The (Perhaps) Never-Ending Story Part 2

     Renae was sitting in the captain's quarters at a table across from the ship's feared captain.  He used his hook to thoughtfully comb his long, black mustache.
     "You see Missy," began the captain, "when ye first appeared on our magical shores, we thought we'd just get rid of you, and save us the trouble of you telling more nosy land lubbers like yourself about this place and risk them finding us.  However, I think you could be an asset to us and  give us a little help in exchange for your life."
     Renae swallowed.  The musty smell of unbathed men was choking her and making it hard to think.  "What do you want me to do?" she asked a little shakily.
     "There is this boy," his eyes glazed over with a certain contempt, "my...nephew, Peter, who has been gone for a very long time, and you see, we have not been speaking to each other.  I would like you to find him, and tell me where he is so that I can...make amends.  He won't be difficult to distinguish; his hair is firey red. "  He smiled a sugar coated grin.  "It would make me most grateful.  We will be reaching the Never land quite soon now.  You will be placed where he is found playing with his curse--I mean, delightful friends."
    
     Renae was in a terribly thick forest.  She was trying to find this boy that the smelly man had talked about.  He had gone into great detail in describing his appearance, even so, Renae could not help feeling a sense of hopelessness.  She had no idea where this boy was, or where she was for that matter.  And she was sure the pirate was lying.  It is not often that one hears, "help me find my nephew or die,".  'Ugh.'  Renae recalled the last words the hook-handed captain had told her: "Remember girlie, your life is at stake."  "Pirates must not have many social skills," Renae decided.  "But still, I had better find Peter, whoever he is, and turn him over to this 'Hook' fellow, or it'll be my head."
     A shadow passed over her, and Renae instantly stiffened.  Who knew what kind of horrible creatures could be running around?  The shadow stopped in front of her.  'Huh?' 
   

Boring Spider

    There is this spider in our front yard bigger and neater that the ones that I've seen out there before, and I got some pictures of it just sitting around and being a spider, but I wanted to get some pictures of it in action.  Nicholas poked it with a stick for me several times (and remarked recently that he is not going to do it again) and when it did move, the pics I did get of it were not what I was hoping for, being a perfectionist and all.  So I was throwing a number of things on the web, trying to get it to move, but it just stayed there. This is some of the stuff we put on its web.  Not a movement.

   

     By the way, here is another picture of it: I forgot that last night it attacked a plant I threw on its web.

The (Perhaps) Never-Ending Story Part 1

     Once upon a time, there was a girl named Renae.  Now Renae was home schooled, and had just joined photography class, and needed something to photograph other than her pet rat and spiders.  So she decided to grab her camera and go exploring for something interesting that had straight lines to take a picture of. 
     Renae set out for the woods behind her house, thinking that there must be many straight lines in a place with so many trees, but when she was about fifteen minutes away from home, Renae noticed something unusual happening.  In what had always been thickly wooded land, the trees were thinning out and the ground was gradually but steadily sloping down.  Curiosity drove Renae to investigate.  Soon, the terrain underfoot turned from grass to sand, and a salty breeze was tousling her long, wavy hair.  Suddenly, she saw a line of blue on the horizon; "no way...", she breathed to herself.  Renae began to run; the line of blue grew thicker and thicker until it she finally saw it stretch into an endless expanse of water.  'Oh boy, I don't believe it!  The ocean?!  I live in the mid-west, how could the ocean possibly be here?!  I should take some pictures; they won't have straight lines, but oh well.' After doing so, again, driven by her curiosity, she explored the edge of the ocean, wading through the water and marveling at how this huge body of water came out of no where.
     At last, Renae felt it was time she started home.  She turned to leave, and before she had gotten several feet, two pairs of strong hands grabbed her arms, turned her around, and started hauling her back towards the ocean.  She looked upward at her kidnappers, and saw that they were burly seamen.  Renae would have screamed, but instead she swept her gaze across her surroundings, looking for some one to help her, and gasped.  For instead of seeing just the ocean, she now saw many seamen like the ones who were dragging her along.  That, and a huge ship that looked like it had just sailed out ot the seventeen-hundreds, and flying pirate colors, too.  Finally regaining her wits, Renae did scream, and struggled too; one of the seamen just rolled his eyes, picked her up and threw her over his shoulder as if she weighed no more that a sack of flour.  Renae was carried up the gang plank and onto the ship, and was thrown down onto its deck at the foot of a tall, thin man of apparent power.  "Welcome aboard the Jolly Roger miss!" At the end of this man's right arm, where his hand should be, was large, ominous looking hook..