Abby's thoughts

Oh Wow, Another Year to Review!

2009-12-31T10:40:00.000-05:00

Over the past month or so I've been thinking about 2009, and what happened during that year. As I kept thinking, I realized that God did so much in my life! I feel like I could write a book about 2009 if I tried, because that's how eventful it was. I'll start at the very beginning, since Julie Andrews says that's the best place to start. The first few months of 2009 were not that eventful. I just went through my last semester of high school. In that process, I worked at letting go of a friendship that I thought God had finished in my life. This friendship never really ended on sour terms, but rather simply phased out. Eventually graduation came around, providing me with one of the sweetest nights of my life.

A week after graduation I moved out of my parent's house and started working full time. God gave me this awesome opportunity to work at Messiah College for a few months before I started school. It was the best decision of my life to get a taste of campus life before classes started in September. Even though sometimes I mourn the fact that all I did during the summer was work, it doesn't change the fact that I will never regret summer work.

In addition to working during the summer, I also found myself pulling out of a "spiritual crisis" that I happened to be in for the past two years. As I finished high school, and moved into this community of believers, I noticed changes in my spiritual life, but still struggled with rebuilding that connection and relationship with God. In late July, however, I received an email from that friend that I let go of earlier in the year. Basically, in our conversation he said something about God putting my name on his heart for someone to contact. Just knowing that God was still using me in the lives of others was enough to fully pull me out of that spiritual crisis. I wrote a song about it, and you may contact me if you would like to see the lyrics to that song.

After a long summer of work, I officially started college! This past semester was definitely an eye opening experience. I also started doing a radio show again! It reminded me of how much I love radio, and it's definitely what God called me to do with my life. I can't wait to continue my radio show next semester!

Along with this whole theme of change, in case you didn't pick that up for this year's events, I changed churches twice this year. During the summer I attended the church just outside of campus. I can walk to it from my dorm, which helped since I do not own a car. Then I helped the friend that contacted me during the summer with finding his new church home. Once he found his new church, I felt God calling me to continue to go with him. And even though at times through September and October I felt like I should bail out of this whole thing, God kept nudging me to go.

The previous two months could probably have a blog post of their own. But I'll try to summarize the best I can. Basically, I conducted my first DTR (or Pulling a Ruth, if you want to call it that) ever with this guy who had been taking me to church. It was seriously the hardest thing I ever did in my life. Needless to say at first I did not receive the response I desired. From this first response, I spent the next week figuring out what to do with myself now. I knew that first and foremost I needed to switch churches yet again. That was a rough week, but I got through it with God's help. I learned a lot about leaning on God, and relying on His strength. With the twists and turns of life came a change of heart from David. Thankfully this change was for the better.

So from this experience, I went from being single to starting a relationship. We waited until I finished the semester so that I wasn't juggling too many things at once. This explains why I mentioned the countdown twice in my previous post, and why I didn't blog much in trying to keep this a semi-secret. After going back and reading the blog post from my birthday, it's funny to see how God works everything out. I had talked about not going on date yet in my life, but two and a half months after that it actually happened. In this I also realized that I had been waiting for roughly seven years for David to ask me out. That's pretty crazy.

Overall, 2009 was a great year. So many cool things happened, and I learned a lot, and changed a lot. Even though having these constant changes took their toll on my emotions, I'm thankful for the continuous opportunity to learn to cope with change. Just because 2009 is coming to a close does not mean the changes will stop, and I'm okay with that. While I have an idea of what 2010 will bring, I'm okay with not knowing the full picture. It gives me more chances to trust the one who leads me through life.

I should be working on homework...

2009-11-19T16:33:00.000-05:00

I couldn't complete today without posting my thoughts from one of my classes today. I'm 28 days from completing my first semester in college (not that I'm counting or anything) and the work load is starting to multiply. Thankfully, I feel okay about it, and know that if I keep trusting God, and reorganizing my priorities, eventually everything will be completed. Each one of these 28 days will bring its own struggles and challenges, but I will push on towards the goal.

Anyways, onto my main point of this post. Today in my Foundations of Marriage and Family class, we talked about people as the reach the middle age and elderly years. My professor ended with showing us a clip from Good Morning America that featured Robin Roberts being transformed from her 45-year-old self into an 85 year-old-woman. The whole concept puts everything in a new perspective, but there was one part that stuck out the most to me. When Robin goes to the grocery store as her 85-year-old self, there's a hidden camera that goes along for the ride. As she narrates her journey, she points out that some people laugh at her, while some others tried to help her if she had problems reaching an item on the shelf.

As I watched this, the following thought hit me, "What happened to those people who helped Robin once they found out it was Robin Roberts (if they watched the end result)?" Also, I wonder how many people would have helped her if they would have known? God decided to run with those thoughts and bring me to another conclusion. We do that to Jesus. What if Jesus wants us to reach out and help someone in need? How many times to we brush these off notions because we think it won't matter? Personally, I don't even want to know, because I'm sure many times I haven't even thought about opportunities to help staring me in the face.

So there it is, what I wanted to share with the world. I hope you appreciated me coming up to breathe in the form of posting this on my blog. Realistically, you probably won't hear from me again until December 17th. But, that's only 28 days away!

Just when I thought I was done...

2009-10-19T19:38:00.000-04:00

How is it that during the low stress times of my life I have no relationship problems to speak of, and then when all this stress piles up, it walks in and says "Hey! Remember me? We haven't debated in forever!" Obviously God knows what's going on, so I'll keep following Him. Maybe I end up creating the issue, making it larger than life. I just know that I need to keep waiting, and praying for my future husband. Sure, it gets monotonous after awhile, but I have faith that my persistence will pay off someday...hopefully someday soon.

Thankfully, I have a wealth of resources to help me in my journey. Every Sunday morning I eat breakfast in the floor lounge and listen to The Boundless Show. They always have sound advice on all aspects of being a young adult. They usually provide a good dose of humor as well, which puts me in a great mood before I head off to church. I really wish another one of my friends listened to Boundless, because there's so much I want to discuss with someone, but can't. For now I'll keep listening, reading, and thinking.

Well, I need to get back to the normal College life stuff. Maybe I'll find more time to blog over fall break?

A morning like this can't go without a blog post...

2009-10-10T09:36:00.003-04:00

So, it's kinda early for a Saturday, and I've already been up for what seems like forever. Let me explain: My mom is going to Ohio because he uncle is getting remarried out there. Actually, it seems like a lot of people I know are either out in Ohio or Indiana. I really don't understand, what's so great about those states? Just kidding, I know people who love it out there, just like I love it here in PA. Anywho, Mom's plane left at 6:15am, which meant she needed to be at the airport at 5am or so. Now, Mom considered just paying to leave the car at HIA, but I jumped in and volunteered to drive her to the Airport so that I could have a vehicle, but that's another story for another day. Anyways, I slept on the lounge chair in the living room last night, and woke up to my parent's alarm clock going off at 3:30am. I figured while I was awake, I might as well get ready for the day, since I knew we'd be leaving during the 4 o'clock hour. We didn't leave until 4:45am, but that's okay because there was no traffic what so ever until we got closer to Harrisburg.

After Mom check her luggage, and started going through security, I decided to follow the signs for the observation deck, because that just sounded like fun, and what else is a girl to do at 5:30 in the morning? Well, HIA's observation deck isn't exactly much to write home about. Plus, I knew that I'd have to wait at least a half an hour before any planes took off (it's a small airport), and didn't want to wait that long. So I made my way back to the parking garage, only to find that I couldn't remember where I parked the van. I don't usually find myself in this predicament, and thankfully I realized that I came back to the parking garage a different way than when Mom and I left it. I was able to remember some of the surroundings of where we parked, and eventually found it! Mind you, this was my very first parking garage experience, and I think I did pretty well.

I drove out of the parking garage, paid for parking, and made my way towards the highways. I was doing okay until I had to chose whether I needed to take 83 north or south. Somehow I ended up in the lane for 83 north before I could change my mind. So I went with it, and knew that I saw signs saying it would lead to I-81, and I knew that once I got to I-81 I'd regain my sense of direction. Somewhere around there is started to rain. No biggie, it's been raining a bit lately, and I can handle it. Then it started raining harder and harder, until I needed to put the wipers on high in order to see! I checked the clock, which told me it was 6:00am. Good, Mom's plane hadn't left yet. I turned this time into my morning devotion, praying fervently that I wouldn't die right there on whatever highway the van was on. The drivers around me didn't seem to understand my precautions of going slow in dark while pouring down rain, but they just passed me and it was okay. (because what's the use of driving fast when you can't see?)

It was scary, and reminded me of whenever I helped with the driving out to Ohio and went through two major thunderstorms head on while driving on the turnpike. This had the added element of experiencing it in the dark. I made it to the Carlisle Pike, where I walked around a little bit at Wegman's and WalMart. I was going to go to Panera Bread, but they didn't open until 7, and I figured I might as well go back to the college to get a meal included in my meal plan, so I wouldn't have to pay anything.

No, I haven't slept since I got back, and yes, I'm tired. I still need to work at some point today, and should probably do some homework. I'll sleep at some point, I'm just not sure when. I'll figure it out though, no worries.

Another new song!

2009-10-07T21:41:00.002-04:00

so for the past two days a new song has been forming in my head! I'm really excited to see the creative process go to work like this! I don't have a title for it yet, and probably won't until I absolutely need it. I already have some of the chords on guitar, but am waiting until I can get to a piano to try to figure that out, because I'm hearing piano in my head. It's harder for me to write music on piano, so it's something I don't usually do, but definitely feel like in order for me to put my best into this song, I need to at least attempt to pick out the music on piano.

I'm not ready to share the lyrics with the world yet, however. This song is extremely personal to me at the moment, making it very difficult to share.

Well, this week so far has been good. There's still much to do before the week ends, but I know that with God's help I can accomplish much!

so here I am

2009-10-02T09:15:00.002-04:00

It's here, I'm 19. If you want to be technical about it I won't be 19 until 11:54am. The story goes that on the day when I was born, the doctor told my mom that I would be here before the end of the Price is Right show. and that's what happened! I was born exactly 40 years after the Peanuts comic debut.

So, how do I feel about being 19? Well, like I said yesterday, I didn't think it was a big deal up until last week. Then I started thinking about my grandma, my mom, and even my aunts, and what they were doing on their 19th birthday's, or what they had accomplished thus far. We'll start with Grandma.

When my Grandma turned 19, she had already married and given birth to my mom's old sister. I know that this was probably quite normal among most 19-year-old young women. That still doesn't change the fact that it's weird to think about. I mean, I haven't so much as gone on my first date (or courtship outing if you want to call it that). I know that this fact doesn't make me any less of a person, but it's still something to ponder.

Okay, by the time my mom and her sisters had turned 19, they had each completed a year of college.(they're birthdays are all in the summer) At this point in time I have only completed a month of college. so that's not really helping my self esteem at all. In addition, my aunt Tracey already had two nieces and one nephew by the time she turned 19. But I attribute that to the fact that she's the youngest, and 8 and 9 years younger than her older sisters. I've already come to the conclusion that I will not have the privilege of being an aunt for a very long time, unless I end up marrying someone who's already an uncle.(don't worry, that won't be the basis of looking for a future husband. it would just be an added bonus just like it would be if the guy I marry already has an uncle Bob so I can have one too!)

I'm so sorry if this post sounds depressing, but I'm only sharing what my thoughts contained over the past couple weeks. It's not always easy being the oldest in my immediate family. Some days I feel the trail-blazer inside of me, and other days I want to hide from my trail-blazer responsibilities. It's okay though, I know that God is there for me as a leaning post.

I would like to close this post with a chorus to a song of mine. I may have posted this chorus before, but it's good enough to post again.

Blink your eyes
Time goes by
Here we are on the side
Figuring out what we want to
Do with our lives
Where do we go from here
Where will we be
In another ten years
Oh where will we be
Ten years from now?

I'm excited about my birthday, I really am. I can't wait to see what God has in store for me this year!

Thinking back to look ahead

2009-10-01T19:10:00.002-04:00

Over the past month or so, I've been having lots of flashbacks to middle school. Why, you ask? Well, that's for me to know, and you to not find out yet. It's been very interesting though, thinking about the different people I hung out with compared to who my friends are now. I also thought of how monumental a drawing of a "scary caribou" can be. Now that I think of it, I wonder if I still have some of those drawings...once again, don't ask. Thinking back to those times gives the future a new light. Ok, so the fact that I'm turning 19 tomorrow may have something to do with it. Turning another year older didn't seem like a big deal a few weeks ago, so why does it matter now? well, i'm not really sure. ask me again in a few weeks and maybe I'll be able to tell you.

Lots of thoughts tonight

2009-09-20T21:36:00.003-04:00

Ever since this morning, I seem to have a mind saturated with diverse thoughts. I have more questions than answers, and those questions produce more questions. In some ways I suppose it's a matter of sorting out my life. At the same time I realize it's going to take more than one day to sort all this out. For some of it I need to wait on God. Waiting can be extremely difficult at times.

Part of the reasons for feeling this way could be stress from school. By noon tomorrow I will have completed two tests in a row. This isn't exactly the most ideal way to start the week, but hopefully it'll only get better from there. I do know that I feel like homework is a never ending cycle, and as much as I try, I can't seem to get ahead.

Anyways, back to the mind full with thoughts thing. It's made today seem longer. I feel like I just fit three days into one. While there's a lot of unknowns in my thoughts right now, I do know that I can keep holding onto God. I know that He hears me, and will help me through these strange feelings I'm having. In the mean time I'll keep praying and find something to do while I'm waiting. Oh wait, I can do all that homework that's on my to-do list! (I love college, I promise!)

while i'm on the subject...

2009-09-07T16:59:00.003-04:00

I would just like to say that I love the media! and not for the reasons that the rest of us love the media. I really love studying the media, and learning as much as possible about it.

And this is why i can't decide what i want my concentration for my major to be. I guess i have time to think and pray about it though.

just a thought

2009-09-03T14:20:00.003-04:00

ok, i've really held back on saying the following comment, because i don't want it to come out of as a complaint. But the time has come to just say it. i feel like i've been 18 forever. it's not a bad thing. Actually, this past summer was the first where my age never really mattered, because everyone was in college, and all that did matter was that we were cleaning a bazillion bathrooms.

on another note, during the past few worship experiences, i have come up with parts to a song of mine. i actually wrote the chorus three years ago.(or something like that) this past sunday, i went to church with an awesome friend of mine. while i did actually get something out of that sermon, i had a verse to write down. thankfully the bulletin for that church has lots of white space for taking notes, so i did both. i took notes and wrote my song. although i always think i look really weird when i'm writing songs because i end up tapping out the rhythm, and sing to myself and stuff like that. oh well.

During Chapel today, i came up with the second verse. i still need to practice it all together to see how it sounds, but i think God really came through on that one. This is all such a blessing because i've been really struggling emotionally over the past few days. i still need a bridge to the song, but i'll wait on God's timing for that.

well, i need to head to class.

wow

2009-08-31T08:03:00.003-04:00

where did all that time go? summer, working, enjoying sunsets and all that? actually, i think the sunsets are only going to get better as we move into the season of fall. last night's was pretty cool. oops, i 'm getting off track already.

ok, so classes start tomorrow. i'm kinda nervous about that, but i think it'll be okay. I still have some things to do in order to get ready. I'm waiting on a few books to arrive here by mail, and i have two or three books that i need to buy from the textbook express. Thankfully, since classes are starting on a tuesday, i only have two of them. one in the later morning, and another in the afternoon.

on really random note, it's amazing how Relient K songs don't really sounds old unless you really read into it, and it's amazing that so many people know so many of their songs. I love Relient K, and sometimes when i listen to some of their earlier stuff i'm reminded of Middle School. weird.

nervous energy

2009-08-30T09:40:00.003-04:00

I am super nervous right now. While I know i shouldn't be nervous, under the circumstances, i think i'm allowed. In addition, I have about nine more minutes of nervousness until it all climaxes. I'm praying that God will calm my nerves, and just help me to stay sane. that's all, the end.

College

2009-08-29T13:19:00.002-04:00

So, it's Welcome Week. i'm loosing track of what day it is because every day for the past week has felt like a saturday. so now that today actually is saturday, it just feels weird. I keep seeing more and more people from high school, and i think that's going to really help my transition. Obviously, living here during the summer helped both myself and my parents with the transition of me not living at home anymore.

We've been doing lots of activities, and attending lots of meetings. yesterday we went on a service project to various places in the area. I love service projects, and really enjoyed my experience.

the cafeteria on campus has been a lot crowded compared to during the summer. i guess it's not quite as bad as it was whenever the Jewish Conference was here. But for dinner yesterday and lunch today i went with a large group, and that almost makes it worse. but we found places to sit, and it provided a great time for fellowship between the people on my floor and in my peer group.

well, i have to get ready for a floor meeting that i think is in the lounge.(i should probably check on that) so far i really like college, and community.

and here i am again

2009-08-25T20:08:00.003-04:00

Somehow, it doesn't feel like I took this test two years ago. It feels like two weeks. And yet, here I am again waiting to take a test that could change my life. sure, it could be like the last one where it did not amount to anything, but what if this one gets me through to the next step? what if this actually changes my life? Everyone says that they could see me being on Jeopardy. While I'm not always able to answer the questions ever single night I watch the show, I love when knowledge of school or random facts show up. Yesterday, for example, there was one clue where the contestants had to take the derivative to come up with the question! I'm not sure if anyone else my age became so excited with being able to actually apply Calculus to real life.

I almost decided not to take this first step in taking the online test. But then I remembered a quote I've read a million times passing through the school hallways. It goes along the lines of missing 100% of the shots you never take. That's about the time when i decided i had nothing to lose.

Through it all, I keep remembering a different version of 1 Peter 5:7. In the NIV text, it says, "Cast all your anxiety on Him for He cares for you." However, The Message: Remix starting at verse 6 states, "So be content with who you are, and don't put on airs. God's strong hand is on you; he'll promote you at the right time. Live carefree before God; he is most careful with you."

I like how that's worded. He will promote you at the right time. So right now might not be what God had in mind in terms of promoting me. Or maybe, I am supposed to be promoted right about now. By the way, in this case, I use the term promoted not in the sense of getting a raise, but just being blessed in a public way. Either way, I have peace of mind knowing that I am capable of watching TV for educational purposes, in addition to taking what I learn on Jeopardy and applying it to school. Not that it happens often, but once in awhile something like that will come up.

That, my dear friends, is what my heart has to say. Well, it's part of it. The other part doesn't even pertain to the topic of discussion.

Dealing with Transitions

2009-08-22T07:56:00.002-04:00

Yesterday I completed my last day of working for the summer. while i was really impatient all day for time to go faster so i could be done, i was really sad when it was over. since completing my time at the Pizza Buffet, i guess i always thought i'd be in a job situation for the long run.(even though i knew my full time work would come to a close at the end of the summer) but after leaving the second floor hub without my name tag holder, key, or any of my work shirts, tears found their way to my eyes. i guess i've been through so many changes lately, so it's just been hard going through yet another one. also, yesterday was just really fun, despite the fact that we had to clean nine bathrooms. one of my co-workers brought his CDs to listen to while we cleaned, and he had a lot of christian ska (Five Iron Frenzy and the O.C. Supertones) and just some great music from the late 90s/early 2000s. i had a blast listening to all that stuff while cleaning each toilet in the building.

so after leaving work in tears, i decided that i needed to figure out what exactly is wrong with me. and i came to the conclusion that i just don't handle transitions the best, especially when a bunch come in the span of three months or so. and i knew my full time work would come to a close. it just came really fast, that's all.

so, what's next, you ask? well, i have three days of preparation for welcome week. all that means is that i need to get this room cleaned up in three days. also somewhere in there i need to get my computer configured for the college's network, and find out whether i have all the school supplies i need. lastly, i'm going to rest. after thursday, i'm going to be pretty busy for the next two months or so (until fall break). am i scared? yes. But i know that the education i received from Mechanicsburg surely taught me something about college.(after all, isn't that what they attempted to do in Period Zero?) I also know that God never brings us through anything that He and I can't complete together. that alone has brought me through so much in my life.

moved again

2009-08-15T09:37:00.004-04:00

so here i am, in fall housing. after two month of working for Campus Events, and living in Bittner with the rest of the summer workers, it has come time to move. and frankly, Bittner will always hold a special place in my heart. i now live in a building on the outskirts of campus, and on top of all that it's facing the wrong way, towards the sewage treatment center. (why did Upper Allen Twp have to pick Grantham for this stuff????)

my stuff isn't quite unpacked, i'm not sure if it will be by the time my three roommates get here for Welcome Week. i didn't sleep that well or that much last night, but i'm hoping to go to bed earlier tonight.

there are a few good things i'm finding out about this building, however. I am on the third floor, so i get great reception when listening to my favorite radio station. and, i've found that i can get WCRH, which comes out of Williamsport, near where my grandparents live in Maryland. i was amazed when i found i could get it crystal clear. i can't even get WDAC clear like that from Lancaster! so i guess i'll be able to listen to Adventures in Odyssey from WCRH if i happen to be around. the only downside is that these two radio stations (WJTL and WCRH) are right next to each other on the dial, so hopefully i'll be able to keep them separate.

another awesome thing about this place is that there's a TV in the lobby with a VCR connected to it. so i actually might do some of my TV watching down there, and bring some cassette tapes to watch at some point.(just because i can)

at least i can rest in the assurance of knowing that if i want to exercise all i need to do is run up and down all the stairs a few times.

so much to say

2009-08-06T10:47:00.002-04:00

wow, a lot has happened since i posted last in May. The job i thought i was going to get, i didn't, and ended up with a job at the college i will attend in the fall. because of all that, i decided to move in early, which has been the best decision ever! i've found that living away from home has it's own sets of challenges, and responsibilities, but i like it all. i've made a few new friends, and i get along with my co-workers pretty well. and now summer is almost over.

oh, and failed to mention the most important thing that has happened to me over the past few months. i graduated from high school!!!! the graduation ceremony went so well, and i had so much fun. yes, it was a bit stuffy and hot in the arena where the ceremony was held, but it was so worth it. Graduation was held at Messiah College, which is a nice transition for me. since my dad works there, he was able to come to the rehearsal earlier that day to find out where i would be sitting, so he would know where to save seats. he also was able to get in before they opened the door to the public so that he could get the best seats possible. i really liked that advantage, even though i'm not the one who benefited from it.

along with my transition of living arrangements came a change of church. I knew this day was coming, and i might as well of been counting down the days. It actually took a few sundays before i could because of other obligations, plus i had to work two sundays in a row. but i finally did make it to Grantham BIC, and i really like it there. i feel so at home, and it's been really awesome for my spiritual growth. unfortunately, i have to go back to my home church for two weeks towards the end of August, but thankfully i'll be able to listen to the sermons from Grantham online for the weeks i missed.

i've written another song, and have been practicing the others. i'm not exactly sure what i'm practicing them for, but i know God will let me know when the time is right.

so next week i'll move into my fall housing, and continue to prepare for the start of college. i'm excited and nervous all at the same time. but i know it's going to be good. not always easy or fun, but all around good.

Say Goodbye

2009-05-18T10:20:00.042-04:00

This is the last Monday of my high school career. Well, other than graduation Monday that is. In exactly 21 days, I will be walking across a stage and departing on the rest of my life. Pretty scary, right? Actually, in a way I am scared. Not scared that I don't know what I'm doing in the long run, because I know. It's just getting to that point that seems scary. All this, by the way, leads to a very exciting announcement.

A week after I graduate, I will be starting a full time job with the state. I'll be riding the bus every day (hopefully...I'm still working out those details). Not sure what exactly I'll be doing but I know it involves office stuff. Either way, I'm very excited to be embarking on this adventure for the summer. I know that it'll take up a lot of my time, and I will only have saturdays to sleep in, but that's okay with me. It's a little different when you're earning money and getting up early everyday than when you're not. I just hope that I'll have enough self-discipline to go to bed earlier each night.

I hope to meet many new people with this new job, and maybe even network a bit. I figure it can't hurt just in case I'll need a job after college. One major thing on my "to-do" list this week is to hand in my two week notice for my current job. I work at a Pizza Buffet right now. We don't have many part time workers, so I'm interested to see the reaction of the managers when I hand over that letter telling them my plans. I already have a first draft written, and intend to put it into a Word document so I can print and sign it and all that official stuff.

So, back to this last week of school. It's actually just our last full week with classes, because next week Seniors have review days and finals. I achieved exemption for most of my classes. Survey of British Literature became my enemy, therefore I will be taking that final. Elementary Concepts of Calc suddenly made sense somewhere along the way, and so I am on the boarder line of being exempt for that. If I preform extremely well on the next test, which is very attainable, I will be exempt. I need to turn in the form by Thursday, so it'll be really dramatic until then to see if I'm exempt from math.

Getting back on track, next week I will only have to come into school for Survey of Brit Lit and gym class (and math if I have to take the final). This means I come in for period two and three on the first review day.(and maybe period seven) and then on the second day just period 2. Thursday of that we I have off, because I don't take Social Studies or World Language, and those finals are on Thursday. Friday of next week I have Survey of Brit Lit. If I'm taking the math final that will be before Survey of Brit Lit. I like this because then I can spend all my energy on math, and then not try at all of Brit Lit.

Maybe I just need to focus on this week. Or maybe just today. The idea of graduating has been very exciting so far. I will feel sadness saying to goodbye to all my friends. Thankfully, someone came up with the bright idea to invent email and facebook, so we will all be able to keep in touch! It just won't be the same...

Grantham

2009-04-09T12:20:00.003-04:00

I don't how it works for the rest of you, but I found out last night that if I need to pray about something, it really helps of I'm in the place I'm praying about. That may seem complicated and unreasonable, but last night the place I needed to pray about was only a ten minute drive from my house. Joel needed to go in that direction anyways.

See, for whatever reason I have been extremely worried and stressed about paying for college. Well, I was upset and worried about more than that, but it's taking a lot for me to work through everything that's bugging me. I have troubles voicing my "deep down opinions" for fear that my parents won't honestly listen, therefore leaving me worse off. Except for the fact that I'll be worse off either way because everything just keeps eating away at me, which is probably one reason why I'm really looking forward to moving out. Even so, I have a feeling that these problems will follow me to whatever residence I end up living in.

Anyways, sorry to digress. As I mentioned, paying for college probably stresses me out more than the work load itself. Even though I have tuition remission, the bill for living (and breathing) at college is a lot for an 18 year old to pay with no help what so ever. Well, I haven't had any help yet. No scholarships (yet) or secret benefactors. I don't even know of anyone who could be a secret benefactor. All I have is my stupid stupid self who just works maybe 7 hours a week if I'm blessed enough, and has been making minimum wage for the past two years! Why did I ever take this in the first place?

So anyways, I'm looking for a new job, and hopefully a full time job for the summer. It's kinda hard to come to this realization before a holiday, because I can't just go out and ask for applications on Good Friday. Well, I could, but I really want to focus on Jesus, not money. I may have to let go of my not working on sundays thing, which bothers me. Seriously, I will die if I don't go to church.

I digressed again! My point is, since I didn't know what to do, and I didn't really feel like being around other people, I took Joel to Chill Time at Grantham, and went to the college library, to work on a scholarship essay. I needed to get online for something, probably just to check my email, but I couldn't access the college's internet on the laptop. I typed in my user name and password, but over and over again it wouldn't work. Even when I came home and tried to log onto my college email, that didn't work either. I don't know what's going on with that, so I hope no one important emails me on my college email. Anyways, I wrote down some ideas for the essay, and then headed down to the creek. I walked around and prayed. And I felt like praying that the place of my future schooling/residence really helped give focus. I know that God would've still been listening if i would've stayed home and prayed, but I would've been distracted. I'm always distracted while I'm trying to something important. Some family member is always either asking/telling me to do something, or wants to show me something, but I'm not getting graded on housework/chores/viewing random youtube videos, I'm getting graded on understanding Shakespeare, and doing calculus problems.(by the way, I'm starting to question why Shakespeare had to be so great. why couldn't he have been a fad that went out with the 16th century?) These distractions are part of the reason I refuse to live at home and go to college.

I really felt at peace while I walked back to Lady Blue.(um..that's our mini van. i have a bit of an emotional attachment to that thing) I'm not exactly sure where to go from here.(insert Pillar song) I guess I need to continue with my job search. I did come to the conclusion that if Jesus can sacrifice His life, maybe I can sacrifice sleep, school work, and sundays(afternoons and evenings). I'm working on being open to pretty much anything, as long as it pays, and can give me lots of hours over the summer. I'll be sad to leave the pizza buffet, seeing how it's been apart of my life for the past two years. They can't give me the hour i need/have been looking for.

I also found last night that walking helps my anger. I've always had problems with anger, but no one bothered to show me practical ways to get rid of it. The only problem with my solution is that I'm not allowed to walk in town after dark, because I'm a vulnerable adult who could get mugged or something. So that leaves me with one other option: writing. How is it that I can never meet word requirements on essays about natural disasters, and yet I have gone on and on and on just now? I have no problem writing. My grammer and style, and comma uses suck, but I like writing.

Speaking of which, I need to switch laundry and then write more for my essay. Maybe later today I can post about planning our lives around TV, and how it's starting to really disgust me, and how I fear it can tear a family a part.

Craziness

2009-04-03T10:27:00.002-04:00

I've just started to realize how crazy life is for me right now. I mean, I'm graduating in two months and five days, and officially moving to Grantham in...I don't know how many days. But I've heard that the count is down to less than 150 days. I'm trying as hard as I possibly can to resist senioritis, but alas, my efforts are slowly stopping. I'm still trying in my classes, but I just seem to get more frustrated with the hard stuff, and the long stuff, and confusing stuff. How is it that we get to a point where we don't care? How do we get out of it?

All I know is that the time is flying by. In some ways I feel sad, because sometimes I can feel this school year slipping away from my grasp. At the leadership meeting the other day, we realized that we don't have that many Christian Clubs left. Just one more for April, and then we'll be in may, which only has three or four! Christian Club has been one of the soul factors of helping my attitude about high school. In fact, I still come in early for Christian Club even though I could sleep in, and don't have to be at school until 8:55.(first period study hall) It's been a distinct love of mine, and something from which I will carry memories. I feel so sad knowing that it's all going to go away. Or maybe it's just me who's going away. Either case, I'm feeling bittersweet. Some other days I'm just ready to be done, and be Grantham-bound. but I know I have work to finish here at school before I go on to the next school.

Moving on...I finished Deuteronomy today! I just need to ready Psalm 91 (or is it 19...) and then it's onto Joshua and Judges. After that I should be back on schedule. With that said, I think it's time to wrap up this post.

Lost, the 90s, and more!

2009-04-02T10:17:00.004-04:00

So...admit it...who watched Lost last night? I won't give away too much, because I understand some people are way too busy, and need to catch up. I will, however, say this: I think there's a running theme of sandwiches, and people bring other locked up people sandwiches.

Before Joel and I sat down to watch Lost, we watched some old music videos. I got this DVD several years ago called "The Vault." Well, I think that's what it's called. It's basically every single music video from Gotee Records up until 2004. See, during supper we talked about this one music video from John Reuben called "Dippity Doin'" and we felt that we needed to show Aunt Tracey this music video. So after that music video, we just kept watching. These videos go from the most recent to the oldest. It was interesting scanning all the ones from the 90s, and even the earlier 2000s. I absolutely LOVE 90s music! While some of the music videos are cheesy, it's still fun to watch. The music video for "Two Sets of Jones" is very well done in my opinion.

It's musical season again! Our musical opens tonight. But I'm not going until Sunday. I volunteered to usher so I can get in for free! This will be my third year in a row ushering, so hopefully I'll be pretty good at it.

On another note, I found that I'm really sick and tired of driving every single day in a row! I think I've driven every day since........March 24th? See, I can't even remember! How do people do this every day? I'm used to driving for not long maybe 6 out of 7 days a week. I normally like driving, but I'm ready for a break. I did, however, enjoy the opportunity to sit in student parking lot traffic after school yesterday. That was the first and only time I have done that while being in the driver's seat. Mr. Robinson was still out there in the rain with his umbrella making sure no collisions occurred. It took me longer to get home than if I would've walked.

Well, we're nearing the end of another study hall. Aunt Tracey called Juno, and they're sending us a new modem within three to five business days. So that means between monday and wednesday. I'm not complaining, because I lived without it for three days now, so I can do without it for a while more. Plus, if I really need it, I can go to Messiah College on Sunday afternoon.

Now for some Actual News...

2009-04-01T09:01:00.003-04:00

My first intended purpose was to update you on how the home life is going. Well, it's quite swell I suppose. The DSL still isn't working, but I'm getting used to it. I think we came to the conclusion that our modem is dying? Since Mom and Dad are away, we can't really do anything about it other than deal with dial up. Since we have access to the church's laptop, we can take that to the Library or the church if needed. Plus, I can always check my email here at school, which is what I'm doing now. I guess it proves we don't really need the internet. I mean, obviously it has become necessary in the past ten years, but just because it's necessary doesn't mean we should be on it every second of our lives. What if we only checked our email once or twice a day? What if we only checked every other day?

I hear your complaints. You're saying, "But my friends need be to be online so I can talk to them! I need to do school work! I have to do research!"

Okay, so maybe you do have research waiting. But how many times do you "research" and have facebook up in another window to check on it? I do it too, but that doesn't make it right. Sometimes I amaze myself with how fast I can get something done if I really put my mind to it. Sometimes while I'm working on an essay, and have a window up with my email or facebook, I also bring up a tab with the website www.something.com. try going there sometime, and tell me what you see. It's nice because then I don't see the words "Facebook," or "Gmail," staring at me from the task bar, so I don't click it as much.

And tell me, what would happen if we decided that with the time we won't spend on the internet, we did something else productive. We could read our Bible more (I am two books behind in my Bible in a Year goal), or clean our room! Better yet, we could actually put some effort into our homework. In some ways it's good thing to not be concerned with getting online. In fact, I'm very glad that I won't have to pay for internet for a long time. That means no worrying when something goes wrong!

Well, we have come to the end of another study hall. I hope you enjoyed my commentary.

Center of the Week

2009-04-01T08:48:00.002-04:00

Happy April Fools Day! I've heard some crazy things today, and thankfully I have discernment as to what I can and cannot believe. While I was driving to a meeting at 7am, I heard something on the news having to do with someone important in our state resigning or something. I have to admit I was only half listening. By the time I was truly listening they were saying stuff about two newspapers that are merging, and it sounded kinda sketchy.

It makes me remember last April Fools day, with the media just dumping all their April Fools jokes on their audience. On the Word FM, at the beginning of the morning show(I just happened to wake up for the start of it.), they said that they had a special announcement. They claimed the from surveys that they took, changes were needed. So the host of their Sunday Evening Bluegrass show came on and made some sort of announcement that the Word FM was going to a bluegrass only format. The crazy thing is, people actually believed it! Now, even though I was half awake, I realized that it was April Fools Day, therefore this obviously was a joke. But I guess some people are wrapped up so much in their own lives that they don't remember what day it is.

This morning on the announcements they made all sorts of claims. If they really want to get us, and get all of us, they need to come up with something that would affect the seniors too. Everything they said, if true, would affect everyone except the seniors. It was a nice thought however.

Well, I really don't want to find a fish on my back, and I hope no one sticks a fish on your back either.

A Week Without Parents

2009-03-31T18:52:00.002-04:00

So, this week my parents, and my grandparents are in Oklahoma. My dad is attending a conference there, and my mom and grandparents are along for the ride. They traveled there yesterday, and I’m guessing it went well. It’s very exciting because my family never flies. I mean, all of you know that I flew last summer, but that was my first time. Part of the reason why it was my first time is because my family can’t exactly afford to pay for five plane tickets every summer. My mom has flown before, when she was a kid, but obviously, there has been a few changes to the system since then. Yesterday was the very first time my dad flew on an airplane. I thought seventeen in a half years was long enough, but add a couple more decades onto that? Anyways, I’m not sure whether he was nervous, because my dad doesn’t exactly show nervousness much. But I’m sure they all did fine.

Here at home things have been okay too. Sure, the DSL isn’t working, so we’re stuck with dial up, unless someone wants to spot me a few dollars to go to Panera Bread. Actually, I don’t really have time to get everything together and go somewhere that has WiFi. I’m not sure what Joel will contribute commentary to this dilemma when he gets home, but Aunt Tracey and I continue to ask ourselves, “How did we deal with dial-up just a couple years ago?” And then I get to the question of, “What did I do with my time before internet and Facebook?” I know one thing we used to do….cook dinner! That’s what I need to do now! By the time I post this, dinner will be long gone. I’m typing on a Word document that I will cut and paste later. Here’s to a clean house and a broken computer…I mean, slow internet!

Later:

Ha! I'm here at the library, got fed up with what all I had to do! Plus, it's a homework free night, so that helps. Maybe if I get bored during study hall I can blog some more!

A Message for StorySideB

2009-01-20T10:29:00.002-05:00

When I woke up this morning, I caught the tale end of the news on WJTL, and they sounded sad about something, as if there was a sudden piece of news that hit home. I never got a chance to figure out what it was, because all the local news stations were talking about the inauguration and not worried about what the people on WJTL was worried about. Since they were also dealing with some closings and delays, I didn't happen to hear the news again. Then I checked one of my favorite website, Jesus Freak Hideout. I found out what Lisa Landis and Fred McNaughton were talking about early this morning.

It seems that the bassist for the band Story Side B suddenly past away on January 18th. I can't imagine what pain the band and family are experiencing right now. Even from loosing a cousin four years ago, I know that there are unknown feelings to feel. I would like to share my sympathies with Story Side B, and let them know that I am so sorry for their loss. I'm praying that God will reveal His presence and love to you, even during this horrible time. The Christian music industry shares your burden and pain, I'm sure.

year in review in my eyes

2008-12-31T10:57:00.003-05:00

Doing a year in review seems to be increasingly popular this week. so i'm going to do my own little year in review, which i'll try to keep as brief as possible. It might not go in chronological order, but hopefully there will be some kind of flow. Here we go!

During the first half of 2008, i finished up my Junior year of High School. With that, i took the SATs, ACTs, and finished the Senior High Project required by the school. i also found out that i passed my Senior High Project the first time, which lifted a huge burden. By June i was all ready to leave Junior year in the dust and embark on Senior year. Also, in the realm of school, i got to watch many of my friends graduate from high school. It was my first high school graduation that i attended, and i'm so glad i attended the 2008 graduation before attending my own this coming year.

In May, i got to kiss my braces good-bye! of course this meant that during the summer i had to wear a retainer, but at least i could take that out. the braces came out about a month before i got my senior pictures taken, which was my ultimate goal.

In mid July, i tried a lot of new things all in one day. See List of Firsts for the inside scoop. the main attraction of that very hot July 17th was that i got to fly in an airplane for the very first time. i had been saving my money for a good year or two in order to go on this trip with my friend Noelle. We went to Colorado Springs for five days, and had a wonderful time! I'm hoping that some day soon i can take another trip on an airplane. even though traveling can be tiring, it's so much fun!

In August i went to a family reunion in Baltimore. It was my first time going into the city of Baltimore, and using a LightRail system. I also had the chance to see a distant cousin of mine play a piano concert.

Along with all that, i had the opportunity to see many events of the Olympics. I admit i was one of those who stayed up practically until midnight to watch Micheal Phelps swim. Unfortunately it was at the time of year when i should've been conditioning myself to go to bed earlier because of school starting a few weeks from that time. oh well...

In late August i started senior year. for the first few weeks it felt surreal. it helped going through the "Senior Routine." Things like taking the '09 picture, making sure to raise my hand in mixed classes when the teacher asked, "how many seniors do we have in here?" and stuff like that. Oh, i guess the part where i applied for college was another way to remind myself, "yeah, i'm a senior."

Speaking of college, i was accepted to Messiah College in November! This officially meant i can start focusing on school more, and not be distracted by applying to college. it also meant that i could focus on applying for scholarships.

I think that's about it. there are a few more things i'm sure i could add, such as seeing Fireproof (if you haven't seen it, mark your calendars for January 27th, that's when it comes out on DVD), and turning 18, which meant voting for the first time. it sure had been an active 366 days. Then again, leap years are always full of action.

In this coming year, i'm looking forward to graduating from high school, and starting college in the fall. I'm also currently looking for a job for the spring and summer, and thankfully i may have some options. All in all, i hope i'll be "feeling fine in 09!"

You'll never know

2008-10-31T08:24:00.002-04:00

So last night I went to work, as usual, but I ended up meeting a new employee there. I work a pizza buffet that's seen better days. We have a relatively new manager in there, and his mother-in-law has started working there just whenever we need the help. Last night I met her for the first time. I came to find out that I met her before, though I'm sure she doesn't remember.

See, two years ago I met her and her husband at a Jars of Clay concert. We sat in line for an hour and a half. For those who've never done that, when you sit in line for an hour and a half, there really isn't much you can do other than get to know the people beside you. Since this concert was at Messiah College, that made it even easier to talk to people, since most likely those people have a connection with Messiah College. Anyways, they were very nice, and I had the chance to meet two of their children. Now that I think about it, I guess they did say they had another daughter. Or my manager could be married to the daughter that I met that night, who knows?

My point is, I was a trifle surprised when I walked into work last night and "met" Anne. I was reminded once again of how nice of a person Anne is. I'm so glad she's coming to work here part time. It's amazing to see how God "randomly" brings people into our lives again and again. I was getting to a point where I thought that kind of thing only happened in books and movies. Well, proved wrong again...

I should be working on something productive...

2008-10-15T10:32:00.002-04:00

so right now i'm in Powerpoint class. but see, i have Word, and then Powerpoint, so sometimes it gets repetitive, like today. Today during Word, we had a speaker, and it's for all the business classes. so instead of seeing the speaker for a second time, i decided just to chill for awhile. i could be figuring out how to import lists in Access to make them one huge list, but i already tried and it didn't work. i also could be working on my Powerpoint FAP, but i don't really feel like doing that either. for my FAP i'm making a presentation about Adventures in Odyssey. So far it's been really fun, but i haven't been as productive as i could be.

so let's see, it's been awhile since i've posted, so what's been going on? well, i started my senior year. started writing two songs. i like the one, ripped up the other because it ended up not working.(i'm waiting for a good time to burn those papers) but i haven't really had any inspiration to add to the other.

See you at the Pole went really well this year. and Christian club has been going well too. Aparently God is supposed to do something really amazing this year. We're not exactly sure what. for some reason though i haven't felt as connected with God as i have in the past. i don't know what the problem is, or where it started. i really hope i can fix that connection soon. it just gets difficult at times, because i see everyone else on the leadership team on fire for God, but yet i can't feel anything. i even almost pulled myself off the leadership team, but i reasoned that doing that would be more harm than good. over the past few weeks i think i've realized that part of this whole thing is that my thirst for Worship hasn't been quenched through my church.

see, we still sing hymns at my church. and that just doesn't bring me into worship like other songs do. over a week ago, i went to a concert called the Art Music Justice Tour. We had a time of worship there, and it was awesome! i really felt connected there. so i guess i need to find a suppliment? i'll have to see. but i do know that the people at my church really need to warm up to the idea of doing some songs that were written during my lifetime.

ok, i have about five minutes left, so i'll try to come up with something contructive to say during that time. i turned 18 almost two weeks ago. so now i can vote, and drive past 11pm. at church last sunday, some of the ladies were giving me advice about marraige, because they were 18 whenever they married their husbands. the continued to tell me that this is a much different world, so i can wait a bit longer to get married. one of them even said 30 is a good age to get married. personally, i think that i don't to wait on purpose until i'm 30. but thinking through all this made me realize i'm the same age that my grandma was when she got married. and then i thought that in a few years, my mom will be the same age that my grandma was whenever she became a grandma.

on those thoughts i must bid you all good-bye. i'm off to practice piano during my next study hall!

Share the Joy, Share the Love, Share the Inspiration

2008-08-19T09:30:00.003-04:00

A few weeks ago, my dad told me about yet another Christian radio station he found. we were on the way to Baltimore for our family reunion, and we were still pretty close to home so i tuned it in just to see what it was. my dad has a really cheapo mp3 player that he got off of eBay right after i got my iPod.(well that was because he got eBay gift certificates, so that's what helped him pay for it) anyways, his mp3 player has a radio on it, and i guess he was just scanning the dial the one day, and found this Christian radio station on 89.9FM. it's more mellow than 90.3, WJTL, yet more music stuff than 94.5, WDAC. Anyways, over the past few weeks when i've been driving around, i switch back and forth between the WORD FM(88.1), WJTL, and this unnamed station, 89.9. i've heard the Legal ID for it once. the station is called Hope FM, but i keep missing where it's located. and i know they have to say where it's located, because that's part of FCC standard. i'll have to remember to check that out sometime today at the top of the hour. usually when i turn it on they're either playing music, or someone is giving a sermon. and like i said, the music is mellowish.

now, on Saturday nights, i've found that they have a cool-ish alternative show. but it's interesting to see their version of alternative. but the DJs seem cool. it's better then any of the other Contemporary radio stations that play around here on Saturday night. WJTL has the Archives where they play music from the seventies and maybe 80s. the WORD FM used to have the Sound of Light, but then Bill Moore left, and made them all sad, so they don't have that any more.(well, that's not entirely the case, but things with that show did start to go downhill after Bill Scott temporarily took over. but i hear they have a new host now, and from what i've read, he's pretty cool, and pretty funny.) so they just play their normal music.

so this brings me to my point that we have way too many Christian radio stations in this area. it's mostly because we are a bible belt. This is because of Messiah College, and Lancaster.(pronounced, LANG-kister) i calculated yesterday that we have seven and a half Christian radio stations, and i think even then i'm missing a few. here, i'll list them, and what kinds of stuff they play.(maybe i'll even put a website with it.) let's count together. (disclaimer: these are the radio stations that can be heard from where i live, so it might not be true for all of South Central PA)

WJTL 90.3- Best Mix of christian music. you'll basically hear a little bit of everything while listening to this station for a week. www.wjtl.com

The Word FM 88.1(Harrisburg) and 93.1(Carlisle)- station based out of Eastern PA with over a dozen towers and transmitters. they play more harder rock stuff than WJTL, and they sometimes have different singles from the artists than WJTL. both have funny morning shows. www.wordfm.org

WDAC 94.5- Focus on the Family programing, and praise music for certain parts of the day. really, really mellow praise music.

Way Truth Life Radio 107.1(Mifflintown)- this station is basically the same as WDAC. they're based in State College though, so they're weather reports are off most of the time.

1230AM The Fortress- praise music, very small and very low powered station. also has some sermons and stuff during the day. and on saturdays they have 20: the Countdown Magazine.(i know you all were singing that as your read it!)

720AM The Rock- lower powered, only during daylight(last time i checked) station. basically the same as the Fortress.

WVMM("the V") 90.7- this is the half station. they have gotten away from playing Christian music all the time, but i'm still going to give them the benefit of the doubt and call it a half Christian music radio station.

89.9- i don't know the name of this, and i described it in the first few paragraphs.

so now you have all those, so let's go back and count them up...eight and a half. if you ask me, we are spoiled when it comes to Christian radio. there are some parts of the country that don't have a good solid Contemporary Christian radio station, or they do, but it's so far away they only get it in their car. i really wish we could share the joy of having a Christian radio station that inspires, and helps people grow in their faith by playing the right song at the right time.

i really hope that during the course of my career, i can help to start a Christian radio station in a place that really needs one. a good solid local station that will help to change the lives of the area. it's going to take so much work and experience, but i know that i can totally do it with God's help. and hopefully he'll bring other people in my life who can help.

so next time you're complaining that they're isn't a good station to listen to, and you live in South Central PA, scan that thing again, because you're just not trying hard enough.

list of firsts

2008-07-16T15:05:00.002-04:00

i'm going to be completing a list of "firsts" tomorrow, and i just wanted to list them all out here, because i think about things differently when i am reading them and can see it in front of me. okay, so here we go:

tomorrow it will be my first time to...

-go inside the BWI airport
-fly on an airplane
-be in Indiana
-be at Indianapolis
-go inside the Indianapolis airport
-only be in a city for 55 minutes
-be in Denver
-be in Colorado
-go inside the Denver airport
-see those wonderful mountains with my own eyes instead of seeing them on TV or in pictures
-be in the Mountain Standard Times Zone
-travel just with a friend
-Travel with Allergies
-Travel with Benadryl
-Travel with an EpiPen
-use my new luggage
-be that far away from home
-be in a state that isn't connected to any other states i've been to(i know, i make it sound like an island)
-see my friend's house that they moved into several years ago

well, that's all i can think of for now. it's quite the list. but i'm sure it'll be great! i have lots of podcasts, music, Noelle, God, my Bible, and a book to keep me company. oh, and how could we forget my sudoku book?

i guess i'll try to update this at least once while i'm out there. it would be really fun to post something from out there. we'll see.

Wow

2008-07-10T13:23:00.002-04:00

okay, so most everyone knows that pretty soon i will be trying something new. i will be flying in an airplane. it will also be my first time going anywhere that lies west of the Mississippi River. thankfully, i do not have to take in this adventure all by myself. a friend of mine will be coming alone with me, being my personal expert on flying, and making sure i'm not an unaccompanied minor.(for pete's sakes, i'm turing 18 in two and a half months. but it's okay, she just turned 18 last March. talk about beating the system.)

there's sort of a fear i have of flying right now. it's partly because i've never flown before in my life. i've never even gotten to ride in a helicopter of hot air balloon or anything. sometimes when i really think about it, and think about what could happen to the plane, or while i'm on the plane, it kinda scares me. a lot of that is just because it's unknown, so i'm not entirely sure of what to be afraid of.

i really need to start getting everything together to start packing. i've slowly been getting everything together, but i need to finish that process. i feel like i have so much to do. at least it's not my entire family going on vacation. if it was, we'd have to empty out the refrigerator, and giving gallons of milk away, and all kinds of craziness.

Through this time of getting ready, i've learned a lot. i learned why my family has never flown instead of driving somewhere.(it's sooooo expensive. way too expensive to take five people all at once)

all in all, i know it will be one of the most exciting adventures in my life. and hey, maybe i'll write a song from it. so i guess if you could be praying for me, that'd be great. i will be leaving in one week.

Saying goodbye

2008-06-10T09:31:00.002-04:00

okay, you guys, i just thought i should let you know that this is my 100th post. so let's celebrate! and what better was to Celebrate than by recapping last night's graduation. I was an usher last night at graduation, along with a few other class of 09 people. we were supposed to meet in the back of the parking lot at McDonalds at 5:45. so i got there a tad early, and at first no one came. i thought i was just going to drive myself over. but then three other girls came and asked me if i had a parking pass. since i was the only one of us who had the special parking pass, i took all three of them with me. so we go to Messiah College, and i park where my dad always parks for work, which is where Mrs. Sassaman instructed me to park. And then we get in to where we need to be, and get instructions from Mrs. Sassaman and Mrs. Hoover. After that we got to take tickets and hand out programs as people came in. all in all it was very well organized. Mrs. Sassaman does a great job, and the Campus Events team also does a wonderful job at running this whole thing.

Eventually it was time to start. They had a few stray chairs for us to sit, or we could go and find somewhere to sit, but that seemed a lot harder to do, so i just grabbed a folding chair and positioned myself right next to a door. there was another guy there with me who decided to camp out there as well. it actually helped out because we were able to be there to answer people's questions, while still being able to enjoy the ceremony.

i found it fascinating how everyone entered. most of the high school teachers, along with some middle school teachers, and elementary school principals came in dressed in their cap and gowns. they formed the aisle for the students to walk through. then the students came in two by two, and they got to see all their teachers, who had the opportunity to offer their congratulations to them. i got to say hi to a bunch of my teachers, including some of the middle school ones. That was really neat, and i'm glad i was able to see it before i actually went through it.

I also liked that they came in two, because it's a smart way to speed up the process. also, i think it must have been nice for the students as they could have someone to talk to or just have there in case they felt like going crazy. once they all got in and seated, the senior class president came and gave a speech. then the superintendent gave a speech. then three speeches, two being metaphor speeches. the last one was really funny.

After that Mr. Harris(head principal) came up and started calling all the names of everyone. it actually went pretty quick, which made me surprised. i guess i do need to remind myself that my class is a bit bigger than the class of '08.

Towards the beginning there was one name we were listening for. his first name is Easton, and we've been waiting six years for him to finish high school. and we were hoping so bad that he would graduate this year, because he's 21 now, or he will be 21, so he wouldn't be allowed to come back next year. his last name starts with a B, so he walked across the stage early on. once they called his name, everyone in those maroon cap and gowns were on their feet cheering that he had finally passed through beyond high school. I'm not sure how many of the parents and other family members out there knew what was going on, but it was priceless to see that class give so much support to him. i'm pretty sure the cheering went on for at least a minute before Mr. Harris resumed the rest of the names of everyone else.

throughout the rest of the ceremony, i made sure to clap loud for all my friends. They came out the same way they came in, minus the teachers. I liked this because then i could say hi to my friends as they went out.

I had tried to take as many pictures as possible, but a lot of them were blurry. Dad says it's hard to take pictures in that Arena, although i'm not really sure why. But i do know that i tried my best, and ended up getting some good ones. even some of the blurry ones look artistic. if you're friends with me on facebook, you can go right now to check out the album of my pictures from graduation.

i'm very glad i got to see graduation from this side of things first. being the oldest, this whole process of being a senior is so new to myself and my parents. It's nice to have such great friends to go before you and help to guide your steps as you follow.

Today i get to complete another step towards officially being a senior. i have senior pictures later today. i hope the rain either just pours down now, or holds off all together, because i really want a lot of outside pictures. oh well, i'm sure it'll work out.

Congratulations Class of 2008. May God be with you as you face the next stage in your life. I'll still be here in high school if anyone wants to come visit. :-P

hmmm...

2008-05-30T22:23:00.002-04:00

As most of you know, the entire Christian Music Community has been reaching out for the past 9 days to the Chapman family, and helping them through their time of grieving the loss of little Maria. I just now read about another passing of a COCA(Child Of a Christian Artist). this time it deals with Nicol Sponberg, and her two-month old child. Nicol Sponberg had been in the group Selah, but now does her own CDs and stuff. anyways, apparently the child died in his sleep, probably from SIDS. That's so weird that there would be two of these types of deaths in just under ten days. I just wanted to put that piece of news out there for people to be praying for these families. The great thing about being a Christian Artist, as compared to just a regular mainstream artist, is that when something like this happens, you have literally everyone for support. You have all your fans praying for you, which is so powerful, and you have colleagues who drop whatever they are doing the second they hear about it, and come to be with you. it must be really encouraging from that perspective, and i think it's a reminder of how the body of Christ needs to be. We need to come together like everyone did(and still is) for the Steven Curtis Chapman incident. It's amazing to see, and read about what all happened, positives, in just two or three days last week to put together an amazing service to honor the life of Maria. from what i've read about on his manager's blog, it was very moving. and it's moving all of us.

so as "Miracle of the Moment" plays on the radio right now, i bid you goodnight. another action packed adventure will commence tomorrow. Life was never really promised to be boring when God's involved.

A time to learn even more

2008-05-10T17:21:00.002-04:00

Yesterday, I had an opportunity to visit a place that I would have never imagined going to. I had the opportunity to go to WITF in Harrisburg. Many of you know that I have a huge interest in radio and broadcasting, and that's what I want to do with my life. So I just had to take up this opportunity to explore and learn. There was another girl from my school who went along, and the School-to-Career Coordinator drove us there.

To start off with, we met in the Guidance office to get ready to leave at around 8:30am Friday morning. We went to leave, and it was pouring outside. So we rushed to Ms. Dynan's car, and on our way we went. We headed towards I-81 north, however that was backed up because of a truck accident. I had actually heard about the accident at 6 that morning, and was surprised that there was still some back up from it. So we took some back roads, and got on 81 at an exit further north. So we were supposed to arrive at WITF at 9:00, but we didn't get there until 9:20. That was okay though, because the lady giving the tour was still talking to the group at that point.

I would like to pause here to say just how much WITF has been a part of my life. It's probably the first station I ever started watching on a regular basis. Since my family has never had cable (yes, we keep living, and we're fine!) I haven't been one to watch Nick Jr. or whatever other channels on a regular basis. Even now that I'm older, I watch some of PBS's programming when I can. I love watching all the cooking shows during the summer. They are just a wealth of information and education.

I know even in the winter of 2007, there was one weekend when both my dad and I were sick. We were literally sick the entire weekend. So on that saturday, all day we had the TV on, but most of the time it was on PBS. It's nice because most of their shows are family friendly. It doesn't mean that kids would be interested in it, but they could watch it if they wanted to. So we watched home improvement shows, and cooking shows, and traveling shows. They have a really great variety of shows, and anyone could find a show on their that they might like.

Anyways, back to my visit. There were all different kids from a variety of different schools. All of us had some interesting in going into the broadcasting industry. We got to see the control room, which you can actually see from the lobby, through a bunch of glass windows. We could see what was on TV right at that moment, both on the regular station and the HD station.(my family just recently got the box to get those HD channels, and we love the HD channel for PBS!) After that we entered into the rest of the building. We saw where they broadcast the Radio station. The radio station they have is a classical NPR(National Public Radio) station.

We see inside where they do the teleprompter for some of their live stuff, and got to learn about all the elements of a live broadcast that they do. We also got to see the set for a show called Smart Talk, as well as get an idea of what other kinds of sets they have in that room. After that we went into the board room, where five employees talked to us about careers in broadcasting, and how they got their start. actually, one of them worked for human resources. But they answered our questions about internships, and just general questions about broadcasting. I recognized the voices of at least two of the people talking to us, because of hearing them on the radio, or being the voice of various TV spots. They were very blunt about the fact that it's a hard industry to enter into.

Afterwards, some schools had to leave, but most of us stayed longer and tried out the Demonstration Station. They had a camera, and teleprompter, and it's a nifty room to practice your presentation skills in. So I ran the teleprompter, and two other girls gave a news story. it was fun getting to try it out.

All in all I'm really glad I got to go. Ms. Dynan told me that I'll have to come to her at the beginning of the year next year, to get the list of these kinds of field trips, so I can try to go on all the broadcasting ones. That will be very exciting, and I'm glad I discovered these kinds of things while I'm still a junior in high school, so i still have one more year left. Also, hopefully it won't be quite as painful to miss school next year. I think this week I was in school for a total of 3 days. For someone who hasn't missed a day all year, that's a lot.

Well, sorry again for my long post, but as you can tell, I had a great time. I was even able to inform Ms. Dynan of a shorter way to go home. I think I surprised myself that I even knew of that way.

Anyways, I hope everyone has a great rest of the weekend.

Worship Through Moshing???

2008-04-27T08:44:00.002-04:00

Last night my brother and i went to a concert at one of the mega churches around here. it was in their senior high youth room, and it was cheap because a mission organization around here was sponsoring it. the band giving the concert? Dizmas. never heard of them? well, before you read any further, click here. okay, now that you've listened to at least half the songs on that website, we can continue.

it was a smaller crowd than your normal, GIANT Center concert. it was basically a bunch of teenagers from the area youth groups hanging out together. it was nice because pretty much all of us got to be up front. and, my brother was excited because he was going to get to mosh. now i'm going to have to make this really quick, because i need to leave for church here in the next few minutes. anyways, apparently some other guys wanted to get in on this moshing action. so they did, they moshed through a few songs. and this was the reason why i had the camera.

so i was thinking about it later, and thinking that moshing is such a guy thing. Joel agreed. i also feel like in moshing can be a way of worship. i'm not against it, as long as it's not to violent. i would never get into it, but it think it's cool that God provides so many ways for us to glorify him.

Needing some support

2008-04-17T20:17:00.002-04:00

I would just like to ask for prayer tomorrow. all of us juniors have to present our Senior High Projects tomorrow. actually, after next year, the term Senior High Project probably won't even exist. after that it will be called "Graduation Project" aka Project Dreams. here's a video to explain. well not really, but it's still cool: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tyOgluKzpE

Anyways, my class is the only one who could chose whether we wanted to do Senior High Project, or Project Dreams. I went with Senior High Project, because i was already halfway through by the time they told us we could pick. anyways, we all had to write a four page paper, and do a 15 minute presentation. we all handed in our papers at the end of March, and tomorrow we all present. and if we don't have it done, we still need to go(or else they'll punish us somehow) and tell them what we have done. it sounds really scary, but from what i've heard it's not, because the teachers really try to work with you to make sure you have a plan to get it done.

this is not the case for me. i did my 100 hours, and loved it! i have my presentation prepared, and have been constantly going over it in my head. tonight i need to make sure i have everything together, and then tomorrow morning, at 10:15 i will be heading up to the school. i present at 10:40, but i want to be there early. oh, that reminds me, i also need to get together what i plan to wear tomorrow.

so if all of you could just pray that i'm relaxed, and that i remember everything, then we're good. and hopefully i can make this thing be 15 minutes long. i don't think it'll be that bad. all the current seniors that i've talked to have said that it's really not that bad. it's a graduation requirement, so none of us can get out of it. it's one of those things you just have to do.

i do have to commend the school on the way that they are handling the way we present these things. it's all on one day, and the juniors have to come in only when we are scheduled to present. the freshmen, sophomores, and seniors don't have to come in at all. so i'll probably end up being at school for 1 and a half hours at the most.

so am i scared? a little. part of that comes from the unknown. i don't know which teachers will be in there evaluating me. i don't know how this is going to pan out, and i don't know what God will throw at me next. but i'm confident in my topic, and i have lots of stories from my project that i can always add in. so i'm open to the leading of the Holy Spirit.

it also helps that i'll have some time to regroup afterwards, because i'm waiting for one of my friends to finish up hers so we can go out to lunch. so i'll probably just hang out in commons, and bring a book. actually, i'll probably bring my notebook. that will be a great time to do some song writing, and journaling.

wow, i never expect these things to be this long. why can't i get my research paper to be long?

so i was trying to do my family a favor...

2008-04-14T17:54:00.002-04:00

by asking my mom to buy whole wheat noodles. i had been learning about making half our grains we eat each day whole grain in Foods class, and figured a great way to get started with that would be to see if Mom could start getting some whole grain noodles. we could always use whole grain noodles in the pasta dishes we make, such as tube noodle stuff, or goolash.(both are basically noodles, meat, tomatoes, herbs, and cheese)

so she got some boxes of whole wheat noodles, and made tube noodle stuff. but the two times i ate the tube noodle stuff (once at dinner, and then for leftovers), i had a slight allergic reaction.(which just involved my lip swelling a little bit, nothing too serious.) i wasn't exactly sure what it was. the only things different were the kind of tomatoes my mom used, and the noodles. so we held off on making stuff with whole wheat noodles, and mom went back to her original brand of tomatoes. then i went back to making my concoctions with some of the noodles that are basically the equivalent to egg noodles, but whole wheat. i didn't get any reactions with those.

so tonight i had some whole wheat noodles that i had boiled on saturday, but didn't get a chance to eat. my mom had called and told us to meet her at a local pizza place for lunch. so i made a cheese sauce for them, and had supper. but as soon as i finished what was on my plate, and went up for some more, i noticed my mouth feeling ichy. so i decided that i didn't want seconds. then i swallowed, because that's how i know if i'm having an allergic reaction or not. i was definitely having one. i quickly got a glass of water, and then i made a bee-line to my purse, where i dumped out all of its contents until i came across the Benadryl.(oh, that reminds me, i still need to go clean that up...) so back to the kitchen i go to take this thing. so i did, and my parents and i decided it's that brand of noodles. that's what caused it. everything in the sauce is stuff i have on a regular basis. so i'm wondering what's in this stuff that made my mouth panic, and i feel bad for asking my mom to get it in the first place.

so i guess after my mouth quits feeling numb, i will go back and eat something else, something i know i'm not allergic to. if you don't have allergies, be very thankful. but also, be open and prepared to interact with people who have allergies. there might be precautions you have to take that you think are dumb, but the truth is, you're making sure the lives around you aren't in danger. i'm even still learning how to take those precautions. i never really knew about my allergies until a year and a half ago. so my family has been slowly adjusting. it's nice though because on my mom's side of the family they're trying to learn with us.

like at Christmas, some of the Christmas cookies have nuts in them, because that's what some people like. so one plate had the cookies without nuts, and another plate had all the cookies with nuts. each had plastic over it. so they took the plastic off and set it aside so we could have our cookies after lunch. there's only one problem, they forgot which piece of plastic went with the nuts. so we know for next year that we need to mark one of them so we don't get them mixed up. it was no biggie though, they just got new sheets of plastic wrap for both of them.

it's interesting how that side of the family is very aware of my allergies, and makes sure that i'm not "left out" because of people getting candy with nuts.(on the sunday after Valentines day everyone at Grandma's house got Reese's peanutbutter cups, and i got a milkyway!) but on the other side i'm pretty sure they don't remember at all. last Christmas some people gave candy as gifts, and that candy had nuts in it. actually, one of them had almonds, which i consider my worst food allergy. no worries. my brother liked the extra candy, and my mom got me a dark chocolate bar, and someone else in my family had the extra candy bar with nuts. i figure while it's good for people to be aware, they probably have bigger things to worry about, so it's no use getting upset over.

having food allergies is nice when it comes to ice cream. whenever there's ice cream with nuts(as well as kinds that i can have) i get the first choice so we know the spoon is clean and not contaminated. it's also been interesting to see what exactly is in my food. i have become much more aware of all of that now. while i could just look for the bold print that says: this product contains nuts, there are some foods i'm allergic to that i really have to read into the label. like sesame seeds.

well, i've rambled on enough. my allergic reaction has been resolved now, and the taste of the vanilla mint is slowly making its exit. maybe i should've just had a ham sandwich. i wonder what i should do with all those extra whole wheat noodles....

So Here's the big Story

2008-03-14T15:23:00.002-04:00

So on Wednesday night, i was running around, trying to get everything together so i could leave for Chill Time.(umm, glossery: Chill time: wednesday night fellowship time at local youth group. we play video games, do homework, and play Apples to Apples. fun times) it's a come whenever kind of thing so there really is no "on time" except for the time you, and only you intend to get there. my target time is 6:00, but when Joel's home he makes it later because he takes forever to get ready. but Joel was on his way home from a science competition. so anyways, i was getting ready to leave, when the phone rang. Mom answered it, and it was for me. i was hoping it wasn't work asking me to come in, because i would really be irritated at that.(i'm not normally available on wednesdays) but it wasn't work, it was the executive producer of the Weekend 22. I believe i've talked about the Weekend 22 on here before. it's a countdown show for Christian music. it's really awesome, and my siblings and i try very hard to listen to it every week. anyways, he was calling because i had won a contest. now, if you would go back and read the post from when i won a book from the Weekend 22, you would recall that it just showed up. there was no letter, no flyer, just the book. but see, this contest that they were calling about wasn't just any regular contest. it had a grand prize.

and this grand prize was a really nice guitar. and it's one of those deals where they would call the person to tell them that they won, and then they would get all excited and every0ne listening at home would go "that is so cool, i wish i would've won." well, i had at least won the Sanctus Real CD.("We Need Each Other"). so i needed to wait an hour to see if i had won. so i decided not to go to Chill Time, and be under house arrest.

so i tried to do my math homework while i waited. except i got distracted. i was IMing Barb and Liz about what i was going through. the guy said to make sure i got really excited if i won, so it would come through to the listeners. i'm not that great at that, because i'm more of an all smiles person, and tend to be speechless at those sort of things. at the same time i didn't want to work myself up so much and then not get that call. it was a fine line to walk on. so then the phone rings, and my gut jumps to my throat. but it's not for me, it's someone returning my mom's call. so i continue with math homework and IMing.

then we get another phone call. this one is for me, and they are recording it.(they told me they would record the conversation, sorry i forgot to mention that earlier.) so i won it. i am going to be getting an electric guitar. don't ask me what kind it is, or if it's signed by Sanctus Real, because i really don't know. and while i do care in the long run, right now i don't care, because i'm just happy that i'm getting another guitar! i already play acoustic, so now i get to start something new. and this is something that i never would have been able to just say "Hey, let's try and learn how to play the electric guitar!" because i don't have the money to buy one in the first place. i barely had enough money to buy an acoustic guitar a few years ago.

anyways, those are the details that Liz was trying to pry out of me. once i get the guitar, i will be sure and post a picture of it on here, so you can all see. oh, and if you want to here me on a nationally syndicated show, be sure and tune in to the Weekend 22 on March 22. if your station doesn't play the Weekend 22, you can contact me, and i'll tell you when it's on my station so that you can listen online.

so i still got to go to some of Chill Time. i volunteered to pick up Joel at the school, and then on the way home we stopped at the church to say hi to everyone. i had felt bad for not going in the first place because i told one of my friends that i'd be there. but it turns out she left early because she wasn't feeling well. but that was okay, it was nice to go even for just a few minutes.

So this is a very excited Abby, signing off. God is awesome, never forget it!

Wow

2008-03-12T18:48:00.001-04:00

I would just like to thank Jesus for all the opportunities He gives me to let His light shine through me.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-03-12T18:05:00.002-04:00

ok, i just need to keep remembering that, according to The Message, in 1 Peter 5:7, it says that God will promote me at the right time. once again, i find myself right at "that time". i found myself there with the Jeopardy audition quiz thingy, and numerous other contests. and now, it could be here again. so i gave up going to youth group tonight in order to possibly gain something that could help people in youth group. i'm not sure if i'm allowed to say it now, although it wouldn't much matter in an hour. so needless to say this is all quite exciting. while i'm waiting for the hour to pass, i'm busying myself with math homework. well, and then i need to do some history stuff. anyways, i should get on it. in the meantime, i need to work on getting really excited.

Junior Year

2008-03-10T21:09:00.001-04:00

Need I say more?

That makes Three

2008-02-25T15:41:00.003-05:00

I just on Jesusfreakhideout.com that Larry Norman passed away. for those of you who choose to block Christian music history from your brain, Larry Norman had a huge impact on Christian music as we know it. He's one of the Christian music pioneers. He's one of those guys they play on the WJTL Archives on saturday nights from 9-12.(i would like to confess at this moment that i don't listen to that show much. i can do the classic cafe, but the archives go a little too far back for me.)

As far as i'm concerned, that makes three who are with God right now. Over 25 years ago, Keith Green went to be with the Lord, and then ten years ago Rich Mullins. I have a feeling i'll be hearing more Larry Norman songs on the radio for a season. i also suspect that in the next year there will be a CD put out that has to do with Larry Norman, whether it's a greatest hits, or today's Christian artists doing covers of some of his songs. that's just the kind of thing we like to do. so just be keeping his family and friends in prayer, for this must be a very difficult time for him. for more information you can visit www.jesusfreakhideout.com, www.larrynorman.com, or www.cmcentral.com.

767 and still going

2008-02-19T20:09:00.002-05:00

That's how many songs i have on my ipod. and you'd think that with all those songs i'd have plenty to listen to. i've already gone through all my CDs and gotten most of the music of those that i wanted on my iPod. now i've started on my brothers CDs(it's not illegal, it's in the same house!). it was pretty interesting the first time i got my ipod and plugged it in to the computer. since we just have itunes on one computer, so everything is in one place, it has both my music, and Joel's music. and since when i first plugged it in, i didn't have it specify which playlists to sync, so it synced everything, which inlcuded the plethora of Project 86 songs. thankfully i quickly taught myself how to make sure it only synced my songs, so i didn't have to suffer through all that. but there have been a few times when somehow there's been a glitch and some of his stuff has landed in my playlist.(hmmm...)

Podcasts mean so much more to me now too. it was different before because i'd always have to be beside a computer to listen to them, so there was really no point. but now there's a point! and i like it. I have a sermon thingy on there, and a video podcast from Starfield. and, as always, i have my Adventures in Odyssey podcast. that thing is fun. i'm not sure how many more podcasts i'll get, but i'm so much more open to them now.

it's also interesting how getting my ipod has sparked a new trend of sorts in my family. well, not really, it's just how it happened to be. around the time when i was saving up for my ipod, my aunt Tracey saved up for one too. then shortly after i got mine, my dad got an mp3 player off of ebay. so we all compare how many songs we have on ours. so far, i think i'm in the lead. but then again, i just happen to have the most space on mine. my oldest song is from the late 70s, and my newest song has yet to come out yet.(that CD will come out a week from today)

well, that's my feeble blog post for today. i'm off to find out some information about circular motion and the earth. hopefully i can get to bed early enough so i'm not falling asleep during my "sunrise" meeting tomorrow. I'm off!(to see the wonderful Wishy Waz)

Chick fil a....

2008-02-15T12:50:00.002-05:00

Chick Fil A opened last week, just a ways down the road from where i work. the really sad thing is that i'm allergic to their main product. not only that, but i'm not sure if i can have their fries either, because they're fried in Peanut oil. so it's really no use for me to go there for a meal. so last night i went to get a milkshake. my cousins had been telling me that i needed to try the cookies and cream milkshake. so i did. although when you're eating a milkshake at 9:10 at night, it's hard to finish it all. so i took it home and let my mom and dad finish it for me.(there was no way i was going to throw away half a milkshake when i paid nearly three dollars for that thing!)

while i was sitting, enjoying the scenery, and just the fact that it's finally here, i noticed that i recognized the song that was playing. i focused more on it, to decide what song it was. it ended up being a Rebecca St. James song. they play Christian music at Chick Fil A! i knew that they were founded on Christian values, and they're closed on sundays. but i work at a place that's found on Christian values, and closed on sundays, but we don't play Christian music. i think it's cool though, because at Chick Fil A i was able to hear just the songs i needed to hear to be encouraged. it worked on me the same way that Christian radio does. i think that's really cool. i'm glad i got to go there, and escape from my life for 20 minutes.

well, i'm off to a hopefully not too busy afternoon. i'll be doing some things around the house, and then going to work. oh, and i learned that i have a long way to go before i can make a good hamburger. let's just hope i'll have that down pat by the time i leave for college...

yum?

2008-02-05T15:38:00.001-05:00

the peppermint mocha was alright. Joel really liked it, so at least i know he'll drink it. i think tomorrow i'm going to add some hot chocolate mix to it. we're trying to get my sister to taste some, but she keeps saying no.

Something new

2008-02-04T20:02:00.000-05:00

i've been continuing my quest to try new things. it seems that lately i've been trying even more things, like increasingly today. let's start with where i'm sitting. right now i'm typing this thing on a flexible rubber keyboard. my mom got it from the church who got it from ordering office supplies. so she gets all the free stuff. sometimes, like this time, she gets cookies. but they're chocked full of preservatives. anyways, it's weird, and i'm still trying to get used to typing on this thing. but it's coming.

i bought starbuck's coffee today at the grocery store. i got peppermint mocha. i figure it's cheaper to buy four jars of it at the store than to buy a small cup of it at the starbuck's place at the mall. and this way i get to share some with my brother and dad, who are going to try some too. but we're waiting until tomorrow morning to try it, because Joel and i haven't had caffeine in forever, so we're not sure what it will do to us. and we really don't feel like being up all night. we've never really been big coffee people, but Liz, from the great state of Washington, told me that you can't even taste the coffee in peppermint mocha. so we'll see.

Joel and I have started trying new youth groups. well, i guess i started that venture last october when that guy invited me to his youth group. well, Joel didn't want to go there. but a bunch of his friends go to this other youth group that meets on wednesday and sunday nights. so last wednesday we went there. on sundays is their actual youth service, and then wednesday is Chill time. we just hang out, do homework, play board games, play video games, and eat. it's really fun. i think we surprised some people from school by showing up. it was great because there are a lot of people there in my grade.

one guy who is a senior asked Joel and I if were church shopping. i told him i'm not allowed to church shop until i leave home and go to college. but we did tell him that we were youth group shopping. so Joel wants to go back there this wednesday. we weren't able to join them for their superbowl party yesterday, because we went to my grandma's house. but we do want to try a sunday evening with them this sunday.

even though i was looking forward to trying out all sorts of youth groups, i'm glad we only had to try out one. it made it easier. although i'm wondering what my pastor is going to say when he finds out that we've started attending a different youth group....oh well, my sunday school class seemed pretty supportive of me trying a different youth group. but i knew they would be, because my sunday school teachers let their youngest daughter go to a different youth group/church when she was in high school.

the youth pastor of this youth group is really nice, and really relates well with everyone. actually, when someone else introduced us to him, he recognized me. he thought he had met me before. but i told him that he had taken a picture of me at See You At the Pole when i was playing the guitar, and those pictures are currently on the website. i had visited the website a few weeks ago to find out more info about the youth group, and stumbled upon SYATP pictures. he and a few other people thought it was funny that he thought he had met me from that. but it was cool. i'm really excited to go back this week. that's something i haven't felt in a very long time. i'm glad to feel apart of group like that. i don't often feel that way with the kids at my church.

well, it's taken me 45 minutes to type this up. there are a few other new things i did over the weekend. i followed directions that my mom gave me to go to another county in the dark on friday night. i got lost, and it took 1 hour and 15 minutes, when it should have taken me 45 minutes. but i got there. once i got to my destination, i ate bruster's ice cream for free. i tried the Birthday Cake flavor for the first time ever. my friend works at Bruster's, so her family always has left over ice cream in their freezer.

so tomorrow will bring a whole new realm of new things to try. i'll be sure to tell you all about that peppermint mocha.

Never going back to O.K.

2008-01-25T16:33:00.000-05:00

a great new song and CD by The Afters. i get so excited and inspired when i listen to, and comprehend the meaning of, that song. it makes me really crave a concert from the Afters so i can hear that song live, because i'm sure it's the most amazing thing ever. well, actually, there's a lot of artists i would love to see in concert, but it just hasn't worked with my schedule to go. one of these days i'll get myself and Joel out to a concert, and we'll love every minute of it. we had better, seeing how much some of these tickets cost.

Second Semester...

2008-01-23T19:26:00.000-05:00

Now that i actually take semester long major courses, i'm feeling the thrill, or horror, about switching semesters. it reminds me of the first day of school, but not fully. in this case, i have the same teacher, during the same class period, and some of the same people are in the class. the only difference is that all the girls got put in some other class. well, all but three girls and myself. i can tell it's going to be an interesting 90 days.

three periods before that, we made a realization at lunch. we're going to have some serious girl power time at lunch now. the two guys that used to sit at our lunch table(the ones who talked about Arby's all the time) have moved on with their life, and now are stationed at a different lunch. so it's like Susie Shellenberger says on that promo for the mother-daughter cruise, "It's just us girls..." i think it'll be fun to have just girls at the table now. it was much quieter today, which we all thought was really weird. but we'll get used to it.

on another rant, i'm a little displeased with how many parents let their young kids sit in the front seat of the car. i guess i noticed it a lot today. i mean, i can understand how it feels weird driving, and having your passenger in the back seat, but that doesn't mean i'm going to put my sister's life in danger by letting her sit up front. she has to wait two and a half more years just like the rest of us. whoa, getting off topic a bit, i was just thinking where i'll be in two and a half years. wow.

well, i think it's time to call it right there. it's time to watch the PBS special about the Pioneers of Television. tonights show is about Game Shows. i'm sure it'll be interesting.

4 down, and one really hard one to go

2008-01-17T12:57:00.000-05:00

midterms. terrific. i've been taking two finals and three midterms all week. that means i've had a test every day. well, yesterday i had two. but it's okay because while my sister is still sitting in her classroom watching it snow, i'm here at home watching whatever cooking show is on PBS.

i've found this year that Praise and Worship music is really great to listen to while studying. on tuesday night i listened to K-LOVE radio online while i studied physics and english. last night, i had to put on the headphones because i wasn't moving from my comfortable spot, and yet someone wanted to watch television. but i found a praise and worship online radio station. so i listened to that a little, and that was good. so far yesterday morning, and this morning i listened to a song by Hillsong London. it's called "Where the Love Lasts Forever". a friend of mine told me about the song last week, and i really like it. so that's been helping too.

today when i came home i loaded some more praise and worship stuff onto my iPod. so tomorrow morning, before one of my hardest midterms i can listen to some Chris Tomlin. that'll be pretty cool.

my brother on the other hand, has been listening to jazz a lot to help him cope with midterms. that's been interesting.

let's see, what else has been going on lately....oh, my brother and i are going to try to look for a new youth group. some friends of mine talked me into trying to go to youth group again. but i didn't want to restart this journey by myself. and actually, at the time when i was trying to think it through i totally forgot that Joel could come with me.(oops) so now we just have to decide where we want to go. because of midterms, i haven't done much research. if there is anyone reading this who lives in the general area that i live in, please suggest away!

well, i guess that's pretty much it. for those doing midterms this week, i hope you do well. just think, all you have to do is just press through tomorrow, and then you have a three day weekend!

explaination...

2008-01-14T20:24:00.001-05:00

the post below is the beginning part of a song i'm in the process of writing. but the sunset when i came out of walmart today inspired me to post this part of my song. i think maybe in the second verse i'll write about going to wal-mart today and seeing that. we'll have to see what God comes up with. and maybe i'll post some of my other songs on here too. i wish you could all hear them. i'm working on that too.

Paint the Sky

2008-01-14T20:20:00.000-05:00

I don't understand
The Heart of an artist
How they come up
with all their creations
I especially don't understand
The artist heart of You

Where did you get the idea for the sunrise
for this morning's commute
It made a potentially bad ride
Turn into something even I cannot explain

*chorus*
You paint the sky, at all the perfect times
When i need encouragement
It makes me feel like
Everything will be alright
When You paint the sky

A word of advice

2008-01-07T19:05:00.000-05:00

If you are ever thinking of moving, and realize there's a dog food factory near the house you are considering to buy/rent, don't move there. move to the other side of town instead, where you will only smell the dog food when it rains, and on weird days like today. i really don't like those days, but at least it doesn't smell like this all the time. i'm glad my parents decided to move to the west side of town, instead of the east side. and if i ever post on here about being excited about moving somewhere on the east side of my town, would someone please come over and knock some sense into me before it rains again and i have to smell that nasty stuff?

sigh

2008-01-04T15:50:00.000-05:00

it's been quite the week. it's hard to believe new year's day was just three days ago. it seems like forever ago. then again, it was hard for a lot of people to get it in their heads that it was friday. maybe that's why Christian club attendance was lower than normal.

it's really cool what we're doing in Christian club coming up soon. we have this "Mega-blessing" planned. for the next few months, we're going to have everyone bring at least a dollar a week, and then each week we'll use that money to do something for a group of students around school. today we told the club about it, and got their feed back. we also bounced around ideas. two other people were presenting, and then the one girl looked at me and asked me to write some of this down. so i told notes on the meeting. i'm really excited for this, and i hope it all works out.

in other news, i got all the info so i can start planning my schedule for next year. because i'll be a senior(that's so weird to say--i feel so under prepared), i have a few options. so i really need to pray about what God wants me to do. for some reason, i'm feeling like a normal schedule is not for me. so now i need to figure out what i want to do next year. well, i have awhile to think about that.

lastly, i would like to express that i don't like the way the high school teaches purity. except, it's not for the reason everyone else gives. it's because today, my health class teacher told us that he wasn't trying to tell us that we had to wait until marriage to have sex. thankfully, i was standing next to a friend of mine who goes to one of the area churches, so i exchanged a glance with her. i'm glad to know that someone else in the class agreed with me. i've heard a statement similar to that on tv. i honestly don't know why people would have that point of view. and i don't know how people could do that without feeling so...dirty. because that's how i would feel. i just needed to get that frustration out of my system.

well, i guess i just want to warn you that midterms are coming up, so i may not be posting quite as much as i was. we'll just have to see where life takes me.

Happy Boxing Day!

2007-12-26T13:39:00.000-05:00

A late Merry Christmas to all of you! i am very sorry i haven't posted in a while, but i've been quite busy.

i got a facebook last wednesday. i was really bored on wednesday night while i was waiting for my turn in the bathroom, so i decided to create a facebook. and now i've found all these different people i know from school. it's pretty fun, but it's also easy to spend way too much time on there.

my Christmas break has been good so far. yesterday was not normal to say the least. i usually go to my grandma's house on Christmas eve, and then stay there until the day after Christmas. yesterday Grandma wasn't feeling so well, and Granddad ended up having to take her to the emergency room. so that left my immediate family, my cousins, two aunts, one uncle, and a spattering of great-aunts and great-uncles at Grandma's house all by ourselves. my two aunts and Mom all worked together to make up for all the parts that Grandma always does. my cousin and i, who are the oldest two cousins, probably would've helped too, but they had other adults that we don't normally have for sunday dinner.

having everyone there actually made it better, because that meant our minds were distracted from worrying about Grandma. all of my cousins were there until about 5:00, when they headed off to their other grandma's house. they left a number where we could reach them when we had more information about Grandma.

around supper time, my Granddad's cousin and his family showed up. at first we weren't going to get much out for supper, but then my brother asked who decided we weren't hungry. so we ended up eating supper. we always have a special punch at Christmas, and it's a special recipe from my Grandma's side of the family. except whenever we make it, Grandma's there telling us how much of everything to put in it. my mom and Aunt Tracey looked through some cookbooks but couldn't find it. finally we called someone to get the recipe.

Even though Grandma wasn't feeling so great yesterday, that meant that she had an audience of six watching her open her Christmas presents this morning.

so that's my Christmas break so far. tomorrow my cousins are coming up and we're going to Hershey Chocolate World. then they're coming to the pizza buffet while i'm working. at first they were all going to go without me, and just let me go to work. but i was really upset by that. even though i've been to Hershey Chocolate World so many times, i've never gone with my cousins. and they don't come up to see us all that often, so it'd be nice to see them at a time when i'm not working.

while my mom was on the phone with my aunt this morning, i started crying because i didn't want to miss going with them. but they worked out so we could go before i have to work. i know i'm going to have to get used to missing out on things when i go to college, but i haven't moved out yet. i'm not totally ready for complete isolation.

Wow, this is interesting

2007-12-17T08:07:00.000-05:00

so there was an ice storm yesterday. we still had church, but some other churches canceled their services. it was pretty cool walking on the grass, because there was ice surrounding each blade of grass. same for the leaves on the trees. all through the afternoon we heard the wind blow lots of ice off the trees and onto the ground. before supper, Dad and Anna traveled back to the church to get something, and they reported that most houses south of our street didn't have power. this meant that my school and Anna's school didn't have power, theoretically.

then this morning i woke up to hear that we had a two hour delay. but then it was changed to being closed. when i went on the website for one of the local TV stations, i saw that it was only high school and one elementary school that was closed. this was because of what i had guessed before. there's no electricity at those two schools. so that means that all three of us are home all day today. i'm not sure if we'll have to make this up later on in the year. i'm guessing we won't, since more than half the district is going to school today, just on a two hour delay.

i'm actually glad that the schools affected are the ones that Joel, Anna and I go to. otherwise that would make for an interesting day. although, with the way my life has been going, the day would've been interesting even if we went to school.

well, if you'll excuse me, the writing process is calling me.

Snow!

2007-12-06T07:42:00.000-05:00

it snowed all day yesterday. we didn't get out of school, which was actually good in the long run, because i had forgotten to bring my house key to school with me. and who knows if Joel had his with him. but all of us juniors were freaking out during the school day because the majority of us haven't had any experience driving in the snow. oh, and for those of you who live in places such as New England, or Wisconsin...or Canada, i'm so sorry i sound like such a wimp. but you should remember that we are not used to snow. and since this is the first major snow of the season, many people forgot how to drive in the snow.

anyways, i had to go to piano lessons, which is in the next town. fortunately, i had the van, so i felt more confident in a large vehicle. so i left as soon as i got myself ready after school. i still got there 15 minutes early. driving there wasn't too bad. i quickly found out that a good rule of thumb is to just drive at a speed you're comfortable with, even if it's ten mph under the speed limit. the only difficulty i had was determining where the yellow line in the middle of the road was. but then i figured that probably didn't matter too much, seen how i could tell where people had been driving on that particular road.

so i got through piano lessons, went out to scrape the van off before heading to the credit union. it's part of my wednesday routine. the credit union is in the same area as my piano teacher's house, so i go to the credit union after piano lessons because it's just efficient. going there it was a little worse. it had started to get dark, and i guess some workplaces had let out early, because it seemed that rush hour was beginning a half an hour early.

i was the only one at the credit union, but that was nice because that meant no lines. actually, there's never any lines when i go to the credit union. i didn't have any checks to cash, but i had a whole lot of tips to add to my electronics fund.

going home was very painful. it took me 45 minutes to get from the credit union to home. my leg got quite the work out with keeping it still over the break just in case i needed to use it. most of the time i was going anywhere between 5 and 10 miles per hour. thank goodness for WJTL though, because i listened to Kristi Leigh the entire way home. that helped make the long trip bearable. i didn't go the speed limit on any of the roads until i got in town, because in town the road were fine. they were just slippery, so it was just as if it rained on it.

when i got home, Dad helped me park the van, and then he cleared all of the snow and ice off of it. my parents told me that if there's another wednesday when it's snowing and i go to piano lessons, i should take one of the highways home, because they would be the clearest. so i'll remember that next time. it's just that i've never gotten on a crowded highway either. goodness, i have a lot to complete.

so we have a two hour delay this morning. so i'm off to work more on physics and trig.

the wonders of allergies

2007-12-04T17:27:00.000-05:00

i guess you all remember when i posted about having hives? that happened in summer, somewhere around July or August. i still didn't figure out what caused that. and actually it happened again in foods class. except there was only one, and that was on my pinky. i just suffered through that one.

anyways, this evening i thought i would be helpful by helping to get dinner together. that involved washing dishes/filling up the dishwasher. so we filled up the dishwasher and got that going, and then i washed dishes. in the pile of dishes to be washed were some cookie sheets. my mom made cookies on friday afternoon/evening. it was for a cookie exchange we did with my mom's extended family at the Parlor. and since one of my seconds cousins and i are allergic to nuts, they made sure to label all the cookies to say if they had nuts or not. my mom made Oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. she made a batch with nuts, and a batch without nuts. she made the batch without nuts first, so we would be sure that no nuts got in the stuff that needed to be nut free.

so when i went to wash these dishes, there were still a few nuts on the cookie sheets, since the cookies with nuts were the last to be baked. i didn't think it would be a problem if i washed them, becaues i'm not surverely allergic to nuts. this actually comes in handy, because my siblings love peanut butter and would be very upseat if they couldn't have it anymore. anyways, to make a long story short, i have a mild case of hives from washing those. i really don't like to have to deal with allergies. it's not fun. and i don't want to take Benadryl, because that makes my mouth numb, and i haven't had supper yet. but now they're going away.

so for those of us who have allergies, i know how you feel. and if there's anyone out there allergic to meat, please contact me! i would really like to meet someone allergic to meat. i'm allergic to chicken. it's strange, but true. well, off i go, to a supper...without nuts.

quote

2007-12-02T11:42:00.001-05:00

since i haven't posted in awhile, i figured right now i'd share a quote from my sunday school teacher.

"Tea [along with coffee and hot chocolate] is just flavored water"

Happy Thanksgiving!

2007-11-22T20:31:00.000-05:00

I would just like to say that i'm thankful that i'm surviving junior year! also, i'm thankful for the invention of radio and all it's advances. that way i actually have a career to look forward to. just a little update of...whatever: i finished up two songs i was working on. i finished them over the past week, and i have music to the one, and i'm still working on music for the other. but it's very exciting to have that sense of accomplishment. i hope you all have a restful, yet exciting long weekend.

Me? a Winner?

2007-11-17T12:59:00.000-05:00

that's what i thought on wednesday afternoon when i got home from school. there was a package waiting for me on the dining room table. i don't normally get packages in the mail, so it was pretty odd. i looked at the return address, and it said the Weekend 22. The Weekend 22 is a weekly Christian countdown displaying the hottest songs in Christian music for the week. It's a syndicated program. The WORD FM plays the Weekend 22 on saturday afternoons. Since the WORD FM has temporarily gone away from this area, i haven't heard it in quite some time.

Anyways, so i realized that i must have won something from them. I've been entering nearly every contest they have. i do that with a lot of websites. i figure i should just enter into anything and everything i can, because i'm bound to win sometime. so i cut open the package, and find a book in there. it's called "My First Message". it's a children's devotional bible, with 50 bible stories written in the same text that's printed in the Message Bible by Eugene Peterson. This book also has really great illustrations. It seems like a great tool to get kids excited about God.

I'm not quite sure what to do with it right now. i guess the easiest thing to do is to put it away until i have kids of my own, and then read it to them. but that's a long time away. i was thinking i could give it away to someone at church, or just donate it to the church library. but i'm not really sure. so i'll just hang onto it until i figure out what to do with it.

in other news, WJTL just had their 500 countdown this past week. the fun started on Wednesday afternoon at 2:00. so for wednesday, thursday and friday i would rush out of school at 3, listen until i had to go to piano or work, and then make sure to listen in the car on the way home until i had to go to bed. on wednesday night, i washed dishes and cleaned the kitchen until 9 or 9:15 because i needed something to do while i listened to the radio.

they really had this well planned out this time around. in the past, on the third day of the countdown we would be at 10:30pm and still not be at #1. but in the past they would start the countdown at 2 in the afternoon the first day and go till 10pm, and go from 6am-10pm the next day. then on the final day they'd start at 6 and go till they finished. this time around they went to 11pm the first two nights. then they were done by 9 on the third. but i had to work from 5-9 last night. so i was a little bummed that i was probably going to miss the last ten songs. but even though it was really busy, for some reason they let me go home at 8:20.(i didn't even complain about missing the top 500 countdown. i knew they wouldn't understand) so i ran to the car and turned it on as fast as i could. it was a total God thing that i was able to get off early. when i turned on the radio in the car, they were on song 8. so i was able to go home and listen to the last 5 and a half songs with my family. that was really nice. Casting Crowns had three songs in the top ten, which was really good, and really surprising. the Number 1 song was Mercy Me with "I can Only Imagine". that was the number 1 song in 2004 too, which is the last time they did the 500 countdown.

it was great listening to the radio at every single moment that i could. i guess i do that on a normal day anyways, but it was way more exciting this week. and with listening to all the DJs, you could tell that they were excited about this too. i would be excited if i was a DJ on there. i really liked that they did the countdown this week. that way we were excited about the countdown this past week, and then next week is Thanksgiving. after that it's advent and getting ready for Christmas. well, i'm going to add some more to a song i'm writing, and work on my paper for physics. i hope everyone has a great weekend.

responding to comments...

2007-11-13T15:28:00.000-05:00

since i've had such a great response to the whole advent discussion, i decided just to post about it. first, i guess i'll do what i should have done in the first place: explain it. basically advent is a season where we light candles on the advent wreath. the advent wreath consists of five candles. four of those candles make a square, and then the fifth candle is in the middle. at my church the four candles are purple, but last year my pastor said that in some churches the candle for the third week is pink. i forget why. but i'm sure he'll tell us again this year. the candle in the middle is lit during the Christmas Eve service. Except a few years ago, i think they lit the middle candle on Christmas Day when that happened on a sunday. at least, they did that at my church. but my family wasn't there that sunday. i've actually never seen that middle candle lit.

anyways, each of the four candles stand for something. there's the candle for hope, peace, love and joy. At my church we usually have sermons that go along with each of those sundays during the season of advent. it's nice to have that whole month focused on remembering what it took to actually get to the birth of Jesus.

When we were without a pastor over a year ago, we had one guest speaker who tied in his Christmas music listening with the season of advent. at the church where he preached, he wouldn't listen to any Christmas songs until the season of Advent started. and actually, i really like that "guideline." i guess it keeps the season all in that time frame so we don't get burnt out on it.

I wasn't able to tell my friend who asked about what i found. But the girl who helped me answer the question, "What is Advent?" got to hear a little of my findings. she, like me, see advent as something that she's been doing for her whole life.

so i really enjoyed hearing all your input on the subject. and yes, Aunt Tracey, i was surprised of what came out of a little something mentioned on the car ride home from Grandma's house. i'm not trying to put out there that advent is right or wrong. i guess i'm just looking for purpose and history. and it looks like i've found it. other than that, i totally forget where i was even going with this post. i guess that's what i get when i'm trying to talk to two people on IM, and blog something at the same time. but it's alright, i'm having a blast. i guess all i have to say is today is World Kindness Day. so be nice to someone this evening.

The Season of Advent

2007-11-12T16:08:00.000-05:00

I know it seems a little early to talk about Advent, but Thanksgiving is only 10 days away, so Christmas will come sooner than it seems. it's roughly 42 days away. that means advent will start in a little less than three weeks.

anyways, all that's to say that i need all the bible buffs to show their face around here. it's your time to shine! i have a question about the season of Advent. is Advent talked about in the bible at all? i know i could probably look it up, but i thought maybe some of you might want to get that natural high from knowing something someone else didn't. if i do get the answer, i'll be sure to post it on here.

the reason i'm asking is because one of the guys at my lunch table wants to know. I asked him today if he knew why his denomination doesn't "do" advent. He seemed to know everything else about his church, so why shouldn't he know that? well, he had no clue what advent was. thankfully, someone was there who could name what the four candles stand for. And between the two of us we tried to explain it to him. then of course he had to go and ask if it was biblical. we couldn't answer that question. but i told him i'd get back to him on that.

so now i guess i'm wonder why some churches do advent and others don't. it's something that's been apart of my holiday season every year for the past 17 years. i honestly think i would feel strange if i didn't do advent. i've never really thought about this before. i guess i'll get to think it through while i'm at work tonight. it's off to the pizza buffet for me!

what a relief!

2007-11-08T16:33:00.000-05:00

we actually didn't talk about Arby's today! i actually just realized that a second ago. what an amazing relief.

Just thought i should mention...

2007-11-07T20:54:00.000-05:00

there's something you all should be aware of. but first, as always, we need background info. so for those of you who went to my mom's blog, you may have seen the pictures of when i got my hair cut. i had really, really long hair, and got 10-12 inches cut off to give to Locks of Love. for those of you who haven't figured out, i have very thick hair. and i have a lot of hair. actually, currently i stretch out many of my ponytail holders from putting my hair into a pony tail. it's a very thick ponytail.

anyways, i'm the only one in my family who has hair this thick. my mom and sister have thin hair, so they use volumizing shampoo and conditioner. i usually stay far away from that conditioner, or else i would look like i was trying to bring back the styles of the 80's. so i get the moisturizing stuff. well, my shampoo had been running low over the past few days, and someone tried to dilute it but it's basically like putting water on your hair and expecting that to make it clean. and tonight there wasn't enough water to do the job right. so i decided to take a drastic measure. i used the volumizing shampoo. i still used the moisturizing conditioner. but i figure for the next day or so i'm going to have to wear my hair in a ponytail to try to keep the frizz or whatever down. i dont' even know what's going to happen. i guess i'm expecting some time bomb to go off and then "poof" goes my hair. so i just wanted to warn you, especially those of you who see me every day. i'm not really trying to bring back the styles of the 80's. i just decided that cleanliness outweighed image.

one other part to this story: there's two bottles of my mom's shampoo. i don't know why there are two bottles of this stuff, but there are. so i first reached for the closest one. when i tried to open it, it decided i shouldn't open it. i don't know why it was so hard to pry open.

on a totally random note, two weeks from tonight we will be living through Thanksgiving Eve. that makes me excited. that means we just have the two days of this week, five days of next, and then two after that. and then we get a week off! we're just chugging our way through the year.

I'm thinking Arby's

2007-11-06T15:58:00.001-05:00

Yeah, i've been thinking that statement a lot lately. especially whenever i go from lunch to my forth period class.

i would like to give you all some stats on my lunch table. there are ten people at the lunch table. 8 are seniors, and 2 are juniors. 8 are girls and 2 are guys. that makes things a little...interesting.

the two guys that sit at my lunch table both work at the same place, which happens to be Arby's. there was already an Arby's in the area. in fact, my family goes there after church whenever we have coupons. otherwise, for a family of five(with a 14-year-old cross country runner) to go to Arby's is pretty pricey. anyways, the Arby's we had is sort of out of the way for some people in the area, but not for the people who live in town. so anyways this other Arby's just opened up, which means more jobs are available for us poor teenagers so we can start saving for college. :-) so the one guy at my lunch table got a job there, and then a few weeks after that the other guy got a job there. so for the past two weeks all we've heard about is Arby's, Arby's, and...oh yeah: Arby's.

most times i end up sitting near, or between these two, so i hear everything. some of it's interesting. i've learned that they will be very mad at me if i go through the drive-thru and use coupons, and that those new cheesecake poppers taste much better than they appear in the picture posted on the ad we received in the mail. i also learned that i shouldn't try to eat a cheesecake popper right after it comes out of the fryer because it will be piping hot.(thanks for trying it out for me:-])

but i have a feeling the rest of the girls at the table are a bit fed up with the fact that they talk about Arby's all the time. today at the end of lunch they were trying to get their point across, except the guys were in the middle of another conversation about Arby's. now, if this had been my siblings, i probably would've put my hands on their heads and made them face Steph. but i couldn't do that because sibling authority doesn't come into account when there are no siblings to authoritize. so maybe Steph will try to talk to them tomorrow. or maybe i can come up with an effective way to get them to stop. or maybe i just need to brainstorm a list of ways to change the subject. or maybe the girls at the table need to have a mini-conference sometime outside of the lunch table to figure out a way to communicate.

well, now that i'm thinking Arby's, i'm thinking maybe i need to grab a snack before i go to work.

Parallel parking

2007-11-04T16:41:00.000-05:00

Somehow i managed to get the words Parallel Parking into a song yesterday. i though it was pretty cool. i guess it's just been on my mind lately. see, usually whenever i work, i come home really late. so late, in fact, that i have to either parallel park on the street, or park out back in front of the garage. and i have to parallel park to do that. i've become quite skilled at parking back there. okay, so there's one scratch on the car from one incident. but i'm a lot more careful now.

so last night i came home, and at first parked two houses down the street. but then i decided i'd just park it in back. so i went halfway around the block, parked in the middle of the alley with my fourways on so i could move something in the way, and then got down to parallel parking. whenever i park in front of the garage, we don't measure how far away i am from the "curb", or rather, the garage door. we measure how much gravel is between the driver's side and alley. apparently i'm able to get the car in closer to the garage than my mom can. this is according to my dad. last night i got really close. almost too close. but somehow my brother was still able to get in the passenger side door when i drove my siblings to church this morning. He said it's no problem for him. i guess he's used to it because when he was in middle school my dad used to park that close, and then my brother would have to get in for the ride to school.

and then i got to park the car again this afternoon when we got home from church. see, tomorrow and tuesday we can't park out front because they're trimming the trees for the electrical lines. and since we weren't planning on going anywhere this afternon, my parents parked the van on the side street, and i parked the car near the garage. This time was a little different though. my brother and sister decided to all ride home with me, because we listened to Dizmas on the way to and from church. so they got out of the car, just in case i parked them in. and then they moved out of the way while i backed up.

being the wonderful younger siblings, they decided to tell me exactly how much room i had. they stood there in the middle of the alley towards the back of the car holding out their arms the same length of space that i had to back up. then when i put the car in first gear(oh yeah, did i mention this was stick shift?) they moved to the front and did the same thing. now i would like to know why i don't have them whenever i come home from work at night? well, for one thing they'd be very tired, and i probably wouldn't be able to see them in the dark. but hey, today they helped me not back into anything.

oh...yes...Tech support!

2007-10-31T20:07:00.000-04:00

For those who need a light-hearted thought for the day, here it is. i get a daily email from crosswalk.com. This one my family and i found really funny.

TODAY'S CLEAN LAUGH

*Stuff You Don't Want To Hear From Tech Support*

"Do you have a sledgehammer or a brick handy?"

"...that's right, not even McGyver could fix it."

"Looks like you're gonna need some new dilythium crystals, Cap'n."

"Press 1 for Support. Press 2 if you're with 60 Minutes. Press 3 if you're with the FTC."

"We can fix this, but you're gonna need a butter knife, a roll of duct tape and a car battery."

"I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that."

"In layman's terms, we call that the Hindenburg Effect."

"Okay, turn to page 523 in your copy of Dianetics."

i hope you all enjoy! :-)

All thanks to Emily Ralph

2007-10-31T18:11:00.000-04:00

Emily Ralph is a DJ on for the WORD FM Morning Show. this year she's bee trying something new every day. so she has inspired me a little. today i did something new with out even knowing it. i rode in a Dodge Durango for the first time ever today. now, i've ridden in trucks before. well, a truck. my granddad has a Nissan Frontier, but it's about 10 years old, and it's small as far as trucks go. this is probably one of the bigger vehicles i've been in. see, i had a leaders meeting this morning for Christian club. and i always ride back with one of the three people in the group who have a car. i'd gotten in the habit of riding with this one girl, but this time i decided to ride with someone else. i really don't like being in big vehicles like that. i know he's an okay driver, but it was still a little scary. fortunately i had distractions. one being the beautiful sunrise.(it was so amazing! God is so amazing painting the sky like that!) so anyways, it was interesting. and all thanks to all that, i got some more ideas for songs. it was good. so thank you Emily Ralph, for your wonderful example. i don't think i'll be eating dog food or trying out various part time jobs like Emily does. but i'll try out the little things. it could be fun!

Day by day

2007-10-25T20:37:00.000-04:00

so on my way to lunch today, i got to talk with a friend of mine from church. he's a senior in high school, and when he asked how i was, i told him crazy. junior year is so stressful. so then he decides to tell me that it's going to be like that all year. but thankfully, he offered a glimmer of hope. he said if there's one piece of advice he could give me, just take it day by day. one step at a time. if you don't, you get overwhelmed, and then nothing gets done. so i'm supposed to just keep chugging along with my senior high project. the past few weeks have been a whirlwind. and from what it looks like, it's going to stay that way. so i might as well get used to this stress level. and i've decided that i'm going to have to set aside time to relax. otherwise i won't survive. so saturday and sunday are going to be relaxing days. i'll probably still do homework and housework, but i'll make sure to reserve some time to just watch a movie and knit. or read a book. last saturday i went shopping by myself, and i really liked using that as some relaxing time. especially when i'm just by myself and have no certain time i need to be back. i just go home when i start to get hungry, because my budget is too tight to eat out all the time.

so i just want to apologize to everyone in advance if i'm not the most pleasant person this year. i'll try my hardest to be as positive as possible. but maybe it won't be that bad after all. i mean, we're already through the first marking period. well, almost, the end of the marking period is next week. so i just need to hang in there until thanksgiving, and then i'll have a break. from there i just need to hang on until Christmas. but that's too far ahead. how about i just make sure i have all my music together for tomorrow's Christian club...

It's been quite the day

2007-10-24T20:04:00.000-04:00

So i was walking home from school today, and witnessed the funniest traffic jam of my life. there was a combine in the middle of the street i live on. now, while i'm not giving away the street name, i will say that it's parallel with Main St., and is the second busiest street in town. so to have a piece of farm equipment in the middle of the road is a bit of a hindrance. they were trying to get it through the street, making sure they didn't hit any of the parked cars, not to mention the cars heading the other way. many drivers got very frustrated and did a k-turn to go the other way and take a detour to their destination. i've never seen anyone do a k-turn on my street! i've seen people do u-turns, but not k-turns.

so while i was walking towards my house, i figured i'd just go in and ask my parents and sister what was happening outside. maybe they had some inside scoop that would be useful to me. well, when i asked them what was going on, they wanted to know what i was talking about. so i told them about the combine trying to get through the street. so Dad and Anna went outside to see what was happening. then Dad sent me back inside to get the camera, so we could take a picture to send to my mom's uncle. a high percentage of my mom's extended family are farmers, or grew up in a farming family.

i would just like to say that i never ever want to try to drive a large vehicle, such as a tractor trailor, or a combine, through town. i'd probable run into a car or two. my parent's van hits the limit when it comes to driving big vehicles. well, i guess i'd drive a 15 passenger van if i had to. but i'll stick to small cars. there's that small stuff again. and i felt really bad for the person driving the combine. i would hate to be in that situation. but he got through it.

then when i went back outside to leave for piano lessons,(this is twenty minutes after the combine thing) i saw police cars down the way. i really don't want to know why they were there. then there was all kinds of traffic hold ups. the van in front of me going through town would randomly put on his break every five seconds. i can get very stressed out driving to piano.

well, i need to go study for my physics test. i tried to go to the review, but we kept getting off track, and didn't get much done. so i hope i have a good hold on this stuff. hopefully i'll post more this weekend. don't forget to tune into the Squeaky Show!

Be sure to listen!

2007-10-23T16:26:00.000-04:00

yeah, i haven't posted in a while. and i'm very sorry, but i guess that's how life goes. anyways, i'm going to be on the radio this saturday. so you will have to head over to my Squeaky Show blog to check out how you can listen. i'll be on from 8-11am eastern time. i know it's really early for a saturday, but hey, these things happen. if it makes you feel better, this will be the second saturday in a row i've had to be somewhere at 8am. i just really feel bad for my west coast friend, Liz, who i know will not get up at...5am on saturday to listen to my show. although that'd be pretty cool if she did. i'll just be playing some awesome music to get you up and going for your saturday morning.

busy, busy, busy

2007-10-20T14:03:00.000-04:00

that's how this past week has felt. but last night, that just took the cake. so the homecoming football game was supposed to be last night, but it was canceled because of rain. but it didn't really matter to me, because i had to work. so i got to work, and the parking lot was a lot fuller than normal. i've become accustom to parking in "my" parking spot, which happens to be in front of the light pole. and normally there's no one else that parks even close to that area. all the other workers park near the plaza itself. i figure i don't want to get in that habit, because once the stores in that area of the plaza open up, we won't be able to park there anyways. so some of my fellow workers were parked near my spot.(but thankfully not in my spot.) so i parked in my spot, and got out and said hello to Morgan, who got there at the same time i did. we were marveling at all the cars in the parking lot as we walked toward the building. we weren't sure if they were all there for the Pizza Buffet or not. see, there's this other restaurant that just opened up the other day, and it's two doors down from us. so we thought maybe all the cars were people wanting to check out this new restaurant. well, we walked passed the restaurant, and looked in the window. there were less than ten people in there. so everyone was there for us. it was a really crazy night. i've been so used to working on tuesdays, thursdays, and saturdays. the busiest out of that three is saturday, but it's not nearly as busy as friday. so when i work till close, i'm used to working till 9:30, 10 at the latest. so it was strange when it was 9:45, and i knew there was no way we were even close to being done. but we had a lot of people there to help out. so i got out of there a little after ten. except i had to stop at the grocery store to get a gallon of milk, so i didn't get home until 10:30.

and then i got to get up and go to school. it was for the PSAT. basically most of the junior class came in today to take them. it went alright, but it was so weird sitting there in a class room on a saturday. but i got used to it after awhile. and it felt like the end of a school day, or at least it reminded me of finals, when everyone was standing outside waiting for their ride to come. i drove to school for the second time this year. :-D so i chatted with a friend of mine for a little while, and then walked over to the van and headed home. the traffic was the same as a school day too. well, except there wasn't quite as much. but i tried to wait a little while so i wouldn't be caught up in too much traffic. but i wasn't stopped for a long period time at all while waiting to get out of there. so that was good.

well, i think i'm going to go practice piano and guitar a little bit, and then do some homework. and hopefully i can get to bed a little earlier tonight. i'm so glad i'm not going to the homecoming dance tonight.

"Just ask Abby"

2007-10-17T17:50:00.000-04:00

that's what my physics teacher told everyone in class today. apparently hardly anyone else in the class understands what we're doing. and we did this one problem today, and i did it, and then just sat there. and then she had me go and explain it to her and how i did it. so then apparently i had a really good handle on what we are doing. i should pause to say that my class has about 15 students in it, so it's rather small. before i knew it, several of my classmates were around me asking how in the world i did the problem. oh, and for those of interest, we're in the unit of "Vectors and Projectiles". except we're still on the Vectors part. this problem included head to tail addition, and solving components, which is when you make a few right triangles from the vectors, provided they're not horizontal or vertical. from the one right triangles you could figure out the other sides just by knowing the hypotenuse and one of the angles. in this particular problem that helped you with one of the sides of the R-value. and then you just subtract for the other side, Pythagorean theorem your way through, and there you go! well, then you need to find the angle touching the y-axis or something parallel to it.

so sorry if i just confused a bunch of you. anyways...i couldn't explain it to other people from my messy drawling. so i ended up just drawling it again, and doing each step at a time. as willing as i am to help my peers with these things, i don't think i want to become a teacher. but i'm not used to such power. i'm not usually the only 0ne in an entire class that "gets it". it's quite strange. but i'm sure this won't last for long. it'll probably be a week or two before everyone is asking someone else for help. and that's perfectly fine.

and the product of all this?

2007-10-12T17:23:00.000-04:00

a new song! and it's going to be a bluesy, jazzy song. it's a new endeavour for me, but so far it's working out just fine. i'll probably get really frustrated once i work it out on the piano, but the words and melody is working out great. basically the song talks about the mini-crisis i went through yesterday. once i get all of the lyrics worked out i'll post it on here. but i feel much better today than i did yesterday. Christian club really helped with that. in thinking about it, Christian Club and WJTL saved my life today. at least, they made things a little more bearable. it's amazing how God can work through a radio station to have a very helpful song playing right at the time i need it. God's pretty cool like that.

here we go

2007-10-11T16:35:00.000-04:00

youth group was good. the people were really nice, and a lot of them started conversations with me. that made it easier being new. but it was a bit of a "culture shock" as my lunch table called it. thank goodness they were on my side explaining to the person who invited me why it was such a culture shock. i don't really have anything against that denomination, because my mom grew up in the denomination of the church i went to last night. the only reason i'm apart of the Churches of God General Conference is because that's what my dad was apart of. so my whole family is apart of that. it's what i've grown up with, and i'm used to it. my church is more traditional, and i'm used to that.

but this is definitely going in the book. i just need to remember to write it down later.

so.....

2007-10-09T14:46:00.000-04:00

...i was invited to this youth group. it's tomorrow night. and it's at a really big church. let's just say that my church is very small. and very old. those aren't bad things. it's just different, that's all. there are so many churches around this area. and many of them are what we like to call, "Mega-churches". these are churches that have about 1000 or more people in their congregation. but this person invited me, and i'm not really sure why. but Liz says i should go because then i can put it in my book. btw Liz, i started a list of some stories to put in my book. i'm going to need your help later to makes sure i list everything. anyways, back to my story. Liz also said i should go b/c then i can tell her all about it on thursday! ;-) so i'm going. but not just for those reasons.

but when i recieved this verbal invitation last week, i was warned. yes, that's right, warned. the person who invited me told me that worship at "big churches"(i believe was his terminology) is a bit different than at small churches. frankly, i could decide whether i should be offended, or whether i should laugh. i took option three. that option was to calmly explain that i had been to some events of some larger churches, so i know how they worship. and i'm okay with that. maybe he thought that in my small church i had been sheltered from whatever in the big churches. and i guess i could understand how he might think that. but i don't concider myself sheltered.

it's just interesting to hear what people think about small churches. i don't think it's really a big deal how big or small a church is. lately i've realized that i'm more for small things. churches, towns, businesses, schools, cars. i'm rather short myself. i'm just trying to figure out the big picture with all these small interests, and small actions.

it happened again!

2007-10-07T21:13:00.000-04:00

i was able to write some more music! this makes me so excited. i decided a few days ago that i should write a sequal to that song i shared with you all a few weeks ago. the one where the chorus starts out, "Can we put our differences away for awhile and find something good to talk about?" but i knew that i needed to wait on God's timing to write it. well, during church today i came up with a chorus. it's a chorus that's going to need some work, but it's a base to something. then after church i was seeing if i had anything more to add to the other song i was working on, when i decided i should try and come up with something for this new song. so i did. and i think it's a pretty good start. i was even able to come up with some of the lyrics, though i still need to write them down. i'll probably work on this more tomorrow night and on tuesday morning. i'm really excited that God has given me these gifts that i may glorify Him. even if i never do end up writing the next big praise song bound to be sung in churches all over the nation. i've often wondered why i even write songs if i know i'm gifted in radio. but i figure that shouldn't stop me from writing them down, because God has a plan for them. and i know God has a plan for the music too. so i should keep at it.

creative moments

2007-10-06T14:49:00.000-04:00

and i just had one! i was just practicing guitar, and figuring out some more chords to a song i've been working on. then i decided to figure out what the chords would be to part of a verse i wrote. the verse goes as follows:

"blink your eyes, time goes by
here we are on the side
figuring out what we want to do with our lives"

and i thought i was going to have to spend twenty minutes or so figuring out what the melody was, and what chords went with that and stuff. but no. it took me under a minute because the chords just came to me, and i just played them. and all i have to say is Thank you God, and that was amazing. i hope that can happen more often. now i just need to come up with the rest of the song. but i pretty much know the chord progression. i also wish this could happen to me on the piano, but i know it will when the time is right.

the gift of life

2007-10-05T17:37:00.000-04:00

yeah...today i gave blood. twice a school year the PA Bloodbank comes to school, and people ages 17 and over can give blood. surprisingly a lot of juniors and seniors give blood. anyways, since i turned 17 three days ago, a few weeks ago i signed up for it in homeroom. my parents give blood pretty regularly, so i figured why not. also, i'm not exactly freaked out about needles. i don't like to look, but it's okay. so i was scheduled to start the process at 9:45 this morning. so i filled out some papers, and drank some water. note to self: drink more water next time. so then they did my temp and blood pressure, and answering all those questions. then it was off to the bus! basically, they have two buses, with four chairs each. there were a lot of people giving blood at the time that i was! i was really nervous about it, but knew that i would get through it just fine. and i did. i felt really great while i was pumping the blood into the pouch. those nurses are really good at making sure you're okay and making sure no one will pass out. then after i was done i sat and ate a few crackers and drank some orange juice. another note to self: eat more crackers next time. third note to self: don't take the smokehouse cheddar ones, take the oreo looking ones.

so then i walked back into the school. it was only a few minutes before lunch so i just waited around. but walking to lunch, through the food court area, and to my seat was quite interesting. i felt really light headed, and felt like a bunch of energy had been sucked out of me. so i ate, but felt like i should've eaten more. i made sure to keep drinking water through the afternoon. if i make a lot of sudden movements then i get light headed, but i know that'll go away in a few days.

so now i'm getting ready to have a really nice meal of spaghetti. on a side note it was interesting being one of the younger ones to give blood. because a lot of my fellow juniors were asking me about my experiance. i can't count how many times i told people the worst part was when they pricked my finger. and how walking to each class i just felt really exhausted. but then again so many of us upperclassmen. i'm glad i gave blood today. and i think i'll continue to give blood whenever i can. so sign me up for the spring blood drive!

how ironic!

2007-10-02T16:01:00.000-04:00

so, to start off with, today is my 17th birthday. and no, that's not the ironic part. as always, there's a long and involved story with this. so my friend, the same one who i went shopping with on sunday, got me a gift, and she was going to give it to me before school. but she didn't get there as early as she normally does, so i didn't see her before homeroom. so throughout the day i forgot about this gift i was supposed to get. then comes 6th period, which is my government class. we had started off class, and then got off track, which was strange because we never get off track quite that much in government class. anyways, after that was done, my teacher was talking, and then he stopped and picked up a gift bag and gave it to me. he told me he was told to give it to me, but he forgot who he was supposed to say it was from. but i knew, so it was okay. that's never happened before. so then everyone told me happy birthday, and some people attempted to sing to me. i was puzzled for a second as to how it landed in his room, because my friend doesn't have this teacher for government. but then i figured there was another person she could've given it to that probably left it there for my teacher to give to me. as it turns out, i was correct.

anyways, the ironic part. today we talked about the separation of church and state in government class. we had this worksheet that we filled out that listed all these court cases that delt with the separation of church and state. my friend gave me a t-shirt for my birthday, and it says "Pick Jesus", and it has a big picture of a guitar pick on it. i thought that was ironic how it landed in that room on the day when we talked about separating church and state. i thought it was pretty funny.

so far that's been the most interesting thing during my day today, with getting a gift in government class. after this all came about, i knew i had to post about it here, because it was just too good to leave unposted.

traveling in light vs. traveling in darkness

2007-10-01T15:22:00.000-04:00

A few weeks ago, my friend Cait and i went shopping on a friday night. so i drove to her house to pick her up, and got lost on the way there. that's because she lives in a developement in the area, and i don't have much experiance driving in those developments, they're pretty tricky and all look the same. anyways, i did finally get to her house, i just missed her street and had to turn around. after i dropped her off when we were done, i got lost going from her house to mine. i missed the road to get back on the route that would take me into town. so i figured i would keep driving and find a road to turn off of and then turn around. well, there were no roads to turn off of. so i just kept going. after what seemed like forever i came upon a town. i saw a sign for a church, and figured out what town i was in. then i saw a traffic light, and this is going to sound really strange, but then i knew exactly how to get home. since it was about 9:15 or 9:20pm at that point, i decided to stop off at the McDonald's parking lot to call my parents to let them know that i was on my way home and i just got lost a little. i told them i'd be home by 9.

yesterday we had another shopping adventure. and when i dropped her off at home this time, i decided to go that same way, just to see what it looked like during the day. it turns out that during that drive there's a steep down slope on the ride side of the road. and at the bottom is a stream. i'm kinda of glad i didn't know that while i was driving in the dark. but i'm also glad none of my right drifting tendancies came back to me either. also, the drive didn't seem as long. when i came to the town, i was sure i missed something. and i've realized that with other things too, how it seems longer in the dark.

when i was driving in the dark, it seemed to take longer because i didn't know where i was going, and i could only see 250ft in front of me(300ft when i had my high-beams on). but during the daytime, i was able to see a whole lot further than that. i was about to see as far as the next curve in the road. so i saw the town sooner, and the intersection sooner.

i'm wondering if the same could be said about life, and different situations of it. i'm having a hard time applying that analogy to my own life, but i have thought of how it could be applied. maybe someone went through a situation before they became a Christian, or during a time when they had fallen away from God. during that time it may seem long and never ending, and if they know that they're lost and not on the right road, they may even be a little panicky because they have no clue where they are. so that would be driving on the road in the dark. then, maybe when the person becomes a Christian, or has a closer walk with God, they can see the same thing a whole lot differently. maybe they can be in that same situation, yet it's not that bad. they can see what's a head, and they know what's coming. i knew that i would pass through the town eventually. and maybe they'd know which part of that situation was coming. anyways, i felt much better about driving on that road during the day. it wasn't quite as fun as i thought, but it made for a great story. i just need to stop getting lost so much.

What a town!

2007-09-29T07:51:00.000-04:00

It's amazing to see what a small town does in events like these. a week ago from today we all read in the paper that the head coach of my school's football team passed away. Oddly enough, he passed away on Friday, September 21, at 7:01pm. our friday night football games start at 7. I know God had a planning in that one. Anyways, on monday morning all the teachers had to read something to us about this coach, because he had been the head coach of the football team for over 25 years, and a teacher for a long time too. a lot of the teachers at my school who had been there a long time were taking it very hard on monday. but my homeroom teacher told us that we should be very thankful that we live in a small town such as ours. a town where many people go to the football games, even if they don't know anyone who goes to the high school. it's really nice because the football field is in a park right in town, and a lot of people just walk to the game. well, all the people who don't live in developements in the area. it's only two or three blocks away from my house. even on the nights when i work, i can hear the announcer from outside our house. and Main Street is always parked full of cars. actually, the street i live on is pretty parked up too, so it's hard to find a parking space coming home from work.

anyways, i didn't have to work last night, so i went to the football game for once. i haven't really had much motivation to go, because the people i always walked around with either graduated or have better things to do. but the girl who graduated comes home every weekend, so i was able to walk around with her during the game. except we seems to stop every ten feet because she saw someone she knew, and hadn't seen for a while. but i guess that's just what happens whenever someone is away for awhile. but i'm glad i went last night.

i knew they were going to something special in memory of the head coach who died. when i first got there with my dad and brother, i sat with them until the marching band was done with their thing. but we get there super early so they can get a good seat. so we watched as the two teams warmed up for the game and did their weekly routine. but there was something different about what they were wearing. they had some special shirt on. the mother of a football player in front of me said that they had special shirts made for the team. it said something about playing the game for the coach. even the assistant coaches had those shirts on, along with a lot of the behind the scenes people for the team. and then we heard that they were selling them. so during the course of the game, we saw many, many people wear these shirts. there was also a different shirt that a lot of people were wearing, but it had the same concept.

it's so amazing to see an entire town come together like that. i guess it shows how many lives were impacted by this coach. they read something special about him before the band played the national anthem.

our team still lost though. but it's been quite the week for the players and the coaches.

i really love this town. it may not be the ideal small town, but it's pretty good. and i'm really glad that my parents made an effort to buy a house in the school district. even if it had to be on the small side. at least we're in walking distance of the school, and our church. and i have a great school to go to.

what a crazy day

2007-09-26T20:26:00.001-04:00

i can't type for long, so i can't really give the outlook for my entire day. but let's just say this: it was nuts. i woke up an hour late, got to drive, instead of walk, to school because i woke up late. somehow by the grace of God i still got there on time. this morning was SYATP, so i had to be at school by 6:55am. i had no study halls today, so it was a go, go, go day. and then some people were asking me about this test i'm taking in a half hour. i'm just praying that everything will go alright. and i just know that whatever happens at 9 tonight, it's God's will, and i need to be okay with that. actually, more than that, i need to like it. so for now, i'm hanging onto God and 1 Peter 5:7, which states "Cast all your anxieties on Him for He cares for you." i guess i can just pretend like i'm watching the game show. because i have no problem answering then. well, actually, sometimes i don't always answer allowed, because then i'm scared of what my dad or siblings will think about my answer. while my grades at school don't often show the extent of it, i seem to have a knack for trivia. just random stuff, really. i can do a lot of the history. the one part i'm a little worried about is pop culture. i'm okay with that, but i limit myself on the media i consume, so i'm not often up to par on that. but i'll see what i can do. i'll be sure to update again soon, but right now, i need to sign in for my test.

Where You're leading me

2007-09-22T07:44:00.000-04:00

wow, it's been quite the week. one topic of conversation that keeps coming up at school is homecoming. it's not until the second week of october, but people like to start the hype about that early. i don't want to go, but some of my friends are trying to convince me to go.

a new Wegmans opened up last sunday. apparently at the grand opening there were supposed to be 15,000 people or so. i'm not sure if that's how many there were, or if there were more. i didn't think i could go to Wegmans this week, but then God made a way. i was at work on thursday, and they needed to send two people home. the more i think about it, this sounds like some reality tv show. or maybe that's because the new season of Survivor premiered that night. anyways, i said i'd go. after i said that, i realized i could stop at Wegmans on the way home. so it ended up that i had to give someone a ride home, he went with me. i'm glad i went with someone, instead of wondering around aimlessly by myself. i actually did need to pick up orange juice, because my mom asked me to if it wasn't too late when i was coming home. but i decided i probably didn't need to get it at Wegmans, because it would be cheaper at Giant. since Wegmans came in, Giant has had some major sales, and they've lowered practically all their prices on everything. so when we looked at the orange juice, it looked sort of expensive. although we had no clue, because we don't normally have a need to pay attention to these things.

anyways, did you know that there's a such thing as organic clothing? well, there is. and there's about 500 different kinds of cheeses at Wegmans. and that parking lot was pretty busy, and it was only thursday. i told Jared i wanted to know what this place would be like on friday night. but i didn't feel like driving out here to find out. so i drove him to his friend's house, and then went to Giant. i'm glad i went because i could get the same size and kind of orange juice container for about $1.50 less at Giant. not only that, but i also saw someone i knew at Giant. he used to go to my church, but he goes to a different church now, so i don't see him that much. it was really nice getting to talk to him a little bit.

anyways, back to relating this post to its title. it's interesting to see what God wants me to do, and where He wants me to go. looking ahead, some of the places might look a little scary, but i know that God and i can get through it just fine. So i'll just keep holding onto him, and let him bring me through everything, like that Bethany Dillon song says. It's like when i went to Wegmans, it was a little scary because of all the people and just the massiveness of it. but we got through it, and looked around.(after we marvled at how huge it is) and somehow we led ourselves though the store. at one point we got lost, but just kept going a certain way hoping that was the way out. and we got it. in the words of Jennifer Knapp, "With the Spirit as my guide, i'll never have to hide again."

being scammed

2007-09-20T20:23:00.000-04:00

sometime during the summer, i received a letter saying that i hadn't paid for a subscription to a Christian magazine. i had never heard of the magazine, nor had i received a free issue or anything. at the time, my mom was at work, so i was just going to wait till she got home until i did anything with it. but then i started looking some stuff up on the internet. once i looked up the name of the person who signed the letter, i realized it was a scam. i found many websites that had these complaints and such. and an article that said to contact my local attorney general. well, i never did. but today i got another follow up letter from these people. i don't understand why these people would do such a thing.

when i was scammed a month or so ago, it was really fun once i found out that i was being scammed. my brother asked if it was fun this time, and i said not really. i just wish they would quit sending me these things. they're wasting their resources.

It's a good thing...

2007-09-14T21:04:00.001-04:00

that i've done the 30-hour famine before. because i haven't eaten since 11:20ish this morning. so that's over nine hours without food. but i'm heating up some Boston Market Mac 'n Cheese.

I had more civil conversations today with that person i was talking about yesterday. i talked a lot about Christian club, and See You at the Pole. SYATP is on September 26th. i'm really excited because this year i'm one of the leaders for it. and i get to help lead worship. oh, that reminds me, i need to look up some stuff for that.

I'm so thankful to have a God who can work things out just perfectly. i saw that in action tonight. and thanks to that action, i know for sure that i'm going to a conference tomorrow. it's for students wanting to share their faith at school. since i'm one of the leaders of Christian Club, i figured it would be good for me to go. i'm open to any ideas God gives me.

well, it's going to be a crazy weekend. but i know i'll get through it just fine. i hope the rest of you have a nice, peaceful, and craziness free weekend. maybe i'll get that next week. actually, next week is my sister's 10th birthday. that's going to be loads of fun!

Something good to talk about

2007-09-13T15:55:00.000-04:00

If i was a Christian artist and had a CD coming out, that's what i would name it. it comes from the chorus of a song i wrote last year. that song is about the "friendship" i've had with this guy at my school. well, i guess interaction is a better word for it. see, we first met in seventh grade, and every time we attempted at conversation, it ended with an argument. and for some reason he has this thing against my friends and myself. we just tried to come up with great come backs when one of us got into an argument with him. for some reason it seemed to always be me heading up the argument, and my friends backing me up. eventually they just happened to not be there.

Last year he was in my french class. we were always constantly at each other, except for if a certain event happened. there was another guy in my french class who's an atheist and would always get into arguments with him about Evolution v. Creationism, and arguments against Christianity in general. well, the guy that i always argued with would always turn to me and be like, "answer him." so then i would have to bail him out because apparently i have lots of knowledge for arguments such as those.

then, i realized that this guy and me could have a very civil and positive conversation if we talked about God and Church. so then i wrote this song about it. here's the chorus:

"Can we put our differences away for awhile,
And Find something good to talk about
'Cause we seem to disagree on everything but God
Which is when we team up to defend His name"

how crazy is that? so today, he was looking for one of my friends who helps lead Christian club. well, i help lead Christian club, so i asked him what he had a question about. and he told me. and i told him i would ask the proper person/people and get back to him soon. as i was walking off to homeroom, i realized i had just had a very civil conversation with him. i was shocked, i have to admit. we actually handled things almost like adults! we're growing up! that makes me very excited. i hope we can have more civil conversations in the future.

on another note, i didn't realize how many people noticed shoes. i had new shoes on today, and my homeroom teacher said something about them, and then a friend of mine in one of my classes, he said something. yes, i said he. i was very surprised too. i didn't think many guys noticed things like that.

Interesting Conversations

2007-09-11T15:39:00.000-04:00

first of all, why does everyone act so surprised when they find out i'm a junior? i've gotten used to the idea, now why can't everyone else?

anyways, i would like to share a conversation that i had yesterday. it helped me realize something that i hadn't thought about before. i was talking with my friend Heather. she was in my chemistry class last year, and she's in my physics class this year. she also sits at my lunch table, which is where we had this conversation. she was talking about her boyfriend, and where they went over the weekend. she knows that i don't date. once she was done telling me about her weekend, she asked me what i was going to do in college when it comes to dating. i told her i was planning to go the courtship/friendship route, but wasn't too sure. so i'm letting God sort it all out. but i told her i'd just have to wait and see.

then we got talking about our future husbands. we were talking about how we could very well be acquainted with our future husbands now. and i have no clue what guys think about this, but to the two of us girls, it freaks us out. well, sometimes. then Heather was talking about how she would rather just know now whether her boyfriend and her will end up getting married. this is when i was struck with a new level of understanding.

see, i figured out, and told her, that if she did know, and if it would be a No from God, than she wouldn't put effort into the relationship. this is true with almost anyone. Heather probably wouldn't think the relationship was worth it, so there goes the effort. she wouldn't see a point. but God puts people in our lives for a reason. there's a reason why Heather and her boyfriend are together, whether they know that reason or not.

when i really try to think about this whole thing, i get really confused. but it goes right along with what my sunday school class is studying. we're talking about going through Perplexing situations. and i feel like i've been going through one lately. anyways, i had already known about God having specific purposes for all the people i come into contact with, but i guess it never really clicked like this.

so basically, we're back to the fact that i have no clue what i'm doing. i have no clue if where i'm aiming is right or not. but i'll just keep trusting God, and trust that He'll guide me in the way i need to go.

Who wants to think of a title for this one?

2007-09-10T16:03:00.000-04:00

on the message board i'm apart of, i've been adding in my two cents to a topic another girl started. of course, it's a girl's forum, so there are lots of guy problems. well, we've all been helping this girl with some stuff. and if i feel like God wants me to post, i go for it. most of my advice that i give to her just comes from the events of my life, and what i've learned from them. well, there's also books i've read. so anyways, i sent her a private message about something, because it just seems like we're both in situations where the only conclution i can come to is that it will work out. we're just going through, hoping we're doing the right thing. but she told me that she loves all the advice i give. and when i told her it's a God-thing with what comes through the keyboard and onto the screen, she said it must be a God-thing when she receives it because every time it's something she really needs to hear. I am always amazed when she says stuff like that, because that makes it seem like i have it all together. it's just strange to think that someone thinks so highly, and finds value in what i have to say.

in other news, i came up with a few more lyrics and verses to put on my locker. i'm going to really have to be creative with how i fit all this stuff on. i really like the size of our lockers, however some of the surface area is not condusive to hanging lyrics.

Starting New

2007-09-07T21:47:00.001-04:00

there's someone out there who needs to hear what i have to say. hear, that's kinda funny. i can't email this person, i can't write any more notes, or send anymore letters. so i'm letting the whole world know that i, Abby, am starting over. see, there's something i tried to do, but didn't follow through with it, and misused my safety nets. i mis-used the people around me,(well, person) for communication. i don't know how i'm going to solve this "ultimate" problem, but i have help. i have a group of teen girls who are there for me whenever i need them. they let me vent if i'm having a hard time, and all kinds of nice stuff. i know they can come up with ideas, and we can all brainstorm and help me through this. anyways, this "thing", it was supposed to go on for a month, and end the week before my birthday. well, i decided i want a clean slate. so i'm going to try again. Praise God for second chances. or three or four. so now this "thing" is going to go on until the week after my birthday. and i decided that if i mess up, i'm just going to have to start again, and say, a month from tomorrow. i need to be harder on myself. i need to stretch this to the extremes. i decided that i'm going to take this a little further. be more...deliberate i think is the word i need.

in the meantime, in the words of Mister Rogers "Let's think of something to do while we're waiting." so, i'll work on my SHP paper. i'll practice piano more. i'll spend more time with God. i'll do something to get my mind off of it.

so if the right person is reading this, i hope you don't hear from me for awhile. i hope nothing drastic happens while you're not hearing from me. despite the doubts i know if God has called me to do this, He and i will be able to complete the task at hand. I think that's all my tired mind has for now. Good-night to all.

"ya gotta keep on looking up!"

2007-09-07T06:42:00.000-04:00

that's a song quote from the O.C. Supertones. anyways, i went to work last night. it was okay. there was a local football team that came. and practically trashed the place.(and all i have to show from that is a penny!) i have this system down whenever i clear tables after people leave. usually i pile all the trash on the plates, and then take it back. but this time i just worked my way down the line in clearing dishes. it made me feel like i was actually getting something done. but i made many trips into that room and out. and there were some other people in other places, so i had to keep checking on them. but it wasn't that bad.

by the time i left, i was really fed up with everyone swearing. fortunately i planned ahead and grabbed my Audio Adrenaline "Audios" CD when i went out the door. so when i left work, i got to drive on the Pike to "Big House". and then by the time i was on one of the roads leading back to town, i was listening and singing along with "Never Gonna be as big as Jesus". it made me feel really good.

also, at work, we saw some deer in the empty lot next to the building. there's a forest area near the building. at one point, there were two families standing looking out the window with fasinated lookds on their faces. so i went over to see what they were looking at. there were five deer hanging out in that lot. i guess they were eating dinner, but i'm not sure. it was cool because there were some little kids there at the time, so they really had fun watching this. i told them they came on the right night. so we watched them for a little longer and then watched them go back into the forest. the one dad asked me if we saw stuff like this often. i told him that was my first time seeing anything like that. but it was weird seeing such a peaceful animal near such a busy road. it just isn't an area where anyone would expect to see any deer.

and i would like to thank all of you for all your encouragement. i was able to read all your comments this morning. hopefully today will be a bit better.

one and lonely

2007-09-06T16:00:00.000-04:00

why do i have to be a loner? it seems i've been like that all my life. first of all, i'm the only left hander in my family. and in church no one was ever really my friend. at least, no one wanted to be. making fun of me or totally ignoring me all together was always so much easier. well, actually they never caused me any problems until middle school. but i still ended up being the odd one out. in school, in all my classes no one ever wants to be my partner. it's like i have some kind of sign over my head that says i'm a bad person or something. i have friends in my classes, but they always have closer friends who'd they would like to be partners with. so they always end up being partners, except for when there's a project where three people may work together.

last year in french class, is a perfect example of this. we were supposed to be partners with the person sitting next to us. well, for the entire year, i sat in a seat with no one beside me. it was horrible. and then i think Madame felt bad for me because she made me the "techy" person of the class. if the projector or tv didn't work, she'd call me "Elisabeth" to come to the rescue. and while i'm okay with stuff like that, i'm not top notch. so sometimes i'd get it going again, but not always.

my teachers basically all get used to the fact that i work alone. what they don't know is that sometimes i would be so much better working with someone else, because i can't do it all myself. in the words of a band called Mae, "Sometimes i can't make it alone." Whenever we did the posters of a region for cooking class, mine never got voted for because i'm not an artsy person, and no one wanted to work with me to help make it look better.

today in Government class, we worked on worksheets, and we were supposed to work with a partner. guess who didn't have a partner? like i said, teachers catch on quick that i work by myself. and then instead of working on my worksheet, i ended up thinking about how people hate working with me, and i had tears running down my face. of course, i tried to hold as many back as possible, because there's so many people in that class. but no one cared anyways. and then there were no time for tears in math class because i had a quiz to conquer. but it's interesting how no one seems to care. they're really wrapped up in their picture perfect life.

at church i end up hanging out with all the adults. i even dropped out of the high school sunday school class to join one of the adult sunday school classes. but that's because I felt God telling me it was time to change. He finally said "Go!" (and i'm so glad he did!) apparently the high school class has never been the same since.

another thing, i find i've been hanging out with seniors a lot. and i'm a junior. so i don't know what i'm going to do once they all leave. but i'm not worried about that quite yet.

well, that's my rant for now. basically, no one talks to me in any of my classes. well, except for physics. a good friend of mine is in there, and sits next to me, and is my lab partner. i'm so thankful to have her in that class. none of us are really good friends with anyone else in the class.

and i know that God is with me always, and Jesus (and the WORD FM) will always be my best friend. even if no one else conciders me their best friend, Jesus will. i know he loves me so much, and i love him so much too. i wouldn't be sitting here otherwise.

Growing up

2007-09-05T17:52:00.000-04:00

Someone told me today that i'm not allowed to grow up. this is probably because he's known me for basically my whole life. he was a little shocked today in gym class when he found out that i have my driver's license. i think i reminded him that he's growing up to. i mean, after all, he's the one graduating in june. is surprising me that all those Class of '08 people are so close to being done. they're now the ones all worried about what College to go to and everything.

obviously i can't just stop growing up. but i do wish life had a pause button. sometimes things go a little too fast for my liking. so sometimes i wish i could just push the pause button and think about things a little. unfortunately, i can't do that. so i'm sure i'll manage.

what an evening i had!

2007-09-03T07:33:00.000-04:00

last night i had the most interesting experience. i was IMing my friend Liz, and i was going to try to show her a video my brother made on the family digital camera. i was having trouble with that, and then my foot started itching. so itch, itch, itch, itch, itch. then i asked Liz why my foot was itching, as if God had given her a special gift of telling people why a part of their body was itchy. so then, i looked down at my foot, and it was really red. and then my ring finger on my left hand starts itching. so itch, itch, itch, itch. so finally i conclude there has got to be something wrong with me. so i go over to my brother, as if he's some kind of doctor or something.(not!) he said maybe it was an allergic reaction. i really wasn't sure about that, because usually my allergic reactions include my throat swelling up. plus, i hadn't eaten anything in two hours. so this conversation concluded my brother asking me, "what did you eat", me answering, "nothing i'm allergic to", and then me putting my foot up on the computer desk and discovering that i now had bumps on my foot and finger. they looked like i had bug bites. so then my mom looks at them. she said i should probably take some benadryl. but i was convinced they were bug bites. the only odd part about that was that there weren't any bugs flying around me. so upstairs i go to get some cream to put on them. so i started putting cream on them, but then there were more on both my legs that kept popping up. i showed my mom those, and then decided to take the benadryl. and boy did they hurt. but i took one of those dissolvable stips.

they still itched a lot. but i just pretended it was the time when i was at youth group at the park and got 23 mosquito bites. because it hurt just like that. shortly after i took the benadryl, the bump on my finger went away. so it turns out that they were hives. some of them are still there, but they don't hurt like they did last night. and they're smaller than they were last night. needless to say it made my sunday evening interesting.

we're not really sure if the hives are because i ate something or just random. i know i didn't eat anything with nuts in it. all i had was a chocolate chip cookie pie piece. and i checked afterwards and confirmed that there were no nuts in it. and then i had Chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. with milk chocolate shell. so there's nothing there that could've caused it. not that i know of. but like i said, it could've been something random. i don't know. i just know that if it happens again, i'll take beandryl right away. when my dad saw my hives, and heard about how i took benadryl, he muttered something about how he thinks maybe we should invest in benadryl. i certainly wouldn't be here without it. well, i probably would, but it enabled me to go through allergic reactions quicker and with ease.

while we're on this note, i should mention that now i may be allergic to chicken. we're still waiting for the blood test results, but the other test they did showed that i'm allergic. i'm sort of sad, but i guess i could get used to it. i guess that means no more Chic-fil-a. but they fry their chicken in peanut oil, so i wasn't sure if that was going to be okay or not anyways. but i could still go there and just get ice cream! or a baked-potato.

all the right songs

2007-09-02T06:30:00.000-04:00

yesterday when i was listening to the radio, all the right songs played on the radio. songs about being alone, yet not being alone, because God is always with us. the one that i heard during the afternoon is by a band called BDA and the chorus of this song goes:

"But you can't say that we are alone, you can't say that we are alone anymore, we can't say that we are alone. we are anything else, we are anything else. 'cause Love is here, 'cause Love is here with me now. "

there this other song that's by a band called Storyside B, and it's called "Be Still". but during the bridge, it goes something like this:

"is this you, and is this me? it's sometimes hard to believe that I am not alone. It's not just you, and not just me, we all need to believe that we are not alone."

those two songs, along with a few others really spoke to me yesterday. prove that God has a hand in what songs are played and at what time. i think it's so awesome to experiance that sort of thing. it's probably because i have some much intrest in music.

family from long ago

2007-09-01T11:30:00.000-04:00

my dad has been doing a whole lot of searching for our ancestors. our county's library system offers this Heritage thing online where anyone with a library card in our county can look at different censuses and all kinds of things. last night my dad was looking at some cemetery records. see, his grandmother, we all call her Nana, died about on and a half years ago. she's buried in one of the oldest cemeteries around this area. apparently some of her other family members are buried there too. so Dad wanted to find all those grave stones and take pictures of them to show his Aunt Joan, Nana's daughter. so my dad and my sister were going to go to the cemetery, and i decided that i may as well go along. i'm glad i did. first we showed Anna Nana's grave, because i was the only one of us three kids who went to the funeral. so we showed her that, and then we started our search. Dad figured out from a website where section A was. so we drove near that, and started looking. i spotted all the ones that we wanted to find. there were four in all, and it was very interesting finding them. we found out that my great-great-great grandfather may have fought in the Civil War on the Union side. but i think my dad wants to find more information on that.

so all in all it was a very informational morning. on the way there and back Dad was telling us stories about Nana when she was growing up. she used to walk from one town to the other for high school. i've always thought that my parents live in a "foreign town" compared to where they grew up. but it turns out that some of my ancestors lived in or around this town. that's nice to know. there are people in this town who have so many generations who have lived here. and i haven't been one of those people. but at least there were a few people related to me who've lived here.

School

2007-08-30T16:31:00.000-04:00

i just finished the first week of my junior year of high school. i'm kinda exhausted, but i know i'll get used to it okay. two days a cycle(my school has six day cycles) i have two study halls in a row. and today i had those two study halls in a row, and halfway through the second one i was really bored. these study halls are during second and third period. so i got everything done that was assigned for the weekend from my first class, and stuff i still needed to do for my other classes. and then, i had nothing else to do. fortunately, i will have lots of time to work on my Senior High Project paper and presentation. well, i'll just work on the paper for now. but at least if i have that stuff with me it'll be good to make some headway on that.

although, then again, once student commons opens up, i may find other things to do and people to talk to down there. we'll see what happens.

oh, this all being said, i probably won't be writting quite as much with all the other stuff i need to get done. i'm aiming for weekend postings, but i can't make any promises. so i'll just post when i think of it and have time.

Junior Girl

2007-08-26T17:29:00.000-04:00

I officially become a "junior girl" tomorrow. it feels weird saying that. i've felt strange all summer saying that i was going to be a junior. i've gotten used to telling people that i'm going to be a junior, and i've become more accustom to the idea. but not fully. i suppose tomorrow will be like any other first day of school. read the handbook thingy for an hour and half or so, and then go through your day. oh, and bring lots of papers home for my mom to fill out. this year i have to drop stuff off at the nurse's office, since i'm allergic to stuff now. or rather, we know for sure that i'm allergic to stuff. so that'll be new and different. i'm excited. today i realized that i only have two first days of school left. well, in the public school system. i like public school though. it's a nice mission field if one choses to think about it that way. and actually there are a lot of us christians who go to my school. so it's nice to have them to connect with. we get a good sized crowd for SYATP every year. so anyways, i'm praying that tomorrow goes well.

Nothing like Snoopy

2007-08-21T12:40:00.001-04:00

Every year for Chirstmas i ask for a Snoopy Calendar from my aunt. this past yeah, and the year before that the calendar has been a "happiness" calendar. you know, those books "Happiness Is..." well, each month i've been thinking about what happiness is. this month, according to the calendar, Happiness is watching an old movie. it just so happens that a few weeks ago i decided to make some changes about all the media i take in. so i've ruled out a lot of movies that my family owns. but last night my sister decided to watch Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. so i watched part of it last night and the last parts this morning. so that was my old movie for the month. and now i'm watching "Snoopy Come Home". my parents taped it whenever it came on sometime in the early 90s. i'm guessing 1993 or something because after this tape there's some christmas thing with Amy Grant, and i'm pretty sure it's from 1994. so maybe they showed this movie in '94. i really don't know. but it was a long time ago and you can tell from a lot of things. the commercials for one. they seem really cheesy now. and did you relize how boxy the trucks were? but they aren't as bad with content as the commercials are now. at least, not that i've seen. i think it'd be interesting to do a mass media study like that. and i just found out that KISS 99.3 FM used to be called Mix 99.3. that's very interesting.

so anyways, i love Snoopy. i share a birthday with him, which it probably the reason why i love the Peanuts comic so much. and now this year another reason to like those Peanuts is because i'm allergic to the food peanuts. so at least i'm not allergic to the Peanuts comic! that'd be very weird. so i'll have to see what the happiness thing is next month.

J'ai Faim

2007-08-18T12:30:00.000-04:00

So last night, i went to work and then went to Wal-Mart. I needed sticky tack and confetti. yeah, i know, it's a weird combination. i guess i could stick the confetti to the sticky tack. but i don't want to do that. so then i came home. my parents were away visiting some friends of ours, and Joel was home, because he had evening practice for cross-country, so he didn't go with my parents and Anna. When i came home, Joel was on the computer. A few minutes later he asked me when Wiser's opened the next morning. Wiser's is a very small grocery store a few blocks away from us. he said that he was going to go there in the morning to get Cereal, because all we had was Special K and Rice Krispies. We needed something with substance. It was about 10:00pm, and i said that technically i could go out to Giant and get some cereal, but i didn't feel like doing that. so we decided that Joel would wake me up when he woke up, and then i was supposed to get ready and take him to Giant to get cereal.

so he woke me, and then went to ask Dad if we could go to Giant. Dad said to ask Mom. Mom told us not to go to Giant, but to go to Walmart. Then she told us specific cereals to get. so i got to make another trip out to Walmart. it was the first time i've driven with someone since i got my lisence. but it was fine. but i was really hungry by the time we got home. so i just opened up a box and had my breakfast. so now we have cereal.

that's about it for now.