The Song of the Meanderers

Winding, meandering, leading on,
The road we take is fair and long.
We wander on from here to there,
And we will perform most anywhere.

One play, a castle lawn,
Next day, we’re sure to be gone,
Next play, a village square –
But when you come back, we won’t be there.

We’re going somewhere, we don’t know where,
We only know we must be there,
And when we come, it’s then we know,
There’s still a place we want to go.

We’ve practiced all our acts for weeks
We cannot hurry on and leave
We’ll show them to you, then we’ll depart –
Skipping on to the tune in our hearts.

Friendship: Definition Paragraph

"Friendship is one of the most satisfying things in the world," says Wilbur, a pig from the book Charlotte's Web. But just what is friendship? Some synonyms are love, affinity, or unity. Friendship is the opposite of hatred or enmity. A similar term is loyalty. When combined, friendship and loyalty can do amazing things. In Lord of the Rings, the Fellowship was chosen more for loyalty and friendship than power or strength. The reason for this was that good was fighting against evil, love against hate, and unity against enmity. Friendship is not only one of the most satisfying things in the world, but also one of the most amazing.

Everything-That-Comes-To-Mind Post

Got this idea from Mother Auma. Thanks, Mommy!

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Mariel and Cornflower are painting their room. They are thrilled. Mother Auma is helping.

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Mariel and I were trying to sound out the do-re-mi's to Pippin's song "All shall fade" and a friend of mine sent me a link to the song online. Now I have both the do-re-mi's and the lyrics. Yay!

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My story is undergoing inordinate yet necessary revision.

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I'm reading the Mitford books, along with Mother Auma and my Grammy. My favorite characters are Cynthia Coppersmith Kavanagh and Hope... what's her name? Hope Winchester?... from the Happy Endings Bookstore.

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This summer I've been in theater, as Charlotte of Charlotte's Web, the schoolteacher from The Pied Piper, and Despina (Ariel) from The Little Mermaid, and I finally have all my scripts memorized!!!

Now Mother Auma wants me to memorize Romans 8.

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It's a lot of fun to take a really simple outfit and add things like fancy earrings or a scarf to make it totally different. I bought some really pretty earrings but every time I'm about to wear them, I think, "These earring are just way too fancy for today. I'll wear them to church or something."

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Thumper Pasque Hyzenthlay Thethuthinnang, otherwise known as Thumper or the Thumpress, has found a lovely game to play with me when it's too hot for her to go outside. I open her cage door, then I lie down in the middle of the room with a book and pretend I don't know she's there. She will bounce out of the cage, thump, race to me, take a flying leap over me and then zip under the bed, emerging at frequent intervals to growl at her enemy the Evil Smiley-Faced Pillow or to jump over me again.

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That's everything that came to mind!

Name Change Notification

I have not read the Redwall books in goodness knows how long. And I would not classify them as extraordinarily good literature. And I have officially moved off that reading level (whatever the word "officially" means in that sentence). And I'm bored of the name Triss.

I would like to introduce myself to the members of the blogosphere as Aravis, who is my favorite Narnia character. The Chronicles are more-than-extraordinarily-good literature, in my opinion.

I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold, and leaves of gold there grew:
Of wind I sang, a wind there came and in the branches blew.
Beyond the sun, beyond the moon, the foam was on the Sea,
And by the strand of Ilmarin there grew a golden Tree.
Beneath the stars of Ever-eve in Eldamar it shone,
In Eldamar beside the walls of Elven Tirion.
There long the golden leaves have grown upon the branching years,
While here beyond the Sundering Seas now fall the Elven-tears.
O Lórien! The Winter comes, the bare and leafless Day;
The leaves are falling in the stream, the River flows away.
O Lórien! Too long I have dwelt upon this Hither Shore
And in a fading crown have twined the golden elanor.
But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea?

--The Lament of Galadriel

(If you knows the history of Galadriel, you'll understand her song a lot better. If you know what her name means, bonus points. :-)

Finished Composition: Dragons

“Rising from the near side of the rocky floor there is a great glow – the glow of Smaug! There he lay, a vast red-golden dragon…” Thus J.R.R. Tolkien introduces his readers to the villainous Smaug, a dragon living inside an old dwarf-castle. For a long time, dragons have interested readers, but they are dangerous.

How do you recognize a dragon? They are reptilian creatures, with dinosaur-like bodies and enormous batwings. Many shoot fire from their mouths, and some have the unusual ability to breathe ice as well. Dragons are often warm, fiery colors such as red, gold or orange. Some have a cooler color like silver on their stomach and underneath their wings. They are, as a general rule, very large.

They are very powerful creatures. They can see and hear and smell exceptionally well, and are usually smart. Some can read minds, or trick a victim into telling their secrets aloud. They are also, of course, very strong and can fly. They have amazing memories: they can remember every last piece of treasure in a hoard, and if they once hear something they never forget it. Some can also armor themselves with gems.

However, they are conquerable. When they armor themselves with jewels, dragons will sometimes miss a spot and create an “Achilles’ heel”. They have strong immune systems, but can still catch diseases. They are extremely fierce when angry, but they can never resist riddles! Bilbo Baggins was able to stop Smaug from attacking him and his friends by keeping the dragon guessing with his mysterious descriptions of his adventures.

Îrënwhyft Snowflame is a dragon. He is red-gold on top and silver on the bottom. He is very protective of his reputation, as well as his treasure-heap, and he guards both carefully from the Miner-folk that live in the same mountain. He is very suspicious and cautious, but like most dragons has a great love for beautiful things. He is rather lazy, and spends a lot of time asleep. His red eyes can draw a person towards him, or find their true identity no matter how they disguise it.

Some people find dragons too fascinating to avoid, but, as I said before, dragons are dangerous. For these imaginative readers, I would suggest creating a dragon of your own. Îrënwhyft is my own creation, and if he grows too powerful I can remove a few of his abilities and reconquer him once more. Malice, fire-breath, and scaly wings are a good place to begin!

"Ours is Not to Reason Why - Just Invert and Multiply!"

Today's math lesson, courtesy of the VideoText program, cleared up what has always been one of math's mysterious mysteries - that mystifying "invert-and-multiply" rule.

If you want to divide 4/5 by 7/8, then you would think that "all you do is multipy 4/5 by 8/7". But how in the world did we get 8/7 out of 7/8?

4/5 divided by 7/8 means 4/5 / 7/8. We have to get a one at the bottom, to simplify this strange and complex fraction. So we multiply 7/8 by its reciprocal - 8/7 - to get a one.

Does anyone understand why
We must invert and multiply?

It's a simplification of a simple process. Anyone who's worked with fractions knows that when you multiply the bottom of a fraction by any number, you have to do the top, too! So we multiply 4/5 by 8/7 too - tada! The answer is 32/35.

This was such an exciting discovery I just had to share it with someone. So if you're out there in the cyberworld and you've always wondered why we "never reason why - just invert and multiply"...

are you excited too?