So Robotics Team 1967 came back home at 7pm today after a 4 day stay at Las Vegas to compete in the Regionals there. UGHhfhff I have to say that was a pretty cool trip filled with fun but at the same time tiredness and irks.
I rode in our school van (which can hold up to 11 students) for 20 hours total in our trip to Las Vegas, and we had a lot of team bonding time haha. I expected to sleep in the car for like 5 hours straight or something, but I ended up staying awake the whole trip there and when we went back to California I fell asleep here and there xD

My motivation was renewed by the sight of the landscapes on our way to the Regional... There was this one place where they had rolling hills and rocks scattered about it, decorating its greenness, and that reminded me of Oku's homeland. (he used to live on the hills like that where there was no place to hide for battles) and then there was a big hill with power windmills on it, which reminded me of Valley Windworks in Pokemon Diamond/Pearl/Platinum~

When we entered Las Vegas, I had this really weird feeling. Something about the city irks me, despite the beautiful lights at night- I mean, Casinos and lots of erotic ads and media really irked me. But on the other hand we drove the Strip and saw all the cool buildings and stuff on our first night there~

The competition was exciting since it was our first time attending that regional, so we didn't know any other teams around in it- well, there were some teams there that had competed back at the Regionals in San Jose (which is where my school is) but otherwise it was cool getting to know the unfamiliar teams at an unfamiliar place! There were low team numbers (the higher the team number the later it was created) like team 4, 25 and 39!  And holy crap, there was even a team from the Netherlands, Ohio, and even Germany! (You can imagine the trip they took to get to California!) The teams that we were alliance with were so awesome and nice! We even got plushies from some of them, one of them handmade <3 and they were so friendly!

I think we kind of rocked at the Regional. Joe Jr. (our robot's name) was usually on offense and scoring points for us, and we put up a good fight against the other teams- we even got on the finalist list! (our first one in this team EVER! >8O ) but it kind of sucked since we got owned by the godly team on the first elimination rounds. We were unfortunately matched up with them first thing, but at least we made it near final finals!

After one of the days in the Regional, our team attended a social, where we had to basically socialize with other teams (ffff and our team is pretty awkward and nervous) so we just hung around our own team members at the start. Me and my friends were too awkward to join the games the other teams were playing so we rolled down a small hill lol, and then we ended up playing many other games with the other teams.... and unexpectedly, we were the last ones to leave the Social (all the other teams left long ago) and team 4 left before us, but not after multiple games. It was really funny since we were awkward at the beginning and well, look what happened, we've had fun in the end~

The only time we explored the Strip was after the last day of the competition- it was like 10pm when we walked on the streets, but we got to watch the fountain show right outside Caesar Palace- it was super windy, which made an awesome misty effect with the fountains as the water danced. The only thing I hated during this walk through the strip were the Casinos. OH GODDD. It smelled like smoke everwhere you went ;A; We had to go through a Casino to get to the little Paris town, and it was just killing most of us. The walk was worth it though~ in Paris there was this one place where an awesome piano dude was playing and we were just like YEAAAAAAAA GO PIANO DUDEEE (because all we heard in Las Vegas was pop music and rap) and he was rocking at the piano , so he deserved our cheer. 8>

In the end that was a pretty fun trip- I'm glad we got out there and showed them what our team was made of, even though we didn't exactly win and we kinda of sucked at some places-- but whatever! We got into the elimination rounds, and made history to our school! There was a lot of firsts in this trip... But im happy to be back home... Well, spring break is here so I definetly have to get back working on No Reverse and One minute (though I doubt I can finish it in time) uffhhh but sleep comes first