What a long, strange month it's been.

Hey again everyone.

Wow, so much to tell you but so little time and space. What the hell, I'll you everything.

My last post was April 14, 2011, but so much has happened since then. Take for example, April 29, 2011. That marks one year since we came back from Louisville, KY for the DECA ICDC 2010. Wow, time flies. More on that later.

At about 2:40 PM, I walked into the Apple Store with the intent to buy a replacement iPhone 3G for my old and battered iPhone 3G. The Genius behind the Genius Bar got all my paperwork in order, and here came the first surprise: rather than billing me $199 for a replacement, I was only billed $85. 

The Genius walked over to the drawer and pulled out a replacement iPhone 3G. He then inserted his SIM tray ejector tool and tried to open the sim tray of the new iPhone, but to no avail. He spent at least 15 minutes trying to un-jam the SIM tray but it was useless. He then put the iPhone 3G back in the box and came over to me, and I was sure I was walking out of there without a phone at all until they could order a replacement.

Well, he walked over to me, and he said, "So we've been having some trouble with the SIM tray on the replacement iPhone 3G, so we're gonna go ahead and upgrade you to a 16-gigabyte iPhone 3GS.

I nearly lost it right there. Months of eBay-ing, months of making new contacts and asking around, all at an end. I jumped all around the Apple Store bragging that I had a new 3GS (and it's not even as good as a 4!). It's been such a great phone so far. It does everything I want, and then some. The battery lasted over 6 hours of usage on each charge, perfect for my trip to Orlando, which brings me to...

...the DECA International Career Development Conference 2011. Me, along with 8 of my classmates, traveled to Orlando, FL to compete and attend leadership conferences. It was the time of my life. Not only were there 3 plane rides involved (I filmed all the takeoffs and landings on my new iPhone 3GS, got yelled at by a flight attendant, but sneakily whipped out my phone and started filming again), but the weather was hot and humid (85 degrees and clear skies) as opposed to 40 degrees and snowy. Our hotel, the Hilton Orlando, had the best pool I have ever seen in a hotel. We went to SeaWorld, went mini-golfing, and whatnot. In terms of actual competition, me and my partner were the only ones in our group that made it to the Finals. We didn't get top 3 or even top 10, which is somewhat disappointing but I feel that being in the top 22 is still pretty good, especially on an international level.

I am now in the midst of my last full week of junior year, with finals next week. My grades are good, but barely. More work is needed. I have begun my Facebook hiatus for an indefinite amount of time and in the meantime will keep Tweeting and "Bloggering." Until then, I'm off!