'Sup?

So...I'm back. >.>
Back from Tennessee. And let me tell you, a total of 36 hours on a bus is not good for your soul. D:
Brief rundown of the trip...since, well...why not?

Wednesday, July 1:
Left to go to the High School where the buses were at 9 o' clock PM to get my bags drug searched. (Funny story about drugs...but I'll explain more about that later.)
Departed from the school at about 10ish for a 20 hour bus ride to Gatlinburg, Tennessee. With various stops and stuff en route.

Thursday, July 2:
Continued bus ride...and stops. Preeetty dang boring...and irritating. Everyone was so sick of each other, from the season in general not just the bus ride. It's just that the bus ride made it worse. We ended up getting behind schedule, and instead of arriving at 5:30 PM like planned, we got there at 8:00ish. We checked into an old...slightly better than crappy hotel called the Garden Plaza Hotel and my room was on the top floor...which is significant.

Friday, July 3:
Woke up at 7ish for breakfast...that was moved to 9...which ticked most of us off. (By this point, the trend of irritation should be pretty evident. The season had undergone changes that people hated, the unorganization of the trip was not pleasant, and the trip itself seemed kind of lame. So...people weren't the cheeriest.) But, anyway, after breakfast, we boarded the bus to go to Dollywood, an amusement park owned by the busty Country singer Dolly Parton. And for only having 3 roller coasters, it was pretty dang fun. Granted, I was with a massive group of like 8-10 people, every ones tempers weren't the best, but aside from that, the rides were so boss. And I would gladly go again. To any of you who might want to go, I suggest the Mystery Mine and the Tennessee Tornado.
We stayed at Dollywood until about 6 before heading back to the hotel to get ready for the Midnight Parade in Gatlinburg. We left for that at around 9 and warmed up and what not...and that's where the fun really started for me.

So, during warm-ups, my pal Becca came up to me and said something along the lines of "I think some people snuck in some...you know." As she proceeded to make a gesture that clearly indicated the inhalation of drugs. So, naturally, my curiosity flared and I asked who. She pointed out a couple of people she noticed, before we realized shortly after wards that half of the Piccolo section was clearly tripping on something. While I was disappointed that people would do something that stupid on a trip, the hilarity of it was waaaaay more prominent. I mean, if you could have seen them trying to get down a hill and their attempts of "Standing at attention" after having a crappy time like me, you would have found it freaking hilarious too. XD
I mean their adventure down the hill (Which for the record had stairs they could have used right next to it) happened a little something like this:

Pic 1: It's sooooo steep! *giggle*

Pic 2: *giggle*

Pic 1: I'm going to go get water though...*starts to move down the hill waving arms around to get a grip on the grass with Pics 2-6 following.*

Pic 3: AAAAGH! *feels around with left toe for something that was not there.*

Pic 1: *stumbles as she tries to help Pic 3 and Pics 1-6 are instantaneously involved in a 5 minute long giggling/screaming fit as they more or less fall down the hill.*

That fit of...hilarity made my day. And it got better when one of the few Piccolos who was not clearly high, went up to a director and said. "Can I ask you a hypothetical question? What do you do if half of your section is high?" And the director pulled aside the section leader who I heard say "I'm just hyper! I swear, I'm just hyper!"
Oh, those crazy piccolos.

Saturday, July 4:
The parade started at Midnight and we marched down Gatlinburg (Which is a tourist town consisting of one very long Main Street with tons and tons of tourist trap stores...and a HARD ROCK CAFE!)
When we finished Marching, we went back to the buses and after a long period of waiting, we finally left to go back to the hotel at 3, and I got to bed at 4.
Wake up call was at 7 to leave to another parade in Hendersonville, North Carolina which was supposed to be a 2 and half hour bus ride.
Buuuut, since I seem to be unlucky as my friends like to point out, the bus in front of us managed to get stuck in a turn. Not just any turn, mind you, an extremely sharp turn barely big enough for a coach bus on a one way street in the middle of a heavily forested Appalachian peak. So, that added another hour or 2 to the trip as they tried pushing and pulling the bus. (They couldn't back up or else they would crash into trees and thus, not manage to get back onto the road. They couldn't go forward or else they would roll off a cliff, and they couldn't go sideways due to trees.) So by the time the buses finally got through, we had missed the parade, and we went for lunch.
After lunch, we drove back (Through a safe, not forested route) to Gatlinburg, where the option of taking a 9 mile hike through the Smoky Mountains or sight seeing through town was presented. I chose walking through town since fireworks were supposed to be there anyway. So, after much fun (Including the purchase of a Street sign that says BAT CAVE on it, a Bat shaped Henna tramp stamp, and a visit to the Hard Rock Cafe, where I got a picture with THE FREAKING COOLEST GUY EVER, we saw the best fireworks in the history of forever. We then headed back to the hotel...and get this, got stuck in the elevator for 10 minutes with about 10 other people. It was hot, sticky, and kind of freaky because the numbers just stopped and we had no clue if we were between floors or not. But, it turns out that we were on the 4th floor and one of the Drumline members just kind of wrenched open the doors. But other than that, the day was pretty boss.

Sunday, July 5:
Breakfast and checkout were at 8 and 9 respectively, and then we got on the bus to head over to Nashville, a 4 and a half hour bus ride. We spent most of the day at Opry Mills, which is a mall right on the outskirts of Nashville before heading over to the Drury Inn, which was waaaay nicer than the other place.

Monday, July 6:
Breakfast as usual before heading out to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. Which was waaaay more interesting than I thought it would be, and I recommend it to anyone, even if they are not a Country music fan. Because it's just that BA. Then, the Marching Band staff treated us to lunch at the Wildhorse Saloon, due to our perfect season. I learned how to line dance, and met a guy named Dave Robbins, who wrote lyrics to a whole bunch of awesome, and well known songs such as Bluest eyes of Texas. Which, I had no clue what it was while there, but I have now grown kind of addicted to it. Right after lunch, we all got on the bus and headed out for a 16 hour bus ride back to Minneapolis with stops and what periodically throughout.

Tuesday, July 7:
We had breakfast at Kwik Trip/various other fast food options, before arriving in Minneapolis where we got ready for the Lions Club International Parade...which is apparently a huge deal. I saw people from Canada, Italy, Lebanon, and Mexico there. We were supposed to be in the middle of the line up...but got moved back to the very last unit out of 154. So, it took way longer than expected. But, since the staff didn't want that to be the seniors last performance, they arranged it so we could perform at Dairy Queen's world headquarters. So we went to Edina, and performed 2 shows before getting free Pizza from the Chaperones as a welcome back present and free Blizzards from DQ as a "Thanks for playing" kind of present and it was BA.
And about an hour later, we finally got back home. So all together, while the trap had its extremely irritating parts it was pretty epic.

...
And on a completely unrelated note, I finally seemed to have gotten back my ideas and love of writing.
I plan on starting a collection of Harry Potter fictions, and I have butt loads of ideas for Oh Nemodab as well as the Maximum Ride story that I have been working on for a while...so if you see any of those things up, don't be too surprised. XD

But other than that, hope you all are enjoying summer and what not!
Peace!
-Jennifer