Huzzah, I am officially graduated! I never have to go back to school ever again (except for yearbook of course). It's officially summer now, and it feels darn good. I have no school, and I don't have to do anyhting tomorrow if I don't want to, I think I might end up doing something though. What really needs to get done is cleaning out Alex and I's sunday school room. That's a big one.

I start back a ways, it's been a while since I last blogged. Senior skip day was fun, we hung out at the lake, relaxed, got thrown in a few times. I thwarted one of the attempts though, that was enjoyable. I got some fun pictures too, it was the perfect setting, pretty colors and a beautiful day. It was nice and warm too, so it wasn't so bad to get thrown in. This week I've been working on yearbook quite a lot. I have the Optimist/Editors page mostly done. except for proofing, and the Midsummer page is done except for a story and proofing, and academics are mostly done. Slight problem with a certain person who hasn't started his pages and has yet to come in this week. Grr. But anywho.

Friday was graduation, it was not that fun, I hate ceremonies, but for a ceremony it wasn't bad. I got my diploma signed and everything. I didn't fall acrossed the stage, I also am proud to say I didn't win a single community scholarship. Go me! I did however get another B in freekin' pre-calc. Damn math. Oh well, nothing I can do now. I hate that class and good news, I'm taking it again next year probably, because I need two years of calc for my major. Ugh.

I think this summer I'm going to try to volunteer with Hospice, I haven't been able to find a job, so that sounds like a good option for me. It'll look good on a med school application. And it'll keep my sane this summer, not to mention being good experience.

Today I was semi-poructive, I mowed half of the lawn, and I cleaned out most of my closet, and I'm going to do some of my thank-you's pretty quick. It was wierd when I was about to mow my dad stopped me and apparently before you mow now you have to check the gas, oil and screen. I didn't even know our mower had a screen. My dad and my brother were helping me get all this done, and then one of the blades wasn't right, etc, so I went inside and emptied the dishwasher while they were working, because I'm no help, and they looked at me like I would never make it in the world if I didn't know how to do these things, but you know, they can't even put down the toilet seat, sometimes they can't even flush it.

Ok, I'm done, kudos to you if you read this whole thing. It's a lengthy one. Congrats to everyone who graduated this weekend, we finally made it!

This made me depressed, and glad I'm living in a city next year.

You Know You're From a Small Town When...

*The "road hog" in front of you on Main Street is a farmer's combine.
*No social events can be scheduled when the school gym floor is being varnished.
*You call a wrong number and they supply you with the correct one.
*Everyone knows all the news before it's published; they just read the hometown paper to see whether the publisher got it right.
*A "Night on the Town" takes only 11 minutes.
*Running from the cops consists of hiding in the cornfield.
*You have to name six surrounding towns to explain to people where you're from.
*There is no point in high-school reunions because everyone knows what everyone else is doing anyway.
*Driving cars up and down the main drag is a universal high school experience.
*You can name everyone you graduated with.
*You know what 4-H is.
*You ever went to parties at a pasture, barn, or in the middle of a dirt road.
*School gets canceled for state sporting events.
*You have ever gone home for Homecoming.
*It was cool to date someone from the neighboring town.
*You had senior skip day.
*The whole school went to the same party after graduation.
*You don't give directions by street names or references (turn by Nelson's house, go two blocks to the Anderson's turn left and it's four houses left of the football field).
*The golf course had only 9 holes.
*You can't help but date a friend's ex-girlfriend.
*Your car stays filthy because of the dirt roads, and you will never own a dark vehicle for this reason.
*The town next to you is considered "trashy" or "snooty" but is actually just like your town.
*The people in the city dress funny, then you pick up on the trend a few years later.
*Directions are given using "the" stop light as a reference.
*The city council meets at the coffee shop.
*Your letter jacket was worn after your 19th birthday.
*Weekend excitement involves a trip to the grocery store.
*Even the ugly people enter beauty contests.
*You decide to walk somewhere for exercise and 5 people pull over and ask if you need a ride.
*Your teachers call you by your older siblings names.
*Your teachers remember when they taught your parents.
*You can charge at all the local stores.
*It is normal to see an old man riding through town on a riding lawn mower.
*Everyone who played sports had to play on every type of team, or there wouldn't be enough people to have a team.
*Driving to the party on a four wheeler is quite normal.
*The town population increases by one-third when the universities go on break.

Hope these didn't depress you too much, but so many of them are so true. Boo small towns.

Wow, it's been a while, so today is the last day before finals start. Aaaugh. I really only have two, Art and Pre-calc, but Pre-calc is going to be a doozy. I was thinking ahead, and I went home and reviewed,leaving the things I didn't know how to do for today so I could ask questions. Well I get to class today and we have a sub. How terrible is that? I'm really very angry at Mr. F why would he do that the day before the final. Probably so he wouldn't have to teach us. What a snot, I don't know how to do sutff with i, or ln or logs. Frightening, though I do remember how to devide equations again, that's good. I'm so sick of math, and I'm so ready to be done, it wouldn't be so bad, except I have to go after this next hour and work on more maht I don't understand.

Laurie is home again. I came home from school yesterday to find her in my parking spot, and all of my stuff in the shower rearranged. Pretty soon she's kicking me out of the closet too, and I don't know how that's going to work, because I don't have any more room in my room for it. We need more closet space. Right now being a minimalist seems like a really good idea. I actually feel really guilty for having so much stuff, because in Ukraine they sure don't and they're very excited to get new things. Now we'll have a graduation reception, and we'll have even more sutff, and a lot of which I might not use.

Speaking of receptions apparently I have to make all the danish desert for mine, so I think Al and I might be doing that on friday. I feel bad, because we don't hang out just to hang out all that often any more, but we'll have plenty of time this summer.

Well, I get my pictures back from the dance recital today, I'm very excited. I get to go get them after school, I also and meeting Al's grandmother. That's a tad bit intimidating, because I don't think I'm really a good first impression kind of person. Oh well, what can you do? I had better get going though, so I can study some more. I finished my last assigned painting for high school today. Then end.

I'm rather discouraged with the school system recently. I am graduating in twoo weeks, so that's good, but a lot of people who probably shouldn't be graduating are as well. At the arts and academics banquet I was surprised to hear that a girl involved with music had a spotlight on scholarship gold award, that means that she's gotten a's and b's while being involved in a MSHSL activity, and I know that this girl has a very hard time reading. But our special ed program provides that these students can still graduate in 4 years of high school wether they can read, add or not. It's frusterating. And to top it all off, in social this past week I heard my teacher say with a few minutes of each other, would've went and had did. Ouch those pain me.

In other news, busy weekend this weekend, Dance recital tonight and tomorrow, bacalaureate sunday this week. Had to find yet another sub for sunday school, it makes me sad, because now next sunday is our last one, and we don't get to do a lesson then either. I really like sunday school, I'm sad to see it end. I am pumped for the dance recitals though, I love watching dancers, especially Betso and The Alex.

Exciting news! Laurie will be home tomorrow night, she's currently intransit to Soiux Falls, where my parents will got retrieve her. She's traveling in a caravan of two cars driving for 28hrs straight. Eeew I don't know why you would want to do that. But that's what they're doing, so good luck to them. But i'm off to be productive for a while. Wish me luck.

So My mother was talking at me today, and she informed me that for the first month of school I am not allowed to come home, because she wants to make sure i make freinds and don't end up at home. I almost burst out laughing at this, I'm the child who has been complaining about living here for years, and gets excited every time we go somewhere with more than 20,000 people. And she thinks I'm going to come back all the time? It's just I would like to come back for homecoming, and that's in the first month. I believe she made up this rule so that I wouldn't come home all the time to see Al, but I can't come home all the time, it's 4 hours each way, eew. So I went to sleep, that's like my defense mechanism on over advice days. I think this works too, because she always wants me to sleep more, and so if I sleep or even "sleep" it gets her off my case for a while. I'm wondering what she's going to do about me giving blood tomorrow, or maybe she doesn't have to know, because she won't approve. How many mothers do you know that would be anger by wanting to help people? She says I'm not strong enough to give blood, and that I'm anemic (which the doctors told her I'm not, but "oh, they're wrong all the time.") So I figure if I'm unfit to give blood the blood checker people will tell me, and I do have three strikes against me, I'm on medication, went to Ukraine last summer, and may be anemic, who knows.

I got my prom picture back today, and sadly most of the ones with ym good camera didn't turn out, because someone didn't set the flash right, so the two disposabel cameras are fine, but the other two rolls struggle. Sad. Oh well, in good news today, I won my lens on e-bay today. It was only 1.99 punds, which translates to approximately 3-4 dollars. And then 13 pounds for shipping with totals out at about $30 or so. Not too bad I'd say. Well, it's of to paint for me, have a lovely night.

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For our journals we are to respond to a new statistic from a CNN study, that says 80% of the students in the US do 3 hours or less of homework per week, and that 40% of that 80 have to take remidial reading and math classes in college. I think this sounds very accurate. I myself end up doing more thatn 3 hours per week of homework. I took a more demandiong course load than is typical for a high school student, and I probably do 10 hours of homework per week on average. Yet, the majority of my homework is math, and i stil couldn't test into the college math class at the U of M in the cities, so I don't believe homework has that much todo with how welll students will do in college. It is good practice to have to spend time working on classes outside of class, becausze in college for you spend more time on homework than you do in class. Along the same lines, I have had virtyually no science homework tonight, and I did 18% better on my science placement exam than I did on either of the math exams. So I'd say that the problem with students in the US is a combination of laziness, because cheating on homework is more common now than not, and poor instruction. Some parts of the school system are very stong, and it varies for each school, but apparently math and english are across the board some of the weaker areas. buy I know that I've worked as hard as I can the past four years at math, and only really had to work in science during chemistry and still did best in science.
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So yesterday/earlier today was prom. It was a lot of fun this year. I enjoyed it immensly. The dance was actually fun, can't be said for many dances. Gillian Senenaded me, and there wasn dancing and giggling, and attempts at dancing, and lots of pictures, and good food, and overall merryment. After the dance we had Bede, and that was awefully funa s well. I won some money on blackjack and plinko, and also "beauty supplies" and pop which I gave away, because I didn't want it. The hypnotist was very funny againt this year, but he used a lot of the same stuff as last year. Gordie was awesome though, he went above and beyond. He was falling alseep at the beginning, and everyone else gradually laid down and fell asleep, but Gordie was sitting there and then wap over on his head. It made a crazy loud noise. Some of it was really scary though, like Taushia, she started to shake while she was supposed to be sleeping, and I don't think they're supposed to do that. It looked like she was having seizures, and I thought he should have made her go sit back down, because it didn't look right. And he also never unhypnotized ricky, and that's wierd, I think he definitly should have.

After Bede we came to my house and had breakfast, and tried to watch pretty in pink, but I sure didn't make it very far, I guess a few of the boys made it a ways, but they didn't like it at all.

Have you ever thought about what is takes to be able to say you love some one? I was thinking, and I was thinking that maybe if something unfortunate happened to them, you'd be really sad for them, then you could say you loved them, but then I was thinking that's more like empathy. I'd say to say you love some one once they're a person you can't even imagine something aweful happening to, because it would be to hard to see them hurt. People that you feel sick if they're hurting, and want to do anything you can to help it stop. I'd say that that is love.

Tonight there was/is a thunderstorm. It's very exciting, I love thunderstorms. It even hailed, which was a little crazy, and now I understand why hail and tornadoes go together, because to form hail the updrafts keep blowing frozen water particles into the clouds and when they bcecome too heavy the hail falls, well updrafts are very important in tornadoe forming, and so it all makes sense now. But I'm tired and think I'm going to turn in for the night. Evening to all.

So today is thursday, and I'm having an excellent day. I woke up to big clouds out my west window. And then it down poured. I've missed the rain, it means there's no snow, and that the grass will soon be green. I love rain, no thunder yet, but it might thunderstorm on prom though. That would totally rock. I'd love it.

As I drove in to the parking lot today, I was on the black top road and it was covered in water, and the sky was reflecting off the water, and it was beautiful, those are the momments where God says, lets make something pretty, and Amanda wishes she had her camera.

When I got to school I went to talk to Mr. G to borrow a chemistry book to review, and he gave one to me since they're getting new ones next year. Huzzah! And then in Bio we did a fun reation time lab and I learned how to paint waves in painting, and then there was pre-calc, but we're going to forget about that. Then I had lunch outside, and had a cookie and cappucino. Mmmh cappucino. It's been a good day. And it's summer!

Spring is in the Air! Yey, I *heart* spring. The flowers are blooming, the chemists are titrating, and the finals are printing. I love it. So I'm feeling better about my placement tests now, because I do remember some chemistry, so I might be able to pass that one, and I frankly don't really care. I'm being tested in pivoting tomorrow in Discrete, and it's not going to be pretty, but I'm going to do it! And possibly fail, but Froiland can't honestly fail me in my own class if i'm working as hard as I am. I'm really rather scared that I've hit my math ceiling though, and that nothing else is going to come through after this. Eep.

So last night I came home from Al's house, I grab my stuff out of the car, turn around and there's a dog right in front of me. I jump about a mile, because we don't have a dog. Then I realize that it's a friendly dog, and it follows me to the house. We found out today that it's a neighbors dog, and she's going home sometime soon hopefully, but she's really rather sweet. I was out taking spring pictures today, and she was taggin along. I found teh coolest thing in the shelter belt. The grass is getting long, and the sun was shingin at just the right angle that you could see all these spider webs strung between the blades of grass. It was sooo pretty, so I took pictures of that, and my mom's bird bath before it get's ugly, and a few cute little flowers. I had a most enjoyable time. And last night I painted the fastest thing I've ever painted before. I did an entire thunderhead in 30 mins. Earlier that would have taken a good 3 hours. Yey for being able to blend while the paint is still wet. And then in painting today Mr. S taught me about filters, so I can buy them for Betso and I. Sadly people out bid me on my lense on ebay today, but what can you do? bid on a new one, that's what you can do.

I also was reviewing some of my chemistry stuff tonight, and I realized that I miss that class. It was challengeing that's for sure, but it was a good challenge, because eventually I got it, unlike math. And I found teh Chemistry Pledge and the Chemistree Carrels.

The Pledge:
I pledge Allegiance to the chart of
the periodic table of elements,
and to the Atomic Theory for which it stands.
One concept, under Mendeleev,
for observations and experimentation for all.

And I was fixing my Titrate This shirt. Sigh, I miss chemistry.

So today I realized that even though I'm basically done with high school, I'l have lots to do for college, so I really shouldn't worry about being bored. I took my math placement exams for next year today. The U has a thing where you can take them online, which is very nice. Problem #1 calculus exam you can't use a calculator on. problem#2 I such at pre-calc. I scored 7/30 and they suggested that I take the college math placement test, because int thier words "You will have difficulty successfully completing calculus." So I take the college math exam which is basically calculus with a calculator, still don't know hwo to do things, score a 12/30 so I'm basically back to 11th grade math then? sigh, damn math and especially my math insturction so far. Math is ruining my life. But not to worry, I still have the chemistry placement test to take, and I looked at the practice test, and it looks like a killer. I'm studying.

Tomorrow I'm going to have a long morning. I have regular church, then sunday school with two classes. Alex is at a dance competition also, so I called Brett and he said angela would take their class, and he could help me, because I can't handle 10 kids on my own. Then we have confirmation sunday, and Alex and I are running th tech room for that. So I won't get home until 1 at the soonest. craziness. But I'm off, it's late, and I have a busy day tomorrow.