Ok, I know that I'm late for a post on this....

But it's summer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am so happy. This summer feels like it is going by sooooo fast. I kinda wish it would go a li-t-tle slower, if you know what I mean. Sometimes I just laze around all day, and then, before I know it, the day is gone, and I'll never get it back. Doesn't that make you want to do a bunch of awesome stuff that you've never done before? Like, see the Pacific Ocean, go skiing, travel to the other side of the world, and all that stuff. I wish I could, but I have to do school, take care of my dogs, and things like that.

Well, back to summer. I think that this is one of the best summers that I have had in a long time. I have achieved many things, like take short showers (that was really hard), do my school in half an hour instead of two, start liking the zoo again (I never liked the zoo because I thought it was boring. The animals never really did stuff, and we went to the same zoo over and over again. But now, I take pictures of the animals there, and I love it!), I found Arwen's tug-of-war rope, and I am now addicted to Chris Daughtry music. Talk about achievements!

I am not looking forward to the start of the school year, though. Although I have been doing school all summer, we are going to start hard core school again, not just the bare minimum. Ugh! Also, my friends are all starting a bunch of extra-curricular activities, so they are not going to be available after my half hour of school each day. Lacrosse, Band, and Soccer are included in these.

Well, even though summer is drawing to a close as I write, I can't be too unhappy about the next school year. Holidays and birthdays are coming, along with happiness and sadness, which I'll just have to meet sooner or later.

I love life!

Busch Wildlife!!!!!

I went to a wild animal rescue center called Busch Wildlife, yesterday (Wednesday). I brought the digital camera, expecting to get a couple fairly good shots. But I did not expect anything like this! The first exhibit we went to was the aviary. Inside was a couple songbirds and a blue jay. This jay used to be a pet, as we learned later. When I tried to take a picture of him, he reached through the fence, trying to eat the camera (just like somebody else I know...)!


The next exhibit that we went to, was the Florida Cougar exhibit. At first, the cougars were sleeping under a boardwalk thingy, but soon this one came right up to the fence and posed! So cute!

This fox picture was actually one of the last ones I took at Busch Wildlife, just before the camera died. :( It was hard to take, as the foxes were at the back of their little "house."

The Cockatoo's name is CeCe. All the parrots sit out front of the animal hospital, across from the box turtles. There was another parrot named Budweiser. I got pictures of him, but they were not as good as the ones that I took of CeCe.

The last picture on here is of a blue heron. He was with all the waterbirds. All the other birds were walking around pecking and chirping, while he just sat up in the tree surveying the land.

I thouroughly enjoyed my trip to Busch Wildlife, and hope to come back to take even more pictures!

Update on My Life

As of many times before, I do not have anything to write about. I want to write about something, but I can't figure out what. Sheesh.

Because of this, I will just give you an update on my extremely exciting, action packed, life.

Here it is-

I have decided that I don't like summer anymore. This is because all my friends are gone on vacation! What in the world am I to do?

I am once again addicted to the game Virtual Horse Ranch, or VHR for short. The web address is http://www.virtualhorseranch.com/. It is so much fun! If you get an account, which is most unlikely, my nickname on there is jose521. This is so you can look me up and message me.

I have finally bought a Nintendo DS! I have been wanting that for about a year and a half, as aforesaid in one of my other posts. I play it every night for an hour. Wahoo!

Rick the tortoise has moved away from his hole. I think it's because me and my friends came and bothered him so much. I am not exactly heartbroken, as there are four other tortoises that I can visit, although they are not partial to music and iPods. Whatever.

I have found out that I love to make, of all things, posters! I get a big sheet of newsprint paper, and place pictures on it. Then I write something that goes with the theme, and there you go! I made a poster today that had some really good pictures of horses on it, and it said, "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away." I get sayings like this from catalogs.

I have to go post a picture of Rick on this blog, and I can't think of anything else to write, so ye-ah (how does one say goodbye in a post?). Ummmmmmmmmmm...........

Goodbye!

Nintendogs!!!!!!!

I have wanted this game for about a year and a half. I have also wanted to buy the game console that goes with it, as I cannot play without it. I have been saving and saving for a looooooong time.

Now, I just need $15 more and I can buy it! I am so excited, but I just can't wait the 3 weeks needed to raise the money. If you have any ideas, please comment, and tell me!

I Was Not the One Who Traveled...

But my brother and dad were. They just got back from a trip to Thailand, quite an adventure if you ask me. I wish I could have gone, but I don't think I could have stood the 37 hour plane trip.

While they were there, my dad called in to the radio station that he works at, to try to get sponsors for these poverty- stricken kids at Compassion International's projects. All of the 300 kids got sponsors in one week! That means, now they can go to school, learn about Jesus, teach their families about Jesus, and have enough food to eat every day! All of this for the kids who had been raised to worship and pray to, their dead ancestors.

While they were there, Justice and Dad went to this elephant camp thing. All of the elephants there were specially trained to do something weird. Some even painted better than I can! To see a video of this, go to my dad's blog at http://www.branthansen.typepad.com/. It's crazy! At the elephant camp, my dad says the employees were geniuses for making money.

Along the trail for the elephants and their riders, were little food stands to buy treats for the elephants. If you didn't want to buy the food along the trail, the elephant was trained to reach up, over his head with his trunk looking for food, to make you feel bad and buy food at the next stand.

The pictures the elephants painted were money makers too. So was the elephants' poo even! They use it to make picture frames for the picture of you on your elephant. Those people are geniuses, I tell ya, geniuses.

Dune Dog, the Best Restaurant Ever!!!!

On Monday, Memorial Day, I went snorkeling with friends again. The water was really murky and we couldn't see more than two feet in front of us, but I had a great time anyway. Since we were all hungry after swimming, we went to an outdoor, casual, swimwear on, shoes off restaurant called Dune Dog. It is right by the beach and perfect after a day of crashing and splashing around.

I bet everyone who reads this blog can tell where I am in the picture, but I will tell who is who.

On the far left corner, almost out of the picture, is my brother, Justice. Next to him, quite distracted at the time this picture was taken, is Joel. In front of him, grinning broadly, is Alecea Poole. In the back right almost completely overlapped by Joel's brother, the black haired Matthew, is Kyle Poole, whose sister is Alecea. Next to him is Tiffany Laster, my partner in crime. I am sitting right next to her in my blue swimsuit, unknowingly doing the exact same thing she is. Then, last but not least, is Brittany Adams. She was rather rudely cut out of the picture somehow, but at least we know that the right side of her face is smiling happily.

Yeehaw!!!

My Other Birdie Pictures!!!!!

Me and my friend Hannah were out on our scooters yesterday, and we went by the middle school. We saw a fat pidgeon by the fence, so we walked up to take a couple of pictures of it.

Here they are:

My Birdie Pictures!!!!!!

When I grow up, since I will, hopefully, have a lot of money, I would really like to buy one of those big, black cameras, the kind that you can adjust shutter speed and all that. That is my "lifelong dream," other than getting and riding a horse, marrying, and raising kids, and doing my best to follow Jesus.

I love to take pictures, so I have started following and learning about a family of Mockingbirds in my neighborood. They are fighting constantly, I wish I knew why, but it is really fun to watch them.

I have also discovered a newly vacant nest (below), and a couple of baby birds, one of which is pictured above. They are so cuuuute!!!

Switchfoot Concert!!!!!!! Eeeeee!!!!!!!!

This picture doesn't make much sense, but it is cool anyway.

So, I went to a concert on Saturday night. A band called Switchfoot was the main event. Switchfoot is a christian band, but they try to get on "non-christian" radio stations.

Their concert was a smash hit. I invited my friend, (whose nickname is Padfoot) and we totally rocked out, if you would call jumping up and down and screaming at random intervals "rocking out." We had fun.

At the concert, Switchfoot had some really cool lighting going on. When the strobe lights were especially crazy, I looked up at the ceiling of the amphitheatre, and saw really cool shadows and things.

The keyboard person for Switchfoot, Gerome, actually smiled and waved at me! I know it was at me, because I was the only person in my section with a glow-stick, and I was screaming and jumping like crazy. I was thrilled, and still am.

I went to the "meet and greet" thing, too! I got every one's autographs on a cool poster. I gave it away to a friend, Kyle. When I gave it to him, he was so happy though, that I didn't really care that I had given my signed Switchfoot poster away.

When I was at the "meet and greet," there was a small pile of Switchfoot posters on a table out in the middle of the tent. I was the first person to get one, then my brother, Justice, went and got one. Padfoot, a.k.a. Tiffany managed to grab one before Justice's friend, Peter, tried to get one. But just then, since this all happened pretty quickly, a mob of people just swarmed in on the table, and engulfed it. Peter later told me that he got a poster, but somebody jerked it out of his hands, so he lost it. Sheesh!

Although I gave away my Switchfoot poster, and Peter didn't even get one, the concert was a huge success that I will remember for a long, long time.

SimCity and FRUSTRATION!!!!!

My dad recently installed a computer game called SimCity 4. It is really fun, but he said before he installed it, that when he installs it, we won't be able to use any cheats. Darn!

Now that I play the game, I really wish he hadn't said that. It is so hard to keep one's budget balanced, while trying to expand a city, and make money at the same time!

I have made a city that I call Superawesomecoolville, just to spend a bunch of money on. It is really fun to do that, because one can take out a bunch of loans, and just keep taking them out. Unfortunately, though, the game won't let me take out more than 10 active loans. But, when I am done, or have lost all my money splurging, I destroy my city with a bunch of disasters, then obliterate it. So much fun!

A couple days ago, my dad asked me if I had messed with the settings. On the game, I had only made a new region, so I had no idea what he was talking about. He said that when he made a city on my new region, his citizens, for some reason, didn't need water, or police stations! Hmmmmm.....

My Amazing Fort Country

I've always wanted to make something really big and complex with friends. I have FINALLY got that chance!!!!

My friends and I have made a sort of "country" thing in my neighborhood. We have so many different forts, that we decided to organize them together, and trade between them. It is so fun!

I think I am in four of the forts. The only tough thing about that is that sometimes I trade something from one of my forts to another fort I have. And if I find something when I am alone, I don't know which fort to give it to.

When I get together with friends, we collect stuff to trade, work on our forts, make flags, and hide from innocent bystanders. For some reason we don't want ANYBODY to see us in our forts. I guess that's because nobody wants to be thought of as weird.

We haven't totally finished with the organization yet, but I think it's going to work out great! Unless I move to a different neighborhood.

Violin Lessons!

My mom has an old violin so she volunteered to get it fixed and teach me violin!!!!! Eeeeeeee!!!!! I am happy about this arrangement.

So, I have now had my second violin lesson from my mom. I can already play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in a fancy way! Wahoo. I can also play, very badly, excerpts from Be Thou My Vision, which I like a lot.

I guess all that I can say is that I am really excited about playing a violin, and am a fast learner.

Recipie #2 (Still More to Come)

Egg-in-the-Hole Breakfast


You need:

1 large brown egg
salt and pepper
1 slice of good toasting bread
butter or tea oil (butter tastes better)
a skillet
and a glass with a mouth that would fit on top of the bread

You need to:

Start melting the butter on the skillet. Cut a hole out of the bread by using the glass like a cookie cutter. Put both circle of bread and holey bread onto the skillet. Crack your egg into the hole of the larger piece of bread. It will probably seep through, but that doesn't matter. That just spreads around the eggy goodness. Season the egg-in-the-hole along with the bread round, with salt and pepper. Fry until bottom of egg is white, then flip. Season both breads again. Lift up the egg-in-the-hole and put more butter to melting underneath it. This prevents it from sticking to the pan really bad. I have had to do this maybe up to 3 times before my tasty treat was done. When you think your egg-in-the-hole is done, slash the yolk to find out. If the yolk runs, it is not ready.

Bon Appetite!!!

Makes: 1 egg-in-the-hole
Serving: 1 egg-in-the-hole

An Update on My Vacation

Ok, so here is what's going on. In my last post, I told y'all that I am in Tennesee on vacation with my family. So, here is an update.

Today, I went out to eat with my cousins. We had a great time. We did that yesterday for lunch and dinner too. I am getting sick of eating out.

My cousins have left. I am pretty bummed about that. Right before they left, the boys were playing some army game on an Xbox 360. I hate it when I am trying to be peaceful, and I hear continuous shooting. Very annoying, very annoying.

I really slept in today. I woke up at around 9:00 am, which would be about 10:00 at home. Some people might think, "Oh, that isn't 'sleeping in', that's nothin'." For me though, that is a huge amount of sleep. I even missed the hotel breakfast, too! I usually wake up at six.

I woke up with a headache this morning. I hope I'm not coming down with something. It is really dry in Tennesee, so my nose is really stuffy and my lips are chapped. Not complaining, or anything. :)

Our flight is leaving tommorow morning (Wednesday). I never like airplane security. Of course I don't want to be blown up by some random bomb, but I still don't have to like it!

My Most Recent Vacation

I am on vacation right now in Tennesse. It is really cool. I am on my dad's laptop in our hotel. Our hotel is really nice with a exersize room, free ice, and things like that. Oh! And they serve breakfast here! Hey hey hey!

My family has a really nice suite paid for by my dad's company. I have my own little bedroom-thingy! I sleep on a couch, though. Whatever.

The reason why we are on vacation, is that Dad's company wants us to check out Tennesee. So we came, and are having a good time.

My cousins are coming down to meet us here, at our hotel. I am a-thinkin' that they should be here by now. They live in Illinois so my dad decided to invite them to come and check into this hotel. I think they are going to have a room accross from ours which should be really fun.

I have started practicing my rubber-band-shooting. The hallway is a really nice place to do this in. I've never really tried to focus on shooting a rubber band. It is pretty fun, believe it or not!

We are going to stay in Tennesee until sometime Wednesday. Boo. I wish we could stay longer, but our days aren't very full already. Also, my family has two dogs who are back at home. They get lonely easily.

I hope I can post updates on my vacation by posting on this blog. C U L8R! Heeheeheeheehee! :)

Recipie #1 (More to Come!!!)

Tuna Pitas Lunch/Dinner

You need:
1 loaf Pita Bread
Lemon Juice
Mayonaise
1 can Tuna
Salt
Pepper

You need to:

Tuna
Open the can of tuna and drain before dumping into a small bowl. Add one squirt of Lemon Juice, along with two full teaspoons of Mayonaise. Put in salt and pepper to your tast. Stir.

Pita
Rip the loaf of Pita Bread in half. Toast the halves. Open the ripped loaves after they have cooled. Drop in half of the tuna in one piece of the Pita Bread. Do the same with the other.

Bon appetite!! :)

Makes: 2 Tuna Pitas Tip! Serve with milk. :)
Serving: 1 Tuna Pita

A P-r-e-t-t-y Cool Sport

See this? This is called horse surfing. I think it is really neat. It looks scary to me, but I might like to try it someday on my future horsey.

The part I would like to do more is the riding. That looks incredibly fun! Also, I would like to fix a major problem for me. I would want to ride alone, so just take out the surfer. Then it would be perfect horse surfing! :)

Dance Dance Revolution

Have you ever heard of Dance Dance Revolution?

It is a video game that you use a mat instead of a controller with. To play, one must watch the tv screen which would have arrows showing you what arrows on the mat to step on. All the while music is playing and the steps are to the beat. It takes practice to get the moves right, but it is really fun once you get groovin'!

I love watching people who don't have much practice trying to do it. It is so funny to watch!!!!!

My brother was kind enough to get me the game and the mat for Christmas. I have had it for a little more than a year, now. I love it, and since I have aced almost all the songs on the disk, I think I might get a different disk with different songs that I can master on it. Wahoo!!!!!!!

Just wondering, are good "Revolutioners" really as rare as I think? Please comment and tell me if you are very good at DDR and if you know anybody who is.

Wheeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!! (I just had to be random for once! )

:)

Happy New Year!!!!!!

Sorry I can't put up a picture for this. My computer, for some stupid reason, won't let me.

But, y'all CAN be happy about something. It is the New Year!!!!!!!!! I don't usually like the New Year, but lots of other people do, especially the people in New York City about this time. I have a lot of fun at the party my family goes to every year, but there are other things that go with New Year's that aren't so great.

I don't like it as much as other people do because, for some reason, I get attached and used to saying the year number. I wish it wasn't 2008 also because the years are going way too fast for complete enjoyment. Not saying I don't get any enjoyment and happiness out of living, it's just that everything is going WAY TOO FAST FOR ME!!!!!!!!!!! :)

I guess I'll just have to be happy and make the most of life.

My Vacation

I had an awesome vacation in Illinois where most of my family lives. We spent one week there. It was totally not enough time to spend with all my friends and family.

When I was at one set of Grandparents' house, my cousins, and my brother played about four games of croquet per day. I think I only played one game. Maybe two.

My cousin (pictured) makes many versions of popular games. He renames them Extreme____. He made some version of Croquet called- you guessed it- Extreme Croquet. It involved hitting the ball across a small road. Wow.