Preoccupations of the Mind

Now that the Holiday break is upon me (almost...I have an exam tonight but I had no problem with the study guide so I'm sure it will be fine), perhaps I will be able to write more. I have been a lazy blogger all semester. Here! Read a poem I wrote a year and a half ago! Watch this thing on YouTube I watched over the summer! Yes, I have occasionally appeared live and in person, but most of the blogs that posted were scheduled in August. I don't mean to be so impersonal, but I wanted you all to have something to read while I had no time to write it. Consequently I am quite out of poetry until my brain can think up some more. Video of the Week shall be taking a break until I run out of time again (probably some time mid-January, so if you think about it, it really isn't that long). The truth is I really enjoy blogging, and wish to continue doing it. It just is a big time consumer. I'm not saying it wastes my time, but it probably is not the most useful thing to be doing either.

So...since something like Friday afternoon (after my English exam was over), I have started overwhelming myself with a bunch of information. That sounds a little funny to your Average Joe, I guess, who is probably scratching his head and wondering "why is she studying MORE now that she is done with school for the semester?" and why do people scratch their heads anyways? Does having your brain respond to something make it itchy? I don't scratch my head when I am wondering something, but perhaps I am used to wondering and I have become immune to brain-itches. Nonetheless, learning is something I have been waiting to do all semester! Sure, Sociology is interesting enough for a while, but then it just gets depressing and I start to think that maybe the reason the population is declining is because everyone is taking Sociology of the Family and getting depressed and discouraged about having families. I have not changed my mind, but let me tell you that some of this stuff is painful to study. And I am not even from one of those broken homes or blended families or anything else like that! I have talked to other people in the class who are not as blessed as I am to have a mom, dad, and siblings of origin who are a traditional family with joint sharing-something-or-other and we all love each other most of the time, and it gets to them more than it does me. However, I shall prevail.

What I was saying before I got off on that was.....um......yeah. Learning. Oh, I also learned in British Literature, don't worry. It was a fun class. But all the paper writing drove me crazy, as usual. The only class I want to take over again where I had to write papers would be English 111. That was the best class ever....I could pick ANY subject to write about and could be as opinionated or satirical as I so desired. It was paradise. For me.

SO BACK TO WHAT I WAS SAYING TWO PARAGRAPHS AGO, I have learned a lot since Friday, and it hasn't even been a week. First of all, some friends came to stay over Friday because their parents went out of town. One of these friends really likes to educate people on very interesting things. I could just sit there all day and he would tell me everything about anything I wanted to know about. I don't know how somebody can have so much information in their head and be able to recall it exactly and then explain it to somebody like me in a way that that somebody can actually understand it. So after two days or so I learned a lot more than I expected to, plus he had brought some Michael Rood DVDs that we watched Friday night. Michael Rood is extremely cool, I have discovered. I like cool people. :D

After all of that, I then began doing all that I have been looking forward to all semester, which is learning. I have been studying law, religion, medicine/health stuff, and midwifery. It is all quite fascinating. The only problem is that I am now putting so much into my brain that I haven't really been talking to anyone. This blog post is the most I have said in five days, and this is writing. I don't know if my mother has noticed anything, but I seem to be having trouble keeping up conversation. She asks me, "How was your day?" And I answer, "Uh...good." "What did you do?" "Uh....stuff."

Yeah, I guess I still am a teenager, but I usually am...uh....responsive. I am a girl. I talk. At least, I thought I did, but I guess I don't. I am too preoccupied. I feel like Mr. Meredith from the Anne of Green Gables books. I am too preoccupied with my theological musings that I cannot seem to do anything but look glazed over and then go back to studying, perhaps writing down some thoughts on what I am reading. Yes, I had about three epiphanies yesterday, so I wrote those in my journal, and went right back to studying. I am sure I am driving my mother crazy. Sorry mom!

On top of all that, if I do have a conversation it is very surface, even with people I normally do not have surface conversations with. Take this blog entry for instance. I can't even think of anything to say other than "I have not been able to think of anything to say." I DO NOT FEEL LIKE CARRYING ON A CONVERSATION. Let me repeat....I am a girl and conversations are all-too-natural.

Perhaps I am in Absorbing Mode. I am a sponge that may be in dire need of squeezing, but squeezing hurts, so for right now I am only dripping. Some day I will submit to being squeezed, but for right now just leave me be, and feel free to run water on me or dunk me in a pan of water...I am all for it!

Let this be a disclaimer--if I do not talk to you this week or do not talk much, please do not think I don't like you. That is not true. I [probably] like you very much.

Talk you you all later (heh heh...)

~Jessica

The Ocean-Side Holiday, Part Two

Deja vu...

As we walked up the deck, back towards our condo, we stopped and looked at the
condo next door to ours on the left. It was quiet, but that shouldn’t have been
deceiving. The night before at about two o’clock, we were rudely awakened by the
booming of music, fireworks and various screams and throwing-against-the-wallses.
It was a house full of night owl party animals, right next door to us.
We weren’t even sure why they were staying there. It was our third full day on the beach and we hadn’t really seen them out on the beach at all. We had only seen them on their porch, and every morning they would come out on the deck overlooking the beach while we played football.
Otherwise, hardly a word came from their station, except at night (much to
everyone’s dismay).
Mike and I had gotten rather tired of the partying, and concluded that, if it were to persist tonight, we would wake up early and do our best to be equally as noisy during the day, which was when our neighbors apparently were sleeping.
We walked on and had just reached the safety of our own deck, when two guys came out of our adjoining condo. Neither of them looked much older than Mike. They were scrawny and hairy and both took to walking on the rail of the deck that stretched out from all the condos and overlooked the beach.
A preppy blonde stuck her head out of the house. “Omigod, get down you guys!”
She shrieked, giggling.
“We’re fine!” Responded the hairier one.
“Yeah! Look!” The other one took off his shirt (Mike and I cringed at the abundance of hair and lack of muscles which he proceeded to try to flex) and he threw it at
the girl.
“If you fall I’m SO going to kill you!” The girl chortled, catching the shirt and going back in the house.
The guys ignored us as they jumped off the railing, walked over to some boogie boards leaning against their condo, grabbed them, and ran down to the beach.

That was from that story I'm writing...you see, I've been writing it for about two years now. I started it just before our beach trip two years ago, so this is my third beach trip working on it. It doesn't have a title, so I'll just call it "That Story." Anyways...that was based off of what we were plagued with 2 years ago when we stayed in this same condo. Last year we were fine, and thankful for it. Then...guess what? A big bunch of college students arrived late Friday afternoon in the condo next to ours. I was having serious deja vu, especially when they turned on the music very loud (I recognized almost all the songs mostly by their resounding, sub woofer-afied bass lines), drank, smoked, and partied like there was nobody else around trying to sleep at midnight, or at least concentrate on reading a book.

We were coming back from eating at Jordan's Seafood when some of the people arrived. There were two guys and a girl. One of the guys, once he got in, immediately came out on the beach. It was dusk, and Marck and I were out appreciating our beautiful surroundings. He kind of ruined everything as he whipped out his cellphone, plunked himself down in the sand, and said to his friend, "Hey, man! Guess what I'm doing...having a beer on the beach!"

There was an absence for most of yesterday of nice, clear, salty air as we went from our deck to the beach...all I could smell was tobacco smoke. It was awful.

Last night we concluded they went clubbing or something, because it was actually quiet at their home, till they all came in about 12 or 1 AM, making a bit of a racket. We haven't heard them this morning. Yesterday afternoon they were all down at the beach, set up probably 30 yards from us. Marck and I kept accidentally drifting down to where they were set up. All the girls were in bikinis, and sometimes they would get in the water a little bit, and scream at every wave that came by. It was very funny...Marck and I just had to make fun of them...I think they were too self-absorbed to notice. After all, when Grammy asked them Friday night at 11:45 to please "keep it down to a roar", they barely turned down the music, and certainly didn't turn themselves down. Yeah...pretty self-absorbed. Another reason I'm glad I was homeschooled...I was around my parents enough to learn to be conscientious.

Anyways, despite all there is to complain about, I'm having a great time. I'm about two thirds of the way through Twilight...I'm still liking it! I am a little curious as to what she's going to add to the plot(s) to put in the other three books. I'm just hoping it's not something that wasn't meant to be a series, like Pirates of the Caribbean, that she just adds-on to later, resulting in poorer plots....you see what I mean? I just don't see how this could get to be something that extends beyond the first book, but perhaps it does...

Anyways, I'm off to go play out in the sunshine...

BUBBA -- The Italian Mob Trucker

By Jessica, Lizzie, Nathan, Sarah, and Marck

Once upon a time, there was a little boy named Bubba, who was born in Italy, moved to New York for a few years, and then down to Alabama for the rest of his teens. This story begins with the beginning of Bubba’s…um…life change. He was walking along the Mississippi one day and a tree unceremoniously fell upon his head. Ever since, Bubba has done some strange and occasionally amusing things.

After getting hit in the head, Bubba had a sudden subconscious urge to turn his footsteps towards the nearest diner. While walking to the diner, a big trucker came by, offering Bubba a ride. Bubba, being foot sore, readily agreed. It was during that ride to the diner that Bubba learned his life’s calling.

He dropped out of Kindergarten, got himself a totally-awesome camo hat, and started driving! As he drove, he would stop at every store he saw, and try on all the sunglasses on display. Because of this, he never got a lot of work done, but Bubba really didn’t seem to mind. His first assignment was from Alabama to New Jersey. It was never officially finished, because somehow he ended up at a campsite at Jordan lake in North Carolina, where some members of TCC Seahawks were camping out for a few days.

At first, when the swimmers saw him, the swimmers just stopped their Mafia game and stared at Bubba, mouths hanging open in a very uncivilized fashion (after all, they WERE homeschoolers). Bubba grinned and struck a pose. “Yo!” he coolly exclaimed in salutations.

Nathan blinked, a beat went by, Sarah snapped a picture of the posing Bubba, and the click knocked Nathan somewhat back into his senses. “What…is…that?!?!?” He asked no one in particular.

Bubba said proudly in his unique Italian/Yankee/Southern accent, “It’s a trucker who loves sunglasses!”

Then Bubba invited himself to play Mafia. Before the 15-18s had a chance to confer (since otherwise they never had a say in anything those days…especially in coffee matters), Chandler started the game again. “Everyone go to sleep,” he declared.

The participants all closed their eyes and lay down their heads, only to all jerk a moment later when a large snore came from the chair where Bubba had situated himself. Chandler proceeded narrating the game over Bubba’s snoring.

Alec was the Mafia, and when he awoke, he pointed to the snoring Bubba without even being asked who he wanted to kill…

And that’s as far as it got before we all left!

One of "Those" Entries...

I have just been informed by a certain “Allison”-type-person that I need to update my blog. Thus, this entry...

Many of you are probably wondering how my life has been since my last entry. Well…it’s been just fine, thanks for allowing me to ask for you. The family reunion was kind of a bummer in the area of my own generation, but the two above mine were fine people, resulting in many fine relationships with older people. This generation is just not RIGHT sometimes, you know? However, we homeschoolers and ex-homeschoolers are just fine, am I right, or am I right? Ha ha…sorry for the generalization about non-homeschoolers. Y’all are pretty much okay, I guess…especially since my parents are included in that category.

Anyways, I had an itchy spot and I scratched it and I believe I feel slightly sun burnt. Allow me a moment to check. Okay…only on that small line right before my tan line, where I seemed to have missed putting sunscreen. It’s on both sides. Fancy that. At least I am consistent and symmetrical in my inconsistent unsymmetrical ways.

So the Totally Amazingly B’gorious Seahawks stole another win, leaving us completely UNDEFEATED!!! It is very amazing, considering that at the beginning of last season we were at the bottom of the last division. That’s a bit of a comeback, I’d say. So I believe we get a trophy, and get to move up at least one division, which will make me happy. The thing is that I won’t be able to swim in the fall because of time, won’t be able to compete in the fall because of graduating, and will only have one summer left (next summer…) before having to completely move on forever. However, I am making plans to continue to play water polo (I almost typed “water polka”, which is something a little similar to “water disco” which Matt and I are currently working on perfecting) on the day that Coach has that, which I hope is Wednesday (or Monday)…although I just realized that with the school schedule I have now (not much) I would be able to make it on Tuesday or Thursday. Anyhooness, I really like water polo. Have I ever said that? And I scored a goal on Matt yesterday. Yes, that’s an accomplishment. I think…better go check before bragging more…

Today was nice. I had planned to wake up at six, work out some, take a shower, get ready and go with Elizabeth B. to Wake Tech to clear up some advising stuff. Well, I don’t remember staying up too late last night, though I don’t remember what time I went to sleep, either. And what was I doing…? I seem to recall some faint vision of playing the guitar or something, but then I think that was the night before…well, I don’t know what I was up to. It’s not really important anyway. The point is that I woke up at ten after seven and Elizabeth was supposed to pick me up at eight. I looked in the mirror and…my hair was even on both sides, even though I slept in it! I was amazed. I had to straighten out my bangs a bit, wash my face, put on a little makeup and drink some coffee, and I was ready to go.

We stopped by MacDonald’s for breakfast, and don’t you all just go assuming I didn’t drink more coffee there or anything…that would be ridiculous. We when to Tech, got our advising, I bought my books, and then we went up to Target and Best Buy to look for birthday presents for Michelle. I was about to say what I got for Michelle, but then I remembered she reads my blog sometimes. Um…I also got a new purse finally, because one of the straps on my beloved light brown leather back pack broke, and for some reason the amount of things I keep in my purse has grown since last time I used either of my other purses, so I needed a new one. Thus, a very nice dark brown “leather” purse from Target. I was about to go into a purse crisis, you see. Too small, too big, too shiny and sparkly, too beach bag-ish. But this one is perfect. You know, I should start naming my purses. Hmmm…

I went to the Bradburn’s for lunch where Michelle had prepared some very yummy chicken-thing, with a side of some squash-thing (sorry to totally butcher the names of the dishes, but I can’t remember them…it was great anyways). While she was cooking that, Elizabeth and I looked at some clips on YouTube from “Across the Universe” which is a new movie using Beatles songs for the musical numbers.

I think it would be neat to take the work of some singer or band and make that into a musical. Like they did with Abba in “Mamma Mia.” So today I started thinking about, if I did that, how I would do it, and who I would use. But the thing is that a moment later I realized that I would want to use my own music to go with whatever story I needed the music for. Still, I guess it’s a cool kind of challenge to write a story around existing music, at least for me, anyways. And…that got me thinking that what if I took my own songs and wrote something around them? So I am opening my little binder where I keep most of my finished songs, and the first song, “Understand” is…too wordy and complicated. I don’t know what you think, but songs for musicals shouldn’t be that way. They should be concise and straightforward. Or maybe that’s redundant, but you know what I mean. Second song, “Here” (Rachel J.’s favorite song), is…reflective…you know? I change tenses in this song. No I don’t. There’s just a flashback-thingy. Never mind. Third song, “Residing”, is…longish, but that’s not bad. Actually might work. And actually-actually…it might work better for this thingy I was writing and thinking about turning into a musical that I started writing lyrics for…I don’t know. I like this song though. Fourth song… “Elijah”. Ah, yes…straightforward and concise, no doubt about that. Though not very musical-ish. The fifth song, “Away”, has too much imagery to be in a musical. “Hating One, Loving One, Expecting One”, the sixth song, might work. A monologue kind of thing…yeah. So that’s two so far. The seventh…it really, really, really depends on the context…and that’s a bit more of a personal song anyway. And there’s the part where she’s explaining and the part where she’s talking to the one she’s explaining about. That could be broken up into two songs…oh! To expand “Rockwell”…that would be really cool! I could devise the whole plot around “Rockwell”! Now I’m getting excited. It’s nice to have this blog-thing to brainstorm on. Okay. Three down…or three and a half. “The Freedom In-Between” seems like it could be a good musical song, and it may fit well. Very straightforward. “Time” is even more so…and would work well as well. Five and a half already! Well…now I was just thinking “Sounds of the Morning” and “Questions” were very imagery-laden and wordy songs, but looking at them…they’d make good heartfelt solos. They are kind of alike. Though I guess the only reason I think so is because I wrote them at about the same time. “A Confession” isn’t finished, but it would do for something. This is fun, but now we’re getting into my older depressing stuff. “Forever Winter”…hm…aside from being perfect for a Narnia musical (though no Miss Denmans requested to use it [gee, I wonder why…marketing usually helps]). “Your Own” may be of some good use after all…and “December”. Wow, that’s an interesting song. Not so sure about that. “Leave it at That” is a good musical-type song…if it can be incorporated. I hate “You and Me.” I know it’s Joanna’s favorite song I’ve ever written, but it’s just a musical cliché and I really hate those. But if musical clichés sell, then…whatever. I’ll have to deny myself the pride of writing something ingenious and go for the cash, I guess. So that’s all in that folder. There are a few others I’m working on which may work…well, whatever. Just some stuff to put in my thinker.

After lunch, Elizabeth dropped me off at the pool, where I finally got to spend some time with Elayna. Then…surprise! One of my friends and her mom came to the pool! Marck was a little disappointed because the two brothers in that family couldn’t come. They had come straight from shopping or something, so my friend had to swim in some clothes which dragged a whole lot, but it was all okay. We went diving down to the bottom of the diving pool, and I helped her on her dive and her butterfly. She says my butterfly is as pretty as ballet, and I’m like a graceful serpent moving through the water…*sniffle* *sniffle* *tear*…how…nice…*sniff*. She actually said “snake”, but “serpent” sounds much more romantic, don’t you think?

After Elayna left, my aunt stopped by the pool, and came over to our house afterwards. Haylea shared some brownies with me, and Charlie informed me that he was going to college in Tennessee. EVERYBODY IS GOING TO TENNESSEE. Jeffrey, Micah, and now Charlie. Wonderful. Well, it is nice there. I’d go live there, out in the country somewhere. And I remember there was this really cool science museum in Chattanooga. That’s such a weird name. Weirder than Kalamazoo. I think Raleigh, Cary, Apex, Durham, Knightdale, Zebulon, Wake Forest, and Chapel Hill are very elegant names.

The song in my head right now is “Annie Waits” by Ben Folds. I like that song, FYI.

So, it’s sad. The last thing for summer swim team is this Tuesday. Water polo playoffs, the fun meet, and the awards banquet. Then it’s done. Finished. I’m going to start crying (again)…I hope…oh, yeah. I already talked about this, didn’t I? Well, gee. Maybe I should stop thinking about the end of swim team so much. FOCUS, Jessica. There’s things to be done around here, like…like…AHHHHHHH!!! I am about to GO CRAZY!!! Do you understand what I mean? When you just get a sudden inspiration to get SOMETHING done RIGHT NOW…when you literally get all twitchy and feel like if you don’t do something, for heaven’s sake, you’ll just go absolutely insane and start running around the back yard in a panicked manner, pulling your hair out and stamping it into the ground? That last sentence was actually taken from a dialogue in a book I’m writing…but taken from real life experience originally, anyways. So there. Don’t you ever feel like that? I feel like that approximately every two weeks or so. It is kind of annoying, because it causes me to stay up late even when I need to wake up early the next morning.

I am wondering right now why I am not feeling a giant pang of jealousy, having been informed about a certain person doing something else with a certain other person which this certain person would have rather been doing with one of those said certain people but not the other certain person around. Whichever certain person is excluded except for this certain person, this certain person certainly doesn’t care and hopes those certain persons certainly don’t take this personally. Another certain person may know what this certain person is talking about…but should certainly keep his or her mouth shut, because this certain person should stop talking about this, even though she feels like keeping on. This certain person can sigh all she wants to, and wonder all she wants to, but it’s not going to solve anything, and this certain person says that perhaps the other two certain people simply were certainly not doing anything pertaining to anything which this certain person would rather…oh, never mind. UGH-ness-icity. This certain person is having an attitude and denying everything.

I am not!!!

Hm.

So to end on a more flavorful note, I was thinking about something I cannot remember. Hey, you want another clip from my book? Let me go find something really quickly. Okay, here goes. Try to see if you can guess the inspiration for the following passage:

Jacob and I followed, stopping in the den. While the walls still had dark wood paneling, the shag carpet had obviously been pulled up and replaced with nice, fluffy cream colored carpet. I glanced around, feeling a bit out of place, especially when my eyes fell upon a person who could only have been who Mrs. Madison had indicated was talking to two girls—Jack Madison.

I was instantly enthralled. There was something about his face. It was so average, but stood out somehow. Maybe it was that it was so averaged, and therefore quite perfect. What made it even more perfect was the thick, smooth chin-length light brown hair which framed the perfectly average face. As he sat talking, he moved in a very animated sort of way, and as he did, his hair moved very animatedly with him. I could only seem to think in my head for that moment when
I first laid eyes on him, “Wow, look at his hair…it goes, swish-swish…”

A moment later he looked up, very intently with his animated, yet fixated and stern-like gray eyes, and as he greeted Jacob excitedly I began to feel very shallow for allowing such meaningless thoughts as ones about the movement of a guy’s hair. “Hey, Jake, what’s been happening?”

So, that’s it for now! Sorry to keep you all in suspense about what happens between…well, never mind. You all certainly will not ever know “what’s been happening” with Jacob, now, will you?

Later!
--Jessica

Onward Ho to Maryland!

So, here I am. It's ten thirty-five. I am again at Comfort Suites in a room in my own bed, next to my Grandma, who is snoring (don't tell her I said that) while the TV is showing "48 Hour Mystery" or whatever that show is called. I don't care if she killed him. They're all dirty, rotten scoundrels anyways. So...deja vu...or however you spell that. In May for graduation/homeschool conference, it was the same ordeal, except we were in Winston-Salem and not somewhere in Maryland. The room is backwards, too. The lobby is nicer...I like it a lot, actually. The pool is indoor, and very small. I am dead serious when I say you can do a flip-turn at one end only to immediately do one at the other end.

The day started off normal-ish. I don't ususally get up at 7:40 am on Saturdays, and we usually eat pancakes on Saturdays. SO maybe it wasn't so normal. I made myself some cereal, ate the cereal, took a shower, got ready, packed the rest of my stuff, put all my stuff in the van, sorted and folded laundry...and...the rest of everybody was still taking a long time getting ready. So, I sat down at the piano bench *squeak* *rock* *squeak* *threatens to collapse* and thought about looking at some sheet music I had gotten from the library Friday evening. You know what? Sheet music really complicates something that is so simple. It took me a whole minute to figure out one chord for "With a Little Help from My Friends". At this time, Marck applauded loudly at my success. After two measures, I got bored of doing such a tedious task. After all, the week before I was just playing around with the same song, rearranging it classically or something I cannot remember...it sounded fine. It was on key and everything.........anyhoo, I don't know. I DO know I need to learn to read music. But really.

Once I started grumbling and banging around, I was asked to find something useful to do. So I made sure that my chinchilla had enough water, food, dust, etc. After doing that about five times and saying goodbye to Nancy (we took Mitch to the Bradburn's last night), we finally all piled in the van and started down the road. We weren't on the highway for long before a...house...came on to the entrance ramp. Yes, a house. It took up two and a half lanes. Some cars got around it, and others were trapped behind as the highway went down from three lanes to two. We were one of those cars, and we were stuck there behind the house for about five miles, going about 35 mph, till the house finally got off a little bit after Zebulon.

We stopped somewhere past Richmond for lunch. I ate a lot there. I should have just gotten a salad, but got a Swiss mushroom Burger instead. Do you know how hard it is to say that out loud? It's happened to me at Lonestar, too. "I'd like the Swish mussroom burger." It's very embarrassing. They are yummy, but I don't think I am going to get one again, unless I remember to practice saying it right before I order.

I texted Nathan a bit as we drove on, and then he had to go do something else, and I got tired. I listened to my iPod (Bob, as you may know from my profile) some more. The rest of my family really likes books on tape, you see. I can't stand them. The person reading the story hardly ever reads it right. Only ever so occasionally is a book on tape enjoyable for me. That's when I really appreciate my iPod on long trips. I run out the battery quickly and probably start going deaf, but I just like the turn up the volume really loud and concentrate on writing or thinking. I can't read with any music but instrumental, and I can't write anything but dialogue unless I have complete and utter silence. I like silence. Sometimes I wish my whole family would pick an hour or two every day and just leave the house for that length of time, and I could just stay home and write or work on music stuff. Unfortunately, when they DO leave, I am given a long list of things to do. I like to ignore that list. Okay, I ignore it accidentally. I'll start doing stuff on the piano and I'll just get lost.

ANYHOO, I then somehow took a nap, sleeping through what I thought would be the rest of this story about some boy who somehow acquires a duck who likes the quiet but can't stand commotion. I actually got into it when I woke up and discovered that I had NOT slept through it and instead had a back-and-neck cramp. We stopped at MacDonald's to use the facilities and get some milk. I was looking forward to some whole milk and what do they give me? 1%. I hate 1%. The only thing worse than 1% is skim, but really 2% all I can stand, though I prefer whole.

Somehow we ended up here in Maryland, at this hotel, checking in. There was a lot of traffic, but that's about all I can remember now. I made a startling discovery--this lotion I bought a while ago that doesn't smell the best when I put it on actually smells fine once it's dry.

Anyways, we went to Denny's for dinner (I had a party with myself about that. I love Denny's). We came back, I read a bit, everyone went to bed, and I decided to do blog stuff. Once I drank three cups of coffee at Denny's, my mom reminded me that even decaf coffee has a tiny bit of caffiene in it. Aw, shucks.

Plans for tomorrow...eat breakfast, swim in the little tiny pool, go to the family reunion, be friendly, eat food, come back here, sleep, get up, go home, beg to stop by Mount Vernon on the way back, be ignored, go home, collapse on familiar furniture, eat healthy food for the meet on Tuesday. Good plan, but now SNL is coming on, and I'm going to watch a bit to see if they happened to think up anything funny this time...

Goodnight!
~Jessica

The Seahawks Camping Adventure Part 3 (final installment)

Ideally, what I should be writing is, "Sunday morning my eyelids fluttered opened as I was roused by the ambrosial scents of summer mornings, and at once I had a impulsive urge to grab my notebook, dash down to the water’s edge and write about everything as I soaked all the glory of daybreak in. So, I did just that. The air outside the tent was cool, but not crisp, which was a sure sign of the weather officially having made the transition over to summer from spring. My heart was filled with virtually overwhelming bouts of joy and delight as I scampered down the trail and laid eyes on the softly shimmering waters before me. I simply had to record the feeling at that very moment…”

Unfortunately for all parties involved (or maybe just me, I wouldn’t know…), my morning went quite differently. It was 8:30 when I was finally jerked awake by SOMEBODY loudly asking, “Did you boys sleep well last night?” Yeah…sleeping…right…so much for that.

As Lizzie illustrates in her own blog, everyone else had already begun stuff for breakfast-ing, so all we girls had to do once we got out was collect the Starbuck’s bottles, separate the three into four cups evenly, and then drink said Starbuck’s. Easy, right? For me, everything is easy in theory. In the execution everything is quite different. Even walking over to the other side of the room. But I suppose that when I theorize about walking across rooms I typically forget to take into account all of those nice little obstacles no one decided to clean up which are lying directly in my path. So I guess that figures into everything I theorize about…it becomes idealizing. Humph. I knew I wasn’t good for much in that respect.

The premise: Three Starbuck’s bottles, four of us. Us means Lizzie, Sarah, Nathan, and Jessica. Four cups, one very meticulous and precise Jessica to measure out said three Starbuck’s bottles into said four cups. One of said four people per one of four said cups, each of said four people drinks their portion, wakes up, is happy, everyone is glad because of this and the day goes on as it is supposed to.

However, some younger members of the party insisted that it was their right as much as anyone to have a share of the Starbuck’s. Another great debate about this determined that said four members of the 15-18 age group HAD to share with younger children the prize coffee. Mr. J appeased our broken spirits with some Maxwell House he magically brewed up. Still, the pride and dignity among the 15-18’s was unreasonably humbled.

The day went on a little less eventfully. Lizzie and I were going to play in the water some more, but we were so tired (again and as usual), and the little sitting rafts looked very attractive. I got the blue one and she got the silver one, and we began to float. At first we were afraid of everyone trying to tip us over and so were on our guard a lot, but after everyone actually got the message and went with it (a rarity among siblings, boys, and fellow swim team members in that order) (so it is especially rare if you, like Lizzie, have boy siblings who are on swim team with you), Lizzie and I were able to comfortably, peacefully float out to sea. At first we were going to try to paddle south towards some foreign shore where we hoped the natives would greet us and ask us to stay for dinner (lunch, rather, but perhaps they were a little uncultured and hadn’t gotten the memo that it’s typically called lunch now and not dinner as it was in the olden days), but after a while we realized that the wind and water really wanted to drift us in the other direction, so again we gave up the quest for the South shore and instead freed ourselves to be at the mercy of the light breeze. We closed our eyes for a while, probably close to ten minutes. After that while I thought for sure we had gone around the bend and were to end up in Whoknowswhere Land. Then I was suddenly jerked to full attention when I felt something under me. Had Alec and Chandler followed us all the way out here and were now about to tip us over into the dark depths of the foreboding Jordan Lake? Had we run upon a sandbar and made a very important discovery which could prevent the injury of thousands of boaters and water skiers? I shrieked in surprise anyhow, and Lizzie asked what it was. I said, “I felt something under me!” Finally I had the nerve to stick my hand under the raft. Sand, or some other sand-like squishy substance. I looked around…

Land ho!

We had washed up on shore. I felt like a dying whale. Not on the outside, but I suppose physically…? Maybe it was rather silly of me to feel like a dying whale. As a matter of fact, it was. I should have never let myself feel that way, because I might have better spent my time feeling like Robinson Crusoe or the Swiss Family Robinson people or like Wolf Larson…well, I didn’t. I felt like a dying whale, but THAT IS VERY BESIDE THE POINT. Lizzie and I laughed at ourselves and so paddled out to the middle of the lake so we could begin drifting again. We had made a lot of headway for doing absolutely nothing and wasting all that time running up on shore. We were quite nearly around the bend.

I don’t really remember much after that. I believe we had woken up enough after beaching ourselves, and decided to have a paddling race back to our own little area of the water, where we concluded it was definitely time to go eat something. Again with the potato salad and hotdogs, but I really don’t care. The difference between American and Southern Style is that Southern Style is made “more right” than the American style. And Mrs. H, I am up for hotdogs anytime. I think God gave me a lovely gift of the tolerance for eating large amounts of hotdogs over however long I must endure. If I had to survive off of them, I would do it without complaint, and I don’t know why.

After eating food, we headed back down to the water for another Sunfish ride. Mr. H had something surprising in mind—let Lizzie sail the Sunfish! He gave her a quick lesson and let me listen in so I could take over if Lizzie messed up terribly or something. As Lizzie said, Nathan and I were the brave passengers who agreed to go along on such an adventure. After we almost crashed, we got underway and did quite nicely, which is a comfort to me, because Nathan said that if we got stranded, they would eat me first. Nathan wasn’t wearing his trunks but was just in his normal attire and so jet skiis occasionally went by and we would then over the wake, causing him to complain about getting more wet each time. After a while we finally got used to it, we declared it was definitely the life. This provoked Nathan to pronounce himself captain, since he had the good paddle. I quickly took first mate, since I had to be more important than Lizzie (and I had the little broken paddle). After all, she got the fun job of steering the boat. So Lizzie got second mate. Somehow we got to talking about how Allison should have come, and if she did, then she should be both cook and cabin boy.

Our seafaring expedition couldn’t last forever, though. Eventually we could see in the distance that the parents were beckoning us to come back in. With a sorrowful unisonous sigh of colossal proportions we set sail towards land, leaving the waters behind evermore-or at least until the next camping trip.

It was time to pack up. I can tell you from experience from the whole home school conference vendor life: packing up is the worst ever. When you’re packing to go somewhere, you have motivation. You’re all excited, everything is in a bustle, and you have to fold your shirts just right so they don’t wrinkle. When you get to that somewhere, setting up may be exhausting, but at least you have motivation. It’s exciting. You have a few days of a new experience to look forward to.

Breaking down and packing up is terrible, though. All you have to look forward to is going back to the mediocre life back at home. Sure, home isn’t bad, but compared to wherever you’ve been before, it will take a long time before the thought of home really becomes exciting. Packing up is the worst. It’s strenuous, laborious work that you just don’t feel like doing because you’re too tired from all the stuff you’ve been doing the past couple of days. Not to mention, everything you’re trying to pack up seems to know this, and tries its best to agitate you more by NOT FITTING. No matter how hard you try, it takes forever to get stuff into their designated bags. I am quite thankful it was just Marck and me in the van. If we needed to we could just kind of fold up stuff, throw it somewhere in the van and deal with it later. We did that with a lot of things. Fortunately I had packed my suitcase light (not much is really needed for camping), but the tent was the hard part. I have determined I will make millions of dollars by selling a tent with just one slight alteration—a bigger bag. Nothing too big. After all, the smaller bag is for the convenience of packing and all. But it is a pain in the everywhere-you-can-think-of to put that BIG TENT in the little-bitty bag it came in.

I mean, those tent manufacturers just don’t understand that, while the tent is folded by machines the first time and so OF COURSE it fits into the bag, humans aren’t that…efficient. Not naturally, anyways. So why not provide them with something just a tiny bit bigger than the bare minimum? You know, so five people don’t have to push and pull in every direction just to squish it in long enough to get the zipper over that one portion. And what if you forget to put something into that large bundle? The bag on the Jessica brand of tents will open easily. None of the contents will unceremoniously pop out of the bag like an obnoxious Jack-in-the-Box with pomp and blare…

Well, you get the point.

After wrestling with the tent bag, Marck and I joined the others to help haul the Sunfish back up. That was a job, and I hated it so much I don’t even feel like reliving it long enough to relate it to you all, even for drama’s sake. I know, I guess I’m being wimpy…

After helping with that, Marck and I had to take off. Marck had a bad sunburn from the day before and mom and dad had said come home.

Marck didn’t like camping as much as I did, I believe. I say, “this is the life for me,” and he says something like a grunt to that. But I don’t care. I believe I shall be doing this till the day I die, especially if we all follow through with that colony idea…

--Jessica

The Seahawks Camping Adventure Part 2

Dawn.

That's like, the start of some book or something, isn't it? Or...no. It's the start of some story some girl wrote in this writer's group I used to be in before EVERYTHING decided to take place on Wednesday nights. Sorry I took that. I mean, it WAS dawn. I guess. I wouldn't know, because it was a might bit cloudy. Nonetheless I forced myself out of my sleeping bag eventually. I didn't want to get up at first because I didn't want to wake anyone else up by exiting the tent, but once I got out that didn't seem a problem, because no one else showed their face till twenty minutes later. I had taken my journal out with me with the full intentions to write down by the shore of the lake. But once I set foot outside the tent, I regretted getting out of my warm sleeping bag. It was freezing outside. At least, to a little, very cold-natured person like me, it seemed like it. I thought I would just sit in one of the chairs around the fire pit for a moment and then go down, but it seemed after a while I was rather stuck to the chair. "Well," I thought, "I'll make it down there tomorrow, perhaps."

I believe what was supposed to be a journal entry about the beautiful environment turned into something more of a reflection about something I cannot remember, and then I began to write about the sounds around me...the crows, the ducks, the bird's songs, the hum of RVs. It seemed as if the Seahawks and all associated beings (namely Marck and Mr. M) were practically the only rustic people around, or at least on that particular campsite. It makes me wonder...what's the point of camping if you're in a house on wheels? And can you really call it camping? I think camping is radical (as Mr. F/Coach [same person, fyi] was saying what it meant last Wednesday), and RV camping is NOT radical. It is probably fun, but not as much fun as REAL camping.

As I said before, 20 minutes later I was joined by some members from my tent, Lizzie and Sarah. We wondered why Rachel hadn't gotten up yet, but then figured it probably took her a while to go to sleep. So we sat there talking in hushed voices and being cold, before we all concluded we were starving and needed to get inside the suburban to get to all the food. Lizzie (yes, that's a link back there...on "Lizzie", to be exact) went into detail about that, so basically once we got in, we stuck our store bought Starbucks frappeccinos (sp?) in the cooler, ate some yogurt, and as other people got up, we began a game of Apples to Apples. By the time all the adults got up, practically everyone was playing. I mean, all the kids. I believe by the time we were done, we had exhausted all our red cards, or nearly so, and I think that's why we stopped. Then Nathan, Rachel, Lizzie and I resumed our game of hearts over some coffee. There was a bit of a dispute over whether the younger members of the camping party (anybody 13 and under, or anybody "not a 15-18 swimmer") should get to have coffee, especially special coffee. They had no need to wake up in the morning, they just wanted it because it tasted very sugary. Anyhoo, then there was a dispute about people being left out of hearts, so everyone got coffee and no one played hearts. Instead, I went to go wash up, and when I came back, everyone was eating pancakes!

I don't know how that all happened, because I don't recall being gone for that long, but it seemed like everyone was already in the possession of a pancake, wolfing it down, and going for seconds. Mrs. M was slaving away at the camp stove (can't be so rustic as to cook pancakes in a cast iron skillet over an open fire, I guess...). I went up with a plate and got some bacon Sarah had cooked, and a little pancake. I buttered it, and tried to pour the syrup over it (I say "sehr-up", not "seeur-ip"), but only a few drops came out. I suppose I should declare the news: Seahawks swimmers are now officially notorious syrup hogs. Sorry to say it, but it's quite true.
I at that pancake and went back to get one more small pancake. They were delicious, for the record. If you're going camping with someone who makes pancakes, go with Mrs. M. They are simply succulent and delightful. Bring extra syrup, though.

Nathan and Rachel's mom, dad, and sister, Hannah arrived after a while, and it was then decided that we should all put on swim suits and head down to the water. Marck and I had brought our little $10 Target volley ball especially for a big, unstructured game of water polo. The Seahawks are very big on water polo, by the way. So it became keep-away water polo with no goals, which was fun for a while, till we all got tired and got on floaties. Nathan and I got these two special floaties and named ourselves king and queen over the waters, and the ball was our royal ball of power. Joel was our faithful knight on his noble steed (a light green floaty), who was temporarily banished from the kingdom for accidentally handing over the ball to the enemy. He came back thought, and Nathan and I tried to arrange a game of Floaty Polo, but that fell through, really. The moms seemed to take to the idea for a while, though. I believe Mrs. H would start a Floaty Polo league if given the chance.

After about an hour and 45 minutes of swimming, Lizzie, Marck, Nathan, Joel and I decided we were hungry again. So we went back up to the campsite to eat some leftover hotdogs, potato salad, slaw, and macaroni salad. I was a bit disappointed that everyone seemed to take to the "Southern Style" potato salad more than the "American" potato salad the night before. Yes, my first thought was...isn't the South part of America? Even when we were the Confederate states, we were still in America. So really it should have been called "Yankee Style" potato salad. I didn't even know potato salad existed outside of the South anyway, like iced tea or barbecue. Okay, well, a little discovery has been made by yours truly. They DO, in fact, make potato salad, iced tea and barbecue outside of states considered "Southern." BUT...there's a catch. They don't do it right. They can't. It doesn't taste, look, or feel like it should. It is wrong.

So what was left of the "Southern Style" potato salad (which was yellow...thank goodness) was piled on top of the nearly full tub of the "American" potato salad, and I managed to scrape the last few bits off the top, while only getting a little of the American style. By the way, I might as well go and mention that store bought "Southern Style" potato salad STILL doesn't taste exactly right, because it's really made by those Americans over there, with their wrong potato salad and wrong iced tea and wrong barbecue. Gosh darn it, they can't do anything right!!!

Well, enough about potato salad. I believe I've had my say in THAT matter...anyway, Nathan and I got dressed because we figured we wouldn't want to go swimming again till four or five. Plus, I reasoned, if Matt, Kara, Sean, Rachel, Trissa, Torin, Coach, and Mrs. F did actually end up coming at some point of the day, I didn't want to be all swam out, because surely they would want to get in the water for a while. So we played Skip-Bo (or whatever that game is called), and I believe somehow that was when I first met Bubba the Italian Mob Trucker. You see, Joel is a Todd in the making (yes, that's a compliment...). I mean that by how he does voices and makes up characters with names to go with them. He has Lenny...and now Bubba. Lizzie explains a bit about that on her blog as well, considering she is a very proud big sister of this improv comedian in the making. :P

After lounging around a bit and playing a lot of Taboo (my kind of game!!), we went down to the water and sat on the edge. Lizzie and I talked about how it was late, and the F's probably weren't going to come. We sighed and frowned for a while, before Lizzie had the sudden inspiration to go ask at the Marina if they rented jet skis. She and I walked back up to gather passengers. Nathan and I almost convinced his parents to let me drive his dad's BMW, but alas, no. So we had to settle for my minivan. Nathan, Lizzie, Sarah and Joel came. We parked in 5 minute parking and went inside to the little store, where somehow a Snickers bar came into my line of sight and I simply HAD to buy it. I told Lizzie she'd better ask quickly, but she wasn't feeling like being outgoing or something (...homeschooler...), so I asked the lady at the front counter when I purchased my irresistible treat. She said they didn't even have jet skis there, much less for rental. That was rather disheartening. Anyway, after that we rode up to the gas station and looked for Aloe for our poor sunburns. No such luck, but Joel tried on all the sunglasses, Nathan discovered he wears aviators very well, and I suggested we should buy more marshmallows in case we ran out before the night was through. Everyone thought that was a very unrealistic fear, so we went back without the marshmallows. When we arrived back at the campsite...it was time for dinner!

More hotdogs.

Well, the kids fixed themselves hotdogs, as I believe we should put it, and after that was all done, the adults came up (finally THEY were hungry...) and said, "Oh, yeah...we have hamburgers and salmon burgers, by the way." By that time, I was full of more hotdogs and more American potato salad, so Alec and I decided we would split one later.

After a while it started to rain, so we all sat under the canopy that was the J's but looked like the absent Y's canopy from the meets last year, and we played "Mafia." One of those Seahawks traditions...Mafia in the rain. After the rain died away, Lizzie and I were able to go down to the shore of the lake, sit on the fallen trees and watch the sunset. We talked about many things, and we definitely agreed that if both of us didn't marry, then we'd have to get a house on a lake together, with lots of boats and a couple jet skis, and then go out every morning on kayaks, go sailing in the afternoon and jet skiing in the evening, with lots of swimming in between (for we would have a 25 yard pool in the back yard, of course), and do yoga after breakfast and fun things like that. Money didn't really enter the conversation. I suppose we could babysit for all our siblings and friends who got married and had children, and get money that way...still, I would like to get married someday.

When we got back, after the last purple stroke on the canvas of the horizon faded away to black, we discovered, to our horror, my worst nightmare had come true. There were only two marshmallows left. Lizzie got one, I got one, and we each got one s'more. Lizzie, I hope, repented from her evil ways and now will go with my instinct when I say we should really trust it.
I managed to get very sticky AGAIN. We played Twenty-Plus Questions for a long while. I even guessed, and got Mr. J's when he was doing "Idea." I felt very proud of myself. I usually just sit and listen...not my kind of game, really. So I did "Music" and after a while Alec guessed it... :) Then we split our hamburger, and after a while we all got sleepy and we went to bed. Rachel was a bit upset that it was even earlier than the night before.......

--Jessica

The Seahawks Camping Adventure Part One

See, I didn't take your title, Lizzie...

So, I've never been camping before, you see. At least, not before this weekend, and not ever any place but in a tent in the back yard a couple years ago. But the concept doesn't frighten me, as it does my dad...so when Sarah, Lizzie and their family asked our family, Chandler and Alec's family, Coach and his family, Hannah and Noah's family, and Nathan and Rachel's family to all take a big camping adventure to Jordan Lake, I jumped at the opportunity! After all, what could be more fun than spending a weekend out of doors with some of my favorite members of my favorite swim team?

The thing is, I decided this would be a once in a lifetime opportunity...and liked the idea so much, I decided to skip the filming for the 48 Hour Film Project film this year (which was to take place on Saturday and which I had been looking forward to ever since the one we did last year). Yeah, so that's a big thing. And what if it turned out I hated camping? I'd be stuck there, I guess. But, I reasoned, how could I hate this? But I had to admit, I wasn't really sure what I was getting myself into...

So, Friday it was just Marck and me heading up (down? across?) 64 on our way to Jordan Lake. Mom had not felt like coming, Robert had some homeschool newspaper kickoff party thing, and as I mentioned before, my dad rather dislikes camping. Marck almost didn't come because he didn't know how things would go without him there to care for Mitchie-Poo.

After much confusion about where we were actually supposed to be going (even a lot of communication sometimes renders itself almost useless), and driving around trying to get to wherever that happened to be at the time (and I, for a change, was usually right and Marck was usually wrong...), both the H's and us arrived at the same campsite at the same campground!

Immediately, there was the small trauma of one misplaced sandal on the part of David. Eventually, though, those of us who were not missing a sandal self-absorbedly (is that a word?) began to pitch tents. Or, okay, Lizzie and I pitched tents. Everyone else sat around OR unloaded the Suburban (they were not missing sandals). Well, Marck helped us pitch the girl's tent. And, when we drafted volunteers to assist in lifting the poles and hooking them into to the little hook-things, we received a little assistance. After the initial pitching of said girl's tent, Marck abandoned us to Whoknowswhere Land, and left Lizzie and me to pathetically attempt to put on the rainfly. After we finally found the loop-pocket thing which we were supposed to stick a little pole into, the rest went on pretty easily, and we stood back to admire our handiwork, for just a moment...and then went to go pitch the much larger boy's tent. Again, we only were helped when it came time to lift poles, and were then (AGAIN) left to do everything else ourselves. That is, until Joel and Marck came over and Joel started going through the accessories and explaining to Marck about the "cupholders that hang from the sky." That doesn't count. Finally, Nathan and Rachel got there, and immediately Nathan asked what he could do to help. We told him to hammer in the stakes. He did. We were happy.

Skipping by a bit, there was a bit of a debate as to whether the M's were coming or not. We already knew that Hannah, Noah and company weren't coming, and as for Coach and fam we wouldn't really know till they actually got there or didn't get there. Apparently Sean had two baseball games in Smithfield, one Friday night and one Saturday morning, so if they came, they would only be able to come for Saturday night. Eventually the M's did show up (thank goodness, otherwise we'd have to have hotdogs for breakfast), and soon after their arrival, Lizzie and I were so tired from tent pitching, we went to unroll our sleeping bags and take a nap. That was a little difficult because of the constant banter from outside, especially Alec's very loud and pronounced exclaimation, "Mr. H, you are SO unoriginal!"

So that night we roasted hotdogs (after the boys took a while debating about how to make a fire, and trying to chop down the small pine trees in the little woods next to us), and after that, we made s'mores. Joel kept taking whole Hershey bars and putting them on his signature giant s'mores he was making. I had two s'mores with the normally accepted portion of chocolate on them. The majority of us managed to get quite sticky, and had to go wash up before Lizzie, Rachel, Nathan and I played some more of our Hearts game.

After I got stuck with the Queen of Spades three times in a row, we decided we'd continue the game the next day, and went to bed. Rachel (of course) didn't want to sleep, so I told her a couple bedtime stories. One was about a 13-year-old adventerous camper named Rachel who counted sheep and promptly fell asleep. The other one was the sequel, which was about ANOTHER 13-year-old adventerous camper named Rachel who heard the first story and was suddenly inspired to do the same thing as that girl in the story did. Then we all decided we would all pretend we were asleep, and see what happened........

And that was the most exciting and eventful part one! Stay tuned for more!!

~Jessica

Good grief, where did I go...?

So, as many of you recall from my last entry, I graduated this weekend. Okay, enough celebrating, let's get back to business, I say. Actually, I don't feel too well. I had a coughing thing, and then I had a sniffling thing, and then I had a throaty thing, and now I have a head-thing, and a stomach thing. I'm not really contagious, but I feel quite rotten. But don't feel sorry for me, I'm just apologising that this entry isn't going to be very lively, because I don't feel like being lively at the moment.

Disclaimers aside, I can now say I had a wonderful time at the conference. I saw lots of people I know, lots of people I didn't know, and even somebody I did know but didn't know I knew and now I do. Yes, I can go back and change my answer on that survey...I have met someone in person who I beforehand knew online. Her name is Natalie, and on her blog she has a picture of us together as physical proof it did actually happen. The story is, I had felt like washing my hands because I had nothing else better to do (thankfully) before the next session started (Jeff Myers! Yay!). Suddenly I heard my name called. Well, all those two days (this was Friday) it had been happening, because I kept seeing people I knew there. But unlike those people's usual, "Jessica!" or "Wow, good to see you, Jessica!" or (said in a very smooth way) "Jessica, how's it going?" This was more like a hesitant question..."Jessica...? From the blog...?" Well, I thought, I have a blog... As usual, nothing intelligent could go through my head but ANYHOO, I looked up, and this girl about my height said, "Um, I'm Natalie..." and immediately it clicked. I probably said something like, "OHHHHHHH!!!!!" and I'm sure my eyes went very wide with some degree of shock and amazement. We chatted for a second or two, and then I felt like the restroom was getting very crowded, and so I asked her what session she was going to, and she was going to the one on "Guy/Girl Relationships" with Jeff Myers also, so I said I would see her there and took off to try and get good seats.

So we sat together for that session, and then the session after that on Postmodernism, and then she had to go to a birthday party. So I went down stairs and pretended I wasn't looking admirably at the guy with the hair that went swish-swish as he talked animatedly with all the millions of girls surrounding him as I checked my text messages, and then who should call my name from behind me but Andrew, who I had seen around that day and who was always on the other side of the room at the dance the night before so we had not gotten to talk to each other yet. Therefore we took the time to think about what sessions we were going to go to. I wanted to go to the next Jeff Myers one, which I could remember had something to do with Buffoons, so I kept calling it the Buffoon One, and Andrew thought he was supposed to meet his parents at a different one in the Ballroom somewhere in the Marriott, so we walked up there. His parents weren't there but Micah was, so the three of us went back up to the Buffoon One. We were so late we had to sprawl out on the floor and get neck cramps trying to take notes from the slide projector, but it was good anyway. After that, where we finally found some of Andrew's family, we found the rest of them, and then they left for dinner, leaving me all alone. My family had decided to leave me there and go to Cracker Barrel with grandma. About an hour later they came with a salad, which I ate with great relish but thankfully without any actual relish on the salad. After eating we all rushed to the talent show. Turns out my cousins were there, and we sat together and had lots of fun making fun of most of the participants.

Saturday was hectic. I got up and got all ready. I was going to wear my favorite blue jeans, my Swimmer's excuses shirt and my Sketchers and change into my fancy clothes right before the lineup. But NO. Instead, I had to go ahead and wear my v-neck, skirt and heels all day. Good thing was I got a laptop, so happy thoughts sort of blocked out my upset thoughts of being uncomfortable all day. Except that...I had five billion mosquito bites all over my lower legs! So, I ran back down from the room my parents, Marck and Robert shared on the 5th floor back to the room grandma and I shared on the 2nd floor, and was going to put some makeup on my legs to cover it all up (I know, very ridiculous but I felt it had to be done), and as I was about to do that, I realized I hadn't shaved since Wednesday or something, so I dashed into the bathroom, shaved the bottom parts of my legs as quickly as possible, grabbed my liquid makeup and some lotion and ran out, down stairs and into the van where I quickly applied both to my legs in the opposite order that I mentioned them in on the way to the conference. I was very late to the first session, so again I had to sit on the floor...in a skirt. Yay. No more sprawling out for me! Then I saw my cousin Lauren again, and decided to sit with her for the next session. That's when Natalie came in, I waved her over and then, lo and behold, Natalie and Lauren knew each other! Weirdness.

After that session, I was grabbed by mother and herded to the parking deck where I adorned my lovely green gown and saved the wearing of my hat for later, and ran back to the North Main hall thingy to sit around and hear some guy talk for an hour and a half about going up stairs and stepping on X's and YES, I have to agree with Natalie that homeschoolers cannot follow traffic patterns, not that that has anything to do with anything. But the whole two-by-two became a little tedious as we had to stop several times on the way to being moved to some other room to listen to more instructions and quickly snarf down chick-fil-a sandwiches and make sure the collar things were tucked in right and stuff like that ...what was I saying?

Oh, forget it.

So once the ceremony actually started (in another room which we were moved to AGAIN), it went fine. I met some very nice new people, though ended up stuck in a ceremony with two people I kind of knew, because the rest of my senior friends had decided NOT TO PARTICIPATE IN THE FIRST PLACE BECAUSE...well, I don't really know. Anyway, I was a little upset by that, but I'm fine now. At least Allison came.

We came back the next day and I can't remember much except that we ate pizza and I was really tired. And the muffin thing. But I'll save the muffin story for later...too tired for that now.

So long!
~Jessica