Friday the 13th

     Happy last day of high school everyone! I have always looked forward to Springfest as the best day of the school year. All of the attention is on the seniors, you just chi11 all day long, and you get out of school a month early! How could it not be the best day? Well, it was a great day besides a few minor issues. I believe that all the bad things that have happened to me today are to be blamed on by one thing: Friday the 13th. I am really not a supersticious person at all. However, I am convinced that I have been cursed. I never freak out if I see a black cat cross the road and I can open an umbrella in the house without expecting bad luck for the next seven years. My birthday is on March 13th so 13 is my favorite number. Yet, Friday the 13th managed to put a major damper on my day. It all began when I woke up. I was supposed to drive my uncle's awesome electric yellow golf cart, pimped out with monster truck wheels and flame decals on the side. Of course, my cousin put oil where the gas is supposed to go and blew the engine. Next, my back up plan failed me too. I rode a lawn mower which I thought was pretty cool. That all changed when the driver decided not to break and plow right into Marc Golsmith riding in a wheelbarrow. I honestly thought we killed him. Luckily, he did not suffer any major injuries and was able to get back in his barrow and continue riding to school. But the bad luck streak didn't end there. I really wanted to win the ghost game in English. I was one of the last five people and of course I spell "yell." Such a buzzkill. I actually thought I stood a chance against Ms. Serensky. Lastly, I worked so hard on the senior issue of the school newspaper and expected it to be great. Yet, upon reading the first page I found at least ten flaws. Shout out to Meghan Shroyer who is going to attend Colgate next year! I'm sorry I forgot you in the senior destinations section Meggie. Despite the few set backs in my day, Springfest was a memory I will never forget. Seeing everyone with their college tees and reflecting on the strong bond our class has formed since we were little kids made everything worth it. Bye, bye Blogger! Hello college!

My Attempt at Writing Poetry

As little, scared juniors we had no clue how to write,
But with some extra help our papers took flight
Some of us cried when we got a three,
While others thought AP English 11 was a breeze


After Harriet Jacobs and In Cold Blood,
We felt as if we were finally getting out of the mud
So we moved onto AP 12 with each other's support
But some ran away to Honors with Mr. Stuart


Boy, am I glad I stayed with Seren
Even though that meant buying a lot more aspirin
All the late night analyzing was worth it in the end
AP English is a course I will always recommend


Now I can write essays in record time
My knowledge of content and devices will surely earn me a nine
I don't have any worries about English next year
I'm sure I will be giving a lot of assistance to my Miami peers


I will truly miss each and every one of you so much
You are all such a brilliant, young bunch
The memories we have formed are ones I will never forget
I'm sure we will all reunite soon, don't sweat it!

Chaos in the Rec

Ashima, Brabantio, and Lady Bracknell sit in the back of the Rec Center as instucted by Mr. Rydquist. They have been given the simple task of collecting the test booklets and throwing away the plastic wrap that covers them. However, their job becomes much more intense when they realize that someone is cheating off of the tall, blonde haired girl sitting in the middle row.

[The three observe Carley working on her test.]


Ashima: [Frowning] "[I] can't help but pity [her]" (Lahiri 25).


Brabantio: "O unhappy girl!" (Shakespeare 1.1.160).


Lady Bracknell: "I never saw a woman [look] so altered" (Wilde 8).


Ashima: "Only in America" (Lahiri 70).


[Brabantio notices a boy peeking over Carley's shoulder looking at her multiple choice answers.]


Brabantio: [Whispering to others] "O heaven!...O treason of the blood!" (Shakespeare 1.1.166).


Lady Bracknell: [To Brabantio] "What is your [problem]?" (Wilde 13).


Brabantio: "[That boy] hast practiced on her with foul charms" (Shakespeare 1.1.73).


Lady Bracknell: "I confess I feel somewhat bewildered by what you have just told me" (Wilde 14).


Brabantio: "Down with him, [cheater]" (Shakespeare 1.3.56).

Lady Bracknell" [Feeling increasingly angry.] "The fact is that I do not approve at all of [the boy's] moral chatacter. I suspect him of being untruthful" (Wilde 48).

Brabantio: [Calling to Mr. Rydquist] "Lay hold upon him. If he do resist,/Subdue him at his peril" (Shakespeare 1.3.78-79).

[Ashima rushes towards boy and drags him out of his seat.]

Ashima: [Looking at Brabantio] "'Like this?''' (Lahiri 23).

[Boy starts yelling and arguing with Mr. Rydquist, defending himself.]

Lady Bracknell: [Speaking her mind aloud to the other students who are now looking around to see what the commotion is all about.] "This noise is extremely unpleasant...[Children] are always vulgar" (Wilde 52).

Brabantio: [To Mr. Rydquist] "Call up [Ms. Serensky]!" (Shakespeare 1.1.172)

Lady Bracknell: [To the students] "Never speak disrespectfully of [Ms. Serensky], [kids.] Only people who can't get into [AP English] do that" (Wilde 47).

[All exit]

The students "ooh" and "ahh" as Mr. Rydquist, Brabantio, Lady Bracknell, and Ashima escort the boy to Ms. Serensky's room. The students, slightly frazzled, get back to their tests, determined to get a five.


The boy's punishment

Laughter is the Best Medicine when AP English Gets Feverish

     "This is not a novel, a book, or a story. It's a PLAY" (Ms. Serensky). Well, now that I know how to properly identify my favorite work of literature we have read this year, I will reveal which play it is: The Importance of Being Earnest. The main reason this text is my favorite is because it is only 54 pages and we read it in a week. Just kidding! That is surely a plus though. Thinking back to all of the books we have read this year my mind goes to a psycho murderer, a man who watches a woman get raped, a doomed life at birth, resentment towards family, and mental patients. Basically, I liked IOBE because it is the only book that didn't have something terribly depressing occur. "Why on earth do you say that," you may ask (Wilde 3)? Ultimately, I thought this piece of literature was filled with pure humor and light-hearted topics. This is definitely the book that I wanted to end my senior year with for the aforementioned reason. Plus, the fact that we read this play out loud made me like it that much more. "It is a great truth" that smiles are contagious and I feel this play created a very joyous atmosphere in our classroom. It was very easy for me to follow the story unlike other novels where I have felt very confused after reading. The characters, especially Algernon, really drew me into the story with their dynamic personalities. I think Wilde's inclusion of "bunburrying" and placing the baby in the handbag instead of the basinette was so clever. I really like how everything in the story reaches a full circle at the end when we find out Jack's history. More so, I especially loved playing the part of Gwendolen. I looked forward to going to class that week to act her part out. By reading the play aloud, I feel I fully comprehend Wilde's mocking of the aristocratic class that I would not have grasped if I read it by myself. I can honestly say that I learned "the vital Importance of Being Earnest" (Wilde 54).


I feel like the yellow smiley when I think of IOBE.

My Top 10 Most Blogworthy Academic Achievements

     Although I have never officially won an academic award (besides the Principal's Merit Award and Power of the Pen challenge in Middle School), I have had many individual academic achievements that I am proud of. Some, although seemingly small, have made the top 10 list that I am about to share with you. Get ready to have your mind blown away my intellectual brilliance in no particular order...


1. Acceptance to my first college. Opening up that first college letter from Penn State, reading the first line that says I was accepted and nothing else. This was the pivotal moment where my hard work in high school paid off. Although I will not be attending that university in the fall, just knowing that all the late nights of countless homework and hours of test prep was worth it in the end. "The site of it printed in capital letters on the...page" was an exhillirating feeling (Lahiri 89).


2. Receiving an A on my Honors Trig Final. For those of you who don't know me, I am not a math person. Never have been and never will. Math, no matter what form of it, just doesn't click with me. I still challenge myself in AP math classes though to try and form a better relationship with the subject. Last year I took Honors Trig with Mrs. Petite. That class rattled and shook my brain more than any one I had ever taken, but I worked hard all throughout the year and...I got an A on the final! I couldn't believe it, I was absolutly astonished that I had done it. To this day, "there is something in that [moment] that seems to inspire absolute confidence" in myself (Wilde 32).


3. The first 7 I ever received in AP English will go down in history. I still have the paper in my old binder underneath my bed so I will never forget. It was the paper that we wrote after we watched the Hurricane Katrina documentary and read an article on it in AP English 11. To my first 7 paper: "I am bound to thee forever" (Shakespeare 3.3.212).


4. The day my team beat the Dream Team. I have blogged about this experience before as my favorite day in AP English 12. If you would like to know the details of this magnificent day, see that post. Jackie, Katie, Nicola, and I made a great team. I knew we could beat the Dream Team. "And have we not affections?/ Desires for [10 extra credit points]?...as the [Dream Team] have?" (Shakespeare 4.3.108-109). Of course we do!!


5. Passing both my AP tests last year. I waited for what felt like the entire summer to get those test scores in the mail. I studied so many hours for the apush exam it is unreal. "[Those tests], an entity shapeless and weightless, managed nevertheless to distress [me] physically, like the scratchy tag of a shirt [I] had been forced to wear" (Lahiri 76). All that studying means less studying in college now!


6. Maintaining a 4.5 GPA all three quarters of my Senior year. I hope to continue this trend all the way to graduation. I'm happy that I did not/tried not to let Senioritis get the best of me. Lady Bracknell says that "Ignorance is like a delicate fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone" (Wilde 13). I am proud to say that I did not let ignorance and laziness stand in my way of finishing off my last year of high school strong.


7. Finishing my college essay was an amazing feeling. I feel that that essay is the best piece of work I have ever written. I worked so hard on that paper to impress all the colleges I applied to. I read it and edited it so many times I had the entire essay memorized. I could honestly recite it back to you today if you would like. My essay basically took over my life but thankfully "it no longer looms over [my] life, darkening it without warning as it used to do" (Lahiri 78).


8. Getting over a 100% on the 10th grade research project. Jackie could agree that this was one of the most unbearable things we have ever had to do. I remember sitting in her office for hours at a time staring at the computer screen trying to type this paper. It didn't help that our topic was "does diet and exercise directly correlate with academic success?" I mean, "that [topic] is nonsense," of course there is a direct correlation (Wilde 7). But our group managed to dish out an amazing research paper that scored well above our expectations.


9. Turning in that first 18 page Data Sheet on Othello. I remember thinking to myself at 2:00 a.m. the night before it was due, "Kill me tomorrow; let me live tonight!" (Shakespeare 5.2.80). I never thought that I would get that thing done..or that I would get an A on it!


10. This blog post. "[I] realized there's no need to lie. Not technically" for I honestly didn't think that I would be able to think of 10 "blogworthy" academic achievements that I have had in my high school career (Lahiri 96). But I did and now I feel very accomplished and pleased with myself.

To Say Yes or to Say No, That is the Question

     My favorite poem this year would have to be Elisavietta Richie's "Sorting Laundry." The reason this poem is my favorite is because it is one of the few that I could completely understand. I think the message is very clear that the speaker is contemplating marriage. I liked that because it allowed me to really explore my writing in my poetry paper without worrying whether or not my interpretation of the poem was correct or not. Although this poem is very serious and genuine compared to the play, "The Importance of Being Earnest," I feel there is some connection there. I could imagine Cecily writing a poem like this in her diary, expressing the happiness and joy Ernest brings her. One of my favorite lines that Cecily says is “I like his hair so much. I must enter his proposal in my diary” (Wilde 34). This affectionate tone parallels Richie’s admiring tone toward her loved one, but in a less creepy way of course. I could also imagine Algernon belittling this poem like no other. The woman in Richie’s poem feels a life without a spouse would be entirely lonely and empty. Algernon, on the other hand, seems much more disdainful of marriage: “No married man is ever attractive except to his wife” (Wilde 26). There is a clear theme of bitterness towards marriage in the poem. Another instance of this occurs when Lane remarks, “I have only been married once. That was in consequence of a misunderstanding between myself and a young person” (Wilde 1). It is interesting to me that my favorite poem and favorite novel we read this year have such differing views on marriage. I wonder whether I will take Richie’s view on marriage or the socialites of the play in the future…

Can you redeem yourselves Dream Team?

     The Dream Team: DESTROYED. Yup, I said it. I beat the Dream Team. I'm sure it is very hard for Sam, Alex, Thomas, and John to swallow this fact but they can't deny the truth. It was a day of a terrible blizzard (one that should have definitley been a snow day, might I add). I woke up late because my alarm did not go off. I threw on sweat pants and a sweatshirt and drove five miles per hour to school Tokyo drifting the whole way there. I probably scared kids when they saw me running through the hallway with no make up on, my hair an afro mess, and my back pack half way open. I made it just in time for English class and for the day that Ms. Serensky would reveal the correct answers to the AP multiple choice test. Of course, The Dream Team was already huddled in the back corner, heads pushed together devising their plan. They were laughing and smiling, looking devilishly excited for what they thought would be yet another victory. Ms. Serensky announced the answer to number one: “B. That goes to Teams 3 and 5," she exclaimed. Of course Team 5, The Dream Team, answered correctly and it "made [them] feel, for those brief minutes, the absolute center of [the] world" (Lahiri 129). Yet, something wasn't quite right. Team 3, my team, started slowly noticing the increase in tally marks compared to the boys. They argued with one another after missing more and more questions. I bet Thomas was thinking in his head, "I had rather be a toad/And live upon the vapor of a dungeon" than to lose to them" (Shakespeare 3.3.66-67). John was screaming beating his fists on the table after yet another incorrect answer. The final scores were announced and my team ended up winning the 10 bonus points! We were so happy that our modesty and humbleness put our team at the top.. I will never forget the shocked looks on their faces. The Dream Team coming in second place for an AP multiple choice game is one of the best examples of simultaneous disappointment that I have ever seen. This day was by far my favorite day in AP English 12. “At last! At last! At last!” we put The Dream Team in their place (Wilde 54).