Reverend Wheet

Just so you know, I'm not actually Reverend Wheet. My name is Marianne, I'm female, I am certainly not 49 years old, and most of Reverend Wheet's interests do not interest me at all. If anybody has looked at my profile, you'll see what I'm talking about. I have another (fake) blog as a character I invented, Samuel Wheet. Feel free to check his blog.

Sorry for any confusion I may have caused, but I don't want Reverend Wheet's blog to say his name is actually Marianne. Blogger won't let you run two identities on the same account. :(

- Marianne

I'm so interesting!

Some people are gifted in that they can actually say something interesting when they are asked about an interesting fact about themselves - say, being hit by lightning - but the majority of us have nothing good to say. The next time you need to tell something interesting about yourself, consider using one of these. They sound very impressive, but they work for everyone!

An interesting fact about me is...

• I frequently breathe air molucules that Leonardo Da Vinci breathed hundreds of years ago. I seem to attract them!
• I am made out of materials that, five billion years ago, were inside stars
• I have a completely unique fingerprint
• 25% of my genes are identical to those of a banana
• My inertial weight is exactly equal to my gravitational weight
• My mass is equal to _ slugs (to get your mass in slugs, divide your weight in pounds by 32)
• One of my ancestors was protoplasmic goo. I'm also related to the Ur worm, the first creature to have bilateral symmetry
• I'm more radioactive than a banana!

- Marianne

If it can happen, it will happen...

If it can go wrong, it will go wrong--that's Murphy's Law.  My experiences today support Murphy's claim.  For those of you who don't know, I am going to attend a research internship program in MIT's magnet laboratory, sponsored by Boston University's High School Honors Program.  Today, was my first day at BU (I'm a commuter, but I still have to do things there). One of the first things we did was get "Terrier Cards" which allow us into the dorm, get food at the cafeteria, etc.  I had to go outside, walk a ways, and go down some stairs into an underground place, where I filled out a form and had a picture taken of me, and then they gave me my card.  When I got back to the dorm--three connected tall, ugly buildings called Warren Towers--I found that my card did not work.  The guard told us that our cards had to be activated.  To do this, we would have to go around the block to some other building, where they activated the cards.  But first, it was almost time for orientation, so we went there, and decided to do the activating later.  Now, I am usually a prepared person.  If there is even the slightest chance of rain, I will usually have an umbrella with me.  I often appear silly carrying umbrellas on sunny days, but when it starts raining, everyone looks at me with envy.  However, I decided not to bring an umbrella to BU because I thought it would be inconvenient to carry around with me, and I would probably be inside for most of the time, anyway.  Well, I was.  But when the time came when I did have to go out for a short walk to the activation building, I saw to my dismay a huge, dark cloud quickly spreading across the sky.  Perhaps I could go before the rain started, I mused.  A few other boys with the same problem came with me, and we rushed out of the dining room, down the elevator.  Alas, the rain had started, and was coming down in torrents.  We had no defenses, and simply had to get wet.  Some girls were ahead of us, seemingly with the same activation problem, also getting wet.  At one point, one of the boys with me turned around.  The other boy and I followed him stupidly.  No, that was not the way in.  So we turned around again.  Then we turned around again.  At last, one of us suggested that maybe we should follow the girls.  "Yes, girls are smart," another of us commented.  

So we found our way into the activation building, soaking wet, and got our cards activated. When I got back to Warren Towers--what did you expect?--my card still did not work.  Neither did the other commuter's, who was with me.  "This seems like a conspiracy against commuters," my companion mused.  We asked the Program Assistant about the problem.  He said we probably swiped the card to fast, or in the wrong position.  Well, I guess Program Assistants are never very useful.  Of course, we had to try his advice, and of course, it didn't help.  So we asked one of the program's authorities, and he said that since we were commuters, the cards didn't let us in, but they would fix that tomorrow.  For now, we had to listen to the police officers talk.  The policeman turned out to be funny.  "We don't want you carrying these around," he said, and held up a gun.  "Or one of these" (holding a mace).  "You don't need one of these to go into Boston" (holding a pocket knife)...."If you can tell me a legal reason to use one of these, I'll give you $50" (holding up a drug pot)  "I've heard everything, including flower pot."  

After the policemen talked, we had to go to a meeting on our floor (commuters are assigned to floors for community bonding purposes).  The rooms were like prison cells, the hall like a prison hall, the common room not very interesting.  The chairs were taken up, so I decided to sit by the wall.  Well, what do you know?  I chose just the spot to hit my tailbone on an outlet sticking out of the wall like a brick.  We had to tell interesting things about ourselves, and one boy said, "I've been hit by lightning.  Well, I guess it was my fault--I was under a tree, holding an umbrella with a metal rod." "What did it feel like?" asked the Program Assistant.  "I didn't feel anything; I just woke up."  I suppose there is some truth to Murphy's Law.

-Philip    

We Know Where You Live...Sort of

I've never taken the bus. This has been one of my lifetime goals, up there with earning a nobel prize and owning a chihuahua (okay, not really). Helen and I almost took one the other day, but neither of us believed the other one really wanted to hop on a random bus to nowhere, and the doors closed before we realized the other was serious. My friend Emlyn from Virginia was visiting, and one of my other friends invited us to their party. "Oh it's easy to get to my house. Just take the T to lechmere and then switch to the 89 bus and get off at South St." (No, these aren't the directions he gave me but I don't want y'all stalking him. That means you, Helen.) So we took the T, got off at the right stop and even got on the right bus. It's a miracle considering how distractable we are. We're sitting on the bus joking:

Sachi: "Oh it's only a few stops, he said."
Emlyn: "Two hours later..."
Sachi: *laughs* "It'll be an adventure."

Two hours later..."This is the last stop this bus makes. Please exit through the rear."

Sachi: "Um...."
Emlyn: "There was definitely no South St."
Sachi: "We are so bashing his head in...where are we???? In the middle of Somerville?"

Yeah. It took us a half hour to get back to Cambridge. What an adventure. (PS. Joseph, if you're reading this, we know where you live.) (In theory...)


Sachi and Emlyn

Giggle, I mean, GIGO

So for the past few days, I've been getting random IMs from people I don't know. It's a little creepy. So I've been talking to the latest, and apparently, there's a "Salmonbot" going around. Basically, it's a bunch of bots with screennames that end in "salmon" that go around connecting random people. (From what I can gather, the bots get screennames from people who recently posted on livejournal or, in my case, on deviantart, and have their screennames on their profile.) So far, I've been hit with "InfectiousSalmon" and "WitheredSalmon".

The latest person, after both of us establishing that we are not, in fact, bots ourselves, went on to explain all of this to me. Apparently, some people even message the bots begging to be connected. Wow.

<3 Helen

Loose Co-what?

Our airconditioner has been quite irregular recently. For a while, it stopped working, then it started again, then stopped. We called someone to fix the airconditioner about two weeks ago; he is scheduled to do it today (but hasn't arrived yet). Today, the airconditioner started working again, but we assume that there is a loose connection, and that it might disconnect again--thus we still need it fixed. Today is quite a crazy day in my house. There are men working on the deck building with wood poisoned with arsenic (tasty treat for termites, eh?), there was a man who came to fix our disposal, there will be cleaning people any time now, and there is supposed to be an airconditioner repairman. In addition, my grandmother is visiting, who, upon hearing about how many people would be working in the house, suggested that we serve them lunch. Anyway, she was out in an interview, my mother was at work, and my father had to go to drive my sisters to different places and Sachi, who was visiting to work with Rebecca on the great chaos theory textbook project, to school to obtain math textbooks. So I was to be alone in the house. Alone to greet the airconditioner repairman. I mentioned that I could drive them, but alas, it was illegal for someone as young as me to drive underaged persons who were not in my family (i.e. Sachi--why do you have to ruin everything?) My father told me that the airconditioner's compressor was working, but we thought there must be a loose connection. "Practice saying that there is a loose connection," he said. I tried: "The compressor is working, but the airconditioner stopped working and started working and stopped working and started working, so we think there must be a loose compressiur...I mean..." I couldn't say it! Compression? No, Connecture? No! Laughing hysterically, Sachi said, "Maybe you should give him a card with "loose connection" written on it, so that he doesn't have to say anything!" Argh!

-Philip

Lunch is just about the weirdest time of day for me...

I've had a lot of awkward experiences in the cafeteria, but here I've thrown together some of the funniest. I know school is over and it seems kind of out-dated, but ah well. Enjoy.

I was in the lunch line (an exceptionally long one, at that), trying to read what the special was today. There were people blocking the paper with the food choices of that day, so I had to lean over in order to read it. I was straining my eyes, trying to make out what it says, when all of a sudden I realize that the person in front of me is staring at me. He was a sixth grader from the other cluster, and I knew who he was but I didn't know him. He was just looking at me, and I was looking at him. Suddenly, he made a weird face and said awkwardly, "Hello, h-h-hi. Just..." With that he turned around. A few seconds later, he looked back at me, and asked, "Do you like to paint your nails?" I said I didn't, and he responded, "Okay, just wondering."

Some time later I was in the lunch line again. Right behind me were some eighth graders that are quite strange. I've seen them around and laughed at them, but this was probably the strangest. There was one girl who is friends with them (who I will call Jill), but was farther ahead in line. She came back to her friends. "Why are you standing so far back in the line?" she began. "There's a perfectly good spot right there and you are too afraid to cut! Come on." One of the girls decided to go with her, but just as she did, the lunch line moved forward. Jill seemed annoyed. "Honey, they just blocked our entrance," she said to her friends.
Later that same day, the girls had split off into two groups. One of them got a lunch tray that said "Do not Litter" on it. She suggested that she and another girl (who I will call Paula) switch trays because aparantly Paula littered a lot. Jill turned around and said, "I bet I litter more than you!" Paula laughed and said that once she had had a whole pack of soda bottles, and there was a trash can right next to her, but she dropped it on the ground. "You do litter a lot," Jill said.

Some time later I was in the lunch line again. Right behind me (this beginning sound familiar?) were a few annoying eighth graders. One of them, who I will call Lawrence, complained that he didn't get enough popcorn chicken. He asked all his friends if he could have some of theirs, and they said no. Then he asked me, and I said no. Suddenly Lawrence looked at me as if he were completely confused and asked, "are you a boy or a girl?" He was being really annoying, so I just ignored him, thinking it would come to nothing. But I was wrong. By the time I left the line, he was arguing with all his friends about whether I was male or female. It was sort of awkward. But I didn't really mind until, about five minutes later, I heard that Lawrence had brought it up with everybody at the table he was sitting at. I started laughing as I listened to their conversation. It went something like this:
"She's sitting-"
"You mean it's sitting."
"Sure, it's sitting at a table with all girls, so obviously, it's a girl."
"But there is a boy sitting next to it!"
"That's a girl, Micheala."
"Oh, you're right."
Another five minutes or so past when one girl sitting at the same table as Lawrence leaned over and asked me my name. So for your information, my name is now Wanda.

-Marianne

It's a Conspiracy!

Philip, Sachi, and I were eating lunch in a Chinese restaurant, when suddenly Sachi exclaims, "It's a bunch of gym teachers, comming towards us! And I know two of them! I hope they don't come in here, that would be a bit awkward..."
"Oh no, I know two of them too! Well maybe they're going to Lam's. Or maybe they're going to turn the other way."
"But what if they are going to come here?"
"Well, we're basically done. We could just leave before they even get here."
"But we still have to pay the check."
"Oh, right. But look--they haven't been visable for a long time. They must not be coming here."
"Unless they're trying to get us to think that, but really they're sneaking in the back door to surprise us."
"But how would they know we're here?"
"Do either of you have your school ID cards with you? Maybe the school puts tracking devices in them!"
"Oh that made me think something! What if the school put spy cameras in all the nearby restaurants and stores so they could moniter people skipping class!"
"It would be easier just to have cameras at all the school's doors..."
After a while, we leave, wrapped up in our discusion about whether or not it would be easy to escape from a restaurant without paying the correct amount of money. As I'm walking by Lam's, I suddenly remember about the gym teachers, only to notice that they're right in there, only a few feet away from me! (It's hard to see into the building, as it's brighter outside so there are reflections.) But they can see us perfectly! I hardly register before we pass the window that both the gym teachers who I had this year are waving at me. But, laughing horribly, I manage to say - "The gym teachers! Are in Lam's!"
"Did they see you?"
"They were waving at me!"
We all laugh. "I wonder if this would make a good blog story," one of us says. "It would be even better, " says another, "if we went back and waved to them. But I don't want to..."
"Yes," we all agreed. We aren't brave enough to sacrafice ourselves purposely for the amusment of our friends.

-Rebecca

I Love Stupid Jokes

The title says it all. I love stupid jokes. Long ones with elaborate set ups and complex plots that eventually all twist together are fine. Profession ones are fine. But the best kind of all are the really stupid ones. However, no one seems to share this love of mine. The reactions I get are rather lacking.

For example, today I exclaimed to Helen, "Ask me if I'm an airplane!"
"Are you an airplane?" She asks.
"No!" I giggle.

She proceeds to cut off my vocal cords, hands and feet and forbid me to tell jokes.

Another good one:

"I know a good knock knock joke!" I say.
"Oh?" The other person responds.
"Yup. You start!" I convince them.
"Okay. Knock knock?" The start.
"Who's there?" I ask.

Silence.

And an obscure mathy one that (if you don't know abstract algebra, it's probably not worth it to learn it for this joke)

What's purple and commutes?
An abelian grape!

What's purple, commutes, and is worshipped by a few people?
A finitely venerated abelian grape!

Of course, no one ever gets it.

What happens when you throw (Edited to fix spelling!) a green rock into the red sea?
It gets wet!

What's big, red, and eats rocks?
A big red rock eater!

What's red and bad for your teeth?
A brick!

Finally, the classic:

What's brown and sticky?
A stick.

Add your favorite stupid jokes!


Sachi

Hot Diplo-Thingys

Indeed, I am not writing this due to the embarrassment of just myself, but mostly to my friend, who we'll call 'Tovah'.

So I'm at the Model United Nations barbecue, which was mostly enjoyed by me, but less so my other common authors on this blog (due to their monophobic natures), and completely avoided by others (ahem). However, I'm with my favorite gossip girls, 'Tovah' and 'Cheryl', although Tovah is perhaps the more interesting one. Her entire reason for participating in the endeavor was to drool of a particular senior. This particular senior she had spouted her not-so-clandestine emotions for in the form of Facebook messages, random quotes and one rather pornographic poem, as well as to a junior who enjoyed juicy gossip, who we'll call Da Yeon.

At this barbecue, Da Yeon, Tovah, Cheryl, several other juniors and I had planned to have her read that aforementioned poem to the said senior, and the rest of the Model United Nations, Mr. Cho and all. However, a rather unfortunate mishap prevented the delivery, so we planned to brainstorm an alternate root for Tovah to display her lustrous emotions.

We had decided to deliver the poem tomorrow, at his locker (which eventually failed, but that's another story), and give him the heads-up through his yearbook. So as it should be, we managed to get our hands on his very yearbook (of which were being passed around at random for MUNers to sign) and opened to the inner covers, the designated signature pages.
"Yo man," she begins, reading from her nemesis' signature, "I'll always miss those basketball and Model UN meetings with you big guy, yo, and those tennis--"
"Excuse me...." We hear a voice above us. Tovah's favorite senior has heard our ramblings and has stuck his ruddy face around the corner in confusion. "Could you stick to, erm--signing?"
Tovah turns a dull puce reminiscent of a Barney after one too many washes. "Oh...oh...oh..."
She flips to his picture, but quickly looses her fearful attitude, and find her picture in the extraordinary embarrassing pictures of us froshy froshy. I point a junior accidentally placed next to her brother in the 'L' section. Tovah makes a loud noise and begins to write her very own phone number under the poor girls' picture. I give double take and realize that she is indeed placing her phone number in his yearbook. I gulp, and am relieved by Da Yeon and a senior (Mah Senior Hero!) entering the room.
Tovah begins to spiel on her latest adventures, and while Da Yeon finds her embarrassing exploits amusing , Mah Senior Hero! is nonetheless confused. She grabs Da Yeon and into the land of the slutty MUN seniors.

And after we have flipped through the yearbook, we return the the land of the slutty MUN seniors (rather, the foyer) and we are greeted by Tovah's one and only man. "So, how long have you liked me?"

Da Yeon whispers rather forcefully into our ears, "he's known FOREVER."

Oh dear.

(There is a very long backstory to this that is quite juicy, but I don't believe 'Tovah' would enjoy me spouting out her long and depressing love story for comic relief of my snobby friends)

-Jared

What Will Be Will Be

It is the way it is. Whatever happens happens. It is so because it is so. x=x. Outside the box means not inside the box. What do all these statements have in common? They're tautologies. What's a tautology? Well, it is what it is. A while ago a few of us were talking:

Person A: "What's a tautologist?"
Person B: "A person who says tautologies."
Person A: "What's a tautology?"
Person B: "Something a tautologist says."

Today was the last DSI Tuesday of the year, Do Something Interesting Tuesday. Usually it's the first Tuesday of every month, but this month we had two. As Derek, Philip, Rebecca and I were talking, Philip comments on something saying "Well, he could have but he didn't." to which I comment that that was a useless true statement that added no information because it is always true, which is the approximate definition of tautology. (If you have gotten this far in this post without a clear understanding of what a tautology is, you should probably look it up before continuing.) Because it seemed like an adventure, we decided to speak only in tautologies.

"We should speak in tautologies, or we shouldn't."
"I might consider that a good idea, I might not."
"If we spoke in tautologies we would be speaking in tautologies."

The tautologies built upon each other and our conversation spiraled around giving me a headache. Someone commented that at tautologist conventions no one ever says anything! Eventually I got sick of it.

"Enough is enough!" I exclaimed.

Moving on:

"We might consider talking in the subjunctive."
"Or we might not."
"That might not have been very helpful."
"Were we to talk in the imperfect I might have to bash Derek on the head."
"Were you to bash derek in the head I should stab the fan."
"If you were to stab the fan I might bash you."

We came to the conclusion that at subjunctive conventions no one ever does anything!

Somehow we evolved to talking in dichotomies. We ended up with strange statements that may or may not be paradoxes:

"Either this is a false dichotomy or it is not."

Somehow we got on to the topic of Newton and Aristotle. (Helen once commented: "Your main topics are philosophy, drama, gifted education or sex. Now which one's the odd one out?" I left out the sex part of this conversation, sorry guys. Maybe later if you're really good :P ) Now, we came up with a strange joke:

An olive falls on Aristotle's head. Aristotle says, "The olive is moving to its natural place at the center of the Earth."

An apple falls on Newton's head. Newton says, "The apple is falling because all objects exert a force on every other object."

A cherry tree falls on Washington's head. Washington says, "Maybe I shouldn't have chopped that tree."

When all was over, and we parted I mused:

"That was interesting."

The same line occurred to both Rebecca and I, "Or it wasn't," we said in unison.


Sachi

90 degrees weather....

Our school has issues. I don't think we have heating or air conditioning, and there is all this mold growing on the ceiling. And usually, we're ok with it. I mean, it's not the best school, but we can normally adapt to it.

Then came 90 degree weather. Everywhere from the ground floor and up is hot and stuffy. My teachers made me evacuate from my art and math rooms because it was just far too hot. I think someone would have passed out if we had stayed. The only place that was (slightly) cold was the basement. Unfortunately, it's rather hard to navigate in the basement, and there aren't that many classrooms down there either. But as I was walking with Helen, trying to escape from the heat, I came upon a space on Main St. (between Blue and Green) which was mildly cool.

Instead of hot spots, we have cold spots.

~'Cilla

Chinese Water Torture has nothing on Arena Scheduling

As you all know by now, from Sachi and Phillip's (I really hope I spelled that right, with two L's instead of one, because I wasn't sure so...) posts, we had Arena Scheduling today, or as I affectionately call it, Hell. And not like, movie-hell with a hot guy playing the devil, no I mean Dante's ninth circle-type hell.

My problem? I didn't have a math class, a second gym class (we're required to take two gym classes, each a semester long, each year), or any electives. So I skip down to the cafeteria, cheerily expecting it to take half an hour, tops, and that I would be free to go back to photo afterwards.

How freaking incredibly naive of me. The first thing I see as I walk into the cafeteria is many masses of bodies, seemingly forming blobs near different things. I look closer, the things they're around are the guidance counselors. But I breathe, still cheery, as some counselors seemed like they only had a few people around them. Well, except for that one, with about forty kids forming a sort of line from him or her. Now, to find my counselor...

And of course, just my luck, my counselor is the one with the forty kid line. I quickly got in line, and seconds afterwards, five more kids have joined behind me. And I wait, for the next hour and forty-five minutes. That's right, one hour, forty-five minutes. That's 105 minutes in line, only.

And then the kids in my line who only had to fix a missing gym class got taken care of early. They just walked off with a different counselor, practically taunting the rest of us still stuck in line because of missing a core class! And then there's the kids like Derek, who was only there because he didn't get an *elective* he wanted! Boo freaking hoo.

I guess other people were just as bored as me, because around 2:37, some guys in the next line over started singing. I'm talking like, barbershop quartet singing. Well, except there were only three of them, so I guess they were more of a trio. Strange, anyway.

The funny thing about being in line for nearly two hours? You start to bond with the people around you. Like the guy behind me had a conversation with me about the classes we were missing, even though I had absolutely no idea who he was. But then the conversation went something like this:

Random dude: Hey, are you taking honors chem?
Me: Yeah, is it hard?
RD: *shrugs* Not really, hey have you ever considered joining science team?
Me: ...er, no.
*awkward silence*

Eventually, I finally got to talk to my counselor. But then the news came that all of the department heads, who were supposed to sign our revised schedules, left. They just decided to go home, even there were still about 30 kids left who needed signatures. My counselor was pissed. But we went on to do the forms anyway.

Please, please, please don't make me ever go through that again.

<3 Helen

Between You and What You Want There is at Least One Line

Arena scheduling: it sounded to me liked I’d be pushed into the middle of a giant colloseum-like arena, thrown a sword, and would have to fight my way through counselors, students and department chairs. Champion wins all: the choice of courses, electives and PE classes she wants. Unfortunately, Arena scheduling was nowhere near as glorious.

I arrived right after school ended, and there was already a line forming to get into the cafeteria,where the scheduling was going on. That was the first line I was in, starting at 2:20 PM. Fortunately that line moved rather quickly and I was soon able to enter a second line: the line to get to my counselor. This was much more tricky, if only because I couldn’t tell which line was the one with my counselor at the end of it. Like one of those game shows where one of three doors has the prize behind it, and you have to pick one. Well, it wasn’t three, it was about twelve, and they weren’t those “easy open it’ll take two seconds for me to turn the handle” doors, they were long, long lines.

Estimates ranged, but the general consensus was that over half of the school’s 1500 rising sophomores, juniors and seniors were at arena scheduling, stuffed into that hot cramped cafeteria. Out of those, probably another sixty or seventy percent had problems with their PE class. It’s rather ironic that I had to wait in so many lines when I don’t even like PE! While I was waiting in line for my guidance counselor, a line of about ten people slithered through the crowded place. “Migrating lines!” I exclaimed to Helen, who was standing across from me.

Once I did reach the front of the line I was in, it took about three minutes to straighten out which courses I wanted to take and check whether they were in the right blocks. I joked with my counselor, mentioning how it was akin to waiting at the airport (though about three times worse). She took it the opposite way—”Oh yes! I love that analogy! Like you’re waiting, but it’s for this wonderful plane ride to some far away country and adventure.” I was then redirected to another line: the PE line. The PE line wrapped around half the cafeteria. The PE line moved at a speed of one one hundreth of a mile per hour. The PE line had only two administrators that worked on scheduling students.

I joked around with my fellow linemates—they should put up advertising for arena scheduling. “Arena Scheduling–Come on, everyone’s doing it!” or maybe “Arena Scheduling—Don’t miss what hundreds of kids wait in hour long lines to go to!” We bet on when we would get to the front, but I was twenty minutes too optimistic. When I got to the front of the line, the PE Department Head was busy convincing people to take world games. I had watched her before, and she kept trying to sell kids the gym with the lowest amount of people in it, I was amused. She got to me—”How about PGA?” PGA? What? “Oh it stands for Personal and Group Awareness, you’ll love it. It’s like...you’re on an island and you have to get off, or other games.” So I signed up. I figured it was better than world games.

In total, I spent 95 minutes in lines and 5 minutes scheduling. I was about average. So if most people have only a 5 minute scheduling debt, then I can’t imagine there isn’t a better way to run this.

I realize I’m not the first nor probably the last to write about today, but I hope you’ll forgive us, (or at least enjoy laughing at our pain) I know the only way I could make it through the thing was to think about all the good blog stories.


Sachi

X-Block from Hell

Last Thursday in homeroom, my homeroom teacher was passing out our schedules for next year. Upon receiving mine, I quickly examined it to see if there were any problems. My heart stopped. There were. Not only did my schedule have problems, but the two problems had to do with English and physical education, the only two required classes for seniors (the rest are just for fun, or more importantly, to get into college). I was even more dismayed to find out over the next few hours that nearly everybody else that I knew had schedule problems. Maybe it was because of the override not passing, so classes were cancelled? Of course, our school has developed a system for fixing schedular problems, a mass schedule-fixing party in the cafeteria during X-block (a period after school ends on Mondays and Thursdays when many clubs and meetings are held) the next Monday, called Arena Scheduling. I had been to Arena Scheduling once before, in June of Freshman year, only to find out when I reached the end of the line that there was nothing wrong with my schedule. I didn't remember the details, but my general intuition told me that if this many people had schedule problems, Arena Scheduling would be pretty bad.

And, sure enough, when I reached the atrium in Red just after school today, there was already a long line winding around Main Street just to get into the cafeteria. By the time I made it through the doors and down the cafeteria stairs, the line was going faster, and at first, I was elated to see very few people in the cafeteria, with the department heads just sitting at desks, waiting for someone to come. But then I turned a corner and was dismayed; there were many people, but they were all waiting to get their yellow "Course Request" Correction Forms (don't ask me why the "Course Request" is in quotation marks) from their guidance counselors. Now, the last three days have been hot and humid, and this is bad enough. But picture near shoulder-to-shoulder contact with sweaty people in an overcrowded high school cafeteria in such weather, and you have something of an idea of what it was like. I couldn't even see the counselors, because there were so many people everywhere. I tried to squeeze my way between people to look for my counselor, which was a very slow process, and I often bumped into people, who luckily didn't seem to notice (I suppose everyone was bumping into everyone else, so it didn't matter). Finally, I saw a male figure sitting at one of the tables, and thought it was my counselor, so I got on line. A little while later, the crowds parted enough for me to see that it was not my counselor that I was waiting on line for. So I was lost in the crowd again, occasionally conversing with my fellow lost-people about the dreadful situation. At one point, I happened upon Sachi, and mentioned that I couldn't find my counselor. "Who is your counselor?" she asked. When I told her, she said, "is that him?" I looked to my left, and saw my counselor right there, in plain view. "Yes," I replied sheepishly, and got on line.

Now, it so happens that the line that I got on was not a straight line, but more of what looked like a U shape. Or so I thought. After a while, the girl who I thought was ahead of me told me that I was in front of her. Confused, I asked for clarification about the meaning of "in front". "Do you mean I am behind you, or ahead of you?" I asked, awkwardly. "Ahead," she replied. Strange, I thought. She continued, "the line is snaking like this," and showed me with her finger in a meandering line that I could make no sense of. But who was I to object? I was apparently ahead of so many people who had gotten on line before me. So I went along with the absurdity as if I understood, and reached my counselor pretty soon. There, I told him my problems, and he filled out my form, and I was off to the department heads to get my classes changed.

First, I went to the English department head, who didn't have much of a line, and I got that taken care of. Next came physical education, which had a monstruously long line. I don't know why it is, but P.E. classes are the ones that the most people have problems with. So I waited, and waited, and waited. At one point I saw Rebecca get on far behind me, and then a while later, Sachi. I couldn't help but grin to myself at how I had managed to get so far ahead of them. When I reached the end of the line, I was greeted by a cheerful female gym teacher, who tried to convince me not to take the wellness class that my counselor had written on my form, because I had taken it before. First, she tried to get me to register for PGA, or Personal Group Awareness. When I hesitated to agree to this, she had a renewed burst of excitement, and said, "How about Aquatic Instructer Certification" or something like that, "You could become a lifeguard! It would be such a useful job after college..." What an awkward position I had gotten into! I showed some interest, but mentioned that alas, I didn't want to have to bring in a bathing suit twice a week, and wash it, and all of that. She replied, "Oh, you just stuff it in your locker, and that takes care of it!" I still was hesitant. Yes, it would be interesting to learn to be a lifeguard, but...that dark, smelly, over-chlorinated Newton North swimming pool.... Eventually, the gym teacher said, "Don't be pressured. I'm pressuring you." She then asked if I really only had one block open to gym. I didn't know, but I pointed out that I was scheduled for three AP classes, and that would limit my options. Seeing my point, she grudgingly signed me up for wellness, and accused me of being an over-achiever. Now really, anyone who knows me knows that I am no over-achiever; I just enjoy learning. How insulting. But then, I was free! No more Arena Scheduling for me. It had taken me just over an hour. How lucky I was! Filled with the joy of freedom, I made my way to the cafeteria stairs, and after looking back at the poor students who were still waiting in lines, I skipped happily up the stairs.

-Philip

Let's Do the Time Warp Again

I am usually a pretty punctual person. Not like Nathan was, certainly, who was always on time to the minute and couldn't understand anyone who wasn't. (There was a wonderful story told at the assembly in his memory in which he offered to set all of the clocks in John's house to his own watch, which was precisely on time so that John would be on time when he met up with Nathan.) While I'm not as good as Nathan at that, I like to be where I am going at the time I say I am going to be there. Especially for important commitments, like work.

I work at the after school program at a local elementary school on Mondays and Fridays. Most days I get out of school at two twenty, and walk over there, talking with friends outside to pass the time until it gets to be around three, which is the time the elementary school gets out. This past Friday the high school was dismissed at around 11AM, because it was step up day for the eighth graders, who would come visit the high school. A few of us (Philip, Rebeccca, and Marena from the blog, and others not from here) went out to lunch afterwards, which is where these recent two entries' quotes came from. (Can you guess which one I said?) We finished lunch far before I had to be at the elementary school, and I got home around 1PM.

I only got about five hours of sleep the previous night so I decided to take a nap. Aware of the fact I had to be at the elementary school at 3PM, I set my alarm clock to wake me at 2:30PM. I didn't trust myself, though: I double and triple checked it was PM and I hadn't set it to AM. The little light for PM on, I turned the alarm on and went to sleep.

I wake up, and my alarm still hasn't gone off. Surprised I look at my alarm clock: 3:05PM. Oh crap! I run out of my room, grabbing a pair of socks and quickly putting on some shoes. I ran the few blocks to the elementary school, signed in, and hurried up to the third floor where the other staff members were setting up snack or watching the third graders. "Sorry! I fell asleep," I tell one of them, grabbing a few cups to set out on the tables. I was only about ten minutes late, though, so all worked out well.

Mystified, when I got home I checked my alarm clock. Yes, I had set the alarm to 2:30PM, that wasn't the problem. I checked the time: 7AM. It wasn't the alarm: my clock was set wrong.

Sachi

*Note: Actually, it's Helen posting this for Sachi, because I'm her stalker and I try to be like her in every way.

Haha, no actually her computer's just being weird and not letting her post, so I was being all helpful! =D

Final exams...yum?

My Chinese teacher is a little...eccentric.
He was informing us of our upcoming final exam, and was using a bit of a liberal metaphor for the makeup of the test.
"The final exam is like making a dish. I'll give you the fish, and garlic, and noodles, and scallions, and you're job is to create a delicious dish from them."
"But some parts will be a bit more challenging, like making a lion's head from doufu..."
Mmm...wait, what??

Marena

Some Miscellaneous Laughs

I suppose you are all bored with the ubiquitous collection of random funny quotations on this blog, but, being as cruel as I am, I would like to torture you with some more. Enjoy!

In history class, a student was presenting his end-of-year project topic, when suddenly he stopped--"WHAT?"
The teacher replied, "Oh, nothing. I was just rolling my eyes."

Person A: (to paraphrase) "I wish I liked hamburgers. It would be very useful to like them, because they're like sandwiches, but more filling, and they are served at almost every restaurant, and it would be very convenient if I liked them. But I don't.

Person B: That sounded like an audition monologue.

Person 1: (excuse me if I get this quote wrong--I am paraphrasing from memory) "...My teacher said that the final exam is like a dish, with scallions and potatoes...she's gone crazy!"

Person 2: "Teachers often make strange analogies to final exams. One of my teachers said that the final exam is like hitting a beach ball with a tennis racket--it's so easy!"

-Philip

Life's tough, get a helmet.

I seem to have an unfortunate habit of hitting my head against various objects. I can't even count the number of timest that I've walked into a pole, a door, got out of a car painfully... Really, it's a wonder I'm not in a coma by now.

So in Gym, we were playing volleyball. And I really, really suck at sports. As in, when we played football in middle school, my *four* person team eventually gave up on me and told me to be the mascot. And volleyball's no exception. But anyway, I was the setter (since we rotate) and my team was all "You have to get the ball! You do, you do!" So the other team serves the ball, it comes towards me, I run toward it.... and it hits me in the face. Yeah, I'm talking full-on, smushing my nose, hitting me in the face. But it gets even better. The ball bounces OFF of my face, goes up, then comes down and hits me on the head, before finally leaving me alone. Not exactly my best moment.

Then, this morning, a girl in my class picked up a desk to move it. And she swung it. And it hit me on the side of my head. Not fun.

<3 Helen

500 Babies. Or maybe more than 500 babies, but not in Finland.

Some humor to brighten your day:

Proctor: "Please place your sticker centered in the dotted box."
Student A: "What if you don't center it?"
Student B: "Then you fail. They don't actually look at your answers, they just grade you on how centered your sticker is."
Me: "This answer booklet will be destroyed following test administration."

Proctor: "Please place your shrink-wrapped test packages off to one side of the table..."

Me: "Why would you ever need a giant block of salt?"
Derek: "Well, maybe if you had a really large llama..."

Nutrition Lady: "Well, let's look at it this way, if your baby was hungry and you didn't feed it, this would be child abuse."

Me: *reading history text* Don't throw your baby out with the hoards of rapacious relatives from Spain!

Rebecca: "You can't eat two early lunches!"

Student trying to speak spanish: "Mi papa...toque...toco...Tokyo?"

Me: "What does 'mark up this paper' mean? Scribble a few notes, draw the anarchy sign..."

Teacher: "So these are going to be equal, even though they're opposite ways, it's separate charges..."
Student: "Yeah, separate but equal, I see where this is going."

Teacher: "We'll talk about this later but a ground is something that grounds things. Like the ground."

Presenter: "I just feel so bad, all these introverts and me in a room..."

Paper: "What is the compass measuring? (HINT: Current creates magnetic fields.)
Me: "The north pole! It's not working, but if we don't lie we can't answer any of the questions..."
Derek: "The compass is measuring our scientific integrity."

My math teacher on two different occasions, in a class with 30 kids is and is always short of desks:
"You are welcome, if there are not enough desks, to go forage into the other room."
"Look, we have an extra desk! We should build a shrine around it."

(reading over a theorem, using abbv. for 'parallelogram')
"Opposite sides congruent implies P in a box." (Note: read this aloud.)

"Your face is a parallelogram!"

My chaos theory teacher, during class:
"It's decaying right? But what if you have a farmer that throws in 2.7 bunnies every hour. But the 2.7 bunnies are dying, too."

"But what if I took all the dust particles and put them into a pile."

"I'm sure a lot of people sit around thinking of spheres touching each other."

"One wall, two wall, three wall, I must be living in 3D space!" (Note: how many walls does your room have?)

"You guys don't spontaneously generate calculators."
"Anyone can non-spontaneously...well...not really."

"It's set to...there's a triangle with a prism going through it. What's the band?"

Her:"What's a chaotic system you have to deal with every day?"
Student:"School!"

"Weather—look, we can predict three minutes into the future!"

About white music, which is discrete white noise: "It keeps almost getting good!"
About brown music, discrete brown noise: "It's awkward music."

"Somewhat random pieces of string music which make you kind of nervous."

"If you take white noise and you take out all the notes that aren't Beethoven, you get Beethoven."

History teacher:
"I'm not trying to say the Patriots are a Chinese dynasty..."


Sachi

Funny Teacher Quotes I Scribbled in Margins

Student: Do you want to retire?
Teacher: No, if I did I wouldn't be here.
Student: What would you do if you retired?
Teacher: I would be in the garden all the time.
Student: What about when it snows?
Teacher: I would find an indoor garden.


"Remember, theses, like people, come in many shapes and sizes... some are one sentence, some are two..." (continues rambling for a while) "...in junior year you will write a junior thesis..."


As an example sentence: "Sleeping is my favorite sport."
A student says: "It actually is my favorite sport."
Teacher: "Mine too! I really love it!"


My Spanish teacher is allways talking about how she hates math. Once she said: "Numbers! I'd just drop out!" A student said, "Drop out of what, life?" "Yes," said the teacher.


Student: I would take out my book, but it ran away.
Teacher: I hate when that happens.


Principal, talking to students from South at an assembly: "Welcome to the dark side of the city... The better side? What do you want to call it?"


Student: You smell good. What kind of perfume do you use?
My art teacher: I don't.
Student: That's your natural scent?


This wasn't teachers, it was two kids, but I thought it was funny so I'll include it:
Person 1: It's a twee!
Person 2: A what?
Person 1: A twee!
Person 2: A what?
Person 1: A twee!
Person 2: A what?
Person 1: A tree.
Person 2: Oh. Don't talk like that.

-Rebecca