Distractions, distractions

My dad, soon-to-be step mom, and half sister paige! (p.s....its cute to coordinate colors right? (; ) 

My mom, dad, step sisters, sister, and brother on their wedding day!

Ever since my last post about Wesley and Bianca being partners for the English paper, I haven’t been able to put the book down! Turns out my excitement for what its like when Wesley and Bianca are alone together was predicted pretty well. Bianca went over to Wesley’s house (which by the way is a mansion, and his parents are never home, either on business trips, vacations, etc.) and the only computer was upstairs in his room….yep! Bet you can predict what is going to happen. Before they even start talking about their project, they start hooking up. I’m going to skip the details, but they continue to hook up for the next month and a half or so. (And yes, they did get an A on their project!)

After a while, they start learning more and more about each other and Wesley figures out that Bianca is using him as a distraction, but he can’t figure out why. He finally learns what he is distracting her from one night at her house. They walk down the stairs so Bianca can walk Wesley out to his car, when Bianca’s dad finds them. He is completely wasted, due to divorce papers sent to him from his wife, and starts calling Bianca a whore because she had a boy in her room. (While her father was home, they played Scrabble for three hours in her room.) Bianca is horrified to see her father like this, especially because her father had been sober for 18 years because before she was bon, when he got drinking, his anger became out of hand and he became destructive. He ends up slapping her across the face, and Wesley punches him in the mouth and leaves with Bianca to his house. At the house, he finally tells her he knows what she has been using him as a distraction from. The divorce.

This part of the story is very relevant to me, because I know exactly where she is coming from. Okay, maybe I don’t hook up with random guys to get my mind off of my parents divorce, but I did find things to distract myself. I have this one friend in particular where if anything ever goes wrong in my life, and I need to get away, I know that she and her mom will love my company. When my parents got divorced, I spent lots and lots of time there, simply because it hurt too badly because I couldn’t stand being in a broken household. My sister and I staying at her house for 3-4 days straight for the week during summer and school, just to get away from reality, and it worked, well most of the time. Everything is forgotten til you go back home and have to be bombarded back into reality. I know exactly where she is coming from, and I know many other people do.

By the way, my family is now split into to, and I absolutely love it! 

(Big familia right? (: )

CURRENTLY

This week: 100

Last week: 138

Pages this semester: 238

1: "And you daring, are the Duff." "Is that even a word?" "Designated. Ugly. Fat. Friend," he clarified. "No offense, but that would be you."

2."Hey, Obama was kind of sexy for an old guy. Maybe I had a shot."

3. "Most girls find my jokes charming." "Those girls must have IQ's low enough to trip over."

My favorite sentence is probably the third one because its you're typical male-confidence that gets the best of them. In this book, Bianca lets him know, well tries to let him know, that she isn't one of those girls who are dumb enough  to tolerate Wesley Rush.

Teenage Girl Drama-Rama

             In The Duff, I have learned more about Bianca, and how she functions with her surroundings affecting every aspect of her life. Her mom is away on business trips 2 months at a time, and her father and mother doesn’t get a divorce, which might be the best situation in this case. I know that even when I didn’t want my parents to get divorced two years ago, it was the right thing to do. Next, not wanting to go to parties and have fun with her friends. Where she lives, there is a “teen club” which was once a bar, but now its for teenagers, and they only serve soft drinks and have loud music. When she is here, Wesley Rush decides he needs to pester her, and before Bianca knows it, she kisses him. And worse, she likes it. Now she has to forget that she ever kissed Wesley, and forget how incredibly much she liked kissing him.

            With all this happening around her, she still can’t forget when Wesley called her “Duff.” He refers to her Duffy, and when she can hardly stand to be in the same room as him (contrary to what she wants to think, she still wants to kiss him!) she now has to be his partner in a report about a novel they’ve just read in class. I’m eager to see what unfolds when they are alone and have to get together over the weekend.  I just know she’s going to fall for him, and in a way, I want Wesley to actually be a soft-spoken guy who has a heart when he’s not influenced to be the bad guy in a room full of over-obsessed high school girls. I know that I shouldn’t want them to be together because he’s a jerk and coward to her, but it’s what you see in the movies right?  All teenager girls wish that something like this would happen to them, where they are partners with the hottest guy in school and suddenly realize that they know nothing about the real “him.”

The Duff (Designated Ugly Fat Friend) A novel by Kody Keplinger

So far in The Duff, we meet the main character Bianca Piper, who is cynical and loyal, and she doesn’t think she’s the prettiest of her friends by a long shot. Wesley Rush, the (excuse my language) man-slut of the school tells Bianca she is the DUFF. She is the Designated Ugly Fat Friend. You see, Wesley Rush thinks to get Bianca’s friends to hook up with him; he has to converse with, befriend, and get along with the DUFF, aka Bianca. Of course, this novel doesn’t sound like the average story you’d tell your teacher about, but hey, I can only imagine some of the blogs he’s read.

Even though I’ve only started this book yesterday (*cough* last minute check out *cough*) every time I have the chance to read it, I do! It is the basic love story; the hot guy ends up with the not-so-popular girl. But somehow I just can’t get enough of this book. “Duff” is a new term that I’ve never heard of before, although the author was introduced to it during her senior year. The biography at the end says, “When I realized that my friends felt like Duffs, too, I knew I had to write this story.” Many girls in high school feel this – I know I do! And even though we may think it, it’s just a word some stupid, arrogant jerk says to make him feel better. I’m very excited to continue reading this book to figure out how Bianca overcomes her new “nightmare word,” being called the Duff. 

PERSONALITY TEST

Qualitative analysis of your type formula
 You are:

• distinctively expressed extravert
• slightly expressed sensing personality
• moderately expressed feeling personality
• moderately expressed judging personality

CURRENTLY...

This week: 138 pages

This semester: 138 pages

1. Maybe we are too educated, too "smart," to name these creatures in the simple language of a child: monsters.

2. And to imagine God answerings it by "shooting down prayer"...well. it was just incredible.

3. But now he (Colton), had become a messenger, a tiny tour guide for a departing heavenly traveler.



My favorite sentence is number one. I like this one best because it tells that adults spend too much time using "up-scale" words and definitions, when there is another word for it that is much smaller. Perhaps you should ask a child to define every word you say, it becomes very innocent. A monster in the definition of a child is a big, scary creature, who hides under your bed, who creates shadows in your room, and the creaking and ticking you hear. Adults may say a monster is an imaginary or legendary creature, that combines parts from various animal or human forms. And foror me, when I think of monsters, I think of Sully from Monsters Inc.

RAINBOWS IN HEAVEN

After reading Heaven is for Real, I would really recommend this book to just about anybody. Those who believe in an afterlife and those who don’t, it gives you an inside look on a little boys trip to heaven and back, and everything he claims to have witnessed. Colton tells everything from the gates of heaven, to what Jesus looks like, to what God’s throne looks like, and how it never gets dark in heaven. This book makes me never want it to end, thinking there’s more and more to learn from about heaven, just from a tiny 4 year old’s mind.

It’s hard to believe that reading something like this that a four year old tells is real. Children often have the mind that can go on and on for forever, and make up thinks that seem lie impossible. Although Colton’s father who tells the story claim everything’s true, from Colton’s little sister who was miscarried that he met in heaven, to asking God to send down a rainbow that resembles the one he saw in heaven.

Colton’s childlike attitude and faith in this story is remarkable. He reminds his family that God really does love his children, and that God answer’s the prayers of friends. Everything in this book is interesting, and I never want to put it down. I plan on reading even more books like this, because it gives me a little faith that this is really what God has waiting for me in heaven. Without this book, I couldn’t even try to think of what I have waiting in store for me in my afterlife.

I am sad to see this book coming to an end, and I wish I could read more of what Colton has to say about his trip to heaven and back.