Saturday, April 25, 2009

It amazes me how many old choir songs that I think I've forgotten...that is, until I hear them again. Something about music (especially music that you spent a period of time intentionally memorizing) seems to stay in long-term memory. When I did my clinical in the Alzheimer's ward, I worked with people who couldn't remember how to eat, but could sing every verse of an old hymn. Hearing these songs again brings back memories; experiencing their sweet, rich melodies and harmonies makes me miss being around people who appreciate the depth of choral music.

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

I want beautiful feet.


I have a new favorite artist: Lecrae. Usually, hip-hop isn't my thing, but when you can rap well about secular humanism and reformed theology, I'm down with it. (or whatever lingo would effectively communicate that I really appreciate the way he's bringing the Gospel to the streets.) I'm listening to this one a lot. The whole album, Rebel, is really good; and the DWYL song is among the top played in my itunes. =)

Monday, April 20, 2009

A curious day, indeed.

As I registered for classes this fall today, it occurred to me: I'M MOVING OUT OF THE HOUSE AT THE END OF THE SUMMER. Not like this hasn't crossed my mind before, but it struck me afresh. I'm finally done with high school. At 17, I'm going to be living in a foreign country at least 6 hours away from my family, or anyone I've known for any real period of time. Would I have guessed this time last year that this would be my plan? That I would ditch my ideas of a Biology major for something so peculiar as English Lit.? The Lord works in mysterious ways, and I'm sure glad He knows what He's doing.

Today was quite eventful: We spent the morning trying first to run cardstock through our finicky copy machine, then trying to remove said cardstock from the machine, then trying vainly to find the screwdriver head that got dropped somewhere in the machine while vainly trying to find/remove the jammed paper. As of right now, both the head and the paper are somewhere in the machine, and several hours of trying to find them proved frustratingly fruitless.

Meanwhile, a disheveled-looking young man walked slowly by on main street; hesitated for a moment, debating inwardly, then strode in the door, a well-worn briefcase in hand. In a thick, foreign accent, he told us that he had just been released by the police, hadn't eaten all day, and needed to get to Winnepeg. (Jenni and I, who till this unusual entrance, have been completely engrossed with our seperate tasks, look at each other with the same "So, what do we do now?" look on our faces.) My dad joins us and while Jenni runs out to the grocery store for some food, takes Sebastian (which we later learned was his name) back to his office so more of his story can be discerned. The details are a bit sketchy, but we confirmed enough of his story with the RCMP that we decided it was legitimate. Besides, if you were scamming someone, why would the first words out of your mouth have to do with how you've recently been arrested?

Sebastian is from Holland, come over to work with ex-convicts. Ironically enough, he ended up getting involved somehow with a stolen car (or so we were told) and got arrested with a couple other guys. He was held in Edmonton for 3 weeks, then sent to the court building here in town. Apparently he was cleared of all charges and told he could leave, but being unfamiliar with the area, having no money, car, ect., he decided to walk around to determine his next course of action. (which is how he found us...a church on main street.) We fed him, gave him some money for dinner and got him a room at a local hotel for the night.

Who knows what tomorrow may bring?

Monday, April 6, 2009

Welcome back.

We survived the long late night/morning and it was a wonderful privilege to be able to welcome the team back! Praise God, I got to bed at around 4, managing to get a few hours of sleep in before work. One of my projects for today has been typing up each individual's account of the highlights of the trip. Not only fascinating (to get to see the trip through each team member's eyes and unique writing style/way of communicating complicated thoughts and feelings) but absolutely exciting to re-write. To get to read about their newly awakened desire for spreading Christ in Cebu is truly a sweet thing. I can't believe I get "paid" to do this.

Sunday, April 5, 2009

It's late Sunday night and I'm forcing myself to stay up later than I have for a long time. The Cebu team is flying into Edmonton at around 1:30, so we're going to start heading to the airport at 11:30. We anticipate getting back into Vegreville at around 3 tomorrow morning. Because I have to work tomorrow, I'm been trying to make up for the rest I'm losing tonight by cat-napping all day...so far I've gotten about 6 hours of light sleep. Beyond that, it was obvious I'm too full of anticipation to get any rest. Hopefully this "high" will last me through the morning. Which leads to to a question: Why do I seem to blog when I can't sleep? Or better yet: Is that as totally irrelevant to the rest of this post as it seems to me?
I'm going to go eat something.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009



It didn't work on the ACT, so here goes...


What I found interesting was the side note on the website:
Primary Function: Introverted Intuition
Population: 1.5% (2.5% male, 0.5% female)
Apparently I'm not only uncommon for the population, I also have an odd personality for a girl. People like this are further described as " introspective, analytical, determined persons with natural leadership ability. Being reserved, they prefer to stay in the background while leading. Strategic, knowledgeable and adaptable,...are talented in bringing ideas from conception to reality. They expect perfection from themselves as well as others and are comfortable with the leadership of another so long as they are competent...can also be described as decisive, open-minded, self-confident, attentive, theoretical and pragmatic." Seems to fit. Jane Austen is said to be this personality type, as is her famous Mr. Darcy. For myself, I wonder how a fictional character can truly be classified as having a personality type...