Camping, Stars, and Rain

I'm going camping for a whole week. I'm looking forward to it.

There's something oddly soothing about camping; it's relaxing.

I remember the first time I really saw the stars was while camping in Montana. Yes, of course I've seen stars in the night sky, but not like this. There was something different about these ones. There was little to no air pollution and when you looked up, the sky was permeated with them. Little clusters sprinkled across the sky, natural illumination as far as the eye could see. It was breath taking as I lay there with my father while he showed me constellations. I remember thinking that it looked as if God had taken a salt shaker and shook it vigorously across the sky.

In ninth grade I learned in Earth Science that for most stars, it takes eight years (or more) for their light to reach Earth. Ever since then, I've always thought that looking into the night sky is like looking into the past. Then I get all nostalgic and then common sense kicks in.

Shut up, nostalgia.

Anyway, camping. I hope it doesn't rain. There's actually a 50-60% chance that it will, but I'm crossing my fingers that it doesn't. Rain is terrible while camping. We're going tubing and hiking, we're making peach cobbler and s'mores.

Yeah, it should be good.

Hello?

Hi. It's been a while....

New layout! Thanks, Andrea! I really like it, by the way.

Summer is here. Why does it take forever to feel like summer? Just when it starts to feel like summer, it's time for school to start again. This seems kind of unfair.

Last Friday, on the last day of school, I felt like I would be back there on Monday, doing homework during one of Watson's lectures, cringing/rolling my eyes at Volansky, loving one of Bryen's classes, and falling asleep in Shupick's chem class while Vera drew something wildly exciting. The normal routine of life. But it's over and I'm sad. I think I'll miss many aspects about school. It provides me with a motivation to work. I need to stay focused this summer; we're looking to have an amazing quiz bowl team next year. I just hope I'm here.

I'm glad summer's here anyway. I don't have super exciting plans (no Germany this summer), but I am going to quiz bowl camp! NERDS OF THE WORLD UNITE! (Yeah, that was a Communist Manifesto reference.)

Super psyched nonetheless!!

Also, I've learned something a bit...frightening? exciting? surprising? since school ended. I'm not quite sure how to respond or if I'll even need to respond. Probably the latter, but it's OK.

Ahh, the relaxation of summer.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

I've been reading Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead and I find it to be a very humorous yet insightful play. The titular characters are the protagonists (obviously) in this play adapted from Shakespeare's Hamlet. Essentially, that's what this play is: Hamlet from the perspective of his two friends, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. The following is a passage from the play, one I find particularly interesting:

"Guildenstern: ...you can't act death. The fact of it is nothing to do with seeing it happened--it's not gasps and blood and falling about--that isn't what makes it death. It's just a man failing to reappear, that's all--now you see him, now you don't, that's the only things that's real: here one minutes and gone the next and never coming back--an exit, unobtrusive and unannounced, a disappearance gathering weight as it goes on, until, finally, it is heavy with death. "

Death--whether this version of Hamlet be told by Shakespeare or Hamlet's two comrades--seems to be a prevalent theme throughout this play...however I think I like Stoppard's more light hearted and well-balanced version somewhat better. I would definitely recommend it.

My Kind of Humor

"Hey! Just wanted to say I loved the Book of Kells."

I love geeky humor.

Can you even read the Calvin and Hobbes one?

Anyway. It's been over a month now. Odd. It's not like anyone really missed me, but I usually blog more often. Though I should warn you I'm not going to be blogging for a while. May is a busy, busy month. I feel like all I do is sleep, sleep, study, study, or just repeat myself for rhetorical effect. Something like that. These fragments are getting worse.

Spring Break

This break will be nice. For many reasons, actually.

But really, it will be nice to take a break from many things, not just school.

That's all I have to say. I'm starting to think my blog is extremely useless/boring.

Facepalm.

I read the following sentence during World History today:

"Female children normally did not receive an education, and in times of scarcity when food was in short supply, daughters might even be put to death." (Dukier & Splievogel)

First thought: "They were eating their daughters?!?"

On second thought: "...Oh, they killed them so they had fewer mouths to feed. I get it. Meanies."

So...basically, for two seconds, I thought people in the Ming and Qing Dynasties were cannibals.

Gahhhh

I look at things things now and all I can think is: "Oh, look, a Doric column. Oh, look a pendentive dome. Oh, look, Roman influence! Oh, hey--that's some Neoclassicism! Oh, there's some Rococo. Oh, hold up, got some Baroque there. Oh, why do all of these thoughts begin with 'oh'?"

And then people-*coughNeha/Michellecough*-have to remind me that I have AP tests in less than two months?!

Thanks.

But seriously.

Also, I've been...slackerish lately.

Oh, gosh it's frustrating.

I'm too influenced by outside sources. I will not succomb!

Also, according to Eshwar, I'm Shakespeare. ??? OK.