but the converse is also true: i am more awesome when i am home

Yesterday I spoke to my friend David on the phone and then I made a nice cup of tea. I am very, very happy to be at home but I do miss my Baltimore people.

We went to church, as usual, and it was Pentecost so everyone was wearing red and there were lots of red balloons about. I can't decide if the balloons have gotten smaller over the years or if I have gotten bigger. I hope it is the former. I also can't remember if I was as annoying with the balloons as the younger youth group members were yesterday, or if I was a wonderful child who never made great chains of balloons and caused general mayhem in church. I am sure it was the former. Balloons are an excuse to cause trouble.

Mom did the scripture reading in ASL and I read it aloud with her.

Yesterday Bryn ran a half-marathon and I took photos of her, but I must develop them first. I was very proud of her. She made running a half-marathon look easy. The race was held on Alameda Island which I have never been to, but it seemed quite nice. Lots of empty used car lots.

I also washed Dad's car because the colour spectrum of bug guts on the windshield was one previously uncatalogued by man. Truly, an intense array of color. It's been nice out.

Yesterday I convinced Dad to buy me sugar-free popsicles, which felt like a small but poignant triumph over adversity, even though it wasn't.

Jasmine and I also drove home from Ashland yesterday. It was a long drive and we wanted to kill lots of bad drivers. Because there are seven hours between Ashland and home, we had the opportunity to make up some good car games. Here are two:
1) Every time you see a US Xpress Enterprise truck, Vulcan high-five everyone in the car and use the time to make many dumb Star Trek jokes.

2) Every time you see a "Yes on 8!" bumper sticker, you must immediately tell the gayest story possible. Ideally this story includes themes such as: gay marriage, gay babies, gay love, gay families, and homosexuals not ruining the sanctity of marriage/the Californian constitution.

Yesterday I introduced my dad to fmylife and MLIA after he heard me cackling over the mediocrity of life. Then we went for a very long walk and argued about church politics.

I am going to Oregon today for the rest of the week.

Ella: okay why are you going to oregon, that is not a place you go
Camden: i am going to oregon to see my friend that lives there
Ella: UGH YOU HORRIBLE CHILD

So there's that. I don't know if I will update frequently.

Yesterday my friend Jasmine and I saw the new Star Trek movie with my father and a friend of his. It was the funniest movie I have seen all year. In general, Jasmine and I are terrible people to see movies with. But when you add variables like space, explosions, sexual tension, people who look good, or sexually tense people who look good, in space, causing explosions, I think we become unbearable. I giggled through the whole movie and I think my father regretted bringing us.

We also got bagels and milkshakes earlier in the day and I told her about my Baltimore friends, who I think she thinks are sort of weird. But I'm only mentioning this because I want to start an East Coast/West Coast gang rivalry.

Yesterday my dad and I went grocery shopping which is how Bryn was able to eat her bowl of cereal on the kitchen floor while I made her pull apart Christmas poppers. Bryn explained to me on Sunday that no one in our family knows how to shop for a number other than one or four so that is why there is never any food in the house when I come home.

Also, Bryn did not mention in her post that the paper crowns came wrapped in jokes. Here is the best one:

What lives at the bottom of the sea and shakes?
A nervous wreck!

There were jokes in French too. Here was the one we understood:

France: Ca fait dix jours que je n'ai pas dormi.
Luc: Tu dois être très fatiguée?
France: Non, je dor la nuit.

I'm finding that my room has a lot of toys in it. My favorite discoveries so far are the plush Darth Maul and the toy record player.

Yesterday I realised I had maybe become an adult when I turned to these two kids in Sunday School who were kicking each other and said "Could you two stop?" They stopped only to look at me with these wonderfully betrayed looks on their faces. Dad taught Sunday School - he made us write poetry about our relationship to God. The responses were more varied and honest than I had expected. Outright denial through anger and uneasiness to celebration.

My sister and I went to the farmers market after church and a man sold us two quiche for four dollars. But I think he had rather we had bought his almond croissants, of which he had many more.

Yesterday I took photos of my sister in her prom dress for our grandmother:



We also went to our mother's choral concert. It was a great concert. Mom had commissioned a piece in honor of her twentieth year of singing with the choir. It was received well, which is good because it was a fantastic song. My favorite piece was called "Dona Ubensa" which not only a solo/duet involving my mom but it was a song that the conductor had arranged himself.

The other things I did yesterday included: jetlag, milkshakes with Jasmine and Bryn, going to a pet store with Jasmine and Bryn, going to a comics shop while Jasmine and Bryn made fun of me, going to my dad's writer's group, taking a lot of unnecessary photos of Bryn:



She's standing in front of St. Patrick's Seminary, which is where our mother's concert was held and is one of my most favorite places in the world.

Yesterday I came home on a airplane and summer started officially. My family picked me up from the airport. My father said, "you look thin!" and then he said "do you want to get some Mexican food?" and I thought, "it is good to be home!"

Our family went to get Mexican food in San Jose and then we went to a pet store because we thought there might be kitties there, but instead, there were many birds and one puppy. The cats were hidden in another room. After that, we went to a bookstore and I looked at poetry and my father bought a hardbound copy of Life of Pi by Yann Martel in hopes that this lovely, illustrated version would compel people to return the book to him after they've read it. He bought me The Art of Reading Poetry by Harold Bloom which I am very excited to read. My sister and mother did not buy anything, but my sister is still in school.

Today Bryn and I set up this blog, but today isn't over yet so I won't report on it.