Oops – I haven’t written in a while. Sorry about that!

Today was the last day of classes for the summer. I think I escaped Electrical Engineering unscathed. All I have left on my plate is one last lab report and a lab practical on Monday, then it’s two weeks of freedom. That’s the longest break I’ve had since Christmas, haha.

While Daytona itself is kinda “meh” as far as cities go, its proximity to Orlando is great (if you have a car, that is.) I’ve spent quite a bit of time down there the last couple weeks. One of my favorite things about Orlando, is that bands always play there. Minneapolis was always kind of a hit or miss city as far as musical tours, so it was always disappointing to have to miss seeing bands I liked because they decided we just weren’t important enough for a show. But everybody plays Orlando! And it’s awesome.

Myself with Juliet Simms! Too bad I’m a sweaty mess in the photo (it was like 100 degrees and super humid – bleh.)

I spent the whole day down there at Warped Tour a couple weeks ago, which was awesome. I had never been before, and almost didn’t go because I didn’t have anybody with whom to go. Well, I ended up at the show for free, courtesy of Hawthorne Heights, who picked me to work their street team for the Orlando show! Although I was promised a backstage pass that never ended up happening, I still got to get in early and for free, as well as meet the band and get some free cool signed stuff, and all I had to do was hang a bajillion posters around the grounds. It was awesome. Except for the part where it thunderstormed and they tried to shepherd the entire audience at this enormous music festival into a big barn thing. But I digress. I also got to meet Juliet Simms, who is awesome. If you don’t know who she is, she is the singer for the band Automatic Loveletter (they aren’t super well-known, so I don’t really blame you if you haven’t heard of them. Oh man that sounded so hipster.) She was touring with Warped as a solo act, and she put on a really great show – her voice is amazing. She’s on my list of musical idols (along with Lzzy Hale, Amy Lee, and Ville Valo – if you don’t know who these people are, I urge you to find out), so it was really cool to get to meet her, and she was super nice.

All the signed CDs I got from Warped Tour, plus the compilation album. Woo! I also got a couple signed posters from Hawthorne Heights and Echosmith that I somehow managed to find wall-space in my apartment for.

I also met this awesome band called Echosmith at Warped. They are really new, their first album comes out in a couple months. But get this – they are four siblings between the ages of 14-20. Yeah, the drummer is 14. And they are good. I’m really looking forward to their album. I think they’re going to be super famous someday (and I have a signed copy of their first songs ever released!)

Another thing I like about Florida is that they do a tax-free weekend in August on things like clothes, electronics, and school supplies. So a friend and I went down to the big malls in Orlando for some shopping, (something in which I don’t frequently take part, I might add.) I bought some new clothes and running shoes and coffee cup earrings. And the government didn’t take more of my money! It was a fun day. Orlando has everything – including Panda Express. Mmmmm.

Between Kennedy Space Center, Warped Tour, and tax-free shopping (plus picking people up at the Orlando airport), I’ve put quite a few miles on my car lately! It’s not too bad of a drive though.

Those are the exciting things I’ve been up to. Other things I’ve been doing include super-cleaning my apartment last weekend, writing lab reports, reading about wave acoustics (that’s literally all I’m doing in SPRL right now), and hiding inside where it’s air-conditioned. I thought the worst of the weather was past, but boy was I wrong. It’s been consistently humid and about 100 degrees outside. It’s pretty much terrible. I also dug out my Nintendo DS and started a new game on Pokemon SoulSilver, but I got stuck at the third gym and got mad and stopped playing it.

Hopefully next week I’ll have a cool research project started that I can write about – so stay tuned for that. Then the following week I’m headed back up to Minnesota to see my family ’cause they miss me and stuff. It’s about 70 degrees there right now, so I might just not come back until Florida quits being so Florida-y. Then after that it’s fall semester! I’m really excited for this fall because I’m taking some really cool classes, but more on that later. And I get to blog for y’all again in the fall, so you’ll get to hear all about it. 🙂

I didn’t talk about much this post, so here is an astronaut sloth for your enjoyment:

“Slothstronaut”

Peace out for now, readers!

-Lynsey