How Many Bucks Do You Have?

Have you ever had someone ask you how many bucks do you have? Have you ever paid for something and the cashier says, "that will be four bucks"?  In case you were wondering where the term buck came from, many years ago people traded deer skins as money.  A male deer is called, a buck.  Throughout those years, people would trade for supplies and other items with buck skins.  So instead of money, the Indians used buck skins as their currency.  I have always wondered why we subsitute the word dollar with buck.  That's why i decided to blog about it and let others know, just in case they didn't already.

The word "like"

The word "like" is used all day, everyday.  I don't think a single person says a sentence without using the word "like".  There is no use for the word but it is thrown in there all the time. I find it annoying when someone is talking and they use it three times in one sentence.  I know a few people that say "like" more times than the other words in the sentence!  I don't believe those people deserve all the blame because it is how they grew up.  People these days grow up with others that use it so of course they will too.  I honestly think I never say it but who knows, I might.

Sonnet

In English class we started learning about sonnets.  Sonnet comes from the Italian word sonetto, meaning "little song".  A sonnet contains 14 lines.  A line in sonnet has ten syllables and is written in iambic pentameter.  The last two lines in a sonnet is called a couplet.  The sonnets we are doing in class are from Shakespeare.  Our class was given an assignment to write our own quatrain.  To be honest, I enjoyed writing mine.  When writing a sonnet, you have to actually think and sound everything out.  Like Mr. Carty said, "It is like a heart beat".  I wouldn't mind writing more of these in class if we had too.  Once I was finished writing my sonnet, I felt accomplished.  I wrote something that I have never before written and it was a solid piece of work.  I normally don't like writing poems or any other form of writing, but sonnets I really enjoy.

Black Friday

Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving, and helps people shop for Christmas.  Black Friday is the busiest day for shopping all year.  Black Friday indicates the point at which retailer begin to turn a profit, or are "in the black".  Black Friday is a day where stores have big sales on everything.  These stores open up very early in the morning, some at 12:00 am.  Black Friday was originally associated with a financial crisis in 1869.  Black Friday gets many shoppers because they already have off for Thanksgiving.  It is said to be the start of Christmas shopping.  Along with that day being the busiest is the Saturday before Christmas.  People save up all their money for a whole year just to get the best deals possible.  Big items are electronics such as laptops, game systems, and phones.  Many people go for clothes too.  I have never been Black Friday shopping, but I plan on going this year to see what it is like.  It is going to be a whole new experience!

Where are you going....

Our class recently read a story called Where are you going, Where have you been.  It is about a girl named Connie that goes through the same things that any teenage girl goes through.  Teenagers always act and dress different around their friends than when they are with their family.  Connie has an older sister named June.  June gets more attention from her mom than Connie does.  The reason for this is because Connie's mom thinks Connie is too pretty.  When I first read the story, I was very confused at what was going on with Connie and Arnold.  I was hoping the story would have an ending that would help me understand it better, but it didn't.  The author did that on purpose (which I didn't like).  As I kept re-reading it, I began to just make up an ending to the story.  In my opinion, I believe Connie was just dreaming the whole time.  This kind of story is the first one I've ever read.  I don't really like being left feeling like "what happens next?"  If anyone feels the same I do, please share.

Cursive Writing

Last Saturday I took the SAT's and came across something new.  It wasn't new to me but I don't see it on tests.  I had to write a few sentences in cursive.  It was easy for me because I enjoy writing in cursive and I believe it's fancy.  Cursive is a style of penmanship that is conjoined to make writing faster.  There are many types of cursive writing styles, and there are a lot of countries that use this type of writing.  A pediatric coordinator said that learning cursive helped students hone their fine motor skills.  It is also said that cursive is easier to learn than print.  A bunch of students in this generation simply can't read or write in cursive.  We see a lot of cursive writing on letters, cards, and banners, but not all of us can read them.  I believe cursive should be taught so students can read these things and they might even find cursive easier and faster.  I am obsessed with cursive writing even though I am not good at writing it.  I jot some things down in my notebook to try to get better and it seems to be working.  All teachers should work with students and have things done in cursive for future occurances.

O Brother, Where Art Thou?

O Brother, Where Art Thou is a movie that is like the Odyssey and The Three Stooges combined in Mississippi during the 1930's.  It's about three convicts who escape from a chain gang in search of a treasure that's buried underneath a lake.  The three convicts are Everette, Delmar, and Pete.  They do some good and some bad things while on their journey.  The three convicts crashed a KKK lynch mob, helped a man rob three banks in two hours, and put out a best selling record as "The Soggy Bottom Boys."  There were a few connections to the Odyssey.  There were Sirens, a cyclops, and a blind prophet.  The film also ended with divine intervention.  O Brother, Where Art Thou was a pretty good movie in my opinion.  There was a lot of humor and the movie had me thinking whether or not they were going to get caught or find the treasure.  I never heard of this movie before but I'm glad I saw it.  The blind prophet was right when he said, "the treasure you seek shall not be the treasure you find."