College is like WOW

Since Twitter wasn't working at the time, I decided to blog about some stuff. I feel so internety.

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I got a free book cuz I was the only person at the Creative Industries Club meeting and my name didn't have to be drawn because I was the only one there so I was the only possible candidate to receive the free book! I agree that that sentence could've been worded better, but I'm pretty confident that it was almost a sentence palindrome.

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First time at CSUF... at night! I walked around campus... at night. I went to a meeting there... at night. I talked to people at college... at night. NIGHT NIGHT NIGHT NIGHT NIGHT NIGHT NIGHT - nuh nuh nuh night nuh night, NIIIIGHT! (Anyone get that reference? Hopefully not.)

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So college. Good stuff. It's very much like... WOW. No not that kind of WOW, I'm talking about the Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game... World of Warcraft. College, for me anyway, is indubitably as stated. Lemme esplain.

I've only played the game for maybe 30 minutes at a friends house a long time ago (so there goes my ethos), but I've played other MMORPG's similar to WOW, and college reminds me of them. I start off with not a lot, but I have plans to level up, so I go talk to people and they give me missions. You wanna join the newspaper? Go here. You're here? Go ask this person over here. I often times have multiple missions at once, so I'm never bored. So I run back and forth throughout campus doing these chores that help me explore my new world, and will ultimately benefit me in the end.

The main part of any MMORPG is the walking. So much walking. It's almost never fun, but the walking makes reaching a destination just that much more satisfying. I have to walk all over the campus, and it sucks, but once I reach that air-conditioned classroom and take a seat, it makes the whole trip worth it.

Speaking of walking, horses always kick butt when it comes to traveling, but I can't fit a bike in my car to bring to school.

Servers are kind of like majors. Sure, you're playing the same game, but you see different people and stuff, and it's hard to get together unless you're taking a break from your epic battles with dragons or Minotaurs or whatever the heck you fight.

Arguably the best part about them online games is the leveling up, or translated to the real world, getting better and better. College does just that for me! My favorite part about college THUS FAR is all the opportunities it gives me if I just take time to catch them. I already applied for an art scholarship, and there's another one I found today that I'm going to get more information about. There's also an "animation pitch" contest I'll be submitting my stuff to this Friday, and I look forward to that. With every class I take, test I pass, or opportunity I apply for, I'm just gaining experience points and leveling up!

Finally I gots me some guilds. I really don't know how WOW guilds work, like how they form or whatever, but I'll just assume it goes something like "hey, wanna be in my guild?" and the other guy's like "alright! heheheheh!" "heheheh!" "heheheheheh!" and the nerdy giggling would continue for a few minutes. Well guilds are similar to clubs or just a group of friends. I basically collaborate with a bunch of people I meet and tackle an objective, whether it be a difficult test or a delicious meal. However, they usually don't include all that giggling, but that depends on your guild MMMMM...

Alas, not every aspect of WOW is analogous to my college life. If I meet a girl at school, I don't instantly think she's a hot babe that enjoys a little role playing. Unless she is. Then that would be my instant thought. But see, I don't make these crazy fantastical assumptions because I can actually SEE her. So there can be some discrepancy with my previously stated analogy.

If you're wondering what the moral to this story is, I shall tell you after these colons: College is an experience not like anything else! Except World of Warcraft. It's totally like World of Warcraft.

Also, I often run into a classroom without my classmates and yell "LEEEEROOYY... JEEEEEENNNNKKIIIIIIIIIIINS!!!". Amen to nerdy references.

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Instead of ending the Kanga post with a moral (that would be ridiculous!), I'll stop my WOW talk and I'll end with a nice story.

I was taking the side streets home from school today (AT NIGHT), when I changed my mind and decided to take the freeway. I turned onto this street called Harbor Blvd, and to my amusement, the middle of the street was filled with a bunch of dark trees entangled in hundreds of thousands of Christmas lights (white/yellowish, not colorful). It was beautiful. It was amazing. It was like ten million fireflies (but I'm weird because I hate goodbyes). It wasn't like Pioneer, because Pioneer has a bunch of other streetlights that make the road look yellow. But Harbor Blvd was black everywhere except the tree lights and the neon lights coming from the buildings on the sides. I'm probably over exaggerating a little, but it was an incredible sight.

Now after my seconds awe, my next thought was... I have no one to share this with. There was no one with me to remember that moment, no one who I could turn to and share this experience with. Just me. Only I could appreciate it.

And I felt a little lonely.

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Yeah actually that wasn't too happy of a story at all...

Oh well. Win some lose some!

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Lemme stray away from that sad mood with some buffer...

You are reading my Kanga.

Kevin is cool.

Ladeeda, my son!

Hey man, whatchoo want?

Oh, golly gee.

Holy Batman, Batman!

It's itsy bitsy time!

These aren't really quotes, just random thoughts.

I gotta lotsa to doooooo!

There! Isn't your mind clear now?!

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I'll end with this. Go to sentimental mode now.

I really appreciate it when you guys comment about my posts. Even though I don't reply to everyone when I want to, I don't think I should because there's gonna be that ONE weirdo who's like "weh weh LOLZ kanga knee high kicks and all GG NOOB!", and if I don't have a response for him, he'd be like "weh weh LOLZ kanga knee high kicks and all GG NOOB! Hey you suck.".

But in any case, I love it when you guys comment, it makes me happy. Keep it up.

Speaking of love, I just HAVE to say "love phrases" like Max in Trust the Hoe (a great movie BTW). "I... I love petunias..."

Like that.

"I... I love finishing Kanga posts..."

Addicting words.

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P.S. I really don't mind if you DON'T comment on this post. For irony's sake.

Senior Year Miss List

It's never too late to talk about Whitney, right? Well I guess maybeso if I try to remember everything I want to... but not too late for the eager reader! I'll be fine if you just read parts you're familiar with. So here... we... go!

I'm gonna miss trying to park awesomely in the Whitney parking lot.

2
I'm gonna miss 2nd period art with Ms. Agrums, barely making it to class on time, saying "Hi" quietly to Steffi (the only other "advance" artist), trying to paint when most of the lights were turned off for 2nd year slides, having my own shelf thing that slowly got more and more cluttered, watching the other 2nd year-ers do what I did last year and totally owning me in the face, going into the classroom at lunch and after school to finish my procrastinated pieces, and listening to Mrs. Agrums's zany lectures and stories. They weren't zany because of the content - they were zany because of her.

3
I'm gonna miss homeroom which gave me time to watch awesome Comiclub/IFF whittles and shirtless Pauls, and it also gave me time to study for some Jeans tests.

I'm gonna miss 3rd period Civics and Econ with Jeans. I USED to like Jeans, but then he got annoying. I'm gonna miss doing all those projects we did (they weren't torturous so much as time to work in a group with friends! but yeah sometimes they sucked), and I'm gonna miss doing really well in, like, two projects, acing econ tests because they matched Perry's review packets, sitting in the mecca of fun of CraigAnumCindyJaneJaydee and still being able to talk to my other friends outside the lil circle, being on the winning side of a debate, hating on the Jeans as a class, and... board freaking. Definitely gonna miss board freaking.

Break
I'm gonna miss snack, walking there and trying not to crack up FOR NO REASON AT ALL, then seeing Marina's face and laughing anyway. I'll miss having a todo list that would send me on little missions to do something (hey much like a MMORPG...), and I'll miss having absolutely nothing to do. I'll miss seeing everyone come back with a forever steaming and forever shrinking breakfast burrito that's only delicious to the most hungry. I'm gonna miss Michelle telling me we'll be late for Delgado, and then me telling Darren we're gonna be late for Delgado.

4
I'm gonna miss 4th period CalcH with Delgado, usually arriving on time with just a few seconds to spare. Yeah at times it was boring, but I'll miss switching back between intense note taking and intense drawing -cough-. I'll miss all the "group work" assignments that usually had 10 problems (30 minutes to solve each one mind you), I'm gonna miss when Delgado made her eyes bigger than her head, borrowing books from every-so-kind people, feeling really good about a MATH test I just took, looking out for lights off in Palmieri's room to know if we're watching a movie, mustard colored sweaters, and wondering what the heck Delgado's HUSBAND is like.

5
I'll miss 5th period English class with Palmieri, watching all those movies, doing pretty decent on those quote analyzation quizzes, getting time to "work on college essays", failing the comps but some how still get a passing grade, having no due dates, watching the class panic after finding out about a quiz (then realizing I'm just as screwed), and listening to a very talk woman speak in a coincidentally high voice.

I'm gonna miss 5th period (2nd semester) English with Mr. Dalley, all them craaazy lectures. I'll miss Dalley's ridiculous expressions, Paul Marshall impersonations, cynical criticisms of our lives, and recomposed perspectives of the world we once knew. His shocked face should totally have a staring contest with Delgado's big eyes. I'm gonna miss working on twenty group projects at the same time, the 10 point quizzes that were difficult and easy at the same time, listening to Paul and Jaydee taking insulting swipes at each other, hangin out with those two along with Jenny/Darren/Julie in the back of the room, doing presentations that include dancing and fat jokes, and having an English class that's fun yet interesting.

Break
I'll miss lunch time, eating under those tent things on the rocky tables, playing iPod in those big speakers a few times, getting front row seats to a bunch of shows near the quad, having absolutely nothing to do and having too much stuff to accomplish by the end of lunch, appreciating Wednesday and Friday for the hour long lunches. I'll miss all them Comiclub meetings where I talked a lot, and them VietClub meetings where I ate a lot. I'm gonna miss those pep rallies, seeing everyone in the school excited about some frivolous stuff, then singing the alma mater with anyone next to me.

6
I'm gonna miss 6th period contemporary media with Mr. Z, conceptualizing ideas, gathering actors props and equipment, and turning all our hard work into a kickass film. I'll miss getting to know all those juniors JonathanJoshStephanieSarah (along with CraigDiana of course), I'll miss the tense moments when Mr. Z was pissed, watching movies to study the directing, brainstorming and getting silly ideas like robin hood in tights (or something??), spending the whole period to just write scripts, being so frustrated when it was crunch time and stuff wasn't working out, avoiding mirrors while filming, getting bizarre shots that turned out great, creepy zooming in of little kids talking, nonsense conversations to test different types of mics, film festivals to show off our accomplishments, and everyone being satisfied with a final product.

7
I'm gonna miss Track and Cross Country, I love the teams so much. I'll miss going to practice reluctant to see coach, running so hard until someone barfs (then running some more), having little conversations with random teammates about anything, guessing whether or not Borah will beat Kimberly, running my butt off in a 400m dash, then trying to beat it, seeing everyone's face when I took roll, dilly dallying before practice just to see how everyone else is dilly dallying, practicing with blocks, drinking Javier's magic elixir that tasted like cereal, Cliff bars and "Gatorade", the holy tree of stretching, the holy bleachers of roll, comforting an injured teammate, getting tired from just plyos, pacing wall to walls on my watch, saving a bottle for Paul to recycle, being bothered that Paul took my bottle when I wasn't done, Kai-bai-bo's and dares, ninja and other ninja, pantsless James and shoes flying in the air, and Ellie poop stories. I'll definitely miss pasta parties (!!!) with "Angelic climbs", "Jaydee Ga Ga"s, truthordare with shirtless Lihans/Henrys. (I kinda threw XC and track together.)

I'll miss the actual meets too! I realized that I just talked mainly about practices.

XC - I'll miss arriving at a course. It has just such an epic feel to it, I look all around and think "alright, this is the place I'm gonna run on the place I'm gonna conquer." I'm gonna miss the immense amount of tension and anticipation that always built up, as if we were going to fight war and knew we would come back dead. Everyone ran the same 3 miles too, and I'll miss the irreplaceable bond that could only be felt through pain, determination, and love.

Track - I'll miss the family love, similar to XC's but a bit quirkier. I'll miss visiting the throwers who always seemed so chilled, and then running back to warm up for the -insert event name-, latching on my spikes, and handing off the baton with "STICKS" and a couple laps. I'm gonna miss all those people who helped me put my spikes on. I'll miss running in a relay race, finishng my leg dead tired, and almost tearing up to yell and make my teammates run even faster.

Both XC and Track - I'm gonna miss the downtime between races where I got to hang out with everyone else and ask the dead tired people how their race was. I'll miss screaming my head off as I cheer for the runner to push them just that much more. I want to make them run faster, and I feel as though my voice would give them that boost of strength and energy to out kick anyone close. I'll miss when my teammates did the same for me.

Man I could write a much longer post about just these two sports, but I don't have time so I did my best to keep it short. All in all, I'm gonna miss running for my team.

FINALLY...

I'm gonna miss my class of 2009. Every single person. Even if I thought you were kinda weird, I'm gonna miss you. I'll still miss seeing everyone's face that gave me a sense of familiarity with my life. Thank you.


So there you go, guys! My Whitney mental closure. Tomorrow I start college at CSUF- along with my new Miss List for next year.

Something's bad.

That was a short lived good feeling!

Well actually I'm not feeling too bad. I just got lectured by my parents for pretty much not being on top of things (that's what they implied! [that was a reference to the last post, not me being pissed]), even though I totally finished my personal statements last month, which I felt pretty awesome about! I also planned a bunch of Comiclub stuff, finished my UC apps (other than touching up my essays), and ALMOST got a 4.0 (ABAAA!! [oh whoa I'm only taking 5 classes?!]). And then my parents go on to lecture me about how I often times don't manage my time well because my civics group decided to work on our project at 10:00pm tomorrow. Yeah, that's really late to be working on homework (EHM, GROUP...), but I'm fine with it. Oh Kevin rolls with the punches.

And what my parents do when we argue is that every time I get some kind of reasoning in for my side, they point out another mistake that I made starting with "well the point is..." or "Kevin, you're not getting it..." or something else that changes the subject. I'm not saying that they're being dumb for doing it, it's really wise on their part, but... I'd rather have them not. In the end, our arguments usually start with me thinking "YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND", then at the end it's like "we don't understand... we don't understand..". I have to remember that.

But honestly, don't pay too much attention to me. This was totally a one sided account.

Something's good.

I don't know why, but today I was driving home from school and thought... "Huh. My life is pretty great right now."

It could be because I didn't have any homework and I was going home to learn some Actionscript like a bonafide nerd, but still, that isn't reason enough to contemplate the awesomeness of my life! (BTW, sorry if I'm coming off jerky if I talk about how happy I am? People sometimes get pissed when other people are enjoying themselves, so if you're one of those people... I'm sorry... and stop it.)

I'm thinking part of my happiness is the result of me being a lot more on top of things this year (that's what I said!). I've been trying really hard to DO stuff when I'm SUPPOSED to do stuff. Ysee, this used to be one of my philosophies:

"As long as I'm doing as good as the guy next to me, I should be okay."

Sadly, this does not apply to most things. Cross Country races? Homework? Growth? Hot dog eating contests? No. What if the guy next to me failed at EVERYTHING? I'd be a slow, dumb, and short kid who can only down half a weiner a minute. That would suck. Especially since I want to be an artist when I'm older! My new philosophy is now:

"As long as I'm one step ahead of the guy next to me, it lowers my chances of getting totally owned in the shins."

Getting owned in the shins is the worst.

So this school year I've been trying to follow that, and for the most part, it's been working. I don't know if this was the real cause of my satisfaction but... whatever! Might's well post about it before the feeling goes away!


Sidenote: WHOA how often do I write a post dedicated to my emotions? About as often as the consumption of cheap food at an amusement park, I'd say!! I read other people's blogs and most of them have so much stuff about how they feel, and I guess it's good to vent. But for me, my Kanga is more of a place for... random entertainment tantamount to a scoop of delicious ink blots in the form of a strawberry filled funnel cake...

Go ahead and quote me on that.

Lice-means TO PANIC!

Today I thought I had lice.

Is that really so farfetched? An army of insects inhabiting the head of 17 year old boy from out of nowhere? I was so scared that my scalp had become some home to hundreds little creatures without my consent! Okay, let me back up some hours ago.

To the morning.

This morning I woke up at 1:30 AM and I was REALLY itchy! So itchy, in fact, that I could not fall back asleep. I tried my best to knock myself out, but I just kept on scratching away. I was so frustrated that I went to the living room to watch some TV hoping a glowing box will lull my mind to slumber. Fun fact, nothing is on in the middle of the night.

After about 10 minutes of Attack of the Show, my cravings finally ceased and I fell back asleep on the couch.

3:00 AM comes around and BAM! Another itch attack! If I had to use a cliche at that time, I'd probably go with "This is getting REALLY old, REALLY quickly!". That's a cliche, right? Well anyway, I tried TV again but I was too tired to force my attention spans awake, so I stumbled into the kitchen and took some aspirin. That seemed to do the trick (yay cliche) and I was able to sleep until 10:30 AM!

But I was far from content. The hours passed throughout the day and I grew incredibly annoyed. I'm not sure what I was annoyed at, but I was just pissed. Like, I was pissed at _____. That's the worse kinda piss because it has no object! It's just a stand alone piss!! (Hah, that would also sound funny out of context.) I think a big cause of this was because I had a Nguyen-sized migraine due to my weird sleeping.

After lunch, I had a crazy idea: what if I had lice? I mean, last night (or this morning I guess), I was so itchy, sleep was impossible! I went on the good ol' internet to see the symptoms of lice. "Itching on the scalp, the back of the neck, and behind the ears is common". THAT'S EXACTLY WHERE I WAS SCRATCHING! I was so freaked out. Now, not only was I annoyed at nothing, but I was also incredibly depressed! HOW COULD I GET LICE?! What do I do now?! Will I be able to see my friends?! Have I infected my family?! WILL MY BRAIN DETERIORATE?!

Okay that last one I never really thought about.

I kept going into the bathroom, trying to zoom in closely to my hair in an attempt to find any white beads crawling through the jungle of wires that is my head. I even took a picture of my scalp with my camera (using macro, of course), but there weren't really any positive results. Well, "positive results", as in "LICE LIVE results". Still, I was worried.

I thought through my situation many times over. Itching means lice... Or it could just be bug bites... but I was itchy on my neck, that's where lice live... although I didn't wear any hats or come into contact with heads recently... it could take weeks for lice to hatch out of their eggs... but I still hadn't head-mingled in a few months... whatever, I have lice... I can't have lice!

After my night shower, I had my mom check my hair for lice. Yes, she gave me a funny look, but she checked anyway. Conclusion? I don't have lice. I made her peer through my hair for maybe 15 seconds and the results were negative (geez, sounds like a pregnancy test). My dad confirmed it was probably just bug bites.

But I'm clean!


This whole dilemma really got me thinking though... if I had lice, how would I have posted such a story on my Kanga? Do I just start a post that says "Hey guys, guess what; I HAVE LICE!", because quite frankly, I would not want to share that with the entire world (assuming the entire world reads this stuff). Yet, I would still WANT to say something about it because it would play such a big part in my life, believe it or not.

And that's another thing, what if something really bad, something REALLY HORRIBLE happened to me? Do I talk about it here?? Do I tell you guys all about how I'm as depressed as a parachuting zebra falling into a crocodile pit??? I always thought my Kanga was different because it seemed to shun out any stupid worries or frivilous problems that many other blog-like sites possess. No matter the ordeal, I would try to incorporate some kind of positive spin. I dont' want people getting sad when they read my thoughts. But what if I'm the one in trouble and there's no way of avoiding it when I type these posts? Would that mess up the idea of my Kanga being a vacation from the ridiculous?? What would I do in such a situation???