So Korey and I wasted away last weekend completely on playing Alpha Centauri. For a game that came out in 1999, it’s really freaking addicting. After Saturday morning practice, we came back to the room, played for a while, ate dinner, and then played for a while more. And then the girls and I had another girls night! We watched 27 Dresses which, like all other chick flicks, was so cliché and totally predictable. I’m never going to see a chick flick with an unpredictable ending, it’s just not in the definition.
I am now at my Uncle John and Aunt Vero’s house in Piedmont, California, which is a suburb of San Francisco. It’s awesome here mostly because it’s not snowy and not cold. Don’t get me wrong, I love the snow, but when it gets all gross from cars and gets all over everything, then I like it less. And even though I’m from Wisconsin, where apparently, people here think that means that I’m immune to cold, I could do with a little less cold. Especially walking to and from the pool. I do have a hat though, so my hair doesn’t freeze.
I didn’t even mention how we got snow. Well, you see…it snowed. From the sky. Sometime in the last week. Everyone totally flipped out because we had like a centimeter and they ran outside and had snowball fights somehow. I sat inside like Scrooge and shook my head disapprovingly.
And then, a few days later, some girls from the team were chucking snowballs at our window. Which, by the way, is so dangerous because someone’s window totally broke from that already. Then they came into our dorm, but Korey had locked the door so they couldn’t come in. And then, they pretended to leave, and got someone to pose as Aaron’s voice and Korey opened the door, and the Banshees barged in and put snow in our shirts. Needless to say, I was pleased. Just kidding, I was really angry.
“COME PLAY WITH US,” they shrieked horribly. “NO!” I replied happily. I mean, grumpily. Korey relented and went outside, but I have no shoes for playing in the snow, so I just watched from the window like a total creeper. At some point I suggested that we go to late night to eat thousands of empty calories. Before we left, however, I gave Abby the whitewash of a lifetime, since she had been the one to put snow down my shirt while I was on the computer. How dangerous and insensitive.
They accused me of being grumpy. I have no idea why. But anyways, since we have the Husky invite next weekend, and every year the girls make cool, fancy posters for the guys’ team, my poster has Grumpy the Dwarf on it (from Snow White, duh!). Some people’s offspring…
The snow is awesome and stuff, but walking five minutes to the pool at 5 am when the wind is blowing directly in your face is not awesome, and it is definitely not stuff. I hope someone reading this understood that clever wordplay.
Back to the present, I am now at the house of the Sumnichts of Piedmont. It is great here! They have banana bread. AND NUTELLA! So you can just imagine my pleasure. Oh, and I slept in today, so I feel fantastic. And I am so so so so excited to eat everything in the world in about six hours.
Getting here was a little bit of an experience. I’ve definitely flown before, but not without the guidance of parents. I knew I had to be at the airport early, and that I needed stuff to last me the next few days, and that I needed to get to the airport somehow, and that’s about it. I thought that my flight was at 11:45 am based on what I remembered from checking my flight info about two weeks ago. So on Tuesday night, I double-checked just to make sure. Turns out, my flight was at 5:35 pm. So, having made earlier ride plans, I quickly changed them. Christine brought me to the airport at about 2 o’ clock with Jen, Rae, and Mel. I know, right?
Christine told me that she would pick me up at closer to 1:30 on Wednesday afternoon, so I planned to eat lunch at about 12:30, pack, and be ready to go about then. Turns out she had told the other girls that they would be leaving at about 12:30. I got a text at 12:45 while I was nomming on my pizza and cookies saying that she was coming to get me, so I thought it prudent to return to my dorm room at that point to pack.
I ran back to my dorm room with a box of vitamins I had just received from Stephan because it was cold out and because I was running late. I stormed into my dorm room and threw a bunch of stuff in my backpack and into my Pulaski Dance Team duffel bag. Don’t ask questions. Anyways, I was in a sweaty flurry when Rae and Mel came to my room, and I was pretty sure I had packed everyth-oh wait! Can’t forget the shaving cream. My facial hair had begun to become unruly.
So we got to the airport in plenty of time, spent about 15 minutes finding a parking space, walked through a snowy field only to turn back because we ran into a fence in an attempt to get to the front door of the airport, and we eventually found our way to checking bags. I also printed out my boarding pass! Those are pretty important. I then spent the next several hours watching Seinfeld with Rae and Mel after seeing off Christine and Jen. Then Renae found out that our flight was delayed until 7! So then eventually Mel left, and Renae and I watched How to Tame Your Dragon, or whatever it’s called. Then I got on the flight, yadda yadda, got here, ate some food, talked about myself, and took a nice shower. Went to bed, slept. Got up. Typed blog. Read Theo’s blog. Ate banana bread with Nutella. Spent a few seconds in heaven. Breathed. Bye. HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Thursday, November 18, 2010
My Diet is Poor.
I got a letter from grandma today and that just made my day! And encouraged me to steal a few minutes from the day to write another blog post.
The meet last weekend was rough, to say the least. Don’t get me wrong, as a team, we completely destroyed the other teams. One of our team goals is to win the conference meet by over 200 points, which is an insane amount. We won the second dual meet 170-something to 30-something, so I think we’re well on our way. However, personally, I realized that I have only been training for three weeks, and on Thursday I lifted with extra vigor. So, on Friday, I swam the 1000. I kept up with their guy for like a 400 but then the heat of the pool and my numb forearms gave out. I got 4th place, out of 4 people hahahahahahh. Next was the 400 IM, and I got a decent time and won the exhibition heat with a time that would have placed me 4th (out of more than 4 people this time). Then I led off the 200 Free B Relay and we got 3rd.
The next day, we had some crappy hotel food for breakfast, and then took off to arrive at the meet 2 hours early again. Steve loves being early. Andrew likes sitting around for an hour stretching and sleeping, so I guess it kind of works out. I definitely was hurting from the 1000 and 4im the previous day, so my 200IM and 500 free were kind of pretty bad, but not bad in the grand perspective of where I’m at and where I will be down the road. However, I had a solid split in the 400 Free A Relay, and we won that. And as I mentioned earlier, we totally crushed the other team, no offense to them. They were really nice guys!
On the bus ride down to the meet, I was so productive. I spent 3 hours doing my cell bio lab report, which, by the way, is so frickin good. I had better get my ten points! On the way back home, I also did most of my chemistry take-home test. Did I mention that chemistry is going better now? The professor is learning how to teach better, and this was our second take-home test. Sweet.
So, Sunday was an awesome recovery day, and I checked out a new church called Branches which I liked. There are too many good churches here, and I can’t decide which one to consistently attend. The pastor was pretty funny, and apparently he teaches a leadership class at Whitworth. He went on a practiced five-minute imitation of a black revivalist preacher. I laughed. Also, in small group, we read the first two chapters of Jonah. Chapter two is really good, it’s Jonah’s prayer and I really loved the wording of it, you should check it out.
The next day, Steve had prepared a little speech for us. For such a kind, Godly man with a warm smile, he can be completely cold and soulless! He basically told us that we swam crappy at the meet and so he was going to make us do a bunch more distance crap at practice. Also, we upped the weights by a significant amount and got rid of the aerobic circuit. On Monday we did all these 1000s and on Tuesday we randomly pulled out a mile. Oh, and on Wednesday we did all these 400s at a high intensity. He’s killing us! I had a good practice today though. I think I had a backstroke epiphany, because I did 7x200 backstroke descending 1-3 and 4-7 and I swam them really well. I surprised myself.
Tomorrow night, a whole bunch of swimmers have gotten tickets to go see Harry Potter (including me). I’m so excited! I wasn’t really that excited a few days ago when I said I would go with the group, but this last movie provides total closure on the Harry Potter part of my life. I’ve read all the books, and after tomorrow, I’ll have seen all the movies.
Did I ever mention my girls night? Yeah, me and some girls exfoliated and ate pizza and watched “Ten Things I Hate About You”. And I think this weekend we’re going to do back massages and watch “500 Days of Summer”. I hear it’s a must-see. Eeeeek! (that’s my imitation of a girl’s excited squeal)
Look what college has done to me!
In other news, I’m really excited for Thanksgiving break. I’m still doing well in school, but it’s exhausting me mentally and I’m feeling a bit burnt out. So burnt out, in fact, that I just spelled feeling “fealing” the first time. It’ll be nice to rest, enjoy the company of my relatives in California, and only swim once a day. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll study a little bit for finals. But I probably won’t. But I’ll bring my stuff to say I tried.
What else…My mom sent me Alpha Centauri in the mail, which should arrive tomorrow. That’s a really sweet computer game made like ten or more years ago that Korey and I have been getting the itch to play. And a week ago I got cookies, a card, and $20 in the mail from her! Sorry grandma, you’ll have to beat that next time you send me mail.
……………………..kbye!
The meet last weekend was rough, to say the least. Don’t get me wrong, as a team, we completely destroyed the other teams. One of our team goals is to win the conference meet by over 200 points, which is an insane amount. We won the second dual meet 170-something to 30-something, so I think we’re well on our way. However, personally, I realized that I have only been training for three weeks, and on Thursday I lifted with extra vigor. So, on Friday, I swam the 1000. I kept up with their guy for like a 400 but then the heat of the pool and my numb forearms gave out. I got 4th place, out of 4 people hahahahahahh. Next was the 400 IM, and I got a decent time and won the exhibition heat with a time that would have placed me 4th (out of more than 4 people this time). Then I led off the 200 Free B Relay and we got 3rd.
The next day, we had some crappy hotel food for breakfast, and then took off to arrive at the meet 2 hours early again. Steve loves being early. Andrew likes sitting around for an hour stretching and sleeping, so I guess it kind of works out. I definitely was hurting from the 1000 and 4im the previous day, so my 200IM and 500 free were kind of pretty bad, but not bad in the grand perspective of where I’m at and where I will be down the road. However, I had a solid split in the 400 Free A Relay, and we won that. And as I mentioned earlier, we totally crushed the other team, no offense to them. They were really nice guys!
On the bus ride down to the meet, I was so productive. I spent 3 hours doing my cell bio lab report, which, by the way, is so frickin good. I had better get my ten points! On the way back home, I also did most of my chemistry take-home test. Did I mention that chemistry is going better now? The professor is learning how to teach better, and this was our second take-home test. Sweet.
So, Sunday was an awesome recovery day, and I checked out a new church called Branches which I liked. There are too many good churches here, and I can’t decide which one to consistently attend. The pastor was pretty funny, and apparently he teaches a leadership class at Whitworth. He went on a practiced five-minute imitation of a black revivalist preacher. I laughed. Also, in small group, we read the first two chapters of Jonah. Chapter two is really good, it’s Jonah’s prayer and I really loved the wording of it, you should check it out.
The next day, Steve had prepared a little speech for us. For such a kind, Godly man with a warm smile, he can be completely cold and soulless! He basically told us that we swam crappy at the meet and so he was going to make us do a bunch more distance crap at practice. Also, we upped the weights by a significant amount and got rid of the aerobic circuit. On Monday we did all these 1000s and on Tuesday we randomly pulled out a mile. Oh, and on Wednesday we did all these 400s at a high intensity. He’s killing us! I had a good practice today though. I think I had a backstroke epiphany, because I did 7x200 backstroke descending 1-3 and 4-7 and I swam them really well. I surprised myself.
Tomorrow night, a whole bunch of swimmers have gotten tickets to go see Harry Potter (including me). I’m so excited! I wasn’t really that excited a few days ago when I said I would go with the group, but this last movie provides total closure on the Harry Potter part of my life. I’ve read all the books, and after tomorrow, I’ll have seen all the movies.
Did I ever mention my girls night? Yeah, me and some girls exfoliated and ate pizza and watched “Ten Things I Hate About You”. And I think this weekend we’re going to do back massages and watch “500 Days of Summer”. I hear it’s a must-see. Eeeeek! (that’s my imitation of a girl’s excited squeal)
Look what college has done to me!
In other news, I’m really excited for Thanksgiving break. I’m still doing well in school, but it’s exhausting me mentally and I’m feeling a bit burnt out. So burnt out, in fact, that I just spelled feeling “fealing” the first time. It’ll be nice to rest, enjoy the company of my relatives in California, and only swim once a day. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll study a little bit for finals. But I probably won’t. But I’ll bring my stuff to say I tried.
What else…My mom sent me Alpha Centauri in the mail, which should arrive tomorrow. That’s a really sweet computer game made like ten or more years ago that Korey and I have been getting the itch to play. And a week ago I got cookies, a card, and $20 in the mail from her! Sorry grandma, you’ll have to beat that next time you send me mail.
……………………..kbye!
Thursday, November 11, 2010
HVZ
By the beard of Zeus it’s been too long since I’ve updated my life for my loyal viewers and for that I sincerely apologize. I’ve been no busier than usual, just lazier and tireder. More tired. Whatever.
After last Monday’s insane long practice, the rest of the week was also very difficult and tiring. I didn’t sleep more than 7 or 8 hours each night on the weekend, either, so I didn’t recover incredibly well either. Even though it was daylight savings on Saturday night, I was up late playing video games (surprised?) so it didn’t even phase me. Actually, I haven’t even noticed the hour time change physiologically so I guess that’s a good thing.
This week has been very rough, as well. On Monday and Wednesday we did some threshold sets, and I am just dog tired. However, I swam the sets pretty well. Much better than I did the past two weeks. And on Tuesday we did a sprint set and I hit some really good practice times, so that was cool. This morning (Thursday) we did some longer stuff, so it wasn’t too hard but I was dragging on the bottom of the pool anyways.
I found out last night what events I’m swimming at my first real dual meet this weekend. Tomorrow I have to do the 1000 free, 400 IM, and 200 free relay. Saturday I swim the 200 IM, 500 free, and 400 free relay. Maybe I should rephrase that to say that I am privileged to swim those events, but I’m actually going to die. I think I say that too often. But seriously, look at those babies. Frick!
As far as school goes, I very recently created a rough draft of my 4-year plan. I had the help of my advisor’s TA, and it took about an hour, so I was very glad she could help me so I wouldn’t spend four hours of my own time trying to figure out how to create it. At this point I am going for a biology major and a chemistry minor. I was considering going for a Spanish minor, and it could still be a possibility, but my credit load might simply be too full to do it. I really like Spanish, which is why I would want to do it, and I could take classes just for personal enrichment and not for a minor, but then it would feel sort of pointless. Regardless, I have to take a proctored Spanish exam at some point to test out of the modern language requirement, so I should brush up on my skills at some point.
As far as school goes, I very recently created a rough draft of my 4-year plan. I had the help of my advisor’s TA, and it took about an hour, so I was very glad she could help me so I wouldn’t spend four hours of my own time trying to figure out how to create it. At this point I am going for a biology major and a chemistry minor. I was considering going for a Spanish minor, and it could still be a possibility, but my credit load might simply be too full to do it. I really like Spanish, which is why I would want to do it, and I could take classes just for personal enrichment and not for a minor, but then it would feel sort of pointless. Regardless, I have to take a proctored Spanish exam at some point to test out of the modern language requirement, so I should brush up on my skills at some point.
Nothing else is really that new, I’m sorry if I’m getting a bit boring. I’ve fallen into a routine, and getting up at 5 isn’t as bad as it used to be.
Actually, the past two days, it has been kind of rough to wake up early, because it’s been hard to get to bed early. Our campus started this thing called Human’s Versus Zombies, or HVZ. Basically, this one guy started as a zombie and about 450 people started as humans. When zombies tag humans, they incubate for 3 hours and become zombies who can tag other humans. However, humans can neutralize zombies for 15 minutes with a nerf gun or a balled up sock. I think it’s ridiculous but kind of funny to watch, too. The way I figure, since I’m not participating, I can’t technically be “killed” by a zombie or “neutralized” by a human. I’m actually invincible. I like it.
But the downside is that people are running around screaming until the wee hours. And when you go to bed at 10, 11 is a wee hour. It’s so annoying.
Anyways, next semester I am probably taking chemistry, biology, revelations, and core. Doesn’t sound too bad. For Jan term I’ll probably try to take mask making, drawing, or making glass in a kiln! I gotta get that art elective out of the way at some point.
I’ve been healthy, except that I am tempted by the pizza more often than I should be, which should be never since it’s so greasy. My room is messy, but it’s okay. My clothes are really clean! I was going through a crisis of having wrinkly clothes, but then I went out and got some fabric softener and fabric softener dryer sheets and bleach so the last load I did was so fresh.
I just thought of something cool I did. Last Sunday night, this dude originally from Spokane came to Whitworth to play some music. His name is Tyrone Wells, and he’s actually kind of a big deal. One of his songs was played in Grey’s Anatomy, if that impresses anyone. I like his music, and he played pretty well live. He was preceded by Noah Peller and Jessemac, who are guys from Whitworth. Noah is actually basically the best RA/bass player in the world. And the other guy who actually sang the songs was really good, too. What an exciting day for music.
Monday, November 1, 2010
Whitworth Dominates This Conference...ARRR!
Sorry again for the long length of time between this post and my last. I was reminded that my blog even existed by my good friend Quinn Mason, who gave me a shout out in her blog so I guess I should give people something to read.
Last weekend was pretty awesome at Coeur d’Alene. The big gooeys were pretty delicious. Matt Brody and I shared the Big Bash, which is cake batter ice cream with frosting swirls topped with strawberries, fudge sauce, and pieces of chocolate cake. Sounds glorious, right? Well, our table was basically the last table served, and since our party was about 60 people strong, they were out of goblets, so we got ours served in like a soup bowl. Also, after later viewing some people’s pictures, we got ripped off on ours since we only got 2 small pieces of chocolate cake and others got 5 or 6. What the heck! Whatever, it was still super tasty.
Also, might I add that the scenery there was beautiful? We arrived there at nighttime, but there were spans of gardens and the lakefront was gorgeously bathed in moonlight. Too bad I didn’t have a date. Actually I had Matt, so I guess that works out.
I suppose last week was also my first week where I was able to do pretty much normal practices. I did all the lifting and swimming that everyone else did, and by Thursday, I was able to do all the dryland stations that use pecs minus pushups. We also had some hecka hard sets on Monday and Tuesday. I got no break from being out of shape, so I was thrown right into some threshold type sets on those days. I was pretty beat by the end of the week…I guess I still am. Actually, I guess I never feel not beat until taper comes around, but I don’t want to throw that word around just yet.
Last week was also some more midterms and stuff for other people, not me hahahhaha. But I did find out my Animal Biology grade, and it was rather pleasant. I have another calc exam in 2 days which will be kind of rough since we’re doing some really long problem types right now.
So, on to the meet. If you want to view results, click here. The sprint meet sucked big time, because for one I’m not a sprinter and for another I was so very dead tired. The relay meet was a little better; Korey, Oliver and I won the 300 IM Relay and I split 2 seconds faster than I did in the 100 IM the previous day. Also, my 900 free relay with Austin and Squeak got 2nd. Funny story, so I tried to catch the Whitworth A team, and I almost did, but after taking out the first 100 really fast, I was like, “oh yeah, I’m not in shape”, and I died.
To be fair, I’m not really that out of shape. Today we had a 4 hour swim workout which included about 14000 yards (a little more, actually), and I was able to pull out a little extra at the end. I’m so sore though. And it’s really weird, because I only ate a power bar before the workout, and after the workout I just had some Cytogainer and a bowl of cereal and an apple and that was it. And I haven’t eaten yet since then. And I probably burned like 5000 calories. Oh well, I’ve been getting a gut anyways. They fed us Domino’s pizza after the sprint meet, so I think I just used all of my fat stores on the practice.
Or maybe I grew chloroplasts so I don’t need to eat as much because I now get a lot of my energy from photosynthesis.
Guess what, Avatar: The Last Airbender is an awesome show. I started watching it yesterday, and I just finished season 1. You should probably watch it, too.
Okay that’s all I got for ya…PEACE! Actually I hate saying peace, that’s not me. How about, FAREWELL!
Last weekend was pretty awesome at Coeur d’Alene. The big gooeys were pretty delicious. Matt Brody and I shared the Big Bash, which is cake batter ice cream with frosting swirls topped with strawberries, fudge sauce, and pieces of chocolate cake. Sounds glorious, right? Well, our table was basically the last table served, and since our party was about 60 people strong, they were out of goblets, so we got ours served in like a soup bowl. Also, after later viewing some people’s pictures, we got ripped off on ours since we only got 2 small pieces of chocolate cake and others got 5 or 6. What the heck! Whatever, it was still super tasty.
Also, might I add that the scenery there was beautiful? We arrived there at nighttime, but there were spans of gardens and the lakefront was gorgeously bathed in moonlight. Too bad I didn’t have a date. Actually I had Matt, so I guess that works out.
I suppose last week was also my first week where I was able to do pretty much normal practices. I did all the lifting and swimming that everyone else did, and by Thursday, I was able to do all the dryland stations that use pecs minus pushups. We also had some hecka hard sets on Monday and Tuesday. I got no break from being out of shape, so I was thrown right into some threshold type sets on those days. I was pretty beat by the end of the week…I guess I still am. Actually, I guess I never feel not beat until taper comes around, but I don’t want to throw that word around just yet.
Last week was also some more midterms and stuff for other people, not me hahahhaha. But I did find out my Animal Biology grade, and it was rather pleasant. I have another calc exam in 2 days which will be kind of rough since we’re doing some really long problem types right now.
So, on to the meet. If you want to view results, click here. The sprint meet sucked big time, because for one I’m not a sprinter and for another I was so very dead tired. The relay meet was a little better; Korey, Oliver and I won the 300 IM Relay and I split 2 seconds faster than I did in the 100 IM the previous day. Also, my 900 free relay with Austin and Squeak got 2nd. Funny story, so I tried to catch the Whitworth A team, and I almost did, but after taking out the first 100 really fast, I was like, “oh yeah, I’m not in shape”, and I died.
To be fair, I’m not really that out of shape. Today we had a 4 hour swim workout which included about 14000 yards (a little more, actually), and I was able to pull out a little extra at the end. I’m so sore though. And it’s really weird, because I only ate a power bar before the workout, and after the workout I just had some Cytogainer and a bowl of cereal and an apple and that was it. And I haven’t eaten yet since then. And I probably burned like 5000 calories. Oh well, I’ve been getting a gut anyways. They fed us Domino’s pizza after the sprint meet, so I think I just used all of my fat stores on the practice.
Or maybe I grew chloroplasts so I don’t need to eat as much because I now get a lot of my energy from photosynthesis.
Guess what, Avatar: The Last Airbender is an awesome show. I started watching it yesterday, and I just finished season 1. You should probably watch it, too.
Okay that’s all I got for ya…PEACE! Actually I hate saying peace, that’s not me. How about, FAREWELL!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)