Friday, December 17, 2021

Mr. Lemoncello's All-Star Breakout Game

By Chris Grabenstein

    In the latest game, Mr. Lemoncello's game goes live on national TV! Kyle Keeley and his friends are playing his newest picture guessing game, What Else Do You See?, on a library computer when their old enemy from the very first breakout game, the stuck-up Charles Chiltington, tells on them to the librarian and gets them all detention, sticking Kyle with 5 of them. Later that day, Mr. Lemoncello, the famous game-maker, goes on TV, telling everyone about the new breakout game that he will be hosting live on the Kidzapalooza network. He also explains that the teams will be chosen in auditions at the Alexandriaville Middle School in Ohio, his hometown, where Kyle and his friends go to school.
    Only one problem...Kyle has detentions to serve at the same time the auditions are taking place. He does the only thing he can do - he skips his final detention, earning him 5 more, and attends the audition. To get into the auditorium, teams of 5 must first pass a preliminary word scramble, which he, Akimi, Andrew, Miguel, and Sierra easily pass. Of course, Charles isn't one to be outdone, and at the advice of his rich, competitive, and oppressive father, he gathers a group of 8th graders known to be the biggest bookworms in school history. In the audition, his team, aptly named the Bookworms, take first place, while Kyle's Lemonheads take second. Both teams will be moving on to the real deal!
    In a final attempt to undermine his adversary, Charles emails Kyle's parents, informing him of the detentions and the skipped detention, painting Kyle as badly as possible. Kyle almost gets grounded, but Akimi is able to explain why it happened and that Charles is a bad person, often insulting Kyle's father for working as a mechanic.
    In the meantime, Mr. Lemoncello and his Imagination Factory have been madly working on their latest invention to be used in the breakout game - the Fictionasium. The immersive virtual reality simulation will enable participants to weave their own story in a genre of their choosing, be it fiction, nonfiction, history, anything, using a combination of motion capture suits and Smell-A-Vision. When the Bookworms and Lemonheads are brought in to train on the system, Mr. Lemoncello tells them that there will be a special third team joining them in the breakout race, to be revealed on the day of the competition.
    The team is the Kidzapalooza All-Stars, a combination of the biggest young stars on the network, including Alexandriavill's own Haley Daley, who gained fame after being featured in commercials as a prize for being one of the winners of the first library breakout game.
    When the contest begins, two things quickly become clear. First, that the All-Stars are indeed all-stars. They quickly took the lead and progressed through the Fictionasium room for each genre. Meanwhile, Charles's Bookworms were found to be indeed bookworms, and not gamers. He had failed to anticipate the interactive aspect of the Fictionasium, and one by one, his teammates resigned, leaving him all alone. Soon, he seems to have given up as well, disappearing for a hour.
    In the meantime, the Lemonheads and the All-Stars work through their rooms, getting all the way to the fourth room, despite all sorts of surprises, while Charles remains AWOL. Then, all of a sudden, Chiltington reappears and works his way through the rooms at breakneck speed, looking like he already knew the answers - because he did. He had found his way into the Fictionasium control room while the guard was in the bathroom, attempted and failed to sabotage the others, then found all the answers before resuming the competition. He is onto his final room, the mythology room, where he discovers that a lightning blaster meant to resemble Zeus's lightning bolts is a bonafide laser blaster! With it, he resolves to take down the entire library, which he and his mother believe to be dangerous and bad for the city.
    In another room, the All-Stars and Lemonheads must collaborate to complete their final room - realistic fiction. And Kyle gets an experience that changes his entire mindset. In it, he plays the part of Charles Chiltington under the name Miles Millerson. When he meets Mr. Millerson, modeled after Mr. Chiltington, he understands why Charles is the way he is. His father is an oppressive man, focused solely on winning, and spares no one from his wrath - not even his son. Mr. Millerson gives him two keys - the two keys that the teams need to open their boxes with the final clue - and tells him to use one for himself and forget the other. Instead, he shares the keys and the two teams race off to stop Charles from destroying the library.
    Kyle decides that the best way is to show him a version of Mr. Millerson who tells him to reconsider his actions. But once Charles is prevented from destroying the library, he tries to win the competition, resulting in a three-way tie playing the game, What Else Do You See?, where the Lemonheads prevail.

Monday, December 13, 2021

CNN 10 12/13/2021 ~ 12/17/2021


Go to cnn.com/cnn10 for the latest video 

LAST SHOW OF THE YEAR
Happy Holidays!

Tuesday, December 14, 2021
The Omicron variant is continuing the spread around the world. The UK has reported dozens of cases, 10 hospitalizations, and one death from the variant. Based on preliminary reports, the WHO says that existing vaccines are less effective against the new variant. It's still uncertain whether a surge in cases in many areas is due to existing variants like Delta or the new Omicron. The tornados that swept through the Midwest have left devastation in their wake. Entire cities have been flattened, dozens are dead, and crews are still digging through the rubble as over 100 people remain unaccounted for. Charities and other organizations are leading efforts to get help, and they say that the most urgent need right now is blood donations. The latest economic report for the country is out - it showed around half the jobs growth than economists had expected, likely due to new variants. Inflation is also up nearly 7 percent, but partially offset by 5 percent gains in wages. But the continuing inflation is having detrimental impacts, not only on city dwellers but on rural residents, who have seen the costs of their most important goods go up.

Wednesday, December 15, 2021
There is a security flaw in a popular server software called Log4J. The flaw, which has not yet been patched fully, could allow hackers to take control of servers, potentially impacting big businesses like Amazon, Apple, and Tesla. The Microsoft-owned game Minecraft has already been affected, and Microsoft quickly released a patch to fix the issue. Log4J is recommending all users to find out if their systems have been impacted as soon as possible and for end-users of software distributions to download security updates as soon as they become available. Since news of the hole became public, hundreds of thousands of hackers have already attempted to exploit it. Rivers are important parts of the world's ecosystem, but like most "renewable" resources, they aren't infinite. Some of the biggest threats to their survival are pollution and invasive species. Jeremy Shelton, part of a wildlife conservancy effort in South Africa, is using photography to try to get people more involved in protecting the environment. He hopes his images will help people understand the underwater ecosystem in a more real way.

Monday, December 6, 2021

CNN 10 12/6/2021 ~ 12/10/2021


Go to cnn.com/cnn10 for the latest video 

Monday, December 6, 2021
In Indonesia, a volcanic explosion has left many people without homes, and many more covered in ash. The explosion occurred on the island of Java. The island is part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, an area that sits along a fault line and sees intense volcanic activity. It accounts for the majority of volcanos around the world, most of which are underwater. As a result, the islands located on the ring of fire have frequent volcanic activity and tsunamis. The US has begun restricting travel to several southern African nations that have seen high numbers of cases of the Omicron variant, a new variant of COVID-19 that scientists still know little about. It has already started spreading in the US and other parts of the world, though Delta still remains the most dominant variant. Part of the problem may be that poor countries, which see the most mutations as a result of their poor safety measures, also don't have the money to sequence the virus efficiently. The labs that they have are constantly low on funding, so while massive labs in the UK are processing thousands of samples, they take months to process just a few, which allows variants to spread in the meantime. The last surviving member of the World War II paratrooper regiment known as the "Band of Brothers" recently passed away at the age of 99. He said that his most proud achievements from the war were his duty and bringing home the most men out of any platoon in his division.

Tuesday, December 7, 2021
The makings of a new space race are heating up between the US and China. Back in the mid-1900s, the first space race took place between the US and Russia; the latter initially appeared to have an advantage but the US ultimately won by being the first to land on the Moon. Since then, the US has been the leader in space technology, but China has been ramping up its development and top officials say that they could catch up soon. Other players in the modern arena include the UAE, India, and the European Space Agency. Grocery stores end up throwing a lot of food away when it starts to get close to the expiration date and people no longer want to buy it. They have tried many methods to get people to buy the produce, most of which is still edible, from price markdowns to repackaging. A new startup has created an app called FlashFood to try to alleviate this problem. They enable grocery stores to put up daily listings of food that is near expiration but still edible so that people can buy it for immediate use at steep discounts. To date, they say they have eliminated as much as 30 million pounds of waste.

Wednesday, December 8, 2021
The Biden administration recently announced a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics scheduled to begin in just a few months. This means that athletes will still be allowed to participate under the US flag, but there will not be an official diplomatic delegation from the US. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said that a full boycott like the one seen under the Carter administration did not feel appropriate at the current time. The move comes as pressure from a flurry of human rights violation claims against Beijing are mounting; several other countries are also considering diplomatic boycotts. Yesterday was the anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. The surprise attack lasted just a few hours of the early morning but devastated more than a dozen ships along with thousands of sailors. It ended up launching the US into World War II and the eventual defeat of the Axis Powers. The President and First Lady participated in a wreath-laying ceremony and other memorials were held across the country.

Friday, December 10, 2021
The Chinese real estate corporation Evergrande has run into financial trouble. The once megacorporation grew during China's massive industrial expansion, taking advantage of the massive movement of the Chinese population into industrial centers. It also began to expand into other sectors, and its founder became the richest person in Asia in 2017. But this rapid expansion came with massive amounts of borrowing, amounting to over $300 billion dollars, and along with the pandemic's economic impact and the Communist government's crackdown on excessive borrowing, it could not keep up, leading to a recent default. The company reportedly sold several assets but is still deep in debt. If Evergrande does fail, it would be catastrophic not only for China, which has over 3/4 of its investments in real estate, but for the world at large because Evergrande has so many connections in so many sectors. People have been talking about robots and AI a lot recently, and a new one called Ameca recently made social media headlines. It can replicate human facial gestures to an exactitude where, if not for the metallic color, one might actually believe it to be human. And that's the application its creator hopes to see, to have it be able to greet people and talk to people who need help.

Monday, November 29, 2021

CNN 10 11/29/2021 ~ 12/3/2021


Go to cnn.com/cnn10 for the latest video 

Monday, November 29, 2021
A new variant of coronavirus has popped up - omicron. It was first identified in South Africa and initially appeared to have milder symptoms than other strains of the virus, based on observations of a small group of patients. Scientists don't know yet if it can infect people who have already recovered from a previous infection or people who have been vaccinated, though the UK claims it has caused breakthrough infections in vaccinated people. What is unique about this latest variant is the number of mutations it has - it has the most mutations out of those seen so far. Black Friday shoppers were up almost 50% from last year, when the pandemic caused many to stay at home. But that's still down around 20% from the year before that, which means many people are still buying online. A drawback from this is the high rate of returns, significantly higher on online purchases than in brick-and-mortar stores. The seemingly "free" returns are far from free, costing retailers a large portion of the original cost of the product, only to have many of them end up in landfill. Companies are working to reduce this through online tools, but in the meantime, liquidators are picking up some of the slack, buying returns from shipping companies, and sending them off to discount stores.

Thursday, December 2, 2021
Inflation is still on the rise, and the Federal Reserve now believes that it is not going away anytime soon. New variants of COVID-19 are popping up, threatening to exacerbate the already strained supply chain and hiking up prices. Many people have seen the price of fresh produce go up - but the farmers say that their profits aren't going up. In fact, they're going down. The middle men who transfer all of the food are seeing higher costs because of a shortage of truck drivers and ships, so they are transferring the cost to farmers and consumers. White rhinos were on the brink of extinction. While the northern species is still down to just two female members, southern white rhinos have been restored to thousands, largely thanks to the work of a nature reserve in their native habitat of South Africa. But they are still constantly under the threat of illegal poachers there, who shoot them for their horns. A few dozen of them were recently transferred to a safer park in Rwanda, where the national park hosting them also hopes to draw more tourists with the new animals.

Friday, December 3, 2021
Tensions are ramping up in the European country of Ukraine. It borders both Russia and several NATO countries, and the country is heavily divided over the two opposing sides. Some Ukrainians want to join Russia; others want to join the EU. The latest argument is over Russian troop movements on Ukraine's western border. NATO officials say that the magnitude of the force is sufficient to invade Ukraine and that Russian propaganda is displaying similar tactics as those seen just before the annexation of the Crimean peninsula in Ukraine in 2014. Russia for its part claims that it is simply trying to protect itself against NATO advances, and the US says that it is prepared to levy new sanctions against the Communist nation if it does not back down. The 2022 Winter Olympics are scheduled to kick off in Beijing in just a few months, and there is already controversy over it. The first is COVID-19; while China claims its strict safety measures are effective at preventing the disease, the Omicron variant is causing new concern around the world. The second is the increasing allegations of human rights abuses against the Communist regime. Events like the disappearance of tennis player Peng Shuai have raised new concerns and several countries are considering diplomatic boycotts of the winter games. In Major League Baseball, a lockout has occurred for the first time since 1994. That means players can't use team facilities until a new collective bargaining agreement is reached. The old one just expired, and the Players' Union and owners have failed to reach a new agreement, both sides accusing the other of failing to compromise. If a new deal is not reached, the lockout could have an impact on the 2022 season, which begins spring training in February of next year.