iRead Journal Prompt #2 for The Compound

-Often main characters will grow in confidence and learn how to accept themselves in some new way.  Cite an example of how the protagonist found a source of strength.  Describe how you felt as the reader when this happened.

Eli, the protagonist, found a source of strength from the internet that he occasionally was able to access.  He found a computer in his twin brother, Eddy’s, room.  He never wanted to go in there because he missed his brother so much.  He knew it would be an exact replica of the room from his original house, and it would bring too many past memories of him.  One day he decided to go in there, and he found Eddy’s old laptop that was still charging in the wall.  While Eli was looking through the computer, he recognized an internet icon, that had been deleted off his personal computer.  He has not seen this icon for over 6 years and it brought back many distant memories of staying up late at night playing video games and instant messaging his brother and his friends.  However, the internet was down. “That was the difference between this laptop, and the one I used.  Mine had no integrated wireless internet.” (37). The internet icon made Eli very suspicious of his dad and the information that he was telling all of them.  Eli felt that his dad was not telling him the truth about what was happening above ground.  He knew that his dad was keeping secrets from them, and he wanted to get to the bottom of it.  The internet icon gave him the confidence to confront his dad about what information he knew about the Earth.  Eli decided to secretly keep the laptop because he wanted to explore more of it.  He went to his dad’s office and sat outside the door and tried clicking the internet icon again.  Eli got the message “Wireless network now connected.” Seeing that message helped Eli grow in confidence that there was somebody that was keeping the internet working.  It gave him confidence to find out who was still on Earth.  Curiosity started to eat at him to make him find out more information and, of course, the truth.  One day he got on the internet and saw his brother’s user ID on the instant messager.  He immediately started to chat with that ID, and confirmed that it really was his brother, Eddy.  At that moment, he knew that everything his father has told him so far was a lie.  The conversation with his brother really made Eli determined to get out of the compound, knowing there was no nuclear attack.  This source of strength caused him to physically fight his dad to get the code.  I feel like this encounter with the internet created a new part of Eli.  It brought out a new side of Eli that was more determined than ever to get the code from his dad to get out of the compound.  Now that Eli knew that his dad has been tricking his family for the past couple years, Eli started to revolt against his dad and confront him about the code.  If Eli didn’t search Eddy’s room, I believe that Eli would have stayed inside the compound for the remaining 9 years, never doubting his dad’s views on the outside world.

iRead Journal Prompt #1 for The Compound

-Select a relatively important event in the book and describe why it was a turning point in the character's life? What was it that the character decided or learned to do?

The turning point of a relatively important event in the book happened when the dad was unconscious, and the mom was going in and out of consciousness.  The dad was unconscious because of the food poisoning and he was uttering numbers and words; he was very hard to understand.  Eli was trying to figure out if he was mumbling about the code to the door, or if he was just talking nonsense. Eli decided they had to get out of the compound; he needed to figure out the code to the door.  He knew that the code had to be numbers, but he was unsure how many numbers.  When Eli confronted his mother about the code, she replied that his father was the only person who knew about the code.  She claimed that the code was memorized, and not written. Eli was really concerned because his mother was pregnant, and she didn’t look so good.  He thought that his mother’s life could be in danger because she told him that doctors recommend that she not have any more babies.  She kept complaining about a lot of pain in her stomach.  She was starting to bleed.  He felt bad that he couldn’t help his mother besides giving her blankets and telling her to be calm and to rest.  Eli knew that she needed medical help and he didn’t know how to help her, except to get out of the compound.  He told his mother “I’ll find the clue” (194).  In his mind, that mentally committed him to find a way to get the door open.  He could see his mom was in a lot of pain, and this motivated him even more.  His father gave Eli a one word clue (turducken).  Eli remembered turducken was a type of food that his family enjoyed eating at Christmas time.  Turducken is a tuckey stuffed with a duck, that was stuffed with a chicken.  He was trying to figure out how that food was a clue.  He remembered his brother, Lucas, talking about the clowns, and saying “the mystery inside” (204).  Eli decided to go into the nursery and find the clowns that Lucas was referring to.  He took them all apart, and at the bottom of the smallest clown was a clue.  The word on the clown was “Hautbois” which is French for oboe.  Still driven to figure out the clue, Eli went to his sister’s oboe case and searched it.  He found a piece of blank paper.  He could tell there was invisible ink on it because when he was younger he used to write a bunch of messages to his twin brother, Eddy, in invisible ink.  He took the paper into the lab and put chemicals onto the paper to reveal the message.  A lot of numbers started to appear on the paper.  “I had it, I had the power to get us out of here.” (208).  While Eli was looking at the paper, he heard someone clapping.  His dad walked towards him and said “So you have the code now.” (209).  Eli replies by saying they can escape and get help.

Creative Writing - Canterbury Tales Prologue Addition

Creative Writing – Canterbury Tales Prologue Addition

My friend went to his school on Christmas Break.

He could have spent it skiing on a lake.

He didn’t like to party or have fun.

He didn’t like to stay out in the sun.

In fact he was a very smart adult.

And thought that everything was an occult.

Whenever danger stood in front of him.

He would become a quiet soul and dim.

But now he’s grown and changed into a man.

And even started filling out a tan.

Ashfall Prompt #2

AJ Pendharkar

Ms. Morrell

English IV Honors

October 8, 2012

iRead Journal Prompt #2 for Ashfall

            When Alex went to his Cedar Falls Taekwondo academy, he was looking for weapons.  The author writes “Every one of the schools edged weapons was gone.” (Mullen, 66) After searching through the school for any weapon, he found his teacher’s Bo staff.  He grabbed it and took it with him.  Alex was trained how to fight and defend himself with the Bo staff.  The Bo staff is a weapon.  It is “six feet long, an inch and a quarter thick at the middle, and tapered to one inch at each end.  Stained a deep chocolate color.  The varnish was worn in the middle of the staff from hundreds, maybe thousands, of hours of practice.” (Mullen, 67)  I think he feels very confident having this weapon with him.

            Alex woke one day to the sound of breaking glass.  He had slept in a gas station and was surprised to hear this sound.  He peaked through a small hole and saw that a family had come into the gas station and was rummaging through the debris looking for food.  It was a man, a woman, and two small kids.  He tried to stay out of sight, but the man spotted Alex and approached him.  Alex sensed the man was trying to take his backpack because the man kept looking at it.  Alex stood up and kept a strong grip on his Bo staff.  The man asked Alex if there was any food in the backpack.  Alex told him he had no food, but the man kept approaching.  The woman kept telling the man to stop.  “He’s only a kid!” (Mullen, 113)  Alex thought about trying to run, but he didn’t think he could turn his skis and get moving fast enough, so he took his Bo staff and, with a two handed grip, started to whirl it around his head.  It was quite difficult on skis.  Alex thought this would scare the man, but he still kept approaching.  Alex kept spinning the staff and smacked it into the roofing.  This stopped the man.  He went back to the woman and kids and started to search for food in the rubble.  Alex slowly skied away. I think that if Alex didn’t have the Bo staff, he wouldn’t have given a confident, powerful, fighting stance.  The Bo staff helped him stand his ground and not give into the request of the man.  Without the staff, Alex would not have acted like a fighter. 

            I felt relieved when Alex found the Bo Staff.  Although it may not have looked like it, the Bo Staff actually gave Alex confidence in what he was doing.  First off, he wouldn’t have been confident enough to kill Target if he had to do it bare handed.  I feel as the story went on, Alex grew to the Bo Staff.  He protected it as if it were a human; in his eyes it was the key to living.  The Bo Staff was a very influential item to Alex, and if he never found it I don’t think he would have found his Uncle’s farm alive.

Works Cited

Mullen, Mike.  Ashfall.  Terre Haute: Tanglewood Pub, 2011.  Print.

Ashfall Prompt 1

AJ Pendharkar

Ms. Morrell

English IV Honors

October 8, 2012

iRead Journal Prompt #1 for Ashfall

            There was a very important event that changed Alex’s life forever.  Alex had awoke very early one morning, in the gym in Worthington.  “Darla still slept.” (Mullen, 231) Instead of lying quietly on the cot next to Darla, he stood up, got ready, went outside, put on his skis, and started to ski out of the town by himself.  He had snuck out of the gym without saying goodbye to Darla.  He did not wake her up.  Alex had made a planned logical decision to leave Darla at the gym.  He felt responsible for her mother’s death.  Even though Alex did not know that Target would go to Darla’s farm, he thought Target had followed him there.  He was stunned that Darla’s farm ended up burning down in flames.  Darla would probably never go back to live there because of the horrible experience they had when they fought back with Target.  Alex thought she would be safer and would survive with her friends in Worthington.  She probably wouldn’t survive if she traveled with Alex to his family in Illinois.  These are reasons he felt comfortable justifying why he made the decision to leave her.  Yet the author writes, “It felt wrong, somehow, to leave her there.  I knew I missed her terribly.” (Mullen, 232)  Alex’s heart spoke his true feelings for Darla.  He tried to ignore the feelings by skiing away.

            The event continues to unfold when Alex is skiing and the author writes, “I looked backward.” (Mullen, 233)  Why would he look backward?  Why did Alex hesitate and lose focus of his determined journey out of town?  Usually when you leave a place, a person will look back over their shoulders when they are leaving someone they miss. 

            “I flopped sideways, sitting in the ash to wait.” (Mullen, 233)  The author wrote this when Alex turned around, and saw “another puff of ash there.” (Mullen, 233)  There was a tiny figure on skis heading toward him.  I believe Alex waited to see who it was, because he sensed it was Darla.  He was hoping it was Darla.  The feelings in his heart for Darla were showing, and overruled the logical decision to leave her.  This moment was a turning point for Alex.  If he never looked behind and kept a fast pace on his skis, Darla would have never caught up to him.  He would have journeyed alone to his uncle’s farm and might have not made it.  When Alex was waiting for Darla, he gave encouragement to Darla to catch up to him.

“I thought about the problem for a minute.  I could easily outdistance her, leaving her in the dust.  She had no food, water, or bedding.” (Mullen, 234)  In that moment, Alex didn’t move and knew Darla would be with him on his journey.  They were a team.  That was the final outcome of this very important event in Alex’s life.

Works Cited

Mullen, Mike.  Ashfall.  Terre Haute: Tanglewood Pub, 2011.  Print.

Earth Without People Reaction Paper

Earth Without People Reaction Paper

            Alan Weisman, the author of Earth Without People, uses an immense amount of imagery.  Weisman starts off by explaining about an area in Korea that has been abandoned for almost seventy years.  This certain area is currently a Demilitarized Zone that has once provided fertile land to farmers for 5,000 years, which now only families in desperate need migrate to.  However, this Demilitarized Zone is more useful than it looks; it provides answers as to what the world would look like if humans didn’t exist.  Over a certain amount of years without human contact, the world would eventually look as if there were no humans at all.  Animals would all become “wild” and the endangered species list would soon balance out with the population of animals.

            Weisman provided a great amount of examples as to what would happen to New York City if humans would ever suddenly disappear.  First off, within ten years the sidewalks would start to wear off; weeds would start to crack the sidewalks and push it aside.  The balance of animals that depend on human interaction and man-made objects would drastically decline (ex: rats who depend on human garbage and cockroaches who depend on warm buildings), and finally natural plants such as carrots and broccoli would regress back to how they used to be grown without farmers harvesting them.

            Within twenty years, the subway tunnels underneath New York City would collapse due to the amount of water rusting down the supporting structures, and soon the tunnels would be completely gone.  Wolves, bears, and other fierce creatures would make their way into Central Park and make that their habitat as the city slowly demolishes itself around them.  After Most of the buildings have collapsed, and the sidewalks have been completely covered with weeds, trees would start to grow and populate the land, making a bigger region for violent animals to roam.  Without humans on top of the food chain, there would be many more battles between groups of animals trying to find a dominate species.  Soon horses would become completely wild (a species that has never been wild for thousands of years).

            During the time period that the buildings collapse and the trees start to grow, the Indian Point nuclear reactors would start to leak radioactivity into the Hudson River.  This would greatly harm the fish in the river, and hurt the animals that depend on that river for cleansing and drinking water.  About 300 years later, most bridges across major lakes around New York City would collapse due to lack of maintenance and water erosion.  Then, around one thousand years after the humans have disappeared; the famous Hell Gate Bridge would collapse.  This would greatly affect the animals on the island because there would be no way to get back to the mainland with the amount of water in between each land mass. 

            Finally, with about twenty thousand years without humans in earth, glaciers would ruthlessly move across the island of Manhattan.  During this time, the Indian Point nuclear reactors would still be leaking radioactivity into the Hudson River, having leaked radioactivity for over nineteen thousand years! 

            Alan Weisman did a great job with imagery.  Without the imagery, I feel as if the paper would have less meaning to it and wouldn’t have been taken as seriously.  Weisman gives great examples as to how things would slowly demolish into the earth and how nature would grow over them.  He gives great examples as to what each species would go through to try and become the dominate species and thrive.  I feel Weisman did a great job with this paper and his examples were outstanding.

Beowulf and the City

Beowulf and the City

            Beowulf suddenly woke to the piercing sound of his alarm clock going off.  However, today he woke up in a total different mood; he had been looking forward to this day for the past couple of months.  Today was the day that Beowulf would release his new desert in his food-hall (restaurant).  He even got the Chanel 7 News to come to his food-hall to publicize his desert even more.  Beowulf was a well known food-maker (food-maker) in the outskirts of New York City who had recently created one of the greatest deserts of all time.  He had been secretly making this desert and altering with it for the past year trying to make it perfect.

After taking a shower in record time, he snatched the recipe out of his safe and darted to his brand new Lexus sitting in his driveway.  Beowulf could hardly concentrate on the road as thoughts kept pondering his mind as to what he would call this new desert.  Only two people knew about his invention; Beowulf himself, and his assistant, Grendel.  Grendel was one of the most talented cooks besides Beowulf.  Frankly, Beowulf didn’t know why Grendel just didn’t open up his own food-hall and be a head food-maker.  However, he was happy he had such a great assistant.

While Beowulf was driving, fire trucks and ambulances kept whizzing by him.  He thought something big must have happened in the city, when suddenly Grendel called him.  As his thoughts returned to his food-hall, he happily answered to a shaky voice telling Beowulf to quickly come to the food-hall.  As he turned the last corner to his food-hall, his stomach dropped when he saw what was ahead of him.  Tens of fire trucks were stopped on the road viciously hosing down what was once his food-hall.  Stunned, Beowulf got out of his car and walked over to the sidewalk, where Grendel was sitting with his face in his hands.  Speechless, Beowulf sat down next to Grendel and stared at the roaring fire, as thousands of memories passed through his mind.

  That was his family’s food-hall that was passed down throughout the generations.  Beowulf spent his entire childhood in that food-hall with his father, learning how to cook and how to prepare different meals.  Beowulf lost his mother at age 6, leaving him to grow up only with a father.  Whenever he asked about his mother, his dad continuously told him that she just “went to sleep and never woke up”; however in his early teen years he learned that she actually suffered from a brain aneurism.  After Beowulf’s mom passed, his dad went through serious depression, almost quitting the cooking industry.  Nothing hurt Beowulf more than when he saw how sad his father was.  Beowulf could plainly remember waking up in the dead of the night to the shattering of plates and glasses.  This was a side to his dad that he has never seen before.  His dad was the kindest person he knew, who would stay up countless hours of the night comforting Beowulf whenever he was sick.

Beowulf could clearly remember the day he got the news that changed his entire life.  It was his senior year in high school, a week before graduation.  He was in Science class taking the final exams when the principal walked into the classroom, and with a hurt look on his face whispered into the teacher’s ear.  The teacher slowly looked at Beowulf, and beckoned him to go outside with the principal.  Confused as to what was happening, he quickly went outside, wanting to get back to the test quickly, but instead of the principal talking, he embraced Beowulf in a hug and with tears in his eyes told Beowulf that his father has passed away from a heart attack.  He continued to tell Beowulf that because he had no family left he would have to live in his old house, and would have to manage the food-hall.

All these memories faded when a fire man came up to him and said there was nothing left from the food-hall and the cause of the fire looked like arson.  This meant that the insurance would not cover any of the damage.  Beowulf had no money to rebuild the food-hall, so he questionably looked at Grendel as to what would happen next.  Grendel said he would be moving in with his Uncle all the way in California, and open up a small food-hall there.  And then right then Beowulf got up and never looked back, and tried to start a new life.

Five years later, Beowulf was taking night classes at a local community college, to get a degree in physical therapy.  He had pretty much started a new life.  One night he was watching TV when he saw a documentary about food-halls in California.  He kept watching, to see what his life could have been life, when suddenly Grendel’s face popped up.  For some reason, he was the star of that episode.  Beowulf was tremendously happy to see that Grendel was a great success in California, when suddenly he saw how he got famous.  Grendel had been selling a desert for the past five years that has made him a millionare, and a famous face in the world of food-makers.  Beowulf’s mood changed abruptly when he realized that Grendel was selling Beowulf’s desert.  Beowulf quickly ran to his safe and saw that his recipe was gone.  He remembered after the fire he lost the recipe, and realized that Grendel somehow got his hands on it.

Beowulf had never been more furious in his entire life.  He knew he had to do something about this, so he quickly drove to the airport and bought the next ticket out to California.  Lucky for him, there was a spot open on the next plane.  Throughout the entire flight, Beowulf kept thinking as to how much Grendel has betrayed him.  When Beowulf landed in California, he got a taxi to take him to the part of town that Grendel had a food-hall in.  He didn’t know where exactly the food-hall was, so he walked the streets looking, still pondering as to what he would do to Grendel.  Just then he saw Grendel’s Uncle, Matt, coming out of a nearby store.  Matt must have seen Beowulf first because he was already happily waving and quickly walking over to him.  When Matt got to Beowulf, he explained how he was so happy to see him.  He told Beowulf to come home with him because he had a lot of explaining to do.

When Beowulf got to Matt’s apartment, they sat down at the table and Matt suddenly started to apologize.  Beowulf was confused as to what he was apologizing for, but then he realized all that Matt knew.  Matt explained how he was the one that got Grendel to steal the recipe from him, and that Grendel was the one that caused the fire at his food-hall.  As Matt kept talking, Beowulf kept getting angrier.  He realized that it was Grendel who messed up his life, and he had to get revenge.  Matt explained the only way to get revenge was to do the same thing Grendel did to him; set fire to his prized possession.

Beowulf and Matt waited until late that night to go to the food-hall.  It was around 2 AM when they finally decided to carry out the act.  They carefully crept around the city until they got to Grendel’s food-hall.  On the window was a picture of the famous desert with Grendel’s smiling face.  This infuriated Beowulf to no extent as they started to set Grendel’s food-hall on fire.  As the last of the building burned to the ground, Beowulf felt a relief of joy pass through him.  When Grendel would come back to the food-hall, he would know that Beowulf did it and would never sell the desert again.