School Stuff and Things

So.

SCHOOL IS OUT!

Haha to all the losers still in school.

But also, I need to tell everyone about my AP testing experience. It was not pleasant at all. In fact, on my list of Top Ten Least Pleasant Things To Do, it is right in between Hanging Out With Relatives On Days When The Banks Are Open and Going Grocery Shopping On Black Friday. And those are pretty unpleasant.

First, they take you to this room, and it's this ugly Pepto Bismal color, and it smells like expired Scentsie smell. GROSS.

Then they make you sit at these squeaky old tables. And everyone has to be exactly five feet apart. In case the AP Test Inspectors arrive to do some, uh, Inspecting. I'm sorry, but HOW, exactly? In a room in which the total square feet do not amount to a number divisible by five? I'm not taking an AP math exam for a reason, lady. Who died and made you the contractor?

Then you put stickers on your booklet and fill out bubble sheets and so on. On any test, I hate doing that. Like, why do they need to know what my race is, or what religion I practice? I mean, I can understand being concerned if English wasn't my first language. But my religion? My RACE? Why don't I just come up with a short autobiography and submit it in triplicate for you? Wanna know my favorite TV show? What I ate for breakfast this morning? The clothes my parents were wearing the night I was born?

And why do they need to know what your race is, anyway? Doesn't that present bias? Do they favor different races? What if they look at the grades of races and found out that in the past, this certain race is dumber than the others, so they cut them slack when grading standardized tests???

Food for thought.

So you're sitting there feeling thoroughly discriminated against, and all these conspiracy theories are running through your brain, and there's a whole bit about not being allowed to have electronics, and don't look at your neighbors' tests, and if you are suspected of cheating your test will be taken away, and you are not allowed to stand up, make noise, breath, or look happy at all during the test. You also can't talk about the questions on the test, because there are Spies Watching You, and the AP Test Creators Have Eyes Everywhere. If you talk about the test, they will Come to Take You Away. So, Live in Fear.

Right.

Then you take the test, and then it's over. And you wonder why they all get so uptight about everything when one of the words in their questions was misspelled.

(All right, no, but you get the idea. We're in POST-Cold War America, people.)

(Those test creators sure love to flatter themselves, don't they? I think it boosts their self-esteems, especially since clearly they spent their whole childhood without friends. Who wants to be friends with the guy who tucks his shirt into his jeans and always has exactly two sharpened No. 2 pencils for standardized testing?)

And then Awards Ceremony.

NOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I hate that Time of the Year. I really do. I never got awards for anything at Yukon, because I wasn't involved in sports- *coughcough* - WOO, sorry, I mean *theonlyavailable* extracurriculars. (C'mon, guys, you KNOW it's biased.) So during Yukon assemblies, I was my normal sarcastic self.

At Harding, I didn't want any awards either. Because getting an award means you have to go onstage and smile and try really, really hard not to fall. And you don't want to make eye contact with anyone in the audience, or you'll totally lose it.

For the rest of us, it's completely boring. Like, "Woo-hoo, you have the highest math grade in the Freshman Class. You might wanna count your friends when you get home. Only the ones that everybody can see count."

But I still got an award. In choir. Which was nice. Because after school my parents to me to my favorite Chinese place for dinner, and then we went and saw The Avengers all the way through, right down to the last scene where they all sit there and eat awkwardly.

Which was pretty awesome.

Last, but not least, Graduation. The Big G. The one everyone's waiting for.

*sob*

Okay, so I only went to the robing, and I only went to that because it was a required school assembly and I was stuck at school till 4:30. And I was way in the back so I couldn't see anything, and I was playing with a paper fortune-teller the whole time.

SO WHAT???

The principal got up and made about the worst metaphor possible:

"Parents, eighteen-some-odd years ago, you swaddled these young men and women...."

And that should give you some idea of how the rest of the ceremony went. If there is any one way to completely lose an entire audience of four hundred and fifty high schoolers, plus there parents, that's it. And she executed it perfectly.

After the seniors were swaddled into their robes, there were awards for them too, which I only remember vaguely. Because when I graduate, it'll be a home schooler ceremony.

My PARENTS have to give me the diploma.

There will be tassels and stuff.

I'll have to be swaddled in a robe. On stage.

Worse. They don't let you wear sneakers to a graduation ceremony.

WHY???