Reflections on Monotony Revisited
WARNING: It is late, and I am tired, there are undoubtedly are numerous grammatical errors in this post.
It has been more than 1 week wince I have last blogged! The nonexistant readers of this blog will remember that my last message was rather cryptic and written from a computer at the library under pressure of time. The explanation for this lapse is simple: school. It has begun.
It's funny, I had set out with great intentions in writing this entry, but I am now thwarted for some reason. Let me start with the newest and most different piece of information. As president of the sophomore class, I have rapidly assumed numerous responsibilities--many to my dismay. Over the summer I was not here in Portland, so I could not sell ads for the student phone directory (one of our class's tasks). The other members of the cabinent did not exactly fill their responsibilities however, and by the beginning of this week only 2 ads had been sold. This is a serious problem, primarily because 3 other people in the cabinent have play practice for various plays around the city almost 5 days per week, and one other person has football practice and games essentially every day. This left myself and one other person to do all selling of ads after school. I had music events, so this means that I have to balance this pitiful salesman role, music, and my 7 classes worth of homework. So me and Molly Georgetta went around to nearly every establishment in Hillsdale and Multnomah Village during several late afternoon/early evenings, selling this stupid advertisements. I really do feel a bit guilty doing it too. I mean, I feel slightly morally subjugated having to go around begging people for money for advertisements that clearly aren't going to bring them much return (it's a student phone directory for god's sake), in an economy that's well... self-explanatory, when I'd rather be doing homework so that I can avoid staying up until midnight. In any case, I think we sold about 12 or 13 ads for a grand total of somewhere around $300. I think Molly hates me for that. It wasn't great. I am also on the commitee for half-time shows as part of my student government responsibilities. As strange as it may seem, it is nothing but the truth. Our next half-time show will involve a short game of three-legged football with the captains of all the sports teams. I get to be the mascot!! Woohoo!! Unfortunately we don't have a Trojan costume, so I may have to dress up as an ape or banana (the costumes that we do have). I like this position of power, even though I'm outranked by layers of people and our teacher is trying to turn us into mini-ultra-bureacrats by intentionally inventing swampy layers of bureacracy in the name of "organization". Everything has to be written up in a proposal, and the proposals have to be signed by at least three people and approved by at least one commitee (don't ask me which one, there's more than ten of them now), and then they have to approved by some administrative person. It's too much for me to possibly understand.
The real classes are, well, good, but they are time-consuming. I'm too tired to elaborate, but you need only wait to hear more. Actually I can't resist myself, I must drone on some more. My teacher for precalculus (McFarlene) is a moron--she makes arithmatic errors and it takes a long time to succeed in convincing her that she's wrong, and she can't perform simple algebraic operations with manipulatives (she admitted that to us today while lamenting how she hates people who are pretty, smart, and/or perfect in some way). I am also the co-president of the Wilson Model United Nations Club this year. Come one come all! Do join! (for all of the especially nonexistant students who read this). Aside from a these few minor bumps, everything is going quite smoothly at school. Soon, La Klubo de Esperanto de la Gimnazio Vilsono will be founded (as soon as I get the applications from the person who is supposed to make them next week), and will have at least one member. My attempts at handing out pamphlets on Esperanto didn't pan out.
Oooh!! More good ramblings! Let me deal with the perennial issue of any multi-year institution of learning: the topic of freshmen. It really is entertain to talk about. I accepted it last year, and I still believe it to be true: the majority of freshmen are inherently obnoxious to the majority of the general population. I really go on and on and on about this for a really long time, but I'm starting to have trouble keeping my eyes open, so... moving on. The one thing that I've found rather obnoxious about these new people is that they will not talk to anyone except for their freshmen friends. I can walk up to virtually any non-freshman, and without fail, I will be able to start some kind of conversation. It is not so with the freshmen. Earlier this week I started to talk this nice friendly-looking group of freshmen, I they did not even acknowledge my existence. They surely heard me, I was standing right in front of them. It was frustrating. And today, I took the early bus home from school for the first time this year. Last year there were four high-school students who regularly rode it, and now there are twelve. The swelling of size is due to the influx of eight freshmen who now ride the bus. When I entered the bus, they looked at me rather nervously, then I started to read. I was listening to music at the time and I thought someone said something to me so I took out my headphones and heard one of them mumbling about how they liked my shoes. My shoes???? Rather odd, don't you think? Yes! I thought so too, especially considering that my shoes are kind of in the style of cheap 1980s running shoes (despite the fact that '80s popular culture is experiencing somewhat of a renniassance, I along with the majority of society despise what I know of it (but that's what makes my shoes funny, see)). I was caught off guard a bit; it would kind of be like if someone said that they really liked your plain, solid white t-shirt. So I said hello. Then one of them asked me to say something in German (I was seriously confused at this point, either their or my thought processes wre clearly fumbled severely), so I responded that I knew no German (because I don't. Actually, I know "guten tag", but I that didn't pop to mind. It generally isn't common for non-German-speakers to think in German... I think.) They fell into silence, so I started describing how they should join Model UN because it's very cool and because I'm the co-president (which makes it all the more cooler... right? maybe not.). From this point on I was given "the cold shoulder", so to speak. I talked some more, and even asked them several questions, all with no response, as if I weren't even on the bus. This behavior is truely abhorrant in my opinion. What rude manners, and what a poor understanding of the customs of American social dynamics (I though I was bad...).
Anyway, I am tired. I went go-kart (yes, with a "k") racing for a friend's birthday party. The karts have a top speed of 35 mph with a 5.5 horsepower engine (It left me in awe). The course was indoor, so it was really curvy, and crashing into barriers at high speeds with go-karts is not fun. I got a tad scraped up. I was also really slow and succeeded in cutting everyone off for about 3 minutes: there was a bit of a line behind me. You can really slide in these things: I spun out in a 360 degree twirl into a barrier, skidded at least 5 feet sideways into a barrier on a turn (the impact actually caused me to bleed), and created numerous trails of smoke and loud noises from it all. I believe I have mastered the art of cutting people off and skidding. I also did it all in flip-flops. This reminds me: I need to get my driver's permit sometime soon. Driving is not high on my priorities, it seems really boring. That's all I can bear to write for the day.
