Josh's Junction

Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head

2011-01-03T16:32:00.000-08:00

and falling on my head.

Upon my arrival back to Lancaster following my first semester at USC I was greeted with rain, six days worth of it. One of the strangest things about rainy weather to me is that everyone I know has a strong opinion about it, as in they either really enjoy it or they hate it. I don't ever recall someone telling me, "Rain is okay, I have neutral feelings towards it." While I've never considered my personal opinion about rain, I will admit that rainy weather makes me feel like being productive and studious.

Like it or not, when a semester of college ends, so do the classes. In other words, professors cannot give you work to do over break since the class is done. This is strange to me since I've always had school-related work to do for all major breaks since 9th grade (summer school, winter assignments, etc.) This is the first actual break in which I have no educational work to do. As if feeling terribly slothful for this reason isn't enough, this rainy weather only exacerbates this feeling.

Perhaps I'm just not creative enough, because there is always something school-related that I could be doing. I should just appreciate these moments while they last because they definitely won't be here forever.

Between my internal drive to do something productive/thoughtful and the gloomy, raining skies outside transforming this drive into somewhat of a charging rhinoceros, I decided to contemplate the nature of rain for twenty minutes. I often have moments of contemplation like this, but I usually internalize them. Since I have a blog, and and hour to write, I guess I'll externalize this time:

When rain falls down from the sky it catches the smog particles and industrial wastes that contribute to air pollution. Although rain cleans the air, it brings all that filth down on us. So what is left after a rainstorm? A clean sky but a dirty person, I suppose. Perhaps this is why some vehemently hate the rain, understandably. I don't see it that way, though. I see rain as the bridge between the "filth" we throw so high up into the sky so as to avoid it and the inevitable time when we must deal with the consequences. Rain drops onto our heads the problems we intentionally put into our sky, problems we tried to place so high we never thought we would see again. That's when it hit me...I love rain. It brings down all the filth that we always try to hide, the filth that would otherwise destroy the air we breathe, the filth that reminds us that we are in fact, human.

I love rain because I've never been one to avoid issues by sweeping them under the rug and hoping they would just disappear. My strong desire for closure demands I try to the best of my ability to deal with what some may consider unpleasant consequences early on so that I can move onward in life. This future-oriented approach of mine causes me to deal with consequences early so that I can better see what lies ahead. I like knowing that my future is unobstructed and bright, so naturally, if there is going to be any pollution in my life, I want to deal with it in the present. That's where rain comes in.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the effects of rain are only temporary. It's only a little while before people will continue to throw their filth in the sky and avoid the tribulations of life, which I can completely understand. However, my sky can only smell fresh and full of promise, full of hope, for only a short amount of time before pollution creeps back in....

...But I realize that I'm okay with that because a small moment of perfection and clarity after the rainstorm is all I need to ensure I'm happy with the path I'm taking. While I may not ever completely know what lies ahead, knowing that my path is bright and unobstructed is good enough for me.

Rain. I don't care if it makes me feel dirty because I love that it drops anvils of filth onto my head so I can deal with them here and now. More importantly, I love that it smells clean and full of hope, if only for a little while. I can always shower the physical filth off of my being, but only rain can shower the problems from the sky far too lofty for my reach and bring them to my attention.

Thank you rain, for your passing has provided me with the clarity I need. Onward I shall march, until the next rainstorm comes and I can get another small glimpse of where I'm headed, where I can change course if necessary. The charging rhinoceros is coming, READY OR NOT.

What about snow? Well, I guess that's a contemplation for another day. Right now I'm going to go play in the snow that blankets the arid Mojave desert I call home.

Everywhere I go, The more I See The Less I Know

2010-10-13T22:42:00.000-07:00

about life. So it seems like...but I've come to accept this with open arms. No one ever said I'm supposed to get it all right the first time anyway. Now it's time to grow, which I'm sure will come in due time. As I wished, I am being challenged here in every way possible and am enjoying every minute of it. Thanks for all the support to those of you who know what's going on. I miss my sister, and my parents.

Some things I love:
Learning, college, band, car bombs, culturing bacteria correctly, laughing obnoxiously, watching others who are happy, all the walks I take around campus at random times and all the random building explorations (buildings I'll never have class in), thinking, cazsh nights, banana bread, music. I love my clarinet section, tons and tons and tons. They might not ever read this, but I want them to know I truly appreciate their presence in my life.

Things I wish never had to happen:
uncontrolled tissue growth in the brain, radiation, seeing the ones you love being strong so that their family doesn't have to worry.

Loving life, but still wishing I could do something more about it,

J~

P.S. legitimate update soon to come.

T-Minus 7 Days...

2010-08-08T17:01:00.000-07:00

...until blast off, A.K.A. college. I always knew this day would come, and even with my college schedule in hand, it still doesn't feel real. To be quite frank, I'm terrified. But at the same time, I'm so ready to challenge myself in ways I never thought possible- intellectually, socially, personally, morally, etc.

The final month of senior year (May '10) definitely did not disappoint:

Band Trip to San Diego (can you believe I forgot my camera?)
finished up IB crap
took IB/AP Exams
grad practice
grad night
graduation
alumni concert

Looking back on it now, it all seems like a blur, but I'm so thankful it happened the way it did. May 2010 was such a great month- lots of testing, but also lots of happy memories.

Once June came around I finally started the EMT class I've been looking forward to since Sophomore year. The EMT course lasted 6 weeks, and we had class Monday- Thursday from 8:00-3:00. While this sounds bad, it really wasn't too shabby. I found the material fascinating, and save for the occasional idiot here and there, I really did end up learning a quite a bit about emergency medical care. The ambulance ride along proved to be an experience I won't soon forget...I saw some pretty grody things that day, though for legal purposes I am not allowed to discuss specifics. It's so strange having to test on practical skills, because my whole life in IB involved tests based on books and writings. For this reason I usually never freak out about tests, but the practical/skills finals were even more nerve-wracking to me than the IB exams. Despite the nerves and mental lapses (it's amazing how much you can forget in the heat of a scenario), I did well in the class and received my EMT course completion certificate. I then took the NREMT (National Registry for Emergency Medical Technicians) exam a week after the course ended. That was an experience...tricky exam. I don't see how 71 questions is enough to test for competency, but I'm not complaining here. I got my papers and national certification in the mail the other day. So to put this long story short: over the course of this summer I became a nationally registered EMT, who can apply for a job in the US, which will allow me to glorify the motherland. While I don't plan to work as an EMT at USC (crazy 12 hour shifts), I might look into some part-time, or even a student-run EMS. In any case, I learned some pretty valuable skills that can potentially save someone's life. All in all, I was glad I took the course, as it gave me some field experience in the rewarding medical career. I'd say I'm off to a a decent start.

Aside from the EMT thing, I've been spending a lot of time with friends such as Charles, Nicholas, Tayler, Marianna, Caitlin, John, Alyson, Melissa, Michael, Sarah, Dustin and even Iamee. I really enjoyed getting closer and just hanging out with all of these folks this summer. I can't believe I've known these people for 4 years and have just recently realized how awesome they all are. Anyway, aside from the numerous hanging out events they invited me to, I also was thrown a very special surprise birthday dinner and party (thanks to Priscila, Sheena, Julia, and Iamee on that), made foam swords, got hooked on the Showtime T.V. series Dexter (check it out if you haven't already), watched a ton of movies, and swam in many different pools. Although I only have one week left with these folks, I'm confident I'll be seeing more of them in college and during breaks.

Also worth mentioning, my best friend, Sheena Cruz, recently had her 18th birthday party. Since She's Filipino, she had what they call a Debut (the Filipino equivalent to a Mexican Quinceanera). Michael, Julia, John Young, Priscila, and I effectively acted as Sheena's cotillion. We danced the Waltz and the Bachata, and some others did the Tinikling. The whole day was immensely fun, especially the Oh, So Sexy dance and the Samba.

I had my freshman orientation back in June...and from the feeling of how everything went, I'm in for an exciting and challenging year. Originally, I planned on double majoring in Bio and Music, but after weighing all the pros and cons to this choice I have decided that I will no longer pursue the Music major, the main reason being that it would take 5 years to complete since USC's music department is so strict. I will instead minor in music since it's a very doable 26 unit minor. As I have probably stated before, USC is really big on the whole double majoring thing. With only 6 GE classes (most of which I can pass out of thanks to IB), there will be a lot of room for a double major. As of now I'm thinking of doing the Neuroscience major (since there is overlap with the Bio one) as well as the music minor. It won't be easy I'm sure, but the material I will cover sounds so fascinating. It's probably too early to make up my mind at this point, I mean I haven't even started yet, so I will figure all this stuff out during week 0 and keep everyone updated.

So far, I have 24 semester units of credit at USC thanks to IB/AP, though that number may increase once my AVC transcript is processed. Though most of these units will only clear GE and electives, it's still very reassuring to know I have that many units before I even start. As of now, I am taking 6 classes, for a total of 18 units:

Bio 121
Chem 105
Religion 140 (GE)
Writing140 (mandatory for all freshmen; paired class with the GE)
Clarinet lessons
Marching Band

As you can probably gather from my schedule, I indeed decided to join the Trojan Marching Band at USC. I did this for a number of reasons:

To get involved. College is what you make of it, and I'm determined not to let my introversion hold me back anymore.
I met my closest friends in marching band during high school. Hopefully it will be like this in college, too.
Assuming I can handle my work load, the marching band is a unique extracurricular I can put on med school apps, something most med school applicants can't say they did. Anything to stand above the competition, right?

Band camp starts this Sunday, August 15th. From there the season will start. We practice Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays from 3:45-5:45 and sometime on Saturdays from 9:00-11:00. I know this is a pretty huge commitment, but like I said, I'm looking forward to challenge myself in ways I never thought possible. If worse comes to worst, I can always drop out. Though I really hope I don't have to do that.

I'd like to take a minute to remind any of you parents out there to never shake your baby. Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS) kills approximately 1,500 infants each year in the US alone. Don't get angry and let it happen to yours. Charlie and I are going to make a commercial about this pressing issue.

For some strange reason, the Old Spice commercials really bug me, especially the guy in them. Naturally, I chuckled heartily when I shown this parody of the Old Spice commercials.

Who doesn't love throwing water balloons at their friends? For those of you lay awake at night wondering what a water balloon bursting in slow motion looks like, this video should answer your question and restore your lost REM cycles...or something.

Just in case you ever lose your elephant (it says" Where is my elephant?")...I'm totally buying this awesome shirt:

I suppose I should wrap up this rather lengthy post. This past summer has been one the most eventful in my entire life, what with all the numerous graduation parties, hangouts, and trips. I've gotten closer to some pretty amazing people, and I'm so thankful they all took an interest in my existence. What a perfect way to wrap up my final months here in the AV. Thank you to all of my friends who have contributed to this memorable summer.

University of Southern California

2010-05-08T12:02:00.000-07:00

Exactly one week ago (May 1st) came the infamous day for all college-bound seniors; the national deadline for submitting the Statement of Intent to Register (SIR) for your chosen University. With that being said, I'll use this post to officially announce that I have submitted my SIR deposit with USC, and will be attending there this fall. I've gotten a few questions from family and friends, so instead of answering them individually I will respond to questions and explain myself further here:

Ever since I was a boy, I've felt that the career which would make me happiest would be one in which I would use my own two hands to save the lives of other human beings. Seeing my dad do this on a regular basis served as a huge inspiration and gave me something to aspire to at a very young age. I've been working towards this goal since.

Academics. USC is top-raked in virtually every field, with a medical school acceptance rate much higher than that of the national average. Furthermore, competition doesn't scare me, it in fact encourages me. However, USC strikes a nice balance. Instead of competing with 770 rabid premeds at UCSD, USC has 300. Definitely competitive, which I like, but not as cut-throat. I've gotten a few calls and emails from current premed students as well as natural science professors. In their candid words, the atmosphere is competitive, but everyone gets along pretty well. There is a nice balance between work and play. What more could I ask for?
Setting/Atmosphere: USC is one of the few large research institutions in the country, coupled with the fact that it is situated in LA, there are a multitude of excellent opportunities, be it for for research, internships, clinical experience, or for cultural, artistic, sports, or entertainment venues. At the same time however, being a private school, it also offers the personal attention with professors and faculty (with some more work of course, but this will be good for me since I'm learning how to become more extroverted) and even among students. It just feels right, and I can picture myself as a student there.
Support: Besides Biology, I want to study so much more. Maybe music, maybe Spanish, maybe Russian. No other university has been so supportive of my...diverse interests. USC offers its students with personal advisors to see that they are fulfilling the requirements for their degrees. Advisors have far fewer students than counselors, making it easy to get to really know the person who will help me graduate. My USC advisor let me know right off the bat that he would see to it I learned everything I wanted to in college. Perhaps, I'm too ambitious, but I'll see how it goes once I start this fall. Nevertheless, the sentiment and support from the USC staff means so much to me.
Alumni Network: As corny as it sounds, the USC network isn't just a network, it's a family. If (and this is a huge if) for some reason I decide that I don't want to pursue medicine, I won't be trapped on the streets. USC alumni exist in practically every country and major city in the world. USC alumni are always willing to extend a hand to other USC alumni. Much like the home my real family will always provide, wherever I go in life I know I'll be in good hands because of my USC family.

In terms of cost vs. benefit analysis, USC's benefits far outweigh the costs. USC has one of the largest endowment pools in the nation, and being a private school, it is unscathed by the failing economy. With that being said, there are a multitude of scholarships USC offers every year (most of which are permanent once awarded). So even if I do not get a whopping amount for my first year, I have a good chance for year two, provided my grades are high.

I've thought about this decision from essentially every angle and perspective. And even with all the Pros, it was by no means an easy choice for me. Thanks to those who gave me insight into the big picture, and those who played devil's advocate for me. To be honest, I'm slightly scared for what the future has in store for me, but at the same time I'm so excited for all the opportunities that await. I was told by someone I highly respect that no matter what I do or where I go, life is what I make of it. With this in mind, I am confident with my decision.

Some notable words of wisdom:

"In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer."

Josh~

Happy Easter 2010

2010-04-04T20:31:00.000-07:00

There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8

Happy day, everyone.

Josh~

Nothing is Coincidence

2010-03-26T12:46:00.001-07:00

...no matter what is said to try and dissuade me.

I could start off this post with how sorry I am for not updating in approximately half a year and wish everyone a happy 2010, but I feel I owe it to not only you folks, but also to myself to give an update with some substance.

In all honesty it's been a really tough year for me and my family, though going back to my post title...it all happened for a reason. We're all hanging in there now and thanks to those of you who have been helping me through this tribulation life threw at me.

My senior year of high school has been going by quickly. The teachers have been the most inspiring ones yet, and as the end approaches I find myself wanting it to end even quicker. Not that I hate High School (I love most of the people), but being one who always focuses on the big picture I can't help but think of all the awesome opportunities that await me when I graduate. I had some pretty grandiose visions of college as a Junior, but when application season came around I narrowed down my list to a few colleges:

USC
UCSD
Stanford
UCLA
UCI
CLU
CSULB
APU
Master's College

Why only 9, Josh? Well, for many reasons I will not delve into right now I decided that I wanted to stay in California. Mostly because my family is here and my set of wings aren't that big to fly me to the other side of the country, yet. I've gotten acceptances into all but one of these colleges (guess which one rejected me) and am just awaiting scholarship information from the others. There's a lot of thinking I have left to do, and with so many factors involved this will undoubtedly be one of the hardest decisions I will have to make in my young life. All the same, I'm looking forward to what the future will bring and what life has to offer me. Bring it on.

As far as the music thing goes, I'm sure it's something I will carry with me to the grave. The whole section leader thing was awesome and I only hope that I inspired at least one of my fellow clarinetists like my section leaders did for me. We had a successful marching season too. It all seems like a blur looking back at it, but there were definitely some happy moments that made it all worthwhile. The way they ran the Palmdale parade/field show this season (two different days) eliminated the whole grand champ thing. However if you combine the parade and field show portions of the Palmdale tournament, we beat our cross-town rivals at Littlerock, by far. TofR season was awesome as well. There weren't as many many high school clarinets this year as 2/3 of the section happened to be PCC kids, but all 6 of us QH folks made the best of it. The parade itself was just as much fun, yet seemingly longer. Though that's probably because a float broke down right in front of us and we had to march in place for 20 minutes. Apparently I got some good coverage on KTLA...you be the judge. *insert* the KTLA video was removed from the website, so I inserted another one. Quality isn't as good, but feel free to watch anyway*

A major highlight of my senior year was undoubtedly the 2010 All-State experience. I made the 2nd chair clarinet in the concert band and couldn't have been happier. Our conductor was Dr. Boonshaft from Hofstra university in New York. He was so knowledgeable and passionate about music that it not only showed, but pierced all of us there as well. He would recite quotes from many composers (Mahler, Mendelssohn, Copland, Ives, Shostakovitch) and masterfully connect it to what he was trying to teach us. I wrote every single one of his quotes down in the nifty folders they gave us, then found this page that contains many of his most notable quotes. If you have the time, go digging, some of these quotes are packed with meaning and just need you to unlock them. I purchased the audio recording of the concert (which was on February 21) and plan to post that up when it comes in. But in the meantime, check out some of these recordings:

This year's band trip will be to San Diego, which although close will still be pretty fun. It was between Seattle and San Diego, but the majority of the band wouldn't have been able to afford the Seattle one, so we ended up deciding on San Diego. Besides, the true reason we go on band trips is for our musical performance, not to be a tourist somewhere. The trip will be April 28- May 2, so it will not interfere with the IB/AP testing season in May. Awesome.

I got all 4 of my impacted wisdom teeth extracted on Monday, and I was lucky enough to keep them. As bloody as they look, they are pretty awesome. I never needed the vicoden I was prescribed either, though I'm really thankful I have the penicillin. The liquid diet is somewhat annoying since I have in insatiable urge to chew, but I'm not complaining since I get smoothies whenever I want.

So now that it's 2010, I was curious what changed in the past decade; needless to say, this visual helped quite a bit.
Now that Spring break is coming to an end, I'm gonna go make the most of what's left. In the wise words of Dr.Boonshaft, "Today I will give everything I have, for everything I keep I will lose forever."

Josh~

Full Force

2009-08-16T16:48:00.000-07:00

So I have to apologize for not updating this summer...some things just strike with full force, like life. I can actually say I've been having a life this summer though. Funny how I've been too busy to update, but for different reasons than all the other times I've used that excuse. So here's a brief summary of my summer 2009:

After ToK summer school, the family and I went to Vegas on a mini-vacation. It was the first memory I've had of Vegas although they claim I have been there before. It was a nice little escape and I really enjoyed sitting by the window of our very high room and staring at the buildings and lights of the skyline. Hoover Dam was pretty neat, too.

I've also been to Six Flags this summer with Sheena, Michael, Christian, and Julia. The people you go with makes all the difference, so I can say that I had fun thanks to my buds that accompanied me. Throwing up after wasn't so great, but we won't get into that.

I've also gotten to hang out with friends a lot this summer and I gotta say I really enjoy just taking those breaks from school and just being stooopid, yes stooopid with three o's, with my friends. Thanks to all of you, and you know who you are...

I only went to one concert this summer, but it was definitely a great one. Clark, Julian, Casey, LordKemper, Julia, and I went to the Hollywood Bowl to see the Phillip (not Peter) Glass concert on the 23rd of July. It was weird how so many people were there considering minimalism isn't a very well liked style. I myself thought it was superb and the musicianship of all the performers was amazing...especially on the pieces where no conductor was present. While I still cannot say I've been sold to minimalism just yet, I do enjoy listening to the works of Adams and now Glass. Too bad I missed the Tchaikovsky spectacular yesterday...but I'm sure I'll have other opportunites to see some great concerts.

Throughout summer, I've been taking weekly classes for Foxtrot along with Sheena. It's been quite the challenge, but we're both enjoying it very much and it's giving us CAS hours, so...Win Win Win.

Band camp took place on the 3-7 of August, and it was a different experience going through it as a section leader. I'm happy to report that even though we have a whopping 25 clarinets this year, they all know when to be quiet and I'd venture to say they might even respect me. Thanks to Clark and John for the hints and tips. And Clark, yes, I did use those drumsticks you gave me and I really didn't care that I looked retarded doing so, ha. I might lose patience with the section at times, but Sheena and I are really lucky to be leading the most well-behaved section of the entire band. I'm actually looking forward to the Band season to start up again, and at this rate it's looking like we'll be able to beat our cross-town rivals over at Littlerock.

I just finished up week one of my senior year. It's looking to be a tough year, but I pretty much like all of my teachers so I really can't complain there. I'll post up my schedule and thoughts about senior year sometime this week.

Every time I post here and reread it, I find something that I forgot to mention. So I'm probably forgetting some important thing I've done over summer. I'll post pictures to this entry sometime this week as well, seeing as I gotta get going to a fiesta. Great fun. Have a happy week everyone, keep it clean.

WOW...

2009-06-01T15:41:00.000-07:00

...sums up my life these last few months. Considering I haven't updated in a long time, I really don't know where to begin. And seeing as quite a bit has happened since the last update, I'll try my best to recap it all:

Junior year- check. It seemed so slow and deathly at the time but now that it's over...wow. So I'm pretty much dumbfounded on what to say, but I'm sure any of you that completed junior year can understand that. Much like last year, I can say with confidence that I have learned many life lessons from some unexpected people. I've exited my comfort zone numerous times, almost pushed myself to insanity, and have established some worthwhile and substantial friendships along the way. Thanks to all of you (and you know who you are) for...everything. No need to say more, right? Some highlights of junior year include:

Friends, empathy, inside jokes, humor. You folks know who you are.
Becoming more personable. Can't say I fear talking to people now. I mean, I may be somewhat awkward still, but I'd like to think I've improved quite a bit since last year..
The Quinceaneras I participated/danced in over fall. I pushed myself out of the safe zone and learned that Dancing can be quite enjoyable (somewhat).
My clarinet undertakings (TofR, DHB, S&E festival, lessons, etc.)
Band activities. D.C. & W.Virginia trip (check out facebook for pics, ask me for stories), Clarinet SL, the numerous concerts I've attended throughout the year.
College tours. Specifically, UCSB, UCSD, UCI, and CalLuteran with Clark and Sheena.
Remmie! My very own Buffet R-13, Bb Clarinet.
My own car! Indigo colored (so I think, but I'm color retarded) '06 Honda Accord EX. Don't feel like explaining the story, so if any of you are at all curious, feel free to inquire (see pic below).
English/Mr.House. I'm really gonna miss that class. House is such a great teacher.
Good grades are always a nice topper for the cake.

So my summer will not be free by any means, but it will definitely prove to be a nice break compared to the hectic school year. I'm enrolled in the summer IB Theory of Knowledge course, so that's where I'll be at from 8:00-10:00 for the next three weeks. I'll also be working on my Extended Essay, so that should take a nice chunk of time, but I'd rather get it over with than leave it for when senior year starts up. Still haven't decided if I will be taking a class at AVC, but I have some more time to make up my mind.

I also plan to renew my CPR/First Aid certs, donate some of my A+ blood (ha, funny story if any of you are interested), shadow some local physicians (thanks, dad) and get a feel for things since AV Hospital no longer lets volunteers under age 21 work in the ER.

Oh, and I will get back to running and swimming this summer (along with some buddies of mine) and will be learning the Foxtrot and Tango with Sheena and a few friends. Say what you will, but I think when those dances are done right, they look really cool. I hope I can pull 'em off. If anyone is interested, I'll be getting a schedule of dance classes offered by a private studio here in the AV.

Lastly, I plan to spend a lot of time with friends. We've made THE LIST, which is just a compilation of summer activities consisting of hiking, donating blood, going bowling, going to magic mountain, throwing a Wii party, and much more. I'm looking forward to starting it, should really make this summer a memorable one.

NBC's The Office has undoubtedly become my favorite T.V. show over these last three months. The subtle humor appeals to me so much, words can't fully do it justice. I even take it upon myself to memorize office quotes, just because I know I can recite them to either Michael or Charlie and we can all have a good laugh. How dorky. Thanks much to Michael for introducing me to it.

Oh God. That's all I have to say to that...

Call me crazy, but corny wordplay/humor is some of my favorite stuff out there. This site made me chuckle...

Well I'm off to finish up ToK homework and review for the SAT subjects which I take this Saturday, June 6th. Awesome.

Bienvenidos a la Tierra de Tortillas

2009-03-26T18:31:00.000-07:00

Greetings from Tortilla Town, A.K.A. Texas/Mesico (not a typo). As I type, my family is chatting about the day's adventures in the living room of my Tia Alicia's house. It's been such a relaxing week, I'm so thankful I got to leave CA for a while and see my family over here.

Seeing as time is short I'll make this post quick:

S&E festival this year yielded two CPs and two Superiors. All in all a great day, and while I personally think I could have done much better, I will refrain from "complaining" because I did have tons of fun just doing my thing on Saturday. Plus it was pretty nice seeing some alumni come back just to watch us play.

So today was a special day because mother, tia Alicia, cousin Nicho, and I, all drove down to Reynosa, Tamaulipas, Mexico to visit more family despite repeated attempts to prevent us from going from the other family here in McAllen. Hey, we're all back safe and sound, plus I got some good pics of the border for Dr.Reti (not that he remembers he asked me to take some for him) so no need to dwell on what MIGHT have happened, you can't live life in fear or else you'll miss out. For those of you not aware, the drug war problems in Mexico have escalated to new heights and chaos in the form of shootings and even beheadings have been ravaging the country- especially the border cities- as the drug lords and government officials have shootouts in the middle of plazas, in malls, even in officer's houses, and Innocent civilians usually end up losing their lives in the crossfire. No worries though, we're currently building walls (see pic on left) to protect us from this predominantly underground danger...(??) Ha.

Here are some more random pics of family, I'll get to explaining them and adding more when I return. For the moment, I'm off to enjoy the warm embrace of family; hard to believe in just two years time it'll be very difficult to plan family trips down here with my mother, father, and sister.

I've probably packed on a few pounds, so I should go running tomorrow morning- if only it wasn't so dang humid and warm (bad combo). I'd like to point out how much more I can communicate with everyone here, it's thoroughly rewarding when you can carry on somewhat of a substantial conversation, all alone, with your abuelos who do not speak English. I'll save the excitement for my next update though. Hasta luego folks.

Happy (Belated) Day of Pi

2009-03-15T17:19:00.000-07:00

I have a math project to get started on so this post will be brief:

"Ugh" just about sums up how this hectic week had been...and I originally planned for so much more to happen...how am I still sane?

School is somewhat killing me at the moment (I've been saying that for the last few months, but I'm really not kidding), but my grades are solid and overall, I'm hanging in there.

Solo and Ensemble Festival is this Saturday (March 21), and I'm really looking forward to hearing some of the performances. All of my performances are somewhere around 8-10 AM, but I'll post specifics for everyone if I get around to it. I'm somewhat anxious for it this year since I know what to expect (last year was my first time ever doing S&E festival), but I'll just try to remain calm and composed. Right after S&E festival, the family and I are heading over to Texas since we didn't do so over winter break. Needless to say, I'm looking forward to seeing my massive family. I doubt we'll be able to go to Mexico this time due to increased danger and the drug cartels, but we'll see.

On a rather disappointing note, AV hospital's new HIPAA regulations have redone the whole volunteer service gig. To put a long story short, volunteers under age 21 can no longer work in the ER, regardless of GPA or hours. That really sucks for me considering the whole point of my volunteering was to get into the ER. Regadless, I'm not going to quit volunteering, no matter how upset it made me. I might try to get into the Trauma Center at Palmdale Hospital, assuming they don't push back the opening another few months, again.

Now that it's getting warmer, I'm almost about to consider heating up the pool and going for a swim...but then I saw these.

A real post will come soon, sorry for not sticking to the whole once a week thing.

Important Things

2009-02-22T17:44:00.001-08:00

Dang it, I skipped a week of posting. Sorry about that. I really am trying here. A happy 19th birthday to Clark by the way (I've said this what three times now?).

Nothing exceedingly special to report. School has been pretty hectic, but knowing that I'm not going through it alone helps. I blew up once this week, which has only happened twice to me in school before, but I wont go into that.

I donated blood on Wednesday for the annual blood drive at QHHS. It was pointless waiting 4 hours, and I'm never going to do it at the school again. I will definitely go to the Red Cross center though. I was happy to find out that out of everyone I know I had the smoothest time with the whole process. No bruises (sorry John and IB juniors), no passing out (sorry Sheena), and I'm not anemic. It's a freaky feeling seeing your blood like that- the initial injection causing this massive burst of blood into the tube. Awesome. We got some pretty nifty shirts too. Congrats to everyone who made the decision to help save up to three lives.

The multicultural assembly is quickly approaching (2/27), and being the secretary for the club, I finally understand how much work goes into it. No wonder it's the only decent assembly all year. I'm actually proud to be an integral part of it all. These last two weeks I've been helping plan performances and organize the assembly. I'm in charge of flags and general supervision, but wont have to do any talking which is great for me.

Iamee and I recently received a Wii as a gift from the parents for our straight A's. It's tons of fun so far even if I don't have much time to play it. SSB Brawl is one of my favorites. The story mode is too corny (it's funny how epic it tries to be) and I like playing the game just because it's pointless. I'm left-handed with the Wiimote and right-handed with the nunchuck; pretty strange, but it works for me. One of these days I'm gonna have a Wii party. Good pointless fun right there.

As amazing as the Wii is, the event that made me happiest was the new Buffet R13 clarinet I received last Saturday as a belated Christmas present from the fam. It's amazingly beautiful, and plays so dark and smooth for me (we spent 1.5 hours trying all these different clarinets at this one music store in LA). Remeaux is the sexiest hunk of wood I've ever owned. I'm really looking forward to being able to fully break Remmie in and integrating him into my playing but for the first year I gotta take it easy (playing in intervals, swabbing every 30 mins of playing, all that good stuff) so as to not kill/break him.

S&E Festival is quickly approaching and I'm getting somewhat anxious for my five performances I plan on doing (sadly the clarinet ensemble wont fall through this year). We really need to work on our Klezmer trio since we haven't done much for it yet.

I'm pretty sure everyone who reads this knows that our church has been pastorless the last few months. Today we had our first sermon with the potential new pastor. I really enjoyed his style and diction, ties it so well into life. It's hard to find to right lesson when you need it but I feel potential Pastor Sy did a great job of that today.

So I came to the realization that I'm really grateful for pillows. They're so crucial for a restful night's sleep and it's sorta fun to have a pile of them, of different shapes and sizes, when you're sleeping. Maybe it's just me. Here are some, well, unique pillows. I totally need to get one of those drug pill-ows.

About two years back I was introduced to the comedian, Demetri Martin, by my cousin Annie and have liked him ever since. Then during TofR over winter break, one of the clarinetists showed me some of his stuff on her iTouch. Now that he has his own T.V. show, Important Things (Wednesdays at 10:30 on Comedy Central), I should be able to watch more of him. I like how his humor is unconventional, even if I don't find everything he does comical.

I really like palindromes for some reason, and sometimes wonder if they're unique to our alphabet. Could there even be a a palindrome in the Cyrillic-Russian alphabet (or some oriental language)? If not, what is it that one would find weird about his alphabet that we never experience in ours? Demetri Martin is a fan of palindromes too. As crude as it is, he's a master at raping English; who else could make a 224-word palindrome and turn it into a poem? Not a great poem mind you, but with some insightful interpretation almost all poems can be great.

I've been reading Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely this last week as an English assignment on personal reading. It's a real interesting book about how people "work", and how people (yes, even the heretics) make predictable decisions. This is what I love about English this year, I'm learning so much more than I thought English could ever teach and I'm liking all of the books House has recommended to me so far. I also bought The Tipping Point and Blink by Malcom Gladwell, so I'm looking forward to getting to those soon.

Off to read. Then practice and swab Remmie...I'm excited.

Ouch

2009-02-08T20:18:00.000-08:00

Finishing what has been one of the busiest weeks of my life, I realized I promised to post more. Nothing exciting (what did you expect?) but here it is:

School is fairly rough at the moment. There is always something to look forward to though, and that's partly what helps me through the rough times. Having "philosophy" classes for the first two periods has proven to be deadlier than I originally expected, but I maintain the thought that it is somehow good for me.

District Honor Band was so great I want to apologize to everyone for not expecting much of it. While the music could have been more challenging, Carnahan did a great job at teaching the band as a whole to play musically. His passion was truly inspiring and I thought it was amazing how much thought he put into the piece he made (...and the antelope play) what with the Indian Tribal ritual played 4 times for each direction, the trumpets mariachi line to represent the Spanish conquest with the gnarly dissonance to represent the war, and the final note landing on "home" to symbolize that no matter what tribulations our seemingly desolate valley faces, it will always be our "home"... I really enjoy looking for the "deep stuff" like that in music; it's meaningful and fulfilling I believe. Maybe I'm just weird. Whatever. The media group that recorded our concert screwed up the DVDs, now no one will have recordings of the concert. That sucks.

My cousins Erica and Dennis have been sending us loads of pictures of Antoine (Born December 30). It's sorta cool to see how much he's grown the past 6 or so weeks. If I get to it I'll definitely post more.

Like I said, this past week has been rough and staying up till 1 or later for 7 days straight took a toll on me. The lymph nodes on my neck are swollen and I'm coughing up things that shouldn't be coughed up. It's a virus, but nothing serious. It not painful thankfully, but my throat feels "fuzzy" and I get the occasional urge to destroy something (more than usual at least). Missing school is out of the question unless I develop a nasty fever. I'll live.

So I saw The Shawshank Redemption yesterday at Nif's house along with Sheena and Kyle. Great movie. It was an actual assignment meant to supplement our reading of One Day in the Life of Ivan Desisovich (OditLoID). we had to jot down the prison rules both spoken and implied then write a brief description of the character's archetypes. We never did get to our Bio project. Dang it.

Superbowl commercials were somewhat of a disappointment this year in my opinion. feel free to check out the top five if you feel so inclined.

However bad Superbowl XLIII commercials were this year, they pale in comparison to the top 13 worst possible placements for ads. Some of them are just so stupid, you would think it was intentional. I hate people.

Stress relief? I've never tried this method...wow, maybe I should.

So the new A.V. Hospital (still under construction) in Palmdale caught on fire last Wednesday. Pretty unfortunate, but thankfully no major structural damage and construction has resumed.

Off to get some drugs...now where's that Chloraseptic spray? Happy week Everyone.

Semester Two

2009-01-28T19:40:00.000-08:00

From now on I will try to update more frequently, sorry to those who read this and ask me if I'm still alive.

The new semester officially started about two weeks ago and so far it's been hectic. I'm glad to be back to doing work again otherwise I'd be bored doing nothing.

Finally turned in the math portfolio from hell #2 on Monday which left a nice big feeling of accomplishment. No more portfolios, awesome.

Last Saturday I (and 1/4 of the IB class of '10) took the SAT. It was longer than expected but I feel decent about it. Can't say much more than that if I want it to get scored though.

Since I took the first semester of IB History over summer and finished the second semester last semester, the empty slot is now filled by the mandatory class IB refers to Theory of Knowledge (ToK). It's essentially a philosophy + psychology class and the perfect way to start off the day (kidding). Lots of reading, but the subject is actually pretty interesting sometimes.

Wind ensemble also started up this semester. We got some nice Sparke pieces (nothing permanent yet), and a crazy piece by Leroy Anderson- a Clarinet feature called Clarinet Candy...It's a challenging piece but it's fun to play so hopefully we can get it decent. AVC Symphonic band and Clarinet Choir (last semester before it gets cut) start up the second week of February and we might be playing the Danse Bacchanale by Saint Saens. For those interested, the piece is from the Samson & Delilah Opera. It's an interesting Biblical tale, and the music is nice.

So I started clarinet lessons with Matalon earlier this month since Tani finally escaped the AV for college up in San Jose. Tani's mentoring really helped; it was a pretty smooth transition. I enjoy lessons so far, Matalon gets straight to the point and he's fun to talk to.

I missed the All-Southern concert this last weekend at CSULB, which bummed me out, but Mitch said he'll let me borrow the CD's when they come in. Cant wait to hear them. Sounds like he had an amazing experience.

District Honor Band rehearsals start tomorrow (sectional was last week), kinda cool since we get to miss the two days of school. I'm looking forward to working with CSULB's music director, John Carnahan, even if the musical selection this year isn't so hot. Concert is Friday night at 7:00 at the Lancaster High School auditorium. Not sure if we'll be doing another CA Adventure field trip this year due to the budget, though it would be extremely nice if we did.

It's pretty much settled that the Q.H. annual band trip will be a D.C./ West Virgina combo for the Strawberry Festival. Six days, five nights for a more than reasonable $700. It should be great. Sucks how it will be in the middle of AP/IB testing season, but McQ is working on that. I might be able to take the IB music exam over there, which would be pretty cool.

With Solo and Ensemble coming up in march it's time I let all of those who care what I'm planning on doing. All but the Klezmer are on iTunes if you want to check them out.

Solo- clarinet/piano arrangement of the Spanish Dance no. 5 (Bolero) by Moszkowski
Duet with John- Krommer Double Clarinet Concerto (the second one- op.91), 3rd movement
Duet with Sheena- Mendelssohn Concertpiece no.1, 1st and 2nd movements
Duet with Hollie- John Rutter's Three American Miniatures, 3rd movement- Rag
Trio with John and Sheena- a klezmer trio arr. by Mike Curtis
Clarinet ensemble?- may not happen this year, but we're searching

I find it slightly interesting how there are many points of view to something that appears so straightforward. I could probably go into a rant about this, but chances are it will be a subject for debate in ToK. Here's a visual:

Studies show that if a cat falls off the seventh floor of a building it has about thirty percent less chance of surviving than a cat that falls off the twentieth floor. It supposedly takes about eight floors for the cat to realize what is occurring, relax and correct itself. I wonder what these "studies" consisted of. Cats are awesome. In case anyone is excessively bored, here's a list of 500 mostly useless facts, just like the one above.

I'm off to cook a tortilla. Great fun.

Put That Hat Back On

2009-01-09T11:25:00.000-08:00

I realize this post is way overdue so bear with me please.

Now that's it's all over I gotta say my TofR experience was totally awesome. I made memories I will never forget and learned a lot about people (and computer viruses/root kits) during the 2 months. I gotta thank everyone who helped throughout the experience and those that came to cheer/support us. Special thanks to my section leader, Carlos, for forcing our section to be social otherwise I would have never talked to some of those really great people that I will probably never see again. I really wish the best for those 8 clarinet seniors in life.... Disneyland, Bandfest, and the Rose Parade were everything I wanted them to be and then some. Check out the slideshow of the Rose Parade and look at those diagonals. I still find it hard to believe we marched 6 miles because it really didn't seem that bad. I'm kinda sad it's all over, but if we don't go to Texas/Mexico next year then I may get the opportunity to do it again. For those interested, the picture on the left is us in Disneyland with some trumpets from the Mexican band; picture underneath is 7/9 of my rank during our second Bandfest performance.
During the last few weeks of TofR I managed to finish World War Z throughout my scattered free time. For those of you who don't know, dystopian literature is my favorite type to read, and by recommendation of House and Sheena, I decided to give WWZ a shot. Yeah it's a book about zombies, but don't judge until you at least give it a shot. It's a fictitious satire of government response to crisis; quite eerie, sharp, and even humorous. Negativity and short-sightedness aren't going to help anyone and while the American mentality is to complain, destroy it, or take a pill for it, we really can survive the worst the world throws at us, be it a stupid argument with someone you know or a worldwide zombie pandemic. Keep that in mind...we're all more resilient than we may think.

So Sheena made me this really cool duct tape wallet and so far it's been able to withstand all of my abuse. I've always wanted one since my freshman year when I saw Junior Emily toying around with one. Two years later, I'm now the proud owner of one- a grey with black trim tri-fold that says "bud" on it!

LastTuesday, Clark and Casey invited me to join their ghost hunt expedition around some haunted places in the AV along with Kemper, Julian, and Rachel. While I really wasn't expecting to find anything, I did have a fun time pretending to see ghosts and "black figures." Places we checked out include the railroad tracks near Joshua Elementary, the Lancaster cemetery, the Hospital, the Western Hotel on Lancaster blvd, and some desert area deep in the West side. Highlight included the razed insane asylum near 80th W and Ave I. While we didn't go to the right place, we did find some ruins of a building and this bloodstain (look at the shrubbery on the right side of the picture, you may need to enlarge it to see). We made some audio recordings that have suspicious sounds on them, so Casey is working on compiling a slideshow of our "findings." I'll post it up eventually.

What's up with everyone getting a Wii? My cousin got one and she's like 3 (though I know it's for mom and dad, you guys don't have to be all secretive), Clark has one, and now even President Elect Obama has a Wii. I'm jealous. My recommendations aside from the standard Wii Sports: any of the more current Mario Party games, Mario Kart, or Super Smash Bros. Brawl. You can't beat classic Nintendo folks, timeless, ageless fun right there. Have a happy experience. I'll just go blow up sand with this nifty game I found. It requires the Java plugin, but who needs that when you have a Wii?

I think I'll start reviewing for Finals now. Happy '09 everyone. May it be blessed and prosperous.

We're Live from Pasadena! (Again)

2008-12-29T20:34:00.000-08:00

Second time now that the TofR band has been flooded with media attention, apparently it wasn't like this last year? My theory is because it's the 80th anniversary (a nice round, beefy number) since PCC started marching the big parade, but who knows.

I say "Live from Pasadena" because I'm currently blogging from the Saga Motor Hotel, directly across the street from PCC because we were only allowed to rent a room if we stayed a minimum of 3 days. Fair price though, and now I don't have to wake up at 5:30 anymore like the rest of the crew. The Saga has this quaint 50's feel to it...pretty cozy, or maybe I'm just tired.

So Bandfest Day one was today and highlights for me included both our performance and the Performance of Aguilas Doradas Marching Band from Puebla, Mexico (the ones in blue). I traded pins with a flute player from their band, so that was kinda cool. I'm looking forward for tomorrow as The Royal British Legion Youth Band (from the U.K.) and the U.S. Marine Corps Band will do their gigs then. Lots of good stuff coming up tomorrow and the rest of '08. If anyone can make it, have a happy time.

For those that remotely care and are planning to watch the Rose Parade on the First:

KTLA 5 should give us the best coverage. It should begin at 8:00 AM.
The TofR Honor Band is the 4th band to march the parade route and we're right behind the Queen's Float (Heralds are right in front of it).
We have an early spot this year, so keep an eye out early on.
Brendan and I are towards the front of the block and John, Julia, and Rachel are towards the end of it.

Breakdown is as follows:

I'm the center guide of the 5th rank. I'm in charge of horns down notification (every 5th rank center guide) so I'll be swinging my arms once the DM decides to call us out of TV sequence. If you see a center guide towards the front of the block flailing his arm then that's me.
Brendan is in the 4th rank, 6th file (left side)...He's the first person in my left diagonal.
John and Julia are in the 14th rank. Julia is the left guide and John is in file 3 (towards the right).
Rachel is in the 15th rank, 2nd file (John is in her left diagonal).

Enjoy the pics, more to come once we take them. Off to clean my shoes and gloves now. May everyone enjoy the rest of '08.

Happy Christmas...

2008-12-25T18:09:00.000-08:00

to all and to all a good night. Or however that saying goes.

Christmas is going well here in the AV, albeit different than what I'm used to down in Texas/Mexico with lots of family. We just finished our little family get together (the white side) and now I'm enjoying a brief respite as TofR starts up again tomorrow in full swing. Enjoy the picture of our festive cat, Chloe. The things my mom thinks up...

Speaking of TofR, I'm really enjoying the whole experience. I'll never forget the first marching rehearsal when I found out what a secondary diagonal was. Never before had it occurred to me that you could look one rank up and two spots to the left/right and find another diagonal! Pretty neat stuff. I think our spots are now permanent, but I'll wait a couple more days before I let everyone know where in the parade block to look for us just in case some changes occur. We have the Disneyland performance this Saturday, and the Bandfest performances on Monday and Tuesday for those interested.

I'm probably one of the only people pissed that school was canceled when it snowed last week. I wanted to take my finals and start the Math Portfolio, but I guess all I can do now is wait. School starts up on January 12th, the first three days will be finals review and the two finals days that were canceled. Can't wait. It sucks because I can't yet officially rejoice for finishing the first semester of IB, but I can say I'm relieved to have finished the Oral Commentary for English. Now to prep for that SAT.

Last night, Sheena invited John and I to her family's Christmas party as the musicians. We played the Beethoven Menuetto and were going to play the Clarinet Polka, but someone (I wont divulge names here) lost Sheena's part and go figure, it's the one part on sheetmusicplus that isn't sampled. On the bright side I got some good ideas for things to play at S&E Festival while we were frantically searching for the lost second part of the Polka. We're thinking of doing a Klezmer trio, and I'm now considering doing a clarinet/piano arrangement of the Spanish Dance op.12, no.5 (the Bolero) by Moszkowski. Still not 100% sure though. Aside from that I had a fun time and apparently it's surprising to people that I can make banana bread from scratch.

so I'm psyched for my cousins Erica and Dennis. Come December 30th, Antoine Alexandre Martineau should be making his grand entrance into the world. It's a weird thought for me because I've been the youngest on that side of the family for as long as I can remember and come January the new generation should have about 6 youngsters...I must be getting old.

No random stories about happenings in the world today...I really hoped people would have the decency to be warm-hearted and gracious to all on this most festive of holidays, but no such luck there.

Bananas Royale beckons...my mother has really outdone herself this year.

I Hate Snow

2008-12-17T13:31:00.000-08:00

Winter has arrived, and with it, a snow storm (all the way from Russia I've been told...Leftovers for us Californians. Thanks Russia).

Apparently the 14 freeway from AV to Newhall Pass is closed down.

Haven't seen this for over three years.

It's my brachiosaur...he's roaring.

I look like a penguin.

Update coming soon. I'm off to study for my Bio final. Happy Warm and Fuzzy Christmas season to all.

In the Presence of Greatness

2008-12-05T19:59:00.000-08:00

That phrase just about sums up my Turkey Week.

Arcadia took place a couple of weeks back (Nov. 22th) and, not surprisingly, we didn't place. We performed decently enough and I only wish we could practice the way we performed there. The first local (AV) will be tomorrow, so hopefully we can snag grand champ there. Apparently, our Littlerock rivals wont be there which does give us a better chance but takes the fun out of it...oh well.

QHHS football team is still going at it. The semifinal will be held tomorrow (Dec. 6th) evening and it's a home game so QH band was requested to play at it. QH football team hasn't made it to CIF/Golden League semifinals in 18 years. What all this means for us: tomorrow will be a 13.5 hour band day.

As some of you already know, the fam and I went to Palm Springs for our annual Thanksgiving trip to see my Great Aunt and Uncle on the 26th-28th. To make a long story short, my Uncle had his old friend from USC come over (he currently lives in Chicago but flew out to spend time with my Uncle for Turkey week), and it just so happens his old Friend is Melvin Warner- former associate principal clarinet of the Saint Louis Symphony and former clarinet and chamber music professor emeritus at Illinois University. I say Former for the ladder because Mel had a liver and kidney transplant about a year back and had to give up playing since...it's really sad when you have to give up something you loved and spent your whole life doing, but he appeared happy and accomplished with his career. Mel gave me some great constructive pointers and unique ways of thinking about techniques I already knew, so I'm thankful for that. Check out his CD- Clarinet Candesence- if you haven't already. Since I let someone borrow it and forgot to scan my autographed cover, I'll have to post it up later. Meanwhile, enjoy the family photos and my unphotogenic qualities.

The day after we came back from our mini-vacation, Marcea's Quinceañera took place. I have to admit it was a fun night and aside from the embarrassment I was anticipating (which wasn't that bad once I got over myself) I enjoyed the evening and a fun time with friends and family. The Waltz, Coumbia, and Hustle turned out nice...can't say the hip hop's my thing. Even the video turned out funny, I doubted they could fix it up the way they did when we were recording in Pasadena's very own black/burnt forest, but they proved me wrong. I rolled down a hill at least twice for the shoot, and skipped in 2 of the 3 takes (yet they put the one of me not skipping in the video...). I don't have pictures but once I get a hold of some good ones I'll post them up for those that remotely care.

School- only two weeks left in the semester, thought it feels like a lot more. Finals and Projects are coming up so that will take a nice chunk of time. My grades are pretty solid right now so as long as I don't fail everything the next two weeks, I'll be happy with them.

Anyone hear about the shooting at the Toys R Us store in Palm Desert? It just so happens in that same shopping center there's a Best Buy my uncle and I wanted to go to. However, my Uncle decided he didn't want to after all so we dropped him off at home and went to that shopping center only to find it closed off and swarmed with cop cars, yellow tape, ambulances, and chaos. I wonder what we'd be doing if we never did drop off my uncle which took away those crucial 10 minutes...

Sally Guidon of Manchester, England, wrote to Manchester General Hospital listing complaints and asking them to investigate her father's death. The hospital responded back stating that they would need the dead man's consent to investigate the reason as to his death. Go World.

The world's oldest living cat celebrated his 125th birthday on Wednesday...that's 27 human years Mischief has been living up to his name.

Food- it's supposed to nourish our bodies and give us the energy to perform the demands and activities of life. Now there's a lot of dishes out there that do absolutely noting to help, here are the 15 deadliest. The captions are somewhat funny. Enjoy. On second thought, please don't.

Think I'll go throw up now. Happy December to all.

What Built-In Microphone?

2008-11-15T19:39:00.000-08:00

True story...I'm earnestly trying to record myself playing the clarinet into my laptop while under the impression there's a built-in microphone picking up the sound waves, only to realize a few seconds later that my Audacity software isn't picking up anything I'm doing, and the end product- me looking foolish and ultimately having no justification (as in a recording) for that wonderful F# melodic minor scale. [wow, that sentence is 66 words long] That story got me thinking about life...it's a stretch (not to mention corny) I know, but hear me out. Why do we assume things to be there when they're not or thoughts to be inherently understood when they can't? We all make sense of the same events differently (just look at the election turnouts). Who's to say which sense is the correct one? It's probably a wise idea to make sure that your built-in microphone actually exists before you go on about recording your life, otherwise you may end up without proof for that F# melodic minor scale (or whatever scale/song of life you fancy) you played.

So Hart this year was disappointing. We managed to score 4 points less than at Simi Valley (which was the week before) and lose to our cross-town rivals at Littlerock by 11 points. The band still has potential to do well and we have been improving in both sound and the maneuvers. With Arcadia (our last non-local competition) in one week, hopefully practice will be productive this week.

Football season officially ended yesterday after our final game/senior recognition/ hug-a-senior night. Since we made CIF play-offs again for the second year in a row, we will be having another home football game this Friday. Looks like it will be another band-filled week for us.

AVC symphonic band along with the Clarinet Choir "special guests" will be having the LPAC concert this Monday. Tickets are $10 (discount if you're a student or a senior) and it should be a nice concert if anyone is interested.

I gotta say day one of TofR was an awesome experience...the strength and musicianship of the band is impressive and the music is nice for the most part. The drive to PCC tomorrow might be difficult with all these fires causing freeway closures in SoCal, so hopefully we find some alternate route. Our music for the 80th year (Themed, 'Hat's off to Entertainment' meaning all songs will be from movies and the like) since PCC started marching in the Rose Parade is as follows:

Seventy-six Trombones (Led the Rose Parade). Catchy song. From The Music Man (from the '60s)...check out the lyrics
Fantasmic. From Fantasia (a Different arrangement than what QHHS band played last year)
That's Entertainment. From that movie back in the 70's (had a redo in '94 I think)...can't help much more than that, sorry.
The Jetsons. Self-explanatory I think
Star Spangled Banner. Hey, patriotism is entertaining too, at least that's what I keep telling myself.

With the election turnouts some people think the end of the world as we know it will come. Some think socialism will envelop the country (as stupid as that is, I'll refrain from commenting). Others think Armageddon. If you're one of those who think the ladder, try reading this clever article about multiple end of the world scenarios and maybe you'll lighten up a bit. My thoughts, whether you're happy with the national happenings lately or not, try supporting and praying for our New Prez to make the right decisions for the country.

The first infant to be born as a result of an entire ovary transplant has made her first appearance in the world. Born in London, Maja Charlotte Shasa is technically the daughter of her mother's twin sister (who donated one of her ovaries to her sister so that she could bear a child)...confusing but pretty cool.

I have a new found appreciation for turnips, those little suckers are quite versatile. I'm off to eat some banana bread while staring a prime number of turnips. It's gonna be a wild night.

Happy Halloween

2008-10-31T18:13:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's been about a month since my last update. Balancing my life (and myself) is proving to be the most difficult aspect nowadays, but for the most part I think I'm doing well. I'm especially grateful for family, friends, and humor, all of which keep me sane and motivated.

Quite a bit has happened this past month, but I'll just mention a few of the events:

As some of you already know, I'm participating in a Quinceañera as a member of the court (beau is think it's called). Basically I learn how to dance and make the special day of the quince dama, well, special by performing the dance routine with the other 9 or so people- usually a waltz and a "surprise" dance. This will be my second Quinceañera I've been in the court for (the first was on October 11) and I've got to admit, the dancing is pretty hard to get down but can be fun and rewarding when it's done right/looks cool. Leaving my comfort zone proved to be the hardest aspect of it all, but I think it's good for me to do something different that I normally wouldn't do.

Tryouts for the Tournament of Roses Honor Band (TofR) have come and gone and I was pleasantly surprised to have found out that I was accepted; it's a huge honor and I'm looking forward to the the experience. First practice is November 9th, and continues every Sunday afterward. I'll be sure to post up more dates and such when they get closer.

I hated Math Portfolio #1 on trapezoidal approximation & integration (A.K.A. portfolio from hell). Thankfully it's all done and over with. If anyone is curious about the portfolio here's a cool link that proved to be extremely helpful (thanks to Sheena who found the site) just type in different functions and watch it do its thing (you may need a Java applet for it to work).

Our first band competition took place last Saturday at Simi Valley and we placed second. If you omit the fact that there was only two bands in our division and add that more than 20 bands at the competition, our 2nd place trophy sounds like a huge accomplishment. In all honesty though, we did OK and still have some work to do, but hopefully we improve our score for tomorrow's competition at College of the Canyons (Hart).

So for no particular reason whatsoever, I learned how to dilate my pupils at will in a normally lit room. While it isn't anything dramatic yet (I just learned yesterday), it does look sorta cool when I do it in front of the mirror. There are a variety of methods to do it but the one I think works best it tensing your stomach area. In a nutshell, the tensing effectively causes you to hold your breath which then causes you to release adrenaline; thus, dilating the pupils. Just be warned because the tensing can cause lightheadedness.

John tells me a lot about his physics class and I find all of his stories about it as comical as they are morbid. I'd like to see John do a problem like this.

Sometimes I stumble upon the weirdest things that happen to be valuable tidbits of knowledge, like this article here. It's funny because I bet everyone who will click the link already knows the info in it, yet it's strangely reassuring to see it in type and read it over.

Off to give candy and read some dystopian lit. I wish a happy and safe Halloween to all...Don't eat too much.

What's that...?

2008-09-28T20:28:00.000-07:00

I just found out that some of my extended family actually reads my blog (which is cool). So here's to y'all in Tejas (and anyone else who cares of course):

School has been pretty rough, but I'm hanging in there and doing my best with everything. I just try to keep an upbeat outlook on things and life in general and it has been working quite well so far. Humor is great, especially when only a couple of people get your sardonic humor and others are totally confused or think you're retarded. Actually, thanks to Julia, here's an example(click it for the full res. version) of the type of humor I enjoy (i.e. pretending to be clueless)

Band has been going...well, bandish. I notice so much more things than last year, which isn't always a plus, but aside form a weak sound I think we can have the show down sometime in October (definitely before Hart on November 1st). We had the traditional 16 hour school day for our first football game on the 19th, but seeing as some of us are in pep band, we'll be doing that for most football games now...we might even have to play at away games. We had our second/homecoming game on Friday which was nice seeing as some alumni came back to see us do our thing. It was awesome seeing those people and spending time with them again. Hopefully they come see some competitions too.

Sheena, Julia, and I had a bible study thing yesterday (with a certain John being absent) after a month of failed planning. I gotta say, I wasn't expecting it so be as helpful as it turned out. Lots of powerful things that simply can't be called coincidence happened this weekend. We really got to do that again sometime.

Speaking of "futbol" this looks like an entertaining activity to do while performing nature's calling...how creative.

And speaking of creative, does anyone else find well done hand paintings particularly awesome?

Well I'm off to give attention to my cat who has been bugging me unceasingly these past 42 minutes. Glad to hear my family in Texas is doing alright after Ike brutally hit y'all. Have a happy week everyone.

Happy 35th Amá (mom)

2008-09-07T19:38:00.000-07:00

It's been a nice week I gotta say. School's going alright, and I've been in pretty good spirits lately.

On the day of Labor, John, Sheena, Marcea, and I played the important roles as musicians for Allison and Tyrel's wedding at the Devil's punchbowl. It was one of the most unique and original weddings I've ever been to and I had a good time there. While we only did get one person to applaud for us, everyone seemed to like our music. We played various songs from a light polka to the somber Ave Maria, but it was all fun and I'm honored that we were asked to do such a professional type thing.

On Friday I went to AV hospital for this meeting/appointment type of thing, and even though things didn't go as planned, I ended up going to the Junior Volunteer meeting. There was this guest speaker for the CSI forensic squad who did this interesting presentation on sexual assault...some really sad stories, but also some nice outcomes.

In honor of my mother's birthday yesterday, we along with my Aunt Patricia, all went out to Lawry's- The Prime Rib in Beverly Hills for dinner. I got to (i.e. was forced to) drive about 4/5 of the way there too...merging onto the 405 from the 14 is now one of the scariest things I've ever done. I've been doing a lot of solo drives lately...it's kind of depressing to be honest, but I'm told it only gets better from here on, so I'll see. Anyway, the restaurant's ritzy atmosphere and the fact that I was surrounded but the top 5% of America's wealth was pretty cool. The food was great too. It's always nice to do special things like that.

The Canadian Prime Minister, Harper, has dissolved the Canadian Parliament in order to strengthen his conservative party's hold on power. That's pretty extremist for a conservative if you ask me. I wonder if that will be on our test Tuesday.

So Google released it's new web browser, Google Chrome, last Tuesday. I haven't gotten around to using it yet, but It does seem very promising despite what critics may say. They even have the whole comic relief thing going on if you should decide to uninstall it. You may want to enlarge the pic for full benefit.

In Russia, the potholes drive over you. 'Nuff said.

Well I think I'm done for today, gonna get me some birthday bread.

Go World

2008-08-24T20:23:00.000-07:00

Finishing homework on Saturdays is a smart move. Hopefully, I can try and keep it that way.

I'm currently watching the closing ceremony of the 2008 Olympics...really awesome stuff. There was definitely a lot of talent and dedication put on not only by the host country of China, but by all of the amazing athletes that participated in the games as well. Diving, Archery, Fencing, Gymnastics, synchronized swimming, and rhythmic gymnastics were all fun ones to watch for me.

I have decided that I am rather content with my teachers this year, and that's a very important thing for success. I have Mr.Cassady (history), Mr.House (English), Sra.Pena (Spanish), Mr.Herman (math), Mrs.Rayfield (biology), and Mr. McQ (IB Music and marching band). AVC symphonic band starts tomorrow and "independent study" for clarinet choir starts on Wednesday, so things should get busier especially with SAT/ACT prep I plan on doing, but I think I can hang in there/be OK.

I'm almost officially a volunteer for AVH. I got my TB skin test on Friday and it came up negative, luckily for me because I don't have to go drink dog's blood now. I go in for training sometime next week, buy my uniform (anyone know a good place where I can get white pants?), then hopefully start next Sunday.

Marching band is doing fairly well. We finished the first song last week but finally got it looking decent on Thursday. It may be a bit too early to speak, but we may have a good chance of getting the whole song done (minus visuals...there are lots of them this year) by the time the exhibition show comes around. I'm number 21 this year and am pretty much content with my spot, even if I have to take these inhumanly large back-marching steps occasionally. Pep band starts up Wednesday. Hopefully, a few certain people do not stick with their smart plan of 2-3 instruments per section...what fun is PEP BAND if it's so small and strict, not to mention how are people going to even hear us?

My license with the correct info has finally come in. Now, I plan to avoid the DMV for as long as possible.

Charlie and I concluded that Michael Phelps is part tuna and that we would both be equally scared to go into a pool with him for he could charge at us. Although this is quite mean, it is the closest thing we have to support our hypothesis. Who comes up with this stuff??

Here are five weird facts about water I never knew before. This is some real neat stuff...makes me miss Chem.

Well that's it for today. I have some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies to devour.

And Life Goes On

2008-08-13T17:51:00.000-07:00

As much as I'd like to pause it sometimes or even fast forward it at others, I can sum it up in two words: awkwardly fast. Being a junior who can drive himself and his sister (vise versa sometimes) to school really isn't as exciting as I originally thought. Here's my schedule, which by the way was one of the hardest choices I've ever made, for the year:

IB Histof Amer HL 2
IB English HL1
Spanish 3 Hnrs (though it isn't weighted as one...yeah, I dont get it either)
IB Math SL (same as methods, but only one year long now)
IB Bio HL 1
IB Music/So Perf SL (so perf=solo performance, no real difference except in the final IB has you do)
Marching Band

Thanks much to all my family and friends who helped clear things up.

Since I took psych at AVC over summer I was hoping to take anatomy during the school year, but because of scheduling conflicts I couldn't, which is why I'm in IB music, not anatomy or psych...gotta love those unexpected surprises. So now I'm hoping to take anatomy senior year or at AVC sometime before I graduate. We'll see. I'm also doing AVC symphonic band and registered for clarinet choir but I may have to go on "independent study" for that depending on my work load. Oh yeah, and volunteer work- I'm currently in the process of applying to AV Hospital, I would probably start of in the med-surge ward on Sundays and work my way up to the gory/awesome stuff eventually. Lancaster Community (next door to my dad's practice) has a minimum age req of 18, so unfortunately I can't volunteer there.

What's sleep?

The Idiot Test

2008-08-07T18:46:00.000-07:00

Go ahead and try it. I openly admit my first time I reached the kinda-smart level (level 3) and by my third time I reached brilliant (level 5) which is the end of the test. Warning, follow the directions CAREFULLY.

I can hardly consider myself a gamer anymore but I still enjoy my rpg's and Nintendo based games (not that I get to play, maybe once a month if I'm lucky). I remember how I would become annoyed with the non-gamers who made snide remarks, but rather than try to explain, let this do it for you. While I do disagree with most of them (partly because I'm not into the whole sick thing, war/violence, and first person stuff), some are true and make sense if you think about it.

How stuff works

2008-08-03T20:41:00.001-07:00

I consider that phrase the motto for my summer; I have been learning much about, well, how stuff works.

Tomorrow band camp shall commence and needless to say, I'm pretty anxious for it. The clarinet section has been getting progressively smaller each passing year, but apparently there's a nice number of incoming clarinet freshman to help restore some of the numbers we desperately need. We're gonna make the best of it either way.

After 7 full months and 50+ hours of behind-the-wheel driving, I passed the driving test and received my driving license on July 30th. Yes, I Joshua Kling- 5' 1" and 105 lbs- can now legally drive...great going DMV! (*insert Wednesday August 6*. After receiving some confusion it seems some people don't understand I was being sarcastic there, so hopefully the color change and this note will clarify: I am not really that short or light. I was complaining about the DMV. There, all clear? Good.) Rant warning: I want the whole "clean-cut sophomore" thing to stop; it's annoying. The dude who printed out my interim license pretended to look at it as if he were checking it for mistakes (he failed to notice a 9 inch and 17 lb. difference) and said that comment. Ugh.

Another rant warning: You know, I wasn't even nervous like "you're supposed to be before you take the test" and I don't get the whole thing about the testers being "mean." They're just regular people who have become sort of cold towards other human beings because they have to administer a test to some real idiots out there who screw up royally and endanger their life (what a job, huh??). As for me, I got 2 "errors" (you can get 15 and pass unless you get a critical driving error/auto-fail) and although a bit rough around the edges, the tester was nice to me (maybe because I passed, who knows). As any new driver will tell you, it's a "weird" feeling...I'm in no big hurry to drive either. So to other drivers out there, keep an eye out for me an be prepared to duck and cover...or use your defensive driving skills.

Since then I have been taking lessons on stick shift from Al who has been really patient and helpful. From experience I gotta say, stalling at a green light is pretty scary, that plus our impatient Californian drivers make this whole standard gig insane, but hey, I'm doing much better now and one day this will come in handy (hopefully).

I recently saw the movie Swing Vote and it was definitely more witty than I was led on to believe. While I'm not the type to openly shove my political views (or anything about politics), if it could help inform some people about the direction we are headed and help bring change, I would definitely try to. I suggest anyone who still cares about our country to see the movie and become informed/educated about our politics and direction we're headed while trying to ignore all the slandering and empty promises...just think about it.

Ever wonder how stuff works? This site is awesome and very informative...In case you were wondering though, "How the heck did Joshua Kling get his license?!" does not match any search results.

If you have a couple of free minutes and like reading those silly foreign sings (gives a whole new meaning to lost in translation) here are some cool ones.

A new law bans the use of trans-fat in restaurants and food retailers in California. I admit it, kudos to the Schwarzenegger on this one. Way to go!

It's been a stressful week, so I apologize for pictures and life events, or lack thereof. I'm gonna eat some banana bread while looking at the Russian alphabet. There's an episode of family guy about illegal immigrants on soon. That should be interesting.

5.4 Earthquake shakes Southern California

2008-07-29T11:52:00.000-07:00

Just 10 minutes ago a magnitude 5.8 earthquake struck Southern California for a duration of about 20 seconds. The Epicenter was estimated to be in the Chino Hills region with a maximum aftershock of about 3.8...No immediate reports of heavy damage or deaths, and from what I can tell the AV experienced little to no damage. I'll post up more info when I find out myself.

This earthquake was felt from San Diego to Las Vegas, and though no serious injuries have been reported, people are definitely rattled and cell phone lines are reportedly dead in the LA area.

*Insert-12:52* Now that things seem to be calming down, no reports of heavy damage or deaths have been confirmed by the various news stations and websites. The USGS has reported that the magnitude was actually 5.4 and there is a 5% chance that this earthquake was just a foreshock to a greater one. However, this 1 in 20 probability will fade each passing hour and when 24 hours have passed things should be back to normal.

Thankfully this earthquake was not "the big one" we all know will happen someday...hope everyone out there is doing alright.

Update & WASP

2008-07-20T13:19:00.000-07:00

Surprisingly quite a bit has happened in the past few weeks, I'm thankful for that though. Here's just a few of the events:

Mammoth was really nice; I personally like it better in the winter but still had a good time there and with our hosts. My dad's friend Paul is a Urologist and he taught me lots about the field (as some of you know, nephrology/urology is one of the few branches in medicine I really think about pursuing), so that was a huge plus. I even had the opportunity to chuck a snowball a Iamee!

So I recently played a Wii, and man was that fun. Apparently there's no difference between a skilled Wii-Wrestler and one who incoherently flails his arms and the controller about.

A few weeks back I went to this multi-ethnic potluck thing that Tani planned. The nine or so ethnically diverse people who showed up brought some food from, well, their identifying ethnicity. There was some good/odd stuff there, but I'm glad we finally got around to doing it. The quality time with friends was nice too.

Last Friday I attended Caitlin's surprise party. I've never actually been to one before (that I remember at least), so it was mildly exciting to hide in the kitchen away from everyone else and miss the opportunity to say "surprise!" or whatever it is they said. I was able to see some familiar faces there and though I had problems being social, I did have a fun time.

I've never thought too much about knives before, but apparently this new WASP knife is capable of instantly freezing and exploding one's internal organs via the process of gaseous expansion (gotta love chemistry). The possibilities are both amazing and terrifying to me. Other than that, WOW, I am at a loss for words...hopefully this will do it for you:

I'm done for now. Anyone ever try meditating?...I highly recommend it. I think I'll go do that, then make a nice farewell cake or something to our beloved Pastor Russ...he will be missed.

Happy 4th

2008-07-04T06:54:00.000-07:00

Yes, Iamee had a fun time, and yes, we are glad she is back. Cool/strange fact: although not in the arctic circle, Great Britain can still have sunlight even at 10 o' clock P.M. and still be dark at 7:00 A.M. There are plenty of other pictures and good stories if anyone wants to see or hear them.

Well, I have some last minute packing to get done. Happy and safe 4th of July to all.

Zip, zoom, whoosh

2008-07-02T14:16:00.000-07:00

Hectic and speedy sums up my life these past couple of weeks...

The Disney Hall performance was incredible and so much fun. I was both happy and honored to have been able to attend (thanks to the ride from Clark and his Mother), relax, change, and perform in the very same spots as the musicians of the LA Phil; it was truly a once in a lifetime opportunity. The sound and quality in general in the concert hall was top-notch and extremely impressive. I also had a fun time walking about LA with compadres, Olvera St, and being within a 0.1 mile radius of Obama. I really have to go back there and watch a concert sometime.

Last Saturday I attended Priscila's Quinceañera party. It was pretty fancy, the fishy chicken was good, the video of Priscila's life was touching, and I had a fun time even though I didn't dance. Hey, maybe if they played La Bamba...

QHHS summer school is about to end, just one more day and we're all out of there. I was expecting to cover more material than we did, but there is still a hefty amount of historical knowledge stuffed into our brains. We got to ditch some class today for the first summer rehearsal for a marching band music practice, so that was pretty cool. Although many people didn't show up it was nice to finally play our field show and I gotta admit, there's some good stuff in the piece.

It's hard to imagine a future with a retired Bill Gates. The bloke had an amazing career going on too, but hopefully he'll live a happy life continuing his philanthropic deeds for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation... For as long as I can remember I've always used the Windows OS (and the numerous problems that befall it), though I gotta say the Leopard from Mac is pretty dang cool also. I've only tried the GNU/Linux thing once at my cousins house, so I don't have a strong opinion, but I had no problem with it.

Well, the extended family has been gone/Iamee has been back for about two weeks now. She took some nice pictures, most of them with people I don't know, so here are the few pictures without complete strangers in them: *see P.S.*

So Iamee has obtained her very first car, and with it, the pride of ownership and outrageous gas prices to pay. It's a deep blue (almost violet) KIA Spectra, with decent mileage. She let me drive it for some practice hours...it was really nice. Chances are I wont be getting a new car, which doesn't bother me though. Looks like it comes down to my Uncle: if he sells his Lexus (gotta love family transactions; so much simpler) my parents said that will be my car when the time comes, otherwise, we'll be buying a used Honda or something.

Howdy physics. Creepy, this poor 'vette is the same '89 model my dad has.

Friday morning the family and I are going up to Mammoth for the weekend to visit one of my dad's friends from Med School. It should be fun, even if there's no snow this time of year. I've always wanted to try skiing before, not so much snowboarding because your legs seem uncomfortably locked onto the board, but I really don't know... Happy July/blueberries/hot dog/cell phone courtesy (ha!) month.

Josh~

P.S. I'll upload the pics of Great Britain on Friday morning before I leave to Mammoth...I'm burnt out right now.

Family, birthdays, and technology

2008-06-18T13:15:00.000-07:00

About three weeks into summer and I'm making the most of it. Actually I've been having a great time since last update, I'll try to sum it up as best as I can...

Summer school has been much more intense than I was expecting, but it's still not terribly bad. It'll be cool to focus on Latin America and Canada instead of exclusively the U.S. The schedule for IB History summer school has been altered so we don't have school this week, but I wont go into explaining it all.

My sister is having a jolly good time in Great Britain. She called us up and told us about England but is now currently in Scotland. It kinda sucks that there are no phones/Internet in their hotel, so we wont be able to talk to her until she comes home. Hopefully she'll take my advice and eat some haggis. I'm looking forward to her stories and pictures.

The extended family has been over for almost a week now. I've been having a great time with them. They are now addicted to Jamba Juice, Dimitry is a tech buff (runs in the family I hear), we visited the Blackbird Museum/Airpark, went to the Pirates Dinner Adventure on Sunday, and visited the Santa Monica pier afterwards. All six of them are visiting the San Fran bay area and will be back tomorrow afternoon, then Friday morning my father, Uncle Henry, Alik, Senia, and I will go to the shooting range for some gun fun. Come Friday evening we're inviting some friends over for a get-together. If you haven't caught on by now... well, it's been pretty hectic, but in a good way.

Well it's finally here- the long awaited release of Firefox v3.0! It officially debuted yesterday and I (along with millions of other geeks) upgraded from my current Firefox v.2. I'm still checking out all of its cool new features, so it looks like I'll be content for a while.

My 16th birthday was pretty cool although a bit sad since I had no sister to celebrate it with. Hey, she called despite the time difference so that was nice. This year's goods include: a couple of cool shirts, the movie Once, 3 new watches, 16 drug pens, a combined total of $30 in gift cards to Jamba Juice, 2 packs of gum, cupcakes, a collection of awesomely funny Russian/Soviet comic strips, a delicious tres leches cake, and a Commie-Mexi mole. The most important though is another healthy, happy, and safe year of life not only for me but for my family and friends as well.

I went to Denny's and the Movies yesterday with John, Julia, Marcea, Priscila, and Sheena because they wanted to celebrate my birthday. The food was good, Kung Fu Panda was alright, and Cold Stone's hit the spot afterwards. It was a fun time and I'm glad they invited me.

We all learned the speed of light before, yes? For our purposes we estimate it at c≈ 3.0 x 1o^8 but in actuality it's more like c= 2.9887 x 10^8. What's the speed of the fastest light in the world? This is really amazing, science is breaking down barriers once thought impossible. For example, nanomedicine. You know how we learned that the process of aging is due to the fact that our cells, over decades of life and constant mitosis, begin to lose some genetic info (the whole photocopying a photocopy concept). In actuality, we age because we are genetically programed to do so, not because our cells are slowly becoming inefficient. It is said that DNA and genes are mathematical formulas, and what do we do to these formulas? We apply them of course, rearrange the variables to solve for the unknown. In this case the unknown variable is aging, though couldn't cancer and other chronic/hereditary diseases be variables in other "formulas?" With nanomedicine (If you're gonna check one link in my blog, make it this one) scientists can effectively create robots that can fit inside a human cell and "solve the mathematical formula." I wouldn't be surprised to hear in the next 50 years that the technology to stop aging, cancer, and chronic diseases have been discovered. Awesome, just awesome! Ethical issues though may hamper this...can't say I'd want to live 500 years, but that's just me.

Now that I'm done with a rather long rant, time to read and start projects...

Josh~

Halfway There Ya'll

2008-06-05T10:01:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe yet another year has passed me by... All in all though, sophomore year has been one of the best for me. I've learned numerous life lessons from family, friends, teachers, peers, etc., strengthened the relationships I established freshman year, and learned some pretty fascinating things along the way. Highlights of my school year include:

Band, all the band events, and the band people/family.
A (mostly) successful concert season & the Chicago band trip
My clarinet undertakings/activities (Solo & Ensemble Festival, lessons, trio, etc.)
Chemistry! I'm gonna really miss those hectic test days and the adrenaline highs...
The established inside jokes- impossible to list 'em all.
Good grades are always nice, the family thinks so too.
Leaving English 10 Pre-IB, forever!

There are plenty of other things too, though I don't think I should mention all of them...and too, I may be forgetting something, I'll be sure too add them up if they come to mind...

The band banquet went well and I'm quite content with everything on the band front for next year. The field show for next year is entitled, The Music of Danny Elfman which for those of you who have no clue, he's the dude who composed numerous cinematic hits including: Pee Wee Herman's Big Adventure (If I remember correctly he's the bloke who had his own "adventure" in a movie theatre), Beetlejuice, Batman, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Spiderman, The Simpsons, and even some video games such as Fable. I'm looking forward to playing this field show next year.

Here's a scary thought: I'm officially certified in CPR and basic First Aid (which is thoroughly exciting). I am trained, empowered, and prepared to save someone's life if the need ever arises. It made my dad really happy to see this, so I'll keep striving to do my best. I gotta admit that the class and people in it, however awkward, were definitely amusing.

Iamee is going to the G.B. (Great Britain) on the 11-21. Truthfully, I'm gonna miss her, she has never been this far away from me or this long for that matter... I'm sure she'll have a great time visiting the major destinations of England, Scotland, and Whales. So hopefully she will take some amazing pics and drink some good tea for us. On a related note mysterious decapitated figures have been appearing in London's graffiti recently... wow this person is one sick puppy.

My summer is looking pretty light especially when compared to the school year. My dad's aiming to stuff in driving hours this month so that I can take the driving test later this month or in the first week of July. I plan to do a lot of swimming (hopefully my hair wont turn blonde again), practicing, and bonding with the family. Six of my favorite family members (from Mexico/Tejas Ya'll!) are visiting from June 11-21 so we're gonna have a blast with them (FYI, Iamee wont see any of them, schedules are a funny thing, huh?). I'm taking two summer school classes too; IB History of the Americas @ QHHS and Psych @ AVC. I'll have to devote quite a bit of time for these things but I'll still have free time which is always a plus.

I often debate with myself if the PS3 is really worth it's hype especially when compared to the Wii or XBOX360. Considering my lifestyle nowadays, I'm not about to spend $400 for something I'm not even gonna use that much. Recently though, more worthwhile games have been coming out for the console and PSM magazine stated KH3 and FFXIII will be debuting on the PS3 (not to mention the much anticipated musical score!). Man, those are by far, in my humble opinion, the absolute best RPG's to hit the world of gaming! Isn't that reason enough to buy one?! I'm so confused... Patience is a virtue my friends, so I wont be making any hasty decisions (not that anyone cares about the geeky gamer deep inside of me).

It's said that one's man's trash is another man's treasure. Replace treasure with art and here you go. Literal stuff is comical, indeed... some really awesome pics.

Well I'm off to drive now. I'm swimming later today, so that should be fun. Have a Happy summer ya'll.

Josh~

Yes? ... No? ...

2008-05-26T09:40:00.000-07:00

Even with only one week of school left (and a really short one at that), things are still hectic and will be 'till the very end. It's a blessing though, in a weird way... keeps my mind off the sad and in the good. I will say however, It's a bittersweet time (end of the school year/ graduation). Yes or No? Personally, I'm siding with maybe. Hey, at least there are a few good things this summer to look forward too.

AP Exams are over and as for my Chem one... well it was hard, but I didn't crash and burn like I was originally anticipating. Unsurprisingly, I hope I did well but I wont know for sure until July.

Band, too, is slowly coming to a close and all that remains are the band banquet and graduation. With it [end of band] some (more like 7) amazing people I've come to know and love (like friends/family) will be going down their roads of life. Obviously I'm a little sad but I know they will do great things in the future. It has been a real honor befriending them and even more so, them befriending me. Naturally, I plan to stay in touch with them as best as I can.

Last Friday my dad, Clark, and his father went to the Dodger's game against the St. Louis Cardinals. It was a close game till the very end, which we left and didn't see because it started raining rather heavily and had to be delayed for a little over an hour in the bottom of the 9th inning. Even though we left soaking wet and the Dodger's lost (1-2), we still had a fun time.

Yesterday morning Julia invited me to her church. So with the permission from the family, I was allowed to ditch my current church for this occasion. It was a powerful sermon about healthy relationships... eye-opening. Makes me so humbled and thankful for all the amazing friends I have and hope I never lose.

Yesterday the family plus John went to see "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" and coincidentally so did Sheena's minus John. So our "threesome" (as Sheena put it) sat together by my family... It was an okay movie, and though it got extremely corny towards the end we all had a good time laughing at the Russo-Soviets in the movie. Krazazchvita Viaskhknoskt...

The "Phoenix" landed on the Martian surface yesterday. It was live on CNN, good stuff. Really amazing if you think deep about about it and the whole prospect of creation.

Leave it to Canada to construct an ecologically friendly skyscraper. Apparently the building is called, "The Bow" after the river it will be located near. Some really nice pics. I'm kinda curious though, how and why?

Enjoy this pic I found from Flickr. Pretty funny. I put in the link just in case the full res. version doesn't appear when you click the picture.

"If the Fall Doesn't Kill You..."

Well that's about it from me. Happy Memorial Day, remember and thank all who has/had fought for your freedom. Have a great last week of school. Make it count.

Josh~

It's the home stretch now folks

2008-05-04T20:31:00.000-07:00

Last month of school and just about everything academically and musically possible is going to take place within the next four weeks. May 2008 is shaping up to be a true test of patience, retention/application of knowledge, and tying up some loose ends.

After an intense discussion with my family and some friends, I decided to go for the IB diploma after all ... we decided this because of the fact that if I did not go for the diploma, while my course load could be lighter (since AP isn't as restricted), I would essentially be taking the same classes just in the AP name instead. If I do IB, I still get to take anatomy and all the other classes I wanted to take in high school anyway, except senior year I'll have to take 5 IB exams instead of 4. I really hope I made the right choice here...

On Friday night I saw our high school's production of The Crucible and to my surprise it was so much better than I was expecting. It evoked emotion, mainly frustration, but that's a sign that it's a good production, yes? My sister accompanied me to the play and drove me there and back. There was this chick sitting behind me who laughed obnoxiously at some of the scenes... It was amusing and equally annoying hearing her screams and comments.

AP/IB testing season officially starts tomorrow. My test is Tuesday May 13 for AP Chemistry, I'm slightly nervous ever since I found out they changed the rules and severely restricted the use of a calculator (for the multiple choice and part II of free-response), but I will do the best I can. Good luck to all of my buddies who are taking any of the upcoming exams in the next two weeks.

Dr. Price and Mr. McQ announced to us that District Honor Band will have a final performance culminating at LPAC on Monday May 12. I read in the school paper that the AVUHSD will be making budget cuts next year and that there is a possibility that District Honor Band will be scrapped because of those cuts. DHB and the rep was/were really great and I felt so honored to be a part of it all. Needless to say, I hope that they don't cut it.

On May 19 the AVC Symphonic band will have their concert at LPAC, along with "special guests" Clarinet choir and QHHS Wind Ensemble. Since I happen to be in all three of those groups... well, it'll be a long day. Oddly enough, I'm sorta looking forward to it. Then on May 30, we have the QHHS graduation and May 31 is the AVC graduation. Woo!

In the spirit of Mexican/American culture clash, May Day riots, and some stupid people doing stupid things (on both sides here people), I really want to let all of you know this: Before you go on ahead and protest amnesty for illegal immigrants or argue that anyone who can't master English doesn't deserve to live in America, please learn it first, and then protest, unlike this idiot over in Texas.

Don't want to go bald? Then go green! According to a new study, men living in polluted areas are more likely to go bald than those breathing cleaner air.

Well I'm off to grade a practice test and eat a tortilla... happy Cinco de Mayo, and have a happy week everyone.

Josh~

The windy/second city- Chicago

2008-04-21T08:56:00.000-07:00

As expected, this years band trip was incredible, and I don't just mean the sights, pictures, and tangible evidence... I came away with the realization that the process of opening up to people, however difficult and awkward, is definitely worth the effort. However, I shouldn't be talking just yet... Enough about me though, here are the pictures I promised to post up. I have plenty of others if you're interested. Oh, and much thanks to Clark for teaching me how to make this slide show thing.

On Saturday I accompanied my father to his office where I saw this nifty little calendar in which every date (page) has a medical joke/saying. Some were nasty, others were horrible, but they are all true stories, here are three of the better ones:

1) March 18

"One day I had to be the bearer of bad news when I told a woman that her husband had died of a massive myocardial infarct. Not a moment more than five minutes later, I heard her reporting to the rest of the family that he had died of a 'massive internal fart.' "

-Dr. Susan Steinberg, Manitoba, Canada

2) March 21

"At the beginning of my shift I placed a stethoscope on an elderly and slightly deaf female patient's anterior chest wall. 'Big breaths,' I instructed.

'Yes, they used to be,' replied the patient."

-Dr. Richard Byrnes, Seattle, Washington

3) April 15

"A doctor saves lives- it's up to people to create lives that are worth saving."

-Philip Gold

Well that's it for now... I'm going to attempt to learn the electrochemistry unit I missed while I was at Chicago. Happy Spring Day.

Josh~

Chicago, blackjack, chemicals, and blistery burns

2008-04-06T18:00:00.000-07:00

The long awaited band trip is just around the corner, a little bit over two days to be exact. This is will my first time ever going to a large city, excluding those in CA or TX, because by large I mean tall (understatement)... over 100 stories tall. I'm looking forward to hearing an Air Force Academy's concert, eating Chicago-style deep dish pizza, and attempting to look for Loyola University (the Medical Facility) of which my father is alumni of, and discovering those seemingly insignificant, yet respectable things about his past. He told me to look for the area where he witnessed a fellow school-mate commit suicide (I guess that snow and wind gets brutally depressing after a while). Needless to say, I'm looking forward to this upcoming trip. I'll be sure to post up pictures for those of you who care.

I love it when things just, for lack of a better word, click; my example for these past few weeks- driving (I'm currently approaching hour 23). Maybe its because I'm no longer going on those long 1-2 hour marathon drives with no real purpose except to knock of time from the 50 hour behind the wheel, to quite a bit of shorter 10-30 minute chauffeuring/errand driving with an actual purpose. I feel more comfortable on the freeway now, so there's proof. Whatever the case, I have a healthy fear for driving and many more things to learn. On an related note, I got to test drive my uncle's black '93 Lexus ES300. He's thinking of selling it, and considering it's 15 years old, has only 70,000 miles on it and a real nice steering radius, we just may buy it from him.

Last Saturday (29th) the family and I went to see this Old/Wild Western themed murder mystery dinner theatrical performance aboard a train over yonder (West) in Fillmore. It was really entertaining and I had a great time, even if I incorrectly guessed the murderer. The Energy there was a bit too high for my liking, but it was definitely funny when this desperate lady, playing her character very well, (Klondike Kelly) hit on my dad. The food was good, and the whiskey was poisonous. I highly recommend one of these murder mystery things if you ever have the time. Just talk to me, I'll tell you more about it and show you some of the pictures we took.

On Friday, Marcea, Sheena, John, Julia and I saw the movie "21". Aside from a few parts, it was a pretty good movie. Actually it was the first movie (in a theater at least) I've seen in about 4 months. Afterwards we hit In-n-Out for dinner. All in all, it was a Happy Friday, not only because of the movie and food, but because of the Chemistry test I took earlier. I like chemistry tests, the worry for them causes this sort of adrenaline high, then when I realize that they aren't hard just tedious and rather lengthy, I work with superhuman effort (thanks for that Mr. Manthey, I'm not even Chinese!) to try and finish them. While I never do completely finish them, this was by far the closest I've ever gotten; one letter away, darn you 6-e.

On Tuesday morning I pulled what is perhaps the most idiotic thing ever in my life. I managed to burn myself with the iron while ironing my shirt. I blame it on the fact that I don't iron frequently and am therefore inexperienced at it. It took about two seconds to realize that the skin on my hand was melting, but what is weird is that it didn't hurt until I arrived at school. the wound wasn't agonizingly painful, just a constant and persistent level 6 (scale of 1 to 10). Here's where my weirdness kicks in; I tried to make myself feel better by relating the mark to something familiar, which for my burn mark- is North America. I do this with anything (mosquito bites, cuts, bruises, scrapes) and to anyone who has an injury because I believe that if your injury can be related or looked upon as something familiar/cool, then you feel slightly better about it. by the way, the pH of my blister fluid was 7.4 (which is good). I was going to take pictures of it and post them up, but the skin kinda peeled around the center and doesn't look much like North America anymore. As of now, it just looks like a pretty nice/nasty burn and feels rough (un-humanish).

I cant believe many things, but one of them is how stupid people are to let kids (I mean younger than 13) get away with crime, simply because they do not know better. that's complete crap, if a stupid kid is smart enough to think up and get others to join in on a conspiracy crime, and almost execute it, then they deserve harsh punishment. They should send the delinquents to prison (don't drop the soap). This is what happened in Georgia about a week ago, where a third grader and some of his friends plotted to harm, "but not kill", their teacher. They brought a steak knife, handcuffs, duct tape, and other murdering/evidence erasing paraphernalia. Why? may you ask, because the teacher, "scolded one of the children for standing on his desk"... That just pisses me off...

On a lighter note, enjoy this picture:

Well, I'm off to start packing for Chicago. Happy week everyone... Now where's that camera?

Josh~

Tis About Time...

2008-03-16T12:39:00.000-07:00

It's been about a good three weeks since I've formally updated. I figured I'm overdue, so for any of you who care about my life these past few weeks...

On Saturday the 8th, I went to LPAC to see the "Stars of Tomorrow" featuring the AV Symphonic Orchestra, the AVC Civic Orchestra, and some selected few, talented soloists. It was the first time I've heard the repertoire (except Mozart's Don Giovanni Overture) before, but all of the pieces were extremely nice. The Spanish piece by de Falla, Three-cornered Hat, was also an enjoyable one to listen to.

The CAHSEE, which can be pronounced many different ways (Oh, I'll tell you how I pronounced it...) was pathetic and a waste of time. There was a question on it that asked what the reciprocal of 3/5 was. I'm so glad it's over.

Math has been pretty deadly lately, but that's probably because I missed half of the chapter from the two days I was gone for Band & Orchestra Festival. We took our test last Thursday, and I aced it! It was definitely worth the sleep deprivation. That's nothing new though, I'm getting used to running on 6-7 hours of sleep, and I know that I get more sleep than other people (ahem, poor Sheena). Oh, and It occurred to me that this was the first time ever I prioritized another class over Chem. How odd...

In honor of PI day on the 14th, we had a pie party in math. Plus, our teacher read us some personified stories of PI. It was a relaxing day, and a nice way to wrap up the third quarter of my sophomore year.

S&E Festival took place yesterday. I was pretty nervous/psyched for the whole thing seeing as it was my first time performing a solo/small ensemble for a judge. All of the preps I've been doing, not to mention Tani's mentoring, paid off though. Out of the four things I did, three were CP's and one was a Superior. All in all it was a major highlight of the year for me, Plus I don't feel the same intensity of nervousness for playing in front of people anymore. I can now look forward to Chicago and various other events without the anxiety of performing at S&E Festival.

After S&E festival, Julia, Marcea, John and I went to one of Sheenba's- family's crazy Filipino parties. I have to say it was nice to just have fun after a stressful day. We played pool, ping-pong, guitar hero, ate food, and John, Sheena and I performed our trio from Clarinet choir (from last semester) for Sheena's various family members. I suck at guitar hero while John (considering it was his first time playing it) and Sheena are freakin' amazing at it. It's all right though, I got some other games I can destroy those two at.

Spring Break is finally here, that means naps, studying, and homework. My cousin, Maricela, from Monterrey, Mexico, was supposed to come over, but she had to cancel for some reason. As sad as that is, I'm sure I'll live.

On Thursday through Saturday the family and I are going college visiting for Iamee and I. We are planning on hitting CSU Long Beach, UC Irvine, and Whittier. That should be fun, hopefully I can finish all I want to do before that though.

Ever heard a name that was just plain wrong/stupid? Ever wanted to kill or wish extreme misfortune upon the parent or whoever bestowed the name to that unfortunate kid? I sure have. Oh, and just in case you were wondering, here are the some of the worst names ever. Some of these names are just terrible, "Emma Royd", "Wanna Towell", "Ima Hooker", "Harry Pitts"... What's wrong with people?!

Well I'm gonna go start my chem and have a green bagel. Happy St. Pattie's Day and Holy week everyone. May this coming Friday and Especially Sunday be good for you all.

~Josh~

Aye/Eh! (Canadian- like)

2008-03-07T20:24:00.000-08:00

I love Canada. The sandpaper I use is made there, the CN tower is located in Toronto, and they have some mighty fine tasting water (I had some yesterday at the Littlerock Band & Orchestra Festival). Apparently Five Iron Frenzy did too, way back in the 90's when they still existed...

This isn't FIF's actual video seeing as they were never "famous" enough to appear on mainstream television. The video is stupid but the song is somewhat cool. Oh, and here are the lyrics if you're at all interested. Thanks to Julia for introducing me to these guys.

I'll probably update later this weekend,

~Josh~

Yay for Clark!

2008-02-24T19:04:00.000-08:00

I was reading the paper this morning when I found this. Impressive article, Clark. It seems my respect for you grows larger each time I talk to you.

-I tried to upload the scanned version, but it was too large. I'll just cut & paste the type-

Josh~

__________________________________________________________________

Quartz Hill High Senior all Jazzed Up
to become a Doctor, Possibly Radiologist
WRITTEN BY ALISHA SEMCHUCK • PHOTOGRAPHED BY EVELYN KRISTO

CLARKSON (CLARK) CRANE
AGE: 17
SCHOOL: Quartz Hill High School
GOAL: To become a doctor

He’s got rhythm, so Quartz Hill High School senior Clarkson Crane, “Clark” to family and friends, took up the clarinet, yet professionally his heartbeat leads toward a career in medicine.
Clark, 17 and an aspiring physician, possibly a radiologist, was caught off guard when he learned that high school biology teacher Mandi Nichter nominated him as a 2008 Future Leader. He first found out when he received a telephone call from the Antelope Valley Press requesting an interview
“I had no idea,” Clark said. However, he acknowledged, he felt not only surprised, but honored.
“She was my anatomy teacher last year,” Clark said of Nichter. “This year I’m her teacher’s aide.
“I actually had her my freshman year for biology, but there was an issue with the schedule, so they had to switch teachers. I enjoyed her classes a lot. It’s very hands-on, the way she approaches (teaching). She helps you. Yet, there’s a lot-of independent learning.”
The respect and admiration Clark feels for Nichter is a two-way Street, prompting her to view him as a worthy candidate for the Future Leader title — a student who manages to maintain a better- than 4.0 grade-point average while involving himself in activities for the betterment of the community
Nichter said she’s known Clark nearly four years.
“I have had the pleasure of having Clark as a student for three of the four years.” She considers him a competent and persistent individual. “Clark is the perfect student. He is mature, responsible, efficient and intelligent. I am sure that Clark will attain every goal that he sets for himself.”
Though he isn’t particularly inclined toward athletics, Clark said he runs “for casual recreation.”
“I competed in two half-marathons — 13.1 miles.
A few years back I did the Las Vegas half-marathon.
I’ve also done the Santa Clarita half-marathon. I did
OK. I don’t remember my placing.”
He’s definitely not the type to pump iron, standing 5-feet-1l and weighing 125 pounds.
“People call me skinny,” Clark said.
But, without a moment’s hesitation he willingly puts 150% effort into endeavors that rouse his interest.
“I like to think I put a lot of hard work into things to get what I want. I’m very involved in music. I’ve tried out for a lot of honor bands. That involves a lot of practice and dedication. I’m in the school band. In the past couple of years, I’ve auditioned for the All-Southern California (High School) and also the All-State Honor bands.”
He marched in the Tournament of Roses Parade, playing his clarinet in 2007 and 2008.
“It so much fun to be with such a large group, and people with such musicality and maturity,” he said.
His favorite composer is Aaron Copland and his favorite works are Copland’s “Appalachian Spring” and “Clarinet Concerto,” which Clark said, “starts off slow, then picks up and gets jazzy toward the end.” Clark said he always will continue music as a hobby, but is determined to become a doctor, if not in radiology, then in emergency medicine. He volunteers in Antelope Valley Hospital’s emergency room once a week on Friday nights.
“You see some interesting (cases) come through. I’ve seen gunshots, cardiac arrests and more light stuff, like a kid who shot a BB up his nose. For my (high school) senior project, I rode along with a paramedic squad from the L.A. County Fire Department.”
His top picks for college are the University of Southern California; University of California, Irvine; and California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, which has offered him a Regents Scholarship.
Aside from medicine and music, Clark loves family life, especially spending time with his parents, Don and Margaret “Margie” Crane, as well as his older twin sisters and their families. “Both are married and have newborns.” Clark is the proud uncle of three nephews that he “loves being around.”
“My husband and I feel blessed. We have three wonderful kids. Margie Crane said. “He’s always been kind of industrious. He started a company with some friends when he was in the fifth or sixth grade. He was CEO. Another friend was treasurer. They called it Junko. They sold old junk they found. He went to the city and found out what it would take to get a business license. ... He’s very independent. He doesn’t have to follow the crowd.”
Clark said his parents have been the major influence in his life. “My love music has come from my dad who sits on the board of the Antelope Valley Symphony Orchestra. He credited his mother, a physical therapist, for stirring his interest in medicine.
“My sisters have been really good role models as successful individuals,” not only as wives and mothers, but as career women who balance their home and work lives.
Clark said he doesn’t live according to any particular mantra. “I just try to work hard at whatever I do.”

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Freeways, Brachiosaurs, Echoes and Portals

2008-02-22T20:40:00.000-08:00

February (or rainy winters in general) is a good month (time of year) if you ask me. I'm just slightly annoyed that it has been really busy and I can't fully enjoy it. I got myself into all of this though, and I can handle it. Otherwise, I'm quite content with everything.

"ROAR!" Says the brachiosarus. Since Nithya/Elizabeth Davenport said I looked like one (when I eat at least), I decided to check for myself... I see slight to no resemblance whatsoever. I will go along with it nonetheless. I guess it doesn't matter if Iook like one, but I gotta feel like one. I'll tell you one thing, I sure don't feel very Mexican since my haircut, not to mention how stupid I look (but that is nothing new).

Iamee's birthday was 10 days ago. While we really didn't do much for it (except a nice dinner at Outback Steak House over the weekend) we will be attending a murder mystery dinner theatre in March. Hmm, murder mystery... should be fun. I'll post up more info as I learn more about it. Iamee- Even if you're too affectionate for my liking at times, I still love you; always have and always will. Happy Day Sis (not that you would read this).

I think I can safely say I'm starting to get the whole driving thing down. While I still need much more practice I feel confident in my abilities to safely transport the lives of my family, and family only as of yet. Every time you get in a car with someone you basically hand them your life, that's why I only accept/ask for rides from people I thoroughly trust. My new speed record- 82mph northbound on the 14.

Today, the class of '10 received the course selection sheet for next year. This is probably one of the most difficult choices I've ever had to make in my entire life. I'm still not sure if I should go for the IB diploma or not, as of now I'm 80% for IB diploma, 20% for AP. I really want to take anatomy though. Simply put, I'm totally confused and frustrated. Any suggestions/comments/ guidance would be greatly appreciated.

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Classes I'm thinking of taking next year:

IB English HL
IB HisoryOfAmer HL
IB Bio HL
IB Math SL (formerly known as math methods) now it's one year long though. Senior year I can take Calc BC
IB/AP Spanish 3
Anatomy (can I do this?), otherwise IB Chem SL. Senior year I would then take IB/AP Physics

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We have all heard the question, "What do you want to do when you grow up?" Right?

"I wanna be a doctor."

"I wanna be a lawyer."

"Ooh, a fireman!"

Oh yeah?! Try a Teenage Pregnancy Implementation Manager.

...Only in Britain....

There are these two video games I feel as though I must mention due to their sheer simplicity/originality. They are: Echochrome and Portal. Both are minimalistic puzzle games (that's probably redundant but oh well) in that you do the same basic process every time, just in a different manner to get to the end of the level. They're both games that can kill time if need be, but can also be very frustrating. So they probably shouldn't be played unless you are feeling good and thinking clearly, otherwise something might get killed...

Echochrome is basically a game in which you, a humanoid figure/manikin, walk on a limited pathway with gaps and traps (blessings sometimes) on the floor. In order to prevail over the map and collect your "echoes" (similar to points) you must alter the camera angle so that the walkway covers up the gaping hole/etc. It's confusing to explain, so check out the video. Echochrome has not yet been released, but I'm hoping I can try it out when it finally does come out.

Portal is a much more hilarious game. It's a first-person narrative, you are a woman who randomly wakes up in a tiny box inside some lab facility run by a mysterious company called Aperture Science. You're presented with a portal that lets you walk out of the room and into another. From there, the game gradually introduces you to portals and eventually gives you a gun that you can use to fire portals onto walls, ceilings, and floors. You have to reach the end of each test chamber and ultimately, out of the weird company's factory. Throughout the story a female's voice is playing through speakers in the game, she's guiding you and sometimes tricking you. Here's a video of Portal gameplay. This game has already been released, and I've never actually tried it yet, but maybe one day.

Well I've maxed out my thinking capacity for today. I'm off to bed. Happy week everyone. Oh, and a happy birthday to you, Clark (:

Josh~

An "Adventure" in California

2008-02-10T20:11:00.000-08:00

These past few weeks have been really busy, I can honestly say I've never been this sleep-deprived in my entire life. But you know, it's worth it. Hellish as it may have been (and continue to be) I did have fun (and will continue to have more).

District Honor Band is officially over (our finale was Friday at California Adventures) but it was by far one of the greatest musical experiences I have ever undertook in my entire life. Our group of four, consisting of John, Nithya, Sheena, and myself, have really good time-management skills. We went on a total of 14 rides in the 7 hours of free time that we had. Our concert sounded pretty good (as always there are a few parts...) and it was pretty hot onstage. Our group also has a knack at getting stuck on rides. I've never been stuck on one before, but it happened to me, not once... but twice; once on California Screamin' and once on the Grizzly Rapids (or whatever it's called). How do you manage to get stuck on a water ride! Well we did, something about the current being to slow... Overall it was a fun trip except when Sheena separated from us and we started to panic thinking the worst. I don't feel like telling the story though... Oh, and I felt very honored when Clark, Casey, and Andrew rode on California Screamin' with us.

I started my second semester of AVC classes last week. This year I'm taking Symphonic band, CPR/First Aid (basic life support), and Clarinet Choir. So far they are all easy, but they do take a lot of time away that I could be using to do other h/w such as math and chem. I really like the CPR class, it's teaching me a lot and I'll feel better knowing that I may be able to save someone's life one day. I'm just nervous for the part where we partner up, seeing as I don't anyone (awkwardness/friendliness with strangers). And needless to say, AVC band and Clarinet Choir are awesome as well. Sheena and I even convinced some of our awesome clarinet freshman to join it.

Ever wondered what the top 1o most... vestigial of the Organs are? Hopefully this answers your question.

Well, I''m off to chauffeur my Father around town. Thankfully the whole driving thing is going smoothly; I don't hate it as much as I used to... Happy week everyone.

~Josh~

Music Week(s)

2008-01-27T18:37:00.000-08:00

This past week (and for about the next two weeks), music has been (and will be) the predominant force in my life. Hey, I have no complaints.

The AVUHSD Honor Band took place last Wednesday and Thursday. It's nice to be in a band that has a nice sound and is filled with talented musicians who ACTUALLY care about music (unlike Symphonic Band). This year we played a variety of nice pieces such as Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man, Bernstein's Overture to "Candide" (nasty ñah's are fun). And to top it off, the insanely killer/fun invoker- Adam's Lollapalooza. Our concert was Thursday night and although we fell apart at some places, overall we had a really nice, mature sound. We still have one concert left (maybe one practice as well). The concert will be at Disneyland, which has never happened before in the Honor Band. I bet it will be awesome to play some tasteful music at Disneyland.

The All Southern concert was today. I was going to go watch it to support my friends in it, but my dad decided that the two hour drive in the dangerous flooded roads was not the safest or wisest thing to do... Even though I didn't get to see them perform, I'm sure they did great. Hopefully they will show me some pics. and I can hear a CD or something of their performance.

Tomorrow is our annual Disneyland performance for the QHHS marching band. Hopefully the weather will tone down some, otherwise Mr.McQ said he might cancel our performance. Although that would give us two more hours of free time, I'd rather perform. I think I'm more excited for performing than the free time waiting in lines for hours to end up going on six rides. Hey, maybe I'll see funny Farley and his fancy fiddle again.

The top 10 weird ways people deal with the dead? Number four and two sound cool. Hmm, Cryonics...TaJoReNa de Gill! I'm surprised that feeding the corpse to a crone isn't there. Idiot made a big rant on crones the other day.

Coming soon is the sequel to best selling GC game of all time, Super Smash Bros. Melee. It shall be named, Super Smash Bros. Brawl! and is scheduled for release March 9, if it doesn't get delayed again. Instead of appearing on the GC though, it will debut on the Wii. Hopefully the game will live up to it's hype. I've read some articles about it and it sounds like it will definitely be worth it. With new stages, items, characters (Sonic the Hedgehog, Metal Gear Solid cast, some more Kirby characters) and Wi-Fi capability, it should be pretty insane/fun. Hey, it must be great if the Japanese top gaming magazine Famitsu gave it a perfect score.

Well I'm done for now. I'm off to finish up my make-up work so that I can enjoy tomorrow without the worry of homework. Happy week everyone.

Josh~

I'm back

2008-01-13T18:27:00.000-08:00

Actually, I've been back for a while but was too lazy to update.

I hated driving school and for many reasons, but I won't rant. At least I knew one person in the class to help keep my sanity, otherwise I would've bashed everyone's heads off with the Railroad sign. I couldn't believe how disrespectful and ignorant most of them were. Take my advice if you haven't done Driving School yet, take the freakin' thing online! Hey, on the bright side, I only got one wrong on the permit test... So now I can drive with a certified driver of age 25 or more. As of now I have a few hours of practice in. In just a few words, it's so much different that I thought it would be (not necessarily in a good way either).

Texas/ Mexico was very Texy/Mexy, I had a great time. Family, friends, food, experiences, wouldn't trade them for the world (I'll post pics and explain them later). Highlights:

My little cousin Dimitri [14 months] and his parents/my cousins Azenette and Alik. Good times, and I have a better understanding of little kids now.
The AQOUS with its superb graphics audio and res. I got to see the pixels. Since Alik is very proficient in technology, he taught me quite a bit on a whole bunch of things.
Going to Mexico and not getting kidnapped, murdered, or other things... I talked quite a bit to my cousins (in Spanish of course) and had to translate for Iamee.
Eating Cabrito, which is baby goat. I tried the kidney part, it actually wasn't that horrible. Kinda sweet, I thought it would be salty though.
LIFETIME DREAM FULFILLED!! for those of you who wondered why I've been in a good mood since I came back, this is why. I actually communicated with my Abuelo in Spanish, all by myself (not Abuela, she's going downhill fast, I still need to talk her her and hopefully soon, before, well...). We talked about cats and dogs and he started barking like one ...You know, it's so weird how you have these archetypes of someone; how they act, what they do, who they are. And once you talk to them and get to know them more you see that you were completely wrong about them. I always thought my Abuelo was this stern, strict, just intense person, but he can be laid back. I would've never known that had I not talked to him one-on-one.
My funny and white father. Iamee-"What's an entomatada?" my mother is starting to answer Iamee's question when dad decided to use verbatim and copy my mom's answer in such a matter that Iamee only heard dad, not mom. Dad-" It's like a chicken enchilada, but with pollo." Mom never said pollo, so I don't know where dad got it from, but it made Tia Alicia and I crack up in laughter. Yeah, it's probably stupid unless you happened to be there and heard the whole thing.

Since I've returned nothing much has happened. just a new semester with no Marching Band but stupid P.E. I wish I was in Wind Ensemble.

Chemistry is still awesome. I bought the new "5 Steps to a 5, AP Chemistry" by recommendation of Ms. Hutch. It's a wonderful book so far and I strongly recommend it as the book to buy if you are going to take the AP Chem Exam or just to supplement what you are learning in AP Chem. The explanations can get a tad confusing but they are very well written and in the format the AP Exam Graders want them in. Of course, you should expect no less seeing as the book is written by two of the graders from the Free-Response portion of the Exam. Hopefully I can pass the AP Exam.

What do you do if you are upset, because a reporter is bugging you about the murder of Nancy Holloway? What if you have a glass of wine in front of you while he's doing so? Yet another reason why Alcohol is destructive. Sloot has good aim, that jerk. Hey, at least the guy felt remorse and apologized. Note to self, "don't ever get a Dutch angry, espically if he has an organic based compound with an "OH" attached to the carbon chain."

Well, that's enough for now. I'm gonna practice for Solo & Ensemble Festival. Happy week everyone.

~Josh~

Alas, winter has arrived

2007-12-16T17:38:00.001-08:00

It feels wonderful to be done with finals, the first semester of school, and get a much needed break... Even if I have a lot of things to do. I bet I can get most of them done though.

I just love winter. Now that it's finally cold outside, I have the Christmas spirit inside of me. I wonder what I should make this year. Maybe Bueñlos (buen-ye-los). I probably just butchered the spelling there, I apologize.

Good ol' marching season has finally come to a close. We did tremendously well on our two local competitions and the morale of our band, especially LordKemper, seemed to boost quite a bit. For AV: we snagged music sweepstakes for parade, first place for 4-A marching band, and a few other goodies. No Grand Champ though. For Palmdale: first place auxiliary, sweepstakes for Drum Major, band and music. It was a nice way to end the year. I'm going to miss marching band and all the people (mainly seniors though) who stood next to me. At least we still have the Chicago trip in April.

Today was just a crappy Sunday, technologically speaking. It all started last night when I PRL updated my stupid cell phone after being told it would prolong the battery life. And when I turned my stupid cell phone on this morning the software completely glitched up and froze. I lost all of my contact info, my pictures of my cousins, Hawaii, Mexico, and the Waffle Song. The Waffle Song :( So I got a replacement phone (I knew Insurance was worth it!) but now I have to program it the way my old phone was. I was going to get a new phone, not just a replacement, but there wasn't any phone I was especially interested in, so I'll wait. Patience is a virtue. By the way, I HATE cell phones. Then on the way home from getting the replacement phone, Shelly (our family car) wouldn't start. Luckily, there's a handful of nice people in this world who are generally nice and therefore do nice things, such as offer to jump your car and help you get home. And well, after a tiring Sunday, here I am now. Hey, I'm lucky to be alive.

I start Driving School tomorrow and I couldn't be more angry. I really wish I could have taken it online. Oh well, it's only four days. I'll manage to survive by looking forward to Thursday, where I'll take the permit test at the DMV, pass it (hopefully), and then head on over to Texas/Mexico. Howdy/Hola.

Seeing as I had time, I found a nifty little game, about driving nonetheless. As sad as it may seem, it's actually entertaining. The site has a multitude of other games as well. If you find yourself bored then check them out. I haven't done so yet, but hopefully there are some other fun ones.

For Solo & Ensemble Festival I'm planning on playing the Clarinet Concerto by Franz Krommer (Op.36, in Eb Major). It's a beautiful song, and hopefully I can have it all nice by March. Here's a video of someone playing the first few minutes of the first movement. The opening credits take three minutes, so just bear through them. I'm also planning on doing a clarinet trio and a flute/clarinet duet, but I still need to find nice pieces for those.

Well I'm going to have a Nithya cupcake and some Tani cookies. Yum. Have a happy holiday break everyone; stay safe ...Go spend time with your family now.

~Josh~

Happy Thanksgiving (Turkey and/or Ham) Day

2007-11-22T18:42:00.000-08:00

Go to your parents, siblings, and anyone else in your life that you appreciate and tell them how much you appreciate all that they do for you. Whether or not they show it, they will be very happy that you said it. Life isn't granted, it can be whisked away before you know it. Go ahead, make someones day!

Hope everyone had a fulfilling family day, I sure did. Oh By the way, to anyone who knows me and reads this, thanks for existing and acknowledging my existence too. I really do appreciate it. Have a merry Black Friday tomorrow for those of you who are planning something.

~Josh~

Photons, Electromagnetic Radiation, Lambda

2007-11-18T19:43:00.000-08:00

Finally (bitter-sweetly) it's all starting to slow down a tad. The calendar year is coming to a close and all that remains are a few concerts, Turkey Day, District Honor Band tryouts, a few finals, driving school, registration for CPR class along with Nith, and a much needed vacation.

Excuse me in advance for the upcoming paragrapgh as it's very scattered...

A few weeks ago we had our supposedly last foot ball game, which was also hug-a-senior-night. It's depressing to think that all the wonderful seniors will be gone next year, but on the bright side we still have 7 months or something with them. We won the game, so we advanced to play-offs. Then the Band went to Chino for the band review/parade. We placed fourth out of sixth (or eighth, whatever) in our division for auxiliary and band. That managed to bring the morale of our band and drum majors up quite a bit. Next we had an away football game at highland High school; it sucked as it was miserably cold, but at least we won by a miraculous touchdown in overtime. It was worth it because I got to meet Yoshi Toshi's mom, who is completely awesome. The week after that (3 days ago) we had another home football game against St.Paul which was Coach Degnan's old high school. Although our team lost I was extremely proud of them for making it this far, CIF/Golden League, which is something we haven't done since 1993! Lastly, yesterday we went to Moore Park for our final, non-local, band event. We played our field show pretty decently I thought. Our Pageantry won third place but Drum Line and band didn't acquire a trophy, although band would've gotten fourth place. Since the third place for the band in our division receive a score of 84.25, I'm assuming we got a score around 78-82. There were some great bands at Moore Park and I felt honored just to watch them. For example, Thousand oaks, PCC with the Reel Big Fish "Sell Out", and some of the 5-A bands too. Next thing coming is the AVC Symphonic Band with the Clarinet Choir "Special guests" concert tomorrow night 7:30 @LPAC.

Aw man, in just four weeks I get to go to Flippin Texas/Mexico. Excitement. I hope I can finally fulfill my 12-year-old dream of having a full conversation with my grandparents in Spanish, no help from anyone else. I can do it . Sí, Si puedo... no... puedo hacerlo.

Good luck to you guys in T of R, hope you're managing to survive somehow.

I got these pics from one of my buddies, and some of them are actually pretty funny, but as with most things there's a fine line between the two "standpoints" (for lack of a better word). In this case, funny to just plain retarded. Thanks by the way, to Jimmy for the pics. You'd probably want to expand the ones with small type. I'm pretty sure you know what to do.

I feel like a smoothie. Gotta eat a banana so I dont die and I'll throw a pineapple in there for added measure... Have a happy holiday week.

~Josh~

Happy Day of the Mole

2007-10-23T06:41:00.001-07:00

Galvanized Vestibular Stimulation (G.V.S)

2007-10-21T17:52:00.000-07:00

October and some of the preceding and following weeks are considered to be the longest consecutive days of school (since there aren't any holidays until Thanksgiving break). That means this time of the year sucks, and should be decimated by something "rabid."

I took a career aptitude test about three weeks ago at school during my history class. My results were slightly unexpected to say the least. It was cool how most of them were medical and science related, but the actual jobs it gave me were weird; i.e. Ob-Gyn, dentist, explosives specialist, plastic surgeon, and I'll stop there. What's really weird though is how the results got these specific types of M.D.'s when the test itself asked very broad, unfocused, and general questions.

Last week the band went to Hart Rampage 2007. We didn't actually place, again, (REALLY?!) nor did we actually get called to sand up with the other 4-A bands to not get our awards. That managed to anger me, but I can't imagine how much worse our drum majors/other captains, who had to stand there and cramp up while the cold wind bit at their faces, felt. Despite getting a headache and almost throwing up, all went pretty darn well except when I, "flailed about." I'd prefer call it a, "stumble" though.

As for football games, the one on Friday was awesome, it was one of the better ones I've been to and I even got to see my dad so his thing, which is saving peoples lives. Go dad! We have one last football game left, and it's homecoming. I hope we make the play offs this year, or even the CIF's if we're lucky.

We get our parade spots tomorrow. Last year I had a cool spot even if it was in the second rank, and I'm hoping for a good one this year too. I hear the back is a better spot though....

The PSAT's were yesterday, and unlike last year I sat by people I knew and enjoyed being with. Pretty much the whole gang was there (Nithya, John, and myself) we were just missing Yoshi Toshi. The test itself was pretty miserable. Although the test wasn't too bad, I know I could have done better. I hate the Critical Reading portions, I didn't get to answer some of them....

Leave it to the Japanese to invent the technology to control people via remote control. It's a quick and interesting read. Before you read the article, read this following background info: Our sense of direction and balance are controlled by our vestibular tubes in the inner ear, these three tubes control the three dimensions of left/right, up/down, forward/back. When we move the fluids in these tubes do so also, similar to a carpenter's leveler (that thing with the green fluid and air bubble, and if the air bubble is in the center then the surface is straight). Now, since I have the time (SO NICE TO TYPE THOSE WORDS!) here is a paraphrase of the article: The Japanese technology (Galvanized Vestibular Stimulation) sends electrical impulses that stimulate the vestibular tubes. In essence, the electricity "messes" with the delicate nerves inside the ear that help maintain balance. Leave it to the Japanese (in a good way)!

Well, I think that about covers my uneventful life these past few weeks... I'm gonna watch "The Incredible H uman Machine" on Nat Geo. It sounds like it will be good, I hope it's worth the time...

~Josh~

My apologies

2007-10-14T21:22:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since a formal update but one will come later this week....

2 Band competitions (aq) + WEEKS practicing (aq) + HOURS studying (g) + 3 music/band related activities (aq) + school crap (g) + 4 other things that I don't feel like typing up (l) ---> 1 busy Josh (s, just barely)

Good luck to all of my friends/affiliates who tried out for Pasadena City College, Tournament of Roses Honor Band (T of R). I sincerely hope you all transcended expectations/had confidence/killed it.

~Josh~

Alaska to México!

2007-09-30T14:48:00.000-07:00

I think updating every other week is a reasonable goal. Not to mention my life is pretty boring, so it's actually easier this way, but I'll still try the weekly update whenever I can.

Let me start off by saying that Sophomore year sucks. It's not difficult or anything (yet), but the work is extremely vapid. Other than slight sleep deprivation and the difficulty in squeezing in practice time with the clarinet, it's all good.

We had our second football game on Friday. It was a pretty close game although we lost 29-32. I have to say though, since we were facing one of the better schools in the AV we did tremendously well. We're off to a pretty good season (varsity at least). Sad thing is that there are only three more home-football games left and one of them is homecoming. I thought we had like seven or eight games last year... Oddly enough, I kind of want to see our football team make play-offs and hopefully give our band more football games to do our thing at.

Our field show is going pretty well too. All we have left to do is assign hats to the freshies, finish up our last nine moves, work on playing louder while not losing the tone, practice, and then were done. All in time for our exhibition show, unlike last year.

I went to Panera Bread again with basically the same people, to celebrate Jenkins' birthday. It was pretty cool, I had a good day, and I managed to talk more than I did last time. No one wanted to break my phone though...

Ever thought about going to México? Well, Alaskan Airlines can help you get there! Check it out...

I think they started this whole thing a few weeks ago, in honor of Mexican Independence Day . Whatever the case, I found this fact very funny, especially when I saw the commercial...

¡Viva la Raza!

Well that's it for today, I'm going to Jamba Juice for my very first functional smoothie. Hmm, Heart Defender or Cold Buster...

~Josh~

Yo (insert 2-4 letters of your name here)

2007-09-16T19:09:00.000-07:00

Sorry for not updating last week, things have been rather busy lately. I heard from some reliable people that Sophomore year (Pre-IB) contains the most amount of work, and If I transfer to AP or Hybridize AP & IB then next year won't be as bad.

Two Fridays ago I, along with numerous other band people/affiliates, stayed our annual 15 hour school-day before the first football game. Good times... Our half-time band show sounded pretty well, although quiet, we marched pretty decently also. I'm confident that we can finish the show by the next game on 28 August. If I could sum up the game in one word, miraculous! Our football team killed Rosamond 42-0. I'm not sure how it happened or why, but hopefully our football team makes something of itself this year. I really wish I took a picture of the scoreboard, in fact I tried, but it didn't come out so well. **insert** thanks to Tani for the pic. it's slightly blurry, but you can still see the score.

Nothing overly exciting during the school week. I was thoroughly embarrassed by my English teacher, plus I had a Chem Test (don't worry I won't rant)... Clarinet Choir went well also, oh wait, that's because Al wasn't there.

Yesterday evening the family and I went to the street fair, for lack of a better word, on Lancaster Blvd. Then we ate at the Lemon Leaf, which was robbed sometime ago (or so I was told), how nice... Overall, I had a nice time, plus it was a comforting experience to see all of the different cultures/races/people interact in a socially uplifting manner. I even got to see the moon through a telescope, although the bloke who was in charge of the telescope was a perv-weirdo.

I was seriously thinking of trying out for Tournament of Roses Honor Band, In fact I was going to try it. However after talking to my parents about it we realized it interfered with our annual trip to Texas/Mexico to see my family. I have a mixed feeling about the whole thing, I wanted to try the Tournament of Roses thing, It would've been difficult mind you, but it also would've been an immense honor. On the other hand we didn't go to visit my family last winter, and I'm terribly sad to admit it but my grandparents aren't going to be around much longer. I guess there's always next year, although we would have to reschedule our traditional family Winter trip to Spring or Summer. Regardless, I hope the people I know that are going to try out for it make it and do exceptionally well.

I'm such a nerd, really. Besides YoSHE (TOSHI) I'm the only person I know that has an adrenaline rush whenever I see a polyatomic Ion, organic compound, or functional group that I can correctly identify. Even more so, I'm admitting it...

Since I'm getting closer to the magical age, 15.5 (where EVERYONE suddenly matures mentally, has the responsibility for their life, and an I.Q. high enough to make educated decisions; according to the DMV/State) where I can start Driving School or take an on-line class, here is a related video showing that not everyone has a high enough I.Q. to apply educated decisions (in this case, common sense). Things to remember; use the parking break, have patience, or THINK!

All right, I'm done for today... A nectarine has my name on it. This will be the first nectarine I have ever eaten, besides the free sample I tried that made we want to buy them in the first place. I still have to side with pineapples and pears as my favorite fruits though...

~Josh~

Happy Labor Day

2007-09-03T17:03:00.000-07:00

For some strange reason I now associate Labor Day with Chemistry... I especially like that reference sheet that Ms. Hutch gave us. That two-sided one, "The Periodic Table and Common Ions List." It's makes life as I know it so much easier.

I apologize in advance for the lack of pictures, I should have taken my camera to the AV fair ...my bad.

The AV Fair ran throughout the course of the last two weeks. I went on Saturday, along with the family and some of my sister's friends. We left at around 3:50, and on the way there we saw a pretty spectacular sight; a funnel cloud, mini-twister, call it whatever you wish. I hear it took out some power and dealt some decent damage over in Rosamond. From the time we got there till about 6:00 I didn't do much. I just walked around the fair, visited the art buildings, ate tacos, and visited the llamas and goats. Apparently I just missed Mr. McQ's daughter's pig ...Darn. I did however see a goat get away from his cell...I mean cage, man do those suckers run fast.

At around 6:10 I started my trolley duty. My parents left (said they would be back at 9:30) and my sister and her friends stayed at the fair hitting the rides, walking around, having a life unlike me, etc. At first I was nervous, After hearing some horror stories like I did you would be too, but it actually wasn't that bad. I was kind of hoping to see a drunk person undergo the American legal system. Clark taught me what to do and what to say, in some cases though- what not to say. Clark's brother-in-law seemed pretty happy the entire time, I could learn a thing or two from him. Basically, I TRIED to talk to people, answer their questions, make sure they didn't try to jump off the trolley, and help bring their strollers onto the trolley. I also had the privilege of helping a disorientated old lady find her silver-Honda, or was it a grey-Toyoda, no wait, a gold-Saturn. I had a semi-uncontrollable fit of laughter when our trolley flung a rock at this Bi-polar lady's leg. Overall though, I had a good time on that trolley.

School is going well, I have a set routine, and now I can prioritize my time to the fullest. I now know which teachers are funny, and which I should or shouldn't participate in class debates with. My classes are going fairly smooth as well, and this includes the Clarinet Choir which I am now officially registered for. Our Q.H.H.S. section has diminished to a mere three, but all is well. I know who to sit by and who to avoid. The music selection we have is quite nice. One of my favorites has to be the Gypsy Dance from Carmen.

Our first football game is this Friday. Our uniforms aren't ready yet (seems kind of hard when just two people have to do it all), so it looks like were gonna wear our band shirts and jeans. I have a good feeling knowing that the field show (however much we can accomplish in two practices) will look pretty cool by Friday. I'm also in the Pep Band, and as ShHeenBa so wonderfully stated it, 'Pep band is the essence of purpose.' To that statement I say, in a certain English teacher's typical diction, 'define purpose.' What teacher comes to mind, Sheena? If you need a hint, it's one who likes cloths, or rather, a lack thereof. If you can't guess it may be that I'm lacking (a) clarity, (b) precision, (c)accuracy, (d) relevance, (e) breadth, (f) depth. If I'm annoying you now feel free to CENSOR my ranting... In all seriousness though, I'm sorry if that annoyed you.

What's the deal with all these natural disaster's happening all over the world? (rhetorical question) Mother Nature must hate us, whose to blame? Stop global warming! Conserve water for your future generations! Boycott McDonald's! Don't forget there are soldiers dying for you every day! ...Good job Bush...

Necesito estudiar las nacionalidades y pronombres reflexivos para el examen de español mañana. Or maybe I should attempt Chemistry Ch.22... Have a happy week everyone.

~Josh~

Various sophomore paraphernalia

2007-08-26T14:39:00.000-07:00

Yes, the much dreaded (or is it celebrated) year finally commenced two weeks ago (13 August).

My schedule for this year is as follows:

1) English 10 Pre-IB
2) Symphonic band
-- Break
3) World History Pre- IB
-- lunch A
4) Chemistry AP/Pre- IB
5) Algebra II/Trig Honors
6) Spanish II Pre- IB
7) Marching band (P.E. Drill)

Comments:

- Our English was in RM.313, but because of the English fiasco, we now have Mr.Thibault in RM. *109*. He's pretty cool, but creepy.
- I was looking forward to having class with three particular people (our section leader and the two trumpet section leaders. Only one of them is it in now (the female trumpet SL).
- World History with Mr. Mathey is completely awesome. Just having him as a teacher makes the walk to V.6 bearable. I'm in his banana period, and apparently there's a fine line between a sugary-soft banana, and a rotten one...
- I have lunch A, next semester it will switch to lunch B along with everyone else that is currently in lunch A. I like most of the people in it, but it's nowhere near as quiet as last year... plus Nithya and Korean aren't with Sheena and I, It kinda sucks...
- Chemistry is an intense class, but at least I have Ms. Hutch for it. I will still have to push myself for this class though. Tiffany is our class TA (well one of them), so that's pretty cool.
- Alg.II/Trig isn't all that bad, yet... most of the people in the class are annoying though. Mrs. Shy is a great teacher, but I was sorta looking forward to having Mr. Lenaway.
- Spanish II with Senora Reyes is decent. At least it's not Mr. Ostler... The class is at the very back of the village (V8). Senora Reyes only talks about 10% English throughout the period, but I guess it's good because it will help us learn faster. I will try to actually talk in this class because I can't help but feel sorry for Senora Reyes' hard life...
- Marching band is pretty cool and I really like my spot. I guess I've been lucky to have tremendously amazing spots for both of my years in band.

As if my day isn't busy enough, I'm trying pep band (although I was told underclassmen aren't allowed to join). We have to sing in it. Great... Plus I joined clarinet choir at the college. It's a pretty fun class, and I know about five other people in it. There's this one guy who said he was old enough to be our grandfather... Forget what I sad about Mr.Thibault, now this guy's creepy!
Aside from those two things I want to: Try out for District Honor Band, Perform at Solo & Ensemble Festival, and Take the AP Chemistry exam.

So the Antelope Valley Fair parade was on Saturday. It was pretty cool to go there and see some of my old buddies from middle school that now attend different high schools. It was incredibly easier this year to stay on tempo and and on phase, Apparently as the years go by it comes more naturally for people... Overall though, our combined march sucked. the school behind us was playing a different rhythm, and people had a serious problem guiding... oh well. This Saturday, I have a trolley shift for the AV Fair, so I hope that it all goes well...

I think the LA Dodgers are playing the Mets tonight. I should probably be a loyal fan and watch them, but then again... Maybe some other time this week (except Thursday when they don't have one, at least I think). I haven't been to one of their live games in a while... *Insert at 4:45 P.M.* My dad just bought me a new LA Dodger's hat, it looks pretty dang awesome. By the way Sheena (if/when you read this) it's not shiny like yours...

For lack of anything better to say... ¡Viva México! ...Woo!

Is it me, or are there no good movies coming out?! It's been like a month since something worthy of notation came out! Whatever way I look at all of the recent ones, The Invasion, Superbad, The Simpson's movie, Transformers, Hairspray, etc.; They all seem, uh, STUPID! I did think Rush Hour 3 and the Bourne Ultimatum, although not amazing, were pretty decent.

I recently saw on the news (although I can't find it anywhere in the computer, maybe I didn't check hard enough) that the indication, "Made in China" is more commonly viewed as a warning sign than an indication depicting a place of origin. How great, huh? My rubber duck-y "Wendy" was "Made in China" but I haven't witnessed him spontaneously explode, yet...

Phobia of the week: Phobophobia

Philia of the year: Ailurophilic

Aww crap, tomorrow's Monday. Miserable, miserable, Monday. Oh well, I have a good-gut- feeling that this week will not contain surprise essays or loads of homework, probably just pop quizzes and tests. Well, I'm off to start reading Fahrenheit 451. Hopefully you all can manage to have a decently happy week.

~Josh~

Band Camp '07

2007-08-12T14:39:00.000-07:00

My second year of it has finally come and gone.

This year's band camp was, what's the word, oh yeah, "spiffy". I was amazed at how quickly the semi-forgotten maneuvers came back, and "came back" they did. It was so much easier this year! The field show was atrocious at first, but at the end of the week we finally got the first set to look like an arc-y thing, which is what it's supposed to look like. I'm pretty sure that we can eventually do the entire field show pretty decently.

As for our new clarinet freshies, we have four of them ...all girls. Two of them happen to be social, and the other two are fairly quiet. I hope they have a good year with all of us weirdos and nerds (sorry if that offends any of you) in band, or at least I hope they like their new life... So our new clarinet family now consists of about 18-20 people.

The sectionals were pretty swell as well. The only thing I will complain about is the uncomfortable sitting positions we were in (sitting on top of a desk for about three hours is not fun). It's a good thing we were able to stand up and play if we wanted. Our professional instructor this year was Dr. Price. He's a funny bloke and I'm looking forward to joining his Clarinet Choir.

The water fight, yes... Good times. I had fun, got decently soaked, and no major injuries to report. I can't help but feel sorry for a certain someone though (If you read this, do I have permission to use your name next time?)... He got soaked from head to toe, pelted by a water balloon with great aim, plus he had a horrible spot for the sectional that afternoon. What a nice way to end your final band camp ever...

After coming home from registration the Thursday before band camp (2nd August), I found Caleb with a piece of cactus stuck on his fur. I think that Caleb was coming home after his morning stroll around the neighborhood when a dog or something startled him, so Caleb clumsily ran into a cactus plant while trying to escape the startling catalyst. For those of you who care, Caleb was not hurt during the cactus removal process. We (as in my mom and I) simply used tweezers and plucked the cactus stub off of him. Next we gave him a bath (technically we just used these moist cat-cloths, a bath would've been a tad impossible) to rid him of the little spikes that the cactus is commonly known to have. After Caleb was bathed and brushed, my mom and I ended up getting some cactus spikes in our hands. Chewed gum works exceptionally well to remove those little suckers when those darn tweezers don't. As my mom so wonderfully stated it, "[Caleb] tiene el nopal pintado." He's got the cactus painted onto him. In other words, "he's a Mexican and can't hide it." You gotta love the Prime Minister of Mexico...

The clarinet section, well about eight of us, hit Panera Bread last Thursday (9th August). From what I can remember we all had pizza, and each pizza was split between two people. Then we (carefully) crossed the street to Baskin Robins, even though only two of the people in our group actually got ice cream. The two people (I won't use their names, or any one's name unless I have their permission) ate their ice cream outside on the benches while the rest of us stood there by them and "socialized". I came across a coupon for a "FUNCTIONAL Smoothie" for Jamba Juice while we were there, I had a great laugh about it, but now I'm up to try one of those things. I love Jamba Juice...

All in all I had a nice week. It was a pretty nice way to wrap up my summer. I hope you all had a nice summer too, and I'll see you all (again) tomorrow. I'm off to enjoy my remaining hours of summer...

~Josh~

The new look ...I think

2007-08-01T19:34:00.000-07:00

This is the new look of my blog... I hope you all like it. It was fairly easy to make; I just used shades of blue, green and white/black. Making the colors match proved to be the most challenging aspect of renovating my blog, and I'm not entirely sure if they do indeed match. Still not completely done upgrading my blog, so some things may change slightly... or not.

What do you all think? Anything I should change/modify? The name (and overall color scheme) for example... any suggestions?

I think that covers most of it then. Thanks for taking the time to help improve my blog.

~Josh~

Lifelines don't always work out so well...

2007-07-30T13:17:00.000-07:00

Nothing exceedingly special or of significant importance has happened these last few weeks, so I'll keep this fairly short.

Magic Mountain... I've been there twice since my last update. I managed to go on every major roller coaster at least once. Not that you would find this information pertinent, but regardless, here is a list that shows the frequency of times I rode each roller coaster (not including water rides or other rides):

Scream!-- 6 times
Goliath-- 5 times
Colossus-- 4 times

The Riddler's Revenge-- 3 times

Deja Vu-- 3 times

Batman-- 2 times

Tatsu-- 2 times

X-- 2 times

Revolution-- 2 times

Gold Rusher-- 2 times

Viper-- 2 times. Only received two bruises!

Ninja-- 2 times. Pretty boring in my opinion.
Superman-- 1 time. Happy to report that my feet weren't severed off of my body...

That's pretty much it, though I may be forgetting something. Oh well...

I never got the chance to help my dad around the office. I guess that's okay though, so long as I will still be able to take some CPR classes (my dad will probably start pushing for that even more when the time comes). My winter break is going to be be eventful. Driving school, CPR classes, and Texas/Mexico.

Yesterday some family friends came over for a visit. They brought over a Key-lime pie, and some various pie recipes. Hmm, Maybe I should take a shot at baking... Don't worry, I won't burn down my house!

I finished my summer reading, along with my "semi-thorough" notes. So all I have to do now is go to registration (this Thursday), get my backpack all ready and then I'm set for school to start.

On a scarier note, our "neighbors" (technically they aren't our neighbors, but my dad knows them) were robbed! It was pretty creepy to find out about that, but it just goes to show you that no matter where you live, you can potentially be robbed/vandalized; so you'd best be careful.

Here's yet another clip from X-Play. This one is making fun of Lifeline which is a game for the PS2, Lifeline is unique because it uses a headset instead of the control. Basically, you just communicate to the main character what it is that you want them to do (whether it be run, jump, shoot, dodge, etc.) via the headset instead of controlling her movements with the Dualshock2 controller. I myself don't have this game, and I don't have the slightest desire to either. Whatever the case I had a good laugh at this clip, so hopefully you do too...

Well, I'm off to enjoy my remaining days of summer vacation. See you guys at band camp!

~Josh~

Adrenaline, and torture...

2007-07-17T12:20:00.000-07:00

Seeing as I haven't had an official update since 25 June, I'll try and sum up my life these last few weeks...

Not too long ago, I saw Sicko with my family. While I shouldn't express my personal opinions of America's health care system, I will say that the movie was, ..."eye-opening"

My sister wants to marry a Canadian now though, and I guess if that floats her boat she can go on ahead. By the way, she was kidding...

Last week my Aunt Trisha, Uncle Mike, and my two cousins came over. I had a fun time with them, what with all the "family time" and such. We talked, swam, and they even made me play my clarinet for them, how great...

Skipping last Wednesday ( see previous post) and going to Thursday, I went to Magic Mountain! It was definitely a fun and happy day. We (three of my middle school friends and myself) hit almost all the major rides. First was X, then Log Jammer, Goliath, Scream, Colossus, Tatsu, Deja-Vu, The Riddler's Revenge, Batman, Tidal wave, Revolution, and then repeats of some of them. I was fortunate enough to come on a day when Deja-Vu was open. The longest we waited was over an hour for our first ride. Luckily though, all the others were extremely short, not being more than 20 minutes of a wait! Even Tatsu, Usually a two hour wait, was only five minutes for us! We also met these interesting Canadian people who had "fire-colored" hair. Go Canadians, woo!

Oh and speaking of six flags, I'm going again this Friday! It seems as though I can't get enough of the twisting, flipping, cork-screwing, and inverting (Uh, what are you thinking?) But as I have stated before, I hate the park, and I only like riding the roller coasters.

Other than that, I have been having a fairly busy summer. I'm planning to go help my dad around the office sometime this month. I get to call in patients, file away random stuff, and I might even be able to take blood pressure readings/vitals. He also wants me to take a class (next year sometime) so I can learn the proper technique of CPR and Basic Life Support. Does AVC have that or should I try the American Heart Association website?

In case you were wondering, I'm doing great with my summer reading. I'm currently on my second book and I've been taking semi-thorough notes. As for my video games, well I've managed to play some. I could always stay up an hour later at night so I can play more, but I happen to like my sleep. let's see... Oh yeah, swimming. I go almost every day and my hair isn't changing colors like it used to! Won't Nithya be happy...

Panera Bread, sometime this month. Nithya wants me to pass the word on to Sheena and various other people. I still don't have the details so if you want to, feel free to contact her (if have a way to contact her).

My new blog layout... I only experimented once as of now. I got a few good ideas but I could use some more opinions (I only have two opinions right now). I'm planning to put up my new layout and such by the time school starts.

This is what I consider to be a clip of the week, but first I should explain a bit. X-play is a television show that only shows on a station accessible to those with a satellite dish. We have cable so we can't see it, but I saw some episodes at my friend's house. The show basically reviews games and game paraphernalia. If the game is bad, it gets made fun of. If the game is good, they (the hosts of the show) still manage to make fun of it. The humor is somewhat retarded, but it manages to make me laugh sometimes. I will show you one of my favorite clips from X-play, where Morgan tests the endurance/tolerance a PS2, X-Box, and a Game Cube (Morgan is one of the hosts of the show). Well, I can't actually show it to you, because I don't know how to post videos, so just click the link...

I find the final result unsettling, because I have a PS2... but I also have a Game Cube, so I guess it's good to know that if I accidentally drop it or send it flying with a sledgehammer it would still work...

By the way, These people do these things because they are paid to, I'm amazed that stupid people think they should try destroying things because they, "saw it on T.V." If you would look at the sidebar when you click the link you can see some other videos of random people destroying perfectly good game systems ...case and point...

I wonder though if Morgan Webb will do that again but with a PS3, X-box 360, and a Wii. Needless to say, you'd have to be "Wiitarded" (stupid pun, I'm sorry) to destroy a Wii or a PS3.

Well, I'm off to Cosco. I love that place... Hopefully you all like that retarded video and I've got another one coming soon... Have a happy week!

~Josh~

R.I.P. Pierre Cardone

2007-07-11T15:48:00.000-07:00

As some of you already know, well... I love cats, just being in their glorious (living) feline presence brightens up my day. I got this love for animals from my parents, who have always been animal lovers themselves.

We had three cats, well two days ago we did... Pierre Cardone, Caleb Caboodle, and Chloe Chloessa. Pierre has lived a happy life with us these last 6 years, and just one year ago we got Caleb and Chloe. It was rough at first because you could easily spot that Pierre was well, jealous. However once Caleb and Chloe got a litter older and more independent, the three of them became inseparable friends (well from what we saw when they were in each other's company). I always remember letting Pierre out so he could "do his business" (he was an outdoor cat) at around 6:00 every night. Most of all though, I remember Pierre's ability to avoid hazardous situations that would've put his life in danger. He was an intelligent cat, enough said ...

I shouldn't reveal my private residence but, we live relatively near this place- The Prime Desert Woodland Reserve. And as some of you should know various animals call that place home, such as coyotes, owls, and other ...predators. Recently there's been construction around that area, causing the habitat to get smaller. This forces the predators to go to different places in search of, well ...food (so says my dad, I believe him though).

Two nights ago after we rounded up our cats inside and locked up house, we went to bed... but somehow Pierre managed to get outside, maybe because he had to "do his business." When my dad got the paper that morning (6:00 A.M.) he noticed... dismembered paws, fur, and blood... (ugh I'm shaking now, and if you haven't figured it out yet, keep reading). My dad went into the street and saw more fur, a spine, and a colon (we never saw the head). That night he told us the news that Pierre had been, ...killed. My dad assumed it was a coyote, I agree with him now, but at first I thought it was a stupid teenager, or maybe it wasn't even Pierre, because there were other cats that resembled Pierre.

Next we went outside to pay our final respects to little Pierre (not a funeral because we didn't have his entire body). After our final words words, I looked around the front yard trying to see sings of a struggle, because I know Pierre was smarter that that; he was street-wise and he knew his way around the neighborhood, he was smarter than to just sit there while being killed!
Towards a patch of grass (about 30 feet from the front door) I saw, his little pink stomach complete with esophagus and duodenum completely intact (there were ants on it though). I immediately pictured exactly what happened last night, and here's what I think did. Pierre was sitting on the grass when a coyote got him from his head, which is why we didn't hear the screams. But wouldn't have Pierre seen the coyote if it was right in front of him?! ...I'd rather not write the rest of my theory because it's pretty gruesome. I'm pretty sure you get the point though.

Pierre was my very first pet that had been killed. All of our other ones lived long, eventful lives and died of old age. It makes me feel bad because I can just picture the fear Pierre must have endured. I feel horrible that his life had to end that way...

I realize now that it wasn't our fault because there was nothing we could have done. I can remember my mom telling me the saying, "you don't know what you've got got until it's gone" when I was younger. I would always say stuff like, "yeah, yeah I know, I know!" But even if you think you do, truth is you really don't, until it is gone- forever.

I wish I was nice(er) to Pierre because I can remember always telling him to quiet down when his meowing got real loud at night (he was by far our loudest cat that chose to be loud at inconvenient times).

I guess it's a good thing that I'm not too sad about this whole experience, in fact it taught me to take better care of the cats we have left. I think that posting about this experience is my own way of giving my final respects to Pierre. So to my friends out there, no need to worry because I'm fine. In fact I'm going to have a nice day tomorrow at six flags the amusement park. I like the amusement (only the rides) but I hate the park. oh well...

~Josh~

For Pierre on behalf of my family and I -
Thank you for the wonderful moments you blessed us with and we could only hope that you enjoyed your six (cat years 54?) years of life with us as much as we enjoyed our six with you. . .

~The Klings~

Happy (belated) 4th

2007-07-05T14:51:00.000-07:00

I'm hoping everyone had an awesome day being patriotic and eating "American" food. If not, then I would at least hope you all had a nice "family day".

I saw the fireworks show at the Jet Hawks game, and they were a spectacular sight to behold (like always).

It's been pretty hectic in my life the last week, which for some reason isn't all that bad. I'll try to post up a complete post of happenings in my life ...soon.

Still haven't found my new blog layout, actually I haven't even experimented with it yet. Like I said, It's been pretty hectic. I'm still open up to opinions as to what colors it should be.

~Josh~

Renovations and revisions

2007-06-29T11:13:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking of changing the template/layout of my blog. To be honest, the only reason why I chose this "Harbor" template was because it reminded me of Maine with the lighthouse and all (which I like, because Maine is an awesome state). I like this template, but when you scroll down it's all plain and white (which is boring).

I'm thinking of getting a "Rounders" template and then altering the colors so that:
A) The central colors are red, white, and green (hmm, sounds oddly familiar...)
B) The central colors are blues, greens, and black/greys (dark-ish colors)

So just keep in mind that if one day you come to my blog, and it looks completely different, then you probably will have come at a time when I will be experimenting with layouts and colors. I will post when I get my new and hopefully permanent layout.

Feedback and/or suggestions would be greatly appreciated and graciously accepted...

On an unrelated note, the iPhone comes out today. I'm not getting one and I don't really have a desire to. My cousin (Alik [27]) is getting his own nifty little iPhone because he's a connoisseur of technical gadgets and such. Hopefully sometime soon, when/if he comes to visit us sometime, I can check it out.

By the way, does anyone know how to post up videos from let's say... YouTube? I don't want to post up a link, but rather, a video for you all to see.

~Josh~

Acts of Random Kindness ...(ARK)

2007-06-25T16:15:00.000-07:00

Here is that second synopsis that I promised to put up a while ago...

Tales of the Abyss

First off, I think the Japanese are diligent, studious, and awesome people! Every great RPG has been, and will probably continue to be, created in Japan.

While ToA's graphics and overall quality can't compare to FFXII's, ToA has some special qualities that make it a worthwhile game to play... this is the cast of characters. While they are not as detailed as the traditional Anime (ish) RPG, all six of them, be it you like them or not; always manage to thoroughly entertain you no matter what is that makes you crack a smile...

Summary: ToA is basically about a spoiled young noble who, since his kidnapping seven years ago (*after the kidnapping he lost his entire memory of EVERYTHING that ever happened to him in his first ten years of life*), has been confined in his manor with nothing but the art of swordsmanship to occupy his life. Luke [17] is arrogant, snobbish, condescending, and patronizing, plus he never thinks before he speaks. He will undoubtedly annoy you (he definitely annoyed me). One day Luke gets thrown out into the cold, harsh, outside world. He is forced to learn the workings of the world around him, he does have help from the other characters though.
One day, Luke gets deceived by the person he trusts most... he accidentally demolishes a city causing the death of thousands of people. Most of the other characters leave Luke because the destruction of the city was the final straw, they lose all trust that had with him. Luke is now virtually alone... He must learn the true meaning of rebirth, in order to change the way he is... (corny, huh? I'm leaving out a whole bunch of stuff though, it's easier to play for yourself and see...)

What's good about ToA:

The Character's conversations that they have with each other, priceless... enough said.
Guy [21]... He's apparently a womanizer, but he's afraid of them. (I'm still confused myself...)
Anise [13]... She likes to tease the guys, she sometimes flirts with guy... She's one the main contributors as to why this game is amusing.
Jade [35], he's funny in a weird way. I like his sense of sarcasm...
How you can chain attacks and muster up some massive combos.
The opening theme song. It's different but by far the coolest one to date in the Tales of " " series.
Karma (Japanese version and in my opinion the cooler one) & Meaning of Rebirth (English version) They're the exact same, but the Japanese version has lyrics... It's kind of funny, and cool, hearing Japanese singing. I like the guitar licks...

Here's what I consider to be the moral(s) and/or lessons to be learned from the story:

Only by taking the more difficult path in life will you learn how capable you truly are; how to walk on your own two feet.
The meaning of rebirth, change, is not easy to come by. Only by loosing almost everything you were will you finally be able to change; if you change for the better, you will have help by the people who matter most...

To wrap it up, I would NOT get this game if you're looking for an action packed RPG or a game that has a "deep" and interesting storyline/plot. This is basically a fun game that is intended to make you laugh and to provide an interesting story with mild-difficulty on the battles along the way.

-End of synopsis-

Last Friday I saw Evan Almighty with five other soon-to-be Sophomores (from band, of course). It was an okay movie. But here's the creepy part (unrelated to the actual movie)... Sarah and I saw this man who was odd to say the least, I think he had a problem (I'm not joking). He kept telling us to go to arkalmighty.org or something like that... he told us this about seven times total. Then he told us to go on the website quickly because by September 22, everything will be gone; in the movie September 22 is the day of the flood... Coincidence? I think not... I do think that he was an affiliate of the movie, but now I'll never be sure...

On Saturday morning my family and I saw Barnum at AVC under the big red circus tent. It was actually very good, and I'm glad I went to see it. I can't reveal too much, but we sorta got special treatment because my dad knows Mr. Branner, who plays the main character (P.T. Barnum) and is the director of the play.

I've been working on cleaning my room up, as of now I removed all the extra junk that I no longer need and I thoroughly cleaned it (I kept stuff of sentimental value though). My room is bare, and I actually like it, but I hope to get some posters of clarinets or anything that would scream, "Band Nerd"...

There's going to be a full band rehearsal tomorrow, and I'm really looking forward to that...

This site is wonderful. I can't get enough of it, maybe you can't either. It's basically a site dedicated to clarinets (and other instruments as well) who like to play Final Fantasy sheet music. Just give it a try, some of the pieces are actually challenging (ahem, One Winged Angel) but that makes them sound all the more fulfilling. I enjoy playing the Chocobo theme song, it's quite catchy. I pretty much have all the songs playable for clarinet in one of my music binders on my desk. I wonder if any of these songs can be considered appropriate for Solo & Ensemble Festival...

That's it for today, I'm off to enjoy a nice swim in our -what is now currently an eighty-two degree- pool. ...Nice...

~Josh~

My summer agenda ...And a synopsis or two

2007-06-19T16:48:00.000-07:00

Just recently my birthday passed, and I got a lot of cool stuff. Whether it was the Hawaiian vacation, the numerous articles of clothing, the opportunity to redecorate my room, and to cap it all off… a brand new clarinet! As of now I still haven’t chosen a clarinet yet, but I have my eyes on a select few. These include: the RC Prestige, the Opus II, the Concerto II, the R13 Prestige, the Vintage, and the Festival. I’m leaning toward the RC Prestige as of now, because I like its "crisply radiant" sound and the resonance it creates when played...

Over the course of the next two months or so, I will be enjoying life to the fullest. This means summer reading, swimming, playing video games, and feeding/giving attention to my cats.

I wanted to take a class for summer school, for lack of better things to do... My original intention was to take World History, but this "hope" was cut short when I was told that it was impossible by the obviously intelligent (sarcasm) counselors at my high school. Then I was recommended by some highly trustworthy (not sarcasm) people to take Spanish 2 at AVC, so I wouldn't have to see Mr.Ostler's face all next year. This second plan never worked out. Maybe that was for the best because it seems pretty hard to cram an entire year's worth of foreign language into your brain in just one summer... That is, if you can call a year's worth of Spanish with Mr.Ostler a learning experience.

Some of my friends are taking summer school though, which is good, so maybe they can teach me some stuff to keep me occupied. Sheena (sHHeenBVA) will be teaching me the things she learns about in her Fundamentals of Music class. I've always enjoyed learning musical theory so, naturally, I'm looking forward to this. Ultimately, I'm going to advance my title as a Band Extremist. We'll see how this goes...

Yesterday I went bowling with some friends/family (Do I have permission to call you guys that?) from band. We played a grand total of 2 games each and there was a grand total of 12 people, including myself. Banana Chips are very good, not good-tasting mind you, but good for the body. I bowled crappily-mediocre (at least I tried)... I won my first game (96), and got second place on the next (124). Oh, and I almost got a turkey... Overall, I had a really fun time, I enjoyed the company and acknowledgement from the people, and if they want to, I would really enjoy to do it again sometime.

Okay, well I'm done posting about happenings in my life now... here are some synopsises/opinions about the two video games I am hoping to complete during summer.
1) Final Fantasy XII (FFXII) for the PS2, an RPG made by Square Enix (which is a trademarked company).
This game is superb, in just so many aspects that I just don't know where to begin...
First off, this game never got the spotlight it really deserved. This is because around the time of release for FFXII people were excited for the release of the Wii or the PS3.

FFXII is about an orphaned bloke (Vann [17]) who has a tough life. He is a child of the streets, and a leader of a sub-culture of orphans who roam the Ghettos (slums) of Rabanastre. Meanwhile, a mighty war rages on between the Archadian Empire and Dalmasca. This war was what killed Vann's brother (he lost his parents to a plague). Vann dreams of freedom, of escape, he sees this freedom in the skies... he wants to become a sky pirate. One day Vann decides to steal a treasure from the royal palace, little does Vann know that this incident puts him in a clasp of destiny that no one could forsee.

"It is a destiny that includes an exhilarating adventure in the company of Sky pirates, a princess, and a great fallen Knight of the Order. As such the story begins..." - FFXII guide book-

here are some reasons why FFXII is one the best games I've ever played. I'll try to keep this short...

The Graphics are top-notch and the people look nearly real.
The new concept of MIST ATTACKS, which engage devastating damage on the opposition.
The ZODIAC SPEAR, strongest weapon to date in the series. An attack power of +150!
There's a whole bunch of side quests that you can do, just in case they main storyline is staring to wear you out.
You can spend a long time grinding (leveling up) your characters.
The birds talk?! (I found this reason on a website, haven't checked to see if it's legitimate yet...)
The scenery is breath-taking, I would say comparable to Hawaii... (except Hawaii is real) you can go from an arid, vegetation-deficient desert to a lush, vast, and seemingly endless cliff-side beach.
Espers! These are the summon creatures, they are spectacular, and nowhere near as lame as a pikachu. These towering titans, if you keep them alive in battle long enough, will eventually become apocalyptic and ignite their master attack (which gets it's own cut-scene).

Good stuff...

Well I guess that's it for now... I really should do a synopsis for my other game, but quite frankly, I am too tired right now. I will procrastinate on that other synopsis, and let the information I just gave you on FFXII to percolate inside your brains...

I am gonna take a nap, swim, eat, and then sleep again... because that's what summer is for...

~Josh~

Random Hawaii pics.

2007-06-12T18:22:00.000-07:00

1) View of a black-sand beach. Somewhere in Maui, The Road to Hana.

2) A cascading waterfall. Somewhere in Maui, The Road to Hana.

3) A random store with, as you may have guessed, stupid stuff...

4) View of Waikiki Beach from our hotel.

5) A Filipino Pineapple, grown here at the DOLE plantation in Oahu, Hawaii.

Sorry it took a while to get some pictures posted.

Oh, and remember, patience is a necessity, virtue, and key factor that you should have in your life... Imagine how better our would could be if some people could learn how to properly use patience.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

-Galatians 5: 22-23-

~Josh~

Sun, ocean, rain, tropics, oh, and pineapples. My Hawaiian experience...

2007-06-11T13:40:00.000-07:00

Hawaii, The Aloha State, was amazing. While I could rant about how much fun I had, how beautiful it was, and how I would recommend everyone to go to Hawaii, I'd rather not. Just in case you were wondering though, In Oahu we stayed at a ResortQuest hotel in Waikiki beach, Honolulu. In Maui, we also stayed at a ResortQuest hotel but this one was in Ka'a'napali shores.

If you are a friend/person I know, and NOT a stranger/person I don't know, then feel free to approach me and inquire about my trip to Hawaii. If I happen to have my camera I will show you the pictures taken...

What I enjoyed about my vacation: the green landscape, the beautiful scenery, how it rained about every day (not too long though), the friendly people (for the most part), the clear waters, the fact that I gained 3 hours due to the time zone, The fact that I saw 2 sea turtles while I was snorkeling, the para sailing, pineapples, The dangerous trek to Hana (the road to Hana), the Humuhumunukunukuapua'a fish I saw while snorkeling, PLACEMATS (just ask Iamee), and other various things that I probably can't remember as of right now...

What I disliked about my vacation: accidentally getting saltwater into my eye while wearing my contacts. Getting lost because in Hawaii the locals and almost everyone who lives there don't call the roads/highways by their number, but instead, a rather lengthy Hawaiian word. Trying to watch News to learn about Hawaiian stuff, But all that could be viewed was information on Stupid paris hilton and her jail incident... (I should cut off my hands because I had to type her name...)

*Insert picture here* for some reason I am having technical difficulties uploading a few of my pictures... so I think I'll try again later. I apologize if you were expecting some scenic pictures.

~Josh~

That was quick, I'm not a freshman anymore....

2007-05-30T14:49:00.000-07:00

Well, now that the end of the school year has come and gone, I decided that I should get a life ... I mean... start a blog.

This year's field show was based off the movie, The Mask of Zorro and I really enjoyed playing it. Marching Band (Concert Band too... I guess) were fun experiences, and next year will be even better seeing as our field show is from Disney (Fantasmic!).
By the way, I plan on never quitting band...

I finally completed my freshman year of high school and surprisingly it was so much easier than what I originally expected. I made many good choices such as, choosing to abstain from drugs, joining band, joining *PRE* IB, and various other ones as well. However, that's not to say I didn't make bad choices also... I didn't take Healthful Living over the summer, and I didn't keep in touch with my middle school friends as well as I would've liked, oh and some of my teachers were crazy and not in a good way (Ms.Thomas, Mrs. Black, and Velaquisha/Victoria Sodenine).
Thanks to all of you (and you know who you are) who befriended me... and cared about/aknowledged my existence.

So right when school lets out for the year this Friday, My family and I are going to enjoy a much needed vacation to... Hawaii! To be exact, Oahu and Maui! This will be my first time ever going to Hawaii, so I'm pretty psyched. While I don't particularly care much for planes, or riding in them, I will just think ahead to the fun time I will hopefully have. We are at Hawaii for a little bit over a week, June 2nd to June 11th. We plan on doing a variety of activities there. These include, a Luau, snorkeling, para sailing, sleeping, and swimming.

I think this is the Hotel we will NOT be staying at

Wishful thinking...

I will be taking pics. of Hawaii so I will try to post them up when I come back. Well I hope everyone has a wonderful rest of the week, and a great first week of summer vacation.

~Josh~

Josh's Junction

Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head

Everywhere I go, The more I See The Less I Know

T-Minus 7 Days...

University of Southern California

Happy Easter 2010

Nothing is Coincidence

Full Force

WOW...

Bienvenidos a la Tierra de Tortillas

Happy (Belated) Day of Pi

Important Things

Ouch

Semester Two

Put That Hat Back On

We're Live from Pasadena! (Again)

Happy Christmas...

I Hate Snow

In the Presence of Greatness

What Built-In Microphone?

Happy Halloween

What's that...?

Happy 35th Amá (mom)

Go World

And Life Goes On

The Idiot Test

How stuff works

5.4 Earthquake shakes Southern California

Update & WASP

Happy 4th

Zip, zoom, whoosh

Family, birthdays, and technology

Halfway There Ya'll

Yes? ... No? ...

It's the home stretch now folks

The windy/second city- Chicago

Chicago, blackjack, chemicals, and blistery burns

Tis About Time...

Aye/Eh! (*Canadian- like*)

Yay for Clark!

Freeways, Brachiosaurs, Echoes and Portals

An "Adventure" in California

Music Week(s)

I'm back

Alas, winter has arrived

Happy Thanksgiving (Turkey and/or Ham) Day

Photons, Electromagnetic Radiation, Lambda

Happy Day of the Mole

Galvanized Vestibular Stimulation (G.V.S)

My apologies

Alaska to México!

Yo (insert 2-4 letters of your name here)

Happy Labor Day

Various sophomore paraphernalia

Band Camp '07

The new look ...I think

Lifelines don't always work out so well...

Adrenaline, and torture...

R.I.P. Pierre Cardone

Happy (belated) 4th

Renovations and revisions

Acts of Random Kindness ...(ARK)

My summer agenda ...And a synopsis or two

Random Hawaii pics.

Sun, ocean, rain, tropics, oh, and pineapples. My Hawaiian experience...

That was quick, I'm not a freshman anymore....

Aye/Eh! (Canadian- like)