End-of-the-semester review!!!

It is March 17th, 2008, St. Patrick's Day, and I just remembered something that I wanted to be in my end-of-the-semester reflection blog entry, so I thought, "Why don't I just start on that entry now and add things as they come along?" We'll see how that goes, but I know now tha I definately won't forget this... I found out this semester that the solo violinist for the Treasure Planet soundtrack is the same guy that I saw perform live with a cellist at the Scottish Highland Games at Stone Mountain, Fall Break of my first semester! My mom bought one of their duet cds, and it's great. This guy is, like, one of my fiddling heroes, and I find that not only is he awesome, but he's famous, too! And I saw him!

Movies I saw for the first time:
Gladiator
The Truman Show Cinderella Man
Serenity
For the Title!!!
While you were Sleeping
Minority Report
And, I saw the first two of the LOTR movies again. :)

This semester I:

Got my wisdom teeth out!

began the semester with a boyfriend! That was cool. :)

Began to make some more sandwiches in the cafeteria! They've been putting out one really good cheese a day for a while now. These choice cheeses are the one that now go on my sandwiches. They are either provolone, swiss, or pepper jack. If there is swiss, then I will make a mushroom swiss sandwich. Also, they've been putting out much, much better deli meats. Then there is roast beef out, I like to toast some wheat bread, put some cream cheese on both pieces, grill up roast beef, tomatos, ad mozerella and cheddar cheese, and voila, a wonderful, delicious, gooey, cheesy goodness of a sandwich. I love it.

...had my first night class. Teaching English as a Second Language. I'm really glad that I got into the class, because I had been third on the waiting list. Thanks, God!

performed in the Disney show! That was a blast.

tweaked and memorized and new alphabet/code.

was influenced by Ian Benardo, Bryan Fellow, and Shannon. Don't know them? You should.

...did not see a single movie in theaters. I think that's a record.

went to Junior/Senior. With Nathan!

attended the Scourge conference and was jolted out of my life. Deep, dark stuff was brought inside and made real to me.

registered to vote.

took my secend semester of voice and performed with Molly! Pie Jesu... it goes up to a nearly unattainable A flat. Thanks to Mrs. Keck's instruction and encouragement, though, it became less and less unattainable.

...became itchy to get out of the country, specifically to Russia again.

created a gmail account.

strengthened and began new relationships.

came to appreciate human moments even more. These moments are the moments when you connect with another person, a stranger on a more personal level than usual. Example: striking up a random conversation with the girls working at Starbucks that really wasn't all that shallow. Meeting the ice cream guy, Josh, at Clumpies and talking with him for a while about something you'd talk with your avereage friend about. Those times are just good and they remind me that that person is a human too with their own problems and joys. I think that these moments come easiest between people of our generation because we are usually open and adventerous. I love these.

...looked up merchandise fromt he Beijing Olympics and gave a little impromptu report about the Olympics mascots to Millie, Devon, and Molly. :) (Thanks for listening, guts)

researched the choreography of Michael Kidd for a report, but even more exciting and odd... I researched the choreography of Prabhu Deva. (Look him up) I also choreographed his song, "Kaluuri Vaanil," while trying to use some of his style, but also throwing in a lot of cheerleading moves. Oh yeahhh.

bought new brown flip flops for about $3 over Spring Break. They gave me blisters between my toes, and they're still there. I think they got worse yesterday... I also bought two dresses over Spring Break. They were both on sale, and togehter, they were around $50. Good deal!

...went down the walking trail in downtown Dayton for the first time.

went roller skating. Twice!

went to Pocket with my class SGA and had chocolate fondue on the trail. No joke. We went and hiked out to a big flat rock on the river, and John Moore and Jeremiah starting pulling fruit, fondue sticks, a fondue pot, and a cook stove out of their backpacks! After the fondue, Ryan and I put our feet itn he really cold water until they were numb and didn't hurt anymore. When I finally took my feet out of the water, I saw these little worm-like things on them, realized they were baby leeches, and freaked out!! So, I've never even seen a leech, let alone had one on me, sucking my life away! I jumped up, squeeled, shrieked, acted very girly, and shrieked some more. I was traumatized. Thankfully, they were only baby ones. If they'ed been adults, I think I might have fainted. Well, maybe not. I mean, now that I've actually met these vile, disgusting, ne'er-do-wells, I think I could handle them in the future. I hope that I never have to again, though. Gross. Ick. Blech and hiss.

This semester I was really happy when I got to see some of my good friends from Bryan who have gone away: Nate Madden, Sam Kirchman (twin), Dan Estes, and Calista Turner! And Kevin Bradley came to speak at one of our class chapels about the tornadoes at Union. His talk was very captivating. The whole room was quiet and everyone was hanging on to all that he said.
It has been a good semester. A good year. As summer looms ahead with its uncertainties, I begin to miss school already. I'm going to miss my friends so much. I'm going to miss seeing so many familiar faces. I'm going to miss the grills in the cafeteria and having all of that food at my fingertips, 7-7. I'm going to miss having a whole building devoted to the arts, filled with pianos and students having music lessons. I'm going to miss the huge deciduous trees and the grassy bowl. I'm going to miss those cats... Well, no I won't miss the cats. But I will miss the dorm life and the community, the goodness of Bryan College. The closeness. My dear, dear friends.

...academics? Why yes, I did learn something in my classes. I learned (or rather, began to learn) the preterit and subjunctive verb forms in Spanish. I became a little more cultured through Oral Interpretation. I learned about escatology in NT Lit.

I bought a WWF shirt that reads, "Start a Revolution." Now, I am the tree hugger of our group. When we went to the mall last week, everyone showed me every WWF/eco-friendly shirt on the racks.

I caught the very end of the bouncy balls falling on video.