Crikey!

Okay, things have become a little messed up when it comes to my future plans... If you know me personally, you most likely know that my ultimate dream is to travel. More specifically, Australia. Down Under! I found a program I could travel through and everything! It's called Rustic Pathways and I could travel there for ten days and because of the program I had initially decided on, I would work at the Australia zoo as a volunteer. But since I have to go to summer school this July and most likely the following summer (when I wanted to embark on this trip) I won't be able to do it until probably the summer between my Senior year in high school and College. You're probably thinking, "Hey, at least you get to go." You have a point there, I'll give you that. Today's blog is just going to be my rantings about what I want to do there, how I plan to get there, etc... hopefully you won't get too bored!

HOW ARE YOU GOING TO GET THERE???

A plane. I'm not totally sure which flight or where I'm going to have to change flights. That'll probably be something I look into closer to my trip, just in case things change for some reason. I mean, this is a couple years off. Anything could happen. But from what I looked at now, I'd probably get a connecting flight somewhere in the U.S. and from there to Fiji, and then to Australia.

WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO THERE???

I looked at the Australia zoo website, and besides visiting there, I hope to volunteer there. I'm going to have to figure out just how to do that, but I put the Australia Zoo website in my favorites, and I'm also going to link it here for my reference and whoever else is reading this. I have asked their staff if they would be willing to hire someone for just a summer, so I'm excited and a little nervous to hear from them... apart from hopefully a job, I want to go to the Sydney Opera House, I want to go whale watching, a crapload of art museums as well as ones related to history... sight-seeing, I'd love to try snorkeling... that's probably not even it! What am I talking about? Of course that's not it!

HOW LONG ARE YOU GOING TO BE THERE???

I want to spend sometime between one month and the entire summer over there. I guess it really depends on if I get a job and a temporary place to live. It'll really depend on how far I can stretch whatever money I save up.

HOW CAN WE CONTACT YOU/FIND OUT WHAT YOU'RE UP TO???

Email, of course. Probably this blog if I don't get really lazy. I was thinking about vlogging by uploading YouTube videos and putting the links here or in my emails. I'll probably make an email list and send some snail-mail just because it's always fun to get stuff in the mail that isn't bills. Who knows? I may even set up a legitimate website that's sort of like Blogger, but with more freedom to it. When I write this, I have FreeWebs in mind, but I'll have to learn more about that before I actually do anything. If FreeWebs doesn't work out (in ways where you can't see pictures, videos, and journaling all in one place) I'll probably get a Flickr account and put pictures there and then put that link everywhere. Adding on to the snail-mail plot, if I do in fact have a temporary address in Australia, I'll put that in safe places and you could probably send letters to me (I love getting letters! They're so much more personal than emails!). I have plans, guys... don't worry, you'll be able to find/contact me.

WILL YOU BRING BACK SOUVENIRS FOR ME???

Sure. Just ask. I'll do my best.

WHAT DO YOU HOPE TO GAIN FROM THIS TRIP???

Work experience, travel genius, a social butterfly, photos, stories, LOTS of postcards, music CD's, and more international friendships. Good list?

HOW ARE YOU GOING TO PREPARE???

Save up. A lot. Summer jobs, odd-jobs for my neighbors and my family, birthday and Christmas, asking people for donations (especially if I'm volunteering!) research... hopefully it'll be enough. That's all I can ask for.

Okay, I think that just about wraps up that. That's my longest blog entry in a while! And really, it was fun to do! If you can think of something else I should do, leave a comment and I will consider! Thanks for reading!

--Jude

Ponderings After a REALLY Long Tuesday

I've never actually heard the lead singer of Jack's Mannequin talk, I have never really seen what he looks like, and I have never really seen one of his music videos (except for 'Dark Blue' which was amazing!). He looks genuinely angry in his videos and he looks older than I pictured him to be. When he used a normal talking voice, I couldn't believe that the guy on the YouTube video was the same guy that sang 'The Mixed Tape,' 'Dark Blue,' and 'Last Straw' among others. But it was cool! I have lost no respect for my beloved Jack's Mannequin. If I have any readers and you're curious, here's Jack's Mannequin's YouTube Channel. If I don't have any readers, this will be for my reference. Even though I have already subscribed to his channel and drooled over his songs. There's a song or two to the right-- in the music player with the Monet painting as a skin. Enjoy it at your own pace. Perhaps you will become an even bigger fan than I. Maybe you already are...

I turned in my Yearbook application today. I had to include a picture that I took and a paragraph about a school event. I'm not going to show you (if there are any readers out there) the picture because it's of my best friend in the whole wide world and I don't want to betray his trust or invade his privacy. All I'm going to say is I'm really, really satisfied with how it turned out :D I asked my French teacher if she could write a recommendation for me. Normally, I would have asked my English teacher because he'd be more familiar with my writing and my art work (though I have a few speculations... 1) I have no idea what happened to my English teacher. All I know is that he's not there anymore and they brought in a teacher to replace him until the end of the year. 2) He claims he hasn't had time to read my story that I labored over for two years (wow, that makes it sound like really gruelling work. Like, worse than when they made children work in factories...) 3) He's never actually seen any of my photography. There's never been an opportunity to show my pictures off except through my scrapbooks. That is all).

One final thought. I have been thinking about college lately. It's still roughly two years off, but it's never too early to think about what you want to do. I feel like I've narrowed it down to two, three, maybe four areas of expertise. Journalism, Photography, Architecture, or Phychology. I think it would be so cool to be a child therapist. Or deal with teenagers. I know we're annoying sometimes, but we have problems too and we all need someone to talk to and help us (whether we want to admit it or not). I've gotten a lot of mail from colleges. The ones I'm most interested in are in Iowa (2) and Minnesota (2). Any way, I'm just throwing that out there.

If there are people reading this, could you drop a comment here so I can omit the less important and frankly uninteresting stuff.

Thanks!,

Jude Rosenberg

Happy Music

Between homework and everything else going on, I have found some time to write. I'm not referring to the blog this time. I'm talking about fiction. Knock on wood, but I think I can see see the light at the end of the tunnel--the tunnel being my writer's block. One night, I started typing. It was about a middle-aged woman named Rose. It didn't seem promising, but I went with it any way. I had nothing better to do... but as I went on, it started to grow on me. I'm not going to say this new story is for sure going to be finished (though I hope it will be), but I'm putting it in my "Has Potential" folder. Yes, I really do have an electronic folder labeled just that.

Ummm.... yeah. I think that's it. Thanks for reading.

Jude Rosenberg

A Second or Third Posting

I don't know why, but I'm sort of getting a gut feeling that I'm never going to use this blog. I don't post my school work on here like I thought we would be doing, this is only the second or third time I've actually written something for this blog in particular. In a nutshell, I'm giving up on putting hope and the like into this particular blog. I'm not going to delete it just yet, but rather, try to re-evaluate what it could possibly be used for.

It was specifically created for school, so maybe I should keep this school related. To a certain degree. Or I could do what I wanted to do with my other blog and post poetry and random bits of wordiness on it. I dunno. It could be kind of fun even if everything sucks... Like I've said (who knows how many times), this whole thing is a toss up. In fact, I'm going to go so far as to say that it's on probation. Yeah, that's right.

Maybe you'll hear from me in the future and maybe you won't. So in the meantime, enjoy life! Live it to the fullest!
Sincerely,
Jude

Beginning!

In the future of this blog, you can expect English classwork. Just as the subtitle reads... But now you're extra assured, right?