120/365

I had a nightmare about accidentally skipping three Mock Trial after-school practices, and getting kicked off Varsity. =[

Day 8 ~ The One Feeling During The Season That You Won’t Ever Forget

To be honest, it's that moment when I'm on the field, just before we perform, with the crowd watching you and the stadium lights shining down... It's one of the best feelings in the world. I don't get the same vibe from parade, although the adrenaline rush from performing is amazing anywhere, anytime. There's just something special about the brightness of truly being on the field in the night - the one bright spot in the stadium; the one place where everyone is watching. Then, of course, winning sweepstakes or first in our division is pretty awesome as well. =]

119/365

.

Science Bowl!!!

So A Team's record through the qualifying rounds was 3-1-1; we tied with Monte Vista and lost to Santa Theresa. Santa Theresa's only win was against us though, which was... interesting. Foothill beat us 4-0-1 in our bracket (their one loss was against us). But we moved on to quarterfinals? semifinals? where we sort of got owned by Monta Vista. Not completely though - the end score was something like 74-114. But in any case, it was pretty awesome. I played a total of 1 1/2 rounds (since technically I'm only an alternate) but I got to get some questions right! It was fun. =] They had yummy Costco muffins and Costco pizza too; it made me happy. =P

I had opportunities to make random quips too. We have to introduce ourselves whenever we begin a round, so one moderator asked us to add, in addition to our name, some random fact about ourselves, so I told them that I spin rifles. It sounds much cooler than just saying, "I'm in Colorguard," especially since there are many deprived people in this world who don't know what that is. Another moderator asked what our favorite sports team is (a lot of people said they don't have one - what do you expect, we're nerd!), so I just went, "Marching Band is a sport, right?"

I left early with Zach; the rest of the people (excepting Erin and Natasha, who also left early) stayed to watch another round after we got eliminated. They apparently went ice-skating after, which sort of makes me sad, since I wanted to go, but it wouldn't have been a good idea, on account of the still-bleeding cut on my ankle (you'd think it would have stopped bleeding after a full day!).

We all went to Melanie's after though, she had yummy food. =] Cocktail shrimp, lots of fruit, sandwiches, chips, and cookies! We watched a bit of Schoolhouse Rock, then played some Rock Band. =D

It was a really fun day. Competing is stressful though... Ah well. It's still awesome. =P Hopefully I'll be on A Team (as in actually on it, not just an alternate) so I can stress myself out! =D

*****

Epic fails of the day...

Simplify [sqrt(19) + sqrt(5)][sqrt(19) - sqrt(5)]
Zach: 19 - 5
You mean 14...?

Sally (or whatever) brings 3 shirt, 2 pants, and 2 pairs of shoes (not sure about the items of clothing) on a trip. How many possible outfits can Sally make?
Tommy: 24
He apparently did 3*2*2*2... Same with the 2+2+5+2 from practice, except with multiplication... xP

The equation y - 4 = 3x intersects the y-axis at which point?
Tommy: (0, -4)
Whoops. Wrong sign. =[

A human somatic cell has how many pairs of homologous chromosomes?
Boozer: 23
So this isn't a fail exactly, but sex chromosomes aren't homologous...

DDT was banned for its destructive effect on which type of animal? (I forget the exact wording...)
Monta Vista dude: Tuna?
It was birds, especially birds of prey. The DDT would make the eggshells of their eggs super thin, so when they tried to brood them, they'd essentially just be crushed by the mother's weight. This wasn't too much of a fail either, but tuna? Really?

I'm sure there were a few more, but I love how we know all this random knowledge (like the three types of magma and their range of temperatures!) yet we screw up on simple math or just blank out... xD

The Effects of AP Bio On My Life

.

I got this adorable, soft, fluffy, fuzzy stuffed animal today. It's so cute! Anyways, I guessed that it was a female. The thing is, I didn't do this based on the fact that it's wearing a pink ribbon... I did it based on the fact that it's a calico cat.

Calicos are predominantly female, since to have that coloration, a cat must possess two alleles which code for orange and black, and these are sex-linked, present on the X chromosome. Therefore a cat must have 2 X chromosomes to be a calico. The only way for a calico cat to be male is from nondisjunction, which ends up in the cat having the genotype XXY, known as Klinefelter syndrome in humans (characterized by a sterile male with underdeveloped male genitals and female attributes). Yeah. Not the pink ribbon, the biological explanation for the coloration. Oh, Mr. White...

Day Seven ~ Least Favorite Marching Memory

Uhm... Fainting, definitely. Lunges around the track sort of sucked too. xD Every drop in the show, forgetting work, doing the wrong work... Being yelled at for not being able to get work down... Yeah, there are a few. But the benefits and positive aspects of Colorguard far outweigh the unsavory parts.

Oh, and the very first parade competition. That route was horridly long, and it just wasn't the same performing without the chill of the night air and the blinding stadium lights shining down on you...

118/365

I hate it when people ditch what was supposedly their "favorite club" because they did well once in another club.

First it was _ _ _ _- _ _ _ _ _, and now it's apparently _ _ _ _. And you said you wanted to run for officer positions in both? There's certain things you need to learn... If you aren't willing to devote the time to the clubs and competitions, if they aren't your absolute first priority, if they don't have your absolute passion, then don't even bother.

There's an art in being involved in multiple clubs and trying your hardest in all of them. I know. I have quite a few academic clubs (five, to be exact), that all seem to have competitions on the same days. I need to skip a few, because there's absolutely no way that I would be able to attend them all, but when I can, I do. I don't make up excuses as to why I don't think I can attend something, because I planned to go out with friends, or because my parents were going somewhere. Even if you show up, saying that you might not be there just shows the lack of effort in attempting to show up.

Oh, and one more thing? Don't fool yourself. A few positive comments and some awards doesn't mean that you're absolutely splendid at whatever it is you're involved in. You keep saying it was because other people helped you along, but with your attitude, one would think you got there yourself, and want the world to know it. Focus on your weak points, and don't exaggerate your strong ones. I'm not saying you don't deserve recognition for your achievements, simply that there's always something to improve on, and the "Why can't you just realize I did this well?" attitude isn't going to get you anywhere.

That Was Freaky...

I was taking a shower, and while I was shaving my legs, I forgot that I had this surface scab (you know, those that aren't really scabs since the blood doesn't pool on the surface, it comes out in little dots? I don't know how to describe it...) on my ankle, so I sort of ran the razor over it and ripped off half the scab then proceeded to rip some more skin off. I have this shallow furrow in my ankle now. It wasn't big or anything; it stung a bit, but mainly I was just like, "Wow, really? I'm retarded. I can't believe I forgot that was there..."

So I kept shaving and ladeeda, and after a few more seconds, the wound or whatever you want to call it started dripping blood. I'm not kidding, it literally started oozing blood from the ankle down. At that point, I sort of looked at it and went, "Crap." (Hey, it was a lot of blood!) But I figured it would stop, so I rinsed it off and kept taking my shower, except the damn thing wouldn't stop bleeding. Like I'd get rid of all the blood and the next time I looked down, there was a nice new bloody river flowing down my ankle. I remember looking down once and seeing my whole ankle red, and the water around my ankle a reddish-pink. And for a girl with really bad eyesight, that's sort of... impressive?

But it was rather freaky, so after I finished showering, I walked downstairs (with a pad of toilet paper stuck to the bottom of my foot, so the blood wouldn't drip all over the floor), and by the time I got to the kitchen (which is where our Band-Aids and crap is), I had another river of blood down the side of my foot.

Anyways, that was my legit "Oh Sh*t" moment of the day.

Pyro Nerds!

We had the flame test in chem today, where you burn barium/copper/strontium/potassium and look at the color of the flame. Anyways, Joanne/Faustine/Courtney/Jessie/I finished the mini-lab, so we started burning the sticks that the elements were on, and mixing colors and all that good stuff.

So we finished burning sticks, and I head on over to Peter and Ross's group, since they always do a ton of awesome stuff. They were burning pennies. =] As in, the post-1982 pennies. Since they're copper-coated zinc, and zinc has a lower melting point than copper, the penny would start melting on the inside with the copper still being solid, and tapping it on the lab table would cause the zinc to ooze out. (See? There's chemistry involved! We're pyros, but we're not just pyros.) We decided it would be awesome if we had a crucible, since we could then fuse all of the zinc bits together and get a nice block of zinc. xP I love how Mr. Coburn did absolutely nothing about it - when Joanne and I were still burning pennies and he wanted to turn off the gas, he asked if we were done burning stuff. =P

So after that lab group stopped, I got Joanne to do it with me, and Peter came over to watch. I tried burning a pre-1982 penny on accident - it turned cherry red and started flaking. o.o But anyways, we burned a few more pennies and it was pretty awesome. =D If any of you ever get to try this, adjust the Bunsen burner so that there's that bright blue triangle within the flame, then hold the penny at the tip of the triangle. Once it starts melting (you'll be able to tell; it'll like, bend), pull it out of the flame and tap it on the tabletop.

So anyways, I now have a zinc penguin and a demolished copper "penny" that looks like it's oozing zinc (the two pieces are fused together).

Day 6 ~ Favorite Marching Memory

Oh jeez, there are so many! Most of them not even directly related to marching... xD I love our bus rides to and from competition, and how we used to get back around midnight. Jhay's random little quips (beaten puppies, God pulling the wings off angels, being Nemo or a piranha, etc.) were pretty amazing... We had a pretty beast Publish or Perish game going on this year while waiting for announcements at one of the comps. I could go on forever. =]

117/365

I'm academically average! Yay C- in APUSH! Hm. Yeah, this isn't average, at least not in my social group... I would cry if not for the fact that this is due to our having only a single assignment in the gradebook as of yet, and that assignment being a pop quiz that freaked out pretty much the whole class. xD

I love how Mr. Coburn humors the pyro nerds in his class, including myself. =]

116/365

.

This made me so ridiculously proud of myself... xD

Day 5 ~ Favorite Show You've Seen

.

115/365

My subconscious scares me sometimes.

I had this dream last night in which I lived in this quaint little village, where you knew pretty much everyone, but vampires started to appear. But these weren't your typical suck-your-blood vampires, oh no. They pretty much ate you whole. They would also something bash your head in with rolled up pieces of paper, and if that didn't work, they whipped out a block of tile from thin air. Plus they had little pieces of metal that, in the smallest quantities, could set you on fire. It was really creepy.

In any case, I guess I was trying to fight these demons, but they couldn't see me? I remember saving this one teenager from being burned, then I saved this old lady called Betty Smith, and shoved her into her group of friends to be protected. But her friends pushed her around their circle (trying to protect her, I should add) that she broke out the other side, and there were two vampires who burned her despite my efforts. Then two of my friends tried to save her, and one of the vampires tried to burn them too, by putting the pieces of metal down the back of their shirts when they bent over. I was able to save them, and somehow shoved the pieces of metal down the shirt of one of the vampires, and found out that it works on vampires, though not to the same extent as humans. [Side note - The vampire who tried to/burned Betty Smith, and tried to burn my friends was blonde with her hair in a half-updo, wearing a magenta dress and a red shawl].

After a while, the vampires discovered that I was the one foiling their attempt to, I don't know, eat and burn all of mankind, and tried to kill me. I somehow found a companion - I seem to remember the person being a guy, but I'm not sure, because I remember Courtney in the dream but I can't place where - and we were both trying to save the village and stay alive. We met this old guy which snapped our picture as we ran past, which freaked both of us out, because there was something about vampires having a connection with cameras. But we discovered it was a Polaroid, which calmed us down, because vampires use digital cameras (don't ask me why/how I "know" this...). So we ran up to the guy, he gave us the picture and these sheets of paper.

Eventually, this guy? and I found this old hut thing to hide out in (it was literally tiny, the max number of people that could have fit was probably three), and it had symbols on the walls. After a bit, I was able to find out how it worked - it was apparently an anti-mystical creature boundary. We read the pages, which described all of these mystical creatures, and apparently the vampires who ate/burned people were called Batman Johnsons. There was also this creature called a Luminar that could shoot shards of crystal out of the palms of its hands, and a little invisible lump creature thing that was supposed to be nice. There was a lot of information on more creatures too; I remember there being something about a companion puppy as well. But it was really interesting, and would have been a nice read if, oh right, we weren't being hunted down by crazy man-eating, flesh-burning Johnsons. (Rofl. xD)

Eventually this creature found us, and I was able to activate the barrier, so he got trapped in the wall for a few minutes. But either I wasn't working the spell right, or it was weak from non-use, because he escaped outside of the walls, and apparently made a hole in the hut, and stabbed my friend in both eyes. I thought the creature was a vampire, but it used shards to pierce my friend, so maybe it was a Luminar... At this point, I kill off whatever it was somehow, and sit sort of sit there petrified.

Then I woke up, and apparently the whole thing was a psychological experiment on how people would react in times of great stress? I was one of the few people who actively sought out to prevent the vampires from killing off others; a lot of people just tried to protect themselves, and a few even joined the vampires. One of them remembered stabbing someone in the eyes, so... I guess that was a correlation? It was creepy...

In any case, I was really freaked out when I woke up, especially since I didn't get so much into the "psychological experiment" part. If the dream was an hour long, maybe 30 minutes were spent protecting others without the vampires knowing it was me, 10 were spent running away, 10 were spent reading the manual, 9 were used to trap and eventually kill whatever crap thing killed my friend, and one minute was devoted to the "waking up" from the "psychological study."

Anyways, I have really weird dreams...