Dead week

So dead week is nearly upon those of us who call ourselves college students, and I for one am fairly happy that it is almost here. I normally have pretty big beefs with the title of this week, because I feel that it is so misleading. It seems like it should just be a week where there are no classes and nothing to do except study for finals. The only thing special about dead week, though, is that professors aren't allowed to assign anything during that week that was not on the syllabus that was handed out at the beginning of the year. All this means is that there can be no surprises in what needs to be handed in, so professors can have as many tests/quizzes/homework as they want. And since this is the last week before finals, they normally take advantage of this in a major way. So dead week can turn into the busiest week of the year for some people, and judging by the name, this should not be. I don't really mind if it's a busy week, just don't call it something that is so opposite of busy.

The reason I am glad that it is almost here, though, is that I have absolutely nothing due during the week. So in my case, it actually lives up to its name. Well I won't rub it in anymore, because I will probably get made fun of for my finals schedule, and I don't want to make it any worse than it could be.

In my opinion

So, I've been able to put up a good number of posts now, and I've found that in writing all of them I use the phrase "in my opinion" a lot. Now this isn't good or bad in and of itself, but I've noticed that, because I've typed it so many times, you can type it all with one had (using the proper typing technique, that is). I found it to be kind of fun to type that long of a phrase with only the use of one hand, especially when typed really fast. So my mind began to wonder how many different logical things could be typed using only one hand. I've developed a list of words for each hand and have attempted to put phrases together that make sense. Well here goes:

Left hand:
as, fast, fat, cat, a, bead, bed, red, were, was, far, tread, read, fad, fade, stage, stagger, strafe, brat, ate, rate, scar, scare, car, card, race, racecar, tract, are, cab, see, crab, bread, taste, great, case, drag, grab, garbage, attract, verb, revere, tear, at

bread tastes great
as far as a crab sees
a fat cat bed
as fast as a drag race racecar races
grab garbage garb as scared as cabs
beads were great at a fad stage

Right hand:
in, my, opinion, kill, you, link, hill, onion, I'm, on

in my opinion
I'm on my onion
you kill my opinion/onion

Some of these are a stretch but they kind of make sense at least. As you can tell, there are not as many options with the right hand, but that makes sense since there are 15 letters for the left hand and only 11 for the right (all of you lefties out there can be proud of that). I'm sure there are a lot more combinations that I'm not seeing or words that I am excluding, so please inform me, because it really is so very fun to write with only one hand.
At least in my opinion.

A bunch of jumbled words that hopefully made sense

So I've been thinking a lot about purpose and why I am here, exactly. This was mainly sparked by one of our college group "discussions" a couple weeks back, so I've been thinking about it for a while now. I mean, I've heard all of the obvious answers that we're here to glorify God and things along those lines, but how does that become incorporated into my life both now and in the future? I guess I'm thinking more of what God's plans are for me in the future when I'm talking about this because I really have no idea what they bring. So aside from the obvious answers, what is my ultimate purpose for being here? Sure, I'm supposedly going to graduate from college and start a career, but what does that mean? How does God plan to use that to His ultimate glory? It's something that is kind of weird to think about and also something that we can never really know. It's the second part of that that has gotten me thinking the most. I feel that we as a society have all become so dependent on being in control of every situation that we are in and have lost a sense of trust. When we see that we don't have complete control over the future, it can be a little despairing. I guess what I've started to realize and still haven't fully grasped is that we can take joy in knowing that God does have a plan for us that will come about in His own timing. I know this is something that has been said so many times before, but I think this is the first time that I've actually started to realize what that means. We just have to worry about the here and now and focus on how we bring Him glory today and God will take care of our future. The biggest thing is trust in God because He will reveal His purpose for our lives in His time and we have to be content with where He has us at and with what He is doing.

I feel like this has all been jumbled together, so let me just recap real quick. God has a purpose and intent for our lives. We know this is true by the mere fact that we are still on this earth. It is easy to lose focus on that fact and begin to wonder why we are even here. It all comes back to a trust and reliance upon God, realizing that He will use us more perfectly than we can ever imagine. If we can focus on Him and allowing Him to conform us to His will, then we will never be disappointed with where life, or God I should say, takes us. So that's what I've been thinking about as of late and will most likely still be pondering in times to come.

That last hour

So I've found that I love the last hour of work. This is kind of unusual for me because every job I've had before this the last hour was terrible and took what seemed like days to pass. Now this is my first part-time job, so my days aren't as long, but the last hour of any work day should be terrible, in my opinion. But at this job I realize that I actually enjoy the last hour of the day. The reason that I like it is that it is so laid back. Nearly everybody takes off at 5 each day, and since I work until 6, there is basically nobody in the office. It is so quiet and I never have anything to do, because everyone is gone. It is in this final hour that I turn the volume on my ipod up a little bit and just sit back and relax. Sometimes I play solitaire or minesweeper and other times I'll read the newspaper or browse the internet, but that last hour is entirely up to me in how I spend it. The best part of that time, though, is that once there are only ten minutes left, everyday I turn on "Only in Dreams" by Weezer, which just so happens to be eight minutes long. This is one of the greatest songs done by Weezer, in my opinion, and if you haven't heard it, I would highly recommend it, but when you do, you have to listen to the whole thing, otherwise it loses some of its greatness. But that song just puts a perfect cap to the day. So once it is over, I just use the last two minutes to put everything away and make my way out. It works out pretty well actually. Well, until next time...

Blayness in a bottle

So today feels like a reminisce day. I don't know how to explain it, but it feels like I'm back in time or something. This is largely due to the fact that I have been reading old blog posts for the past 2 hours and been thinking about what all has happened over the past year or so. But it's one of those feelings where everything is slowed down and nothing seems like it is happening in real time. That's the best I can explain it, so sorry if I confused you. I'm pretty sure this feeling is the closest thing that I will come to time travel, so it's pretty cool. Well perhaps I'll listen to some music or at least take a break from the blogs to get back to reality.

I really need to get a stocking cap. I'm thinking Scheels will be the best place.
Ok, I'm done. Random.