Dreams

Since we're reading A Midsummer's Night Dream by William Shakespeare we have to interpret a rescent dream. Last night I dreamed that I escaped a robot fortress with some Jedi and we ran through a snow covered forest. I wore a whiet poncho so they couldn't see me in the snow and I crossed a big field with it on. Then we went to a McDonalds and had Lunch. Appearently McDonalds is a symbol of happiness or I was hungry. Snow is some kind of symbol of cold isolation, so that wasn't good. I didn't try to interpret "robot fortress" or "Jedi" because I don't want to know what the internet might come up with.

2nd Semester

For my English blog this semester I picked the theme English Paper, so now my blog looks like a gigantic english paper. Yes, very creative, I know.

Boring Orange

In the short story The Mask of the Red Death, by Edgar Allen Poe, different colored rooms were used to symbolize different stages of life. The color orange was selected by Poe to represent the stage of life from about 21 years of age to about age 50. Of all of the rooms, this one made the least amount of sense.

An analysis of the seven rooms proves that all of the other colors have some meaning, but orange. We only know what ages it represents because of the gap between green and white. If one ponders the meaning of the color orange and middle aged adults then they will deduce that there are few connections. People of this age have a lust for life; gold may have been a good choice. They are spontaneous or sometimes angry: maybe red. Did Poe blend the two colors to make orange? Probably not, he might have just been daft. It may be close to red or gold, but it isn’t either one. Was Poe off his rocker, or was he just as uncertain about what color to use as the rest of us? No one will ever know.

The people I know who are between 21 and 50 seem to be happy. I think I heard that in south-western Russia orange is the color of happiness. Connection? Possibly. Then again some of these people are angry that they are getting older. Red is the color anger, another possible connection. When I think of these people, orange defiantly doesn’t come to mind. Poe was a heavy drinker, maybe his decision about the use of orange was made when he got home from the bar one night. Who knows? One thing is certain, of all the colored rooms in The Masque of the Red Death, Orange was the most pointless.    

Supertramp with a wild side.

The book Into the Wild by John Krakauer is a story of adventure and the pursuit of happiness. In this book Chris McCandless travels North America in search of fulfillment in an unconventional way; he roams the continent as a tramp enjoying the landscape and culture. Along the way he makes many friends and sees places that change his life. This book is great for anyone who likes tales of adventures and wilderness survival; I personally enjoied it.

O.Henry

• O. Henry is the pen name for William Sydney Porter.
• He was bourn in Greenboro North Carolina.
• After he was fifteen he lived in Texas for his early life.
• However trouble with the law made him relocate to Honduras.
• After 3 years in Honduras he returned and was arrested.
• While in jail he started writing to make money for his daughter.
• In 1902 he moved to New York City.
• He wrote many published stories about New York life.
• He was an alcoholic, sometimes drinking two quarts of wiskey daily.
• In 1910 he died of Cirrhosis in the Liver. 
• www.kirjasto.sci.fi/ohenry.htm

Edgar Allen Poe Unit

Edgar Allan Poe Website Questions
1.Provide the following biographical information: birthdate; birthplace; death date. Poe was born on January 19th, 1809 in Boston. He died on October 7th in Baltimore.
2.What tragic childhood events influenced his writing? When Poe was a child both of his parents died in the same year. This probably influenced his grim writting.
3.There are 13 theories on what caused Poe's death. List five of them. 1. Diabetes, 2.Rabies 3. A Toxic Disorder 4. Epilopsy 5. Dipsomnia
6.What famous military academy expelled Poe in 1831? In 1831 Poe was expelled from West Point.
7.Who did Poe marry? How old was she? Poe married Virginia Clemm, who was 13 years old.
9.What is "Murders in the Rue Morgue" the first of? This was a detective story, the first of which that is considered to be written in a modern format.
10.When was "The Tell-Tale Heart" and "The Black Cat" written? Both of these stories were written in 1843.
11.When was "The Raven" published? "The Raven was published in 1845.
12.Check out the Poe photo gallery. Which picture looks most like the Poe you envision while reading his stories? Of the twelve pictures, the 8th is the one that I envisioned him as.
17.Who is the Poe Toaster? The Poe toaster is an unidentified person who leaves a bottle of alcohol with a rose in it on Poe's grave once every year.

information from http://www.poestories.com/ and http://www.poemuseam.com/
In my life I haven't done very much with Poe. When I was little my older cousin told me the story "The Pendulum in the Pit". It scared me a bit. That was my only previous Poe experience.

Quarter 2

Time for round two of my english blog. It was so boring that I set it on fire to make it better. That is why it is called the burning english blog. This quarter is going to be better than the first, because it won't be as depressing. The flames are only on the top of the blog because that is the only part that is worth reading.