Category: Junior Literary

So, while looking though my google docs for something to use for this week’s blogs and I thought this might make so of y’all laugh or something I don’t know. Have fun reading this, I guess.

In the future I want to be a writer. When it comes to writing you experience things on a deeper level. With S.T.E.A.M., I was able to learn beyond the mere transfer of pencil to paper.  I was engaged with critical thinking problem solving, and also tapped into my creative side of writing.  I learned how to evolve the many characters throughout the stories.  

I really enjoyed the S.T.E.A.M. program.  I enjoyed the way the teachers challenged me to think outside of the box and tap into my creativity.  I really love the experiments we did in class.  I also enjoyed the information we learned in astrocamp, get to move, and leadership class.

 

I don’t really remember what I made this for, but I think I might’ve had fun writing this, but I really need something for this week’s blog, so I put this together for y’all.

So, in the comments could y’all tell me what y’all want to do in the future I know it’s probably very cheesy, but I like learning things like this from people. 

Sorry if the blog for this week is a little boring but I didn’t really have an idea what to write. Also, it’s 4am right now while I’m writing this, and I really need to go to sleep to get a better sleep schedule for myself.

So, Oolong is another one of my favorite bands, and it’s a love-hate relationship, because,
By far, out of every band I’ve researched, they’re definitely the hardest to learn anything about haha.

So for one, they only released one album, it’s fantastic, don’t get me wrong. But only one? In three-ish years? It’s a little disappointing. Also, since they’re not all that well known, with less than 500k listeners a month. They’re underrated, but then again, their music is kind of hit or miss depending on the person.

This was one of the most troublesome bands to research. For instance, it took me two days of web browsing just to find the names of the musicians. And I’m not even sure if they’re the real names. So the band members are Vinny Colardi, Scott Lang, Sam Becht Jesse Silver, and  Matt Brando.

I couldn’t find ANYTHING on Vinny Colardi or Matt Brando and every time I searched up Scott Lang, all that came up was ant man. But I did have some luck with Sam Becht, I found his Instagram and figured out that he’s a freelance drummer who played for Oolong. I’m sure with more time and more research I could maybe stalk Sam Becht’s Instagram and see if he follows anyone with similar names to those in the band, but… That’s a lot of work.

But as far as their music goes, it’s some of the best I’ve heard. They have incredible vocals and even better instrumentals. Their album is called About Your Imaginary Friend.
Honestly, I wish they had uploaded the lyrics, because it’s more than a little difficult to make out what they’re saying when the vocalist is screaming at top volume. But I don’t have a problem with it personally. 

On one hand, I think it’s nice to listen to the lyrics because they play a story, but on the other hand, I think you can get that same emotion if you listen to the voice. The raw emotion you can feel with each syllable is incredible. That’s also why I like listening to other songs from different regions of the earth. German punk is interesting, and so is Japanese rock. I can’t understand the words, but the vocals are amazing and emotional.

So in summary, I think Oolong had the potential to be one of the best, but they haven’t released anything new since 2020. But if you want, give them a try. 

Humans are busy. Laced with the strive to become people with identities, to be more than what they were born with and they taste in their gums and their tongue, this dream to be more an individual. Oh, to be an individual who beats out the masses. Confronted with a world of identities, man-made identities, spending decades trying to carve out one of their own in hopes to find it and understand one day. To be a human without an identity is terrifying.

Humans are slippery, humans yearn for the chance to taste of something they’ve never seen before, to taste fulfillment when they’ve only got 100 years or less, and humans search all their lives in places fulfillment can’t be found. Hollowed out places with green and blood-shot red, with teeth rotting and bodies aching and the man-made contentments falsehoods routinely lounge.

Humans are born seeking security. Born into an always shaking, shuddering world, the earth under their feet can split and shudder and threaten the little solace they carry, (if they ever knew it in the first place) humans hold on. Humans live for today, fear for tomorrow, humans fear but scream and live, and humans are both the makers of their story and their own destruction.

Humans are terrified of other humans. Humans are terrified of the world around them. Humans are terrified, yet all the same, their own undoing.

Humans are. The same. There’s some point here, the point of human condition, but human condition can’t be found so much as a man from Brooklyn taking the train to the stranger on my screen I may meet one day, to someone I’ll never meet, tens of thousands miles between. We are people, the same, defined by our differences but deeply alike. It’s lonely yet invigorating.

Humans are the same, yet humans are my father, my brother, they are made of the world that makes up me. Humans are the blood and bone that make my flesh, just as they make up yours. They are the river of tears that trail down your eyes, the babble of words that falls from your lips, the little bits of humanity that trace up our skin, they are you, same as me.

Humans are.

 

So for this week’s blog, I was racking my brain trying to think of what I wanted to talk about. And while it first it was stressing me out a little bit, not just because of the fact that I couldn’t think of what I wanted to talk about, but because I had an entire christmas break to think and I was still coming up blank. However when I had that thought, the words Christmas break popped up into my head, so suddenly I found myself trying to recall the whole break to find something notable and blog worthy. And while I was thinking about that I also began to think of old topics for blogs that I had previously spoken about, and that of course brought me to one of my favorite blogs, which was my first blog. In this specific blog I spoke about the rise and the establishment of A24 production studios, however one thing I did not really get the chance to speak on, and what I had hoped to speak on in another blog. Is some of the movies from that studio. This movie is a new dramatic release that came out in December of 2023 titled, The Iron Claw.

And while I think that this is not just an incredible film, but an incredible piece of art, I think that my description would not do it the true justice that it deserves. Another factor that contributes to my decision of not giving too detailed of a description is that I do not want to spoil too much of the movie itself, so I have chosen instead to speak on the underlying messages it provides, while also giving a vague description along the way. The Iron Claw is a drama based on the true story of the prowrestling family, the von erichs. And goes through their life, capturing every agonizing, triumphant, and every other moment in between. This, personally, is what I would call the greatest sports movie of all time, maybe it is because I am a pretentious art student and this movie really isn’t even about sports, more the psychological effects of family trauma, masculinity, and death, I would say that  wrestling still plays a very large part in the movie. In conclusion, I would say that if you’re in the mood for something different, something that on the outside might seem like just a testosterone filled fever dream of a film, but proves to be much more, then I would highly recommend this movie.

ALSO- I am thinking I am either going to be touching on the film Saltburn for my next blog post, or the movie dream scenario, both movies coming out in 2023 that I found very interesting, if you would like to see one more than the other then please, I beg, tell me what you want to read about.

For today’s blog, I’m just going to share a bunch of random gibberish.

1. One time my best friend, Ava, was at my house and my mom made us blueberry smoothies and she spilled it on the couch, the floor, and my dog. We got some hand towels and started wiping it up and got most of it off the couch and floor when I got a op and started mopping the couch and floor. Then my dog walked over covered in smoothie. I looked at the dog. I looked at Ava. I looked back at the dog. I mopped the dog.
2. If you have an Amazon alexa, ask it to fart.
3. My brother’s dog, Napoleon, is a little pig. When we feed the dogs he keeps eating the other dog, Roo’s food. One time my mom caught him doing that and she yelled, “Napoleon you fat f*** quit eating Roo’s food!”
4. I was talking to my mom about Napoleon and I said “he’s a good boy” and my mom replied “did you say he’s a pillsbury doughboy”
5. When I was younger I used to hiss at my brother and his friends. I was really weird. They were scared of me. They were 2-4 years older than me.
6. I was sitting in the kitchen and my brother walked in and looked at me and said “I remember when I caught you eating that stick of butter.” I was like 6 and really liked eating butter. Apparently I had asked my mom to eat some butter and she said no and then went outside. I was alone in the kitchen. I opened the fridge, dragged a chair over, opened the butter penthouse, took a stick of butter, unwrapped it, and started eating it when my brother came into the kitchen and found me eating straight butter. If you’ve seen that girl on tiktok who puts like sriracha sauce on butter and eats it, that was me. Minus the sauce.
7. When I was about five, me, my mom, my brother, my brothers friend, and her mom went to this pizza place and while the moms were still inside paying and talking before we left, Thomas (my brother), Holly (his friend), and I went outside to Holly’s moms car and got in it and were playing around. Our moms were inside talking to the staff people for a good 15-20 minutes so we had some time to make some trouble. Note 1: None of us could drive yet. Note 2: We didn’t want to actually kill anyone. Note 3: We had access to a car and the keys. You may be thinking “Oh god they drove off and killed someone” Close but no. Thomas and Holly came up with this brilliant idea. I hid in the trunk of the car (it was an SUV so the trunk was open to the rest of the car) . Thomas was walking in front of the car as if he was crossing the street. Holly was fake driving the car. We had an amazing opportunity. We ran into the store and dragged out our moms to act out our play. I got in the trunk, Holly got into the driver seat, and Thomas positioned himself outside the car. Holly says “Y’all ready?” Thomas and I yell yes. Holly starts humming (we had all the windows down so our moms could hear everything) Thomas starts walking in front of the car talking about how it’s a beautiful day. Holly goes “Oh no! A person! *BANG*” and Thomas fake falls as if he’s been hit by a car. Holly says “OH-” I stay silent. Holly says, “I said OH-” I stay silent. Thomas stays dead. Holly says, “GEORGIA” and I said “oh, SH**!” and our moms died laughing. Holly wasn’t allowed to curse so she had me do it for her.

What’s up everyone! It’s time for another one of Crislyn’s random dumb things of the week.

So, this might be out of spite and the fact that this trainwreck of a show is finally going to be over in about three days, when I am writing this, but I going to write how I thought the Nine realms should have been written. 

 

DISCLAIMER!!!!! This is not me talking bad about any of the screenwriters or anyone working on the show this is just my opinion on how I thought the show should have gone when it was first announced that they were making a next part in the HTTYD franchise.

 

So onward to the story. /This won’t be the full thing cause of the word limit./ 

“In ancient times giant beast use to live on this earth with humans. These beasts were dragons and there was just so many of them from the ones in the air to the ones living at the bottom of the ocean. I remember when I was younger my father would tell me and my brother stories of these dragons and his adventures with them. How he meet the most dangerous dragon of them all the Nightfury. He would tell us how he made peace with the dragons and how he and my mom fell in love. There was even one time when I was seven that my parents took me and my younger brother to see the dragons. None of the kids back home believed me when I told them but that’s ok with me…If you are reading this then that means you are part of the Haddock family and it’s your turn to learn about the family purpose and mission.

Protect the Dragons No Matter What.

My father always talked about how one day humans and dragons could come together again like before. Maybe it will happen one day but for right now this family will do all it can to protect the dragons and where they hide. Good luck.”

An old woman with blonde closes the book she’s holding. “Grandma are there really dragons out there in the ocean?” The voice of a child asked. The child looked to be four. He had blonde hair with a small button nose.

“I don’t really know my dear, but my grandfather used to tell me that his grandfather told him all about the dragons. Even my great great great great grandmother use to tell me about them.” She explained to the little boy. “For many years our family has protected this secret and even though we don’t have the haddock name anymore we still have that blood flowing through our veins.” Grandma told the boy. She tucked him in gave him a small kiss on the forehead.

So, what did everyone think? Of course, it’s not finished cause of well like I said in the beginning the word limit but if anyone would like to give some feedback drop it in the comments. I think might continue this as a side project along with some others I’m working on. If y’all want to see those too tell me and I might share them.

                                         

                                                               Hello Lovelies! 

 It’s that time of the year.  The time when you’re supposed to smell hot chocolate and mint in the air, or when you feel the imaginary snowflakes falling gently on your skin. Or at this time in age, when you hear them 3 gift items you bought from Walmart rise up to $200.00.   That, Time. Of. The. Year. So, that means you also know that it’s the time of the year when you yell at that certain person who’s playing all of the Home Alone back-to-back at the break of dawn.  No?  Well, I guess I’m the only one. Don’t worry though, I’m not lonely because today I’m joining the side of the people who live and breathe to watch these movies during December, but instead of watching them, I’m going to talk about my favorites that are well known and some that aren’t well known 🙂 

 Disney A Christmas Carol 

                                             

I’m pretty sure most of us had seen this classic with Jim Carrey voicing Scrooge.  But like I always say, it’s okay if you didn’t and I don’t mind summing this up for you.  This is Disney’s adaptation of the story that has been interpreted almost a hundred different ways, the story about the man that is visited by his ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future so that he can get his life together before dying miserably not knowing the purpose of Christmas.   I personally think that the graphics put a real good eerie vibe to the story and the plot taught me well.   I also want to say that until I was in about 7th grade, watching this movie with the lights off was so scary to me, it was Horror movie level to me.   Don’t laugh! (For those who are snickering with their eyebrows) that scene with Marley still gives me shivers today, especially when the scene is blasting loudly in your earbuds.                                                                                           Point is, I think everyone should watch this at least once during Christmas break, while I watch this about 300 times.  (That’s just me though, I have no choice but to, with a certain Home Alone super fan I know.) 

                                                                                                                         Ghosts of Girlfriends Past 

                                                                     

Oh my gosh.  I know I’ve watched this so many times because of my sisters and I don’t even like watching Rom/Coms, but I adored this one. Also yes, it’s PG-13 and yes, I watched it at eight but like it didn’t do anything really.                          Any who, this movie is a modern spin on Scrooge/ Christmas Carol classic story, where instead of getting visited by ghosts symbolically, he actually gets visited by his past, present, and future ex-girlfriends that he has actually dated.   I promise this lighthearted movie is so funny, I mean listen to this plot:  A serial womanizer is haunted by the ghosts of his past girlfriends at his brother’s wedding.   Also, I think the wife is one of his ex-girlfriend’s) and that one Uncle is in there too.                                                                                                                                       I know right, the tea.  I know it may sound cliche, but it’s not cliche at all and it’s so sweet, and to me all of it was fantastic.  Also, if you’re worried that it’s an overworked plot and that everything is going to be expected, you can relax now because it has a different theme than most of those movies, and if you need a little bit more convincing, here’s the cast list for those who may know these people: 

• Matthew McConaughey 
• Jennifer Garner 
• Emma Stone 

                   

 Polar Express 

Okay, I know most of us have watched this movie, but listen, I just learned that the movie was all CGI, I mean, the people didn’t animate these characters and the cast voiced them.  I mean, Tom Hanks and everyone else sat there and actually acted out the movements and the actual face expressions and emotions of these characters.  I watched the behind the scenes, and I was so shocked.   I suggest a lot of people would love BTS because the way Tom Hanks portrayed every character, he played was gold for me.                                                                      Also, I mean it’s a classic, even though someone I know said it was creepy, it’s a creepy classic.  I mean, I have warm memories of it, and I watch this every year.  So, take this as a reminder not to forget it. 

                                                                         

                                            This Christmas 

                                                                       

 

If you know you know, and if you don’t, (silence) well, I’m going to tell you anyway.  The plot is starring the Whitfield’s who are finally coming together as a full family on Christmas after four years, and the head of the house, Madera Whitfield the mother, is happy to see her estranged older son, her marine son, her teenage baby boy, and her three daughters despite the fact that they all, have beef with each other.  The movie has so many layers, for example, there’s debts that need to be paid, secret family members, secret kids, and so much more.   I personally love the movie because it’s heartwarming and reminds me of my family sometimes with and without the drama.  So, if you just like movies that are a Slice of Life, and it’s on Christmas, you should go check it out. 

                                                                                

Hi! I was supposed to have a blog coming up that turned out much bigger than I expected! So that's gonna take a while! Anyway this is an old story from around August that I never finished but I think it constitutes for flash fiction. cheers!

I’ve always been familiar with the subway; could probably take it better than most of my family. I’ve never gotten my license. Even if cars have never been my thing, trains have never, not once, scared me. They’re just big hunks of metal, ones that I don’t drive.

And whenever I get on the train, there’s always an empty car waiting for me. Somehow, in a crowd of people all processioning into our big, long hunks of metal, I find the empty car. No one ever gets in it, not until I get off. Then I see all sorts of people flood into it again. I’d come to not question it, just my simple stroke of luck, I get on and off all the time.

I guess today was strange. Bag tipped over He’s got a cigarette in his mouth, an overcoat covered in soot, and the most prominent feature, the stench of bleach.

It stinks up the entire car, and I curl my scarf around my mouth because one whiff already makes it hard to breathe. But I don’t think he notices. He just takes his cigarettes, rids his mouth of smoke, and taps the bum of it on the ground. I thought I only saw that in movies.

Then he looks at me. Or he sees me looking at him.

And for a moment he turns around, turns back, and I speak: “Hello.”

The cigarette drops from his mouth.

“You can see me?”

A cold, dead feeling sticks to the back of my neck, just as the words linger from his throat, like the smell of death is permeating off of him. I’ve never been afraid.

“I can,” and the words feel all sorts of wrong as if I’m not supposed to be talking to this man, maybe because I’m not, but he smiles. “That means I’m finally leaving, right?”

“What do you mean?”

He doesn’t answer, he pushes hair out of his face and repeats himself. “It’s felt like years.”

“Sir, I really don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He doesn’t hear me, doesn’t see me just smiles, smiles, smiles, smiles. My back presses to the seat of the train, and that’s when I see it; what I thought was a darkened subway wasn’t a subway at all. It was an inky blackness, nothing there but a void. A lump of bile presses to the back of my throat.

My breath sounds just as ragged as his as I ask, horrified, “Where am I?”

I look at him, and suddenly there’s another cigarette in his mouth where there wasn’t before. He takes it out of his mouth and examines the car around us, almost as if he were a carnival.

He looks around the car. “Are we going to Hammond? I’ve always loved going out to Hammond.”

“Where’s Hammond?”

He thinks, brushes it off, and closes his eyes.

“Where do you think we are?”

He shrugs. Then he turns the question on me.

“Where do you think we’re going?”

My answer comes up empty. He chuckles and turns out the window, taking the cigarette out and blowing the longest plume of smoke I’ve ever seen. It floats to the top of the train car. It forms a cloud, bigger than the car. The cloud turns darker and darker until it begins to rain.

So for this week’s blog I was struggling with a topic that I had felt passionate about for a while, and while I have a few things in the works I think that I will most likely save them for future dates, so for today I decided I wanted to sample a bit of my novel and if you don’t mind I would love feedback on my introduction on anyone willing to give it. Thanks!!! :)))

“So, what does it mean.”

 

Jude hated this question. “What does it mean,” as if his words would give light to the beauties within the elaborate winding halls of Washington DC’s National Gallery of Art. It was as if the reflection of the large marble pillars across the museum had reflected poorly into the eyes of these tourists and left them unable to think straight. “What does it mean?” Jude scoffed under his breath as he walked past Abir, his coworker giving a tour. Jude had never been one to have a high tolerance for people who asked arbitrary questions like that, at least when it came to art. Maybe it was because he was pretentious, or maybe it was because of those late nights where he would wake up and go to the bathroom and look at himself, looking for something. He was looking for a part of himself that he could not find, not because he lost it or he was lacking that specific attribute, it was because it was here in this museum. In the paintings, in the slick, washed, hardwood floors, in the white collared shirt, black suit, and golden name tag that he was required to wear everyday when he came into work. Every time he walked among the art he knew that he had felt more complete than he had in his entire life, and some people had the audacity to ask what it meant.

 

As 5pm finally struck and the nightly Janitors came in, Jude, finally grabbing his long wool overcoat and taking his black earmuffs out of his bag, began to traverse down the concrete stairs in the front of the building. 59 steps. There were 59 steps going down the museum staircase, and Jude lightly rested his polished black loafers on every single one. A routine that he had picked up a few months ago. This wasn’t the extent of the small details that he had discovered about the museum in the four years that he had worked there however. The number of benches on every floor, the steps it took to get from one exhibit to another, these details kept Jude’s mind occupied during the times that he found the museum barren and all the tasks that he had been assigned completed. 

The path back home was long, not because he had to walk two blocks to the subway station and take two trains, but because he had left his copy of the Piquit Papers next to his bedside that morning so the extent of his entertainment on the ride home was now bound to whatever he could hear the people on the subway talking about. He owned a cell phone, however that was only because of his mother, who insisted if he was going to leave Chicago that he was to at least have a mode of communication with her. 

“I don’t know Amy, it’s not like I don’t understand what she’s saying she’s just being too much, ya know?”  The women sitting adjacent to Jude on the train that afternoon said into her cell phone, 

“Exactly, it’s like she’s making me out to be the bad guy.”

Jude always found himself with a lower tolerance of people that he considered loud, while a part of it was because of an annoyance accompanied with a slight headache, another part of it seemed to be a sense of envy. Envy that there were people out there who did not feel bound to the ever strickening confines of their own anxiety. 

“She just keeps doing it and to be honest Amy it’s getting on my nerves”

“Jesus,” Jude thought to himself, turning his headphones on as he connected it to his phone, classical jazz beginning to erupt into his ears.

“God that’s so much better,” Jude said to himself. A blend of brass and piano beginning to drown out the honking of horns, the screeching of the train on the tracks to a halt, the opening of the doors. If it wasn’t for the sudden movement throughout the metro car then Jude would have missed his stop completely. But as he finally found himself stepping upon the platform and the cold  November air of DC entrapping the exposed skin on his face. 

I don’t think I’ll ever forget about the gift I got for Christmas when I was four. “Santa” had gotten me a trampoline. It wasn’t one of those small indoor trampolines, it was one of those big outdoor trampolines. Also, it was a full size trampoline so it was huge. Well anyway, I was ecstatic when I found out I had gotten a trampoline. My brother and I used to have a smaller one but our weirdo dog, Tuba, literally ate it. Tuba also somehow ate part of the wall in our house. I don’t remember exactly how he ate a hole in the wall (it wasn’t on a corner, it was on the like actual wall itself) but I think there was a hole in the wall so we could rewire an electrical outlet or something and Tuba stuck his head in the wall and just ate around it. He was a weird dog. We ended up getting rid of him because he was a little bit too weird for us. And destructive.

Enough about Tuba and onto my trampoline. I loved that thing so much, I was always outside on it. I remember one time my brother, Thomas, had his friend, Ashton, over. Ashton lived down the street so he was over all the time. Anyway, Thomas, Ashton, and I were on the trampoline when all of a sudden, this amazing idea came to me. I ran inside and grabbed some liquid soap I had gotten for my birthday or Christmas (I can’t remember which) and I squirted it all over the trampoline. I then proceeded to rub the liquid soap over the entire surface of the trampoline all while slipping and sliding everywhere.

The next story I have of my trampoline is one my brother wanted me to share in a blog. As I woke up one morning, I (like always) begged my brother to go jump on the trampoline with me. He of course said no. He is three years older than me and never wanted to hang out with me. Anyway, after about half an hour of screaming and begging him (I was really annoying and really persistent) during breakfast, he finally agreed, but only for “a little bit.” When we finished eating breakfast, I was so excited. I said something along the lines of, “Ok, let’s go! Come on, let’s go! Hurry up, let’s go!” over and over again. But of course, Thomas had other plans. Plans that had him in the bathroom for an hour or two, stinking up the entire house. When he finally got out of the bathroom, we headed for the trampoline. After a few minutes of jumping, as Thomas landed from one of his jumps, he let out a god forsaken, deadly, terrifyingly loud, burst of wind. I did what anyone whose nose works did. I started gagging. Thomas thought this was funny for whatever reason and decided to continue doing what he had just done. Every time Thomas landed from jumping, the smell got ten times worse. After a couple of seconds, I hung my head off the side of the trampoline and started violently vomiting. The smell had gotten to me. My nose hairs had been burned off. Even the grass around us had wilted from the toxic fumes (not really but still). That day, part of me died.

Note to self (and anyone reading this) never, and I mean NEVER, trust my brother jumping on a trampoline after he gets out of the bathroom.