Notoriety for the Nefarious Neal

INT. The PROFESSOR’S Room

The PROFESSOR is handing out the tests.

PROFESSOR

I am passing out the tests now so everyone be quiet; you all are familiar with the drill.

NEAL

Psst... Pass this note to Nina.

Random Kid

Okay, Psst... Nina this is from your “boyfriend”

NINA

Thanks

The note read: Good Luck on the test, see you after class.

Nina begins to pass a note in response back to Neal.

PROFESSOR

You are you passing notes during a test. You are in trouble for cheating little missy

NINA

No sir, I was just. . .

PROFESSOR

I don’t want to hear your petty excuses; out of my classroom now!

NEAL

Sir, I can explain. . .

PROFESSOR

No need to make excuses up for her Neal.

A couple of hours later after class. . . with Nina and all of Neal’s afore mentioned friends

NINA

Thanks, a lot Neal. Now my parents are going to be so mad at me. This is your fault. I am going to be officially grounded by my parents.

NEAL

I know your right, this is my fault but if everyone is up for it, I have an idea.

Nina leaves and Neal tells his idea to his friends (Yash, Daniel, Nathaniel, SURAJ, and NATASHA)

SURAJ

Gee Neal, I’m not so sure this is a good idea, besides, we could get in a lot of trouble, not to mention the fact that Nina never told you to do this for her.

NEAL

Nonsense, what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.

Later on that night...outside the Professor’s residence

NEAL

All right, let’s go, you all know the drill. There should be no evidence that we came here and no room for mistakes.

YASH

Got it! Now let’s do this.

They enter the Professor’s house, noting that his car isn’t outside so they can sneak in.

Int. Professor’s room

NEAL

Let’s hurry up and find Nina’s test paper and the Professor’s test answers.

The friends are all rummaging through the cupboards and drawers searching for the papers. The wind can be heard rustling outside as there is a figure outside climbing up a bush at the side of the house towards the window. The figure comes unnoticed.

NEAL

Found it! Now all I have to do is copy it quickly before the Professor comes back.

Wait! Who’s that outside of the window?

NINA

(Tapping on the window outside) Guys! What do you think you’re doing? Get out of there now!

NEAL

Nina, you weren’t supposed to be here.

NINA

I heard about your plan to lie and cheat on my test for me. You’ve lost your mind Neal and I don’t want to take any part in your dirty scheme.

NEAL

You’re going to have to be our lookout in case the Professor comes back.

Yash had been rummaging through the papers when he found an object in one of the drawers.

NEAL

Guys we’ll be done shortly.

Fear erupts on Yash’s face. Suddenly... SlAM!!!

NINA

That was the door! Oh no! The Professor’s back and he is inside the house.

YASH

Neal, there’s something I need to tell you.

NEAL

Not now Yash, we’re already in as much trouble as it is.

The Professor’s footsteps can be heard on the steps, as he gets closer to the room.

PROFESSOR

What are you kids doing in my house! Are those the answers to the test I gave you earlier today?

NEAL

We can explain.

Yash can feel the fear well up inside of him as he panics...

YASH

Hold it right there! (Holds up the gun now understood to be the object found in the drawer.) Don’t move or I’ll shoot!

NEAL

(Shocked) Where did you get the gun from?

PROFESSOR

What are you doing son, just give me the gun and all of you will be free to go.

YASH

Stop or I’ll...I’ll sh-sh-shoot!

NEAL

Don’t do this Yash; you’ll regret it. Please, please don’t do this.

PROFESSOR

Listen to your friend; you have your whole life ahead of you. You don’t have to do this.

YASH

Shut up! Shut up! I need you to stop talking!

Without thinking Yash pulls the trigger. Neal jumps in front of the Professor and the bullet and gets shot in the leg.

Neal

Ow! Damn you Yash, I told you not to pull the trigger!

YASH

Oh no! What have I done! I’m so sorry!

NEAL

Whatever, its okay, I’ll be okay.

YASH

What are you crazy! You’ve been shot! Of course you’re not going to be okay!

PROFESSOR

Well, it looks like you’re all in trouble. I knew that I shouldn’t have started teaching some dumb punk kids such as all of you.

YASH

What do you mean?

PROFESSOR

I mean that I could have been anything a doctor a lawyer even an engineer; but NOOO... I decided to become a teacher. Man what was I thinking? But now that all of you are here, I can’t just let you leave!

Neal, thinking quickly, grabs onto the Professor’s leg (while still bleeding on the floor) and pulls him down which knocks him out.

NEAL

What are you guys waiting for! Run!

YASH

But, what about you!

NEAL

Go on without me. . .

YASH

Okay! See Ya!

NEAL

What! You all are actually going to leave without me.

YASH

But, you just said it was okay.

NEAL

And, you believed me! It’s just a figure of speech. I mean, I’m bleeding to death because of you, and you actually planned on leaving me here!

YASH

Would you quit arguing and get up already! I swear sometimes you are just being a drama queen.

Neal gets up, while everyone else runs downstairs and out the door and Nina gets away from the window and goes to her bike. Natasha tries to help Neal when Neal opens a door which he believes to be the front door. They open a closet door to reveal a skeleton.

NATASHA

Is that what I think it is...

NEAL

Yeah, that’s the Professor’s wife! The rumors were, I mean are true, he did kill his wife. Talk about having skeletons hidden in the closet!

NATASHA

Let’s get out of here; I don’t want to find out about anymore of the Professor’s hidden secrets.

Rhetorical Letter

I decided to write a rhetorical letter for my blog post this week. I was inspired by these rhetorical letters written by an Urdu short story writer, Saadat Hasan Manto. I read a few of his short stories and didn't like them because they were kind of erotic and violent. I looked him up and came across someone's blog about the author. I read the few "letters" written by the author that have been translated and I thought they were quite witty and they changed my opinion of the author entirely. I was having a really bad day, so those letters definitely raised my spirits. So here's my own version of a "letter" based off of actual events. I want to see if anyone can figure them out they should be quite obvious. I am going to post the link to the blog I found after I write the letter; but I ask that you please refrain from reading that blog until you've read mine because that will ruin the whole blog. I want you to keep in mind that I am writing these letters as a person from a different country altogether.

Dear Uncle,

I heard about the twins and I'm deeply sorry for your loss. Events like that really have a way of bringing people closer together; for when one dies a part of everyone dies with it. I'm sure you have already heard of what happened here. What happened on 7/11 was being compared to the same event that took place for you. I watched the news and I was devastated by the impact and how reckless people seem to be becoming now a days. I heard that some people are planning on building a mosque and the controversy that's going on about it. I think it's ridiculous that people are having such an argument about it. There really shouldn't be such discrimination and prejudice directed towards one ethnicity because not all Muslims are terrorists. I hope my regards and prayers reach you safely and I hope in time that some day people will be more accepting of others and less judgmental.

Your niece


I'm pretty sure that letter was obvious enough as to what I was talking about. If you didn't understand the reference of 7/11 you can try to look it up. Just type in Bombay 7/11 and you'll understand.

Here's the link to the blog about those rhetorical letters written by that author mentioned in the beginning.

http://www.lehigh.edu/~amsp/2006/07/saadat-hasan-mantos-letters-to-uncle.html

Addictions and books

I would say that everyone's addicted to something whether it's something as harmless as technology or as serious as drugs. Though, I would say I've never been addicted to anything serious like that. I've been addicted to mainly technology like watching tv or going on the internet. I finally got a Facebook this week; my friend insisted that I get one because everyone has one. But that's the whole reason I didn't want one in the first place. I like to do my own thing and not mindlessly follow a crowd. It's better to stand out than to blend in; I liked the idea of being different from everyone else. I think it's just a matter of time before I start to get addicted to Facebook as well.

Over the years I've gotten addicted to reading fanfiction and for those of you who don't know what fanfic is, it's basically a site where people write using ready made characters. For instance, some people write their own stories using the characters from Harry Potter or tv shows or other characters from different forms of entertainment. You can use characters from books and even games and movies. My friend told me about the site when I was a sophomore and I became obsessed with it, but I limited myself to only reading fanfic during the summer. I've always loved to read, but most fanfic is usually really shitty writing. The writers that are good are usually writing romance shit that always seems overdone. The fanfic I read is usually writers that are better than Stephanie Meyer, her books are basically the shittiest fanfic like writing ever to hit the face of the earth. I looked her up and found out that she had never even written a short story before writing her precious Twilight series. Everyone knows that before you can actually embark on writing a novel, you have to at least write shitty short stories before you can jump in to writing something so time consuming and long.

What I want to know is what happened to people reading the classic novels that sparked more interest. The books I read in high school had more literary merit and they were really good novels. The books that I fell in love with in high school include: The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson, Lord of the Flies by William Golding and How to kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. I know not a lot of people would agree with me on these specific choices especially since most people I know have always said that they didn't like Lord of the Flies mainly because it was just one big metaphor and about savagery. When I was in middle school I used to get tutoring at Sylvan learning center; one of my tutors turned out to be an author and her pen name is C.S. Friedman. She said that judging by my personality I would probably really like that book and she was totally right. I've never actually read her books, but I hope to one day see if I can. I tried looking for her books at the library and couldn't find it. I'm not sure if any of you have ever read her books, but since she was right about my taste in books I'm probably going to enjoy reading hers as soon as I find it. I also know that most people prefer not to read nonfiction books and The Devil in the White City is a nonfiction book, but it's about a serial killer named H.H. Holmes and it talks about how he grew up and how he killed his victims. That story's really quite interesting and even though it's a little long about four hundred pages or so, it's still pretty amazing.