Man I hate being sick. But it is thankfully now overwith. I am now nice and well. My cold started on monday as a general sickness thing. Then on tuesday it turned into a throat cold. ouch. Wed. and Thurs. were really bad because I kept having to talk and talk and talk. The v-ball game on Thurs. was the climax of my cold because it got to a point of swollenness where I couldn't talk because it hurt so much. Then on friday it morphed into a nose cold. It semi-dissipated on saturday, and is now relatively clear. So that is a load off my mind. This week also was bad on the volleyball perspective. On tuesday we had to go see the middle school v-ball team play from 4-5 and then be back for practice at 6:15-7:45. I got my eyes dialated so I was wearing my aviators plus those glasses they give you. I had to play mom because my parents were at a DMB concert. So I was driving to and fro all over MA with glasses on. Then I had to wear my glasses in practice, much to the objection of coach k. Then on friday we had to have practice from 7-8:30. AM. Whoa there. But because I woke up so early on friday, it seemed to have lengthened my weekend. Last night I had to babysit from 3 PM on sat till 8:30 AM sun. Fun times. So there was my week in a rather large nutshell. Adios!

So today volleyball was yet again a waste of my time. Coach Knott tells me if I practice hard then I will get to play. Not true. Last week I had the most stellar practices of my entire volleyball career. So, I thought maybe I would play at least for a couple seconds in the game. Whaddya know? I played for a grand total of 0 minutes. Thats right, 0. Not a lick of playing time for Emma Jane Refvem. Right... like that is going to make me practice harder. So today at practice, I was less than enthusiastic. I wasn't "moving my feet" according to Knott. Umm.... ok.... And then we had to run sprint after sprint after doggone sprint. Lovely. It hurts me to run. Not my lungs, which means I am semi-in-shape, but my whole body. My feet, my knees, my abdomen, my chest, everything. Running more will only make it hurt more. Knott doesn't get it. So there I go. Tomorrow I have to devote 2.5 hours to volleyball and a lot more time to taxiing my family around while my parents are at a DMB concert. When am I supposed to do my homework? How should I know? So we ask if we can do it while we have to watch the Middle School V-Ball game. She says no. We ask when we are going to have to do it, and she shrugs her shoulders. So I told her I would have my teachers send her a note when my grade drops. Argh... this is frustrating. It will all be over in October... oh happy day...

So today was a good day. I spent the whole afternoon doing US history stuff. First I had to write a report on Tecumseh in first person. Hello, I am Tecumseh. I fought in the battle of Tippecanoe. You know, stuff like that. That reminds me of a joke. What do you get when the indians stand up in their canoes? A tippy canoe! hahaha... right. Then I had to go to wal mart to get posterboard and construction paper. Then I had to do the poster. Then I had to do a timeline. Woah there... I guess that's where procrastination gets ya. Of course, in between the poster making and the timeline writing, I watched the last 45 minutes of LOTR2. Didn't get to finish it last night. That is a good movie. Real good.

Oh yeah... I went to church this morning, also. It was great. Quest is starting at our church, which is just a fancy name for spiffed up sunday school. We ate donuts and played music and sang and talked about God and it was tons of fun. There were 31 people in sunday school! Apparently our church sunday school attendance was 141 or something like that. It broke records... seriously. 'Twas a good day for the methodist church. Oh yeah... you should come on sundays at 9:30! If you do, I get bonus points and if I get enough, I can go to Busch Gardens. Yay. I really really REALLY like Busch Gardens. Right... ok... tootles!

So right now I am sitting here procrastinating. I really should be doing my report right now, but it just isn't happening. Maybe it would if I really cared about Tecumseh, but he doesn't really matter to me. I'll have to get down to it. Right now all I want to do is chill out and watch LOTR2. So that is what I'll do. Because I love it. Yay LOTR!!!

Matchstick Men... good one... go see it... that is all.

This is an apology. I have been misusing the word euphamisms. First of all, it is spelled euphemism. Secondly, it is used to make a phrase sound better than it is. Like "slumber room" in a funeral instead of like "death room" or something. Sorry!

And I'm back. I feel as if I have settled back into the routine of school, and can now devote a little more time to this here blog. However, I might not be able to devote as much time as in the past. Therefore there may be lapses in the days of postage, so bear with me. Is that how you spell that? It kind of sounds malicious. Almost as if I am asking you to act like a bear or something. Is it bare? because that would be kind of more like I was asking you to "bare it all", which is not the intention at all. It is funny how we take this funny language for granted. Ms. Ucinska, my spanish teacher, is polish and knows like 5 languages. I think English is like her 3rd or something. She reads the newspaper and highlights phrases, or euphamisms, that she doesn't know and gets a student to translate, if you will. It is not for a grade, it is just for her knowledge. Es muy interesante. We were trying to explain "rip tide", and I asked her if she knew what an undertoe was. She pointed to her toe and said she knew what toe meant. I said, "no, i mean like in water", and she didn't know what I was talking about. So we had to take the long way around to explain it to her. I think it is a good exercise for communication. Right-o... tata! Ah... how good it feels to be blogging once again...

This is a public service announcement brought to you by the letter "S" and the number "21".

Volleyball season is now in full swing, therefore blogging has become virtually impossible. Weekdays are devoted to bench sitting and conditioning, and weekends are devoted to rest. When volleyball season dies down, blogging will resume at a more regular rate. Sorry for the inconvenience. Adios, Amigos!

The volleyball scrimmage was great. I had to wake up at the buttcrack of dawn to go to Dobson to sit on the bench for 75% of the games watching our team play. I guess our team was helped by the experience, I wouldn't know. There is one thing I'm gonna get out of volleyball though, and that is killer leg muscles. All that "boot camp" Coach Knott makes us do sure helps with those. In fact, all my muscles are sore. I guess that means they're getting stronger, I'm not sure. Well, My contacts are about to pop out because they've been in since 6:45 this morning. I'm gonna skidaddle. Tata!

Sleep is a many splendored thing. Is that how you spell splendored? Who knows. Anyway. Too bad I'm not going to get to sleep in for like 2 weeks. Man, that's the one thing I miss about summer. Even though most days I was getting up at 7:00 at Camp to wake other people up for showers, it was still better than this. I have to get up at like 6:45 tomorrow because we have to be at the High School at 7:30. We have a volleyball scrimmage at Surry Central. That is cruel and unusual punishment. And I'll probably be sitting on the bench most of the time. But I'm not complaining, because I'll just come home and take a nap. But it still isn't the same as sleeping in. Most of the time naps only make me more tired. I will miss my only day to sleep in, but there will be another one, hopefully soon. Well I'm gonna go savor the 8 hours of sleep I might get, ttfn!

Hello all! As has become the norm, I apologize for lack of postage. I will also take the chance to apologize for events such as this in the future. The apologies take so much out of the blog. The plug is pulled on the creative juices. So there you go. Alright. School is going good, thanks for asking! It seems as though it is second semester though. I feel like I have been at school for 4 months already. That is not so nice. I still don't know whether or not this semester will be hard. Spanish is going to be easy, they tell me. Ms. Ucinska, for those of you who do not already know, is Polish, and is fluent in Spanish as well as English. English is her 3rd language (at least) so it is quite fun. My spanish name is Cecilia. Represent Simon and Garfunkle baby! Honors Bio with Bodnar looks like it will be fun because he drops in random jokes in the middle. Its great. Comic relief. Then Honors Physics... boy I hope I'm never tired in that class because Mr. Belton's voice would put you right to sleep. He reminds me of the way the boys in my grade talk when they don't really want to be talking. Kind of slow and depressed and stuff. Honors U.S. History is going to be fine I think. No EOC, which is a big plus. So those are my classes. I have to go study for my quizzes, I have one in each class except Spanish. Perfect. Gotta jet! Tootles!

I got my braces off! Yay!!! I look so different, but yet so the same! While I was driving around today, I kept looking in the rearview mirror and smiling to see my teeth. Also, my tongue is worn out from licking my smooth teeth... woah that sounds disgusting, sorry about that. If I had the technology to put a picture of myself on here I would, to show all of you guys my new smile! I'm glad I got them just in time, too. School starts Wednesday, so its a good start. Well, I gotta go to bed, I'm trying to get in shape for school hours... tata!

I get my braces off tomorrow! Finally! I am nervous, though. The person that I am today, the person who has been in high school for two years has had braces. I have learned to play my oboe with braces. I have grown accustomed to how my face looks with braces. Now I won't have them anymore and that will be weird. But the good outweighs whatever the bad would be. Now I won't have to worry about wires poking my cheek or hooking into my tongue. (ow!). So I will post tomorrow on the results. Wish me luck!

I apologize for the lack of postage. As I have said before, it is hard to get back in the groove. Anyways, back to the subject at hand. Today I earned some things. I earned 12 dollars to watch The Simpsons with Matus and Anna Kriska, and I earned a sunburn from laying out at the Cross Creek Pool for 2 hours without sunscreen. Yep, I'm probably going to get skin cancer. I don't know why I didn't wear sunscreen, I guess I thought I was rebelling. I need to stop myself from doing that. Nothing good ever comes of it. What makes me mad is that I only got sunburn on the places that didn't see the sun at camp. That would be the places that my lifejacket (PFD) and shorts covered. The only place on my legs that got sunburn was the white where there used to be a shorts tan. And I now have a reverse lifejacket tan (I mean BURN). Alright, I'm off to lather my ailing skin with Aloe and then going to sleep. Goodnight!

Sorry for not posting, I can't get back in the habit. I've been driving around Mt. Airy like a person who drives a lot. It is crazy. But still, since I've had my license, I've only used 1/2 a tank of gas. Thats right, my Corolla gets some serious gas mileage. I'm pumped about that. (get it? gas... pumped...) So. Here is Emma's version of the news right now: Mt. Airy High School has gone under some serious changes. New teachers are everywhere and good old classics have abandoned us. Teachers such as Mr. Bretz, Mr. Dickson, and allegedly Mr. Bodnar have left the ranks of MAHS teachers. This year is gonna be different. Next item on our news agenda is that VH1 is coming out with another new series: I Love the 70's. To add to the greatness of I Love the 80's. I hope it's just as good. They have some of the same commentators, and I'm really looking forward to it. OK folks, that's all for now, adios!

Hello all. I am back from England. And I am running on lack of sleep. I have been up since 6:00 England time, which is 1:00 NC time. Now it is 8:20 PM which means I have been awake for... hmm... almost 20 hours. Woah. So I'm going to try to stay awake till 9:00 to get over jet lag. Alrighty, tata!

Hello everybody. Sorry for not posting yesterday. I wasn't quite in the mood. I am rather tired right now, probably from staying up so late watching big brother. It is a really boring show, but I like their accents. The main speaking guy who says the times and all that is Scottish. When he says "big brother" it sounds like "big brootha". And he says eight and AM funny. And the guy who won was from Scotland, and he had a funny accent too. The second place guy was from Ireland, and he had a sailor's mouth. They did a series of clips of him swearing, it was funny. Anyways, so this season was really boring. I didn't see that much of it, but what I saw wasn't interesting. They didn't really have conflicting personalities, so they were always just sitting around. The announcer would be like, "3:42, PM. The housemates have been sitting on the couches for 31 minutes". And then it would show a clip of them just sitting there. It was worthless. The good part was at the end when they showed a bunch of clips of the good parts of the show. So that's why I'm tired, I stayed up to watch that. I would take a nap, but the last two times I've done that, I haven't been able to get to sleep that night. And I always feel so tired after I wake up. It is a lose-lose situation. So I'll have some Coke and finish out the day. Alrighty then, bye bye now!

Today I went on an expedition with my aunt. We were determined to take pictures of funny road signs. There are some really funny ones that I have seen. Here are some examples: (these pictures are typical road sign pictures, like the one for pedestrian crossing in the states)
~a picture of a man holding the hand of a little girl and a sign below it that says: "no footpath for 1300 yards"
~a picture of a duck
~a picture of a girl holding the hand of, practically dragging, a smaller boy with a sign that says school, and another with the same picture that says playground
~a picture of an old man with a cane and an old woman following him and a sign that says either elderly people or disabled people
~a small sign that says "feeding the ducks attracts RATS" with a picture of a rat crossed out
~a small sign with a picture of a dog standing next to a pile of poop that says "clean it up"
~an exclaimation point with a sign under it that said "farmyard, tractors crossing" (I saw one somewhere else that said "caution lorries turning", lorries are 18 wheelers)
~and the finale, a sign that said: "Kill your speed" (they used to say speed kills, kill your speed).
It was fun times. Gotta love european road signs. Well, that's it for today. Cheers, mate!

News is different when you see it from a different country. I've been watching BBC news over here, and the perspective is totally different. First of all, the subjects are different, but that is to be expected. Like lately the big story has been on the death of David Kelly, a weapons inspector. It's been all over the place. But the story that made me think of the differences is this one about Saddam's two son's being killed. Over here, they are more skeptical, and they are wanting proof of it. I looked on msnbc and it was more certain and there were more details. It makes me wonder what the news was like during the war and all the stuff going on. Also, I've been hearing more about Tony Blair, but that is only natural. It will be a switch when I get back to American News. Well, that's about all I had to say, and sorry for not posting yesterday. Ta ta for now!

Why hello there! On the menu for today's blog will be an appetizer of random sillyness, a main dish of fun times, and a dessert of savory funnyness. A good, balanced 3 course meal. Actually, I shall tell you of today's events. First I woke up, then went back to sleep. That is the best part about summer and being in a foreign country. If all other excuses fail, I can chalk it up to jet lag. It is the greatest to wake up and realize you have like 2 more hours of sleep. I love it. Anyways, after breakfast and a shower we ventured out to a villiage called Cromer, where we viewed the Lifeboat. Quite impressive. Then we went to Blickley (not sure on the spelling) where we saw a really big mansion and ate in a pub. I love pubs. Except they are based really on alcohol, which I am not legally able to drink. After that we came back here and played rummikub for a while. Then we went to see my grandma's cousin's husband's grave. It seems like he is more closely related to us than that though. It's all just names. We also saw my grandma's aunt's grave (my grandma's cousin's mom's) along with it. While we were there we took a peek in the church where they were practicing bell ringing. Now this is not your typical Methodist Women's Handbells, but big church bells. Jill, Charlotte, and I got to ring them! The men were very impressed that we were from North Carolina. I think one man even asked if NC was in Virginia or vice versa. A rather small man assisted us with the ringing. He had to get on a box to be able to help with my rope. It was great. Then we heard them ring a song. That's something you don't normally do every day. Actually, it's something you probably will never do, come to think of it. So we had a lovely day agian. I finished Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy today (the second time I've read it) I need to read The Restaurant at the End of the Universe sometime soon. Those books are great fun. The question and answer of Life, the Universe, and Everything is, according to the mice,: Q: "How many roads must a man walk down" A: "42". Quite fun. Go have a read, it's great. Alright then, adios!