dance, drama, and derping

Y'all, I just need a nap with a billion blankets or a Disney movie...or both. Of course I'm blogging; I have so much homework to do! That's the way it goes.

Remember the surprise I said was coming? It isn't exactly working. I'll try to work on that.

I discovered this beautiful thing called a recumbent bike, that lets me read while working on getting killer legs! It is so wonderful. Speaking of legs, guess what! I've been wanting to take dance lessons for ten years, ever since I saw a clogging exhibition. I haven't been allowed to to various reasons. It cost too much, or we were too busy, or the costumes would be too immodest, or whatever else. My parents are finally signing me for ballet and tap! I know I'm a late bloomer, but I won't let the fact that I'll be in classes with little kids or adults get to me. This will be my motivation to get stronger and eat more. I'm super excited!

I also got the role I wanted in my high school play. I get to be the Sour Kangaroo in Seussical! Have you seen Horton Hears a Who? I'm the evil, purple kangaroo. And I get to belt and be sassy. So that'll be a ton of fun.

My sister is coming home from India soon! I miss her so much, but I'll have to move out of her room. It's been six months.

Spring break, come quickly! I might pull all my hair out before then, and I don't want that to happen. I just keep telling myself that I'm almost finished with my hardest year of school. It's not even as hard as last year, but last year I wasn't practically an invalid!

One of my goals was to get 50 followers on Twitter this year....and I'm already there. So that's good!

One more thing. I made a couple of derpy videos on my sister's iPod touch. They are really funny! Should I create a YouTube channel and post them? The idea is that I'm this weird reporter for The Wild World of Nature, a goofy nature show.

It feels so good to just document things. This isn't a really cute post and doesn't have pictures or anything, but it does keep y'all updated. Actually, this month I've had more views than ever before, so that's encouraging!

~billyBobjoe Squarepants

favorite song right now: Appalachian Wine by Eleventyseven

a purse of happy cherries

I'm so happy!

If you want to envision me as Bert from Mary Poppins floating around a room and singing, go ahead. That's how I feel. I'll start to feel guilty for sitting around and doing nothing, then realize that I have NO homework, then leisurely do nothing some more! Actually, I have to do geometry like gangbusters because I'm behind, but I'm taking a week off until I really focus on that.

This is something that I just bought:

Isn't it cute? I think it's amazing. I also bought my summer purse, which is also adorable. If you know me, you know that I wear incredably large purses, so I decided on a backpack purse, which is supposedly the "next HOT thing for Summer!!" or whatev.

They both go in my cozy nook together!

That isn't what I call it, because actually that picture represents most of my side of the bedroom. Anyway, the nightstand holds my journal, Bible memorization book, Q&A journal, lyric journal, and whichever book I happen to be reading on the top shelf. The bottom shelf is for my purse, but that's not what it looks like now!

That's the great thing about pictures: they hold a moment in time, regardless.

I have this random piece of paper on my wall with, as you can probably can tell, a lyric from Good Life, my song for 2012.

This next one is my M&M graph, which goes to show that I have OCD badly. :) Someday, I'll show this to my future kids so they won't think that they made M&M graphs up!

That's a random note to end on, but that's the way I like it! Got to go, I'm watching I Am Number Four with my Dad.

Over and out, bBj

first flight

I got to see a baby bird's first flight! A pair of chickadees nesting in our apple tree kicked the fledglings out so they would learn to fly and live on their own. They hopped around on our driveway for a couple hours and hung out in the shade of our van.

Doesn't he look proud of his contour feathers?

When my dad needed to leave to take the van somewhere, I think to get the oil changed, I carefully moved Conrad and Twitty with a broom to safer areas of the driveway. Yes, that is what I named them.

Can you see that piece of down that is about to come off from his left side in the next picture? In case you were wondering, down feathers are different from contour feathers, the ones used for flight, in that they are next to the skin and used for insulation. On feathers, there is a shaft running down the middle, from which barbules attach. Some of the barbules are hooked and some are smooth on contour feathers so they can attach to each other, providing the strength and flexibility necessary for flight. Down feathers only have smooth barbules, making down comforters so very comforting! Now you know.

I didn't watch Twitty all the time, but I kept a close eye on Conrad. hardee har har, of course I did! Anyway, I shaded him from the sun, and after waiting, saw him take his first wobbly flight. I cheered and tried not to be jealous of his attached plane tickets to wherever he wants to go.

I really did try to restrain myself from petting him. Supposedly that's bad, but I did anyway, and boy, those down feathers were super soft! I'll never forget my babies. Spring has sprung.

the beginning of spring break

I keep starting posts, but by the time I get back to finish them, they're out of date! darn it! I promise to write a whole post in one day this time.

*loud cheering* It's FINALLY spring break! Spring itself is so welcome to me, but having no school at the same time is like super-mega-awesome-double-win-forever! I did important things like clean my room this morning, but vegged all afternoon. I watched Judy Moody and the Not Bummer Summer (don't laugh at me! It looked cute!), a Brian Regan stand up comedy show, and AFV! Oh, and ate. I ate food while doing so.

Lest you think that I get pleasure from folding clothes and putting objects away, that's not really what I mean by "Cleaning my Room" (with capital letters). I just bought a new organizational set of drawers on wheels at Target, so today I was consolidating things to make the best use of space in my room! Why that makes me so happy I'll never know. Just you wait, I'll go to college and have to room with a slob, it's in my future! But I do have practice from my little sister whom I share a room with.

I got some new clothes the other day! I finally got some overalls. I've been meaning to for forever, almost. I'm going to wear them out. I also got some shortalls, which are overalls with half of the pants missing, just to explain. I'm about to get saddle oxfords for Bye Bye Birdie, but also for me to have and wear in general. A few tshirts rounded out the new addition to my wardrobe.

I haven't been reading much lately. Not that I haven't wanted to, but I've just been too busy! I did just finish The Pilgrim's Regress by C.S. Lewis and 1984 by Orwell. Wow. They both blew my mind, but in totally different ways. As you can see on my sidebar, I'm behind on my 2012 challenge, but I'll catch up. Maybe when I go to California or Colorado... Yes I am! And I am pumped! I'll take a few pictures for ya! I'll probably take Pete and then have a post of all of his adventures. CO is for the family vacation, and CA is the destination of me and my big sister to visit some friends.

I think that there's nothing like working. My family members are laughing at me. What I meant, of course, was working somewhere for PAY! duh. It's so rewarding to work hard and put yourself into something, then to go to the bank. You know, God gave Adam work to do before the Curse. Work must be good for us, because it is not a result of sin. Most people don't think of that, or conveniently forget it, although, I will be the first to say that it's not always fun.

I wish my computer wouldn't be so slow. I really can't ever get online. *tear of sadness* I'm considering breaking down and getting a tablet. *looks away guiltily* I don't have anything particularly against them, but I ahvne't seen the need for one until now. But I don't really have a need; I could just buy a new computer. heh heh yeah! Just kidding, I can't! My computer works well enough for non-interweb related things, but I kind of like the internet, you know? Like, wouldn't want to live without it!! Okay, I'm fine. Well, I sure am not thinking of getting Apple, with all it's bling and... this just in! It can't really do anything? Oh, that.
I'm thinking more along the lines of a Kindle Fire. I need to do some research, because I would like an ereader, but one that was also a tablet so I could watch movies, update my blog, listen to music, and play games. Do you have a tablet? What do you think of it?

I'm off to feed Gandalf...my fish, and go eat dinner!

See ya in the movies, or on stage, whichever comes first!
billyBobjoe

PS So super excited about THG premier!

day of jumping

Sorry it's been so long! Well, it's (was) leap day, hence the stupid post title, and I still haven't done anything spectacular. Yesterday is a different story. Yesterday I started a new job, babysitting each week, at 8 in the morning. Had to go to rehearsal at 1 'til 4 after that. Don't get me wrong, it was a great day, but I did come home with sore muscles!
Have you danced for three hours straight? It's a little tough. We had learned the choreography for two songs, but nobody really understood it. They needed polishing, and everyone needed a pep talk, which one of the girls, the one that plays Kim, gave willingly! She should be a football coach.
Anyway, I'm super excited about Bye Bye Birdie! To all IRL friends: You better come see me and scream for me when I take my bows!
I think I have senior-itis. Schools not too hard anymore, but takes forever! The weather is so nice that I don't wanna be anywhere but outside. I'm finally being accepted at Comm. Central and rehearsals. Maybe all of this seems disjointed, but I promise that it's all related! See? The weather's so nice that I don't wanna do school, and school's easier, which lets me focus on friendships and stuff. Whatever.

I watched the new Pride and Prejudice again! I watched it before I read the book, with a girl who didn't like it and pointed out its flaws. I read the book, then watched the 1995 version, with Colin Firth, and loved it! In my mind, that was the only real P&P. But the two are so different. I recently watched the 2005 version again, with a mind to like it, and enjoyed it very much. The whole film is just beautiful; I guess it's the cinematography. I still don't think that Keira Knightley can do Elizabeth justice, but I sure don't mind Matthew Macfadyen! I believe that I will always prefer the old one, because of its extra length and ability, for that reason, to delve deeper into the book, but might be watching the new one more frequently when I don't have 5 (or however many) hours.

So excited! I already have my ticket to the midnight showing!

-billyBobjoe

grey skies

It's pouring at my place. The sheets of water make white waves in my culdesac.

I've been mentioning rain these last few posts, so I figured that I should devote a whole post to it.

I love rain. Maybe not more than sunshine, but definitely equally.

Well, not when the wind sounds scary, or family members are out driving, or you're stuck at school (which I have been because of flooding), or sirens are going off, or your roof is in danger of being whipped off...

...but when the rain hits the windows and makes that sound...

...when the sky is just a low wall of darkness, and makes the world feel small, but not crushing...

...when lightning flashes and shows you the glory of God Almighty...

...when thunder makes you look up in apprehension...

...when your soul can feel itself being washed clean as you think of nothing at all...

...when you swear that the electricity in the clouds affects your blood...

...when soup, chili, and hot cocoa is called for...

...when friends are stranded at your house for long periods of time...

...when you run outside in old clothes and dance...

...when it's not too cold and not too hot, but just right...

...when you stare at the water hitting the pavement for so long that you can actually see the faeries...

...that's when I like rain more than sunshine.

-billyBobjoe



One of those days

I had one of those days yesterday.

Not the kind when your hair goes in every possible direction.

Not when you trip over everything.

Not when you lose every train of thought that ever thought about boarding.

Not when you get super distracted over dumb things.

Not when you feel all depressed for no reason.

BUT, the kind where everything goes right!

It was great! I woke up at 6am, which, as some of you know, is something that can be likened to climbing Mt. Everest for me. Not only that, but I woke up refreshed and ready to kick that puppy! Or take on the day, whichever you prefer.

I started doing homework at 6:30am and worked without getting distracted ALL day! I got so much done! I did have to hide in my attic space with two blankets and a heater so I wouldn't disturb Stanley with the light. It did end up being quite cozy though!

I made dinner that night, because this is my week, and it actually tasted good! I'm not a terrible cook, but I usually cook boring, freezer food, which isn't scrumptious. Anyway, I did made mashed potatoes, that weren't instant!

The weather was amazing, even though I spent very little time outside. It smelled like rain and the clouds were dark. There's a 100% chance of rain today or something. Weird, because it's bright outside of my window...

I didn't get a chance to read, which was sad, but I did get an invite to lunch for tomorrow!

I hope everything is going as well for you as me right now!

bBj :)