Currently Playing Credence Clearwater Revival Chronicle By Tom Fogerty, John Fogerty, Stu Cook, Doug Clifford see related

Damn, it’s been three weeks; I doubt I’m going to be able to remember everything.

Two Weekends Ago: State Tournament for Speech and Debate. Brandon and Murray came over the night before it and spent the night. We wrote the cases in about 3 or 4 hours (although we already had all the evidence. We also spent less time actually writing them, as the majority of the 3 to 4 hours was spent playing video games. Our Aff case was written in a grand total of 30 minutes). We finished at 1:30. The next morning we woke up and I drove to Columbia, where I met with Mr. Fober (not our coach, just a teacher who came to be our coach, because Mr. Witt sucks. Our first two matches we won handily against really, really bad teams. We lost both ballots (two judges were in all four rounds, so there were two ballots you could pick up) to Rockhurst in the third round (they went on to get 3^rd place). I was in a real funk at the time, my tiredness had just set in, and I made ridiculous claims like “Wages are not driven by supply and demand,” without giving the reasoning behind it. Our final round was against last year’s national champions. We debated well and ended up splitting the ballots. So, even though we didn’t break on a 5-3, at least we won a ballot against the National Champions (who didn’t break). Ladue A, the team who beat us at state qualifiers didn’t break either. We ended up 10^th place, the top 8 break. We ran the Aff case all four times. My debate career is over. We met up with Witt and then went to our hotel, The Best Value Inn. Shittiest motel imaginable. We saw a DeSmet van in the parking lot, which was very weird. Turns out the Tennis Team was also in town, headed by Mr. Ron Rebore (my Western Civ. Teacher, who I loathe). He (and the entire tennis team) defiantly thought I was high out of my mind. We then went to go see Sin City (I had already seen it, and fell asleep 5 minutes in). Went back to the hotel, Murray and Brandon smoked, and I feel asleep. Brandon did oratory Saturday, and Murray and I just wandered around and hung out with Jeremy. We saw a coach who looks exactly like Tim Curry. McDonalds has awesome ice cream. Brandon ended up getting 2^nd in state, just like we had been telling him he would all weekend, losing to Dan Dorsey, the only Saint Louis kid to get a first place. We went to Taco Bell for lunch/dinner in-between meal, where the Pattonville team also came by. Brandon can’t stand it, because Dorsey is of course, with them. We split up with Witt, and head into town to buy some shampoo to throw on the DeSmet Van. We find out that apparently the Best Value Inn was until two months ago a Super 8 motel. Then a guy was shot and killed there. Lovely. The DeSmet Van was gone by the time we got back, so we didn’t get to put shampoo on the windshield (it’s a harmless prank, it’s just when they try to windshield wiper it off, it only lathers. Which is funny. Almost as funny as when you put a strip of duct tape behind a car before it backs up. When it goes over it, the duct tape wraps around the tire and makes it sound like you have a flat). Drove back to St. Charles, got a pizza, than spent the rest of the night driving around South County, doing absolutely nothing. That was depressing.

One Weekend Ago: Went down to Western’s for Rugby. I got stuck as Room Captain of the room with Kaufman, Van Cleave, and Hinds. I had an insane amount of Subway subs over the course of that trip. Also, I got to eat at the H3 Steakhouse for the third time. Once again, the best food ever. Although since we had an odd number of people who went, I ended up having to share a table with Bob (real name is Will). It looked really gay. As for actual rugby, first game we played Dallas Jesuit and won handily. Second game we played against Dallas Harlequins (the All-Star select team from Dallas). We played with them for ¾ of the game, and scored a penalty kick. But then on the kickoff back to us, rather then let it roll into the try zone for a center scrum, Lascowitz tried to catch it and knocked it on. They had to go like a yard to score. That turned the game. We did neutralize their best player, a U-19 flanker from South Africa. Santiago was to play man defense against him, and he shut him down. The kid stopped picking pretty quick. One time, he broke off the scrum early, Santiago pushed him back, he through a punch, Santiago dodged, put him in a bear hug, and tossed him. Nick Aiello and Billy Hinds also smoked the kid a few times. He was very, very frustrated. There other really good player was negated, due to the fact he was a fly-half and their scrum half was horrible. They scored one last time when we took Santiago out, told Kaufman it was an 8-man pick to his side, and he missed the tackle. I got to play the last 10 minutes or so. They only ran one time to my side, and I played it very well. I was on my man, their fullback ran between my man and the man with the ball, got the ball, and I got off my man, and tackled him. Got up to ruck, and someone smoked me in the head. I staid there, and he fell back clutching his head. Final Score: 14-3. Best game we played that year, best challenge Dallas got all year. I went on to make some really good rucks, but that was it. They went on to blow out Rockhurst in the finals. Rockhurst somehow managed to beat SLUH (and badly at that). So we were going to have that rematch against SLUH for third place (who goes to Nationals, albeit in Tier B). Somehow we played the worst game of our lives. Ever. We lost like 70-30. It was disgusting. 4^th place at Westerns, worst finish in 5 years. My rugby career is now also over. Oh well.

Last Weekend: Went to two Proms, my own and Howell. Mine was on Friday. My AP exam went long because three kids never showed up. I rushed home, changed, and went to go pick up Jewel. We ended up driving to the wrong place, because my school sent out directions to the America’s Center instead of the Ritz Carlton. So we wondered around downtown Saint Louis for about 45 minutes, until another hotel was able to inform us that it was in Clayton. Turns out, they had been announcing that there was a change of directions over the intercom for about 3 weeks, and I had slept through all of them. I did have the new directions though, but I forgot them. I remembered about them about 2 feet away from my driveway, but my mom said that the ones I had were fine, so I didn’t turn around to get them (to be fair, I though they were the same directions and didn’t know I even had any in the car). We drove there, arrived an hour late. Day-Glo. Which was fine, it meant there were no lines for dinner. And we were actually in the top 3 for arriving at our table. Cameron and Loveless actually arrived after us. We ended up sitting at the all black table. Apparently, the 4 black seniors didn’t specify where they wanted to sit, so Matt Blind grouped them all together (a lot of teachers are pissed at him because they see this as racist). And then I got thrown in because Brandon is a debater too. As for dancing, I tried my best the entire time, but I am just not good at it. I blame my self-consciousness and lack of rhythm. It was a lot easier when they were songs I knew. Most of what they played was rap (which I hate), but it was almost o.k., just because it was hilarious to watch Brandon’s date dance. She’s a stereotypical white catholic school girl, but apparently she lives in Normandy, so she knows specific dance moves to every rap song imaginable. It was even funnier when she started to sing along. Not that I have any room to talk, due to the fact I’m monotone. They did end up playing Bon Jovi (You give love a bad name), AC/DC (You shook me all night long), Def Leppard (Pour some sugar on me) Footloose, Shout, Love Shack, YMCA, and they finished off with Meat Loaf (Paradise in the dashboard lights). I was disappointed they didn’t play Wonderful Tonight. Proms should be required to play that. I ended up having a really good time, and I’m glad I ended up going. After prom, we stopped by Ted’s house for the after-party, but nothing was happening, and Jewel needed to get some sleep for the next day, so we headed out early. I dropped her off at her house, she claimed to have a good time as well, despite the fact I couldn’t dance to save my life. Then, I proceeded to go down the most deer-infested highway D ever. I saw a minimum of 12 deer, 3 possums, and 2 raccoons. It was ridiculous. The next day, I decided to go to Howell’s prom, although I didn’t have a ticket. Farmer told me I could buy one at the door if I was from Howell though. So I took my brother’s school I.D. and Jewel agreed to let me walk in with her as her “date” (since Matt is a sophomore, I couldn’t buy one without a senior/junior date). That’s when things began to unravel. I got there and found that you couldn’t buy them at the door, and the people working the table knew Jewel had no date. So I decided to bide my time and make it work. I bought a disposable camera as an excuse as to why I was outside (and because of this, I have a lot of pictures of various people I know who were there). I waited until 8:00 (right after dinner) to go in. I got a ticket from a couple who had left early. My name would still not be on the list however. I found that if you exited prom you got your hand stamped. So I got Alex to rub off some of his stamp onto mine. Turns out, I didn’t need any of that. I just walked right by the admission guard people and they were to busy eating to notice me. Then, I was set. I sat with the group as they announced Prom King and Queen. Fred and Danielle were on court, but they didn’t win. Coolest couple goes to Lisa and Gabe. Lisa was wearing a huge dress that if you twirled really fast in it would do that circle thing you see in movies. Gabe was actually wearing a tux. I agree with everyone else, he looked like he was about to kick someone’s ass. Or, he looked kinda like Travolta from Pulp Fiction and he was about to pull out a .45 and cap someone. Either description worked. Bad Ass. I didn’t really dance at all at Howell’s, due to the fact I had no date, and all the music was rap. I still had a good time talking to a bunch of people I hadn’t seen in years. I didn’t go to any after-parties because I was dead tired, so I just went home. I wanted to go mini-golfing with Farmer and Charlene though, they bought a putter from Walmart, a bag of balls, and played on a closed course. I defiantly had more fun at my prom though.

James: Ok, so James, one of my calmest, least angry friends, is going to be on trial for Assault 2. It all started when he was outside working on his car with a utility knife. His sister and his sister’s boyfriend were both outside as well. James apparently said something to his sister that pissed off the boyfriend. Here is where the accounts differ. James’s sister and her boyfriend say James attacked him. We doubt this however, due to the fact James is not exactly a big guy, or violence prone. The other guy however is. When Dave was drunk off his ass and barely able to walk, sitting at the top of the subdivision, because he had just broke up with his longtime girlfriend, the boyfriend came with 3 other guys and tried to kick the shit out of him. James, Farmer, and Matt had to diffuse the situation and drag his ass back to his house. Well, the boyfriend by James’s account attacked him, and to defend himself against the bigger guy, he started stabbing him with his utility knife. He stabbed him 8 times, and he had to be airlifted to the hospital (although he was released the next day). James was arrested by the cops for implicating himself in the crime. He is now out on bond and has just completed an anger management course (that stuff looks really good when you’re on trial). Now, here’s where it gets weird. James’s sister is 16. Everyone thought her boyfriend was 19. Turns out he had been lying to everyone, and is actually 22 (everyone found this out because of the police report). James’s dad is furious. James’s mom and sister both knew, but didn’t tell him. And they both want him convicted, so James’s mom has been lying to the cops. James’s dad wants him out of jail, and rumor has it they might have to divorce. I’m not sure if they actually will though. James’s dad is also considering pressing statutory rape charges against the boyfriend. That would mean that ironically, if they were both convicted, James would get the lighter sentence. James was on probation at the time of the incident (it would have expired a month later), because he let the air out of a few cars tires with a vine stem clipper, because they kept taking his designated spot at Howell. This would result in them getting in no trouble with the administration, because they did not know who’s cars they were, but he would still get fined for having to park in someone else’s spot. So, he let the air out of the tires, got caught on the third person who took his spot, and was charged with Tampering. This lead to a two year probation. Hopefully, his name is cleared.

Last Week Of School: I don’t feel any different. Its weird, a major stage of my life is over, and I can’t seem to feel any different. I might not make First Honors for the first time ever. I’ve kinda let Senior slide take over this semester. I barely scraped by at quarter, allowing me to get the following awards at our awards assembly: First Honors Every Quarter (all four years), George Washington Carver Award (Top 10% of class), National Something or Other of the President (Don’t be stupid and get at least a 25 on the ACT or something), NHS member, and National Merit Finalist (although I was a step above that).

AP Testing and Finals Week: Wow, a lot harder then last year, probably because I have 4 of them this time and didn’t study at all. I took Physics B, European History, English Literature, and Calculus AB. I don’t think I got any more 5’s, in fact I think I might have gotten as low as a 2. Oh well, doesn’t really matter, cause the classes I would be exempt from would be free anyway. And an easy way to bump up my GPA. I only had to take 2 exams, Western Civilization and Christ and Faith. I doubt I did well on either. I’m now done with school, and waiting for my dad to pick me up. Graduation is next week on Sunday, along with our “Final Fling” Lock-In. My graduation party is Saturday, May 14^th.

Tonight: I just got back from seeing Suburban Legends in concert. It was amazing. What could be better then choreographed dance moves, audience participation, and the most effeminate band in the world. I saw both Todd from debate and Ben at the show. Ben and his girlfriend apparently did a lot of promotion for the show so they got in free. The first band to play was the Monskasities, whom I love. They were really good as usual. They just had a very crappy article about them in Louie. But then again, all articles in Louie suck. They had a guy come out this time and play the Sitar for them, it was wild. The second band, Psycho Dad, I had heard a lot about but never saw. They too, were really, really good. It was there last show ever though. Then came Suburban Legends. They did everything they did at Reel Big Fish and more. Throwing instruments around, flips over each other, chicken fighting with trombones. They also had a lot more new dance moves. They were astounding. At one point they even did that thing where you lean really far to the side (like Alien Ant Farm in Smooth Criminal (which I assume they took from Michael Jackson)). They also fought with their instruments like they were swords, ran around, and sang a cover of “Under The Sea.” I guess being the house band for Disney World and playing over 1000 shows in one year has its perks. They had a lot of audience participation too. They had the spirit fingers thing they always do, a whole lot of jumping around, and a lot of skanking as well (and yes, I did skank like crazy, it’s the one “dance” I can do). The funniest part was when they had everyone in the entire room sit down, counted to three and had everyone jump up and start dancing. It’s only been like 45 minutes and I’m already having trouble remembering all the cool stuff they did. Time for bed and then sleeping in forever, since I’ve got no school tomorrow.

Last Friday - Last game of the regular season against Eureka.  It was a slaughter. We won like 60-0.  We actually stopped keeping score at 49.  I got to play the entire second halve (my first time playing varsity ever).  I did pretty well, they didn’t ever really have the ball, so I only got one tackle, but it was pretty good, I ran across the length field and drove him out of bounds.  I rucked a lot, they were all pretty good, but I have the bad habit of bridging.  I had a few good runs, and I almost scored a try.  But the pass to me was ruled forward as I slid into the try zone, so it didn’t count.  Oh well, playing varsity is good enough for me.

Last Saturday – Went over to Drizzle’s house.  A bunch of people were there.  James, Kris, a sleeping Matt, and I stayed at the campfire until 4:00 AM.  My parents were super pissed.  We decided we’re going to build an industrial strength potato gun.  James’s dad is going to construct it out of stainless steel for us.  We’re going to use my cars old sparkplugs to ignite it, a lawnmower battery to start it, shells to hold the potatoes, a wooden frame to hold it in place, and acetylene to shoot it.  It’s going to be sweet.

Last Sunday – Played a game of paintball with Matt, his friends, Clay and Javier (Clay is the son of a friend of my mom and Javier is the foreign exchange student who lives with him.)  Then I had to leave. Saw Steve Vai with Farmer, John, Dylan, and John’s dad.  John’s dad has a tradition of taking us out to eat before hand, and we went to Blueberry Hill.  It was insanely awesome.  The food was excellent, and since everyone else either needed to lose weight or were little girls, I got to eat soooo much, since no one wanted to leave leftovers.  I ended up downing like 3 chicken hot wings, a side of chips, a large side of fries, three pickle spears, a burger, half a roastbeef sandwich, and like 4 mozzarella sticks. I couldn’t finish the roast beef sandwich though, which was kinda depressing.  It was all amazing though, and the atmosphere is sweet.  The concert is self was incredible.  The first performer Eric Sardinas wasn’t the best, but he was a pretty good showman.  He jumped into the crowd, and walked around the entire venue playing, used a half drunken beer can as a slider, and set his guitar and about a square foot of the ground of fire with a cup of vodka and a match.  Steve Vai defies the laws of physics.  To quote Farmer, “I want to go backstage so I can see the three guitarists who are actually playing this.”  “For the Love of God” and “Whispering a Prayer” were beautiful.  I don’t think I’ve ever been physically stunned by music before.  Some of the crazy stuff he did includes: him and his bassist (I forget his name, but his guy was also amazing) each played the other’s instrument with one hand and their own with the other.  Playing music with his feet that Farmer and John (many years of practice) can’t even do with their hands.  Sliding harmonics with his tongue.  General asskickery.  People aren’t lying when they say he is the most technically proficient guitar player alive.

The Week – Sold the Vanagon.  Farmer didn’t show up Tuesday to show me how to start it.  So when JoAnne and her dad came out, we couldn’t get it to work.  Farmer came over the next day and we found out that the only thing we were forgetting to do was give it gas when we turned the key and hit the starter with the hammer.  Dave swung by with Zach though, who bought it for $400.  JoAnne would have bought it for $525, but because we couldn’t get it to start, her dad talked her out of it.  He was defiantly creepy though.  My mom was scared of him.  He was talking about how he was dating a 65 year old, but “she looks 25 because she works out.”  Keep in mind this is within 10 minutes of meeting my mom.  They also showed up at my house like 2 hours early.  Dave says that he apparently is always checking out JoAnne’s friends.  At some point I saw Sin City.  That movie is bad ass.  The best part is assuredly the nazi/arrow scene.  I’m gonna get it the minute it comes out of video.

Friday:  Went to the front of Farmer and Matt’s subdivision for a D-Jam (Tenacious D sing-a-longs).  Everyone was being retarded and wouldn’t come up, but eventually Dave, Christina, James, and even Taylor and Chris came.  But then I had to go home.

Saturday:  MRFU’s.  First game against Chaminade, we played like crap the first half.  We were down by 3-0 at half.  But we turned it around and won 22-7.  Swartzmeyer got a red card at the end of the game (which would have put him out until after nationals) but both coaches convince the ref to revoke it.  A kid from Chaminade just started punching him and he didn’t do anything.  So the ref decided to take it down to a yellow card.  Matt’s team got slaughtered by SLUH 29-0.  So they won’t be going to Westerns this year.  Matt got a red card for having both feet in the air during a scrum (he should have only gotten a yellow, since it wasn’t his fault, the second row behind him sucked.)  We lost to them in 23-18 in overtime.  We played well, but stupid mistakes and injuries killed us.  Ady was still hurt, and Rowles and Summa both were injured.  So we’re second seed in the MRFU’s and 4^th seed at Westerns.  After the game, I went to Steak ‘N Shake where I hung out for the first time in a while.  I talked with Kim, Brandy, and Steak ‘N Shake Dave until Brent showed up and took SnS Dave, and two chicks I kinda know out to drive around.  We ended up passing Bear Creek community club where Wright City was having their prom.  I decided to go in since Farmer was there with Charlene, so I clipped a SnS bow tie on to my t-shirt, had Brent call a chick he knows who was inside, and went in as her date.  I said “Hi” to Farmer, and then got kicked out pretty quick.  I almost got a parting gift some girl handed to me on my way out, but a principal was like “I don’t think so”, so I told him she gave it to me and left. Then I went back to SnS and hung out for a while more.

Sunday:  Got a haircut, got groceries, and retrieved my wallet from Steak ‘N Shake where I had left it in Brent’s car.  Not much else.

Week:  Our debate coach is so fucking stupid. Because of him, we might not even be competing Friday, because he never filled out our registration.  We were able to finagle ourselves hotel rooms and food money and convince Alexis to be our coach for the day though.  Murray and Brandon are spending the night and I’m driving us there at 5:30 tomorrow morning.  Turns out I’m going to prom after all, the lovely Jewel Reeves has agreed to go with me. Now I just need to find out when it is.  Our school never actually told us anything about it.  Gabe is going to Truman this fall it seems.  Well, time to get back to my cases, Reminder to self, Shank stories, Steve Stories, Riesman Stories.

Currently Playing Steve Miller Band - Greatest Hits 1974-1978 By Steve Miller Band see related

Friday:  We had a game against Francis Howell.  We won both games varsity was 22-7, we were only slightly less.  I played about as well as I usually do, didn't really make any mistakes, had a run where I got tackled, but not held, so I ran a fair distance, but nothing spectacular.  The lone time they ran it weakside off the scrum I made the tackle against their varsity 8-man.  Kala and I broke up a while ago, I think I forgot to mention that.

Saturday: My mom and I took a road trip down to Tulsa for their "preview weekend."  It's nothing spectacular but I guess it will do.  I got to talk with the head of the petroleum engineering department, he seems really involved with helping out his students.  They really want me to go there, they keep having alumni calling me and taking me out of the tours and stuff to try to convince me to come.  I saw a guy who plays for Eureka while down there (well I was wearing a DeSmet rugby shirt, so he noticed me), he's a national merit finalist too, so he's probably going to go there.  I also talked to Josh Bieverdorf while I was down there.  They don't have a rugby team, but there is a city team.  They also don't have a debate team, but I'm gonna try my damndest to get one started.  They have a pretty cool library, it's really big for how small the campus is (4,000 kids).  I think it has the collected works of James Joyce.  They also have an AMAZING gym/work out center.  If I don't get buff in college from spending all my time there, there is something wrong with me.  It's also a Division I school with a decent football team.  They were 4-8 this year, but last year they made it to a bowl game.  The dorms are just fine, I got accepted into the honors housing, but for diversity reasons I think I'm gonna stay at a all Freshman dorm.  I hope I end up liking it, everyone who goes there seems too, and it is rated in the top ten for happy students by Princeton Review.

Sunday: One of the best games of my life.  Still no try though.  We played Rockhurst, varisty won 22-7.  There varsity had beaten some team 106-0 the day before.  I suppose if we wanted to (and if we actually ever played them) we could do that to Priory, but we're not assholes.  Brandon broke his collarbone during the game, which sucks since it was the best game of his life, and he will be out for the season, but he is going to Rockhurst for college so I'm sure he'll get to play there.  For now Spillane (and when Coach realizes he sucks, Kaufman) is our new scrum half.  The JV lost, but I played really well, so I don't really mind.  They ran weak side off the scrum like everytime, so I tackled their 8-man one on one like 6 times.  One time I tackled him incredibly high though and ended up taking his jersey off tackling him, so I had to tackle him again and then take the penalty (it was funny enough I didn't really care though).  I also made a bunch of other tackles, had a few good runs (including one where I got tackled twice, but neither was wrapped up, so I just kept getting up) and I ripped the ball from their mauls about 3 times.  I ended up getting one of those mauled right back to them once, so I was still 2 ahead.  I also got a penalty for playing the ball on the ground when I tackled a guy, stupid move on my part, but they wasted the penalty, so no harm.  I think I did really, really well.  I had to come out about 3/4 of the way through the second half for two reasons.  A. Gramke needed to play.  B. I got stiff-armed by a guy in the face, so I couldn't see out of one eye well and my mouth was bleeding.  But hey, I still made the tackle and drew a penalty.  Hopefully I'll get a little playing time at western's since Patton and Duvall havn't been showing up to practice.

Rest of the Week: Rejected from Stanford.  No big surprize since I wrote my last essay and a half in under 10 minutes (I thought they used pacific standered time, turns out its actually eastern.  Oh well, it is cheaper to go to Tulsa).  It just pisses me off that my test scores turned out to be useless.  I could have still gotten a full ride to Tulsa if I had stuck with my 27 from 7th grade.  My completly and unabashed bragging of test scores: 35 ACT composite, 1550 SAT (800 Math), 800 Math IIC, and 760 Writing.  All useless.  PSAT scores are what got me to college for free. Thats gay.  I also found out that I recieved a $2500 scholarship from National Merit, apparently its a pretty good honor, but again, useless to me.  I was nominated for man of the year at my school (12 are selected, (about 1/6 of the senior class are nominated)).  I was considering hanging up posters (campaigning is forbidden, but I don't have a snowball's chance in hell because teacher get 50% fo the vote) that said "Vote Dawson, I'm Sure He's Done Something".  I'm on reserve for tomarrow's game against Eureka so I will hopefully get to play for varsity for the first time.  That would be sweet.

Steve Vai, John Fogarty + John Mellencamp, Tom Petty, Flogging Molly, Warped (with Dropkick Murphies, Fu Manchu, and the Offspring), Muse, The Roots, Muse, Suburban Legends, Sparta, Motley Crue, and perhaps the Steve Miller Band are all coming to town this summer, so I'm going to be spending a crapload of money on concert tickets as one last hurrah before I go to the musical wasteland that is Tulsa. 

Currently Playing Are You Experienced By Jimi Hendrix see related

EDIT: Wow, I finally get around to catching up where I left off.

Spring Break! Wooooh!!! '05! What! What!

Enough of that.  Friday, State Qualifiers at Ladue. They use a weird system for the outrounds where there are two judges and they just sum up your wins and losses.  First match: Rosie and Mike, won pretty handily.  Second Round Marquette A, we were Aff, came out with the double win.  Third round was some school I can't remember.  Won that.  Last round we went against Lutheran (North? I can't remember).  They somehow managed to pick up a judge so we were 7-1.  Broke to next day.  Rolfes never showed up.  Brandon and Alex also broke 7-1, but they only had to face B teams since we were the A team.  Spent most of our down time talking with Pattonville and Brenson and experiancing the joy that is Jolly Ranchers out of a box that looks like a gum box (you know like orbits or something).  Met Sean Wojohowski again, hadn't seen him since second grade.  I remembered him because of his last name, and he remembered me because I look the exact same.

Saturday:  Dave didn't have any of his story memorized so he was out, he didn't do to hot in HI either.  Alex was out in extemp, Brandon was 2nd in Oratory again, earning him a trip to state.  The round to determine if we went to state or not was against Brandon and Alex, which was even gayer because there was another school that had it's A and B competing.  We ended up winning 3-0 what was a very fun round.  That meant us, Parkway West A (Alex and Carolyne), Marquette A (Nadia and Chris), and Ladue A (Weice and Levy (Schnieder, Lindsey, and Alex Song were not competing)) were going to State.  We beat Marquette A on a 2-1 desicion using our Neg.  Thank you Rosie for giving you your anti-testing the mentally retarded evidence.  We would never have won without it.  I ended up using it to deliver my best speech ever.  One of the judges hated me though.  The scores for speaker points range from 6-30 (you can score 1-5 in 6 catagories) I had a 25, a 28, and an 11.  Wow, lowest score ever for my best speaking ever.  Worst part?  I can't read the judge's signature.  We originally thought we lost due to faulty insider information, so we get a call by Alex as we're running on the track that we have to be in the finals round in 10 minutes.  Our hearts weren't really in it, our debating was only O.K., and I'm gonna go ahead and say the judges were gay.  Plus Sam and Levy did really good.  So we lost 2-1 and got second.  Doesn't matter much because since 3rd and 4th seed are determined arbitrarily, we have just as good of a chance as them to hit an easy team first few rounds.  Alexus (my cousin) apparently does Speech and Debate.  She won seventh place in story telling.

Tuesday-Thursday - I worked at Parkway Early Childhood Special Education.  I needed service hours to pass high school, so I decided to go back to where I worked junior year.  I forgot how much I love helping out those little guys.  One of them even had the same problem that I did as a kid, tubes in her ears malfuntioned so she heard everyone like she was underwater, and as a result talks the same way.  I think as soon as I get a day off school, I'm going to go back and visit them.  This is defiantly what I would want to do if I wasn't so dead set on becoming a engineer or patent lawyer.

Last Four Days - I've been fairly sick with a sore throat/headache/frozen legs, I had to spend a few days in bed, but nothing major.

Everything In Between - Wow, lots of hanging out at Dave and Kris's houses.  Lots of drugs and drinking (not by me of course).  Lots of DDRing (Dave and Kris both bought it).  Lots of Monopoly (Matt is amazing at it, even when stoned).  Krangle stopped by a few times, it was sweet, we never get to see him anymore.  And 12-year old looking Sara brought over her friend Renee.  Damn, everyone is in agreement, her ass was practically perfect in everyway. We also found out that everyone's nagging suspicions that Matt's Sara was a fucking whore are completly true.  She's been lieing to Matt so that she doesn't have to hang out with him.  We just bought a Ford Escort because of Gas Mileage.  Useless Car Count - Vanagon (since my mom won't let me drive it.  Now, I've got to sell it), Trooper (There's no denying it's a piece of shit, cow skull on the front or not), and Escort (it's not really in bad shape, but whatever).  Next time I gotta remember to write down the stories about Shank and Steve.

Currently Playing Holy Roller By Reverend Horton Heat see related

I didn't get into MIT, but I don't really feel all that bad about it, I was never really expecting to get in.  Plus I've got the fact my school's valedictorian didn''t even make it into Wash. U. to keep me happy.

Guess I best update what happened last weekend before this next weekend comes about.

Friday:  We hung out at Dave's for a while then went to Farmer's for a bonfire.  He was already drunk off his ass, he drank 2 bottles of Jager, a bottle of vodka, and some beers.  Everyone except James and I ended up bailing on him, so we had to carry his drunk ass inside, because if we didn't, his dad would have to later.  It was scary carrying him through the garage, he fell on the floor and wouldn't let us pick him up, and then he slammed his face on the ground.  Luckily, he didn't get cut, just a bad bruise.  His mom was freaking out because he was all twitchy, hitting himself in the face over and over again as he was passed out on the floor (we deduced that was from all the red bull he drank).  Apparently he didn't even get in any trouble.  I'm starting to agree Farmer has a problem and that pot might actually be good for him.

Saturday: Game against Chaminade.  Varsity played like shit, was down 15-5 at one point.  Came back in the last 7 minutes, won 31-15.  Francis Howell got destroyed by Penn, Matt got another yellow card for elbowing a kid who punched him.  The kid proceeded to kick him in the head 5 times and never was sin-binned.  JV lost 0-5, but I didn't play because Josh Meyer needed playing time and he couldn't play Penn cause he would probably die (he just got moved to scrum half today).  After the game, I went to Lisa's birthday and had a blast.  I got to hang out with so many people I hadn't seen in forever; Lisa, Fred, Danielle, Jewel, Chris, Taylor, B-Rad, Smelliot, Ian, and a load of other people.  Tommy broke Lisa's couch, but her parents didn't mind.  I still have yet to meet Troy Battle.

Sunday- Game versus Penn.  I played my best game of the year so far.  I caught 3 of the 4 kicks to me and Tychowski was right on the one I missed.  I also completly LEVELED their fly half.  He was bobbling the ball and I just smoked him trying to get to it.  Everyone on the sideline immediatly started yelling.  I had some nice runs, rucked well, and played good defence too.  We still lost 15-7, with the lone try going to Laschowitz, and Spillane made an insane kick.  One of the tries that was scored against us was retarded, Bennet was getting tackled, so I was right behind him to ruck over.  So he decides to blindly pass the ball 7 feet straight up.  I jump and barely tip it, trying to catch it, and Penn's outside center ends up snagging it and running it into the try zone.  Gay.  Varsity ended up losing 17-24, not bad considering they were losing 15-0 in the first 10 minutes.  Penn was huge, very huge and fairly well organized and I think that got to us.  But we ended up playing how we should have and came back strong.  I was particularly impressed with their 5.  He was a HUGE kid who is going to Northwestern to play DE.  Wow, that kid has balls to put his scholarship at risk to play rugby.  After the game, we ate with Penn.  Time to start work on my cases I guess.