Random Knowledge of the day

So everyday it seems I learn about something completely new which I had not ever heard of before. Its true what they say! You learn something new everyday. Also, rhyming is good for your brain. Mostly these things are from the internet. Todays new thing is Dunbar's Number. Major, major props if you can figure out the sequence of events that led to me reading about this on the intarwubs (hint: that was a clue).

In other major news...sheesh I'm trying to remember when I posted last and what was going on. Just a sec...cool I figured how to back-date post something...ah yes, Saturday wasn't exactly an amazing day. Friday was pretty sweet because of the meeting with the Lifeway publisher lady and good times with my hall family. I think we watched Grindhouse? Maybe that was Saturday. I dunno. Sunday was cool, pretty basic: Church, do nothing, Ryan's house, Settlers. Lindsay came to church this week for the first time which was cool. Harvest is definitely smaller than I'm used to, but its cute, welcoming, doctrinally sound, and I have a family there. Also, I played pretty well at Settlers, if I do say so myself.

Then Monday was the big MLK day InterVarsity hike in Willamette National Forest. It was a beautiful day and the hike was refreshing and healthy, but it was also freezing cold. And that's another thing, this weather has been freaking ridiculous. I mean, its warmer in Alaska than it is here. My desktop keeps popping up with cold weather warnings for the area! Not so cool. However, Hike=very cool. Pictures here. and most of here. I also did my laundry on this day and called Freddy Faye. (haha another rhyme! :)

Um...I also decided to apply to be an RA and then I read the deadline and it said it was due today, the 23rd, so I freaked out for about 24 hours before I checked the website and it said the 30th. And then I was in the EMU today and saw my FA Maria and she totally sold me on the idea of being an FA, and she said that the FHS program director, Dan Close, does a FIG class and so I totally want to be his TA. I'm gonna go to his office hours on Monday and talk to him about it. Also, apparently they choose the residential FA's based on who wants to do it, not by pre-set FIGs. So I'm pretty sure I'll apply for both and end up doing one or the other. My first choice would be Residential FA with Dan Close and and International studies class. That would be totally amazing.

The main drawback in terms of my plans is that I would need to be back in Eugene by the beginning of September, pretty much a full month before the term starts, which throws a wrench in the whole Africa plans. So we'll see. Here are some options that I can see:

1. I could go to Africa for most of the month of August and maybe miss Heather's birthday and Fusion AK
   
2. Go for 2 weeks instead of four
   
3. Forego the trip altogether for now and save the money for my study abroad in Senegal the next fall. But see, that's not doing missions work...But the rest of my summer pretty much is, what with 6 weeks of camp and all.
   
4. So if I really, really wanted to do Africa still I could just not do camp and go mid June to mid July and be back for the month of August.
5. Or I could go to camp for two weeks, go to Africa for a month, and be back for Heather's birthday and go to fusion and chill in Palmer for about a month, then jump into school fully restored.

That last option is probably the only way to do some of everything. I'm going to miss the first two weeks of camp, which includes High School, which is the most intense, anyway because of school. I would be at camp for Junior and Primary camp, and then the next week is staff break, so its a good time to go home. Otherwise there are only two more weeks and teen pursuit. I don't really want to go to Africa for less than a month because its two days of travel both ways and the plane ticket is way more expensive than the on-ground costs so I want it to last as long as possible. Also I'd like to be around for Heather's birthday and I checked out Fusion AK 08 and it looks completely amazingly awesome and I want to chaperon. Then it would be nice to have the three weeks as a buffer before school. The only extra drawback that this plan includes (besides skimping on camp) is that I would need to buy another plane ticket to and from Alaska if I came back after Africa and then left again in September...instead of going direct from Africa to Eugene. But if I have free room and board next year it would totally be worth it.

So that was the super-long non-coherent version of what has been running through my head for like three days. Plus, I haven't actually applied to the Africa thing because I haven't been accepted as an RA or FA yet so I couldn't tell the ICY people what dates specifically I'd be going. Yikes. Argh, no more.

Different news: I'm pretty much sort of sure that I'm going skiing on Saturday and not to the 24 conference, because skiing, although it is very expensive, is something which I have very fond memories of and which I haven't gotten to do much in recent years. Plus I'm going to the IVCF conference in Portland in a couple of weeks (four) anyway and I can only take so much conferencing.

Tonight I have a bunch of stuff I need to do, so I should probably stop blogging and hop to it. I'm struggling with ethics on this paper I have to write for Intro to International Issues. We get to choose our own topic, preferably one that the class doesn't cover, and write a multi-part research paper, the first part of which is due tomorrow early morning (boo). So the dilemma is that the greatest topic I can think of is writing about international negotiation, but I am taking that class and am sort of already learning about that topic. The brilliance of doing the paper on it though is A), I already know a bit about it and have two great texts and a ton of great websites on the subject, and B), that writing the paper would help me to study for International Negotiation, the class. I also consider Negotiation the Class to be a lot harder and more interesting than Intro, which is pretty much still all review of INTL 240 last term and other stuff that I already know. I'm moderately sure that the professor would consider it an OK topic anyway if I told him the situation, but I haven't asked. I think I will do the bit that's due tomorrow on it an then maybe email the GTF sometime. They would never find out if I didn't tell them. But just saying that makes me sound like I'm sneaking around.

Incidentally we had an interesting discussion about personal ethics and leadership today in my leadership seminar...

Oh, also, the topic for my other, huge, 10 page term paper in New Testament is about the Pharisees. Mostly. Also about Jesus. And God. And some stuff about the early church and the new testament in general. Funny story though because Caleb and I picked the same topic and Ryan asked us to pick another one so we wouldn't be doing the same research and we both picked the same alternate. In the end he kept the alternate (Jesus' theology about money) and I kept the vague, but easier (?) Pharisee one.

So I was going to walk over to the Law Library across the lawn to study and get stuff done but its like 25 degrees out and it would be colder at midnight when I walked back. Plus, all my stuff is here. Brr.

In Alisha's Body news, things are being weird. My newly repaired ear started draining bizarre fluid right after I got back to school, leading me to believe it has something to do with flying, but I think it might be getting worse. This is not supposed to happen. Also, I'm sore, for the first time, from running. I'm sort of glad because I was beginning to wonder what the deal was. I pushed myself pretty hard on Tuesday in my 3 miles and I was already sore from hiking and using different muscles the day before. I am, however, beginning to wonder if I should take a break from ibuprofen. I don't take the maximum amount every day or anything, but I took it for most of break because of my surgery, and I usually take a few every day that I run, but I always make sure to eat food with it. The bottle says not to take it consistently for more than a month. I guess its not like aspirin.

Weirder still, is that the horrible wrist pains are back in my left wrist. Not as bad as they were junior year, when they were debilitating, but enough to make me nervous. Also, I think either my allergies have been bad or I'm coming down with something icky because I've been kind of stuffy and had junk in my throat for week or so and I've felt completely exhausted a lot. The obvious explanation for the fatigue is running a lot, but I've been eating a lot of carbs and my runs are actually pretty energizing. I just get tired later. Except for after my long run on Saturday, after which I was completely wiped.

And then today I didn't really feel nauseous but I just didn't want to eat anything, which is not good because I know I'm going to run tomorrow morning and I need carbs. Lisa, who is also a runner, said to eat some rice, because its pretty tasty when you don't feel like eating. So I think I will go do that because they close in a bit, and then I will work tirelessly on my paper and my MEA scholarship application, which I plan to mail by Friday.

And this is the end of yet another really long blog post, which I started because I got excited about something totally out of the blue and ended up somewhere completely different. I have a couple more substantial blog posts in draft mode because I'm working on being profound still.