Ignorant Historian

Today the Kansas girl herself turns 26. There’s something pleasant about an even-numbered birthday isn’t there? Or is that just me?

Remember last summer when I did a YouYou? A YouYou is the opposite of a MeMe; instead of a post about 7 things about me or whatever, it’s a post about you. All you have to do is comment on this post and I’ll tell you (in the comments):

1. What I’d buy you for Christmas if we were RL friends
2. What color you would dye your hair if you had the guts
3. Your favorite ice cream flavor
4. Your favorite store in the mall

See, wishing me “happy birthday” pays off! It doesn’t matter how well I know you, really. I’ll give it my best shot, regardless!

Elizabeth did this for her birthday, and I thought it was a good idea. Since this is my last day of being 25, these are 25 things that have happened while I was 25. It was a momentous year for me!

1. I had my first overnight layover, in Atlanta.

2. I hung out in Norman with Dana and Mindy for what is probably the last time, as none of us live there anymore. Why does everyone graduate and move away?

3. I officially became a resident of North Carolina.

4. I spent a lot of time with a couple of boys that I love.

5. I spent another Valentine’s Day single.

6. I wrote a letter to a spider.

7. I was called “blonde” while in a ghetto movie theatre in Oklahoma.

8. I watched my team, the Kansas Jayhawks, win the NCAA tournament. I hope that next year I can say I watched my team, the Oklahoma Sooners, win the national championship!

9. I was quoted in the Washington Post.

10. I moved out of seminary housing and into a “real” apartment, paying bills and everything.

11. I got a reading chair in my bedroom. This might seem like a silly thing, but I have wanted this for a long time!

12. I vacationed with my family in San Francisco.

13. I tried to be more open, especially with available men.

14. I and my friends found $110. And gave it back.

15. I started my last semester at seminary.

16. I fell even more in love with my church, and with the bridegroom of the Church.

17. I went full-time at my job, thus officially entering the “real” world.

18. I was featured by SITS. You all know that’s a big deal.

19. I took a picture of a bathroom and used it to write not one, but two blog posts.

20. I voted for an almost exclusively losing ticket.

21. I wrote letters to my elected officials as well as the president. Took me long enough!

22. I was flirted with by a teenager.

23. I got trained as a housing counselor, and completed half of my training for being a credit counselor. A big part of #17.

24. I wrote my last paper EVER.

25. I graduated. Hmm, this seems like a big one, doesn’t it?

Okay, it’s probably not a stretch for you to believe that my last school day memory happened, well, yesterday. If you haven’t heard it enough, I graduated from seminary with a Masters degree, my final degree and my last day as a student.

My graduation was as graduations are, but more stately and dignified than most. It was probably the least annoying graduation that I’ve been to, and the smallest. There were about 150 graduates, 67 of whom received the same degree that I did.

Though the ceremony itself was rather dignified, you can’t really make the students be dignified. I sat in a rather loud, borderline-obnoxious group of guys. There were only a few other women getting my degree, and I wasn’t near any of them. Oh well, it’s what I’ve had to deal with my entire seminary career, but now that’s done. =)

After graduation, I went out to eat with my parents and then back to their hotel where they gave me my graduation/birthday presents. In fact, that’s what I’m using right now to write this. =) From now on, many of my posts will be coming from my laptop!

And now, what you really wanted to see:

And yes, that’s a real diploma inside.

Happy weekending! Don’t forget to come by for my bloggy birthday celebration Monday!

Today is the day. At 10 AM this morning, I will be graduating to never darken a door of any learning institution again. Okay, so that’s probably an exaggeration. But still, my formal education is now at an end.

Since I’m sure I’ll get questions about it and I don’t have to worry about stalkers since I’m a graduate, I am receiving a Masters of Divinity in Christian Ministry from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. If you know nothing about seminary degrees, you should know that an M. Div is 90 hours, about 3 times the number of hours required for most other masters programs.

And oh, does it feel so good. Sure, it’s bittersweet, but I’ve been working for this day for FOREVER. Or 20 1/2 years. Whichever is shorter.

Stop by tomorrow for the most momentous school day memory ever!

I shared with you already all the work and school craziness, so it’s time that I share with you the fun craziness. This is what happens when you graduate and turn 26 in one weekend (and don’t forget Christmas)!

Today: Picking up the ‘rents at the airport and then hanging out with them the rest of the day. Wouldn’t want to give you more details or you might stalk us. Or maybe I don’t know any more details. I do plan on showing them my apartment and making them dinner. My dad’s a picky eater, but I’m making him something he’s never had before anyway. And he’s going to like it.

Friday: Graduating at an early hour (10 AM…early when you consider I have to be there well before that and have to look purty and all), followed by a celebratory lunch, just the 3 of us, and dinner with my parents and a few friends.

Saturday: More time with the parents and a Christmas party at night.

Sunday: Getting up early-early to take my parents to the airport (payback for all the times I’ve made them take me to the airport early). Partying at Awana for Christmas.

Monday: Bloggy birthday party all day (you’ll see, just make sure you stop by or it won’t work!), and then birthday party with a few real-life friends that night. I suggested ordering Chinese and games, so we’ll see what we’ll do. I didn’t want anything big because of all the previous things!

They’ll still be good posts between now and then, but I’ll “see” you again on Monday! Should be fun!

A couple of weeks ago Brittanie mentioned the By the Decade Challenge and I had to look it up. Since I will no longer be challenged in the classroom, I have to be challenged in some way, right? The idea is to read 9 books from 9 consecutive decades. Here are my selections:

1830s – Old Goriot by Honore de Balzac

1840s – Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte

1850s – Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

1860s – Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

1870s – Daisy Miller by Henry James

1880s – Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

1890s – War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells

1900s – Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

1910s – Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust

Several of these are already on my shelf begging to be read. Almost all the authors are new to me, except for James and Dostoevsky. Have you read any of these? Any sound interesting?

At 8:08 PM on December 9th, 2008, Debra said,

“By my watch, you should now be a free woman! Hope everything went well! Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy! “

Indeed, indeed. You are reading the writing of a non-student. Actually, I was done right at an hour before. Even my usual first-or-second-one-done wasn’t fast enough for me. I sped right through that test, not even stopping when my professor suggested I write a little bit more on the first page.

Nope, the moment my pen lifted from that page, I was gone. My mind was already thinking about all the things my non-student life would include: parties, reading for fun, marriage, children, vacations in far away lands…

and then my earring fell out in front of everyone else who was still taking the test. Definitely brings ya down to earth.

Besides, I wrote what I got. If you are going to give me more points for writing down unrelated things, I don’t want them.

Don’t worry though, I certainly received enough points to pass the class (I only needed a 52%). After all, I hear they don’t let people graduate if they fail a required class.

I did go out to celebrate afterwards with dinner at Old Chicago and several rounds of Diet Pepsi. Not my drink of choice, but it’s not my fault that these restaurants haven’t learned to cater to my every desire.

And yes, it made me feel good to end the post title with a preposition, even with all my learnin’.

All the pressure from the past week? It’s practically gone. This week will still be busy, but I can see how I possibly can get everything I need to done. And starting Tuesday night?

It’ll be a week long party.

I just hope I’ll have enough energy by then!

This weekend was incredible. I can only thank God that I got everything done that I did, because I have never written papers in so little time before.
Friday I went grocery shopping, went clothes shopping (needed some essentials for graduation), went Christmas shopping, wrote my last 2 Sunday school lessons (it was my internship this semester for class) as well as a couple of pages for my smaller paper while I was babysitting.

Saturday I finished my smaller paper, went a baby shower, re-wired the dryer, did 3 loads of laundry, cleaned my room, wrote several pages on my long paper, cleaned up a mini-flood, and rooted for my national-championship-bound Sooners.

Sunday I attended church, finished memorizing Titus 2:1-3:11, wrote on my paper, cleaned up a minier-flood, went back to church, and came home and finished that paper. Yesterday afternoon I actually wrote 5 pages of one of my papers in an hour. I’ve never written a paper that fast. I’m more in the 1-page an hour with a break, 2-page an hour without a break type of gal.

You’ve been keeping count with me, that’s my last paper of the semester, of the year, of my masters, and of my entire career as a student. I almost teared up when I put the finishing touches, and then I thought better of it.

Hmm, seems like I had something else to say. You may have a question in your head if you’ve actually read the whole post semi-carefully: “cleaned up a mini-flood,” “cleaned up a minier-flood,” what is that all about?

Yes, I had to clean up a couple of small floods this weekend. We’ve been without a washer and dryer in our apartment since August when our old roommate came back from visiting her parents for the summer and needed her washer and dryer for her new place. We’ve made due by visiting friends with baskets of laundry in our hands and making a few costly trips to the laundromat (why in the world should it cost $4 to wash and dry a load of clothes?). But this week we finally have a washer and dryer to call our own. Okay, to call my roommate’s own. She paid for them.

For whatever reason, the washer is really shaky, so shaky that it knocked the water return hose loose while I was doing a load yesterday. Water flooded the entire laundry closet about half an inch deep. It made me vaguely reminiscent to when our entire apartment had at least that much water in it last year. After getting the water to stop pouring out, I was able to mop up most of the water with about 6 towels or so. The rest of it dryed up pretty quickly as it was warm in their and it’s winter, so our apartment is pretty dry. I put those back in place as far as it would go, and thought we’d be good.

Not so. The same exact thing happened yesterday afternoon, ironically while I washing the towels I used to mop up the first accident. There is a learning curve to such things, though, and I was much quicker to respond and clean up. It only took 3 towels this time around. From now on, it looks like we’re going to have to make sure to push down the hose with each load, or we’re going to have more floods.

Anyway, I’m entirely sorry that this post is rather rambly. Maybe those papers took all my writing skills. Regardless, I’m going to refrain from posting until I am completely done with my school work tomorrow night. The last thing I have is a final at 6:30 tomorrow night, so by 8:00, I’ll be a free woman! Don’t expect a post right then, though, because I might just have to out and celebrate. =)

This is my second to last school day memory, as I’m graduating Friday. I’ve saved something extra special for next Saturday’s memory and then I’ll be closing this chapter of my life.

I was somehow able to march all the way through my school years and pull out fun memories, but 6th grade was hard. It was a hard year to be a kid as it is for most. I think that’s why I love tweens so much: I remember how difficult it was to be that age. You aren’t really a child, but you’re not an adult, either. There’s all the questions about who you are and who you’re going to be. Peer pressure also seems to be especially strong those years, or at least it was for me.

Well, there is a memory that I can share that’s reasonably interesting. I’m sure you might have picked up on it, but I’m a good student. Always have been. I always (well, almost, anyway) did what was asked of me and I never turned in anything late.

One day in my reading class in 6th grade, I wasn’t feeling very good, so instead of working on our worksheet, I laid my head down on my desk. The next day I came to class and realized I didn’t have that worksheet completed to turn in, so I turned in what I had. I got an 18% on it, which warranted me a spot in lunch detention which was utterly mortifying for me.

Mrs. P. knew me to be a good student, so she told me that if I did the required lunch detention and completed the worksheet, she would average the 18% with whatever grade I received upon completing it. That was totally worth it to me, as I didn’t want that bad grade on my progress report.

So I did lunch detention, the one time I ever had any sort of detention, and Mrs. P. never gave me my points. Because of that, I got a B in reading, which was, as you can imagine, also rare for me. Needless to say, I didn’t care much for Mrs. P.

Tune in next week for the extra-special school memory!

Other School Day Memories:

Kindergarten and 1st Grade: Kisses and Skunks
2nd and 3rd grade: Spitwads
3rd grade: Laundry Chutes and Floppy Disks
4th grade: Watching Whales
5th grade: Bad Grammar
7th Grade: Teacher Review
8th Grade: 100 Marble Pick Up, Pink Jackets and Saxophones
9th Grade: Science Nerd
10th Grade: Playing in the Rain
11th Grade: Pink
12th Grade: Sleepovers on a School Night
College Freshman Year: My First Day of College, My Second Day of College
College Junior Year: Kidnapping and Frozen Custard
College Senior Year: Why Procrastination Might Not Be My Thing

I’m not sure what to write. I had scheduled the other posts this week (you know it’s sad when you can’t even take time to blog), but I wanted to give you a “live” update on what’s going on.

Thanks for all your well wishes about graduating. I keep telling myself, “X days of madness and this will be over forever.” Not that I actually say “X.” That’d be crazy. And I’m not crazy. How’d I end up here in this room without any windows? And why is everything padded?

So today there’s 5 more days of madness. I won’t go through it all as I’ve already shared that, but basically I have 2 papers, 2 Sunday school lessons, a final, a presentation, and a few odds and end left to the semester. Pretty much everything has to be done today or tomorrow. We’ll see how that goes (And yes, if I wasn’t taking the time to write this blog entry, I might be writing something of actual importance. I’ll pretend that this is a warm-up exercise.)

I have an editor looking over my shoulder right now, and she suggested that I should have put “and a partridge in a pear tree” at the end of that list. I’d rather not add anything to my already long list. It’s weird to have an actual audience to my writing. A moment ago she laughed out loud, and that was weird. I never imagine you all actually laughing at what I write, though that’s often my intent.