Thank goodness its thursday. In the middle of weekday madness, only having one class, and at 2 at that, is such a relief. Today there is a book fair fundraiser for the local library. Every book except a few is a dollar apiece. HEAVEN!! $5 to get in as well. I think I'll take 20. Surely I won't need more than 15 books to add to my collection. I'd take 40...maybe I'll take 40 -- maybe I should go rearrange my bookcases and figure out exactly how much room I have to put them. There's always room for more. I'll just build some wall shelves or something! More news on this when I get back from the hunt!

I really do not want to go to class today. Why should I...I'm having a perfectly wonderful time reading sappy love stories. Not romances -- those are rediculous. But Pride and Prejudice will suffice, and Jane Eyre, and Emma, and Little Women. What is wrong with a book that imposes a moral? Some consider it Victorian and old-fashioned. OH well...There's something refreshing about a method of entertainment that takes its influence and responsiblility seriously. One of my favorites (I keep trying to spell it with an "ou" -- too many british novels) is "An Old Fashioned Girl" by Louisa May Alcott. It goes to great pains to instill the idea that values and morals are much more important than being fashionable. All of her children's books have a second half that shows them making adult decisions, and all of her later characters are my age. I think C.S. Lewis was wise when he said that any book that is good for children should be equally applicable to an adult. What is wrong with morals and values and sacrifice and virtue being good and proper. I turned on my television last evening, something I rarely do anymore, and I was reminded WHY I don't watch television -- the majority of it isn't worth watching. Anyway -- I must get off my soapbox and into the shower. More on this subject later..

I'm very tired. Why? No clue. I'm sleeping...taking evening naps and everything. I've become the smoothie goddess. I bought a new blender -- give me anything and I'll puree it. It's very fun. My current favorite recipe? Take 5 icecubes, 6 frozen strawberries, one banana and a healthy splash of banana/strawberry/orange/pineapple juice. Blend until creamy -- enjoy! Very good. Once I get tired of strawberries, I'll experiment with the raspberries and berry blends in my freezer. Oh, and who knew how many varieties of "cream of" soup they have. I had "cream of shrimp" the other day. Very tasty -- even little bits of pureed shrimp in there. I highly recommend -- don't leave it warming on the stove though -- it develops a personality and subculture of its own in remarkably short time (like 20 minutes and it was shrimp gelatin). Makes you wonder what its doing in your stomach...

Term Paper Madness

I wrote my term paper, handed it in on time and everything, It's official title: Claudio Monteverdi: Il ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria. What was it really about? Not so sure anymore. It was a case of -- I checked out all of my resources weeks ago, and they proceeded to sit around my apartment so that I felt like I was actually doing something. Wednesday I finally went and checked out some scores (ie: printed copies of music for the full opera), recordings and videos -- in the hopes that they would help narrow the topic down. Thursday: my class is cancelled, which leaves all day to write paper. Time spent watching video - 2 hours. Time spent putting clever little post it notes all over book to use as quotes: 3 hours. Time I actually started working on the research project now due in less than 24 hours? 9:00pm. Procrastination works for me. At 1:00am I decided that I was too tired to type anymore, and that I just needed to lay down for a sec....which turned into about 7 hours. Amazingly I spent the whole night curled up on my couch -- which for those of you who know my couch, not such an easy proposition. So I woke up, skipped a class and finished my term paper at 12:35 -- jumped in the shower while it was printing, and got it to class on time....yay me. Now I can have my weekend. I'm glad that's over. Now all I have to do is get ready for finals...ooh and study for one more blasted italian vocabulary quiz.....

I'm so happy that I voted. Apparently Texas was one of those states that decided whether the republicans control the Legislature or not. Woohoo -- like one vote in a sea of republican votes is going to count. But I'm glad I did anyway. Sorry Daryl...but I'm really hoping that if the congress gets their act together they can pass the partial birth abortion ban. Maybe they can do something about human cloning, and keep the institution of marriage and family a priority. On the downside, we do have a greater chance of going to war now -- and we can forget about the environment. (The prevailing attitude here in George Dubleya's state is "Air Pollution? What air pollution? sniff...sniff..Smells fine to me -- besides the wind currents blow it all to Mexico anyway.") Oh well...the ups and downs of politics. And best of all...now that the elections are over, we can go back to tv without "Rick Perry SAYS he supports gun control.....but last term, instead of voting....he was out SHOOTING ANIMALS AT THE ZOO WITH A MISSILE LAUNCHER! Rick Perry. Not as good as he seems. (paid for by the committee to elect Tony Sanchez)" I hate political commercials. By the end of the last few months I didn't want to vote for either of them. I would have voted for a ficus tree had one been running this election. But, c'est la vie. Thank heavens we'll go back to car commercials. The volume is slightly lower than that of political ads

I'm tired. I really have nothing profound. I did vote. That took bloody forever -- I went 4 different places to figure out which precinct I'm now in (I've moved three times since I registered here). When I finally did vote I got a sticker. I want 3 stickers. One for each polling facility I visited.

Hi everyone again. Isn't November a wonderful month? It means that school is within sight of being out! Christmas is coming, going home for Thanksgiving...and I've actually studied some for my polisci test tomorrow. Not enough, mind you -- but some. I hate that class. If I pass, I'll be happy. Actually so far I have a B. No problem. In fact...I have a B in everything. Except Choir and Voice -- but that's 5 credits there. Should be more than enough to keep my GPA up. I hope. I just want this semester to be over with so I can get on with my easy semester and graduate. I have senioritus, can you tell?

I went to see "THE RING" last night. It was after all, Halloween, and one must see a nerve thrilling, spine tingling, hair-standing-on-end movie for kicks now that we're all to grown up for trick-or-treat. (Or at least we like to tell ourselves that). It was not bad. I'm more of a 6th Sense, or The Gift kind of scary movie fan...this one was borderline -- not enough gore to be a slasher, but not enough plot to be a suspense in the above sense. But it was fun to be all screamy, and having a full house of shreaking Baylorites didn't hurt the mood at all. I did find a few nits with it. (I won't put any spoilers in for those that havne't seen more than a trailer). How exactly does the lady falling off the cliff come into the "dream" images, when the lady was clearly alive when...oh wait, I cant' tell you that. Ok...so how exactly does the psychotic dream get on tape in the first place. And thirdly....my biggest problem with the movie...(Ok, people who are planning on seeing the movie had better stop reading right now, because what I'm about to say will clearly ruin the ending for you. So you are now properly warned. I'm not kidding....stop reading....no really stop...ok, if you insist) What ever happened to clear cut horror movies where the main character figures out how to ward off evil, fight off the bad guys, seal the mummies back in the crypts, the ghosts back in the tombs, kill the murderer, lock up the psycho, and throw the chalice down a chasm, thereby saving the world no matter what the sacrifice? Apparently we aren't doing that anymore, because the main point of this movie seems to be "oh well, who cares how many people end up dying from this thing -- as long as we're still safe."Huh? So much for archtypal heros. In a previous life, the heroine would have gone -- oh my gosh this thing is killing off everyone I love...I"M GOING TO STOP IT SO NO ONE ELSE GETS HURT. Nope. Not here. Uh-uh. In fact they're going to make darn sure to keep the evil spirit thing happy so they don't end up in the same boat as everyone else. Actually, that pretty much fits into our current thought process. One might get into an interesting discussion about this -- the "every man for himself" trend. Anyway -- no preaching...no preaching. But anyway -- go see it. Tell me what you think. Leave a comment (you read that? what's with all the non-commenting these days? -- not you Daryl...I saw yours :-) Anyway -- Going to take a hot bath and try not to dream of being trapped in a well. Oh dear....my tv just went static.....

Amazingly enough, a stuffed animal may be my biggest seller of anything I've sold on ebay to date. It's up to 10.50, and there's still half a day to go yet. Is that exciting or what? I need to list more stuff. Seriously. But Taz? Why is he so popular all of a sudden? Anyway...

TGIF! Which means tomorrow I get to sleep in....no wait, King's Club at Mission Waco. But then I get to come home and ..... write a research paper! But sunday I can .... get up and go to church, study for a Political Science test, Go to youth group and then.......in all my free time between 8 and 12 I can....write a research paper! Wow -- my weekend is suddenly very depressing. I was really looking forward to it..ah well

Alright.. we all survived another Wednesday! The rest of the week will be downhill from here! Speaking of weather (Teri) its was strange here. I walked to choir this morning, and it was clear and cool and sunny -- but by the time I'd gotten out of the class, it was overcast and threatening to rain. Strange how quickly it changed. I love cool weather! I have tons of winter clothes (being from the North). An another interesting thing...why is it that I'm always cold when the weather is warm, but as soon as it drops below 65 I'm all toasty. Northerners do know how to dress for the element -- and how to do it so you aren't too bulky to be comfortable. Here are some tricks, as long as the weather stays this nice:

1.Wear nylons/hose underneath your jeans (old ski trick)

2.Wear silk -- a thin knit silk shirt is twice as warm as a cotton sweater

3. LAYER -- its much easier to take stuff off if you're too warm!

4.Two pairs of socks...closed toe shoes.

5.Wear a hat...you lose more than half of your body head through your head...

So, I guess I'll go to sleep now that I've sent the rest of you there with this diatribe! Happy cold weather everyone!