David’s Blog

 Today in class Mr.R said that we had to write a blog post about the questions: “What do you think that the main theme of this book is?”and “What was our overall impression of the book. What was the most memorable? The least? What did you like? Dislike?” Here is my blog post;

I think that the main theme of A Wrinkle In Time is Good vs. Evil. Even though I think “good” and “evil” are only perspectives. I think I’ll make a post about that later. I think this is the main/most important theme because in Meg’s, Calvin’s, Charles Wallaces’s, and many others’s opinion the “Black Thing” is “evil” and they are “good”. But in the Black thing’s perspective the people trying to fight it are “evil” and it, is “good”.

Another great example of this is The Lord Of The Rings. This is because Sauron is seen as very “evil” and corrupts everyone he meets. While on the other hand the Elves, Men, Dwarfs, Hobbits, ect… are “good”. But Sauron does the things he does for a reason. One, he was originally one of the, I belive it is 7, wizards, but he was thrown out for practising Necromancy. Sauron was very angry and left to Middle Earth even though the Eldar had told him not to quite forcefully. When he was there he killed Morgomir, the Dark Lord of the first age. Oh well, I could probably go on and on and on about this but I won’t. Well, I hope you get my point, my entire reason to telling you that story was so that you could better understand that everyone does everything for a reason.

My overall opinion of this book is, I mean I liked it but it was way too short. I mean, come on I have read comic books longer than that (for you saying, “yeah right,” it is actually true).   The most memorable part must have been when the chilldren flew up to see a small version of the Black Thing. This was etched into my mind because I liked how she described the Black Thing. Also, I liked the part that the children used flowers to get oxygen in that kind of altitude.  The least memorable must be… Wait a minute, how can I answer this question since the least memoriable I won’t remember since it is not memoriable.  I liked how she made up the Wrinkling process, and if it would actually work, it would be cool to just be able to step from one place to another without walking all the way over to the place that you wanted to get to.  As I said before I disliked how short the book is, but other than that I cannot find any other faults.

P.S. Here is a picture of the Dark Lord Sauron. Ok, the Eye Of Sauron.

I got this picture here.

Here is the titlepage of A Wrinkle In Time by Madeline L’Engle.

I got this picture here.

I have an Ice hockey tournament coming up very soon, 1st of March, 2008. So, I decided to write about what happened at the last tournament.

Yay! Tomorrow I am going to a ice hockey tournament! We are going against some really good teams my brother, Pontus, and I. Last time we beat the host of this tournament 3-2 in Sudden Death after our goalie had done a spectacular job.
In the first period we scored, I passed to one of the players we had borrowed from a city close to us and he shot and scored, 1-0 to us. Seven minutes later, the other player we had borrowed got the puck at half line and was away like a bullet. BAM, 2-0 for us. A minute passed their star player gets past our defence and suddenly the score was 2-1. Fweeeeeeet, the whistle for the end of the first period sounded.
The other team had total control over the game in the second period, but they only scored one goal! Mu Ji, our goalie was a wall stopping everything that came his way. Their goalie though, he is the best in the area. My team-mate, and school friend, Julian, was skating with full speed towards the net. The goalie goes down, Julian shoots high and GOA… wait, what… how could he save that? The puck was going 1 ½ feet above his head. His arm snaps up in a millisecond. He made an impossible save, we were baffled. He saved the impossible, But then again he saved a shot from Jari Kurri, a retired, Finnish NHL player. A few minutes later the second period was over. (We only play two 20 minute periods).
Now for the overtime, this was very short, only about 3-4 minutes long. In the beginning the other team (I cannot say who for security reasons so I’ll call them by their other name), the Sandstorms, got the puck, we won it back and went up to shoot and the goalie saves it, bad luck Raiders. The Sandstorms got the puck, Quickly they got passed our defence and shot. At this time I thought, “NOOO, it is over!” But Mu Ji saved it. We were jumping with joy and screaming our head off, “Good job Mu Ji, Way to go!!!!!!!!!!” 30 seconds later Julian gets the puck, he passes to Noah, Noah passes back, the time on the scoreboard is 3:42, Julian shoots and… Dead silence, where is the puck? Noah looks in the net and he screams, ”GOAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Our entire team is on the ice screaming our heads off and skating around like crazy mad beasts.
Of coarse we were extremely blissful. But the Sandstorms, they were not happy, in fact, thy the complete opposite since they beat us in the first round 7-1 they were as angry as a bumblebee when its flower is taken from it. Some of the parents even said that we cheated!!! Well, back to the game, the MVP for the Sandstorms went to their goalie (needs citation), and our MVP went to Mu Ji, the one who obviously deserved it the most.
Well, I’ll tell you about this tournament after I come home. Well, I’m going to the Sandstorm tournament tomorrow, so bye.

P.S. here is a picture I found of Jari Kurri.

I found this picture here.

P.P.S. On this site it explains more about my favorite ice hockey goalie, why don’t you check out my earlier post about this.

Mr.R said that our Caravan logs were too short so we had to write a longer one. Well, here it is.

A good proverb that i found today is “Don’t cut the tree that shades you.” I think this means that you shouldn’t literally cut the tree that puts you in the shade. I also think that it has another meaning, this meaning is that you shouldn’t cut down the person that shades you. Or in other words don’t hurt people that is close to you and the ones that help you.

I got this image here.

I also found out that Abd-al Rahman III ruled in Spain during the time of the Umayyad Empire. Adb-al Rahman III was the first and greatest caliph of the Umayyad Empire. He ruled from Cordova in Spain. He may not have been as good ruler but as his ancestor Adb-al Rahman, but he was loved by the people because of the freeness of religion during his rule.

This is my second caravan log, I don’t have very much information on this one as the first one.  Well, I’ll start with how many Dirham we earned today.  we lost 11 Dirham, so now we have 44. We gained one trivia card giving us a total of 1 trivia card. We also gained 1 fact card to give us a total of 3 fact cards. Some interesting facts that i found are: of the former USSR’s fifteen states, six are Muslim.  Also, John the Baptist and Jesus are generally accepted as prophets in Islam, Muhammad was the last prophet. Those are some things I learned today.

Mr.R told us to every week write what we learned. but since this was the first time Mr. R said we should write it for the day.

today in class I learned that writing is more than just words on a paper, it is the thought of a person who has written the piece. Also, I learned that people who are good readers are usually good writers, it happens though that some people are good at reading but not good at writing and vice versa.  Another thing I learned is that Science tests can be hard if you forget that you have one and didn’t study on the day before. Fourthly, I learned that writing is a way of communicating. Lastly, I learned that some countries block certain sites to give the people less power and the government more. Those were some of the things I learned in class today. 

Today I daydreamed about the upcoming social that will be on Thursday the 21st. Also, I daydreamed about what I would do if my ice hockey team won the upcoming tournament that we will have soon.

Today in class i wanted to ask; when you are posting a comment where it says e-mail, do you just put your address for the blog or your real e-mail?

Some things I learned in social studies today, on the 19th of February, 2008 are the following. During the golden age of Islam, Baghdad was a great center of learning and art. Here is a fact I found very interesting: the former Soviet Union’s (USSR) population was 20% Muslim. I also learned that the Hadeeth is a collection of quotes and sayings of the prophet `Muhammad. During the time of the Islam empire, Muslim mathematicians contributed to Modern European civilization by using Arabic numerals including the concept of zero, Algebra, Geometry, and using time in mathematics. Another fact I found interesting is that there are 1.4 million Christian Arabs, most of them living in Lebanon.

Mr.R said today that we should write a post about a few responding questions for A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle. Here are my answers to the responding questions.

What thoughts do you have about Meg’s personality as you read these chapters?

The thoughts I have about Meg’s personality are the following. She is a rebel when she is in school because she feels like as if who cares anyways about certain things. Also, she is very good at math but is blamed for cheating because she doesn’t show her work; she always uses shortcuts to get to the answers in math. She also is very protective about her brothers. Those are some things that I have learned about Meg’s personality.

Why is Meg Murry unhappy at school?

Meg Murry is unhappy at school because of these reasons. She is not doing very well because she is not paying attention in class. Also, she is sad because her father has been gone for two years and hasn’t sent a mail for a year. She also always gets in trouble with the principle of her school. She also gets very overprotective when her brother is mentioned in a conversation, she also tries to beat up the person that says something bad about Charles Wallace.

How and why does Calvin fit in with the Murry family?

Calvin fits in with the Murry family because he feels left out with his own family. Also, everyone at school thinks that he is so cool but he is actually just like Meg, very different.

Where and why do Calvin, Charles Wallace, and Meg go with Mrs. Whatsit, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Which?

The children go to many places with the three Mrs. W’s. Some of them are: Uriel, Camazots, Orion Belt planet, and the two-dimensional planet. They go to these places for several reasons. Some of them are: they go to Uriel to see the Black Thing for the first time, they go to the Orion Belt planet to see what Earth looks like through the Happy Medium’s crystal ball, they go to the two dimensional planet because Mrs. Which had made a mistake during the Wrinkle process, and they went to Camazots to free Meg’s father.

In your opinion why do the children accept the three Mrs. Ws instead of fearing them?

Well, this is a hard question to answer. Firstly, Meg was afraid, at first, of the three Ws and didn’t trust them but then they gained her trust later. I think that the three children accepted the Ws instead of fearing them because they found them very trustworthy and friendly. I think they would have feared them if they didn’t have these qualities. Also, Charles Wallace can seem to find the good qualities in people and he said that they were good people, and Meg trusts her little brother.

In what ways does Meg seem like any other person? In what ways are her feelings like yours?

Meg is like an ordinary person by many things. For example, she is doing badly in school and feels like everything is going against her. Also, I agree to what Andrew said. Furthermore, she feels like nobody cares about her and her father is gone. Meg’s feelings are similar to mine because sometimes I do really badly in school and my brothers make fun of me just as Meg’s brothers made fun of her in a way. Also, Meg is very protective about her family, this is similar to me because when I’m playing ice hockey if someone hits people in my team too much I beat them up.

Imagine that you are a guidance counsellor at Meg’s school. You believe Meg can do better class work. Write a letter to Mrs. Murry about Meg, explaining the problem as you see it and suggesting possible solutions.

- Dear Mrs. Murry,

We have found that your daughter, Meg, is not reaching standards high enough to pass. Therefore I suggest that you, first of all teach her some manners so she isn’t so rude in class. Also, you will need to work with her math, she seems to be able to get the answer very well but she can’t seem to show her work. Because of this, her math teacher thinks that she uses a calculator. I also recommend that she sees me at least two times every week.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Sincerely School Counsellor

Mr. R said today that we should read a packet and then write what questions we have about the Islam unit.

I think this unit will be the most fun so far, this is because i most definately enjoy learning about other cultures other than that of my own. I just have some questions before we really start this uni.

Firstly, I didn’t quite get what a sura is. Also, Mr. R, you said that Islam was the largest religion in the world, in the packet it says that it is the second largest religion after Christianity, why is this?  There are still Beduins in Arabia?  Why did Muhammed’s parents die? Those are some questions that i have before we start the Islam unit.

I really look forward to starting the unit project. also i want to start this unit. i think that this will be very fun since i like discussing religion.

This is a video of Henrik Lundqvist my favorite hockey goalie. He now plays for the New York Rangers.

I got this movie here.

P.S. Sorry for switching movies, it said that the other one was no longer available.

We are reading A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle. Also, we are studying the aspects of Science-Fiction and Fantasy. Mr. R said that we should write a short Science-Fiction/Fantasy story about a trip we recently had. This is the story I wrote;

A week on Sharrgsetrel (Sha-R-S-Tel)

It was the 31^st of January in the year of 2058 (Christian counting) when the almost fourteen-year-old boy finished his spaceship. The boy’s name won’t matter to you, so I won’t tell you. The spaceship was a pencil-like craft that had a reflective silvery white colour. This was to reflect radiation and heat. Ek-874, as the space module was named, didn’t use any natural resources but solar power instead. This was energy was collected by the two foldable 250 by 200 meter solar cells and it was stored in the 9 trillion giga-watts capacity battery.

He asked his teachers if he could bring his grade on a journey in space, the teachers said, “yes, if you will let us come with.”

So, the classes went to the boy’s house and entered the capsule which had room for a few hundreds. The boy himself went into the control cabin with his brother, for they were pilots you see.

Ten minutes later the rocket took off. There was a loud crackle of electricity as a few billion giga-watts were used up to start the engines and reach escape velocity. When the ship exited the gravitational pull of the earth there was a crackle of electricity as the ship opened a wormhole. To see what a wormhole is look in the diagram below.

After the wormhole opened something really bad happened, the ship came out on an entirely different location than planned. They came to the planet Sharrgsetrel the second planet from the star Espolianete in the outer ring of the spiral galaxy Xyalgalirspa in the western part of the nebula Lubwenrannrest, exactly 22.43659870333 light years from Earth. Unfortunately the ship had run out of energy and needed three whole days to recharge. So the children unpacked the supplies and set up camp. On the first day when they went to find firewood they encountered the Xszyots, one of the native species of the planet.

Unfortunately Xszyots are very unfriendly with visitors so the group had to make a run for it. Fortunately, there were hoverbikes nearby and they grabbed them and drove. Another group went to explore the mountains nearby and found a huge valley with another of the strange species of Sharrgsetrel, the Onlainti a huge scorpion-like creature. Luckily they only saw one of these formidable foes.

The next day a group went to a inland sea that was found the day before by another group. Here the group built a raft of wood and a leaf that is very commonly found on Sharrgsetrel. This raft they used to go to the island in the very centre of the lake. On this island they made the first contact with the friendly species of Sharrgsetrel, the Umsaegriocf a race of humanoid creatures that can use magic to fulfill their wants, but rarely use this power. Meanwhile, in an old temple the most sinister of species in this part of the Nebula were planning how to get rid of these scum that had landed on their planet.

The day after this the group went to the lake to hide underwater from the Snpseciiisstree, the species earlier described as the most sinister in the galaxy. While underwater the group saw a huge arrangement of species, one important one was Gsrheaartk a 72-meter long shark-like being with a sword as a snout just like a Marlin.

Well, the next day the engine had been fully charged and the ship was ready for takeoff. And Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt the ship was off into the sky BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMM!!!!!!!!!!! The ship opened a wormhole and passed through.

When they got back to earth they noticed something was wrong. The boy heard a muffled sound behind him and turned around. What he saw was terrifying. He turned and saw a tentacley beast that had 3 eyes, stood as tall as a human and had small scratches everywhere from previous fights of other opponents.

The creature struck with amazing force right on the arm of the boy who grabbed a metal plate to defend himself, the  beast struck him though, hard enough to strike blod.  The smell of blood seemed to drive the beast berserk; it attacked more ferociously than before and began to get the upper hand. Then the boy started to fight back he hit and hit and hit, but it seemed as if all were lost. Suddenly the boy was smacked right in the side of the head.

He woke up with a scream.