Fried or scrambled?

Today, I've had a Beowulf test, derivative test, Frankenstein quiz, trebuchet launching, aggregate expenditure test, and una prueba de los partes del cuerpo, and I'm functioning on less than an hour of sleep. My brain has been thoroughly fried and scrambled, and spell check is flagging practically every word I type.

And I have the SAT tomorrow. Blehhhhh.

In other news, the shirts that I designed for choir came in today, and they're super rad. I'll post pictures as soon as I get a new camera.

Fall Concert

chTonight was the annual Friendswood High School Choir Fall Concert. Hoorah.

Initially, I wasn't planning on doing a post about this, but I had a request to put a picture from it on my blog, so I'm doing this instead of the 80 lbs of homework that I should be doing.

There's your picture. Are you happy now?

In all actuality, I totally don't mind putting specific pictures, giving mini shout-outs, or blogging about something that you request. If you want to see yourself, someone else, or a specific topic, just let me know or leave a comment.

Oh, yes--the concert. I figured I would just give my opinions on the choirs, regardless of whether you care or not.

• Treble Choir- This is the freshman choir; they sang Ricevete by Mozart (arr. by Liebergen) and The Storm is Passing Over by Tindley (arr. by Baker). They were pretty good... for a freshman choir. I mean, it wasn't bad, but it was immature. Ricevete was okay, but they seemed pretty timid, and the song sounded so... lifeless. At the end of the piece, one girl decided to be the "hero" of the choir and belt her note--that was fairly distracting. The choir seemed to enjoy The Storm is Passing Over more, and it showed. It was still pretty dull, but it sounded so much more put-together and mature.
  
• Concert Men's Choir- This is the choir for guys who are in their first year in choir and/or didn't make the cut for our mixed choir. There aren't many people in there, which is sad. They sang The Vagabond by Laura Farnell and This Train (arr. by Emerson). The Vagabond was cute, I guess. During this piece, I mainly paid attention to the one animated person in the choir. I loved This Train--you could pick out certain people, definitely, but it was pretty good.
  
• Varsity Women's Choir- We have two women choirs that combine for concerts to form the Varsity Women--during the first period class, I'm an aid, so I know all of the pieces by heart. J'entends Le Moulin, their first piece, seemed sloppy. But I think this is due to combining two choirs that have very little practice with each other. Their second piece, Heart, We Will Forget Him was technically stronger, but it sounded so timid. However, there are over 60 girls in that choir, and while it shouldn't have sounded so weak with that many people, the director probably told them to back down.
  
• Combined District Women's Choir- The girls that auditioned to be in the Region choir sang a piece by Z. Randall Stroope called Psalm 23. In the performance, my main thoughts were about blending, and it's hard to judge the performance of the judge while surrounded by earth mother Alto II's, but it seemed fairly solid to me. The choir thought it was hilarious when someone blurted out, "WOW!" immediately after the director lowered her hands.
  
• Campus Singers- This is our mixed choir, the most elite and theoretically the best of the choirs. The Region audition process is mandatory for the members of the choir, and thus, we sung some of our audition pieces: Daemon Irrepit Callidus by Orban and Sure On This Shining Night by Morten Lauridsen. In class rehearsals, we had issues getting the end of Daemon to "ring" (echo off the walls), and I didn't think it improved much. Otherwise, I felt like our performance was fairly solid--it seemed more emotional and cohesive than in rehearsals. Of course, I was one of the performers, so my opinion is probably not the most accurate.
  

Mambo Italiano (Weekend: Part 3)

Every year, the choir has a pre-game Spaghetti dinner. This year, the entire choir sung a song called (fittingly) Mambo Italiano. It probably has the strangest lyrics ever. For instance:

• "Shake a baby, shake a baby. 'Cause I love a when you take a me."
• "Go, go, Joe. Shake a like a Giovianno."
• "Try an enchilada with a fisha baccala."
• "Hey mambo--no more the mozzarella."

And here are the photos:

This is my father. He's kinda cool.

They're pretty.

She's used to me taking super flattering pictures of her. It's okay.

Man choir. My brother is the one not wearing the right shirt.

We like to mambo.

Is this real life?

There's a group of guys at my school (mainly in band) that coordinate outfits every so often. Masculine, I know. Last week, the came to school as old men (although they looked more like tacky tourists), and today they dressed up as frat boys. I'll try to get pictures next time.

Anyway, when they dressed up as frat boys, they wore two polo shirts, plaid shorts, visors, and sunglasses. A kid that's in my Choir, Economics, and Physics classes brought AXE and applied it liberally throughout the day.

I'll elaborate--he brought a one ounce can and used the entire thing by the end of our 7th period economics class. I don't have a major problem the smell of AXE, but being exposed to that large of a quantity kinda gets you high. I'm not kidding. I had a major headache, couldn't focus on the teacher was saying, and could hardly comprehend the text. It was incredibly frustrating. One of the kids that sat right by the AXE kid was cringing, so he moved to the other side of the room. My teacher told the AXE kid that he wasn't allowed to wear obnoxious scents to her class again.

So... Many... Projects...

I have a ridiculous amount of long-term projects. I have to build a trebuchet and write a "historical reference guide" about its history (I fully intend doing so in children's book format), research the economic structure of Papua New Guinea, and am officially in charge of the Choir's (Curious George-themed) homecoming float. In addition, I still have to finish applying to eight schools, Air Force ROTC, Army ROTC, blog, and get cracking on my duct tape prom dress.

Did I forget to mention that? I've decided to make my prom dress out of duct tape this year for a scholarship competition. This is my general idea:

Based on Blair Waldorf's prom dress from Gossip Girl, by Marchesa. Except this one isn't as awkwardly assymmetrical, will have feathering all around, is red, black, beige, and yellow, and is made of duct tape.

I want it to be crazy-detailed, so I'll probably cover the entire dress in the feather pattern. Right now, I'm playing with textures, and I've managed to crochet duct tape. I'll probably put pictures of that up eventually.

Oh, and I'd like to give a shout-out to my super crazy awesome AP Economics teacher, Ms. Berryhill. I gave her the web address to the blog, and I really hope she's reading this. She told me to write her a letter about myself at the beginning of the year, so I drew this comic strip. Click on it to see a larger picture. Go ahead, click.

Page 1

Page 2

My AP Econ buddy, Allison, is supposed to start blogging today, and I'm excited. Allison Carlin, I'll be stalking following you. I promise.

T-Shirt Designs

In my free time, I blog, watch Gossip Girl, take/edit pictures, and design t-shirts for various school organizations. These are my masterpieces:

NHS - Big (front)

NHS - Big (back)

Math and Science Club (front)

Math and Science Club (back)

NHS - Humorous (front)

NHS - Humorous (back)

NHS - Basic (front)

NHS - Basic (back)

Mu Alpha Theta - Front

Mu Alpha Theta - Back

Choir Optional Shirt

My Fatigue is Showing!

I checked my grades today, and I noticed that my grades decrease as the day progresses. Perhaps I get so worn out by the end of the day that I don't put through the effort? Or maybe my classes get progressively harder? Strange. (Are you confused as to how I have a higher grade in AP Calculus than Choir? So am I.)



In other news, season 4 of Gossip Girl premiered! However, this episode was purely mediocre. It seems like this is the exact same plot with Blair as the beginning of season 2, where she was dated a royal who was trying not to show that he was a royal, but she ended up falling for him because he spilled the beans. Writer's block? I don't know how I feel about this Juliet plot--they always give Nate these relationships that are completely irrelevant to anyone but Nate (i.e. Bree, Vanessa in the beginning). Don't get me wrong, I love me some Nate Archibald, but the show could easily progress without him. Or Vanessa, for the matter--what exactly was the point of her being in this episode? She served literally no purpose whatsoever, other than to show that Jessica Szohr is still in the cast. Since the character was introduced, she's just been... there. I think the Georgina drama is way overdone: she leaves, comes back saying that she's changed, and then people cause her to go crazy and she ruins everybody's lives. And then she comes back, and does it again. Basically, everything that did not involve Chuck Bass was poop.

All in all, I was not impressed with the bulk of it, but the ending was fairly strong. By the way, how is it possible that Ed Westwick and Hugh Laurie can make a cane look attractive?

Becoming Jane

Every year, we have a back-to-school party for Choir. And every year, attendance is low, and it's usually a flop. This year didn't disappoint.

However, we went with a "Doppelganger" theme this year, in which people dress up like actors, singers, or other figures that they are told they look like. I dressed up as Jane from the Twilight series (sorry, once again, for bringing up Twilight in the blog). I think I was pretty spot on.

My friend Jaclyn looks exactly like Bella. We enjoy taking thematic pictures.

Lindsay Lohan--genius.

My friend Blythe was dressed as Giselle from Enchanted. I used my mind games on her as well.

Flo from the Progressive commercials--also genius.

First Day

Today was the first day of my senior year. As you may have deduced from the title. Here are my thoughts on my classes:

1. Senior Mentor - I ended up being a Senior Mentor for one of our women choirs--which makes me happy because I can help the Altos bang out notes, practice, or take my private lesson during that period.
   
2. AP Calculus BC - The teacher, Cap'n Crotteau is way more awesome than I remembered. The man is incredibly intelligent, has like eight degrees, toured as a professional golfer, and was a captain on a nuclear submarine. I don't understand why he would choose to put up with a bunch of high-schoolers every day, but I sure am glad he does, because he's stinkin' hilarious! However, instead of having us sit in rows like a normal math teacher, we sit in table clumps, like in first grade. I named my table "The Table of Champions". I pleased (and slightly intimidated) with the people at my table.
   
3. Campus Singers- There are 73 people in that choir. That is way too many. I was going to audition for Alto section leader, but one of our vocal virtuosos (and choir president) that I thought was a Soprano II (but used to be an alto) moved back, and I think she is more cut out for the job.
   
4. AP English IV- This class is WAY TOO LARGE. There are 38 people in a class with 36 desks. It makes me feel claustrophobic and socially awkward. We also have a gigantoid project called Poet Museum. My teacher, Ms. Simons, told us that we can work alone or in pairs. I am very independent--I am an introverted, finicky, obsessive perfectionist. I like to hog projects, and given the opportunity, I will do them by myself. However, my dear friend (who I ADORE) gave me "the do-you-want-to-be-partners?" look. I'm in a pickle.
   
5. AP Physics- I am so excited for another year of my Physics teacher's obliviousness--it's quite entertaining.
   
6. Lunch
7. AP Macroeconomics- I think I am going to love this class. There are only 16 people, and they are some of my favorite people in the world. Yesssssss.
8. Pre-AP Spanish IV- I am pleasantly surprised with this one. I expected to feel awkward being a senior in a class full of sophomores, but I really don't. There are about 12 people, so I think we'll really get to know each other. However, all but two or three of us are girls, which is weird because Spanish is usually the language that the guys take.

After school, I got a call from a representative for Naval ROTC. I have a meeting with him this Friday at Starbucks. Which makes me super nervous because I heard that a guy at my school had a scarring experience with an Air Force Academy rep. The man sounded nice on the phone...

I also met my (potential) organ teacher today. He was nice. Kinda smelled weird. But he was nice. My dad had mixed feelings about taking organ lessons because he wants to teach me lessons about budgeting and whatnot. But I'm going to try my hardest to go through with this.

So far, I haven't screwed up my fast from solid food and facebook. However, I've been playing massive amounts of piano to avoid thinking about it. I really think I should try to pursue the spiritual aspect of the fast, but I'm so afraid about confronting my beliefs.

Registration Tomfoolery

School officially starts on Monday, and yet, I feel like I've been in school for two weeks. Seriously--here's a schedule of what I did today:

• Woke up at 6:30 am; left for dermatologist at 7:30
• Dermatologist appointment at 8:00 am (Received two additional medications for acne. Gross.)
• Got a mango smoothie from Jamba Juice
• Worked the Interact booth from 9:00 to 9:55 am
• Set up risers and had a Choir officer meeting from 10:00 am to a little before noon
• Worked the Interact booth from noon to 2:00 pm
• Took and printed ID pictures for StuCo from 2:00 pm to about 4:45 pm
• Went home, attempted to read Atlas Shrugged, and uploaded a bunch of junk to my computer

By the way, the ID picture taking area is SUPER FUN. Here's the result:

This is a picture of a poster that's in the cafeteria. Something about eating healthy.

So, uh... we ate too much free candy.

Another picture of the cardboard cutout that my dear friend brought.

Wall mural?

Yessssss.

And here's a productive use of the ink ribbon:

Schedule

It's official--I'm a senior. I can prove it, too: I have a schedule. It's on paper and everything!

1. Senior Mentor - Basically, I'm supposed sit in a basic math class (i.e. Algebra or Geometry), and help out freshmen or sophomores that aren't really latching onto the concepts. However, the teacher that I'm mentoring for has an AP Calculus AB class first period. A student that was in the same situation last year wrote on facebook, "She'll either make you basically a teacher aid or will ask you to find an algebra class going on the same period to mentor. I had a friend who became an aid and she asked me to find another class. (Took the off-period because my assistance was not needed)."
   
2. AP Calculus BC - Theoretically, this class is right next to the class I'm "mentoring" for. Which would've been convenient. Pfft. On another note, I had the same teacher for Pre-Cal my sophomore year as I'll have this year for calculus. He was a captain on a nuclear submarine. And he got mad at a kid my sophomore year for calling him "Cap'n Crunch".
3. Campus Singers- This is the top choir at my high school. No big deal or anything.
4. AP English IV- I had to read Wuthering Heights this summer. I heard the quiz was brutal. I'll let you know the result later.
5. AP Physics- The instructor of this class also taught my Physics class last year. He is a goon. See video below.
6. Lunch
7. AP Macroeconomics/AP Government- I heard that the government teacher is quite liberal. But I'm okay with that.
8. Pre-AP Spanish IV- I couldn't fit the actual class in my schedule, so I'll be doing the curriculum in a Spanish III class. Hooray for sophomores...