There are only 7 more weeks of school until summer and I am so ready. This is what my perfect summer day looks like: I start off the morning reading in bed, then make myself a delectable smoothie bowl. I get ready – shower, pick out an outfit, brush my teeth, and put on some mascara and sunscreen. I work on my French course a little bit and do the NYT mini in the hammock outside. Before it gets too hot I might go on a bike ride in the meadow with Siya or Tomoki or them both. We make avocado toast and fresh lemonade for lunch.
PC: Me
Next, I drive to the beach, listening to Spotify’s Daily Drive (which mixes your favorite tracks with daily news and is my new favorite thing.) I meet up with friends here – let’s say Ula and Melia – and we sunbathe and swim and body-surf and laugh. We probably hit a thrift shop and pick up a burrito on the way back, before staying up all night together.
Imagine rainfall, accompanied by the sound of warm piano slowly picking away at the layer of your sorrows, that’s how I feel when I play Laura by Erroll Garner. It’s a song I’ve been learning lately, and one of the hardest and technically challenging songs I’ve tackled this year- but most rewarding. The arpeggios are INCREDIBLE.
the rain last week made me want to go back to playing more moody jazz. Pieces with really pretty and new york city-type chords. Songs like Almost Blue (Chet Baker), and Scenery (Ryo Fukui).
amore mio aiutami by Piero Piccioni is perhaps one of the most beautiful songs I learned on the piano. I can’t stop playing it. Another one like it is Lujon by Heny Mancini
I found one of my Dad’s old Billy Joel books, and I’ve been playing the music (that I could play) in there too. Billy Joel is the master of complex and heavenly chord progressions. I especially liked Just the way you are, and The Stranger (interlude).
Surprisingly, George Michael and Sade’s songs, although very slow, are a blast to play on the piano. Their melodies are so satisfying to play.
Color: It changes constantly, but currently I’m liking electric blue.
Scent: Jasmine, or coconut if it’s summertime.
Flower: Pink tulips. If it’s a bouquet, wrapped in brown paper.
Season: Autumn, especially in Ojai, where it is still warm but not as sweltering and sweaty as in the summer.
Sport: Gymnastics, as always.
Book: How do I even choose? Maybe The Book Thief. Recently, though, I read The Virgin Suicides, which I thought was brilliant. The author’s poetic writing romanticizes even the most dreary of scenes.
Movie: Not my all-time favorite, but as of this past month, I loved the Mid-90s. The characters, the storyline, and the directing were all so well done. It definitely presented a perspective I don’t typically see.
I picked up a new PS4 2 weeks ago, Throughout the last week and a half I’ve been spending too much time and money on this device. It’s been over two years since I had my last one, so I’ve been catching up on everything that I missed. Fifa has got to be one of my favorite games at the moment, I play it almost every day. Before almost every soccer match, I play a game of Fifa and envision myself doing the same thing I do in the game. I’ve also been playing a game called Overwatch, which I played for most of my childhood. This game was recently revised and now it is Overwatch 2 which has gotten some criticism because people loved the Original version. At first, I was opposed to the new game as I missed the nostalgic feeling that I got from the original Overwatch, however, as I play the game more I begin to appreciate the game more.
Something is special about summer, it’s probably the almost total lack of responsibility but I like to think about the subtler parts like the way everything is always bright like an overexposed photograph. I love the way the sun casts shadows in the summer and how leaves perfectly block the suns beating rays making glowing green arrows that flutter in the wind. I love how the heat overwhelms you and forces you to jump in a pool or the ocean or maybe close the windows turn on the ac and watch a movie. I love eating snacks with friends and doing things too energetic for the stresses of the school year. I loved last summer when we went to the beach in the morning and started the day at the beach, or, after a hot day jumping into the cool seawater as the sun set or when it was pitch dark out yet the sand still held the sun warmth from the previous day. I loved the summer of covid. I’d sneak out for a ‘bike ride’ only to lounge at the river preserve for hours on end. I loved 8th-grade summer, that warm night in woodland hill sleeping on the living room floor with my dad, or the night after seeing my whole life packed into boxes in the foreign garage I now know so well. I’m glad I was here for summers, playing GTA and eating those sour candies, late nights in the RAV with the AC on, or learning to surf on the shitty red board. I’m scared about losing summer—being so caught up in my life that I forget to enjoy it. Still thinking about school, work, and money all while the sun glistens down and the tree makes its perfect shade. Im scared to be like my parents, unaware of how beautiful it is outside. Lost in my own head never letting out that final sigh, that feeling of needing nothing more and wanting nothing less. Im scared I was going to never have summer again. I don’t want to lose something special about summer.
I’ve been thinking about doing more creative story writing, I probably won’t, but, here’s an idea for one:
There’s a person in a village/town of some sort in a cold somewhat barren landscape. Some bushes and plants grow but for the most part, there’s just not much life. But there is a lot of ice, specifically a large glacier. He’s lived in the same house his whole life on the edge of the town. When this man was just a child the glacier was miles above the town but slowly the hundred-foot wall of ice crept up toward the village. Now, while the town does have history there, the fact that this glacier is going to wipe it all out was well known for years beforehand, people could watch it over a year travel a few hundred feet, over a decade travel a mile, and so the town moved everything except for the building out of the glaciers path. Everyone has a new house not far from the original town but kind of live between the two. Until the last few months, the man has been fine to leave with only some memories attached to the shabby old town, but in the months before he notices a plant growing just beyond the confines of his backyard. He becomes attached to the little sprout, and then the plant, and then the small bush, and as it’s growing his attachment to it is growing. He becomes almost obsessive sitting next to it all day watching the wall of ice get closer to destroying this little thing that he loves (I think there’s an element of him being alone I want to explore in the beginning) and then the wall is 10 feet away from this little plant, and then its three and then one. And on his last day with the plant he watches as this wall gets inches away from everything he loves and then it’s getting pushed to the side and finally it’s gone mixed together with everything else that the glacier has picked up.
Idk just what I’ve been thinking about the last few days
Just 20 minutes ago, I tripped over a chair and a white man told me, “you gotta pull your pants up.” This made me livid, I looked back at him with a black man’s rage in my eyes, and I looked him up and down, pounced, and attacked. Flinging myself at the boy I begin by attacking his eyes, I begin to dig my fingernails deep into his retinas and claw them out. Working my finger through the eyes I take my other hand and shove it down his throat and pull from the back of it his Uvula. I then jump off, and with the boy screaming in agony on the ground I walked away and began to write this story. I know that may have been a little harsh, however, this is what will happen to you if you tell me to pull up my pants. PANTS DOWN FOR LIFE!!
Holy moly these are amazing. Right now, I’m eating the pocky Zimo brought with some Tostitos chips and this combo is sending me to heaven. The taste left in my mouth is a perfect mix of salty, sweet crunchy, and chunky. Yum yum yum. Zimo is touching me with these snacks.
It’s been a very long day and im very ready to go home. This weekend I have to ship and pack over 85 orders and I am excited but I know by the end of the weekend I will be tired. I also have an apes test that I need to study for, which I am delighted about. Emanuel is sitting to my right eating Cheetos with pencils that he’s using as chopsticks, what an odd guy. The new Fortnite season came out today and I’m going to go home and play a lot of it. If anyone wants to add me, my gamer tag is trynaholdmawood.
Wow Wow Wow. These snacks are delicious. It’s rare to have such wonderful and thoughtful snacks brought to journalism, I mean a lot of the time people don’t bring anything at all. I am immensely enjoying the combination of the salty Cheetos with the sweet and amazing chocolate Pocky. Pocky is really an amazing snack, they can get a little sweet, but other than that they have the chocolate covering on the biscuit stick kind of thing. It’s very unique to have this combination. I also think I like them because they were very popular in Bali when I was living there so they definitely have a sentimental value. today has been a pretty weird day, I think the rain throws off the mood a bit around here, plus, with the Mammoth trip out and all the kids getting in trouble this whole week’s been kind of off. It all culminated today I think. very strange. Anyway, I think this is about the word minimum and this isn’t my best blog so bye.
As part of surfing for sports, inspired by Logan’s running journal, Logan and I decided to make a surf journal of each session we had over the week. We surfed Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday this week because Logan’s leaving to Mammoth. We had this idea on Tuesday so that’s our first day. To explain the data at the top of each day: The Santa Barbara East Bouy (closest buoy to Ventura) collects information 24/7 about conditions at sea. The first piece of info is wave height, then the period in seconds, then the strongest swell direction, then tide on the beach (not collected from buoy), then wind speed and direction. Onshore means the wind is blowing from out at sea onto the beach, this is generally considered bad and creates “mushy waves” as opposed to off-shore winds which, generally speaking, create barreling waves, but more realistically steeper and better-formed waves. So here are the first two journals for this week.
3 really good waves, learning how to stomp on the back of the middy and turn it. Walk to nose to gain speed. Lul period was challenging and messed up the session a little mentally.
Emanuel: One really good wave plus some other shorter ones. The good session got better in the end as the tide rose and the wind died down. Felt really good turning and working on my Steez
3/8/234.3ft @ 10s, 270 W,20mph cross-shore
Emanuel:Ben, Kenya, Logan and I surfed all on longboards. Good session despite very small waves and high wind. Ben lost the fin to his board so I surfed finless which was more fun than I thought it would be. It required a lot more strength and body control which actually felt like a good way to train in those aspects of surfing. Waves were supposed to get bigger as the session went on but honestly, conditions got worse. Maybe because we were deeper in the bay in a less exposed area to swell.
OVS Journalism Blog 
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