Only 174 days of school left!!
At least, that's how many I think there are. 183-9=174, but I don't know if we're supposed to have 183 to begin with...whatever.
I'm really glad there weren't cuts on the swim team. I'm on the "practice" squad, but for the last two or three days in a row Jill and I were complimented by the coaches because we were working so hard. :D Coach Margraf said "Way to work it" to us two days in a row because we like started before everyone else while they were just talking or something, and the Coach Martin sort-of complimented us on Friday: he told Jill something about her arms like a way to use them better and then said we were both doing really well and that he'd try to get everyone in the meets. I'm not sure about being in a meet, because I wouldn't want something important like that to depend on me. Although I think they said that if you were on the practice team but it looked like you would be able to be competitive in a meet you could get a varsity letter even though you weren't on the competitive team. Which is really cool. It's great to be on two walk-on varsity teams, swimming and badminton. But apparently Kara got a varsity letter for math team?? Go figure.
I was also thinking about swimming...it's the one thing I've ever done that I actually push myself at. Like, with school and stuff, if I "finish" something I'm done and that's it. A lot of it comes easily to me and what doesn't I just sort of ignore. But with swimming, it's different. Anything that I can't do I try really hard to do. Like during sprints I get tired and everything begins to hurt but I just keep going. It's like your body keeps saying "no" but your heart and mind are saying "yes" and you know which one to listen to. I was actually thinking that as I was swimming the other day, because my legs and arms were burning and I just kept moving as fast I could as long as I could. And at the end I was tired and out of breath and my heart was pounding faster than it probably ever had before but you know what? I felt good. And that is why I like swimming so much. Aside from the fact that you don't sweat, it makes you feel good. Inside and outside.
The concert last week was really cool, it was all these "Pipes and Drums" bands from all over the country (mostly police bands) and they were all really good. The Marine band came and played, too, and also these Irish stepdancers performed and they were really good, I wish I had taken Irish stepdancing, I really want to learn! AND, I don't know if anyone will know who I'm talking about, but one of the Irish Tenors, Ronan Tynan, performed as the closing act. He's this really famous opera-singing guy and he was/is in the Irish Tenor group thingy. I only know of him because my Pop-pop listens to his music and stuff like it all the time. I didn't get to hear much of him though because we left as soon as he came on (not that I minded much) but the first song he sang was that song that goes "I heard there was a secret chord, that David played and it pleased the Lord, but you don't really care for music, do you" and I like that song but not enough to want to stay. The rest of the show was great, though, especially the NYPD and Bergen County, NJ bands. Bergen County even had glow-in-the-dark drumsticks! It was pretty cool.
This weekend we went up to West Point to see the Army football game and have a tailgate party. It was a lot of fun, and I am very proud of myself because I now somewhat understand football. The Army lost miserably but that was to be expected, so we weren't too disappointed. The game was actually a lot of fun, and it was cool to watch all the cadets singing the fight songs and jumping up and down. The other team had a big blowup mascot and at one point a bunch of cadets ran over to the other side of the stadium and deflated it. It was sooooooooo funny and the company mascots had run over too, and one tried to hop over the 4-foot-ish fence thingy (it was a big green dinosaur with blue spikes) and it fell over. The whole stadium cracked up because it was so ridiculously funny. Plus my cousins are pretty cool, especially Conor who is about the smartest and cutest sixth-grader ever. I wish I was in 6th grade (and not related) just so I could have a crush on him, hahaha. And the funny thing is that he things girls hate him. Psh.
Alright, so I'm done for now...and don't be surprised if I don't update forever because I'll be dying on Tuesday (physics test) and probably again on Wednesday/Thursday (math/US test somewhere in there). So yeah. Leave me some comments. :)