Currently Nothing..

<-- That is my adorable dog, Odie. I love him. He's about 4 months right now, but that was taken about 2 months ago (do the math yourself). He's adorable, and since no one else in my family is puppy trainer (and my sister screams whenever he licks her) I've solely by myself taught him to Say, Sit, Laydown, and Wag His Tail (the last one was the easiest). He's adorable. I'll get more pics of him soon.

Oh, and in the background, that's me. I'm wearing a really baggy sweater.. so I'm not.. obese.

There hasn't been much going on lately. I finished the script for the movie due in.. may, and my teacher and I talked a little about my story. I ripped out pages from my old sketchbook and glued them in my new one to finish it before it was handed in, and have to draw and life-sized portrait of me for grad.. who I have currently named Sally, because she can't be me, because I'm not that ugly. I hope.

I'm doing Red Maple, which is a reading thing my library has. Important people (old geezers) pick good books they like, and we read them, vote from all over Ontario, and the winner gets an award. This year, the old geezers picked the worst possible books ever. One is even about those standard act-older-than-you-are girls who walk around in malls 3 feet high wearing abercombie and miniskirts. Luckily, most people were warned about the book... unluckily, I was the person warning them, and I'm scarred for life. (She's in love with her teacher, and every single guy she meets!) So far,the winner seems to be a book about a boy becoming obsessed about the make-belive "King Arthur" game. Interesting eh?

Yesterday, on an unexpected snowday, I saw Inkheart with my boyfriend (yeah, I know, but it's the hold-hands-at-recess type of thing, and niether of us wear abercombie or fitch). It was pretty okay, but really, what they need in the movie is some great fight scene. Add Matt Daemon as a blackjacket, and let Mo fight out his life. If they had that, I would've loved it. But no, they didn't have any fighting what-so-ever. If I hadn't read the books... I really don't know what I would have thought about it.

I'm trying to start writing a totally romance story called "A Changed Story" because of how many times I've changed it. I've ran out of names like "Empyrean". The problem is, with ACS, it's more of a learning story. I'm trying third person, multi POV and romance being the main headline of the story. It's hard. I think I'm going to have a really real narrator... something somewhat like that. I'll update you if I get anything, but I don't really have a clue yet.

And, on a sadder more personal note... ahhh!!!! I used to only occasionally get these moments of extreme depression where the sky was falling and I'd fallen into a deep hole with everything crashing down.. now they are happening at least twice a day. I feel like Harry Potter with the whole angsty thing going on, except mine isn't acted.

But hey, that's not your problem. It's mine, and how I seem to have inherited every bad trait from my family.

Sarah

Words.

Because I'm feeling wordy, I'm doing a little thing on words here :D

Free Rice
I found this awesome site in the summer sometime. It's supposed to give grains of rice to people who can't aford it, and it also teaches you stuff. The version I like the best is the English learning bit. It starts out with easy words, like "solitude" and asks to click on a synomym. If you get it right (and it tells you what the right answer is/if you get it right) the next time it gives you a slightly harder word. You can change the level of words all the way up to level 60, which has words like capitulum.

Also, you can change the subject to math, french (which is helpful the the french-extrended student here - which is half-way between french immersion (totally bilingual) and core (normal)) and stuff like that. It's really cool, and if it works and they're not just lying to you, it gives rice to people in need, which is great as well.

Words, Un-Worded
In my class, we have something called "What in the World". It's were you bring in a newspaper article, about anything, submit a report on it, and talk to the class about the article. For mine, I did this really cool and exceptionall nerdy article: Collin's Dictionary Un-Wording Words.

This is the summary I wrote for fun, and as a guideline as to what to say to my class. The more formal version will be following, as suckish and written-the-night-before as it is.

Collins Dictionary Un-Wording Words
The article I chose is about the dictionary Collins is trying to make some words go linguistically extinct - which, by the way, is not a word I use at all - ever - but maybe I should start, because some really weirdly interesting words are about to go extinct because Collins doesn’t think their used enough for their dictionary. They are still words!

Well, the article goes on and says that they have compiled (another word that is luckily not on there) a list of 25 words that they think should go extinct. Of course, some people are getting really upset about this, like the poet Andrew Motion, who has officially adopted the word “skirr” after finding out it was endangered and is trying to get people to use the word more often. “Skirr” means a whirring sound, like the wings of a bird - which is how Andrew used it in one of his poems. Other word-using people are also adopting words and trying to save them from becoming extinct.

I liked this article and think it was important because if one dictionary can get away with killing off one of their words, than the others will follow and then we’ll have nothing in dictionaries but words we always use - and dictionaries are for finding weird words that you didn’t know about. So what if their long and hard to say - but half the words that they have on their list aren’t even that weird. I mean, the word embrangle? It was winning for the word the most people want to save, and means to tangle. It’s important, because when you think of tangle, than you, or at least I, think about hair or tape or something. Embrangle kind of has more of an outdoorsy-feel, maybe a tangle of green twigs could be an embrangle.

Also, I think that some of the words Collins has chosen are completely wrong. Skirr at least looks human, and if you randomly look at any word-of-the-day on dictionary.com sites, than you find words are look like they’re from Saturn - like catafalque, which means some sort of decoration on a coffin. Maybe I haven’t been to enough funerals, but I haven’t ever heard anyone call anything a catafalque - it isn’t pronounceable or spellable.

So, overall, I think that dictionaries are for finding words like skirr, maybe even catafalque if it’s a big dictionary, but it’s actually a little sad to figure out that skirr isn’t even recognized on Word’s spellchecker - because it’s my word of the day.

Okay, here's the icky formal one. It's bad, I know.

Collins Dictionary Un-Wording Words
Imagine looking in the dictionary, flipping through the few pages it has and never finding that word you were looking for. The horrible thing is, that could actually happen sometime in the future - if dictionaries start to cut books from their pages, and therefore make the word go extinct.

The article that caught my eye and that I decided to do my “What In The World” on was called “Collins To Remove Obscure Words From Dictionary”. It was by Rebecca Tucker and summarized the decision Collins Dictionary was going through; whether to delete a list of twenty-five words from their upcoming dictionary, or not. The article didn’t list the words, so I looked around on other sites for another article - and found one. This one was called “How You Can Help Save Some Cherished Words From Oblivion”. It explained the same idea, but of a slightly different case; saving the words. Collins has decided that if the words were still used in the papers and internet (not including the articles about Collins and the endangered words themselves) they would include the words in their dictionary. Good thing for me, at the bottom of the article there was a list of the twenty-five words. Also, this web-article has an online poll for which word you would save - embrangle was winning. Embrangle is the word I voted for on that site, and means to confuse or tangle. I think that “embrangle” is more outdoorsy than “tangle”, and would actually be useful.

Actually, a lot of the world would be useful. Some of the words that stood out to me are “skirr” which means a whirring sound like a bird’s wings, “malison” a curse - and it sounds curse-like - and “calignosity” which means dimness or darkness even if the “calig” part makes you think of calligraphy, which makes you think of light/white. I could totally use these words - especially when I need to write more formally (even though I’m already having to do that, but more formally). Also, I like these words. Words are awesome and great inventions, and none of them should ever be forgotten.

Overall, any weird word is still a word, with consonants and vowels, and deserves it’s place in the dictionary. If one dictionary can get away with cutting out these tools of writing, more dictionaries will follow, destroying more precious words. What would a world be without words? Some people have already reached that, and decided that the wordless world would be disastrous. Those people have decided to endorse these poor words and save them. All of the words need to be saved. A world just cant be a world without every one of them.

I know that's not half as formal as it should have been, but it was late at night and I was tired. So it passed the Sarah-Check. I can write more formal stuff, but not when I'm not in the mood. Yeah, my writing is all moods. But no fears, this blog is over. I would add more.. but I think this is enough. I'll find more wordy-related stuff for later.

P.S. my Word Origin of the day is: Nerd. Which was invented by Dr Suess to be a wierd looking creature. Go nerds!

Grade 8 Graduation

Ahhhh!!!! I'm not the type to like wearing a dress - but in an hour my mom's making me go dress shopping with her!!! (She likes to get stuff done early... kind of the opposite of me). I really, really, really, really hate dress shopping, but I hate shoes more.

The sucky thing, is that I'm tall. Like, 5"4' for you american peoples who make it hard to use metric 24/7, lol. And most people, including my boyfriend, are about 5"2. Which really sucks, especially when you're around your teacher's hieght as well. So no heels for me for grad.. but have you seen the flats? I've been looking for a pair of nice, normal flats for two years. Haven't ever found one.

I am going to die. I'm gunna die a slow and painful death from now until grad.

Why is grade 8 grad such a big deal? I think we should all just go to the movies and have a little ceremony (tiny one... like.. jeans and a t-shirt style) and then have a dance. Normal. But no, it can't be normal. Gotta be full out dresses with shoes and hair done. Ick.

Okay, I'm finished my whining...

Interesting fact: The word "Sky" is Old Norse and it means cloud. So, really when we're saying "sky" we're saying "cloud". Wierd eh? I got this calender that has the origins of a word for every day. Amazingly cool :D

Sorry for lack of things to say.. don't really have much going on right now, but when I finish my newspaper article I'll put a bit up.

Sarah

EMPYREAN!!!!

I'm exstatic. Totally, 100% exstatic. I'm to happy to even care that I probably spelt exstatic wrong.. and the three errors are glaring up at me with those evil red eyes. I'm too happy to care. I think you might be able to know why, but if you dont...

Well, a while ago I have my book, Empyrean, the first book I've ever started, middled and finished, not to mention a really crappy editing (by yours truely), and get edited by other people (much less crappy edits).

So, I waited, and waited.. for a whole two weeks. And now, I just got it back. I think my teacher read the whole thing and now is editing from the beginning.. most likely. But I got it back!!!!!

The first five pages. And they just happened to be delivered in the middle of my music class. I think most people, or at least my friends, knew what the white envilope was. I did. But I had to finish playing my sucky clairinet, go play an hour of badminton (which wasn't the best because I was preoccupied) and then get home. Luckily, my dad was on time so I got home pretty fast.

And now I'm here.. with five pages of writing with all these green pen. My favorite colour is green (and it has been for years, not just cuz it's what this is marked in).

But anyways, amazing, happy... you get the idea. I'll give you a page.. and only maybe more later - I've got editing to do! (Yipee?)

Anyways, here:

Emprean: page 1



Fire. Fire surrounded my body. Angry flames licked at the small space that had yet to burn to cinders. That small, uncharred space was the one I was crouched on, watching the flames crawl closer and the heat burn higher. Even at six, I knew I was there until my death. There was no way I could get out, no way to survive. I was unable to stand because of the smoke, unable to scream (my voice had given out ages ago), unable to move, frozen solid in fear while the burning heat froze me in a different way.

All I could do was wait. Wait for death, wait for a savoir who wasn’t coming.

I felt the heat sinking through the top of my shoes and the plastic on them began to melt. It dripped onto the floor like an ice cream cone in the sun, but far less delicious.

This wasn’t delicious at all. My mouth was dry and tasted of smoke and ash. The air around me was so thick with the fumes from the fire, I could hardly breathe. Sitting there, watching the rubber melt off my shoes, while the pain of the heat still tolerable, I should have known something was up.

But at that moment, my mind was calm and clear. I took in things as they happened, when they happened, calmly and sanely. I didn’t look for ways out, I didn’t question the things happening; I stood, eyes wide open taking in everything, calmly and sensibly. All I could imagine was what the outside of the building looked like - most likely similar to all those other awful, grey, smoke fires. We passed them sometimes on the way to school, still smoldering from the life-taking ‘accident’ that had been caused the night before. Those fires happened almost every day, and no one knew why. But for some reason, the fire fighters never came, and the fires where left to put themselves out.

My sister, Alexa, once said that the fire fighters, loyal and diplomatic to our small and powerful country, were not supposed to come. She said that someone had told them not to save lives in those big fires, and the poor fire fighters weren’t allowed to break that person’s rule.

She’d whispered that in my ear as the house beside me had burnt down, killing one of my family’s best friends. I remember thinking of the mother and hearing a single scream. She had given me cookies every day on my way home from school. Now, she was gone. My parents caught us watching the blaze, and quickly ushered us away from the windows, telling us in strict, severe tones that we were never to talk about that family again.


Yup.. maybe not that different, but to me it is. And it's a start too.

Haha. Right now my cat is sleeping on the papers. If he shreds them, I'll shred him (not really. I love him).

Sarah.