When I first arrived in August, I had the impression that the teachers were supper strict and were very unforgiving. I thought to myself that first day, “How am I going to survive?”.
Seventh grade is the first year we got electives and I was excited for this turn of events but also wondering if I would have a good time. I soon realized that while my teachers weren’t exactly as demonic as I portrayed them to be, they certainly were not as easy going as my previous teachers. Grades were different, consequences were harsher, the homework load was heavier—it was a very different year.
By October, I finally felt that I had gotten into the groove of things, and that the teachers were a bit easier to get along with. Sometimes, I was actually enjoying what we got to do in school and felt as If my teachers liked me. (Hopefully 🙂
I did figure out some very important lessons throughout the semesters. Procrastination, is a very bad way to go. I am a notorious procrastinator and push things off until a day before it is due. Most of the time it ends up making me stay up till midnight and ends up me having a bad day. Even though a usually get good grades on them, procrastination is a bad habit to have, and if you are faced with this issue, get rid of it immediately.
I have learned a lot of things in seventh grade though. My mind has been stuffed with information all about body systems from Science. I have even learned a new language!(Future seventh graders, pick Latin. It is the best language ever). And I have learned a lot of life lessons like procrastination, honesty,vans always trying your hardest. It will reward you greatly later in life.
As the year comes to a close, I can tell you one thing for sure. I. AM. READY. FOR SUMMER. This a a great year but very tiring and I can’t wait to relax and sleep in.
If I could redo the year, I would probably give it 150% and never procrastinate. It might seem fine at the time, but it comes back to bite you in the butt later.
My advice to next years seventh graders is that they should never procrastinate (as I have stressed very much in the post), give it your all everyday, and try to have a good time—it will make things seem better. Also, have a good reputation with your teachers. (It will help a lot). Overall, I believe you will have a good time.

A lot of the times in school I am a quieter person- not really acting out or being one of the “popular kids”. The baseball fields are a different story though.

In baseball, our coaches want us to know the plays so they need some voices on the team. The catcher is like the boss of the game. He calls the shots and he relays it to the rest of the baseball field. The catcher and middle infield (shortstop and second base) help unify the team so we actually know what’s going on.

That’s only one piece of the pie though. Sure leaders are supposed to give the directions to people, but I believe that they also need to support your colleagues and that is exactly what we do in the dugout. Whenever a batter goes up to the plate, we cheer him on. This gives confidence to that person and is going to benefit our team. Besides, what is the point of sitting around doing nothing during the game?

Whether it be on the baseball field or in our every day lives, leadership is an important attribute to have and we should try to display it whenever we can.

Homework! Oh, Homework!

Homework! Oh, Homework!
I hate you! You stink!
I wish I could wash you away in the sink,
if only a bomb
would explode you to bits.
Homework! Oh, homework!
You’re giving me fits.
I’d rather take baths
with a man-eating shark,
or wrestle a lion
alone in the dark,
eat spinach and liver,
pet ten porcupines,
than tackle the homework,
my teacher assigns.
Homework! Oh, homework!
you’re last on my list,
I simple can’t see
why you even exist,
if you just disappeared
it would tickle me pink.
Homework! Oh, homework!
I hate you! You stink!

Jack Prelutsky

This is probably my favorite poem that is not a serious one. I remember first going over this in fifth grade near the end of the school year. It has a certain feel and flow to it that makes it a good poem. On top of that, the lyrics are funny and represent an accurate description of what I want to do to my homework sometimes. This poem isn’t a serious one or have any life lessons, but to me, it is my favorite.

LEGO’s are something that I have played with a long time. Whenever I had nothing to do, I would go straight to my LEGO stash. the creativity that flowed through my body was cause but those pieces of plastic. My LEGO’s were one of the things that I couldn’t do without.

It was something that I enjoyed the most at that time in my life. There are no restrictions to it; you just find some peaces and see if they look to gather and then build off of that. You can do virtually anything you want with LEGO’s as long as you have the creativity to do it.

While I was playing with my toys, I would often think of myself as a professional designing ships for LEGO’s. You see, when I was younger, my favorite movies were Star Wars. I would often dissasemble a previous TIE-Fighter or other ship and fashion my own out of those pieces. I would pretend was a bestseller on the market–all the kids wanted to buy my ship.

I am such a such a perfectionist right now because of my ships. If they weren’t symmetrical then they could get out of my life.

Without my dear LEGO’s I would’ve had a boring childhood.

Kites, bats, restaurants, and music–there are so many things to do in Austin. Austin is a quaint little town that is full of many perks and is growing quite exponentially. Austin is an interesting town that has a lot of fun things to do.

For one thing, Austin’s most recognizeable feature–is their bats. There are one and half million bats that live under our most prominent bridge–Congress Avenue Bridge. The sight of the bats emerging from their hideout at night is quite incredible. Covering the sky with their wings you can’t even see the sky. Now some of you that are reading this might think that is gross, but in truth, these bats consume 10,000-20,000 insects per night! I find the bats a very fascinating part of my town. Austin’s bat have the caught the eye of so many tourists that the bats have bring in 10 MILLION dollars annually. The bats are a very big part of our society.

Additionally, Austin holds a variety of events around the year. We have SxSW (South by South West), F1 racing, and other music events. SxSW isn’t just about music, but contains technology shows, and marketing conventions. This events brings in people from Japan, places in Europe, and many more places. It is a great place to lear about things happening in the world, and businesses trying to make a stand. This event attracts people worldwide to see the amazing things we have to offer. F1 racing was held in Austin two years ago and was a great success.The council decided that Austin was a prime location for the event, and so we are now a permanent location for it. Just a few years before that, they were racing in Europe. How did our little town get on their radar? These event are spread throughout the year perfectly so you always have something to do. I especially love listening to the famous bands that come to our town (Foo Fighters, Coldplay, Red Hot Chili Peppers, etc.). The festivals and bats make quiet little Austin into a place of fun and diversity.

Austin is a very diverse city that people come from all over the world to see. The fun things held here will reel any curious person in. So whenever you might be thinking of a place to visit, I encourage you to come over to good ol’ Austin and give it a try.

The time has come for us to pick what we will do next year and frankly… I have no clue.

I mean–we have our required classes like math, science, history, and English, but what about our electives there are so many things to choose from and all of the. Are pretty interesting.

I do know a little bit about what I am going to do. I will be doing my third year of band at West Ridge—which has been a phenomenal time for me, learning music and playing competitively. I will also be continuing Latin which is a very fun and education al class. Not to mention MR. BRANDENBURG IS AN AMAZING TEACHER. (So are you other teachers, nothing personal). Both of those are full year classes and Latin is a high school credit so it is a win-win.

But what about those two other classes. I think I will do Health which is also a high school credit which seems ok. I’m not even sure if I chose this because of the credit or because it is a fun class but either way—hopefully—there isn’t a lot of homework.

Then the last semester. I am really divided on this one and am debating wether a school related topic is the right way to go, or if I should do something fun. On one hand there is tech systems which seems pretty interesting to me learning about new sciences and other things or we have… speech. *sigh*. It isn’t a credit anymore which is sort of a bummer but there are some high and low points. First of all (as my dad reasons), it will help me in life and will make me better at speaking, and other nonsense like that, button the downside, I hate speaking to a audience.

There is just something in my mind that if I mess up in anyway or embarrass myself in front of other people (mainly speaking) I will feel really bad and I’m not shy, but definitely not talkative.

In the meantime, if anybody reads this, I would appreciate if you comment and say what class you think I should take. (Even though I will most likely have chosen. Thanks for reading!
what you think I should

We are learning about expository writing in English and we had to think of something to explain. This is the thing that I thought up of so tell me what you think: (It’s kinda weird.)

Look at all this JUNK lying around. Junk is pretty unnecessary.

For one thing, trash can clutter up your home making it smell, and remove useful space. Say if I leave every wrapper and bag that I have used throughout the house. It smells like all the food I have eaten from the last week, and it makes everything look terrible. IT’S SO DIRTY EVERYWHERE. AHHHHHHHHH! *pulls hair out. Anyways for perfectionists like me, we like to keep things nice and orderly, so this makes us have a heart attack.

Furthermore you won’t ever use it! For instance, if I had a banana and once I was finished I was left with the peel, would I keep it? For what it does absolutely nothing. Why would you keep it if instead you could throw it away. Anything that doesn’t have a purpose I’m my life, can be thrown away. (Besides, I HATE BANANAS)

Despite the thirteen years I have loved I have never found anything helpful about junk. It stinks, clutters, and gets your parents mad at you. Things don’t always have a purpose. But maybe someday— someday I can find a use for trash but until then…. *burns trash with flamethrower 🙂

I recently have been drafted into a select baseball team which is probably one of the more hardcore teams I have played on. We practice three times a week, each practice being two and a half hours each. By the time I am done (which is around nine o’clock) I am too tired to do any of my schoolwork.

I have been getting more and more homework increasingly as time goes by through the year. Some nights, I am lucky enough to get homework from every teacher totaling at sometimes two to three hours (band included).  So when I have baseball stacked on top of my school life, I am barely hanging on sometimes.

The team is fun as it is one of the only teams where i have felt my fellow players are equal to me. Its always been me being on of the better ones filling in for people that can’t play there own positions that well. But now–I can finally test my limits (not to sound overdramatic). We are working harder and it is a group effort on this team so if someone if messing around or somebody misses a grounder (baseball rolling on the ground for all you non-baseball fans) it’s to the fence or thirty pushups. It really does test your patience sometimes.

Wednesday night I am flawless on the field not missing a single ball… fielding everyone. The coach comes over and really praises me, which was weird as he is one of the most strict people I know. Feeling that I had the wrong impression all along I go back to my position feeling good about myself. But don’t worry, he wasn’t really like that, he yelled at me about five minutes later about skipping someone whilst we were fielding the ball. The guy had to run to the fence and back because HE had missed the ball not I. So what was I going to do–stand there and wait an extra thirty seconds while i could get in some reps of my own. Well.. my coach apparently doesn’t have the same logic as me and when I told him my feelings he insulted me in front of the other coaches and the players to make it worse. Oh yeah, he also made me run … around the field… three times.

Annnnnnnywaaaays… we have a tournament every other weekend–so– this is gonna be so fun.

For now I am just trying to hang in there while juggling the homework, the hours, and coaches– but overall I think this will be a fun experience for me despite the differences i have with some people *cough *cough.

So a couple days ago we were asked to right a story full of detail and writers techniques. So I am sharing this story because I thought that this might be one of my better stories.
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Shivering Jimmy slid down the wall, teeth chatering, body trembling full of despair. His cup spilled out of his shaking hand spilling all the contents that he had begged for the last day. Cursing he got on his knees, embedding them deep within the snow to pickup the frosted coins.

“Still $13.38— good. Good” he muttered under his breath, cursing the cold for its ruthlessness.

The gloomy clouds dumped their unending snow, covering the land in blankets of snow, blinding the eye whenever glancing downward.

Jimmy was fantasizing what he could have got for Christmas if he has a loving family to care of him. The imaginations took over his mind filling his whole body with sensations of warmth, love, and giving. The presents under the tree, had a certain magic to them that drew Jimmy near reaching out for the appealing apparitions. His parents that he never knew stood in front of the crackling fire, inviting him to share the warmth with them.

Reaching out he felt his imagination ripped to shreds by the merciless wind.

He though back to the day. He had a good day today. He might be able to afford some food for a couple more meals. The hurt though came back like a hammer blow. The people walking, scolding him for asking money. They kicked him “accidentally” as they walked by. They said disparaging comments when they thought he couldn’t hear. They did all these uncaring things that pushed Jimmy deeper into his depression

As he tilt his head back against the wall, the poor boy went limp, and for the last time— he wished away the pain.

About one month ago I went to enchanted rock with my friend, which is if you didn’t know, is a huge heavily weathered rock. It takes about one and a half hours to drive from Austin to there, but I believe that it was well worth it.

We actually saw Miranda Seade there which was a little weird and coincidental.

The climbing up to the top was different from the previous times because it seemed like every other time there had been 20 MPH wind pushing back on us. But on this time, it was a beautiful day at 60 degrees and a clear sky. We walked around the rock like we always did but this time was different. We were going to go in the caves which we had previously had never traversed.

The caves weren’t something that you would usually expect. It was small, dark, and wet. It started out big enough but gradually shrunk down. We had to start doing a sort of sideways crab walk where we put both of our feet on the other side of the chasm [4 feet wide] and our back on this side.

As the time went on it did get increasingly more difficult and gradually went from gray, to black, to some shade that was so dark I can’t describe it.

We emerged from the cave on the whole other side of the mountain, which surprised me because it only felt like we traveled a couple hundred feet.

This is the part where it gets painful—for an idiot like me. There was a big boulder which we had to run up and grab a handhold to lift ourselves up. ,y friend and his dad went first, and when it was my turn I didn’t think twice as I raced towards the granite.

*CRUNCH* I felt my bones giving way as i didn’t move my left arm away in time and stiff armed a rock. Feeling like my bones were jello, I fell to the ground, embarrassing myself for a second time. Clutching my arm I thought to myself why am I such an idiot?. We returned back to the car not risking another injury, us all feeling a little disappointed I could tell.

It was a fun adventure until that stupid little mistakes, but then again—it’s always those little mistakes that cause your downfall. So the lesson of the day is. If you are trying to take on a rock, it will always win