Last post of the year

This is my last D.J. post of the year and I know it's a little late, but I'm doing it anyway because I don't want to fail this class.

This post is about our class retreat. This year the sophomore class went on the "wilderness experience". At first, I wasn't to psyched about this. I hate the wilderness (mostly because of bugs). All the previous classes had said it was a fun trip, so I tried to keep an open mind. When we got there, the first thing my group did was the high ropes course. I hate heights so I didn't like the high ropes course at first, but when I did the ladder thing with Hannah I had so much fun! I felt so accomplished afterwards because at first I only did it because Hannah wanted to, but then it turned out that we were the fastest to beat it in our group.

After the ropes course we went scuba diving. This was a really great experience. It was fun breathing and swimming underwater, and a lot of other people enjoyed it too. After we ate lunch, we went to the actual wilderness. We did some "class bonding" games when we got there and then we ate dinner. Later, we had a campfire and then we went to bed.

The next day, we went kayaking and did some problem solving games with our groups. Both of these were really fun, but I especially enjoyed the kayaking. It was the perfect weather for it, and the water was surprisingly warm. After that we cleaned out our cabins, had lunch, and then it was time to go.

Usually I don't like class trips because I think the activities planned either aren't fun, or we just have too much going on and I feel like there isn't time to rest (and sometimes it's just that I don't want to spend time with the majority of the class). But this retreat I thoroughly enjoyed. All the activities were really fun (especially the ropes course and kayaking). I also bonded with some people I didn't expect to. I think the trip was well-planned and I hope the new sophomores next year enjoy it as much as I did. I also hope our next class retreat is as fun.

The end of the year...

Honestly, this is the first thing that came to mind and I am super behind on my blogging and can't think of anything else. It's the end of the school year, and I am so surprised that we have less than three weeks left. I don't think this year went by fast, but looking back I don't know how I made it here. It kinda seems like one, big blur.

In August, I had no clue how this year was going to turn out. Well actually, I thought it was going to be really crappy (is that language allowed in D.J. class?). And I did NOT know how I felt about digital journaling. I liked the whole photography aspect of it, but I did not want to blog, and put my pictures online for all my peers to see. Now, I'm kind of glad I did it. I really like this class a lot, and it does put me out of my comfort zone, but I think that's a good thing. I don't think I'm 100% comfortable with the blogging thing, but it gets easier every time.

I'm so happy the summer is coming, because I really need a break from school. Even though I am happy about that, I know I'm going to miss all the seniors, and everyone who's not coming back in the fall. The school is going to be way different without them. I hope everyone finishes the year strong! Okay, I'm done with this post...

New Ted Dekker Book

As you all know, I am a nerd. I like math, science, and reading books. Recently, I just read a new book by my favorite author, Ted Dekker. It's called The Priest's Graveyard.

This book was about a man named Danny who grew up in Bosnia. In his youth, there was a war going on and during that time, soldiers came into his house and killed his sisters and mother. After, he avenged their deaths and decided to become a priest and take the law into his own hands when officials let criminals slip away. He moved to the US and did exactly that. He killed people who committed crimes, but got away with it because they had political or some other kind of power.

The book is also about a young woman named Renee. She is a heroine addicted with an abusive boyfriends. One night she is Running away from him because she fears that her life is in danger. While she's running she gets hit by a car. The man in the car sees that she is hurt, and that people are trying to kill her. He saves her by getting her away, and taking her back to his house. There he gets a doctor to visit her. It takes her weeks to recover but when she does, he gives her the offer of living with him because she has no where else to go. Then, they supposedly fall in love.

The man who saves Renee, Lamont Myers, has OCD. In order for her to live there, he does have a few "harmless" rules she has to follow. The walls in his house are made of glass, and everything is perfectly clean. She has to wear gloves so she doesn't get her prints on the walls, and slippers so her feet never touch the floor. They live like this for a year. One day, Lamont comes home and tells Renee he is worried that his boss may kill him. He was a very powerful man, with a lot of political power. Supposedly, Lamont found out something about his boss, and was afraid that because he found out, his boss would kill him.

Later that week, Lamont went on a business trip, and left Renee home. This was a usually thing, and he said he would be back by Thursday. When Thursday came, Lamont never came home. Renee waited for 5 days, but he never showed up. Eventually, some people who worked for Lamont's boss came to investigate his house. Renee thought it was so that they could kill her. She took some money, stowed away in one of their cars, and went to a hotel. From that point on, she decided she would to whatever it took to avenge Lamont's death. She later met up with the priest I mentioned earlier. He decided to help her investigate Lamont's death, and maybe help her avenge it.

Okay. That is my not very short summary of the book I just read. Every part of me is itching to give away the ending, but I wont. I hope someone who reads this blog will read the book.

Taekwondo

You are probably all bored of this subject, but I love it and have nothing else to blog about... Actually I do, but it's a serious topic and I need more time to write it. Anyways... for now I'm just going to blog about TKD (taekwondo). TKD is probably my favorite thing to do. There are many reasons why I love it. One of them is that it is not a team sport. Even though I do enjoy some team sports (lacrosse, basketball?) I like being able to work at my own pace, only competing against myself (and sometimes other people but they do not know about it). Doing TKD also helps me to release stress. Some nights I go into class really stressed out, or just not feeling good but by the end I always feel so much better. It almost gives me a peace and it also gives me joy. I am also on the demo team. This is small group of people who get to perform at different events and competitions. During these performances we do choreographed routines. In these routines, one of the things we do is break boards (another thing I like about TKD). We all do a certain thing either at the same time or in a row and it looks really cool. That was a short(ish) summary of why I love TKD. Pictures and videos to come..?

Mr. D thinks I have no friends...

Okay, so, today during Digital Journaling class Austin was playing the game "Tiny Wings" on my iPhone. Mr. D came up to him and took my phone away. Just a few days ago he was bragging about how he beat the game, but he was in fact lying. When he looked at the stats on my phone he started making fun of my high scores and saying I had no life and no friends (I think he was jealous). Then I got a text from my friend and it unfortunately just happened to have two profanities in it. He said my only friend was laden with f-bombs. I said I did have a BFFL (best friend for life) who was Kayla. He told me to get a good friend. After that he pretended to give me money to go buy a friend. Isn't he a great teacher? You may find this hard to believe after just reading my post, but he is actually one of my favorite teachers. He tells it like it is, and doesn't spoon feed us (even if this is what we want at times). He very encouraging and tells us to be ourselves (even if at the same time he is making fun of us for being ourselves). The point? I don't think there is one, this was just the first thing I could think of blogging about,and I only had 10 minutes.

Mr. D is forcing me to do this...

Mr. D thinks that I have an imagination, but of course I have to disagree with him. I don't know how to creatively express myself in any way. Doing things without structure make me uncomfortable, even if I'm good at the thing I'm being asked to make my own. For example, when I play the bassoon and the oboe (yes, laugh) I don't know how to make a song my own. I have to play it exactly the way it's written unless someone tells me how to add detail and my own style to it. My teacher sometimes get frustrated (well not really) with me because I don't know how to "noodle". "Noodling" is where you just play around with different notes and scales that you like to warm up. I feel like I am physically unable to do this because I'm afraid I'll sound stupid. I know this isn't true however because the point of "noodling" isn't to sound good, it's just to warm your instrument up.

Because I love it so much, I'm just going to throw something about TKD (tae kwon do) in here. Tae kwon do is a very structured sport and there's not too much you can do to it to make it your own. I love the structure of it, and how your being told what to do. I learn so much better this way. I think that might be part of the reason why I'm good at it and like it so much.