27 Aug 01

Well! I realised I only got to my second class while discussing my schedule, so I will finish the necessary types of things, and stuff! o_o Anyway, re: Bickley vs. Lee, it's kind of bad because Bickley is always like "pay attention, you don't need to be writing right now, put down your pen please," which is fine except that I truly listen just as well while drawing, which I do constantly, and having to just sit there while people struggle through the meaning of the paragraph we just read entirely reeks. Anyway, Mr. Lee didn't teach us half of the stuff we should have learned in second year, but he *did* teach us metric tonnes of grammar stuff we really didn't need to know until like, later *this* year. He kind of taught what his heart told him to, I guess o_o()

I sincerely hate it when someone else says something but another person thinks it's me that said it. Like at my friend Sara's birthday party in like... 4th grade, there was this girl named Christie that I didn't like. She was really rude and stuff. Anyway, Sara's mom kind of makes a lot of food that's considered weird-- she's really into health food and stuff, so the snacks to eat at the party weren't "normal". Anyway, at one point we were watching a movie and Sara's mom asks if anyone wants fried papaya chips, or something like that, and Christie goes in this really rude obnoxious voice, "NO!!!" Anyway, Sara's mom thought it was me that said that. So later that night, when it was about time for supper, she asked if anyone wanted pizza, and I said "no thank you," because I wasn't hungry. And she said, "It's okay, Rachel. I didn't make it." And I was like ;_; But the reason I thought of it at all is because that sort of happened last Thursday (or was it Tuesday...?) in Latin. Mrs. Bickley was asking for some uses of the accusative case, and this girl Ashley says "time when," which is a use of ablative, not accusative, and Mrs. Bickley thought it was me that said it, because she looked at me and said "No, that's ablative," but I thought maybe I imagined it and she was looking at Ashley because she sits near me *shrug* But anyway, what Bickley does, is that if someone gives an answer and it's wrong, she tells them, but later when she asks another question and the answer they gave before is the right one, she asks them specifically. So when we were doing uses of ablative and people had named a few, she goes "And Rachel, what's another one?" and I was like "..... time when" and she's like "Right." .... but anyway I really hate it when I don't say something but people think I did. Makes me look mean/stupid/etc. Well, maybe not always, but almost exclusively it makes me look like something I'm not, and I'm not into that.

So anyway! On to 3rd period. I have Chamber Choir. Okay, last year it was about... 50 people, I guess. And that felt about right-- *maybe* on the big side, but good. And. I do not know what kind of crack Scurlock was smoking. But there are SEVENTY PEOPLE in Chamber Choir this year. And I don't wanna say mean things about people, but the thing is, last year there were a few people in that choir that probably shouldn't have been in the top choir, and this year, there are... well, a lot more than a few people now in the top choir that more than likely shouldn't be there. I know Scurlock is a good director and stuff... but... it's just so many. I don't feel special anymore being in that choir since everyone and their Betta fish can get in ;_; It finally gives me a reason to be happy about having joined Soundsations though since that's only 20 people XÞ 'course one or two of those shouldn't be in it either O_O()()()()() Anyway, Scurlock did that because she wanted to do some big choir pieces, Handels and stuff. But I feel like we're sacrificing too much. I wanted the choir to be smaller. We were having some behaviour issues on Thursday, and Scur was all like "I chose to have the choir be this big; if you don't stop talking I can demote you!" and that sort of thing. And a lot of the veterans were like "That's right, keep talking!" but only thinking it of course. Bah. I wish Scurlock would demote a bunch of people. We're already having so many problems that we never had last year. But I know she's not going to demote anyone. She always threatens to kick people out of the choir and stuff, but I don't think she's ever even done it once. *siiiigh*

Which brings us to 4th period XÞ Physics Pre-AP. My teacher, Mr. Hausenfluke, is an uber-nerd, but still really cool o_o() Not too much to say about Physics. It's Physics. *shrug* Since a lot of it is just math, I don't think it'll be that hard. And that *pose* is my *change pose* A DAY *final pose* *hold*

B Day! 5th period is U.S. History. It's a regulars class-- the first non-GT/Honours academic class I've had since I started my high school career o_o() I took it instead of AP History because I heard a lot of horror stories abotu AP US History from people who had it, and because my history class last year was really hard for me and that one was only pre-AP. Of course, Whitehead taught that class as though it were AP, not Pre-AP, and I still made rather good grades, so it wasn't so much that as the fact that I knew from reliable sources that AP US History has like three hours of homework every week and every class is just 90 minutes of lecture and you have to take good notes and read the chapter and do big huge study guides on your own time. Anyway... my regular US History class is kinda groovy XP I can draw pictures the whole class and still do well. o_o() I'm not used to that kind of class, though. Or rather, I just forgot what it was like. By way of example, the homework on Wednesday was to read chapter 2. I showed up on Friday having read ch. 2, and the homework was "finish reading chapter 2." And in class we carefully went over the first section of chapter 2 with a study guide thing. Sometimes I kind of wonder... I mean, I appreciate Honours classes and the "higher-order thinking" stuff we get taught, and the mad thesis producing skillz everyone developed last year in World History, and I like not being held back (that sounds conceited, but I really was, like in elementary school and stuff) by kids who don't learn quite as fast... but don't the kids who aren't "gifted" need to learn "higher-order thinking" just as much or more as the ones who naturally learn more quickly? Their classes are easy, but college and real life aren't going to be like that. Then I remember that some of them aren't going to go to college. And then I get depressed and think about something else for a while ;o But seriously... there aren't that many feelings I dislike more than not understanding something. I mean, in anything, if other people are all getting it and I don't understand, I just feel crushed under this huge weight of helplessness. Kind of like claustrophobia, I guess. o_o When I think that there are people who learn more slowly than others, or are just "average," and imagine how often it must be that they feel like that, I get even more depressed than when I think about people having dead-end blue-collar etc. futures. I just can't even imagine... but.... people are different, obviously. When people are born with something, or without something, they compensate automatically and don't feel really that they're deprived since they don't know what it would be like to have or not have whatever it is. So maybe people who do learn slowly don't feel helpless or depressed when they don't understand things. I hope so, anyway.

I philosiphise too much.

....6th period then o_x I have study hall. I dearly love study hall. I sit next to C. Reynolds. He's a sculptor and he has a lab coat with clay stains on it, but they look like bloodstains, so it's really cool XD We're friends. *shrug* I met him in 9th grade Latin when I randomly thought he was a senior because I subconsciously interpreted his general "keep teaching, I'm just gonna finish reading this novel" attitude to mean that he, like many seniors, already pretty much had his GPA cemented and didn't care that much anymore. But then I found out he was a sophomore, and that's just how he is XD He's a senior NOW though. Although, if you're a praying type of person, pray for him with me, eh? He's severely agnostic-- meaning, as he puts it, he doesn't believe much of anything. He doesn't believe that there is a God, but he also doesn't believe there's NOT one, because that would require faith anyway. And he's a bit blasphemous at times. .-. But we're friends o_o() It's kinda groovy, though, I guess. I mean, I'm mostly antisocial/misanthropic, and so is he, but he once said that I'm one of the few humans he approves of, or something to that effect. And he knows I'm a Christian, and that it's something important to me, but that never changed his opinion of me. A lot of times, with someone who's disrespectful to or against faith/religion in general, they don't have a lot of respect for someone who sincerely believes in their faith. But he's not like that. It's cool. Plus we're also both totally addicted to Dr Pepper. And he's a fanboy. *shrug* Soda and Squaresoft RPGs bringing people together across culture gaps XÞ

I'm having a conversation with Maxim about the true meaning of "Nintendo" after NP had that thing about how Regis Philbin said it means "leave it to heaven" and they said it means "we do what we can and hope for the best" or something, and how I had previously said it means "Responsibilty Way of Heaven" or something to that effect. Anyway, just so you know, I'm not a retard, I checked the kanji and have reliable sources *bidaaa* But I was wrong about one thing, it's not "Responsibility Way of Heaven," it's "Responsible House of Heaven/Responsible Paradise." The kanji are nin, "Responsibility," ten, "Heaven," and dou, "House, hall." Their idiomatic translation is correct-- being, that if you say "Heaven is responsible," in Japan, you mean "We do what we can but in the end we hope for the best, i.e., trust to luck, i.e. to heaven, i.e. heaven is responsible for what ends up happening". But Regis's literal translation was also correct. So, NP did make a mistake in that they said the "we hope for the best" thing was the literal translation *shrug* But we were all right, nobody's a retard. ^___^

Aaaaagh, my head hurts and I still have two more classes and a whole weekend and also today and other Soundsations stuff to talk about _-_ Okay, 7th period-- that's Soundsations. umm, yeah. So far we've just rehearsed more and stuff *shrug* Tomorrow morning we perform, and I'm hoping that Scurlock gives us a party during class =D!! We have been working really hard, and we don't have really anything to prepare for for quite a while since our first concert isn't for more than a month and even then we *do* already have a show ready to go even if it's kind of queer XD!!! Beh. And then there's Web mastering, 8th period. The teacher, Mrs. Holmes, is kind of neurotic and won't let us sit at a computer where she can't see the screen from her desk. And she doesn't pass things out-- she makes everyone get up and walk to the desk and get them. She says it's so we don't get bored sitting down the whole class period, but it's soo obviously just because she's lazy ;o Anyway, what it seems to me is that we might not have as much freedom/enjoy ourselves as much as AnJa did in her webmastery class last year with Mr. Becken, but it'll probably be easier to get a good grade in because we've already been given a couple of nothing easy grade assignments whereas Becken apparently gave only two grades a six weeks, which were on a curve despite the fact that some people really were only beginners with HTML and others already knew Flash and all kinds of stuff ;o

Now for random school-related information. Last year we went from 8.45 to 3.45 with three 30-minute lunches and 7-minute passing periods. This year we go from 9 to 4 with 6-minute passing periods and a 35-minute lunch. It's kind of not good because the school is so crowded this year that 6 minutes isn't enough time to get to class a lot, plus also the administrators kick everyone out of the cafeteria five minutes early anyway >:| Okay, so. That's summary of the basics of school so far. And now, the weekend.

AnJa went up to UT on Friday in the morning with dad, and mum and I went up after school. I took a nap on the way =)~ But anyway, Friday wasn't a very good day. The entire right side of my head was one gigantic tension headache and it never went away. And I was sad and stuff because AnJa's going away, or rather, has gone away ;_; Saturday AnJa and I hung out at her dorm room and went out shopping a little and ate at Chick-fil-A. There's this store on the campus called "Urban Outfitters," and I really loved the clothes there, but they were kind of expensive u_u Then came home and slept and stuff.

And anyway. Sunday night AnJa and I were gonna watch Andromeda together like we always do, except we'd be in different places and stuff, but she didn't get to see it because UT cable is different from regular Austin cable and things like that and it didn't come on at the same time ;_; It's a sadness. I thought it was a good episode too =D I think I bonded with Harper after discovering he drinks 3 liters of heavily caffeinated soda every day. When I just watched the first episode, I didn't like Harper or Beka that much, but now I really like all the characters a lot, except for Dylan O_O()()()() I don't DISLIKE him, I just don't LIKE him. *shrug* Whereas I actively like everyone else. And stuff.

Keith has a misplaced nipple.

At the end of "Celebrate America!", we have to do this arm-raising thing behind us while facing forward, so we can't see where our arms are going. And people are always accidentally getting groped. O_O()()()

Well, I really need to go to bed since I have to be at school dressed and ready for everything at 6.45 tomorrow morning. HANS, IF YOU ARE READING THIS, POST ON BRESBY. I AM NOT SCREWING AROUND

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