This conversation just occurred between my mother and my fifteen-year-old sister.

Hayley: "Mommy, look how far I can jump."
Mommy: "I'm impressed."
Hayley: "But Mommy, I haven't even jumped yet."

I am not kidding.

Mummy made me. She dragged Hay and I to a datonga class today. Datonga: DAncing, TONing, and yoGA. It was...something. We began the class with this quote: "Kindness is the oil that reduces the friction in life." Something like that anyway. In this class, "There is no right, and there is no wrong." Yoga kind of disturbs me. It's just creepy. And the dance part, let's not forget that. All I'll say is that it involved scarves. SCARVES. At the end, we were laying on our mats clearing our minds of all thoughts, removing the day's tension, concentrating on our breathing, and embracing our inner calm, kind person. Instead, I was thinking of all the different things I was going to write about Datonga. I was also thinking about the light. Which light, you ask? The light in the middle of the ceiling that was crooked. The other two in the room were on a perfect line, but the middle one was CROOKED. How was I supposed to RELAX and drift into TRANQUILITY when the light was crooked? It was quite distressing. The very last thing we did was sit cross-legged and OHM. Apparently all yoga classes end with chanting OHMMM. I just sat silently and pretended to Ohm, but our leader made this really deep OHMing noise that made her sound possessed. A complete DATONGA experience, nonetheless.

In other exciting news, Comcast is finally coming to the island. That means new cable with good stations AND CABLE INTERNET. This is brilliant news to me. Does anyone remember what it's like to have a dial-up modem? Anybody? I didn't think so? I'm the only one left, and hopefully I won't be alone for long.

And in what could be considered even more exciting news, our baseball team just won the state championship. I didn't go to the game; I went to see The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants with Hayley. I thought about going, and I did sincerely hope that they would win and wish them all the best, but the Sisterhood won out in the end. (It was extremely enjoyable for two teenage girls.) The baseball team has been all over the paper and the news for months now, and it's really thrilling that they're now state champs, but, as one of the journalists put it, it wasn't unexpected. The win was especially sweet, though, because this whole season was dedicated to Hunter's father.

I must go now because I might actually get up early tomorrow. Who knows?

Sometimes your whole world gets turned upside down. That happened to me this morning. Last night, my family and my uncle's family were gathered at my grandparents fairly new vacation home eating lasagna and having fun. This morning my mother woke me up with shocking news. My grandmother--my MeyMey--died last night in her sleep. She was so alive last night; nothing seemed wrong. Then suddenly she's not here anymore. Daddy and Uncle David were devastated, but they handled it remarkably well. I don't know what I would do if I lost my mother. I'd be inconsolable. Now they've lost both parents, and I've lost both of my paternal grandparents--Grandpa is actually my step-grandfather; Granddaddy died almost fifteen years ago. It's so unbelievable. She wasn't sick; she wasn't weak. She still played tennis a couple of times each week. I'm convinced, though, that the timing was the work of God. She had her whole family together at the new house that she loved so much. She'd told us how proud she was of us, how much she loved us.

We're leaving early tomorrow to go to Columbus. The funeral's going to be Tuesday. So many people have called. I'm fine until somebody brings it up; then, my face distorts and I can't control my tears.

I can't help but feel that I've always taken her for granted. That I wasn't as friendly as I could have been that last night. That I should have showed her how much she really means to me. How much I love her.

But I can't.

I'm supposed to be writing a physics paper on Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR for short); obviously I'm not. The convenient part of all of this is that if I sit here at the computer in the dark typing a bit, pausing every once in a while, and generally looking productive, it appears that I am writing the above-mentioned physics paper on CMBR. For instance, did anybody know that CMBR levels are astonishingly uniform throughout the universe in every direction? Now you learned something on Live Journal today.

It was "Singing Sunday" at church today. If you can't figure out what that is (and I sincerely hope that you can), it's when, instead of a sermon, we take song request from the congregation for half an hour or so. While this particular fifth-Sunday tradition can sometimes be a little trying on one's patience since the SAME people request the SAME hymns every time, I was in a pleasant mood this morning and enjoyed the old Methodist hymns that are requested every time for the delight of all.

I'm beginning to feel slightly guilty about not working on my physics paper on Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation. It's probably best to take a gander at the seven pages of information I collected on the highly entertaining CMBR. Hope everyone has a terrific evening.

Four days until we're out for Christmas break. Four WHOLE days. That's much, much too long. I say we forget exams and the review days that precede them, and just go ahead and declare ourselves emancipated from school for the next two and a half weeks. Wouldn't that be brilliant? (Brilliant is my new word for anyone who would like to know. A couple of weeks ago it was Royal Treatment Weekend on WE, and I watched this movie about Prince William (in fact, I think that's what it was called), in which they said brilliant in almost every other sentence. I might have even watched the movie twice just to listen to the accents. It was wickedly awesome.) Anyway, back to the exam dilemma. I have devised a perfect scenario for Friday: It snows during the wee hours of the morning, enough to cancel school, including my bloody Bible and English exams. We must them instantly leave to go skiing to prevent any pre-Christmas make-up days from occurring. Brilliant, I know.

Wouldn't everybody love for it to snow? That is my ultimate Christmas wish: A WHITE CHRISTMAS! I would be the happiest girl in the whole U.S.A. (to quote SNL).

I'm supposed to go study for mid-terms. We'll see if that actually happens. Have a brilliant evening!

Guess what's Thursday? NOT JUST Thanksgiving! It's the annual Thanksgiving barbeque on my grandparents' farm! You may ask yourself, "Who eats barbeque on Thanksgiving?" Well, that would be my family. And we have for as long as I kind remember. We have 30-40 people each year. It's terrific. It was more fun when I was little, but it's still alright. Believe it or not, when I was a young child, Thanksgiving was my favorite holiday. What kind of child picks Thanksgiving over Christmas? Me apparently. My cousins and I used to have these HUGE Capture the Flag games all over the farm, generally boys v. girls. This was wicked fun when I was little; now it's not nearly as much. Partly because Brooke's 20 now; Thomas is 19; Frank's 17; David's 16; I'm 16; Heather's 15; Hayley's 13; Jessica's 11. We're the older cousins-not so into Capture the Flag anymore. Ah well, we'll have to think of other ways to pass our time. For instance, last year Brooke straightened my hair. It took over two hours.

Enough about Thanksgiving though. This has to be the most boring entry ever, far surpassing all of my other mind-numbingly dull, impersonal entries. ARGH! I need something to talk about! PERFECT'S BORING. As if I'd let it be any other way though.

Well, I'm here, though I can't really think of much to write about, but I decided to anyway since I'm sure it will be awhile before I think about it again. Oh, I did go to the "overnighter" at Samantha's church last night. I had a pretty good time. It's absolutely nothing like my church where we have eight people, maybe, in our youth group. They probably have over a hundred. It's insane! It's also so much more contemporary, etc., than my sweet little UMC. I have to admit that I kind of prefer the traditional hymns and worship style. I don't know why, I just do. Back to the lock-in though. Staying up 'til 4:?? in the morning, and then getting up at 7:00 and driving forty minutes home is not the way to go. Trust me. Driving down 16 with very heavy eyelids that try to stay closed every single time I blink does not do much for my driving skills.

When I came home, I slept for almost four hours until I was forced out of my bed to go to my tennis tournament/play day/thing. I didn't stay to see who won (the person who had the highest cummulative score from all five dates, two of which I missed for Tech games). Instead, my mother and I went to Bass Pro Shop. That's a fantastic store. They have everything possibly imaginable. I could live there. Seriously.

I just found the coolest 3-D snowball-fighting game. It's absolutely spiffing (and few things are that great)! Before are start doing anything worse than virtual snowball fighting, I better go get some sleep. Bon soir!

Good evening. And a pleasant day one at that. This day started off awfully. An awful ending to an awful week; however since I used the phrase "started off," you obviously know it got better. It started at One Act practice. (Yes, I'm breaking character and joined the cast of the One Act Play, AND I've actually enjoyed it...for the most part.) It was a hectic, stressful day with an abundance of tests and quizzes, so I wasn't quite in the mood for staying an extra hour at school to practice for the play. It didn't help that SOME PEOPLE kept messing up there lines. But then there was Eric. Maybe he messed up too, but he's so entertaining and makes me laugh so hard. That perked my mood up. Then I listened to some great music on the way home, and that helped also. I was in a pretty pleasant mindset when I came home to find my grandmother already back from her tennis tournament in town. I cheerily chatted with her for a little while before I went upstairs to my room to change and go to the YMCA Pumpkin Patch to get volunteer hours for Mr. McGee's class.

It was when I was about to leave that Daddy and Grandpa returned from playing gold and asked what the white stuff was on the side of my car. It was paint. Apparently someone spilt tons of paint all across the road right before you get into my subdivision. And I had driven right through it. It had been drying on my car for forty-five minutes. We scrubbed and scrubbed, and it was still hesitant to remove itself from my nice green Lexus. I was very upset. Then Bill drove up, and we discovered that he had also just gotten white paint on his car. His came off pretty easily since it hadn't dried. To make a long story short, I took Daddy's Tahoe to the Y, and Daddy and Bill took my car in town to a self-carwash and managed to get the stuff off. Love you lots Daddy and Bill.

My time at the Y was miserable. I hate working at that place. I don't particularly car for all those little kids. I'd rather sit with one and read a book or something than have 100 of them running around screaming their heads off dressed like goblins, princesses, aliens, fairies, grim reapers, super heroes, hippies, football players, and prostitutes (I swear there was a 7-or 8-year-old there who must have been trying to be a prostitute for Halloween.). Finally that was over, and, armed with my community service hours, I came home. We then went out to eat with MeyMey and Grandpa, and I somehow got into a really great mood, which is where I am now.

Currently, I'm supposed to be going to bed, so I'm contemplating getting off and being the good little child that I always am. G'night.

This has been a great week. Don’t you love great weeks? First on Monday we had a “hurricane.” The “hurricane” resulted in the cancellation of school. That entire day all we had at my house, right on the beach , was a little bit of wind-not a lot, just a little. We get more wind than that during thunderstorms. The next thing you should know is that this week is homecoming week. Not that I’m particularly excited about homecoming, but I must admit that it does have its benefits.

Benefit 1: We get no work done in class. None whatsoever. It is absolutely required that all students turn into a ravenous bunch of caged monkeys who are going crazy trying to obtain the banana dangling on the other side of the itty-bitty window in the classroom doors.

Benefit 2: No homework. Alright, so we did get this minute little amount, but we have two days to do it, so I’m not complaining.

Benefit 3: No tests. How are teachers supposed to give tests when they never know when their students will be in class. We up and leave for things like the presentation of the homecoming court and class games. (As a side note, I actually managed to sufficiently fill myself with school/junior spirit for class games today.)

Benefit 4: When things like the aforementioned class games and other such events like pep rallies take place at the end of the day, we generally get to leave school fifteen to twenty minutes early.

Benefit 5: No history notes. Now some may say that this falls under Benefit 1, and indeed it does, but I decided that it is such a wonderful benefit that it merits its own separate number. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t dislike history or anything (that’s not allowed in my house), but taking endless notes as Mrs. Thompson just reads the book to us can get just a teensy bit tedious.

Also this week…is Thursday. Sure you may say that Thursday comes every week, and you would be right, but not every Thursday is a conference day. (a.k.a. A HOLIDAY!). Two “holidays” in one week. Isn’t this amazing? And the final absolutely awesome thing that’s happening this week…I’m going to Atlanta this weekend for the Georgia Tech vs. Miami game. I know Tech‘s going to get stomped, but I still love football games, and I am also rather fond of the new Tech Bookstore.

Okey dokey, I think I’m going to go do something else. I’m even considering the idea of doing something productive-possibly my minute little amount of homework. So, to all I wish a very delightful evening and a wonderful conference day tomorrow.

I know it's been awhile. Sorry. I've been busy. School's stupid. We do a bunch of busy work, but don't actually learn anything significant. I had my final test on The Scarlet Letter today-thank God in Heaven. I suffered through that book last weekend and was one of the few people in our grade who actually read it.

My mood an hour ago was much better than it is now. I was a happy sixteen-year-old girl. I had just gone out and eaten Mexican, had very little homework this weekend for what must be the first time since school started, and actually had time to get on the internet. That was before I heard the news. The news that a boy who just graduated from my school last year had been killed in a car accident. I didn't know him personally, but he was still connected to my life. It's so unnerving to think that this could happen to someone I know. Earlier today he was a popular, former high school football star, barely in his first year of college. Now, only a few short hours later, his life here on Earth is over...forever. I shudder to think how I'd feel if that had happened to someone closer to me. And it's not as if he was drunk or anything either. It was a freak accident. He had car trouble, pulled over to the side of the road, then was hit by a Mack truck on the driver's side of the car. Another boy that had graduated from Calvary was on the passenger's side, and he's in the hospital now. How can something like this happen? Why?