Finally did something with...

My Christmas cards. Arranged by size, hole punched, labeled and looped!

Food Matters

So lately I have been making many recipes in an attempt to incorporate healthy food into our diet. I pick about 5 recipes a week, buy the ingredients, and make one every day or so. This week I made:

Edamame w/zucchini, tomato and tarragon (tarragon smells like licorice) (Malcolm gave the thumb's up)

White grape & lemon foam (a beverage Malcolm found weird to eat/drink)

Kale stir fry (Malcolm gave the thumb's up)

Corn chowder (okay but not amazing)

and super vegetable salad (a salad that incorporates cold and hot vegetables)

I will continue to post the recipes I make just for the hay of it. These were all super healthy. I got them from a detox recipe book, a book called "100 Healthiest Foods," a Vegetarian Slow-Cooker cookbook, and the super vegetable salad was from a health magazine. :)

"I'm not getting fed"

Many of us have heard or even said "I'm not getting fed" if we've ever gone to a church that isn't perfect (which is all of them). Whether it's the preacher's style, the complexity of the sermon, the intensity of the worship, or the service's lack of application to us, we think-- there is something missing here.

For the past few days I've been thinking about Jesus' statement, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work," [Jn 4:34]. I know that in the past I have flung out the 'ole not-being-fed sentiment more than once as a reason to exit a particular situation involving different groups of Christians (churches, ministries, etc.).

But somehow deep down I am realizing that perhaps my dissatisfaction in those past circumstances wasn't so much what was lacking in the preaching/worship/experience aspect, as much as it was actually a lack of my own involvement in the body of believers I was involved with. I wasn't being fed because I wasn't doing God's will who sent me into those situations. I wasn't putting myself "out there" in one way or another.

And I would venture to say that most of that "doing" Jesus spoke of centers around ministering to people in a discipleship kind of way. One thing I learned last fall at the Global Awakening Conference I went to with my husband is that-- it is SO pivotal that believers have discipleship relationships-- relationships into which they can pour out what they've received from God-- pour into the lives of others who need it. God put us into the earth for many many reasons, one of which is to be fruitful and to multiply. In the most important sense of that calling is the spiritual aspect. We are to have spiritual "children." If you are not multiplying, you aren't really fulfilling a huge piece of the destiny that God called you into.

So if you are not reaching into the lives of people and really investing your heart in them, you aren't fully doing His will. It is awesome to receive revelation from God, to experience intense intimacy with Him, and even to walk in the miraculous, but a natural outflow of that strong connection with God is letting that life flow from your "belly" into someone else's life.

And so maybe, just maybe, some of those times I felt unfulfilled could have been because I wasn't pouring anything out and things were just gettin' all stagnant and clogged inside! So much of life is really about your personal involvement with and reaction to people and so little about what they're doing to/with you. It truly is better to give than to receive!

As a song I wrote eons ago says, "every time I give myself, I lend unto my God, and He gives back so much greater in measure!"

SPIRIT OF GENEROSITY

At Life! Church, we've decided to amp up the spirit of generosity lately, and with that thought I have set out on the daunting task of DONATING all my unwanted items in the smartest ways possible. Tonight I compiled my list of donation destinations, and thought I would share said list in case others wanted to do the same. So here it is! If you have any that I don't, please do share!

Donate video games to cure rare diseases: http://donategames.org/donate.htm

donate everything but clothes in Lawrence to families in need to rebuild their lives (half-hour away): http://www.phama.org/

donate computer equipment: http://www.cristina.org/donate.html

donate techno-trash, everything from computer parts to cassette tapes and VHS’s: http://greendisk.com/

donate your old prescription glasses to people who can’t afford them: http://www.onesight.org/na/

donate clothes to the Salvation Army in Manchester. The bin is at their office in the ally between Cedar Street and Auburn St. They can also pick up your furniture if you call 1-800-626-1122 ext. 222.

donate your old cell phones to Cell Phones for Soldiers. They recycle them, then use the money to buy calling cards for troops so they can phone home: cellphonesforsoldiers.com.

or donate your cellphone and plant a tree at the same time: http://greenphone.com/

donate your old yoga mats: http://recycleyourmat.com/

donate your old but functional musical instruments: http://therootsofmusic.com/donate/donate-instruments.html

donate suit-wear for office work in Malden, MA (an hour away): http://www.tailoredforsuccess.org/boutique.aspx

donate prom dresses & bridesmaid dresses: http://www.thecinderellaprojectofnh.org/donate/index.php

donate chic clothing (cocktail dresses, etc) and furniture to help people living with HIV and aids: http://www.housingworks.org/donate/in-store-walk-in-donations/thrift-shops-donations/

donate gently used stuffed animals: http://www.lovinghugs.org/shipping-hugs.htm or
http://www.projectsmile.org/drop.htm

donate your wedding dress: http://bridesagainstbreastcancer.org/#donategown

donate soap (like hotel containers, etc): http://cleantheworld.org/donate-soap-and-shampoo.asp

donate old crayons! http://crazycrayons.com/recycle_program.html

donate old jeans: http://www.myuselessjeans.com/shipping-and-dropoff-locations

or to http://www.cottonfrombluetogreen.org/

donate shoes: http://www.soles4souls.org/about/

You are What I need

I need a Comforter, but I also need a Challenger.
I need discipline, and I need liberty.
I need a miracle, but I need patient endurance.
I need beauty, but I need humbling.
I need strength, and I need brokenness.
I need an embrace, but I also need a push.
I need forgiveness, but I also need accountability.
I need mercy, but I also need justice.
I need fullness, but I need to be emptied.
I need to soar, but oh how I need to bow.
I need vision, but I must have blind faith.
I need rest, but I crave a furious tenacity.
I need to be quiet, and I must also shout.
Who can give me what I need?
You can.
You are my Comforter. You are my Challenger.
You discipline me in your love. You give me the ability to have discipline.
All the while you've set me free from every hindrance!
You are a miracle leaving a trail of miracles,
but in your patience you teach me to endure.
You made me beautiful out of your abundance of beauty,
but in Your abundance I am humbled.
You've given me strength in Spirit,
and my heart has broken open before you.
You embrace me in Your unconditional love,
and You push me to go higher and further.
You've forgiven all my mark-missings.
Your justice will flood this earth-- righteousness!
You've filled me with your Spirit of love and power,
and emptied me of all the old rubbish.
You are the wind that makes me soar;
with a bowed soul I fly high in praising You.
You've opened my eyes to the heavenlies,
and caused me to take illogical steps.
You are my Sabbath,
You are my persistence.
You are my Shiloh,
You are the theme of my trumpet blare.
Who can give me what I need?
You can, and You did.

words

I saw something posted on twitter yesterday by a couple different people, this quote: "Vision is the world's most desperate need. There are no hopeless situations, only people who think hopelessly." -Winifred Newman

It got me thinking of how people say things like this in such a definitive way, though it may not be the BIG picture. It may be one person's immediate understanding of truth. They may have experiences that really point to, underline, capitalize and italicize a certain aspect of God's truth. My initial reaction was, "well, I'm not sure if that's completely true," but then I thought, "well. It's one way of putting it!" It's amazing how His truth unfolds with layers. You may learn a lesson over and over again, and every time it's just as much of an epiphany and a joy to discover because God is revealing Himself to you, bit by bit.

For example. This quote: "Vision is the world's most desperate need. There are no hopeless situations, only people who think hopelessly," could be said so many other ways, discovered for different reasons, to reveal our need for God. Like:

"Love is the world's most desperate need. There are no hopeless situations, only people who do not know they are loved completely."

or

"Understanding is the world's most desperate need. There are no hopeless situations, only people who don't understand the story's ending."

or

"Faith is the world's most desperate need. There are no hopeless situations, only people who have replaced faith in God with faith in anything but God."

or

"Jesus is the world's most desperate need. There are no hopeless situations, only people who don't know Jesus and the way He does things."

THINK ABOUT IT!

Eating Animals

Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


If I could make everybody in America read a certain book, it would be this one. Heart-wrenching, life-changing, and crucial for the future of our world. And also, pertinent and grasp-able by all. Once you read it, it's not controversial or confusing. It's quite clear. READ IT



View all my reviews

Can You Keep a Secret? by Sophie Kinsella

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Cute chick-lit that made me actually laugh out-loud a few times. The plot was pretty predictable and it didn't seem like there was much of a climax, but it was entertaining, well-produced and narrated, and amusing. I would recommend it!



View all my reviews

COMPETITION

So lately the topic on my mind has been COMPETITION. It's come up a number of times in my thoughts and in things that I've heard lately to really make me want to sit down and hash this out. I really want to get something out there for the world to know:

I HATE COMPETITION. I hate it with the fury of a thousand bursting suns. I HATE IT. It's a big fat lie, in my opinion. The word "competition" is just a deceptive disguise for the true culprit mainly comprised of jealousy, covetousness, and bad-wishing on others.

Listen, I'm not talking about competition as in sports where the whole point is to win the game. But even in that instance, if you lose you shouldn't feel bad about yourself. Sports are supposed to be games, and games are supposed to be fun things you do because they are fun. If your whole self-worth depends on your performance in a game, that's terrible. Likewise, if you identify yourself with a team and that team loses and that causes you to feel any negative emotions, I would say you are falling into the spirit of competition that is unhealthy.

By definition, competition is rivalry. It is the struggle to be the “winner” over the “loser.” In ecology, it actually means “the struggle between individuals of the same or different species for food, space, light, etc, when these are inadequate to supply the needs of all.” In the medical field, competition means “the process by which the activity or presence of one substance interferes with or suppresses the activity of another substance with similar affinities, as of antigens.”

And that is exactly what I’m thinking about. If you label yourself as a competitive person, aren’t you really saying that you want something even if it means another individual goes without? Or sometimes it means you want what the other person has, or what the other person also wants, in a way that would make you have it more than them.

Competition results from a lack of self-worth. If you do not have a high enough opinion of yourself to be satisfied with who you are, you look to another person and think—I am going to try to get that. I want to have that more than they have it, so I will try to take “the prize,” or the place of possessing that thing.

Look, I understand that in our day and age, there is a tendency to think that being competitive is necessary for getting ahead in this world. People think that it’s all business, it’s not personal. You need to be competitive to really accomplish anything important. I think that’s a lie from the enemy to cause us to put boundaries between people. It breeds the thought: “You and I are separate. Only one of us can succeed at a time. We can’t BOTH be as successful as we want if we help each other and want the best for each other. There can only be one ‘top’.”

I guess there can only be one TOP EXECUTIVE in a company. But the ends don’t justify the means. You see the movies where people have to step on each other to get to the top. Then the main character realizes that it’s not worth being scum to get ahead, and settles for the happy life of “less.” If even Hollywood can recognize that squashing someone else isn’t worth losing integrity and if even Hollywood can admit that it’s actually self-respect that says “no” to lowered standards for success, you’d think we’d get it in our heads too. (think: Devil Wears Prada, Baby Boom, and countless TV movies)

But we deal with it on a much more intimate and sometimes what we consider mundane level. There can be a fine line between wanting to do well and wanting to be the best at something. It’s so easy to cross over to the dark side. I suppose it goes back to the question that seems to be the root of every heart issue: what’s the motive?

So if you consider yourself a “competitive” person, search your heart and make sure your motives are pure. I understand it can be hard to hold on to your self-worth—the self-worth that doesn’t depend on all the hoops you can jump through or your accomplishments, but the self-worth that is really just derived from what God sees in you: a perfect new creation that is irresistibly loveable.

Are you doing what you’re doing to be the best and therefore find yourself valuable? Or are you doing what you’re doing as an outflow of who you know you are and what you know is achievable because of your relationship with God and your already-existent, God-created, unconditional value.

In The Words of Satan, by The Arrows

I've been here since the beginning
Know exactly how you work
I know all of your cravings
Know what makes you go berserk
Been lying from the start
just to make you play a part
in my infinite rebellion
against the Father God

Hate
Everything he is
And I make you hate him too
Make you hate him with your actions it's so easy for me to do
'Cause you like it...
Sin feels good for the ego...
You love it...
Oh, come on baby

And all the time, I'm winding you up
Like my perfect little puppet, you're my favorite robot, welcome to the show
but I'm watching you and all of hell is with me too,
helping me make my lies look true

Oh and there is a lie that works for everyone, everyone
A lie that opens your hearts so I can get me some
more of your free will
I'm winding you
Winding you
Give me the control
that's why I'm telling you
Selling you
Anything
Everything
Appealing to your human way of being
and I use it all against you
to just keep your eyes from seeing
past the life you're living
Past the moment you're in
Past the pleasure of your sin
Or the cigarette you're smoking
Choking on your lust
I'll make you drunk with pride
So deeply spun into my system
that you won't see the light
Never mind that I'm drowning you
I keep deceiving you...

'Cuz I don't tell you
'bout the God in heaven
Who loves you
Who yearns for you
I don't tell you
'bout the freedom of forgiveness and truth
Why would I tell you?
Why would I tell you the truth?

But I'll say that millions of years ago an accident exploded
And you're the result of this cosmic unknown with
no real purpose, Created for no real intent
The reason for your living is just coincidence
So all the remains is what you can gain
Whatever meaning you attach to your days you decide
Mmm, but I help you recognize important things in life

Introducing money, it's the root of all evil they say so
I attach your self-worth to the salary you're paid,
be a slave
to your property
Your jewelry
Your cars and things
Advertise that lie up on the TV so you'll want that bling
Selling bit by bit the little pieces of your soul
Climbing up the ladder of economic control
Oh, the greed of man
makes it so easy to pervert the Father's plan

Or I'll tell you...
There is a heaven but there's many ways to get in
Keep you so confused that you stay bound to your sin
Tell you there are many ways to the same God
Keep you distracted with your methods so your heart stays hard,
I'll make you think you've got spirituality, but it's really just emotional alchemy
Oh, the vanity of self-idolatry I never let you see that it breeds
Hedonism! Whoo!
And it's the answer of this generation
Come on, drink it, snort it, smoke it, swallow it
Chew on my illusion of freedom till you vomit it

And still I don't tell you
'bout the God in heaven
Who loves you
Who yearns for you
I don't tell you
'bout the freedom of forgiveness and truth
Why would I tell you?
Why would I tell you the truth?

The English American by Alison Larkin

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


What a cute book. The author did an awesome job narrating!! It made me laugh in my head a lot and was VERY entertaining. It kept my mind busy and happy while doing chores. This is the kind of book that makes plain my taste for chick lit. :-)

View all my reviews >>

The Chosen Path by Deborah Joyner Johnson

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


While the idea of the book was excellent, the writing was sadly poor. I couldn't tell who the audience was-- children or adults? It was simplistic, but also included romance, so while a child could understand it, a child might also be grossed out at the romance. It might make a good book for an adult to read to a 10-ish year-old. I was also confused about the allegorical component, which at times seemed allegorical and at times seemed literal. The premise behind the book, the spirituality, was good. I would describe it as a "good try" or an attempt at discussing important spiritual matters, but one that came from little experience writing fiction.

View all my reviews >>

The Last Song by Nicholas Sparks

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I've read a few Nicholas Sparks books. I think this one is my favorite so far. It seemed really complete and well-written. I do NOT understand how Nicholas Sparks can get inside the heads of females so well! EEK! Very sad. Finished it at work. Tried not to cry.

View all my reviews >>

What I made today

Got a recipe for Blueberry Green Tea slushy and made it. It's SO YUMMY!

First divide a cup of blueberries in an ice tray...

Boil 2 cups of water, let 3 Green Tea bags steep for 5 minutes, then pour into the ice tray and freeze.


Add 1/2 cup water and 2 TBs agave nectar and blend together and voila!

YUM!

never givin' up

I was going places [except not] on the elliptical yesterday, listening to some tunes. Jonathan David Helser was singing a song and he was singing,
"you're never giving up, you're never giving up, you're never giving up on me..."
which goes on for quite some time. Then they break into, "set me free!" which they sing over and over.

Now I believe that when Jesus died for me, He paid the price for my sin, setting me free from the law of sin and redeeming me from every curse that could keep me enslaved to it. So sometimes in certain songs I have trouble because I don't want to ask the Lord to do something for me that He's already done. But as I was listening to this, I started to think about freedom, and what that is, and I was thinking about the truth that God provides for us, which sets us free. If it doesn't set you free, it's not the truth! God's truth is liberating, not enslaving.

And now as I write this I'm connecting it with something i heard from Bethel Church about slavery and how when you don't know what's going on, you are a slave. When we are first saved, we are slaves to righteousness. We just do what God says but sometimes don't really know why. But "it is the glory of God to conceal a matter and the honor of kings to search it out" [Prov.25:2]. As we mature and get to know God more, His desire is to share His secrets with us through revelation, and then are, not just his slaves or his servants, but we become his friends.

So anyways, I'm thinking about how truth sets us free, and this song is just opening up to me. He's saying, "you're never giving up on me, set me free." God isn't going to give up on us even when our lives aren't perfect or our thinking is still imperfect or our behavior is far from perfect. We can ask him to set us free, meaning to give us His truth. Only God can reveal what is true, and it is freedom from misconceptions that we need.

We need, as Pastor Steve was preaching last weekend, IMMACULATE CONCEPTIONS. Meaning, spotless conceiving [as in our thinking]. The word immaculate comes from im- [not] -maculate [spotted], which comes from the word macula, which means a spot on the cornea. It connects. We need clear vision-- clear understanding-- clear thinking-- clear conception-- immaculate conception.

I need God to brainwash me. I need him to cleanse my mind from all misconceptions that I have and give me His thoughts, His truth.

I was talking with my sister today and she was saying how the message of God's grace and love and forgiveness just resonates so strongly inside. Hearing a message that doesn't jive with that which we know of God-- that He is good, merciful, and loving, is HARD to swallow but when we hear the good news of Jesus, it's like a breath of fresh air or a swig of fresh living water! Why? Because the Lamb was slain before the foundations of the earth were laid, and when Jesus came he transitioned us into an age where God's law of love is now written in our hearts. The message of grace is easy to swallow because we already have a taste for it, since God changed our spiritual taste-buds to crave Jesus.

He's never going to give up on us, until we are free. I'm pretty confident He'll keep working on us until the day we are like Him completely.

the Spirit speaks through "coincidence"

It's funny how you can be rolling along in your life, slowly growing more and more asleep, and not realize it until after you've been awake for a while. I've come to a new understanding of grace in the past year-- one that removes the pressure of guilt from my conscience. I believe God doesn't use guilt or even conviction of sin with His people anymore. What is the point of pointing out our faults when the pointing out of our faults focuses our attention on them? I believe the Holy Spirit convinces us of righteousness-- the righteousness that is ours because of what Jesus did for us. God was the first Father to think up positive reinforcement. Anywho, so with this new understanding of grace comes a bit of the testing of the water. I mean, I don't HAVE to read my bible everyday anymore, because God's not mad at me if I don't. But the truth is that reading my bible is one way of communicating with God and when I don't do it, I miss out on hearing from Him. It's a way to focus my thoughts on Him and a way to water my thirsty soul, after all I am called to renew my mind by the washing of the Word.

So I bought my husband a new bible. It's in chronological order, which is super neat. It puts all the books of the bible in chronological order, which means that the psalms are intermingled with the history of David, the gospels are all shuffled together, etc. It also includes super cool historical points to add to the narrative. So this has made reading the Bible particularly interesting to me lately, and my hubby and I have been reading it every night before sleep. So we had been doing this a few nights and I tell ya, I started to feel a bit different. It was like I woke up from a heavy nap and my brain was re-focusssing again. Everything I had before was still there, I had just temporarily let my eyes close for a while. So my brain started thinking about Him again, and that was nice.

It's funny how God gives so willingly. Once you're tuned back into His frequency, you start to hear little whispers that can tune your heart strings.

I received some callers last week while I was getting ready to leave for work. They were unexpected and eager to share with me their religion. In times past I probably would have either A: gotten flustered and not known how to represent myself, B: gotten annoyed by their unannounced visit, C: gotten offended at their religious beliefs. But these days I'm finding it unnatural to be offended by people simply for differences of opinions, values or beliefs. I know God's love and how expansive it is, and find that people are more valuable than other people think they are, and more valuable than they probably think I think they are. I think my visitors expected a scowl or at least annoyance, and they were pretty surprised when they didn't get it.

I was actually doing cartwheels inside because I was so happy to be able to share my faith with someone who was pointedly asking me what I believe. "Oh please! Let me share it with you! Someone is actually inviting me to dive into my faith? Who cares if they're looking for something to correct, at least they're looking." And since I know how wonderful God is and how the Spirit wants to touch everybody I come in contact with, it becomes an adventure. "What will He do today? This is a surprising circumstance. Must be for a reason!"

So after my visit, I'm driving to work while listening to some Bethel music, and the line comes on, "now my faith in You is a mountain that can't be shaken, my strength is found in You-- it is joy that can't be taken." BAM. WHOA. See I always thought about the verse, "the joy of the Lord is my strength," as kind-of a mantra to recite when I was feeling down or weak. That was my answer and I would try to believe it as best I could. But this time it took on an alternate life for me: I was experiencing a joy in that moment as a result of my intimacy with God that had just rekindled in our communication with each other. I was in that joy, and I saw the effect it had on my visitors. They were surprised by my good will towards them. And I was genuinely happy to see them, for various reasons. I think maybe one was God's love inside of me for them [whoever they were!]. And this is the strength of God's people. It's love that will inform the world of who we are. Eventually those people who are intimate with the Lord will cumulatively be radiating a light and a love that everyone else will be able to see. No more judgment, no more intolerance for any kind of person, no more anger and no more division. It is the opposite of these things that tears people apart, inside individuals and also between people and groups of people. How great was Christ's sacrifice to pay for all our mark-missings, so that we can become one with Him and each other. Nothing can separate us from that love, NO THING.

So anyways. I'm having this epiphany about the joy of the Lord being my strength, and the strength of the church as a whole-- how it is only this joy that results from God's love that will really be our strength on this planet called Earth, and I arrive at work. I go into the house and turn to my best friend, my Ipod, for some entertainment while cleaning. My choices are listening to a Lost podcast or listening to another Bethel podcast. So I decide I can save Lost for later. I put Bethel on and it's Bill Johnson giving a teaching about THAT EXACT VERSE [message called "The Purpose of the Outpouring"]. The joy of the Lord is our strength. Coincidence? Yeah right!

Gotta love those kinds of coincidences.
The next day, after I had told people what happened the day before, I was at work listening to a Worship Leaders podcast. The hosts were interviewing a guy I had never heard of before, and I was just going about my work. I started to drift off in thought about the song list for the meeting that night. I had written down a list of songs the day before that I thought I was supposed to do, and I was thinking, "I should do the song 'Shine Jesus Shine, that was one of the songs, right?'" And I looked at my list and it was indeed the first song for the night. No sooner had I thought the title when the interviewer said to the worship leader, "so tell us about the song, Shine Jesus Shine." Turns out this guy was the author of that song.

Ha ha ha.
It's so fun.

"FAVES" playlist on Itunes

1. Desert Song, Hillsong
2. Dharma Lady, Geronimo Jackson
3. Dreams, The Cranberries
4. Everything, Tim Hughes
5. Feeling Good, Michael Buble
6. Holy, Jesus Culture
7. Holy, Matt Gilman
8. In Jesus' Name, Darrell Evans
9. Island Fun, Oscar Begat
10. Light Of Your Face, Jesus Culture
11. Light of Your Face, Misty Edwards
12. The Lord is My Shepherd, Keith Green
13. Manchester, Brendan James
14. Meant to Live, Switchfoot
15. My Favorite Coat, Deb Talan
16. Note to God, Charice
17. Orange Sky, Alexi Murdoch
18. Our Song (edited), Marco & Missy
19. Salvation's Chorus, Todd Fields
20. See His Love, Kim Walker
21. St. Judy's Comet (remastered), Paul Simon
22. Sweet Disposition, The Temper Trap
23. There Goes the Fear, Doves
24. This is Our God, Hillsong
25. Us, Regina Spektor
26. Wake Up, Josh Albillo
27. When The Saints, Sara Groves
28. Where You Go I Go, Kim Walker
29. You Won't Relent, Misty Edwards
30. You Won't Relent (Live), Misty Ewards
31. 75 And Sunny, Ryan Montbleau

My mosaic

DIRECTIONS:
- Go to Google image search.
- Type in your answer to each question.
- Choose a picture
- Use this website ( http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/mosaic.php ) to make your collage.
- Save the image for use in this note.
- Post and tag your friends.

QUESTIONS:
1. What is your name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What is your hometown?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. What is your favorite movie?
6. What is your favorite drink?
7. What is your dream vacation?
8. What is your favorite dessert?
9. What is one word to describe yourself?
10. How are you feeling right now?
11. What do you love most in the world?
12. What do you want to be when you grow up?

I miss my cat.

For those of you who haven't heard the story of Cuddles, here it is. Once upon an October 23rd of the two-thousand and ninth year of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Malcolm and I went to "meet" a cat. My mother had sent me the link to the advertisement placed on her company's website. It described the cat as a four-year-old black medium hair female named Cuddled. This of course sparked my mother's interested and then my own, since growing up I had two cats, one of them named Cuddles, who, in fact, was herself a black medium-haired female.

We went to supposedly meet her but when we arrived at the small cigarette scented apartment of an elderly couple, we quickly realized the situation was more pressing. The lady proceeded to inform us that she'd already packed up all of Cuddle's belongings and that they simply had to leave at six o'clock for their nightly Dunkin' Donuts run, and they wanted that cat out.

Did I mention that the cat was in the dark recesses of a closet and all we could see was her glowing yellow eyes and all we could hear were deep growls and hissing? After the elderly man attempted to extract the cat from the shelf by repeatedly whapping it with a rolled up newspaper (which of course horrified me completely, and also resulted in the cat grabbing the newspaper away from him), Malcolm said we wouldn't take the cat in this condition and we'd be back in the morning after Cuddles had a "good night's sleep."

After we left, the old people's social worker called us back and told us that she seriously believed they wanted the cat gone so bad that they would kill it that night. Malcolm decided we couldn't leave her in that setting so he went back with my brother-in-law and the social worker's boyfriend. So some smooth maneuvering, a cardboard box and a cushion, they slid the cat into the box and got her out of the apartment. Cuddles spent that night in our living room with a new cat box, a bowl of food, and some peace. The following days she scurried around hiding in every shadow. Now, almost five months later, SHE LOVES ME! (And Malcolm, too)

And I am in Virginia now, left her with a nice responsible young man to take care of her while we are gone, but tomorrow I'm going home and I wonder if she will love or hate me??

"Give me a conversation starter," I said to him as he giggled by my side. Always giggling. Giggle, giggle, giggle. Shall we stay or shall we go? Stay and write in Panera or go next door and play Super Mario World on GameStop's Wii? Hmm. Tempting. I would like to play the whole game, but I think the guy working there may get sick of me and kick me out. I know the guy sitting next to us in Panera is getting sick of us giggling. So that's what it comes down to-- drive the guy in Panera mad, or drive the guy at GameStop mad. What will it be, Malcolm?

We also have to go to the laundry-mat. He's here another four days and i leave tomorrow. He needs clean clothes. He asks me why I have to wash my clothes since I'm going home tomorrow, and I say, "what? You don't want me to have clean clothes?" And then we start giggling again, because we have a tendency to turn everything into a joke somehow.

He's reading over my shoulder now. And giggling.