Month: June 2020

In my opinion, I feel very strongly that the short story, The Landlady is a horror story. Think about it, In the beginning, it is a dark and rainy day. That is how almost all scary stories are told. The author, Roald Dahl, used a lot of words like deadly or words that mean death in the beginning.
When Billy sees the Bed and Breakfast, he goes straight to it, it sticks out from all the other houses, with paint fading. The flowers next to the window are common in funerals. Billy peeks inside and sees a dog lying down next to the glowing fireplace. Then, he goes inside and meets the landlady, who allows him to rent a room. The landlady acts really kind, she offers to make the price of his room cheaper, plus, the Bed and Breakfast have very cheap rooms. Billy then realizes that the dog is stuffed. In fact, all the animals in the room are stuffed after dying.
After Billy goes into his room, he is asked to sign his name in a notebook in a drawer. Billy then sees that the last entries were from years ago. There were two entries, and that the news said that there were two missing people. The Landlady then tells him that the two people are still in their rooms. They were stuffed, just like the other animals. Later, when they are having tea, the Landlady keeps on shutting him down when he asks about it. Billy thinks that the tea he has tasted like bitter almonds, which actually contain a type of poison.
In the end, Billy probably died from the tea of just like the other two people, got stuffed. The message is deception, then Landlady, who acts very nice at the beginning is the one who kills Billy. These are my reasons why I think that the Landlady book is a horror story.

The short story, Landlady, is about the seventeen-year-old Billy Weaver, who thought the owner of a hotel was fairly nice, although she probably poisoned the previous guests. I believe this because why would hotel guests stay at the same hotel for two to three years? If they did, is it not odd, or in fact very peculiar for one to do so? Usually, one would stay at a hotel for a week or so, and then visit somewhere else. Well, since all of the landlady’s guests drank tea, I think she added poison to their cups and then put the bodies on the fourth floor.

In the story, the landlady apparently stuffed her dead pets to make them look realistic, which is quite odd. Typically, pet owners would burry their pets or do something else with their bodies to pay their respect. Due to the reason that the landlady stuffed her pets- and made them look tremendously real, Billy thought she was really nice and caring (pet owners tend to treat their pet as best as they can to make them feel comfortable and welcome).

I think this story was teaching people to be careful and do not look at how they treat you at first, but look at their true character to discover whether or not they are who they seem. For example, one may seem really helpful and help you carry your groceries when walking to your vehicle, but they may end up doing something bad to you.

Elon Musk. You may have heard of him. Some people think Elon Musk is crazy. Actually, his SpaceX company is very helpful for everyone, well, nearly everyone. What is it’s goal? They have lots of them, but today there is one goal that is very important and ambitious.

As you may have heard, SpaceX recently made history. This is just one of its achievements. Now, they are already working on another goal, called Provide good internet for everyone on Earth, even in the most remote of areas. Elon has a clear goal to get at least 1000 satellites into orbit, for good internet for all, with an approved aim of a whopping 12000!

SpaceX’s satellites are called Starlink internet satellites. Some of the new satellites have new technology called Visor_Sat. They will have a ‘visor’ that will dim the brightness of the equipment. It will act a bit like a sun visor on a car’s front windshield.

However, lots of star watchers and scientists have recently been protesting and disclaiming these satellites. They say that the satellites have been blocking their view of the stars.

-Justin

Billy Weaver, a 17 year old, was looking for a job at Bath. By the time he got to Bath from Boston, it was already dark. He asked the porter for a recommendation of where to stay. The porter told him to go to The Bell and Dragon. The Bell and Dragon was a pub, which he liked.

A house near it drew Billy’s attention. It had a wiener dog curled up near the fireplace, and a parrot. The house seemed so cozy and warm. The house was just like the rest, broken down, but once swanky. He knocked on the door, and immediately, a woman barged out and offered a price that was half of the amount he was even considering to give. He went in, and there, he gave the amount, and the woman gave him a entire floor. He realized that the parrot was dead along with the dachshund. The lady told him that the dachshund and parrot was stuffed.

He sat at the couch across from the lady. She beckoned him to sit next to her, and he obliged. She offered him tea, which he gladly accepted. The tea had an almond taste to it, which in a scientific standpoint must have had cyanide, because the story was already going so spookily.

After that drink, he went to bed, and died, obviously because of the cyanide (in case you don’t know, cyanide is a toxic chemical compound that will kill you if you drink too much). He “transferred all his money to the landlady, and disappeared. Only the landlady knew he died, and stuffed his body.

The short story (Landlady) is about a teenager (Bill) who is London. He wants to stay in lodging this night. When he finds a hotel called Bed and Breakfast, which he thinks is not a bad place to go to (because the owner has pets; he turns out to be wrong; they’re just stuffed animals). The landlady was nice, but a little bit too kind; that’s suspicious. Something that’s also suspicious is the fact that there are only 2 other people here, and that they have been here for years (that’s what the landlady claims).

The theme of this story is that you shouldn’t be too gullible. The reason is that anything may happen no matter what. Even ‘normal’ people are suspicious: this is because the one who is harming others is probably trying to be as normal as possible.

Bill is a cautious person, but he is not cautious enough. Even if the lady has a pet, that doesn’t mean that she is nice and caring. what if the pet is forced to stay there and look like that? Maybe there is a force controlling the pet, or what if it’s a stuffed animal (as in the story)? Bill should still be on his guard. Instead, he is off guard and unaware that anything may happen. Also, he accepts a lot of things, like the tea and the eggs (for breakfast, although he probably never gets it).

I found the Marco Polo video very interesting. It shows me how bewildered the people were back then to this news of foreign lands. I enjoyed the video very much, and learned a lot.

In the video, he started with how Marco Polo had his works spread, by talking to a man named Rustichello, a writer, while in prison. They agreed to write down his stories, and they had them published after they were released from prison. The stories gained a lot of fame, and there were tons of skeptics.

He then talks about how Marco Polo was raised in a family of merchants, which meant a lot of travel. His uncle and father would travel the world, collecting precious goods and selling them back home, providing lots of money for their family. When Marco Polo was 17, his father and uncle took him to China. Here, they were treated as royal guests. They could observer the complexity and how advanced China was. The video also showed me some gorgeous watches that I will be checking out.

When they arrived home after 24 years, Polo collaborated with Rustichello to publish his experiences. The book was a instant bestseller, and many people were shocked by what it told. Many even believed it was made up, by how wild the book was to them.

This video showed me how that important things may not always be heeded, and that big ideas may take a very long time to be accepted by people. Not only Marco Polo experienced this, but other figures in history, like Copernicus. This video not only was entertaining, but also taught me a lesson.

Marco Polo was a merchant and traveler in Europe. His main achievement is writing the book about his adventures and also traveling to China and Exploring what China was like back then.

Marco Polo was from the family of merchants and travelers so they usually traveled around. One time Marco Polo’s father traveled to China and told Marco about all the wonderful things in China. Marco Polo was really awed and wanted to go see for himself how wonderful China was. He decided when he grew up he would go and visit China.

When he first went to china, the the king/emperor welcomed him and was really fascinated by him since he knew how to speak 4 languages and also because his culture: Christianity. After a bunch of time spent there, he was sent to Europe back again, but the next time he comes back he brings 10 priests, so the Emperor could study Christianity and increase the knowledge of his people.

So now, Marco Polo came back to Europe and he’s ready to travel back to China WITH only two priests he managed to convince. He met a lot of hardships when crossing the deserts to go to China. There were sand dunes that “lured” people in, but Marco Polo evaded that. There were bandits to rob you, but Marco evaded that using the “golden passport”. If somebody were to rob somebody with a golden passport, they would be against the WHOLE army of China. However even though Marco evaded them successfully, the priests hated traveling like this and they had to drop the priests off back at Europe.

When Marco Polo returned to China, he was greeted as a royal guest and was really popular. Many people wanted to have a good relationship with him and he was treated to the best food, the best wealth and the best things in China. After a couple years in China, he decided he wanted to go back to tell his people of the amazing wealth and power of China, also because the recent Emperor is close to dying and who knows how well the next Emperor will treat him. Even though the Emperor was reluctant, he agreed but he wanted Marco to accompany the princess to another place for a arrangement/peace treaty. The trip was really dangerous and in the end, only Marco’s family survived and the princess.

So now that Marco is returning home, what will happen when he gets to Europe? Well things did not look good for him since he was going to be sent to jail. At jail, he and his “roommate” shared stories, but Marco’s story about China intrigued him. Together they made a book about Marco’s adventure to China and once they were out of jail, they sold the book and the it turned out to be a over-night bestseller.

Marco influenced many people and also made plenty of enemies. Lots of people thought he was not saying the truth because one, they simply didn’t believe it, or two, they didn’t like the idea of another empire being significantly greater than them.

Overall Marco’s adventure told us lots of information about history, especially China, and even though we don’t know too much about Marco himself, we will always remember the adventures the he went through and the great feats that he did. His last words were “I have not told half of what I saw”.

In Flannery O’Connor’s short story “A Good Man Is Hard To Find”, a family going on a trip is murdered by a criminal calling himself The Misfit. When the family gets into in accident while driving, The Misfit and his assistants find and kill them, the grandmother last and only after they have had a discussion at length about repentance and fairness. The grandmother tries to convince him that praying to Jesus will relieve him of his sins and The Misfit is only adamant that he is doing fine on his own, insisting that he is doing fine as he is and that no matter what he does he will be punished for it. This suggests that the lesson the story teaches on the fairness of life is that life simply is not fair, but a person does to some extent control how it treats them.

An example of this is what The Misfit says about what he did that landed hin in the penitentiary: “I forget what I done, lady. I set there and set there [in the penitentiary], trying to remember what it was I done and I ain’t recalled it to this day. Oncet in a while, I would think it was coming to me, but it never come.” The Misfit has entirely forgotten what he did that first got him in trouble, but naturally, nobody believed him, and people only assumed he was a simple-minded boy lying to get out of trouble; that, and “they had the papers on me”, or in other words, legal documentation of his crime. But the fact that he could not remember what that crime was is a sign that he is, perhaps, mentally troubled, and therefore should have a lighter sentence, and it is not fair to him that he does not.

The Misfit, once out of the penitentiary, continues to commit crimes that, again, he cannot remember, and he is sentenced accordingly to those crimes, again no adjustment being made for his lack of memory. But should there really be an adjustment? Even though The Misfit does not remember these crimes and claims that “I can’t make what all I done wrong fit what all I gone through in punishment”, seeing his punishments out of proportion to his offenses, it is him who continues to choose to commit these crimes.

So while it may be unfair that he is continually punished for things he cannot remember doing, it is completely his own fault that life is treating him that way, for it is his own, free-willed choice to continue committing crimes.

While The Misfit’s life is certainly unfair in that he is punished for what he cannot remember doing, it is almost completely his own fault that life is treating him that way. For while if the penitentiary workers had believed him, he may not have gone down his current path, it is his own, free-willed choice to continue on it, showing that life certainly is not fair but how life treats you is mostly your fault.

Curtis Zhang

6/4/20

Marco Polo

Marco Polo was a very famous explorer born in the mid 13th century into a wealthy Venetian family. When he was born, his father and his uncle were off on a journey to china and mongolia. His mother died while his father and his uncle were away, but he was still well educated and learned to speak many different languages. When his father and his uncle came back from their expedition, they told Marco about many tales of the mongolian empire and how rich it was, and they allowed him to come with them after staying in Italy for 2 years. They went and prepared to go, but it turns out that their family ship had broken down and would not work. Then they decided to go by land. I think that is very dumb, why can’t you just get the ship repaired and sail on it? Apparently not, because they decided to go on land and face very harsh conditions that lay for them on their path to china. 

On their way there, they walked through deserts and climbed over some mountains to get to their destination. They even had bandits that would attack them and try to rob them. Fortunately, the Dad and the uncle had met the ruler of the mongolian empire, Kublai Khan before, and the Kublai was interested in learning more about other cultures, so he gave them a golden pass that said if you harm these people, then the full force of the Mongolian army will fight you. The climate alone was so harsh that the two priests that had accompanied them there decided to turn back to Italy. Marco, his dad, and his uncle continued, and finally reached the place where the Kublai lived. They were treated as royal guests and were given very great privileges. There were also many riches in the places and magnificent buildings that even though his father and his uncle had told him about the many wonders of the place, he could still barely believe his eyes. After living in Mongolia for a while, they started to get afraid about what would happen if the Khan died. The next Khan might not be as willing to let them live in peace and have such power, and might have them killed. They claimed that they were homesick, and so Kublai sent them home on a ship carrying someone called “The Blue Princess” which was known for her beauty to get married to her new husband in persia. During the voyage met some disaster and only 18 of them survived, including The Polos and the princess. They made it to Persia, but when he landed in Italy, the government arrested him and illegally seized most of his money he had acquired during his time away. He was put in jail with a famous author whom he told his stories. The author wrote down his stories and it became a bestseller. 

The Majority of the people who read his stories thought of them as too fantastical to be true, and he was called a liar for the rest of his life. He died telling everyone that his stories were true, and they were proven true, but that would take them hundreds of years before they would.

Marco was a famous explorer who did not really get the reward he deserved. He was called a liar for his perilous journey east, and he was robbed of his money on his way back. Marco Polo may of not been able to live out his well deserved reward for his travels, but he is still one of the greatest explorers of all time.

A few months ago: “Man, I just wish I the afterlife is real,” the grandma complained in bed, “I’m already pretty old, and I ain’t wanna lose all my beauty.”

“I see,” a mysterious voiced boomed from above.

“Who’s there!” the grandma screamed in shock.

“It is me,” the voice responded, “The Dream.”

“The Dream?” she questioned, “Whats that!”

“Oh,” the soft yet eerie voice explained, “I am here to make your wish come true.”

“Really?!” The selfish old woman happily exclaimed, “I wanna be able to have an afterlife, so I can live forever!”

“Just remember these two words,” the voice echoed, “Physical and Spiritual.”

“Physical and Spiritual?” the grandma eagerly shouted, “What does that even mean?”

“Goodbye,” the voice soothed.

“NO! WAIT!” but the voice vanished before it could hear her.

Present time: The Misfit sprang back, as if a snake had bitten him, and shot the grandma three times through the chest. The grandma took her last breath and fell motionless onto the ground. Her body soaked in a terrifying pool of blood. The men put their guns back into a box and locked them up with numerous locks.

The lady’s consciousness was still barely hanging on, and she barely managed to say, “Spiritual.”

Suddenly, a brute force of wind pushed her spirit out of her body. The grandma was physically dead but spiritually alive. The grandma’s spirit looked down at her dead body in confusion. Next to her body, she saw Bobby Lee, one of the Misfit’s friends, and the Misfit having a conversation.

“Oh boy! Ya little bastard!” The spirit violently screamed, “I’m gonna beat-cha up for killin’ me!”

“Quiet!” the Misfit said to Bobby, ‘Ya hear that sound?” Bobby looked at him like he was nuts.

“Oh ya! Yer gonna hear me now!” the spirit gleefully shouted.

“Shhh,” the misfit hushed silently, “I heard it again.”

“Oh, yeah I heard it too,” Bobby added, “What is it?”

“It’s me, and I’m back for revenge!” the spirit erupted. She held up all her strength and charged directly at the Misfit’s head.

“Youch!” screamed the Misfit, “Somethin’ like a big wind just smacked my head!”

“Are you going insane!” Bobby said to Misfit.

“Nah I’m not! This is real!” He responded.

“HEEHEEHEE!” the spirit thought in her mind. Now I remember those two words that the dream thingy told me, they were spiritual and physical. If spiritual tranforms me into a spirit, that means physical should turn me into a human again!

“Physical!” the spirit shouted. All of a sudden, she was sucked back into her body like the power of a million vacuums. As she popped into her physical body, she started glowing and vibrating simultaneous for a second or so, and she was now a human again. This time, her body strength and health was significantly improved from when she was an old lady.

“YO!” the Misfit screamed, “That old lady’s back somehow! What in the hecking flopperdinkles!?” The lady jumped into the air, and threw her fist directly at the misfit’s face. He ducked just in time, and used his elbow to hit her directly in the face. The lady flew backwards, only to regain her stance within seconds. This time, the lady swung her foot at the Misfit, but Bobby jumped in and grabbed it with all his might. The lady fell back to the ground, and the Misfit pounced over and pinned her down.

“How in the world did you come back to life!” the Misfit asked.

The lady had no time to explain, and she quietly whispered, ‘Spiritual.” Immediately, her spirit form was flung out of her body. The powerful force blasted both men back many feet.

“What kinda wizardry is this!” the Misfit complained.

“Quick!” Bobby replied, “Go open the box and get our guns!”

As soon as the spirit heard this, she charged at the box, pushing it off the car and far away.

“Physical,” the spirit said. In an instant, her spirit was sucked back into her body and she pounced on the men before they could react. She hit Bobby in the chest with her elbow and also slammed the Misfit on the car with her foot. Both men were extremely confused and weak.

“Spiritual.” the lady called once again. She turned into her spiritual form, and floated over to the weapon box where the guns where stored. Without any effort, she simply phased through the walls of the box, and grabbed the guns. By engulfing the guns inside her spiritual self, she managed to phase the guns outside the walls too.

“Physical.” The spirit said. The spirit was flung back into its physical body, and the guns fell into her hands.

“BAM! BAM!” With two perfectly aimed shots, the lady killed both the Misfit and Bobby Lee.

“Next time!” the lady warned, “Never mess with me!”