Category: Senior Literary

I recently had the pleasure to watch a film that has been recommended to many a multitude of times. I only finished yesterday, however, I’m obsessed. The symbolism, the writing, the characters, and the plot. It’s all so perfect. The film I’m talking about is Meeting Joe Black.
I’m not the best at avoiding spoilers, so if you haven’t seen it, I advise that you stop now and watch it. This is a movie worth going into blind. I unfortunately had a small part spoiled by my roommate, and I think it took away a small aspect that would have made it all the better.
So, I’m warning you now, that I will be going over spoilers.

Meeting joe black is a movie about how death takes human form. From context and dialogue, we can tell that death has been very lonely. He said himself, that if we were to take our understanding of time, multiply millinea by infinity, and take it to the deepest depths, we would only see a glimpse of how long he has been around. Death wants to—for lack of a better word— take a tour of life. He wants to experience whimsy and wonder. After millenia (times infinity) he wants to explore the world the the body of a mortal.

To do this, he confronts a man who’s soon to depart from the world. Bill.
Bill is an extremely wealthy man soon to reach his 65th birthday. Death confronts him, telling Bill that he would extend his time on earth to however long Bill could keep him entertained. Death sticks by Bill for most parts of the movie, side by side. Bill introduces Death to his family. Not as death, but as Joe Black. No further information is given, and he keeps himself very secretive from the group. 

Death takes many likings to being a mortal, one specifically that I found the most humorous was how much Joe liked peanut butter. Throughout the three-hour movie, in random scenes, he’ll be eating a spoonful of peanut butter. I thought it played fairly similar to how Ryuk from Death Note liked apples. Anyways, Joe Black seems to take an interest in Bill’s daughter Susan. Susan is a Doctor, and that plays a very interesting part throughout the movie. 

When Joe wishes to see Susan, he goes to the Hospital where she works. There is SO MUCH symbolism in this scene. Joe is dressed in all black, while the doctors are in white. Death commonly being associated with black, and life with white. Joe stands dressed in a slim black suit, and white doctors push their way past him wearing white.  The irony of Death standing amidst people who save lives. I don’t know, I just thought that made such an interesting scene.

Joe goes on to fall in love with Susan, and Susan with him. There’s something almost poetic about how Death falls in love with a doctor. I think it shows a unique and interesting balance that 

Can only be found in very few movies.

Joe falls so deeply in love that he tells Bill he’s taking Susan with him when he leaves. Which I assumed meant to take her life with him. However, this contradicts the deal that Bill and Joe made with one another. If Bill willingly complies and works with Death, he wouldn’t harm his family. Death seems to have no morals in his word. He tells Bill it doesn’t matter, and he’ll take Susan regardless. I love this next part

Joe Black: I don’t care Bill. I love her.

William Parrish: How perfect for you – to take whatever you want because it pleases you. That’s not love.

Joe Black: Then what is it?

William Parrish: Some aimless infatuation which, for the moment, you feel like indulging – it’s missing everything that matters.

Joe Black: Which is what?

William Parrish: Trust, responsibility, taking the weight for your choices and feelings, and spending the rest of your life living up to them. And above all, not hurting the object of your love.

Joe Black: So that’s what love is according to William Parrish?

William Parrish: Multiply it by infinity, and take it to the depth of forever, and you will still have barely a glimpse of what I’m talking about.

Joe Black: Those were my words.

William Parrish: They’re mine now.

I love how Bill turns Joe’s own words against him. I had to have rewatched that scene nearly six times out of sheer appreciation.

In conclusion, this movie has made me take another look at Life and Death. This movie made death seem so much more beautiful than our books and movies tend to. I think anyone in their right mind should give this film a chance. And yes, it was rather lengthy, However, It didn’t take away from the experience, at least not for me. 

hey everyone, when thinking about what i wanted to talk about this week, i found that no matter what i thought about, it all came back to me, and to me changing.  the biggest change i’ve been thinking about is college, changing where i spend my every day, who i see every day, and what i do in between the sun’s rising and setting. 

it’s not for certain yet, but it looks like im going to be going to the university of iowa. a place known as the university for writers but lately ive known if more for the fact that it is 12 hours away. 12 hours that seem to stretch and contort itself much farther than a plane ride or a days’ worth of bus and trains. stretching much farther from anything and everything that i have come to love. 

and i’m aware im kind of sounding whiney, i get to go to a school i think i’ll enjoy and hopefully ill make friends and a post like this will one day be nothing but an afterthought, but no matter how much i think i might enjoy it, sometimes i wish i could just skip it, go straght to the part of my life that i want to be in, back where im with the people i want to be in a place where i can be me, but what i’ve learned from that wanting is that it isn’t what i need.

if i want anyone to come out of this blog reading learning at least one thing, i would want it to be that if the time you spend unhappy, anxious, or making mistakes was skipped over, you’d erase yourself. and i think this might be one of the few times in which i think i have my past to thank for something. because i know at one time, whether it was me struggling through middle school or freshman year, i wished that i could just skip over all of highschool, now i sit writing this blog at the end of my final year with only one or two more blog posts happy that I didn’t skip a thing. 

the last time that i took the time to write out something that i felt when it came to this subject was actually the last poetry assignemnt, maybe it is cheap to add in a poem that i already turned in but i think it has a lot to do with everything going on at the moment-

 

(p.s.)

 

the morning i came to visit,

i took my shoes off at the door.

down next to plants that had long 

since grown out of their pots,

and weeds that had made 

themselves at home in the

cracks of the front porch

 

i dusted off the handle of

the old screen door

and let the sound of it

swinging open cascade and

echo throughout my eardrums

the morning i came to visit,

i walked into an empty room

that smelled of lavender perfume,

smothered by mildew 

and cigarette butts

 

the ghost of chandeliers hung in

the form of wires protruding

from the ceiling. the

contents of each room  

now either rest under white

sheets or are sprawled out

across the front lawn.

the morning i came to visit

i filled my bag with empty 

lipstick containers 

and picture frames,

and layed down on your

old mattress, battered and beat

i tried to hear your voice in the 

chirping of the birds outside

the window of what 

used to be your bedroom.

and i tried to smell your smell in the air,

i didn’t smell a thing, even if i 

told myself i did

the morning i came to visit

i knew you had gone out for a while

 

 

After writing this poem I realized that all I have been doing is staring at wounds that had healed a long time ago without me realizing, and I think that is part of the beauty of change, and what took me the longest to understand. Sometimes change is just different, nothing more and nothing less. I’m scared of things changing because they might not be as good as they are now, but when it comes down to it think I changed a long time ago, as well as a few seconds ago. It honestly makes me think about this one quote from Jake the Dog I love,

 

“The shapes are always changing. Changing is their normal state, like us. Even if we’re not changing on the outside, we’re changing on the inside constantly. There’s some stuff about me that I’d been ignoring for a long time. I’m afraid of that stuff. But its part of who I am. As long as I know the shape of my soul, I’ll be all right.”

Frogbloginning (Frog-blog-beginning) 

It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Yet the frog blog still returns! I’ve been looking forward to writing one all senior year, but I haven’t actually gotten on it until now. I just can’t go into May without a frog blog. It’s mandatory to my heart. I love frogs. And information. And sharing information. Basically, I really wanted to do a frog blog before senior year gets out. 

I really do feel like there should be more to say here, though. I mean, graduation is approaching faster than I ever want it to be. We’re getting a class for personal projects. Senior showcases are looming. But I guess part of frog blogging joy is that we don’t have to discuss all that. We just need to discuss frogs! And boy, do I have some frogs to share. Course the hype through your veins. Away we frog! 

Grey Foam-Nest Tree Frog (Chiromantis xerampelina) 

(Source 1) (Source 2) 

I first found out about these frogs through a friend! They sent me a video of this species making a foam nest, and it was immediately insane. However normal they may look, they aren’t! They’re an arboreal species, meaning they live in trees. Though you could spot them visiting some water source to rehydrate, you probably wouldn’t see them swimming or even just sitting in a lake. To survive dry spells, their skin isn’t as permeable as other frogs, and they change color according to temperature! Dark to light are the colors they can go through. Darkening their color allows them to absorb more heat from the sun, while lightening their color allows them to reflect heat. There’re even more adaptations they have which you can check out if you click the sources. I just know what you’re mainly wondering about: their name. These frogs build nests of foam to hold their eggs! Female foam-nest frogs, which are bigger than the males, secrete a kind of mucus from their cloaca, which they churn into foam using their back legs. The foam will then harden a bit on the outer later, all in all protecting the eggs and keeping them moist. Female foam nesting frogs do this with a lot of males present to fertilize the eggs. They also build their nests above water sources, so once the eggs turn to tadpoles, they can eventually wriggle out of the foam and into the water below. Keeping the eggs out of the water until then increases the chances of survival. Developing into a tadpole only takes about six days for a grey foam-nest tree frog! 

Water-Holding Frog (Cyclorana platycephala) 

 

(Source 1) (Source 2) 

The water holding frog! Like the foam-nest frog, this frog is pretty much its name, too! They live in areas with dry periods, meaning they’re on their own when it comes to water a lot of the time. For frogs, that sounds pretty impossible, but its actually really interesting how species adapt to live without the things they need. Water-holding frogs go about this by aestivating and burrowing! Aestivation is basically hibernation but in the hot, dry season of summer instead of winter. During aestivation, deep inside their muddy burrows, water-holding frogs shed layers and layers of their skin, all the while secreting a watertight mucus. The shed and mucus lines their burrow, allowing them to maintain their water with more efficiency. And, while they survive off all the nutrition they stored while awake, they may eat their den lining if they need to. It doesn’t end here, either! All of this would constitute the name ‘water-holding’, but the name is from the fact they absorb up to half their body weight in water. They store all of that water in their bladder in skin pockets to survive aestivation. Even if it takes years, the water-holding frog can arise from its burrow again, froggy as always. On the surface, they feed, breed, then fill up on water again to hit the burrow.  

Fringed Leaf Frog (Cruziohyla craspedopus) 

(Source 1) (Source 2) 

Also called the fringed tree frog, and most definitely one of the most colorful guys to ever color. (Not really, but you know what I mean.) You’d think the hues they flaunt would mean danger- toxins, poisons-!- but you’d be wrong! Fringed leaf frogs are safe to handle. For you, at least. Don’t go picking up frogs willy-nilly. These frogs do, however, change color! They rapidly switch into brown hues during the night, then return to vibrancy in the day. They also hide their yellow underbellies when adhering to a surface for camouflage. As for where they live, it’s high up in the treetops. Their eggs can be found on ground level, as they only descend to breed! 

Red-Eyed Tree Frog (Agalychnis callidryas) 

(Source 1) (Source 2) 

And lastly, I thought it would be neat to close with a classic frog! The kind you see in cartoons and logos and whatnot. We all know the red-eyed tree frog, but what do we actually know about it? For starters, they’re nocturnal, like a lot of other frogs. They can also change their color to brownish or dark green! They lay eggs on the undersides of leaves (over a pond) or on the shores of ponds, then leave the eggs soon after. One of the biggest things to me was finding out the purpose of their eyes. Why red? It turns out the red is for a thing called startle coloration! Imagine one moment you’re about to eat a little green morsel, then suddenly it looks up with gigantic, burning red peepers. They’re meant to spook predators out of eating them. Pretty neat! 

Frogblogending (Frog-blog-ending) 

You’d be surprised how difficult it is to get a conclusive call on a frog’s scientific name. Research takes time, but it’s fun, and it only gets better with frogs. Don’t feel afraid to share your own frog facts in the comments below, if you so wish! Or just share what your favorite frog is, on the list or not. There’s so much out there! Until next time, frog blog out. The frogs are never ending! 

Part 2 of 2: Black Friday 

We left off with Uncle Wiley aka Wilbur Cross feeding into our main antagonist Linda Monroe’s want to be adored in order to have her help him bring along the birth of a god aka “Wiggly”. 

Immediate cut to the white house where we find out that Hatchetfield isn’t the only place dealing with this extreme shopper mania. Its all over America at this point and even threatening other countries. The president is wracking his brain for an answer but the search is cut short when a doll is revealed in the white house and they all nearly turn on eachother before a the doll is shot by none other than General Macnamara from TGWDLM. He informs President Goodman that to defeat Wiggly they must step into the black. 

Another cut Becky and Tom are in an empty movie theatre while Becky nurses Toms stab wound. The two begin to share about their lives since high school, Tom expresses guilt for Jane’s death, stating that if Jane were driving the accident wouldn’t have ever happened and that he killed his family. Becky then begins to share her story, meeting Stanely and the beginning of his violent behavior dating back to high school. It is then we find out Stanley never left Becky. Becky found out about Jane’s death and wanted to attend the funeral much to Stanley dismay. But she fought back, he chased her into the woods where she stabbed him in his femoral artery, a blood vessel she only knew about because Stanley encouraged her to be a nurse. After both revelations the two share a song and a passionate kiss. 

Cut back to Macnamara and Goodman, here we learn that there’s another dimension referred to as the black and white, this dimension is led by Wiggly as he is also the dolls and Wilbur Cross(Uncle Wiley) was a man who pledged his loyalty to Wiggly and disappeared not long after and that his goal is to have a birth canal built so he can enter their dimension. 

We cut toy Sherman Young pledging his loyalty to Wiggly to the other residents at the mall, goons bring in Frank and Lex who are bound. After that it is then they introduce their “mother” Linda. Linda slits Frank’s throat after he fails to tell her where to find a Wiggly. She heads over to Lex who denies knowing anything about a Wiggly before a mall cop turned crazed cult follower reveals security tapes from earlier announcing that Lex gave the doll to a little girl with pigtails and a baseball cap, Hannah. Linda sends goons after Hannah as others drag Lex away who’s pleading with them to not hurt her. 

Cut to Hannah, hiding away frightened it is then a spirit who resembles Ethan steps forward and tries to lead Hannah astray, telling her to give the doll to Linda. Wiggly then speaks to Hannah himself but his magic seems to not affect her at all. The come Tom and Becky also turned crazed by Wiggly’s magic they chase Hannah down, Becky wielding a large needle. When they catch her Becky goes to jab her but ends up getting herself instead knocking her unconscious on top of Hannah, who can’t move her while Tom grabs the doll and flees. The crazed shoppers find Hannah and an unconscious Becky and bring them to Linda.   

Cut to Goodman who’s in the black and white being coached by John. After a failed attempt at reasoning with Wilbur and Wiggly John sacrifices himself to allow President Goodman to leave the black and white. 

In the Toy Store Sherman is holding Lex hostage with the same box cutter used to kill Frank to her neck. She gets him to untie her with a promise of mispaint pony toys. She then knees him in the groin once she’s free, this doesn’t work too as in no time Sherman is back on top of her with his hands around her neck. It is then she sees General Macnamara, he informs her that Hannah isn’t only one connected to the black and white. He encourages her to reach in as he holds out his gun, she is able to reach in and take the gun shooting Sherman and saving her own life. Lex then finds Tom who is just about to leave, she manages to break through Wiggly’s trance and reason with him. It is then he realizes that Tim never even asked for the stupid doll he just wanted to spend time with him. 

Meanwhile, Hannah and an unconscious Becky are being taunted by Linda. Her smile quickly dissipates when she sees that Hannah doesn’t have a doll. Right before Linda has the chance to hurt Hannah in her rage Lex walks in holding the doll. Tom comes from another entrance and holds Linda at gunpoint. She seems to be defeated until Lex holds a lighter up to Wiggly and somehow Linda is able to get away and get her hands back on Wiggly. But she doesn’t celebrate for long before Becky appears holding a gun and shoots Linda in the dead center of her forehead, killing her on the spot. 

Lex sets fire to Wiggly leaving him, the shoppers, and the mall to all go up in flames. 

Becky, Lex, Tom, and Hannah watch the mall burn when Paul and Emma come up to him, relieved he is alive and informing him they are just about to leave but Tim refuses to go anywhere without him. When questioned where to go Emma informs them of her cooky reclusive biology professor.

The final song of the musical poses a question ‘What if tomorrow comes” Our final surviving characters including a few characters from TGWDLM circle around and Tom begins a 15-second countdown at one they all look into the sky and the screens fades to black. 

This video has 3.9 million views on YouTube and raised hundreds of thousands of dollars on Kickstarter in order to get created.

I have to be honest I favor this one over TGWDLM. The amount of world-building present within this musical, the lore that revealed the interpersonal relationships we learn about is unmatched compared to the Jazzy rendezvous TGWDLM was, though I also love that one there really is no competition here.

I definitely recommend checking both out.