Dreaming in Reality
Chapter 4
For lunch, I had almost the same thing I had everyday: a chicken burger, a fruit, and some salad without dressing. The school dressing is just plain gross! I went through the line, picking everything up, got to the end, paid, and went to go sit down.
I sit with Leann and Maddie. There are also two other friends I haven't mentioned yet: Amber and Zoe. They are part of the group, too. Together, I'd bet anything that we're the loudest bunch of kids in the lunchroom. Anything anyone says can lead to and explosion of laughter. There are also weird, loud, random noises that can be heard coming from our table, usually courtesy of Leann.
"Oh great! The loser is sitting with us again!" Amber said as I sat down.
"As it does every day!" I replied proudly.
"Yeah, but we don't like losers!"
"Then just imaging me as something else!"
Amber laughed, "Like a fat pig?"
I laughed, too. My friends were always making fun of me for eating a lot. I'm always taking anything anyone's not going to eat, so they joke and call me fat and a pig.
"Sure, as long as I can sit here," I said as I started to eat.
For the rest of lunch, we laughed and joked about who-knows-what. That's how everyday is: talking about random stuff. We talk so much that usually no one, but me, is eating so it takes us almost the whole lunch period to finish. Most of the time, the teachers on lunch duty have to kick us out onto the field so the lunchroom can get cleaned. Once we're outside, we'll just talk and joke some more.
The bell rings at one o'clock for us to go in. From there, everyone goes to their advisor. Advisor is a study period in which we can get everything done. Unlike all of our other classes, it lasts a half an hour instead of fifty minutes.
I went to my locker to get any homework I needed. So far, I only had Science and English, so I grabbed my Science textbook, and walked into the classroom. I sat down in my assigned seat, and started to work. First, I finished my English worksheet, and then started on my Science.
By the time Advisor was over, I'd finished my English and Science.
After Advisor, I go to Math, my favorite subject. This year, I'm taking an advanced course. I qualified last year when I passed a nation-wide test. Part of the test had been to see how well the school was doing, and part of it was to see who could qualify for the advanced math class.
After I got to Math in room 28, I got out last night's assignment. We were learning about algebra. Things like solving for x in an equation like 3(5-x) 3(3). That was my favorite part of Math.
When class began, the first thing we did was correct our papers. I ended up getting a nineteen out of twenty. Then, we took about a page of notes. When we we're done, Mrs. Demetree gave us our assignment, which was page 245, problems 2-40 evens. She gave us the rest of the class period (about 30 minutes) to work on it. When the bell rang, I had finished the assignment.
Now it was time for 7th period! The last class of the day! And my personal favorite, Social Studies!
I found my way through the crowded hall to my locker, forcefully pulled out my things for my next class, and hurried back down the hall to room 22. I got there with one minute to spare, so I figured I might as well get ready.
I got out my binder, and looked through my Social Studies folder. Ah, there it was, my project outline. A project outline is just a packet to help us with organizing information on our slideshows. So I got it out, and then put my binder and book on the floor, under my desk. We were working with Microsoft PowerPoint, a computer program for designing presentations, to make slideshows about countries in Europe. My country was Slovenia, located in the eastern part of Europe. We got to use laptops to make our presentations so that we didn't have to go to a computer lab, or even get out of our desks, for that matter! And the laptops were really nice, too; I liked them.
The bell rang at one fifty-five. By now, everyone else in the class had done the same thing I'd done. Almost every desk had a project outline on it.
"Who's missing today, people?" Mr. Erickson asked the class. He was sitting at his desk behind his computer, as usual.
"James!"
"Tammy!"
"Rose!"
A bunch of people shouted out the names of their absent classmates at the same time. You couldn't tell what they said.
"Seventh period!" Mr. Erickson looked up from his computer, "Please, just raise your hand. Don't shout out all at once. Yes, Tanner, who's missing?"
Tanner, a thin kid sitting on the opposite side of the classroom from me, put his hand down.
"James, Tammy, Rose, and Jared," he said.
"Thank you."
Then, Mr. Erickson looked back down at his computer. While he was taking role, I got bored and decided to check my pockets for anything to do until class started. As I checked the left pocket, my hand touched a piece of paper.
Hey, what's this? I thought.
I pulled it out. It was a plain, white piece of drawing paper, kinda like the ones we use in… Art! Then I remembered what it was. I unfolded it carefully and looked at the sketch. But before I had a chance to study it too much, Mr. Erickson started talking, which meant that class had officially begun. I quickly folded back up the paper, and stuck it back in my pocket.
"…so when I call your row, I want you to come up and I'll hand you your laptop. Please, do not drop them!! They are very expensive, and I don't think you or your parents would want to have to pay for one."
"How much do they cost?" A curious kid, sitting three desks in front of me, had to ask.
"Something around seventeen or eighteen hundred dollars."
"Whoa…" The kid responded.
"Yeah, it's a lot, isn't it?" Mr. Erickson said, "So please hold them with both hands when you take them back to your desks. It would be best if you had nothing but a pencil and your outline out, making it less likely that they slide off."
When I finally got my laptop, (it took a while because I was in one of the rows on the far side of the room) I carefully brought it back to my desk, and set it down in the same manner.
We had done this yesterday and the day before, therefore I knew what we had to do. I opened up the laptop and pushed the little power button. Then I waited a little bit for it to load. When it came to the sign-in screen, I typed 'stdestm', which stands for 'Student Default System'. The password was student. Once the desktop showed up, I clicked the shortcut to Microsoft PowerPoint. Now I had to open my project. So I went file, open, my documents, and then PowerPointSlovenia. My project was loaded; all I had to do was type in some information.
As class went on, everyone was busy organizing their research onto slides. Today was the last day to finish our projects, because it was Friday. Mr. Erickson came around and gave us tips and comments. As he walked by my desk, he stopped.
"Nicely done. Except, you spelled Slovenia wrong on the title slide; you might wanna fix that."
"Oh, whoops," I said as I realized what I'd done. I'd put Slovinea instead of Slovenia. Mr. Erickson smiled at me, and moved on.
The rest of the period went on as such. I fixed the spelling of my country and checked for any other errors. When the bell rang at two forty-five, I'd finished, also having time to go over everything twice. I saved my work, shut down my computer, and took the laptop up to Mr. Erickson. Then I went back to my desk, put my pencil and outline in my binder, and headed out.
School's out for the weekend!
