My Big Fat Armenian Wedding

Clifford the big red dog by Sandara The Giant Dog This story really stood out to me the most in this unit. First off, just from the title I knew that I would provide a great inspiration for my next story telling this week as there are so many story applications for a giant dog character. When I read the story, the part about the dog catching a narwhal painted a really nice picture for me. I only learned that narwhals were real in the past 3 years, so I am still fascinated how there can be a creature living in the sea that is so close to a unicorn. I think that I will definitely include a narwhal character in my story telling. I really like the story telling method of this story. It gave the feel of someone retelling an old tale in a tavern. I think that this will be something I include in my story. I can start with an old man telling travelers of the dangers of the night. He will tell them of the epic proportions of the giant dog as well as his most famous attacks. I rea...

Morgan Le Fay: Wiki Media Commons I really like the idea of combining well know characters in stories and causing dramatic scenes where they intertwine. This definitely something I would consider doing in my future stories. I could use characters from Beowulf and make a connection between it and Homer's Odesey. Another idea would be to link some of my existing stories, such as cyclopes island and animal magnetism. Where the saint is on an island where are the animals that love him, are cyclopes.  Cyclopes Island was by far the most fun I've had with story telling and I would love to bring it to my portfolio so that everyone can appreciate the weirdness that I created. I hope that this connection will yield an interesting story, but at the same time not be too weird. That has been the balance that I have been trying to find all semester. I also like the dialogue in the story, where the writer worked herself into the story as if she was narrating the main character a...

Young Female Wolf via Shutterstock The Wolves and the Bear One day, a young wolf, pregnant with two pups, was preparing their den while her mate was out hunting. A red fox crept up behind the wolf mother and killed her with her claws while she was making her preparations. The Red Fox removed the unborn, male pups and tossed one into the cave a mile away, and the other was tossed into the forest near the cave. The Red Fox propped up the wolf mother with sticks to fool her mate when he returned from hunting. When the wolf father returned to their den after hunting all day, he went to greet his mate, nuzzling her affectionately. But once he touched her, she fell sideways, exposing the damage that the red fox had done. The wolf father reeled back and horror and despair, howling his anguish to the moon and the stars. The Wolf Father knew instantly who had murdered his mate and set off to find the Red Fox. After searching for several years, he was unable to find the Red Fox and puni...

This story is part of the  Native American Hero Tales unit . Story source:  Tales of the North American Indians  by Stith Thompson (1929).  Lodge-Boy and Thrown-Away I really enjoyed reading this story. The beginning was truly shocking and made me very sad for the husband who found his wife propped up like that with a stick. The intermittent flow of the story made it hard to understand. As the story changed directions and settings very often. I would like to write a story similar to this with the same scenes of a group of children who refused to listen to authority. I think that plot provides a great deal of opportunity for creative illustration and the addition of new stories and characters. I am excited to see where it leads me. The tone of the story I thought was odd. As it presented some truly horrifying scenes or unbelievable circumstances in a very calm way that I enjoyed. It took the emotion out of the wording, and allowed the reader to image the emotion...

illustration by Church & Moser This story is part of the  Brer Rabbit unit . Story source:  Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings  by Joel Chandler Harris (1881). I really enjoy reading the Brer Rabbit stories. They add such a different tone that creates such a complicated image of the story. But it also makes the story difficult to understand at times. While this story made very little sense to me, I liked the structure of it where it looks like a proverb from the Bible. It looks like it is just providing useful information in each line. Information on how life should be on a plantation.  I think that I could use a similar format of writing where I create rules and information on how to live in a certain society, such as one ruled by red pandas. I currently have a working story involving pandas and I think that I could use some elements form this story to make mine much better.  With this kind of story, there seems to be very little in ...

This story is part of the  The Monkey King unit . Story source: "The Ape Sun Wu Kung" in  The Chinese Fairy Book , ed. by R. Wilhelm and translated by Frederick H. Martens (1921). Magic Forest via Antti Toicanen The thing that I loved the most about this story was the characters used. The "Dragon-King" is quite possibly the most epic name of a character I've ever heard in my life. It paints the picture of a gargantuan monster of epic proportions that has the ability to level cities. That will be definitely what I will write about in one of my future story. I would love to include a monstrous, powerful character that inspires awe, just by the sound of it's name.  I really enjoyed the idea of combat between different animal "kings." I think that will add some kind of a dual between lions, tigers or bears for some humanitarian cause. I think that this will provide a fun read and an interesting depth that many might not consider at first. It wi...

Looking back, I am happy with my progress so far, I feel like I have developed a good system to work enough time for the many assignments each week. Although most weeks I feel like I am scrambling to complete the hours of work required for this class on top of the work for my other classes. But at the same time it is nice to have a change from chemistry or physiology and just spend time reading stories. I have enjoyed the reading notes and the story telling the most. I have been doing the extra commenting and the extra credit whenever possible to get ahead.  Looking forward, I would like to do more of the extra credit assignments so that I can finish the course early and have an easier load later in the semester. I would like to avoid having to rush to submit all the assignments on time over the weekend by getting ahead on the assignments. I think ill try adjusting my schedule a little from the previous one so that I feel less overwhelmed.  This image really reflects ho...

1. Feedback in. Overall, i think that the majority of the comments had helpful information about what needs work in my stories, but some just critiqued without providing any advice on how to fix it which isn't quite as helpful, but it is useful in improving my writing. I think the most useful ones tell me what is wrong, and a brief solution to the problem.  2. Feedback Out. I think that my feedback and comments have been good. Sometimes it is hard to finding anything wrong with a perfectly written story, and I feel like i am just looking for something to complain about when its an excellent story. I always like to praise them on specific aspects of their story that I liked to show that I read the entire story and that I genuinely enjoyed it. I have learned a lot about different story telling techniques while reading other stories and have used many of the similar elements in my stories.  3. Blog comments. I do feel like I have gotten to know many of my classmates throug...

Overall, I really enjoyed the reading and writing assignments. My favorite reading was the African stories, such as the Brer Rabbit stories. I really do think that the reading notes have made the story telling much more organized and easier to write. I think my best accomplishment has been working in a greater amount of descriptive details for the surrounds and the characters in the stories. I feel like as the semester has progressed, I have gotten better and better at descriptive story telling. I think that my biggest accomplishment was coming up with the idea for my Land of the Cyclopes story. My favorite story to write was by far The Land of the Cyclopes (see image posted). That is why I chose this image. It was the weirdest, most spontaneous story I have every created and I really enjoyed writing it. Even though it is utterly ridiculous, I think that story telling should give you the freedom to come up with whatever insane idea comes to mind and express that on paper through a we...

China: The Flying Ogre This story is part of the  Chinese Fairy Tales unit . Story source:  The Chinese Fairy Book , ed. by R. Wilhelm and translated by Frederick H. Martens (1921). Woman and Ogre I chose this story because of the title and I was curious to read about tales of a flying Ogre. I was a little disappointed that there was very little in the way of a description of the Ogre other than it was a women in red. However, this story has given me inspiration for my next story telling. This plot where someone meets a traveler on the road and promises to keep them hidden, but it turns out they are the bad guy and only make themselves look like the victim. I would like to retell this story, researching more about the life and legend of Ogres and create a more detailed, and involved story involving a traveler and an Ogre.  The style of writing seemed a little flat, but I liked the dialogue between the Monk and the messenger. I wish that the Monk had more ...

Mr. Fox is Again Victimized I chose to read another Brer rabbit Story because the reading A I did intrigued me into the life of Brer Rabbit. It has given me a lot of inspiration to make my writing more creative and lighthearted. I would like to tell the story from the view of the one who is on the other side of Brer rabbit, while still maintaining the same language used for the first reading that I wrote about. Again this story is hard to follow, but its seems as though yet another animal has been victimized by the rabbit, in this case it is a Fox. A common theme seems to be the pray victimizing the predator which is an irony that I enjoy in story telling. I could perhaps write about a gazelle who gets the upper hand on a lion. Or a king salmon who bets a grizzly bear in a staring contest. I think that all these ideas would provide a great story.  Also, writing a story where all the animals band together to fight Brer Rabbit because they are fed up with being victimized woul...

This story is part of the  Brer Rabbit unit . Story source:  Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings  by Joel Chandler Harris (1881). The first thing I noticed about this story was the style of writing. I really liked how the author used his own creative spelling of words to provide a whole new tone to the story. I would like to do something similar with my story telling post later this week. I like how it provides the reader with the freedom to image the speaker their self. Also I like that it provides the author with the freedom to misspell any and all words used in the story as I definitely struggle with proofreading. This style of writing definitely made it difficult to understand what was happening the story, but it also let me image my own setting for the story. In the story, I really liked how the Rabbit took care of the wolf when he was down, it provided an interesting twist. I honestly am not sure how the study ended, I think the rabbit ended up killing the wo...