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Well, folks, it's the start of another school year, and the beginning of my senior year in high school. Exciting, you say? More like stressful. It's the second day and already I'm struggling to get everything organized. Maybe that's just because it's the first week of school. Maybe later it will pass. But geez, it's the second day and already we're worrying about college applications and what-not...I'll get over it.
I've already received applications for NYU and Northeastern. I'm really hoping that I can afford either one. I'm not the richest person in the world, you know. So I've been scrambling to find good scholarships to apply to and, hopefully, win.
Here's my
list of classes for the year:
Chorus
College Calculus
Gym
Driver Ed
Health
AP English
AP American History
Gov't/Economics
College French IV
As you can see, I'm quite swamped for my senior year. It's amazing that they could fit a block long of study hall in there. It's amazing that everything fit at all, says my guidance counselor. As it turns out, I have to "skip" chorus one time a week so that I can go to gym. The two classes coincide and there's nothing else we can do to change it. Oh well. I'd really have loved to have journalism as a class, but I guess that didn't work out, either. I suppose I'll have plenty of that next year! Besides, I'll be doing the school newspaper this year, which is kinda cool. I've got over 56 poems to submit to it, and I might have my own column!
Since school started, I've had basically no time to think about anything else, besides my writing. I'm busy working on some fantasy-genre stories that might very well become novels later on.
Friday.
Freedom. Parking...
Monday, September 8, 2003 -- 10:33 pm
Music in CD Player: none
Mood: Reflective
Gonna do some page turning tomorrow and Wednesday night at Turning Stone for my piano teacher. She's playing for Man of la Mancha. Should be interesting. My first piano lesson of the year kicks off tomorrow too.
You simply have to love Honor Passes. There is really nothing bad about them. Because of being smart and in Honor Society, I have one and can get out of school for my third block study hall. At least Herkimer High School has ONE good thing about it, other than a nice facility. That whole thing about closed halls during lunch time though...it just pisses me off...
Parking's a really nice thing to do...Yet another good thing in life.
School's basically taken over my life again. Just wait 'til college, Liz. Oh well. "Life is only as good as the memories we make."
I got sick over the weekend. It sucks. My whole family caught it from my brother. I was the last to get it, thank God. But now I have it. It's not like a pukey thing, more like coughing. It sucks. Oh well, I can still function. It reminds me more of seasonal allergies than anything. I think I'm getting better though.
Turned in some poems to my english teacher. Before I did though, today in class he was like, "Did you guys know that we're going to read a poem a day in here?" I was like, "Well, I just brought about 13 of them in!" So it worked out eerily well. I hope I get that list of publishers from him soon...
Waiting for October...I dunno what's so great about it, I just love October. The song's good too.
Thursday, September 11, 2003 -- 11:59 am
Music in CD Player: Dashboard Confessional EPs
Mood: Work-mode
2nd anniversary of September 11th. I'm not too patriotic and all, but it's kinda weird, being as I "celebrated" the first-year anniversary in Germany. They remembered it there too. I guess we're not so alone as we think.
Senior Quote: "To deny our own impulses is to deny the very thing that makes us human." - Morpheus, The Matrix. It's official -- I put it on my sheet already, along with my will and prophecy and stuff. Still need a prophecy...hmmm...I picked out my baby picture too -- it's hilarious. I was looking over old baby pictures of me and realized how much of a boy I looked like since I had no hair. I had black eyes too. I guess I was a cute baby. The weirder thing was looking at pictures of my dad from when he and my mom first got married. Now I look exactly like he did then, only I'm a girl and he's a guy...you get the picture. In any case it was a bit eerie but cool. Speaking of pictures, we took our senior picture today -- in front of the school. How creative. Anyway, it didn't go too badly.
Did you know that Friday is National Chocolate Milkshake Day? Monday was Grandparents' Day and I didn't even know it. Gotta love those little insignificant holidays that no one knows about and therefore we don't have school off for. Well, I guess we wouldn't have school at all if everyone recognized those little holidays. Still, tomorrow's National Chocolate Milkshake Day! That in itself deserves a break from school!
Well I'm on
another one of those awesome Honor Pass breaks from lunch until
1:15, and I'm doing another slice, like I promised. It's been an easy day, as all A/C days are. I had
gym first period the other day. It sucked, but the gym looks nice
in its refurbished form.
The night before last and this night I went to the casino with my piano teacher to turn pages for her for the Utica Players' version of Man of la Mancha. It was quite good the first night but not-so-good the next. Besides, I had to stay up til around midnight both nights, giving me only about 6 and a half hours of sleep each night. Oh well. I guess I just like to help out.
Parking on
Friday...what a haven -- "So yes, I'll see you
there..." "Remember to breathe and everything will be
ok." Sorry, I'm listening to the So Impossible CD -- I
can't help but get carried away.
Saturday, September 13, 2003 -- 12:06 am
Music in CD Player: none
Mood: excited
Just got back from my first Woody party experience -- not bad. Got boring after awhile. Still, it was full of some interesting experiences...
Chris is back for the weekend. It was great to see him again tonight. He's always fun to be around and fool around with.
I found all these cool smilies online and am wondering if they'll work on webpages. They're originally designed for e-mails. Let's see if some of the good ones will come on here --
HAH! I knew I could get it to work somehow. Anyway, here are some kinda funny ones.
I'm becoming addicted to parking...this might have to be a more often thing...
Monday, September 15, 2003 -- 10:01 pm
Music in CD Player: The Best of The Doors
Mood: Anxious
So it's Monday again...and what a Monday it was! Well, I guess you could say that. It's been kind of hot lately. I'm anxious to get into more fall kind of clothing!
I wanted to
write this during my extra long lunch break but I just warmed up
some spaghetti from the fridge, ate it, and fell asleep watching
some movie on VH1. Luckily I got up in time to get ready for
Driver Ed., where I figured out that we'll be starting to drive
soon. My group starts on Friday, which means that on Wednesday I
have a study hall, which means that I can go home at 11 and I
don't have to come back to school! Ah, the life of...me.
On a less self-centered note, I found out that those animated free smiley things don't animate when you put them on the web -- I thought that when I saved them as files it would save the whole animation but I guess it didn't...oh well. I thought it would be interesting to see the guy mooning everyone...if you're that passionate about seeing it, along with many other funny smileys, which you can compose into an internet-based e-mail provider such as one from Yahoo! or Hotmail, go to http://www.smileycentral.com.
"We want the world and we want it now." - Jim Morrison
...Filler!
Everyone seems to be involved with work except for me. Maybe I should get crackin' at it? I dunno, I don't really have any actual work to do right now...it's kinda lonely.
On a semi-lighter note, we had our first Quiz Team meeting today at lunch. I realized how stupid I really am, as far as useless trivia is concerned. I just sat there as the rest of the team rapped off the answers like nobody's business. Talk about feeling stupid. Anyway, it was kind of amusing. And I get to be on TV...hehe. We'll see what happens with that one. I've gotta start studying things like varicose veins, Marie Antoinette, and chemistry compounds...I guess I got my work cut out for me then.
I organized a lot of stuff today. It's amazing how messy my drawers (desk drawers, for those of you who were thinking something else!) can get in a matter of weeks. I got rid of tons of old papers and stuff. Nothing interesting, really. Time for another filler. Or maybe to upload this slice...
Friday, September 19, 2003 -- 12:44 pm
Music in CD Player: none
Mood: A fun one
Hey, you're reading something from the new President of the National Honor Society! As of this morning, I am officially President. It's my first actual office that I've held, unless you count that one time in 8th grade when I was like, treasurer of National Junior Honor Society or something, but you don't do anything then. Besides the fact that I ran unopposed, I'd say I'm pretty proud of my accomplishment. Hey, it looks good on college applications, and besides, I'm going to try my best to do a good job.
The one problem with not being able to send out my manuscript TODAY: I am STILL out of printer paper! The millions of things that could go wrong with getting it to the publisher and it's something trivial like lack of printer paper that throws the whole project off...Go figure. Well, at least it hasn't been rejected yet!
So it's
Friday! And what a week it's been! Lots of good stuff going on in
school, life, whatever. In some ways I gotta thank Isabelle for
coming...even though Saturday's supposed to be nice here, a
certain soccer game has been cancelled, which means that...well,
you might get my drift if you know what I'm talking about, which
most of you don't, so HAHA. Sorry. Anyway...
Bethany's birthday's on Sunday...and I STILL don't have my damn credit card...well, it might be a happy belated birthday if I don't get it by tomorrow!
Sunday, September 21, 2003 -- 10:47 pm
Music in CD Player: none
Mood: content
Ok -- this
weekend kinda sucked. Well, the soccer game on Saturday was
basically the main highlight of my weekend. Yay, Mohicans!
Woah -- just had a random feeling of deja vu...weird. Oh well!
Well so last night I tried to meditate again after awhile of sabbatical -- I guess I'm just afraid that it won't woork. I'm kinda afraid of what I might see...the last time I saw/felt something, it was panic and fear. I saw a girl in a high school gym with dark straight hair and her hands were up against her ears and she was screaming but I couldn't hear a sound but I felt her anguish and her fear and panic...then I forced myself to wake up. Yeah. It was a little freaky...
Damn, tomorrow's Monday. A long day, too. Quiz team tomorrow...time to look like a dummy again, haha.
Anyway, before I die of sleep depravation...I did two essays today. It sucked. Essays suck. I love to write and all, just if it's about something I actually enjoy writing about.
Watched Bowling for Columbine. Maybe it's a good thing that I didn't watch it when my class did in english class in Germany. It doesn't exactly make Americans and America look very good. Especially since guns in Germany are illegal, which I think is one of the coolest things. But watching that movie, seeing the footage from the Columbine school as the boys walked through it shooting people up, it just got to me. I felt the fear, the panic. Like when I meditated that one time, only this time it was more pronounced. The other time it crept up on me and got worse and worse. And I could wake up from it. This time I was awake. And I still don't understand how human beings could have done something like that -- what was going on through their minds is something I might never know. It was the first time I couldn't identify and feel what someone else was feeling along with them. It's scary...
Thursday, September 25, 2003 -- 6:40 pm
Music in CD Player: Liz's MP3 CD #34 ("Tonight I'll Take
What I Can Get" from Dashboard Confessional)
Mood: wasted and ready (haha, it's really a song, I just felt
like putting that down...)...actually I'm pretty calm
right now...
Hey boys and girls...the week's almost over! That means tomorrow's Friday, and that means that the weekend is just around the bend! Yay!
The big game I'd been waiting for all season long was yesterday -- Herkimer, the school I'm supposed to be loyal to, versus Mohawk, the school I was supposed to dislike but ended up being more loyal to in the end. In any case, I wrote an article for the Herkimer school newspaper on it. I swear, I must be Mohawk's lucky charm or something, because they won against Herkimer 2-0, even though Herkimer had won against Ilion, breaking their undefeated streak. Mohawk had lost to them previously, so a lot of people, including me, weren't too sure that Mohawk would do too well against Herk. Well, I guess we were all wrong. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, if you're not a member of the Herkimer boys' varsity soccer team, which I'm not. But watching the games does make me kinda wanna play too. They're pretty intense. They make you just wanna shout along with the crowd and cheer on the team when they make a goal and sigh loudly in disappointment when they make a bad move. Hell, it's better than football. Sorry, football playing friends.
I wrote this funny "morality play" for AP English class. It's about responsibility and consequences of people's choices in life. It's so morally correct I was getting sick writing it. To believe that anything like that could ever come out of my mouth! Ahh! That's why I put myself as the bad guy, haha! It's more fun that way, after all.
I printed out and categorized nearly all the Dashboard Confessional tabs for just about every Dashboard Confessional song known to man. It's great to be able to play them and hear the sound of DC coming out of my guitars through my hands. I should start a tribute band or something, lol. It's great. Anyway, my 6-string's G string broke again (dammit!!!!!!!!), so I was really pissed about that. That means I gotta buy a whole new set of strings just to get a new G string...damn. Stupid weirdo tunings that Chris Carrabba uses...oh well, you can't help but love the guy, though.
Speaking of Carrabba, I heard a thing on 94.9 FM the other day that I thought was pretty funny. They had just got done playing the new version of "Hands Down" on the radio and Rainman said, "You know what? I hate that Chris Carrabba and his music. You wanna know why? Well, I'll tell you why: he makes me and every other guy out there look like a jerk. He actually sings about his emotions and all that other kind of stuff that girls like. Girls, does your man ever do that for you? I don't think so!" Haha! Savanna says that Chris Carrabba gives her hope that there are really guys like that who exist in this world. Unless he's the only one...Chris, if you're reading this, I'd like to marry you. Hell, we're both Italian, you can't go wrong there!
Anyway, I'm not obsessed. At least I hope not. At least there are also other things on my mind. One of them happens to be Lopez's party tomorrow night. The highlight of my weekend, most likely, unless you count...parking, haha! Yes, that'll definitely be the highlight, being as I'm starting to suffer from withdrawl, since I didn't get to do it last weekend. Oh well. I'm just in such suspense...sometimes I just wish that...well, you have no idea what I'm talking about anyway...Sometimes I just wish that I didn't have to keep everything such a secret, that's all. But even then, you still don't know what I'm saying.
Saturday, September 27, 2003 -- 10:56 pm
Music in CD Player: Liz's MP3 CD #34
Mood: emotionally ill 
Eh, it was a normal, boring Saturday. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, though. It was just the awesome combination of temperature, sunshine, wind speed, and fallen leaves that just got me thinking that this could have been one of the most beautiful days of the year, in my eyes. And, as on all the beautiful days of the year, I took a book out to the side porch, lay on the most comfortable white wicker couch known to man, amongst the potted tree and a bunch of potted flowers, and fell asleep in the beauty of nature (if you can call my side/backyard nature), while reading, at ease and peace and in unity with my surroundings. It's a beautiful thing.
Last night was the party at Lopez's. His birthday party, that is. Well, it was ok. I met some more interesting, crazy people to add to my book of memoirs that I might just one day turn into a poetic, Kerouac/Wolfe styled beatnik novel. More to come as that thought develops. Too bad there was only about a half an hour's time for parking...man, this sucks.
In the
evening I went out on the porch just in time to light some
candles to the light and comforting, cool sound of the rain so
that I could write some poetry in the darkness. Another
beautiful, simple aspect of life that I enjoy. What's better than
staying home on a Saturday night and...well, going out, I
suppose...
Tuesday, September 30, 2003 -- 9:29 pm
Music in CD Player: none (I'm listening to VH1 Internet Radio --
good stuff)
Mood: pretty good, thanks 
Hey, it's the last day of the month! That means that the next time I write a slice, it'll be the first one on this page, and the September slices will go into the September archives, like the October ones did.
I finally
found out how to animate the little smilies!! Enjoy, and bow to
my internet prowess! Hah! Well, the second part is
optional...I'll let you off easy this time.
I just watched probably one of the most exciting Mohawk soccer games ever. They might not have played their best in the beginning, but they really whipped West Canada ass at the second half of the...second half, as well as into overtime. Great game, guys! I'm going to another game on Friday -- a night game in Frankfort. Should be good.
Tomorrow
the newspaper staff, including me (being as I am on the
newspaper staff, probably!), are going to Utica college for Press
Day. I'm excited, being as I'm looking to be a journalist.
They'll only really be giving us advice on how to make our school
newspaper better, but oh well. Hell, it's a day out of school,
isn't it? Besides, the only real class I have tomorrow
is Calculus, unless you count Driver Ed, which I don't, because I
have study halls half the time, when other groups are driving. I
was supposed to drive tomorrow but I had to switch with Doug,
who's in the other group, so that I wouldn't miss it. Driving on
Friday?...definite. Parking?...doubtful. 