Also...

I sort of forgot.  I went to the Rose Parade this year--

--I say this year like it's something I've always meant to go to and just didn't get a chance until this year.  False.  I didn't even know what it was until I was informed the people we were staying with were going, and that meant that I was going, too.  I had to have it explained to me.  Yeah.  That's how much I know about things related to sports.--

--and took some photos.  As you can see, it is a parade.  Called the Rose Parade.  People carried around those letters stating such.  So... that was exciting.  Actually, it was very interesting.  All of the floats were made from natural things, such as, you know, roses or whatever.

The actual interesting part was that we camped out on the sidewalk before the parade.  And when I say, "before the parade," what I mean is "for the entire NIGHT before the parade."  Not my idea.  But anyhow, one of those blue lumps is me, sleeping soundly.  I slept pretty much all night, because I have magical sleeping abilities, pretty much.  I'm sorry for everyone else who apparently can't sleep on sidewalks, but when I'm tired, I sleep.  It's awesome.

This last photo was me waking up in the morning.  I don't know if you can tell, but I look... like I just woke up.  I literally rolled out of bed and ta-da! there was the parade.  We were right on the street, so when all the police cars came by and stuff started happening, I woke up and got a front row seat.

I... will probably never do that again.  Even though I did sleep fairly soundly for six hours, I didn't think it was worth the six hours.  Then again, I was the girl at the parade who was saying, "Wait, the Rose Bowl is today? I've heard about that!  Football, right?"  I had no idea who was playing in the Rose Bowl or even that the Rose Parade was somehow related to the Rose Bowl.  Truth be told, I probably didn't deserve to be there.  Other, more worthy sports fans will cry at this account.  I'm sorry, sports fans.  It just sort of... happened.

Oh, Euty

Last Sunday we were talking about Eutychus in our Sunday School class, and I was talking to the girls about being examples.  I brought up Euty because I was reading the story the other day and it made me ponder more about examplehood.  Not that that's a word.  But what's interesting to me about the story of Euty is that he wasn't paying attention to Paul, or got tired, or whatever happened, and fell asleep and ended up taking a tumble into the yard.

How this relates to examples:  So, say Eutychus had a younger brother or something who saw the severity of what happened to Euty (whether or not Eutychus actually died or was just presumed dead was a matter of some debate at the breakfast table this morning, interestingly enough) but then thought, "Hey, it's okay, he ended up alive.  I'm going to sit in that window sill where I can breathe some fresh air and I'll just make SURE to not fall asleep, since I know what could happen if I did, but even if I did, obviously nothing too horrible happens if I get all Humpty Dumpty."  All good in theory, but what happens if said younger brother actually does have a great fall and can't be brought back up alive again?  What then?

That's the thing.  God in His graciousness gives second chances, and sometimes someone takes a fall, as it were, and it works out fine, but sometimes things don't work out so well for the faller.  And that's why Christians have to be careful to not be the ones to make it seem like it's okay to fall in the first place.  Because the guy who follows (FALLows?)  after might not escape unscathed.

I don't think my Sunday School class necessarily got what I was saying, but hey, they got the gist of it.  I think.  I hope.

Also, I call Eutychus by his way-cooler nickname "Euty" because when I was a youngster I used to have a book of Bible poems by someone named John Knapp, and it's AWESOME.  Seriously.  You slash your children slash any person would love it.  He writes poems about several obscure persons from the Bible (Ethan the Ezrahite for one) and writes ditties to help you remember the lineage of Abraham's offspring, the churches of Revelation, and why Miriam got leprosy in the Bible instead of being turned into a pillar of pepper.  Trust me, it makes sense.  Anyhow, in one of his poems it references Eutychus and endearingly calls him Euty.  Ever since I first read that I've taken to also calling him Euty.  It has a much nicer ring to it.

Another day

I have been exceedingly busy recently, working on some projects which are nearing completion.  I must say, projects are fun to dream about, but the execution thereof is usually trickier than I expect.

Which means...  this morning I woke up at 4:30, worried that I wouldn't have time to finish everything I wanted to get done.  Thankfully, it paid off and I've accomplished a lot!

None of this is very interesting, but since I've been awake since 4:30 I don't think I should be expected to have profound thoughts.

That's all.

Let it snow!

I love snow.  I hate to drive in it, but in general, those big fluffy flakes that you see outside?  Huge fan.

Only problem is, snow makes me want to be inside, by a fire, reading a book, or possibly napping.  In other words, I don't feel like doing anything whilst it's snowing prettily.

Too bad life always must go on.

Jumble

Sometimes in my head the thoughts don't come clearly. Especially late at night, when I lay awake and think and I'm sure that if I just thought hard enough, I could categorize my life into neat little boxes, all the beads sorted out separately, so there aren't any orange ones in the purple box, or blue ones with the yellows. It's not possible of course (though hope springs eternal), but life would be more tidy, less bother. Not that life was meant to be a bother, of course, but it sometimes feels like that ride when you were a kid and you're spinning all around and you desperately want to put your arms up in the air, because in the pictures it looks like so much fun when people do that, but you just can't let go of the handle bars, because you're sure you'd fall out. But you can't. You know that.

Any way you look at it, though, there's that thread running through everything, that silver thread that keeps everything bound to reality, and when you stop to sort it out, to try to get your beads on it (which makes no sense, really, because why am I talking about beads?) you realize how strange your life has become. The Lord knows best, we say this again and again, and even mostly believe it, but when you look back you realize that you'd never have chosen what He ended up choosing for you. Your life would have been tidier, with point A coming firmly before point B, and on and on and on it goes through the alphabet, ending with Z for Rapture (which makes sense, because the Rapture is the end of our earthly life, even though it doesn't start with Z at all), but here looking behind you, even if you're only up to the letter I, or maybe J, you can already see that life doesn't follow a human pattern even thus far. His thoughts are higher than ours? That's the only explanation. Plus, you are where you are (I am where I am) and somehow it makes sense. His ways are higher, and they're always better than the best (because only the best gets to be better than itself).

Which leads us to ponder, why don't we trust all the time? because if we can see, even now at the J or K stage of life, that His arms are always carrying us through, wouldn't it make most sense if we like Him do His perfect work all the time? Today, tomorrow, and even on alternating Mondays (though those are hard days due to life being what it is), we should trust. We mostly don't (I mostly don't, but you can judge for yourself what you do, and don't do or trust).

So that brings us back to the beads, all in their little boxes, all mixed up because we sin. All mixed up because we live. Living isn't bad, it's just messy. The peach of on part of life gets mixed in with the maroon, and we just have to face up to the fact that it's OK. That even when we don't sleep (which is often) we'll be OK. That's what concealer was invented for (even if you don't wear it, it's nice to know it's around), and that's what coffee was invented for (even if you don't drink it, and miss it, and sometimes wonder why you gave it up in the first place), and that's why people don't expect much from a tired girl. Somehow this has nothing to do with what I was first thinking of--

--when I woke up. Even though it's the middle of the night. They say wonders never cease. I wish ceasing would be the thing that happens to insomnia.

Some signs I'm getting older

1) I really like cooked mushrooms. I used to hate them.
2) When someone called my office yesterday to say that her husband has passed away, I can this close to crying. It was so sad!
3) I realized I don't like the Disney channel any more.
4) I actually take the time to weigh my options about things.
5) Also, I don't just read everything with words. I just pick the ones that I deem worth my time.
6) I sleep all the time (nothing new, I'm just stating a fact).
7) And (drum roll, please) I even eat raw mushrooms. And (mostly) like them. Ipes!

I'm back!

Tired, but back. I had an amazing two weeks, and now I just want to nap for two weeks. Alas, not so fast, thanks to work and life.

Anyhow, it was a whirlwind of awesome, truth be told. I'll outline the trip later, but essentially I flew out after work on the 30th, was in Italy for a week, and then was in Romania from the 6th up until the 13th, after which point I flew home to a wedding on Saturday, and made it home in time for work yesterday morning!

Like I said: nap needed. At work today I actually spent some time napping on the floor of one of the offices. It was refreshing.

Like they always say, though, there's no place like home!

Zzz

It's no secret that I love my sleep, and I need it. It seems a little dramatic to need sleep as much as I do, but it's a true thing, my friends. I need my sleep.

So when I get the chance to go to bed early, say, maybe 7:30 or 8:00, I'm willing to jump for it. Which is why, when my 85-year-old grandpa called me on Monday night at 7:15, I was all ready for bed. When I told him I think he just about choked. Of course, when I arrived at his house to help him garden (why are my grandparents up later than I, and why are they gardening? I don't know) some fifteen or twenty minutes later, he was surprised to see me in real clothes.

"You could have come over in your pajamas, we wouldn't care."

"Uh, your neighbors might mind having a hobo in the area."

He's deaf, so he didn't really hear what I said, but I'm pretty sure his neighbors would rather not see me wandering around in my pajamas. Though their immediate neighbors don't speak any English, so I guess even if they cared, they wouldn't be able to complain to my grandparents. It was the rest I was worried about.

So, I helped them hang some tomato plants, anchor a shepherd's crook, and spray some hibiscus plants for Japanese Beetles. (Would that be hibisci?) Then we sat down for a few minutes, my grandparents and I, and visited, until finally I got tired, and so did they. When I left at around 8:30 we were all planning on going straight to bed.

It's times like this that make me realize why it is that people see me as being such an old person. Then I think, "Yeah, but I need the sleep, so I guess I'll just not succumb to the wakeful peer pressure and sleep anyhow." That's usually when I leave whatever is going on and find a bed. Or some chairs to lay down on. (Lie down on?) The way I see it, He gives His beloved sleep, and I am well in that category. I just appreciate the gift a little more than the rest of you.

The music in me

I couldn't sleep on Sunday night. Very well, at any rate. I'd had sort of an emotional weekend, and I was just sort of decompressing, and instead of getting much-needed rest, my brain went wild. The weird part, though, is that it wasn't going wild with World-Problem-Solving problems, like usual (no, really, I have education reform plans all up in this pretty little head of mine, but only late at night, and it never makes sense in the morning), but something far, far, less sensible.

I was thinking about words. How if words are just comprised of letters--and we all know letters are just marks we're trained to recognize--then why does it have to be words? If we assigned a musical note to each of the 26 letters, could we learn, over time, to listen to language as if it were a song? We could play each word as if it were part of the grand symphony of life, and we'd know (because our ears would be trained in this manner) what the music was saying.

This is what I laid in bed and thought about for about an hour. There are a lot of issues with this thought pattern, of course, first and foremost that it really doesn't make sense and wouldn't work, due to octaves only having eight keys. I'm sure something could work though.

But I got on this whole thing about what these proposed musical words would sound like. Would mean-sounding words sound... mean? Like you know how the word "harsh" sounds sort of, well, harsh? And grating really does bring to mind a grating feeling? I mean, because we haven't grown up with musical words, we don't even really know how our brains would interpret something like that.

While I miss the sleep (yes, I still miss it), I don't really regret that hour of puzzled thought I put towards the harebrained scheme. I knew that morning couldn't be that bad. After all, my Good Mornings still sound like words, not like angry feeling expressed through music.

Something to be thankful for, yes?

Songs in the night

While my mother and I were discussing sleep (and lack thereof) recently, she made a rather cute comment which I shall endeavour to recount. We were discussing the trials of insomnia (oh, my favorite) and my mom was sort of indignant that I should find it a trial in any capacity.


"At least you have something to think about!"

By that she meant that I was a Christian, and when I'm awake in the middle of the night, I don't have to lay around (lie around?) worrying about the end of the world, or my finances, or anything like that. Rather, I can have some quiet time to spend with my Father in Heaven. I can pray, review memorized verses (which is usually pretty futile, since my poor memory plus a sleepy fog equal no recollection of things I may or may not have effectively learned), and do other profitable things.

So good point, mom, and thanks. At least I have something to think about!

Home alone

Well, I'm home alone. Well, I'm not home at this exact second, but in general I'm alone at my home. Unless this is a stalker reading this who somehow knows where I live, in which case I have a dog and a burly guard and alarms that will tie you into a ball of humanity.

Moving on.

You'd think I'd want to order pizza and laze around and eat junk food, right? That's what I'd think, but all I can think is that I have a ton of grapefruit in the fridge that I want to eat. I don't even usually like grapefruit, is the weird thing. But right now I just really want to eat it. Maybe it's the three cups of coffee talking, but citrus sounds amazing right now.

Everyone has told me that a fun thing to do is listen to really loud music when you're home alone. All good and well, but I don't like my music loud. I like music to be more like a background to the life I lead, not the leading... lady. Leading loudly? Eh, I have no idea.

I feel wholly uninspired right now. A friend of mine told me today that they actually read this sometimes (uh, hi co-worker slash best friend, if you're reading) and it made me realize how boring and pointless this whole blog is. I don't like when I post posts like this--pointless ones talking about my day or how I feel, but at the same time, the posts where I ramble on about nothing are lame as well. So... everything I write? pointless.

The end. I go. A-fishing. Just kidding, I've sworn off fishing expeditions. I hope.

No, seriously, I'm done now.

'Tis the Season!

They've started playing Christmas music full-time at work. Oh, joy.

But you know what? I'm still really thankful, and Thanksgiving/being a Christian still seems to me lingering. Which is good. So I've been trying to be duly thankful for as many things as possible. Like... not sleeping=lots of time to pray! Woohoo!

I'm on my lunch break at work. I just don't have time to keep up with anything meaningful... Sigh.

What am I thinking?

I mentioned that I was doing NaNoWriMo this year, right? Well, I commented to my brother the other day (back in October) that I was interested to see how I'd do with my full-time job plus trying to write a 50,000-word novel. Well, I'm sure you'll be pleased to know that... it's tough. I leave my house before 8:00 AM, and don't get home until after 5:30, at which time I skip straight to supper, and with all of our extra evening events, I'm not usually free to reach the computer until at least 7:00 PM, and usually later (those nasty dishes, goodness).

Plus, I'm still trying to get used to the job, so I'm needing as much sleep as I can get. Which means I'm just not tempted to stay up until all hours of the night writing words I know I'll be disgusted in as soon as the month is over. But, I said I'd do my best, so I will. Also, I've given several friends a hard time for electing not to do NaNoWriMo this year, so I think it's only fair that I prove that it can be done. And even if it can't be done, an attempt can be made. There's no sense in deciding before you begin something that it's too hard to do.

Then again, that's what I say now. We'll see what happens as the month drags on!

Discoveries, of a sort

So last Friday, I guess it was, was when I realized Google Chrome was in existence, so I was like, "Oh hey, I don't want to forget about it" so I came to blogger here and typed a little sentence and apparently typed "Publish Post" instead of "Save Now" like I had thought.

Which is why, when I came back on Monday and turned it into an actual post instead of just a surprised phrase, it said the post was from Friday. How crazy is that? That's hilarious, if I had some crazy controversial blog (slash widely-read) it would be beautiful to post something on a subject one day, and then go back and change it to be the opposing view on the same subject, but it would still be marked from the day I originally posted it, so people would be all like "Oh yeah, I agreed with Friday's post," and someone else would be like "Are you crazy? It didn't even make sense!" and they'd be talking about two different things and not know it.

I was lying awake last night (if that's the correct lie/lay thing, I can never remember) pondering the difference between "O" and "Oh" and I came to the conclusion that it's "oh" when it's an exclamation or thought expressed (Oh my, what a funny-looking baby) but "o" when you're using it as a form of address (O postal carrier, what did I do to deserve this bill?) and it took my sleep-fogged brain about 45 minutes to come up with that, and when I woke up this morning I realized that I already knew that. Goes to show that those people who think up clever things in the middle of the night are made of sterner stuff than I.

Sleep says hi

I decided to just up and do it. Start a blog.

And I know, it’s not like I’ll follow through (do I have any motivation to follow through with this? Really?) but I keep on wishing I had a blog, so I figured, hey, why not?

And it’s named, for those who wonder about such things, Hopeful Rambles because, well, as everyone knows, the best sort of rambles are not aimless wanderings but instead “To speak or write at length and with many digressions,” which I foresee a large amount of in the future of this here blog. As for the hope? Well, I’m a Christian, and as such, my life is a hopeful one. Also, the title “rambles” was already claimed as a blog name. But I do still live life hopefully, honestly I do!

I know this is my first post and I’m supposed to write something clever and witty that will make my friends want to stay and read on, but I’ll let you in on a little secret only like three of my friends will ever hear about this blog from my lips so I pretty much have nothing to be worried about. Praise the Lord.

So I should be thinking of things to say to introduce my yet-blasé blog, but it’s like 2:00 AM and I’m not very clever at such an hour. Apparently I’m wide awake (second night in a row where I just can’t seem to sleep, I’m beginning to think my years of sleep-full childhood are catching up with me just to remind me that being an adult is a terrible thing) but wide-awake is no indication of a sound mind.

Chances are, this will mostly be me talking about how wonderful Google is (how sad it makes me that they’re so crazy liberal) and random things I find in my Bible reading I feel like sharing with someone but don’t know with whom to share them. Or maybe I’ll pull a Nancy Pelosi and just make up verses to talk about at random. How does that go? “Taking care of creation is an act of worship. Something something something something.” That’s what I hear when Nancy Pelosi opens her mouth. I’m sure if she ever said anything worth noting I’d be told about it in short order, so I’m not too worried.

Seriously? I just spent valuable hook time talking politics? A sign of the times, my friend (I say singular because I doubt more than one person will ever frequent this place of such promising brilliance) that such a politically-unsavvy soul such as I should be talking politically-related items at 2:00 in the morning.

That’s it. I’m going to bed. If this never pans out into a more-than-once kind of blog, I’ll consider telling my friends, but until I post something of more substance, I shall lay this crazy place to rest.