EDIT (3:20): I finished all my grading.  YAY!!  End Edit

We watched Pirates of the Caribbean 3 last night.  I had heard that it was hard to follow and that it ended poorly.  I didn’t have any trouble following the plot, and though the “resolution” of the love plot was definitely less than stellar, I thought the ending did, overall, make sense.  But that is just my take on it.

It was also nice to sit and watch a move with Eric instead of sitting by myself on Wednesday night.  Eric is taking a break from the orchestra at church, so he didn’t have rehearsal last night.  And since both of us were tired and had minor headaches, a night on the couch with a movie was a great way to spend the time.

Classes were not terribly exciting.  I had one student finish Basic English yesterday (5 more to go!).  Comp was spent doing peer group work.  They are doing presentations on Friday and Monday in their groups, so I give them a couple of class days to meet/work together.  It does, however, make for somewhat boring days for me.  But really, it’s pretty easy to entertain myself.

I’m currently reading, among other things, a book entitled Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose.  It’s lovely!

My visit to the chiropractor was a tad interesting.  My back is definitely better now!  However, I got some more information about the supplements he was recommending, and I have decided I won’t be trying them yet.  I may come back to them later, but for now, I’m not convinced that they are really able to do much (and they could get a bit costly before long).  So I’m going to continue with my current plan, and keep them in mind if I need another option later.

Okay, I think that’s all I have for now.  I am going to grade today and start getting ready for our Super Bowl Party on Sunday.  Since we are making a quick trip to the farm (leaving as soon as I get home on Friday and returning home Saturday night), I need to get started on that stuff today.  So we shall see what I decide to accomplish!

Nothing terribly exciting happened yesterday…

I goofed off a lot.  I washed the sheets and remade the bed.  I recharged my ipod (which took some time to accomplish…it was fighting with me).  I graded one class-worth of papers.  Oh, and I broke one of our toilets.

Eric and I had tilapia for dinner and then went to Dick’s Sporting Goods to wander around.  Eric is going for a week-long camping trip with his brothers in March, so we wanted to look at some of the things they had and start considering what he’s going to need.  We wandered around together and then came home and goofed off on the computers until bedtime.

I have another chiropractor appointment today, but I am already feeling much better, so hopefully, this will resolve an residual issues.  It’s another work day in my classes, too, so I don’t have a lot that I have to accomplish to prepare for classes either.  That means I can catch up on some work (and maybe grade that second class of papers!). 

Anyway, have a happy Wednesday!

Some praises to begin the day:

• My mom’s surgery went fine, and everything looks good.  And she and my dad got to hang out all day yesterday together.  They always like that.
• I’m doing much better today.  The chiropractor said my back was really messed up, and I have to go back tomorrow.  While the abdomen pain isn’t entirely gone, the other various pains are.
• I got a great night’s sleep last night.  Good sleep is such a blessing from God. 

All in all, yesterday wasn’t terribly exciting.  I had classes (they were working in their peer groups) and a chiropractor’s appointment.  I was home by 4:00 and spent much of the rest of the day/evening sitting on the couch reading or watching television. 

And to finish for today, I have a story, leading to a question:

So the last time I went to the chiropractor (almost exactly a year ago), he gave me these supplements to clean out my gall bladder or something.  Now I’m not a big believer in all-natural medicine.  I’m not opposed to it, but I don’t buy either side entirely (that natural-types are quacks or that medical doctors are bad).  So I got them, but I never used them, primarily because my husband read the ingredients.  One of them was bovine prostate.   We laughed about that for a long time, and after that, I just couldn’t take them!

So yesterday, the doctor asked about the medication I just finished to kickstart a cycle and why I was taking it.  So I told him the gist of my issues.  And he has these supplements that he is sure will regulate my cycle and get me pregnant.  Two other women he’s given it to have babies now.  I don’t know what to think about it.  I have trouble believing that he has some magic pill that is going to be able to do what my body has never done on its own.  But my mom commented that she might just have to try that, with such a promise as that attached. 

My question is this: what is your take on natural medicines?  Have you tried any that really worked?  Or do you think they’re not worth using?

To begin this morning, two prayer requests:

• My mom is having a minor surgery this morning at 7:30. (UPDATE: Everything went fine and looks good. Thanks for praying!) 
• I have been having some issues that started yesterday afternoon.  Lots of pain, no clear reason why.  I’ll be working on getting answers today.  I feel better than I did yesterday, which is good, but I’m not normal yet.

The weekend, otherwise, was good, but uneventful.  Friday night we went out to Red Robin for dinner and then came home and watched television.  Eric worked on Saturday (10-4:30), so I was on my own.  I cleaned the bathrooms (really well!), did a load of laundry and refilled the bird feeder (they emptied it in about 3 days this time!). And I read some and did some writing, too.  Saturday night, we had goulash on the couch while watching Star Wars and then vegged for the rest of the evening. 

Sunday was church.  Starting today, Eric is now on break from the orchestra, so we’ll have a reprieve from early Sunday mornings for a while.  How nice!   After church, we  tag-teamed dinner: we had “pasties” – I made the dough, he filled and baked them.  They were yummy!  Then we hung out in the afternoon until about 4:30 when my issues hit me like a brick wall.  I spent the next four hours sitting with a heating pad, so Eric went to small group without me.  Thankfully, I was beginning to feel some better by the time he got home.  Hopefully, I can get the rest of it resolved today. 

Anyway, that’s where things stand…happy Monday to you all!

Don’t worry, Trisha, there is no test today!

A slow start to yesterday led to a pretty busy evening.  I’m not sure exactly where the switch happened, but I was really tired by 8:00 pm.  So I got ready for bed about 8:30, and we turned out the lights a little after 9:00.  Lovely! 

I had lunch with a friend at Panera yesterday.  Love their black bean soup!  We met at 12:30.  We talked about lots of stuff.  I got home at 2:45.  Yikes!  Oh, and I did see another couple there, too, who have recently left our church.  We miss them a lot, so I was glad to connect with them for a minute.

I made scalloped potatoes and ham for dinner last night.  Yummy!

I watched Facing the Giants while I ironed yesterday.  I cannot iron without watching television, and that movie came from Nexflix yesterday, and I knew Eric would not want to watch it.  Since he wasn’t home yet, and I needed to iron, I popped it in and finished it just before I finished with the last shirt.  It was a decent movie.  Considering that none of them are high-power film people, it turned out pretty good.  A bit cheesy in places, though.

This morning, I got an email from the Faithwriters.com editor.  They do a weekly challenge and then publish all of the winning entries in a quarterly book.  One of my stories from the end of 2006 won, so it will be in the next volume released.  She needs a bio from me for that project.  The funny thing is, I had to go back and figure out what story she was talking about!  I’d forgotten about that one entirely.  Oops! 

Anyway, I’m ecstatic that today is Friday.  So enjoy your last day of the week!  And enjoy the weekend!

See the answers to the quiz below!!!

I find myself just a bit unsettled this morning, and I’m not terribly sure why.  I could spend my post trying to figure out why and rambling on about the areas of my life where I’m less than satisfied.  But instead, I think I’ll just chalk it up to being a cold January in the middle of the long haul of the semester and focus on other things.  After all, I serve a God who always satisfies completely! 

And for a little something different…here is a true/false general knowledge quiz for you to test yourself with.  Answers to come later!

Quiz
1. T/F: Walt Disney was cryogenically frozen after death.
FALSE – He was cremated and buried in a cemetary in California.

2. T/F: Marco Polo discovered pasta in China and brought it back to Italy.
FALSE – The Etruscans, Romans, Egyptians and Greeks all had types of pasta before Polo’s travels

3. T/F: Some mammals actually lay eggs instead of giving birth in the usual manner of most mammals.
TRUE – these mammals are called monotremes and include 5 species of spiny anteaters from Australia & New Guinea

4. T/F: S.O.S. stands for “Save our Ship”.
FALSE – It doesn’t stand for anything.  Those letters were chosen because they’re easy to transmit.

5. T/F: Key West is the westernmost Florida key.
FALSE – There are more western Keys (Dry Tortugas and Marquesas Keys)

6. T/F: In the book of “The Wizard of Oz”, Dorothy wears silver shoes.
TRUE

7. T/F: Bulls will charge at the color red.
FALSE – Bulls are colorblind

8. T/F: Dracula was a real person.
TRUE – The character was named after a Romanian Tyrant who ruled in the 1400s (Vlad IV)

9. T/F: “Frankenstein” was a monster made by a mad scientist.
FALSE – The scientist was Victor Frankenstein, his creation was never named.

10. T/F: One would think the water in the Panama Canal would be salt but it’s not. It’s fresh.
TRUE – The water runs into the canal from lakes and streams.

11. T/F: John F. Kennedy was the youngest President of the United States.
FALSE – Teddy Roosevelt was 42.  JFK was 42 when elected, but 43 when officially inaugurated.

12. T/F: William Shakespeare wrote in “Hamlet” (Act 5, Scene 1), “Alas, poor Yorick. I knew him well.”
FALSE – The line reads “Alas! Poor Yorick!  I knew him, Horatio.”

13. T/F: Presidents Andrew Johnson, Bill Clinton and Richard Nixon were all impeached.
FALSE – All were tried on impeachment charges, but none were convicted.  Nixon resigned before trial.

14. T/F: Icebergs are composed of frozen sea water.
FALSE – They fall off glaciers and are made of fresh water.

15. T/F: Witches were never burned at the stake in Salem, Mass.
TRUE – Some were hanged and one was stoned.  No one was burned.

16. T/F: Stonehenge,the ancient stone monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England was built by Druids.
FALSE – Built about 1500 bc, they were already there when the Druids arrived in 500 bc.

17: T/F: Abraham Lincoln was the first U.S. President to be born in a log cabin.
FALSE – Six presidents were born thusly: A. Johnson, Taylor, Fillmore, Buchanan, Lincoln, Garfield.  Extra info: The first Prez to be born in a hospital was Carter.

18. T/F: The fabric denim, used to make dungarees, was
developed in Dungri, a surburb of Bombay, India as well as in France
both in about the seventeenth century.
TRUE

19. T/F: The British government owns Queen Elizabeth II’s residence, Buckingham Palace.
FALSE – The Royal family owns the palace, along with other estates and the crown jewels.

20. T/F: The entrance into San Francisco Bay is named the Golden Gate because it was the gateway to the gold fields.
FALSE – It was named after the Golden Horn that makes up the harbor of Istanbul (it’s shaped similarly).

Things I did yesterday for the first time:

• Cleaned the honeycomb blinds in our loft and bedroom
• Vacuumed the window valances in our bedroom (they’re velour, so they don’t wash easily)
• Tried a new way to make pork (it turned out decent…tasted fine, could’ve been much worse)
• Made a pie.

Yep!  I was trying all sorts of new things yesterday.  And Eric thought the pie was really good.  It was apple, by the way, so I even got to use the pie filling I canned in the fall!  Anyway, he ate a piece with ice cream, and then another small slice before bed.  He’s so funny!  I used the leftover pie dough to make a fake peach cobbler (peach stuff inside, pie crust on top). 

Other than my adventuring, I did get my papers read.  I got bored with that job part-way through, so I was glad when Karen called to chat.  That provided a nice break, and then I finished them.  I also did laundry.  I finished it all (even put it away!).  I do still have to iron, but maybe I’ll do that tonight while Eric’s at orchestra.  Eric and I watched a bit of television last night, too (Dirty Jobs) before heading to bed.   So, all in all, it was a good day!

Today is pretty typical.  I do have a meeting at 10, but that should be a good one.  Then classes and such to follow.  Today will be a grammar day.  Lucky for them, I limit attention in their papers primarily to 8 very common errors (mostly commas and pronouns).  But I still have to tell them how to fix the things I’ve now marked in their first papers.  Yah…they’ll be a bit bored today, I bet.  Oh well, I can’t win them all, huh?

Anyway, Happy Wednesday!

I wish I had something interesting to talk about today, but I don’t think I do.

I had a good day yesterday.  I got lots of work done.  I taught my classes.  I’ve discovered that the 11:00 hour is a bad time to have a class.  I think chapel sucks all the life out of the students, so they won’t talk when they come to my class.  Makes for a much less exciting hour for me, too!

I used movie clips in Comp yesterday, from Legally Blond and Transformers.  The students always enjoy that.  In Basic, I have 6 students, 2 girls and 4 guys, but yesterday, only the girls showed up.  I think both of them are going to finish in the next week or two.  I have no idea how long it’s going to take the guys!

Eric had dinner at the church last night, so I goofed off at home.  I did some reading and writing.  I was pretty tired, though, so we went to bed right on time.  I had a hard time getting up this morning.  I think my busyness of the last few days is catching up with me now!

Today I have no major plans.  I do need to run a couple of errands (so of course it would snow!), and I have first drafts of the first papers to read for Comp.  Other than that…we shall see.  Happy Tuesday!

It’s been a long weekend, and I’m not ready for work to start back up again today.  I needed another couple of days off!

Friday was a very busy day from beginning to end.  I got up early and drove down to get my hair re-cut.  The last cut I got was a bad one, and there was not shape/style to my hair.  As it has grown out, the bad cut became more and more obvious.  SO I went a month backwards on the growing out my hair process, but at least it should be nicer now.

After that was a normal Friday: dept. meeting, class, lunch, class, class, taking care of various students’ needs.  And then I had to make a quick trip to my mom’s office for a final housekeeping detail from last term.  And THEN I got to go home.  No wonder I didn’t make it on to Xanga very much on Friday! 

Friday night was relaxing on the couch, watching television.  On Saturday, I knitted.  All day.  I did, however, finish the blanket for Karen’s shower.  My BIL Ryan came over, so Eric could help him build his new computer. They spent the day on that.  In the evening, we ordered a pizza and watched the Bourne Ultimatum. Not bad, though I had some slightly-scary dreams that were directly based on that movie!

Sunday was church and then Mom and Deb arrived.  We drove up to Erik’s parents’ house for Karen’s shower.  She got some nice things there, too.  So now she’ll just have to take inventory and start taking things back if necessary.  We drove home about 4:30, so we got to Columbus about 6:30.  Earlier in the day, I was thinking we might make it to small group last night, but I was too tired (and late) by the time we actually got home.  So Eric and I watched television and went to bed.  Very nice!

Today should be pretty low-key, I think.  Normal CU schedule and then Eric has a dinner at church tonight for orchestra.  So I’ll be on my own. We shall see what sorts of trouble I get into.  One thing for sure, though…I will NOT be knitting this evening!  

Happy Monday to you all!

I feel as if I’ve been running around continuously for days, and it’s not done yet.  Between classes and students and meeting with friends and such, there always seems to be something on the agenda to do or accomplish.  But, in the midst of the busy schedule, I’ve found myself returning to some foundational lessons…

Patience is a virtue.  It seems like, these days, life is all about waiting.  But not just suffering through the moments until I get to the next step.  That’s not really patience.  Patience involves joy and laughter and confidence that this moment is just as important to God as the goal (maybe more important).   The truth is, no matter what the issues in life, we are all called to live where we are and not rush on to the next stage.

“The Kingdom heart is never hard.”  Dallas Willard made that comment in his book The Divine Conspiracy.  Definitely a worthwhile read for all who long to see Jesus in their real-life realities.  But that comment has been particularly haunting to me recently.  My heart it seems is always hard toward someone: God, friends, my pastor, CU, Eric, myself.  Yet a heart formed after Christ’s heart will not look like that.  I want his heart: loving, tender, breakable and welcoming.

God is good, all the time.  He is not withholding any good thing from me.  He is filling my life, moment by moment, with an abundance of goodness.   He is pouring Himself and his life into me.  He has surrounded me with friends, with material blessings, with so many things and realities that to choose to live in fear and discouragement and anger is to snub my nose at Him and all He has done for me.  I do not want to respond to all his grace like that any more.

So there are the thoughts running through my head all the time.  But, so as not to seem too serious today, here are some happy thoughts for you to enjoy:

• Yesterday in class, as I turned my Thesis Sentences powerpoint on, a student called out, “I knew you were going to talk about that!  I knew it!”  As I took a drink of water, I commented, “Yes, You are so clairvoyant.”  His response: “Well, I can read minds.”  I nearly choked on my water laughing at him.  Poor kid…at least he learned a new word yesterday!
• And, for all who were wanting it…here is the recipe for Deb’s cookies from the shower.  Enjoy!

Sinful Saltines

Line 11″x15″ jelly roll pan with foil.  Line pan with saltine crackers.
Melt butter and sugar; bring to boil.  Pour over crackers.  Bake at 350
for 10 minutes.  Remove from oven; while hot sprinkle chocolate chips on
top.  Give a minute to melt; spread to cover crackers.  Dust with nuts.
Refrigerate until completely cool.  Break apart and keep in refrigerator
until served.