Since a couple of people have asked me about it, here's what all happened on my trip to Florida.

It was a lot of fun, but it was in no way relaxing. Almost every member of my mom's half of the family except for her lives in Jacksonville, so we spent most of our time out with various family members and had very little down time. Pretty much the only times I was at  the house (we stayed at my aunt's) were when I was either sleeping or showering and changing before going out somewhere else. This wasn't a bad thing; I like everyone on my Mom's side, so I had a great time during all the visiting, dining, and shopping. There's been a lot going on with that half of the family lately: my cousin is pregnant (so.. many.. baby stores...) and my grandmother has Alzheimer's and her health has been declining recently, among other things, so everyone was pretty stressed.

Despite all that, everyone was really happy to see us and it was wonderful just to see everyone since we only go down two or three times a year. I talked with my cousin who's an interior designer about the rec room, and I've got some ideas for it once it's finally in my grasp... THIS SUNDAY!! *cue maniacal laughter* I think I'm going to go with a sage-y green, antiqued white, and rose. Once the exercise equipment is out (THIS SUNDAY), I'll be able to move the furniture around and get an idea of where to put everything.

We did a lot of shopping while we were down there, so much that it gets its own paragraph. We found a really neat store called Croatia that imported furniture and things from all over the world. We spent a while just talking to the (rather cute) guy who worked there who had just returned from China. They even had a collection of the headrests that geisha used that were actually boxes for their valuables. They were beautiful, but pretty expensive so I didn't get one. I was too busy spending my first paycheck over at Tommy Hilfiger. I got some really cute stuff while we were down there. However, when Mom caught sight of me trying on a navy, v-neck sweater with an Oxford blue collared shirt (which I bought), she reached the horrified conclusion that yes, I am a closeted prep-school student. If I had ten thousand dollars to spend on clothes, I would spend every last cent at RALPH LAUREN BUYING TWO THOUSAND DOLLAR LINEN JACKETS!!  I REGRET NOTHIIIIING!!

Let's see, what else happened.. Mom and I stopped by the Harry Potter celebrations at a nearby Borders the night the book was released, but not knowing anyone, and having already reserved one back at home, it just wasn't the same and we went to Starbucks instead. I read Crime and Punishment aloud on the way home. My aunt just got a shiny new laptop with Vista on it, but I didn't get to poke around nearly as much as I would have liked. Ashely got kidnapped by zombies for the third time (yes, I brought RE4 with me and played it in the small amount of time I was actually at the house. Really the only time I could play was late at night... far from home.. in the dark... It was a ton of fun, but creepy as hell.) I saw an attractive Dell laptop for the first time, though there was a depressing lack of attractive men on the beach when we went. We frequented Starbucks and had a delicious breakfast there on our way to the beach. That was actually one of my favorite moments. It was a beautiful morning, it was just my mom and I, my croissant and frappechino were delicious, and we had a nice, long, walk next to the waves ahead of us.

All in all, it was a really good trip. I just had to go home and sleep for 12 hours afterwards. My senior portraits just got here, so I'm going to go check those out now.

This got old SUCH a long time ago. But only two more weeks left! And for one of those weeks I'll be in Florida! Yay!

Speaking of Florida, my trip almost got moved up to tomorrow. Today, rather. My grandmother has fallen twice in a few days and has broken her arm, gotten a hard cast, mysteriously taken it off, gotten it put back on, and driven my aunt to anti-anxiety medication. My mom was afraid we were going to have to go down early, but things turned out alright, so we're still leaving on Tuesday. My cousin who's an interior designer will be there, so I'm looking forward to asking her about the rec room and hanging out, since she's awesome.

I got my first paycheck the other day; just 52 cents away from being an even 200 dollars (after all the taxes, that is). You know what I did with it? I went to Crabtree, missed seeing Dena again, and bought a 3 dollar pen and a Rufus Wainwright cd. A very satisfying purchase, indeed. The pen was from the Sanrio store; I got it because it reminds me of the one Tamaki had in that one episode of Ouran, and it's topped by a small raccoon that makes coffee for a living. Seriously. http://www.tenorikuma.com/index.html

I painted my room earlier today. It's a much richer, warmer shade of white that's got a bit of creme in it. It looks so much nicer! I'll still be on the futon tonight, though, since my room still smells very strongly of paint. Today was spent painting my room, then playing Resident Evil 4. It was a drastic change from yesterday, which was spent going to see Harry Potter again and playing Resident Evil 4. It gets less creepy as you go along, well, I guess you could argue that it gets more creepy, you just get used to it. It's a lot of fun, and it's pretty interesting because they're the same voice actors as the original Japanese version. I tried to find it in Japanese, but since the main character is American, he actually speaks English in the Japanese version, and just has awesome subtitles. I can't help but wonder where they found all those Spanish voice actors for the Spanish zombies, cultists, and zombie cultists. I succeeded in finding The President's Daughter, Ashley, but man, is she a pain! She's almost as annoying as getting your head chainsawed off. Almost.

It looks like they're going to be here all night, so I need to find something else to write about... Actually, I think I'll just grab a cup of tea and Crime and Punishment and go wait it out upstairs. To the microwave! Away!

So here I am again; another late night update, stuck downstairs for the exact same reasons as last time. What an awful end to an otherwise amazing day. Dad said there's only 24 days left. Easy for him to say.

Anyhow, on to the amazing part of my day. I didn't have work today, so I got to sleep in like a fox, which was wonderful after having both a tension and sinus headache yesterday. Today was the day of the Live Earth concert, so there was good music for an awesome cause going on all day. Mom and I watched that in between periods of getting my room ready for painting. The short videos were really neat, too. I wish they had shown more of the show in Tokyo since that was where Rhianna, Linkin Park, and all the J-Pop stars were.

Later on, Dad came back from getting the red car checked out at the mechanic's, and there is good news: I WILL HAVE A CAR FOR NEXT YEAR!! The old Honda still runs just fine, so Dad will use that and I will get to drive the silver car (the red one does not have airbags, so my dad didn't want me driving it). Whoo! This may mean no more riding the bus for me if I can get a parking space! *dace of joy* Dad said that they offer parking spaces to seniors a second time during the summer, so hopefully I can get everything worked out.

After that, we went to go see Japan play America in baseball. We got seats on Japan's side this time, good seats too. We were right in front of where the pitchers were warming up. The guy next to me was awesome and spoke in Japanese most of the time. He shouted 'amai' after an AMAZING play by Japan, which I though was pretty much the best thing ever. I shouted 'sugoi!' and we hive-fived. Man, that was a great game. Japan won five to two. We looked for some Japanese jerseys, etc. in the store, but they only had U.S. and Durham Bulls stuff, so I got a Durham Bulls jersey. What possesed me to buy a jersey, I will never know, but I am strangely attracted to it. It is white and blue with a big D on it. Yes... 0.< 

What luck! They left! I'm going to bed, because I am exhausted and I have work and superhappyfuntime with Megan tomorrow. With hats. You didn't forget the hats, did you?!

So, right now I'm updating for lack of anything better to do. CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES which I have ranted about EXTENSIVELY to a certain DENA are happening AGAIN, so I'm downstairs  with some tea taking a break from a bit of angry, late-night studying of German. (Really, what better time to study German?) I've hit a snag with my particles, so I'll just chill and waste time here on the internets. (I may be having trouble with particles, but I can ask where the phone is like nobody's business.)

Mom and I went paint shopping today. I'm painting my room a softer shade of white, so we looked at colors for that as well as for the Rec room. Before, I was planning on using pale blues, greens, and sort of a rosy pink, but while walking down the window treatments and valence curtains aisle, it occurred to me that blue and yellow might look nice in there. It was an odd place for an epiphany, but hey, whatever works. Any feedback? *cough* *Megan* *cough*

Wow, it's the Fourth of July! You know what that means, Independence Day in the Phillippines and in America! Happy Fourth! Megan and I are going to watch the fireworks over at McGregor Downs, possibly with other people if there are actually any other people who are not on vacation.
I still say we should have a picnic. If only because it's been years and years since I've been on one. We can make the little hot dogs that look like octopi and sing merry Welsh drinking songs.

Come on, you know you want to.

In other news, I have discovered Rufus Wainwright! Mom heard an interview with him on NPR, and said he talked about lederhosen and that I might like his music. I youtubed some of his videos, and his music is really nice. He has a very pretty voice. And very pretty hair. Mm... pretty hair...

Argh! I am running out of things to write about about! Ah... well, I finished The Taming of the Shrew. I didn't like it, which was surprising, but the whole 'wives be submissive unto thy husbands' merde that they kept going over again and again was not fun to read. It also bothered me that he never gave you any closure on the whole plot line with Christopher Sly. I think it may be Taming of the Shrew that Ian Finnley is writing a musical version of for Apex next year; I'm sure it's much better when you actually see it performed, especially in musical form. Especially in musical form as done by Ian Finnley.

Oh, thank God, it looks like I can finally go back in my room now and get some sleep. Megan, please call me tomorrow about getting together for the fireworks.

I had my first day of work today, and things went very well. I'm over at the Tennis Pro Shop at McGregor Downs, so everyone there is very laid back and polite. There's a lot of down time in maning the shop, so I got to finish The Man in the Iron Mask and got a start on Taming of the Shrew during the eight hours I was there. The courts are right by the lake, so the view is gorgeous and there's usually at least a slight breeze to keep it from being too hot. Aside from the good pay and low stress, one of the perks of my job is that I get to drive a golf cart with a giant brush attached to it in circles all over the courts to smooth the surface.

I love my job.

I picked up a workbook the other day to get a head start on German this summer, since the word on the street is that Herr Maseman doesn't spend much time on the basics (such as pronunciation). Thankfully, some of German's pronunciation is taken from Latin, so part of it isn't quite as difficult as I was afraid it would be. Umlauts, on the other hand... It will definitely take me a while to get used to those. Jen says there's a pattern to the way they change the sound, but I haven't learned enough yet for that to help me all that much. I liked them much better when they were just tremas in French. So much easier to understand... Horrible little dots aside, German is a lot of fun and I'm really looking forward to German with God-knows-who-possibly-Herr-if-he-hasn't-been-fired-already in the fall.

Kit's birthday party was last night, and that was a ton of fun. I finally saw The Lion King (I had seen it before, when I was very, very young, and couldn't remember a damn thing about it). It was both amazing and Jeremy Irons-filled, making it a truly epic movie. She got me the most adorable Hello Kitty calculator for my birthday, that I am definitely using whenever I am not allowed to use my graphing calculator. Some of the buttons on it are still in Japanese, but since I don't know my calculator/math kanji, I don't know what they do. (Just like that one time, in Titan A.E., with the whole "I put a button on it! And I want to poke it! But I don't know what will happen if I do...") I'll definitely have to bring it to my next lesson and see if Ashley knows what they mean. While I was there, Kit convinced me to audition for Jesus Christ Superstar in the spring. I think it will end up being a lot of fun if I make it, even though I found the movie INTENSELY TRAUMATIZING. Just think... I could be a townsperson! Or a leper! The possibilities are endless! Apparently, Mr. Koechling is putting on the weird movie version of All My Sons, which has a cast of 'more than ten people'. I think I may still pass on that, since I'll be fretting over college application stuff in the fall.

So, that's what's been going on in my life lately. Now, I must go translate some Godchild. I've made it all the way to volume six, and I've picked up some new and exciting vocabulary on the way, like dassuru: to extricate oneself from, and kuruu: to go mad!!

I now know the address to the Baby the Stars Shine Bright in Paris.
It's right near the opera house.
<3

I'm still a bit nervous about The Golden Compass movie, since I'm a big fan of the books, and I'm not sure how well they'll adapt into movies, but the movie does have a very nice website that lets you pick your own daemon. It's pretty cool.

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Right, just a quick post to see if anyone has any ideas about my birthday. Which is coming up...

Due to the fact that it is the day before exams, I can't do anything huge on the actual day of my birthday, but I would like to do something that weekend. Any ideas? I have no idea what sort of thing to do, other than go to Build-A-Bear with Dena. There are several groups of friends I would like to invite, so I would need something a lot of people could mingle in and enjoy.

Maybe if I'm feeling ambitious, I'll try to write about all the things that happened at Animazement, but I have a chemistry test tomorrow and need to go study. Out on thee, Chemistry, thou kill'st my heart!

The AP Tests are done! Now Kit and I can concentrate all our mental energies to making the most fabulous sock puppet based, calculus incorporating, rendition of Titus Andronicus ever! We finally took our AP test this morning in a Baptist church in downtown Apex. The room we were in was very pretty, but the people working there and its use as a nursery during our test left a lot to be desired.

After being informed that we were never to speak of what happened in that room, we began testing. We got a quick break before the open ended part, during which Angela and I had an awkward conversation about the weather, since we weren't sure what else we were allowed to talk about without being smote mightily by the AP ninja. And Jesus. We were in a church, after all.

Someone taking the test parked in one of the cook's spots, so they said they were going to tow their car if they didn't move it during the ten minute break. Parking was just so scarce that Wednesday morning, you know, at a church. On Wednesday...
Psh. The cooks didn't even make enough brownies for all of us, so they probably deserved it. I bet the brownies weren't half as good as the ones Dena, Dave, and I ate while watching Hercules. Those were good stuff.

Tomorrow is Mardi Gras and  I finally beat Dr. Cid in FFXII.

It is a good day.

After having Augen Auf stuck in my head all day, I now know my German numbers 1-10. Hooray for educational uses for angry German music.

I don' t have much in the way of time (or events) to update with; I have a lot to do tonight, which, by the way, is what she said.

Happy National 'That's What She Said' Day. I'm off to go write a speech about Puritains.

O Gankutsuou, your delightful combination of French and Japanese goodness will never fail to make me smile.

Today was the first day since Thursday I haven't had a spontaneous dizzy spell, so today was much better than the past few days have been. I also had no homework for once, so I got to relax, go out for tea with my mother, and watch Le Comte du Monte Cristo in what can only be described as the illegitimate child of CGI and anime.

I finished The Crucible the other day, and I was pleasantly suprised by how fantasic parts of it were. Some of John Procter's lines near the end were absolutely amazing. Overall, it was a very frustrating play to read because of the overall ignorance of the people and how throughout the entire thing it is obvious that the girls are pretending, yet everyone believes their ridiculous claims even when one of the girls confesses that they are making it up. The connections to McCarthyism made it even more interesting, and the lack of "good Puritain style writing" was certainly welcome. However, the dialogue got very repetitive later on in the book, and I think if anyone says "It were pretense, John Procter!" I may have to attack (while shouting 'Subject-verb agreement!!!', of course). Or possibly give a speech on Oliver Cromwell. It could really go either way.

I have decided to take Latin IV next year; the call of an entire semester of Roman stalker-poetry (Catullus!) was too strong, you see.  For all of his crazyness and obsession, he did write one of my favorite poems, so I'll be interested to read a bit more of his stuff. Perhaps we'll finally get around to translating part of Tramalchio's dinner from the Satyricon as well. If they have a level of Latin after VI, I may end up taking that, too. I've really been missing Latin this block; going from taking Latin and French to no foreign languages at all has been rough on me. Speaking of classical Roman literature, Zachary got a copy of Juvenal's Satires! Gah! I can't wait until he's done with it! It will be terrible because it's going to drag me away from all my bloody required reading, but I cannot resist! Choosing between Juvenal and Thomas Paine is really no choice at all.

It's late and I should really get some sleep. I'm still not feeling quite back to normal yet, though I'm definitely feeling much better. I was horribly disapointed that Justin Timerlake did not bring sexy back at the Grammy's last night, but oh well. ^^

Dena, today in English, Mr. Koechling made some statement about Thomas Paine that ended in a long pause and then the words
... "in America."
It made me think of you.

Every time I try to write this, it turns into an angry rant about transcendentalists, U.S. History, and incoherent, Russian, Green Hope students singing Brittney Spears songs (it was just that kind of day), so I'm going to give up on trying to write for now.

Hopefully, we'll go to China Pearl for dinner tonight, and I'll perk up a bit after throwing back several cups of hot tea. It wasn't really a bad day, it was just very taxing. And did I mention the Brittney Spears?

We have moved away from Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God to The Crucible. A definite improvement, but still about Puritans. We got the play yesterday, but I need to have a topic for an oral presentation on it by tomorrow. This is difficult to do without having read the play, but there are several different places he said to look that should make it easier.

In other school-based news, today in chemistry I learned how quantum leaps are like buying corn. It was very amusing to all four or so of us who were not asleep at the time.

In the half-hour or so when I was free from homework last night, I worked on translating some more of the Godchild manga I ordered. It is interesting to note that "koukai" means both "regret" and "sailing; ocean voyage" depending on the context and kanji. After a quick scan of the page in which I failed to notice the correct definition, I ended up with the sentence "If you kill me now, you will go on a nautical adventure... twice!" It was fantastic.

Zachary was being wonderful and got me some Starbucks to keep me going and help my throat. (All the cold, dry air has left me very hoarse lately.) I asked the employee if they had cafe au lait, and they had no idea what I was talking about even after I explained it. How can you work at Starbucks and not know your coffee?! It was shameful. And I had to get regular, French-less, milk-less coffee.

Hurrah, there is my random update for the moment. I'm off to go do some chemistry and read about Puritans. And listen to Los by Rammstein thanks to my sentence with all the less' in it.

To lift my spirits as we go over the lovely piece of Puritan literature  "SINNERS IN THE HANDS OF AN ANGRY GOD!!!!" tomorrow, I picked up Twelfth Night while my mom and I were at Borders. I've been meaning to get ahold of a copy ever since Laura gave a fantastic one-man rendition of it in Chris' livingroom, but all of my AP English reading got in the way. It will be the first Shakespearean comedy I've read since A Midsummer Night's Dream back in middle school, so I'm pretty excited.

Tonight, I get to sit by the fire with Twelfth Night and a cup of coffee and life will be good because I  smote my English paper mightily!

And tomorrow's Friday.

w00t.

I would like to begin by stating that the Puritans have the worst literature ever.
EVER.

Aside from my literary woes, things have been alright lately. U.S. History is a surprisingly interesting class, though the more I lean about America the more I wish I were British. Chemistry has its ups and downs, but it's certainly much better than I was expecting. Today we did a lab where we threw marbles at wooden shapes to emulate the famous experiment of Ernest Rutherford. Whoo.
My insane amount of homework has kept me from doing, well, most everything lately, but my main concern is a paper I have to write for English that's due on Friday. I have to connect some event and person in my life to an event and character in Their Eyes Were Watching God. Not having had an alcoholic mother, 3 husbands, or a murder trial for shooting one of my rabid husbands before he bit me, this is a bit difficult.

I was really tired this morning and ended up hitting my head really hard on the door frame of the car, so I have quite a headache right now. I'm going to go lie down for a bit.

First day with new classes! All of my teachers seem pretty good though my workload is looking somewhat deadly. Hopefully I can withstand the combined fury of US History, Chemistry, Calculus and English. No matter the outcome, I will certainly have a lot more upper body strength when all this is through. I get to leave my chem and history books at home, but I will be lugging around my English and math books every day.

Mr. Koechling is absolutely fantastic, but being in his class is a bit sad because he does remind me a lot of Mr. Robbins. I think I'm really going to enjoy AP English, even though the focus is on writing and American literature, two of my least favorite things. He's very enthusiastic in his teaching, and I think I may even end up enjoying some of the things we read. If I'm lucky I'll gain some writing skills while I'm at it.

In other good news, the manga I ordered earlier this week may be getting here as early as this Friday. Hurrah!

I'm off to go label a map of the 50 states (again).

Ah, it feels good to finally have a day off while all the college students are in class. At least we get one day to make up for the two extra weeks they got off around the holidays. *confetti*

Laura and Anna's birthday rave was oodles of fun. I had some Adventures in In The Groove, but I didn't do anything too crazy. For example, anything involving hitting six arrows at once. *twitch*
Dena, Max and I had an awesome time playing some variant on volleyball, hackysack, and soccer with some of the balloons that were lying all over the floor. There was much running about and general joy. Once the music got started, I danced for a bit, but then turned to talking with Tyler and Jeff about constructing a stairway out of the refreshments to get to the glowstick that had ended up on a distant windowsill. The most fantastic part of the evening is a dead tie between watching Fennick (sp?) rave and talking about Chris' need for a handlebar mustache. It was a conversation that quickly degraded into a discussion of the best way to tie ex-girlfriends to some railroad tracks, and later, finding the volume of the solid generated when you rotate a handle bar mustache about the x-axis. It was amazing.

I should probably stop procrastinating now and just go work on my English paper.

Bah! Responsibility...

Today was interesting. Thanks to a terrible mix-up involving two cups of coffee and a 12-hour sudafed, I was unable to stand or walk for two hours and got a total of one hour of sleep last night. However, it also meant that I was not the least bit tired today, so I guess it all worked out. Today was review day, so all of Apex's seniors were off not worrying about exams. Tomorrow is going to be the more difficult of the two days since I have math and Latin III. That woman made our final extra difficult and nit-picky, so I will definitely have to go get all my notes together in a few minutes.

This weekend was a lot of fun despite all the stress from exams and such. I had a fantastic time with the other J-club officers as we worked to put together our Communist Russia themed manners lesson. I also discovered that Paige is a fan of techno and Apocalyptica as we were driving to the Staples near our house. I was in a state of shock for a while since I had yet to come across another person my age with similar tastes in much of anything, especially music. She even had a different mix of Never Gonna Come Back Down, one of my favorite techno songs.

I should probably stop writing and go work on getting everything ready for tomorrow before I completely crash. I'm finally beginning to feel a bit tired, so hopefully I'll be able to sleep well tonight. Good luck to everyone taking exams!

I've finally found the time and energy to post another LJ entry. Oh wow, lj has active spell check now! Look how it's underlined the word 'lj' in red three times now... 

So yes, here is my update. I apologize for the randomness, but this is the best I can do right now and I always feel bad when I leave my LJ alone and neglected.

Anyway, things have been incredibly busy this week. I've had three days of calculus testing so far and I've been reading Godchild in Japanese in what free time I have had, so my poor mind is completely shot right now. The katamari music probably hasn't  been helping either, come to think of it. Yesterday I lay on the bed and managed to talk to mom  about how I wanted to go to Olive Garden for an hour. The sad ending to this tale? I never got to go to Olive Garden. Even without restaurant-going, I've been keeping busy this week by doing math and shouting things like 

"ヘエ?!? リフはツバーキュロシスでしにますか?!  Noooo!!" as I squint at kanji and read Godchild. It is a good life.

Crayzyness aside, it's been an alright week. Not much has happened other than my books arriving and the disgusting amount of testing I've been going through. Mom and I did get to go to Borders for some tea last night during George Bush's speech, which was very relaxing. My throat's been bothering me lately, so some nice, hot, orange mint tea really hit the spot. It was a short trip since I had a math test the next day, but it was very nice.
Japanese Club should be better this Friday, since Paige is giving a presentation on 'Manga Between the Lines'; i.e. series that are not Fruits Basket, Inu-Yasha, or Naruto. Thank the gods. Our t-shirts may also be here, but I'm not certain about that...

Eh, I have a headache after having to sit in front of Chantal-Francois during French. That woman wears far too much perfume for anyone's good.

Also, my icon wins.

After much frustration at discovering used books don't ship outside the country, I finally got everything nice and ordered from Amazon. I'll be getting seven manga sometime between now and March. Most of them are volumes of Godchild (All but the last volume, actually. Curse you, shipping fees!). Other than those, I'm getting two volumes of Deathnote and the first volume of Kingdom Hearts II's manga. w00t. I really wanted to get some Yami no Matsuei too, but all they had was the 'manga set', which confused me because it cost the same as one manga and I couldn't read it's description to figure out what it was. Curse the lack of furigana, too!

Today was spent hanging out with Megan and finishing my French project. Which reminds me... I have school tomorrow... Yikes, getting up is not going to be fun. I was in bed until 12:30 today since we got back so late from Matt's party. It was a lot of fun, though. I finally got to play on a Wii, we had some late-December hot-tubing, and an epic Adolf vs Winston tennis match.

I'm off to walk Boomer. More later.