Special K and Coffee
I don't really know why you'd be here. I mean, I know I'm the single most interesting person, but don't you people have lives? Really, it's quite sad.
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Thursday, December 15, 2005
Interesting thought
I checked out some things from the library yesterday. By the time those items are due, I will no longer be "Miss Karleen Weitzel"--I will be "Mrs. Karleen Hester." Wow. Scary. Wonderful. Amazing.
Now for the question Paul and I can finally answer: "Where will you be after he's done with school?" During his 14 weeks of Officer's Basic Course in Texas (for which I cannot join him), I will be moving us to... Ft. Riley, Kansas. And after looking at it, if we can live off base, we will probably see if we can find a nice home in Milford.
Some notes about Ft. Riley:
It is the home to the U.S. Cavalry, which means that the Army alone has 13 horses and two mules. Paul is extremely excited about this.
We have been told that that area of Kansas is unlike the Kansas that everyone thinks of. Not that we would mind that kind of Kansas, but it is apparently quite hilly, forested, and lakey with good hunting and fishing.
It's about two hours from Kansas City. Can you say, "Big XII Women's Basketball Tournament?" All together, class... "Big XII Women's Basketball Tournament." Very good. :-D
Friday, December 09, 2005
My Harry Potter/Lord of the Rings/Star Wars
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe opened today! Paul and I are going to see it tonight. He knows virtually nothing about the story and didn't even really know who wrote it, though he did successfully guess on the first try. Later this month we will watch the WonderWorks version, which is how I first experienced C. S. Lewis.
Wednesday, December 07, 2005
This, that, and the other random things
I think today was the first day I have ever had Special K and coffee for breakfast--or for any meal, for that matter.
Apparently there is now a Maharishi Enlightenment Center in Ames at 137 Lynn Ave--ya know, just up the street from Memorial. And they are offering "Introductory lectures on transcendental meditation every Wednesday and Thursday and on request." I thought they were at least gonna stick to Vedic City.
The Iowa State Daily truly does have some bad journalism students. I mean really, Greenville College's paper had better written stories than this. Get your facts straight, kid. #1) His wife's name is Jennie (and I'm sure Barb spelled it for him). #2) "the memorial service students"? uh...that doesn't make sense...you're either missing something or need to take out "memorial service." #3) (and this is just slightly picky, and if Barb gave him that information, she may have just said 6 children to make it easier) three of the children are his and three are step-children. #4) The church's website says "In lieu of flowers, memorials may be sent..."
Thursday morning I got to work and Jennie (Foley) wasn't here yet, which I didn't find too unusual since it had snowed and she lives in Boone. I started my morning routine of making coffee and checking my email and the answering maching and things. Jennie called to tell me that Boone was on a two-hour delay so she wouldn't be in until a little after 10 a.m. Went back to the routine and the phone rang again. This time it was Grace Amemiya, a long-time member and the clown at every rummage sale. She had just gotten back from visiting family in California so I asked her how that went and if she liked the Iowa snow greeting, then she got to her reason for calling: she'd woken up that morning to find a message on her answering machine from a friend who said that a Presbyterian minister who is their neighbor had had a heart attack and thought someone from the congregation should know. Well I hadn't heard anything from anyone and didn't have any messages about anything like that, so Grace and I were trying to figure out if this was, in fact, Malcolm, which I thought was unlikely. So I asked her what her friend's name was and looked it up in the phone book: the address was directly across the street from Malcolm and Jennie Laing. Grace tried calling both Larry (former interim pastor) and Barb without any luck, so I tried to concentrate back on what I'd been doing while thinking, "holy crap, this is the last thing we need, but even if it was him, he's probably fine."
Not too much later, the phone rang again and it was Barb. She just gave it to me straight: "Malcolm had a heart attack and has died. I'm at the hospital with Larry and Mary Kitchell and Jennie. You're gonna be the frontline getting phone calls and you just have to tell them the truth: Malcolm was shoveling snow this morning, had a massive heart attack, and died."
As she was telling me this, my mind still said, "this has got to be some kind of sick joke." I still sometimes feel like it's a dream I should wake up from, but that feeling is rapidly fading. It had to be about 9:00, but it felt much later, when I couldn't take being here alone anymore and called Paul who'd been sleeping in. I told him what was going on and that I just needed to hear his voice and talk to him, but he responded with, "ok, I'll be there in 15 minutes to help." Not my intent of the call, but he did help a lot with answering phones and watching the office while the staff had a meeting. The whole rest of the day is kind of a blur, as is Friday. Friday, however, we didn't get the bulletins even printed until 3 p.m., we also were getting everything set and ready to go for Walk Through Bethlehem the next two days, and were trying to get a mailing out to the entire congregation about what had happened. When all was said and done, we ended up staying until 5 p.m. (we're usually off at 4:30) and would have been there until about 6 had we not called in an office helper and recruited one of the members who walked into the office (for a different reason) to help us finish folding the bulletins.
He was here for all of about 4 months, and we had his funeral here yesterday. In addition to that, Paul took his boards yesterday and doesn't feel they went too well, but I still think he'll be pleasantly surprised come January. At least I pray he is. Last night we took some relaxing "us time" and, even though it was Tuesday, it felt like Friday night. Unfortunately, since it wasn't, I had to come to work this morning again. It's been a long week and we're all a little sick of being asked how we're doing or if there's anything to be done to help.
On a different topic....there are only 24 days until I'm married!! ...and there are still 24 days until I'm married! :-P
Thursday, December 01, 2005
Life is too short to worry about the little things
I was hoping to have pictures of my dress up for ya'll to find today, but that won't be happening due to extremely unforseen circumstances here at work. The head pastor, who has only been here since August, passed away this morning. I will post more about it when I have time. It was about the last thing anyone expected this morning. Prayers for his family, the staff, and the congregation would be much appreciated.
