The Terror of Driving

So last friday I hung out with my very dear friend, Ms. Audrey. We headed down to the neighborhood gas station after being rejected by this negative and unfriendly child. So we bought a shit ton of calories and my diet was instantly ruined. They we hung out at the park by our elementary school for a while.

Completely normal day.

Until
.
.
.
About an hour later
.
.
.
Her dad came to pick us up.

I know what you're thinking.
"How nice of him, now you don't have to walk all the way home!"

no
that is not what happened.

Her dad pulled up in his stick shift VW and announced "Audrey! You're gonna drive!"
Of course Audrey replied with "What chu talking about!" and I stood there like "What the hell! She doesn't even have her permit!"

"Too bad! Get in the car!" And Audrey preceded to get into the front seat and I hesitantly got into the back, making sure my seatbelt was properly fastened despite knowing it would do no good in the inevitable accident.

The keys were turned and the engine of the car roared in protest, knowing that it was facing death in the face in the form of a 15 year old girl. The Wagon was put into reverse and the jerky ride began.
Audrey managed to back out of the parking spot and then continue to turn the car around. Too bad there was a gigantuous white pickup truck right behind us. The car continued to back up and the truck got closer and closer.
"stap Stap STAAAAAHP" Her dad and I yelled in unison. Luckily her dad had hold of the emergency break right before we practically died.

Even if we survived, I think the owner of this thing would have killed us.

After that Audrey drove us into the parking lot of the gas station nearby. "Ok, I'm done!" She declared.
Now it was her dad's turn "What CHU talking about? You're driving us home!"
.
.
.
"WHAT!!!!!!! Dad! Noooo! I can't do that! There are important people in this car, I can't wreck!!!" (I think I was the important person being mentioned.)
But her father would not be swayed. Audrey was forced to drive us all the way up to her house. Very...very...slowly.

Thank god.

But sadly other drivers did not seem to appreciate the precautions being taken to make sure I didn't DIE! Looking in the rearview mirror Audrey proclaimed in horror "Look, I'm causing traffic!"
Her  dad just shrugged it off telling her not to worry, even though it pretty much looked like I-80 up there.

Look what you caused. 

When we finally got back to her house Audrey's father told her to park on the side of the road with one tire in the empty lot.

I think Audrey took this the wrong way.

"I CAN'T DRIVE OFF ROAD!!!!!!"
I think she was imagining something like this.

Yes... after that stressful experience her dad was going to take it one step farther and tell her to survive the wilderness. No........ that wasn't gonna happen.

So.... I survived the trip. And now I am forever scarred by the experience.

Math.... no

As I am typing this I am sitting in math class, supposedly doing a review for our final.

Well I will tell you guys, I am not doing the final review. No. Nope. Nopity nope no. Hell to the no. Not happening.

Today is not a day for math. It is not going to happen. Just no.

I mean really? I have to get up at 6 in the morning every single day and make it all the way to school. And they expect me to do math? With every other class having finals on the same day I end up having to stay up until three in the fucking morning just to make sure that my grades don't drop. And then they expect me to sit here and do a big ass math packet full of algebra and matrices at seven in the morning.

No thank you.

It's not that I'm bad at math, I mean I'm not good at it either. But in the middle of the day I think I would be much more willing to do math then I am first thing in the morning. I'm not awake yet! My mind still thinks I am happily in bed sleeping away. But in reality I am here. Sitting in a class with a million people I greatly dislike. Forced to do problem that solve no real predicament and just serve the purpose of making my brain hurt.

This post had no real purpose, good bye.

Quick Update

Just thought I would tell everybody. After my last post I know you are all dying to know the results.

Wait..... you're not?

You mean you don't care.......

WELL SCREW YOU!

I MADE WIND ENSEMBLE!!! I AM SUPERIOR!

The Suspense is Killing Me

Literally. I have never been more anxious about anything in my life.

Last Friday I auditioned for wind ensemble. The highest level band in my school. The band that goes to New York next year to compete in a national competition. The band with all the talented kids in it.

I must be a part of it.

So on Friday I played the piece I had been practicing none stop for the past two weeks for my band director. I played Bach's second Sonata in Eb. I never want to hear that song again for as long as I live. I have come to the conclusion that Bach is totally evil. I mean, his middle name is Sebastian! How can he not be a demon!!!

Yep..... That's a demon.

Anyway..... back to band. So I played my piece and I actually did pretty well. I was proud of myself. Even though I was super nervous I think I played it better than I ever practiced it. I got every single rhythm and run. The only thing I did wrong was miss a few accidentals. That's pretty damn good for me. Plus I have spent the entire year working myself to death by doing EVERYTHING I POSSIBLY COULD!!!! Seriously, you name it I did it. Marching Band, Pit Orchestra, Football Pep Band, Basketball Pep Band. I have 505 letter points!!! The requirement for a letter is only 450! I have dedicated my entire life to music!!! 

So when Mr. Band Director asked why he should put me in Wind Ensemble I pretty much vomited reasons why he owns my soul.

Yes. I have every confidence that I will make it. At least I did.

Then sight reading happened. 

Basically Mr. Band Director found the most impossible, evil, malicious, soul devouring, dream smashing piece of music he could find. 

So it went like this:

"Amanda, please play up to measure 42 for me." 

"Yes Lord Taylor!" *Salute and looks a piece*

.

.

.

Soul is instantly crushed.

Dying Goose Noises Commence. 

Amanda Sad.

So yeah...... I spend all weekend freaking out about this. And next period I will be able to look at the list to see if I made it. If I didn't make it my life is over....... tell my family I love them. Audrey can have my guitar and I leave my manga collection to Lyndsey. Burry me with my clarinet. The instrument that ruined my life. 

Goodbye -.-

Anime Is For Children?

A few weeks ago a placed a poll on my blog. If you look to the right you can see said post.

Here's a picture of how the poll currently stands.

As you can see, most of my viewers like anime.

But there is this one person.

That 9%

This is not ok.

I would first like to say that the only reason I put that option on this poll is so I could make this post. 

No anime is not for kids. 

Why you ask?

Don't tell me anime is for children.

Grades......I Hate Them

Grades. Yes, Grades.

Dictionary Definition: The process of applying standardized measurements of varying levels of achievement in a course.

Student Definition: The most stressful thing to ever be invented ever in the history of the world where you are put up against every other kid in your grade and ranked. If your grades are not sufficient your teachers, parents, and peers are automatically given the right to ridicule you until your life just completely revolves around grades and there is nothing else in the entire world that can distract you from the fact that you are a failure. 

Grades Suck.

Now, many people may think that all this technology that students of the 21st century have access too just gives us distractions from our work. When in reality it just makes everything a million times more stressful.

Back like 30 years ago you had a text book, you read the book, and you answered the questions according to what the book said. Nowadays you have to look everything up on the internet. You have to make sure that the site you look at is legitimate, which is impossible considering 99.9% of the internet is a bunch of ass holes who want to mess with people, and if you use Wikipedia your teachers are going to make you burn in hell.

Another example is that because of all this technology we have nowadays, it is absolutely impossible to escape from school. 30 years go you go to school, you spend the day at school with teachers, and then you come home and you don't have to deal with teachers till the next day. On the weekends you can completely forget everything, over christmas break school never crosses your mind. But now we have computers! All the assignments are online! You can never escape! You can't be too lazy to write that history report like back in the good old days. If you don't write your God Damn report you will be attacked by vicious streams of emails from your teachers who are going to be all like WHERE THE HELL IS THAT GOD DAMN HISTORY REPORT!?!?!?

Yeah.... not fun.

Grades are pretty much just a way to make kids who already have low self-esteems feel worse about themselves because they aren't as smart as the rest.

And then my school does things like giving out donuts to honor roll students! Seriously! I mean just think about that, you are already feeling awful about your grades and your parents are giving you grief and then you go to lunch and your friends all walk up with their donuts and they are like "Go get yours!" And you have to admit that you didn't make honor roll. How is that going to help students!

Plus, if your grades aren't good enough you can't join in clubs and travel with teams. That is not ok! If you're told you aren't allowed to go to a team event out of state you aren't going to want to stay home and study! You will just want to sit there and feel sorry for yourself!

Yeah....... If you couldn't tell I'm pretty frustrated with my grades right now. Thank you for reading my rant. :P

Maybe If I Ignore It, It Won't Happen

I feel like my life just revolves around a series of things that I don't want to happen. I have a bad habit of just ignoring these things, thinking that if I'm not aware of them neither is the rest of the world. I keep up this way of thinking until the thing I don't want to happen gets so close that I finally have the epiphany that this thing is actually going to happen.
Examples?

AP Testing
Windensemble Auditions
Spanish Project
The Extinction of Panda Bears

These are just a few of the things that I am dreading with so many feels that I have just stopped giving any feels about them.

Let's discuss my non-feels, shall we?

First up is the upcoming test for my AP geography class. You know, just the most important test I have ever taken in my entire meaningless life as a student. Just the test that is going to make the entire year of horrendous studying in the hardest class ever that only the most advanced students can get A's in. And by advanced students I mean the ones that have had there brains experimented on by aliens. The test that is going to stop me from having to retake this class when I begin my boring life as a college student at the University of Utah were I will waste away my parents money by partying and not doing a bit of studying.

So what have I done to prepare myself for the biggest test of the millennium?

Nothing.

In fact I have only gotten through this class this year because I cram the night before each test and I use my friend, Audrey, as a study tool in the way that I have her tell me everything of importance that she read instead of actually reading the book on my own.

The test is May 13th, which gives me exactly 72 days to get my shit together and learn all the things.

I know what you're thinking. 72 days is a TON of time. I could breed wolves and have a puppy in that amount of time. But I guarantee that we will get to the night before the test and it will be the first time I have actually opened the book. 

Moving on.

Wind Ensemble auditions are coming up in the next two weeks. Wind Ensemble is the highest level in the band program that you can get to. 

Meaning that it is audition only to get in. This is stressing me out to the point where my mind had gone into self defense mode, and has pushed this fact to the deepest darkest corner of my mind where there is no way it can possible resurface, in order to make it so my mind doesn't explode from all the stress. 

Basically I'm at the point where my brain is completely sure that I will get my schedule for next year and I will have just magically gotten into Wind Ensemble. 

Next is my Spanish Project. 

It is excential that I do well on this project. Why?

This is why....

Look at all the A's!

Wait... what's this...... Future Exam?

 .........Grade?

-.-

This Future exam has changed my grade from a beautiful A down to a B. This is not expectable. Mainly because AP Geography is the only class that I can allow myself to get below a A- in because if I do worse than that I will be kicked out of National Junior Honor Society and then Colleges will see this fact and I won't get into college and I will end up working as a grocery store bagger and in about two years my job will be completely taken over by a robot and I will end up living on the streets.  

So I have to do well on this project. But my partner and I have no idea what to do so we are totally procrastinating. 

And what can I do about Panda Bears????? It's not my fault! It's the Chinese! I blame you, FIX IT!!!!!!

Disapointment

A few months ago I made a post called BANDS RELEASED TODAY. On this post I described my excitement for the upcoming Vans Warped Tour. This post included a list of bands that I would like to see on the tour.

The list consisted of the following:

A Day to Remember

Escape the Fate

Sleeping With Sirens

Bring Me The Horizon

We Came as Romans

Pierce the Veil 

Asking Alexandria

Bullet for My Valentine

Capture the Crown

Memphis May Fire

Out of the bands listed above five of them went to Warped last year. You know how many of them are going this year. I'll give you one guess. If you are having trouble guessing just look at the title of the post.
Did that help.
I bet you guessed it.

NONE OF THEM
NOT A SINGLE ONE
ZERO
GOOSE EGG
NADA
RAWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR


.......I just thought I would express my disappointment with you guys. I'm gonna go cry now. Bye.

Drawing.... Bleh!

If you read my blog regularly you will know that occasionally I illustrate my blog with very poorly drawn pictures that I make on this wonderfully frustrating site.

I hate it.

I can't draw for shit. I am very artistic, don't get me wrong. But I am artistic in a musical way. Not a drawy, painty, visual, way. The way people can visualize things in their head and reproduce them perfectly on paper in the exact way the imagine it fascinates me. I want to be good at drawing. I practice drawing anime every now and then but they usually don't come out very well.

So why did I decide to start illustrating my posts? Well, basically I have friends who are super duper talented when it comes to drawing and they illustrate their blog posts. Drawings make you posts more interesting and even when you have a really long post breaking it up with drawings makes the reader want to pay attention instead of them feeling intimidated by the huge amount of text. Plus their drawings make their blogs extremely funny and they have a shit ton of page views.

My expectations for blog illustrations. 

Reality

My thinking process was this.
I want pageviews! I want my blog to be popular! How can I do this? I know! I can copy my friends in a inauspicious endeavor to be artistic!
.
.
.
....... Wonderful idea, wasn't it?

Not only are my drawings awful, they also take FOREVER to make and are tremendously difficult to do on a computer. I don't understand how anybody can do such good drawings on a computer! How is this possible? I just don't know. I am obviously not coordinated enough for this.
I hope you guys appreciate the work I put into these drawings!

New Musical Obsession

If you read my blog, know me in person, or know just one thing about me you will know that I am a giant band nerd. I play clarinet, saxophone, and flute. I also own a keyboard and sometimes I like to sit in front of it and pretend that I'm talented. But now I have added yet another instrument to the rotation!

Wait for it......
Wait for it.....

I play guitar now :3

BTWs Best guitar drawing ever :P

Yep, I've been playing guitar for about a month now. It is surprisingly easy to learn and I am very proud of myself. Considering that for the fist nine months of playing saxophone I sounded like a mix between a wood pecker and a cat that was being stabbed repeatable and that I still can't play two notes on the flute without having to take a breath so that I end up looking like I'm having an asthma attack, I think my progress on the guitar is sensational.

So about two months ago I decided that my dads guitar needed to make it's way out of the storage room. So I brought it into my room to join the family of instruments. For about the first month it just kinda sat in my room and I would stare at it imagining how cool it would be to be able to play it. 

It wasn't till a few weeks ago that I actually got it out of the case and broke out youtube to learn to play If I'm James Dean You're Audrey Hepburn by Sleeping With Sirens. That song was incredibly easy. And I've been driving my family crazy with it for the last month.

The reason I didn't learn anything else is because, and if you play guitar you will totally understand this, you need a capo to play every single cool song out there. I guess singers just can't sing in the right key to save their lives so they have to make the guitar players use capos in order to make it so they don't sound like dying cats.

But last week it arrived! I finally have a capo!!!!! So now I have been playing guitar non stop. Yesterday I literally got home, picked up the guitar, and played for the next two and a half hours. My dad can in to take me to karate at six and I was like "What???? Where did all the time go?!?!" I think I just transported myself to magical guitar land were everything but music completely vanishes.

But those two hours were well spent because now I can play If It Means A Lot To You by A Day to Remember like a total boss.

And the night before that my dad came into my room and told me that the guitar was officially mine. YAY!!

Yep, and now I have five instruments. One day when I become ultimate ruler of the universe I think it will be a law for every single one of my subjects to have to learn to play an instrument.
It will be a good world.

Why I was a Weird kid

When I was a little kid I had what some people might refer to as an "overactive" imagination. I understand that everybody was imaginative when they were little, but I was a bit different.

Where to start?
You might like to know that I have extreme ADD, or attention deficit disorder, and we didn't know it until I was in like.... third grade. Meaning that I went through all of 1st grade, 1st grade again, and 2nd grade with the attention span of a ten year old boy watching Twilight. And yes, I did 1st grade twice. Only the incredibly special kids get to do that more than once. :3

So how did I spend this time?
You would think that 1st graders would be hyperactive and excited.

Well I was. To the point where I couldn't go a hour without falling out of my chair. The other kids got used to it and just ignored me. My teacher constantly complained to my parents about it. And I honestly couldn't understand why it was a problem. I would just be sitting at my desk calmly and learning how to spell words like cat, hat, bat, and calling my teach fat. Then all of a sudden WHOOOP, I would be on the floor.

I also day dreamed a lot. Like..... at lot a lot.

When I was little I was completely one hundred percent convinced that I belonged in the anime world. I had an imaginary charmander in the second grade. By second grade kids are really too old for imaginary friends. But I wasn't. I was also convinced that Sasuke (from Naruto) was going to take me to the hidden leaf village and Kakashi was going to train me to become a ninja.  It was going to happen.

Eventually my day dreaming just turned into flat out sleeping.

The first time I remember actually falling asleep for an extended period of time during class was in 2nd grade. My teacher didn't even bother to wake me up, she just let me sleep for like an hour.

The same teacher also ignored me when I was feeling super duper sick! I felt like my stomach, liver, kidney, and all other organs had a party last night and they were all recovering from their hangovers. So I had my hand in the air for something like 20 minutes, trying to ask Mrs. Teacher if I could go to the nurse. But apparently my illness was of no concern to her when she was describing the art of making a cursive r. So you know what happened? I threw up all over my desk. That will teach her not to ignore a child.

So let's move forward to 3rd grade. I vividly remember asking my teacher why the hell we were learning how to read a clock for the third year in a row. I guess she didn't appreciate my sass because she held me in class during lunch and made me do a bunch of math papers when I should have been eating.

Next! Ok so I guess that the ADD meds were working because after 3rd grade I was moved into the "HA" class. HA meaning High Ability. More like hahahaha no way I'm in that. When you're in fourth grade high ability basically means you have the ability to comprehend what is happening in the Harry Potter Books.

Let me make it very clear that I have no idea in hell how I was placed into this class. I was the equivalent of a spazzy puppy who was just placed into a room full of highly trained police dogs and was expected to sniff out drugs.

And the teacher expected us all to be super mega brains because she made us forth graders do sixth grade math and our spelling worlds were things that no normal person would ever use in conversation ever.

We literally had words like:
aficionado
ennui
bivouacking
chartreuse
I don't even know what those words mean.

Plus she hated me.

She was one of those teachers that would pick favorites. And her favorites were always kids who were popular! I'm sure you have realized that I was absolutely not popular. So basically she picked on me. Yeah, 4th grade sucked.

There are some of my weird elementary school stories.

Flappy Birds......... wha?

Ok so if you look at my most popular list right off to the right side of this post, you will see that I have a post called "Worst. Game. Ever." This post is all about the new game Flappy Birds.

I want to make something clear.

This post was meant to be complete BullShit!

I made THis for no real reason. I just wanted to make a total BS post about nothing! But now its my SECOND most popular post on my blog! WTF (why the face? (kudos to you if you get that)). It completely bumped "SWS Happiness" of the list!

Flappy Birds attracts more people than Sleeping with Sirens, Breath Carolina, Our Last Night, and Issues all together! NO!!! NOT OKAY!!!

Doc Martens!

A few weeks ago my mother ordered me a pair of Doc Martens online.

On friday the finally got here!

These lovely shoes appeared on friday! And I haven't stopped wearing them since.

I first discovered Doc Martens last fall, when my family went on a trip to Disney Land and my mother pointed out a girl wearing them. I thought they were super cool and so did my mother. My mom said she would get me some. I'm not really sure why, but instead we went for a different type of leather boot. Those boots were my present last Christmas. 

They were beautiful. I loved those shoes. They were black boots that when up to my knee with big buckles on the sides and they zipped up on the other side so I could actually put them on. But the thing is, I walk funny. My feet bend inward, so I ruin most of the shoes I own. So those boots were soon trashed. I destroyed them. Because of this sadly they were thrown away when I got these new shoes. 

So I have wanted to get Doc Martens for a long time. But I actually have my friend Courtney to thank for actually getting them. You see, a few weeks ago Courtney came over to my house. Courtney was wearing her snazzy white Doc Martens and my mother took notice. 

Her thought process must have been something like this:

"Hmmm, didn't Amanda want those shoes at some point? Now her friends have them. Courtney's a cool person, I guess Doc Martens are cool now. I must get my daughter some so she too can be cool!"

And just like that it was decided. A few days later my shoes were ordered. It turns out that my friend Audrey also has these shoes. But her's are red. 

Audrey's are on the top right and Courtney's top left.

So I am already planning to get more of these fantabulous shoes. The ones I have right now are matte leather and I want some funky shinny ones. The first ones I want to get are the hot pink ones.

I have nothing that would match this color -.- 

Oh well

Then I want purple!

Snazzy

The problem is that these shoes are damn expensive. They are over hundred dollars in most cases and I just don't have that type of money, as described in my previous post "Why I am Awful With Money".

So I don't think I will be getting more of these any time soon. 

Worst. Game. Ever.

Unless you have been living under a ROCK you will have heard of the terrible new app called Flappy Bird.

The game of pure evil. I'm obsessed. I constantly feel the need to play it. I also constantly need to beat my sister at the game. My record is 61, while hers is something in the 70's. >.< 

This game is incredibly addicting. And incredibly frustrating. Even if I have a record of 61, which isn't bad, I still die before I even get past 5 pipes at times! I can't believe I haven't chucked my iPod across the room in rage yet. But for some reason the creator of this game has decided to take it off of the app store! Why? 

So it is no longer available! ¿PORQUE? Why would you take down such a successful app? 

But I can still play it. So I guess I'm gonna stay addicted -.-

Why I am Awful with Money

It's a well know fact that teens should never be trusted with money. But recently I have actually been making some.

I didn't get a job....... I watch Henry.....

Henry is a 60Lb hunk of pure boxer muscle.

And no..... I don't mean Henry Cooper, the british boxer:

I mean this boxer:

Yes, I have decided that dog sitting is the best job you can have. Henry's owner leaves town frequently for business and he lives right next door to me. So I get to go over to Henry's house (yes, it is Henry's home, he has complete control) and watch the giant TV that is there, take Henry for walks (which is actually good for me too cuz I never do anything), and feed him. Yep I just go over there and cuddle with him, do homework, and watch TV.

And then TA-DAH!!!

I have money!

I started watching Henry and some of the other neighborhood dogs last year. And I never spent any of the money I earned. Why? Because I had a goal.....

ANIME BANZAI

"What is this?" You ask. Well, my friend, I will not tell you in detail because you will be weirded out. But I will tell you that it is what all Otakús dream of. For this special trip I had to buy a costume, pay my share of a hotel room for three days, and pay the admittance fee for all three days. That came close $200 right there. But it was money well spent for three days of fun.

Now this isn't the bit I considered bad. The bit that I considered bad was that I brought another $200 for food and a few souvenirs. An important bit of information for this part of the story to make sense to you is that my mom bought me a shit ton of junk food for "snacks" over the long weekend. Then she sent me off with the mother of my friend. I saw said mother a total of twice the entire three days.

So the bit about using the money I brought to buy food went out the window entirely. I lived off of cookies, chips, and yogurt covered raisins for those three days.

I spent every last cent of money on anime merchandise........ I came home with nothing. I actually had three dollars left. But then I saw a bell with Hello Kitty in a Panda Hat.
.
.
.
I have a panda hat and hello kitty is the cutest thing to happen since the first baby panda bear was born.(Yes I am aware that when pandas are born they look like naked mole rats, picture them after a few weeks)
.
.
.
So I just had to have the bell.

And there it went. Four HUNDRED dollars that I spent a entire YEAR saving just vanished.

It has been three months since then and I have realized that I am able to get a lot more money a lot faster now that I have an established position as the neighborhood dog walker.

My next goal for saving is to go to Warped Tour. But that is not an expensive goal. I actually already have my ticket.

The goal is actually to waste around another $100 dollars on posters and T-shirts. But let me tell you something "If it makes you happy, then get it" Those are the words I live buy. So even though I know I will get home and my parents will be like "Look at all the shit you wasted money on!" or "You already have tons of shirts with your stupid bands on then!"
I will still buy all the things.
I am also currently saving for Banzai again.
But because both these things are so far away, and because I am a child who does not have to worry about bills and food and other such things, I am currently spending money on completely irrelevant things.

For example:
All pictures are curtesy of Amazon.com.

Totoro Onesie 

I will never wear this more than twice......

but when I do I will feel nothing but joy.

Black Veil Brides Wretched and Divine Box Set

Because I love them too much to not have the three extra songs

 and the movie so I need to spend more.

BVB Poster

Imagine walking into you room and always seeing them :3

More posters

Blue Exorcist Manga

Because I am a nerd

Attack on Titan Manga

because like I said... I am a nerd

One Piece Manga

I just can't not have One Piece manga. I need all 70 volumes... I am at 22 right now.

And many other things like Pokemon sweatshirts, more BVB shirts, batman sweatshirts, and Beatles shirts.

And that is why I am awful with money.

Goodbye for now my little Panda Bears! \(*.*)/