WildWood

I just came back from a field trip. It was different from most field trips, though. For one thing, it lasted for three days and two nights. For another, it was at a very fun place: WildWood!
WildWood is a camp for schools to take their kids to. You can learn about nature, have fun, eat good food, have fun, have a campfire, have fun, see animals (including deer, which I liked, and copperheads right outside our cabin, which I did not) and have a lot of fun!
A lot of the stuff we did at Sequoia Kings Canyon, but with friends from school, not with family.
The first day started at school, where we had a brief explanation of bus rules (no yelling out, keep your hands to yourself, blahblahblahblahblah...) and then got on the bus for the hour-long ride there. Unfortunately, what we had on that first day was whatever you had on the bus, we didn't get to our cabins and unpack until 5:30, and I didn't have my camera. So when you look at the pictures on my NEW PICASA SITE there aren't very many on the first day; only the first four, in fact.
So!
After we arrived, we had an explanation of the rules at WildWood (no yelling out, keep your hands to yourself, blahblahblahblahblah...) and then split into our groups. The 6th grade was divided into groups A,B,C,D,E, and F. I was in group E. Most of the kids would say things like, "Group F is for FANTASTIC!" or "Group A is for AWESOME!" We came up with, "Group E is for EGGS!"
Hey, we were hungry.
So!
Groups A,B, and C went off to do the Challenge Course which I'll tell you about later. Groups D, E, and F went to play some kickball!
I'm not saying who won F. But rest assured, it was probably the one I was on No it wasn't. But you can't have three teams playing kickball so group D played a game called Sprout ball against itself., which is basically tag except that you tag the other person with a ball, not with your hand.
After that, we got into our real classes. E went to Sensory. First, we went along the Unnatural Trail. It's a normal hiking trail, except that there are things planted along. Things like old mops, bottles, ratty pieces of string, an old broom, a rusty cage...
well, you get the idea. You had to find all of the unnatural things you could, then we went back and she told us what everything was and we could see how many we got.
I got four...out of eleven.
...
Well, anyway [koff] moving on. Then, as more sensory, we went to this big treehouse in the woods. We sat, listened, and wrote poems about nature. I wrote one about spiders, which I'll put up on the site later.
Maybe.
Anyway, after that we had Recreation Time, which I do have pictures of because we did it again on Friday. At Recreation time, you could do one of three things. You could read first of all, which I'm normally all for. However, choice number two was to canoe, which I had never done before. Let me tell you something...
I loved it!
That was the only thing I did in both of my recreation times! It is so much fun! I HEART CANOEING!
Choice three was fishing. (yawn.) You go ahead and catch the fish, I'll wait for you at home and help you eat it.
Third class. We went to the cemetary! I was so disappointed not to have my camera for this part. There was some really ornate stuff there! Fortunately, I have some good friends in group F, and I had them take some pictures of the place for me on Friday. So you can see those.
We went on a scavenger hunt there, looking for certain names, looking for the oldest person there, things like that.
Then we went back to the cabins to unpack, then off to the dining hall for food. This is where I got my first glimpse of what cabin life was going to be like.
It scared me!
And with good reason, too.
Pillow Wars, easily ten times more dangerous than measly pillow fights, raged on. In the night, I couldn't get to sleep until around midnight thanks to people saying things like, "OMG! There's something outside!"
There was one event in particular...
(VArious boys in the cabin, looking out the window, around 11:00 at night:) OMG! There's a demented dog outside!
(Isaac, trying to sleep and quite annoyed at this point:) A what?
A demented dog! Dude, I swear it's moving! It's so freaky!
Groan. Let me see. (shuffle shuffle.) You Shmuck, it's a trash can.
No, Dude, it's a demented dog.
It's a trash can.
Shut up, Isaac!
(Mr. Whitney, gym teacher, sleeping at the cabin, trying to keep order:) Hey! We do NOT use that kind of language!
Sorry. But Mr. Whitney, Dude, there's a demented dog outside! Dude, it's FREAKY, dude!
(Many of the boys in my cabin, I noticed, tended to say "dude" a lot when they got scared.)
What? (shuffle shuffle) It's a trash can.
What? But I swear, Dude, I saw it moving!
(Isaac, shuffling back:) I wish you guys would go to sleep.
Dude, it was-
Go to sleep.
But, Dude-
GO TO SLEEP!
(sigh.) Anyway, I was going to talk about what happened before all that but right after supper. Each cabin was instructed to get a pillowcase, fill it with "things you think you'll need", and meet back right outside the dining hall.
A lot of the boys in our cabin wanted to fill it full of underwear. That idea was scrapped by Mr. Whitney, but he couldn't stop them from putting a couple pairs in there anyway. I took a picture of most of the stuff we put in there so I won't go into detail.
What happened when we met with the other cabins was that one of the teachers would read out something like, "a box of batteries, 100 points," or, "an ace of spades, 50 points." If any cabin had that in their pillowcase, they brought it up and got that many points. At the end, the cabin with the most points won. Would you like to guess what cabin won?
BIG PRARIE!
...
MY CABIN!
After thst, we had to put on a skit or write a song about WildWood using those things as props. Big Praries passed the pillowcase around the circle, pulled something out, said, "this is what I brought to WildWood!" and passed it along in a poor excuse for a skit. I had a different idea, but I was outvoted...meh!
And now, it is past my bedtime. So I'll write more tomorrow.
Fair enough?
Ok, then.
Good Night!

Brace Yourself

Try not to take the news too hard, Ruhe.

Marble jar partys

Today at school we had a marble jar party-a fun event that happens when we fill the marble jar from good behavior and it was getting to watch a movie instead of math class '' Charlotte's web''the cartoon math class is from end of lunch to start of recess.

New pictures

I've uploaded some new pictures here. There are the boys' back to school pictures and Isaiah's bike rodeo. I also put some new pictures in the Renaissance Festival folder, from this year. Here's a picture from when we made ice cream. Yum!

Okapi

Those who know me well know that I am fascinated by the okapi, a relative of the giraffe which appears to have the hindquarters of a zebra.

Therefore, I was thrilled to hear that, not only are they not extinct, but that they have finally been photographed in the wild.

Camera traps set up by the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) and the Congolese Institute for Nature Conservation (ICCN) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have captured landmark pictures in Virunga National Park (VNP) - proving that the species is still surviving there despite Over a Decade of Civil Conflict (WAR).

Yes, it is certainly a thrill to look at the first picture of an okapi in the wild. If you pay careful attention, you can tell that it is looking straight at the camera. Can you feel the camera operator's excitement?The next picture, taken eleven days later, is even better, though it reminds me of the photographic skills of certain grandmothers I know.

However, it is the third picture of an okapi in the wild which says it all, really. This is what nature conservancy is all about. This is why you should donate to the okapi project.

If that does not convince you, then you should see the sort of photograph researchers have been taking in the past.

I'm convinced...

...that the Apocalypse is Overdue.

Click for more, at your own risk.

Very good, Jeeves.

Recently, the four of us have been watching an old TV show: Jeeves and Wooster. It stars Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry. Hugh Laurie plays Bertie Wooster, a high class British twit with whom brilliance is not his strong point. He's always getting into scrapes, but can fortunately always count on Jeeves (no first name given) his manservant, brilliant to the last and highly sophisticated to bring him out of it. The episodes are set in England and based off of the stories by Pelham Grenville (usually called "PG") Wodehouse. Mom and I have also read the stories and enjoyed them too.

Grassroots Effort

Since I am thoroughly disgusted with both candidates, this was a welcome relief.

Cuteness!

Ok, as you all may or may not know, my little brother Isaiah is the cutest third grader ever!
And he's at his cutest when he's sleeping.
These days, I get up at 5:30 for Prealgebra and Isaiah usually doesn't wake up until 6:30. Therefore, I'm awake while he's asleep.
So, I took these pictures. I'm no photographer, but they're not too bad!

What can I say? So cute!

Then he woke up. Still cute...
...Until he tried to block the camera.

Anyway, I thought you all might like to see!

bike rodeo

I had a bike rodeo today and it was not much of a rodeo.
A friend of mine thought so too his name is Sam and he and I both thought that it would be ride all over and have fun.
We missed our second recess for a tiny track with stop signs yield signs roundabouts and non-fun.
So I think it was a waste of time.
-Isaiah
-the annoyed

Book reviews

One of the funniest books I have read recently is The True Meaning of Smekday. It had me laughing out loud. I talked Christopher and Isaac into reading it, too. It is an alien invasion story told by a young girl whose mother was kidnapped by the aliens. She is telling the story for a school project.

A book to avoid: Rune Warriors. This book isn't published yet, but I signed up for an Advance Reader's copy. The description looked interesting, and the cover looked cool. You can't judge a book by it's cover, though. This book is a stinker. The writers are used to writing scripts for cartoons and it shows. The story is predictable. I didn't care about any of the characters. I wouldn't even have finished the book if I hadn't promised HarperCollins I'd write the review for it.

A great series I've been reading recently is the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, by Alexander McCall Smith. They are set in Botswana, and they are funny, light reading. They really give you a look into the lives of the people there.

School

I just started school,and now I am convinced that I have one of the best teachers... Mrs. Stealey!
She has the best board games, a lot of them too! A very fun teacher. She has the best room in the school.