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Although the series focuses on Hogwarts, there are other wizarding schools throughout the world, according to Rowling. Obviously, you have Beauxbaton and Durmstrang, but Rowling also mentions at least one school in Brazil and one in the United States (reppin') called "Salem Witches Institute" Not as cool as going to Hogwarts I presume, but hey, beggars can't be choosers. And all the Americans who are reading this, just had their minds blown. (information for this was found here)

Kick Hard or Go Home

For a fun day of shenanigans this year, my class dean decided that we should have an all out kickball tournament, pitting advisor group against advisor group. Naturally, my advisors were thrilled to find out we had a chance to prove our awesomeness through physical activity. We got seriously into it, donning group t-shirts and a cleverly devised nickname "the Shinmates". Unfortunately for us however, we seem to have overlooked one important skill necessary for winning ANY kind of sporting event, athleticism. The shinmates were "shincompetent" when it came to winning a game. Yours truly even managed to get a bit roughed up in the process of losing miserably. On the plus side though, we had a lot of fun since no one was truly bent on winning, and we managed to win a game in the end! Well, I'm off to manage the 3rd degree burns I have on my face after not thinking ahead and packing sunscreen for our all day sports extravaganza... Oh, the trials of being pale...

Cooking Catastrophe

School Projects can bring out the best and worst of your abilities to think fast, make deadlines, and be creative. Unfortunately, during a recent Spanish Project in which I had to make an authentic hispanic dish, I failed all the above criteria, and managed to make the worst food possible. My first mistake was choosing an authentic Spanish chocolate mousse recipe that was so authentic, it used the metric system for the ingredients! I wouldn't even know where to start putting in 2 DESERT SPOONS of sugar! what is a desert spoon anyway? A really small spoon? It seems like it would be easier if the whole world decided on a global measurement that was easily understood by everyone. My greatest error of all though was not reading the entire directions and skipping the butter that I was supposed to put in step 1. After I had finished making the mousse I had to hastily add in all the butter and when it hadn't melted properly, there were chunks of butter in my mousse. It was horrific. Needless to say the last thing that went wrong is the mousse never solidifying, making it look more like brownie batter then anything else. The lesson I learned the hard way, besides the fact that no one in their right mind tried my "mousse" was that cooking should be left to the professionals, and not me.

Vermont

Back to some warmer weather! (I never thought 34 degrees would seem warm to me!). I had a great weekend skiing in Vermont on a school trip! This is my second year going on the trip and I can feel myself improving every time I step on the slope. Still not ready for black diamonds yet, and I had to learn that the hard way. (Picture a someone taking a miraculous fall down an incredibly steep hill and not stopping until they reach the very bottom) It was mildly humiliating when I snowballed, but I can appreciate the humor in it. Anyways conditions at Killington were great, not too icy and MUCH warmer than my trip last year. If I find pictures I will post them later! (fortunately my demise was not captured on film)