My Short Story

My short story will be set in America in a future dystopia world where civilizations have gone to poverty. More than 98% of America is unemployed, due to all the jobs being taken by computers and robots. The main character will be a 15 year old girl named Valerie, but all she has ever known was living in poverty due to robots and computers. Her family is not that bad off; they still have decent food to eat and a home with walls and a roof. However, they are considered "lucky". Since she has never known any better, she just deals with living this way and doesn't complain.

The world will be introduced by Valerie waking up, and going to get the small breakfast her mother has prepared for her. While eating her mother tells her that her dad got promoted to a job that pays $4 an hour. This is a huge deal, and they celebrate. Her father is one of the few people left with a job. He is a barber, and barbers are one of the few jobs left for humans to do. Robots have been banned from being barbers because of the many incidents of eyes being poked out. The conversation will continue on and her mother were announce that her little brother's birthday is that day. Valerie decides to go and get things from outside to make a small party for him. While Valerie is outside looking for things to throw the party with, she will face many dangerous people. She is used to having to be defensive because that is the world she has grown up in. Throughout her journey, she kept on hearing ruffling in the bushes and felt like someone was watching her. She collects all the items, and heads back to set the party up. When the party starts, and guy shows up and begins to cause chaos. He was being violent, and there is a fight. With this, they defeat the guy, and everything goes back to normal and they continue having the party like nothing happened. I want to convey on how Valerie has grown up in a world like this, and having this man attack their party was not a very big deal, and the only thing she was worried about was the decorations being messed up.

Short Stories

I have been enjoying reading short stories in class. I honestly think that they are very interesting. One thing I noticed was that when you summarize all the stories in a sentence and just talk about the plot, they sound very weird or boring. For example, Harrison Bergeron was about a guy resisted the government, declared himself emperor, and began to fly on live television. A&P was about a group of girls who walked into a small supermarket in their bathing suits. When you summarize these stories, they seem either weird or boring. However, when you read them, they are actually highly entertaining. This helps me because I have been having trouble with coming up with a plot for my short story. It makes me realize that you can honestly make any story interesting with good writing.

I have also been enjoying reading these stories because I think it is interesting finding out why the author put a certain detail and what it stands for. I usually can not find these types of details on my own, but when I go to class and we go over it together I understand it. I don't know why, but I find this very interesting. Reading the short stories have been very enjoyable for me, and I can't wait to continue.


9-24 Ready Player One Ernest Cline 30 mins
        A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings Gabriel Garcia Marquez 20 mins
9-25 Ready Player One Ernest Cline 25 mins
9-26 Dry September William Faulkner 35 mins
9-28 Ready Player One Ernest Cline 30 mins

Falling Asleep

Oh my gosh. Today has been such a long day. Packing all of my stuff up was so exhausting. I can't wait to get on my flight tomorrow and fly to Manhattan! I wonder if our new house is nice-- it's going to be so different Georgia. I hope it looks exactly like the pictures, because the pictures are amazing. I really hope my room is just as huge as it looks in the pictures and the two story closet is real! Wow. I can't believe we're actually moving tomorrow.

I hope all the kids at my new school like me. I hear they are kind of snobby. What if nobody likes me? Most of the kids have known each other their whole lives-- what if they don't want a new girl? No. I'll definitely make new friends. They all wear all the designer clothes and drive expensive cars. I guess I 'll just have to do some shopping! I won't mind that!

Harrison Bergeron

When I read Harrison Bergeron, I was very surprised. I thought that the writing was absolutely amazing. I was so impressed on how well Kurt Vonnegut portrayed Harrison with all of his handicaps. I could picture Harrison so vividly. I also thought the world and society that he created was interesting. It was very different and creative. Kurt Vonnegut did a great job of describing the society with little details, like how the TV announcer couldn't speak well, or when some of the ballerinas stumbled because of the buzzing in their ears. He didn't just list things that happened in this society. He showed them.

This story was also very strange. I was so confused when Harrison and the ballerina began to fly and touch the ceiling. I was so confused that I even went back and read the sentence over again. However, I still liked the scene a lot. Another thing that I liked was the ending. I thought it was very funny when Hazel and George forgot that their imprisoned son had just showed up on the TV show they were watching unexpectedly. Overall, I thought that this short story was very weird, but interesting.

9/17 Ready Player One- Ernest Cline 45 mins

          Harrison Bergeron- Kurt Vonnegut 10 mins

9/18 Ready Player One-Ernest Cline 20 mins

9/19 To Da-Duh, in Memoriam  -  20 mins

9/21 Ready Player One – Ernest Cline 50 mins

Making an Ebook

I am excited about making an ebook! I think it will be fun to put all of our papers together into one book. I am kind of nervous about everyone reading my paper, though. There is nothing really embarrassing in it, I am just scared that some people will read my writing and think it is bad. However, I am excited about getting to read everyone else's literacy narratives because for some reason I think they are very interesting.

I think that I should add of a picture of the cover of Beezus and Ramona to my page because my literacy narrative basically revolves around that book. Another thing that I think would cool would be if someone wrote about a paper they wrote that changed their outlook on writing if we could include that piece of writing in the book (of course if they are willing to). For the cover, I like the collage of words with the title of everyone's paper on it. Also, I really like the cover of the ebooks on the school website that have the handmade type of collage. If there is anyone who is good at art, it would be really cool if they could make the cover.

Reading Log 9/10-9/16

Date	Book/Author	Pages	Time
9/10	Literacy Narrative		20 mins
9/11	Literacy Narrative		25 mins
9/14	Literacy Narrative Ready Player One – Ernest Cline	1-70	90 mins
9/15	Literacy Narrative Ready Player One – Ernest Cline	70-120	60 mins

Ready Player One

This weekend, I began reading a book called Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. I had heard some people talking about it and they loved it, so I decided to try it. So far, I love it! It is a story set in a dystopia where the world has basically gone to ruins and most people live in poverty. There is a huge video game called the OASIS where people basically live another life. It is a simulation, so when you are in it you believe it is reality. Everyone plays OASIS, and when the owner of OASIS died, he left behind three keys for someone in the OASIS to find, and if they do, they inherit his entire life savings of billions of dollars. After years of people searching, nobody finds anything and the contest sort of dies off. Until one day, an eighteen year old boy named Wade Watts finds the first key in the contest.
In this book, there are tons of references to comics and video games from the 80s. There is a ton of Star Wars, Superman, and Star Trek in this book. One of my friends is in to that type of stuff, but I never understand all of her references. When I finish this book, I feel like I will definitely be able to keep up with what she is talking about. I would absolutely recommend this book to anyone into comics and video games. I don't even really like that type of stuff, and I love the book!

Reading Log 9/1-9/8

9/1	Hate List	Jennifer Brown	20 mins	Pages 131 - 157
9/4	Literacy Narrative		30 mins
9/5	Literacy Narrative		20 mins
9/7	Literacy Narrative		35 mins
9/8	Literacy Narrative		45 mins

Breaking Your Funny Bone

"Good morning, Mr. Lee," Dr. Smith said, in his monotone voice.

"Do you have the news? Did the tests come back yet?" Albert Lee asked, not even bothering to greet his doctor as he walked into the hospital room.

"Yes, they did," pursing his lips and slowly sitting down onto his chair.

"Well what did they say? Am I alright?" Albert asked asked in a nervous voice.

"Well I have good news and bad news. The good news is your blood test came back fine. You will not have to have the surgery. The bad news- your x-ray came back. You have broken your funny bone."

"E-excuse my sir? I don't believe I heard you right," Albert replied, confused.

"You have broken your funny bone."

"Isn't that bone just a joke? I didn't think that a 'funny bone' was an actual bone!"

"Oh no, no, no, no, no! The funny bone is absolutely part of your body!" Dr. Smith said matter-of-factly, in a much happier tone that before.

"Oh. Wow. Uh... where is this 'funny bone'?" Albert questioned, wondering why Dr. Smith was acting so strange.

"Well it is right here in your elbow!" Dr. Smith replied in a sing-song voice, pointing exactly to where he said it to be.

"Dr. Smith, I don't believe you are correct. You're acting really weird," Albert said, worriedly. "Nurse! Nurse! I think Dr. Smith is a little confused!"

The nurse came rushing in, with a worried look on her face.

"What's wrong? What's wrong? Are you alright?" she responded with a red face.

"Yes, I'm fine. I think Dr. Smith is acting a little strange. He said that I broke my funny bone!" Albert looked over at Dr. Smith, but he was hiding his face with his hand. The nurse hurried over to the corner where Dr. Smith was to check on him, but to everyone's surprise the nurse started screaming.

"Security! Security! There is a man pretending to be Dr. Smith!" A man with a white doctor's coat came rushing into the room a few seconds after she started screaming this.

"Who are you?" the man with the doctor's coat screamed.

"I- I am Dr. Smith," the man thought to be Dr. Smith replied with a shaky voice, huddled in the corner.

"You are not Dr. Smith! I am Dr. Smith!" the real Dr. Smith yelled.

Albert looked up with a shocked face.

"So I haven't broken my funny bone!" Albert exclaimed with a smile all the way across his face. When he said this, everyone's face turned to him, confused about why this was what he was worried about at the moment.

"Really?" the nurse, Dr. Smith, and the fraud said in unison.

My Literacy Narrative

Overall, I think that my literacy narrative is going pretty well. I am having trouble with a few things, but mostly I think it is going great. I am really enjoying telling the story with vivid detail. I have never really written anything with a story in it, so I am enjoying writing about all of my senses, how I was feeling, and the atmosphere from the moment.

The things I am having trouble with is transitioning from my introduction to my story and from my story to conclusion. Also, the story part of my paper has lots of vivid detail, but when I get to my conclusion, it is just facts. I would like advice on how to transition from the story to what the experience taught me other than "From this experience, I learned..." Also, I am having trouble knowing whether my paper is too dramatic. In my story, I am a third grader that has to read a big chapter book for the first time. I write about how my jaw drops open and my hands start shaking when I was told about the assignment, but I really did not do that. I just want to convey that it was a huge deal to my third grade mind about reading a chapter book, I just don't know if it is alright to be so dramatic. I really hope I can get advice from my classmates about all of these things.

Literacy Narrative About Cats

In class we read the literacy narrative about a little girl who was obsessed with writing about her cats. I really loved how funny the story was. I could really picture the teacher, Mrs. Foil, standing over Miriam telling her not to write about cats again. I loved how the writer acted like she was the little girl again, and wrote exactly how she felt about the cats as a child. The writer also got her point across about how she learned to be audience aware while writing, while still managing to be funny.

When the author was writing, I could here little Miriam talking in a little high-pitched voice. I loved how the writer channeled her inner little girl and used that to write. She used dramatic words that a little girl would definitely use, and acted like it was the end of the world when Mrs. Foil would not allow her to write about her kittens again. I loved reading this literacy narrative simply because I though it was cute and funny, but it also told how she learned how to be audience aware while writing.

Hate List by Jennifer Brown

Recently, I have been reading Hate List by Jennifer Brown. I really like it so far. However the tempo is kind of slow. I have read more than 100 pages, and the story has still yet to get through an entire day. However, there are many flashbacks which make the story more interesting. The book switches from flashbacks to the present each chapter, so it helps make the story more interesting. The flashback chapters have tons more action though, so I find myself wanting to skip the chapters set in the present.

I also really like how the book really shows Val's thoughts. You really get to hear what she thinks and how she feels. Her boyfriend opened fire on the school cafeteria,  and she had gotten some blame for it. The story is mainly about her dealing with going back to school and coping with her problems. It is very interesting to me how she goes through the problems and copes with going back to the school where the traumatic experience happened. So far, I am enjoying Hate List, I just hope the story picks up soon.

8/26	Hate List	Jennifer Brown	45 mins	1-56 56 pages
8/27	Literacy narratives from Norton		20 mins
8/28	Hate List	Jennifer Brown	35 mins	57-92 35 pages
8/29	Hate List	Jennifer Brown	35 mins	93-131 38 pages