MySpace, Applebee's, and Uncle Steve. And stupid algebra 2.

I officially started two of my five classes for next semester today. These two are computer/online sort of classes.
Chemistry.
And lovely Algebra 2.
I think those two classes will be the death of me.
At least I don't have to do them at certain times... Just as long as all my work is done by the end of the week.
That does make things a bit nicer.

Well, nothing really happened today outside of that. I listened to my "new" iPod. I put a few more songs on it. I straightened my room. I played some piano.
Oh, my uncle Steve left to go back to Alexandria today. He's thinking of moving down here, though, so as soon as he sells his house, we'll be seeing him again.

I do not like Applebee's.

And I'm trying to cancel my MySpace account. It's taking a bit of a long time. It said they'd send me a confirmation email, but so far, I haven't gotten it.
I got impatient earlier and canceled my account a second time.

Sunday with Daly.

Well today was a good day.
My happy wagon has completely recovered with a grand total of 17 rocks in.
Daly came to our house around 8:40am. Dad saw he was here first and went to get... yes, his shotgun.
And he sat down at the end of the kitchen table facing the living room, so the first thing Daly would see would be him cleaning his shotgun.
Lovely.
Daly and I later talked about the "incident" and he said he was probably holding his breath the whole time until my Dad put away the shotgun.
It was quite hilarious, I admit. I laughed the whole time, pretty much.
We went to church. Daly was awfully quiet (in his speech) the whole ride up there. Upon arriving at church, things got progressively better until he was acting quite himself.
We went to lunch at California Pizza Kitchen. My siblings, Daly, and I shared two pizzas. Their White Pizza is so delicious...
We walked Southpoint Mall for a bit before going to Petsmart. Antoine was not there, but Grayson was. I asked for fifteen crickets and (though I did not count), I'm pretty sure he gave me a bit more than fifteen.
Sad thing: I spent 2 dollars on the crickets (well, technically only $1.69, but I don't count the loose change).
While at Petsmart, I discovered Daly got an iPod Touch for Christmas. I had somewhat been suspicious of this. And when he started saying something about him knowing "someone who got an iPod Touch for Christmas and won't be needing his 30GB iPod anymore" I had a feeling he was referring to himself...
He also mentioned that the 30GB iPod was free...
Well, it wasn't until after Petsmart that I knew for sure he was talking about his old iPod.
He took it out of his shirt pocket when we got in the car. Handed it to me. Waited. I looked at it. Looked at him. Asked him if he wanted any money for it. He said no.
"Well. That was easy." I said.
He handed me the iPod synchronization cord and got out his iPod Touch to show me some neat stuff that it could do.
So I guess there is no longer a need for me to save up $267.50.
I will continue to save my money, though. Just in case this iPod were to randomely break.
Also, my sister's birthday is coming up next. February 19th.
Scott's is on February 10th. He'll be eighteen...
*sigh*
But then my birthday will be on March 18th! I'm considering not mentioning it...
I'll either do that, or actually say something about it.
I don't know.
I am planning to not do much for my birthday, though. At least, as of now. We'll see how things look as we get closer to the day...

But anyhow, it was a good day.
We took Daly home. He lives like, two minutes away from where my Grandma used to live. His parents like to talk.... Mine do too.... That can be a bad combination, if you know what I mean.
So we ended up staying at Daly's house for nearly an hour. I got to see their goats, huge dogs, fields, front yard, his climbing tree that is apparently quite difficult to climb (it certainly looks difficult), and his house. Well, a good part of it. The kitchen, the hallway, a glimpse of the living room (it looked rather... decorated), and his room.
His room is smaller than I imagined it to be.
But I also got to see Pocket Mouse!
I had a couple of opportunities to play some Yann Tiersen on the piano... But I didn't. I kind of wish I did.
Next time, I WILL.
I'll make myself.
Yes.

Today. That is all.

The beginning of today was unpleasant. My happy wagon lost 12 rocks.
The afternoon was calming. I recovered.
The early evening was productive. I finished all the tasks on my list.
The later evening was tiring. I got six hours of sleep last night.
The early night, I took a look at my sad happy wagon. Not so happy, now was it...
Now my happy wagon has 6 rocks back in, giving a total of 14 in.
Which is much better than only 8.

Daly is coming to church with us tomorrow for the first time.
I have two surprises for him. Hair scrunchy. Le Bon Croissant.
Tomorrow should be a good day. I also plan to stop by Petsmart while we're out in Durham.
Maybe Antoine will be there. He wasn't there last week, but I'm assuming it was his Christmas break or something.

Oh, speaking of tomorrow, my Dad was joking with me today about getting his new shotgun out and polishing the barrel in the living room when Daly walks in the door tomorrow morning.
Hopefully he was only joking. I imagine it would be a bit awkward if he really did do it.

Now it is late night and I should get some sleep.
Good Night!

$222.50

I sold the Jones sodas to my brother.
$5.
Progress with the iPod....

What a Day.

Ah, the day of Christmas. Something I will now have to wait 365 days to experience again.
It started out quite nice. I was woken by the sound of Christmas music and the voices of my parents wishing us a Merry Christmas. My siblings and I ventured downstairs and unwrapped the little stocking stuffers in our stockings. I got toothpaste... And deodorant... Also the next Hallmark ornament in the series my parents started giving me each year starting with my first Christmas.
We ate breakfast after the stockings. Scrambled eggs. Cranberry juice. Baklava(I was the only one to have it, though).
We all moved to the sofas in the family room by the Christmas tree...
And began opening our gifts.
I got rocks.
Seriously.
I asked for them, though. They're decorational for fish bowls and stuff. I also got more toothpaste. (Are they trying to tell me something??)
I also received granola bars (why am I not surprised...), a capo, guitar tuner, guitar strings, an reeds air freshener thing, an African robe(it's actually quite neat), Martian Child (second favorite movie!), Ratatouille, The Fragile Army by The Polyphonic Spree, and a few other miscellaneous gifts.
My brother gave me aspen wood shavings for Dormir's new house. He also gave me hamster food.
My sister gave me two necklaces and a pair of earrings. They're very lovely.
And the last gift I opened (by the instruction of my mother) was a bunch of rabbit skins. I found this wonderful because I have been wanting to make a blanket out of a bunch of rabbit pelts. It's so warm and soft.
So then, it was over. Christmas was over. It was about 11:30am. So at least it all lasted a few hours.
It's amazing. You wait 365 days for it to get here, and it's all over in a couple of hours. If that.
Well, I took my gifts upstairs into my room and began finding places for things like the granola bars and such.
Dad called me and my siblings back downstairs after about thirty minutes and had us all sit in the places we had sat to open the gifts again.
He then proceeded to hand us each a gift. My sibling's gifts both looked like nicely shaped boxes. Mine was a bit lumpy. And heavy.
I unwrapped mine first... it was.... more rabbit skins! I counted them all later and I have a total of 42 rabbit pelts! That is plenty enough to make a blanket. Just the right amount, really. Six across, seven down. Perfect.
My sister opened her gift next. She had... a small pink FujiFilm camera! It looked expensive.
My brother's gift was a nice video camera. It also looked a tad on the expensive side...
I took the rabbit pelts upstairs and laid them all out on my floor to see how many I had. I counted. Then spaced them out in the shape of my bed. Yes, I had enough. Just perfectly.
Lunch was made up of a few random snacks. I cannot even recall what I had. Probably a cookie or something.
I finished putting away my gifts and organizing my mess of a room unitl about 3:30pm when we drove to my grandpa's house.
There was food, family, conversation, laughter, silly cousins, dogs, guns (loud and random... The menfolk were shooting at a target), and of course, presents after supper.
My "personal" gifts aunt gave me four bottles of Jones Soda.
It is apparant she does not know me all that well.
I am going to attempt to sell the sodas to one or both of my siblings.
My grandpa gave me $25, and someone else gave me $5.
Add that to my ten dollars I made by cleaning bathrooms around the house, and I've only got to save up $227.50 more to get that iPod Classic.
My plan is to get it by the end of March.
Oh, I brought Dormir to Grandpa's house. All my extended family reacted well to him.
My "personal" gifts aunt told me about some random disease that hamsters can get and was warning me that if Dormir got stressed, he'd die.
Which yes, that is very likely to be true...
But I have a feeling if he was going to get stressed about little things, he'd already be dead.
I'm not worried about him.
I was just hoping her holding him and talking about him like that wouldn't spread that "curse" of dying hamsters (her daughter had two hamsters at different times and they both died fairly quickly).
So yes. That was the only slightly negative thing to happen, really.
Nobody commented on my dreads.
I expected that, though. They didn't really say anything at Thanksgiving either..

Now I'm home. Dormir is sleeping in his new tea box. He seems to e enjoying his new home.
I think I'd like to watch Ratatouille. The question is... how late will I be staying up if I do that?

Not a Creature Was Stirring...

Merry Christmas to one and all!!

Even though it's only been Christmas for an hour and a few minutes, lovely things have already happened.
Daly and I spent about 36 minutes deciding if we'd open the gifts we gave each other tonight, or wait until tomorrow morning. Eventually, he flipped a coin.
Tails for tonight, heads for tomorrow.
And it landed on tails.
So I opened his handmade card first. It was really quite hilarious. I love it.
Then he opened one of his gifts (I gave him two). The first he opened was a book called The Tale Of Despereaux. It is my own copy. And such a beautiful book, it is. I even included the bookmark I used while reading it.
Then I opened my gift. Carefully unwrapping it (I got the wrapping paper off all in one piece!), I saw that whatever it was that he had given me was in a box.
The box itself was your typical Belk box. Gray and whatnot. But what made it special was, he had drawn all over it! Little drawings of memories like Water Pipe Fairies, Mr. Stumpf, Pocket Mouse, bad cat, and a few other random things (including a drawing of a mouse he did with his left hand).
I cut all the tape holding the box together. Inside was..... a beautiful, colorful scarf! Very soft. It looks somewhat expensive. And wrapped in the scarf was a CD! It was the soundtrack to August Rush! (My favorite movie of all time.)
So I folded the wrapping paper and put the bow and card and tag from the scarf inside the gift box. I'm saving it. All of it.
He opened his other gift. I had bought him a really cool (I think) journal. It's got a music-themed cover.
He likes it! And, what's kind of funny is, he said, "Last time I was in a book store, I found myself a journal for when I start one next year...
I picked one out, and I continued looking around until my mom called me and told me it was time to go. I had all intentions of buying it. But as I walked to the counter, I oddly changed my mind and sat it down and left."
I found that interesting.
Also, he said, "I think your gifts are potentially going to be my favorite this year."
So now, it is quite late and I ought to be asleep. I will likely be a tad tired tomorrow. But I don't really care. It was worth staying up tonight. Completely worth it.
But I believe it is a good idea to get some rest.
Christmas Day is usually a big day..

The Eve of Christmas...

It's been a pretty nice Christmas Eve.
We had Grandma over for lunch and had some kind of roast with some cooked vegetables, biscuits, and salad. And of course, Christmas cookies and such for dessert.
After a lovely lunch, we opened the gifts from her side of the family. And the gifts from her, to her, all that. She gave me Edward Scissorhands (love that movie!), granola bars (she knows me too well...), and cashews!(quite lovely, they are. But only Planters name brand will do)
I gave her the George Winston CD. It's a great CD. :D
Also, around the wrapped can of cashews, there was a red ribbon. I tied it in a bow around Dormir's neck. After crawling around a bit (and even crawling through the ribbon once or twice), he settled down to sleep in my lap.

Cutest thing you ever did see.
After all the gifts had been opened and unwrapped, Caleb decided he would rather see Edward Scissorhands than It's A Wonderful Life. So we voted on it, and Edward Scissorhands was chosen as the film to be viewed with Grandma (though I did vote for It's A Wonderful Life).
I do love Edward Scissorhands, though. Good story. Johnny Depp is a very talented actor.
Mom and Dad took Grandma home after the movie. We ate supper when they got back, plus watched another movie. This one was on Hallmark called The Christmas Choir. It was a good movie. It ended nicely.
And now, everyone is in their respective bedrooms. Waiting... Just waiting for Christmas morning to arrive...
It'll come sooner than we want.

Already?!

HAPPY EVE OF CHRISTMAS!!!

Left Hand Texting.

So I've noticed the past few days that when I put pressure on the lower part of my right palm, it pains me terribly.
I talked with my Dad about it last night and he said it might be from texting, since I usually text with that hand, and only my thumb. (I'm actually quite fast!)
So he suggested texting with my left hand for a bit.
Won't be too much of a problem. I'm ambidextrous in a lot of things, really. I'll just have to get used to where the numbers/letters are on the phone again...
Also, my converse are clean. They're hanging in the shower to dry. I'm glad that they look nice and white and new again. Muddy converse just kind of break my heart...

That pound cake I made yesterday? Delicious.

Happy Birthday!

Today is my Dad's birthday! I'm going to help make a nice 5 Flavor Pound Cake for him. It's his mom's recipe. When she died, all her kids made copies of her recipe book.
Here is the recipe as it's written:

Dolly's Five Flavor Pound Cake
-2 sticks butter, room temperature
-1/2 cup shortening
-3 cups sugar
-1 teaspoon each:
--butter flavoring/extract
--rum " "
--lemon " "
--coconut " "
--vanilla " "
-5 eggs, well beaten
-1 cup milk
Sift together:
-3 cups plain flour
-1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

For glaze:
-1/4 cup sugar
-2 tablespoons water
-1/4 teaspoons each of all extracts/flavorings used
-1/4 teaspoon almond extract
Bring to boil until sugar dissolves.

Cream butter and shortening, add sugar and cream until fluffy. Add extracts and beat eggs until fluffy. Add sifted flour combination. Add alternately with milk mixture. Bake in floured and greased tube pan 1 1/2 hours at 350 degrees.
Brush glaze over hot cake and let cool.



Now, the way that recipe is written is potentially confusing. I was confused by typing it. But we've made it year after year and had no trouble yet.. So good luck to you, if you decide to give the recipe a go!

An Ordinary Sunday?

Today I went to church.
Not much special about that. I go to church just about every Sunday.

Something that was special (or rather, out of the ordinary) was Kevin was there. Kevin, my cousin 50 times removed (okay, slight exaggeration. His great grandfather and my great grandfather were brothers), had not seen me with my dreadlocks. Upon seeing me, he shook my hand and said, "I've never met someone with dreadlocks. Well, actually I have. But I've never met you with dreadlocks."
He's a pretty funny fellow.

We went to Moe's for lunch. Kevin didn't come, unfortunately. His sister, Megan (we actually share the same birthday, she and I. We're just one year apart in age.), got a puppy. They went home so she could take care of it and such.

After Moe's, we drove over to Barnes & Noble where I purchased two George Winston CDs. One for my Grandma (Autumn) and one for my Mum (Spring). Also stopped by Petsmart to buy some crickets. Antoine was not there. Neither was Grayson. Instead, some girl got my crickets for me. She counted out EXACTLY ten crickets. No more, no less. It seems like everytime I go there, I get less...

Except when Antoine or Grayson get the crickets for me. If I ask for ten, I end up with nearly twenty.

While I was there, I picked up a little free booklet thing on the care of salamanders. Apparently they like live insects such as crickets. Oh boy.. More food to buy...

I stopped by the rodent/small animal section there and saw something that I found very interesting.

Le Bon Croissant!

It is amazing because Daly has a mouse named Little Chef. He got the name from Ratatouille. When I saw that package of Le Bon Croissant -for small animals- I just had to buy it.
Yes. I'm giving it to Daly.
Not for Christmas, though. No, I'll just randomely give it to him. A surprise.
Which, by the way, he may come to church with me next Sunday. I mentioned the idea to him, and he liked it.
He'll have to bring Little Chef with him. I told him that. He said he might bring Pocket Mouse along as well. If you're wondering how he manages such a thing as two mice, he keeps them in his coat pockets.
Oh yeah, Daly's cell phone kind of stopped working today. Means no texting. Very sad, yes. I'll miss that greatly, especially since we're on holiday.
He said that if it doesn't work tomorrow, he'll get his parents to take him to the place he got it.
Speaking of tomorrow, the time says 12:08am. I do believe I should be getting some sleep.
Good Night!

A Bit Tired, I'd Say...

This has been a pretty unproductive day.
I spent most of my afternoon at the computer.
I did nothing.
I can't even remember the details.
Details of nothing... That's actually kind of interesting sounding.
Maybe make a good song or album name.
Or a book.
That'd be cool.
This evening we watched Hancock and had pizza. There is a lot of profanity in that movie... Other than that, it was good.
And later in the evening, I Skyped with Daly and watched Monk. Two episodes. The Christmas one, and another called Mr. Monk Goes to the Hospital.
I find that show quite hilarious. Love it. Yes.
Still talking with Daly.
I'm going to miss him come Monday. No more classes until January 9th.

Duerme...

By the way. This is Dormir. Dormir is the Spanish verb for "to sleep."
And she (I mean, he. I'm pretty sure Dormir is a fellow hamster now.) sleeps quite a bit.

Bah at MySpace.

Something that is slightly upsetting to me is that MySpace has blocked Project Playlist. Very bad. Very, very bad.
I will survive, though...
We went to Walmart today to shop for Mom for Christmas. While there, I bought Lydia a fingernail manicure kit thing that I have a very good feeling she'll like.
My shoes are soaking wet still. I've had them in that bucket for nearly two days (the only reason behind that is, I forgot about them). I should take them out and see about maybe bleaching them. They need bleaching because, I was adventuring with Daly behind CCCC where there is this creek that's really Enchanted looking and stepped in a good bit of mud. It pretty much stained up my new converse. Which is slightly upsetting. But they're just shoes. It's not the end of the world. And if I do this right, I'll have them looking like new in no time...
I think I'm hungry.
I know I'm tired.
And I have things I could and probably should do.
MySpace is annoying me.
Also, Daly has a credit card now. It was his mom's idea. See, he needed a new computer and apparently, if you charge it on a credit card, you get 10% off.
His parents are funny like that.
So he has a credit card.
I don't think he really wanted one...

[Insert Title Here]

I didn't have any classes today, you know. I went to CCCC for about four hours anyway.
I went with Daly as he switched his major to an Assocciate in Arts. We sold his books from this past semester and were going to buy his new books, but he had apparently spent too much with his debit card already (he had payed for next semester's classes a little while earlier). We had tea afterwards and walked about outside. We walked to and from his car numerous times. One of the later times we did this (he kept having to go back to get stuff or put stuff away), I stuck the gift bag with his Christmas gifts in it in the back of his car. He saw what I had done and started smiling. I told him that the only thing he couldn't do was open them before Christmas. He told me to walk to the passenger seat of his car and look in the window.
So I did.
In the passanger seat, there sat a gift wrapped in Christmas-y wrapping paper with a ribbon tied around it. The ribbon had been cut and curled to look... really fancy. Daly said it looked "dangerous." He says it was his mom's idea to make the ribbon like that.
It looks like a lot of work went into it.
Also, there was a card taped to the top. Daly said he "made the card and the envelope."
When had told Daly he couldn't open his gift until Christmas, he said, "Well then you can't open your's either!"
So we put my gift from him in my bag and walked on.
We chanced upon a Red Salamander (I think). Apparently they're a protected species? I don't know...
But I'm keeping it. I named it Tag.
I brought Dormir with me to CCCC, and she (I'm really starting to think she looks like a he...) can be quite troublesome at the most inconvenient times. It never fails.
Also, we visited Mr. Malenick at his office and found out our final grades for Psychology. I got a 102.5 and Daly got a 101.6.
That class was a very nice class. It was fun. Mr. Malenick is a good teacher. I wish I had him for a class next semester, but I doubt I will. Maybe next fall semester...
Daly and I walked around quite a bit. When it got close to noon, we started standing around in the courtyard of CCCC, waiting for my Dad to pick me up for lunch. When Dad came, he asked me "how was school that was not?" because he knew I didn't have any classes today.
So I told him a little of my adventures.
We got home, ate lunch, and did a few things.
Now I'm at my Grandma's house. I'm tired. I want to go home, really. But I'm waiting...

What Does One Use For a Title?

Still not asleep. I've spent the last almost hour trying to figure out how this website works.
It's very confusing at first.
I'm starting to get very tired, though.
Oh, tomorrow, I'm bringing some presents to school. Since it's the last day of the semester, I probably won't see Daly again until January 9th.
So I'm giving him his Christmas gifts tomorrow, but ordering him to not open them until Christmas.
Anyhow. I should get some sleep.
I'm still talking to Daly on Skype, though....

A Title?

Well, this is my first day blogging...
I have a journal. Well, many journals, really.
But my notebook is running out of pages and I want to continue keeping record of my days...
Today was a pretty nice day. I went to CCCC, but didn't have any classes. I just walked around campus with Daly, Pocket Mouse, and Little Chef. Also Dormir. But if you don't count the three rodents, I walked with only Daly. For a bit over an hour. We followed the perimeter of the campus and talked (we never seem to run out of things to talk about). I got to hold Pocket Mouse for some of the time. I really have been missing her lately. At least I've got Dormir. Dormir makes things a little better. Even though she sometimes get's annoyed with me and bites my finger...
Right now, I'm talking to Daly on Skype (instant messaging) and wondering when I should go to sleep.
Now, probably. After all, I'll be waking up fairly early tomorrow morning to go to CCCC (no classes again). Planning to spend four hours with Daly. That's the longest amount of time I think I've ever spent with him at one time. It should be nice.
Also, tomorrow is the last day of the semester. Christmas holiday until January 9th.
It seems so far away...