Oye Carumba!
I came back from the band trip on Sunday night, and it was awesome! I loved Pennsylvania.
We left freaking early on Thursday. Then we got to Amish country in the afternoon. We first went to a touristy model Amish house/farm. We spent most of the trip in rural areas like this, particularly Lancaster, and everyone's favorite, Intercourse, PA.
We also went to a delicious Amish restaurant for dinner that night.
On Friday we went to a Farmer's market in everyone's second favorite, Bird-in-Hand, PA. It was a pretty cool place. I got a lollipop for ten cents, a cup of apple cider for 50 cents, and got my mom some chocolates for Mother's Day.
Next we took a ride on the Strasburg railroad. This was actually really fun. I sat with Brittney, Kaitlyn, and Dylan. Kelly and Joe were supposed to sit with us, but they "got separated" (I bet they secretly wanted to ditch us). But it was a nice ride on the train, just looking at the land out of the window was cool.
Then we went to Gettysburg. Gettysburg is freaking huge, I had no idea. You could probably spend multiple days there, but we just had a couple of hours. Luckily we had a pretty good tour guide.
The gift shop at the restaurant in Gettysburg we went to for dinner proved just how stupid some people from my school are. People actually bought Confederate flags, and not even to be rebellious or anything, but "because they thought the design was cool." I compared it to buying a flag with a swastika because it looked cool, but Cindy (who bought a Confederate flag) didn't seem to get my point, haha. Denningham and Callahan joked about this plenty on the bus, I sat in front near them, and was pretty much the only student laughing at their jokes all the time, haha.
Then Saturday was the festival. We had to get up at an ungodly hour because the school was far and Jazz band had an early performance time.
Jazz band played pretty well. Not perfect of course, but really good. I wasn't the slightest bit nervous. I could tell other people were, even Joe. Joe had some awesome drum solos. Everyone who soloed did great.
Then, after watching the chorus and some choruses from other schools, concert band performed around noon. Our warm-up song went pretty well. And our first song Elsa wasn't so bad either. People were nervous though. I think the band's biggest problem, which includes myself, was not watching Pratt. I had my eyes on him (I don't even have music for the song), but I kept jumping the gun and rushing the downbeat when I had my crash cymbal crashes (he stretches the time, especially at the end of the measure, so obviously there's a problem when people don't follow Pratt's conducting). Finally, we played our last, and probably hardest, song, Tricycle. We've played this song awesomely lately, including at the concert, where we played everything very well. However, on this day people got really nervous, and didn't watch Pratt. The time was all over the place. It sounded like a train wreck to us. People actually stopped playing their parts at some parts in the song. Mike B even messed up his solo, that's unlike him. Most of us thought we lost our A, but we tried to forget about it so that we could have fun at Hershey Park.
Hershey Park was awesome! I wanna go back so badly! I hung out most of the time with Joe and Kelly. First we went on a small roller coaster called the mouse hunt or something. It was babyish, but it was Joe's first roller coaster, and he and Kelly liked it. Then we went on the Wildcat, this was a wooden roller coaster, that surprised me by being the craziest roller coaster I went on all day. It basically consisted on nonstop drops in steep curves that caved inward, it was pretty cool. Joe and Kelly didn't want to go back to that one though, haha. Then we went on another wooden one that featured two roller coasters that raced to a finish line. Each one had a slightly different track. This was the coolest roller coaster ever. We went on five times in a row, posing for the camera every time. Joe and Kelly bought a picture of them kissing when their picture was taken on the roller coaster. It was cool.
Then at 7 we went to the awards ceremony for the festival. They started with lots of awards for middle schools and stuff. But then we started getting awards. Both concert band and jazz band got first place with a gold! Every chorus group got first place too, chorus and chorale with a silver, and jazz choir with a gold. Jazz choir also got the overall choir award. The first place didn't mean all that much because we were pretty much the only school in our division (for most groups at least, as far as I know, and jazz choir was the only jazz choir that competed), but the fact that we got golds was amazing! PHS has never gotten an A in concert band before, we finally did it! And we all though we sucked too. Pratt told us today that it was because of the things we worked on that we normally get points off for, like intonation and interpretation. We also got a bunch of solo awards, and my favorite, a rhythm section award for jazz band! It was great!
We were all so happy after this. I went back to the bus with Kelly, Joe, and Brittney, who brought the trophies. Then we walked back to the park, and Kelly got henna tattoos on her hand and stuff. But I was kinda bummed that I missed over an hour of time I could've been on roller coasters by walking with them. But then Brittney and I went to meet the rest of the band at the Great Bear roller coaster. Pratt told everyone who wanted to go on to meet him there at 9. This was one of the roller coasters where your feet dangle and it goes upside-down and all that. I had never been on a roller coaster before. Brittney and I sat in a row with Mr. Pratt. And he was scared shitless of the ride. Denningham and Callahan wanted him to ride in front, but he refused to sit anywhere but the middle seat in the middle of the ride. I sat on the end seat. Pratt also insisted that it was worse in the dark, but I think it would be worse during the day because you can see where you're going and when you're upside down and all that. The ride was awesome! I don't see how Pratt was scared shitless though. I could barely even tell when the difference between being upside-down and right-side-up. It was wicked fun though. Then I went on a second time. I convinced Danielle to go on with me, and eventually we got Mr. Pratt to go on a third time too. And I sat in his row again. He said he only did it because the band got the A. It was so fun. I wish I had more time at Hershey Park. I wanna go to Six Flags this summer now.
After Hershey Park I thought my bus driver was crazy because he kept flashing his high-beams. But I eventually realized something was wrong, and he was trying to contact the first bus driver because the buses had to stay together. He finally had to contact him by having someone call a student on the bus. We pulled over and I soon found out the bus lost its power steering. Luckily our awesome bus driver got us back to the hotel alive though.
The next morning we left the hotel late because of the bus problem though. Eventually we went to breakfast with only two buses, people had to sit on the floor. So we went to Philly eventually, but we were behind schedule. In Philly we went to the liberty bell, the Independence Mall (I think that's what it was, it was a food court with gift shops) where I had a couple of Philly cheesesteaks (mmmmmm), and we were going to go up the steps from the movie Rocky, but something was going on in front of them so we just posed with the Rocky statue. I wish we had more time in Philly because it was a really cool city.
After this we headed back to RI. It was an awesome trip, and I can't wait to go on another one next year!
We left freaking early on Thursday. Then we got to Amish country in the afternoon. We first went to a touristy model Amish house/farm. We spent most of the trip in rural areas like this, particularly Lancaster, and everyone's favorite, Intercourse, PA.
We also went to a delicious Amish restaurant for dinner that night.
On Friday we went to a Farmer's market in everyone's second favorite, Bird-in-Hand, PA. It was a pretty cool place. I got a lollipop for ten cents, a cup of apple cider for 50 cents, and got my mom some chocolates for Mother's Day.
Next we took a ride on the Strasburg railroad. This was actually really fun. I sat with Brittney, Kaitlyn, and Dylan. Kelly and Joe were supposed to sit with us, but they "got separated" (I bet they secretly wanted to ditch us). But it was a nice ride on the train, just looking at the land out of the window was cool.
Then we went to Gettysburg. Gettysburg is freaking huge, I had no idea. You could probably spend multiple days there, but we just had a couple of hours. Luckily we had a pretty good tour guide.
The gift shop at the restaurant in Gettysburg we went to for dinner proved just how stupid some people from my school are. People actually bought Confederate flags, and not even to be rebellious or anything, but "because they thought the design was cool." I compared it to buying a flag with a swastika because it looked cool, but Cindy (who bought a Confederate flag) didn't seem to get my point, haha. Denningham and Callahan joked about this plenty on the bus, I sat in front near them, and was pretty much the only student laughing at their jokes all the time, haha.
Then Saturday was the festival. We had to get up at an ungodly hour because the school was far and Jazz band had an early performance time.
Jazz band played pretty well. Not perfect of course, but really good. I wasn't the slightest bit nervous. I could tell other people were, even Joe. Joe had some awesome drum solos. Everyone who soloed did great.
Then, after watching the chorus and some choruses from other schools, concert band performed around noon. Our warm-up song went pretty well. And our first song Elsa wasn't so bad either. People were nervous though. I think the band's biggest problem, which includes myself, was not watching Pratt. I had my eyes on him (I don't even have music for the song), but I kept jumping the gun and rushing the downbeat when I had my crash cymbal crashes (he stretches the time, especially at the end of the measure, so obviously there's a problem when people don't follow Pratt's conducting). Finally, we played our last, and probably hardest, song, Tricycle. We've played this song awesomely lately, including at the concert, where we played everything very well. However, on this day people got really nervous, and didn't watch Pratt. The time was all over the place. It sounded like a train wreck to us. People actually stopped playing their parts at some parts in the song. Mike B even messed up his solo, that's unlike him. Most of us thought we lost our A, but we tried to forget about it so that we could have fun at Hershey Park.
Hershey Park was awesome! I wanna go back so badly! I hung out most of the time with Joe and Kelly. First we went on a small roller coaster called the mouse hunt or something. It was babyish, but it was Joe's first roller coaster, and he and Kelly liked it. Then we went on the Wildcat, this was a wooden roller coaster, that surprised me by being the craziest roller coaster I went on all day. It basically consisted on nonstop drops in steep curves that caved inward, it was pretty cool. Joe and Kelly didn't want to go back to that one though, haha. Then we went on another wooden one that featured two roller coasters that raced to a finish line. Each one had a slightly different track. This was the coolest roller coaster ever. We went on five times in a row, posing for the camera every time. Joe and Kelly bought a picture of them kissing when their picture was taken on the roller coaster. It was cool.
Then at 7 we went to the awards ceremony for the festival. They started with lots of awards for middle schools and stuff. But then we started getting awards. Both concert band and jazz band got first place with a gold! Every chorus group got first place too, chorus and chorale with a silver, and jazz choir with a gold. Jazz choir also got the overall choir award. The first place didn't mean all that much because we were pretty much the only school in our division (for most groups at least, as far as I know, and jazz choir was the only jazz choir that competed), but the fact that we got golds was amazing! PHS has never gotten an A in concert band before, we finally did it! And we all though we sucked too. Pratt told us today that it was because of the things we worked on that we normally get points off for, like intonation and interpretation. We also got a bunch of solo awards, and my favorite, a rhythm section award for jazz band! It was great!
We were all so happy after this. I went back to the bus with Kelly, Joe, and Brittney, who brought the trophies. Then we walked back to the park, and Kelly got henna tattoos on her hand and stuff. But I was kinda bummed that I missed over an hour of time I could've been on roller coasters by walking with them. But then Brittney and I went to meet the rest of the band at the Great Bear roller coaster. Pratt told everyone who wanted to go on to meet him there at 9. This was one of the roller coasters where your feet dangle and it goes upside-down and all that. I had never been on a roller coaster before. Brittney and I sat in a row with Mr. Pratt. And he was scared shitless of the ride. Denningham and Callahan wanted him to ride in front, but he refused to sit anywhere but the middle seat in the middle of the ride. I sat on the end seat. Pratt also insisted that it was worse in the dark, but I think it would be worse during the day because you can see where you're going and when you're upside down and all that. The ride was awesome! I don't see how Pratt was scared shitless though. I could barely even tell when the difference between being upside-down and right-side-up. It was wicked fun though. Then I went on a second time. I convinced Danielle to go on with me, and eventually we got Mr. Pratt to go on a third time too. And I sat in his row again. He said he only did it because the band got the A. It was so fun. I wish I had more time at Hershey Park. I wanna go to Six Flags this summer now.
After Hershey Park I thought my bus driver was crazy because he kept flashing his high-beams. But I eventually realized something was wrong, and he was trying to contact the first bus driver because the buses had to stay together. He finally had to contact him by having someone call a student on the bus. We pulled over and I soon found out the bus lost its power steering. Luckily our awesome bus driver got us back to the hotel alive though.
The next morning we left the hotel late because of the bus problem though. Eventually we went to breakfast with only two buses, people had to sit on the floor. So we went to Philly eventually, but we were behind schedule. In Philly we went to the liberty bell, the Independence Mall (I think that's what it was, it was a food court with gift shops) where I had a couple of Philly cheesesteaks (mmmmmm), and we were going to go up the steps from the movie Rocky, but something was going on in front of them so we just posed with the Rocky statue. I wish we had more time in Philly because it was a really cool city.
After this we headed back to RI. It was an awesome trip, and I can't wait to go on another one next year!