No. 3 Pencils

I often enjoy spending Saturday mornings trapped in an unknown classroom of some unknown school for hours upon end, staring into nowhere while waiting for my standardized testing experience (read: torture) to begin. I have chewed my pencil’s eraser end in the shape of the proctor’s head so that I can gnaw on it whenever his voice (or his words) gets boring or repetitive.

He read from the 500-page “Proctor Instruction Manual” “Today, you will be taking a test administered by…” gnaw slowly…it’s gotta last… “…in an effort to continuously improve the testing experience, today’s test has a different format than previously known” What?!#$%?!! No! The test was hard enough already! After the proctor finished reading the instructions, (I chewed down to the chin of the eraser head model) I received an answer sheet that was in the shape of…a circle? I thought this was a mistake, but the proctor reassured us “The testing administration hopes to improve scores with these new sheets, since they are easier to store and transport. In my opinion, circles represent wholeness and completeness Yeah. It’s also the shape of a ZERO!!! The name, address, etc. blanks spiral inwards, which eliminated jumping from box to box.

What surprised me next, was when the proctor handed out stickers!!! “These stickers are for your name, address, and other information, so use them carefully. I’ve been told there’s 15 of each letter, number, or symbol that you could possibly use, so I don’t think you’ll run out” This test is actually a whole lot cooler! I thought as I pasted the stickers on the sheet. Afterwards, the proctor plunked the question booklet on our desks. When he instructed us, I opened the book to the first question. It was a SUDOKU PUZZLE!!! I solved the five missing blanks, and filled in the bubbles on the answer sheet. Whoa! Each question had one circle next to the question number, and the instructions said to modify circle with one of the five designs:

a=☺, b=®, c=Ø, d=Ө, and e=Θ. The rest of the test contained questions like “What gender are you?” “1+1 ISN’T equal to:” “How many teeth should you have?” “Should you drink mercury?” “Is it safe to microwave aluminum?” and my favorite: “How are you feeling today?”

After I finished my test, the proctor called time. Then I heard my cell phone ring. I opened the phone, but it still kept on ringing. I could not get the phone to stop ringing…“YJ!...YJ!!...YJ!!!!!!” Huh? I awoke. “Breakfast is ready. We can’t be late to the testing center!” said my mom a bit too cheerfully. DARN! I’m toast. If I don’t grid my answers correctly today, it is NOT my fault.

Originally Published in Tower Times, Whitefish Bay High School

The Power of Rain

Rain is powerful. No, I'm not talking about some flavor of gum or electrolyte-enhanced sport beverage or men's body spray. I'm talking about clean, pure, slightly acidified rain that falls from above. On everything. Outside.

"Rain is influential" might have been a better way to put it. Rain made some guy (or gal, I dunno) write a cheerful tune with lyrics you may recognize:
"Rain, rain, go away/come again another day/[insert name here]'s friends all want to play/rain rain go away"

I'm kinda making up the third and fourth line in the sense that I'm not sure if those are indeed the right lyrics, but I know the first two lines are correct. Correct? Yes. Logical? Not yes.

I have always been curious ("always" meaning "since some point in time a while ago that I fail to remember") as to why the words "come again another day" are in the song.

Singing this cheerful tune implies this: The singer does not want it to be raining. Why? I think "rain, rain go away" makes it pretty clear why. So is the singer bipolar? Why does he or she want the rain to go away and yet wants it to come back again another day (besides today)?

Some may answer me in saying "The plants needs rain. Duh!" and to them I say "Touché...BUT! Let me ask you this: "

When the rain comes again "another day", what will one do? Sing the "Rain Go Away" song, right? (I realize the person may not mind it raining that particular "another day" on which the rain "[came] again", but even so, how often does that realistically happen? It's seen as a "very necessary evil" in the sense that we obviously would die without rain, but we don't want it "raining on our parade". Ya heard of that saying?) In this second singing of the song, the singer would express their desire for the rain which "[came] again another day" to "come again another day". This rain obviously won't relent and come again on "another day", because when the rain comes on that "another day", the singer will just selfishly want it to come on a different day!

This madness confuses logicians (a word I made up meaning "people who study logic") worldwide, in addition to filling children's minds with evil vile lies about what we really want when it is raining.

Therefore, I propose this new version of the popular song:
"Rain, rain, go away/come when I don't want to play/the plants can drink some other day/that's when you should fall, okay?"

Shining Properties of Apple Products

So you may think this entry concerns the positive features of Apple devices and how they outshine the competition, right? Right! I'm just kidding. This blog post talks about things that all Apple devices seem to have in common: Here we go!

Before you critics begin to criticize, let me list the products of which I'm talking about:
iPad, iPhone, iPod shuffle, iPod nano, iPod classic, iPod touch, MacBook, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, Mac mini, iMac, Mac Pro, Apple TV

10.) Apple Logo
Let's start with the basic. Yeah, I know it's obvious, but it's not a stretch! Okay, fine. I include within this point that they all contain or display on the outside some variety of metal (that was going to be a separate point)

9.) Shape
All Apple products have a rectangular shape. Remember that a square is classified as a rectangle, but not vice versa. Some have rounded rectangular shapes when viewed from the front, but devices such as the iPod nano have sharp corners when viewed from the front.

8.) Desirability Regardless of Necessity
Whether or not you need an Apple device, if you were offered it for free (including monthly fees). I know very few people who would deny such an offer. The way Apple markets their product appeals to people, who will buy whatever they produce. (The first two sentences and the third sentence of #6 complement each other quite nicely, don't they? I would say it leaves me neutral!)

7.) Price (see #4)
All Apple products have a high price for the device's functions and capability, but I am not presenting this as a good or bad thing. Apple has integrity in their products enough to believe they merit such pricing, and I have nothing to say about that!

6.) Content Control
All Apple products have quite restrictive control over what software and content can be synced or transferred to and from devices. iTunes regulates audio and video content, while Microsoft Office programs and games have exclusive mac versions

5.) Easily Damaged Headphones
One time, my headphone cord got caught in a jagged corner of some variety, and a small rip formed. Another time, I accidentally dipped a portion of the headphone in some kimchi liquid, and found it irrevocably stained a reddish hue. (I mispelled "portion" as "potion" when I first typed this sentence. Just thought you'd want to know) Yet another time, after sleeping with the iPhone headphones in my ears some nights, the remote control piece magically ceased to function! I'm making an assumption here when I think all Apple products come with headphones, but if they don't, you need to buy them, probably, which would make this common feature a valid point.

4.) Feeling Incited in Gift Giving (see #7)
Since Apple products are not cheap, when one receives an Apple device as a gift, usually the gift giver is seen to possess a lot of money, or that they went through a lot of trouble in buying the device.


3.) Cheerleader Support
No Apple product is attributed with a less than excellent adjective, and this can especially be seen in the iPad, which has been even described as "magical". Adjectives like "intuitive", "simple", "easy", "funnest" and adverbs like "very" and "extremely" ("simply", "easily", "schmesily", "squeezily"...yes, you get the point) all hype up the product and fails to remind the consumer that a device is just a device. Nothing more, strictly speaking from a technical standpoint.

2.) Color Option
All Apple devices have that gray/grey/metal/white hue color as an option. I think that's just their signature color that they'll copyright someday...like Wimbleton Blue or Target Red!

1.) LED Backlight
We can thank Apple for making products which have an LED backlight bright enough to substitute a flashlight in the dark, cause eye pain after long use, and quickly use up that annoying small remnant of charge left on the device.

Thus, Apple is quite the unified company who makes it relatively easy for me to handpick ten features that all their devices share in common! Either that, or I'm picky enough to notice 10 similarities. Now you can save the world with this knowledge, so go ahead. You have my permission.