hello!

I hope your days aren't so weird this week amber. I should call you 'cuz it's twoooosday. Maybe if there's nothing going on at work.

I'll talk about my morning. I woke up at 8. My alarm went off at 7, and my second alarm coughjeremycallingmecough got me out of bed an hour later.

Then what did I do? Oh, I talked to jer for a little bit, but I didn't have much to say. I wanted to sleep longer. Maybe I'm grumpy in the morning. No, maybe it just depends on who it's with...and how cold it is. I remember going camp yurting with amber's family, and I got a cold and felt all gross and sick, but amber and I were going to get up at 5 or 6 in the morning and go to the beach or something, but she woke up and she tried to get me up but I wouldn't wake up because I was tired and she didn't shake me enough. I'll always get up if you bug me enough, push me out of the bed or something. And I won't hold it against you. Well, not for too long anyway.

Then, letsee, I made matt some breakfast. I ordered my new phone. Oh, I'm getting a new phone. It's a camera phone, so now I'll be taking like a bajillion and a half pictures of things just because I can. I got it for free, I think that's pretty cool, because I wouldn't just go out and buy a new phone. Except that mines broken, so I kind of needed one, but I could've gotten by.

Oh look now there you go with hope again, Oh you're so sure that I'll be leaving in the end...I'm kind of on a dashboard binge. It's like all I've listened to for days. Except I was listening to ben folds five last night just because, but that only lasted like...a song...or two...and a half.

Okay. I'm going to go do something more productive before I have to leave for work. I just felt sorry for our poor blog, because we never hardly at all update it ever anymore...now.

I'm in a silly silly mood today.

-becca

I'm having a weird day. Nothing bad has happened, but I've been in tears for the majority of it. Isn't it weird, not having a reason for crying?

I spent the last half hour drinking Earl Grey tea (I like it hot now, too) and reading Calvin and Hobbes. It sure was nice. Calvin and Hobbes can make me laugh out loud even when I'm just reading it by myself, and even when I'm so familiar with the comic that I have most of the dialogue memorized.

I'm just glad that I'm having an emotionally trying day today, when I have a lot of free time, and when my roommate's gone so I can just be alone in my room and cry or pray or read or whatever.

I don't have anything to say. I'm having a fairly easy time with my life, in general, though. I just made a list of the classes I'm taking next semester, and since i'm pretty much done with gen ed, I'll be taking mostly Bible classes from mostly difficult professors. Next semester is going to be hard. But at least I'm coming back!

somehow, I always find myself in sandals on rainy days...

Amber, remember when I left you at the train station last october? ha. Sounds like a song. October sang the train goodbye...that's not a song, if you were wondering. I don't even know what that really means...but it sounds sort of sad...because of the word "october." what do I know.

anyway.

We waited in the rain, both of us, in sandals and no jackets. It was so cold. wow.

I'm at the library. This morning, I carpooled with my mommy, so I decided after closing up the shop to walk down here and wait for her to come get me. It was a very wet, cold and windy walk. But I loved it. If you don't care about getting wet, then it's a lot easier to ignore and even actually like it a bit. Besides which, it's nice and toasty warm in here, so I'm happy.

I'm having a nice day. I worked all day. I really like working full days. I mean, yeah, I like time off, but from a day to day basis, I much prefer working open to close rather than just a random set of hours in the afternoon. Well, 5. From 1-6. ha. I'm more motivated and focused on getting what I have to get done when I have less time to do it in. Wow, does that not make sense. But it does. It makes perfect sense. Because I know exactly when I have to do something and I do it, because it's the only time I have, so I just make myself do it. Where as, when I have a lot of time to do things, I tend to procrastinate for a while. But, then again, it would be nice to have lots of time to do everything in. I'll take it either way. Someday I know my work will be more than just a job, when I get to be doing ministry way more of the time than I am now, and then I'll love what I'm doing all the time and I'll never complain about how much or how little I'm working because it'll be different, like I'm always working or something, but it'll be work I love, and it won't ever take away from any of the important things in my life because it will be my life and all the important people and things will be in it too.

waaah I'm rambling. But that's okay. I'm in a good mood. I think I'm done writing though, because this is getting boooorrring.

lovesies,

-becca

Becca, dear, I think it's high time you changed the blog away from pink. Valentine's Day is over!

This is probably one of the shortest posts I've ever had.

wow, my feet really do not smell very nice right now at all.

Good morning, everybody! Happy Valentine's Day!

My roommate said something on her blog about Valentine's Day that I really appreciate:

"Just know that if you're bitter about the holiday, it's not because of it's commercialization of love, it's the fact you're lonely and bitter. Accept it and move on."

This morning we expounded on this. Why should someone stop at being bitter at the commercialization of love (Valentine's Day), and not be bitter at the commercialization of giving (Christmas) or of green (St. Patrick's Day) or of bunnies (Easter)?

I'm glad today is Valentine's Day, and I'm single.

Then again, I think I'm going through an extremely optimistic period of my life. I'm ahead on all my homework (I've done it all for this week, and next week is Missions Conference - no school), and the sun boosted my spirits, and pretty much nothing is going wrong in my life. I think God wants me to use my extra time to pray, especially since it seems like everyone of my friends here are going through difficult, stressful times, except me.

It's amazing how quickly I can forget that I've gone through really stressful times, and account my current lack of stress to my own doing. This attitude makes me want to tell people, "Oh, you should get ahead on your homework, like me" or "Oh, you should be more happy. I feel happy, so you should too!" Even though the reason I don't have homework is mainly because I have a slow week this week and I'm happy because of the absence of bad in my life. How annoying it would be to hear things like that!

So, instead I'm praying.

It's 8 30 am. I'm drinking tea. It was relaxing up until this point, when I took a drink and it went down the wrong pipe and I had a coughing fit. But I'm better now.

I don't have class until 12 30. Yay! I have a lot to get done in that time.

I just read Voltaire's Candide last night. I have to read it for Western Civilization. I was going to spread out my reading of it today, but last night I thought, "I'll read it till midnight" and I finished it at 11 30. That means today I'll be reading Marx and Engels The Communist Manifeseto. Super short. I get the feeling I'll have to read it chunk by digestible chunk at a time.

If anyone from home wants to come visit me, anytime in the next two weeks would be PERFECT! I work Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings, and Saturday afternoon-evening. You can eat in the cafeteria off my card, attend classes with me if you want, experience Portland, and hang out with me!

Well, I just finished my tea. That means it's time for me to go.

Goodbye! Have a pleasant day!

I am a happy girl right now too, so I expect this post to have a liberal count of the word "love" in it, because unlike amber, I have no problem with being public about my feelings right now.

Quiz meet this weekend! Even though they end up pretty much exhausting me, I love them. Of course they're fun, and it's something I've grown to be so familliar with that I have to love it - there are so many memories and friendships tied up around it. But, it's also an encouragement and a chance to deepen relationships with people. Whether it's something silly, like snuggling up in a blanket during finals and taking a bunch of ridiculous pictures while watching shirley temple movies at the host home or being able to talk about our lives and praying together.

I love my team. Did you girls know that? I love you! ha, you better know that, because I tell you all the time. It doesn't even matter to me how well you do at the meet. Well, sort of. I mean, I do absolutely love to see you do well - that makes me so happy you have no idea! - but most of all, I just love spending time with you and watching you learn the bible and grow. I love being silly with you and I love being serious with you too, and I want you to be the very best you can be. I don't think I can tell you that enough. So I'll just go right on saying it wherever I please.

I have so many people to fall back on, I am so very blessed.

My family is always there to talk about anything with - my brothers and sisters and my parents listen to everything and talk about anything with me. Matt's always there for hugs and kisses and reading books to and being silly with. Amber will always make me tea or a sandwich (supposing I order it correctly :P), Jeremy is there to brighten my day - but that's a complete understatement. I don't know if I can get enough of Debbi and her kids, should I go on? I could. If there is one thing I have never been without in my lifetime, it's people. People to lean on, to learn from, to love and to know that I'm appreciated by.

Ha. I'm so needy.

I guess this is a little sappy but I'm just in that mood, and it's so true and I don't care how much I ever talk about it because I love to think about it and I never feel like I quite qppreciate this aspect of my life enough because it's the most important thing to me and I know that I'm never really tired of hearing that people love me. Maybe I'll feel like I don't deserve that love at all, I guess none of us really do, but it's still so good to hear, so I'll say it wherever. Even on blogger...but definitely not only on blogger.

ha. Such a silly girl.

♥becca

Hi! I'm very happy for reasons I cannot disclose in a public blog.

Haha, made you curious.

It is Saturday morning, 10 19 am. I work in forty minutes. I just had oatmeal and tea. I'm not going to shower (that would be pointless, because I usually have a strong desire to shower just AFTER I get off work and smell like Subway).

I get off work at 6. Usually I don't work for 7 hours on Saturday; usually I work less. But I'd rather work 7 hours than 6, because we get TWO free sandwiches if we work that long!

Our radio at work has stopped working. We're getting a remodel done soon (they've said "next month" for the last five months I've worked there) and supposedly getting everything new and painted and fixed (imagine actually having a men's bathroom!). The situation isn't THAT bad, I mean, especially compared to my old Subway, this place is very clean and up to date and on top of things. But it'll be a lot more fun to work there once we get stuff nice. I wonder if we'll get an automatic ice maker so we don't have to haul big buckets of ice and dump it in the machine.

But, the radio stopped working. This basically means I've been humming and singing a lot. Usually I hum and sing in the back where we can't hear the radio, but now I hum while I'm making sandwiches, too. It's fun. I don't think the customer can hear me, because it's usually really hard to hear them from across the thing. And we have big noisy refridgerators and machines behind us too, so that probably doesn't help the sound.

I have not been able to get to the bank for a month, so I have two paychecks to deposit. I want to buy shoes and a chair! I want a chair that is comfortable, but also a space saver. I'm thinking about a cloth folding chair or a beanbag type thing. I want a reading chair that will be good for this good weather we're having. Maybe even something I could use outside? I don't know, Ben's going to take me to Target either tonight or tomorrow and I'll see what they have.

I hate walking home from work alone in the dark. Last week, I got off around 5. It wasn't even dark yet, and I wasn't worried or anything. As I turned down the street my school is on, I was walking behind three guys. They knew I was behind them but they didn't directly look at me. As soon as I turned into the school walkway, they turned and started walking onto campus too. They weren't guys from my school, but now they were behind me. I walked all the way into my dorm, and they followed me through the door! Now, guys are allowed in the girls' lounge downstairs, and we have a front desk there with a receptionist, and there were lots of people around. I didn't see what happened, but I know they came in, and when I came around and looked out the window, they were leaving the dorm. It was freaky.

That's why I like to get rides from people back from work.

Usually I get Ben to pick me up on Mondays and Wednesdays, and I call Bethany or Amanda for Fridays when Ben's gone, and Saturdays I get off early enough that it's not a problem. But last night, everybody was out, so I was just going to walk home. I was working with Mandi. Just as I was about to leave, Colin came in (he's good friends with Mandi) to visit with her and stuff. So I asked him to make a quick trip to my school, and he did! I was happy, even though I don't really like working with him, I sure appreciated the ride!

Once, I was off in five minutes, and I was worried about not being able to find a ride, and two guys from Multnomah came in. I didn't know them very well, but they recognized me, and I asked them if they were going back to the school and they were, so they waited till I was off and gave me a ride.

Anyway, it's always nice to have little things like that happen.

haha, last night it was funny, two Multnomah girls came in, and then two more Multnomah people came in, and it was like a Multnomah party.

And THEN, we got a call saying that 19 people were going to be coming in at 6 30. Blah! There were at least 25. The whole restaurant was packed full. But we made a lot of money off them. They were all black. I've said before that in general, black people tend to be rude more often than white people. However, there was one lady that smiled nicely and said, "thanks so much for doing this for us; we really appreciate it." Seriously, that made it all worth it.

I need to get ready. Bye!

blogga blogga blogga blogga

I'm bored.

actually, I'm going to bed. haha. no substantial post for you!

goooodnight loverlies!

-becca

I know you've all been dying for a work story.

Toni, my dear roommate, you've already heard this, so you don't have to read about it all over again. Unless you miss my presence.

So, I worked tonight. I was doing really good on my list (we have lists we cross things off of when we do them) and I was even hoping to get ahead and make some stuff ahead so the opener wouldn't have to do so much work in the morning.

The phone rang, so I answered it. This is the conversation I had for twenty minutes. This whole time, there are people talking and laughing and yelling in the background, and music playing. I can hear black accents in the voices, which drawl so I can't always understand them, so there's a lot of repetition going on throughout this.

Me: "[name of street withheld] and [name of street withheld] Subway, this is Amber."
Lady: "Hi. Where are you located?"
Me: "On "[name of street withheld] and [name of street withheld], right across from Safeway."
Lady: "Do you have the number for [another Subway]?"
Me: "No, I only have numbers for [these two Subways]. Is there something else I can do for you?"
Lady: "Yeah, do you have any specials going on?"
Me: "Yes, we have a two footlongs for 8 99 deal, and -"
Lady: "Any two footlongs?"
Me: "That's right."
Lady: "I want that. How much is your chicken bacon ranch?"
Me: "A foot long would be [some price], but did you want to get two of them?
Lady: "Well, yeah, you said there was a special."
Me: "If you want two foot long chicken bacon ranches, it'll be 8 99."
Lady: "Then I'll take two of those, and two of those chicken clubs, and two-"
Me: "Hold on. We have five different kinds of chicken sandwiches, and our club sandwich has turkey, ham, and roast beef on it."
Lady: "Okay, talk to him about it."
(Phone is handed over.)
Second lady: "Hello, we want two Italians."
Me: "We have two Italian sandwiches, the BMT and the Spicy Italian. The BMT has pepperoni, salami, and ham. The Spicy Italian has pepperoni and salami. Which one did you want?"
Second lady: "What's the difference?"
Me: (I repeat what I just said)
Second lady: "I don't know, talk to him about it."
(phone is handed over)
Gruff guy: "Hey."
Me: "Um, hi. What kind of sandwich did you want?"
Gruff guy: "Chicken club."
Me: "[I explain again the chicken club dilemma and figure out what he actually wants]"
Gruff guy: "Okay."
Me: "Okay..." (wondering what will happen next)
(phone gets handed over)
First or second lady, not too sure now: "Okay, so two of those, and then two teriyakis and one, hang on, what did you say you wanted? I can't hear you! Oh, come on, they have all kinds of sandwiches, just pick one, come on. What do you want? Well, I don't know what you want!" Blah blah blah, etc.
Me: "So, how many sandwiches are you getting altogether?"
(no response)
male voice comes on the line: "Hi, how's it going?"
Me: "I'm really confused, honestly."
New guy proceeds to nicely tell me what everybody wants.

From that point on it was semi bearable. The thing was, I had so much trouble just figuring out what kind of sandwiches people wanted (there ended up being ten foot longs) and I still had to ask what kind of bread, what kind of cheese, toasted or not, vegetables, mayonaisse and mustard, oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, wahtever. For EACH SANDWICH. do you underSTAND! ugh. So I would ask the guy the question, and he'd ask the person, who would tell him, and then he would tell me. I told them to come in half an hour and the subs would be done.

So, I spent twenty minutes on the phone. I spent the next half hour making the ten subs. It took me about 25 minutes, so that's like 2.5 minutes per sub. Pretty good, huh?

The lady came in about ten minutes late. Unsmiling, she told me she was here for the subs. I brought them out and said, "Do you want any chips or drink with these?"

She said: "What! They don't come with chips?"

Me: "No ma'am, not unless you're willing to pay extra. I told you the deal was two foot long sandwiches for 8 99."

She rolls her eyes. "But we don't have any chips!"

Me, getting really annoyed, especially after nearly an hour of my work time was wasted, meaning now I have to stay late to get my list done: "Feel free to buy some."

Her: "Can't you just throw in a few bags?"

Me: "Sure. How many would you like to buy?" (emphasis on the word "buy)

Her: "Buy?"

Me: "Ma'am, I can't just give you free chips."

She rolls her eyes and selects three bags.

Me: "Did you want any cookies?"

Her: "no."

Me: "Your total comes to [some total]."

She pauses, as if in deep thought. "Hey..." as if the idea just hit her, "how much are your cookies?"

She buys three cookies.

I ring her up. She counts her change, gathers everything up, and shuffles off without a word.

So. That was my frustrating experience.

The other thing is, we had nonstop customers during the time I was making the ten sandwiches. I didn't have time to stop and help customers, and I really hate being up front when there are customers waiting, because I get a "Why aren't you making my sandwich" feeling from them. I hate it so much that I didn't even make a sandwich for my own dinner when I left, because there was a line of people I already felt bad about leaving my coworker to deal with (but some guys from the school came specifically to pick me up and I didn't want to keep them waiting). I can just imagine some mean person saying "Why are you making yourself a sandwich? Can't you see that I'm hungry?"

Amazingly, I only stayed half an hour late, and I got done nearly everything on my list, though it was shoddily done.

I'm going to stop typing now, because blogger doesn't like me having a post htis long and my typing is incredibly and annoying lagged so that it takes FOREVER just to fix my typos!

Life is good.

I know so much I get caught up in things and sort of...forget for a little while. But I know it. It seems there are a lot of things I just know, but I'm still full of emotions, and it's another good part of life. Life without emotions would be so...boring. But why can't I just be okay with my emotions and be okay with knowing that everything is going to be okay? You have to learn from things, you have to, that's the way to know life is good - to learn from even the bad things.

Sometimes though, I can't escape the feeling. What is this feeling? Why do I act so silly sometimes? I mean, why do I let things I think or feel really change the way I'm acting around people? Is it some weird pathetic plea for attention? Look at me, I'm feeling bad? I don't know if that's really it though. I don't really like attention for that, because then I know that I'm acting differently than I want to be. Maybe that's something I struggle with, something I long for more: transparency.

This past weekend, I went over to 'camp' in powerless Indianola with Jeremy and his family. Maybe that's part of why I'm thinking about this, but it's something I think I end up thinking about a lot anyway. Just how different I am around different people. I don't really understand it. But, I'm really quiet around his family. Really. I don't talk. I don't really join in that much when they're joking or start any conversation up on my own. I don't know why. It's sort of weird, because I want to, but it's also sort of like I'm just okay with watching and listening to everyone else and don't really think about how weird it is that I'm not saying anything. Or I think if I do say anything it has to be...funny or something. Or I'm just used to when I say something, people thinking it's funny or wanting to talk about it more or whatever. I hate that feeling of...not knowing how to be myself. ha. I'm so silly, what does that even mean? There must be some reason for it, right? I guess I'm still kind of shy at times. I'm not shy about doing things, if you ask me to do something, I'll do it without even thinking, but just sometimes the normal stuff, like sitting around doing nothing, I'm shy then. But it doesn't seem like me to that quiet. So maybe there's something just pointless behind it all, but I'm pretty sure I'll stop being that way anyway, because I pretty much always do. I just take time.

Because, many times, I'm like that in any new situation. At all of my jobs, when I first started, I was quiet. I would just watch and listen and figure things out, and then start enjoying it and talking to my co-workers and building relationships with them, but it took me a little while to get used to everything.
But that's not even always true of me. Sometimes I just jump in and I'm me and I'm enthusiastic and on top of everything and joking and open and completely comfortable doing whatever and being interested in everyone and everything. That's how I've always been in CEF and Awana and Bible Quizzing and at school and things like that. That's how I always want to be too.

I want people to know me as much as I want to know them. Who I am and what I believe, so we can learn from each other, and like each other, and everything. I want that with everyone, in every level of friendship I have with anyone. I forget that though. I forget that it takes two sides. So much of the time I think if I'm the one who listens, and I'm the one who encourages, it's good. But it's not. You learn from peoples strengths, but it seems like you learn more from their weaknesses. I struggle with showing what I struggle with. I never think anyone really needs to know or wants to know. But isn't that weird? I'm not scared of telling people my problems. I'm very quick to tell some people those things - if it comes up. But I don't bring it up. And maybe thats something I need to work on.

I don't mean just shelling out all of my problems to people. No. But we're supposed to share our burdens, as Christians, and I think as part of witnessing too, when people see that you're down-to-earth, and still make mistakes, maybe God's grace is more clearly seen. Because it's not like I'm perfect. Ooh boy, am I not.

I struggle with many things on a day-to-day basis. There are times when I just can't get over myself, because I'm a selfish human being. And they're things that aren't the most important sometimes. Oh, I'm feeling ugly today, or like I'm not really that good at things I do, I'm going to let that affect my attitude and my confidence in anything. No. Come on, that's dumb. There's no confidence to be had in the flesh. My confidence should come from Christ alone. There's nothing I can really accomplish on my own that's worth anything. Only when God is using me, only when I'm letting Him work through me, then is it worth something. And it's an amazing something. Even the smallest thing is big.

I have absolutely loved being able to be involved in as many things as I have been able to. Sometimes I was bitter about moving from one place to another, but God has always revealed His plan in that move, and now, I just about can't wait to move on. I'm happy where I am, doing what He has for me here and now, but I'm so looking forward to what will happen next.

wow, I ended up writing a lot. And all about myself, can I be any more vain?

yes I can.

-becca

Hi! I haven't posted in a while. I've been busy, but it's been good.

I am way ahead on homework, so much that my friends hate me. Basically, I'm keeping way more organized, and if there's something that can be done all at once for a class (like reading a book that has a chapter due every week) I'm doing it all at once so I don't have to worry about it. It's nice. My classes this semester are:

Gospels
Text and Canon
American Literature
Western Civilization
Private Voice
Choir

This adds up to 15 credits.

Work: Most of the unpleasant people I worked with quit, got fired, or went to jail. We got a new full time manager. I don't like him very much, and he doesn't wear deoderant. He's very arrogant. -_-

The weather here can't make up its mind. February 1st was extremely mild and sunny. People were already wearing T-shirts and playing frisbee outside on the lawn. February 2nd was cold again. February 3rd was slightly warmer, so that I could be outside in a T-shirt last night and not get too cold (it was even a little bit humid). Then, without warning, last night around 10, wind started blowing, and suddenly we got a hailstorm. Then the rain was blowing in so hard that I got wet through the window I'd opened so I could hear the storm, even though the blinds were closed over it. This morning, everything is extremely foggy and windy. I'm kind of hoping the wind will continue until it blows some warm weather in.

My Gospels professor mentioned the other day that encouragement is not something Christians do well. Why don't we commend other Christians for using well the gifts God gave them? Because we're jealous. How pathetically sad.

That's all for now, I guess.