Lindsay Loves

Whoo-hoo!!! I’m back! Good Lord, did I miss being online. I missed IM’ing so much. I think just being offline for this past week has made me type slower. Or something like that.

The story is: It’s been raining really hard lately. Like, circus animals on steroids. Apparently, the underground lines running to our house were affected by all the water. (As far as I know, everyone else on this block was fine.) There was a loud buzzing noise and static on our house phone, and the Internet line (we have two) was so bad I could only stay connected for twenty minutes at a time, if that. So they came out last week and today to fix them. The only problem now is that the house phone line is being used for the Internet, and vice versa. My mom was yelling at me earlier ’cause she thought I was ignoring the phone when she called. It never rang; she was calling the number that currently leads to the computer. But the moral of the story is: Lindsay was terribly lonely and hopes to never go through that again. I missed you all so much!

I managed to update a few times on uJ [6/17, 6/24, 6/26]. I keep the client running on my computer, so I could type the entries when I felt like it and post them in seconds once I got a halfway decent connection. Semagic rocks.

In other news, still no local Teen Jeopardy! auditions. I’m hoping for D.C. Or maybe Baltimore; they did one there the year that guy from Greenbelt won. I want to be on the show so badly. I just got finished watching it and eating dinner (Hamburger Helper — lame, but tasty). I love playing along. I get angry at people who watch it with me and won’t answer in the form of a question. It doesn’t even have to be grammatically correct; a person can be a “what” — it’s not that hard to play right! But one of my ambitions is to compete on Jeopardy!, and now that I’m eligible, I’m going for it.

I just caught the very beginning of 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter on ABC, right after Jeopardy! It was so cool; John Ritter (who plays the dad) quoted two of the rules verbatim. I don’t know if my dad has the read the copy I got him yet. I still love those rules — and my dad — even if Greg isn’t too keen on them. ;)

I got my SAT scores in the mail today. I got a 1300! 700 verbal, 600 math. I was so excited, I almost got up and danced on the spot. But since I was outside, I didn’t. Even though no one was within sight. I danced internally. I swear I thought I’d do worse this time around. I was happy with 660 verbal, but I’m glad I managed to pull my math up a little bit. I think I’m going to quit now, though. Even if (horrors!) my ACT score turns out comparably lower, I still have a pretty good score. I’ll run it through the Princeton Review Counselor-O-Matic next chance I get.

Reese Witherspoon was on TRL today, very pregnant but still pretty. I don’t know if I want to see Legally Blonde 2: Red, White, and Blonde, though. Legally Blonde was great in itself; I don’t know if a sequel could do it justice. I was fine with the Elle-graduates-and-Emmett’s-going-to-propose ending. It’s good that Reese is getting more recognition in Hollywood, but not every movie needs a sequel. Sequels, by definition, have to be as good as or better than the original, or they just flat-out suck.

New layout for Rajni (lol) and a new host and layout for Mykella. ::breathes in the wonderful scent of the World Wide Web:: It feels good to be back.

OotP tomorrow night!!!!!!!!! Okay, so technically, it will be Saturday morning, but still. It’s almost here!

Sims has finally posted the first four chapters of her fic, “The Fourth Unforgivable”, which I beta-read and omega-read for her. It’s quite good. Go read it if you get a chance. It’s a fifth-year fic, and seeing as we’ll have fifth year canon very soon, she’s afraid she’ll lose potential readership. Please give her some support.

I have just entered a short story contest, sponsored by Donard Publishing. Yeah, I’ve never heard of them, either. I only got the link a few days ago, and barely realized that the deadline’s tomorrow. The idea of the contest is that all the submissions will be posted online and the public will vote for the winner. I’ll let you know when mine are up; please go vote for me. Even if I don’t win, it’s a good opportunity.

School was boring beyond reason today. I tried playing Spades with Greg, Alanna, and Iris, but I don’t really know how. I’ve only played once before: at Megan and Stephanie’s Christmas party. And even then, Stephanie coached me because we had an odd player. Jorge was my coach this time. I played, but I didn’t really understand. It was fun, anyway. Greg came with me to lunch. I watched Paul and Kevin play Enter the Matrix on Xbox in Avondet’s class. I talked and read Seventeen in fourth period; I also found out I did quite well on the final. Yay. Beat my personal high score on Bookworm again: 79,000 this time. Greg came out to the gym during sixth, then we hung out with Mr. T until the final bell. We organized some It’s Ac questions and looked up possible rentals for tomorrow.

I guess today wasn’t such a terrible day after all. Nearly missed the bus again, and it was raining. It just started raining circus animals about ten minutes ago. I was bored at times, but other times were almost enjoyable, considering I really didn’t want to be there.

We’re supposed to be having a picnic at school tomorrow. Despite the record number of fights lately, I think it’s still on. We shall see, we shall see. Long day tomorrow. Probably won’t get online until late afternoon. Got a book to read. :o)

Blogger has been lagging a lot lately. Sometimes it freezes my browser. And I’ve been having computer and Internet issues lately, so I do not need a frozen browser. Maybe I should move. I hear diary-x is good. Yesterday’s entry is here, because my Internet connection was so flaky, I didn’t feel like fighting with Blogger.

Mark: I read YA fiction. Chick-lit is aimed at adults. Female adults, but still. And I avoid reading fight scenes. I tried that once; I think it was a Buffy novel. It was terrible. And I like reading about relationships. They make mine seem slightly less dysfunctional.

The author of that Harry Potter sex article wrote a response to the mass of hate mail she received. She should have known. We Harry Potter fans are a rabid bunch.

THREE DAYS!!!!!!!! Eek. I can barely contain my excitement. Seriously, when I’m not moping about wasting time in school, I’m thinking about how, if I keep my pattern, I will able to read OotP without having seen a single spoiler. Yay for self-control. I think I’ll just reread the end of GoF and leave it at that. I am going to be ridiculously late Friday night/ Saturday morning. My staying-up record is 5:30am so far. We’ll see if I surpass that. Obsessions aren’t always such terrible things.

Lots of HP news lately, including a front-page article in the Washington Post about fan fiction and copyright laws, featuring Arabella and Zsenya of the Sugar Quill. Turns out Zseyna’s a librarian at College Park. Who knew? People are stealing copies of OotP left and right, and “accidentally” putting them out for sale early, so spoilers are everywhere. My philosophy is that too many spoilers will ruin the whole book. It’s not like re-reading a book; then, you know what’s going to happen, but you choose to relive it all. Spoilers are evil.

School was very close to pointless today. Again. I think I did okay on my History final. And I finished labeling the parts drawers for Mr. Avondet, so I’m done there, too. I don’t really have to go to school tomorrow. But I will anyway. I will sorely miss seeing Greg every day at school. I had every intention of skipping gym class today, but at the last second, I freaked and went anyway. The whole conscience/angel on one shoulder/inner voice thing is driving me insane. Why am I such a goody two-shoes? I refuse to let myself rant about that again, but… argh.

I finished another book today. It felt so good to have read something so quickly. It was Among the Impostors, by Margaret Peterson Haddix, sequel to Among the Hidden. Pretty good book. There were a lot of plot twists, though. No one ever tells the whole truth right away. Every time something is explained, we find out later that the explanation was a lie, too. Almost confusing. And the chapters are far too short; I dislike having to turn pages that often. The situation was less believable than the first book. I realize that’s a bit ironic, seeing as it’s set in the future anyway, but you know what I mean.

We had another grade-level assembly this afternoon. Our last as juniors. We found out the stuff for senior portraits (in early July) and senior dues ($170). And they gave the same speeches (with horrid grammar lapses) about satisfying obligations, community service hours, and not assuming we’ll be graduating next year just because we come back to school. I tune most of those out.

Three days! ::skips away, giddy::

I only really had one final to take today, AP Physics. I have gym sixth period, and I didn’t have any laps to make up, so I sat on the bleachers and counted as other people made up theirs. Those poor, deluded freshmen actually tried to get me to cheat for them. I’m like, “Uh, no?” I had to run (okay, jog/walk) all those miles. I had to come to class even when I really didn’t feel like it. If I had to suffer, so do you, Ms. 32 Laps Behind. Sad, no?

Mr. Avondet’s final is that each of us has to do two cleanup jobs for him. No big deal. Organizing drill bits and wrenches and such. Nothing requiring actual skill. I didn’t clean up today. I figured out that if you look busy (which I was, glancing at my physics notes), he’ll leave you alone. I’ll see what I can do tomorrow.

I got up to about 48,000 points playing Bookworm on Yahoo!Games in fifth period. My best word, worth 2300 points: chorale. That made me feel very clever. It made up for ditzily (is that a word?) forgetting my earrings this morning. My earlobes felt so naked. As another plus, Mrs. Anderson gave me a glowing A+ on my paper. I got an A+ for all the subsections except writing, because my transitions sucked in the way that they weren’t there. But it was otherwise spiffy. I’m glad. I just can’t b.s. things, no matter how much it could reduce my stressload. I have an overwhelming compulsion to give 101%. It’s quite annoying.

My piano lesson tonight went much better than usual. I went, I played well, and then I came home. I think it’s because it’s only Monday, so I’m not exhausted from a week of putting up with school. I plan on taking Greg to my lesson on Friday. His mom is going to drop us off at Borders so we can pick up OotP (squee!!!). I refuse to have him driving after midnight. That would be rather illegal. And he’d be tired. So not good. So, he’s coming over here after school, then we’ll go to my lesson, and then to Borders. We just have to run all of that by our parents, but I don’t think they’ll mind.

So, trig final tomorrow, and a drawing for Lifsey. Shouldn’t be too hard; turns out my math final is open-notes. I understand the material, anyway. I’m convinced one of the review problems has a typo because I couldn’t get it to work right, but whatever. It looks like I might not actually have to go to school on Thursday. Cool. Oh, and I finished Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella) today. It was pretty good. I don’t read chick-lit, like, ever, but I like it. It started well, but it got a little slow in the middle. Then it picked up again at the end, just enough to convince me to get the sequel from the library when I get a chance. Good book, though. It made me do that thing where I react out loud, gesturing and going “no!” Hope, Alanna, and Sarah know what I mean. :o)

It’s so good to be online again. I couldn’t get on Friday ’cause I went to bed early, and I didn’t have time yesterday. Friday was unbelievably hot. I mean, seriously. I was so glad I didn’t have any makeup laps for gym. On the down side, I’ve got another sock tan. Bleh.

Yesterday was the ACT. I had mixed feelings about it. I read this book I got from the library, but it wasn’t really helpful. I did badly on those practice tests. So, on Friday during downtime in school, I did the official ACT practice test. I scored much better on that, but I only timed myself on the math section, so I didn’t get a clear idea of what to expect.

So, yesterday morning, I got up agonizingly early to go take the test at Largo. There were far less people testing there. I saw Iyen, Jennifer, Gonzo, and this guy I knew back at Flowers. The test itself was okay, I guess. I don’t feel good at all about the math or science sections. Maybe I’m just in a bad standardized testing cycle (see last week’s dismal SAT). But I’m done for at least three months. Just waiting for scores now: SAT in two weeks or so, ACT in three, AP mid-July. Sigh. And application time will only be more stressful.

As a wonderful relief from the torture of testing, I went to the movies with Greg last night. We’ve seen pretty much everything good that’s out right now, so we went out to Hoffman to see Bend It Like Beckham. Greg got “turned around” about six times. (He insists we weren’t lost. Mm-hmm….) We missed our intended showtime, so we went into Ruby Tuesday’s to wait. Our waiter was really nice. Very attentive — almost too much, but not quite. After we ate, we just sat around until the earlier showing let out. The movie was pretty good. I liked the music; it reminded me a lot of when I lived in Germany. That is a nice theater. I wanna go back now. :o) Greg’s mom led him part of the way back, so I got home at a decent time and went to bed. I was tired! A three-hour test, and Greg.

I nearly forgot this morning that it’s Father’s Day. I got my dad’s present weeks ago, so it’s just been sitting on my closet shelf waiting to be presented. I think he likes it: 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter, by W. Bruce Cameron. He appreciates humor (I got him The Ferengi Rules of Acquisition one year), so I think he’ll like reading it. Greg thinks I’m trying to hurt him. I am not. And he never honks for me, anyway. He knocks on my window. =)

Oh my gosh. In this article from an Australian newspaper, the writer asserts that Harry’s (lack of) sexuality is the big question for future books. I mean, yeah, it is odd that Harry never thought of girls like that until he was fourteen, but that doesn’t make him gay! Sure, I want to see Ron and Hermione hook up. But part of what makes Harry such a good archetypal Hero is that he isn’t distracted by girls. (::thinks:: Did he fall off his broomstick from paying attention to Cho instead of the Bludger? I can’t remember…. But you know what I mean.) All Potterites should go read it. (I am personally against the term Potterphile because of its obvious reference to pedophile.) An excerpt:

Harry is forever polishing his large wand, his Nimbus 2000 broomstick and later, his precious international standard Firebolt.

Cauldrons, wands, broomsticks and peculiarly shaped plants and creatures that exude pus, poisonous sprays and all sorts of fluids appear frequently.

Dear Lord. We Potterites are an odd bunch. That last bit reminds me of The Slytherin Kama Sutra. :o) Also, less than one week! ::screams madly:: ::realizes she is screaming, stops:: ::remembers why she was screaming in the first place, resumes screaming and doing a happy dance::

Today royally sucked. This is going to be pretty long and rather ranty.

First period was boring. Ms. Anderson showed a PowerPoint on American literary movements. I think there’s a quiz tomorrow, but it’s open-notes, and I’ve been taking some (just to keep me awake), so I’ll be fine. Second period lunch was normal. No visitors today. Sarah laid off the energy drinks. Hope discussed Carnegie Mellon (she got into the summer program — yay Hope!). Alanna is finally back, but still kind of sick.

All I needed to do to complete my power supply in third period was put the knob on the potentiometer. So I did that, leaving me with a good 35 minutes to kill before the end of class. I worked through all the practice questions in my ACT book, so I had nothing to do. I sat around reading Confessions of a Shopaholic (which is okay), bored to tears. Then I saw a daddy longlegs crawling around near my foot. As expected, I screamed and moved away. Then Dwahn (who I currently describe using very rude words) decided to scare me out of my mind my messing with the spider. For a second, I honestly wanted to kill him. To just end his life so he wouldn’t pester me anymore. That scared me, too, that I could feel so much rage.

In fourth period, we watched the video projects that the sophomores made. The first one (on the Holocaust) was good and informative, but generally boring. The second (on Mr. Capati’s cop-out topic, Crucial Issues Facing the World Today), was good, informative, and funny. In the segment about illegal immigration, the “reporter” said, crouching in the grass, “We’re at the United States – Mexico border. We’ve been waiting here for almost two hours with no sign of any illegals.” But in the frame behind her, you see people running. And in the bloopers for the segment based on New Jersey vs. TLO, they showed some of the botched takes. In one, they made an announcement over the intercom. In another, Ms. Soraci walked right through the frame. Quite funny.

In fifth period, I wasted time. Lawrence was attempting to be funny by rolling up his shorts, so that it looked like he wasn’t wearing pants. Then he stood in the doorway while people walked through the hall. It gave me eerie flashbacks to John’s moonings. (That’s what Megan meant the other day. “Exposing himself” is something totally different and far more disturbing.) I wasn’t as icy cold as I usually am, which is odd because I wore a sleeveless top today. Which also confirmed my belief that, though they threaten us all the time, the admins don’t care what we wear. They’re tired and hot, too, so as long as we’re sufficiently covered, they’re good.

Sixth period was horrific. It was unearthly hot outside. Usually we’re assigned six laps, but we only had three today. I walked all three and was still all sweaty and disgusting afterward. Fate hates me. I couldn’t have had gym class in the fall, when it was cool. I’d rather be stuck wearing sweatpants all the time than go through that. Thankfully, it’s not as hot this year as it was this time last year.

Seventh period sucked, too. Ms. Dixon relocated to an air-conditioned room (yes!), but I was so bored. I did a little more of the review for the final on Tuesday, then gave up and read until locker cleanout. I didn’t really have anything to clean out, so I just gave my trash bag to someone else, tossed my old broken umbrella (I never use it anyway), and went upstairs to return Ms. Sim’s books. The hallways were packed. Combined with the innate heat, it was terrible.

I finally made it to Dr. J’s class. He was originally going to give the final today, but people complained, so we’re having it on the assigned date. Mine is Monday. ::whimpers:: I don’t even want to study for the very few questions I have to get correct to keep my A. I’m getting lazy. So, instead of studying, I tried some more of my math review. I got stuck. I felt so stupid, because I remembered covering that part, but I couldn’t work it out. I read some more.

After school, I called my mom at work to let her know I was staying for the last It’s Ac, but I didn’t catch her, so I left a message. Turns out she leaves work at 4. Oops. Staying after without prior permission always makes me nervous. I really don’t need distrust from my parents right now. The game was fine. Andrew and Vicki jumped ahead, but Greg and I overtook them to win. We wrapped a bit early, just as the giant thunderstorm started. My mom texted me “WHERE ARE YOU”, then called me. I thought for a second she was going to reprimand me, but she was just wondering. That was a relief.

Then there was an incident involving Greg, the intercom, and me. It definitely goes under “most embarrassing moments ever.” To retain what little pride I have left, I won’t go into detail. I am also avoiding it because I might forget it quicker that way. I should probably have not added this paragraph at all, but I feel compelled to keep it.

I came home to find that the power had gone out. Again. Three times last night, four+ tonight. My piano teacher tried to call (she’s out of town tomorrow, when I would usually have my lesson), but I didn’t recognize the number, so I didn’t pick up. We rescheduled for Monday night. Dinner was late (no power for the oven), which made me very hungry and more depressed than I already was.

The most depressing things are (a) I actually have it pretty good. To my knowledge, I’m still pulling straight A’s, and except for math, my finals shouldn’t be hard. (b) Being depressed is zero fun. And I could stand to relax a tiny bit. I’m so stressed, my neck and shoulders hurt. (c) I’m making Greg empathically depressed. And the fact that I’m making him depressed makes me more depressed.

I hated today. And it’s not even quite over yet. ::sighs::

Hmm. Blogger must be switching people to the new version chronologically, ’cause mine’s still the old one.

NHS meeting this morning. My grandma drove me this morning. She got here early, but instead of coming inside, she walked around in the backyard at first. I saw her as I was making my lunch, and it seriously scared me. What am I supposed to think when there’s someone traipsing around behind my house. I was sort of late to the meeting, but Ms. Bitondo didn’t even show up to open Ms. Sheehan’s door until after I got there, so I’m good. They collected contact info, gave out contract-thingies, and explained the point system. Everything NHS-related (meetings, fundraisers, pizza sales) is assigned points. We have to get 110 points by graduation to be allowed to graduate as an NHS member. That might be a bit tricky, but I think I can handle it.

During lunch we were visited my Mykella, Iris, and some other girl (I think her name is Sharon). Still no Alanna… wonder where she is. I had much fun bouncing between chatting with Hope and Mykella versus Sarah, Iris, and maybe-Sharon. And I had Sour Cream and Onion-flavored Utz chips, which always make me feel better. My comfort foods are mashed potatoes, chocolate, soft bread, and chips.

Guess who’s basically finished with her power supply? Me! I just have to put a knob on the potentiometer and I’m done. And except for the screw Kevin drilled in for me before I realized what he was doing I did all the work on it all by myself. I feel much more competent than usual. Yeah, it took me about a month to finish, but I made it and it works. Yay for me!

We finally finished Schindler’s List in history class. Dear Lord. That was a great movie. Besides being R-rated for violence and nudity, it is incredible. There were times when I was so stunned by what I saw, I absolutely froze. It’s about the Holocaust, so it’s very sad. But, unlike the slow sophomores in that class, I was able to follow the action and understand the benevolence of Oskar Schindler. It’s based on true story. It’s good to know that someone cared.

Gym was moved to the senior lounge due to grade-level assemblies today. (We had ours first period. Pointless, boring, and redundant. Don’t fail, don’t break the rules, come to school, and admins that can’t speak proper English. Nothing new.) That was a welcome surprise. It was nice to not have to get all sweaty for one day.

Bored to tears in trig and physics. I get the distinct feeling that the ACT is going to screw me over like the SAT did. Why, why did I sign up for this test now, when I have so many things to do? I did English and math section practice tests tonight, and I didn’t score well on either. The English results surprised me. I can punctuate properly. The math sucks. More than SAT math, even. I am going to die.

It’s Ac was the usual. Another appearance from Nick. Greg had to leave early. I shined at the end of the lightning rounds; we had one on African-American writers and one on children’s literature. Yeah, baby. Those are my kinds of categories.

Possible piano lesson tomorrow. Not good, as we’re having It’s Ac again for the actual last time, and it will be my last good opportunity to study for the stupid ACT. And, as I have not studied at all, it looks like I’m taking Dr. J’s final on Monday, when it’s scheduled.

Overall, I am not in a pleasant mood. Chocolate didn’t even make me feel better. I got sick of the taste, which is not a good sign. Stupid stress. I’m going to sleep now. At least I can find solace in my dreamless sleep.