one more girl to deal with =)

WELCOME BABY MADI!!!!

FOUR JOBS YOU'VE HAD IN YOUR LIFE
1. student assistant/grader for the english dept. at baylor
2. greeter at the art gallery at baylor (most boring job ever..only 2 months...i basically said "welcome to the art gallery and then punched a clicker to keep count of visitors)
3. tutor at the options high school program for mclennan county
4. lssp


FOUR MOVIES YOU COULD WATCH OVER AND
1. pirates of the caribbean
2. napoleon dynamite
3. the count of monte cristo
4. saved


FOUR CITIES / TOWNS YOU'VE LIVED
1. hearne
2. waco
3. conroe
4. tba in several months


FOUR TV SHOWS YOU LOVE(ed) TO WATCH
Right now...
1. scrubs
2. arrested development
3. the office
4. gilmore girls
5. amazing race
6. survivor
7. smallville
8. extreme makeover-home edition
ok, so i watch a lot of tv.....

Loved to watch...
1. 2 guys, a girl, and a pizza place
2. boston public
3. ed
4. the mole


FOUR PLACES YOU'VE BEEN ON VACATION
1. nyc
2. boston
3. indianapolis
4. orlando


FOUR WEBSITES YOU VISIT DAILY
1. espn
2. wacotrib
3. baylorfans
4. nbc, cbs, abc, fox, thewb....gotta find out when my shows are on


FOUR OF YOUR FAVOURITE FOODS
1. chicken fajitas...especially my dad's
2. mom's chicken casserole
3. lasagna
4. chicken fried steak


FOUR PLACES YOU'D RATHER BE RIGHT NOW
1. nyc
2. colorado/new mexico/nevada...any place with some slopes
3. australia
4. cozumel....soon enough =)

coming home

WELCOME BACK ADAM!!! glad you finally came to your senses =)

alright "alwaysfeelingblessed," you better ace those upcoming interviews in the d-fw area and cancel the one in houston =)

the next coach K

i have a friend who is the basketball coach for a high school team comprised of players from mission waco. he was looking for some assistance with the team, so who better to ask than me!
bet you didn't know i had some sweet b-ball skills =) it's been kinda entertaining for me to tell my friends that i'm helping out with a basketball team because the reaction is the same for those that are closest to me.....laughter, followed either by "YOU?!?" or "HOW!?!" hey, give this white boy some credit. i played ball until i was about 15, and i would dare to say that rose marie blvd. in hearne has never seen a better post player. of course, it did help that i was at least 2 years older than every other kid on our block. ah, there was nothing better than dunking on your friends on a lowered goal. so it looks like i'm now the assistant basketball coach...or is it the assistant to the basketball coach??? (if you don't get this, please start watching 'the office' on nbc tuesday nights)

for the girls out there who don't get my title: mike krzyzewski, the coach of duke university, which is the #1 college basketball program, is referred to as coach K. now you can impress your boyfriend/husband with your knowledge of sports....

the people you meet

here's the easiest way to earn some spending money. i participated in this research study involving soft drinks. answer questions about soft drinks for 90 minutes, earn 75 bucks. the whole rating and explaining your answers got boring quickly, but fortunately, my group members were anything but. my group was placed at the dr. pepper table. to say that i was different than my group would be quiet an understatement. there's no doubt in my mind that the other guy in our group was high. he showed all the typical signs, and the fact that the two women in the group also mentioned it, confirmed my suspension. he had a ton of classic random comments, but my favorite was this. dr. pepper is thinking about coming out with a drink called "23," based on the 23 flavors used to create it. the can will be red and black. as soon as the guy sees the can, he excitedly says, "oh no, they're going to get sued over this! they're going to be sued!" naturally, the faciliator has to ask what the heck he's talking about. he replies, "michael jordan is going to sue them! they stole his number and chicago bulls' jersey colors!"

now on to one of the girls, who i'm almost positive had to represent the beautiful city of bellmead (if you know bellmead, then you'll understand after her description). side note you need to know: to be in this study, you had to be between the ages of 22-29. based on looks, i would say she was about 25-26. after one of the ideas was presented, she made a comment that her children would love that product. she then goes on to say, "Yeah, all five of my kids would drink that." FIVE KIDS! are you crazy! why do people do this? my favorite moment of the bellmead girl occurred after the study was over. as we were walking out, she grabs a soft drink and a bag of chips that were provided as a refreshment. then, it's like a light bulb went off in her head and she thought, "hey, i have five kids at home." so, she turns around, walks back to the table, and starts picking up more refreshments to apparently take home.....no kidding

one more new toy

here's the new cell phone!
a nano and a new cell phone within 48 hours of each other.....buying birthday and christmas presents for myself is awesome!
http://www.letstalk.com/product/product.htm?prId=29325

all i can say

so it's been four weeks now since "that day at ubc." it's strange, but i noticed that i have referred to the day that kyle passed away simply as "that day at ubc" on numerous occasions. it's like if i don't verbalize what exactly happened, then maybe, just maybe, it didn't really happen.

the reason i'm writing about this right now stems from our church service tonight. church is so odd now. ubc had become such a sacred place for me. no matter what mood i was in, no matter what was going on in life, i could go to ubc and somehow find God. i knew He was there. i knew He heard me there. He encouraged me there.

all that has changed now. as i sat there tonight, two emotions were prominent: anger and sadness. during worship, i mainly just stared at the screen without singing. i looked at the words and questioned whether or not i actually believed what had been written as lyrics. i want to believe. i can't stress how incredibly bad i want to believe.

i haven't been able to pray once since that day without questioning whether or not my prayers are meaningful....or even if it's worth the time to pray. i mean, i was praying, as was others, for a man to live, and the opposite happened. and now, my confidence in prayer is shattered. it's not because a prayer went unanswered. that's happened previous occasions and it didn't bother me because it was never of this magnitude. on those other occasions, i would basically tell myself that God had some different plan for me and just to trust Him. and for the most part, i could do that. but this prayer wasn't about me. it was about kyle. it was about kyle remaining alive. so now i have this feeling that my prayers, compared to that prayer, are so trivial. and if the most important prayer goes unanswered, then why even bother with the minuscule ones.

i realize that doesn't sound good, but that's what i'm trying to work through. i'd do anything right now to have the type of faith again that i had when i first became a christian. i haven't given up hope that it could happen, but at the moment, i'm frustrated and confused on how that can come about.

birthday party (30-1)

i think, without a doubt, that my 29th birthday was the most enjoyable one to date. i would like to say that it was so great because of the people i spent time with that night, but i think those that were there all know the real reason it was so fun for me. just kidding! although...the drinks were incredible. combine a diaquari, a margariata, several shots and a couple other drinks that friends handed to me and you definitely get a different person than the typical me. i really don't know if i was drunk...i guess those there could answer that. i definitely know i was tipsy and feeling really good. the night started at t.g. jorge's in austin. nice little mexican restaurant. best memory from there was the drinking contest to see who could finish their margarita the fastest. at the time, it sounded like a great idea. but wow, that was some potent stuff. after the restaurant, we went to dave & buster's. everything at d & b's was awesome. ddr was completely insane...those stupid arrows seemed to be flying on the screen at sonic speed. the basketball game was my favorite. i started the night on fire, but after that it was like there was a lid on the rim. having that drunk speech therapist next to me throwing her basketballs at me and trying to push me down when i shot didn't help much either!

so next year is the big 3-0. that freakin' sucks! i saw the friends episode a couple of weeks ago where rachel turned 30 and was agonizing over the list of her life's goals. i'll probably be revealing my list on here soon....especially since i only have 361 days left to achieve some of those things =(

the joy of waking up at 4 a.m.

so i had never done this day-after thanksgiving shopping event until this year. i've always heard it was crazy in the big cities, but what about in waco? waco would be calm, right? i could show up at best buy several minutes before 5 and everything would be fine...right?

when i saw the line of traffic exiting off of the interstate at 4:45 i knew i was in trouble. then when i discovered that there were no parking spaces left in the best buy parking lot and saw people walking back to their cars in disgust over the line of hundreds outside, i knew i was in big trouble. but, i didn't wake up at 4 in the morning for no reason. about 15 minutes after the doors open, i finally made it inside the store as those early-birds were already walking to their cars with computers, tvs, etc. my main purpose of going to best buy was to get an iPod nano. on page 7 of the best buy sale was the nano, with what i thought was a great price. it wasn't until standing in line for about 20 minutes that i got a phone call and discovered that i could have purchased the nano online for the same price (hey buddy, if you would have been awake enough at 4 when i called you, you could have told me then and i could have gone back to sleep....but no, you had to sleep in...jerk) fortunately,i bought some dvds and cds that were marked way down so i did save money. after waiting in line for an hour and ten minutes, i finally reached the beautiful land of the checkout counters.

after surviving best buy, i hit the mall, which was relatively peaceful. i started at gap, and to my surprise, one of the workers there basically became my fashion consultant. i'm used to the following conversations with store workers:
worker- "welcome to gap. can i help you with something?"
me- "no thanks, just looking."
worker- "ok, let me know if i can help" as they walk away.

this is exactly how our conversation began, but the guy didn't walk away. instead, he basically became my personal fashion shopper for the next 30 minutes. really bizarre. i went to the dressing room to try on two sweaters and next thing you know, he's bringing me different types of sweaters...and then jeans...and then buttoned-up shirts to wear under the sweaters. this person was like the guy version of ryna, and almost as good, but not quite. =)
after all the fun, i purchased three sweaters...saved like $40 bucks. not great, but that $40 will now be spent on my new cell phone i'm off to purchase.

a gift

here is an excerpt from the sermon that kyle was prepared to give this previous sunday. it really defines what life is all about, doesn't it?

Live. And Live Well.
BREATHE. Breathe in and Breathe deeply.
Be PRESENT. Do not be past. Do not be future. Be now.
On a crystal clear, breezy 70 degree day, roll down the windows and FEEL the wind against your skin. Feel the warmth of the sun.
If you run, then allow those first few breaths on a cool Autumn day to FREEZE your lungs and do not just be alarmed, be ALIVE.
Get knee-deep in a novel and LOSE track of time.
If you bike, pedal HARD… and if you crash then crash well.
Feel the SATISFACTION of a job well done—a paper well-written, a project thoroughly completed, a play well-performed.
If you must wipe the snot from your 3-year old’s nose, don’t be disgusted if the Kleenex didn’t catch it all… because soon he’ll be wiping his own.
If you’ve recently experienced loss, then GRIEVE. And Grieve well.
At the table with friends and family, LAUGH. If you’re eating and laughing at the same time, then might as well laugh until you puke.
And if you eat, then SMELL. The aromas are not impediments to your day. Steak on the grill, coffee beans freshly ground, cookies in the oven.
And TASTE. Taste every ounce of flavor. Taste every ounce of friendship. Taste every ounce of Life. Because-it-is-most-definitely-a-Gift.