These past few days have been pretty crazy for me. Friday began with a Spanish Honor Society meeting, which was fairly routine, and then while standing around waiting for the hall aides to let us in, I decided to do something crazy, maybe because I was in a hyper mood because of the forthcoming quiz bowl weekend. Anyway, when I walked in, the hall aide asked me to produce my ID. I knew I had it in my pocket, as always, but I walked up to the lady who sells temporary IDs and bought one, for a dollar, entering my name not as Colleen Powers but as Sylvia Plath.
This was something Emily had suggested to me rather jokingly, after reading The Bell Jar (sigh; I love that book), which of course is by Sylvia Plath. I don't think she actually expected me to do it, from her amusement and surprise when I showed her. I was quite excited, needless to say, and spent the rest of the day proudly showing my friends. Emily told the Flomester, who confronted me later in the hall when I was running an errand for Ms. Greene. She thought it was funny, and told me that Max Parrish did the same thing when he was at Auburn, only he used Ronald Reagan; it's much sadder that the hall aides didn't catch that one. She must have told Mrs. Longhenry, too, because as we were leaving that afternoon for quiz bowl, we saw Mrs. L., who said, "Hi, Sylvia," chuckling to herself in that way only Mrs. L. can.
The weekend went pretty well, although by the end I was not only dead tired but pretty sick of some of my teammates. We left from Auburn at around 4:15 and stopped at Bob Evans in Bloomington for supper. We all talked on the bus, except for Will and Tyler, who were both listening to music and/or napping, which was a nice change from most bus rides. I had brought some chips that we were passing around; Ryan christened them "Rama Lama Ding Dongs," because he said it sounded like a cheap snack, and it became the first of many inside jokes of the weekend. I was pleased to discover that I wasn't the only one who was abstaining from meat that day. I guess I knew John was Catholic, but hadn't really thought about it, and I definitely didn't expect Will to adhere to such rules while away from his parents and with his buddies, but both mentioned that we should find a place with meatless options. About all Bob Evans had was grilled cheese, but that wasn't bad.
We reached our hotel in Decatur a little after 9 that night; I thought we might congregate to talk or play cards, but if the guys did they didn't include me. I watched Ellen DeGeneres' talk show, which was mildly amusing, for a bit before just turning in. The room was quite cold, and I tried messing with the thermostat with little success. I slept as well as could be expected, though, I suppose. The next morning we met for a quick breakfast--I had Pop-Tarts from a vending machine--and then I watched "Beverly Hills, 90210" until it was time to go, entertained by both early '90s styles and by just watching Jason Priestley.
The tournament was pretty boring, mainly because it took forever for no apparent reason. There was a huge opening ceremonies thing, including the induction of seven coaches into the newly created IHSA Scholastic Bowl Hall of Fame, which involved speeches by or about all seven of them, as well as speeches by several Masons about how great it was to see all us smart kids, etc., etc., blah, blah, blah. Then we played a round (beating Moline), had a bye, played another round, had lunch, which lasted over two hours (but it was fun playing B.S. with the guys), played another round, and then finally played Fremd for the championship. They beat us. Not to make excuses--we all could have played better--but some of the questions were ridiculously easy, and they made reckless early guesses that in a normal round would have been detrimental, but in this format paid off. So we got second. Then we had to go to the awards ceremony and be presented with a plaque and have pictures taken of us and more Mason speeches and then we finally got to go home, or so I thought, but then Ms. Greene insisted on taking still more pictures of us.
One of the high points of the day occurred when we were sitting around after eating lunch, and Will had us all listen to a song he had downloaded onto his iPod. It was, he said, by some guy named Kompressor ("with a K") and consisted of angry, electronic chanting of such lines as, "7 plus 8 is 15! Adding up numbers is so uplifting!" and "9 plus zero is equal to 9! Even adding nothing will do just fine!" I looked up Kompressor online today, and found a list of downloadable songs, with hilarious descriptions, like "april showers bring KOMPRESSOR POWER." Another high point, although it involved embarrassment for me, was when Ms. Greene was taking pictures of us right before leaving for home. She said, "Everyone say..." All the guys yelled, "Donald!" So now there's a picture of six gleeful-looking guys with mouths wide open and one shocked, red-faced Colleen.
The ride home got pretty long. Will brought out a card game called "Bang!", which, while it seems like it could be fun once you get the hang of it, proved confusing for me, and thus embarrassing. Then we all settled down to do homework, and I grew bored; I can't read while on buses. We decided to stop in LaSalle-Peru for supper; Ms. Greene claimed that she knew of an Applebee's in Peru, and Patrick had been saying that he wanted to eat at Applebee's. When we got there, however, Ms. Greene's memory proved faulty; we drove around the place for a while, had to stop for directions, and so on, and then when we got there it was packed, with an estimated 45-minute wait. We sat around for a while, as Ms. Greene talked about a place she knew in El Paso (which is not between LaSalle-Peru and Rockford), until Will finally said, "Let's just find another place right here," and then Ms. Greene was like, "Oh, look, there's a Steak 'n' Shake right down the street," which Ross had observed about half an hour earlier. Then we had to sit around at the Steak 'n' Shake, which was also crowded, for a while, until we team members finally mutinied and just got up and walked in.
I made the mistake of sitting with Will, Ryan, and Patrick; they talked about guy stuff and inside jokes the whole time, excluding me. I guess it was better than sitting with Ms. Greene, Tyler, and John, though. The ride to Rockford was boring; we sat around talking about playing a game or something for a while before most people fell asleep. Patrick amused himself by flashing his booklight in people's eyes and out the window to annoy passing trucks. For an hour. I was glad to get home, being tired and, frankly, sick of the guys.
Today was Rory Zuba's memorial service. It was nice, with lots of pictures and good music and funny and touching eulogies. I saw Connor and Sean immediately upon entering the church; both recognized me right away, but later, afterwards, didn't seem interested in talking. I can understand that, though; they were very busy with relatives and everything. Ben and Bill Houtkamp gave speeches, both of which were hilarious. They have perfect comedic timing and deadpan delivery. Bill told of the love of computers and video games he shared with Rory, while Ben related a story about him and Rory and their friends getting in trouble at King for playing a game in which they tried to "de-pants" their buddies. Mrs. Borchers, Mrs. Hamlett, Mrs. Deacon, and Siva Sundaram also spoke, and the West orchestra played. They played "Bad Day" and "Man on the Moon" by R.E.M. as some of Rory's favorite songs, and both were songs I had listened to while viewing the Caring Bridge website about Rory; I had "Bad Day" playing in my head for two days after Rory's death, thinking about him. It was a scary coincidence, but a fitting one, I guess.
Tomorrow we have Regionals for quiz bowl; normally I'd be looking forward to it, but after this weekend, it's going to be tough to get back out there. And I worry that even after the closeness of the weekend, the guys will still be the same, rather distant and wrapped up in other friends, at school. I'll just have to see.
