3/14/99
Do have those days where you don't know why you even bother trying to do something well because no one will give you a chance anyway? I've been having a lot of those days lately. Normally that happens in PE, like last time I wrote and again this past Thursday. Friday that happened to me for the first time in track.
See, normally in track no one cares that I'm the slowest runner or anything as long as I always go to practice and try. Friday, however, we went to a nearby park to play this game with a frisbee. We formed two teams and had to pass the frisbee to eachother trying not to let it touch the ground and make it past the goal. No one on my team passed me the frisbee except maybe once the entire two hours we were there. Near the end someone said, "Okay, let's all run while playing this time...ANGELA." I replied, "I would, but no one passes it to me anyways." So then they told me, "That's because you suck at throwing and catching." How could they even tell if they never gave me a chance to? Right as they finished saying that, I caught the stupid thing too. It was very unfair, especially since they frequently threw it to the other girl on our team and she missed it practically every single time. And these are people I joke around with and know! Being a girl can really suck.
3/9/99
I made a special page for all the penguin conspiracies on my site.
Wow, long time no update. Track's been keeping me busy; we had our first meet three days ago. At first we went to the wrong college, found out the meet was somewhere else, then waited for the buses to take us back there. I ran a 400 (fourth a mile) and an 800 (half a mile), but it was a relay so you can't tell what place you came in. I got my best times for those distances, so even though it was slower than everyone else's who've been running longer, I was happy.
Something really sucky happened in track practice last Wednesday. For warm-ups they have us run in rows in various ways for a short distance. They were having us run backwards, which I'm really slow at, and the guy in front of me was going really fast. Just as I started to turn around and run normally, the guy collided with me, knocking me flat out on my side on the gravely track. To top it off, barely anyone saw me, so the next two people ran right into me when I sat up and toppled over me. Finally a guy stood in front of me so that they'd run into him and I could get off the track without getting hurt more. I still have the scrapes and bruises.
PE on Friday wasn't that great either. I was on a basketball team with two guys who wouldn't pass me the ball, even though I made all the shots I tried for but one the entire class. We won every game, but it wasn't fun since I had to always steal the ball if I wanted to play at all, whereas the previous class the two guys on my team passed the ball equally between us. I liked that a lot more; even though we sucked we were more relaxed and joked around with eachother. Today in PE we just played knock-out and I played basketball with some friends. I also won a soda for winning a knock-out game, which was very cool.
I guess that's all for now; so long folks!
2/21/99
Something really stupid happened today. Me and my younger brothers Matt and Paul went to the park around the corner from us to play basketball. We were having fun, joking around and goofing off, when these two kids rode up on their bikes and asked to play. Matt kept telling them no, so they resorted to cussing at us and asking if we were too scared of losing to play them. They wouldn't get off the court, so we said, "Fine, keep the court," and left with our ball. Since they couldn't do anything without a ball, the stupid kids decided to follow us partway home while they insulted us. The older one tried inmpressing us by saying he was on the Varsity basketball team. I asked him, "Where, at an elementary school?" He said no, at Springview, which is a middle school. The other kid was younger, and they were both tiny little shrimps. Pretty idiotic to try and intimidate us when we were all bigger than them.
2/20/99
Last night me and two friends went to see the musical at our school, How To Succeed In Buisness Without Even Trying. It was pretty funny with some good singers, including some of my friends, one of which had the lead female part. So that was fun.
Track's been going well lately. Except for one day when we had to run up and down a muddy path that was a quarter mile long uphill in the rain. I made the mistake of taking off my sweatshirt, so by the time we were done my arms were so numb I could hardly move them. Other than that and the fact I'm one of the slowest distance runners, track has been good, especially getting to make stupid comments out loud, but that's common for me.
I can finally use my permit! Woo-hoo! Legally, that is. Unfortunately, I've only used it once so far driving to school, and my mom is not a very good person to drive with. Here's an example of what she was saying while I was trying to drive: "Slow down! We're coming to a corner! Drive faster, you're going too slow. See that car in front of you? You should be right behind it. Don't speed up, you won't be able to catch up now!" And so on. It got pretty annoying. But hey, at least I can drive.
2/15/99
I added a thought about the latest penguin conspiracy.
Valentine's Day was pointless, as it probably is for all single people. I went to the dance at our school anyway, and that was fun. First time I've worn a dress in about two years. Then I went out running over the weekend, like we were supposed to for track. I ran three miles yesterday with Matt and Paul on his bike. About halfway through Matt had to walk though. Today I went six miles with my dad and once again Paul on his bike. My dad was impressed; he had to walk near the end too. I saw my track coach drive by as we crossed the street. She turned around and pulled up along side me, asking how far I was running. I told her six miles, and she looked really shocked. Always fun surprising people like that; I guess that means they have low opinions of me, but it's still fun.
2/11/99
What is it with people who talk about me when they think I can't hear them and it should be obvious I can? In math today, this one girl was quietly telling Darrell (who was next to me, but with an aisle between us) that he should ask me to the Valentine's dance Saturday or buy me one of the flowers they're selling at lunch. She kept telling us we'd make a cute couple, but we told her it doesn't matter what she thinks in this case, it matters what we think. She finally shut up when everyone in our two groups started teasing her.
Track today I decided to try sprinting since I tried long distance last time. Take it from me: never ever sprint. It's painful. I'm definitely going to stick with long distance instead. I feel good doing that (even if I'm really slow), plus I'm able to joke around with more of the people on there.
Anyway, I left the sprinters early and went to the lockerroom. Everyone but too people left soon after, and those people started singing and talking. I ignored it until the girl in my row went over there and heard her whisper, "Just so you know there's someone else in here." They whispered for a bit, then I clearly heard the other girl say, "Yeah, she's in my history class and made her group lose points for playing with the dice." Fortunately they left after that. I love how I'm so invisible that no one knows my name and only remembers me when I do stupid things. See, we played this game in history, and our teacher told us not to play with the dice, so of course when he handed me one I had to tap it against the desk or roll it around, til near the end he finally docked my group a point (not that it mattered since we were losing the entire time and my friend in charge of points didn't even dock us). I never realized how that was the type of thing that stuck in people's minds. Or maybe it's only if they're stuck-up.
One last thing that sucked: I was going to have my driving lesson today with an instuctor so I could (legally) drive with my parents, but they cancelled it. I was pretty annoyed about that.
2/6/99
I wrote more of Island of the Penguins.
And yet again I haven't updated for a long time. This time it's my own fault; I've been staying after school every day two hours for track. I also have tons of homework to do over the weekend since I won't have enough time after school. I decided to listen to my friends and join track as a sprinter. Maybe it'll actually be fun.
I am so ticked off right now. Some jerk got into my email account and has been reading my emails; you can tell because it said I had one new message when there were a ton I never read. They also replied to one of my friends. From my friend's reply, apparently they pretended to be me and asked him out, then said they wanted to have sex with him. I hate to imagine what my friend's thought of me this past week. I do have an idea of one person who might do something like that to me though.
Something in my theater class really sucks too. We're performing our own version of Sleeping Beauty for the elementary schools in May, and our teacher casted our parts. All the popular girls got the biggest roles, while me and two of my friends who are excellent at acting got tiny, unimportant roles. I get to be a seamstress. Wow. You could cut out that part and it wouldn't matter. I get to dement it somewhat though and create a monologue about my sewing abilities, but it still sucks that only the "popular" snobs got the important female parts.
1/28/99
Sorry I haven't updated recently; once again something was wrong with our computer so we couldn't get on the internet.
My math teacher is so dumb. Darrell and I got really bored towards the end of math yesterday; it was one of those days where you feel like if you do one more math problem, your brain will explode. So we searched for other ways to entertain ourselves. Darrell took my calculator and was determining the height of various actors. He decided Tom Cruise is over 5,600ft, Brad Pitt's 300ft, and John Travolta is 17ft tall. After he got bored with that, Darrell decided every minute for the last fifteen minutes of class, he'd tear a page out of his Baseball Digest magazine, crumple it into a ball, and walk across the room to throw it away. The teacher was too busy stamping and going over the homework that she didn't notice at all. So I walked up to the front of the room and, at the suggestion of two of our classmates, started walking around the table at the front of the room. I did that for approximately the last five minutes, and only about two other people in the classroom noticed, neither of which was the teacher. Sometimes I'm positive that I'm invisible.
Hey, guess who's a manager for the track team? I know, not that thrilling, but it gives me something to do where I can see my friends and earn the community service I need to graduate. All I really do is time people and record the info. I would've tried to actually be on the team, but I'm not that interested in track. I did want to try out for the girl's basketball team, but never heard about the meeting and try-outs for it.
PE's been going pretty well. Our team's been murdering the other girl teams at basketball, so next time we're asking to play some guy teams. At least none of them scream loudly the entire time. The only way to shut the scream team up is by making baskets, which we did frequently. Not that it stopped them for very long.
The second half of my day sucked. I'm coming down with the flu or something, and the medicine I'd taken wore out halfway through school, so the rest of the day I had a major headache and no energy (which is very unusual for me). We had lunch even later than usual, and I wasn't hungry at all, another rare thing. Plus I only slept for two hours last night before Joe and my mom's loud talking woke me up. I spent the rest of the night feeling miserably tossing and turning, only dozing off for short periods of time.
I've already had a few sleeping problems; for about the past two weeks I've had nightmares I could only faintly remember until last weekend when I actually remember most of one of them, and it was not pleasant. I could recall people with no skin on their faces, only skulls with hair and eyes, who made me look like them. I could also hear screams as they tortured and killed one of their own kind. Definitely not one of my best dreams. However, during these two weeks of nightmares there were exceptions: two wonderful dreams I had and could remember fairly well with one certain person....
1/23/99
I added a few things to my thoughts page, including some pics my friend Efrain sent me of Pinky and the Brain.
Okay, okay, so I haven't been able to update for about a week. Our mouse and keyboard got screwed-up, so we had to get a new one. Then I had the difficult task of getting my dad and brothers off....
Anyway, I've actually done some stuff lately. Yeah, I realize that's highly unusual for me, but oh well. Sunday night (since we didn't have school Monday), I went to a surprise party for one of my friends. We went bowling, watched some videos, played N64, some drama improv games, and basically just joked around and had a good time.
I'm surprised I still have my hearing after yesterday. In PE we played sexist basketball where girls play girls and guys play guys. My team had to play six girls who screeched the entire time in my ear for no reason. The teams on the court next to ours even stopped playing for a bit and watched. It probably sounded like we were torturing them or something. Then we had a rally at the end of the day. That wasn't too bad, except the people behind me were also yelling in my ear.
Last night there was also a dance at our school. Me and some of my friends just went there to hang out and listen to music. I didn't dance with any guys; no one I liked was there. We did talk with some of our guys friends though. There was one girl there that none of us had ever even seen before that joined our group and was dancing with us. She followed us around most of the time, which was really strange. For the last hour, I got really hyper and started acting weird and scaring my friends. That's always fun to do. Of course, a lot of it had to do with the penguins, but not all of it did. Anyway, I had fun.
One last thing: be glad if you don't have annoying little brothers like mine who give you an hour on the computer and N64, then count down how much longer you have and repeat that your turn's up over and over if you stay on a second longer than your hour.
