Wildlife Humor

Me: I'm filling out weird application forms. Would you rather be certified in small craft safety or wetland education?

Him: Who educates wetlands?

Me: Me, I guess. If I get certified. Otherwise I'll be instructing small crafts on how to be safe.

Him: That's useful, I think. Small crafts need to be protected from evil crafts.

Me: Oh, there's also wilderness first aid. I can apply first aid to the wilderness?

Him: Oh no! The wilderness is bleeding! Quick! Get the wilderness-aid!


Sachi

You Never Know What Will Happen in New York

I was walking by Rockefeller Center today, looking at the Christmas tree and all of the decorations, when I felt something slap against my shoulder. I ignored it and walked on. It slapped me again. This time I looked, and saw that a girl had just slapped me with her scarf. She looked at me expectantly, as if she thought I knew her. I just smiled and then lost myself in the crowd. Strange things happen in New York.

-Philip

The Bread Bowl....

I don't remember whether we ever mentioned the Bread Bowl concept, but if we did, this is Bread Bowl Redux.

So, a couple weeks (months?) ago, Derek was eating a bread bowl during lunch, and he happened to comment on using a bread bowl as a metaphor for society and how we're eating society or something. Today, Derek abandoned our lunch table (which has moved over apparently) to sell tickets for Frosh Cab. However, Rebecca was eating a bread bowl, and she asked Anita, Becca, and me about the bread bowl metaphor. Anita, having only joined the debate, wondered why we would be eating up society, what do we do once the bread bowl has been emptied, is the soup the people and the bread itself the remnants of society? Rebecca and I had no idea what the answers were. Derek's metaphor could use some explaining; I don't think Ms. Carillo would accept it as an appropriate comparison.

Well, as lunch began to end, I was walking to my locker when I came upon Derek selling tickets. On the podium thing in front of him was, yes, a half empty bread bowl.

Happy Birthday (*cough*), Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, Happy Festivus (is that the correct term?), and I hope 2009 is good =)

~'Cilla

Photonesses

Yet again, I was drafted to participate in a photography project.

I subsequently spent the whole day in Boston in a faerie costume.

yep...they think i dont see them.

But yknow what, whatever. Stare away!

Skewered Sachis

Today I was on my way to class as I rounded a corner in green when a finger shot out towards me. I stumbled back to avoid getting skewered. "No model UN tonight!" A voice boomed. I stabilized myself and looked up at the person. It was Ben, an undersecretary general in model UN.

"Oh..." I said, still frightened after being almost skewered on his finger. "Alright."

He grinned at me. "Tell everyone you see."

"Just like you did, with the booming voice and all?" I asked. He nodded.

So for the rest of the day I went around trying to scare people like that. Unfortunately I never managed to catch people rounding corners, so it was not as effective. However, I did manage to get 'cilla in orchestra.


Sachi

Christmas Carols

Today in chorus we were singing holiday songs, including winter songs, Christmas carols, and Hanukka songs. At one point we were singing frosty the snowman. The music only did the main part, but one boy continued on with the "thumpety thump thump" part. It took him a second to realize that he was the only one singing, and he quickly stopped.

Soon later, somebody mentioned that "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" was not in the packet of songs. The chorus teacher had been trying to explain something, and so she ignored this comment and tried again. However, before she could get very far, someone started humming "Santa Claus is Coming to Town." Soon the entire chorus was singing. When they were done, she tried to explain it again, and the chorus burst into "Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer" (The next song on the sheet).

-Marianne

To Be or Not To Be?

It was long block English. We are reading Hamlet, and my English teacher has us read it out loud in class. Today I was supposed to read the part of Hamlet himself. We began reading Act III, when I noticed that my copy of Hamlet was missing a page. Worse, the next page had Hamlet talking on it and so far Hamlet wasn't on stage, so I knew that Hamlet would come in on the missing page. I raised my hand. My teacher, who was busy talking about what the king had just said, ignored me for awhile and then said, "I'll get to you later." She then kept talking and forgot about me. When she finished, she motioned toward me and said, "And now..."

"My book is missing a page," I replied. "That's what I was trying to tell you."

"Oh, no," she said, "this is a key page. Why don't you borrow hers?"

I traded books with a girl sitting behind me and looked at the page. "To be, or not to be: that is the question..." Of all the pages to be missing! I could hardly contain my laughter.

-Philip

A Comoros Future

The past four days I've been at Harvard Model United Nations, a simulation of the United Nations, in which students represent delegations from different UN countries in the different assemblies of the UN. I represented Iran in Special Political and Decolonization, where we were debating missile defense systems. Many many amusing and interesting things happen, so I'll try and get to telling a few stories, but here's one for starters.

There are two parts of the conference, that which goes on in the committee room, and that which goes on outside of it. Inside, people make speeches, spar verbally, vote and follow parliamentary procedure. Outside, working papers and resolutions are written, delegates network and form alliances.

I'll share with you my favorite semi-serious speech, made by Comoros:

"Fellow delegates: In this dangerous world, I live in fear every day that someone will show up at my doorstep with nuclear missiles. But I hope one day I can wake up in a peaceful world, in a safe world. A Comoros world."

More to come when I am not so exhausted, I hope this will last you until then.


Sachi

There's Nothing Like an Emergency to Wake You Up in the Morning

It's taken me a while to actually find time to write this, so this story takes place a few days ago:

It was Tuesday morning, and I was tired. I went to my first class, gym, knowing that we were doing yoga. That can't be too bad for a day when I'm feeling tired, I thought. In gym class, we learned a sequence of yoga positions called the Sun Salutation. First you stand with your hands together, then reach your arms over your head. Then you bend down and touch the ground, bending your knees if you have to. Breathe 5 times, and with each exhale, straigten your knees out more. Then you put one foot backwards into a lunge, then the other foor into plank position... you go through a few more positions until it goes back to the head to knees position and the arms over head and back to where you started.

First we did it with the right leg back, then the left leg back, always for some reason repeating the middle section multiple times. Eventually my hamstrings began to get sore from being stretched and my triceps (I think they're my triceps) were tiring from downward-facing dog position. Between each major section of yoga-ing, we rested for maybe thirty seconds in child's pose. My gym teacher taught us another position called pigeon, which is like a split but with the front leg bent. Then we added this into the middle of the sequece, and repeated the sequece a few more times. I was thinking about how this could be called torture in yoga form. :)

By the end of the class I was practically collapsing with exhastion. I plodded along the hall, flopped into a chair in my homeroom, and stared straight ahead. Eventually I had enough energy to at least talk a little bit to people in my homeroom. Then suddenly, everyone in the class started crowding around the door as I heard someone say, "Why is that locker smoking?!" I rushed over and sure enough there were billows of smoke comming out of a locker. I considered whether maybe someone had put a piece of dry ice in the locker, but soon teachers began to herd us back into the room and direct us out the room's back door as the fire alarm went off.

We went outside, trying to find the place where our homeroom was supposed to meet, but we couldn't find it. When it was time to re-enter the building, we saw on the ground our room number, right around where we had been wandering. We were in the right place all along!!!!!

What with all the excitment and cold outside, I realized I was feeling much more awake. The rest of the day was pretty much normal--except for one event. It was lunch, and I was sitting at a table with only two other people because everyone else who usually has lunch with us was mysteriously not there. ('cilla from this blog was there. I feel like I must give her due credit.) Anyway, Ms. S, the housemaster for our grade walked over. If you didn't already know, she is infamous for making strange conversation with students involving lunch. So, Ms. S came over and said, "French fries and mozzarella sticks! Who would of thunk it!"

We all stared in shock for a moment. Eventually, one of us thought of something to say. "Um...yeah, I guess we don't usually think of it as strange because it's been a common school lunch since middle school."

"Yeah," Ms. S said, "But the lunches are supposed to be healthy and yet we have french fries and fried mozzarella sticks. I asked, 'what goes with the mozzarella sticks' and they told me, 'the french fries' !"

I babbled something about how we're used to the school lunches so we never really thought about it that way, and eventually she left. I mean, if she's trying to start conversation, it's certainly a weird method to say something that leaves everyone speachless!

-Rebecca

It's Fractacular!

From a DVD on the Mandelbrot Set.

We're thinking we need to have a fractal party. Everyone would dress as their favorite function.

-Sachi

Don't Ignore Red Warning Lights

Yesterday I was driving to piano lessons. It was the gray 1996 Ford Taurus, an old car that occasionally has things go wrong with it. Suddenly I noticed a flashing red light that looked like a battery on the dashboard. Then it stopped flashing; it was solid red. I mentioned it to Rebecca who was also in the car. We decided that it probably meant that the car's battery was charging, and Rebecca commented that it was misleading to make the light red, since that gave the illusion that there was a serious problem. So I drove on, forgetting about the light. Then, when I was parking, I heard a strange clicking sound. I wonder what that is, I thought to myself. Maybe I just never noticed it before. Later that day, my parents were out using the car when they called to say that the car had stopped working. It had run out of battery, the lights all went out, and it stopped moving. They were on an onramp to 128, and they had to carefully steer onto the side of the road and call AAA to tow them home. They thought that some kind of belt had broken that charges the battery. Suddenly, I remembered the red light. "Oh," I said, "when I was driving I saw a red light shaped like a battery. That must have been why. And I heard a strange sound--that must have been the broken belt. I'm sorry; I forgot to tell you."

-Philip

God? Juliet? Subjunctive? Confused?

Confused?

If you aren't confused by the end of this blog entry, then I am impressed. What I am about to write is a brief summary of a highly confusing conversation that I had today at what would have been a DSI Tuesday, had enough people shown up (cough). It started when Sachi, Rebecca, and I recalled that a few months ago we had decided that on the first day of a month, before talking to someone you would have to say that person's name and then that person would say yours. For example (assuming that I am Person A and you are Person B)

I: Person B
You: Person A
I: This is quite a confusing way to talk, isn't it?

Since we forgot to do it yesterday, we decided to do it today. But eventually things got out of hand. Sachi said a tautology (I don't remember what she actually said) and then said that she was playing my role (for some reason, I often accidentally talk in tautologies). So then, if she was Philip, who was I? Apparently, I was God, for that is what people started calling me (again, I don't remember quite how it happened). We discussed the fact that the name "Sachi" must have been anihilated when suddenly, lo and behold, Rebecca ended up renamed Sachi. The conversation went this way until someone, commenting on the rapidly changing names, said, "Rebecca."
"Philip"
"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." And suddenly, someone was named Juliet. Whoever it was, it eventually switched to someone else. Then a Sorry got into the mix somewhere, and a Not Sorry, and I became Confused. Or was I Subjunctive at that time? But we ended up so confused that we decided to revert to the more fun part when Sachi was Philip and I was God. "Philip."
"God."
"That was the Golden Age."
"God."
"Philip."
"You stole the phrase right out of my mind."
"God."
"Sachi."
"Am I named Rebecca or Sachi in the Golden Age?"
"Sachi."
"God."
"It depends on whether we are talking about the Early Golden Age or the High Golden Age."
"God."
"Philip."
"Again, you stole the phrase out of my mind."
"Philip."
"God."
"As they say, great minds think alike."

-Philip