Hello, World!

I haven't blogged in about a Century. But whatever. I'm ready to go again.

I'm currently experiencing a 5 day period of freedom. MJ is gone (in Corvallis, Oregon), I have no obligations, and I'm free to do as i please, thank you very much. Today didn't consist of much. I read Fruits Basket Volume 19 (which i got days ago, but haven't had time to read), talked to mom about a variety of subjects, and worked on my D&D thing.

See, I'm creating a dungeon (my first) as practice. I want to be a Dungeon Master. It's my goal in D&Ddom. It's not a bad dungeon for a beginner, who doesn't even understand the basics of the game, let alone the complexity that is DM-ing. There's 'too much treasure, not enough bad guys' as i remarked to mother at Easter Dinner at grandma's house. But I delved deep into my brain, and out of it came a clever idea. I got out our Sculpey clay and made small figures for each character in the adventuring party that will be using this dungeon. I also made a little figure for the bad guys they will encounter. Then I got out many sheets of graph paper and made much larger, player-friendly versions of my maps for the little clay ones to move around on.

With MJ gone we can't play yet, but I consider that a blessing. I need to learn a great deal about the game itself, like what 'to hit' really means and how to do saving throws and what the hell percentile dice are and how they work. Perhaps when I know more I can make a better dungeon. Hopefully I'll learn before we play.

But enough about what I've been doing. Or no, wait. Something else important I've been doing. Wicca. I'm getting back into Wicca. Or more specifically, magic. I'm not entirely dedicated to the Wiccan faith or anything, but I like it, and I like doing magic and the rituals and rites belonging to Wicca. Just a few days ago I celebrated Ostara, the main Spring Sabbat. Then yesterday I celebrated Easter, our main Spring festival. Easter and Ostara, far and away from having similar names, are in service of the same thing. Both involve Spring, eggs, flowers, bright colors, and joy and rebirth.

Leading from that back to the topic I meant to discuss, which was what I am going to do with this free period, tomorrow I'm taking a trip to our local magic shop (Moonflower Magicks, on Hewitt) to get a few things I'm needing. Harmless magickal items, I promise. Herbs and stones and stuff. No blood or eyeballs or anything. Heathenistic Godless Sentence to follow. If they don't work, I didn't hurt anyone, if they do work, they only do positive things to consenting parties, and if Witchcraft condemns me to Hell, hey, I was headed there anyway, with my Heathenistic Godless Ways.

Other things I was intending to do include a trip to the Thrift Store, to see if i could find some cool new clothes for very little money. I was actually thinking about asking Grandma if she wanted to take me. I've been meaning to spend time with her, and mom and dad are a little busy anyway. Also I want to go to Kinko's (whatever they're calling it now. Fed Ex Kinko's or soemthing.) and get my manuscript printed. I'd like a material copy of it. Or maybe I'll print it normally at mom's work and do some intense editing and rewriting before expending the money to print it bound. I wonder if they can but big black title letters on the front with my name smaller underneath. I would put it on my bookshelf and read whenever I felt like it. Let's see. What else was I planning to do? Ah yes.

Work on my fairy book. (A collection of drawings of fairies with household objects. Each drawing will have a brief explanation of the fairy's actions on the opposite page.)
Work on my art skills. (They are currently at an abominably low level, and I haven't learned anything about drawing in ages. Maybe I'll work on postures and hands and stuff.)
Read 'Fire and Hemlock' by Diana Wynne Jones. (Should be arriving from Amazon tomorrow. I haven't had anything by her to read I hadn't already read in a while.*)
Eat Easter candy. (No explanation needed.)
Hang out with someone. (Chelsea maybe. I'll see who's free this week.)
Blog more. (It's pretty OK. I'll at least do Thursday Thirteen and Friday Fill-In.)
Write more. (I haven't written in ages. Or is this wrapped up in the manuscript thing and the fairy thing? Come to think of it, is the art improving wrapped up in the fairy thing?)
Feel lost and confused. (Always. Doesn't everyone plan on feeling lost and confused? :-))
Et Cetera. (Can't think of anything else right now, but I will.)

Ok, I guess I'll wrap it up here. I've said quite a lot for one post. Well, I guess I haven't said anything, considering this is on the computer, but I've typed quite a lot. Sleep now, and hope to do many things this week. Good luck on your own stuff!!!

CHLOE!!!!

"Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast!"
- Alice in Wonderland, by Charles Lutwidge Dodgson.

*That sentence was convoluted. What I mean is, I haven't read anything new of hers in a while. But by new, I don't mean NEW new, I mean something i haven't read before.

what unschooling looked like today.....part one.

ok, i know mom usually does these, and i know today isn't anywhere close to over yet, but i felt like doing one. thought it'd be fun. lessee....

i woke up on the couch, because that is where i fell asleep last night. i stayed up until about six AM, reading 'The Wizard's Dilemma', the fifth book in the Young Wizards series by Diane Duane. i also read a volume of the manga, or japanese comic book, Kareshi Kanojo No Jijou, commonly shortened to Kare Kano. other books i have been reading recently are things like The Spiderwick Chronicles and the manga Bizenghast.

anyway, i fell asleep on the couch at around six, and woke up later that same day at perhaps one in the afternoon, as per usual. when i awoke, i picked up the sixth Young Wizards book and started reading that. i had only just started reading, however, when i was unceremoniously and rudely disturbed from my comfortableness by none other than the dreaded wake-up monster, MJ. i was forced to crawl, wriggle, hide, bite, and finally remove myself from my nice comfy couch. MJ then cleaned the living room while i watched and informed her i was sick and unable to help her. which was, of course, true. i never ever lie. however, the sickness and the not helping didn't actually have a whole lot to do with one another. i've become most skilled at that kind of truth.

anseyways again, i then decided to do a bit of research on the subject of Harry Potter, hoping to discover some clue as to the ending of HPATDH. i looked at the chapter titles in both DH and OP. i looked at the covers of all the books. i got on the harry potter lexicon (found at http://www.hp-lexicon.org/ ) and looked things up. however, my search was fruitless, my efforts in vain. nothing more was revealed to me than i had already known or strongly suspected. in fact, i had been learning more from the book itself then any amount of research could tell me, as i had been having it read aloud to me by mom and MJ. (in my current sick condition, my voice is odd and i am prone to fits of coughing. therefore i was unable to read aloud. hehe.)

during my search, whilst looking up the demiguise on the lexicon, i was interupted by an IM from mother. we had a chat about MJ's plans and about Harry Potter, and when she brought up a new theory i dove into research for that as well, bringing up a few interesting facts and writing my findings down. my information can be found on mom's blog, at this adress; http://zombieprincess.blogspot.com/ .

at this point, however, i wound down, and had nothing else to do. so i wrote this post. i'll write the second half later tonight, when the 'today' part of 'unschooling today' is done.

farewell!

'should your kids get an allowance?'

i recently found an article on giving kids an allowance. they had some things that seemed reasonable to me and even correspond with what i recieve, but they also reccomended/mentioned things i disagree with.

they say that kids as young as four are capable of handling an allowance, albeit a small one. i agree with that, but they also say "children at this age tend to lose or misplace money. That's OK. It's all part of the learning process. If your son is playing with a few quarters and loses them, he won't have the money to buy baseball cards or a pack of gum."

pshaw. if it's a small amount of money, you can easily replace it. in this way, the child can learn kindness and generousity instead of what will appear to him as greed. 'no, this is my money, you can't have any'. faced with a similar situation on a more serious level when he is an adult, he might subconciously remember this and refuse to give money to someone. if you send him the message of 'when someone needs help, do what you can to be kind', he might remember this instead, and in my opinion, that is a much better message.

the person writing this article goes on to describe different age groups and how much money they should get. following the 'Preschool' group is Elementary, from about to five to eight. "By 5 or 6, most children can understand the differences between spending, short-term savings, long-term savings and donating." IF your child can, and there is no guarantee of this, they will often not know how much to put in each category. most children this age get a small allowance, so they are likely to put most or all into the 'spending' category. i doubt any will be put in the 'donation' category. however, the article says "you may require that a certain amount of your child's allowance be...donated to charity". i strongly disapprove of this. i believe that everything you do around or to your kids sends a message to them about how to behave. forcing them to donate part of their money will just destroy what giving to charity is all about. it's about being generous and helping others. if you're forced to be generous you'll just be less generous in later years.

after the 5-8 range we come to what most people call 'Tweens', kids between the ages of 9 and 12, who are not quite teenagers. the article says "Some tweens are ready to take on the challenge of purchasing their own wardrobes and paying for all of their entertainment expenses." with a strong implication throughout the entire article that if they use up all of their money they won't have any more. it also says something that vexes me. "Many tweens...will need constant supervision and guidance. That's not to say that parents should stop them from making mistakes...allowance is a tool for learning good money-management principles. One of the best ways to learn is by making mistakes and dealing with the consequences of those errors."

what?

what?

That's not to say that parents should stop them from making mistakes

but that's so idiotic! if you tell them that what they are doing is a mistake, they will then learn that just as well as if they had been allowed to make a mistake. except they'll still have money.

does anybody see a bad side to this?

the 'Teens' section reccomends that older kids be given a "clothing allowance", with which they would have to buy all of their own clothes. i somewhat agree with this. it gives kids the freedom to choose what clothes they buy, instead of having to ask their parents for everything. but then they have to go and ruin it by imposing that 'even if you spend all your money, we won't give you a penny extra.' thing on it. the exact wording is this "when the money is gone, don't offer more -- even if he's forgotten to budget for a new winter coat and needs to wear his old one, which is ever so snug and showing its wear."

argh!

Chloe

i am so angry! Blogger has just forced me to swich to a Google account. i actually cried. i hate being forced to do things. I HATE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FRUITS BASKET

Fruits Basket is a japanese comic book (manga) and cartoon (anime) about a girl named Tohru Honda whose parents have died who winds up living with three members of the Sohma family, Yuki, Kyou, and Shigure. but then she finds something out: the Sohmas have a secret. they are cursed. thirteen members of the family are cursed with the animals of the chinese zodiac, plus the cat who was left out. when their bodies become weak or they are hugged by a member of the opposite gender, they transform into their animal. but the Sohmas are a complex family, and there is more to it than just that. but i don't want to ruin it, so i'll stop now. but i really love this series. it's so good!!!! i love it. i have all the episodes of the anime, and all the volumes of the manga. if you're at all interested, TRY THIS! it's FABULOUS! i would also like to make a request to Megan: i neeeeeeeed my volume 2 back! i must reread the whole series! i want you to finish it soon so i can read it! anyway! the end! i just had to talk about it cause i love it!

ME! cause i'm the best. ;-)

hello! chloe here! this is my blog, containing everything about me myself and i. not that you're interested. just cause i wanted to. so yeah. i am blondeish, grey eyes, five foot one, incredibly talkitive, and obsessed with manga and anime, especially Fruits Basket cause it's the best. i love drawing manga, writing books, writing manga, reading manga, reading books, and reading fanfiction. i have really sensitive eyes. i hate it when people tell me i'm too young for something. i hate mediating disagreements, because everyone winds up mad at me. i hate it when people don't tell me things. i love it when i get hugged by random people, as long as i know them at least a little bit. i love singing my favorite songs, even if i have to make up most of the words i forget. i love swimming, but it's always really cold here and plus i can't swim properly. i just dog-paddle, actually. i stick my head above the water and swim almost vertically. i can swim very fast when i'm lying on my back though. i love dancing ballet, except i don't know how, so i make it up. i love listening to my favorite songs, and i love singing along with them, even if other people look at me funny. i want to be a manga artist when i'm older. by the way, manga is japanese comic books, which are usually a couple hundred pages long per volume. i also want to be an author, and write mostly fantasy or sci-fi. futuristic earth is my favorite sci-fi setting, and my favorite fantasy setting is alternate universes, which i love making up. i just read a really wonderful book called 'extremely loud and incredibly close' by jonathan safran foer, and i highly reccomend it. it was really good. chiara got it for me, because she thought i would like it, and i did. anyhoo, i'm really blathering a lot now so i'm stopping. but i'll write more later. about my life and all. so yeah. THE END!!!!