Highlights of 2008 and looking forward to 2009

This past year has been a good one, it began with turning 16, becoming a priest, getting my eagle and eventually getting my driver's license, which is a huge plus! :) From there it went on to finishing up my first year of highschool and ending the track season with a region championship! Then the summer began and cross country (my favorite sport) began, eventually ending with placing 2nd in region and 4th at state! The year just got better and better as well, when I gained some new friends which I wouldn't trade for the world, including my new buds in special needs seminary!
As for the new year well, I'm looking forward to quite a few things. The biggest thing I'm looking forward to is obviously the cross country season! We've got a lot of our team returning and we're looking forward to a hard summer and season and coming out as the best team we can possibly be! Plus, next year I'll be a senior, which is of course exciting! Some of the goals I have are; improving my running times (this year was a little disappointing in that respect), being a nicer and more aware person, preparing myself more fully for my mission (studying preach my gospel at least once a week), being in general more organized and not procrastinating my homework especially with History (actually using my planner and then looking at it!), and otherwise just trying to keep moving forward in all respects, being a little better each day, as Abraham Lincoln said "I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday. " and I guess that's my biggest goal to be wiser each day than I was the day before.

Happy New Year!

Sweater

oh, and I added a sweater! :)

Elephant!

At a christmas party for our extended family my great grandma knitted this little stuffed animal bear for my little something month old cousin, frankly I thought it was freaking awesome! So I decided to try my knitting hands at making my own knit stuffed animal, and as you can see it resulted in my little elephant buddy George! :)

Why do we run?

Why Do We Run?
We run to fight, to fight ourselves, to fight the desire to give up and give in.
We run to conquer, to conquer ourselves, our abilities, and our emotions.
We run to become, to become something more than we are, to become great.
We run to fly, to fly over pavement grass and dirt, to fly above the pain and fear of loss.
We run to win, to win over ourselves, our fear of loss and failure, to win for our team.
We run for something more, more than just running, for something seemingly untouchable.

We run to be, victorious.



Thanks to Brad for writing something so inspirational he inspired me to write something that explains Why We Run.

Footlocker

This past week the cross country team went to a western regional cross country meet down in California, simply put, it was awesome! We left Thursday afternoon and set off on Le Bus for California, a 12 hour grueling bus ride. I'm sorry to say it took forever. We ate dinner just outside of Las Vegas (hate the place) and then continued on our way. We pulled into our hotel at somewhere around 2:00 a.m. California time, so like 3:00 Utah time, a little late, but about what we expected. We slept soundly and then the next day it was off to see the course.
The course was really cool. It consisted of 2 half mile loops, fairly flat terrain, followed by a set of switchbacks and three other steep steep hills. Thankfully between each of these was a long stretch of downhill. It was a fairly intimidating sight, but we were all confident, having run tons of trails similar to it during the summer, still it was an impressive course. After running the course we set out for.... the beach! It was a long drive to the pier, but a worthwhile one. We spent two or three hours at the pier eating, playing football in the sand, playing in the waves, and just hanging as a team and having fun. Oh, and we protected a hermit crab from the raging ocean waves :) I wish I had some pictures to show you guys! We headed back to the hotel and got ready for the next day... the race!
We woke up early at six o'clock so that we'd be able to get to the race in time. The races started with the freshman/sophomore girls at 7:30 so we had to leave the hotel early. As always the meet was an impressive site with tons of people getting ready for their races and families and friends there to cheer them on. My race was at 8:15, so a little after we got there it was time to start warming up. I wasn't too nervous about the race, I was there to have fun and do my best, but I did have some goals, and although none of them were fulfilled that's ok because I'm just going to keep on working until I reach them! The race was intense and I finished in 68th with a time of 18:14. The rest of team did amazingly well as well! Some of the highlights were Jason Lynch finishing first in the boys senior race, and Josh Kennedy placing second in the boys freshman/sophomore race! Those kids are crazy good runners, props to them! (To see everyone's times look at the cross country blog). Then it was time to go home, a 12 hour bus ride again lay before us. This time for some reason the bus ride didn't seem as long. We played card games and watched movies and just talked, it was actually pretty fun! We got back home at around 2:00 a.m. Sunday.
This trip was way fun and I think that the team really got to bond together a little more over the past three days. I know I got to know Kevin Lynch a little better, he being one of my roommates, and the kid is awesome! Plus it was just fun to spend time with your friends and learn more about them, and just spend time with them. Our coach was awesome, good old senor, he was so nervous about the trip, particularly some of the bus drivers and their rather mediocore driving, not too mention all the stress that comes with having a bus load of teenage kids to cart around :) I'm glad he trusted us enough to take us on the trip, and he supported us in our races and made sure everything went as smoothly as possible. Like I think I've said before he's turned the program around. A few years ago it never would have been possible for Hillcrest cross country to have made this trip, but he's trained us and trusted us enough that we've become capable of performing in a big race, as well as just becoming better people. It was a good trip!

GO BYU!!!!

GO BYU!!!!
and congrats to the Utes I guess.....

Tribute to the BYU Utah Games

Both teams are really good this year, it's going to be a good game! I know I talk a lot of smack, but that's just because it's fun to talk smack, so going with that spirit... GO BYU, CRUSH THE UTES!!!!

and one random pic

if you click on it it looks better enlarged

Pics of my cousin

Thought I'd take a leaf (ha ha) out of your book Andrew and try my hand at photo editing.

Cross... again

Sorry, i know I always post about running, but hey that's what I do! The team will soon be going to foot locker, it's a regional race down in California! It's going to be awesome, we're going to be able to race against some of the best runners in the Western United States, and it's going to be amazing, I can't wait!

Presidential election

Congratulations to Senator Obama and what appears to be his election to be President of the United States of America. Although I do not agree with hardly any of his policies, morals, or beliefs, I sincerely hope that he does a good job. I sincerely hope that the economy gets better and not worse, that his appeasement policies pacify the terrorists and allow the Iraqi and Afghani people to remain free to govern themselves, and allow the United States to remain safe from terrorist attack. However, I also cannot hope that his policies on abortion and gay marriage will be allowed to stand, I sincerely hope that they fail. As to everything else, well, the next 4 years will be interesting, and I sincerely hope that he keeps this country together, and that the Constitution stands strong and weathers any storm that comes its way. "Good night and Good Luck", America.

Blanket

This is the blanket I'm knitting, it's about a foot long now! Oh and by the way, that's all a single piece of string, or I guess two now that it's two colors, but it's tied together, so a single piece of string, I don't know, that's just cool.

State!!!

Well, the main event of Cross Country occurred on Oct. 22nd, the State Championships! The team has been working for that day for a long time, try 5 months, and for some of us for a year! It was definitely worth all the hard work and effort we put into it! Our team did really well, we finished 4th out of the 5A schools in the state! We had amazing performances by everyone, particularly two of our runners that finished in the top 20, out of something like 120! Jason Lynch ran the race of his life running a 15:44 at the state course to finish.... SECOND!!! Yep our own Jason Lynch finished second in the 5A State Cross Country Championship Race! Daniel was our other top 20 finisher finishing 19th with an insane time of 16:24!! Josh Kennedy finished 28th with another freaking amazing time of 16:34! Matt Lynch finished 55th with a time of 17:05! I finished 74th with a time of 17:20 (there you go Andrew, I mentioned myself :)! Kevin Lynch A FRESHMAN finished 80th with a time of 17:28! And Brad Marshall finished 84th with a time of 17:37! It was an amazing year, and we just about all got our fastest times of the year! Oh, and by the way, 3 of us our juniors (Daniel, me, and Brad), and TWO ARE SOPHOMORES (Josh and Matt), and one is A FRESHMAN (Kevin), and of course Jason is our Senior, the capitan (spelled that way on purpose)! Our sophomores and freshman have really shocked me, and to use our coaches saying "Shocked the world!" They're amazing runners, and for all of them, and Brad as well, this is their first year running cross country, that's pretty amazing! It was an amazing race, and we're looking forward to track as well as next year of cross country, we're going to work our hardest and perform to our best, and well, we'll see what happens, and whatever it is, it's going to be good, we have a great group of guys! And I'd like to give a big thanks to our alternates Ryan Gregorson and Andrew Forrest! Those guys are awesome, they ran with us every day after Region even though they might not get to run! Thanks a bunch guys!

This race was especially important to me because I learned a little bit more about myself, as well as what it takes to be a good racer. Similar to Andrew's realizations at region my happened at State. In a way I conquered myself I finally believed I was capable of running well, and well when you believe good things happened, I PR'd! I definitely still have a lot of room for improvement, but I started to make some steps towards figuring myself out, as well as figuring out how to race. It was a race of realization. The source of my inspiration? Check out this video at YouTube, it's inspiring! Go Bill Mills!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlF4OdDZnLE

Abortion

I have recently learned about something so horrible and disgusting that I can hardly believe it's real. Partial birth abortion was, until recently, allowed in the United States. For those that do not know what partial birth abortion is, it is defined as

"An abortion in which the person performing the abortion, deliberately and intentionally vaginally delivers a living fetus until, in the case of a head-first presentation, the entire fetal head is outside the body of the mother, or, in the case of breech presentation, any part of the fetal trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother, for the purpose of performing an overt act that the person knows will kill the partially delivered living fetus; and performs the overt act, other than completion of delivery, that kills the partially delivered living fetus. (18 U.S. Code 1531)"

In 2003 the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act was passed and ratified as constitutional, this of course bans partial abortion. However, Senator Obama has pledged that his first act, if he were to be elected President of the United States would be to "sign the freedom of choice act". This act would legalize Partial birth abortion. I cannot see how this in any way can be seen as morally or ethically correct. How is it that we could allow for innocent children to be murdered even as they take their first breath. Even for those of you who are pro-choice, this cannot seem right. One of the major issues surrounding the issue of abortion is the question of when life begins, whether in the fetus, or at birth. How than can it be said, even for those that are pro-choice, that a baby taking it's first breath, it's head out of the womb, born into this world, is not alive, but is merely "a fetus"and is no longer a living human being? Can a child be only partially alive, and thus justify a "partial" birth abortion, I think not. I cannot see how one could possibly agree with such blatant murder of innocent babes. It cries out against every moral belief or standard on this earth. How could such a thing have existed in our society, and how could we ever allow it to happen again? America, it's supposed to be the land of freedom, of opportunity, of justice, of peace, yet it seems that in this respect it is all a lie. When the people of America are largely supporting a man who has claimed that his very first act will be to legalize such an atrocity, then I believe that the people of America are not looking closely enough at his moral values, nor their own. A land of opportunity, yet we kill children before they have a chance to even see the world and barely take a breath, a land of freedom, and we take the freedom from the future of America, her children, and a place of justice and peace, and yet we seek to elect a man who will legalize the murder of innocent children. It is not right, we are better than that, we cannot condone such atrocities within our own nation. We must stand up for that which is right, and speak out against such a possibility, that again our nation could legalize the murder of babes just born, yet considered only "partially alive".

We should each seek to speak out against the evils that exist in this world that threaten to undermine our societies family and moral values. We cannot sit idly by and watch as laws may be passed that will allow abortions, gay marriages, or any other evils that seek to destroy the values of our nation. It is not right, it is our moral imperative to speak out against such things, and to advocate for a raise in our nations seemingly declining moral standards.

Do not misunderstand me, our nation still does much good throughout the world. We are involved in many relief efforts that save lives, and help to bring peace and security to impoverished states of the world, as well as much more. We therefore cannot allow ourselves to fall into a trap that will lead to a decline in everything that America stands for, we simply cannot.

http://frcactionpac.org/

(support the American people in maintaining the ban on Partial Birth Abortion, and further speak out against abortion, and other such beliefs that threaten to undermine our societies family and moral values)

Region!!!

Well we recently had region, everyone else has given a pretty good rendition, so I'll just give another brief overview :) Our team ran an amazing race! We placed second in our region! Last year was the first time we went to state in over a decade, and now look at us, second in our region! It's so fun, and amazing that we've been able to accomplish so much. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to our coach, Senor Olsen, he turned the cross country program at Hillcrest, and he's pushed us to perform, and become the best we can possibly be, and he genuinely cares about the sport, and about us.
Jason ran an amazing race! After losing to the Alta pack for two races in a row Jason decided it was enough, and figured he'd just go win the race! He ran an amazing race, and ended up beating the entire Alta pack by a huge margin, becoming The Region II Cross Country Champion!!! Our whole team is so dang proud of that kid, he's amazing! Daniel and Josh also did amazingly well on our team, finishing 6th and 10th, giving us three runners in the top ten, Insane! Everyone else did amazing as well, I can't believe the Lynch family, they're insane! Brad is as well, just look at his blog, he's amazingly awesome!
State's on the 22nd, and we'll be ready to roll!

Running, Running, Running all day long

I thought I'd just give everyone an update on how the Hillcrest Cross Country team is doing. The season is almost done, in fact, there's only one more race until the Region Meet (the region Meet is the only race that really matters, it determines the region champs and who goes to state)! This season has been going really, really well for our team! We went undefeated in region meets, 3-0, and we won our first invitational in something like a decade, or maybe more! We're really excited for the region and hopefully state meets! There's only 12 days until region, October 10th is the day that we've been working for all summer, and for the veterans of the team for pretty much a year, it's going to be really really intense!

My Shoe

This is the best thing that I've ever drawn! I'm very proud of it, and it took me a boatload of time, like over an hour! Still, I think it's pretty cool :).

An Interesting Conversation

So today at Cross Country somehow we managed to get into this weird discussion. It started when someone said something at comparing yourself, or someone else to an animal. In other words "What animal best fits you?". I know it's really weird, and really random, but we went with it. Apparently I am a Meerkat, I can't quite see that, but whatever. The team said that I remind them of Timone from The Lion King. Daniel is a Koala, it kind of fits doesn't it! Andrew is a labrador, and Brad is a Golden Retriever or maybe a sheep, we're not quite sure, amazingly enough it does really fit their personalities! Senor is a wolf, yep, kind of scary, and Stucki.... well Stucki we decided was a hippopotamus! Yep, that was our conversation!

School and then some

Well, as we all know school has started. It should be a very interesting year, and in some ways I'm very excited, there are lots of new things happening that have gotten me pumped for the school year. Probably the most exciting thing that has happened to me this week, and I have a feeling will be pretty much the best part of the school year is that I get the opportunity to be a peer tutor in special needs seminary! So far it's been awesome, and has really helped me spiritually, and made this past week really fun! The kids are awesome, and I've already become fast friends with a few of them. Already they're teaching me more about myself and the gospel then I thought was possible.
Another thing that really has me pumped is, of course, cross country! This week we won our very first meet! The first meet Hillcrest has managed to win in over a decade, and it was with the defending region champs! We're really excited about our team's potential and we're really excited to see how we'll do at region!
This week has taught me a lot, and it's only the first week! For instance, keeping a good attitude has definitely been a lesson I've relearned this week, as well as just putting one foot in front of the other and moving forward. It'll be interesting to see what else the Lord has in store for me this year, because so far nothing has been what I imagined this school year would be like. I'm no longer in IB, and I have only a few classes with most of my friends, not to mention a few other things. Yes siree it's going to be a different, interesting, and definitely a good year!

Music Newsflash!

My sisters have recently been listening to the Jersey Boys soundtrack, a musical about the Four Seasons. The music was awesome, so I decided to look up some of their music, and music from their era... It's the bomb!!!!!!!! For some examples look up "Marice" by The Four Seasons, "Daydreamin' of You" by the Dreamers, "Earth Angel" by The Four Seasons, and "One Fine Day" by the Chiffons, oh and of course "Sherry" by the Four Seasons! This music is some of the best!

Pre-Region and upcoming races

The Pre-Region race is tomorrow at 10:00 at Cottonwood Complex! It's the first race of the season, and in the next week or so we'll have two more races. The Tooele Invitational is on Saturday, it's a huge race with tons of schools coming! Then next Wednesday we have our first tri-meet at Crestwood Park, Hillcrest is hosting, I think that that one starts at 3:00, so if people could come that would be really great, people cheering for you does really help, but it's entirely understandable if people don't come because unless you really love the sport, it can be kind of boring. Anyways that's the cross country schedule of races for the next week! Come if you can!

time, life, and the end of summer

Man this summer has just flown past, it's really kind of sad. You see I've done quite a few things, I've been to Taiwan, gone camping, worked, run, and had a bunch of fun, oh, and I found a new hobby.... knitting, unfortunately it seems like there just isn't as much time as there used to be. I remember summers when I was a little kid, it seemed like they would never end, we would always be outside running around, playing games, and just being kids. Now it seems like the summer never begins, there's so much stuff going on that you never have time for that summer feeling to just sink in. It's kind of just a constant go, go, go. I didn't get half the stuff done I wanted to this summer. I don't think I ever went swimming, I camped only about half as much as I would have liked, plus I never quite got the guts or time to go on a date, yeah I know all this is my own fault, but still it seems like summers were longer when I was smaller. I just regret not managing my time better, because now all that free time is going to be gone when school begins again. Still, not withstanding all the shortcomings, the summer was pretty good, I just wish it didn't have to end. We've only got one week left of summer, and then school. School where we'll be thrown back into the chaos of homework, pressure from sports, more social pressure, and all those great things. :) Still, hopefully it won't be too bad, and it will be really great to see everyone again, plus for some reason it seems like it's going to be a good year!

Pepe

Guess what everyone?!?! I got a car! Yes siree no more driving the little green old bug for me, it's awesome! It's a 1998 oldsmobile intrigue, it's a little older, but it only has 80,000 miles! My family has named it Pepe, as in Pepe le peu, after the skunk, because unfortunately the air conditioner emits a rather offensive odor, we're trying to fix it though with a combination of lysol and other things, and amazingly enough it's actually gotten better! Yes siree my own little car pepe le peu!

Flaming Gorge

Well, as a few of you may know my sister and I went to Flaming Gorge for a youth conference! It was awesome! We went rafting on the Green River all of Friday, and we managed to go down it twice! The first time was really really fun, there was ton of water fighting, and the rapids weren't so bad either :), plus we got to go hunt for geocaches along the river! Halfway down it also started to rain really hard, right about when we hit the best rapids too, that was the best part! It did get a little frightening when lightning struck the top of the canyon wall just behind us, the thunder was instant, and the storm was right on top of us! Still, that part of the river rafting was awesome! You could look out across the river and see the dimples and ripples where the raindrops struck the river, the only word to describe it is majestic! I also got dunked, and dunked others in a little raft attack that me and my leader pulled, that was way fun! We also had a short devotional, devotionals always seem to manage to readjust my life in some way, sometimes it's small, and other times it's quite significant. This one managed to remind of some things that I had forgotten, and it's already helped me to readjust and keep heading down the right course. It was a really fun, and really memorable trip! Sorry I don't have any pictures, I forgot a camera :(

Cross Country

Well, I haven't posted in awhile, so I thought I might as well say something about what I do just about every morning, run! Cross country is awesome, and summer training this year has been really fun, but also really hard. Our team is really amazing, and we've got quite a few new people that are likely to be amazing by the end of the year, that's you Brad and Andrew! We also have quite a few new girls runners, which finally gives us enough for a varsity, and it's looking like the girls may make it to state this year! Still, it's been a hard season so far, we're averaging somewhere around 8 or 9 miles a day! Hopefully that'll be enough to get us a region title! We've also had a series of injuries this year, lots of rolled ankles, and a couple of major falls... still nothing too serious. It's fun stuff, everyone should come out and run with us! :)

Taiwan

Well, I went to Taiwan this summer to visit my grandparents over there, (for those of you who didn't know, my mom is from Taiwan). It's always an interesting experience, I've been there four times, once every four years, and well, each time has been different in some aspects. The first time, well, I don't really remember that one :), the second time about all I remember is going to the park with my grandparents, and an awesome bakery! You know me, I remember food, food is a bit of a passion of mine :). The last time was similar, and this time, well considering I remember a lot more, having just been there, it makes it a lot easier to remember.
The trip started with a flight to Los Angeles and a 4 hour layover. At that point we were all already tired, and ready to be in Taiwan, sadly enough we still had a 13 hour nonstop flight until we got to our destination. The plain flight was largely uneventful, with the classic horrible airplane, really hard to eat with turbulence, and a slightly nauseating smell :), still over all it wasn't too bad.

In Taiwan we did a variety of things, however, the first thing we did was eat, we were almost always eating! We ate a variety of things there, anything from normal fish, to a whole chicken, chicken's feet, and an entire pork leg! I know, it's quite the variety! :)

For the first half of our vacation we went on a tour of the island, starting at the northern tip, and moving to the south, it took us three days, and was one of the more, well, interesting parts of our trips. You see, we went on a tour with what we deemed the "Old people's club", it was a government sponsored tour for the older generation that would teach them about proper hygiene in respect to diseases such as diabetes and other things. So we were to spend three days on a bus full of old people, and sadly enough we can't understand anything they're saying, because sadly enough only my mom speaks their language, and none of them speak much english... and to add to the awkwardness and slight annoyance, it was a karaoke bus, meaning we listened to karaoke in a different language, sung by slightly tone deaf older people, and that lasted for something like 6 hours a day! It was, interesting... :) The tour was really cool though, we got to see the southern tip of the island, as well as a bunch of cool Buddhist temples!
For the remainder of the trip we spent time with my grandparents, as well as did A LOT of shopping, not a good thing, my feet hurt just about every day after that! :) We also went to a humongous zoo, it was way cool, there were a ton of butterflies there, more then I've ever seen! Oh, and I got to dress up in traditional royal garb! It was a really fun trip, and I'm glad I was able to go. Before I went I'd never really thought of my grandparents over there as being my grandparents, they were just my mom's parents, if that makes any sense at all, but after that trip, even though I was never really able to talk to them I think of them as my grandparents, my grandma and grandpa, my ugon and uma.

Joining the Craze

Well, I've decided to join the blogging craze that seems to be sweeping the nation. So many of you now have blogs I decided to give it a try. I don't know how updated I'll be able to keep it, but hey, I'll give it a try! Be sure to come back I should have some posts up about my trip to Taiwan sometime soon!