Reflecting Light

You shine on us
And we reflect you
Lord you're beautiful
You are the Light

Everything that's beautiful is because the light
The stars and the moon and yes diamonds too
They all reflect...the light

Light makes them beautiful
You make me beautiful
May I always reflect you
Let me shine with you're truth

Lord you're beautiful
You are the Light

Not Quite Dirty Dancing

Click here to see some Dancing

Ballroom Dancing. I haven’t quite gone over this subject of my life for this blog yet, so if you have never taken a dance class, you can learn a little here. Be aware that it will not help you dance or inform you of actual dance steps. When I decided to take this class I didn’t think about the fact that I wouldn’t want to be close and hold somebody for 50 minutes straight twice a week. I knew it wouldn’t be anything like the movies. There would not be happy Baltimore rats dancing around our feet like in Hairspray, or janitors who just want to lift us up because it looks funner than changing a light bulb like in Step Up. And don’t even think that there will be a Patrick Swayze type because everyone in this class are beginners not resort performers.

One good thing about this class is that we don’t wear shoes. I’m very thankful for that when the guy can’t keep time and keeps stepping on my toes. This was the case during my latest class. I didn’t think I would be picking one of the less suitable dance partners, but then that’s not really what I’m thinking when the teacher says it’s ladies choice. I think, “Oh no! I better grab a guy quick so I don’t end up dancing with one of those timid girls that are usually left overs.” Dancing with one of the left overs is like deciding what color of socks to wear when you won’t be taking off your shoes. It doesn’t really matter, but what if? With one of the left overs you have to decided who will lead. It usually depends on height or which one of you cares the least about being the leader. When I have been stuck with one of the left overs, the teacher sees how much we’re floundering and switches up the couples. It’s quite a relief because she always puts me with someone good.

There are a few guys that I really enjoy dancing with because they are pretty good, but a couple of them are just kinda hot. Quamay (way off with the spelling on that name) is just such a guy. His well, muscled arms and chest are enough to keep me occupied while we dance around the floor. Richie is also a lovely dance partner. I would like to have him for all my dance tests; but alas, many of the girls ask him. That almost became a problem during our first test. He had to dance in 3 of the 4 sets of tests.

The kind of guys that are annoying to dance with are the ones that can’t keep time. Who think they are doing something right and they’re not but they won’t shut up to let you tell them. Who think they are always right and keep trying to tell you how to do something that you already know how to do. Who keep telling you that you’re tense or thinking too much when actually you are not tense and you’re mind is a blank with daydreams about wanting to dance with someone else. The worst of all of these is the guy who can dance good enough that you don’t mind dancing with him, but he is just short enough that his breath line is in your face and he didn’t brush his teeth that day.

I can only hope that this class will pay off and I’ll be able to live out my fantasy of dancing around a beautiful caste ballroom in a glistening yellow dress with a hairy beast in a suit while the teapot sings and the music swells. I might have to move to France though…

 

Dried Cranberries...

In an attempt to eat healthier, dried cranberries have become my new favorite snack. They are fruity and delicious! A few years ago when I tried craisins I unfortunately purchased Cherry flavored. Where does Ocean Spray come up with these horrible mixtures of flavors? Cranberries should taste like cranberries. Cherry flavored crainsins taste like dried cranberries covered in cherry cough syrup. The experience was forever ingrained in my taste buds’ memory. But, Alas! I accidentally bought a cherry flavored bag of craisins the other day and just realized this. I will never open this bag for myself so if anyone wants bastardized dried cranberries come and get them. The back of the package shows even more disturbing flavors of crainsins. You can have pomegranate, blueberry, or cherry “juice infused” crainsins. If I was a cranberry farmer I would be disgusted with the way Ocean Spray uses it’s cranberries like bodies for extraterrestrial cherry flavors to inhabit. I think we need to get Molder and Scully on the case!

Yuki Hana: Let's get all Sushi Faced

Like all good restaurant experiences, the longer you wait, the better the food will taste. That’s not true unless you are going to the outback and the food is a tray full of deep fried mushrooms and cheese fries.

Friday night 6:50pm:

I had only been to Yuki Hana once before during the lunch hour on a weekday, so a Friday night was quite a bit busier. I arrived 10 minutes early and thought surely we would get a table soon. The hostess told me it would only be about 5 minutes. After my friends, Alexis and Cheryl, arrived, the hostess told me 5 more minutes. After she repeated that phrase 2 more time during the next 25 minutes I started to wonder if, “It will only be about 5 more minutes.” Is the only sentence this woman knew how to speak in English.

Alexis: “The night was a test of patience.”

7:30pm:

The time we waited didn’t seem too long since all three of us were chit-chatting, but after waiting for around 40 minutes watching people who came after us being seated and served, a waiter finally came to seat us. We needed time to look over the menu and decide what we should try. After we told the waiter we needed a minute I was suspicious what his definition of a minute was. I was correct in assuming it was about the same length as what the hostess thought.

Everything else happened between 8:00pm and 9:45pm:

We finally ordered and started off the meal with miso soup. Apparently miso soup is made with soy beans. It really should be called “essence of soy bean” because it’s not much of anything. Maybe that’s what miso means.

Cheryl: “I want ice cream!”

Cheryl’s strong sense of smell was working extra hard that night. She liked the smell of the restaurant, could smell the soy sauce, wasabi, and couldn’t stand the smell of the ginger… When the first part of our food came, there was ginger on the edge of the plate. It had been soaked in something. The waiter told us that it was to cleanse the palette. One is supposed to rub it on the roof of their mouth and either swallow it or spit it out. I tried it once and…spit it out. For me, a swig of water works just as well to “cleanse the palette.” Alexis and Cheryl each ordered California rolls. I ordered the spicy California roll. They were good. 

Alexis and I also ordered Octopus sushi. It was a piece of octopus tied on top of a cube of rice. I didn’t think it tasted like much, but Alexis had a more opinionated comment of the taste.

Alexis: “It tastes like fishy asparagus lobster.”

We waited what seemed like an eternity before our short-armed waiter came to our table to see how we were doing. We informed him that we had only gotten half of our order. During the night we repeated our order to the waiter about 5 times, and he wrote it down 4 of those times.

Alexis: “The experience was an emotional roller coaster.”

Cheryl and Alexis were served their final rolls. Cheryl got a spicy shrimp roll, which I helped her eat.

Cheryl: “I’m gonna try this roll and if I don’t like it I’m gonna spit it out of my mouth.”

Alexis got a salmon roll that she enjoyed. She said it was “slimy but good.”

Alexis: “ I’m so full I feel like I’m going to die!”

And that was Yuki Hana in Fargo. Just don’t get the waiter with the midget arms or you’ll be there all night long.

Me: “Can’t see my, can’t see my, no you can’t see my sushi face, so fishy fishy fishy!”

H.G. Wells can’t stop this mustard stain

Mustard is a mess. It doesn’t matter what I put it on, it always ends up on me. I thought maybe I had gotten lucky when it just splattered all over my face when I opened the bottle, but I guess I got too excited when I finished making my sandwich and it squirted out of the sandwich onto my shirt. It’s kind of like in time machine movies. In most time machine movies someone dies and the main character goes back in time again to try and stop that person from dying. They always fail because of destiny/fate/whatever. Mustard is like death and I am the victim. No one can stop the mustard from staining my shirt. Although, some time machine movies they don’t even get into trying to stop the death of somebody. For example, the movie Time After Time where H.G. Wells has to go forward in time to catch Jack the Ripper who used Wells’ time machine to escape from the police by going to 1979.  At one point Wells takes his love interest in the time machine forward 3 days. They see in the paper that she will be Jack’s next victim, so like the idiots they are they go back those 3 days which makes no sense because if it says she’s dead then she wouldn’t be if they just stayed those 3 days ahead, but if they really wanted Jack not to kill all those women in 1979 then they should have gone back to the first day Jack got there to catch him. At least Jack got his in the end by being sent into infinity (whatever that means? Hopefully it means dead.) Other than the clear stupidity of the time travelers, it was a good movie. A man from the 1800s going to 1979 (funny), and me watching it from 2011 (funnier)…. from this view 1979 seems outlandish, but it was set in San Fransisco.

Baking at Mom's House

When I get into the mood to bake, I always want to try something new. This time I tried chocolate star cookies and spicy banana bars. They turned out good.

Chocolate Star Cookies

Spicy Banana Bars

The Lovers Are Losing

The week before Valentines Day is excruciatingly annoying to me. It’s not the overwhelming amount of heart shaped things. (Even at church the background pictures for the music projections had landscapes with heart shaped islands or ponds.) It’s not the various shades of pink and red decorations in every store window. The thing that bugs me is that I really could care less about February 14^th until the week before. In that one-week, there are messages from commercials, TV shows, stores, and people in general, that target single people. They either try to make you feel ashamed for being alone or they try to make Valentine’s Day into a holiday to celebrate “friendship.” I want to say that the latter of these ploys is to sell more decorations full price by encouraging “singles” parties, and the former is to get depressed single women to buy up the left over chocolate boxes the day after. I am fine with these marketing ploys as long as I can plan accordingly to avoid them. But living in a dorm, along with impressionable international students, we are pushed into the “friendship” Valentine’s Day “celebrating.”

I tried to avoid making a Valentine’s Day box when I got the notice that their would be a floor Valentine’s Day box making night. My RA tried to tempt us by saying she would give us candy on Valentine’s Day if we made one. She left all the crafting supplies out, and finally after seeing them sitting there for 4 days, I gave in.

Just being single in a college town with many other young single women, I was invited to one of these “singles” parties. I don’t want to say that these things are wrong. It’s just not in the right spirit of Valentine’s Day. Valentine’s Day is about romantic love. The United States is so united that it has this problem with letting holidays be for just one set of people. For example, Christmas (Christians & Santa Worshipers), Chanukkah (Jewish people), Kwanza (African Americans), Boxing Day (British people). No one wants to be left out of Christmas so they have to call it something else if they have a different religion or no religion at all.

The same thing has happened with Valentine’s Day. No one wants to be left out of the festivities, but it’s hard to kiss some one who’s not there. So let’s get all our friends over for a party to celebrate being single in a room full of red and pink hearts that say things like “I luv you” or “kiss me” or “be mine.” Have your parties if you want. It’ll be fun. But why can’t we just leave Valentine’s Day for the lovers that buy heart shaped pendants, over priced roses, and chocolates for their significant others. Because I just like to see this day as something to look forward to when I’m no longer single. (If that will ever happen.) So for all you couples out there, YOU BETTER DO SOMETHING ROMANTIC because February 14^th is for you. Even if everyone else thinks it’s for them too.