10. yule

9. yield

8. miniscule

7. stool

6. six

5. mortuary

4. goblin

3. genocide

2. forgetfulness

1. for

Worst:

10. rule

9. demand

8. gigantic

7. table

6. morgue

5. five

4. troll

3. suicide

2. training

1. at

These words have been chosen based on how they sound, what they are and various other qualities.

We had a two and a half balconies, and they all had a really nice view. One big one off the living room, a smaller one off of my mother’s bedroom and a tiny one off the kitchen. You could see over the HuangPu river and over into Pudong. (Shanghai is seperated into two parts; Puxi and Pudong. Well, there were other kind of outlying areas and I’m not sure if they are under the same category… I just lived there, I didn’t study it. Or care, really…) We had the most amazing view, and the sky would always be lit up at night. It was a sort of dusky maroon. A rather strange colour for a sky, but that’s what it was.

My mother’s balconey was actually facing the other direction, and you could see a busy Shanghai street. There was a green sign which had a pretty interesting pattern that I remember watching.

Whenever my mother would throw a party, she’d always show off the view. It was pretty amazing. That apartment is someone else’s now, and that’s sad. I had tons of pictures on my mother’s old camera, but no one knows where that went. So I guess I’m stuck with my memories for now, until I find it.

School lunches were sometimes scary, sometimes nice, sometimes just kind of boring. One thing I remember loving was the wintermelon. That was really amazing. Back there, you can’t really be a vegetarian because so much of their protein depends on meat. Milk products were only introduced recently, and still haven’t caught on. Beans are pretty common, as well as tofu (dofu), but I think that meat is eaten when it can be bought, because it shows a richer life style. Anyway, there was this soup that I’m pretty sure had pork in it (it was grey meat – boiled) and it was actually really good. There was wintermelon in it as well and that just made it amazing.

There was also this other stuff, which I would always mix with rice, that had peanuts, diced tofu, diced meat and some vegetable in it. It was in this really good sauce and I loved it. I always hoped for the day we would have that. It almost made up for all the really crappy good.

So what does the future have in store for me? Well, I’ll keep gaining experience with WordPress, and CSS and PHP along with that, then I’ll probably branch out into some of the others, like Dabble. I can see the future coming, but hopefully it wont come to quickly because I quite like where I am now.

Completely changing topic, I’m going to make this the best summer of my life. I’m going to do tons of stuff, and I’m going to make sure I remember this summer as the time I did this, or the first time I did this. Little stuff like that. I actually got my inspiration for this by thinking of Calvin and Hobbes. They spend their summers on adventures, why can’t I spend mine the same way?

I’m off to explore the future, one present at a time.

The problem is, my life is not interesting any more. Oh well. I’ll try going in for history instead.

Back when I lived in Shanghai, I used to love to eat these pancakes called Cong You Bing. That means, literally, chives oil cakes. Actually I’m not sure about that last word. I’m not sure of the exact meaning. Anyway, they were delicious, and probably my favourite part about China.They cost 5 Jiao, which is half a Yuan, which is one seventh of a dollar. They were not expensive. I bought them at this little vendor a block away from my flat. Then we moved a couple of streets away, and since streets in Shanghai are ridiculously long, I couldn’t really walk over there. But then, something wonderful happened. I found another Cong You Bing place right up the street from me. And it was between my house and the bus stop where I got off the bus after coming home from school! Some days I would stop there and buy pancakes to enjoy. The problem was, we’d have to eat them before we got home since my mother was not fond of snacks. And I didn’t often carry pocket change. Oh, I forgot to mention, I have a younger brother. He loved the pancakes as well, and went to the same school as me. That’s what the ‘we’ is. But then, disaster. That place closed, and I no longer had access to the wonderful wonders of Chinese fast food. The original place was on my bus route, but it was a half hour or more walk from my house. Never fun after school. So what was I to do? Well, I simply had to go without. Whenever my dad would come over (my parents are divorced, and back then they were seperated), I would always make him stop and get me some. I simply loved the simplicity of the delightful treat. But alas, they were rare, and now I don’t know if I’ll ever have them again.

Thus ends my little anecdote. I think my next post shall contain another one, and will definitely be sooner than this.

I have two cats here, one we’re planning to get and one in China that’s going to be here soon… I’m not insane, right? I just really like cats. The cat who’s currently in China is called Max. I’ve had him since he was so small… He really loves me.

On a related note, blogging aout my cats doesn’t make me insane, right?

Just to be on the safe side, I’ll blog about blogs.

Everyone has a blog now. It’s insanely popular. You can start one from free, you can use it to express your opinions (my opinion: I’m the sane one, everyone else in the universe is nuts) and complain about people and have it become very easy for total strangers to know everything about you and use that information to freak you out and guess all of the passwords in your life and slowly commit identity theft until you become a hobo living on the street and are worse off that all the big banks… Not that I’ve ever done that. Really, I haven’t.

Cats!

Blogs!

Beyond!

Infinity!

It’s funny how infinity is infinite. It’s just so puzzling. Can anyone really imagine something going on… Forever?

Zeno’s paradoxes. One of them really puzzles me. If you shoot a bullet, it goes halfway, then halfway of that remaining space, then halfway of that remaining space…

Will it ever get there? It’s so confusing, and at the same time, so… Basic? Really thinking about it hurts the mind.

Although I’ve got a cold, perhaps it’s just that.

One thing I like about November this year is that we get two Tuesdays off from school in a row. One for the election, although the official reason is that there was a teachers’ workshop. The second one (today!) is for Veterans’ day.

One thing I don’t like about November is that it gets dark at 5 o’clock, due to how far north I live.

One thing I do like about November is that NaNoWRiMo is happening now. It’s such a fun challenge that can really get you writing.

One thing I hate about November is that NaNoWriMo is happening now. It makes life so much more stressful. I keep missing days and then feeling guilty about it, then feeling very satisfied that I have caught up. Right now I’m feeling guilty.

At least the weather isn’t letting me down, since I don’t care what it does. Good old weather, always there for you. Although the chill bugs me a bit, it’s still better than being hot.

Now, onto the third subject: MIT. MIT has taped their lectures and put them on their website, so anyone can watch them. There’s also a PDF version of either this year’s book or an old one. It’s really cool.

Now on the more… What should I write about? The Twilight movie coming out next Friday? Perhaps a list of books I love… Top ten things to do on the internet? Or perhaps I should just end this post here…

No, the first one, definitely. Now, I’m not a fan of Twilight like some people I know. Actually, out of everyone I know who likes Twilight, most of them are guys. Not really surprising considering I live in Massachusetts… (cough cough) But I’m going to see the movie anyway, provided life doesn’t get in the way and something goes wrong. Hopefully it wont, but honestly, you can never know. Well, I can, okay, I can’t, but I can guess. Except in this situation. I’m not going to guess, I’m not going to tempt the Fates, that’s for sure. My dad is always incredibly unlucky. One time, he and my mom were supposed to meet up at a restaurant they both really liked, and the restaurant burned down. This sort of thing happens a lot around my dad.

So, Twilight. The movie should be interesting. I found the book rather over-dramatic, which is odd considering I’m at the age where I’m a fan of drama. Maybe I’ll read the second book. I read the first one long enough ago that I’m fuzzy on the details, and, indeed, the general plot. Movies, however, are supposed to be rather dramatic in order to keep the watcher’s attention and interest. Perhaps it will be good, perhaps not.

Until next time, be wary of those random fluctuations in the space-time continuum, in other words, my god.

Anastasia Trombly

9. squish

8. gloop

7. demonstration

6. psychosomatic

5. longitude

4. supreme

3. after

2. rain

1. formaldehyde

I put words on this list based on how they sound, how balanced they are, and how awesome they are to say. Formaldehyde is definitely my favourite. It’s fun to say. Try it!

Wow, really long.

So, I was on the NaNoWriMo website the other day, my English teacher will be so happy.

NaNoWriMo is a challenge where you have to write 50,000 words in a month. They’ve also got a program for those under 17, which is where I fall. You can sign up for the adult one if you’re over 13, but 50,000 words is hard!

On the younger one, you get to pick your own word goal. I really love the site, it’s just so friendly and gives off a fantastic vibe. I can’t wait until November (when it starts). I’m going to plan out my story in preparation.

There’s a little library at my school and it’s just adorable. It’s so small and cute!

There’s an okay selection of books, not the best, but they’ve at least got a few Terry Pratchett books. But sadly, only a few out of the 40? he’s written so far.

It’s just like a real library, only smaller! Did I mention how cute it is?

But it’s fun, I can drop off my checked out books on the way to class, which is cool. And I don’t need a library card since I’m an actual student. I’ve got a student ID card and everything. I’ve never had a student ID card before, it’s wicked fun. It’s got my picture on it and my grade and stuff…It makes it feel all official.

It’s really weird, going to an English-speaking school. I’ve been living in China the last four years, and now that my life is normal again, I’m going to write every single boring detail about it!

Something is definitely messed up there. I should have started a blog sooner, oh well.

I’m taking French, because it’s just such a beautiful language. The classroom always smells different than in the hall, because the french teacher has cooking classes or something in there. It smells sort of like coffee… Only ten times better.

French is supposed to be a really good choice if you want to get into college or something like that.

I’d like to be a physicist when I’m older, so I’m not taking any chances. It helps that I’ve wanted to take french since I was about five.

I’m really interested in all the physic stuff, quantum particles and all that junk. I read that electrons are connected to each other, or something like that, and when you move one, the other one it’s connected to moves too. Could this be a foundation for something much larger?

And what about time travel? It would require too much energy, I think. Although I don’t know anything, so ignore that. But either if we go back and change a time line that will require too much energy to work, or changing the time line is impossible because our destinies are fixed in place and all of our decisions have already been made for us, although by us, so does that really count? It’s like looking at a past decision you made. You made it, the you that made it might be different from the you now, but if you went back then and were just like you were then then you would make the same decision. Unless it was completely random, in which case, would it happen again?

xkcd.com

List of webcomics – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You know, I’ve found a lot of interesting stuff of my trolls around the internet. I’m really good at Google searches and can generally find what I want, even if I decide I don’t want it any more. Of course, wikipedia is very good for finding stuff out, and is definitely useful for school projects. Here’s how:

Step 1: Find the wikipedia page of what you have to study.

Step 2: Scroll down the the references.

Step 3: Click on those external links!

Since teachers don’t let you use wikipedia, you have to find a different webpage. Not that that makes any sense… They ban wikipedia because anyone can edit it. Who writes those webpages? It could be anyone! Although I think they want you to use official website for your info… I suppose it makes it less likely that there could be mistakes, accidental or diliberate.

Until next time, Anastasia.

I’m not quite sure what I’m going to put on here yet, which is kind of the point, but what I do know is that I’ve made it my personal mission to bring more insanity into the world, and this blog is my first attempt. So be prepared for some really random posts, about anything that happens to catch my fancy.