Prayer Request

A beloved Dominican of the Western Province and Blessed Sacrament was just diagnosed with aggressive cancer of the esophagus. Fr. Tom Kraft O.P. is a good friend of mine, and he served at Blessed Sacrament for a few years ending last summer at the Newman Center. He's still rather young, and was a wonderful part of BSP before he was transferred.

Jesson says, "We have hope in miracles and in the great mercy of God. Let us keep him in our prayers."

So please do and maybe tomorrow for the Friday of Lent offer up an extra little something for him. Or whatever.
But thank you!

crap, I forgot what I was going to say........

and I forgot the body of the post as well.
But that doesn't matter because it's Lent.
wow...I really cannot believe I was brainwashed that completely! haha!

I guess I'll just update then,

I love Blessed Sacrament.
I am cool with Lent.
I hate the CORE chemistry class with a violent passion.
I am enjoying my Valentines candy today.
I qualified for State, but am not going because it's on Holy Saturday.
I have a good chance of going to the Florida Forensics Institute Summer Congress and Speech Institute. (kinda retorical, but whatever) I'm very excited about the opportunity, and I am so incredibly excited about the possibility/potential of that experience.
My last tournament of the season is the National Qualification tournament on March first. Please pray that I do my best. There is a slim chance I will qualify, and if I do then I'm going to Las Vegas in June to compete with about 2,000 other Nat Qualifiers. But I probably won't. But you never know. Oh well.
I wish you all the most blessed Lent and I love you!

blah blah blah

blah blah blah Kamiak blah blah blah had to get up early, bored, tired, competed, di, congress, blah blah blah, stuff, people, blah blah blah cold, tired, bored.
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah...oh!
I had a really delicious "death by chocolate" cake/pudding/goodness cup. :)
sorry...I'm sick of writing about speech and debate, even though I didn't win.
Maybe I'll talk about someone else for a change:
Ali - top speaker novice LD, 2nd novice extemp
Erika - 2nd novice extemp
Elliot- 2nd open dramatic
Henry & Alex - 1st (state bid) open duo
Jakob & Daniel - 1st novice duo
me: 1.3.2. DI, 8.7.7. Congress. Don't get me started on Congress, I really would rather just let that move under the bridge.

hm............
yea, I got facebook. whee. It's awesome. Sheila is freaking gorgeous! <3!
I talked to Emma yesterday at Kamiak on the phone, that was fun :)
Rose is gone...coming home tomorrow, right?
Madeline and Grace invited me over Friday night to watch a movie and have a really fun time and I was really annoyed I had to decline the invitation. They better have had fun.
Superbowl just ended and Dad and Louie are talking. I'm done now. Sorry for wasting any time you might have spent reading this. If you have facebook, just look for me there instead...or maybe in my bed. HAHA! that sounded WRONG! ....yea, as in, look for me there cuz I'm going to BED because I'm TIRED. zzzzzzzzzzzzz

I am beaten, but in a trophyish winnerish openish sort of way...

Yello.
It's 5:30! Do you know where your brain is? Well I did, yesterday, and this is a special moment for me. This is the one year anniversary of me first starting to post about my many s&d adventures online. Even though you can't really understand (you really do have to go to a tournament to be able to understand) it's still pretty fun recounting the day again. With that said...
The Mt. Vernon 2008 Invitational had 25 schools. It conflicted with the PLU HS tourney, but Mt. Vernon is cooler so the majority of schools went there. :) Boo-yea.
Ali, Susan, Elliot, Erika, me and Dawna rode up in the school van. Ali did extemp, LD, and StuCo Erika did Duo and Oratory, Elliot did DI and Duo (and later judged a few B events) and I did DI and StuCo. You have no idea how nice it was to be in the StuCo room with a fellow teammember. It was awesome!
So there were three rounds of DI, and I really loved them. I hadn't done DI since middle of December, but I tweaked it up and felt okay with it. This is the part of the year where the pieces are getting old, so you just have to buckle down and bear through it. Sometimes I even zone out while I'm performing my piece, because I already have the words and actions down so pat I don't really have to concentrate. So I noticed a lot of really wonderful pieces, and wonderful speakers. It was really interesting, because lots of the DI's I've seen are good, but not wonderful or great. I saw a really sad piece called Distracted, and another one about an mother of an ADD child. Fortunately neither TJ nor Tahoma (biggest rival and 13 things girl) were not there, which made me very happy. :)
So that was in the morning, then at 2 I went to the StuCo room. There were 15 other representitaves (they only had one room, so it was Novice and Open mixed). Snohomish was there (but fortunately not Hare!) as was Shorecrest. That was where my biggest competition was, because there is a guy named Max Cho from Shorecrest and he's SO GOOD! He beat me at Snoho this past year. Anyways...
So I gave the authorship speech for the Coffee resolution, and it failed. haha. I don't really care. This congress was really relaxed, partly because it was towards the end of the day, but also because it was so short! It was kind of annoying, but I adjusted. (I prefer the really set and rigid Congress' like at UPS). I gave a pro speech on a Resolution to Ban the Death Penalty, and it was the worst speech I have ever made. I was so embarrassed, and I messed it up SO BAD. I was so embarrassed that afterwards I didn't look up for like 2 speeches afterwards, and Ali said he even noticed that. It was terrible. But after that I had to PO (the PO sits in the front of the room in front of EVERYBODY) so I stifled down my resistance and went up there. The rest of the congress passed uneventfully, then we started voting. There were 4 PO's, and they eliminated me first. There were 9 top speakers, and they did that by elimination. I survived all the eliminations! I was one of the Top 2 Speakers in the room, voted thus by my peers. (Student's Choice) I knew I'd get a trophy for that then, but I didn't know if I was 1st or 2nd top speaker. By that time, I didnt' really care.
I made it to Open DI finals, but I wasn't that excited. All the DI's were really good, and I was just a really interesting round, I did my best and really just enjoyed it and enjoyed watching the other pieces. Those are the best rounds, the ones where all the pieces are really worthwhile and interesting and yea, it was good.
Oh yea, and I also watched Ali's Semi round for LD (between Congress and finals) then we hung out until Awards. Mt. Vernon has an award show, not an award ceremony like all other schools, so it's pretty rocking. I got 1st place Student Choice in Congress. The first trophy.
They then called me back up for 2nd place (tie) for Top Points. The second trophy. (Cho got 1st, and he deserved it)
Then THEN called me back up for my final trophy, a 3rd place in Open DI. This is my new record for the most trophies in one tournament.
Erika got 2nd for her novice oratory, Ali got 2nd for novice extemp, 1st top speaker points in novice LD and 1st for novice LD! It rocked. :D
So on the way home, we figured out that I now have 324 poinnts, and Ali has finally passed me with 325. (Hence the title) I am beaten, and I have trophies to prove it!!!Kingston was there, I talked to Mitch a little, and Frank a little, but my interest in them is wanning, I think. It wasn't that interesting... Haha, I do have an admirer though, this guy came to our table to talk to me twice! The first time Ali 'saved' me, the 2nd time I managed to end the conversation. Needless to say, Ali, Elliot, and Erika all found it very amusing. I found it annoying, so (if you were planning on it)don't tease me ;). I had fun talking to Ali and walking around with Erika, and it was a wonderful day. :)
As my slogan for yesterday was: "All in a good day's work..." ;) :) :D :D !!!!!

Army of Me

This is the most awesome band EVER.

I absolutely cannot get enough of their music, and I love the way they are still a relatively small band. I really love their songs Perfect, 2 into 1, and Saved your Life. They aren't Christian, but their music has a wonderful feeling around it, and the language isn't suggestive or crude.

They are AMAZING!!!!!!!

check them out: www.armyofmeonline.com The website rocks, Citizen rocks, their music rocks, they rock. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!