Monday, August 29, 2005

school days

Well, I'm finally back at school but as of yet am unable to blog from the comfort of my own dorm room. We'll not have internet there for a few more days. Of course, working in a construction site all summer (Hy-Vee) prepared me well for living in one right now. I'll tell you all more wonderful things later, I don't feel like spending hours and hours in the library before classes even start.

-Kim

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Just a few more weary days and then...

I'll fly away
to a land where joy will never end
I'll fly away!

Okay, so I'm taking the lyrics out of context, but I feel I'm allowed. These last several days have felt very weary indeed. For starters, I just finished a stint at the salad bar of working eight days straight. Add to that grandma June having tripple by-pass surgery. She's doing much better now. At least, as well as a person can be doing only a week after such invasive surgery. Thank you to all of you who got the news and offered your prayers. Continued prayer for her full recovery would be greatly appreciated.

As summer draws to a close I'm suddenly confronted with all the things I didn't accomplish. I wrote less than a chapter more of my story, when I had intended to complete the whole second book. I almost never practiced my violin, though I had meant to stay in shape and even learn The Devil Went Down to Georgia. I got through only a small fraction of my self-imposed summer reading list. I rode the full length of the bike trail only three times during the entire summer. And I managed to avoid most of my friends all this time I've been home.

I never intended for things to go this way. I could take the cop-out excuse and claim it's all because I worked 30+ hours a week at the salad bar, but we all know that's not the reason. Sure, it contributed somewhat. This was my first real job; I had no experience in making life fit around work. But that's not a real excuse. Most people at Hy-Vee have a larger social life because of it. but I managed to avoid that in the simplest way imaginable. Just do your job and keep to yourself and no one will ever invite you to anything. Of course, I don't mind that much. Hy-Vee is as much a soap opera as a supermarket. But it illustrates my point. I've been withdrawing inside myself again.

And I would discuss this point further, but I need to free up the phone line. In case I don't get online again, I guess I should let all USF-ers know that I'll be moving back on Saturday. Of course, we'll be running all sorts of errands and visiting grandma again, so I may be busy all afternoon. On the bright side, at least I'm not hauling boxes on my birthday this year. this year I'm hauling boxes the day before my birthday. And yes, that is an improvement, because there's absolutely nothing else that has to be done on Sunday.

See you all in three days.

-Kim

Friday, August 12, 2005

Family Camp and other stuff

Well, I promised bloggage, and here it is.

First of all, Family Camp was awesome! The focus was on water and Living Water and getting out of the boat to walk on the water with Jesus. Let me just say that events during the week kind of pushed me out of my boat of silence. I was invited to play for morning worship (a lady just learning to play had her violin there for me to use), during the talent show Dad couldn't be there so Kevin and I had to do the hittite Finger Magic all by ourselves, and this led me to actually share at campfire Friday night. That's what's so awesome about camp: you feel loved and encouraged and stretched at the same time. We did other things during the week too. No, I didn't climb Baldy this year. In my defense, it was really hot and I refuse to go up there without my dad. I don't trust anyone else to wait for me. Anyways, on our afternoon off we went to Bear Country. I can't believe I had never been there before. Let me just say, baby bears are about the cutest little things ever! And the big ones are just plain cool. We have so many pictures it's not even funny. Oh, and my mom pulled a muscle in her leg before we went. So, since we were staying all the way up in cabin 5, we were allowed the use of a golf cart for the week. I think my mom didn't feel quite safe with me driving, but I thought it was a great deal of fun. oh, and the last night there I learned an awesome new game. It's called *Wa!* I may have to teach you guys to play, though I warn you in advance, it's loud. In fact, one lady said we woke up her cabin and they thought someone was being attacked by dogs. Personally, I think it wounded a lot more like a bad kung fu movie than dogs, but whatever. So that's the short version of camp.

Let's see, I am very excited for Marc and Carrie's wedding tomorrow. I managed to find myself a dress on sale for $12 that actually looks good on me, so I'm all set. I actually found the shoes to go with it (yes, Jesse, I bought more shoes) out in Rapid City. The saleslady said I had nice legs, which was weird. But then I proved her wrong by skinning my shin on a rock two days later. I'm hoping it's healed enough by now that my mom won't make me wear nylons. I have a serious dislike for the things, as you probably realized if you ever read my essay last fall. Anyways, happiness will ensue tomorrow.

Work continues. It's not especially good or bad, it just happens.

Annie Get Your Gun opened tonight. Mon and I went to dress rehearsal last night and it looks really good. We're going on Sunday afternoon with Grandma June. It's also playing next weekend. Apparently they decided 8 performances would be a good idea. I think my dad has always been Sitting Bull. He's fully in character on stage, but I've seen that character around the house many times before. I hope he does community theater again next year, he really seems to be enjoying it.

The only other thing I've been doing lately is watching episodes of Firefly. It's a sci-fi that apparently only had one season, because the entire series is 14 episodes. I managed to get through 9 hour-long episodes in the first two days. I just really love the characters. It's a space show, but it's more realistic than any I've seen before. There are no aliens, just humans spread out to the far corners of the galaxy. And just because we can fly through space doesn't mean everything is clean. Medicine involves stitches, not lasers. The whole show is kind of like a space western. The main characters are a group of smugglers. Well, they occasionally take legitimate jobs, but basically they're criminals. Except for the preacher they picked up in the first episode. And then there's the doctor who would be the respectable one except that he broke his sister out of a government facility because they were messing with her brain. It's a lot of fun and I intend to finish it this weekend. I suppose that would be good, since I have to give the DVD's back to Amanda before we go back to school...

Anyways, I think that's about all I have to catch you all up on. It's almost time for back to school. So I guess I'll see you soon.

Kim

Sunday, August 07, 2005

I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaaack!

But, I'm also very tired. And it's already late and I need to do some unpacking before I can sleep. So I'll tell you all about camp in a future blog. Hopefully that'll be up in just a couple days.