hippos and puzzles

well, i just realized that i haven't posted a thing in a week. (that may or may not have something to do with the 24 Kbps dial-up connection out here at my parents' house. you decide.) but anyway, i am here, safe and sound, and having a lovely time, in case you were wondering. it's been very relaxing. i've done some crosswords, and some soduko (sp?), and played trivial pursuit, and worked on a nigh-impossible puzzle, and watched the cosby show. it's been wonderful to see my family, and i actually feel pretty comfortable in the new house. i'm still not sure what to expect when i open a drawer, but at least i know where all the doors lead now.
christmas was great, though we missed darren, my brother-in-law. his job required him to be away in texas over the holiday, and it just wasn't quite right without him. we did have a lovely time, as you could tell by the pictures if the dial-up would hurry up. (just in case i haven't told you, i got a digital camera for christmas, and now i can and will post pictures of my family at will. i need to go get another memory stick, and then i'll be able to post pictures of the wedding this weekend too. soon, i will be digital camera savvy. watch out.)
perhaps my favorite christmas vingette was when my sister stephanie gave my sister tracy a stuffed hippo. apparently, when the local radio station started playing christmas music back in november, tracy chose the christmas classic, "i want a hippopotamus for christmas," as her favorite song for the season. she's been singing it to her co-workers, friends, and family with such reckless abandon that stephanie decided to make tracy's christmas wish come true. the stuffed hippo came with a cd of the song that she had to put on before she unwrapped it, and as soon as she heard the first few notes, she began jumping up and down, and performed the entire song with whimsical charm and gusto that i think i shall remember it forever.
"i can see me now on christmas morning
creeping down the stairs
what joy and what suprise when i open up my eyes
and see a hippo hero standing there!
i want a hippopotamus for christmas
only a hippopotamus will do
no crocodiles or rhinoceroseses
i only like hippopotamuseses
and hippopotamuseses like me too!"
oh trixie, no.

i've also gotten to see lots-o-people that i love that i don't normally get to see. last night i hung out with the ciemini (that's plural for cieminis), who i haven't seen since the summer. and sam is here from toulouse, who i haven't seen since JANUARY! yay for long lost friends, including lots more who will continue to arrive over the next 24 hours for the lord wedding tomorrow. hooray!
(p.s. i've been trying to upload some photos with our faster-than-the-speed-of-molasess connection this entire time, to no avail. perhaps the pictures will have to wait. boo, dial-up. boo.)

i'll be home for christmas.

i'll be home for christmas
you can count on me
please have snow and mistletoe
and presents under the tree

i'm all packed and ready to go! i'm here to check-in and print my boarding pass, and then a few more errands before its off to the airport. yay! :D

ummmmm...

i want to post something great and interesting today. but, as i intend to spend the rest of my day doing laundry, finishing some christmas cards and thank you notes, and culminating the day at a middle school band concert, i find that to be unlikely.
hence, here are some pictures i like. the first one is of erin and anya and me a few weeks ago. i am looking forward to our grand reunion next week. the second one is frannie, the camel, and the third one is me and chris, a co-worker of mine who was dressed up as a wise man/astrologer/king of the orient for the outdoor nativity at eastminister. there is no rhyme or reason for the grouping of these pictures. just a filler for a substantial lack of content. enjoy.




p.s. j/the mole/windmill cookie, etc., thanks for the comments. so witty.

a lonely place

from Out of Solitude by henri nouwen:
"somewhere we know that without a lonely place our lives are in danger. somewhere we know that without silence, words lose their meaning;
that without listening, speaking no longer heals;
that without distance, closeness cannot cure.
somewhere we know that without a lonely place our actions quickly become empty gestures.
the careful balance between
silence and words,
withdrawal and involvement,
distance and closeness,
solitude and community
forms the basis of the Christian life and should therefore be the subject of our most personal attention.
when you are able to create a lonely place in the middle of your actions and concerns, your successes and your failures can lose some of their power over you. for then your love for this world can merge with a compassionate understanding of its illusions.
then your serious engagement can merge with an unmasking smile.
then your concern for others can be motivated more by their needs than your own.
in short, then you can care.
let us therefore live our lives to the fullest, but let us not forget to once in a while get up long before dawn to leave the house and go to a lonely place."

VICTORY! sort of.

fifteen minutes ago, i was in my office, working diligently on the newsletter that i promised allan i'd distribute on sunday, when i heard a little scratching behind me. for a few minutes, i had convinced myself that allan was messing around in his office, which is on the other side of my wall. finally, i began to worry that it was not allan after all. i slowly turned around in my oh-so-professional black leather swivel office chair (justin, i added all those details specifically for you), and looked to where i heard the sounds. to my chagrin, i saw a little movement under the bookcase. upon closer examination, the movement was found to be caused by... dum dum DUM: HAROLD, the church mouse*.
harold has been absent from my life for a few weeks, and no one had seen or heard anything from him. those were happy times. but today, lo and behold: harold. so, i calmly swiveled around again and dialed allan's extension. i informed him of our situation, and he promised to be there momentarily. meanwhile, harold snuck out from under the bookcase and headed for the other corner. i instinctually jumped up on my chair, as i've seen my mother do numerous times in my childhood, and watched harold try to run away. but alas! harold seems to have been injured in a fight with the sticky traps that we've set for him, and was dragging his tail, hind legs, and some debris with him, hindering his mobility! so allan came in, and was quickly able to drop a plastic bowl on top of him, quite effectively trapping him. (my favorite part of this situation was when allan shuddered and screamed like a school girl after catching him. ahh, sweet bliss!) anyhow, allan, who is a die-hard pet lover, instead of immediately "disposing" of harold, took pity on him! he spent the next fifteen minutes plotting how he might de-glue him and save his life. he has taken six or seven animals into his home, and plans to do the same with harold. i am supposed to come to his house tonight to watch his three and a half year old twins, and i have threatened to back out if harold too is under my charge. despite my protests, he is presently braving the blizzard on his way to the pet store to buy a cage and some mouse food. sick sick sick sick sick.
so, i have eventually won the war with harold the church mouse for control of my office, yet he seems determined to haunt me to the death.
we'll see, harold. we'll see.

*this is not actually harold, as you can see by the lack of tail-debris, but merely a likeness.

walt disney + c.s. lewis

hello again. i am just now remembering that i was going to tell you what i'm reading/listening to when i write these, and that for the most part, i haven't done it lately. so, today i am reading the screwtape letters by c.s. lewis and listening to sigur ros, who, consequently, will be playing at calvin in february. good job, calvin college.
(in related "good job, calvin college" news, i am sad to be missing the january series this year. i recently received the speaker schedule in the mail and was thrilled to see lauren f. winner and paul rusesabagina, among others, on it. i am less grieved to be missing these two as a will see lauren f. winner at jubilee in february, and recently saw paul rusesabagina speak at the university of pittsburgh. for those of you who are unfamiliar with these two people, do yourself a favor and get to know them. i have recently developed an author-crush on lauren winner after reading her mudhouse sabbath. she is also the author of the renowned girl meets god and real sex, which i have not yet read, but plan to in the very near future. paul rusesabagina is the man whose life is depicted in the film hotel rwanda. listening to him speak was surreal, since this man has witnessed more horror with his own eyes than i could imagine even in my wildest and most terrifying nightmare. if you have the chance to see him speak at the january series, go.)
okay then. so, the point of this post was to say that last night i saw the chronicles of narnia: the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe. it was pretty great, and i would recommend it. it made me wonder if non-christians would catch the allegory-like resemblance to the christian story. on my way home, i had the hymn "come thou fount" in my head. this has always been one of my favorite songs (until my father tried to ruin it for me over thanksgiving break... i'll never be able to sing the "here i raise my Ebenezer" part again! i specifically looked for a version without that line to post here!) but anyway, the lines i put in bold came to mind as i was thinking about what aslan did for edmund. i am curious to see how people respond to this film.

Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing
(John Wyeth)

Come, Thou fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace.
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above;
Praise the Mount, I'm fixed upon it,
Mount of God's redeeming love.

Hitherto, Thy love has blessed me,
Thou hast brought me to this place.
And I know Thy hand will lead me,
Safely home by Thy good grace.
Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wandering from the fold of God;
He to rescue me from danger,
Bought me with His precious blood.

O to grace, how great a debtor,
Daily I'm constrained to be.
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here's my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.

okay, enough for now. i have to go and finish my end of semester evaluation stuff for my meeting tomorrow. and also, i just really want to get out of this tundra they call my office.

kickin' it 2.0

currently reading: lauren winner's mudhouse sabbath
currently listening: feist's let it die
so, you may recall my post from a few days ago with the picture of the tiny soccer player. well, it's over now, and so i can fill you in. on thursday and friday, i went up to staff seminar, a cco training event. during our organizational life meeting, the recruiting team (of which i am a part) had to present an update about our recruitment progress for this year. enter: me.
you need a little background information before you'll fully appreciate this. a few months ago, i went on a recruiting trip back to my alma mater with one of our recruitment associates and a fellow campus minister. as people often do on road trips, we went the drive-thru at the golden arches. my co-worker kim ordered a happy meal. her toy prize was "kick-it girl," a two-and-a-half inch doll in a soccer uniform. she did not come with a soccer ball, and as toys go, she was pretty boring. so, we set her up on the dashboard of our rental car and proclaimed her to be the mascot of our trip. much kicking and joking ensued. upon our return to pennsylvania, i expected kick-it girl to go down to the depths of the garbage, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. somehow, she was resurrected. apparently, she has been residing on kim's desk in her office since october, and has inspired the recruiting team to encourage the staff to "kick it into gear" with regards to recruiting. they decided (and apparently this means that they have too much time on their hands in the office) to turn kick-it girl into a mascot for the recruiting team. she would present the appie award, a very prestigious honor, to the staff person who has been doing the best work in recruiting, at the organizational life meeting at staff seminar. but, since kick-it girl is so small in stature, she would need some help. i received an email asking another staff person and i to DRESS UP LIKE KICK-IT GIRL and prance around in front of the ENTIRE organization. so, on friday morning, morgan and i dressed up like happy meal toys and "kicked it for the kingdom." i don't know if i'll ever live it down. all weekend people were jabbing and kicking me, and i'm fairly certain andrew heffner will never let me forget it. it wasn't quite the mortifying disaster i was expecting, but hopefully, kick-it girl's job is done.
and now, here are some public service announcements:
1. in your haste to get in your cars during this icy cold season, be careful not to get the turn signal lever in your car stuck in your coat pocket. it will jam it, causing the left blinker on your car to blink incessantly for days on end, and leading other motorists to believe you have lost your mind. when you call the dealership, they won't be able to get you in for a few days, and when they do get you in, it will cost you $134.27 to replace it.
2. if you live in a city or neighborhood with sidewalks, it is your responsibility to shovel the portion of the sidewalk in front of your home. if there is a blizzard where you live, and you are unable to shovel the snow because you are gone, and even if you had been home you would not have shoveled the snow because you don't have a shovel, and your neighbors know this, they might bring a shovel to your house and prop it up against your front door. you should not assume that this gesture was either well-meaning or ill-tempered, since there is really no way to know. but you probably should shovel the snow as soon as you get home.
3. if you and some friends are playing outside in the snow, and you make a pact with one of them not to throw snow in each other's faces, you should not assume that that same friend will not conspire with another friend to tackle you and throw you flat on your back, causing your neck and back to hurt for two to three days afterwards.
4. if you have a friend who works at geneva college, and that friend has $48 tickets to go to opening night of the nutcracker in pittsburgh that are paid for by the college, you should be very nice to her for five and a half years before the show, and she will probably offer to take you with her. you should probably shower before you go, since the $48 tickets are pretty nice.
so, i have to go shovel some snow, and then get ready for the ballet. peace out.

weekend update

hello all. i suppose it's time to update again. i was waiting for these pictures from a friend of mine to post with this, but he hasn't sent them yet, and i'm getting tired of waiting. hence: i'll post picture-less, and perhaps add some later.
so, friday night i went bowling with chi alpha. i did, as i always do, quite poorly. bowling is a game of consistency, and the only thing consistent about my first game was a high gutter ball frequency. this was reminiscent of last year's chi alpha bowling event, during which i bowled so poorly that i was awarded a blue ribbon that says "great effort" and a suggestion that perhaps i should try a different sport. true to form, during this year's first game, i had ten gutter balls in as many frames. even the few times that i managed to keep the ball on the lane, i hit pitifully few pins, giving me a grand total score of 37 (which unfortunately, is not even my worst score). i began rejoicing when hitting as few as three pins per frame. instead of yelling, "i got a strike!" i yelled, "i got some!" and then quickly realized the social faux pas of yelling "i got some!" in a roomful of people, particulary of the chi alpha variety. luckily, they did laugh, and i don't think they judged me too much.
we deemed my horrid first game "warm-up," and i did suprisingly better during the next round. i still got six gutter balls, but i also managed four spares and two strikes, to achieve a score of 118, plus my pride. i did opt to sit out for the final game, in order to end on a good note.
on saturday i spent the majority of the day trying to get my newsletter out--watch your mailbox--until evening. i went into the city to attend a live nativity celebration at eastminster presbyterian church. it was way cooler than i was expecting. eastminster is in east liberty, a part of the city where i doubt there are often farm animals. there were a bunch of sheep that chased us around the yard, and a donkey, and a goat, plus two CAMELS! it was the coolest thing in the world! i got my picture taken with frannie, a three-year-old camel who was trying to eat one of the wise men's pizza. her head was taller than me, and she kept swooping in so close to me that i got scared and ran away. but khadija ran away from the sheep, so at least i was braver than her. what would you do if you turned your head and saw this?

anyhow, it was awesome. if chris ever sends me the picture, i'll post it.
sunday night i had twelve of my students from the university over for a spa party, and a good time was had by all. this is getting too long, so i'm done for now. the end.

oh eric...we're quite straight

last night after bible study (the one i just go to and don't have to lead... brilliant!) khadija wanted some dessert. so we (d, fuller, cristina-our new ecuadorian friend, and i) went to gullifty's in squirrel hill. (side note: if i lived in the city, i think i'd want to live in squirrel hill.) there weren't many people in the restaurant, as it was fairly late. our waiter eric was very attentive and maintainted eye contact for about three seconds longer than i would consider comfortable every time he stopped at our table. he did a fine job serving us, and i don't think he minded us too much. when we were finished, he brought the bill, and we asked if he could split it up for us. in order to convince me to go, as i'm currently not made of money, fuller had offered to pay for me. so, we asked him to put us both on one check. he left awkwardly, and we started to wonder if perhaps he thought he was waiting on two lesbian couples, which we (perhaps not-so-)clearly are not. our suspicions were confirmed when he brought the check back, which he had split quite effectively for me+fuller and d+cristina. his eye contact diminished significantly following this encounter, and four of us had a pretty good laugh about it. hahaha.
in other news, i was awakened by the doorbell a few days ago at 8:30 a.m. since very few people drop by without my prior knowledge, i was suprised. i went down the stairs to find two very attractive young men standing on my front porch. though i've never spoken to them, i know these men to be jehovah's witnesses, and i've seen them gallavanting about my neighborhood quite often for the past few months. to my knowledge, this was their first visit to my home. i peeked out the window, saw who it was, and immediately crouched down on the floor so they couldn't see me and waited for them to leave. is this a marketing trick? i don't care how cute they are... i'm not interested. especially not at 8:30.
well, that's it for now. adios.