Operation High School

Mission Complete

2010-07-08T13:17:00.002-05:00

This marks the conclusion and completion of Operation High School. I think I can safely say that the mission was a success and a good foundation has been put in place for the next mission. The new blog is going live within the next 5 minutes. The new URL can be found here.

Thank you all for catching a ride and joining me in the mission. Hope to see you reporting for the next mission.

Safe Journeys,
~Wolfie.

Every Trip Has Surprises

2010-06-29T21:31:00.000-05:00

Well, I'm on my way to the start of a little white water rafting, and I've lost cell service again while talking with my robotics friend (funny story there I'll have to discuss later), so I figured in this short little time before we arrive at the drop off point. I'll send this when I get back to Haines where I at least have an AT&T roaming signal.

Oh wow we're already here! Short entry I suppose.

***

That was a lot of fun! We saw somewhere upwards of twenty-something-odd bald eagles. I took TONS of pictures, and some came out really well!

The ride was very peaceful actually. I again got much thinking time to myself.

So...I've been mentioning my robotics friend a lot, and there is a reason behind it (as always). A funny thing happened yesterday, and it all started with a fur bikini...

Like I said before I've been texting him pretty much nonstop since leaving for this trip. And I know him well enough that I can talk about absolutely anything with him and it isn't awkward. Well, anyways, I saw yesterday at the fur stores in Juneau a fur bikini and thought he would get a kick out of the thought. So I texted him about it for kicks, and his response was along the lines of "not gonna tell you who I just imagined in that fur bikini." WELL, I was curious as to why it was me (he was obviously hinting at, and eventually admitted to, the fact that it was me he had imagined). That was right before my cell service went out.

Then I wrote yesterday's entry. That was why I was so anxious to get my signal back.

Before I continue, I need to note that earlier this year I had been considering going out with him during college should I go to A&M. But I never thought I would have a chance of him liking me.

So when I got a signal again, he called and I nagged at him to tell me why he had imagined me of all people in a fur bikini. Caught red-handed. He was silent for a while trying to "figure out how to put it" and eventually he spoke and said something along the lines of "what if I told you I've wanted to be more than just friends?"

I was dead silent, gaping as I stared off the stern of the ferry. Surely he was joking, right? There's no way he really feels that way. Or did he?

After several minutes of my silence and the giggles that followed, I finally revealed the mutuality of the feeling.

***

Okay, so I forgot to finish this entry yesterday, suppose I'll finish it now. We just flew in on a Piper to Gustavus and are now headed for Glacier Bay Lodge, located within Glacier Bay National Park. But ANYWAYS...

After I had admitted to feeling the same way, I lost my signal shortly thereafter. And after several long excruciating minutes and my signal returned I continued to text him, as I was roaming and didn't want to incur charges. We were basically both dumbfounded that the other person had kept their feelings bottled up for so long and we had no idea.

What's next?

And just a heads up, this will probably not get posted on time due to lack of cell phone coverage. I don't think I'll be on T-Mobile for much longer, because they lack coverage in too many places. Hopefully mom will allow me to change over.
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

Day 2 in Alaska

2010-06-27T15:01:00.003-05:00

Well, technically this is Day 1, and it's not even over yet, but seeing as I have some down time, I figured I'd write a little.

So yesterday I was chatting with two people basically the whole day: a friend from robotics and my new friend from orientation. I had a bagel from the Silverbow (the Inn/bakery where we stayed last night) and it was the absolute best bagel I've ever had. I had a cinnamon bagel with apple butter. YUMMY! Then this morning I had a plain bagel with cinnamon sugar butter. It was the best breakfast in the world.

We're now waiting around for lunch. My phone AND camera died while on our little hike around the mountain that neighbors Juneau. We're back at the hotel to hang out and wait for lunch. We've seen countless bald eagles already, far more luck than we had in Yellowstone. We did some walking around downtown, and later today we'll be boarding a ferry for our next destination. So far, this is a great trip, and the weather is much better here than hot and humid Texas. It's a nice cool 50 degrees here, as opposed to a steaming 90+ degrees back home.

I've been looking at Facebook and realizing that as more and more of my friends are going to their respective freshman orientations, they're adding more friends on Facebook as they meet more people. We find new people, but we never forget the people we grew up with. Maybe we're a wolfpack divided, but we're united in spirit. And that's what matters right? Right.

Looks like it's lunch time! I'm hungry so this is perfect timing. It is taking a while to get used to the 3-hour time change, but I'm doing it bit by bit.

Too Good to be True? I Think Not!

2010-05-02T23:37:00.001-05:00

Yesterday one of my childhood fantasies became a reality. Not one of ponies and unicorns, not one of meeting my Prince Charming. No kissy kissy gah gah stuff.

This dream was about a car.

This isn't a Ferrari, it's not a Corvette, it's not a Mustang or a Spyder. It's no Lexus or Mercedes Benz.

It sure isn't American either. This car is British.

Any guesses yet?

We're talking the world of "Let's Motor!" We're talking small. We're talking...

MINI Cooper.

And this is how it all began...

At around noon yesterday I was lying in bed, thinking about getting up, but too tired from the business of the past week to force myself up before Dad called up to me to do so. By then my brother had been sent off to his marching clinic, so it was just me and Dad in the house. And it wasn't long before the usual alarm went off...

"Time to wake up, come on downstairs and eat your breakfast!"

I grumbled and rolled out of the bed, not knowing what I was going to do that day.

As usual I slowly munched on breakfast (Cheerios that morning). And, also as usual, I was sitting there for an hour munching. And around that time Dad entered the family room, looked through the kitchen at me and, long conversation short, told me to hurry up because we were going somewhere.

"Where?" I asked obliviously.

"To go test drive a MINI."

My eyes lit up like miniature suns as I shoved the rest of my bowl of cereal in my mouth. Right away I knew to assume that test driving was all that we were doing. Then again, I knew that, after past experiences, to never assume anything when it came to Dad. Because no matter how long you've known him, he always keeps you guessing.

Always.

So we hop in his Chevy Avalanche, and on the way there he's talking to me about why he was considering getting me a car in the first place, what the terms of my using it would probably be, etcetera. I listened intently, unsure of just what he might have up his sleeve this time.

When we arrived I had to fill out a form to test drive one of their automatic transmission MINIs in a parking lot (they wouldn't let me take it to the streets since I was under 21). I quickly noticed how drastically different it was from my huge Toyota Highlander. It was quick, zippy, and peppy. Driving a MINI was better than I had ever dreamed it would be.

When we returned from the test run, dad showed me a couple of cars in the lot. He started with an automatic. It was Pepper White, and had no features whatsoever. Pretty much just the standard package. Then he showed me a Clubman that was also a standard package automatic.

Dad brought me to a different Clubman. This one had the upgraded sound system, iPod adapter, Bluetooth, and the whole nine yards. It had the luxury car look. But me being the person I am, the luxury look pushed me away.

There was a catch, however, to having all the nice features.

Manual transmission.

Dad led me on to the last car he had eyed and inspected. A Chili Red Hardtop with black bonnet stripes, black roof, and black side-view mirrors. It had black painted wheels, chrome lining accents, an upgraded sound system, and a matching dual-tone red and black interior.

It was a car taken straight from my dreamland.

I hovered around it, snapped a picture with my phone, and gawked at it. Our sales assistant offered to open up the car, to which I quickly agreed. And when I sat in the driver's seat, I felt like I was in another world, like I had left reality.

Dad requested he open the Clubman for us, and I reluctantly climbed back into reality and followed. The interior of the Clubman was the epitome of luxury. And that quickly pushed me away. I had never liked luxury cars, and never would.

Though a sporty-looking MINI would be the exception. And that's what that red flame was.

I was eager to return to the fireball of red and black. And it wasn't long before I had said that was the one I wanted.

What I didn't realize was WHEN I was going to get it.

It took me a while to figure out through all the finance jargon that the car was coming home that very day. And as soon as I got the chance I jumped up and gave dad a big bear hug.

And while I didn't get to drive it home (seeing as I didn't know how to drive a stick yet), I did get to drive it later that day. My first lesson in driving a manual transmission.

Yesterday I made little progress other than how to operate the clutch. I did research after my first attempts, if efforts of speeding the learning process. It was to no avail, because my second outing left me pretty discouraged.

Last night I fell asleep thinking about manual transmission, and this morning I woke up thinking about manual transmission. I presumed that I had probably dreamed of manual transmission that night. As I drove my Highlander on errands I paid attention to the engine and its shifts and even went so far as to imitate engaging and disengaging the clutch and the gas pedals in hopes of getting more practice in.

Later I had another lesson, this time with my dad's girlfriend (who happens to drive a stick MINI as well). It was that in combination with my newly-accuired knowledge of manual transmission from howstuffworks.com that allowed me to succeed today. In fact, Dad was so pleased with the fact that I was going for so long without killing the engine that he offered me the chance to take it to the streets. But I decided to wait and give myself a few more days of practice before taking my hot ride to the streets.

You know, just to be safe.

All MINIs come from the factory with a name. The name printed on the sticker of my windshield?

ROOSTER

It was a name that I first found bland. Then I thought I would probably grow on the name and love it.

I did.

I can still hardly believe I'm not dreaming. I'm half-expecting to wake up eventually and realize that I'm dreaming. But so far I haven't. Which means in a few days I'll be showing off Rooster to the school.

But for now, until I master stick shift enough, I have the keys to wave in friends' faces.

~Wolfie
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

Forethoughts on a Senior Band Trip

2010-04-21T13:09:00.000-05:00

It would be a huge oversight if I failed to include any entries regarding this year's band trip, my senior band trip.

Destination: Memphis, TN

For the trip I'm keeping a journal, as blog entries, even if done through my phone like this one, will be highly inconvenient. I plan on typing up one large entry with each day's writings when I return from the trip (and find the time to type it up). It's going to be a fun-filled journey into the past. Hang onto your hats, we're in for a wild ride!
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

More College Preparation News

2010-04-09T15:56:00.005-05:00

So it's time I finally reveal what college I will be attending. After a long tough decision-making process and extensive research and campus visits and asking around, I have decided... (drum roll please)

I'm going to become a proud member of the LSU Tiger family! So put on your purple and gold, we're taking a trip to Tigerland!

I have already, for the most part, set up the new blog, and it is indeed on the internet. But at the moment, until I have completed it, it is locked, and only I can view it. I have one entry up already, and the color scheme is set and looks nice. I need to get the okay from the university to use some of their logos in my title, but as soon as that is done, I'll make the announcement here and unlock the blog. One of the last things that will go up is going to be the new question/comment email address. LSU won't be unlocking my LSU email to me until the summer or perhaps even right before classes start, or later! Right now the address isn't something I want released, so I want the chance to change it before releasing it on the internet like that. I am also actively researching whether I can get my blog linked on perhaps one of LSU's student life websites under a list of sites by other students and such. I will keep everyone posted on news in that subject.

Unfortunately, the url operationcollege.blogspot.com was already taken, so the new blog's address will be operationlsu.blogspot.com for anyone who wants to go ahead and add the site to their bookmarks.

I also recently discovered who my roommate at LSU is going to be. I recently emailed her to find out if she had decided to go to LSU or not (as there is still time before decisions must be locked in on May 1st). When I get a response from her I am considering inviting her to joint-author the new blog, which might be interesting. The only thing I know about her as of yet is that she is going into engineering like me (because we're in the Engineering Residential College). I am anxious to hear back from her, and hopefully establish a friendship before we even step onto the campus.

Also, today I picked up my cap and gown for graduation, as well as all my announcements, name cards, diploma holder, and other things like that. Now that box I have kept in my closet with all my graduation stuff is finally complete, minus my stole or cord (i forget what it is) for having a high GPA. But I have my National Society of High School Scholars stole, cap, and gown all in there, and I have attached the tassel drop bearing the NSHSS insignia (although I had to attach it to the zipper for now because I couldn't find a place for it on the actual tassel).

I also made the important step and accepted the scholarship I received to go to LSU (glad I noticed that!) and have signed up for my freshman orientation.

Prom is drawing closer with every passing day, and I've already been sucked into the clouds. I've narrowed my choices down to five dresses (all ballgowns) and now it's up to my mom to find the best deal on one of them. I've made all my plans with my boyfriend so that mess is out of the way. The band trip is also fast approaching, so I'm pretty excited about that. We're taking a trip to Memphis this year, so it should be awesome!

Lots of stuff happening during the last two months of senior year, so the excitement is quickly building. The ride through high school has been a fun and crazy one. I'm sad it must end, but always try to keep my eyes where I'll be in the future, and what kind of a four-year ride college is going to be.

~Wolfie

College Decision

2010-04-04T17:15:00.000-05:00

While I won't be making my decision public just yet, I do want to inform you, my readers, that my college decision has indeed been made and confirmed. And I am very excited to have made the decision. From here, it's a matter of finishing high school and preparing for the year ahead of me, including creating the new blog, Operation College. I am sad to have to leave this blog behind, but I will give everyone plenty of time to switch their bookmarks. I also will not be taking this blog down, but rather leaving it up, and I will even try to refer to entries here on the new blog. And, due to the fact that I have made my decision, I have also decided a color scheme for the new blog. Within the next few weeks I'll be preparing the new blog, leaving it as private until I can make my college decision public. For now, I need to slowly and carefully leak the decision to friends and family before I can open this important decision to my readers.

It goes without saying that this decision was a hard one, and one I didn't make lightly nor without many a deep thought. But I think I have done the homework and have come to the best decision. Regardless, these next four years are going to be some of the best in my life so far.

It may also be of note that this is the first entry I have written on my new computer, which will be going with me to college. Sadly, I had to leave my beloved Macbook behind for the sake of cost, but I must admit that Microsoft has done many things right with Windows 7 and this has been a large improvement over my experiences with Vista and other previous operating systems. I still miss my OSX, (thus my remaining iMac desktop will also be traveling with me I hope when I journey to college), but for the time being, I can live with this exceptional operating system. So for anyone whom has been considering moving up from Vista to Windows 7, I strongly encourage you to do so. But I still believe that if you want the best choice, get a Mac. Insert wink here.

School is in its final stretch. AP exams are a mere month away, and classes are wrapping up with their final units. I have thankfully kicked aside my earlier case of senioritis, and have kept up my grades and have continued to strive for success in preparation for college.

And speaking of school work, I have some that needs finishing. That Physics won't do itself you know!

What is Washington Doing?

2010-03-16T17:15:00.000-05:00

We've all heard the news. It seems everywhere we look on the news the only story is Health Care. And with good reason.

There was a reason the Constitution was written the way it was. There was a reason behind the method of making bills into law. Why does Washington insist on bending the rules?

This "reconciliation" is unconstitutional and we know it. Heck, Pelosi knows it! But does it bother her? Not in the slightest. She has been quoted saying "But I like it." Never mind the content of the bill, the method that is trying to be used to force this beast into law is wrong in every way.

I've been following Sarah Palin for a while now. It was Sarah that brought the unconstitutionality of this so-called "reconciliation" to my attention. And quite plainly and honestly, I'm shocked.

We should be afraid of what's going on at capitol hill. For all we know this could be just the tip of the iceberg of what has been happening over the past several years.

The deadline that the president has set out just happens to be my birthday. This only further unsettles me. They're trying to push this thing through without properly voting on it! This is not what the United States was meant to do. This bill is too big and too important to pass in such an obscure and horrendous manner.

The constitution clearly states how bills are meant to be signed into law in Article 1 and those of us whom have taken government class know it, or at least they should.

When will Washington get the message? We don't want this monster passed. Period. Why does it seem like the public is being ignored?

We need to act and we need to act now. If you don't want this bill to become law, tell your representatives! Email, snail mail, phone call, heck, text them! Do whatever you can do to stop this beast. We can't afford it, we don't want it, and Washington needs to start listening to its constituents.

For the sake of this nation's youth, stop this bill! We don't want this national debt to be mounted any more upon the shoulders of me and others in my generation than it already is. We didn't do anything to deserve such punishment that we are already undoubtedly going have to deal with. Please don't mount it any more with the passing of this expensive bill!

A call to action is at hand. Will you listen?
~Wolfie
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

Story in the Making

2010-02-16T18:15:00.000-06:00

Wow, it's been a long time since I've written an entry on my computer! Anyways...

This semester I'm taking a class called "Creative Writing." It's pretty much what it sounds like. One day we had a "quick write" prompt that involved a picture of a man wielding a chair over his head about to smash a lump under a rug. Of course, me being the fantasy writer and dragon lover that I am, I decided to integrate, you guessed it, a dragon! The resulting story ended up pulling forth a stream of ideas that I'm now constantly pulling ideas from.

This was the jist of the quick write: There is this boy named Max, a young adult in this fantasy land (I have yet to name his "world" that he lives in) who is a warrior in training to become one of the Soaring Flame Warriors, which are basically a band of dragon riders who serve under the "good" side, which I have since named "The Pact". Max's dragon is named "Sallaelia", or "Sammy" for short. For whatever reason, the evil overlord (the ruler of the "bad" side, the name of which I cannot remember at the moment) wants Max and his dragon dead. (I have since developed a reason for this, but more on that later.) The quick write consisted of how Max and his dragon escaped the attack of a pack of Ravagers (a creature I have created, which are basically demonic panthers).

From just that quick write, I have developed almost an entire story plot and rich character backgrounds. This is what I have since developed, beginning with our central character, Max.

Max Leovis is the son of one of the Soaring Flame Warriors (his father) and one of The Pact's principal messengers between the three races under The Pact. These three races are the humans, elves, and the Spirit Wolves (more on these guys later). I won't get into too many details about his personality and looks without my character sheet in front of me (my teacher currently has that), but I will say that his last name, Leovis, is shared by a very well-known legend among those of The Pact. More on this after our next character.

This brings us to Max's dragon, Sallaelia. Sallaelia is the last surviving member of the Azure Dragon Clan. This clan, when it was thriving, was thought to be one of the strongest clans of all the dragons. An Azure Clan dragon is marked by icy blue-iridescent scales and amazing abilities. The Azure Clan is closely tied to the legend of Leovis. Ages ago, shortly after the overlord of the "bad" side assumed his own throne, he launched a massive Ravager attack on the small town of Leoshire. The battle, now known as the Last Stand of Leoshire, was nearly lost. But in the last moments of the battle, when it seemed all hope was lost, Leovis, a legendary winged lion, and every Azure dragon soared into the fight, eradicating every last Ravager, saving the town of Leoshire. At the end of the battle, three key things happened. First was the creation of the Spirit Wolf race. No one quite knows how or why, but somehow some of the Ravagers, rather than being killed, were transformed and purified of their demonic nature, turning them into a Spirit Wolf. Many believe that the Spirit Wolves contain the spirits of the Azure dragons that fell in battle. The Spirit Wolves quickly allied with the humans and elves under The Pact, and have fought along side them ever since. Second, in the center of the now wrecked Leoshire, a sole Azure dragon egg was left, unscathed by the massive battle. This egg was very quickly recovered by the elves and brought to the dragon egg nursery, where it would wait for its rider to arrive to choose his dragon. The egg was given the elven name of Sallaelia, which means "Bringer of Hope." This egg would eventually become Max's dragon. Third, though not so major, the city of Leoshire was rebuilt and became the human capital city.

It was the shared tie to Leovis that brought Max and Sallaelia together, and because of this tie they share, each has a special undiscovered power that will play importantly into the destruction of the overlord and the final purification of the rest of the Ravager race.

When the Spirit Wolf race was created, there was one Ravager that did not fully convert. He ended up being a blend of Ravager and Spirit Wolf. When he faced the decision as to which side to ally with, he chose to fight under The Pact. When he joined The Pact, he was given the name Sallaeumber, which means "Hope from the Darkness" in elven. He had the wisdom and power of the Spirit Wolves, and the grace and fighting ability of the Ravagers. By the time Max begins his training, he has retired from full-time fighting, and now aids in training future Soaring Flame Warriors. Because of his half-Ravager blood, he is able to teach new warriors how to defend against a charging Ravager. Sallaeumber is a fairly minor character, however, and is not deeply developed.

The overlord, Umberamor, rules over his trusted human servants, the Shades, and of course the Ravagers. Umberamor is a very shallow character, and, at the moment, lacks much depth. Umberamor used to be one of The Pact, and was even one of the best Soaring Flame Warriors ever known. But his hunger for power was too great and brought him to a more evil facet when he reached adulthood, and he made himself the overlord he is now. His dragon is one of the Red Dragon Clan, and Umberamor himself is usually cloaked in black and red as he sits upon his throne. His crest is a Ravager in mid-pounce, while that of The Pact and the Soaring Flame Warriors consists of Leovis himself.

I have written out one other scene, and am currently working on a second. The other completed scene is of when Max travels to the elven capital and chooses his dragon, or rather, she chooses him. The scene in progress was inspired by the recent dumping of snow in my area, and is a scene where Max and Sallaelia roam through a snowy landscape in the winter's first snow. They engage in a quick snowball fight, Max shows Sallaelia (and the reader) what will become his saddle and reins with which to ride his dragon, and we get a sneak peak and clue as to what Sallaelia's special power might be (she transforms two icicles into necklaces for her and Max, and in the process changes the appearance of her horns and claws temporarily).

I'll admit, much of my inspiration comes from Christopher Paolini and his Inheritance series. Another good deal of my inspiration comes from World of Warcraft. So far these ideas have been met with very positive reviews from my Creative Writing class and teacher. Throughout this semester I plan on connecting every assignment in that class to this story line, and, hopefully, by the end of the year, I'll have all the important scenes written out, and all that will be left will be to connect them. Who knows, perhaps I might have a full story to submit to a publisher before I'm done with college! But for now, this is just a method of stress-relieving and amusement. I've found that if I try to force a story out it often ends up being bland and, well, forced.

I hope everyone had an excellent Valentine's Day, President's Day, and Mardi Gras! I know I did. I may try to post excerpts of the story either here or on my FictionPress page, and perhaps some character sketches on my deviantArt page (though, don't expect anything amazing except for Sallaelia) if I ever get around to drawing them. But right now, I need to work on my English project. (It's centered around photography, so it should be fun.)

Bon Mardi Gras! (Happy Fat Tuesday for you non-French speakers)
~Wolfie

A Step into the Dream World

2010-02-07T15:57:00.001-06:00

Yesterday and into last night I was texting my boyfriend discussing the fate of our relationship once the next chapter of our lives begins. Up until now we had just sort of accepted that this relationship would end when our lives took their turns. But I've now considered giving this Long Distance Relationship (from here on referred to as LDR) a shot. So we talked about it, the good and the bad. I tried to keep us focused on the good things that would come out of it. Of course, we haven't quite come to a final decision, but we did get a lot discussed.

One thing I brought up was the different ways that LDR couples can do things together without actually being together. One that we both thought amusing was setting our watches to the same exact time. Then, at a set time, we would both do the same exact thing, like jump, or say "sprinkles", or something silly.

Before I went to bed last night I did a search on different things LDR couples could do together. I found one site that had a good nine-page long list of creative things to do with a 300-mile-away significant other. And one of them caught my eye, not because of how clever it was, but because of... well... I honestly don't know exactly why it appealed to me. Maybe it was because it was about dreaming. And as I have discovered throughout my life, I am someone that has done anything and everything that I put my mind to.

It's called "lucid dreaming". What is lucid dreaming? It is very simply being aware that you're dreaming while you're dreaming. Often times while we're dreaming we accept strange things that we never would accept while awake, and so dreams often seem like reality. But in a lucid dream, you usually determine that something is strange and just like that your dream becomes lucid, if you deduce that you are in fact dreaming. Many of us have already had these dreams, though we may not know it. And usually we become distracted and we loose lucidity.

What does lucid dreaming have to do with LDRs? Well, training yourself to recognize dreams and be able to induce lucid dreams is the first step in learning to control your dreams. You could make ice cream appear in front of you, fly, summon a dragon, or make someone appear in your dream! See where I'm going with this? So even if you and your partner are separated by hundreds, or even thousands of miles, you could spend time with them in the dream world.

So I'm working on being able to do this, because to me it sounds like fun. The first step is improving dream recall. Because without dream recall, you won't remember a lucid dream even if you've had one! Now what use would that be? Lucid dreams and being able to induce them is one suggested way to combat nightmares as well, so there are some excellent practical purposes for learning to induce lucid dreams.

One thing me and my boyfriend also discussed as a possibility should we decide to try this LDR thing is to co-write the Operation College blog, the one that will succeed this one. It might be an interesting thing to consider.

Of course, most of us know that today is the Super Bowl. And, like most Americans, I'm watching the game and the pregame festivities leading up to kickoff. For the first time I have a team in the game, so for the first time I'm actually going to be interested in the score, and not just the clever advertisements!

So, it is with great pride and enthusiasm that I close this entry with a strong "GO SAINTS!!!" Wolfie out!

~Wolfie
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

My Saturday Afternoon

2010-01-24T15:44:00.000-06:00

So yesterday I decided to spend the day doing a little diy project. Actually I got the idea from the internet (of course, where else do we get our ideas these days), but it started with something else.

Back when I was in middle school or so, I had this purple Lego spybot. They came in other colors like blue and red and green. I got the purple one. Trouble is, I lost the remote to it a while back, so I decided to dismantle the main console and inspect the innards to see what I could find and salvage. I didn't find anything, but I thought if I could figure out where it would store the information for the missions that you could load onto it, I could remove that and use it somehow to make a flash drive.

That got me searching on the various ways I could case the thing. I saw Lego bricks, Rubik's Cubes, even old USB cords modded to be flash drives. There was even one example that was a bowling ball, modified to be a working flash drive. (I was wondering how the heck anyone could use that!)

That was when my project shifted from the spybot to just a normal flash drive. My mom had an extra one laying around and I told her I needed one for me to use for school. She took one she wasn't using and cleared it off for me. (She still had no idea what my plan for it was!) I took it and started measuring it up against my step-brother's Hotwheels and Matchbox cars and found a Ford GT Mustang that looked nice. I took it to my room and began the project.

I started by drilling down the rivets of the car, to open it up. After several minutes the car was in four pieces, and I began work on opening up the old casing of the flash drive. I ended up having to use the drill to create a hole in the side so I could pry apart the two-part casing to get to the goods I needed. After the hole was made (and with minimal damage to the PCB inside) I cut the slit with a knife. After a little struggling to pry out the drive itself I called my dad.

With his approval I drove over to his house so he could dremel a slot for the USB and shave away some of the car's chassis to make room for the PCB. After a few hours everything was fitting perfectly and I was back at Mom's house.

From there it was all a matter of hot-gluing everything together. And before the sun went down I had gone from a plain boring flash drive to a DRIVING flash drive that looked awesome.
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A Side I Never Knew

2010-01-13T15:04:00.001-06:00

One of my biggest self-discoveries during my senior year has been the revealing of my second stereotype. We all know, and I admit, that I'm the stereotypical band geek. But what I've now begun to see is that I also fall into the geek and nerd stereotype as well. It's strange how I didn't see it before, with my love for math and science. But robotics has pulled that part of me out into the open.

Of course, who else would spend hours every week on a robot after school when they could be doing other activities?

And it's a nice little discovery, this side of me I've never recognized. I knew I would always identify myself with the band members, but band is a very large organization, and trust me, not every member fits the stereotype. But the robotics team? We're only six people strong. Not much chance for deviation. And every one of us more or less fits the summary, or at least is attracted to people who do.

And now that marching season is over with, there are no more band practices to occupy my oodles of free time. No after school meetings to attend. Or, so it had been in my past three years in high school.

But now something fills that void, and I'm not missing the marching season as much. And Robotics is teaching a lot more than how to engineer a basketball-playing robot. With the club at a loss for funds, we're all having to pool in fundraising ideas. And most of it is going to come from sponsorships. That means dressing up pretty and persuading a manager to donate. Life skills. All while joking around with people who can speak the complicated language of geek-speak.

All this is done with one goal in mind: victory. Our goal is to continue the school's tradition of advancing all the way to worlds competition in Atlanta. Armed with five seniors and a junior, two girls and four guys, and one robot that cost precious hours to craft and program and wire and test... You get the point. We've worked hard. And still are.

And yes, we even give up our Friday nights. It's football season all over again. And as usual...

I don't mind one bit.
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Hard Work Pays Off

2009-12-14T16:16:00.000-06:00

Today was perhaps one of the best days of my life. A day worth celebrating, and a day worth remembering. A day that was made possible by the support of my friends and family. Today my hard work all these years in high school have finally paid off; and the reward is a great one.

Today I got a letter from Texas A&M University. It was the letter I have dreamed of getting since sixth grade: the letter stating I have been admitted to the engineering school.

I have dreamed of going to A&M all my life. Not just because of the long family line of former students, but because it felt like home. A&M is a place rich in tradition. Because when you're an Aggie, you're an Aggie forever.

I have worked hard these past three and a half years to earn the grades I've earned, and it has truly paid off. Now more than ever I have the strong drive to succeed with excellence in everything I do. All the blood, sweat, and tears, all the accomplishments, all the friends I've made along the way, it all culminates before my eyes today. The long hours I've devoted to band, the sleepless nights doing homework, everything was worth it.

To have been admitted so quickly into the college of engineering at A&M as a non auto-admit is something so fulfilling. But I know it wouldn't have been possible without the support of my family and friends. My parents have been there for me no matter what, my grandparents and aunts and uncles have been behind me, encouraging me, and my brother has looked up to me, pushing me to succeed. My step-dad to-be has helped me remember that no matter how bad life may seem, it could never compare to the devastating losses he has had to endure. My step-sister to-be has been there to give me advice, to encourage me to excel in everything I do. My friends have helped me through the roughest parts of my life in high school. And my boyfriend has been there to show me that I really can do anything. Everyone has stood beside me through it all. And though I can be sure it won't be the last time, I want to thank them all for everything they have done for me, the big things and the small. Without their support, I wouldn't be where I am today.

And with finals just around the corner, the drive to succeed grows ever stronger. Because college is going to be one wild ride!

Now, it's high time I headed off to Robotics!

~Wolfie
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More on Future Blog Plans

2009-11-08T15:46:00.000-06:00

So, I have a little more dead time to kill before my shift at the band fundraiser starts, and I decided to expand on the blog plans for the future, namely with the sequel Operation College and plans for design and such.

So, I've already mentioned the decided name for the new blog, Operation College. I didn't go much further than that, though, so I feel the need and desire to give a sneak peak into the new blog's design, features, and other highlights that will give you an idea of how it will differ from Operation High School. With this sneak peak you will get a glimpse of what college is going to shape up to be for me.

As far as color scheme goes, I plan to keep it to the school colors of whatever college I end up going to. This could be one of four: Rice University, Texas A&M University, Louisiana State University, or Texas Tech. At the moment, I can be pretty much guaranteed admission into the last two, based on my SAT scores. I'm still anxiously awaiting my ACT scores (which are supposed to get in tomorrow) which could switch me over to automatic admission into A&M if I managed a 30 or higher composite score. I missed automatic under the SAT score by a mere 10 points, which was, as you can imagine, a bit frustrating. But I really think I did well on the ACT, so we'll have to see what happens. Anyways, so I'm going to make the new blog's colors true to the school. If I can, I might try to put up the college's logo as a part of the banner, but I'm still working on possible designs.

As far as entries go, they may be more frequent than for Operation High School, or they might be even less frequent. Again, it's going to depend a lot on the school, as well as on the schedule I end up with.

I plan on creating another facebook page for the new blog, and (hopefully) will have the time to regulate and use it more. Again, this will depend on the school, but I am hoping there will be more free time in college, but I might be more interested in spending that free time studying and doing my reading for classes.

As far as Twitter goes, I might just rename the current page to make it easier. For something like Twitter it's best not to just let a page die.

I will keep everyone updated as admission letters start rolling in and as scores are posted. They should start filtering in within the next couple of weeks. I hope everyone is having a great weekend, and to fellow high school students, I wish you all the best in your college application process and admissions. And to everyone else, a safe rest of the weekend.

~Wolfie
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First Free Friday Night...

2009-11-07T01:07:00.000-06:00

I didn't think I would be doing another entry this early, but I'm still quite wired and wide awake after tonight's happenings. Haven't done an entry like this in a while, so it'll be a nice return to the blog's early days.

So, tonight was my first free Friday night since, well, the summer really. Early this week I had no idea what I wanted to do with myself, seeing as I get out at 2:30. Then I was talking with some of my band friends and they told me they were thinking of going to another football game for another local school to see some of their friends in the band there. I know a few people there, so I decided to tag along when asked if I wanted to go.

So today when I got out of school I went home to grab a few extra things to bring to my dad's house for the weekend. I waited around for a bit until it was time to pick up my brother. I did that, and stopped by my mom's house so he could get his computer, and we turned around and headed over to my dad's house. Once there I discussed with my dad the plan and he gave me his approval, but said I needed to drive with someone else. So I talked with my friends that were going and we decided that I would drive to one person's house and we'd all car pool together to the game, and then we'd drive back to that house and I'd drive home from there.

So I waited for it to be time to leave, and left my dad's house at 6:00, to give myself time to make it to my friend's house by 6:15. When I got there we discovered that the game was an away game for the high school we were going to see. We went anyways, since it wasn't that far, and, once there, found seats on the visitor side right next to the band.

From there, it was a chance to experience Friday Night Football Games from a spectator or student point of view. That was a first for me, and it was just as much fun as it is as a part of the band. We had many laughs and fun times, so it was really awesome to get to go to the game. As I'm writing I'm still singing one of the (many many many) school spirit songs that the band played at the beginning of the game. It was just overall very very fun and exciting.

We decided to try and beat the rush and leave the game early. We ended up leaving with three minutes left in the fourth quarter, with our team winning 21 to 3 or 6 or something along those lines. Our trip back to the car was quite an adventure. In attempts to take a shortcut, we cut through a field that was next to the football stadium. We ended up having to cross a ditch, which was very fun. We all laughed the whole way, having a good time as band friends, like we usually do. The ride home was very similar to the ride there. We stopped at Starbucks on the way, and chatted more. After that we dropped one person off (whom we had picked up on the way to the game) and then went back to my friend's house. The rest of us chatted to 15 minutes before me and my other friend had to leave to make it home before curfew. My drive home was somewhat rushed, and I made it back to my house with mere seconds to spare, based on my car's clock. It was almost better than any other Friday Night Football night spent as part of the band, and certainly the most fun free Friday night I've ever done, so it was cool.

I knew Senior year was going to be fun and a blast and all, but this just exceeded my expectations. And it's not over yet. I'm so glad that I'm getting to have the fun I had wanted to have this year, so it's shaping up to be a great last year of high school.

I should get some sleep now. I have to work the band fundraiser tomorrow, and plan on being there at 12. I will hopefully get more chances to write as the year continues and my time frees up more and more. Again, have a safe and fun weekend!

~Wolfie
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Overall News Update

2009-11-06T17:25:00.000-06:00

Since it's been a while since I last posted an entry, and I have some free time on my hands, I figured I ought to write a much-needed update. A ton has happened since the beginning of Homecoming week, so hang on for a long ride!

My first order of business I suppose should be my plans for the blog after this year. I have decided for sure that I will leave this site as it is, and I plan on writing a conclusionary entry that will end with a link to the new blog, which I already plan to name Operation College. As for my contact email, I will try to use my university email rather than a GMail address, like I have been using. However, depending on where I get accepted and where I end up going, that might not be the case. As of yet it's a wait-and-see kind of game here. After college, I plan on (hopefully) creating yet a third blog, currently unnamed (would gladly take suggestions). That's the game plan right now. It might tweak depending on what my free time shapes up to be when things get started.

I'm not going to go into much detail on homecoming, as it was pretty much the same as last year only I knew everyone in my group and we had an after party at Main Event and it was all a blast. I'll just leave it at that.

Now that my last high school marching season has come to a close, I'm looking back at something I'm so proud to have been a part of for four years. This year especially has made me so proud, both out of being section leader and just getting to do such a cool show this year that was full of visual effects. Sure the first divisions were nice, and placing 9th in our last contest was okay, but that's not going to be what I remember later. What I'm going to remember is all the effort and time put in along the way that made the end product as awesome as it was. I made candy boxes for the clarinet section in honor of the end of a very successful season, and as a small thanks for being the section they have been this season. The note I wrote to them all just wasn't enough to explain how proud and honored I feel to be able to lead such a strong section. I know already I'm going to do something special for them when band banquet time rolls around.

I think that was all that I wanted to hit on for now, as there hasn't been much else that I considered note-worthy. Have a nice weekend everyone!

~Wolfie
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Final Week

2009-09-23T19:12:00.002-05:00

Well, it's the final week before Homecoming week, and the excitement just keeps getting better. I can see the garter didn't get posted for the previous entry, but I recently got the bears back and have added them to the mum and garter, so I hope to have new pictures up very soon. The bears came out extremely adorable (and accurate) and now the mum and garter are complete. I even found a way to get a clarinet and trombone for them to hold. The mum is as big as I am so I'm going to look hilarious walking around with that huge thing around my neck!

Our group recently had our group meeting, and it's looking like it's going to be an awesome night! We have dinner at Maggiano's, dance at the school, and then an after party at Main Event. We even have a limo pretty much secured for the night (or at least for dinner and the dance).

I can't get over how cute the bears came out! Especially when I got their respective instruments in their hands... er... paws. They're the right color and everything. Since the senior mums are all silver and white and the band uniform is black and blue, it makes the bears really stick out. I'm very pleased with the effect.

I've enjoyed being able to drive myself everywhere, rather than relying on others for rides. It really opens up a ton of freedom. For example, just today I drove myself to school, then back home after school at 2:30, then drove myself to the tailor to get my homecoming dress altered, and then back home after that. Other days I have driven myself to McDonalds when I forgot my lunch, to my boyfriend's house and back home, and to the movies. I've loved every second of it. Even when I've done idiotic things (never on purpose of course), it's been fun, and, so far, accident free. I'm hoping it stays that way. My plastic license also recently came in, so I'm really happy about that. No more dealing with a paper license.

I can't say I've had much time to be playing World of Warcraft since school settled in, but it's not like that's the most important thing in the world. I might play it some tonight since I have no homework. Or perhaps I should work on some of my homework that's due on Friday.

More Homecoming Fun

2009-09-13T14:01:00.002-05:00

So yesterday was an action-packed day. There wasn't an hour where I wasn't doing something. Here is what my day looked like.

In the morning, it was the band parade. It rained hard on us but we kept at it. After our first major stop all of us woodwinds put our instruments in the cars that were following us to keep them from being completely ruined by the rain. But our march continued on. It was a blast to march in the rain, making huge splashes and basically acting a bit like we were kids again. It was all very fun. Though all our clarinets had chanced color by the time we all arrived in Walmart, they still played fine. I just hope my pads don't get trashed. It might be too late for them, but I suppose I'll be making that decision tomorrow when I play in band class or practice before going to school.

After we finished at the local Walmart, I took my car (which I had dropped off there before heading to the school campus for the start of the parade) and drove myself to the local craft store to get last-minute supplies for my homecoming mum and my boyfriend's garter. I had made a last-minute decision to do a triple for me rather than a double because it was so cheap to do one by making it. For thirty bucks less than I paid for my single mum and my boyfriend's garter last year I made a triple mum and my boyfriend's garter (with materials to spare might I add)! And they came out looking awesome! I'm going to try to attach pictures (I'm writing from my BlackBerry again) of both. The first picture should be his garter (which looks bigger in the picture than it really is), and the second picture should be my mum. The garter I bought a base for, so most of it was already made. The mum however was made completely from scratch. I'm very proud of myself for having done that. And they're not even done yet! I'm still waiting on the bears. One of my friends agreed to fit the bears in the band uniform, hat and all. I can't wait to see how they turn out. Once those are done I'll get to put them on the mum and garter. I'm really excited about them!

So that took me until around 7:10 to finish (I started them around noon or so). As soon as I had finished them I went to see the movie 9 with some of my lunch friends. It was an awesome movie! But the best part was I got to drive myself and didn't have to rely on someone else for a ride! It was awesome! I'm really glad to finally have a car and a license to drive by myself. The freedom to do what I want whenever is amazing.

Well, I have homework that needs doing, so I ought to go do that. I will try to keep writing as much as possible. I had forgotten about sending entries from my phone, so now that I remember I should be able to get more entries more often.

~Wolfie

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When Life Gives You Lemons...

2009-09-11T20:14:00.000-05:00

Make Lemonade! Well, our game got delayed due to rain. Unfortunately the band won't be able to go the game, so I'm sitting at home with a free Friday night! That doesn't happen very often in the fall semester now does it! There's no doubt that I'm disappointed, but this also means that I won't have to worry about getting sleep before the band parade tomorrow, unless that gets rained out also. I really hope that doesn't happen.

I haven't gotten a chance to write in so long. I've been spending most of my free time playing World of Warcraft (I'm a geek and I'm proud of it!) so it's left me with hardly any time to write. That game is really addicting.

Being section leader has been an amazing experience for me. I'm beginning to learn just what it's like to lead a group of people and hold extra responsibilities. It's been rewarding so far, because I feel like I'm finally getting the chance to give back to the band as much as it has given to me.

It's that time of year when the Homecoming drama is starting to hit the student body again. This year I'm far more caught up in it than I was last year. Last year was spent just thinking about how much fun it would be, and I didn't really worry about getting with a group to go. But this year has been different. I'm caught up in all of the drama of trying to decide what I'm going to do for a group. Right now I think I have my group set, and I think what I want to try to get us all into is rather than do a dinner, we'd all go to Six Flags for the day, and then everyone would go home and get ready for the dance, and we'd all meet at someone's house, and then leave for the dance. We wouldn't stay for the whole thing, but instead we'd all go to Main Event and go bowling and do laser tag (in street clothes of course) into the night until maybe 11 or something. It's going to be a fun day and a fun night. I really can't wait.

So my lemonade that I'm making from the lemons that life has thrown at me is spending time planning out homecoming details, and just getting to relax for a night. This is a much needed break from my action-packed day.

One more thing I need to write about: DRIVING! After years of trying to get a license and a car, I finally have both and am now at last driving myself to school. It has been amazing the amount of freedom I have now. I'm quickly becoming more and more responsible (as if I wasn't already) and it makes me really feel like, as a friend put it, "a big senior" to be able to drive. Everything that I had wanted for this year, or at least for the fall semester, has come to me, save driving my younger brother to the junior high school for his morning marching rehearsals. I hope to do that next tuesday to help them out, addressing timing in the feet and upper body placement, the little things that they work on at that level. I'm really excited for him. He's really loving high school, I can just tell. It's been a reliving of my first year in high school, and it's really cool to get to experience something like that.

As homecoming grows closer I will try my best to write as often as possible. Next weekend I will address what will happen to the blog when college starts (because I can't keep writing entries under the name "Operation High School" if I'm not in high school anymore now can I). But, that is for another time. For now, I must go and play, maybe start on my homework.

~Wolfie
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Morning Boredom Blues

2009-07-14T12:40:00.000-05:00

Well, since the servers to the game I just got yesterday (more on the game later) are down and I can't play until 1PM, I've decided to update the blog with an entry about the family reunion. Boy did some funny stuff happen, and cool stuff!

There are two events in particular I want to discuss in today's entry, then I need to move on to a different topic that caused the lull for me to be able to even write this entry.

So one day of the reunion my dad and one of my uncles took my three cousins, my brother, and me out for waverunner rides. That was fun. We had one person (my uncle) get flung off his waverunner by a huge wake. That's about all that happened with that activity.

I believe it was the next day that we had a boat rental. The boat came with water skis and a tubing float. All the kids got to ride the tubing float for the first two hours of our four-hour rental, while the adults got to use the skis for the second half. Tubing is extremely fun! It was perhaps the most fun thing I've done in a long time. First, it was me and my second-oldest cousin on the tube. Every five minutes we'd yell at eachother, "Keep legs locked together!" to keep from falling off. My brother and my youngest cousin were next. They didn't quite go as fast as I did. Then it was me and my oldest cousin up at the plate. Each of us had one fall and one near-fall. Both times I ended up dragging in the water for a while before either letting go or pulling myself back up. That is something I want to do in the lakes here around home in the future possibly.

Recently I went and got myself the game World of Warcraft. It's a live online role-playing game (or rpg for short) with over 11 million players playing. I nearly stayed up all night last night playing it. This morning the servers were all down for maintenance, so I was left with a lull to write this entry. But the server I play on was recently brought back online so I'm going to go play now.

Wolfie out!
~Wolfie

Monthly Questions and Shoutout Picks

2009-07-05T14:04:00.004-05:00

Well, this ends the first month of Operation High School's first month of being on Facebook, and the results from the Monthly Poll, Interview Question, and Shoutout Picks are in! Here are the results.

Monthly Poll:
Well, we only had one vote, but that's to be expected since this is only the first month. Here was the question and answers:

Q: What is your favorite thing about the summer?

a) No school work
b) Going places on vacation
c) Seeing friends
d) Swimming in the pool
e) Other

And you answered (drum roll please...)

A!!!

Okay, this month guys, we need to answer the poll more actively! Let your opinion be heard! Exercise that right of free speech! You know what I mean.

Monthly Interview Question
Uh oh! No one answered this one! Lets aim for at least five answers for the month of July! It will be a new question for a new month!

Shoutout Picks
Again, we only had one shoutout this month. Here's what was said:

"HOLD ON TO OUR TONGUES CHARLIE!! BLOOP!!!
My sister has cancer...
...
ZOMBIE CANCER!!!"

Stay tuned and keep watching the sidebar for July's questions, and keep posting those shoutouts!

In other news, a new summer brings new writing opportunities. If you enjoy reading my romance stories from last summer, keep your eye on my FictionPress.com page for a new story about this year's Fourth of July! This story is the first in all of my writings to be dedicated to someone. Who is it? You'll just have to find out!

That's all for now, Wolfie out!
~Wolfie

North Dakota: Home Sweet Home

2009-06-26T02:18:00.000-05:00

Well, this is the end of my third day in the state. (Okay, technically it ended about two hours ago and it's technically the 26th now, but I haven't hit the hay yet so I still consider it the end of the day.) And by far, this has been the most fun. I'm sure it will be topped the day I get my license and stuff, but that hasn't happened yet now has it?

So here's how my day went. My totally awesome, amazing day.

I woke up this morning to the voice of my step-dad and the internet technician who was here to fix the internet (the modem happens to be in the room I sleep in so there). I just lay in bed, still "sleeping" until my step-brother comes and "wakes me up". He asks me if I want to join him and my step-dad on an ATV caravan. "We might go to our neighbors' houses!" I knew what that would mean: visiting all three of my favorite people in the state! So I jumped out of bed, "SURE!!! Lemme get out of my PJ's so we can go!" I was so excited.

I love the people here. I really do. One minute a person is a total stranger and the next you're inviting him over for a drink or something! And just about everyone is like that! I just love it!

But anyways, so I got dressed and got out to my dark-green ATV and ride around the yard some, having fun with my step-brother, who was on his brand new ATV sized perfectly for him (we were one short). Then we ended up changing plans. We had to drive to town to get some gas tanks filled up, and I begged my step-dad to let me drive. This town is a small town, so there was maybe only three cars we saw the whole way there.

So I drove the blue pick-up into town, got some gas, some car fresheners, and drinks. I drove us back, and soon turned back around (this time in my own SUV which I like far better than that pick-up because I can actually see over the wheel) and drove to the neighbor's house on the gravel road that connects the two, with my brother in the yellow pick-up driving behind me. I had my step-brother with me in the passenger seat.

When we got there, no one was there. Not even the dog! I had half-expected him to come running to the two-car caravan and follow us the rest of the way to the house. But he wasn't there to hear or see us coming. So we hung out there for a few minutes. What we didn't know was that the neighbor's son, a year younger than me and friend of mine since our last trip up there, had arrived back at our house in his own car. Meanwhile, back at the neighbor's, we all hop in the cars and begin the drive back.

About a half mile or so out from our house, a car popped into view in the distance. I veer to the right side of the road, not knowing who it was. I figured it was my step-dad coming to get us or something. When we met on the road, I saw the neighbor's son in the passenger seat. My step-dad said he (the neighbor's son) was wondering if we wanted to go to the local pool in the next town over. Me and my step-brother yelled in excitement "YEAH!!!" My step-dad then said, "Where's your brother?" I looked back in my mirrors. No one to be seen. "I thought he was back there, I guess not, maybe he took the long route or something?"

So I drove on to our house. When we got there, my step-brother and I ran for our swimsuits and changed. I put some clothes on over mine, since it was a two-piece. I put my shoes back on in case I got to drive. I ran back out with my step-brother. They weren't here yet. We didn't see my step-dad's car or my brother's pick-up. "Maybe they got stuck," my step-brother said. So we hopped in my car and began the drive back to the neighbor's house.

About half-way there we see my step-dad's car. Just before we were stopped I saw my brother in the back seat. "What happened?" My brother then said, "Next time check your mirrors! My car died!" "The engine died," my step-dad said. "Okay, well we'll follow you guys home," I said as they left. I turned around and went back to our house.

Unfortunately I didn't get to drive to the pool, my North Dakota friend did. When we were all ready we drove off. The pool was fun. We did jumps, splashing, and even some playground fun (there was a playground beside the pool facilities). After a humiliating near-fall off from the merry-go-round and other fun activities, we all drove home.

From there most of the action was just me, my step-brother, and my ND friend. Mostly my step-brother was being silly and we were doing mild horseplay and wrestling and such (this is when I wrote the entry earlier today and when my step-brother started trying to type gibberish on my blog entry). After about five hours of that mom and my step-dad got home. It was all good fun. Soon my ND friend was being asked to go pick-up pizza from the local bar and we were all snuggling up to watch a movie. About thirty minutes into the movie the neighbor walks in from a day of motorcycling. So we all huddle up in the family room and watch the movie until 1:30 in the morning, when the movie ended. The neighbors went home and I got back into my PJ's, and got in the bed and started typing this entry.

If you ask me this day couldn't have gone better. A good third of my day spent driving, and the other two thirds spent goofing off with family and friends. A day well-spent!

Well, since it's now a quarter past two, I should get some sleep. Tomorrow is another day, and another chance to have fun with the people I love in the place I love. Maybe tomorrow we'll finally call the driver's ed lady and get me set up with a day this week and I can FINALLY get my license! That would make tomorrow the second-best day ever! (Because the day I get my license will be the best! *wink*)

Best Regards,
~Wolfie

Returning to North Dakota

2009-06-25T19:42:00.000-05:00

Guess where I am right now everyone! NORTH DAKOTA! Yup, I've come back to my favorite state in the universe for 10 days of the summer. I kind of miss the snow up here, but if you ask me it's just as beautiful without the snow. There's green grass everywhere! It reminds me of the Yellowstone country I loved so much last summer. I miss that place, but not nearly as much as I had been missing this place.

Since I've been so far behind on my driving, I've been practicing here, since there's nothing for miles to hit! I plan on getting my license here in North Dakota, since the course is only a day long, and I bet the test is easy compared to back home. And since I've passed the one back home, I should be able to pass this one easy after I've finished the course.

There's even more to do here when there isn't snow covering the roads. Things like riding ATV's and drive cars to your neighbor's house that's miles away!

Well, looks like I have to do some more wrestling with my step-brother and my North Dakota friend! Step-brother is getting restless! I'll write some more later, when I'm not busy entertaining company or the step-brother! GOTTA GO! HE'S TRYING TO TYPE!!!

Mission Possible Days 1 and 2

2009-06-17T08:48:00.001-05:00

Well, sorry I haven't updated on a day-to-day basis for this. I've been caught up in other things. But this has been a fun week so far. Here's how the story goes.

The first day my group went to a resale shop. There we polished some silver and brass, sorted clothes, and priced purses. It was pretty fun. I also had to organize shoes.

Day two consisted of playing bingo with the elderly at a local senior center. We also served their lunch and then helped clean up afterwards. We got to decorate tack boards. I wish I could see their joyous looks when they see it at breakfast tomorrow. It's far more colorful and welcoming than it was before.

But, I won't be able to today. Our group will be at a different senior center, playing more bingo and serving more lunch, and probably cleaning up afterwards as well. I'm already at the church awaiting the start of the day and our morning prayer.

Well, it looks like we might be starting soon, so I better send this off. I love this BlackBerry. I'll relate my stories at the end of the day. I have plenty more from yesterday that isn't Mission Possible-related!

~Wolfie
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

Operation High School Now on Facebook!

2009-06-10T15:02:00.000-05:00

I am proud to announce that Operation High School is now on FACEBOOK! I have finished setting up the page. Several features that I used to host here on the blog are now hosted on the page, as well as some new features never before seen here on Operation High School. The following paragraphs will describe some of these exciting new features that can be found on the new Facebook page!

First off, the monthly polls are BACK! I have a new poll question for the month of June and it's a special question to kick off Summer '09! Running tallies are available here on the blog and on the Facebook page under Discussions. To answer the question, just head on over to the page (see the badge in the sidebar) and go to Discussions. There, the poll will be a topic. More directions are there. If you do not have a Facebook, you can answer here. Just go to the page and see what the question and answer choices are and come back to the blog and post the question and your answer as a comment to any post. I already have one response to the quiz question. Keep the answers coming!

Another returning feature is the ShoutBox!. Here you can just post any random comment. It can be about a recent post or about the blog in general or it can be about how you just saw your neighbor's dog slobber all over your little sister. Anything at all, you can post it in the ShoutBox! for everyone to see. The funniest and most interesting posts will be posted here in a monthly entry! So get posting! If you don't have a Facebook, post a comment here to any post and be sure to write "ShoutBox! post" before your shout out.

A new feature I'm adding to encourage reader interaction is a monthly interview question. This is similar to the poll, but instead of having answer choices it's an open-ended question. You provide your own answer! Head on over to the Facebook page to see the question and post your response! If you don't have a Facebook, you can post your response here. Just post a comment on any post here and be sure to mention the month and the question you're answering!

You can also post general comments about the blog on the new Facebook page. I've also set up the page to import posts here as notes onto the page, so all the entries are available in both places! I'll try to keep the sidebar updated with the month's poll question and interview question. Running results for the poll will be available in the sidebar. Be looking out for more features on the way!

Next week I'll be starting back in Mission Possible. Some readers who have kept up with the blog for a year will remember I did this camp last year. It's a camp where you perform charity acts for a week. Since it's centered around being of Catholic faith, it starts on Sunday with a mass for the whole group. It concludes at Hawaiian Falls on Thursday to celebrate our hard work for those in need. One main organization that worked with us last year was Catholic Relief Services (CRS). I'm hoping they're with us again this year, as they had some very fun activities for us. I'm really looking forward to it this year now that I know what to expect. Good thing I remembered to pack my swimsuit!

~Wolfie

Summer '09

2009-06-05T12:50:00.000-05:00

Wow! What a year this has been! I am officially out of school! Several updates I wish to make before band mini camp later today.

First of all, I am working on the possibility of setting up an Operation High School Facebook page. If I can get everything set up, I will post a link to the page here on the blog under the links section. I am working on fixing up discussion boards and polls that will occur on Facebook pertaining to the blog. Keep your eyes out on updates on this project.

With senior year comes my new position of clarinet section leader. As I wasn't section leader at the junior high school, this is an entirely new experience for me, and one I hope to make the most of. I feel privileged and honored to have received this position. I also feel like this is my chance to give back to the band everything it has given me over the years. I have several projects in mind I want to do, especially to help the incoming juniors from each feeder school relate with each other and with my fellow seniors in the section. I am really excited to be able to be the one who helps everyone along. To be honest I feel just a tad bit intimidated by the responsibilities, but I am confident I will be able to handle them. This summer is going to be the beginning of the job, and you can bet there will be entries about my learning experience. Today is my first day on the job, so I'm really excited to get started on making the clarinet section a spirited section that no one will be able to ignore.

And hopefully by the time August band camp starts I'll be able to drive. Mom has gotten me a Toyota Highlander, so now all that's missing is the license. That we plan on working on over the summer, so keep your eyes out for updates regarding that as well.

This is also the summer for college visits, and you can bet there will be several tales of those adventures.

There will be a lot to cover this summer, so expect (hopefully) several frequent updates throughout Summer '09!

~Wolfie

My Crazy Exemption Story

2009-06-04T15:16:00.000-05:00

Like I promised on Twitter, for those of you who follow me on Twitter, here is my story of a nearly-lost-AP-Computer-Science-exam-exemption mess!

Okay, so this morning I'm just walking casually to my Computer Science classroom to check in with my teacher since I was exempt from that exam. When I got there I find out that my absence due to going to the State contest was marked as unexcused! That meant my exemption was suddenly POOF! GONE! So I'm beginning to freak out. I hadn't studied for that exam because I had thought I was exempt. My teacher told me to have my band director just email her and the sub-school office and I would be fine.

So I return to the band hall to tell my director who to email and such. I'm still going bazerk in my head. I call Mom and ask her to bring up a note to give to sub-school. She says she'll email my Comp. Sci. teacher and my sub-school office for me and try to get things sorted out. I also go to sub-school myself to help get things sorted out. I had to go to a different sub-school as mine was busy with textbook issues. So I get a sheet that tells my director who to email giving permission to change my unexcused absence to a school-related absence.

I return to the band hall (the bell has already rung by now) and I'm nearly running to get back before the exam starts. I take my band exam (on which I think I did okay, definitely didn't get a 100 though) and then wait nervously for the period to end. When the bell rings I go to sub-school. I stop by the office I had checked with and asked if she had gotten an email yet.

No email.

Now I'm panicking over the exam. I check with my own sub-school for an email. She checks my absence record. "I've changed it, you're good." I thank her immensely and then run down excitedly to my Comp. Sci. classroom to double-check. She has the records changed as well. "You're clear!" I sigh with relief, running out of the classroom with my fists up in the air in a victory cheer. I make a mad dash back to the band hall to meet up with Symphonic band. I had nothing else to do as my ride home is in Symphonic band. Besides, I have so many friends in that band. So as I wait for Symphonic to finish their exam, I listen to my new purple iPod listening to my friend's new album. Then I watch other friends play Wii and join in on the fun that was missed during my own band period due to my stress.

And to top everything off, me and my boyfriend (yes, for those of you who don't know yet we're back together because we've both been a part of the problems and we deserve a second chance) went to Baskin Robbins to get ice cream (we did that at the end of the year last year so we decided to continue it). I tried this awesome flavor called Love Potion. It was raspberry and white chocolate ice cream with raspberry ribbon and dark chocolate hearts! SO delicious! Definitely recommended to any ice cream lover or anyone in the mood for some ice cream!

Other than the mess, my day has been awesome. I really love this album my friend made. He's an upcoming artist. He might be on iTunes soon, so keep your eyes out! We have so many awesome musicians in our school, not just the school groups, but individuals and bands.

Like always, keep checking up on the blog, including previous dates and months for other entries I'll be adding from the FLY Pen soon here. For those of you who are students or parents of students, I wish you all happy trails on your travels this summer, and the best of luck to all seniors going into college. I hope your new experiences are special and never forgotten. Enjoy your last years of education, and the best of luck later in life. And to everyone, have an awesome summer, and thank you for reading!

Best wishes,
~Wolfie <3

Austin Here We Come!

2009-06-01T12:21:00.001-05:00

Well, I'm finally on my way to Austin tor the Texas Solo & Ensemble Contest (TSSEC). I'm missing school for this so I'm really happy about that. If it weren't for the snow day I'd be missing exams today. I'm one of only two people from my school that's going to this competition.

We stopped in San Antonio last night to see family and to get in my one rehearsal with my accompanist. He lives in San Antonio. I'm really excited for this. I really can't wait to see how my new Legere Signature Series synthetic reeds play and fare against the strict standards I'll be held to by the college professors that will be my judges for the day. Here we'll truly see how great these reeds are. :-)

I should probably sign off for right now. My battery needs to last me a good long while. My performance time will be at 3:30 PM. Wish me luck! ;-)

<3 Wolfie
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

Operation High School now on Twitter!

2009-05-20T16:13:00.003-05:00

Okay, so I've noticed that many of my favorite news shows and channels have a Twitter account for their viewers to post on and such, as do many other public shows, magazines, newspapers, etc. As such, I have decided to open up my own Twitter profile. In the sidebar you can see the latest five updates, and in the links you can go directly to the Operation High School Twitter page. Since I hardly get enough time these days to write and upload full-blown blog entries, Twitter will help keep everyone posted on what I'm up to. And since I can update my Twitter status directly from my BlackBerry through the application TwitterBerry, updates will be quite often.

For everyone's convenience I've linked the Twitter page back here to the blog. Anyone who is on Twitter already is encouraged to follow me on Twitter! Tell your friends and family, too.

With summer vacation coming up soon, blog updates should become more frequent. This summer is going to be a busy one, though, so we'll have to see.

Oh the Memories!

2009-04-24T15:24:00.001-05:00

Wow I'm getting flashbacks from just discussing all the rides. Right now we're in the (fast-moving) line for the Haunted Mansion. Don't know when I'll loose my connection so I'll have to end this entry here. Boo! I'm a ghost! Not really, but you get the picture. ;)

First Moments

2009-04-24T13:18:00.001-05:00

We're now in Orlando! That's the good news. The bad news... Space Mountain is closed! That was the first ride our group rushed to only to find a sign that said it was closed until Winter 2009! So, instead, we're doing the Jungle Adventure instead. I vaguely remember these rides from my childhood from just talking about them, but I'm sure I'll end up remembering it all more once I get on the ride. We'll be getting on the boat soon, so I'm going to end this entry here. I'll get another chance to do some more blogging during the wait for Splash Mountain! Wish me a safe trip! ;)

Trip Excitement

2009-04-22T08:47:00.001-05:00

Our school's drill team just got back from their trip to Disney World. They said they had a blast! I'm getting so excited for the trip now! In two of my classes this is my last day this week! Tomorrow night is going to be epic. I won't be the only one in the band staying up all night, so I'll have some people to talk to and plenty to do. The bell is fixing to ring, so I'm going to stop here and send this post off. Wolfie signing off!

Band Trip Upcoming

2009-04-21T08:53:00.001-05:00

I haven't written up here in a LONG time, so I figured I'd do so tonight from my phone so that I'll be able to later once I'm in Orlando. First off, I got another new phone. The Sidekick I decided wasn't the phone for me. So, now I have a BlackBerry, and I love it! But enough of that. Quick news flash, I'm proudly single again. I'm not one who likes to just broadcast reasons for such actions as breaking up, so I will leave my reasons undisclosed. I learned an important lesson while in North Dakota, and I want to thank my new friends there for helping me reach the decision that I did. That is all I will say about that particular subject. Tonight I did a bit of my packing for the trip. We leave Friday morning, but we have to be at the airport at 4:00 AM. Early, but it will be SO worth it! I'm so excited for this trip! But the night before will be sleepless, in part due to the fact that I won't be getting home that day until around 7PM or so due to UIL Competition that same day. I plan on spending that night doing all of my make-up work and then with any leftover time text other friends who will be pulling all-nighters as well, in addition to jamming to my iTunes and dancing around my room and just finding any way to kill the time. Then the last 15 or so minutes before I have to "wake up" I'll take a quick cat nap to build up some energy. It'll be a fun night and one I surely won't forget anytime soon. I'm so excited for this trip to Orlando though! We get to go to Disney World, the Kennedy Space Center, Cocoa Beach, and EBCOT. It's going to be a blast! I'm so excited! Anyways, just wanted to get an update posted so that I'll be able to update the blog while in Orlando, since I won't be able to bring my laptop.

Updates Done, Finally!

2009-03-17T18:16:00.002-05:00

Whew! I finally got all the FLY Pen entries up! Those had been hanging over my head for a while now, and now that's all out of the way.

I'm having fun up here in North Dakota, but I already told you that.

I got a new cell phone for my birthday. It's a Sidekick. I love it except for two things:
1) You can't load custom ringtones onto it without some special piece of code or something on it. You have to download ringtones for $2.49 each from T-Mobile >:-(
2) The phone needs to be able to get to the GPRS and use the Data Services in order to do anything on the phone. So out here in the-middle-of-no-where North Dakota, I can't do anything calling-wise except "emergency calls". Kinda silly, but oh well.
Other than that, this phone is really awesome. Some plus-sides to it:
1) You can design custom skins, or "shells" as they're called, for the phone. You design the shell with a simple Flash application on the T-Mobile website, order the design, and they print the design directly onto the shell and send it to you for 15 bucks! Pretty awesome, is it not?
2) Very easy to figure out how to navigate through the menus I have to say. I was an expert at the phone within the first few minutes of getting the phone.

So yeah, having my lazy day today. I've done nothing but eat, sleep, and work on the blog.

Another funny video from YouTube before I go now. It's Broccoli Kitten!
MEW! MY BROCCOLI!!

Up in North Dakota

2009-03-17T15:27:00.001-05:00

Well, we're a couple days into Spring Break and we're spending it up here in North Dakota. I've never seen so much snow in my life! We've gone sledding and shot rifles (since there are no neighbors within a two-mile radius of the house so no one cares if we shoot off as many guns as we want).

I still have some entries to update from last year, so I'm going to try to work on those before the break is over. I'm getting a little bored right now anyways, so I'll try to work on that today some.

My birthday is tomorrow, so I'm really excited to have my birthday in the snow and the cold as opposed to back home where it's 100 degrees in the summer.

Hey, while I'm writing a new entry, here are a few videos on YouTube I recently hit up. They're pretty funny.

Happy St. Patty's Day everyone!
~Wolfie

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-25T08:48:00.000-06:00

Hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday. I just have a quick update for today. I'll have others from earlier in the year up soon, which will be posted under their respective days. Be sure to check previous dates for new posts. I hope to have them up before the new year.

As far as Christmas goes, I've had a rather quiet one. I've gotten so far vinyl skins for my phone and computer, a custom poster with some of my dragon artwork, and a digital camera and SD card to go with it. Now I'll be able to take more decent photos to be posted here, and I won't have to borrow either of my parents' cameras to do so! It's a small pocket-sized camera, so I'll be able to have it handy anytime. It takes amazing photos, too. But then again, no wonder since it can take pictures at a whopping eight megapixels! And the videos it can take are far better than those my phone can take, or any other camera I've used for that matter.

For now, that's all. Again, be on the lookout for more posts from October, November, and December. I'll try to have them up before the new year begins. Have a Happy Holiday, and for those that travelled this season, have a safe trip back home.

~Wolfie

Band Exam Fun

2008-12-18T10:00:00.000-06:00

9:30 AM
That was my easiest exam yet! That was the band exam, by the way. All of my studying took place this morning.

The band hall is all decorated and festive for the holidays. We've got a couple of white trees with multi-colored lights (not to net mention ornaments and wrapped boxes underneath them), garland on and around the board, and a menorah (I think I spelled that right).

There is no way I'll write all the way to the bell, so I'll probably break it up throughout the period.

10:00AM
Going to listen to music on this pen, then do Guitar Hero. I'm leaving FLY Notes on so you can see what's going on.

Okay, it isn't working. Never mind.

Exams Day 2

2008-12-17T12:50:00.001-06:00

10:38 AM
Wow! That English exam took forever! My focus must be dead this morning.

I only have ten minutes to write before the 20 minute break. After that it's off to take that Donors Algebra If exam. I actually had to do a b: t of studying for that exam To make sure I could Still do everything. I wouldn't want a repeat of last year's IS+ semester Geometry exam where the Were five or so questions I had to skip Because I couldn't remember how to do them

I have a Guitar Hero song stick in my head, but I don't know which one. Its House of Rock and Roll, or something to that effect, I think.

I played a ton of Spore yesterday on my economic creature file. That game is so addictive. I once stayed up until 3am playing that game; I did that to get the Galactic God achievement.

Bell!

12:30 PM
First one done, woo hoo! My math teacher seemed a bit concerned when I came up to her with my test. She had told the class that the exam was hard. Ha! That test was easy as pi! (Sorry, couldn't help myself ^_^'). I actually finished with at 12:20, but took 10 minutes to go over my answers because no one else was done. One thing is for sure: it was in no way a repeat of last year. I was able to answer everything.

Four down, three to go. Tomorrow I'll have band first thing followed by AP Computer Science. Those with both be a cinch. I'll have to just look over the band material tonight and Is good to go for tomorrow.

~Lizerology will be updating her page over the next few weeks, starting Friday or Saturday I believe. If you haven't gone to see her work, you can do so using the link in the side bar. She is an amazing artist, so I feel really lucky to know her.

I made a very interesting (and somewhat strange) discovery. It happened when I was eating McDonald's chicken nuggets with BBQ sauce. When I opened another packet of sauce, some splattered. Some of it got on a copper necklace I was wearing at the time. The necklace had been tarnished badly. I didn't realize that the sauce had splattered, though, until a minute or so after the fact. When I looked down at the necklace I saw that the tarnish had disappeared in a blob and that something was splattered on the necklace. I washed the substance off and was astounded at how shiny the blob where the substance had been was. In attempt to figure out what it was, I spread a layer of the BBQ sauce onto the whole pendant (the part of the necklace that was copper). The tarnish disappeared before my eyes in a matter of seconds! I essentially discovered a tarnish remover on accident. I don't know if it works on silver or other metals, but if you have tarnished copper, slather it in a thin layer of BBQ Sauce and it'll be gone in seconds! Amazing, right?

Five minutes left in this exam period - and the end of the school day. Friday is going to be an awesome day. Since I have 7th period off, my school day ends at 10:50 AM. Better yet, one of my favorite Dogfight episodes will be on at 12 PM that day, so I'll get to catch it!

It's looking like we'll have people working all the way to the bell. I know What I'm doing when I get home: Spore! Like I said before, that game is addicting.

Bell, bye!

Exams Day 1

2008-12-16T12:55:00.001-06:00

10:10 AM
Just finished my US History exam, and have a good 40 minutes to do whatever while I wait for the bell for the next exam.

This morning was a crazy one. My mom took my brother to school and got stuck in slow moving traffic due to ice on the roads, and TONS of it. When she came back to pick me up and we returned to the same roads I got to see how bad the ice was. Mom's car slipped when we turned into the parking lot! It covered nearly every inch of the parking lot! It might all still be there. I hope it's gone by the end of my last exam today so I don 't have to worry about slipping on The wat to my boyfriend's car!

Our concert last week went well. I had a blast playing Sleigh Ride. But my favorite pieces we played were The Night Before Christmas and the Percy Granger piece we played (I can't quite remember the name). We also played Christmas Legends.

POST-EDIT: the Grainger piece was entitled Sussex Mummer's Carol or something to that effect.

I'm sitting right next to a window, so I'm cold. I still have my jacket on zipped up all the way to my face. It's my old ski jacket from last year. I plan on using it again if we go this year.

I got some more bridge-breaking footage on Thursday of last week, and some of the numbers were pretty intense. The highest at this school was 600 pounds! That's almost 8 times my own weight!

I've got Foreplay/Long Time by Boston stuck in my head. I was playing it on Rook Band last night, on drums of course. I'm getting really good at them. I can nearly do Wanted Dead or Alive by Bon Jovi on hard mode. I don't think I can do it outside of practice mode yet, but I'm getting close. I can do several songs on medium outside of practice mode. I might like the drums blfo than gu: taro, a lot better.'

Woo, still a ton of time to kill. Everyone is done with the: r exam now, so The room 'is alive with chattering. I might decide to listen to music on this pen, since my i Pod is dead and at home.

We apparently have 20 minutes between our first and second exam periods today. What in the world will I do during that time!?

I can't wait to catch up on sleep over the break. I've lost so many hours of sleep this semester. I overloaded my schedule; I can't handle it. I'm dropping French for Creative Writing.

I'm surprised school wasn't closed due to the ice. Someone must have set their sprinklers to run last night in order for the ice to have been as bad as it was this morning. It's probably cleared up on the street by now, but I'm not so sure about the parking lot. It might melt after all of the rest of the students who don't have a zero hour class start arriving. From this classroom I can still see the street. Cars are still moving relatively slow compared to a day without ice at this same time, which implies that the ice is still bad.

I think the bell is finally fixing to ring; I'll have to wrap Up soon.

My next exam is French. I'm not worried about it at all, especially considering the fact that its an AP class.

Bell! Gotta go!

12:20PM
Just finished my French exam, the last one of the day. Forty minutes to write again.

Still looks pretty icy outside. I'm going to have to be careful when I leave the building.

My exams were easy today. I'll have to do a little bit of review for Algebra just to make sure I can do everything still. I don't want a repeat of Geometry last year where I couldn't answer several questions due to the fact that I couldn't remember how to do them.

I hope we finish quickly so I can turn in my French books because I'm dropping. There are still several tests out, at least 8 that I can see.

Traffic on the street is moving a little faster, but still not as fast as it usually is. The parking lot will definitely still be icy. At least the roads on the other side of the toll way aren't as icy, last I saw.

I'm not even next to a window and my hands are still a bit chilled. The weather has been crazy. Sunday 'it was nice and warm at 77 degrees Fahrenheit. But today and yesterday it's been in the 30's. I'm glad none of my instrument are near any windows or outside wall. All of my instruments have wood in them that is prone to cracking in extreme temperatures like this.

I'll finally be able to upload some stories and art to dA and FictionPress with the coming of the break. I've got another song and a few other things that need to go up in terms of writing, and a couple pieces to finish for dA. Not to mention I get to see the Tans-Siberian Orchestra again this year. I'm already excited and it isn't even Christmas yet!

Traffic is beginning to quicken. Perhaps all the cars on the road have melted most of the ice. The parking lot will still be iced over, though, unfortunately. we'll just hope no one is stupid enough to floor it on the ice.

Still 20 minutes left to go. I'm getting a bit restless to say the least. Unusual weather does that to me sometimes. Only 4 exams still out now. Everyone else in class is doing whatever they can to an use themselves with pencils, erasers, anything they can find. It's looking like I'll have to sty a little bit after class to get my book situation cleared up.

Just got an idea for a simple Flash animation: a melting ice cube. I'll consider it for a project over the break.

Only two more tests out how with 10 minutes to go. Everyone is getting antsy now with the end of the school day looming near. Looks like there was a little form precip during our exams, as many of the parked cars have a thin sheet of ice.

Everyone is done now, I've got to get my books cleared up now. I'll write some more tomorrow.

Preping for Exams

2008-12-15T08:41:00.000-06:00

Well, it's the last day before exams, and we just finished reviewing in US History.

This past weekend I discovered that I can actually do drums on Rock Band. I didn't think it would be as easy as it was. I can't wait united after school today so I can play some more with my boyfriend. Drums are now more fun than guitar. I think Guitar Hero World Tour is on my wish list now!

The bell is ringing now, bye!

Paper Bridges? Stronger than You Might Think!

2008-12-11T09:35:00.000-06:00

I'm writing from French class due to the fact that I'm done with my test and have no homework to work on. I haven't written in so long!

We've been having some crazy weather recently. Monday night I'm doing my work to the sound of thunder and the tornado siren, and then the very next night I'm doing my work to the sound of sleet hitting the windows. It doesn't get much crazier than that, now does it?

Yesterday was the first day of the Paper Bridge Physics Olympics iin my honors physics class. My bridge probably could have had the potential to hold a good deal of weight, but there were two spots I had failed to reinforce and so my bridge only held 15 pounds. Some of the other numbers are astounding - 400+ pounds! All it is is paper, Elmer's glue, and optional toothpicks. Below is a video compilation of my bridge's performance. The video is also available on the blog's YouTube page (see the link in the sidebar).

You can see where the bridge failed in the after shot. Only one rod (called a member) is missing. That are snapped off under the weight.

My first concert here at the senior high school is tonight. I'm really excited. I got all of our songs stuck in my head.

The dismissal bell will be ringing here in a few minutes so I'll try to find time later to discuss the concert more in depth.

Glenn Miller Night

2008-12-01T11:29:00.001-06:00

The Tuesday before Thanksgiving Break I got the chance to go to Glenn Miller Night. I of course went with my boyfriend, and got to swing dance with him and several of my friends from the junior high school. The music was awesome, and the dancing beat home coming any day. The real fun, though, came from trying to keep a secret from my boyfriend. Our six-month dating anniversary was the next day, and I had an evening planned for the two of us: Indiana Jones Movie Night. He wanted to do something during the day, not knowing that I already had something planned. "I have a secret for you,'' I told him. That sent him on a mission to guess what it was, a mission that took him all night. We'd be dancing and he'd randomly say, ''Tell me the secret!'' That made the already amazing night even more enjoyable. When he finally got to open the envelope I had stored the "invitation" in, he smiled, satisfied. For me, that plus dancing at Glenn Miller Night to awesome music played by none other than our school's awesome Jazz Band was enough of a six-month gift for me.

Happy Turkey Day!

2008-11-27T17:35:00.005-06:00

Just want to get another entry so no one thinks I'm gone or anything. School is taking up so much of my time, I hardly have the time to even use the FLY Pen!

This has been no doubt one of the best Thanksgivings I've had in a very long time. I woke up this morning to two text messages from some of my closest friends wishing me a Happy Thanksgiving! Now who doesn't want to wake up to that? Then while I was eating brunch at the country club, I got a call from my boyfriend wishing me a Happy Turkey Day! After a good brunch (and calling my boyfriend back), I got a call from an old friend from middle school! Thanksgiving doesn't get much better than that!

Yesterday was our (my boyfriend and me) six-month dating anniversary, and to celebrate, we watched the other three Indiana Jones movies. Well, only the first two. He had already seen the third movie, so we watched Mythbusters instead. It was a fun night. Now I have to think of something even better for our one-year anniversary. That will be a challenge, but one I'm willing to accept!

Short entry today. I've been busy all day, and I'm sure everyone else has been as well. (My day isn't over yet! I've still got dinner and two football games ahead of me!)

Happy Thanksgiving!
- Wolfie

Homecoming '08

2008-10-12T21:43:00.003-05:00

Wow, what a day last night was! But I first have to start with Friday (after all, what's Homecoming without the game)!

Like most Homecoming games, there was a pep rally that morning. And what an epic pep rally it was! For starters, the way in which the student body was sent to the gym for the pep rally was different from all the others. Instead of the classes going to the gym on their own, the band got to march all through the halls to lead the student body to the gym! I couldn't stop laughing and smiling throughout the whole mess! It was as epic as marching through Walmart for the parade! You could hear the band echoing through the halls, and the whole band went crazy! The whole school was crazy at that! and the whole day just got better from there! The pep rally was the noisiest and best pep rally I've been to! I kept wheeling around to my boyfriend behind me in the trombone row and mouthing, "This is EPIC!!!" He, in return, nodded excitedly.

The rest of the day I spent in my happy place, being complimented continually (especially in my English class) on my mum. Speaking of which, here are the pictures of the mum and garter:

Here's the mum that I wore.

And here's the garter that my boyfriend wore.

And here's us together by the fireplace with our mum and garter on with our game day wear (our show shirts) after school had ended.

I could hardly focus on Friday for class. I didn't dare take my patch that day - I never do on game days for fear of forgetting to take it off before the game.

I think the most clever group t-shirt I saw on Friday was that of a friend of mine from Algebra. Background info: most of the people in her group were lifeguards. The front of the shirt said, "My date is good at..." and then below it was a red cross. On the back it said, "... Mouth to Mouth" and listed the names of the people in her group.

After school my boyfriend and I chilled at my house as usual. We headed back to the school to do the send off for the team. That was sorta fun. Before we loaded buses ourselves, my section leader handed out bags of candy to the clarinet section (which I shared with my boyfriend on the bus). The bus ride there was spent again listening to my iPod.

While the game score didn't end well (we lost 44 to 21, which isn't that bad considering the team we were playing and how badly we were expected to lose), the action in the stands and at halftime were epic! I took a couple pictures at the game.

One of my tenor saxophone friends making "the most obnoxious face he could make"... a bit blurry... my fault.

Me with my clarinet, taken by my tenor sax friend.

The halftime show was great, save the back end of the show, visually and musically. That's understandable, as we spent the week cramming the back end of the show in at the last minute to try to get it out there before UIL. I'm overall very pleased with how Friday went, especially after a great hot dog at Moo Yah's (I finally was able to finish a whole hot dog at the daring of my boyfriend, who always jokes with me about how little I eat).

Now we get into yesterday, Saturday, the day of the dance!

I woke up at 7:30 AM in order to make it to the central senior high school, which is where French Immersion Day was held. I got there to find a few of my band friends, including one of the members of my Homecoming group - a tuba player. Since he hadn't gone to French Immersion Day last year, he followed me the whole day.

The first session we decided to go to was "The Biggest Airplane in the World" (originally "French Technology"). It was an okay session for me, probably because it covered a commercial aircraft, whereas I interest myself with military aircraft. After that, the popular cheese tasting session (which they had last year). That was really good. I snapped a picture of the table with all of the cheeses they had to taste.

The cheese, like last year, was delicious. They had many of the same cheeses they had last year, but since I tried only one cheese last year I was able to enjoy it. Ironically, I had eaten some of the very cheese I tried last year for breakfast that morning! Haha!

Next we did the crepe session. That was also delicious. That was a new session this year. I took pictures of my finished paper plate and of the making of the crepes.

We then proceeded to the dessert session. Unfortunately, though, the session filled up before we could get in. So, since there were no good sessions going on, we skipped the last session and explored the outside of the campus. We found a spot that really echoed, and I took a video of us being stupid and amused with the echoes.

We wandered around trying to find the band's practice field, and successfully found it. I, amused with the thought, took a picture.

We sat down on a nearby bench and amused ourselves with band talk and the like. I experimented with the capabilities of my camera, as seen in the pictures below...

Negative

Solarized

I also saw a bird that appeared to be limping. I videoed it for the heck of it.

Later, on our way back to the cafeteria for the drawings, we saw a bird's nest.

Neither of us won the drawings, but there was leftover cheese, which we rushed to snatch. At the event's conclusion I had one of my junior high friends take a picture of us.

My tuba friend gave me a ride home, and I took a brief nap.

I really should have taken a shower during that time. You'll see why later.

Mom drove me to get my nails done at 3pm, and was home by 5:00 to get ready for the night of my life.

My boyfriend called me to arrange a time for him to pick me up. We settled on 6:45, and I was in a rush to get my shower done, my hair dried and put up, my make-up on, and dress and jewelry on. I was caught by surprise when my boyfriend showed up with his usual knock on the door.

My boyfriend had been looking forward with inexplicable excitement to seeing me in the dress that I had picked out (which he had helped pick out). When he opened the door, his reaction was priceless!

He took several steps back, speechless. After several seconds of holding an amazed look on his face he simply said, "Wow! *pause* Kinda went over on the eyeshadow-Wow!" I laughed, amused and overly flattered!

His look of excitement was short-lived. He soon took on a face of frantic hurry. He was afraid that we would be late, and tried to rush me out the door. Mom, in a furry of who knows what demanded that my boyfriend come in and let me finish getting ready. Mom insisted that I put lip gloss on and then let my boyfriend hurry me out the door as I snatched the "gift" (if you want to call it that, it was hardly two bucks of mom's money) I had cleverly packaged for him. But before we had gone a yard I had him stop so I could run back inside to get my phone and the mum and garter in case they had to be worn at the dance. When I got back in the car he joked, "You took so long that the dance ended an hour ago!" While I'm sure it was meant to make him feel better and probably me as well, it only made me feel worse about not being ready.

He wasn't happy the whole drive to my dad's house to get pictures done there. I called my tuba friend as well for directions to his house. I got through just as we got to the door of dad's house. I quickly wrapped up the conversation, telling him to text me the directions, and hung up to pose. My boyfriend got to meet my dad's dad briefly before we hurried out the door to go to my tuba friend's house for group pictures. My boyfriend still hadn't calmed down. I tried to make him feel better by mentioning the "gift", and managed to distract him from the thought of loosing our reservations at Maggiano's (one of our group members was still out picking up his "date"). Upon my mentioning of the "gift" he said, bewildered, "You got me a gift?" He then proceeded to ramble on about how he didn't deserve anything, to which I argued that he most definitely deserved it.

My tuba friend finally got back and my boyfriend immediately started off with how we really needed to hurry to keep from loosing our reservations. I had to really cool him off enough to let the whole thing go and pose for pictures. (When he gets angry like that he's tough to cool down, but you know what, I still love him.)

Our group was a small group of three couples: me and my boyfriend (the only true couple in the group), a trombone friend of mine and his "date" (my tuba friend's sister - she really, really wanted to go to homecoming and didn't care who she went with), and my tuba friend and his "date" (my tuba friend's sister's friend). All of us were in band, with the exception of the other two girls in the group.

My boyfriend finally calmed down once on the road to Maggiano's due to the poor driving of my trombone friend. He failed to use his turn signal, couldn't stay in the middle of his lane, and several other silly mistakes. In fact, when my trombone friend had finally gotten out of the car, my boyfriend said, "Geeze, can you at least stay in the middle of your lane!" and laughed. We all laughed at his poor parking job. My trombone friend defended with, "Okay, compare my parking job with those people over there!" They had in fact parked far more sloppily than he had, and my boyfriend agreed. Then my tuba friend's sister pointed out, "Hey, why are we walking away from the restaurant?" We all burst out laughing, heading back towards Maggiano's.
Probably out of not thinking or failure to pay attention, my boyfriend opened the door that was on the side of the restaurant, revealing several people seated to eat, who turned and looked our direction. He quickly closed the door and said, "What, just thought I'd scare a couple people!" in his usual joking voice.

We continued to the front of the restaurant, seeing several other groups obviously going to the Homecoming Dance on the way in.

We signed in and waited to be seated. My boyfriend motioned for me to go first, and I thought he was motioning to the door (especially since he started it spinning), and so went into the first slot. Then I felt resistance on the door. I turned back to see my boyfriend holding the door, smiling jokingly. I laughed as he said, "Come on, we're not going outside!" I stuttered, "But you... but I... oh whatever!" I let out a half-forced laugh as he took me in his arms. My tuba friend's sister said, "Okay, maybe we should move out of the way of the door." So we backed into a corner by the door as best we could and continued our conversation.

My boyfriend pulled out my chair for me smiling proudly as I giggled in amusement.

We debated over what to order, and quickly agreed upon our choices. I had pasta, like I had wanted, and two servings of delicious cheesecake. We ate over several widely ranged topics, including band and school. We left the restaurant happy and ready to party!

Again following my trombone friend, we left the parking lot. But again, my trombone friend's poor driving and lack of attention got himself into a mess, dragging me and my boyfriend along for the ride. My trombone friend had accidentally turned onto a one-way street facing the wrong way. My boyfriend realized it as well, and began backing up to give my trombone friend space to turn around, both of us laughing our heads off. My trombone friend began backing up, turning the car some. For no apparent reason he poked his head out the window for a second with his usual silly attitude of doing stuff. This caused me to laugh even harder. Nearly turned completely around, my boyfriend shifted back into drive and finished the turn. Still laughing, he clipped the curb, causing me to let out a squeal of surprise only to continue laughing even harder than ever. We continued to the school, laughing half the way there.

I continued my argument as to why my boyfriend should open the "gift" I got him. He continued to argue that he didn't deserve it. I defaulted to what always seemed to work: my puppy dog face and whimpering voice. I finally got him to give in. "Yay!" I exclaimed, jumping back to my happy and perky voice.

We parked and I handed him the box. He slowly lifted the lid, revealing the note which I had carefully placed in a slit in the foam which covered the gift. I pulled out the note and instructed him to read it. I smiled proudly as he read through the poem I had thrown together earlier that day.

You've said mine is the luckiest one
Bringing good fortune 'til the day is done.
It's because of it that I found you
Without whom I don't know what I'd do.

So in hopes of this night be as lucky as the days before
I present you one of your own to bring luck to what's in store.
(And it even has a face!)

When he finished it he lifted the foam and revealed a blue rabbit's foot. He lifted it, smiling. I showed him the face on the lucky charm (he often jokes about the face on my own pink rabbit's foot that I wear all the time). He promised that he would put it on his keys as soon as possible. I smiled, satisfied. We stood up to head to the cafeteria and let the party begin.

Upon entering we posed for a photography group there taking pictures of the event. We entered the cafeteria.

Earlier at dinner my boyfriend had said that he would step out if and when Sojila Boy came on. He then predicted that that would be the first song to play when we got there. Well guess what! No sooner had we entered the cafeteria did Sojila Boy play! We laughed in amusement, watching everyone else dance. We then began our search for the rest of our group. Once reunited, we found our way to the punch.

My boyfriend snatched a cup and filled it. Predictably, he handed me the full cup. How cute!

We joined the mass of dancing students, starting first at the edge of the blob. My boyfriend was the first to jump right into dancing upon seeing one of his friends. I watched, working myself into a dancing mood ever so slowly. I had before predicted that I would completely fail at dancing, and was uneasy about just letting loose right away. I watched the moves of many, taking in what I could. I was soon doing quick little moves, very subtle ones, and laughing in amusement. Such was the way that I worked myself into the blob.

Then the music stopped for no apparent reason. I took a video of the incident. You can see my boyfriend's face for split second.

When the music started again, we moved further into the mass of students on the dance floor. We formed a circle and I began to loosen up. I was soon dancing my heart out and literally dancing the night away.

The night concluded with my boyfriend carrying me out to the car and dropping me off at home with a sweet goodnight kiss. It was the perfect way to wrap up the best night of my life.

Here are two videos of the dancing. Both of them are kind of dark, and nearly impossible to see. Following the videos are pictures from the evening. The first one is of our group at my tuba friend's house, and the third is me and my boyfriend at our table at Maggiano's.

Unexpected Writing Opportunity (Homecoming Week Begins)

2008-10-06T08:43:00.000-05:00

8:43 AM
Never thought I'd get to write at a time like this! My 00 hour teacher had to go to PSAT training this morning, and so let us out early. I thought, "What am I going to do for 30 minutes!" So, I decided to pop a squat on the stairs and blog.

Now, to begin the topic which I mentioned on Friday!

This actually isn't new news (it's actually news from over four months ago), I'm just releasing it now at the request of the other person involved. I'm sure most of my frequent readers have figured it out by now, especially those of you who read my FictionPress stories. If you haven't guessed by the number of times I refer to "Webmastering Friend", he and I are actually a couple. Yes, "Webmastering Friend" is actually "Webmastering BOYfriend", and have been for almost 4 1/2 months. And if you haven't already figured it out, he and I are going to the Homecoming dance this Saturday - whoa, that's not far off! Gets me excited just thinking about it!

Speaking of which, I hope to have pictures of the mum and garter up soon. And, later, I'll have pictures from both French Immersion Day the morning of the dance and the dance that evening. OMG I'm getting overexcited now. I should stop before I randomly squeal and make everyone think I'm crazy! ;-)

Later!

Ink Restocked (The Band Bus)

2008-10-03T18:05:00.001-05:00

6:05 PM
I finally got more ink for the pen! I'm on the band bus with Webmastering Friend on our way to a football game. And, as usual, the bus is loud, crazy, and littered with our silly teenage humor.

A ton has happened since the previous entry, nearly too much to name at a time like this. Our football game last week was the cluster game, so I got to see my friends from the other feeder school. That game was also at the cricket-infested stadium, which provided me with plenty of amusement (that includes my own cowardliness)!

This bus is so noisy and my ADHD so influential that I can hardly concentrate to write this entry.

News regarding Homecoming... or rather, I'm using Homecoming to springboard to my next topic... Nah, I'll devote an entire entry to it. I'll keep you all waiting eagerly! ;-)

Okay, I can concentrate no longer. perhaps after the game on the way back I will continue. Wolfie signing off... for now! I'll be back with the afore mentioned topic! ;-)

FLY Pen Out of Ink (Random Updates)

2008-09-17T09:43:00.000-05:00

7:43 AM
The FLY Pen ran out of ink, so I'm forced to blog without being able to see what I'm writing.

Well, I got "certain someone" to ask me Homecoming! I'm so excited! Bell, have to pack up the pen.

9:43 AM
Just finished a French fest. I'm writing this originally with a black-ink pen, and will go back over it with the FLY pen later. I don't want the pen to make noises - it will if the battery is low. Hehe, someone or something made a weird noise, sending silent giggles through the class. Everyone is done now, I have to put this journal up and pay attention.

September 11th Happenings

2008-09-11T08:20:00.000-05:00

7:45 AM
Wow! I can't believe it has already been 7 years since the terrorist attacks. I will remember that day for the rest of my life - vividly.
It's hard to believe that Homecoming is only 3 1/2 weeks away! I'm excited to see what the attendance is for the Homecoming game.

8:20 AM
The bell rang on me this morning, but I've gotten another chance to write here in my US History class.

As I was saying, I'm also excited for the dance, even though I don't know if I'm going yet. I'll say this subtly and say I hope a certain someone ;-) * wink wink* asks me to the dance *nudge nudge* some time!

I forgot to put my Daytrana patch on today. Normally I wouldn't be all that upset, But I happen to have several tests and quizzes today that will need my concentration. I'll just hope that I'll be able to stay focused. I have an AP French quiz, a timed writing in Honors English, a test in Algebra II Honors, a quiz in AP Computer Science, and a lab (post-lab to be exact) in Honors Physics.

Wow, I can't even focus on writing I. Oh, this is bad. I can't stop daydreaming. I'm finding it next to impossible to refrain from it. Such pleasant and pleasure-filled dreams... I guess I can do nothing more than embrace until French next period. But for now, * sigh * I shall pur for my daydreams.

Several Updates

2008-09-10T20:52:00.001-05:00

7:44 AM
In the cafeteria again this morning. I had to drop off my class ring order form.
The game on Friday, by the way, was exciting!

Later...
The bell rang on me and I had to stop the entry incredibly short! Anyways...

I've never been to a football game that was that exciting before, and OMG DID I HAVE FUN!!! The clarinet section actually got into the music and we actually had choreography! There's this one thing that drumline does (it's a sort of cadence, if you will) that a group of us clarinet and flute players with long hair do headbanging to, with our hair loose and flying all over the place! It's a blast to do! Meanwhile, Webmastering Friend and several other brass players have their own choreography that goes with it! My neck was sore the Sunday after, but I didn't care, I just knew it was fun (heck, it's still a little sore and our next game is in two days)! As for the actual game, we were winning for much of the first half before the opponent inched ahead just before the end of the half. Our team managed to pull ahead in the final minutes of the game, keeping the whole student body and band up on our feet for the whole rest of the game, jumping up and down and cheering every time something good happened! We must have played the Hey Song more times in the last few minutes of the game than we did for the whole rest of it! We played A TON! So far we've done tunes like the Jaws theme (for which we get to scream at the end ^_^), the Hey Song, Super Freak (for which we get to scream "Shlock!" at the beginning), Apache (THE MOST FUN SONG EVER), Iron Man, and Enter Sandman (love that song), to name a few. We're working on getting Bad to the Bone and several others out there soon, so I'm really excited!

As for the weekend in review, I had the football game on Friday topped off with a trip to Mooyah's (a band tradition - we go to Mooyah's after every game) that had me home at 12:30 AM. I then was woken up by a call from Webmastering Friend at around 8:15 AM to tell me to hurry and get ready to go to his brother's Bar Mitzvah service because he was probably driving me there. After lunch I went to his house for a while before returning home to change into more casual clothes for the party. There (at the party), I did nothing but ride the mechanical bull there, translating to 3 hours of being tossed off and battered and beaten up. By the end of the party I had 10 or so bruises and a pinched left pinkie finger. I was home by 11:00 PM, and didn't get in the bed until after 1:00 AM. The next day I woke up at 9:00 AM (terribly sore in my arms, legs, and waist from riding the bull so many times and in my neck from headbanging on Friday) to try to catch Mom before she went to church to have her drop off stuff I needed for homework that day. After leaving a voice mail I fell back asleep, only to wake up again at 10:00 AM or so to get breakfast and start on homework before the first youth group meeting at my church for the year for lunch. After diligently working on homework, I went to church at 5:00 PM, was driven back home by Dad to continue working on homework, and was finished and in the bed by 11:00 PM. When I woke up on Monday at 6:30 I was still sore and was for the whole day. Yesterday and today that soreness continued, though not nearly as painful as it was initially.

Whew! I'm finally caught up on the blog! I thought I'd never get the chance to get caught up! Stuff just kept happening and I was bogged down with too much homework to have any time for blogging. But thankfully I had the FLY Pen to help me with that, so it has again proven itself to be a valuable tool.

School Spirit Galore!

2008-09-05T07:48:00.000-05:00

7:48AM
I'm in the cafeteria this morning waiting for my zero hour class to start. Today is going to be a busy day. This morning during 1st period we have a pep rally - my first one here at the senior high school. I'm hoping the pep rallies here aren't lethargic like those at the middle school and high school.

We also have our second game tonight, my first real Friday-night-football game. I'm super excited for this game! Well, class is about to start here in a few minutes, so I'll have to stop here. I'll try to find time to write more later today, perhaps even on the bus on the way to and from the game if I'm not otherwise occupied! ;-)

Returning to the FLY Pen

2008-09-03T15:55:00.000-05:00

2:03 PM
Well, I'm back to using the FLY Pen to blog during the school day. I'm writing from AP Computer Science I. I've finished my first program: an output window with my name, address, and a face printed. Simple, but cool. But what I'm most excited about as far as this class goes is its possible application to learning Action Script (more commonly referred to as AS) in Flash.

Anyways, I figured that since I've finished my class work and homework, I may as well blog.

In other news, hurricane Gustav, or rather what's left of it, has been blowing wind at us for almost a day now. We have yet to see any rain, though. The wind has brought relief during smoldering band practices, so that's good.

One of the school's transformers blew today during 1st period, resulting in an entire building's loss of power. Ironically, it just happened to be the building where I have Computer Science! Webmastering Friend has this class two periods before me, and said the power was out and the servers were down for part of the period. They got those back up by the time I got here (they were actually back online during Webmastering Friend's class period), but the AC is still down, so this building is a bit toasty. I have Physics next period, which is coming here in a few minutes. I'll have to wrap up here for now, I'll probably get another chance to blog after school before band practice.

3:55 PM
Wow, since when do I finish homework this early! I hope all Wednesdays are like this.
The wind is still blowing strong outside. Everyone thinks it's so cloudy that it has to rain soon. I know otherwise. Gustav's remnants are over us, but we're in the dry and windy quadrant of the storm; all rain is miles away, too far to reach us before practice starts.

First Senior High School Football Game

2008-08-30T22:19:00.001-05:00

What a way to pull off my first game at the senior high school with style, as well as a laugh or too! Despite the fact that our team lost the game, I had a blast! The show went well for me individually, save the fact that my clarinet came apart during the show (meep!). I'm pleased with how I did musically and everything.

There isn't much more to say about the senior high school games other than THEY ARE A BLAST!!!!!!!

First Week of School

2008-08-29T19:00:00.000-05:00

This has to have been the most interesting first week of school I've ever had. From start to finish the week was full of action.

But before I start going off about school, there lies a bigger story to be told: the finally achieved trip to Six Flags!

Webmastering Friend was able to get permission from his parents and rides were negotiated in time to be able to go the Saturday before school started. After getting up early enough to print tickets at home and have Mom drive us there to drop us off, we discussed our plan for the day, or rather at least the first ride. I could hardly wait to ride the Titan again, and we knew that would be the first ride to gain its full 3 hour wait time, so we quickly agreed on the Titan. Well to our misfortune, we get to the beginning of the line only to find that the Titan was closed! On the spot we came up with Plan B: the Texas Giant. In that line we added another two people to our traveling group: a couple there for a Christian rock concert at 7:00 PM later that day. After riding the Texas Giant the four of us headed to the other side of the park to hit up Batman and Mr. Freeze (in that order).

Mr. Freeze apparently hates me because it was having problems again. The same side that broke down when Webmastering Friend and I were there for the band trip was out of service again, and only one side was running. Half-way through the wait that side began having problems! Luckily they got it back up and running so that we could actually ride it! But the wait ended up being twice or even thrice as long as it would've been had both sides been working.

After Mr. Freeze was said and done, we checked up on the Titan again. Still closed, so we took the new Tony Hawk's Big Spin ride out for a spin (no pun intended). That ride was more fun than it originally looked from afar. The coolest part, though, was not the ride itself, but the way they captured the fun. Unlike other rides where they have a camera hidden somewhere to take a picture of you with a usually stupid "I'm having so much fun I can't do anything but scream" face that you can buy for some insanely expensive price after the ride, the new ride had webcams mounted in the center of the four-seater car that took a video of you making multiple crazy faces and expressions that you can buy on a DVD for an even higher insanely expensive price at the end of the ride! After giving the ride our stamp of approval, we checked up on the Titan again, only to find it still closed. By then we were hungry and stopped for a quick bite to eat. Following that, the other couple left us to go hit the shops before the concert, so we went to ride Superman (Titan was still closed). That was the first ride where I got a hint of that "I-shouldn't-be-here" feeling. That feeling was only proved unnecessary when the ride turned out to be more of first a sudden jump up, then after being slowly tossed up and down, a quick drop before gently reaching the ground once more. I was somewhat disappointed, but not nearly as disappointed as Webmastering Friend was. "That was not worth the wait," were his first words after reaching the ground.

With the day nearing its end, we headed to Shockwave. Apparently that was the second time I rode that ride because I apparently rode it once when Dad took me and my brother to Six Flags one summer - though I don't recall riding it then. I got that "I shouldn't be here" feeling again in the wait for that ride after seeing one train slow down two thirds of the way through the second loop. And again, the feeling was proven unnecessary because that near-pause only added to my hysteria (I tend to laugh a ton when I'm getting a decent adrenaline rush on a good ride like that, laughing to the point of tears and seemingly empty lungs).

Our final ride of the day was an ironic choice. By the time we got off Shockwave, we were thinking Runaway Mountain (or "mountains that run away" as Webmastering Friend was calling it when we were headed for the ride and he was reading the signs that point to the different rides). Clouds had begun to form in the sky, but we thought nothing of them. That is, until we started getting splashed by water. At first we thought it was water from the waterfall being blown by the wind and hitting us. Then we realized that that water was coming from the sky, and Webmastering Friend took on an annoyed face. "At least this ride is indoors, so it'll be one of the last rides they close if it starts to get ugly."

When we got on the ride, Webmastering Friend was prepared for a light ride. Well, to his surprise, they apparently made changes to the ride and it was a little more exciting compared to what he recalled from his memory. For me, it was fun nonetheless (I even closed my eyes for the whole thing, since it was in a dark room).

By the time we had finished with that ride it was raining pretty hard. I used my Superman cape as an umbrella so I could see where I was going. While we waited for our ride home we played in the rain, splashing in the puddles and flinging the water off our shoes for pure amusement like children. I think I fell asleep on the ride back. And if I didn't, I came pretty darn close.

That out of the way, school took over my life and time. Monday was just about as crazy as any day could possibly get at school. On top of all the first day of school stuff (forms to fill out, getting to know students, finding friends you didn't see over the summer, that sort of thing), I had my own stress factors that had me cranky and stressed by the time I got home. The night before I had planned out my entire morning. I would get to school 30 minutes before my first class. During those 30 minutes, I would first stop by the counseling office to pick up my new schedule (they had originally put me in regulars physics, even though I had signed up for honors, so we had to get that fixed, and Mom didn't have time to pick up the schedule the Friday before), then stop by my locker to put my band practice clothes bag and lunch in there, then go to the band hall to drop off my band stuff, then sit in the courtyard to map out my schedule so that I would know where I was going during the day, then finally go to my first class.

Well, fate had other plans for me. I got there only to find that the counseling office wasn't open yet. So I thought, "Okay, I'll go to my locker instead, then see if it's open." I get to my locker, and couldn't remember my combination! I had it written down on my old schedule, but I couldn't find that the night before and so left home without it. "Okay, I'll go the the band hall, then get my combination from sub-school, and then see if the office is open." After dropping my stuff off at the band hall, I went to the sub-school office to get my combination again. I finally could get into my locker and drop off the remainder of my stuff that wasn't needed for the school day, and did all that I could do: go to the counseling office and wait for it to open. By the time I had my schedule in my hands, I had only five minutes before class, and had to go straight to my zero hour class. "Okay, hopefully the rest of my day will be better." The exclusion of the mapping out of my schedule prevented the day from getting much better. By lunch time I was laden with heavy textbooks, had been piled with homework, and had been late to band (which had really gotten my spirits down). I began the long trek to the rec center for lunch, hoping to see Webmastering Friend on the way. When I saw him I ran for him, ignoring my fatigue from lugging those ten pound textbooks, knowing that my day was going to get better for at least a little while knowing we had the same lunch. I had been through such a hectic day by then I was about ready to just plop down on the concrete there in the parking lot to have lunch there. But I wanted to go to the rec center like we had planned. The walk was far longer than it looked. By the time we got to the rec center, 15 minutes had passed and I had only 30 minutes to eat and I was exhausted. After attempting to shove my sandwich down my throat, we left for the campus. By the time I had reached my next class I was sweating like a pig and felt, albeit, a bit miserable.

At the conclusion of my last period (for me it was sixth), I happily made my way to my locker, and then found Webmastering Friend. We again made the trek to the rec center, and again I was worn out by the time we got there. Once inside the building, my brother found us. I went off to get changed for band in the locker rooms, and tried to get started on my homework before leaving to go to practice. Needless to say, I wasn't feeling up to walking the whole way back or doing a full two-hour practice! But I somehow managed to work up the strength to do it. I don't know how, but I did it. By the time I got home I was tired, stressed, cranky, and wanted to be alone. I could do nothing but moan and whine and complain about everything.

The second day went much smoother, mainly due to the fact that I finally had my schedule mapped out and Webmastering Friend and I decided against going to the rec center any more.

The third day, Wednesday, was a bit more eventful - in a bad way. That morning, Mom's car battery decided to die on us, and I was stuck with few options in terms of rides to school. I first called Webmastering Friend, but he wouldn't have been able to make it to my house and to the school in time for us to be on time to class. So I called another band friend. She had just woken up and couldn't make it. I had to go to my last resort: catch the bus to the middle school next door to the senior high school and make a run for the campus once the bus arrived. The bus, much to my misfortune, ended up getting to the middle school just as my first class was starting. I made a dash for the school, but grew tired after ten seconds of running (I was fully loaded down with several binders and my band stuff). I whined and complained and murmured all the way there, burning with frustration. On the plus side, my zero hour teacher wasn't counting tardies until the second week, so I got off the hook on that one! Whew!

Getting Home Part 2

2008-08-16T09:23:00.000-05:00

6:42 AM CST/5:42 AM MST
So, we got stuck here another night last night, and ended up having to get up at 4:15 AM CST/3:15 AM MST to catch this first flight to Denver out of here.

I missed home and everything about it last night more than ten times the amount I missed it during the rest of the trip combined. I missed band friends, Webmastering Friend, the house, my room, my bed, my shower, and band camp.

Part of my breakfast was half of the biggest cinnamon roll I've ever seen (the other half went to my brother). I took a picture of my brother holding the plate before we boarded the plane.

I'm going to sleep now; I'm very tired. Maybe I'll write on the next flight.

8:37 AM CST/7:37 AM MST
What is it with our luck and catching flights this week! We've landed in Denver, but now there's a plane in our gate and we don't know when it's leaving! If we don't get off this stupid plane soon or that stupid plane that's in our stupid gate doesn't move out of our stupid way, we'll miss our stupid flight home that's just one stupid gate away! Stupid! I want to go home! Wah ha!

9:02 AM CST/8:02 AM MST
We're boarding our next flight home now. We're going home! :-)

9:23 AM CST/8:23 AM MST
We're on the plane and might actually leave on time!

It's kind of crazy - yesterday I went from not wanting to leave to wanting to be home so badly that I cried over it within a span of 10-20 minutes yesterday!

One last thing on the trip before I wrap things up here. On the way up here I was listening to a song called "October" that we almost played in band last year. I listened to it again the night we arrived, before the real journey began. The song stuck, and "October" ended up being the theme song for the whole trip. It played in my head through everything I did, especially in Yellowstone and Beartooth Pass.

Well, that concludes this trip journal! :-D

Getting Home Part 1

2008-08-15T14:20:00.000-05:00

1:38 PM CST/12:38 PM MST
I officially declare the Denver Airport cursed! Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit, but that's beside the point. Moving on...

First there was the whole mess getting here, and now we've got more problems! As it was, we would've been running to catch our connection flight at the Denver Airport to get home. The layover would've been an hour - probably 45 by the time we would've gotten off the plane - and during that time we would've had to run from the end of one concourse to catch a train to a different concourse and then all the way to the gate to catch our flight home.

Well, as if that wasn't bad enough, now our plane that was going to take us to Denver is stuck at Denver with mechanical problems, and at the very least will be delayed! It might even get canceled, leaving us stranded here for another night! I wanted to stay longer, but I didn't mean in the city of Billings! I meant in the wide open ranges of Yellowstone and Cody!

2:20 PM CST/1:20 PM MST
I'm so bored! I would use my iPod, but I don't want to kill the battery before the flight, if we catch one out of here. Oh, Dad's talking to the lady at the desk, I'm going to listen here real quick.

Okay, sounds like if it gets canceled, we're stuck here another night. But if not, and this flight gets out of here in time, we're going home and will land at around 10:00 PM CST and end up with a late night.

May as well work on the story, seeing as I have little else to do.

*Story Continue*

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip journal.

Yellowstone Trip Day 7

2008-08-15T12:00:00.000-05:00

No time specified (whoops!)
I didn't write yesterday because I was busy all day. We had a heck of a white water rafting ride in the morning. You can see the video footage from that here. The videos may take a while to load, so be patient. ;-) And just in case it didn't make it in the videos (haven't watched them all myself!), we saw a fox while paddling our way down the Shoshone River.

After that, we had lunch at the historical Irma Hotel, and after a stop at the hotel gift shop, I went horseback riding with the other two girls on the trip. A little more of the Cody Historical Center followed, and the Cody Nite Rodeo topped off the trip.

At the very beginning of the rodeo they started off with a herd of unbridled and unsaddled horses. The first one out in front was a beautiful yellowish tan and black buckskin horse (black legs, muzzle, mane, and tail fading to the main color, in this case yellowish tan). It was exactly like Spirit, the main horse character in the movie Spirit: Stallion of the Cemaron.

*Sketch of the horse*

Back to the raft trip, we saw a deer in the canyon. I wasn't aware of it until Dad pointed it out to me. I was recording at the time, and when I saw it, I said, "Oh, deer!" Soon someone repeated what I said in a tone like you would use when you say, "Oh no!" The whole group burst out laughing and I started repeating the words, "Oh dear!" as we hit the rapids ahead! All of that is in the first raft trip video, so go check that out.

The horseback ride went far better this time. I was on yet another beautiful white horse named Marshmallow. She was far more obedient than George was! I didn't have to kick nearly as hard to get Marshmallow going. I did a better job with trotting as well.

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip journal.

End-of-Trip Conclusionary Words

2008-08-15T10:00:00.000-05:00

Overall, this trip has been a unique experience. I learned many things, both historical facts and self-discovery surprises. I also made new friends and saw things I wouldn't have experienced otherwise.

This trip ended up being one of self-discovery. I learned things about myself that I wouldn't have otherwise found out. For one thing, my fear of bugs has been reduced to nearly nothing. I now only jump at a bug that could potentially cause me harm such as a bee. That's quite a milestone considering I came from a stage where I would jump at anything that so much as moved like a bug!

I've also uncovered a previously dormant love for the outdoors that I never knew existed. I was actually sad to leave Yellowstone because the land was so beautiful, romantic even. The day we left the park I was a bit lethargic. I felt deprived of nearly all energy. My subconscious mind wanted to be back in beautiful Yellowstone.

I also discovered how much stamina I really do have. In the past I've never been able to accurately measure my stamina because I'm doing strenuous activities that demand lots of energy exerted at once on top of enormous mental focus and attention. But on this trip, the hiking was a similar amount of energy used over a longer period of time. On every hike, I failed to break a sweat!

This trip was made even more special due to the other family that was in our tour group. They were Orlando Floridians, a mother, father, daughter, and best friend. Ironically, they were fellow bandies. The daughter played flute and piccolo and her best friend played trumpet. Both of them are going into their freshman year of college. By the end of the trip, we became become best friends,mainly through our band commonalities and quasi-shared love for horses. They actually ride regularly for fun, unlike me, though.

But perhaps the part that stands out the most is my split feelings now that we've come to our journey's end. Part of me doesn't ever want to leave this land. I love the wide open spaces that you just can't find back home. It's so peaceful here. On the other hand, I want to get back home to band camp and school and friends and Webmastering Friend. I know feelings like this are common, especially for me, but these are far stronger than I've ever experienced for any trip. But I can't stay now. All I can do now is cherish the memories I've made here and hope to come back to this place someday.

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip journal.

Yellowstone Trip Day 5

2008-08-13T10:01:00.000-05:00

10:01 AM CST/9:01 AM MST
Off to Cody now. Starting the story to pass the time on this drive. Not sure if I'll go through with finishing it or posting it on FictionPress.com, but we'll see.

*Story Start*
Side Note: I spent most of this day and the next writing this story, so Day 4's happenings are in Day 5's entry.

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip journal.

Yellowstone Trip Day 4

2008-08-12T00:07:00.000-05:00

9:39 AM CST/8:39 AM MST
Got up at 5:45 AM CST/4:45 AM MST this morning to see animals. Still no wolves, but we have seen two coyotes and a bald eagle (which I spotted). It was extremely foggy, which made for an eerie mystical - and somewhat jungle-like - setting.

I get absolutely no cellphone coverage here in Yellowstone. You really feel shut off from society out here. It's really a magical feeling.

That moon above the lake last night really sparked my creative imagination, both artistic and literary. Just that image of the darkness with the moonlit dock and the rippling water is so powerful, I'm finding it impossible to explain in words. It was just like a scene out of a romance movie. I could just see a couple standing there in the moonlight. I'll have to write a story about that dock and that scene.

The hotel we stayed at last night (and will be staying in again tonight) is having a strange effect on me. Part of it has to do with the fact that this hotel is the oldest one still standing in the park. The whole place has a very Victorian look and feel to it. But that antique look and feel is messing with my mind, or rather exciting it. Everything I do when I'm in or near that building creates a mental image of a Victorian version of me doing the same thing. My imagination is also blurring and blending this near "view of the past" with the present, putting the others around me and people I know in the setting with me. I'm considering using these mental images as a basis from which I'll build characters for this story I have in mind with the moonlit lake.

4:07 PM CST/3:07 PM MST
Wow! I knew geysers were a spectacular sight, but I never expected it to be that amazing! We spent the day in the geyser basin around Old Faithful.

It's really peaceful out here. The more I see of this park the more connected I feel to the beauty. All over the park I see couples, young and old, and I can easily see why!

9:19 PM CST/8:19 PM MST
Goin' wolf spotting (...and bear spotting...)!

12:07 AM CST/11:07 PM MST
It's unbelievable how powerful this moonlit lake scene is to me. The story is rooting itself in the present, so I hope to get started on it tomorrow during the drive to Cody, WY.

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip journal.

Yellowstone Trip Day 3

2008-08-11T23:43:00.001-05:00

9:24 AM CST/8:24 AM MST
Just left the hotel this morning. Last night I had something new: bison rib eye. It was pretty good. I had a huge waffle this morning for breakfast. Everyone back home is at band camp right now.

We're driving through Beartooth Pass today, as well as parts of Yellowstone. I can't wait to see wolves and bears and elk and bison!

We'll be doing a lot of walking today. I'll be getting my fair share of leg exercise just like the rest of the band!

10:35 AM CST/9:35 AM MST
We just finished a short hike in search of wildlife and berries, huckleberries to be exact. We didn't see any animals, but saw four different edible berries, three of which I tried. The first one was a grouse wortle berry. That was my second favorite. Next, we finally found huckleberries. Those were good, too but I liked the wortle berries better. Then by chance we found wild strawberries. They were tiny, but still just as good. I took a picture of one in Dad's hand before popping it in my mouth.

I took a picture earlier of one of the mountains that I saw animal shapes in the contours to give an example of the "cloud picture" effect. The following two images are the same picture with different animal outlines drawn.

11:41 AM CST/10:41 AM MST
We just walked on snow... in the middle of summer! How cool is that?

3:26 PM CST/2:26 PM MST
Recently finished lunch, and what an entertaining lunch it was. The small restaurant we ate at housed two beautiful dogs, a beagle named Whisperer and a husky named Rusty. The beagle was a clever dog! He'd come up to you and literally give you a puppy dog face to try to get you to give him food! The husky was the first one I've ever seen in person. It was mystifying to look at his eyes: if you look hard enough, you feel like you're staring into the eyes of a wolf and you begin to feel almost a spiritual presence. The feeling is hard to express in words.

We've arrived at the entrance to Yellowstone. Time to start scanning the trees with eagle eyes!

4:00 PM CST/3:00 PM MST
Bison ahoy! A whole herd of them! They're huge!

We got out to see them better. This one bison was so close you could see his eyes with the naked eye! All within the first hour! Wow!

6:40 PM CST/5:40 PM MST
I never thought two tree logs could be so amusing! They had several trees arranged to form natural see-saws. We also saw a huge raven on a try. Upon the sighting I croaked, "Quoth the raven nevermore!" in a demented voice.

11:43 PM CST/10:43 PM MST
Just got back from a little star gazing outside the hotel. AMAZING! I've never seen the big dipper before tonight! I was so amazed and awe-struck that when I saw it my jaw dropped and I clapped my hands over my mouth!

The next major sight in the night sky is a little on the romantic side. We're staying at the Lake Hotel, which is next to Yellowstone lake. There's a wooden deck that hangs over the lake. The moon, which was really bright, was right over the lake, and its light reflected off the lake, reminding me of a romantic scene in a movie. Hehehe... I could so see a couple standing there, maybe a kiss or two!

Also saw several shooting stars.

It's very late, so I'm going to sleep now.

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip Journal.

Yellowstone Trip Day 2

2008-08-10T18:05:00.000-05:00

10:09 AM CST/9:09 AM MST
We've just left the hotel and are now on the van. Our first trip will be the horseback riding. We will arrive at Red Lodge this afternoon.

10:20 AM CST/9:20 AM MST
Whoa! Large dead animal on the road, a cow perhaps.

10:24 AM CST/9:25 AM MST
Just passed an oil refinery and there was a smiley face on one of the buildings! Haha!

10:35 AM CST/9:35 AM MST

Just passed an osprey nest on a telephone pole! Got a (blurry) picture of it.

Forgot to mention earlier, but at breakfast this morning we saw some members of the Airforce. They were of the 757th Airlift squadron piloting C-130's. They were scheduled to do a supply drop to one of the indian reservations today. Who knows, maybe we'll see their C-130's later today when we see the Crow indians!

The scenery here is just absolutely beautiful.

1:37 PM CST/12:37 PM MST
Just finished the horseback ride. We're going to eat now.

2:55 PM CST/1:55 PM MST
Just finished lunch. I had a delicious sandwich, and for desert we had chocolate chip cookies and lemon squares.

About the horse ride. I had this beautiful white stallion named George. He was a bit stubborn. I'd give him a good kick to try to get him to catch up and he wouldn't get moving fast enough! Eventually the horseback guide had to lead my horse by rope. When she maneuvered her horse up to mine to reach the rope, my brother's horse (he was in front of me on a brown horse named Padre) kicked the guide's horse, who reared and backed up! She went on the other side of me to get the rope. The most fun was when we got to trot. You end up bouncing up and down, making your rear end hit the saddle with each bounce if you're not ready for it. The first time we trotted, my brother started going, "Oww oww oww oww oww," as his rear end hit the saddle. It was quite funny. We never got up to a full gallop, though. I wonder if I can convince Grandma to get me a horse or Mom to get me started on horseback lessons. That would be fun!

3:23 PM CST/2:23 PM MST
Just passed a beautiful deep blue lake! The water was as blue as the ocean!

6:05 PM CST/5:05 MST
We've stopped for a little bit during this tour with the Crow Indian. I've always been fascinated by Native American culture. It's so interesting listening to this guy's stories!

The mountains are simply astounding. Sometimes if you look at the mountains and scenery from the right perspective they look like animals, much in the way clouds seem to take shapes.

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip Journal.

Yellowstone Trip Day 1

2008-08-09T21:39:00.001-05:00

9:04 AM
We've just settled down at the gate in the airport. Back ad baggage-check Dad's suitcase started vibrating. That turned out to be his toothbrush! There seem to be a good deal of armed forces (so far mostly Army, but there have been two from the Navy) today. Earlier there was a bird - a small sparrow I think - hopping and flying around the gate. This first flight is to Denver, a two-hour-long flight. 9:30 now, I'm putting this journal up now to board.

10:00 AM
We're just about to leave the gate now. I forgot to mention earlier we saw this child that had shoes that squeaked when they hit the ground. It was the cutest thing!

That was funny! The flight attendant just made the announcement to turn off electronics and said, "That includes cellphones, blackberry's, raspberries, strawberries, whatever you have!"

Our seats are right next to the engines, so this will be a loud two hours.

10:23 AM
We've reached cruising altitude, so I can finally block out some of this engine noise with my iPod.

10:35 AM
I might get a story started sometime on this trip, perhaps even while on the plane. There's no telling what kind of inspiration all of the beautiful scenes I'll be seeing will bring upon me. I might add a few quick sketches in here should the right inspiration hit. It's a good thing I brought a pencil rather than a pen!
I've not yet decided if my next story will be fact-based or pure fiction. Maybe I'll do a dragon love story. I fear that continuing fact-based stories, though dynamic to me, may soon bore my other readers. I'm still pleased to know that my stories are getting several hits up on FictionPress.com. Hehe, the blog is going to be getting a good updating next time I get the chance, which might end up being during the trip!

I'm still amazed with all that happened yesterday, especially in regards to my passing off the first 60 measures of our marching show. I mean, being referred to as the future of the band is quite flattering to say the least. But the statement, in my eyes, comes with the responsibility, perserverence, and discipline to continue to live up to that statement in everything I do. And the way I see it, that's not just limited to band alone. To me, that includes academics, and social life to some extent. The way I see it, being called the future of the band also means representing the band. I guess it pays to be a band geek. I can look back and remember this with pride.

11:44 AM CST/10:44 AM MST
The aircraft has begun its descent as we prepare to land in Denver. From this altitude (I'm guessing around 2000ft) I can see mountains in the distance. The flaps are now extended far enough that faint contrails can be seen.

11:52 AM CST/10:52 MST
Touch Down!

1:32 PM CST/12:32 PM MST
We've finally made it to the next gate to leave for Billings

When we disembarked the last plane, the squeaky shoes could still be heard.

There was a Crocs shop further back. I've never seen so mant Crocs in so many styles in one place! I took a picture with my phone (saving the good cammera for the good stuff).

There was also a WWI biplane hanging from the ceiling on the way to this gate. It was either a French or American plane I suppose due to the red white and blue tail. I'll have to get a picture on the way back.

2:17 PM CST/1:17 PM MST
Still an hour until boarding time. Depending on how we end up seated once on the plane I might start a story. I'm starting to get inspiration just sitting here and letting my mind wander.

2:23 PM CST/1:23 PM MST
*Story Start*

2:54 PM CST/1:54 PM MST
There has been lots of commotion at the gate in the last few mintues. Aparently a flight has been delayed (not ours). In the last ten or twenty minutes the gate has gotten crowded and twice as noisy. It's one of the reasons I stopped writing the story or now; I can barely think and focus on one thought.

Right now it's hard to tell which gate the delayed flight is in, B94 or B92. B92 is the gate our flight will eventually leave from. I'm hoping the delay is at B94.

3:57 PM CST/2:57 PM MST
You'll never guess what happened. Among all that confusion earlier, our flight changed gates and we didn't know. As soon as we found out we made a mad rush for the new gate. Too late, the plane had just pushed back from the gate. We could even see the stupid plane right outside the stupid window, and they wouldn't let us on the stupid plane! Luckily, there's a second flight, but it means another two hours of waiting.

*Story Continue*

6:47 PM CST/5:47 PM MST
We've finally made it on a flight to Billings. I went back to snap the biplane we saw earlier during the two hours we had to wait.

And now, at 6:52 PM/5:52 PM, we're finally on the runway outta here! Woo hoo!

*Story Continue*
*End Story*

9:39 PM CST/8:39 PM MST
We've finally settled down at the hotel after a long and crazy day. I'm glad I got that story finished. I'll have to post it up on FictionPress.com when I get back home.

Let's just hope the rest of the trip isn't as unfortunate as today was.

This entry was taken from my Yellowstone Trip Journal.

Cheerios

2008-08-07T11:09:00.000-05:00

Another random happening of late like the ones I seem to always find myself spotting at meals (like the Hershey Kisses back in the blog's beginning days) has chanced upon me. I was eating my morning bowl of Cheerios and I spot one of them that looked like this:

Does anyone else see the heart in the middle, or are my eyes deceiving me? I wonder why I seem to find these kind of things all the time. Maybe I'm just more attentive to such details than most people.

I also finally managed to beat Ace Combat 4 in Ace mode, the hardest mode in the game. It took me far longer, but that's no surprise. No one ever said it would be fast and easy! But I'm far from done with the game. I still have one more aircraft to unlock, and the way to unlock it is in such a way that it will be as hard as beating the game itself, if not harder. This game is far from over yet!

I've also started up at band camp, and it's definitely giving me stuff to do. I still plan on going to Six Flags this summer, probably on a weekend now that band camp has started. But now my plan is to go with just Webmastering friend so I don't have to worry about my younger brother preventing us from going on the good rides, or even preventing us from going at all like he did last time! I just hope my mom will let us go alone. If not, my dad can take the two of us. Either way, we're so going this summer and we're so riding as many rides as we can fit into one day! Woo!

Summer Boredom Sets in

2008-07-29T14:40:00.000-05:00

I've reached that point of the summer where I've run out of things to do. I'm beginning to get that urge to do something exciting more often, but I run into the problem of either not knowing what that exciting thing is or I'm unable to do the exciting activity I end up having in mind.

It's not the best of situations. At least I only have a few weeks left of the summer. Even better, after this week, it's band camp for the rest of the summer, which will make it go by tons faster. Also, during one week of the next month, I'll get to go to Yellowstone. I'll be missing band camp for it, but it'll be worth it. I can always catch up or get ahead on band camp, but a trip to Yellowstone like the one my dad has planned for me is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. And, as much as I love band (I've all but contracted OCD for band), I'm more excited for the trip than I am sad about missing band camp.

Today I'm supposed to be getting the band paraphernalia that I asked my mom to order. For the new school year, and to take advantage of the absence of the "no backpacks in class" rule at the senior high school, I'm getting a messenger bag that says "Touch the Clarinet and Die!" on it. And that couldn't be more like me! I guard my case from anyone and everyone who dares try to take one from me. Not many have earned enough of my trust to be able to so much as lay a finger on my clarinets without me trying to attack the person. My mom also ordered me a shirt that says "You WISH you were cool enough to be a band geek!" Hehehe... band is the biggest cult in high school these days; any of you former and fellow band geeks know it just as well as I do. I'm SO wearing that shirt to band camp!

As big a band geek as I am, I've hardly touched my clarinet this summer. And I can tell it in my sound. There was one session this month where I couldn't even make it through the warm-up packet. I was so upset that day that I was brought to tears for the first time in months (the reason for going so long without being how sweet life has been in the past two months). But not too long ago I did far better. I still need to get to work memorizing the music I was given back in early June, *gulp of guilt* especially considering I'll be gone for one of the band camp weeks!

The other day I made the cutest little dragon sculpture out of Sculpey clay ever. I'll try to find it again (the small little bugger got lost somewhere) and get it up on dA, along with another dragon sculpture I did a while back. I'll do that as soon as I finish this entry.

I've got another story up on FictionPress.com for those of you who keep up with my stories. Like always, the link is in the sidebar under the "My Bookmarks" section. I haven't done anything since the two Flash animations on deviantArt, but the sculptures will change that.

My next Flash project is going to be one that accentuates my interest in airplanes and the History Channel show "Dogfights." It will be a dogfight between a P-51 Mustang and a Messerschmit ME-109. All views of the aircraft will be accurate, and I'll be using example photos and visualizations to make this animation. It's going to be the most elaborate thing I've done in Flash so far. I'll need to do a ton of background research before I can just dive right into making this thing. This is going to be one of those animations that will take weeks, perhaps even months. And with the school year rolling in and band camp just days away, my schedule will make things take that much longer. But I'm excited for the whole feat. It'll put me at Webmastering Friend's level in my mind. He thinks I've already passed him simply because of the Interactive Guitar. I think otherwise. The Interactive Guitar is, well, interactive! Most of the amazing stuff I see come from Webmastering Friend is strictly animation. And when it comes to animation, he's still done far more impressive stuff than I've done in my animations. With this animation, I'll be able to work on my skills in drawing the objects to be animated. I still have a bit of fail in me when it comes to drawing stuff in Flash and Flash alone. With the Interactive Guitar, I had to get some help from Photoshop, which I know far better. In order for me to consider myself at Webmastering Friend's level, I have to be able to do an entire animation in Flash alone, and the objects have to look good. But I've learned many things from Webmastering Friend while watching him do his Space Flash that will come in handy when animating the dogfight. Overall, I'm anxious to get started once I find the time.

More YouTube Fun!

2008-07-25T10:04:00.000-05:00

I've found yet another adorable video on YouTube. You have to like that website - it can be a source of fun and giggles sometimes.

*starts using squeaky voice* Awww! He fell asleep trying to clean himself!!! CUTENESS OVERLOAD! I want a kitten that tiny and that cute! *stops using squeaky voice* This is almost cuter than the otters holding hands! But the otters still hold first place in the cuteness category. You just can't beat that.

I'm almost done with another story. I just need to edit it. Go check out FictionPress.com later today and you'll see it up, hopefully...

Love Letter FINALLY Finished

2008-07-21T12:22:00.001-05:00

I was able to finally get around to finishing the animated love letter I started back during the school year! It's up on deviantArt here. I also completed an interactive guitar, also on deviantArt here. Go check them out! The guitar took an entire day's worth of work. Flash was all I did yesterday, working on that guitar. The love letter was completed this morning.

Flash Blues No More!

2008-07-17T13:58:00.000-05:00

So, in previous posts I've pined for Flash CS3. Well, that dream is becoming reality, and it's about time. On deviantArt, there's a section for Flash animations. So, everyone can go check out my animations there! I ordered it yesterday, and it's scheduled to get here this coming Monday, or possibly even tomorrow! Now I can actually work on that love letter animation. And this time, I think I know what I plan on writing in it. I wrote a sort of love poem a few days ago - okay, it was actually a song, but whatever - that would be fitting. It might not have the same effect if it's just read and not sung, but hey, it'll work.

If you haven't checked out my deviantArt page recently, you might want to. I'm quickly adding works as I dig them up. And when Flash gets here, you can bet I'll have some of those projects up within a week, including the love letter!

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!

2008-07-13T20:38:00.000-05:00

Yet another video on YouTube. This one is hilarious!

Note: Look closely! That was the baby panda, not the big one!

I laughed so hard the first time (when I thought it was the big panda) that my stomach hurt. When I realized that was the baby panda, I laughed so hard I was gasping for air and my eyes were watering!

WOW that was hilarious!

Dragons, Dragons, and More Dragons

2008-07-12T22:49:00.000-05:00

After watching a friend of mine grow in her artistic ability (check the Lizerology link in the bookmarks to see some of her works), I've decided to release my own stash of works to the public. And, though they could never compare to those my friend has posted, I'm proud of a good many of them.

Without further delay, I'm opening my own deviantArt account to post my prized dragons, among other doodles and successful tests I've done in Photoshop over the years. If I ever get Flash I plan on posting some of those animations. I have a link located in the "My Bookmarks" section of the sidebar.

There isn't much now in terms of my dragons, but I do have some other Photoshop doodles up there.

Short post today; not much else has happened recently. Didn't even go to Six Flags the other day like I had planned.

Recent News and Upcoming Events

2008-07-08T17:55:00.009-05:00

It's been a while since I've posted an entry, so I thought I'd do so, seeing as quite a bit has happened since the last entry.My Fourth of July was an action-packed day full of fun, with a swim party in the morning, swimming at my house with Webmastering Friend in the afternoon, and fireworks at one of my mom's friend's Fourth of July parties. There were sparklers there! I took this video with my phone:

I was going all day, always doing something. There wasn't one second that day where I was idle and had nothing to do. During the time between the last session of swimming and the party, I was showering the chlorine out of my hair (and there was a TON of it after having swam from 11:00 AM to 5:30 PM nearly nonstop). It was a fun day, nonetheless. All the action was good for me. By the end of the day I was exhausted.

The next day saw little action due to how tired I was. I did watch Top Gun that evening, but other than that I simply played Ace Combat 4 and Rock Band all day. Sunday was a similar story, aside from having to get up earlier than usual for church. Today I didn't get much of a chance to catch up on sleep, as I had an orthodontist appointment early.

But I'll need to catch up on that sleep soon - as in tonight, tomorrow morning, and an early bedtime tomorrow night - because we've got plans to either Six Flags or Hurricane Harbor, and Webmastering Friend will be coming along. In either case, we're getting there as soon as the park opens to take advantage of the shorter lines during the week and earlier in the morning, when fewer people visit the park. Regardless which park we decide on, I plan on getting on a ton of rides, many of which I plan on being the roughest ones. If it's Six Flags we're going to, you can bet I'll be riding all the big ones: Superman, Batman, Titan, Texas Giant, Runaway Mountain, Mr. Freeze, Shockwave, Flashback, and the newest Tony Hawk ride (forget the full name, but oh well)! WOO HOO! While Six Flags has the better rides, Hurricane Harbor would provide the cooler day. Even as the coolest day this week, the Thursday forecast says a high of 93, so we might be compelled to go to Hurricane Harbor instead. On top of that, Six Flags isn't the only park with a new ride. Hurricane Harbor just opened the Mega Wedgie, which is its version of Hawaiian Falls's Half-Pipe, which was a blast. We'll just have to see what Mom, my brother, and Webmastering Friend have on their minds. Regardless which park we end up going to, it'll be another fun action-packed day.

I don't know what I plan on doing tomorrow, but I sure don't plan on doing something too entirely active - I'll need all the energy I can get for the next day.

I've also recently opened up a FictionPress.com account. For those of you who know what DeviantArt is, FictionPress.com is basically the fiction writing version of DeviantArt. I currently have two stories up, and plan on adding a third soon, once I finish it. I'm working on it today, so I'm hoping it will be finished by tomorrow. Those of you who are regular readers and like my writing style should go see it especially, as my even more formal writing style will be used there. I have the link posted in the "My Bookmarks" section of the sidebar. Be sure to check out and read the profile page, which is the one that I have linked. You can access my stories from that page, but some vital prologue info is available on that page. And, as a little insider note, "The First Moment of Magic" expands on one of my earlier blog entries. I won't tell you which one it is, though. You have to figure that out on your own. Look through the "Blog Archive" section of the sidebar to look at older posts.

Let's make this a little mini-contest. Send me a line via email with what you think is the answer, and if you get it right, I'll send you a little something as an attachment in my reply. It's not going to be much, just a little graphic I'll whip up in Photoshop, but it'll make this fun.

Search Function Added!

2008-06-30T14:38:00.001-05:00

This month's poll was on the addition of a search function to the blog. So, without further delay, I've added a search function, located in the sidebar. I'm working on next month's poll, and will add it when I've come up with a new possible addition to the blog.

Meet Me in the Future

2008-06-30T13:36:00.008-05:00

The College Board had been such a valuable tool in helping me prepare for the future. And now, the SAT portion of the website has a feature where you can post a voice bubble of what you plan to do in the future. I went and created mine today.
Add your bubbleAll you fellow high schoolers can add yours through the "Add your bubble" link. Just finish the sentence "I will be..." and type it in the spot provided. If you decide to add one, post a comment with your "I will be..." bubble text. Or, for those of you who know HTML, you can get the embed code and put that in your comment instead.

*If you can't see the bubble, you'll need to download Adobe Flash Player*

Our Favorite Archaeologist... and a bit of beading too

2008-06-24T11:50:00.012-05:00

I told everyone I saw the latest of Indy's movies, the Crystal Skull, and this week I've been able to watch the first two, with three waiting for later today. It was cool because the first one revealed a little factoid about the opening scene in Crystal Skull. The first one, I'm sure we all know, was Raiders of the Lost Ark. And, as we also all know, the movie involves the Ark of the Covenant. In the beginning of Crystal Skull, we see the Ark in Area 51 while Indy is helping to find some unknown treasure that resides within a hangar in Area 51. Now that I've seen the first movie, I know how it got there: at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, we see the Ark being brought into an aircraft hangar full of other wooden boxes. It is the very same hangar that we see in the beginning of Crystal Skull.

The second movie, Temple of Doom, was interesting because I had seen some of the scenes while watching an Indiana Jones special on the History Channel the day before I saw Crystal Skull, as well as the very end while in College Station sitting in a Ci Ci's Pizza eating my cheese sticks. But my favorite so far has been the first one. In my opinion, the funniest scene was when they had opened the chamber during the thunderstorm and they look down into the chamber and one of them (I think it was Indy, but I can't remember) said, "Why does the floor move?" The other guy throws a torch down into the chamber and reveals the whole floor covered in SNAKES! Then Indy says, "Snakes. Why did it have to be snakes?" We all burst out laughing!

In other news, I've done some more beading recently, and have completed two more sets. The first one took me just a little while to whip up, just an hour or so of my morning, but the second one had me working all day.

The first one was one I had thought of a while back, but hadn't gotten around to it until the other day. It involves moons and stars. The earrings are different from what I traditionally do. They don't look the same, yet they still match. Here are some pictures.

These are the earrings. Instead of choosing two of the same charm, I chose two complimentary charms. I got that idea from a pair of earrings I saw at Clair's once where the two earrings were different. It worked out really well and continued the moon and stars theme that I had going in this set. I made these last.

This was the second part that I made for this set. This ring is a simple one; just some seed beads and a charm were all it took to create this one. It was strung on stretchy thread.

Second to last in the creation timeline, this necklace is one of my favorites of the ones I've made in a while. The reason the chain is there at the top is because I accidentally finished off the piece too soon, thus it wouldn't fit around my neck. So, I added a little chain and a jumpring at the end and I had myself a clasp and a necklace that fit. This necklace is meant to be a choker.

This was the first part of the set that I made. It's made with stretchy thread so that a clasp wouldn't be needed and it could just be slipped on.

The next set was made just yesterday. It started off when I was redesigning the watchband for the watch I had used for concert season so that I could wear it all the time, including in the water (since the watch face was water-resistant) when I go to Hurricane Harbor later this week. This is the watch.

While working on the band, I surfed the internet for project instructions to make a chain necklace. From there I found a result for Daisy Chains, and changed my mind to making a Daisy Chain choker. That quickly turned into an all-day project to make an entire set devoted to Daisy Chains. This is the most complete set I've made thus far, and the time it took to make it makes me that much more proud of it.

This is the necklace that started it. It fits very well as a choker.

This is the bracelet. I almost made it too small, as it's a bit difficult to get on. At least it isn't constricting my hand ;-)

The ring for this set was made with slightly larger beads than used in the rest of the set, so as to make the daisy in the ring stand out more. Unlike the other ring, this one was made with nylon fishing wire like the rest of the set.

No, not another ring, it's a toe ring. I went back to the smaller beads for this one so that the whole daisy would be visible when the ring was on. Also made with nylon fishing wire.

Not a necklace or bracelet, but an anklet. See what I mean by "most complete set thus far"?

The earrings took a little more thinking before I came up with the design. The suns at the bottom of each are a reminder that the theme of the set is SUMMER, not FLOWERS or SPRING. If you want to think of it this way, the suns are providing light for the daisies in the rest of the set to grow! Interesting concept...

That whole set took an entire day to create. That was all I did yesterday. I sat in my room hunched over my bead boxes jamming to Christian music on KLTY. It was a fun day.

If you haven't already figured it out by the blurriness of the images, they were taken with my phone. I need to get a digital camera since I seem to be posting images here so often. Then they would actually be clear. Maybe I can get Mom to let me have her old digital camera.

BattleBots

2008-06-17T18:37:00.006-05:00

With the second full week of summer empty due to Dad's work, I've had time to work on my newest Lego NXT robot. A while back my brother and I agreed to a little competition with our Lego NXT's to see who could build the best air-hockey-playing robot. We each took extremely different approaches to accomplishing the task. My dad described the scenario by alluding to the Cold War. My brother took the "Russian" approach (simple and easy to repair) by refusing to use any sensors. His puck-flippers would be in constant motion. I, on the other hand, took the sophisticated "American" approach (high-tech, but many opportunities for things to go wrong). While I did succeed in making sensors activate the flippers, they required the puck to pass under a certain spot. Thus, I lost the competition.

Now I've proposed a new challenge: BattleBots. My brother was reluctant to accept because he didn't want to disassemble his "Chopper," as he called his air-hockey-playing bot. He agreed on the following terms:

He would be allowed to keep his current design
The showdown would take place on the air-hockey table
The air-hockey table would be turned on for the showdown
All air-hockey pucks would be on the table during the showdown

I sneered and agreed. I couldn't see how having the pucks on the table would pose any threat or challenge to the design I had in mind, and saw my brother's wish to keep his current design as an advantage for me.

I've gone through a few designs before reaching the final BattleBot. These are pictures of the robot as it's design progressed:

The initial design called for a large arm to essentially flip the other robot over or off the table. The first picture is of the whole robot before I had finished the arm. Next, a close-up of the sound sensor, which I planned on using to make the robot voice-activated. The last picture is of the parts I attached to the end of the flipping arm.

After manually testing that design, I decided against it, as the opponent bot was too heavy and large for the flipping arm. I moved to a more aggressive approach both in attack style and looks.

Instead of trying to flip my brother's robot over or off of the table, I redesigned my BattleBot to ram and rip apart the opponent using several spikes and hooks and claws. The new design required less moving parts and a different control method. Right now the plan is to control the robot using a Wiimote bridged to the NXT brick through my MacBook through Bluetooth. If that gets too complicated, Plan-B calls for using one of the servo-motors and various sensors for movement control. Both plans have their advantages and disadvantages, so I'll have to see which one proves more effective.

This perspective better portrays the BattleBot's mean looks. To attack, the robot will power forward at full speed right into the opponent. With luck, the force of the hit will allow the hooks and spikes to latch onto something. The robot will then reverse direction, again at full speed, to try to rip parts of the enemy robot off. Should any of my robot's parts get caught in the enemy robot and come off, they will get left inside the enemy and hopefully jam a motor or get something tangled and cause more mayhem. If all else fails, the tactic becomes ram like there's no tomorrow and hope the force causes something to give.

I'll post an update when more progress is made on the controlling systems.

Friday the 13th and Hawaiian Falls

2008-06-13T21:00:00.010-05:00

-2:41 PM on the FLY Pen-
The old cliche Friday the 13th has never been the case for me. In fact, Friday the 13th seems to be lucky for me! Today was, or rather has been, no different. But before that, I'll update everyone on the final day of Mission Possible.

Yesterday's service site was CRS, or Catholic Relief Services. There, we learned about service on a global scale and how fortunate I am as an American and inhabitant of a first world country. As fun as all of the activities were, they don't compare to the fun to be had at Hawaiian Falls.

From the time we got there until 6:00 pm, all of Mission Possible was merged with the usual traffic in the park. Then the park was closed to the general public. From 6:00 to 6:30, all of Mission Possible converged at a cluster of pavilions while the park was cleared out. After that we had the whole park to ourselves until 8:30 pm.

Now the actual details. Upon arrival, my brother and I found a place to drop off our stuff, then we made our way to the Pineapple Express, a mat slide. I made the mistake of not listening to all of the last minute tips and instructions, and so didn't keep my head up through the ride (I actually did quite the opposite). As a result, when I reached the bottom, my head went under, sending water rushing into my mouth and nose and down my throat. The first few seconds after emerging from the water I tried to inhale, but had slight difficulty doing so. When I had gotten sufficient oxygen into my lungs I coughed up the water that had reached my lungs before letting out a loud, "Woo hoo!" When I opened my eyes and stood up, I saw my brother up ahead. We began jogging only to be caught by a staff member who told us to walk. My brother slowed to a walk gradually. I made my second mistake and tried to slow abruptly. My body slowed, but my legs and feet kept moving ahead of me, throwing me off balance. I fell backwards within seconds. "That's why!" my brother called after me. I stood back up and proclaimed, "I'm okay!" and continued onward.

Next we went onto the pipeline slides. From there we did one lap around the Lazy River before going to the wave pool to kill the time before 6:00 pm.

After the park was cleared out, we went down the Pineapple Express a second time, luckily without any mishaps. By then, my brother thought he felt up to going on the half-pipe. But by the time we were half-way up, he had "second thoughts." After the difficulty of getting back down, I waited for a second person so I could go. Boy was it a blast, probably one of the closest things to the Titan in the park. That was enough to convince my brother to go. Even still, he hesitated as we neared the loading station. I pretty much forced him to go. When we could see the top, he really wanted to turn back, but I thought and told him that it was too late to turn back when we were so close to the front. He was glad I pushed him to go; so much in fact that we went a second time!

After that it was off to another dip in the wave pool, followed by another run in the Lazy River. After exiting the chain that formed, we split up. My brother went to the water playground while I did more runs on the pipeline slides, including a backwards run on each of them. By then, 8:30 pm had rolled around and we picked up our stuff and headed for the bus, ending the day.

Today was the four back-to-back episodes of Dogfights. They started at 7:00 am CT, so I set my alarm for 6:45 am to catch them. Hawaiian alls had drained my energy, leaving me tired when my alarm went off. When 7:00 came around, I was still sleepy. For the first hour of the two-hour episode I fought to stay awake, but failed and drifted between sleep and open-eyes. But by 8:00 I was wide awake and able to catch the last hour of the first episode of the day. I caught the second episode in its entirety before having to begin packing to come down to college station. The fourth and final episode was missed as well for the same reason. The bits I did catch of it allowed me to figure out that it involved P-51 Mustangs, and so I downloaded the episode from iTunes to watch later.

Right now, I'm on the road to college station for a Porsche DE event with my dad. I've been to many before, and look orward to this one just as much. And, in case you haven't already figured it out, I'm on the FLY Pen once again.

-8:36 PM on my cell phone-
How much better can this Friday the 13th get? We drive over to the Manor House and by chance we came across a gathering of antique car owners and their cars! And what a photo opp it was! We saw everything from Mustangs to Chevelles and everything in between! And of course, we saw Porsches as well! My brother took some great photos with his camera and has allowed me to post them here.

Look! It's Mater from Cars!

This one had the tachometer on the outside of the car, rather than on the dash.

Here is the same car.

I kind of liked how this one looked being brushed rather than smooth and glossy.

We also saw a superbird! What a score!

We also saw a Stingray. I like how that orange looks on this car.

Now that's an old car! Reminds me of a Model T. Not sure if it really is one, though.

It's pink!!!

The pink car from the side.

Looks like the way-back-when version of an 18-wheeler.

It's another pink car, this time it's two-tone. This was probably my favorite of the ones we saw.

Another Cars character, the little yellow guy who owned the tire shop in Radiator Springs. I think his name was Luigi, but correct me if I'm wrong.

This one was my dad's favorite. The original picture was a bit blurry, so I fixed it up in Photoshop, just FYI.

There's that Chevelle I was talking about.

An old Ford Mustang

The Mustang from the back

This one just looked cool.

Who says Friday the 13th was unlucky?

*Photos courtesy of Wolfie's brother.

Splinters and Leadership

2008-06-11T17:46:00.004-05:00

The two things aren't interrelated in any way other than they both happened today, just FYI before I begin.

Today's Mission Possible work was at my church doing general clean-up. We washed windows, cleaned tables and chairs, and tidied up the playground (that was reverse chronological order, BTW). The work on the playground involved redistributing the wood-chips and moving those that had fallen out of the playground perimeter back in the playground area. Turns out some of the tools were so battered that they gave me countless (literally) splinters on my elbows and a few on my hands. I got out those that ended up on my hands, but the ones on my elbows are still there with a band-aid over them to keep them from snagging my clothes. I did tough it out for the whole day and worked harder than the three boys who refused to do work combined. That in itself made today a success in my book.

Moving on to leadership. I started to see in myself the things I see in other great leaders for the first time this week as a result of the skit our service crew has to do tomorrow. Being the oldest one in the group, I was appointed by both our crew adult leader and the majority of my group as the group leader to organize the skit. We started working on it yesterday, but got little done other than decide on what the skit would be about plot-wise. When we ran out of time to work on it, I said I'd work on it at home. No one asked me to do that, nor did anyone suggest that someone do it. I just stood up and announced it. And indeed I did work on it last night. I came back today ready to present my work, but we didn't get any time to work on it. Tomorrow I plan on getting some preparation work done on the bus ride to our service site. That means I'll have to take the initiative to call for the group's attention to get things organized. Tell me if I'm wrong, but that sounds like leadership to me. It's little things like those that I see in others who were great leaders that I'm beginning to see in myself. I'm really beginning to amaze myself with what I'm just starting to find hidden within me. But I'm not doing this to prove myself as a leader, most certainly not. I'm doing it because no one else will step up to the plate to really push the group to get this skit done in time and I want our group's skit to be the best one. The good feeling that gives me is enough to compel me to take on the task. To me, that's what leadership means.

Weather: It's Unpredictable

2008-06-10T18:05:00.000-05:00

The title says it all. I told you about the crazy rain phenomena yesterday. If you thought that instance was crazy, wait until you hear about what the rain did today.

Again, we were on our way home from Mission Possible today. The skies looked like rain, even though the forecast didn't call for it. It rained all right, but it wasn't just any old shower. One second (not minute) there was no rain and the roads were dry, and in an instant it just started pouring, drenching the roads! It rained for no more than 15 seconds before it started to jump between pouring down rain and just raining every two seconds. Then it just suddenly stopped. Five seconds later, it poured again, only to stop another few seconds later. It started again, then abruptly stopped. Then out of nowhere, it started drizzling! By then, we reached an area of the road where the three or four feet in front of us were covered with dots of water, but farther than that the road was completely drenched! By the time we pulled into the garage, it started pouring AGAIN! And now, the sun is out and the skies look beautiful again! That's what you get when you live in a place like where I live: the weather really is unpredictable!

Other news related to Mission Possible...
Today we went to a different senior center. This one was for people with Alzheimer's. We got to play games like horseshoes and puzzles with the residents. It was interesting the variety of people there. Outside each of the rooms where the residents stayed were display cases called "Memory Boxes" for the residents to put some of their possessions in for display. You could sort of guess what they used to do by some of the things in the cases. Just by looking at some of the cases I was able to figure out that there were three veterans, and all three were pilots. One of them was in the Korean War in the Navy. Another, also in the Navy, I believe was in WWII judging from the medal that said "Germany" on it. The third pilot had more golf stuff in his box, but there was a picture of a guy in an aircraft. I'm assuming it was the person to whom the box belonged. Either way, that's still two pilots for sure! Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to talk to any of them, but just knowing they were there somewhere among the many faces was an honor in itself to me. Knowing I was helping people like them really made today's experience special.

First Summer Randomness

2008-06-09T20:14:00.001-05:00

What do you know! I predicted the summer to bring about more varied post topics, and lo and behold, here are the first of the random happenings!

Beginning with the most recent, and most random, we (my dad, my brother, and me) found one of the strangest looking bugs I've ever seen in the house by the sink. We argued over what it was and what bugs were related to it, as it looked like a cross between several different bugs. It had little claws like a scorpion, but it didn't have a stinging tail. It was about the size of a large ant. We went through the trouble to try to catch it and get it on the scanner to scan it (the scanner was the closest thing we had to a microscope) only to have Dad kill it because we thought it flew (and therefore we didn't want it in the house). Dad went on the internet to figure out what it was.

Turns out, the little bugger was a pseudoscorpion. The one we found was black (hence the resemblance to an ant).

Second most recent (though not exactly the second most random) was the 10-minute rainstorm we just had! One minute the skies were blue, the next it's pouring down rain! Within the first few minutes the roads were flooded. While Dad was driving my brother and me home from the first summer camp of the summer, we went through water and caused it to splash higher than the truck (we're talking a HUGE Chevy Avalanche here)! The rain was some of the heaviest I've seen in a while. Then, just as quickly as it blew in, it was gone. If you looked out the window now you would have no idea that it had been raining, aside from perhaps some wet roads or leftover water puddles, because the skies are blue again.

That first summer camp of the summer, by the way, is Mission Possible. It's basically a camp where you do various service projects. Today, for example, the service crew I was assigned to went to a local senior center and helped with games. Our crew members walked in the cake walk for the handicapped, then helped out with a few games of bingo. Unfortunately for me, the vast majority of the people there spoke Spanish and little English. Seeing as I'm taking French and am pretty much semi-fluent in the language, I was clueless as to what some of the people were saying. At least numbers in Spanish are somewhat similar to those in French, so that helped with the cake walk and bingo. Nonetheless, I still had fun doing it all. The theme for this year's camp is superheroes and how we're all heroes this week for the ones we're helping. Me being the creative, spirited, and somewhat crazy person I am, I decided on wearing my Batman cape (which I actually got while at Six Flags with the band) for the rest of the week, you know, in spirit of us being heroes for the ones we're helping and all. Who cares if everyone thinks I'm crazy, I'm just trying to have fun. If anyone has a problem with that, I'm not going to let it bug me! That's the way I roll: I do my own thing and people can hate me for it or love me for it, but I'm not going to let the bitterness of others run my life. It's a great rule of thumb, and it has done me well. In a way, I'm immune to insults and name-calling and the like as a result.

Speaking of Six Flags, I'm anxious to go back again! My dad said he'd take us this summer, so it's definitely a possibility. Hopefully I'll be able to go more than once! I'd definitely ride the Titan and the Batman and Mr. Freeze and Flashback again, as well as go on the Texas Giant and Shockwave and even the Superman if given the chance! Too bad my brother isn't a crazy-roller-coaster person. It was a miracle when he said he'd ride the Batman, though only if we do that first so he "doesn't have time to chicken out." Either way, it'd be a miracle to get him on such a ride. I can't wait to go this summer!

While I'm on the subject of amusement parks, I'll get to go to Hawaiian Falls this Thursday as a part of the Mission Possible camp. I'm excited for that. Too bad it's not a band trip, else I'd know exactly who to assemble into my group if I want to do any of the meaner rides and slides. Maybe I'll know by then who in the camp would do such rides as eagerly as me. But at the moment, such a feat would be like trying to find a door in a gymnasium that's pitch black.

More TV news, word's out that there'll be a new show airing on the Military Channel. The show is called "Showdown: Air Combat" and will be similar to Dogfights in most respects. But, unlike Dogfights, which uses computer-generated graphics, "Showdown: Air Combat" will use the real things (restored of course). I'm not sure if that means that they'll actually use weapons and all, but I'll hope they don't. I mean, let's be honest, who would want to shoot down and destroy a perfectly good P-51D Mustang, restored at that? I know I wouldn't! But the fact that they'll be using the actual aircraft could either make this show better than Dogfights by a long-shot, or be an inhibiting factor and leave Dogfights to reign supreme. Or, it just might be just as good. I'm hoping the latter is the case. Either way, I'm anxious to see the show. I'll get to see it for the first time either this Sunday if the hotel I'll be at when it airs receives the Military Channel, or a week from this coming Saturday. By then (next Saturday the 21st), I'll be back at my mom's house. This week, though, is Wings Week on the Military Channel! Yay! The "Top Tens" episode on fighters will be on Wednesday, so I hope to catch that. Last time I mentioned the fighters episode, I said I'd be upset if the F-22 Raptor and the P-51 Mustang weren't in the top ten. I've been reassured by Webmastering Friend that both made it in (he's seen the episode before). Raptor made 10th only because it hasn't had a chance to prove itself. But after seeing Dogfights of the Future yesterday (hehe... got up at 7:45 AM just to watch it), it will definitely have that chance in the near future! As for the Mustang, Webmastering Friend says I'll be happy with its ranking. Didn't tell me where it ended up (that would've spoiled it), but I'm sure it was respectfully ranked based on the legend it made during combat.

I do hope everyone has noticed the link to the deviantArt page of a friend of mine. She's a friend from webmastering and English, though mostly English. She makes my dragons look like child's play! She's an amazing artist. Go see her page if you haven't already to see what I mean.

This post getting as lengthy as it is, I'll give your eyes a break and wrap it up here.

Animator vs. Animation

2008-06-06T18:27:00.003-05:00

I mentioned these Flash animations in my Flash Blues entry, so I'm linking to them now, for those of you who haven't seen them. They're really quite amusing, and for people who have ever worked with Flash, you know how hard to make and how long it can take to complete an animation (or better yet, the games that go along with them) such as this! Webmastering friend knows, probably better than I do, seeing as he's done some long animations himself!

Anyways, let's move on to what I was doing this entry for! This was the first one in the series.

AtomFilms.com: Funny Videos | Funny Cartoons | Comedy Central

You thought that one was cool, wait until you see the next one! This one must have taken FOREVER to complete!

AtomFilms.com: Funny Videos | Funny Cartoons | Comedy Central

You'd think the guy would leave it at animations, but no! He went and made not one, but TWO games! Those really must have taken a long time to do! I'm embedding one of them so you get a feel for them.

AtomFilms.com: Funny Videos | Funny Cartoons | Comedy Central

I'm not worthy! I'm not worthy!

Year in Review

2008-06-04T18:03:00.003-05:00

This year has been by far one of the best and most eventful years of those I can remember (trust me, that's a long time; we're talking as far back as first grade)! Here are a few of the many things that saw change this year:

Music - Perhaps the area that saw the most change of all, my clarinet playing and musicianship have seen unprecedented (for me) improvement that easily beats all previous years combined. I've also learned more about the clarinet itself, something I previously thought insignificant. As a result, I can proudly say that I can spend hours talking clarinet jargon and have fun doing it. Not many others at my level can say the same. I've also learned enough that I can now make set-up decisions on my own more easily. Even right off the bat, way back in marching band camp in the August days before school started, I was hard at work researching plastic reeds (aka The Dark Side of the clarinet world). With an already strong will to become a better clarinet player, I took initiative to research the several options I had when it came to synthetic reeds. I made sure to do all the research before actually going out and getting any synthetics at the local music store. Even after getting them in my possession I continued to research. But perhaps the part I'm most proud of is what I went through before deciding to go all out synthetics. I spent a few weeks adjusting to them before putting them to the test against the best cane reeds I had. If I had found even the most insignificant shortcoming in the sound of the synthetic reeds, I would have continued to use cane. But to my surprise, I found my sound more appealing on the synthetics. And those results were not just a one-time stroke of luck. I quickly saw improvement in other areas than just my sound, such as improved range. But the one milestone that stood out the most was that I finally found and mastered the sound I've worked to attain for so long. That alone is enough to make me smile!

The Future - Since day one of my high school journey, I was all over the map as to what I wanted to do with my life. That all changed when I received a letter from the National Student Leaders Conference (NSLC) saying I had been invited to go to the conference. As I flipped through the booklet of conferences, one particular meeting grabbed my attention: Engineering and Robotics. As I read through the summary, an interest in the world of engineering was born. I quickly lost interest in meteorology as my curiosity for engineering grew. Today, that curiosity has grown into a solid plan for the future. Though I've still continued to change my mind, my career choices and major selections have remained in the engineering field ever since! What are those plans right now? A major in aerospace engineering from the University of Colorado at Boulder and a future job at Boeing's Phantom Works division.

Writing Skills - As sharp as they are, my writing skills still had a good deal of room for improvement. Through both English class and short stories I wrote for fun throughout the year, my writing style was honed and my writing voice developed into something more unique than ever before. The many short stories I wrote made including even the deepest and darkest of secrets second-nature. By the time the Writing TAKS came around, I was more than ready and willing to spill out thoughts and emotions I previously kept heavily guarded. That ability has improved my writing skills more than I could have imagined possible.

Combine the countless improvements that took place this year with the many memories that were created throughout the year, and my sophomore year in high school shapes up to be a year that will be cherished forever.

In other news, school is finally out for summer break. At last, blog updates should become far more regular and far more interesting, if not a bit more varied as well!

Firsts

2008-06-03T09:28:00.002-05:00

Just finished the second easiest exam on the planet (band, second only to webmastering). I can hardly believe I was even the slightest bit worried!

I'm sure everyone has noticed the absence of the monthly poll. It's not down for good; I'll be re-posting it with questions regarding the site design. Please take part in the polls; it will help me improve the blog's design, and it'll give you a chance to voice what you want to see done around here.

I'm so glad I took that webmastering class; it has helped me so much with managing and customizing this blog.

I went to the local recreation center for the first time. I had loads of fun. It's no wonder my brother goes there so often! Come to think of it, I had a good deal of firsts yesterday: first visit to the rec center, first time to play pool, first time doing something after school, and others to be kept to myself! ;-) It's great to try new things.

And, after all of that, I still found the time to write an email, clean up my room, do my usual internet routine, and finish my final two composition covers in Photoshop! What an eventful day!

Eyes to the Sky

2008-06-01T13:57:00.002-05:00

My interest in flight has been revived to what it was in 8th grade. And it couldn't be more timely! With the coming of summer, that interest will have countless chances to be stimulated. School will be out of the way and I can go back to creating aircraft in X Plane.

Next week (the week of June 9th) is Wings Week on the Military Channel, something I'm looking forward to. Unfortunately I have another summer camp that week, but I will get to catch shows like the Fighters Top Tens episode, among others. If I don't see the P-51 Mustang in that episode, then they don't know what they're talking about. ;-) I also better see the F-22 Raptor, seeing as it's going to be king of the skies for a while, rawr!

I've also gotten back into video games now that my band video game has run out of music for the time being. My interest in Ace Combat has been reawakened from its deep slumber. I used to like that game, then I left it for a while. Now I'm back to playing it again. Though it's only Ace Combat 04 for PS2, I'm still having fun with it. So far my favorite fighter in the game is, of course, the F-22 Raptor, followed closely behind by the F-14 Tomcat, and the F/A-18 Hornet just after that. Unfortunately, I'm having to use a sluggish A-10 for the final mission, since you have to fly inside a building, which requires slower speeds. This immediately pulls me out of any dogfights I want to start. :-( Oh well.

Kicking Off the Exam Week

2008-05-30T08:00:00.000-05:00

Exam week has officially started. Today is going to be the easiest of all of the exam days. First off, a study hall in 2nd period, which is English for me. We're also cleaning out lockers then. After that, it's off to my first period webmastering exam, after a ten minute break / passing period. That exam should be a piece of cake. Yesterday we did a practice exam, which I easily finished in 45 minutes. If the real thing takes just as long, I'll be done before even half of the allotted time (two hours) has elapsed.

Yesterday I gave that persuasion speech in English. Truth be told, it could have been better, but it could have gone far, far worse. I apparently did a good job in hiding my nervousness. Best of all, I got the class to participate in my speech. I had one spot where they had to close their eyes and imagine a scene in nature, and two places where I asked for a show of hands. I couldn't see if anyone actually closed their eyes, but I got some major participation on the show of hands instances. I'm overall very pleased with how it went. I'm excited to see what I got on it.

I'm in the band hall writing this, by the way. I'm using my beloved FLY Pen.

Less than a week before my first-ever Senior High School marching practice! I'm so excited for that! The best part is that we won't have to re-learn marching fundamentals because there won't be any freshmen! Yes! We can do just a brief review and then jump right into music and all of the shows! Woo hoo!

Oh the wonders you can find on YouTube!

2008-05-29T00:24:00.006-05:00

YouTube videos range from cute and sweet to silly and funny to informational and intelligent. I stumbled upon this one at random. It's two otters holding hands! Too cute to pass up!

Awww! That's just too cute!
If you want to view the video on YouTube, the URL is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epUk3T2Kfno.

Funniest thing I've seen in a while...

2008-05-28T21:27:00.002-05:00

A friend of mine emailed me yesterday night. Her Grandma sent her this, and she sent it to me. It gave me quite a laugh. See if it doesn't do the same for you!

TEACHER ARRESTED.. - A public school teacher was arrested today at John F. Kennedy International Airport as he attempted to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a set square, a slide rule, and a calculator. At a morning press conference, the Attorney General said he believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-gebra movement. He did not identify the man, who has been charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.
"Al-gebra is a problem for us," the Attorney General said. "They desire solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in a search of absolute value. They use secret code names like 'x' and 'y' and refer to themselves as 'unknowns,' but we have determined they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, 'There are 3 sides to every triangle.' When asked to comment on the arrest, Senator Ted Kennedy said, "If God had wanted us to have better Weapons of Math Instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes."

White House aides told reporters they could not recall a more intelligent or profound statement by the Senator.

Everyone to whom I showed it at school thought it was just as funny as I thought it was. Though, of course, nothing can match the short funny things my band directors say daily! ;-)

Beading Makes a Comeback

2008-05-24T15:16:00.005-05:00

At last, Dead week has arrived and homework finally dies down for the year. I've finally gotten the chance to finish a couple beading projects I started months ago, as well as crank out a couple new ones.

Beading has apparently made a huge comeback, and I can easily see why! You could make a bracelet or something that looks just as nice as, or even nicer than, one you might find at a store - for a fraction of the price! It can also save money if, say, a clasp is broken or you want a different style clasp than one that already exists. My mom had this gold necklace with a clasp that was hard for her to open. She was on the verge of taking it to a jewelers to get them to change the clasp when I offered to do it for her, all she had to do was pick out the clasp she wanted at the local Michael's! How much did the package of three clasps cost? Probably around three bucks. How much might it have cost to have it repaired at the jewelers? Maybe more like ten!

This first set was inspired by a picture I saw on the internet. If any of you have seen those tiny 3-D origami stars you fold out of strips of paper, you'll recognize them in this piece. For the rest of you, here is a hand-full of some I made with gold-colored paper a while back. This picture was taken with the built-in iSight on my MacBook, so it's a much better quality than other pictures I've posted.
I had made some extremely tiny ones to fit in a vial of some sort, and the vial landed in my hands while I was in France this past summer. We took a trip to a perfume factory and they gave us all samples. The vial was the bottle that had contained the sample, which I had emptied out. I drilled a hole in the top so I could thread wire into it to make it a pendant. These are some shots of the finished product, taken with my phone camera.

A view of the whole necklace

Close-up of the vial with the stars inside.

I used one of the remaining two gold clasps on the necklace (the clasps leftover from fixing Mom's necklace). After that was finished, I quickly conjured up a matching bracelet.

It's kind of hard to tell because of the poor quality, but all the wire is gold like the necklace, trust me.

When that had been completed, I decided to make a new cell charm for my cell phone, since the one I used to use broke a while back. This was the result.

Cell charm by itself. Another phone camera picture, so it's rather blurry

Here's the charm on the cell phone. This picture was also taken with the built-in iSight camera on my MacBook

These are just a few of the things I've created. If I had to choose my favorite piece, it would be the earrings I made to look like miniature clarinets. At a glance they look like the real thing. So much, in fact, that all of my band friends recognized it as a clarinet. Just another way for me to channel my creativity and imagination into something useful!

Strokes of Luck

2008-05-24T02:00:00.006-05:00

This post will cover three days, since they're all intertwined.

Written on May 22, 2008...

Luck seems to have taken a liking to me recently. Ever since Six Flags I've had nothing but good happen to me. Not quite sure what I did to deserve it, but I sure am enjoying it all. Here are just a few of the things that have happened.

The week immediately after Six Flags Saturday, absolutely nothing happened that was bad. Each little happening was a stroke of good luck. I scored a 95 on a French quiz when I should have gotten a 90. My English grade remained higher than usual throughout the whole week, and my E-Commerce project turned out outstanding. There were other little tidbits along the way, but that's just a few of the highlights.

Then, there was the Band Picnic on Saturday. That turned out to be a fun day. And purposefully forgetting my Daytrana patch worked out well. Then this Monday was the award ceremony, and though I didn't manage to score the Webmastering award, I sure did swipe one for World History with little effort. Tuesday was the concert, which went well. Wednesday we got yearbooks, the 8th graders from my old middle school came, and I made plans to see Indiana Jones on Memorial Day (looking forward to that). Today my lesson went far better than planned. Despite being pretty unprepared, I cruised through quite well.

Written on May 23, 2008 from the FLY Pen...

2:45 pm
Seeing as I've finished the Chemistry review - or at least, the part that Was due today - and I can't find my pencil to be able to work on my World History review, I'm writing another entry. This time, I'm writing from Chemistry, again on the FLY pen. I'm the only one in the whole class who was already finished. I'll get to be the explainer person today. But that is fine; I'm glad to help.

We've all gotten yearbooks now. Today was the school-wide signing party during all the study-halls.

This has been yet another great week. The concert went really well on Tuesday. Rush was the most fun I ever had while playing. The performance was the best run of Rush I've had yet!

This weekend is going to be the busiest three-day weekend this year. Starting right after school today, I have an extended Crochet for the Cure club meeting-a full 30 minutes extra! Then, tomorrow, the club has its '"big" end-of-the-year party at the recreation center by my old middle school. Mom also plans on taking me to the Toyota and Ford dealerships to look at cars. If only Ford Mustangs were in the price range, I would so get one! Then, on Sunday, I get to see the Dallas Wind Symphony perform patriotic music for Memorial Day Weekend. I've never seen or heard them play, so I'm excited about that. Memorial Day, I get to see Indiana Jones.

The class is getting restless. I'll have to stop soon.

Entries should become more and more frequent with the arrival of Exam Review Week - aka Dead Week - and the end of the year inches ever closer.

Five minutes left now, so I'll wrap this one up here.

Early Morning on May 24, 2008...

Another great day! I don't know if it's luck or a guardian angel or what but whatever it is it has found its way into my pink rabbit's foot and has given me nothing but sugar.

The annual yearbook signing party, which takes place throughout the lunch/ study-hall periods, was today. Luckily, I have band 4th period, so I've had absolutely nothing to do but stare at the floor since the concert (we haven't done any playing since then, aside from lessons). So today I was bored for the first study-hall period after lunch (B-Lunch). Then, five minutes into C-Lunch, surprise! My boredom bubble was burst when my webmastering friend pops in the band hall for a visit. Happy to have something to do (I didn't feel like blogging because there wasn't really anything to write at that time), I hopped up and followed him outside to the hall. He had brought a friend with him who wasn't in band, so we had to sit in the hallway just outside the band hall doors. The three of us sat and talked in the hall for the entire study-hall period. When that period was over, they left to go back to class, and my signing period began. A bit bored and with few other band members outside of Wind Ensemble, I wandered and found three or four people that I knew, got signatures, and continued wandering. When that period was over, I was off to chemistry, where I wrote the above FLY Pen entry.

The crochet meeting was fun today, and I finally managed to catch Battle 360 on the History Channel for the first time. The first fifteen minutes, unfortunately, I missed because my brother and his friend had the TV with the Wii and the only other TV wasn't receiving the signal. I sat whimpering in front of it before finally booting my brother and his friend off the TV they were using, and caught the rest of the show. I guess it was okay, but I still vote Dogfights #1 (after Mythbusters of course).

Speaking of which, I went and got two episodes of Dogfights off of iTunes because I hadn't seen the show in so long. I've watched one of them, and might watch the other one tonight even though it's 2:00 in the morning (hey, my brother and his friend are still up - I can hear them through the wall - so why not?). The one I've watched was the one on one of the longest dogfights in history (between one F8 Crusader - a crippled one by the end of the fight - and four MiG-17's) at 10 minutes long. The second one is on three memorable battles involving P-51 Mustangs.

I'm going to watch those now before it gets too much later. I'll end this one here.

In for Chemistry

2008-05-19T08:00:00.001-05:00

I'm in early again, this time to get a chemistry assignment finished. After that I hope to make it into web to fix up the Flash animation I started at home. One of my main tasks there will be to change the button's play action to a go to action. But, should the door be locked, I'm heading for my second home: the band hall (off course).

Yesterday was our second annual band picnic. It was fun. I played Frisbee with a few of my band friends, and got some sun while I was at it! ;-)

It's almost 8:15, so I must stop here. Short entry today.

Flash Blues

2008-05-17T11:41:00.002-05:00

Thanks to webmastering, I've become addicted to Flash. So much, in fact, that I've ended up passing my teacher's abilities! The same thing happened when my dad introduced me to Photoshop. But I probably won't be passing my webmastering friend any time soon. He's had an entire year's more experience than me!

Both of us have been eying Flash CS3, wishing it were cheaper than $700 (gasp). Maybe when CS4 comes out that price tag will come down just enough to not make such a huge dent in my savings. I could afford it right now, but the damage such a purchase would do to my savings is greater than I wish to do at the moment.

Nonetheless, Flash is addicting program. If you ask me, half the fun is working around mistakes. For example, the other day I was fixing up my flash NavBar for our webmastering project. All of a sudden it started going haywire, continuously loading the home page. I went in to try to fix it, and the error was one of those "Oh, now I feel stupid" kind of mistakes: I had accidentally put an action on the frame itself, rather than on the actual actual button! That gave my teacher, web friend, and me a good laugh that day.

I'm on the pen again, just FYI.

But anyways, back on topic. I've eyed older versions of flash, namely Flash 8 Professional - a version that came out before Adobe bought Macromedia and the very same version we use at school for webmastering. And like I said before, half the fun of the program is its glitchiness, if that's a word. Anyways, it might not be found on any of the big-name online stores, but it's certainly cheaper! Even still, I'll probably wait for the price of Flash CS3 to go down or for my savings to grow enough to withstand such a blow., whichever one happens first.

Now that all of the major web projects are out of the way, I'll finally get the chance to do some flash animations on my own. I might try to finish the marching stick figure, but I'll probably try to take up my previously abandoned task of an animated letter. I started that back when I downloaded a demo version of Flash CS. I got annoyed with the fact that it defaulted to Action Script 3. 0, thus preventing me from putting an action on a button, but the program wasn't as glitchy as Flash 8 Professional. Nonetheless, it still has a mind of its own. I'll tell you, animating an envelope opening is quite possibly the most amusing task I've taken up. Perhaps I'll post the finished product when it's done.

But if you really want to see an intricate Flash animation, check out the Vandoren website. I'm telling you, that must have taken months to do! Now, the animator vs. animation series, that's tedious in a whole different respect!

Early Morning

2008-05-13T08:00:00.000-05:00

This moring, I'm in for webmastering to finish my project early so that I can get the flash intro up and working. I'm in the cafeteria now, so I'm on the pen and journal again.

I'm still tired, dazed, and giddy from Saturday, and still a bit blissful from yesterday. Nonetheless, I'm ready to work as diligently as possible this morning.

I'll be in tomorrow morning as well, regardless of whether I'm finished or not, so I'll get to write then as well.

I'm surprising myself with how much I've been able to keep this blog updated. And again, I can thank the pen for that. I'm really looking forward to finding out how useful this pen will prove to be next year.

Paradise in Six Flags

2008-05-12T19:21:00.004-05:00

-Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 9:00 am-
WOO HOO! I'm on the bus waiting to depart for Six flags. This is going to be so much fun! I can't wait. This is in celebration of what a great year this has been.

We're off! WOOT! Or not...

I think I'm going to try to ride the Mine Train, Judge Roy Scream, and other rides. It sure is a good thing I put my patch on this morning, because if I hadn't I'd be going any right now from over-stimulus. I'm a bit on the hyper side at the moment.

WOO HOO! We're finally going! Let's make this the best time I ever had!

I'm sure everyone has noticed that I changed the layout a day early. I went ahead and changed it to honor the weekend as a whole. I also changed up the favion to be a pink Blogger icon. Thank you webmastering class and Photoshop know-how!

It looks a bit cloudy. It's supposed to be hot today, but it looks a bit more like a little cooler and possibly some rain. Let's hope not. I'll tell you what the weather was like either while in the park or after we're back on the bus.

Oh, fooey! I should've asked my brother for his video camera so I could take some pictures and videos of the day and post them! Oh well. My phone will have to do. I'll try to get some funny videos of today. That phone has a decent camera, so I should be able to get some good stuff. All of the pictures on this blog have been from my phone so far.

One thing is for sure, I plan on riding a ton of rides today. The orchestra is on this trip with us as well, so that's cool.

Hey! We're in Carrolton! I was born in this city!

These clouds seem pretty persistent. I'm taking a picture.

Let's hope those clear up later.

Now we're in Irving. This bus is so bouncy, I don't know if this pen can read my hand writing! Hehe...

This pen is making Blogging so much easier. It's making a lot of stuff easier. I predict it will only become more useful as I begin to get into harder classes as well as on in to college.

I'm signing off for now, I'll write more later.

-Monday, May 12, 2008-
Okay, so I didn't get the chance on the bus or while in the park. That was a BLAST! I've never had a more fun day than Saturday EVER! Trust me, that's truly saying something.

I didn't get the chance to upload this entry the day of because I was tired by the time I got home (you'll see why later). Here's what happened.

When I got there, I had to stick with one of my friends from lunch, as I was asked to hold onto his iPod for him. There's the first person in the group. Then, not wanting to be just a twosome, I suggested one of my friends from webmastering. He was already in a group, but offered to add us to his group. That made us a group of six or seven.

Once we entered the park, half of the group decided to go to a different ride first than what we had originally planned (the Titan), so we split up. Then I was left with my friend from the bus and from webmastering, making a total of three. My friend from webmastering ended up being our map, as he knew the park better than the rest of the group. He led us to the Titan, where, after going through a mess to get my bag in one of the one-use lockers and waiting for a while, we rode the Titan.

After that, we ran for Mr. Freeze. That wait was a long time, but it didn't seem like it to me, as I had fun even in the queue lines. Then, right before we were about to enter the loading room, one of the coasters stopped working.

This is a bit confusing to understand until you know how the ride works. In the loading room, there are three tracks: one main one in the center that leads to the rest of the ride, and two loading tracks (one on either side). We were on one side, and the other side wasn't working.

Anyways, they finally got it back up and running again, did two test runs, and started the lines moving again. Then, two loads before we were about to get on, the other side stopped working again. They just gave up on it and brought that one into the "garage," I guess you could call it, and moved everyone on that side to our side. Then we rode the 30-second long ride, ran to check in at 1:00 pm, then ran back to go ride the Batman ride.

The line for the Batman ride was by far the longest. In reality, the wait was probably two hours or more. But to me, it didn't even seem to last more than 45 minutes. Just goes to show you what happens when you put two band members in a room with nothing else to do. The ride was a blast! My friend from webmastering had us all wait the extra few minutes to get the very front, and boy was it worth it! That was the most fun of them all, both the two-hour wait talking about band and school and stuff, and the ride itself. The Batman was one of those floorless rides where your feet dangle.

On the ride back on the bus, I think I fell asleep for part of the ride. I sat with my friend from webmastering, since he was giving me a ride home. But for the most part, the rest of the day was uneventful.

If I could, I'd make every Saturday like the trip to Six Flags. My dad said he might take us over the summer, but I'm not sure how we'd work out riding the Titan with my brother being scared to go on anything more intense than the Batman (and even then, we'd have to do that one first so he doesn't chicken out). I might have to get a friend to take me who wouldn't be afraid of doing all of the big coasters.

Oh well, such is life: you win some, and then you loose some. But Saturday, I definitely won not just "some", but "all"!

Happy Mother's Day!

2008-05-11T09:00:00.003-05:00

Today's post is short, as I'm sure most everyone has plans for Mother's Day.

In case no one noticed, I've updated the site with a different template to commemorate today's special holiday. Tomorrow the site will be back to the usual style. The favicon will be temporarily disabled as well, and that too will be fixed when I change the template back.

Happy Mother's Day!

~Wolfie

WE GOT SWEEPSTAKES!!!

2008-05-09T21:38:00.008-05:00

I'm on the pen again. This time, I'm on a charter bus on my way to a band competition. I just finished my French homework, so I have nothing else to do.

This festival is in Denton, so it will probably be a long ride. Our charter bus today is red, and seems fairly new. I always like riding in charter buses for band events.

Tomorrow, we bet to go to Six Flags as a band. That'll be fun. I'm so excited for all of it. I wish we could've played at North Texas instead of Guyer HS. That would've been so cool. The have one of the top music schools in the nation, and the top in the state.

Anyways, today, A-Lunch was crazy! On a normal day, it's fairly crowded. But today, because of the festival, they stuffed the entire band in there in addition to the normal crowd! It was the best lunch ever!

This ride reminds me of the San Antonio trip last year. That was a fun trip.

I'll write more after our performance. I'm going to do some games on the FLY Game Pad.

Later...

WOW! WHAT a performance! I have never made it through the program without sittin out for at least 30% of the time during the first two pieces until today! It's like marching season again! Even better, the Wind Ensemble scored straight ones (aka sweepstakes), which basically means we did outstanding. And, on top of all of that, our Wind Ensemble was the best band there today, so we got a HUGE trophy! Talk about a great way to top off my final contest at the junior high school!

Reporter: So, what are you guys going to do now?
Band Member: WE'RE GOING TO SIX FLAGS!
Rest of the Band: YEAH! WOO! (continues to cheer)

Only one task remains: the Spring Concert. That, my friend, is going to be one wild and crazy ride!

But yeah, I'm very pleased with how I played. Once again, I couldn't stop smiling at how clear, resonant, rich, and pure my sound was. I've really grown and matured and improved as both a musician and a clarinetist. Life is good!

Later...

That was all on the pen (minus the image, I added that just now). I can't get it uploaded, but I drew a quarter note with a smiley face in the note head. I think what I've written sums it all up for today. I have to rest up for tomorrow's action.

I Can Draw a Circle!

2008-05-05T21:38:00.004-05:00

Random title, right? I thought so too. So is the topic of this post.

I was doing my geometry homework and I come across a problem where I have to find possible points of tangency on two circles that exist on a grid. This was the text of the problem:

Circle M has center M(2,2) and radius 3. Circle N has center N(-3,2) and is tangent to circle M. Find the coordinates of the possible points of tangency of the two circles.

So, I sketch a crude graph on my paper on which to plot the circles. I finish the drawing and then wonder to myself, "I wonder if there's a way to do this on my graphing calculator." I run upstairs and pull out my graphing calculator and begin messing around to find the draw function (it's a TI-83 Plus, by the way). Confused as to how it worked, I cruised the internet to find the manual for download, downloaded the .pdf file, and "flipped" to the page of interest. This is what my graph looked like when I had finished the circles.
Yay! I drew not just one, but THREE circles! Who knew a calculator could be so amusing! It kind of makes me wonder what else this calculator can do.

Plans for the Future

2008-05-04T13:20:00.000-05:00

With my sophomore year coming to a close, planning for the future is becoming more and more important. These are my plans so far. I've given careful thought, and, needless to say, they've changed countless times!

I'll begin with those that have already been executed (classes I took last year and those I'm taking this year). Last year, for required courses, I took English I Honors, Algebra I Honors, World History, and Biology. Then, for my other classes, I chose band (naturally!) and French 2 Honors as full-year classes, then two semester-classes, Keyboarding and Health. Then this year, I continued in honors classes for English II, French 3, and Geometry I. I remained in regulars for World History and Chemistry I. For electives, I continued band (of course!), French 3 Honors as I mentioned before, and Webmastering (a fun class, I might add).

Next year, I plan on continuing with honors in English III Honors and Algebra II Honors, as well as adding Honors Physics I to the list of honors courses. I'll also be adding some AP courses: French 4 AP and Computer Science AP. Band will be a part of that schedule, as always, and US History will remain regulars, just in case I need a break from the many difficult classes I'll be taking. But I'm not too worried about that. If time allows, I also plan on taking Pre-Calculus over the eSchool, which is like an online classroom maintained by the school district. Although the counselors discourage taking Pre-Cal. at the same time as Honors Algebra II, I'm pretty sure I can handle it, being the math expert I am. In addition to that, I'll be taking advantage of this program at the senior high school called Zero Hour. It basically means that I'll get to start school an hour earlier, and get out an hour earlier. My main reason for choosing this option is so that I can get a head start on homework. That extra time will be a grave advantage, especially for marching season when we will have rehearsals after school rather than before like it is at the junior high school. That way, I can start homework right after I get out of school and work on it for an hour before I have to get back to the campus for marching practice or whatever. I might also use that time to take the Pre-Calculus class over the eSchool, but that would require me to either bring my laptop to school or have access to computers at the recreation center. Another advantage to the senior high school is off-campus lunch. I do plan on taking advantage of it, but I plan on avoiding the crazy mad-rush off the campus to get lunch by instead walking over to the recreation center that's next door to the middle school. There, I can leisurely eat lunch comfortably, and maybe start some homework then, or play games if I have none by then. I'm excited for next year, with all of these extra things to do!

My senior year will hopefully be even easier. I'll be on my last year of English in English IV Honors, as well as my last year of social studies in Economics (or something like that). I'll still be in band, hopefully as one of the drum majors for marching season, and I'll be in my final year of French at the highest level offered in the district: French V AP. Going past the graduation requirements, I'll be doing either Calculus AP or Honors Pre-Calculus - depending on whether I end up being able to do Pre-Cal next year - and two science classes: Environmental Systems AP and Physics AP. That still leaves my last period open, which I'll fill with either Oceanography and Meteorology or Senior Release. Senior Release will allow me to get out of school for my last period if I've already fulfilled my graduation requirements. That combined with Zero Hour would give me a full two hours before any after-school activities to get started on homework. And I'll probably need all the time I can get if I take as many advanced classes as I will be taking.

Ultimately, all of this leads to acceptance into the University of Colorado at Boulder. I actually happened upon the university on accident when I was looking at the overview for the aerospace engineering major on the College Board website. Many of the first-hand accounts on the major came from students attending that college, commenting on the hands-on aspect of the curriculum. Not only that, judging on pictures on the university website, the campus looks like a beautiful place for studying, not to mention that I'd actually get to see snow every year! I'm planning right now on majoring in one of three engineering fields: Aerospace, Environmental, or Mechanical. All areas of engineering appeal to me in general because they're all problem-solving intensive, a predominant characteristic in the proofs that I love so much in Geometry. I seem to have gotten that from my Dad, because he's always trying to conjure up innovative ways to do everyday tasks, and I usually get involved out of pure interest. Of course, I plan on continuing band through college and beyond, so I double-checked for marching band and concert band at the school. To my surprise, it turned out that the largest percent of members in the band were majoring in engineering at 30%! I can also see myself taking a trip to ski resorts over the winter breaks while studying there. As far as I can tell, it's the perfect fit.

I'm really looking forward to the future and what it brings, both planned and unplanned. But one thing is for sure: It's going to be a wild ride!

The Smartest Pen Ever!

2008-05-01T20:27:00.002-05:00

So I'm sitting here, bored, in my TAKS room, nothing to do, no one to talk to, stuck here until 1:46 PM. I'm writing this entry with my FLY Fusion Pentop Computer. It's the coolest and smartest pen ever. It can read What you write, translate French and Spanish, help you prepare for a test, and loads more. When I get home today I'll boot up my MacBook, launch VM Ware (an application that allows me to run Windows in a virtual environment right on my trusty Mac), start up Windows, connect this pen to my computer, and load the contents of these pages. From there I can Open them in Word, send them in an email, or whatever. The picture above I drew with the pen and selected it as an image. Even cooler, this pen can play MP3s! You can even download the periodic table onto the pen. From there, just write an element's symbol, atomic number, state of matter, or other characteristics, and the pen gives you the name, atomic number, and other specs! There's also an Essay Coach, Dictionary Thesaurus, Rhyming Dictionary, and countless other applications. I have a feeling this pen is going to be a vital tool for French 4 AP next year. It's an enormous improvement over FLY 1.0!
And now, our TAKS period is about to end. I'll may bye try to continue in English.

Later...
So I didn't get the chance in English, but oh well. Isn't this cool? It's too bad, though, that I couldn't get the images to work right. I'll have to figure that out soon. I love this pen! It's helping me learn the SAVE words (SAT vocabulary that we're quizzed over in school) at a much faster rate than I did last year through mere exposure. The pen is actually making me write the word out. If I'm learning the words quickly that way, then I can be sure that this will help me study for AP French exams, quizzes, and tests next year.

On yesterday's post... I looked over it and thought it far too harsh. I somehow tend to get carried away when I get into a critical mood while I'm writing. But that ability has its advantages. In English, we have to do a project where we have to write a persuasive essay and give a persuasive speech. Luckily, I got the topic I wanted and can most easily be expressive about (therefore making it easier to allow my writing to get carried away), so this project should boost my grade. But I will admit that yesterday I went too far. I've deleted the entry in its entirety, as it violated my original plans and intentions I had when I created this blog.

Back to the pen. It proved to be valuable for my last English essay, which happened to be the essay for our final exam. The assignment was to take the essay we wrote for the Writing TAKS, revise it, retype it, and turn it in.

The Writing TAKS, by the way, is my favorite of all of the portions, especially when we have to write an essay. Many people complain about its vagueness, but I love that aspect. It means I can write about band every time and still be on topic! By being able to write about band, I can really let my voice shine and my writing skills are accentuated.

Anyways, so rather than wait until I had access to my computer at home, I simply used the FLYNotes application on the FLY Fusion pen to record my revised version of the essay. That expedited the completion of the assignment, and I was able to leisurely work on it.

These are a few images of the FLY Fusion pen and its accessories.

The pen is shown here with the first page of the blogging journal. The ballpoint is extended and the pen is on.

This is the journal I'll be using to write blog entries while away from my computer

These are the two journals I have for the pen. The orange one came with the pen in the starter pack, and the blue-green one I ordered to have one dedicated strictly to school assignments.

A close-up of the stickers on the front of every journal. Each journal has a unique sticker that, when tapped with the pen, allows the pen to distinguish one journal from another.

This is what the inside front cover of every spiral looks like. You can see the main controls on the left flap, which include mp3 controls, the menu, as well as the FLYNotes controls. The rest is controls for applications like the scheduler, calculator, and other tools.

This is the Music Studio control panel. You can see the keyboard clearly at the top. The circular disc in the center is a scratch pad. Other controls include recording, rhythm loops, save slots, percussion, instrument selection buttons, and others.

And, of course, the part of the pen that makes all of this interaction possible: the on-board camera. It's located behind the semi-circular window just below the stylus. You have to be sure not to cover this when you write, otherwise the pen has no way to read what you're writing or drawing.

If you want to read more about the coolest pen ever, check out the FLY World website.

Strangest bag of Hershey kisses you ever saw...

2008-04-29T19:27:00.002-05:00

Okay, so after I've finished the stupid and pointless TAKS test today I go to eat my lunch, right? Well, I had put some Hershey kisses (well, hugs to be exact, but you get the point) in my bag for desert. So I pull them out and I'm surprised with some pretty funky-wrapped candies! This is a picture I took when I got home with my phone.

Apologies for the bad quality. Even Photoshop couldn't fix it, or at least I couldn't...

There have been many others. My brother found one that was just a wrapper and flag - no candy! There have been several without flags, and three so far that had two. Five or so had flags that were almost entirely hidden.

Introduction

2008-04-29T17:49:00.001-05:00

With this first entry I'll have some specifics to outline.

Being in high school and in a competitive city in general in terms of grades, GPA, etc., I'll have little time to do entries during the school year. In other words, don't expect a post every day. I'm expecting to be able to do one every week or two for the rest of this school year. Come June I will be able to do more updates with school out of the way. Summer break should bring some interesting events. But once school starts back in August, it'll be back to rare updates. That will be the general pattern for now. And a heads up, the vast majority of these entries will probably relate to band. Anti-band geeks beware.

That concludes the introductory business stuff. I'm expecting to get my first real entry up later today or tomorrow afternoon.