My Thoughts On...The Body Of Christopher Creed

 I just finished reading The Body of Christopher Creed (by Carol Plum-Icci) for my teaching young adult literature class, and if I were to sum up the book in one word it would be, "Wow". 

When I first started reading the book I wasn't sure I would end up liking it. Firstly because I don't read many mystery books, because my imagination tends to get the best of me, and secondly because I didn't much like the idea of reading about a murdered teenager. I have to say though, before I continue on, that I was pleased with how the book turned out. 

The story starts out with the main character, Torey Adams, saying:

"I had hoped that a new start away from Steepleton would make my junior year seem like a hundred years ago, rather than just one. Granted, senior year is not a great year to be switching schools, especially if you played football, baseball, had a decent blues band going in your basement, and had known the same kids since forever. I kept telling myself at first, Hey, going to boarding school will be like leaving for college a year early. It's cool. But that's a hard argument to hold on to when you're looking at people whose average age is fifteen, and when we're still living under a 10:00 P.M. weekend curfew in the dorm, At first it was a weird change. But staying in Steepleton after all that had happened would have been weirder." 

Because of the above, we automatically know that whatever when down in Steepleton must have been big if it caused Torey to flee to another school. It makes readers interested as forces them to ask the question, "What happened and why are you running?"

As the book continues, Torey begins to tell his story and we learn about the missing boy named Christopher Creed. Now, I'm going to tell you the whole story, and I most certainly won't tell you the ending, but I will give you a quick summery. The following is the current summery I have written for the project I read this book for. It lacks many details but should get the point of what's going on across to you.

Summary:

  A high school student by the name of Christopher Creed has disappeared. There are no signs of a kidnapping and a note left behind -from Creed -throws the town of Steepleton into chaos. By the wording of the note, no one can tell if it Creed planned to commit suicide or if he simply ran away. Fellow classmate, Torey Adams, has known Creed since Kindergarten and when the school’s reject goes missing he takes it upon himself to find the kid.

            Torey’s search leads him to make some unlikely allies in the form of the school’s ‘slut’, Alie McDermott, and a boon called Bo Richardson.  The three of them set out to discover what exactly happened to their classmate. However, when Chris’ mother starts blaming Bo of killing her son things get messy. The teens find themselves thrust into a world they’ve never seen and it opens Torey’s eyes to the fact that Steepleton, and its locals, are not as perfect as everyone says.

            He learns who his true friends are when his best friend, Alex, and Alex’s girlfriend, Renee, start thinking that not only did Bo kill Chris but that Torey helped him. Wanting to prove both his and Bo’s innocence, Torey is determined to find out the truth behind Creed’s disappearance.

The story that Carol Plum-Ucci presents to readers brings up many themes and at times it was difficult to read. It was an uneasy read that had me sometimes watching the shadows around me. Though it was enjoyable, it hit on some themes that made it hard to swallow sometimes. There were even a few things mentioned in it that I recognized having witnessed in my own high school.

For the sake of explaining each theme I want to talk about accurately, I will divide them up and give a quick response to each.

Homosexuality:

This theme is only touched on once in the book and at the very beginning. Torey mentions some fellow students thinking a kid named Leo is gay. He states that there are two other gay guys living in the dorms, but no one cares because they were open about it. He makes a point of saying that it wasn't really the possibility of Leo being gay that bugged people, it was the fact that you could tell the kid was struggling with something and knowing that he was made you struggle as well.

Sex:

This is not really a theme so much as it is something the characters talk about frequently. There are characters that are accused of being sluts, characters that are said to be virgins, characters that claim not to sleep around but actually do, and characters that actually seems to think of sex as being something special. Honestly, there were a few times that I thought, "How could a teacher teach this book to her/his class without feeling awkward," but the scenes were nothing that students wouldn't have already read. In fact, most of the scenes with this theme in it were mainly conversations of the topic or a characters thoughts on it. They were tings that teens would actually talk/think about.

Gossip:

Gossip and the harm it does is a big theme in this book. In fact, I'd say it's one of the main ones. Through the book Torey notices how much of gossips his friends really are and how much harm they are actually causing. The boy has his eyes opened in many ways in this book and faces revelations that many teens are forced to.

Human Faults:

One of the big things Torey learns during the story is that there is no such thing as a perfect life. After starting up a friendship with Allie he slowly starts realizing that his friends' 'perfect' lives were not as pristine as everyone pretended they were. In fact, he learns that Steepleton itself has a hidden past. As he says at one point in the story, Christopher Creed -the weird kid -might have disappeared but his disappearance only brought out the weirdness of everyone in the town...and that weirdness ends up revealing a lot about the town's inhabitants.

Something Interesting:

Now this is not a theme, this is something I merely observed. Being an English major, I tend to pay attention to the language and style author's use. The slang Carol Plum-Ucci used really caught my attention. I liked how the author kept the story in Torey's point of view -keeping to first person -and in that teenage slang was used. I had to laugh though, a few times :) You see, the slang used in the book isn't exactly common today. Of course this is because the book is not a new write and takes place in the past, but I still gained amusement from it a few times. Slang and insults such as, "You're wigging out," "Quit wigging," "You sound like you were cutting logs (referring to sleep)", and "She's a turbo-slut" sprang up repeatedly.

I swear half of the lingo used in the book I had never heard before. I even asked my roommate on a few of them and she hadn't heard of them. It kept the story interesting though. One thing I wasn't impressed with, but understand why the author did it, was the amount of curse words used in the book.

The F-bomb, as well as a few others were used throughout the book by the characters. The cursing is understandable, considering many teenagers talk like that, but it's another reason to question whether it should be used in the class room setting.

While reading The Body of Christopher Creed, I was constantly toying with the thought that it shouldn't be presented in classrooms. I had spoken to a friend who said she had read the book in sixth grade and another who had said she had read it in eight. Honestly, six grade is a bit too young to be reading this book. I have a younger sister in fifth grade and I will not be encouraging her to read this book. Only my high school aged siblings will be allowed to take it from my book shelf due to the themes and language used in it.

As for eighth graders...I'm iffy. I could see how you would want them to read it, but I think -and this is strictly my personal opinion -that they are still too young for many of the themes presented in the story. Technically, the book could be consider a late middle school to high school read, but I wouldn't want to present it to a class younger than sophomore year of high school. If I had to teach it, I would prefer that it be to a Junior level class. This is because the characters in the book are Juniors in high school and the situations they face and themes that appear often take place during that age.

Overall, the book it great and I will most likely read it again in the future. The ending of the book had me convinced that it should be used in a classroom setting. I won't tell you what the end is, because I don't want to spoil the story for anyone who wishes to read it, but what Torey eventually comes to realize is important and I think there is a valuable lesson to be taken from it...a very valuable lesions actually.

I look forward to reading the sequel and will most likely start on it tomorrow...if I get the chance. I also encourage any of you above ninth grade to read it. I took something away from it and was able to connect with some of the things mentioned in it. I think it is an awesome read.

Book Trailers:

The following are a couple of fan made trailers I found for the book on YouTube. I thought they were pretty cool and would show them to you.

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/AQGVeC0Gwcw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/gJVwdbRp6cU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

The Joys of English

So, I found this list on the internet at http://www.thecampuscompanion.com/2011/01/25/you-know-youre-an-english-major-if-part-2-of-a-series/ and thought I'd put it up here in a sort of check list format. This way I can see exactly how many of them I fit and you can see if you fit any of them too, if you so desire. By the way, my opinions/answers to each statement are the words in bold.

• People’s everyday grammar and vocabulary make you cringe (Yes, I'm okay with most of it but real hic langauge makes me cringe)
• You believe that you are mentally and socially superior to all other majors (No)
• You want to become a teacher (...maybe...)
• You want to become a journalist (NEVER!!!!! I shall NOT restrict myself to facts)
• You are a teacher/journalist (Ha, no! I haven't even graduated college)
• You know the difference between “its” and “it’s” (Yes. It's is an abbreation for It Is, where 'its' is when it has something)
• People’s grammar and usage on facebook horrify you (Some times. Gangster langauge and text talk irritate me...yet I'm guilty of using text talk. It's convenant when one's too lazy to write out a whole word)
• You know the difference between “their” and “they’re” (Yes! Yes! Yes!)
• You write for the school newspaper (Nope)
• You know what a “gerund” is (...I do now...Google is a wonderful invention, isn't it?)
• You regularly make use of Sparknotes (Guilty as charged!)
• You are tired of being asked what you thought was “significant” and… here it comes… Why? (Amen whoever wrote this! Those are problably the most asked questions in the English majior)
• You’ve spent an entire day writing a paper (Yes)
• You’ve gotten an A or a B on a paper you wrote at 2:00 in the morning (Hehe, yeah. Most of my best work is done in the early hours)
• You’ve gotten an A or B on a paper defending a position that you don’t even agree with (Yeppers)
• You’ve gotten an A or B on a paper that you don’t recall writing because you were blacked out, and the professor wrote a comment praising its “fluidity” (Define blacked out....I have gotten and B on a paper that I didn't remember writing, but it was durring a week where I had papers due almost everyday and I honestly couldn't tell which ones I wrote and which ones I took a grade on)
• You have an insane number of chapters to read tonight (I always have an insane number of chapters to read)
• You have a personal relationship with William Shakespeare (Well, no. He's dead. No one has a PERSONAL relationship with him, anymore. He is one of my favorite playwrites though)
• You’re convinced you can make a living writing poetry and/or novels (Want to = Yes, convince =No)
• You have a pet named after an author or literary character (Not currently, but I did last year)
• You regularly invent bad puns, and your friends want to kill you for it (Hehe, sometimes)
• You look down on anyone who wants to ban a book (YES! You have no right to ban a book...expecilaly not in America. Freedom of speech people! Now, you can put age restrictions on it, for example I wouldn't want a 10yr old reading Stephen King, but don't completly ban the book)
• You use famous quotes in much of your conversation (Some times)
• You consider authors to be sex symbols (What?!?!?! Uh...weird)
• You analyze everything you read in terms of where the prepositional phrases are (No)
• You’re offended by statements like “no more than six pages, please” (Yes)
• You analyze things constantly and impulsively, often more than is needed (Kind of have to. If I don't then I end up not analyzing things enough and end up failing my paper on the subject)
• You know that everything in the universe relates to English literature (There are many other things that it all relates to, and it's not just English literature. I, myself, happen to be a fan of Irish literature and British literature)
• You want to learn a foreign language so you can read things other than English literature (Been there, done that, love reading things in another language)
• You want to analyze how that other literature relates to the universe, and to English literature (yes)
• You want to consider the significance of said relationships and why they are significant (sure)
• You regularly get in arguments about correct grammar (Yes!)
• You shout “ONOMATOPOEIA!” whenever your friends use one (Hey! I randomly shouted that word today!)
• You know when and how to use “lie” and “lay” (Now there's a tricky pair, but yes...if I think about it)
• All of your classes encourage the “Socratic method” and have the desks arranged in a circle (I wish)
• You go to English classes that you aren’t actually signed up for, just because you’re excited about them (Why would I do that? I don't go to anymore classes than I have to, because as much as I love English I'd rather spend my free time writing)
• You spend more money on books than you do on food (Guilty)
• You go to the library more often than you go to rock concerts (Yes)
• You know that absolutely everything you write must have a thesis statement, upon penalty of death (In some shape or form, yes...but I dislike creating them for research papers)
• You know that every source must be cited, upon penalty of death (Absolutly! And it must be done in the correct format...I perper MLA to APA...but that's just me)
• You know that only one of your cited sources can be a website (Yeah, I've deviated from this one a few times...)
• You know that nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition ( :P )
• It bothers you when people say “neither… or” (shrugs, actully that one doesn't bug me as much as others)
• You don’t understand why your friends laugh when you talk about how thick Moby Dick is (Hated that book, and if you put your mind in an imature mind set it's easy to figuire out why they're laughing. Seriously, who words things like that?)
• You know the ins-and-outs of MLA format (YES! YES! YES! My all tiem FAVORITE format!)
• You know that there are other formats besides MLA format (Yes...I extremly dislike you APA. People say you're simple, I say you're a pain in the butt)
• You know the ins-and-outs of them, too (So what if I do? Doesn't mean I like to use them)
• You’ve fancied becoming a hippie (Maybe *gives too innocent of smile*)
• You aren’t bothered by the idea of being homeless (Not really. Though I'd rather not be)
• You correct other people’s spelling, but shudder at the thought of them catching mistakes in your own (I don't pretend that my spelling is perfect. I know for a fact that it's horrible)
• You, unlike most of your classmates, can actually understand dialects (Yes)
• You use Shakespearean insults (I bite my thumb at you sir! Is that enough of an answer for you?)
• You favor the English spelling system over the American one (Yes)
• You need a calculator to know what 7×9 equals (Yeah...math is my enemy)
• You posit that the book is always better than the movie  (Always)
• You spend years trying to understand “the human condition”
• You are currently reading 5 or more books at once (Clockwork Prince, Stranger, The Hatchet, The Island, A Picture of Dorian Grey, and part of Ulysses....um, yep, more than five)
• You know that the backbone of a strong argument is the text that supports it (Yep)
• You keep a running list of books you’d like to read (Yep)
• You keep a running list of books you’ve read (Yep)
• You keep a running list of books you’d like to read again (Yep)
• You have what you consider to be a personal library (No doubt about it)
• You have enough books in said personal library to start a new public library (Problably)
• You always encourage others to read more, even though you know they won’t (Yes)
• You swap books with your friends because they have to read yours and you have to read theirs (Ocassionally...I have an odd collection of books I want to read so I normaly just end up buying any that I wish to read...even if my friends have them)
• A book is the best Christmas or birthday gift you can think of (Always on the list)
• You have friends who are science majors and don’t understand “why reading all day is so hard” (Yes)
• You are constantly asked “where you plan to go” with your studies (Yes)
• You are tempted to answer “Jamaica” to the above question (Haha, my answer's Moscow, but I  guess Jamaica works too)
• You are seriously considering a career as a librarian (Yep, applying for a summer position)
• You feel guilty when you walk out of a bookstore without buying a book (Nope...I feel sad, but my bank account is happy)
• You have to know what year a book was written in, and who it was published by, just in case you have to cite it (Year, yes...that determins what the language style will most likly be like...publishing company, only ocasionly)
• You make a mental list of words to look up in the dictionary (A mental list? I look them up right a way)
• You know that “bada-bing” is in the dictionary (Yep)
• You keep tabs on which words are added to the unabridged dictionary each year (No)
• You like to do things that make you “feel intellectual” (Sometimes, but sometimes I just liek to be lazy)
• You’d rather compose a thoughtful haiku about the moon than build a base on it (Ew! Haikus! Please, no. I'll write you a free verse, even one with a set pattern, but no Haikus. I HATE writing Haikus)
• You know how to spell Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (Not off the top of my head. I can't even tell you if yous spelled it right)
• You’ve catalogued every case of consistent alliteration throughout the course of this… crummy… list (No, I'm not that bored)
• You’ve already started writing an essay about the significance of this list, why you find it significant, and how that main idea relates to the “human condition” (Fiction writer...I don't care about the how this list relates to the "human condition")
• You hate it when people end sentences with a preposition (Yes, but I'm guilty of doing it)
• You can conjugate any given verb in future perfect tense (No)
• You know what “future perfect tense” is (Nope)
• You understand the concept of “literary license” (yes)
• People with other majors regularly ask you to edit their papers (Yes)
• Writing and/or editing others’ papers is actually a steady source of your income (I wish)
• You know how and when to use “who” and “whom” (yes)
• When reading a novel, you pause to analyze the author’s writing style (Yes)
• You get annoyed when non-English majors get excited about their “poetry” (No)
• You get annoyed when non-English majors say they “would love to write a novel” (No. Why would that annoy me?)
• You’ve read something in Old English (Yes)
• You can actually understand Old English (Yes)
• You’ve memorized the first line of at least five novels (Yes)
• Typos of any kind throw you off, and in some cases make you angry (Not always)
• You’ve considered how this list might be rewritten in free-verse (It could be)
• You’ve considered how this list might be rewritten in iambic pentameter (It could be)
• You’ve considered how this list might be rewritten, period  (Are you really THAT bored?)
• You found at least one misspelling or grammatical error in this list (Yes, actully...but I wasn't sure exactly how to corect it so I just left it as it was)
• You’re too busy reading and/or writing to bother mentioning it, or to write a list like this for that matter (Yeah)
• When you hear the name Zelda you think of F. Scott Fitzgerald and not video games. (Nope. I think of the video games. F. Scott Fitzgerald is one of those authors on me 'To Read' list that I haven't gotten to yet)

I love being an English majior...at times. In class today, a few of my class mates were discusing wether Crane was a naturalist, a romantist, or an existialist, and one class mate (who isn't an English majior) randomly started laughing. When we looked at him he said, "I have no idea what you are talking about." In the same class, also today, another one of my class mates said that she found Crane depressing and our professor made a joke about Thomas Hardy. Most of us were laughing, but the same guy from earlier laughed nervously and then said (jokingly), "Stupid English majiors and their stupid jokes about authors."

Thinking about it, us English majiors do make a lot of references to literature and joke about authors a lot. One of my favorite ongoing debates amongst all of us though is wether or not Shakesphere actully wrote all of his plays. I honestly don't think that debate will ever be finished.

Wonderland

Hey, I mentioned in an earlier blog that I was working on a poem that was loosly based on Alice in Wonderland. Well, it's nto finished yet (I don't think), but here's an update on how it's going :) This is what I have so far.

Topsey turvie,
Upside down,
My world's spinning faster,
I'm loosing my ground.

This, that,
Up or down,
Arrows pointing every way,
I'm nowhere to be found.

Tables turning,
Hands down,
Voices raised in passion,
We're going around and around.

Taught terrors,
Going down,
Against the old flow,
We're finding our own sound.

Troubled times,
Marching down,
the tiem has come,
This is our current battle ground.

Trails, tribulations,
Coming down,
Whatever comes we'll face,
There is no turning around.

Tales told,
Girl down,
Into the rabit hole,
Into a world underground.

That's it so far. It still needs to be rewritten, and I'm not so sure how I feel about the last stanza. Hopefully I'll ahve another version up soon though.

College: Where Crazy Happens

The following is a text message conversation that took place between my roomate and I when we were sleep deprived. We are in no way actul stalkers, or cops, or anythign like that. Just wanted to point out that we were just goofing around while I was waiting to go to work and ended up with this conversation....also, I have her consent to put this on here. I will never post anything on this blog that I don't have the concent of the friends I'm speaking of to.

Conversation:

Me: I see you.

Her: Stalker.

Me: :o How'd you know? My true job's supposed to be kept a secret!

Me: Why is a raven like a writing desk?

Me: You smell funny.

Me: But not really.

Me: Maybe I'm lying and you really do smell funny.

Her: I'm training and you stinky :p

Me: No you are :p

Her: I know that, go spray some perfume on for the chickens ;) They miss you. (Inside joke here, people)

Me: Aw :) I miss them too! One of them proposed to me last night. Will you be my maid of honor? Me and Mr. Chicken are goiing to get married and live happily ever after...and then I'm going to kill him on our wedding night and serve him as food the next day. (Okay, just realized how very morbid and sadistic that sounds...I was not trying to be creepy. Kepp in mind, we're talking about already dead chickens that I have to cut and serve at work...yeah, it's a weird conversation...just bear with it.)

Me: That's gruesome if you think about it. (No lie there)

Her: Wait, so you aren't going to be Mr. and Mrs. Smith? (I have no idea where that came from. When we don't know what to say in conversations we tend to say random things...yeah...subjects change alot)

Me: No, that's Granny Smith's kids...they specilize in pies, not stalking and the murder of my chicken husband.

Her: So hire a hit man.

Me: I did! But then SOMEONE arrested him for contaiminating a crime scene. (My roomate's a Criminal Justice majior)

Her: Wasn't me. I was off duty.

Me: Yeah, 'off duty'. Is that what you're calling it theses days? It must have been your 'clone' then that arrested him.

Her: Or my look alike.

Me: You have one of those? Where can I get one? After all, a certain person figured out my true job...so now I must frame someone.

Her: Try the phone book.

Me: What? How can you get a look a like from there? You can't see their faces!

Her: It's called an ad.

Me: There's ads for that stuf?!?! Who would have thunk!

From that point on or topic changed from playful gooing around to actul discuses about things we needed to do, like homework and work...and all those things that life makes us do. Anyway, I'll repeat this one more time THE ABOVE CONVERSATION WAS PURE FUN CAUSED BY SLEEP DEPRIVATY, AND WE ARE IN NO WAY STALKERS, COPC,  LOOKING FOR HIT MEN, OR PLANNING ON MURDERING CHICKENS. Just thought I'd clarif that. You can never be too careful, expecilly ont he internet, and I don't need people thaking this conversation out of context.

College is full of crazy events, crazy people, crazy food, and jsut down right crazy days/nights. It's fun though, as long as you keep up wiht your studies. Which is something I've managed to do. 

My roomate and I have had one crazy adventure after another...leading to some epic quotes. Just so you don't think we're complete psycos, here are a few of our favorite quotes that eachother have said :) Enjoy!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Her: Hey! He's that one guy, from that one show, that we watched that one night!
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Her: *laughing evily and getting a kick out of confusiing me*
Me: Stop being evil!
Her: *still laughing* I can't!
Me: Evil's a choice!
Her: *becomes very serious* No it's not.....
Me:...
Her:...
Me:...
Her: *cracks up laughing*

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Friend: What is this? *opens her sandwhich from lunch* It looks like flesh! Flesh That's been grinded up and put on a sandwhich...with sourcraurt. Did I really take a bite of this?

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As I said, college is full of crazyness, but it's a blast :) Today, my roomate and I had to get something to drink and some new earphones so we spent the entire day outside. We walked to my bank, walked the opposite direction to K-Mart, hit the store called The Dollar Tree, stopped at Pizza Hut for lunch, stopped at McDonalds to get icecream because we were burning up, and spent an hour or so at an arcade. Let me tell you this....I'm a red head...I don't tan...I burn...and I was outside practiclly all day. I look like a lobster!

Well, actully, my legs and the top of my arms look like they've been fryed, why'll the underside of my arms are so pal they practilly glowed in the sunlight. It was worth it though :)  The arcade was amazing and my roomate and I learned 4 things...

1) $5 gets you an aweful lot of tokens

2) You're never too old for Skii Ball

3) We suck at Dance Dance Revolution when competing agaisnt eachother

4) The plastic fake vampire teeth are just as fun now as they were when we were five.

<---That'smy roomate (left) and me (right), by the way. Just though you might like to see who I'm talking about.

Well, people, that is all I have for you tonight, but I'll leave you with a quote. I found the qoute on DeviantArt one day and it's by a singer I ocasionally listen to.

"Sometimes the hardest thing to wear is your own skin," ~Jayy Von Monroe

Down the Rabit Hole

"Why is a raven like a writing desk?"

That is very possibly the most well known quote from Lewis Carroll's Alice In Wonderland. It is a riddle that is asked by the interesting character the Mad Hatter at the tea party scene. gathered with the March Hare, the Dormouse, and Alice, he asks the above riddle. As you may know the only answer ever given to the riddle was, "I haven't the slightest idea." 

Why am I speaking of this? I haven't the slightest idea :) Actully, that's a lie, I do know why. I am currenty working on a poem that is inspired by Alice in Wonderland. So far I have two versions of it, I have a general version (which doesn't mention Alice at all) and one that directly refers to the original tale. The rhyme scheme of my poem is a bit odd, but what isn't odd when one is speaking of Wonderland?

For all of you literature lovers out there, the scheme I have so far is this:
(A, begining letters all the same)
(B, two words and ends in down)
(C)
(D), ends in 'ound')

(A)
(B)
(E)
(D)

(A)
(B)
(F)
(D)

(A)
(B)
(G)
(D)

...ect...ect...ect...You get the idea. Basicly, it's the same pattern. One line of two words that start with 'T', one line of two words and ends with down, one line of four words with no specific number of words or rhyme, and one line that ends with a words that rhymes with down.

Do you get me? Perhapse not....here, for the sake of you understanding, here are a couple stanzas from what I have written so far:

Tables turning,
Hands down,
Voices raised in passion,
They're going around and round.

Taught terrors,
Going down,
Against the old flow,
They're finding their own sound.

Toubled times,
Marching down,
The time has come,
This is their current battleground.

Like I said, that's only a part of the poem and it's still in it's rough draft stage so don't judge it too harshly. First writes are hardly ever the best. I say hardly because I've had a few things that I've ended up sticking wiht the original because all other drafts were horrid.

Out side of my little poem and thoughts of Alice, I thought I'd let you in on the week I've had. Belvie me, it could have been beter.

This was my first week back at school after Spring Break and I was sick for most of it. It turns out that spending a break around sick siblings can get you sick as well, who would have though. Note my sarcasm.  Both myself and my roomate managed to get the virus they had and had to call into work 3 days in a row. That didn't sit well with me. I swear my roomate would have killed me if we would have been sick any longer because I was problably driving her nuts. You see, I had this problem...I hated kaying in bed doing nothing, but I felt absolutly miserable and didn't have the strength to do anything. It really got on my nerves...so I spent most of the time annoying my roomate...when I wasn't sleeping because of the medicine I was taking (Seriously, there was one day that I slept all but like four hours. I hadn't known it was possible to sleep that much). Don't feel bad for her though because she did the same right back.

Outside of being sick and worrying about missing work, these last two days have been pretty great. I still have a few of the symptoms of the virus, mainly just a sore throat and my voice ocassionaly disapearing, but I feel great! Honestly, I've been so full of energy since I've gotten better that it's almost frightening. 

Enough about that though, I'd rather not focus on it actully, so let's move on to Spring Break. I had full intention of posting on here through break but I ended up not. So, I'm going to highlight a few things about my break.

1) I got to sit down wiht a friend of my parents and talk to her about hte Great Depression and World War II. It was for a homework assignment for my History class but I absolutly loved it! The stories she told! They were amazing! I felt bad for her though because as she talked about certain memories her eyes would get misty and I just wanted to hug her.

2) I whent on a couple shopping trips with my roomate and my sister. Here's what I bought, in case you wanted to know:

 <----A shell turtle I named Franklin

<------Silver nail polish

<------Sword braclet

<------Jack Sparrow ring

<-----Pirate charm braclet

<------Message in a bottle necklace

<------Sword necklace

<------Feather necklace.

I bought other things too, of course, but I got all the above for ten bucks when it would have been thirty if it wasn't for the sale. Yeah, I rejoiced at that. All you girls out there will know what I mean. It's great when you can get awesome assesories, that actully fit your style, for a decnet price.

Outside of the above, I guess I really don't have too much to say. I was jsut updating for the sake of updating and my writing side took over. Sorry about that. Let me apoligize now for this and any other future entries where I end up writing about random crap that I'm sure none of you will care about. When ever I sit down to write something like this, and don't really ahve a reall goal in mind, I tend to write acourding to the stream of consciousness....meaning I write whatever pops into my head.

To end this post, let me leave you the same why we started, with an Alice in Wonderland quote.

"Those who are mad are the most intresting people."

Raise Your Voice

Obviously, if the time between my first blog and this one is any hint of how my blogging is going to go, I'm not going to be a very good blogger. Yet, I shall attempt this anyway :)

I really don't have much to say today, so this going to be a realtivly short post, but I wanted to pass on a quote that my Enviromental Science Professor told the class. When myself and my fellow classmates walked into class he had this written on the blackboard...

"Our lives begins to end the day we become silent about the things that matter," -Martin Luther King JR.

My challenge for all who read this is to think over the above quote and decide what it means to you and humanity in general. I have decided that I agree with it, but what do you think about it?

This is me

Hey eveybody, this is obviously my first post on here and -outside of DeviantArt -I haven't done a blog before. I've debated over what to write for my first blog on here and I've decided a get-to-know-me post would be a good idea. I know there's an 'about me' area on here but I don't really like about me's. I never know how to fill them out and what to put in them. So, this is how we're going to do my 'about me'...even though I have put a bit in the 'about me' area on my page.

First thing you should know about me is that I'm currently a sophmore in college. My current major is English Literature, but that's going to be changing soon. As soon as I can make an apointment to meet with my advisor, I'll be changing my major to English Education/Special Education. 

Second thing you should problably know is that Casper isn't my real name. It's a nickname I was given back in my freshman year of high school. A foreign exchange student from Korea gave me the name after she said I reminded her of Casper the Friendly Ghost. These were the reasons she gave for nicknameing me Casper: 

1. I was as pale as the dead
2. I walked silently (still do sometimes) and it use to creep her out when she'd suddently turn around and I was there (that still does creep people out....note: I'm not meaning to creep anyone out. I just happen to be quiet and be in the same place as them)
3. I was so invisable enough that my observation skills whent unnoticed by most...giving me the upper hand in a few situations.

After she nicknamed me that, the name caught on. First our mutural friend Jasmin picked it up and then it slowly made it's way to my other close friends.

Besides my nickname, majior, and grade level, I guess the next thing you need to know is that I love to write. I may be majioring in Education, but what I really want to do is write. I've had publishing companies intrested in a story of mine, but I haven't gotten any of my stories published yet. I'm hoping to have a book I wrote published within the next year. Until then, I post the stories I write on DeviantArt. My username on there is Wrightingangel2010 and you can find me here http://writingangel2010.deviantart.com/ . I'd love to chat with you all so if you visit my page feel free to browse my gallery, favorites, leave a comment, or send me a note. Also, if you have DeviantArt, let me know and I'll pay yoru page a visit.

Let's see, what else is there to tell you?
Oh yeah! The purpose of this blog!
Don't expect any specific theme from here. The blogs I make will be about whatever is on my mind that day. This is, however, not my journal so I won't be getting as personl on here as one would on the pages of their journals. I have a journal for pouring out my soul in. This is not for that. This will contain the crazy, the hectic, the funny, the cool, and the down right disurbing things I see, hear, and realize about life. I'll also be posting quotes on here.

I draw inspiration from many things and therefore quotes won't be something rare oin my blogs. I wouldn't be surprised if I put at least one in each. Infact, I plan on ending this blog with a quote.

Before I go though, just incase any of you were wondering, the title of this blog page came from a Shakspereane play wher Sound and Fury is use to describe something that is made out to be a big thing but in the end means nothing. I chose those three words because there are many things in life that fall under their definition...and most of the time we don't realize until much later in life that they really ment nothing. The Whispers part came from somethign I once heard someone say. Originally it was whimpers (from T.S. Elliot's quote, "The world won't end in a bang, but a whimper") but I changed it to whispers because I once heard someone say that whispered words are the most powerful. 

I think that is about all I need to say for this post, so allow me to leave you with this parting quote from one of my favorite authors:

"Whatever you are physically," he said, "male or female, strong or weak, ill or heathy -all these things mater less than what your heart contains. If you have the soul of a warrior, you are a warrior. Whatever the color, the shape, the design of the shade that contains it, the flame inside remains the same. You are that flame." ~Jem, from Cassandra Clare's Clockwork Angel