*is hiding*

Goodness it's been forever - almost a year.  So much has changed.  What am I supposed to say now?

It's another school year, I lost some friends, I made some friends, I got taller, I got stronger.  Wow, that felt poetic.  :/  But it's the truth, and one should hope the truth is always that poetic.

Some of the finer points of the last year or so:
-I turned 16 and managed to grow three quarters of an inch in one year
-I'm an upperclassman now
-I joined Madrigals*
-As of November of this year I will have been tutoring at my synagogue for two years**
-I tried out for but didn't make Patriot Singers (though Advanced is fun; we seem to be having more fun that Pats is...)
-My friend circle expanded and re-organized, leaving me confused as to where I stand with most people
-I'm holding my first grudge
-I in a very short period of time made friends with a fair amount of high school graduates
-In some respects I hung out with more legal adults during my free time this summer than kids my own age
-I went to Europe***
-I will be doing a Torah portion at high holiday services at the end of the month
-I have a brain twin now; she and I are writing partners; we're trying to write a Disney movie****
-I finally got my learner's permit in May and took driver's ed this past summer
-I got into Pottermore beta-testing on Day 2 at 4:00 AM and have now been on Pottermore for almost three weeks - I was sorted into Ravenclaw (ooh, shocker) and my wand is yew and unicorn, 10 3/4 inches, slightly springy.  I'm in the top 3-4% of Ravenclaw point-earners
-I'm not yet failing any classes, though I'm getting pretty damn close - I've now learned that physics really isn't natural for me
-I went to Renaissance Fair for the first time <3
-I saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2 at the midnight premiere - the only HP movie I've ever done that for (and ever will)
-Coldplay craze for about two months now <3
-From January to the end of July was probably the happiest period of my life

That seems like a good note to end the list on.

*OH MY G-D MADRIGALS.  This group became my life for about two or three months at the beginning of my year and contributed greatly to my happiness.  For those who don't know what Madrigals is, it's an a capella singing group that sings secular polyphonic (many voice parts) music written during the Renaissance.  We learn the music, and script-writers (I was one) are tasked with weaving a script between the songs.  The culminating performance is a lunch/dinner at a nearby golf club.  It was the fastest I ever made friends with such a large group of people.  After graduation, we lost six kids to college and one to a transfer to a private school.  As one of this year's writers (and essentially a leader,) I'm harassing my friends into taking the open spaces.

**I continued regular Thursday night tutoring of bar/bat mitzvah students until the end of May, and during the summer I tutored a kid almost completely on my own - I handled getting paid, I made assignment sheets, I was in control.  Normally this sort of thing wouldn't happen, but my boss moved and our cantor took over the program... he's a little scatter-brained.  But my boss trusted me.  We don't start up tutoring again until the end of October... I'll tell you how that goes.

***EURO TRIP.  We visited Munich (Germany,) Salzburg (Austria,) Vienna (Austria,) and Budapest (Hungary.)  There were nineteen of us... and I didn't know very many people.  I got precious little alone time (something I practically require to exist,) and I knew unfortunately from the beginning that I wouldn't be talking to these kids after the trip.  Huzzah for intuition.  THAT SAID, HOLY CRAP THAT AREA OF THE WORLD IS BEAUTIFUL.  There are museums everywhere and forests and mountains.  We visited Schloss (Castle) Neuschwanstein, the castle that has inspired most Disney movie castles (in particular the one in Sleeping Beauty.)  I loved it so much I was nearly moved to tears - I have never before been so inspired to create and write and learn.  Another highlight was going UNDER the Alps to visit a salt mine.  I actually walked across the Austro-German border... underground.  And there were these slides to get across dips in the ground... I had to wrap my legs around a guy that like half the trip was shipping with me, but besides that it was great.  Food was kind of eh because I don't like to eat pork (I'll eat bacon and my mother's AWESOME ribs, but religiously or otherwise I just won't eat pork) so they mostly gave me vegetarian meals... I had spätzle like four times, and the first time it got me horrifically ill (think of it like German mac-and-cheese... and I'm lactose intolerant) but the second time I had it it was from a famous cafe and it was wunderbar.  Speaking of German, being intuitive with language as I am, I started picking up on German immediately, to the point where I was consistently asked whether I spoke the language.  I don't, but I aaaam half-German - must be genetic.  :)  Also, while in Munich, we visited the Dachau concentration camp... I didn't cry as much as I thought I would... but it was still hard.  (Did I ever tell you guys that I'm the granddaughter of a Holocaust survivor?  Yeah, third generation survivor's guilt ain't fun.)  Other places we visited:  in front of Herzl's synagogue in Budapest, Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna, the Museum and Castle quarters of Vienna (in the Castle quarter Hitler gave some famous speeches...), The House of Music in Vienna, a famous marketplace in Budapest, lots of churches and things, and Heathrow Airport (we had a SEVEN-HOUR LAY-OVER THERE COMING HOME.  Upside:  because of the odd number of kids, I was permitted to go around completely alone for hours on end.  I bought myself paperback copies of the UK version of the first two Harry Potter books as an early birthday present.)  All in all, I'm glad I went... I just want to go with different people next time.

****I should first define what a "brain twin" is.  Urban Dictionary defines us as this.  And that barely scratches the surface.  She and I react in the same way, have many of the same mannerisms, are the same personality type (INFJ represent!), laugh at the same tempo, look similar, had very similar childhoods, were born in the same month (though nearly two years apart), say and type the same thing at the same time... it's mind-boggling, even months later.  We must have been twins in a past life.  It's the only way this makes sense.  We met through Madrigals; we were on the same voice part (my first stab at soprano 1 since seventh grade.)  She expressed a wish to be able to voice and sing for a Disney character, and then shortly after she sent me an Italian folktale.  We've been developing characters and plot since the end of April (five months, nearly) and it's the most I've written since NaNoWriMo.  Maybe sometime I'll post some of the scenes we've written for critiquing.

There's so much more I could talk about, but I think I've said enough for now.  But before I go, I'd like to impart upon my readers a gift:

I.  Love.  This.  Song.

Cheers,

Hannah

Face, meet palm.

So...bad time to mention this, but...yeah, I failed NaNoWriMo.

Now, don't go saying to me:  "But but but Hannah, you've still got FOUR WHOLE DAYS!"  Oh, really?  And what do you suppose I do?  Write 10,000 words a day?  Riiight, I can see that working out for me.

Funnily enough, I recently discovered the rest of my plot.  All I need is inspiration to write...except that it only comes during the school day, and I hate writing by hand.  I know, excuses and more excuses.

I suppose you idealists may have a point.  I still have four days.  Who knows what might happen?

-Hannah

(btw, WATCH THIS MOVIE - IT'S GREAT:  Flynn Rider <3)

[Insert creatively-titled journal entry name]

(Quoting a journal thing my English teacher asked us to do for fun - being who I am, I went all out.)

G-d I’m tired.  Warning you now, Dr. Noskin, I tend to ramble.  The only person I know who seems to appreciate the meditative power of a good, long ramble is my best friend Rebecca Friedlander.

Anyway, what to talk about…oh, right.  You mentioned in class that you were interested in what we did with our four-day weekend.  If it’s all the same to you, I’ll just go day by day; a lot went on.

Thursday:  My dear mother sort of kind of forgot my brother Marc and I had school off, so she spent the day out doing errands and such while we stayed at home.  My friend Liz came over, which is something of a semi-miracle considering the love-hate relationship she and I have.  Marc, Liz, and I ate some magically delicious Lucky Charms (as I was too lazy to cook everyone lunch,) and we got in some quality writing time for NaNoWriMo.  Now, she’s not doing it this year, but my NaNoWriMo story idea inspired Liz to start writing, and we sat together for a few hours bouncing ideas off each other.

Now, as an English teacher, I would hope you know what NaNoWriMo is.  If you don’t…basically, NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month.  From midnight November 1 to midnight November 30, I, and over 150,000 others from America and beyond, am attempting to write a 50,000 word novel.  If I manage to exceed 50k, the program gives me one month to edit my manuscript, and then for free they’ll publish one copy of my book in paperback.  I am, oh, about 16k words behind, but considering I’ve had the worst writer’s block for months, this is a major improvement.  With homework, extra-curriculars, and work (yeah, I work as a tutor for b’nei mitzvot students at my synagogue, Congregation Beth Judea,) I’ve got almost no time to write.  So, wish me luck!

Back to Liz.  So, Mom eventually came home, I ate dinner – homemade chicken parmesan; Mom’s a fantastic cook – and went to work.  As soon as I got home, I wrote another 1,000 words, so I felt incredibly accomplished.  That is, until I stayed up ridiculously late.  Who in their right mind stays up until 3:45?  I do, because I can.

Friday:  Marc didn’t have the day off, but I was comatose when he left for school, so I didn’t get to walk him over – we live five minutes away from Tripp Elementary, one of District 102’s schools.  I got up around 10:45 (again, because I could,) but Mom wasn’t up yet.  Rather, she had been up since 5:00, – possibly because my dad sometimes wakes up at weird hours to get work done – so she had every right to be still asleep.

My original plan had been for Rebecca and my other friend Danielle to come over around 2:00 to hang out and do homework, but Danielle cancelled unexpectedly, and Mom and I weren’t ready to go eat lunch until 2:00 anyway.  Instead, we took Rebecca out to California Pizza Kitchen (old tradition:  one half days in grammar school Mom always took Marc and me to CPK.)  We never got to doing homework because Rebecca had to get to fencing practice around 5:00, so instead I found How To Train Your Dragon, one of the best movies I’ve ever seen – on OnDemand.  We watched that until she had to leave, and by that time I was home alone and the sun had set.  I finished the movie and sat in a forty-five minute reverie in the darkness of my wonderfully empty house.

At 6:30, my parents drove into the garage in a large, silver van I didn’t entirely recognize.  Why didn’t I recognize it?  Last weekend, without originally planning to, we bought a new 2011 Honda Odyssey.  My parents had gone to pick it up.  We literally spent an hour playing in it until it was time to pick Marc up from this birthday party he was at.  Just like I did when I saw the car, my brother ran across the parking lot and attempted to tackle-hug the new car.  (We’ve never gotten a car at the start of the model year – this was an exciting event for all of us.)

We got dinner at this cool gyro place right by where I live, and we went next door to Kaleidoscoops, the famed ice cream shop.  It also just so happened to be their last day open.  They had been losing money for ages, with the economy and all, so it was to be expected…but, we may have been their last customers.  I know it’s just an ice cream store, but they’ve been great about donating to District 102, and it made Buffalo Grove a little less suck-ish.

Saturday:  I’m notorious for being anti-social.  So, another semi-miracle that occurred was my spending Saturday afternoon at my friend David’s house.  Admittedly, I’ve been avoiding him a bit, – he’s been having angsty teenage/girlfriend/grades drama, and as my group’s chief therapist, I was sort of getting sucked in – but it was actually quite fun to hang out with him.  We watched the somewhat-new martial arts flick Ninja Assassin.  I adore Japanese culture, but at the same time generally dislike purely action movies; even so, overall it wasn’t half bad.

Afterward, I agreed to helping my parents and brother babysit my fifteen-month-old “niece” Elayna.  While I have no older siblings, the three Weinstein girls, (Lorna, Abby, and Ariel; they don’t remember you, but you may have heard of them) who babysat me for the first ten years or so my life, are the closest thing I’ve got to sisters.  Elayna is Lorna’s daughter.

I love kids of any age, but this little girl…OY VEY.  She doesn’t have a set schedule, she had never had a babysitter before, and she doesn’t eat in a high chair.  In the insanity I missed while at David’s house, she was throwing tantrum after tantrum while all her relatives were bustling around to get ready for a cousin’s wedding.  By the time I got there, Elayna was eating dinner (read:  she would eat a small piece of apple and then go point at her mommy’s picture on the wall and cry.)  My dad and I had brought dinner for my mom and brother, but I really didn’t eat much.  Instead, I got Elayna to eat.  We were also looking after Lorna and Abby’s respective dogs (three large dogs in total,) so they kept trying to get at the food.  At that point, I just picked Elayna up and had her on my lap while she ate.  I got her to eat everything.  I’m a little biased, but she seemed to like me best.  :)  Marc did a great job keeping her from throwing any more tantrums, but for the few hours in between dinner and bedtime, it was me following her around.

We got her into bed after another tantrum, and after a neighbor came to walk the dogs, she woke up again.  My dad and brother left around 9:00 because Marc had Hebrew school the next morning, so I let Mom take care of the fussing baby.  She and I were fine until about 11:00, when we both laid down on opposite sides of the couch.  Mom was asleep until 1:00, but I forced myself to stay up, just in case.  By 1:30 all seven who went to the wedding were back…and drunk.  Not too drunk, but enough to make me feel as though a bit of childhood died.

Sunday:  As this journal entry is getting really long, I’ll try to keep this short.  I woke up at 10:30, and I got up in my pajamas to do homework.  Mom and I didn’t get dressed until 5:00 (I usually don’t get dressed on Sundays,) but we eventually had to because we were to meet Julianne (maiden name:  Weiss; she also went to Deerfield with you and my aunt) and her husband and son.  We were supposed to meet at the re-opened Claim Company, but it was far too crowded…so we ended up at California Pizza Kitchen again.

All in all, a busy weekend.  (See what I meant about rambling?  I’m a menace!)

As I have homework left, I’m gonna leave it at that. - Hannah

"Blaaaaargh!"

- Denis, a dear friend.  XD

I'm avoiding AP Euro catch up to do this.  Hey, it ain't due till fifth period on Wednesday; I'll be fiiiine.  (I'll just have Rebecca do the highlighting.  :P)

NaNoWriMo Update:  Just hit 5,062 words.  I'm 8,000 and change behind, but I'll manage.  The plot's turned in a way I wasn't expecting, but I'm glad it did.  I now have more material to work with, so much so that I probably won't be done at 50k words.  So hopefully I finish the story in time to have its complete form printed in the paperback copy I'm sure I'll be getting in December after I win.

Yeah.

I'm hungry.

K bye.

-Hannah

Say it with me now: NANOWRIMO!

For those of you who love writing, National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, starts at midnight tonight, in a little more than eight hours from now.  I'm participating for the first time ever, and while the prospect of writing a 50,000 word novel is tantalizing, I'm very nervous.

Scatter-brained as I am, I had a fully-fledged story idea in mind a few weeks ago...and then it waltzed away.  I mean, I still have all the characters and the basic gist...I just don't quite know where to start.  Writers are notoriously never satisfied with their own writing, and this is so very true for me.  I'm a compulsive perfectionist, so the idea of writing and writing without reviewing or revising any of it is scary, to say the least.

I'm going to try and outline some of my story idea (tentatively titled "Within and Without") here, for anyone who's remotely interested:

-This world is a hybrid between Medieval serfdom and futuristic America, but don't assume this is completely sci-fi.
-Everyone in this particular gated community, Nad, has white-blonde hair and gray eyes and pale skin
-Well, not everyone.  Sometimes, children are born with jet-black hair, and occasionally some are born with freckles.  This is rare and considered undesirable.  Many (such as the mother of Myra - the main character) dye their hair to hide it.
-Recently, some have been developing a...condition.  The eyes of some people have changed from the pleasent gray to a bloodred.
-Along with the red eyes has come some...tension.  The weather patterns in the area have fluctuated violently, as often as once every five minutes.  A few younger children are being pulled out of school, and their parents are talking about a disease that causes "blindness."
-The story follows an adolescent named Myra, the daughter of the head of law enforcement in Nad.  Not only does she have black hair, but at the age of six her eyes turned crimson.  She has been home-schooled since.  In public, she wears black glasses and feigns blindness.
-One day shortly before her eyes changed color, in the market Myra saw a blonde, freckly boy with one eye gray and one eye red.  A decade later, she is sure he has died on the streets.
-To escape the boredom of her home, Myra slips out to the market and assists the butler in the selling of her mother Camilla's apples.  Here, she sells a bushel to a young man, and only as he leaves does his scarf slip and show her his left red eye and right gray.  Not a minute later, a blonde toddler picks a fight with a passive brunette baby boy, and in the end the black-haired one gets slapped.  This sends Myra into a nose-dive.
-That night, as Myra packs a bag to run away, Camilla seeks her out and hands her a bottle of bleach.  Myra realizes her mother has been like her all along.
-The butler helps Myra abscond, but as soon as she's out of the house, the world overwhelmes her.
-Just on time, the boy with heterochromia, Lin, finds her and leads her out of the gates.  No one ever leaves the community.
-The rest of the story is the journey Myra, Lin, and Cass (a 25-year-old rebel leader from Nad with black hair, red eyes, and freckles) make to the red-eyed holding and their discoveries as they battle their powers and themselves.

So yeah.  Wish me luck.  :)

-Hannah

In Which Golden Rules are Meant to be Broken

Like the one about sharing?  There is a point where it's necessary to scream "TMI" to the heavens.  I've just about reached that point.

(I will not name names, but those who read this can prolly infer who I'm talking about.)

I have a very close guy friend.  I also have a close female friend.  They're hanging out on the weekends.

...and making out.

The girl - let's call her *Bathsheba - is having school problems, but not boy problems.  Luckily for me, she doesn't bother me much about it for advice.  The boy - who we'll call *Adonijah - is having girl problems, which will - according to him - lead to school problems.  Unlike Bathsheba, he always bothers me for advice about it.  They're a problematic couple, you see.

Bathsheba is okay with this "friends-with-kissy-face" situation because she isn't ready for a relationship right now.  However, Adonijah is having some feelings.  These strong feelings are causing him a great deal of confusion and pain.  I'm not trying to downplay his feelings, but I've told him he will probably have to deal with this on his own.

Unfortunately for me, he has spent the better part of the last month asking me for advice.  I want to help him, but I've discovered I don't know how to.  So, not only will he not stop reminding me he's in pain, but he's now constantly rubbing in my face that for one of the first times in my life, I can't help someone.

It's a scary thing that I can't help.  I'm my group's therapist.  They come to me when they need advice or help or just to rant.  But, for once, I want Adonijah to stop coming to me.  I actually started crying today because I'm drowning in his pain!  I'm sure he doesn't mean to be doing that, but that doesn't change the fact that other people's drama is suffocating me.

Normally I'd be okay with handling other people's drama.  It's not the first time I've had to do it.  But, in relation to this post, I've just got over a whole lot of my own drama.  I'm in no state to be sorting out the problems of my friends when I am struggling with my own.

Well, that's really all I had to say.  I needed to get that off my chest.

One more thing before I go:  we might not have Quidditch at the party, guys.  Rebecca and I are considering a smaller-scale thing, but I'm not sure how that'll go.  Regardless, we'll still have fun - we're a fun group.  It's not the end of the world if it doesn't happen because you can trust me when I say we've got alternatives.

That's all.

-Hannah

*These are some Talmudic allusions.  Just sayin'.

"Ponies AND rainbows?"

Ah, nothing like a good quote to end the school week with.  Courtesy of The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan.  For Percy Jackson fans that don't already know, this is the first book in the second PJ series.  No, Percy and co. are no longer the main characters, but they do still exist.  In fact, this book begins just a few months after the end of The Last Olympian.  I do have my own copy, and you can borrow it if you'd like, but I'll warn ya now that the waiting list is long.

(Speaking of which, I still haven't quite figured out the official list.  Excuse the interlude...

-Liz
-Danielle
-David
-John R. from math
-Andrew from English and Spanish
-Rebecca, somewhere down the line?)

Like I said, a lot of people.  Which gives me some happy, fuzzy feelings in my tummy.  Why?  I have no idea.  I just like that I have a big enough library that I can lend out books all the time.  It feels good.  Which brings me to another interlude...

(Who has what of mine?  Let's try to remember:

-Rebecca - Witch & Wizard - is also next in line for complete PJ series and Nicholas Flamel series
-David - all three Night World volumes - and I have his Greek/Roman mythology book
-Andrew - Battle of the Labyrinth and The Last Olympian
-Julia - my DVDs of HP5 and HP6)

Hey, if I can't become a psychologist, and the CIA rejects me, I could always be a librarian.

Speaking of YA fantasy novels, I had a super-power moment again while I was home alone an hour ago.  I tend to do that when I'm alone:  imagine I've got some ability.  Today, I was shooting invisible arrows made of energy and flying on air currents.

Every since I was very young, my dearest wish has been to have a power.  Any power would be fine, but in particular powers of the mind (telekinesis, telepathy, premonition) and of the elements (pyrokinesis, cryokinesis, "bending" of the elements, - like air, water, earth, and fire in A:TLA - summoning of elements like Percy Jackson or Leo Valdez can do in Riordan's books) pique my interest.

Why would I need or want a power?  I'm definitely unique enough as I am, what with my insane-fast brain and other traits my friends and peers and family love to emulate.  Truth be told, I'm not sure.  Maybe I want the reassurance that there's something more than the darkness clouding my view as I form my opinions on this world.  Maybe I've got an over-active imagination.  Maybe I'd rather live in my books and shows and movies than on Earth.

So, my few readers, a parting question:  What power would you want?  And, more importantly, would you even want a power in the first place?

-Hannah