aw.....

...fly lot to post. but not now. later.

things upcoming:
tues past feed my house swim team
thurs willmar home parents night 600 @hs

...kward. Some things are just awkward...

....like walking into the eclectic or hot topic...

cleveland

I am writing this from a hotel room in Cleveland right now. I have a college audition tmrw morning around 9. I have another one in Chicago on Tuesday. I should be back in Brainerd by Wednesday. I was able to go to Jesse Kellers gig on friday night. That was really good. I will write more maybe tmrw night how the audition went, but I am gonna keep it short tonight cause I hate typing on laptops.

The end is.....

...too far away. Seriously guys, I am ready to be done right now. Done with hs, done with public education, done with scholarships, done waking up so dang early, done with back pain.

But I am not quite ready to be done swimming, even though we didn't beat alex tonight. Sometimes there is satisfaction in losing, as long as you give it your best shot.

Just Perfect.....

Josiah, you will be back just in time for the meet against alex!!!

Not like it is a really HARD meet or anything, it is just that we only beat them by three points at true team.... and lost to them at the maroon invitational. So yea, having very little sleep and no practice the day before won't be a problem. Jk, you need to do your college auditions.

For the record, we weren't that slow out of the locker room. And, not a single guy on the bus noticed not one but three guys were missing. Since Jake iten didn't ride the bus, there wasn't a Captain on the bus, and if Zemke would have at least bothered to look for a captain, things would have been different. He usually checks with me, since I 'clear' the locker room. Furthermore, right before he got on the bus, my parents told Zemke that I would be riding with them.

The list goes on:

Chris dens didn't notice we weren't on the bus, and he had just been in the locker room with us. JOrdan westphal didn't notice that his seat buddy wasn't on the bus. Nathaniel tyner didn't notice that my bag and jacket were all alone in a seat, as were Jake's (he forgot them, even tho he wasn't riding the bus, still worthy of an observation.) Andrew Goll didn't realize that he couldn't play pokemon all the way home with Josiah as they had planned if josiah wasn't on the bus. Chris Thompsen didn't realize we weren't there, nor did mike stunek. Of course, Chris was in front letting Zemke use his phone to call the hotline...

So when I realize that the bus left, I scrolled through my phone for a swimmer. I find Chris Thompsen, and give his phone a call ASAP. Zemke answers it, and I say, after some confusion, "Hey Chris? Tell Zemke you have to turn around, we're still at the high school." Zemke replies: "Who is this?" by now I realize that it is Zemke, and he isn't at all happy. Chris was wondering what the heck Z was doing answering his phone. "ummm, JOsiah, Jesse, and Tim."
I think that he was angry, and he thought that we were prank-calling from the back of the bus.

The next call goes to my parents, who happen to be right behind the bus, and they tell me that it has indeed pulled over and that it is on the way back.

15 minutes later the bus shows up. They had a really hard time finding a place to turn around, considering they were about a block from turning onto the highway, with an abyss of country road ahead. All the while, we were laughing at the high school, trying to think about keeping a straight face when we got on the bus, considering the irony in Zemke wanting to leave so quickly ending up in a later arrival.

We decided to go one at a time, a few yards apart so we wouldn't laugh. Josiah went first, because he would have laughed. A straight face wasn't a problem. We get on the bus, and Zemke says,
"Next time you should just call your parents." No one was laughing.

Now I was angry. That was not the right thing for a coach to say, especially when he doesn't take any type of roll call, check with any captain, or check with Tim Lange. Especially when three athletes are left behind. HIS FAULT.

So I was pretty much miffed for the ride home, and I ended up quizing Josiah on music listening stuff. We were both angry with Zemke, but I was more vocal about it to the guys around us, wanting to know why no one wondered where we were. they all were oblivious. I don't think that we will win the state academic championship three years in a row. Oh, and Josiah left that banner on that bus, and the driver (erwin) walks into the locker room with it, thankfully.

So, still angry when I got off the bus, I said, "Next time you won't have to worry about me. I'll just ride home with my parents from now on so it won't be such a big problem." pretty bold. too bold.

I shouldn't have said that. But they shouldn't have said what they said. But two wrongs don't make a right. when two wrongs occur, who is the one to apologize?

I did that the next day, but their (the coaches) only response is "from now on we are going to have captains take roll call." Now that is genius.

Our meet on tuesday is at 600, so a lot of ppl should come!

True team state was alright. The only decent swim I had was the split of the 400 relay, which was about 50.5, my fastest outside of sections. together with everyone's fastest splits, this puts us in good postion for a run at state. :)

stuff

ok so anyway thursday was a meet at sauk rapids. Apparently afterwards tim lange, jesse mcarthur, and I were slow getting dressed and got left and had to call the bus and have it turn around for us. That was fun... anyway. Then friday was the Music Listening Contest. That kinda sucked. We didn't do at all as well as I had hoped. Then the true team state that night was alright. I spent most of saturday getting ready to go to michigan on sunday for auditions in interlochen for oberlin. I will be back on tuesday early morning.

Some People Say....

...the wrong things. I am talking about the swim coaches. More on this later. Actually, more on this in another post when I am in good humor about what they said.

Sauk Rapids was a win tonight, and off events were the ticket. I swam the 100 butterfly, and it wasn't especially good. Granted, my butterfly form is lacking, but I simply never found a rhythm. I was like Andrew Goulson in "Estampie" with the jimbe**. I finished third, behind josiah and a sauk kid. I did win the 50 free tho. That was exciting. I beat josiah. And so was the 200 medley and the 200 free relays, which we won as well.

Mr. Lazy

Johnny V had a good story today about blong, and so I thought that my own encounters with the "brainerd guide" ought to be posted.

After failing to grade the entirety of our math tests today in calc on account of the stupidness of several people in the class who don't understand the concept of "going to ask for help when I don't understand something,"
I told blong that he was lazy.
He told me he wasn't, and then he held out my fist and told me to "come here." I told him that if he really wasn't lazy and wanted to pop me in the face that he could come over to me and do it. Stalemate.
I walked away.

STUPID CALC CLASS!!!! Learn your stuff so we can move on.

True Team State

I neglected to post this earlier, and by popular (the power of one) demand:

True Team State
U of M Aquatics Center (One of the nicest in the nation)
Friday, January 20th
6:00 PM

If you can make it, come!!
(bring your wallet)

And now true team

Well, we won true team sectionals, so now we will be going to true team state on this friday when we don't have any school.

I am happy to have won, but not entirely thrilled about spending another weekend in the cities.

We beat alexandria by three points. Ah, it was wonderful to have won by three points this time too!! And I did what I was supposed to do, so hurray for that, and our relay's continue to drop time, at least the last two swimmers did. ;)
(That would be josiah and myself) Tyner seems to be having some difficulties dropping time in the freestyle, entirely paradoxical when he is dropping large amounts of time in his other three events. Andrew Goll dropped time to, so I guess I can't ignore that.
It was fun to beat alex.
(I had to say that again.)

First things first

Okay. These are some quotes that I have been meaning to post for a while:

During a long a grueling set, or maybe it was during cooldown, lane 6 came up with some interesting jokes.
Jake: "What do you give a plant with a headache?"
.....
"Ivy-profen"

five minutes later:
"What do you give a cheerleader with an upset stomach?"
....
"diarrhea"
.....
"Wait! I mean pepto-bismol!!"
Who said this? A) Josiah B) Jake C) Andrew Goll


and another, dealing with another painkiller, but I can't remember how it goes so this will have to do:

What do you give a donkey with a heart-attack?
.....
Assprin
________________________________________________

When playing hearts,
"Shooting the moon is like a trick in arithmatic."
The round after this was said, I shot the moon.

Who said this: A) Josiah B) Tyner C) Aana Tadych

When holding up the Queen of spades, Tyner asks Aana:
"Do you know what this is?"

_______________________________________________

Josiah: "Did you know that a serving of brain has 1000% of your daily fat value?"
Andrew Goll "You mean, like, people eat human brain?"
Josiah: "Yes Goll, people eat human brain."
Goll: "What? I though you were talking about cow brain or something"
Josiah: "Yes Goll, we actually are talking about cow brain"
Goll: "Do you, like, buy it in the grocery store or something?"
Josiah: "yes"
__________________________

I guess in the world of Josiah, migrant workers don't exist, as we were debating, because:
"Mexicans don't count as people"
___________________________

Answers: 1: C 2:B (or not 2B)

most of these quotes are those that you "just had to be there" to appreciate.

In other news, most originated from the fabulous pasta dinner here at my house on thursday night. 40 ppl. was fun. that is a lot of shoes.
We have a lot of leftovers. Does anyone want any salad? ;)

Fovever Lost, But Never Again

A blink of an eye
A splash of water
Two races
Two finishes
Eight points lost.
Never Again.


Too many out touches
Just not fast enough
A team, in valor
A team that lost.
Three points.
Never Again.


Consisitancy is Amazing
Inconsistancy tries the heart.


Why?


Life.
A blink of an eye
A day that passes
Things that happen
Take it, learn from it.
Accept it.
And never, never
let it happen again.


Resolution
Determination
The lifeblood of an athlete
Perserverence.
Hope.
Next time.

U of M invite

If you don't want to read anything about swimming, skip this post.

Here is how the U of M invite works. First of all, I must say that this school has done a fine job with their aquatic program, and the facilities are wonderful. (That's for you Parker)
The meet is actually three separate meets, each one hosted by a twin cities team. The brackets are supposedly divided by ability, but St. Cloud Tech was in a bracket up from us and we are way better than them. So not everything is according to ability. I say that because we were in the bronze division, which is below the maroon division, which is below the Gold division. hmm. I wonder which one is best.

Anyway, as a team we finished 3rd of 13 teams, losing to only Alexandria and Red Wing. We swim fergus falls on tues, and they were in the maroon division after us, so redwing, Brainerd, and Alexandria should have been in Maroon, but it is fun to win things too.

With an invitational of such size, there are several heats of every event, and I had to wait awhile before I could swim at all. The 50 free open went well, as I was seeded a slow time from several meets ago, won the heat, and beat seven of the guys in the last heat to take 2nd overall in the event with a 23.53, beating Alexandria's Brock Edwards. The 100 was after the break, and this also went well, but didn't feel as smooth as the 50. I had a better time in thursday's meet when I raced josiah, but a 52.47 isn't far off of a 52.12. I was actually hoping for a 51-high, but that will hopefully come on tuesday. The 200 free relay posted their best time this year, two and a half seconds faster than thursday. I split a 23.4, and it should have been much faster than that because with a relay start I should be able to take off .7 seconds. I am learing. The 400 also posted their best times this year, with a 334.38. Since Josiah (ahem) didn't hit the pad correctly, we didn't get splits. But between the two of us, doing funky things with the times we have, we both split 52.2's. So I finish the race, a time trips in on the timing pad, but it doesn't register as us finishing the race for another 15 seconds. They eventually corrected the error.
It was fun overall, and I was pleased with a second place finish in the 400 free relay.

If Josiah ever posts, he can say how he did, but I think he had a very good meet, and did well against Alexandria's Shmeagle.

In other big news, we swim against:
Fergus falls on tues the 10th away, (a very close meet)
true team sections next sat the 14th
Sauk Rapids thurs 19th (easy meet)
**Poss** true team state friday 20th
!!!!!ALEXANDRIA!!!!!! TUES 24TH HOME 600 PM BE THERE!!!!!!
(meet of the year)
Tech Away Thurs 26th
Thurs feb 2nd Willmar home 600 pm be there
....then conference and sections in feb

And the winner is.....

Josiah and I raced tonight in our swim meet against Apollo. It was in the 100 free. I swam a 52.12 and Josiah swam a 52.26. Both times are good, and it was exciting to see us both going so fast, because it makes a return to state that much more probable. Oh, and we won the meet to. I also won the 200 free with a pretty awful time because I have hardly ever swam this event, and the relays also won. It was pretty much a blow-out.

In other news, today after school I was walking by the teacher's lounge and the door happened to be open. Whew! All of the sudden a draft of super-heated tropical air blew past me. Upon investigating further, to rule-out the possiblity of a temporary hallucination, I discovered that the teacher's lounge is indeed quite comfortably heated. It's good to know that they are warm when they eat lunch. Grr. By the time I sit down, my food is already cold, because the cafeteria is so dang underheated.

P.S. I beat Josiah. he claims it was because he was watching the rose bowl last night and because he had windfall. whatever. I watched the ending of the game too.
lol.

Sporadically Spoiled Silly

Well, it is back to school. And I didn't realize how much sleep I had actually been achieving over break. Seriously, homeschooled kids are spoiled silly with their flexible schedules. But then again, they aren't in contact with nearly as many people as a "regular" student, and by that I mean that they might not have as many opportunities to make and maintain friendships. Then again, who wouldn't like sleeping until 9 every day with only four hours of study and essentially no PM homework?

This is actually a venting over the time wasted in school. Ap calc. 6th hour. perhaps one of the most frustrating classes since kindergarten, when I was so bored that the teacher told me I had ADD or ADHD and sent my mom to have me tested. (By the way, I am simply a "spirited child" and the kindergarten teacher could have been in big trouble if the same thing had happened nowdays.) I thought AP classes were supposed to be advanced and not a pre-school blab all. Okay, I am not trying to insult anyone. I just find it a little annoying that we go so slowly in that class.

Enough of that. Back to that spirited child reference. Thank goodness for the Lowell
School Teachers or I would be addicted to Ritalin. I think that a lot of us have benefited from the programs at Lowell, and it would be interesting to see how they are all doing now their senior year. Includying that kid named Zach Kern/Buckwheat. I wonder what he is up to. Anyone know?

A football fan?

No not usually. Not a big fan of anthing on TV.

But Notre Dame needs to score some points right now and pick it up on defense. The only football games I really watch with the exception of the Super Bowl, and I really don't watch the game, but the commercials. C'mon Notre Dame!

P.S. 1 min left 1st half Ohio st. 20, ND 7

random thought

I have recently been talking with many people about the topic of homosexual tolerence. Being LCMS (the real lutherans parker :P) I am totally against the stance of homosexuality. So living in liberal minnesota (even though a pretty conservative area) I have been accused of being intolerant, ignorant, and bigoted. I was once told that 'I should never hate someone, but tolerate them because I haven't walked in their shoes.' But the opposite of hate isn't tolerance... it's love. So I say don't tolerate others, love them. I love my sister (you know what I mean john) and if she decides to do drugs I am not gonna tolerate that. I am not gonna hate her but I am gonna hate her doing drugs. I believe that non-christians will go to hell. How can I not but doing something if I believe that someone I care for is going to endure eternal punishment? And when I put it's easy for me to see that I haven't done enough. So next time you accuse someone of being intolerent maybe you should put yourself in their shoes...

Things that go bump in the night

New Year's Eve was a blast. Good times by all involved. Thanks.

Things went down at MG's house, or rather, Cabin 7. I had only once been to MG's house, and it was for about 30 seconds to drop someone off at their car. This experience was much more exciting.

Houle and I carpooled up to Nisswa, since it is a bit of hike, and arrived about 830. "waterworld" was in progress, and I must say that I couldn't wait for it to be over to move on to much more exciting and thrilling forms of entertainment such as wrestling. In other words, it was a boring movie.

Some genius (I honestly don't remember who this was) decided that I needed to wrestle someone. Under protest, I wasn't going to start anything, because it really isn't my nature. I can't hurt a fly, nor do I have motivation to tackle someone for fun out of the blue. To me, it doesn't make sense. I am also not a fan of being the center of attention for this type of thing. Anyway, Holbrook and david or whoever, I don't remember, started things off in a amusing style. Soon it was houle and I against John and David. Things were romping around, when all of the sudden "poop" (onomatopoeia) david's elbow connected to my mouth. Or rather, the precise location where I had already chipped my teeth and had them rebonded. Twice. Out they came. Actually, just the parts. I think that it shocked everyone, including me, but fortunately I wasn't bleeding, Yet. That came later after I recoved the teeth and spontaneously combusted against hobson. very amusing, honestly. Fun stuff.

I went to bed around 4 to loud noises of the other guys doing weird things.

Woke up, and my teeth were still chipped.

Happy New Year, and what a way to start things off. I have a killer smile right now. :)