CHRISTMAS.

I don't care about being politically correct; I don't care if I "offend" anymore; I don't care what anyone else thinks, because I refuse to say "happy holidays" and I'll scream MERRY CHRISTMAS to the entire world.

...that was kind of an emo bit for such a happy salutation.

But seriously, if I'm Christian and I celebrate Christmas, I have the right to wish people a merry Christmas, regardless of what they celebrate. I live in a free country; I can say what I want. I respect the fact that not everyone is Christian and might not celebrate Christmas. They might celebrate Hannukah (did I spell that right?) or Kwanzaa (does anyone know someone who actually celebrates that? I've never met anyone who does), but I'll still say "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays."

On the radio I heard the host wish everyone happy holidays... and then add a "Merry Christmas" at the end before returning to the regularly scheduled Christmas music. I haven't heard or seen anyone else do this, though. All the companies try as hard as they can to be politically correct or religiously tolerant (or whatever) and say "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas."

I might as well go with "Happy Christmahannukwanzaa" and be done with it.

Won't be blogging for the next few days; I've Christmasy things to do. :D

Reading and writing.

YES I AM READING EMMA OF WINDS OMG SO COOOOOOOL.

[We will use this opportunity to take a short commercial break while the blogger froths at the mouth in excitement.]

...

Right, then.

I'm in the middle of reading Emma of Winds, a book written by OMG A PERSON I KNOW. Since I kinda know the author and all, I got an early-release book from her. I actually would like to review this book, but 1) I'm not done reading it, and 2) I suck at summaries, so I'll just put the bit from the inside flap.

1697... Pirates mercilessly terrorize the Seven Seas, despite the English Embassy's attempts to stop them. Yet in the midst of all these foul, adventure-thirsty cutthroats, one pirate stands out. Her parents having been killed as outlaws, Emma has been raised by pirates. Now eighteen years old and the captain of her own ship, Emma's own adventures are thrilling, but unorthodox. With Heflan, an eccentric Embassy sheriff, constantly on her trail, things seem to get worse when his nephew, Ben, lies his was onto her ship. And when a mysterious treasure map is found, leading to a "treasure from Heaven," will Emma be able to outrun the dangers of being a pirate...while falling in love?

[My own words now.] Emma is a decidedly untraditional pirate, being both a woman and a pirate that isn't recklessly bloodthirsty and power-hungry. She enjoys the notoriety that comes with piracy and always tests the limits of whatever dares to restrain her, but  isn't arrogant and is well-liked by those who know her.

So when this thing gets released for real on January 1st, I expect you all to be looking for it in the bookstore.

Do it.

AND DID I MENTION HOW UNBELIEVABLY COOL THIS IS FOR ME?

Rachel, if you read this, don't get too scared, and don't be too intimidated by the fact that when we get back to school on the 5th, I am going to tackle you with a flying glomp and scream something along the lines of "OMIGOSHIREADYOURBOOKYOU'RESOCOOLOHMYGAAAAASH."

So... yeah.

In other news, it's pouring rain. :D My insane friend is at Disneyland, and I directly quote from our text conversation yesterday:

yeah but don't blame me when you try to go on a ride and end up sitting in a puddle
Oh we are planning to get wet
NO REALLY I HAD NO IDEA OMG
I see what you did there. but alas we know we are going to sit in water

I'm sure he's having fun running through the thunderstorm.

Spam

Look what I found in my spam box this morning.

Heh. Heheheh. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

IDEAS?!

As you all know, my life during the month of November consisted entirely of WRITING WRITING WRITING WRITING. I did not, unfortunately, remember to check SparkLife on a regular basis, as was my custom. Since I didn't do this, I missed the announcement regarding the new Never Been Kissed columnists AND the offer for new columnists to send in ideas.

This sucks for a number of reasons.

1) I could totally write a Never Been Kissed column. I've never been kissed. Or had a boyfriend. Or been on a date. Or been asked out. Or liked. (Except maybe that one time, and that other time, and possibly last December.)
2) I have ZERO TIME to think of a column idea and send it in.

Seriously, how awesome would it look on my track record if I could say, instead of just doing one measly semester publication for my English class, I write an entire column for SparkLife? (It would be extremely, insanely, excruciatingly awesome. Trust me.)

So, fellow Sparklers and spazzers and bloggers: Got any ideas for a column? My feeble mind-ramblings include things related to:

~Writing [fiction]
~Writing [a novel, which I am currently doing]
~Chemistry
~Nerdiness in general
~Disneyland
~Ideas for lazy Saturdays

Actually, I kinda like that last idea. My friends and I come up with countless ideas to do over the summer, or over Christmas break, or next weekend, or for our birthdays... but we never have the time to do it, and no one else ever knows about our lovely ideas. For a column, I could offer up a fun/insane/completely idiotic and time-wasting way to kill time on a boring day (or even between classes when you have seven minutes before class and no one to talk to). I'll even make sure to toss in some stuff that will NOT make you eligible for expulsion from your school and/or a life sentence!

Or I could do a thing about Disneyland. I know how to make the most out of Fastpasses, what shows are worth waiting for, how long is too long for a line, how to properly Disneyland-walk (much more challenging than hallway-walking), shortcuts through obscure areas, random bits of trivia... but that might not appeal to everyone, because not everyone lives in southern California. Heck, there are Sparklers from all over the world. Why would they care about one little strip of land in Orange County?

Not sure how either will work out - what if I run out of ideas? What if people think the ideas are lame? What if I'm not funny?

And here's where you guys come in. Do you think that's a good idea? Any suggestions to improve the idea or for a different column? Reply STAT!

At least we're not animal abusers.

Uncensored except for the names.

me: ...idk why i just remembered this but when i went to italy we were sitting around eating crepes and watching pigeons
me: and then i saw this couple buying crepes from the stand
me: and i would've thought it was cute
me: except they were like 13 o_o
me: AH, EUROPE
THE CONTINENT/GEOGRAPHIC REGION OF LOOOOOOVE
[friend]: omg
[friend]: when we go to italy
[friend]: we are buying crepes
[friend]: okay?!
me: OMGYES!!!
me: crepes crepes crepes
me: ...oh wait maybe that was in france, not italy
me: bc france has the crepes >>
[friend]: also our fail temperature brought the average class temperature up 0.4C
[friend]: lol
me: LOLNICE
[friend]: we're like global warming
me: HAHAHAHAHAHA
[friend]: except we kind of suck more
me: ...
me: but we're not killing polar bears

The voice of failure

I didn't win.

(Non-emo posting will resume shortly. I promise.)

DVDs and word counts

And today, in breaking news:

• I got The Last Airbender on DVD! YAAAAAY. The outtakes are completely hilarious. It has a ton of clips of people A) dancing, B) running into things, and C) dancing some more.
• I'm only 11,445 words behind on my NaNo. Ack. o_O
• But that means I'm at 28,545 words and it's only 6:13! WOO!
• If I don't win NaNo, I will fail at life.

No screencap because I'm busy juggling Write or Die (best anti-procrastination site ever, btw) and Skyping my friend. SO! Faretheewell, fellow bloggers.

Quotes of the week

Just wasting time thought you very few readers might enjoy a couple random things I've heard around in the past week or so. :)

***

"Good news! I'm getting better at drawing! Bad news! All over my homework."

"If I do this, will it make you feel better, or will it just make it awkward because you're not wearing any pants?"

"Come on! I think you're short enough to ride the tire swing! And if they ask, you're fourteen, okay?"

"Here, hold this. It'll be your man-purse."
"No! It's a SATCHEL!"

"On a scale of one to ten, how awkward would it be if I went over and sat on him right now?"
"THREE POINT ONE FOUR ONE FIVE NINE! Nah, just kidding. More like nine point two zero zero seven eight."

"I went out to go play on the Wii and I was going to play Disney Princess Enchanted Journey, but I ended up playing [Super Smash Brothers] Brawl instead."

"Nathan! I'M A LITTLE TEAPOT!"

"So Robert and Silver are in the kitchen and there's only one cookie left... what happens? DEATH."

"When I grow up, I will have a pet hamster and I will name him Garbanzo so I can call him Garbo for short. Garbo Garbo."

***

I just realized that like 60 percent of those are from my Disneyland trip on Friday with two of my friends. I'm pretty sure that was the most interesting time I'll ever have there... unless, of course, Paige comes along and makes it even MORE interesting. Meh heh heh.

VICTORY IS MINE (partially)

YES! YES! YESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESSSSSSS!!!!

THE HALFWAY MARKER IS MINE! MMMMMIIIIIIIIIINNNNNEEEEEEE!!

If this is spazzy, I don't even want to see what happens if I actually win.

WORD COUNT

OH YEAHHHHHHHH

Stereotypical.

I will never stereotype football players ever again.

Earlier today I helped in the Writing Center after school let out for the day. The Writing Center (which I will not abbreviate to W.C., thankyouverymuch) is this place run by honors English students where people can take their essays and get them revised by one of us.

It was almost time to close it up. A few people were finishing up their revisions and my English teacher was sitting on a desk, talking to a student about his Macbeth essay. A couple other guys had the same teacher/essay prompt, so they all started discussing it (in an epically English-nerdy and awesome way, I may add). Apparently, one of the essay prompts was broad and confusing. My teacher said that the question was basically "Is Macbeth controlled by the witches' fate, or is he responsible for his own actions?" They could argue that it was 1) just the witches' fate, 2) just Macbeth, or 3) a bit of both.

The first guy, who was reading off his essay rubric, said he thought it was a little of both. The second guy, a slightly dorky student who was getting his essay revised by my teacher, asked the third guy what he thought. The third guy was sitting up on the teacher's stool. He was... okay, I don't want to sound racist or judgmental, but he looked like a big African-American football player jock-type.

"I said it was a little of both, too. Actually, I thought that the witches instigated the motivation in him, [then Macbeth was responsible after that]."

Yep, that was his answer. Perfectly casual, completely serious.

Congratulations, dude. You just beat the system without even realizing it.

Late-night posting, Part III

I'm awesome at keeping promises, aren't I? "No more late-night posting!" Yeah, it's kinda 12:29 AM.

Whatever.

Today consisted mostly of a golf tournament (I had to be at my school at six-freaking-fifteen this morning) and then the rest is a blur of procrastination and frantic studying for chem. Yet in between the blurs, I've heard some really, REALLY weird stuff today (and for the past few days). Just thought you might find this entertaining (although it's no double rainbow).

***

ELIZABETH: "You should invite him to come to Disneyland with us!"
ME: "Okay. Why?"
ELIZABETH: "Because he knows things."

ME: "Oh, and she said she met 'The Situation.'" [MAKES AIR QUOTES]
DAD: "The Situation? You mean the-" [SWITCHES TO STRANGELY HIGH-PITCHED VOICE] "guy who talks like this?"
MOM: "You sound like a gay gangster. Don't do that."
SISTER: "And Kermit the Frog. Kermit the Gay Gangster."

SISTER: "But it says eta is E."
ME: "No, no, eta is H. You know, like in The Lightning Thief? Remember the part where they're at that water park? Annabeth sees the Cupid statues and she's like 'Oh, look, there's an eta on the base, and it's H in Greek and I don't know why it's here!' and Percy's just going 'Huhh, I dunno,' and then later on Annabeth goes 'Oh, H for Hephaestus! How did I not remember that?!' and Percy's just like 'DERP!'"
[NOTE: Meaning, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 1: The Lightning Thief.]

MEGAN: "Yeah, I threw up earlier, but it wasn't because of this Mexican marshmallow - it was from something else. So do you want some? It's really good!"

***

Also, I won't be posting much (if at all) during November due to the epic stress of NaNo. See you all in December :)

Short stories!

"No, I swear this is my blog! I didn't steal the story! I put up an excerpt because I'm desperate and need to promote myself! Really, I'm that pathetic!"

Not going to work so great.

Moving on...

***

Today my friend asked someone to homecoming. He remembered the note and which locker was hers... yet neglected to bring a flower.

"I'll just bring it on Monday," he said.

"Then hurry up and take the note out before she comes," I said. "Just give her the note and the flower together on Monday when you bring it."

"No!"

"Why not?"

"Because I want to give her the note now," he said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. I rolled my eyes.

"But it would make much more sense to take it out now," I reasoned, "because then you can give it to her all together and it'll be all nice and pretty."

"Nah, I'll just give it to her on Monday."

"But-"

Too late to back out now; she just walked up.

At least she said yes. :D

***

In the girls' bathroom on the second floor, there's been an Out of Order sign on one of the stalls for a little over a week. I don't know why they haven't fixed it yet, but today I walked in and saw that someone had penciled in:

The Chamber of Secrets has been opened
Enemy of the heir, BEWARE

I changed "enemy" to "enemies" and ran away giggling.

My school is so awesome.

Late-night posting once more

Yeah, so, the last two posts I've written (this one and the stream of consciousness one) have definitely been written between the hours of 11 PM and 1 AM. I hope this isn't a trend. My writing tends to become slightly incoherent after 11:30. But anyway...

IT'S NANOWRIMO TIME!!!!!

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

In case you've been living under a rock, moved to the plains of Siberia, or are just plain stupid (sorry, dude) and don't know what NaNoWriMo is...

NaNoWriMo is short for National Novel Writing Month (also known as "November," strangely). It's when a bunch of really insane writers get together and commit to writing a 50,000-word novel in one month (from November 1 to November 30).

Are we crazy? Yes.

Committed? You bet.

Suicidal? Not quite.

I'm participating for the FIRST TIME EVAR this year (not a typo). OMG YOU GUYS I AM SO PUMPED THIS IS GOING TO BE SO COOL OMG WRITING YAAAAY *majestic arm-flailing*

Brigid, my writing hero/fellow Goodreadser/Wrimo is participating, too, except this isn't her first year. She's also about eight thousand times better at writing than I am, so go check out her stuff, because she's amazing.

If you're as completely insane as I and the thousands of other Wrimos are, go check out the super duper official NaNo website and SIGN UP NOW, because it's going to be really fun. Like, really really fun. Like, more fun than taking a garden hose and helium balloons to a bouncehouse.*

And on that note, I'm going to bed. Next time I'll try to post while it's still light outside (which actually might be impossible, because it was dark ALL DAY today on account of the freaky rain weather).

See? Making no sense at all.

FARETHEEWELL, BLOGGERS.

*Not that you would suck the helium or anything, you little chipmunk, you.

Actual stream of consciousness

(NOTE: This was written by a slightly sleep-deprived student shortly before midnight. Please do not take this too seriously. Apologies in advance for any lack of coherence. I am not editing any of this- I'm just flailing along.)

The clock in the corner says 11:29 PM and the clock on the desk says 11:33 PM. Most people wouldn't think it's much of a difference, but I'm a student and every second counts. Seconds count if you're submitting a paper with a midnight deadline or sprinting halfway around your school to make it before the late bell because if you get four tardies you get detention for four hours on the weekend and it sucks. And now you're sitting at your desk and trying to remember to sit up straight and not slump (because according to your mother and the Internet, you'll regret it in forty years), and you have writer's block and tons upon tons of inspiration at the same time. Your English rough draft sits in its binder patiently, near-illegible scribbles covering the front and back. Hopefully the teacher won't actually read over these- she'll probably mark you down because of the sheer inability to read anything that's on the paper.

The chapstick from the little round container is too sweet on your tongue, even though it's usually your favorite chapstick for that exact same reason. It tastes like candy but it's 11:33 PM now and it's much too late for that kind of thing (although coffee does sound really great). You know you're supposed to go to bed soon, but you have all these ideas crashing around your head and you have to write them down or you'll stay awake for an hour, staring at the ceiling, wondering how you should phrase this sentence or that, and then you'll pass out at 1:24 in the morning and then complain that you only got four and a half hours of sleep-- oh wait, tomorrow is late start, so you'll get five and a half.

Five and a half hours of sleep, one hour of general getting-ready-ness, seven hours of school, four and a half hours of golf, one hour of general winding-down-ness, and then it's 8:30 and you haven't done any homework except for those chem notes you took in the car. You fall into bed at 12:47 and it's the same cycle all over again until the wonderful, glorious weekend where you can sleep in and slack off.

Now it's 11:38 and you're irritated because you got a 99 on your math test (sometimes you really hate graphing calculators and their stupid exponents that are so awkwardly formatted) and because your mom won't let you start filling out that form for the National Honors Society-

-and now you remember that you're supposed to be emailing your teacher from last year so he can write a letter of recommendation for NHS, although it's really short notice and you hate to bother him because he's really busy (obviously; he's a teacher), but you really really want that letter because if you don't get into this stupid honors program you'll feel like you've failed and every time your genius friends start talking about it you'll think about all the things you would have, could have, should have done and feel guilty all over again...

It's 11:41 and you're reminded of that time last school year when you emailed your math teacher a little past midnight to ask if there were step functions on the algebra final, and I guess emails must show the "sent" time because he said to just go to sleep and then my mom saw it but just laughed and oops, fail.

It's much too late to be up, your family is asleep, your honors application shouts your name, your ring is stuck on your finger because your hands are hot, it's 11:43 and you should really send that email--

PUBLISH POST

Durr

Just a quick update to say I haven't died. D:

It's 11:45 PM and I just finished my chem homework. That pretty much explains why I haven't been blogging AT ALL (and partially because I'm a procrastinator).

Once golf season ends, life will be so much easier. I got home at 7:15! WHAT IS THIS MADNESS.

In which I complain about various things

So today I started school. I have quite a bit to say about THAT, so I just decided to make a list. It's part of my self-campaign to get my brain out of Don't Give a Crap about Anything Besides Avatar mode and back into Actually Motivated to Do Important Things mode. (This is not helped by the fact that my best friend and all my relatives don't start school for at least another week.)

PRO: We finish school on June 1.

CON: We started today (August 18).

PRO: This year, our first-semester finals are the week before Christmas break, so during break, we don't have to worry about anything.

CON: No more Christmas-induced laziness for a week right before break.

PRO: Shiny blue locker instead of crappy yellow locker.

CON: Shiny blue locker located in most crowded corner of school.

PRO: Chemistry with two people that I actually know very well.

CON: Chemistry. Every day. All year. No breaks.

PRO: Get to see multiple friends again.

CON: Don't have any classes with said friends. Must resort to sitting together in chapel and talking for six minutes at a time between classes.

PRO: Spiffy new backpack (with polka dots, I may add).

CON: Separation anxiety involving myself and old, worn-out, reliable backpack.

PRO: Lots of people to interact with.

CON: Lots of people to interact with.



There's also the added stress of HOMEWORK and AP CLASSES and WAKING UP EARLY, of course. (In case I haven't mentioned this before, I am forced to drag myself out of my immensely comfortable bed at the ungodly hour of 5:45 AM.)

But despite all that, I actually like school.

Now all I have to do is get that book about How to Not Die During AP Chemistry*...

I suddenly miss middle school. A lot.




*If this book actually exists, PLEASE TELL ME. I'll love you. Forever. Platonically, of course.

Me against the world (or something)

Just now, I had a bit of an epiphany.

When some high schoolers talk about their First Time, they're talking about doing the horizontal naked dance.
When I talk about my First Time, I'm talking about watching Sozin's Comet (season 3 finale of Avatar: The Last Airbender).

When some teenagers think, "Oh, $*%&! Mom found my stash!", they mean drugs.
When I think that, I mean my rapidly growing collection of fanart I've drawn.

When some girls see Jackson Rathbone in a movie, they scream "OH MY GOD, IT'S JASPER!!"
When I see him, I scream "OH MY ROWLING, IT'S SOKKA!!"

A lot of teenagers count their favorite quotes as "So the lion fell in love with the lamb" and "You're my personal brand of heroin."
I count my favorite quotes as "Geeks shall inherit the earth" and "Maybe we can get some giant pots of glue, and then I could gluebend his arms and legs together!" "Yeah, and then we'll show him his baby pictures, and all the happy memories will make him go good again!"

They get excited when they study cell phases because it's the lab Bellaphant does in Twilight.
I get excited because I can identify each stage without checking the bio book.

They get a high from drugs.
I get a high from reading a good book.

At science camp, they hope to meet hot guys.
At science camp, I hope we can kayak wherever we want.

They shriek during bio dissections.
I ask if it's mandatory to wear gloves.

And finally...

They can quote a paragraph of Twilight.
I can recite the entire "The Boy in the Iceberg" play verbatim.

And I, unlike them, know what "verbatim" means, how to use it correctly, a few synonyms and antonyms, and that I should put quotation marks around the word when using it in this context.

In which I draw, spaz, and get sick

I fail so hard. The last time I posted was what, July 12? SORRY ABOUT THAT. My brain is on summer mode- I don't do anything unless it's related to Avatar: The Last Airbender (but only watching or drawing) or seeing my friends (but only sometimes) or reading a new book (but only if I really like it).

Basically, summer mode = empty space where brain is supposed to be.

Since I start school on the freakishly early date of August 18 (ridiculous, right?) at the ungodly hour of 7:30 AM (torturous, right?), I'm going to have to shape up soon.

In regards to drawing:

In case you guys didn't know, I have a deviantART account. I'm getting better at actually putting up some of my art, but I don't have a ton. Right now, I have a couple new ones, because it's Zutara Week. For those of you who don't watch Avatar: The Last Airbender, you can just skip down to the part about me being sick. For those of you who do watch, keep reading. You may or may not find this interesting. Or boring. Whichever. >_>

Zutara Week started this past Monday and continues on until Sunday. Even though it's Day 5, I'm still in the middle of my Day 4 comic. (Fail much?) If any of you are bothering to devWATCH me, I'm going to color in my Day 2 submission later on, after ZW ends and I have more time.

Chatspeak alert!

MOAR TIEM. I NEEDZ IT NAO.

For those of you who don't watch ATLA, Zutara is a shipping term. For Zuko and Katara. Yeah. It's pretty intense.

In regards to spazzing:

I have two reasons to spaz.

Every day of this past week (Zutara Week), when I log in to dA, I have more than TWO HUNDRED new messages in my inbox.

WHAT. THE. HECK.

Yup. We Zutara shippers are devoted.

This morning was a new record- 368 new messages, four of which were actual messages and 364 of which were notices about new artwork in the ZW group. CRAZINESS.

Another reason to spaz:

Since I'm in the ZW group and all, this gives me an actual opportunity for other people to see my work. I keep getting comments and views and faves and...

OH MY GOSH THIS IS SO AMAZING I'M SO HAPPY IF YOU GUYS EVER READ THIS SUPER MEGA THANK YOUUUUUU FOR TAKING FIVE SECONDS TO LOOK AT MY ART INSTEAD OF JUST SKIPPING OVER ALL THREE HUNDRED MESSAGES LIKE I DO SOMETIMES EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

*cough* I'm done.

In regards to getting sick:

Yeah, this morning I woke up feeling all sluggish and lethargic and generally gross. So much for going on that college tour. On the bright side, I have more time to draw!

Blog again soon!

A small excuse for a blog post

So my best friend sends me this link with a very vague and confusing description.

What I thought it would be: Some really random video with a guy jumping up and down in a banana suit or something.

What it was: A 20 Questions-type game in which you can use any character. It tries to guess who you're thinking of...

...and it's almost always RIGHT. It's one of the freakiest websites I've ever found (in a good way), and it's actually kind of awesome.

And to prove its freakish accuracy, I present our (meaning my friend and I) combined results! They're organized alphabetically by first name, just because I'm OCD like that.

Characters it guessed correctly
~Aang (Avatar: The Last Airbender)
~Alice (American McGee's Alice)
~Darren Shan (Cirque du Freak)
~Ender (Ender's Game)
~Jin (LOST)
~Larten Crepsley (Cirque du Freak)
~Nudge (Maximum Ride)
~Percy Jackson (Percy Jackson and the Olympians)
~Steve Leopard (Cirque du Freak)
~Toph Bei Fong (Avatar: The Last Airbender)
~Zuko (Avatar: The Last Airbender)

Characters it couldn't guess
~Max Vandenberg (The Book Thief)
~Kat Bishop (Heist Society)

And yes, Toph has a last name. Who knew? (I DID!) Yes, it IS Bei Fong. Technically, since Avatar takes place in long-ago Asia (probably), she'd be announced as Bei Fong Toph, but that's just me being nitpicky and Asian.

Oops. Again.

Hi, my name is Nightshade, and I'm ridiculously forgetful.

AAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH. I haven't posted here since... uh... okay, it says June 13. EPIC FAILURE.

I am SUPER SUPER SUPER sorry I haven't posted! I was actually on vacation for a week, but for the rest of the time, I was just being a procrastinator/forgetter. Oops.

Anyway, just a small update because it's 11 PM and I don't have much time-- I'll update more soon, I promise! I'll virtual-pinky swear! *pinky swears*

Peace out, Girl Scout!

Poll results! YEAHHHH!

Yes, you read right- it's time for the POLL RESULTS. *confetti explodes out of ceiling*

I made this poll when I was planning the Saga, so naturally, it had to be about spicy food. (It was also right after that time I went to that really good Japanese restaurant and accidentally forgot to scrape the wasabi off the chopsticks BEFORE I used them again... ow.)

Anyway!

QUESTION: So how's your spicy-food tolerance level?

40% of you guys (two people) said that you were medium-ish when it came to dealing with Teh Spicy (that was not a typo).

20% of pollers (one person) said that they weren't so good with spicy food, and could only take mild stuff.

Another 20% (one more person) said that they were tough enough to down the REALLY spicy food.

Aaaand one superhuman said that they were the Grand Master of Spicy Food. (Whoever that was, congratulations. Don't blame me when your tongue burns off, okay?)

No one said that they never ever (EVER!) eat spicy food, and no one said that they were complete wusses who writhed on the ground in pain upon coming in contact with something remotely spicy. It's a good thing, too, because I would've been kind of worried.

Now excuse me while I go eat. I am STARVING.

OMGWHAAAAT.

AGH I'VE BEEN SO BAD ABOUT POSTING NOW THAT SCHOOL IS OUT MY BRAIN SHUT DOWN I DON'T KNOW WHAT DAY OF THE WEEK IT IS OHMYGAAAASH

Hello, faithful blog readers!

As you can see, I've been AWFUL at posting here now that school's out. (Finished on June 3, before everyone else! HAAAA!) I don't even know what day of the week it is! Wait, actually, I do. It's Wednesday (I think... yeah, it is). I only know this because I'm keeping track of THIS week because everyone else is getting out of school tomorrow/Friday and I need to know the appropriate time to brag about my summer-ness when to congratulate them on getting out of school!

Yeah. I do that out of the kindness of my heart. I simply OOZE kindness. Yeah.

I should probably do more in the Saga, shouldn't I? (I probably should.) But the thing is... I don't want to. (Noooooo!) I mean, I know I said I was going to, and I really don't want to break a promise, but... I'm just not really into it.

Oh, screw this. I'll just tell a short story about the "Exploding Soda" part of the Saga title, and then shriek about a new Rick Riordan book (EEEEEEEEEEEEE).

The Saga of Freakish Salsa and Exploding Soda, Part III: In which the soda actually explodes.

Earlier in the night, my friend had mentioned that he had some soda, which I then wanted (I can only go so long with being slightly dehydrated, you know. For any guys out there, girls actually do need to do things like drink and eat and sleep).

He said that the soda was in the fridge in the garage. I said that obviously I'd never been there before and had no flipping idea where the garage was, let alone the fridge in the garage. Therefore, the soda hunt commenced.

Two seconds later, I found out that the garage was located in a very convenient place that I really could have found on my own, but I didn't know where it was in the first place, and- never mind. WE WERE STANDING IN THE GARAGE, OKAY? OKAY.

"Ooh, root beer," I said, taking a can down from the top shelf. "Gosh, I haven't had a root beer in so lo- WHOAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!"

That last part was because I'd cracked the top and foam and gone flying out all over my hands.

And then it was because I'd taken a step back... not realizing that there was a step behind me, which caused me to balance on one foot, trying to NOT fall backward onto the various pieces of junk in the garage, one arm windmilling like a cartoon, the other trying not to spill any more of the exploding soda...

...all while my friend stood there, staring at me in complete awe of the fact that any one human could be so freaking uncoordinated.

Oops.

After several seconds, I regained my balance (without dropping the soda!) and stood there, trying not to panic at my near-death experience.

"Whoa," my friend said. "Uh... you okay?"
"Uh, yeah. Heh heh... heh..."
"Wow. Don't die, okay?"

My thought process: Holy crap he is touching my shoulder I think my face is red is it red? it totally is oh my goodness I am an IDIOT and I almost died and my hand is sticky from soda and SQUEE--

"Okay."


*END*



Next up, Part IV, which contains a possessed Christmas hat and extreme boredom. (No, seriously.)

Ridiculously uninspired.

Well, the title's true.

I CANNOT THINK OF ANYTHING TO WRITE (for the Saga, at least).

I know, I know. There's no such thing as writer's block, suck it up and write, get over it, blah blah- I GET IT. I just CANNOT WRITE TODAY.

Well, now that that's been settled.

If there are any Avatar: The Last Airbender fans out there, they just redid the movie website and it is OMG AMAZING. (I have it open in another tab! Squee!)

There's also a lovely update about it on YouTube from Jeff Palmer, the guy who did all the other updates where he micro-analyzed every single thing ever released about the TLA movie.


In other news...

-My Internet connection is horrible today
-Finished a new picture that I can hopefully upload to deviantART soon
-Working on an anti-Twilight pic, too
-Wouldn't let a friend borrow my copy of Frankenstein for the summer, because I can't possibly go without Victor's amazingness for an entire summer


And I may post tomorrow, but Tuesday through Thursday? Nothing new. See, there's this thing called finals...

It's probably because you're BRITISH.

Sorry. I just had to throw the reference into the post title. (I'm so clever. AHAHAHAHA.)

Anyway, I'm not going to- wait. OH MY GOODNESS, South Africa's official website uses the British spelling of "organization." It says "organisation." Well... it's either the British spelling or a typo, because my (American) Mac is spell-checking it right now. It's more like "OMG YOU MUST FIX THIS GRIEVOUS SPELLING ERROR OR THIS COMPUTER WILL EXPLODE IN YOUR FACE."

If the computer really did that every time it spell-checked a word, it would be bad.

I mean, it spell-checks "Quidditch" and "Hogwarts" and- WAIT. It doesn't spell-check Hogwarts. HA! I KNEW IT WAS REAL! I KNEW IT!!

I go a little crazy under stress. Can you tell?

So, back to the original reason I was going to post (before my yet-to-be-diagnosed ADHD led me wildly off-track to spell-check and Harry Potter).

PRO: I have no homework aaalllllllll this week! Yaaay!
CON: It's because finals are aallllll next week! Noooo!

PRO: After I get through finals, it's SUMMER!
CON: Getting to summer requires surviving through finals. Right now, the future is... iffy, at best.

So, there you have it. I'm being dragged under the Finals Bus, and it's a one-way ticket to Stress-Induced Insanity...town. Insanitytown. ROIGHT. (No, that is not a typo.)

And with that, I leave. GIEBELHAUS! (I have no idea what that means. What language is that? What does it mean? Does it mean anything? Is it even a real word?)

The stress bunnies are eating my brain.

The Saga of Freakish Salsa, Part II

As I conjugate verbs into the past-preterite form and fantasize about The Last Airbender, I present to you...

Part II: In which I am warned of the dangers of The Salsa, and give an eyewitness account to its effects (no exaggerations included).

(Fast-forward to a bit later, when I'm actually at my friend's house.)

First of all, we spent quite a few too many minutes driving around a very dark, unfamiliar neighborhood in complete confusion. It sounded like

"I don't see any house numbers at all. It's too dark."
"Have they ever heard of streetlamps?"
"I guess not. Do you see it?"
"No. Do you?"
"No. Do you?"
"No."

And eventually:

"MY GOODNESS, WHERE IS THE FREAKING HOUSE?! I CAN'T SEE ANYTHING!!"

Except that last part was in my head. I was about thisclose to screaming at the top of my lungs, though. But after all that, we finally found the house. (Of course, they turned on the front light after we'd spent fifteen minutes driving in circles trying to find the house.)

The first things that were said once I got in the door:

"Hey, Nightshade!"
"Hi!"
"Glad you made it."
"Heh, yeah. Almost got lost seventeen times, but we got here all right."
"Heh, sorry about that."

Immediately following that, a very short boy of approximately eleven years old (that I'd never seen before) ran up to me and tugged on my arm.

"Eh?" I said. "What?" (Well, it was better than "Who the heck are you?", which was what I was thinking. But that would've been quite rude.)

He pulled on my arm again, so I bent down (he was a short kid). "Don't eat the salsa, okay? It's mild," he whispered, then smiled in a way that I generally associate with chainsaw murders and exploding wedding cakes. A smile like that, coupled with the command "Don't eat the salsa," is quite frightening, especially when you have no idea who the kid is.

"Uh... why?" I said. I noticed that my friend was staring at the kid with a go-away-NOW! expression that's generally applied to younger siblings.

The kid pulls me a few feet away from my friend, then makes me bend down so he can tell me.

"I made it super spicy," he giggled. "Like, super super really extra-spicy."
"Uh," I said.
"Want to know how I made it?" His whole face lit up, like he'd just won the contest for a year's supply of Pixy Stix.
"Um... sure?"

Just then, my friend tried to step in with "Uh, hey, you don't have to-", which was interrupted with "Shhh! Go away for a second! I gotta tell her something!"

"I put in green peppers, and some garlic stuff, and cayan pepper-"
"You put cayan pepper in salsa?!"
"Yeah. A LOT of it, too." At this point, I could only stare at him.
"But... why?"
"Because [my friend] can eat really spicy stuff, and I wanted to see if he could eat it."
"Oh. Um... that's interesting."
"Yeah. So it's mild, okay?"
"Okay. And by mild, you mean mild, right?" (I put air quotes around "mild.")
"Yeah." (Another evil chainsaw grin.)
"Okay. I'll... uh... stay away from it."

Then my friend pulled the kid away and told him to leave. "That's my brother," he explained.
"Ah," I said. "That explains it."

At this point, I noticed another of my friends staggering around the kitchen, gasping for air. I also noticed that his face was unusually red.

"Uh," I said. "What's with Bob?" (Not his real name.)

The kid smiled.

"He ate the salsa," he said.

Bob was now chugging a glass of milk while some other guys stood next to him and laughed hysterically.

"Oh," I said. "That's some strong salsa."
"Oh, no," the kid said. "It's mild, remember?"
"Right."

I watched as Bob tried to scrub his tongue at the sink. He also attempted mouthwash.

"Dude," my friend said. "How long's it been since you ate the salsa? Like... five minutes? Ten?"
"At least ten," someone else said.
"It's been ten minutes?!" I said. I was starting to seriously worry about the state of my health while inside the house.
"Yeah."

I looked at the kid, who was giggling so much I thought he'd explode.

"You're evil," I said. "The salsa's that bad?"
"Thanks. And yeah, it is."
"Mm."


About five minutes after all that, after my mom had left, Bob was mostly recovered from The Salsa.

"Hey," I said.
"Hi," he wheezed. (Seriously, he did.)
"How's the salsa?" I asked. He just coughed and shook his head.

Needless to say, no one else had any salsa. Except...

"Dude." (Friend of a friend.)
"What?" (The original friend who invited me.)
"You should eat the salsa."
"What? No! I saw Bob eat it! I'm not stupid."
"Yeah, yeah! Eat it!" (The kid was back.)
"No way!"

Then the kid ran over to the table, where another guy was staring at The Salsa in complete awe. He grabbed a chip and piled a giant scoop of salsa onto it, then held it up.

"EAT IT!" he yelled, as only little brothers can.
"NO!" my friend yelled back.
"Please?"
"No. Not that much, anyway."
"Wait, so you'll try some?"
"Fine. Sure."
"Dude," I said. "You're going to eat The Salsa?! You saw what happened to Bob!"
He shrugged.
"Sure," he said. "A tiny bit."

I swear he touched the corner of a chip to the salsa, then walked back and showed all of us. It was probably about a millimeter or two wide.

"Here we go," he said.
"Dear God, please don't eat that," I said.
"Do it!" his friend yelled.
"Seriously, don't-"

He ate it.

We all stared at him, waiting for him to scream in pain and run for the kitchen for some milk.

He didn't say anything.

"Well?" someone said. "Is it good?"

Still no answer.

"Watch, watch," the same guy said. "He's going to be all manly and not say anything, but then he's going to walk away and be like 'Ahh! Ahh! It burns! Ahh!'" (At this point, he staggered around, gasping and holding his neck.)

My friend started to walk away.

We started laughing really hard.

But then he came back.

"Just kidding," he said.
"WHAT?! How are you not dying?"
He shrugged. "I dunno. It's not that bad."

There was some general staring all around.

"You're insane," I said.
"Yeah, pretty much," he said.

**END PART II***

Oh, goodness. Wow.

I just have to post this. I really do.

@sky: um, yeah, remember when i ate you?

WHOA WAIT SKY GOT EATEN? Geez, hanini. Didn't know you had it in you.

@nightshade: yes, hanini ate me. then puked because she said I tasted bad. can you think of anything more insulting?

@night: well the first thing he said to me on facebook was 'don't eat me please'. what's a girl supposed to do??? not eat him??

I freaking love SparkNotes.

Thanks to skysquirrel417 and hanini_panini for letting me market you two as cannibals on my blog. Love you guys! We should have midnight conversations more often.

UPDATE: Only hanini is a cannibal. Sky was the helpless victim. Or something.

A very small update... thingy.

GREETINGS. [echoing voice: EETINGS EETINGS EETINGS EETINGS]

A small update before I stop procrastinating and actually do some homework.

Today, I have a 900-word essay to write, so no new Saga posts. However, I'll probably post some more either tomorrow or Friday. There'll also definitely be some new stuff up this weekend, too. (Yay!)

The poll is right over there, if you would like to VOTE. ----->

On a more random note, I had a cupcake today in art class. It was awesome. Everyone had bright pink teeth afterward, but no one really cared, because... well... there were CUPCAKES. And they were GOOD. And they were FREE.

Nightshade + art class + architecture + iPod + cupcake = very very happy

Well then.

No new posts in the Saga today- too much homework. DARN YOU, HISTORY CLASS. *shuns*

But anyway, I've been thinking about this blog, and I feel kind of like a self-centered, conceited jerk who loves talking about herself, because oh my goodness, obviously everyone else must care about what she has to say! Of course!

(It's a bad thing.)

So I'm rethinking the Saga a teensy bit. I'll still put up the rest (probably?), but I'll focus less on my own random thoughts and more on what actually happened (because honestly, it's pretty freaking hilarious).

But seriously, I need opinions. Should I even continue the mini-series or not? I mean, I don't have to. If it sounds really lame/boring/conceited/selfish/just crappy in general, just say so. (Seriously, I won't be offended.) Or if you think it sounds remotely interesting/funny, let me know, too!

(This will require leaving a comment, dudes.)

So.

Saga: Yes or no?

UPDATE: I shortened Part I just now. I reread it and decided that it kind of dragged in a few parts, so I took out a bit. No worries, you guys aren't missing anything. I promise.

The Saga of Freakish Salsa and Exploding Soda... PART I.

While I struggle through extremely difficult math homework, I realize that I can't get one particular day (er... evening?) out of my head. It's probably the most fun I've ever had in three hours (other than, like, Disneyland), so I thought, "Hey, I should blog about this! It's funny and really random and contains information about freakishly spicy salsa!"

So after that, I HAD to blog about it, of course. I mean, who doesn't love hearing about freakishly spicy salsa?! (Jerks, that's who. Or normal people, I guess.)

It's a pretty long story, so instead of doing one, gigantic, eye-shriveling post, I'll split it into parts. Yaaay! It's a whole mini-series of blog posts! I'll call it... The Saga of Freakish Salsa and Exploding Soda. (Erm... long story. You'll see.) I have no idea how many parts it'll be, but no worries, you guys will definitely be entertained.

And with that, let the saga COMMENCE!!

***

I suppose we should start with the day before.

I was at school, working a fundraiser for our team. Me and two of my teammates were wandering in circles around the school, trying to get rid of all the little flyers because there were like 70 of them and we had nowhere to put them.

Our sales pitch, and the usual response:

"Hey, you! In the red! You want a candy cane?"
"Uh..." [confused stare]
"It's free."
"Sure?"
"Cool. Take a flyer, too."
"Uh..." [More confused staring.]
"It's for the golf team. We're doing a fundraiser. Just take the candy and then give your parents the flyer."
"Oh. Uh, okay."

So we were walking around, giving people candy canes and postcards, and then my phone rang and it was one of my friends. (Shut up, Tracy. His name is not Adam.)

Anyway, I picked up, and one of the most awkward conversations I've ever had followed. But here's the thing: The actual dialogue that was spoken wasn't awkward. Usually, we talk easily, because we both like to talk about really strange things. But for me, it was super awkward. Why? Because my two teammates were standing there, smiling evilly, saying "Hey, Nightshade. Who's that? Huh? Who are you talking to? It sounds like a guy. Is it a guy? Oh my gosh, it totally is. Oooh. Who is it? Do you like him? What are you talking about?" while I glare at them and make the universal shut-up-right-now throat-slashing sign at them.

Kind of like this:

"So, um, I should go now. I'll ask my mom about tomorrow."
[Teammates: "Tomorrow? What's happening tomorrow? Is something happening tomorrow? Ooooh!"]
"Okay, cool. Have fun ambushing people."
"Heh, thanks. I definitely will."
[Teammates: "Will what? You'll what?"
Me, covering phone: "Shut up! I said we're ambushing people for the fundraiser!"
Teammates: "Oh."]
"What?"
"Nothing. Anyway, talk to you later."
[Teammates: "Oh, yeah. You'll definitely talk to him later."]

And then a very awkward exchange that I thought only existed in the magic metal boxes we call "television," that went like this:

"Okay, bye-"
"I'll call back late- wait, what?"
"What?"
"Wait, what were you going to say? I was going to-"
"I was going to call back- wait, what?"
"What?"
"What?"
"Agh! I'm sorr-"
"Sorry, wha-"
"I'LL CALL BACK LATER! BYE!"
"Bye?!"
Click.

Then I look over at my friends, and they're standing there smirking in a I-know-something-you-don't-know way. Then one of my friends looks at me, puts on her best seductive voice, and goes:

"You gonna text him later?"

(Replace that first T with an S.)

"HAHAHAHAHAHA! No."

***END PART I***

Some new things

A few new things before the storm of posts.

1) New poll up! I can't stop thinking about the wasabi I ate on Sunday night. (I had Japanese food.) Note to self: Make sure to get the wasabi off the chopsticks BEFORE you put the chopsticks in your mouth... unless, of course, you enjoy the feeling that the taste buds on your tongue are ON FIRE.

2) New page up, too. It's the "About" page. Completely pointless? Yes. Why? Because I was bored, okay? (Okay.) Moving on!

3) I forgot what I was going to say.

The first-ever superpoll

And now it's time for... the poll results!

So for the first-ever poll on my blog, I polled about... Twilight. (Aaaggghhhh!) I figured, "Hey, everyone's read Twilight, so I'll talk about it! Whee!"

Epic failure.

But hey, you guys voted on the poll anyway! YEAH!!

Also, for this poll, the results might be a little skewed, because I made it possible to pick more than one option. I probably won't do that in the future, but I dunno. It all depends on the poll question, the mood I'm in, how much caffeine I've consumed in the past 24 hours... you know, the usual.

Anyway, ON WITH THE RESULTS!

Question: Which out of the Twilight series did you think was best?

16% of superpollers (1 person) said that they've never read the series, so they didn't know. (Consider yourself lucky.)

33% (two) of you guys said that New Moon was the best.

33% (two) said that Eclipse was the best. (WHY?! It was so pointless! Bleah!)

50% (three) of you said that Twilight was the best.

Another 50% (three people) said that Breaking Down Dawn was the best.

Aaaand... 66% (four people) said that they didn't like Twilight. (YEAH! I'm with you guys!)

New poll coming soon. Yay!

Like a NINJA.

Okay, so right now I'm- WHOA WHOA WHOA. Stop the music. Blogger totally changed the Compose A Post So Random Strangers Can Read About Your Personal Life format.

Um. Well... now this is awkward.

It just goes to show how ADD/ADHD I can be. (And technically, ADD and ADHD are the same thing... I think?)

Anyway, it's 10 PM and I am sneaking online like a ninja. (Hence the post title.) Also... I have nothing to blog about. Seriously. Nothing. At. ALL. I feel so un-creative. It's not just writer's block, it's flipping creativity block.

Oh, well. At least tomorrow I get late-start-day. Plus I can read this blog. (Sorta-warning: Blog in said link contains strong language. Heheheh, I said "strong language." WHOA I'M TALKING LIKE AN OLD PERSON WAIT HOW DID THAT HAPPEN HUH- wait. Erm... anyway, there's some language and mentions of "adult themes" (heheh, I said "adult themes"), because the blogger is, well, an adult. But it's really freaking hilarious, so if you don't mind some language, check it out!)

(I thought of something to blog about just now. AHAHAHA. I win.)

I think if I ever meet Kat (who writes that blog), I'd totally spaz out (even though she lives on the other side of the country and it'll never happen because that would be ridiculous). I'm not sure how it's possible for a single human being to be that incredibly hilarious.

Wait, is it possible to monitor site traffic and see who links to you and stuff? If that's possible... um... well. Hi, Kat. You probably think I'm a complete creeper now. No worries, I'm not. Heh. Heheh. HEHEHEHEH.

By the way, OMG KAT you're so cool I read your blog all the time and I feel really behind because there are all those posts from like two years ago but I didn't even know you existed HAHAHAHA ISN'T THAT FUNNY oh and also I love your SparkNotes articles and I'm going to stop talking now so I don't make an even bigger idiot of myself

If that's not possible... I feel like a dork now.

And with that, I end the post.

Oh my goodness.

NEW BOOK!! OMGOMGOMGOMGOMG

<-- Look! It's... The Red Pyramid! AAAHHHHHHHHHH!!

In case you haven't noticed, I'm quite excited about this. I mean, I've only waited a YEAR for another Rick Riordan book. Now, I suppose I should give this a proper review...

Rick Riordan, the author of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, has just released a new book (and by "just released," I mean "four days ago")- The Red Pyramid, the first book of a planned series, The Kane Chronicles. Instead of centering on Greek mythology, this series focuses on the Egyptian gods and mythology.

Carter and Sadie Kane have lived apart since their mother's death six years ago. Carter travels the world with their father, a renowned Egyptologist, while Sadie lives in London with their grandparents. They almost never see each other and have almost nothing in common... until one day, their father takes them to the British Museum. He summons a mysterious, glowing figure, which in turn blows up the museum and makes their father disappear.

Carter and Sadie both know that they have to save their father, but there's a factor neither of them expected. The ancient Egyptian gods are rising, and one- Set- has his own plans for the fate of the world. On top of that, the ancient magicians of the House of Life decide to reveal themselves. Now Carter and Sadie have a nice list of things to do:

* Save their father
* Stop Set from carrying out his plans
* Get the House of Life to stop trying to kill them
* Save the world

When you read this, you will definitely NOT be disappointed. :D

Always in a hurry

It seems like I'm always in a hurry.

Take today, for instance. I get up, expecting a nice, leisurely Friday in which I happen to have no school (faculty meetings FTW). I plan on getting up sometime between 10:00 and 11:00. After that, all I want is to finish up The Red Pyramid (new Rick Riordan release! AHHHH), do my history assignment, and after that... not much. Toss another post up here, check Goodreads, see if I won a Friday Award, watch some Avatar: The Last Airbender. All in all, a nice, relaxing day.

Did I get it?

Of course not! That would be much too easy.

Instead, my mom forces me to get up at 9:30, then do history homework as fast as possible because WE MUST GO SHOPPING RIGHT NOW. (Still not done, even though it is now... 4:54.) After that, we picked up my sister from school (not bad), but then I suddenly have to rush to finish homework because... we're going out to dinner with my parents' friend? What?! WHY did no one tell me this?

Because that would be MUCH TOO EASY.

Sometimes I think my parents say to each other, "Hey, let's ask [insert friend's name here] to dinner on Friday. We should tell Nightshade, since today is Wednesday... nah, let's just tell her thirty minutes before [friend] gets to the house! And we know that she NEVER has any plans for herself! No, never! Why would she do that? She's a teenager! Teenagers don't do anything except eat, sleep, and go to school!"

So now I have to go finish my history assignment before my parents' friend gets here. No worries, I'll be back to the usual upbeat/chipper/happy/joyous/thrilling/uplifting/inspiring posts tomorrow, as always.

PEACE OUT, GIRL SCOUT.

Pros and cons.

There are times when my mom is the coolest person in the entire universe (except for, like, Jesus), and then there are times when she makes me want to throw myself off a cliff in sheer frustration. I've experienced both within a few hours of today.

PRO: When I'm very strangely not-hungry (seriously, I'm usually always hungry. Always.), she plunks down some chocolate milk and cinnamon twist thingies and goes "Here you go" and walks away... because she knows how much I love chocolate milk (way more than boring old plain milk), and she knows how much I love the cinnamon twist thingies (it's like heaven in the form of a grocery store pastry). And she still gives it to me, even though I barely ate any of the Panda Express that was supposed to be my dinner three hours earlier.

CON: If I am not completely finished with all my homework by maybe 10:15 PM, she flips out and basically tells me that I'm going to get a zero on the assignment and fail all my classes and never get anywhere in my life because I don't work fast enough. And she still says this, even though she knows that stoichiometry, even though it's completely awesome, can be a total beast and threaten to shred my brain into tiny little bite-sized pieces... and on top of that, I'm supposed to write a fake dedication speech for a war memorial with a ridiculously depressing backstory.

Because apparently, if I don't finish ALL my homework in under three hours, I'm going to...

1) Get a zero on the assignment, which means I will
2) Fail the class, which leads to
3) Failing ALL my classes, which means that I would
4) Flunk out of school and
5) Not get into the school I want, and then
6) End up flipping burgers at McDonald's until I'm eighty-four (and three-quarters) and have enough life savings to FINALLY retire. And on top of all that, I will also
7) Not be able to hold a steady job because of my tendency to procrastinate, and then
8) I won't be able to get married, because
9) I won't be able to support a family

Okay, so I paraphrased a little. But I swear numbers 1-5 have all been yelled at me when I take just a tad too long with my history assignments.

For those of you who have seen the movie "The Vampire's Assistant": It's like the COLLEGE! JOB! FAMILY! talk Darren's parents give him in the beginning of the movie.

For those of you who haven't seen the movie: Unfortunately, I can't find a clip of it right now. If I find one, I'll definitely put it up. In the meantime... if anyone knows where I can find a clip of the college-job-family lecture, let me know! It would be awesome!

Well. Now that this has turned into a full-blown rant about how I'll never succeed in life, I'd better wrap up this post. After all, I do have homework to do.

To end on a positive note...

Umm...

Originally, I had a picture of two adorable puppies running on a hardwood floor. Blogger seems to hate me as of right now, so I can't post it. Sorry.

Stream of consciousness

I have no idea why I put "stream of consciousness" as my title. It just sounded cool... plus we're learning about it in English. I have to write a stream-of-consciousness piece about a homeless man. Um... okaaay. I guess I can do that. (Well, I have to. Stupid homework.) It's better than the usual writing assignment, though, because this one is creative writing. Usually it's just essays comparing the ideas of Rousseau and the Enlightenment and the Romantic Era and blahblahblah... (I really have no idea what I learned during that unit.)

I just wish we'd read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland- the original version. It's SO legit. We read a couple chapters of it (and a few of Through the Looking-Glass), but not all of it. So, next on my reading list: Alice in Wonderland. Yeeaaahhhh. :D

And another reminder to vote on the poll. It's right there under the little animated fox! Vote vote vote!

A last random thought to wrap up this pointless post: When rabbits are being attacked and dying, they make this noise that sounds like a woman screaming. At least, that's what my friend says. Apparently, his rabbit was attacked by some sort of animal and it was screaming... which was really freaky (and a quite morbid topic for the middle of trig).

WOOHOO!!

Hey, followers/readers/stalkers!

Take a look around at this lovely blog. *waves hands around like a Wheel of Fortune letter-screen girl* I changed the template! Sooo... what do you think of it? Love it? Hate it? Think it's too orange? Does it burn your retinas with its total orangeness? (I hope not.) Let me know! Just shoot me a comment and tell meeeee! DO IT NOW.

Also, I put up a nice little poll in the sidebar. It's right under Spirit (the fox) and right above the list of books I've talked about so far. I didn't know what to put, but then I thought, "Hey, I'll poll about something everyone knows about!" Hence the Twilightness. But no worries, fellow Anti-Twilighters: I put an option to click if you don't like Twilight. (Like me.) So go vote! Whee!

Mini-update

Hey, all 12 of you followers! (Twelve... wow.) Just a mini-update to say a couple things!

1) I was just informed of the existence of the Blogger Template Designer... so that means the next time you see this blog, it's going to be all spiffy and redone! It also means that the approximately two and a half hours I spent searching the Internet for a good blog template... was... pointless... *headdesk*

2) I added a list of all the books I've talked about so far in the spiffy sidebar. I put helpful little links to each one, too! (Uh... they're all to Goodreads.) They're all to a site with exciting summaries and average ratings and stuff, plus it's got all the book information if you want to buy it or something. If the list down there is too crowded, confusing, or just plain annoying, let me know! LEAVE A COMMENT! (Seriously. I love comments. I really do.)

Heist Society

Well.

I honestly can't think of anything to write about.

Fail. *facepalm*

Might as well review a book, eh? (Eheheh. I said "eh.")

What I'm Reading: Heist Society, by Ally Carter. You might've seen this in the bookstore, since it's gaining a big fan base- and for good reason. This book is so. Totally. Awesome. *goes into fangirl mode* Even the title is awesome! Heist Society... it makes you go "Huh, I wonder what this is about..." and then pick up the book and go "OMG SO COOL." So... well... I should really summarize, huh? Sorry if the summary is horrible. I'm awful at this kind of thing :P

Katarina Bishop lives in a family of thieves. She's been in the family "business" her entire life, but she's decided she's tired of it. She scammed her way into a prestigious boarding school and intended to stay there for a while... but other people had different ideas.

There's a bad guy within the bad guys, and his collection of priceless (and stolen) paintings have been taken from him. Kat's dad is the one and only suspect on the list. With Interpol watching his every move, he can't do much about it. An old ally wants Kat back on the team to clear her dad's name and possibly save his life. But even the best of the best couldn't pull off a heist this big...

[insert sound of evil cackling]

Soooo, if anyone read my April 13 post with the little mini-story-type-thingies, you'll have seen the one about the obnoxious girl who flings herself on the narrator's friend constantly. (What? You haven't read them yet? Read them! And comment! Please?) I based the story on a girl at my school with a locker near me. Curse you, alphabetical arrangement! *shakes fist angrily*

Anyway, I saw the girl at school last week. It was certainly entertaining... for me, at least. >:) So here's a few stats on the story:

Story: The girl has pretty much zero knowledge of my existence.
Reality: True. I know her name- duh, how could I not? She's even louder than me- but she doesn't know mine.

Story: Her locker is right near mine.
Reality: True. Like I said before, we're arranged alphabetically, which is quite unfortunate.

Story: She throws herself all over the narrator's (my) friend.
Reality: Nope. I had two very specific people in mind when I wrote the story. I was trying to imagine how they'd react to each other, and I think I got that pretty well.

Story: Seems like I (the narrator) kind of have a thing for my guy friend.
Reality: FALSE!! I added that bit to the story to make it a little more dramatic. In real life, we're just really good friends. (Seriously. I promise.) Someone suggested that he likes me and I yelled "Ahh! That's like incest or something!" We're not actually related, but we've known each other for a super long time, so we might as well be.

To elaborate on the bit about the two people who inspired the story: Yes, there IS a girl who's exactly like the one in the story. Only difference: I'm pretty sure she doesn't know my friend exists, either. (Honestly, it's not a bad thing for either of us.) Besides that, I had two very specific people I thought of, and I tried to think of how they would react if they were ever in that situation.

And the girl throws herself all over other guys, but not my friend (re: doesn't know he exists). Believe me, I see her every single day. Shrieking obnoxiously and cussing at the top of her lungs and running around in shorts so tiny I'm stunned the admins haven't descended on her for dress code yet. (Believe it or not, I'm not her biggest fan. Hurr hurr.) I swear someday she's going to be walking around in those tiny shorts and that tiny shirt and Uggs (why does she wear fuzzy boots with short shorts? Anyone knows why, PLEASE let me know) and some weirdo will come creep on her and she won't know what to do except scream and cuss.

Wait, that's a little harsh. Maybe she'll think to run away. Not sure, though, because a typical sentence is something like "Ohmigaawwd, the party was so [expletive] fuuun! Like, Brett was like, so weird that night, and I was like 'Holy [expletive], Brett! What the [expletive] is [expletive] wrong with you?' And-- oh, [expletive]! I forgot my [expletive] English binder! [expletive]! I hate my [expletive] English class anyway!" It's like, f-bombs galore, plus a bunch of other words that I didn't even know existed. Thanks, darling! You taught me some fun new words today! (My sarcasm hand is raised.)

Oh, almost forgot. The other day, she was standing there and I kicked my locker shut really hard. I saw her glance over for a second, so I glared at her. Then I smiled evilly and walked away. *wins*

More random bits

Just some random bits of conversation I heard (or said) today. I have a feeling these random bits will become a trend in my posts...

"No, stupid! The ice cube is right there!"

"Nelson! I have to eat the earth dragon! Come on!" (No kidding. This is what I heard.)

"I'd tell you to pretend to be a girl, but that would be freaky."

"Bright yellow chicken-ade?" ((EDIT: It was actually "Lemon yellow chicken-ade." Sorry for the mix-up. :) ))

"Is it hah-pee or haa-pie or hah-pie or what?"

Also, I am officially addicted to the Death Note manga, because holy cheese, it is amazing. Much thanks to Mack, who told me what it's about!

Random bits

Today's post is just random bits of my life that I overdramatize for the sake of writing. No, this is not because I have no idea what to post! Pfft... By the way, not all of these are about me. Some of it's what I see around me. You know, at school and such. Also, I changed some elements of most of the mini-bits, just for the sake of drama. They're not all part of the same story, either.


"He won't get up," she complains, nudging the puppy.
"He never wants to get up." She laughs and tugs him up by the collar. "He's lazy. Fat, too. But still adorable, so that kind of makes up for it."
"Yeah, it does." The puppy lays down again. There's silence for a few seconds as he rolls over.
"Back to work now?"
"Sure."

***

The girl laughs, "playfully" bumping the boy with her shoulder. "Ohmigaawwd," she shrieks. "Shut up!"
I shoot her a glare, but look back down before she can notice and start cussing me out, although I've never spoken to her before. I'm sure she's barely aware of my existence.
But I'm certainly aware of her existence. She's the one who blocks my locker daily. She's the one who keeps throwing herself all over my friend. She's the one who makes him uncomfortable, but I don't know if she realizes that. She probably does, though. That's probably why she keeps doing it.
How did she even get into this school? We're supposed to be prestigious, hard to reach, renowned for the difficulty of the admissions process. She must have really wowed them during her interview. She probably did. She's good at facades.
But I know who she really is. I've seen her type so many times.
The five-minute bell rings. The hallway begins to clear quickly. I stay at my locker a bit longer, hoping for a chance to talk, but she doesn't leave. I sit back on my heels, pretending to be indecisive about a certain binder.
"Hey." A foot nudges my backpack. "Come on, we gotta get to class." I glance over at my friend, whom she's still got in a trap.
"Sure," I say. I stand up and kick my locker as hard as I can. The slam echoes around the hallway, making her shriek. She stares at me as if she can't fathom how I could possibly want to be that loud.
"Whoops," I say. I turn and walk away before I do anything stupid. I can sense him staring at my back, hoping I'll turn around and rescue him from her... but I don't. I can't deal with her right now.

***

"No way! Are you serious?"
"Yes!" I gape at her for a second, then burst out laughing.
"A cheerleader? What's her name?"
"I have no idea. Dark brown hair. That's all I know."
"The one in our math class?"
"No, not her. Wait... do you mean that girl-"
"Sits one row over from me, a couple seats up."
"Oh. No, it's not her."
"Darn. Wish it was. That'd be hysterical."
"I know, right?" I pull up a mental image of our class, then try to remember if I've ever seen her watching him a little too closely. I don't think she ever has, though, so I dismiss the idea.
"Yeah. I mean, out of all the people in this school, she chooses him to Facebook-stalk?"
"Totally. It's just so... so..."
"Freaky," I say at the same time she says "Weird."
"Yeah." I lean back on my hands, wondering if he knows. "Does he know?"
"I dunno."
"We should tell him. It'd be hilarious."
"It would," she agrees. "It'd definitely make math a little more exciting."

Golf.

This is just a really short post, since I'm in the middle of writing a monstrous mini-essay. (Why do teachers assign homework over spring break? It's called a BREAK for a reason, people. Like, a break from the punishment they call homework.)

Anyway, my dad had one of those "OMG COME WATCH THIS PUTT" moments whilst watching professional golf on TV. The Masters are on, Phil Mickelson is tied for the lead, and my dad is so excited that I think he's going to start jumping up and down at any second now. Also, pro golf's leading Recovering Jerkface just missed two reeeaaally easy putts. IN A ROW. It's like the cardinal sin of golf. (Well, that, and leaving a putt short. Apparently.)

So Tiger misses the putt, and the crowd goes "Awww," and then he misses ANOTHER, and the crowd goes "Ahhhh!!" because they OMG cannot believe that he missed the putt!!

It's a valid concern. When stuff like that happens, it sucks really bad, because you fail at life. Twice. Within sixty seconds. Believe me, I would know. I golf, and I've done that before. SO not fun.

Golfers get upset over the strangest things.

UPDATE: Phil Mickelson just won the Masters. (Yes, it's a good thing. From what I've heard, he's a really cool dude. :) ) I think my dad might scream. Phil's his favorite.

Wow...

Oh my goshness, I am HORRIBLE at remembering to update this. Ack! *facepalm* Well, after reading this amazing blog, it motivated me to start writing more often. Yay for SparkNotes!

Which brings me to my next point: I'll probably be expanding out from just reading, since sometimes I don't really read anything new. I pretty much just reread my favorites (like this week... Catching Fire :D), so I actually am running out of material. (Gasp!) So most of my posts might be recommendation-less, but I guess I'll just put the random stuff that spews out of my brain onto the keyboard and screams at me to type up. (That was kind of graphic. Sorry.)

Just a quick note, if anyone cares- rereading Catching Fire, by Suzanne Collins. Epicness at its best!

New Moon stuff

Nightshade hesitated, long-nailed fingers hovering over the thin silver keyboard plugged into the glossy computer. She had always wished for a device of her own; however, she was tragically forced into sharing a wonderful Mac with her family.

"Perhaps I shall write about the novel titled 'New Moon,'" she mused. She began to type carefully, but quickly tired of penning a blog post in such a ridiculous and absurd way. "Now," she murmured, "I shall return to writing in the plain, understandable vernacular of most Americans."

Okay, I seriously can't believe I have the capacity to write something as horribly overwritten as that. I'm kind of torn between pounding my head on a wall and laughing hysterically.

So right now, I dumped Twilight and skipped to New Moon, because I was SO INSANELY BORED with it. (This may or may not have to do with the fact that I was reading Dan Bergstein's Blogging New Moon posts last night.) While I was reading the prologue/preface/melodramatic paragraph that comes before Chapter 1, I decided I'd attack with a pencil and EDIT, as if Stephenie Meyer handed me the manuscript and said "Hey Nightshade, can you edit this for me? It's my new book and I need a proofreader."

I'm a brutal proofreader, by the way. BRUTAL. Especially with grammar and punctuation. And sentence structure. And a lot of other things... but that's beside the point. The point is, it's like rewriting New Moon. So here's the Preface for all NINE of you followers! I'll put the original text first. (Disclaimer: New Moon text copyright Stephenie Meyer 2006)

I felt like I was trapped in one of those terrifying nightmares, the one where you have to run, run till your lungs burst, but you can't make your body move fast enough. My legs seemed to move slower and slower as I fought my way through the callous crowd, but the hands on the huge clock tower didn't slow. With relentless, uncaring force, they turned inexorably toward the end--the end of everything.

But this was no dream, and, unlike the nightmare, I wasn't running for my life; I was racing to save something infinitely more precious. My own life meant little to me today.

Alice had said there was a good chance we would both die here. Perhaps the outcome would be different if she weren't trapped by the brilliant sunlight; only I was free to run across this bright, crowded square.

And I couldn't run fast enough.

So it didn't matter to me that we were surrounded by our extraordinarily dangerous enemies. As the clock began to toll out the hour, vibrating under the soles of my sluggish feet, I knew I was too late--and I was glad something bloodthirsty waited in the wings. For in failing at this, I forfeited any desire to live.

The clock tolled again, and the sun beat down from the exact center point of the sky.

Heh. Heheheh. HEHEHEHEHEHEH. That was horrible! And now for my version...

I felt like I was trapped in a nightmare- the ones where you have to run away, but you can't run fast enough. I seemed to move more and more slowly as I fought through the crowd. Unfortunately, no matter how much I cursed the clock, it didn't slow down.

But this wasn't a dream. And this time, I wasn't running to save my life. Instead, I was saving something much more important (if you can believe that).

Alice had told me that there was a good chance that we'd both die today. Maybe it would've been different if she hadn't been stuck in the car. But right now, I was the only one who had the freedom to get out and run.

But I couldn't run fast enough, so to me, it didn't matter that we were surrounded by enemies.

The clock began to strike twelve. I knew I was too late. I was actually glad that our enemies were hanging around, because if I failed in this, I didn't want to live.

Huh, that was a lot shorter than the original. Did you love it? Hate it? Think I could've shortened it a little more? Leave a comment with feedback- I'd love to hear it!

WHOOOOAAAA.

My little egg timer just went off and scared the HECK out of me. O_O

But disregarding my lameness, I've been rereading the first Maximum Ride book lately. I stopped, what with all the homework screaming at me, but it's sitting on my desk waiting to be read. I already reviewed Max (the fifth book), but I think I should do the first, too. :)

What I'm Reading: Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment. Like I said before, it's the first in the Maximum Ride series. (Yes, I'm sure. The series is set up really confusingly [WHOA, confusingly is a word?!], but this is the first.) In this book, Max and the flock are living in secrecy, unknown to anyone, but one day an old enemy shows up and kidnaps Angel, the youngest flock member. Now they have to go find her before a crew of complete psychos uses her for their experiments...

They were getting closer. Dim light filtered in through the woods in front of me -- a clearing? Please, please... a clearing could save me.

I burst through the trees, chest heaving, a thin sheen of cold sweat on my skin.

Yes!

No -- oh, no!

I skidded to a halt, my arms waving, my feet backpedaling in the rocky dirt.

It wasn't a clearing. In front of me was a cliff, a sheer face of rock that dropped to an unseeable floor hundreds of feet below.

In back of me were woods filled with drooling bloodhounds and psycho Erasers with guns.

Both options stank.

The dogs were yelping excitedly -- they'd found their prey: moi.

I looked over the deadly drop.

There was no choice, really. If you were me, you'd have done the same thing,

I closed my eyes, held out my arms... and let myself fall over the edge of the cliff.

Ooh, cliffy! :D

Erases on Film and Paper

The title of this post came from the little label on my eraser I got for art. Finally, an eraser that actually works well! *throws an eraser party*

Anyway, not much to blog about. Sorry. :/ 

Although I did start a new blog: http://notactuallyatwitter.blogspot.com. They're just little 'status updates,' like on Facebook or Twitter or Google Buzz (yay!) or something. Unless I find some more interesting stuff to blog about on there, it's going to be a total fail. But that's okay, because it'll occupy my time. :)

What I'm Reading: Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley. It's old, and the language is kind of hard to understand, but it's actually a really good book. (Assigned reading that I like?! Apocalypse!! *passes out*) It's pretty intense- usually, when I'm reading chapters that were assigned for school, I have a nice system.

1. Read the chapters

2. Throw book across room in utter confusion

3. Go on SparkNotes so I can actually understand what I just read

4. Rinse and repeat every time another chapter is assigned

It works pretty well, actually. (Nightshade + SparkNotes = LOVE) It sums up Frankenstein really nicely, because even though the language is somewhat understandable, Mary Shelley was even MORE in love with her thesaurus than Stephenie Meyer is. However, her ridiculously difficult language can sort of be excused, because it was written in the early 1800s and, well, people wrote stuff like that. (But for Stephenie Meyer, there's no excuse.)

In the ORIGINAL Frankenstein story, it's even freakier than all the other "actual" versions that are out there. Victor Frankenstein has a nice childhood, skipping through flower meadows with his BFFs and hugging puppies (figuratively). But then he goes off to college and gets obsessed with anatomy... When he creates the infamous monster, the stuff that actually happens is WAY cooler than all the Mary Shelley wannabe writers out there (yeah, they exist. Probably). I give it 4 out of 5 stars! (I deducted one star for the crazy writing style.)

Remove by friction.

Random title, I know. I just looked around my desk and saw this "erasable" highlighter that says "remove by friction" on the side. I thought it was funny... by the way, it doesn't erase. So don't blow your money on erasable highlighters, because they really don't erase well. Believe me, I tried it myself. :P

Anyway, I'm still taking an attempt at Twilight... I haven't had much time to sit down and actually go through it in detail, so I'm just through chapter 2. So far, I've done chapters 1, 2, and a bit of a later chapter... 7? 8? One of those. Still excited for Chapter 13 (the one where they're in the meadow and Eddiekins sparkles for Bella)! I haven't reread THAT part in a while, so it will be extremely entertaining. >:D

Also, I'm officially ADDICTED to unrelatedcaptions.com. It's seriously an amazing site! I just sent an email to a bunch of my friends with a bunch of unrelatedcaptions.com links... they'll probably be quite annoyed with the spam, but at least they'll be entertained when they view the links. :D

What I'm Reading: Nightlight, by The Harvard Lampoon. It's actually a group of a few people who collaborate to write parody books (like this one). It's amazing and about ten million times better than the original Twilight! :D When I read it, I couldn't stop laughing. My family thought there was something wrong with me... but that's okay.

In THIS version of Twilight, Belle Goose abandons life in Phoenix to live with her window-washing dad in Switchblade, Oregon. She quickly discovers Edwart Mullen, a strange germophobe whom Belle is absolutely convinced is a vampire. After all, he DID save her from a speeding snowball...

"About three things I was absolutely certain.

First, Edwart was most likely my soul mate, maybe.

Second, there was a vampire part of him- which I assumed was wildly out of his control- that wanted me dead.

And third, I unconditionally, irrevocably, impenetrably, heterogeneously, gynecologically, and disreputably wished he had kissed me."

FREEDOM!!

Freedom is MINE!! MINE, I SAY!! I'M DONE WITH FINALS!! AH HA HAAAAA *manic laughing*

Heheh. Anyway.... XD

Obviously, I'm now done with finals. Just finished late this morning, and now it's late afternoon and I have nothing to do. And I am perfectly happy. Actually, I wanted to teach myself how to harmonize (my voice is weird), and I was right in the middle of getting started when the rest of my family decided to arrive at home. It was like, Great. An hour of solitude, and the second I try and do something that I'll only do by myself when no one's around? They come back. Okaaay.

Whatever, I'll try it again... um... some other time?! O_O

What I'm Reading: Dork Diaries, by Rachel R. Russell. It's way below my reading level (it's actually my sister's book that she got when we were at B&N), but it's actually a really good book. (Infinitely better than Twilight, too.) It's kind of like Diary of a Wimpy Kid, but it's a girl telling the story (instead of a guy). It's reeeaaally funny :D

Highlighting Twilight

So right now, I'm in the process of rereading Twilight and adding snarky little comments in pencil. I'm counting how many times...

1) A form of the word 'murmur' is used

2) A form of the word 'glower' is used

3) A semicolon is used (they're awesome, but if you overuse them? LAME.)

4) Edward's physical traits are described

5) Edward tells Bella that it's dangerous to be around him

#5 isn't applicable yet, since I'm only on chapter 2 and they haven't spoken yet. But so far, in 1 chapter plus one page (a total of 29 pages), there are...

1) Murmurs: o

2) Glowers: o

3) Semicolons: 15

4) Descriptions: 18

5) Dangerous: (N/A)

That's right, folks. And the physical descriptions are only on TEN pages. Scary, I know. Unfortunately, I'm not to chapter 7 yet, so I can't rewrite much yet (plus, I'm in the middle of finals). I'm especially looking forward to commenting on chapter 13- the chapter where Bella and Deadward are in the meadow. >:D

What I'm Reading: Twilight. Duh. Didn't you read the rest of the post? ;)

Ew, finals...

Bleah, sorry I haven't posted in so long... I just kinda lost motivation. :P Unfortunately, I may have to put the Breaking Dawn stuff on hold because I have finals coming up. I mean, Christmas break was nice and amazing and relaxing, but once I get back to school? INSANITY. So for the next four weeks or so, anything outside of school will be pretty much nonexistent. My finals schedule is a bit like this...

~Drag myself out of bed at the ungodly hour of 5:40 AM

~Somehow get in the car and to school on time

~Attempt to stay awake in my morning classes, both of which pound finals material into my head

~LUNCH! 25 MINUTES OF FREEDOM! HOORAY!

~Back into the death trap of afternoon classes (still trying to stay awake), both of which attempt to engrave finals stuff into my brain

~Get home and procrastinate for an hour or so

~Procrastinate some more while "studying for finals"

~Actually start studying for finals at like 7:00 PM

~Stay up until approximately 1:07 AM frantically trying to cram as much information into brain as possible

~Go to sleep at about 1:30 AM and repeat the whole thing. And repeat again... and again... and again...

On a lighter note, I finished the WHOLE Cirque du Freak series! (*sob*) I read... er... one of the later ones, and I got super depressed and was like "Why should I even keep reading? ___________ happened... there's no meaning to reading OR writing... the world is ending..." But then somehow I got the motivation to keep reading. (The fact that my best friend threatened to murder me if I didn't finish the series soon helped a lot.) :D

What I'm Reading: Sons of Destiny, Cirque du Freak Book 12!! 8-O It was AMAZING! I cried! A lot! Uncontrollable crying/whimpering/rolling around on the ground in the fetal position is a sign of a very good book. If it can evoke strong emotions, it means the author did their job right. Darren Shan did a little TOO well... (just kidding) :D