You Are My Superstar!

I'm listening to S.H.E. right now. So much fun!

I have a list of 12 different companies to start researching to approach about hiring me. I've decided that in addition to applying for posted open positions, I'm also going to preemptively strike companies about hiring me. The idea of bringing up the idea of hiring myself is rather daunting, but I think it's worth a try.

Dad called last night. It's always so good to hear his voice! He's gotten over the cold, although he said the dust is a constant respiratory irritant.

Random observation: why do people assume that if you don't speak English well you must be here illegally? I have had so many people make this assumption here in Oklahoma. I think it shows how provincial Americans, and Oklahomans in particular, are. Do they think that the possession of a green card automatically magically gifts the bearer with perfect English? I think they all need to spend some time in a foreign country where they don't speak the language and have to just learn as they go.

Speaking of languages, I'm going to start Hebrew classes in Tulsa. I'm trying not to get my hopes up too high. I was excited to learn that it's only going to be about $100 for 9 classes. It's on Mondays, which is a bummer, but I think the class will finish in time for me to make the upper belt work out after class.

Bring it on!

23

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ABKA Nationals Highlights

  Mr. Murry was promoted to sixth degree black belt this morning, a highly deserved honor.  Also, Mrs. Rutledge and Mrs. Lester were promoted to sixth degree.  And the crowd went wild.

  Joshua won first in his kata division.

  Dad won second in both kata and fighting.

  My foot was only hit twice and with no sustaining injury. :)

A bulletin from the couch

where I have pretty much taken up permanent residence. :)

Everyone but Dad and BonnieJean went down to the Bowie tournament over the weekend.  Samuel placed third in black belt weapons after deciding on the spur of the moment to compete.  Dillian Ramey and Crista Bailey took first and second, respectively, so he's hanging with the big dogs, for sure.  He also placed third in the super fight, coming in behind Greg Partridge and Luke Rosebure.  Ethan didn't fight because it was only a week from his black belt test, but he placed first in adult underbelt weapons and adult brown kata.  He got a nine from Mr. Holzbauer on his weapons kata!  Naomi came to help coach and decided suddenly to compete in kata!  She didn't place, but I'm so proud of her!  And after we all saw the flying pigs, she decided to do fight a 13 year old who didn't have anyone else in her division to fight.  Naomi won!  Joshua placed third in kata and second in fighting.  Isaac placed second in kata.  He lost his first fight by one point to the boy who went on to win the whole division.  Irony.  At the last tournament, Caleb forgot his kata and had to make it up.  This time he remembered it perfectly!

  Before the tournament, Scott and Theresa tested for fourth degree and passed.  I'm so excited for them!  I'm kinda disappointed they didn't do any board breaking, but that's just because I so enjoy watching them do it so well!  I can't believe they managed to test and run a tournament in the same day.

  After the tournament, little Alexis hit my right foot while I was standing in the hallway.  When I unwrapped my foot to take a shower Sunday night it was swollen really bad and black all down the right side and top of it with pooled blood under the skin.  It totally freaked me out.  Dad prayed over it right then and we called Orjala first thing Monday morning.  I didn't go to work or karate.  We unwrapped it Monday afternoon out of pure curiousity and it looked tons better.  I don't think a bruise on a normal, active person would go down that quickly.  It was just an answer to prayer!

  While I was home resting Monday night, Caleb passed his yellow belt test, Dad passed his orange belt test, and Isaac did all of his blue belt test with the exception of fighting and board breaking.  He'll do those Monday night.  I'm so excited for all of them!

  In other fantastic-answers-to-prayer news, I found out today that I passed the Comp II test out!  This means I get to graduate this May!  I am so wildly excited!

In the middle of the night...

I have turned into an almost completely nocturnal studyer.  I don't think it's the noise in my house--I work around that all the time.  It's like my brain doesn't get settled into studying mode until at least 10 p.m.  It's not like I'm doing nothing before that, though, it's just not schoolwork stuff.

  I got to work on chintoe a good bit tonight, got some good pointers from Samuel.  I also worked on suji no kun, but it still feels way too sloppy to me.  Of course, it didn't help that I was doing it with a bo twelve inches too long for me.

  OK, I'm throwing myself in bed like a good girl.  I'll still probably need a nap tomorrow, though.

  I am still alive.

  The capstone proposal is submitted.

  I feel like my life is a runaway freight train with me running behind it holding onto the caboose railing.  But I'm pretty sure God is the engineer, so we should be ok.

  I won first in brown belt kata at the Oklahoma City tournament.  This is a landmark event of my life.  I have been competing with Wansai Ni for 5 years.  This is my first time to win first in anything!

  Should I go visit Erica and do her spring cleaning over spring break or should I go on the BCM mission trip to Shreveport?

  I got a cricket cellphone, free texting and calls.  I don't get the best reception sometimes, but I'm happy with it.  918-933-2303.

  Winterjam was incredible!  My favorites were "Arise My Love" by Newsong, Brandon Heath, and Toby Mac.  Toby Mac was the most incredible performance I have ever seen live, with the possible exception of the laser light show at the Grand Coulee Dam.

  RSU's men basketball team is doing extremely well.  They are ranked number one in the nation for schools their size, have had only one loss the entire season to a team they later beat, and are already in the semifinal round at the conference tournament in Lubbock.  I seriously think they might go to nationals this year!

  I have discovered a good, free puzzle site.  www.jigzone.com  All the fun of puzzles without having to take over the kitchen table!

  Good night all!

This and that

  I love my praying friends!  I have friends that I haven't seen or even maintained contact with, suddenly reconnecting with me and praying for me.  I have a group of ladies older than me in age and in faith that all pray for each other.  My Sunday school class prays for me.  My karate class prays for me.  My parents pray for me.  The Teagues pray for me because of the Friday Bible study.  Chera and JC pray for me.  I'm sure there are many more people that pray for me that I don't know about or just don't remember.

  It seems like I'm suddenly much more aware of who's praying for me.  I think even this is an answer to prayer.  I've been praying for a new understanding of God's love and working in my life.

Lazy ramblings

This is a meandering post of my random thoughts. Proceed at your own risk.

I want to learn how to play this.

I had such a lovely time yesterday! I don't really care for baby showers (they're just so feminime and trivial) and this was a very stereotypical baby shower. So I played with my cousin Sarah's baby Zoey most of the time. I wish I could have taken her home. The good part came after the shower when we just got to visit with Sam, Samantha, Tobin, Erica, Kent, Linda, Adam, Matthew, and Nathan (it gives me warm fuzzies just to write their names out!)

Erica has gained 32 pounds and it's almost all entirely in her baby bump. She's as gorgeous as ever! It still freaks me out to think that she's actually having a baby! I'm insanely excited, too! If it's a boy, his name will be Blake Cameron. I don't care for the name Blake, but if she has a boy I will instantly love the name Blake. If it's a girl, she'll be Molly Jean, carrying on the family name of Jean. :)

Adam went against all of our advice and bought a pick up truck--a huge truck. It's a Dodge Ram, double cab, really nice bed liner, silver, seats 6. I don't think he should have gotten in debt for it, but it is pretty awesome. I forgot to ask him what he named it. He's working two jobs and going to school--typical overachiever Sutherland, I love it. I like his girlfriend Sam more every time I see her.

While we girls were in Texas, Samuel, Ethan, and Joshua went with a bunch of other karate people to the Murrow's Children Home in Muskogee. The famous Zip Taylor was there! Erica, I hope you realize what I unknowningly sacrificed for you! Zip Taylor is old, old school ABKA, and THE kata man. He's helping out at Vicki Rutledge's dojo in Lawton. I think that's a good thing--their kata needs help and Vicki's health isn't going to be getting better. Vicki asked him to help out because she's been having trouble with gangs at her dojo.

I LOVE driving on the Indian Nation Turnpike. It's relatively flat and straight and almost desserted. I went 85 the whole way--Mama wouldn't let me hit 100, even though I really wanted to. Next time, I'm not gonna ask, I'll just wait until she falls asleep. I had a moment of pure joy when I came over a rise, got hit with a lovely view of pasture land and straight road all to Josh Groban singing Panis Angelicus on the I-trip.

I've come down with some kind of throat infection and left my voice in Texas. Poor thing, it's probably cold and confused, trying to hitch it's way North along highway 69. I'm sure it will eventually find me. I still have Whisper with me.

I'm reading Blue Like Jazz right now. I'm really enjoying it. It has deep truths, but it's still very readable.

There are a lot of CDs I need to get, which is rather unusual. Usually I just want specific songs, not the whole album. I want Dark Horse by Nickelback, Fearless by Taylor Swift, Anti-Meridian by Brave St. Saturn, Weezer: The Red Album by Weezer, And Winter Came by Enya, Peace on Earth by Casting Crowns, and the Twilight and Prince Caspian soundtracks. I think I'll space it out throughout my yearly budget, one CD a month. So I should have all of these in a year!

I need to make a point to read some poetry over my break. If you read well, you write well and I'm already nervous about my poetry class next semester.

It's sleeting right now and the low tonight will be 19. Yuck.

Starting tomorrow, I'm job hunting. Jia-o!

Facebook etiquette is confusing. Is it rude to peruse someone's wall? Does anyone read my notes that are a feed from this blog? Do people only read notes in which they are tagged?

Uncle Evan fell off a ladder after Thanksgiving and broke his pelvis. He's home now. Mama called Esther this evening, but I haven't debriefed her yet.

I finished reading Mort by Terry Pratchett. It was stunningly clever. I think I'll read The Color of Magic next, also by Pratchett.

I think I'm going to go play a mindless computer game, read my Bible, and hit the sack. Love y'all!

Contentedness

  I'm curled up on the couch with my laptop and a mug of sleepty time tea.  *happy sigh*

  I'm so glad Samuel talked me into buying a laptop.  It's definitely been worth the investment.  I love my Hermione!

  Tonight was Chloe Cobb's birthday party.  I had so much fun!  I got to visit with Papa Ed, Jason Murry, and Mama.  We talked about drugs, Glock semi-automatics, babies, driving, Dad, Mama's dad, and other sundry topics.  And I danced a lot--Virginia Reel and the Cha-Cha mostly.  Not enough people knew how to swing dance for us to do that.  I would like to learn how to swing dance.  What little I've done, I've really liked.  Some of us did kata to Move It from Madagascar--great fun!  There was a small dance competition--some of us white kids can actually dance, whudda thunk it?  Carrie and Jeremy won, hands down.

  Tomorrow there's a karate demo and gift distribution at the Indian children's home in Muskogee, hosted by Vicki Rutledge.  I know that Samuel, Ethan, Joshua, the Murrys, and the Browns are going, not sure who else.  Pray for them.  This is a really neat ministry opportunity.

  Mama, BonnieJean, Naomi, and I are driving down to Arlington for Erica's baby shower tomorrow.  It's so ridiculous that showers are only for girls, but I won't let my outrage get in the way of seeing everybody.  I love my extended family!

  I love the fact that the price of gas has gone down so much.  It's made me really itch to travel!  Not long trips, but impulsive day trips.  The other day, in the middle of finals, I got the urge to see if I could drive to New Orleans in a day and still have time to see some sights.  I resisted, but, man, it sounds like fun!  That's just one possible destination.  I've never been to Galveston, it's been a long time since I saw the Texas capitol or Alburquerque.  What else is within a day's driving distance?

I feel like I'm drowning

Between now and Thursday I need to...

Study for a Public Policy Quiz

Do a writing assignment for Public Policy

Administer my survey to six different randomly selected general education classes.

Write up the fourth guided discussion for Campaigns class.

Read a chapter of Enchanting a Disenchanting World.

Read at least some of Savage Spawn.

I would also like to finish up door knocking all the independents in precinct eight.

Also, in the next week I need to...

File an ethics report for the County Republicans.

Finish Savage Spawn.

Read two more chapters of Enchanting a Disenchanted World.

Do a case study for Internship II.

Write my long procrastinated literature review for Research Methods II.

On a happier note, Joshua passed his pre-test tonight which means he'll test next week!  I'm so excited!  Oh, and we got to fight tonight and I did good.  And I got to start learning the next bo kata.

The spring class schedule came out today.  It looks like I should be able to take all Tuesday/Thursday classes--cool!  Everyone mark your calenders now.  Graduation is May 9th.

Huzzah for Fall Break!

  Brave St. Saturn rocks!  (Can you hear me screaming Daylight right now?)

  The Rogers County Election Board is pathetic.  I'm trying to knock doors in precinct 8, one of the largest precincts in the county.  My list is of active independents and democrats.  Now, if we were practical it would be arranged by street and include phone numbers.  But, no!  It has no phone numbers and is arranged *drumroll for the stupidity here* alphabetically.

  I've found my younger brothers extremely irritating today, which is highly unusual.  Usually, it's an absolute blast to be with them.  Wonder what's up...

  I feel good about my midterms and very exhausted from having to do them.

  Maybe it's because I'm doing so much campaigning this time, but this semester seems to be flying past.  Usually by mid-terms I'm burned out and dying for the semester to be over.  I'm not saying I'm going to miss this semester, just that it's going really fast.

  I love Facebook's flair application!

  Sometimes I wonder what psych majors at school and peacenicks generally would think if I actually told them how violent I am.  For example...last night Samuel and I were sparring and discussing martial art strategy and theories of self defense and somehow we got onto breaking.  I have a major issue with breaking in that I don't hit with the power I know I have and I don't follow through.  Samuel is my main coach on this, the patient soul.  Anyway, he told me to go at his body, hands only, as hard as I possibly could.  I was very tickled with myself over the fact that it was hard for him. :)  It was sooooo much fun to go all out.  Since the hanging bag got taken down at the dojo I haven't gotten to go full power in a long time.  It felt great!  I would love to tell that to a psyched out peacenick just to see their reaction.

  As long as I'm going on a total ego trip...not Monday, but last Monday we were doing epon (sp?) sparring, similar to World Combat League or sabaki fights.  I got to spar Larry.  When we were done he told me that I needed to guard my head (majorly) and *smug grin here* control my knee strikes.

  Ok, to pop my ego, I'll also say that he totally clobbered my head and I really need to work on guarding it.

  I'm majorly pumped about Kate not needing chemo or radiation!  God is so good!  It's been awesome to see Him work on Kate's behalf over and over.

  OK, I'm going to veg a little with a computer game, Samuel, and my mug of sleepytime tea and then go to bed.

Dude, apparently every club and organization in existence in Claremore meets at Cappuccino Corner on Monday nights. There's some kind of youth group meeting, a school fund raiser board, a bridge club, and earlier there was a Bible study. There are no tables open, only the couch. I would go home to free them up some space, but I paid for a bottomless coffee and want my money's worth. And it's not (very) distracting because I have new headphones--yeah! they're sony, much better sound than my old ones.

I'm so bummed about missing karate.

Battlecreek Rocks!

Today, Jason promoted to third degree black, Erin promoted to second degree black, and *drumroll* and Samuel promoted to black belt! They all absolutely rocked! All three were of the quality of higher rank long before they tested and definitively proved that to the rest of the system today. I'm so proud of them and so thankful they all made it through safely!

Life is so good!

I'm insanely busy, but I sure do love my life!

Samuel and Ethan test for 1st degree brown tomorrow. I'm getting really excited!

I have doctor's appointment tomorrow that I'm nervous about so please pray for me.

My internship with Inhofe's office is going great.

Job is going great, too.

Y'all remember Dad doing a lot of training for the Army Corp of Engineer's FEST (Forward Engineering Support Team)? Well, these teams haven't recently gone to Iraq since they now have their own district with the Corp, but there would be an exception. Dad leaves on the 17th and will be in Iraq for about 4 months. I think that's a terribly long time, but I admire him so much. He's such a servant and I'm sure he's the absolute best guy to lead the team and support our troops.

The library is about to shut down, so I'll see ya. Love y'all!

I got a job last week! I'm working evening or overnight shifts taking care of 54 yr. old, physically and mentally disabled lady named Donna Marie. She's total care, which means all her shifts are waking. I've worked one overnight so far and it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. I'm just so thrilled to be employed again and being paid well ($7.35 until I get some training and then it goes up!) and having it work with my schedule. Praise God! Pray that scheduling all my training classes can be done without missing too many college classes.

I just made 96 on my first quiz in U.S. Courts. Yeah!

I wrote a press release for the Republican Precinct meetings this morning and sent it to Sherri. Hope she likes it.

Everything for the state of Oklahoma is scheduled for May 3rd: State tag meet, Republican state convention, OSU's graduation, and ABKA nationals. So not fair! I'll be at nationals and maybe swing by the state convention.

"Abortion is advocated only by persons who have themselves been born." - Ronald Reagan

I'm nuts

I'm signed up for 18 hours next semester. Everybody keeps telling me I'm nuts. BJ, the great and powerful, survived 21 so I ought to be able to do 18.

I called my friend Rachel Sunday. She had just found out earlier that week that she's expecting a girl! That's what she and Josh had wanted, so they're real happy. She's due in March, so I would really like to go see them in May when school lets out. Yes, I've been invited. :)

Missions tournament is Saturday! Isaac, Ethan, and Joshua are all fighting a sinus bug so pray really hard that we all get well and stay well by the tournament. I really would like for Samuel and I to take both first and second in our kata division. Obviously, I want first, but as long as both end up at the house I'd be happy.

I'm listening to the Bond music right now. Sure is pretty.

I need to get up to school and check out a book that we're supposed to talk about in class tomorrow. Have to get it before everybody else gets it! If you hear about a fist fight in the RSU library it will probably have been me and one of my Perspectives classmates.

Busy, busy

I just found out that the RSU spring schedule is online. Ah, now the planning. So far it's looking pretty good. Pelase be praying.

Wankan's demos went great last night. We had about 70 people hear the gospel the first time and between 80 and 90 the second time. And nobody got hurt. Praise God! I haven't heard how the demos went for Mr. Sauter's class.

I have to try to get a hold of a video camera today to film my speech that's due tomorrow. I'm doing Patrick Henry's Liberty or Death Speech.

This is a lovely still life.

And this is a great scenery.

Love y'all!

Why do I only ever post when I don't have time to?

I really ought to be in bed.

I'm really enjoying my fall break. Sleep, read, sleep, read, play a game, sleep, talk, sleep. Oh, and lots of eating and karate in there.

I need to start priming Wansai Ni for missions tournament. I want to win first in kata so bad! I've been so close so many different times. What's frustrating is that I can't seem to figure out what I need to work on to push it over the last rise and into first. I'm trying to decide if I want to do a weapons kata as well. Right now, I'm leaning towards no. I'm just not that into bo.

If you live to be one hundred, you've got it made. Very few people die past that age.
- George Burns

I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of national emergency, even if I'm in a cabinet meeting.
- Ronald Reagan

God is good. I babysat Dr. Mackie's (my literature professor) daughter, Stirling (isn't that a beautiful name?), over the weekend which times perfectly for when I needed to gas up the Subaru and pay for some clothes. I have some good possibilities for jobs that I need to hop on tomorrow. Keep praying.

I got to work on my spinning back kick with Mr. Murry tonight. I'm not turning my front heel enough which is why my kick so off center. He also mentioned that my footwork in fighting might be helped by getting in a lower stance and bending my front leg more. I didn't get to try it out much, but it does feel better that way. It's great to have some concrete things to try. A lot of times I feel like I'm just shooting blindfolded, just practicing and practicing until I accidently figure it out.

The first Hebrew class on Thursday went really well. I think it will get a lot easier once I get the alphabet down. There's a good workbook that we borrowed from the professor until we get one ordered. Which reminds me I need to look for it online.

Samuel needs to write an essay that's due tomorrow. Love y'all!

I got my visa application sent off today. Yay! We'll get it Monday or even possibly Saturday. The sage BonnieJean says international trial is all about growing your faith. I feel like Dr. Dopple in Treasure Planet. "That's more fun than I ever want to have again!"

I got to see the animated Curious George movie today. I hated the books, but the movie is really cute, original, and funny.

I didn't pass my brown belt test. Mr. Murry said my fighting and breaking were not at the level they should be and I agree. I'm still majorly bummed though. I don't know what else to do. I run, I do makwari, I work on the bags, I fight at home, I fight at the dojo, I work hard every Monday night, and I'm still no good. Am I just going to have to make it a full-time pursuit to get any good at it?

BJ has her last final tonight and then she gets to rejoin the living. We're doing a celebratory movie viewing tonight, of course.

So yesterday I get this email from Rep. Boren thanking me for contacting him about impeaching President Bush, but he doesn't think impeachment should be used as a political tool. ???? So I emailed him back asking him to send me a copy of whatever pro-impeachment message I sent and that no, I don't want President Bush impeached.

My neck is really sore. But I'm not as bad off as Samuel (who did pass) who can't hardly turn his head.

I think I'll go eat my supper. Love y'all!