What? Already?

We have 380 posts. Doesn't that mean we have been posting for over a year? I am so happy about that. Forgive me if someone has already mentioned it, but I did not see it.
There are two more months of summer. I hope to enjoy them as fully as possible before people have to leave.
Yesterday on Facebook, I became a fan of the World's Largest Brat Fest. This used to take place outside a small mall that was only a 15 minute walk from my house, or so. Then, it was moved to the Alliant Energy Center, which is basically like a civic center. So many volunteers volunteer to cook brats and hotdogs. It is amazing. Then, there are tables where they put the condiments, and round porch tables with umbrellas to eat the food, and drink the pepsi or whatever they had in the Pepsi cups. I don't mean that in a bad way. I never went to the ones at the Alliant Energy Center. They moved it there because the Brat Fest just got so humongous, I suppose, that they couldn't fit it in the parking lot of a mall. Anyway, it is so fun and actually quite safe. Now, watch there be a news report about a kid being kidnapped from the Brat Fest. But it was one of the cool things that could be done back in the day, up north.
Today, on the way home, I had a very loud conversation with Erica. It was loud because I put the phone on speakerphone so I didn't have to put it up to my ear, therefore reducing the distance between my right hand and the steering wheel, in case I needed to drive with both hands during the phone call. She tried to explain where Tropical Smoothie is. I drove a bit too far into the area with all the rich people shops. But then, since I decided to drive back and look around again, I found it! I went in, and it turns out that one type of smoothie was free for the I'm guessing first 100?ish customers, but it was half-off now. So that was interesting. Later, I visualized Lacey being horrified that a smoothie could be half-off, since she uses those plastic eggs to hold precisely the amount of change needed for one smoothie. I think that is so smart of her, but she and my other friends do many, many smart things. That was not meant to have a sarcastic undertone.
My friend in Wisconsin had to use the search box to find an email from December, and finally replied. I decided to write her a letter a month or so ago, and she said she sent it on Wednesday. I am so excited.
Another interesting thing is that Nathaniel and I have finally begun to speak Spanish online. Hopefully, it will benefit both of us by practicing more, but I'm pretty sure it is mainly benefiting me, because he is much better than I. In fact, unless I am mistaken, he received a "5" on his AP Spanish Language exam. Incredible kid. Or young man.
I'm going to try to talk to him now.
Good-bye until next week!
Oh, that reminds me of something I thought was extremely well-said at the funeral yesterday. Chanyang and Gyeongbae told everyone that they did not need to say good-bye to their mom because they would just see her later in heaven because they knew that they could meet there. I thought that was wonderful.
(I am Atheist, though.)
-Kejing

Mortality

Before I begin my post, I'd like to examine the definition and roots of the word "mortality".

Definition :: The condition of being susceptible to death

Etymology :: from Old French mortel "destined to die,"

from Latin mortalis "subject to death," from mors (gen. mortis) "death."

This past week, three friends have suffered greatly for the loss of a loved one. A classmate, a best friend, and my own mother have learned of life's greatest shock- death. I'd like to share with you the story of Danny, my mother's friend.

My mother's former patient, Danny, and soon after steadfast friend, died last week from a misdiagnosed lymphoma in his gut. Bureaucracy in its ugliest form was his true cause of death though. He had been rushed through the hospital with the diagnosis of "Crohn's Disease," an incurable chronic inflammatory disease of the small or large intestine that is dealt with by treating the symptoms. However, he responded to none of the drugs. Actually, that's not true- he did respond lightly to a few, but they, coincidentially enough, were the same drugs often given in conjuction with chemotherapy drugs (those which he should have been on from the very beginning). Rather than being alarmed by this startling nonresponce, his arrogant doctors dismissed it as an unusual reprentation of Crohn's. This went on for a year. For a year he fought a cancer the size of your forearm with little to no help from his doctors. My mother was there though, taking him to the hospital when she could, keeping him company since his children and sister lived far out west. She became his friend when she met him on rounds and stayed his friend even after. I even had the pleasure of meeting him several times. He had an adorable fascination with Disney, particularly with Mini and Mickey Mouse. Danny enjoyed the theatre and good french pastries. He was, by all means, a kind soul- a diamond in Miami's rough. It wasn't until he went in last August for one of his countless colonoscopies that one doctor finally did not like the looks of something that had perforated his gut lining. He ordered a biospy, and sure enough, the correct diagnosis, lymphoma, was made and he was immediately prepped for chemotherapy. The chemo was rough on his old body, but he showed great promise. The cancer receeded and shrunk to a fraction of its original size. But, ultimately, the cancer won. Chemotherapy, for those of you unfamiliar with it, is a brutal treatment option. You essentially kill yourself in effort to purge those cells that you don't want. However, this isn't a precise method. It's like trying to flatten a single bad nail in a sea of good nails with a giant Whack-A-Mole hammer. However, such is the treatment because cancer cells are technically your own cells- making it hard for the drugs to differentiate. No, he fought hard, but with a compromised immune system (again, thanks to the chemo) he developed serious infections. Would he have survived if he had begun chemotherapy when he entered the hospital? In all likelihood, yes. His death means a lot to me. It showed me that even though you can show so much promise with one treatment, life is never certain. I also learned to love each day like it would be your last. Finally, I learned never to take a diagnosis for granted. Danny's presentation wasn't atypical. It was wrong. My mother recognized it as wrong and brought it up with his doctor several times. The arrogant surgeon laughed at the "silly medical student," my mother, and assured her that this was just an atypical presentation and that, as a medical student, she had a lot to learn. I have never wished that someone rot in Hell (as I actually do not believe in Hell), but today, I hope that there is a something far worse awaiting this man: remorse. However, emotional vengence will not bring Danny back, and I know it. What will bring Danny, and the other two lost loved ones of this week, is loving memory. These people must be remembered for what they've done for you. From something so simple as a smile, or in Danny's case, a phenomenal chocolate chip cookie recipe, we must cherish these memories and keep these people alive at all times in our minds.

I hope we never have this bad of a week ever again.

- Jonathan

A New Found Friend

Finally, I decided to renew my covenant with Christ! By covenant I mean reading the Bible, praying and committing myself to obeying the ten commandments. Once I started reading the Bible I realized why it was so easy to doubt my faith and religion. The words were so powerful and passionate. One who doesn't read the Bible, like I myself, would stray away from the protocol of their religion if they merely went to church and refrained from reading it. The disappointing about it is that I do this every summer, I feel closer to God than ever before, and then school starts and I get swept up in my school work. I decided that if I continue to read the Bible, weekly, then it will be impossible to forget what I have learned.

It started with the kids. I work at a camp with kids that are pretty wild, and as much as I love them it was impossible to teach and work with them. I finally started praying to God, asking Him to calm the children and make them listen to me. It got better, but I still kept praying for them and our camp. Before I knew it, I was praying for everyone else, my family, and myself. Later I figured that it is hard believing in someone you cant see and following a religion whose meaning has been lost, but it's even harder for me to live without God. I am not ashamed to admit that I am weak, and that I need someone strong, not a human on earth, to sustain me and give me strength.

I still have a lot to learn about Christianity and the Lord; hopefully I have many years to learn.

I can't believe Tuesday was a whole week ago. I hope everyone had a much better week than the one that I've had.

When I wake up in the mornings, I feel like I can predict exactly what is going to happen to me during the day. So why should I wake up? Why can't I just sleep?

I feel so lazy. And it is probably because I am. I don't know. I am just tired all the time. And it's hard to sit down and work on anything when you can barely keep your eyes open.

Well, I think that by the end of this month, I will be an official vegetarian!! I am so excited. I learned how to cook a few things yesterday and I am feeling pretty capable. I think I can actually handle it. Ever since I was about five, I've been trying to go vegetarian but my mom would never ever cooperate. But now that I can cook/buy my own food, it is actually going to happen. For reals.

For about six years, whenever someones asked me my favorite animal, I have been kind of stumped. Usually I have to give several because I just couldn't think of one that stood out beyond the rest. Then I realized it. My favorite animal is the ocelot. So that is exciting too.

I left my house, shutdown my computer and then opened it up again and this post is still here. Yay for technology.

I used to sing. I used to really love it. That's one thing I was thinking about today.

I'm not too good at keeping promises today. (Actually I just forgot, so that is a little better, kind of.) This doesn't seem like a selfless post at all. Okay, I am officially not going to use the word "I" once in my next post.

Well. I am awfully tired. So the end.

-Lacey

Basketball

My church holds an annual basketball tournament for the youth each summer. We compete in our various wards (divisions based on locations). This year, they decided this was no longer fair, and put the guys on teams based on skill level. The girls, however, stayed on ward teams. Since about the number of girls is about as half as the guys we only had two teams this year. I was ok with this, considering our ward had won every year since I was twelve.

Now, I'm no basketball player. I know the rules, and I can run up and down a court. I can't shoot or anything of that nature. But the girls are always bad, so it's cool. I looked forward to our team winning again this year.

Right before the game, one the girls said, "How do play basketball?" I laughed, thinking she was joking. She wasn't. I was surprised that my almost everyone on my team just stood stationary. We even had a clinic before going over rules and drills! So for the first time in five years, we lost. I played as hard as a could, and was the "star" of the team...though it wasn't much to be compared to.

So just a story...it didn't really have a point. :)

-Brianna

Scanners Suck

Hey guys, this is Blair filling in for Caroline. She's busy in Georgia and will hopefully be back next week.

At the moment, I'm trying to figure out how to scan my first physics assignment onto my computer to turn in. It is a total pain in the butt. We have three printers in my house and only one works with my computer. My parents are disorganized so they lost the CD to install it. I'm trying to get the program online but its not working!! Technically, I'm not supposed to be working on Physics yet anyway, I'm not "activated" on FLVS. I just want to get it out of the way.

I got the Sims 3 a couple weeks ago. I went to Target before they opened the day the game came out. I'm a little obessed. Anyone who knows me well enough will know that I've been so depressed because the Sims 2 stopped working on my computer months and months ago and I've been desperate to play it again. I stayed up till 3:30 like 2 mornings ago because I lost track of time. Its pretty much the most amazing game ever.

I also took my senior photos recently. They mostly turned out pretty good, but I'm really hard on myself so I hated a lot of them. And for my favorite outfit that I picked, my ear is sticking out of my hair super awkwardly in basically all of them and it ruined all thsoe pictures. I was mad. But I'm glad its over. It really wasn't that bad of a process. Brandon said last year they crammed so many people into a time slot and they spent hardly any time with you, but they got a new guy this year and he spends a whole hour with each person. And he was nice. I still need to go in there and pick up my pictures though......

I started FSU summer music camp today! Well, registration was today. I lost my parking permit 5 minutes after I got it which is kinda bad cause I need it to park in the garage. And I'm a worrier so I was freaking out about where I could've possibly lost it. But its all good, cause Brandon has a second one so I just borrowed one of his. I think this week will be fun, I miss singing in a group. It would've been better if Brandon could come with me though to show me where to go. He has stupid orientation to go to.

And I'm finally having more time to hang out with friends over the summer. Over the year, I had like no classes with my bestest friends and we all were too busy with homework and other issues to see them at all and I thought we got kind of distant. But already this summer, I've gone to a pool party to see everyone, had lunch with Ally, gone to Tropical Smoothie with Lacey and talked for three hours, and also MAO study sessions to see people. I kinda hate MAO practice tests, btw.

In one week, I have to go to Indiana with my parents. 10 hour car ride and a week of nothing to do.....woopee. But I convince Brandon to come with me, which makes it exponentially better right away. I won't be stuck with crazy parents all alone. And we have to share a bedroom which I found really funny. My parents were kinda worried about that but I told them they could just stick a cowbell on him if they thought it made it better.

Oh Brandon found a HILARIOUS video. You should watch it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n8N65UE6-Y

And I think I have told you all the news of my life now. This seems like a really long post, I'm sorry I'm so boring. And sorry for mentioning Brandon so much, but I'm with him all the time so obviously he's involved in lots of this. And he's been staying at my house from like 3 in the afternoon to 2:30 in the morning. Its pretty cool for him to not have a curfew :)

Enjoy Bri tomorrow!


~Blair

Meeting Josh Wilson

Yo.

I finished taking the ACT today. It was alright and much better than the SAT in my opinion. Did you know my chemistry teacher gave me half credit on a 200 point folder check? Yeah, it effectively lowered my grade from a 78 to a 69.9. How great is that? Apparently I didn't put some Ch. 18, 19, and 21 work in the folder. You know why I didn't put it in there? BECAUSE WE TURNED IT IN WHEN SHE ASKED FOR IT!!!!!!! GHIWIONWRVIOQJFPQEFJDPJVAPDOFJQPEGO.......
I'm just a teensy bit angry... that's all...

I found this music artist recently on the radio. His name is Josh Wilson. I wasn't interested at first because I was barely listening to his songs but the second time around I became really intrigued. The one that impressed me the most was a really catchy song called "3 Minute Song" and true to its title, it is exactly three minutes long. The lyrics also made me laugh. Check it out:

He doesn't do anything particularly ground-breaking but I have to admit that the song makes me smile every time I listen to it. This next one is about money. He wrote a song where he talks to money. The song is called "Dear Money" and this one also made me laugh. Mr. Wilson seems to make me laugh a lot =)

Finally, this last song came to me. I was going to tell you guys about this song and name it best sad song and everything. But something even sadder and more depressing came up today. After I was done taking the ACT, a friend of mine received terrible news... really terrible news. Her parents got in a car accident and both were severely injured. I was shocked. How was I supposed to react to something like that? I tried to get it out of my mind and tried to assure myself that it probably wasn't that bad. When I got to the car, this song came to me and I had a nagging bad feeling. I hate it when I have bad feelings. I really do... A few hours later, only one of her parents made it. Even if you don't believe, I'd like to ask you to pray for my friend (don't want to give away names) and her parents because this hit her really hard. Here is the final song:

I wish I could have ended on a better note. Sorry.

-June