20!

Wow, I reached 20 followers! this deserves some sort of celebration lol. Well, all I can say is that I never could have believed that I would actually reach this point and that all of you guys are absolutely amazing (Love Y'all!!!). I would like to make a shout out to my newest follower Cooper and his blog "Cooper's Corner". He seems like a really nice guy and you all should go check out his blog.

Did I mention how productive today was? I waxed three cars, finished a good chunk of my English homework, started my Georgetown application and I am going to try and finish most of my history reading in about 20 minutes. And all of this isn't even due until Wednesday! Something must be wrong with me lol.

Okay, well, I'm off to go celebrate with a slice of pumpkin roll cake, y'all really are amazing :D

All the best,

JP

A Reintroduction

I've realized that since I first created a blog back in May, I've gained 19 followers, come out to so many more people and have evolved as person. One of my first posts was an introduction to me as a person of sorts and I feel that it's worth it to do one again.

Let me begin,

Hi everyone, my name (well nickname) is JP and I am 17 years old, I was born in Washington DC back in 1992 and lived there for the first 4 or so years of my life. I am an only child. When I was almost 5, my family moved out of Washington DC and into the suburbs surrounding the area. I am currently a senior in high school trying to simply do my best and work my hardest in order to pave the best road towards the future that I possibly can. At school, my favorite subject has traditionally been math but recently it has also delved deeper into history. I plan to go onto college and study business management or something in the business field but nothing is set in stone at the moment. My dream school would be UPenn's Wharton School but that would be a lifetime achievement if I ever get in.

I am not the most athletic individual in the world but I am a rower on my school's crew team. I started during my junior year after much prodding by my friends and have loved it ever since, I will be rowing for the second year in a row this year. Some of my other passions and hobbies include cooking and cars. Cooking has long had it's roots in how it provided me an escape from the busy world. The precision, preparation and feeling of fulfillment when you see a pile of ingredients end up as a finished dish has always been something I enjoyed. Cars have been a key part of my life for quite some time as well.

As a person, I believe that I am a generally quiet individual, especially to people I don't know, but this can rapidly change if I'm with a bunch of close friends. In order for someone to become one of my close friends, they must first gain my trust which is easier said than done. It's not that I'm suspicious but I will only trust people with things such as my deepest secrets only if they have earned it. I do have a sharp sense of humour and love to laugh and have a good time with friends. So, what about relationships? Well, I've never had a boyfriend despite wanting on for quite some time (did I never mention that I was gay? whoops, silly me). This is mostly my fault as I'm not exactly all the way out at my school. For the longest time I tried to fight my homosexuality but a few years I ago, I realized that it was never something that could, or would change and that I needed to love myself for the person I was. Since then, I have come out to over a dozen people and my mom.

I look for many things in a guy but some key things he must possess include a friendly demeanor, a sense of humour, a sharp mind and a willingness to nerd-out from time to time. I also tend to like guys who are slightly taller than me (Though that's hardly a requirement, I'm 5'9.5") and I've had a trend for falling for runners. I currently do like someone but I have a strong feeling that it is mostly one sided *sigh*.

Once again, my name is JP and welcome to my blog. I hope to get to know you that much better and hope you will enjoy reading my scribblings and thoughts about this very complex world around us.

All the best,

JP


P.S. - my favorite colours are blue and silver, just in case you were wondering lol

So That's How You Do It....

Okay, I admit that some people will get the wrong idea from the title but whatever. Thanks to the amazing discovery by Ethan (thanks mate) I finally figured out why while people are subscribed to this blog, they haven't been receiving updates. I seems that while they are still on the subscribers list, updates do not follow. So, I guess in order to receive updates, you have to re-subscribe to my blog. I know if this can be rather annoying and if you don't care too much about my bablings you don't have to go through with it, but if you would like to receive updates, I guess that is what you will have to do. Sorry for the inconvenience :/

All the best,

JP

Election Day

Tomorrow is election day for the Virginia Gubernatorial election, and for Government extra credit, I will be volunteering as an election page from 5AM to 1PM. Now, the one thing I don't really like about state-elections is how little people actually care about it compared to national elections. Sure, electing the president is a major thing, but people seem to forget that the gubernatorial, local delegate, attorney general, etc. elections in everyone's own state often will have a much greater impact on their lives than the president ever will. The president doesn't decide whether road X or motorway Y will get repaved, or schools in region X, Y, and Z will be refurbished, no, this falls into the hands of local legislature. So while presidential elections receive much more press attention, it is the forgotten election which really matters. It's a shame then that so few people end up voting in their local elections, this is really where it counts and since turnout is lower, your voice and vote matter that much more as a result.

I encourage everyone of voting age wherever you live to vote whenever you can, whether it be for a national executive office or local elections, your vote and voice really do matter and should be heard.

Well, there's my two cents on election day and voting, I really should be heading off to bed so I won't be too zombie-ish when I get up at 3:45 tomorrow morning. lol

All the best,

JP

This is Halloween, Everybody Make a Scene...

Four day weekends really make my life :D. Anyways, I hope everyone had a terrifyingly fun Halloween, probably one of my favorite holidays. On Friday I dressed up as a pirate complete with eye patch to school, being one of the few non-theater kids to dress up, I felt exceptionally nerdy that day :P. Friday turned out to be quite an excellent day for me, I pulled off an A in AP Government and Comparative and got my English grade up form a B- to an A just as the quarter ended (yay extra credit). Our finance class reached a new low for unproductiveness, what was supposed to be a letter of application/resumé review day with the teacher ended up being a scavenger hunt online for discontinued flavours of ice cream in the Ben and Jerry's Online Flavour Graveyard lol. That evening I carved out my first two pumpkins in over 5 years, I think they turned out pretty well, one regular Jack and one of a tomb stone, I'll post pictures later.

Saturday - Happy Halloween! Most of the day was spent anxiously waiting for darkness to roll in so I could set up outside. Most people would be indifferent or even loathe having to hand out candy but I honestly think it's quite fun. The setup this year included a ginat cauldron of candy, glowsticks, seven candle lit decorations and various other things, o, and screaming floor mat and my trusty ipod playing "This is Halloween" from the Nightmare Before Christmas. For what started out as a drizzly night, turnout was impressive. Some costumes included a kid dressed up as a fork, a John Deere Tractor, a drag queen, bacon and a clan of pirates. There was also this pretty cute guy who was about my age who simply wore a cape but I gave him an extra few pieces of candy lol. My general rule was everyone gets at least two pieces, but bonus pieces were given for costume creativity or how elaborate it was.

Sunday - Shopping! Yeah, I love to shop, clothes in particular and I ended up buying two pairs of jeans. While at the mall, Madonna's "Hung Up" started playing and I sang along the whole time, by the end, I felt really gay. Afterwards, we (my parents and I) went car shopping. Since Crew practice is starting very soon, my dad needs to go buy another car so we have have a massive intra-family car shift. My mom will get the SUV while I get my mom's current car, which is a 2006 VW Passat, my dad gets the new car plus the secondary hatchback we use mostly to transport out dog and stuff from the hardware store. We were considering the Lexus LS460 but with things the way they are economically now, we think we will end up getting an ES350 which was our 2nd choice to begin with. We went to look at the new Ford Taurus (big on the outside, small feeling and too chunky on the inside) and new Buick LaCrosse (nice, but the rear seat is too low and the Buick label just screams "Retiree"). I really want my own car, namely a Volvo C30, but I'm perfectly happy with the Passat. The final car in the ring is the new Mercedes E-Class but it's also expensive and Mercedes has been kinda weird lately with their interiors and suspension setups and recent reviews haven't been the most favorable either. Hopefully I will finally be abel to have my own car that I can drive to school, something that I have been waiting for for over 3 years.

Tomorrow will be dedicated to some homework but we're having lunch with one my mom's friends who recently renovated their home and invited us over for lunch. On Tuesday I'll have to get up at 3:45 AM (>.<) because I'm volunteering with the county on election day. Virginia is electing it's new governor and I'll be helping out at one of the polling stations from 5AM-1PM, it's should be a fun, yet tiring experience.

I hope everyone had a great weekend and Halloween and I hope everyone will have a pleasant week.

All the best,

JP

O, P.S. to all my Mexican friends and readers - Happy Dias de los Muertos