B-A-B-Y-S-I-T-T-I-N-G

In my last post (which you probably haven't read yet, so get moving!) I mentioned that I had my first real non-Fairwood babysitting job. Who was the lucky kid? Um, the third cousin of a town friend who helped get Uncle Sterling elected as a selectman. Or at least, the lady told me that the girl (yes, I babysat a six-year-old girl) was her third cousin, but she also told me that the girl's mother was her second cousin. Automatically I was tempted to protest ("Hey, that's not how it works!"), I who have to keep such things straight like so many of my readers, who are privileged to keep track of their fourth cousins or second cousins once removed, and so forth. But wisely, I refrained. I didn't need to point out the dear lady's ignorance.

 

Anyway, with very minor tremors of trepidation I set forth, and drove myself to the site of my first real babysitting job. Actually, most of you have probably been by the house many times, so I'll tell you that it's right next to Carr's store, and if you know where that is, great, if not, oh well. I'm not about to hand out other people's addresses. Well, if I was nervous, I shouldn't have been. To tell the truth, the whole thing was disgustingly easy. Basically I spent the whole time watching The Santa Claus with the girl, and then her mother came by after an hour and a half or so and picked her up. Then it was over. And people get paid for doing this?

 

But the girl herself was a character. Right away I could tell she was going to be interesting. A dark eyed, slightly Hispanic-looking girl waved at me from the window, and as soon as she had opened the door and had gotten my name straight, she began  jumping up and down asking me to guess how to spell her name. It was Jessica, and my mind flipped through the spelling, trying to figure out what was so tricky about it. Obviously there was some deviation from the normal, but I decided to play along, and spelled it just the way she was hoping I would.

 

"Nope, it's J-E-S-I-C-A. There's only one S. You see my mother's name is Melisa, and hers is spelled with only one S too. Her mother was a Spanish teacher. That's how it all got started!"

       

The girl's third cousin's husband, or whatever relation he was to her, proceeded to give me directions and began to recall an interesting history of the house, which used to be a school house,  and the work they'd done to it. In the meantime she kept jumping up and down, trying to catch my attention.

 

"Oh, oh, I know how to spell your age!" was the next thing she told me. "It's S-I-X-T-E-E-N!"

 

"Very impressive," I told her (or words to that effect). "And you're six, right?"

 

"Y-E-S."

 

Later, when we were alone, she started bouncing up and down on the couch saying my name over and over again, as if she were a chearleader trying to get on my nerves. Once out of breath, she told me, "You're nice. Nice like mice."

 

I wasn't sure this was a compliment, but since she seemed to think so, I decided to take it as one.

 

She asked me if I had ever had snow icecream. I hadn't, so she asked me if I wanted to see some. Taking me to the freezer, she pointed it out to me and then told me she was allowed to eat a little, so could I give her some? I wasn't sure whether or not to believe her, but I decided to take her word for it, and a little while later she was licking her fingers as we watched The Santa Claus.

 

"Mmm, I'm eating the blood on my fingers," she informed me.

 

"You're gross," I told her.

 

"Have you ever had it? It's good! It tastes like a dark chocolate and white chocolate mix!" Then she told me that she was painting the couch with her blood. Perhaps I should have been more alarmed, but she was just the sort of girl who would have told me that just to get a reaction out of me, and since she didn't want a bandaid and so far I hadn't seen a drop of blood about her, I decided not to be too concerned, beyond telling her to stop.

 

Her mother came soon, and then I locked up the house drove home. And thus ends my little babysitting story.

To sum it all up

So the Christmas season is over. Ugh, those words reek of despondency!
However, life is still great, and I refuse to let blothpickness conquer
me! I'm not quite sure what my favorite part of the season was. Could it
have been stuffing my face with desserts at the Dessert Banquet! I think
not (poof!). No, but it could have been a combination of any of the
following things:

~Watching the bibleschool students' powerpoint presentations.

~Making a gingerbread houses with the bibleschool (Craig and I painted
ours purple and gave it an outhouse)

~Sneaking up to people's houses to carol to the inhabitants.

~Swapping fun stories in the girls' van during the above said caroling
venture (like how Kendra got locked out on a baby sitting job by the
Maguire boys, and how she got Craig to call them and scare them into
letting her in; or how Clyde and Bria were arguing about whether Cara or
I should get a tricycle, and how Clyde tried to spank Cara)

~Coming in from caroling to sip hot chocolate and eat cookies,
culminating in a spontaneous, a cappella song of the Carol of the Bells
in the kitchen (and I loved singing tenor with Aaron and Bobby:)

~The Bibleschool Christmas Tree time--and taking pictures of it with
Clyde's camera

~Wasting ages of time trying to figure out which student was the most
tactful to ask Dan if the students could play outside in the
snow--ironically, it was Bobby, the least tactful, who finally procured
the permission.

~Playing Monster with almost the whole bibleschool out in the dark and
snowy wonderland around the Maine House

~Christmas shopping (e.g. yay, Kendra ended up loving the pink winter Red
Sox hat I gave her!)

~Going outside with my dad and cutting down our very own Christmas tree
from the woods like all cool people do in books (something I'd never
experienced before!)

~Decorating and trimming our angular, but beautiful Christmas tree (it's
got loads of character, let me tell you!)

~Seeing God answer prayer.

~Having Kimberly and Andrea around.

~Getting an e-mail from Amanda, my Aussie friend.

~Having my first real non-Fairwood babysitting job!

~Thinking about what the world would be like if Jesus hadn't come.

~Having lots of snow, and getting church cancelled one time because of
it.

~Singing the Twelve Days of Christmas for the home church service that we
couldn't get out of (this was after watching Dave's powerpoint
presentation on how each of the gifts were a symbolic representation of
something that God gave to us)

~Going to my first Conval basketball game of the season.

~Having my family home.

~Having a frosting party with my family when I needed help decorating the
eleven dozen cookies that I had spent all afternoon making.

~Singing and reading through a fun old Christmas program at my Aunt
Lori's with her, three keyboards, Aaron, Kimberly, Craig, Kendra, and
Clyde.

~Seeing the shy little Post boys singing up front for our church
Christmas program.

~Stealing toe socks from Chad at our church's Yankee Gift Swap.

~Reading the Best Christmas Pageant Ever out loud on our radio station.

~Going to Pizza Hut for Clyde's birthday

~Having the presents I ordered arrive on time, when I wasn't sure they
were going to.

~Missing my Grammie on Christmas Eve, since it's the first one in ages
that we haven't spent with her. (that probably wasn't my favorite moment
this season, but it was bittersweet)

~Caroling around Fairwood with my family all decked out in Santa hats
(even those who didn't want to).

~Playing games and watching movies with my family.

~Surprises on Christmas Day--like my new papasan chair! Or better yet,
hearing about Claire's baby!!!

~Watching Kristin Chenoweth sing "Taylor the Latte Boy" on Utube.

~Having dessert and a Yankee book swap with my dad's side of the family.

And so much more that made this season special! Hope yours was as
wonderful!!!

Mr. H's latest

You've heard about the whole issue with Beethoven, haven't you? Well I
guess lately there was some sort of dispute about whether or not some
music was really written by him. To settle the problem, investigators
decided to get a DNA sample from him to find out. But when they went to
dig up his grave (or his tomb, or vault, or whatever it was that he was
in), they found Beethoven sitting there scribbling away on on sheets of
music!

"Beethoven, what are you doing?" they cried.

Undisturbed, he replied, "I'm decomposing."

That's my chemistry teacher's (Mr. H's) latest from this very morning.
Hope it amused you as much is it did me! ;)

Weak attempts at sparkle

Okay, I've decided that my previous depressing post has been sitting alone for way too long. I'm well over it now (thank you so much for the encouraging comments!), and now how about some sparkle? Sorry, I'm too impatient to describe the Messiah Sing for you eager readers out there. It would take far more time than I'm interested in spending, and besides, the only thing that made this year very different from most years is that a girl in the front row threw up right before the concert. But perhaps I shouldn't be dwelling on that. Still, she did run out, but she left a trail behind her (poor thing), and it was enough to make you feel sick if you are the least bit squeamish. Fortunately the lady in front of us had some Calvin Klein perfume, and it was passed around freely so that many of the sopranos reeked of a scent which, ironically, was called "Escape." Some people in the orchestra even passed out cinnamon toothpicks to stick up their noses. Such ideas may sound unpleasant, but they were alternatives much more favorable than the more unpleasant smells that uh, wafted, or um, assailed those not far away. No sparkle in that story I assure you, though it's interesting in the telling.

Should I talk about the gingerbread house making this year? Craig was going to make one with the bibleschool students, but when he arrived late and realized how dull making a gingerbread house by yourself can be, he invited me to join him. And how freely the creative juices flowed! ("freely, freely, freely, and he that is thirsty let him come . . . ") While Bria and Jane beautifully furnished the inside of their house (including a deer head over the fire place), Vanlora and Katie K. produced a quaint church with stained glass windows. Some made dump trucks in their front yard (what makes me think that was Stephen's idea?:), or just trees, or even a backyard barbecue that very much resembled a bunch of cows sacrificing another cow. But Dave said it was a barbecue, so a barbecue it was.

Although at first Craig and I were at a loss for ideas, our gingerbread house was inspired by the purple house with green trim that you see in Marlborough, and it was complete with a fire pit, a duck pond, and a roofless outhouse (roofless so you could see inside, where the dear little candy toilet and toilet paper were). Actually, we did put plastic wrap over our purple outhouse just so people would stop asking why there wasn't a roof, so now we have an outhouse with a sunroof, which is very convenient if one like star-gazing. However, despite the ideals of such a construction, some students claimed that they would never want to use our facilities. After all, what would they do if an airplane came by? But what I want to know is, what kind of airplane comes low enough to be dangerous anyway?

On town trip on Thursday I told some of the students about NASA's new plan. Have you heard about it? They're going to take a bunch of cows, put them in a space shuttle, and send them to a space station so they can be orbiting the earth. They'll call them the herd shot 'round the world.

"Are you serious?" Bobby asked (or he uttered incredulous words to that effect).

Katherine laughed. "You're not serious, Kayla, right?"

Of course I wasn't. I had heard it that very morning from my wonderful chemistry teacher and thought it was so delightful I wanted to share it. But only one person seemed to think it was funny, and that was Katherine. But then Uncle Tim asked me to repeat it (I was near the back and he hadn't quite caught it) and he laughed quite heartily and asked me if I had made it up. I told him I hadn't, and he informed me that actually that joke was around in his day, only they said the Russians were going to do it. I was rather pleased that someone else besides myself could laugh about my joke, but at the same time I was a little put out that nobody else seemed to think it was funny. I just assumed that my sense of humor must be different. However, later I told it to Craig and when he chuckled sincerely I began to wonder if there was another reason. He suggested that people might not have laughed because of their ignorance of the phrase "the shot heard 'round the world," and I would rather believe that than deny the humorous wit of my joke. So there you have it, most of the bibleschool is ignorant and therefore can't laugh at my jokes because they're so beyond them.

Actually, pretty much everything I say is so beyond people that they just don't get it, unless they also have a higher mind that appreciates puns and other such simple pleasures. Or maybe my first theory is more accurate in that some people just don't appreciate me and my sense of humor. *sigh* But at least I appreciate my sense of humor, which my bursts of laughter at odd moments when I'm by myself can testify. Maybe that's why I get along so well with people like Klara, whose clever jokes more than match my own (which aren't even clever, just random), and who sometimes seems unappreciated just as I am unappreciated. At least we appreciate our own wit (at least I do), and we appreciate the other's, so what more can we ask for?

All right, maybe my vague jesting concerning my sense of humor (which obviously isn't as clever as I'm pretending) isn't exactly sparkle, but at least it's something new, and it's the best I can do for now.

no more suspense

The only problem with having now told everyone that I tried out for All-state is that now everyone is going to kindly be interested whether or not I made it. I knew that might be a problem but I decided that I didn't really care, because after all, this was a big thing on my mind, so why not let people know what I've been dealing with? When I finally had that silly audition behind me, I was very uncertain how I did. For one thing, I tend to be quite self-critical. Part of me thought I did all right for some of it, but I was pretty sure I did a terrible job at sight reading that ridiculous (and rather high) piece. So I settled down to wait for the results, telling myself fiercely that I should pretend that I hadn't made it so I would be pleasantly surprised if I did. This worked in a fashion, but I couldn't quite quench that one small hope.

 

 

I won't leave you in suspense any longer.

 

 

I never got to be pleasantly surprised.  The list came out right before Thanksgiving, and my name wasn't on it. I didn't make it into the All-State Orchestra. Eighty violinists tried out, and only thirty-six made it. Okay, now you all can know what a loser I am and can surmise about my awful violin skills.

 

 

Though I felt (and still feel) a little deflated, I wasn't altogether disappointed. For one thing, it's just less hard music that I have to work on. And even though I'd been interested in doing All-State, it was really my teacher's idea, and I didn't have much choice in the matter. And since I think I tried my best, there really isn't anything else I should worry about. After all, once the audition was over, it was God's call, not mine.

 

 

(I figured that I better post this so people wouldn't have to feel bad when they asked me if I made it and I told them NO. But don't feel too bad for me--picture me saying most of this post in a fairly cheerful voice, which is probably how I would have responded if you had asked me in person. This is just for those of you who would feel awkward because you don't know how to sound sympathetic.:)

Free!!!

Well, lades and gents, guess what? I am a free person!!!!!!!! My audition
is done with, completed, finished, history, past, and behind me
forever!!! And I also want to say that if any of you prayed for me, a
thousand thanks! I believe it made a big difference. Instead of a
paralyzing fear, I felt surprisingly calm, instead of sweaty fingers that
go sliding all over the strings, they remained almost cool and dry, and
instead of an oppressive headache from stress, my head remained clear and
painless. I guess trusting God really works!

Now even after I've said that, it doesn't mean I didn't make mistakes.

First of all, my dad and I arrived at Memorial Highschool in Manchester
an hour before my audition. After obtaining directions from a 6'4"
athletic director of sorts (okay I didn't really ask him his height but
that's what he looked like to me), we managed to find the registration
desk, and after finding good old Mr. Sweeney who was coming to look for
us, I found myself in a room full of chaotic music. I heard Mozart in
this corner and in that corner, and scales near and far, cellos rumbling,
violins squeaking, and people chatting. Every once in awhile someone
would come walking in with an official-looking air, and a girl at the
front of the room would lean toward the mic. and the room would get
really quiet. Who was to be the victim this time? All would wonder. Then
the name and school would be pronounced over the mic, and the said person
would come forward solemnly with his or her instrument, often accompanied
by the cheers of encouragement from their fellow classmates. Ten or
fifteen minutes later they would return to be plagued with questions
about how it went and how they thought they did. Some seemed okay with
it, others felt it was a disaster. No one seemed too confident.

Finally it was my turn. All of my friends (a violinist, a violist, and
two cellists) had already gone before me and the clock had gradually
ticked closer to 5:55 p.m.: the time of my own audition. It seemed like
the room was gradually emptying of people; I think I was near the end of
a group of auditions before the judges would take a brief break and take
in a new group. More people were now talking than playing, and once when
I noticed that I was the only one playing in a rather quiet room of
people, I loudly spluttered and told them they should keep playing. A few
people chuckled. But now it was time. "Is there a Kayla _______ in the
room?" I heard the girl at the front of the room ask. I came forward. I
had been "called up."

The walk to my fate seemed long. We passed through the cafeteria of many
waiting students who had finished their auditions, winding through the
long halls until the sound of chatter had died away. I was accompanied by
a girl about my own age, who asked me questions like if this was my first
time and if I felt I knew my piece well, etc. I asked her some questions
in return, and I discovered that she had been going to try out for
All-State chorus, but she had been too freaked out to turn in the
paperwork. "But next year I'll have to try out, because I'll be singing
in chamber choir," she told me, a little grimly.

We had arrived at the room. I stepped inside, and found two very quiet,
solemn ladies within. One was given my paper; she never said a word. The
other told me in a still, whispery sort of voice what scales I was to
play. I played them without much ado, amazed at how something that you've
been working on for a year can suddenly flit past you in a flimsy
representation of playing it just once. A couple of the scales were just
fine, as close to perfection as can be expected in the circumstances,
while some of the others were more iffy. Thus I went through G major, A
major, B flat major, g minor, and c minor. In one of the minor scales I
had a moment of panic. As I was coming down my haze was broken by a
strange sounding note. I kept going, but I had the odd feeling that I had
changed key by accident, but the scale seemed to end fine so I wondered
if it was just my imagination and the sound of the melodic minor had just
taken me by surprise. When I had finished it I resisted the temptation to
ask if I could play it again, because for all I knew I could have played
it exactly as I should have. So I hoped for the best.

With the scales behind me, the whispery voiced lady came over and told me
to play from B to C on the piece of music that was already on my stand.
Here I blanked out. As I looked at the music, it didn't look anything
like the Mozart piece I'd been practicing. Had I been practicing the
wrong piece??? Quickly my mind ruled that idea out as absurd, but my mind
wasn't thinking clearly enough to stop myself from saying something like,
"I've never played this before." At least I think I said that out loud.
Did the lady laugh and say, "Yes?" No, she patiently told me that I was
sight-reading. Light dawned on marble head. Of course. I knew that. In
fact this all happened so quickly I can't remember what I actually
figured out on my own and what she told me, but I felt a little idiotic.
But letting it pass, I finally took a good look at the music. Craig had
told me that I could take my time and play when I was ready, but the lady
hadn't said anything about taking my time, and as I looked long and hard
at the music, I was afraid that their silence was growing uncomfortable.
So I decided to wing it.

A few painful minutes later, during which I wasn't wholly convinced I'd
been playing the right notes at all (my teacher tells me I'm a good
sight-reader but here I was bit skeptical), I was done. "That was
painful," I said with a little laugh, and for what seemed like the first
time, the lady smiled, if not a little vaguely. The lady handed me my
scale book (which I had only brought because I thought I was supposed to,
not because I got to use it) and told me I was going to be playing my
piece now. She started to move for the door. Once again I was met by
confusion. She had told me I was going to play my piece, so I prepared to
open my music where I was, but now she was implying that it was time to
leave? Of course I knew that my teacher had told me that I would probably
play the scales in a different room than my piece, but with Craig it was
different and as you must recall my brain was too fuzzy to remember
anything clearly. Once more the lady said something to remind me of my
stupidity by informing me that I was to move to another room. I laughed
as good-naturedly as I could, apologizing and explaining that I had never
done this before. She laughed, though it sounded like a tentative laugh
to me.

Out in the hall again I started to turn in the wrong direction, but was
called over to another room that was almost just across the room I had
just left. Here a friendly young man greeted me, a refreshing change from
the nervous lady I had spoken with previously. Inside an older, bearded
man with a rather red face awaited me. His chin rested in his hand in a
tired sort of way, and I realized how exhausting it must be to have to
listen to person after person after person playing the same exact piece.
Later my dad told me that there were 80 violinists in all trying out,
which helped me give the other two ladies some grace after their rather
cold reception of me. But not to be dissuaded by this man's look of
slight boredom, I greeted him cheerfully and he answered back cheerfully
enough. He was given my paper and the young man told me what I was to
play. I was told to start whenever I felt ready. At last, I didn't need
to feel like I was injuring them and their precious time while I caught
my breath. So I snatched the time to send up a short, wordless prayer and
then began. To be honest, I don't remember much. My body went on
auto-pilot, and I can only hope that I remembered to do dynamics. My
opening start strong like I wanted it to, though it faltered slightly in
the second or third measure. My very high runs were okay, some of my
accented notes sounded weak, and the really high trilly part right after
the page-turn was a little wimpy but not a disaster. Other than that I
don't really remember. Before I knew it I was done, and I almost asked if
that was really it. But the young man was kindly telling me I did a good
job and asking me if I needed someone to show me the way back. I could
hardly believe it, but I knew it had to be because he wouldn't tell me to
keep playing after he'd sent me out of the room would he? No, of course
not. So in a happy dream I walked back to put my instrument away, talking
with some friends along the way. I looked at my watch and found that only
ten or fifteen minutes had gone by! Who would have thought that so much
work and effort would have to culminate and be presented in a tiny period
of time before it's all over and you have no idea what hit you? It was
just mind-boggling.

I left in a stupor, but a very grateful one. It is over. And God is good.

Mixing Metaphors

Okay, here I am.

here I am

here I am

here I am.


I don't suppose anyone out there still perseveres in checking my blog anymore, but I'll still talk and at least enjoy hearing my echoes in a room all to myself.

to myself

to myself

I might say some serious stuff in a meaningless way, but it's okay to laugh--you and I will probably forget about it soon afterward. After all, sometimes it seems like I can never retain anything! It just goes in one head and out the other!

I've actually had very good reasons for not writing. Well, sort of. I've done plenty of interesting things, but none that sound interesting when you write about them. Could it be that I've been kind of busy?

You hit the nail right between the eyes!

Ever since the Feast ended I've felt as thought my life has pretty much been a whirl of school catch-up, tests, and practicing my violin--punctuated by second-hand clothes scavenging, bibleschool sports, driving, having weekend visits from my brothers, apple sauce day, sleeping at Fairwood for a weekend, the harvest party, youth group, listening to or watching Red Sox games, and going to PA for a long weekend. See what I mean by interesting, yet not interesting enough? And full, very full. I pretty much have had my ear to the grindstone for over a month, hopping from one hurdle of stress to the next.

For one thing, I decided to bite the bull by the horns and sign up to audition for the all-state orchestra. I sure opened up Pandora's box of worms! And if you're a bit puzzled at how I'm writing, from now on you'd better watch me with a fine tooth comb. It's only going to get worse. So anyway, as we all know, Rome wasn't burned in a day. Therefore I've grabbed the bull by the tail and faced the problem squarely. Practice, practice, practice. For an hour. Or two. Or three. Well, to be honest, some days there just isn't enough time (Fridays seem especially crowded), and going on trips doesn't necessarily help the issue either. But whenever I'm not practicing I'm wondering if I should be, and then when I think about auditioning I feel like I have a frog in my stomach. That really gets under my goat. It seems a lot more stressful now than it did just a few weeks ago, mostly because my time is running thin (auditions are a little over a week away) and I haven't felt prepared. I'm right down to brass knuckles now, since I'm skating on borrowed time. However, the grass is always greener on the other side of the rainbow, and pretty soon it'll be over. Thankfully in just the last day or so God has really given me a remarkable amount of peace about the whole issue. And since God is so willing to help me out, I remember that you shouldn't bite the hand that lays the golden egg. God is fully capable of helping me, and all I need to do is to "cease striving" to do it on my own, remember that He is God, and give Him the glory for whatever He does through me. Hey, it's no skin off my teeth to trust Him! And after all, there's no need to fret over something that's still a week away. I'll burn that bridge when I come to it.

The sister of a history teacher

I was doing some research yesterday for a history project when I stumbled upon an unthinkable fact. Did you know that in 1659 the celebration of Christmas was outlawed in Massachusetts?! Apparently it was according to Puritan custom in England or something. But still! It wasn't until about 22 years later that the law was repealed, and can you imagine being forbidden all that time not to celebrate Christmas? Next thing you know we'll discover that in the mean time it was always winter. And it's crazy! What ever happened to "freedom of religion" and our constitutional rights? Oh yeah. They hadn't happened yet.

Hey, and do you happen to know what the term "spooning" means? Why, it's the Welsh term for courting of course! I guess when the young man came to visit the young lady at her house he would carve spoons while she might play music or something. And if the sound of whittling or music stopped, the parents would get suspicious. In the end, the man would present a "love spoon" to the girl for an engagement present.

And, while I'm on a historic note, today I learned something else in history class today. My teacher said it, so I have no concrete evidence to back it up, but did you know that Queen Elizabeth I was almost killed by smallpox? And not only that, but once she had survived the traumatic disease, she hid the scars on her face by painting it with white lead and vinegar, and then to smather on some color she painted her lips and added red dye and egg white to give her cheeks color. Some make-up! And, oddly enough, it was actually the white lead that eventually killed her. Or at least I think that's what my teacher said. Moral of the story? Don't wear white lead and vinegar!

And now that I'm relieved of my watchman's duties, I can breathe a sigh of relief that at least your blood won't by on my hands if you end up trying it. (but take my advice and don't)

Ha. I guess you tell that I'm the sister of a history teacher.

Goodbye to plus sizes! (or is it hello?)

Hey, check out this article my chemistry teacher shared with us in class today. Bet you never knew this. It's amazing!

 

Soda and Ice Cream Diet

 

            As we all know, it takes 1 calorie to heat 1 gram of water 1 degree Celsius. Translated into meaningful terms, this means that you can eat a very cold dessert (generally consisting of water in large part), and the natural processes that raise the consumed dessert to body temperature during the digestive cycle literally suck the calories out of the only available source: your body fat.

 

 

For example, a dessert served and eaten at nearly 0 degrees C will, in a short time, be raised to the normal body temperature of 37 degrees C. For each gram of dessert eaten, that process takes approximately 37 calories, as stated above. The average dessert portion is 6 oz., or 168 grams. Therefore, by operation of thermodynamic law, 6,216 calories (1 cal./gm/deg. x 37 deg. x 168) are extracted from body fat as the dessert's temperature is normalized.

 

 

Allowing for the 1,200 latent calories in the dessert, the net calorie loss is approximately 5,000 calories.

 

 

Obviously, the more cold dessert you eat, the better off you are and the faster you will lose weight, if that is your goal.

 

 

This process works equally well when drinking very cold soda in frosted glasses. Each ounce of soda contains 16 latent calories, but extracts 1,036 calories (6,216 cal. Per 6 oz. portion) in the temperature-normalizing process. Thus the net calorie loss per ounce of soda is 1,020 calories. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to calculate that 12, 240 calories (12 oz. 1,020 cal./oz.) are extracted from the body in the process of drinking a can of soda.

 

 

Frozen desserts, e.g., ice cream, are even more beneficial, since it takes 83 cal/gm to melt them (i.e., raise them to 0 deg. C) and an additional 37 cal./gm to raise them further to body temperature. The results here are really remarkable, and it beats running hands down.

 

 

Unfortunately, for those who eat pizza as an excuse to drink soda, pizza (loaded with latent calories and served at above body temperature) induces an opposite effect. But, thankfully, as the astute reader should have already reasoned, the obvious solution is to drink a lot of soda with pizza and follow up immediately with large bowls of ice cream.

 

 

We could all be thin if we were to adhere religiously to a pizza, soda, and ice cream diet.

 

 

Happy eating!

 

 

As I listened to my teacher reading this I couldn't keep myself from grinning and grinning. I shoved away the majority of my skepticism as I basked in the revelation of this incredible idea. Why, this is genius! The whole world must have it wrong! And how come I never heard this before? But of course, if you are chemistry-savy like I'm not (that would be why I'm taking chemistry!:), you may have been able to point out the gross error in this theory (besides your common sense telling you that you can't get thin eating icecream and soda) as you read--there's a huge difference between "calorie" and "Calorie."  And those are terms that were kind of blurred in the account above. But hey, it sounded good, right?

 

 

Now I wonder if any of you were as gullible as I was . . . .

Hello August 28! Long time no see . . .

Something dawned on me recently. The fact is, I haven't experienced August 28 for a very long time.

"Guffaw," you say (I can't remember what that sound means exactly but it sounds good for this situation). "A whole year is not that terribly long you cake head!" (Perhaps you haven't heard that "cake head" expression before. That's because I just made it up and it hasn't had time to become a cliche yet. It's a softer rendition of "fat head" since everyone knows how fattening cakes can be.)

Actually I agree with you. A year is not long enough to start missing August 28 by any means, unless that happened to be my birthday. But how about two years?

Yes, ladies and gents, I have not experienced August 28 for two whole years! Okay, well MAYBE I experienced about an hour or two of it in the wee wee hours of the morning, but the fact remains that about this time last year all was nearly normal. I was going along at about one o'clock in the morning on August the 28th, minding my own business . . . la la la la la la la la---when BAM!!!!! It was suddenly one o'clock a.m. August 29. Don't ask me how I did it, time travel isn't a secret I'm about to divulge.

Still, there's something undeniably uncanny about the idea of having a whole day wiped out of the history of your life. Why, for me August 28, 2006, never even existed! While everyone else has something written down in the record of their life for that date (like this: August 28, 2006. Susie spent three hours drooling, one hour laughing, and the rest of the 20 either eating, sleeping, or being incredibly naughty), my life for that page is practically nothing! In fact, my page would probably look something like this: August 28, 2006. Kayla is moving amazingly fast, propelled by extraordinary powers (maybe a UFO?). She is drowsy. No, wait! She's gone! She's missing in action! The rest of her page is blank! She's----page turn. August 29, 2006. Kayla is sleeping . . .

The top side to crossing the International Dateline is that if you come back you make it all up by getting a day twice. Woe to those who cross it toward the Orient, never to return! They will forever be missing a day that they could have enjoyed with everybody else. On the other hand, if you traveled west you could cross the International Dateline going the other way and experience the day twice! Then if you had super time travel you could cross the International Dateline coming from the other way again and again--every day even. In fact, perhaps if you got it to pan out just right you could live every day of the year twice, which would mean your birthday would come only about once every two years and therefore you could remain young for years and years! Or would you just be experiencing the same day over and over? I'm confused . . . . but anyway, yikes I'm practically a genius--I should patent my idea. All you need is super duper traveling speed to go all around the world in an hour or so, then you can cross the International Dateline and spend most of your day in Hawaii. You'd stay young for a very long time . . . though I suppose if everyone did that then the national average age for deaths in the U.S. would probably drop from 76 to 38, and those statistics might throw a bad light on the healthy environment of our country, not to mention how old a 38-year-old would end up looking. I guess I'm not a genius after all (rats, scratch that idea). For the good of the country we should just let ourselves grow old.

However after all that I'm still happy to see August 28 again, and now I shall greet it, "Hello August 28! Long time no see . . . "

p.s. don't mind all the flaws to my far-fetched "staying young" scheme. If you don't understand it then I'm gratified because I'm still confused about it myself, though I keep "almost getting it." But hey, it sounded good, and I bet it made you think, right?

An anniversary

Sunday, August 27, 2006

This is my much looked forward to day. The airport terminal is relatively quiet, excepting the occasional Spanish announcements chattering over the loud speaker. No, this trip is not to Spain or Mexico. As a matter of fact I am sitting in the Los Angeles airport, waiting for my flight to the beloved Australia.

"Oh my," you might be saying, "Israel and Norway would have been enough, don't you think, but you just can't stay put for long and now you're off to Australia, of all random places! And you're only the lucky age of fifteen!" What can I say? Traveling is in my blood, and I'm bound to be doing it whether I expected it or not.

"Okay, Kayla," now you wonder, "the first one was during a war with a bunch of crazy bibleschool students going to march and pray in Israel, then your family wore themselves out driving all over Norway praying; what takes you to Australia, more prayer battle?" Actually no. Although I hope to still believe God in this needy country, my reasons are not purely based on this.

It all started probably when I studied Australia in Geography last May or so. I think it was my favorite chapter of the year, and a little seed of thought was planted, saying, "Huh, I think I would really like to go there someday."

A few weeks later (on Mother's Day, actually), I was talking on the phone with Kendra, who started talking about her previously planned trip to Australia. Curious, I began to ask her questions, and as I was struck with a thought, I said, "Do you mean if God plopped [X number of dollars:] in my lap I could go with you?"

To make a long story short my parents and I thought and prayed a lot about it, and a month and a half later Mom bought my ticket . . .

They're used for WHAT?!?

Oh they're always in the way!

The cows eat them for hay!

They hide the dirt in Daddy's shirt,

They're always in the way!

 

 

What's this song about? Why, Daddy's whiskers of course! Sound familiar? Maybe you weren't blessed with the Wee Sing collection when you were growing up, or more specifically Wee Sing Silly Songs. Which is exactly what this song is from. As I remember it, a couple of the verses go something like this:

 

 

I have a little sister,

Her name is Ellie May,

She climbs up Daddy's whiskers,

And braids them all the way!

 

 

Chorus:

Oh they're always in the way!

The cows eat them for hay!

They hide the dirt in Daddy's shirt,

They're always in the way!

 

 

I have a dear old mother,

She likes the whiskers too,

She uses them for dusting

And cleaning up/out the flue!

 

 

As a kid, this last verse really troubled me. I mean, how many six-year-olds know what a flue is? Naturally I went to my wise, all-knowing brother who was five years my senior and therefore knew everything.

 

 

"What does flue mean?" I put the question to him.

 

 

He gave me a dark look before replying, "It means throw-up."

 

 

Oh my! How horrible! Why, that was almost as bad as when Kendra vacuumed up the stuff late one night after a certain brother of mine had an accident! And thus for years I sincerely thought that the dear mother in the song really did use Daddy's whiskers to clean up such unpleasant messes. It seemed awful but it must be the truth because my big brother said it, and I'm pretty sure he even wanted to know where I heard the word even before he replied to such an awkward question, so he seemed to answer in full knowledge of the context. Therefore it was set in stone.

 

 

Imagine my relief when I stumbled upon the difference between "flu" and "flue." I think a lot of haziness from my childhood was really cleared up right then.

 

 

The sort of long and the sort of short of it

Last Wednesday my brother left for college. Now he's far far away, in a distant land full of buggies and cow-like perfume, and when am I ever going to see him again? Probably never. But life moves on . . .

And I was faced with a decision. My parents were gone to help Clyde move into college so I was home alone, only to see Craig in the evenings when he gets back from work. What was I to do with myself? Should I stay and go mini-golfing with small group? Or should I go over to my cousins for an over-due visit? I really wanted to go mini-golfing (I haven't been for over a year and I haven't been to Twinkle Town for about two years!), but then I very much wanted to see Cara again too. What was I to do? Then the solution came. When in need, pray! So I asked the Holy Spirit to help me, and after a long and painful deliberation, I felt led to go to the cousins. Granted, I was still unsure, but that seemed like the right thing to do.

But Dad and Mom had taken our van, and since I'm still not wholly comfortable with a standard just yet I needed an alternative for transportation. Daddy had arranged it so that I could take the Fairview car, so I prepared to do so. It didn't help that my dad told me not to fill it up with gas because the car is supposed to come off the road at the end of the month. Nor was it exactly encouraging when my mom suggested I take some change for a pay phone in case the car broke down and I needed to be rescued. And the trivial fact remained that not only had I never broken down before but I had also never driven by myself anywhere beyond a dozen miles or less.

But I told my mom not to worry. After all, I had learned what to do if you break down in drivers' ed. If you're by the side of the road and you need help you put the hood up and tie a white flag (red in a snow storm) to the radio antenna or driver's door handle. This supposedly is the universally known signal that you need help, though if it were universally known I'm not sure why I'd never heard of it before. But that's why you take drivers' ed, right? And everyone remembers everything they're supposed to know about other people signaling for help, right? So of course I really had nothing to worry about even if I did break down. Drivers' ed covers it all.

So now that I've made a sort of long and sort of short story sort of long I'm about to make it sort of short again. I drove over to my cousins and back the next day all by my lonesome (an aprox. 1 hour drive one way, now that the bridge is out), with little or no mishap. Nothing really happened in particular, except when I had a guy tailing me. I hate being tailed. I wasn't even going an unreasonable speed! In fact, I was actually going five or maybe even ten (*gulp*) above the speed limit. When I got to going over by about fifteen I decided that this was ridiculous and I was going to go whatever speed I liked (I was also feeling very guilty). So I resumed going five over again. I don't like the idea of triggering road rage in anybody, but there are some things that people just have to deal with. I only hope that the speedometer in the Fairview car was accurate . . . .

And not only that, but I had a fabulous time at Cara's! Plus when I got home I found out that small group decided not to go mini-golfing after all so I was saved from some devastation.

I guess the Holy Spirit might actually know what He's doing. :)

dinner table dialogues

It’s incredible how many opportunities exist for unique conversations at the dinner table. Why, in a setting you’re comfortable in you can talk about pretty much anything, whether intense or hilarious! Provided it’s appropriate for the dinner table. But that point is often debatable.

Anyway, take one dialogue that happened a number of weeks ago at my own family’s dinner table. We were discussing the cows that might be given to Fairwood if only someone around here knew how to, well, cut them up. Somebody mentioned that so-and-so’s father had known how to do it. That’s nice, but I’m afraid it wouldn’t do us much good now because that dear person passed on to heaven some time ago. Anyway:

Clyde: We could have him do it (meaning the man that’s currently in heaven cut up the cow). He said it as a joke, but meaning no offense to him, it was rather a lame one.

I sat there, a reply shuddering on my lips. Did I dare say it? I think very highly of this person . . . but it was just too good to pass up. I yielded to temptation.

Me: Yeah, we could package it up and send it to him. Maybe it would get roasted on the way!

Too bad I couldn’t say it with a straight face.

And, moving on, it’s also interesting how certain things said aloud stimulate unusual thought processes, before you even realize that what you’re thinking is too absurd to be true. Here’s another recent dinner table dialogue:

Clyde: We’ll have to teach the grandkid’s Mom’s angry lemming face.

Craig: What grandkids? (or maybe he said “whose grandkids?”)

My train of thought: Yeah at the rate things are going Clyde is probably going to have grandkids before Mom ever does.

Oh wait.

A momentous occasion

I had my first solo drive today! It was a momentous occasion. It's amazing how it's been a whole month (from today!) that I got my license, but I've had very little reason to drive. It's as if now that I have it there's no need to! But anyway, I had my first solo drive. I was a little excited, a little nervous, and I prayed and talked to myself so that I wouldn't feel lonely. But, amazingly, it actually wasn't a big deal! In fact, after I dropped my mom off, my drive (one way) was probably less than 10 minutes and probably covered no more than 5 miles! Still, I have now officially entered the driving world. As I said, it is a momentous occasion.

A gallery of progress

What I find very interesting is to explore the progress of young artists. Especially at the time of the 12-16 era one can improve quite a bit! For instance, I have drawn the same picture three times, with gaps of time in between. I'm not an incredible artist by any means, but check it out: (these are the originals of my drawings scanned onto the computer)

Here's what I drew at age 12
(I did have to darken some lines by hand though before I scanned it because I drew so lightly it was hard to see)

Here's what I drew almost exactly a year later, at age 13.

And here, between two and two and half years later, is what I drew at age fifteen.

Moral of the story? Encourage those young artists. They may be pathetic now but maybe they'll turn out to be the next Michelangelo!

Even though I'm not. :)

Blissful completion!

I forgot to mention it before, but recently I finished another story!!! Huraaaaayy!!! Perhaps you didn't know it, but I happen to enjoy writing, and fiction is something that also happens to be up my line of interests. If you've read my blog for a long time you probably have gathered that, but since you might not have, I thought I should tell you.:)

Anyway, at long last, my latest masterpiece is complete! Or the first draft anyway. I started it last winter sometime and have been inching my way along since then until a week and a half ago I was so overcome with inspiration that I spent hours on end brainstorming on my dad's lap-top. I wrote a couple hours on Saturday, then a couple hours on Sunday afternoon, and to top it all off, after dinner I sat down and wrote for four hours straight! But it was worth it.

If you've never written a story you probably don't know exactly how blissful I'm feeling. It's kind of like finishing a monstrous school paper except it's even more delightful, because unlike the monstrous school paper it comes completely from your own imagination and you enjoy every bit of it. The 34 pages are now finished and resplendent in all their glory. The problem is that I'll probably never be wholly satisfied with the final product, and I'm not a huge fan of editing either. . . but barring that I am a very happy writer indeed!

p.s. and there's no point in asking me to post this one because it probably won't be ready for the public eye for ages.

An eyeball accident not for the squeamish

The other night I did something very stupid. I usually wash my hands before I take out my contacts (I guess some people don't but I do), and as I was doing this I guess I wasn't paying attention to my thoroughness of rinsing. So, just like any other night, I poked my finger into my eye to fish out that precious contact. Oddly enough, it didn't come out right away, and instead searing pain burned it's way into my eye. It was even worse than the time I tried to take out my contacts and rubbed my finger on my eyeball only to discover that I was supposed to be putting them in! No, this was more lasting. This stung to the core.

Confused, I looked down at my index finger and discovered soap bubbles. Yeeooooowww!!!!! I had just rubbed diluted soap along my eye! Somehow I managed to take out my contacts as my right eye got more red and the unavoidable tears arrived. I just wanted to sit in agony to wait for the pain to pass. It ebbed some, but I still had an irritation every time I blinked. It was as if I had an eyelash in my eye but whenever I looked there was nothing there. Thus were the after-effects of getting soap in my eye. There wasn't anything I could do, so I went to bed.

The next morning my eye was better. Or was it? My eye was sealed shut. I went to the mirror and saw the "sleepy sand" gobbed up at the corner of my right eye. Also my eye wouldn't open. But gradually, as I exercised my powerful eyelid muscles my eye slowly opened, stretching the goo around it like taffy. Yay. My eye was still red and a little swollen, but it was better. Still I had my work cut out for me to dig the gunk out of my eye. The happy part is that I did and am now better. The end.

A renewal

I'm baaaack!!!! Last Saturday my mom and I got back from going to the ATI conference in Indy. It was simply fabu (even though we did have to get up at 2:20 a.m. to leave for the airport). I got to meet lots of people (though with most of them I'm afraid I can't even remember their names) and go to lots of wonderful sessions. I was blessed by the concept of prayer being like we're entertaining God as Abraham entertained Jesus and how we need to stop and pray so that Jesus won't pass us by like He almost did when He was walking on the water.

Another thing we heard about was saluting people. It's amazing how important the first brief eye contact you have with somebody can be. In that moment you have the opportunity to "enfold them in the arms of your heart" or to stare at their strange appearance and judge them by it. If they see you looking at them the latter way they are more likely to feel like, "Huh, they don't like me so I won't like them!" And if you then try to salute them and witness to them, it won't do them any good. So now I must try to salute people, because it's so important that they feel Christ's love through me.

Also we heard from another speaker who talked about the verse in Psalm 119 that says, "Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee." He made a point that I had never thought about before--if we're meditating on God's word and hiding it in our hearts then it helps prevent us from sinning. This man even had a powerful testimony how meditating on Bible verses had helped him conquer lust. Wow, some mighty powerful stuff!

We even had a day of "delighting in the Lord." We came to sessions at nine o'clock in the morning and kept on going with no lunch until five o'clock! Of course it helped that it was Thursday, so my mom and I were old pros at this skipping lunch business.:) There were breaks, never fear, but they were set aside so that we could spend time working on Bible studies or confessing things as a family. It was an incredible sight to see people scattered all over the huge auditorium (there were about two thousand people at the conference), in the halls, and outside, gathered in closely-knit clumps as families or as individuals kneeling in prayer.

My mom and I had a good time together on the third level balcony. As we were praying and talking, I was thinking about the speaker's message that we had heard the night before about hiding God's word in our heart. I also felt like a verse came to me to lift me up as I was feeling kind of bogged down in my own degradation. It's one from Romans 6, that says, "How shall we who died to sin still live in it?" Yikes! To me it was as if Paul was saying, "Hello? Wake up people! Duh! Christ made it so you don't have to live in sin that way. It's taken care of!"

Duh, I guess He did. And I found great encouragement in it.

'Tis hot

It is hot, it is humid, and we have no air conditioning. It's just the
sort of day that you feel that if you moved a muscle something terrible
might happen. Say I did something seemingly harmless, like cleaning a
bathroom, and as my muscles moved so much extra heat and energy would
build up that it would cause my heart to pump faster, and, as my blood
reached a boiling temperature, something would pop inside and pieces of
me would be everywhere! Which means I don't need to do my Friday
cleaning, right?

*Sigh*

Sometimes I wonder why my seemingly irrefutable logic convinces no one
but me.

The Dinner Horn

Nearly three years ago this fall (when I was a mere thirteen:) I wrote a short story. I wrote it for the small writing club that Lisa and Mr. P led for a short time, and this particular assignment was to write a story about a picture. So I did. The picture I chose was a painting by Winslow Homer that I had noted in the National Gallery of Art. The title was simple yet imaginative, and it intrigued me. Therefore I used the title of the painting for the title of my story, and wondered what might be the deeper story behind the painting.

I never shared this earlier because for awhile I had hoped to do something with it. But since I never have gotten around to it, and have now moved on and my writing style continues to change I am reminded that I have only been letting this dear story of mine collect dust! Oh my, that will never do! So I am about to share it here with you:

The Dinner Horn

Plop-splash. The old wooden bucket had just landed neatly in the deep well. I maneuvered the rope to let the bucket tip and fill with cold water. When I thought it was full enough, I strained my muscles on the handle and began to slowly but assuredly roll the rope up, bringing the bucket closer to the top.

As it neared the brim of the well, I reached down to grasp my prize and heave it up. My suspicions were justified. I had gotten too much water; I had filled it near the top and this was a massive five-gallon vessel.

The year is 1865. My family lives here on a farm in the wide open countryside of Pennsylvania. There are eight of us: Papa, Mama, my two older brothers Charlie and Jonathan, me, and finally my younger siblings Daniel, Carey, and Sarah. We all are very close, but unfortunately our family has been separated over the past couple of years. Papa, Charlie, and Jonathan have been brutally taken away from us by this savage War Between the States. Not that they were forced to go. They chose to leave out of their own free will, and I’m proud of them devoting themselves to this noble cause. However, I still can’t see the sense in a country dividing only to turn around and fight.

“It’s the complications of war, Lizzie,” Papa had shaken his head sadly when I put this point to him. “I don’t understand it anymore than your own pretty head does. It’s just the way it is.” Before long, he was gone.

In the meantime the rest of us stayed home to take care of the farm. Carey and Sarah were too young to do much, but Daniel was a fairly capable twelve-year-old. Together he, Mama, and I labored to keep the farm running.

Now, two years later at age seventeen, I poured what water I needed into a lighter bucket. Even as I poured I could feel a refreshing coolness emanating from the water, reminding me how warm it was for April.

Lifting the pail, I turned and made my way past Molly, our cow, chewing passionately at the edge of our pasture. She turned and gave me a mournful stare. I ignored her however and began to cross the farmyard.

A door banged, and Carey and Sarah came prancing out of the house, giggling. They began to chase each other, and soon they were running around me in circles. Marching on, I pretended as if I didn’t even notice that I was being treated like Maypole.

Just then, Maxwell, our German Shepherd, bounded around the corner of the house. Barking happily, he bounded forward to join the party which had forgotten to invite him. I knew he would make me spill the precious water, but, with expert timing before the inevitable collision, I sidestepped him, and his attack hurtled by me harmlessly. It helped to have had plenty of practice.

I pressed on to the house before Maxwell could conjure a counter attack. Entering the house, I sighed with relief. This place wasn’t extremely large, but this simple brown farmhouse was a haven of joy and peace, even if it was just from charging dogs.

The second my foot was inside the doorway I was enveloped in the sweet, cozy aroma of baking bread. At the next instant a waft of something else curled around my nostrils, and as the identification of this scent went to my brain, I was stunned as if Maxwell himself had bowled me over.

“My bread!” I cried, and dove toward the stove, my forsaken bucket of water sloshing dangerously on the floor. I peered at my two forgotten loaves of bread. They were brown, but faint traces of black whispered hideously at one end of each loaf.

I sighed as I took the loaves out to cool, but this time it was a sigh of dejection.

“My, does it smell nice in here!” A bright voice broke through my melancholy. I turned to see Mama, who had gone to town for most of the day to get supplies.

“They’re ruined,” I lamented. I knew I was just being juvenile to take the well-done loaves so hard, but, being a perfectionist, I did feel rather crestfallen.

Mama came to look over my shoulder and her trained eye scanned the loaves.

“They don’t look that bad Lizzie, and I’m sure they’ll taste just fine.” Mama always did have a way with making things seem better, and she had to, what with Papa gone and all. I abruptly turned my thoughts away from myself and my silly bread.

“How did the trip to town go, Mama? Any news?” We lived deep in the country with few neighbors, and we always gleaned news of the world from town.

Mama ignored my first question. “Aye, there is at that.” Her eyes sparkled and she took off her hat. “But first, this is Wednesday, isn’t it?”

I nodded.

“Then we best be getting ready for the dinner horn, as it’s nearing close to six o’clock.”

I smiled and almost skipped out of the room with eagerness before darting upstairs to get ready.

For as long as I could remember, I had done the dinner horn. Even when I was small, Mama would ask me to blow the thin instrument to call Papa home from the fields to eat dinner. I was delighted with this little chore, and have been ever since; even so that no one else has been allowed to do it except me. It became known as “Lizzie’s job,” and I loved standing on the hill, calling Papa and later my brothers home.

When Papa, Charlie, and Jonathan were about to leave for the war, a thoughtful Papa turned and said to me, “Lizzie, I’ll miss your blowing that melodious little thing to tell me to hurry and come home to eat. You’ll never know how much it means to me to hear that sound and come home, even if it’s just to be with you.” At this he swallowed, wavering. “I want you to do something for me while I’m gone. At six o’clock each Wednesday I’d like you to stand on that hill as always and blow the dinner horn. That way at that time I can think of my sweet girl Lizzie and my priceless family. And maybe someday I can come home in answer to that call.” I hugged him, and that sealed the agreement.

So ever since I have blown the dinner horn for Papa, in all weather, even in the snow. It has become a sign of promise that Papa will return.

I now hurried into my best dress, which was white, and Papa’s favorite. Then, pinning up my blond hair, I laced up my good black shoes. I liked dressing up for the dinner horn now, even though I had never done so before Papa left.

Going downstairs to get the horn, I saw that Mama, Daniel, Carey, and Sarah were waiting for me. They watched me in silence as I went out the door and they followed me to wait on the porch.

I strode forward to the corner of the house and stood there at the top of the hill, taking in the green expanse of land before me. A breeze caught my skirt, wrapping the light fabric around my legs, and then creeping up, it brushed my cheek, feeling like a ghost’s gentle finger.

The world seemed to be listening as I raised the dinner horn to my lips. Then I blew. The sound sprang up, and it merrily skipped across the field, ringing joyously with a hope unspoken. My spirits lifted and soared, wanting to join that dancing melody. Then it was gone, and the sound had died.

The silence almost drenched the light inside of me, but a new sound came to my ears. It was traveling on the wind, faint and barely audible, but still existent. Straining my ears to listen, I perceived that the sound was a voice, maybe two or three, shouting from afar. A minute later, three figures came into view around a clump of trees. They were running.

I don’t know how I could tell from the distance, but the moment I saw them I recognized them. Suddenly I was halfway down the hill, elation having given wings to my feet. Papa and the boys were home at last.

~The End~

spouting something tasty. . .

Sometimes I find myself enjoying being poetic or using interesting expressions (not to mention puns, which I love). Not that I use them impressively, by all means, but occasionally I do find myself spouting something tasty. Some, however, do not appreciate it quite the same way. Here's what I mean:

Me (speaking of Klara): Look at her, poetry just drips from her lips!
Stephen: Ew.

His simple reaction cracked me up!:)

Then today, while I was cleaning:

Me: I can't wait to get my teeth into this toilet.
Lisa: *expressions of grossed-out-ness and laughter*

Confessions of a humane mouse killer

Today I got to go to our neighbor's house to clean! They'd been having mice problems and they wanted a pretty thorough cleaning. Luckily Lisa was willing to help me tackle the job, so together we set to work and pretty much transformed their whole house! It was long (we skipped lunch and were there for about five hours), and we tried with difficulty not to be too meticulous, but it was still fun, even though we did have to deal with a lot of mousy remnants, seeing one or two in the process. Mr. W. found one that he thought was sick and carefully took it out to the woods, claiming that he was saving a life.

I liked Mr. W. It's strange because I've never met him even though he is my neighbor, but he lives in Denver part of the time so that would probably explain it. This sexagenarian host was very appreciative, and he also was fairly talkative. At one point he even "confessed" to me that he had some mouse poisoning around the house.

"I don't know how you feel about it," he told me, "But for years when we lived out West I hemmed and hawed about doing it but my wife finally convinced me. It kills them quite painlessly, but it still hurts me to do it."

I decided not to tell him that in my house we use mouse traps.

A pretty groovy weekend

It's too bad I went to Cape Cod instead of the Conval graduation. Because if I had, I could say that I went to three different Ben's graduations in the same year!!! Yikes, that name must have been pretty popular the year they all were born. Anyway, as I have hinted, I just went to Ben's graduation. But which one? My cousin? No. The friend in our church? No. One of my best friend's brothers? That would be yes.

Anyway, I made the trip to Upstate New York with my mom and two of my brothers and I ended up staying the whole weekend. A grand time was had by all. When you get to attend an outside picnic-like graduation celebration with lots of great people and steal digital cameras from various friends (a certain Nikon D70S comes to mind:), you can't go wrong, right? We even got to compete in a low key game of baseball with a tennis ball and Caleb's 25" bat, as well as a score-less game of volleyball by the pond until it got too dark to see. Having it by the pond was a mistake however. We had to keep racing after the ball and watch Andrew leap into the pond with unnecessary (but amusing) gusto on the numerous occasions when the volleyball landed there. Sounds like fun? Then of course there was the campfire with the customary s'mores served that Sarah and Elizabeth used as bargaining tools to get themselves dry seats. As we sat warming our toes, we listened with laughter and fright to Drew's unusual stories, and later heard the guys bellowing the National Anthem at night into the valley. On Sunday I even got to shoot my first gun! We were taking turns trying to shoot leftover balloons floating in the pond. Not convinced it was a super time? Well how about throwing in the fact that Klara and I went into the woods to pretend to be Rapunzel and the prince, then returned with messy hair and chewing straws, which made us feel extremely at home in the red-neck world. Pretty groovy weekend, huh?

Oh yes, and I even wrote a tiny bit in Ben's Word's of Wisdom for the Graduate notebook. Aren't you proud of me? I told him that if he ever went to college he should try not to get too fat because I've noticed that a lot of guys do. Words of wisdom indeed.

NO WAY!!!

Well, I have my drivers' license now, so what next? I mean, besides the actual building up of the loads of experience that I know I need, what more do I have to learn? The answer, to me, is obvious: I've gotta learn how to drive stick shift!!! Aaaahhh! For awhile I wanted to learn back in May or June when I was taking drivers ed, but Craig suggested that it might not be the best idea before I take my license test. After all, who wants to reach for the clutch, accidentally slam on the brake, and fail your drivers' exam? I took his point, so I waited.

But now is not the time for delay. The car that we use the most is a standard, and I better learn how to drive it really well before winter hits. Which means I have to learn soon. All I was waiting for was somebody to teach me. Mom recommended that I learn in Clyde's car since it's the easiest to shift in, so eventually he offered to teach me. And my first lesson was last night.

To begin with, he drove to the ball field. We switched drivers, and he began to enlighten me in the ways of using a manual transmission. But as we sat there with the ball field gathering darkness all around us, what should we see but Gerry's car drive up and stop at the other side! This was a puzzle. What would Gerry be doing here?

"Maybe Lisa is learning," Clyde suggested.

"Or maybe he's teaching Drew," I added, since that young person is here visiting his relatives and the Reeds.

Then sure enough, Gerry and Drew did the exact same thing that Clyde and I had done just a few minutes before!

NO WAY!!!

How could both parties have the same idea, on the same day, at the same time, and in the same place? I mean, I know a lot of people aren't comfortable with a standard, but going up to the ball field at dusk on a Thursday night isn't something that's just done by everybody! It really weirded me out.

And how did the lesson go? Well, first I had beginner's luck in starting the car. Was driving a standard going to be way easy after all? Um, no. Because after that whenever I tried to start I stalled, and stalled, and stalled, and stalled again. But near the end I began to feel like I was getting the hang of it, at least to a certain extent. Thus ended lesson one.

But I still can't get over that coincidence. . . .

Back from the life of Riley

I got back last Monday from being in Maine with my parents. Here are a couple highlights (or low points):

~Almost running over three deer during my first night driving experience (and in Maine)

~Playing darts by myself countless times. I always managed to win whenever it was just me, but I always seemed to lose when it came to playing my dad or mom. :)

~Hitting the bull's eye a couple times in the above said activity

~Having to dump out a good cup of hot chocolate because my parents wouldn't let me drink lake water even if it had been boiled. (I don't blame them, it was just sad)

~Biking with my dad (even through the rain)

~visiting Heidi

~losing the key to the cabin at night--thank the Lord the Beans found it in their yard since we'd just been visiting them.

~reading and reading!

~going garage-saling and picking up two CDs for a buck a piece

~surviving without indoor plumbing

~washing my hair in the lake

~going canoeing with my parents

~going to Salvation Army

~stepping in the results of the neighbor dog's egestion with my bare feet!!! disgusting!

~sleeping in until ten o'clock almost every morning.

. . . . and other such boring activities that are so delightful when you're on vacation!

Hello, my name is Anonymous

Have you ever wondered about all those deep quotes out there in the world that are attributed to “Anonymous?” Well, here’s another:

“Any loser can win, but it takes a winner to lose with a good attitude.”

~Anonymous (alias: Kayla)

Yep, folks. My name is Anonymous. Here are a couple more anonymous quotes, deemed by Chad and Craig to be quite profound:

“The ones you’ve already seen you’ve already seen.”

And,

“I don’t like movies that I don’t like.”

That is what it is like to be around me. You never know when sparks of wit will fly from my mouth. Just look at all those quotes out there with my name attached to them! I couldn’t make anybody jealous though, so that’s why my name is Anonymous.

There are those out there, however, who do not have scores of incredible wisdom just spouting from their mouths. That’s why they have their names attached to them, ‘cause they gotta get their claim to fame in somewhere! Like here are a couple I saw in the store a couple weeks ago. Ponder these:

“To the world you may be one person, but to one person you may be the world.”

“Time enjoyed being wasted is not wasted time.”

Spiritually, I don’t agree with that second quote. But in many ways I can see why it makes sense!

If you were wondering, I’m not going to go digging into all the deep quotes I can find. You see, we have smart people all around us that are great at edifying, so now I’m going to recount a few that I scribbled down or remember from girls’ week and the last youth convention’s meetings. If you were there it may be an encouraging reminder:

~ “In every heart there is a God-shaped void.” ~Andrea (or whoever it was)

~ “If nothing is too hard for Him, then with Him nothing is too hard for you.” ~Ari

~ “I need no other sunshine than the sunshine of Thy face.” ~some hymn I can’t remember

~ “You have made us for Yourself, oh Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in You.” ~St. Augustine

~ “Draw me after Thee; we will run together.” ~Song of Sol. 1:4

~ “God doesn’t choose favorites. Each of us is a favorite.” ~Andrea

~ “The highest attainment open to a human being is the knowledge of God.” ~F.W. Sandford

~ “What you feed grows.” ~Andrea

(concerning the verse that nothing can separate us from the love of God) ~ “If nothing can separate us that means I can’t either.” ~Cara

~ “Sometimes I think if other people could see what I’m really like on the inside they wouldn’t really like me, but Jesus already knows what I’m like and loves me anyway.” ~Klara

~ “God holds nothing back that’s really worth it.” ~Anonymous (though I might have gotten it from Andrea)

~ “Your love toward each of Your children—including me—is intensely personal.” ~part of a prayer in our devotion book

Wow, and that was just the girls’week! Sorry if you’re bored, but this is good stuff, so here we go on to the youth convention (and these are just snippets of course)!

“Christianity isn’t just a religion, but a relationship.” ~Daddy (or something like that)

~ “God doesn’t want me to be successful. He wants me to need Him.” ~Mr. Turner quoting Mary’s magnet

~ “Mankind was created to serve, not to be served. . . his first priority should be to bring glory to God.” ~Daddy (quoting somebody?)

~ “Surrender is the key to transformation.” ~Danny

~ (concerning slaying giants) “This is not a game—it’s war.” ~Uncle Tim

~ “Holy and without blemish. That’s the uniform. Jesus died so we could wear it!” ~Uncle Tim (basically)

~ “Nevertheless—I believe God.” ~Uncle Tim

~ “You may have to fight, you may have to fight, but keep right on fighting and never give up.” ~Daddy

~ “You may be big, but Jesus is bigger.” ~Daddy (quoting a story)

~ “Do you have the courage to be a young man or a young woman of valor?” ~Mr. Chuck K.

~ “We will find suffering—the Christian life isn’t easy. However, to be in the Lord’s army is a privilege.” ~Mr. Chuck K. (basically)

~ “We’re not in a worldwide conflict. We’re in a worldwide conquest.” ~ Chuck

~ “When your eyes are on Jesus, you can endure anything.” ~Chuck

~ “No good soldier entangles himself in the affairs of this life.” ~Chuck

And, since the youth convention wasn’t all seriousness, here are a couple quotes I’ve just now mustered from my memory, mostly during the skits. They’re not exact, and you’d definitely have to be there to appreciate them. If you were there, maybe you will:

Aaron: Peter, was this Bible read between the hours of 8 and 10 last night?
Peter: Twelve times.

Zarah (pretending to be Cara as she slaps her biceps): I knew these would come in handy someday.

Richard: Dude, being twenty and in the fifth grade is not all it’s cracked up to be.

Ryan (pride seeping out of every pore): Here I am with my new Wal-Mart fishing pole.

Ryan (in their High Noon rendition skit): And he’s arriving at high noon! (sarcastically) Well what do know, it’s high noon.

Abbie (and people): I’m so glad Diane isn’t here, now I can get some peace and quiet.
Diane (in an impressively high and very loud professional sounding singing voice): I’m hooooooooooome!

Emily: Hey, isn’t that a pie server?
Anonymous: NOOOOO!!! It’s my thinking stick! It helps me think.

Remember Ben trying to scare the bear (otherwise known as Daniel A) away by playing the kazoo? Remember Cara gasping for breath as she gave Gabe his “graduation spanking?” Or the family tug-of-war with everyone against her? Or how about Klara’s hairdo? Phillip being a raccoon? Eric’s impersonation of Andrea? Ben throwing “Andrea” over his shoulder to rescue her? Jacque as the ferocious cook? Aaron and Peter’s hilarious sleuthing techniques?

If you don’t, you’re missing out.

And finally, because the compliment made me so happy, I quote Zarah talking to me:

“You crack me up.”

Sweeter than banana cream pie

Today I did something I've never done before. I went to the DMV and got my license.

Yes, that's what I said!

Now I say "!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" I can't believe I actually did it! And yet here I am typing away with it sitting in front of me to admire. It might seem a bit vain, but I feel like I just have to keep looking at it to make sure it's still real. . . and besides, as my mom expressed in her fine opinion, our state's license has always seemed quite pretty. But of course since it's mine I would think it was pretty no matter what it looked like.:)

Soooo, how did it go? The eye test? No sweat. No surprise I guess, especially since I was wearing my contacts.hehe The written test? I spent a little bit longer on it than I should have, perhaps, but no problem-o. Then came the long hour wait for my driving test, while all the while I yawned and yawned, trying heartily not to be nervous and not wholly succeeding. Mostly I was waiting for an ancient 97-year-old man trying to renew his license. . . I'm afraid the poor man may have failed. In the meantime things got pretty backed up since it was so busy and all, but fortunately I was next and got to get it over with (finally!). Fifteen minutes later I walked back into the office, brimming with relief as I carried a yellow paper that had an "X" marked in a box next to a word sweeter than banana cream pie: "Passed."

I blinked, stunned, and I was holding my license.

WWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Smashing" says it all!

Well, I am back once again. Girls' week was smashing, the youth convention was superb, and vacation was fantastic. What more need I say?

You know me well enough to realize that I am about to say more.

Announcement number one: to whom it may interest, I have successfully completed AND passed drivers' education!!! No license yet but the bulk of the work is behind me and HISTORY! I actually had to take the final test the day that girls' week started. Not only that, but my final class was right before the van was leaving so I had to leave my class early and get shuttled down to Jaffrey to meet our ride. Thankfully the rendezvous went smoothly.

Hmm, next I would like to say for the record (and for all those who haven't heard me say it already) that this girls' week was my first sick-free girls' week EVER!!! True, it was only my third one, but being sick for two girls' weeks in a row is not to be taken lightly, and therefore I don't take my healthy week of fun for granted. Obviously Someone was looking out for me. Not that God wasn't looking out for me in past years. In fact, I learned a valuable lesson last girls' week on just accepting sickness when God allows it. It's a very content feeling, and it certainly helps dispel fear in the "oh no am I going to get sick?" category. Nonetheless, I am extremely thankful that I was spared a day or two of misery.

So, what did we do? Um, went to Newport, saw the Coronet, and oh yes, shopped. The next day we went strawberry picking and rode a hayless hay ride, and the day after that we toured Blithewold Mansion and got to explore its humongous garden by the bay. Then before ending up at Fairwood, oh yeah, we shopped again at the outlet malls. And that, with the exception of the myriad of scintillating conversations, breathtaking games, and uplifting meetings, sums up the week. The End.

And of course the youth convention went swimmingly. I wish I could say that I felt like describing it for you, but since the majority of my readers know what a youth convention is typically like, I won't force myself. However I must say that along with the good meetings and sports (and meals and people and everything else), Craig did a very good job of coming up with creative games. One afternoon we were divided up into teams and we competed in field day activities as a team (for instance every team member's time for the fifty-yard dash was averaged with everyone else's, the long jumps were all added together, and so forth). Another time we played the regular skit-in-a-bag game, where everyone did a splendid job in coming up with hilarious ideas. Over all a fun convention.

On to vacation. Last Wednesday morning we picked Kendra up at the Hartford airport and our whole family just chilled around, exploring corners of Massachusetts we'd never seen before, having a picnic lunch, and then wandering around in the Holyoke mall which was closing early for the 4th. But we still got some last remnants from a closing Chinese place in the food court. I think they were happy to bestow their leftovers upon us! I was the last person in our family to get my food I think, and the Oriental lady absolutely heaped my plate, chuckling, "You eat a lot tonight!" And I did, but not without a little help.

Thursday was Six Flags and I got to go to my first water park ever! I had loads of fun trying those out, sloshing round dark corners in a tube with my siblings, going through waterfalls at odd intervals, and speeding down twisting slides that go faster and faster as you go. I even tried out a slide that was several stories high and practically just drops you at a sixty-five degree angle or so. I wasn't ready to go on the Superman roller coaster though. Somehow going 77 mph and being dropped two hundred some feet just isn't quite my cup of tea.

On Friday my whole family minus Chad sailed on up (in our mini van) to Quebec City where we spent a relaxing weekend camping. Yes, camping! And we love it! Or at least those of us who went do. No wimps in our family. . . . except all those people who slept on air mattresses, for Pete's sake. I mean, if you're going to go camping it's no fun unless you feel a couple of rocks sticking into your back, right? I can understand if you're a lady in your upper fifties who has to deal with arthritis, but if you're just a twenty-one-year-old guy? Come on! Where's the adventure? Nonetheless, since we had the air mattresses, we used them, though Daddy and I were the only people who didn't wimp out. Oddly enough, Craig's air mattress proved to be the one that never leaked and he was the one who ended up with back problems on the trip. Poor kid.

So we explored Quebec City in all its quaint Frenchness, admired St. Ann's Cathedral, visited Krispy Kreme (of course), explored Canadian countryside with beautiful red-roofed barns (which of course we stopped to take pictures of), swam in the campground pool, played croquet, read Jeeves and Calvin and Hobbes, and hid our books from Kendra who kept on trying to steal ours because she didn't bring enough reading material. All in all, we had a lovely vacation. There's some sort of charm in having a vacation where you wash your face from a spigot, spit your tooth paste into the woods, pay a quarter for a hasty shower, and eat three s'mores each night before bedtime, is there not? The last morning we intended to break camp and touch on Montreal on our way home, so we woke with the rooster. I'm serious, we all really did wake up to the call of the rooster outside our tent at seven o'clock sharp! Never mind that the rooster's voice sounded suspiciously like my mom's. . . .