They laid siege to it for seven years.

I just completed by penultimate week of class today, and I realize you guys are even closer to the end than I am. I hope you're surviving. Most of you. After I blogged last Friday, I got in a bus bound for Tufts, which is pretty close to MIT. I thought about texting you, Raku, but it probably wouldn't have been worth it because I was occupied with the track meet all day. So I didn't.

I did not race because I didn't qualify for NESCACs, so Saturday was a watching day. Sebastian ran a a fantastic 10k and Pete finally broke 2 in the 800! I know these names and accomplishments don't mean much to you guys, but keep in mind I'm writing this blog for my future self as much as I'm writing it for you. Quick Pete story: He's a senior this year and he had ran between 2:00 and 2:01 approximately seven thousand times, but he'd never gotten below two. This was his last race ever, and he barely squeaked in under that mark. We all went pretty crazy when it happened. Gigantic group hug on the track. If we had suffocated him with that group hug and he died right there, I think we would have all been okay with it because he finally did what he needed to do.

Here's the thing about riding on the bus to and from meets: Bus movies can really suck. I have seen some God awful pieces of cinema on those too-small TVs. But last weekend was different. We watched Miracle on the way down, which isn't anything new 'cause we watch that one a couple times a year, just before the really big meets. It definitely gets better the more times you see it. On the way back, we started out with The Lion King, and everyone was singing along, of course. But since that's a short movie, we started another: Braveheart. Now Braveheart is a great movie. Historically accurate? No. But a great movie nevertheless. It is an atrocious bus movie, though. Thing with bus movies is you can't really hear them all that well. And you've only got so much time on the bus. We didn't finish it. And that sucks. I was so ready to see that last scene.

Just me.

Sunday was hike day. We loaded up in the back of a pickup truck (which is apparently legal in Vermont) and drove to nearby Lake Dunmore, which I compared to Nen Hithoel in my first blog post of freshman year. The hike . . . could have gone better. Sebastian thought he knew where he was going. I'll leave the rest up to you. You and my pictures. Some are from the drive there, some are from the hike, one is from the lake wading session that followed the hike, and I might even squeeze in one or two from the drive back. Let's see how it goes.

The Joker doing his best Derek impression.

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En route to hike: Kate eating an invisible burger, Mark trying to look cool, and my thumb actually being cool.

Those mountains way in the distance are the Rockies. The land between them and where I was standing when I took this picture is called Iowa. It includes states such as Ohio, Indiana, Chicago, and Nebraska.

Those are the Green Mountains. Can't you tell?

Chuck found the entrance to Menegroth.

It's a lot prettier in September. 

Outrageous flow.

So passed Sunday. I wrote a ten page paper (on Scottish nationalism) on Wednesday night-early Thursday morning, the second ten-pager I've written in less than a day since two weeks ago (the other about Iranian sponsorship of terrorism). And I've got another ten-pager due Tuesday (Western film and mythology/history). Hopefully I'll start that one this weekend.

While doing some reading about suburban SoCal for my History of the American West class, I came across this bit:

While we're on the topic of Newport, I'll go ahead and announce that Middlebury and Newport Beach show the same temperature right now. This past week has been beautiful. Living in Orange County all my life, I had no idea how spectacular a sunny day is. People here go crazy. I am now a firm believer that you can never, ever really appreciate the sun until you have been deprived of it. The weather is something you actually talk about here, and not just to stave off awkward pauses during passing conversations with semi-acquaintances. Here, you talk about the weather with your best friends, and you talk about it a lot. It changes everything. Yesterday we played frisbee for an hour on the field. How crazy is that? I've been wearing short to class. Shorts!

Of course, the change of the seasons means something else, something far more important than even the weather. The following video probably won't get any of you excited, but it did get me excited, so I'll put it up here for the sake of my future self. (Maybe I'll take this opportunity to address my future self. I hope he comes back to read this at some point. Hi Derek. Hope life's going well for you. I know you remember the 2013 playoffs. Right now the Ducks-Wings series is tied 1-1. Don't tell me what happens, please.)

The playoffs started on Tuesday, and opening night couldn't have gone much better. The Kings lost in spectacular fashion. I'm posting the video of their game-losing goal below. You guys actually should watch this one. It's such an outrageously terrible mistake that even non hockey fans will appreciate how titanically awful and hilarious it is. Keep in mind, this happened during sudden-death overtime, while the Kings were on a power play.

Wow.

Also that night, the Ducks opened up their series against the Detroit Red Wings, whom they have faced six different times in the playoffs since 1997, the most of any two teams in the NHL. The Ducks took Game One with a 3-1 decision.

Teemu Selanne's third period goal.

Game Two was last night. I'm not emotionally put together enough right now to describe it. I'll just say it was the most exciting hockey game I've seen in six years. History will not forget this game. The end result was not good. Maybe these texts between my dad and me will give you a small idea of what kind of game this was.