ECONOMICALLY IS NOT A WORD! Seriously, my English teacher said "economically" about seventeen times today.
A couple of months ago, my science teacher said something was "unrelevant and irequivocal." She then proceeded to tell the whole class that those two words were antonymous. However, she did catch the antonymous mistake and switch it to synonymous, but the mixed up prefixes remained.
My Chinese teacher makes a ton of spelling mistakes, but she's from Shanghai, so it's acceptable. No one can spell February anyways.
Last week, my math teacher spelled the word "image" wrong three different times. He wrote "imagine," erased it, wrote "imagine" again, erased it, and then word "imige." A few minutes after that, we proceeded to get into a discussion as to what "dilate" means. When you shine a light directly in your eyes, they dilate, right? They get smaller. They expand when there's not enough light. That's what I thought, I'm not sure though. Anyway, the whole class got embroiled in that discussion.
My science textbook doesn't understand the meaning of a paragraph, or a comma. They had three independant clauses joined together with no punctuation. And then there was a paragraph that was about three pages long.
In a video we were watching on the Cold War during social studies today, they pronounced "lethargic" as "lee-far-gik" as opposed to "le-thar-gic."
In science today, she showed us a picture that showed the water cycle, however, there was this really big mountain right next to the ocean and it was raining on the leeward side of the mountain, not the oceanic side of the mountain. I pointed this out to my teacher. She blinked. And then the class started finding other problems with that particular photo.
I know I make a lot of mistakes with grammar and spelling and whatnot, but these were some teacher-related goofs that I just felt like sharing.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Monday, March 14, 2011
Because I Need a Topic...
Apocalypse came when little Coco Kolla stood on a zoo bench, staring down at a pair of aboriginal kangaroos.
"Boring," cried she, and off she ran, bouncing though the zoo like the over active eight year old everyone knew she was.
Crocodiles watched the girl, a smile on their faces, but in fact, they couldn't care less.
Dolphins jumped and splashed, trying to warn little Coco Kolla of her inevitable doom - because dolphins always knew about the danger - but the girl would not listen.
Elephants trumpeted and monkeys cawed, but Coco paid no head.
Freedom, for a few free moments, was hers; and she would not soon give it up.
Granny Kolla had dropped her off and the zoo and left her all alone, but that did not worry Kolla.
Having no one around was great fun for her.
Ignoring the animals, Coco Kolla dashed through the zoo with no supervision; and she loved every moment of it.
Juice boxes strewn the ground behind her, as Coco had learned out to break in and out of concession stands very, very quickly.
Kola bears watched her with sad, somber eyes, thinking, 'Poor little girl, all alone in this big wide world.'
Later, Coco started to tire out, so she found a bench and lay down.
Many animals watched her from their cages, always exchanging a series of animal communications.
"No good," hissed the snakes, "humans are no good."
"Oh," cried the kindly giraffe, "so young to be the only one to survive."
"Poor form," replied the tigers, "not dying with the rest; now we can't have the run of things."
Quite naturally, Coco Kolla was sound asleep and did not hear such conversations.
Reaching beyond the walls of the zoo, apocalypse had come in the form of a meter which struck the earth with more deadly force than any atomic bomb; little Coco Kolla was the last human alive.
Sunset came, and Coco awoke to the cold.
Terrified, she started upright and began to run around the zoo, searching for someone to cling to; but she found no one.
Underneath a picnic bench she hid as with the night came a freezing, acidic rain.
"Very, very, cold," Coco whispered, her teeth chattering, "I want my Granny."
Wildebeests led the escape from zoo, as all the animals broke free from their cages and charged into the world, leaving little Coco Kolla under her picnic bench.
Xylophones have no bearing on this story.
Years past and Coco turned into nothing more than a fossilized memory; a tribute to the last human left alive.
Zoos, however, were closed for the duration of the apocalypse; because with the death of man came the rise of animals in control.
Wow.
Everyone. Forgot you ever read this. I will hypnotize you. And you will forget.
"Boring," cried she, and off she ran, bouncing though the zoo like the over active eight year old everyone knew she was.
Crocodiles watched the girl, a smile on their faces, but in fact, they couldn't care less.
Dolphins jumped and splashed, trying to warn little Coco Kolla of her inevitable doom - because dolphins always knew about the danger - but the girl would not listen.
Elephants trumpeted and monkeys cawed, but Coco paid no head.
Freedom, for a few free moments, was hers; and she would not soon give it up.
Granny Kolla had dropped her off and the zoo and left her all alone, but that did not worry Kolla.
Having no one around was great fun for her.
Ignoring the animals, Coco Kolla dashed through the zoo with no supervision; and she loved every moment of it.
Juice boxes strewn the ground behind her, as Coco had learned out to break in and out of concession stands very, very quickly.
Kola bears watched her with sad, somber eyes, thinking, 'Poor little girl, all alone in this big wide world.'
Later, Coco started to tire out, so she found a bench and lay down.
Many animals watched her from their cages, always exchanging a series of animal communications.
"No good," hissed the snakes, "humans are no good."
"Oh," cried the kindly giraffe, "so young to be the only one to survive."
"Poor form," replied the tigers, "not dying with the rest; now we can't have the run of things."
Quite naturally, Coco Kolla was sound asleep and did not hear such conversations.
Reaching beyond the walls of the zoo, apocalypse had come in the form of a meter which struck the earth with more deadly force than any atomic bomb; little Coco Kolla was the last human alive.
Sunset came, and Coco awoke to the cold.
Terrified, she started upright and began to run around the zoo, searching for someone to cling to; but she found no one.
Underneath a picnic bench she hid as with the night came a freezing, acidic rain.
"Very, very, cold," Coco whispered, her teeth chattering, "I want my Granny."
Wildebeests led the escape from zoo, as all the animals broke free from their cages and charged into the world, leaving little Coco Kolla under her picnic bench.
Xylophones have no bearing on this story.
Years past and Coco turned into nothing more than a fossilized memory; a tribute to the last human left alive.
Zoos, however, were closed for the duration of the apocalypse; because with the death of man came the rise of animals in control.
Wow.
Everyone. Forgot you ever read this. I will hypnotize you. And you will forget.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Writing
I love writing, I really do.
But the thing is, I've got this really cool idea for a "short" story and I can't figure out how to write because the words aren't flowing. I can't figure out how to portray Ora's nervousness. I can't figure out how to portray how she feels when Salrev yanks her past one of the screamers. I can't figure out how to portray the sweat on her brow and the frantic, hurried pace of the fighting.
It's probably not really original, but I love my characters. Ora's the innocent one, who doesn't understand things. Salrev is the mentor, but he's nasty and stuck up and he works for the government. There's Erik, who's the depressed one. There's Marris, who would be the mentor if he didn't disappear early on in the story. Ora becomes desperate to find out where he went, but she never does, at least not until the end of the war. There's Lars, the new kid, after Ora. He's the terrified one.
They're the street-rat group, so no one really trust each other. Marris is the oldest, and he's about twenty something. No one really knows. Erik's from New York. He was caught thieving, so he got sent to a correction facility. All the pilots are orphans, criminals, or volunteers who have no idea how dangerous everything is. Ora's a volunteer. Her aunt didn't want her to go, but she insisted. She's from Quebec, I think, I'm not sure yet.
The pilots and everything are fighting because the Earth is fighting a war between the New World block and the Old World block. Africa, however, is pretty much divided into North and South. The North allied with the New World and the South stayed with Europe and Asia. Most of the land fighting takes place over North Africa while the space fighting expands up to the moon and back. There is some amount of land fighting that takes place on the moon, but not a lot.
The technology is advanced, but not true space flight. There's no hyperdrives or anything. Flying a fighter takes so much energy that most of the pilots debunk in two or three months, becoming "screamers" which are basically just insane people. There's not a lot of nukes and everything, especially not on the big cities, because that's the only rule of the war.
I just can't get this story to work. It's short, probably no longer than 30 or 40 pages, but I still can't get it to work. And it won't leave me.
Because I love writing...
But sometimes, I really, really, really hate writing.
But the thing is, I've got this really cool idea for a "short" story and I can't figure out how to write because the words aren't flowing. I can't figure out how to portray Ora's nervousness. I can't figure out how to portray how she feels when Salrev yanks her past one of the screamers. I can't figure out how to portray the sweat on her brow and the frantic, hurried pace of the fighting.
It's probably not really original, but I love my characters. Ora's the innocent one, who doesn't understand things. Salrev is the mentor, but he's nasty and stuck up and he works for the government. There's Erik, who's the depressed one. There's Marris, who would be the mentor if he didn't disappear early on in the story. Ora becomes desperate to find out where he went, but she never does, at least not until the end of the war. There's Lars, the new kid, after Ora. He's the terrified one.
They're the street-rat group, so no one really trust each other. Marris is the oldest, and he's about twenty something. No one really knows. Erik's from New York. He was caught thieving, so he got sent to a correction facility. All the pilots are orphans, criminals, or volunteers who have no idea how dangerous everything is. Ora's a volunteer. Her aunt didn't want her to go, but she insisted. She's from Quebec, I think, I'm not sure yet.
The pilots and everything are fighting because the Earth is fighting a war between the New World block and the Old World block. Africa, however, is pretty much divided into North and South. The North allied with the New World and the South stayed with Europe and Asia. Most of the land fighting takes place over North Africa while the space fighting expands up to the moon and back. There is some amount of land fighting that takes place on the moon, but not a lot.
The technology is advanced, but not true space flight. There's no hyperdrives or anything. Flying a fighter takes so much energy that most of the pilots debunk in two or three months, becoming "screamers" which are basically just insane people. There's not a lot of nukes and everything, especially not on the big cities, because that's the only rule of the war.
I just can't get this story to work. It's short, probably no longer than 30 or 40 pages, but I still can't get it to work. And it won't leave me.
Because I love writing...
But sometimes, I really, really, really hate writing.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
中国文
Have I mentioned that Chinese grammar makes no sense?
Well, that's really because I haven't found any pattern to Chinese grammar. Well, nothing beyond the rudimentary who + when + what sentence order. The title 中国文 means "zhong guo wen" - middle country language. Which, well, basically it's the Chinese language.
I think, so far, my favorite Chinese word is 滑 which means "hua" which is slippery. Put it in front of 雪, "xue" which is snow, and you get skiing. 滑 冰 "hua bing" which is slippery ice, and means skating. I really do enjoy this language, at least when I don't have to worry about the language. 冰淇淋 doesn't have hua in it, but it's "bingqilin" which means ice cream and all three of those characters has the radical for water. I shall explain radicals. Maybe.
The language is just fun. I mean, it's a puzzle, because there's so many different pronunciations and everything. It's enjoyable, I think.
So far, my favorite sentence in Chinese is "我有三个哥哥." Which translates to the pinyin system as "wo you san ge gege." "Ge" and "gege" do have different tonal marks, however, with the first "ge" being a down slash and the "gege" having just the level bar. The sentence translates as I (wo) have (you) three (san) measure word for people (ge) older brothers (gege). I have three older brothers. Yay me.
My family is the largest in the Chinese class. They all seem to think it's either hysterical or horrendous that I have "si ge xiong di": four measure word brothers.
Did I mention the measure words? That's one thing I never understood when I was working with the Rosetta Stone program; stuff like the fact that there's different measure words like "ge" (people), "zhe" (animals, I think), "zhang" (paper/books/etc, again, I think) and oh so many more... that's not something the Rosetta Stone format would have taught me.
Anyway, I did mention the radicals. In the character system, there's a bunch of smaller sets of strokes that have a specific meaning behind them. Three dashes running down the left side is water, and I mentioned that one, but the text-characters kinda screw it. Picture a slanted colon with an extra dot. If a character has that in it, it usually has something to do with water. Most radicals are pictographs, simply evolving from the original character, like the one for "eye." This radical, 目, started out as an actual picture of an eye and then it was flipped upright and straightened out. Now it's the radical for eye.
This stuff is fascinating!
My teacher says that the major difference between the traditional and simplified systems for characters is that the traditional system based more on pictorgraphs and is a lot more curved than the simplified system.
The character for older brother, 哥哥, has the radical for mouth in it. Four times. It's the little box thingy. My class found it hysterical when my teacher made a joke about how older brothers always like to talk a lot because they have big mouths. My Chinese class is strange. The teacher isn't so great, but it's the only class I'm actually learning something that I really couldn't learn alone, so, I enjoy it.
Oh. Oh. Oh! Bob had a movie playing and this guy was working for a Chinese restaurant that had the character for fortune on it. Except the character wasn't upside down. Because during the Chinese New Year, people hang the big character for fortune upside down because the pronunciation of the word "upside down," is the same (besides for tonal marks) with the pronunciation of the word "attend/arrive" so hanging the character for fortune upside down would symbolize that fortune is arriving. Chinese humor. Who knew?
这么久了，告别，并感谢所有的鱼
(I'm not translating it. It's only my favorite sign off. Use Google translator if you can't guess)
So far, my favorite sentence in Chinese is "我有三个哥哥." Which translates to the pinyin system as "wo you san ge gege." "Ge" and "gege" do have different tonal marks, however, with the first "ge" being a down slash and the "gege" having just the level bar. The sentence translates as I (wo) have (you) three (san) measure word for people (ge) older brothers (gege). I have three older brothers. Yay me.
My family is the largest in the Chinese class. They all seem to think it's either hysterical or horrendous that I have "si ge xiong di": four measure word brothers.
Did I mention the measure words? That's one thing I never understood when I was working with the Rosetta Stone program; stuff like the fact that there's different measure words like "ge" (people), "zhe" (animals, I think), "zhang" (paper/books/etc, again, I think) and oh so many more... that's not something the Rosetta Stone format would have taught me.
Anyway, I did mention the radicals. In the character system, there's a bunch of smaller sets of strokes that have a specific meaning behind them. Three dashes running down the left side is water, and I mentioned that one, but the text-characters kinda screw it. Picture a slanted colon with an extra dot. If a character has that in it, it usually has something to do with water. Most radicals are pictographs, simply evolving from the original character, like the one for "eye." This radical, 目, started out as an actual picture of an eye and then it was flipped upright and straightened out. Now it's the radical for eye.
This stuff is fascinating!
My teacher says that the major difference between the traditional and simplified systems for characters is that the traditional system based more on pictorgraphs and is a lot more curved than the simplified system.
The character for older brother, 哥哥, has the radical for mouth in it. Four times. It's the little box thingy. My class found it hysterical when my teacher made a joke about how older brothers always like to talk a lot because they have big mouths. My Chinese class is strange. The teacher isn't so great, but it's the only class I'm actually learning something that I really couldn't learn alone, so, I enjoy it.
Oh. Oh. Oh! Bob had a movie playing and this guy was working for a Chinese restaurant that had the character for fortune on it. Except the character wasn't upside down. Because during the Chinese New Year, people hang the big character for fortune upside down because the pronunciation of the word "upside down," is the same (besides for tonal marks) with the pronunciation of the word "attend/arrive" so hanging the character for fortune upside down would symbolize that fortune is arriving. Chinese humor. Who knew?
这么久了，告别，并感谢所有的鱼
(I'm not translating it. It's only my favorite sign off. Use Google translator if you can't guess)
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Hello Seattle (Remix)
I'm sure scientists have poured hours of their time into finding just the right alarm clock. Look at ThinkGeek or Hammacher Schlemmer and they'll have entire pages devoted to alarm clocks. I really want that clock that lights up in binary, but that one isn't really an alarm clock. The ones Bob liked the most where the whirley gig ones that would send a flying disk into the air when the alarm went off, and then those alarms wouldn't be quiet until you fetched the disk and put it back on the clock.
I think I first started paying attention to alarm clocks – beyond admiring the Hammacher Schlemmer ones – at summer camp last year. We would talk about how Kiska had the most annoying alarm clock because it would start off slow and soft and then get louder and faster until it was just a constant blare. Most of the councils at the camp admitted to struggling to wake up to alarms that wouldn't also wake their campers up. One of the great things about being one of the oldest at the camp; the councilors told us things like that.
On the canoe trip I went on, Bobbi woke the other girls up with a blow-horn. I had already exited our tent and was therefore saved. They refused to talk to her for the rest of the morning. Rusty's alarm clock sang “rise and shine and give God the glory, glory...” It was way to chipper for most people. Tika's just beeped. I found that incredibly irrating that someone as wonderful and creative as she was would have an alarm clock that simply beeped. It was too normal! Some of the councilors would even prank the alarms of the division directors and other staff. Great fun. Skuttle's alarm clock, apparently, quaked like a duck. No one was able to verify that, as she slept out in the staff cabins and there was no way they'd let us sneak up there before her alarm went off.
Ah. Cedarbrook.
I eventually decided that the best alarm clocks work like Kiska's, when they start off slowly and then work up to a faster and much louder tone. It has to be almost impossible to sleep to, so a little offbeat, but not jarringly so, and not that loud. It takes a lot to get right, but it is possible, because I've found the perfect song for it. Song. And I don't even listen to music.
Anyway, there's this band. And this band is called OwlCity. And it's sung by this guy. And that guy's name is Adam Young. And I like the word “and.” And I'm being rather repetitive here... And there's this song. And this song is entitled “Hello Seattle.” And there's this remix of that song. And this remix is entitled “Hello Seattle (Remix).”
What a shocker.
The remix of Hello Seattle is simply the perfect song to wake up to. It starts off really slow and soft and then just gradually gets louder and louder until the words come, very, very, very soft and then it jumps to loud music again, with no words, and then goes down to a smoother balance between words and music and I find it great. I think the only words of the whole 4 minutes are “hello Seattle,” but when all you're doing is waking up, it works really well.
I've gotten a flesh reaction, however, because I've woken up to that song so much that when my iPod is on shuffle and that song comes up, there's the I've-got-to-go-to-school reaction, which is kind of annoying. And when I get home from school and turn my iPod on, I know exactly how long it took me to roll out of bed, simply by knowing which place in the crescendo the song is at. Is that at all insane?
So, question of the day...
What do you wake up to?
The EU
Shoot me. Just shoot me now.
This is a rant. Just so you're aware.
We're doing this research paper in social studies and while we were supposed to be picking our topics, I requested my teacher suggest a very difficult topic. That's how I ended up having to write a five to six page paper on the economic problems of the EU.
We were in the library at school today (the LMC), doing research on the computers in the backroom. I had such a migraine. It was awful. And of course, this is a group of regular students, non-enriched, who have absolutely no wish to be working on that research paper at the time. They were so loud! I wadded up two pieces of paper and stuck them in my ears to try and keep the noise down.
I asked my teacher how long she thought I'd last until I cracked and did something really, really, really stupid. At least I made it through the class. I might not be that lucky tomorrow. Yes, social studies was definitely a long class today. I really, very strongly dislike the LMC. Every time I go there, I get a headache. Maybe it's got something to do with the rooms or whatever, but I can't go to the LMC without a migraine, it's awful.
The thing is, my teacher's making us print our sources so she knows we're not plagiarizing and include those sources with our paper. It's a nightmare, I've never done that. I don't think in that way. I accumulate the information and then go back and find the specifics; pile that headache on top of the first one.
And, to top off the simply lovely day I'm having right now, I've got a bucket load of homework, mostly research for that paper on the economic problems of the pigs of the eu, English, IED, science and a ton of Chinese. On top of that, I got my score for the AMC 10 back today and it was rather depressing. I got below average on all accounts. Below average. One of the feelings I strongly dislike is being subpar in an area in which I know I can succeed and do better. Gr. I got a 61.5 out of a possible 150 points. 61.5!
I've complained about three things, so I'll say right now that I'm grateful for sleep, I'm grateful for pretzels, and I'm grateful for stuff to drink. There, now I've been thankful as many times as I complained. >.> Kinda. At least I get to skip Brit Lit next year, seeing as I already took it. The process was almost painless, really. I'm taking Creative Writing and problem Contemporary Literature and this'll give me space to take another half year elective like psychology, which I'm excited about. Thankfulness. Yay.
I'm gonna go get something to drink.
And something salty.
Or paprika-y...
This is a rant. Just so you're aware.
We're doing this research paper in social studies and while we were supposed to be picking our topics, I requested my teacher suggest a very difficult topic. That's how I ended up having to write a five to six page paper on the economic problems of the EU.
We were in the library at school today (the LMC), doing research on the computers in the backroom. I had such a migraine. It was awful. And of course, this is a group of regular students, non-enriched, who have absolutely no wish to be working on that research paper at the time. They were so loud! I wadded up two pieces of paper and stuck them in my ears to try and keep the noise down.
I asked my teacher how long she thought I'd last until I cracked and did something really, really, really stupid. At least I made it through the class. I might not be that lucky tomorrow. Yes, social studies was definitely a long class today. I really, very strongly dislike the LMC. Every time I go there, I get a headache. Maybe it's got something to do with the rooms or whatever, but I can't go to the LMC without a migraine, it's awful.
The thing is, my teacher's making us print our sources so she knows we're not plagiarizing and include those sources with our paper. It's a nightmare, I've never done that. I don't think in that way. I accumulate the information and then go back and find the specifics; pile that headache on top of the first one.
And, to top off the simply lovely day I'm having right now, I've got a bucket load of homework, mostly research for that paper on the economic problems of the pigs of the eu, English, IED, science and a ton of Chinese. On top of that, I got my score for the AMC 10 back today and it was rather depressing. I got below average on all accounts. Below average. One of the feelings I strongly dislike is being subpar in an area in which I know I can succeed and do better. Gr. I got a 61.5 out of a possible 150 points. 61.5!
I've complained about three things, so I'll say right now that I'm grateful for sleep, I'm grateful for pretzels, and I'm grateful for stuff to drink. There, now I've been thankful as many times as I complained. >.> Kinda. At least I get to skip Brit Lit next year, seeing as I already took it. The process was almost painless, really. I'm taking Creative Writing and problem Contemporary Literature and this'll give me space to take another half year elective like psychology, which I'm excited about. Thankfulness. Yay.
I'm gonna go get something to drink.
And something salty.
Or paprika-y...
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Paprika
I seem to be obsessed with this spice. I don't know why. It's probably the name. “Paprika” is almost as epic as “skiing” or “vacuum.”
I just tasted plain paprika and I think Blue's Clues got it right. It tastes like a mixture of salt and pepper with a smidgen of sugar and that really hot spice that starts with a c and I've never managed to spell. Cayenne. Right. There, I spelled it.
Paprika is made from the grinding of dried fruits of Capsicum annumn. Capisicum annumn is a domesticated species of the plant genus Capsicum native to southern North America and northern South America. The three species C. annuum, C. frutescens and C. chinese all evolved from a single common ancestor located somewhere in the northwest Brazil - Columia area. This species is the most common and extensively cultivated of the five domesticated capiscums (Wiki).
A.k.a, the pepper.
Wait a second. -rereads the article- Peppers are a fruit?! I had totally not connected with that before. I mean, tomatoes, sure. Everyone knows tomatoes are a fruit, but I don't see peppers as fruit; they're so... vegetable. We eat them with meat, onions, mushrooms, alone, salads, etc. etc. etc. but as fruit? They get crushed into spices like cayenne and paprika, and you don't often see many fruits turned into spices other than lemon and various citrus jests...
Peppers grow best in warm and dry climates, but they can survive almost anywhere. Their color ranges from from red to purple on the color scheme, but I have yet to see a blue colored pepper. All the other colors, I've eaten. The purple once aren't so great. Apparently, what makes chili peppers hot is this chemical capsaicin that causes a burning sensation in your mouth; a sensation responsible for the my-mouth-is-on-fire reaction!
Paprika. Peppers. They're my favorite spice and fruit right now.
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