Last Saturday was a Region Dance. Kimber just turned 14, and so this was her first dance. I got her a nice necklace for her birthday and gave it to her at the dance, and she really liked it. (She also liked how it tinkled when she jumped and moved. She's so funny.) Maya was also there with Jeremiah, and Rachel O. was there with Allie because they had spent the day together reviewing APHG stuff. (If you're uninformed, APHG = Advanced Placement Human Geography. Or AP Human Geography. Or APHG. Whatever floats your boat.)

Monday was my mom's birthday. I got her a canvas thing that said "When I count my blessings, I count you Twice." After school we went to see "How to Train your Dragon." I really liked it. It was cool. I'm thinking I can do some research on how much of the movie was based on research, and how much was just popular and fabricated ideas. But there's actually not much known about the vikings and stuff, as most of their mythological records were destroyed, so who knows.

Tuesday we had a field trip to the Zoo. It was pretty fun. For an assignment, we were observing the Gorilla, and this zookeeper comes out and says "I'm about to feed the animals. Anyone want to help me?" Naturally, our group jumps on that. She gave Cory a big burlap sack and says "Just chuck that in there over by the gorilla, sorta up the hill." So he does, the gorilla hears it plunk and grabs it. Then he drags it up to the top of the hill and dumps out a ton of vegetables, like lettuce and broccoli heads. She gave the same thing to Riley to throw to the Orangutan. She also gave them a bottle full of frozen water with carrots suspended in there. (I think they were carrots... They were orange, at least.) She told us that the gorilla would wait until it melted, drink the water and eat the carrots. The orangutan, on the other hand, would rip the bottle open and then break the ice, picking out the carrots and sucking on ice chunks. So I had fun going to the Zoo with all of my friends. :D

Tuesday night was the Honor Choir Concert. On the way over there, I get a call from Jason (Who had left in the middle of the school day) And he frantically says "Jarom! I totally forgot about the Concert! Can you give me a ride??"

How do you forget about a concert you're in?

So we went and got him, and of course ended up in traffic on the way there, arriving 15 minutes late. (West Jordan Construction Traffic... Geez.) But everything went really well.

Wednesday night we had mutual, but I had planned to leave early to get some stuff done. After all, we were just playing basketball. But I convinced myself to stay for one game, and promptly slammed into Carl as he was turning around and landed badly on my elbow, hip, and knee. So I limped home, and I still have a little bit of a limp (Not too much) and it hurts to put my elbow on the counter.

Good Going, Jarom.
Hey, you be quiet. I thought I'd get some exercise, you know. It wasn't like I was playing basketball when I should have been doing homework becasue I wanted to, I decided I should stay with my quorum for some exercise because I've been skipping out on them lately because of how much homework I have.

So yeah. That's my happenings of late.

Just because my camera broke is no reason to stop posting. (By the way, my watch broke too... :(   )

Since I suck epicly at this, let's start at last Thursday.

Last Thursday was the BYU Language Fair. Every year, they do a fair where they have activities for foreign language students. I know they do Spanish, German, and French. The Spanish kids, being the coolest, get the Wilkeson center and the buildings around the courtyard. They had a bunch of different events we competed in, such as Show and Tell, Skits, Language Bowl, Humorous Stories, all in Spanish. My events were Poetry and Impromptu Conversation. For poetry I had to memorize this poem and recite it:

Lázaro, por Jose Asunción Silva

"¡Ven, Lázaro!" -gritóle
el Salvador, y del sepulcro negro
el cadáver alzóse entre el sudario,
ensayó caminar, a pasos trémulos,
olió, palpó, miró, sintió, dio un grito
y lloró de contento.


Cuatro lunas más tarde, entre las sombras
del crepúsculo oscuro, en el silencio
del lugar y la hora, entre las tumbas
de antiguo cementerio,
Lázaro estaba, sollozando a solas
y envidiando a los muertos.

It's a strange poem... Here's what it means with Jose's lining, which I don't like all too much, but oh well.

"Come, Lazarus!" cried out
the Savior! And from the black seplechre,
the corpse rose among the shroud.,
he tried to walk, trembling steps
he smelt, he felt, he saw, he felt, he gave a yell
and cried with joy!

Four moons later, among the shadows
of the dark twilight, in the silence
of the place and the time, among the tombs
of the ancient cemetary,
Lazarus was weeping alone,
and envying the dead.

Yep. I got an "Excellent". Upstairs was Españolandia. For those of you who are uninformed, that roughly translates to "Spanish Land". There were a bunch of booths where you got stamps. We've been preparing for a month so we would know what to say no matter what they asked us. It was really fun.

So our Language Bowl team, which consisted of Hannah, Lindsey, Riley, Isaac... and someone else... daggett... anyways, they got first place. WOO! Then at the very end of the fair they counted up all of the Superior ratings that each school got and gave out trophies. And guess what? WE GOT THE GRAND PRIZE! That's right, Midvale Middle School won the whole Language Fair. To sorta let you know how much that means, we had High Schools and Middle Schools from all over Utah, plus a few from Idaho, and one from Oregon. YAY FOR MIDVALE!

Yesterday I went to Gene Fullmer's swimming pool with Quin. No one came to his house before, so he was afraid no one was going to come. He was afraid he'd have to be with me for 3 hours. But then right as we got there, so did Maya and her little sister Lexi. I got to make friends with Lexi, and she's going to Midvale next year. After a while Rily showed up and so did Quin's friend Kat. We had a lot of fun. Afterwards, we went to Quin's house, where we found Aerin waiting. I was glad to see her again, especially because she was gone the last three days of school and I never got to say goodbye to her in person! But I'm going to see her again soon, especially because of the news she gave me: She's getting Baptised! Yet another thing to be excited about. Quin was really annoyed because he's not going to be home for it. But I'll be back from California, so I can't wait. All in all, I had a lot of fun. Next time, maybe I'll host!