Post 140

Happy New Year!

technically, it's still new year's eve, but i figured i could jump the gun a bit. especially since there are parts of the world that are already into 2011.

year changes are about as weird as they come. it'll take me about four months to stop writing 2010. cause that's what i does.

today i can't help but think of the saying we have for the month of march: in like a lion, out like a lamb. here's to hoping that saying will work with 2011. especially since 2011 is being brought in with winter storms and blizzards...not much travel is being advised for the state of south dakota. yesterday was freezing rain followed by snow and wind. and the snow and wind are continuing today along with low temps. as in, single digits.

which means:
wind + temps in single digits + several inches of snow = icky blizzard conditions

if that doesn't count as a lion, then i don't know what would

that and i'm going to be staying indoors for a bit longer. didn't go out yesterday and have no intentions today.

add to that we have libby here. who is a riot. chatty little girl who speaks really well for being 2 years 2 months old. she's entertaining and energetic. and smart. really smart. and of course, the age where you say something and she repeats it 10 min later...

Merry Christmas!

today is Christmas (nothing like stating the obvious). santa came last night and left a few stockings upon the little tree my mom sets up every year. although, mom got the tree out of storage and left it in its box, and technically kiana set it up this year.

the family gathered yesterday for a meal and to exchange presents. we all rolled into parkston by early morning of the 24th. and we all slept upstairs. slumber party! it's amazing how the five of us slept in our attic for years, let alone when you add a few more bodies. but we managed to have a bed (or at least a foam mattress) for everyone. it got really warm up there, which never happens. kendra and i didn't sleep very well, waking up at random times.

then i was officially woken up by libby. the little child started moving around and somehow discovered krissa's toy accordion.

use your imagination to figure out what came next...

i open my eyes to see the child leaning against the bed looking somehow innocent while holding the accordion and trying to figure out to play it. i close my eyes and waited. and she delivered some good music. kid's got talent, even at 7:15 in the morning

activities of the day: a few went to mitchell to take lunch to mom, who had to work at walmart until the afternoon. some set up the wii to play games. i know this because i came back from a quick trip around town to find trevor and libby tossing beanbags. and i'm pretty sure libby beat her dad. i also showed the boys how to watch netflix on my wii. of course, they were a bit overwhelmed but trevor and casey were fascinated with how many options there were for them to watch. at the end of the day, kiana, krissa, colten and i played some additional wii. turns out that krissa and i cannot play ski ball to save our lives but we kick butt at trivia. and colten is great at ski ball but not lawn darts.

animal updates: bill is comfy at home with most of the people and animals, but didn't like jack (libby's little rodent dog). jack was tiny and scared of the animals bigger than he was. no major problem with karma, but definitely did not know what to do about bill and gray, the rabbit and cat who are basically twice as big as he is.

meals for the day: kendra made chili for lunch with the evening meal comprised of turkey (i am so good at baking turkeys...), corn, mashed potatoes (trevor), gravy (casey), stuffing, and biscuits. it was a toss up of tradition as more males were in the kitchen than females. but it turned out really good.

we then moved on to exchange presents. our price limit this year was 53 cents (my theory in setting the limit was to encourage creativity by limiting it to a 50 cent item plus tax). so there was much creativity. for example, kayla gave mom items picked up that end up free with rebate and some old gift cards she had laying around (with no idea if there was any money on them). other highlights: mom tried to give karma back to trevor. trevor gave dad some old tools that he doesn't use for his job anymore. dad gave krissa stuff laying around the house. kendra gave kiana an old purse while kiana gave kendra a bag filled with some stuff she bought using up her money at the college store.

libby had no price limit. so she got books, shoes, finding nemo (to match a pair of shoes that look like clownfish), barbies, toy horse, and a giant purple dinosaur she can sit on and ride.

kayla opened up a bottle of wine she brought back from greece a couple years ago (kept forgetting to drink it at the big family events until yesterday). it was tasty.

then the troops started disbanding. kendra, trevor and libby went to trevor's family in wagner for the next round of meals and presents. casey and kayla to casey's family. and kiana and colten to pierre for his family.

which means that this morning krissa and i were the only children here this morning to see the stockings hung on the tree with care...

comforts of home

i often wish that i spent far more time at home than i do. oddly enough, even when i come home (which is defined as the house my family has lived in for 20 years) i often go stir-crazy and decide to make mini-trips.

like yesterday. i get a phone call while driving from st paul to parkston from the baby sis asking if i wanted to go to a movie that night. i get home and spend a few hours there before taking off for sister bonding time with krissa and kiana.

or today, when some of us are going to drive to omaha to spend time with kayla on her day off.

i love being home.

i enjoy having the pets around. even if they are simply sleeping like they are right now. it's nice to know that i can pet something soft and fuzzy and likes the attention. karma may be yippy when we first walk in the house after being away for days/weeks/months, but he calms down. gray (our gray tomcat) meows and wants to be babied. chili (the cat's full name is chilixitive) blips in and out for attention. and bill (krissa's bunny, aka agent bill tickelmeister) hides but sometimes appears to remind us that he exists.

i enjoy being around family. currently i am blogging in a house devoid of life except mine and the pets'. the rest of my family is in mitchell, either working (parents) or running errands (krissa and kiana). kayla and kendra won't be back in parkston until christmas eve.

i enjoy not cooking for myself.

i enjoy the fact that i can relax and not be stressed out about schoolwork. because i don't study while at home during breaks (whether or not i have homework to do). and even when i do have homework, i don't stress.

i love home. i'm glad that i am home.

i think that i will be a copycat and take a nap like the pets.

finals week

i really need to learn about time management skills, which i hear are intended for people who lack them...

but the challenge is that finals week happens the last week before a break. which is when i would much rather be with friends i won't see for a few weeks.

take this most recent week. i've already written about 30 pages for class. and i have another 30 to type up this weekend. but i still am being intentional about spending time with people. partly to avoid homework, partly cause i'm gonna miss em this coming month.

today is the best example. i have a massive final tomorrow. is it done? no. do i care? yes but no. i care because i want to be done and i want to get a good grade. i don't care because i'm choosing to spend the day with friends.

i had brunch with jess. then got my hair did (so i can be all savvy and look mature over break). then had coffee with kelli. taking a break from friends to think about school (or blog...). then i'm off to eat pizza with joel and melissa. then i'll come back and (hopefully) feel pressured/inspired to work on my final...

but i'm not worried or stressing out. cause i know that it'll get done when it gets done. then i will be able to enjoy my month off knowing that i worked and played hard during finals week so i can rest.

of course, my time off will be interrupted by my approval interview, but i'll deal with that when it arrives...

quatschen it up on 12.12.2010

since i am the bestest i know at not doing homework, i decided to blog a bit. get those crazy thoughts that keep circling through my head out so i can focus on my finals (book reports for preaching and church leadership; proposal for intergenerational ministry; history essays; mission research paper; lifemap; prayer journal). i admit, some will be way easier than others. and all would be easier if i don't wait until the last minute to read course books. or if i didn't lose all my class notes from october and november (which, just for the record, totally sucks).

here is some quatsch (german for nonsense):

hanging out with jess and katie tonight. our conversation, which was not even an hour (ok, maybe it was), covered a lot of topics. from cankles (i thank my genetics that i am blessed and do not have these) to the rapture. from talking about the 17 inches of snow that fell yesterday to planning a weekly nora roberts reading (i love sappy romances). workouts to hair cuts. i think you get the drift that we hopped topics...

peter rollins' how (not) to speak of God is an awesome book. thought-provoking and something i would love to figure out how to implement. because i am beginning to realize more and more that the culture i find myself in the midst of needs to have a new way to talk about God. i like his emphasis that God is the one thing we cannot help but speak about while at the same time we can't speak about because we have no idea what we're talking about.  i'm reading it because of my preaching class and i'm gobbling it up like it's chocolate (i'm a chocoholic and proud of it!)

praying the psalms has been an adventure and a half. i love being able to structure my day with an intentional time with scripture and journaling. i was really good at it for a few weeks. but as is my nature, i lost momentum. i'm beginning to realize more and more that i like to have constant change. somedays it's weird because then change becomes the constant, but i find that i struggle to keep myself in a one-track frame of mind. i have limited abilities when it comes to not multi-tasking.

i love my family. i miss not being with them, although having a great community at seminary helps to ease the pain of not being with my family. i'm looking forward to being home in a week. hard to believe that i could be hanging out with blood relatives soon. not that i'm starving for attention. i hung out with my aunt and uncle on thursday. not the best of circumstances since it was because he was having surgery to fix a ruptured disc in his back, but was a nice day overall. well, the weather was pretty bad. but i had a good time with my aunt. who in all honesty is more like a big sister in some ways. like the fact that she's nine years older than me. and her daughter is the about the same age as my niece (i think they're 6 or 7 months apart). makes for confusing age gaps.

i need to clean my apartment. it's really messy right now. i live in chaos. it's not dirty or unhygienic. but it could probably use a good vacuum. and some major organization skills. and some blocks of wood so i can put together a shelf i bought...

i have a problem. i'm addicted to escaping the reality of my world. this means i don't watch or read the news beyond the headlines (well, sometimes i do). it means that i prefer to read books or watch tv and films. anything for me to escape. some days it's easier to return to earth than others. but i'm learning how to connect what i experience through others' imaginations to the reality i live in. how to merge different realities in a way that will be able to enhance the here and now. it's taking some time and creativity, but i think that in our era of internet, video and constant visual/auditory barrage, we need to learn how to filter and focus. our learning styles will have to take into consideration that we no longer read one book at a time. instead we (well, i know that i do this) have three email accounts open while reading four blogs on the computer while watching tv (or movie, depending on if there's anything good on tv).

limitations and change. i'm hearing a lot about how our world is changing how leadership needs to change along with it. i think the way we talk about religion needs to change as well. as a future church leader, i have a vested interest in learning how to navigate these changes. i personally find great joy in being able to test out new theories and try new ways to experience God. which means i can butt heads with those who like the way things were. they don't like the way things are since things are changing and they don't like change. it's a challenge. that and the fact that i'm part of a generation that is becoming known for being tech-savvy (remember how bereft i was without a personal computer?), global (contacts everywhere), adapting/changing (new stats suggest that people are changing jobs and careers every few years), pluralistic and tolerant of others' beliefs and ways of living. sad fact is that those currently in charge are not enthusiastic about a complete bottoms-up reversal of power. with good reason, they are being cautious. unfortunately for people like me who want to experiment, we perceive this as old-fashioned, outdated and downright annoying. the times they are a changin. so we need to change as well...but i realize i need to learn about reflecting upon change, not just always going with the flow. easier said than done...

well, these are some of the big (and not so big) thoughts flowing through my head at any given time. there are more, but i think i'm going to work on a paper that's due tomorrow evening. or maybe watch something on netflix or hulu. not sure. should do the paper, but i hear the internet beckoning me...

snow-nami lingerings

i don't think many people in southern minnesota (or wisconsin or iowa) are gonna be traveling too much this morning...i can't imagine how bad it was yesterday when the snow was both falling and blowing as opposed to just blowing today...and of course, it's subzero temps/wind chills today for much of the region

snow-nami

old man winter,
i told you to bring it on (via facebook status yesterday) and you did. well done. thank you for the snow-nami that permitted me to be lazy and not venture out. i appreciate the day off. (even though i should be productive working on finals)
thank you

snow-nami is not my term, but i'm lovin it!

for those of you who don't watch the weather channel or live in minnesota/wisconsin area, we are having a wonderful winter!

i heard that it's the snowiest winter in two decades.

i'm not really complaining.

cause it's fun and pretty.

fun cause the city shut down. literally. minneapolis/st paul recalled all buses. hennepin county (minneapolis and its suburbs) pulled plows off the roads until the snow lets up a bit. i was unaware that the twin cities ever took snow days...snow day!!!!!!!!!!!

pretty cause the snow makes everything look gorgeous and fresh and clean.

highlight: the fact that my car is currently not covered by the snow drifts. want proof? here it is...

from our window on the third floor

katie and i ventured out to investigate the snow drifts

and to play (well, katie did...)

yay winter!

let the multitasking commence (again...)

so i've been without a personal computer for a week. it was rough but also educational.

rough:
1. no computer to sit on my lap while watching tv, reading books for class, writing papers. i had to go to the computer lab.
2. no hulu. cause my wii internet is not hulu-friendly.
3. checking email via wii. fun but not fun. fun because it's a wii. not fun because i could only check one email at a time and it was slow.
4. typing papers in the computer lab.
5. seeing my hdmi hookup to my tv look forlorn...
6. spending hours in the computer lab finishing up assignment paperwork.
7. not knowing what info i lost between the last back-up and the crash...

educational:
1. bringing back memories of freshman year of college which was the last year without a computer
2. realizing that there are poor unfortunate souls who don't multitask. which was rough for me (see rough #1) since i love to have multiple browser tabs open at once. prefer to have multiple activities going on at once. but for the last week, i was forced to slow down.
3. breathing space. i was disconnected from the world. technically, i had my cell phone where people could reach me. but it was not the same. i logged off for a short time.
4. realizing that my computer is not my life. no matter how much i like technology. i can live without (at least for a short time...)

but i'm now reconnected to the world.
with a brand-new computer recently purchased and started up (so exciting to see the screen that tells you that it's starting up for the first time...)

hope this one lasts more than two years...

self-imposed snowday

it's so amazing how something so white and fluffy can affect moods, travels, temperature, and activities.

friday night was game night at the library on campus. i drove up cause i was not about to walk up the hill through several inches of snow that had fallen during the afternoon/evening. and i know it was quite a bit of snow since i had been out shopping in the afternoon/evening. after game night we made some snow angels with two fellow students from texas. the whole community will work on educating them about the differences between snowman/snowball snow and the sparkly, light, fluffy snow perfect for snowangels.

saturday was a snow day. theoretically i could have left my apartment. but i didn't. cause i didn't want to. so i watched tv shows and movies via netflix.

i liked taking it slow. of having a day of rest before the craziness of the week(s) to come. of having time to relax before i jump in and work on finals.

i miss not having a computer of my own so i can be multitasking. with only my wii for internet and movies, i'm so limited. i can either check my email (and only one account at a time) or watch tv. no flipping between tabs on the browser while having some movie going at the same time. no reading blogs while also checking the latest news. no playing music while researching for class. so limited...

i hope tomorrow i will be freed from my boredom. cause my computer is supposed to arrive tomorrow...

formal complaint

dear God
you are truly almighty and lord of all
please shift your powerful gaze from me
i am in pain and turmoil
i have no more strength
chaos surrounds me
i struggle and am weary
but you are gracious and merciful
i desire only good from you
bless me
bring me out from my agony
give me life and sanity
restore me
for you are God
you are my God
and i praise you

note: this is my psalm
another note: psalms are not always just happy or full of praise
yet another note: i understand the psalmists' desires to cry out and have their pain purged once they give their concerns and rest them in God

craptastic

just as an update since my monday morning duldrums: life is not better

for some reason, life is against me this week.

monday afternoon: computer decides to be unfriendly and uncooperative as a way to let me know that i really should learn to be nicer to it instead of continually tossing it in and out of bags...

monday evening: computer reboots and i work on a paper til 1 am (due in class at 8)

tuesday morning: computer dead. lights turn on the keyboard but no whirs suggesting processing or thinking. cold, snowy and a bit icy. signs that winter has arrived and may stay around for a few months.

tuesday afternoon: out and about grocery shopping (and browsing computer selections with hopes of finding a cheap one to be a "throwaway computer") when check engine light comes on.

tuesday evening: spend hours in the small computer lab on the less than high quality computers. first time in years i spend more than 30 min on a computer that is not my own laptop. projects: assignment for class and paperwork for assignment.

wednesday morning: complete paperwork for assignment on computer. try to submit but fails (busy day for churchwide's server). cold morning. december greets us with a wind chill in the single digits. and a bit of sun to deceive us.

wednesday afternoon: forgot assignment and run back to apt. late for class. find out churchwide's server not happy. not a shock since today is the day hundreds of people are going to try to submit their rlp.

wednesday at 5:17 i submit my rlp successfully! rejoice! this means i officially submitted my name and information (bio info, ministry skills and interests) so that i can someday (hopefully this coming summer) be ordained as a pastor in the elca

tomorrow: appointment to have vehicle checked. plan to buy new computer and possibly get old fixed. hopefully get data off the old one even if it will be otherwise unusable (i really want my notes from the last few weeks of class. everything else is replaceable)

terminology defined:

- assignment: 1) homework due in class 2) process through which pastors receive a new call to a congregation 3) formal name for the "draft" of new pastors into the elca who are then assigned to regions and synods where they receive new calls

- rlp: formally the "rostered leader profile" that is the main piece of information submitted to the elca churchwide office for pastors seeking a new call through the assignment process

- submit: trickly little button through which the form is sent to churchwide instead of as an email attachment