My Blogging Year

As a final hurrah on the blog, we've been assigned to reflect on our blogging journey. 
So I started the year as an ignorant, nerdy girl who brushed the curls out of her hair, played some mediocre trumpet, and didn't have a social life. Boy, has that changed. Isn't it interesting how much you can discover about yourself over the course of less than nine months? I'm not anything like I was all that time ago. 
Back in August and September, I was finishing out my first and awesome summer of marching band. I knew I would be doing a blog, though in June I had wanted to write about Star Wars and Seabiscuit, a dreadful combined topic. But one day in September, something changed. Since I had basically spent each day of my summer around a bunch of upper classmen (the marching band), I wanted to be different. I didn't feel like being that awkward, completely introverted person I had been for the previous 8 years of my existence. It wasn't going to work anymore. So I started to change.
I went from silent to mildly quiet. I let my hair dry in its natural beachy waves, because it just turned into a frizzy mess when I tried to brush it. I stopped being so obsessive about Star Wars. I grew closer to my friends in my free time, instead of spending it reading at home. I practiced trumpet so I could actually be good at it. I amassed a library of music I love and became opinionated about what I listened to and when. I started thinking more about my social life, and how I could be a more interesting person. I tried to be more friendly, and not snap at people when they said silly things. It was certainly an interesting time, and, along with me, this blog's changed through the year. Now, coming out of the transition period, I can look back and say, "...Wow. I'm glad I am who I am now." I am sophisticated! And I will continue to become more so. 
At first, if you don't remember, I said that I would be blogging about, "My experiences in band. What we do in band. What happened last night at band. What we're doing tomorrow in band. What's happening next marching season." I think that was because I watched my friends blog about band; mainly Danielle, she was the other one with a band-themed blog.
...
It didn't turn out like that, I can tell you. 19 of my 44 posts have been about band (that's less than half). 3 of the other 25 were about horses, 3 were general advice, 14 about goings-on in my life, and the remaining 5 were on random opinions and dance. 
It turns out that this is actually a much better mix of posts and subjects than solid band. I learned that if you're running a simple 'about my life' blog like me, it's hard- nearly impossible- to stick to a single subject. You have to put variety into your writing, just like in a novel. When you write a story, you can't repeat yourself over and over and over again. You've got to make it interesting in some way. And so now, I know not to mono-blog. That is to say, don't be such an obsessive band geek that that's all you talk about. It won't be fun for your audience. 
So that's where I started and what I learned. And now I know how to actually blog successfully. I know that once I'm done with high school, I'll be keeping a blog for sure. It helps me to write often like this... so in the end, I can thank my English teacher for giving me more work instead of saying, "Oh, blogging is such a drag" because it was helpful, and, dare I say... made the year more fun. So thanks.

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Aaaaaand, we're at the end. It honest-to-gosh looks like this will be the last post of the year. :( I plan to be back periodically next year, but since I don't have an obligation to fill (I won't be getting graded on it), it will probably be longer between posts. Just a fair warning. But thanks for reading this year. It was nice of you, and maybe you learned something about me because I'm an awful lot more extroverted here than in real life.
Now, to wrap up, I thought I'd make an album of the year in photos and drawings from my early posts and such. 
See you as a sophomore, 
Emma (the tried-and-true band geek, smart person, introverted trumpet girl, etc.)

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2015-2016 in Photos

In the beginning...

Triple-Crown conquerer
http://www.breyerhorses.com/

Forever summer, forever marching band.

I CAN DRAW... only horses.

Yes, you are a teenager. You must do work.
http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/

Homecoming. Coming, happening, gone!

HAWAII, that's where.

Beautiful.
swivelstone.deviantart.com

I <3 cars.
http://www.subaru.com/vehicles/brz/index.html

AND MUSIC. SO MUCH MUSIC.

Shoes, in their respective positions, on their respective surfaces...

Reel pumps/dance shoes on dance floor

Marching shoes on concrete (albeit w/out black socks...oops)

More commonplace shoes on gravel driveway.

Oh yea, that thing...

Yeet.
nhwn.wordpress.com

My life, right there.

February somethingth, à la Band Fundraiser
http://www.pcbands.net/

The sky is blue, of course. I took this. I HAVE SKILLZ.

Congrats, baby.
www.thoroughbreddailynews.com

Luv it.
bvso.org

And here we go again. 

To be continued! Thanks again, everybody. More later. :)

Still sitting on the slowly emptying beach, we watched the sunset. It was warm, cold, sweet and bitter at the same time. I had never lived more than in the past weeks, and here I was watching it come to an end. 

“Not a bad time, was it?” he asked me, studying the patterns in the surf. 

I looked up towards the sky, smiling to myself, and thought for a moment. 

“Certainly not. Went fast, but I’ll never forget it.”

By then we were alone on that beautiful stretch of Outrigger Beach. The stars were coming out. 

He sighed and adjusted his aviator sunglasses.

“I kind of wish we could live it all again. I haven’t felt that… alive… before in my life.”

I ran my tongue over my teeth and turned to smile at him, then spoke again.

“You voice my thoughts- but, listen. Every good thing ends- like this day we’re watching now- and then it begins again. A new sunrise; a new week; a new year. Everything, believe it or not, will begin again. So really… just wait, and it’ll start again for you.”

--From my unnamed, unfinished NaNoWriMo novel

------------------------------

Am Procrastinator

... like many of my fellow teenagers. On Tuesday I came home, looked at my to-do list, and wasted two hours doing not-homework. Mostly I'm a procrastinator about homework, which I get done eventually. I'll want to practice music but not do homework, so I try to do homework first and might get some busy work done, and then it's either dinner or time to practice, and then after dinner I'll get some more stuff done. That's at least how it usually goes.
But yesterday I felt like doing nothing that was assigned. I studied for my two tests I had today, but other than that I decided not to get a head start on any actual WORK for the week. I practiced nearly right after getting home, and read a book for English, and otherwise browsed through my files because I was bored. I was basically like:

From here

And then I went out to our music room to practice instead. 
Here's the rough process:

By me

The funny thing is, it isn't always like this. There are days where I get lots of stuff done. Take yesterday, for example. Yesterday I came home, walked up and down the hill up to our driveway three times, came in, did my math homework, cooked dinner because my mom told me to, practiced, and got to bed at 9:00, my goal time. I haven't had an efficient day like that in a while, but it was nice, so I'm trying to do it more consistently. 
Other than me trying to be proactive, there are only 25 days of school left! Mind you, I've got to pass finals and an AP test in those 25 days, but before those 25 days are past, marching band starts! At this point I think it's only about 3 weeks until it starts, so now I actually have some motivation. But look at the weather for the next week!

From Le Weather Channel 

This is alarming. It'll be May on Sunday, and if this carries on much longer we'll be wearing jeans and marching in the rain. This- please believe me- is miserable. It also spoils our plumes and makes them look like wet chickens (mind you, I haven't seen that happen, but Mr. Hughes claims it's true). Although, I have a suspicion that before the season starts, however, it will be warm and sunny again. Funny how quickly the weather can change from end-of-winter to super-dry summer. I suppose we shall see what we shall see.
In other news, my dad announced to me that he may like to buy the new iPhone when it comes out in November, so I'm trying to write up a case file to convince my mother to let me have the old iPhone. I asked for one before and been turned down; my dad claims that she doesn't want to just give me an iPhone. I took that to mean that I would have to earn money for it. And let's be honest: I'll probably procrastinate on that, too, and remember the day my dad goes to the store to get the new phone. Oh WELL. :)

Aftermath of a Band Trip

Yay music.

I just barely came out of it. The aftermath, that is. The band trip itself was last Wednesday. I was extremely grateful that it wasn't quarterfinals week. But you're probably wondering what this band trip was about? Well, that's real important, that part is. It was region concert band!!!
To translate, region concert band means all the high school bands in the region (there are boundaries, I'm not sure where ours fall) come to a single school and play 3 pieces of music for a panel of 3 judges. Scores rank from 1 to 5, with 1's being the best and 5's being... well, I don't want to talk (or think) about that. But to qualify for state concert band, which is over a weekend in May, you have to get at least two straight 1's and the rest 1 minuses (or more ones). We weren't sure what our competition would be like, but we prepared zealously in the weeks beforehand. We had a well-recieved prep concert the week before April break, so confidence levels were running high. To add to that, Mr. Taylor confided in us that he thought we had an actual chance at beating the Wind Ensemble. Amazing! So of course we all expected great things- from ourselves and each other. 
Wednesday wasn't a particularly important day at school itself, aside from normal classes. It was boringly cloudy with random sunbreaks. It was a red day, so that meant that we did have band class the day of the competition- er, festival. Whatever. So I went to French, Ceramics, Band, and Geography. French was very normally boring, Ceramics relaxing (I was working on the potter's wheel), Band high-intensity, and Geography mildly stressful (it's an AP class). All through the morning and afternoon, I had my mind on my first traveling band trip. Yes, this was my first time spending a significant amount of time on the infamous band bus *dun dun duuuuun*. I have nothing much to say about the bus ride except that it was quite fun; but what happens on the band bus really does stay on the band bus. Believe me, this is for good reason. If you knew what happened on there, you'd be inclined to think that we band geeks are even weirder than you do now. So I won't say a word about it here.
When we got to the school we were playing at, we had spent about an hour and a half on the band bus and had about 2 hours until we were supposed to go on stage. So we went in to the auditorium and sat and watched 2 bands, I think. They were good; I was surprised at how much their numbers varied by section from ours. I suppose it really varies by school/region/whatever. 
The odd thing about this trip is that there was a track meet at the same school at the same time, so people kept running in and out to make it to their events (and some of them ended up coming on stage in their track uniforms and running shoes...). I didn't envy them; it was raining and at one point became a thunderstorm.
After watching the other bands for about 45 minutes, Mr. Taylor, our director, came and got us and said it was time to go get warmed up. So off we went, leaving the Wind Ensemble to watch, we went to get our instruments and filed into the choir room, which was our warm-up spot. We tuned, went through little bits of our music, and kept our instruments warm. Our entire time in there was about half an hour. We went on stage at approximately 5:35, like we were scheduled to. Our overall performance was quite good, with some little times where we slipped out of tune for a second but recovered well. We played March Juno, Lest We Forget, and Into the Storm. I don't remember any of the composers, but they were all fun to play. I'm not honestly sure whether or not we all expected to get to state or not after we played. I think subconsciously we all realized that though it was very good, it may not have been quite enough. So we played our music and then came off stage and put our stuff away, then went back to the auditorium to watch the Wind Ensemble. They were good as always, and of course because of that, we expected them, if not both of us, to get to state. They played an excellent march entitled The Mad Major, something by the famous American composer Copeland, and some sort of "Divertimento" by some composer I don't remember, that was, as said by one of the judges, "a nice diversion from the rest of your band's music, and from the festival in general". I can't tell if it was a good or bad thing, but I enjoyed listening. While we were waiting for them to get set up, for some reason I had an intense straight-face contest with  Danielle and Whitney. I conquered them both. After the Wind Ensemble was done, we all packed up and high tailed it back to our buses, leaving the track and field people in the rain to run the rest of their races. It was still raining on and off, but it was a fairly warm rain so none of us band kids cared much.
After this, it was about 7:00, and we had a long drive ahead of us. Despite that, we had been promised a stop for food. What none of us had counted on was stopping at a gas station. But that's where we stopped and so everyone got out, ran in and swamped the gas station's little store-thingy, buying loads of junk food. It was something of a frenzy that I watched (I refused to buy anything and had brought my own dinner) as my band-mates tore around the little store in an adrenaline-fueled search for sugar. My friends grabbed handfuls of candy and crackers and ice cream and junk while I tagged along and complained about being dragged out of the bus. Eventually they checked out and Ceci picked up the burger she ordered. We ran back to the bus through the misty drizzle, got on, running past Mr. Taylor (who was looking like he had watched this happen many times before) and returning to our original seats. Once there, Emily and Ceci immediately started on their vast quantities of gas station food. I started on my dinner from home. Group by group, people got back on the bus with their food, and started eating. In the first few minutes of waiting to leave, we were all tired and just stuffing our faces with food. As we later learned, we were sitting there for about 15 minutes, just waiting, because some people hadn't followed directions and had crossed the street to McDonald's. So we waited and ate while Chris the tenor sax counted us a bunch of times to make sure we were all accounted for (*Walks past for the first time* "How many times you gonna count now, Chris?" *As he walks past for about the third time* "Wait...how many times have you done it?!" *As he walks by again* "OK, WE'RE ALL HERE, STOP COUNTING!!"). Eventually we left, and by that time the sugar had gone to our heads. Yes. We were all very hyper. It was extremely entertaining and fun. It made the whole bus ride feel like it was really short, and it was punctuated with light from a glowing rock that Ceci brought along. 
The next thing I knew we were pulling up to the our own dear high school, ready to go home and get a few hours of sleep before school the next day. We cleaned out the busses, grabbed all our stuff we had left in the dressing rooms, said goodnight, and high-tailed it out of there, now all sugar-crashed from all that junk food. 
And so ended the great adventure that was region concert band, and my first traveling band trip.
I only feel bad for my friend Elaine, who got up at 4:00 a.m. the next morning so she could sit and listen to the zero-hour Varsity jazz practice. 
We've all recovered now though, so it's all good. :)

Quotes to Laugh At

There's a lot of stupid stuff in the world, but thankfully there's a lot of funny things too. Here are some I got from the world around ME. 
As I hear more funny things I'll update this post.

Things I said:

"Well, you don't have to worship the trumpet, especially since you're woodwinds."

*Another trumpet says something weird and my friends hear it* 
"It's a trumpet thing, you wouldn't understand."

*The older trumpets are being obnoxious* 
"See, this is what happens when you bunch together a big group of brass players in one spot."

"I think my feet and marching shoes melted together this morning, and now that whole thing is melting into the astro turf..."

"BANANA PRINT VANS!!!" (Yeah, they exist!)

http://www.vans.com/shop/womens-shoes/bananas-sk8-hi-slim-ballerina-true-white

"Ok, you cannot pack a suitcase just by upending a dresser drawer into it!" (in response to a how-to-pack book)

"Merci pour le chocolate-- WHAT ARE THOSE!?!?!?" (as I see banana-chocolate chip muffins on the countertop)

"No- do not break logic. NOTHING MATTERS BUT MARCHING BAND!!!"

(Typing something and being pestered to type faster)
"I'm a-tryin'! Be patient! We trumpets can't do everything as fast as you!"

Things my parents said:

(Dad) "Those mutes are definitely toilet plungers."
(Me) "No, Dad, they aren't. They're mutes and they were made to be mutes."
(Dad) "Yeah, but they had to have at least been made in a toilet plunger factory."
(Me) "NO, they're made as mutes in a mute factory! Never were they a part of toilet plungers!"
(Dad) *laughs*
(Me) "Dad...kindly don't say that in front of any upperclassmen..."
(Dad) *keeps laughing*

"Will you wipe the dirt off your running shoes please?"

*I'm eating something with my fingers* 
"You won't want to be doing that when you go over to someone's house for dinner- especially if they're a hot brass player!"
*Facedesk* 

"How is it again that you got interested in trumpet? Where'd you get that idea?"
(To be honest I don't know)

"Look at this, I got an Apple watch!" 
(I didn't even have the remotest idea my dad was going to buy one, he just showed up with it one day)

Things teachers said:

"You should be on a yard line or on a yard line or on a yard line or ON A YARD LINE!"

(Me) "I'm getting to the point where it's like, 'More band, more band, more band...'"
(Mr. Hase) "More cowbell."
(Me) "Yep."

*stops the band* "Where're my 3rd trumpets?"
*Has 3rds play their note*
"That was cute. That note needs more. PLAY LOUDER."

*Talking about dating*
(Teacher) "Where would you go, Emma?"
(Me, totally caught unawares) "What? On a date? Uh... I don't know. Marching band?!"
*Everyone laughs*

*Friend is eating applesauce*
(Mr. Hase) "Is that...corn soup? Corn? What..."
"...No! Applesauce!"
"Oh... it just smells kind of like corn in this corner over here."
"Well, the spoon is made of corn..."
"...Oh. Ok."
*Friend and I share a look*

(Mr. Tanner, orchestra teacher) "How do you prevent your flute from being stolen?"
(Us) "BACH!" (Mr. Tanner jokes that the answer to everything is Bach)
"For once, no- you put it in a clarinet case!"

(Mr. Taylor walks onto director's podium and starts a great split F chord)
"Wow...not many people can just walk up and start a great chord! It's like you're my minions! Well...maybe not. Whatever."

Things my friends said:

"I know everything about the alignment of the stars and you're a Gemini by the way." 

"My jacket smells like the barn..."

"I literally forgot everything over the weekend, so I don't know how to do math now."

(About Romeo and Juliet) "The first time I saw this movie I thought it was fabulous..."
(Me) "HOW COULD YOU."

"Emma, do we have a math final on Friday?!?"

"Ok, am I the only person at this table that thought the prequels to Star Wars were amazing?"
(the other 3 of us) "YES YOU ARE."
(Me) "But it's ok, once you've seen Episode 6 all of that opinion will go away."

*In a text conversation in which we were discussing what we were going to do at each other's weddings, whenever those may be* 
"Yeah, we'll be marching up the aisle and we'll be the wedding escort and everything and we'll play the music and WAIT YOU'RE GOING TO MARRY SAM?!?!?!?!?"
(Me) "... I never said that. I just said I was going to marry another trumpet player, which IS NOT limited to our school!"

(Holding up a dollar to donate, talking to the person holding the donation jar) 
"Hey person! Come hereeeeeee!!!"

"I have a stalker boyfriend!!! Yet he doesn't know I exist."

"This pencil makes weird noises!" (Wha...?)

Things other people in band said:

*After having water bottles thrown at him on the band bus* 
"DO YOU WANT TO FEEL MY FULL WRATH?!?!" 
(answer: no, you don't, it was another trumpet!)

*At pep band* "These shorts aren't even dress code but I'm getting twenty dollars for wearing them anyway!" 
*He says it about 40 more times to everyone in the room before FINALLY talking about something else*

*In a tuning circle at marching band* 
(Section leader Sam) "You guys have really bad contagious tuning..."

*Sectional time*
"Ok, we'll start with--"
*Someone starts laughing subtly because above-speaking person's trumpet had leaky spit valves and leaked spit all over his jeans*
"What?" *Starts looking at himself in the Green Room mirror*
(all of us are laughing now)
*Finally realizes his pants are soaked with spit*
"...Oh. Now, I was saying, let's start with 'Space'..."
*Everyone returns to normal*


Things I overheard:

"We were thinking about stealing Donald Trump's hair and selling it..."

(A right-handed person) "Stuff I write with my left hand is actually better than stuff I write normally..."

"Shaggy turtle? Where?!"

Reasons Why Shakespeare Isn't Worth Your Time

Every 9th grader in the U.S. of A. reads Shakespeare. Most commonly Romeo and Juliet, the stupidest love story in the known universe. My parents read it. My grandparents read it. 
And now it's my turn.
I...highly dislike it. Why would anyone like to read Shakespeare, who manages to create the worst tragedies out of otherwise fine things? I have other reasons why Shakespeare isn't worth reading, too:
1. Over-dramatization. Apparently, hidden deep within the Old English, there's humor, but Shakespeare also over-dramatized. Mostly, he killed off characters mercilessly. On the wall of our English room there's a Shakespeare's death count poster. I think the worst is King Lear or Hamlet, with around 14 dead people by the end. In good stories, people (or other organisms) don't die.
2. Old English. Like, gross. You can't even tell what they mean unless you take the effort to go read on No Fear Shakespeare; and sometimes that's forbidden when we read as a class. Even then it's not an easy read. Well, how are we supposed to write an analytical compare-contrast essay if we can't discuss the meaning and comprehend the story in class?
3. Why on EARTH do connoisseurs of fine English call Shakespeare the 'Noble Bard'? Shakespeare is in NO WAY noble! One is not noble if you make people listen to lute music instead of actual, good music like U2. Also, the plots of his plays certainly aren't noble, they're sad or stupid or just plain out, "Why would anyone want to write or read this junk?!?"

TRUTH, drawn by me.

4. People always quote Shakespeare! There's a whole arsenal of other really great quotes out there that were NOT said by Shakespeare, get some out of there instead of reverting to Old [VERY OUTDATED] English. STOP SAYING THINGS SHAKESPEARE SAID BECAUSE HE WAS NOT COOL.
5. Shakespeare made up a way to TERRIBLY insult people with his Old English. Now, we are forced to insult each other in this way at the start of every English class while we read Romeo and Juliet. It's not fun and I think we shouldn't do it because the world could do to just chill out for a while. Even though our insults aren't meaningful, it's stressful. I always think, "Why are we faking insulting each other? Why even do that?" It's not funny. It's not cool. That part of class should seriously be discontinued, because it's just pointless and it's a waste of time.
That kind of turned into a rant, but Shakespeare is literally and truly stupid! Why even bother! If I'm ever an English teacher (which is highly unlikely), I WILL NOT force my students to read Shakespeare. I don't believe he has anything worthwhile to say to us. 
Now, on to the rant on Romeo and Juliet. This is literally the worst love story I know about. First, I get that in those times, girls were... married off... to rich guys when they were even younger than me (14). Still, that's rude and weird and not cool. Then, Romeo seems to be this really emotional, depressed guy who's really lovesick and just rushes between one intense crush and another. NOT GOOD. Chill, Romeo. Chill. You don't always have to be in love with someone (although maybe that's easy for me to say? I've been single my whole teenage life...I don't know). I don't like how quickly Romeo and Juliet fall for each other. And they get married just about the next day after they meet each other. What's with that?!? Weird, that's what, and a large reason Shakespeare isn't a good thing. It's also just not really possible. Yeah, there's love at first sight but even then... get to know someone before you marry them... I think they should have slowed down and done some compatibility checks with their personalities first. Because right after they get married Romeo gets in a fight and is exiled and then Juliet gets sad and drinks the potion-thingy and then Romeo comes back and thinks she's dead and then he kills himself and then Juliet wakes up and Romeo's dead and then she stabs herself and it ends in a big, sad, stupid, why-did-I-waste-my-time-with-that MESS. That's not how the vast majority of love stories end. It's certainly not how they SHOULD or are SUPPOSED to end. 
If I'm wrong, correct me. But still. Even someone like me, who would find things like pep band romantic, wouldn't want a relationship to end like that. 
So basically, Shakespeare is just like, NOPE. I've given you ample reason.
(THIS IS TO YOU TOO, MR. PARKER. SORRY. SHAKESPEARE IS JUST NOT COOL.)

Bandapalooza! (and some random photos of cars)

Last Thursday was the band program's biggest concert of the year: by the end, we had 266 wind players plus the percussionists; around 320 of us total. It was certainly fun and interesting, so I think I should tell you about it. 
Our call time was 4:30 after school, although the actual concert started at 6:30. This was due to the fact that we had to rehearse with every ensemble. This made for pretty much a mock concert. Though it was crowded and there was hardly any room on the stage, and I had to sit right next to the percussion's gong, and by the end of everything we were swamped by tiny little sixth graders, and the hallways were crammed full of cases, everything turned out well. 
We played Esprit de Corps with the Wind Ensemble, but before that they played the Imperial March from the original Star Wars movies (I liked that!). Then we played a bunch of easier stuff with the younger kids. It was fun to have such a large band, which is something you don't get every day.
Well, that whole fun fiasco was last Thursday. It was a white day, so we didn't have band at school that day. That made the next school day a red day, so there was band. 
And there were tryouts for Wind Ensemble. Live ones. During class.
I had only found out that they would be on Friday on that Wednesday. I hadn't really done any homework for the second half of the week because I spent nearly all the time I had at home practicing a few measures of Esprit de Corps to play at the audition on Friday. I even practiced after Bandapalooza on Thursday, which I believe might be part of the reason I am currently sick. More on that later, though.
I woke up on Friday in kind of a oh-yea-I-have-an-audition-today haze. It stuck with me right through the first half of the school day, until I left lunch early to walk to the high school for band. I was nervous and jumpy, as I've only been playing trumpet for about 10 months compared to 3+ years for all my other friends. I'm honestly not sure whether or not I expected to get in or not; while I'm very good for how long I've been playing (excuse me for bragging), I just don't really have all the skills I need. I know this because I spent my whole summer in a section full of real strong trumpets. I'll get there. But anyway, I auditioned despite my doubts. I played pretty well but the start was weak and I didn't articulate anything very well and- actually, I could go on about mistakes all day. But Mr. Taylor was impressed with where I was. That is a good thing. 
So next year I will not be taking Wind Ensemble, but instead playing first or second in Symphonic band rather than the 3rd part I play now. And there's a great new class called Jazz Techniques that's for everyone who's not in JV or Varsity Jazz. Mr. Taylor said that if I take to the style, he'd put me in JV Jazz by the end of next year. So... cool! 
All that ended last week. Over the weekend, I went to my private trumpet lesson, like I do every Saturday, and walked dogs for a local shelter (that's for a school project). 
On Monday, I woke up and felt sick. But I couldn't stay home, really, because after school there was a big placement test for Honors Chemistry next year. So I went to school and half-struggled through the day, then took the test. It actually surprised me that I understood it quite well. I also found it interesting and therefore am looking forward to taking it next year. 
After the test I promptly went home, announced that I had a cold, and flopped onto my bed. That's where I've been for the past 3 days. Now I'm back at school, which is convenient because the weekend starts tomorrow. Oh well. I’m still a bit sick anyway, so it’ll be good to have some more time at home. 

Now to the more important matters- summer!!! It’s only 3 months away plus we have a week-long break in there! That means marching band, some online sophomore classes, and, much to my chagrin, driver’s ed. I don’t really want to learn to drive- or, I do, but not already! Where has my childhood gone?!? The thing is I wouldn’t at all mind driving a Range Rover or Subaru BRZ, but neither of these are in my budget, nor are they very practical, so… no. Also, neither of these are super good in winter weather, which we have an abundance of. Besides, I probably won't drive myself to school until college- or maybe ever. My parents say cars are highly impractical to have in college. I don't understand this yet but I probably will eventually, so I'm good with it.

Dream car 1
http://www.subaru.com/vehicles/brz/index.html

Dream car 2
www.lexani.com

Cars are really- REALLY- unimportant now, though. I don't know why I'm even worrying about it right at the moment, as I have to first sign up for and then complete 2 sophomore credits during the summer, learn to drive, and handle marching band in there too.

I'll survive. The past week was fun, despite this sickness. But that's a small issue and it's ending. So. I'm good.

'Bye. :)

Break Time FINALLY

Today is/was the last day of school for a week. Next week there's no school and then we go straight through March with no breaks. 
So this is time to recharge. 
Tonight is the big band fundraiser complete with big band music from Varsity Jazz. Stupidly, I signed up to do set up yesterday instead of something today. Next year, I'll do set up again, but I won't be stupid enough to pass up a chance to be there the night of. It's also kind of weird that I helped out yesterday instead of today because both of my parents will be there helping tonight. Oh well. 3 more years to do it. 
Now, on to what I will be doing over break. 
Over the break I am staying here at home unlike a lot of my acquaintances at school. People are going to Hawaii and New York and Sun Valley, for family vacations and ski races and the like. While here at home, I have some organizing to do in terms of my house (I’ve let stuff build up over the past few weeks), a minuscule and insignificant amount of homework, and I know we're going shopping and stuff one day this week. On Wednesday I have to go to the dentist. Other than that, I'm hoping to watch Star Wars or some other movie and continue reading the would-you-rather series from SparkLife. This week's was very perplexing and related to Valentine's Day. See it here. I ended up not deciding what thing I would go with in the end.  

I decided just a minute ago when I paused to think that I would write about why Ireland is a great thing and why I want to go there. First, it’s naturally green! All the green is real pretty especially during the few times when it’s sunny. Then there’s Dublin, the capital, where everything that you could want in a city convenes. And then, of course, there’s all the people! You know there are more famous bands and actors and stuff from Dublin than you might expect? Examples U2 (old but good) and Domhnall Gleeson (most people know who he is, right?). 

Ever since I posted my “Assigned Thing” post I’ve kind of wanted to write to the other actors from Star Wars. Kind of…

Dear Domhnall Gleeson:

…

Who are you?

…

…

I don’t know since I’m not the type to stalk celebrities and also my phone doesn’t have Twitter/Instagram/Facebook/etc. 

…

I like Star Wars. (That’s the only one of the movies you were in that I’ve seen)

…

What’s Ireland like?

…

Um, what else… (Meanwhile in my brain: disrupted binary brain code: 00110a;lsk011dj?*ERROR*wha?t to say… a;lks00111010100dfj?huh what’s happening 01110101010s;l?;aks0101000101ejawkn/;? GET ORGANIZED! 00101111010010end it now10111010001010111010 < organized binary brain code)

…

Yeah.

(end of letter thing)

…but not really. *Sigh* I fail at writing letters and I especially lose my mind around celebrities.

I want to go to Ireland for the abundance of green, Dublin, and the Irish dance (which I used to do competitively).

And while I’m there, I do not wish to run into any famous people if I can avoid it, thanks! 

(For any of you that actually took the time to read the Would-You-Rather above, I REALLY don't want to EVER FIND MYSELF STUCK IN AN ELEVATOR WITH ANY ACTOR OR ACTRESS ESPECIALLY THOSE FROM STAR WARS. I WOULD PROBABLY JUST FLOP TO THE FLOOR AND NOT BE ABLE TO SAY A WORD. FOR THAT REASON I'M NOT RIDING ELEVATORS pretty much ever again. JUST IN CASE. [yeah, just me being paranoid] But I don't want a list of everyone who's ever liked me, either...)

Moving on. 

On Monday, my friend Syscilia shows up next to my locker after lunch and has a huge smile on her face. I ask her what she’s so happy about. She tells me to ask our friend Emily. So I finish packing my bag and then go to find Emily. She’s at her locker. I ask her what Syscilia is so happy about. 

It turns out that she’s dating this Mongolian kid that goes to our school. I don’t have a problem with this except that she keeps bothering me to tell her who I like (which is no one). I have explained to many different people and parties of people over the years since about 5th grade that I don’t yet have a love life, but all of them seem to say that’s not possible. It’s not true that I haven’t ever liked someone, but, especially now, I just don’t give it hardly any thought. That’s why I say I don’t have a love life. For all of you who have been pestering me about it, there’s your answer. Pester no longer.

Excuse me a minute, Seabiscuit demands some hay and an apple.

This is what I spend my time on...
(my pic)

Seabiscuit was made in 2003 by Breyer to accompany the release of the film Seabiscuit, which in turn was the movie adaptation of Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand. Maybe I will watch that or Secretariat in the next week.

Most everyone in the band program is currently at the Sweetheart Gala helping with something or else playing big band and jazz music. I wish I was there too. Next year. 

Also during the book I'm going to buy a quality book from Barnes and Noble. Maybe a fancy coloring book too.

And now I need to go to bed. Bye. Goodnight.

Busy (But Good) Times

I, along with the rest of the band department, am heading into a busy time. A week from last Friday (this Friday, which is now tomorrow), we're hosting our biggest fundraiser of the year- a Valentine's Day dance. It's not uncommon for us to raise enough money to sustain the band and (partly) percussion program for the whole year- about $20,000. I helped with set up today. My dad's taking pictures and my mom's managing the student volunteers. This year we have a major fundraising push because of Hawaii (which is 10 and a half months away!!!!), so we're hoping for a good turnout. It'll be a good benefit event if all goes as planned.
After that, we have a recruiting drive for the entire band program grades 6-12 called Band-A-Palooza after February break, which is where each section of band plays music with all the ensembles below it. So that means we're playing with the 8th grade band, 7th grade band, and 6th grade band. Plus the Wind Ensemble plays a more complex song with us. It's a nighttime concert and a lot of the kids from the elementary schools come and see if they want to be in band. Plus we're a bit... inspirational... to the younger bands. 
With the Wind Ensemble we're playing Esprit de Corps, a Grade 5 (the scale goes up to Grade 6) piece that's quite fun to play even though I'm not perfect at it. I'm pretty sure that will be the premier part of the evening, so we're working at it. 
After that, auditions for Wind Ensemble are due. I am trying out. I'm also going to see about trying out for Junior Varsity Jazz, the precursor to Varsity Jazz. If all goes well, I'll be in both Wind Ensemble and JV jazz. :) I'm practicing every night to have a good chance of getting in to both of these. 
After those tryouts have passed and we all know if we succeeded or not, we have region solo & ensemble in March. I'm also doing a bunch of stuff for St. Patrick's Day with dance, so I'll have band and dance to practice. 
We have a band concert in there somewhere. An early spring concert. 
Come April, we have our last or second-to-last concert.
In May, the concert band season comes to an end. I think we have a very-end-of-year concert for the rest of the school. On Friday the 13th of May, I take the AP Human Geography test. I know, bad day for it. 
In the 3 days of school we have in June, we have beginner's camp for marching band, although we all go anyway just for the fun of it. 
Then it's MARCHING BAND SEASON!!!!!!!!
All in all, the next year will be very busy and planned out plus I have to take driver's ed in the summer. 8(

Life.
trompete.ru

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone, although I find little to actually celebrate in the holiday other than family and close friends. Whatever, it's all good. :)

Objectives for the Holidays + Post-Christmas

I have 3 objectives for every school holiday:
1. Do not turn into a salty stressball.
2. Do not get sick.
3. In the midst of 1 and 2, enjoy the holiday.
This is fairly easy considering that we get two school-free weeks off, but also fairly hard because of the fact that those two weeks are soured by bits of homework. That's a small part of it, though.
To help myself with #1,  I didn't do much- in fact, any- homework before Christmas Day. I was also kind of sick before Christmas, so that wasn't fun and I didn't feel like doing much. I did draw a lot of nice horses, though:

Digital art creds to me.

He's a mulberry grey roan. I tried to make him more roaned, but since computers have nowhere near the blending capabilities of drawing pencils, I made it work with the tiniest size of digital brush I had. Compare his color roughly to the horse below. That's him in real life, pretty much. 

Mulberry grey is kinda like this guy's color....
www.prehorse.info

The next objective was to enjoy the holiday, which I did! I got a nice lot of stuff this year, including the Breyer models of both Secretariat and American Pharaoh! Wow, two Triple Crown winners in one Christmas. That's pretty cool. I also got a great Lego set from my dad- the Blue Power Jet from Lego's Creator line. It's actually a 3-in-one set, so you can make not only the plane but also a helicopter and speedboat/yacht. I'm pretty sure that the Creator 3-in-one sets are my favorites (other than the themed sets, like Star Wars) because they're dynamic and flexible! I like the other sets but it's nice to get three models in one set, and you can pick your favorites out of the three. 

We also got some great family presents. One is the new comic book from Simon's Cat, a popular Youtube channel of videos that are animated by hand about a funny cat that gets into all sorts of trouble (want to watch Simon's Cat? Search it on Youtube). The second present is a Bluetooth speaker from Bose that we use for watching movies and listening to music off iTunes on our family computer. It's really nice and we listened to Christmas music almost every day on it, as we were allowed to open it a bit early for our listening pleasure. The third family present is a really cool game called Forbidden Island. I'd seen it in the miscellaneous toy catalogs that we get every so often, and it looked really fun, so I was glad that we finally got it! It did turn out to be really fun and a good challenge. What happens in the game is that you're on Forbidden Island, which was a secret retreat of an ancient empire. They had the ability to control the four elements- earth, fire, water, and air- with four coveted treasures. You're working as a team with the other players to try and save the treasures- before the island sinks. The ancient empire designed the island to sink in case any intruders came to claim the treasures. So the island sinks and floods with every turn every player takes. It's a great challenge- we've only won it once- but it's quite fun. I recommend it- check out Gamewright to see Forbidden Island and the other games they offer.

Other than get awesome toys for Christmas, I tuned into the LA Times on New Year's and watched the first part of the 127th Rose Parade! For those of you who lost that tradition in your families, the Rose Parade is pretty much a New Year's Day parade like the Thanksgiving Day parade, although the Rose Parade accompanies the Rose Bowl for college football. It's in Pasadena and goes down Orange Grove and Colorado Boulevards- for 5 MILES. If you think about this from a marching band's point of view, that is SO LONG... and it's not cold in California in January. Just kind of in the mid-sixties. Which is nice, although, with band uniforms? And a five-mile parade route? And all the chaos of the biggest, most famous parade in the COUNTRY? Yeah, not so much. Despite all that, it was fun to watch! There were some great bands, impressive floats, and amazing horses. 

Yay, large band!
finotoday.com

The super-impressive Disney float, complete with the Millennium Falcon on the back! My favorite float of the bunch.
www.univision.com

Unfortunately it's too far away for us to take a family trip to go see it live, so I have to make do with seeing it on the screen. But I have hopes that someday we'll at least try to get into this parade, as Mr. Hughes, the organizer of our band department, sent out a message on New Year's Day and he said: "Happy New Year's to all the band kids! Is anyone watching the Rose Parade? Do you think we should apply to be in this parade sometime?" And I was like, YES YES YES YES YES YES YES! It would certainly be a fun thing to do. 

That same day, we went to see the new episode of Star Wars. At first (meaning before Christmas), I had been hesitant, sure that Disney had spoiled Star Wars, but I was certainly in for a surprise. It was mainly my dad that took us, who had already seen it twice who told us to see it... and at first I was skeptical. But then I saw it. AND I LOVED IT. SO MUCH! It was really great. If you haven't seen it and are a Star Wars fan, then I can now tell you truthfully: the Force is strong with that movie. I won't say anything more here about the story/plot, in case there are any of you that haven't seen it yet. However, if you have seen it, may I recommend this article from Sparknote's Sparklife. It answers some good questions the folks over at Sparknotes had and brings up some good points. Yep. I already want to see it again. It was that good! So I actually added some more Lego sets to my list from the Star Wars line. Hopefully I can earn some of my own money to buy them because I do have a Hawaii trip to pay for this year. 

That wrapped up my Christmas vacation. At this point I had been over my sickness for a while, and I wasn't at all happy to go back to school, but I hadn't seen my friends for quite a while and I was happy to see them. Also, on Monday or Tuesday, Breyer released some new models for 2016- including one on a mold that had been "locked in the vault" since 2011. "Locked in the vault" means that Breyer didn't use that mold since 2011. This creates larger demand for the models made on the mold. I'm glad it's out of the vault now because it's a great mold- a trotting Arabian mare with Egyptian type looks. The model they made was a portrait model of Rhapsody in Black- a top Arabian mare. Apparently she's the mother of several top honor winners in the world of Arabians, according to the Breyer website. 
So now, what with Christmas being over, I'm thinking about doing homework and surviving/passing my classes until summer and the start of the marching season!!!

What's up for you this year?

*P.S/update/whatever:* I'm changing my school schedule so that I can be in jazz band, yay! 8)