SOL 31 - The Last Slice

31 Excuses for Forgetting a Slice

"My WiFi crashed. I was only able to watch TV for some reason."

"My grandparents were over for dinner and I couldn't leave them."

"I needed to empty the dishwasher."

"I needed to clean the garage."

"I didn't forget, exactly, but there were more important things."

"My fish died."

"My computer stopped working and so did all five others in the house."

"The tree outside obscured the window so I couldn't see the keyboard."

"I stubbed my toe. The pain was so bad that I passed out and couldn't type my slice."

"My mother died and I was too sad."

"My dad was on a trip and it was traumatizing for me."

"My lawnmower stopped working."

"There was an ant crawling on my computer."

"It was 3:00 pm and I can never write at three pm."

"My computer was updating for 20 hours."

"My grandparents were on a plane and it crashed."

"My cat stepped on the keys and forced my computer to explode."

"I was locked up in a basement for a day."

"My house, along with the computer, were wiped out by a tornado."

"Japan sent planes to bomb only my room."

"I was typing my slice at the top of a tree and the computer fell and broke."

"I dropped my computer in the ocean."

"I don't have a computer but the libraries were all suddenly closed."

"I died."

"My living room is yellow and I can't type a slice in a yellow room."

"A bear came and stole all the computers in the house."

"A bear was holding me hostage so I couldn't do the slice for that day."

"My whole house spontaneously combusted."

"I shipped my computer to Costa Rica."

"There was a tsunami which wiped out my parents and I'm still grieving their loss."

"Aliens invaded and kidnapped me and the computer was my only source of food."

SOL 30 - The Penultimate Slice

     This is it. This is the penultimate slice. I've been waiting for this slice for so long, before Johnny was sent to war and Felicia married Uncle Grant. I'd been silently counting the days gone by, the days where all we had to eat was our fingernails, the days where we sat aimlessly poking the hard dirt with sticks and staring at the tapestry on the wall. The Penultimate Slice has been long foretold in our household. The Prophesy of the Orange told of one student, Thea, C-P, who would either save or destroy the nation:

A student of the Logan School

Shall slice the last in a swimming pool

And see the blog in endless sleep

A person's soul, cursed slice shall reap

A single word shall end her slice

Logan to preserve? Think twice

     And tomorrow, we shall see who's odds are ever in their favor as the students of Logan battle for the Slicing Crown.

SOL 29 - Two More! (Train of Thought)

     The Train of Thought comes chugging into the station in a cloud of black smoke. It screeches to a stop just beside Platform 9¾ and the heavy door opens to let passengers in. No one needs a ticket for the Train of Thought. After everyone has boarded, the train doesn't chug away. It simply disappears.

The first stop on the Train of Thought is at a bakery. A scratchy voice on the loudspeaker tells passengers about cake:

"Cake is pretty good. The most recent time I've had cake was two weeks ago at my friend's bat mitzvah. There was lemon meringue cake and chocolate cake. The lemon meringue, ironically, did not have any meringues on it. Instead, there were macaroons. I remember reading something in a book about active and passive voice using cake as an example. 'I ate cake' vs 'The cake got eaten.' And now folks, I think it's time to continue on our trip."

The train chugs to a slow stop at a large red brick house in San Francisco.

"This is where my grandparents live. This is also where I am typing this slice. I was thinking about my grandparents because I was stretching my arms and heard my knuckles crack. My grandpa is a retired medical doctor and he always freaks out when my knees click, when I have a headache, etc. He always assumes the worst. Headache = tumor. Knees or elbows clicking = something wrong with the joint. Sneezing from pollen allergies = horrible cold. Coughing = asthma attack (I don't even have asthma). Speaking of asthma, we will now continue to the emergency room in Denver.

"This, folks, is where I was brought because of a supposed asthma attack a year ago. My family was driving to Moab, Utah, in a rented trailer that we had just picked up that morning. The trailer was cleaned with something that made me continually cough. After all that coughing, my fingers started to go numb. The doctors told us later that it was because of a lack of air. Telling my parents that I was having trouble breathing (who wouldn't when they're coughing) we rushed to the emergency room. I got some medicine for that particular cleaning product which has a very long name and could continue on the road trip."

Passengers looked out the window for the next stop on the Train of Thought, but they were back at the station. To the outside, the train lost a bit of form and became more and more transparent with every person exiting the train. Finally, a small girl with short brown hair and a Totoro shirt stepped onto the platform, and the train disappeared once more.

SOL 28 - A Headache-Inducing Slice

     As I sit in front of my computer, I open up the Logan SOL blog and click on Miles' link. His blog is about posting about me posting about him posting about me posting. Personally, I like the part about him commenting on my post about his post about me posting about him posting about me posting about him posting where, in the blog, I comment on his blog about me posting about him posting. I also like where he comments on my blog about him posting about me posting about him posting. I type into the keyboard: "This is a very nice slice! I like the part where you comment on my post about you posting about me posting about you posting!" 

SOL 27 - Shelties

     As soon as I step into my grandparents' house, here they come. The shelties, not my grandparents. The shelties swarm my feet and suitcase barking loud enough and high enough for bats in China to hear. If I lean down to pet them, the one I brush my fingers against zooms into another room and then zooms back, still barking. These shelties have been here for as long as I could remember. Different ones, for sure, but still two to four shelties yipping and yapping to signal my arrival. To follow the tiny floofy dogs, my grandparents. After much hugging and chatting, the shelties get bored and wander away.

SOL 26 - The Wonderful Wondrous Wonders of the Color Gray

     First off, the color that is white with some black in it has two different spellings; grey and gray. They're both correct, but grey is more popular in England and gray is more common in America.
     I enjoy this color, gray. It is a basic color and has lots of different shades. The colors can range from the color code #FFFFFF, which is white, to #000000, which is black. Gray is very good.
     Gray is cool because it has different meanings. A light gray could be snow, or rain, or clouds. Dark gray could be a bad storm, foreboding.
     As you can see, I was having a hard time coming up with ideas for this slice. I looked at a book, as I was sitting in the library at the time, and the cover was grey.

SOL 25 - Snow Day!

     I wake up, groggy. The clock I have projected on my ceiling (I like to know the time when it's dark) blinks a big red 10:45 am. Jolting up in bed, I wonder if my parents forgot to wake me up for school. Or maybe my clock is wrong. Maybe it's 10:45 pm. I throw off the 3 blankets I have on my bed and walk sleepily to my parents' room down the hall, past the window.
     "Mom? Why didn't you wake me up?"
     "Snow day! The school called me at 5:30."
     "Snow day? But... there's no snow."
     "Look out the window."
     I backtrack down the hallway. The apple and cherry trees are bending with a foot or so of snow on every branch. Occasionally a squirrel tries to hop across the tall wooden fence, falls in the heavy snow, and clambers back up.
     It's freezing by the window. I mumble an "ok" to my mom and climb back in bed. I don't go out of my house for the rest of the day.

SOL 24 - A Horrible Ode to Salt

Salt
O' salt
You are extremely salty
Salt
O' salt,
You are never faulty
Salt
O' salt
I hope you can tolerate this poem
Salt
O' salt
You're now free to go (em)

SOL 23 - A Conversation With a Lemur, as Recommended by Maia

Me: Hello, I'm a huge fan.
Lemur: Oh thanks, it's very hot here in Madagascar so please get to work.
Me: N-no, that's not what I meant.
Lemur: I'm in Africa, not Japan. Plus, I'm a lemur so I can sit in the shade and don't have to hold one of those flippy things.
Me: Forget it. So, what do you enjoy doing?
Lemur: How am I supposed to forget what I enjoy doing?
Me: No, those were two separate questions.
Lemur: Oh, I see. I am a ring-tailed lemur so I enjoy hopping around on rocks.
Me: Sounds... interesting.
Lemur: Yes!
Me: Well anyway, it was nice talking to you.
Lemur: I am very happy so I will bounce around and stick my lemur bottom in the air, OK?

SOL 22 - 22

To honor this 22nd Slice of Life, I shall be slicing about many things relating to 22

"SOL" 22 times: SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL SOL

22 random words relating to SOL: Boring. Tedious. Very. Long. March. Thirty-one. Soda. Candy. Starbucks. Rewards. Slice. Of. Life. Fourteenth. Word. Sixteenth. Words. Story. Ice. Days. Fun. Cool.

I was thinking about writing more but I can't think of anything else. This ends my 22nd Slive (yes, slive).

SOL 21 - _______ (fill in a topic)

     I can't think of anything to write about for this slice, so I will be doing many topics. 

1. My thoughts on cheese: Cheese is very tasty and usually yellow. I eat it sometimes.
2. My favorite day: I think my favorite day was when I heard that I was going to Madagascar. As many of you know, I am a big fan of lemurs.
3. A haiku:                                                                                                                                    Here is a haiku.                                                                                                              Wonderful haiku for you.                                                                                                      Enjoy this haiku.
4. Thoughts on a snowy day: THIS IS FREEZING WHO CONTROLS THIS COLD SUBSTANCE FALLING FROM THE SKY 
5. Thoughts on a rainy day: Pizza and hot chocolate.
6. Thoughts on a day: It is a day today.
7. Thoughts on the SOL challenge: *runs into forest* *hides in cave* *doesn't come out until April*

SOL 20 - Milkshakes

     Everyone reading this, I have some very horrifying news for you. Let's all pause for a moment to utter audible gasps at our computer screens.

     I.
     Have.
     Never.
     Had.
     A.
     Milkshake.
     Ever.
     
     You heard me. Not once, never in my life, have I been to McDonald's or Rocket or Denny's and gotten a milkshake (actually, I've never been to any of those places just for food). Not once have I tasted the ice-creamy goodness that is known as a milkshake. Until now. This special milkshake was a homemade milkshake. Ice-cream and milk thrown into a blender and spun until creamy. The mixture was poured into a regular water glass, nothing fancy. The wonderful, splendorous milkshake was then devoured by yours truly.
   
     Guess who's now the world's biggest milkshake fan?

SOL 19 - The Stress of Almost Forgetting a Blog

     It's just a normal day. I'm sitting in a hot tub with my friend who's about to be bat-mitzvah'd in Joshua Tree, CA. We kick our feet in the warm water. This is so peaceful. We're talking about school. My friend mentions how her school does lots of contests every year and the winning classes get a pizza party or even a day to skip school. She asks me what my school does. I tell her we do lots of fun stuff also, including the Slice of Life Challen-

     WAIT.

     I FORGOT TO POST MY BLOG.

     I'm now freaking out. I know I can just miss a day of posting, that's not that bad. But I need that Starbucks. I need to post every single day or I will be forever mad at myself. Now, you may just be thinking, "Thea, why don't you just go post now?" But I'm in the desert. There's no wifi. 

     Frantically, I jump out of the hot tub telling my friend that I forgot to do something and I'll be right back. I throw on a sweater on top of my swimsuit and rush across the dusty road to where my parents are. My dad has a hotspot on his phone. He can fix this. I convince him to turn on the hotspot and dash inside to where my computer is. Clicking the Publish button, a weight lifts off my shoulders. I'm still in the Starbucks running for one more day. 

SOL 18 - Conferences

     I walk into the school building. My legs are shaking as I climb the stairs to Max's room. He's probably going to bring up something about how I am the worst student ever and then play it off with a "heh" and a smile. Did I forget anything in my portfolio? Is it all together? I can't shake the feeling that there's something I left at home and Max is going to make me uncurrent. Forty minutes later as I walk out of the classroom, the feeling drifts away. Whew. That wasn't nearly as bad as I expected.
 

SOL 17 - My Life Story

     I was born in Kansas to Ma and Pa. As a young lad, I worked on the farm with them. I fed the chickens, and milked the cows. Oh, those were the glory days!
     One day, it all changed. A big twister came speeding down the prairie faster than you could say "howdy!" I hollered to Ma and Pa to get to the shelter, but they were too late. I was the only one that survived,
     16 and alone, I walked the fearsome two miles to the nearest town, fending off prairie dogs and small lizard along the way. I reached the town after days without water. Then I had to stop by the saloon to ask about work. One fella told me "if ya wanna pet dem kittens all day, I'll hire ya." "Naw," I says, "I'm too good to pet lil' fuzzy kittens and get paid for it." With no work found, I walked back into the prairie.  My last thought as I walked up to the farmhouse was: "Oh look, there's another darn tootin twister comin' right at me."
     Thus concludes my life story.