Tomorrow?!

The second part of my cleaning day(s) turned out nicely. I got $17 worth of work done.
Add that up to yesterday's, and I now have a total of $30.
$25 of that goes to my savings for the iPod.
The rest goes in my wallet.

I've spent the remainder of the day preparing for tomorrow. Both mentally and physically.
After all, tomorrow will be a big day.
First day of classes...
It's always interesting. The instructors will likely have us say our name, degree we're going for, and an "interesting fact" about ourselves.
I still haven't come up with the "interesting fact" (I was trying to think one up in advance to prevent awkward moments of thought during class tomorrow).

Even though I won't have to be at school until 9am, I plan to wake up around 6am and leave about 8:30am. Maybe a bit earlier, depending on how the morning goes.
I know where my classes will be. I'm familiar enough with the buildings to not be worried about that.
I still would like to beat Daly to CCCC, though.
He thinks he's going to beat me there...

Unproductive-ness.

Today was not nearly as productive as I'd hoped it'd be.
I slept in.
Made out a list when I finally woke.
Started the first thing on the list, then went to lunch with Grandma.
Upon returning home, Mum decided it'd be just grand to rearrange the furniture with my help. So I couldn't finish my first task until much later in the afternoon.
I really only did two things on the list.
I technically earned $13, though.
Two dollars of which do not belong to me, since I owe both Dad and Daly a dollar.
I tried to give Daly that dollar tonight at youthgroup and he refused to touch it. When I thought he'd finally accepted it, he had actually stuck it in my bag without my knowing and I didn't find it until I got home this evening.

My two formerly nameless green anoles are now missing parts of their tails.
Ty's tail is Clive's fault. Cat likes lizards...
But Stumpfy... I don't know what happened with him.

Friday is the first day of the spring semester!
I can hardly wait!
Thank God I was able to get those classes! It all worked out so perfectly.

!!!!!!!!!!!!

YES YES YES YES!!!!
YES!!!!!!!!!
SO HAPPY!!!
YEAHHH!

ONLY ONE ROCK OUT.
!!!!!

(that's groundbreaking, by the way)

Oh yeah, if you're wondering what I'm so happy about..
I GOT MY CLASSES.
All three that I wanted!
Yes!
--Literature-Based Research (Daly has this class, but at a different time)
--Human Values and Meaning (Daly and I will have this class together!)
--Elementary Spanish II (hopefully people like Amy, Phillip, James, etc, will have this class. I'll have my Spanish teacher from last semester!!! I'm really happy about that!)
Also, I'll have the free hour in between Spanish and Literature-Based Research. Time to spend with Daly!

Yes. Very happy.

Crickets and College.

This morning brought both good news and bad news.
I was informed by my father that I will indeed be able to take the classes I want to (if there is any room left).
And two crickets died during the night.
Figures.
So I pretty much wasted twenty cents.
Lovely.

I've been looking up college application stuff just about all day and have been entering random essays and poems into a few contests on certain (credible, yes) websites.
I'm more likely to get scholarships if I've got stuff published.
And a scholarship of ANY kind would be helpful.

Clockwork.

Daly came with us to church, as you may well know.
It was a nice day. I really did enjoy it.
I went to Petsmart to get my semi-weekly cricket purchase.
Some girl got my crickets for me. I really don't like it when people of the female gender get my crickets..
She counted EACH individual cricket and made sure I had EXACTLY twenty crickets. (Well, she gave me 21, but the 21st was dead.)
See, when I have someone like Grayson or Antoine to get my crickets, they just pour them in and give me what LOOKS like the number I requested.
Which is quite nice, because, what if one died or something? Then I'd have one less than I payed for. (the fact that they don't exactly count the crickets may have something to do with my sneaking suspicion that both of the fellows fancy me...)
Anyhow, that cricket counting episode kind of made me sad..
We stopped by the thrift store before heading on over to youthgroup. I found a record! Yes! And guess what! It is in perfect condition!
Oh, you're probably wondering which record I'm referring to..
Clockwork, by Alex de Grassi.
In marvelously wonderful condition.
So I bought that.
And now I owe two people a dollar each (for the sole reason that I neglected to actually bring money with me). It should be no problem at all, even though I'm not really wanting to spend the $50 I have (I've hidden it out of my sight).
I'll just do a few paying chores around the house and make a few more dollars...

Tuesday.
And Friday.
Yes.
Big days.
I hope there's youth on Wednesday.

Yes..

Today was the wedding!
It was a very nice wedding. Saki and Cool Cousin look so cute together.
The only thing I had against the event was that it seemed to drag on and on...
The stories. They got terribly long, boring, and repetitive.
The speakers. They were... eh, slightly boring.
The family pictures. Too many. Too long.
The reception. Lovely, so far as food is concerned. But then they had all these other ceremonies and it just seemed to never end...
We actually left before it was completely over.
I am glad.
I was VERY tired at that point (and still am!).

Daly is coming to church with us tomorrow.

I'm still going strong with my New Years not-resolution.

I am going to wear my pirate shirt tomorrow.

I am tired.

A Number of Things...

This evening, I went to the dress rehearsal dinner for Cool Cousin and Saki's wedding (which will be tomorrow at 2pm). It was a fancy dinner, yet, all the dishware, glassware, and cutlery was made of plastic...
Had to have been the most informal formal meal I've ever had.

Got home. Tried to put two videos on my iPod (Monk and Psych) but I somehow managed to erase everything on my iPod instead.
Quite discouraging...
I felt like crying. Seriously.
It takes quite a while to put 900 songs on an iPod when you're doing it manually (the only way I will do it). I took a deep breath and refilled my iPod, at the same time, going through some songs I haven't listened to in quite a while.

By the way, progress on my funds for my future iPod Classic (when this one dies. The battery only lasts about a day, so I know the end is not too far off...)
I've got $50 dollars saved so far.
I'm going to try to make some more money this weekend. It'll be challenging, though, because tomorrow is that wedding and Sunday we're going to be gone all day...
Well, maybe by the time Tuesday or Wednesday rolls around, I can clean the house and make another $25 or so.
I plan to do that sort of thing. Still go with my March 31 goal. Just because (even though it is no longer important because I doubt this iPod is going to die that quickly..)

I did some work in my Chemistry and Algebra 2 computer classes. If I didn't want to, I wouldn't have to do any more until Tuesday (algebra) and Wednesday (chemistry).

Next Tuesday is open registration at CCCC!
I plan to get there super early. As soon as they open.

Le Festin!

I cleaned my entire room. The whole thing. Organized all the drawers. All the shelves. All the little corners and hiding places for old forgotten papers and such.

It took the whole day. But I did it.

On New Years Day, too!

What a grand way to start out the year!

The question I have been asking today is, do you have any resolutions?

I've gotten some really interesting answers.

Unfortunately, I don't really have resolutions.

I have goals.

Goals for the year.

One of my goals for the year is to actually read through the whole Bible.

I don't really have any others right now...

Last year's goal was to keep a journal for a full year. And I did it!

The Spring semester is coming around!

I am painting a new canvas tote bag for my books. I plan to paint a new one each semester.

This one has an abstract sun on one side and the outline of a star on the other along with some lyrics to Le Festin by Camille. In French, they are, "Je suis heureux a l'idée de ce nouveau destin

Une vie à me cacher, et puis libre enfin."

In English, that is, "I am pleased at the prospect of this new destiny
A life in hiding, and then finally free."

I am tired now. I still have to get on with my New Years not-Resolution...

And I'd like to get ahead in my computer classes.

So long!

2009??

I neglected to write yesterday.

It's just as well.  Nothing of any significance really happened.  I mainly just listened to my iPod and experimented with it.

Today was a productive day.  I did $31 worth of household chores (it was a lot of work).

I was motivated.  And I had music.  Good combination.

I have this plan, see.  I have an iPod, yes.  But it won't last forever.  So I am going to save up my money like I originally planned and be ready so that when this one does die, I'll have the money to purchase a new one.

So I've planned to make at least $25 per week for ten weeks and I'll have enough money to buy either an iPod Touch or an iPod Classic (120 GB?!?).

And for my birthday, I don't plan to do anything special.  I'll ask for money if anyone asks me what I want (I'm not sure many will...  Most people who would give me a gift know me too well to give me money).

Oh, by the way. 

*ahem*

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!

Anyhow.  I have $50 saved up (officially).

One more dollar and I'll have $75 (officially).

Amazing..  It's all moving along quite nicely. 

My current project and goal is my room.

I'm cleaning things like drawers that I haven't seen organized in a few years.  A desk that certainly needs a little straightening.  Stuff like that.

Maybe after it's all organized, I'll actually have room for stuff...

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!