*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