Response Paper 6, Photon The Farting Man

 

Ashley Brown

Matt Thomas

Language Arts 9

January 22 2008

Photon, The Farting Man

This is the story of the amazing man Photon who has a strange talent, being able to fart on command. Photon is completely immature with this power as he farts at everyone within 2 feet of him even when he doesn’t want to. This gets him into trouble. A lot. After farting at a fire and blowing the house up, along with over half the island, he was expelled from his home and had to find a new home and turn it into a stinky crater just like the last one. The only thing he was able to take with him was, well everything. He had left the island so stinky that nobody had dared to touch or even eat the food unless they absolutely had to. The people, still dizzy from the fumes of the explosion, sent him off with rotten tomatoes and dead chickens that were killed in the blast.

After a year of sailing he came to an island of wind and decided to live there, however when he arrived there he was nearly blown away by the strong winds. After regaining consciousness he found himself stranded on the island with no food or anything.

Photon was dazed and confused. He called out for people on the island, but no one replied to him. He was scared and confused and alone. He sighed in frustration, then he began to travel the island’s shore.

He skipped rocks and climbed trees, never venturing too far into the island’s massive jungle. He was very alone as soon as he returned to the place where he had set off it had been three days and two nights, and the nights seem to grow colder and colder as they went on. He fell to the sand exhausted, starving, and weak. He moaned and his stomach roared in furry. He looked out at the ocean and started to weep.

“Why me? Why did I ever gain this power? It has ruined me and soon it will be the end to me.” He wiped his tear and sighed once more.

It was silent for a long time, his mind wandered to what his old neighbors, and family would be doing now. But after many minutes of wandering his ears heard a sound, a slight cracking of sticks. It made him jump and fart for it terrified him. He quickly raced his eyes throughout his sight. He saw nothingness, even the moon was hiding now. But then he heard a louder crack, closer to him. He looked around once more, but this time it found a pair of brilliant golden eyes staring at him in fright. These eyes weren’t from a large cat, or from a small snake. No, these eyes were human. He was amazed and joyous once more.

“A human, a real living person. I can live, I really can,” His voice ran out followed by a chorus of farts.

The smile on his face was brighter then those eyes staring at him in confusion, and worry.

“You speak English? I thought you were a foreigner. We don’t like foreigners here much.” A quiet and gentle female voice finally spoke.

“Yes, oh yes. I do speak English. I am sorry to ask, but do you have food? You see I have been stranded here for three days and two days with out none, and I am to weak and tiresome to search anymore.”

He voice was still happy, just dryer and slowly dying with each word. Even his farts were slowly growing fainter and fainter each time the came.

The young native girl grabbed a hold of his hand and said “Oh, you poor thing. What has this cruel shore done to you? Follow me and we will get you something to eat.”

She reached for Photon’s hand, and lifted him up off the beach. They went into the forest, and he continued to grow more weary and tiresome. He was too tired to move or to fart, and soon dropped to the ground. He eyesight was dim, but his hearing was colorful and clear. He heard her scream as he fell to the ground, her heard the ground rustling as he was dragged into a cold, damp, stony place. A cave? Then everything grew dim, until it was black

His eyes burst open and he sat upright. He was dazed at the beauty of the stony walls the grace of the wooded furniture. Everything had a white mysterious glow about it. His eyes dimmed back down to normal size and he signed in sadness and frustration.

“What is wrong stranger? Do you feel alright? Are you still faint?” It a fair skinned girl. Her beauty was astonishing. She had gentle green eyes that seemed happy to greet him, and shinning red hair.

She walked towards a small wooden table and placed a little black tray, with mounds of fruit and meat. “You should really eat before you die again. It was hard enough to revive you the first time, and the doctor is running low on supplies so that would be a bad thing for you.” She laughed.

“I died? I really died?” He asked in astonishment.

She simply nodding, then pointed to that food, and walked calmly out of the room. Her dress just gliding as she walked.

He began to gorge himself with what was on the tray, the food was amazing and he felt it fall into his empty stomach leaving the taste all throughout his throat. He heard a small laugh from behind him. He shallowed quickly and turned around. It was the girl from before, he eyes still glowing golden.

“So you like the food? You can take as much as you need on your way home.” She said

“Home why would I want to go home? I don’t want to go back there. They hate me, they can’t understand me.” He growled.

“But you must, you must go home. You would be hated anymore. They will love the gifts you bring on your new hand craved ship. They have missed you so.” She quickly replied.

“Come with me then, so I can have one true friend, no matter how much I fart.” He grabbed her hand.

“What? Fart? You’ve never farted in front of me?” She pulled away in confusion.

“Yes…. wait they’re gone… they are really gone. So will you come with me?” He stood up and held her.

“Yes! Of course anything for a friend.”

They got on the ship and sailed through the sea in the all it’s wonders. It was difficult but the made it home and they were greeted with joy. Mainly for the gold though.

 

 

Response Paper 5, Tim Burton, My Hero

Ashley Brown

Matt Thomas

Language Arts 9

January 14^th

 

My hero

            Hero is such a strong word, and it is has different meaning to almost every person. Some heroes aren’t real such as Batman or The Flash. But some heroes can be real life people can be some parents, a great friend, or maybe even a famous person. But what makes a hero a hero? Is it good hair, a smile, and the ability to save the world, or does it go much deeper than that? I think it does, or else we could have we would consider Bono a hero, which he may be, but not according to my own standards. I think that a real hero can stand up and fight for what they believe in, have people be able to depend upon them, and be caring about their homeland and the people that live in it. Maybe they could look the part too, but for the most part what they really need to make them truly a hero is the heroic attributes.

            As I said, it’s important that heroes have certain things that make them what they are. One of the most important of these things is to be trustworthy, to have people be able to trust and depend upon you. It’s so important to have that because how can anyone ever be saved if you aren’t there to save them? One thing that I think goes with that idea is caring about people, and what happens to them. And Heroes must be able to love mostly everyone so that you are willing to save them but. Even heroes have enemies, and so you can’t love your enemies but maybe the hero will try. After all that I think the last one that a hero should have would be to be able to get out of difficult situations. When the going gets tough the tough get going, and you have to be pretty tough to be a hero.

            The Odyssey has a very heroic main character, Odysseus. He has many attributes of a hero, some of these things I listed before, like caring about people, and being able to get out of difficult situations. But I think that he doesn’t have some things that I think a hero should have that I didn’t list before, such as being able to keep your morals even with the hardest pressures on them, or the physical things, I think he needs to look the part and I just can’t see that in him.

            I think that some unusual characters are great heroes and most people don’t even realize it. Personally, one of my greatest heroes and role models is Tim Burton. He has done so much for himself, fans, his crew, and possibly, at least part, of the world. I know he may have not saved them all from a burning building or giant sea snake. But it you think about it enough, he is a hero. Even though he just a regular person, he does amazing things. He has given the world a new outlook on both life, and death. Even though he may not fight monsters, he still has to do a different kind of fighting to keep his vision alive and he is able to keep his morals and beliefs alive when no one else seems to believe in them. Even though he is not your typical hero he is one of my greatest ones.

            I think that heroes need to care deeply about a lot of different people, be able to get out of really difficult and frustrating situations, but still be able to keep their morals and ideals alive. And maybe even look the part of a hero, too. I think that both Odysseus and Mr. Burton are great and amazing heroes in their own way. I think that they have many different and great qualities, but I think that I would rather have Tim Burton as my hero (or be his sidekick) then Odysseus because I don’t want to get into a fight with any gods or Cyclopes soon.

Response Paper 4, New Year’s Resolution

Ashley Brown

Matt Thomas

Language Arts 9

January 7^th, 2008

My New Year’s Resolution

      I am glad for the New Year because last year I had a bunch of problems and I am hoping to start fresh. I think one of my biggest problems I had was the fact that I am a big klutz, and have almost no coordination. I think that it is a big problem because one time in the beginning of the year I was ridding this brand new fire engine red racing bike around in the snow. Which could be a factor, but then I went to turn this corner around the back of an apartment when the bike ended up sliding out from under me, I landed on some glass and skid across the pavement. So I think that fact that I have amazingly horrible bad luck doesn’t not go well with bad coordination. I think there are a few ways that I can fix it, but mainly focusing on the little things that contribute to the bad coordination will help the most.

I think that part of the reason I have very bad coordination is that I don’t play many sports and I don’t get the exercise that many kids do normally get. I did think of that before, around the summer time I thought that maybe that doing tumbling, handstands and things like that may help with gaining balance. I tried it for a little bit and I did considerably well, for awhile. But then I got into the more advanced things. I was on this grassy hill it was pretty cold for a summer afternoon and I was stretching and I thought to myself “Hey I should try that walkover that I saw Rachel do.” And I went to the top of the hill and I started to do it. I thought I was actually going to make it too, but then I slipped the grass was still wet from the sprinklers and I ended up spraining my arm. I was just glad it didn’t break. Well I know that if tried a less dangerous sport it would help, because before I sprained my arm I did stopped tripping over my own feet for awhile. So I proposed that I should try a sport that will stretch me. I could start with yoga or something.

I figured out the hard way that putting myself in slightly dangerous situations makes my problem worse. I know this because one time when I was rock climbing, yes rock climbing, to get to this lake with this really beautiful, but kind of small waterfall The rope ended up slipping just a little bit and my foot of course slipped off the rock that it was on and I ended up scratching my arm, busing both my knees and spraining my wrist again for the third time that year. It was loads of fun. Anyway after that I figured it might be better if I didn’t deliberately put myself in that type of situations. even though I still went rocking climbing and things afterwards. But I learned to stop placing myself in between a rock and s sharp place, which helped me understand what I shouldn’t do.

I know that by adding my bad luck, not getting enough exercise and placing myself in dangerous situations is bad for me and my coordination. I know this because when you place yourself in dangerous situations with the proper exercise will get you hurt which is not going to help you regain coordination. Because you will try it once get hurt and nit want to retry it. Add bad luck you know you will get hurt. So by getting more exercise, not putting myself really dangerous situations that I am not trained, or well practiced enough to handle, and maybe getting a good luck charm should help in the end with my bad coordination.

 

Response Paper 3, Don’t Ban The Catcher in the Rye

The Catcher in the Rye is a story that speaks of situations that didn’t necessarily happen, but do happen to real people. It should be a considered a required book in many classrooms, but for many different reasons it is banned from most of them. I’m going to explain why I think this or you may never know why this book is such an amazing piece of literature.

            One reason many people are upset about this book is because there are that fights happen in this book. But critics are not looking at the causes of the fights. Holden Caulfied, the main character, does get in a few fights. I do admit that. But mostly his character is very passive. When these fights do occur, Holden is able to stand up for himself and be courageous. Like when Marice, the man who is in charge of the elevator, tells Holden that he owes him money and Holden believes he doesn’t, Holden is able to stand up for himself, even though he doesn’t win. Which is how it usually goes in real lifd. So it is easier to believe. Even though some people think that having fights in the book is a bad, it’s not, because it can help teach how to be courageous and stand up for what is right.

            Some people are a little bit uncomfortable to read about fighting. And The Catcher in the Rye tends to get that reaction that on many different subjects, like suicide, underage drinking and smoking, and sex. But talking about these things can help people be more knowledgeable, and have a better overall understanding. It’s makes things very difficult when someone is depressed and on the verge of suicide and no one can ever talk about it. My mother started feeling a little like that, when she was my age and her parents didn’t want to talk about it. So she got really depressed and she ended up going though a lot. After she was better and she had me and my brothers and sisters, she told us throughout our childhood about some of the things she had to go through, the good and the bad, so we knew what to do whenever we got stuck in those kinds of situations. I know it was hard for her to talk about, but in the end it has been better for me, knowing how to cope with theses taboo subjects. Most people say that talking about taboo subjects or reading about them is going to make people go out and do them, but not talking about them is going to just make people more curious. Being able to hear from a fictional character like Holden talk about them is good.

            The thing I think is the best about The Catcher in the Rye is that the author understands the minds of teenagers. Which is hard to do for most classic pieces of literature. I believe that J. D. Salinger knows what it going through the minds of many American teenagers, and has found a way to write it down so they understand. He has written about a realistic teenage character, you could read this book for five minutes and already believe that Holden Caulfield is a real character. He has complex good things and bad in his character. Take for example how he feels about women and girls. He thinks that some are dumb, some are pretty, and some you just can’t figure out. In real life, I’m sure that some or a lot of guys feel that way. I don’t know why some people think it is bad to have a flawed character. I think it is better and more believable to have flawed characters.

            In the end The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger is an amazing tale that it bound to bring many types of readers and should not be banned from any classroom or library.