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BorrowerofMangos
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Name: Borrower
Gender: Female
Interests: writing, reading, cooking, eating, drama, sleeping, Greek tragedy and Georgette Heyer novels
Expertise: Er...schoolwork. Sad but true.
Occupation: Student
Industry: Quelling glare
Message: message me
Website: visit my website
Member Since:
7/22/2005
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| I'm still out here....I still remember my username and password, shockingly enough.
I guess I generally end up writing these entries at random introspective moments; ironic, really, since the whole point of a blog is make one's introspection a spectator sport. But in this case that hardly applies, as I'm pretty sure no one reads this; a state of affairs I'm not too upset about.
So, random stuff that I can look back a read in a couple months...Hmm. I've been all captain-y lately, which is good, given that I'm one of the forensics team captains and was not particularly useful in the first semester. So I've been doing the whole pep talk and warm up and find the tab room and make sure underclassmen get home okay and don't throw up in their rounds thing. It's good. I nearly fell asleep at the tournament today, lying next to a heating vent between rounds. Actually, I only had one round, but it was a doozy. One of the judges didn't get there till we were 1/3 done, and then there was delay, and confusion, and we had to start over and the one-hour lot ended up being a two-hour one. At least the kids in my room were a pleasant bunch.
I'd never sat through a straight round of dramatic interp. before; this was a league where humorous and dramatic are separate (in CFL they're together). So my first round of that was pretty exhausting; there was lung cancer and then an angsty split-personality vampire and then the Holocaust and then me with teen pregnancy and child death and then the Holocaust again; and later there were car crashes and angry models and suicide and Edgar Allen Poe and social dysfunction. Whew.
I quit the spring musical, because I was stressed with applications and school and didn't want to be the understudy of the overbearing mother again. It's been nice. Perhaps unfortunately, I've been spending pretty much all the time I would have been rehearsing dance sequences, etc watching Gilmore Girls. I'm hooked. It's addictive. It's like animal crackers.
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| So...I made it.
Summer vacation is finally upon me, after a year that was insane and ridiculous and stressful and, overall, pretty good. I've slept a lot and gone to the Potomac again and gotten better at waltzing and watched rather a lot of movies and been Miss Caroline Bingley and reread The Last Battle because it is simply gorgeous. And I was a bridesmaid at my sister's wedding. And in a few days I leave for a somewhat intense and mildly prestigious three-week summer academy for Latin. I'm a little nervous.
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| An update! Now who would have thought, eh? The past four months have been a bit on the insane side, with AP classes and theater and forensics and dance troupe and having a social life. Midterms start next week and I am NOT EXCITED. I am NOT EXCITED AT ALL. Yesterday was the last actual schoolday before said exams begin, and I missed it for my theater class. Instead of a normal exam, we go out and perform a Christmas show for elementary school and retirement homes. And that was, though I was pretty peeved at missing IMPORTANT REVIEW SESSIONS, extremely fun. The little kids got unbelievably excited when one of the boys appeared dressed up as Santa. We got back to school a little early, and since there was a class going on in the black box, our teacher said, "Let's go carol in the office. They could use some holiday cheer..." So we all trooped down to the mail office, decked out in Santa hats - Mike still in full costume - and green and red and polka dots, and sang "Jingle Bells" at the top of our lungs to the counsellors and administrators, and proceeded to the cafeteria, and thence to C hallway, and thence through the entire school building. There was hardly a class we did not disrupt - people in the halls started laughing hysterically and teachers opened doors to see what was going on and one of the yearbooks staff tried to take a picture. I am not sure how many times we bellowed out "Dashing through the SNOOOOW in a one horse open SLEEEIIIGH, Or'er the fields we GOOO, laughing all the way HA HA HA..." but by the time we finished everyone was hoarse and completely out of breath. It was just about the best 20 minutes of my life. Last night was nice too, as Kendall had a random party where we ate Indian food and played pool and danced crazil on her coffee table. There was an alarming period when we were afraid that Ava, tripping, had dislocated her knee - she hurt it this spring - but fortunately she didn't. She was settled into a chair with an ace bandage and frozen peas and much solicitude, and proceeded to play Apples to Apples with great spririt. She's an amazing girl. Anyway, life goes on. I'm in the chorus of the spring musical, and understudy of my favorite part, which is a good place to be. I have managed to continue having good grades, which makes me happy. Most days I eat lunch in the orchestra room, making myself unobtrusive so the teacher doesn't notice that I am not, in fact, an orchestra member. | | |
| Today was quite ordinary. I read a bit, painted in the bathroom, puttered about, watched Sailor Moon while babysitting and reached the conclusion that whoever came up with it was, to be blunt, on several kinds of crack. Yesterday was more interesting; I went to mass, saw a kids' theater production of The Hobbit, which butchered the story rather spectacularly - Elf Queen? There is no blooming Elf Queen in Mirkwood, Thorin does not survive, Bilbo is NOT a snarky twerp, and Smaug is not really, really inept. Strangely enough, I rather enjoyed it...the fact that dwarves kept popping in and out of Thorin's band as the actors were needed for other roles was pretty entertaining. Also, I reached a CONLCUSION. And the CONCLUSION is this: I am hit upon roughly once a year. In the library, peacefully and studiously doing my summer work, a random guy came up to me and instigated a conversation that went something like this: RANDOM GUY: (sitting down across from me) What are you working on? ME: AP History. RANDOM GUY: So ...you're in high school. ME: Yep. RANDOM GUY: How old are you? ME, getting both amused and slightly ticked off: Why? RANDOM GUY: Um, I was trying to figure out if you were eighteen. So I could make a move on you. But you're not. Dammit. So I'm not. ME: Ah. That would be a good plan. RANDOM GUY: I didn't realize how young you look till I saw your face. ME: That would make sense. RANDOM GUY: You're pretty. And you have a brain. That's why I came over to talk to you. So it'll be cool when you're older. ME: Um. Thanks. RANDOM GUY: (goes away) ME: (Tries not to snort with uncontrolled laughter into AP book.) Yep. I found it pretty hilarious, overall. Silly young men are just so funny. And so very, very awkward. I look forward to being entertained by next year's installment of 'Picking Up Non-Pick-Up-Able Girls.' And on a personal note, I HAVE STARTED A FIC. SOMETHING I HAVE NOT DONE IN AGES. SO I CAN OVERUSE CAPITALS. It concerns Remus and Tonks - no surprise there - and falling asleep. And I got my class schedule. Also, I find myself rather disliking The Secret Life of Bees. It's just so tidy and urgh. | | |
| I have spent the last few days in an entirely aimless manner. I drift about the house and yard, do chores when requested to, make feeble attempts to complete sewing projects, think about working on the second draft of my NaNoWriMo attempt - the structure of which, I have realized, needs to be entirely revamped so as not to bore the reader to tears in the first eight pages - read a lot, and waste time on the internet. But definitely read a lot. Sadly, though, I've been neglecting those required texts for school...not so wise of me. But Harry Potter and Dorothy Sayers and Joan Aiken are all so very distracting.... And yes, indeed, I really do need to discuss Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, though I imagine that's what nearly every other blogger who ever reads fiction has undertaken in the past few days. I bought in on Sunday - by the greatest, the most improbable good fortune, as a matter of fact. Our friendly neighborhood B&N was out except for reserved copies, and most remarkably I ran into the mother of an old acquaintance. The daughter already had a copy, and the mother works for the library and thus had already had a chance to read the municipal copy: thus, with unexpected kindness, she let me buy her reserved copy. I believe I thanked her enthusiastically and incoherently, and then settled to read in front of the store for twenty minutes till I could go home and settle down for a proper seven-hour sitting. Which I did - with meal breaks - and finished it just before midnight. It lefty me so wound up that I stayed up very late writing a poem about Philemon, which ended up being quite long and startlingly bitter on Zeus, Mercury, and being a tree.. [SPOILERS] I rather loved it. The way Harry's life kept breaking down was brilliant - JKR removed small things one takes for granted until the realization that it is not Howarts any longer and the war is on just up and whammed the reader in the face. Most particularly Hedwig's death. She was such a staple that it never occurred to me that she might be done in; ditto with the loss of broom and wand, even if the latter was later returned. I need to reread so I can process the plot a bit better; though I did not exactly race through, doing the whole thing in one sitting left me a bit shattered, most particularly by REMUS AND TONKS. WHY? WHY WHY WHY WHY WHYWHYWHY???????? Strangely enough, it was not their death in the final battle - or even poor beloved Fred's - that hit me hardest: it was Colin Creevey's. I got a bit teary, as a matter of fact. Not in any other part of the book....only when Colin had died. Odd. I have never even thought of him as my favorite character, but when he was gone it was just rather horrible. But she quoted Aeschylus, which makes everything all right. If JKR could pick a single thing to cement love for her in my heart, it would be that. I'm such a sucker for Aeschylus. He's my boy. One thing I did love in the story itself- and had predicted, along with the deliciously obvious R.A.B. bit - was Neville being quite essential to the downfall of darling Voldy. I do adore Neville. And Luna. And that awkward, awkward conversation Fleur and Remus had when Percy rejoined the clan.[/SPOILERS] Rereading HPB, and finally getting to the conclusion of the series, has reminded me that JKR really is a legitimately rather brilliant author. In the blur of Harry-obsessed, hormone-driven teens and tweens I had rather lost sight of the fact. I recall when, as a devoted Tolkienphile, I viewed as a bit more like fantasy for lightweights...but it's good. It's terribly, terribly good. To switch topics abruptly: I tried on dozens of pairs of spectacles today, and finally picked a pair that was nothing like what I'd expected to get. They're light brown brushed metal frames, almost the same color as my hair, with an odd, swirly texturing on the legs. Mom tormented/entertained me all through the incident by slipping bizarre grammar abuses into her speech every few minutes. Then we did more errands, and came home, and I learned that I can flip a rather full quesadilla and that Eragon the movie has villains who seem to be known as Argyles. Maybe they knit up some fearsome sweater vests...I never did feel the need to read the book, but it was rather easy to tell that the film was based on the story of a mildly plagiaristic fifteen-year-old. Oh dear. That is rather unkind. | | |
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