Questions: 5. If you offer Valerie a piece of watermelon, she will refuse it, because the slices look like the wicked smile of a circus clown who once scared her as a child during a trip to the big top. 6. My cat Buster loves to nap on warm appliances when he sleeps on top of the television, his tail swipes the screen like a windshield wiper.

To determine whether the sentences are comma splices or run-on sentences, we need to understand the definitions of these terms:

• Comma Splice: This occurs when two independent clauses (complete sentences) are joined with just a comma without an appropriate conjunction.
• Run-on Sentence: This occurs when two or more independent clauses are joined without any punctuation or conjunction.

Let's analyze each sentence:

5. "If you offer Valerie a piece of watermelon, she will refuse it, because the slices look like the wicked smile of a circus clown who once scared her as a child during a trip to the big top."

• This sentence is not a comma splice or a run-on sentence. It is a complex sentence with a dependent clause ("If you offer Valerie a piece of watermelon") and an independent clause ("she will refuse it"). The sentence is correctly punctuated with a comma after the introductory dependent clause.

6. "My cat Buster loves to nap on warm appliances when he sleeps on top of the television, his tail swipes the screen like a windshield wiper."

• This sentence is a comma splice. It contains two independent clauses: "My cat Buster loves to nap on warm appliances" and "his tail swipes the screen like a windshield wiper." These clauses are joined by a comma without a conjunction, which makes it a comma splice.

In summary:

• Sentence 5 is neither a comma splice nor a run-on sentence.
• Sentence 6 is a comma splice.