The Grand Fiasco.

I just came back from baking cookies at my friend's house.
It was a disaster.
She has apparently never made cookies or cake or anything from scratch before in her entire life, a great worshipper of the boxed cake mixes and refrigerated slice-and-bake cookie dough rolls.

Earlier today, discussing whether homemade or storebought cookies are better:
Me: "Homemade cookies taste better."
Judy: "You can't even tell if you don't taste them side by side."
Me: "People will be impressed if you tell them you made cookies yourself."
Judy: "If you don't mention it, nobody will even think about it."
Me: "Homemade cookies are more thoughtful to give to people."
Judy: "Storebought cookies are more convenient."
Etc, etc, etc.
There was no baking soda or vanilla extract in her house, so we made a quick stop at mi casa for me to dash into my kitchen and retrieve the necessary ingredients. She was unsure of the purpose of baking soda. I told her it was so the cookies would rise. She was unsure of what rising was.
She only had one egg in her fridge, so we sent her dad to get another carton. Then I couldn't find any butter in there.
Me: "You don't have any butter..."
Judy: "Yeah I do... right here."
And then she pulls out this big tub of fake-vegetable-oil-butter-flavored-spread.
Me: "...that's not butter."
Judy: "Yes it is, look."
And then she points at the word "butter" in the phrase "butter flavored spread."
Me: "Well okay then we'll see how this goes."
And then I open the tub.
Me: "Um. It's empty."
Judy: "Oh. Whoops."
So she calls her dad at the store and tells him to get more butter. Guess what he brings back? Another tub of 48% vegetable oil "butter flavored" spread.
Me: "Sigh. Okay, I guess we'll just put in a little more flour."
So we're sticking all the ingredients in a bowl and beating it all into a fine greasy mess, thanks to the oily fake-butter concoction.
Judy: "This beater feels really hot."
Me: *adds sugar*
Judy: "I think it's overheating."
Me: "Okay, we better hurry before it breaks, then."
So we throw the rest of the stuff in and she flicks the beater on high speed.
Me: "Hurry gogogogogo the top is starting to smoke I think hurry gogogogo!!"
I smash a couple eggs into the bowl, glug in the vanilla, and dump in the flour.
Beater: *breaks*
We dumped the smoking, useless appliance in the backyard and stir the rest of the ingredients in by hand. It is a slow, grueling process, but we are finally ready to plop greasy balls of dough onto trays. We stick them in the oven for ten minutes, then check to see if they're done.
Me: "Ehhh they could use a couple more minutes."
Judy: "Okay!" *punches button*
I didn't see that she entered FIFTEEN more minutes of baking time, when I had meant just two or three. And I didn't realize until it had been quite a while...
Me: "Hey, the oven hasn't beeped yet."
Judy: "Well it still has five minutes to go."
Me: "??? How much more time did you put it in for???"
Judy: "Fifteen minutes..."
The cookies are almost completely blackened.
The next few batches come out looking fine... but then we tasted them.
Us: "EW."
That butter spread stuff really messed up the cookies. They tasted like dry, dense lumps of ickiness that even her little brother wouldn't eat.

I don't think I convinced her that homemade cookies are better than storebought ones.

"Life," said Piggy expansively, "is scientific, that's what it is."

Remember when I used to post every day? Or at least every other day?
Those sure were the days.
One reason is that the half-broken laptop (as in, the only thing that worked was Appleworks)(which is mildly ironic because... apple works. It was the only application that worked.) (Ha.) broke completely, so I can't type on it and then transfer to this Internet-capable computer. Another reason is that I don't have the time to blog anyway.
It's not like I really have anything to blog about. Blogging used to be fun, but now it just sort of feels like a responsibility. I feel guilty if I go too long without posting.
And okay, now I have a dentist appointment. *goes to the dentist*
*returns from the dentist*
Hi.
My teeth felt lovely and refreshed for all of ten minutes. Then I had to eat a salad for dinner, and there are bits of walnut and spinach and feta cheese and dried cranberry stuck in all the little crevices.
Christmas.
I have done almost all of my Christmas shopping, and it's only the first day of December. I also have done almost all of my Christmas-crafting. For my dad, I papier-mached the letters "F-A-M-I-L-Y," then ModPodged family photos onto them and strung them into a thingie to hang on the door or a wall or something. And for my mom, I made bath jellies, a bar of oatmeal soap, and these awesome little things called "bath cookies." To make them, you have to bake them in the oven like real cookies, and they come out looking like cookies, too: but instead of eating them, you drop them in the bath and they dissolve and make the whole bathroom thick with the scent of sweet vanilla.
My mom is actually more of a florals kind of gal. But I love the smell of vanilla. I will be lying on the floor outside the bathroom whenever she uses a bath cookie, nose pressed to the crack beneath the door where it doesn't quite meet the ground. Inhaling.

Today I realized that sometimes people go out of their way to be incomprehensible. It is very inconvenient when I am trying to understand what they mean when they say this or do that. But I guess I can sympathize with those who are too insecure to be their honest selves.

The werewolves looked like kitties!

Despite my refusals, my friends were able to drag me, kicking and thrashing, into the theater showing New Moon. I sat in one of those retarded chairs that flop upwards when you stand up staring at the screen and trying to convince myself that this was the worst movie I had ever seen in my entire lifetime.
Darn. I accidentally liked it. Especially the part where Robert Patterson got smashed into the marble stairs. That was my favorite scene, that one with him getting tossed around. It wasn't bloody or icky, so don't think I'm a morbid freak. Though I may be one.
It was hilarious in that theater though: people laughed out loud when they saw Lautner with his nasty long-haired wig on. And then they screamed with excitement when he took his shirt off. I did too for the fun of it, but I thought he looked COMPLETELY NASTY with these all bulbous muscles in extra places where nobody even has muscles in real life.
Umyeahwell, it was better than the first one for sure. Not really a good movie at all, but not a wretched mess.
I always just have one thing to say, and then I wait to post until I have something else to add to it because I don't want the post to be so short, but then whatever I had to say gets old and I don't want to post it anymore because it happened three weeks ago, so I just delete it.
From now on, I'm just going to post what little tidbits I write anyway. Starting... NOW.

"Ew! Broccoli is so good!"

OKAY SO.
The school newspaper has this section called "Overheards," which is a collection of random and often humorous quotes that the newspaper people have heard in the hallways. Since they don't know anybody's names, the quotes are anonymous. One of them this month was "Ew! Broccoli is so good!"
I SAID THAT.
I feel so proud. I'm practically famous! (not really.) But it is completely out of context. My friend was saying that cheesecake was her favorite food and that she hated broccoli. I hate cheesecake and love broccoli, so naturally I said, "Ew! Broccoli is so good!"
Yeah. That's the only thing I had to blog about. I'm so happy I have time to blog today. High school means so much WORK. Now homework consumes most of the weekend, and I'm out with my friends for whatever is left of it. Poor blog. I neglect you.
And now it's dinnertime.
Sorry for the lame post.

Or are we ashes and wine?

Okay. I know I have urged you to listen to A Fine Frenzy songs far too many times, and if you dismissed anything of hers before because it was too slow for you, give this song a chance. It's much catchier than what she usually does. Listen.
I also want to nominate "Bird of the Summer" (by her) as the best lyrics ever. I used to think "Minnow and the Trout" was so clever with its whimsical stories, but this song is so pretty:

You came with the season, as the first swallow sang
A brown-headed stranger, with a five-letter name

We planted our kisses where the wild berries grow
My feet sprouted wings and I flew all the way home

My cheeks red like fire engines racing
Straight to the heat of your skin
And I know our days are numbered, early bird of the summer
You'll fly south just as the fall begins

The leaves changed their colors and the schoolyards were filled
My coat with the patches barely keeps out the chill

You sent me a postcard from a town out of state,
I wish it were warmer and I hope you're the same

The fields where we wandered were golden
Now only muddy my boots
And I know I should recover, you're a bird of the summer, I was wrong to try and capture you

I met someone walking in a park by the lake, it don't fly like we did but it don't fly away

Gone is the pale hand of winter
Here is the first flush of May
And soon I will discover whether birds of the summer fly in circles or just fly away

I must be boring all the non-A Fine Frenzy fans to tears. Sorry about that.
We have to memorize all the states and capitals AGAIN, for World Cultures. Plus some physical features to spice things up and make us feel like we haven't been transported back to the fifth grade.
I'm excited for this weekend. There's a race in Monterey that I do every year, and it's this Sunday. I don't do too many organized races, but this one is really nice. The route goes right along the water, so you've got a nice view of the ocean to enjoy while you run.
And the weekend after that, I'm going down to Palm Springs to visit all my relatives who migrated down there as soon as they turned forty and refused to ever come back and live Northern Cali ever again. We're eating Thanksgiving dinner in a restaurant, which is so untraditional and lame that I don't think I've be able to choke down the turkey.
Just kidding. It will taste fine.
I'm going to go to this little store that I went to last year for my (very very early) Christmas shopping. They have all these cute little stationary sets, jewelry, plushies, and things like that, and I will probably get the majority of my gifts for my friends there. I always get impatient for Christmas. I'm going to start my season a month early.
Okay, I keep getting distracted with things, sooooooooo
bye.

Sanna Croose.

SO today I went to Santa Cruz. Beautiful place. My family and I occasionally decide it's time for some salty air, so we drive over there and park about an hour from the wharf. Then it's an hour's stroll along the ocean, enjoying a constant view of powerful waves crashing onto the rocks.
Almost every other time we've gone to Santa Cruz, I have bought a chocolate-covered strawberry at this festive little candy store on the wharf. For the first time ever today, I bought a bag of caramel corn instead. Everybody crunched and munched the delicious confection all the way back to the car. I felt sugar-buzzed and content as we pud-pud-pudded around the downtown area. There was a bookstore that I spent at least an hour in. I bought three used books for less than ten dollars, and read this one book that made me literally laugh out loud several times. Luckily there were few other patrons to stare at me.
My mom bought a knife at a kitchen store. The blade could not have been more than two inches long. She apparently found in in the clearance section and was charmed by its soft lime-green rubber handle. I asked her what she was planning to cut with the dinky doll's knife.
"Little things, you know, like radishes and stuff," was her reply.
The last time I ate a radish, I was nine years old.
In the Urban Outfitters, several quirky objects stole my heart. A flashlight shaped like a cat, and when you turned it on, the lights came from its eyes. A plug-thingie that was shaped like a little man, with a face and limbs that you plugged extension cords into. A magnetic clip that looked like a mousetrap; the trap could be lifted and could snap down and clip papers. A phone shaped like a hamburger: the bun flips open to reveal the keypad. A drawing pad that you could draw on, then look at your drawings through special glasses and they would look like they were popping off the page. A Rubik's Cube with a little screen that would function as a clock, thermometer, timer, or one other thing that I forget, depending on which way you turned the top row of sqaures. Who comes up with these weird little items? Can it be my job when I grow up?

Anyway, when we got back I decided to make a pair of shoes out of duct tape. My dad got mad at me for wasting expensive duct tape, but they were awesome shoes.

Oh my golly gee, I forgot to mention. On Friday I attempted to teach two of my non-softball-playing friends how to play softball. I never realized how hard it is to teach somebody a new skill. I will never be a teacher, I guess. I was like, "Okay first we'll learn how to throw yay," and I threw a ball, and then was like "You go now!!!" and of course they didn't know how. Then I had to go, "Ummm well you put your arm back kinda like that, and then you just sorta bring it upwards and then like, go like... that, and then you're done."
Trying to explain how the game worked was even harder.
"Okay soooo if the batter hits it and it hits the ground before any of the fielders touch it, they have to throw it to first, which is that one, and if the batter gets there first then they're in, and if the first baseperson gets it and steps on the base first, they're out... oh and they're allowed to run through first base, but not second or third, those ones, because if they do then the fielders can tag them even if they already touched the base, but you're allowed to go back if you run it as long as you're not tagged first... but if the batter hits it and it goes in the air, one of the fielders has to catch it and the batter is out automatically, and the batters on base can't advance to the next base, because if somebody hits the ball and you're on, for example, second, you can run to third and even home if you have enough time..."
I'm so bad at explaining things. I left them dazed and confused.

Clever trick

Today I was walking home from school, and I saw this candy wrapper on the ground. It was for Air Head Extreme-o's or something. That exact wrapper had been lying there for as far back in the school year as I can remember. I have been taking the same route home every day, and I've noticed that wrapper on the ground the same way I notice the cracks in the sidewalk or the fallen leaves scudding across driveways. It's always just been there, part of the scenery.
Today I realized it was litter. So I stopped, and picked it up, and threw it away. It's something I should have done weeks ago.
But now I'm worried I'll miss it. Maybe my life will change somehow, because I purposely altered it by getting rid of something that has always been a part of my daily routine. You never know.

A little later, still walking home, I realized I was smiling. I immediately stopped, thinking it would look stupid to be smiling at nothing. But then I thought, why not? I smiled all the way home. Why is it considered idiotic to be smiling when you're alone with nothing funny or cute or whatever? I protest this unwritten law. I will smile all day tomorrow.

I have an urge to go to a park with somebody and sit on the grass tell them my entire life story, and then talk about randomities such as the ones listed above for an entire afternoon.
Any takers?

T-shirts and Tutus

I'm not dead. I swear.
I guess... I've just had a really busy twenty days? High school is so nonstop. After cross country is homework, and after that is bedtime, and if there's ever any free time, my sister's always on the computer so I can't update. I used to have about twenty-thirty minutes of free time in the morning depending on how quickly I chose my outfit and ate breakfast. That was when I left for school at 8:05, barely making it to tardy bell. Now I have to leave at seven forty, so I can't really use the morning for blogging time anymore. Plus... the sister is usually watching her cop shows on it anyway.
Stuff that's happened during my absence:

• I got my backbrace. It's really uncomfy. It's like a great big SQKWEEEEZZ around my torso... constantly. And it looks really awkward under my clothes. I tried to find shirts and stuff that hid it, but only about three shirts actually made me look normal. It really hurts in the rib area because my sister kicked me there and now there's a large and icky bruise. Putting pressure on it does not exactly relieve the pain, know what I mean? But enough complaining.
• I finally scored a medal in cross-country. I think my dad would be pissed if I went through the whole season without a medal, so I was relieved to earn one, even if it wasn't anywhere near first place.
• Free online barcode generator. This is mine. Get yours. *click*
• Realization: we really have a very rowdy school. EXAMPLE: Today while crossing the street to get to the trail behind the school, a guy with his buddy parked in the passenger seat swung out from the student parking lot and swerved the car towards where my friend and I were standing and made an "OHMYGOD I'M OUT OF CONTROL" face, then veered away at the last second, sending loud guffaws out the open window as they sped down the road. Dangerous. Stupid. Rowdy. EXAMPLE: In the parking lot, a bunch of seniors were hanging off a pickup truck, sitting in the bed and jumping on the roof. The driver lurched forward to try to send all the guys flying backwards, a haphazard experiment in inertia. They all laughed and swore and clung on even as the truck screeched into the street. Dangerous. Stupid. Rowdy. EXAMPLE: As I walked home from practice today, tired and sweaty and in no state to put up with any dangerous stupid rowdy acts, of course I ran into a gang of hooligans by the creek. They greeted this vulnerable young freshman with various obscenities. Where has the respect gone? Why are people obnoxious in the face of innocent passerby?
• Halloween. After a two-year hiatus from dressing up and trick-or-treating, my friends have peer pressured me into dressing up and going candy-begging with them. We're being MAGICKAL FAIRIES. That means t-shirts and tutus, with wands and tiaras to top it off.
• That's it.
  

My single solitary guide...

Oh my goodness. I used to only watch one show, The Office. Then I added Chopped to my queue. And then I watched two episodes of Community and fell in love. This show is hilarious. I love it. But I'm afraid I'm turning into a regular television-watcher. I used to watch TV every once in a while, now I watch it every weekend. The no-TV-on-weekdays rule still applies, though. Not that I have time on weekdays to watch TV after cross-country.
Speaking of cross-country. Eight mile workout the other day at QUICKSILVER, which means upupupupuphill. My legs have been feeling icky and weird ever since. They've never felt like this before, and I gosh darn don't like it!
Ahhhh. My sister and mom are out somewhere, and I finished my homework. Now I have the house all to myself. I walked to CVS for a roll of Necco Wafers, and now I'm blogging and listening to wonderful A Fine Frenzy and eating delicious chalky candy and enjoying the perfect lazy evening with no interruptions.
I'm glad the day worked out this way so I could have this little pocket of time to myself. It has been a busybusybusybusybusybusybusybusy week and I am SO glad tomorrow is Friday.

My dog is begging me to play with him right now. He enjoys dragging me out into the backyard and placing various objects in my hands just to snatch them back again. It's the real thrill of his day in his dog life.

Ick.

I just thought I'd share some photos that make me feel extremely uncomfortable.

This next one makes my femur feel like oatmeal.
Something about children with really unnatural faces gets me. These vintage food ads give me the shivers all the way up.
Why does this kid have a pile of hot dogs lying on the table while he's eating a big bowl of pasta? If you'll notice, the spaghetti is being brought into his mouth with such force that the strands are tilted back with the tailwind... and he's not even bothering to look at where the food is going. Bright fellow.
You know you want these pork and beans. But you can't have these pork and beans. These are my pork and beans."OH MY GOD IS THAT OSTRICH LIVER? GIVE IT HERE!"
I know it's just a baby. Not even a real baby, just a doll of a baby. But it completely freaks me out.
I don't even know how I stumble across these things. I hope I've made your Tuesday a little bit creepier.

Another quiz, yay!

You heard me, folks. Get ready from another copy-pasted quiz that I got from somebody else’s blog!

Do you love life?
Certain aspects of it...

How many hours of sleep do you get per night?
Depends... usually about nine.

Can you draw?
Anybody can draw! Some people just can’t draw WELL... like me.

What’s the creepiest thing that has ever happened to you?
Thinking I was being followed this one day... RUN-ON SENTENCE TIME! ...it was getting dark, I was walking home and I kept making random turns through the neighborhood to get this guy off my trail, but he kept following me and I was like WHOA, GO AWAY so when I got close to my house I started running and he did too, but then I went inside and locked all the doors and looked out the front window and he just kept walking down the road, so I guess it was a coincidence.

What does your room look like?
Blue wall. Green lantern. Mishmash of colored pillows. Polka-dot bedspread. Two bulletin boards cluttered with cards/photos/tickets/drawings/whatever. Whiteboard. Bookshelf, whose top is often used as a lounge area for my cat or a seat for me. Shelves of junk. Drawers of junk. A desk cluttered with junk. Horrible screechy metal doors that open into a closet. Bamboo wall stickers. Beige carpet. Mirror. Teal hanging organizer tube thing.

How long is your hair?
About this long.

Have you ever traveled abroad?
Proud to be able to say YES!!

Which do you prefer: boiling hot or freezing cold?
If we’re talking about tea, I’ll take boiling hot. I’m guessing this is about weather/temperature though, so my respuesta finale is freezing cold.

What font do you like to type in?
I don’t know. Helvetica?

Have you ever cut yourself?
Falling off a bike, being careless while chopping vegetables, pricking a finger with a needle while sewing, pressing too hard while shaving, tripping and scraping a knee, yes, I have cut myself.
I think if this quiz was looking for juicy emo secrets, it should have been phrased as “Have you ever cut yourself on purpose?”

Have any of your family members died?
Yeah.

What are all the pets you’ve had in your life?
First pet was a goldfish, whose name began with a D but I forget it now. My sister had one named Ditto. They died.
Second pet was a hamster named Zoom, and another (my sister’s) named Slyvester. They died, a terrible tragedy.
Now we have a cat, Lewis, and a dog, Jack. They are not dead.

What is your favorite song?
It’s always changing, but stays within one album: One Cell in The Sea by a Fine Frenzy. Right now it’s between “Last of Days” and “Minnow and the Trout.”

Who was your first crush?
Peter Pan. The animated one. Not kidding.

Is he/she still your crush?
No. I have MOVED ON, Petey-boy.

Who do you like now?
What if I had answered yes to the last question? Then this question would be a repeat. :o

Who is your best friend?
I have a lot of best friends!! I don’t think anybody really has just one...

What do you usually take for lunch?
I take an apple and carrot sticks just about every day, then I usually grab Craisins, almonds (if we have any), or a granola bar. These days I’ve been taking Gatorade too, to ‘fuel up’ for cross-country. (Or maybe I just like the taste.)

What do you give your friends as gifts for their birthdays?
Impossible question!! It depends on the person!!

Do you floss?
Do you breathe? Yes, I floss.

Do you prefer a big group or small cluster of friends?
Big group!

What smiley faces do you use the most? (ex. :) :/ XD)
The normal one. :) Sometimes :D too, but that’s reserved for when I’m REALLY happy. Plus :( when I’m sad, and :’( when I’m REALLY sad.

Are you outdoorsy or indoorsy?
I guess outdoorsy. Because after school, I run cross-country in the outdoors, then do my homework in the backyard (outdoors) and eat dinner and sleep. And spare time is usually spent on my bike--in the outdoors, and I do love camping and hiking, which my family does at every opportunity. Then again, I like to spend time in my room with my cat and a book/my scrapbooking stuff/the newspaper/modeling clay/my sketchbook/my journal when I’m feeling lazy. But I do that stuff out in my little spot in the backyard a lot too. :/ I don’t know!

Are you a jock, emo, prep, nerd, or artsy type?
I thought there were more labels than that...? Well anyways, I am not an emo or prep for sure. I don’t know if I’m a nerd or not. I have friends, but they might be nerds too through someone else’s eyes. I can’t really tell. I’m not exactly a jock, I play softball and run cross-country but not super-duper well. And I’ve never quite been sure what defines an artsy type. I can’t draw or paint, so I’m pretty sure I’m not. What does that leave? I guess I’m in the Miscellaneous file. No one label can define me.
When you think about it, that’s true for everybody.

If you were a crayon, what color would you be?
I’ve heard this one before. I never get this question. I think I would probably get to the wax factory and ask for a deep maroon or a bright green, and they would tell me they ran out of colored wax and use plain wax instead. Other crayons in my box would bear wrappers with “Tickle-Me Pink” and “Goldenrod” printer on them, and I would be sitting there, brand-new for eternity, because no kid ever took any interest in the crayon labeled “Plain.”

Do you have a secret admirer?
How would I know if they were secret?

What is the most important thing in the world to you?
My cat, my family, my blog.

What is the best thing that has ever happened to you?
Going to Europe last summer was without a doubt the most wonderful thing that has ever happened and will ever happen to me in my lifetime.

Can you sing?
See “Can you draw?”

Which celebrity do you admire the most?
Einstein. He was a genius.

Are you a good kisser?
You’d have to ask my cat.

Are you usually early or late?
Uhhhh. Both. I guess I’m usually early for appointments and what-all, but sometimes late for parties and meet-you-at-the-mall-at-noon type things.

Fan of Pandas

So this morning I had to get up WAY too early to go to a cross-country meet at Westmoor. It was all the way in Daly, which meant an hour's drive. I had to get up at EIGHT. I repeat, WAY too early for a Saturday.
Not really. I actually haven't been sleeping in so much anymore, partly due to the fact that I want to get up early enough to get at least a forty minutes' run in before the sun comes out. This won't be a problem come winter. I wish it were winter right now. Cold air slips easily in and out of your lungs. The outdoors aren't so sticky and uncomfortable in winter, and as long as you've got a thick jacket you can enjoy crisp air on your face without worrying about sweat or sunburn or freckling. Plus, with winter comes rain. i<3rain. style="font-style: italic;">sharks to buy and kill and eat. Nothing was all packaged up like it is at Safeway. The squids and dead fish were piled up on beds of ice, oysters laid in tubs of water that you scooped out with a strainer, and the live fish were crammed into tanks with no room to swim around, just fins and tails wiggling, the piscine equivalent of jogging in place. Only the sharks had any room to move around. It smelled like lobsters and crayfish and fish and squid and and dead cow and dead quail all intermingling into one big cornucopia of nauseating scents. I scurried over to the nicer-smelling bakery area after a few minutes of holding my breath. They had adorable little butter cookies that were shaped like pandas:
which we got for my sister, fan of pandas. She hasn't eaten any yet because they're too cute. I don't blame her; I wouldn't want to demolish the cuties with my teeth either.
We went out to lunch, and I got a salad because I wasn't very hungry. Irony ensues. The salad was two feet wide and three inches deep, a monstrous dish that could feed fifty people. After eating for a couple of years, I had barely made a dent in the thing.
After such a fun day, I came home to homework. Blah. The rest of the day was pretty blah-y, so not much else to say. Plus I should sleep anyway because I have a 10k tomorrow morning and I should have gone to sleep a long, long time ago...


(...in a galaxy far, far away...)

Considerella went to the ball.

Got measured for the back brace the other day.

Yuck. Yuck, yuck.

Lots of pokey-proddy-feely-pinchiness from a doctor who smelled of hair gel and cheese. He put me in this tight cotton jumpsuit thingie and scanned me from a zillion different angles, and whah-la, a 3-D image of my torso started rotating on the computer screen. The horrible plastic spine-straightener is being fabricated as I type.

Got my new cross-country uniform after practice today.

Yuck. Yuck, yuck.

Not only is it Spandex, it’s about fifty-four sizes too small. And I have to run in that thing!!

The past few days haven’t been all bad, though: I shaved a few seconds off of my previous time at the meet last Saturday, had some time to ride my bike over the weekend, went to Wal-Mart and bought pajama shorts for three dollars, and took a nap on a school day.

This is a first. After a disgustingly intense cross-country practice that ran late, I headed upstairs to get my homework done before it got too late. My bed, though, was radiating some serious comfort rays, and I decided to crawl up onto it and sit for just a few minutes, deciding my brain would work better if my achy legs were rested. It being a bed, though, I was obligated to lie down. Once I had my head on the pillow, the cat rose from the bookcase, padded across the room, hopped up onto the bed, and curled up on my stomach. No way could I get up with an adorable fuzzy feline snuggled right there, so I kind of accidentally conked out. When I woke up almost two hours later, I thought for a few minutes that it was morning. But then I remembered... cross-country-bed-cat-homework-ohcraphomework and sprang up to get it started. I’ve never actually slept like that in the middle of the day on a school day. I slipped into unconsciousness for a few short minutes during the Broncothon last year, but that hardly counts. I felt wonderfully reenergized afterwards and powered through my homework.

I could not get to sleep that night.

Homecoming dance and game is next week. Dances are the bane of high school to me, but everybody else seems to enjoy them and the mild ripples of drama that go along with them. EXAMPLE: He was gonna she was gonna ask him out he said yes she said no they told me he said she said she turned him down for him but he asked her so she asked him and he said no and I said yes so now I’m going with David, can you believe it???

*sigh* Freshmen. (MEANT SARCASTICALLY BECAUSE I think it’s hilarious when sophomores, who were freshmen a single year ago, sigh and shake their heads and go, “oh, those freshmen.”)

----

The world is still spinning

The sky is still blue

My life will continue

But I’ll keep missing you

Still missing people, especially one. Why do I keep wanting to see them when I know it’s impossible? Somebody once said something about elusiveness; knowing you can’t have it makes you want it.

Here comes the first flash of May

Today was my first cross-country meet. It was very un-intense: three miles with only mild hills. The freshman girls ran first, at nine o'clock. It's so much easier to run in the mornings than at three/four o'clock in the afternoon in August/September. That doesn't mean I did any better than I expected: I was in the middle of the pack, exactly average.
It was a nice change from my usual Saturday morning, though: rolling out of bed, lacing my running shoes, munching a piece of toast, going out to run, and then either riding my bike to my grandma's house, starting my homework, vacuuming the house, or getting a load of laundry going and crawling back into bed with a book.
Which is pretty much how I've spent every single Saturday morning since school began. How many weeks ago now? Four?
This first stretch of school usually drags onnnnnnnn and onnnnnnnnn, but this year the days are whipping by like that. *snaps fingers* High school is good, but I miss certain people. Some people went to other schools or moved away, (actually only two people moved away) but some people I just don't have any classes with, and it's so impossibly crowded that it's hard to find people at lunch.
Um.
Yesterday was 9/11. I never really knew what the big deal was about 9/11 before. I thought a plane had accidentally crashed into a building, which I knew was very, very bad, but why all the "AMERICA SHALT NEVER FORGET THEE DAY" patriotismness? Disasters happen all the time.
But then we watched a documentary about it in World Cultures. It was a TERRORIST ATTACK, and people DIED. There were people on fire and people stuck on top of the building, and it was so horrible horrible horrible that they jumped off and pummeled SMACK into the ground because they were scared and confused and would rather be dead than suffer this sudden and unexpected hell. Another plane rammed into another building, people fled, wild-eyed and breathing raggedly as a tower collapsed behind them.
It's one thing when you see stuff like that in a movie. I'm one of those people who have trouble buying into special effects
but
this was real
and it happened in our country
when I was alive, not a thousand years ago.
I felt really deflated for a while.

iwilln e v e r f o r g e t

Then I came home after cross-country and went online, and GUESS WHAT.
A Fine Frenzy has a new album, Bomb in a Birdcage. Now, I have never been one to freak out over some new album but adnjfnjdahgufgbfbfudaifd;uhfg this is amaaaazing, I didn't even know she was going to have another album.
Unfortunately this one isn't half as good as her first, One Cell in the Sea. Not a quarter as good as her first. In fact, I don't think I'll even buy the entire album. The style of music has turned around, and even her familiar voice sounds different in most of the songs. "Elements" though... that's a good song.
It's hard to love it as much as the first, but I will carefully cultivate myself and allow it to grow onto me until there is a place in my heart for it, right next to One Cell in the Sea.
In other news, I wrote four poems last night, after a long era of not writing any at all. One of them was about missing people, because lately I've been thinking about all the people I'll never see again. the little old lady-the lonely girl-the cute lovable one-the inspiring artist-my first follower-the off beat kentuckian~~ Some people have it a lot worse, though. They move somewhere new, and then every single person in their lives, aside from family, are just cut right out. I guess when so many people are lost like that, you only remember the ones who were close to you, and the thespians just sort of drift to the fuzzy edge of your memory.
Most of those people I knew for a long, long time. Two of them I knew for less than three weeks. But I don't want to forget any of them evereverever.
Ever.



Sorry this post was a big string of mood swings. Parts of it was written other days, and I just patched it all into one post here.

...for only $4.99/month!

I just bought some more music on iTunes. I also went to the mall today and bought two shirts. After the mall, my mom and I went to the downtown Tapestry and Talent and I bought a bag of cashews at a convenience store on the way.
So I'm just on a spendin' spree today. Whoo!
Thanks to cross-country, I now know how to get to a dog park on foot. And NO WE DON'T RUN IN CIRCLES AROUND A DOG PARK. There's a trail thing behind it that we run on. But anyway, that's where I'm going for tomorrow's morning run. I'm gonna bring the dog and have him socialize for a while, then run home. Yay. I don't run with my dog often because the thing is kind of a hassle, but we'll make an exception tomorrow WON'T WE POOKYBUTT??? (He just walked in. He must have known I was talking about him.)
I was taking pictures today with my old camera, the one with the lens that doesn't close all the way and the weird internal disfunction that makes it slightly blur some shots, and realized that the camera was junk. But it's not like I really need a new one, I'm not really so much in the habit of taking pictures.
My phone is on the fritz, too: it refuses to send a text, so I try to send it a billion times and it keeps not working. Then it sends all one billion of the texts and I'm like agahfbdsafdjkfvj
but that's okay, I still love it, we're best friends for life.
Uhhhm not much else to say. School's fine, cross-country's aweshum, life is good. I just remembered that we have cranberry juice, so I'm gonna go drink some now.
~~J

Two Weeks

Of school have passed. And I'm functional!
Anyway, I was about to blog, but then I got caught up in this website, called One Million Giraffes. It's so cool, and such a good idea! A bored Norwegian set a goal to collect one million giraffes by 2011. People can sculpt, draw, paint or whatever a giraffe, then upload it and send it in. I'm going to make one after I publish this post.
Other stuff: I watched every single Harry Potter movie that we own last night. I was up until three o'clock in the morning, but still managed to wake up four hours later to go for a run before it got too hot. AND TODAY WAS HOT, LIKE SERIOUSLY BOIL-THE-SALIVA-TIL-YOUR-TONGUE-BURNS HOT. I had to mow the lawn and trim the shrubby things over the fence. Not a good day for yard work, but c'est la vie.
Thursday is my birthday! I was going to say yay, but then I remembered I had to get a back brace that day.
I don't know what I'm still doing up. I'm really tired, and I should finish the last of my homework instead of browsing giraffe pictures and blogging. I should do my laundry that I never got around to. I should drink an Airborne because my dad is sick and I'll likely catch it.
I should go.

This is my life.

WELL it has been a realllllly long time since I last posted.
My days are busy. I get back from cross-country past five, and then the rest of the evening is occupied with the consumption of dinner and homework. No time to blog, phoo.
Bad news. We have to swim in P.E. It's cold and chloriney and then you're all wet and your hair sticks to your face and you smell like chlorine for the rest of the day. But that's not the worst of the bad news.
I have scoliosis for real, and I have an appointment on September third for them to run tests and get me fitted for a back brace if I need one. The doctor said she was pretty much absolutely sure that I would need one, but they were going to do the tests anyway just to make me SUFFERRRRR.
And guess what September third is. September third is my birthday.
Leave it to my mother to forget my birthday and schedule an appointment for a scoliosis specialist to poke and prod at my spine on the one day that should be fun, or at least pleasant. Maybe she'll schedule an appointment for me to get braces on Christmas.
I sound so whiny. I'm not really so upset about it. My birthday's on a Thursday anyway, so it's not as if it would be much different from a regular day. Aside from a scattering of "happy birthday"s from friends.
I bought music on iTunes for the first time in my life this afternoon. Click for a bigger picture:

It was seven dollars and ninety-nine cents for that, money that could have been spent on a real object that I could hold in my hands and use. It's a strange thing, buying music. Money was just cast off into the world somehow, and what you've bought is just a few more lines on your iTunes library. But then you click the lines, music starts playing, and it's all worth it. This music was definitely worth it. I think I mentioned her before, but in case I haven't, GO LOOK UP HER SONGS AND LISTEN LISTEN LISTEN LOVE OBSSESS.
Cross-country today. Was so hard. Five miles, and it was all up-hilly. BUT I only had about a half-hour of homework, and I could hop online to blog, so that's okay. I decided I'm going to take my dog up that trail again this Saturday since I have nada planned. Sunday brings a birthday party, yay. But it's only halfway through the week. Can't be looking forward to the weekend yet.
So.
How's your life?

It's the first day of school.

Urgh. You know what that means, though? That means this blog has been here for almost a year. I guess I'll have some sort of blog-party when we hit the anniversary.
Yesterday, I tried to stay active all day so that I would be tired at night and fall asleep right away and get the maximum amount of sleep-minutes possible so I wouldn't be late on THE FIRST DAY OF HIGH SCHOOL. I went for a run in the morning, then bike-rode most of the day, walked my dog in the afternoon, played basketball with my sister, looked for my classes at the high school, and ellipticalled while watching Chopped until it was dinnertime.
Yeah, I was tired. And I ate two Canada mints. Oops.
Cross-country starts today after school. I don't know how much we're going to have to run. Hopefully not too much because I'm really tired right now.
Probably just sleepiness. Waking up a six/six-thirty has yet to become part of my morning routine. My alarm woke me up at six, and I managed to roll out of bed and crawl into the bathroom half an hour later, but now I'm all sleepy, have extra time on my hands, and wish I'd gotten more rest while I could.
I still haven't picked out my first-day-of-school outfit, which I should probably do now, seeing as I'm in my pajamas and have to leave in ten minutes.
Gotta go.
----
First day of school: I was a clueless freshman among clueless freshmen. My cousins and sister, who had walked with me to school, dissipated immediately into the crowd, locating friends within seconds of arriving.
I was jostled and bumped through a hallway leading to the quad, where I sprang down into the grassy oasis at once. The concentration of students was lesser here, and I caught my breath as I pulled out my schedule. From the central point of the school I could see just how intimidatingly crowded it was here. Students bustled past each other in groups, hundreds of bodies in constant motion. It was a relief to locate some friends so we could dive back into the crowd together and make our way to our first class.
My teachers seem pretty nice, mostly. And I have friends in all my classes.
Lunch was crazy. My friends and I walked around in hopeless circles looking for a place to eat that wasn't already occupied by a scary clot of seniors or a huddled circle of freshmen. When we finally sat down on a brick wall-thing, we were informed that it was the "senior wall" and that we as freshmen were not safe in their territory.
Whatever. We stayed there. Nobody stabbed us or shoved our heads in toilets, so it was okay.
In sixth period I sit behind a guy who went to Juvenile Hall for five days for getting high at school and attended San Jose Community last year.
I feel scared.
Cross-country after school was pretty horrible. It was hot and muggy, the conditions that are the opposite end of the spectrum of perfect for running.
The good thing about the first day of school is that there's no homework, so I have time to blog and shower before dinner.
It was a pretty good start to a school year. We'll just see how all this goes.

Screenies

I figured out how to do them. This revelation will change the legacy of this blog forever.
FUN GAME!!!! <--Click for a good time. My desktop :)
For the record, I absolutely cannot stand the taste of Soyjoy. The smell nauseates me. But I collect the wrappers because they are just so cool!
Okay, this is just a dumb little post. I didn't really feel like blogging, just wanted to share my discovery.

Canada mints!

Cross-country tryouts were yesterday. Warmup-stretches-sprints-laps-more sprints-done. The coach guy (never told us his name) told us to turn in our sports forms and run over the weekend. Today I got up entirely too early (seven o'clock on the dot: compare to my usual ten or eleven wake-up time) and ran for a half hour to get it over with before the clouds parted and the sun could boil my bones. Cross-country goes from three to five. That doesn't leave very much time for homework before eight o'clock beddy-bye time. Maybe I'll have to start going to bed at the ungodly hour of nine!
School starts the day after tomorrow. I should probably have already gotten myself into a school-night sleeping regimen. Oh well. I'll work on that tonight.
Yesterday I walked to the Long's Drugs near my house (now CVS) and got a few luxury purchases: White-Out and Canada mints. Canada mints are like giant Altoids, but not as minty and less expensive. I've only had them once before, loved them, but then couldn't ever find them again. So, I was thrilled to see the 99 cent package for sale. I ate one on the way home and vowed to only eat one every other day. I haven't eaten one today... so far, so good. :D The whole drugstore has been restocked and re-shelved with the aisles all in different arrangements and new signs. It's weird. But cool.
Okay, I left for a while to go for a walk with my dad. Now I'm back, with no more to say.
kthatsitseeya