Wednesday, April 28, 2004

Sorry, it's been a long time since I last posted.

Let's see.....

At the JamFest National Competition, we scored first in our division (senior variety open), and we also got first in the nation for the overall category of dance.

I have been insanely busy: preparing for Chile, running for Junior class office, regular homework, the cultural fair, getting our old house put on the market, and so much more.

Nevertheless, though, I tell you, I thrive on craziness. More later. Time for school. Elections are today--- wish me luck!

Wednesday, April 07, 2004

Alright so now I wanna talk about the dance/cheer competition, 'cause I am way over excited, but I think that's a good thing....maybe....just a little?!

Anyway, the host is JamFest, and it's the National Cheerleading and Dance Competition, and it will be held in Washington, D.C. for a whole three days! WOOHOO!

Let's see....Quintin is my instructor, and he's pretty cool, though I really like working with Ashley, who is a college student at Peace, and works at the gym part time. She's really sweet. She takes me to practice ('cause Peace and RCHS are like next door) whenever we have unusual practices (i.e. before 5:30pm) and my mom can't take me. We have lots of fun, flooring it at yellow lights, and blarring the radio (she likes country too!), and we always race to beat Kevin (who also works at the gym, and I think owns the place) to the gym if it's an early practice (i.e. 3pm) If we beat him, like we did last Thursday, then we get to park in HIS parking space, which is a HUMONGOUS deal!!!!! :) Yeah, it's fun stuff. Ashley laughed at me the first time we rode together because I said all of 4 words to her in the ten minute drive to the gym from RCHS. She said "how are you?" and I said "Fine, thank you." well, those were three of the four words. The other word was a "yes" when she asked me some other question. Yeah, she thinks it's funny I don't talk to her, 'cause she knows I rarely shut up during class....hehehe.

Anyway, back to the competition. We are leaving early Friday afternoon and headin' up to DC, and we will compete twice in the Open Category, and the judges will average the two scores. The Open Category is a mix of Pom (what cheerleaders do), hip hop, jazz, kick, and gymnastics moves....The dance is a mix of songs that I haven't even heard yet, but it should be good, cause Kevin's making it. We're wearing plain black jazz pants, and royal blue shirts. One side has a long sleeve, and the other is just a strap....interesting. So one arm will be sweating and boiling hot and the other will be cool....hmmmm....interesting concept.


In other news, our gym CATS Cheer and Tumble School of Raleigh will be merging with EXCEL, another gym, to form one of the largest cheer families on the east coast. So it should be fun....yeah, I gotta pack for the beach. More later. And if I can figure out how to work our digital camera, I'll take pics at the competition and post them...but that's unlikely b/c I'm technologically challenged. *sheepish grin*
Alright, where to start???
Let's see, I've had two Flex Days since I lasted posted. Truth be told, I thought only one of them left a lot to be desired, but that's just me. The first activity on the first Friday was Optical Illusions, 'cept it was really drawing on beach balls and blowing bubbles...yep no joke. The bubbles were fun but the beach ball activity was just stupid.....We drew a line from the "north pole" to the "south pole" of the beach ball, then the instructor asked if that was a "straight line." Of course it is. If you take it off the surface, it is a straight line. ......oh well. The coolest part of the bubble thingy was making the hypercube, filling it with bubble mixture by carefully dunking it in the bucket, and then pulling it out. It only worked once, but theoretically you should get a third cube made entirely of bubbles inside the smaller of the two original cubes. It's really cool.

The second activity that day for me was Ethics, which was a science activity that dealt with issues such as DNA databases, research and testing, genetically modified foods, whistleblowers in the science field, and other things such as medicare and different anti-depressant drugs. We got split into one of those categories, paired up and then we were told either pro or ocn, and we had to debate that topic in front of partners from all the categories. I was whistleblowers...kinda boring, but very important. It's easy, I think, to sit and say, "oh yeah, I would blow the whistle, even if it cost me my job," but out in the real world....would it be so easy???

My next Flex day I watched Gallipoli in the morning. It's a movie about the WWI battle at Gallipoli, which if I am not mistaken is off the island of Turkey. It's got Mel Gibson, about twenty years ago, in it, and it's really sad. These guys all go off to war, with glory in mind, and their first battle is tragic. They were fighting the Turks from the bottom of a hill (trench warfare), and the Turks were at the top of the hill. They got an order to take all the ammunition out of their guns because the Turks weren't worth wasting ammunition on. These guys could only use their bayonets, and that meant running up hill and getting as close to the Turks as possible. I will leave the end to your viewing. My only negative comment about the movie was the music. It was the same as that from Chariots of Fire, one of my favorite movies. The synthesizer was a big thing when both these movies were made, and in Chariots of Fire I didn't notice that it was kinda out of place, but in a WWI movie, it distracts you.

In the afternoon we went to the NC Museum of Art, and had a tour completely in Spanish.....fun fun fun. I'll leave the details of our excursion and our wacky tour guide up to your imagination! :)

I'm leaving for the beach tomorrow afternoon. Other than that....yep. Spring break is droning slowly on, but that's not to say I'm not enjoying it. I can stay up reading till 2am and not get up till 11, and still do anything I wanna do all day....it's nice.


"Some days you gotta dance
Live it up when you get the chance
Cause when the world doesn’t make no sense
And you’re feeling just a little too tense
Gotta loosen up those chains and dance" ("Some Days You Gotta Dance" by the Dixie Chicks)