I Love Learning.

I have learned some of the most entertaining things in my Romanesque and Gothic art history class.
For instance, did you know people in Medieval times believed there were six senses? The sixth sense is love. Yeah, pretty awesome. And they believed that rocks were alive. And that St Luke was a painter (that being the justification for the making of images in the church).

Lack.

I would have had some lovely pictures of the bright and lush array of flowers in the gorge, or from our family dinner of Southern food in honor of Josh's upcoming 21st birthday, but I need new batteries in my camera. Sigh.

This is a picture a 5 year old I nanny for took of his dog's tail that I found pretty interesting:

On the way to work: Check out how the mountain looks all up in the clouds:

Tired.

I am sitting on my bed, listening to Delirious and unsuccessfully attempting to peer edit a paper (every time I look away from the pages in front of me, I forget what it was I was doing). Why are you so tired? you may ask. I believe there are four good reasons by which I can answer that question:
-Friday night Harry Potter marathon at Kelly's that lasted till 3:20am
-Saturday late night job
-Sunday night work catering the reception for Joel and Amber
-Monday big awesome hike in the gorge with Pamela

I suppose I could have summed that up by saying "I had a really fun and crazy weekend" but that would have been less fun.

Amusing

Even when I'm tired things can be funny. Maybe they're funny because I'm tired. Either way the point is, some things are funny - even on days like today.
-I have a huge bruise on my knee
-My big final art project is to illustrate an art proposal of my classmate Bret: for 24 replacing all the babies in Emmanuel Hospital with Cabbage Patch Kids.
-University of South Carolina sent me a letter informing me that I am in an "Ineligible Program of Study" and thus I cannot receive financial aide. As if anyone is going to give me financial aide! hahaha! Why did they even bother sending me a notice, really.
-I ate McDonald's for dinner.
-Alyssa is in a class at school that meets unofficially in various classrooms around Neuberger.
-I watched a documentary on labor in Turkey, in Turkish, dubbed in person by my Professor. Maybe that one was just more awkward than funny.
-There was an overall theme of the day today wherein people made fun of orphans.
-When I told the boys that when I googled "map of the world" the 4th image down the line was the World of Warcraft world, Austin said, "Oh you must have been like, 'Wait, that's not Oregon, that's Azeroth!'"

My Life

Firsts and Lasts

Spring is often thought of as a time for new things (what with all the pollen producing flowers and multiplying rabbits). This spring I tried something new: disc golf. I think I had the most fun because I got to throw my frisbee the most. Some people call that loosing, but whatever man - I still got to do the most throwing, which is good or I most likely would have been completely bored. Thank goodness for good company (Jon, Christina, Andi, and Josh).
But sadly, Spring is also a time for lasts: the last snowboard trip of the season.
This particular last, though, included some firsts. Josh learned to ride switch (sort of). I learned that I'm getting old. There was another very cool first on today's trip to the mountain: a rainbow around the sun.
Yeah, never seen anything quite like it. The photo, of course, does not do it justice. Though the photo of Josh and I does do justice to the great brightness of the sun today. All our squinting did not make for beautiful pictures. We sort of gave up on getting a good one.

Eating.

Today: strawberries dipped in Cool Ranch chip crumbs. Mmm.
The other weekend: Lebanese almond dessert of goodness.

Unaware

I had no idea I was so in to The Office.
Apparently I am: last night I had an Office dream. Actually, it was a nightmare, and one of the more scary one's I've had recently, at that. It started sort of mid-episode, which was weird to begin with. As follows with the last show I watched, there was some sort of competition going on that was a little on the brutal side. I was in an elevator with 2 other people (I think they were supposed to be Jim and Jan, but they looked slightly different), and we were supposed to be going down two levels (the competition was a race toward a cabin in the woods) but we kept going down till we went through the bottom of the building into this nasty lake, where eventually we broke the top off the elevator so we could get out and swim. We discovered that our elevator had been tampered with, and so had some of the others. There was all sorts of sabotage going on during the competition. It was quite alarming. When people started arriving at the house, Jan or Karen had left these creepy, dangerous little "gifts" on all the beds to injure people or something. Eventually, in the midst of high tension running around looking for who knows what, Michael set the place on fire and some people barely made it out. At a couple points I was just watching what was going on, and sometimes I was participating. I don't recall Dwight being in it, which doesn't make any sense at all.
I don't really remember what happened next, but the dream morphed into a dream where I was wandering around an ugly curio shop at the beach looking for the bathroom.

Twilight Ether

One of my favorite places in the city is atop the Marquam Bridge heading North. There is always a beautiful surprise awaiting me whether rain, fog, night, day, sun, noon, night. All of downtown, most of the bridges, the Willamette, the Rose Quarter, Hood, and Helens are all, generally, visible.
Tonight was a special treat. On my way home from church, via Josh's apartment, I drove across the bridge while the sun was setting. Downtown was covered in a pinkish glow with yellow and soft orange behind. Portland looked quite like Queen Frostine's Ice Cream Sea. And St Helens looked like Mt Fuji.
Candy Land and Japan, coming together in my town.

I Want to Be a Loofah

I remember toward the end of Capernwray Winter school Rob or someone talked about how we might be feeling like wet sponges - so full of Bible and information that we feel like we can't absorb anymore and so we just start shedding it off. I believe he told us that and followed it up with encouraging us to hold on and not miss the last few weeks of school. I recall quite vividly how that felt, and how I did not open my Bible once on Spring Break. (I'm not saying I enjoyed not reading the Bible - I actually missed it - but I felt that I couldn't read anymore without my head popping or something.)
I think maybe something similar is going on right now in my brain, though not just the Bible, but written word in general. Last night I read some Caribbean Lit, some Bible, and some Harry Potter before bed. I currently remember nothing of either of those three things. I have no idea what I read. This morning wasn't much better, either. On the bus I read my two articles for Women in the Middle East. The first soaked in a tad, but even as I was reading the second it was leaving me. I could almost see it dripping off the pages onto the floor, escaping my brain entirely.
Maybe this weekend of fun will squeeze my spongy grey matter out enough so I can make it through the rest of Spring Quarter

Oh Well.

I was sitting in my Romanesque and Gothic art class tonight and thinking about all the cathedrals I've been in. My professor was lamenting the pathetic-ness of trying to understand what it's like to be in a cathedral by looking at a miserable slide. We watched a movie entitled "Reflections"; a series of shots of Amiens Cathedral backed with piano music and chants along with a periodic description with a British accent. But, in keeping with the unfortunate limitations of film, it does not do the Gothic cathedral justice. I have yet to visit Amiens, but from my experience of cathedrals, I know the feeling of being there in person and experiencing the architecture, the height, and the loftiness. There is nothing quite like it.
[Westminster Cathedral, London]

[St. Peter's Basilica, Rome]

[Sagrada Familia, Barcelona]

[Divinity School, Oxford]

For All Those Who Thought We Were Normal.

I know you are few, but to those who have a limited knowledge of how crazy my boyfriend and I are: These pictures are for you. Especially for those who think Josh is "normal", as he calls himself - after almost a year out in Portland with me and all these awesomely insane jr hiers, he's joined the ranks.

...heh... after looking at these pictures I can't help but see that it is mostly me looking insane, but I want you to note how happy he looks with all the craziness. And please observe the energy drink he is holding - that might also have had something to do with the look of sanity.

Behind

I woke up this morning very slowly. Or rather, I woke up rather stutteringly.
I did not set my alarm, instead, I was startled out of the land of nod by a phone call. That having not succeeded in rousing me, I mumbled a bit and then fell back asleep. A little while later, I was mildly aware of voices in the house, but then was more intentionally woken up a few minutes later by my mom, who needed to fill me in on some stuff before she took off. Eyelids still heavy and pillow still calling, I snoozed some more before the phone rang a second time.
Now I am awake: the prospect of a brunch date hauling my lazy butt out of bed more successfully than the thought of the piles of homework left to be done.

[In other news, I cut my own hair a couple of days ago. Here are the results:]