Over and Out

Image by mugley via Flickr

43 days and its over. Really, I'm not surprised, but I'm more disappointed. Not entirely in the other person, but then again, I'm not entirely disappointed in myself. It always happens like this, it goes among the lines of "oh, well you weren't committed." "You weren't this." "You weren't that." It is all bullshit. I guess the timing pretty good because valentines day is just 2 days away.

I want to say that this break up was "painless" but that would just be a lie; every break up is painful, but sometimes they just don't hurt as bad. Its like getting a paper cut on your hand, and one on your fingertip; they both hurt, they are both on the hand, but you will feel the one on the tip of the finger more.

I'm not sad right now, I'm more disappointed in myself and the situation I'm in. Put yourself in my shoes for a second; I've been single for 3 years, people break up with me for really stupid reasons and I been dumped on or before valentines day twice. You can see where I'm coming from. I just want to know what I'm doing wrong. I'm not a bad person and I'm not a bad date. It really makes me mad when people make up a bullshit excuse or "dumb things down" to "lessen the impact". I'm not going to feel better if I keep thinking about "how lame I am".

I went to bed at 2:15, I was still trying to digest everything. To be honest, I still dont' know what went on. Everything is so confusing. When this was happening at 8 ish last night, I was kind of tired and pissed off. I only talked to them because I "wanted to know if we were doing anything tomorrow. Its going to be a nice day". Frankly not. I got all the reasons why "this couldn't work" and "why both of us shouldn't be dating" and all of this unnecessary rubbish. I then used my time honored debate skills and said something among the lines of this: " I see your point, and I know that it it is valid. The thing is, I know that you were trying to break up with me for 2 weeks. I'm not stupid".

I don't even know if I want to be friends. I don't want to be friends with them right now, that is a sure thing. We were good friends in the past until the same thing happened the "Oh, I think we are done dating. We never do anything."  I then just quit talking to them for a good while and then out of the blue, "want to go out?". I flat out said that "This isn't going to last if you don't give me some space to focus my responsibilities" and they agreed. It sucked when they used that against me. "We never do anything, you are always doing something". Really? I never would have guessed (bitterness over). Friends are there when you need them, and there when you don't. This isn't going to happen right now. I don't know about the future, but I doubt that would happen.

I learned 2 things from this: Don't EVER date an Ex no matter how long its been. Also rebound relationships hurt the non rebounder too. I don't care how long its been, how many people you dated since you last dated your Ex, how great and fantastic your self esteem is, or any of that. Never date an ex. Its like déjà vu every time you see them again, nothing is going to change, it never will.  If you are thinking of a rebound relationship, keep the other person in mind. Think of all the pain that you might cause someone else. Think about how you will make them feel when things are over and done. They might cry themselves to sleep every night, lash out at friends and family, or grow to hate you in the long run. Keep that in mind before you fall into a relationship

On dating

I talked to my significant other last weekend and we settled on three dating events: concerts, tattoos, and dinner. When I thought about it, I realized that I should blog about dating.


Clothing.
I'm pretty relaxed when it comes to clothes. I weir whatever I feel like wearing. I go back to my punk roots often, and I sport my handmade jacket sometimes, other times I'll feel fine with my favorite combo: band T-shirt, pants, and Doc Martens. Sometimes I feel like spoofing my debate centric life too; Blazer, Band shirt, jeans, slip-on vans. I think I cover both sides of the spectrum well, on one side I can out dress a banker, but on the other hand, I can be ready to mosh in a split second.

I just got a haircut yesterday, and its a shag and bob hybrid. I don't really think about my hair, but I knew that it was getting too long.

So how do I dress for this "Date"? Well, I have some errands that I have to do Satruday morning, so I think I'm going to weair my new green hoodie that I bought last weekend, a plain blue T-shirt, my ultra cool "faded" and "trashy" looking skinny jeans (I wear then when I go skateboarding), my bracelets that I always wear, and my slip on Vans (I shouldn't be walking though snow/slush/ice)

Communication.
I'm socially awkward, or over polite, too formal, whatever you want to call it. I don't want to focus on me, so I have to focus on them for once. Basically, what I'm trying to say is this: I don't want to talk about music, I don't want to talk about my music collection, I don't want to talk about Speech and Debate, and I sure don't want to talk about my life. That shouldn't be too hard right? Wrong.

I really don't know what to talk about, I run out of topics a lot. My thought train goes like this:

"How was your day?"
"Did anything cool happen?"
"Something cool happened to me today."
"You know what I seen today?"
"I bought this really wicked album, but I didn't bring it with me."
"I think that music education is on the decline, do you?"
"No? well thats ok."
"How about that weather?"

I might let nature take its course. If something comes up, I'll talk about it. It isn't that hard (or not like Debate for that matter).

The Converse
(not the shoes silly, the opposite side!) Here is the deal breaker, or the thing I'm fearing the most. The Significant Other yelling, running after me and throwing things. I really dont want to have the "I was working for 19 hours last weekend, I'm sorry I didn't' go to the movies with you" speech. I really don't.  That would kill me. I don't want to apologetic for being a "wishy washy date", it isn't my fault really, blame the team that needs me, blame the kids who depend on me for homework help, blame the people who need me.

We will see how it goes. I'm highly doubting a date this weekend, but it should be coming up soon.

Take the Day

The Semester ended on Friday, and I now have a 4 day weekend. Today was kind of boring because I got up at noon and watched a documentary on how various types of alcohol is made. Around 2, I ate the rest of the left over pizza and thought about why my head was pounding so bad. A little while later, I watched Portlandia for the second time (http://www.ifc.com/portlandia/). Then I sat in my room and lit my new orange scented candle and relaxed for a while. I then looked at my clock and came to the realization that I'm wasting my day by not doing anything. So, I then ran 2 miles and sat on my floor and started to play guitar. Right after that I picked up my computer and started to type this blog post.

I always think that I'm wasting the day, no matter what I do. One of my various personal mottoes is "Carpe Diem" but I always wonder about what part of the day I'm seizing. I might have a whole laundry list of things that I have to do, and I might only get 3 done. Did I do what I could with the time I had? Did I waste the day? I always ask myself that question before I go to bed, and then I always realize that I forgot to do something important.

How I stole fifth place.

Coming into the Debate meet this Saturday, I was guessing that I would just get my excellent ribbon and leave, but I don't know how I did it, but I captured the titled of 5th place in a little under 8 whole hours! Alright, my voice is still kind of messed up from it, and I have a wicked case of congestion, but looking at that trophy every morning is worth it.


I was kind of scared when I woke up on Saturday because I was feeling quite relaxed. I didn't do any case revisions, or evidence reading because I honestly was too tired to do anything else. I went to bed at around 11:30 and got up at the unholy hour of 5:00. I had some breakfast, got ready, got dressed and left around an hour later.

Rounds posted at 8 or so, but I had a hard time waking up. I got out my handy dandy Ipod and tried to get "pumped up" on the way there with some good punk rock tunes. Eventually, I realized that the room that I was scheduled in was in the other building. I grabbed my hat from my backpack and somehow made my way around 300 or so people. It was colder that I thought when I got outside and I was really happy when I got that hat on my head.

When I got into that building, I realized that the 700's were in the back of the building. Being the only one in the hallway (I'm a fast walker) I was there in no time. Seeing that no one was in the the hallway, I thought I would look into the room for a little (something you shouldn't do at a meet!). I knew that this would be an interesting meet because I seen a piano, composers and music notes; I would have never thought I would be debating in a Choir room! Eventually, my opponent and the judge showed up and the round got underway. Halfway though, I got somewhat scared because I lost confidence in my case; apparently the judge could see that in the round because my ballot said that I "could try to be more confident in my case because you are a good debater, you just have to believe in yourself."

After the round was over, I got kind of mad my teammates didn't say "How'd your round go?" so I grabbed a chair and parked it in front of the tin of mini Christmas cookies and ate about 5 of them. For the rest of the downtime between rounds, I listened to more music, and tested my friends to see if they would text me back in time before 2nd round posted (that never happened). Postings went up at 9:45ish and I went off to second round.

More waiting, different building same thing as last round. I talked to one of my friends for the better part of an hour just trying to make jokes and cut the nerves before I went off to speak. The room was a little bit different, but it still had the same "odd" vibe as the last room. We went in after the first wave of debaters left. The room this time it was a "Science research room/ library". The offices were being used and me and my friend really couldn't wait to start the round because one of the judges yelled "NO TALKING! ROUNDS ARE IN PROGRESS!" I whispered "see you latter" to my comrade, and shook my opponents hand. The guy was a pasty pale redhead with glasses, who said he was form the southern part of the state that I have never heard of or seen. As for manners, he was decent with them and the round was somewhat pleasing. I thought that I would have suffered a loss, but I really started to be angered when I realized that my opponent started to call me "He". Now, I have issues when people mistake me for a guy (If you see me, you will know that I look NOTHING like a guy) so I had to convince myself that my opponent was making a personal attack towards me. I really didn't know how to say it, but instead of making a big deal out of it, I kept the fury of the attack I had in mind and put it towards his case and then ended up winning. The judge gave me a good tip of advice, "Spend more of your time attacking your opponent and then tell me why you win." Gender jokes or not, this was a good round.

Got back around 11:15, talked to my debate buddy, and we looked over some evidence cards. I opened my backpack and took out my secret weapon, Monster Energy drink. I don't drink this often, but when I do it provides a tremendous boost of energy and confidence to myself and my case. A friend of mine that graduated told me to "drink it whenever I felt like I couldn't win". I slowly opened the can and watched the cold fog from the can float into the air.

After I had about a 4th of my drink, me and my buddy went to stand by the posting board. We were there for about 15 minutes and the big "boss" captain had to stand with us because "we can't do anything without the captains approval first" (I'm done with that witty comment). We met some kids from different schools, talked about how 1.75 is a high price for a burrito. And then out of the haughty captains mouth "It is bad luck to stand by the postings for too long." In my brain, I just gave a "Whatever" and walked it off. 15 minutes later, postings went up.

Back to the other building, I ran outside without my hat, beat the rush of people like last time, and arrived to my round 10 minutes before my opponent came. To be concise, I was surprised, you don't normally see Women who "dress down" at meets (by dressing down, I mean dress slacks, button up and converse. I normally do the colored button up with gray or black slacks and a suit jacket to "finish everything off)It was odd because my opponent kept staring at me, not like the "I'm going to destroy you" stare, but more of the "your kind of cool in a hot way" stare. It really didn't get to me because I get it all the time. It then occurred to them that they probably should say something: "Oh hey, how are you today?" "I'm fine" I didn't want to sound too arrogant, so I started to talk a little, "I see you got a newspaper, anything good?". They replied, "Not really, I guess this place is having a winter concert soon." I don't care for concerts really, (or not these kind")"That's neat." More awkward staring. I went back to my Ipod and fooled around with that for a while and then I seen that they left. I took a walk around break for 20 or so minutes with my energy drink and finished it all. When I came back, they were back reading that same newspaper. Out of boredom, I got all philosphocal and thought about my friend who lives on the other side of the country that is probably worried sick about me right now. I'm worried sick about them. (If you are reading this, I'm ok.)

Right when my thoughts started to get good, the door opened and the people from the last round came in. I sat down at my table, took a quick glance at my opponent, looked at my papers, and then started to see that my hands were shaking because I had the jitters. Eventually, I let that past me and I read my speech with confidene and poise and just felt proud of myself. I got mad beacuse, my opponet had this high pitched, wailing naisly voice that I didn't hear in our awakward conversation and I realised that this must be a front to make the judge vote or them. Anyway, I hammered in my points, and gave them a 5 point loss, something that is RARELY heard of in Debate, and something that I have NEVER dished out to anyone in my 3 years of debating. Anyway, I offered the post round hanshake, and I found it sickining because the other half of the handshake was slimely. I think I take that back.

Back to the meeting room, more cookies, some water, more music, more waiting. I was going to play a card game with my other friend, but somthing was telling me no. I looked around the room and just looked out the window in a trance like gaze and then I heard my name; "Hey! You made it!". "Into what?" I asked? "To Finals!". I never would have thought that I would make it into finals at this meet after loosing all 3 rounds last week and being pissed off at the whole team. I was just so exicted to go to finals I almost had a heart attack(what did I say about those drinks?)

Anyway, I threw down at finals, I did everythig like the last round that I won. The only thing that got me mad was the fact that my oppponet didn't see my evidence and said that I "didn't have any" and that "stats carry more weight than logic". If we wanted to think her way, then money would be better for you than food.  I only did this once, but what I did was say "if you want to look at my opponents logic, then I don't deserve to win today just because she says so. Basiclly, I want you to throw out what she said [my opponent] about me having no case and no merit, I don't want to win on her rules, I want to win on the ones I offered which are fair for both sides, I'm leaving it up to you today, because we are pretty even as is, and I don't care if I loose, at I'll loose a good round." 

You could see that they really wanted to give the win to me, but I lost by 1 point on two judges and 3 on another (you get 3 judges in a final round). I think the judge that gave me the 3 point loss was a newbie, because there really wasnt' anything on the ballot to say how I did. Anyway, when I was called up on stage I was nervous, and as they kept calling the names, I still stood up there, but once they called 5th place, I proudly took my trophy and left the stage knowing that I did the best that I have done so far.

All due respect.

I lost a debate today, but that doesn't really matter to me. It doesn't really matter to me if I win or not now, the thing that really matters is trying to get the reward that I deserve from all the work I put in. This is really making me mad, so I'll do a good job explaining.

Now debate, is something close to my heart. I've been sacrificing every weekend for the past 3 years towards the betterment of my debate career. If that doesn't sound like a lot, then something must not be connecting. I've missed weekends of music, painting, hanging out with friends, and just enjoying myself. I miss just sleeping on weekends and just not having to worry about anything. I think that somewhere in this "haze" I forgot about what really mattered to me, I couldn't tell because I was so infused with just being "better" and doing "better" than I did last time. I feel like sometimes, I can't get back into being a "normal" person with "normal" things to do. Recently, I've been feeling as if my efforts are not worth doing in the first place. That was one of the major issues with today.

I wasn't having a good day anyway (getting up at 5:30 doesn't help any). First round was delayed by 2 hours, people were getting on my nerves, people wanted to play the "blame game" all day long. People just flat out sucked today, and I never think that negative. When I think negative sometimes, then I think about things that I would otherwise "block" out of my head. Unfortunately today, I had to think about how sucky of a job that our coaches are doing to help us WIN something. I don't really get mad at people at all, but when people talk to me like I'm stupid, then we are going to have issues.

This really started last year when I lost the bid for team captain. I really wanted to be captain, and I did what I could to say "Hey, I'm going to be the best darn captain ever". When the flawed voting system didn't work out for me, I got sad. If that wasn't enough, I found out the the kid who used to make fun of me 2 or 3 years before made captain, then I really got pissed off. They announced who wast to be the captains at a team party, and I ended up leaving not even 5 minutes after. That next Monday, they are blaming me for not "Taking the loss in stride" and not "being a good role model". I got hashed because "everything is my fault". I had to tune it out and hope for the best next season.

Next season comes around, I doubted that I would win one round out of three, but when I started to go 2-3 and had the high speaker points, I had hope for myself. In the first 2 months of debating, I got 66 or so points; a nice pace for someone who only had 200 or so over 2 years of debating. I'm progressing, and that is a good thing. The better thing is that I'm only 4 or so points off from getting into finals. But that doesn't matter to the "Captains" because they always break no mater the cost of the team, or even the cost of the other debaters. I wouldn't do that. Never will. When I see these liars get into finals without working working for it honestly like I do.

When I left the meet tonight, I wasn't acting "stressed out and angry towards others because I have a lot on my mind" like our coach said, but I was acting the way that I was because "I'm sick and tired of not getting the respect that I deserve from everyone". Hell, if I can give other people respect, why can't they do the same to me?

I've gotten used to being the "odd one out" on the team and I don't care about that anymore, I think I care more about the simple things, respect, hard work and truthfulness. If we could have these things on the team, then I wouldn't be half as mad as I am now.

I don't think that I'm going to talk to the head coaches by myself this time because the last time I did that, nothing happened. I want something to happen this time, not that mess I had the last time around. I just wish that I had the people who could help me out sometimes, but they always have to be 500 miles away.

I get what I want (finally).

I wory a lot. But I guess that that is a good thing. I wory about the people I care about and sometimes the people I care about think that this is a "needy" trait. I don't really care though, because this "worrying" is quite my thing.

So why the worry talk? Today, I guess I could say that this worrying payed off. Because I got what I wanted. When you wory about a person on and off for long peroids of time, you wonder a lot if you will ever hear from them again, and I got what I wanted.

Now, I can't be greedy. I can't take what I got for granted. I got this for a reason and I need to do the best thing by saying something back. But the question is, "What the hell do I say?".  Should I go for casual? "Hey, whats up?" or is that too laid back? Or should I just go for the formal one "Hello. Haven't seen you in a while. How are you?" I hope that doesn't sound too standoffish. If that fails, I have the tired and true, my trademark, "Joke greeting"; "So I was about to call a search party because I haven't heard from you in ages." "Welcome to the future! How was the alternate reality you've came from?" I might not do that.

Well, I got to say this soon, so I'm just going to use this: "Hey! How are you? It's been a while." That's great. That's fine, I'm not doing anything else.

Hopefully, I won't have to do the "Oh my God, I'm about to faint if I don't hear anything soon" post, but I'm prepared if I have to.

It doesn't add up.

The red bumps are gone, and I'm not feeling malice as much as I did this time last week, but that seems like nothing compared to the other things that I have encountered.

I got a cough, but it isn't that "normal" cough that one might get while having a cold. It's borderline "hacking crap up" cough and "I got acute bronchitis cough". I'm kind of weary of doctors, but if I keep the same cough until Friday, then I'm going. I can't stay up for too long, I can't really eat, and I'm more tired than normal. This is bad enough, but I guess my teacher wants me to fail math.

I never was good at math, but I always passed with a D+ or even a C- if I got lucky. But my teacher was gone for about 2 weeks, and our 3 subs told us that some papers were due while others were not. I finished all of these papers, and I did every thing on those papers. When the week before last week came around, our teacher came back and told us that our papers were due. Not a big deal. But the paper that I did a half- ass job on was the one that was worth the most points. We have to get the paper checked by our teacher, and then we open a "treasure chest" and get a candy. Bull. I'm pragmatic, and I have to say that I'm not opening a damn treasure chest to get a reward for doing nothing. So I'm not. But that is a problem though.

That brings me to today. I've been emailing my teacher about my illness and how I really can't do my homework because I can't do too much of anything. They agreed to give me 5 days to turn in my makeup homework (or in other words, do that over break.) Then I remembered about my test tomorrow.

If I don't do good on the test tomorrow, I will be failing the class. That is nothing new to me, I can take failure with a grain of sugar. But this time its different. I dont' want to fail math. I really don't. Although I don't have a need for math in my chosen career path, it would just be nice to have some self confidence about my math skills.

I'm not an underachiever, and I hate when people think that I am one. It is going to be hard, but I'm going to try my best to get a C by the end of the year. I kind of know that I won't but then again, why not try?

Aches and Pains

Last week or so, I started to see red bumps on my legs. They were all around my thighs, but not on my calfs or anything. At the debate meet this weekend, I couldn't stop itching my collar bone. It might just have been the shirt, but I still wasn't sure. When I got home, it looked like a rash, and I wasn't to concerned.

Then yesterday I lost my voice (a little). I thought that this was just from talking for 10 hours, but again I still don't know where it came from. 9ish yesterday night; my throat was super sore, and I couldn't swallow. This morning, I couldn't sleep and I think I had a fever because I was sweating so much. I kind of threw up this morning and I couldn't really stand up straight. I don't know why, but I went to all of my hard classes today. Just my luck, I forgot my homework on my desk. I almost passed out 3 times this morning and my skin hurt to  the touch. I just felt awefull.

I got home and I took some meds, and I took a hour and 30 minute nap. I felt better after that. I'm working on going to bed early so no more blogging for now.

Debate and wasabi don't mix.

Yesterday was my first debate meet of the year. I've been volunteering with the new members in October to get them ready for November, which is varsity season. Yesterday was our first varsity meet of the year, but I chose not to debate. I did do student congress as my alternative event. Why did I do this? Well, we started doing our cases last week and I realized that I was not going to win anything this week with a half done case (I seen this happen though, but I rather be safe than sorry).

When the day was over around 7:00 I ranked up a nomination and a pretty cool yellow ribbon. Not a bad day.  By then, I was up for a pretty savory 15 hours. I was then notified of a pizza party half way across town. I was going to go but then I remembered that my friend wanted me to go to this concert at 8:00. Realizing that I couldn't fly across town, I had to decline even though I really wanted to go.

When I got home, I enjoyed some vegetarian sushi and a veggie bowl. Out of absentmindedness I put soy sauce on wasabi and ate it straight. I then was crying on my floor for a good 15 minutes due to my nasal cavities being blown. 

I then went to bed and got up at 12:30  and watched some movie on TV. I then slept and ate a pop tart for breakfast.

It might just be me, but I think my life is starting to get duller. It feels like I'm stuck doing the same old thing every day, or every weekend. I might need something to look forward to. I might need to find some weekday concerts to go to. But whatever I do, I'm going to enjoy today first.

First day of Vacation plus thoughts.

My week long vacation starts now. I'm going to post the things that I've been holding off posting for various reasons, and I will also be sitting down at my desk refreshing my blog stats and seeing what I can improve on. So if you haven't already, check that out now.

I'm kind of concerned (no wait, really concerned) that I'm going to lock myself in my house, play my guitar, sleep for 3 days straight, and probably won't do anything until Thursday when I noticed that I slept the week away.  I'm starting to worry that I'm going back into those "dark ages" where everything wasn't the way it was now, and when I really wasn't the person I am now. I think that I just need to write it all down and talk about it because all the things that I want to say are swirling around in my head like a almost done smoothie.

I might bring back the "What I did" series on vacation because I honestly don't know what to do over vacation. If I do block out what I do over vacation, then I can try extra hard to get something done over vacation, so you guys have something nice to look at.  I think that my life is kind of like a 3 paragraph essay on repeat "I did this, then I did this, and then I went to bed". That's all. That all I do. But I'm sure that I'm not just a "person with a routine life"; I only do the same things on vacation.

I guess that I really want to talk to someone. That's all. I'm just lonely. I just want to talk to my friends and just say "Dude, can you just forget about everything that is going on in your life and talk to me for 15 minutes?". I'm sure that someone would say "Yeah, I have time to talk for 15 minutes. What do I do all day anyway?". The differentiating factor is that I don't want to tell my life story to everyone that I talk to. I told myself that I don't want others sympathy, I want others to tell me what to do right now because I frankly don't know how to do it myself.

I have 200 dollars that I have saved over the past 3 months. No, it isn't going to education, but to other things that I find more important right now. I know that I'm going to buy some things that I need and buy some more guitar picks because I've been playing with the same one since July.  I need to pay for my shrink visit, but they might wave it for me because they know I'm broke and I really need someone to talk to. (Handy tip: Shrinks  won't charge you for "verbal" therapy, or "e-mail" therapy. Milk out their morals and use it to your advantage.). They might even let me go to the park with their 125 pound Golden Retriever (btw, that dog weighs more than I do!!). I guess if no one else want's to talk to me, the dog will show some concern. 

I kind of already know that I'm going to go to bed disappointed tonight. I don't every night, but what else do you do when everyone else is having "fun" and you don't even know what "fun" is anymore? I'm going to do something now, I'm not sure what it is, but I'll be sure to tell you all about it tomorrow.

Papers, papers, papers.

Today was the first novice home meet. It started pretty late (11am) and got done around 7pm. In the Debate world, that isn't too bad. At home meets, we have to work if we are not debating, I had to work because I'm not a novice. Working isn't too hard, unless they put you in the wrong place with the wrong people at the wrong time. As you might know, I'm a Leo, and I can't deal with people infringing on my domain. However, I just had to suck it up and just deal with it today which isn't something that I normally do.

So I left my house at 10:45 and got there at 11, that isn't too bad because the traffic was light, and we weren't started 'till late anyway.  Because I'm a varsity member, I take it into my own hands to great everyone but some of the novices that I dont' know don't want to say "Hi" back to me, or answer my question of "Do you need any help?" I think that I should get to know all of these kids before the end of the year when they say "Hey, that girl is part of our team? I never seen her around before." I should probably say that the world of Speech and Debate is a dog eat dog world, and if you don't want to get eaten, you have to do what you can to make it out ok.

I got my ballot and judged a novice LD round, and although one kid didn't have his case, he did a really good job attacking everything that this opponent said. His opponent, did have a case, but he did a crazy good job with evidence. I gave them a little extra prep time than I normally would because I felt like being nice to them.  I thus went into the cafeteria and got a slice of pizza (Cheese, because they don't order vegetarian. My school never does) and a smoothie that I got a discount on because I know the people who make them.  I then sat at the ballot table and started to "run" ballots to the Tab room (where they put the ballots into folders and make sure that everything is ok with them). I did this for about 30 minutes until they said that I needed to stay to "help them out".

I got into the tab room and my coach said:  "you take the ballots, you look at the code on the corner of the ballot, put the ballot into the folder with the correct school code. The Aff team/person gets the white sheet, the Neg team/person gets the yellow paper. Pink papers go into the recycle bin". That didn't sound too hard. I got the ballots, tore the first two papers off, and put the pinks in the recycle bin. I got through the first 40 or so papers like that, but once the other ones came in, I had to up my game. I say that I could get the staples off 100 papers, sort them and put them in the right folder in about 2 minutes. Yes, I'm a fast worker.

That reminds me, I never really told you how many papers I was filling. Here is a math equation in case you are visual person:

Speech Events
4 people in a round x 7 rounds in a wave x 3 rounds total = 84 ballots per event.

84 papers per event x 6 Speech events = 504 speech event ballots total.

Debate Events
2 debaters per debate x AT LEAST 6 debates in a wave x 2 per wave (double wave = 7 debate at once, then 7 more) x 3 rounds = 72 papers for the debate types.

72 x 3 debate types = 216 debate papers total.

504 + 216+ 100 for 2 congress houses= 820 papers to be filed.

That is just a rough estimate. I know that there was a range of 600 ~ 1,000 balots that I filed today in a really fast 1:30 minutes. No paper cuts on my hands. But those god darn coaches got in the way of my filing, and they wanted to "just look at the ballots. I held every ballot of a judge that took 3 minutes looking at ballots till the end of my filing because they were getting in my way. I forgot to say that the table was round. You know what happens when you block one side of a table right?  I'm not rude, don't get me wrong, but when you are asking me to "see your folder" I'm going to snatch the paper from you and say "File it yourself. I think you know where your file is, and you can put the ballot that I put ON TOP for YOU inside your folder."  This is the only thing that I hate about volunteering, how rude people get and how much they ask you to do when they can see that you are doing something very important.

At awards, everyone else got a "thank you" except for me, (unless I was the judges table).  I didn't really care. I can just say, that the next time I'm working this, I'm setting some boundaries down, so I can have this done and taken care of.

Late nights and deep thoughts.

It's late again and I have nothing else to do than blog about all the stuff I have to deal with and listen to the first half of my Cocteau Twins Box set (you should check this out sometime. Very relaxing). So if you read my blog a lot you might know that I'm very stressed over tiny little stuff and that my neck/shoulder have been in pain for the past 3 weeks. Not too bad right? (heavy dose of sarcasm sorry). I think it just is exhaustion getting to me, but I can tell that I'm not too pleased with what I'm turning into right now.

No, I'm not in that depressed streak that I was in a couple of years ago, I'm just something different now. Most of its good, For example, I'm getting better at being me. Some of its bad though, I'm getting concerned with "being me", or in other words, I'm getting kind of worried about "being me" and how I compare to my friends that I haven't seen in about 4 or so years. If you don't know me that well, you should know that I care a bunch about everyone in my life that has done something, or been there for me when I needed it the most. It feels like I owe all of these people something, and I'm starting to play the "blame game" and I'm blaming myself for not keeping the relationships that I had.

Now, its hard for me to have friends, dates, whatever you want to call them, and keep them in my life for years or for even months. Growing up, I've went to 3 elementary schools, 2 middle schools and one high school. This made me the way I am now I guess.  It was hard making friends and keeping friends when I was a kid because I didn't know how long they or myself were going to be there, so instead I went into the one thing that was constant in my life, schoolwork. I've always been smart, so it wasn't that hard to keep up my grades in school, but like always, I always overdid it and it just didn't seem fun anymore. This was at its highest point in middle school when I really started to do too much work instead of too much hanging out with friends. This lead to my 3 year depression and all of that wonderful stuff, and I frankly didn't care about anything or anyone for that matter. Then I couldn't handle people or anyone for that matter, then my grades started to slip from A's to B's to C's then D's.  Then I switched schools, didn't talk to my good friends, and then started at my 4th new school. Life went on. Things got harder, I started to care less. Then one day I woke up and seen the bright light of reality, and climbed out of my hole of depression and got back where I never been before.

I realized that I've never had a real date while I was writing in my journal lying on my bed with my plaid pajama pants and my speech and debate hoodie on. Yeah, I didn't care at one time but, now I'm really starting to think "why the hell didn't I have a serious relationship with someone?". I have gotten to bond with people quite often, but before I hear the words "Do you want to go out with me?" I always get the cruel, cruel words "I'm sorry, but I think that we would just be better off if we were just to stay friends." When I hear this, no matter who says it, or even if its not in my conversation, I just want to kick the bastard who uttered those words in the mouth and tell them what it means to me. I'm guess I'm doing that with you right now, just that you are not a bastard and I'm not mad at you.

I lost hope, to a point because I'm starting to think that I'm going to be alone for the rest of my life. I don't want to see my best friends getting married and I'm the only single one there. If that was to happen then I'm probably am going to get drunk out of my mind, drive home, and then write in my journal about how I feel inside.

I'm glad that I can share my feelings with all of you guys, but I'm sorry again that I've been kind of "gloomy" the past couple of days, but I'm not going to write a happy post when I'm feeling bad inside. That just doesn't work. I write how I feel, and I'm not going to give that up for anything or anyone. It might not be late anymore, but those "late night feelings" are going to stay with me for the rest of the day today.

Worst Pain Ever

I've had the worst neck pain for the longest time. It started around last Wednesday when I slept on it wrong. I didn't think that it was a big deal but when I couldn't pop my neck, I started to think otherwise. At the concert I went to last Saturday my arm was kind of falling asleep and that was strange because my arm just felt numb and I just wondered "Why? What did I do?". Then it went away for a while and then I thought that I could get some more sleep and be happy.

This week, it came back and I was sitting in class on Thursday and out of the blue I couldn't feel my arm, I felt dizzy and I stated to panic. I made it though the day alright fine and that was just great. When I got home though, things go t worse. I just didn't feel "right" so I took some Advil and took a nap; I felt better after that, but then I started to think about all of the things that I have to do in the next week.

I have two tests on Monday, some random day-to-day living to do, plan out my clubs Homecoming float, type a 100 point essay over some question and to top it all off its almost the start of debate season.  I might just be really stressed out, but that wouldn't be an abnormal thing because I'm always stressed out nowadays and I need to do something about it, because I can't sleep and I'm not eating normally. I just want Monday to be over. If I can get through anyway, then I can probably get most of the other stuff done.

Well, I think that I post some more stuff later once I get some more sleep and after I type all of my essay. I don't care how long it takes me, as long as I get it done, then I'm set. So until then, have you checked out my music blog? It has some crazy cool stuff on there.

This weekend.

I feel like blogging about my week, but then at the same time nothing really happened this week.  I think I'll push out an essay that I was writing last month, but didn't have the time to finish it all. I have a show to go to tomorrow and I'm pretty hyped up about it, but my stomach is starting to have some issues but I'm still going to go. I'm not going to dance, I'm not going to start a mosh pit, I'm just going to pay my 7 dollars sit down and listen to some bands. Its a "early release party" or whatever and I'm like "What the heck? What is an early release party? There are like 3 bands playing are they all releasing albums?" I dont' think so, but I'm still going no matter what happened because the last gig I missed was some serious rockatude and hell, if this is a folk concert I'll still will be happy to go. I get to see some of my friends that I met this summer (I hope that they are going) and I can be like "how is school? School is a drag for me because I might have too much going on". No lie, I'm only going to school for Guitar club and to keep up my grades to at least a B in every class which is kind of challenging when people call you "sir" and you almost have to beat someone up for calling you "blue lunchbox kid". But I think I'll just have to write about that later.

Self Esteeem in Low Regard.

So last week wasn't looking good in the first place, and then when I try to talk to my Debate coaches about the things that we need to be worked on so that we can actually WIN something this year, I get called out on all of my faults and and things are suddenly MY fault and not the captains fault because I bring it to the forefront. Ever since third period Friday I haven't really felt like myself and I had the bad thoughts of harming myself instead of others. I spend the majority of yesterday on the couch and felt pretty blue and kind of mad at the world for taking my happiness away and giving me this bullshit to deal with instead of all of the good things that should be in my life right now.  But it is hard to focus on the good things when the voices inside you are telling you that you "Can't do anything because you never are good enough".

Let me just say it, I hate myself sometimes. I don't hate myself when I'm happy though because I'm focusing on all of the good things inside of me to care about all of this. So when I'm happy, I don't really care what is going on inside of me and I really don't care about anyone else. But when I'm sad, I'm sad and I start to think about all of those "bad" things that I forgot about when I was happy.

What are the "bad things"? Well, the bad things can be anything varying from day to day. On Friday I was worrying about if I had the "guts" to be on the team. Deep down inside that I know that I have the "guts" to be on the team, but myself is conflicting with myself and I really have no idea what to do about it. With Debate and even life, I'm always striving for perfection and I do have to say that it is kind of bad to just be obsessed with obsession. For example lets just say that my goal for the meet day is to break to third round and try to end third round with at least 50-49 points. When I'm on my "highs" I can reach this goal, and I might even have a true shot of getting to finals, but it always ends the same, I never get to finals, I break around 30-29 points and I always loose. At the end of the day I always ask myself "Why did I even try?". It is disheartening,it really is and I want to change, but I honestly don't know how to.

Sometimes it isn't even me, it can be other people.  When I see someone with their "significant other" something there is not a time where I don't say "Why am I always single?". Once I think this, then it kind of sets me on the slippery slope into negative thoughts. The thoughts just pop up into my head like little text messages "They broke up with you because you never had the guts to say that you loved them" or "I'm going to be single for the rest of my life. No one loves me anyway.". I don't want to be a sand bag on anyone's emotions, but I think this is the reason why no one "likes" me. Yeah, it sucks when you have a really good friend and you ask them out and you have a relationship for a while and then they dump you out of the blue beacuse I'm too "passive aggressive",  "too dependent on them" and "never show my real feelings".As if that was bad on its own, then I found out that they were cheating on me with their best friend. I have been single for going on 3 years now and it isn't a good feeling.

Then my friends come around and I do have to say that I try my darnest to keep my cool around my friends, but my "real feelings" are always peeking though. Example: this summer, I tried almost every week to talk to my friends or just try to do something fun because I was feeling down myself, but what did I get? I always got that old, tired and lame excuse of "Oh, I'm doing something this weekend".  I try to tell them that I really need their help, but what do I always do? I just kind of lack when it is needed the most.  I don't even think that I have "friends" but more of the "people that I talk to when I see them in the hallway or when a thought reminds me of them". A friend for me is right next to me riding my own emotional roller coaster and is screaming right along with me. I don't see too much of that these days because I'm the metaphorical weight in my old friendships, and the friend who is just "there". I wish I was cool enough to talk to all of my friends about these things, but they won't care. They are just going to read it and say "oh well that sucks for her". Or if I did let them read this, then they would see that I'm not the same person inside and out and that will freak me out.

I think that I can only say "I hope you fall down a well and die" so many times. When you are me, there is at least one person wherever I go that I will be saying that too. I'm not mean, trust me. I'm as far as mean can get. But when people mess with me enough, I kind of just want to quit, give up and say "Go to hell and fall down a well" and then it is on to the next person. People hate me sometimes, and that isn't the low self esteem talking. I could talk about all of the times I've been hit, kicked, punched and waked but I wont. I just keep it inside of me and just something or someone will just do one little thing and I will explode like a volcano.

If it doesn't come out, then I will just keep it in. And thank God that I didn't kill myself this Friday. I just don't go and say "Oh, well my life sucks, let me go kill myself." I work my way up. I cry to start off because I'm upset. If crying doesn't work, then I try to do something fun, if that doesn't work, then I think bad thoughts, and if that doesn't work I try to talk to someone about it, but no one wants to talk. The last resort that I turn to is harming myself. I haven't harmed myself in about 3 or 4 years, which is a good thing, but when I feel like this, I just hurt myself with my own thoughts. I found it strange this weekend though because I just couldn't harm myself. I don't know if it was all me, but I just couldn't do it. I guess I had to write this instead.

The other debate coach kept repeating this quote with tears in their eyes but I can't for the life of me remember what it was. I was forgetting it on purpose, but it went along the lines of "go for what you want" and "get what you deserve". I want to say that I didn't care, but I do care about what was said. And I will try my best to get what I deserve in life, even if it takes a damn long time. I have another meeting with the coaches soon, and you can bet 3 dollars that something is going to change and it won't be a "pity party".

If you read all of this. Thank you. I really need someone right now.

Mad rush of freedom.

This is the last Saturday of my summer vacation and I still have some homework to do. It is also the last Saturday of my summer and I still want to capture my last "mad rush of freedom" that I have left inside of me.  I bet your thinking "well, she still has Saturday and Sunday when she is in school off right?" that is false. See, I'm in this soul crushing club called Speech and Debate. I'm getting so fed up with it, I'm going to give you readers a look inside my life as a Debater. And I will post that today. So why am I up this early in the day writing about my the last hours of my summer vacation? I'm writing this because I'm exhausted and can't sleep, and because I'm worried sick about school.

What I have to do.
I have 2 days and a couple of hours to do the following so I won't be all worried and stressed out on Monday.

1. Finish the History Packet.
2. Type the 5 History short responses.
3. Write the "best of" list.
4. Write the huge essay on that 600 page collection of short stories and relate it to "modern day America"
5. Create the hate filled blog post about how much I hate Speech and Debate.
6. Write some stuff for The Sound Collection.
7. Get the rest of my school stuff.
8. Take advantage of my 25% off coupon.

Oh, by the way, I'm trying to do all of this stuff off of 5 hours of sollid sleep. I'm sore as heck, kind of mad, and stressed out. This is for sure not a good way to spend a Saturday. But you know what they say, Carpe Diem.

(I got 100 visitors, so I'm going to change my blog theme back to the way it was :)

What I should be doing right now.

I'm kind of bored right now, so I'm going to list the things that I should be doing right now. Hopefully, this will serve as a list so I can start to do these things whenever I get bored in the next few days. And to make it fun, I'm going to see how many of these things I can do in a whole day. Its fun, and I get something done too!

1. Write blog post on all the things that I did on my "to - do" list.
2. Finish writing post about my music collection on "The Sound Collection".
3. Write Birthday wish list.
4. Go outside and do something before it gets too dark.
5. Buy skateboard wheels before winter. 
6. Buy 3 pairs of new pants.
7. Get a Le Tigre CD and dance to it.
8. Get Mika Miko's C.Y.S.L.A.B.F CD and blog about it.
9. Buy some Cd's off of mail order.
10. Buy something from of K Records and blog about it.
11. Buy something from 4AD Records and blog about it. 
12. Upload new CD's that I got for free.
13. Finish that darn summer reading book by next week so I can be like "Yeah! I finished my summer reading early :D"
14. Finish that darn History homework so I can be like "Yeah! I finished my summer homework early!"
15. Take more naps/sleep late/get to bed early.
16. E-mail friend and and update them on stuff thats going on.
17. Try to update my blog theme.
18. Read another 3 books this summer.
19. "Try" to hang out with my friends before they go to school.
20. Go Skateboarding.
21. Start packing for weekend trip.
22. Finish the patches I started making.
23. Start making bracelets from my old broken belt.
24. Buy a new belt/get a new belt buckle.
25. Think about new hair cut and get it.
26. Buy two or three pairs of shoes. 
27. Play my guitar more.
28. Finish that song I started writing earlier this summer.
29. Write a journal entry.
30. Write a blog entry.

Yeah, I know that I won't get all of this done in one day, but it is still worth a try. I'll see how it goes tomorrow.