My Summer...

...is almost over. D:

A lot has changed over the summer. I have changed a lot over the summer. I've had the opportunity of going to numerous fencing camps, and even went to fencing summer nationals for the first time. I've said goodbyes to seniors, now freshmen in college, making them promise to visit during the school year. I've been to Forks, Washington, famed setting of those awfully cheesy vampire novels (which really is just a dead smalltown village that generates 99% of its annual revenue from Twilight marketing). I've discovered new things about the biggest mystery in my life: Myself. I've met plenty of new people, made plenty of new friends (and enemies), and eaten plenty of junk food. I know, that last one isn't something to be proud of. But amidst all these changes, there is one old habit that I still can't change about myself...

Procrastinating.

I just can't seem to stop procrastinating. Even with my school district starting school a week later than most other districts in the area, I'm still freaking about all the things I promised to get done over the summer, and still have not done. I promised I'd work on my art skills (I am terrible at human portraits, and my "anime" looks like a sketch-cartoon hybrid). Maybe even finish that novel I've been slowly dragging my feet to finish, of which the original idea was conceived with much enthusiasm but has now become more of a nuisance. But most importantly, I need to prepare for the first AP classes I will be taking this year, ever (chemistry, US history), and my summer reading books/notes feel hastily overlooked and rather neglected...

As always, while I had the whole summer to do this, I've decided that I will cram it all into the final hour... or in this case, the final week. Some things will never change. ><

...Actually, if these habits will never change, I can confidently say that the rest of my life will be miserable.

I'm glad I have no actual followers who continuously read my blog, because this entry is just one big rambling about my faults and regrets of what I should have done over this summer. I hope I don't find myself in any of those "should have done" situations during the school year though...

Despite my shortcomings, overall I think this has been quite an eventful summer. But don't get me wrong- that doesn't mean I anticipate school with any enthusiasm.

OH HAI GUYZ

Yeah, it's been a while, and yes, I know, I never finished my Florida stuff from... when was that again? Oh, some time back. Sorry, I've decided not to finish that. No one wants to read that anyway, right? Anywho, in case there are still people who bother to read my ramblings, a lot has happened since then. Before I forget, I'll make a general list of it for later reference and ramblings:

• Fencing
• ...uh yep. That's about it. ^^"
• ???
• Profit!

First of all, the fencing season has come and passed, and basically was the highlight of the bulk of my school year thus far. I was lucky enough to experience being a member of our high school girls' fencing team, having existed for just a mere 4 years, at the peak of its glory. It's only just ended, and yet I find myself eagerly waiting for next season. Until then, I'll be sure to be going to fencing club and getting better. But now that the season's over... well, I'm not quite sure how to get back into the swing of things. I often find myself arriving home way to early to my liking, without the 2 1/2 hours of fencing practice to fill up time. And so I've chosen to fill it up ineffectively... such as with this post.

 Blah blah. Okay now I'm lazy. (ends post temporarily)

Banners, Amongst Other Things

Our theme for Homecoming is "A Night On Broadway," and as such, we chose a musical that would represent our grade. Since Student Council decided to hog all the popular musicals, we ended up choosing "West Side Story." Though our banner had a rough (and slow) start, with the help of the rest of the class officers and a couple point-seeking friends, we managed to make it in the end: after much hard work (as well as plenty of fooling around), our freshmen class banner is finally finished. Actually, I'm quite surprised that the end result turned out so... decent.

Being a class officer (I'm Treasurer) is tough work. Just for the record I'll put down a little common rumor: As Treasurer, you are not entirely in charge of the money or counting the revenues and whatnot. Heck, I don't even know how much money we have in our class funds (but I do know that we are no longer in debt!). The 5 class officers all just share the duties, and the only officer who really has a specific job would probably be the Historian, who takes all the pictures (but truthfully we haven't taken very many yet). It's an implied duty to be present at EVERY single event, but although the responsibility is huge, it's actually quite good to know that I'm accomplishing something for my class. Even as I type this, I realize that we have a Powderpuff meeting this Sunday (yes, that's a weekend day) to choreograph and finalize the act. Finalizing... at their first rehearsal. In case you didn't know, Powderpuff day is basically when the roles of the men and women are reversed-- the girls play football, and the guys do cheers. Yes, imagine a bunch of guys in cheerleading uniforms chanting encouragement to the female football players. It'll be great, except for one teensy problem...

We have a total of 3 participating guys, and a bunch of overzealous girl choreographers.

Way to support your class, guys.

Anyway, I also just realized that it is 15 minutes to midnight and I have piano lessons first thing tomorrow morning. Whoops... But on the bright side, I only have to keep this blogging thing up for one more day...!

"Great Expectations"

(...which, I should mention, is the most boring book in the world)
---
The leap from middle to high school is certainly a big one, especially in a school district such as mine. I honestly don't think they do enough to prepare us for high school, but I guess they assume that we can learn from our own mistakes (but sometimes making mistakes aren't enough. What if there's that one kid who just doesn't realize they're doing something wrong?! They need someone to bluntly put it to them: YOU'RE WRONG. Ah, anyway...).

The typical freshman usually enters high school with some preconceived notions about the first year, myself included. Obviously I'm not going to tell you exactly what I thought about how 9th grade year would be, but let's just say that we've only been in school for one month and everything I expected have proven to be mostly false, for better or for worse.

The biggest jump I've noticed is the dramatic increase in workload. There's more homework, long-term assignments, frequent tests, a profusion of writing AND reading assignments for English and even other subjects, you name 'em. I've personally never been a big fan of expending my efforts in vigorous studying and working (I look to optimize what little time I have each day, and yet I still feel pressed for time); therefore I have never really studied for tests and the such. That could possibly have been the biggest mistake I've made in my middle school years of habit-building. As soon as high school arrived, I began to see the effects of my slacking off. I now literally see papers flying at my face left and right, forcing me to smash my previous loose schedules and abandon the free time I used to take enjoyment in. And, as the world works, I find it necessary to study, or flunk. But of course, I shall take the higher being's path and look into the future, realizing that all this will HELP me in the future (eh... yeah right)!

After proofreading (yeah I know, who proofreads their blog entries? ME!) the above paragraph, I realized that it was all just a jumbled block of mixed thoughts. I'm thinking of deleting it all and rewriting it, but you blog readers will just have to deal with it, since it's 11PM already and I WANT TO SLEEP. You too, no?

5 days down, 2 to go!