Food for Thought

One of my favorite book series, Redwall, by Brian Jacques, has been one of my favorites for a long time. One of the things I always wanted to do was try the different foods that were mentioned throughout the books. Things like October Ale, Mole's Favorite Deeper n' Ever Turnip and Tater and Beetroot pie(not an actual pie), and other such foods. Then one year for Christmas, I believe it was my seventh grade year, my grandparents got me the Redwall Cookbook, filled with recipes for the foods in the books. While I don't make things from it often, it is still amazing. I found out how to make two really good drinks, and I found out that it's a bad idea to put a pot with rubber handles in the oven. Yeah, wasn't the best idea ever, but at least the food still tasted good.

Summer Strawberry Fizz: strawberry ice cream, strawberries, seltzer water, blended together. Makes one delicious smoothie.

October Ale: 2/3 cup ginger ale, 1/3 cup grape juice, mixed together. Fill your cup two thirds full with ginger ale, then add the grape juice to finish filling it, I find it makes for a nice drink.

Books for Kids

Title: Fox in Socks
Author: Dr. Seuss
Author's Bio: No author's bio in the book.
Cover: The cover is a red fox wearing blue socks walking on orange grass.
Page Number: It has 61 pages.
Characters: Fox, Knox, Chicks, Sue, Slow Joe Crow, Goo-Goose, Bim, Ben, Luke Luck, Luke's Duck, Tweetle Beetles.
Summary: Fox likes to rhyme and say tongue twisters, and is trying to get Knox to say them. Knox is protesting that he can't say tongue twisters. Knox eventually gets mad at Fox's continued efforts, sticks him in a bottle, and leaves.
Does this book...
   have animals as characters? Yes.
   use rhyme? Yes.
   teach a lesson of some kind? No.
   have monsters or creatures? Yes.
   have kids as characters? No.
   have adults as characters? Yes.
   use humor? Yes.
   have illustrations? Yes.
   use color? Yes.
   use actual photos? No.
   have a more sentimental/lovey tone? No.
   lots of words per page? No.
   one word or phrase repeated throughout? No.
Age group book is for: Young, like 1-6 years old, maybe less.

Would I have liked this book as a kid? I...don't know. I can't really remember much from when I was a little kid, the only book I can really remember my mom reading to me when I was young was Eragon. Although I may have enjoyed listening to someone stumbling through attempting to say a few of the tongue twisters in it, I just can't remember it.

childhood memories

#37) Recall one of your favorite childhood movies.
I'll apologize now, but I can't really remember anything that was earlier than sixth grade, just tiny bits a pieces. I can remember that events happened, but not what was happening during the event.

So one of my favorite movies as a kid(and it still is), was Zoom: Academy for Superheroes. It starts off by explaining, as if in a comic book, about Captain Zoom and his team of superheroes. They had been bombarded by gamma radiation in an attempt to strengthen their powers, and while it worked, it also made one of them go crazy and kill his team members. Concussion was defeated by Zoom, and had supposedly died. At the beginning of the movie the general gets word that Concussion wasn't dead, but he was coming back, and reactivates the superhero program. They gather Zoom, who appears to have lost the ability of super-speed for more than one finger, and gather up some new kids with powers. Tucker with the ability to expand his body, Cindy with super strength, Summer with Telekinesis, and Dylan with Invisibility and mind sight. They go through training, which is mostly the kids messing around, and the general attempts to use gamma radiation on them as well. They escape with the help of Dr. Holloway, who has a 'super breath' ability, rescue Zoom, escape in the flying saucer from Area 51(it was actually in Area 52), and go to fight Concussion. After a brief fight with Concussion Zoom regains his powers just in time to save Cindy from one of Concussion's concussive blasts before creating a vortex with his super-speed to bring Concussion to his senses. Afterwards Zoom, Concussion, Wonder(Summer), Princess(Cindy), Houdini(Dylan), Mega Boy(Tucker), Dr. Holloway, and an old friend Dr. Grant leave the general and his group to continue helping people. If you like superhero movies where the heroes aren't occasionally closer to antiheroes and you aren't afraid of a movie that was made for all ages you'll like this.

"Reely" Good Quotes

Avengers

Avengers

Avengers

Avengers

Avengers

A few quotes I like, all of which are from The Avengers.

Dan in Real Life Response

1) I think it is very important to know about what you are writing about, in fact, it is probably the most important part, at least for fanfiction like what I write. If you don't know much about what you are writing it makes it difficult to visualize what you want to write about.

10) In all honesty, I have no idea. I have never been on a date, and as far as I know no one in my family is pushing for or against it.

11) Well I can remember one time in Elementary School when I hid behind some bushes for two straight games of Hide-and-seek. That was probably my best hiding spot.

15) I have an extremely rare disease, Fanconi Anemia, which is a DNA breakage disease. This means that when my DNA naturally degrades or is damaged I can't repair it, which also results in getting injured easier, lower immune systems, other physical problems, and a much higher chance of cancer.

22) Yes, life really is full of disappointments, you just have to take the bad with the good. I tend to deal with disappointment based on how big it is, sometimes its fine, sometimes I just retreat into myself.

"Reel" Life

My favorite movie is, you know, I'm not actually sure. There's a bunch of movies I like, such as Star Wars, X-Men, and Zoom: Academy for Superheros. The kinds of movies I don't like include bad movies, most humor movies, musicals, horror movies, and romance movies. I don't watch movies very often, since I prefer to watch YouTube videos and read. When I do watch movies its usually at the movie theater. When I watch a movie I prefer to have something to eat or drink, even if I sometimes forget that I have it. If my life story was made into a movie...I wouldn't ever watch it, cause it would be kinda boring. Come on, real life doesn't make for a good movie, and I don't even want to think about it.

The Folly of a Dare

I was not an adventurer, I was not one of those people who enjoyed crawling through dark dungeons and fighting horrific beasts. So how then did I wind up here? A sword in one hand, a dim torch in the other, walking through the twisting underground ruins. I'd accepted Rolf's dare, not really thinking things through, and if I didn't spend at least a week exploring the ruins I'd be the laughing stock of the entire town. I'd heard the stories of course, how these ruins had belonged to an ancient empire which had broken through into the Underdark, a subterranean world filled with darkness, evil, and things best forgotten. And now I was walking through the ruins, completely lost, and seeming to be going farther down no matter what I did. I had passed things down here, skeletons of adventurers, giant bats, a few automatons, but nothing that really suggested that it was anything but a normal ruin. I felt strangely disappointed, having entered on a dare, I had hoped to at least find something. And then I entered the room and the door sealed tightly behind me. Frantic I looked around, there were several old corpses, preserved with magic, lining the wall in small alcoves. In the middle of the room was a pit, which extended down into the darkness, I gulped, I seemed to have found a passage into the Underdark. I was no adventurer, so if I was attacked I had little chance of winning. And then, my torch sputtered out, plunging me into darkness. The dead eyes opened, filled with a malevolent light as the corpses rose, giving me two options. I could be hacked to pieces, or I could jump into the world of the banished, a place I would never escape. I jumped.

Meh, not really a horror story, although it would probably be scary if it was real. I based it off of the game Dungeons and Dragons, although the corpses at the ends are actually supposed to be Draugr from Skyrim. The prompt was from Nighthags Writing Corner, but I'm not especially good at writing horror, although I do read it from time to time.

Photos of the Millennium(so far) response

That is something I wouldn't mind doing, if I had enough money and room that is. But that guy looks like he's having fun, tackled and licked by all those dogs. Although the one going down the slide looks like he's thinking, 'oh no! I'm falling! He let go of my tail!' Yeah that one doesn't look to happy, unlike the rest of them. It's like someone just dumped a bunch of dogs in a school playground, only all the kids already left.

Window Poem

I can see the neighbors roof,
the empty street and,
other houses of people I don't know.
Today I can't see out of my window,
as it's in Florida.
Sometimes I see rain streak down the glass,
I see blue sky,
which slowly fades to black with the setting sun.
A lake lies just out of sight,
hidden behind the houses.

Michelangelo

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simone was born on March 6, 1475. He was born in Caprese, near Florence Italy. His father, originally a banker, had taken a job as a Judicial Administrator. When his mother died in 1481 Michelangelo lived with a nanny and her husband in Settignano, where he found a love for marble. Michelangelo was sent to Florence to go to Grammar School, but was more interested in doodling than in his classes. He preferred to hang out around artists, and eventually secured an apprenticeship with Domenico Ghirlandaio, who was a master in Fresco Painting, Perspective, Figure Drawing, and Portraiture.

Michelangelo's two most famous pieces, Pietà and the Statue of David, were completed between the years 1497 and 1504. Pietà was a sculpture made for the French ambassador to the Holy See, Cardinal Jean de Bilhères-Lagraulas. It depicted Mary morning over the body of Jesus, and was carved from marble. His other most famous piece, was surprisingly, not started by Michelangelo himself. It was an unfinished project from some 40 years before by Agostino di Duccio. Between the years 1505 and 1512 Michelangelo was commissioned to build the Pope's tomb and paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

After a great many more sculptures, paintings, and several poems, Michelangelo died on February 18, 1564. He died in Rome at the age of 88. As an interesting note, he was also the first western artist to have his biography written before he died, and not once but twice.

Comments 3

Haley

That is an interesting story. I can kinda sympathize with the guy, cause I'm kinda invisible myself. I tend to be quiet, and I don't like talking to people, so I'm often overlooked. In any case, I kinda like this story.

I really like the first two quotes. The first one because it reminds me of some stories I've read, as well as my mind(which has an annoying tendency to wander). I like the second one because it's so true, years of friendship can be destroyed with a single sentence.

I know what you mean about grammar, it and spelling are the bane of my writing. But that is what a beta reader is for, cause they are generally better at the grammar aspect than the writer. I personally don't really read horror, I prefer Fantasy and Sci-fi, but I've read some that I liked.

A nice picture to go along with a very good idea. I think that really everyone should follow their own path, not go down other peoples paths. I also like the title of your blog.

Hannah

Well, its always better to arrive late rather than never.

6 Word Memoir

Human Nature Definition: Insane, Impulsive, Greedy.

Just something I thought of. When I was younger I used to say that "human nature is the essence of insanity," because people just do things that make no sense. This is a new version of my old saying. Humans are greedy, almost everyone wants something for themselves, whether it is money or just the good feeling from helping someone else. And they all want to keep getting it. Humans do stupid things without thinking it through quite often, especially teenaged boys. And people are insane, whether they admit it or not, everyone is crazy, its just part of being human. Although the medical definition of insanity is probably different than mine.

Story from Famous First and Last Lines

Now this is nowhere even near done, and I'm not even sure if I'll end up using much of this past the first paragraph, but it's too perfect for me to not use it for the start of a story.

I had the story, bit by bit, from various people, and, as generally happens in such cases, each time it was a different story. One person told me that it started several years ago, someone else said just weeks ago. One said it began in ancient history, another said the end was where the story truly began. Another simply didn't care when it started, only what happened afterwards. It could have started with the attack, although a better place would have been the volcano. It could have started when the experiments began, or in the spell dump, but I believe that to get a full account of the story you must go even farther back than that. Back before the first visitor, before even the wars. Finding accounts from that far back is difficult, near impossible if you want them to agree, but I believe that I have discovered the true history behind the cataclysm and the rise of the Dragon Riders.

According to the journal I read, it all began, truly began, with my great-grandfather, although really everyone agrees with that. But where in his story to start? I believe that the journal I read tells the true account of the beginning. At the time he wasn't the man that I knew, the wise yet approachable, old yet powerful, friendly yet stern leader. In fact, at the time, he was not yet even an adult, he was younger than I am now. He was only fourteen, and yet he had already accomplished so much more than I have. At age eleven he defeated the shade of a powerful wizard, at age twelve he killed a Basilisk, at age thirteen he was able to drive off over a hundred minor demons(Dementors to be specific) with one spell, and then at age fourteen he was entered into a tournament for those older than him. He was my great-grandfather, Wyreleader of the first Wyre, Grandmaster of the Order of the Dragon Riders, Senior Councilman of the Magical Guilds, and master warrior and politician. He was Harry Potter. And this is his story, recorded from his journal.

So yeah, this is all I have so far. I'll post more as I write more, who knows, maybe I'll actually finish a story for once. As long as I don't get sidetracked...like I usually do.

Famous First and Last Lines

I had the story, bit by bit, from various people, and, as generally happens in such cases, each time it was a different story. This is the opening line in Ethan Frome, a book by Edith Wharton, and was published in 1911. Edith Wharton was born on January 24, 1862, and died August 11, 1937. The book Ethan Frome takes place in a fictional New England town, and is written in the form of an extended flashback, with all but the prologue and epilogue being set 24 years in the past. The main character, Ethan Frome, is a man who basically never has things go his way. His wife was sickly and constantly irritated, he loved his wife's cousin, and he was forced to stay at a fairly rundown farm. When his wife decides to send her cousin away, they go on a suicide sled run, which left Ethan with a limp and her paralyzed. In a bizarre twist, at the end of the story it is her who is constantly irritated and sick and Ethan's wife who is now taking care of her.


I closed my eyes, head drooping, like a person drunk for so long she no longer knows she's drunk, and then, drunk, awoke to the world which lay before me. This is the ending line in Don Quixote, a novel by Migeul de Cervantes, and was published in 1605(part 1), and 1615(part 2). Migeul de Cervantes was born on September 29, 1547(assumed), and died April 22, 1616. For a summery of the story, click here: Don Quixote.

Memorable Passage

Excerpt from Fairy Tail Vol. 1, Chapter 2: The Master Appears

Makarov: "So you dolts have done it again!! Just look at all these letters from the Council!!"
Lucy(thoughts): The Council? Isn't that the body that manages all the wizard guilds?
Makarov: "First...Gray! It's good that you rounded up that ring of smugglers...but afterward you stumbled around town on the nude...and in the end you wound up stealing somebody's underwear right off the line and running away with it."
Gray: "But...I could't keep running around naked!"
Elfman: Maybe if you hadn't gotten naked in the first place?"
Makarov: "sigh. Elfman!! While performing bodyguard service for a VIP, you attacked that selfsame VIP!"
Elfman: "He made a crack about how 'a man is only worth as much as his education,' and before I knew it..."
Makarov: "Cana Alberona, you drank fifteen full kegs of liquor at a certain tavern, falsely claimed it as 'expenses,' and worse, sent the bill directly to the Council!"
Cana: "So they found out?"
Makarov: "Loke...you seduced the granddaughter of the senior Council member, Rage. Also, we've been sent an invoice for damages at a certain talent agency. And Natsu..." He slumps dejectedly. "In bringing down the Devon Bandit Clan, you destroyed seven private homes!! You brought down the Tuly Village's historic clock tower!! The town of Freesia's church is completely destroyed!! You damaged a section of the Lupinus Castle!! The observation station at the Nazuna Ravine is closed due to wanton destruction. And you leveled half the harbor at Hargeon!!"
Lucy(thoughts): So most of the stuff I read about in the magazine was Natsu's doing?!!
Makarov: "Alzack...Levy...Krov...Reedus...Warren...Bisca...etc...All of you...have done nothing but make the Council mad at me!! But...The Council can eat crap for all I care!! Listen! Ours is a power that goes beyond the bounds of reason. But is is born out of reason itself. Magic isn't some miracle. What we do is match the energy that flows between us...with the wavelength of the world's natural energy. And take what is embodied in that union...using our force of will and concentration. More than that, we pour our entire soul into it to make what we call magic. If you spend time worrying about what those in authority think of you, your magic will never advance! So don't let those idiots on the Council intimidate you!! Follow the path you truly believe in!!!! That is what it means to be a Fairy Tail wizard!!!!"

I like this speech by Makarov, guild master of the Fairy Tail guild, for a couple reasons. First, its kinda funny how he goes from being angry at his guild members for doing things that got the Council mad at him, to encouraging them to do it. Second, it really just shows what Fairy Tail is about, a bunch of people who despite their faults, arguments, and past can care for each other like a big family. And third, it nicely sums up my thoughts on magic from the Harry Potter universe and makes me think it would be something Dumbledore might say. Although he would probably put things in much politer terms.

A Couple of Quotes I like

Albus Dumbledore


Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, & Prongs

Writers as Readers

1) Honestly I can read just about anywhere, I read so much that I can tune out distractions fairly easily. But to be really comfortable I prefer to sit in my bed under the covers. I have my door shut and like everything to be quite. Well, not completely quite, I like to have my music going in the background, and I'll often sing along to my songs.

2) My preferred genres are Fantasy, Sci-fi, and (although I'm not sure these are genres) Manga and Fanfiction. I really like magic, and tales of wizards, elves, and other creatures of magic in Fantasy. I am drawn to Sci-fi because of Star Wars and the Mass Effect games. I love Manga (in specific Naruto and Fairy Tail) due to the amazing plots and humor. And I love Fanfiction because it allows me to find stories about anything I want from other stuff I like, such as Pokemon.

7) The first book I can remember reading was Eragon by Christopher Polini. It was during first grade, when my mom was teaching me to read. I didn't really read it, it was more mom reading it to me, but since then it has become one of my favorite books.

8) Oh now this is difficult. Hm...well my favorite fantasy series is the Inheritance Cycle, out of which I like Eragon the most. My favorite Sci-fi book...is probably...Battlefield Earth. My favorite Manga series is Naruto, which is about ninjas who throw around attacks such as "Fire Style: Flame Dragon Bullet". My favorite Fanfiction...hm...probably Fate's Gamble by Lupine Horror.

12) Well I know that I'm a better writer due to how much I read. Most of what I write is Fanfiction, which means I need to really know the original stories. For that I need to be a good reader. In addition, reading other peoples Fanfiction allows me to get new ideas and vocabulary for my own Fanfiction.

Do I Dream?

Well despite everyone saying that I do dream, but just forget it quickly, I don't really ever notice that I've been dreaming. This might be partly due to how I wake up. Once I wake up it has been at least an hour since I was woken up...which means my active mind can't really remember much from that area of time. However there is one dream that I've had...more than once. I don't know how many times I've had it...and I'm not actually sure if I'm asleep or half-awake when I have it. Basically what happens is that I get into a fight with the 'bully' that tried to be intimidating in fifth grade. He wasn't really very intimidating though...he was kinda dumb. But either he kicks me, sending me flying though the air, or I win and start falling out of the sky. And then I'm fully awake feeling like I've just been falling from a great height. I'm not sure if its an actual dream, or what kind it is. It isn't a good dream, but its also not a weird one or a nightmare...so I'm not actually sure what it is.

Caged-Bird Inspired Piece

"Fly away from the sea," the old man said.
"Water will loosen the wings, fly high instead.
But do not fly to the sun, for heat will melt the wax."
The boy laughed, "father, your invention will hold, relax."
As they prepared to fly the guards burst in!
"Fly my son! Escape this prison!"
The boy leaped, spreading his wings to fly,
the guards watched in stupefied awe as the two soared through the sky.
The boy cheered, soaring ever higher, nearing the sun.
His father yelled, "stray from the sun!" But the boy was lost in freedom,
until the wax melted, sending the boy down to the sea.
His father flew on, weeping bitterly.
And thus ends the tale of Daedalus and Icarus,
for the pleasurable taste of freedom can blind even the cautious.

Dream Threads

I knew it'd be a rough road, and it may not work out for me, but if I gave up, how would I ever know if I could've made it. I had always wanted to be the greatest Pokemon master. Right off the bat things were difficult, since I overslept and almost missed getting a starter. Then Pikachu refused to work with me, until we almost died from being attacked by Spearrow. Things only got marginally easier after that, I had never realized just how little I actually knew about Pokemon. I was destroyed by Brock when I first challenged him, and only got the badge the second time from luck. Now my partners and I have gotten all eight badges needed to enter the Indigo league. Tomorrow will bring a beginning to the battles, and will bring a chance for me to prove myself. For now however, Pikachu and I are just sitting here at night, looking out at the stars. Wondering what tomorrow might bring. We just sit in silence with only the calm, steady sound of breathing to fill the air.

Color Chip Poems

Color Chip Poems

Romantic Peach

5) Romance, it looks
7) like a pale pinkish color,
5) perhaps it is peach.

Grey or Purple?

5) Dream in Purple it
7) looks grey to me, but others
5) say it is purple.

Red Delicious, and acrostic about the Manga Fairy Tail.

Real men use their fists to talk!
Elfman yells.
Destroying the hall.

Destroyed tables, benches, and walls go flying through the air.
Elfman is not the only one destroying things though.
Loke, Grey, and Natsu are also brawling, trashing the hall as they do.
Inside the hall is complete chaos.
Cana gets annoyed at the noise and threatens to stop them with her magic.
It doesn't work, as the others start to prepare to use magic.
Old man Markarov grows to giant size and frightens the others into behaving, however it's
Useless against Natsu who wants to continue.
So Markarov steps on him.

If I were in charge of the world

If I were in charge of the world
I'd cancel school,
dumb TV shows,
internet fees, and also
slowly running internets.

If I were in charge of the world
there'd be free ice cream,
real Pokémon, and
dragons.

If I were in charge of the world
you wouldn't have school.
You wouldn't have the ACT.
You wouldn't have idiots.
Or "go play with your brother."
You wouldn't even have annoying brothers.

If I were in charge of the world
a desert would be a vegetable.
All dogs would be big and fluffy.
And a person who sometimes forgot to shower,
and sometimes forgot to wake up
would still be allowed to be
in charge of the world.

comments 2

That's a cool story. Its always nice to be reminded of people you like but don't get to see often.

I like how you managed to get everything ton rhyme and still make sense. whenever I try to do poetry and have it rhyme it doesn't make sense.

I really liked this story, it was quite interesting to think about what an animal might think about a person.

I was Wondering...

Hey I was wondering what people might think about an idea I've had. You see, I love to read, and over the past couple of years I've taken up writing fanfiction. However, I haven't posted anything on any fanfiction sites yet, for three reasons. The first, and most important reason, is I need a beta reader to read through it and tell me if they think its good and what mistakes I've made. The second reason is I'm kinda nervous about other people reading what I write. And the third reason is that, I've started work on so many stories, that most of them aren't past a chapter or two long. Saying that, I wanted to know what people thought about me posting one of my stories here. If yes, there are four that I'm debating about posting. The first is a crossover between Harry Potter and Pokémon. The second is a Naruto fanfiction. The third is an eventual crossover between Naruto, Pokémon, Star Wars, Harry Potter, and Percy Jackson and the Olympians. And the fourth is a Naruto and Pokémon crossover. So please just give me some feedback about what you think. Thanks a lot.

Comments

I can defiantly say I know what you mean, although for me it wasn't a blanket. For me it was a book that I took to the doctors appointments. You see, I have a blood disease, which means I go to the doctor a lot. I have a bone marrow biopsy, where they stick a big needle into your rear and remove a bit of bone, once a year. I would always have a book and be reading up until I could no longer keep my eyes open before the operation. Afterwords, the book would be there when I woke up. On a side note, I would suggest either changing your background, or the color of your text, as the black text is kinda hard to read.

You know, funnily enough, I did something similar to that, twice. In first or second grade, can't remember which, I was told to write a letter that I'd open in sixth grade. I don't remember what it said now, but I remember thinking that my handwriting was atrocious. I had another one that I wrote...sometime...and then opened on at a church youth group activity. That one was full of encouragement. I think everyone should do that, write a letter to themselves thats full of encouragement and the fun from when they were younger.

A Week of Fossils

A Week of Fossils

Two years ago I took a week-long college class, fun right? Normally I would say no, but this was about dinosaurs. I drove down Route 44 to a small, and mostly unknown, town named (). This was in the middle of New Mexico, right in the middle of the desert. Luckily for me, it had rained in the previous week, so instead of everything being brown there was a large amount of green as well. I met up with the other people taking the class, and the professor and the grad students. That day we didn't do much, just spoke about what we'd be doing over the week and were and when to meet the next day. The second day was the first real day of class, and the group piled into a pair of trucks, before going off down a road for the next hour. That was at six AM, we got to the dig site at seven AM. The dig site was halfway up a hill, in a position that made it impossible to get any kind of vehicle anywhere near it. the site itself was a large ledge, with a rocky slope below it and a sheer wall of stone circling it. Above the stone wall was the rock and sand filled dirt, with small, gnarled trees and spiky cacti lining the small path to the only entrance. The entrance, the sloping end of the rock wall, could be slightly tricky to get to while carrying the tools. Once there, we saw that we were limited to different sizes of hammers, chisels, and brushes for tools, nothing powered and nothing extremely heavy. There were three areas to dig at, one was on the floor, where several good fossils were, but where you were restricted to the smallest of tools. The second was low down on the wall, where the stone changed from a greenish-white to reddish-brown, once more only the smaller tools were really used, although sometimes the larger hammers and chisels were needed to break off a chunk that was higher up. The third was near the top of the wall, using large rock hammers and foot-long chisels to break off large chunks of rock to get to the fossil rich rock below. The second and third days were, for me, spent down on my knees, carefully chiseling the rock on the floor. That rock broke easily, but rarely broke the way you wanted it to, making extracting fossils difficult. There I found the first fossil, a Phytosaur tooth. I also later found another fossil, a bit of a limb bone, although we were unable to identify what it was from or which bone it was. The last few days I spent sitting up on the wall, smashing my hammer onto a chisel, in a seemingly futile attempt to remove a chunk from the wall. The rock was hard, but contained nice breaks already. Although it took several minutes of hammering to break, it would break in predictable ways, creating large solid boulders. Here I found two more Phytosaur teeth, these ones larger, and not as well preserved as the first one. After five hours sitting under the hot desert sun breaking apart rocks, we piled into the trucks, and drove for an hour to return to the museum. We would take the next half-hour or so for lunch, and then after cleaning up, we were in the lab. In the lab we would learn about one species and their fossils each day, before we would start cleaning the bones. It was slow, tedious work, and I loved it. We used three tools, water, cotton swabs, and dental picks. Using wet cotton swabs to dampen the rock and loosen the glue holding the fossil together, I then would gently, but quickly scrape at the rock. Although at first it seems to have no effect, after half an hour you start to see some progress. The class ended at five PM, and then we would do the same thing the next day. Although I only found four fossils, I got to keep all of them and had great fun with the class.

I am...

I am…

I am…

dusty shelves and musty smells of old books in the library.

exciting adventures and suspenseful mysteries played by brave knights and boy detectives.

the slow loading and bright screen of a phone on the internet.

half finished stories and untold plots of ideas yet to be explored.

never finished stories and abandoned ideas of fanfiction writers.

I am…

key lime pie and ice cream, cherries and pork, bacon and roasted potatoes.

large, fluffy dogs and lithe tigers, majestic eagles and sinuous snakes.

blazing campfires and flaming marshmallows, camp stories and ridiculous skits, singing in the mess hall and throwing the leaders in the pool.

bright screens and familiar buttons, blocky cartridges and shiny discs, vibrating controllers and long loading screens.

breaking lead, many colors, and thick dry paper waiting to come alive with lines and color.

I am…

cherry dump cake baked at night over a bed of hot coals, homemade ice cream chilling the heat, and cans of soda fizzing when opened.

stories of the older guys who already went through the challenges, celebrations when the newest guys get back, exchanging stories of the funny moments of your years at camp.

whistling winds, pounding rain, crashing thunder following flashing lightning, sleepless nights when tornadoes strike.

stifling heat, not enough water, hot dry breezes, cicadas buzzing, falling asleep with the spiders by your face, waking up with a racoon on your chest.

forest hiking, skunk on the path, no running, gnat attack, feeding turtles half dead bugs, and roadkill food.

time with friends, summer camp blues, getting cards and I miss yous, hanging out in the sun, that’s what I do for fun.