what I need to do in the next two days:

Prepare for my final two final exams (US history and French)
Read Orlando, by Virginia Woolf
Return a fiction book, a French textbook, an English textbook (opened once), and a US history textbook
Finish a painting
Go to work
Pack for a trip to Chicago
Memorize two piano pieces
Sight read a Schubert string quartet; this also means I have to find [...]

I love clothes.

Just to make that clear. I love clothes. Usually, as a high school student with a minimum wage job and no allowance, I can’t afford them. I have to save up for a couple months to buy some high-end items, so usually I just go to eBay and buy some scarves or something.
But this coat/jacket:

Has [...]

the problem with white jeans.

Sadness:

I just stained my new white jeans.
The culprit:

Jack, Rose, Arthur, and Marilyn.

Families series, Part 1
So, most everyone knows that Arthur Miller was married to Marilyn Monroe. After their divorce and her death, he married Inge Morath and they had a daughter, Rebecca Miller, and a son (who has Downs Syndrome). Arthur Miller worked with Daniel Day-Lewis on a film version of The Crucible and Day-Lewis [...]

“That’s two answers!”

Today, at Quiz Bowl Districts:
“Find the y-intercept of the equation x^2 + 5x -15 = 0“
Teammate buzzed in, is acknowledged: “(0, -15)”
“Incorrect.”
Other team guessed wrong.
“The correct answer was negative 15.”
Obviously the team challenged the answer. The y-intercept of an equation is a point. A point can be expressed in coordinate form. The moderator was confused. [...]

nomenclature.

I’m on The Great College Tour (East Coast Edition) right now, that great (new) tradition that every high school junior/senior/sophomore/whatever partakes in. Now that wireless has completely taken over life, I’d like to share some system names with everyone.There are those names that seem to 1. utilize fear tactics or 2. defy reverse psychology:

 >:(>:(>:( – [...]

Materialism in America.

Christvertising, a fusion of two twin pillars of American identity: religion and materialism. “God Bless Your Brand.”
from Joe. My. God.

I hate days like today.

Blatant racism, immaturity, physical harassment, annoyance, further disturbance of my already-damaged ears. Oh, the joys of public education. Wait, and I thought I was in a good school system? This city/town is nationally ranked for a good education system, and the school has repeatedly won national awards and has an obscene number of Presidential Scholars. [...]

Ridiculousness? You bet.

[Edit] <start sarcasm> Or, Free Speech: It Really Sucks. [/edit]
“That’s ridiculous,” I turned away from my computer screen, lips curled in a sure-to-be-disgusting snarl. Like so many Americans, I depend on my computer to escape from every day worries. Too much homework? No problem, I’ll just go surf through some blogs to take my mind [...]

Christmas cheer.

I had a very typical Christmas, as far as surprises go. Everything went as planned. The parents were happy with their presents, and my little brother was charming for a split second. Just kidding. He’s a good kid.
—
Meditation on Lagunitas
by Robert Hass

All the new thinking is about loss.
In this it resembles all the old thinking.
The [...]