I would have named this "The Disappearance of Hatsune Miku", except it isn't a Vocaloid disappearing. It's an actual person - to be more precise, my own piano teacher.

Last night, my mother received a call from the mother of a girl who has the same piano teacher as I do. She was wondering if we knew anything about where my piano teacher was and whether she was okay (at her age, it was not completely unreasonable to suspect that perhaps she'd had a stroke, or a heart attack, or some other terrible affliction). The woman's daughter was supposed to have a piano lesson, but she'd been unable to find the piano teacher.

My mother came over to me, rather unsettled, asking if my piano teacher had mentioned anything about there being no piano classes next week or anything along those lines. I was not particularly concerned. I'd wracked my brains and recalled that she'd said something about going to Shanghai, though I couldn't remember whether she was telling me or the student who had his piano lesson right before mine. I'd assumed it wasn't anything important. My teacher, in the past, had always made it clear when she would be gone. She would write that there was no class on such-and-such dates on the little notepad I keep for recording info from the piano classes, and she would say, directly to me, that she would be taking a trip. But not so this time.

I think that she probably thought that she had told the students when she really hadn't. According to my mother, who spoke with someone who is connected to the piano teacher, my teacher has been planning the trip to Shanghai for quite some time now. It wasn't just some spur-of-the-moment decision, a sudden desire to chase an until-now-forgotten childhood dream. But why hadn't she told her students that she wouldn't be here?

It was strange. Very strange. I don't think that my piano teacher is in any danger for her life, at least for the time being. But it seems that her age is starting to show. She is already more than middle-aged, if not quite an old lady. I wonder if maybe she can't remember what she's done and hasn't done anymore. That she's getting her thoughts and what has really happened mixed up. She's becoming like me.

I hope that this is just one incident, that this won't be happening again. I don't want to see someone losing his or herself. It's just too terrible to be alive in body, but to lose your mind, little by little.

Labels: classes, deteriorating, forgetful, losing, mind, missing, past, piano, shanghai, teacher, the disappearance of hatsune miku, trip

If you have the game Wii Fit on your Wii, you can choose the male or female fitness trainer. (Both are pretty weird. I think the girl is better, since that's the one I picked.) While you do yoga and strength training, she constantly lectures you. She might say "This exercise is popular because it tones your arms" or "You're a little shaky. Focus on stretching your spine" or "Good job! You're pretty strong." It gets annoying after a while, hearing her blab on. They even have subtitles on the screen that you can't get rid of, for people who are deaf. (If you're blind AND deaf, like Helen Keller, then you can't play video games anyhow, seeing as touching the TV screen does no good)

Sometimes, to make the game seem more real...If you have a female trainer like me, once in a while, she'll be replaced by the other trainer, the male one, for whatever your first yoga/strength training activity is. I would assume it is vice versa if you are trained by the guy. The first time this happened to me, I was shocked and laughing at the same time, and then I couldn't concentrate for a while.

If you play a long time, you might unlock the three challenges - Pushups, jackknives, and plank. (In case you don't know, a jackknife is where you lie down on the ground, bend your knees, and then come up in a V shape, then go back down to the ground. Feels like a sit-up.) At first it's really amusing when you beat the trainer. She'll go "I'm not giving up yet!" or "It looks like that's all you can do" or "Still with me? Do 10 more" or "You win this time!" One day I tried to challenge her and she refused, saying she wasn't feeling up to it. I was pretty steamed, since this is the first time any video game snubbed me like that. XD

Anyhow, I ended up doing 100 jackknives and 180 seconds of plank. The plank was especially hard and after I was done, I felt my arm. The muscle in it (is it the bicep? or the brachialis? or maybe the tricep?) was really stiff and hard, since it had been strained. Probably I'll wake up with pains tomorrow, if experience tells me correctly.

I forgot to talk about Friday, so this is a good opportunity. It was a pretty miserable day for me. I didn't have a good test score, due to a lot of silly mistakes in math. Then Mr. Robinson the PE teacher was supposed to do weight and height measuring, but our class, 4th period, didn't get to because he had to leave and buy pizza for his champions (whoever does the most jumpropes and pushups or something. I've always been intimidated by those people). So instead we went over to Ms. Rawson's class and played a weird game. Two people face each other in pushup position. A blue ball is placed between them. When someone gives the signal, both people try to grab the ball with one hand while not falling down. It all relies on whether you have a fast reaction time. This must mean I'm not an old lady yet, so that's a relief.

Afterwards we ran for a bit and then went up to the giant green field. We had to do an odd kind of relay. You roll on the grass from the first cone to the second cone, then run from there to the small backstop cage thing, and then you have to "crab-walk" to the third cone (it's like you go on the ground with your knees bent and hands supporting you, and move in the direction of your back) and finally "bear-crawl" (walking on all fours) to your teammates. I didn't think it was too bad besides being exhausting until it was lunchtime and I was feeling strangely itchy. I couldn't stop scratching and soon the places where my arms and legs bent were pink and funny-looking. On my arm, a tiny circle of skin had risen up like it was swollen. I didn't want to poke it since it looked dangerous. Maybe I'm allergic to grass. (Next time I have to tell the teacher. I'm only afraid they'll think I'm making an excuse, like those boys who go to the bathroom a lot in class to avoid it)

Labels: allergies, challenge, exercise, lecture, missing, pep talk, pizza, reaction, refusal, relay, trainer, wii fit

I was feeling fine in the morning, but during the second class of the day, I started to run into trouble. I had this strange pounding headache in the left side of my head. It was extremely painful and I found it hard to concentrate on my homework or focus my eyes. I thought it would get better, but it only got worse during the day. I couldn't take it anymore and when 4th Period was over, I asked my friend to walk with me to the nurse's office. I called my mom and then I tried to sleep on one of the weird beds they have in there. After a long time my mom finally came and I got taken home, so I took some medicine and a nap.

Anyhow, now I'm really nervous because I don't have the homework from my language arts class, and I missed a quiz in PE class. My PE teacher threatened to make us come before Zero Period in the morning and run a mile if we missed class. I really hope she isn't serious, and I hope she'll believe me if I say I'm sick...

Labels: dizzy, headache, homework, missing, morning, nurse, office, sick

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