Week 9 Story: Jack & Junior

(Brer Rabbit Picture)

     Now, we've all heard the stories of Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox and all they get up to. All ya'll know how Brer Rabbit always pullin' the wool over Brer Fox's eyes. But what ya'll all ain't never heard about, was their younguns. 

    Well, back in that little holler that all them animals lived in, Miss Meadows would watch the younguns and teach em proper. They learn readin', writin', and countin'. She loved 'em all like they was her own. But the nearest and dearest ones close to her heart were them there lil bunnies from Brer Rabbit and his Missus. Miss Meadows thought they was cute as a bug's ear. So they could no wrong in her eyes. 

    Welp, the littlest out of them lil bunnies was named Jack. Even though he was the cutest, he was also smart as a whip. He could sell ice to a penguin if you asked him to do it. And he mostly used them smarts to always get one over on lil Fox, Jr. He was Brer Fox and Missus Fox's only lil pup. He was a trouble maker, that one. He's always goin' after Jack and the lil bunnies. Course, he just was doin' what his Pa was always doin'. 

  One day all the younguns was out in Miss Meadows garden helpin' her to tend to it. Each youngun had a certain job to do. Jack was supposed to be paintin' the little fence that went round the garden to a nice white color. Well, Jack so got bored. He looked round at ole Junior pullin' up weeds and grinned when an idea came to his head. "I am so lucky that Miss Meadows picked me for this here job. Ain't nobody anywheres that can do this job," he said real loud like gettin' Junior's attention.

"What you over here yammerin' about, Jack? Alls yuns is doin' is paintin' that fence over yonder. It ain't that hard." Junior was snarlin' at him. 

"Yeah, but Miss Meadows said only I can do this job. On count of I'm SPECIAL, and only SPECIAL younguns can do this work," He was sayin' actin' all proud like.

Junior scratched his head a' thinkin'. What if he went over there and made lil ole Jack give his job to him? Then Miss Meadows would think HE was special. "Hmm..yun's is right. So gimmee that brush!" He yanked it out Jack's lil paw and pushed him real good to the ground. 

Jack grinned to hisself. He just sat back and watched the day drifitin' on by while ole Junior painted that whole fence. 

When Miss Meadows called all the younguns to show her their work, she saw that there fence was painted but her garden still afull of weeds. "Well, bless me! Looks like you are lazier than a fat tick on a hound dog, Junior Fox!" Miss Meadows was exclaimin' when she saw that there weren't no weeds pulled up in the garden. "I'm gonna tan your hide fer bein' so lazy! And I'm gonna tell yer Pa when I sees him!" She took him inside by the ear and all the children could hear him gettin a whippin' from Miss Meadows' switch she ain't hardly ever used. All the while, Jack justa sittin' there grinnin' to hisself. 

A/N: 

For this story, I wanted to do something with Brer Rabbit's children. They are mentioned a lot in the stories but we are never given any specific characteristics of one of the little bunnies. So I thought I would make the youngest one a trickster, just like Brer Rabbit. I was thinking of what kind of trick he could pull when I though of also giving the other animals children too. This is how Junior Fox was created. I also took a bit of inspiration from Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. Tom Sawyer tricks a bunch of boys into painting a fence for him, and ends up not having to do the work. I also used a different kind of Southern language. I'm from East Tennessee and tried to stick with slang from there because that's what I'm more familiar with. Thanks for reading! 

Bibliography:

Uncle Remus: His Songs and Sayings by Joel Chandler Harris (1881).

Reading Part B Notes: Brer Rabbit

Brer Rabbit Reading Notes Part B

Brer Rabbit getting the best of Brer Fox. (Source: Deviant Art )

Mr. Fox and The Deceitful Frogs

-picks up after Terrapin has tricked Fox into letting go of his tail, Terrapin is mocking him from water

-teased Fox in terrapin talk

-Frog and Bull-Frog join in

-they tricked Fox into thinking his reflection was another fox and he fell in the water

Old Mr. Rabbit, He's a Good Fisherman

-has origins in Europe

-Fox, Rabbit, Coon, Bear, and others are clearing a patch to plant corn

-Rabbit begins to get tired but doesn't say anything because he doesn't want to look lazy

-Rabbit jumped into a bucket from a well

-bucket went down and rabbit got scared- "They ain't been no worser scared beast since the world begin than this here same Brer Rabbit." 

-ague-illness

-Fox followed him and saw Rabbit fall down the well in the bucket

-Fox thinks that Rabbit is actually hiding something in the well

-Rabbit tells Fox he is fishing

-Rabbit tricks Fox into jumping in other bucket and pulling him up

Mr. Rabbit Meets His Match Again

-Buzzard and Rabbit growing crop together

-Buzzard didn't get his share

-Buzzard tells Rabbit he found a gold mine

-Buzzard carries Rabbit over the river

-Rabbit gets scared and is weak in the knees for months

A Story About The Little Rabbits

-Little rabbits are Brer Rabbits children.

-good children

-Fox wants to eat them but remembers when Wolf got boiled and skinned so is making an excuse to eat them

-"Take your toothies and gnaw it,Take your toothies and saw it,
Saw it and yoke it,
And then you can broke it."

-"Sifter hold water same as a tray,If you fill it with moss and dob it with clay;
The Fox get madder the longer you stay—
Fill it with moss and dob it with clay."

-"Spit in your hands and tug it and toll it,And get behind it, and push it, and pole it;
Spit in your hands and rear back and roll it."

-A little bird sang solutions to the problems that Fox gave them

Mr. Rabbit and Mr. Bear

- goober- peanut

-cute- "acute"

-Rabbit got caught in Fox's trap

-told Bear he was making money being a scarecrow for Fox

-Rabbit tricked Bear into taking his place and told Fox he was stealing from him

-Fox beat him with a stick- "blip"

Mr. Terrapin Shows His Strength

-all animals went to Miss Meadows to make molasses 

-all are given jobs to do

-Miss Meadows said they weren't allowed to play tricks or fight each other and hung up a flag of truce at the gate

-rocking in chair repetitive

-terrapin says bear cant pull him out of a puddle

-got the rope and tied it to a tree root

The Story of The Deluge

-"way back yonder"

-not  a beer rabbit story, but flood story

-Lion was king

-Rhinossy-hoss- Rhino

-elephant stepped on a crawfish and squished it

-Crawfish burrowed down into the earth and released water from the earth flooding it

Plantation Proverbs

Bibliography: 

Uncle Remus: His Songs and Sayings by Joel Chandler Harris (1881).

Reading Week 9 Part A Notes: Brer Rabbit

 Brer Rabbit Notes Part A

Artwork by Kenket. (Source: Deviant Art )

The Calamus Root

-Southern Accent sounding

-descriptive in how Brer Rabbit looks

-third-person
-"looking just as plump, and as fat, and as sassy as a Morgan horse in a barley-patch."
-"mending his licks"-

-"confab"- conversation

-"holler from where you stad"

-"ain't"

-"calamus root"

The Wonderful Tar Baby Story

-Brer Fox mixed up tar and turpentine and made a contraption called a "Tar-Baby"

-"Brer Rabbit pacing down the road — lippity-clippity, clippity-lippity — just as sassy as a jaybird"

-How does your symptoms seem to segashuate?" says Brer Rabbit, says he."-means "how are you?"

-"but Tar-Baby ain't saying nothing."- repetitive sentence 

-Brer Rabbit hit the tar-baby and got stuck

-Brer Fox laughs at Brer Rabbit

Why Mr. Possum Loves Peace

-intro brer possum and brer coon

-"just as sociable as a basket of kittens"

-Brer Possum fell over like he was dead in front of the dog

-"skaddling through the woods like it was shot out of a musket."

-Brer coon calls brer possum a coward

-"And down to this day, Brer Possum's bound to surrender when you touch him in the short ribs, and he'll laugh if he knows he's going to be smashed for it."

How Mr. Rabbit Was Too Sharp For Mr. Fox

-Brer Fox plans to barbeque Brer Rabbit

-Rabbit repeatedly tells Fox not to fling him in the brier patch

-Because Fox wanted to hurt Brer Rabbit as badly as possible he flung him by his back legs into the brier patch

Mr. Fox is Outdone by Mr. Buzzard

-Buzzard was supposed to be guarding the tree where Rabbit was at

-Rabbit escaped and Buzzard tricked Fox into cutting down the tree still'

-"I done been tampered with till plumb down to the sapsucker'll sit on a log and sassy me."

Mr. Wolf Makes a Failure

-proverbs

-gossip about how Rabbit tricked Fox

- "they sort of palavered on"

-Wolf tricking Rabbit by saying Fox died

-"tear out the house like the dogs was after him."

Mr. Fox Tackles Old Man Tarrypin

-"terrapin"- turtle

-"you don't know what trouble is"-repetitive 

-tricks Fox into letting him go in the water

The Awful Fate of Mr. Wolf

-Folks what's always pestering people, and bothering about that what ain't theirs, don't never come to no good end.-life lesson

-"What you doing now, Brer Rabbit?" -repetitive

Bibliography:

Uncle Remus: His Songs and Sayings, by Joel Chandler Harris (1881).

 Week 8 Progress

1. Looking Back

I am pretty happy with my progress. At first, I thought I was really behind because I had a week where I got behind on my assignments. After looking at the progress chart, I was not as behind as I thought I was. I've had fun with this class. I've kind of used it as self-care from the other stuff I have going on too. My favorite part of this class is when I get to write my own stories. I love being able to be the one to tell stories for people to read! 

2. Looking Forward. 

One of the things I need to improve is staying on schedule with all of my assignments. I need to make sure weekly I'm getting everything that needs to be done, done. The only things going forward about my project I may change are my grammar and revisions that were suggested. There is a name I might change as well. 

3. 

 A personal image I created on Canva. (March 18, 2021)

 Week 8: Comments and Feedback

1. Feedback in:

I would say that the comments I have received so far have been helpful and encouraging. I like that I get useful criticism from people and that they specifically tell me what I can change or fix. 

2. Feedback out:

I think I do well at leaving feedback on others' posts. I tend to use the TAG strategy the most because it's the easiest way for me to leave good constructive feedback as well. I do think I need to practice using the other techniques, though. 

3. Blog Comments:

I enjoy reading other people's intro posts and getting to know them. I think that in this class I get to know people better than I do in in-person classes at times. I think my blog is very thorough (maybe too thorough!) about introducing myself. I feel like I got most of the important things about me in it. 

4. Looking Forward:

I think it would be more useful for me if I tried other feedback strategies besides just the TAG one. This could even help me find out other things to say in my comments. As of right now, I do not want to make any changes to either my Intro post or comment wall.  

5. Image:

(Source: Growth Mindset & Feedback Cats)

I chose this image because I find that most of the time I am growing is when others are teaching me to be better than what I am currently. 

Week 8 Reading and Writing

 Week 8 in Review 

Looking Back...

    Overall I think that the reading and writing assignments are going great. My own personal schedule has been really busy, but I like that this class is structured to where even if I do miss any assignments, I can always catch them up later with extra credit. I'm pretty happy with how my blog and website have turned out. When I started this class, I did not know anything really about designing stuff like this. So for a beginner, I think I've done pretty well. I'm pretty satisfied with the direction my project is taking. I have a really emotionally and mentally tough internship and class load this semester, and my project stories and weekly stories, and reading have become a form of self-care for me. My biggest accomplishment in this class with my writing is it has really helped my creativity. I used to write a lot more when I was younger and I really enjoyed it. But as I got older I didn't have enough time and I really feel like I was letting my creativity go to waste. But this class gives me a great outlet for it and encourages it. My favorite reading so far is the Adam and Eve unit. I grew up in church hearing the classical Bible story but never read any of the Apocrypha, so it was interesting to add that into the story and even think about it on a more spiritual level for me, as well. I think my reading notes are helping some. They help me remember names and things about different gods and goddesses a lot.  

 (Source: Once Upon a Time Fandom Postcard )

Image Information

I chose to use the image above from my favorite storybooks post I did at the beginning of the semester. This postcard was a promo for the show Once Upon a Time. The arc of the season they were promoting was about the land of untold stories. I thought it was fitting because in this class we are all telling our own stories and they are all unique just like the ones in the show. 

Looking Forward....

    Something I think I really need to focus on is maybe sticking to more of a schedule going forward? It's hard because I have an internship/practicum that the schedule changes day to day really. But I think this just means I need to be more intentional with my free time and downtime. I also think it would benefit me to maybe look into a different note-taking strategy. This would help me come up with ideas for stories. 

Reading Part B: Japanese Mythology

 Japanese Mythology Part B

Picture of the underside of a Japanese Umbrella (Source: Pixabay )

The Labors of Yamato: The Grotto of Love 

-Benten- sea kami (goddess) one of the Seven Lucky Gods of Japan

-Yamato got bored with his wife Princess Tacibana

-he went hunting to stop his boredem 

-Enoshima 

-jumped from a cliff into the sea and found a grotto filled with emerald light

-"Upon a couch of coral bowered mid glittering sea-blooms, reclined his lost siren, singing softly the whiles she gently fingered a gold and amber lute."

-handmaidens of the siren Benten spread out a feast before Yamato

-"Grant me thy love, sweet siren- else I shall surely die."

The Labors of Yamato: The Golden Apple

-Benten tells the story of Jofuku who traveled and got a golden apple

-"Prince! If thou wouldst be my lover, that Enchanted Isle discover, Bring me back the Golden Apple, thy devotion thus to prove! Then in joyance beyond measure, in a round of ceaseless pleasure, Thou shalt dwell with me forever in eternal youth and love."

 The Labors of Yamato- The Demon Boar 

- very similar to the labors of Hercules 

-asked all the servants, sailors, and fishermen about the Golden Apple but no one knew anything

-depressed- "A lethargy of despair"

-boar in the forest of Hakone

-Ise- high priestess 

-the priestess tells Yamato that only the sacred sword can kill the boar and that he is only vulnerable in his tail and runs like the wind

-search brought them high into the mountains

-killed by cutting off tail and driving off a cliff

The Labors of Yamato- The Grass- Cleaving Sword

-Suruga 

-Sagami

-Princess Tacibana saves Yamato and men from  raging fire

The Labors of Yamato- The Sacred Sword

-Yamato starts thinking about Benten again and tells Tacibana to go home and hide herself till her hair grows back and her burns heal because he says she is hideous in his sight

-Benten trying to trick Yamato for the Sacred Sword for Susa-no-wo

-she got him drunk and made him pass out and she stole the Sacred Sword

-lost in the forest

The Labors of Yamato- The Sacred Sword (Cont.)

-Kwannon- the merciful, goddess of mercy and love

- told Yamato that the sword is in the horns of a stag

-made a lance from bamboo

-goddess lent Yamato her hounds for the hunt

The Labors of Yamato- The Dragon

-norito-an ancient exorcism to protect the faithful from serpents, sprites, and goblins

-Tacibana was "the goddess more beautiful than Benten whose love was greater than her own,"

-Susa-no-wo the dragon- "His head was like a camel, his horns were like a stag, and his eyes were glowing coals of fire. Scaled like a crocodile, he brandished a tiger's paw, armed with the talons of an eagle. 

-Yamato's wife died just like Hercules did in the story of his labors

The Jewel of Heart's Desire: The Land of Morning Calm

-Emporer Chiuai- son of Yamato

-the Empress had a vision from Amaterasu and the Emporer doubted it and was killed by the goddess

-the Land of Morning Calm

-jewel of heart's desire

Bibliography:

Romance of Old Japan by E. W. Champney and F. Champney (1917).