planning

I am looking forward to tomorrow... small group :)
I am looking forward to Wednesday... college interview !
I am looking forward to Thursday... I get to sleep :D
I am looking forward to Friday... NO SCHOOL and Swing Dance! Could it get any better...? (that is, if Christine came back, it could not get any better. But I will bring MRWP :P)
I am looking forward to Saturday... going to see Glass Menagerie at UDel ! ! ! !

As for today, I smiled when the Government midterm I thought was today was made into a take-home, open-book exam due Monday. And the Literature essay I thought was due tomorrow is now due next Monday.

And I fixed my school's blog layout!

And there might be an ice storm tonight causing mass power outage and slick roads. Hopefully just enough for a two-hour delay so we can still have school and small group.

Kathryne

tertiary colors.

That is, aqua, plum, and yellow-orange.

This is my smiles-of-the-day in picture form.

Giant orange hairbow. YUM.

Painting the bathroom purple?! :D

I can fit into the $1.99 Girls 12-14 tights! (Girls sizes have way more fun colors)

Found this today, then talked to its giver for the first time in what seems like 3 years.

Kathryne

BONUS:

Yay for finding the whole of Italy's copyright laws... public domain/fair use, anyone?

PS- Speaking of public domain and Italian music (hint: this may have been the purpose of my research), I need help choosing a song for the Fine Arts Festival...

I cannot find YouTube videos I like and sound anything like me (perhaps this is saying something), so I will leave you to choose for yourself.

Sebben crudele; by Caldara

Se tu m'ami, se sospiri; by Pergolesi

O cessate di piagarmi; by Scarlatti

sledding with friends

1) Went to the library and got lots of materials for my thesis... WHICH IS TAKING FORM (slowly, but it's getting there).

2) Almost convinced my mom to paint the bathroom purple... again, getting there.

3) Wend sledding with friends :) Blake, Colin, Daniel, David, Mark... and Christine, of course. Vicariously.

I didn't sled much, because the trails were a little steep for the excessive foliage covering them (and when I did try it was inevitably a FAIL), but I had fun taking pictures and walking around.

Kathryne

PS- I am going to take MRWP with me to Europe and have the Pope sign it. Wouldn't you like that, Christine?

traipsing through a winter wonderland

My fairy place takes on a whole new nature (NOT A PUN, I just can't think of another word) under the snow. I love it. I almost fell into the water a few times. It was just warm enough that it kept flowing, even under the 10-18 inches of snow covering it.

Note the bamboo. Still green. And not a dusty blue-green like most evergreens... a really intense green. You can't see it very well in this picture.

<3

Kathryne

snow day!

slept in.
so happy.
did schoolwork.
but not too much.
ate pasta! again! yes!
worked on thesis... sort of.
finalized some college stuff.
can I not be done with this now?
fractional exponents are deplorable.
overall, very good day, and tomorrow
should be even better for budgeting of time!

Kathryne

hoops

"I can have a fun time anywhere... except maybe the mall."
"I think Christine and I are going to get up in hoop skirts and go to the mall, when she gets back. That will be fun."
"Daniel, you should totally do that!"
"Yeah, and I could jump off a building and..." [voice covered by exceedingly loud laughter]

Kathryne

blah, blah, MONDAY

Today I volunteered myself to teach a how-to-fix-your-Blogger-layout crash course. Of course, with the new template designer tool that should not be difficult at all.

In the spirit of the thing, I decided to have some fun with my own blog template... but NO! I cannot change mine! it is so happy! So I made a new blog for the sake of playing with layout. I had to put some content up there, just because, so that I could actually see what the layout was for. Check it out, if you are so inclined :)

(note: many of the things posted on there were composed during what I call "The Year of the Misguided Teenage Angst." Because before the summer of 2009 I had few good friends and no sense of Philippians 4:8.)

Kathryne

socks

I really love socks.

funny-looking socks.

Recently I discovered that my feet are small enough that I can kinda-sorta get away with wearing socks over my tights to church. I mean, it is a cold, cold walk from Bible Force to church. So I have my striped fuzzy socks on ...with my heels... as I walk into church. We get there today just as the 20-second Praise Choir is starting up. I love the 20-second Praise Choir. So I dump my coat and my gloves and my binder, and I run up to the front.

Halfway up I realize that I still have my fuzzy socks on. Hot pink stripes. Totally did not match my outfit. SIGH. And I'm like... my mother is going to absolutely kill me. I get back to my seat and realize that my mother is not there. What, is she hiding in the bathroom of mortification that her daughter's choice of footwear resembles that of the Wicked Witch of the East?!

(turns out she was sick. :P )

ALSO, some really epic hand-me-down sparkly tights. And the coziest sweater ever. It does not look too good on me, but it is deliciously warm <3

Kathryne

slow day

The world will never know all of the things that make me smile.

Except Christine, because I am writing them all down. Most of them, anyway.

I finally cleaned my room. I was planning on vacuuming before I went to bed, but both of my parents are asleep and I think that would be a bad idea.

Oh, um... I talked to a lot of people today. Which was cool. and MEGANISBACKHALLELUJAH<3

(not that the Winter Formal would die without her or anything...)

Kathryne

swing!

fabulous evening.

I had not danced in, like, 40 days. And it's weird that that would matter to me at all. I think I have been officially addicted... or something.

Christine, I danced for you! But I did not go so far as to ask *cough* people you normally would have danced with. Since I do not ask guys and *cough* guys do not always like to be asked.

Too many things made me smile. I spent some time sitting in a corner with my book feeling very lonely... it is funny how that can be true when you are surrounded by people... but about 15 minutes later a song with really ridiculous bass came on and forced me out of hiding. And I became grateful for that soon afterward. I think I was like yea close to effervescent. Almost. And when I was in the kitchen refilling water pitchers I thought I saw Christine, like legit saw her, like she was there, but then I walked closer and realized it was not. Funny how delusional you can get at these times.

Kathryne

Confessions

I am Katie.
Incapable of sleeping before midnight.
Incapable of getting out of bed before 7.
Incapable of using Powerpoint competently.
Incapable of remembering which light switch does what.
Incapable of throwing away a tea bag without thinking there must be a way to reuse it.

and then there is Kathryne, but she makes me feel insecure about myself. And I'm not speaking to her today.

Katie

Disneyyyy!

I know nothing about American television (don't watch it), American movies (rarely watch them), American literature (don't read it), or American music (does Regina Spektor count?)... and I am at a loss for my senior thesis. Catcher in the Rye depressed me so much that I my faux-idea for a thesis is not going to happen. SO... I realized that the one (small) link I have to American culture is Disney.

So I am going to do something about Disney.

It might actually relate to what I want to do in college. WHEE!

Kathryne

un-productivity

"So, Daniel, how's school going?"

"Oh, it's great. I start in about a week."

(truer words rarely spoken)

I need to get more motivated. Truly, I do.

However, today the distraction is one for which I can forgive myself. I was not on Facebook or email or anything at all all afternoon/evening, which is unusual for me. It was people. Which was lovely. Playing games and eating food and talking... then small group... then Big Boss, Little Boss with Kristen & David & Daniel. I won! surprisingly.

However, I suppose that if I am going to allow myself good distractions I must cut out the bad ones entirely, since they can no longer claim to exist for their mere value of being distracting. You know? Like, sometimes you need a distraction, so you take anything, even something totally addictive and time-wasting like sitting around on the computer. But then when a GOOD distraction comes up, like doing things with people you actually care about and can see and hear and feel, you feel like you've already spent your distraction-budget and now need to go about filling your work quota.

Now I need to go clean my room and read another chapter of Catcher in the Rye (aka the-only-book-I've-ever-read-more-crude-than-Native-Son-ICCCCKKKKKK) before bedtime.

CIAO.

Kathryne

PS- if you're wondering, it was a snow day

MLKJr Day

Today I ran errands. And did some thesis work (note to general population: Catcher in the Rye is similarly crude to Of Mice and Men or Native Son. WHEEEE. I'm seriously tired of this.)

Then I dropped off Amy's birthday present... finally :) along with a CD of some of Regina Spektor's wackiest, most-obscure demo tracks, I made this...

...which sums up life most beautifully.

And now it is snowing.

Can you say 2-hour delay?!

Kathryne

Sundays are awesome

I love, love, love the feeling of "I finished all of my homework and housework yesterday and now I can do WHATEVER I want to with my Sunday."

Including spontaneous plans to make trips to obscure state parks in northern Harford County. That's fun.

Note: I am not as bad a videographer as some of the shots would indicate. I just had to use some... uh... creative cropping. Let's just say that graffiti is rarely clean.

Also Note: I tried really hard to find a good song that was the right length to put this video to. The next closest thing I could find was Sugar Plum Fairy music, and I know how Princess feels about the misuse of THAT. :P So suffer through some Veggie Tales, it'll be okay.

Kathryne

PS- new post on Veloquence. Check it out.

TGIF

wheeeeeee!!!!

saw some sketchy characters at Barnes & Noble tonight.

that was fun.

oh, and I also saw the chairman of the school board and his wife, but that is of no correlation to the guys-in-baggy-pants reading Genesis 19 (of all things) at the table across the aisle.

Kathryne

new things

Today, I stepped out of my comfort zone.

I showed up for a government exam unprepared.

I wrote a speech to give at my school event tonight... in the 45 minutes before I had to be there.

I showed up to run through The Precious Blood with Doug, who was to accompany the Girls' Ensemble for the first time on that song, and since school was cancelled yesterday we couldn't practice then.

Doug forgot the music (my only copy), so I played it from memory. If you could call what I did playing. I think that's an insult to the piano.

I stood up and gave a speech I had never practiced and only had a detailed outline for.

I started crying in the middle of it.**

I completely deviated from what I wanted to say (read: skipped the last half because I was crying.)

And then I hugged people :P

Kathryne

*turns out he postponed the test.

**I allow myself allowance for 2 cries a year. Preferably not in public. NEVER in front of 200 people. But Mr V is leaving in March and I will miss him. And I was stupid enough to put the part about him in the middle and not at the end.

day off!

"I'm not really beefy..."
"No, you're more like a rump roast. Er, soft, and tender, and juicy."

:P

My family can be quite amusing.

I was not very productive today. I ought to have been. I'm going to make up for it by going to bed on time and throwing productivity to the wind (although I could get much done in this next hour if I so chose.)

I also made chemical experiments on my hair. That's always fun. And only sometimes results in an explosion. It didn't this time, for which I am grateful.

Kathryne

tuesday

I dislike Tuesdays. There is not much to look forward. So I made myself something to look forward by dressing myself in ridiculously saturated purple and hot pink and sparkles and my yellow-polka-dot hairbow (and it does NOT look bad! this was an accomplishment)... and then it snowed like a half inch and nobody came to small group. BOOOO.

But this is an Optimism Initiative, so... um...
I started piecing together my scrapbook?
And my cat let me pet him without biting me.

Kathryne

randomblah

"Larry does not like to have her nails trimmed."

Wrote one of my best essays of the year, perhaps, today. Funny how you can get the most out of a really unenjoyable book.

Kathryne

PS- my mom played Boggle against three of my teachers today (including two English teachers.) Guess who won? Hint: not a teacher.

Sunday!

took it kinda easy.

Until we clipped Hummer's nails, that is.

So I made a video of it.

Then there was the evening service, which I love. And out of the 20 people in the congregation, 8 were wearing purple! (this may have been because of a certain football team, but I am choosing to disregard that.)

Kathryne

mmmmmmhahahah

I finished a Christmas present today. For a certain doofus.

:D

Kathryne

I'm sure there was something...

today was good. 2 HOUR DELAY, WHEEEEE!!!

Then I was totally useless and got little-to-nothing accomplished all day.

Then Amy's 21st birthday :D

Watched Despicable Me... that was cool.

Missed swing though. Next time I suppose.

Kathryne

oddities

"Megan, cease the Wheelock's remix, please."

-Mr. C

I BEAT MOM AND DAVID IN BOGGLE! WHEEEEEE!!!!! (well, one round... barely... BUT STILL.)

My afternoon craft project:

...to last me until Christine gets home (the big black one stands for 9 days in EUROPE!)

I will upload pictures periodically as it shrinks, oh joyous thing!

Kathryne

grace.

I woke up this morning feeling very sick.

I blacked out.

Then I dragged my feet about getting ready.

Then I fell asleep on the couch with wet hair for about a half hour.

I woke up feeling much better... like, better than usual.

That was grace.

Then in senior thesis I confronted my anxieties about writing a 28-32-page paper I was not passionate about.

And my teacher suggested I chose a topic to do with literature. That made me happy.

That was grace.

Then in Literature Megan's cell phone went off.

She took it out of her purse.

She answered it.

In class.

Then she yelled at the person and told them to never call her again.

Then she didn't get in trouble.

That was grace.

That was also very funny.

Kathryne.

re-

rested.

revived.

refueled.

rededicated.

Today was really, really good. I just felt... happy. And like I could breathe, and talk to people, and not worry about must-go-straight-to-choir-so-I-can-eat-before-I-do-my-homework-so-that-I-can-write-another-college-essay-before-bed-if-I-even-get-to-bed.

Seriously, I am glad that the concert and my college applications are just... done.

Next big hurdle?

Senior Thesis... yay. But that's not due until March. Who's up for 28-32 pages? I feel like a baby, but when I think that that's 12 pages longer than last year... and about something I am not-as-passionate about... yeesh. But we shan't talk about that.

I TALKED TO CHRISTINE TODAY <3

Kathryne

one more day :)

Today was what I call my "bonus break" (the day all the public schoolers go back and I have off still :D)

First: got an email from Snapfish, by which I ordered some picture prints recently, with a coupon. Free shipping on my next order? 25% off? YES PLEASE! Expires December 31... 2010? Um, wasn't that like 3 days ago? Thank you, Snapfish.

Second: hanging out with Megan and Marina and Kirsten for our... wait for it... CRAFTERNOON. Yes, I am punny. haw haw. We talked, and made fun things.

Third: Voyage of the Dawn Treader! AAAHHHH! Movie review to come on Veloquence soonish.

Kathryne

PS- Kirsten, if you're reading this, that one picture of you on your mom's blog, with the cape, where you're looking at the camera... Facebook profile, NOW.

BIRTHDAYS

Not mine... certainly not.

Just two of my FAVORITE PEOPLE in the ENTIRE WORLD turning seventeen today... Christine Marie Elizabeth and Rachel Elizabeth (aka Princess).

I love you both.

Funny how God put you on Earth the same day and put you in my life within the same month or two. Almost like He planned it or something. I don't know how I could have made it through this past year and a half without you guys to rant, cry, argue, joke, chat, email, rave, etc to. Love you both so much <3

To Christine:

To Rachel:

(couldn't resist that one :) )

Kathryne

almost the end.

Almost the end of break.

My homework is complete (HALLELUJAH! ...except for Latin studying, and ofcourseimgoingtodothateventuallywhatareyoutalkingabout?)

My room is almost clean (just kidding. I'm about to do that.)

I read the whole Lord of the Rings trilogy.

I wrote way too many pages in the Christine-book.

I stayed at home and rested and it is all so wonderful :)

This has been almost the best break ever.

imissyouchristine.

Kathryne