Standard recon

Eight ball question of the day:
Am I cool?
Eight Ball: Without a doubt.

(I mean it goes without asking, but for those of you who need objective proof...)

Night Owl

Eight ball question of the day: Can I stop working and go to sleep?

(context: 5 AM)

Eight Ball: Outlook not so good.

Myself: Screw you

My new cactus!

Dangerous weekend naps

Gee, I always manage to fall for the good old super-bad really long weekend nap. This is the sort of nap where I sleep way too long, and wake up feeling like I might have been abducted by aliens for a week (of course they keep you anaesthetized and unconscious and so far I haven't found any signs of surgery); usually the only result is losing a few hours and feeling really groggy. The worst punishment comes at night when trying to fall asleep.

Last night, for example. For once, Eric Whitacre's choral track on sleep did not immediately lull me to sleep. Not even on REPEAT! So I grabbed my guitar and began playing it right there in bed for at least an hour. I contemplated sleeping with the guitar, just sort of playing scales up and down the fret until I fell asleep, but that could have led to me shoving it off the bed during the night. So I put it to sleep on its stand and visualized scales and notes up and down the frets. That seemed to do the trick.

Sweet rest...

...of the good old spring conference. It means three days of listening to old folks from China and Tanzibasomething telling random stories and it means NO HOMEWORK OR CLASSES (excepting an online class). It also means white glove, but that's not too troublesome. I am especially happy for the break happening when it did; I need it.

Morning: it looks pretty but waking up is still hard sometimes.

I like this photo: it is peaceful.

The past week put me down for the eight-count. I screwed up my sleeping rhythms, fell behind in greek and orals (lost a few grade points there booooo), and my exercise patterns went haywire. The result of this is that the past couple days have been a furious test of mental and physical stamina. It has taken some refocusing and effort to catch up on homework and just get everything done. Right about now I feel wiped, but that's not so bad after getting a lot of nasty tasks off of my shoulders.

Here's what my days will be looking like for the rest of the semester (leaving a little room for life's left hooks): On weekdays I get up between six and seven, drink some gatorade mix, and go running (alternating between distance jogs and hill sprints). Then I have some devotions, followed by studying (usually Greek) until Greek class at 9. Classes are done by 2:30.

At this point I play a little music and pretend like I can dance for three or four minutes to fight off lethargy (currently using breakdance videos to learn to toprock). At some point in the middle of the day I do the beginner balance drills from , which is a nice five minute task. After all that, I try to finish as much of the difficult homework (greek, online class, orals) as I can before dinner. I do some guitar or piano after dinner (food makes my mind mushy for a few minutes), and try to finish up remaining homework. There are always plenty of oral examination notes to study or greek vocab words to memorize. The only homework I am able to do very well in evenings is writing.

Other things that I do in evenings are general boxing workouts (differ a little every day), occasional sparring, and lots of small general tasks that I manage to accumulate (where the heck do they come from?). Half the difficulty in a training regimen is planning it out so that it is progressive and specific. Tracking and adjusting that plan is as much work as doing the exercises. Sometimes, if I have taken any photographs, I load them onto my computer in the evening. Haven't taken the time to sort through them yet =P.

On Wednesdays I have church from about 7 - 9 (I'm going to "Grace Baptist"); on Fridays I am involved with an outreach called "Coal Mine." Sometimes it is a time to make connections in coffee shops and such. Other times, I am more proactive and do politically incorrect things like suggesting that Jesus is the only salvation for men. After a busy week, I like poker on Saturdays, but this weekend my poker partners are gone.

I suppose it isn't especially romantic. But that's okay. "A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work." (Ecclesiastes 2:24, NIV). Tonight, I just have some rounds of shadowboxing, core workout, and then finishing some cleaning for white glove, and then sweet sweet rest. Recommended new old music that I've been listening to: Cat Stevens, Tea For The Tillerman.

UPDATE
2/22 - Extra-curricular activities during the week are now beginning to disappear entirely. Not much time for anything beyond superbasic workouts (abs, pushup variations). I've also learned when to take a nap so that I have the energy to just keep working throughout the day. I do music on some days but it's getting pretty inconsistent; I downloaded some sheet music for Final Fantasy VII songs, WHOO now I just have to find time to learn it.

Currently Listening to... Bob Marley and the Wailers

Bob Marley And The Wailers: Rasta Revolution (1974). I'm not going to pretend to know a thing about reggae. (Because I don't :). But I can tell that this is a great album! The songs mellow me out (which might not be good considering I've been pretty mellow lately), and the rhythms and bright, colorful instrumentation make my bop and sway every now and then. In other news, there is no other news. I've done badly with an online class for two weeks, but the third time is the charm. Of course the little Instant Messenger Devils occassionally whisper "Resistance is futile" but I exorcise them with a little "Souls Almighty", courtesy of Bob Marley.

Happy 250th Birthday to

MOZART!!

Meet Thrash: Robot In Disguise

Well, I was going to let people suggest a name for this transformer, but I wanted to call him Thrash (after "Thrasymachus" from Plato's Republic), and I just realized there could be no other name. Without further ado, meet Thrash:

It's not just his name: he can and will thrash you.

herclassicgrace

Ants are slowly eating away my walls and floor. I vacuum several hundred up rather regularly (it's kind of fun), and suggested that they are getting a bit testy and will probably kill me in my sleep one night. One person wrote me a poem as a pre-mortem funeral dedication (thanks Alydia!) :

Read more at herclassicgrace.blogspo...

Your belated christmas gift is that you get to invent your own title

Most of my creative energy is being sapped by a Creative Writing class (which is excellent). Most of my analytical energy is being sapped by Greek (inductive method = figure it out yourself, wimp). Sometimes life gets busier and more difficult than we like; the whiney dude inside me (blameshifting) pipes up and says "It's not fun anymore." Strangely enough, I'm struggling to write anything else, but that's probably due to over-exposure to Greek.

Here are my classes: Proverbs [2] (online), Greek II [4], Creative Writing [3], Theology VI [3] (Systems and Separations), Senior Theology Seminar (ie ORAL EXAMINATIONS ARGH) [1], Geology [2], Wilderness Ministry Leadership [3]. Really no clue what that last one is going to be about or how tough it will be - all I knew was that it was an easy way to fill 3 needed credits and get a trip on the Appalachian Trail over spring break.

Besides that, I have some minor unofficial extracurricular stuff. A little boxing / exercise in the early morning, sparring once or twice a week, and some piano and guitar in the evenings before I go to sleep. I'm looking forward to loading photos off of my Christmas camera but am squeezed for time - my slow computer makes the whole thing a bit of a process.

I am listening to Contabile for Violoncello and Orchestra OP. 11 by Tchaikovsky, and off to bed; it feels great to have finally gotten a minor update on the blog.