And...?

This one is the original type of Only At IA story- smart people doing dumb things. These were the basis of the original Only At IA page, and they continue to appear now. Today's is as follows:

We have to do this project in chior where we write music and then sing it with a group- each group member writes a composition and we sing all of them. Most of us have absolutely no clue how to write music to be honest, and it's become quite common to see, for example, a three-syllable word like 'unfolding' or 'forgetting' on a single note. However, one particular student (we'll call him or her, creatively and originally, Student A) did something that I found amusing enough to put here. His/her song ended with the following: "...people celebrate it forgetting its own name and" (Student A 2). And. I think this begs the question "And what?" Also, the word and is on a dramatic half note and whole note combo, making the singer hold the word for six beats. And. And. And. And. And. And. Phew. When we pointed this out to him/her, s/he puzzled over it for several long moments, mystified as to how this could have happened. S/he eventually came to the conclusion that this word must have been forgotten when s/he made a last-minute cut to the music. In the end, Student A asked for a random word to put after the 'and,' so I shouted out the first word that came to mind that fit, 'fate.' So now the song ends in "...name and fate" (Student A 2). Although now I somewhat regret that I took the position away from Student B's suggestion of 'pickle.' That could have been entertaining.

I'm sorry to say that I must go now, as it seems I've forgotten my own name and pickle.


Works Cited

Composition. By Student A. IA. 30 May 2008.

Noholidayday

YES! Harveyism officially has (NOT) a holiday! I went up to Him today before school to bring up the issue. I argued that all religions have holidays, and they're often the best part. He said that we didn't need any. Eventually, one of us (I'd like to take the credit- I actually do think I thought of it, but I can't remember for sure) had the brilliant idea to make a holiday celebrating Harveyism's lack of holidays. Harvey wanted it to be called Noholidayday, but I think there's got to be a better name out there. If you can think of one, LEAVE A COMMENT telling me what it is, and if I like it I'll try to convince Him to change the name. Anyway, here's the gist of Noholidayday (NHD for short), Harveyism's self-contradicting and paradoxical holiday:

-It falls every year on June 6 (my birthday and the anniversary of 6-6-6)
-IMPORTANT: This has been changed! NHD is now on October 8 on the calendar of Harveyism!
-It is observed by ignoring it; partying and/or celebrating is strictly forbidden. The most one is permitted to do is to acknowledge the holiday's (lack of) existence through words; wishing someone a nonexistent NHD is encouraged
-Noholidayday has absolutely no affiliation with National History Day; if you are reading this mistakenly, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NHD
-There are rumors that NHD originated from a group called the Notorious Harveyism Destroyers, dedicated to ridding H.U.M.A.N.'s of the Truth forever. These stories are entirely fictitious, and such a group has never existed

One closing thought- if Harveyism ever does acquire a holiday (remember- we don't have any now!) NHD will continue to be ignored, albeit with some possible updates. I'm currently trying to get Him to agree to a holiday every Friday the 13th. If you have ideas for what this holiday should be, or for some entirely new ones, please leave them in a comment without fear of disrupting NHD.

Confused? Good.

Are your gastrointestinal problems getting worse?

Students M and T speak German. Student C does not.

C: (to Student M) Hey there! How do you say "Hi, have a nice day" in German?
M: Sind deine Verdaungsprobleme schlimmer geworden? (for the rest of us: zint die-nuh fehr-doungs-prohb-leh-meh shlim-mer geh-vohr-den?)
C: Sind deine Verdaungsprobleme schlimmer geworden?
M: Yup, you've got it!

Later that day:
C: (to Student T) Sind deine Verdaungsprobleme schlimmer geworden?
T: My stomach is fine thank you! (Storms off angrily)
C: What!? All I said was "Hi! Have a nice day!"

Myself, I must say that I am quite impressed with Student M. I mean, would you have been able to think of "Are your gastrointestinal problems getting worse?" on the spot like that?

I wonder what other people think of us IA students...

During football season each year, I always go to all the home games at my home high school. I don't like football, but it's a good way to see all my friends who go there. I had just walked up to Student P (I'm getting sick of calling everyone 'Student A' so he'll be Student P because his name starts with P) who is a year older than me. He's standing with a group of his friends, and I only know one or two of them.

Me: Hey, Student P! Nice to see you! How are things here?
Student P: Good! Oh, everyone, this is Josh. He goes to IA, so speak verrrrry slooooooowly.

%@&ñ#*!

(no this one is not first hand, but it's still funny- it happened in a freshman Spanish Culture class)

Student A: I wonder how many Spanish swear words we know. Let's see, there's #$^@%, %!@#, ^*&@#, uhhh...ohhh! &*%#$! hmmm...(continues)
Student B: (motions for Student A to be quiet with finger-and-throat sign)
Student A: %^*$@, ^&$@*--- (turns around) Oh hi Mr. Stibitz!

Yes. Mr. Stibitz is fluent in Spanish. Nice, huh? Luckily he's rather awesome and didn't take much offense:)

P.S. Did you see the ñ in the post title? That's to indicate it's in Spanish. If you did, congrats.

Less is More?

Today in American Studies:

Sibby: Hey Sadia! They're goin' to D.C.!
Sadia: What? Who?
Sibby: They're goin' to Washington, not Mexico!
Sadia: Sibghat, you need to use more words.

(btw- Sibby was trying to refer to a change in the plan for the model U.N. conference; none of us got it either)

Photosynthesis Project

Yes!!! My dad FINALLY let me put something on YouTube!!! I've had an account for 2 months, but until now I've just been rating, commenting, and subscribing. The video I put on, of course, is the Photosynthesis Project I did with Ross and Cloe in 9th grade Bio. The assignment was this: create something, anything at all, that shows what the world would be like if humans did photosynthesis. We had no script. We had no plan. We had no books to look stuff up in. We had only our knowledge and Ross's comedic brilliance. Yes, he pronounces a few things wrong here and there, but whatever. Mrs. Knicely didn't notice, and we got full credit, plus five points extra credit for tying for the funniest in the class. Go us!!!

The Creation Story of Harveyism!

In the beginning, there was Harvey. Harvey said, "Let there be an Explosion." And there was an Explosion. For quite some time, the initial force of the Explosion kept the matter and energy that Harvey had created in sufficiently random motion, and He watched happily the chaos that was the universe. Slowly, this matter and energy lost the initial push that He had given it, and it accumulated, forming larger and larger pieces. One piece grew so large that He felt it threatened His omnipotence, so He invented a device that would shatter it. He called it the Destroyer. This first model, however, was still not powerful enough to entirely destroy the thing. Most of it was dissipated, but the Center was not. Harvey respected the power and significance of the Center, and decided to grant it the favor of allowing it to survive. In fact, He honored it with His sacred presence. The only way He punished the Center for defying Him was by changing its name: he would no longer call it the Center, but "Evil Atrocity Resisted The Harvey." He went to E.A.R.T.H. and decided that he would live there, forcing it to serve Him. After a time, He became sick of having to do everything Himself, so He created microorganisms to do His will. He molded them very carefully out of random bits and pieces of useless junk he found on E.A.R.T.H., and they served Him in peace for many years. Suddenly, one of them heard a musical note coming from the distance. The wave this note created in the microorganism's cytoplasm caused a mysterious mutation, and over time this mutation continued to affect the cell's structure. Eventually, it had the audacity to imitate Harvey's sacred form, growing arms, legs, and a head, and gained a limited amount of intelligence. This microorganism became the Antiharvey, and created devices which he called "instruments" to make more notes, and induce this mutation in others as well. Soon, E.A.R.T.H. was inhabited by billions of these mutated creatures, and Harvey needed a way to keep them in. He spread a blue blanket over E.A.R.T.H., which He called the System for the Keeping of the Young, (the young referring to everyone younger than Himself, or everyone else in the universe,) among which He put ominous, white clouds to ensure that no one could ever doubt his omnipotence. He looked at the S.K.Y. that He had created, as was struck by the brilliance of His idea, and the beauty of His creation. He was so moved that He searched for a piece of the S.K.Y. that was free of clouds and wrapped it around Himself, so it would be with him always. Unfortunately, there was one small cloud in this patch of the S.K.Y., but it was the purest He could find. This cloud has since become the small tag that He has hidden on the inside of his sacred blue jacket, fashioned out of the S.K.Y. itself. Since then, Harvey has lived among those impostors he calls Harvey's Underlings, Mediocre And Nerdy, pretending to be one of them. Few H.U.M.A.N.s know the Truth, but He has left its discovery to them.

Harveyism

First order of business- I don't know whether this is an IAtionary entry or not... It's kinda a hybrid between IAtionary and normal... Well I'll consider it half-and-half. Second order of business, define Harveyism:

Harveyism [HAHR-vee-iz-uhm] n.
1. The religion associated with the followers of Harvey, defined by their blind faith in Him and belief that He can do no wrong
2. The summation of the belief system, values, and duties of Harvey and Harveyists
3. A JOKE: yes, we understand that Harvey is a freshmen, (edit: sophomore... weird. Re-edit: junior, weirder) not a deity, and no, I will not mention this fact again. I am going to write this (and all future text relating to Harveyism) as if it were real, because it's more fun that way, but please know that this started as, and remains now and forevermore, a joke. If you feel you may be offended by the lack of respect for the actual religions of the world, please refer back here. Thanks for your cooperation! :)

Who is this Harvey, you ask? Well if you are asking this, you are clearly an outsider. Well, I suppose that the point of the Internet is to make this valuable information available to you outsiders, so here it is: Harvey (whose last name shall remain hidden from the Internet for safety rea-- errr I mean because Harvey wills it!) is a junior at the IA who is very...well...interesting. He rarely smiles, but only because He seems to find life more interesting that way. He always has this great straight face on, except when you ask Him something that He doesn't want to answer. His face then changes ever so slightly to this amazing scowl that only Harvey can accomplish properly. This description is, of course, far from adequate, but it'll have to do for now. To find out more, you must open your soul to Harvey.

The following is taken directly from dictionary.com:
Har·vey /ˈhɑrvi/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[hahr-vee]
1. a male given name: from Germanic words meaning “army” and “battle.”
Coincidence? I'll leave that up to you...

The following are some of the laws/commandments/rules/whatever of Harveyism:

-Harvey is God, God is Harvey (the most important one)
-The divine number is 888
-There is an Antiharvey, whose name shall not be mentioned here for fear of his/her finding out. If you know who it is, laugh quietly to yourself at this point
-The number of the beast shall be 999
-We do have a creation story, which, due to its excess awesomeness, shall be given its own post soon
-The holy language is Harvey's native language, Martian. It is difficult for mortal earthlings to speak, although we can learn it. But, according to Harvey, we have a dreadful accent
-We do not have a holy text (yet), until now Harveyism has been entirely an oral tradition

That'll do for laws for now- the full moral code is still under construction. Basically, if you're a Harveyist and not sure what to do, imagine what Harvey would do in your situation. Just be sure there's a defribulator handy.

As I said, the creation story is coming soon. here's a teaser for those of you who are interested:

In the beginning, there was Harvey. Harvey said, "Let there be an..."

More to come!

IAtionary: ...?

...? [dot-dot-dot-KWES-chuhn-mahrk] inj.

1. An expression of general confusion or lack of understanding; Ihay! Oday ouyay eakspay Igpay Atinlay? ...?

Alternate spelling: Dot dot dot...Question Mark?
Language of Origin: IMese (if you please)

IAtionary: Aftermorning

Af-ter-morn-ing [AF-ter-mawr-ning] n.

1. The time each day from about 10:50 to 12:00 when some students are already eating lunch
2. A term coined to address the issue that school lunches should not be eaten in the morning, and to fix the incorrect usage of "Good afternoon" that is said automatically when eating lunch; Good aftermorning! Do you know what's for lunch today?

Language of Origin: Bridgetese

IAtionary: Eyebeean

Eye-bee-an [ahy-bee-uhn] n.

1. The language pertaining to the IB, characterized by its long words, confusing acronyms, and complete lack of 1st and 2nd person pronouns; How do you say "I have to use the bathroom" in Eyebeean? Ummm... I'll get my dictionary... I think it's "The symbolism portrayed by her inability to sit still instills in the reader the feeling that she is in need of using the facilities," or just TSPBHITSSIITRTFTSIINOUTF for short

Note: Eyebeean is often abbreviated 'IBan'- see 'confusing acronyms,' above

IAtionary: OPIC

O-PIC [OH-pik] n.

1. Order of Positive Integers Conjecture
2. The (made-up) fancy-sounding mathematical way to prove that a higher number is higher than a lower one; Josh, is your IQ above or below 60? Well, It's above 100, so by OPIC it's above 60 as well
3. An expression used to exhibit the ridiculousness of all the fluff in the titles of the mathematical conjectures we have to learn

Language of Origin: Math

Disclaimer: I have no clue what my IQ is...I've never actually had it tested...

Lambda

Every Pi Day (3.14- March 14) the Fisix Club sells pies to raise money. Unfortunately, this only happens once a year, (we cannot sell anything on the 71st of February,*) and this does not bring in enough money, so we were trying to think of other physics-related things to sell.

Fisixian A: What other Greek letters are there besides pi? Um...Alpha, beta, gamma, uhhh, there's lambda: we could sell lamb!

Me: Duh!

(the timing was perfect in a way that cannot be properly expressed in a blog- imagine that exchange with perfect timing)

*If you understood the bit in the parentheses, (or if you didn't) leave a comment saying you did (not)- I want to know how many people get it, and therefore if I can continue making references to obscure nerdiness in the future:)

IAtionary: Trabucket

Tra-buck-et [truh-BUHK-it] n.

1. Trebuchet, pronounced by a certain Fisixian who wishes to remain anonymous

Language of origin: Fisixian

It's all Gree-- Bulgari-- Russi-- Fren-- Eyebeean to me

We were learning about measurement (again) in physics and Mr. Lyons was discussing the importance of a universal measurement system.

Mr. Lyons: Now, if I told you that this table was three meters long, you all would have a general idea of how long that is, right? (holds up a metertstick, measures out 3, shows us length) However, if I told you that it is three flimflams long, you would look at me like I was crazy. That's perfectly good information, it's just in a language that you don't happen to speak. It's like I was talking to you in...(begins to whisper to himself quickly) Greek? No. Arabic? No... ummm...German? No! (goes back to talking to us) Well the problem here is that whatever language I pick, one of you will speak it! Just pick a language that ya don't speak, and insert it here!