First sentences are always the worst. You sit and stare down at the happy little keyboard grinning up at you; you crack your knuckles and then instantly regret it; your head spins because there is so much seething around inside of you, trying to get out and prove something to all those people who innocently stumbled upon your bit of cyber-territory...and then horror swells up and conquers every other reeling emotion because you have come to a very dangerous conclusion: you have absolutely no idea how to start your post out. This is very often the case with me. I know what I want to say, I can't wait to say it, and then I traipse off disappointed because the first sentence simply refused me. Tragic, no? Heh. In my opinion, people should start their blogposts backwards and work their way to the beginning. Think Alice-In-Wonderland-Format; someone should copyright that and put it to good use.
   It's sad how many people bypass God's fulfillment in the process of chasing after their ridiculous ideals. If we are so dead-set on reaching our own man-made goals, why do we strut around claiming to be a vessel for God's perfect plan? We can't see His urgings through the murk of our own standards! We make plans, we ignore open doors because we are still trying to tug some other door open by ourselves, we put all our effort into what we want to focus on rather than what God is whispering for us to do, to think, to become. We fail to reach our insane goals and then beat ourlseves up because arrogance snarls into our ears, "You just aren't good enough. What a terrible person you are! Stop trying, it's no use." Then we pay attention to the Spirit of God, the quiet presence that has been there all along, and we come to realize who we are and who we can become through God's mighty hand. Arrogance and despair literally run screaming. In their place surges joy, purpose, self-worth; life suddenly snaps into a fresh perspective. This is sort of what has been going on with me during this long, sad elusivity. The only way to become filled with God is to empty yourself of yourself. Sound easy? A divine smack-down is perhaps the hardest thing we can go through because as piddling little humans, we are forever straying from God's will to find a reality outside of His absolute truths. We want to rule our own existence, be the lord of our own lives. Big mistake, peoples. Base nature takes you down a shadowed path and danger lurks at every bend. Don't keep convincing yourself that you'll be alright, that a little sin is okay, that God's grace is sufficient for any rotten thing you might do in the meanwhile. "Oh, He'll forgive me because He's so good and anyway, I'm not that bad of a person. *nervous laughter* Right, guys?" [insert chirping crickets] In my personal experience, this is too often the little game we play with ourselves. Pretty sad, huh?
   Now, dear Reader leans back in their chair and peer skeptically at the computer screen, wondering why this strange person always charges into her bit of cyberspace like this, ranting and railing about this that 'n the other. Wanna know why? I cannot contain it. If God has given you something to say, SAY IT. Don't hide your light just because you fear sounding like an idiot or making a fool of yourself. Yes, random person, I am talking to YOU.
   *contented sigh* Now that I have that said, here's what's been happenin'.
   Our internet upstairs has been turned off, and I must admit to feeling very...unshackled. I was throwing the wrong impressions of myself out to total strangers, putting too much of my energy into the wrong things. Now that I have stepped back to see what I'd been missing this past year, everything I'd let slip and all those convictions that had gotten weaker instead of stronger, I am thankful for the experience, hard a lesson as it was to learn. I feel more capable of facing other things, having that difficult time under my belt. Not continually being on the internet has allowed me to spend more time with my precious family, throw myself into my beloved writing with a new fervor, consider options for new dreams that I would never have thought about otherwise. I am sitting cross-legged in Momsie's big stuffed rocking chair, typing on her laptop and feeling a giggling autumn breeze tickle the back of my neck from the open window. 'Glad' is playing and we're having cold pizza for lunch. Life is good, no?
   The week before last, we were blessed with the crazy opportunity of going on a weeklong vacation to Orlando, Florida. Dadsy had a business trip with the company he worked with, and financial resources were such that we were able to get five day tickets to all the Disney theme parks. Bewildered at the mere size and bravely facing the horrendous waiting lines and 90-degree weather, Momsie and the Girls and I bashed around every inch of every park [exlcuding Animal Kingdom, since we have a zoo somewhere nearby our own house] and had the time of our lives. Thankfully, we had a master plan copied from a guide to the parks we had purchased several weeks in advance, and were able to avoid most of the crushing crowds and general lost-ness. Being natural tourists and favoring wild laughter on the rollercoasters as opposed to terrified shrieking, we did almost everything there was to do. Dadsy got a half-day ticket on Friday, the last day we were there, and we ended our vacation with a kick, roaming around Magic Kingdom at night while the fireworks popped over our heads, feasting on crazy-big roasted turkey legs and slushies [!!!], unable to contain our smiles. I even had coffee MWAHAHAHA okay sorry. It was so much fun! Momsie took a ton of pictures, almost 300 if I'm not mistaken. On Saturday, however, we were spent and decided to brave the long road from Orlando to our tiny-town 11 hours away, on the same day. Stopping at a gas station in Georgia, we were startled to find the temps dropped down into the 40s! Talk about shock! It was freezing when we finally got home at 2:15 in the morning and we all developed sore throats and coughs. I don't care; it was worth it. This past week, we waded through school despite our maladies, and actually did very well all things considered.  I was informed that I am now one-fourth of the way through my entire school year. The weather in our absence had tossed all our surrounding woods into a fair miasma of autumnal colors and the temps have remained around a comfy 70s.
   Several noteworthy events have occured since my most recent, rather sad post. If you find any of this a repeat, rest assured that this coverage is much more positive than the information found in its predecessor.
   For starters, I was admitted into a traveling theatre troup at the local college called the Jack Tale Players. We act out the folk tales of the Appalachians, most of the scripts written by our director who also happens to be a Ph.D. in theatre, and we perform them at schools, churches, libraries and folk festivals. Sofar we've had two performances that went very well. The work is rewarding because I love performing, and the Girls like hearing me rattle about the rehearsals. I recently got somewhat of a stunning piece of news; the director wants me to play the main character, Jack. *squeak* Jack has a lot of lines. *another squeak* I dearly hope my role won't be switched with someone else at the last moment, but nevertheless, Momsie said that the practice of memorization is never wasted. I have been plunking away at the lines all week and confidence has only now descended. Even if something happens and I can't play Jack, it was glorious fun grappling with the role at the time. I was basically given around three minutes during that rehearsal to learn the first part and though I fumbled quite a bit, the part is delicious to wrap one's mind around and I enjoyed myself greatly.
   The library has an annual speech class and guess who's joining it. Yours truly, facing the 'firing squad of audience eyeballs'. The two classes I have sofar attended have gone well, much better than last year, and I was even asked to be the big cheese for the most recent one. They called me ''Madam Toastmaster.' Toastmaster's Speechcraft...I wonder how in the world they came up with that title. What does toast have to do with public speaking? Something to think about.
   It's hard to explain this next bit because it envelops so much of my thought. You might recall me speaking about my novelinprogress, 'Wizard', from the recent posts. Well, dear Reader, I finished my beloved novel yesterday. 130K in under four months, bigger than any other novel I've attempted sofar. It was so strange, typing the epilogue to the end, because that book has literally been my consumption ever since I started it back in July. I woke up thinking about it, I went to bed worrying over it, I dreamt about it and filled page after page of my notebooks with things I had to convey, phrases that sounded purty, mental images that whole chapters centered around. The material was probably the hardest and most bittersweet I've had to bang out ever since I began writing around five years ago. But I think finishing my precious novel gave me a sensation of quiet triumph. I allowed God to guide it and it became a defiance against other books in its genre, other darker temptations that have recently tried to pull my writing into an evil rut. I literally could not stop writing as I neared the end; I hurried through everything else so that I could go and write, and I would lock myself up in my bedroom for hours, completing sometimes over 6K in one afternoon. The victory of finishing it has given me joy, but my heart was physically aching when I finally packed Pussy Willow [my laptop] away. So much of my soul has gone into 'Wizard', and now that it's finished, it's like '...what now? ' It felt so strange, not having another chapter to mess with this morning. I don't regret writing a word of it, though. Everything held conviction and a manifestation of my own struggles during the time of the writing. I see now however that the title of the book is actually contradictory to several remarks my kids [characters] made in it. The title isn't wrong but it's not straightforward and immediately gives people the wrong impression of its content. I believe that, should my novel ever be published [*smirks*], it would have to bear another title despite my incredulity regarding it being called anything else.
   The answer to my borderline remorseness over the lack of something to write will, hopefully, be amended by NaNoWriMo. Yup, I'm still going to seal my doom *coughs* uh, I mean attempt it. Considering I have been known to bang out 9K in a single day, NaNo should be small potatoes. As far as I know, the book for November is about a very dear character I have had almost ever since I began writing, Saffron [stop laughing at his name, I refuse to change it] and his history, from sometime around his preteen years up to present day. He was abused as a child, ran off into the inner city and joined a bloodthirsty gang that preyed upon the fading light of sidewalk ministries and street preachers, got fed up with his existence to the point of suicide and then experienced God in a very powerful way. The events preceeding his conversion draw a very thin parellel between the conversion of Paul; I think Saffron was a bystander to the violence of his gang towards some preacher or something. The basis of the novel is mainly about his gentle yearning for a delicate young woman and her protective father, the willingless Saffron has to improve his life in hopes of proving the depth of his love to the young woman, their tender courtship and eventual marriage after the woman's father gives his consent, and then the struggles the new couple face after their decision to start an outreach center for the 'scum of the asphalt' while being oppressed by the consequences of Saffron's life-changing decision to become the victim of those he used to encourage, the persecuted rather than the one doing the persecuting. The novel reaches through a ton of material and I am insanely excited to write it; Saffron, who appeared in several previous works of mine which have also undergone some changes, is a multi-layered character with a quiet strength about his faith. Since the novel covers so much time, I may find myself having to do that annoying thing we authors so often resort to: 'So'nSo Years Later'. Gah! Just when I have gotten used to describing almost every moment of every day! *grins* But the novel will be powerful, I hope, and I am eager to see where God leads me with it.
   Good grief, this post is entirely too long. It should last you until I bombard you again. Go and have a laughing fit.

• 2 Thoughts Most Glorious • Tell me your Thoughts • Permanent Link

   I find myself yearning for my Hideaway at the oddest hours of the night. *muses* Sleep has been coming in erratic bursts peppered with vivid dreams, dead-set on making no sense whatsoever, but at least on the weekends I have an excuse to while away the unholy hours by reassuring all you devoted readers [I’m talking to maybe, what? Two, three people here?] that nothing tragically fatal has happened since my last outdated post. *wild grin* If anything, life has improved. I found myself startled into a delicious summer of non-stop writing and tampering with college goals. If all goes well, I am going to take the PSAT in October. I no longer feel called to pursue a degree in English, however. My writing style has morphed into a genre of its own far beyond the fiddling tweaks of a stuffy professor. I won’t sit here and claim that I disregard tidy writing but that to have my precious trashes torn apart when in reality they are the expression of my soul and the tapering of my convictions would physically hurt me! I don’t want it! If I can write a good essay, I don’t feel the need to go further than that as far as ‘formal‘ writings. The genre I have finally thrown my goodies into is called psychoquantum, and to give it a description would sound something like this: A name given to writing dealing in the crossing of parallel realities, the invasion of supernatural influences, the motives behind sin-nature occurrences and the psychological existence of the individual. Sounds pretty perky, huh? Naturally I made it up, but it feels so much more sophisticated to be writing for a genre rather than random spurting. Wouldn’t you agree? *flails*
   This summer brought many new experiences, and a solo trip out of state to visit my good friend and dear sister Laura for her birthday was one of such instances. I was able to fly down to their house for a visit extending five whole days! We had a glorious time making brownies and sword-fighting, and being able to hug each other in reality as opposed to meager virtual condolences. I had a beautifully memorable time and simply being with her for any number of days made up for my pre-conceived nervousness about making a connecting flight from another state. *winks*
    School has taken many twists and turns in recent weeks. Momsie, as always, has thrown herself into a feverish thoughtfulness about our education; I believe most of it has been worked out thus far. The trick is trying to mesh together what I am learning with what the Girls are learning, and matching the different subjects into a streamlined continuity. Fun, fun. I respect my mother as a true genius for all the care she puts into every single year. I can’t help but wonder if she will have an easier time once I hopefully get admitted into a college? My educational options have somewhat changed; I found several resources in the field of drama and have become wildly infatuated with psychology, spiritual counseling, the study of the human mind and etc. If God so wills it, I may pursue something of that sort.
   The Girls continue to amaze me in all their colorful talents. I found myself gaping when Katsy displayed a homemade puffy-sleeved Colonial shirt she had created out of a spare bed sheet. She sees something that looks like it has homemade potential, and she creates it. G.B. has been toning her singing out on the swings and in the shower, but mainly her surprising tendencies lies within her perceptivity. Her mind works in a different way from her impatient friends and one has to look deeply beyond her wild sugar-highs to find a soul mature as someone twice her age.
   My dearest Onna and I have decided to co-author a book. Unlike several of my failed attempts at co-authoring, this novel is flowing with an almost alarming speed and promises to be a rich, rewarding venture. It’s been interesting, twisting minds with such a thoughtful person. Rumor has been spreading of us perhaps meeting in reality sometime in the near future. I pray God will work that out into His will for the months ahead, because it would be absolutely thrilling!
   The days are moving steadily towards a productive autumn; one can smell chill in the wind. And thank goodness, too! The chiggers and sweltering nights were becoming old hat.
   Writing has been, as I stated above, interesting. Several of my smaller works were shot to pieces in my face. Realm, for instance, hit over 54K and died. As of now, and besides the nameless co-authoring with Onna, I am rewriting my novel M’aine and it has been so much more fulfilling to bang out in. My other novel caused a bit of hesitance with me simply because Christian fantasy is so controversial. Momsie possessed the natural grace to listen as I explained my views about ‘magic’ and such. The conversation the two of us had over this, probably my most preciously beloved work, stretched for 2 1/2 hours and she pointed out some things which should be addressed over the course of this book. I am calling it Wizard not because wizardry is looked kindly upon in the writing but it conveys the depth of what the usage of magic could become if channeled in incorrect ways. Meaning, technically, when I think of a wizard I think of someone who uses their magic for their own selfish gain. I have always been a fan of writing in the sense that God created magic, He gives it to His children like He gives gifts of peace or joy. Momsie pointed out that magic is not one of the spiritual fruits mentioned in the Bible, but IF God HAD created magic, it could be regarded as such. I am still smoothing out the obvious kinks which will unavoidably arise in such a project; I probably will be until I finish the novel. But I would not be writing it had I not been called to, had I not been convicted that the events in the novel should take place on the page. I am fair-enough decided in most of the views manifesting themselves in these concepts, but if you have some burning desire to know why I would take up a project like this because it is ‘wrong’ or ‘worldly’, then I will do my best to reply to your concern as I am able to. Please pray for me, that I will be a humble vessel so that God may fill me up with the words He wants me to write.
   Writing in general has become more of a glorification of God’s power over Evil by the conflicting forces in my scribbles; I no longer seek out publication as a dire necessity. I find fulfillment by simply writing, and Onna has been somewhat my tech support, reading everything I give to her and providing very encouraging and helpful feedback. In return, I read her amazingly well-written pieces and we continue in a very even two-waying. Laura also found herself reading Wizard upon her own request, which I am grateful to her for.
   Since it appears I have no time and often no desire to fervently keep this place updated with everything required of it, I hope to post a couple times every month or so with my poor musings. I have always considered blogging as another form of self-expression as well as an outlet for social ministry. Not implying, of course, than I am some perfect preacher who will redeem your fabricated stupidities, but rather, you may find some sort of enrichment in reading what I think about certain things or at the very least that you will take things into a new sort of consideration, a different angle by which to sit back and grin at the world.

• 6 Thoughts Most Glorious • Tell me your Thoughts • Permanent Link

Fridays are usually very happy go lucky and pleasant at our house; the Girls and I typically get the bulk of our schoolwork for the week over with so there's not a whole lot to do, and we alternate between Dadsy getting pizza and Momsie making it from scratch [they're both about the same awsumness in the way they taste]. As the Girls and I waited around for Dadsy to come home this evening, we tried all stuffing onto my bed, Katsy and I with books [The Preacher has recently been taken with the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boy series, and sofar "Left Behind" has fascinated me] and the CD player cranked up. G.B. came along and decided she wanted to watch a movie. I have a tiny television set and the only VCR player we really use, so I often get booted out of my own room. :-D She started a movie with music which clashed terribly with the Jim Brickman thing I was playing, and we started some sort av weird game as we tried to read, listen to the CD, make sarcastic comments about the movie and focusing on everything at the same time. Not an easy task, dear Reader, I assure you. After that we jumped around downstairs and when we'd eaten supper and after the darkness had fallen into our woods, the Girls and I made our way to the shed we have on the top of the North hill. Inside, it was eerie with the sound of leaves scuttling across the wooden floor and the light of the fading blue sunset light streaming in between the slats in the side of the shed. The Girls and I sat around the table we'd drug up in there, with a little plastic lantern between us, and commented on how weird each other's faces looked in the ghostly light and how deliciously spooky it was, sitting in the darkness in a drafty old shed. It was very inspiring!

Speaking av inspiration, I got sucked into a bad mindset of feeling I had a certain sequence to follow here at the Hideaway, and couldn't post unless I reached that level. Yes, I have a standard here, but my motives had gotten mixed up. I simply don't have the time nor the energy to post a theological sermon every time I come here. This is not in answer to any of your expectations, Reader, but rather a mistake on my part. It's to be simply whatever I feel called to blah blah about that day. People so often either get infatuated with blogging so that it grabs away their time, or they think every single post must fire a thousand thoughtful reflections on the part of the blog's reader. Yes, you want people to come away with something, but you should be coming away with something as well from the experience of writing your posts. Stuff to consider.

Schoolwork has been plugging right along; I finished Latin and science, and have a bit less than three weeks to go with math. In a couple days I'll be starting that reading challenge, which'll be nice because I've been saving a lot of books until the summertime to read. I'd rather be busy during the summertime than have too much time on my hands and be dead bored. Boredom gets turned into foolish or even harmful time-wasting hobbies, and goodness knows we don't want that upon any of us! We made a trip to the library the other day, and I think I have a summer position for volunteer work once every week or so. There's a meeting for new volunteers on the fifth, so hopefully I'll get a more structured view of what's up with that. It'll be a new experience as opposed to the stage productions which I've done for the past  two years.

For some reason, I've found myself to be extremely busy. Mainly with writing, which might explain my lack of rambling on my poor widdle blog. *dumps a slushie over IH* I'd mentioned in the most recent post here that I was planning my own NaNoWriMo for the rewrite of FaM, called Realm, and I am indeed doing it. It's been, I guess, more than two weeks now and I have almost 21.5K! So that's going very well. A few days ago was hard pressed regarding inspiration; my musings seem to get shot and then take me by storm. Hopefully this craze of ideas won't leave me hanging somewhere around the middle. I realized the day before starting my NaNo for Realm that Anna and I, and maybe a couple other of the Peoples, are doing this thing from June 20 to July 20 where we write 40K. Unless I can't stand to look at Realm by then, I'm going to continue on with it to reach around 90K. Whoot! There's just so much to convey, so much that needs to be in there, I'm pretty sure that'll all go okay. In other writing news, Anna and I have two more TMCs done, Syd and I posted chapter one of "Last Man Standing" [go read it!] and are doing a Iwriteonechapteroneweek and shewritesthenextthenextweek deal. Not to mention I had a failed attempt at some weird random thing, and a magazine article with a deadline that I'm going to edit and hopefully send in tomorrow. I tend to wait until the last minute if it's something with a deadline. Meh.

Oh, and the Rodents struck my HSB messings-around once again, and messed up Inkstains so bad that it'd freeze up every time I forced the RC there, so I used up the third space on this account for a writing blog, Noir. I'm keeping Inkstains only because I've saved and backed-up so much writing there just in case the RC decides to pull a total crash like it did during last December. 

Dear widdle Loomis Tunut continually charms us with how plain adorybuhl she is. *grinz* Today she climbed into an empty Ramen Noodle box and decided that it was an ideal place to play in. We carried the box around and she pawed at us through the plastic. She's also fallen in luve with Momsie's desk chair and sleeps in it for hours. I've never seen a kitten more cute when sleeping, or one so downright Clovisish-crazy when hooting. She keeps us on our toes, that's for sure. >:-D

There was a tag which Syd dumped on top av me; I don't usually do tags anymore but basically my middle and last names are Joy and Armour, I'll be 16 on August fawth, I live in a random state in the Appalachians, I don't know what my favourite state ish but Washington State is high on the list, I have an animal [Loomis, and G.B. has Tootsie Zee Terror Mutt] and one av mah favourite colours is aquamarine. Laura also awarded me with a LotR fan doodad, many thanks to my dear sister!

The weather here was gloriously inspiring; high winds through the leafy green trees, billowing clouds threatening us with rain, lots of shadows once the sunset had melted away. *blissful sigh* That and black cawfee has rectified me for a raw dry cough which has taken too much av a liking to me.

May God bless you, and may His light pierce your darkness!

~PIP~  

• 28 Thoughts Most Glorious • Tell me your Thoughts • Permanent Link

Fascinating it is how the creative juices flow.

I was under the impression a couple days ago that my new novel, "Fire and Moonlight", was simply something wherein I could care less if the wording sounded weird and where I could jolly well have a loose, skeletal, shaky, disjointed plot if I wanted to. *shakes finger at herself* So much for that idea! I was basing that old idea off mere poetry and pretty pictures from my imagination. Writing, for me, is like eating chocolate; the process is not for money or publication, or even for the sake of writing itself, though the last is indeed a very large part of it. It's the beauty of working with the talents God has given us, however rough [in my case] these talents may be. Writing is, for me, also like a battle. I show Evil for what it is instead of ignoring it [you show something for what it is; don't overdo it but make one aware of its depth], or delving in deep with it so that it makes me angry and dark myself. I don't write something "because it needs to be written" or because I am rebellious against pleasant plots [I'm having a blast with the crack novel, my playful "Sundapple" about the Peoples of one of the writing blogs I'm a member of]; I learned my lesson with "M'aine" about dark writing like that. I hate it. I don't let darkness guide my pen, I am God's child and He guides my writing. If I write something, it is because He inspired me for it and because, even if it's very trivial, it's for Him Who gave me the words to write it with. *falls off soapbox*

That said, one now realizes that this section of the post is to be a writing update. Run! 

So I'm rewriting FaM, and it's NOTHING like it was. It's much fuller, richer; the geography and history, not to mention the allegory which startled me by popping up in there clear as crystal at times and annoyingly elusive at others, is better grounded now. But, dear Reader, I did not only decide to rewrite FaM new and improved-like, I decided to do a NaNo for it! *weakly tosses confetti* As far as I can recall, I started the rewrite on the 19th., so June 19th. and I should have a full 50K. Unless it decides to stop there, I might take it further.

For various reasons, I am NOT rewriting Heveria. I am going to incorporate characters/elements/junketh into my other works, and I may even go so far as to write a book like it. But it's been so precious to me, and it took so long and is so sentimental, that rewriting it would be, to quote Momsie, like killing it. I just don't feel led to. So I'm not. [The Kids had an interesting episode directly following my breaking the news to a couple of them, they posted a bit of that at RAP]

In other writing news, "Sundapple" is going very well! It's so much fun to ramble about the Peoples with a quirky plot. My main character, however, suddenly turned Renegade. Not against me, against Bethy The Real Person who she was based after! Bethy said that Beth The Character wasn't like herself. *confused grin* But that's okay; for now, she's doing alright.

Anna has been plugging away at TP and we've been holding various WWs earlier to up various wordcounts. Our "Midnight Chronicles" are on hold till I make myself write the next one and she finishes TP so she'll have more time. LMS with Syd is going, but slowly, my fault. The co-A with Laura is even slower but who could weld inspiration as a sword? We can't just go snap and there it is. It has to be sent. Hmph. And no, that is not an excuse, it's not my turn to write in it. 

Now that that's over with...

I must be becoming one of those more infrequent blogposters, mainly because when I update here, I'd like to have something of worth to say. This past week Dadsy went and came back safely to/from Chicago on a business trip and we've had sickness in the house, including one day where I hardly got out of bed at all, so schoolwork was interesting this morning. I'm nearly done with science, one-fourth of the way to go through math, and finished with Latin as of today! Whoot whoot! I got a pair of thick-rimmed [Riley Poole!] reading glasses, which I wanted as opposed to needed; I look like such a geek wearing them but hey! They feel nice when I'm writing but I wouldn't use them for reading because I do a lot of it.

Something I was thinking about earlier is perhaps creating an informal writing workshop for any of the younger Inklings or aspiring writers interested. Any suggestions for that? By the way, if Momsie ever got a blog, what sorts of things could she write about on there? We'd been talking about that earlier...advice from veteran bloggers? I have cookies for helpful comments. *grinz*

Why is it that people on commercials, usually the ones selling something, find it necessary to YELL OUT THEIR LINES?! I mean, we have volumes on our remotes, people...

Here are a couple peekchurz to whoever may so desire to look upon them...You can see a bit of Appalachia there against the sky...[that's a peachy shurt, not a nasty light pink] May God bless you, and may His light pierce your darkness!

~PIP~

• 11 Thoughts Most Glorious • Tell me your Thoughts • Permanent Link

Have you ever noticed that getting up on time, doing everything you need to in time to stare out at the rain falling down in the green yard with a cup of tea in your hand, feeling the cool breeze blowing the lacy curtains, generally makes one feel better? =^D Somehow hot tea, lacy curtains and Mozart mix beautifully, as I found out this morning. I decided to go ahead and keep doing two weeks' worth of math in one week and I'm finishing science this month or I'll...I don't know what I'll do! Go on a coffee lent for a day or two. o_0 Can't have that! Seriously though, black coffee is beneficial. These days there is a contented kind of joy I've been feeling; a lot of things have happened recently to make me realize just how important grasping onto God's joy is. Not that black coffee is the root cure-all for joylessness. But I'm positive it helps. :-) Life is more interesting if you take pains to make it so. One of the most dangerous things to our culture nowadays is boredom; when you're bored, you get into all kinds of trouble. Which is why I'm only playing around when I grimace at Momsie's announcement to the Yavanenskis that I was doing summer school. I don't want to be bored! I'd rather do something productive with my summer than have hours and hours with nothing to amuse myself with. Besides the glorious Read A Thon [ http://www.incredibooks.com/ibdicsuss/, see the forum for details about this unique summer challenge] to participate in, I'm doing some SAT Prep work and an Italian course Momsie got at some cheapy store, plus a ton of other stuff. The only thing which would bother me is having to do science during the summertime. Blegh. Hence, my mental overload of epidermis and photosynthesis information. *grins*

Another thing I plan to do over the summer issa challenge my friend Anna came up with; basically you try and write 40K of something, even if it's random doodads and various novel-progressions like I'm planning to do, from June 20-July 20. I don't by any means wish to drop my writings over the summer, especially since I've been on an inspiration high. FaM isn't really included in this; I finished chapter two last week but I'm not happy with the whole thing in general. Not the plot, which is okay, but the way it sounds to me, reading it. It's like the styles shifted from chapter to chapter. RAWR! I'm not going back to it until I jolly well feel like it. *saunters* Anna and I have been doing this wacky thing called "The Midnight Chronicles"; it started when I was talking to her on the phone and we mused over how interesting it would be for us both to walk in a graveyard at nighttime and get names from the graves for our characters. We did a Word War [WW] that night and I wrote a doodad about us doing just that. She decided to write one where we and our characters had a parTAY inna graveyard at night, and it's growing from there. I call it comic morbidity because even though it's graveyards and nighttime rambles, it's hysterically insane. Something only an Authoress would enjoy, I suppose. It's a nice break. 

Also in the writing news is the co-Authorings I've recently taken up. Some of you might have seen my little announcement on the Inklings about how Syd and I were coAing. o_0 Yeah, it's still on, and we're loik nearly halfway through chapter one. *sheepish grin* It's fun, though! We have a blog for it and we're calling it "Last Man Standing", or LMS. Syd wrote a ridiculous tragedy about it where we both die because we had to write together. We got a surprising amount of comments from just that. I suppose the poem is mainly to warn people that PipNSyd are co-Aing, so RUN. "Strange House" [SH] is still on, like I keep saying, and we're considering redoing the way the chapters fit together. More on that when I know something. Also, and here is something exciting...LAURA AND I ARE CO-AUTHORING. Andwehavethefirstchapterdone!!!!!!!!! *shrieks* It's been amazing sofar, I got wildly inspired while stirring noodles for supper. Emails between the both of us have been flying like mad and, despite the fact that we called our two villains [two sofar, hahaha] Creepy Dude and Ultimate Creepy Dude, the kinks are slowly starting to get themselves worked out. I think we may begin outlining for each chapter to make it run smoother.

Guess what? The Girls got blogs!!! They're on the same account we post "Popchanka" on. Katsy's was actually a surprise from me;  she has this thing going about Perry Mason and his private detective Paul Drake, called "The Paul and Perry Files", so we made a blog for it. =^D The address is http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/PaulandPerry/ and she would be thrilled for someone to read the first file. G.B.'s blog is typical cute little girl's. http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/puppies/ I was forced at swordpoint to edit the first chapter of a book she's practically written out in her head called "Fairy Tale", and she comes to me every twenty minutes asking whether anyone has commented. So forget commenting here, go see those two blogs! The first entry on G.B.'s blog ish foony and gloriously random. My sistahs rocketh!

I was reading a Philip Yancy [WAHOOEY!] book this morning and suddenly began scribbling a bunch of thoughts down on a notecard; these are questions people might ask about sin and Goodness. ... Did God "punish" Eve because she was curious about the heightened view of Good and Evil she could gain by eating the apple? Didn't she have free will to do it if she wanted to? Did God want us to be blind to the stark reality of Evil? To rephrase, if you want to protect your child from something bad, is it right to lie to them about whatever it is? On the other hand, if Evil is out there, why try to hide it? Should we cover it up and walk away from it, ignoring it completely, or should we show it for what it is? How much content learned about the nature of Evil is too much? If Eve had not eaten of the tree, would we fight Evil [with God's strength] like we find ourselves doing now? "They chose to deny their creatureliness by reaching for more than God had granted them. Distrusting God, they brought the burdens of [God] upon themselves." ~Yancy. If we have eternity set in our hearts, doesn't that erase the socalled evidence for predestination? These things are fascinating to me and I hope to get on my soapbox about them in future entries. In the meantime, it's certainly something to think about...

I am continually amazed with Dadsy's servant's heart. He isn't feeling well [sore throat, sick stomach, headache, that sort of thing] and he's still able to work nights all this week. Please pray for his quick healing. [See, Dadsy?! That's what comes from putting creamer and sugar in your coffee!!!]

Go and create an inside joke, and let someone inside the box. It's awesum.

Oh, and random: I deleted The Attic blog because I have too many different cyber places and it was confusing me! Not like I can't put book reviews on here. ;-) And I have started using Photobucket instead of Webshots for peekchurz and things on zee sidebar; it's much cleaner-looking now. Dudn't have those wretchedly-annoying blue outlines.

This Mother's Day we went to Syd's granny's house. Syd and I drove around in Nanny's golf cart! Those things are my new obsession. Golf carts and jaw harps. This golf cart was automatic and all one had to do was press down on a pedal to move and press on another one to stop. And you have to steer, av course. =^D We drove along, grinning at the surprised people in their yards, enjoying the cool wind blowing on our faces and the wooden Indian-style tassles hanging on the sides of the awningthingy. The lake was sparkling to one side and the woods were standing there being all inspiring on the other. Ah, bliss! I want a golf cart now. 

May God bless you, and may His light pierce your darkness!

~PIP~ 

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