Duck story

Today was a sunny, bright morning where the birds chirp and the cars drive by on the road. I start to waddle over to my pond that is only a few yards away; where the water-lilies  are bright green with the bees flying around the white and pink flowers floating in the water. The misty air that covered the grassy green floor is hard to breathe in at first, but after only a moment of walking, I could finally breathe yet again. My duck friends are already gathered around the petite pond, so I quack towards them, and they all turned. Quickly I waddled even faster towards them, so I could get a spot in between, to swim.

Once I finally reached the edge of the water, I jumped as hard as I possibly ever could, and landed directly on a water-lily. I came up from going under-water and realized I could barely move my wings. All of the ducks were starring at me, and I had to idea why. When I looked down at myself, I had a gooey green substance all over myself, and I realized I had a small frog on my head.

 I didn’t care if I couldn't fly, but man was the frog annoying just sitting on my head. So I shrieked my loudest quack and the frog got off and into the water. Of course, I had to chase after it. It was like a game between us. So I chased after this little frog, until I realized where this chase was headed to.  I slowed my pace down, because I almost just got hit by a car! I cannot believe a gigantic car would try to run over a sweet little innocent duck like me! Curse them.

On my way back from chasing after the frog, I realized everyone was swimming in the substance I just was. It was so much fun when I jumped in too! My duck friends and I played together all day, until it started to become dark.  I was beginning to yawn, so I called it a night.

Win and Die?

Author's Note: My class and I read a short story of The Lottery by an author who lived in California and wrote this in 1948. Her name is Shirley Jackson and I believe this is a great, but saddening story.

In the short story "The Lottery" by the author of Shirley Jackson, Tessie Hutchinson one of the main characters in the village, was killed by stones and rocks that the other families and her children, had to throw at her. I thought this was kind of ironic because Tessie was late to the gathering, and she had gotten upset when her husband was picked. One sad moment that had happened in the story was when the younger boys in the family had cheered when they didn't get the black dot on their sheet of paper, but they just realized that their mother had to pay the price; of dying by rocks that they had to throw at her themselves.

I believe that the black box and the black dot for the lottery was a sign of death for anyone who entered their name in it. When you first begin to read the story, people most likely thought it would be an actual lottery where a family earned money and became rich. In this case, it was the exact opposite and I thought that was unbelievable and ironic for the story. Therefore one of the themes that I believe could fit for the short story would be the theme of survival. Why I thought of survival was because every year the villagers had to enter their family's name in this box and see if someone had to lose their life for this traditional event. If you weren't chosen, you could happily live your lives without the fear of having to be sacrificed for a inhuman tradition.

This story should have a happy ending, but sadly it is the exact opposite and it makes you think to yourself what happened back then, and then compare it to now. Are there still traditions like that, in the world? There is mostly likely a tradition or sacrifice in other countries, but I personally don't believe there are any in the United States. 

The True Killer

Author's note: Here's a story that I came up with. From my story the perspective will be from two children, out of the six. The perspective is from two children that are twins, and their names are Jason and Jasmine. I am going to write this piece for my District Assessment paper. 

In the midst of the night, almost about two in the morning, it started to drizzle outside the old mansion. The young twins, Jason and Jasmine, woke up startled; not from the rain, but from a terrible nightmare that they somehow had together. This nightmare was about the two of them being captured, and killed.  The twins had no idea where the source of the nightmare originated from, or how they had the same exact dream, but it happened. The thing that they aren't aware of is that they aren't the only children in the world that had the dream. Little did they know, they weren't the only two kids that had somehow created this life-like nightmare that included four other children, all over the world.

The next morning, just after sunrise, the two twins adventured downstairs into the kitchen, where the parents were sipping coffee, to tell their parents their horrendous dream.  "Good morning papa! Good morning mama!" said the twins as one. "Good morning sweethearts. Did you sleep well?" asked the mother who was in her purple pajamas. Jason looked at Jasmine, and they both got wide-eyed while they thought of how to start to explain their dream. Slowly, but steadily, they turned to their half-asleep parents and explained that they had a nightmare together. Their parents then took precautions and got worried.

From there on out, for an hour long, the twins were explaining, or trying to, that frightening vision they had together, and what all happened. When they were finally finished explaining themselves, the parents looked concerned. The father questioned them on who was all in it, what happened to them, and finally if they had ever had the same dream before. The last answer was a no, and that got the parents even more worried. The parents told the children to ignore it all, but it kept happening for the rest of the week; but all of the other times, the kids would act like they were insane, and needed medical help. That’s when they finally packed suitcases, and traveled to a mental institution in South-eastern Carolina.

That very next day they traveled to South Carolina. From there six hour flight, to the parents starting to become cranky from their kids constantly wanting to jump around; they just wanted to get to a hotel, or even the mental hospital and see what the problem was.  As they all traveled in a rental car to the mental hospital, Jasmine  watched Jason start to have a spasm attack, and she then  started to hyperventilate because she was scared of what was happening. The father saw and pressed as hard as he could down on the accelerator to get to the hospital quicker. "Thank gosh there's no cops around" thought the father. After at least 10 minutes, they were finally at the hospital, rushing in, and the mother screaming "HELP! SOMEONE HELP MY CHILDREN!" In the next second a load of nurses came rushing around the corner, and grabbing the children away from the parents and dragging the twins into a room. Jason had finally calmed down, after the nurses gave him a special, shot.  Now he was just plain out dizzy, but yet screaming out to his sister that he saw across the room, trying to breathe from an oxygen tank.

When he tried getting up and walking towards her, he stumbled across the room, like a person that just got finished drinking; Knocking over metals of some sort, and medications.  Just before he reached Jasmine, he stumbled over a table, and feinted, hitting his head on the white, stone-cold floor. When he awoke, he was facing the ceiling and could tell that he was lying in a cold bed, with his arms wrapped around himself. Although he was comfy just lying there, his thoughts slowly seeped back to him, and he remembered that he was in a mental hospital, and something happened to his sister. He shot up quickly from the bed, just to find that his body was connected to so many tubes, and his arms were tied together. When he was searching around the room for his sister, he saw four other children, about his age; possibly a year or two younger or older. There were two boys and two girls separated throughout the room; and they looked restrained, such as himself. Finally, in the corner next to the other two girls, he saw his sleeping sister. Who looked so innocent and sweet while she dreamt. Jason knew he couldn't walk over there, so he called out to Jasmine, but there was no answer. He thought she was just deep in sleep; nothing else to it.

Although he felt as if he was a trapped monkey in a cage, he just stared at the kids in the room with him. He was becoming curious as to why they were here with them, and what they did to have come here in the first place. After about twenty minutes of staring at one boy laying down six feet away from him, the boy turned, and smiled. "Hi. You must be new around here." All Jason could do was stare, but then a minute later nodded slowly. "Well I've been here at least a month. It's boring around here, but I'm glad there are new people around. My name's Robert. Yours?" stated the other boy; who seemed to be older than he looked. "My…My names Jason. Over there is my twin sister Jasmine." he stammered, but felt like adding in the last part, so that the other boy would know that there together. "Twins? That’s different. We haven't had twins in here before." and from there on out, for the next two hours Jason spoke with every sibling in the room, except for his own sister.

Even though Jason is becoming comfortable with the other four kids in the room, he still couldn't shake the feeling of distrust and worry for his sister, and these people. He figured out the names of everyone in the room, and why they were here. Robert and Stephen were the two boys, about his own age, and the two girls names were Angelica and Nicole, about his sister’s age. They were all here for the same reason as Jasmine and him; because of the nightmare and the actions after it. Jason started to wonder where everyone's parents were, but shook off the feeling when his sister finally woke up from her deep sleep, bleary-eyed. She looked confused and frightened, almost in tears, because all of the kids were looking at her. She finally stopped once she placed Jason at the far end of the room, looking at her, with his smile.

In the next several days at being in the hospital, it was the same routine; going into the room to sleep and hangout with the four other kids, eat in the small cafeteria, get shots everyday to calm ourselves down if we start to act strange, and this week the parents were able to come visit. Just, the only difference that day was during the middle of the night, it started to thunderstorm outside of the room that they were staying in. You could see lightening through the window, and it looked like a nasty sight outdoors. Everyone in the room took a deep sigh and turned to face each other. Right after that, Jasmine realized she's seen all of this before. She remembered it from their dream, and after she explained that to Jason, he also remembered it.

Then in the next second, a wailing of a siren went off. Everyone in the room, including Jasmine and Jason, jumped up from their beds. They didn't dare move, because sirens have gone off before, but they were fake alarms. It would take at least ten minutes for the nurses to declare it was fake, so the children waited, and sat back down. Jasmine came close to Jason and whispered "Do you remember this from the dream too? This is scaring me Jason." "I know Jasmine…I know. But I'm right here. I won’t leave you." just then did Robert ask "Is it too quiet in this building, or is it just me?" We were all quiet, because no one knew what to do, or say. "It is awfully quiet out there…has everyone left and forgot us? What happened? Why aren't the nurses saying anything, or checking up on us?" Thought Jason. "Well…I'm going to see what's happening out there. Anyone care to join me?" wondered Stephen. Everyone crept along with him outside the doorway. We all were wondering where everyone was, because we didn't even see one nurse or child in the hallway like we normally do.

After a few minutes, Nicole thought of the idea of splitting us all up into pairs, to cover more ground in the hospital. Everyone agreed because none of us knew what else to do with ourselves. Within twenty minutes, Jasmine and I both were almost on the other side of the hospital. It was a lonely feeling, and every hallway was as dark as the night sky. It was a creepy and nauseous feeling looking through rooms and hallways alone, but we handled it well enough. *BOOM* The thunderstorm outside was still going strong, and it made the night worse. "Should we turn back and look for the others?" Jasmine questioned as she tugged at Jason's arm. He nodded, so they turned back and started to walk the way they came. "AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Help me! Help me!" someone close by screamed. Jason started hurtling himself forward as fast as he could, but it wasn't fast enough. When he reached the room where the scream came from, no one was there, except for part of a ripped shirt which looked like Nicole's. "Now I'm completely freaked out." thought Jasmine. They kept moving towards where they traveled from, but one by one, almost every five minutes, we heard a scream. Some of them the twins recognized others they didn't. But every time they reached the location of the scream, something from that person was left behind.

Jasmine started whining, then crying after running around and finding objects that belonged to the people they just got to know. Jason kept trying to sooth her and make her smile, but nothing worked, and he soon gave up and broke down with her. "For some reason", thought Jason, "everyone keeps dying around us and we don’t even know why. Is there a murderer on the lose? Or are they playing a sick minded joke on us?" "How come I've seen all of this in my dream Jason? I don’t like living this nightmare." questioned Jasmine. "Let's just try and find a way out of here before we answer that." answered Jason who all of a sudden had enough courage to stop and think of someway of breaking out of the hospital. "How about we try and find the entrance to this place, and then we'll find some help along the way" Thought Jason out loud.

After an hour of searching throughout the night for the entrance, they finally found it. When they looked outside, it was almost dawn, and the thunderstorm was slowly coming to a halt. They could see the horizon, and the sun peeking out from the clouds above. It looked like it would be an amazing day, once they could get out of this spine-chilling building. After a few minutes of double-checking that no one was around, Jasmine and Jason slowly walked out of the building, until they heard one more shriek of help. Then dead silence walked the halls.

Give Your Heart A Break

Author's note: This is just a poetry piece I chose to write for one of my language arts goals. I wrote this poem after I listened to the song "Give Your Heart A Break" by Demi Lovato.

All day and all night
To sunrise
And sundown
I've only been thinking
About you

 I threw a wish
In the well
And wished for you

I didn’t know
I would feel it
But in the end
I fell for you

That first day
That I met you
My world would never be
The same way
It was before

I've tried playing it cool
But when I'm looking at you
I can see it in your eyes
That smile you try to hide

I don’t know what it is
But I'm going out of my mind
Just to let you know
I love you

Did you believe in love at first sight?
I didn't
Not until I first saw you

And yet
In the end
I'm still crazy about you

Common Cold

Author’s note: This is a research essay for my science class. It is about the common cold, how it could affect you, how you can cure it and the differences between colds and allergies.

 Everyone feels the horrible dread of feeling like they’re going to puke, or pass out. Every single person in the world goes through this feeling, but it may be more serious, or it’s an overreaction. Feeling this queasiness of not feeling well, you may have something wrong going on in your body, which you’re not exactly sure of. Although sickness and viruses may be deadly to the body, you can still cure and react to your common colds. Possibly not knowing what’s going on in your body is a good thing. On the other hand, it’s also a terrible thing. Most of the time if someone doesn’t feel well it may be because they have the common cold.

 A common cold is a virus or disease spreading throughout your body and it interacts or mingles with your cells, until it goes away. Even though there are more than 100 types of sickness, or viruses that spread around the world, people mostly only get unwell at least 4 to 8 times a year (Common Cold, 1998 - 2012). This mostly happens during the winter season, when it is cold and wet. When you first catch a cold, you may have been with it for a few days, without even realizing it. The virus doesn’t take effect until at least 2 or 3 days later (National Center for Biotechnology Information). Normally, whenever you catch a cold or small sickness, you receive it from another person, possibly even a friend or family member. If you want to try your hardest not to take delivery of this illness, then try and stay away from someone that was, or is sick, until you positively know for certain that they have gotten rid of it. Another risk of becoming in poor health would be going someplace where there is a huge crowd, because of all the germs and illnesses that could possibly be spreading through the air. One other step you could take is to wash your hands constantly in case you touched someone that has a virus, or something that they may have touched themselves (MedicineNet).

While you are on your infection or condition, you will be hoping to find cures to get rid of them. One cure is eating chicken noodle soup. For the most part, that does help prevent it, or makes you feel better for a little while. On the other hand, taking medications might also help with the pain and prevent even more damage to yourself, if you have gotten worse. Lastly, another treatment you could try would be either gargling salt to help your throat if it hurts, or to drink lots of fluids, such as water, orange juice, milk, or anything else that might possibly help with curing your unpleasant cold (Common Cold, 1998 - 2012).

 If you have ever thought or confused a cold with some other symptom, it might have possibly been an allergy, because they are closely similar. You catch shocking colds from other people that are sick, but for allergies, you would catch them from your other family members, when you were born. Normally whenever or wherever you have an allergy, it is most likely to be indoors or outdoors (Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp.) If you have an allergic reaction, you might have the symptoms of runny nose, sneezing, itchy nose, congestion, sore throat, headaches and possibly more (Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp). You can use medications to help prevent these affects of the body, but it may not always help. If you go to the doctors and they give you a certain medication, you must take it, to get rid of the reaction. The symptoms of an allergy and an illness are almost identical, but if you’re not quite sure which is which, ask a doctor.

Meanwhile, if you’re possibly feeling ill, is it because you have an allergy, disease, or something worse? Or is it just a simple common cold? If you feel unwell or appalling, it most likely has the results of you having a cold, in which you recovered from someone that has been by you recently. Most people would take medications to prevent the pain, or runny nose, but you can also just simply rest and take care of yourself.


 Bibliography Common Cold. 1998 - 2012. 18 April 2012 . Jack M. Gwaltney, MD and MD Frederick G. Hayden. What a common cold is. 1999 - 2007. 18 April 2012 . MedicineNet. "Common Cold Symptoms." Common Cold (1996 - 2012). MedicineNet, Inc. A cold, or seasonal allergies? 1996 - 2012. 19 April 2012 . Merck Sharp & Dohme Corp., a subsidiary of Merck & Co., Inc., Whitehouse Station, N.J., U.S.A. Indoor and Outdoor Allergies. 1998 - 2012. 19 April 2012 . National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine 8600 Rockville Pike, Bethesda MD, 20894 USA. Common Cold. 2012. 18 April 2012 .

Shari Cooper

Author’s note: This is a Character Development piece about the main character in the novel Remember Me and how her actions affected people around her. Her name was Shari Cooper and she was a dynamic character.

in the beginning of the novel Remember Me , Shari Cooper was just a young, eighteen year-old girl that was just starting to figure out what to do with her life. Her flowing blond highlighted hair and her eyes as green and bright as springs grass, are now gone forever from the world. She was once the popular rich girl, but now is the girl that has been murdered. Shari Cooper has developed and changed in a way that makes her a dynamic character.

First off, Shari Cooper was an innocent, sweet, popular girl in her school and at home. She was especially sincere to her older brother, who had diabetes and color blindness. She loves him more than anyone in her life, even her best friend and boyfriend. But, that innocence was lost when she started doing drugs and drinking. She became pregnant with her boyfriend’s baby, and it seemed like she didn’t care as much for her other friends and family members.

Even though Shari changed in ways that she shouldn’t have, she is still the same girl that she was before, just a little more disobedient. During the party, where she died from a balcony, she found out that her boyfriend was cheating on her with one of her friends. She became depressed and then wouldn’t talk to anyone. But then later on in the novel, that is especially when she has changed into a dynamic character. When she died, she turned into a ghost roaming around the world, looking for things to do, such as helping her friends understand that she will be fine, and so will they. She protected them from their dangerous fates, and her own, until there was none left.

For the rest of the novel Remember Me, Shari was helping another girl that has gone through the same thing as her. This girl was taking drugs and failing in school, until Shari came and helped her secretly, without the other girl knowing what was happening. Shari Cooper has changed lives, as of her own, and she is always constantly helping other people, even if she is dead. Shari herself has changed because she normally wouldn’t help any other person, unless truly wanted to.

Although Shari Cooper has helped people out in their lives, she has helped herself too throughout being dead. She has changed in a way that most people wouldn’t understand, and she has helped change other people’s lives for the better. She started to see the world as a better place for others to live in. This happened in another story too, such as The Outsiders. Ponyboy, the main character in that short story, was also a dynamic character who changed the way he saw things, and he helped the society he lived in, from becoming friends with other people, rather than just hiding, or staying the way he was. He helped his family members through rough times, such as losing some of their friends along the way.

The reason I believe the ghost Shari Cooper has turned into a dynamic character is because she made her life, and the people around her, see that life is great to be living in. and that you should live the best of it for what it’s worth, rather than dreading it. With her actions, she has helped save a few lives of her friends, and has learned a few things of her own. That goes for the main character in The Outsiders, because he has learned how to create a better environment and he has changed a few lives around him.

Big Yellow Taxi & Field Below response

Author's note: I am going to do a short response to the two poems of Big Yellow Taxi, by Joni Mitchell and then the other poem of Field Below by Regina Spektor.

In the two interesting poems, they both relate to each other because they both are missing something to do with nature, or where they used to live. The poems both are depressing or sad, for the tone, while in the mood of the poems, they both are sad, or feeling alone. Both poems miss something, and they can't possibly get it back. You don't know what you have, until it's gone.

When I listened to both of the songs for the poems. The poem Big Yellow Taxi, was more up-beet and energetic and happy. While when I listened to the song Field Below, it was still a depressing sound, like it sounded in the poem. Therefore possibly the true meaning in Big Yellow Taxi isn't supposed to be depressing, but just telling a story of a young person, still happy, but missing something. On the other hand, the Field Below poem was just like the song, because it was a saddened story, or depressing, and the music was slow and meaningful.

I believe that the author's of the two poems did a great job, but when it came to the music, they should have changed it. The Big Yellow Taxi music should have been slower, like I expected it to be, because of the tone and mood of the poem. For the Field Below poem, the music was perfectly fine, because it was some-what of a depressing, slow song that fits to the poem. I believe that both of the author's did a good job on all of it, and I especially like how they relate to each other.