Sydney is over right now and she and Nat are downstairs talking or something. I invited a friend over as well since I'm leaving for Spain soon, and considering I haven't seen her in quite a while and probably won't for quite a while when I get back, I felt obligated to do so. In all honesty, I'd rather spend these last few days alone, but it's all good I s'pose.
Anyway, I'm pretty excited about Spain. Quite a few of my friends are going, as well as Vin. Vin's one of my old friends from middle school, he left after 6th or 7th grade. He's very smart and he's hilarious, but he's a little eccentric--which is part of his charm unless we are talking politics. Upon talking to him about politics fairly recently, he mentioned that Huckabee's policies were the ones he agreed with most out of all of the candidates and former candidates. This was utterly horrifying to me, of course, considering that fat man is the living, walking contradiction of the ideas most important to me. I didn't dare mention that the social policies I most agreed with Gravel's, but I told him that I was very socially liberal and that I was rooting for Obama (who got the nomination recently, YES!). Anyway, despite the stark contrast in our political beliefs, we get along very well and I'm glad he's going to Spain too since I haven't seen him in forever.
Also, just a reminder Nat: don't you dare pinch my butt in Spain. I'll assume you are an old Spaniard man and it won't be pretty.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Summer and finals
Well, it's been a while since I last posted anything here. I prolly don't have any even occasional readers after that depressing fiasco that occupied my last two posts, but I suppose it's nice to talk to myself too, every once in a while. Anyway, it's Summer and I'm ecstatic about it.
A lot of weird crap has been going on recently, in the last week of school that is. There's a mass exodus of teachers this year (about 7 are leaving, including 3 teachers I had). Frankly though, I'm not really upset. There's only one teacher out of those three that I had that're leaving that I liked--my Spanish teacher. She was fabulous. My health and scripture teachers... not so much. My scripture teacher thought I was a godless heathen and my health teacher, well... let's just say he left a not-so-nice parting gift in the answer choices on the multiple choice final. It was weird. Really weird. But I won't get into detail about that, there are other things to talk about and that whole situation was just too strange to explain.
Onto something slightly more interesting, someone hacked onto the school internet system thing and posted a fake honors biology review under the teacher's name. It threw us all off and it was... disastrous. I'm making it sound very petty, but I can assure you it was quite a big deal. The honors bio final was an absolute nightmare concerning it included issues such as the following:
1. We had missed about a week and half of school because of former teacher's death
2. We were being taught then by someone who didn't really seem to know what she was talking about
3. Our final was made up by the regular bio teacher--who didn't know what we had learned and whom we'd never met before
4. Some knucklehead posted a fake review on the school website to throw everyone off on the final
Anyway.... I'm going to Spain next week, so that's exciting. I'm a little worried about it, but it'll be fun.
A lot of weird crap has been going on recently, in the last week of school that is. There's a mass exodus of teachers this year (about 7 are leaving, including 3 teachers I had). Frankly though, I'm not really upset. There's only one teacher out of those three that I had that're leaving that I liked--my Spanish teacher. She was fabulous. My health and scripture teachers... not so much. My scripture teacher thought I was a godless heathen and my health teacher, well... let's just say he left a not-so-nice parting gift in the answer choices on the multiple choice final. It was weird. Really weird. But I won't get into detail about that, there are other things to talk about and that whole situation was just too strange to explain.
Onto something slightly more interesting, someone hacked onto the school internet system thing and posted a fake honors biology review under the teacher's name. It threw us all off and it was... disastrous. I'm making it sound very petty, but I can assure you it was quite a big deal. The honors bio final was an absolute nightmare concerning it included issues such as the following:
1. We had missed about a week and half of school because of former teacher's death
2. We were being taught then by someone who didn't really seem to know what she was talking about
3. Our final was made up by the regular bio teacher--who didn't know what we had learned and whom we'd never met before
4. Some knucklehead posted a fake review on the school website to throw everyone off on the final
Anyway.... I'm going to Spain next week, so that's exciting. I'm a little worried about it, but it'll be fun.
Friday, April 11, 2008
And finally, it's Friday
Well, it's finally Friday. This week went on forever.
Yesterday, we had mass at school in honor of the science teacher, and we got these little colorful striped ribbons (they're the shape of those breast cancer ribbons). It was very sad, and the teachers were all either wiped out or in terrible moods afterwards. The day went by slowly and I had biology right after lunch. The biology room still had the flowers from the lab we had done on Friday, they were sitting on the table wilting. The sign with her name on it was still taped to the door.
We have to finish the work we were supposed to do this week by Monday. It's really distressing, I want to cry every time I touch anything related to biology now. I still have a lot of work to finish. Later yesterday, four of my friends came over to spend the night so we could go to the funeral together this morning. For the most part, we chatted about trivial things, but we couldn't go more than an hour without talking about the incident. This morning, we went to the funeral together. In the beginning it was fine, but towards the end when her family spoke about her, I couldn't force the tears back. I kept sniffing a lot during the service since I was crying and, to top that off, I have a bad cold. After we left the church, I was crying the most of my friends. I don't usually cry, so I think it scared them a bit.
After the service, we went to our old middle school in which my sister still attends. We had today off to go to the funeral, so it was about 2:30 by the time we arrived at our old school. In the car on the way there, my hands were sweating and I felt sick. For once I was nervous to visit my old school, afraid they would ask about what had happened or, to act less nosy, indirectly ask by inquiring about the little ribbons on our blazers. Sure enough, they did.
When we first got there, we greeted our former principal, who congratulated us on all being on high honors. He asked about the ribbons and I said politely "could we maybe not... talk about that?" He asked about it again a few minutes later anyway. Now, Former Principal, I know you mean well, but what exactly do you not understand about "could we not talk about that?"? One of my friends answered "it's for our science teacher" and since my old school tends to gossip quite a lot among the faculty and staff, he understood and proceeded to apologize for the loss. Two other teachers asked about the ribbons. I suggested we start telling people they were merely for decoration, but one of my friends just couldn't keep her mouth shut about the topic. It's fine, I know some people get over things by talking about them like that, but personally there is nothing I despise more right now than talking about that incident with people who don't go to my school.
Yesterday, we had mass at school in honor of the science teacher, and we got these little colorful striped ribbons (they're the shape of those breast cancer ribbons). It was very sad, and the teachers were all either wiped out or in terrible moods afterwards. The day went by slowly and I had biology right after lunch. The biology room still had the flowers from the lab we had done on Friday, they were sitting on the table wilting. The sign with her name on it was still taped to the door.
We have to finish the work we were supposed to do this week by Monday. It's really distressing, I want to cry every time I touch anything related to biology now. I still have a lot of work to finish. Later yesterday, four of my friends came over to spend the night so we could go to the funeral together this morning. For the most part, we chatted about trivial things, but we couldn't go more than an hour without talking about the incident. This morning, we went to the funeral together. In the beginning it was fine, but towards the end when her family spoke about her, I couldn't force the tears back. I kept sniffing a lot during the service since I was crying and, to top that off, I have a bad cold. After we left the church, I was crying the most of my friends. I don't usually cry, so I think it scared them a bit.
After the service, we went to our old middle school in which my sister still attends. We had today off to go to the funeral, so it was about 2:30 by the time we arrived at our old school. In the car on the way there, my hands were sweating and I felt sick. For once I was nervous to visit my old school, afraid they would ask about what had happened or, to act less nosy, indirectly ask by inquiring about the little ribbons on our blazers. Sure enough, they did.
When we first got there, we greeted our former principal, who congratulated us on all being on high honors. He asked about the ribbons and I said politely "could we maybe not... talk about that?" He asked about it again a few minutes later anyway. Now, Former Principal, I know you mean well, but what exactly do you not understand about "could we not talk about that?"? One of my friends answered "it's for our science teacher" and since my old school tends to gossip quite a lot among the faculty and staff, he understood and proceeded to apologize for the loss. Two other teachers asked about the ribbons. I suggested we start telling people they were merely for decoration, but one of my friends just couldn't keep her mouth shut about the topic. It's fine, I know some people get over things by talking about them like that, but personally there is nothing I despise more right now than talking about that incident with people who don't go to my school.
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
This is why I don't believe in Determinism
Today was quite possibly one of the worst days I've ever had. A horrible conclusion to something already so awful.
On Saturday, I had a dream that I was at school in the cafeteria. They announced over the intercom or whatever it is that we all had to go outside. When we were outside, there was a bus, and they said the 9th grade honors biology teacher (one of my teachers) had to leave. We didn't see her, but the bus left soon after we were given the news and everyone burst into tears.
On Monday, it was announced that the biology teacher had died. I was sick that day, but I heard from my mom. They didn't know yet the cause of death. Everyone at school was hysterical according to my friends, who were also very upset. I had a really bad feeling about it all.
Today, my sister (Nat) shadowed. That's when you go to a school you're considering and follow someone for half a day. Today... was not a good day for that. In the morning, we waited thirty minutes longer than usual for class to start because of a meeting the teachers were having. We were told then to go to homeroom. When we sat down and my homeroom teacher entered, he told us that the cause of death was suicide. I think we were all too shocked to do anything, so we just sat there until we had to go to second period.
In second period, honors geometry, we all just sat there for fourty-five minutes. The first fifteen minutes we were all crying, then we just sat there not knowing what to think. Nat sat at the desk behind me doing nothing, I felt terrible for her but I didn't really want to do anything so I just gave her my backpack and told her she could use my laptop.
The next two periods, we did the same thing. We sat there, just thinking about everything in silence, for another two sets of forty five minutes. Lunch time finally came and our friend Matt came over from the boys' school across the street. He kept talking about his biology test. We all wanted him to leave.
And now I'm at home and it's almost time for bed. My pen name on here is coincidentally her first name... I'm going to change it, so don't be too confused. I don't know what to think, still. This is upsetting and it screws up my perception like nothing else. The one group of people I've always trusted more than any other is teachers. They've always been like gods to me--strong, responsible, and untouchable. Now I don't know what I think about anything. And I keep thinking about my dream and feeling really guilty. It feels like I could have done something, if I had only known to take it seriously I could have told someone and maybe this wouldn't have happened. But I'm confused too, and I can't push down the feeling of abandonment that keeps bubbling to the surface whenever I step inside the science building. The last time I saw her was on Friday in the library near the afternoon when she was grading papers. I had taken a makeup test before then, during lunch. She had told me as I was leaving the room after taking the test that I could see her if I needed any help with catching up with science. I wonder if she knew, then, that she wouldn't even be here the next Monday? She was such a nice woman, she was always smiling and so enthusiastic about biology. She was so young too, none of us ever thought something like this would happen. But it did and I know every time I walk into that building again... I'll remember.
On Saturday, I had a dream that I was at school in the cafeteria. They announced over the intercom or whatever it is that we all had to go outside. When we were outside, there was a bus, and they said the 9th grade honors biology teacher (one of my teachers) had to leave. We didn't see her, but the bus left soon after we were given the news and everyone burst into tears.
On Monday, it was announced that the biology teacher had died. I was sick that day, but I heard from my mom. They didn't know yet the cause of death. Everyone at school was hysterical according to my friends, who were also very upset. I had a really bad feeling about it all.
Today, my sister (Nat) shadowed. That's when you go to a school you're considering and follow someone for half a day. Today... was not a good day for that. In the morning, we waited thirty minutes longer than usual for class to start because of a meeting the teachers were having. We were told then to go to homeroom. When we sat down and my homeroom teacher entered, he told us that the cause of death was suicide. I think we were all too shocked to do anything, so we just sat there until we had to go to second period.
In second period, honors geometry, we all just sat there for fourty-five minutes. The first fifteen minutes we were all crying, then we just sat there not knowing what to think. Nat sat at the desk behind me doing nothing, I felt terrible for her but I didn't really want to do anything so I just gave her my backpack and told her she could use my laptop.
The next two periods, we did the same thing. We sat there, just thinking about everything in silence, for another two sets of forty five minutes. Lunch time finally came and our friend Matt came over from the boys' school across the street. He kept talking about his biology test. We all wanted him to leave.
And now I'm at home and it's almost time for bed. My pen name on here is coincidentally her first name... I'm going to change it, so don't be too confused. I don't know what to think, still. This is upsetting and it screws up my perception like nothing else. The one group of people I've always trusted more than any other is teachers. They've always been like gods to me--strong, responsible, and untouchable. Now I don't know what I think about anything. And I keep thinking about my dream and feeling really guilty. It feels like I could have done something, if I had only known to take it seriously I could have told someone and maybe this wouldn't have happened. But I'm confused too, and I can't push down the feeling of abandonment that keeps bubbling to the surface whenever I step inside the science building. The last time I saw her was on Friday in the library near the afternoon when she was grading papers. I had taken a makeup test before then, during lunch. She had told me as I was leaving the room after taking the test that I could see her if I needed any help with catching up with science. I wonder if she knew, then, that she wouldn't even be here the next Monday? She was such a nice woman, she was always smiling and so enthusiastic about biology. She was so young too, none of us ever thought something like this would happen. But it did and I know every time I walk into that building again... I'll remember.
Saturday, February 16, 2008
Typing [almost] solely with one's non-dominant hand is rather tricky it seems
Well... I'm typing this all with my left hand and my right hand index finger only. I got a biopsy the day before yesterday on my right hand middle finger and I'm not supposed to bend it or the stitches will fly off and it'll spurt blood (okay I made up that last part, but it makes sense right?). I had to shave yesterday using just my left hand (which just so happens to be my non-dominant hand) and it was absurdly difficult.
In speech class last week we watched The Color Purple, which was absolutely fascinating. My classmates were rather squicked at the kiss between Shug Avery(sp?) and Celie, which was rather obnoxious but it's to be expected of southern conservative Catholic girls I suppose. I should mention, though, that my poor expectations of what speech class would be like did not manifest themselves. I like the teacher a lot and the class is at times quite interesting, though as expected there is also some of that "all media is propaganda" going on. On Friday, we had a raffle holiday (in which we had to have sold 130 tickets to have off) but the raffle idea is absolutely absurd to me. It's such a scam. Everyone thinks they're expected to sell the tickets to neighbors and random people but honestly now--who would buy raffle tickets from some random little girl? Where I live: no one. The faculty knows this, and therefore secretly expects us to sell all our tickets to our parents. But the thing is--if we're going to be hitting up our relatives anyway, why not just include the $130 in our tuition fee? It's such a hassle.
And I've been absolutely exhausted this whole week. I think I'm going to take a looooong nap today if I can get away with it.
In speech class last week we watched The Color Purple, which was absolutely fascinating. My classmates were rather squicked at the kiss between Shug Avery(sp?) and Celie, which was rather obnoxious but it's to be expected of southern conservative Catholic girls I suppose. I should mention, though, that my poor expectations of what speech class would be like did not manifest themselves. I like the teacher a lot and the class is at times quite interesting, though as expected there is also some of that "all media is propaganda" going on. On Friday, we had a raffle holiday (in which we had to have sold 130 tickets to have off) but the raffle idea is absolutely absurd to me. It's such a scam. Everyone thinks they're expected to sell the tickets to neighbors and random people but honestly now--who would buy raffle tickets from some random little girl? Where I live: no one. The faculty knows this, and therefore secretly expects us to sell all our tickets to our parents. But the thing is--if we're going to be hitting up our relatives anyway, why not just include the $130 in our tuition fee? It's such a hassle.
And I've been absolutely exhausted this whole week. I think I'm going to take a looooong nap today if I can get away with it.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Dear crazy Catholic school: please be more exciting!
Even after all this time, nothing entirely interesting going on right now save for the comments of my crazy homeroom teacher. My homeroom teacher, who I will have all four years of high school, is a conservative man in his 60's of German descent. This week is diversity week and during the mornings and afternoons my school plays music from different cultures on the TV (we have an amateur TV broadcast thing instead of an intercom system or whatever it is). He was joking that they should play Nazi music, and after hearing about a contest for "most authentic native dress" he said he would win if he brought his Nazi armband. I guess he had forgotten there was a Jewish girl in his homeroom...
And because it's diversity week, we had an assembly on Monday. In assembly they played a 20 minute video about the civil rights movement (the theme for this year's diversity week is fighting racism by the way) and then two bishops spoke. After the bishops were done talking, they asked if anyone had any questions. A senior girl stood up and asked "what did the Catholic church think of segregation?" That alone was obnoxious considering her question had already been answered in the video and was really not that hard to guess the answer too anyway, but that was not the end of the very insightful questions my peers had. Two more senior girls then asked, in different wording, the same question. Apparently people in my school need to ask a question not once, but three times before they can fully comprehend the answer.
And because it's diversity week, we had an assembly on Monday. In assembly they played a 20 minute video about the civil rights movement (the theme for this year's diversity week is fighting racism by the way) and then two bishops spoke. After the bishops were done talking, they asked if anyone had any questions. A senior girl stood up and asked "what did the Catholic church think of segregation?" That alone was obnoxious considering her question had already been answered in the video and was really not that hard to guess the answer too anyway, but that was not the end of the very insightful questions my peers had. Two more senior girls then asked, in different wording, the same question. Apparently people in my school need to ask a question not once, but three times before they can fully comprehend the answer.
Monday, January 7, 2008
Substantialicious?
Today was my first day back to school from the holidays. I got to school before all my friends as usual and when they finally showed up we talked about report cards. My parents seemed rather disappointed by my grades, speaking of that, and I was a little displeased to see that. I thought I did just fine. Anyway, they were all "what is this 'high honors' business? It's great by the way, but what does it mean? You're in the top... what percent of your class?" Of course, I had no idea, and neither did my other high honors friends (I'm still not sure what that means actually...).
At lunch my stomach was feeling absolutely dreadful and I decided not to eat anything so as not to further upset it. However, the five dollars in my binder were just too tempting, and when half of lunch passed I asked my friend Malone to get change for the five and get me a Snickers. I'm not sure when they started doing this, but I recently noticed there are little [made-up] words they put on the back of Snickers bars. Today it was "substantialicious" or something of the sort. In any case, it was a terrible thing to eat with an upset stomach, but what can I say? I have no power over my chocolate desires.
Starting today, I am taking "Communication Apps" (some sort of speech class) instead of Open Lab (which is basically study hall). It seems interesting enough, but a little cliche. It's the sort of propaganda class in which they repeatedly tell you (in a variety of different ways) that:
1. You are a mean person and you need to change (because all high school girls are mean of course according to adults. Not to sound all hoity toity but I don't really consider myself or many of my friends to be "mean" ....)
2. You listen to bad music that brainwashes you to believe women are all whores and sex objects
3. You are insecure and need to be less influenced by the media
Personally, I don't think I really listen to bad music. I listen to alternative and electronica mostly, which is generally not women-are-sex-toys propaganda. Even so, it's not difficult to identify the "hidden messages" in rap and pop and that sort of thing. I listen to the words in everything thank you, I know what I'm listening to. I'm not being "brainwashed" or "influenced." I can think for myself, I don't need the media to do that for me.
In any case, we all had to do mini introductions. One option was to say what you wanted to do in the future, which is what I chose. I said that I wanted to live in California and be a psychologist. Since my statement wasn't that long, the teacher asked "why California?" (it wasn't the sort of genuinely curious question, but rather an obligatory one because I didn't talk enough). I responded by saying that's where the crazy liberals were of course, and she laughed asking if I wanted to "cure them." I shifted my eyes nervously, seeing this was not going to be a very good start, and stated that actually, I was also a crazy liberal. It was all rather awkward.
At lunch my stomach was feeling absolutely dreadful and I decided not to eat anything so as not to further upset it. However, the five dollars in my binder were just too tempting, and when half of lunch passed I asked my friend Malone to get change for the five and get me a Snickers. I'm not sure when they started doing this, but I recently noticed there are little [made-up] words they put on the back of Snickers bars. Today it was "substantialicious" or something of the sort. In any case, it was a terrible thing to eat with an upset stomach, but what can I say? I have no power over my chocolate desires.
Starting today, I am taking "Communication Apps" (some sort of speech class) instead of Open Lab (which is basically study hall). It seems interesting enough, but a little cliche. It's the sort of propaganda class in which they repeatedly tell you (in a variety of different ways) that:
1. You are a mean person and you need to change (because all high school girls are mean of course according to adults. Not to sound all hoity toity but I don't really consider myself or many of my friends to be "mean" ....)
2. You listen to bad music that brainwashes you to believe women are all whores and sex objects
3. You are insecure and need to be less influenced by the media
Personally, I don't think I really listen to bad music. I listen to alternative and electronica mostly, which is generally not women-are-sex-toys propaganda. Even so, it's not difficult to identify the "hidden messages" in rap and pop and that sort of thing. I listen to the words in everything thank you, I know what I'm listening to. I'm not being "brainwashed" or "influenced." I can think for myself, I don't need the media to do that for me.
In any case, we all had to do mini introductions. One option was to say what you wanted to do in the future, which is what I chose. I said that I wanted to live in California and be a psychologist. Since my statement wasn't that long, the teacher asked "why California?" (it wasn't the sort of genuinely curious question, but rather an obligatory one because I didn't talk enough). I responded by saying that's where the crazy liberals were of course, and she laughed asking if I wanted to "cure them." I shifted my eyes nervously, seeing this was not going to be a very good start, and stated that actually, I was also a crazy liberal. It was all rather awkward.
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