Herding Cats

Oh what is the power of Marcie York that I cannot say no to her? Once again, my former boss got me to volunteer to babysit for the church meeting. I was assgined to Preschool this time around, trying to altertavily apply discipline and massage fragile Egos at the same time. Two to four year olds are always an intresting task, as they really don't have the concept of group behavior down..making them wonderfully idepent and woefully destructive. Some fond moments:

* the swtiching of shoes amongst the girls

* The atempts to sneak past the workers and make a run for the other rooms of the nursery

* The kamakazie run by one student into a pile of jungle gyms parts that were under construction..comepletly unaware of the danger. I've never ran so fast in my life

* The Magic of the Camera that showed pictures of pupies

* The random hugs :)

*Sitting in a chair as big as my shoe

All in all I had a lot of fun and enjoyed myself immensely. It's really easy to love Preschoolers and I think everyone got a chance to be remebered fondly (for a day at least)This was also the first event where we were able to feed everyone without pannicing.

End of the Spear

End of the Spear....this is a damn good movie

So after I erroneously showed up at the Jett's house for bible study I made my way to the Ehlert's Thursday night bible studies. I received a warm welcome as always:) Evidently Greg hadn't had any warning about having to lead bible study, so he gathered us around and offered to carpool up to see the movie End of the Spear. We were pretty enthusiastic and went for it.

For those who haven't heard about it, roughly 50 years ago a few missionaries made contact with the Waodoni tribe of south America. The Waodoni were fiercely violent people who valued warfare above even hunting, a rarity for a stone age people. The missionaries distributed gifts to the Waodoni tribe and then made contact on a small sandbar outside the village. Unfortunately, such was the way of the Waodoni that they killed all of the missionaries and destroyed their airplane. Such things can often happen in missionary work and matrydom is all to common. The unique things about this case was that the story didn't end there....the wives and children continued not only to make contact with the Waodoni, but settled amongst them. It was this strong testimony and the refusal of the missionary family to bring harm to the murders of their husband and fathers, that would eventually convert the waodoni.

The trip there was just the start of the adventure, with a heavy discussion involving the South-east side dyamnics and the effect of commercial properties in Fresno. (seriously) and then met up with the rest of the group, where the discussion turned to whether or not the winter queen was ugly or hot. (I stand by my opinion, too thin and waaaay too much hair)

The movie itself was wonderful, with good cinematic and a very strong story. I didn't cry, but I sure felt for the people involved in this tradegy. It's hard not be moved when someone does something so outside the normal human experience under the Lord's Will.

I've been giving thought to Lord's will myself this week, the loss of my Internet connection seems to have prompted it. There are several things in my life I have been looking to straighten out and face directly rather than sideways. I will need wisdom as I do this as I must watch my steps carefully.

On a completely different topic, this time has also given me time to write more. Does anyone know a place to publish philosophical papers?

Guild meeting Part 2

Today was workshop day for the guild. I eagerly showed up wearing my liene and trews, eager for a day of acting and fighting.

I was the only one in costume.


Whoops.

On the plus side, I did a lot of work on my accent, learned several new words of Gaelic and had a lot of fun doing improv. We also posed our weapons for the website. (got a nice picture of my sgian stuck in a tree.)And shot three pepsi cans and a lemon full of pellets from an airsoft AK-47.

Some good memories:

* During an improv skit where Ali thought I was a disobendiant soldier and I tought I was a woman begging for owed money.

* Finding that I can pronouce almost anything in an irish accent except the phrase "I don't know"...at which point I should like inspector Crosue and gain an instant french accent I can't get rid of.

* Finding out that the entire guild failed the history test (OUCH!)

* Walking down fulton mall looking like a total forgiener in my outfit.

* Eating cupcakes with little red hands on them :) and hearing the word 'cheese doodle' prnounced in Irish tounque. heh..Cheese doodles...

Guild Admin meeting at Fagans

So I visited a Pub for the first time ever today...

This years annual mandatory administrative meeting was held a Fagan's Irish pub. I've never been to a pub before, but hey...How much trouble can 20 Irishmen and 4 honory Scotsmen get into?

Fagans is defitnly a place to see, Irish memobirallia hangs from every wall and two huge Irish flag, including the Irish harp...Which is Ireland's national symbol. All the decor is very nice and some is quite old, giving the place a very established feeling. All the menu items (with the exceptions of fish and chips :p ) are Irish and the poor waiter and lone bartender had to whip up about 20 orders of shepherds pie by themselves.

As for the meeting, it was generally decided that last year was a good year and we had the usual debate over which faires to attend. As usual some of us were willing to attend any faire, while some of us were more interested in doing faires that were actually fun. As usual, I volunteered for everything...Ian taught me well. Some interesting notes form the meeting:

* No costume changes for the most part...I will need to get a chanmaille coif/mantle..but I wanted one anyway. The kern are being encouraged to get cloaks...Which would be nice in some of the colder renfaires.


* My Chainmaille was presented to me by Dwight for fitting, some adjustments and the additions of sleeves and skirting will give me a complete set!

* Tim had to inform everyone that the site acohol and smoking rules would now have to be enforced strictly as "the atmosphere of the renfaires are not the free-for-alls they once were....most of the faires are cleansing up their acts and we'll have to too" This is a change I have noticed in the faires and I think it's been the inclusion of a new generation of actors like myself who are nowhere near the original hippish forefather of the faires...While I appreciates the loss of what must be some of the original spirit of the faires..I cannot help but applaud this change.

*We are no longer the guild of St. Kennochs..We now go by the more Irish name of "Tuath Ui Niall'

The best part was doing the Ui Niall pledge at the end..It's completely in Gaelic and the sound reverbates off the walls like thunder...Other people on the Pub must've thought we were a militia or a cult or something.

Grades....

Forget semester crams

I will never, ever fear finals again. I will never fear finals becuase I now know there is a far eviler time...a time so daibolical only the most foolish sufffer under it.

It's grading time :P

30lessonsx70students = 210 grades for typing alone

The actual assignments are even worse: 70 students X 4 montsh of assignments X 5 grading fields per assignments

AYIIEEEEE!

I've finished most of it while playing Tech support action hero at work and moving the entire contents of the house we;ve lived in for 12 years into the rental and teaching classes and starting the paperwork into FPU.

But there is a light at the end of the tunnel

I got all my DMV work figured out tuesday, meaning I now longer need to fear getting pulled over for my car registration or getting arrested for consipracy for a crime Fresno PD decliens to tell me about(long story). I also may be getting rid of the car(and the associated $500+ monthly payments) soon. I am also making plans to take a week off in march to get away from the nuttiness and enjoy somethign that's niether sword nor computer oriented. A trip to gettysburg and possibly (If I can find a map and figure it out, williamsburg). And last, but not least...they will sonner or later blow up the old house, elmintaing the needs to move anything.

as a side note, we need prayer for our dog....she's devloped a taste for chainlink and is proving difficult to contain in our new backyard..and for teh cat who is ever so upset that her home she grew up in mysteriosuly disapperaed and the new one is so strange.

FPU night

I had my application meeting with FPU last night about getting a bachelor's
degree trough their Center for Degree completion. The entrance requirements
are tough, but I can scrape by most of them. The realissue is the fact they
want 7 years of work experience : EEP! : I've only been working (paid) for
5 years and less than a year in the field of education. I'm applying anyway,
just to see if I can get a waiver or something.

If I succeed I'll be attending school one night a week for 3 hours and
CLEPing everything under the sun. It means a hell of a lot of work for 18
months..but so was Heald....and I so rocked at Heald.

the Degree is liberal arts (:P), but qualifies for the Teaching credential
program for California. Which means I could become a fully creditntialed
teacher after this :)

*Thump*

Ok so maybe I haven't posted in a while.....or slept more than 6 hours...

As soon as Maureen left on her plane I was already packing everything for the move to the new rental home. My family has about a week to clear out of the old home, which we've been living in for over 12 years. Naturally being disorganized, this involves throwing away almost everything but the bare essentials and setting up what we can in the new place. Even more inresting is the fact that barely any of the old furniture is moving with us...mainly because most of it was so poorly off that it wouldn't survive the trip. My mom has been saving up for this for a couple years so we've been raiding costco and walmart for furniture. All together there has been little rest for anyone in the family and tensions are running high, but with any luck we'll all be able to laugh about this a week from now when everything's finished :)

No More Moe...

I had to say goodbye to Maureen today :(, altough I should'nt feel too bad I suppose, since I'll see her in a couple months..while everyone else is gonna have to wait like 6 months. (at this point 3 of the four people reading this will feel very sad. THe fourth is wondering how his google search for Monkey Knife Fighting turned up this link). She was busy all this week, becoming a little mini-celebrity with the church. I'm susprised at how excited the church has been to recieve the '05 networkers that were away at school...or for that matter any of the away networkers. It was nice to see such good freinds again and some of the kids made certain to harrass thier favorite networker this week.

I have had a wonderful week with Maureen and am really going to miss feeling like an utter idiot around her. I just hope I can manage to get my ability to drive with a passanger without getting hopelessly lost fixed :)

I miss ya moe!