Merry Christmas!

  We're doing Christmas a little different this year.  We've all been taking it in turns to be sick with one bug or another since before Thanksgiving.  This means that nobody felt like shopping, wrapping presents, or cooking.  So, we decided to postpone Christmas to January 1st.  Or, rather, we're spreading Christmas out over several days.  We did our big Christmas breakfast of pancakes, bacon, orange, etc. today.  Either Saturday or Monday we're doing the big turkey dinner thing.  Sometime this weekend, I think, we'll drive around and look at Christmas lights.  Tomorrow and on other days throughout this week we're taking advantage of post-Christmas sales to buy presents.  Thursday we'll open presents and read the Christmas story.  We might do this again next year whether we're sick or not--it has distinct advantages.

  I don't know if any of y'all outside my family know them, but Katie Sova and Ryan Deckard have finally made it official and set a date of October 10th, 2009!  I think that's too far away, but I'm sure they have their reasons.  I don't know Ryan very well, but Katie is unadultered perfection and she's very happy with him.  Congrats, guys!

  Happy 19th birthday to my favorite teddy bear, Johnny!  I remember getting him as a present on my third Christmas when I was only two years old.  Very long life for a teddy bear and he's still going strong.

  The fam is watching Jingle All the Way (great movie!) and Mama had planned to watch it with us, but she's gotten a terrible ear/toothache from sinus trouble.  So, I'm going to go sit and read with her back in her room.  I'm reading The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett, the Gospel of John, and Do Hard Things by Alex and Brett Harris.  I think right now I'll go with the Bible and Terry Pratchett.

  

Procrastination

  Good news--I'm officially in the Capstone class for next semester.  I had been on the waiting list, but Dr. Varner gave me an instructor's permission paper thingy so I'm in!  I may not be so happy about this next semester, but we'll see.

  Amanda's idiot doctor (Dr. Melinda Steelmon--nobody use her) induced her yesterday for no good reason.  I suspect she wanted Thanksgiving off, which was Amanda's actual due date.  Amanda was in labor for 17 1/2 hours.  She wasn't dilating enough or fast enough, Caden wasn't very far down the birth canal, and things were generally going badly.  When Amanda started running a fever, they started giving her antibiotics, which hopefully made their way to Caden, but that also means Caden's digestion is going to be all messed the first couple of days.  Finally, at about midnight last night they just did a c-section.  I haven't talked to anyone since about 8:30 this morning, but as far as I know they're both doing fine.  I'm just so mad at her doctor.  That poor baby was just not ready yet and she just wanted it to happen on her time table.

*takes some deep breaths*

Campus Crusade for Christ was selling luscious chili, cornbread, and desserts for just 5 bucks today in the Student Union.  It was really good.  It's a fundraiser for the Winter Conference in Ft. Worth.

Tonight is the Twilight Premier!  BJ, Samuel, and I are going to the midnight premier with Renae.  That should be fun.  I don't have very high expectations for the movie, but everyone needs a chance to disengage their brain in a teenage romance flick every now and then.

Tomorrow night and Saturday will be Dickens on the Boulevard!  I'm so excited!  I'm going to freeze half to death, but I'll get to see Jesse and Emily and Melissa and lots of other people that I don't want to leave out!

I've been really bad about procrastinating school work this week.  There are a lot of other things going on in life that are distracting me, I've been highly emotional (read: in a bad mood) this week, I'm burned out on this semester anyway, and none of the assignments are terribly interesting.  So I've been doing a lot of trivial things and some good things (cleaning my desk, cleaning my room) and even sneaking in some pleasure reading and actually getting 8 hours of sleep occassionally.  I need to grow a backbone and just get the rotten semester over with.

Joshua hyperextended his right knee yesterday when he and Sirius collided head on.  He was on a crutch this morning and headed off to the chiropractor, but I had already left for school before they got back.

I need to go to Public Policy class now, which I really don't want to.  After that, I'm working 4-10, doing some shopping and then to the movie.  Hut, hut, hut!

Lists

I need to...

Be one of the first 75 students to enter the Student Union at 11 in order to get a free ice cream Sundae.

Call every high school in Rogers County and find out when their first football and homecoming games are.

Read two more chapters of America's Meltdown.

Write a journal for chapters 2-5 of America's Meltdown.

Read the first chapter of the book that I forgot the name of for my campaign class.

Review for a quiz on Tuesday in Intro to Public Policy.

Sleep.

Go to work.

Watch some more Monk episodes.

Hang my clothes.

Clean out a drawer.

Restack everything on my desk.

Do some banking.

Ponder and pray some more about getting a laptop. (What do y'all think?)

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!

So Tuesday it was 82. Tonight it's snowing. I heard it's cold all over the Eastern 2/3rds of the country. I feel like Pooh. Is it snowing in there? It's snowing out here, too.

Poor Chera's sick. Everyone blow get-well kisses her way.

I got to see Night at the Museum! It was wonderful! Ethan looks a lot like Dick Van Dyke and the Teddy Roosevelt character was my favorite!

I also saw Pursuit of Happyness. It was a great idea with great acting (Will Smith can RUN!) but too much like Dumbo-2 hours of sadness and angst for 5 minutes of happy ending. And they could have covered a lot more successes (selling bone scanners, financial plans, paying bills, making it to the shelter on time, etc.) that would have brightened it up but they just glossed over them.

I passed the Government CLEP today! This only leaves Biology, Chemistry, and Algebra. Hmmm... the three hardest for last. Is that good or bad?

I have so much to do by the end of this month!!! Buy cool clothes for the unairconditioned Kinmen, formal gi for nationals, boards for test, bo for test, take biology CLEP, buy used books for classes, go to the Republican State Convention, iron out my last class with my advisor, write my COMMIT girls, get music on mine and Mama's MP3 players, back up my picture files, get a kata ready for nationals, my fighting has slumped terribly and I need to practice a ton so I don't embarras myself at nationals, all this on top of working, church, housework, karate, maintaining some sort of organization in my room and on my desk, and practicing personal hygiene and rest. Bonuses are music practice, exercise, Isaac's lessons, reading, and movies. *pants* Right now I think I'll go to bed.