#18 - "You should try parkour!"

Lately I have been feeling happier than ever, except that one of my neighbors moved away without telling me while I was away at a funeral. He still rides my bus though, but gets off at the stop before mine, so he's not far away.

We never talked, except when he told me there was a car behind me because I like to walk in the middle of my road (ONLY my road, as barely any cars go there). But now I'll have to walk home all alone. And possibly get run over.

Goodbye, life.

I also thought that my lunch buddies had ditched me after not showing up for a week, but then one of them found me and told me they had just changed location (we have no classes together). We sit outside now, by the art room, and I like it better than our table at the cafeteria.

I've been so happy out there that I haven't been able to sit still. I've just been climbing on everything. Also eating berries off a tree that I was warned were potentially poisonous. No side effects yet! Yay!

There's a tree full of these at school.

Due to my climbing on everything (I happen to do rock climbing as a hobby), one of my friends, Parker, suggested that I try parkour. Another contribution to that may be that I tried to grab the cover thing with horizontal bars to maybe swing on it or climb on top of it. I don't even know. It's probably for putting a plastic sheet on top of it in case of rain.

I didn't succeed despite being maybe 12 feet off the ground. That thing's probably 20 feet, and I'm only 5.

All the girls at my old school were f*cking huge, making me have height issues for the rest of my life.

Really, Parker did say so though. She said it would be cool if I could learn flips and stuff too. I'm not entirely sure if she was talking about parkour or freerunning though.

One thing about parkour is that I tried it in the summer for a few days. It was fun. But it just so happens that my crush also does parkour. That's the main reason I tried it in the summer, to see just how good it was and why he liked it.

This used to be me. I still like him, I just don't show it that way because he has a girlfriend already.

I might take Parker up on that suggestion. I might eventually be able to climb those horizontal bars.

She attached a condition though. Our exact conversation was:

Parker: "You should do parkour!"
Me: "I should?"
Parker: "Yeah! Can you do flips and stuff?"
Me: "No."
Parker: "If you could learn that, it would be pretty cool."
Me: *happy smile as I imagine myself doing this stuff*
Parker: "Just don't break any bones though!"

Fair enough. I've never broken one before anyway.

And I love Anti-Flag.

#17 - Teeth

Sorry I didn't upload a video. My camera's batteries are being really annoying right now! I tried and got 2 minutes of a (to-be) time-lapse art project in before it turned off and I continued on, not even noticing.

Sometimes I feel the urge to do this, even though it's not the camera's fault.

Anyways, I also just read an article about a 4 year old who needed many teeth removed and the rest covered in caps. I don't even know if the story was real, but there was a lot of outrage in the comments. Apparently the fact that her mother was not in the room with her during the procedure and "allowed her teeth to get that bad in the first place" sparked this outrage.

There was actually a person in the comments who believed the caps were made with "mercury-laced silver"...some people probably don't know what stainless steel is.

I also have a bad history with teeth, though not as bad as that girl, whether or not the story was fictional. When I was just 3 years old, I had to go to the dentist to get 7 teeth pulled and 4 covered with caps. Apparently I didn't cry or scream, but just stared blankly at my parents for the whole procedure. And yes, it got done in a day.

I mentioned the apparent non-painfulness because some people were saying that a 4 year old would not be able to stand the "painful" procedure. Also that it couldn't be done in a day.

Most people don't expect a child to have this expression during what is pretty much a mouth surgery.

All the capped teeth fell out when I was 12, and what I saw when I looked at the actual teeth that had been covered for all those years was disgusting: colored silver on the outside, with red, blue and yellow all on the inside. The red wasn't blood. It was a stain from what might've been blood when I first got the cap.

So appreciate your teeth. Even though I went through so much with mine, I still appreciate them, because I recently learned of the trouble of braces. I heard that when you have braces, you can't have certain types of food or open your mouth really wide to take a big bite, and things get stuck in them (maybe even your lip). At least caps don't prohibit you from doing anything. They just sit on top of your teeth and then you treat your teeth like any normal, non-braces wearing person would.

No thank you!

Another point of this post was to say that even though I appreciate my teeth. sometimes I have irresistible urges to pull them out. One in particular, though it doesn't matter which one I want to pull out because because of my bad tooth history, all my teeth now are adult teeth, and adult teeth don't grow back. Once I pulled a non-loose tooth in 4th grade, but that was a baby tooth. I had a similar urge that one time, but never again until recently.

#16 - First Youtube video

Today I plan to film and post my first Youtube video (not much editing will be done, because I don't have any skills not included in WMM :P). Please check it out. It should be out in 4 hours at the most.

Here is my channel - http://www.youtube.com/user/chibikona100

I already have some videos, but now I am going to start vlogging. All my previous videos are of me playing short (and easy) songs on the guitar and keyboard, and occasionally something else.

By something else, I mean something like this:

So please check out my vlog when I upload it. It will be a big help :)

Some songs to listen to while you wait-

#15 - Calluses

Why don't people like calluses? It has never made any sense to me why anyone would want soft, easily cut/bruised skin on their fingertips or feet.

I had calluses on my fingertips before I even started playing guitar. I don't know how anyone lives without those. How do you even prevent them?

I've seen beginners on guitar forums asking if there was an alternative to calluses.

There is no way out of calluses if you want to play guitar.

GET. OVER. IT.

If this is too much for you, consider another instrument. Preferably not string.

As for calluses on feet, well...you actually have to walk on hard surfaces barefoot for that.

I get stares when I do that, as if it's completely unnatural. And I live in a semi-rural area. It's not even that I do it in "public", I just do it occasionally at school (it rains so much here and I wear Converse, so wet cloth shoes can be my excuse for not wearing them) and within a half-mile radius from my house.

It really hurt when i tried to run on this American school track barefoot though. I was used to running barefoot, but it's like this track is a freakin' road. Made of tiny sharp stones. Or needles.

And that's why I didn't re-join the track team when I moved here. I'd been doing it since upper elementary school, but I can't run on this track!

Ever tried to run on these? No? Don't.

I actually wish my foot calluses were stronger. I'm pretty proud of my fingertip calluses though.