Review 7: Gendered Marketing (Video)

I saw this video a few days ago while scrolling through tumblr. It’s about the disparity between prices of "women's" and "men's" product and how it came to be. It start by acknowledging the difference between sex and gender. Then it further breaks down into how the advertising for different genders and how it hasn't always been that way. The great thing about this video is that it talks about a serious topic using a lot of great humor and sarcasm.

It manages to be critical and biting without overwhelming negativity. The script is witty and it was easy and concise to watch. I think everyone should check it out.

Prompt #3a Silver Lining: Protest

There is a city block crowded with people around on an afternoon in March. A chilly wind blows, the trees still barren of their leaves. It’s an unusual day for such a large group to be hanging about, but it’s all for an important reason. There is a battle of beliefs happening on this crowded street, on this March afternoon.

On one side of the street reads a group of signs:
“GOD HATES FAGS”
“GOD HATES AMERICA”

On the opposite side is yet more signs:
“FREE HUGS”
“THANK GOD FOR LOVE”
“DONATE TO THE WORLD AIDS FUND”

The battle continues - loud but nonviolent - into the night.

------------------------

One of the ugliest things that I believe exist in this world is bigotry. Many people may have heard about the Westboro Baptist Church, a hate group led until 2014 by Fred Phelps. They spread their hateful message evangelically through protests of funerals, concerts and other public events with hateful slogans. In 2010, a group of Westboro protesters conducted a tour of Chicago to spread their message. Many of the surrounding citizens were uncomfortable or mocking or ignored the protesters all together.

Out of this horrible situation however, was a bit of silver lining. Across the street, with their own makeshift signs and slogans, was a counter-protest group boasting free hugs and love for all. UIC student Jason Connell used the appearance of the hate group to raise money for queer rights groups such as Human Rights Campaign, International AIDS Foundation and Chicago based Jerusalem Open House. The donations were named in honor of the Westboro Baptist Church and community thank you cards were sent from the non-profits to Westboro leader Fred Phelps.

Since this event, many people have found ways to use the publicity of the WBC for good causes. There have been counter-protests to promote fundraisers and veritable strangers coming together to let the group know that they are not welcome.

Though the WBC spew hate and bigotry everywhere they go, good things can come from these events. When faced with hate, people tend to band together and unite as a community against the threat. In an effort to counter evil, people go out of their way to put more good in the world.

Time Travel Episode 2: The Strange Zoner

Drake is sitting in his home on the hovering lounge trying to get the work done for this particular jump. He has to thoroughly study the period he is jumping to, in order to blend in as seemingly as possible. He checks his clock. Ironically, time means much more to zoners than to the average person. He sighs. It is almost his scheduled jump time. He is just about ready, so with a final glance at his studies, he gets dressed in his suit and heads back out to the Zone dock.

The dock is empty when he arrives. Unlike the offices in the adjacent building, the dock usually is empty. Drake guesses it’s because that makes it easier to avoid any mishaps, or because it’s just really weird to watch someone else be departicalized and sucked into a hole in time, so management tries to spare them that particular unpleasantry. His zone-standard watch beeps. He feels the pad underneath his feet vibrate, and the lights of the scanner aboye him confirming his identity and mission. A succession of three beeps and…

There. He’s arrived at his destination, indicated by the way he still feels a bit like his insides are vibrating. He checks his watch again, as is standard.

He is late. Zone jumpers are never late. It’s a part of the job to be on time for every single mission. In the seven years Drake has been in this job, he hasn’t been late once. He is nothing if not efficient. Something must have gone wrong. Small inconsequential things like the messages zoners took usually have very arbitrary consequences, as to not do any damage to the natural time line. However, being late was unacceptable.

Drake rushes to the shuttle just beyond the sliding doors of the zone dock. Thankfully, the personal shuttle is outside the dock as it should be. Drakes breathes a sigh of relief as he hops on the shuttle. You can always feel the differences in time the most during the transportation phase. The shuttles from this particular time do not hover as smoothly as the ones from Drake’s. It’s as if he can feel every bit of turbulence and it makes him unduly nervous.

He lands at he assumed destination, an unmarked P.O. Box, and checks his watch again. He should be right on time now. His anxiety settles, but he still walks a  bit faster as he stepped down from the shuttle. It's because of this that Drake is distracted. And it's because it's destructed that he runs headlong into another body. It's his second mistake today and he's a little exasperated with himself.

His exasperation turns to confusion when he looks up to see what exactly he has collided with. Standing before him is a person wearing a similar outfit and expression as him. Another zoner, one he doesn’t recognize, standing in front of his drop-off destination.

“Um, I think this might be a mistake,” he says after the initial confusion lifts.

“And who are you?” the strange zoner asks.

“I’m zoning here." Drake asserts, flashing the identity code on his watch.

“From when?” the stranger says, scrutiny obvious in his voice.

“Twenty-two twenty-two," Drake huffs.

“Who’s in charge then?”

Drake isn’t sure why it matters to the issue at hand, but in meeting another zoner, it is protocol to identify oneself. “Maximilian,” he says.

“Mistake indeed,” the zoner mumbles. “Well, this is my mission, so I’m gonna fulfil it." He opens the P.O. box and inserts an object from his air-tight carrier tube into the unknon darkness of the box. With one final, uninterested look, the zoner steps away and into a shuttle that has suddenly appeared during their conversation.

Drake, looks after the shuttle, bewildered. He has never had an interaction like that from another zoner. Zoners are profession by design and make it their goal that every delivery goes smoothly. At a true loss for what to do, Drake makes his delivery as well, before stepping on to his own newly-appeared shuttle. As he heads back to the Zone, he can’t help but question what just happened, and dread all the paperwork he would have to fill out in reporting it.

There is little reason why the Zoning board would send two carriers to deliver different messages to the same place, moments apart. Perhaps someone mistimed their jump or - impossible! The board is full of experts and algorithms and paperwork and paperwork and paperwork, just to avoid this sort of thing. They never make mistakes.

Something is seriously wrong here.

ABC Story: Men of the Rain

Buffed and shined shoes tap nervously on the carpeted floor. Collared shirt scratches against a sensitive throat. Dry hands pat smooth black slacks. Eli is not nervous. Forget nervous. Galaxies away from nervous. He is terrified. It isn't as if this is his last chance, but this opportunity would mean so much to him. Just when he feels as if he can calm his runaway heart, he thinks about all of the possibilities and his head spins again with visions of the future. Knowing that this could maybe change everything made him shake with anticipation.

Let the chips fall where they may, he tries to convince himself. Maybe we’ll make it, maybe we wont; there’s always next season. Next to him, his plus one, his best friend, is holding his hand and looking just as nervous as he feels. Only a few more moments left yet. Pressing their hands together tighter, Eli silently thanks his friend for being there with him. Quiet suspense radiates from them both. Readying himself for this was a process, he told himself that he wouldn't panic, and yet….

Something is telling him that this is it. Time seems to slow as the presentation inches by. Until that final announcement, Eli will not be satisfied, can not breathe a full breathe of air. Various noises threaten to distract him from his obsessive thoughts, but he can only find himself musing wildly on all it has taken to get to this place: the months of preparation, the sweat and tears and blood and paint.

When he tries to remember a time that he felt this stressed, felt like a single moment could decide everything, he thinks nostalgically back to his eighth grade spelling bee, as he was spelling the final word. “Xeriscape; X-E-R-I-S-C-A-P-E; xeriscape. ” Years later, and he feels the same anxiety, but this time he know that there are real world consequences at stake here, not just the possibility of disappointing his mom. Zero or everything.

“And the Tony for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Broadway Play goes to...," Eli hears as he holds his breath, "Elias Zhu in Men of the Rain!” and all his dreams come true.

Review 6: Angel Haze (Rapper)

The Rap artist Angel Haze came to my attention when she released this free-style as a reaction to Macklemore's song Same Love.

I found the lyrics to this song very pertinent because of her identity as a queer person of color and the fact that she quotes a poem by one of my favorite spoken word artist Andrea Gibson.

Turns out, Angel Haze is a great rapper in her own right. I have listened to most of the songs on her latest album Dirty Gold. Her music is equal parts deeply personal and relatable. There are songs to party to and songs that relay the artist's history as a queer rebel in a conservative environment.

This is her most recent video:

I enjoy the album for it's the mix between the familiar, fast paced rap that's awesome to dance to and the slowed-down tracks where Haze shows her skills as an R&B singer. Though she isn't as skilled as some of my other favorite artists such as Kanye West or Childish Gambino, "Dirty Gold" is only her sophomore album and, as she gets more attention, I expect her to improve more and more.

Review 5: Vision Test (Video)

This really interesting video was brought to my attention a few weeks ago. It shows examples of basic micro-aggressions of such as stereotypes and how they change people's perceptions stereotyping. 

It is a clip by Wes Kim, "A routine eye exam turns into a troubling look at American attitudes towards minorities in positions of power. (Jury Prize from the 2003 Media That Matters Film Festival.)"

The way I experienced this video was that I answered the questions along with the patient. This can reveal our own biases, which we do not think about often. I thought it was a good look into how we stereotype people and a good start to thinking about where those stereotypes come from and how they affect our everyday interactions with others.

The most poignant point I found in the film was the very last question. "Which is more American?" The succession of images following was  particularly interesting, because after watching it again, I realized that every image was an equal part of American society and culture. Even the racist imagery is a part of American past and affects the American present. That, after going through that meticulous slide show of different  people, this entire culture is just a great amalgamation of different types of people. It's all one big mess. But it's our mess.

Review 4: The Shield of Achilles (Poem)

Earlier this week, my AP Literature did a practice test. The poem sampled for the test was a work by W. H. Auden called The Shield of Achilles. I really enjoyed the poem and decided to review it!

The Shield of Achilles 

by W. H. Auden

 She looked over his shoulder
      For vines and olive trees,
    Marble well-governed cities
      And ships upon untamed seas,
    But there on the shining metal
      His hands had put instead
    An artificial wilderness
      And a sky like lead.

A plain without a feature, bare and brown,
  No blade of grass, no sign of neighborhood,
Nothing to eat and nowhere to sit down,
  Yet, congregated on its blankness, stood
  An unintelligible multitude,
A million eyes, a million boots in line,
Without expression, waiting for a sign.

Out of the air a voice without a face
  Proved by statistics that some cause was just
In tones as dry and level as the place:
  No one was cheered and nothing was discussed;
  Column by column in a cloud of dust
They marched away enduring a belief
Whose logic brought them, somewhere else, to grief.

    She looked over his shoulder
      For ritual pieties,
    White flower-garlanded heifers,
      Libation and sacrifice,
    But there on the shining metal
      Where the altar should have been,
    She saw by his flickering forge-light
      Quite another scene.

Barbed wire enclosed an arbitrary spot
  Where bored officials lounged (one cracked a joke)
And sentries sweated for the day was hot:
  A crowd of ordinary decent folk
  Watched from without and neither moved nor spoke
As three pale figures were led forth and bound
To three posts driven upright in the ground.

The mass and majesty of this world, all
  That carries weight and always weighs the same
Lay in the hands of others; they were small
  And could not hope for help and no help came:
  What their foes like to do was done, their shame
Was all the worst could wish; they lost their pride
And died as men before their bodies died.

    She looked over his shoulder
      For athletes at their games,
    Men and women in a dance
      Moving their sweet limbs
    Quick, quick, to music,
      But there on the shining shield
    His hands had set no dancing-floor
      But a weed-choked field.

A ragged urchin, aimless and alone,
  Loitered about that vacancy; a bird
Flew up to safety from his well-aimed stone:
  That girls are raped, that two boys knife a third,
  Were axioms to him, who'd never heard
Of any world where promises were kept,
Or one could weep because another wept.

    The thin-lipped armorer,
      Hephaestos, hobbled away,
    Thetis of the shining breasts
      Cried out in dismay
    At what the god had wrought
      To please her son, the strong
    Iron-hearted man-slaying Achilles
      Who would not live long.

The poem describes Thetis, mother of Achilles, looking over the shoulder of Haphaestos, the death god, as he forges Achilles' shield. Thetis expects to see images of gods or politicians or atheletes, or nature, but instead she sees a scene of war and destruction. Between the stanzas of Thetis's revelation, we see the sort of warfare and destruction that in the end, is depicted on Achilles shield. The poem mentions vacant fields and marching soldiers commanded by some unseen figure, people being executed while others watch motionless, and a man that knows only a world without empathy. 

One thing I really enjoyed about this poem was the back and forth of the narrative. We go from a very specific scene taking place during a specific even to a vague scene that could really be describing any major war in time. Because of Thetis' point of view, we get a very personal look at the effects of the images of war and descructiion. While we also get the detachment from the more vague scenes that truly portrays. the feeling of mechanized, totalitarian warfare where the feeling of individual are inconsequential.

Auden really blends these two perspectives in an interesting way, that may be hard to catch at first. I suggest reading the poem a few times to really understand the message.

Another great thing about this poem is that Auden wrote specifically so that it would be relatable to all time periods. The scenes of battle are not specific to one particular war, but could be describing any human conflict throughout history. The fact that the words are still so relevant today, though it was written sixty years ago shows how well-structured the poem is. 

The final irony at the end of the poem is that these scenes of battle that Achilles was so eager to have on his shield are eventually how he looses his life: in war. 

This poem is beautifully written and reveals some really important social commentary along with some cool Greek mythology.

Prompt #1: Found Poetry

Life is an acting game; this is theatre

We reach to affirm our fundamental worth

Against hate crime and institution

No power

To be allowed to dream out of sight

The hero, the reckless youth, the great battle

Anyone and everyone is welcome

Imagine what you could create

Review 3: Dream interpretation

If you know anything about psychology, you've heard of Sigmund Freud. Freud is infamous for doing some of the first work with psychoanalysis and being wrong about pretty much everything. One of Freud's most weird and interesting work is with dream analysis. He believed that "the function of dreams is to preserve sleep by representing as fulfilled wishes that would otherwise awaken the dreamer." He was big on the "unconscious" part of the mind. Most of his dream analysis interpreted manifest content of dream, or what was actually happening, and interpreting it into "latent content", or the hidden meaning.

Most of Freud's analysis ended up having to do with sex or sexual objects, because again, Freud was a weird guy. But, he wasn't the first or only person to try to interpret the content of dreams.  Ancient societies such as the Greeks and Egyptians thought or spiritual communication and tried their hand at dream interpretation.

The idea that images portrayed in our dreams are representative of some unfulfilled wish or future prospect, though pretty unfounded, is an interesting one.

per 5 dream brainstorms

• lucid dream
• mlk jr dream
• dream is a wish your heart makes
• sacrifice for your dreams
• nightmare on elm street
• latent dream content
• surrealism
• sandman
• dream being in space
• ‘i dreamed a dream’ -les miserables
• dream/death
• dreaming in animals
• living vicariously
• hope
• childhood dreams
• dream time vs. real time
• night terrors
• sleepwalking
• american dream
• dream interpretations
• theatre about dreams

About Dreams (Text)

So, when I think of written works about dreams, the first thing that comes to my mind is a poem by the one and only Edgar Allan Poe


A Dream Within a Dream
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-'
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?


This poem is most literally about someone watching all the important things in life fade away, and in the face of it's ephemerality, questioning whether or not life is just a dream.



In searching for this poem, I stumbled upon another of Poe's works having to do with dreams that I also quite enjoyed:

Dreamland
By a route obscure and lonely,
Haunted by ill angels only,
Where an Eidolon, named NIGHT,
On a black throne reigns upright,
I have reached these lands but newly
From an ultimate dim Thule-
From a wild clime that lieth, sublime,
Out of SPACE- out of TIME.

Bottomless vales and boundless floods,
And chasms, and caves, and Titan woods,
With forms that no man can discover
For the tears that drip all over;
Mountains toppling evermore
Into seas without a shore;
Seas that restlessly aspire,
Surging, unto skies of fire;
Lakes that endlessly outspread
Their lone waters- lone and dead,-
Their still waters- still and chilly
With the snows of the lolling lily.

By the lakes that thus outspread
Their lone waters, lone and dead,-
Their sad waters, sad and chilly
With the snows of the lolling lily,-
By the mountains- near the river
Murmuring lowly, murmuring ever,-
By the grey woods,- by the swamp
Where the toad and the newt encamp-
By the dismal tarns and pools
Where dwell the Ghouls,-
By each spot the most unholy-
In each nook most melancholy-
There the traveller meets aghast
Sheeted Memories of the Past-
Shrouded forms that start and sigh
As they pass the wanderer by-
White-robed forms of friends long given,
In agony, to the Earth- and Heaven.

For the heart whose woes are legion
'Tis a peaceful, soothing region-
For the spirit that walks in shadow
'Tis- oh, 'tis an Eldorado!
But the traveller, travelling through it,
May not- dare not openly view it!
Never its mysteries are exposed
To the weak human eye unclosed;
So wills its King, who hath forbid
The uplifting of the fringed lid;
And thus the sad Soul that here passes
Beholds it but through darkened glasses.

By a route obscure and lonely,
Haunted by ill angels only,
Where an Eidolon, named NIGHT,
On a black throne reigns upright,
I have wandered home but newly
From this ultimate dim Thule.


This poem is in Poe's more recognizable style with tangential descriptions of different landscapes and the sort of suspenseful shadow that creeps over the entire poem. He tells an unsettling story without giving you all the details.


I think what both of these works show is that, even with just a single author, the theme of dreams can take on different meanings and can be handled in different ways. Is life all a dream or is dream-land a sinister dimension separate from the waking world, ruled by old kings and dead things? Maybe that's one of the questions we can answer through this collaborative project. 

Prompt #3: Time Travel Episode 1

Drake Maliac wouldn’t say that he hates his job. No, being a Zoner is not the worst occupation to have by far. He gets to visit different decades and see with his own eyes more of the past and future in a week than most other humans. It’s a pretty cushy gig compared to say, deep sea mining like his father had done for twenty years.

So, Drake is appreciative of his job. It’s just, he feels that the general public romanticizes the adventures of Time-Zoners, thinking that it’s all one big game, that they have control over destiny or something. That is completely untrue. For his year, 2216, exactly one-hundred and ten zoners are chosen from all over the world. It is a competitive occupation, many people vying for the spot every year, each with an outrageous number of credentials. Then once chosen, these 110 people take classes upon classes of physics and biochemistry and calculus just so that they know how it all works. Then there is the mandatory reading of at least eleven guidebooks. Then there’s a low-level desk job. And another, slightly higher level desk job. And a final, intermediate level desk job. And, if you make it through all of that, you get to become a Zoner and learn what the job is all about: being a glorified mail courier.

Most people don’t mind the tediousness of the bureaucracy and ladder-climbing. After-all, isn’t it worth it in the end to have the privilege of time-travel? Twelve years ago, Drake would have said, “Of course it is.” The feeling of standing in the Zone for one year and then slowly feeling every cell of your body separate and somehow travel together all at once before, after what feels like virtually no time, appearing in the Zone of another time? Drake though it was the best thing in the world when he first started.

Now though, now he’s almost bored of it. First of all, for every day he he gets to Zone, there are a hundred times as many when he’s signing paperwork and researching and then signing paperwork again.

Don't get him wrong, he understands why there are so many rules. Each time-Zone is its own jurisdiction, each Zone worker has to be an expert at avoiding paradoxes or meeting their past self. It's just that there is so much tedium. And then, when he actually does get to Zone-jump, it's to pass a message to the sister of the secretary of the President of Ireland in 2335 or retrieve an otherwise meaningless bauble from 2152, and then zoom it's back to his own time to report to his higher-ups.

As he stands in line in the zoning office, twelve people in front of him, to receive his warrant and the necessary papers for his next ambiguous mission, he’s sure this mission will be just as tedious as all the others.

Reveiw 2: YouTube

I do not do much, but one thing I do in excess is watch YouTube videos

I thought I would write a description of my favorite sects of YouTube as well as review my favorite YouTubers.

There are four main categories of video that I watch frequently: vlogs, sketch comedy, tutorials, music and web series.
The first category, vlogging, is pretty self-explanatory. People record their lives or different moments of their lives and post them on YouTube for the world to see. Video-blogging. Think: reality television, but actually real. 

The vloggers that I follow most closely are Will and his fiancé RJ. This is mostly because they are daily vloggers, which means that they each record their entire day and edit together the most significant parts into a ten-or-so minute video every day. Few vloggers have that dedication. The couple lives in Los Angeles and get to meet interesting people and do cool things, taking their viewers along for the ride.

And their dog is adorable.

Some other interesting vloggers are: charlieissocoollike, DailyGrace, CTFxC, and VlogBrothers

The next category is sketch comedy. YouTubers that use this method have scripted skits or characters, some reoccurring, that are funny or satirical. This is also probably the largest category of popular YouTube. Any type of humor you have, there is probably a channel you can spend all day laughing at.

One of my favorite comedy channels is called hartbeat by a YouTuber named Hart. She does comedic monologues as well as has reoccurring skits in which she plays all of the characters. Her silly type of humor is just what I need sometimes. A lot of her best videos are not 100% school appropriate, so better safe than sorry, you can find them in your free time.

Other popular sketch comedy channels: MilesJaiProductions, nigahiga, CollegeHumor, Smosh

YouTube tutorials are probably one of the most helpful things on the internet. You can learn how to do literally anything from YouTube from glass blowing to holding chopsticks to practicing safe sex to dancing to a Waltz. You can learn it.

One of the more frequent tutorials types you see on YouTube are makeup tutorials. See, I don't even wear makeup, but watching those transformations can be pretty enchanting.

Gigi Gorgeous is one of my favorite makeup gurus simply because I've been following her the longest. I'm not sure if she's particularly good but I do know that she likes a good, smokey eye-shadow. Whatever that means.

Other Makeup Gurus: nitraab, MichellePhan, missglamorazzi, Sara 

Being a hub for original content sharing, YouTube attracts a lot of independent musicians and dancers. A few quick searches and a random click and you can find a gem of an artist.

I'm not as devoted to YouTube musicians as some, but I will just feature Dave Days because this version of this song has been stuck in my head for the past week.

Last, but definitely not least, is the webseries category. Webseries on YouTube are basically television shows shot by independent directors and filmmakers. I love finding a good new webseries, because there are usually some really good independent writers involved. Awkward Black Girl is a really real and really funny webseries about a Black woman navigating adulthood in the most awkward ways possible.

Obviously, this isn't all there is into YouTube (I mean, I didn't even mention funny cat videos) but these are the spheres that I usually explore.

So, we all know what YouTube is. Now, why does it matter? Well, I think YouTube as a movement is helping with the problem of under-representation in popular media. In the case of the people you see on YouTube, you will probably never meet people like them in real life or see them in any mainstream media. YouTube gives is an inner look of the lives of people who are usually overlooked. It gives us a chance to tell our own stories, which is critically important. It's the new wave of independent media where content isn't prescribed for the majority.

And that's why I spend literally hours a day watching YouTube videos. Yep, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Prompt #2: Up in the Clouds

There was a buzzing in the air and not just from the propellers of the ship. The sky that day was beautiful and clear. The clouds thin and buoyant. Terra was the captain’s first mate on the airship the Exhibition She had been taking the first watch on the ship that morning when she saw it. There was land ahead. Now, on a sea-ship this would be a common occurrence, but for this ship it most improbable. Actually, it was almost impossible.

“Land?” She questioned herself. She looked more closely through the telescope into the distance.

"Land, land!" She shouted, rousing the captain and crew from their slumber.

Terra stood astonished, still gazing at this-this sky island. In her five years of service on that ship she had seen many outlandish and outrageous things. She'd seen creatures with wider wingspans that twice the ship's length. She'd seen where the northern fae kept their gold hidden from common human thieves. She'd seen the land of Paolop where the people shined like glittering obsidian. She'd seen a man with hair as long as a tower is tall. She had never once seen an island in the sky that was not made-made.

Just then, the captain shuffled out to the bow of the ship with his heavy coats and a brown face painted with curiosity.

"What's this about land?" He asked.

Terra handed him the telescope. "Just look. See for yourself."

It takes him a moment to spot it, then: "Well hell. That is land."

"I saw it just as the sun was coming over the horizon. If we coal the steam a bit more, we could probably make it there before noon.

The Captain patted her heartily on the back. "Good work mate." He turned to the rest of the crew who were still a bit blurry-eyed from sleep. "Lop some coal in the steamer, rotate the propellers 12 degrees south and prepare to land."

Everyone immediately started to scuttle away, across the dull brass surface of the ship's deck, to do their assigned jobs. The second hand, a boy named Kneop, was the only one left hesitantly lingering.

"Um, sir," he hesitated.

"Yes, boy?" the Captain asked, distracted.

"Well, it's just.."

"Spit it out, now."

Kneop babbled out, "How do we know that this 'island' is safe. There could be any manner of creature or kingdom there. Do we know what it's like? Do we know what it's called? Do we know what's on it?"

"Take a breath, boy." The Captain hands the telescope back to Terra. "The answers to your questions are no, no. and no. But as long as we find something shiny enough to trade, I'll take those chances."

With that, the Captain stalked back away from the bow, toward the control station, leaving behind a bewildered Kneop.

Terra placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. "Don't worry, it'll be just fine. We've been in weirder situations. Besides, this is a sky island. We just have to check it out."

Kneop nodded pensively. "Of course, of course."

And that's how it came to be that, around midday, the airship Exhibition landed on the odd island in the sky.

After a quick meal of venison and warm beer for fuel, the crew climbed from the ship and went to work. Izzy, the cartographer, set immediately to mapping the land as the sailors treked across it. Kneop was to make observations and, being one of the only literate members of the crew, write them down for later research. It was Terra and the rest of the crew's job to, in the words of the captain, find "something shiny."

An hour into their exploration and Kneop's worries seemed to be for naught. There did not seem to be any other living thing on the sky island. All that was visible for miles and miles was a layer of fine, tall brown grass, warmed from its close proximity to the sun. There was only rolling hills for as far as the eye could see.

The crew busied themselves with combing through the tall grass in search of anything of value. Terra was doing just this when she heard Izzy's concerned voice behind her:

"Captain, there is something very strange happening."

"And what might that be?" The Captain asked, perturbed.

"I'm making all the correct calculations, like I always do, but the further we go, the less things add up."

"And what in the seven bloody skies does that mean?"

"It means, it seems as if this island is moving. Like, the actual topography is shifting from one minute to the next."

"Ah," the Captain stroked his left eyebrow, a sure sign that he's in deep thought. "And is there any way you can be sure of this?"

Izzy seemed to shrug. "I wasn't prepared to map a moving landscape. That requires more complicated equipment, which is back on the ship."

The Captain paused in thought before shouting, "First Mate Terra!"

Terra stood. "Yes, sir?"

"You're the best navigator of the lot of us. You think you can get to the ship to grab the land surveying equipment and get back to us in one piece?"

Never one to turn down a challenge, Terra said, "I believe so, sir."

"Perfect. Go on then. Keep your eyes open."

And with that, Terra set off back East, toward where they had left the ship. She walked and walked for as long as the crew had walked earlier in the day, then double that. She checked the compass to be sure she was on the right track. She could not, for the life of her, find the ship. It seemed impossible that she could have lost such a large vessel, but after an hour, she decided to cut her losses and head back to the Captain and crew, no matter how embarrassing it would be.

So, back again, another half hour she walked alone, miserable in her failure. By the time she got to the spot where her crew should have been, she was frustrated to find that they were not where she had left them. Thinking that they had moved on without her, Terra started up swearing all of their names in her head. And their mothers too.

Then, she saw Kneop's notebook . Now, that was very strange. Kneop was never one to leave his things behind, no matter what. Out of equal parts curiosity and worry, Terra picked up the leather-bound journal and opened it to its final page.

Odd, unexplained shifts in landscape. Kneop wrote. An unnamed sound, like a humming. Strange, centralized warmt-

The entry ended there. Terra took a moment to feel her surroundings again. It was true. The land did feel warm, almost organic. Sort of as if it was...alive! At that last thought, Terra felt a distinct pulling at her foot. She noticed that the grass all around her had separated a bit as she was distracted, as if of its own accord. By the time she thought to resist, she was ankle deep in the earth that didn't seem to be earth after all.

As she was slowly devoured, Terra's last thought was that her last and final meal hadn't even been all that great.