So, I'm watching Hogan's Heroes, and I realize that I could learn a lot of manipulation techniques from these guys. Having studied episode after episode of this, I now have a list of two techniques to use. Here they are:
Technique 1:
1. Find a really stupid person.
2. Find out what they're scared of.
3. Tell them that it's going to happen.
4. Tell them that they can get out of it if they do what you want them to.
5. When they find out that it wasn't going to happen, blame rumor.
Technique 2:
1. Find a really stupid person.
2. Find out what they like.
3. Tell them that it will only happen if they do what you want.
4. Pretend to give it to them.
5. Push the red button at the last minute.
Both of these techniques seem to be foolproof. As soon as I can, I'll try them out and my life will finally go the way I want it to.
Only one problem.
I don't know any really stupid people.
That kind of messes things up a bit. Maybe I can find out how to manipulate smart people someday.
Or maybe I could just try being content. That might work better.
Laura
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Catching Up
Before you kill me for not posting, please just let me apologize. I've been busy. (Yes, busy for a month and a half.)
So, let's catch up on some of the things that have happened since April Fools Day. I had a birthday and am now approximately older than I used to be (surprise, that). I got my driver's license, to the horror of my family, my friends, and the entire Police Department. I took the ACT, and am currently trying to entertain a cousin for three weeks. I cooked, cleaned, and read a book about an evil mechanical unicorn.
I visited Arches National Park and collapsed, exhausted, when we got home. I made an orange-pineapple-and-tomato chutney to go on top of fish. I began talking like a webcomic character and ate a nasturtium steak. I chased a cabbage butterfly to keep it away from my cabbages and made coleslaw out of other cabbages.
I did things involving roses, things involving lemon basil, and things involving drying chamomile flowers on a plate by the stove. My cousin and sisters put on two plays, one involving a stupid prince, a hippy prince, and an accidental love potion. The other involved a stupid dragon, a princess in shining armor, and a wizard costume.
I wrote a bit of my book, let Mom read it, and consequently drove her crazy because I'd stopped at a cliffhanger. I also made up another two books and a comic strip about a baby dragon and a kit fox. (Don't expect much from this for a while.)
The one thing I have not done much of is schoolwork. I'm kind of a failure as a homeschooler, I guess, but it's taught me how to dry chamomile by the stove. So, now that you know everything I've done, I need to go do something else blog-worthy.
So long!
Laura
P.S. Don't let Crazy Joe anywhere near the explosives while I'm gone!
So, let's catch up on some of the things that have happened since April Fools Day. I had a birthday and am now approximately older than I used to be (surprise, that). I got my driver's license, to the horror of my family, my friends, and the entire Police Department. I took the ACT, and am currently trying to entertain a cousin for three weeks. I cooked, cleaned, and read a book about an evil mechanical unicorn.
I visited Arches National Park and collapsed, exhausted, when we got home. I made an orange-pineapple-and-tomato chutney to go on top of fish. I began talking like a webcomic character and ate a nasturtium steak. I chased a cabbage butterfly to keep it away from my cabbages and made coleslaw out of other cabbages.
I did things involving roses, things involving lemon basil, and things involving drying chamomile flowers on a plate by the stove. My cousin and sisters put on two plays, one involving a stupid prince, a hippy prince, and an accidental love potion. The other involved a stupid dragon, a princess in shining armor, and a wizard costume.
I wrote a bit of my book, let Mom read it, and consequently drove her crazy because I'd stopped at a cliffhanger. I also made up another two books and a comic strip about a baby dragon and a kit fox. (Don't expect much from this for a while.)
The one thing I have not done much of is schoolwork. I'm kind of a failure as a homeschooler, I guess, but it's taught me how to dry chamomile by the stove. So, now that you know everything I've done, I need to go do something else blog-worthy.
So long!
Laura
P.S. Don't let Crazy Joe anywhere near the explosives while I'm gone!
Monday, April 1, 2013
April Fools Day
Hello again, Blog-reader. It's April Fools Day! So here's how not to run your April Fools Day.
I wake up this morning, and I realize that it's way too early. Then I realize that I was the one who set my alarm to go off at that ridiculous hour of the night. Not a good start. Don't do that.
I wake up again after a crazy and amazing dream, only to realize that I overslept drastically. (That's an extremely bad idea on April Fools Day. Don't do it. On second thought, don't sleep at all on April Fools Day. It's safer.)
I then start doing some last-minute scheming. Lousy idea. If you're going to prank anyone, plan several weeks in advance. Last-minute pranks are always either lousy or mean.
By the way, never do a mean prank. Get someone soaking wet? Sure, why not. Get someone soaking wet on their way out the door to that all-important interview? Better not. That's how you get hurt. And if your prank injures anyone, chances are that you'll be the one going bankrupt over the doctor's bill.
So, back to my day. I bring Mom her spiced tea, the way I do every morning. Only it's not tea today, it's coffee with enough orange juice and cinnamon to make it look and smell like her tea. I also make her a cup of her real tea as a conciliating gesture. I mean, really, how can she murder me if I'm already bring her her real tea? I then find out that she talked my little sister into bringing her some tea, so I'll have to wait for her to finish her first cup off before she tastes mine. By then her real tea will be cold, giving her about thirty seconds to come find me before I can give it to her. Things are rapidly going downhill.
I then decide that, since I'm about to die anyways, I might as well prank Mom twice. So I start sending her blank texts. She yells, "Laura, you're pocket-texting again!" (My phone pocket-dials, takes pocket-pictures, pocket-texts.... Sigh. Once it even called 911, but I won't go into that now.) I send her at least seven messages before I get tired of it and tell her what I did.
She sighs and tells me that it wasn't really funny. I then turn to leave, and she jokingly asks me, "Is that real tea?"
WHAT? NOOO! My best practical joke in years, and I ruin it because of a boring one? NOOOOOOOOOOO!
But I have to answer her, and I can't lie! Lying makes me feel like I just rolled in a sewer. It's awful. So I tell her the truth. Sigh.
Now I wasted a prank that she says would have been funny for one that wasn't. Sigh. Pick and choose your pranks. You never know what might happen.
So then I prank her one last time.... I do all the dishes, tell her it was my little sisters who did it, and hope she thinks she's gone crazy. She doesn't. Sigh.
And then I realize I lied. April Fools Day isn't much fun anymore. At least, not until I tell her the truth. So I finally do, then spend the rest of my time writing a blog post. I can't decide whether it's a waste of time or not. Oh well. You decide for me. And don't tell me it was if it wasn't, because by the time you comment, April Fools Day will most likely be over and you won't have any excuse. Sorry about that, by the way.
Laura
I wake up this morning, and I realize that it's way too early. Then I realize that I was the one who set my alarm to go off at that ridiculous hour of the night. Not a good start. Don't do that.
I wake up again after a crazy and amazing dream, only to realize that I overslept drastically. (That's an extremely bad idea on April Fools Day. Don't do it. On second thought, don't sleep at all on April Fools Day. It's safer.)
I then start doing some last-minute scheming. Lousy idea. If you're going to prank anyone, plan several weeks in advance. Last-minute pranks are always either lousy or mean.
By the way, never do a mean prank. Get someone soaking wet? Sure, why not. Get someone soaking wet on their way out the door to that all-important interview? Better not. That's how you get hurt. And if your prank injures anyone, chances are that you'll be the one going bankrupt over the doctor's bill.
So, back to my day. I bring Mom her spiced tea, the way I do every morning. Only it's not tea today, it's coffee with enough orange juice and cinnamon to make it look and smell like her tea. I also make her a cup of her real tea as a conciliating gesture. I mean, really, how can she murder me if I'm already bring her her real tea? I then find out that she talked my little sister into bringing her some tea, so I'll have to wait for her to finish her first cup off before she tastes mine. By then her real tea will be cold, giving her about thirty seconds to come find me before I can give it to her. Things are rapidly going downhill.
I then decide that, since I'm about to die anyways, I might as well prank Mom twice. So I start sending her blank texts. She yells, "Laura, you're pocket-texting again!" (My phone pocket-dials, takes pocket-pictures, pocket-texts.... Sigh. Once it even called 911, but I won't go into that now.) I send her at least seven messages before I get tired of it and tell her what I did.
She sighs and tells me that it wasn't really funny. I then turn to leave, and she jokingly asks me, "Is that real tea?"
WHAT? NOOO! My best practical joke in years, and I ruin it because of a boring one? NOOOOOOOOOOO!
But I have to answer her, and I can't lie! Lying makes me feel like I just rolled in a sewer. It's awful. So I tell her the truth. Sigh.
Now I wasted a prank that she says would have been funny for one that wasn't. Sigh. Pick and choose your pranks. You never know what might happen.
So then I prank her one last time.... I do all the dishes, tell her it was my little sisters who did it, and hope she thinks she's gone crazy. She doesn't. Sigh.
And then I realize I lied. April Fools Day isn't much fun anymore. At least, not until I tell her the truth. So I finally do, then spend the rest of my time writing a blog post. I can't decide whether it's a waste of time or not. Oh well. You decide for me. And don't tell me it was if it wasn't, because by the time you comment, April Fools Day will most likely be over and you won't have any excuse. Sorry about that, by the way.
Laura
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Easter Musings
So, today I'm going to ramble through a lot of theological 'maybes' and 'perhapses', mostly because Easter makes me think. But I don't just write stuff like this, I write because I want you to think about it. If you don't like what I say here, please don't panic. This is just wondering.
So, here are a few things I think about Easter.
I think that we don't really understand how much suffering was involved in the work of the Cross. Christ had been beaten; we think that only means they whipped him a few times. But Roman beatings were absolutely brutal. Onlookers might catch a glimpse of the victim's internal organs through the blood. Imagine someone ripping your back off and adding a few more lashes to your liver for good measure. But worse was the guilt. We're miserable when we know that we did something wrong and disappointed someone we love. Now imagine never having disappointed someone you love infinitely, and then the load of guilt from every person that ever lived suddenly hits you somewhere in the heart region. You still aren't seeing it properly, but you're a little closer.
I think that Christ's final words on the Cross dramatically challenge some ideas about salvation that a lot of people hold. They think that they have to add to God's grace, but He said, "It is finished." Absolutely finished. If it's already finished, how could we add to our own salvation? You couldn't make a better cake by baking it twice. You'd get a blackened disk that was once edible. In the same way, you couldn't make finished salvation better.
And I think that the world would be a much better place if we remembered that Easter applies to every part of our lives, every day of the year.
HE IS RISEN!
Laura
So, here are a few things I think about Easter.
I think that we don't really understand how much suffering was involved in the work of the Cross. Christ had been beaten; we think that only means they whipped him a few times. But Roman beatings were absolutely brutal. Onlookers might catch a glimpse of the victim's internal organs through the blood. Imagine someone ripping your back off and adding a few more lashes to your liver for good measure. But worse was the guilt. We're miserable when we know that we did something wrong and disappointed someone we love. Now imagine never having disappointed someone you love infinitely, and then the load of guilt from every person that ever lived suddenly hits you somewhere in the heart region. You still aren't seeing it properly, but you're a little closer.
I think that Christ's final words on the Cross dramatically challenge some ideas about salvation that a lot of people hold. They think that they have to add to God's grace, but He said, "It is finished." Absolutely finished. If it's already finished, how could we add to our own salvation? You couldn't make a better cake by baking it twice. You'd get a blackened disk that was once edible. In the same way, you couldn't make finished salvation better.
And I think that the world would be a much better place if we remembered that Easter applies to every part of our lives, every day of the year.
HE IS RISEN!
Laura
Friday, March 29, 2013
Introductions
Hello, Blog-reader. My name is Laura, and I tilt at windmills.
No, no, not literally. Horses cost too much, not to mention the expense of armor and a windmill. It's annoying. Maybe someday I'll save up enough money, and then I'll tilt at windmills. But not now.
So, on with the introduction. I am a Christian Homeschooled Kid living in a city that's out somewhere near the middle of nowhere. I have three sisters, no brothers, a dog and a cat. I'm approximately in my teens, psychotically reclusive, and scared of shadows. (But only when I'm wandering around the dark house at 11 P.M. wondering where everyone is because I stayed up too late reading.) I have fun with cooking, cleaning the house (as long as it doesn't involve scents, I'm allergic to most chemical smells), and petting my cat. I have multiple food allergies and am currently on a crazily restricted diet, but I don't mind because that way Mom gets me more exotic things to cook with. I make jewelry sometimes, try to keep my room clean, and hide whenever someone rings the doorbell (just kidding, I'm not that reclusive). Life at the moment involves frantic memorization so that I can get a small scholarship, my cat's incapability of walking down the hall without company, a small Monopoly city abandoned in the living room, and attempts to get to bed on time.
Oh, and one other thing you should know about me:
I have a bizarre mental life. I write about it, too. I have to pick and choose various parts, of course; sci-fi weapons do not belong in the same universe as regency romance novels no matter what the voices in my head say. But no decent genre has escaped my mind as far as I know.
This is the only place where anyone will ever see the pure, unfiltered chaos of my crazy brain. Try not to panic if dragons and WWII meet; that's the least unusual of the clashes. This stuff just happens.
I try to give credit where credit is due, but sometimes I forget Who made my brain, and my allergies, and my sisters. It's literally depressing when I do. Everything gets a lot heavier and it feels like the light is fading. If it feels like this blog is going downhill, please post a comment about God's strength, or His Sovereignty, or anything about Him. Thanks.
And now, the evidence of my tangled brain: an argument between myself and a character I'm writing about.
Character: I don't think it's fair for you to control us all like this.
Me: I'm the author, I can do what I want.
Character: So, you're like God, in a way?
Me: Yes, sort of. I'm not God, but-
Character: But isn't there a God out there where you are, too?
Me: Yes, there is. Why?
Character: Then He has control, right?
Me: Yes....
Character: So what He wants there to be in this book will be in there, right?
Me: Yes....
Character: So you can't just pour in whatever you want! It has to also be what He wants! And if the two of you want different things, He wins! Therefore, you can't just do what you want.
Me: Uh.... Um.... Well....
Yes, I did lose an argument with someone I made up. Scary, huh?
So long!
Laura
No, no, not literally. Horses cost too much, not to mention the expense of armor and a windmill. It's annoying. Maybe someday I'll save up enough money, and then I'll tilt at windmills. But not now.
So, on with the introduction. I am a Christian Homeschooled Kid living in a city that's out somewhere near the middle of nowhere. I have three sisters, no brothers, a dog and a cat. I'm approximately in my teens, psychotically reclusive, and scared of shadows. (But only when I'm wandering around the dark house at 11 P.M. wondering where everyone is because I stayed up too late reading.) I have fun with cooking, cleaning the house (as long as it doesn't involve scents, I'm allergic to most chemical smells), and petting my cat. I have multiple food allergies and am currently on a crazily restricted diet, but I don't mind because that way Mom gets me more exotic things to cook with. I make jewelry sometimes, try to keep my room clean, and hide whenever someone rings the doorbell (just kidding, I'm not that reclusive). Life at the moment involves frantic memorization so that I can get a small scholarship, my cat's incapability of walking down the hall without company, a small Monopoly city abandoned in the living room, and attempts to get to bed on time.
Oh, and one other thing you should know about me:
I have a bizarre mental life. I write about it, too. I have to pick and choose various parts, of course; sci-fi weapons do not belong in the same universe as regency romance novels no matter what the voices in my head say. But no decent genre has escaped my mind as far as I know.
This is the only place where anyone will ever see the pure, unfiltered chaos of my crazy brain. Try not to panic if dragons and WWII meet; that's the least unusual of the clashes. This stuff just happens.
I try to give credit where credit is due, but sometimes I forget Who made my brain, and my allergies, and my sisters. It's literally depressing when I do. Everything gets a lot heavier and it feels like the light is fading. If it feels like this blog is going downhill, please post a comment about God's strength, or His Sovereignty, or anything about Him. Thanks.
And now, the evidence of my tangled brain: an argument between myself and a character I'm writing about.
Character: I don't think it's fair for you to control us all like this.
Me: I'm the author, I can do what I want.
Character: So, you're like God, in a way?
Me: Yes, sort of. I'm not God, but-
Character: But isn't there a God out there where you are, too?
Me: Yes, there is. Why?
Character: Then He has control, right?
Me: Yes....
Character: So what He wants there to be in this book will be in there, right?
Me: Yes....
Character: So you can't just pour in whatever you want! It has to also be what He wants! And if the two of you want different things, He wins! Therefore, you can't just do what you want.
Me: Uh.... Um.... Well....
Yes, I did lose an argument with someone I made up. Scary, huh?
So long!
Laura
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