"Age Appropriate"

Hello! Today I'm going to talk about something I really care about: books. This whole train of thought was inspired by a long list of books I saved from a Page-A-Day calendar of book reviews from 2013. I figured it was time to go through the list and decide which ones I still wanted to read-then figure out if my school and public libraries have them, make color coded lists, and plan which ones I wanted to read first. You know, just normal, bookworm stuff.

I ended up going on Goodreads to get a sense of what regular readers thought of these books, and also to see which of them would be (for lack of a better term) age appropriate. I've been reading at a college level since second or third grade, so I've never encountered a (fictional) book I didn't understand, but if I'm going to read an "adult" book, I want to know if it's rated adult because of its complexity or the gratuitous and graphic sex scenes.

I didn't really think this was an unreasonable request, but after poking around on the Goodreads site for a while, I found that the idea had been discussed by users years ago and (as far as I can tell) scrapped. In fact, a lot of people on the forum seemed extremely offended at the thought of people telling them what they can and cannot read. I was kind of confused by this, so I went and looked at other sites. I couldn't find a single website that offered useful appropriateness ratings for books. Basically, everything said either "Adult" or "Young Adult," with no explanation for the rating.

Then, I understood. People seem to think that the only reason a human would want to know what kind of content is in a book is if they are a parent trying to prevent their child from being exposed to the world. Has it never occurred to anyone that there are teenagers who aren't interested in reading about sex, violence, and half the other things these reviews are telling our parents about? Why not just tell us?

As I looked even further, I started getting a little frustrated. After almost an hour of searching, I hadn't found any useful information about the content in any of the books I wanted to check. It's done with movies, isn't it? Not only are there official ratings assigned to movies, I can also go on hundreds of different websites to get information about exactly what kinds of potentially inappropriate material is in a movie I want to watch, then make my own, educated decision about whether or not to watch it. Why isn't there that much thought and effort put into rating books in a similar way? (End rant.)

So, what do you guys think? I'd love to continue this conversation in the comments, and if anyone knows of a website like I'm describing, please let me know! Also, if anyone knows how to design a website so we can just make this happen on our own, that would be great.

JMU SBC 2014

Hey guys! I've had a pretty crazy couple of weeks, and today's post is going to be about the most interesting part of that-band camp! I just got back (on Saturday) from JMU's Summer Band Camp, and it was amazing. It honestly was one of the best experiences of my life so far, and I can't wait to go back next year (hopefully).

One of the best parts for me was being around so many great musicians. I play tuba (and march sousaphone), so I'm used to being in the smallest section, and not having much of an example to follow, so having fifteen other tuba players plus our section leader (a JMU student) was incredible. It was just a few days (Tuesday to Saturday) but I really feel like my sound has improved just from playing with such talented people.

Speaking of people, I made several new friends while I was there. Two of my friends from winter guard who go to a different high school

Another thing I really loved was one of the main focuses of the camp, which was on the process. They gave us a lot of ideas and teaching techniques to bring back to our programs, and I'm really excited to share what I learned with my school's band.

And of course, the most exciting part of camp-our show! We learned and memorized the music and drill for this in just three days, because we are all marching ninjas. But seriously, I love our show, and I'm lucky enough that people have already put videos of it online. So, here is my favorite (it has the best angle):



Isn't it awesome?! We all completely freaked out when we got our music! And I can't tell you how many times we listened to Bohemian Rhapsody last week-the trumpets even wrote a parody for karaoke night.

Something that I think is really amazing is that there were three separate torrential downpours, the showers were kind of disgusting, and I'm still so sore I can barely walk, but I can't imagine not going back. It was seriously that much fun. Also I can't wait for my school's marching band to start (23 days)!

I once again have no idea what my next post will be about, but it should be coming at you soon!

Your question for the comments: What have you been doing so far this summer?

What is My Life?

Hello! Today's post is just going to be me filling you in a little on my life, so you can have some context for all this crazy. (I thought the title was appropriate, because I've been saying that a lot recently.)

First, and most excitingly, school ended on June 13th. Lucky me, the math and science program I'm in only gives one exam a day during exam week, so we all got to go home earlier than everyone else. Including picking up my sousaphone from my base school, I was home over an hour earlier than my brother (and you can bet I lorded that over him, because maturity). Although I've spent a lot of time just relaxing, I've also been pretty productive (mostly on the stuff from yesterday's post), and I'm planning on keeping it that way. Since I'm apparently incapable of having fun. It's fine.

Speaking of sousaphones... marching band! I mentioned that our show is Latin, but I thought I'd give you a little more detail. (Yay, details! Come on, at least pretend you're excited!) Our show doesn't have its performance title yet, but right now we're just calling it A Celebration of Mangione. Chuck Mangione is a composer who was apparently big in the '70s. None of us had ever heard of him, but he composed the music for the movie Children of Sanchez. For those of you (like me) who haven't seen it, let me tell you, the music is fabulous. Or we got a really amazing arrangement. Probably both. Both is good. There are way too many sixteenth notes, but I really like the music, and I'm really excited about our upcoming season!

A lot of my time this summer is going to be spent on band and crafts and other fun things, but I also have a decent reading list. My priority is something that was assigned to me for school, called Napoleon's Buttons: How 17 Molecules Changed History. Something I want to read for myself is The Count of Monte Cristo. Because of the weird way we did our foreign language exams this year, my French class finished about three weeks before the school year did. My teacher decided to use all the extra time to show us the seven hour movie version, starring Gerard Depardieu. Then she challenged me to read it, so I'm going to do that. It's apparently over a thousand pages, but I've read Lord of the Rings, so how bad can it be? I really enjoyed the story, so hopefully I'll feel the same about the book. I also have a few smaller things I'd like to read, which aren't really as interesting. And finally, my dad is continuing his quest to get me to read the Bible and the Koran. Neither of us are religious, but he thinks it's important to be well educated in other people's beliefs. He has a point, so if I get around to it, I'll probably do that.... I don't really know.

I think that's enough of a look into my boring life. At least now you'll have a vague recollection of what I'm talking about in future posts! Speaking of which, I'm going out of town for the next couple of days, so I don't really know when the next post will be, or what it's going to be on. Yay, surprises, right? Right? Well, in any case, I'll talk to you soon!

And now, your question for today: What are you doing this summer/over the next few months? I'd especially love to hear about books you're reading or have read recently, since I'm always looking for new stuff to try. Let me know in the comments!

A Lazy Craft Update

Hello! This post is going to show you a few things that I'm working on right now, recently finished, plan to make soon, etc. Just one thing: I hope you aren't looking for super classy pictures, because I took these on my iPod in bad lighting. (It's easier to get them on the computer that way, and I was feeling lazy. Hence the title.) You're welcome.

First, just a quick look at something I'm so proud of, I might end up writing a whole post just on this at some point.

This skirt was super easy, super fun, and dare I say super cute? Here's a closer view of the print:

The band geek in my gets excited whenever I look at it!

Next, I have a much bigger project, which is nowhere near being done.

This is just the first square of this blanket, which, according to the original creator, will eventually be the size of a queen bed. Anyone recognize it? Yeah, I'm really living up to my blog name with this one. It's the Earth Kingdom symbol from Avatar: The Last Airbender, which is completely nerdy but also fantastic. (Side note: Book 3 of Legend of Korra airs this Friday and I'm so excited I can barely contain myself.) I've already started the next square, which for me is the symbol of the Air Nomads. I don't actually have all the yarn I need to do Water and Fire. Ooops. I guess I'll just have to go to the store soon..... (yay!)

I'll keep you up-to-date(ish) on how this goes. I'd really like to finish it this summer, or at least the bulk of it.

I also have another blanket I'm working on, a t-shirt quilt. At this point, the top is basically done, but I'm not totally sure how I want to proceed from here. I'm going to do a little reading to figure out what the standards are for finishing these things, and I'll let you know what I decide

In addition to all this, I also have some other projects I'm planning on doing soon, including this Kimono Cardigan from Peabrain DIY, this Gathered Skirt from By Hand London (because I desperately need zipper practice), and something like this Red Skater Dress from Melissa Ting: Life & I. I'm really excited for all these projects, and for the trip to the fabric store they will inevitably require!

Next time, I'll probably talk a little about my life, and what my summer looks like. I swear, it won't be as boring as it sounds!

And your question of the day: What projects are you working on? What are you excited to start? Let me know in the comments!

On Writing and Mechanics

Hello again! This is the second part of my writing post from a while back. I'm not really a fan of either of these posts, since they are more like boring rants and not very interesting to read, but I figured I would just get this up and get it out of the way. Here goes:

One major problem I have when writing for school is using "academic mechanics." For example, one thing that I do a lot, and mentioned in my last post, is use parentheses. Obviously, I have some sort of unhealthy obsession with them, because I will overuse them forever and always, but I find that they're a lot like how my brain actually works, and that helps me share what's going on in there. Besides, if they're so wrong then why were they invented? However, if I tried to turn in an essay, even a narrative essay, with parentheses in it, I'd get points taken off before it was even read.

That's just one example of my own mind constantly battling with my English teachers. Don't get me wrong, I have always been the girl that gets excited when the teacher announces yet another writing assignment or essay, but I've also always been the one who has to switch modes in order to write them. For a while, I thought this was some weird thing, since none of my friends had this problem. They just hated writing essays! But finally, this year, my English teacher taught us what diction is in writing, which kind of cleared it up for me. Basically, whenever I write for my teachers, I'm struggling to take the informal diction in my head and make it formal diction that I can turn in. As far as I can tell, this isn't an unusual thing, but it is a little bit annoying. My inner voice is naturally sarcastic, so when I'm told to get my act together and use an "appropriate" tone, that inner voice sighs and rolls its eyes (yeah, that went in a weird direction).

I think next time I'll be talking about some projects I've been working on the past few weeks: mostly sewing, but also some crochet. I have no idea when that'll be up, but keep an eye out for it! And now, my question for you:

Have you struggled with translating your thoughts into something you can put onto paper? Let me know below!

No One Cares

*peers sheepishly from behind my laptop*

Hi guys. I know it's been a while, but I have finally returned to the land of bloggy goodness. However, I have come back with a new attitude, which hopefully will mean that this will be more enjoyable for all of us.

I have always been a very self-conscious person (actually that's not completely true, but that's for another post), so something I've been working on lately has been telling myself three words: no one cares. No one cares if you answer that question wrong, no once cares if you have two big zits, no one cares if you look tired today, etc. I'm extending this into this blog with three things: No one cares if you don't post for a while, no one cares if you don't post every day, and no one cares if you post twice in one day.

All of this is a kind of long-winded way to say that I'm going to be posting what I want when I want to, completely unapologetically. I have some cool things to share with you guys, including an awesome skirt I finished up in time for the last week of school, a t-shirt quilt I'm working on, and a whole bunch of random other things that I'm excited about. Maybe even a little fashion, although I'm not entirely qualified to talk about that. Even better, marching season is coming up, so you'll probably be hearing a lot about that, too. Here's a teaser: our show is freaking fantastic, and despite what our director says, totally Latin.

I have a post that I started back in March, which is sort of continuation of my last post about writing for school. It's a little boring, but it's a rantish thing that I want to have, so I'm going to post it anyway. That will probably be for tomorrow, though, because it needs a little work and it's late here. So you'll probably see that sometime tomorrow morning, assuming I actually get up (ahhh, summer break). Talk to you then!

Oh, one more thing. I'm going to start leaving a little discussion question thing at the bottom, in the hopes of sparking a conversation. Come on guys, it could be fun! No? Too bad. Here's your question for today:

What have you realized lately that has made a change in your life? What words or ideas are you living by? Let me know down below!

On Writing and Personality

Hi guys! Can we just skip the part where I awkwardly acknowledge the fact that I missed two posts? Yes? Thanks so much, I love you all.

Anyway, today I thought I would write about writing. Because that makes perfect and total sense. You in the back, I can see you rolling your eyes. Yeah, you! So getting on with it...

I'm going to start with something pretty basic: I write a lot. This probably won't be a surprise to anyone who's been to high school, but it goes a little beyond that. First, there is the part of me that is a high school student, so of course I write all the time for my classes. (In fact, I've been known for my creative writing and essays for as long as I can remember.) However, with a few exceptions, I don't really count that stuff. I also do a lot of writing in my spare time, mostly short stories (and some much longer ones) and a bit on this blog. This writing, my personal writing, is much more interesting to me, since I actually get to put my personality into it and have some fun.

On the one hand, I know that I have a distinctive writing style (which is a little different from what you read here, due to my excessive social awkwardness and the possibility that there are actual real live people reading this), and most of the time I like it, but I have a voice in my other ear telling me that everything I write in my spare time is wrong. (Let's just ignore the fact that I switched from hands to ears. I think you still get the point.) This is about everything from my naturally sarcastic narration to my overuse of parentheses (come on, don't say you haven't noticed).

Part of the problem is that writing assignments at school are so subjective. Last year, we were given a prompt to write about the similarities we had with a fictional character. I immediately thought of Hermione, and I got really excited about writing this essay. I kind of ignored the usual limits that I put on myself when I write in school, and I ended up with the essay that turned out to be my favorite piece of writing that I've ever done as an assignment. Since it was about me, I was comfortable in revealing my writing style in a way that I never had before, and it paid off. I got a perfect score on it, but I know that if I had turned it in two years earlier, I would have failed the assignment. Even though I consider it to be one of my major writing achievements, I know that the teacher I had then wouldn't have been so accepting of my style and tone.

All this means that I've developed two brains: one for school writing, and one for personal writing. Most of the time I wish my personal writing brain could just take over, but I do acknowledge that being able to write more professionally is important. And then I'm right back where I started.

You're probably completely bored of reading about my messed up brain by now, so kudos to you if you read it all through! I did really enjoy writing this, and I haven't really said everything on my mind, so if no one has any objections, I think I might come back to this topic at some point. In the meantime, what do you think? Do you have two (or more) separate writing brains? Leave a comment and let me know!

Snow, Feels, and My Eyelid

Hello everyone! Today is going to be a little bit random and disjointed, mostly because I'm on a five day weekend (yay, snow!) so I'm not really focusing much, and also because I'm having a lot of feels (yay, fandoms!)

First, snow, I think. This storm brought us what we're calling Winter Break, Part 4. Yeah. 4. I honestly don't remember the last time I had a full five day-week of school. We are going to be so screwed during March, since we won't have any three-day weekends or any chance of snow days. But, I'm just going to enjoy it while it lasts! We got about a foot of snow on Wednesday night, so we got Thursday and Friday off. I've actually spent a while outside, which is unusual for me, since I'm not a fan of being cold and wet. (Although, really, is anyone?) The rest of the time I've spent either doing homework or reading, which is my idea of a perfect weekend.

And now feels, because I am so full of them right now, and my dad has no idea what I'm talking about. It started with rereading Divergent yesterday. I could barely make it three pages without seeing something that made me want to curl up in the corner. Some of it was from the end of the book, some of it was from the end of the series..... just a lot of feels. Then, just a little while ago, I decided it would be a good idea to listen to the soundtrack from Series 3. Seriously?!?! Why did I mot realize that was a bad plan! It's very good, and I did really enjoy it, but some of those tracks.... Mostly the ones from HLV, now that I think about it.

Finally, my eyelid. Yesterday morning I woke up and my left eyelid was folded weirdly. It just had an extra crease under the normal crease, and I don't know why, but it is still like that. It kind of makes me look like half of the really derpy character from Animal Crossing: Wild World, the one that makes you restart your game if you accidentally get him/her.

(Image from Nookipedia.)

Hopefully it will go away before I have to go out in public!

Oh! Also, I had my first thought in French in the shower Tuesday night. This was very exciting, since my teacher said that once you start thinking in a different language, you're on your way to being fluent. And I really want to be fluent! (This is the same teacher who told us that if we get a 5 on our AP exam senior year she'll spend an entire day teaching us every French swear word she knows. I love this teacher!)

I know, not a very interesting post this week. I still have two more days before I have to go back to school, so I'll try to use that time to write a really good one for next week! Talk to you soon!

Misogynistic Pop

Before you ask, no, this is not about sexist soda. If you're looking for that, go ask Dr. Pepper. (No? Too obscure? OK.)

So I just got home from the winter semiformal at my nerd school, and it was surprisingly fun. This may shock you, but I don't do that much social stuff, so dances aren't really my thing. I took my best friend, who does not attend said nerd school, and she forced me to dance. To horrible music. Yes, not only am I antisocial, I also don't listen to "normal" music. My favorite playlist has a mixture of Star Trek, the Ohio State band, and classic rock. So I'm not a fan of the kind of music that was played tonight, which objectifies women and has a swear word every four seconds. This was especially awkward as the dance was held in a synagogue, but eventually I just started blocking out the words. All in all, I did have a pretty good time, though, so I think it was worth it!

I'm going to the sing-along version of Frozen tomorrow with my guard friends and I am SO EXCITED!!!!! We will probably be the oldest ones there, but we will sing the loudest and the proudest and I have no idea where I'm going with this. I actually think it's really interesting that teenagers seem to enjoy Disney movies more than the target audience. Like Wednesday, when we had a snow day, and I spent the day watching old Disney movies and had a fantastic time. (Hercules, anyone?)

I hope you had a wonderful week, and I will talk to you next Saturday night three minutes before my deadline soon!

Reactions to The Empty Hearse (SPOILERS)

Hi guys! I know, try not to die of shock from me posting on a Wednesday morning. (Deep breaths, in through the nose, out through the mouth. I think.) Our school district has a two hour delay this morning, but I didn't find out until after I had already gotten dressed and such.... so I decided not to waste my extra time. Anyway.

This post isn't going to interest you if you're not a Sherlockian or if you for some reason haven't been able to watch The Empty Hearse yet. Basically when I was watching it on the 19th I had a little notebook and I wrote down what I was feeling as I watched. I started a few minutes beforehand, so there's a bit in response to the commercials that were playing before the actual episode. Now I've used those notes to write down some of my favorite things about the episode.

• First I was basically just raging over having to wait, like when Mark said the suspense was killing him I may have actually yelled at the screen.... And then there was a commercial about marijuana, and then Ralph Lauren, and I really just didn't care but I may have scared my family.
• During the first scene, I was so excited, and I was freaking out, and I screamed out loud at the kiss, and then it was taken from me and I was quite upset. Then I got a lot of feels from Anderson and Lestrade (thanks guys), and then I was really happy to see that Sherlock's reputation had been fixed.
• During the scene(s) with Mycroft, I was basically just sitting in a pool of emotions. It was really annoying that Mycroft let Sherlock get beaten, and it gave me sibling-feels when they were arguing about it, and the whole time I was just really distracted by Sherlock's hair (and the brief interruption by Khan).
• I would just like to say that I wrote down, "I'm not actually gay" about 3.2 seconds before John said it. Psychic?
• I have to admit, I got really upset when I realized that Sherlock was going to be crashing John's proposal. I mean, after leaving him for two years, he finally decides to come back, and that's when he does it? Gah! Also I thought it was really interesting how he kind of pauses when he walks into the restaurant, just before he starts putting together his disguise. I was thinking, "yes Sherlock, those are called emotions," and I think Benedict really did that scene well,
• The entire sequence in the restaurants may have been my favorite part, because, let's face it, we have all kind of been John for the past two years (me only for seven months), and in that moment, Sherlock was Moftiss, and if you say you haven't wanted to punch them at least once since the Fall, you're lying. I also loved the French accent, and the whole thing with the champagne, and that Sherlock said the hashtag. 
• The bit with him returning to all his friends was great, but my favorite was definitely Greg. You've probably seen a lot of predictions for Series 3 that talked about John using his cane again, right? Well remember how in ASiP Lestrade showed Sherlock his nicotine patches? My headcanon is that he started smoking again after the Fall because he felt guilty and I just had SO MANY FEELS!
• Another favorite was the scene in 221B with Mycroft and Sherlock. First of all, OPERATION???? Also, they PLAY Deductions?? I think my inner fangirl may have lost it! (Also my outer fangirl, but we don't need to talk about that.) I loved that glimpse into their childhood, too; I think it explained a lot about their relationship.
• I just want to talk about Molly for a second. Molly who we all know has had feelings for Sherlock since before ASiP, who helped him fake his own death and keep it a secret, who is the only person (besides John) who can get him to apologize with just a look, who has tried SO HARD to get over him but keeps getting screwed over, who thinks she's really moved on but hasn't. Just, Molly.
• I don't really remember what I was thinking after that, because I basically spent the entire rest of the episode almost hyperventilating. First because of the bonfire, then the bomb, then the real solution, then just everything!

I hope you enjoyed this look into my crazy brain! It's honestly a miracle that I managed to pull something coherent out my notes, since I was flipping out the entire 90 minutes. I have seen The Sign of Three, and I absolutely loved it, and it gave me at ton of new feels, and I'm learning the waltz on piano. So yeah, I really think that Series 3 is going great!

I'm not sure if I'll have another post this week, but I will definitely try. I do have my first guard competition on Saturday, which will occupy me from 9am to about 11pm, so I probably won't be posting then. I guess it'll just be a surprise!

Dragon Army Scarf

Due to my amazing intelligence and crazy amount of planning, I wrote this on Wednesday, I think, but I never took the picture, so I'm not posting until now. So, yet, again, I'm posting late on a Saturday night.

Hello everyone! Due to the bad weather, I somehow got this entire week off from school. Yeah, it's kind of blowing my mind. This half of our county got about five inches of snow, but the western half has less developed roads and worse weather, so we often get off for minor weather problems. We just got the mass phone call which told us about tomorrow and Friday, and most interestingly, midterms. They're cancelled. I don't even have the proper words to express how I feel about this. The super nerdy half of me is actually kind of disappointed, but I'm also a bit relieved (mostly about science).

But you probably don't really care about that. The important part is that I know have a ton of unexpected free time, and I plan to use it well. First, I'm going to have at least one other post this week that won't really be of interest to you if you aren't a Sherlockian. During the airing of The Empty Hearse (which I LOVED) I took a few notes of my reactions and thoughts and things. I'll be posting those at some point, along with some additional commentary. Because there isn't enough of that on the internet, right?

Right now, however, I'm going to show you a project I did a couple weeks ago.

I did it in small stages, which is really the only way I could have had time. I used this tutorial from Rae Gun Ramblings, and this tutorial to make the freezer paper. I also had to look up how to do a French seam, but I don't have any idea what video I used. I'm definitely planning on doing some more projects with freezer paper, since I'm really happy with how this turned out. I think I'm going to make it a little shorter at some point, though. Since I'm already small for my age, and this is sized for an adult, it kind of adds up into one really big scarf!

Less Than 24 Hours

Hi guys. Are any of you surprised? Because, let's be honest, I think we all knew we were going to end up here. However, alert the press, because I actually have a full 40 minutes to write this!

Speaking of time (I know, great segue), there is now less than 24 hours until the American premiere of Sherlock. And I'm freaking out. A few of my friends have already seen it, and they say that I'm going to go insane. I've been avoiding spoilers like the plague, but I've seen a few things, and I'm quite excited to see how they play out in the next three episodes.

Under normal circumstances, I think time would be going reeeeaaaalllllyyyyy sllllooooowwwww right about now, but I kind of lucked out. Midterms are next week, and I'm totally freaking out in a not good way about those, so time is also going really fast, so it all balances out. We have Monday off for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day (the only reason my parents are letting me stay up to watch Sherlock), then my first exam is on Tuesday. It's science, which will be my hardest one, no competition. It's 23 pages long, and my teacher says there aren't any huge diagrams to take up space.... Oh well. I'll be fine! (I may be a shriveled up mess on Tuesday afternoon, but I'll be fine.)

This is really random, but are there any Sly Cooper fans out there? I used to play it all the time when I was 9 or 10, but after I broke the PS2 the PS2 took an unexpected fall I haven't played since then. Lately I've been watching some walkthroughs and cutscene movies, and I'm now re-obsessed! Also I have a major crush on Sly, but in real life I think I would slap him. He's just so sassy!

Next week's post will undoubtedly be about Sherlock, so if you aren't a Sherlockian, what's wrong with you? feel free to skip it. I'll try to be a little less fandom-specific in the next one!

A Tale of Two Barbers*

So about five minutes ago I was in the shower, just casually rinsing my hair, when I remembered a joke-ish thing my dad told me and thought, "Oh, I should put that in a blog post!" And then I thought, "Oh crap, I really need to write a blog post!" So apparently I will be making a habit of waiting until fifteen minutes before my deadline to post every week...

As I obviously don't have a ton of time, I'm just going to tell you guys that joke-ish thing that actually is not a joke but I laughed about for five minutes. My dad says that this is attributed to Mark Twain, although he may not have actually said this, but this is the Internet so I don't think anyone will mind if I accidentally misquote someone. Here we go....

In a town with only two barbers, should you go to the one with the good haircut or the bad one?

Get it? You should go to the one with the bad haircut! (I'm now realizing that this in no way qualifies as a joke. Forgive me, let me try again.)

A photon arrives at a hotel with only one suitcase. The bellhop comments on his lack of luggage, and the photon replies, "Well yeah, I'm traveling light!"

This joke speaks to me on a deep level. I got it from my sort of homeroom teacher's wall. Thanks, Dr. T! (Although I have been using just first initials to refer to people I know, I would like to state that many of his students actually refer to him as Dr. T in real life. This apparently caused some confusion when he arrived at the school last year because people thought another teacher, referred to as Mr. T because of his horrifyingly unpronounceable last name, had gotten his doctorate.)

So now I have told you a joke random thing, a joke, and an anecdote from my school. What more do you people want from me at 11:54 on a Saturday night?

I swear I'll try to have a proper post this week.... possibly even during the week and not at quarter to 12 next Saturday!


*In case anyone is wondering, I am aware that A Tale of Two Cities isn't by Mark Twain, I just thought it sounded good. Poetic license? Even though I hate poetry?

Thirty-Six Minutes: My New Year's Resolution

Hi everyone! I hope you've enjoyed your first few days of 2014: waking up at 1 pm on the first, hastily scribbling some half-thought-out resolutions so you can feel accomplished, then not fulfilling them the very next day? (I know that wasn't a question, but all the other punctuation looked wrong, so let's just go with it.)

Nevertheless, I have my own resolution that I made, shockingly, a day early. I decided that I wanted to post here at least once a week, and to keep track of my progress, I even printed out a Don't Break the Chain calendar. In case you haven't been around here before, this means that I will be posting twice a day about biweekly. You may have noticed that I have already posted twice this week, but that was last year, so it isn't on the calendar, and I decided in the bath that it wasn't good enough. So I came down here with 36 minutes to spare (less, now) to write this and have this week's official post. So here it is, my very own lame New Year's resolution that I very nearly broke, but managed to save for at least another week.

What do you think about New Year's resolutions? Do you have any? Let me know in the comments!

P.S.
I am going to try very hard to not make next week's post tomorrow, because I feel like that would be unbearably lame. But, as always, no promises.