Here I Blogeth

This is frustrating.

Well, as I aptly put into one sentance on my facebook, I'm WAITING for my brother to finish his bible paper so I don't have to write 2,800 words tomorrow.

I'm actually on my mom's netbook ATM, far away from my yWriter and happiness in general. I really don't want to write three thousand words tomorrow... I'd love to keep it to three thousand a day.

Anyway, as i've promised the general populace a report of that month that I didn't blog, here it is.

1: I ran and lost Student Council elections. (thank the Lord. I hate the dirty politics.)

2: First ed of my newspaper went out

3: I failed a math test

4: I went camping

5: I had a spiritual veil lifted from my eyes then smacked myself in the forhead for being stupid.

6: I passed my two-month anniversary in school and am applying to SAS next year... if I survive that long.

7:... that's about it.

So, if everyone who reads this actually comments, (because I know most of the people who read this DO NOT COMMENT. D=) I will be able to choose which of these things I will tell you about. (PICK NUMBER FOUR! PICK NUMBER FOUR!) So, just reply with which number you want, and I shall dutifully write about it, NaNo or not.

Also, i face a serious NaNo issue. I have no idea what to name my kitten of mystery and amazingness! PLEASE HELP, I'M DESPERATE!

*bangs head on table*

he's still on the computer...

Anyway, I shall end this post here, and the next post will actually have something in it.

Until next time, (probably tomorrow,)

Katie

NANOWRIMO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *spazzes*

Okay, I'm done now.

However, as it is officially thirty minutes until the Writer's Marathon begins, I'm impatient. It's SO much fun. However, I'm kind of going crazy. It's like trying to go to sleep on Christmas!

For those who are NaNo deprived, I must explain what NaNoWriMo is.

http://www.nanowrimo.org

NaNoWriMo = National Novel Writing Month.

AKA: The month where all the crazy writers get together and have a marathon - those who dont' have the endurance don't win.

I'll probably be blogging through NaNo - because it's fun to blog. I know I kind of slacked off, (Sorry, general public of readers,) during school and student council elections and such, (which I really must tell you about! They were awful!) and didn't post anything for about a month. Excuse my while I go hide my face in shame.

*

Okay, I'm done hiding now.

Anyway, NaNoWriMo.

The Goal: 50,000 word novel in thirty days.

The Point: I have no idea.

So that is what I'm going to start in twenty-five short minutes! Sorry, I keep glancing at the clock in wariness and impatience.

Over the past week, I've been doing something I totally didn't do and paid for with sweat and blood last year - planning ahead. I downloaded this WONDERFUL program called yWriter, which is a huge help, and I basically have my entire novel planned down to the content of the chapters. However, I don't have all the scenes planned out yet. I think if I plan too much it'll lose the fun, dontcha think?

So far, I've done two character sheets, (I need to do more - guess what I'll be doing in class! Other than paying perfect attention, of course...) constructed a culture, a world, decided on a genre, story, plot, rating, and... need i go into it? Basically, I have this thing planned down to the random kitten I'm putting in as a dare. Yay, word padding. (it was a NaNo dare!)

I'm not going to release much of the story on the blog, except for some of the first chapter. This decision is subject to change, and I will be asking for y'all's help on different stuff, asking opinions on quotes, characters, events, what to name my random kitten that my main character is going to hate with the burning passion of a thousand hells, and other things that I'm SURE will come up.

As I'm now rambling with masterful ease, I'm going to go into the beautiful, wonderful thing that is talking about my story until I drop.

So far, this is what I've come up with. I've named it Babylon, after the title of the pirate ship that will figure largely throughout the story.

However, the name has a double meaning. I want this story to have deep spiritual meaning. I'm a Christian, and whether I like it or not, it's going to show up in my writing. Therefore, I'm very intent on making it extremely important for my character. Faith, that is. I really need to go find the french word for faith...

foi?

Maybe. Someone who knows, please comment and tell me! I never know whether these things are right...

Anyway, my main character, Charlize, is arrested for a theivery she didn't commit and.. an act she didn't do. Or so she says... She pleads innocent, but all the evidence is against her. She is placed on the prison ship "Dagger" along with a few other women prisoners and many other men prisoners, (in seperate sections, of course,) along with the crown jewels of the King of Italy, who exists in my alternate universe, okay?

Anyway, with five minutes left, I shall rush through the rest.

CharlizegetsanewnicknamegiventoherbyherfriendCoyaneandthengetspreggiebytheCaptain(notherwillofcourse)andrunsawayandisfoundbythearmyandthenjoinsanactinggroupforsevenyearsandthenrunsintothemagaiandmuchtraumahappensanddramahappensandamutinyaboardthebabylonhappensandthen... Ihaven't figured out how to end it yet. oops.

Will write more later! Promise! (and I'll tell you about my latest news at school - PROMISE!)

I am TIRED of just existing!

I’m TIRED of being treated like a child at school, tired of being pandered to, tired of just existing in a world where nothing else is expected of me except just cleaning my room and doing my homework!

I just want to do MORE.

I don’t know why I want it so much, or whether there’s actually truth behind the teasing I get at school that I don’t want to have fun. Maybe I don’t. Maybe fun isn’t the only thing that matters. Doesn’t anyone SEE that?

Why am I only expected to do the bare minimum? Why can’t I do anything else? Why does everyone expect me to fail? Why am I just living a life of existence – not real living?

I feel like my reading “Do Hard Things” by Brett and Alex Harris are my feelings, my frustration, put into a book and set out for the world to see. How long have all of you had to put up with my rants on how teenagers are underrated in today’s society? I just finished the book now… and I feel like I’m strapped down.

The school, for example. I know they’re trying to bring these kids along “slowly” and whatnot, introducing them to real work, but in the meantime, I’m stuck in a place where I’m not learning anything except in math class. They put me in charge of the new newspaper club because I complained of not having enough to do – but that’s not what I want. And, as much as they hate to admit it, it's not what the students want either. I would bet that if the teachers raised the bar and expected them to make the jump, then I SWEAR that they would make it. They're not stupid - a lot of them are even smarter than me! All they need to do is make the jump, the effort... give the extra mile. If they wouldn't expect nothing of us, then we would give as much as they expected.

Newspaper club is nice, college is important with a capital I…

But I feel like that I’m more than capable enough to do things NOW. Not that I’m perfect, or completely mature, but just because I’m a teen doesn’t mean that I’m worthless and can’t do anything! My mom tells me that all the time – that teens today just aren’t growing up… but then she turns right around when I ask to do something more and throws a bunch of stuff about me getting overwhelmed and not being able to handle it.

As much as she believes that, and says she believes it, every time I feel like God’s placed it on my heart to do something, she stops me.

Recently, with my garage sale, she’s learned not to underestimate what teenagers can do when I raised over two hundred dollars in less than a week. However, she also learned then, she can’t just expect me to fail. She has to stop me from trying if she doesn’t want me to do something.

So now, that’s what she’s doing.

I know that parents are the mouths of God or something, and that God put them over me, but I feel like as much as they encourage me to do as much as I can, they’re also perfectly sure that I won’t be able to handle it. As if what I can do just isn’t enough.

Maybe God’s holding me back for a reason – or maybe he’s seeing how hard I’ll try to do his will. I don’t know. All I know is that I feel like God wants me to become involved in politics somehow – I’d love to help out with the CFC group. The Christian Family Coalition. Maybe I need to push her, maybe I should just trust God and step back and not pursue it. I don’t know.

All I know is that I, as a young woman, have the potential to be so much more than they expect me to be. My parents expect me to make A’s and go to a good college – but at the same time, they don’t expect me to be responsible enough to handle doing what I want to do – which is help to form and shape the future of our country in a Godly direction. Why does everyone expect me, as a teen, to be unable to do anything now?

Can’t I do something?

This is a message to all teens that read my blog… don’t let low expectations drown you in the idea that you’re worthless, stupid, and unable to do anything. We can. We’re just as able as any adult to do everything from raise a million dollars to running a political campaign. Don’t let the adults stop you from doing big things now… and don’t get wrapped up in the “fun” and the “now” so much that you can’t develop to the best you can be. If you don’t, then you are stealing from yourself – and God.

To the adults:

Don’t underestimate us. Don’t say we are the future. Don’t let us be content with complacency. We’re not the future. We are the now.

Let us fly, I beg of you.

Love and Pitchforks,

Katie

P.S: I highly recommend the book "Do Hard Things" by Alex and Brett Harris. I've got a copy for anyone that wants to borrow...

So, uh, I actually had this post written... like... three days ago.

*embarrased cough*

Anyway, I'm writing another one today, so I may have an unheard-of two posts in one day. =D

***

Contrary to popular opinion, I DO go to church.

Geez. Some people, y’know?

Apperantly there has been this strange, unusual rumor going around that certain people, (ahem, Julie and Joy,) have decided that I hardly go to church. I would like to knock that rumor right out of orbit RIGHT NOW. I totally go to church EVERY WEEK. However, as most of you who pay attention will know, I usually go to SECOND service, not FIRST, unlike those people who are of the opinion that I don’t go to church. I did skip out on Sunday School this year, though, I will admit. And Youth group. But I did make it to church, I PROMISE.

Anyway.

For those that are interested, Skull Candy Headphones are a certain, very good, somewhat expensive brand of headphones. They sell them at Target. I like them. A lot.

*glances at her list of topics to address*

Oh, right. I did another garage sale. The church that I’m going to Night of Joy with had a garage sale the week after I had mine. As with all interesting stories, I suppose I shall start at the beginning…

The The tension of Bible class hung around me, with kids furiously taking notes, teasing each other, talking as if the Bible teacher didn’t have ears sharper than a cat. As usual, I was ignoring the “hang loose” hand sign from Cory and Alec when the Bible Teacher (who is also the Youth Leader at Crave the Youth Group for the Church I go to school at,) mentioned it.

As I needed another thirty dollars to make my two hundred to go, I raised my hand, intelligently, as per usual. “Mr. (insert name here),” I asked, using my diplomatically reasonable and interested voice, as if I’d been paying close attention to the entire lecture. (Which I did, of course. *innocent face*) “I still have some things left over from the garage sale I had last week – could I bring it over and help with the sale?”

As I am charming, convincing, and he probably badly needed help, he let me. (Besides the fact that he’d been asking us to do it… reiterating points makes it sound like you’re listening.)

It set in cycle quite a round of events.

I brought the stuff over that afternoon, and made the spectacularly stupid move of staying up until midnight on the computer with the intent to wake up at five in the morning. Personally, you can just buy me a cape and call me superwoman – because I did.

I arrived at the surprisingly small garage sale, expectations lowered. Okay, I thought, They’ll just need help carrying stuff and setting it up, and then I’ll aim toward working in the shade – I get dehydrated way to easily.

HA.

I was pinned to the clothes section, which was possibly the only section that was out in the hot sun once they figured out that I was proactive in begging people to buy things, unlike the rest of the world.

I WAS surprised that that Columbian woman that shows up at every single garage sale I’ve ever been to or had didn’t come. It was almost sad.

I found out that if you make begging signs with your hands then people come and at least look at your stuff.

Also, since everyone else priced everything, all the prices were off. They had a flat price for everything in my section – one dollar. So I… uh… cheated. I started handing out the baby clothes for fifty cents each and upping the price on the bedding. I mean, who sells a quilt for a dollar??? Or a rug, for that matter?

Ehh. So I tweaked them, then told on myself, then got praised for it. This is life. I think.

What I’m trying to figure out is why did they put the easily-burned, easily-overheated, and with a family with the history of skin cancer out in the hot sun for five and a half hours. I mean, considering I was one of two white people there… You would think they could afford to put a couple people a little less prone to sun-related health risks out there. But no. Of course not. Just because I’m not shy about talking to people.

No, I really liked it and am complaining because I like complaining. =D

Oh, and there is an incident I MUST tell.

On Friday, during the all-important Lunch Hour, my twenty-something year-old math teacher and Alec, (one of the seniors,) had some kind of bet or dare or something. I only saw the contest.

Basically, each took a dime or quarter-sized blob of wasabi, and had to chew it for five seconds and then not drink water for another five or something.

It. Was. Hilarious.

I nearly DIED laughing. I’m not sure what they bet on, but it must have been either a decent-sized bet or an insult to their manhood or something. I know I would never be so stupid as to eat that much wasabi willingly. Men’s brains must be missing a self-preservation sense or something.

And, Apperantly, since I've already taken Spanish 2 twice, they're sticking me in the Senior SAT Prep class. This will be... interesting.

Love and Pitchforks,

Katie

Well, I’ve survived an ENTIRE week of school. It’s been crazy, fun, tedious, and not at ALL what I expected. I met new people, (always a plus,) and I wasn’t in my room all day, though I can read during about half of my history class if I get my work done. It’s mostly busywork anyway. =P However, my blog isn’t ALWAYS going to be about school. It will come up though, I assure you.

I’d like to touch on the insanity that was Izzy’s and My weekend. We had a garage sale. I never KNEW how much time went into a garage sale.

Tell you the truth, it was VERY last minute. As in, we decided to have it two days before. Izzy slept over that night… I use the word “slept” loosely. We got about two and a half hours of sleep that night. I made beautiful, artistic, giant signs to point to our house so that I’d get enough money to go to Night of Joy. Until midnight. I painted letters while she went to go get junk from her house. = )

We tried to pull an all-nighter, (I mean, what’s the point of sleeping if you’re going to be up again in two hours?) but between it being Friday night and us running all over the neighborhood collecting stuff (begging, more like,) from our neighbors until eight and painting signs until eleven and then scraping the insides of my house for stuff until one in the morning… we were sooo tired. So we powernapped until 4:30 and then dragged ourselves outside out of bed to start the garage sale.

We were out in the HOT sun for five and a half hours begging people to buy our stuff. FIVE AND A HALF HOURS. Though, on the upside, Izzy was spectacular. She really should go into advertising. She can make people buy stuff that they don’t need for good prices while convincing them they need it! Spectacular, eh?

At first, people JUST didn’t come. Five people passed by without even buying anything, and Izzy and I were close to despair. We were at the time where we really needed to make sales, so we decided to do the only thing we could think of – Pray.

The results were nothing less than AMAZING! We made our first hundred dollars before eight o’ clock. I tell you, I’m not doubting the power of prayer for a LONG, LONG time.

Long story short, I’m 170 bucks closer to Night of Joy. wOOT!!!

Night of Joy. Wonderful, wonderful Night of Joy. The Christian concert of concerts, ringing its beautiful sound across the rolling hills and screaming rides of Disney World… For those of you so unpriviledged as to NOT know what Night of Joy is, it’s basically a collection of Christian singers and musical artists that come together for one superconcert on the night of the 11th and 12th of September. It’s supposed to be SO much fun. I’m exited about going and getting to know my classmates betterer.

*runs to grab the notes on what she was going to go write about because she left them on her bed*

Oh, right, Yuckfest. After our giant crazy garage sale of doom, as if we hadn’t killed ourselves enough, we went to Yuckfest with Crave, the Youth Group at my school. The Yuckfest was basically an excuse to throw all sorts of disgusting things at each other – like pickeled and raw eggs, oil, yuck, shaving cream, and flour. (I opted out of the last one.) Izzy took great pleasure in getting egg allllll over my face and hair, while random people also seemed to enjoy throwing things at me. Like water. And random mixtures of things I don’t even like to THINK about.

I went home and literally CRASHED for the rest of the afternoon.

DRASTIC SUBJECT CHANGE!:

One thing that I’ve been thinking about a LOT over the weekend is the true nature of love.

I know that seems deep and rather obvious, but… really, so many people say things about love. Is teenage love possible? Can people really fall in love when they’re so young? What is love? What is friendship? Why do we feel the need to be loved?

So many of my friends are entering the boyfriend/girlfriend stage, where they’re beginning to pair off. But beyond the utter stupidity of being distracted at such a crucial place in life, I have to wonder… is falling in love now even possible?

Love is such a strong term. In our generation, people are so selfish… selfish and self-serving. Especially people my age. I could never fall in love now… I love myself too much to give everything I have to anyone except God, and even THAT’s a struggle.

Love… love… love… everyone, everywhere in our culture this is the mantra. Everyone should fall in love, fall in love with falling in love, and live, die, and exist for love. Somehow, this seems wrong to me. All around me I see how much this selfish love hurts, and I can’t comprehend how people are sucked into believing this crud.

DRASTIC SUBJECT CHANGE!:

Birthday Wishes:

The 10th Anniversary Edition soundtrack of Les Miserables

Ender’s Shadow Series

New Skull Candy Headphones

I will add more as I think of them. Doesn’t mean anyone should buy me stuff, just me thinking it out to ask the ‘rents. =)

Oh, I had a TOTAL De ja vu in Spanish class today. =D It was SO weird. For a moment, I could have sworn I’d lived it before! As if I was remembering a dream. Or something. I was staring at one of the signs underneath the board, then turned around to talk to Chelsea who sits behind me in Bible and Spanish, and just suddenly could see the scene in my head as if… as if… I’d done it all before.

*insert twilight zone music here*

EEEERRRRIIIIEEEE.

Topics I need to address in the next post:

Politics, Enda, Healthcare, and new changes in the War On Terror

Random goof-offs in Chorus and drama

And Volleyball woes.

Love and Pitchforks,

Katie.

Well, I finally decided it’s time for another post, considering the fact that I actually have something to write about. Now that I’ve been in this school almost a week, I’ve figured out a few constants and kind of how things work.

One thing I’ve learned is that just knowing the Pledge of Allegiance doesn’t fly. Apperantly, I need to know the Pledge to the Christan Flag, (didn’t know we had that…) and the pledge to the Bible. Both basically sound like the Pledge of Allegiance, except more... Christian-y. Anyway, I’ve found that actually LEARNING those is actually taking time. I’m obviously not devoting enough time to it. O.o

Another thing – HOW IN THE WORLD DO THEY EXPECT US TO FIT ALL OUR BOOKS IN ONE LOCKER???? AND WHY COULD THEY NOT MAKE THE LOCKERS WIDE ENOUGH SO THAT A 1” RING FOLDER COULD FIT IN SIDEWAYS????

Apparently it’s impossible.

My locker is about the size of a mouse hole. I have to stick everything in at a weird angle just to get it IN, and getting it out is a serious fight. Geez. How do the rest of the people in my class manage to get stuff in and out of their lockers SO easily? There must be some secret method. Me, for one, can’t freaking figure it OUT. It’s nearly impossible! There are literally scrapes on my folders from yanking and bending them out of my locker forcefully. The Local Between-Class Attraction: Watching Katie Fight With Her Locker.

Another thing – I now adore my math teacher, for some reason. It may be because he’s twenty-three-ish and was homeschooled, or maybe because he REALLY reminds me of the guys I hung out with at Speech and Debate tournaments. XD He’s HILARIOUS. He has this very-flat voice where he delivers things in one tone. We have the funniest conversations between classes, ranging from the merits of Jane Austin’s work to why people don’t like coffee.

You’d be very surprised at the academic level of this school… not. I kind of feel leashed back. I like being CHALLENGED, not underestimated. I can do the flipping work, people. But I want more than busywork, if you know what I mean? Though the current events are kind of cool. I like current events. =) I almost feel like… well, kind of like everyone just does what they need to do to get their A’s and get out. What I’m trying to figure out, is this a mentality that school produces? It has to be. I know that these people are smart and capable of producing top-notch work, and are probably even smarter than me… but for some reason they do the bare minimum. It’s totally incomprehensible to me. Why not do the best you can, and learn the most you can? That way you’ll be the best… Also, if you only do the bare minimum, are you truly giving glory to God? Every action, every thought, and everything we do is supposed to be for the glory of God. Is it giving glory to God if we only do what we need to do to pass, or is it giving glory to God to give your very best efforts to everything?

While I’m on the topic of minimum work, I’d like to talk about Chemistry.

Chemistry. Supposedly it’s a class, but I’m not exactly sure about how much work goes into that class. I mean, it took us two days to finish twelve review questions in class, and everyone just copied off me anyway. (No, I’m not completely innocent of talking and including myself in these conversations. In fact, I’m a rather large culprit.) Don’t get me wrong – we have a LOT of fun in that class! I’m just not sure about how much of that fun is school-related. Like one time the teacher left to go get copies of something from the office, (way on the other side of school,) and we hatched a master plan to go and hide all over the classroom before she got back. The ensuing scene was absolutely hilarious. XD. Let’s just say that we found a closet that I never knew existed, extremely obvious hiding places, and that the teacher humored us. And THAT’S why we didn’t get our review questions done!

=D

I guess you could say I’ve marginally relaxed around these people. I’ve learned who they are and what not to say, (kind of,) and they’ve learned about the Katie-isms that you just have to watch out for. I may invite a few of them to my rumored but not yet concrete birthday party of doom. O.o

Finally, I’m going to talk about Chorus and Drama.

If any of you have known me for more than about a month, you’ll know that I would do many illegal and desperate things for singing lessons. Ehheh. Well, I’ve finally got them. Kind of. I AM learning about technique and such… but most of it is spent cracking up at random people’s mistakes and goof-offs. We all get laughed at, so it’s perfectly fine to laugh. XDDD

Now, I have NON-school subjects I’d like to touch on.

How many of you have considered the absolute brilliance of the satire of the Princess Bride? Roundaboutly, it totally makes fun of EVERY SINGLE FAIRY TALE EVER and yet is unique. I love it so much! Izzy and I were watching it last week, and it struck me how satairitical that movie/book IS. It also manages to make fun of conventions of society, stereotypes, and it has PRIESTS WITH LISPS! Mawwage. Tat bwessed union…

Also, did I ever mention how much I HATE getting contaminated with gluten? It happened today – I was imprudent, didn’t think, and then I was in bed for the entire afternoon throwing up and reading pride and prejudice for English.

HEAR THAT, ENGLISH TEACHER? BE PROUD OF ME! I WAS ILL AND ALMOST ON MY DEATHBED, AND I STILL DID MY HOMEWORK!!!

Anyway, It’s going to take a little while to get back to normal, so if I walk around wincing a little bit, it’s totally because my stomach hurts. I blame CRCA for breading their freaking French fries. >.<

I would also like to get opinions on this poem I recently wrote. I was bored, okay, and Izzy was on the PHONE, and we had been interrupted from talking about DEEP topics. That is my well-orchestrated excuse, and I’m sticking to it. So ha. Haha, people, haha.

One-two-three, one-two-three,
Here feet touch the ground in a well-honored dance,
For-ever and ev-er a dance of dis-pair.
A face drained of pleasure,
Of life and of love,
A soul full of tiredness,
Shatter-ed, Scatter-ed.

One-two-three, One-two-three,
Her legs weighted down from the time of the rounds,
A-round and a-round from be-ginn-ing to end,
Too often betrayer,
Too often betrayed,
A life left in lonliness,
No time and no hope.

One-two-three, one-two-three,
Her heart in small pieces from mistakes in the dance,
Stomped on because the waltz never can stop,
A hole left inside her,
Not leaving her whole,
A life without Gaol,
Just plodding to end.

-Katie

Now, you’re going to have to look up that word you don’t know in the last sentence – or I could just tell you. It’s another word for Savior, but I didn’t want to write Jesus, simply because I felt that that name didn’t fit the rhyming or the tone I was going for. Thank God for google.

Everyone who comments gets a virtual cookie!

Love,

Katie

Well, I've decided to start blogging again, for better or for worse, it seems. Some of you may shout in pleasure, and others may groan in...

Okay, I'm getting melodramatic.

But how can I not? I'm going to school for the first time in... ever. So I started writing. I do that when I'm nervous.

If you're reading this, chances are that you know that I've been homeschooled most of my life, (from 2nd grade on,) and that this year, my junior year, I'm going to private school for reasons I shall not put in print.

Oh, joy. (not you, Joy! <3)

Needless to say, I was beyond terrified. However, my annoying little writer's instinct started buzzing, wondering if this was something different I could offer the collective writing world. Apperantly I'm so calculating that I'll use even my own tradgeties and terrors to make a good story.

Before this last week, I hadn't really thought about it much. Well, I'd avoided thinking about it, more like. My collective terror REALLY started the tuesday before school started, and I went uniform shopping...

Through pain, suffering, terror, life, death, and a heartrending giving up of my leggings and skirts, I learned five very important, true, and sad things.

1: Uniforms are designed so that they fit no one and look bad on everyone, especially me.

2: That my school's uniforms, especially, are icky. I mean, not everyone looks good in dark blue and green, people! What of those others with warm palates and who can't pull pure white off? Would it kill them to offer more than three colors and a dorky oxford? Red? Pink? Anything else?

3: The skirts are made to make you look like a nun.

4: That "specially tailored" uniforms are basically not tailored at all and look a little like art smocks on those of us who are less than 5'4".

5: That "specially tailored" uniforms are WAY overpriced for baggy, shapeless clothing.

Even worse, their contract with this company is ending, so they didn't have enough polos in my size! -insert dramatic sob here- So I'm stuck in the dorky oxfords that I can't dress up AT ALL until my polos come in. It's so pathetic! I'm the new kid in the oxford. Talk about embarrassing. I will admit, I cheated. I took my oxfords to my neighbor and had her take them in for me on the sides a bit so that they didn't look like me using my dad's shirts for art smocks and more like a shirt.

Uniform shopping aside, there was then the orientation. My terror grew exponentially as I sat, petrified, as the principal talked forEVER about the billions of rules and importance of order and timeliness until I was well nigh convinced that while the principal may be a perfectly nice man, he was very dedicated to teh rulez.

After the orientation, I went to my homeroom and met my english teacher who is also the P.E. coach. Well, that was new. Not to be annoyed, but, uh, I was annoyed. She completely ignored me and acted like I didn't exist! Even for questions that my mom wouldn't know at ALL she asked her like I was a brainless third grader who was more concerned with the contents of her lunch than the themes of Les Miserables.

I think this spells the beginning of a wonderful and beautiful relationship, don't you think? [/sarcasm]

Of course, then they handed us the Giant Rule Book of Doom, also known as the Parent-Student Handbook. Hah. The Book is huge!! According to The Book, hugging is against the rules. And creativity, non-school books on campus, having other beliefs, wearing sandals, multicolored belts, neclaces outside your uniform, and individuality.

Then, of course, there is, wait, get ready for it... "Christian T-shirt Day"

What the HECK?

And I thought it couldn't get any more pathetic. Why don't they just call it no uniform day and get it over with? Where am I supposed to get a T-shirt with a, and I quote, an "appropriate Christian logo" on it? Is it a sin to not own shirts with logos on them? I buy plain t-shirts, sometimes with patterns... not t-shirts with logos.

Well, at least I get to wear jeans and black once a month.

Then, of course, there is always the apprehension. I didn't know any of these people - and I'm not neccesarily "normal". I mean, how many teenage girls watch the news obsessively, argue politics, did speech and debate for four years, watches Star Trek, and reads over thirty to forty books in a three-month period? That's as much as a lot of people my age have read in their LIFETIME. I write obsessively, ask deep questions, take notes, study, and give the extra mile of work. I'm practically an alien!

Well, it was ALMOST as bad as I imagined.

Apologetics is my favorite class so far, because it's the closest thing to debate I've got. It's official, I'm a NCFCA addict. English is dry, because, for some reason, the P.E. coach is the English teacher. There's no enthusiasm from the students... It seems like there's very little feeling for literature except from me and the teacher.

Spanish is REALLY easy, because it's still beginning levels and I basically speak that wonderful language. The teacher is nice, even if she doesn't think that I speak spanish. (She's never evaluated my spanish before, however.) She's a pretty Dominican lady from Santo Domingo...

I had a good laugh about my math teacher's name. Mr. Callahan. Now, if you've seen Legally blonde, you'll know why I crack up every time I hear his name.

Hm.

I met new people today. YAY, new people. Some of them were fun, and others were annoying AND fun, and most of them I didn't get to talk to enough to know anything about them. We were with the senior class in a LOT of classes, and with the tenth grade in one, so I got to know basically the entire high school. One of them enjoys teasing the HECK out of everyone, including me. He did hold his distance until he figured out I could take it. *sigh* Then I hit him over the head with my lunchbag when he kept trying to make me sing base for his friend. Hopefully he'll give me respect from now on. I only hit when pushed to it.

Another girl wrote on her "all about me" card in Math class that she when she grows up, she wants to be a pedestrian. Huh. Apperantly she meant pediatrician.

Uh, oops.

Well, it's an easy mistake to make, but it was FUNNY.

My somewhat-issue is that everyone is so close-knit. They've all been in for a few years together, and I don't know what to expect... or how to relate to these people. I guess for so long I made friends with people who I could relate easily to. However, none of these people want anything to do with basically anything that smells literary. Though one of them does want to go to law school. I'm praying that I don't come off as a know-it-all or standoffish - I just don't know how to react to so many of the things they say or do - and i'm deathly nervous. Scared, believe it or not.

Just let me get through it and get out.

-Katie