by evening out the weight just enough so the balloon is in equilibrium! Yay!

Ignore the giant mess that is my room. >.<. But yeah, there you go. It's all floaty (I'm talking about the blue star, in case you didn't know)!

Have a great week everyone. Just a few more! We can make it!

Waterrrrrr...

So today, my blog is kind of late, because my friends threw me a surprise party today! YAY FRIENDS! Haha. Well anyway, we went swimming in the pool about 2 hours ago, and yes, it was freezing cold. But super fun anyway. We had a waterproof camera, so we took tons of pictures. And I saw a few different physics optics concepts.

First, we took pictures through the mediums. Our faces were above water, but the camera was submerged in water. There was refraction of light, and on top of that, the waves in the pool increased the distortion. Hence, the picture below.

Second, I saw reflection at the surface of the water. You can see some reflections of my friends and my faces on the surface due to the flash.

Third, my friends and I took underwater pictures. That was fun, but kind of hard to do without drowning. But the final products came out super cool. Since the camera and us were in the same medium, there was no refraction or refraction or anything, so the picture came out (relatively) normal (besides our obviously weird smiles).

Well, that's pretty much how my amazing day went. I hope all you people have a great week. We'll have fun with our giant review packets for physics, won't we, Doc? Next time you get the chance, everyone should go take pictures underwater. But no drowning. That's bad. ;) Happy Headmaster's Holiday everyone! :D

Sinking...?

Doc, does my extra post count for this week? Is this blog necessary? Oh well, I guess I'll do it anyway. Just in case. Ooooh. Or do I get extra credit for my extra blog? Haha. Just kidding (not really).

Okay well, prom is coming up in about a month for so, and since I'm a girl, I need things like a dress and shoes. Dress: Check, Shoes: uncheck. :( Haha. I was thinking about shoes, and my mind wandered to Junior Ring Ceremony, which happened to be the last time I wore heels. Good times. :] I wore the heels I wear to virtually every formal thing I go to. They're black, 4 inches high, and have a scary skinny heel.

I had to walk with all my heavy bags and stuff from Weinberg to the Chapel in those heels. And on the way, my friends and I had to walk over some grass. Apparently, it had rained a few hours before, and the grass and dirt were soft. As we walked across that grass, I realized that I was getting stuck in the ground with every step I took. I started freaking out along with a few of my other heel-wearing friends, while Danielle, who was in flats looked at us strangely.

This, my friends, is a lesson in surface area related to weight (mg). There was more pressure focused on that smaller area. Danielle's flats had a greater surface area than my pointy heel did, thus, I sank into the ground while Danielle didn't. Plus, my heels were high, so I added a few more inches of potential energy to myself. :] If I wore my other heels which are wedges and have a larger surface area, I wouldn't have sunk even though they are heels too.

Wow this was a pretty lame topic. Sorry about that, people. I'll think of something better next week (hopefully). Thanks for singing to me, AP physics period 7/8. I should have video taped that. Have a good week, you guys! FAIR WEEK! Live it up! :]

An Extra Post

Hello everyone! This is a special edition of Stephieee's AP Phys blog, made especially for doc! :]

So, you may or may not know, but I recently had my self portrait posted in Seto Hall for the Artist of Iolani exhibition. Doc seemed to like it, so he told me to blog about it.

That's me with my self portrait. :D I don't really know what doc wants me to say, so I'll just talk about it. This was shot for my self portrait assignment for Photo class. I had to take 200-something images of myself which was strange, but kind of fun. To take this particular picture, I set up a tripod and used the self timer in my (messy) room. I don't know where I got the inspiration to use the headphones, but I guess it works because music is a big part of my life and I like listening to it pretty much all the time. :] I shot myself with a digital SLR, Canon Rebel (The one that was featured in my other blog!). I must say, it was really strange to see such a large picture of my face on display some place. Haha.

The Artists of Iolani exhibit was really interesting to me because it gave me a chance to see what other art classes do. I'm always holed up in the Photo room, so seeing other artists' work from different mediums was amazing to me because of what they can do. It was also cool seeing work I have seen before from my Photo peers. I like the idea of the exhibit because unlike other electives, artists don't really get to have their moments. Dance has dance showcase, performing arts classes have recitals and concerts, and theatre has performances. But art doesn't really have that, so it's nice to have some place to show off what we've been working so hard on the entire year. Sure our work is around school all the time, But having all the mediums in one place at one time is a nice change.

Plus I got to sign my name on the huge wooden board in the back of the room. That made me feel a little accomplished. Overall, I'd say this was a really good experience. And according to doc, my portrait is very much like me, so I'm glad I was able to portray myself through a photograph.

I think that's pretty much all I can say about this. Doc, if you're reading this, and you want me to add anything, just let me know. That goes for anyone one else too. Enjoy extended schedule! :D Say Happy Birthday to me if you see me tomorrow! :D