Madeleine L'Engle wrote more than one book

In case you didn't know it, the title of this blog post is true! Madeleine L'Engle did, in fact, write more than one book. She wrote or co-wrote 63 books and plays. Of those 63, I've read at least 31 and parts of others.

I'm assuming that most of you know of Madeleine L'Engle and that most of you know her as the author of "A Wrinkle in Time." Wrinkle is a science fiction/fantasy book about a pre-teen girl, Meg Murry, and the adventure she goes on with her younger brother, Charles Wallace, and a boy from school, Calvin O'Keefe. Meg and Charles Wallace are trying to save their father and all three children are being led by Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Which, and Mrs Who. It's very exciting.

If you did read more of L'Engle, you probably read the sequels to Wrinkle, "A Wind in the Door," "A Swiftly Tilting Planet," and perhaps even "Many Waters."

But L'Engle wrote realistic children's fiction as well, ranging from picture books to books about the complexity of teen relationships and teen pregnancy. Just as L'Engle wrote a series about Meg Murry, she also wrote one about Vicky Austin. Unlike Meg, Vicky lives a normal life, dealing with the pressures of school, family, and relationships, while dealing with her gifts as a writer. L'Engle also has an amazing talent with weaving characters between series, so at one point Vicky's boyfriend works for a grown-up Calvin O'Keefe as a lab technician. As a teenager, Vicky was my favorite of L'Engle's characters.

Now....well. Now I'm conflicted. Because L'Engle didn't stop. She wrote for adults and for adults she wrote both fiction and non-fiction. So, I'll give you tastes of four more L'Engle books. Books that you likely haven't heard of. (If you have, please let me know!) First, we'll stay in fiction. "A Severed Wasp" first enthralled me because it's told in a non-linear fashion, not a simple feat for a book. Katherine is an old woman and a young woman. She is reliving her past and living with the problems of the present. Centered around the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in the present and the horrors of post-WWII family life in the past, the book deals with almost every issue you could think of. Seriously. Except monsters, zombies, and the apocalypse. Homosexuality, fertility, marital disputes, the dark arts, drugs, child abuse, cancer, prosthetics, music, concentration camps, death, pregnancy. It's in there. And it's delightful. Primarily because it's not at all predictable.

"A Live Coal in the Sea" is one L'Engle book that I believe I tried to read when it came out and my mom had checked it out from the library. I was 13. My mom wouldn't let me. Now I understand why :) It's the sequel to "Camilla," one of L'Engle's teen novels, but is much darker and deeper than "Camilla," and written 41 years later. Again, it's told by an old woman looking back on her life. But her story in the now is much less a part of the plot than in "Severed Wasp." Instead, it focuses much more on the story of her relationships and her marriage and her family. Not at all the typical family, but in some ways easier to relate to than Katherine's in a Severed Wasp. For Camilla is not a professional pianist in post WWII, but an astronomist in today's world. As a mother she's struggling with getting her Ph.D. and being a mother. With being a preacher's wife and being a scientist, in a place where science isn't taken seriously by the congregation. (L'Engle and her positions on church and science deserve a WHOLE different post. So I'll save that for later.) But again, L'Engle has made a plot and characters who are not predictable. And every time I read "A Live Coal in the Sea," I somehow think that they might change their minds and do something different, because they seem capable of that.

This post is getting long, so I'll turn this into a multi-day L'Engle Extravaganza. L'Engle's non-fiction is up for tomorrow. And if you're in the Twin Cities and want to borrow any of these books, let me know. I have about 15 of them (including the two named above and three of the Austin books) at home.

Life in the Dorms

I was trying to calculate some data to write another blog post and to help alleviate the boringness, I opened up hulu. I decided to watch Sesame Street's top 16 video clips and one of them was of Norah Jones which got me thinking about college and life in the dorms. Primarily because one day my friends and I decide to run a pretend radio station call-in show off our laptops and my friend Efe kept trying to "call in" during my "segment" and request Norah Jones. Only this was before I had any Norah Jones on my laptop.

Sadly, I have almost no pictures from before I got a digital camera in January 2004...

This is me with Liz, my roommate from freshman year spring on. One day we decided to curl our hair. Really really really curly. Liz had the best curlers ever. Not that we had anything to curl our hair for. I am wearing an Agriculture and Natural Resources Department t-shirt.

So we went to food service, or food circus, as we called it. We went with Mary (right) and Jessi (center). I believe that Mary had decided to wear her pants inside out. Sadly my lack of freshman photos means you are missing out on Sarah P.'s antics. I'll have to bring pictures back from Thanksgiving.

This is how much I care about you, dear readers. I will show you pictures like this. For some reason, Liz and I took pictures like this sophomore year. We used them to decorate our door. They were to demonstrate that we were crazy math majors. That is all I remember. I am being nice and not showing you Liz's picture :)

In 2004, I ventured away from Berea to the University of York. Dorm life there was MUCH different. A big part of this had to do with the fact that most students didn't live in the dorms, as well as other factors, like the co-ed dorms, nonshared bathrooms, single dorm rooms, and lack of cafeterias. Our dorm was also on a lake, so one day a bunch of the students went out fishing. Tony even caught a fish.

During the Euro Cup (soccer) at the end of June, the guys bought a wading pool, hooked up a hose to the kitchen faucet, and ran hot water into the pool to simulate a hot tub. I was encouraging them to place a tv near the window so they could be in the hot tub while watching the game, but that didn't pan out. They also had a water fight. And they're drinking beer. (Berea is a dry campus in a dry town.)

Simon was at the U of York with me and one day we used up her brownie mix and my chocolate chip cookie supplies and baked for hours. (When your oven is the size of a microwave it takes hours.) Then we fed our baking to the boys in the "hot tub." Simon made fun of me for eating raw eggs, but hey, cookie dough is yummy. My chunky laptop is playing awesome tunes.

Back at Berea, I was living with great girls and we lived in a great dorm my senior year. We even could have BOYS in the dorm in the evenings. (Ok...we could have boys in the evenings starting second semester freshman year.) What did we do with the boys? We made their hair all purdy! Example: Matt. He's posing with his girlfriend, now wife, and stylist, Mary. Awwwww!

What else do you do with boys in the dorm? Make them hang upside down from the ceiling! (This is Jesse M. We also did his hair, but you can't see it here.)

Then you play bumper cars with the rolling chairs.

Then you can be all tough and gangsta like. Because that's how we roll in James. Only not at all. Rachel's face is the giveaway. As is the King's Singers poster that I may or may not have borrowed from the UK library in the background. I guess that makes it more gangsta.

There you have it. An introduction to my weird and wacky dorm life through my limited collection of photos.

Science is Cool

This is a post that's been rolling around in my head for a while now and it may take more than one post to do it justice, but here's the main principle. It seems like science is becoming popular.

Think about it. There's a mainstream tv show about science (other than the forensics & medical shows) in CBS' The Big Bang Theory, They Might Be Giants just released an album called "Here Comes Science," and the Carl Sagan/Stephen Hawking Auto-Tune fan music video "A Glorious Dawn" has over 1.6 million hits on YouTube. (I'm sure there are more examples too. Simon?)

So let me first state the obvious. This is great. Science as a "cool" thing is fantastic. Some fields have always been cool to kids and they don't have problems with recruitment and retention, but speaking as someone from a field that struggles with recruitment and retention, visibility is important. And cool is important to kids. Much as we (as academics) may have a hard time with that. This is why when you ask a first grader what they want to be when they grow up, no one replies with "computer scientist." They might say "scientist" (the general type with the lab coat and test tubes) but more likely they want to be a doctor or a firefighter or a ballerina. As they grow older the dreams become more realistic, but generally stay anchored within a core set of possibilities which generally don't include mechanical engineer, computer scientist or

astrophysicist. By having bits and pieces of science enter the popular realm, we are condoning science as a valid career and a good option for high school, college, and beyond. Those are my initial thoughts.

But then there's the other side of me. The more infantile side. This is the side that, at some level has always been a scientist. I don't remember my science escapades in elementary school, but in middle school I had many. I dissected salmon and collected salmon sperm for class, leading me to a decision to become a reconstructive plastic surgeon (lasting from 7th-9th grades). I participated in Science Olympiad at the state and national levels: taking tests, engineering devices, and winning medals. I participated in the state science fair and went to my dad's lab three times a week to monitor and count seeds for my germination study. In high school, I made a cake to look like a cell and took college biology. In college, well, I was a math and computer science major. Not only that, but I was one of the first computer science majors EVER from Berea College. Along with my friends Bethany and Sarah we were the first people with Independent Majors in Computer Science. It just so happened that all of us were female. Here we are with our fabulous mentor and advisor Jan Pearce at graduation.

In short, I've always been a science and math geek, regardless of public opinion. So now that the tide's turning, I feel a little cheated.

In some ways, I know that people will realize that I was ahead of the trend. Obviously I was. I'm in the fifth year of my Ph.D. program. But part of me feels like the girl who's been listening to a band for four years and the band has just been discovered by "the people who discover bands." I want to wear a t-shirt: "I liked science before science was cool" But I'll settle for just going back and reading "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!" for the fifteenth time instead.

Opinion Piece: Organ Donation

First, let me just say that if you don't read xkcd webcomic, then you are missing something. The comic is funny, geeky, and just plain smart. But every once in a while the comic is also deep. Friday was one of those days.

I think when I got my driver's permit in Alaska I wasn't an organ donor. But I was 14 and wasn't very aware. The first thing I did when I got my permit in Kentucky was have the lady at the DMV and my mom sign as witnesses that I wanted to be an organ donor. My Kentucky license and Minnesota license say the same thing. I am a proud organ donor.

If you want to be an organ donor and your driver's license doesn't indicate such, go to www.organdonor.gov to learn more about how to let officials know that you're a donor. If you don't know if you want to be an organ donor, think about it and talk to friends and family about it.

There are other ways to help too. I try to give blood when I'm able (and when they'll take me... I need more iron in my diet most of the time) and I'm also on the Be the Match Registry for the National Marrow Donor Program. They need more people in their database as potential bone marrow donors and while it is definitely a commitment far above and beyond blood donation it is much less than organ donation. And all three can be done together.

So that's my call to action for you today. You don't have to do anything you're uncomfortable with, but if you were planning to get around to being in the Be The Match Registry or becoming an organ donor, you should do it today. And if you (like me) have been meaning to go to the blood bank and donate blood, go do it! I now have an appointment to donate blood scheduled for Monday.

Board Game Goodness

This may be a short post because I burned my right thumb while on a cooking spree this evening. It was not the spree that burned me so much as it was a misplaced hot pad. Whoops. Luckily it has lessened my appetite for the chouquettes that lie on my counter. But more on

them in a later post when I actually fill them with pastry cream or other goodness.

Today I was at lunch with some folks from church. It was our 20s/30s/40s group which is not a singles group, but a group for people in their 20s/30s/40s. It used to be for people in their 20

s & 30s, but then one of the mainstays turned forty, so they extended their reach. For such a wide age range in such a large church (700 people on a given Sunday) it is a small group. We had 5 for brunch today. ANYWAYS. At brunch the topic of cranium night came up, as

in, "Katie should make red velvet cupcakes in the shape of brains for cranium night" and then the three people who didn't know me asked if I played games. Which amused me. I then tried to explain the plethora of games I have at my house. Then they asked if I was a geek. I laughed.

Big pile o' games and miscelany on the floor. This is the "popular" pile. If this were high school, these would be the first games asked to the prom. They would definitely wear letter jackets, even when it was 90 degrees out. They are THAT cool.

So here's a list of all the games that I could find in the condo. (I'll star those that I have not personally played.)

• Carcassonne - Build a monestary. Farm. Rob. Knight. Screw up other people's cities.
• Carcassonne Inns & Cathedrals - The above but with cathedrals!
• Settlers of Catan - Make Ben lose. Put the robber on his best tile. Ruin his road.
• Settlers of Catan (Collector's 3D edition) - Admire the pretty pieces.

This is the 3D edition of Catan. In the fancy chest. But you can only play with four players, so we never use it. But it sits on the shelf and is pretty. It is VERY good at that.

• Starfarers of Catan - Curse the broken rocketship.
• Settlers of the Stone Age - Try to figure out how in the world this is related to Settlers of Catan.
• Settlers of Catan Card Game* - Play Catan, but with fewer pieces.
• Catan Traders & Barbarians - No memory of this.
• Dominion - Get more cards. Shuffle. Play cards. Get cards. Shuffle. Shuffle. Shuffle. Loose.
• Agricola - Plant stuff and buy animals. Before the other players do. Otherwise you starve to death (not in real life though).
• Eurorails - Build trains and carry stuff across Europe. Make money.
• Robo Rally - Program robots. Realize you don't know left from right. Get shot. Fall in Pits. Repeat.
• Xactica - Lots of colors and numbers and betting, but without money. Play with someone who already knows how to play, cause it's impossible to explain. (By the makers of set.)
• Corsari - The PIRATE game! 12 colors, but it only looks like 8, especially if you have bad lightening or eyesight. Make the best fleet before anyone else can and set sail.

Ignore the large stack of casette tapes on the right. They stack well with boxes of playing cards.

• Chez Geek - Played once. Thought it was stupid. You can be a slacker. That's all I remember.
• Unexploded Cow - I assume the goal is to not explode the cow. But I forget :(
• Set (x 2) - Any trait has to match every card or be different on every card. Then it's a set (if there are three). Yell set and grab them.
• Zar - Uno on crack. Especially if you play with two decks. Which you should.
• Uno - Who doesn't know uno?
• Fluxx - A game where the goal of the game changes. Like the goal could be to have the milk card and the cookie card. Then it's to have the love card and the peace card.
• Scrabble - Again, who doesn't know Scrabble?
• Friends - Scene It? * - I'm guessing this is some sort of game where you put in a dvd and then have to answer questions about clips from the tv show friends.
• and at least 6 decks of playing cards - WAR. Spoons. Egyptian Rat Screw. So many choices here. If you want to be classier there's also cribbage, bridge, gin rummy, and many, many more.

Amusingly, the majority of these games take multiple hours to play and during an

y given 6 month period, there is general preference for one or two of them. Where one of the preferences is always for Robo Rally. So if people come over to play games they will want to play ____ or Robo Rally. Right now the popular choices are Dominion & Robo Rally. Dominion is the new favorite because a) it is new and b) it is short. Every once in a while someone will suggest Agricola, because Agricola is also new, but, unlike Dominion, Agricola takes several hours, so it is always shouted down.

Contrary to popular belief the XO laptop is not infact a game. The "book" to the right of it is scrabble, and the book to the right of that is the large German manual to Settlers of Catan. I've never read it because it's in German. And Ben and I don't know German. But we have it, so if you come to vist and want to play Catan and know German, you can read ALL about the variations. The Atari Flashback 2 is also not a board game, but it was on the shelf and I was lazy.

So, if you come to visit and do not bring your own games, these are the choices you will have. Unless there has been games night between now and then and they have learned about a NEW game that is the new favorite that we must go out and buy immediately. In which case that would be the obvious choice to play. If you don't like any of these choices I suggest you bring your own games. Or avoid the subject altogether and come armed with "topics of discussion."

Migraines: Prevention

I wrote several weeks ago rather vaguely about my migraines and encouraged people to ask questions. I was talking to Simon this weekend, and she said "I wanted to ask questions about your last post, but I didn't know enough to know what to ask about migraines." Of course, as we do, we got talking further and I was able to draw out of her more of her questions. My goal in writing that post, in part, was to draw out these questions, primarily because it's my experience that if you don't have migraines, you probably don't have a clue what it's like. Not to belittle you or anything, but the more you know what it's like, the more you can understand me and my suffering. And to be honest, I didn't understand it 6 years ago either, which is why I think I want more people to know about it now.

So, for this first migraine post, before we get to the nuts and bolts of the pain, let's talk prevention. What causes ME to get migraines? (Everyone's different.) My migraines are genetic, so that's a huge factor. I also have a big part of them that's hormonal and some part that's based on barometric pressure. So basically those are outside of my control, for the most part. The only thing I can do to not mess with that balance is not add external hormones, which means no birth control pills, which is ok, in part because most doctors will never prescribe estrogen pills to me anyways because of the type of migraines I get.

But the biggest thing I can control is my diet. For a while I went on a trigger-free diet. It was horrible. I eliminated almost everything awesome from my diet. Citrus, onions, fresh bread, cheese, cured meats, chocolate, etc. There was a list of over 30 things that I couldn't have. It made going out to eat super fun! And cooking was super fun too! But I've learned some things that I have adverse reactions to. Fake sugars are bad. I always forget which one causes migraines, so I avoid aspartame and sucralose like the plague. Caffeine causes migraines in the long range but can cure them in the short range, so it can go either way, but mostly I avoid it, except around deadlines or Important Things. Alcohol is a trigger that may seem difficult to avoid, but has become fairly easy. I've gotten used to drinking water or sprite when I go out and it's second nature now. Plus it's cheap. If I do decide to drink, I do so very knowingly and I've made a very conscious decision with my schedule in mind. Thought process: Do I have time to spend 4 hours in urgent care or the ER in two days? Yes? ok, I can have some drinks. No? ok. it's time for water.

There are other weird things that are triggers too. I can sleep the wrong way or sleep too long. I can smell the wrong thing or spend too much time around strobe lights. (Strobe lights are really, really bad for me.) There are smaller things too, like driving down the highway with the windows down for long periods of time. The throbbing starts to become throbbing in my head instead of just in the air in the car. Spending too much time at a computer (especially without my glasses) can cause me trouble as well.

Ben would also say that shopping on Saturdays around noon is also a trigger, but I'd disagree. But he's probably not that far off in that missing meals does throw my body for a loop.

If you're further interested in this subject and the idea of triggers, I'd encourage you to read Heal Your Headache: The 1-2-3 Program for Taking Charge of Your Pain. The books is by David Buchholz and focuses on eliminating triggers (including medications) from your daily life. It was my first attempt at getting my migraines and other headaches under control. I know other people for whom this book has radically altered their life and has helped them eliminate all migraines. So it's definitely worth reading. Whether or not it can eliminate the pain altogether is a different issue.

That's it for the migraine stuff for this week. I'm trying to be informative but not bring you all down while I'm at it :) More pictures and fun tomorrow!

Random things from the internet

It's Friday, 9pm and I haven't had dinner. Plus I'm feeling a little lazy. So for my post, I'll give you two random Obama related things I've run across today plus a bonus link. You must click through to the articles for the really amusing/interactive parts. (I am lazy, so you must do work!)

First: Obama sushi. This seems like a lot of work for sushi. Plus sushi with shrimp, black sesame, and fish paste just doesn't sound all that appetizing to me.

Second: Obama weather predictor. Want to find out what the weather is like and what you should wear? Ask obama-weather.com. (You can also get Bender, House, or Angelina to model weather appropriate clothing for you.) Using this site will also tell you if you should wear sunglasses or lean on an umbrella like a cane. Very useful stuff.

Third: Not Obama related. Completely apolitical. But science-y. If you watch The Big Bang Theory, you may be interested to know that the science consultant behind the show, physics professor David Saltzberg, runs a blog called The Big Blog Theory which goes more in depth about the science for each episode. Interesting and scientific, but aimed at a mainstream audience.

Why my family is weird: Part 1

My mom (known to the rest of the world as Anne) had wondered why I referred to our family as "weird" in a prior post. This is not weird as a bad thing. I put up a poll on facebook (more on that later) and we determined that my family is weird but "in the best possible way." And, to be honest, a good number of these things are responsible for making me part of who I am today. Some simple reasons for my family being weird:

• I have never owned a Barbie
• My family never got more than 5 tv stations
• The only video games system we ever owned was a Super Nintendo, but that wasn't until I was in college and my brother snuck one in the house somehow.
• Pop music wasn't known in my house until my brother realized he was weird and set out to fix that
• We got to watch a maximum of about one hour a day of tv to be selected from the following: Reading Rainbow, Wishbone, Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers, 3-2-1 Contact, Magic Schoolbus (all PBS shows)
• I didn't realize that not all kids spent over an hour a week at the library and maxed out their library card every week. Our limit was 40 books. Yes, we both checked out 40 books at a time.
• I started cooking around age 8. I started making dinner once a week around age 12. By 15 or so I was cooking dinner for the family 3 nights a week.

So that's a simple, small start. Here's more proof with pictures.

Most of our family pictures look something like this. Of particular amusement is my brother off to the side. He's making faces. If you scroll down, you might guess this is genetic. You might be right.

Dad's friend found a giant mushroom in his brother's backyard, rescued it and left it on my parents' porch. Dad immediately photographed it and called his brother to see if it was safe to eat. It was and I think dad said it was yummy.

Rosie is on the right and Rosette? is on the left. Rosie was given to me when I was 1 by a dear friend in Madison, WI. I've had her ever since which is why her face is yellow. I wasn't allowed to have cabbage patch dolls, but since Rosie wasn't a cabbage patch doll, she was allowed. Also, take note of the fact that she is wearing a native Alaskan winter fur-lined parka, made by my mom. The other doll, now I think she's called Rosie II (found at a thrift store), is wearing a Red Riding Hood Cape and pajamas made by my mom. Original Rosie is wearing a sleeper that I wore as a baby. Because my family has that stuff lying around. Because my mom and I kept it...

Another example of why my family is weird. I was going to say my brother. But that is mean, and I love him, so I won't say that. I'll say it's cause we sleep on mattresses on the floor. This is genetic and is not just a trait in my immediate family. (Anthony is solidly asleep in this picture though. Apparently he was comfortable.)

When we were little, this was the sort of thing we did to amuse ourselves instead of watching tv or playing with video games or Barbies. It wasn't Halloween. (Rory, in the middle, is unrelated and probably unaware of what she has gotten herself into.) There are also pictures of us playing with bins of flour. More typically we'd play with Legos and wooden blocks, but that's not as exciting and I don't have pictures.

Dad has started making everything from scratch including sausage. It's not anywhere near as gross as people make it out to be. But it's weird that he makes it. The sausage and cheese making started AFTER I left for grad school. I do not find that to be coincidental.

Dad also makes pizza. His two best pizzas are grilled pizzas and his pesto/cottage cheese/veggie pizza which you see pictured above. It is made even better with homemade pancetta.

To reassure myself that others also find my family weird, I asked people on facebook: " Fun late night survey time. If you know my family: are we weird or normal? Vote in the comments." I didn't get many respondents, but I did get three weird votes "but in the best possible way." Anecdotal evidence: "I always remember when we went trick-or-treating there and your parents gave us fresh baked sourdough bread. That was the bomb." "Her dad makes the best kaiser rolls ever."

I finish with a comment from my mom from this evening, proving yet again, that my family is not normal: "An idea for a short blog post - your dad's foray into making pancetta. We're completely out of it, but we have all the pieces parts - your dad just needs to find the time to put it together before your Thanksgiving visit. Let's see - only 21 days left, and he doesn't even have a timetable drawn up yet!"

Opinion Piece: Bacon Jelly Beans

Reid's suggestion for posts was to do shorter opinion pieces. So here goes.

Context: Simon hates bacon. Ok. She doesn't hate it all, but this is what she says:

"I prefer bacon to be used in acceptable ways. You may eat bacon with your eggs, your pancakes, your hash browns, even your sausages, if you have considerable faith in your cholesterol levels. You may eat bacon in salads. You may eat bacon in sandwiches. There are many ways to consume bacon that are fully appropriate. And then there are methods by which the consumption of bacon is rendered inappropriate. You wouldn't think of these on your own without some kind of diabolical intervention, so I will provide you with a list."

Read more about her thoughts (and her list) here. Basically she doesn't believe bacon should be in cookies or candy or vodka or cupcakes or chocolate. I disagree. I may have forced my beliefs on her in the past...

So for my birthday she sent me a package which included among other things, a Mo's Bacon Bar (mmm!) and

Opinion before eating: Bad idea. (Note: I don't really like Jelly beans in the first place. And bacon without maple or brown sugar or chocolate is somewhat scary to me.)

Opinion after eating: Bad idea. If you would like to sample one or two or ten to disagree, please let me know. Even the people who have claimed to like them (aka Ben) have only eaten one. The guys in the lab refused more than one. Thus, Simon has likely won the bacon war.

So if you are wondering whether to buy bacon jelly beans or bacon dental floss for your loved ones for Christmas, I would advise the dental floss. (It smells like bacon, but tastes like nothing!)

Back in time

Well, loyal readers, it is late. That is because I did not fully understand the terms of Ben's challenge (so I had to do an extra 30 minutes of exercise...). And because I made dinner, called my parents, and planted some plants in farmville (EVIL EVIL GAME!). Then I checked election results. But I thought that maybe on Tuesdays throughout November I'd go into my archive of old photos and post some of them here. They will, of course, be embarrassing, making it all the better for you, the reader. Today's theme is Alaska, because I was telling Alaska stories today.

You might be surprised to learn that there is grass in Alaska and it does turn green. Otherwise my dad wouldn't have had a job. I am wearing thick gloves in this picture though. I'm also hoping that my brother is wearing boots and that his jeans aren't rolled up, cause that would be really embarrassing for him if they were...

We had to shovel off our deck so that the snow didn't cave in our garage or melt into it. When I say we, I mean my mom. This lead to us having great piles of snow surrounding the garage for sledding or tunneling. Or posing for pictures in. Notice the great reflective tape on my coat, this is a recurring theme. Mom could never find coats that were reflective enough, so she'd always sew on additional reflective tape. That's what happens when you walk to and/or home from the school bus in the dark.

This was probably taken around 4 or 4:30pm. I would tell you 11am, but that would imply I was skipping school which was definitely not the case. Unless this was the year I was homeschooled...

I love that I have a more dazed look than the snowman. I believe, in retrospect, that this was fairly common throughout middle school. My mom's most frequent accusation was that I left my brain in my locker. Looking back, I think this was probably deserved. Also, that hat plus that hood made my head look ginormo.

Apparently, even with all the snow outside, I still needed snowflake sheets. And a Flags of the World poster. That was before I upgraded to the Map of the World that had a border of Flags of the World. I would also like to take this moment to point out that while I sometimes complain about my family being weird (which is very true) it is also very cool that in addition to reading out loud almost every single night between 0 and about 12 or so, we also sang for a portion of that. While most of it was a capella, apparently sometimes Mom played her guitar. Awwww.

And, because my family doesn't seem weird enough, here we are (my aunt, brother and I) having a picnic on an afghan in the middle of a parking lot IN THE MIDDLE OF WINTER. I believe this was the only winter picnic, because of the high high high volume of complaining (similar to many outdoor activities).

Now I will leave you to your Wednesday and I will start digging up more pictures for next week, because I know this will leave you anxious for more embarrassing pictures and stories, which I will, for some bizzarre and unknown reason, most likely supply.