Easing Up

It has probably been two straight weeks, maybe even longer, since I have touched my own skateboard. I need to go out and skate to relieve all this tension. All this tension is coming from these end of the year assignments that I fear I might not be able to complete. I always stress out, but end up doing good in the end. The stress is what pushes me to do such a great job. I need the stress. Without it, I will crumble down into a worthless slacker. I am starting to miss out a lot on friends and such because of doing these projects. I have not had a session ever since two Fridays ago. But, this will all be over soon, and it will be summer. I will finally be able to hang out and play with my friends for hours without having to worry about school or grades for at least another two months.

I plan to put this summer to good use. Last summer, my friends and I had progressed our skateboarding by a lot. One of them started landing 360 flips, the other got dolphin flips, and I finally got stylish pop shuvits every try, landing them on the bolts of the skateboard ("proper form"). It is a shame that I am taking a break from skateboarding because I had just landed two kickflips of mild height, on the bolts (proper form), within a month. I was so happy because I only landed one a year ago, and lost hope after that, until now. I can finally feel the trick within my grasp. I want to be able to do them consistently.

What makes me even happier, is that I did the better looking and feeling kickflip under pressure. It happened two or three weeks ago. I was with a couple of friends at one of their houses. His house is pretty cool because he has a long driveway and his parents allow him to build many "skate-able" objects. One of them we were using a lot. It was a nine of ten foot long movable manual pad that was approximately mid shin height. Some of us were playing a game of L.I.N.E. This is some sort of complex game that we heard of on the Berrics. Well, I was losing, and my friend set the trick by doing a kickflip and after that manualed the ten foot pad. I was pissed at the time because I knew that I did not have kickflips. I had proper rotation, catch, and height (knee high sometimes), but my front foot just never stayed on. I watched my other friends go and do their attempts, but none of them were able to copy, so they received their letters. Then, it was finally my turn, I did my first try, did not get the proper flick, so the board spun wrong and I did not land it. The second time was the charm. I caught and landed it. I looked back at my friends and they were screaming with joy, but I remembered that I had to keep going and do the manual pad. I thought that I was not, going to make it, but I told myself that I will not let anything get in the way of this moment. So I ollied lifted up the front end of the board bracing myself for the back wheel impact. I felt total concentration flow throughout my body. And finally, just as briefly as it had started, the manual was over, and I was rolling away, back to my friends to celebrate my accomplishment.

My Spring Break

Hmm. Well. Another blog post about my vacation. I was looking forward to spending time with friends. I really needed to use this vacation with STAR testing coming right up around the corner. But, I did not get to spend time with friends. I will not bitch about it (because I feel that I bitch about my vacations way too much and it makes my dad sad). My family and I went on an RV trip for this spring break. My dad rented one at some place near Oakland. The RV was pretty nice. It had a toilet, a shower, a microwave, a stove, a ton of cabinets, and a few areas that could be used for sleeping. This one was not even worn down at all. It looked as if it were brand new. We used it for nearly the whole vacation. We got back in town on the second to last day (Saturday) right before my siblings and I would have to return back to school. A place that we love so dearly (SARCASM).

I am not going to lie, the first four days of the vacation were spent really well. It was the segment of the trip that we spent heading towards our destination. On the first day, I got out of school around lunch time. My parents had me excused from my last two classes so we could load up the RV and hit the road before traffic appeared. The first stop on the trip was a place called Tulare. We checked into the RV place first to get a space to stay. After that my family and I met up with my God Father. I was so happy when I saw him. I remember the last time we met I was only six pears old and my greatest passion in the world belonged to dinosaurs. We all went to a diner to eat and catch up with each other. After that, my God Father, my brother, and I went to go see Clash of the Titans. It was an alright movie. After that my God Father dropped my brother and I off at the RV park. That day was obviously the highlight of my trip.

The next three good days were spent in Las Vegas. My family and I went to meet with an uncle on my mom's side of the family. It has been a while since I saw him too. He moved to Nevada a few years ago with his family and they are doing quite well. I am going to try to just summarize up the majority of what occurred on these three days because a lot of the time was used on driving for long hours. We got to Las Vegas, checked into an Oasis RV park. It was pleasant area. The next day was Easter Sunday. We attended my uncle's church. I will say that this was quite a different religious experience for me. My mother said that they used the King James Bible rather than the New American Bible that my church back home uses. That was a small contribution to the different experience. My brother and I took a part in the highly successful youth group that they have. It was a while since we have gone to a CCD class, so we were prepared for nearly anything. To my surprise, we got to attend a small rock concert in the name of Jesus Christ. After that the youth group took us to talk about Jesus and why him rising from the grave was the key to sparking Christianity.
The differences in the Bibles were not that great. But what I found interesting was the fact that they believed that Jesus was dragged down and tortured in Hell for three days after his death. On the third day, he took back the keys to life and death, and returned to the human world to tell his apostles. This was the only difference that I heard from the story that I was told as a small child.

The next good day was the last one. We drove to Zion (some sort of National Park a lot like Yosemite). I climbed a really tall mountain that only had chains on the sides to help people. There were a lot of huge (approximately 1,000ft.) drops. The view was fantastic, but I did not enjoy it much due to my fear of heights. After that day, we started the "homecoming" part. I hated it. The worse part was the fact that when we got back to Alameda, all the good weather that they supposedly had was gone. It rained on the last two days and I was pissed. Oh well.

Winter Vacation

I am going to blog about another vacation. This one was my winter one. I got to celebrate Christmas and the welcoming of the new year. Both of them I had done with my family. In the time between the two holidays, I spent more time with my family by going by L.A. to Universal Studios. Overall, I think that I spent way to much time with my family. More than half of the vacation was devoted to spending time with them. Originally, I planned to be with them for Christmas, New Year's, and probably a few more other days. But, then I found out about my parents' other plans. My dad wanted to go to Universal Studios and to Yosemite. Thank God that my mom had found this overwhelming as well. She was able to convince my dad to cancel those plans.

Universal Studios was a whole lot smaller than I had remembered as a child. My mom bought the two day pass from her friends. On the first day, we did nearly every ride and show. The second day my brother and I were somewhat bored of the place and pretty much asked ourselves, "What have we not done yet?" I guess that I was not really able to enjoy myself there because I hate traveling (plane, car, or train) for hours. And I really do not like being in extremely crowded areas. These two things happened a lot to and from the trip to L.A.

I guess that I am not ready to go back to school. I wanted to make the most out of the time I had away from school. In total, I only got to spend two days with friends. I wanted to spend the majority of the break with them in the first place. So I guess that I am upset. I just miss that old feeling that I use to get when I was a very small child. Usually, it occurred over summer break. The feeling was when I do everything that I could possibly think of over the vacation and end up being bored out of my mind, and get down on my knees to beg to go back to school. It may sound a bit silly, but this hasn't happened to me for such a long time that I don't even feel content with any vacation I have anymore.

Christmas?

What has happened to Christmas? It has become so commercialized. Atheists are even starting to celebrate this (what use to be a) religious holiday. They have casually put an "X" in front of this holiday (removing the Christ), thus altering the basis of Christmas. Christmas is originally suppose to be a time during the year to worship and celebrate the birth of the infant Jesus. It is a time for Christians to remember the roots of their religion. When Jesus was born in order to create the gateway to heaven. Well, that is what I believe. Other things associated with this holiday are getting together with family and having a good Christmas meal. I am okay with everyone doing this. I mean, all families, regardless of religion, need a time to get together. Especially, with these tough American times.

What angers me the most, is the fact that a lot of people are obsessed with the "receiving" part of Christmas. The giving part is good. It allows people to show that they care for the other human being. If the gift is something that the other person wanted or needed, that only shows that the giver cares even more about the person who got the gift because they pay attention to the other person's needs. Nowadays, some people just give more gifts in order to receive more. I almost forgot about the children. Oh, the children. They whine and whine all for a single gift. All that they know to say is "GIMME, GIMME, GIMME!!!" Their young, so they do not know any better. I know this, because I use to be one. But, in due time, they will forget about the universe circling around them. Unfortunately, I do not know what to ask Santa Claus for this year. I am not really sure if it is because I don't deserve one, or if I am content with my life and what materials I have. This is the possible reason for why I am questioning Christmas. I think it is because I want something that cannot be given in a gift wrapped box. Maybe, I want happiness, because at this moment is when I will need it most.

Thanksgiving Break

Well, for me, I wouldn't really have considered it a break. Just like all of my other "breaks," i did not get to do that many activities that I wanted to. Usually, my parents take control of whatever I do over my breaks. But, this time, I was given one of the six days (I included Tuesday after school and totaled my half days of freedom as one) to do what I wanted to. As always, I just wanted to hang out with friends. This period of time that I got to enjoy was about equivalent to a weekend. The rest was mainly family time.

Family time wasn't all that bad. I got to be with my cousins (some of them are about my age) for majority of the break. We watched television, rented movies, played a few video games, went on youtube to watch many hilarious videos, and helped a bit in preparing the Thanksgiving feast. Unfortunately, I didn't eat that much turkey. This happened probably because I ate a bit too much of the home-made lumpia (I think this is how you spell it, by the way, they are the Filipino egg rolls) appetizers with the delicious sweet, spicy, and sour sauce. My mother and my aunt had prepared two turkeys this year. One was oven roasted, the other was barbecued. Both tasted great, but the barbecue turkey was a little dry.

My cousin didn't have any turkey because of his big football game the next day. His team made the playoffs, even though the team was just started last year. Unfortunately, his team has much to learn, because they lost by a lot. My uncle knew that the other team was going to do well, because he saw the other team's coach at my cousin's team's practice (possibly spying). In a few years, my cousin's team will probably get better.