Hello... Don't yell at me...

Hi. My name is Eric Pankow. I'm not sure why I made a blog and then gave out my full name, but It's already been done, so I'll just go with it. When I made it, I was so young. I didn't know any better! I was like, 16! That's SO MUCH younger than 17. I've gained so much more experience and knowledge in all this time. 

Ha, actually, I have been kidding you this whole time...  Ha yeah, that's it. My name isn't actually Eric Pankow, it's Sam! Sam... Check...son. Sam Checkson. Flip it all, spell check doesn't like either of those last names.

I'm re-introducing myself to you because I feel that I have been gone so long, it is something that needs to be done. It's been so long, that you have forgotten everything about me. I'll give a quick review. 

I am a boy. I am 17 years old. I have blonde hair.

There. Everything you ever need to know about, me Sam Checkson! Sigh... Ok, that's dumb. My name is really Eric Pankow. It's too late now. Once I named the blog, 'The blog of Pankow' it became too late.

So I'm here because I really really want to start blogging again, because many things have happened to me since I blogged last, and I feel that I actually have things to talk about again, and time to talk about it in. 

I know. I've said, 

"Ho ho ho! I'm back! This is going to be great! I'm going to write all day and night and provide pictures! Blarhjfkjlasjkdf,"

Like, five times already. But I'd like to believe that it is for real this time! I really want to do this again. Also I want to make good, long, content-filled and funny blogs again, instead of the last twenty or so which were all complete dung. Heh. Dung. 

In THIS blog, I'd like to talk about the situation of my schooling I am in, because it has changed since my previous blogs.

Oh hey. It's 1:23. That's cool.

Ok. So Beginning of Junior year, I went to Ye Olde School. That is the school that was one and a half hours from my house, so I lived in the dorm with three room mates. That was a fun school. But for one reason or another (I can't remember if I actually ever mentioned why I did this), I left that school around Christmas time. Now, my brother is a freshman, and he goes there. I still do not. 

After I left Ye Olde School, I was home schooled online. However, I used a system where there was just things to read daily, and then an assignment you had to do daily. There was no teacher really, so If I had a question, my dad had to try and figure it out, or I would Google it. That worked for a while, but at the end of the year, we decided not to use that home schooling program anymore.

Now, I am a senior in high school. I am still home schooled, but I am using a different program. Every day, there is a video that I watch for each class, and then I have homework for the next day. The video is a recording of a class room in Florida, with a teacher and students in desks and the whole Nine Shebangs. I like this much better. The teachers can describe it so much better than writing can.

I also like it because sometimes the students say something funny, or once a student fell down. The videos were recorded some years ago, so they all are wearing nice plaid dress shirts and glasses as big as their face. 

In the next few blogs, I will describe what my life is like nowadays. There is a twist at the end too. Something you may never have imagined to happen to me happened. Teehee.

I might even write another blog tonight. Who knows?

THE END. 

Clap clap clap 

*Applause 

clap clap clap 

*hooting and hollering

*people throwing roses onto stage.

*Me bowing to the left, then to the right, and then in the middle, saying thank you repeatedly.

*Someone throws a ham sandwich wrapped in plastic wrap onto stage.

*I can't tell whether it was a compliment or not, but it's a free sandwich, so I pick it up and eat it thankfully as I walk off stage.

I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH. CLICK THE PICTURE TO ENLARGE IT.

A plastic bag got stuck on the front of our van while we were
driving. I tried to stick my camera out the window to
get a better picture, but my mom didn't like that.

Rolo (My Dog, the brown one),  and this dog converse
through the fence everytime we go to the park. I always try to
pet the dog, but he/she always runs away. So sad.

There were SO many grey dandelions at the park. (If you look
closely, you can see Rolo pooping in the background.)

More dandelions.

On Saturday I went to my brother and sister's softball game.
I spent most of my time playing with the younger children. They
know how to have fun. I pushed them on this merry-go-round
(Because when it gos round you are merry, I guess.) 

There was a sandbox, and it had rained the day before.

We could dig really deep holes, and then they would fill 

up with water and the sides would fall in and they become

only about two inches deep, when they started being as 

long as my arm. It took a while to wash the sand off my

arms and legs, because there wasn't an outdoor hose, so 

I had to wash in the bathroom sink. Washing my arms were

fine, but washing my feet and knees in the bathroom sink

was pretty weird.

Here's another hole, with the green plastic things the little kids
insisted on using for a shovel, even though they were terrible
shovels, and it was much easier AND faster to use you hands.

Here's a big pile of sticks.

Here's a huge pile of sticks.

It was very muddy that day, and almost everyone took their
shoes off.

They had these there! They are not as fun now since I am too
big for them. Major dissapointment.

I found my old Lord of the Rings puzzle!

There are a few pieces missing...

It's a double sided puzzle, and this is what is on the other side.

I will be back soon!

I think I've been away from this blog longer than anyone has ever been away from a blog in the history of the world. I mean SERIOUSLY. It's been, um... 


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I've been away since April 28th, but that blog really doesn't count, due to it being completely and utterly stupid. So really, it has been since March. March 10th to be exactly exact.


When you count, that's actually only about two months. That not SO bad I guess...


(Yes it is. It's very bad.)


Basically, I want to start blogging again. This time around however, it'll be a bit different. There will still be the occasional text only blogs, but for the most part, they will be mostly pictures with commentary. This may sound absolutely horrific(And it very well may be!), but I hope  It will be interesting. If not, then I will change it to make it interesting.


See, my brother got a new camera. It's a quite nice one really, and I can't believe it was so cheap. It was around 66% off. It has a nice touch screen.


Anyway, since his new camera is much nicer than his old one, he is selling the old one to me for pretty cheap. 35$ to be exactly exact. 


I've only had one camera before, and it wasn't even my own. Me and my brother saved up when we were a bit younger, and we put our money together and got this cheap 60 or 70 dollar camera. We had that camera for a while, and then one day it just wouldn't turn on. I don't remember exactly why, but I remember that for some reason we were not too upset about it. I know that nowadays I would mad, and I would try and figure out what was wrong with it. No, we just took it apart, not thinking at all of how long it took us to save up for it. 


The inside of my nose itches a lot today, and when I scratch it, it looks like I am picking my nose. I AM NOT! I AM ONLY SCRATCHING!


So, I am going to bring my new camera around everywhere, and take lots of pictures. 


See you soon!

Meal at Twilight

Smell that burning? It's the toaster oven.


Hear that Scream? It's the tea kettle. 


Things I like: Toast with Cream cheese, Fruit tea, strawberries, the sound of the dishwasher.


Things I dislike: The strange stain clay leaves on your hands, when you scrape your skin on pavement.


Bobbing slowly forward and back is comforting, but it makes you feel crazy.


Things I want: To read more of my book (Charlie Bone and the castle of mirrors), to eat my toast.


Things I don't want: The strange itch on my back ( It keeps coming back, it keeps coming back.)


Number of lists: 5


Now I feast. Earl Grey, Toast, and I.


You have two eyes. 

100th post! (Group effort x3)

Group effort x1
Group effort x2


This weekend, Krieger was over, so I decided to do a group effort blog. I also wanted this to be specially good, because it's my 100th blog! 


So for this group effort blog, I am going to blog like normal, and then Krieger will write every paragraph again underneath from HIS point of view. Basically, this will just prove that he needs to continue his blog. Uh-huh, the one with the flames and the indecisive title. To make things harder for him, I'm going to try and make the paragraphs as specific as I can.


Here we go.


This weekend, Krieger was over. Usually this means that we do many things, and we hardly have time for them all. This was a pretty busy weekend though, and we didn't really do all that much at home, except watch movies on Netflix. Those movies included, The Prince of Persia and  Arena. Did we really only watch two? It felt like more...  


This weekend, I was at Pankow's house. Since he no longer goes to 'ye olde school', I was really looking forward to the weekend. I've been there several times before, and I always enjoy myself, though we rarely have as much time as I would like. This time even more so.


So the weekend started off, as most (by most, I mean all) do, at 'ye olde school'. Nothing really notable happens there, however, so I'll pick up when I arrive at Pankow's house.

It was a dark, and modestly stormy evening. We decide to walk to the store, as we are low on resources. (Half of a flat 2-liter ginger ale, 6-ish ramen, and a disturbing lack of paczki) We venture out into the rain to the nearest grocery establishment, where we stock up on pop, then head off to a convenience store for some paczki(I love me some paczki). We return and watch Prince of Persia, because surprisingly enough, I hadn't seen it yet.


First thing Saturday morning, I woke up, and since Krieger NEVER gets out of bed right when he wakes up, but instead sits there waking up, I played a little Legend of Zelda on my wii. After I died many times (Krieger laughed at me...:( ), I rage quit, and we both got up. 


The next morning I wake up to Pankow playing Zelda. Man, I got a good laugh out of that one. We plan on going into downtown, but time slips away into the Minecraft and it never happens. Nothing you plan ever happens once you get sucked into Minecraft.


At 12:00 A.M., We had to go to my Choir concert. It was the most laid back performance that people wore tuxedo shirts that I ever went to. Usually at 'ye olde school', everyone was so worked up and nervous that it made you nervous. Here, it almost seemed like no one cared. Sure everyone was a little nervous, but it didn't show. Before my choir sang, the orchestra played some songs. I had never heard them before, and they were the coolest sounding orchestra I have ever heard. Then my choir went up, sang, and then we left. Simple as that.


Eventually it was time for me to go to Pankow's choir concert. I wasn't terribly excited for it. I think we were late, but from what I could tell, so was almost everyone else. As soon as I walked in, I instantly felt underdressed. Everyone was dressed fancy, and there I was in jeans and a Pokémon shirt. Still, I managed to kinda enjoy myself. It's the type of thing where you're content, but you can think of so many places you'd rather be and things you'd rather be doing. The orchestra was pretty good, and Pankow's choir was decent. As all things do, it came to an end, and instantly I was thrust into the next event of my Saturday. 


At 5:00 P.M., we were going to go to fasching, a German holiday in which you dress up and dance. We were going to a German club not too far from my house to celebrate. We have been going there every year since I can remember. There is a costume party, and there is prizes, so Krieger and I thought,  "Hey, we might as well dress up, just in case we do win something." So right after the choir concert, my mom took us straight to Goodwill for things to make a costume, because I am a believer of making your own costumes, and I am completely against store bought.


As soon as we got to Goodwill, Krieger and I went straight for the shirts, completely forgetting the real reason we were there. I did get some good shirts though, one about AOL with the little yellow guy on the back, a Volcom shirt with white birch trees and a red versionof the 
Volcom symbol, only because it looks REALLY cool, and a black and white horizontal striped shirt, because I have always wanted one. We then realized, we need costumes. We really didn't care what we dressed up as, as long as we won something, so when my mom came with a red and white striped pirate shirt, we decided one of us would be a pirate, and we would figure something else out at home. To make a very long story short, Krieger ended up being a pirate, and I ended up being a Mexican bandito, just because we had a sombrero and a poncho.


Said event was a trip to Goodwill. While we originally were going to get costumes for a fasching party, as soon as we got there we headed straight for the t shirts. I was rather satisfied by my haul of shirts, finding a Captain Hammer shirt(It's from a series of videos called Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. Check it out, they're really well done.), a light green shirt with a pig on it(I have no idea what I liked so much about this shirt, but some part of me couldn't say no.), and a Volcom shirt(Mine's cooler than Pankow's.).

After our successful Goodwill outing, it was time to dress up for fasching. (We really didn't get much at goodwill in terms of costumes, but eh, whatever) I ended up going as a pirate(red and white striped shirt that exposed more of my stomach than a guy should show regularly, ragged jeans, FAKE BEARD(actually drawn on with eye shadow, but it looked pretty good I thought), and a sword(a katana actually, which is about the least piratey sword available, and apparently I had the sheath upside down the whole night)).  Oddly enough, three days after I go to a fasching celebration, I learned about it in German class. We watched a video on it. CRAZY STUFF HAPPENS AT FASCHING.


Picture:

Krieger won a $15 gift card, but I didn't win anything :( . IT's OK though, because I was more comfortable than him the whole night with that tiny red and white shirt. Heh heh.


We also watched Troll 2 later that night, which Pankow forgot to mention above.


On Sunday, we went to church, and then lazed around at home and took a nap. 


On Sunday, we went to church. Afterward, Pankow tried to force me into a bike ride, which I was vehemently opposed to. We only got a little into the trip before we turned back (But not before buying more paczkis).  I then proceeded to take a nap for a while, until I had to leave.

I feel as if I have more to add, but I cannot for the life of me figure out what it is. I assume it will come to me later, and I’ll do what I’m usually forced to do and convert it into a comment.

Quick fact about me and naps, quoted exactly from my mom, 
        "As soon as you (Me, not you) were sixteen months old, we could NOT get you to take naps. We would read you books and drive you around in the car but you would not take a nap." 


I remember being a couple years old and having to read books or draw or make things with construction paper (make a mess with construction paper) while everyone else took naps, because I could just not take naps. I think this is really cool, but my mom says it is not. 


So long and thanks for all the fish! -Pankow

The weekend and cake.

This weekend, Jeremiah came over. The school I used to go to, and he goes to didn't have school on Monday or Tuesday, so he stayed at my house from |Friday night until Tuesday night.


I'm going to give 'That school I used to go to' a name so that I can stop calling it that. From now on, it will be called 'Ye olde school'. It fits, because it's my old school. Ha. Hahahahahah. I like it.


So on Saturday, Jeremiah and I rode our bikes downtown where there are a lot of big buildings and stores and stuff. Were my house is, there isn't so much. It is Really cool to go there, but it's 18 minutes bike ride. I just checked on Google maps.


On Saturday specifically, we stayed downtown for six hours. SIX. We went by the capitol building, and there was a teachers rally going on there. A LOT of people were all crowded around the front stairs, and everyone had signs and was yelling. In the middle, there were some speakers, and they were speaking about stuff that neither Jeremiah nor I understood. This was the first rally like this for both Jeremiah and me, so it was pretty cool. Plus, they gave us free Hawaiian pizza! Pretty soon, Jeremiah and I decided to leave. We went down the road, and decided to find some place to sit and warm up our feet, since there was snow on the ground, and snow is cold. We decided to go into a coffee shop (Called Biggby, formerly Beaners. I Don't really know how popular it is). While in there, we decided to buy the cheapest cup of coffee they had. We sat in that coffee shop and drank our coffee. When our cups were empty, we got free refills! We each had three refills each, and then decided that was as much coffee as anyone should have in one day, so we left.


On the wall there, there were some REALLY cool drawings by a famous artist that lives near to where I live. They were all drawn on napkins, and they were really cool for us, since we both like to draw. I wish I could have taken pictures of them, but we forgot to bring a camera.


We went across the street to a sub shop called Jimmy John's to go to the bathroom. While in there we noticed a sign that said, "Buy yesterday's bread - 45 cents". Jeremiah saw it first. We went to the cashier and asked her if it was a real sign. SHE SAID YES. So we bought two of them, and then sat down to eat them. They are big bread loaves. Then on Monday, we brought hardboiled eggs that my mom made us for breakfast and some pepper jack cheese, and made this lovely sandwich. All the bread you see in this picture was one loaf. That is not two loaves. We each had a piece of bread that big each. For 45 cents. Amazing. And so were the sandwiches.

Here are two other pictures from our trips downtown. I only took three pictures. Sad I know.

This is Jeremiah. This picture makes him look fat. The glasses he is wearing are just those 3d glasses from Movie theaters, but he made them white with white duct tape. Now they look kinda cool.

In this picture there is light reflecting on the building from the windows of the building across the street. I thought it was really cool. 

I will definitely take more pictures whenever I go there again, I am pretty sure I will this weekend, and I think Krieger is coming over this weekend. So look forward to that.


On Monday night, I told Jeremiah, I want to bake a cake. Should we do that tomorrow? Because that's how we plan things. He thought it was a great Idea. My mom helped us get the basic Idea of the cake, so that it would turn out as a cake, but we added a lot of our own ingredients.  What came our was the most delicious and moist cake I have eaten in a long time. And we made it ourselves! I was amazed. We put in the normal cake making ingredients, but we also put in: chocolate chips, chili powder, paprika, yogurt, lingonberry jam, cinnamon, coffee, flour, eggs, cane sugar, butter, vanilla, nutmeg, ginger, milk, cocoa, chocolate bar shavings, and I don't even know what else. Here are some pictures. 

That piece at the end has homemade whipped cream.

And now, I must end this blog. Group effort blog probably coming this weekend.

LEX: I PROMISE I WILL DO THE TAG THING.

The Dance

I left early Saturday morning, to stay in the dorm of my old school, AGAIN. This will be the last time for a while. I went up there for the Valentines dance.

Here's my opinion on dances. Mind you, I have only gone to dances from this same school, so this is basically only about those dances, because I don't know what other dances are like, what is similar and what is different from other schools' dances.

1. The music is generally bad. Usually, they just play popular hip hop songs changed to have a dance beat in the background. At the dance, the DJ played Justin Beiber. Yeah, my supposed look-alike. It was funny though, because as soon as it came on, half the guys left the gym, only to reenter when the song was over. 
2. To put it bluntly, most dance moves look stupid to me. I stood up on the balcony that overlooked the whole dance floor and just watched, and people were either just jumping up and down, or just flailing their bodies around. I tried to think, if everyone is doing it, it can't look too stupid. When I tried it myself however, I felt too stupid to continue. I dunno.
3. The thing I like most about dances is the handkerchief game. It has no name, so I'm just going to call it the handkerchief game. It is a game that has been played since my first dance freshman year, and I don't know how long before that. Basically, someone brings a handkerchief into the dance, and puts in in his back pocket, half hanging out. That person proceeds to run around the dance floor, doing whatever we can to avoid the other players. The other players try and find this person among the other dancers, and then steal the handkerchief. If successful, that person puts it in their pocket, and runs away. It's basically tag. With a handkerchief. No matter how boring this game sounds, it IS fun.
4. To get into the dance, it cost's $4.00 if you are single, and $6.00 for a couple (Three per person in the couple). While this is a good deal, the male person of the relationship ends up paying for the girl, so it isn't a very good deal for the guys. Also, people would pair up on the way to the dance just to get in cheaper. They should just have one solid price. I dunno.
5. Good things: The Handkerchief game; when the dance was over, the freshman had to clean up; and free candy!

One funny story from the dance. One of my friends from Korea (not important) sneakily-snuck* his laptop into the dance by putting it in the back of his shirt. He then sat in the corner and played Minecraft until he got caught. I admire his love for the game.

I am still getting to your tag Lex, just be patient!

*Sneakily-Snuck is a phrase I made up a while ago. I like it a lot.