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I should actually answer this . . .
Okay, so, the cop-out answer is any and every fantasy and fairy tale I read as a child. They really nurtured my imagination and my love of stories and storytelling.
The non-cop-out is The Enchanted Forest Chronicles by Patricia C Wrede. Those books were my childhood, and they inspired most of the games I played with my friends, which in turn inspired the first stories I tried to write. -
. . . Sorry. As Deputy Queen of the Universe in Charge of Most of the Weater . . . I guess that's kinda my fault . . .
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I don't much care, as long as I get to be the Albert figure and mentor him as he grows into his Decepticon eating abilities.
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Ebay. Duh.
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Eh . . . the classes themselves are going fine and I'm really excited about all of them, which is new and unknown for me. I'm in an acting class based on building characters, a musical theatre history class, a youth and pop culture class (which I'm hoping might shed some light on the vampire lit phenomenon), and a service learning course about storytelling that will actually let me get into some elementary classrooms and doing exercises with kids.
The term itself . . . could be better. Extracurricular stuff is giving me some grief, and I am, as ever, wrestling with my department, which is irritating. But I'm focusing on the classes themselves, and I think the rest of it is getting sorted out all right. -
Sigh . . . okay.
So, the first thing you have to know is that I used to get sickk more than everyone else in my family, and probably more than both my brothers combined. Generally, I had one major illness each winter, and I had the tendency to get sick right before some kind of trip. Seventh grade, bronchitus, right before a choir tour to Vancouver. Eighth grade, influenza, right before a choir tour to Chicago. Ninth grade, strep throat, right before a band trip to Florida. You get the picture.
Well, it got to the point where I would walk into the doctor's office and my pediatrition would ask me where I was going this time. But at least they were all fairly ordinary diseases, even if he did begin to call me Typhoid Cassie.
Then came winter tenth grade. I developed a rash on my arms and legs, and I had canker sores all over the inside of my mouth. After five days or so of this, I went to the doctor, did the whole bit. And Dr. Tomchak comes back into the exam room laughing.
I had Hand, Foot, and Mouth, a disease that is very rarely seen after the age of four. I was fifteen, and the second oldest person Dr. Tomchak had seen with it.
So, yeah. That'd be the most bizarre thing. A preschool disease while in high school. -
That's a hard question. If you'd asked me . . . seven, eight years ago, I'd have said my life would have been a million times better. Now, though, I consider myself fairly close to both my brothers, and had I been an only child, I would have missed out on those friendships. I also wouldn't have had Matthew and Jeffrey to kind of . . . diffuse Mom and her attention? I guess is the best way to put it.
Also, no West Wing quote sessions, and that would have made my life significantly emptier. -
Vampire lit. Will someone please explain the explosion of vampire literature, as well as the appeal of said literature? I'm not just talking Twilight, either, though I certainly don't understand Twilight or its appeal. But I'm talking this entire huge phenomenon of vampire lit. There's a lot about pop culture I don't fully understand, but this is the biggest one.
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Okay. Basically:
Pre-school: Most American kids spend one or two years in a preschool. It's not a required part of schooling, and a lot of times it's really more of a day care system, but it kind of helps prepare kids for mainstream school.
Our school year is late August/early September to late May/early June, divided into two semesters, and further divisions vary by school, but grading periods are either two nine-week periods per semester or three six-week periods per semester.
Elementary school: When kids are five or six, they're enrolled in elementary school. The lowest grade is Kindergarten. The age is really up to the discretion of the parents. At the beginning of the school year, the child has to be five, but lots of parents wait until the child is six for maturity purposes. Kindergarten is the grade most often repeated, and it's usually for reasons of maturity rather than intelligence. For instance, I turned five in July and started Kindergarten that September because I was already reading and there was no reason for me not to, but I could have started the next year.
Kindergarteners also only usually attend for half the time as other elementary students. Personally, I went full time, five days a week, but Matthew was in morning kindergarten five days a week, and Jeffrey had the bizarre schedule of Monday, Wednesday, and every other Friday.
The next year, then, starts the numbered grades. Depending on the school system, elementary school go either to 4th or 6th grade (though most are going to 4th grade now). So, in terms of ages, kids usually go to elementary school until the age of 9 or 10.
Middle and High School: After elementary school, most kids go to middle school (5th to 8th grade). 7th and 8th grade (ages 12 to 14-ish) are usually referred to as Junior High. High school, then, is 9th to 12th grade (freshman, sophomore, junior, senior), and we also have the vocational option for upperclassmen. High schools also offer Advanced Placement (AP) classes, and tests for those can be taken at the end of the school year and potentially earn college credit for them. Most high schools also offer something called a Post-Secondary option (PSOP), in which high school juniors and seniors can take courses at a local college or university for college credit.
After high school is college or university (we use the terms interchangeably), which can then be followed by grad school. If you don't go for a vocational degree in high school, you don't really start specializing in a career until university.
As far as testing goes . . . I'll be the first to say that it is supremely messed up. Every other year (2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th), students are required to take statewide Proficiency exams, which are standardized tests set by the government. They last a week, and there are five in all, Reading, Math, Science, Composition, Social Studies. The results affect both the schools and the students. High school standardized testing has changed since I was there, but I know that I took the PLAN test in 10th grade, the PSAT in 11th and the ACT in 12th. The ACT and the SAT are the two tests whose scores are used for admission to college/university. So, yeah. American students are tested within an inch of their lives, and I won't get started on my feelings on that here because it will turn into a rant of epic proportions.
As far as being held back or asked to repeat a grade, the teacher determines at the end of each school year whether or not the students goes up to the next grade, based on how they've performed that year. Most often students pass. Beyond kindergarten, it's rare that students are held back a year. It happens, just like students occasionally can also skip a grade if they're advanced, but those don't happen very often.
So, yes, hypothetically, you could end up with an eleven year old in a first grade class, but realistically, if a student is held back that many times, something else is clearly wrong, and they'd probably have been taken out of mainstream education and put in a special education program.
And yes. Our school system is as messed up and complicated as it sounds, and I'll be the first to admit it. We need a complete overhaul, but that, once again, is a rant of epic proportions for another day. -
You don't have any trash cans. Or litter bins, as I learned during my ten days to call them. Now, this may not be all of the UK, but London? You can't find a litter bin to save your life! And then, we went into the Tower of London, and they were every four feet! It was utterly bizarre.
Also, no almonds in your chocolate? This is a sad, sad thing for your culture to be lacking.
I also find your schooling system to be slightly incomprehensible, but that's because I've never had any sit down and explain it to me. Maybe I'll have you do that at some point. :) -
No knees. I use my arms and hands too much.
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It has been my literary experience that fairy godparents, of any gender, tend to be more trouble than they're worth. That being said, however, I like the idea of having one of both because then I get to see two sides of an issue, two possible solutions, and I think they'd keep each other in check as well.
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I don't know. I have a lot of trouble with this question, I think, because I'm not really an explosive personality. I very, very rarely lose my temper in an explosive way, so . . . yeah, I don't know.
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Mr. Kidswatter is a Mugworm Griblick, if I remember correctly.
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I am a Ravenclaw through and through. I think you almost have to be when your reaction to the revelation of how to get into Ravenclaw Tower is one of the things in Deathly Hallows that excited you the most. Also, the Hufflepuff and Slytherin dorms would make me claustrophobic, and I am incredibly not a Gryffindor.
As a Muggle (born witch), I think my favorite subject would honestly be History of Magic, which is a little odd since Binns would probably be one of my least favorite professors. I also think I would enjoy Arithmancy. My least favorite class would probably be Care of Magical Creatures, since I'd probably be allergic to about half of them, or Divination because I'd have the same frustrations with it as Hermione.
Favorite professor would have been Lupin because of his wonderful approach to teaching, and regular professor would have been McGonagall because she reminds me a lot of my fourth grade teacher who pushed me the most and got the most out of me. Least favorite, Binns as mentioned above or Snape because Snape was a horrible teacher in terms of how he treated his students. -
. . . official reason? Non-Platform 9 3/4 reason? Um . . .
Kidding. Okay. Real reason. Every other year, the theatre department at my university offers a class called The London Experience. It's a ten day trip to London to experience theatre as it exists in a different cultural setting, and to experience theatre in many different forms that aren't exactly available to us in the US boondocks where our department is located.
So 15 of us went to London for 10 days in March over our spring break. As a full group, we took three walking tours (Jack the Ripper's London, Shakespeare's London, and Historical London), visited Westminster Abbey, visited the Tower of London, toured the reconstructed Globe, spent a morning at Portobello Road Market, went to Harrods, toured the British Museum, and saw eight shows (La Clique, The Pied Piper, Touched, Chicago, Toyer, The Pitman Painters, Stomp, and Spring Awakening).
On our own, in smaller groups, then, we hit all the London hot spots: Covent Gardens, Hyde Park, Kensington Gardens, Trafalgar Square, the National Gallery, The National Portrait Gallery, the Tate Modern, Buckingham Palace, and of course, Platform 9 3/4. Most of us also bought tickets on our own to see two additional shows, though I think everyone saw two different additional shows. I saw The 39 Steps and Avenue Q.
Personally, I also got the chance to meet one of my online friends IRL. She came down to London to spend my last day with me, which was really cool. She took me to Chelsea so I could get photos of a church where my great great great grandparents were married, and then she trotted me around to places I hadn't already seen and took me to dinner where I got to meet another online fandom member. Basically, we sat around and talked Harry Potter all day, which was amazing.
Sadly, 10 days isn't really enough to even cover London, so we definitely didn't get out of the city really at all. If I'd had the time and the money, I would have been on the train to Stratford-upon-Avon in an instant, and I would also have loved to see Hampton Court and some of the English countryside. I can't wait to go back and see all the things I missed! -
Writing, definitely, but "best" is . . . something of a dangerous term to my mind.
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Honestly, much the same as Matthew's.
Don't do stupid things.
Treat everyone and everything you encounter with respect, regardless of personal feelings.
Be the kind of person you want others to be.
At the end of every day, you should be able to prove that you spent at least ten minutes of it in a rational manner. -
Meeting and getting to know people I wouldn't otherwise get the chance to know. Through LiveJournal, which is probably where I'm most active, I have several international friends that I never would have met if it hadn't been for that network. The same is true for people across this country. These are friendships and relationships I would never have had the opportunity to have without the Internet and social networking.
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My happy dance is full-body-centric. And remember your hyphens, please.
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Cassie’s Bio
I'm 5' 2 3/4''. Short enough for you?
