Dear Diary,

Mr. Selnick did a really neat trick in science today. He laid an empty soda can on the lab bench and then made it roll across the table without touching it by using a balloon that had been rubbed on a piece of wool. (Click here to see the experiment). Everyone was having a fun time trying to figure out how it worked when that insufferable know it all, Marcy Pillar, piped up that she knew how the trick worked. She said Mr. Selnick was using static electricity to make the can move. That he had transferred something called electrons onto the balloon when he rubbed it with the wool and the can would move towards the balloon because of the ‘charge’ it now had on it.

Mr. Selnick was pleased as punch with her answer of course. He just loves it when Marcy trots out her esoteric knowledge about science. It’s no wonder Marcy knows all this science stuff, her father’s like some all mighty techno guru of electrical engineering. The teachers all adore her of course, they all have a thing for terminal nerds.

Mr. Selnick says we’re going to learn a lot about atoms and electrons and the ways they can move around in nature in the next few weeks and do a lot of experiments. That’s good and bad I guess. Less note taking but more lab write-ups.

But, then again, Brian Miller is in my lab group this semester and he is so cute! Doing more experiments means I get to spend more time with him. Tracy thinks I have a good shot at getting him to ask me to the winter dance. It’s only one month away.

Mr. Selnick said if some of us wanted to do our science projects on this topic we could. (Everyone has to do a project sometime this year.) Marcy Pillar will probably do four of them, she’s such a show off. Maybe Brian would be interested in doing a project with me! Hmmmm…. that would give us an excuse to spend more time together. This might be a good idea.