We make me sick.

"In this needle and haystack life, I found miracles there in your eyes. It's no accident we're here tonight, we are once in a lifetime."

Those are some lyrics to Switchfoot's new song Needle and Haystack Life. I have to say, I am completely in love with those words. I think it's funny that the world gets excited when a comet that comes around every "million" years or so is going to make an appearance, or it's all over the news when an eclipse that only happens every now and then is going to occur, people freak out over rainbows or planets aligning or whatever rare occurance is going to take place. But the real magic is that we are more rare than the brightest most beautiful star in the sky. We ARE once in a lifetime. I'll be here for a while and then one day I'll be gone and that's it. I know it gets said all the time that people take life for granted but it amazes me sometimes just how true that is. No one looks at another human being like they're a stunning falling star, no one looks in the mirror in awe of their skin and bones put in place to house a unique and unmatchable soul. We all just march on with our God given lives like this existence is nothing special. My point is that I just don't know how God does it. How day after day he makes life and breath and the person blessed enough to have those things doesn't even get how completely sweet that is. If I put that much of myself into something and then it didn't even care or turned away from me completely, I'd be pretty pissed. How he promised to never flood the world again like he did in Noah's day is beyond me. I'd of stabbed everyone by now.

.... and on that lovely note, i need to go make some Theraflu.

I feel like Bambi alone in a forest

Pray for me, people.

I have no idea what to do with myself these days. I feel absolutely and completely lost. Not having a job for so long does not do positive things for the self-esteem. I don't even know what I would enjoy, what would make me happy. And have no idea what I would actually be good at. I've been looking into Medical Assisting lately but I just don't feel comfortable with the idea of going to school and being jobless. And if I was going to school and working at the same time, I would feel Shaneless. I wouldn't see him very much and I don't want that.

Homer Hickam's idea of a Rocket Boy or a Rocket Girl is someone who knows what they want to do, they go after it, and they get it. When I met him a few years ago, he called me a Rocket Girl... now here I am wondering what the heck that crazy man was thinking? The only thing I really enjoy and already know I'm good at is video editing. But I have no idea where I would even start with that as far as schooling or careering (that's right, i made up a word) would go. I don't exactly see many postings for video editors or film editors on Craigslist these days. Other than that, I feel that I've got nothin.

Dental Assisting was fun while it lasted but some part of me is over it. I know I wouldn't be happy with that again though if that's the only job I can find right now, I will take it.

Journalism I was good at but that's a nearly impossible industry to succeed in... unless my dream is to write obituaries for a few decades.

And other than those things, I've never really been great at anything else.

I don't know what to do but to pray for some newfound skill or passion.

Untill then, I feel like a shivering scared little animal. Which way do I go? Which path do I take? I don't like this feeling of being all alone in a big scary place, especially since I can't find my way anywhere without a GPS and animals don't have thumbs...

It's all for the best

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSwWSpSESbg

I think these guys did this very well.

Fast forward to about 35 seconds in.

Sunday Skoo

So I began my career as a Sunday School teacher at the church this past Sunday. It was fun though I was kind of weirded out to discover the boy from VBS who kept talking about blood and demons is in my class. Kindergarteners should not be that passionate about blood.

But it was good times, I get to be Sprout... which is a puppet some of the kids have come to know from previous years at Sunday School, so they were so excited to see him. I just wish I could do a better voice!

In other news, I'm in charge of the snack for bible study on thursday and am hoping it goes well. i will be making 30-something key lime bars. If they don't turn out right, i will be sad.

ooh and bowling season has started again, so i will be bowling with the league on wednesday! i've been missing it so much all summer. I've been missing winning money in the mystery pot too!

Also, i'm looking forward to going to the halfway to St. Patrick's Day White Sox game on Friday. Green everywhere!

... annnnnnd i'm done.

Old video

Since I've discovered I can upload videos to blogger, I'm going to throw one of my favorites up here. YouTube muted the sound on this about a year ago which really bummed me out cuz I'm quite happy with it.



Music is Dead Man by Jars of Clay with clips from 6 Feet Under. It's kind of dark but I dig dark so there you go...

New video

I worked very hard on this video and tried to put it on youtube but the record labels have this thing there now where anyone using their music... their videos get muted upon upload. Stupid youtube. Sooo I put it here instead. Quality isn't perfect but neither was my horrible software, I did the best I could with what I had and this is the result...

Video

my latest creation... it was a pain in the butt to make...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXXSTN10YkA

Knock knock

*opens crypt and crawls out*

It's true. I'm still alive! It's shocking that me of all people could neglect my blog for so long, but I have. I just haven't really felt like writing about anything lately and haven't had much to say.

I don't have anything interesting to say now either but I figured I should probably update.

Well.... I think a wisdom tooth is coming in. Which scares me! I'm a big baby and hear that wisdom tooth removal is not a stroll in the park. I'm also very picky and refuse to go to anyone but Dr. Wolff despite having lost my job there a year and a half ago. And though professionally, he's the best general dentist a person can get, he's not a specialist and can't always pull wisdom teeth. And with my uber tiny mouth, I have a feeling he'll send me to a specialist. Which is lametarded.

In other news, my xbox 360 is sick. Every now and then the ring goes like 75 percent red. So I take out the power cord for a second and then plug it back in and then all is well. I fear it will eventually just die soon though. I have a warranty and all but it's such a pain in the butt getting a replacement. I had to wait 6 months last time when my original 360 broke cuz they just didn't have anymore. Gah!

In more other news, I'm getting more involved in the church. Which is something that makes me happy. A few weeks ago, I noticed in the bulletin that they were looking for people to help run the St. Paul's booth at the Lake County Fair and I told Shane we should sign up for it. So we did. We didn't really do too much there because most people at a County Fair aren't interested in church booths, but it was still fun and we felt good about helping out.

And while we were there, Carol, this woman who usually leads the Sunday morning bible class that we go to, showed up to chat for a while. She told us about how her dog had cancer and she wanted a cheaper alternative than expensive surgeries to fix it so she started doing internet research. She ended up coming across this tea called Essiac that's supposed to make the immune system stronger and it also contains cancer killers. It was made for humans to use but she went ahead and got some for her dog and said it worked!

Sooooo after hearing this and knowing that my Granny now has lung cancer, I told my mom about it and asked her what she thought. She instantly ordered a bunch of it. Then when my mom and I took Granny to her first chemotherapy session, we asked her doctor if he heard of it and if it would be ok for her to take it. He looked down at the list of medications she was on and said "You know what, I want her to stop taking (some medicine that I can't remember the name of) and start drinking the tea instead. A lot of my patients have better results with the tea."

So yay! That was good to hear. She still hasn't been able to try it yet tho because she can't keep anything down. But when she gets stronger and isn't so sick, hopefully she can have some and it will help.

Anyhoo, as for getting involved in the church, last Sunday, Alice (who is the designated Sunday School organizer) told Shane she put something in our church mailbox about Sunday School. Then she turned to me and asked if I'd be interested in helping out at all. (she told me before she thought i was really great with the kids during VBS) I told her yes! And that if the position was available, I'd be interested in being Linda's helper. (I was her helper thru VBS and loooooved her) So now I'm waiting to hear if the position is open. I really hope it is.

Well that's it for now but I may edit later when i realize i forgot stuff i wanted to talk about...

Tangerine, Roger, and Minneapolis

Soooo as anyone who reads this knows, I am now a married woman! Shane and I said our I dos on April 18th at 3:30 pm! Everything was perfect. I had so much fun, especially dancing my face off at the reception, and I felt like Cinderella in my beautiful dress.

Then we left for our honeymoon, at 5:50 am on Sunday the 19th. Mexico was beautiful and I have pictures of the resort and the ruins that I want to get up on the webs at some point. Shane and I were very happy with my pick for the resort. The Grand Palladium was stunning and let me tell you there is a reason it's a 5 star resort! First of all, it's absolutely MASSIVE. We needed a map to find our way anywhere and even then sometimes we had some trouble. Shane always got us where we needed to go though. There were also mini shuttle like things you could catch to get from one part of the resort to the next. (it was divided into 4 parts with 4 main lobbies... we were in the kentenah part, there was also the Colonial, White Sands, and Riviera) So you could catch a ride to any of those lobbies or back to your villa. We were upgraded upon arrival to a villa on the beach. Our window didn't actually face the Caribbean but we were right on the beach which was really cool.

Another reason I think it was a good resort is the fact that it's in a jungle... which means lots of bugs. And Chrissy no like bugs. I was freaking out the first night cuz I saw a bunch of bugs in our villa. But Shane called reception and asked if they could come spray. I dunno what the heck they used but there was not a single bug in our room after that one-time spray. Good job people!

Anyway, there were different shops and different theatres and things in different parts of the resort which is why we needed rides to get to other spots sometimes. Though walking was nice sometimes too.

The food and drinks were really good as well. I would have tangerine juice for breakfast every morning which was delicioussssssssss. Their apple juice is also amazing too, much better than stuff we have here. Also of course real Mexican food in Mexico was YUM.

Another cool thing about Mexico... lizards! Lizards everywhere! No squirrels or rabbits, just lizards! They were so cool and they were everywhere. Just crossing a path or running around by the trees. They were very scared little creatures though, it was incredibly hard to sneak up on them. But I had a goal... I want to touch one! I tried and tried and tried until finally Shane pointed out that one had lodged itself under a sidewalk in a little divot. I slowly leaned over from the top of the sidewalk and quickly poked its tail! (didn't want to get bit) It felt so weird and so fun. I was so happy I acheived my goal. There were also really cool looking geckos that we started seeing on the second half of the week. They would run on their hind legs reeeeeeeeally fast and end up looking like crazy cartoon characters. Very cool.

I read on tripadvisor.com (which is the best place to research hotels ever) in a review that someone wrote they talked about how they had a gecko in their room and how it became their little pet and they named it and everything. I was very jealous. I desperately wanted a pet gecko too.

Then one day Shane opened the door for a reason I forget, and a BABY gecko came scurrying in on the ceiling! A BABY! It was no more than an inch and a half long. It was soooooooooooo cute. I took pictures of him. We wanted to get him out though because well he was tiny and easily killable if stepped on, and the room isn't exactly made for baby geckos... so Shane got on a chair with a cup to try and get him but the gecko ended up falling on Shane's back. Shane stepped outside and I barely touched the gecko before it jumped off Shane's back and on to our porch. I was so excited though to have our pet gecko if only for a short moment. I named him Roger.

Later that day Shane and I went to dinner or a show or something and when we came back I said it would be cool if Roger had waited for us on the porch. We looked around and didn't see him. Shane eventually sat down on a chair next to where one of our towels was drying and picked up the towel. Who was hiding under it? Roger! Cute cute cute precious adorable awesome little Roger! I watched him for a little bit before we went inside. (he was very frightened and I didn't want to scare him by trying to touch him anymore)

I don't think we saw him much after that but Roger was fun and awesome and I will miss him dearly. *sniff*

Let's see, what else....

The first night we were there we saw a show. Before the actual show started though someone named D.J. Carlos came on the stage to do a little mini-game show type of thing. Guess who the first couple called on stage was? That's right, the Conklins. There were 4 other couples from 4 other countries. We were obviously the US team. Anyway, the point was for the women to wrap the men up in toilet paper to look like mummies... which I failed at because it was hot and I was getting soooo dizzy and sick running circles around Shane and he got dizzy trying to run in place for me. Anyway after the mummy wrapping, they threw a bunch of Mexican clothes on stage... bigs skirts, crazy pants, hats... whatever. We had to take stuff from the pile and dress the men up over their mummy gear. It was completely ridiculous and Shane looked nuts. But not nutty enough. We came in last place (i was too dizzy and hot to care) and won a bottle of Tequila. Which ended up being what everyone else won anyway. It was nuts and I probably wouldn't do it again, but it makes for a fun story.

Anyway the main show we went to see was called Prehispanic. Which was a Mayan show. I thought it was so beautiful. The woman were stunning and so exotic and their movements were just hypnotic when they danced. I wish I could move like those women. The men were also very cool and something about their dancing was hypnotic too. I think the costumes and body paint was part of what made everything so cool. The only thing I could have done without was when the women all came out in this weird cape that like hung in the front instead of the back.... leaving their backs exposed... and they had thongs on. So there were a lot of butts just running around the stage for a few minutes.

What was funny though was that after they got back into some better costumes... they picked 5 men from the audience to come on stage. Of course Shane was picked again. They put this white robe thing on him and then we're pretty sure they got married. lol. From then on, we kept joking that Shane got married twice in one week.

We also joked when we went to see the ruins in Chichen Itza that he was going to see the churches of his mayan wife's ancestor's or something, going to his in-law's.

The ruins were cool and we saw this huge cool pyramid. I wasn't as impressed as I thought I would be though. Shane was, but for some reason I was expecting more. It was still cool and impressive just not as much as I thought it would be. Maybe the heat just made me not care as much. It was reeeeeally hot in Chichen Itza.

Anyway eventually we had to come home. Unfortunately what was supposed to be a 3 hour flight turned into about a 10 hour flight. There were a bunch of bad storms hitting the Chicago area and we couldn't get clearance to land. The captain said we were circling around Peoria for a while waiting for clearance but we never really got it and were getting low on fuel. We ended up going to Minneapolis to get fuel and we sat there for a few hours just waiting for an ok from O'Hare. What was really bogus was that no one was allowed off the plane because we had to clear custums in Chicago. What was the most bogus was that there were some people on the plane who were actually taking a connecting flight from Chicago to Minneapolis. There they were, sitting on a plane in the airport that they were supposed to end up at but couldn't get out because of the custums rule. So they had to fly to Chicago just to fly back to Minneapolis!

And most bogus of all... they fed us nothing! No food for 10 hours! LAME. I believe if it had been United, they would have fed us. American Airlines were lame and I don't like them. Shane says it wasn't their fault if they didn't have enough food on board. But I believe they did or they could have gotten something at Minneapolis. United would have! I just know they would! They have in the past for me. They always take care of people.

Buuuuut anyway. We are home now and married life is nice. There are still a billion more things I could talk about but I am tired from all this writing. I shall upload pictures soon!

Adios!

Saturday, from good to bad

I feel like writing about how I spent my Is He Here Yet? Saturday.

First Shane and I went to a White Sox game, where they kicked major booty against the Twins... 8 to nothing! It was a good game though I got a little sunburn on my nose and a spot on my forehead. (easily covered with some makeup). I was worried my whole face would burn before my wedding! It's all good though.

Anyway, a month or so ago Shane and I were watching Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives with Guy Fieri and he went to this place in Chicago called Tufano's. Everything he tried on the show looked absolutely delicious. I told Shane we had to go there sometime and he wrote it down and then we both kind of forgot about it. (so I thought) Then after the Sox game when I was half asleep, he says "You don't pay attention to anything, you haven't even noticed I'm using a map." And I just kind of looked over like "so what?" It never occured to me that he's NEVER needed a map to get home from a game before. Then he's like "you're not even aware of what's around you right now." And I'm looking around and I see valet parking going on all around me. He told me I completely missed the sign that had the name on it of where we're going. I asked him what it was and was sooooo happy to hear it was Tufano's! The place from the show!

It was some pretty good times. The portions weren't huge but everything was yummy and fast. I'd definitely go back there again if given the chance. Though I think next time I would get the dish Shane ordered. My tortellini alfredo was good but i loooved the sauce on his spinach ravioli.

Things were going pretty well but I noticed my mom called me and I missed it. So on the way home I called her and was told my cousin David from Michigan killed himself. He had been trying to for a while now, maybe 2 years or so that I know of... even on the cruise to Hawai'i he kept saying he was going to just jump off the ship. Well I thought things were getting better and he was supposed to come to the wedding but finally succeeded in his attempts to end it all. I can't imagine what my family there in Michigan who saw him all the time is going through right now but I know it's not good and if you're reading this, please just keep them in your prayers.

Even though it makes me sad to read this now, I'm gonna post a poem I wrote for him about a year ago...


Prayers for David

At night when he’s etching the pain into his deadened skin,
I say a prayer that he’ll discover what it’s like to breathe hope in.
When the tears are falling and his body collapses to the floor,
I imagine God wrapping His arms around him until his cold figure is warm.
When he thinks that rescue is impossible and his life is too far gone,
When he believes everything good has become incredibly wrong,
God will release him from the prison he’s put himself in, and I won't sound the alarms.
I’ll reach my hands out to him, one to hold him tightly, and the other to write love on his arms.

At night when he sees no way out of the shadows growing inside,
And he’s become blinded by sudden darkness, I promise to be his eyes.
When he’s had enough of losing and he cries until he’s numb,
I will find a way to save him, I will kiss the shaking hand that holds the gun.
When the world around him is failing and his beautiful soul turns frail,
When he feels he’s disappearing and that true love does not prevail,
I pray that God will be there to make strong what has become so harmed.
He’ll reach his hands out to him, one to wipe tears away… the other to write love on his arms.

come lay on stuff

So I will be Chrissy Conklin in less than 2 weeks! And then I will be Chrissy Conklin... IN MEXICO. I cannot wait to get there and relax after all the wedding worrying.

I thought with it being so close that I'd have a bit more of the cold feet... that I'd be worrying about the relationship to come... but honestly it's the stupid trivial stuff that seems to be clouding my head at night. Like will it rain or snow? Will more people show up than we got RSVP's for? Will I will be able to move around as freely as I want to in my dress?

It's all lame stuff like that. Which is a good thing I think. Definitely good to sweat the small stuff and not the big thing. I dunno, I mean Shane and I have our troubles just like anyone but it's like hey this was God's will. He brought us together and that's that. I love Shane and he loves me and things will be good in the end.

In other news, the new apartment is looking fabulous. Our new mattress and bedroom furniture arrived last week. (huge thanks to my mom for that amazing wedding gift). It looks beautiful. I can't even believe that room is ours... it looks like a fancy shmancy room you'd only see on tv. And the mattress... oh man. I can't wait to sleep on that thing. Shane and I were having trouble finding something because he likes a firm mattress and I like a plush mattress. Then we went to Harlem Room Place and were shown this awessssssssssome mattress called a Dual Comfort or something like that. One side is firm, the other plush. And what gets me is that my side is the most comfortable I have ever felt on a mattress. *sigh* it's so nice.

Life will be good!

Oh boy oh boy

So I went to see a Dr. Swenson today in Orland about having the surgery to get the cyst removed. He examined it and stated that a surgery is probably not even worth it, there's a 40% chance the cyst will come back anyway.

Boooo.

But today the infection was bad enough to lance. Which was music to my ears. I've never been so excited to get a shot in my tailbone area, be cut open, and have an infection drained. It seriously made my day.

It was a pretty hilarious site to see. Today being St. Patrick's day, I decided to wear the toe socks Christina got me that have these big fuzzy ball like things dangling from them. So there I was, face down on the table, dressed from the waist and below in nothing but my underwear and the fuzzy socks. The nurse was cracking up. lol.

It was a very painful experience but I'm glad I had a song in my head to sing that got me through it, also my mom's hand to hold and squeeze the life out of.

Right now there is ribbon gauze in the wound that I can't take out until tomorrow which means the wound can't start to close until then... today is going by ever so slowly. But the good news is that I will be good and ready for my bachelorette party and should be back to normal in a few days!

If you're wondering what beautiful tune got me through the horrible experience, you can find it here....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCbuRA_D3KU

Absolutely normal chaos

So the wedding is getting closer! Things are gettin crazy!

Shane and I are going to get the marriage license tomorrow morning, I have an appointment for a trial run with my hair stylist on Friday (I'll make the appointment for the rest of the girls and I on the wedding day if I like what they do), and I'm going for my first alterations on my dress on Monday!

And I had a fun day at the mall with my bridesmaid kristen today. We went to get shoes to go with her dress, she got these really pretty silver shoes... they look amazzzzzzzzzing with the dress!

I also had my makeup done at a cosmetic department in a store for the first time. It was fun! kristen wanted something from MAC cosmetics... I think it was in Macy's, and while she was deciding what to get, I noticed the woman that was helping her had awesome lipstick on... it was the color I had been searching and searching and searching for foreverrrrrrrrr. I started looking through the lipsticks to see what it could be and I found a color that looked great, I asked the woman what it was and she said "That's called Myth, it's what I'm wearing." I told her that was cool cuz I was going to say her lips looked awesome. lol. So she said she'd do my lips for me if I wanted and I said YES! ... turns out it's all about layering. I used to see directions at kohl's for how to achieve this certain look and they always said to add a gloss on top of the color and I thought it was stupid... I learned today I was wrong.

First you put on a darker lip liner but not as just the liner... cover your whole lip with it. Then blot the lighter colored lipstick on top of it and blend it in (don't just apply it all over like you normally would) and then put the gloss on top. ... my lips looked AMAZING. And what gets me is... it lasted for hours! Usually lipstick or gloss comes off if I even just talk too much, or it gets all over my teeth but not this! it's all about the layers! And it's fun cuz you can make the shade lighter or darker simply by how much of the lipstick you apply. The undertoned lipliner can either shine through and make it darker or you can apply more lipstick and the lip will look lighter!

I know that was a lot of info but I'm so excited I finally found out how to achieve the look I want with my lips!

Yay for lips! yay for wedding!

On the pretty electronic...

My newest music obsession is Lady Gaga.

She's pretty weird and her fashion sense is not exactly normal but she's quickly becoming known for her skillz as a live performer. She does a lot of dancing in her acts and never lip syncs. She may not have the best voice ever but she's impressive and entertaining and I cannot get her music out of my head. I'd love to get her cd The Fame, now available on amazon. (that was a hint to Shane. lol.)

Anyhoo, here's a link to a really odd performance. The sound is kind of weird but whatevs.

Her weirdness reminds me of Madonna. It took me off guard in a way that left me intrigued.

Transformers activate!

So Shane and I finally saw Transformers.

First of all, this movie made absolutely no sense whatsoever. Both Shane and I agree it was totally messed up. Whoever wrote it must have been on some type of drug. I have no idea how the hideous script and storyline were accepted.

Probably because the visuals were stunning and they figured the story didn't matter as long as the robots and cars were awesome and Megan Fox was hardly wearing any clothes.

Neither Shane nor I can figure out why so many people think Megan Fox is hot. She has big empty "I'm dumb" looking eyes and looks completely fake. The only thing we can figure is that people like her because she dresses like a stripper. Seriously, google search her images... there is not a single shot of her not looking like a tramp.

There was a blonde girl with a supporting role in the movie who was much more attractive and actually wore clothes. Why is no one talking about her?

I gotta say though, Shia Labuff or whatever his name is surprised me. He seem to be insanely annoying and depressed. Since Even Stevens on the Disney Channel, I have not seen that dude smile. But I think besides the amazing visuals, his character was one of the only good things in Transformers.

I hope the sequal features more of him, blondie, and special FX, and a lot less of Megan Fox and INSANELY crappy storylines.

Jorb

I feel completely useless lately.

A job and a new computer would really make me feel better.

Also cupcakes.

Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer.

I miss getting out. I miss warm weather and baseball games.

Yes, the Cubs are my favorite but half-price Mondays at Comiskey are the best. And I will say, The Sox have an AMAZING intro. It always gives me chills. I get the same feeling I used to get for the starting line up for the Chicago Bulls when dudes like MJ, Armstrong, Grant, and Pippen were there. It's good times.

I also miss going to concerts, just being out. I miss Switchfoot. Jon Foreman's been doing solo stuff lately and then he did this Fiction Family thing which is him and a guy from another band. Fiction Family is actually much better than Foreman's solo stuff. He had 3 good songs on his own and that was it. He tried too hard to be intense. I mean I love the guy but he's just no fun without Switchfoot.

Anyway, back to topic here... There's always a point in the midst of Winter where I start to crave summer and I feel like I will go nuts without it. This craving has begun and I just want to go out and see a game or rollerblade or even just be able to go to Wal-mart without 2 tons of winter gear on.

Also, my title for this post is awesome but sadly no one will get why. Unless Jon Foreman is reading my blog.

Shush

So I'm posting at another blog.

But this one isn't mine. A friend of mine posts there with some other peeps and I was asked to post there as well. And so I am. And you can't stop me! This now brings my blog total to 2. I only have TWO. So I don't want to hear any lip from anyone! Or there will be throttling!

http://disgustabunk.com/

Story Side:B

Ron McClelland, the bassist in Story Side:B passed away on the 18th. He was on a cruise, playing some basketball when he collapsed and died.

I really enjoy their music and am putting a song of theirs on my profile in his memory.

Press play and wait a few seconds for it to start if you're interested in hearing it.

I'll Do What I Can

You be Earth and I'll be the moon, you'll see...
That I'll do what I can to pull you in close to me.
And when the waves in your oceans are rising,
And the people are jumping away from the ground with their feet,
I'll know that my magic is working,
And that we've made a connection, a little non-locality.

From here I can see that you're blue for the most part,
Could you use some cheering up?
I'll do what I can to shine some light on you
When the nights are growing dark and the sun is hiding too much.

The seasons are changing,
What was warm has grown so cold.
Everything is spinning, things are out of control.
Leaves are delicately falling,
Then the snow comes rushing in.
A symphony plays the sounds of nature as we continue to spin.
When the weather won't behave and you're feeling like a kicked around ball,
Take a look around you, I'll be there through it all.

For in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?

Haven't posted in a while because there's not really much to my life right now. Work used to take up a big chunck of that and now I don't have it anymore. There's the wedding but there's not much to write about there. The details don't exactly make for a thrilling blog post.

So for the most part I've just been reading a lot lately. I started getting into near-death exeriences a few years ago after reading What Dreams May Come and I began to write a short story that kind of has something to do with those experiences. I haven't touched my story in a while though. At least a year. But that changed a couple of months ago when I saw a doctor on tv talking about a study he's conducting. It will be the largest NDE study on cardiac arrest survivors that has ever been conducted. This doctor, Dr. Sam Parnia, also talked about a book he wrote called What Happens When We Die. Shane got it for me for Christmas and it completely totally intrigued me. I also noticed as I began reading it that I would be able to use it to help my unfinished short story move along.

But besides the book just being able to help me out, it pulled me in. I ordered 2 more books that deal with the same subject that I can't wait to read and in 1 day I read one book that focuses entirely on one NDE case... it made me cry. No book has ever affected me the way this book has. But I will be posting more about all this later. This subject has seriously captivated me and I want to write a long, well thought out, educating post on the matter.

Until then this is the post you get. :p

I'm also reading A Prayer for Owen Meany which Shane gave to me a year ago and I kept forgetting to read. It's fiction and the movie Simon Birch is loosely based off it. Some of it is a little hard to accept but for the most part it's a good book. Talks a lot about religion. I just finished reading a huge chapter about some kids putting on a play, The Christmas Carol, and doing a big nativity scene for a church Christmas pageant. In the midst of all this, the writer goes off on his own thoughts about other things and he talks about Mary. He doesn't really go into any of this but I was reminded of my own thoughts about Mary and women in general.

Men get to do a lot of things. The man is the head of the house, the world is known to be ruled by them. But the thing that always touches me and makes me incredibly proud to be a woman... was the fact that when Jesus was taking his long walk to crucifixion, when men were cold and brutal, mocking him, slashing him, literally kicking him when he was down, it was the women who would stay out of this. It was the women who would not hurt him, it was women who would go after his death to annoint the body with sweet spices, it was the women who actually cared.

We may not be perfect but we have strong hearts and that's a pretty powerful thing.

Well I will end my random thoughts with a favorite quote from the current book I'm reading.

"Anyone can be sentimental about the Nativity; any fool can feel like a Christian at Christmas. But Easter is the main event; if you don't believe in the resurrection, you are not a believer."

Fave videos of '08

Watch them even if you think you've already seen them. :p

Not in any order...

The best dance of the year. I love the story the dance tells. It's about a business man who's in love with his work. The wife begs him to stay, to just spend some time with her but he has to go make the moneys. There's even a point in there where he manipulates her into thinking it's going to be okay and then he rips her heart out. *sniff* short dance, lots of drama.



One of the best car commercials ever!



My very favorite commercial of the year...



Fanmade ipod commercial



A fanmade Ron/Hermione video. Shane will love the song in it. (there's an intro with stupid music) but after that, it's all good. Amazing editing.



And finally Christian the lion. (Christina should watch this!)

Here's the story first

In 1969, John Rendall and Ace Berg saw a lion cub for sale in Harrods. Cramped and lonely in a small cage, they decided to bring it home.
A local vicar allowed them to exercise the cub, now named Christian, in the curch grounds but he very quickly became too big for their flat. The only thing they could do was try and reintroduce him to Africa, which they managed to do. A year later they wanted to visit him but were told that he was now the head of his own pride, completely wild and would not recognize them anymore. They wanted to try to find him anyway. 2 minutes into the video we find out what happens when they do...

It's been fun

Everyone's been on Christmas vacation and I got to see people for longer periods of time than I normally do. It's been extremely insanely awesomely fun hanging out with Shane, Christina, Andy, and Brian all the time and seeing Kristen and Jim too. It will all be over starting Monday though and I'll be back to spending my days alone in the house looking for jobs online, doing wedding things, and other stuff.

On the one hand, I'm looking forward to just relaxing and reading, doing some new paintings on the awesome canvases Brian got me, playing some Guitar Hero, and experimenting with recipes. But on the other hand, I will be very sad and lonely at first. I miss all this human interaction. I'm at the point where I want a job for the purpose of interaction more than anything else. Yea it sucks not having money, but it's depressing on a whole other level not having people.