Uncommon courtesy.

As I was attempting to pull out of a gas station today, I found my way blocked by a long line of cars at a red light. I was preparing myself mentally to wait for the light to turn green and the line to eventually dissipate, when the car blocking the parking lot entrance backed up and waved me into the space. I gave him a thumbs up. He deserved it.

Listening to: "Star Trek Girl"
Reading: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling

Acoustic.

The best thing that happened today was that I forgot to make a lunch. I know that sounds bad, but it was for a good cause. I decided to download an album of strummy chilliness onto my iPod before I left for school. It was taking longer than expected, and while I was worrying about being late the concept that I might need to eat around noon completely escaped me. The album was Around the Well by Iron & Wine.

I finally went to the art museum on campus. The architecture alone is stupendous. I wanted to run up and down all the steps. It was serene listening to the fountains echoing cavernously underneath the gentle guitar of Iron & Wine.

I also got to hang out with some good friends tonight. They just got a new roommate (another friend of mine) who brought with her a ginormous bean bag. She was doing flips onto it without incident. I view this as extra incentive to visit these extraordinary ladies. That, and they always feed me yummies.

Listening to: Castle
Reading: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling

Are these funeral potatoes?

I was going to make a post bragging about my Starburst-flavored chapstick, but the awesome conversation at FHE tonight trumps it. I heard somewhere that the mark of a good conversation is that you can't remember what was said. I suppose if I tried I could list some things that were talked about (one of the guys took a class from Brandon Sanderson), but all in all it was a wonderful night because people were laughing and interrupting each other and exchanging knowing looks. For once I wasn't the one doing most of the talking at my table. I spoke my fair share, but there were people with just as much or more to say. I wish every Monday night could be this fabulous.

Listening to: "Tu Angelito Soy Yo"
Reading: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling

Heartstrings.

I've been working my way through the Harry Potter series again. I just finished number four. I love that no matter how many times I experience something, be it a book or a movie or something else, it can still make me cry. I know what's coming. I've felt this all before. Call me a girl (you'd be spot on), but it still touches me in just the same way. In this instance, it was Dumbledore's toast to Cedric at the Leaving Feast. He has a way with words, that one. Great man, Dumbledore.

Listening to: "Take It Easy" by The Eagles
Reading: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling

Romance.

I went to the zoo yesterday intending to sketch. I did a little. The wallabies were being particularly obliging models (they were asleep), but the shifty ocelot...not so much. I wandered through the kids' section for a short while before deciding to head home. Before I did, though, I decided to see just a few more animals, then just a few more. I stumbled across a part of the zoo I don't think I'd ever seen before. I won't describe it because I want to preserve it in my memory. I don't want to warp it or jinx it. The second to last thing I saw was the komodo dragon exhibit. I'm fairly certain they didn't have those last time I was there. I know; I looked. They're such pretty beasts. Naturally the last thing I saw was the giraffes. I can't go to that zoo without visiting the giraffes at their giant, multi-species enclosure. I love that they have room to run. I arrived at just the right time: feeding time. They're fed extremely close to the fence, so the view was amazing. I could've stood there until they all wandered away.

Listening to: "Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of" by U2
Reading: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling

Burrito.

Today I spent an hour writing a letter and amicably chatting with a friend instead of studying. It was nice.

It looks like my new Latin professor is going to be marvelous. If nothing else, one has to give the man props for enthusiasm.

Institute is going to be fun this semester, and I'll be learning about sections of Church history concerning which my knowledge is currently rather fuzzy.

Listening to: "Don't Look Back" by She and Him
Reading: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling

Hiatus.

I've been spending far too much time on the internet lately, so I'm going to take a break for a while. I'll probably peek at Facebook once a day, but other than that I'm dropping off the radar. My internet use is going to be limited to school-related browsing. I need this. The internet has been eating up my time. I've forgotten what it feels like to be taken over by a book. I need to rediscover that and rediscover the world outside my screen.

There's more to life than this.

For now, ciao.

Listening to: The Rocketeer
Reading: The Buddha of Suburbia

Week in review.

Monday was fabulous. I put off my Spanish homework to go to FHE, and I'm so glad I did. The activity was a crazy don't-get-tagged dash with swords made out of PVC pipe and pool noodles. Dessert was root beer floats. After the activity, one of the guys made a ball out of his sock and some duct tape and an impromptu, teamless, makeshift baseball game commenced. I actually think it was better than the planned activity. While I didn't play myself, I had a blast watching. Someone even got up and started comedically announcing the plays.

Tuesday I stayed after school, ostensibly to study Latin with a friend. We mostly just ended up chatting. It was wonderful. I don't get enough sophisticated discourse in my life.

Wednesday just continued the goodness. I hung out with the Magnificent after school. We went to her apartment and four of us girls watched How to Train Your Dragon. It felt so good to get thoughts and feelings out that I haven't had the opportunity to express for some time. Sometimes you just need to look a friend in the eye and bare your soul. Of course, the conversation degenerated into us comparing our feet, but that's what's marvelous about friends like her. Anything is fair game.

Today was the first Thursday to officially be just for dad and me. We watched HP6, had root beer floats (I snagged leftover ingredients on Monday), and played a couple games of chess. It was nice. I love spending time with him.

Listening to: "Bohemian Rhapsody" by The Muppets
Reading: Language Awareness

Bum-scooching.

There was no school yesterday in honor of Veterans Day, so I slept in to a ridiculous hour and then whiled away the time until I met my friends for a night of awesome. Fortunately for NaNoWriMo, that whiling away included working on my novel. Unfortunately for the same, I've been neglecting said novel for a good week and my word count is laughably low. As in, it's nearly the end of week two and I just barely topped the word count goal for day one. It's all good. Steady on, men.

At 4 PM I met my friends B. and C., and we went to an antique book store and tried not to drool on some pretty amazing tomes. We all completed an exercise in self-restraint and walked out of there with no more than we'd taken in. Next came Panda Express.

Eventually, we met up with some other people and went to a drive-in theater. We saw a double feature of Shrek Forever After and Megamind. I enjoyed both, though the latter a bit more so. It was tremendous. We completely picked the wrong time of year to go. It was quite cold. Granted, it's better than most parts of the country, but it still wasn't the best weather to be sitting around in lawn chairs.

I spent most of today helping out with the Fall Forum, which was an event for high schoolers hosted by the Classics department (think Latin and ancient Greek). It was nice. I didn't really do much more than set up and take down, but it was relaxing to just chill in the SS Atrium all day. It helped that I had a good friend there to chat with.

This evening B. came over to watch some premieres on Disney Channel because we're both 12 and proud of it. I've been referring to it as Gregg Sulkin Night. Avalon High was spectacular! The names were especially clever and some of the plot twists were admirably twisty. I did not see that coming. It's definitely something I would buy. I suppose since I loved the movie so much, it's time to read the book. Sorry, Meg Cabot. School takes up a lot of time, you know?

After the fabulous movie, the season premiere of Wizards of Waverly Place was a wee bit of a let down. Still, all in all a grand night. I think I made a wise decision in topping it off with rewatching all of Alex Reads Twilight.

Listening to: Alex Reads Twilight

Reading: A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

Expecto patronum.

Let me just get this out. This is my blog, and I can rant like a crazy person if I want to.

To the guy who tried to asked me to see HP7 with him tonight: let me tell you a few things.

1. You've admitted that you've never read the books and that you haven't even seen all of the movies. No. Just no.

2. When a I am trying to inform you gently that I don't want to go see HP7 with you, the correct response is not to tell me that I just must not be a big enough Harry Potter fan. For starters, see point one. Then lets take into consideration that I first started reading HP when I was 7. That means I've been involved with it for more than half my life. Heck, I've known Harry, Ron, and Hermione longer than my best friend. My love affair with HP started about 10 minutes after I started reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. I remember what I ate for dinner that night. I loved HP before most of my peers had even heard of it. Don't talk about things you can't even begin to fathom.

3. When I say that I'm funny about movies, the correct response is not, "Oh, yeah, sure." After I see a movie for the first time, I like to be left alone. When I say alone, I mean talk to me and die. I have trouble remembering any movie after which someone hasn't asked me whether something was wrong. After I see a movie, I am lost in a place in my mind where no one can follow. This is a state of mind that should not be disturbed, especially by awkward first date conversation.

4. If you think I'm funny about just any movie, imagine how much worse I am when that movie is one of the last installments in a film franchise based on a book series that has been an integral part of most of my life. If you had trouble wrapping your mind around point two, just try to get it around this one. I dare you.

5. I do not want HP7 to forever be associated with you or any other guy.

6. Even if you didn't see it, I'm sure you heard at some point about the CES fireside in which an apostle of the Lord told the YSAs of the Church that people shouldn't go to the movies on dates until they're, you know, married. Something about it being a horrible situation for conversation, thus for getting to know people, and in a dark and just generally not wise place to be in such a scenario.

So, no. No, I will not go to HP7 with you. Not in this existence.

Listening to: YouTube
Reading: A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

Impresario.

Sometimes I'll say to myself, "What am I doing? I'm not trying to impress anyone." Mostly this occurs while I'm deciding what to wear. Well, it's a lie.

True, most of the time I don't really try to impress people with the way I dress, but sometimes I actually do. Why am I lying to myself?

Appearances may not be supreme to me, but that doesn't mean I'm not trying to impress anybody. Although I try to deny it and convince myself otherwise, appearances do matter to me. More than that, though, I'm guilty of trying to impress people on a deeper level. There are times when I say nothing because I am afraid of saying the wrong thing. Other times, I look back on conversations I've just had and wonder whether I totally flubbed the situation.

Why would I care if I wasn't trying to make a good impression? It's time I acknowledged this.

I don't yet know what application admitting this to myself will have, but I think it's important to be honest with myself. I'll figure out what to do with that honesty later.

Listening to: Frank Sinatra
Reading: A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

Serious thoughts.

I've been thinking a lot lately about how I want to be.

Listening to: Frank Sinatra
Reading: A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

Unnormalcy.

I feel I should mention Monday before it slips from my mind into oblivion.

It all started when I stopped by Grandpa's after school to deliver his mail. I had to wait around for a good 20 minutes while his girlfriend showed off her turtle, then as I was trying to leave they invited me out to lunch.

They suggested going to KFC, so I started following them in my own truck, planning on going straight home afterwards. Not far into our journey, it happened that there were two vehicles in front of me that looked pretty much the same, one being my grandpa's and the other being very much, well, not. Eventually one turned and the other didn't. I chose to stick with the wrong one. Also, it turns out that there really is no KFC to be found where Google Maps thought there should be one.

Finally my grandpa got in touch with me. Apparently he had to go all the way back home to get his cellphone because he'd forgotten it. We went to the Big Apple for lunch instead. Grandpa's girlfriend talked pretty much the entire time and kept hitting on the waiter who, at the end of the meal, turned to me and said, "This may be kind of strange, but I think you're really cute and I'd like to take you out sometime. Can I have your phone number?" Wow, dude. You get mad props for being the first guy to straight up ask me for my number. We have a tentative date set for Tuesday.

I went straight from dinner to K.'s so that we could work on our novels for NaNoWriMo together. On the way, a car in front of me plowed right through a flock of pigeons that was sitting in the middle of the road. Most of them flew away in time, but one of them took a major hit. The car just zoomed on through the explosion of feathers, but I was totally unnerved by the poor little body falling back to the road. I seriously considered stopping, but I didn't know what I could do. I just kept going. It was so sad.

FHE that night was a post-Halloween dance. It was totally awesome. There were some great costumes. My favorites were all four Ninja Turtles, Sean Connery, and Quail Boy. There was also a girl dressed like a lemonade stand. My old home teacher gained instant popularity by dressing up as Justin Bieber. I wasn't really a fan.

At last I fell into bed with worn-out shins that were already promising to ache by Tuesday.



Listening to: "I Like It" by Enrique Iglesias
Reading: The Return of the Soldier by Rebecca West

Circadian.

Well, huh. This is unusual. It's before 8 AM on a Saturday and I'm up, quite willingly I might add.

Actually, I first kind of woke up around 6:15, when my weekday alarms usually start going off. Since I didn't go to bed until midnight (I was playing with my Kindle), I decided that wasn't enough sleep, so back I went to La Tierra de los Sueños. The next time I woke up, the sun was streaming through my east-facing window. The birds are singing. I can hear my Dad on the phone. Almost eight hours is much better. I briefly considered going back to sleep again, but why? I'm not really tired. I got a good amount of sleep. Why not get up?

So I did. I am. It's surreal.

Fun tidbit, since I've decided to continue with Latin for the next few years. I hope it can find its way in with my two majors. I would love it if it could. Psh! what am I talking about? I would love this information anyway. It's that whole etymology thing again. Circadian, as in circadian rhythm, comes from Latin circa, meaning around, and diem, meaning day. So, around a day.

Another interesting, and possibly useful thing to know, is that in Roman times, only men and prostitutes wore actual togas. Women wore other garments. Single women wore either a peplos or a chiton, while wives wore something called a stola. Good information to have if you ever find yourselves time travelling.

Listening to: birds singing
Reading: The Red House Mystery by A. A. Milne

Accomplishments.

A few highlights, since my week felt like too much at the time for me to want to squeeze blogging in.

First, Conference last weekend was grand. Plus, I made serious progress on a quilt while I was watching. It even turns out that we own an iron, which is great. I'm a big fan of ironing seams open for neatness when stitching various parts together, and by "big fan" I mean I'm a little obsessive about it. This iron exceeds all expectations. It's a beast. I'm guessing it's older than me, but if not, it's at least not from this millennium.

Last Saturday, I also went out to dinner with Dad and company. Halfway through my chimichanga at Matta's, the doors opened like the parting of the Red Sea and the children of Israel crossed in. Men in suits and boys in dress shirts stood four abreast from the counter to the sidewalk. I thought I recognized the missionaries who showed up, but I didn't ask them how the Priesthood session was, though I kind of wanted to. Still, it was pretty awesome seeing the flood of priesthood holders wash in.

Wednesday was a rather splendid day. After dollar-lunch at the Institute (ginormous burritos and a variety of ice creams, including a delicious rainbow sherbet), I stayed on campus later than usual to talk to a teacher and then to go to an information meeting for people who want to study abroad. The meeting was pretty sweet, and I got a bit of a nap in beforehand in a chair outside the study abroad office. I'm pretty sure some people in the office across the way were staring at me, and it wasn't the most comfortable seat, but hey. Sleep is sleep. For the first part of the meeting, I was the only one there, which was nice. I had the two peer advisors all to myself. Another guy eventually showed up, but we're both interested in going to Spain, so the conversation didn't fly off in any new directions. After the meeting, it was late enough that I didn't feel like fighting the beginnings of rush hour traffic to merge onto the freeway, so I took the arterial streets home. It was nice and relaxing. The weather was amazing! I had my wipers on full blast to see through the rain, but the skies were still blue. Eventually I got out from under the rain and  rolled the window down. I drove down the pretty, downtown-ish part of Main St., which includes the temple, all the while enjoying a Mexican radio station I found that plays a bunch of dance music. Shakira, Shakira! The next part of Main was semi-flooded, which I found awesome and hilarious. I love seeing water split around the front of an SUV as if it were the prow of a ship. Sadly, I was in the entirely wrong lane going the wrong way to splash through too many small ponds myself. After the amphibious blocks, there was some construction. What a day to drive down that road, huh? I was enjoying the experience so much, and was so much stunned by the revelation that there was an Arby's on Main St., that I didn't even realize I had passed my turn until the style of the street signs changed and I was suddenly in a 50 MPH zone. Most ironically, the Arby's is on the corner where I needed to turn and is a place I've actually eaten before. Go figure. When I finally got home and stepped out of my truck, I decided that the day was just too fine and the concrete just too perfect after the rain. I decided to kick my shoes off so my feet could enjoy the gorgeous circumstances. I was attempting to just kick them as close as I could get to the door, but the first one went a mite higher than I expected and landed on the roof. Which I found just too funny. I can't remember, but I may have even gone down the street to check the mail before I tried to retrieve it. I was a little worried about the rescue mission at first, but once I realized we don't have rain gutters, it all fell into place quite neatly. After several attempts at throwing the hose, I managed to hook it behind the flipflop and just drag it off. It's not right how proud that made me feel of myself.

I had a paper due Friday in Brit lit, so Thursday was a little busy for me. I honestly meant to start it on Wednesday, but I just kind of crashed that afternoon after all the excitement of the day. Thursday's was an evening of procrastination. After straightening my clutter and reorganizing my bookshelves, I finally sat down to my paper. In a strange turn of events, I finished it. True, it was around 1 AM, but I'm just too thrilled that it was the proper length and everything to mind about that. That's actually earlier than I decided I could stay up in the event of a worst case scenario. I'm a little worried that I might've gotten too plot summary-ish there at the end, but it's too late to worry about it now. It's out of my hands.

My Latin and English tests yesterday went well. The woman overseeing the English test didn't even care whether we used our notes. Really. She would bring it up from time to time. I was a little worried about Latin, since I didn't make my note cards until earlier that morning, but there were only a few words I was unsure of, and checking later, I only got one of them wrong. Apparently "vix" means "scarecly" and not "since." But I'm sure the bonus more than made up for that. I wasn't really worried about the English test. Basically, if you spoke English natively, you should've been able to wing most of it. The other parts I wasn't too worried about because they were concepts that either were common sense or were covered in my intro to linguistics last semester.

Yesterday, I watched nine straight hours of Wizards of Waverly Place. It was awesome. Okay, so I'm twelve, but it wasn't a completely wasted day. I did a load of laundry, and most shockingly, I cleaned my bathtub. That deserves more than just boldface. It should have some sort of fanfare, a parade maybe, a blimp flashing the message, perhaps an international ad campaign. I've spared you to avoid being ostentatious. It's like a whole new tub. I was going to feel a little bad about not doing any homework, but this just makes it all better. I feel so accomplished.

Listening to: "A Year Without Rain" by Selena Gomez
Reading: Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Drudgery.

I feel like I should share a little something, even though I have nothing new to share. Life goes on. Latin goes on. Spanish goes on. English goes on. You know, the usual.

My days are spent with school, homework, and napping.

But I love it. Even if it is lonely at times.

Listening to: The Mummy Returns
Reading: The Phantom of the Opera

Doodlies.

I just can't stop making new blogs, can I? Here I've gone and made another over at Tumblr. Though admittedly, it's for a specific purpose. A lot of artists have blogs where they post works in progress and doodles and such. Well, I wanted one, too. I've sort of been experimenting with doing that a little here, but I don't like that it's all mixed up with my this-is-how-my-day-went posts. Furthermore, I like the sheer simplicity of posting over at Tumblr.

So, if you want to see what would be commonly known as my "sketch blog," mosey on over.

Listening to: Percy Jackson and the Olympians
Reading: The Phantom of the Opera
Reading for class: North and South

Update.

Ugh. Since school started, I've sort of tapered off all internet activity except Facebook and deviantART. I just don't feel like I have time for everything. Even that comparatively little time wasted comes with no lean share of guilt for neglecting homework. It's not just that I've stopped posting, such as here, but I've even stopped my faithful reading of other's posts.

It's sad, but true, that I just don't have the time. Sometimes I'll think that I'll get caught up on the recent activity when the weekend comes around, but I never do.

But there is light in the darkness. One happy side effect is that instead of spending my spare time on the internet, getting lost in chains of links for hours, I've started reading like I once did. While this means that you're not hearing from me as much, it also means that I'm feeling like myself again. It has worried me for quite some time that I haven't been able to focus on books like I used to do. For months, possible a year or more, I've had to reread things, bogging down my reading experience and making it distasteful and drawn out. That seems to have mostly cured itself. It still occurs sporadically, but rarely. I think part of the antidote was my British lit. class. Instead of using an anthology, our teacher chose to focus on longer works. The novels we've been reading and the time constraints I've had on getting through them have refocused me and I now find myself getting through personal reading better. It definitely helps that I am thoroughly enjoying all of our assignments for class.

I have also worked through the anxiety of my Spanish major. I have decided to keep it, but to switch the track from linguistics to literature, a move that I think will be both less stressful and more enjoyable. I am also going to seriously look into doing a study abroad next summer. I'm going to schedule appointments with the appropriate people and fill out the appropriate paperwork. My desired destination is Leon, Spain, where, if all goes well, I will spend four weeks and take a literature class and a culture class. I prefer Spain over anywhere in Latin America because they use verb tenses and such that aren't commonly heard in this hemisphere. And besides, where better to learn Spanish than Spain?

I've also had some sort of nasty sore throat/head cold going on this weekend. It started about Wednesday with a sore throat, which worsened to the point of painful speech on Thursday. By Friday, the sore throat had slackened off, but the ailment had worked its way upward, resulting in a debilitating headache on Saturday and an annoyingly runny nose.

But I got my Kindle, so it's all good. All 14 of Baum's Oz books? 95 cents.

Listening to: Cardinal's game
Reading: The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux
Reading for class: North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell

Colorado.

I've meant to blog about my Labor Day weekend in Colorado, but school overpowered me and now I feel like I've lost the will (not to mention like I can't spare the time) to write a long narrative about it.

You've already heard me enumerate my love of the Rockies, so I suppose I can skip that part. Imagine me reiterating it, though. And add some love for the way those coniferous woods feel in the early morning, when it's light out but the sun isn't quite up.

We (Dad, his girlfriend, and her kids) went up there to see my brother and his family. My nieces are so adorable! They both have the hugest blue eyes. They started out quite shy, but by the end of the weekend and after half an hour of my drawing Sesame Street characters, the oldest had really warmed up to me. I'll admit it was a little surreal to be referred to as Aunt Rebekah.

My brother and sister-in-law really enjoyed seeing all of us, too. They told me covertly that they would especially enjoy it if I came up to visit them by myself sometime. Am I going to take them up on that offer? You bet I am!

Apparently we took the long way there. The GPS said it was the shorter route, but it had to have been referring to how the crow flies. There were so many hills it added four hours to the trip. On the way home we took all interstates. It would've been shorter if we hadn't broken down an hour from home. Good thing my dad's a mechanic. He fixed it with a staple and some radio wire and we were home free. Still, I think I prefer the long scenic route. It's that love of mountains again.

To make this post any more disjointed I would have to bring up the fact that I seem to have stumbled upon a recent dinosaur obsession, which manifests itself in the purchase of dinosaur shaped sprinkles and dinosaur egg oatmeal. Speaking of, I wish I could've gone to the dinosaur museum in my brother's town. Next time, maybe.

On another side note, I've ordered one of the new Amazon Kindles. I've been wary of the whole eReader scene, but I was thinking about it and I came to the conclusion that the power to carry 3,500 books around with me in a space the size of a small notebooks is kind of an exhilarating prospect. A lot of classics (my favorite genre) are completely free on the Kindle, so I would be able to delve into the list of old books I would love to read with relative ease. New books on the Kindle are noticeable cheaper than their tangible counterparts. My logic is I can read books on the Kindle, then if I decide I can't live without them and I have to have a hard copy, I can spend a little extra and get a hard copy. Another thing about the Kindle is it will be easier to travel with. Instead of carefully arranging my volumes in my backpack so as to offer each the maximum protection while still maximizing on space, I can leave my precious paperbacks and home and just slip the Kindle in instead. I can also put the scriptures on it, so I could take it to church instead of lugging my full-size quad around. Man, just talking about it is making it sound better and better.

Listening to: Bones
Reading: Aurora Leigh by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Primary.

I forgot to mention that on Monday we sang "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" in my 300-level college class. Could this school be any greater?

Listening to: "Objection" by Shakira
Reading: The Truth About Forever