long one

so this one has to cover almost two weekends and the week between.

but first: thanks to all the prayers surrounding my interview. it especially nice to hear from my dad on here. i haven't heard any news this past week so hopefully, they'll call with more information this coming week.

i barely remember last weekend, but i'll do my best. started off with cookout at maurer's in arrowsmith on friday night to see aaron back in the state. saturday was the football game against northwestern. it was cold! very cold! movie on saturday night, church on sunday, supper at jeanne's (good supper! i actually enjoyed the mashed potatoes!). sunday night went to purdue to hang with mr. wuetrich and mr. waibel. played some good halo, had a great sandwich at panera thanks to mr. klotzle.

back on tuesday, went to the mall with erin to shop for christmas list items. shortly afterwards was treated to o'charley's and the illini basketball game by kup's family. the game was a sellout and a blowout. we won by 34 points! wednesday, i worked and then packed and then headed home for more halo with the gridley guys.

for thanksgiving, mom made a cornish game hen for each of us (neal, jay, mom, dad, me) and i ate the whole thing! i was the only one to do that, although everyone else was done and just watching me for at least half of it. relaxed, napped, ate some more, and more relaxing.

friday, i went shopping with my mom to get all the after thanksgiving sales. she wasn't going to go because she didn't have anyone to go with, so i went with her. i got a great new comforter and a space heater for my room. plus, to thank me for going with her, my mom bought me a daily calendar with color pictures of france. i love it! friday night, more halo (better matched teams).

saturday, i did laundry, drove back here, played some roller hockey and hung out with adam and caroline. caroline has a new ring on her ring finger of her left hand! it was nice and sparkly. we went to cheddar's to celebrate with a skillet cookie. it was great hanging out with them again.

well, that's long and it's up to date so i'll stop.

interview!

i just got an email from motorola saying they want to bring me in for an interview! i'm so nervous that i'm actually shaking a little bit! it could be the cold though a little bit too! ahh! i'm so excited and nervous at the same time! wheeeeeeeeeee!

title? i forgot the title!

so this weekend was great.

friday: progressive dinner. it was fantastic. alyssa did a great job of planning and organizing it and getting people to come (that's what i'm worst at). first was appetizers at apartment 5: little weinies, spinach dip, mexican dip, bagel chips, and punch. second was salad and bread at brown house. third was main course at salt shaker: turkey, ham, mashed potatoes (bleh), green beans, corn, and stuffing. last was dessert at wayne and char's: pie. since i can't cook worth junk, i offered to help wash the dishes afterwards. there was a lot. then jaclyn and i went and got a movie to watch, but erin went to bed, i left after about 1/2 hour and the rest (jaclyn, trish and alyssa) all fell asleep.

saturday: woke up around 11:30, went to help rake leaves at 1:00. had the pleasure of working with nic and bob and gab and heather and michelle and another girl from ohio. it still took us two hours to bag up 40 bags worth of leaves from the yard and gutters. and in my opinion, it was a little yard! by time i got back home, neal and jay were here. i went running and pulled my lateral collateral ligament on the backside of my left knee. jaclyn and erin are convinced it's because i don't have proper shoes. ate supper at 5:30 at dos reales (my first time!). twas very good. totally beats taco bell's quesadilla. cleaned the apartment for awhile while the apt5 girls cleaned church. then david, neal, and i went over to hang out and since we couldn't decide on whether to try to movie again or play pictionary, we did neither. we (jaclyn, alyssa, neal and i) did, however, make a sonic run trying desperately to get there before ten only to find out it didn't close till eleven or so. then we hung out some more and then i went home to finish cleaning.

late night: pumpkin capers.

sunday: church as normal. darren had a great sermon about the persecuted church in the afternoon. about half of my family was there for church. shortly after church, another brother and his family showed up. i showed them all my apartment, we had some snacks and watched some football. then we went to a park so the kids could play in the playground. we threw the football around for a bit and then hit the baseball a bit too. unfortunately, my eldest brother's kids were sick so his family couldn't make it. i was a little sad, but i get to see them all in a week and a half (or two). we all had supper then at cheddar's and invited david and katrina to go with us. i recommend the chicken tenders and shrimp, it's a good combo. lounged for awhile and then went to 8 for the praise singing; it was a small group so we tried to learn a couple new songs. made a short run to dairy queen and decided to try watching the movie one more time. i made it through and (of course) erin didn't, but it was only an ok movie to me.

monday (today): took off work and skipped class to study all day. so far i've looked at all the prof's notes and soon i'll look at examples and ta notes. i haven't really moved from this chair all day and i'll probably be here right up until seven. apparently, it's pretty cold out with the possibility of snow tomorrow. yay! it won't stick but forecasted snow means getting colder means ice hockey and snowboarding. thank God it was nice and warm yesterday so my family wasn't all stuck in my tiny apartment between church and supper.

this is waaaay too long.

the end of chatterbox

the chatterbox is dead. apparently the company that made it went broke and now they're gone. i had looked at others when i first began, but this was the only one i had liked. so everyone will have to post comments on normal posts, at least until i figure out a way to exploit blogger.com's system to make a new custom one.

conditioning

first of all, last weekend's testimonies and baptisms were fantastic. anyone that was there knows. it was a fantabulous weekend filled with friends, fun, and faith. our pictionary team won, but there wasn't any picture of us to show for it. good times, good times.

so i've started my training for the snowboarding season. it's a long hard road. on tuesday, i ran. and ran. and ran. i ran until i couldn't run any more. then i rested and ran back. turns out, i ran two miles. one way. four miles total. it was pretty extreme for someone who has almost never run before.

when i wake up in the morning, i usually hit one rung on the way down the ladder to turn off the alarm. this morning, i bounced off the rung and landed on the floor and almost just collapsed. i had to hold on to the ladder to support myself. i barely reached over to the radio to turn it off and then fell into my chair. my calves were killing me! they hurt all day so i figured i'd better tone it down some so i just ran 2 miles today. i had been planning on doing stairs on friday, but i got talked out of it since it was such a calf killing exercise. i'll wait a couple weeks until my calves can take the daily exercise.

i need to start doing crunches and push-ups too. i'm going soft. i'm getting kinda fluffy around the midsection. have you seen me? i'm like an inverse hourglass.

titles are overrated

it's been a week. i don't know how else to describe it. slow. maybe. two tests (wednesday and thursday) and an essay today. i'm hungry and i'm waiting for lunch right now. my thoughts are rather scattered right now. i'll try to pull it all together for this post.

nothing new to report. oh, except one thing that i found out at work today. it's going public so i think it's ok to put it on here. turns out that anjie (who resigned from the testing center a couple months ago) had been siphoning off money from the computer based testing pay up to about $25,000. police have talked to sue and anjie (she somehow talked them out of arresting her) and will talk to ann on monday about it. i don't think they'll need to talk to me since i'm only a part-time student but maybe. it's pretty big news, may even make the di. i feel bad really bad for anjie because she was always nice to me. so if you could pray for her too, i'm sure she could use them. i've never known anyone get arrested, so it's kind of weird for me.

yay! lunch is done! chicken fingers! i'm so happy. mmmhmmm...sooo good.

edit: will and erin are getting baptized this weekend. if you're not coming, you should come! i've got some extra space for guys. make sure you bring your own blankets/pillows/towels. girls, you're on your own. sorry.