Christmas Story essays

Christmas Story essays A few years ago there was a fortuneteller living next to my house. From what I remembered she was very famous, her predictions were very accurate as there were so many people visiting her everyday. I heard that she had used a very big crystal ball to tell fortune. I was so afraid to visit her house until one day... It was Christmas Eve, my mother asked me to bring a gift to the fortuneteller next door. At first I did not want to go but somehow I knocked on her door with a small wrapped gift. There was a very kind and young lady answered the door. After introducing myself I asked for the fortune telling lady. She replied she was the person that I was trying to find. I was so surprised as I thought the fortune telling lady must be a tough and old lady. She thanked me for the gift and asked me for a snack with her. Her name was Lucy, from what she told me she inherited the fortune telling crystal ball from her mother, whom was very ill. I noticed that it was very late already. I thanked her for the snack and ready to leave. She said she appreciated our kindness so much that she was going to perform a free fortune telling for me. I was so excited that I did not know what to ask for. We went into a room with only a table and 2 chairs. A crystal ball was sitting at the middle of the table, coving b y veil. We both took a seat and she said the crystal ball would be able to answer any question, from the past to the future. I was so nervous, didnt know what I should ask. Finally I asked the ball, Tell me what the world is going to be after 3000 years. There was sudden flash from the ball and there was nothing in the ball except darkness. Lucy was surprised too, she said it should be showing something, not just darkness. Then she said, The reason why there was nothing in the ball was 3000 later, there will be no lights in this planet. She further explained that it seems that a huge layer of dusk and pollutants ...

Psittacosaurus - Facts and Figures

Psittacosaurus - Facts and Figures Name: Psittacosaurus (Greek for parrot lizard); pronounced sih-TACK-oh-SORE-us Habitat: Scrublands and deserts of Asia Historical Period: Early to middle Cretaceous (120 to 100 million years ago) Size and Weight: About 3 to 6 feet long and 50 to 175 pounds, depending on species Diet: Plants Distinguishing Characteristics: Short, blunt head with curved beak; small horns on cheeks About Psittacosaurus As you may have guessed from its name, Greek for parrot lizard, what set Psittacosaurus apart from other dinosaurs of the Cretaceous period was its distinctly un-dinosaur-like head. This plant-eaters curved beak made it somewhat reminiscent of a parrot, but otherwise, its squat noggin was distinctly tortoise-like. (One shouldnt draw too much from this analogy; Psittacosaurus, and other ornithischian dinosaurs like it, werent directly ancestral to modern birds, an honor that belongs to saurischian dinosaurs.) Although its often depicted in a four-legged posture, paleontologists believe some species of Psittacosaurus (there are at least 10 currently named) walked or ran on two legs. (A new study concludes that this dinosaur scuttled around on four legs as a juvenile, then assumed a bipedal posture thanks to a growth spurt in its hind legs.) Psittacosaurus seems to have led a relatively quiet life, although the horns on its faceprobably a sexually selected characteristicindicate that the males may have engaged in combat with each other for the right to mate with females. Theres also solid evidence that Psittacosaurus cared for its young after they hatched, like the distantly related duck-billed dinosaurs Maiasaura and Hypacrosaurus. By the way, you wouldnt know it from its small, unprepossessing appearance (six feet from head to tail and 200 pounds, max, for the largest species), but Psittacosaurus is classified as a ceratopsianthe family of horned, frilled dinosaurs the most famous members of which were the much later Triceratops, Protoceratops, and Styracosaurus. In fact, Psittacosaurus was one of the most basal ceratopsians, predated only by the late Jurassic Chaoyangsaurus and itself a close cousin to a bewildering array of proto-ceratopsian genera, including Yinlong and Leptoceratops.