Fair thee well

Okay, let me think back upon the last couple of days where I neglected to make a post. Wednesday evening I went to the Physics help session. I was the only one there for about 10 minutes, then one other girl showed up and eventually we were up to six total (which is a pretty sad turnout). We think there will be more next week as people start to get nervous about the homework. I had been to lecture, spent a bit of time looking at the book, went to lab, listened the entire time at the help session and.... Thursday spent an hour in lecture, two hours directly after that in another one of the discussion sections (where there is a quiz every week) and lastly spent an hour in my own section, for a total of four straight hours in physics, and my discussion leader finally made things begin to click for me! At least in this first chapter we've been studying :( Now I've got to figure out the second one next week.

Friday was a normal day as well, except I discovered a bag of snacks left by my mother. I didn't know they were there though I'd seen the grocery bag and assumed that there was laundry soap in there or something. What a pleasant surprise to vacuum near it and find it was peanut-butter oreos (I didn't even know there was such a thing) and Pringles and Cracker Jacks! Thanks mom!

Friday evening some of the CY and the Yost family volunteered to watch some kids for the Mom's night out, something to do with Stillwater Life Services and the Sunnybrook church (we used their facilities). I arrived about twenty minutes early and took a look around but no one was there. The church doors were open but the hallways were dark. I snuck silently around for a little while, looked at the literature they had on their new study in Genesis (it was very weak in my opinion and very loosely based off of Genesis) and then went back out to the car to read. It was just about six and I was starting to suspect that I had written the date down incorrectly when the Spitler vehicle drove up. Apparently everyone else had been in there for the last ten minutes or so, they came in the other side of the building so I completely missed them.

The volunteers outnumbered the children about 2 to 1 I think. I had hoped there would be lots of kids there and had asked the N's if I could borrow some children's books, which Laura brought for me. I had been eagerly anticipating what I imagined would be a captivated audience of youngsters listening intently to "Green Eggs and Ham" or something like that. Instead, I couldn't even get one young boy interested in hearing me read. And Raychel isn't interested in anything for more than 3.6 seconds (max). So I sadly put the books away after several tries. I read aloud to myself sometimes *sniff*

We played outside on the swingset and slides for quite some time. Johnny started shooting at the boys with dual pistols (make-believe) and would have gotten me had I not had the sense to jump through the end of the monkey bars (a special portal) and made it to Safe-Land, eventually pulling JD in after me. Johnny tried to follow but sadly (for him) guns just disappear in Safe-Land. There was a girl there whom I was chasing toward the slide and she turned and said "Gets away from us", screwing her face up into a snarl. So I said (in a Gollum voice) "No, it's tasty, it's crunchable!" And thereafter she periodically begged me to do it again.

When not watching the younger kids, Stephen and I competed to see who could jump the furthest off the swingset (we're good examples, I know) and ended up tying I believe. The swings were too low to the ground so I had to keep my legs directly in front of me the whole time. Laura said I belonged on the funny farm.

We went back inside and I started playing with a couple of the younger boys, they had a box of farm animals so I grabbed a farmer, elephant, truck, helicopter, and small horse and let fun ensue :)

One of the boy's cows kept getting stuck (on top of a cliff) so the helicopter man had to rescue him. About six times! Eventually the farmer drove his truck near the cliff so the cow could walk right down when she got stuck. Then he drove her out to the farm where there was lots of nice green grass, went back and got the horse, and the baby horse, and the last trip, a dinosaur jumped in the truck! "I can't take you to the farm, dinosaurs don't belong on farms" said the farmer in a deep voice (then Jesse was horrified to see that the farmer had been a girl the whole time and I hadn't noticed, so she switched him out with a brown-haired boy for me). But the dinosaur insisted so the farmer took him out.
"Goooooodness!" exclaimed the Cow. "I've never seen a dinosaur on the farm before! What do you eat" (rather nervously).
"Oh, I eat um....."
"Dooooo yoooou eat grass?"
"No, I eat.... dirt!" Squeaked the dinosaur
"Oooooh! Well here, help yoooourself, we have plenty of fresh dirt here" said the Cow invitingly."
And then it was time to leave. So they all went home.

Now for today. I spent the time in the morning cleaning up various things and getting all of my paperwork laid out for the next week. I also finished my Statics homework. At 1:00 I went to the fair to see the exhibits. The very first thing I saw when I walked in the door was the scene that Laura had made (I forget what it's called, but it has to do with loops and yarn and hangs on the wall and looks kind of like a rug). It had won first prize. Around the corner was a shield with a red lion emblazened upon it. JD later told me that he thought Betty had done it. I wouldn't be a bit surprised!

I looked around at the photographs, the drawings, and saw that Stephen and JD had both won first place for their self-portrait sculptures of their heads (which I thought looked very good) and Mary showed me her pumpkin. JD took me over to see the robot and then Laura surprised us by popping through the curtain. It turns out that she had an excellent vantage point at the SLS booth and could see anyone at the robotics booth. The robot was impressive (I'd never seen it before) and looked expensive too :) I liked the way the chain drive was supposed to work. Laura said it kept breaking though.

I dropped by and talked to Liz for a short while and then headed back to where everyone else was gathered for the pie-tasting and awards. Abigail won first prize and so did Nathan for his Peanut Butter pie. The lady said that all the pies were good and yet the filling on some was a little "loose" etc. and that you shouldn't fill it so much when you're transporting it but when you're at home it's fine but..... she didn't know if it was a great idea or they had just forgotten to take it out of the freezer until the last minute, but that Peanut Butter pie was excellent and you could just taste the peanut butter all throughout! I think she would have been surprised if she had known who had made it (aside from the fact that he was practically dancing around the room throwing his chest out). And on top of that, he later won Grand Champion for the pie. Man, I've got to get a piece!

JD and I took Mary and Emily to see all the animals. They had some miniature donkeys and a camel! Then we went to see the rabbits. The girls (especially Mary) kept wanting to run on ahead so I had to keep them "handcuffed" in my hands for a little while. We viewed the rabbits (there were only two of them) and lots of poultry. There were some chickens there with little tufts of feathers on their heads like an afro. They looked pretty funny. Some of the pigeons had feathers all over their feet! The geese honked at us and the roosters crowed incessantly as they each tried to claim their dominion over the hens in the cages next to them. We then headed down to the horses. Mary started petting one horse and I was a bit cautious at first. I lifted Emily up to see one and I started rubbing its nose because it was near the bars (I wanted to get Emily comfortable around the big animals) but suddenly the ears went back and he snapped up at my hand. He didn't catch anything but air but I cautioned the girls after that because after several days in a stall, the horses' tempers could be rather short.

Eventually we headed back and Emily and Mary both had the chance to milk the goat (the man helped them, just pinching it and then telling them to squeeze). Wow! Good job, look at all that milk! They had hand sanitizer nearby.

We all went back and I decided to head on home, I'd been there for nearly three hours and was feeling a little tired. I called Jonathan to see if he'd want to go to supper somewhere but I forgot that he was probably out of town (I just got a message). So... that's been my day. Aside from a little reading which I plan on doing.... NOW! So good night.