"OMG YOU GUYS!"

One of my favorite people on the entire planet is coming to visit next month.

& also she apparently sometimes stalks my blog, so, hi Erin :waves:

This absolutely counts as a blog post. Come on, it's Saturday.

There is a lot a could say about Erin, but she often leaves me speechless ;)

Song you should totally listen to because Erin recommended it: In the Aeroplane Over the Sea by Neutral Milk Hotel

Tomorrow: Hamlet

i wouldn't fast forward through them...if i had DVR

I wasn't really thinking this through when I chose TV theme songs for today's blog topic...but, I shall attempt to do that now.

The Gilmore Girls theme song is one of my favorite songs. Not because it necessarily has the greatest musical or lyrical composition, but because it reminds me of my best friend.

Grace and I used to watch Gilmore Girls together all the time. And (while I know you're not the biggest fan of cheesy things like this, Grace) it is basically my song for her =) I miss my sister.

There are other theme songs I really like; Psych's, for instance, is just too perfect for its own good. The Bones theme song is incredo-techno (as is House's, in a different way). I do like some shows with nearly non-existent theme songs, but generally, the theme song enhances the whole thing. There was an amazing episode of Monk a bit after they changed the theme song, got a ton of flack from fans, and changed it back. Sarah Silverman was in it. That's all you need to know (also, basically all I remember).

Another one of my favorite songs is from one of my favorite shows: Cold Case. The theme song is an excerpt from the E.S. Posthumus song "Nara". I am convinced that you could montage it over anything, and it would be moving and make sense somehow. Speaking of music montages, the way Cold Case incorporates music into the last 1-2 minutes of the show is inevitably incredible.

This was another post with excessive links in it. I apologize.

[Please actually listen to]: Nara - E.S. Posthumus

Tomorrow: {undisclosed}

P.S. Epic fail in not mentioning the Chuck theme song. Which is actually a Cake song. Love.

If Your Heart's In The Right Place [Home.]

At the moment, I'm sitting in my kitchen. This room has some pretty gaudy flower wallpaper from the 50's, a light-switch that flips the wrong way, cabinets whose pale yellow color matches my skin tone on a sick day and windows overlooking the bird-feeder collection. And it lacks a dishwasher. But it makes me smile, because it's home.

For a while now, it's been easy for me to call any place "home". I've lived in 17 (18? um...?) different homes in the past 7 years. They've all had their quirks (and, in some of the cookie-cutter Florida apartments, their...lack of quirks) but they've all meant something to me. It's not like I'm particularly attached to any place we've lived, but...wherever we lived at any moment, I think God gave me the grace to call it "home" and mean it.

This phenomenon carried over a little oddly when I toured with Communicators For Christ this past fall, every week a new place to sleep and new people and new experiences. And yet...everywhere felt like home.

This could, of course, be easily explained by the fact that I was with some of the most amazing people in the universe.

"If home is where the heart is, then my home is where you are."

I must've been given more heart than I ever thought possible. Because...my heart is with so many people. & So I think I can find a home anywhere. Because I can find someone I love anywhere (practically). Also because I miraculously find something homey about every place I inhabit.

This will probably make eventual house-hunting fairly easy.

Song [quoted in this post]: I'm Taking You With Me - Relient K

Tomorrow: TV Theme Songs (it'll probably be as lame as you think)

A #2 Pencil & A Broken Heart

http://xkcd.com/499/

[just go look at it, i don't feel like figuring out how to make it show up on my layout right now]

Ah, it's that time again. Spring is in the air, and the SAT is just around the corner.

Last year I was pretty much totally freaking out, like a boss. But, it's true what they say, the SAT turned out to just be a longer version of the PSAT with an essay thrown in for good measure.

[Or, at least, they claim it's for good measure.]

I read the entire prep book, and took a couple of practice tests, so when that Saturday morning came I felt sleepy, but reasonably prepared. I definitely forgot that "the book" had told me to read/write something before I went into the test, so it wouldn't be the first thing I read/wrote that day, and then the first section ended up being the essay...oops. Let's just say, my first written words after a partially sleepless night did not end up being particularly insightful.

[sidenote: one of my reasons for doing BEDA is that it will help me to practice writing every day. Very needed.]

The test wasn't as scary as anticipated and didn't feel as long. But, looking back at it now, a year later, I am hesitant to go into the SAT a second time...very optimistically. Caution has always been my default emotion for these situations, and it has rarely failed me. So I will continue to plod through these SAT prep books, sharpening my #2 pencils, blogging and asking my brother for math help.

When April 30th comes, I will try to get a good night's sleep. & When I awake, to read and write a little. & Go in guarded, and mildly optimistic. I mean, I'm interested in the SAT, but I'm not gonna let it break my heart.

Songs I wrote this blog to: Baby - Justin Bieber (yes. true fact.) & First Day of My Life - Bright Eyes

Tomorrow: Home.

P.S. Great quote from Michael about the SAT: "I hate the way they make you apply your knowledge in new ways."

Eyes Open

I have long claimed that going blind is my worst fear.

Sure, death is a little scary. [& Edward Cullen is pretty freaky, too]
But I find the thought of life without sight to be even more frightening.

Constant darkness. It's like an endless claustrophobia of the mind.

[You get the picture. I'm gonna move on.]

As much as I dislike the constant overuse of analogies in blogs, I will now transition into one.

But, oftentimes, I think, it's easy to be blind to the truth. The expression "if it was a dog it would've bit you" isn't just about looking for your keys, it can also apply to direct knowledge (like, I guess, where you left your keys).

If God can restore sight to the blind (what? that's right, I said it), then He can certainly do the same for the metaphorically hard-of-seeing. [is that a phrase? it seems like it would be]

What I'm saying is...sometimes we miss the obvious truths that are staring us in the face. It's a kind of blindness. & Shouldn't it be just as terrifying and breath-quickening, and cause my blood to run just as cold, as optical blindness?

I so often lose sight of the truth. The Truth.

I am never alone.

There is always hope.

Peanut butter ice cream is delicious.

I am weaker than I think.

He is stronger than I can imagine.

Butter should not be eaten by the stick. (or Sweet'N Low by the packet.)

& Jesus loved to the point of death.

Lord, restore my sight.

Tomorrow: The SAT

"I'm so tired, I haven't slept a wink"

I tend not to get a lot of sleep.

It reminds me of that Beatles song.

..you know i can't sleep, i can't stop my brain...

I know I should probably be getting more sleep than I do [hi mom!], but for some reason even if I go to bed early (for me "early" means "before midnight") I end up waking around 9-10ish, which is when I get up normally (by "normally" i mean "after going to bed past 1").

I like to imagine that the longer I stay up the more I can accomplish. But, really, who am I kidding? I can't get anything worthwhile done in the late hours of the night/early hours of the morning. (That doesn't include chatting with people, which is a beneficial & meaningful pursuit...usually.)

Sometimes I spend two hours reading xkcd/graphjam/MLIA/tfln/FB/other webcomics/etc. without thinking about it. I know, I know, I should keep better track of time. But when the sun's gone down and the schoolbooks have been put away, not even the seventy-two clocks we have in this house can help me remember how long it's been since I did anything productive.

I like reading. Reading is good. But I rarely read in the evenings. Therefore, I am now resolved to read more during the night. After all, lightbulbs were made for a reason. Help me out with this?

KTHXBAI

Tomorrow: Blind.

Identity. {Who am I?}

"For every being cursed with self-awareness there remains the unanswerable question: Who am I?"

I am an ISFJ. {i think}

I am a salsa con queso lover.

I am a photographer. {or as my mom would say: "phratographer"}

I am a writer. {sometimes}

I am a ginger.

I am prone to pack-ratedness.

I enjoy smiling.

But do I find my identity in these things?

I like categorizing myself, I think everybody does. (Yeah, even hipsters...especially hipsters). It feels...safe to know I can place myself in any particular category or set of categories. I am a nerd, subset: Star Trek fan. I am funny, subset: occasionally.

I also like "figuring myself out", learning things about myself, realizing how I work. Hey, I like hot pockets. Good to know. Hey, I enjoy rap music. Also mighty good to know.

When I introduce myself I am introducing the person I think I am. When I say "Hello I'm Katie." I'm really saying, in so many words, "hello, my name is Katie and I hope you like me because I think you are cool and maybe I'm a little cool, too, even if I do get bad sunburns sometimes, and I don't always know what words to use in sentences and I stumble over my own insecurities and failures and...well, hello."

So if I'm presenting this front of myself to everyone I meet and interact with it's probably important for me to know who I am. I can get pretty confused about that some of the time (all of the time). I'd hate to be all "subliI'mawesomeminal" but at the same time an "I am not worthy to be in the same room as you" attitude can be annoying as well.

Who I am to myself determines (at least partially) who I am to other people.

Oh, but, oh, oh, OH!

"The ancient human question 'Who am I?' leads inevitably to the equally important question 'Whose am I?"

I am a child of God. In this I find my true identity. Nothing matters but loving Christ & joyfully obeying Him. To glorify Him with my every thought and breath should be the greatest desire of my heart. In Him I live, in Him I am truly alive, in Him...I am who I am supposed to be.

It isn't easy to remember that, it's so hard. But when I do, or when He reminds me, I know who I am. I know whose I am. I am His.

Oh, and Happy Easter. He is risen!

Song[s] I can't stop listening to: "Love You Madly" by Cake & "What Is Happening?" by Alphabeat

Tomorrow: Sleep[lessness?]