The Two Towers

Okay, that last post likely bored you to death (can't say I blame you). Anyhow, The Two Towers starts off literally five seconds after the first book ends. It ends pretty abruptly, more like the end of a chapter than a whole book. Oh, and the "two towers" are watchtowers at the gate to Mordor, which is basically the land of eeeeevil. Plus Gollum, otherwise known as Smeagol, makes a comeback. Um, or maybe that happens in the next book. I can't remember. Ehehe.
I also read through Appendix B, which is a timeline/huge spoiler. Apparently all that happens in this 1000-page book lasts less than a year. Funny, all of The Hobbit lasted a year too, and that time the journey and book were a lot shorter.

The Fellowship of the Ring

I finished the entire first book. It deserves a 3.5 out of 5, because frankly it was pretty good, even if the plot was slow. **SPOILER ALERT** Gandalf dies.
The "Fellowship" is basically a bunch of guys (and girls pop up veeeery rarely) who are trying to defeat Sauron. Frodo is Bilbo's nephew; Sam, Pippin, and Merry are hobbits; Boromir is a Man from Minas Tirith in Gondor to the south; Gimli is the son of Gloin (you remember Gloin, right?); Legolas is an elf dude; Aragorn is...erm...actually I don't know who he is; and Gandalf is Gandalf. The journey starts off with the hobbits in Hobbiton of the Shire, goes east along the road to Bree where they meet Aragorn, past the Trollshaws (they see the eighty-year-old statues of those three trolls from before and eat lunch under their legs) and into Rivendell, where Frodo reunites with Bilbo and meets everyone else.
...okay, this post is getting really long. Guess I'll give you more on the next one.

Before I start...

All three LOTR books combined are just about 1000 pages, and there's an extra hundred or so pages of six appendixes, family trees, and, for some reason, a veeeery long index. The appendixes talk about everything. The first one is about nothing except a detailed history of, apparently, every king there ever was in Middle-earth and takes up fifty pages all on its own. Appendix D is about holidays in the Shire. Appendix E is purely about pronunciation of the words and somehow takes up twenty pages. I also took a look at the Baggins family tree. Bilbo and Frodo are apparently third cousins once removed. And the first Baggins listed is called--you guessed it--Balbo. *facepalm*
As you can see, I am quite overwhelmed.

LOTR is a fail acronym

So I'm going to start reading Lord of the Rings on Saturday, starting with the first chapter of the first book. Hopefully it's as good as Amy says. Oh, and I won't have to go to the library to get the books, cuz Amy has the full collection (plus glossy movie extras) at home. Yeah, she's a fan.

ACK

Don't you HATE it when people mispronounce Chinese or Japanese stuff in social studies?! They don't even bother to read the pronunciation thing right after the word. Case in point: Tokugawa Ieyasu, first shogun of Japan (erm, I think?). Even Ms. Hare just says "Iescha." Makes me ANGRY. At least most people in my SS class have learned to correctly say the Chinese stuff, otherwise they get beat up after class. xD

And what is up with this zapping thing? o.o

And now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

You know how Renner has PACE social studies? That must be so awesome. While we were reading the Russia Reading Resource for the 1000000000000th time, they were reading Animal Farm and having class discussions! URGH! Frankly, I feel quite annoyed today. The choir concert is this evening and my class sucks. None of the altos sing AT ALL. Then what's the point of being in choir if all you do is lip sync? Plus 90% of the kids are "popular."

Graduation

Grrr, Amy's graduation ceremony was so boring. I mean honestly it went on for like four hours, literally. Bleh. And it rained the whole time. The thing was outdoors in the college soccer stadium and they DIDN'T CANCEL it. They just gave everyone plastic ponchos. After the prez of the university said congrats for the fourteenth time, everyone stood up and only half the grads threw their caps. xD Fail. We also talked to Amy's research professor Mr. Naaman. He's like six foot four. I'm wearing my awesome NY t-shirt right now cuz my other one got all muddy in the rain. I'M SO SORRY I couldn't get any for you guys!

Boy I sure ramble on. Coming home tomorrow (not in time for school though!).