Pranked!

So, long story short, my dorm got pranked over reading break.

What happened was, sometime ago, my keys got stolen. I figured they were gone for good. Turns out, the guys who pranked our dorm left the keys. Therefore I do not need to buy new ones, which is a positive aspect to this prank.

However, what you will see as you scroll down are photos of us bringing our furnature back upstairs. The guys thought it would be really funny to take apart our table and couches and bring every peice of furnature down to the basement. Props for them, I must admit. It was a clever prank.

The fun part was trying to bring everything back up again. This proved more difficult. Not only are these 'birth control couches' much heavier than we thought, but there's a narrow stairway, and gravity is working against you. I thought I would put my muscles to good use and take pictures.

As it turns out, our livingroom set up is better. Not to mention the prankers took down some boxes we were just too lazy to bring down ourselves. Plus, we think they vaccuumed the floor too. All in all, it was an interesting end to the reading weekend.

Why Won't The Mosquitoes Die?

I wondered today, as I thought about all my dear dormmates, whether the dorm mosquitoes had died. You see, we got really quite good at keeping our door closed these past two weeks. There were a few really cold days. We had figured the mosquitoes outside had pretty much died. Apparently not.

I remember thinking to myself this week, 'why are there so many mosquitoes here again?' I blame it on the open door and the warm weather. Not that the warm weather is bad (although, this nice Autumn weather will be paralleled with some mean Winter storms), I just don't like the mosquitoes so much. It became particularily evident to me when I woke up with 2 bites on my foot Wednesday morning.

Apparently I had slept with a foot outside the covers. Apparently the mosquitoes in the dorm aren't quite as lethargic as we had all thought. I think, that on Sunday night when I return, I am taking a wad of newspaper and going on a mosquito massacre. I will not be bitten again! (not to mention the bites are pretty itchy..)

From now on, the door stays closed.

The Colours of Fall

For a season where the earth prepares to go dormant, it sure is beautiful. I am in my hometown this weekend as Redeemer is on a Reading Break. This afternoon, I hopped on my bike, took some books and went on a trip to the library. I had forgotten how vibrant the town is in the fall seasons. The trees were all changing into gorgeous hues of red and yellow and orange. The streets were covered in fallen leaves, and the air was crisp.

I couldn't resist taking some photos of the colours in my own backyard.

Perhaps it wasn't that I had forgotten how beautiful my town was in the Fall, I had never really noticed. Something about this town will always be home. It's quaintness, old uptown buildings and the simple picturesque life authors like Margaret Atwood write about. The colours of Autumn is something that needs to be appreciated. It is the earth's last attempt at summer colours before the snow falls and wipes everything clean and white.

These are colours that only God could have fashioned. So I challenge you, dear readers, take a walk through your town, snap some photos of the changing season. Appreciate the beauty created by the Maker's hand. And then, say a small prayer of thanksgiving.

<3

Rainshower

I'm getting sick. First cold of the fall season. And I was doing so well.

I haven't been sick since about June. June was when I bought my 'Advil: Cold and Sinus'. That's how I know. What sucks about being sick is this whole exhaustion thing. If I wasn't so tired, it wouldn't bother me so much. But I feel like I could just fall down and sleep and never wake up.

I'm basically paying for enjoying the nice cold rainshower last night. I love fall rain. I love summer rain too, but I love fall rain. Yesterday, the air smelled of rain all day. The whole campus was just waiting for it to come pouring down. At about 11pm, the skies opened up and it just came. The sound was beautiful. The soft pitter-patter was great background music to studying English notes (although, it would have been better suited if the English Notes pertained to Walt Whitman, or Ralph Emerson). The air had this misty humidity to it. It was beautiful.

The sad ending to this is plural.
1) This means that the evenings of porch-sitting have ended. An absolute tragedy! I love porch sitting. Curled up in a blanket with hot tea. It's peaceful.
2) The beginnings of cold and flu season. I hate being sick.

Word of Advice?

Don't go out in the rain at midnight.

Redeemer Market Sucks

Don't worry, I haven't been shopping on Sunday.

I'm sitting here, having a conversation with two of my friends and we are talking about the appreciation for food we have all discovered. And not just food, but fruit! Like, actually, when you are at home, you hate fruit, not because it's gross, but because people make you eat it.

When you are gone to school, not only is the selection of fruit depleated, but you actually feel like you need to eat it. You really do learn to appreciate healthy food. Like apples.

Have you ever seen Into The Wild, where he eats the apple, and tells the apple how he loves it. Well, that's how I feel about apples today. I had the best apple in the world today. There wasn't anything special about it. The apple was red and green like most apples are. It had a core, and a small bruise. But this was the best apple in the world.

I would have talked to it too, but apparently that is weird. And I don't want to be weird (in public..)

The Art of Relaxation

The crazy post-thanksgiving week is over! This weekend will be one of relaxing and catching up. I feel like I have accomplished a lot this week. I wrote a math midterm, finished a Sociology essay, enjoyed a visit from my cousin, cleaned my room, read for my english class and took notes and just finished up a lot of unfinished school work. It's just been a productive week. Busy, but productive.

So this weekend is devoted to relaxing. Enjoying the weather, hopefully, taking it easy, spending time with my boyfriend, and dormmates. Church-in-the-Box is on Sunday night. I'm just really looking forward to spending time with God and with friends.

Hippos on my Kleenex Box

Conveniently, they aren't even Kleenex brand tissues. They are Scotties.

One thing I will not discuss here is my view on the election. I voted. That's all you need to know.

Come to think of it, I don't know if I have anything noteworthy to put in this here blog. It's one of those days where everything that could have to say has been said before. Celebrate the mundanity. Funny thing is, as hard as I might wish it to be, 'leading lives of quiet desperation', life is not mundane. It's so much to do with outlook.

Seeing the trees change colour into hues of beautiful reds and oranges and yellows, watching the sun soak into the horizon, like its being consumed by a kitchen sponge. The geese fly south for the winter, the pumpkins and corn stalks to decorate doorsteps. Even better, the old cliche of the 'cornecopia' (horn of plenty) rests deep in our hearts. In all this mundanity, we are tried through and through; Give thanks.

With a close to the Thanksgiving weekend, suppose you ponder all that you are really thankful for. Is it your family and friends? Is it that you have enough to eat? Is it that you have a freedom of speech unique to this side of the world? Perhaps you are thankful that the world has hung on another day. Perhaps you are thankful for your house, your car, your computer. It's okay, don't be ashamed of being thankful for those material things. They, too, are gifts from God.

Time now to reintigrate that Hippo on my Kleenex box. Thought I forgot about him? Yeah, I almost did. But let's try something here.

I am thankful for the Hippo on my Kleenex box.

The Hippo on the Kleenex box means that I am sitting at my desk at University. A Christian University. It means I had the money to buy that box of Kleenex (Scotties...technicals..). It means I am surrounded by all these other great things that God has given me. That Kleenex box holds Kleenex, which I use when I am sick. I use when I write, when I draw, and sometimes, when I cry. That Hippo on the Kleenex Box reminds me of all the things I should be thankful for. God has blessed me with many things. Both gifts of personality, and reminders of love, food, family, friendships and so much more.

So when you consider what it is you are thankful for, hopefully you can find a Hippo on your Kleenex box to help the process. And even though we have one day of the year designated for giving thanks, it should not stop there. Each day this week, thank the LORD for something. Each day, you will find yourself more blessed.

There's something about your own church...

I know this may sound cliche, but there's no place like home. In this case, that applies to church. There is just something about being back in your own congregation that is just wonderfully refreshing. There is something about hearing your own pastor's voice coming from the pulpit, and knowing who the people are that need prayer that draws this sense of community inside.

Apparently, Pastor Andrew (commonly referred to as P.A. by me, or PA) has been getting right into the sermons lately. Inserting funny little quirks and humourous hiccups into the prompt. He really illustrated today's message well. It was about God's love and sin. His depiction of wrestling with sin was quite funny, and likely something I will never forget. He paralleled sin to a mouse being killed in a trap. Strange, yes, but bear with me. You know how there are different kinds of mouse traps. There are the ones that kill the mouse instantly, and the ones that the mouse wrestles around in for a while until it finally dies. Sin is the same way. There are some sins which are easily killed. Some that can be nipped in the butt on the first try, but there are also those that we struggle with daily. And those sins are the ones that are wrestling with the mousetrap. The mousetrap, of course, being Jesus.

He also talked about Jesus's love for us. How it is everlasting, and can cover a multitude of sins. For some reason, though we all know this, these words just stuck this morning. Although we wrestle with these sins that enter our lives, and sometimes not all of them are easy to just quit, God promised redemption. God promised a mousetrap of sorts, placed in the houses of our lives to get rid of the infestation of evil in our lives. I don't know about you, but I think that's pretty darn amazing.

Good sermon, PA!

"Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you." (Acts 13:38)

Lacking the Mustache

For the last 17 years of my life (I am almost 19 years old now), my father has had a mustache. Today, I came home for thanksgiving. The mustache was gone.

I am lost.
I don't know this man.
I miss the mustache.

:)

Black Holes and Laminin and Golf Balls

I hope you have a bit of time.

Remember that old children's song? It goes something like this.

"My God is so big, so strong and so mighty,
There's nothing my God cannot do.

My God is so big, so strong and so mighty

There's nothing my God cannot do (for you!)

The mountains are His

The rivers are His

The stars are His handywork too.

My God is so BIG, so STRONG and so MIGHTY,

There's NOTHING my God cannot do!"

Chris Tomlin went on tour. The tour called 'How Great is Our God", had a speaker named Louis Giglio. Louis Giglio made me realize how truly great my God is.

Below I have posted quite a few youtube videos. Please watch them in order. Collectively, they are about 50 minutes, so if you have something to do, I suggest you reschedule. This will blow your mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_82lZ2PpYQE&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwrFILPaFWQ&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjL4SZyc5Ko&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btyacVmGszA&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXgiTUfFhLI&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ud0kaWLHEd4&feature=related

So often we tell God what we want. So often we pretend like somehow we can influence His will for our lives.

How truly Great is our God.

140 Ceiling Tiles...

So I was bored in Math class, who hasn't been?

There were 140 tiles on the ceiling. That was, of course, if you didn’t count those cut out for lights and speaker phones, or rounded out just right to make room for the imposing walls.

She thought for a moment, reread the sentences and then placed her pen down in exasperation. Those were great words to start a story. So why was no story coming yo mind? It wasn’t like high school. No, in high school she could sit down and write and it would go somewhere. Character development would happen, she would at least know who was counting the ceiling tiles. The counter of the ceiling tiles would probably be very bored, in fact, anyone would need to be bored to bother counting ceiling tiles. The room would take shape, a description of walls and floors, doors, carpeting, perhaps enlightening the reader into the place to which these ceiling tiles belonged. But no, all she could muster were the words to say there were a lot of ceiling tiles. She picked up her pen and tried again.

There were 140 tiles on the ceiling. That was, of course if you didn’t count those cut out for lights and speaker phones or rounded out just right to make room for the imposing walls. If you actually took into consideration all the ceiling cut outs (10 lights, 6 speaker phones -half a tile to remain from those, 2 air vents-also half a tile, and almost 7 full tiles removed for the strange wall squared off at the front end) you would be left with 119 ceiling tiles, accented with sprinklers (in case of fire), a projector and funny little circles with plastic mesh keeping all the technical stuff in.

She stopped again. Who in their right mind writes a story about ceiling tiles? The entire idea of it was just strange. Finding the extraordinary in the ordinary perhaps, or just extreme boredom. More likely to the be latter. She had no interest in what was being taught, and thus found the ceiling that much more interesting, but really, was this to be some top seller? On account (no pun intended) of ceiling tiles? It seemed silly. She placed her pen down and watched as the professor drew out a graph on the front board. Linear graphs, oh what a joy, she thought.
The concept of the linear graph wasn’t nearly as difficult as everyone seemed to think it was. Steps were simple. Solve for ‘x’ letting ‘y’ equal zero. Solve for ‘y’ letting ‘x’ equal zero. Plunk the coordinates you get from the answer on the graph and draw a line through them. The slope is either positive or negative based on whether the line goes up or down.



It was more fun than taking down a math note... Hope it was enjoyable.