So...

It's the first day of Sophomore year...

Sometimes you can't help but wonder where all the time has gone. I'm still having a hard time believing that freshman year is over. My cousin is starting middle school. Sometimes it seems like just yesterday we were having a joint birthday party while wearing princess tiaras.

Yesterday we celebrated my youngest cousin's second birthday. You can't help but to ask yourself where all the time has gone...

I have to catch the bus in 45 minutes to start a brand new year. (Pro of not being a freshman - the first day of school doesn't start until 12:30).

A lot has changed in the past year. I'm never going to get to relive my freshman year of high school again. The next the Summer Olympics come around I'll have graduated high school. I guess that growing up isn't just one day you're a kid and the next you're an adult. It's a slow process that comprises of every moment in our lives.

It's amazing how fast life goes when you're living it. 

I have to go get ready. I'll try to get this blog back on some kind of schedule.

Until next time, and to a great year,
SVAMS

I'm Still Alive...

Hey there Blogosphere,

I'm still alive, I know this blog has been dead for about 6 months but I'm hoping to get started posting again soon.

I have about 3 weeks of freshman year left and things are getting really busy. One of my teachers actually made the analogy that we were a train headed for a brick wall and we wouldn't be stopping, we'd be crashing into it. So you could say I'm pretty busy.

I have some ideas for this blog in the future like shorter but more frequent posts. Also I'd love to start doing reviews and adding tags to my posts.

These 3 weeks are going to pass so quickly and then I'm done with 1/4 of my high school experience (and it feels like I haven't done anything.)  

I really should be getting back to work soon but I'll try to update later this week (but then again no promises.)

(Hopefully I'll) see you in a while blogophile,
SVAMS

Winter Spirit Week!

So this week was winter spirit week. There wasn't much hype leading up to it so very few people dresses up. The one day that we did go all out for was today - Battle of the Sexes.

During the pep assembly they had 3 competitions to see "which was the better sex."

The first one was having two people from each winter sport share a pair of nylons. They tried to stuff mini balloons into them and walk across the gym and dump them in a box. They had 2 minutes to get as many balloons as possible. The girls won this event (I think it was the girl's basketball team, with the gymnastics team coming in second.)

Next there was a round of trivia. The girls go asked "boys" questions and the boys got asked "girls" questions. You can see the quotation marks means somethings up. The problem was that they used stereotypes to form the questions (I actual knew more of the "boys" questions than girls). The boys had questions about eyelash curlers and Victoria Secret. They also had a few easy ones like "What's the difference between a manicure and pedicure?" The girls questions were also pretty easy. They had questions about the super bowl and what a "pigskin" was. My friends were mad that they asked, "Which company makes the Xbox?" Which is natural because they're gamers. There questions stereotyped both sexes... Which is ridiculous. Both teams got 7 out of 7. It actually came down to a history question about the "Sun King" (who was King Loius the 14th, if you wanted to know.) The boys won this event.

If they had done this right, neither team should have gotten more than 5 points. (Of course, how does knowing interests of the other sex prove that your sex is better in the first place?)

Finally we did the "Miracle Two Minutes." Each gender got to pass 2 buckets around the stands to raise money for charity. This event came down to 2 dollars. The girls raised 132 dollars while the boys raise 134 dollars. (Though they didn't announce the two dollar difference to get us hyped up...)

The girls won the last event, which was being respectful during the assembly. (Though I think that whoever was down one point may have gotten this point so that they could have a tie...)

So the Battle of the Sexes came down to rock, paper, scissors (which is a stupid way to decide the "best sex." The girls won 2-1. And so the Battle of the Sexes was over.

I think that we can all agree that the real winners of this was all the people that will be helped with the 250 dollars we raised.

And if you wanted to know the other spirit days were:

Monday: No school
Tuesday: 80s neon day
Wednesday: Superhero day
Thursday: Western day
Friday: Battle of the Sexes (girls wear gold and boys wear green)

So that was winter spirit week.

Also happening at school is candygram selling. I didn't even know that they still did things like this. You pay 50 cents to send a note and candy cane to your friends (it even includes a "special delivery.") My lunch table sits right next to the selling table, and it seems to be doing pretty good.

A homeroom food drive for the holiday season is also going on. The top 3 winning classes will get a doughnut or pancake party. My homeroom teacher says that she'll match any of our donations up to 50 cans. We'll see how the results turn out (though my science teacher says that freshman honor classes usually win because they donate a lot.)

There's also a lunar eclipse tonight/tomorrow morning but that has nothing to do with what I'm talking about.

One more thing, readers make sure to go to YA Sisterhood   and take part in their heroine tournament. They're pitting our favorite fictional heroines against each other.

I'll try to update later,
SVAMS

PS. I'm getting my Christmas tree this weekend... just though that I'd share that fact with you guys...

Book to Movie Adaptions...

With the new Twilight movie just released I thought I’d do a short post on book to movie adaptions (and yes, there will be spoilers)…

Harry Potter by JK Rowling

               I think that Harry Potter is probably the golden standard for book to movie adaptions (at least in more recent times). You have 7 books, 8 movies, and now Pottermore… it is a full blown phenomenon. The movies for the most part followed the plot set forth in the books (yes people could get nitpicky and say they left parts out but I haven’t read all seven books so I can’t really comment on that). The other great part of the Harry Potter movies was that there were only cast changes if they really had to change them… Most of the main cast stayed for all 8 movies. If this didn’t work out then the Harry Potter franchise could have turned out differently (Of course the cornucopia of talented British actors also helped).

Twilight by Stephanie Meyer

               Twilight gets a lot of hate (but the most recent movie is also been the #1 movie two weeks in a row). On the front of book to movie adaptions it actual isn’t that horrible. Yes, the sparkle effect is a little cheesy but then you’re trying to make someone sparkle it’s going to be cheesy. The love triangle is a little exaggerated in the movies and the acting is only so-so but they did follow the basic plot line (unlike this next book to movie adaption).

Percy Jackson by Rick Riordan

               First I should start off by saying that I really loved the Percy Jackson series. The movie was decent except for the fact that it didn’t follow the book… at all. First there actors were too old (If you were wondering the main cast is supposed to be 12 in the first book...) Next they left out one of the characters who is pretty important in the second book (Were they even aiming to have a sequel). Finally they didn’t follow the plot. They used 10% of the actual plot, left out some if my favorite scenes, and… Well I’m going to stop here because I could go on and on. If you’re interested the Percy Jackson Wiki lists some differences here…

Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

               This is the next “big” teen book trying to break into the movie making business. I’ve been following the hype leading up to its release (March 23, 2012). You can see the full length trailer here. Will this take off like Harry Potter or crash and burn like Percy? My current opinion is that it has all the ingredients to be great… Will it? Well that’s TBD…

So give me your opinion. Do you like me doing reviews and want me to do more? Who knows this could become a regular thing (and feel free to give me ideas on stuff to review)…

I’ll be back sometime later to get you caught up on what’s happening at school (it’s been over a month since I’ve given you an actual update on my life).

So over and out (for now)…

SVAMS

PS. Congrats to everybody who was able to finish Nanowrimo!

11-11-11

It's 11-11-11 11:11! YAY!

Halloween

Sorry for not updating... but this will be a quick post...

It's that time in my life where I have to decide whether or not to go trick-or-treating... and this year is officially my first year not going... it's weird...

Anyway... I guess I'll just spend it at home - hanging out...

I'll try to update later... but until later have a Happy Halloween

SVAMS

PS. For all my writing blog readers it's also Nanowrimo eve... Good luck writers...

Homecoming Update #5

So the homecoming dance is just starting... And I'm not going.

It starts at 9 PM and ends at midnight (quite appropriate for the Happily Ever After theme, that is if you're Cinderella).

But for me it's a night of tv watching...

That's it for this year's homecoming... Next weekend we'll return to a series of semi-frequent updates...

See you at next year's homecoming...
SVAMS