Tired

This past week has been interesting and exhausting. To be perfectly honest, I don't remember much of this week, I've been so out of it, but here's a synopsis. First, I had to get through all the first semester finals - man, was I tired by the end of those. The first day was french and honors English, which weren't too bad. It seems like every day, there was a test that I studied more than the other, and out of Tuesday's exams, it was definitely French. It doesn't help that  I  wasn't really sure what to study for Honors, but whatever. Then, on Wednesday was my worst day - at least from the point of studying - AP Biology and AP Chem. The night before, I seriously spent five hours working on my biology reference sheet, only to use it less than five times during the test. By the time that I got around to studying for AP Chemistry, it was pretty late. And even though I did study my notes for an hour, it didn't really sink in. All in all, though, all my tests, even Thursdays (math and civics) weren't as bad as I expected. I already know that I did well in my French and Civics test, and what I got on my chemistry test - though it hasn't been curved- but I'm not too worried about the rest.
Even after getting home on Thursday and anticipating a day off on Friday, I didn't get to rest. That's because yesterday (Saturday) was our first Science Olympiad invitational, which meant that I had to make up the anatomy cheat sheet and practice all day Friday. Let's just say it wasn't my best day off of school. The invitational itself was okay. The main problem was that they weren't really prepared, and neither were we. For one of my events, Optics, the test proctor didn't get there until the time it was supposed to get started, and then passed out the test to people in the front and told the rest of us to go down and get it (we were taking the test in the auditorium), which wasted a ton of time that we could have been working on our test. When the time was up, we still had 20 questions or so left. Then, for the second part of that event, the laser shoot, the way we practiced couldn't work, so we had to improvise, which didn't exactly work out very well. Luckily, though I'm not sure why, that event was not counted toward our team score. Another event of mine, Water quality, was also not counted because the people who were supposed to do the test never showed up, so someone provided a test - but not until the first testing hour was over, and so was 20 minutes of ours. Unfortunately, that was the event I actually got second place, and I didn't even get an award for it! Then in the event Sounds of Music, where we had to build and play our own instruments, we pretty much failed at the playing together part. Basically, everything was a train wreck. Somehow, though, we managed to place 5th out of 39 overall - not thanks to me, though. The way they scored events was really weird; they only ranked teams up to 15th place, and then after that, everyone got 16th place. Why they chose 15, I don't know, seeing as that's not even halfway through the teams. I would rather know where I placed, and see how I need to improve, then have my feelings spared. But that's just me. I bid you adieu until next week's spirit week (whose days are really stupid).

Trees Galore

Here are all the pictures of the tree since the last post. As you can see, it snowed, then melted, then snowed again :) On the 8th, I almost forgot to get a picture, which is why it is at night.

January 3, 2012

January 4, 2012

January 5, 2012

January 6, 2012

January 7, 2012

January 8, 2012

January 9, 2012

January 10, 2012

January 11, 2012

January 12, 2012

January 13, 2012

January 14, 2012

January 15, 2012

January 16, 2012

Winter Blahs

For a while there, it was beginning to look a lot like winter. There was an appreciable amount of snow on the ground, it was a little chilly, and generally winter-ish. But that moment has passed because the snow is already starting to melt and it is 40 degrees outside. Really, Mother Nature! It's supposed to be winter, not the beginning of spring, as it has felt of late. I'm not complaining that strenuously about having balmy and sunny "winter" days, but if we don't get a snow day some time this winter, I am going to be ticked!!
But other than complaining about the weather, doing homework, and studying for tests, not much has happened since my last post. Our exams for the first semester are coming up in a week, so all the teachers are cramming in all the information they have to get through, which leads to a bunch of tests. Not fun at all. Last week, I had three different tests to study for, and I probably have one or two coming up. The worst (at least so far) was my Chemistry test. The multiple choice questions weren't too bad, but the free response question just about  killed me. I stared at it for at least five minutes before doing anything, and of course, it was one of those questions, where everything is based on the first one, so that if you get that wrong, all the rest will be wrong, too. Let's just say that I won't be getting my usual high grade on that one.
On a slightly happier note, this three day weekend has been nice. On Saturday, I went with a couple of my friends to see the school musical - Legally Blonde. Apparently we are the first high school  to preform it, so that's pretty exciting. The actual performance was really good, other than one person forgot to turn on their microphone for one scene, so you couldn't really hear them. Of course, some of the actors were better than others, but on a whole, the production was very professional. I even managed to enjoy myself, after wanting to strangle some of my friends as the kept on singing the songs over and over all the week before. My favorite parts were the musical numbers "Bend and Snap" and "Whipped into Shape," as well as "Here! Right There!" (better known as Gay or European, where the defense tries to figure out if the pool boy is gay, or just European) which was hysterical.  Last night, I watched part of the Golden Globes, and caught up on Downton Abbey with late-night re-runs. While watching the Golden Globes, I liked most of the fashion on the red carpet, except a few that were a  little too frou-frou for me and the few times that I saw Ricky Gervais, I was amused, though I do feel he tuned it down a bit from last year. Downton Abbey, of course was awesome! I can't wait until the next episode airs on next Sunday!!!!! That's all for now - upcoming: Winterfest/Spirit Week, which should be interesting!

New Year Excitement

Happy New Year, everybody! I can't believe that it is already 2012! As usual, my family and I welcomed in the new year by watching the television broadcast of the celebration and ball dropping in New York City, and then my dad yelling out the door "Happy New Year!" I don't know when my dad yelling out of our door became a tradition, but we figure that he might as well make it one because as he's been doing it for several years now. Every year it amuses me that all this hype is built up around the ball dropping, but I never seem to catch it actually dropping. But who am I to talk, seeing as I watch the darn thing year after year. I usually don't make New Year's resolutions because I figure I'm just going to break them anyway, but this year, I've decided to take a picture of the tree in front of our house every day, as a sort of record of the passing time. The first two pictures are found below.

January 1, 2012

January 2, 2012

Now that all the holiday stuff has died down, I've tried to buckle down and work on school work, namely reading Catch-22 for my independent reading project in English. As much as that book amuses me, I have to read it in small doses so as to not confuse myself so much. For those of you who haven't read that book, you should know that Catch-22 is not written in chronological order, but in random flashbacks and references to future events, not to mention that most of what is being said is completely pointless (which I guess is the point...). So as I said before: very confusing. In between doing school work I've managed to go to the movies twice (!) over this break, a frequency that is unheard of in my family. On the 30th or 31st of December, we went to see Sherlock Holmes at the local theater, and then today, we saw Mission Impossible at the IMAX theater at the Henry Ford Museum (which according to my brother, is that largest). I enjoyed both a lot, especially seeing MI in an IMAX theater, which made all the action seem more real and around you. Unfortunately, though, we forgot to look at the movie schedule today, and got there several hours early, so we had to look around the museum. That being stated, I have to say that the movie was definitely worth the wait. Tomorrow's the last day of break, so I'm going to try to make the best of it!! Happy New Year, again!

Return Home

Well, my family and I made it home from Missouri in one piece. There was a little snafu when we were driving through Indianapolis and missed the turnoff on the highway, but other than that, the drive was fine, albeit boring. On the 26th of December, we drove to St. Louis so that we could see more of our relatives during the vacation. My mom even planned a party on the 28th so that we could see my dad's side of the family, who we haven't seen in three years or so. It was nice to catch up on everyone, and the food that we made for the party (caramel apple cake, sugar cookies, and spiced pecans to name a few) was delicious. The next day was the end of our vacation in Missouri, and we drove home, reaching our destination at about 11:20 PM. Here are some pictures of our holiday season that I wasn't able to post earlier (the sd card drive on my laptop doesn't work for some reason):

Carmel Apple Cake (earlier one)

Kingsley and the gifts

our Christmas tree

Kingsley opening gifts

WWI Museum in Kansas City, Missouri

WWI Museum (on same day)

Kingsley making sure we won't leave without him

Kingsley, Casper, and Baxter looking out the window

Kingsley and his cousins, Casper and Baxter