How Not to be Popular by Jennifer Ziegler

I just started the book, "How Not to be Popular," by Jennifer Ziegler. It's about a girl named Maggie,  whose17 and all she's done is move from place to place her whole life, never more then 8 months. Making friends and finally adjusting to her new home, then leaving again to the next place. It seems like she would never learn until she is moving to her new home in Austin, TX, and has the idea to simply NOT be friends with anyone. To be the weird one and the loner type, but I think this is a good idea and bad idea because it could backfire, and she might have people try to be friends with her.

Even though I understand that Maggie just doesn't want to have anything to loose when she leaves Austin, I think this plan could go really wrong. Or there could be a plot twist and she has to stay here longer than expected. Already in the book she turned the popular girl group down in class, and also  a chance to sit at the popular lunch table twice. It's nice that she really wants to keep to her plan, and I understand how hard it can be to change schools and have to make new friends. And with her schedule of always moving around, it must be really painful to loose connections with all the friends you used to have.

All in all I think Maggie should be careful on the actions she makes over the next months in Texas, and realize even though she doesn't want friends, she might accidentally make them. Some people just don't know how to get a clue, and those might be the people that latch on to her because they want a friend.

Hunger May Be Driving Spike in Sea Lion Strandings

I recently read, "Hunger May Be Driving Spike in Sea Lion Strandings," by Megan Gannon. It was an article about little sea lion pups being found on the shores on South California. Nearly 1,100 have been found. Biologists are mostly clueless as why, but their best guess' are hunger. Environmental issues have killed their normal food of sardines and anchovies, so they are left with barely nothing to eat. Some have been rescued on shores and brought into captivity.

I think what's best for the pups right now is to move them into captivity. It's going to just be safer for them, older sea lions can adjust their diets easily to a new food, but it's much harder for the little sea lions. Some of the ones have been found with lice, but that is not the reason they have been washed up on shores. Some was even found with pesticides on and in them, but I think those are more secondary causes. In shelters, they can be better taken care of until they are better. Though no one can help all the sea lions still in the oceans, we can feed the ones that we can reach to make them better.

It's sad to hear this because getting food to all the animals who have been losing it is impossible. Environmental conditions have been targeting all of us, which of course includes animals. The hard part is try to help them.

Blog Review

I think Kimberlee's post on Love and Other 4 letter words was one of her best. She really expresses her thoughts on the book and the main character. It's was an interesting topic about the self conscious feelings, that I thought she expressed really well. I've read some of her other posts before and I've noticed that she really tries to incorporate her own feelings of the book in her summaries of them.

From her blog, I think I can learn to talk more about the characters of the book. In mine I like to write about the other characters in the story, or the connections the main character has to them. But I think I can learn more about how to focus on the main characters and about their roles in the story, I think that makes the post more relatable to other people. And I know I can make more text to self connections or other connections to the story that way.

13 Gifts by Wendy Mass 2

I am still reading "13 Gifts,"  by Wendy Mass. Tara is now in the town of Willow Falls and is actually impressed in small ways. Though she didn't expect much of the small town, the people there have surprised her. Even on her second day in the town, she's already made new friends! Which is really unlike the usually Tara, being pretty reserved, and staying away from people she might become close to. I think she is doing this because of all the moves she's gone through over her life.

Tara has moved many times, and has learned not to get to attached because she is probably going to move again soon. But this has always been a conflict for her, because her mom has always pushed her to be very social. I think her mom just wants Tara to make the most of whatever place they are in. But really, I think Tara just needs to stay in one place and make real friends. Even though that is out of her comfort zone, she is finding out how amazing friendships can be in Willow Falls.

All in all I think Tara is going to make new friends and want to stay in Willow Falls longer than just the summer. She is also going to find out why she belongs there, because she can relate to many of the new characters in the book in small ways. And even though the author makes the place of Willow Falls seem very unique, and she makes the people seem like that too. Like her cousin is a math genius, and two new friends only communicate through black boards to each other. While even though Tara is shy to the new town now, I can't wait to see her understand it better.

13 Gifts by Wendy Mass

I recently started reading "13 Gifts," by Wendy Mass. It's about 12 year old Tara, who is always dealing with always moving and her confusing mom. She wants Tara to be social, very social, always pushing her to make friends. But her mom is also very protective, and even put a GPS tracking device in her phone. When Tara did something really stupid to try to get some girls at her new school to like her, she ended up being sent to Willow Falls, the town that they never vistit even though that's where most of her family lives. Of couse this was a big punishment when she will be missing the trip to Madagascar by going to Willow Fall. I think this was an unfair punishment because Tara was only trying to make her mom happy.

When Tara got busted for trying to steal the Principals favorite stuffed goat, she not only got in a lot of trouble with her parents, but she got suspended from school. For 2 weeks, which were the last 2 weeks of school. I think her punishment shouldn't be missing a trip like that, especially since the family had been planning for awhile, that everyone was excited for. But maybe Tara's mom doesn't realizing how the pressure to be social is some of the reason she isn't social.

All in all I like this book, and I want to see how her summer turns out. Probably reconnecting with her family and realizing it isn't so bad out in Willow Falls.

That's Too Salty! How the Tongue Knows

For my non - fiction response of the month I read a scientific article called, "That's Too Salty! How the Tongue Knows," by Tanya Lewis. It's about how we taste foods through the pores in our tongue. Especially the salty, bitter and sour. I like this article because it explained how the tongue is more effected by bitter tasting foods, than sweeter.

I learned that there are 5 main tastes/ flavors of food that are classified. There are sweet, salty, bitter, sour and umami. Umami is pretty much the taste of acid, like in tomatoes but aparently also has a meaty tatse. It sounds unfamiliar but I think everyone's probably tried it. I've learned about the 5 sensations of the tongue before but I don't remember the umami one.

Because they're similar in flavor, salty, sour and bitter tastes all trigger the same mechanism on the tongue. Sodium is the main cause, and salt is good for us. It has iron which people need, but it becomes a problem when people eat to  much sodium. I think that this article brought attention to the fact that the tongue is really important in being able to taste. I know from memory that its the same fact for smell, if you plug your nose when you eat, you won't be able to taste. I liked this article and all the facts I learned about tasting and the main ones. Also how the sodium in 3 out of the 5 are making them similar tastes to us.

The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

I finished "The Phantom Tollbooth," by Norton Juster, a while ago, but I've read this book 3 times. I have always really loved it. It's about a boy named Milo who thinks that life is boring and there is never anything to do. Until one day a magical tollbooth shows up in his room, and being to bored to care, he drive through in his toy car and ends up in a whole new world. The character of Milo changes through the book because he realized life is not boring, it's just an adventure.

When he first gets to the new world called Expectations, he is still skeptical of where he actually could be going. And throughout the story he gains the friends of a dog/ clock named Tock, who ironically makes a tick sound. His goal in the story is to rescue the Princesses Rhyme and Reason, who made that world nice and equal. But they are locked up in a tower and he must save them. By the end even Milo wishes he could go back to that world, he knows that his life can be exciting anywhere.

I always liked how the book was full of metaphors. Like Milo was first greeted by "The Whether Man" who can tell if something is whether this or that. Instead of a "Weather man" who will talk about meteorology. I didn't really notice that until the second time I read the book when I was older, but I think it's smart that the author did that. It makes the reader think about it as they are reading the book.

All in all I really recommend this book to anyone who likes an adventure story. Milo can be a really relatable character for anyone who has felt bored out of their mind and wishes for something, just anything that they could do. I think the moral of the story is to enjoy life and appreciated it. And I love who Norton Juster shows that to the reader.