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

Lately, in my science class, we've been dealing with explosives. We learned how to make uranium bombs in class. The process starts with getting ahold of uranium, which can be obtained by digging up ore from the ground, separating the uranium from the...other stuff, and making it into a powder called yellowcake. (Oddly enough, yellowcake was something I saw in the movie Get Smart.) Then the uranium is exposed to fluorine and is heated up to 56 degrees Celsius, where it becomes a gas called uranium hexafluoride. The gas is pumped into a centrifuge, which works like a merry-go-round/carousel... The heavier uranium atoms move to the outside and the lighter ones are gathered more around the inside/center. The lighter ones are the ones that are wanted for blowing things up. They are unstable and more fissionable than your regular old uranium atoms.

The uranium gets put into a bunch of centrifuges (in fact, about 1500 of them) so that it eventually reaches 90% purity (meaning the lighter and heavier atoms separated well and the uranium is easier to blow up), which is considered "weapons grade". The uranium is molded into a sphere which can be put into a weapon...As for actually setting off a bomb, that's not something I know or am allowed to be taught. o_o;; Otherwise we might not have a school anymore if some student was curious or vengeful. I mean, I think I heard someone suggest burning textbooks in the past.

I heard that you can't mention bombs at the airport, or some other place with security. I'm kind of curious what will happen if I do but at the same time I don't want to get in trouble when I have no intention of being a terrorist.

Anyways, we also watched some of a film called Kaboom! made by Nova. It talked about how explosives were discovered and developed over the ages. I hadn't known before that Alfred Nobel had bought a company that made guns or something like that. People thought he was being a hypocrite since he called himself a pacifist but made explosives, which served to kill people. Actually, he was hoping he could make a perfect weapon that would make war meaningless, but that didn't happen. And Alfred Nobel was haunted by the negative feelings coming from other people.

This kind of reminds me of the situation with Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson was a slave owner, but he wrote against slavery. This led to people considering him a hypocrite. But if he hadn't owned slaves, and had been an abolitionist, people would say, "You don't get it because you haven't had slaves." So it was either people didn't listen to him or they thought of him as a hypocrite. Not the greatest choices.

I haven't done much exploding in my life. Probably the most has been the typical experiment with vinegar and baking soda. Explosions are somehow captivating but are at the same time so devastating. They spread out so quickly.

Actually, I always think the adventure in the video game Super Smash Bros. Brawl, which is called "The Subspace Emissary". You'll see a lot of blowing up of areas there. It was pretty fun playing that, actually. I remember I got stuck on a part where you have to figure out where to move and jump or you'll die. I ended up having to look up how to do it on the Internet...Ugh. I try to figure things out on my own at first, but at the first sign of trouble I turn for help (I cheat like crazy in some games, like Starcraft and the Sims). I used to be so proud because I learned how to find my way around web sites and other things all by myself. I wonder if I'm becoming more dependent as I age, not less.

Labels: alfred nobel, atomic, bomb, cheat, dependent, explosive, get smart, guilt, hypocrite, movie, school, science, super smash bros brawl, the subspace emissary, thomas jefferson, uranium, video games

Due to an astronomy lab we've been doing in my science class, I go outside at night to look at the moon and record the phase and location. In the beginning, the skies were clear, and it was easy to see the moon. But then clouds moved in and I couldn't see it for a while. When the sky cleared up again, I still couldn't find the moon. It was a strange experience. The stars were still there, but the moon was nowhere to be seen. I thought perhaps it was blocked by a building or a tree, but no matter where I walked I couldn't see it.

In the morning, though, I saw the moon. It's just so strange, seeing it up there in that vast expanse of blue sky, instead of in the mist of a black blanket dotted with stars, the way it is at nighttime. I was rather annoyed at the moon, because I am only supposed to record when I see it at a certain time (the teacher wants us to try to view the moon at the same time each night that we go out). It showed up in the morning but refused to come out at nighttime.

In class today, one of my fellow students told the teacher that she had gone out at night and was also unable to see the moon. My teacher then got the attention of the class to explain this phenomenon.

My teacher said, "I have told the moon to go away for a while. Us science teachers are very powerful, so I have made it disappear. Look carefully every night and eventually I might let it come back out again." Another one of my classmates remarked, "I looked in the morning and I saw the moon." My teacher's reply was, "Ah! You cheated! Well, the moon is naughty and it tries to come out before it's supposed to."

So there you have it. A highly scientific explanation for why the moon is not visible sometimes, even without any clouds covering it. (If you want to know the real reason, you had better look it up since I only have a theory about it and it would be unwise to take that as fact.)

I was just looking at a picture of an exploding alarm clock on a magazine cover (Discover magazine March 2010 issue, if you want to know) and I was reminded of what of my "experiences" at Yosemite. It was difficult to get to sleep on the first night. Some kids had not gone to bed and were making a racket outside, or were giggling in their cabins. The heater in our cabin kept making some sort of rattling and banging noises. I kept sweating from the heater since I wasn't used to having it that warm. And then there were the two alarm clocks I had brought. They kept on ticking...My clock at home ticks too, but I never really noticed it. At Yosemite it seemed they were quite loud. One of my cabinmates said she wasn't used to it since she has a digital clock, which doesn't tick. After the first night, though, we become more accustomed to the loud nights and were able to get to sleep more easily. (And anyways, we were tired out from the strenuous daily hikes, or something.)

I have been rather concerned about my ability to remember to do my homework recently, especially the French homework. I forgot to do my French homework and remembered it during the night once, so I got up earlier in the morning to do it. And then today I was supposed to bring sunglasses because we were discussing summer/seaside activities in French class, but I forgot to bring those as well. (Then again, I'm not exactly sure where the sunglasses are, I will have to find them. I don't like to wear sunglasses. Although I like the cool way that they look, they always seem to slip down my face or otherwise get in my way. And I don't like how everything seems so dark or is tinted a weird color.) I wonder if my memory is getting bad or if I'm getting too careless. Both options are rather unpleasant.

Labels: astronomy, careless, clock, digital, distraction, forgetful, french, homework, magazine, magic, moon, powers, science, sky, sleep, sounds, teacher, ticking, trip, yosemite

Have you ever heard of that TV show called Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? I think I've watched it once or twice, not very much, but enough to get the gist of it. It's a game show, where a person tries to answer questions to win money. Sometimes the contestant asks for help from one of the fifth graders present. I used to be shocked by how little the contestants seemed to know. Like how they didn't know the epidermis was the outermost layer of skin.

But then again, I, having been quite a bit younger than those adults at the time, had learned the facts more recently, and since they were still fresh on my mind, I could recall them easily. Adults cannot remember all that much of what they learned when they were younger, except maybe the subject they teach if they are a teacher. My parents weren't even taught that much biology (there was more focus on physics and chemistry). And it's hard for me to talk to them about science because they learned the terms for things in Chinese, whereas I only know the English words. Well, anyways, there's no guarantee that they remember any history they learned. They still know how to do math, but they use it in their jobs (and in daily life - there is always that stress on "Math is important!") and I make them help me with hard homework problems, which are probably the main reasons for that.

I wonder if all these years of going to school are really worthwhile, then. If we don't remember much of it later on, what use is it to us? Knowledge is power, but if we lose that knowledge, has it not gone to waste? Or is it worth it to go school for other things, like the memories and friends we make? And yet at the same time it can be painful, when friends drift apart or fight and never make up, when friends move away, when you have difficulties in academics or in PE that you can't seem to overcome. When you have a teacher who seems to have a personal grudge against you. (Some of these have not happened to me. But I have drifted apart from friends. And many of my friends have moved away. I am lucky in being able to maintain contact with some of them. But I fear I might never see others ever again, except by some chance encounter. And what if I didn't recognize them? Because we had changed so much in our time apart?)

We still go to school anyways. (It is required by law, so I suppose it isn't much of a choice, but nevertheless...) We still take the good together with the bad. A few people do lose faith, lose hope, want to give up, try to end their lives so they can find an end to it all, have a chance at a fresh start. But as I heard in a school performance about puberty, "Suicide is a permanent solution to what may be only a temporary problem." And I suppose we all still have to keep struggling, keep living, reach out for the things we want, despite all those things that stand in the way, make you experience all the emotions you wished you would never feel again. I think it's something amazing, how there are still little things - and big things - that make it all worth it, that we can all bear our burdens for the sake of something precious.

I am getting awfully sidetracked. But then, that's not necessarily a bad thing. My history teacher was rambling about something that wasn't necessarily related to history, and then a student raised his hand to ask a question. The teacher said with a humph, "Great. You shouldn't interrupt me when I go off on a tangent. Now I feel like teaching again." At this point, we all groaned, since we preferred hearing interesting stories to getting an education. (I mean, hearing stories is a kind of education too, an education in life instead of just in academics.)

We didn't have much to do in science class at the end of the day, so a student said, "Hey, do you want to play Stump the Science Teacher"? The teacher asked how it was played. The student said that it was his goal to ask a question about any kind of science that the teacher would be unable to answer. He asked, "What is cement made up of?" The teacher said, "Well...What kind of cement are you talking about? Different grades of cement are used depending on the purpose. Do you mean our modern cement, or the kind that was made a long time ago in England?" and so on. I think it was more like the teacher stumped the student than the other way around.

Labels: are you smarter than a 5th grader, cement, change, daily, distraction, education, friends, game, life, loss, math, memory, pain, school, science, show, story, teacher, television, waste

A while back, my science teacher started us on an Astronomy Observation Lab. We were to go outside ten times to look at the moon and draw it. We were given a month to do a project. Spring break overlapped with the time given to do the lab.

My teacher said that if you were going on vacation during the spring break, you could just reorient your map while you were there so you could still do your homework. She said that one student had gone to Chicago and came back saying "I couldn't see the moon." But my teacher says that she's been to Chicago, and the moon is still there. "The moon is a big dude," said my teacher.

I wonder what makes people decide the genders of things. The Earth is called Mother Earth, and nature is called Mother Nature. But people say The Man in the Moon. Whose decision is it to determine the genders of things? I mean, all objects have a gender in French, and I'm curious about that too. There is kind of a way to say "it" in French, but mostly you would refer to "he" or "she". But in English we just refer to things as "it" so frequently. I suppose this is a trait that sets English apart?

One of my classmates mentioned something interesting to me. She says that when she reads Chinese, she just thinks of the Chinese words in her head, but when she reads French, she translates it to English in her mind. My mom says that when you practice a lot, you end up understanding automatically and don't need to translate to English. (When my mom was first learning English, she says she would translate it to Chinese in her head first, but now she can just think of the English words) But I, despite being so unskilled in Chinese, do this too. When I see the Chinese word for the number one (one of the only characters I can read! Yeah!) I think of the Chinese word for it, not "one". So is Chinese just different? Are languages spelled with symbols like this in comparison to languages with the same alphabet in English? That means the languages with English letters make me feel smarter, because I can translate it to English automatically in my head. XD

I was told a rather unsettling thing by someone. On my school trip to Yosemite National Park, we stopped at a town called Los Banos. I was told that it actually means something like "The Bathrooms". Imagine if you were saying that you ate in Los Banos and someone who understood Spanish walked by...

In history class, I and some other students had a presentation about Mormons, irrigation, and Mexican food. One of my group's members said the names of various foods in Spanish. The teacher later said that she pronounced them quite well and asked if she spoke Spanish. The girl said, "No." A classmate said, "But don't you take Spanish? So wouldn't you be able to speak it?" And the teacher said, "Taking Spanish class and being able to speak it are different matters."

I think that is true. People may be learning a language in school, but can they really speak it? I have noticed that sometimes students have trouble actually putting words together even if they know what the words mean, and that speaking the language out loud seems harder than writing it. I heard that you could really learn the language faster if you actually lived in the country of the language you wanted to learn. (My French teacher says we could learn a lot more in just a few months in France than what she could teach in a year because we would be "forced" to adapt to the country and learn French) I'd like to move to another country, experience something different, but I don't know when it will happen. (My mom has suggested having me move to France for a while and live with my aunt's family, but I feel it would be rather stressful with her rambunctious children)

Labels: bathroom, chicago, chinese, country, english, experience, foreign, french, gender, language, learning, los banos, moon, school, science, spanish, speaking, symbol, teacher, translation

My mother has revealed her uncanny knack for making things. (Well, she was always better with her hands than I was, but never mind that) Why, just today, she was helping me out with a project about buoyancy we're doing in school.

The project is a partner project. I have a partner who I work with in science class. The point of the project was to build a boat which weighs less than 15 pennies and for the boat to float for 10 seconds in water with a load of 60 pennies, 2 quarters, 3 dimes, and a nickel. You can't get a premade boat or use a boat-building kit, and the boat needs to be small enough so it won't hit the sides of Lake Hembry. (Lake Hembry is not an actual landmark, it's a big tub filled with water. It got polluted by the coins)

My partner and I worked on it on Monday and Tuesday. Our first stage of the boat, which was simply a box made of aluminum foil with toothpicks in the corners and yellow masking tape to make the walls higher, worked fine, and was able to hold the load quite well when we performed a test run. However, some problems did occur later on. For one thing, my partner had some ideas, like added another structure made out of carton and putting it in the boat (which I denied him, because it would add to the mass without really adding to the volume, thus making the boat more likely to sink). We ended up putting paper on top of the foil, and putting another layer of foil on. Then we added another layer of tape. It still floated, but now it was leaking, which is very dangerous. And so I brought it home, planning to patch the leaks (I tried to do that with Scotch transparent tape, but the transparent tape soaked up too much water).

And so here came my mother to the rescue. She said we should simply build a new, better boat, so we did. We got some aluminum foil and recreated the boxlike shape. (I know a box isn't necessarily as good, because that means it has more mass and less volume than just an almost completely horizontal boat, but we have to make sure water doesn't flow over the sides and into the boat) We put plastic wrap on the inside of the box so that even if there were holes in the aluminum foil, the water would not leak into the part of the boat where we put the coins. And then my mom suggested we line the base of the inside of the boat with four straws so the walls would stay straight. And now we are just waiting for my dad to bring masking tape since he probably can find that at his office (he insists he is much more valuable to the company than masking tape, so no one minds if he takes supplies as long as he's not abusing them).

My mom is much more resourceful than my partner and I combined. I feel the need to bow down to her. I never really thought my parents had great knowledge of science despite the fact that they have Master's Degrees (my mother in Physics, my father in Electrical Engineering). So I guess it's like a wake-up call for me. You can never judge a book by its cover; you can't underestimate people, either.

Let me give you an example...There's a book called The Star of Kazan by Eva Ibbotson. (I can't recall whether I've talked about it, so please tell me if I already have) I had been seeing this book in the library quite a few times. (This was some time ago, when the Calabazas branch of the San Jose library was not yet planning to close) I always debated whether to check it out. I wasn't sure if I was going to like it or not. Finally I did check it out, and it turned out to be one of my favorite books. This isn't a risk, but it reminds me of what my math teacher has been talking about...

He said that some students have parents who are successful in their fields. And if the parents would be asked by their fellow workers "What can I do to get ahead?" (regarding work) the people would say, "Do what everyone else is doing" or something like that. And they want their kids to do that too. "Get all A's. "Take as many AP classes as possible." And my teacher said that colleges are not going to be interested in you if you do the same as everyone else. True, having good grades is definitely helpful. But you need to make yourself look different. The colleges are interested in people who have dreams and plans for the future, who are going to do great things (to make the colleges famous! XD). So my teacher said, "Why do all of you not want to take a job at Starbucks? Go join the Peace Corps? You have to take risks sometimes in life." And I heard someone say (not to the teacher, "I only care about getting rich." So my previous post, about the selfish people, is proven... People really are selfish after all.

Labels: aluminum foil, boat, buoyancy, college, different, eva ibbotson, knowledge, lake hembry, leak, library, master's degree, physics, problem, risk, science, selfish, success, the star of kazan

I haven't posted in a while on this blog. I guess I've been busier this school year than I ever expected it to be. I was told eighth grade was a harder year by far but seeing as seventh grade was such a lax year for me, this is really a change. I have to get used to it again or I will lose all semblance of free time except for on weekends.

I'm already beginning to worry because I had some pretty unfortunate luck in science class. I was assigned the very first of the presentation days for my Current Events this trimester. Basically, Current Events is where you pick a newspaper article or something, and then you write about it and give a speech. Except in this case it has to be science related. I have a pretty good idea what article I'm going to use, but seeing as I have only until September 8th to get everything together, it's stressful. Also, I'm not very good at public speaking so I'm afraid my lack of charisma will result in a worse grade. I mean, in the past I have rocked on my feet from nervousness or missed some crucial part of the presentation or something along those lines.

As for the blog title, what I mean is that if you don't touch something for a while, dust collects on it. Like corners of my piano. The little parts at the very left and right sides of your piano keys, well, you never really put your hand there so there's dust on it. I had better make sure mold and dust and such doesn't grow on my blog.

I'd appreciate if you all let me know if the blog's layout is working out right for you. Sometimes the header and background image don't show up so the layout looks all weird and you can't see things like the navigation. And when you view certain pages, since I wrote too much, the scrollbar looks like it's cutting off the text. I'm going to try and fix it if I get the chance. Anyhow, if you can't see the navigation, try highlighting the page with your cursor (the arrow or whatever thing you have on the computer screen that you use to click on things) until you can see the stars. (I will see about changing them to text, maybe it'll be easier to navigate that way as well.)

Today my language arts teacher and class were supposed to sing the birthday song to me and another classmate of mine. Our birthdays are in August (more specifically the 5th) but since we have summer birthdays we have to celebrate during the school year instead. However, we didn't have enough time in class and so I didn't receive my head of the line pass or get sung to. I don't really care about that but I worry that maybe the teacher has trouble managing time or something. (Or perhaps it's just because it's Wednesday, a short day.) It's a good thing I have brunch right after language arts class.

Labels: birthday, busy, current events, dust, eighth grade, language arts, layout, middle school, navigation, problem, public speaking, science, speech, summer, time management

That's what I thought when I peered inside the science classroom yesterday. It was almost the end of lunch, so I wanted to see if the classroom was open yet. Surprisingly, it was unlocked, and I saw not only my own teacher in there, but also the next-door teacher. Both had their laptops and the TV was on. They were watching SOCCER of all things! I didn't know you were allowed to do that at school. (But who knows. Mr. Brown has his own Internet server just in his room, apparently. And he makes food in his beakers.) I backed out quickly and hoped they hadn't noticed.

Mr. Brown shut off the TV once class was getting under way, but later he said he would turn it back on so we could watch the game if we did our work. The game was between Manchester United and Portugal. (Note: Manchester is in England.) There were some guys in the background announcing what was going on. I don't remember their names exactly but their voices are familiar. I know that because of my dad.

My father always used to play this Fifa Soccer 2002 game on the Gamecube until he got a newer version. He always has a Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2003 game. It's been a long time since he's played them, though, because now he has a Wii and can play Wii Sports or Wii Fit instead. I guess he thinks it will help him exercise. And he can't play a lot of games because he gets motion sickness easily. (I don't, which is weird, but maybe it's because I first played a video game at my parent's friend's house back when I was in kindergarten, so...)

Nowadays my insomnia is getting worse. I usually turn off the lights between 10 and 11 pm, which is pretty late, I know. It wouldn't be a problem if I didn't keep waking up early in the morning. Even though today is late start and I have enough time to sleep in, I still woke up at 7:45 and had to use the bathroom. I couldn't get back to sleep since it was sunny outside. So I wish it was winter again so I could actually get enough sleep. (The problem is, it would be really cold and miserable weather.)

My PE teacher was absent today yet again, so we got a substitute, an intimidating-looking guy who barked at us. He didn't even say what his name was. We had to do this skittles thing (You run to one end of the blacktop, then gallop sideways to the other end, then do karaokes to the opposite end, then skip back to the other end, then run to your PE number). Then we ran a mile, which was no fun because it was kind of raining. But at least it wasn't extremely hot like the weather has been a lot lately. Afterwards we had free time so I joined up with my friends in Mr. Blair's PE class and we played paddle ball, which is like tennis, but we just lower the nets on the volleyball courts to play. One of my friends used her PE notebook to hit the ball, which actually worked somewhat. Anyhow, the substitute turned out not to be scary. He complained about having wet clothes and socks because of standing outside all day in the rain. One of my friends suggested we get him some dry clothes from the Lost and Found, but he said it would be hard to find something his size. And no offense to him, that's true.

My most recent anime is Kamichama Karin. It was depressing in the beginning and I didn't like the theme song that much so I was considering quitting. But after a while it got to be more amusing, especially because the main character is always calling another guy "Something Glasses Guy"! For instance, she's called him "Shopping Glasses Guy", "Crossdressing Glasses Guy", and so on. He always got mad and yelled that he was Karasuma Kirio.

Labels: anime, classroom, glasses guy, kamichama karin, manchester united, motion sickness, paddle ball, portugal, science, sleep, soccer, television, video games

I came up with a scientific experiment you can try at home with bottles of shampoo, conditioner, or body wash. Oftentimes it is hard to get out the substance you want to use if there is not much of it left in the container. So, since most containers are designed to have the lid thing facing the ceiling, you'll have to wait a while for the shampoo/conditioner/body wash to fall all the way down so you can squirt it out. Instead, swing it backward towards your shoulder, then with one powerful movement swing it back forward. The momentum and the kinetic energy together make the shampoo/conditioner/body wash quickly move to the other end of the bottle. This worked with a Softsoap Honey and Milk bodywash but it didn't work with the Vanilla Organic Conditioner since it is so thick and dry, nowhere near liquidy enough.

It's been such a long time since I've last posted...I've been busy with projects (A children's story in language arts, and I made the pages too big, so I have to draw huge pictures for it, and also a booklet in science about geologic history). But not only that, there's the evil TurboTax!

TurboTax is a program which my dad uses at least once or twice a year to take care of all the taxes our family has to pay. My dad takes out a lot of papers and stares at the computer screen until his face becomes angry. While doing TurboTax he's always grumpy, so he either won't respond when you talk to him, or he'll pick fights. Like if you hang around the computer he starts asking in an angry way, "Do you want to use the computer or not?!" And when I say no he just gets even madder. It's really scary and my mom doesn't like it either. I think he might need some anger management books.

My dad has started watching drama sometimes too. There is this one show in Mandarin which he will watch some evenings. The music is repetitive and there doesn't seem to be a lot of different songs. It is cheesy music but kind of catchy in a weird way. One time the music played while one of the characters on the TV was answering their phone (which had a rather generic ringtone). I thought it was bad timing to play the background music at a time like that.

On Friday, my history teacher was looking pretty upset. Mr. Blair had new glasses and his face was very angry and serious, so he looked scary. I heard someone stole a can of Coca Cola out of Mr. Blair's mini-fridge. I don't think that's the only reason, though. He wouldn't look that upset over just one can of soda, would he? Unless it was like a Gatorade bottle where you might've won something. and he won some kind of sweepstakes.

Labels: background, coca cola, drama, emotions, homemade, kinetic energy, momentum, music, projects, science, shampoo, soda, turbotax

Monday marks the beginning of a new week. But it also means the weekend is over, awww. D: So, another long week until the weekend returns. Oh well.

Science class was the highlight of the day for me this time. The teacher, whose name is Mr. Brown, was telling us about pine martens, which was our "Animal of the Week". He's in the middle of it when two boys come in, apparently Mr. Brown's old students. One of them has a Pizza My Heart t-shirt, and since there will be something going on at the local Pizza My Heart soon, Mr. Brown asks where the Pizza My Heart is anyhow.

The boy starts talking about there being a hotel and Petsmart and a Starbucks near it. Then Mr. Brown thanks him and says his favorite phrase, "Moving right along..." So, the boy begins saying that in a singsong way, and begins to dance as well, as he and his friend back out of the room. Once he thought they were gone, Mr. Brown said, "That kid is mentally retarded." I wonder if it's true. D:

Labels: animal of the week, animals, moving right along, pine marten, pizza my heart, science, singsong, week

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