I love this song that isn't so much a song but more of a... creepy voice humming...?  I don't know.  Just listen to it.
Anna

The Last Post

It's that time.  The last post.  The final hoorah for this sad but resilient blog I have slowly cultivated into a wordy representation of my life and daily thoughts.  It has been a wonderful journey.  This blog has been my outlet, my inspiration, and also occasionally the bane of my Friday nights.  I would like to think that in this current stage of my blogging endeavor all my anonymous readers and I have a telepathic bond.  Okay, maybe that's stretching it.  I actually don't want a telepathic bond with anyone.  I take that back.  That sounds like hell. I would like to think you guys have a clue who I am. Never the less, here is a countdown of my greatest achievements this year (according to me, so this post will not include anything related to grades or religion)

A. I did not end up in a psychiatric ward.  There were a couple instances where I got close, but I managed to avoid the whole complete insanity thing.

B. I found some really awesome people, especially this amazing chick, this brilliant chick, and this cool chick.  These people aren't the only people who have changed my life this year, there are millions more people that have loved me and been by my side my freshman year. They've gotten me through so much and I really wouldn't be where I am today without them.

C. I joined the Debate Team.  I competed in debate and actually did okay :) I didn't mean to like it, but I fell in love with something I had previously hated.  I look forward to competing in Duo with this amazing person next year.

D. I survived my classes this year.  Yay! School is almost over and I managed to not have too many school related mental breakdowns.  Considering the whole honors and AP thing, I put this accomplishment pretty high on my list.

F.  My year was good.  I got so much better and I hope to continue to work to make myself happier. I found that weird little thing called hope this year, and I plan to keep that little guy under my wing for as long as possible.

I love you all so much and I will, after some consideration, post during the summer.  Yay, I think.  I hope you guys quite literally have the best summer ever, even if it's just spent reading in your room and watching anime (this is what my summer will mostly consist of).

Loves to you all,
Anna

Credit to this website.

School. Again.

So guys, this is one of my last posts :'(  I'm going to miss you all.  I'll probably post a goodbye post next week, but so none of us start crying over the sadness yet, another random post.

 My school only has 18 days left, and my head is currently filled with undue nostalgia for the year that could've been better.  My usual apathy for anything school related has been suspended as pretty much everything is bathed in this soon-to-be-gone nostalgic glow.  It's messing with my head.  Seriously though... I'm at the point where I thought Aw... I'm going to miss getting shoved against the lockers in the halls... and it's only going to get worse.  I know from last year that by the end of the year my normal don't-you-dare-touch-me personality will go all sappy and huggy by year end.

See... high school is hell.  Ask pretty much anyone and if they are answering truthfully they will probably agree.  The basic thought process behind my high school seems to be if they don't die from it, don't mention it.  What I mean by this, is that the kids in my semi-snobby (or really snobby depending on who you talk to) school seem to be able to get away with pretty much anything.  Well, as long as you're white, straight, and preferably male.  I'm sorry, did that sound bitter?  Maybe it did.  Before I rant about the administration here and get suspended for saying something I shouldn't, let me just summarize it by saying that I can't wait to get out of here.

The days are slowly ticking away, and soon the week of procrastination will be upon us.  You know what I mean.  That last week-or-so of school where teachers have to find some way to contain a vast amount of teenagers in a building without them burning it down.  This means all the busy work! Yay!

This is me right now.  Except female.  I got this picture from this person.

Thanks guys! I will see you next Friday and I hope you have a good week :)
Anna

So... School.

You all already know what I'm going to talk about, don't you? Yeah.  I bet you do.  It's the end of the year, we're getting close to the end of the semester, and if you know me in real life you probably have noticed I'm close to pulling my hair out and stand shaking in a corner.  Don't worry, I won't.  I'm just exaggerating :) So now you get a list of things that I'm stressing about, much like this post so, enjoy ;)

1. Finals
The impending doom of finals is looming over my head like an anxiety filled cloud ready to rain nice little raindrops of overwhelming panic on my ill-prepared self.  To summarize that very wordy sentence, finals are coming up soon and I haven't started studying yet.  I should.  I know.  But, like every year and every quarter, I will wait until the last moment to study and then cram the week/night before. To add to this, the lovely PTSO has decided to require that we all have a final.  In. Every. Class.  -_- thanks guys.  I NEED a final in art soooo badly.

2. "SAGE" Tests
Apparently we don't take CRTs anymore, which is kinda a mixed bag.  SAGE tests are harder, and adjust the hardness of the questions based on how many you get right.  Sadly this means that I can no longer finish the English Core test in 10 minutes.  On the other hand however, SAGE tests are graded by hand which means that they get graded too late for teachers to put them in Powerschool.  Yay for no death because I failed the SAGE Tests!

3.  Online Classes
I'm taking PE and Health First Quarter Online.  I wouldn't have registered this early if I would've known that it would start right away.  This means I'm currently taking these 10 classes.  Homework, tests and all.  More anxiety with this, I know for a fact that I will be taking these classes during Finals Week.  Eep.

4. Social Shiz
I'm not going to put anything in this section, just primarily because of the fact that it's kinda awkward and personal :P

Loves to you all,
Anna

Cool/Creepy picture I found on a desktop pictures website!

My Fluffy Balls of Happines

I. Am. So. Sorry.  That last post was painful to read.  Very very very bad writing.  As an apology please accept this even more terrible rant about my puppies.

I love my puppies to death. Currently have two puppies, a Morkie who looks like this:

Slightly inaccurate image Creditted to Olympia OLX

and a Husky-Lab that looks like this:

Image Creditted to  Dog Breed Info

The Morkie's name is Ginger and the Husky-Lab's name is Eddie.  Ginger is adorable and completely brilliant.  She does this really cute tilt-y thing with her head when she is confused.  We got Ginger at a school auction where they were giving her away.  She was smaller than two of my hands and couldn't figure out how to bark. Seriously.  She would just kinda softly purr like a cat with a little bit of whine thrown in.  Unfortunately my sister taught her how. :(  Ginger is my little ball of happiness.  I love that chick.

Eddie technically isn't a puppy anymore, since he's about 13.  He has these little fits of youth once in a while when he runs around the house and starts barking.  He's precious.  Eddie had a lot of issues when he was little, because he was abused as a puppy and abandoned.  When we first got him he would chew or claw his way out of any room or crate we left him in.  The first crate he chewed through was like this one, except we ended up putting heavy-duty crowbar to keep the door shut. Eddie ended up bending the crowbar and chewing through the side of the plastic.  We ended up just making sure that there was always someone there with him ao that he wouldn't destroy the house.  I love the big guy though, he's my baby.

Thanks to Ginger and Eddie they make me not hate on people most of the time :)

Until next week!
Anna

Deck the halls with... screw it.

I'm sorry if I seem like a very pessimistic person during this post.  I've been sick all week and just failed my AP History Final.  Anyways, I hate holidays.  I don't understand the whole concept, really.  We donate an entire season to greed.  Every square inch of space is covered in sparkles and various shades of green and red.  Everyone involved is expected to be magically happy for every freaking second from Thanksgiving to Christmas.  I don't get it, and it frustrates me to no end.  Really.  I hate the holidays. I know that I should be crazy grateful for having a family around the holidays, and I am, I just can't get past everyone's expectations that everyone else be happy constantly for more than a month.

Image Credited to Christmas Games

Now just warning you, this is going to get kinda deep.  I was hanging ornaments tonight, and something occurred to me.  I have  ornaments from second grade onwards.  You know the ones you make in elementary school? Well, anyways, most of them have little chips, and some have completely shattered into large pieces.  The ones that have shattered are re-repaired every year, and every year it gets a little harder as more and more of the ornament breaks.  Me, being me, started thinking about how the ornaments symbolized my growth as a person.   I started thinking about how the small little clay contraption I made in second grade with my name sloppily scrawled across the front represented my unabashed ability to be myself in those years.  As I looked at the poor thing now however, chipped in several places; shattered; and missing one side,  I thought about how as I grew my ability to throw other's opinions away slowly chipped away until it was virtually non-existent.  When I saw my little glittered letter that I made in kindergarten or first grade addressed to my mother, I saw my innocence, and my struggling relationship with my mother.  I did this with every single ornament in the box, which resulted in a very bad mood.

Now you see why I shouldn't be left alone with my brain.  So this is my little corner of brain for you.  Yes, I know, bad image.

Some Not-Too-Happy Stuff...

Since we don't have a blog assignment this week I'm not required to ineffably cheerful so I've decided to give you all a little bit of... my brain. My brain is a slightly scary place, mostly because about 70% of the shit that goes through my head I hope no one else ever feels.  Unfortunately, a lot of people our age do feel like I do.  Approximately 11% out of every 100 people experience severe depression at some point during high school.  Let's give this a little perspective:  if you are in a class of 30, more than three people in that class are severely depressed, at least five people are seriously considering suicide, and at least one person will commit suicide by the end of high school. 157,000 teens per year are committed to a hospital because of severe self-harm injuries.  This doesn't just pertain to "dramatic" teenage girls, 19% of suicide deaths are male.  These are some seriously sad statistics.  Most of these people feel like they don't have a way out, or are trapped.

Image Credited to: Hyperbole And A Half

The rest of the world seems to be shoving their ability to feel, well, anything in their faces.  Any effort by anyone to help them just makes them feel worse.  

Image Credited to: Hyperbole And A Half

I had a purpose to this when I started it... and then as I kept writing the purpose just kinda faded into this blurry mass... so thanks for reading... and just... I hope you remember some of this and... be sympathetic... we are all human... and we all deserve to feel like we are worth something.

Sleeping With Sirens!!!

My friends Audrey, Amanda, Lucy, and I all went to a Sleeping With Sirens concert last night at The Great Saltair. We were all super excited and probably came off as really dorky fangirls, but we were all determined to have a great time.  We got in really easy after waiting in line for a while we were let in early because we already had our tickets.  

Image credit goes to: Amp Musicians

We made it up to the front by the stage about the second song into Our Last Night's set.  When I say "we made it up to the front" I am referring to the shoving, elbowing, and swearing it took to get most people to move.  It took forever to get up there and we were all already dripping with sweat, but with electric guitars and screams echoing through my ears I didn't really notice that much.  This was one of the moments I hated being 5'2" because I had some issues seeing/surviving throughout the night.  Anyways, I wasn't expecting Our Last Night to be that great but they were really good! Everyone got really excited and the band was very enthusiastic which pumped us all up for the next band, Issues.

Our Last Night Image Credit goes to: Infectious Magazine

Issues was really disappointing after Our Last Night.  They were just a little too close to the pop-rap spectrum for my taste.  The crowd was really crazy during this one and it got kinda dangerous if you couldn't hold your own.  Even though Issues wasn't one of my favorites being so close to the stage somehow made their music better.

Image credit to: Highlight Magazine

Anyways, Breathe Carolina came on next and they were amazing.  Everyone was so psyched by now and we were so packed in that it felt like we were grinding with the entire Salt Lake county.  It was so much fun.  You could smell the enthusiasm and anticipation in that room. Actually it was probably the weed, but still.  The four of us tried as hard as we could not to get separated and just attempted to survive while enjoying some amazing music.

Image Credit goes to: A Website I've Never Heard Of

Sleeping With Sirens was up next, and we were four people away from the stage.  It was going to be amazing!  Except for one small issue. Everyone behind us was pushing and shoving and screaming to get to the front.  This is where the 5'2" thing came in.  Most of the people in the front were either really tall muscular guys or teenage girls with frizzy hair.  The last one accurately describes me at this point, which wouldn't be an issue,  except for the fact that I physically couldn't breathe.  My rib cage was being crushed from either side by two men, while my face was unwillingly shoved into someone's thick hair.  The whole room kinda started to sway slightly and the place where a crowd-surfer had landed on my neck suddenly started to send panic signals towards by brain.  I was determined to make it through Sleeping With Sirens.  After all, they were the main reason I was there. My breaking point was when, almost as one, the people behind us shoved as hard as they could.  This had been happening all night, but this time I had a chick's elbow in my back and no air to breathe.  I had to get out of there.

Image Credit of a Concert at the Saltair goes to: UVU Review

Getting out was slightly difficult, but eventually we made it to a safer area with less crazies (but more drugs).  We then listened to Sleeping With Sirens from there.  They were fantabulous.  Kellin introduced each song with a surprisingly inspirational speech and some humor.  This is the setlist that they played:

Here We Go

Congratulations

Low

Free Now

If I'm James Dean You're Audrey Hepburn

The Best There Ever Was

A Trophy Father's Trophy Son

These Things I've Done

Scene Five

Do It Now Remember It Later

Satellites

If You Can't Hang

Image Credit Goes To: Facebook Covers

The whole experience was awesome! Even though I will feel dirty for the next three years and only got three hours of sleep because of it, the concert was totally worth it.  Audrey and Amanda also posted stuff on last night if you want to check out their blogs too!

SO MUCH JOY IS SEEPING FROM EVERY PORE IN MY ENTIRE BODY THAT I THINK I AM GOING TO DIE FROM A LACK OF OXOGEN BECAUSE THERE IS JUST TO MUCH JOY IN THE SURROUNDING AIR!!!!!!
-Amanda

"Kellin Quinn's voice sounds like an angel peeing in your ear."

-Audrey