Shortest post ever by me

This post is basically just to let you know that I am still alive. I know you're all disappointed, but I have to speak the truth.

In any case, I haven't written for the past week because I've been on vacation, so I'll be updating with a super long post shortly, probably tonight or tomorrow (most likely tomorrow). But I just wanted to let you all know that I'm still around, and that eventually you'll get an update.

"Well, gotta go, kid . . . keep doin' that spoon thing."

The above quote is from Legendary Frog's "The Matrix Has You," a parody of, you guessed it, The Matrix. I saw it this week and thought it was hilarious . . . I showed it to AJ and he seemed to think it only mildly amusing. *sigh* He has no appreciation for lower humer . . . :P

This will probably be a pretty short update, for two reasons: 1) I don't really remember what happened since I last posted, and it wasn't a whole lot anyway, and 2) I want Rae to read it :P

Okay, so Wednesday . . . hmm what happened on Wednesday? I don't really remember . . . well, I posted Renovation, and did the renovations, and announced the departure of Google News from my site . . . after like 2 months or so, it finally took its leave.

I almost posted "it's" right there!! :O . . . Never confuse "its" and "it's." Its very bad.

Har har, you all say. Deal with it. I thought it was funny.

Anyways, back to Wednesday. UMMMMMMM . . . . gah this is frustrating. Well let's see I know there was a rehearsal . . . gimmie a sec, I'll go see which one it was.

*hold music plays*

Your call is important to us. Thank you for visiting the Death Star. If it's the Emperor's will, we kill. Okay yes we know that was stupid. But every big place or organization has a motto. If you would like to participate in the Death Star Motto Contest, please contact Lord Harbison at ------------@-------.net. If you didn't get that, ask Lord Harbison himself, or his brother, or someone else. Because quite frankly, this is a public place, and Lord Harbison is afraid of getting bad email, because he may be a Dark Lord of the Sith, but he's a safe Dark Lord of the Sith.

*sound of a phone picking up*

Thank you for holding, this is me again. I just realized that I probably didn't write about Tuesday night's rehearsal, either, but I shall check. One moment.

*hold music plays*

Your call is important to us. Thank for visiting the Death St—

*sound of a phone picking up*

Okay sorry. I discovered that I didn't write about Tuesday night's rehearsal, so that comes first. I'm not sure if I mentioned it (but don't worry, I won't find out, I'm pretty sure I didn't), but I had a sore throat on Tuesday and was afraid of becoming sick, which would not have been good because I had Oliver and Vacation. And, as if that wasn't bad enough, Tuesday night was a vocal rehearsal, so I had to sing through that sore throat. Oh me, oh me, woe, woe!!

And curiously enough, it hurt when I sang, but not when I talked. Seriously. I had no problem at all talking, but singing was a killer. UGH. Why Tuesday of all days?? *sigh* . . . anyway, I survived, and it turns out we actually have a pretty cool harmony for the finale . . . and of course, I'm singing it. I seriously can't remember a time when they did harmony on a song and I sang the melody. Like I said, it's pretty cool, but I'd really rather just listen to it and sing the melody myself . . . ah well. Too late now.

So anyway, I survived, then I went backstage to try to find Melody and ask her to teach me what Larry taught the Saturday I wasn't there (when the debate was). But she was teaching Josh L., so I thought "well, I guess I'll just watch her teaching him and see how it goes." Then Taylor turns up, and starts doing random stuff to me (hitting me, verbally abusing me, that kind of thing). So I said, "Just so you know, I don't know this song, so I'd appreciate it if—" and she cut me off. Apparently, she thought I was going to say "if you'd teach it to me," when actually I was going to say "if you'd leave me alone." But in the end it worked out well, because I got someone to teach it with me and didn't have to learn it from a distance.

In any case, the song was It's Never Too Late to Start Over Again, which is a fun but Lifehousey song. The choreography is good though. Larry is awesome. He's actually a lot like Dustin in his choreography (notice the wonderful Hs), except slightly less intense. Anyway, Taylor took the next hour or so to teach me the dance, and I actually remember it (I think), which is good, since I have a solo and I'd look stupid if I was dancing and had no idea what to do and everyone's watching me in particular . . . well, okay, I should clarify. I don't have a dance solo, I have a singing solo, and it's one line. But because of that, I'm in the back on some very high stairs that put my feet on level with everyone else's heads (probably a little higher, actually), so I'm kind of prominent. Mercifully I don't have to go there until I sing my solo, but then I'm there for the rest of the song . . . I actually get to be there twice, but the second time will be covered in Thursday's coverage.

So anyways that was Tuesday's rehearsal.

On Wednesday, I don't really remember a whole lot of what happened, which makes me think I was just messing around all day. Actually, come to think of it, I think . . . THAT happened on Wednesday . . . let me check.

*hold music plays*

You—

*sound of phone being picked up*

Actually, it happened on Friday, so we'll get to it then.

So since nothing really happened on Wednesday, I'll go straight to rehearsal. It was a choreography rehearsal, which was just fabulous because my apparent sickness had progressed from a sore throat to a runny nose, so it didn't hurt to sing but it sounded awful and I had to pause every few minutes and whip out my handkerchief. Anyway, we choreographed the opening scene, where I'm a vendor selling Fruit and Vegetables to the poor of suburbian London. I have a very awesome solo in that song: "Buy my vegetables!!!" There's a lot of moving around . . . Larry is a genius. He came up with the most awesome way to create a street scene that I've ever seen in my life. He put tape down in what was basically a square, but that had some jutting out parts and some indented parts, and he told the poor to walk on it. Now, that might sound like a stupid idea, but under Lifehouse's constraints, it really makes it look like a busy street with people walking all around. It's actually more apparent in a different scene, which I'll get to in a minute.

Anyway, we did the song (I also get to go up on the stairs in that, I forgot . . . I get to walk down them and sing my great solo). Then we moved on to the next big crowd scene, which is the scene where Oliver meets Jack Dawkins, aka the Artful Dodger, aka my friend Nick. Basically, it's the same as the openin, minus the poor. Because the vendors are now selling to rich Londoners. This one guy (Name: Doug) is so funny . . . he decided that he was rich, so he went and hunted up a cane randomly, and then held his head in such a way that you could almost picture the top hat, and he had the perfect snob face. It was great.

So we did that number, and that's where the street idea really becomes very cool. Because for this, since there's a lot of talking going on between Dodger and Oliver, there's a long period of time between the songs where the chorus (aka the vendors and Londoners) do nothing. Normally, we would just be given freedom to wander the stage as we pleased, attempting to give the appearance of a busy town. But that wasn't good enough for Larry. No. He wanted something that actually looked like a busy town.

So he laid down the tape again, this time in two patterns. One went clockwise, the other counter-clockwise. And so we walk along in our little paterns, trying to sell to everyone who goes by (or looking to buy if you're not a vendor). It's really pretty cool . . . because there's constant motion and there's never a large whole at one spot on the stage, which we've had problems with in previous shows. Although in writing it probably sounds like a stupid idea, it was really the work of a genius.

So that was pretty much Wednesday. Again, not a whole lot happened on Thursday, so I'll skip right to rehearsal (Oliver is basically the only thing happening in my life right now worth writing about). Thursday we quickly went through all the choreography we'd learned, and then we ran Act 2. Since I'm in a whopping big two scenes in Act 2, I pretty much just hung out with Spaghetti (and Nick and Jeremy and Megan when they were offstage). We talked about Star Wars (and how every movie's not the same :P). Nick had been sitting in a big swivel chair earlier, with a scepter in his hand and a crown and royal robe and stuff (it's amazing the stuff that's just laying around at Lifehouse). So me and Spaghetti decided that he could be the Emperor . . . all we had to do was shave his head and wrinkle his face all up. Then we decided that Melody should be Mara Jade, she'd just have to dye her hair a little more reddish and get a purple lightsaber. Basically we were just going through everyone and trying to build the Empire, which was a lot of fun and killed quite a bit of time.

Then, suddenly, it happened.

Then we went back to talking about Star Wars for a while, then it was time for my scene. Well, my first scene, anyway. In this scene, Dodger and Bet (Dodger's girlfriend and fellow thief) are walking home at night singing about their life, and I'm a grumpy man in a window. I get mad at them. I throw shoes at them. It's fun. Except . . . well, the third time I threw a shoe (the second time we were running the scene), Nick dodged it, and it bounced off of the wall and right into Steve (the director). So that kind of scared me for a minute, but Steve is awesome so he just thought it was funny. Which, in retrospect, it was.

Also, my wife was chosen . . . Steve selected Jazzi (who also is my wife earlier, she's Mrs. Sowerberry). So I was happy because it wasn't Taylor. I was happy. Taylor literally cheered. But in the end, they didn't do that scene anyway because Mr. Brownlow wasn't there. So we'll get to that next week, probably a night when I'm on vacation and not there. *sigh* Darn life . . . always getting in the way. That's why I try to minimize the life I have. Ask AJ. I do a good job.

Then. Friday. A pretty regular day, until a special thing happened. You'll recall the game Tales of Symphonia, which I got a while ago and love very much. And Friday . . . som-something terrible happened . . . my favorite character . . . BETRAYED ME!!!!! TURNED EVIL!!!! TRIED TO KILL ME!!!!! IT'S NOT FAIR!!!!!!! *sob sob sob weep weep weep*

Now, probably you're all thinking that I'm way too into this game . . . But really, it seriously made me depressed for the rest of the night . . . but I'm not as bad as Sarah, she was depressed for the whole next day. She went to see Episode III. She said the whole time, what was going through her mind was "Anakin is turning evil. But that's to be expected, because *bleep* betrayed me." I'm censoring who the character is because of the off chance that one of you will one day play the game, I don't want to ruin a MAJOR surprise. It's like when you're reading a mystery, and you just KNOW that the culprit is Steve, there's just no question, all the evidence points to it. Then the policeman says "Bob, you're under arrest." And you're like WHAT??? BOB??? BOB WAS GOOD!!!! But it was Bob that done it, and Steve turns out to be perfectly innocent. That's what this was. Major surprise.

Anyway, Friday night we also had a rehearsal, but there's really not much to tell. We ran Act 1, so I just got to do the crowd scenes and the Sowerberry scene (no shoe-throwing :'(). Which is fun, but not as much fun as throwing stuff . . . I guess it was Friday, though, that I did something very stupid. Megan can correct me if it was another night, but I think it was Friday. I stupidly accepted a pepper from Doug on his word that it wasn't very spicy . . . you'd think I'd have guessed that it was based on it being called a "death pepper," but no, I was stupid. I had to take it. And not just eat it. But shove the whole thing into my mouth at once. It took a while to kick in, so I was thinking "Hmm, this is pretty good, this tastes good and isn't too spicy, I wonder if AAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!! WATER WATER WATER!!!!" So then I ran into the make-up hall and thanked the Lord that there was water in the cooler. Which I drank very much. Because it felt like my throat was on fire. I seriously drank so much I almost threw up because the spiciness just wouldn't go away. But finally it did, and at that point I realized "Hey . . . my nose is actually clear!"

Alas, though, even with the help of a death pepper, that only lasted for about an hour or so. It was pretty nice, though. I thouroughly enjoyed it, and I thanked Doug. He thought I had something smeared on my hand, he couldn't believe I was actually thanking him for giving me that. But I was. So then I was hanging out with Doug and Jake B. for the rest of the night, unless we were onstage.

Saturday pretty much nothing happened other than my messing around, although I did talk to Megan and she said she was making a "which Disney princess are you?" quiz, and that she wanted me to take it when it's done . . . so I'm still waiting to find out which princess I am. I can't stand the suspense much longer, I hope she finishes soon.

Then today we went to church, which was good. We talked about Jesus' funeral and the discovery of his ressurection (sp?). And we talked about pig farming, because Josh is going up to Canada and he's going to work at a pig farm for a few weeks. Then we came home and were just hangin' for a while, and AJ told me to update, and here I am a few hours later updating.

And now, to comments:

Comments on "Yet Another Post":
AJ: You remember my thoughts . . . about onion rings and "take your time." And we discuss bugs at dance because we're weird.

Megan: Ewoks ARE cool!!! Just because you're a crazy stupid ol' Star Wars hater doesn't mean you're right . . . in fact, it means that chances are you're wrong. And for your information, the beauty of the Faun victory dance is that I do it alone. Because there is no other faun. And the BVD is awesome, I must admit.

Comments on "Renovation":
Cormack: lol . . . it basically means "Is that spelled right?" I think it stands for "spelling?" So there you go. Now you know. I have imparted some of my great knowledge to you. Be thankful, worm!!! (sorry . . . couldn't help it)

AJ: Well, as I said, you've got one more, then you have to hit "command-D" and save it for yourself. And if you try to access another site from here . . . *glares*

Rae: lol . . . actually, if you did read it, you'll notice I said not to count it . . . but oh well. You've got two dongs, so I guess you're alright ;)

AJ2: Cool. Yay for me!!!

Renovation

Did I spell that right? It looks like it's wrong . . .

Anyway, you may have noticed that the sidebar is somewhat bigger, and that Google News is finally gone. So for those of you who used this site as a way to get your daily news, that option is no longer available. However, just so you won't be TOO disappointed, you can find Google News here. So you can use this site to get there one last time, but you'll finally have to bookmark it yourself.

So basically what I did was remove the Google News link and add links to the blogs/xanga of the people who comment here. If I missed someone, let me know and I'll add it (I didn't put David or Dr. C on there because I don't believe they have one . . . right?). Also, if for some reason you DON'T want a link to your blog/xanga here, let me know and I'll take it off.

So anyway, if I think of anything else I feel like linking to, I'll probably add that, too. And I actually just thought of something, so I'll probably add that as soon as I publish this post.

In conclusion, I'd just like to say that if you haven't read the post before this (as in the one right below it), you should read that and not count reading this as reading my update, since this was just to alert you of why all of a sudden Google News is no longer accessable (sp?) from this blog.

Yet Another Post

This one will probably seem like the shortest post ever after that last one . . . and who knows, maybe it will be. I was somewhat disappointed that last post only got 6 comments . . . seems like the shorter posts actually get more for some reason. Maybe it's because when people read shorter ones they can remember what the heck I was talking about at the beginning :P

Anyways, after posting on Saturday, I just kind of wandered about like a zombie, then I went to bed. Some of AJ's friends were supposed to be coming on Saturday night and going to church with us on Sunday, but apparently there was a big to-do at . . . wait a sec, why am I telling you this? Pretty much everyone here (with the exception of Dr. C, David, and Megan, and Rachael if she's still around) already knows what happened, I think . . . anyway, it ended up that there weren't any friends of AJ's staying at our house or going to church with us.

So I set my alarm for 8 o'clock (first time I've ever said "sleep in til 8" in my life), then Dad woke me up to tell me that I didn't have to go if I didn't want to, because he knew I'd still be exhausted, which of course I was. So I chose to sleep.

When I did get up, I was still kind of tired but I wasn't sleeping, so I just decided to face the world. Not a whole lot happened, I just decided to take a day off from Math to let myself recover. So I basically just wasted the day away, which was LOTS of fun.

Then on Sunday night, me and Dad and AJ went to see Fantastic 4 at Krikorian.

Acting: pretty good, but not stupendous.
Story: Eh . . . okay
Superhero Powers: very awesome
Special Effects: Good

So you can see that where it really fell flat was a story. I felt like there was a lot of potential for it to be good, but it never quite got there. It was mainly about the romance between Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman, and then the Thing's woes. And they didn't really have a whole lot of interesting things to do, either . . . we discover their powers in a few minutes, and then they're just a given. With Spiderman, there was a pretty long period of time where he was figuring out what his powers were and how to use them. With Batman Begins, there was a whole long scene about him creating all his gear and stuff, and he kept building on it throughout the whole movie.

But then again, perhaps it's unfair to compare this movie to Batman Begins. Because Batman Begins is in a whole different league of movies. F4 was okay, but nothing more . . . a fun movie to see, but not one that I'd like to see over and over.

And that was all punctuated by the heartless crowd . . . there was one scene where the Thing was trying to pick something up (I don't want to give anything away, although it doesn't come as a huge surprise), and this thing was very very important to him, and he couldn't pick it up because of his huge hands, and the people were laughing. Maybe it was supposed to be funny, I don't know, but I found it very sad.

So then we went to Denny's afterwards. I had some interesting thoughts there (despite what AJ will tell you). And AJ told us cool things about how NZA solves graffitti (sp?) problems.

then we came home, and Dad and I watched Diagnosis Murder, then we went to bed.

On Monday, I had to get up at 9 or so because of Dance, so I did, and had a rather funny experience . . . as you know, I hadn't been there in like a month because Mom kept saying I was free on Monday mornings. So I walk in the door and everyone says "Mark's here!!!!" in a surprised tone. And then Rachael's mom started chastising me for not being there, and then said "oh, sure, blame your Mom" when I said it was all her fault . . .

In any case, dance was fine, I discovered that I actually wasn't too far behind on the routine, and that they're pushing the recital back about a month, thank goodness. So we had our usual pointless discussions about bugs and what-not.

Then we came home, and I crashed for pretty much the rest of the day. Then came time for rehearsal, so Mom went to drop me off on her way to work. And we somehow managed to miss the street, so we went a few more and she suddenly said "Oh . . . I passed it." And we had a hearty laugh, and then turned around and came back and finally made it to LifeHouse. And I walked in, and Director Steve said "what are you doing here?" And apparently, at the rehearsal I had missed on Saturday, they had told everyone that all cast rehearsal was Tuesday and not Monday, and so I had missed that, and so I showed up and didn't need to be there. So I called my Dad to come pick me up, and he was out at the store . . . so I went back into the theater and was talking with Megan for a while . . . turns out she really hates freaky movies, and didn't know that War of the Worlds was a freaky movie . . . lol, hearing an account of what happened was quite enjoyable . . . almost makes me wish I was there.

So then I called Dad again and he was home, and so he came and picked me up, and we went home. Not a whole lot really happened after that . . . I finally got unstuck in ToS, but that was about it.

So then after much messing around I went to bed, and got up VERY late today, and wasted all the time from then til now, and soon I shall go do Math, if my stupid internet will come back on and let me post this and tell Megan that I have to go do Math . . . *sigh* while I'm waiting, I'll do comments:

Stephen: lol . . . I'll have to get my hands on some of those somehow. And NO, the beaver victory dance is special. As cool as the ewoks are, I have to side with Megan on this one. But we can't expect someone who wasn't in Lion Witch to understand, so you're okay.

And speaking of your evil side . . . Megan was looking for a good way to get back at someone, and she was wondering if I could ask you for ideas. If you're interested, I'll explain it, if not, fine, I'll just get someone else to help.

AJ: (and Megan) Okay, okay, gosh. You have NO IDEA how tired I was while I was writing that. You're actually probably lucky I was, too, or it would've been even longer.

Well I'm happy you found them funny . . . and actually, that wasn't the first time it's happened to me . . . and it's happened to you, too, so shut up.

Cormack: Cool! Another person found it funny!!

Eleanor: Uhh . . . should I stop saying y'all? Would that just be a better situation for all of us?

Stephen2: Uh . . . yeah.

Megan: As I said, I was exhausted. And ewoks are cool, contrary to what you most likely believe. But fear not, I do stick with you on this issue, the beaver victory dance is awesome. Although it really looks pretty dumb unless a few of you are doing it . . . no offense or anything, it's just . . . you could've done better. A faun victory dance, for example, would've been the ULTIMATE victory dance.

A Debating Pilgrimage

Yes, the title is a pun of sorts. Even I wouldn't wouldn't put that as my title for no reason . . . well okay, I would. But the issue is that I didn't.

GAAAH!!!! WHY??? . . . I said "the issue is" . . . I must've said that phrase today at least 6 or 7 times. Stupid debate camp . . . SEE WHAT YOU'VE DONE TO MY POOR LITTLE MIND???!!

*ahem* Okay. So now you know what the first part of the title is: the debate camp. For those of you who don't know (as in, everyone who isn't David or Dr. C, or Megan) what the second part is, you'll just have to wait in terrible suspense. *evil laugh*

Anyway, Debate Camp. If you'll recall, I said I probably wouldn't post anything here until Friday . . . which has obviously come and gone. Which will be explained later. But anyway, the reason is that I had a "Debate Boot Camp for Beginning Debaters." Basically, there were three days of getting up early, going to a class type of thing for 9 hours, where we would be given lectures (with short breaks interspersed here and there), then come home and do 3-4 hours of homework. Of course, that makes it sound like torture. At least to me it does. But it was actually quite enjoyable, other than getting up early and having like literally 2 hours of free time from Wednesday morning to Saturday afternoon. And those two hours were spent going to see Pilgrim's Progress at LifeHouse, which is of course the second part of the title.

So on Wednesday, I got up and showered, ate, and we left. And we somehow managed to miss our exit and arrived a few minutes late. But we got there before they started, and Mrs. Lane (who was in charge of the whole thing) gave us a basic rundown: we would be listening to the "AEAers" (people who had debated in the AEA debate club), and they would be cramming everything there is to know about debating down our throats in three days. I don't really remember the divisions of the lectures and who gave them (it all started blending together about halfway through Thursday), but I do remember a few of the more interesting and hilarious moments, which I shall cover in detail.

First off, I should note that our AEAer instructers were about 17-20, so they were young enough that they could relate easily with the class. And one of their most awesome features was that they were all clowns. They knew their stuff, and they got the point across, and I learned a LOT, but it was also really fun to listen to them talk because they were so hilarious.

On Wednesday, we were given one lecture (on basics of debate), and then two other people got up and gave us a short half-lecture (I don't remember which one it was), and then they sprung a very cool surprise on us: they had a movie on debate they wished to show us. As described by Tim (who was one of my two favorite instructors), it was "What debaters do when they're bored." It was basically what NOT to do in a debate. It began by playing the LOTR theme and had the fade-in words like LOTR, and the title was "A Debater's tale, by debaters." Then they had a creepy-sounding voiceover that basically said stuff like "Debating is a horrifying, terrible thing . . ." and stuff like that, and they had people randomly walking in slow motion through a building. Then they met up with a creepy guy covered in a black sheet who had a really high, chipmunk-y nasal voice, who was really hard to understand but yet funny to listen to. Then the movie progressed to part two: "The great chair debate." This was basically a parody of a debate. Some general info on these debates: there are two debaters on each side, each performing two speeches, and these speeches are interspersed between each other and basically are set up so that each one answers the arguments put forth by the previous one. There are also two teams: Affirmative and negative, the aff team wanting to change some policy and the neg trying to prove that what we already have is better.

Okay, back to the movie. The four debaters entered the debate room and shook hands with the judge, which was in itself very funny because they were all walking in cheesy film slow motion, and Apollo 13 music was playing. And they had a guy who was playing a girl, and who (this is scary) actually looked the part with the costume. So after they had taken their seats, the first aff speaker (played by Tim, I think, I'm not sure) stood up and basically told the judge how chairs are evil because they cause injuries when people pull them out from under you or whack you on the head with them. He presented the case, and then he was cross-examined by the "girl." "S"he came up and asked him if he had any evidence for his case, that chairs were evil and kill people. After lots of beating around the bush, she finally said, "it's a simple question: do you have any evidence?" and the guy said "NOO!!!!!!" and then they both sat down. Then the first neg speaker got up and explained how they had no evidence. As he was speaking, the aff team was writing fake evidence to present. Then the second aff speaker got up and had two thick binders marked "evidence." He said "They say we have no evidence. Here are two giant binders of evidence. I am now open for cross-examination," and then he was asked some pointless questions and sat down.

The rest of the debate was a musical thing, with no talking. But in involved one guy drawing pointless diagrams (he had earlier said "If this circle is the debate, this line through the middle is the other team's chance of winning"), and the girl literally falling on her knees and pleading the judge to vote negative.

And one thing I forgot to mention, the second aff guy did present one valuable piece of evidence: "America has an obesity problem. And we sit down in chairs to eat. If we eliminate the chairs, we'll have to squat to eat like Africans. Now, Africa does not have an obesity problem. Therefore, getting rid of chairs would solve the American obesity problem."

So after the debate was over, the judge labored over the case, and couldn't decide who to vote for, so finally he flipped a coin, and it flipped and landed in slow motion, ending up tails, and that was the end of the movie.

Now, with me describing it, it probably wasn't funny at all. But watching it, it was hysterical.

Then on Thursday we had another hilarious incident (I'm focusing on the funny stuff because the serious interesting stuff would take too long to explain). One of the other instructors, Nathan (who is an AWESOME debater, we saw him debate some of the other instructors and he annihilated them), and Tim were giving a talk on some very important subject (the affirmative case, I think). And Nathan asked Tim to create a case on the board that he could use as an example. Tim began doing this, and Nathan kept talking, but soon discovered that no one was listening to him, because Tim was writing an absolutely hilarious case on the board. (I'll present the case in English, not technical debate terms.)
Basic Definitions: Nathan = "tall"
Problem: Nathan hits his head on doorways.
Solution: Remove legs.
People to carry it out: Tim, Mrs. Lane, Jason (another instructor).
Advantage gained by carrying out solution: Nathan rocks, so we'd preserve the awesomeness of him without his hitting his head and killing himself.

So of course after that Nathan was explaining about responding to cases, and asked Tim to respond. Then, in one of the greatest moments of the week, Tim looked at it and said "Well, there really isn't a whole lot you can say against this . . ." And Nathan took two giant steps forwards and held out his hand for the marker (which was hilarious if you're there watching it). Tim gave it to him, and Nathan annihilated his case:
Basic Definitions: I'm not that tall.
Problem: You have no evidence.
Solution: Cutting off legs is illegal.
Advantage gained: "Nathan rocks" is a given.

So then of course Tim had to get the last word, so he took back the marker and made his final arguments:
General: His hitting his head is supported by history. I mean, just LOOK!

And thus ended the great "Nathan Debate."

Then Thursday night we saw Pilgrim's Progress, but so I can keep myself aware of what I'm talking about, I'll talk about that after I've talked about the rest of debate camp.

On Friday (aka yesterday), there were just two looooong lectures on argumentation. But we played a seriously awesome game over one of the breaks (Rats and Exterminators . . . super fun game), and there was one moment that won't be funny at all in writing, but that in person had me laughing out loud for literally like five minutes.

Another one of the instructors, Ben, told us the story of his first year in debate: "I won 2 [debates] the entire year: one was a bye and an automatic win, and the other one was against someone I had practiced against all year." But he said that every time after the bye, he would go up and communicate to the judge (subtly) "I've won a debate round, so you can vote for me." Then he told us, "Since this is your first time debating, you don't have the ability to say that. But what you can say, is 'my opponent has never won a debate round.' Of course, the problem is that your opponent will come up and say the same thing." At this point, he paused because people were laughing. When they stopped, he looked somewhat bewildered and finished his statement by saying: "but eventually, one of you will not be able to say that anymore." Pause. Shrug. "So,"

The entire room, students, instructors, parents, Mrs. Lane, started cracking up. It was just such a pathetic ending to such a stupid statement . . . it was awesome. After the laughter had died down somewhat, he looked at us and said, "That's one of those moments where you have absolutely no idea what you just said." Which kindled even more laughter. Ahh . . . a truly great moment. Hopefully you can all picture what I mean, because if you can't it isn't funny at all. If you can't, then ask me to demonstrate next time you see me. It probably won't be funny then, either, because it's me doing it, but then you can read it again imagining him doing it, and you'll hopefully find the funny part of it.

So that, in a nutshell, is how much fun the first three days of debate camp were. Which brings us to today: the debates themselves. We had five rounds (debates), where each team went against another team. Without bogging you down with all the boring details, it was a LOT of fun. Because we finally got to put all the stuff we'd learned together (coupled with my extroadinary ability to win informal, everyday debates :P), and match it against another team. My team went 2-3, which is worse then I expected (and I think we really should've gone 3-2, one of the games was decided by the judge's personal opinion of something, and it shouldn't have been enough to give them the win anyway), but it was fun anyway. Actually, I think I would've done better, but my partner wasn't a really strong debater. I don't want to talk bad about him, he really tried hard, but he was only 12, and he couldn't process or understand all of the information that was crammed down our throats over the past few days.

So I was somewhat disapointed, but the good side of it was that every judge (the judges changed each round) said that I was an awesome public speaker. Thank you, Mrs. Perry!!! If someone here (aka Dr. C or David) could kindly convey my thanks to her, since I probably won't see her for a while (unless I see Beth at dance, in which case I can tell her to tell her mom), I'd be much obliged. That was really cool . . . they gave us evaluation sheets at the end of each round, and every single one of them said that I did "An awesome job speaking." So that was comforting after facing a losing record. Mrs. Perry officially rocks in my book now. Not that she didn't before, but now I'm seeing the results of the class . . .

Anyway, I'm repeating myself, so I'll move on.

David, you asked me for a full review of Pilgrim's here by the end of the week. Well, the great Mark Harbison does not disappoint. (Actually, I would've said a lot of this stuff to you after the show, but I was thinking about the conversation I'd just had with Sarah about ToS and Debate, so it slipped my mind.)

I can describe my general feelings about Pilgrim's Progress in three words: IT. WAS. AWESOME. Definitely one of my favorite LifeHouse shows. As funny as Esther and as serious as Hunchback at the same time (if you don't know what I mean, ask AJ, or me, or David, or any other LifeHouse person who comes here . . . which I think is Megan). As cheesy as this sounds, this was the closest to tears I've ever come at a LifeHouse show.

For AJ, it would probably be a really good show, but not an awesome show. Because about half the music was by Jeff Moore, which was very refreshing and un-Wayne-like, and was REALLY good, but the other half was by Wayne and Debra, who (no offense to anyone) frankly cannot write music. So there was one song which was sung by lady in Vanity Fair (not Hopeful, who was female in the play), and it was really really cool, and then a similar song sung by Hopeful on the road that I thought was only okay (please don't kill me, Melody).

And the acting was stupendous. A guy named Nathan played Christian, and he was awesome, another guy named Nathan played John Bunyan/Evangelist (yes they were the same person), and he played the part to perfection, doing Evangelist exactly the way I pictured him in the book.

But one person who really stood out to me personally was a guy named Jason, who played Good Will and Faithful. He was awesome in those roles, but the reason he was awesome to be is because of something else. He is able to play those two parts really well, and in Oliver he plays Bill Sikes, and he's really good at it. So he can turn the ultimate good guy (Faithful) into the ultimate bad guy (Sikes). That's a rare ability.

And of course, he had the best line in the whole show, too (those of you who haven't been to LifeHouse too much won't appreciate it, probably). When he was Good Will, he opened the wicket gate and told Christian to follow the straight and narrow path. Then the chorus came out doing a really weird and random dance, with as much cheese as humanly possible (and the priceless site of Cedric in a blue sombrero shaking two rattles . . .). They danced for a while, and sang a song that was just as cheesy, then split in two and exited through the audience. Then Christian said to Good Will, "Who were they?" And Good Will says, "I have noo idea."

As I said, if you haven't been to lifehouse a whole lot, that probably isn't too funny. But it's such a great line . . . LifeHouse likes to have the chorus (or often the town) enter in random places to sing a song.

So anyway, it was a perfect mix of comedy and drama. With great acting and great singing to top it off (other than a few people whose names I will not state[because I don't remember them]). And of course the great story.

Oh, and also, there was one thing that was sort of different, but that I really liked. In Moses, for the scene crossing the Red Sea, they did the STUPIDEST thing ever, and the had a blue sheet that they lifted up, and people walked under it. But in Pilgrim's, for the rivers and the Slough of Despond, they had people be them. They just kind of sat there and waved their arms to look like waves, and it was actually effective and made it seem like a real river somehow.

And I must say what some of the funny parts are, because that's the way I am and I can't resist. Taylor was Fear in one scene, where Christian was climbing a hill. He was going up and Evangelist came over and they were talking, and Christian said "all I've found on this path is fear," and she leaped out of nowhere and yelled "boo!" and he flew backwards. Then Evangelist said "Fear, begone!" And she folded her arms and kind of snorted in disgust and walked off in disgust. Yes, I said disgust twice. Give me a break. I'm super-tired, gosh.

So then after the awesome show, I went up to say hi to people. And although the bulk of the time was spent talking to Sarah about ToS and Debate, I want to focus on (stupid debate class) the conversation I had with Taylor. Besides our general desire to kill each other, she had something else to talk about. Apparently SOMEONE told her SOMETHING about this blog(*glares at this someone*), and me writing about her . . . I don't even remember what it was I said, but I ended it with "If Taylor ever reads this, she's going to kill me." I'm too lazy to go back and look at it, but apparently I wasn't wrong. She had two guys sock me in the arm a few times, then started sending vicious insults my way, then I left because Dad had already been waiting in the car for a long time.

So, now that you're all dead from boredom and thinking over and over "why the heck is that funny??" I shall finally get to comments (and Rae, remember, it's not "I'm predy bore to death" :P):

Rachael, 1 and 2: I thought it was probably you, turns out I was right. Wait, what am I saying? Of course I was right. I'm always right :P (@ Megan: after all, I do know all) And to both you and David, WILL YOU STOP ACTING LIKE IT'S MY FAULT I HAVEN'T BEEN TO DANCE?? Seriously, I got really upset with Mom when she scheduled the math class there, but what am I supposed to do, say, "Mr. Burton, my mom lied, I actually do have something on Monday." I can't exactly do that. So I guess I'll have to put my dancing abilites to the test and learn a routine in a few weeks . . . *sigh*

Normally, I would answer you, but please please PLEASE don't bring up healthcare. I have been studying Medical Malpractice pretty much nonstop the past few nights, and I really don't want to talk about healthcare policies and insurance rates and all that stuff. But one thing I will say, because I said it over and over again today: Good doctors will operate on the correct side of the brain. This is what makes them good doctors. Thank you, I am now open for cross-examination.

And who ever said that one has to be from texas to say "Y'all?" It's just easier to type than you all, and sounds cooler. I actually say it sometimes in real life, if you listen close enough. Tim even said it this week in debate, and I'm reasonably sure (as in, I have no idea but this is what I'm guessing) that he's from CA from his moment of birth.

Rae: It's Death Star. Capitalized. Proper noun, it's a specific place. Topicality. WE ARGUE TOPICALITY!!! (stupid class . . . I seriously am trying not to say stuff like that, but it's just coming out) And to y'all (yes, Rachael, y'all), I'm fully aware that women can do worse things than make me eat garnishes and fruit rinds. Just look at Sarah. She made me waste valuable hours of my life playing ToS :P

And bean bags are awesome weapons, because they allow you to prove your superiority without hurting the person, thus allowing you to actually hurt them the fun way (with swords and knives and poison darts and sniper rifles and hand grenades and atomic bombs and earthquakes and tornadoes and blowing up the world and destroying the entire universe with a tiny little gun).

Stephen: You seem to be my top commenter on my last post! You get a prize! . . . or, well, okay maybe not. It was pretty cool, at debate, if they were quizzing us, whenever we got the answer right we got a Starburst as a prize. It was awesome.

Anyway, back on topic, I point to my response to Rae's comment in response to your comment.

Eleanor: Seriously? You can do a Russian accent? That rocks!!! I can do English and French (sort of), and I've always wanted to do a Russian accent . . . make me a Russian, Eleanor, with your awesome power!!

Megan: Done and done.

lol . . . alas, no, I cannot do a beaver victory dance. We'll have to get Sarah on here to do that. We vastly superior fauns cannot stoop so low as to do that dance :P In reference to Talor's "oh crap" face, it was funny because I mentioned that the FOURTH OF JULY was coming up. Now, think about Pollyanna, and what happened in Pollyanna regarding the FOURTH OF JULY, and why Taylor most likely hates that holiday now. And it'll all make sense.

Well that kind of stinks . . . you told me you were putting EMBARASSING things on the sign! What happened to that?! And for the fiftieth time, I'M SORRY ALREADY. I'm sure you enjoyed yourself anyway. And despite the fact that it isn't really funny, I can't help laughing at your dad. I guess I just find it . . . so predictable, based on what you said beforehand. In any case, just assure him that I am not your boyfriend, and hopefully all will be well.

P.S. I know how to type P.S. correctly, and you don't. So there! *sticks toungue out*

Stephen 2 and 3: Oh my . . . you really are evil, aren't you? That Wal-mart scheme on your blog, confusing poor idiot teenager drivethrough people . . . next thing we know you'll be making some elaborate scheme to destroy the local store you don't like by somehow dumping millions of tons of bean bags on it.

You left me a comment just for the hack of it? I feel special!! I am the first person to ever have a comment left to him just for the sake of a typo!! (unless of course they were correcting it)

Now I'm going to do something I've never done before and end with something other than comments. I'm going to give a joke that Tim told in debate:

Two penguins are sitting on a block of ice, just talking and having a good time. Then the ice breaks in half. One floats of one way, the other floats off the other way. One says, "See you later!" and the other penguin says "Chocolate milk."

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!! Get it? Me, niether.

Oh no . . . ONLY ONE MORE DAY OF SLEEPING IN ALL WEEK!!!!

I just don't know what to do . . . I couldn't sleep in today, and tomorrow I get to . . . but then I don't again until NEXT MONDAY!!!! And even then I'll have to get up at like 9 or so to go to Dance . . . so I won't have a FULL sleeping in until NEXT TUESDAY!!!! AAAHHHHHH!!!!!

Yes, yes, I enjoy Summer Vacation. How ever did you know?

Aaaaaaaaanyway, I left off Thursday night, I think. So basically I should give an account of the weekend, I suppose.

On Friday, not much happened during the day. I messed around a lot, was online a lot, was playing ToS a lot. Then, all of a sudden, it came time to get the mail. So I did, and my player's guide for FE:SS FINALLY came. They said a week, but it was almost two . . . anyway, I've been playing that a lot since I got the player's guide because (obviously) I am no longer stuck.

So then came Friday night, the church game night. It wasn't as fun last time, because we didn't play Bunko and played something not as fun instead, and there were less people there, and most of the people around my age weren't. And to make matters worse there was this one guy who was Josh, Rebecca, and Christina's cousin, and he was a really good basketball player, so of course he was on the team that I wasn't on, so we lost every game by a LOT. Because no one there is really that good at basketball other than him.

So then we went inside and ate food, which was good because it was burritos made with Clay's homemade salsa, which is like the best salsa EVER. Then there was more basketball playing, then we celebrated Dad's birthday (which was a while ago, but they celebrate each months' birthdays), and then we began to play the main event.

The main even was a bunch of board-type games on tables, and we went around the room playing different games at different times, and at the end whoever had won the most games won. I did pretty well, but there were three or so people ahead of me. So I didn't get a prize :( Oh, well. Carol won, and she chose to share her prize (a bag of Almond Joys) with everyone, so I did get kind of a partial consolation prize. Or not. Whatever. I'm trying really hard not to think because I'm going to be doing more of it this week than is generally required in a whole Summer . . . *sigh*

So then we came home and AJ came home about two or three minutes later, and we were all sitting around talking for a while (Mom was asking him a lot of questions about work such as what his bosses are like, what he does exactly, the layout of the building, the kind of bed he sleeps on, the exact shade of the carpet in the main room . . . that kind of thing), then I played FE:SS for a while and then went to bed.

Saturday was pretty much a day of messing around and being on the computer, playing FE:SS, and reading (I'm finally getting to the Star Wars books Stephen gave me . . . my mom's making me read "literature" in between them :P). Then I remembered that I had math class on Monday (today), and that I had homework for it. So I did some of that. Then, before I knew it, it was bedtime already.

Then came church, which was okay. We didn't have a very interesting discussion in my group . . . it was informative, I guess, and made me think about one or two things I hadn't thought about before, but not as interesting as usual. Then afterwards we played some basketball and I chased Kelsey around because she seems to think I'm always trying to attack her, and I'd hate to disillusion her. If you're wondering about the situation, she's 5 or 6, so it's not like someone my age thinks I'm always trying to attack them . . . except Preston of course, but that's a whole other story.

So then we came home from church and we talked for a while, mostly about my school for the fall. I'm going to be sort of partially homeschooled next year and partially . . . I don't know what to call it. Something-schooled. I'm doing an online thing from Biola, which at the moment is where I desire to go to college. I'd explain more, but I really don't feel like it.

Then I was eating, and Mom went to bed (she was working), and Dad took a nap, and AJ watched movie trailers online (and discovered that the new King Kong is like LOTR 4 . . . Peter Jackson, Andy Serkis, Howard Shore, Fran Walsh, and someone else who's name I can't remember are all involved in the same way as they were with the LOTR movies). It appears that King Kong is now actually a King, and he rules over dead people and dinosaurs . . . didn't make a lot of sense to me.

After that there was more of the same on a typical day; reading, online-ing, video gaming, etc. And there was also a Math lesson. And I had a test to do, as well, but that got pushed back until later, as we shall see.

Before I knew it, it was time for the evening service at the River (which we usually don't go to, but Dad was preaching and it was "House Church night"). So I looked mournfully at my Math test waiting to be done, then kind of cheered, and we went to church. It was a good service, good music (Jeff has a unique ability . . . I've never seen anyone "rock out" playing piano before), good preaching (duh :P), and just an all-around good service.

After the service it was decided that we from the house church would go out to a late dinner together, at Cocos. Then the parents got talking at church (as expected), so me, Josh, Joel, their cousin Caden, and Julieanna (who almost doesn't count because she kept leaving and coming back for fear of death) went down into the basement. We had a bean bag war, which was quite fun. Joel would run around gloating about being so cool, and being the "mascot," however that applied to the situation. So while Joel was doing this, me and Josh and Caden decided we weren't going to take it from a 6-year-old. So we started chucking bean bags at him. It was awesome because since they were bean bags they didn't hurt him, so we could keep pelting him with them. Also, they were the big kind that are made for sitting on, so whenever he was running and we hit him with one it would knock him over and he'd kind of slide across the floor for a ways. Then all of a sudden Josh made an unprovoked attack on me, and so I tried (and failed) to defeat him in battle, and Caden just kind of hit whoever he felt like. So basically by the time my dad came down to tell us we were leaving, everyone was fighting for themselves, except Joel, who was still gloating about being the mascot.

Then we went out to dinner, and Julieanna wanted me to eat a garnish . . . so I lifted it up to the side of my mouth and chewed, and made it disappear slowly, and made noises by ripping it, so she thought I was actually eating it. She thought it was quite funny, so she made me eat it again when she saw it on the table a while later, and she made me eat all kinds of peels and rinds and stuff . . . and then Brian turned around and asked us how it was at the kids' table, and I told him what Julieanna was making me eat. And he said, "See what women can do to you, Mark?" and everyone laughed.

Then, alas, I had to go home and do my Algebra test. Then I went to bed.

Today I got up and went to Algebra class, which went by rather quickly because I was so tired that I actually almost did fall asleep a few times ("almost" being the key word). I was kind of out of it, but I did okay, so no real problem.

And there might not be another update here for a few days . . . I'm not sure. The thing that's making me get up early and think is a debate camp, which takes place in Upland, so I have to get up early and go down there every morning and debate all day, and have people tell me how to debate. I'm sure it'll be fun, other than having to get up early. Although it would've been MORE fun if Sarah had done it *glares at her and asks her family members to pass it on since she probably isn't reading this*.

So anyway, hopefully I'll get an update in at some point before Friday, but I'm not sure.

Now, to comments:

Rae: I'll just skip straight to the stuff I know how to answer: Oliver is fun, although it's kind of dark in parts. It's playing August 6th (I think) - September 4th, on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays, and one special Thursday performance. But I'm starting to sound like Wayne (which is NOT a good thing). Anyway, I probably can't get you hooked up with free tickets, but "the guy who wrote some songs," who is apparently "as involved with lifehouse as anyone," might be able to get you some . . . seeing as how he's so high up and everything . . . :P

Stephen: Kingdom Hearts is fun . . . I just wish I could play it without Rachel screaming "NO NO NO!!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!!" every time I walk past an inconsequential (sp?) door that would lead to like 1 munny . . . it's scary.

And although I don't find opposition to Harry Potter quite as aumusing as you, I share your general . . . uh . . . thing. Totally lost my train of thought there. Hopefully you understand me.

Cormack: I agree. But it's also a book :P

Dr. C: Yes, we're using Saxon . . . and it isn't so much your getting upset at it as you telling someone who would get upset . . . like, say, for example, maybe, my mom. Or Steve. But then again, Steve would know if I did, since there are only four people in the class.

I thought I was spelling that word wrong . . . thank you. I couldn't figure out what was wrong, but now I know :)

Yes, we have a recital in a few weeks. Which made me rather upset that Mom forgot about it. But I can't exactly say "Yeah, my mom lied, I actually do have something on Monday." But thankfully I should be there next Monday, so I'll just have to learn the routine in like a day . . . yippee.

Eleanor: Yay! Welcome back! I missed your comments . . . and I'm somewhat curious: what does my voice sound like when you read it?

"cilla anne": uhh . . . thanks . . . who exactly are you? I have my suspicions, but the only help you gave me in your comment was that you like to bug me, which narrows it down to about forty million people. And about 39.99999 million of them would've left a comment like that . . . so any help would be appreciated.

Stephen again: Yeah . . . fun stuff. Especially when it's urgent, and it takes 5 minutes to figure out who it is you're trying to talk to, and then the urgency is wasted, and . . . well, you know, however you would end something like that. Like I said, I'm trying not to think.

My mind is gone right now, so I'm not even gonna try . . .

. . . to think up a good title. I got up early this morning and went to math, then was at my friend's house all day, then was at rehearsal all night and then was looking at college-ish stuff online for about forty minutes and now here I am. So yeah, my mind is mush.

So let's see, what happened since Tuesday . . . well, Wednesday was a good day, I got to sleep in, then I got to do two lessons of math (yippee), then I got to go to rehearsal. And don't worry, there WAS more to my day, just not anything really worth mentioning.

So basically, rehearsal was the big thing last night. As you'll recall, I mentioned that a guy codenamed "Larry" was coreographing Oliver. This is still the case. He has a very competent assistant codenamed "Dustin" . . . who probably at least two people reading this will know. So anyway, "Dustin" has done stuff that I've been in before, so I already knew him, and it turns out "Larry" has a very similar style. Which of course means that I can barely move, I'm so sore. Why don't you try jumping around and clapping and stomping and leaping and turning and whirling and running and MORE leaping and jumping . . . okay, now do all that for three hours straight, with one 5 minute break, and that was pretty much rehearsal, except more organized AND we were singing at the same time. So it was fun, but hard.

But thankfully, "Larry" and "Dustin" told us that the song we coreographed last night was the hardest song in the show (well, they said the "show-stopper," but I translated it for you non-theater people :P), for which I thank God. Because if that was the easiest song, I'd be ready to cry. WHY DOES STUPID OL' DODGER WANT TO BE A FRIEND TO OLIVER ANYWAYS???

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaanyhow, then I went home and received the glorious gift commonly known as sleep. And then I woke up and had the horrible "gift" commonly known as Algebra Class. Yay. So I sat in a living room for two hours listening to "So x equals the square root of the line that we just graphed that is equal to the radius of the circle plus the hight of the triangle divided by pi squared, and then in order to find y we have to zzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzz" . . . okay, so maybe the last part there was me and not the teacher.

I'M JUST KIDDING. DR. C, IF YOU'RE READING THIS, I'M JUST KIDDING. I DID NOT FALL ASLEEP DURING CLASS.

Okay, now that that's taken care of, I'll go into more detail. The teacher (Steve, but not our director Steve) is actually a very cool and funny guy, and the class would be enjoyable if it weren't for that pesky little math thing that keeps showing up. He's very helpful, he really knows what he's doing, and he's an entertaining guy.

But it's still Algebra, and it's still early in the morning during summer vacation.

So then I came home and kind of did the Calvin thing (getting off the bus [in my case Mom's car] and running and yelling "I'm FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!"). And then I remembered something that made me feel EVEN BETTER. I remembered that I was going over to Rachel's house to hang out with her and Preston! Yay!

So I messed around for a while and then I went over there, and our period of hanging out can be sumarized in basically 5 letters and a number: PS2, DVD. The PS2, Rachel and Preston were playing Kingdom Hearts (Rachel got Preston to get it and it's downright scary . . . okay, to put it in perspective, for those of you who know (or are) Sarah, take Sarah with Tales of Symphonia, and substitute "Rachel" and "Kingdom Hearts," and there you go). I was watching and laughing at how bad at it Preston was. Seriously, I've played it once in my entire life, and I'm better than he is, and he owns it. I got as far in two hours as he got in like a week. It's cool. Now I have yet another thing to gloa— er, to HELP HIM DO BETTER with.

So after a while I got bored of watching this, and I suggested we do something else (I had swimming in mind, but they obviously didn't). So Preston pops out Kingdom Hearts and in goes Harry Potter. Which I actually played a bit, it was quite fun . . . I probably shouldn't have even mentioned what game it was, actually, I'm not sure where y'all stand on that issue . . . well, anyway, what's done is done. So I was playing it, and it is FUN to be walking along, and suddenly to turn and electrocute your best friend. Or the wall. Or a mirror. Or whatever. Pretty much, I just run around randomly firing my spell at everything in sight. And the coolest thing is that if you shoot your allies enough, they'll get mad at you and run away. It's fun.

So then after doing that for a while, Rachel got bored and cut in on my rampage through the area, and we went up to her room and I met Marvin (she named her computer Marvin), and we used him to watch a movie, and about a half an hour into the movie Dad came, and I had to leave.

So obviously I had a fun afternoon. So then I came home and ate dinner and messed around for a while and wasted time and discovered that Game Boy Advance cartrediges (I KNOW I spelled that wrong, I hope you can guess what it says) are VERY tough. One of my games went through the washer and the dryer, and it still works. I didn't lose any memory or anything. It rocks.

Then there was dinner, then some being online, then it was time for rehearsal. We were supposed to run act one tonight, which kind of scared me since we've coreographed a whoppin' big ONE SONG. So most of the night consisted (for me) of standing on stage and singing, and whacking Jeremy and having Jeremy whack me.

Okay, this is going to get really confusing, because I just realized that the guy who plays Oliver is named Jeremy, and then the Cheese Vendor is also named Jeremy. Which wouldn't be so bad except for the fact that I'm relatively good friends with both of them. It'll be like last time with Marks . . . ("Mark!" "What?" "What?" "What?" "Oh . . . sorry, Mosher.") And in addition to two Jeremys, we have three Joshes . . . and there are like 6 or 7 of them actively involved with Lifehouse at the time . . . how scary. And sad.

Anyway, I also got to go through the Sowerberry scene for the first time having some idea what I was doing, and discovered that this character ROCKS. Because he's not quite a villain, but he's a sinister, not-so-nice, snobby, arrogant guy. And of course, those are the most fun roles to play, next to the villains themselves. And also of course, I come off after doing the scene and like four people come up to me and say "typecasting." (And if Sarah has gotten clearance yet to read this, yes, OF COURSE Taylor was one of them.)

So the night went pretty well on the whole . . . it's sad though, because most of my really good friends deserted me . . . Rachel: Oh, heck yes I'm auditioning. Then she doesn't audition. Preston: OF COURSE I'm auditioning! Then he doesn't audition. Zach: My Dad's directing it, I don't even have to audition. Then he goes and gets accepted into some prestigious acting camp and can't be there. Sarah: Well, I wanted to, but I decided to do Pilgrim's Progress instead. Megan: I'm auditioning. And we FINALLY reach one who did audition. But of course then she goes and gets herself a main part, so she's on stage all the time so I can't hang out with her. Nick is the same as Megan. Cedric: I'm going to audition. Cedric later: Yeah, well . . . I'm in another show. Sure. Talk about lame excuses . . . I know people who have done like 4 shows at once. So it's just me and Taylor and Spaghetti from the Lion Witch group, and then a few other people I know from various other shows or places.

So then I came home, and Mom told me that the Torrey Program at Biola (which is what I'm thinking of doing for college) has a high school program, so we were online looking at that for a while, then they went to bed and I came to the Death Star. And now it's time for comments:

AJ and Rae: Alright, alright, GOSH. But don't you think you should kind of talk to Eleanor about this . . .? Rather than me?

AJ: You did that whole ::ducks and runs and gets a rope and runs away across the rooftops:: thing, and I grabbed you in a Force grip as you jumped from rooftop to rooftop, and then Stephen told me to throw you.

Rae: Well, it isn't that I don't like pairing up with girls . . . although I'm not really sure where that came from. It's that I always get paired up with the girl who wants to kill me. So you can imagine why that isn't fun. And THANK YOU for sparing my blog your aunt's comments . . .

Cormack: You're a comment?! Wow . . . I would've thought that you would be more than what you write on other people's blogs . . . :P

Stephen: Getting all oxy-moronical on me, are ya?

David: *gasp* I've attracted another person from my immediate circle of friends to comment! Cool! . . . Yeah, well, I think I'll let Karen play Miss Monks . . . 'cause she gets caught at the end anyway. I'd rather be Sikes, then I'd at least get to die. . . . And no, alas, I won't be at dance on Monday . . . why? Because my mother happens to convienently forget that dance is on Mondays every time that someone asks "Is Mark free on Monday mornings?" If I were around for those conversations, I would of course remind her, but since she supposedly knows my schedule better than me (which, other than dance, she does), I am not a part of those conversations . . . uhh, wait a sec . . . stare at your head? What the heck?? I have no idea what you're talking about . . . And I'm seeing PP next Thursday.

And since this seemed to work . . . COMMENT ALREADY!!!

Rehearsal for . . . I was going to say a funeral, but they don't have rehearsals for those.

So now that I have succesfully made you think I'm totally insane, let me explain. I went to rehearsal tonight for Oliver, and Steve (the director) told us that the buy who was playing Mr. Bumble had to drop. So the guy who was playing Mr. Sowerberry became Mr. Bumble, and I became Mr. Sowerberry. Who is an undertaker, so it was a reharsal involving a funeral-ish person . . . whatever that means.

So anyway, the amount of lines I have went from 5 to 15, and I also became Produce Vendor, so I have multiple singing lines. So I went from being in like 2 scenes to being onstage quite a bit . . . which is cool. Since all my friends who said they were trying out DIDN'T . . . well okay, not all of them. But many of them . . . which made me really mad when I thought I had tons of backstage time, because most of my best friends wouldn't be there . . . I'll get you back for this, Rachel, if it's the last thing I do . . .

So anyway, I was told I was Mr. Sowerberry, and then we blocked that scene. So I was kinda freaked out, because since I had just found out I was that part, I had no idea what that scene consisted of. But it worked out alright . . . Steve kind of told me that I was evil, and yet not evil, and diabolical, and yet not . . . which wasn't really too helpful, but then I read the lines and I got what he was saying. So hopefully I'll be able to pull it off. We'll have to see . . . it'll be a stretch of my acting ability.

Oh, and it turns out I have a wife in that part, too . . . *sigh* Why oh why does Wayne so enjoy pairing me up with females?! I had two girlfriends in Pollyanna, now I have two wives in Oliver . . . gaaa!! I can't take it any more!! . . . well, as long as it's not Taylor again I might survive . . . y'know, one day, she's going to happen upon this blog and decide to kill me. ((Another place where that iron bar would be helpful, Rae :P))

So that was pretty much rehearsal. So then tomorrow I get to do math homework and then go to rehearsal and do coreography! Yay! I love coreography . . . I'm looking forward to working with the coreographer of this show, I've heard he's really good.

So anyway, that was the big event of the day. We had another algebra class this morning that seemed to last forever . . . but then it finally ended. So yeah. On to comments:

Rae: Oh . . . well that's okay then. Looks like the only person I lost was Megan . . . cool. And I know what a minion is, I was asking why I was being classified as one . . . and as for going to the party, . . . whatever you say. I barely even know Eleanor, much less her family, but whatever.

Now . . . COMMENT ALREADY!!

A short post

It's been a few days, so I figured I should update, but nothing really happened, so this'll be pretty short.

On Friday, AJ came home, and I updated this, and then I played SSBM for a while, and then was online for a while, then I went to bed.

Then came Saturday, which was a tragic day, because I had an Algebra class from 1:30-3:30 PM. It went alright, I found out I got a 94 on my first test. Which was far better than expected. So that was cool. But hey, it's still algebra.

Then I cam home, and was online again for a while, and then Mom said "Let's go out to dinner," so we did. AJ was leading worship at the Saturday Night service at the River, so he wasn't around. So me and Mom went to Blimpie's subs, a new place that opened around the corner. We had one in Colorado.

So anyway, we went there, and ran into some people from Pilgrim's Progress who had gone to Coldstone, so I said hi to them (and told Cedric that I was going to kill him because he didn't audition for Oliver like he said he would), then we ate. And, since we were in the area, we decided to get some Coldstone Ice Cream. Which of course was very good. And I also figured that since we were there, I'd check Gamestop again for Tales of Symphonia, and what do you know, they had it. So I bought it.

Naturally, the rest of my night was spent playing it. Then yesterday we went to church in the morning and talked primarily about purposes and priorities and such (lots of talk about Dad's speech at CVCA graduation, actually).

Church went kind of long, and AJ was going down to see people in Fullerton and stay the night at their new(er) apartments. So he left, and I spent pretty much the rest of the day playing Tales of Symphonia and doing 1 Algebra lesson. Then at night (since I didn't have to get up today), I watched Diagnosis Murder and then was talking to Rachel online for lke 3 1/2 hours, which was fun. Then I went to bed.

Then today, I got up and played ToS for a while, then I was online for a little while, then I did an algebra lesson, then I played some more ToS, then I did another algebra lesson, and now here I am.

So tomorrow I have Algebra class in the morning (8:30-10:30 AM), so I have to get up early and not stay up late tonight. And also tomorrow I have a rehearsal, in which we're going to be doing something like blocking the entire first act (which is a scary thought). So I'll probably post tomorrow night telling about that.

So pretty much my Fourth of July has been rather uneventful, Mom's working tonight and Dad just got home from a conference in San Diego today, so we didn't go to any parties or anything. So probably we'll just watch the fireworks from the back porch and go to bed.

But anyway, happy fourth of July, and happy 229th birthday to our country!!!

Comments:

Cormack: Well, that's good to know . . . I suppose that when AJ and Rae were getting all mad at me for not posting I just assumed that everyone was mad at me and so they left . . . which appears to be true of Megan.

Stephen: But, to replace Megan, Stephen came back! yay! And I'm aware that I should've thrown him off the edge, but I'm one of those evil people who likes to play with my victims . . . there was no way for him to escape, so I figured I'd hold him in an iron grip of terror between to buildings for a few minutes, then let him fall to his doom. Or something like that.

Well, it looks like 75% of my readers left . . .

No Rae, no Cormack, no Megan . . . I'm stuck with AJ *rolls eyes*

:P j/k But seriously guys, come back!! It wasn't that long . . . If you think about how the average human spends two weeks of their life waiting at traffic lights, then you can just say that I was stuck in traffic and unable to post :P

Okay, so anyway, on to business.

Nothing really happened Tuesday after my post, since it was reasonably late at night . . . I was on the computer for a while, then I was reading for a while, then I went to bed.

On Wednesday, again not a whole lot happened. I continued training with Bowser on SSBM, and reached the point I wished to get to. I'm now confident I could beat several of my friends with him. And I was on the computer for a while, I read for a while, and I played basketball for a while.

Thursday was pretty much the same, except that I forgot that I was supposed to do a math lesson on Wednesday, so I wasn't happy that I'd have to do two on Thursday, so I chose to do two on Friday instead, and just do one on Thursday. And I did.

To go into a little more depth about Thursday, let's focus on my basketball playing time. I was out there mid-afternoon (the hottest part of the day) playing for a while. I was playing an imaginary game and was in the late 4th quarter when Dad came home and then came out to wash his car. When he came out to wash the car, he offered to play a short game to five. I agreed. When it was 1-1, he mentioned that it was also a requirement to win by 2, which I also agreed to. So we played a short game to 5. Final score: Dad: 15, Mark: 13. I was totally exhausted by the end of it, because I had already been out there for well over an hour, and was getting ready to go in when the game started, and since I actually had to play defense there was more physical exertion than normal. But it was a lot of fun. So that's why I didn't post yesterday, because by the time I felt up to doing anything but lying on my bed I no longer felt like updating.

On Thursday, I also went to Stephen's blog and heard a very funny speculation about In-N-Out.

So that brings us to today. Today I was heading down the street to take care of my neighbor's dogs one last time (I was watching them while my neighbors were on a trip of some sort), when I realized that I had a huge blister on the back of my right foot, and it hurt. And by the time I reached their house (it's not my next door neighbor, they're a short ways down the street), it was bleeding, so that wasn't fun.

Naturally, I didn't play basketball today, I decided to let it heal somewhat. So instead I spent the day on the computer and the gamecube. I was going to call around and try to find Tales of Symphonia, but since there was no way I could get a ride, I chose to wait until tomorrow or Sunday for that.

So that pretty much sums it up, other than my joyous 1-week anniversery with summer break. And of course, the highlight of my week was:

AJ: Wow . . . that was so heroic. Now, for retaliation: *uses Force to leap up onto the rooftops with you, then uses the Force to grab your neck in a choking grip and hold you suspended in the gap between two roofs* *decides to point out you never commented on the rest of the post* ;)