As the STAR tests are coming up, I have been going over some released questions from previous years to try and refresh my memory of the various subjects. (STAR stands for Standardized Testing And Reporting. It is a test taken in California.) I was rather concerned about science especially, because the last time I took the science STAR test, I didn't score as well as I had hoped. And my science teacher had said it would cover science from grades 5-8, which was of great concern to me since I don't really remember much of what I learned in elementary school anymore. All I can remember are vague names and ideas, like Ohlone (a Native American tribe, if I remember correctly), the Revolutionary War, and something about the organs of the human body. I keep thinking of the word spleen, for whatever reason, but I have no idea where it is, what it looks like, or its function anymore.

I was going over the language arts released test questions, and there was a part from How I got to Be Perfect, written by Jean Kerr (at least, that's what I think, I was rather confused by the content of the heading, but anyways).

"The dog that gave us the most trouble was a beagle named Murphy. As far as I'm concerned, the first thing he did wrong was to turn into a beagle. I had seen him bounding around on the other side of a pet-shop window, and I went in and asked the man, 'How much is that adorable fox terrier in the window?' Did he say, 'That adorable fox terrier is a beagle'? No, he said, 'Ten dollars, lady.' Now, I don't mean to say one word against beagles. They have rights just like other people. But it is a bit of a shock when you bring home a small ball of fluff in a shoebox, and three weeks later it's as long as the sofa.

Murphy was the first dog I ever trained personally, and I was delighted at the enthusiasm with which he took to the newspaper. It was sometime later that we discovered, to our horror, that - like so many dogs - he had grasped the letter but not the spirit of the thing. Until the very end of his days he felt a real sense of obligation whenever he saw a newspaper - any newspaper - and it didn't matter where it was. I can't bring myself to go into the details, except to mention that we were finally compelled to keep all the papers in the bottom of the icebox."

I find it rather interesting reading the stories from past STAR tests. It seemed like there was quite a bit about the dangers of the sun. There were advertisements for sunscreen and how to apply it, as well as advice for how to avoid being damaged by UVA or UVB rays. I don't put on sunscreen as often as I should...Although I may not get sunburns that much, it is possible that I'll end up with skin cancer and wrinkles, which are both problems that don't show up right away. (Then again, my skin already has problems and my hands are quite wrinkly - although I was told that had to do with my hands being small so the skin is not stretched as tightly across my bones)

This morning I was thinking about something that I hadn't thought of for a while. It started out with me wondering if someday I should take Oral Composition (though the idea was soon dismissed in my head, for not only do I still lack confidence in my public speaking abilities, I also would be behind those who had taking Oral Comp in 9th grade, and anyways I was planning to take Photography soon as I had the chance). And then I remembered that I had seen a kid in PE who looked kind of like someone I used to know. I would always stare at the back of his head until he turned around so I could see his face. And even though it was impossible for him to be that person (since this boy was in a lower grade) I always waited and looked, and was greatly disappointed. I wonder why? I guess I'm still really stuck to my past. I wish I could have those carefree days back again. I haven't seen a person who I was friends with in elementary school for so long. Perhaps he moved...But I am sure he must still live fairly close by, for I thought I saw him at Target once. (If you want to see people you know, go to Target, the library, or the San Francisco Airport. I've seen many acquaintances at these three locations.)

Labels: beagle, dog, elementary school, familiar, friends, health, interesting, memories, memory, moving, newspaper, people, recognize, science, score, skin, STAR testing, sunlight, training, wrinkles

I saw my mom reading a Chinese newspaper, a common activity of hers. There was a page featuring, France, Paris in particular, and I saw a picture of a food dish with the words "Au Chien Qui Fume" under it. I said, "Oh, it must be something like a dog who smokes." My mom read the Chinese translation and said I was right about that. She seemed a little surprised. Well, I guess learning French is doing some good at last. (I mean, I really can't read Chinese...)

Au Chien Qui Fume is the name of a restaurant in the Paris. See if you can understand anything on their website. XD I can vaguely read it...And considering that whoever is reading this right now understands English, you could probably guess at some of the words.

I recently heard that there was some regulation being passed in France saying that you couldn't smoke in restaurants anymore, I believe it was Paris in particular... So then people went outside to smoke. However, some restaurants are open late at night (bars too, I guess?) and so the smokers outside make noise. People who live upstairs above the restaurants get annoyed by it and have complained so restaurants/bars had to close at an earlier time. This made people upset, saying something along the lines of, "It's Paris! The city of lights! And now you're taking this away from us!"

You know, I've always wondered why countries where people smoke seem to have such long average lifespans. France and Japan are both countries where there are quite a few smokers and yet the average life expectancy is quite high in both countries. Perhaps other factors like diet end up outweighing it? (My parents actually question whether smoking is bad, but I don't think that is debatable. I mean, if nothing else, it makes your breath smell bad.)

Friday, being the closest day to Valentine's that we were in school (next week is a week off!), was the day Singing Valentines were going on. Just to get you up to speed if you don't have that at your school, a Singing Valentine is something that you can buy for a few dollars from the school for a friend or significant other. The recipient will be sung to by students from the school choir, as well as a card from the sender and a piece of candy. I didn't send any this year, because I really wasn't thinking about it at all, but one of my friends did send me one.

One of my teachers was sick of all the Singing Valentines. At first I was shocked by his attitude since the singers had probably practiced their songs and choreography, and anyways it's easy for me to respect those better than myself at something, but then my teacher said that during third period, there were 9 Singing Valentines. That's a lot of singing. In my period, one student got 2 Singing Valentines.

There were various groups of students, like a group of people wearing white shirts, ties, and red hats, a group of people with pink outfits and fairy wings, a group of people with plaid shirts, and a group of pizza deliverers. I liked the pizza group the best because I liked their songs. (And they were unique since they had two guys in the group...I bet those were the only two guys in the school choir. It's kind of sad how there's such a huge difference between the number of girls and guys. I wonder if it's any different in high school.)

Speaking of high school, it is really starting to loom near for me. On Thursday, I went to the high school that I will most likely be attending to listen to presentations about science, math, and language arts (since history isn't offered for freshmen, there was no presentation for that) and to get information about the electives offered at the school. My dad says the teachers there are pretty cool, like college professors. I am not sure what to think of this because I'm not that sure about what college professors are "supposed" to be like.

Anyways, the school newspaper looked pretty cool. It was pretty different from my school's newspaper, that's for sure. Does four years really make that much difference? My school's newspaper was fairly amusing - the bad advice column was great - but now it's not even there anymore because Journalism was cut from the electives (Not enough money! Not enough students! UGH!). The articles in my school's newspaper weren't all that long most of the time and some of them were just kind of unexciting, corny descriptions of school dances and rallies. But the high school's newspaper talked about actual issues, and showed the car accidents that have happened. There were also pictures of the crossing guards, which I thought was nice - they should be recognized for their work.

I wonder if I should take Journalism when I reach 11th or 12th grade? I've always worried that it would be really hard work, having to stay after school and interview people and slave away typing articles on laptops. I guess I'm just really lazy and fearful of hard work. I can't always stay this way... (As much as I'd like to retire, it's simply not that likely to happen in the near future. I'll have to get used to studying or working for long hours and dealing with more burdens over time)

Labels: au chien qui fume, chinese, choir, french, gender, group, hard work, high school, journalism, lifespan, newspaper, paris, restaurant, singing, smoking, teacher, valentines, website

I mentioned briefly that I visited Petsmart in my post on January 17, 2010. When I was younger, I always wondering how you should pronounce Petsmart. Is it Pets Mart, or Pet Smart? I still am not sure. (I should probably wait for a TV commercial, if there is one, so I can hear how it should be said.)

While I was there, I noticed that there was one koi in a tank full of a different kind of fish. The koi looked very stressed and was trying to swim away, but it couldn't because it was only in a small tank, and it's impossible for it to break through tank walls to get to other tanks and back to safety among its own kind.

Since I'm on the subject of fish, I recently bought two fish from Petsmart - a greyish koi with a weird yellowish splotch on him, and an algae eater (my dad wants one, probably because he hopes it'll clean the tank for him, and anyways, since we have a "Petperks" card - it's like a store membership - we get a discount). The algae eater, as is their nature, found a place to stick on the tank, and didn't move until later, while I wasn't looking. He moved to the underside of this fake rock decoration we have and I didn't see him until I took a closer look. And the grey koi seems to be doing fine. It's my original fish that were troubling.

I have two fish tanks. In the bigger tank, I have a big white koi (used to have orangey-red parts, but it faded with time...Really weird) and a red and black koi. Yesterday, I noticed the big white koi (I did name him/her - I actually still have trouble telling the genders apart - Pumpkinflash, but we don't really use the name) was acting funny. It kept swimming around frantically and it would sometimes go up to the water's surface and seemed to be making nibbling motions. The red and black fish eventually did that too, but I think it's more likely that it was just imitating its friend. I suspected that the white koi must have choked on a pebble, because koi try to glean food from pebbles. I tried to scare it by flicking my finger against the tank, thinking it would spit out the rock if it got frightened (I used this technique for a fish I used to have, to save its life, since it was really and truly seeming like it would die, except I used a net to chase it) but it didn't work. At least the fish seem better today, maybe the white one digested the rock...Wait...Then that would be really weird. o_O;;

My mother read in her Chinese newspaper that an old lady, apparently a doctor of some sort, recommended eating meat for breakfast, fish for lunch, and something light for dinner (like rice soup). Not eating much for dinner makes sense, I suppose, seeing as you shouldn't eat much before you go to bed. But I tend to eat something light or sugary for breakfast, meat for lunch, and fish for dinner. Guess I have everything reversed. I wonder whether the lady in the newspaper's suggestions would really work, though, or if it only benefits the health of some people. My mother always reads that newspaper, and probably has for a long time. She also reads books about fitness and cooking and such things. My dad says that she keeps reading cookbooks and never really cooks the foods in them. XD

I'd like to make something based on a recipe. I really haven't cooked in a long time; barely at all ever since I moved on from Cooking class in 7th grade. I wonder if I should use one of my recipes that I obtained from that very same class. We made a coffee cake once and it was pretty good (it doesn't taste like coffee at all, it's just called coffee cake). I don't know if we have the cake pans and ingredients, though. I guess I'll have to find out sometime.

Today in debate club, the topic kind of changed until it was about how unhealthy America is, what with so many obese people, while in other countries peoples are reduced to making mud pies. There were more people than usual in debate club since it's been raining hard nowadays and students just want shelter from the rain. One boy said that people keep looking for a perfect, easy way to lose weight. But he said that if you're not rich, it won't happen. (Because then you could afford to have that surgery to remove some of your fat and skin) If you run out of your Nutrisystem food your eating habits aren't going to change. He said that you must simply eat less and exercise. And other students suggested vegetarianism but then there were people who protested saying they couldn't live without their meat. (And I can't, either, sadly) Besides, meat does have its benefits, like protein. Even eating other protein foods or supplements isn't quite the same as the real thing.

That reminds me, my mom said that one of the possible reasons why my skin is sensitive and tends to get itchy or infected easily is because I don't get enough zinc. She said that peanuts might have zinc, but since I'm allergic to peanuts, I can't get much zinc. There's only a limited variety of nuts I can eat - almonds and pistachios are the only ones I've confirmed to be "safe". I wonder if I'm destined to have skin problems forever.

Labels: choke, coffee cake, cooking, debate club, eating, fish, food, koi, meal, meat, newspaper, nuts, peanuts, petsmart, protein, recipe, rocks, skin, weight, zinc

Well, kind of in the literal sense, and kind of not. On Christmas Day, I was spacing out and I noticed something unusual on the ceiling. Upon closer inspection, it turned out to be a crack...In fact, a pretty long one. I am not sure how long the crack has been there. It could be new, it might've been forming over the course of several years. But what I do know is that it's a bad sign.

Our house is not new, that is for sure. My mother says it was built in 1945. It was remodeled once, but that wasn't recent, and it wasn't us who remodeled it anyway. My dad says the insides of the house are getting ruined and sometime we're going to have to either move out or redo our house from scratch. I hope that won't happen, but you can't prevent the inevitable; fate works in strange ways. When I mentioned the crack to my parents, my dad said it would probably be okay (at least for now) while my mother said, "Okay, let's remodel the house now." I don't want to move away (unless it would be to some far, exotic place like Australia, or France, or Italy, or the Hawaiian islands) and I don't want to tear down my house...But now that I think of it, that would give me a good opportunity to try apartment living. I've been wanting to live in apartment because I figure it would be interesting, and it would be good to have neighbors close by and a swimming pool that can easily be accessed. I really don't understand why people always want to buy a house so badly. Is it wanting to call something your own? Or do you just want some privacy?

Recently, my dad told me about the difference between the way houses are built. There are slab houses and houses with crawl space. If your house is a slab house, then it is built directly on top of a concrete foundation. The pipes and other things are in the concrete. If your house has crawl space, then there is some space between a foundation and the house. The space is called "crawl space" because if your pipes break or something, you can crawl under the house to fix them. If you have a slab house, then there is no crawl space, so you're in big trouble if your pipes break - you'll have to blow up the concrete. But if you do have crawl space, then you run the risk of termites. My house, in fact, probably has termites.

My mom and dad both watched a Chinese drama. In the drama, a couple wanted to buy a house. They don't have much money, so the wife asked her husband to borrow money from his parents. But the husband didn't want to do that since his parents are poor and he would feel guilty. His wife grew angry, saying she was tired of him making excuses about his family. They already had to take out a loan for a large amount of money that had a high interest rate, and the down payments took the help of neighbors and friends. My mom complained, "Why do they want to buy a house when they really can't afford it?" Why indeed.

On Christmas Day, I visited my parents' friends' house. My parents' friends' son is visiting (he lives in Seattle) and he brought his dog along with him. His dog is a Shetland sheepdog, I believe (at least partially, maybe he is mixed with some other breeds). The dog looks quite different from the last time I saw him. He seems to be bigger and has a lot of hair, even though my parents' friends insist he was already like that. This time the dog was a lot friendlier to me than last time. (Or maybe I'm better at dealing with dogs now. When I was in Australia, I got to interact with my mom's friend's dog...) He watched me whenever I tried to eat something (of course, animals find human food to be MUCH tastier) and let me pet him and even tried to lick me. (I really don't understand why a dog would want to lick you, not that I really mind or anything, but it's not like I taste good....DO I?!)

My mom was reading the newspaper (in Chinese) and there were some pictures of some objects. I guess it was some recommendations of things to buy. There was lipstick that has seven colors you can use...Isn't that like one of those pens with many colors? Wow. The most interesting thing, though, was the key hider. It was supposed to look like a sprinkler on your lawn or one of those outdoor lights. Actually, you can put your keys in them, so if you forgot your keys, you could have a spare key outside. But I think that's dangerous. Any ill-minded person who reads that newspaper article will know where to look for someone's keys and would be able to break into your house...

Labels: apartment, chinese, crack, crawl space, disguise, dog, drama, food, house, key hider, lick, lipstick, money, moving, newspaper, old, risk, shetland sheepdog, slab house, termites

That's what I can infer from comparing two houses that I see on my route home. One of them has a dark reddish door with a long oval of fancy glass in it. It is two stories and has a front yard. Originally the house looked quite different, what with so many weeds in the yard it looked scary. Now it has been repainted orange and green and all the weeds were pulled up so it's just an expanse of brown dirt. Whoever lives there is definitely quite active when it comes to their house since it is changing a lot.

But the other house is a white one with a door built into a corner and some columns, and another gate and door into the house. One time when I went by there was a man standing on the second floor balcony and yelling at someone. Today when I passed the house there was a bunch of newspapers on the driveway. Some had yellowish pages and others had white pages. I know one of the newspapers was the Wall Street Journal. I wonder if the house's owner has been out since it seems like the newspapers haven't even been unbound from the rubber bands which are used to hold them in the "suitable for smacking insects and smacking other people" position.

I am recently reading a book called Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen. The main character wants to be an actress and so this tells of her dealing with her archenemy at school, among other matters. One of my friends had no book to read so she read mine instead. She said that the main character lied a lot. I remember last year my language arts teacher said that you should write about what is familiar to you. I suppose the author may have had a big mouth when she was younger, then. XD And no, I don't mean big mouths like those commercials they used to have on television.

Due to this being STAR testing time, we have had a weird schedule what with about two hours for "testing" and class periods roughly thirty minutes each. Plus, this means the schedule looks like this instead, as what happens with assemblies (like bike safety, and such).
STAR Testing
20 minutes for brunch
1st Period
2nd Period
3rd Period
Lunch (about 40 minutes?)
4th Period
5th Period
6th Period

This is bad since I have 4th period PE and must run after eating. Seeing as these days I get nauseous easily it is rather dangerous. Luckily I can usually hold back urges to throw up if I drink some water. (Even the school's water fountains taste better in this case XD)

Just a few seconds ago I heard the sound of someone rapping on the door. I never answer the door because my parents have keys/garage door openers so they would break into the house or open the garage, not knock or ring the doorbell. I bet it's more solicitors. My parents put these stickers on the door to try and keep people away since they never like telemarketers or door-to-door salesmen (they always say "We're not interested. Please don't call again" and stuff like that) but it seems like people usually disregard it anyways. I actually feel bad for them, though my parents don't understand why I think so.

Labels: books, change, comparison, house, lie, nausea, newspaper, schedule, solicitor, STAR testing, telemarketer

...would be the newspaper delivery man. Or woman. I couldn't tell since I wasn't looking at the car window. But whoever it is, was trying to hit me today. I was just minding my own business and walking home from school. Right now the newspaper guy was making his rounds in his mysterious white van (unlike the mailman's truck, it doesn't have anything written on it). I was pretty shocked when a newspaper flew across the path, only a few feet from hitting me. It's a lucky thing I walk a lot slower than the van goes, because every time it passes a house, another newspaper is hurled out of the car window. Doesn't anyone realize it's safety hazard at this time of day? What if it hit some poor little kindergarten kid in the head and she started to cry? (But I guess that's really unlikely anyhow...)

For some reason, my only skill in drawing is copying. If I am given a picture and told to make a replica of it, I might do pretty well, but as for making things up from scratch, without anything to go by, I usually mess up pretty bad. I guess I'll probably be arrested for copyright infringement if I take advantage of any copying abilities, though, so I guess I can only draw pictures and keep them secret.

If you've ever wanted to be a sports pro, I think you ought to get a Wii (it comes with the game Wii Sports). The sports are so much easier on the Wii. For instance, in Tennis, Baseball, and Golf, you won't miss the ball, as long as you time your swing right. (Not to say that you might hit the ball somewhere you don't want to, like off the field/court, or into the rough) And you could easily become a master at bowling, since the ball only weighs as much as the Wii Remote (which is not much at all).

Today one of my friends insisted on tying my hair into a bun. She was bored and figured she'd use my hair, like I was a doll or something. (I don't mind, though. For some reason I like it when people fuss with my hair.) So she tied it in a bun. It's kind of odd not to have my usual ponytail, but not bad either. At least I don't end up eating my hair at lunchtime.

After school some suspicious men went over to the trash dump (on the other side of my house's fence) and put down some wooden things (they looked like the backs of picture frames, or perhaps a painting easel, but who knows what they were). Then they unlocked the "gates" to the trash dump and opened it. Maybe that's what they do for a living or something.

It reminded me of something long forgotten from my childhood, though. Years ago, my grandma was staying at our house to watch over me, and she found a discarded rug on top of the trash dump. We brought it home, washed it, and then put it on the wood chips of my playground (I have a small playground in my backyard. Unfortunately I'm a bit big to use it nowadays). Whenever I use the swings my shoes tend to fall off, so now at least if I want to get off the swing I can step onto the rug and not get my socks poked by wood chips.

Labels: athlete, dump, enemy, hairstyle, newspaper, plagiarize, playground, replicate, rug, wii

Do you ever have a situation where you have your speakers turned on...Or, headphones/earphones for the computer on your head, and then suddenly an advertisement makes noise, or some music blasts out of nowhere? This happens to me sometimes, and I always get shocked and practically jump backwards from the computer.

I wonder if my dreams have some sort of meaning. In my dream I was sitting in Mr. Brown's science class, just minding my own business. There were other students and the teacher all there. Oddly enough, I could hear the songs from my blog playlist coming from one of Mr. Brown's computers, but no one seemed to care. (When Mr. Brown does listen to music out loud, it's normally some of sort of country/rock guitar songs.) And that reminds me, the two people I never see in my dreams or childhood memories is my parents... (I have distant memories of my mom, like for example when she took me out of preschool on my last day, but I never see her face. I have to see photos to know what my parents looked like.) Yet I dream of my classmates, friends, and even my grandma. Hmm.

Most recently I was reading a book called Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry. She's the author of Number the Stars, The Giver, and Gossamer, if those names ring a bell in your head. I am not particularly fond of Lowry's writing style, but the books do have some meaningful stuff in them, so if you're a contemplative philosophical person who likes to hear about different lifestyles, then you ought to check her books out.

My dad and I were looking at the travel section of our local Mercury News (a newspaper). It seems like cruise ships are still a popular way to travel despite our economy nowadays. My mom thought it was a lie, but I just said, "Cruises are so cool, they stand the test of time and all. Who doesn't like to travel by sea? ...Unless you get seasick, but..." It's been a while since the last time I've been on a cruise and I'm rarin' to go again. I hope we will go on a cruise in the summertime. (This also means less time spent at summer academic classes. Ho, ho, ho.)

I keep trying to get my dad to move the rocking chair to a place where I can more easily access it. He keeps the rocking chair in his room and uses it as storage. (Strewing clothes, newspapers, and what not on the chair) I, on the other hand, want to use the rocking chair, and have to clear away socks and TV remotes before I can even sit on it. I used to have my own rocking chair, and it is still in the living room, but it is not very comfortable because it is so small. (It was easier to use that one when I was young...Sigh.) Maybe I should get a Lazy Boy chair or something. My mom says they're like sofas but you can actually rock it back and forth.

It seems like the squirrels in our backyard have gone rabid again. We are constantly visited by squirrels and birds, and sometimes even an outdoor cat or a raccoon. Two squirrels were running around the backyard and performing athletic feats like rolling and flipping. I guess they like the rain even if my mom thinks it's a hassle and depressing.

Labels: books, cruise ship, dream, furniture, lois lowry, music, newspaper, philosophy, rocking chair, sound effect, squirrels, travel

I didn't really go outside today, except for piano class and a little bit of fresh air. I wonder if my skin will turn all white and pale form staying inside too much. Not so far, but then, I'm still young, or so my parents insist.

I finished reading a book today, Artemis Fowl. It was pretty interesting, but took longer than I expected...But I guess I'll end up reading the rest of the series anyway...I wonder if I read too much? The kids from school last year thought so. But my mom would rather have me read newspapers instead of novels. D:

Anyhow, I wonder if anyone really reads this blog? Maybe I should let people know I actually made a blog. Otherwise, I'll end up talking to myself, like those folks in the insane ward of the hospital. x_x

Labels: artemis fowl, blog, books, bookworm, myself, newspaper, pale, piano, skin, talking

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