MathCounts Update

I have recently found out the places of the other three mathletes, and they all did wonderfully, way beyond expectations. Out of 130 kids, Ty was 28th, Oliver 37th, and Emily 39th. Congrats again!

Sorry, Sorry

My life is boring. Busy, but boring. Not a good combination when you are trying to keep your faithful readers happy. So here are a few updates. Piano lessons are going wonderfully. I have about half of 'Flying Leaves' memorized, although it is nowhere up to speed. Of course, I don't know if it ever will be. We have a recording of it, and my mom says that if I ever get it that fast she will give me 100 dollars. I'd say that's a pretty good motivator. I was trying to put the track on this post, but I have no idea how, or even if it's possible, so if anyone knows... We scheduled for next years classes today. I don't even want to talk about it. I'm afraid I was kind of in a bad mood today. It's a good thing my mom was in a good mood on the way to school, because I kept snapping at her, and we probably would have gotten into a fight if she had snapped back. If you read this, I'm sorry Mommy. Thank you to Lauren for the cookie today, and also Lindsay, although she doesn't have my blog address, and probably wouldn't look at it even if she did. I think it is going to by my turn to bring cookies to English some time. Hopefully this will keep the populous happy. Or Lauren, at least, as she is one of the only people who reads regularly. Toodles. Oh, wait. My brother's MathCounts team took first place at regionals on Saturday! Congratulations to Jake: 4th, Rudy: 14th, Naomi: 17th, Ethan: 21st, and Ashley: 23rd, as well as Oliver, Ty and Emily, who places are as yet unknown. There were about 130 students there. They will be going to state at the School of Mines in Golden on March 18th. Viel gluck, Craver! That means good luck, by the way, and is pronounce feel glook, as in cook. There's your German for the day.

Singles' Awareness Day

That is my friend Mary's name for Valentine's Day, which, incidentally, was yesterday (no duh). Mine went pretty well, although I must say one of the more exciting things that happened was taking a math test. Well, watching House was pretty fun. House is going downhill. Not the show, that is, but the doctor. He is starting to get addicted to drugs, and other not-very-nice things. As Dr. Wilson said, he needs a hobby. But anyway... Yeah, so I was pretty aware of my single status yesterday, but that's okay. My parents gave me presents. They love me at least: )

Drumroll...

It's so difficult to keep a blog with all the other things that happen throughout the week. I try to post twice a week at least, but it has been a busy one. Fortunately, it is Friday, and I got to skip my last two classes today to go to a MathCounts competition. Let me give you a bit of background information. My dad teaches middle school at the middle school where I went, and he is the MathCounts coach also. My brother is now in sixth grade at that same middle school, and he is a star Mathlete. (My brother is just all around a very talented person :) This is how MathCounts is described on mathcounts.org: "MATHCOUNTS® is a national math enrichment, coaching and competition program that promotes middle school mathematics achievement through grassroots involvement in every U.S. state and territory... After several months of coaching, participating schools select students to compete individually or as part of a team in one of the more than 500 written and oral competitions held nationwide and in U.S. schools overseas. Winners at the local level proceed to state competitions, where the top 4 Mathletes® and top coach earn the right to represent their state or territory at the national level." Last year I took seventh at the state level. Today was the school competition at my middle school, and I went to help out. It was highly enjoyable. I will have to look into volunteering at the local competition some time.

TI-84 Plus: Silver Edition

I got a new calculator today. This is it. A beauty, huh? If you have ever stopped to ponder my URL address, pirocks is talking about pi, as in 3.14159265..., rocking, as in being very cool, and 343 is seven cubed, which I tacked on simply because blogger wouldn't let me use just pirocks. I am a very math oriented person, if you haven't gathered that from the fact I have just posted a picture of a calculator. Right now in Pre-calc we are learning trig identities, which are very fun. It is highly disheartening to hear people bashing math, but this occurs quite often. Nobody goes around saying bad things about basketball or drama, now do they? Sadly, I did pretty poorly on the last quiz, at least compared to my usual standard. But you don't want to hear all this. About my calculator, though, it has a lot of nifty features, which, if you care to read about in detail (yeah, right) are described on education.ti.com/ By the way, I am hereby endorsing Texas Instruments as the best calculator makers.

Poem (No, It Doesn't Look Like One)

Pushing, pounding, / On the table. / Might as well be / In my head. // Shivers run / Down my spine, / Chills throughout / Though the sun shines. // Music deafens / In this prison, / Shaking hand / Writes words of wisdom. // Pushing back / Not pushed around / Escaping thoughts / In actions loud.