Spam has come a long way from meat in a can
By Jeff R.

Many internet users have become familiar with the term "Spam email." If you have ever received email advertising a product or business that was mass-mailed to thousands of addresses, you have been the victim of Spam email. In short, it is an abuse of email services and a pain in the neck for people who have to search through their email just to find a message from one of their friends. But the word "Spam" has been around for more than seventy years as the name of a famous canned meat product.
Hormel's canned meat was originally referred to as "spiced ham," but in order to increase sales they created a newer and catchier name "Spam." In 1940, Spam was advertised in the first singing commercial, featuring a Spam song. During World War II, Spam sales skyrocketed as both the military and many American households ate it. American soldiers ate Spam during the war because it was easy to transport and didn't need refrigeration. Spam was even credited as helping the Russian army survive during World War II. You could say it helped the Allies win the war!
Spam continues to sell in huge quantities--more than 141 million cans of Spa are sold worldwide each year. The five-billionth can of Spam was sold in 1993. But admit it, everyone wonders...what is SPAM? Well, the label lists the ingredients as chopped pork shoulder meat with ham meat added, salt, water sugar, and sodium nitrate. Whether that's good or bad is for you to decide. But the next time you hear of the email abuse or the canned meat, maybe you'll think of the "Spam" in a different light.

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Whose fault?
Anonymous

This is a story about four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. There was an important job to be done and Everybody was sure Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did. So, Everybody became upset about that, because they figured it should be Somebody's job. They knew Anybody could easily do it, but Nobody realized that Somebody wouldn't. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did it and Anybody could have.

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Canada,a fun place to visit? A short story
By Christa M.

Once there was a dog named Bluish and he lived with his master, Stephen, in Evergreen, Colorado. Nestled in the mountains of sunny, funny Colorado, Stephen ran and owned a tavern called Little Bear Tavern (LBT, for short). LBT was a fine establishment and was visited by friendly folks with their kids - you could do that back then. As time passed, however, it became infested with biker dude types, and Stephen decided to move on. It's not that Stephen had anything against biker dude types, in fact, his third cousin once removed was one. It was just that Stephen was bored. You would be too after eight long years of serving biker dudes in the mountains.
So Stephen set out to fulfill his lifelong dream to become the first Canadian Dracula. He and his faithful companion, Bluish, moved to Canada and there tried to earn a living. As you can imagine the vampire business is not thriving in Canada so, in the meantime, Stephen was forced to find other means of support. He settled on catching leprechauns - tricky devils those leprechauns! Sometimes if Stephen caught a leprechaun late at night, the leprechaun jail would be closed so he would keep the leprechaun at his house until the next morning. Stephen would inevitably wake the next morning to find his lovely abode in a complete shambles. But in spite of its obvious drawbacks, the leprechaun business proved lucrative, even after he caught all the leprechauns in Canada. For Stephen was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize (and some major bucks) for bringing peace and harmony to Canada after eliminating those dastardly leprechauns from its lands.
The Prize money gave Stephen and Bluish enough cash to buy a used castle in Ontario, Canada. As you probably know, Dracula lived in a castle and once again Stephen tried to pursue his lifelong dream. Unbeknownst to Stephen and Bluish, the former owner of the castle was an Eskimo vampire. And as you probably don't know, Eskimos thrive on whale meat (yummy), and are not very good housekeepers. Perhaps that's because when you're accustomed to living in an igloo, you really don't care how it looks. Anyway, this Eskimo vampire had died a mysterious death and Stephen and Bluish were left to clean up the castle. This was no easy task, picking up and scrubbing narwhal off the floor for two days solid!
One evening, Stephen and Bluish sat down to a fine meal of milk bones and herring with Cheez Whiz (you can figure out who ate what). After dinner, Stephen and Bluish began cleaning up the dishes. Stephen put the dishes in the dishwasher and started that baby up. After their long hard day, they decided to retire early. As they lay snug in their bed, they suddenly heard a howling sound coming from the kitchen. Stephen and Bluish ran downstairs and found the howling was coming from the dishwasher. The dishwasher started shaking wildly and continued its hideous howling!
Does this have anything to do with the Eskimo vampire? Will Stephen ever become the first Canadian Dracula? Do leprechauns really exist? The answers to some of these questions can be found in the next edition of The Peacock Charger! Mwa-ha-ha-ha!

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School district web site has some useful stuff. A Review
By Kyle A.

itasca.k12.il.us is a place where you can learn more about Itasca School District #10. Here is a review of some of the pages on the site.
Administration Office - This page stinks. All it has is the Superintendent, Board of Education, District History, Transportation and Employment. The history section has no history. Transportation talks about buses and trains. The Board of Education page only lists the Board members names.
Schools - The schools pages were good but Peacock was definitely the best. It has the most stuff to look at, including information on the sports Peacock teams play, all the Charger articles, the media center, the grade level teams and much more. The media center page is cool. It has a dictionary and encyclopedia--just type in a word and the definition appears.
It would be nice if the web site had a homework hotline, where one teacher a night from each grade would try to help you with your homework. The calendar page is cool because it has pictures.

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Why is it?
By Scott P.

Why is it...
o that abbreviation is such a long word?
o that mnemonics is such a hard word to spell?
o that we call it "rush hour" when no one moves?
o that the Department of the Interior controls national parks?
o that we call them apartments when they're all connected?
o that we park on driveways and drive on parkways?

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