College and stuff

I'm graduating high school in exactly one week. In one week, an entire chapter of my life will be over. Am I sad? Not really. I'm not really losing anything other than the wonderful daily experience of people not knowing how to properly walk through a hallway and the privilege of having an 'honor card' that displays, in physical form, how far the administration trusts us. (Answer: up to six infraction before you lose privileges like 'wearing jeans occasionally.') Am I happy? Not really. I've enjoyed high school, for all my complaints. Am I scared/excited/nervous? Well.

Hell yes.

I'm about to make one of the biggest changes in my life ever. I'll be moving out of my parents' house. I'll be living with one of my best friends - with someone who I choose to live with, instead of someone I'm obliged to live with. Meanwhile, three of my other best friends are moving to a college three hours away (164 miles away according to Google) and I'll see them at best once a month - less than 5% of what I'm used to. I'm going to lose the security of having 90% of my time scheduled by someone else, and gain the freedom of getting to schedule that time myself. I'm going to have to do things like pay for gas and food for myself all the time. I'm freaking out.

But I'm going to do it. I'm going to rock it. I'm going to send my friends stupid texts once a day. I'm going to enroll in classes that make me happy, that teach me. I'm going to make awesome music. And I'm going to do it on as cheaply as possible, 'cause, you know, poor college student.

Rock on.

Rambling Thing About Yesterday

So. Yesterday. Yeah. About that.

So the day started at four, when I left for a friend's new house. Shut up, it's summer, I'm technically nocturnal now. I had my swim suit, because he has a hot tub, and if there is a hot tub I will rewire the house to be able to play whatever videogames are being played from within the hot tub and/or set up a string-and-can system to be able to participate in the conversations. Because hot tubs are that awesome. But then I showed up, and found out that the hot tub no longer worked due to some mechanical issue or another and I had never gotten the text telling me this. Sad face. Plus I now had to wander around for the rest of the day with a halter top bikini under my clothes.

Then there was the awkward hour and a half where Rockband was played, other people were given directions to the house that consisted of, and I quote, 'Just keep taking lefts until the road isn't blocked off any more,' more Rockband, a search for the ring I lost (which turned out to be at home,) and finally sitting and staring at each other while Devin sat in the corner making prank calls to random numbers.

Then Baustin received a text inviting us all to Chickenfest, which we leapt on because we'd completely run out of ideas of what to do since there was no hot tub. Having learned from experience, when we drove over I rode with Baustin, because Austin is a scary driver. And considering the fact that we saw him nearly cause three accidents in the twenty minute drive there, it was a wise choice. Seriously, freaking SCARY.

Then we got to Chickenfest (there were no chickens in evidence, sadly) and I discovered how much testosterone poisoning I was suffering when I turned into a freaking Valley Girl at the sight of Jess, my one stereotypically girly friend. I squee'd. I don't do that unless I'm in fangirl mode. Of course, I got free unlimited rides and a VIP pass for the concert from her because she didn't want to 'waste it on the guys,' so yay for me, I guess?

The concert was Stefano, apparently an American Idol reject. It probably says something about me that while the tweenage girls around us were screaming his name, I was spending way more time checking out the keyboard (and keyboardist) and sound system (and sound guy). Still not worth the bleeding ears from the tweenagers, though.

Then we (the guys and the girls) all met up by a gigantic motorized street-legal shopping cart and BSed for a while before Baustin wandered away, then called me to say that I had to head to the woods because FIREFLIES. Of course I promptly headed towards the woods. Jess followed, because no way no HOW was she letting me hang in the woods with the guy she wanted to be Her Guy. Right about then I remembered why I only have one girly friend, because she was becoming highly irritating and I just wanted to hang with my best friend and watch fireflies.

There were fireflies. It was cool. Then we all got slightly lost in the woods.

Yeah, walking through the woods after dark with no flashlights and no clue where we were going was a bad idea. Moving on.

There was a playground back in the festival area, so of course we took over the tire swing and just hung out talking and listening to the slightly above mediocre cover band perform in the tent behind us. Then I left, or tried to leave, and when I found out I couldn't due to directional issues I went back and found out everyone else had left. Which, of course, meant that I headed to the VIP concert section and listened to the final concert of the evening, a better cover band, and rocked out until my ride showed.





*A recent survey revealed 95% of my friends are guys. A further 4% are girls that are about as 'girly' as a pink flamethrower. Then there's Jess.

Can't Quite String Together a Coherent, Long Train of Thought

I'm semi-officially a senior in high school now. Summer vacation has started. I should be freaking out over both of these things, and figuring out how best to get maximum enjoyment out of my summer.

Instead, I spent two hours yesterday cleaning up after previous renters to make a house ready for new ones. Ew. Certain things I'd really prefer not to clean up, and someone else's nasty kitchen or odd-smelling bathroom are definitely high on that list.

On the upside, there's a pool party this afternoon. I love having so many friends with pools. It means I don't have to pay for a pool pass, ever. Maybe, if I go swimming enough, I'll even discover a heretofore latent ability to *gasp* tan. Unlikely. But whatever.




I discovered a lava lamp in the attic today. Yes, it's now in my room. Shut up, it's blue and purple and highly distracting. I spent half an hour earlier just watching it. Lava-stuff goes up... Lava stuff goes down... Lava-stuff goes up... Lava-stuff goes down... Then I distracted myself from that distraction by trying to figure out the relative density of the lava-stuff in heated and unheated forms, compared to the liquid in which it floats. Then I realized I had to factor in cohesion of the lava-stuff to itself, and how much it weighed, and measure the time it took to float up and down, and while I was searching for a stopwatch I realized exactly how bored I am. And how much of a nerd I am.

(No, of course that didn't stop me. As far as I can tell, if the water at 50 degrees C has a density of 988.1 kg/m^3, then this material has a density of roughly 900kg/m^3 at the same temperature. When unheated, I'm thinking it's something like 1050kg/m^3 or more. Of course this is probably all wrong, considering some research I did, which led me to realize that the water isn't pure [duh], so that density is off and therefore so is everything else. Plus I have no clue what the wax is, etc. etc. There's only so much Google can help me with. But it was a pleasantly nerdy distraction from my distraction from my distraction.)



I just realized my soda is the same color as my lava lamp. Interesting.