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So I'm going to start off with wondering why I never thought to write down a chronology of my life since that's what I seem to resort to when I'm feeling down or something. It's probably because I'd find a way to turn what could effectively just be The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe into a whole series and I'm not committed enough for that, but since I really, really need to write something and get frustrations off of my chest I'll focus on what I can safely call the core of everything wrong with my life: High School. For those of you who haven't heard me say it about five-hundred times in the past: I'm currently living overseas in Naples, Italy. I moved here during my eighth-grade year, October 2013, and it's what I can only think of as the start of everything rolling down a very long, bumpy hill. Don't think I don't like it here; I adore the community that I have the privilege of living in, love all of the close friends I've made during these past three years, and most of my memories I look back with fondness happened in Europe. Unfortunately, life hasn't been all sunshine and rainbows for me, especially as of late. When I moved here as a homeschooled eighth-grader who's only experiences with the real world had primarily been Boy Scouts, church, and whatever swim team I was on, I faced a pretty jarring shift. All of my friends were now six hours behind me, I was stuck in a hotel room for seven months with my brother, parents, and dog, and I had to swim on an Italian club team after being off of swim for about four months. I was too naive to realize it at the time, but my life was starting to go to hell. That first year I had a massive lapse in my studies in favor of attempting to stay in touch with my friends and that obviously wasn't an okay choice that I made, but at the time they were all I had and I tried to hold on with a steely grip out of fear that if I loosened that grip I'd lose them forever. I faced a massive backlog of schoolwork come my freshman and sophomore years that's added on to more recent stresses and I would give anything to have the opportunity to go back and remedy that issue with the knowledge I currently possess. Unfortunately, that will likely never happen unless god himself throws me back in time and it would be an absurd thing to dwell on instead of more important things in the present. The summer preceding my freshman year was where I started to try and put my exuberant personality to good use and make some new friends (I was a really talkative child who only saw the world as good and was friends with everybody). Unfortunately, that exuberant personality had deteriorated a bit since I didn't really know how to make friends anymore since I didn't really have to back in America. Where I lived and in the activities I took part in, I pretty much had friends thrust onto me. It was usually something along the lines of "Hey, you two are sharing a tent this weekend!" or "Hey, you four are on a relay together!", but I didn't really have that here in Naples because I'd hit the age where everybody becomes super judgmental about you and the things you like and are really selective with who they hang around. The first month in Scouts here I didn't really make any friends because since I was an older kid I could have a whole tent to myself so I just did that for a while, and then I made what's turned out to be one of my best friends when we bonded over Doctor Who, LEGO, and other geeky stuff. I also had the extremely important part of assistant director in a one-week drama production of Hansel and Gretel put on by the Missoula Children's Theater and made a few friends there. These few friends I made at the beginning have all moved away or are preparing to move away for college following this year and I'm pretty much the only one left now. I did make some more friends among my teammates on the swim team, but the only person left from that group besides me is going to college early after Thanksgiving, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Oh I also met my first crush who I fell head-over-heels for during that play and I made the very very cringey as **** mistake of DMing her a cheesy instagram photo that basically said "all I want is you in my life" or some bull**** like that after one week of knowing her. Fortunately, we've both moved past that and are pretty good friends now although she's getting ready to go to college after this school year. So there's a brief look into how I thought relationships worked at 13: You meet, you like each other, and then BANG, you're an item. So that was basically freshman year: failed attempt at a relationship, made some friends who have moved/are moving soon, did a thing in a play, and got behind in schoolwork. w e w Jumping ahead to the summer before sophomore year, I was elected to be the senior patrol leader of the troop here and had the absolute worst time with it. Most of that is attributable to a single adult leader who intentionally scared me at a week-long camp in Germany, undermined my decisions in favor of his which ended up being terrible ones, and shooting down proposals when they were just ideas. F U N . After that ****show ended I began taking some electives at the american high school on the base: Robotics Engineering, Engineering CAD, and Advanced Chorus (Here's a fun link). I had two teachers; one taught both CAD and Robotics Engineering, and they're some of my favorite people in the world. The Robotics teacher let me do whatever the hell I wanted as long as it kept to course material more or less (like build an R/C Tank controlled by a PS4 remote, butcher computer fans to experiment with controllable fan speeds, and mess with 3D Printing) and on top of that he was super chill and brutally roasted students daily (it was one of the most entertaining things ever). The choir teacher was also really fun and let us have potlucks during school hours while watching movies like Inside Out. Last year was where I probably made most of my friends ,most of which never talk to me because I never see them in person anymore : ( . I do have a handful of friends both from the school who still talk to me despite how rare it is to see my face and make sure I'm human for them and I couldn't appreciate them more. Sophomore year was where this really happened though... I somehow managed to stay behind in studies at home in favor of, you guessed it, hanging onto friends again. I also started battling with some pretty intense mood swings, especially around holidays and my birthday where everything just dies in me and I lose interest in pretty much everything and shut down, making it harder to stay on top of stuff. Now that I'm back to homeschool full time for junior year for a myriad of reasons (don't want GPA to take a hit from parents wanting to go on vacation early, parents finding different resources to replace classes that would be taken at the high school, etc. usually involving parents), I realize just how much of what I had I took for granted. I thought I would always have that group of people around me and I'd be comfortable like that, but I focused too much on that and slipped up. Though I did mess up on my own, I feel like I've learned from it so that it won't happen again. I learned that the people who do care about me are the ones who will keep in touch, and the ones who I'm a "b-list" friend to won't. Another thing that I learned is that if I just try to manage my emotional issues and not let people know what's going on that I will reach a point where it gets to be too much and I'll ultimately break down, which happened very recently and it wasn't pretty. I just got so sick of the direction everything was heading and locked myself in a bathroom until my mom found me a blubbering mess inside and got me to let her know what's going on. I never really want to admit things because I always think that the result is going to be worse than it actually is, mostly from wanting to talk about these things but thinking through the conversation too quickly and having it end in a worse way than it started. Thus, I just keep it all inside and try to manage it on top of everything else in life, and it just doesn't work. The main point I got across to my mom is that I feel distant and isolated from people, that I need to be around a wider variety of people than the ones who I live closest to and drive me up the wall on a daily basis and invade my privacy a lot, and that I kept thinking that if I had just spoken up sooner it would be very different. That emotional dump actually turned out to be really good for me because in the last month I feel like I've learned more about myself than before. I began figuring out what I actually want in life, in a relationship, and in myself. I figured out that part of the reason why I always turn to action figures when I feel like I need something is that they're a temporary stand-in for people in that I give them personalities and they become a part of me through my photography. I figured out that I was really only talking about wanting to be an engineer because that's what I've been driven towards since I was ten and I hate confrontation about lifestyle choices and will say about anything I need to in order to get past that. I figured out that a lot of the crap I put myself through is just me talking to myself too much instead of talking to other people. With all of that having come out of my system, it's given me room to focus more on how I can improve my junior year from my sophomore year. It's also given me more confidence to speak up for myself. In the past, whenever I'd been suggested a course, I would've just said yes and tried to deal with whatever resulted with varying results. I've been more vocal about my course load this year and how my schedule works for me and I've actually gotten things done. I went into the PSAT three days ago and left feeling good about my performance having left with answering all of the questions, the vast majority I knew how to answer. I've gotten over a lot of my timidness that I'd adopted from moving here and asked a girl to homecoming, something I previously thought would be impossible for me to succeed at, and it went really well (the girl and I are looking at going out again, actually). So, yeah, I'm not done with high school yet (I'm barely past halfway), but I've figured out that it's a delicate experience that ultimately I determine the outcome for, and that it's more of a learning experience than anything I'd previously encountered. Sorry if this seems incoherent and jumpy; I wrote it over the course of a few days as things happened and felt that I needed to actually finish it so I can close the tab.

"no! i must ride the skateboard!" pepper shouted. the radio said "no, pepper. you are the skateboard." and then pepper was a skateboard

Nick's done some crime, now he's doing the time. I just found a better title; Nick's a Bad Brick

Creepy pasta

is nick making the dreamworks face

damn son that was really NOT!

OMGOMG MY CD IS HANTED BECAUSE PEPPER FELL OF HIS SKATEBORD ONTO THE ROAD SO THEN I WENT TO CAVE ANMD SAW FACE AND PEPPER TURNED BLOOD l SCARY RIGHT BUT THEN PEPPR TELEPORTED 2 ROAD AGAIN ANED ABULINCE RAN ME OVER BUT ITS GRAPHIOC SO IM NOT SHOWING

Welcome! May I ask where you got that Pepper face in your avatar from? It looks familiar...

eight

Hah, I can relate to a lot of this, in particular trying to go down one career path because people suggested it and thought I wanted it even though it wasn't something I really wanted. It's rad you've figured that out while you're still in high school - it happened for me maybe a year or so ago, in my freshman year of college. Not too late to change course, thankfully, but it was pretty darn close. Good luck with Junior year!

Hello! I've known this site for... forever! I even downloaded mods for LEGO Island 2! And, I thought, "Why not sign up?"

"I ate the last doughnut" face.

You want some Pepper Roni with that order, sir?

A single like on this post does not tell how much I can relate to this post. There's just so much... IDK even know how to comment except... good luck, and even that doesn't even say what I want to say.

Creepy pasta, my favourite type of pasta.

okay mate

You forgot Jack Stone

I hope you said "can do" "will do" and "done" to yourself at the appropriate points in production

This is a weird Rock Raiders/Homestuck crossover thing written partly in reaction to me finding Rock Raiders again and getting obsessed with it and partly in reaction to someone else doing a story in Homestuck's format but leaving out Sburb. I left in Sburb but am doing this in my own weird format. This is what I have so far: ----------------------------------- The LMS Explorer had just gotten enough energy to escape from Planet U and returned home to wherever when suddenly another wormhole sent them to yet another place, this time to Planet Ouya. Chief: "Oh crap" So Chief was teleported down to the surface of Planet Ouya and was immediately greeted by Master Chief from Halo, except it was the Megabloks version and Chief is a Lego minifigure so it wouldn't turn out very well. Chief: "Hi I am Chief from the Rock Raiders and my ship was transported to this weird place, where am I?" Master Chief: "This is Planet Ouya" Chief: "Wait a second is that supposed to be some parody on the 'Planet U' we just got back from?" Master Chief: "Of course it is; there's also Planet Playstation 4 but it's not ready yet" Chief: "Is there also another planet for a new XBox 360??" Master Chief: "Yes. But it's not called the 720 because you know what happened when Atari tried to double the number on the 2600. Hey do you wanna see my ship? It's called the Internet Explorer" Chief: "What, seriously? Dude you're ripping off our LMS Explorer to make a pun about a web browser" Master Chief: "Yeah but basically everything in this story is gonna turn out to be ripped off on something or another. Let's go!!" Chief and Master Chief went to the Internet Explorer which turned out to be a stupidly designed ship because it was all blue and looked like the letter E but inside it had references to all sorts of Internet memes so it was okay. Vegeta was actually one of the crew so it was kind of annoying because whenever he was asked about any of the ship's stats he always said "over 9000" because the panel he read stats from was edited to add 9000 to every single stat. Chief: "Okay, who the heck owns this ship???" Master Chief: "Oh, the Princess of the Internet of course!!!" Chief: "Oh, you have GOT to be kidding me" So Master Chief took Chief to the main control room where there was a beautiful squirrel girl with a crown. Chief: "YOU're the Princess of the Internet???" Princess: "Well actually my name is Nova but yeah I guess" Chief: "Can you help us, we need to get energy crystals for the ship" Princess: "Yeah sure" And then suddenly the two ships were transported to a new planet that didn't exist yet except right just now. Except Chief and Master Chief got sent back to the LMS explorer and the Princess went and installed a cross between the Sburb server and Lego Rock Raiders on a computer she didn't even appear to have before. Chief: "Okay what the heck happened??" Master Chief: "I dunno lol but I see this isn't Planet Ouya!!!!" Chief: "Well then what is it???" Master Chief: "Well I see a big floating sign saying 'LAND OF ROCK, LANDSLIDES AND FEW ENERGY CRYSTALS' so that must be it??" Chief: "Why the landslides???" Master Chief: "A landslide has occured" Master Chief: "A landslide has occured" Master Chief: "A landslide has occured" Master Chief: "A landslide has occured" Chief: "Hey it's not my fault landslides occur all the time in that game" Master Chief: "Well at least it's not LAND OF SLIMY SLUGS INVADING YOUR BASE" Chief: "That could happen later, perhaps with an ALL YOUR BASE reference" Master Chief: "Or 'im in ur base killing ur doods'???" Chief: "Exactly" Chief teleported like 5 Rock Raiders down into a cavern as well as a tool store and they reported back Docs: "A new cavern has been discovered" Chief: "Shut up the cavern at the start of the mission doesn't count" Rock Raider: "Well uh there's tons of DIRT" Chief: "Drill it, d00d" Rock Raiders: "Well uh, we tried but there's these things that look like Gushers instead of energy crystals????" Chief: "what" Rock Raiders: "Then we got it and it said it went into a grist cache?" then the Chief tried to call the Internet Explorer Vegeta: "Main screen turn on" Chief: "Hello uh princess are you there??" Princess: "Of course I'm here what does it look like I'm doing???" She places the Alchemiter, Totem Lathe and Punch Designix on the LMS Explorer and also the Cruxtruder and stuff but they didn't notice really. Princess: "Okay so you should collect that gusher stuff, it's called Grist. I'll explain how to use it to get energy crystals later." Chief: "What are you going on about" Princess: "Don't you get it this is a Rock Raiders/Sburb crossover!!" Chief: "Oh okay that makes sense I guess" Princess: "Have your dudes drill for more grist then call back" Chief: "Ok" Vegeta: "Main screen turn off" Chief: "Okay so you guys need to keep digging and stuff" Rock Raiders: "Okay I'm drilling more walls" Jet: "An energy crystal has been found" Rock Raiders: "Actually it looks like this is an energy crystal seam??" Rock Raiders: "Energy crystals appear to be super rare on this planet though" Jet: "Energy crystals found!!!" Vegeta: "Main screen turn on" Princess: "Okay guys wait up I'm teleporting over don't use the crystals yet" Vegeta: "Main screen turn off" and the Princess teleported into the LMS explorer Princess: "Okay I deployed some equipment onto the ship earlier" Princess: "If someone can teleport up an energy crystal that'd be great" Chief: "Unit teleported safely" Princess: "When are units ever NOT teleported safely???" Chief: "I dunno I just always say that" Then the Princess took an energy crystal and captchalogued it with her SINGLE LINKED LIST fetch modus, which could hold an infinite number of items but in order to take any out or find any she has to start from the start of the deck each time. She had been meaning to upgrade it to a DOUBLE LINKED LIST which would let her go in either direction but she had been too lazy. ANYWAY she brought Chief to the room with all the tools and found the card with the Energy Crystal on it and looked on the back for the code (ENERGY!!) then putting it into the Punch Designix and entering it to punch the card. She took the cap off of Cruxtruder and put the Cruxite Dowel and card in the Totem Lathe to make an Energy Crystal totem which was then put into the Alchemiter to make an energy crystal at the cost of 1 grist, then does it like 15 more times. Chief: "Holy crap!!" Princess: "Just keep mining that Grist, okay? Then we can make more energy crystals" HOWEVER pulling the cap off of the Cruxtruder caused the kernelsprite to fly out and also started a countdown of impending doom. Princess: "Oh yeah, at this part you would normally have to use a prepunched card in order to make some object to save you but since we're already on our land that's completely unnecessary, oops." The Princess thought for a second about the fact that they'd have a void sesion if they didn't prototype anything at all and prototyped it with AN ENERGY CRYSTAL to make CrystalSprite. Meanwhile Docs looked out from the ship and saw another planet!! Docs: "A new cav- I mean a new planet, has been discovered" It was red, white and blue all over, with stars and stripes. Princess: "Oh yeah, Obama and Romney are also doing Sburb. Land Of Presidents and Patriotism, I think?" ------------------------- to be continued???? ---------------------------