the bird on fire

The Bird is the Word: Sophisticated Schoolyard Shenanigans

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Celtic Knot

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Graphic by Harlow Berny

By Harlow Berny

 

Here are 6 Celtic knot facts, because why knot?

  • The Irish Celts were the people who perfected the art of the Celtic knot, but it is thought that the knots may have originated from Romans, and possibly have roots in Byzantine Constantinople.*
  • True Celtic knots have absolutely no loose ends and are completely one line.
  • Certain Celtic knots can have different meanings and purposes.
  • The basic understanding is that they symbolize how life is an unending cycle.
  • According to Irish tattoo artists, it’s mainly white Americans that get a Celtic knot tattoo.
  • It’s more culturally relevant for a white person to get a Celtic knot tattoo than a “tribal” or “native inspired” tattoo.**

 

Editor: Shelby Armor

*Disclaimer: This does not represent the beliefs of all members of thebirdonfire.org or PVS.

**Disclaimer: This line comes from the perspective of a Native American.

Sources: http://www.gaelicmatters.com/celtic-knot-symbols.html and http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2014/11/25/366584255/the-american-origins-of-the-not-so-traditional-celtic-knot-tattoo

easy self care tips:

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By Makena Behnke, Lifestyle/Poet Guru

  • take care of your skin. wear face masks, wash your face, etc.
  • drink your water. it improves your mood and overall helps your health.
  • take some time to yourself. don’t always feel like you have to talk and/or hang out with your friends 24/7.
  • drink some green tea. it has multiple health benefits; makes your skin glow as well as boosting your metabolism. if you don’t like the taste, you can always sweeten it.
  • plan for the future. don’t get too stressed out though, just make a list of things you want to do when you’re an adult/later on in life.
  • read. just read.
  • take care of your body. inside and out.
  • eat some fruit every once in awhile.
  • find something interesting and educational to study outside of school. like religion or different languages.
  • don’t keep your feelings bottled up.
  • treat yourself to something sweet every once in awhile.
  • find some way to calm yourself down wherever you are.
  • write a song or poem about how you feel. it doesn’t have to be good, no one needs to see it if you don’t want them to.
  • fake it till you make it. stand tall, and smile often.

Editor & Lifestyle Co-Guru: Brennan Nick

How the Polls Weren’t Wrong: A Look at the 1948 and 2016 Elections

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By Brennan Nick, AP World History Student and Political Strategist

 

In the 2016 election there was much discussion afterward about the polls being wrong, being off, or being untrustworthy. This, however, has been greatly exaggerated compared to the reality of what happened. Yes, polls in Michigan and Pennsylvania predicted Hillary Clinton to be the winner, but the margins overall were close enough that a Trump victory would have been within the margin of error. The one exception to this margin of error was Wisconsin, and only Wisconsin, where the polls both predicted Hillary to be the winner, and did not have a possibility of a Trump victory within the margin of error. Another example of how the polls were still fairly accurate was in the average of the national polls (the popular vote) which predicted Clinton to win by a 3.2 point margin over Trump. The final results of the election was a Clinton lead by 2.1 points. The difference between the polls and the reality was 1.1 point, hardly anything out of the ordinary.

 

Now, one election where the polls were in fact wildly off was the 1948 election between Harry S. Truman and Thomas E. Dewey. Harry S. Truman was the incumbent as he was the vice-president when FDR died of a stroke in April 1945. Going into the election Dewey, a Republican, was seen as the clear favorite to win after 16 years of a Democrat in the White House. This was further supported by the situation Truman–a Democrat–was in. The Democratic party had a three-way divide at the time between the far left of the party and the far right of the party; each of which split off into the Progressive Party and the Southern Dixiecrat party respectively. This then left only the center of the party which was now being led by Truman who was facing plummeting popularity when the elections began.

 

The stage was set and the candidates played their cards. Long story short, Dewey and his supporters were so sure that he was bound to win that they decided to run a campaign where all he had to do was not make any glaring mistakes and he would win the Presidency. His speeches were filled with non-political optimism, unity of the country, and broad, vague, optimistic goals including his now notorious quote, “You know that your future is still ahead of you.” Moreover, he avoided–as if his life depended on it–any issue that could be considered controversial. Truman, on the other hand, knowing that he was behind, took up an aggressive, slash-and-burn campaign and held nothing back. He mocked Dewey and the Republican Party and called out Dewey by name, criticizing him. However, as Truman went around the nation spewing fire against his opponents, he was the only one who still believed he could win. His own campaign members considered it “a last hurrah,” and his wife later admitted to having private doubts during the campaign.

 

On election night, the Dewey campaign was confidently waiting in a New York City hotel room, and newspapers had already printed a “Dewey win” on their front pages. Everyone, the polls, the journalists, even Truman’s closest supporters, expected a Dewey win. That, however, was a victory the Dewey Campaign would not have. Truman ended up overcoming all of the odds and won the election, coming within 1% of several, tipping-point, swing states. Even at the end of election day, NBC still predicted Dewey to be the winner once late returns came in. However, once the morning came, it was clear that Harry S. Truman won the election, and a picture was taken of him defiantly holding The Chicago Tribune which was printed the night before with the headline

“DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN.” 

 

What happened? Well, the largest explanation is that this was one of the first elections in which polling was in fact extensively used, and, as such, it had many flaws. The largest of these was the belief that the vast majority of all voters in an election make their choice before October and that the fall campaigns just simply would not sway many voters. However, as it turned out, according to historian William Manchester, “Gallup’s September 24 report foresaw 46.5% for Dewey to 38% for Truman. His last column, appearing in the Sunday papers two days before the election, showed Truman gaining sharply – to 44 percent – and the interviews on which it was based had been conducted two weeks earlier. The national mood was shifting daily, almost hourly.” Later polling revealed that roughly 15% of Truman’s voters decided to vote for him within the last two weeks of the election. Perhaps all of this can be attributed to the difference between Truman’s decisiveness and Dewey’s indifference that swayed the voters.

 

Whatever may have been the case, neither this election nor the 2016 election provide any reason to believe in the future that polling will be that far off, much less flat out wrong. Polling gets it just about . . . right.

 

Editor: Charles Schnell

 

Java Java Java

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By Makena Behnke

When you’re in high school, or any stressful environment requiring bursts of energy and attention, caffeine is a staple, whether it be Dr. Pepper, Red Bull, black tea, or some form  of coffee. Some people are big believers in the wonders of coffee, and some believe that it stunts your growth. Whatever the case, you cannot deny that coffee will ever go out of style. The chance of running into someone with a coffee cup in hand is inevitable. Now, there are many different types of coffee in this world and many different types of coffee drinkers; some prefer it with sugar, some with cream, and some have a ridiculous order that only they can remember. There are the obvious coffees: black coffee, coffee with cream or milk or sugar, lattes, cappuccinos, and frappuccinos. There are many other preparations of the beloved bean.

  1. Latte– cappuccino without the foam. There’s not much else to say… It’s good.
  2. Cappuccino– espresso with steamed milk foam. Pretty standard drink.
  3. Espresso– a highly concentrated shot of coffee you take right before cramming for finals.
  4. Espresso macchiato– espresso with milk foam, for the lighter studying you have to do.
  5. Espresso con panna– whipped cream and espresso, when you need to get some ~extra~ calories.
  6. Espresso con miele– espresso sweetened with honey. Save the bees by stealing their life’s work.
  7. Flat white– microfoam over single or double espresso… hip version of saying steamed milk foam.
  8. Caffe mocha– a chocolate flavored latte. Need I say more?
  9. Mochaccino– chocolate cappuccino.
  10. Doppio– a double espresso. The kind of coffee you need to get through a block day…
  11. Cortado– espresso mixed with warm milk.
  12. Affogato– espresso with ice cream…
  13. Cafe bonbon– sweetened condensed milk and espresso, crafted to make your heart stop if you have more than three.

* “Winter” is coming; stay warm. Drink coffee.

Editor: Brennan Nick

From where do you draw inspiration?

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Junior Asher Mai is an ardent reader of John Green and a recent expert on Robert Frost (thanks to his AP English Language Synthesis Project), so when he found a line of Frost quoted in the newest John Green book, Turtles All the Way Down, Asher felt inspired to write the following poem. 

 

“In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: It goes on.”–Robert Frost, as quoted by John Green

By Asher Mai

 

A red autumn leaf had fallen

And the wind had blown

He had flown seven thousand miles

To the other side of the Pacific Ocean

It was a path that he had chosen

 

He enjoyed the new environment

And learned to be independent

He had an amazing experience

An experience that he would

never have dreamed to experience

 

Summer had come

It’s time to go home

But his spiral of consciousness

had started to tighten

Because it’s a path he had not yet chosen

A future that was not yet known

Editor: Makena Behnke

If Horror-Film Characters Were Rational

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By Brennan Nick

 

“Hey, Joe! Do you want to go check out that abandoned lighthouse?”

“No, Stan. If you go there you’re just asking to break your leg.”

“Come on, we don’t have to climb to the top, just check out the place.”

“Alright, I’ll get the flashlights”

“We don’t need flashlights, Joe.”

“Yes, we do. It’s already dusk. By the time we get there it’ll be dark.”

“You know what? Scratch the lighthouse idea, let’s go exploring around the closed factory out of town.”

“We still need flashlights.”

“Fine, we’ll bring flashlights”

“Okay, great, but I wasn’t aware that flashlights make you invulnerable from twisted, broken ankles.”

“You’re no fun today, Joe…”

“Look, it’s getting late; I’m gonna go home down the main road that is very well lit and with many people on it.”

“Wow, Mr. Super-Safety Joe going down the well-lit road, where’s your sense of adventure?!”

“Fine then! We can go to the lighthouse tomorrow afternoon.”

“No, you ruined the lighthouse for me and the factory, too. We’ll go to the haunted house on the hill.”

“Ghosts aren’t real…”

“Then we’ll go to the totally normal, but creepy and vacated house on the hill tomorrow NIGHT and then…”

“Woah, Woah, Woah, if we’re going to go tomorrow why would you specifically wait until night?”

“For the sense of adventure! Joe, you just have to see it for yourself to understand what I mean. If we did it during the day, we’d just be going through an old house.”

“We’d be much less likely to hurt ourselves…”

“You really are not any fun today.”

“…”

Editor: Claire Jenkins

Halloween Special: Stupid Superstitions

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By Blogger Renée

 

As some of you samhainophobics may know, it is almost the dreaded day of your fears, Halloween. And how else should we honor this glorious day but with a glorious top 13 list! So here we are now to dive into the world of superstitions.

  1. If a black butterfly or moth lands on you (sometimes more specifically on your left shoulder), you will die in less than a year.
  2. During the New Year, wear red underwear for good luck and put new shiny coins with the heads side up on the windowsill.
  3. Trimming nails at night will bring you bad luck or in some cultures premature death.  
  4. Complimenting a newborn baby will bring it bad luck; this is believed in several cultures.
  5. Never, ever, put shoes on a bed; this will bring death.
  6. Don’t sleep or go outside if it’s cold with wet hair; this will bring you a deathly pneumonia.
  7. To bring in good luck for the New Year, eat twelve grapes (one for each month) and make wishes on each of them; you must eat them in the first two minutes of the New Year.
  8. The numbers four, six, thirteen, fourteen, seventeen and six hundred sixty six are bad luck and can even signal death or the devil.
  9. Black cats bring bad luck. There are multiple superstitions about black cats being bad luck: if they lead you under a ladder, cross your path, put their back to you, look at you in the eyes, they will bring you terrible luck or death.
  10. Never wash a baby’s clothes at night. Bad spirits or the devil will come if you wash baby clothes or hang them out to dry at night.  
  11. Whistling indoors brings the devil and general bad luck. Or death.
  12. You should tuck your thumbs into your fists when passing a cemetery to protect your parents.
  13. Don’t post a blog post about superstitions on Friday the 13th or 13 terrible things may happen…*

*Originally prepared on Friday the 13th.

 

Editor: Claire Jenkins

An Ode to Tom Petty

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By Guest Blogger and Music Critic Holden Hartle

This is the story of a boy who grew up to be one of the greatest rockstars to ever live. I feel very thankful that I was able to see him in concert before he passed. This man was a blessing to the music world and to anyone who heard his music.

He started in Gainesville, Florida. His father was abusive, but he found a safe haven with music. He dropped out of high school at the age of seventeen to pursue a career with his band at the time, Mudcrutch. The band moved to Los Angeles but fell apart shortly after. However, after hearing a demo that his former bandmates made, they rekindled the fire of making music under the new name, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

Front man Tom Petty played a beautiful twelve-string guitar and had the perfect raspy voice for the era. After the not-so-great sales of their first album, they opened for Nils Lofgren. Within weeks they were headlining and their album was on the British charts. The Heartbreakers were gaining momentum amongst the music world. This momentum led to great success in their next few albums.

While making their sixth studio album, which took three years, Petty was frustrated because he couldn’t think of any lyrics to write. So, he punched the nearest wall, breaking his left hand. Apparently, something clicked. The album featured the song “Don’t Come Around Here No More,” which became a number thirteen hit on the charts.

Finally, in 1989, Tom Petty came out with the solo album entitled, Full Moon Fever. This song features the classic Petty song that everyone can sing along to, “Free Fallin’.”

Tom Petty gave the world some of the most beautiful songs the world has ever heard. Songs like “American Girl,” “I Won’t Back Down,” and of course, “Free Fallin’” are songs which everyone can appreciate, no matter what generation. He will forever be missed. Rest in peace, and thank you, Tom Petty.

Editor: Peter Kadel

Sources referenced:

https://www.biography.com/people/tom-petty-201299

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/artists/tom-petty/biography

The Golden Key–A Fairy Tale Re-Telling

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WARNING: The following story may be a cliffhanger; proceed at your own risk.

Graphic by Harlow Berny

 

Retold by Harlow Berny

Centuries ago, when the winter had lain a thick blanket of snow upon the earth, a commoner’s son was sent to the forest to collect some firewood for his family, since the old miller from whom they used to buy was now beyond the realm of the living. When he had gathered as much as he could onto his quaint sleigh, he was tired and cold from his hours of work without any more than the thin clothes on his back. He decided to dig in the snow to make a small fire pit so he could regain his strength to bring the logs home, but once he removed the snow from the dirt, he found a small, golden key, no bigger than a toothpick. If there is a key hidden in the ground, thought he, then there must be something to unlock as well! He dug deeper under the ground where he found the key, delighted to find an iron box! Surely this box holds something precious inside! He searched all sides, and after two searches he saw the keyhole, so small that it was barely visible. He decided to try the key in the hole, and it fit perfectly inside. When he gently turned it and heard a delicate click, the box was unlocked. He opened the lid, and found inside…

Editor: Makena Behnke

The Girl Without Hands–A Fairy Tale Re-Telling

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WARNING: As in Grimm’s, the following fairy tale may contain violence; proceed at your own risk.

Artwork also by Harlow Berny

Retold by Harlow Berny

Centuries ago, when an old miller was out gathering firewood to sell for food, he had a chance encounter with The Devil. “If you give me what stands behind your barn,” said The Devil, “I will make you richer than any king in all the lands.” Pondering for a minute, the miller decided that trading the family apple tree that stood behind the barn for generations for vast riches was an outstanding deal. I could buy hundreds of apple trees with the wealth that he promises! thought the miller. “You have yourself a deal!” he shouted as he shook The Devil’s hand. “Excellent. I will be back in eight years time to collect what is rightfully mine.” In the blink of an eye, The Devil was gone in a wave of fire. When the miller went to look at the old apple tree that was going to make him rich, he was mortified to find that his only daughter was standing behind the barn and in front of the apple tree, and he realized how much of a fool he was to think that The Devil would give him vast riches for a measly tree, and further realized that The Devil was waiting eight years for his daughter to become 18. The miller knew he couldn’t go to a priest, for he would have to pay heavily to free himself and his daughter from the deal, if not persecuted for making the deal in the first place.

He did the only thing he could think of to foil The Devil, and eight years later when The Devil came to collect his debt, he found that the girl had been kept free of sin and her hands cleaned with holy water and was therefore untouchable. Infuriated, The Devil demanded that the girl’s hands be cut off so he could drag her down to hell or he’d take the miller instead. Fearing the loss of his own life more than his daughter’s, the miller took his axe and chopped her arms off, but when she cried her salty tears, which had become holy water due to her sinless soul, they cleansed her stumps and made it impossible again for The Devil to touch her. Infuriated once more, The Devil swore that the father would one day take his daughter’s place. Saying goodbye to both The Devil and his newly crippled daughter–now unable to work to pay for her food–the father kicked them both out of his barn. The daughter ran and cried until she stumbled into the royal garden, where the king took a fancy to her, and he married her within a month and commissioned a local blacksmith to create iron gauntlets to replace her missing hands.

A year later, and the royal family was welcoming a newborn boy into the family, and the king was off to claim more land in the name of his son. When he sent a letter home, though, The Devil resurfaced, and he altered the letter to order the queen’s execution. The queen saw the letter, and, in a panic, she threw it into the fireplace and took her child and ran into the woods, fearing her husband’s return.

When the queen was running in the forest, she found an angel calling out her name. When the angel got closer, the queen asked, “Oh, beautiful angel, what have I ever done to deserve your protection?”

“Nothing,” the angel shouted, “it is what your father has done to deserve my punishment!”

“My father, the old miller?”

“Yes. I shall reunite you with your husband and his army, and then you shall order the punishments that I whisper into your ear.”

“But will my husband not chop off my head once he sees me?”

“No. The letter you received was a forgery by someone who despises your family as much as I despise your father.”

“I don’t know who that possibly could be! What would stop them from trying again?!?”

“Do not worry, my child. Once your father is given the punishment he so rightly deserves, this nightmare will all be over. Let us hurry; we must meet your husband a mile north of here, and I will tell you what to say from there on.”

“Why can you not tell them yourself?”

“Because you are the only one who can see me. Now hurry!”

As the angel promised, when they were a mile north they intercepted her husband and his army–right in front of her father’s farm.

“My love,” said the king, “what are you and the child doing so far from the castle?”

The angel started whispering into her ear, and she spoke the angel’s words in her own voice. “I have something of great importance to tell you, my love, and it involves this old barn that I was born and raised in, and the man who raised me in it.”

“Darling, is it truthfully so important that you must tell me here and now?”

“Yes. The man who raised me here, the man who was supposed to be my father, made a deal with The Devil, promising me to The Devil as his servant when I came of age. When The Devil came to collect me, he found me sinless and my hands clean, so he ordered my father to chop them off, but when my untainted tears touched my stumps, they were cleansed again. The Devil could not touch me, but still my father kicked me out since I could no longer work for my food.”

Stunned, the king waited before he spoke again. “M-my word, I… I am at a loss.”

The angel whispered again, and the queen relayed, “Scorned by my father’s deception, The Devil has now tried to end my life. The only way to make this stop once and for all is to punish my father for his sins.”

“But h-how is one p-punished for such… heinous crimes?”

“He must be publicly punished in the same way he maimed me, then hanged. He will serve as an example to those who wish to make an unholy deal.”

“… Yes. He shall.”

The king’s army stormed the barn and brought the miller back to the village in shackles. As the angel commanded, the king had the miller’s hands cut off and then promptly hanged. What no one saw, however, was The Devil standing behind the miller as he died, and then slipping the miller’s soul into his hand. The miller had finally paid his debt, and now the riches that the devil promised the miller were in the queen’s hands as she lived a peaceful life with the king and their child.

Editor: Shelby Armor