A Story That Needs Finishing

Well I started up on my novel again, and I've made incredible progress with paper and pencil. Remember the in-school suspension? That day I finished five rough draft pages of the story.

With all this new material, it's my pleasure to announce that I am starting a new blog that will contain what I've written of Mondays, as well as any other stories, poems, or marginally entertaining literature that I can think up. It's called Monday Musings, and you can reach it at:

mondays014.blogspot.com/

Or just use my handy sidebar. I look forward to publishing in this new blog.

My Avuncular Friend Brian

Well my avuncular friend came to visit last week, mostly to visit Gary and help out our family. While he was there, he was a big help - he drove me to school, helped with the dishes, took Gary to therapy, and more. He was a big help to say the least.

And of course it's always interesting to see my Uncle Brian. He's just such a character. Having a conversation with him is truly like a battleground. He plays with words and cynicism and humor like no other man I know can. It's... inspiring.

Brian, you know what I'm talking about.

Smartass....

Anyway, I just want to give a shoutout - Thank you Brian! You have helped so much more than you needed to and you've helped the family so much. You are welcome anytime at our household and you know that we love to see you. No promises about the roof though...

The Fiddler on the Roof Part 2

In case you haven't read it yet, here's part 1 of my rooftop escapades.
Well, unsurprisingly, I had to pay the piper for my rooftop expedition. Because two days later, I got a call slip from the Dean of Students, Mr. Caldwell. I walked down to his office and sat down. Looks like a teacher had heard about me on the roof and informed him.

Damn. Plus I got nobody to blame It's my fault that the teacher found out - I was the one bragging to everyone in Saturday School that I got up on the roof. And the teacher (Ms. Shea) just happened to overhear, and she was obligued to report it.

Mr.Caldwell made it clear what the punishment was - In-School Suspension and a call home. I tried to talk him out of the call home, but no luck. I walked back to my first period class, grabbed my books and my lunch, and went to the box (as portrayed in the picture above).

The box is a small room with two desks in it, a tie rack, and a bunch of other clothes and weird stuff the office has hanging around, like extra locks. There's a semifunctional one-sided mirror too, but it doesn't work too well. I can usually still see what's going on outside the box. So that was where I found myself for an entire school day last Monday.

It's not so bad though. I mean, I was able to get a lot of work done, and even narrowly dodged getting a zero on an English assignment by pure luck. Soon, though, I had nothing left to do. So I started to work on my story, Mondays. I was able to finish 5 hand-written pages of that book that day. So all-in-all, it wasn't that bad.

Here's the kicker - during the day I would periodically walk in and say something or ask something to Mr. Caldwell, and at one point I asked him if he wanted to see the pictures I took on the roof. He looked at the pictures and said, "Well, you weren't supposed to be on the roof, but the pictures turned out nice." Now that's looking on the bright side.

A Fiddler On The Roof

I'm not really sure what compelled me to climb up onto the roof shortly before Saturday School last Saturday, but it was a strong enough compulsion to make me do it.

When my Mom dropped me off at the school a half-hour early and the doors were still locked, I walked around and decided to take some pictures of the school that I would publish here. Here are the three I picked up before the roof.



This should give you a nice look of what Bishop Kelly looks like. But that's not all that I got. Soon, I was bored of taking these photos though, and I found myself climbing a tree and jumping to the rooftop. (I didn't really have a fiddle, but I did think it was an interesting title)

You remember that photo from the 'May' post? That was one of these photos. My Bishop Kelly readers should recognize these right away.


Here's the football field

Here's the Carly Center

And here's me, sucessfully on the roof as this pictures proves.

I thought it was funny that as I walked around up there, I found a hackey sack that my friend had thrown up there a week ago. It was just lying there next to one of the vents. I picked it up and after taking my pictures, it was time for Saturday School, so I climbed down, safe. I got in and fould a few of my friends already there. I showed them the pictures I had gotten, and they laughed.

Unfortunately, the teacher happened to hear all of this...

An Upcoming Concert and a Broken Instrument

My zero period class this past month and a half has since become obsessed with one thing. The upcoming concert. We decided that it would be mighty fun to do a concert with themes from famous video games. And so that's what we're doing. We've got some famous themes in here - Mario, Zelda, Halo, Tetris, 007, and many more. For any of you who want to come, and trust me, it's gonna be worth coming, the actual concert is May 22nd, 7:00 PM in Bishop Kelly, Boise Idaho.

Meanwhile, we are in the throes of last-minute preparations and song-learning. One of the undoubtedly biggest obstacles that we've run into is that my ocarina broke.

An obvious question - What's an ocarina?

Well, and ocarina is a small flute/whistle-like musical instrument. It is essential to one of the pieces in the upcoming concert. I bought one back in January, but it broke. So I bought another one. This time, my friend broke it. So we bought another one, but that one broke in the hall. So I bought another one. (The thing's fragile). That third one lasted - I carried it around in a case, and only when the case got taken did I finally break this one. And it's a shame. I've fallen in love with this little instrument, and I'm gonna need it for the concert.

So now we're a week away from the concert and we're missing an instrument. We're trying to order another one, but it's a little hectic. Why did it have to break? Oh well. More on this later.

May

Some of you are probably wondering why I haven't written in so long. It's been ten days since my last May post. Here's the thing - it's not easy anymore. It's becoming especially more difficult to blog, what with very limited computer use both at school and at home, not to mention the things piling up on my plate right now. When it comes down to it, it can be listed like this:

An upcoming concert and a broken instrument

An unfortunate breakup

A fiddler on the roof

That fiddler in an in-school suspension

My avuncular friend, Brian

A story that needs finishing

Finals, essays, tests, and grades

And... a less than ideal situation at home with Gary.

With any luck, I will get to tell you all of these stories. My life hasn't stopped, but I haven't been fortunate enough to put my life down on the computer screen yet. I apologize for the absence. Keep reading though. My story's far from over...

Back On The Ice

Well it would seem that although it is indeed May, I find myself back on the ice rink with my old Bishop Kelly teammates. And I love it.

Coach Andersohn, the hockey coach, has signed the team up for 3-on-3 hockey in the summer; a game every week. Not to be upstaged, the other high schools have done the same. So it won't be surprising if we end up playing other high school teams every other week.

For me, this all seems very exciting. I mean, what could be better? I'm going to get to play my favorite sport every week against my rivals and with my teammates, and when the school years comes around next year and the real hockey season starts, we'll all be ready to kick some ass.

I know there are a lot of people who don't like hockey, but let me tell you - getting back on the ice after four months and skating is euphoric. There's nothing better. Just being able to glide again... it's amazing.

And so the picture of my upcoming summer begins to take shape...