First outdoor practice of the year

If you have been reading my blog you should be well aware that playing soccer is a huge part of my life.  It's my main sport however I'm gonna let you in on a little secret...I hate the beginning of spring soccer.  Well let me clarify, I love the soccer but I hate the weather that early spring in New York entails.  The soccer is great though, we are preparing for one of the most important and fun times of our season; the State Cup.  Our play-down game is this Sunday so stay posted for the game details!

Lions and Tigers and Customized Jerseys oh my!!

After school Monday I went to see my girlfriend who had been in Spain all weekend for the Spanish trip.  When I arrived she surprised me with a customized F.C. Barcelona jersey.  They are one of the best teams in Spain and arguably in the whole world.  Having one of their jerseys with my name on it is a bit conceited I understand but at the end of the day I really don't care because it so awesome and this definitely made my week.

Shots fired

As you can see from my previous posts I have spent the week in the south and what kind of southern vacation doesn't involve guns? So anyway this afternoon all the men went out to the backyard where my uncle had set up a shooting gallery.
Weapons:
2 semi-automatic .22 rifles
2 .22 pistols
A twelve gauge shotgun
A nine mm pistol
So yea you could say this experience ranked quite high on the fun-o-meter! One of my favorite parts was the dueling target my uncle has. It's basically ten targets (five on each side of a pole) that are on the end of a metal arm connected to a pole. The goal is to shoot the targets on your side so that they swing around to your opponents side. After all the bullets have been fired the person with the fewest targets on their side wins. I'm proud to say I won both the duels that I shot in.

Antique shopping in the south

One thing that many people may not know about me is that I love looking through and collecting antiques.  In many peoples opinion it's not really a manly thing to do but guess what; I don't really care because I love history and looking through antiques is like looking back through time for me.  My collection is centered mostly around three types of items; tins, bottles, and Coca-Cola advertising and toys.  I started collecting when I was fourteen and haven't ever really stopped. My collection has grown so large that I have basically run out of room in my room to display everything but nevertheless I don't see myself stopping anytime soon.  I look at my collection as a type of investment.  I take good care of my items and since the are antiques they are growing in value even so one day, if I ever want to, I could sell them and theoretically make money.  Whatever the case I'm exclaiming to the world over cyberspace that I Love Antiques!

Seven dogs and counting

Both my aunt and uncle breed and show dogs as a hobby so it's not too surprising that they have quite a few dogs. My uncle has five Staffordshire Bull Terriers that he has bred and shown and my aunt has only two Bernese Mountain Dogs at the moment but the girl, Bridget, is pregnant with her first litter thus the "and counting". Every night, and two at a time, the dogs would come out and be with us.  The Staffies are very strong dogs but very lovable and they want to lap dogs and they jump on your lap and love to be scratched.  The Bernese are bigger and have much thicker coats but they are just as lovable and will sit still for hours if you pet them. I love dogs, I truly believe they are man's best friend because I think they bring out a youthful and happy spirit in most people. Although having them around is sometimes chaos, I love them all and had a ton of fun an laughs playing fetch and other games.

85 and sunny

After church this morning all seven of us (Dad, Mom, Me, Brother, Aunt, Uncle, and Cousin) went to the National Whitewater Center.  The water was a bit cold so instead we opted for dry land activities.  Seen in the picture is the man-made river for rafting, a rock climbing wall with varying degrees of difficulty, and at the very top there are four cable streaking across the picture.  These cables are part of a two hundred foot long cable swing that takes riders across the park and river at a relaxing height of fifty feet.  Yes we did this, yes it was one of the most fun things I have done for this project!  Also, there where tree canopy high obstacle courses and obstacle courses on the ground.  The one in the trees looked like so much fun but it was closed so we settled for the one at ground level.  It was harder than it looked and it didn't help that my footwear (Sperry's) wasn't exactly athletic wear.  Even so, was the first one to complete the course in the last four hours mainly because I was able to climb up a fifteen foot rope and ring a bell.  This was a memorable day and a great way to start the trip.

On the road again

After spending the night in Harrisburg PA, we jumped back on rt 81 and cruised south all the way to warmth in the south.  Driving itself is never fun however a sunny 80 degree day is something to appreciate.  The car ride wasn't so bad either, my saint of a mother packed an enormous snack back which always goes over well with two teenage boys.  Anything from sour patch kids to peanut butter pretzels, if you were craving it, it was probably in the snack bag.  Also, somewhere along the route in North Carolina we stopped for gas and decided to run through a car wash.  I'm not sure if it was just bad luck or what but while in the unmanned touch free car wash it simply turned off in the middle of the soap cycle.  Since nobody was brave enough to get out of the car for fear of getting doused in suds, we drove two miles through a little town, covered in soap suds, to another car wash to rinse off. What a sight we must have been! Anyway we have arrived at my aunts house and are getting settled in for the week...oh boy!

Twenty Second Anniversary

Friday April 11: Dear Reader,
The grueling 13 hour car ride began this afternoon promptly at four thirty. One plus is since we are making this car ride on my parents anniversary we stopped at a nice Italian restaurant for dinner.  I ordered the five layered lasagna and it was amaaazing! But I guess any combination of pasta, sausage, ricotta cheese, sauce, and mozzarella cheese is bound to be pretty tasty.  Anyway, this delectable entree was accompanied by a large Coke and an order of garlic knots, all to be topped off with a chocolate dipped cannoli...you could call it heaven and you could also call it my dinner.

Spring Break

So next week is spring break and my family is going to South Carolina to visit my aunt.  Also, my girlfriend is going to Spain for the Spanish trip.  To keep her company while we are away I wrote her a series of letters so that she could open one a day for every day that we were apart.  I got this idea from twitter and I thought it is something fairly simple that I could do but it would carry a lot of meaning.  I can't wait for spring break this is gonna be so fun!

Legally Blonde

On April 5th I attended the spring musical which this year was legally blonde. It was a great show and I really enjoyed it. I was reluctant to go because it seemed a bit too girly by the name but after a little coaxing from my girlfriend I went with her. I'm glad I did, many if my friends were in it and according to people who had also seen the movie, it followed that story pretty well which is sometimes not the case with musicals or plays. Anyways, this wad the only show I had been to my entire high school career and I guess it made me wish I had gone to more. I didn't realize what a strong drama department we have so bravo to all who were in it!

It's been awhile...

It's been two very busy weeks with internet connection for half the time so here comes a whole bunch of back posts!

Item 24 on my List

Item twenty four states that I want to keep a family tradition on my father's side alive by drinking mate regularly. Mate is basically loose leafe tea that is drank by almost everyone in Uruguay which is the country my father grew up in.  There, people carry around a thermos and Calabash Gourd (as pictured above) everywhere they go because it is as common as drinking coffee is in America. The same tea leaves are used all day and when you want a drink you pour a little bit of hot water in (enough for about two sips), let it steep for a few seconds, and then drink it.  The metal straw has a strainer at the end of it to keep the leaves out of your mouth.
I have begun to drink this pretty regularly as I do my homework because it has many vitamins and is good for you. Also, it has no calories because there is no sugar so its just a refreshing yet hot drink.
Keeping family traditions alive are very important in our society today. Everyone should be proud of who they are and where they come from.  I am proud to keep family traditions, such as this one, alive.

Eye Dissection

In my AP Biology class we dissected a sheep's eye. I have always enjoyed dissections because I am very interested in the body and how it works. This dissection was no different, in fact, it was more interesting because it would explore the miracle of sight. The process started out fairly normal; cut here, remove this, use the scalpel here, etc. However it got much more interesting once the retina was removed and the choroid was exposed as shown in the picture above. It was a beautiful blue-green color, absolutely amazing. This explains why animals eyes show up as green if you take their picture at night, what you are seeing is the light from the flash reflecting off of this part of the eye.
Just another fun surprise to add to the blog I suppose.   

April Fools Day

Most of my post reflect fun things that I've done however in math on April fool's day my teacher pranked us in a way that was the opposite of fun.
We had a test that we had known about for a week and our teacher told us it had been moved to the next day. She waited just long enough for everyone to smile before saying " April fools! Clear your desks and take out a pencil."
I can honestly say this experience was the opposite of fun.