The first two full days of college orientation

This has really gone fast. So, I'm posting from my dorm room at Geneva. I'm really starting to feel like I fit in here. In fact, on the bus back from a trip to a huge park this evening, I remarked to the girl next to me, "Well, we're in Beaver Falls. About back home now." Didn't even think about that until a couple minutes later. That's most likely a good sign. :)

Yesterday morning wasn't pleasant. I woke up and wasn't feeling good... and a few minutes later ended up throwing up. After that I felt better, but I had slept badly, so I was tired all day. However, this morning, the schedule was a bit nicer, so I slept in until about 9. I didn't feel the best this morning, but it wasn't quite so bad. Mom and Dad are thinking that maybe I have some allergy problems, so I got some Triaminic today... hopefully that's going to help.

Another great thing here at school is that I'm really getting to know a bunch of people. My roommate and I are getting along great. My L&T (Learning and Transition) group is great. It's just fun walking to the other side of campus, and on the way there stopping to talk a few times with people I know. Fun times.

Last night, the entire freshman class went down to Pittsburgh for the evening. After wandering around for a while, and hanging out some at Station Square (really neat place - go there if you get the chance), we went on a boat cruise up both rivers. That was really fun in a lot of ways, especially getting the chance to check out the city at night. Milling around talking with people and meeting them was nice too. :)

Not really sure what else to put up here now. I played Ultimate Frisbee for about 2 hours straight this evening, so I really need to get a shower, and then most likely hit the sack. I'll try to keep updating. Seeya!

Interesting past couple of days...

So yesterday was very interesting. All of us went down to Cincinnati for the day to take Grandmother to a doctor's appointment. We were there for quite a while, mainly because of visiting with some more family in the area. As well, the trip back home took longer since we stopped at a Bob Evan's for supper and the food took forever. However, the delays were definitely good. Since we were delayed, we were able to pull off at a rest stop along I-75 just below Piqua. We pulled over since my phone had gotten a text alert from the Weather Channel that Logan County was under a tornado warning. That always makes the adrenal glands work harder.

Turns out there weren't any tornadoes. We did get to see at least one wall cloud, with maybe another weaker one. The definite one was very well-formed. Quite an interesting sight... thankfully not a dangerous one for anyone. There was a lot of wind, rain, and hail though. The northern part of Logan County here didn't get so much as the southern part, but there was still plenty of rain. We got about 1.3 inches, which was great - we really needed it. The lightning also was really spectacular, especially since it was night before we got home finally.

The other big thing was that today was my driver's license test. I passed. :) I almost didn't on the maneuvering part of the test, but did try over again and the examiner passed me that time. The driving part was quite easy, and I did a good job on it. So, I have the license. The only problem is that the new licenses are... pink. Blargh. Oh well. :P

So, that's it for now. Tomorrow and Saturday are going to involve a lot of packing. This coming Lord's day is my last full day at home until I leave for college... wow, that's hard to believe.

Only 12 more days at home...

Yep. By August 24, I will have left for school. This summer has gone by unbelievably fast. Sigh.

So, I went on a campout this last Monday and Tuesday. Our scout troop went to a local horse place, called Marmon Valley Farm. I was one of two guys belaying on the climbing wall for about 1 and a half hours. Since neither one of us was getting paid, both of us got to climb as well. That was lots of fun. After that, we hit a challenge course for a little while, before heading back to camp and then heading on home. However, the best part of the campout wasn't the climbing. It wasn't the challenge course. It wasn't even the pizza that a couple of the other guys and I ordered for supper on Monday evening (yeah, we ordered pizza on a scout campout). The best part had to be the 45 minutes spent on devotions Monday night.

During that time, we first started by concentrating on 1 Corinthians 16:13. "Watch, stand fast in the faith, be brave, be strong." Basically, this breaks down into 4 parts very easily. Hopefully you've figured that much out already. We spent about 20 minutes thinking about this, mainly applications for it. Then, the man running the devotions asked Matt and me if we had anything to add. We ended up taking it the rest of the time. It was a great time. We were able to give some (I believe) good advice to the younger guys there. I know I said it already, but it really was great.

So, that was the campout. Except for one thing. We played ultimate frisbee on Monday night. 2 games. They were GREAT. It was tons of fun. Then, Tuesday night, I played again. That was at a going away party for one of my best friends, Andrew. He's leaving for California this next Monday, going to The Master's College. I'm going to Geneva, in Pennsylvania. Really far apart. The party was great - got to meet some more of Andrew's other friends, got to play ultimate, got to help out with a great bonfire, and got to talk a ton with lots of people. Just... it was a bummer to have to say goodbye to Andrew.

I guess that's it for now. Seeya later!

Why I don't like cats...

I really wanted to post this video. It's incredibly moving. It's also what I believe God has for me someday. The chance to save others' lives, even, if necessary, at the cost of my own.

What has been going on the last month...

So, what have I been up to for the last month and few days since the last post? Well, the answer will be the rest of this post. Sit down, buckle up, maybe grab a cup of coffee, cause this is gonna be one long post.

Well, in my last post, I said that I was sick but maybe feeling a little better, and was going to be going to TFY the following Monday. Well, I left for TFY. I was feeling a little better for a little while. Then, things started going downhill. There was a cold and a GI bug floating around in the middle of everyone, and unfortunately I managed to get both of them. As well, whatever I had been sick with was still going on a bit, and also the antibiotics I was on were giving me some side effects. Put all these together, and I was one miserable guy. Despite that, however, I was having a great time when able to participate. Normally I couldn't do anything in the mornings, since I was having to sleep something like 10+ hours a day to keep moving any. I'd kind of struggle downstairs (4 stories of stairs) for lunch, and then not go back upstairs until bedtime. However, in the meantime, I was often able to make it to classes and such. So, that was how I lived until Friday.

On Friday, I went up, with 4 other kids from the group, to Rose Point PA. We were to stay there until a week from the next Monday. That night, I actually stayed with my Uncle Bob and Aunt Patty, since I wasn't in any shape really to be participating with the rest of the group. So, I stayed there until mid-afternoon the next day, at which time I rejoined the group. I was starting to feel better, or so I thought. The next couple days went downhill again, and I ended up having to go home on Monday. It half killed me (well, not literally, but you know what I mean) to have to leave those other 4 kids. Will and Scott and I had bonded together so quickly, to the point that we were insulting each other right and left, half-attacking each other, and otherwise being generally disagreeable the entire time, and absolutely LOVING it. :D I obviously wasn't behaving that way to Kim and Melanie, but we were still having fun together a lot too.

So, it was a huge disappointment to have to leave on Monday, but my parents and I thought it was the best thing to do. So, that Tuesday, I went to the doctor. He talked with me for 10 minutes or so during/after the exam, to try and maybe narrow down what this could be. I then had a couple of tubes of blood drawn, mostly to eliminate a bunch of things, including cancer. (By the way, the nurse half eliminated my arm too. When she pulled out the needle, her hand twitched. It hurt a ton) That (cancer) was eliminated. So were most of the other things, including mono, which is what the doctor thought was possibly what had knocked me out so bad. However, he also said that the test gives a bunch of false negatives, and, based on the symptoms, he's thinking that's what I've had. No idea if that is indeed the case, but we'll see.

Whatever happened, I'm actually mostly over it now. But more on that later. Since the time that I came home from TFY, I've been doing lots of stuff. Among other things, the weekend after coming home, I went back to PA with the rest of my family. A cousin of mine got married that Saturday. So, we went out for the wedding. It was a great chance to see some of Mom's side of the family that we don't get to see too often. Uncle Jack and Aunt Carol live in Baton Rouge, LA, and her daughter Liz, her husband Shawn, and their two kids live in Kansas... so, yeah, we don't get to see them terribly often. It was nice getting to. I also was able to hang out with Kim, Melanie, Scott, and Will again. That was great. Spent a lot of the Lord's Day talking with them. :) It was great.

So, since that weekend, what have I been up to? Well, besides recovering, I've mowed, practiced driving stuff, flown, and done lots of other things.

Mowing is pretty much the same. Thankfully, we've started having enough rain to keep the grass growing nicely. So, we haven't had any week yet without income from mowing. Had a few where we only mowed a couple or three yards, but still. :P Now, we're back to doing most all of them every week as usual. One mower's in the shop right now, since the self-propelled control cable snapped. A while back, the cable had snapped at one end, so I got some cable clamps and tightened it up. However, that didn't hold long, since that wasn't what it was designed for, so it happened again. Eventually, we ran out of cable. That's why it's in the shop.

As far as the driving, there hasn't been much of anything unusual except today. I did end spending about a half hour with Dad practicing for the Maneuverability test for the driver's license exam. Basically... well, it would be easier to show than explain. Lemme find a picture.

So there ya go. That's what I was doing. Each of the course markers is 20' away from each other on the sides of the box, and the distance between them on the ends is 9'. The "point" is 20' from the side of the box. So, yeah. I was doing that. I also washed the car and put Windex on all the glass surfaces. :D

As far as flying, I've done it twice since I came back. One time was just local and having some fun. A man right outside town finished restoring a 1943 aircraft, and he has his own grass strip out back of his house. So, I decided to buzz him. :D I didn't go too low, and was still legal the entire time. It was definitely fun though. :D

The other time was when I went north and took Mortons flying. The entire trip was incredibly fun. It would have been better if the runway hadn't had workers alongside it most of the time (delaying my arrival by at least 1 hour), and if the mixture control wire hadn't readjusted itself (delaying my departure by at least 1 hour.) Oh well. Small price to pay. It was great. The only thing that I wasn't expecting was having some amazing screams from the seat next to me at a couple different points (you know who you are.. :D both of you). So, that's that for flying.

As for lots of other things, well, I've been doing lots of other things. There's no way I could remember all of them. I can tell you that today, I walked to the post office and library; mowed a yard; washed a car and did some driving maneuvering stuff; ate a powdered sugar donut, a bunch of peanut butter and cheese crackers, saltines with cheddar cheese, a hot dog, some taco salad, ham slices, corn on the cob, rice-a-roni; played around on the computer, taken a shower, talked with friends on instant messenger, poked around on Facebook a little, and written a blog post. So, that's today. However, I'm sure I missed some things. Oh well. I could post something like that every day... or not. I'm hoping to get back into a posting habit again, especially before I leave for college. I'm leaving on the 25th of August. Seeya!