Journal #11

So, this journal is about ethics and values. I personally think that I have extremely good ethics and values. I am well behaved on a whole, and I care very much about how other people are being treated. This reminds me of a funny story in eighth grade. I think I will share it with all of you right now. Just so you know, the names of everybody have been changed.

Elise was at her grandparents' house. It was Christmas. Actually, the day was Christmas Eve, but she was at her grandparents' house for Christmas. Elise was thirteen years old and had been dating Robert for a couple months. She really liked him and their relationship had been going well. However, since it was middle school, it was not like it was anything too serious yet. Anyway, Elise called Robert to see how he was doing. Since she had not seen him in a couple of days, she was really excited to talk to him. To her dismay, when they finally began talking, he did not sound very happy. Elise asked him what was wrong.

"Elise, do you like Thomas?" Elise did not know what to say. She was just in utter shock.

"No! If I liked Thomas, why would I be dating you? Robert, I swear, that is the dumbest thing I have ever heard. Why would you even think that?"

Robert replied, "Well, I was talking to Ann the other day, and she told me that you flirted with him all the time. Plus she told me that your morals and values have been changing."

Elise just kind of sat there, confused. "Robert. You know Ann likes you. Obviously that is why she said that. And what does that even mean, my morals and values have changed?"

Robert paused. "I actually have no idea. That is kind of dumb."

THE END.

To this day, "Robert" and I still joke about that conversation. It is funny because I obviously have and had good morals and values; however, "Ann" obviously did not have very good morals and values. She is my friend now though. <3

Journal #10

There is very much debate when it comes to science verses religion. A lot of people believe in religion and God, while others believe in science. Personally, I think there is a mix of both that is evident in this world. I believe in God; I think He created every little thing that there is. I believe that He created the earth, and that He made every single one of us. I do not believe in evolution; however, I do think it is quite possible for things to evolve. I do not think we came from monkeys or whatever. Frankly, I think that is quite ridiculous. They do not have a developed frontal lobe or something in their brain and there is no way it could become as developed as a humans; scientists said something like that quite recently I do believe.

One book that I think made sense of science verses religion was the novel Angels and Demons by Dan Brown. In that book, he discussed different ideas about religion and how it can relate to science, and I thought his viewpoints are very interesting and intriguing. I never watched the movie, but I imagine that it is very good as well. The book was kind of gruesome, though, like when the religious people were hanged and killed and stabbed and stuff like that. The funny thing is that I do not actually remember how the book even ends. I can't seem to remember who the bad guy actually is; I know it has something to do with Victoria's dad, though. At least I think it does. Maybe it does not, since I kind of thought he died. Maybe I should just reread that story sometime.

I think it is dumb that people get into wars and fights and stuff like that over religion. I definitely stand up for my religion whenever I am faced with that choice in a situation, but I think it goes against everything people are trying to represent when they fight in wars to prove how right they are. Basically, I understand why there is so much debate over science and religion, but I think it is ridiculous that there is so much hype over it.

Puritan Presentation

Journal #9

There are many different forms of organized religion. Some are good, and some are bad. I practice the Lutheran religion. We are a break off of the Catholic church kind of. We are not nearly as strict as the Catholic church, but we are not as cool as Southern Baptists or anything. If I had a choice, I think I would be Southern Baptist. Actually, I would definitely be a follower of Richnology.

Richnology is by far the greatest religion ever created on the face of this earth. I think it is actually probably the greatest religion in the universe. Is there a face of the universe since there is a face of the earth? I bet the great god Richno could create a face on the universe. It would probably be extremely good looking and handsome with olive colored skin, bright sparking brown eyes, and dark luscious hair. It might just be too much to handle. It would be fantastic.

Richnology is not one of the most popular religions out there, but give it some time and it will be. Once people experience the great goodness of Richno, they will probably convert right away. He brings people a feeling of peace and goodness inside of them, which I think is something most people would want to feel. At our little school of Pleasant Plains High School, I would definitely say that Richnology is one of the most practiced religions. Along with Catholicism, Lutheranism, and Baptist, it is a very popular religion around here. This is probably because we have all been able to see and experience the great Richno in his own being and wonderfulness. When he becomes a famous man someday and other people can actually see who he is, there is not a doubt in my mind that Richnology will become by far the most practiced religion in the world, even more so than Catholicism and Lutheranism and Muslim. It will even be more powerful than the Ku Klux Klan, which is arguable a religion. According to Ryan Barnes, it is a supremest group and not a religion, but it is still undeniably powerful. Once Richnology is known to the world, it will become the most powerful religion or organization to ever have been created.

Journal #8

So, we just got done watching "The The Impotence of Proofreading," also known as "The Importance of Proofreading." I thought it was pretty funny and creative. Basically, this guy, Taylor Mall, was doing this three minute and thirty second speech about the dumb mistakes we make while typing papers or essays or whatever. For his entire three minutes and thirty seconds, he acted as if he was reading off of a paper with someone who really sucked at grammar; for example, most of his words were not right. He used "pices" instead of "pieces" and things like that. One thing that I thought was funny is that at the end, he meant to say, "The red pen is your friend," meaning that when spellcheck does the little red underline thing it is there to help you. Since he was trying to show examples of how our stupid mistakes affect what we are trying to say, he instead said, "The red penis your friend." This obviously gives a completely different impression than the one he was trying to make. What struck me as funny, though, is that my friend Alexander Olivero has a brother named Anthony who is a few years older than us. Anthony tells the story of his seventh grade year, when one of his teachers was trying to write on the board, "The pen is red" as a grammar exercise or something. She instead accidentally put the words "pen" and "is" a tad bit too close together, and I think you can figure out what the board read instead. Granted, since these kids were in seventh grade, they all thought this was the most hysterical thing they had ever seen and to this day still laugh about it. This just goes to show how simple spelling or grammar errors can completely change the overall point you were trying to make. I think this guy did a really good job of portraying it in his speech; that would be one difficult thing to memorize. Overall, I thought it was an interesting lesson.

Journal #7

I really do not think I follow any superstitions. Personally, I think superstitions are kind of dumb. For example, Paige Graham, who sits in the seat right beside me, believes that every time a dog barks at her, she will have bad luck for two years. That is so ridiculous. That would amount to like nine thousand nine hundred and eighty years of bad luck, which I do not think is really possible. Basically she would have bad luck for the rest of her life just because a dog barked at her. That is quite laughable.

I think OCD traits are kind of like superstitions a little bit. Well, maybe it is not quite the same, but I am just trying to do a simple comparison. For example, if I put lotion on one leg, I feel like I must put lotion on the other leg or else I will feel all weird and jumpy until I do apply the lotion. However, I do not feel like if I do not put the lotion on I will be cursed or something; who would think that? Oh yeah, witches. But I am no witch. I just feel like my equilibrium is off and that bothers me quite some bit.

When I think of superstitions, I always think of the Fairly Odd Parents. There is this one episode they used to play way back in the day where the anti-fairies are released from jail. They take joy in making people miserable, so any superstition that is broken is punished. For example, Timmy Turner walks under a ladder and his mom's back breaks or something. There is also the time when he spills salt, breaks a ladder, sees a black cat, steps on a crack, and stuff like that. I think his mom's back breaks every time. It might be his dad whose back is breaking though, just because his dad is usually the main parent. Either way, it hurts one of his parents, and it continues to do so until they return all the anti-fairies back into their jail.

Journal #6

Sam and Dottie were sitting in a classroom together. They were in Math class. Sam, an seventeen year old senior, was just sitting quietly doing her homework. She had a ton of work today and wanted to get it done as soon as possible so that she could go home and study all night. She was a very good student, and everyone's parents loved her because she was just a good kid. Dottie was sitting beside her. Dottie was, to put simply, the exact opposite of Sam. Dottie was a quite rebellious child. At age sixteen, she had finally received her license and went crazy. She was out every night partying and having a good time. Her parents were too meek to do anything about her, so she was basically just going psycho.

So, these two girls were just chilling in class. They were not friends by any means; in fact, the two actually did not like each other. All of a sudden, their teacher walked out of the room. Dottie stood up with a sneaky looking smile on her face. She sauntered over to the phone that was attached to the wall and dialed a couple numbers. Then she started screaming.

"Office? This is Sam. Get help now! There's a kid with a gun! Another one has a knife!" Sobbing, Dottie hung up the phone, and immediately the sobbing turned into a vicious cackling. Sam sat there, her mouth open in shock. Then Dottie pulled the fire alarm. Alarms started going off all over the school, and cries and screams from the students could be heard all around.

Sam was expelled from the school. A couple of kids had been hospitalized as everyone tried to run through the slender doorways at the same time, and Sam was responsible. She did not make it into the college of her choice, and she was no longer allowed to be the class valedictorian. Dottie got away with everything.

Journal #5

So, I have these super strict parents. Whenever I do something remotely wrong, whether I even think it is wrong or not, I will get grounded from one thing or another. Usually Facebook is taken away from me. My cell phone used to be the most common thing taken away, but now that I can drive they do not really do that anymore. It would just be my luck that the one day I did not have my cell phone, I would get in an accident or hit a deer or run out of gas or something ridiculous. Now my parents just ground me from Facebook for a day or too. I hate that. Facebook is my main method of communication. My parents are like, can you not just pick up the phone and call them? I am like, no, you cannot creep on people's pictures over a phone call, duh. Plus I have a lot of friends on Facebook that are from other schools and stuff, so Facebook is pretty much how I keep connected with them. Yeah, I could text them, but then my parents will complain about how all I ever do is text and they would get mad about that and then I would probably talk back and get grounded from Facebook again.

While I do hate this, it is fair. It is a lot more fair than getting grounded from my car or something extreme. Some people I know do not get punished at all for anything, and I think that is kind of ridiculous. I mean, I do not like getting punished and I think a lot of parents punish their kids for way dumb reasons, but when the parents just let their kid do whatever they want, they will probably grow up to be bad people. Bad people equal a bad community, and then our own children will be growing up with all those bad influences. What would the world come to? It would certainly not be a very happy place.

Journal #4

I love long trips. Unfortunately, since I participate in cross country and softball, both of my brothers play baseball, and my dad is a baseball coach, there is not much time for my family to take vacations. There is also the fact that both of my parents are teachers and I work at Dairy Queen. It is hard for us to take time off, and, let us face it, we are obviously not rolling in extra money. I mean, I obviously am, since Dairy Queen is such a luxurious job. My parents, on the other hand, cannot exactly pay for us to go to Australia every year or anything. That is the one place I want to go more than anywhere in the world. The reason behind that is that my grandma lived in Australia until she was about twenty. That is when she met my grandpa during the war and she came back to America to live with him.

Anyway, let me clarify what I meant when I said I have never been on a long trip. I have never seen an ocean. Obviously, with that being said, I have never been to another country. Or Canada. I have never even been on a moving airplane. So for my family, long trips, also known as vacation to Wisconsin, is a fun little car ride. For me, though, I enjoy it. I get along well with my two younger brothers, so the long car rides are usually fun. I get to spend time with my whole family, and even though we drive my parents psycho, I usually end up getting closer to my brothers. Until Johnny spills an entire large milkshake in the backseat and it makes the car smell like rotten milk for the rest of the week; yeah, I was not really a fan of him right then. Long trips, though, always seem to bring my family closer together just because we are pretty much forced together for days or weeks at a time without any other friends as a distraction.

Journal #3

I woke up with my head pounding. My eyes were dry and itchy, and my throat was sore. There was something covering my mouth, but I could not reach up to see what it was because my hands were roughly tied behind my back. I wiggled around, trying to free my hands, but something that felt like twine tore into my wrists. They began to burn and bleed as the rope tightened.

I looked around, terrified. I had no idea where I was or how I had gotten there. I was in an empty warehouse; all I could see was the gray concrete floor around me and the dark, moldy wall I was leaning against. It was so dimly lit that I could barely make out the heavy metal door on the other side of the room. I looked down to see that my feet were strongly twined together as well, and I made the decision that I did not yet want to mess with getting my feet free. I could not afford to weaken my feet and ankles so soon; I would most likely be needing those for later.

All of a sudden, the metal door swung open. A big, burly man walked in with a wooden club. He had a gun in his holster. The man was really quite large, and he did not exactly seem to be pleasant. I shrunk down against the wall, not knowing whether to appear weak in order to humor him or strong in order to defy him. I was so scared that I really had no control over my actions, though. I winced as the man came closer, swinging his club back and forth against his hand.

"Hello, Nikki." This man knew my name. How did he know my name? "Glad to see you are doing so well." The man smirked and handed out a cell phone. "Want to go ahead and call that daddy of yours now that you are awake?" Confused, I reached for the phone. "Woahhh there, sister. Before you make this call, we have to go ahead and discuss what you are going to say. First of all, tell him I need the money."

"Wait a minute," I interrupted, then winced from fear. When he just looked at me, I continued. "My dad is a teacher and a baseball coach. What money is he supposed to give you?"

The man then looked as confused as I. He started to say something, then stopped. Finally, he made out, "Oh. You are the wrong Nikki. Sorry."

With that, he untied me and set me free. It was the scariest and most random day of my life.