Years Past

I am copying you, yes. But I liked this one!

Grade School

Where did you attend grade school? Ridgebury Elementary School

Who was your principal? Mr. Monty – he STILL recognizes me and remembers my name, some 20-odd years later.

Who was your best friend in 3rd grade? Stephanie Demers, Lauren Marker, Andy Murdoch …

What was a memory you have from Kindergarten? When Patrick Mott stabbed me in the arm with a plastic fork because I didn’t have any fake money to pay for the fake apple at the fake store so I just grabbed it. He took that personally, being the fake cashier at the fake store.

Sixth Grade? Eating Jolly Ranchers while practicing writing 5 paragraph essays – can never have another Jolly Rancher without thinking: intro, supporting 1, supporting 2, supporting 3, conclusion!

Seventh Grade? I think I did the Germany exchange trip in 7th… not sure. But if so, then woooo Oktoberfest in Ingelheim!

Eighth Grade? Climbing the rock wall in the side gym, and one kid not paying attention when he was supposed to belay and letting the person fall. They trusted us too much, sometimes.

Who did you have a crush on during Elementary years? Chris and Andy… there’s a “Chris + Chris” sign written in crayon on my basement stairs, and I went on my first conceivable date-like thing with Andy to the fair.W

hy did you like that person? Chris was cute and funny, things he still hasn’t grown out of, and Andy was very cute and smart.

Do you still like them? Do you still think of them? Chris is my friend/sometimes confidante/former boss – have random IM, facebook and phone conversations now and then; Andy changed a lot, went to a different school and I haven’t talked to him in years.

Who did you have a crush on in middle school? Lots of stupid little ones, and none that I would ever actually want to follow up on – I’d figured out by then that most of the guys in my grade from the other elementary schools were jerks.

Why did you like that person? Attractiveness factor only

Do you still like them or think of them? Absolutely not

What was one of your favorite songs in middle school? Probably some Backstreet Boys thing… *grin

What was the ultimate crush song in middle school? Stairway to Heaven.

Did you go to a lot of the dances in middle school? Yes, but it was mostly for the food and running around outside the gym where the actual dance was going on. That was much more fun than standing there, mortified, as someone else tried to physically drag you across the room to dance with someone else.

What was your favorite field trip in middle school? Sturbridge Village – we got to smell all the farm animals and churn butter for a day! or the Maritime Center – we got to go on a boat and then touch slimy ocean creatures!

Who was your best friend(s) in middle school? Allison Schnidman and Stephanie Mower

Do you still talk to any of them? Was friends with Allison through high school, then she went to Johns Hopkins and it died off… Stephanie, didn’t see her too much in high school, kind of ended there.

Have you seen them recently? No, Allison is going to live in London and Stephanie is still at Northeastern getting a business degree.

Have they changed in any way? Not really sure – doesn’t seem like it. Maybe Allison got a little more self-confident, judging by her facebook pictures? Yay!

Any gossip you know about some of your old friends? Lots are getting married/having kids. Not cool – for me, anyway.

What kind of car did your mom/dad/guardian drive? Old school woody station wagon, then a Saab, Oldsmobile, Volvo, Intrigue… and the newest addition is a little silver VW.

Was it considered the cool car for the field trips? School… bus?

Did you pick on any of the kids in middle school? No – if I didn’t like someone, I just didn’t talk to them. But I actually did talk to a lot of the unpopular kids because I either liked them or felt bad, sometimes. It also sometimes backfired on me. I went to a Power Rangers-themed birthday party. Wasn’t the best…

Were you the one picked on in middle school? No – at this point I was still taller than just about everyone. And I stayed away from those kinds of mean girls.

Who was your favorite teacher from middle school? Frau Venus for German

Did you ever get suspended in middle school? No

What was your favorite thing to play during recess? Didn’t have recess in middle school – in elementary it was either tag or playing on the tire swings.

Would you consider yourself to be popular in middle school? No

High School

What did you want to be when you were going into high school? I knew I liked biology, art and writing – hadn’t put a career to one of those yet, though.

Did a lot of your friends go with you to high school? There is only one high school, so yes.

What highschool did you go to? Ridgefield High School

Did you transfer a few years later? To where? No!

Who was your first new friend in high school? Jacqueline Robinson

Are they still your friend? I would say so – it’s just hard to keep in touch when she’s in California and then in Ridgefield still.

Were you popular in high school? No – but I had a lot of friends in a lot of different groups. A floater, you might say.

What was your favorite freshman year course? Art or English – they FINALLY divided people based on how good they were, whereas they did that in math in middle school. Frustrating! Also, Earth Science with Condosta.

What was your favorite sophomore year course? Biology with Noyes.

What was your favorite junior year course? AP English Language, go Ms. Wassall! Let us convene in the broom closet!

What was your favorite senior year course? AP English Literature – god, that was insane. Lots of extremely loud, irrelevant fights, my anonymous first chapter being picked for our joint novel and Indian food to celebrate the end! And AP Biology, with the talented Mr. Jeffrey “Jazzy” Jaslow and his ridiculous quotes: [As Kate goes to crush a bug] “And that would be a poor, innocent member of what phylum?”

Who was your favorite teacher (s)? Wassall, Jazzy, Ercole “Spin Doctor” Spinelli, crazy leprechaun Condosta and the German-woman-who-lives-up-to-the-stereotype-gloriously, Frau Kavilauskas.

Did you play any sports in highschool? Soccer for 2 years, skiing for 4.

Any big victories for your team, or your high school teams in general? Skiing: we were undefeated a couple times, won divisionals a bunch of times, won divisionals and states while going undefeated once…! And the football team won states, I think. More people cared about that. :(

Were you in any clubs? I forget the name of it, but it just served to be on my resume and it was kind of fun.

Did you do student government? Ugh, no. The people on student government were all nutjobs.

How were your grades in high school? Good, I guess – something like 3.5-.7, unweighted.

Who were your best friends in high school? Freshman year: Allison, Katie, Cate, Steph, Andrea, soccer team girls
Sophomore year and beyond: Jack, Meena, Steph, Katie, Micah, Dave, Ryan, PJ, Nick

Any good memories? Riding a bicycle off a dock into the lake in the rain.

Another memory? Piggy back race across the golf course at night.

And another good memory? Camping on the bluffs, Marcus Dairy Diner in the morning all scruffy and dirty.

Did you go to the dances in high school? In the earlier years, yes; went to junior prom, but not senior.

Were they fun? What was the song in high school? Got a little better at dancing, and it started to be about actually dancing instead of stalking your oblivious crush, so sure, fun. There were so many bad songs in high school, I forget.

What was the ultimate crush song in highschool? I forget because it wasn’t that important.

Did you drive to school in high school? Junior and senior years, yes, and we even evaded the mud lot.

Did you have any younger/older siblings that went to HS with you? Mark, was freshman when I was a senior, he didn’t know how lucky he was to get rides freshman year. It was nice to have him there, too, as long as he didn’t mess with the heater in the winter.

Where was your senior trip to? What?? If we had one, I didn’t go.

How was grad night? I probably just sat at home with my family. Lame.

Did you party a lot in high school? No, chilled a lot though. In the woods, snuck into people’s pools/hot tubs, relaxed in cars and on couches in the basement. Also, had some mad fun soccer and frisbee games in the muddy rainy fields.

Would you consider yourself popular in high school? Eh, no. Like I said, I knew some people who were, but I was not in that general group.

Was your car cool in high school? Totally. Wrangler. Kickin’ it like the stereotypical suburban kids.

Did you have any boyfriends/girlfriends in high school? Adam, after he’d left.

Did you break up? No

If so why did you break up?

Did you have a crush on anyone in high school that you asked out? Never. I’ve never asked anyone out.

Did you ever date someone from high school, but after graduation? Same person, so no.

Did you pull any senior pranks? I didn’t, but remember those jerks I was talking about? Almost the entire male body of my class? They poured cooking oil on the stairs, left a dead fish in the cafeteria ceiling and let mice go in the halls. The previous class was so much better: one kid rode a tricycle down the middle of the ONLY road that gets to the high school from the south side of town. Everyone was late.

What kind of high school did you go to? uniforms? Public school. One friend brought her baby to school junior year for a day.

What teacher did you hate the most? Rachel Black-Unger. Even the name should instill fear into your heart.

If not the same, what teacher did you fight with the most? No, probably her. She told me that my organizational skills were lacking. As if!

Did you ever get kicked out of class? No

About how many times do you think you had detention? Never in high school, a couple times in middle school because my stupid house group decided to never bring in homework, so anyone who innocently forgot theirs in the entire year had to eat lunch in perfect silence in the history room. NOT FUN. Thanks guys.

Did you ever run for student government? No

Did you do better in English or in Math? Or Both? English, by a long shot.

Did you get into the college that you wanted to go to? Every one, yes.

What college do you go to now? Went to BU.

Do you want to be there? Loved it.

What made you decide to go there? Boston seemed cool, in that perfect distance that was too far away to go home every weekend but still close enough to do so without too much trouble, and they had a good bio department.

What is your major? Biology and German Language and Literature

Any minors or emphasis in anything? No

What have been your favorite classes so far? Systems Phys, Neuro, Mammalian Ecology, Weimar Era Film, Der Romantik…

Any classes that you hate? I disliked Gen Chem.

Any classes that you have failed? Failed calculus the first time around, big time. I blame the teacher and myself. Got A’s when I took it in the summer, though. TAKE HARD CLASSES IN THE SUMMER.

Do you go to a big school, or a small school? Middle-ish, I guess. Nowhere near the size of some of those monstrous state schools.

Do you have friends from high school or elementary there with you? Mmm, no close friends, but I knew some people.

Are you still friends with anyone from HS or elementary school? Sure, whenever I can hang out with them, I definitely do so.

Who was one of the first friends you made in college? A real, solid friend? Raj. Played ping pong with him the very first night.

Did you live in the dorms? Towers, Hojo, StuV

How is/was that? I disliked Towers; my roommate was nice, but extremely awkward. Hojo was better. StuV obviously kicked some butt.

Did you like your roommates? Ok, Yes, Ok, Yes, Yes!

Do you like the people that go to your school? What, as a group? Um … for the most part, they’re cool, but some of them I just wanna… *shakes fist*

Have you ever gotten in trouble at your school? No

Has anything major ever happened at your school? Hockey team took some names – after I’d graduated… and freshman year was when the Sox broke the curse, so that riot was pretty intense.

Do you still have the car from highschool? No, it’s dead now.

Are you going to finish college in 4 years? Indeedy did.

Are you going to go on to a higher education later (masters)? ‘Swhat I’m doing now.

What are you going to be when you grow up? I don’t think I’ll ever consider myself grown up, so probably nothing ever.

Are you satisfied with that? :)

How many times will you change your job interests? How am I supposed to know that??

Are you dating anyone? Yes

If so how did you meet them? Invited by a mutual friend to go see Tomb Raider: Cradle of Life and then fell in love with his car. And him.

Are you going to get married in college, or after college? Uh, I think that one’s set just about now.

Any fond memories of college? Thao teaching me step at 2am – people under us probably didn’t appreciate that.

Another? Getting seriously sketched out with Jen and Danielle at clubs, then laughing about it over late night pizza.

And another? Dim Sum with Jia, Steph and Debbie :D

How long until you graduate from college? Almost exactly a year ago.

How well have your grades been? Sucky at first, then much much better.

Have you done any college sports/clubs? Played a couple of games of IM soccer, did some Ultimate.

Is your school known for anything (academics, sports, ect)? Hockey, biomedical engineering, I guess…

Any great acknowledgements you have recieved in school? I … got a German award? Seeing as I was one of two German majors, I thought it was pretty unsurprising. And Dean’s List once.

Do you think college prepares you for the real world? Depends what you do during it. Probably not, though.

What was helpful for college that you learned in highschool? Teachers love you when you stay after class and ask questions.