A Stolen Story -- Part 2 (Conclusion)

(Left to Right) Draco, Nim, Anky, me (Mr. Smiley), Lizzy, Mark and Para pose for a photo around the newspaper culprit, Betty Shiftwell (next to me).

This is Mr. Smiley reporting from Smiley's News as a follow-up from a story we published a few weeks ago written by Lizzy the Lizard. That was when Lizzy's story went missing and so she wrote a story on the missing article she was working on instead. Ever since, I'd been involved in trying to solve the mystery of who stole it! I began my search by looking on the security camera footage and whoever pulled off this robbery also capable of turning off the security cameras long enough to complete the deed. Smart guy! With nothing else to do, I reported the robbery to Mark Louis, the official at Animal Adventures Inc. (AAI.). He and the other authorities (consisting of Nim the Chimpanzee, Draco the Dracorex dinosaur, Para the Parasaurolophus and Anky the Ankylosaurus) went to Lizzy's office and checked for fingerprints. Unfortunately, they were unable to find anything. Drat! “It seems whoever stole Lizzy's article literally picked up the paper and left,” says Mark. “He/she must have also used gloves to open the door to the office unless Lizzy left her door open. But they knocked down a Lizzy's drink cup in the process, so we know they were probably clumsy and in a rush, as all burglars are.” So what could we do next? Well, Mark and I worked together on the internet to look for any other newspaper article robberies and were shocked by the results: 12 articles were stolen from other newspaper publishers in the past three months, which amounts to one article a week for publishers that publish weekly; and get this: they were all stolen on a Monday! So our culprit was someone who must frequent newspaper publishers a lot and has access to everyone's office (including mine!). Nim thought of a nifty solution – create a sort of booby-trap! He is quoted for saying, “Alright, my plan is to have Lizzy leave her door open with a (fake) newspaper article on the desk. Then, the thief will hopefully pick it up and take it. BUT, there's going to be a little, light-weight beacon on it that will make our beacon detector pick up the signal and we can follow it to the culprit's layer!” So according to the plan, we got right to work and set the paper on Lizzy's desk. Lizzy initially thought the beacon was a little insect, but I was able to stop her just in time before she gulped down our only way to catch the thief. We waited till the end of the day and . . . as Nim had suspected, the paper was gone! So the authorities, Lizzy, my trusty junior photographer, Daniel P. Smithwater and I followed the signal and tracked it to an old shed near AAI. The authorities surrounded the building before bursting inside to find . . . a surprised Betty Shiftworth sitting in a chair reading Lizzy's article! This is the same woman who delivers mail at AAI. (actually we have two mail deliverers; the second one is Ming the Guanlong, he's a dinosaur)! After securing her, the authorities examined the place and found 12 (plus our fake) articles – these were the ones that were stolen. “I was only taking articles to start my own newspaper column!” Betty exclaimed when I asked why she'd steal other people's articles. “I was getting bored and I thought doing my own newspaper would be fun once I had enough articles. I was planning to rewrite them for my own papers once I had about a year's worth . . . [but] I suppose I'll never get my year's worth.” Newspaper publishers (including mine) received their articles back and decided not to press charges since it was a “small theft”. However, I am sure of two things from now on: Betty is fired and I'll be using the more trustworthy Ming to deliver mail from now on and I'm keeping my office door locked when I'm not in it!

Written by: Mr. Smiley

Photographer: Daniel P. Smithwater

Edited by: Christian Ryan, Joy Hammond

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Liz the Singing Lizard

Lizzy the Lizard loves her music!

Hey everyone, Lizzy here and I've been busy this week. I got home and I started listening to music on this app: Pandora. I found many of my favorite songs on it. I have no clue what I'd do if music was never here. I listen to music constantly, like when I'm writing my stories, cleaning around the house and my room, and before going to bed. Sometimes I love the song so much that I play it over and over. Lily, my sister, is a little annoyed when I play the same song over and over again but I can't help it. I've tried to write a song but Lily read it and said it wasn't very good, even though I think it is. Anyway, our topic today is music (as you can tell). I decided to have fun today and I looked up what music was and here's what came up:

"The art or science of combining vocal or instrumental sounds (or both) to produce beauty of form, harmony, and expression of emotions."

Here's my definition of music: music can either lift our spirits or trash them. There are clean and uplifting songs and then their are in appropriate and dirty ones. Today I will show you some of my favorite song and why I like them.

I have so many good songs but I decided to pick the top seven. 

1. It's time for Africa by Shakira

Most of the time when I listen to songs on YouTube, I usually look for the lyrics video instead of the music video because I like seeing what words are in the song first. Anyway, I like this song, not only because its energetic but because its feels encouraging to me. You'll see why after reading the first verse.

You're a good soldier, choosing your battles. Pick yourself up and dust yourself off, and back on the saddle.  You're on the frontline, Everyone's watching. You know it's serious, we're getting closer. This isn't over. The pressure's on, You feel it. But you've got it all, Believe it.

It seems encouraging to me, maybe you have a different opinion but when I'm out on the field playing soccer or anything else that's a competition or hard, I'm gonna have this song in my head.

2. Radioactive by imagine dragons

I wasn't sure how to explain how I feel about this song. It may seem dark but that's not how I feel about it. Trying to look for the right words, I looked up what the song means. Dan Reynolds, who sang the song has this to say, "Radioactive to me, it's a very powerful-sounding song, and the lyrics behind it, there's a lot of personal story behind it, but generally speaking, it's a song about having an awakening; kind of waking up one day and deciding to do something new, and see life in a fresh way. A lot of people hear it in a dark way, but, I think, without saying the word too many times, it's empowering, and so we wanted to display that in a way that the listener wouldn't see normally." Reynold's had been struggling with depression and anxiety issues for most of his life. He put it like this: "Coming out of a pretty serious spell of depression and having a new awakening and real vigor for life."

3. Tell the World by Lacrae

This song also has a very powerful message to it. I've listened to it over six times in a row. That's how much I like it! The message is about being brand new in Christ. Near the end of the song, it says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away, Behold, the new has come." That is based on one of my favorite verses, reminding me that I'm new in Christ and nothing should ever change me back. 

4. Fingerprints of God by Steven Curtis Chapman

Although this song seems to be meant for girls, the song has many important statements. My favorite is, "never has there been and never again, will there be another you." It makes makes me feel special and unique, knowing that no one is like me.

5-6. Fearless and Nothing's gonna stop me now both by Olivia Holt.

Both these song are upbeat and encouraging. I feel confident when I hear these songs. I find myself singing the songs, often. I guess songs can have that effect on you. Songs will change your attitude about things, that would also be why you have to be careful what you listen to.

7. Good time by Owl City and Carly Rae Jepson

This is the last song I'm going to talk about. It's all about having a positive attitude throughout the whole day. "It's always a good time", is the phrase used throughout song. Yep, this song is very catchy, especially the chorus.

Well that's all the time I have for today so this is Lizzy signing off!

Written by: Mr. Smiley

Photographer: Daniel P. Smithwater

Edited by: Christian Ryan

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Next Issue: Knock, Knock! Who's There? Gator's Here!

Codes, Codes, Codes and More Codes!

Here's the international translations chart for the Morse code.

I love codes and signals, do you? I decided to check out different codes and signals used around the world. There the famous morse code: ..../..     ./...-/./.-./-.--/---/-./.    -../---     -.--/---/..-     .-../../-.-/.      .--/.-./../-/../-./--. ../-.  -.-./---/-.../. ? I can't wait to show you lots of codes that I know! Do you know how long codes and signals have been around? As far as I know codes have been around since the book of Genesis in the Bible. Yeah, you wouldn't think of it but most of the codes were dreams or visions which were then interpreted to understand it. Of course, I'm sure you wouldn't count that as a code but it is. Here's another easy code, pig Latin: Idda ouya nowka hatta ona oneway nowska henwa igpa atinla aswa adema? Heta earliestway entionma aswa inwas ayma 1869! Pig Latin was used for entertainment  or for private conversations from one person to another. Signals have been used a lot too, their also codes. Such as this Hand fan language:

Twirling the fan in the left hand-we're being watched

Carrying the fan in the right hand in front of her face- follow me

Covering the left ear with open fan-do not betray our secret

Drawing hand through hand-I hate you

Touching the tip of fan with finger-I wish to speak to you

Dropping the fan-we will be friends

Touching the handle of the fan to the lips- kiss me

Clever huh, I wish I had a fan. Oh wait I do!!! I grab my favorite fan, it's wooden and has a nice painted picture on the front. I open the fan and cover my left ear and smile. There are so many other codes to be learned I'll show you to more! The open letter code:

Hello Everyone,

I hope you remember everything you learn. Writing and decoding codes takes a lot of time and skills. Be ready to tackle any message that comes your way. Ready for a hard one? How many of you are resourceful? Wait for a new adventure is so much fun don't you think? 

From, Lizzy

Well did anyone get that? I bet you didn't well ill give you a hint. The last word or the first word of each sentence makes a message! Good luck! I know that you'll have fun writing in code and deciding messages! Well this is Lizzy the lizard, making sure that you know the codes! :)

Written by: Liz the Lizard

Photographer: Daniel P. Smithwater

Edited by: Christian Ryan, Joy Hammond and Mr. Smiley

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Next Issue: The Speed Dashers Take Off . . . Slowly

The Pachyderm-ingly Huge Jellybean Incident!

Last Tuesday was a normal day at Animal Adventures Inc. (AAI.). In fact, “normal” doesn't cut it – it was boring! There was absolutely nothing going on. I was sitting in my office at Smiley's News working on an advertisement bulletin, Daniel P. Smithwater was taking some nature photographs for an upcoming photo competition and everyone else at AAI. was doing . . . well, practically normal stuff. That is until the head chef of AAI.'s kitchen, Chef Rack-Coon (who as you might have guessed, is a raccoon) received his latest shipment of food supplies in. “I get as much organic food as I can to cook-up dishes for everyone here,” says Rack, “and most of it comes from Mac Dee Dee's Organic Farm across town. They have almost everything you can imagine! That's a good thing too, because the sauropods (long-necked dinosaurs) we have here eat a lot of food!” So as usual, Rack and his assistant chefs (most of which are meerkats) put the food away and started fixing lunch for the animals and people at AAI. Mitch Meerkat, Rack's right hand man . . . er, “cook” is quoted for saying, “As usual, lunchtime was very buys. Everyone ate their fill and left stuffed. Today was a special day because the other chefs and I made a special dessert for today: Jellybean pops, and as we later found out, that turned out to be a dangerous mistake!” Normally, Rack orders jellybeans that are sweetened with organic sugar, but since his suppliers didn't have those jellybeans, Rack ordered jellybeans that had been sweetened with Sweet Common Juniper Berries, one of the sweetest berries around . . . bad idea! So after lunch, everyone went back to their normal routine when many citizens of AAI. realized that there was much noise coming from the elephant's room. Now there are quite a few large elephants (African and Asian Elephants and Woolly Mammoths) and when a herd of elephants gets rumbling, not much can't be heard! The music was piping loud and their neighbors couldn't get much quiet. Now that something bizarre was happening, my trusty, junior photographer, Daniel P. Smithwater and I, went to the neighbors of the elephants, the swine's room, to get an exclusive interview with Wilbur the Warthog. He's quoted for saying, “I was surprised to hear so much noise coming from the elephant's room. Normally they're relatively quiet neighbors, but let me tell you, they were going nuts today! I went over to their room and asked Methuselah, one of the bull African elephants, to have him tell the rest of the herd to turn down the music, but he told me, 'What do you mean turn it down? I can hardly hear as it is. Besides, we're having a party in our room right now.' He asked if I wanted to join, but I swiftly declined. I wasn't sure what was up.” Another resident, Grizzly Bear, also wasn't too fond of the noise. “I have to live with someone who doesn't like to stay quiet every single day,” he explains. “I live in this apartment room with a few other bears, but no doubt the noisiest is Belle Black Bear, but everyone calls her 'Little Black Bear'. She's constantly singing annoying songs, and worst of all, she's almost always off-key! But this particular day, I thought I'd finally get some quiet time when the elephants a couple apartment rooms down started making a great kerfuffle. It was terribly loud!” A number of complaints reached the CEO of AAI., Nigel Milligan who was, as the time having lunch with his close friend Dr. Elizabeth Sorkin. Nigel is quoted for saying, “The complaints from other animals living here at AAI. kept coming and coming and coming! They wouldn't stop, so eventually, I went down the elephant's apartment room and tried to get them to quiet down, but they still didn't listen. Dr. Sorkin told me that elephants can be a bit noisy by nature, but this was over the top.” “After all,” Dr. Sorkin says, “wild elephants in nature don't through parties with noisy monitors blaring loudly.” So Dr. Sorkin, being AAI.'s head veterinarian, did some research. “After retrieving a list of foods from Rack of what he'd been serving at lunch, I did some research on Wikipedia and learned something new about a little fruit called Juniperus communis sweeticus, also known as the Sweet Common Juniper berry.” Dr. Sorkin went on to explain that juniper berries aren't really berries, but actually berry-like seed cones. “While doing my research, I learned that elephants shouldn't be fed this species of juniper berry because it makes them hyper, and as we found out today, really hyper!” So Dr. Sorkin and Nigel went over to the elephant's place, removed their stash of jellybeans and half an hour later they calmed down. Methuselah realizes their mistake and happily apologizes, saying, “We really had no idea those berries affected elephants in that way. I mean, how were we supposed to know? But I hope I everyone is definitely going to be sleeping well tonight!” Rack wasn't too happy about the incident with the jellybeans either. Hoping to get more details about the jellybeans they ordered, I went back to Rack-Coon and got this response: “I don't know why we ordered those jellybeans in the first place. Who's idea was it to order those things anyway?” Then Mitch came in and promptly answered, “It was your idea, Rack-Coon.” Then Rack said to me, “Well, I know one thing: next time my supplier runs out of jellybeans, I can assure you I'm not getting any with juniper berry substitutes!” And I for one definitely agree that that's a marvelous idea!

Written by: Mr. Smiley

Photographer: Daniel P. Smithwater

Edited by: Christian Ryan, Joy Hammond

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Next Issue: The Mouse Lake Monster

A Stolen Story - Part 1

Lizzy the Lizard's story for this week was stolen? That's a news-worthy story in and of itself!

Lizzy the Lizard here and I'm reporting from the Smiley News office where the temperature seems to be freezing and the paperwork is slow." I sit at my desk and groan, what's the use? This day was way too ordinary. As far as I knew, everyone was doing ordinary protocol. I was about to head down to the main lobby, where a few  reporters were leaving early for lunch when I was stopped by the kitchen. "Hey there, Chef Rack-coon," I began, "what's are you gonna cook for lunch?" "Well I was planning to cook," he responded. "But my latest shipment hasn't come in yet." The chef looked puzzled. I volunteered to go downtown and grab some ingredients but Rack-coon refused. "I'm sure it will come in any time." He stated. A few minutes later, a the shipment arrived. I offered to help unpack but again Chef Rack-coon declined. "You know, you could feed the elephants," he said. “Okay” I agreed, picking up a bag of a bag of sweetened jellybeans. I walked around the office building trying to find the elephant's room. I walked into the room and finally found the door. Methuselah politely thanked me for the jellybeans and closed the door. As I walked down back down to the lobby, Rack thanked me for doing the delivery. Since Chef Rack-coon had prepared lunch, I decided to stay. The lunch was delicious but it became evident that the news office was a little too noisy. I decided to check it out. I asked one reporter about it but already said that he was questioned by Mr. Smiley. Rats! He stole my story! The only thing I could do was sit and wait for Mr.Smiley to finish solving the puzzle but I'm don't think I'll just sit here and wait. Where did the sound come from? How did it happen?

To be continued . . .

Written by: Lizzy the Lizard

Photographer: N/A

Edited by: Christian Ryan, Joy Hammond & Mr. Smiley

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Next Issue: A Stolen Story pt. 2 (Conclusion)

The Mouse Lake Monster

This is the very photo James Pittman took of the Mouse Lake Monster (it's located to the left).

Just a few weeks ago, we reported on a strange beast spotted at Mac Dee Dee's Organic Farm that has been nicknamed “The Saber-Toothed Assassin,” and wouldn't you know it (?) Smiley's News has received yet another unidentified creature report. When I got news of this, my trusty, junior photographer, Daniel P. Smithwater and I rushed to the scene to get an exclusive interview with the witnesses. The sighting of the latest cryptid happened last Sunday at 7:35 p.m. Standard Eastern Time when three people (who didn't know each other) were standing on the shore of Mouse Lake, near Riverville, New York enjoying the view: Dr. Arizona Stevenson, a zoologist atAnimal Adventures Inc., Emily Curtis and James Pittman. It was that time when they got the shock of their lives. Before we go on, I'd like to say that despite its name being “Mouse Lake”, it isn't small. It's around the size of Lake Champlain in Vermont and upper New York, which might explain the presence of an equally large unidentified creature. “I was enjoying my time relaxing on the shore of Mouse Lake when I saw it,” recalls Emily Curtis. “I looked over the water and saw a large animal break through to the  surface. The other two people on the shore at the time also saw it.” Emily Curtis works at Flowering Interiors in Riverville and says she has no knowledge of animal life, so she couldn't identify the strange creature. James Pittman, a wildlife photographer, also didn't know what the animal was and when asked what the animal looked like and appeared to be doing at the time, he was quoted for saying, “I have no idea what was before my very eyes . . . but [I] knew instantly that it was worth photographing so I got my camera out and snapped a quick photo (the one seen above). It came out a bit blurry, but considering most strange animal photos, it was pretty good! So anyways, what was it doing? Well, I looked up when I heard the noise of an animal exhaling across the lake and saw that it was a very elongated creature. It seemed to have its eyes and nostrils near the top of its head, four flippers, a long tail and when it opened its mouth upon reaching the surface, I'm pretty sure I saw rows of sharp teeth.” He went on to explain that it looked greatly like a “flipper-legged, bulky snake or a giant monitor lizard with flippers”. Emily then exclaimed to James saying, “You forgot to mention its length! That thing was huge! It must have been at least 50-60 feet in length! I originally thought it must have been a whale or something, but the head shape and the elongated body were not characteristic of a whale.” Dr. Arizona Stevenson, being a zoologist, wasn't able to make a clear identification either. “It couldn't have been a whale,” she says, “because it was too skinny – whales that grew 50-60+ feet in length are either bulky baleen whales such as the majestic humpback or blue whale or Sperm Whales which have large bulging heads. This creature didn't have a bulging head or baleen whale-like bulk.” The witnesses also told me that within 30 seconds of its appearance, it vanished beneath the watery waves out of sight. Arizona believes that the creature must have been coming up for a breath of air, ruling out its identification as a fish because fish don't breathe air like mammals and reptiles do, so it must have been either a mammal or reptile. After thanking our interviewees for their time, I headed off to Dr. Samuel Adamson, a paleontologist from Animal Adventures Inc. who had before helped me give a hypothetical identification for the Saber-Toothed Assassin. I showed him the photograph that James had taken and he said, “Based on the description given by the witnesses and the cryptid in this photograph is definitely an animal presumed to be extinct, if it's not a hoax that is.” He went on to say that, “If it's not a hoax, my best guess would be perhaps that this is a mosasaur.” Mosasaurs were marine lizards that lived in the oceans of the world before Noah's Flood, about 4,350 years ago. They were sort of like modern monitor lizards, but had flippers and were WAY larger – some averaging 40-60 feet in length. Samuel told me that the largest species of mosasaurs such as Tylosaurus, Mosasaurus, and Hainosaurus were some of the most ferocious predators that ever lived on the planet and ate everything from fish (including sharks), turtles and squid to sea birds and even other mosasaurs. “They were the T. rex of the Cretaceous (referring to the habitat, not the fictional time period),” says Samuel, “the top predators of their world.” Then Samuel explained that, “Another possibility for this creature's identification is an extinct species of whale called Basilosaurus. Basilosaurus was a large whale – about 60 feet in length – and unlike modern whales, had a snake-like body.” He said that both mosasaurs and Basilosaurus were air-breathers, mosasaurs being reptiles and Basilosaurus being a mammal, so they had to come up to the surface to breathe. Otherwise, we might never have known if that creature spotted at Mouse Lake ever existed. Scientists around the New York area are curious as to what secrets Mouse Lake and the possibility of finding an amazing creature (if it's not a hoax), that has been given the official nickname of the “Mouse Lake Monster”. Just like similar lake monsters such as the Loch Ness Monster in Europe and Champ in Vermont, it's already attracting attention of cryptozoology lovers from all over who hope that scientists will soon be able to learn as much as they can about the Mouse Lake Monster. Emily Curtis seems very excited about finding this creature saying, “Whatever it is, it would be a wonderful thing to finally find and identify the Mouse Lake Monster. I won't be involved in any expeditions to find it though, that's for sure! I'll stick to my flower shop.” And just to think, that if our witnesses weren't around to see the Mouse Lake Monster get a breath of fresh air, we might never know this amazing, elusive creature ever really existed.

Written by: Mr. Smiley

Photographer: Daniel P. Smithwater

Edited by: Christian Ryan, Joy Hammond

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We here at Smiley’s News, I have been working night and day to get articles ready. I could really use some help! So we are looking for people interested in writing (especially kids and teens). If you are interested, PLEASE(!) send an email to animaladventures@aol.com and save me from working night and day! I’m exhausted!

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Next Issue: A Stolen Story pt. 1