Always Only For My King

Take my voice and let me sing always, only for my King. Take my lips and let them be filled with messages from Thee. Take my silver and my gold not a mite would I withhold. Take my intellect and use every power as You choose. Here am I, all of me. Take my life, it's all for Thee.

Monday, February 27, 2006

celery: my cooking nemesis

i wish i didn't have to buy a whole stalk of celery, but at the grocery store i shop at that's all they have. usually, the celery gets used for one recipe and then gets thrown away after a few weeks because it gets limp.

but alas, this weekend i have found a way to waste it less.
1) being deliberate in using celery in the few recipes i have. roasting chickens, stock, beef stew, chicken noodle soup, chicken stew, other soups, peanut butter and celery, etc.
2) use it to make homemade stock.

speaking of stock, i've also thought of ways to get the most for my money! yesterday, i placed a bed of carrots, onions, garlic, and parsley on the roasting pan. put the seasoned chicken on top and roasted it. then, i took the meat off, saving it for sandwiches for lunch this week. i threw the roasted veggies and the "meatless" chicken into a stock pot, and made homemade stock (i think about 16 cups). i think i'll probably do this more often on the weekend to save money and use up celery!

Friday, February 24, 2006

too much too soon

i realized as i was walking home yesterday how much i do not like the new aol im interface. the newest one is aol aim triton. sorry about the flash in the link. i know that they're trying to revamp the interface and add new features, but i just have had an adverse reaction to it.

some of the things that i have issues with:
  • when you install the software, it uses flash to show you the status of the install. to me, it feels a lot like the ad-ware that has all the bells and whistles.
  • it's different enough from the old interface to annoy me quite a bit.
    • the location of the "away" messages is in a different place. it was hard for me to notice that it was directly above my buddy list b/c the color did not stand out. it was also hard to notice b/c they began to tie the display with your screen name with the status of your chat.
    • i find it more cumbersome to create new away messages
    • they started using tabs in the im boxes. now, when you chat, all your chats show up in a tab, much like gaim. it was hard for me to notice when someone was im-ing me b/c the change in the icons were on the side and not directly where my focus of attention is.
    • it was harder for me to locate how to change my user preferences.
    • they started adding a lot of features that i thought was too much--e-mail, video, video chat, etc.
despite my rant, i understand how hard it is to introduce a new interface. i'd just prefer a smoother transition between the old and the new. maybe a better idea would have been to keep a lot of the old features in the same place and have a similar layout as the old aim. perhaps i'm just getting old and being too critical. if you have aim triton, let me know what you think.

Friday, February 17, 2006

things that magically happen in grad school

so i'm not sure when it exactly happened, but at some point in grad school, i learned how to think more analytically and critically. i think it was after i published my first paper. somehow, by God's grace, i'm able to read papers and make suggestions to make papers stronger in organization, structure, and the points made in papers. this has carried over to making presentations and critiquing others presentation. so i don't know what happened, and how God morphed my brain into this new understanding (it's almost magical). weird.

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

public or private?

i've always tried to be ninja-esque when using the public restrooms for "bowl movements". i check to make sure no one else is there, go to the stall that's the furthest away from the door, and use air freshner if it's available. and if someone should enter (or i just need to really go), i stop and wait until they leave before i continue.

even though it's a natural every day process, i'm embarrassed that someone might have to hear and/or smell my "business". as an aside, for all you guys out there, girls definitely don't fart flowers, nat can attest to that! :)

anyways, am i crazy for being so embarassed and taking all these precautions?

Monday, February 06, 2006

the road less traveled

it seems that marriage is a road that becoming less successfully traveled on. i've been thinking about marriage and committment, as i've heard more about those i know personally that are struggling or ending their own marriage. it breaks my heart to hear such news.

divorce, it's such an ugly thing. though it makes me sad, it makes me angry as well. i find it too frequently used and oftentimes used as an "easy way out" rather than working it out. i've seen and heard the word threatened in marriages, just being tossed around so easily. i just don't understand. even when divorce is not an issue, i've seen and heard so many stories of the lack of committment in marriage. sure, there are the big things like adultery, but there are small things like verbally pondering to your spouse what it might have been like to have married an old lover. people even commit more passionately and fervently to their career, hobbies, children, and other things more than their marriage. i wonder, if we were to commit as strongly to marriage, would we have such a high divorce rate?

for me, i see lifelong committment and marriage as one and the same. you can't have one without the other. and i think in many marriages, people don't think of it in this way. and in my mind, it might the root of why there are so many "unhappily ever afters". i wish i could drill the idea of committment and marriage into couples heads. perhaps it would help them prepare for marriage and hopefully prevent divorces. i guess that's why i'm a big proponent of pre-marital counseling. in our counseling, we got a big reality check of what marriage is: it's the union of two imperfect people that have different backgrounds, experiences, understandings, thought processes, personalities, expectations, etc. so of course, there are going to be problems and issues big and small. we got small doses of what the hard times in our own marriage might look like, and what it has looked like in our pastor's marriage. in the end, we were reminded of that marriage is for life, and it's not always pretty. the underlying tone of our counseling was, "now you know all these things, the good and bad. do you still want to do it?" and i just hope couples think about these things before they say "i do".

Friday, February 03, 2006

open house

i've been missing hanging out with people and feel like i've become "socially unavailable". so, in an effort to be more socially interactive (especially after leaving from school for the day), i talked with nat about having a day of the week where we have an "open house".

so the idea of the "open house" is to have our house open for people to come by. so, some initial thoughts were to have dinner provided (or perhaps potluck if there will be lots) for those that want to come, and then a study or social time aftewards. i think we'll try to set the environment to be flexible, but i think if we'll try to have a "study" corner in the house for people that want to work. in that way, i'm happy we have wireless. :) in any case, i don't want people to feel obligated to stay , but come and go as they please.

i guess my grand "scheme" is to make our house more like a coffee/library atmosphere one night a week. :)

Thursday, February 02, 2006

baby bandwagon (cont'd)

i assumed, in my last post, that we'd be able to get pregnant. if not, we have plan B: adopt. :)

speaking of adoption, i was just surfing around, and i read that the chapman family (steven curtis chapman) have 3 adopted girls from china. i don't know why, but seeing their children's picture really touched my heart.

the chapman's have set up a organization to financially help people adopt that don't necessarily have the money. the organization is shaohannahslove.org, named after their first little girl they adopted in china.

baby bandwagon?

been thinking a lot about babies lately. some of my friends are having their first child soon (most of them before the summer). part of me is like, "well, let's jump on that bandwagon. we want kids!" and then part of me is like, "nat and i can enjoyed being married for a little while longer sans children".

so, my thoughts are, perhaps we'd start trying in a year (or maybe less). but a few factors linger in my head. if i get pregnant:
1) i might be in the middle of my grad school program (if i get in), can i defer for a while and then come back?
2) nat will still be in school (which may not be a bad thing).
3) finances.
4) might have to postpone my teaching career for a few years (which might be fine too).
5) being a parent. kinda scary.
6) what if my friends get married and i can't travel? :)

i know, some thoughts range from silly to serious. but then i'm reminded, there is never a "perfect" time to have a baby (well, at least when you're younger and want to have a smaller chance of any problems during pregnancy due to being older). and i'm reminded of friends that have children that have been under more "stressful" situations, and they're managing.

one things for sure, my family is ready for the thompson baby bandwagon. :)