AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

I'M DONE WITH FINALS!!!!! High fives all around!! As I sit back in my nice comfy blue dorm chair I'm thinking back on this major milestone in my life -- I have completed my first semester at a four-year school. God has been working some academic miracles for me lately (like how I can have my degree in just a little over a year). And, all together, this semester has been one of great personal growth. So, now I think I'll go celebrate by dancing around my room to my Amy Grant Christmas CD that is now blasting out of my stereo (and then finish that one last paper ;) ). Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

P.S.-
I have a couple fo very fun posts I'll serve up for ya shortly. :D

"Nothing" to Now!

I was struck with a sort of epiphany (one of my favorite words!) a couple nights ago when I overheard a student ask another student, "What are you doing tomorrow?" The other student answered, "Nothing...well, homework, but..." This exchange brought to mind similair conversations I have heard, as well and that's when the epiphany came: "Homework has become so engrained in our lives, just like brushing our teeth, that studying Milton, Germanic invasions and geometry has become just the same as doing nothing!" In a way that's weird, and in a way it's sad, but all told it's very understandable ...

But, doing "nothing" is not my reason for my recent non-updated blog. Most of my academic career that would have been the culprit, but lately I have finally taken the step in doing something radical...for me anyway. The pages of my books are so well dusted off, that it was me who needed a good feather dustering. And, with God's help, that's what I began to do! It wasn't easy I assure you. But, God is here guiding me. And, it is God's revelation and conviction that brought about this change, (of course using others to send the msg. my way, as well), so it is by His mighty provision that my grades are up (I've actually been doing better in school) and I have begun to live more lately. I still need to work on this, but the shackles and chains of "nothing" are no longer keeping me from experiencing the joy of living a bright life the way they use to. And, like I said, I still have progress to make, but the step has been taken and the moment is now!

Fun Message

Reading a license plate holder recently, I thought it would be stereotypical, but it caught me off guard:

"In case of Rapture-
CARS YOUR'S!"

Love it, but not enuf to stick around after the rapture to get it!

Newsie Die-hards

Hearing a Newsie song being sung randomly is not like hearing a the very common Sound of Music song being sung. (I think Disney killed the movie before it came out, so many people have never seen it and it's usually the die-hards, like me, who watch it over and over and can repeat the movie, songs and dance moves without the movie going.) It's pretty rare. So, catching someone singing one of the movie's songs a couple nights ago in the caf I turned around and exclaimed, "I LOVE that movie!" The girls (yeah, it's mostly girls who are die-hards since the movie is full of cute really guys...well, they were when we were in high school anyway :) ) returned the passion, "Come watch it with us during open dorms on Thursday night!" So, I did. Expecting to just see 4-5 girls, I was astonished when the dorm room was packed out with both girls and guys (15-20 of 'em! crammed on the beds and floor). Many had never seen the movie before (and, kudos to the guy who began singing!) and two of the girls up on the bed with me had a very hard time keeping quiet during the songs, and, at least I know I had a problem staying still during the dancing. So, we all lip-synched through the whole thing, and, yes there were times we broke out singing, the two with the harmony, me with the melody and the accompaniment of course with the guys in the movie...at sounded so cool! We of course broke out a couple of times with the "Oh my gosh! This is my favorite part!" or "Grrr! Why doesn't he just tell him?!" type phrases. So, after the movie one of the guys looked at us three girls and said and with a big encompassing hand motion toward us said, "That is where most of the entertainment was! I spent half the movie just watching you girls." haha! Then, he looked at me later, "You know the whole movie by heart." Yeah, I do. And I also began writing a sequel back when I was 15, 'til I found out the movie was based on a true story! :D
So, yes, the history, the AMAZING choreography and music, the fight ... you've gotta see this film. Maybe someday you'll watch it wanna dance around with me!

Cal Spirit!

Over the past year I have become a major Cal fan. I love the fact that they're in my "back yard," they're friendly and I've mingled with some of the athletes/coaches and there is SO MUCH SCHOOL SPIRIT!! (My parents and sis are actually friends with some of them.) So, it didn't take long to be captured by it all at my first Cal game/meet (women's swimming, Cal vs. Standford @ Stanford) last Valentine's Day. In fact, it was so cute, Natalie Coughlin's mom and cousins were handing out "Calentines." So, I proudly displayed mine (even tho I was supposed to be unbiased since I was press ... hehe).

But, since I have been at school Cal is just a mite farther away and it's a tad harder to get to a game. But, despite that obstacle I was determined to get to a game anyway. So, taking advantage of my only non-holiday weekend at home this semester, my dad and I shared an awesome father-daughter time when he took me to a Cal football game...an especialy GREAT game being that is was against the Oregon Ducks. And, being that they had a tied record with the Bears, it made for an EDGE OF YOUR SEAT game of 28-27...drum roll...CAL!! It was almost down to the last second...fhew!

The students were always cheering and going nuts, the band triumphantly fought with the fight song and the rest of us fans yelled our heads off to distract the Oregon offense. Combine that with spectating close to the action and downing an all-American fan's meal of a hot dog and pretzyl washed down with a Coke, how could the day get much better?? Golly, I love football! Golly I love Cal! And, golly, I love my dad (and thanks for the new Cal hat! Love you!)!

Got My Sticker!

All the kids around campus were sporting their "I voted" sticker today. Very proudly, I might add, being that they're first time voters. Voting absentee I began feeling very left out...I didn't get my sticker! So, with a pouty face I expressed to the elderly woman at the poling place (right outside the caf!) that I didn't get a sticker, but I voted and I really wanted one... "Oh, honey, here's one for you right here!" Sweet woman! She gave me my sticker ... :) And I wore it proudly ... even though it was my third time voting ... :D

P.S.-- I fondly the last presidential election night ... Nov. 7, 2000 ... Nearly mid-night I was boarding a plane moving to, ironically enough, Washington, D.C. and the captain announced, "Folks, the votes are in and we have a new president, George W. Bush!" If he only knew ...

A Vacuum?!

Okay, I TOTALLY don't feel like finishing my last post, but I WILL say that I happened upon a big crime scene with a helicopter and everything that night ... Wow! THAT'S merely one of my random acts for last week, that and bowling with my professors ... :)

ANYway, tonight. It's Open Dorms, room checks and my friend is coming for the weekend, so I have been trying to get our one floor vacuum for hours, right? Well, almost at room check deadline the vacuum finally appears and I hall it over to my room. And, whatdayaknow, after a few swooshes -- BOOM, it's dead. "I can't believe it ... So, I had to double over and use my hands. Oh, glorious day ... Gotta love dorm life! Really. :)

"You Crack Me Up!"--in a Very Un-Post-Modern Way

Stuffing mini-fridges, to "Ghetto Bowl," to bowling with english professors, to post-modernism, to "Ghetto Denney's" to a crime seen! This describes the second half of my day... Wow. I don't think I've had such a random day in awhile ...

Actually, the first half was way different, too. Not to mention very cool. Not only did I SLEEP IN, but I discovered a really hot guy on campus I've weirdly enough never seen before, but I kinda lolly-gagged slightly and finished my essay (that I thot might take all day) by noon (and had fun doing it--SEE, I am intellectual!). Wow! So, that meant I got to grab a friend and go shopping for my new and needed mini-fridge. After deciding Best Buy was just that, the best buy, I purchased my prized stainless steel mini-fridge for my dorm and proceeded to my car with it on a cart thing. Well...I didn't ask a tall, buff Best Buy guy to take it off the shelf for me for no reason, so I don't know why he didn't follow us out with it because getting it into car proved a challenge. Now, my car is big, but it's no station wagon or anything... My friend and I decided the only option was to put it in the front seat. After squeezing and pushing and heaving and hoeing we finally got it in--and to the driver's seat I went...but before I sat down I realized that I with the fridge riding shot-gun I could not see my right side mirror...and that's kinda illegal I think... So, what to do! We somehow got it out and tried squeezing, pushing, hemming and hawing it into the back seat to no avail. What to do?! "Would it fit in the trunk?" my friend asked. I didn't think it would, but we were desperate. So, after managing to get it over to the trunk and clunk it in we realized the trunk lid would not close over it. Great! A lot of unheroic guys smiled at the attempts of two girls to get it back out of the trunk. We were like a comedy routine...and really couldn't help bursting out in laughter ourselves. When was the last time you were almost crying of laughter in a Best Buy parking lot??

Well, the laughing didn't stop there. Finally squeezing it in somewhere legal we made it back to the our dorm-sweet-dorm and I decided to lug it up to my room myself...Across a parking lot, up two flights of stairs and through 1,000 doors. Where was my hero that was supposed to come to my rescue??! The guys dorm isn't that far away...!! But, for whatever reason that never happens for me. :( Anyway, when my floor-mate heard very loud scootching noises coming down the hall she popped out of her room and cried, "What are you doing?!" Hemming and hawing, I replied, "Well, I've allll-most got it...the--re..." Of course she came to the rescue helping me get it into my room with a "You crack me up!" Yes, I crack a lot of people up, even myself ... And, the rest of my day was no let down. More to come!

And, Katie, my excuse is that of very un-post-modern thinking... I was only trying to win a hero! I took the traditional approach by using my intellectualism ... I'm told Damsels in distress are very attractive...haha! ;)

I'm an Intellectual!!

After reviewing a mandatory annalysis of myself here at the university, I discovered that I am an intellectual after all! I scored much higher than the average college student, so I guess that is why I find it one of my hobbies to annalyze random people. Did you know that I can tell what stop on BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) a person will exit just by looking at them? My sister and I actually both have a lot of fun people watching/reading. You wouldn't believe the elaborate stories we come up with just watching the people in the convertable stopped next to us at a light. They're so intesting ...

Anyway, I am very happy to now know that I am an intellectual...yet another thing I have in common with my brother ... ;) Life is grand.

Sea Shell of French Experience

How many times have you dined in an exquizite French restraunt and ate shellfish out of an actual sea shell...a very large sea shell? Exactly. And that's why this super fun, amazing experience made it to my Radical Randomness list for the week of: Oct. 3, 2004 (but, that actually was a magical Saturday night, the 9th)!! While we were enjoying the bounty and fun crafts of Apple Hill for a wonderful girlie weekend, my very cool mom took us (sister, aunt, good friend and I) to a magnificant Victorian mansion for French faire, the wonderful kind of restraunt where you don't always know what you're ordering and your waiter is debaneir (as well as cute!) ... :) This was esp. wonderful because I have been aching to try French food. We also found ourselves endulged in massages and manicures earlier that day which makes me oh so glad Apple Hill is an annual event ... My poor college back and brain need it, and the sea shell was pretty ...

Boys, Oh So Pretty in Pink!

The campus has been a flood of pink since this morning, guys and girls alike are wearing the feminine color. Amusingly I watched as boys walked by in pretty pink shirts that read "It's hard being a princess," or "True men are tough enough to wear pink." And, then there was the flashy boy who sped by on a scooter in a totally pink dress suit. Girl friends and boy friends have been linked in pink... And, not that I'd want to see guys in such a girlie color all the time, one day a year is satisfying somehow ... :) And, just so you boys know, you are oh so pretty in pink ... :)

Brain-dead

Sitting here in my dorm room almost completely brain-dead after my World Civ exam and overwhelming nature of yearbook, I have to do something super easy ... ;) So, I decided to comment on my "buddy blogs", blogs of my friends:

*Amy: At least at work you can't be in the shower during a fire alarm! ...We had a unnotified fire drill recently here in our dorm in which we girls had to congregate in the middle of the campus. Right before I had almost changed into my pj's (not that I don't go to the grocery store in them at times ...) ... Then the horror of a thought struck me, "What if I had been in the shower?!" A group of men comes searching through the dorm to make sure everyone's out, too... Now, by that time I'm sure I could at least have my towel around me and all that, but sheesh, whata thought!

*Jonathan D.: A couple of friends and I here at the university have adopted the practice of the ever-sophisticated British tea time. Every Sunday at 4 p.m. sharp we meet over Earl Grey, plenty of sweetner and lips full of chit-chatter. I'truly is lovely ...

*Sara J.: I just had lunch with a delightful girl yesterday named Sunshine Haven ... another writer, of course (don't you have to be with a name like that??). Delightfully sweet girl. And, she's in my Brit Lit class with another girl ... named Sunshine (who strongly insists her parents weren't hippies) ...

*Sarah M.: Where on the west coast???

*Kristine: We should FREAKING go surfing together during Thanksgiving break!!!
-Asian mangos???

Okay ... I feel a little better now. Thank you ... :)

Journalistic Team and Phelps!

I love the swim world! It's so interesting ... ANYway, for my online-newspaper job I'm always putting up article links about Phelps, Phelps and more Phelps... He's like the U.S.'s Prince William, I think. And, for a nice change of pace, I got to actually assist in a story on Phelps (which also included Crocker and Kryselburg (sp?)!). How about that for cool?! My sister and I, like on many other occasions, got to do this together (we're becoming a regular journalistic team and I'm beginning to post things up on my wall of our adventures! Fun!). Although, I have to admit, that since I am away at school she went to the event alone for the first time. :( *balling* (I've wanted to meet Phelps for "forever" ... Maybe someday. :) ) But, I DID get to help with the photo captions! This is my fave photo. *smiles* So, yes, I LOVE and ADORE working with my sister. She's becoming a GREAT photographer and I'm gifted in writing, so it's great. And, time will only tell what adventures lay before us...! (But, Phelps is always a good option ... :) )

We Need A Well!

As my wonderful Old Testiment prof points out every so often, we desperately need a well here on campus. He has argued this with the school's officials, but yet have we to get our well... After all, where is it that girls are always being met in the Bible? At a well, of course! That's how Isaac came to know Rebecca, that's how Moses' became the hero of his future wife Zipora (sp?) and the stories go on about the women at the wells. So, if I am to ever meet an awesome guy, I NEED A WELL!!! Therefore, I am hereby officially making this proclamation to Simpson University: Instead of spending your valuable money to hire workers to lay an uneeded brick patio, put them to a much more valuable use in digging and building a well. The lives and wellbeing of your female populace depends on it! If we do not get our well, we'll just construct one ourselves -- in the middle of the baseball field!

The Adventures of My Tennis Shoes

You've heard of the computer that wore tennis shoes, but I bet you never heard of tennis shoes going off on their own taking adventures. Well, my shoes do. Tempting them with the fun and daring life, they began thier journey with my daring, and sometimes downright crazy, brother. He then passed them along to my sister who nurtured them well...although they got some great experience riding horses, hanging out with crazy college kids and playing on a basketball team. That's when she passed them on to me... We've gone all over the country together...even to the dephs of caves. But, yesterday, they decided they would wanted to do something different, not only adventurous and random, but they wanted to see if they could do it without their wearer anywhere near. So, lacing up on my friend Torrie's busy feet, they went to play Powder Puff! Now, have you ever heard of that??

From Cliff Himself!...and Walla Walla

If you're into anything other than the typical Milky Way and Snickers bars, then you know about Cliff and Luna Bars. More nutricious, but still hugging that candy bar sweetness. You also know how a typical lecture class is run, walk in, sit down, pray if you go to a Christian school and then the lecture begins and your scribbling notes. That's why when I walked into such a class this morning my curiosity peeked and a little smile appeared when I spotted boxes of Cliff, Luna and MoJo Bars covering a third of my prof's desk. I sat down already being able to taste the sweet density of the Cliff Bar. While plunking my backpack on the floor, the white haired prof began showing slides of himself and other students touring the Middle East ... always with a box of Cliff Bars at hand. There were he, his students, the Pyramids ... and the Cliff Bar. There he was in Israel with is students, and famous ancient church...and the Cliff Bar. And so on through the Middle East. Then he continued telling us of his friendship with the owner of Cliff Bar, projecting photos of Cliff himself in the Berekeley offices, etc. When he told us how Cliff loved the photos of his treasured food item taking a tour of the M.E., he asked how many students his friend the prof had and sent us all Cliff Bars! Mine was chocolate peppermint stick...which took a good amount of time to eat...and the whole story ate up about 7 minutes of lecture...oh, rats of Egypt! ;)

Oh! And Walla Walla. A good looking tall chap began chatting with me in the breakfast line today about this university. He does not attend her I found out, but rather played our soccer team last night. Curious about where he orginated he looked down and remarked, "Walla Walla, Washington." And, then he found out that I just thought that was the coolest name of any location ever. What fun to say! Walla Walla, Washington-again! Walla Walla, Washington! Walla Walla, Washington! (Have I been studying too hard??)

New-fangled Note Taking

Settling down into my Old Testament Lit class I wasn't sure if I had remembered my paper for taking notes. So, I decided that if I hadn't I would ask the girl next to me if I could borrow a piece of paper...but, that's when I realized she didn't have any... She was taking notes on her lap top, and it doesn't work to say, "Can I please borrow a screen and keyboard?" No, with the rise of technology, more and more students are using other means of note-taking. All a little too arduous for me. Who wants to lug around a heavy computer and have to set it up at every class...and who ever heard of drawing diagrams on with their keyboards?? No, I think I'll stick to a light and practical pen and paper, thank you very much.

Sunday and Sunshine

Last week I met vivacious girl who goes by "Sunshine." "That's a sweet nickname," I thought to myself. Then, on one sunny morning, Tuesday, I discovered that she is a fellow English w/ writing track major and is in my British Lit class. This was a happy revelation, but not as random (they're aren't many writing track majors here!) as the one I was about to have. Going down the roll list, Mr. Philippian (yeah, isn't that a crazy name for a prof at a Christian school?! Too bad he doesn't teach New Testament Lit!) called out "Sunshine Haven?" "Oh my goodness, Sunshine is her real name," I quickly realized. Being a class of only about 15 students, the roll list wasn't long, but down the list the proffesor went until he hit, "Sunshine Someotherlastname." "Okay, this is too weird! There are two girls named Sunshine in this class...this tiny class?!?! I've never even heard this random name before and WHEN I DO THERE ARE two! How hysterical."

So, ANYway, I really like Sunshine...the first one (I don't really know the other one) :/ ... and she's closer to my age, so hopefully she'll be a potential bud. And, as for today, IT WAS MY FIRST SUNDAY AS AN OFFICIAL UNIV. STUDENT! So, what'd I do? Went church hunting, scrapbooked, did a little more decorating, of course am writing you ;), and later I'm gonna watch a movie my fellow dorm-girlies and, write another letter and have a facial. All of that and no homework, you ask? Nope. Sundays are one of my driving forces during the week...my light at the end of the tunnel, my violet in the snow, my ... well you get the idea. It's a rest day, and I thank God for setting that example. When I've applied this principle in the past, no matter how much homework sat on my desk, I received blessing for it. And, that's just how I'll continue. So, when Angie in Pollyanna sourly asks, "What's sa good about Sunday?" you know what my answer would be!! :D

The Commonality Between Deer, Eggplant and Ducks??!

They all have to do with my Random Acts for the past three weeks, of course!

Week of Aug. 23:
*Came this close to adopting a duck in southern Oregon ...

Week of Aug. 30:
*Fed a wild deer in the forrest by hand.

Week of Sept. 5:
*Tried breaded egg-plant--and actually liked it!

Stay tuned for further adventures of "O.J.'s Adventures in Radical Randomness"!

Changes ...

For various reasons, I have decided to not continue my web site (RidingTheWaves.com) at this time. However, I would like to somehow pick it back up sometime in the future. But, good news is this blog will remain and I plan to write in it much more frequently... Every day to every other day. Btw, I ADORE most of my classes (Praise God!). Speaking of which, I need to scram to year book!