A toenail, a carrot, an emo, a librarian, a hippie, a 10-year-old, Siri, newwest, and my cousin all walk into the Celebrity Infinity’s X Club.

We then promptly walk out because it’s almost 11:30 and we gotta watch the fake northern lights.

I expected a cruise to be a relaxing experience, but when you make friends on a cruise ship, and everyone is about 16, none of you actually end up sleeping. There’s a lot of eating though, because the buffet is open until 1:30 am, and room service is open 24/7.

Every night, I had dinner with my family, then I found my friends (we were the 1st squad, there were a couple to follow, but we, of course, were the best, according to us). Though it is only two days later, I can’t exactly remember what we did each evening. Probably something weird and embarrassing. We ate a lot of sour patch kids.

As the ports we actually went on the cruise, Juneau had GREAT end of season sails. The other two places were, like, towns. We didn’t go on any excursions, so we just did a lot of walking around. I bought a mammoth stuffy.

Oh, and my sister was lonely and had no friends. Sorry, Mikaela.

Somewhere on Vancouver Island, there is a privately owned campsite with no real toilets. It has way too many mosquitos, but makes up for it in the presence of a beautiful beach full of wildlife. I came back with a bunch of pictures and swollen hands and legs, but spending time with a friend on a beach at a campfire may be worth a bunch of mosquito bites.

Or maybe not.

I’m still unsure about that.

I did many things this summer, many of them I am not going to write about on this blog because they are either insignificant (like work) or not proud of (five Harry Potter movies in one night). But for the things I am willing to advertise to the world, I have collected them here for your entertainment. You’re welcome.

Disneyland

UBC Music Institue

Camp Ignite (article, video, video)

Camping (pictures)

Alaskan Cruise (pictures)

Camp Ignite was unlike anything that I have ever done in my entire life. What Camp Ignite is, well it’s essentially a firefighting camp for teenage girls. For someone who has a phobia of fire bells, going to that kind of camp is kind of a stretch.

Although, I did it, and there are a few main things I can really point out from this experience is that I really respect firefighters, but not for the reason you would expect. Like, there’s no say the job isn’t really hard and grueling and stuff, but the reason that firefighting is hard is how hot you are in the turnout gear.

At one point during the camp, we put on our full turnout gear (jackets, bella clavas, pants, boots, helmets, gloves) along with SCBAs. We then proceeded to walk around the training institute we were at in 30+ degree weather. We were only wearing that stuff for like, 10 minutes, but it was like we had just gone for a swim.

So. Sweaty.

All in all, the experience was very rewarding and fun. It’s very hard to explain what we did, though. I learned a lot of stuff about firefighters and first responders in general. I think learning about emergencies might help me become a little bit less afraid of them.

For more on Camp Ignite, check out these blog posts.

Although this part of my summer happened before exams, I’m still going to count it as the first thing I did in summer because I went on a plane and that counts, dammit.

Disneyland is my lifeline. If I were to die and go to heaven, I would be at Disneyland. I know when each ride and attraction opened, production facts, what used to be in that location, and have a prediction for the ride’s fate.

This is serious to me.

I went to Disneyland the week before exams, because I am a daredevil who knows how to have a good time. My grandma took me, along with my sister and cousin. We spent 4 days at Disneyland and we were EXHAUSTED by the end. The weather was over 30 degrees each day, and school was out for most Americans, so it was busy as heck.

But, yanno. Worth it.

Open the photo below into a new tab to get more photos.

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I would make a “one time at band camp joke” but I know everyone EXPECTS that of me. So I’m not going to do it.

There’s not going to be much to this blog post because what I have learned is that band camp is sacred. We just can’t talk about band camp.

I am sorry if you expected anything more from me about this.

Band camp is sacred.