Africa- Installment 4

What day are we on now? Right. Friday. Friday I saw a little girl (maybe 5 or 6) manifest a demon. She fell down and started screaming and writhing on the floor. It's bad enough to see an adult who's tormented by a demon, but when it's a child, oh.. that's just not acceptable. The pastor and I prayed for God's peace for the girl and the demon immediately shut up and the girl was normal again. The girl's mother was some sort of leader in the church and we prayed with her for the girl to be free from the demon.

One of the craziest things of the entire trip for me happened that afternoon. It still baffles me. I was talking with a woman and the conversation seemed to be going well. There were no translators nearby but that turned out not to be a problem because she apparently spoke English, perfect English. We had been talking for a while when suddenly nothing I said seemed to make sense to her anymore. She then looked up at me, apparently very confused, and said, in perfect English, "I speak only Swahili. I don't speak English. You are speaking to me in Swahili". Crazy, huh? Unfortunately after that we were unable to communicate at all. She then talked with one of the men from the church for a little while and they both seemed contented and moved on. I don't know what exactly happened or what God did with her, but I would like to think that God did something with that conversation. Perhaps we lost our understanding of each other because the conversation had gone as far as it needed to, I don't know. Anyway, it was crazy.

We had one more day of the conference, in which I don't remember anything too terribly exciting happening. Well, at least not any major healings though certainly there were people who got healed and people who gave their lives to Christ, which is exciting enough right?

The following day we headed off for Ngorongoro for a few (awesome) days of safari before leaving Tanzania. Basically, the trip rocked (in case you hadn't gotten that already); lots of healings (each day we had people dancing on stage who had previously been unable to walk), lots of salvations, and lots of lives touched by God.

Africa- Installment 3

After a rather lengthy break in my storytelling I shall continue with Wednesday.

Wednesday was the beginning of the conference we were working with (the Call Africa). The conference consisted of a pastors' meeting in the morning and a rally for anyone in the area who wanted to come in the afternoon. There were 4 different locations in and around Moshi and each team went to a different location each day.

There isn't much to say about Wednesday. It was a good day, but a day in which very little that was particularly memorable occured (to me at least, that's not to say the rest of the team didn't have memorable experiences that day). There is one person who sticks out in my mind from that day. A man who's right arm and leg were paralyzed. I prayed for him and the moment I had finished speaking he started, slowly, to move his arm, then his leg, and as he did so his face lit up with the biggest grin I think it could contain.

Thursday, in comparison, was very exciting. First we were unexpectedly joined by a group of high school students from New Zealand who had apparently been invited by one of the local pastors. They could not minister with us becuase only people who are with GMA are allowed to minister at their conferences (after all, they don't want people who's intentions and training they don't know being associated with them) but they performed the songs they had prepared (the national anthem of New Zealand and a maori war dance) which were met by the assembled crowd with great appreciation.

Anyway, on to the real stories. During ministry time after our pastor's sermon one of my teammates and I prayed for a young woman with a demon. The demon left her (hallelujah!) and then she asked us to pray for her feet. We looked and saw nothing wrong with her feet. She explained that she had club feet but as she looked at her feet a sheepish smile cam over her face- she hadn't noticed till that moment that she ahd been healed. God had healed her feet at the same time as setting her free from that demon!

I saw a lot of people healed that evening and there were a lot of people set free from demons, but that story is the one that really sticks out.

Africa- Installment 2

Tues July 7
I have to admit, I had not been very excited for our activities this day. This was our Bless Africa day when we broke into small groups and went to various places in and around Moshi to minister. Some people went to orphanages, some to a blind school, some to a deaf school, some to other interesting places, and I was to go to with two other women to a widow's group. Widows? What do i have in common with widows? How much cooler to go pray for some deaf or blind kids! But no, widows. It actually turned out to be really cool. All the women there were so blessed to have us with them. Each of the three of us got a chance to get up and speak to them and share God's heart with them. One of my biggest fears going on this trip was the fear that I would have to do just that- get up in front of a crowd of spiritually hungry Africans and say something meaningful- and those of you who know me well-or at all really- will realize that public speaking is not exactly my forte nor something I enjoy- but this I enjoyed. God told me just what he wanted to share with these beautiful women and they were touched by it- they had tears in their eyes. I find it truly amazing that God could use me to so deeply touch these women.

We were then whisked away to visit a women's dairy co-op. What the purpose of this visit was, I have no idea, but they certainly seemed to enjoy it. Our visit consisted mainly of being carted around the entire mountain village in the back of a standing-room-only pick-up truck with a group of joyous and constantly singing women to each of their three milk coolers. Did I mention this is Africa, and it's in the mountains, and the roads are- well- exciting? Yep, good times, good times (and I mean that, I'm not just being sarcastic, it was fun). AFter serving us an extraodinary meal, they presented us with gifts. A traditional wrap skirt for each of us, which they wrapped around us themselves with much song and dance (During this ceremony we got a call from one of the group leaders asking if we would be on time to be picked up. To this Ann replied "I have to go, they're dressing us").

Africa- Finally!

Today I have a treat for all you wonderful patient people- I am finally going to carry through with my promise to share with you all my stories from Tanzania! Exciting, no? So here it is- relief from your long months of agony (to be completed in a few installments)!

Sunday July 5
This was our first official day of ministry. We were broken up into groups of two or three to go minister at various churches within the vicinity of Moshi (the city we were in, in case you hadn't gathered that). The plan was to go to our churches and then come back to the hotels and have the rest of the day to recoup. That is not at all the way my day actually went. The pastor of the church I went to wanted to to take me and the guy I was with to a rally that the local pastors had put together and we, being the intrepid team that we were, agreed. So, after a rather adventurous lunch at the pastor's home, we made our way to Machengo field where we found an already enormous crowd awaiting us. The alter call that night brought forward 700 people. Even more came forward wanting physical healing. And so it was that I- tired and overwhelmed and hungry, having never seen anyone actually healed when I prayed for them- was released into the oncoming crowd to minister. And you know what? God is really awesome. When you step out and do something crazy he backs you up. I stepped out into that crowd not feeling the least bit brave and he used me. The first woman I prayed for that night had failing sight and hearing and she was healed. After that I found myself surrounded by people wanting prayer, most of whom were children with vision problems and God healed each one of them.

Monday July 6
I went into town with another member of our group and spent the day wandering around doing street ministry. We ended up with a young man- a street vendor- named Kelvin translating for us. He stopped to translate for the first man we prayed for and then accompanied us for the rest of the day. As we were walking we ran into another street vendor (a rather obnoxious one if I may say so). Upon learning that we were there to pray for people he gave up on his attempts to sell us his wares and led us to a man he thought we should pray for. THis man was an old, crippled beggar. He couldn't stand and his fingers were gnarled and deformed- as though he had leprosy. His fingers didn't grow back out (how awesome would that have been?!) but he was able to get up and walk when we finished praying for him. Kelvin was deeply touched that a man who hadn't been able to walk for years would be able to get up and walk after we prayed for him. I kept telling him that he could do the same thing- pray for people and see them healed- and that he could do far more than we could do becuase he lives there and speaks the language. I hope he took it to heart. Our street vendor friend then led us on to pray for another person, a elderly muslim man with bad knees. We prayed for him and he slowly stood up, stomped one foot then the other, looked up with a huge smile and started jumping around. By that time we had a whole group of street vendors surrounding us. They can be extremely obnoxious at first, but once they see you praying for people and talking about God, they forget all about selling anything and follow you around just wanting to hear everything you have to say. (The muslim man's son also followed us for a while, but only because he wanted to trade with me for my shiny purple GMA bracelet- the bracelet which I couldn't trade because it marked me as a member of the ministry team.) I think the thing I found most touching about that day was Kelvin. He never once tried to sell us anything (he, in fact, saved us from an argument with some other street vendors), he struck me as being a very honorable young man, and he was so hungry for God. Before going back to the hotel we bought him a Bible.

So, there is installment one, installment two will hopefully be posted tomorrow.

*SIGH*

So remember how I was going to always plan my use of frozen chicken ahead of time? I fail. As a result I now have an addition to make to my list of cooking lessons: always take your own advise. On Tuesday I got home, wanted to make chicken fried rice, remembered that the chicken was still frozen and decided to blaze on ahead anyway. Bad choice. I ended up with something strangely akin to rubber, sponge, and chicken all at once. I had already made a terrible choice in deciding to re-freeze this chicken and then I just added on to it. I couldn't even pry the chicken out of the tray, much less pry the two breasts apart- so I ran hot water over it- a great idea, had I put the chicken in a plastic bag first.

Mealgonewrong and Other Delicacies

College is a time of learning many things- specifically today I would like to address one lesson in particular which is of the utmost importance- how to, and NOT to cook.

Once you leave your parents' house and have a kitchen of your own you find yourself- gasp- having to prepare ALL of your own meals. This can be a challenging and exciting affair and leads to many new and interesting discoveries. You very quickly learn many lessons on how NOT to cook.

Lesson #1: Always check inside the oven BEFORE turning it on lest something flammable be stored within unbeknownst to you.

Lesson#2: Always be sure that you have burners on "low" when planning on simmering something like, oh, say, pasta sauce- lest you end up with a blackened brick rather than the delicious dinner you had planned.

Lesson #3: While freezing things like pasta sauce and chicken is a great idea, always be sure you plan which night you are actually going to use said ingredient. Otherwise you may think to yourself one night, "hey, I think i'll make something delicious out of that chicken i have", only to discover that, no-no you won't- that chicken is still in the freezer, frozen solid.

Lesson #4: When making something you've never made before, always be sure you really DO know what your doing before embarking upon the creation of said dish. It is not enough to say," I've seen my mother make this before, it's easy". When that is your thought process, you may be sure that disaster is all but inevitable.

When disaster strikes, however, all is not necessarily lost. Just when things seem bleakest and dinner a shattered dream there is the greatest potential for greatness. As proof of this, I would like to tell you of the creation of mealgonewrong (said in a French accent, of course). It was a Monday evening. We had chicken (not frozen), ground beef, and potatoes. We had planned on caramalizing the potatoes, but I, having not retreived the actual recipe from my mother, had simply guessed how to make them. The caramel, well i'm not sure what it did, but it wasn't what it was supposed to do. The caramelizing failed. So we threw all the ingredients into a skillet together with some herbs. It was missing something- so we added some onion. Still, it lacked something, so we dug through the refrigerator and pulled out some cheese. That was it! It was perfect, simple but perfect! Out of the ashes of cooking failure we had made something amazing- we had made Mealgonewrong!

"Nasty Uncomfortable Things"

I know it's been a while since I've posted. Part of this, of course is that I was out of the country and had much better things to attend to than blogging, but part of it also is that I am sure that I should say a few words about my trip, but after being part of something so amazing summing it all up on an online blog seems somehow sacrilege (let me clarify in case anyone has been out of the loop, I was in Moshi, Tanzania for two weeks).

Nonetheless, I must say something about it. I cannot very well tell each and every one of my many tales on this page but I will try to do justice to my experiences. To put it simply: God did amazing things; He touched many people in profound ways and I got to be part of it.

En route to Tanzania I began reading the Hobbit for the second time- it seemed a fitting book to read. Starting off on my adventure I didn't feel much different than Bilbo did starting on his: small and insignificant and not very excited about my adventure ( "Nasty uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner!). I was late for dinner (and other meals) many times, and quite often was a little uncomfortable but God used me to do great things and brought out more of the courage that He gave me (just like Bilbo's adventures brought out his brave side). Maybe that's the most amazing part; there's nothing in particular that I have to offer that such a great God could need but He took me all the way to Tanzania and let me be a part of the things He's doing there. I will tell you a bit about what it was He, and we, did. A small group from my church along with approximately 70 other people were with Leif Hetland's ministry Global Mission Awareness. We worked with a conference called the African Call during which we had pastor's conferences, women's conferences and rallies. During the conference God moved in power. He healed people of blindness, deafness, deformities, paralysis and any number of other ailments serious or otherwise when we prayed for them (or in many cases when we hadn't prayed for them). We also cast out demons from many people by God's power and authority. We saw one girl who was healed of a severe physical deformity when we cast a demon out of her. We had people dancing wildly who minutes before had barely been able to walk. People who's failing eyesight or hearing was restored. People healed in the conferences and people healed on the streets. I saw demons manifest in people for the first time- and thereafter cast them out for the first time. Almost everyone I prayed for was healed. It was thoroughly amazing to say the least.

The hardest part is figuring out how to minister here in the same way that we ministered there- but I know God will teach how to do it. I know he has even greater things in store for me and I cannot wait for the adventures that He'll take me on next- nasty uncomfortable things though they be.

Jambo Means Hello

I know you've all always wanted to know how to say "hello" in Swahili, so there you go-jambo. I have learned this, and many other, valuable pieces of information in my attempts to learn Swahili this past week. I should have started on this endeavor a while ago but I was distracted (by such silly things as finals) and then I forgot about it. I am pleased to say that I am making significant progress, though I don't think that have such phrases as "Would you like to pray to receive Jesus as Savior?" quite down by the time I leave. On that note, I leave in just two weeks. I'm starting to feel ever so slightly...oh... freaked out? That might be a little too strong a phrase though. One would think that I, intrepid world traveler that I am, would not be worried about a mere two weeks abroad, but, alas, one would be wrong. Don't get me wrong, I'm excited- it's like when you first get on a roller coaster and start going up the first hill- that sort of "freaked out"- the good sort- and I'm really excited about stepping out of my box to do what my beloved Jesus is doing. But anyway, we were talking about Swahili. I've had an interesting time trying to figure out some little bit of the language and so far I think it's going rather well. (My favorite thing to say is the poetic-sounding "asante sana" or thank you very much.) I discovered an online Swahili-English dictionary (I did print up four pages of useful Swahili from the group I'm going with so I'm not dependent on whatever resources I scrounge up myself). This dictionary is perhaps not the most dependable resource, as demonstrated by the example sentences they offered:

for "young person" (I don't remember the Swahili translations, sorry)
"Each policeman had got for himself more than one young wife".

Really? The abundance of young wives for policemen is really what you think of when you hear the word "young person"?

for "young girl" (Oh, dear, where will they go with this? more about young wives?)
"all men like to be with young girls".

Fantastic. (I am happy to say that there were no other example sentences like that one.)

for "woman (old enough to be an aunt)" (Wow, that's one oddly specific word)
"The father of John is like my aunt".
wait, what?
"the FATHER of John (okay) is like my AUNT".
If I could type the transition from puzzled face to greatly amused face, I would, but as that is not an option, it will have to suffice for you to imagine it.

If they can't even manage to translate "mama" (the swahili for mother) to mother correctly (it was mama in the Swahili version so I'm assuming that was their intent) then I'm not entirely sure that I should trust to their accuracy (of course the proceeding example sentences had already made me think that this was not the most reliable of dictionaries). So that is the end of me looking up online Swahili dictionaries, though it was quite fun. :)

Clinicals

I've been very lax about writing. My deepest apologies.
Anyway, on to our subject today! I'm not sure how much I've told you all about clinicals (you all mainly being all you Matsons as I think most of my other readers have heard about it in great detail), so I will summarize it for you:
Upon my last chat with my academic advisor I learned that there was the possibility of starting clinicals this fall (for you non-nursing people clinicals are when you actually go work at a hospital as part of your classes), however i needed a GPA of at least 3.3 (mine was slightly below that) and my AP scores weren't in. So I studied practically every spare moment I had, and after much drama managed to get the AP scores delivered, but I was sure I hadn't done quite well enough to get that 3.3. I'm sure you can see where this is going. I just checked my grades (finally) and my cumulative GPA is 3.331! I'll find out if a start clinicals mid summer (possibly while i'm in Tanzania).

Hallelujah!

So, as you all know I have been in need of money for this mission trip. Well, for the past few weeks I haven't had any real hope that I was going to go. I keep saying "If God really wants me to go He'll provide the money even though it seems impossible" but I haven't actually thought I was going to go. I was just going to wait till May 15 (at which point I need all the money in) and then drop out of the trip if (and when) the money didn't come.

I came home for the weekend and upon arriving home found an envelope on my dresser. It was from my church. It was a check from my church (I have not filled out the application for financial assistance from the mission board- I was going to do that this weekend). I was somewhat surprised and pleased- that is until I opened the envelope and looked at the check- then I was whole lot more than just SOMEWHAT surprised or pleased- shocked, amazed, dumbfounded, ecstatic, might work better. Let's just put it this way- it was far more than i would have dared to expect or hope for. Suddenly this mission trip thing is seeming a lot more possible! Which is perhaps the scarier possibility!

(In other news, i think you should all know that there is a "Large Wife Sale" going on in my neighborhood. No joke! I saw a sign for it when I got off the highway!)

News

I havn't posted for a while. Sorry.
so, let me attempt to catch you up a bit. There really isn't much to tell so it should be easy.
My swing dance team (the Cat's Pajamas) competed at the Intercollegiate Swing Battle a couple weeks ago. We didn't place, but we didn't expect to, or really care, we just wanted to have fun- which we did! WE had tons of fun, it rocked. And we didn't get last! Which is great because we're a new team and most of us are new dancers. I ended up dancing 5 nights in a row. It rocked.
I think that just might be all the news I have to share with you right now. Lame. Well I'm still doing well in classes, I had two tests yesterday, it's snowing which ruined my plans to go dancing in Denver tonight (and also cancelled dancing last night) and it's time to sign up for classes for next semester. Oh, and I'm going to try to find a job for summer (i'm not so sure that that will work out) and I still need money for Tanzania so be praying for that cause I know that God is fully capable of providing everything I need and that he wil give me the money if he wants me to go.

Lve you all!

Now Accepting Generous Donations: Part 2

Now Accepting Generous Donations

I have an exciting announcement: I am going on a mission trip to Tanzania this summer! The trip costs $3500. Which I need soon. There may or may not be a fee for not having $2000 in by April 2 (yes I know that's this friday, and no, I did not wait till the last minute to start fund raising) and there is definitely a fee for not having ALL of it in by May 15. Pray for the money to come in. And if you have any fundraising ideas, please share. And if you feel you would like to give a generous donation, feel free.

much love!

The Demise of Theta the Beta

I regret to inform you all that Theta the Beta has passed away. I know he was dear to all of us. He passed away at around 6:00 Monday night. I fear we shall never know the cause of dear Theta's death. For over a week he just sat at th bottom of his bowl, he never ate, he didn't respond to the mirror I put in front of him, nothing. Poor Theta, he was such a good fish. He loved peace, he never attacked anything except his food pellets. My desk feels quite empty without him. He shall never be forgotten.

Hiking

Since I moved down here I have been wanting to go hiking. I love hiking and I've wanted to get to know the mountains in this area. Each morning I see them, so majestic, so close, beckoning to me. I'm not sure why it's taken me so long to plan a hiking trip, but it has.

I tried going with a friend a couple months ago. I forgot the map and neither of us knew where we were going so we gave up and just took a walk in Garden of the Gods and got Starbucks.

Today a friend and I planned to go hiking. I found a place that looked good, studied at the map and wrote down the directions (also, my car is armed with an Atlas)- this time I did it right! We were both very excited. Unfortunately we had some time constraints; she had something to do at work (which took longer than expected) and needed to be back at around 4. This was OK, the place I had chosen didn't appear to be very far away. After lunch we headed off, armed with my book of hiking locations, directions and an atlas. After driving for about 40 minutes (which felt more like 20) we reached a town and as my turnoff was in the first town we ought to reach-Manitou Springs we both began looking for the road we needed- Manitou Avenue. Instead, to my chagrin, I noticed that all the shopping centers and such were named Woodland something-or-other. Woodland Park is another town deeper in the mountains and far past Manitou Springs. We pulled off onto a residential road and took a moment to look at the maps and figure out where we need to go. Indeed we were far past Manitou Springs, which turned out to be much, much closer to Colorado Springs than I had originally deduced. It would seem that while reading the map I had confused the streets a little- we needed to exit at Fountain Creek which then turned into Manitou Avenue, and Manitou Springs did not straddle the highway as I had expected so I never saw it as we passed it. Knowing our error and how to correct it, we set off. At least we now knew where Woodland Park lies and how far away it is, plus we had gotten the privilege of seeing Pikes Peak from a different angle.

We drove 15 minutes and exited at Fountain Creek. Upon entering Manitou Springs we were held up by construction (keep in mind we had a time constraint). We passed through the construction and on to a cute little town. Only at this point did I remember that our next turn, Ruxton, was BEFORE entering the town. Since I was sick of driving around and the town was so cute we decided to put a raincheck on the hiking and just walk around the town. We saw a cool music shop and spent a considerable amount of time in there talking with the owner (who makes his own instruments) and playing with the instruments. I wish I could remember what the instrument we played with was - dulc-something (it was a stringed instrument, it's from ancient Persia and it was the precursor to the piano). Totally awesome.

So we never got to hike but we did have a lovely adventure, and we learned a lot! We learned where Woodland Park is and how long it takes to get there, we learned where Manitou Springs is and how extraordinarily close it is, we learned about awesome stringed instruments and we learned where that trail is so we can find it next time!

http://graphjam.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/song-chart-memes-smoke-detector1.jpg

I think I told you all about how my freinds and I set off the smoke alarm while making pancakes.

Vacuums and Dragons

Saturday (which was already an epicly awesome day set in the midst of an epicly awesome weekend) was made all the better by a long awaited adventure exploring, what else, Vacuums and Dragons! One of my best friends, Jessie, and I long ago noticed a sign in a shopping center that read "Vacuums and Dragons". We were, of course, intrigued and highly amused. We made it our goal to visit that place and on Saturday we finally accomplished this. We drove around the parking lot looking for this store, hoping that it actually existed and the sign wasn't just a typo. We nearly gave up hope but while driving through the last corner of the parking lot we spotted it- Vacuums and Dragons! Ah! Sweet day! Our lives were complete! We parked and entered the store, trying to figure out what to say when we encountered an employee. It is quite the store. They sell and repair vacuums as well as figurines of dragons and other mythical creatures, incense, swords, and plants. A strange and intriguing store, it did not disappoint. We left with hearts brimming with immeasurable joy.

Attack of the Church Folk

I've been church hunting with a couple friends of mine. Last Sunday we visited a new church. It was small and most of the people there were middle aged or older. I didn't much enjoy the service, the pastor was very difficult to follow and wasted probably 15 minutes on a very strange demonstration which represented I'm not sure what. I also had difficulty figuring out how he got his message about Resurrection (he did have some good points) from the passage he was using- the two seemed only vaguely connected.

After the service finally ended (it wasn't even a long service) all I wanted was to book it out of there as fast as possible. On our way out, however, we were waylaid by a very freindly woman who thought we must be new since she had never seen us before- a correct assumption. She spent a few minutes chatting with us and rather impressed me by remembering throughout her entire dialogue with us what each of our names and majors were.
She told us that their church unfortunately didn't have many college age kids (thanks, I already noticed that) and didn't have a college group.
"Not a problem", thought I, "We're not going to come back here anyway".
She told us some more about the church and the small groups they had and then said that she'd go find the leader of her small group and bring him to meet us.
"Ugh, I'm hungry, I don't care, I want to leave" thought I as I smiled politely.
She returned shortly and informed us that she couldn't find the man she had set off to find but she had brought this other man to meet us (who he was I have no idea).
He chatted with us while the energetic woman disappeared again. After a couple minutes she returned bringing with her two people- a college age boy and a man who turned out to be the leader of the "non-existent" college groupn. She and the other mysterious man left us with these two.
They told us all about the college group. The man, after saying many times that he didn't want us to feel pressured or overwhelmed ("Thanks, too late"), invited us to their meeting that evening. Neither of these to knowledgeable though amiable individuals knew the location of the house where they meet every Sunday. The boy went off to call the young man who resides in said house. Then who shoudl come walking by but the young man's parents! who also didn't know his address. Helpful. Finally the boy returned triumphantly with the address in hand. This was entrusted to my care ("oh thanks, I'll keep this safe, since a certainly plan on attending").
"Don's feel pressured to come, but it's going to be a lot of fun", they told us. "But we don't want you to feel pressured"
Finally after being told several more times how we shouldn't feel pressured to come and how much fun they had hanging out together, we were allowed to leave.

I can say this for them; they're very freindly, if not a tad overbearing. I think it goes without saying that we do not plan on going there a second time.

The Departure of Arch-Nemesis Lauren (and other tales)

First of all, I must apologize profusely for having not blogged in over a month (i have a life, and homework). That is why we must mix various tales into one.

Part I: Amy vs Arch-Nemesis Lauren
One day I was in my apartment taking care of various chores. As I was cleaning our living room/kitchen I noticed an oddity; there was a suitcase in the room. Though I did not recognize the first name on the suitcase's label the last name I recognized immediately- Hart- the last name of my arch-nemesis. I then noticed another oddity; there were dishes stacked haphazardly on the nefarious Lauren's black swivel chair. An idea came into my head too good for me to even put into words in my own head for fear that I might be mistaken. I rushed to our bathroom to discover all of the articles that Lauren had provided gone. I sat on my bed for hours working on my homework, trying not to think of that too-good-to-be-true idea and finally I was rewarded with an overheard conversation between another roommate and my enemy. My hearty leaped within me as i listened clandestinely to the words of that conversation. It was true! Praise Jesus, it was true! Yes, dear freinds, she's leaving, my arch-nemesis is on her way out! She's not completely out yet (the actual date of her departure is "up in the air") but she is indeed going to leave. In the meantime she is on her best behavior because she is aware of my vendetta against her and my roommate and my plan to turn her in at the least sign of trouble.

Part II: Rid of Another Bother
I must also tell you all the other most annoying person in my life; Joe the one who was awkward, and sorta creepy and asked me out in a text message, will no longer be around to bother me. Are you prepared for the hilarity of the reason? He is planning on leaving the hobo gang he's in and finding a job. Yes folks, he was in a hobo gang. "What is a hobo gang?" you may ask. Well, I don't know but apparently they do in fact exist.

Part III: Many Adventures
The past weeks have been filled with many glorious adventures, and I am pleased to say that I now feel completely comfortable and normal being in the Springs even during the weekend. One of my friends and I have been exploring the city each weekend. So far we have figured out how to get to Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, explored a palatial hotel (the Broadmoor), and found the cutest little coffee shop. Another friend and I managed to almost burn down my apartment (I use the phrase loosely) twice within the course of 24 hours. One of my roommates decided it would be a good idea to store a flammable pizza box in the oven-a fact which I did not discover until AFTER preheating the oven, and apparently chocolate pancakes cook faster than regular pancakes and hence burn sooner. My freinds from the swing dance team and I have gone to Denver 2 saturdays in a row to go dancing- insane? probably. And the next adventure on my list- changing the headlight by myself.