My mom went shopping and got PEPPERS!

By Marjorie Moreno 

Sailor Moon was the first anime I ever watched. Sad to say, I actually I enjoyed watching it. During the time, there were three animes I watch faithfully and that was Sailor Moon, Dragonball Z and Pokémon. Good times.

The perfect example of life without a care or worry.

I'm currently listening to My First Kiss by 3OH!3 and Ke$ha, so this will be my story…

Part 1: Sweet Home Alabama
I'm fairly sure that I was seven, I was in second grade and I had a "boyfriend" (You know, the little kid kind where you hold hands, really like each other and tease each other constantly). One day, I was waiting for my mom after school and my boyfriend, Charlie, and his friend, Cody, stayed with me. And Charlie and I decided that we were ready to kiss because we were in love, well puppy love. So, we had Cody be our lookout for my mom and we went and sat between the actual trailer (in our schoolyard) and the ramp that came down from the trailer. And we sat there, awkwardly, and we were both waiting for the other one to lean over that few inches and kiss. It didn't happen. He had said before that the girl should never kiss first and he wasn't kissing me. After a few minutes of sitting together Cody, who thinks we must have kissed by now, lets us know that he thinks he saw my mom. So, Charlie and I stand up and walk to the end of the ramp when Cody tells us it was a false alarm. So we stand at the end of the ramp and after some small conversation that I don't remember we decide that we're just going to do this. So we stand facing each other and he looks down at me, I was shorter than him even then, and he leans down and kisses me. It was a tap-kiss, nothing fancy, no big deal, unless you're a seven year old girl who loves this guy. The kiss couldn't have lasted more than a few seconds of our mouths just touching, but it seemed like it lasted for years. I was pretty freaking ecstatic.

Part 2: The Notebook
Years later when I was thirteen I very abruptly discovered that my feelings for this boy had not changed since I was seven (Okay, not so abruptly, I had known the whole time. Whatever.). And sometime that September, say…the 19th, I pluck up the courage (sort-of) to tell him that I like him. He calls me that night, we talk, we start dating. Needless to say it didn't take us very long to fall in love (Real love, not puppy love this time). A couple of months after we started dating he had walked me home, he did that most days and then he'd stay with me until maybe ten every night. So, we were outside and we were flirting like most couples do at first. And then he leans down and he kisses me. This one lasted a little longer than the first and we had gone past the point of tap-kissing. This was out first real kiss, my first real kiss ever.

So, there ya go. My first kiss.

My dad and I have always been roller coaster junkies; every summer we would go to at least one amusement park and ride until our heads throbbed and stomachs were sick.  It was a good pain though, a sign that yes, you had overcome the infamous Steel Force or Kingda Ka.  

When I was about 10, my dad and I decided that this was the year to induct my younger brother, Trevor, into our cult.  He was only 5 at the time, so I picked a kiddie roller coaster that I thought he could handle.  There were some hills, but they were only a few feet high.  Honestly, I was embarrassed to wait in line with him, but I swallowed my pride for future rides that awaited us.

He must have been chattering excitedly the entire time we were in the queue because he never actually saw the roller coaster until we'd hit the front of the line.  He turned around, stunned. He then proceeded to run straight into the people now behind us, screaming, "That is NOT a kid's roller coaster!".

Needless to say, he didn't overcome his fear that day and hasn't trusted me with any rides since.  

I've been staring at this my laptop screen for a whole class now. Waiting to go to the next class then realized we have a story slam now I am wishing this class wasn't over in a few minutes.

His name was Fluffucus and he was created in a computer generated world that went on forever. He woke up on a beach one day and observed the world around him. Surrounded by trees, animals and calm sound of music he didn't really know what do with this world on the first day. So then nightfall came down upon the world. Then suddenly...A ZOMBIE!!!!! Fluffucus was desperately scared and ran for his life and as he ran more of them started spawning from nowhere. The chase didn't go to far until he was killed by the zombies. After he knew the world of minecraft...was in fact DANGEROUS.

The plumber trudged up the long twisting driveway towards the looming mansion. This was exhausting. It felt like he was called up to fix this lady's problems every single day! He had better things to do. He had family; brothers, cousins, more brothers. He had a pet whose eggs would go bad if they weren't harvested in a timely fashion. He had little mushroom friends. But this wouldn't stop Mario. He had to help the Princess Peach.

Panic was racing through everyone’s mind. There was no way we could blow this. All I could do was watch at first base as the trusted pitcher delivered pitch after pitch outside of the strike zone.

 

Let me rewind – It was the championship game. The series was tied 1-1 in a best of three match. We were the underdogs, by far. The only reason we even made it to the playoffs was because there was no elimination in little league, an attempt to promote fairness, I guess. We already shocked everyone by beating the Athletics once. With our backs on the wall, we were able scrounger up a big inning. The score was 7-3.  All of a sudden, our pitcher started acting uncharacteristically, walking several people in a row and giving up big hits. The fielders started to get uneasy as the score was creeping up on us. It was now 7-6 with the bases loaded and the count 3-0, the coach walked out to the mound, and signaled for a pitching change. He was calling for me. I threw my warm up pitches and prepared for the most unnerving baseball experience of my life. I immediately threw two pitches for strikes, knowing that if I missed, we would lose the game. He then proceeded to foul off the next couple of pitches. I prepared for the next pitch. I winded up. SWING AND A MISS.

--From this point, it's all sort of blurry. My teammates came racing in and bombarded me at the pitchers mound. We were awarded our championship trophies and were left with an experience we would never forget, being the underdogs the entire season, coming back to beat the beast team in the league.