I'm going to college!!!

I know my last post was essentially me just whining about the fact that I haven't heard anything from any schools yet and that I more than likely wouldn't find out about any of them until next year. Well, today I got some unexpected mail. First, I got a letter from Rutgers... so I started shaking and pretty much ripped the envelope in half. When I opened it the letter only said that they would notify me online. In February, so I was slightly disappointed that I had gotten my hopes up for nothing. Then my mom continues to go through the mail and suddenly her eyes get really wide. I looked up and was like... what? she proceeded to hold up this giant white envelope that said Michigan State University across the front. I ripped it out of her hands and opened it as fast as I could. Honestly I don't think I read the words on the letter for a full five minutes. I just saw big letters saying "Congratulations, You're a Spartan!" and I burst into tears. It's pretty much impossible to explain that moment, just knowing that regardless of what any other college says, you are going to college. And what is even better is that this school was one of the three I visited over the summer. It's not my number one, but it's nice to know that I have a really good school to look forward to if stuff doesn't work out.
I can't even begin to explain how happy I am right now, it's so surreal. So, I'm just going to leave off with a picture my mom took of me while we were at MSU this summer.

Sorry to make you wait

Quite frankly, I'm mad at myself. I said that I would try not to go for more than a week without posting anything from now on considering I almost went a whole year with absolutely nothing. I also feel really guilty about it because there are a significant amount of people who actually read this now, which is exciting and scary at the same time. I feel a lot more pressure to write about something interesting.
To give a brief update on everything, I have been really busy with the semester coming to a close. I finished my college apps a couple of weeks ago and I am now still currently waiting to hear back from all 10 of the schools. I don't think it would bother me all that much, but everyone else has started to get a flow of acceptance letters and I'm still sitting here not even knowing if I'll be able to go to college. What's even worse is that I won't know about my number one school until March, and my hopes are up so high... I'm terrified. The waiting game is a million times worse than the applications.
My 4-H project is going well, I had about 30 people join me to walk in our local parade to advertise the centennial. I also talked to Joe Simitian again on Sunday, were going to go get coffee one day so he can help me more with my project.
Two of my friends were called back fro the final interviews for the giant scholarship that I was applying for. Hopefully I can get one of the smaller ones.
I was rejected to be a delegate for California in the National 4-H Conference this spring. I was disappointed considering I really wanted to go to that, I'm beginning to get the feeling that the State Office really doesn't like me. Too bad I'm trying to do something really special for them.
I have 2 more days of finals left, unfortunately none of them are going to be easy (except for one which is a party but that's besides the point). Ive got multiple essays and DBQ's ahead of me. Yay for IB style tests.
My class ring came in the mail on Saturday. It's gorgeous and I love it.
Despite the fact that my grades are really good right now, and all my problems are starting to clear up again... I'm just really not in a good mood. I know that part of it is the fact that, even though I am super excited for college next year, I'm really scared about what's going to happen with my friends. 


Okay, so this was a stupid post. I'm sorry. I hope I get out of this trench soon.

Scholarship Interview

So I applied to the Sequoia Awards scholarship, which is awarded to High School seniors who are really committed to community service,at the end of October. I got a call about a week and a half ago letting me know that I had made it past the first round and that I would be brought in for interviews at some point. Well, my interview was today and so I was really trying to look my best so I actually dressed up for school. I know, it is quite an achievement for me.
I ended up running late so I showed up right at the exact time my interview was supposed to start so I was a little more freaked out then I would have liked to have been. The interview went well though, they said that they really liked the essay that I had sent. So, I guess I'll find out in January if I make it too the next round of interviews.

Crossing my fingers!!!

I'm feeling a little bruised.

I have always had problems with being bullied. It has been a constant part of my life since I was in pre-school. I never wanted it to be this way, no one ever does, but it seems that no matter the circumstances I can never escape it.
As I have made blatantly clear on this blog, I have been going through a fairly rough time since school has started this year. Everything that had happened was terrible and I have frequently found myself feeling absolutely miserable because of it, but even through all of the hurt and loneliness I managed to get through it by avoiding interactions with people that aren't my close friends. It has been pretty effective for the most part.
Recently, after Amanda got rid of her facebook, the two of us decided to get tumblrs so that we could share things back and forth with each other. No other reason. Frankly, the fact that I actually gave in to getting a tumblr is very surprising because the whole concept really bothers me, and I consider it a very poor excuse for a blog. But, I would do pretty much anything for Amanda, so I gave in. We only got them a few days ago, and I have been very hesitant about the whole thing because I didn't want people that we know to see that I had one because it is only meant for us and Morganne.
Last night, someone found me.. and sent me some anonymous hate mail. I only responded to one of their two messages, and I made sure that my response would be carefully thought out so that hopefully no one will bother me again. And even though what they said wasn't the worst thing someone has ever said to me it still hurt. I'm sick of the fact that people won't leave me alone, and I can't understand why people hate me so much, especially now that I'm trying to avoid most everyone. I think that it wouldn't have bothered me so much, let alone made me cry myself to sleep, had it not been for the fact that this is not the first or even second time that this has happened. Sophomore year, I was attacked over Formspring over and over again, at 2 separate times throughout the year. And it wasn't just one person, it was multiple people constantly barging me with all of these painful messages until they got bored or something. I never handled that as well as I should have, (which was part of my reasoning for being so careful now) but that has haunted me ever since. I thought that I had escaped it and that people had sort of accepted me or something by this point... but I guess not.
If it happens again I think I am just going to delete the tumblr, it's just not worth it. And if so, Amanda and I can find something else to do where people won't be terrible.

Sorry to have another sad post. I was planning on doing a whole start of the Christmas season thing today, but I needed to vent a little bit after that.

Thank you for being supportive of this blog, I know more people are reading it now and it is great to know that there is somewhere that I can be myself and not have to be worried about it. It means a lot.

Thanksgiving Break

Alright, I was going to start writing this yesterday... But Amanda was very adamant about my getting a tumblr so that the two of us could spam each other all day every day. We figured it would be the best way to keep the internet entertaining because Facebook doesn't hold the same value anymore. Anyway, I promised a  Thanksgiving post... so a thanksgiving post I will provide.

My mom decided that we would have Thanksgiving at our house this year, which hasn't happened for a VERY long time. So we spent a very long time cleaning the house on Wednesday and even Thursday morning trying to get everything ready for when everyone arrived. Now you have to understand that Thanksgiving in my family is with a bunch of family friends that are from different areas of Scandinavia (mainly Norway, and we are the only Swedish group in the mix).  And we have the normal Thanksgiving food but we also have a few "abnormal" traditions regarding food and such. Anyway, part of our group wasn't going to be there because they were in Norway... or Texas, no one really had much of a clue. But that wasn't the worst of it, my grandmothers best friend's husband, Leif, has been suffering from Alzheimers for about 10 years.. and he passed away at about 3 on Thursday  So not only was our group significantly smaller than it usually is... it was also a lot more depressing than normal. We still had fun, but everything was quite a bit less conversational at times. At least we know that he isn't suffering anymore.
On another less depressing note, the food was absolutely amazing.
Every year on Black Friday, my family has the tradition of going up to a small town called Sonora and spending the day there. We always get up there and go to the movies, ( This year we saw Wreck-it- Ralph, which was absolutely adorable) and then around 2 we go over across the street to Wal-Mart and laugh at everything that is absolutely ridiculous in there. I take a picture of the funniest thing I see every year. The past two years have involved some sort of Christmas decoration that has Santa sitting in a bathtub. After we are done there we find our usual spot for their town Christmas parade and wrap ourselves up in blankets and eat cookies. Then we go to all the little shops, specifically to this Ornament store called Dorthea's that has the best Christmas ornaments every year. Then we get dinner and go home.
On Saturday morning I went to Pete's Coffee with Quinn because she was back from college and we wanted to hangout before she left again the next morning. We filled each other in with all of our stories. It was great, I've missed her a lot. Then I finished my UC application, and by the time we were done.. we got ready to leave to go to the Dickens Fair, which I have basically been excitedly waiting for since we went last year. I want one of the costumes so bad its ridiculous. After we were done we went to the other side of the building and saw a San Francisco Bull's hockey game, and they won! Which was great because last time I went they didn't do so well. Still not as amazing as a Shark's game.. but it will have to do for now.
Sunday I spend ALL day working on college apps and got all but 1 of them done. That and I have an interview for the Sequoia Awards on December 4th. Everything is getting super exciting!!!

Alright... I have to get going to ceramics soon. Hopefully this post will be ok until I can find something else to write about. I know it's not the most entertaining thing but if you are anything like Amanda, then apparently you all like reading about my boring daily life.

This made my day

Okay, so I have been really bored and just surfing the Internet when I stumbled upon this beautiful thing. I would post the letter it generated for me, but I would like to keep that to myself... and a couple of my closest friends ( they know who they are). But, I figured that I would leave the link for all of you to enjoy ( http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/1ixqeC/www.breakupemail.com/dump.php/). Honestly, I think its brilliant and it totally helps to stop any anger you might have against someone.
My favorite part? This option that they gave you as a sendoff line: "I hope maggots devour your testicles."
I thought it was beautiful.

Thanksgiving post to come in a couple days! In the meantime... I'll just be fasting and preparing myself to be utterly starving for my favorite meal of the whole year. Only the best holiday's involve gorging yourself with food.

Returning to Normality

I want to sincerely apologize. I have been absolutely terrible lately... I haven't posted in a week. The boredom must have been killing you, and I agree with the fact that I have been super lame about it. But, I have some really good news to go along with the fact that I haven't been blogging for a while. So hopefully I can redeem myself with the fact that my absence does not go without reason. And to make it up to you, I will try to make this post as lengthy as possible to recap all of the exciting things that I have done recently. So... here goes!
I'll begin with my explanation for why I haven't been blogging. To be perfectly honest, it because I couldn't find anything interesting to talk about. Nothing that has been going on has been interesting enough to write about, and (here comes the news...  you ready for it!?!) I no longer have any emotional rants to go on about because I am pretty much completely over that kid whose name shall never be mentioned on this blog. That's right, I have finally been able to shift away from all that nonsense and free myself. So you can all rejoice because you will never again have to deal with the hopeless rants of this once heartbroken 17 year old girl. I'm not exactly sure what caused this change of mind-set, it sort of just happened. I'm glad though, it makes things a lot easier, even if I do still have to deal with all of his friends being super obnoxious about it all. Anyway, I'm done with this topic for good, so let's move on to much more fun stuff. Awesome :)
So last Friday was the Sequoia vs. Carlmont football game. I went, didn't have as much fun as I had hoped for 3 reasons: 1) It was absolutely freezing and since I had been sitting outside in the cold since 3:30 that afternoon with no jacket, I was beginning to develop a slight concern that I could be contracting some sort of sickness. 2) Most of my friends didn't go, so I felt like a third wheel the entire time to one of my friends and his girlfriend who were huddled together next to me and 3) I couldn't even get into the game because we were so far ahead and they weren't even putting up much of a fight that I couldn't even find entertainment in watching it anymore. But we are going to the playoffs, our first game being tomorrow against M.A. Crossing my fingers that we do really well again!
On Saturday morning I was volunteering at the local Second Harvest food bank for Jr. Fair Board. I was put on duty for sorting through all of the donated items to make sure they were ok and safe for consumption. I had no idea that people donate so much JUNK. It was almost sad how much food we had to throw away because it had either expired, been pre-opened, was perishable, or the container had been damaged. And you have to understand, the expiration dates on most things aren't exactly accurate and you can still use them up to 3 years after the date on the container, and even with that criteria there were a significant amount of items that had expired as early as 2002 that we had found. It became really entertaining to see who could find the weirdest things. Some of my favorites, both good and bad were the expired pre-cooked canned snails that were imported from France, the multitudes of Spam, a stack of opened adult diapers that had turned grey, funnel cake batter and a pouring spout to go with it, luxury olive oils, opened jars of peanut butter, and a rotten banana. I think I sorted through a couple thousand cans at the table I was at alone... it was the craziest 3 hours of my life and I would do it again in a heartbeat. Later that night my family and I went up to the Cow Palace for a SF Bulls hockey game. It was nice to be able to go and watch hockey again since the NHL is on lockout right now (I'm super depressed about that) but given the fact that they are a brand new team and thus aren't doing so well... the energy just isn't anywhere near what I'm used to. Plus I miss my San Jose Sharks </3, my school year just isn't the same without them. I did have a lot of fun though, and will most definitely go to more games this year.
On Sunday, I spent the day in San Fransisco with my family to celebrate the long weekend. We decided to do all of the touristy things since that's not normally something we do. We went to pier 39, I got a Left-Handed notebook at the Lefty's store (I can't even begin to describe how wonderful it is to not have to write over that stupid spiral spring wire thing anymore.) and we got clam chowder in a bread bowl at our favorite restaurant down there. We also went to both the Wax Museum and Ripley's Believe it or Not. We then walked down to Fisherman's wharf and went to go see the Balclutha (its an old sailing ship) so my dad and I could relive some old memories from when we went on a historical field trip thing on it when I was in 4th grade. And of course, we had to stop at Ghirardelli Square. So much chocolate, it was wonderful. And we got home early enough that we decided to watch Beetlejuice and relax. It was great, I was super happy and full of sourdough and chocolate.
Finally, the last super cool thing that I did this week happened yesterday. So my friend Dani has been inviting me to go to her church's Youth Group meetings for a while now and they either get cancelled or I'm not able to go. But last night I was finally able to and had so much fun. I met so many new people and they were all super friendly, it was super great. I would talk about it more but a lot of what happened was really personal and prayer oriented, but in just one night I got so much closer to Dani and I can't even begin to explain how perfect that night was and how much I needed that. I'd go into it more, but since I know some people get uncomfortable with it and I want to respect that, I'm trying to leave all the spiritual aspects out. But I am most definitely going to be going a lot more in the future.

So yeah, that's what I have been doing the past week in a nutshell. Hope it wasn't to sporadic or anything. And I'll try to get back to my normal schedule and blog a lot more again. Thanks for holding out for me!