Happy 16th Birthday, Gil!
I’m sure that this has turned out to be a
good day for Gil anyway, since he did get his driver’s license today and is now
free to drive on his own; but the new marching band practice got in the way of
his birthday party for a lot of his friends – Michael, Tim, Rowen, and me
included.
Tuesdays are going to be a tough day for
birthday parties whenever we have those practices, since we can’t do them right
after school because the Maple Valley teens can’t get here soon-enough to do
that; and there were other conflicts for nearly every other day of the work
week too. I haven’t thought about it
before now, but we’ll have issues with baseball too unless the usual teen
practices on Tuesdays are moved to a later time or different day when baseball
starts up in May. Let’s not take that
line of thought any further; since baseball will be yet one more practice to
fit into my week that will just make keeping up with everything tougher for me.
Getting back to the news of the day, since
so many of us couldn’t go to Gil’s party or could only stop in before or after
whatever practices we had after school today; we did a birthday party for him
at lunch too. That was the highlight of
my school day, and maybe you find it funny that I write that about our lunch
break a lot, but keep in mind that our studies aren’t exactly challenging for
me; so it really is the time with my friends that keeps me from being bored out
of my mind all day while playing the part of a normal Grade Ten student.
Okay, make that ‘normal’ for a brainiac
geek-musician-cheerleader or however else my friends and the other teens around
here see me; but you get what I mean.
I must be tired, since I keep wandering
off-track here. The real fun of the day
started with our regular band practice, and while we don’t have the Memorial
Day parade to do as a concert band, we have worked on the music for that so we’ll
be able to do that with the marching band; and we do still need to keep the
concert band going – especially since I don’t expect the marching band to
continue very long after the Florida trip – though we might keep most of it
together through the rest of the coming school year. Beyond that, I don’t really see that
happening simply because of how expensive marching bands are; and that kind of
expense just doesn’t fit into a small town school budget. Fundraising would be tough year-after-year
too; since there are a lot of other charities and clubs vying for those
dollars.
Speaking of that, though, I can report that
the Fruit and Vegetable boxes fundraiser is off to as good a start as we’d
hoped, and while we still have time before placing our first batch of orders;
we are having everyone check in before the marching band practice with an
update on how their ‘sales’ are going. I
haven’t mentioned it in my journal yet, but I am doing my sales for the boxes
in two parts – the first is for my personal fundraising; and the second is for
the general fundraising fund so that I’ll be able to help out other band
members that will need to pay for their trip to Florida entirely through
fundraising. I’m already unofficially
finished with part one of that through my family; and I have lots of help with
part two – including through Dad at the office, Aunt Grace at the lab, and my
aunts and uncles at the med center – though they’re only doing that for
non-local, but regular visitors – like sales reps and regular patients from
other towns that now come here for the better medical care.
That’s another side-trip, but since it came
up; our new medical center has attracted quite a few new patients from the
other towns; and they are willing to make the drive for those better services –
and occasionally because our doctors and nurse are a lot younger and hotter
than pretty much every other doctor and nurse in any town – anywhere. Yes, that is my aunt and uncles, but if you
think that’s weird; remember that I’m a teen too – and those hot, young doctors
do occasionally come up in girl chats at school and elsewhere. Now that is seriously scary! ;^)
Getting back to the update again, our band
practice was fun; Michael, Rowen, and I had to eat a quick snack dinner between
that and the start of our marching band practice – and while Michael and I were
busy collecting that fundraising information from our band mates; and then it
was time to get started on our second marching lesson. This week, we worked on that for half the
time; and then had our first music practice.
Michael and I share the lead tenor sax duties with one Grade Eleven teen
from Maple Valley; and we have four other tenor sax players working in pairs
for the second and third parts of the music.
We only have two baritone sax players right now, but we’ll see how much
that changes over the next few months; since we’re sure to have more students
wanting to join in September – when the trip to Florida is closer. For now, though, we’re in good shape; and our
saxophone section is one of the best in the band.
I can’t say that every section is sounding
great, because they aren’t. Let’s not
pick on any of those groups or specific teens, and I know this was just our
first practice with playing music; but today reminded me a bit too much of our
first music class practices back in Grade Seven when we were all just beginning
to learn to play band instruments. It’s
also one of those times when I wish that my perfect memory wasn’t quite so
good. Remembering every bad note and
even simply the overall cacophony of sound is a bit painful – and only
partially off-set by the much nicer feelings and sounds that Michael and I were
sharing tonight in all three of our practices.
We will get all of the start-up problems worked out in time for the
Memorial Day parade, though; and I’m not at all worried about that first parade
being a disaster for us.
If I’m wrong about that; maybe Mom will let
me use a bit of Magi power to either auto-tune the bad notes for the entire
band – or just alter the memories of everyone hearing us to think that we’re
great! ;^)
Moving along again, Michael and I had a
blast with the marching band practice; and then we needed to hurry on to the
church for our teen praise team practice.
Stacey kept that practice fairly short for us – just a bit under an
hour; and then it was time to head home and get started on our homework. We did that at Michael’s house this time so
that we could spend a bit of time with his parents; and they sat with us at the
kitchen table while we worked. The
downside for that was not being able to work at Magi speed around his father,
but then Rebecca was home too; so we wouldn’t have been able to do that unless
we’d gone up to Michael’s room. Even
then we don’t normally do that, since it’s easier to work using our Magi talents
at my house, but I’m wandering again; and the point was simply that it took a
bit longer to get that homework finished.
That’s why it was time for me to head home
right after we finished that work so that I could get started on all of my
bedtime computing, work, and studies. It
was a quarter-past ten by then, and since Mom, Dad, Ethan, and Ehlana were all
working in the office; I joined them there; we went into a time phase; and I
blasted through about eight ‘normal’ hours worth of work and studying by the
time we wrapped things up by eleven-thirty and headed up to bed. I haven’t had myself tucked in with Mandy for
very long, but that’s only because I’m writing this while in another time phase
so that I can still be sleeping by midnight.
Doing that is a bit pointless, since it doesn’t really matter whether I’m
sleeping a few minutes before midnight or an hour later, but it’s what I want
to do right now, and since I’m a girl; I can get away with changing my mind
about things like that on a daily basis.
If you’re a guy reading this and don’t yet know that about girls, now
you do; and I’m sure that information will help you out a lot with the women in
your life.
We are up-to-date now, since there isn’t
anything exciting to report from my work or language studies. I should really just wrap this up before
wandering off on any other side-trips too; so, until next time...
...May the Magi Force be with you!
