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hYpAbLudRaGoN21
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Name: shelby
Country: United States
State: California
Birthday: 12/17/1988
Gender: Male
Interests: i take photos.
Expertise: sleeping. procrastinating. making people laugh.
Occupation: artist/photographer
Message: message meEmail: email me
AIM:  shellsh0ck21
Member Since:
11/8/2002
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| I used to be proud of my ability to keep updating my Xanga. Over time, I suppose people stopped coming, and I got less and less enthused about updating this, like it's some small amusement park, and myspace was the Disneyland that fucking opened next door.
Lots have changed since my last post. I've graduated. It doesn't seem so different, except that...I won't be going back to Mills in the fall. Actually, you know, I probably AM going back...but not as a student. I have people to see. I have a legacy that I have to make sure stays a legacy.
I wish I had more motivation to keep this going. I do, I guess Facebook takes up a lot of my time. I didn't have too many friends who were xanga-exclusive anyways. But this is not the end. Not yet. I keep this around, hoping one day I'll find a really great reason to write in this.
Somedays, I wish I still knew some people. Sometimes, I wish I took the time to get to know them when they were still here. Like this one girl, whom I haven't ever really talked to. Not in person, anyways. The last time I saw her was January '04, before she moved four hundred miles away, and now it's over 3 years later, and I haven't heard her voice since. Jesus, that's sad.
I miss people. I've been alone for far too much of this summer, to the point where I talk to myself a lot and I'm writing a lot more. I need some friends who like to stay in town.
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| two weeks, and I'm sitting here, incredibly nervous. I do not think I am ready to leave high school. Everyone talks about leaving...as if it is going to be the greatest moment of their life. Seth and I were doing the senior slide show music and he was adamant on injecting lots of songs tinted with the themes of summer...all the while stating that everyone was looking forward to the summer and how his was going to be amazing. I was uneasy with the whole thing- I wasn't too excited for the summer to come, that's for sure. I find myself wanting more and more for these times to never end. I was really downtrodden for a long time, and I still am, to some extent, but I guess I've reevaluated. I like where I am now. I'm content.
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| there is a chill in the room. i can't find the open window, but my normally-warm hands are cold, and it makes it hard to type.
i don't know why my hands are always warm. i don't know why whenever my hands are cold, i am either sick or there is something wrong. usually i don't know why.
maybe it's the way the sky is overcast, with pale blue sprouting up between vast amounts of grays and whites. maybe it's how the wind whipped and stung cheeks, and how it tossed around the dainty leaves on trees, testing resilency. occasionally, a leaf will be broken off, and thrown up, up, then down, in a glorious show. we know the leaf is destined to hit the ground, but we don't know when or where or even the manner in which it will do so. all we have predetermined is that the leaf will fall. and maybe it'll twirl twice and drop. maybe it'll flutter hopelessly and get thrown onto a front porch or a balcony. maybe it'll soar, higher and higher, until it is sucked into the screaming engines of an airplane, destined for places unknown. will the leaf be okay in the end?
who cares? it's just a leaf.
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| it's amazing, and it just hit me: this was my last year of robotics.
throughout the years, i have always viewed it was a chore, something i
had to do. i never once looked back at it as something i could walk
away from easily; it was always something that i had to expend effort
for. i never knew why.
i remember four years ago, i was
sitting on a bench at school, waiting for my interview with the
managers of the robotics team. it was the first time i met natalie,
brock, aaron, and peter. scared the shit out of me. if i ever have the chance to sit in the same room as them again, i'd feel the same. i remember freshman year, robotics wasn't a big deal for me, but
because of brock, because he scared me, i'd go almost daily and stay.
my first time
at competition was incredibly exciting. there were so many teams there
that year, and it was an amazing taste of what we had done. we went on to
win the autodesk visualization award, a grand victory for us. i tripped
over the barrier on they way to high five the judges.
sophomore
and junior years were both years where my membership wasn't
particularly outstanding. i showed up, but i never gave myself that
push to something better. those years, we never really tested the
limits of what we could do.
now, here i am, a senior, and it
has already been two days since competition has ended. i feel
incredibly privileged to have been part of something like that,
especially this year. the competition was extremely tiring, but also
fun at the same time. i spent time with lots of people who were
previously strangers to me. we worked hard, we pushed ourself and ended
up with a record matching that of a team sponsored by NASA, monster
cable, and many, many others. our steelworked frame proved to be more
than enough to keep up with their aluminum base and titanium components. i
am incredibly proud to have been on the side, chanting "el toro" like
it was the last thing i'd ever say, screaming my voice hoarse as we
proved to the other 47 teams that MRT was not a joke, that we were
strongest defensively as well as a very able scorer. our road to
seeming glory ended prematurely, however, when we didn't get seeded for
final 8 alliance matches.
i don't think it matters that we
didin't go on. we did amazingly, and i am sure lots of teams there were
scared of facing off against the tank that was El Toro. We may
not have had a machine shop, nor may we have the most amazing tools and
accesories at hand. but we knew how to play the game. we knew how to
make them afraid, and wasn't it machiavelli who said it was better to
be feared than loved?
it was a bitter defeat, brought forth
only because of the other teams' discontent with ours. but it lived up
to all my expectations and more. we were on tv, we were the team built
by sheer determination, and somehow, i feel as if we connected this
year to team themis. we went out there, and we did what we did
incredibly better than anyone expected without any major sponsors.
i am sad to be leaving, possibly never again walking into the san jose
state university's event center and feeling that excitement in the air, the tingle of almost a thousand nerds crammed into one arena. i may never be able
to see blue haired Mark, nor his insane kicks at the plexiglass. i
may never get the chance to do the cha-cha slide with a dancing hat,
nor will i be able to do the YMCA with judges and students from schools all around the country, brought together by sheer love of robotics.
i'm glad i got to be part of the team. to the members of next year, keep up the good work. we'll be
working hard for the remainder of the year so you can all uphold the
legacy of little caesar's pizza, late nights, unsafe wielding of tools,
and the like. the the members of past and present members, it was an
amazing experience to be able to be cooped up in a small room with you
all during a stressful 6 week building period. making OSH runs, screaming, bickering, joking, cussing, "that's-what-she-said"-ing, welding without protecting our eyes. it was amazing knowing
you all. the robotics team was amazing.
photo album from competiton:
Silicon Valley Regional, Days 1&2
Silicon Valley Regional, Day 3
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