Missed a few days of journal entries due to my laziness, "business", and my shitty internet that never works when I want it to. Wednesday was pretty uneventful, but I actually had REAL LIVE PLANS on Thursday night.

Imogen and I were invited to Kathleen and Josh's joint birthday celebrations at Pizza Hut. I wanted to go, it sounded fun. Kathleen picked me up, after we actually talked on the phone for roughly an hour. I hadn't talked to her on the phone for so long... A lot was reminiscing about Duffield.

It's not so much Duffield I miss -- I miss last June. Josh, Kathleen, Kyel and I... It was so great. Sitting in the back of the bus, without a care in the world. Loving NOFX and Rise Against more than life itself, and having that awesome web pal named Max (for I actually used that term back then). No exams, little stress, a lot of fun.

Anyways, she picked me up and we go to Pizza Hut. I'm seated at the end of the table, with Imogen on my left, and two girls in front of me I'd never met -- Lauren and Allison.

They're completely neurotic, and not skinny, but not fat either. Smaller than me, but not by much. The two of them ordered and ate an entire large pizza (they said it was like a job to them -- they MUST complete it). Myself, I had Hawaiian personal and half an order of chicken wings. I'd been sleeping and eating better lately, it was really good. I also had some of Lauren's crusts (neither of them ate theirs).

Molly, or waitress, came over with free sundaes for Josh and Kathleen, and sang us happy birthday. She also introduced her friend Tim, another employee. We then all bought the dollar sundaes, but Molly said she "forgot" to charge us for them. We ended up leaving her a tip that was probably almost half our bill.

After we ate, we joked around outside Pizza Hut and stuff. Katelyn, Melissa, Lauren and Allison went home, leaving Sarah, Kathleen, Heather, Ashley, Kyel, Imogen and I. We found this sign -- those signs with the letters you can rearrange -- and although I felt bad doing it, we took pictures with them and stuff, goofing off. Imogen and I didn't want to be seen around there anymore, but eventually she went home, leaving me with them.

We went to Starbucks and the lady "accidentally" made a small size cream caramel iced frappuccino that I drank a little bit of (until my medium sized, non-cream, caramel iced frap was done) and gave the rest to Kathleen. Then they screwed around with the sign some more and with the shopping carts and sheds outside Home Depot. I didn't like being around them. I didn't want to do anything unlawful, but it didn't look like that had a high probability of happening.

At nine thirty or so, we walked back to Pizza Hut, and everyone remembered Tim, so they started harassing people asking if they were Tim. It was pretty mean, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't laugh when Kathleen yelled to a guy with what looked like his girlfriend, "Are you Tim? Because that's Tim's girlfriend!"

After much pranking and stuff I didn't really care for, Kathleen's dad picked us up. I got home at about ten, expecting to get yelled at for my lateness. Dad, however, was pretty much high on Pink Floyd and mom was out with Brandi since the pool's getting installed.

I felt shitty, though. I had a bad migraine and I felt bad for wrecking the sign and littering, but also for ruining everyone else's fun with my worrying tendencies.

Coming online didn't really help much. Stress, as usual, and ruining people's fun. It's ridiculous now.

I slept, but not well, and I slept in this morning... I got to school before French was too far in (about 20 minutes) so really, no harm done...

At lunch, I ate with Jenny, Caitlin, Kendra and Emily since Imogen had an exam, then I went to my OWN exam for violin.

The private exams were divided so that each scale (C and F) were 30% apiece, O Canada (memory) was 10% and Study #4 was 30%. I don't know how I did on the scales or the study, but I know I got 10/10 on O Canada. I was really proud to hear that, and Mr. Tyler said I could start using vibrato because I'm at that level now.

I was first to go for our final solo, Humoresque. I was sitting at the front of the classroom, trying to control my nerves, when I remembered something.

I love attention.

I love preforming, I love attention, I love having everyone caring about nothing but ME. I love it so much that I was surprised I never remembered how much I loved recitals. And now, I had the attention of 27 students and a teacher to do my very best to impress them with what I love -- music.

I got 90% on my final solo.

At first I was extremely proud. I mean, on my midterm solo, and all other playing tests, I only got around 85%. My playing skill had increased faster than the songs' levels of difficulty, and that was certainly a good thing.

Oddly, I'm back to feeling bad, now... When I look at that 90, all I see is that 10 extra percent. 10 marks I missed. 10 marks I could have gotten if I had practiced more, or been a better student. Ten marks... It's the same as it was yesterday -- I don't WANT to feel bad. I want to be happy and proud and singing and dancing with the excitement of having such a high mark. But in the states, that's not even an A. I'm mediocre.

Maybe I'm just tired...

I think I'll end it there, for now.

Only five more times will I need to get up in the morning, and then I'm free for the whole summer...