Drumroll please....

So my new calling is 2nd counselor in the Primary presidency. (Translation: an assistant to the president of the kids' organization at church).

Yikes!

But I'm excited. And I'm also excited because a couple of the freshman girls got called in to take my place at the piano and to help out (because we don't always have all the teachers we're supposed to have!), which will give me a chance to get to know them better. And also maybe help them feel like they belong, which is what anyone in the "wait... when do I become an adult?" stage needs! (Or at least I did. Do?)

And on a completely unrelated note, here are some pics from the famed Waterfire last weekend. :)


(See? I told you they classed it up this year. Neon fish on the boats? Yes, please! Providence, you make me smile.)


(Lisa, Danny, me, and Ben. Christina was taking the picture...)


(But if you look around hopefully for long enough, camera in hand, you can usually get someone to take one of everyone! Which we did.)

Number Fun

Well hello. I'm feeling much better (mostly just tired). Some updates:

8 is (roughly) the number of months I have until I graduate! Classes started (as you've probably guessed), and I'm trying to make all the papers and reading and thesis happen like magic. I like to tell everyone I meet that I'm finishing my master's even though I have 8+ months left. I think it puts a positive spin on things. :)

40 is the number of people who came to our last YSA church activity, thanks to wonderful support from the other leaders I'm working with as stake YSA rep (i.e., single Mormons-finder/activities planner). And 6 is the number of LDS freshman at Brown! By the time I leave, I'm hoping the network is a little more stable so people can come in and out of it easily without having to start from scratch every time someone moves. We are on our way!

5 is the number of people I had camping on various air mattresses all over my apartment this weekend. My friend Ben was road-tripping from D.C. with some friends, so they visited Providence Saturday night for Waterfire. I haven't been since last summer when I took Maddie, and I have to say they stepped it up a little. We also only walked around for an hour or two-- which is about all the entertainment bonfires in the middle of a river can offer. :)

6 or 7 is the number of songs we banged through in my first choir practice with a choir up in Boston. That's a lot of songs in only 2 hours, and though I am a pretty decent sight reader, I felt like everyone else already knew what they were doing! Turns out that's true-- Jason (the friend that recruited me to join!) explained to me later that the choir has already done most of those songs--so many people have been working on them for, oh, 8-10 years. Phew. It will definitely push my range though, which is good.

4 is the number of days until I can dish about the new calling (church job) I am getting. 300 is the number of different emotions that went through my heart when the bishop's counselor talked to me about it on Sunday, but that's what divine intervention is for. :)

Hmm...

I am supposed to be working right now, but I have billed only 2 of the last 5 hours because I can't focus; this is why I can't work from home.

However, I'm trying to be a socially responsible person (and good public health student!), so I quarantined myself after I came down with a fever Wednesday night (plus some other symptoms) that were probably a low-grade seasonal flu. Minimum guidelines say to stay home for at least 24 hours after fever goes away, which I did. I feel MUCH, much, much better, but in most flu cases you can be contagious for 5-7 days after onset of symptoms, even if you feel good.

Sigh.

So I canceled everything yesterday and went in to work just long enough to put all my files onto a USB so I could work from home. I canceled everything for tonight and tomorrow... except tomorrow night because I have a friend coming up from D.C. (who was given due warning!) But I will be disinfecting everything and providing Purell, so no worries. :) On the upside, I'm not coughing anymore, so that decreases my likelihood of sharing.

There you go-- public health in real time. And here's hoping that I don't get anyone else sick!

Chi Town Part I

I never posted about my trip to Chicago to see Becca, so here you go! It was a fun trip, and I always love seeing my sister. :)

First of all, the buildings in Chicago are tall-- but there's so much space in between them!


Much to Becca's chagrin, I couldn't get over how many parks there were and how much of the sky you could see between buildings. We did a cool boat tour of the city's architecture, in which I found out why there's so much space between buildings: Because that's how their zoning laws are written! I guess Chicagoans don't like to be cramped.

I also managed to be there for the one week of nice weather they had had all "summer" long, so it was almost like being outside of the city. (Kind of.) We did lots of picnics in the park.

Just in case the picnics and parks weren't enough to ease my city fatigue, we went to the botanical gardens, the Shedd Aquarium, a museum that was really like an indoor botanical garden, and the zoo. It was pretty cool. We even got to see a butterfly being born! The butterfly house had a whole bunch of chrysalises (?), and one butterfly finished breaking out as we watched. Sweet.


On top of all that, we had a lot of excellent eating adventures... Which I will detail in my next post. Becca, you're so good to me. :)

Vicious Circle???

Dear T cells and B cells and all other cells involved in keeping me healthy,

Just wanted to see how you were doing. Not to be rude, but it seems that performance has been declining recently, so just wanted to check in! As you know, we slept for nine whole hours last night, and today systems are still running a bit low. We have a thesis to write and mountains to hike this weekend-- so let's kick it up a notch, shall we?

I imagine the thesis is part of the problem-- you take care of me, and I'll take care of that.

Cordially,
Me

**

Dear Me,
We don't like your thesis. How about you take care of that first, then we'll take care of you?

Sincerely,
Your Immune System

Lol!