Hey, is that...?

Day 27.  What would you do if all the electricity in the world just stopped?

I'll look at the sky. Right now, there's light pollution almost everywhere. You have to go to a very desolated place in order to fully see the sky and its stars but when the electricity stops, the world will suddenly turn their gaze at the sky and its beauty. "Hey, look, what is this wide thing crossing our sky? Is it the Milky way?" I think people have forgotten how the sky should look like and because of the light pollution nobody really looks at the sky anymore. People have forgotten to look at the things that are so much bigger than they are. I remember reading that if humans spare a little time for gazing at the sky every day, the world will be such a better place. I share that view and I add that people have forgotten how to dream. Obsessed by the everyday hustle and distracted by the mundane, the world has lost its dreamers. Now, if only the electricity in the world just stopped...

Giving

26.  What would you do if someone just gave you $1 million?

Right now I don't really need any kind of money, besides the money for my college tuition so if someone gave me 1 million, I'd save a little from them for my tuition and I'd give the rest to someone who actually needs it like someone who needs to take an important surgery. If I don't find someone like that which is very unlikely given the amount of people with weird and obscure deceases, I'd give it to a charity that gives money to research centers or I'd give it directly to a research center. 

I don't think money can solve any of my problems, no matter how big it is, except for health problems. In any other situation, I think that any human being is capable of standing up on it own and working its way back up to the game. In my opinion, it's just a matter of willpower and self-reflection. 

Past Sight

Day 25 What would you do if you could travel into the past?

I'd return to see the major battles between empires, warring country. I'd try to sneak into the strategy rooms and see what are people planning. I'd like to see how people are living and how different are they than today's people. I'd really want to see the samurais of Japan and the knights of the medieval ages. I'd really want to see how Asia developed into the current state and how it made some revolutionary inventions. 

Future Sight

Day 24.  What would you do if you could travel into the future?

If I could travel into the future, I'd first see how interaction between humans has changed and what has survived from it. I'd guess that interaction will be mostly the same excluding a few minor changes. Afterwards, I'll see how people have overcome the problems of each century between mine and the one I'm visiting. I'd be interested to see if we have discovered a way to travel to different planets, galaxies, universes. Another thing that I'm interested in is the date when Bleach, Naruto and One Piece will end because I can't imagine them finishing in my lifetime. 

Meow!

23.  What would you do if you were able to communicate with animals?

If I was able to communicate I with animals, I'd never stop travelling around the world. I'd just have a durable set of clothes and a survival kit. I'd travel through the jungles, talking with monkeys, snakes and cats. I'd go to the savannas and I'll talk to lions like the guy above. 

I'l befriend them and I'll stroke their manes. I'll also scratch hyenas necks because they really love it. I'll climb a giraffes long neck and I'll look around from that tall place. I'll climb up the heights of the Himalayas and I'll meet the white leopards that cross the paths of Buddhist monks.

I'll talk to the condors that fly around half of the planet. I'll talk to lions, tigers, bears, everybody. Being able to communicate with animals and humans would be the best thing to have because I'll you be able to get across so many things. You'd learn how to hunt, how to escape from a hunt, how to fly, how to run. Meeting new people and conversing with them is the one of the best things you could do in your life and being able to converse with animals just quadruples the awesomeness of that experience. I'd really love to talk to animals. 

Invisible day

Day 22.  What would you do if you woke up one morning to find yourself invisible? 

- Jiff, wake up. - says my mother - Jiff, wake up, it's time for school! - she shouts and barges into my room. - How many times do I have to tell you, young man, that being late for school is a bad thing! - says my mother and grabs the blanket that I'm covering myself with. She pulls it and looks in my direction but her eyes don't focus on anything.
- Hmm, maybe he's already up and gone for school. What a good surprise. - she says and leaves the room. 

Wait, what? What just happened? Didn't she notice me? Hmm. I guess that's just a my brother and my brother setting a prank for me. Is it April Fool's Day? No, it's not. I guess it's really time to get up. Time to find my glasses... where's my hand? Where's my body? I can't see myself! Am I a ghost? Can I touch things? Yes, I can pick up my glasses. Let's try to see myself in the mirror. I can't see myself. And, yes, I do have my glasses on. I don't see a reflection in the mirror. Hmm. What should I do? Well, I obviously don't have to go to school and I can do whatever I want. But what do I want to do? Let's eat first. Then I can walk around town. Now that I'm invisible I don't really need to wear clothes and because it's a wonderful summer day outside, I can walk freely walk bare naked. I make myself a sandwich and I leave the house. I catch the bus and I get off at the city center. So many people hurrying for somewhere. I don't want to stay here. It's boring. I go back to my house, grab some clothes warm clothes and catch the bus again for the bus stop. I'm going to the mountains. 

A night in the jail

Day 21. What would you do if you were locked inside your favorite department store overnight?

First of all, I don't really like department stores. I don't like them because I don't really need anything out of them and whenever I go shopping I quickly become bored and anxious to get out of there. I wasn't like this before, when I was little. I used to like it because I got to drive the shopping cart but because my father didn't really let me have it that much and because my little brother also wanted it, I had to give up on this only pleasure I had about department store shopping. If I was trapped in a department store in general, I'll probably try to build some contraption in order to escape from the store, like a catapult or something else. 

Even if I was locked inside my favorite stores, not department store, which is electronics store or a comic store, I'll probably be interested in the stuff they offer for an hour or two. Afterwards, I'll try to find ways to escape it. 

42!

Day 20.  What would you do if 300 mice had just gotten out of their cages in a pet shop where you worked?

I wouldn't really mind that much. If I'm alone in the shop, I'd just make sure that the door is closed and I'd start collecting every single one of the. This sound very tedious but it's a matter of not losing the count because it will get even more tedious. As strange as it may sound, I'd treat them gently because I've read "The hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy" and I know that they're secretly ruling our world, waiting for the question to the answer of the universe to be calculated. 

However, if there are people in the shop, the job will become messy, especially if there are girls around. I'm not sexist but what's the problem with mice running around. It's not like they'll eat them or something. Again, I'll make sure that the door is properly closed and I'll try to calm down the customers while I'm filling my pockets with mice. 

Becoming a true human

Day 19.  Three goals I have set for myself are... 

Becoming a memory master, a polymath and a citizen of the world.

First of all, I want to become a memory master because I want to prove to myself that I can do something great, that I am not mediocre like everybody else. I've always been a fan of memory shortcuts, of hacks, of ways to do things more effectively. Mnemonics techniques are exactly that. They are ways to memorize huge amounts of information in an effective and ingenious way. 

After acquiring a powerful memory, mastering anything of interest will be within grasp. Since I was small, I've always loved reading and doing new things. I've read tons of books and I've tried lots of sports and games but that's just the beginning. With the power of a memory master, I will not only be able to learn about a lot of things, I will be able to learn them in depth. Learning things in depth will get me into the most interesting parts of science and art. 

Finally, independent of becoming a memory master and a polymath, I want to become a citizen of the world. This means that I want to travel all around the world and spread the knowledge that I've acquired. Travelling, I will learn a lot of things about myself and about other people. Travelling around the world is the best way to learn the ultimate truth that governs our world(Besides 42, of course). 

Only after achieving these things would I consider myself a true human. 

A meeting with Dr. Morgenes

Day 18.  Which character from a book would you most like to meet and why?

“Never make your home in a place. Make a home for yourself inside your head. You’ll find what you need to furnish it – memory, friends you can trust, love of learning and other such things. That way, it will go with you whenever you journey. You’ll never lack for a home – unless you lose your head, of course…”

Doctor Morgenes

The dragonbone chair

Tad Williams

I've read a lot of books and it's little bit hard to choose the only that I'd really want to meet but Dr. Morgenes is one of them. The reason why I want to meet him is simply because he's a very intelligent and wise person. He's traveled all around the Tad Williams' world and knows a lot of stories and mysteries. He's also the head of a secret organization which aims to expand and preserve the accumulated knowledge about the present and the past. He has a wonderful sense of humor and is something like a idol to me. If I ever grew old as him, I'd want to be like him. 

Arr! A pirate's life for me!

Day 17.  Imagine yourself in a different century and describe an average day in your life

Arr! The year's 1700 and I'm on the mighty pirate ship "Vendetta." My name's Key Blacksmith and I'm 16 years old. Because of the recent small pox outbreak, all of my family members are dead and I'm an orphan. I decided to take the destiny of an adventurous pirate attacking ships and finding treasures under the flag of Captain Smithson. Of course, I'm not a full-pledged member of the crew and I have to do all kind of odd chores for the actual pirates but life's not that bad compared to the life a blacksmith's son. My father treated me really badly when he was alive. He'd often get drunk and trashing the house. My mother left this world long time ago when my father was still mentally stable. Now that they're both gone I had no place to live in. I saw the pirate ship in the harbor and I found one of the main pirates. I asked him if I could become a cabin boy. Because of my well build body of a blacksmith helper, he said that I could join the crew. I got my small bag of belongings with me and boarded the ship. The next day, the other pirates told me the daily routine on the ship.

The routine started in 0600 when a few other errand boys and I had to scrub the whole deck. This usually took at least 2 hours because of the lack of helping hands. Then, at around 8, we ate breakfast - a little bread, hard as a rock, and we boarded the supplies for the next journey. The supplies were in big heavy oak chests that needed 4 people in order to be barely lifted. After all the supplies were on board, we started patch the sails. At the end of the day we were totally exhausted but we finally had some free time. Some of the crew went to the shady parts of the town where they slept with prostitutes and drank shitty wine. I went out a few time to see what's everyone all hippy about "going to town and getting a girl" but then I stopped and started sneaking into the captain's cabin and trying to read the scrolls and the navigation books. 

Barbara Streisand!

Day 16.  Write about a time in your life when you struggled with a choice and made the right one. 

The time when I made a tough choice was when I had to choose the university. The universities in my home country are all that good and I decided to study abroad. I had two choices - the States or the UK. The USA is the country of the dreams of many people around the world. If a person has been born in the USA, he's considered to have won the lottery. On the other hand, UK is not that far from home and a lot of friends are going there. The choice was really tough. I didn't want to be alone in a university, a town or even in a country but that's how it turned out and I'm glad that I made that choice.

If I had gone with my friends I would have hung out only with people from my nationality and I would have never met so many diverse people. Also, when I came in the States, I realized why people called it the country of opportunities. Especially in NYC, everybody's so busy, everybody's hurrying, everybody wants to grab the chance. Whenever, I hear "USA" and "NYC" in one sentence, I would always think of Duck Sauce's song Barbara Streisand. While the UK has many good things to see, the USA has a lot more simply because of the scale of the county and also because Americans like to scale things in an absurd way. Burgers, cars, ships, everything is bigger, which is not always a good thing but, anyway, I like the people here and I think I grow to like them even more. 

iHero

Day 15.  Describe someone who is a hero to you and explain why

A hero to me is Steve Jobs. The reason why I consider him my hero is because he thought himself to disregard the opinion of others and to strive for excellence. From his early years, he developed his curiosity, he strove to make something perfect. He wanted to differentiated himself from others in order to see what they missed. He looked at the world with an open mind and judged things by investigating on his own, instead of relying on others. He did many things and had fun doing them. I consider him a person worthy of calling a role model, although a little bit faulty. If he was alive, I'd really like to have a walk with him.

Steve, wherever you may be, I hope you've found another pirate crew to have fun with. 

That day

Day 14. Describe an event that changed your life forever, or make up and describe an event that would change your life forever (2)

The event that changed my life forever happened in my fourth grade. It was a typical spring day outside - not too hot, not too cold - and I was preparing for school. Textbooks, check, notebooks, check, pens and pencils, check, school report notebook, check. Here, my backpack is ready. Time to leave for school. I fasten my shoe laces, lock the inner and the outer door of our apartment and go out in the block's hallway. Three floors of stairs fly by as I descend downwards greeting the elderly neighbors at our floor. I go out on the street and I feel the shining sun and the breezing blowing slightly. I sense that something wonderful will happen today. I set off for my school which is seven streets away. Most of the streets are small local streets but the one in the middle, the forth street, is a major one and there a lot of hurried people crossing it. Because of the traffic I had to stop and wait for a minute or two so that the cars clear our. While I was waiting, I saw a young man at the other side, walking towards the street. He was staring at a magazine and feverishly reading it, while listening to music. He probably had his headphones blasted at max because he didn't notice the traffic at all. He continued walking and started crossing the street. Cars started blowing their car horns but the guy still would not notice them. One of the cars barely evaded him and its driver was at a hair's breath away from crashing into a pole. About three quarters past the street the young man lifted his head and saw what was happening around him. It was just in time because one car was about to run him over. He dropped the magazine and jumped for the sidewalk. The car grazed him but he was alright. I went and helped him get on his feet but he was too shocked to think at that moment. I made him sit down and gave him my water bottle. My parents always told me that water could calm scared people. A minute later, when the cars cleared out, I got his magazine and handed it back to him but he refused to take it. He thought that it was cursed and went back on his way after thanking me for my help. I was really curious about what exactly was he staring at that he forgot what he was doing. Because I was almost late for school and I put it my backpack and ran for the school. I barely managed to arrive on time. During school I forgot about the magazine but when I went back home, walking through the big street I remembered the incident. A few minutes afterwards I was at home and I was really excited to see open the magazine. I opened my backpack and picked it up. It was in a very bad condition because it was lying down under the cars' tires but it was whole and that was good enough for me. It had a shiny cover with colorful cover of a mummy's sarcophagus. Its title was "The treasure of Tutankhamun". It had a bright yellow border around it and looked really nice. It was called National Geographic. Apparently, I had acquired the first issue of NG ever printed in my home country. I started reading it and looking at its pictures and then I understood why that guy was staring at it with such intensity. It's like entering a new world! The photo images were breathtaking and the articles were way more interesting that any other magazine that I had read. It was so interesting that my mother had to shake me up in order to grab my attention. I could have been under the cars' tires if I opened it before coming back from school. Anyway, when I read it from cover to back a few times and looked it up on the internet and saw that it was a monthly issue. I immediately stopped spending my pocket money and started waiting for the next issue. From reading the different issues, I started dreaming of travelling to different countries, speaking to other people and taking wonderful pictures. I was so fascinated by that magazine that I wanted to live the life of a NG photojournalist. If I hadn't encountered that unlucky guy with the NG magazine I probably would have never seen the wonder of National Geographic and I probably wouldn't be the same person right now. 

Escape

Day 14. Describe an event that changed your life forever, or make up and describe an event that would change your life forever (1)

One day I was sitting in my office doing the work of a regular office worker and suddenly something struck me. I asked myself the questions “What am I doing with my life? Is this really how I want it to be – excel sheets all day and then TV until nighttime?” I stood up from my chair and left my cubicle. I was in a giant room full of the exact same cubicles as mine. Everybody was clicking on their computers – some of them were working, others were slacking off. And then I looked through the window – yeah, there really was a window in the room, a tiny little window that was letting a little bit of light. And then I saw another person staring at the sky that was shining from the window. She was at the cubicle exactly beneath the window. Her eyes met mine and immediately knew that she felt like me. I didn't really introduce myself and I didn't even say hello. I grabbed her hand and headed for the elevator. I didn't feel the slightest bit of resistance. I even felt like she was pushing me. At the exit we saw our boss talking at his phone. He tried to stand in our way so that he could question us in a minute when his phone call would have ended but we quickly sidestepped and ended up on the street. It was a wonderful day outside. 

Moon food

Day 13. Invent and describe a new food

Today is April 16, 2070, and I'm broadcasting live from the moon. My name is Curious Jiff and this is my show - Food from all around the Universe. Today I'm going to present you something special. As you all probably know, human civilization colonized the moon a few decades ago and we brought different kinds of plants here - tomatoes, cucumbers, rice, etc. The first few harvests were normal but then the plants started adapting to the new environment and this changed them quite a lot. After carefully testing them of bad mutations, the moon nutritional scientists agreed that the mutated plants are eatable and today I'm going to present you moon food. Sounds creepy at first, right? It's okay, as I said, everything here is thoroughly tested. Let us begin!

First, I'm going to make a moon appetizer, made from moon eggplants, moon tomatoes and moon feta cheese. This is quite easy. First, slice the eggplants, flavor them with olive oil, salt and pepper and then grill them for about 5 minutes on your Moonsung electric grill. Meanwhile, mix the moon feta cheese, some moon mayonnaise and moon pepper. Finally, arrange the grilled moon eggplant slices on a moon plate, top each one with a slice of moon tomato, and a spoon of the cheese mixture. Garnish each piece with some fresh moon herbs and serve them.

And now ladies and gentlemen, is time for some moon commercials! See you after the break!

The day that I want to forget...

Day 12. Write about a day you'd like to forget...

I'd really want to forget the day when I won a 3rd place at one regatta. The day was the second day of races and so far my teammate and I were doing okay but we were still in the middle of the ranking. The weather in the second day was very windy and many teams didn't even try to enter the sail races. My teammate and I decided that we had nothing to lose but the dryness of our clothes and we equipped our boat for the race. We went out of the harbor and saw that there were only 4 boats that were going to compete for the prize. The first race started and we headed for the first checkpoint. Racing in that weather was theoretically very easy but it was a lot of work because the boat was constantly getting filled with water so my teammate had to take out the water while I was struggling to keep the boat form capsizing. After the third checkpoint, we noticed that were the second boat in the race and we were very close to the first boat. At that time we got our hopes too high and went on to raise the additional sail that our boat had. Instead of helping us, the extra sail slowed us a lot and we almost became third. The coach was very mad. We managed to get 1 more second place and 1 third place and these results got us to overall third place. 

The reason why I want to forget that day is because after the regatta I felt that I've done everything in my power to succeed in the sailing sport and after a year I stopped going to practice completely. I regret stopping because that's what happened to every sport that I've tried and this makes me think that I can't really continue doing a sport without quitting it. 

I will be...

11. Five years from now, I will be...

Five years from now, I will be more organized, more focused, more a person who knows what he wants from life. I will have learned a great deal about interesting topics like web programming and development, mathematics, mechanical engineering, design, etc. I will have become a true friend to my friends and I will have helped a lot. I will be a person that has traveled a lot, with the intention to travel more. I will be a decent writer and a memory champion for my home country. I will a good teacher, just like the people that inspired me. Like them, I will be able to inspire people to pursue their dreams. I will have traveled around Europe and the States and I will have met a lot of interesting people there.I will have published a number of articles related to my interests and travels. I will be a better and more successful person. 

Give up drugs, please?

Day 10. Persuade a friend to give up drugs

This journal entry is going to be hard. I don't really know what to write on this one. I've seen people doing drugs and I've tried it myself but I didn't see anything in drugs that will play well with the demons in my head. Somehow, it just didn't affect me so I don't really know what people like so much about drugs. Sure, it makes you forget your troubles for a while but they're just going to come back in a couple of hours so why even bother? Instead, try to find a solution to your problems, find a way to deal with them, I don't know how to describe it exactly. I've always thought that if society brings you many problems, either find a way to deal with them or escape from society - just like what Alexander Supertramp did. He was fed up with society's obsession with the material so he just left it. He went to live outside under the blue sky in Alaska and he lived happily there. Sure, he died because of eating something weird but my point is - if you have problems, don't try the temporary solution of drugs.

PS. This is crap. Whoever red this, Sorry!

On being lonely

Day 9. I have never been more frightened than when...

I have never been more frightened when... well, I don't remember a moment when I've felt extremely afraid but what I'm afraid most of is being alone. Yes, I have "autophobia". Because of peer pressure and a lack of knowledge about society, I've always thought that I need somebody beside me, that I need somebody to complete me, that I'm not whole, that I'm a half of something.

Throughout school, both middle and high school, I always felt jealous at the happy boys and girls that were walking down the corridors, running into each other's embraces, hugging and kissing each other as if there was no one around them, as if there were in a paradise where only couples lived. Things only get worse around Valentine day when couples express their love way too intensely and people that don't have partners complain even more than before. I wanted to be in that love paradise, I wanted to be there so much because everyone made such a deal out of it and I thought that it actually was a big deal. In order to protect my consciousness, I told myself and others that I hate them, that I despise every part of their being but really all I felt was - meh. What I actually wanted is to know myself more. Paradoxically, I had to be even more alone to understand that being alone doesn't mean that you'll be surrounded by darkness and evil spirits - you'll always have yourself. Now that I've realized that I'm not actually lonely, I plan the things that I want to experience in order to enrich myself. I plan on making my home inside my head so that I'll always be at home, at the safest place I know.

“Never make your home in a place. Make a home for yourself inside your head. You’ll find what you need to furnish it – memory, friends you can trust, love of learning and other such things. That way, it will go with you whenever you journey. You’ll never lack for a home – unless you lose your head, of course…”

Doctor Morgenes (1)

Work used:

Picture - http://www.deviantart.com/art/Totoro-445939237 by Qinni

(1) Quote from "The Dragonbone Chair" by Tad Williams

What humans are we if we don't question?

Day 8. If and when I raise children, I'll never... 

If and when I raise children, I'll never tell them to do something just because I think it is right. I'll always try to explain every decision that I make and I will also tell them to question my judgement. The reason for is that when I was little I was always told to do something because it was the right thing. When I tried to understand why I have to do something or why something is the way it is, I always received the answers: "Because this is how it is." or "Because I'm right and you're not." I was little back then and because I was also thought to respect the people older than me I developed this bad habit of agreeing with every person older than me which greatly injured my way of thinking. This kind of thinking made me do a lot of mistakes and because I still believed that I was right, I didn't learn anything from these mistakes. If I had known how question, I probably would have taken I completely different path in life. Now, I've realized that many of the ideas that I had agreed to are wrong and I've started questioning the other "truths" that I've been told but it would have been a lot easier if I had realized this sooner. 

I'll teach my children not to believe anything until they find their own understanding of the problem given. I'll also teach them to surround themselves with people that will constantly question my children's judgement so that they live by their own beliefs and thinking, not letting others lead them astray. I'll teach my children to think and observe the world around them because what humans are we if we don't question what we walk on, what we breath, what touch?

About daydreaming during working hours

Day 7. Finish this thought: if I could change one thing about myself 

I would change my bad habit of daydreaming when working. I'd often start daydreaming about something or someone in middle of studying or working and in this way, it would take me hours to finish a simple task such as homework. I've been doing this for as long as I remember. For example, today I had to finish editing my essay and just when I reached the middle of the essay I read a word that reminded of something and then I started thinking about that something. When I realized that I hadn't finished my essay, I already had lost an hour in daydreaming. Just know I stopped writing this entry and started reading an article about mathematical graph theory. It's really unproductive for a person to act like this given that he wants to achieve something in his life.

The best day of my life

Day 6. Write out the best or the worst day of your life. 

I wake up. My back is hurting a little bit from the bumpy spot where I put my tent and sleeping bag but it is okay, I'm fully rested and ready for another wonderful day. I open my eyes and I see my girlfriend still sleeping. I play a little bit with her hair and caress her cheeks. She murmurs something in her sleep and smiles for some reason. I kiss her by the cheek, grab my camera and go outside. The sun's not up yet and it's very dark. When my eyes adjust to the darkness, I distinguish outlines of other people's tents. We're on a mountain trip. I few friends and I decided to take a break from the beach routine and go to the mountain. The mountain is my favorite place and his is my favorite time of the day. The world is getting ready to wake up and I'm up to see it happen. I wait for a few couple of minutes and I see the sunrise. I make some photos, see if they're crappy...yep, they're crappy and I go to the mountain-hostel and use the time until people wake up to do some work. In an hour, I'm done and I see that people are already waking up. One of my friends helps me fix a breakfast and when everybody comes to the hostel we eat together. After breakfast we pack our things and travel to another hostel. On the way we often stop to take pictures, eat a sandwich or take a sip from the tea. We see the remains of an old medieval fort and a few wild animals on the way. By dinnertime we arrive at the other hostel and accommodate ourselves in. We see another group of friends that also likes to go the mountains and we spend the night together. We eat, drink and have fun until midnight when everybody goes to sleep. I fell asleep as a woke up - looking at her face, wondering what great good have I done in my past life to deserve this?

I wish

Day 5. Write about your favorite childhood toy

My favorite childhood toy is... well, I don't remember playing with toys that much. If I really have to name one, it will be some meccano toy - something like LEGO but with nuts and bolts. I liked building different designs of cars and for some time I even tried to make them move with motors and batteries but my interest quickly faded because some of my friends showed me some really cool computer games. Also, my little brother loved breaking my toys and I always ended up doing something that he can't break like reading a book or playing on the computer. Now that I think about it, my brother always clang to me when we were little and I always pushed him away. That's probably the reason why he broke all of my toes. I feel like I've been a awful brother now. Writing sometimes brings you joy but there's also these moments when it brings you sadness - the times when you realize that you've done something wrong. I wish I had fewer toys but more time to spend with my brother. I wish I enjoyed his company more. I wish we were more like brothers than rivals in anything. I wish. 

Bloody Grandpa

Day 4. Describe a real or made-up dream or nightmare.

I am at the house where my father grew up. The house is located in a small village which is almost abandoned after the fall of communism and the only remaining residents are the gypsies who are slowly taking over the forsaken houses. When I was little my father told me stories about how that village was a prosperous town before and how he played games that don’t involve computers with his friends. He was always half-smiling, half-frowning when he told me these stories.

My father’s house is a little to the north from the center in the direction of the cemetery. It is a nice old house on two floors with a kitchen, a big empty living room, one big hallway and two small bedrooms. It has an inside and an outside restroom, a workshop attached to the house and something like storehouse. The garden in front of the house isn’t as big as the neighbor’s gardens but there’s enough room for a rows of wine vines, a place to grow cabbages, onions, tomatoes, pumpkins and also a few fruit-trees, including a gigantic pear tree that has a crown as big as the whole house.

My nightmare involved my grandfather and my grandmother. I was coming from outside and was just entering my house, when something wild flashed past me and attacked my grandparents. I didn’t see anything there just a small shadow whizzing above their heads. From somewhere I pulled a bath and started swinging it in air where I thought the animal was. I was still at the door and my grandparents were one or two meters from me and I was wildly swinging the bat around them, trying to kill whatever they were screaming about. I didn’t see anything but a small shadow flashing above their heads and making them scream. And I kept swinging and swinging, not seeing what and where I hit. When I finally calmed down a saw my grandfather smiling at me with blood leaking out of his mouth and saying “You killed him, son, you killed him.” Then I saw medics taking him out of the house and then I woke up. It was a really creepy nightmare. 

The Lonely Wolf constellation

Day 3: Draw an imaginary constellation. Write a story such as ancient people might have told about it

My grandpa once told me about a mysterious constellation that he had seen during his travels as a seaman in the southern seas. It is mysterious because apparently it can be seen only during from a specific place on Earth, during new moon and even then it's unlikely that it could be seen. The ancient people, grandpa told me, called it The Lonely Wolf. According to the legend, long before written history ever began being written, a mighty tribe once walked on the same soil that are now standing on. The tribe were a horse tribe, they traveled on strong and fast horses than nobody could outrace. Their men were strong, their women were beautiful and they knew no fear. Every other tribe wanted them as allies because the mighty tribe had fierce warriors. Once, however, they stumbled upon a small settler's village on shore of the Vraskan sea. I didn't look like a wealthy village but the tribe had almost finished its resources so the head of the tribe - the Wolf, as they called him, decided to attack the village. The settlers didn't know about the ferocity of the horse tribe so they tried to retaliate. Because of the retaliation, the Wolf decided to mercilessly kill every second person in the tribe and take everything from them. After the attach, the mighty tribe continued their journey north leaving the village burning. Half a year afterwards the Wolf decided to see if there's anything left of the tribe. They traveled towards the same place and found that the tribe had moved a little to the south fortifying a hard to attack position. Because they knew no fear, the Wolf and his subordinates decided to attack the village again and take their resources but as they attacked they saw how, one by one, every member of the tribe starting falling into traps or getting hit by a shower of arrows. Disregarding everything the tribe raced faster and faster towards the village. The Wolf was the head of the pack and reached the village gates first but when he turned around to see where were his subordinates his saw them all lying dead behind him. Devastated by this loss he retreated to the nearest mountain while being chased by the villages guards. They chased him to the top of the mountain but then he disappeared. When they checked for his body at the foothill of the cliff they didn't find his body. The next night they say a new constellation on the sky which became dimmer and dimmer as the years rolled. They called this constellation "The Lonely Wolf"

The onion and garlic-flavored gum

Day 2: Write a thank you note to a friend who gave you onion and garlic-flavored chewing gum.

Thank you, Brian, for giving me one of your onion and garlic-flavored chewing gums! I had forgotten that you gave me one but just when I was travelling for my job interview for Google, I reached into my pocket and found it. Because the wrapping is the same as the gums of Winterfresh, I thought that it was a Winterfresh gum and put it without thinking into my mouth. At first I was really surprised by the taste but then my taste buds felt the great flavor that was locked into these gums. I chewed with pleasure while everybody from my subway wagon left for some reason. At the interview, the interviewers asked me few questions but all of them were exactly from fields that I wasn't really prepared for so I just started rambling about different projects and just added a few terms from the fields that they asked me for and I talked like that for two hours. At the end, the interviewers begged me to stop and said that if I don't chew any more onion and garlic-flavored gums they'd be happy to have me as a part of their team. 

So, thank you again, Brian, for giving me my favorite type of gum and landing me an offer from Google. Next time we go out for drinks, it's my treat!

Thanks a third time,

Jiff

Announcement: 180 day journal challenge

Hello guys, 

I've heard that writing a journal is very helpful to becoming a better writer so I decided to start my own. Moreover, I decided to take up a challenge - the 180 day challenge of writing journal entries. My goal is to write 180 journal entries without missing even a day. Any comments or grammar/spelling corrections are welcome!

Day 1: Write about going back to school after summer vacation.

Going back to school has its ups and downs. At the end of the summer I'm already sick and tired of lying at the sofa, sitting on my chair or tanning at the beach. I'm already filled with excitement to see my classmates and my teachers. Well, I don't really want to see some teachers from my high school but that's another topic.In the beginning of the school year the hot weather in my hometown starts to cool down and going out in the middle of the day becomes bearable again. During the first two weeks, teachers are still lenient towards us, happy to see our faces until one day we manage to put a frown on theirs. The newly acquired second-hand textbooks still lay untouched in the plastic bag from the bookstore where I bought them for 5 bucks a pound. Going to the beach becomes interesting again and we all exchange stories from the summer with each other.

However, the downs of going back to school is that... well, we would have to study again. Who wants to study? I like reading about stuff but not studying. Naturally, my weekly and monthly schedules becomes inflexible again and I'd have to adjust it to my vacations. Parents start nagging about studying, about grades and all the stuff we students don't want to hear a word about. 

In general, going back to school may unpleasant if we look at the things that we would have to endure during the school year but it all becomes bearable when you see your friends from your class and from the other classes as well. School might not be that bad after all.