IT’S JUST A STATUE!

In my opinion Mt. Rushmore should never have been made into a national monument, because in essence, it’s a statue. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great, but as I said, it’s just a statue. It may be an utterly massive statue showing all of America’s greatest presidents, but it’s just a statue! I know I may be starting to get incredibly repetitive, but I really want to make my point. Yes, I am actually a junior ranger there so I know I shouldn’t be insulting it, but…IT’S A STATUE, A BIG, BIG STATUE!!! See, I just don’t understand why they make it such a big deal, sure whoever made it was probably a great person to learn all sorts of useless facts about, yet it’s still just a STATUE!!! I wonder, if I made a big statue of Elvis Presley out of a mountain, would it become a national monument?

The Biggest Ball of Twine in the World

Right now I’m in the RV, headed away from Cawker City. In Cawker City lies the world’s biggest ball of twine! It was pretty ghost-like in Cawker City, not much but the ball of twine. But what was really cool was how in all of the old shop windows there was a re-worked famous picture so that the ball of twine was featured. So, for example, there was a fake picture of Picasso’s Sunflowers, but lying there, on the table was the ball of twine. Or, there was a twine-a-fied version of American Gothic, where the woman was holding a ball of twine.

I think that it’s really cool to visit almost-ghost towns, because they’re a great way to find out all sorts of information about stuff you’ll never need to know. Here are some facts that you will never have any use for, but I’ll tell you them any way; The ball is 11 feet tall, 42 feet in circumference, it weighs 19,092 pounds (which is 5,042 pounds more than the RV!) It is also started in 1953, making it 56 years old. So, all in all, I think that was a great experience that I’ll luckily never need to have again. I hope you like the weird twine pictures my dad took.

Here’s a picture of me adding more twine to the ball!

Here are some of the other Twine-art masterpieces:

The Mysterious Book, Number 2

A Little Treasury of American Poetry, edited by Oscar Williams is the title of the book my grandmother gave me. It was my grandfather’s when he was little. Here are some of my favorite poems;

Glyph (from the Washoe-Paiute)

Truly Buzzards
Around my sky are circling!

For my soul festers,
And an odor of corruption
Betrays me to disaster.

Meanness, betrayal, and spite
Come flockwise,
To make me aware
Of sickness and death within me.
My sky is full of the dreaded sound
Of the wings of unsuccesses.

I really liked this poem because of how it seemed so… other-worldly. It was translated directly from the glyphs of the Washoe-Paiute.

I think whoever is reading this poem will really like it, it’s called “I saw Eternity”.

I Saw Eternity, by Louise Bogan

O beautiful forever!
O grandiose everlasting!
Now, now, now,
I break you into pieces,
I feed you to the ground.

O brilliant, O languishing
Cycle of weeping light!
The mice and birds will eat you,
And you will spoil their stomachs
As you have spoiled my mind.

Here, mice, rats,
Porcupines and toads,
Moles, shrews, squirrels,
Weasels, turtles, lizards-
Here’s bright everlasting!
Here’s a crumb of forever!
Here’s a crumb of forever!

I enjoyed that poem because of how it made me look at eternity in a completely different way.

I thought both of the poems really made me look at things a different way, and I’m looking forward to reading more poems as we travel.

Monthly Budget Report Number 1

I have now “closed up the books” for the month of August and found out some interesting facts, such as, the fact that we spent 26% percent of our budget on gas. Currently we are 1.4% over budget, which, considering the fact that we bought many staples is actually quite good. Our major expenses were gas and groceries which totaled 50% of our monthly budget. We also spent a large amount on admissions (17%). In the future I think we should be driving less to reduce gas costs. I also think thank we should be more careful when buying gas, because if gas is 20 cents cheaper, it makes a big difference when you’re driving an RV that gets eight miles to the gallon with a 55 gallon tank! Another point I will make sure to get across to my family is that we should buy more fruits like apples, and not stuff like strawberries which are out of season and are usually imported, and thus cost more. Finally to lower admissions I would like us to stop going to places that we go to just out of boredom, so we can go to better places that we will enjoy more.

My Penguin Encounter at the St. Louis Zoo

Yesterday, the 27th of August I went to the St. Louis zoo, where there was an amazing penguin exhibit. I really liked this exhibit because all of the penguins had their own society, and it was really interesting watching them in their own little groups. I gave names to the individual penguins. Here are some pictures (and descriptions).

Here I am at the entrance to the penguin area, right behind me are the Humboldt penguins, indigenous to areas in South America, like Peru.


Here is a little penguin I like to call Albert, Albert is an extremely adventurous penguin, you will see many pictures of him later in my blog.

This is Albert, again. He is now quite sad because his favorite seat was just taken-up by a notorious seagull-thing know as Stuart.



Here is Albert once again, he's now having an all-out war against Stuart (the bigger, uglier, and closer one) the other seagull-thingy is known as the elusive Joe, known to snatch food out of unsuspecting penguin's mouth's.



Here is Albert, with his best friend Nick celebrating their victory in battle against the "forces of evil!"


Albert has now decided to go for a quick victory swim in the little penguin pond.



"Maybe my quick swim wasn't such a good idea" Albert is tentativly thinking right now. I think that he has a pretty good point.


At last he has made the leap of faith into the near-freezing waters and conquered all fear of the cold.


This is Nick again, curious to see where Albert has gone off to now. Little does he realize that Albert is swimming right below him.



Albert has gotten out of the penguin pool, and he and Nick have decided to take a little walk around their enclosure. Now I will leave to see some emperor penguins, as well as puffins, and a weird mutated duck-thing.

After I left the Humboldt exhibit I went on to go see the Emperor penguins, plus I saw some puffins, and an Eider Duck, which looks like a duck with an oddly shapen mushroom for a beak. I hope you enjoy these pictures (and, as I mentioned earlier, descriptions):

This is another of my favorite birds, the puffin. This puffin, however is very curious, I have named him Claude.


Here, floating absent-mindedly on the water is Simon. Simon is an Eider duck (the fungus-beak one I mentioned earlier). I call him Simon because he reminded me of Simon Cowell, he just looks annoyed at the world.



Here is the last picture, it is of an Emperor penguin baby whom I like to call Frank. Frank is an incredibly energetic penguin, who is always running around, looking for fun.

I hoped you liked my penguin, puffin, and weird seagull-thing pictures. In my opinion the best pictures were the ones of Alfred and friends. I liked them because they actually gave me some idea as to what a day would be like in the life of a penguin. Please comment on what your favorite picture was.

Various Sights Along the Road

On our way to Cooperstown, NY we saw some pretty strange sights. On our MapQuest directions number 11 was turn right at Banana Dan’s. So, we’re in the RV wondering; what on earth is “Banana Dan’s”? After about 12-13 minutes we see this massive sign saying “Banana Dan’s” towering above us.

My Dad, being who he is, immediately decided to play us the Harry Chapin song 30,000 pounds of Bananas. It’s a very entertaining song all about a delivery man delivering 30,000 pounds of bananas, but he loses control going down a steep hill in Scranton, PA, and the truck crashes! My favorite part is the chorus, when you’re hearing Harry Chapin with a light and more cheerful voice. Then this anonymous voice says “hit it big John” and to finish off the chorus you just hear the incredibly deep voice of “Big John” who, every chorus, sings “…of bananas”!

At last, once we have finally reached our destination, we set up camp at Shadow Brook campground (where we have been staying the past two nights). As soon as we got there we just had to try out the pool. The pool was great, there were even cool pool toys. In particular there was a really cool rocket that I kept tricking Simon with. The special thing about the rocket was if you threw the rocket about two feet, it would go about six feet. Simon really wanted the rocket so he could go diving for it, so I’d throw the rocket right next to him, but it really went about five feet behind him. When he went under water to go and pick it up, I quickly swam over to go pick it up while he wasn’t looking. We repeated this process six, or seven times before my mom started yelling at me, so I just handed it to him.

I think there will be lot’s of weird stuff throughout the year, like “Banana Dan’s” and I can’t wait to see it all (and, of course, blog about it). Here are some cool pictures, as well as a link to the song “30,000 Pounds of Bananas”!

The Flight of my Life

About two or three days ago my friend Matthew and I went on this MASSIVE zip-line known as, The Sun Mountain Flyer! To even get to the start of the ride you must first ride a 15 minute chair lift to the top of the mountain. Then you have to climb a very tall tower to get in a harness. After some tattooed teenagers strap you into your harness, you’re all ready to go!

A first I was very scared to get on, but after seeing some other kids go down I was finally persuaded. Once they buckle you in you’re just waiting for them to release the doors so you can go. This, in my opinion was the scariest part, waiting, just waiting for the drop off the platform into the open air. The ride was unbelievable; you’re soaring at about 60 miles per hour, on a zip-line, down a mountain! On the ride it was really cool to look down at the scenery, and think “O-M-G, I’m going down a mountain at 60 mph, 50 feet above the actual mountain”!

In retrospect I think I should’ve been more open to trying it out, even if it looked really scary at first, because once I tried it I had a really great time. Here is the advertisement: