Now Playing: Brahms, Requiem, Track 2, "Behold, All Flesh Is As The Grass."

Just a post to let you all know that I'm not actually dead yet.

Highlights from this week.

On Monday evening, Rachel Jr. and Tara both came over for tea at our apartment. Tara brought over this enormous wedge of Dutch cheese to share. She hung out in our apartment until it was time for prayer, while Rachel Sr. and I both studied industriously.

Tuesday, I permitted myself to become far too engrossed in my senior project. Rachel Sr. was out all evening, so I ended up reading one of the translations of Beowulf that I'm studying while I ate my tea, and then settling from that into a deep daze for at least forty-five minutes until I came out of my stupor in time to go to RUF.

Wednesday was spectacularly cold and wet. In the morning it stormed riotously, and not only was my umbrella broken, but my jacket wasn't waterproof, so by the time I got to the library and to lectures, I was almost soaked to the skin. That evening, though, Nicole came over, and in the process of the evening, with much labor and travail, I managed to write a decent five-page summary of my senior project, thanks also to the help of The Fellowship of the Ring soundtrack.

On Thursday, instead of doing Bible study in the evening, my small group, minus Rachel Jr., who was at a concert, went to see TU's production of Hamlet. It was quite excellent. The acting was really good. Karl, one of our RUF friends, wrote the incidental music. Rachel Sr., of course, was all ablaze with excitement afterward. Russ, an acquaintance from freshman Honors classes, who'd somehow joined our group in the course of the evening, made fun of Rachel Sr. and me: he calls us "Team Study" and "Team Good Grades" whenever he sees us, which makes both of us uncomfortable, for Rachel blushes and I laugh at him.

Friday evening, Kevin and Holly invited Rachel Sr. and me to their apartment for tea, which was very relaxing, a good break between study sessions for the GRE. We played Taboo (American version of Articulate), and Kevin loaned me a Decemberists CD that I'd not heard before.

Saturday was THE DAY OF RECKONING: i.e., the day I buried myself in a random office complex in south Tulsa at a testing centre to take the GRE. It was alright. Laura, Anna, and Sarah were supposed to visit from Stillwater this evening, but they couldn't come, so Rachel Sr. and I spent a quiet evening at Nicole's apartment with Nicole and Tara, watching the Emma Thompson Sense and Sensibility film.

Today I went to Christ Pres for church in the morning. Afterward, Tara and I took sandwiches to Woodward Park and ate a picnic there in the rose garden. The day was gorgeous. A brisk north breeze was roaring through the oak trees at the top of the hill just to our right, sweeping the smells of the roses to us and scattering our napkins across the little grassy plot where we were sitting on our jackets in the sunshine.