Ouch.

I injured myself THREE TIMES at tennis today.

First, we were doing a drill where we had to run back and forth across the court to get the balls they were feeding. Basically, I couldn't stop after I hit the ball, so I slid like three feet over the clay on my side. I skinned my knee, my hand, and my elbow.

Then, in the same drill, I tripped. Over my own foot. And twisted my ankle.

Then I had a *minor* reinjury of my wrist.

Doesn't my tennis camp sound super fun?

The worst thing about my school

All my friends live in towns scattered around the county.

It can take up to an hour to get to some people's houses. And my parents HATE HATE HATE driving.

Hey, at least I've become an expert in getting rides from people.

Not dead yet...

We didn't do our core/strength/endurance/agility work at tennis today!

I got back from my vacation on Saturday. I was having fun (most of the time) for weird reasons. Last year, I didn't enjoy the trip very much, because I was having so much trouble dealing with the ultra-preppy and waaay upper-class backgrounds of everyone, along with their general snarkiness and teasing. But this time around, I was mentally prepared, so I spent the trip being grateful that my friends (thanks, guys!) are nothing like these kids.

Don't get me wrong, I love all of them to death. For the first two days. But their personalities are so totally different from mine that I just get tired of having to deal with it. I enjoyed my time on my own, though. While the others were tubing (I'm not so cruel that I would make the others be bored to death while they go slow with me), I would sit at the little candy/ice cream shop and do my summer reading or talk to the girl who works there. Oedipus the King is actually really really good! I also read three books of my own, plus my dad's book, plus the beginning of this book about first amendment rights, plus two issues of Golf Digest, of all things.

I wore my new dresses for the first time! My red one was a hit--I wore it twice, once with straps, once strapless. I also wore the purple one twice. I was astounded when I ironed it at the way it unwrinkled itself nearly instantly with me barely touching it with the iron.

Other things going on...dinner with a friend tomorrow night, then poker/game night with other friends on Wednesday. I'm trying really hard to force myself to get out of the house occasionally. I also emailed the president of my town's historical society so I can line up a bunch of volunteer hours (I think it's 10-15 hours for NHS, plus ten more to fulfill the school requirement) before the summer's over. Tomorrow I might give Senator Lautenberg's campaign office a call so I can get something lined up for the fall.

I have recently become addicted to Law and Order SVU. This is a problem, because my dad thinks it's too "adult" for me and gets annoyed when he sees me watching it (weeknights at eight on usa!). Even though he'll never actually make me turn it off, he will give me a look and ask "Is that appropriate?" every time.

Tennis, Day Two.

Tiring. Last night, my calves cramped up. Both my legs hurt like hell--the only thing that soothed them temporarily was warmth. It took me the longest time to figure out a way to go to bed while still keeping the warm water bottles on my legs. Finally, I realized that just bundling myself up would work just as well. So I put on two pairs of knee socks and folded a blanket up so it would only cover my legs. It sort of worked, but I didn't get much sleep.

Tennis was fine. But instead of running, they made us shuffle halfway down, then do crossovers back. And then do it again Not fun. And then during my match my opponent reinjured her hand, an old injury. I hit with one of our instructors, this oldish lefty. He was good. Man, I was hurting after that. He ran me all over the place. His placement was absolutely impeccable. I mean, opposite corners on every shot.

We played some King of the Court later, which was pretty fun, even though we only had one serve and it had to be a spin serve, which I barely know how to do.

Then I went shopping and bought yet another dress at H&M ($20!).

I bought one of Subway's "Five Dollar Foot-longs" for dinner. It was way too big for me, of course.

This post has been more incoherent than usual. I'm exhausted. Four hours of tennis plus shopping? Yikes.

Why the Israel situation scares me so much.

I'm not going to write about it because I don't feel like thinking too hard, but please read this.

http://postcolonialhubris.blogspot.com/2008/06/denied-right-to-go-home.html

Ick

I just wrote a post that makes me sound like a spoiled brat.

I try not to do that. Oops.

Tennis

My serve today was much better.

My backhand today was really on--too bad I was playing with my dad, who's a lefty. A righty would have missed a bunch of the shots I was hitting, according to my dad at least.

The forehand was meh, as usual.

I didn't volley much, but I was getting to a lot of drop shots.

Tomorrow begins my daily four-hour tennis class. Starting at noon. Wish me luck.

Pretty clothes!

Yesterday I went shopping with my sister and four cousins. I needed dressy clothes to wear on our vacation to Basin Harbor, where my family goes every year. All of my dad's brothers and sisters go, and so does my grandma. This year will be (I think) our fifteenth or sixteenth year going. I am SO excited. We go the same week each year, and since we've been going so long, we know a bunch of families really, really well who go at the same time as us.

At dinner, we have to dress up, and the only dressy clothes I own are a) Western business attire for Model UN or b) wintery stuff or c) just not quite appropriate.

So I bought two dresses at H&M. (I love that store)

This one, in a magenta color, but without pockets:



And another one that I can't find a picture of. It's red. The straps are about 3/4 of an inch wide and are removable. It's fitted from the chest to the waist, and the skirt is an A-line shape. It fits perfectly, which is waaaay more than I could say for the no less than SIX skirts I tried on at Forever 21. I love it so much. One of my cousins found it for me. Now I love her forever :)

(By the way, the H&M website is such a pain. It doesn't have most of their clothes on it.)

I still need some stuff. I'll probably go to gap (or back to H&M) sometime this week.

My younger cousins left today for their vacation in Pennsylvania. Tomorrow, my older cousins are going home to Anchorage. Monday, tennis camp starts. Then, one week from today, we leave!