Chiquita on Some Crazy Stuff

I think it’s about time for a crazy sports shot post.

This first one, you might not want to listen to the sound. The guy yells goal, in what I believe to be Spanish, very loudly, for quite a while. But that aside, this goal is a pretty damn good shot. 45 YARDS. That’s insane!

The ones in this next video are pretty crazy. I like the first one the best- its insane. It starts out the first guy kicks the ball, the second guy bounces it off his head, then runs after the ball to try to kick it in, he kicks it, but it hits a player from the other team in what looks like his hand, so the second guy loses it, another player from the other team kicks it, and the second guy had fallen down when he tried to kick it, so he’s laying on the ground, so when the other guy from the other team tries kicking it to get it out of there, it hits the second guy in the head, and score!! How lucky is that?

Check out this video. I don’t know about you, but personally I think street bike stunts are pretty much the coolest shots ever. I know riding a motorcycle isn’t really a sport, but I think this is definitely cool. My favorite part is probably when the guy lands it on a pop can around 1:11. That’s pretty cool.

The last one is a snowboarding video. I think all of these tricks are pretty sick, especially because most of the time they are so freakishly high in the air.

Chiquita on Amanda Daniel

I would never work at a gas station. I almost did though, now that I think about it. Right before I decided to work at Lowe's, I got a job offer from Big Ten. I ended up not taking it for two reasons, one being that they were asking me to work until midnight on some nights, and the other reason was that Lowe's was a much safer place to work, and they offered me a job around the same time that the gas station did.
When I heard about Amanda Daniel, I thought her situation was pretty crazy. My mom told me about it on Monday, and I also read about it in the newspaper and online on Tuesday. The girl, who is only 19, was kidnapped right out of the gas station where she worked at around 4 in the morning on Monday. They found her later that day, and took her and her kidnapper to the hospital. Her kidnapper, named Keith Van Elson, suffered a stab wound. Police suspect that Amanda fought back and stabbed Elson. Personally, I think that is pretty freaking awesome. I think it would take a lot of bravery to stand up to someone who kidnaps you. Personally, I think I would be screwed if I got kidnapped. Not this girl, she's got balls. She stabbed that guy in the chest. What a beast. I'll keep reading up on the whole situation, and keep ya updated!
Here's the article!

Chiquita on Danny Brown, a truly amazing and genuinely great person

You know how parents always say that teenagers think they're invincible and nothing can stop them? Yea, I always thought that phrase was pretty dumb. I am obviously aware that I am not invincible. If I jump off the roof of my apartment building, I know I'm not going to be able to fly.


Today I realized that when parents and adults say that, they don't mean invincible in the sense that I'm thinking. Teens make decisions all the time without thinking about them. They pick up their phone to look at a text while driving, they get in the car with their ride, even though that person has been drinking. We just don't think before we act sometimes. It takes half a second to change your life, or in some cases, lose it.


Today, search and rescue crews found the body of my friend, Daniel Alexander Brown. He had gone rafting with friends in the flooded river in Nashville. He had been there to persue his music career and go to school at SAE Institute for audio engineering. The last time I talked to him, he was so excited about life and he was SO HAPPY to finally be doing what he loved. Danny was a truly amazing person. He was an amazing musician, and he was the best friend that any of his friends could have. He was so funny, and he had so much potential. I am sitting here at this computer screen typing all this out right now, and I can't wrap my mind around the fact that he's never going to pop up in my instant messaging on facebook and said "what's up!?" ever again. The whole thing just tears me apart. He was really going to be somebody, and he was totally happy with what he was doing. It just breaks my heart to see someone so bright, so talented, with so much drive to get where they wanted to be in the world, to just be gone.


I'm a teenager. I don't think about most of the things I do. I know sometimes I do things that probably aren't a good idea, but I don't ever see them as threatening my life. It's terrible that it takes a tragedy like this to see that even if I'm just trying to have fun, I could potentially hurt myself or even die. Danny was just trying to have fun, like always. Now he's gone. It's just terrible that life happens this way sometimes. It's just plain hard.
Rest in Peace Danny. You will be greatly missed by countless people. We all love you.

Chiquita on Prom

I woke up at around ten, crawled out of bed and hopped in the shower. I'd talked to my hair dresser the evening before, and she'd told me to put gel in my hair when I got out of the shower, so I did that. Then my mom and I went to the bank, then we went to visit my nephews for an hour before we went to my hair appointment. Haley and I made appointments at the same time and same place so we could go together. My hair was perfect. I had her do it up, slicked by like a ballerina, then the back was in a bun with a bunch of small curls, and a braid around the bun. It was exactly like I had imagined it. I left before Haley's hair was all the way done because I had to run home to get ready to go for pictures at NoelRidge. Cory picked me up at my house and we rode together to the park. Gary and Beth and their families were already there when we got there. My dad took pictures of just the two of us until Shelby and Jason arrived, then we did all the group pictures. We filled two rolls of film. That's a lot of pictures. After that we went to Kennedy. We were pretty early for Grand March, so we used the extra time to get the posed pictures out of the way. Then we went and got in line for Grand March. Shelby and Jason weren't doing it because they had too many people to go see before dinner. We saved a spot for Gary and Beth and when they got there Beth and I went off to socialize while the guys held our place in line. Eventually it was our turn to walk. I had to tell Joey how to pronounce both of our names so he wouldn't mess it up. I only slipped a little when i first stepped onto the Grand March stage, but I don't think anyone noticed. After that we watched a few people go through, then we went out into the foyer by the gym to take pictures. I took a few on Cory's camera, then I had Jackie take the camera to take a picture of Haley and I. She dropped it and it broke. So I had to go over and tell Cory that I broke his camera. I'm getting him a new one. After that we went to dinner at Olive Garden. Our waiter was super cool and the food was great. After that we went to Jason and Shelby's apartment to hang out for a bit before the dance. When it was time we went to Elmcrest and danced the night away. It was really fun. After that Cory and I went to his house so he could shower and we could both change out of our nice clothes. Then we went to post prom, which was a blast of course. The hypnotist was really funny. I think the best part was when Patrick was made to think he had his shirt on inside out every time someone said car keys. After that we all went home and passed out because we were all exhausted! The next day I had to work at 2, and I didnt get up until one. I made it to work at 2:01. I thought that was pretty slick.

This was probably the best song of the night!

Chiquita on the End of the World

I’ve come to the conclusion that the world is coming to an end. Ok, maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but seriously, what is going on with the world these days? All these earthquakes and volcanoes, flooding, and even an oil spill!
I don’t know which one of these disasters is the worst, but the one that hits home the most is the flooding in Nashville. I have a couple reasons for this having an impact on me. One is that I have visited Nashville before more than once, so I’m pretty familiar with the town, and I know quite a few streets that have been shown on the news. It’s really weird to think that I stood in the same spot and complained about it being too hot and dry when they show it on the news completely flooded with 10 feet of water in every direction. It’s really scary. The second reason is because of the Flood of 2008 here in Cedar Rapids. I was really involved in volunteering when our flood took place, and I really want to go down to Nashville to help out with their flood, but with school and everything, I can’t. I’m disappointed. Perhaps after we get out of school I could take a week off work and go down there and help with the clean up. I think that would be good for me to get a little break from Iowa because things have been so crazy here with my life lately, and I think that I could also help out quite a bit because I’ve volunteered with and for flood victims before.
I’ve been watching the Weather Channel a lot lately and it’s a pretty scary channel these days. They showed these pictures of these two teenagers clinging to a vehicle this morning. They interviewed the girl, and I imagined that happening to me. That girl could have been anyone that I know down in Nashville, and that thought is really crazy. Here’s the video.

An equally concerning event in the news this past week or two is the oil spill. It makes me sick to imagine all the animals that that oil is going to kill. I get dizzy when I try to fathom how much money is just spilling into the ocean with every barrel of oil that leaks out. The economy is definitely going to take a huge hit with this one. A girl in my economics class works at a gas station, and today she was telling the class about how the gas station keeps changing the price of gas every day trying to keep up with what everyone thinks is going to happen to the price of gas as a result of the spill. My mom can’t decide if she should keep her tank full at all times in case the price sky rockets out of nowhere, or if she should fill it up just once and wait to see what happens. I couldn’t give her much advice because I don’t know either. It’s a pretty crazy time to be living on Earth, let me tell you.

This is a picture of the explosion that caused the spill.

All that brownish stuff is oil. =(

Chiquita on Donating Plasma

Just like any other high school (soon to be college!) student, I've been pretty low on cash lately. Its times like these when I really, really miss waitressing. It was always very nice to walk out at the end of the night with cash in hand, not having to stretch out my paycheck to make it last from one to the next. Well, I don't get tips working at Lowe's as a cashier, obviously. Bummer, right? Yea, it sucks. I get paid very well, more than I have ever been paid before and enough to make me want to work really hard to be able to stay on after the season is over, and hopefully all the way through college. Even though I get enough money to pay the things I need to pay for as well as buy the things I want, I still seem to have trouble keeping a hold of my money through the second week. When I first started, I started having my mom spot me twenty here or twenty there just to have some spending money from paycheck to paycheck. Thankfully, all that has suddenly changed. Recently, maybe a month or so ago, Haley and I started donating at BioLife, the plasma donation place. We both scheduled our physicals at the same time the first time and we pretty much always schedule our donation appointments on the same day at the same time so we can go together. The first time was pretty sucky. At first a younger girl poked me in my right arm, but she couldn't get a good vein, so she dug around in my arm for a while with the needle while I tried not to cry, then a different employee, named Lucas, came over and dug around in there for a while before deciding to poke my other arm. They got a good vein in that one right away and I was able to donate that day. The first time they poked me it hurt super bad because I wasn't used to it, but since that day, I feel it less and less every time I go. One time I went and my machine had a faulty separator, so I was only hooked for like thirty seconds and then the machine went crazy and started beeping and someone rushed over and checked everything out. He was like "yeah, you're done for the day," I was like "What?!" and then he explained to me that it was ok, I was fine, the machine just had a faulty separator and wasn't separating my blood and plasma and was just sending my blood straight into the plasma bag. That meant that I wouldn't be able to get my blood back, so I couldn't get on a new machine. I was fine with that though, because I still got paid. I've never been not allowed to donate for any reason, although I did have to sit for five minutes because my temperature was too low one time. Other than those times, I've had no problems and its been great. I love it because I normally go on Wednesdays and Fridays, so I have money in the middle of the week when I normally dont have any cash, and Fridays when I need money to go out. Its been working out pretty great so far!

Chiquita on Moving Back In

Well, that was quick. My mom called me on thursday and wanted me to come home. I told her I'd think about it. Right around that time, I was getting really sick of living at Cory's. Or not so much living at Cory's, but Cory in general. We are too similar to be spending so much time together. We definitely need more time apart with our own groups of friends. Anyways, we had definitely been at each other's throats. I understand that its both of us causing all the tension, but he thinks its just me and he's an angel, which just makes things even worse. He has definitely been getting to me, but I know I've been doing things to get at him too, both intentionally and unintentionally.
Anyways, I thought about it over the day on thursday, and decided that I would come home. Cory and I got into it again on thursday night, so I decided that after I went out on friday night, I would go home rather than going back to Cory's. Since friday, I've been staying at home. Its been good so far, my mom and I talked and we've made a few agreements that I think will help improve our relationship quite a bit.

On another note, I've been going through a serious 90's music phase. I was really happy to get home, so I could get back in touch with my beloved iTunes and download some more. The other day while I was riding in the car, a line in a song popped into my head, and it stayed there all day. The line was, "baby's black balloon makes her fly, I almost fell into that hole in your life", but I couldn't think for the life of me what song the line came from. Finally, I typed the whole thing into google and got back "Black Balloon" by The Goo Goo Dolls. Of course it would be them. They have endless amounts of good music. So I downloaded that song, along with some other of the Goo Goo Dolls' music that I didnt have, and I've been rocking out to it between classes for the past few days. Good stuff!

Well, I guess I will keep ya'll updated on my home life, right now its pretty sweet! Later!

Chiquita on Getting Kicked Out!

So you remember that post about my stupid divorced parents? I left a big part of that out. MY MOM KICKED ME OUT. Of my own house, all because my dad is paying for my graduation party because she doesn’t want to. How stupid is that? So I’ve been crashing at Cory’s house and staying with other friends until I can a) figure out what I’m going to do as far as a permanent home or b) convince my mom that I’m not ungrateful and a terrible daughter and to take me back in.
I have a few options as far as where I’m going to be living for the summer. I could stay with Cory, not that I really want to do that or think that’s a good idea. Also, I don’t want to be a burden on him and his family, and in the week and a half that I’ve been staying with them, I definitely feel like I am. I could get an apartment out at Kirkwood. I don’t know that I want to do that though. Kirkwood is just so far out there. I don’t want to have to be doing all that driving (except I wouldn’t be doing the driving, since I don’t have a car). I could probably live with my dad if i had NO other option, but that's pretty much a last resort. I guess I had better be figuring it out quick though!

Chiquita on Spring

Spring has sprung kiddos. It’s so nice out! I practically beg the head cashier to let me work in Outside Lawn & Garden every time I work because I absolutely love standing out there in the fresh air with all the flowers and the cool breeze. Spring is definitely my favorite time of year because its not too hot out where you get all sticky and its harder to breathe, and its not really cold out so I have to dress in ten million layers and wear a hat and gloves and practically freeze my butt off every time I go outside.
Another thing I love about spring is prom! I am getting more and more excited about going! I’ve started tanning because I want to have a little color for pictures and stuff, and if I didn’t tan Cory would be all dark from working outside at the Golf Course all day five days a week and I would be super white from never hanging out in the sun!
This weekend I think we’re planning a camping trip. I think Spring is the best time to go camping because its not unbearably cold at night, and its not too hot when you wake up and the sun is shining in the morning either. Hopefully we’ll get some fishing and perhaps a little boating in as well. First camping trip of the season, yay! Too bad I have to come back into town to go to work on Saturday and Sunday! I’ll let you know how that goes!!

Soooo I was wondering why my blog grade in AP wasn’t very good, and I just figured it out! I’ve been hitting “save” instead of publish or whatever, so none of them have been posting! Awesome, I am an IDIOT. A lot of them were from several weeks ago, and were about moving and stuff, so I’ll probably just delete them and write new ones now… epic fail!

Chiquita on my Stupid Divorced Parents

My parents have been divorced for as long as I can remember. I have always lived with my mom, and I've only seen my dad in waves throughout my childhood. From the time he left when I was three until the time he married my first stepmom was I was six, I didn't see him at all. He called my brother and I every once in a while, and he came to both our birthdays when I turned five and my brother turned seven. Jordan had a much better memory of my father during this time than I did because he was five years old when he left, and I was only three.
The first real memory I have of my father is the day when I met my step family. I remember coming into the house through the back door that led into the kitchen. My father was holding my brother's hand, leading him into the house. I clung to Jordan's hand for dear life. I remember feeling like I wanted to cry, but I didn't know why. Three girls came into the kitchen, and one woman. The girls' names were Kara, Cassie, and Ashley. The woman, our new stepmother, was Lisa. She was huge, or at least she seemed that way to me when I was six. If I saw her at the grocery store today, I probably wouldn't even recognize her. Its kind of like when you wake up from a nightmare, and you're scared and you know you should be scared, but you can't for the life of you conjur up the image of whatever it was that scared you. Needless to say, my brother and I hated her. Eventually, we stopped going to his house, or their house rather. THis was probably around the time that I was about eight. From then until I was nine, I didnt see him.
The summer I was nine years old, he divorced my step mom. She got his childhood home that they had been living in, so he moved into an apartment building in Marion called Taylor Wood. While he was living there, he dated a woman named Denise. Denise had a daughter named Rachel who was in between my brother and I in age. I liked them all right. We went over to my dad's apartment a lot when he first moved in, but over time he started making more and more excuses as to why we couldn't come over. We hadn't seen him in a few weeks, so when he finally called to see if we wanted to come over, I was really excited. When it came time for him to come get us, he didn't show up. We had to call him quite a few times before he finally answered. He said he wasn't coming because he was too tired. When my mom saw how disappointed we were, she decided to take us out to dinner. When we got to the restaurant, we saw my dad laughing and having a great time eating dinner with Denise and Rachel. I demanded that we leave. I didn't speak to my dad for a long time after that. I was really hurt that he blew me off like that. A couple of years went by of me going to his house on and off as I felt like it. He continued living at Taylor Wood for a while. When I was in fifth grade, my dad started dating a woman named Karen. After a while Karen, her son Taylor, and my dad moved into a house not far from where I lived with my mom. They never married, but they lived together for about a year before they split up. After that my dad lived with his mom for a while to take care of her before we decided to put her in a nursing home. While he was living with my grandma, he met my now stepmom, Vicki. They got married when I was in 8th grade. We went on a road trip right after the wedding.

Basically, what I'm trying to get across here is that my dad hasn't always been there for me. But now, he does much better. He helps out where he can. Its really nice to see that he at least is trying.

Now about my mom. To put it simply, she's always been the one who's taken care of me. We've been close for a long time, but recently all we do is fight. I asked her a while ago if I could have a grad party, and she said no because she doesn't want to pay for it. I was ok with that at first, I thought we could just go out to dinner or something. But then all my friends were asking me when my grad party was, and I kept having to say that I wasn't having one, and it really sucked. So i decided to talk to my dad about it. He said he'd love to help me out with it. So when I saw my mom after school on Monday, I told her I was having a grad party. She immediately yelled at me that I wasn't having one. I said simply that I was. She said, "Well, I'm not paying for it." I said, "I know. Dad is." That's when she freaked out and started yelling at me about how I'm ungreatful and all. I was really upset, so I called my dad when I got to work. He said of course he would pay for it, but no way was my mother invited. This did not help at all.

I am so sick of my parents. I should not have to choose between them. I should be able to have a grad party like every other kid at my school and I should be able to have both my parents there. They are just so childish. They think its ALL ABOUT THEM. Well its not. My graduation and my graduation party is about ME. ME ME ME. Just this one time, can't they put their differences aside and be there for THEIR daughter? Nope, I guess not.

Video!

Chiquita on Life

Ever had a time in your life when a series of events happened that changed you?
That's me right now. I'm not going to go into any detail, because really the details don't even matter. One time, I went to camp and broke my ankle. I got seperated from my group in a big crowd because I was on crutches. I had to walk back to my cabin by myself. Along the way, I ran into a camp counselor who offered to walk with me so I wouldn't have to walk by myself in the dark on crutches. I remember his name, even though it was so long ago. Johnathan Holliday. He had red hair. As we walked the mile or so back to the cabins, we talked. He was saying something about how all big events come in threes in life, or so he believed. At that time in my life, I was rather down and out, and I ignored his advice to watch for things in threes in life. Finally, within the last year, I started paying attention. Sure enough, everything comes along in threes. My three happened within a single month. One; I lost a close friend. Two; Someone I care about deeply hurt me in an unforgettable way, and Three; I made a mistake. Not a big mistake or one that would do any harm to anyone, but a mistake that changed me none the less.
One; the loss of my friend. This I do not regret. Sure, sometimes something funny happens, where I am given an opportunity to laugh about an inside joke, but I don't because at one time it was an inside joke between the two of us. I am not so immature as to say I always hated her and am so glad she's out of my life and on and on. Its not like that at all. We are just much better off without each other.
Two; Someome I care about deeply hurt me in an unforgettable way. You know how every person has a most embarassing moment in their life that they can always recall and will probably always be able to recall? This situation is like that. Only, its not embarrassing. Its just a bad memory I'm always going to have. Like you wake up and you think about it. You try not to, but it doesn't help at all. I don't love this person any less than I ever did. I have less respect for them, but I still care about them. People ask me all the time how I do it, how I go on like nothing ever happened when something clearly did, and I just reply that thats not how it is. I forgave them, so they go on like nothing ever happened, not me. I remember it every day, I bite my tounge on countless questions, things I would like to say. I wonder if this memory will ever finally fade. I don't think it will. I think I've learned a big lesson with this one. I've lost a lot of friends and people I love over things such as this, and this time, I just cared too much to hold the grudge i deserved to hold. I feel like I'm mature for this.
Three; I made a mistake. It wasn't a big mistake, it was a lack of judgement. I am a better person because of it. I guess its just me maturing as I go along, and that feels good, to live and learn.

Chiquita on Shutter Island

Last weekend I saw the craziest movie ever. Its called Shutter Island. It starts out with two investigators landing on an island off a ferry. The lead in the movie is played by Leonardo Dicaprio. He is one of the investigators. There are all kinds of crazy twists in the movie. He is there because he's looking for a prisoner/patient that seemingly vanished. Everything seems super shady. Dicaprio's character (who's name I don't recall) has never worked with his new partner before. The story goes that his wife (Dicaprio's wife that is) died in a fire and he keeps having flashbacks and nightmares about it. In the end, it turns out Dicaprio's character is actually a patient at the asylum. He's acting out this crazy hullicination, and all the employees at the asylum/prison are pretty much letting him do whatever he wants according to his fantasy because a few of the doctors are convinced it will bring him back to reality. The fantasy he's acting out involves the patient that disappeared. She killed her three children, drowned them in the lake behind the family home. In reality, Dicaprio killed his wife. Why? Because SHE killed their three children, in the lake behind the family home. The whole reason the employees were allowing him to run about recklessly on the island and come back to reality is because if he doesn't he has to go to the lighthouse to be experimented on. The doctor's thought they could help him without having to experiment on him. Towards the end, it seems to work. They get him to say who he really is, and to admit to what he did. So now he doesn't have to go to the lighthouse, right? WRONG. In the ending scene, his partner who turned out to be one of his doctors, and him are sitting on the steps of the mens ward. Dicaprio whispers to his "partner" that its going to be really tricky getting out of this place, its a lot worse than he thought. The doctor looks across the lawn, and shakes his head at all the other doctors. They all come over and lead him away to the lighthouse.
I'm not really sure what to think about the ending. I'm not sure if he really is crazy and thinks he's still a well to do detective, or if he does realize and remember what he did, and he wants to go to the lighthouse because he can't live with what he did. Pehaps when the movie comes out on DVD, I'll watch it again and blog about my conclusion. That's all for now!
Here's the trailer, but it does the movie no justice.

Chiquita on Prom

If someone had told me last year around this time that this is how it was going to be, I probably would have laughed at them. I'm talking about prom. Things are going to be perfect. Honestly, at this time last year I wasn't even planning on going to my senior prom. But now, I'm actually really looking forward to it. Aside from graduation, its what I'm looking forward to the most right now.
My boyfriend is a couple of years older than me, he graduated from Kennedy in 2008. His name is Cory Saunders. When we started dating, I figured he would refuse to go. That would mean I wasn't going, because I'm not really down to go to prom with one boy while I'm dating another. Luckily, two of Cory's friends, Jason and Gary, date two of my friends that are in my grade and go to school at Kennedy (Shelby and Beth). Gary and Jason are going to prom with Beth and Shelby, so it all is working out really perfectly. I'm really excited. I get to have a good time because I get to take my boyfriend to prom (and he will come willingly) and I dont have to take some other guy, and he's going to have a good time because his friends will be there. I'm really happy with the way everything is working out.
To make everything even better, I found my prom dress, ordered it, and have already picked it up. Cory's tux has been ordered, and we're pretty much all set. I'm really glad everything worked out this way, its shaping up to be the perfect prom.

Chiquita on the New Job

I've been working at Lowe's now for a couple of weeks. The beginning was pretty boring. It was mostly training on the computer for hours at a time. Finally, after four days of staring at the computer screen, reading and listening to information then taking quizzes over it, I was put with a trainer on a cash register in lumber. I learned about LAR lookups (don't ask me what that acronym stands for). Lumber mostly deals with commercial contractors, and the LAR look up (which you access by pressing F8) is used to look up a business credit account without having to have the customer actually have the Lowe's Business credit card with them. There are all kinds of buttons on the cash register that i have to learn. I never realized all the stuff that cashiers have to do when even the simplest of purchases is made. ITs all pretty interesting.
The people are also very nice. Everyone is really helpful, and if I have a question, pretty much all I have to do is look confused and someone is rushing to my side to assist me right away. I get along really well with everyone I've met so far. A lot of different kinds of people work there. I work with an older woman, maybe 55, whose daughter i went to school with. Most of the cashiers are in college and most of them are girls, although there are a few guys. One of them is also a lunch lady at Kennedy!
Another thing I like about Lowe's is seeing people I know come in. I've rang up several of my classmates or their parents in the two weeks I've been working there. My most favorite person I've had come in has to be the art teacher I had in elementary school, Mrs. Weaver. She's one of my all time favorite teachers, and for years I haven't seen her and I've always wondered what ever happened to her after she retired. When she came through my line, she recognized me right away. It pretty much made my day.
So that's pretty much all I've got to say about my new job so far. I'll keep you updated!

Chiquita on Checking ID's

So now that I'm 18, I'm starting to notice the perks of being legal. I can buy cigarettes, although I don't smoke so I never have. I could go to the strip club if I wanted to but that's um, weird. I can't say I have any interest in ever going there. Anyways, the reason I'm even talking about this is because I have a friend whose parents work at a bar. They needed extra help last night because it was St. Patrick's Day and it was really busy, so I offered to help them out, and because I am now 18, I was able to.

It was a pretty interesting experience. I worked a 12 hour shift, from two pm to two am. I sat at the door the whole time and checked ID's. It was actually very entertaining because some of the people that go to bars are pretty funny. Also, I got all the free food I wanted. They had brats which were SUPER tasty. I didn't have to wear anything special, and all I had to do was say, "Can I see your ID?" to anyone who didn't look 21. I caught one person who wasn't 21 and I got to get the bouncer to kick em out. Pretty exciting stuff.

I got my job at Lowe's (officially!), so I don't really need a job anymore, but I think I'm going to be working at the bar on the weekends just for some extra cash. I am happy I got the opportunity to work there, because it gets me some experience working in a bar, and that's good because eventually I would like to try my hand at being a bar tender. I'd like to do that during college. So yea... St. Patty's Day was good, I'll keep you updated on my bartending career! haha



PS. Check this song out by one of my favorite bands, the Notwist. They rock.

Chiquita on a bunch of really random stuff that i find pretty funny.

Me: i'll leave one head phone out in case you have anything intelligent to say.
Paige Hagemann: I have everything intelligent to say.

Me: I have really simple humor. Cory had three pennies, and he said "Want three pennies?" just as one fell on the ground, so he goes, "two pennies?" and i laughed. I thought it was really funny.
Paige Hagemann: Hmm. Who's Cory?
Me: My boyfriend.
Paige Hagemann: That's why you thought it was funny.
Me: NO!! It really was funny!
Paige Hagemann: Yeaahhh hormones don't play a role in it at all.

Check this out. Its a half female, half male chicken. Yea. Crazy right. Paige showed it to me. Apparently its supposed to help with research about sexual identity. But Paige says that sexual identity has to do with peoples' hormones, not chromosomes, so that argument doesn't make sense at all. Read about it here if you're confused.

I went to dinner the other night with my grandmother and my mom. When we were leaving, my grandma stumbled when she got up and laughed pretty loud about it. I said to my mom, "I think Grandma's been drinking," to which my grandmother replies, "Well you know I did have that big tall glass of ice cold.... WATER!" Love her.

In case you were wondering, this is one of my favorite cartoons of all time. Another favorite is this one.

You should probably see this video. Anyone remember the llama llama duck song that was emailed to everyone in the world pretty much? Yea, this song reminds me of that.

Guess what!? I found the llama llama duck video. Its right here!

Chiquita on My Bucket List Again

Ok, I have a few new things for my bucket list.

I want to adopt a child. (Ok, I know you're probably thinking this is very unrealistic. But I'm serious, if I ever have enough money to adopt a child, and the time is right, I want to do it. My mom was adopted. If she hadn't been adopted, I probably would have never existed. My mother would have never had the opportunities she did. Her life could have been very bad, and because of the kindness of one couple who wasn't able to have their own child, she grew up happy. I want to be able to give that opportunity to a child.)

I want to go to a huge sporting event. (Yes, I watched the Super Bowl tonight. Could you imagine being there? That would be crazy! I've never even been to a Hawk's football game. Its sad, I know. I went to a Twins game one time, but there wasn't very many people there. I'm talking HUGE stadium, completely packed. Like, don't let go of my hand or we might lose each other.)

More specifically, I want to go to a Cubs game. If possible, I want to take my grandmother. (My grandmother is a huge Cubs fan, as am I. We love the Cubs. During the season, our lives consist of a lot of baseball talk and game watching. If I could think of one single thing that my grandmother and I have bonded over the most in my life, it would be the Cubs, no question. I think it's safe to say that its one of my biggest dreams/goals for the next year/season. I hope I can make it happen.)

That's all for now, I'll let you know when I think of more!! PS, I am knitting a scarf and its coming along quite lovely!

Chiquita on Mormonism

So long story short I'm looking into Mormonism. I'd like to say I'm baptist, although I don't currently attend a baptist church. I went to a baptist church with my grandmother my entire childhood, and I also went to a (different) baptist church with some people I babysat for during middle school and the first two years of high school. I'm not going to lie, I don't really understand the whole baptist thing. Its not that I don't understand Christianity, that I have at least a decent understanding of. Its the whole baptist, Methodist, Lutheran thing that I don't understand. But anyways, my friend Mikayla recently converted to Mormonism, and I find it rather interesting, so she gave me The Book of Mormon, (who's actually a person, I didn't know that!) and I'm supposed to be going to church with her sometime. Its not necessarily that I want to be Mormon, its just that I am curious, so I'm going to find out more. We went on a small road trip to Des Moines, so I learned a little bit on the way there. She happened to have The Book of Mormon in her car, and she has another, so she gave it to me. I read the introduction and the testimonies of the eleven people who saw the plates (I know... if you're not Mormon, you might be lost... sorry...) as well as the testimony of Joseph Smith (a Mormon prophet). I read the first two chapters of the first book. That's as far as I got tonight (I had some knitting to get to), but tomorrow I hope I can make time to read more. Oh holy crap!!! I just thought of something! I could potentially pull a research paper topic out of this! (Mr. Ayers, there may be hope for me yet!) I'll keep y'all updated about this whole Mormon exploration thing. And if you'd like to explore as well, this might help.

Chiquita on the Fly Leaf, Breaking Benjamin, and Three Days Grace Concert

I'd just like to add in that as i type this i have a very annoying band-aid on my finger because i burned it while using a hot glue gun while doing another one of my government teacher's dumb project. It hurts.

Anyways, the concert. I wasn't even sure I was going until the last minute, but I was pumped that it worked out in the end and I was able to go. The group I went with was my boyfriend Cory, his friend Gary, Gary's girlfriend Beth, Beth friend Shelby, and another friend of Cory's, Jason. Jason works at Albert Auto right across the street from the US Cellular Center where the concert was being held, so we were able to park there and just walk across the street. We got there right at seven when the concert started, but we had to wait in a really long line. Fly Leaf was already on when we got there. I told Cory I wanted to go to the front, so we formed a line and he led the way, pushing us through the dense crowd. I was holding Cory's hand so I wouldn't get lost from him. We ended up losing the rest of the group, so Cory and I were the only one's that were able to push our way right through the crowd all the way to the third row. The crowd was easy to bully out of our way, no one even fought us, they just looked at us like we were jerks. Too bad! We'd paid our 45 dollars, we were going to be right where we wanted! It was a matter of minutes before we had squeezed our way into the front row. We had to fight to keep our spots the whole time. We were right up against the metal barracade too, so it was rough. If you pushed yourself back on the people behind you to try and make more room for yourself, the person behind you had to push on the person behind them, and it would go on like that all the way to the back of the crowd, who would push back. So then you have the weight and force of an entire rock concert crowd crushing you against a metal bar. I have bruises all over. My knee caps are unrecognizable, they're so torn up. My hips bones are bruised, and so are my ribs. I won't even talk about my arms. But it was all worth it. I was right in the center the whole time too, so I got to rock out to the lead singer right in front of me. It was beyond amazing. People were crowd surfing, and the security guys would catch them as the fell off the front. I took a coupled kicks to the face, but it's all good! I also got kicked by a high heel in the shoulder, that definitely left a mark!! Being up in front definitely has its advantages. Cory caught a drum stick and a guitar pick! He let me keep the guitar pick. Its cool. He also caught us two water bottles, which was awesome because it was so hot!! The security guards were also taking paper cups of water and pouring it in people's mouths. It was so awesome. Three Days Grace even had fire in their show. When the fire started going off, the first thing out of his mouth was "Best Concert Ever!! I love fire!" He's a volunteer firefighter in Hiawatha, haha. So yea, it was all just really amazing. I had a great time. I love rock concerts!!

Chiquita on Wanting to take a Test

I just want to read the book, do the study guide, take the test, and get on with my life. This is apparently too much to ask of my Gov II teacher. He keeps assigning all these pointless "projects" that we have to do. Its SO STUPID. I'm not learning anything. Oh wait, yes I did learn something. There's this thing in Cedar Rapids called "Fifteen in Five", its a bunch of little projects to better Cedar Rapids, theoretically. Most of them were a huge fail because of lack of funding. That's about it. We actually took notes the other day. I was pretty excited. Too bad he'd already assigned another project a few days before. What do we have to do, you ask? Think of a way to better the Cedar Rapids metropolitan area for teenagers. Flashback to seventh grade when I had the same assignment. Please shoot me. I hate high school. Rachel and I are pretending to turn Westdale into a "teen center". In our little fairy tale, the funding would come completely from fund raising organized and orchestrated by teens. Yippy do dah. When we told the teacher about our idea, he was sarcastic like "nothing I haven't heard of before". Thanks for the encouragement, asshole. He's always like that. He's one of those meathead guys that makes you feel like you're retarded, and it couldn't be more obvious that he doesn't give a damn about any of his students. If he doesn't care, then why should I? I can feel myself feeding off his negative attitude. Maybe if he wasn't such a jerk I'd want to impress him. I do have creative ideas in this mind of mine if only I was given the chance to do a project with more than the excitement equivalency of watching paint dry. And if he's so bored with seeing the same damn projects over and over again, here's an idea; ASSIGN SOMETHING NEW. God forbid he actually have to use his tiny brain to come up with something fresh for us to do. I think the reason he doesn't think of something else is that all these years of listening to himself teach has fried his imagination completely. God knows mine burns up more and more with every minute I sit at my desk in his class. What do I have to say about all this, you ask? FOUR MONTHS AND FOUR DAYS. Then I'll never have to deal with him and his stupid projects and his negative attitude ever again. I can't wait.

Chiquita on the Continuation of my Soap Opera Tragedy Teenage Girl Life

I feel like I failed to properly conclude my last entry. I forgot to explain the title, for starters. When my friend (lets give my friend a name. Bestie.) When Bestie told me about all the rumors Smordan supposedly "heard" about me, she also informed me of something that I already sort of suspected would be the case. Bestie (who was also once a very close friend of Smordan's) told me that she doesn't even know the person who Smordan is anymore. She said, "I literally do not recognize her anymore. Its like she thought up this person in her head that she wanted to be in college, and now she's just acting. It makes losing her as a friend easier to deal with, because who she is now is not the friend I once knew and loved." As we were talking, Bestie kept repeating the same word, over and over again- FAKE. She said Smordan is trying to put on this act for everyone she meets in college, and only Bestie can see how fake it all is, because she knows the real Smordan.
While Smordan was saying all these horrible things about me, she managed to utterly shock Bestie with her performance. She actually had the audacity to act like she still cares about me and is just really worried about me. If she was so worried, wouldn't she call? Wouldn't it be a relief just to hear my voice? Wouldn't she want to say Nikki, say it ain't so! Yes. If she cared, she would do all these things. But she doesn't. I don't know where all these rumors originated, but I have a feeling they took root in the Devil's mind and have since blossomed into this elaborate story of my life as a vigilante. Unfortunately, another possible orchestrator of this cherade is Smordan herself. I just have this feeling in my gut that the Devil has finally gotten to her, after all this time of Smordan swearing to God above that she will never let her mother's wrath consume her. I think it's finally happened. Its sad really, the way things worked out.
I have something else I'd like to say about all this. The Devil is an upstand CHRISTIAN woman. She sends her son to Isaac Newton Christian Academy. She has coffee with all these church women. I've struggled with religion my entire life. I'd like to consider myself a christian, but I just don't do the whole church every Sunday and Wednesday thing. I believe in God, but I don't know about the whole Christianity thing. If this is how Christian people are- I want none of it. I mean, I'm sure she's been "saved" or what have you. A woman like this gets a ticket to heaven? I just don't see how that makes any sense. Aren't Christians supposed to love and care about everyone regardless? Ok, maybe they don't have to love every single person they meet. But whatever happened to "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor." Yea. Christian my agnostic ass.

Chiquita on the Friend who became a Fake-o Robot Kappa

I don't normally blog about things like this, but I am just so worked up about it that I am going to blog about my soap opera tragedy teenage girl life just this once.

Once upon a time I had this friend, lets call her Smordan. It was funny how we became friends. Originally, we really didn't get along. We ended up getting close over the mutual dislike of another girl who had seriously betrayed both of our friendships. I really liked hanging out with this girl. She was stylish, she had a great taste in music. We liked the same things. She was a fun person to go to parties with. She liked to dance and be funny, not just stand there being insecure. I never really shared much of deep personal self with her, but she was just a fun friend to have.
Our friendship became complicated on my 17th birthday. I had some friends who lived in Tama, and we decided to go visit them, without telling our parents. It was my idea, but Smordan was eager for an adventure. Tama was a lot farther than we thought. It took us almost two hours to get to my friends house. Long story short, Smordan has this mom, she's crazy. Let's call her "the devil". The Devil was unreasonably strict. She acted like Smordan was doing drugs or something. She wasn't. We are good girls, it wasn't like that. Anyways, on this particular night, The Devil called and demanded that Smordan come home immediately. That was a trick we just couldn't pull off seeing as how we were so far away. So eventually the truth came out. We were busted. The Devil talked to me on the phone, and she told me to "stay away from her daughter. I was poison to her, and she hopes Smordan will eventually see me for who I am. Until that time comes, I will help her by doing everything in my power to keep her away from you." I knew how much Smordan wished she could have some freedom. How much she always said she hated her mother. So i said "She hates you you know. She tells me ten times a day every single day. She can't wait until she can go to college and finally be rid of you. When you call, she doesn't say 'its my mom' she says 'its the psycho'. So for as long as Smordan is even remotely within my reach, I will do everything in my power to keep our friendship alive."
I think that's why the Devil hates me so much, because I stood up to her. Anyways, after that night Smordan and I had to be really sneaky if we wanted to hang out. We still hung out quite a bit for a while. We sort of faded by the time Smordan went to school, but we were still on pretty good terms. I couldn't really talk to her anymore, because her mom supposedly forced her to block me from her facebook and her twitter.
Tonight I found out that she thinks I've "gone off the deep end". When I found this out, I inquired as to how I'd done this. I was told that Smordan had heard "rumors" about me. What rumors you ask? I have STD's. (yea, apparently the fact that I've been dating the same respectable gentleman for the past NINE months isn't relevent). Where did I get these STD's, you ask? Well, from slutting around Iowa City of course. (I'd just like to point out the fact that i still don't drive). Then, once I'd contracted all these STD's, I brought them back to cedar rapids and spread them to a bunch of Kennedy kids. (I've said this on my blog before, I don't have many friends at Kennedy. I don't see anyone except Rachel outside of school). When my friend who was talking to Smordan said that i don't drive, so i can't get there myself, and I really spend all my time with my boyfriend, Smordan replied, "Do you really believe that?" If you don't, ask my boyfriend. To prove to my friend that I do in fact have STD's, Smordan informed her that a nurse of some kind showed the Devil my "case file". Now. Not only did I whore myself out to all of eastern iowa, I also won't be graduating from high school. How does Smordan know this? Well, one of the kennedy counselors told the Devil, she looked me up on the school computer. (Lets ignore the fact that both the school nurse and the counselor would be fired if this was true). There's more. I got a girl kicked off the Kennedy volleyball team. (I DON'T KNOW ANYONE WHO PLAYS ON THE VOLLEYBALL TEAM). Not only that, but there were stolen goods found in my apartment. (First of all, I don't live in an apartment. I live in a duplex. Secondly, there were no stolen goods found in my house. There wasn't a search to find stolen goods in my house. There are no stolen goods in my god damn house.)

So much for taking up knitting, right? This is what I have been doing lately, according to these people. I'd just like to say that for the record, not a shred of this bs is true. As if i needed to say that. Do people really think that of me? I feel like this should hurt my feelings, but it doesn't. I just feel sorry for who ever started these rumors. They obviously have too much time on their hands. Perhaps they should get a job, because the whole house wife deal isn't really working out for them as we can all see.

Chiquita on Things I Hate.

I hate it when people touch me that aren't somehow close to me. Like this kid that sits behind me in my first hour. He touches my hair, and squeezes my shoulders, and he's just sort of annoying and I don't know where he got the idea that its ok for him to touch me.



I hate it when people smoke cigarettes around me. I hate the smell of cigarette smoke. My mom just got a new car, and she told me she wasn't going to smoke in it. That vow lasted a whole three weeks. All of my clothes smell like smoke, and our house smells like smoke. Christ, our new cat Duncan even smells like smoke. Its disgusting.



I hate it when I'm really proud of something I've done, and people talk down to me about it. Example? I recently took up knitting, and I'm actually pretty good at it. I've never really had a hobby, or anything I am good at, so I was really excited when I picked it up. I told my boyfriend that he was going to be really proud of me when he saw how good I was doing. When i took it to his house to show him, he said, "knitting is the most unattractive thing i have ever seen you do." Ouch, right? Not gonna lie, I kind of wanted to cry. I just acted like I didn't care what he thought, but I was actually pretty offended.



I hate it when people say they will do something and then they don't do it. This is pretty self explanatory. If you don't really want to do it, then say you don't. Mom, do you want to take me to a Disturbed concert for my birthday? Sure Honey!!! Then not take me, not cool. Just say no, i don't like Disturbed, how about Taylor Swift?



I hate it when people spread rumors. I recently learned that there are some down right false, and rather outrageous rumors going around about me. An example being that I took part in getting some girl kicked off of the volleyball team. I won't lie to you, I'm not very involved in my highschool. I don't have that many friends at Kennedy. That being said, I don't know anyone on the volleyball team. I could name one person, and that would be more boyfriend's little sister.



I hate when I can't sleep. I'm a very restless person. My mind runs constantly, and I sometimes just can't shut it down so I can go to sleep. Take tonight for example. I had the sudden urge to do some spring cleaning of memories I no longer care about. I had an entire cardboard box full of old notes from middle school and my freshman year, a bunch of random nic-naks that at some point meant something to me. I hauled the box out of the closet, went through the whole thing, and threw out just about everything. It's after 11. Probably not the best time to do that.

I hate it when I can't think of anything to blog about. I think about it all the time, and when i come up with something, I normally write down the blog and type it up later. But then there are other times when I can't think of anything at all and I sit at the computer browsing the internet trying to come up with ideas of something to blog about. It's annoying. Consider this a shout-out to Lisa O'Neill for giving me this idea.

Chiquita on Her Bucket List

I am a firm believer in having a bucket list. Even if you don't write it down, you have one. A list, be it mental or otherwise, of the things you want to do before you die. In light of the new show that will be premiering on MTV, I thought I would put up my bucket list for all to see.

1. Meet my estranged sister.
2. See the Ocean
3. Travel to a foreign country.
4. Volunteer to help victims of natural disaster.
5. Go to a rave.
6. Make a large donation to a charity.
7. Learn to knit.
8. Be a camp counselor.
9. Tour the White House.
10. Live in New England.
11. Get my pilot's license.
12. Get my hunter's license.
13. Go skydiving (of course)
14. Make amends with people whose friendship I've lost.
15. Find love.
16. Have children.

I will probably add more to this as I think of it, but right now this is all I've got. I asked my mom what she wanted to do before she died, and she started listing all the places she wanted to go. I said, ok, so you want to travel, what else? She was quiet for a moment, and then she said, "I've done pretty much everything I've wanted to do. I've been to all the concerts, tried all the reasonable drugs, met all the people. Now I'd really just like to live long enough to see all of my grandchildren born."

Chiquita on Knitting

See the ocean. Travel to a foreign country. Go deep sea fishing. See Mayday Parade and The Maine live in concert. These are just some of the things on my bucket list. Among all these aspirations and dreams, there was something else I wanted to do before I die, and that was learn to knit. My grandmother is a little, well, unconventional. She wears nikes. Her favorite jacket is a chicago bulls jacket with a huge picture of Michael Jordan on the back. She cheats at Skip-Bo. She's just not the knitting type of grandmother. So when I decided that I wanted to learn to knit, I had to go about it in a way other than asking my grandmother. I ended up taking a random trip to Iowa City with my friend Allie to see her sister Anna. It was a random night during winter break, I think it was a tuesday. We made creme brule, and she taught us to knit. It was really fun. Then at the Viterbo Competition on the 8th (we took third by the way), a girl in the group was knitting, and i thought it would be a good idea to start knitting to pass the time at show choir competitions. The day after the Viterbo Competition, I went to the store and bought some knitting materials. I sat in front of my computer (no surprise there, I wish it had UV lights so maybe I could get a tan for once) and looked up how to cast on (aka, start) on Youtube. I came across this video. It worked out really well for me. Anna had already showed me how to do it once, so it was more to just jog my memory. After I watched that video, I found another on the knit stitch, the most simple way to knit. I remembered right away how to do it, and from there it just took off. Now I have almost a whole scarf!! I'll be working on how to knit a hat next.

Chiquita on More Show Choir, 'tis the Season!

Well, in the spirit of the show choir season, I thought it would be appropriate to add some video links of some performances over the past few years.


The first one is of Buffalo Grove at Show Choir Nationals in Nashville, Tennessee last spring break. Happiness was also at Nationals. There is one single reason why i chose to put this video up, and that is the male soloist in the beginning. He's amazing. I just love his voice. The girl is also good, but when i heard this guy, I was rather blown away.


The second video is of Happiness, our varsity group. The song is called Fix You, and its by Coldplay. I chose to put this one up here because it was really moving when you saw it live. The group worked so hard on this number. I remember many practices that were devoted solely to perfecting this song. I'd say the group did a pretty damn good job of doing that. Its definitely one of my favorite ballads by Happiness.


The next video is of a novelty, or a comical song of Happiness's Its called "Toledo Surprise". It had a ton of props, so the tech crew was really involved in this one. We worked really hard to put this together, and when it finally did come together, it was AMAZING!


This next one is a parents dance, and its a parody of Toledo Surprise. The parents in Happiness are great, and very supportive. Even if you're not their kid, they treat you like you are.


This rather interesting number is done by none other than our 42nd street rival, Xavier. The song is called "Never Dance" and i chose to share it because of the band's participation in the number. I really like when show choirs incorporate all aspects of the group onto the stage. Not going to lie though, these costumes look like ketchup and mustard.


Ok, I like pretty much every show choir season. We always put together a really great show, and we work really hard all year long to perfect, and when something is that close to perfect, how can you not love it? So I pretty much love every season, but I still have a favorite. Happiness 2007 was an unstoppable force. That being said, you should probably see the whole show. I'm not 100% sure about this, but i think this is the opener. The soloist is Anthony Rohr, and he's amazing! I just love his voice. His sister Katrina has a solo this season in the closer, and it's amazing as well! I guess it runs in the family. The next song is "That's All" by Genesis. This is probably my all time Happiness favorite. The whole thing is just bad ass. The vocals are amazing, and the coreography is perfect for the song. The wave towards the end is intense. I especially love how at certain parts they just soft of talk to each other. I just LOVE this song! The next song is the ballad, Fly Again. It's a favorite by David Phelps. The amazing soloist is Derek Boots (Who's now in the United States Army <3).The next is a novelty written by Damon Brown, our coreographer. The epic speaking solo in the beginning is David Siegel, brother of our own Happiness member, Josh Siegel. There's a story behind the part where Dave says, "...and wireless mircrophones, that don't work!" You see, this is the second show we'd done that day. It was the finals round. During the first round, Dave's microphone wasn't on/didn't work. Yea, it was a huge fail, but he made a joke out of it, and it was pretty funny actually, at least to us! Anyways, this song basically tells the story of our lives, in a really funny way. The people with the concession box things are techies. And then there's the closer. The song is called "Show Off" and the soloist is the lovely Paige Hauer. I just love the costumes in this one. The girls dresses are just great!

Chiquita on the Start of the Season

And so it begins. Hell week. The worst/best week of my year. I am a tech for both Happiness (the varsity group, if ya didn't know) and Protege (the prep group, if ya didn't know), so this week will be especially busy for me. We have practice for one group or the other every day this week, except Thursday. Why not Thursday, you ask? No, its not to give us a break, we have a concert! I'm actually pretty excited. The dessert concert will be the first time we put the whole show out there for an audience. Its a big test for us. Then on Saturday, we get up bright and early to be at Kennedy at 4am to load the bus and head to Viterbo. Protege performs at 10:30, so as soon as we get there we'll need to get the trailer unloaded and start getting things in order for the show. After we do Protege's show, we'll go to critique, then we'll be free to do whatever (sleep, socialize, etc.) until Happiness performs at 3:30pm. Then when they're done we'll head to their critique, then wait around to hear about finals! I'm sure we'll make finals, we always do. So then we'll get our time for finals, (I'm not sure how they're deciding who goes when at this competition, because we've never been there before) then we'll do our show again. After that, there might be more groups to go, so we'll watch them if there are, then we'll go to awards.
All in all, it should be a really interesting competition. The line up is good. The groups performing include: Linn-Mar “In Step”, Linn-Mar “10th Street Edition”, Brodhead “Guys & Dolls”, Chippewa Falls “Chi Hi Harmonics”, Milton “Choralation”, Cedar Rapids Kennedy “Happiness, Inc.”, Cedar Rapids Kennedy “Protégé”, Xavier “Xhilaration”, Burlington “B*JAZZled”, Madison East “Encore”, and Westside “The Amazing Technicolor Show Choir”. Word on the street is that Linn Mar's varsity group, 10th Street Edition, has improved a lot in the last couple of weeks. 10th Street Edition always has a good show, so hopefully I'll make it in time to see their's after we do our show. (They lock the doors, so if you don't get there on time, they won't let you in.) Omaha Westside looks to be our biggest competition according to predictions on showchoir.com. I've never seen them. Apparently they are really good. Happiness won't be able to see them, unless they go a few groups away from us at finals, because they go right before us during the day round. I looked them up on youtube, and I saw that they did "Someone to Fall Back On", a ballad that Protege did a couple of years ago. It was pretty good, not that I know much about vocals and things of the like. Xavier will also be there, and I've heard there show is good this year, but we'll have to see. Four days!!