Diez

My blog is boring. I know. I am always much worse about updating it during the school year. Maybe in November I will FINALLY succeed at NaBloPoMo and be a good blogger forever.

Unlikely. Ha.

Anyway, ten things I have been doing lately:

1. Making creepy cookies with Maddison and Pearl:

This clearly, is my actual finger. Gross, huh? Read the full post at Pearl's blog here

2. Thinking about Halloween. I have an idea for a costume, but I don't want to post it here because you will ALL steal it. Just kidding. It's not that cool.

3. Working on new songs, as always.

4. Taking antibiotics and eating pineapple for my nasty finger. (Google chat status: explained.)

5. Going to the C.S. Lewis Society on Wednesdays.

6. Visiting the Pendulum Court in the ESC. Today they had Pirate Day. It was delicious.

7. Doing a ton of Spanish homework. Yuck.

8. Practicing for Fork Fest. (Tonight: Book on Tape Worm!)

9. Sending fun letters to Sam the missionary.

(Remember this? I miss this.)

10. Slowly working my way through the Book of Mormon in Spanish.

P.S. My family is coming to town on Friday!! Yessssssss.

First Day of School!

If I had it with me, I'd post the most awkward of awkward pictures ever taken of me on my first day of third grade. As it is, here's an adorable Rockwell cover.

Wait! Also, this:

My first day of school, ever.

Pasadena, California. September 1996.

Twin Day

Today at Palm Desert High School, we had, for the third day of Spirit Week, a Twin Day. Since my sister and I already look so much alike, and we could find clothes we have in common, we decided to dress up. This is what we looked like!

A really funny thing happened involving this after school ended today. Madelyn and I were walking out to the parking lot to go home when some boys from Madelyn's English class walking behind us said stuff like, "Awww; how cute; they dressed up together." I turned, and little did I know that Madelyn turned, too, and at the same time, we both kicked up our left legs and smiled in unison. I was on the outside, so I couldn't see what had happened, but the boys went, "Whoa!" and Madelyn said, "Yeah, we're that good." It was so funny. They wanted us to do it again. Ha ha ha. :)

Another thing: today was my last Chamber Singers concert ever. EVER. I've been in Chamber Singers for the past four years and that was my last official concert. Well... I guess there is graduation, but at least I'll never have to wear that dress again, right? The experience is still kind of surreal... we sang really well tonight. It was great! :)

And Now for a Proper Post about Prom...

Indeed. He was super handsome, I felt really pretty, and we had an amazing, wonderfully perfect night together.
Sometimes, in moments of brilliant color involving flashing lights and gorgeous clothes, high school can really be beautiful.
He picked me up around 4:30 and we went to a mutual guy friend's house, where we took a bunch of pictures together and with two other girls. Then we went to aforementioned boy's date's house, stopping on the way to see my date's mom at her work. She said how nice we looked and then sent us off. It was so nice talking to him in the car; we just talked about everything and he is such a gentleman. (so Darcy-esque) Eventually we all ended up going to dinner at Morton's, which is a really nice steakhouse here, and then we went to prom! We all danced all night and had a lovely time. Afterward, we went to a party briefly, but it was kind of boring, so my date and I went to a friend's house and hung out there for a while until he took me home. :)
It was very nice.

Today I Met Pico Iyer!

Yep. Today I met the author of The Open Road, a great book about the mission and teachings of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. I went to the Rancho Las Palmas Hotel around eleven, where I met about seven other students from AP English who were selected to go talk to Mr. Iyer. We met in a conference room before the lunch and speech and Mr. Iyer talked to the high school students and we got to ask him questions. He told us a really interesting thing about the way he writes: When he decides to write on a particular subject, it is because he has a different perspective on that subject than he feels another writer would have. It's a really cool way to impart of culture he's learned. For instance, he wrote The Open Road because he personally knows the Dalai Lama and knew he could offer a different perspective on his character and philosophy than other scholars. At the end of the student meeting, I asked him to sign my copy of the book, and he did. It was extremely cool.

Otras cosas...

So... a couple weeks ago, I was at a choir performance in Palm Springs when my friend "Joe" came up to me and said, "Okay, Emily, brace yourself."
"Okay..." I said obliviously.

"We all got into All-State!" said Joe. (Meaning himself, the other guy who was in regional, and I)

Upon which, I literally squealed. A lady who  had been talking to us about our performance said something about insurance. :)

Anyway, it will be in March and I am very excited, of course! You are all invited to come and see me in the choir. I am sure it will be sensational!

I have more to tell, but I will do it when I have pictures to illustrate.

It is SO the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

Merry Christmas!!!

And I would just add- FINALLY. I think I have been anticipating this season since about July. Thank goodness it's here. I'm already doing my best to be nicer to everyone and make changes for the better in my life. Forget the election (I couldn't vote in it anyway); Christmas is officially a time for change. I challenge everyone who actually reads this blog to find one way to make the world a little better, no matter what you're celebrating. Visit relatives you haven't seen in a while, volunteer at a soup kitchen, and if you can handle it, begin the process of mending severed ties with someone you used to be friends with. After all, how can we have peace on earth without peace in high school?

Or whatever microcosm of the world you're part of. High school is just my case.

Anyway, this Christmas is going to be amazingly joyful. It's my last one living at home (hopefully, Mom generally adds here) since I'll be off to college next year. It should be full of school choir performances, church choir practices and concert, gift giving, charity, and a lot of new realizations about Christmas for me. I'm reading the New Testament right now, so I'm looking out for epiphanies.

You have a Merry Christmas too! This season (and anything, really) will be what you make it- what you want it to be! I'm sure it will be wonderful. :)

Miss Brown Conquers Her Infirmities and Gets a Giant Needle Stuck in her Arm

Yes, you have read that mouthful of a title correctly.  Ladies and Gents, for the first time in my seventeen years, yesterday, I donated blood.

It was scary. It was nerve-wracking. But at the end of it, it was a self-fulfilling experience. All the way. :)

They even gave me a shirt:

I will now give you, readers, a play-by-play account of what it was like.

It starts like this:

We have known about the blood drive for a few weeks now. I am seventeen, so I can legally donate whenever I feel like it, apparently. But I am, as those of you who know me can attest, a bit of a wimp. I've heard many terrifying horror stories where the nurse didn't know what she was doing and dug around in someone's arm looking for a vein. People pass out if they haven't eaten enough. Even my Dad, who is a giant at 6'4" and the last person you'd expect to freak out, faints when he gives blood. 

So I have my reasons, right?

But then there are those reasons why we should. Donating blood does amazing things like saving people who are dying from blood loss. When you donate, you're basically doing your part to help save the world. Not to mention that I have O Negative blood, which I kind of consider my personal mandate from the universe to donate blood as much as possible. (O Negative can donate to all blood types)

But anyway, all day I was asking people whether they were going to donate. I decided that I would go fifth period, since I could eat and stuff at lunch and I would be less likely to have a bad experience. So, at lunch, I ate some chips, which was really not enough, and then when it was over, a bunch of friends and I went to the Mini-Gym at school and began the process.

First, you sign in. This is so that they can attest that you missed class for legitimate reason. They ask you a bunch of questions about whether you have donated before and stuff. Then, you fill out this little form, and if you forgot your ID like I did, you get a temporary one printed out in the counseling office. Then you go back. They made me eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and drink water since I hadn't eaten enough. Then I waited in a line of chairs, after which they enter you into their program. Then you wait in another line of chairs. All the while I am talking to my friend Courtney and my other friend Caitlin and saying positive things like "I am not scared. At all." 

When I was next, this lady called me into this little booth and asked me all sorts of questions about my health and weird things about who you've had sex with. I should have just said I was a virgin right off. I could have skipped so many of those. :) The only question I answered yes was whether I have been out of the country in the last 3 years. You know all about that. Then she took my blood pressure and stuck my finger to see if I'm anemic. I'm not. Then I went and sat in a chair and waited.

Eventually it was my turn and the nurse who was with me took my blood pressure again and put this tourniquet thing on my arm. You know what I mean, probably. Then she rubbed my arm with iodine on this giant q-tip, which tickled a lot. Then again, I'm ticklish pretty much everywhere. Sometime in there, she had me squeeze that little stress ball so she could find my vein. My veins aren't really visible from the surface, but she found them okay. Phew. :)

And then I looked away and she stuck the needle in.

It didn't hardly even hurt! At first, when I was squeezing the ball, I flexed my wrist upward, which hurt because I could feel the needle, but if you bend your wrist back, the needle stays straight and it's okay. :) Then the lady noticed my trip on the question paper, so I told her about it and she talked about how her grandma went to Vienna. And pretty soon it was over and she took the thing out and wrapped blue gauze stuff on my arm and then I was drinking water and eating cookies. You have to stay in the waiting area for about fifteen minutes and drink juice or whatever. I went to the bathroom and then I came back and hung out with my friends. 

We got T-shirts, even though they only had large and extra large left, and we stuck stickers on ourselves. They said things like "I survived the blood drive," "Done Sangre," which is Italian, and "Kiss me; I gave blood today." Courtney and I went back to English together, eventually. In English we talked about a poem. After class, my friend Scott was so proud of me for donating blood that he gave me a giant hug. :) And then I got my Passive Voice quiz back and I got 100%! Mrs. Marshall even put a sticker on it! :) Ha ha ha.

So that's the end of donating blood. Everyone should do it. Especially me. I live right near the hospital here, so I will be. I might have just been really happy because it wasn't a catastrophe, but I really felt like some kind of superhero. I kind of didn't want to take the gauze stuff off, except that it was bugging my arm.

Hmmmm. The End. :)

Surviving...

Yes, I have made it through my first ten days of senior year. Really. I'm alive. Not only am I alive, but I'm actually learning new things and I like ALL my classes!

Go ahead, double take. I really said "ALL" of them. And I can tell you why.

1st- Government AP. Take everything with a grain of salt. It can be confusing. But you love the teacher because of his obsession with undiluted truth.

2nd- Dance. This teacher is a little weird, but half my friends are in this class. Plus stretching in the middle of the day really is heaven.

3rd- AP Environmental Science, nicknamed "APES." I love it! We watched "The Lorax" within the first few days of class, we played a game outside about deer population vs. resources... let's just say this is extremely interesting. Conservation!!

4th- Choir. I've been doing this for the past three years, and now that it's my final year, it just feels like home. Sure, everyone's new and I've been here longer than the current director, but choir is seriously (no joke) one big, adorably musical family.

Feel free to giggle with warm fuzzies.

5th- Spanish. I thought I would really dislike the teacher at first, but I really like it now. We did an oral last week and I brought in my guitar and sang my oral in front of my class. They loved it, and my teacher basically asked me if I would do that every time. I said yes. It is so fun and I am learning so much about Spanish!

6th- English- duh. You know I love English. My teacher is hilarious; we have Friday Funnies and she tells us jokes. We talk about Jane Eyre a lot, which I actually LOVED, unlike the majority of my classmates.

And that's the day. I'll just post this, since my grandparents just arrived and we should be eating dinner soon. :)

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUGH!

Tomorrow is the first day of school.
(wails torturously, emphatically)
I'm just not ready. I'm just not emotionally, mentally, even physically prepared to get back into the same old cesspool that is high school. I can't stand having a spiritual artillery firing at me all day, every day, needless to say, while I am trying to do well and get into college.
Thank goodness for home. :) I shore love home.
Mom wants me off, I have to go....