"Homemade" movies have been coming together around me. My piano teacher and my parents want me to record my piano playing. My teacher says that I can share it with my children when I'm older (since when you get older, you can't play some songs anymore. Lack of strength? Lack of skill? I dunno). My parents just want to send my music to my relatives in China so they can ooh and ah over it. So my family has been using our new (sort of) camera to record the songs that I'm playing currently. I keep laughing or getting nervous, though, and so I don't think any of the recordings were really as good as I can play if I'm feeling good. Oh well.

And then my piano teacher actually arranged for her top students to have their songs all recorded and put together in a DVD. We would dress up - like dresses, or perhaps a suit if you're a guy - and then we'd go to her apartment, and one of her students recorded us, and then he made it into a DVD. I just got the DVD. The cover picture is nice-looking. But all the piano players and the teacher have their picture in black and white, so it made me feel like I'd already died and it was a memorial DVD. D:

One time I was reading Fruits Basket, and in one of the novels, I was looking at the fan art section in the back. (I don't know if the original Japanese manga has a fan art section, but I know the English manga does.) Actually, I think there was someone from the town where I live. It was amazing. I guess it's a small world after all.

It was the Moon Festival recently. I had forgotten until my mom told me. (But really, it's late this year. I thought it was normally in September) Some of my parents' friends came over to our house because of it. Apparently, one of the families (there were two, though one person was missing because he was sick) had another friend who owned a cat and a dog. They went over to the friend's house, and then their son (who was also at my house, but didn't do much besides play his DS) was bitten by the dog. The dog wasn't even vaccinated since their owners thought it "wasn't necessary since the dog never left the house". And the cat was crazy too, trying to attack people. I guess that's why my parents' friends are against dogs going unleashed in our town. If they already can cause trouble when they are leashed, then having them unleashed would make it worse. But I think it would be cool if there were places dogs could run free, and maybe "touch upon their wolf heritage" or whatever. I mean, I heard there are places where there are beaches for dogs to run free. It would be cool if someday I could have a dog and go there.

I was taking some photos at home and one of them came out kind of weird. I spilled some soup at dinnertime once so I decided to take pictures while I had the chance. When I had the flash on, the photo turned out kind of interesting. (Click to enlarge photo. It's really big!)


This blog has already been running for a whole year. In fact, the anniversary was only a few days ago, on September 30th. Let's toast to the future of the blog! (Unless you want it to go down. If so, I don't even know what you're doing here. o_O;; )

Labels: anniversary, black and white, blog, cat, Dogs, dvd, fanart, fruits basket, homemade, manga, moon festival, movie, music, photography, piano, record, songs, vaccination

I'm talking about the magazine drive. Every year we have it to raise money for our school. The students try to sell lots of magazines (or they can donate money differently instead, $20 counts as one "magazine subscription").

You can earn prizes like Jamba Juice smoothies, Weepuls (little furry collectible things, the sixth grade girls this year thought they were so cute because they went "Awwww!"), even an iPod Touch if you sell enough magazines...But it's really hard to do that unless you have lots of relatives who like to read magazines, you're a superior salesman (and how would that work? You're not allowed to go sell door-to-door. That's lame considering you were allowed to do that for the Walkathon in elementary school. So they're saying older kids are more likely to get kidnapped?!), or you just have lots of money to spend.

This year there was a dog that rolls over. When it senses movement in front of its face, it rolls over. It's a pretty hard prize to get, though. And the class that sells the most magazines will get a 10-foot long snake. Maybe I should win one for my dad. It can be his birthday present or whatever.

Speaking of snakes, I had a dream about a snake. I was in some sort of observatory place in a rainforest, I think. My family and some other people were in it, sitting on wooden benches, peering out at the wilderness. The previous president, George W. Bush, was also there, but he didn't say anything. He had a very small snake. It was short and skinny with a wider head. I forget the exact color but I think it was a dull brownish sort. George W. Bush left and dropped his snake on the floor. I was freaked out since I wasn't sure whether the snake was fond of biting or not.

More recently, I had another dream about an animal. This time it was about dolphins. I don't know much of the specifics of the dream but I was in a room, with my mom, and maybe more people, but I don't remember if there were. There were dolphins there and I tried to get on the back of one to ride it. The dolphin flopped around in a panicked fashion until I let go of it. My mom left the room and I was leaving too but the dolphin, which had been resting on the ground, jumped up and made a really ugly face, like it was going to bite. I was frightened out of my wits and ran out of the room. I hope that doesn't mean I'm going to have a negative run-in with dolphins in the future.

My French teacher told us something amusing recently. She took her class last year to a restaurant called Crepe Daniel. The students were excited since they thought they would be able to practice their French skills...No dice. The restaurant had been owned by a French person a long time ago. Now it was a Chinese owner. The French teacher said, "I don't know, maybe you could practice your CHINESE at the restaurant."

My new camera arrived. It's a dark blue Panasonic Lumix. There is a really funny feature to it. It's called Transform and it says in the manual, "Changes the subject to a slim-looking or glamorous appearance." It's like how before cameras were invented, people would paint portraits of people instead, and they would try to make the people look better than they actually looked.

Labels: camera, chinese, crepe daniel, Dogs, dolphin, door to door, dream, french, funny, george w. bush, magazine drive, mandarin, president, prizes, restaurant, rollover, sales, snake, transform, vicious

One of my friends always needs to be occupied somehow. If she's not kept busy she will descend upon your belongings. I have managed to appease her with a book but who knows what will happen tomorrow because I have finished that book and won't be bringing it to school again. D: Lately I have been working on something called a budget project, in which you make up four or five people to create a family, and then have to use a certain amount of money to rent a house, get a car and furniture, find a job, and feed and clothe all of the people. I am in charge of the food, so I have been looking over grocery coupons and fliers to try to find deals. (All the same, I ended up spending hundreds of dollars XD) Whenever I leave my pencil case out my friend starts rifling through it, or she takes the scissors and cuts up scraps of paper, or she "blows up" my backpack (as it is a roller backpack, that is basically pushing down the lever when it is up). I don't mind too much as long as she doesn't cause any serious trouble, but still I must be sure to keep a secure hold on my belongings.

Another friend of mine is less restless in comparison, but still enjoys poking around. She is a fan of sharp things, so she likes inspecting people's teeth. I think she ought to be a dentist or something. She likes swords, too, particularly katana swords. And if I have noodles as part of my lunch, if I give her permission, she uses the fork to separate the carrots and olives from the noodles, and then sorts the noodles by color (green, beige, and orange). Actually, the lunch looks more artistic that way, but not very appetizing.

Anyhow, as the blog post's title mentions dogs, I figure I ought to talk about them, namely the chihuahua (pronounced "Chi-wa-wa"). Back in fifth grade I remember my teacher would pronounce it the way it looked, so he called it "Chi-hoo-a-hoo-a". I thought of them since my history teacher mentioned it. (Yes, my history teacher is rather talkative...) The name actually means rat dog. My teacher doesn't like them since they are small and might even try to attack you, they bark so much and in a high-pitched way. He only likes the ones that are lazy and don't do much. He should probably get a cat, then, and not one of the hyper young'uns.

This week has been STAR testing week. STAR stands for Standardized Testing and Reporting. It's the annual test for all California students from second grade to eighth grade. (I presume that once you reach high school you can only take finals and SATs or something.) The eighth graders have six days of testing, but we only have four. The school class schedule is messed up now. We have a testing period that's practically two hours, and then thirty minute periods. It feels odd. I also have less homework (I've already done it, mostly, so I just have the budget project and a PE muscle drawing right now) and I fear I will lose my time management abilities because of the weirdness of school.

Lately at school the PE teachers have been discussing drugs, alcohol, and smoking. The first day we started going over it, my PE teacher asked us to separate to the two sides of the gym depending on whether we were affected by tobacco or not (meaning someone in our family smoked, or something like that). I should've gone to the Affected side, since several male relatives of mine like to blow some smoke. Then Mr. Robinson announced he was giving us a sermon (no, not the religious kind) called "How to Be a Loser". He said the very first step is to hang out behind 7-11, because there is bushes and stuff there so people can illegally smoke cigarettes. My teacher said he was very disappointed since one day he was jogging and saw a girl who used to be one of his star students, doing a rather suspicious activity back there. She pretended nothing was going on and said hello to Mr. Robinson, but he didn't reply, having seen the smoke billowing out from behind her back.

Labels: alcohol, belongings, chihuahua, Dogs, drugs, friends, lecture, noodles, projects, restless, smoking, state testing, teeth

I am so tired again this morning. As usual, I woke up early even though I should've slept in (I woke up before 8 am, I think. I must be too used to school). Even though I was really tired from my mom's friend's little private party, it seems like my brain still thinks I need to wake up for school. No wonder my head hurts - my brain is overworking itself on the weekend, and no one pays it, and it doesn't get to retire until I'm super old. XD

Last night we drove for an hour just to get to my mom's friend's house. It is because my dad is bad at navigation, but he is the one who almost always drives... And since I was crabby because I wanted to stay home, I refused to help. I was getting carsick, so when we arrived, I was placed on the couch. I call the host "Soup Chicken" because her the first part of her name is Soup, and the second part of it is pronounced similarly to Chicken!! Soup Chicken has her mother at the house. Soup's mother gave me this weird sort of massage and put some suspicious medicine. It actually helped me feel better, though.

Once I was back up on my feet I was told to go upstairs and "play" with Soup's daughter, whose name is Sara. Normally, I really hate the children of my mom's friends, but since Sara talks a lot, I don't need to do much besides make a few comments and ask a few questions here and there. We get along well because Sara is simply very good at filling the silence. XD This is only the third time we saw each other but we are just about friends now.

Sara told me about the neighbors' dogs. There is a dog called Bear who is HUGE (I saw him before I went into their house), he is mostly black with some other colors. Sara says he looks scary (he is actually considered SMALL for his species!) but he is really very playful and sweet like a puppy. Then there are two other dogs, called Cocoa and Latte. Apparently they are tiny, only as big as one of the floor tiles in Soup Chicken's kitchen, but they are very well-behaved and smart, and can walk without a leash - but they'll come running back if you call them. The two of them always go places together. The way Sara talks, I bet she really wants a dog. So do I, but my mom keeps saying "You can have one once you're an adult." Anyhow, there is one last dog Sara talked about - the DOG AT THE END OF THE STREET. He is small like Cocoa and Latte but very territorial. Sara has a brother, and her brother looked at the dog suspiciously, causing the dog to begin barking in a high-pitched fashion. Apparently, if you even ring the doorbell, the dog will come running and will try to break down the door to bark at you. The owner has to put her leg in the way before she opens the door so the dog won't start attacking.

This is really going to be a long post, so bear with me. After eating some pumpkin ice cream pie, my family left because our home is far away from Soup Chicken's house. (She lives in Pleasanton, CA, which is at least 45 minutes drive from our place. Her neighborhood is called Ironwood and it is filled with nice houses - and dogs!) On the drive back, my dad and I were telling stories and arguing, as usual. My mom laughs sometimes but mostly she thinks we're crazy. And my grandma, always the quiet one, was silent practically the whole time. My dad wants me to write down his "new famous quote". Here it is, below. He obviously thinks highly of himself.

"I'm so good, I'm too good for myself."
And since he likes French movies, I'll translate it into French for him.
"Je suis tellement bien, je suis trop bien pour moi-même."

Labels: autumn, Dogs, friends, parents

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