All over the place

It's getting harder to keep up with everything... too much is happening now. Homework load is at its all-time high, and that's pretty much on a daily basis. But I guess that's good. I feel like I'm actually learning math this year cause my AP Calc teacher, Ms. Nguyen, is a demanding yet awesome teacher. My other teachers quite likeable too: with Madame Topping, I'm actually starting to enjoy French; it's impossible to fall asleep in Ms. Conradson's class cause she is so lively; Mr. Henschtke is quite laid-back and the concepts he teaches in Anatomy are pretty interesting; Ms. Meyer's class is a lot of notes and homework problems but Ms. Meyer is still Ms. Meyer lol; and I'm kinda looking forward to actually covering and writing events in Journalism. Some classes are a draaaag and feel like they're never ending, but I have some pretty great people in my classes.

I miss swimming a lot. I feel like I'm getting fat and my eating patterns are slightly off. It's gonna be quite difficult to juggle swimming and school once MTW starts in October, but I think I can manage. I can handle 5 hours of sleep each night... as long as I get myself used to it.

Chinese school might not be insanely boring this year. My teacher, Kong lao shi, loves our input and actually listen to what we have to say. Plus, it's a small class so everyone kinda knows each other already. And we're doing stuff that we actually feel like we need to learn. It's appearing to be a really personalized class and I love that. I really need to focus on Chinese this year cause I need to decide whether I want to take AP Chinese or SAT II Chinese.

I feel stupid talking with retainers. But there is no way in hell I am getting my braces back on again. On the bright side, my retainers are a beautiful shade of blue that I very much like!

OH HEEEEY, I'M LICENSED! But no car yet, boooo. My cousin is going back to China in October though, and I think I might get his kinda boring but driveable Toyota Camry, the car that I grew up in lol. OH, AND FOR THE RECORD, I will NOT offer rides. People are already starting to ask me for rides and my answer is NO, unless you have a legitimate reason or it's some kind of an emergency. Otherwise, get your own license, buy your own car, and break the law yourself.

I blush too easily. It's increasingly becoming a much-hated problem.

What swimming and school do to you

The annual and long-awaited Monterey meet was this weekend. I am pooped. I don't think I have been this sore yet in the past.. year. If I sit for 5 minutes, I feel like someone is continually punching my back. And walking is pretty excruciating, I feel like I just ran miles and miles. Even just sitting down feels like someone has been sitting on my lap for quite a long time. Everything hurts, more than usual. So my mom put on 4 of those Asian patches that HURT LIKE HELL when you try to peel them off. It kinda helped. Advil did too. And sleep, yum.

In general, I guess I'm pretty satisfied with my results, although I always have those nagging regrets. I received the 1st place High Point Champion trophy for the girls 15-18 age group.. that made everything worthwhile :D And MTW got the 1st place team trophy for the highest scoring team. But there was an air of sadness cause it was Alex's last meet with us; he will be dearly missed. I hope he liked our card and acoustic rendition of "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz. And I know I could have gotten better times and I know what I need to work on now: faster recovery in free, faster kick in fly and back, IM turns, stop saving my energy for the last lap!!! I absolutely hate the feeling of being out-touched by a few tenths or hundredths of a second. If I lose, I would rest easier knowing I lost by an entire body length than by the length of a fingernail.

I wish I could have camped out with the team.. but my mom doesn't like the Monterey fog and the cold breeze that results from it. I'm glad we didn't though, a hotel is like heaven. My major back and leg pain would not have been very pleasant at all if I slept on the hard dirt floor. But I did visit the campsite around sunset and enjoy the potluck, making the s'mores, climbing the trees, ignoring the "no trespassing sign", touching electric fences, playing mafia, hunting for bambi, stepping on the poison ivy, nonstop laughing with Vincent, and feeding Victor, LOL. I love my team :)

I am not at all pleased with school. My grades so far are putting me in a super bad mood and a few people said that it shows. I feel like I'm settling. I can do better, I know it. School is one of my top priorities and I feel like I'm losing this competition. I CANNOT lose.

1. I know you don't, but try to understand. We have entirely different priorities. I act like it's nothing, but it's more than that to me.
2. I think it's the end, but I do hope it's the beginning.
3. Thanks for not even bothering to try.
4. It bothers me when you act like nothing has happened.

Split down the middle

First week of school was so looooong. I do love my teachers and I'm quite satisfied with my schedule overall. I just need to step up my game with those honors/AP classes. It's only the first week, but my homework is already taking more time to complete than it did in sophomore year.

So a faulty laneline at the MTW pool kinda split my middle right finger in half.. there's this nasty red line extending all the way down the middle of my middle finger. If you pry it open, you can see past my external layer of skin. It's pretty freaky but pretty cool!

My brother just won all 8 worlds of Super Mario Bros. He is so proud of himself and my whole family is too LOL. Maybe now I can finally have my DS back; he rarely shares with me even though it is MINE ):

I spent all of Saturday morning watching the Little Leagues baseball World Series international championships. The Chinese Taipei team owned Mexico in the semifinals, so the final game is between the US and China. I always feel guilty cheering for either team when they play against each other. It's like the Olympics all over again... It was a surprisingly interesting game and baseball will forever remind me of Mrs. Mellera.

I DEFINITELY do not show this in any way, but I am very grateful for you, especially now. You are surprisingly easy to talk to. Thanks.

MTW Swim-a-thon

OH, almost forgot! Swimathon was on Friday, and the high school kiddos swam the 200 laps (5000 meters) within 2 hours which was BORING AS HELL, except for the occasional corkscrew and backstroke, teehee. and my parents kept nagging me about resting more and drinking energy shakes.. took me a while to convince them that this is pretty much what we do at practice daily. aiyaaa!

A big THANK YOU VERY MUCH to all y'all that supported me by pledging, you guys are the greatest family and friends<3 I think I raised a whopping... $200?! HELL YEAH, HUGS AND KISSES FOR ALL!!! (Oh and it would be much appreciated if you paid me by Monday, August 31) :D

So today, I turned down a chance to go crabbing in SF to go shopping.. this shopping trip better be worth it!

Carwashin'

Hung out with you guys just like old times. Dirty cars, nasty jokes, sunburned feet, free starbucks, "let's get PHO!", corona boxers, infinite laughs. It's always a pleasure :)

More school

HELLO to the lovely month of JOOOOONE!

Our lemon battery thingymabobber won! Our voltage was off the charts, it was worth the $1.25. Thanks to Brian Nguyen and his vinegar-ed lime. I really hope those extra 10 points on the Redox test will help me to beef up my grade before the SCARY ASS chem final. Which leads me to AP Chem next year, which I don't even feel like talking about. I am just very worried, that's all ):

In fact, must BEEF UP all of my grades, so finals will be less stressful. Time to bring in the extra credit!

Trying to order "underground" team shirts for MHS swimming is very difficult. To rush shipping or not to rush shipping (and pay an extra $80 so I can get it before school ends)? Hanes or Gildan (50 cents difference, but I like Hanes)? More than a hundred different fonts to choose from! And where the hell does everyone hang out at school!? Swimmers are scattered everywhere, I can't seem to find even 2 in one place. Some can't think of a good nickname (ask An, he will definitely think of something nasty), some can't afford it (true, $22 is a lot), some don't even know their own sizes (wow, you don't buy clothes?). Gosh I feel like peoples' mother, constantly harassing them. I think I might just end up having my mom pay for the entire order (almost $400, crazy huh?) and pay her back when I get everyone's money, cause people keep forgetting.

Yay, Kevin Vuong is on MTW! Vincent and Thi are staying too, hooooray! And my love, Wendy, of course<3 (Plus some annoying freshmen from JV but that's whatever, they are slow anyways) It's like a MHS reunion. I just hope that new girl isn't fast. Wow I sound horrible. If she is fast, that's a good thing... right? It will be a good and healthy challenge, I guess. Oh, for the record: I hate breaststroke.

Still searching for that grad ticket cause I want to go! I have really gotten to know some amazing seniors and I want to be able to see them graduate. I will buy it, at a good price. Any offers?

F-troupe

I found the website of a pair of shoes that I have been wanting for quite a while now... but I can't find the place that sells it. I really like it, it's both unique and cute. It was even on a Teen Vogue spread twice! The first time I saw it, I let myself forget it but the second time, I told myself I had to have it. Oh well, it's for the best anyways I guess. No money anymore, swimming stuff (gifts, CCS shirt, team jacket, team suit) has really been draining my wallet.

My 3rd period teacher was a being a beezy today. He caught me in another class when I was supposedly excused from his class and said he was gonna report us to admin. What the hell! AP testing is over, calm down.

I received the candle of... enlightenment? wisdom? authority? (I have no clue, but it was a real lighted candle) during Science Olympiad. Ivy is stepping down as captain and I am supposedly gonna be her protégé (The accents make the word look cool hehe). The thought scares me out of my mind, I have a huge ass pair of shoes to fill. Another load of pressure, BAM. But... another chance to fail? or another chance to succeed? Let's be positive :)

On the brightside, physics this summer at Mission is confirmed! Now I just gotta work out the 4-way carpooling schedule (I <3 carpool lanes) and hopefully physics online at Deanza. Still undecided about SCSC though, can I really deal with all that intense practice?! MTW practice today made me sore! I'm not used to all that weight-lifting and streamline kicking. Yeah, Pagan is to blame for that. Jamie seems okay as a coach though, I am kinda relieved Alex isn't coaching us. He was too much of a pushover. She is demanding, like a real coach.

My taste in music seems to be changing very rapidly lately.

Croque Madame

My dad found a turkey mom (also called a hen?) sitting on a nest in a bush in our front yard. It's their mating season and this mommy had a total of 13 turkey eggs she was keeping warm. Big family! So we hatched (haha, couldn't resist the pun) this idea that we should take 3 turkey eggs and replace them with 3 chicken eggs so we can have wild chickens roaming around when they pop out of that egg! Kinda like the Ugly Duckling where the goose raises the swan, except with turkeys and chickens (turkens? chickeys?) I took a picture of those 3 turkey eggs, along with a chicken egg, on my kitchen countertop that matches the pattern perfectly. I'll keep you guys updated.

The Union came out yesterday! My picture for Science Olympiad was in it, as well as Pagan saying he was proud of me for making CCS in swimming. Wow, it's so weird getting a compliment from him. What's even weirder? A hug for getting a minute flat in 100 free. I still can't believe it, he HAS changed.

Club swim meet today at Independence. Timing for 6 hours in the heat is extremely exhausting, but worth the 8 hours that Coach will sign hehe. It is great to be able to eat McDonalds while other people have to compete, kinda like laughing in the face of those suckers. Our next meet is Leagues, still 3 weeks away from now. Morning practice during spring break... yay?