Big news

These are pictures of the tractor I learned how to use today!

Right now I'm hanging out at work just killing time before I head to the soup kitchen. I just thought I'd post on the exciting news in my life. Today, I learned how to drive a tractor! It is so easy. It's got a lot more knobs and levers than a car but really I think its easier, especially since I've spent the last couple of years watching people driving tractors trying to memorize everything so that once my chance came I would know what to do. I'm just pretty pumped that I know how to drive a tractor now. Jason and Ben said I did a good job especially for the first time.

makeup post

This is a draft from Good Friday that didn't post...

I decided to go home this weekend, so I'm watching "Enchanted" with Kayla right now. I only worked a half day today. It was great. We did normal stuff for the morning and then our crew drove out to a clearing and had a picnic for lunch. After the picnic, I just left-- a great day.

I've been going to the Episcopal church in Jackson and they had a Maunday Thursday service this Thursday. It was so cool. I really like that church.
It was like a regular church service and they went through the story of the last supper. At the end of the service, they completely stripped the church of all decorations. It really felt like the church was closing down forever. All the Maunday Thursday servces I have ever been to were all about the last supper and none about the betrayal. At the end of the night, it really made me think about how it must have been for the disciples to be left behind while Jesus was led away... like it was all over.
I've always thought that I would always be Methodist, but the more I go to the Episcopal church I think that one day I could be episcopal. The liturgy and all the traditions are just really good.

...

This week, Norm got back from the Bahamas. It's nice to have a roommate again. Yesterday, we rented a movie and ate bad for you food for dinner. That was fun. We watched "Into the Wild." It was about a middle class regular guy who graduated college and then just left all that he had and started traveling across the US and eventually to Alaska. I was pretty excited about that movie coming out. I liked it and Norm loved it so much she fell asleep 3 times! This week at work so far I've spent harvesting and counting these little fungus spores about the size of blood cells. I just finished that today and I'm so excited. Tomorrow, we have another field work day. Work is so much more fun when we get to do it outside.

Posting again already!

Not too much happened in the past day. Really I'm just posting because I finally figured out what happens to socks that disappear in the washing machine, and there is no one here to celebrate with me. What a nerd! But the socks- I was doing laundry and one of my socks was stuck almost all the way under the agitator. I had to fight the machine for it, but I got my sock back. That must be what happens: the agitator sucks up your sock and takes it to the deep reaches of the washer. Just a theory, but it doesn't take much to excite me.
It's been so nice here. Today, it was in the mid-70s. At work, we did our first bit of field work. We really just measured a field, but it was a great excuse to go to Milan and hang out outside. We even took our lunches and ate by a pond on the experiment station up there.

Tennessee's getting warmer

This last week... not too much happened really. At work, we're finally getting to a point where we can slow down and not go 90 miles and hour every day. That's nice and a whole new experience for me. We haven't had a time like this since I have worked for Dr. Al- almost 2 years. We've gotten to clean the lab, which doesn' sound like much, but we could honestly hardly walk before and now it's much better. I even got sent out Friday to go sit in a greenhouse and keep somebody company while they worked just because there wasn't anything more important to do. Friday was really the only day that anything exceptional happened. It was a nice day considering work was nothing. Our crew took a 2 hour long lunch and went to Sakura for sushi. It was good. Friday was Kayla's birthday and even though I gave her the option of us going somewhere else, she elected to try sushi with my work crew. I think she had a good time and even liked sushi (it was her first time trying it). After lunch, it didn't take it long to start snowing. Once it started, it went hard. They told everyone to leave the ag center at 3:30 and I'm glad they did because by the time I got home, it was starting to get slick. It snowed and SNOWED. There were at least 3 inches if not more. In the morning, Jenny, Renno and I went laundry basket sledding at Muse Park. That was lots of fun!
On Sunday, I got to church (St. Lukes) what I thought was pretty early and the sanctuary doors were already closed and something that sounded a lot like the end of the communion liturgy was going on inside. I was SO CONFUSED. I kept looking through the bullitein, still confused. I couldn't imagine what was happening... I was early! I started back out to my car thinking that I would have to call Mike in a few minutes to see what had happened. I checked my cell phone clock-- 11:32??!?? Then I realized I had completely forgotten daylight savings started. Then I was sad to have missed all of church, but now I'm glad to have light till 6:30 so I'm not complaining.
This week I'm all alone at the apartment. Norm is in the Bahamas and Val is going to Disneyland in a couple days. She's only been here about 30 minutes since last Thursday anyway. It's kind of nice having a whole place to myself but I can imagine I'll be pretty bored and starved for human contact by Sunday.

Reunion & other stuff

This weekend, I went back to Nashville to a reunion of the team that went to Sierra Leone for the first 2 weeks I was there. Only 6 of the 14 people who went ended up coming to the reunion, but it was good to see the people that did show up (even if some of them were/are a little nuts). We got to hear about how the people who didn't show up for the reunion were doing and talked some about what needs to be done on future teams. I think that the whole team experience has taught me a lot. Mainly that God can use completely unqualified and imperfect people to do some amazing things. Most of us that went were completely unqualified for the jobs we were undertaking but somehow it worked. Just being with some of the team again and hearing the stories of things each member did in Sierra Leone makes me realize that even if these people were completely crazy (in my own too-judgemental opinion) they did make a difference and their hearts were in the right place. I feel like I kind of underestimated them. I'm glad I got to go see them again.
I went to all-sing tonight to see Kayla do her thing. All-sing didn't really seem as put together this year as in the past. It went well though. Chels and Leia, you'll be releived to know that Phi Mu got first place!!!!!!!! Anyway, Kayla was pumped so I'm glad I got to go see her.