Wacky Wally World

Yesterday afternoon, I went shopping at Walmart with.... my mother D: . As soon as we entered, I smelled the wonderful yet conflicting fragrances of Subway and Fried Food. Being the hungry teenager I am, I went straight for the fried food. After eating the wonderful snack of fried BBQ chicken, I promptly threw it away. A few minutes later, my mother looked into the cart and asked "where is the container for the chicken I bought you?"   "I threw it away" I replied with a slight shrug. "What?!? We still need to pay for that!"  she said in utter suprise " What? I thought you already payed for that!" I said with nervous, slightyly shrill voice. "You need to get it back" She demanded. "but It's in the Trash!" I retorted. "We're In Walmart, go get it out of the trash." She shouted "silently". So, very reluctantly, I went back to the trash bin, and retrieved the lid for my crunchy snack with the price tag on it. I felt very ashamed, but then thought "I'm in Walmart, Why should I give a damn?".

Boredom Block- Skyward & Skyrim! XD

It has been a long wait, but I feel like I'm floating on air now that both Skyrim and Zelda: Skyward Sword have been released.I have been BLOWN AWAY the HUGE skyrim world, the HUGE options you have in your professions and in how you fight, and the oh so much more epicness packed into one little disk. I have spent quite a bit of time playing this game, yet I have a feeling I won't be done playing this until next year XD. For the next "main" game in the Zelda series. Every Zelda game may have a same general pattern, but each major game before Skyward ( Windwaker & Twilight princess) have been significantly different from its' famous preccedessor, Orcina of time. Skyward sword I find the classic swordplay of zelda re-defined by the use of the wii motion plus to be quite satisfying when you slice down enemies- but there are some issues. The wii motion plus seems to continually angle to the right or the left, and makes the aiming a little difficult. But this problem is easily fixed by pausing the game and setting the remote on a flat surface for a minute or so. The larger problem I have is that there seems to be a lack in darker themes that you see in Twilight princess- at least, when it comes to enemies. I also don't like Fi. Otherwise, the gameplay and character of the game is fresh and wonderful to experience. Whether soaring above the clouds or smiting the dragons that fly above, I will be saring in- or keeping an eye on- the sky with excitement!

People Past & Present

Today, I was heading to my French class, passing by the regular gaggle of students gathered outside of the doorway. I dropped my bag off and headed back out to get a drink from the water fountain. The faces of the two guys in the group of students were different than the "usuals" loitering around the French classroom- yet they till looked familiar. Very familiar. I  stopped to look at them longer to see if I could maybe trigger a memory. Suddenly I noticed that Adam from my elementary school was standing right there. In my school during hours- Not at his much smaller school. Instantly I recognized the second guy as Zac, also from my old school. I was shocked. They looked so different than when I last saw them. Their voices were deeper, with a kind of raspy kind of rumble to them. Both of them smiling, and saying "long time no see".  That was about all they could say, and they took the words out of mouth, leaving me speechless. A flood of memories came back to me, bitter ones that had slight sweet aftertaste of relief. I was reminded that we live in a small world (or at least for me, a small state), and that people do change over time.

Fish and Freezerburn

I was sitting in my basement, looking at a fish mounted on the wall, and thinking about how cold it is outside. Then, I started wondering- how can fish survive the cold weather? So, I began looking up how they go about doing this on google and I found some interesting answers. In tempature regions like where I live, where it is warm during the middle of spring to halfway through autumn, the fish simply go into a hibernation-like state when the lakes freeze over with ice. Fish who live in the areas where the tempature is constantly four degrees celcius or below, though, have a much more interesting way of dealing with the cold. Many of these cool fish have an antifreeze in their bodies or an antifreeze they can make when needed. Some artic fish take this to a whole new level, having antifreeze instead of hemoglobin. How is this possible? The fish live in salt water, where the water can be mch below 0 degrees Celcius and still not freeze. One property of water is the colder it gets, the more oxygen it can contain. Since the frigid waters of the artic are so oxygen rich, the fish don't need any oxygen carrying substances to assist them in getting enough oxygen to survive.

Harvest Hue

It's that time of year again, when the green of leaves slowly burn away to reveal a red undercoat or brighten in to a sunny yellow. It seemed strange to me when I was younger that the leaves waited until autumn to turn those beautiful and vibrant colors? Why, I wondered, did the leaves go through the effort to change  their color anyway? They  change because they have too

      In autumn, the days slowly become shorter, the tempature colder, and that feeling of stiff, dry air become more apparent. These conditions are not very good for the trees, or more so, for their photosynthesis. Autumn is the time of year when making food from those green pigments becomes too much of a hastle and for a much smaller reward. To conserve energy, the trees stop making clhoroplasts(what makes plants green). Slowly the remaining chloroplasts deteriorate, letting the more vibrant pigments in the leaves to be seen. From here, the leaves are chemically self-cut from the tree, letting them flutter down to clutter the forest floor and litter our not-so-green-anymore lawns. I used to find it odd that the trees would shed their leaves in the autumn just to grow them back in the spring, but the leaves in winter cause a major problem- they create a large surface area for snow and ice to accumulate, and with enough weight can break branches.

Even though trees change their colors out of practicality, I always have, and will, love gazing at the bright canopies that stretch over the horizon.

Getting a Dog

  It has been about four months since my dog died. It was just before my family moved to our new home. It was heartbreaking yet not surprizing to see Dexter, our Brittany Spaniel of 15, die of old age. When we moved, I noticed that both our next door neighbors had dogs. It made me feel a pang in my heart. I really want have another dog, but I'm not sure what to get, or how to open my dad to getting another one- he took Dexter's death pretty badly. I have looked up some breeds, and I am especially looking for a breed that doesn't shed since all of the vaccuming is very inconvenient(not saying I wouldn't like to have a dog that does shed!). Some choices for non/low-shedding dogs are- Cockapoo(poodle and cocker hybrid), most terrier breed, poodle, Bolognese, The Italian Greyhound, and some others. I'm really not sure which to choose from, and It would be a great help if someone could give me some advise on the matter.

Nature is Sexist

I am truly sorry if I have offended anyone by this statement, but it is true. You may think "HELL no, nature isn't sexist!", but if you were to step outside the box of our own species,  you would begin to see the countless examples of nature being sexist. Take, for instance, the praying mantises of the mantid order. The female is much larger than the male, and often will eat the male after or even during mating. Same goes for many spiders. When there was an orb web spider perched between two bushes in my front yard, a vibrant yellow-white and black pattern suspended above the ground on it's web, I noticed a wee little spider that seemed to be caught on the end of the web. Then I realized that the spider looked strikingly similar- it was a male. The poor guy was oly about 1/4 to 1/6 of the female's size. This size sexism nature dishes out to animals isn't just limited to insects- many predatory bird and fish species follow this trend as well- just not nearly as much as the poor spiders. In almost every species, though, females are much more likely to pass on their genes any given male. Now if nature is sexist, and obviously created differences, why is it so wrong to point them out to people? It's a fact that women have less muscle mass, consume more calories , and have bone problems from having children and having their period about every month. Men have more muscle mass, can go bald, are more suseptible to X-chromosome genetic diseases, and usually don't live as long as women do. Is it wrong to not assign a woman a job that doesn't involve heavy loads, is it wrong to have the man pay more for his incurance? Whether you like it or not, nature is sexist.

Deeper Depths- Perfect Love and Imperfect People

After watching so many movies, it often seems the moral of the story is-" The perfect person for you is out there!". Before I even get the chance to ask "where?", The movie says "Somewhere- you just have to find them" and then promises a happily ever after. Every time my friends or me have tried to find the perfect one, we have run into conflicts. It seems as though the perfect one doesn't exist for us.
           In the movies, though, the "perfect love" is someone you connect with perfectly, with no differences in morals or ideas, only misunderstandings that once they are resolved, lead to the perfect love story ending.



       But what if you do have a conflict or a disagreement with your girlfriend/boyfriend, not a simple misunderstanding? What if it means he/she isn't for you? What if he/she isn't the perfect one? So far, I haven't found her, and I'm starting to get the feeling I'm on a wild goose chase, or more so, me and almost everyone else is taking  true love the wrong way.
         What if, just maybe, there is no perfect match? What if, just maybe, true love isn't perfect? What if, just maybe, true love takes work to flourish the differences with your lover in addition your similarities?If mankind isn't perfect, how can love be? I may never find a perfect love, but at least I will find one that can love me as we work together to bypass and flourish in our differences as our love grows.



   P.S.- no examples are used to "prove" this, due to the fact that information about dating relationships are.... intimate and disrespectful to post onto the web for all to see.

Beautiful Brutality

    For the first time I can recall, I have found something relatively disgusting sprisingly beautiful. I discovered gruesome yet goergous act of nature on Thursday, September 22 while I was walking to my house. I was strolling along the sidewalk, when I noticed odd, dark blotch moving on the pavement of the sidewalk. Curious, I bent down to see it was. To my surprize, the "blotch" was a spider and a black, ant- like insect with wings having what looked to be a wrestling match. Not soon after viewing this, though, the little insect flew away as the spider lay motionless. I thought it was strange that an insect capable of bringing down a spider wouldn't carry it off to eat it, until I remembered about parasitoid wasps.


   Parasitoid wasps are different than most other predators- they paralize their prey(permanatly or temporarily depending on the species) so they can lay their eggs on or in the host invertebrate, which the larvae feed upon until they are ready to pupate into the next generation. I quickly slid the spider onto a piece of paper I had handy, and took it to my house. It is still at my house, sitting in a plastic container with fork-punctured plastic wrap to provide a ventating ceiling. Impatient to see the larvae when it emerged and pupated, I began researching on parasitoid wasps. There are two types of Parasitoid wasps- the Koinoboints, which have only a few/one species it preys upon(ex. video of a Koinoboint ), while the second type, Idioboints, have many species they prey upon. Now if you watch the video you may think "EEEWWW how is this POSSIBLY thought of as beautiful?". It is not the whole larvae-eating and emerging from it's victim that is beautiful. That is utterly disgusting. What I find beautiful is how effective these wasps are and the unique way they take care of their young. Not only do they take care of their young effectively,  but they also protect some plants that produce a  'perfume' whenever they are being eaten upon by worms, aphids, and other pests. That's all i got for now, but you can read up more info from (http://chrisraper.org.uk/Html/parasitica.htm#Koinobionts) or by searching under parasitoid wasps on the National Geographic web page.
P.S.The plant genes that key for parasitoid wasps to come and "infect" pests are being researched so they may be able to be put into comon food plants (corn, wheat, exc.) so that farmers will have a reduced need to use pesticides.

Real Life Frogger

  It has been a long time since I played the old Frogger game, where you have to get a little frog across a street and a river to go to the other side. I never really liked the game, because i would always get smushed by a big semi or die in the who-knows-what infested water.Even though frogs in real life do face dangerous encounters with humans and nature itself, it definitly takes many forms they are rarely the ones depicted in the Frogger video game.     
           During this last summer, me and my neighbor would often go out fishing. Since I had recently moved to my new house, and I was only an ameteur fisherman, I often got instruction from him. Of all of the bait he used to catch big fish like bass, he learned that leapord frogs work the best. Often we spent more time hunting frogs than actually catching fish. Sometimes we would bait the wee anphibian so we could catch the hulking bull frogs that seemed to eat anything that moved and happened to be smaller than them. Sometimes, we wouldn't catch any fish with the frogs, but the frog would still end up dead from being cast time after time out onto the water.  With all the frogs in the nearby pond, I found it surprizing that there is a mass-killing of anphibians happening around the world. A fungus called chytrid has been infecting and seen growing on dead or dying frogs, toads, and salamanders. Some anphibians have bacteria growing on their skin that make them resistant to this fatal frog fungus, but most of our slippy, slimy pals don't have these bacteria(nationalgeographic.com). On a lighter note, many new species or 'extinct' species of anphibious animals have been found throughout the world, and an official global 'hunt' for more has been announced(nationalgeographic.com). I can't wait to see all the new animals discovered in the next coming year :-D