Left Behind at the Fishbowl

Iraq and Swear Words

2008-09-10T00:31:00.003-04:00

I'm still waiting to hear back from the submitter as to exactly what college this is from, but Submitter says it's from that college's equivalent of the fishbowl. I'm assuming the highlighting is the submitter's doing. This is supposed to be the text of a speech. I'm really hoping that wherever this was given, no one took Author seriously. I'll update this as more info comes in.

Page after page of pages

2008-08-28T18:29:00.004-04:00

It feels good to put a pen to horrible writing again. I'm not sure what college this is from, but it was one of the submissions I had in my inbox from forever ago. I looked through some of the other submissions briefly and could see I had some other website-worthy writing, so check back next week for more.

One Last Hurrah?

2008-08-22T10:11:00.003-04:00

Hello everyone. Sorry it's been so long. A few things:

1) As is obvious, I'm not able to maintain this site as I used to. A key component of writing a site about fishbowl papers is being able to get papers at the fishbowl. While I still live in Ann Arbor, I'm not able to get over to the fishbowl anymore.

2) If you wish to reach me, the best way to reach me is by leaving a comment. If you have submissions, email them to the address at right and then leave a comment saying you've done so.

3) It has been a long time since I checked my fishbowl email address

That being said, however, upon checking my email for this site, I found I had a decent number of submissions waiting for me (10-15). I'm going to read these over and see if there's something that will be worthy of posting online.

I really miss doing this site. Perhaps we can get it started again. At the very least, let's see if we can get a few papers up before this site just becomes a bad paper archive.

High school a microcosm of U.S.

2007-11-09T11:10:00.000-05:00

Generously sent in by someone who wishes to remain anonymous.

For this assignment, the graduate student had to (among other things) go to a local school to observe. A part of the assignment also was supposed to include research through scholarly websites. Check out the source of the first quote.

How a feminist would see the story of Icarus

2007-10-04T21:28:00.000-04:00

See? When readers send me stuff I post it.

This was forwarded to me by everyone's new pal Chris M who got it from a UMich alum working at the University of Maryland. The last paragraph is gold.

No, I'm not dead

2007-10-01T22:50:00.001-04:00

But I fear this site may be without your help.

As the careful reader already knows, I'm no longer a Michigan student. I am however still in Ann Arbor, but with entering the working world, I'm unable to make it over to the fishbowl. I'd get into further details as to why I've been so busy, but then we'd lose that whole anonymous thing, wouldn't we?

So here's where you guys come in.

If you want this site to continue, I need your grabs. Go dig through some papers (at your college, your high school, your office even) and scan and send me the best ones. You'll remember my email is fishbowlfinder@gmail.com. Just make sure they're high enough res that they'll be legible on screen.

Because the world needs its horrible papers mocked,
AHFB

p.s. Thanks for sticking with me still after all this time.

another p.s. how come no one called me on my bad verb agreement last post?

A New Year of 'Fishbowl'

2007-09-03T13:22:00.000-04:00

Hey all. Classes resume on Tuesday which means a brand new influx of papers. I myself can't make grabs like I used to, but there are measures in place to get papers to me. If you're on a college campus and wanna help out, start grabbing, scanning, and emailing.

See ya once the first set of papers come in.

A "great" brochure about a "movie"

2007-08-07T04:31:00.000-04:00

No, friends, I haven't forgotten about you.

Today's post is a little different: my Fishbowl material is pretty slim pickings right now, so I thought I'd bring you something I found as entertaining as a bad paper: a bad brochure that I picked up from a random place I was a couple months ago.

I'm "sure" you'll "enjoy" it.

(larger mirror)

/also submitted to The Blog of Unnecessary Quotation marks.

Betting money on the Lions is always a bad idea

2007-07-24T19:07:00.000-04:00

A script that dares to go where so many movies have already gone before.

UMich Makes Spelling Error on Diploma

2007-07-19T05:03:00.000-04:00

Blatantly stolen from this UM Livejournal Community Post, I bring you a spelling error right on a graduate's diploma.

A commenter in the post also says that hers had "Literature" misspelled. The errors aren't widespread, which makes me wonder: is there someone who's typing up each individual diploma?

In other news: I'll get back to my regular paper critiques soon.

Mike Anglin City Council Flyer

2007-07-15T03:45:00.000-04:00

Chris S. sent me an email a while ago containing a flyer. He says it all, so I'll just quote his submission email:

"I found the attached flyer in my driveway yesterday

June 26, 2007 Tuesday

I thought you might enjoy it

It is very motivational

I particularly like the author's use of punctuation.

I hope "the campaign to elect Mike Anglin for Council" didn't overpay

(larger version)

I hope that Anglin's speech writer does a better job than his advertising manager. Oh, and his webmaster.

More notes in the comments.

Edit: Also, our pals over at AAIO have some Mike Anglin-ness going on as well.

Bridge Burner

2007-07-09T04:18:00.001-04:00

Anyone care to explain to me how this is a good idea?

Also, check back late this week for another entry (from a local Ann Arbor political candidate).

Let's Randomly String Sentences Together

2007-07-01T21:45:00.000-04:00

So bad I don't even know what to do with myself. I can't believe some of the mistakes in here: rough draft or not.

Has anyone read Mama Day? Does this paper make even a little bit of sense?

Asians are good at being minorities

2007-06-25T16:50:00.001-04:00

Some people really can't write intros. Or conclusions for that matter.

[mirror]

If you want to see what the photo being discussed looks like, freedomvoices.org has a copy

Search for an Identity

2007-06-19T18:10:00.001-04:00

No, it's not a short story about trolling resume websites looking for social security numbers. It's the first ever paper about a character's sense of identity in a work of fiction. Except it isn't. Mostly it's a paper that ambles its way through the plot and throws out the word "identity" from time to time.

This is just the first page and a half because it got [more] painfully boring as it went on.

[Link] This is literally a great site.

2007-06-19T00:44:00.000-04:00

First off, let me tell you that I've got an actual update coming today (Tuesday).

Literally, A Web Log is a site that keeps tabs on the misuse of the word "literally". Take, for example, this quote from NPR.

"In a few hundred words, McGhee simply and elegantly charts the arc of motherhood — from birth and childhood through adulthood and the next generation.

McGhee says that in Someday, her ninth book, she literally put her heart on the page."

Or this, from Jerry Falwell:

"If you and I do not speak up now, this homosexual steamroller will literally crush all decent men, women, and children who get in its way … and our nation will pay a terrible price!"

/was unaware that steamrollers had a sexual preference.

Anyhow, a new post will be going up once I'm able to scan it, so I'll literally see you back here later.

[Link] Catalog of Passive-Aggresive Notes

2007-06-11T23:26:00.000-04:00

PassiveAggressiveNotes.com is a depository of notes left by roommates, neighbors, co-workers, and strangers. Figured this would be a site of interest to the Fishbowl community.

Africa, List of Questions

2007-06-10T20:09:00.000-04:00

This Sunday's post is two pages, each from separate grabs.

The first is evidentally from the same assignment that bought us "The Caribbean."

The second is a numbered list of sentences that don't seem to go together.

Breaking News: Street Sweeps Hurt

2007-06-05T03:10:00.000-04:00

Hi everyone. I'm still out of town (though this week in a different town), so this week's update is a little different than usual.

After plagiarism showed up in the local college paper, I started watching other college papers to see what I could find there. So far I haven't found much in the way of plagiarism, but I've found plenty of the bad college writing that keeps this site alive.

I subscribed to the email edition of The Lantern from Ohio State so I could stay current. Today's commentary and comics center around the lead stories from April 21 to June 1 (the current issue).

[mirror if above image is slow]

Sorry for the quality of scanning: I'm not able to scan on the usual scanner back home.

Some quotes from different articles:

"For those Ohio State students who have been experiencing chicken wing withdrawal this school year, fear not. The new Buffalo Wild Wings Grill and Bar will open June 25 at its new location on the corner of Lane Avenue and North High Street." [This was the first sentence of a lead story]

"According to dictionary.com, a wiki is 'a collaborative Web site whose content can be edited by anyone who has access to it.'" [arggg dictionary.com citations]

If there's anything that you noticed and would like to point out, feel free to do so in the comments.

All about garages!

2007-05-25T19:23:00.000-04:00

I'm gonna be out of town this weekend, so here's the Sunday update early.

Yes, from the author that brought you 'Yards,' we now have a discussion of garages. Looking through Author's other journal entries (which are about articles aren't as amusing as these two), I think these are probably for some sort of urban planning course.

If the above link goes down, I made a mirrored version here.

Also, while I appreciate all our new visitors' comments, please don't link your blog unless your site is relevant to the kinds of things on this site. If you write about fiction, grammar, or teaching? Cool, thanks for the link. If you write a run-on sentence spam advertisment blog? Deleted.

Please bear with me

2007-05-24T20:40:00.000-04:00

We got featured on blogger which has brought in a lot of traffic. The site's gonna be going slow while we deal with this huge traffic spike. I'm working on making sure that mirrors of all files get up soon so you can read at a decent speed. I'm sure it's only a matter of time before all my imageshack links go down

/needs a for-real image host

edit: for the imagesocket mirrors, you may have to click on the image to make it readable once it loads.

All about yards!

2007-05-20T21:05:00.000-04:00

Yards are amazing! Yards!

Mirror in case the above link goes down:

ur baby

2007-05-15T01:13:00.000-04:00

An anon reader so kindly sent in this written conversation he found in the fishbowl

Cletus (pages 8-12)

2007-05-13T02:55:00.000-04:00

I'm not sure about how I feel about how satisfying the ending is or isn't. Maybe I'm just too scared that the conclusion of this paper shows clear signs of revision.

Mirror:

Cletus (pages 1-7)

2007-05-06T02:59:00.000-04:00

A lazy story devoid of a plot other than the fact that the mother is fat and that angers Cletus. Despite my claims of "foreshadowing!" I haven't read any further than these seven pages (of ~~fourteen~~ twelve) so get your own predictions in now.

Found right on top of a Fishbowl scanner, already stapled and inside a bluebook.

Mirror: