Well, I'm almost half-way through my honors American history course.  I'm really glad I took this class instead of a regular history course; I'm learning so much more than I would if I'd chosen the latter!  It's a lot of hard work, of course, and homework takes up a good deal of time, but it's definitely worth it.

I'm beginning to see more and more how important education is, or should be, to people.  Whether the cause of ignorance is willful or financial, a lack of education can be detrimental in any society.  Back in the Dark-Middle Ages (I can't quite remember at the moment   ) when the Pope was higher in power than the king, literacy was limited to the elite and the scribes who copied the Bible.  The Bible was limited to the hands of the clergy because copies were hard to hold (i.e. the monks could only copy so much so fast) and because nearly no one could read -- what's the use of owning a Bible if you can't read it?

Most of the people were devoutly religious (in this case, Catholic), but trusted in the clergy, who partook in lavish lifestyles.  Since they couldn't read the Bible, they couldn't question the Church; and the less they questioned, the more power the pope had over them.  If a king upset the pope, the religious official could issue an interdict (banishing a king AND his kingdom from any and all religious ceremonies until an apology is issued); an interdict would outrage the public, and the public would look down upon their king, possibly even rebel.

Once the printing press was invented, however, Bibles could be readily and efficiently printed; and the number of Bibles throughout Europe grew exponentially.  Now that a Bible was available for the common folk, more people learned how to read.  Some people read the Bible, looked at the actions of their clergy, and noticed contradictions between what the clergy taught and what was in the Bible; one such person, Martin Luther, started the Reformation with his posting of ninety grievances with the Catholic Church on a Catholic church door.

Education is very important if one views history:  in the case of the Catholic Church, it led to the Reformation.  Education can most likely inspire questions in an individual; the individual, then, may seek a resolution to the question.  Education can also lead to freedom -- in a representative democracy such as that of the United States, it is essential that voters be informed of their candidates' views; voting just because the candidate has a nice smile can be detrimental to the nation, and is acute irresponsibility.

Well...I may or may not come back and edit a bit of this...I may have scrambled my words a bit here and there, as my brain isn't quite ticking, today.  Well, happy first week of April, all!

Well, long time, no post!  Though I must say, my last post was a lot more recent than I thought it was!

So, I passed the exams, and then I passed the finals.  I'm going to take honors courses next year, so I'm enjoying my summer while I still can. O.O;

Nothing much has happened, otherwise, I suppose.  I'm still keeping in touch with all my old friends, which is good.

I was looking through the smileys, and found a 'yellow rose'.    It reminded me of this porcelain (I think that's what the material was) yellow rose on a wooden base that my grandparents had, and if you winded the key, it played "The Yellow Rose of Texas".  Not too important information, I suppose, but a random side note. o.O;

The problem with me, is that I remember everything.  I mean, I haven't much short-term memory, but I can definitely remember what happened when two or three.  I remember a lot of things from when I was younger.  The trouble is, sometimes it hurts to remember everything from every year.  I can remember colours, sensations, smells, tastes.  The tastes of meaty spaghetti sauce reminds me of when I'd eat spaghetti at my grandma's.  The look of the bare trees in autumn reminds me of when I'd sit and watch Charlie Brown with my mom and dad.  The smell of the rain reminds me of walking down my old school route to home, and one of the mornings I was going to preschool.  Everything seems to remind me of everything, and that kind of scares me.  0_0

Will there come a point where everything I'm doing is just remembering?  Okay, I guess that was a little silly.. ^_^;  But what do you do when everything reminds you of everything?  Sometimes, I'll be in thought, and I go through a series of memories.  Sometimes they're in chronological order, sometimes they're not.  It's really weird. o_0

Ulch, I've got exams this week.   I took my history exam on friday, and I don't think I did too well on that....even though I did study for it..  Ah well...

But next weekend, I've got a youth group meeting!   Which means I get to see all my friends again! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!  When I opened the letter from the youth group director, that's exactly what I thought.  Even though it would only last about an hour, hour and a half. But still..... YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!

Er....so, you see, I'm ebullient.   Heh, I like that word...ebullient... it reminds me of those little sugary sour gummies.   Yesterday wasn't so bad.. I studied a little for my math exam (tomorrow )  and had THREE, not two, not one and a half, not four, but THREE cups of coffee!   So I had a bit of trouble getting to sleep, too... ^_^;; BUT yesterday was good.

This morning, when I woke up, MacGyver was on!  And only fifteen minutes into the show!  That just added more to my...ebulliency??  Is that a word?  If it wasn't before today, it is now!  

Well, have a great day! ^_^

As 2005 draws to a close, I would truly like to thank everyone once more for their loveliness and caring when I was down.  Although it's more of a belated 2004 thank you, I feel I need to say it, anyway.  Thank you to my friends who stood by me when I was awfully dull or annoying or insane.  Thank you for cheering me up when I was down, and for making my world much better than it might've been if you weren't in it at all.  I'd like to thank you from the bottom of my heart.  I'd hate to think of what I might've done if you all hadn't been there.  You've made my days a heck of a lot brighter. Thank you so much.

2005 has been a rough year, I'm sure, for everyone.  With 2006, we can start another year anew, most certainly, but we can also build from what happened in 2005.  As we go on learning, because I'm sure I can say we learn everyday, and growing, we will face challenges- some of them certainly being tough to overcome.  But we should keep going; not rushing, but just going.  If we rush, we don't take much in and there wouldn't be a lot that would stick with us.  We go our own pace, I'm sure, so one shouldn't rush to catch up with everyone, or else one might become lost.  I hope I put that clear enough.

Well, I'd like to wish everyone a happy end to 2005 and a wonderful, prosperous, and most joyful new year in 2006, and the many new years to come.

A couple das ago, I went with my aunt to the mall.  I'll tell of this, but I first want to mention a couple other things.

On Christmas, my dad and I went to my grandma's house and then went to the football game. =D My paranoid-ness got in the way, though, so I didn't enjoy the first half of the game.  I just suddenly became really scared as I was walking downtown with my dad, past all those large city buildings. They just towered over us and looked hard and intimidating.  And when I got to the stadium, my head filled with unreal frights and possibly silly notions, such as "What if something terribly bad happens?" and I couldn't help the scenarios from popping into my head.

As I was going up the stairs though, as we had the second to the top-most seat (and I mean ALL the way top-most) I saw a friend from my eighth-grade class. He said, "Hey, Nicki, do you remember me?" But of course, whenever someone asks if I remember them, I can't remember their name, so I said, "Yeah! ..." It was still good to see a familiar face, but I was still paranoid as we took our seats.   I was still scared even during second quarter. Whenever my team got a touchdown, the guys in the seats by mine would jump and shake the concrete, and I could feel the seat quake. 

By the end of third quarter, I was near enough to being fine that I loosened up a little.  A couple days later, I spent the evening at my friend, JT's house in Hanover. The mall there is small, but it's much bigger than the mall in Ocean City. We went to the mall last night, and she got a pair of spiffeh shoes and a Ramones mp3 player case.  We then went to the movies and watched The Chronicles of Narnia.  It was okay, but there were a few parts added, a few parts taken away, and some parts just rediculously lengthened to make it more suspenseful.   Otherwise, it was okay.

So yes, in the day, before I left for JT's, I went with my aunt to the mall. She's been away for awhile now, since she's moving in with her boyfriend to Arizona.  The two, my aunt and her boyfriend, came over for Christmas, and I think they're leaving sometime next week.  So, yeah, it was a great thing to hang out with her since we haven't seen each other in a long time.  She just said the usual, though, like "You've gotta keep your hair out of your face!" and "I hate cats!" even though she has one.

The shopping trip was fun, but before, we went to her psychiatrist.  Ever since she started discussing the divorce with my uncle (which was a few years ago), she'd been having trouble getting motivated, and was just depressed, so she started seeing the doctor previously mentioned.  She told him about me, apparently, and introduced me to him before we left just after she'd discussed the next appointment.  It must be very rough for her to get through all this.  I hope she gets through it alright.

Oh, yes, I finished reading One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I loved it soooo much!  I watched the movie, but the movie wasn't as great.  It was only based loosely on the book, as it missed so many cool scenes (the Colonel Matterson 'butter' scene ) and changed a bunch of stuff around.  It also just barely gripped on the point the book was making. I guess it was okay, but I'd have to say, I prefer the book.

Lately, thing's have been weird for me.  Everytime I go to make pierogies, I end up dropping the ones I'm not going to cook on the floor.  In case you didn't know, pierogies are sort of like pasta pockets filled with potatoes and cheese, brocolli, onions, or some other lovely ingredient. Sort of like ravioli.  It's very delicious.

Anyway, I recently read the book The Jungle by Upton Sinclair.  It's a really interesting and great book about the horrors of a meat packing town in Chicago, called Packingtown, in the early 1900s.  It tells not only of how one may lose limbs and how the afflicted meat is shipped out to the public, but how the industry tore families apart, and just broke down the walls of morality.  It told of the struggle to survive in the corrupt town, and how there were only two classes: the poor, and the rich.  How the immigrants had no hope in a capitalist system, but that Socialism was the light in the dark.  It was really sad, too, because every time things were looking up for the main character, Jurgis's family, everything just came crashing down.

Now I'm reading (and almost finished) the book One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey.  It's an uber-spiffed-out book about a psychiatric hospital, with the narrator, 'Chief' Bromden, as one of the patients witnessing the new comer, Randle McMurphy, turn the ward upside down.  It tells about how restricted the patients were in a ward, and how the hospital would work at your brain through medications, electroshock therapy (EST), lobotomies, and other methods.  The patients had very little rights and could hardly do anything, as it wasn't 'therapuetic', until McMurphy came along.

After this book, I'm not sure what I'll read.  I might read Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, or maybe The Divine Comedy by Dante.  There are just so many good books out there!

Lately, I've been contemplating about things. Such as yesterday, when I was staring at the sky. I thought about how big and vast it was, imagining it the size of the ceiling of a basilica. I remembered that it was actually much bigger than that and realized how scary it was. The sky of Earth is so small compared to the vastness of space, and I was frightened, feeling so small. If the sky is big, then space must be really, really, really, really, really big.

I've also noticed I've become stressed out. With work here and there, I can't seem to keep everything together, somehow. Oh well, I've pulled through this far, so I should make it!

On a brighter note, for my Greek Mythology project, I was able to choose which god I could do my project on, and I picked Hermes. Hermes was actually cooler than I thought!  With the caduceus, the lyre, and the spiffed out sandals, and all... Which also reminds me; my friend and I were talking about how Zeus had been around with all these other women besides his own (and understandably jealous) wife, Hera.  Someone mentioned that he was a "playa", so I drew my own interpretation of "Playa Zeus". I can't share it now, and I've taken no picture of the drawing, but if you could imagine Zeus in a cap, with a chain and a medallion, in a purple shirt...

0_0 Random title.. though I did have a pretty cool day. I went to the mall with my aunt, and got a new shirt, magazine, and two books. But I left my jumpdrive at home, so any files I had on there can't be uploaded at the moment. >.> I also have the Gwen Stefani song, "Holla Back" (not sure of the title) in my head. "Bananas! B-A-N-A-N-A-S!" =O *starts dancing* =)

Anywho..I learned how to make pancakes! =D Even though I may've posted this before and I forgot..which reminds me..

I was just putting in the egg to make pancakes, and usinng only one egg, when this happened.

It looks like two yokes, but maybe that's just because my thumb was in the way when the yoke came out. 0_0 It also looks like a pair of eyes, sort of. =) They're watching you. O.O

My cats have been acting weird lately. Misha woke me up with his paw in my face after my alarm clock was done buzzing (it automatically shuts off if you didn't press snooze, after an hour or two). Usually, he gets me up right when it buzzes. 0_0 Well..maybe that isn't odd, but Sassy's been meowing and meowing and we're not sure what the matter is. She probably just wants attention. That's not weird, either, I suppose. I guess my cats are acting as usual, then. 0_0

I "played" poker with Misha, and when I showed him his cards, he looked at them carefully like he was in thought. He's so cute. After a couple rounds, though, he got bored and turned away from me. I guess he's more of a blackjack kind of cat.

I have the "Lumberjack Song" in my head. xp But I'm listening to "What's the Frequency, Kenneth?".

Otherwise, nothing exciting happened today. o_o Except that I'm almost finished reading George Orwell's Animal Farm. It's a really cool book! It's about how these animals take over a farm, and it goes really well for awhile, until one pig, Napolean, takes over. It's a really great book.