glenwood

I just got back from spending Thanksgiving in Glenwood with my extended family. It’s become a tradition the last six years. No one I know lives there, we all just go and stay in a hotel and eat Chinese. My aunt pays for my family.

I only stayed two nights this year. Everyone was there. I even got to see my Uncle John, some cute little cousins I don’t see often, and (**drum roll**) my sister Jacque! I got to pick her up from the airport and have lunch with her on the way.

While we were there our Uncle John (who really likes to spend money on his nieces and nephews) took the four oldest grandchildren to Aspen to shop. Jacque needs a formal dress for the graduations in January and August. We went to Gap first and he bought us all a few things.

Then we went to Christine Doir for the dress. A woman with a beautiful but implacable European accent greeted us at door. She showed us a few dresses; all of them too low cut or otherwise mature for my little sister. Then she took us out side to show us a dress in the window. It was way better, wine colored and quite elegant, imho.

The woman took us back inside and started showing us a dress magazine. She said that she was willing to take the dress down from the window, but only if Jacque really wanted it. “…because,” she said, “it is a princess dress, it costs $4,200.”

At this attempt to discourage my (**coughwealthycough**) uncle offended him. He brashly stated that he was paying for the dress and he would buy anything Jacque wanted. (Right here I must pause and explain that our family hasn’t always had enough money to buy food.) At Uncle John’s words my very snow-white sister paled. I hadn’t thought it was possible but it was clear she wanted nothing to do with a $4,200 “princess dress.”

After that store we looked through about a dozen others and found a whole lot or really expensive nothing. My Uncle got very frustrated, but the rest of us had fun.

For Thanksgiving dinner we went out to eat and had salmon. : 9

biology paper finished

I just emailed the biology paper that I've been working on for a month to my teacher. Our group of five picked me to do the job of cut/pasting five individual papers into one. I took the job without a fuss as penance for being the one to come up with our topic which everyone struggled with. :p

Even though it was a difficult subject, I'm still glad we did it. I learned a lot about cutting DNA into pieces, reading what it says, mapping what genes go where, and cloning. Very interesting. Also very useful; now I can splice some DNA in my college's lab and make myself a totally unique new pet.

foot washing

Tonight Marie led our housechurch in talking about servanthood; a thing we could all use some work at. ;) Among other passages we talked about, we went through John 13:3-16. This is were Jesus takes a towel and washes the disciples' feet.

Marie asked how this could apply to us. Someone said this means being as willing to deal with the gross parts of people's character as we are the beautiful parts. Part of obeying this is loving through the hard times and being willing to help people as they grow and not getting bent out of shape over the dark parts of the journey.

Afterwards we had a silent time of prayer. Suddenly Marie pulled out a bowl of water and a towel. She washed the feet of everyone in the room and prayed over all of us. It was a very touching moment, especially since I live with her and I've been a little obnoxious lately.

Arg, I don't know what to do with myself. It was a bit hard listening to everyone talk Saturday. I feel like I've been quite obnoxious the last couple of weeks. Every other time I talk I end up saying something a little mean without thinking. I'm not sure why.....

ski pass

I got my ski pass from work today!!! I’ve lived in Colorado since I was ten years old and never once downhill skied or been snowboarding. Yes, I’ve lived here, in the middle of all these ski resorts for almost twelve years and never gone. My family never had the money. (**small tear) But now I’m getting one through work and I’m gonna do both! I’m very excited.

flat tire

So after last night's loveliness my two-wheel-drive car was stuck in the driveway. I got a ride to work, when I got off at 13:00 I dug it out.....only to discover a completely flat tire. Eric, a neighbor of Bobby and Brianna, chaged it for me and I took the car to the tire place right there in Frisco. I needed some winter tires anyway, no big deal.

The problem was that somehow me and all four of the other people working on this group paper for biology class thought that the paper was due at 16:00 today. And I had agreed to be responsible for making our five seperate sections into one paper! Sure I was about to let all these people down by ruining everything I called Jenn after leaving the tire place. Half in panic with my cell battery warning me it was about to die I asked her to give me a ride to Silverthorne, the next town so I could try to get the paper finished. She came right away but by the time I got homw it was already after 15:00!

I hadn't eaten lunch and I still had to find a ride to class in Dillon. (For those who don't know the area there are three small towns all within 10 minutes of eachother, so we all act like they're just suberbs of eachother.) Desperate, I called the teacher to beg for mercy and guess what he said? He said that the paper isn't due till next Tuesday! My head is saved.

blizzard

Today I got out of work early because of a blizzard. About 14:00 and I couldn't see from my office window to the other side of our small parking lot. All the rest of our patients canceled and the roads closed. So I'm staying at Bobby and Brianna's house. They're like my older brother and sister in every way except blood and they let me stay with them on those random ocaisons where my car breaks down, it snows, or whatever comes up. My heros!

The snow's slowed down now, but the roads are still closed and my tires are bald anyway so I'm staying the night. It's soooo beautiful outside; I feel bad for people who never get to see this. It's just like a perfect little Christmas card. The snow is piled in lovely drifts and unblemished by any footprints. A little snow still falls thickening the already heavy blanket covering everything. It's sparkeling under the streetlights the way only snow can. Bobby's out plowing and Brianna, Malachi, and I are all stuck in the house. I love being stuck inside in the winter, it's so cozy and peaceful. Just like a perfect little dream.

discipline & training

During our housechurch we talked about God’s training and discipline. How sometimes it’s quite hard and unpleasant. Now this usually doesn’t fail to be a hot topic. The discussion was pretty lively with only four of us. :p

Sometimes I don’t know where I am. I’ve been going through a pretty hard times for a couple years. (And being only 21 it’s easy to worry that the other 60 are all gonna be like this.) Sometimes I get a bit freaked out wondering if this is an attack of Satan or if I’ve done something wrong and brought it upon myself or what. Most of the stuff that’s happened hasn’t been my fault but I know I haven’t handled it well throughout.

Our talk was encouraging. God does use all things for good. The direction from which a trial comes does not impede God’s ability to use it to shape my character. He is the one doing the training not me. I tend to worry that I’m not weathering this desert time very well. It’s a well-founded fear, cause I’m not handling things like the super-saint I wish I was, not even close. That doesn’t mean that God’s just going to let me go. He has no intention of doing so - not even when I believe that He’s about to let me drop. Walking in a desert it’s easy for me to get discouraged over this truth and find it too hard, even painful, to believe. Hey, it’s hard to look up from the ground with all that sand blowing in my eyes.

google game

Today I was looking for something to cheer me up because his codeine stuff is making me very tired and moody. I was reading Gordon’s blog and found an amusing little google game to play with myself. What you do is you type your name in the search bar followed by the word “needs” and see what comes up. It worked and made me happier.

• Jennifer needs a cold shower.
• Jennifer needs to do five things.
• Jennifer needs diva publicity.
• Jennifer needs to keep on improving.
• Jennifer needs exceptional help.
• Jennifer needs space.
• Jennifer needs the earth energy in her life.
• Jennifer needs to be charged for her crime.
• Jennifer needs time to heal.
• Jennifer needs to check her palm pilot.

codeine is my friend

I've had a toothache since Tuesday. It wasn't too bad then, I just focused on my biology paper and kept going. (Am I brilliant or what?) By Friday it was bad enough that I was practically living on advil and still hurting. I discovered that though you cannot take four advil all at once, you can take two tylinol and two advil all at the same time. (Why I do not know, but for awhile it kinda worked.) Saturday I was over playing games at a friend's house on that lovely, snowy morning and was forced to leave rather suddenly. By the time I got to my house it was awful. I arrived to find we were out of one of my painkillers. (*panic*) So Sharon went shopping while I lay on the couch in AGONY attempting to watch a movie. Upon her return more medicine really didn't help a whole lot - except to make watching the movie much easier. :s Finally I called my retired dentist friend, Bill and he told me what it probably was and to ask for some penicillin. I called a dentist, they gave me an appointment but no help till Monday. Then I called my boss and told her my tale of woe. She wrote me up a prescription for penicillin and for codeine, a wonderfully strong painkiller. I'm not supposed to drive and am very drowsy but now I can't even feel the pain unless I stop and think about it......or chew. So I'm happy about all except that tomorrow I will be paying lots of money to the dentist that left me hanging for the weekend as I do not have insurance.

biology paper

Yikes, since the retreat I've been majorly busy writing a paper for Biology class. I'm working on a group paper with four other people. One of them asked me to come up with a topic. So over a month ago I sugested the Human Genome Project then thinking I had a pretty good idea of the difficulty of this topic I volenteered to take the hardest part: how they actually did it. Little did I know. Well every night this week (becase of course I procrastinated till the due date we set for our first draft was nearly uppon me) I've been beating my brain against a wall trying to understand how they actually sequenced the human genome. Most of the stuff I found on the web was either for people who just want a little info on it or for geniouses who were probably involved in working on it. Neither were really very helpful. Finally I found something and wrote it. But my brain is very tired now, good night.