What you can get done at IHOP

SO, tonight I am writing a paper at IHOP (a 24 hour restaurant with free internet) for my senior seminar class, as my roommate writes her paper for a philosophy class. Here are some conclusions I have drawn from this evening so far:
1. I should have started sooner...just because I'm just writing a draft (nl:klad) does not mean I have lost my perfectionist tendencies....It doesnt matter how good it actually needs to be, I still try to make it as good as I can.
2. Three muscle relaxers in one day is not a good idea...especially if you're used to taking one a month and need to write a paper on philosophy.
3. Unintelligent philosophers make people go crazy because none of what they say makes sense. (My parents taught me not to use the word 'stupid' so I tried to avoid that word in this sentence)
4. Taking three muscle relaxers might actually help to write a philosophy paper because it makes you sound like the philosophers in your book. It also helps you to understand these philosophers.
5. Sometimes I feel like the next Curt Niccum...depending on who I am around and the comments they make. (Curt Niccum is basically the smartest person on our campus, mainly in the areas of Bible and language)
6. Doing homework with my roommate makes me draw more conclusions on her homework than mine....especially when she's reading about human robots gone crazy. I think she might be turning into one. Is that possible?

As promised, here is a picture of Derrick and me. This was taken at World Mission Workshop (WMW) in Lubbock, Texas this past weekend. For those of you who do not know, WMW is a type of seminar for anyone interested in mission work in the whole world. Missionaries come and speak to those interested to let them know about their experiences and to show them what kind of mission opportunities are out there. It’s a great time for missionaries to kind of have a reunion...that’s usually how I see it! I like to go to see all the missionary people I know and to meet new ones and to hear what’s going on in the world. Well, I know that I said I would talk about my future this time....it’s going to have to wait. We had a poet laureate, Robert Pinsky, visit our campus last week for a lectureship and I was involved in most of that, so I feel that I need to report on that because it was such a wonderful experience. First of all, a poet laureate basically means that he's considered the king of poets in the States. Robert Pinksy seems to be a non-practicing secular Jewish person. So it was very interesting to have him speak on our campus. I thought it was a wonderful experience. He wrote a book about the story of David which many of us have been reading in our classes, so he gave a lecture on that book. I was able to speak with him a little before the lecture because I was in charge of the registration table at the VIP reception. It was a small enough reception to where I felt comfortable to mingle as well. He asked me about my future plans and I explained to him my aspirations to be a missionary in Belgium, because said Europe needs God. AT this point, I did not know his religious affiliation and he caught me off guard by asking "from a secular point of view, why does Europe need God?" That started our Pinsky-Brazle 'debate', lol. It was fun. After the lecture, during the question-answer section, I stood up and asked him "Earlier you asked me a question from a secular point of view, now let me do the same....From a secular point of view, how do you see David's spiritual life and his relationship with God?" I think it caught him off guard, lol, but he answered well and we’ve enjoyed our discussion. The next day I also got to bring a 2-3 minute presentation about what I had learned from the book and the lecture. If you are interested in reading this, I will type it up and attach it to my next post.
I think that's all for now. God bless you all!

Randa's got a boyfriend!

Yes, its true, I do have a boyfriend. His name is Derrick Logwood and he's from Missouri. Since I know you all probly want to hear the story, I will tell you how it happened. Well, it all started our freshman year, three years ago. We kind of knew each other, but not really. We started hanging out at the end of our first year, but that's mainly because I was getting to know his friend Nathan better and started dating him after a while. Derrick was still immature back then. Actually, so was Nathan and so was I. But I never saw myself dating Derrick. He was fun...but too immature for me.
Second year we were both in Greek 1 together. We got to know each other better as friends because we were in that class a lot and thus we saw each other a lot. But I always only saw him as a friend because he was still pretty immature. He was a fun friend though. I enjoyed hanging out with him, but still could not imagine dating him.
Third year we continued to be in Greek class together, and he continued to slowly mature. We became better friends and started hanging out more. I had the occasional thought of "hmmm, i wonder if i could ever date him", and then usually dismissed the thought. We were just friends. But he was growing up.
Then, over the summer I went to Rwanda and he went to South Africa on a mission trip. I didnt think much of it until school started up again and we started talking again. We didnt really keep in touch at all over the summer. Anyway, this semester we started hanging out a little more, going to the same devo and talking more. He's not in my Greek class anymore, but I could tell from our time together that he had grown up so much more this past summer than I had imagined possible. For most of September I was still holding on to that funny immature immage of Derrick that I had of him from previous years, but every time we talked I learned more about how mature he has become.
Now, we didnt really ever hang out alone. We never went out on an actual date alone. Last week was probably the first time we had ever spent real time alone. We went to starbucks to study....then on a whim decided studies were done and it was movie time. We had a pretty good idea we liked each other then, but we didnt want to jump into a relationship to quickly, so the movie was 'just as friends' and we didnt even bring it up that it was anything different. All week we hung out more than we ever have and then thursday night it happened....we actually verbally expressed what we pretty much knew was going through each other's minds. Then, we decided that since we both feel this way about each other, we would continue our relationship as a 'dating relationship'.
Wow, I dont think Iver ever written this much about just one person on my blog. I hope you all understand how important this relationship is to me and I ask you to pray for me and Derrick as we embark on a completely new, exciting and challenging part of our lives and that God remains at the center.

Let our Lord be praised for He is GREAT!

OH, and thanks for those last comments. I'm really glad to hear you all are interested to know my plans. I will dedicate my next post to telling you about my thoughts for the future (and perhaps a picture of Derrick).

Once again I have taken forever to update this blog. I will try to have more discipline to start updating it more often. Sorry to those of you who check out my blog in the hopes that I have written something!
Anyway, school! School is going great! Its keeping me really busy and I have a lot to think about, but I'm relaly enjoying my classes! I am taking Greek (i'm in my third year now), Technical Writing, Linguistics, Senior Seminar (English) and Church Growth/Church planting.
Greek is going quite well. I dont have enough time to really get to know it as much as I would like to at the moment, but I know that time will come. Technical Writing and Senior Seminar have kind of been overlapping for a while. They were both talking about looking for jobs and/or grad schools and setting up a resume and doing interviews and sending letters and all that stuff...so amazingly enough I have already gotten way ahead of a lot of people in my class in trying to figure out what i want to do after I graduate. Keep in mind that I probably will not graduate until December 2007.

If you are actually interested in my future plans and would like to know more about what my thoughts are or think you have some good advice for me, let me know!

I am still grading Greek for Curt Niccum. Its always a joy to be working in the Bible building! I get to see how the Bible profs really are! I'm not working in the security office anymore. I got a job with the english department as the senior student coordinator for our new Literacy Program that we are starting. We look for volunteers who would like to help our maintenace workers on campus and people at certain sites in Oklahoma City to learn better English. Its such an exciting project!! Lots of people are asking for applications and I'm excited to see it happen!

Praise the Lord for He is good! He loves you all! Remember that!