high school

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  • 04 Jun

    HAGS

    Ever go back to your high school yearbook and see if the “Most Likely to Succeed” actually succeeded, or if the people with the “Best Hair” still, um, have hair?  No?  Good.  Because who cares.

    But what about the more personal things, like specific calls to action left by your friends?  Did you follow through on those?  Let’s see what I was supposed to do.

    Freshman year

    We are off to a bad start.  I can almost surely say I did not pay Jamie that dollar.  Though if I don’t remember what the bet was about, it goes away, right?

    Okay, here we go.  I remember doing this one!  My friend was in my gym class and this girl had gym at the same time with a different teacher.  I told my friend very soon after she wrote this.  No idea if anything happened from there.

    I’m sensing a theme here.  But we’re back in the category of things I most likely did not do.  To be fair though, girls in my grade were prettttty big fans of my brother and I got asked this exact thing all the time.

    Now there’s an instruction!  Let’s say I went two out of three here.  Shout out to Matchbox 20.

    I know you’re thinking this is a statement of fact and not an instruction.  That’s true.  But later on in the note she does mention my HUGE contribution all year long related to her daily requests to put in a good word with her crush, who happened to be a good friend of my older brother:

    Sophomore year

    This is probably my biggest success.  Not only did we make more videos, but they were hilarious.

    Oh boy.   This message later notes that the first thing this girl remembers me saying to her was, “Walk much?” after she tripped while walking past me on the bus.  It also, as you can see, requests that I make her a tape of me singing for her to take as she moved away.  That came from asking me once on a bus ride if I sang, to which I replied that I only did to myself while in a baseball outfield.  I did not make a tape…

    If you know Spanish, you can safely guess this is another thing I did not do.

    Junior year 


    If you talk about 7-Eleven and Taco Bell enough, people on the bus will eventually join in the fun, and everyone is happy.  Wait.  Except…

    Oh no.  I didn’t get to everyone.  WHEREVER YOU ARE LET’S GET SLURPEES.

    For several reasons, I cannot fully publicly explain why this one made me laugh so much, but obviously you can appreciate some of its ridiculousness.  Here is one case where I can proudly say I did not do this thing!

    Well…after getting cut the first three years, that next year I did not try out for the baseball team again, so another failure.  I did sell a lot of shoes though.

    Senior year 

    Thank you!  You’re very kind.  Would anyone care to guess what happened here?  Anyone?  That’s right, a thing I am pretty sure I did not do.  This is going very poorly.  Maybe we need a quick breather before pushing to the finish.

    I’m absolutely calling this a success.  I kept a fleece jacket in my locker specifically to take to that class in case nap time presented itself (after all my work was done, mom).  This girl sat behind me so she’s definitely a trustworthy witness.

    Oh boy, we’ve reached the biggest failure yet.  I’M TRYING.  Wait, does my fake Russian girlfriend count?  No?  Fine.  Anything else?

    I do own a Carrie Underwood album, so that’s a victory!  Great job ending on a winning note, Chris.  HAGS.

    By cjhannas high school Uncategorized
  • 27 Apr

    That’s The Ticket

    Growing up in the Washington, D.C., area meant taking trips to experience everything the city has to offer, from the Smithsonian museums and the Washington Monument, to the mint and the Capitol.

    Going through a stack of old tickets for my last post, I came across some other items like this:

    It’s a pass to sit in the gallery of the Senate from a day in the summer of 1993, when my grandmother took my siblings and I to see the confirmation hearing for Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

    For those who don’t know, if you want to watch the excitement in the Senate or the House, you can go to the office of your senator or representative and get one of these passes.  Of course, they don’t really check if you live in their district.  This can lead to some fun.

    During my senior year of high school, our entire class went to Capitol Hill for a field trip.  I don’t remember having any actual assignment other than attending either a House or Senate session.  The rest of the day was up to us.  So we invented a little game called “How Many Passes Can You Get?”

    It went something like this:

    -Go to one of the House office buildings and walk into any open office
    -Be sure to note the state listed outside the door
    -Pretend to be from that state — the more obscure the town you can pull, the better
    -Bonus points for an accent
    -Repeat as much as possible

    I hope kids still do this.

    Another piece of my childhood I stumbled across was a memento from our trip to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.  We were in Indiana for a family reunion and visited the Indy 500 venue, which included a pretty awesome cruise around the track itself in a bus:

    Finally, the ticket from my time seeing the Dead Sea Scrolls.  On the morning of my brother’s wedding, we had some time to kill, and with this museum near our hotel, a few family members went to check out the exhibit.  The group included my cousin, Lauren, who completely followed through on a joke we made in the gift shop by making me this t-shirt:

    Definitely the most exclusive souvenir I have.

    By cjhannas family high school nerdness Uncategorized
  • 12 Mar

    It Would Be Really Strange If

    In my very quick search for documented evidence for my Leap Day post, I came across the portfolio for the creative writing class I took during my senior year of high school.

    Inside there’s a great mix of fiction and poetry, one of which I’ll share in a minute.  But on the outside of the folder is a great set of seven rules we apparently had for being successful in the class:

    1.  Keep your hand moving
    2.  Lose control
    3.  Be specific
    4.  Don’t think
    5.  Don’t worry about punctuation, spelling, grammar
    6.  You are free to write the worst junk in America
    7.  Go for the jugular

    I particularly like No. 6.  It’s such a great message for what writing should be — just do it, who cares if it stinks or people don’t like it?

    The piece I want to share looks like it sprang out of the prompt “It would be really strange if…”  I briefly thought about utilizing my rap skillz, but I think it’s best if I just give you the text.  You may rap if you please.  Also, it may help to know that Oakton is the name of my school.


    It would be strange if Oakton were run by goats,
    If they walked around school in ties and coats,
    Disciplining children and making them take notes,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by goats.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by chickens,
    If they taught the students and made them read Dickens,
    The brains between them would be slim pickens,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by chickens.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by dogs,
    If in P.E. they went with students on jogs,
    And spent the rest of the day fixing bathroom clogs,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by dogs.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by cats,
    If they did nothing but comb the school for rats,
    And for lunch they fed the students gym mats,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by cats.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by birds,
    If they taught with chirps instead of using words,
    And to lower class sizes they expelled all the nerds,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by birds.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by horses,
    If they said there were no such thing as magnetic forces,
    And accepted papers without requiring a list of sources,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by horses.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by gophers,
    If in the dress code they required students to wear loafers,
    And everyday for lunch they served microwave dishes from Stouffers,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by gophers.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by squirrels,
    If they ignored the boys and taught only the girls,
    And especially liked the ones who wore their hair in curls,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by squirrels.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by armadillos,
    If during class they let students sleep on pillows,
    Or held class outside underneath the willows,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by armadillos.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by fish,
    If they listened to the students and catered to their every wish,
    And they served themselves as a lunchtime dish,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by fish.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by bugs,
    If all they did was harass and bite the students like a bunch of New York thugs,
    And made it illegal for students to give each other hugs,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by bugs.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by bears,
    If they growled at students and chased them up the stairs,
    And forced them to travel everywhere in pairs,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by bears.

    It would be strange if Oakton were run by moose,
    If they let the students roam the halls like chickens on the loose,
    And changed the school colors to orange and chartreuse,
    It would be strange if Oakton were run by moose.

    ###

    By cjhannas high school Uncategorized writing
  • 05 Aug

    Ukraine is Strong

    Back in high school, my friend David and I used to borrow his parents’ video camera and make creative videos as a way to pass time, have fun and learn how to edit.

    Actually, “make” creative videos might not be as accurate as “thinking about making” creative videos. A lot of times we would be hanging out at his house and have the following conversation:

    Dave: “Dude, we should make a video.”
    Me: “Yeah, definitely.”
    Dave: “Do you have any ideas?”
    Me: “No, you?”
    Dave: “No.”
    Me: “Cool.”

    We would look around the room and flip through TV channels looking for inspiration, and sometimes, as in the case I’m about to show you, we could come up with a concept we thought we could actually pull off.

    This video I believe was done during our senior year of high school. I’m pretty sure about the high school part, and based on my car I walk by in the beginning and my seeming lack of braces, that timeline would fit. It would also make it one of the first videos we edited in Adobe Premiere, which has been used for the majority of what I’ve shared here.

    Without further ado:



    Don’t worry, mom. Unloaded BB gun.

    By cjhannas car high school Uncategorized video
  • 21 Oct

    Read Like It’s 2009

    Yesterday was all about catching up with posts from this year.

    Today I’ll follow up with the best 9 posts of 2009. Like yesterday, these are in chronological order, not ranked by merit:

    Door-othy We’re Not in Kansas Anymore
    A debate erupts on the merits of opening car doors for female companions.

    Taylor Swift: Pregnant and Confused?
    I start a rumor about my nemesis, Taylor Swift, with some help from The Washington Post.

    The Smell of Cheap Living
    A poor choice (in hindsight) at the grocery store takes me back to a time of very cheap living. (Note: I will never ever under any circumstances buy these things again).

    Peace Out
    I react to the negative uproar that follows President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize win.

    In Defense of Sweatpants
    A Newsweek article grinds my gears on the topic of men wearing sweatpants in public.

    But the Hat Came Back
    A key piece of my winter wardrobe comes back into my life, years after it was stolen by a swift, crafty blonde.

    All I’m Askin’ is Please, Forgive Me
    Music triggers a round of neighborhood carpool nostalgia.

    Creative Confusion
    Making use of elementary school artwork, and my horrendous handwriting gets me in trouble.

    Do It Yourself Ping Pong
    You never made your own ping pong paddle? Well we did.

    I do not plan retrospectives for the other years in the archives, though there is some good material in there. Solid new stuff coming soon — stay tuned.

    By cjhannas best of fashion food high school home hot dogs running Taylor Swift Uncategorized
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