The Clouds Over Malaysia Are Really Cute.

That is my reaction to seeing the clouds over Malaysia on Google Maps while looking for Qatar (w00t!!) and subsequently Singapore (which I have always traditionally assumed was in the Mediterranean near Italy).

Anyways, that is why I am blogging, right now, in the library, Qatar has seen my blog!

I really meant to blog yesterday. I ran out of time though.

You see, yesterday in church, Pastor DB spoke about Lent, about the varying history and how we can apply it. Lent has traditionally been a 40 day long time period where you give something up and replace it with something that will draw you closer to God. It is not simply meant as a punishment, it is not simply a time to switch vices, it can't be something that you force on someone.

So, when I was praying about it I came up with three options:

1)Give up breakfast. This was based literally off of Matthew 4:4 "Jesus answered "It is written 'Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'""
I eat a lot of bread. This is because of my mother who is particularlly particular about whether her sandwich bread is 'stale' or not leading to the purchase of many additional loaves of bread which I take because otherwise no one will eat them. Especially for breakfast recently I have been eating, like, 5 slices of bread with something on it (Peanut Butter, Jam, Bananas, etc.). So literally, replace the bread with reading the Bible or something.

2)Nevermind. It's not important.

3)Anime which I then felt should be all television including Friends. This is because at breakfast and other various times when I am 'bored' or otherwise decide for no reason that my studies are less important than procrastination that this is what I should do. I would be able to eat breakfast and connect with God!

Reasons against the posssibilities:

1) I am hardly eating lunch ever as it is, so giving up breakfast is either switching over to eating lunches (as if I hadn't given anything up) or starving myself by not eating anything, but dinner when I am already, probably, malnourished. Also, Saturday night I was talking to my support coach JW and he suggested I spend more time at school so I could get things done and he said that he used to go to Baker's and buy a cheap breakfast and 'have breakfast with God.' Then Sunday Pastor DB was recounting how food is a social thing and how in college because he knew nobody he would 'eat lunch with God'. I felt God was telling me to a) eat meals and b) eat them with Him. Nothing such as "you should starve", but rather the opposite..

2)forget it.

3)I have actually got to a point where anime isn't controlling my life. I only watch it during meals or when there is nothing else to do. TV however is almost always a waste of time.

I was thinking about this stuff all day and decided to ask AL about it. I told her about options 1 and 3. She asked if I had thought about option 2. I replied that I had and decided against it.

I suppose I should let you know what it is now. Option 2 is pokemon. At the thought I said "no. I just bought pokemon white on Friday. If I give it up now I will be unable to play it for what will turn into 3 months (because of EAP) and then no one will still be playing. I am going to give it up in a few weeks once I beat it."

AL asked if I had talked to God / the Holy Spirit about it.

I realized I was deliberately ignoring Him for my own selfish desires.

You know what that is? That is the general definition of sin.

I was sinning and I even kind of knew about it. I mean, when I had been playing on Friday night I had been like 'I'll play until 9 then I'll read Lev 9-10 (which I was supposed to read on the bus that morning, but ran into NB and a 16 year old gangster hiphop thug at the bus stop and ya...)' and I pushed it off for hours. On the bus I'd read the Bible as fast as possible to spend more time playing. I was playing at the C4C meeting. I was playing before / after sunday school. I was playing instead of eating the soup my dad had made. It was taking over my life and I was letting it because I wanted to play so badly, but at the same time I was feeling pretty bad about it and although I had played for 9 hours I was not in the least satisfied. yet.

I thought playing would make it better. I mean, the plot will progress, I'll catch more pokemon (especially Galvantula! I want it so badly!!!) and I will catch them all and have a sense of accomplishment.

I chose to ignore God that morning. He spoke through AL because speaking to me directly wasn't working. I was still not listening. For close to 4 hours at work I was thinking about pokemon and how I was selfishly, sinfully, stupidly, stubornly ignoring God and not making the decision to give up pokemon for lent.

The worst part of this is that I knew Lent is supposed to draw you closer to God. How can you draw closer to God while being in conscience disobedience to what He is telling me? You can't grow in your relationship with God if you are willfully living a life of sin at the same time. Sin is why we can't normally have a relationship with God. Sin is why God had to send Jesus to die on a cross (he also rose from the dead). Jesus is how we can have a relationship while having sin in the past tense. God's grace and love for us overcomes everything.

and yet, I wasn't saying yes or no even while knowing yes was the right answer.

I finally gave up. You can't beat God. So pokemon white is now, and will be for the next 40-100 days, be sitting on the shelf in my room beside my DS which I may or may not touch for an equal amount of time.

Ya.

I'll ttyl. xP

D.Fa

PS... Sorry about the essay of a post... xP

This Better Be Quick

"Hey, Al, I don't have much time to explain this, but I don't have a girlfriend today."

So, ya.

This is a quick post, mostly to procrastinate, but I'm trying not to... *rolls eyes*

Today. Church, then work.

In sunday we looked at Dueteronomy I think. Love God with all your mind soul and strength. Pastor DB also brought up the same verse during the sermon when he was talking about passing the torch from parents to their kids. He kinda embarassed RL (like usual) by saying that he doesn't make his own lunches, his dad does. I'm actually in the same situation, so I was thinking all day at work about how whenI wuld wake up at 5:30 for band, now that I don't have band I could use that time to make breakfast / lunch instead of sleeping in. It may or may not happen. If it does happen it will be PB and J on pumpernickel. xP

So, ya. Then I was thinking that it appears that I want to grow up, but idk...

Anyways, bye!

D.Fa

Unlimited Exposures

So, ya. (last time I start this way..?)

"AL. As you know, yesterday I didn't have a girlfriend. Today is a different story. I don't have any pictures or a girlfriend, but the way I was talking it sounded like I had a crush on C(?)*."

So, "And, yes. We are sold out of lemons." refers to work Sunday night. From this point on I will be counting how many times I say "We are sold out" and what we are sold out of because when I work a seven-hour evening shift we are often sold out of like 5-10 different things, often 2-3 are in the flyer. I say it at least like 6-12 times per shift..?

We are never sold out of lemons, so it was rare to say it, but everyone wants lemons, so I said it a lot... A Lot....

Ya, today. Day 1. Period 1 spare. I was going to develop the pictures from Tuesday after school when I skipped Dixie to get my physics project done. I went to the grade 11 photography class and got all the stuff to start developing the film. I then proceeded to take the film out of the camera. This was the part I always forgot. I could never remember how to get the film back into the canister, so when it wasn't working I asked the teacher how to do it. She starts like getting nervous like the film wasn't on the reel properly. I put the camera in the bag then open it.

There was no film.

I'm running out of time to develop film... I have to get these pictures tommorow... Then I have to get it developed Monday. Tuesday - Thursday I have to get the positives. Thursday night I have to write my conclusion / Analysis. Or else. Presentation is Friday.

So during my spare I watched Fairy Tail and Bleach. Yuss. Anime during spare = stress relief. I should have been studying or researching for bio test or essay, but whatever... It's due next week. I'm fine xP. Also, a week ago I learned of this website that gives you formated Bibliography entries if you tell it what work you cited. So, that's a good half-hour of work I don't have to do anymore. xP. bibme.org I think.

Lunch. Last Music Council meeting this year. Fun stuff, kinda, not really, but we ate the leftovers from the bbq, so, xP.

Calculus was oddly fun / confusing. We had Mr. KD as a sub. He's a gym teacher, so ya... it was also a ridiculous lesson about 3D planes and scalar equations and stuff. That was the confusing part. The note was progressing slowly, so SZ told me to get a Sudoku book. I got a sudoku book that also contained other japanese puzzles. Theres a puzzle called bridges where there are a bunch of "islands" with numbers in them that say how many bridges can be attached to them. bridges may not overlap, and all islands must be connected. Go! Me and SZ solved like 3 or 4. http://www.puzzle-bridges.com/ lol. fun.

Physics was slightly interesting. I mean no marks on the line, it was kinda interesting theoretically, but very boring what we were doing... looking a graphs and doing simple math calculations... What the heck is a pion..? And what does it have to do with me??? So ya...

One Acts rehearsals outside... not a bad day.

Kinda sneak-peeked some of the art show. It looks good.

I had supper then played tennis with my brother. I actually won for once. It was kinda fun. My first serves were "kinda moderately okay." I won 6-3 6-5. I was up 6-3 4-0 I think, but I usually lose, so whatever. My brother hasn't played in a while. As the match went on he got better. He usually does and it's kinda annoying. I kinda always at a consisten mediocre so I don't care. The few things I do care about in tennis are always hitting it before the double bounce, always going for it, always getting the balls that have gone off the court and getting it over the net. If it's a terrible lob from behind the baseline I don't care, as long as it goes in. I don't get many winners, but it depends on the level of play. When my brother is playing badly I do a lot less good shots, but when he starts cranking it I have to try harder and so many more good flukes happen. Whatever. If it's fun, play it.

Ya. I'm procrastinating. I also kinda have to study for a Japanese exam on Saturday... whatever, it will work out.

D.Fa

P.S. They actually had 400 pieces of bread, ie more bread points then the 2nd place teams total.... 2nd place had like 96 points...

P.P.S. My brother walked in and saw my old post, and was like "I thought you liked the other lollipop..?" "Your not making your followers vote on which one is better are you?!?" Great Idea!





Vote in comments. xP Plz and Ty.

* (?) signifies that I don't know her last name. I often know people's last names.

Very Shallow

So, Ya.

This blog will update you on the few days I had no computer in a sudden and very strange way:

Sunday: "AL, I don't have a girlfriend, but I can sing and have a job, so I should be able to get one. And, yes. We are sold out of lemons."

Monday: "AL, I still don't have a girlfriend... Maybe if I play more tennis and patch up my relationship with my family..? Or I could just sleep in."

Tuesday: "AL, I don't have a girlfriend. Maybe if I didn't work so much or procrastinated so much I could do something about it..?"

Wednesday: "AL. Sorry if you don't like spam, but you told me to do it! I don't have a girlfriend yet! I probably should have told my parents where I was today / knew what was happening today... Also. My pants are in your car."

So. ya.

Quick, shallow, random update. Including today..?

I just can't be that quick with blog updates. I like rambling... xP It's what I do...

So. Ya. There is a reason for that intro for today's blog. It both vaguely updated you, which kinda annoys me, but I don't have time to go into much more detail... Or at least, I don't want to take over an hour to write blog posts anymore..? Also, the main reason originates from Sunday School.

So, Sunday School. Sunday Mornings. But this week there was a retreat and a number of people (about 50% or so) from our church were there instead. Also, it was a long week end, so other people were away too... So anyway, there were only seven people there. Five highschoolers, one university student and the pastor's wife.

So, at the end we always pray in groups or whatever, so AL, RL and me were in a group. Usually we quickly talk about things in our life before we pray, like so that we know what to pray for, and RL was all like "What's that D.Fa, you have a girlfriend?" or something, and AL turns quickly with a giant smile on her face, "Why didn't you tell me?!?!?" So, I say "Hey RL, You have a girlfriend?!?" She turns the other way quickly. Of course we were both joking.

Then I'm like "Hey Al, why didn't you tell me you had a boyfriend?!?" and she's like "You know why." I was like "Oh... right.... hehe(awkwardly)..." She kinda told me a secret and I kinda told the guy it was about and she couldn't trust me, because she said not to tell him... So, as like a test or something, she didn't tell me for like month(s?) about her boyfriend. Like, the secret wasn't that terrible, but like... she taught me a lesson... I guess. I don't think I really wanted to know about her boyfriend anyway... xP... I mean... ya. nvm.

So, the point was, after the awkward laugh, she was all like, "You should give me daily updates!" Rl, was like "You mean 'AL, I still don't have a girlfriend'?"

And it was all like what if we message you on facebook? Won't that be bad if your boyfriend sees it? Won't it be creepy if anyone sees that, a whole page of "I don't have a girlfriend" ??

So, ya. I forgot on Sunday because I had work and my computer got taken back to futureshop. They have to like empty the computer of anything so that they can be sure the virus is gone. We only got it back so we could back-up the files we wanted to keep before having them wiped.

So, ya. Today was busy. Straight from waking up, to school, to music bbq, to dixie gig, to a Night for MuSic. I got home at like 9:30. I left around 7:40. It's normal in my life. xP... but I didn't tell my parents. I did tell my brother, but only because he wanted to play tennis tonight, which wouldn't have gone well... It was 42 with the humidex........ Celcius!

So, ya. Not having band in the morning kinda messes up the bathroom schedule because like If I wake up at 7ish, I can't get into the bathroom until like 7:10, and I have to leave by 7:45. When I woke up at 6ish, no one would need the bathroom. And my dad leaves at like 7:20, so I have to be out of the house by quarter to or else I'll be late, like before if I was running late I could just get a ride. xP

During spare we made battle sounds for VB's Writer's Craft radio play. It was amusing. I also accepted my offer to Carleton, Biochem, and did very little else. At lunch I hunted down Miss CW for a couple community servie hour signatures. I also wanted to catch Mr. BF, but I had to go to to dixie practice because I missed the one on Tuesday doing my long over due Physics summative. So, I was asking people where Mr. BF was. I started asking some people in Japanese (only people I knew, or at least thought, would understand the simple sentence "BF sensei wa doko desu ka?") MM thought I knew where he was and reacted like she needed to find him. So, I explained I needed to find him (he's in charge of making the slideshow for the Chicago Trip and wanted pictures.)

So, I had to go to dixie, so I gave MM my pictures. DS also had pictures and MM had found Mr. BF, so she was sent again because DS is also in the band. So, we practiced. Apparently we were supposed to wear our music t-shirts to the gig tonight. There was also a permission form, but I'm over 18 and can sign them myself now. xP

So. Music bbq. I went to Metro and bought cookies and chips. I was skipping one act rehearsal to go to the bbq, but it was the last music bbq, for me ever... also, I know my lines. When I went to beg the whole cast was like "Ya, he knows his lines..." So they let me go, but EM said I owed her an Ice Cap. KG said I owe him some fancy Starbuck's coffee thing, but he's not a director, so... Although I'm fine with buying him something, I'm a bit too broke for it... Especially Starbuck's! lol.

So every year. At the bbq there would be fun, unofficial awards which we vote on, the next year's co-prezs would be announced, there would be a scavanger hunt, a semi-potluck type bbq and games.

The co-prezs had been decided yesterday because only two people stepped forward for the election, so it was already announced. Also, I won the "Worst Concert Screw-up" award... fun. The scavanger hunt was kinda difficult. It wasn't semi-random ordinary everyday items it was like "can you make / prove this object for points and / or creativity points?" Like, a LIVE unicorn. RP wore a pointy hat. We had a video of Charlie the Unicorn (hilarious. youtube it!) We both got points for it. The winning team won because (I think) they had a pile of tiny pieces of bread. Pieces of bread were 1/4 points each (bring multiple!) They had like 110 or something... They ended up winning with like double the score of the second place team.

The bbq ran late (40 minutes.) so we had to rush to the gig. I didn't have my music t-shirt at school. I was going to go home at 5 to get it, but the bbq wasn't done... so in the end, I was not in uniform, but we were not late, by much.

DD had to play "Oh, Canada" but didn't like the arrangement he had just been given and was not confident about it, so Mr. CR was like "Don't worry, we'll all sing along and the piano will be drowned out." So we all sang. It was in a kinda high key, but I only octaved the ending. Yuss. I was told that it was in F, ie the high note was F, ie I can sing high F if I want to. Yuss. If only I could sing high G if I wanted to.

Also, the Night for MuSic was awesome. Great singing and jazz. Good job OC! She's goes to MHS and her mom was diagnosed a couple years ago. She organized the event and they raised over 5000$ for MS!

Ya. That's about it.

See ya.

D.Fa

Broken Again...

Ya, So.

Today was Sunday. Wake up, church, work, eat dinner, watch more of "A Very Potter Musical", blog.

One thing I don't like is that I'm always really tired Sunday mornings. I usually end up kinda half awake and half asleep by the end of the sermon. It's not that the sermon is boring, it's that if I sit down and stop moving for that long I start falling asleep... How can I fix this..? Sleep earlier..? Wake up later..? Because today Pastor AN was speaking and I remember he told us that we should remember the acronym VISIT and he was explaining each letter. V - Vunerable, I - Intimate, and I don't remember what S, I or T stood for... There's a chance he stopped becasue he was running late, but I doubt that...........................................

Anyways... "Just once more" is no excuse and can be used far too easily.

So, at work today I finished the things I had to do in produce at like 7:30, and I was scheduled until 10, so I went and helped the girl in bakery. I got to bag the extra buns and then put the prices on the bags and I vacuumed the bins. So... hehe... when I was putting the prices on the bags, I kinda messed up the price label printing machine thing.... xP The sticker roll got off track and it took a while to fix it. It then immediately happened again. and again. Most of this was while another employee, whose name I know, but whom I have never actually spoken to for two years, was standing very close behind me waiting for the actually bakery employee to cut his bread. If that's not awkward, what is..? Then she told me the very specific way to rip the price sticker off the roll. Up and to the side Quickly. and then everything worked out. xP...

So, ya.. being tempted sucks. xP But your friends will always help you out if you just ask, especially if they are wiser then you are. The YA at church are pretty cool. xP JS is way cooler then I thought he was and JK earned more of my respect today and he already had a lot of it. Oh, and AL is a pretty great song writer. I really want to download his song, but it's kind of impossible, unless I go against his wishes...

I've watched the first act of AVPM and so far it's pretty hilarious. I will continue watching later, but I should really do homeowrk instead of watching it... xP

So anyways. I'll talk to you later. Hopefully once I've done some homework and stop procrastinating..... >.>

D.Fa

P.S. I figured out how to post Youtube videos... I think...
P.P.S. Manic Drive is awesome!