Dear Ames,

By the time you read this, I will have already left. I'm leaving you for Iowa City. I'm going to miss you--your beautiful parks, your quaint little downtown, and of course your residents. You've been very good to me these past....how long has it been? Six years? Wow. You've been very good to me these past six years, and we had some good times--the surprise guncotton explosion during a chem club show, watching the swans and geese by the lake, playing Super Smash Brothers on the screen in 1002 Gilman, walking to the mall and back just because I could....the list goes on and on. However, these times have come to an end. I am participating in a church plant in Iowa City. I will try to make it back and visit, but I can't make any promises.

You will always feel like home to me, but I can't stay any longer. My lease ran out the moment this post went live, and the long period of homelessness has begun. I don't know how much you'll miss me, but I'll think about you often, Ames.

Farewell, wherever you fare, till your eyries receive you at the journey's end.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

So, since everything else in my life is changing, I thought the blog should change as well. There's a new look, and a new title. The title was changed yesterday, and is a reference to the verse just below it--1 Corinthians 9:24. Many months ago, in connection group, the leaders asked us to make short-term and long-term goals for ourselves in our walks with God. I couldn't think of anything long-term except for the second half of that verse. Run in such a way as to get the prize. I realize that I haven't done a whole lot of that. I've been running in such a way as to end up in the middle of the pack. This needs to change.

On a semi-related note, I'm really excited to be a church family in Iowa City, but I'm very reluctant to leave Ames. I feel like I've said this about a thousand times in the past two weeks, but it still holds true, and it's even getting stronger as the date approaches. Maybe part of it is that I couldn't attend the big send-off bash because I had to work. Oh well, such is life in this world.

There goes that dream

Last night, I was talking with a friend, and he joked about how much I love prime numbers, and how I should marry them. I responded by saying I should instead find a girl whose birth date is entirely prime numbers--month, day and year. After thinking about that for a little while, this proves to be very limiting.

To start with, there are only 5 months during the year who are prime numbers--February (2), March (3), May (5), July (7), and November (11). There are only 9 days in February (I'm not counting the 29th for reasons I'll explain later) that would be prime, 10 in November, and 11 in the each of the other three months--2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29, and 31. This is 52 days out of the year.

Now for the year. I can't count February 29 because that day only appears during leap years, and those are all multiples of four. Going by XKCD, the dateable age range for me is currently 19-34. That means women who were born between 1976 and 1991 (slight simplification here, but it makes no difference). The only years that are prime numbers within that range are 1979 and 1987. This means I would have to find someone born on one of only 104 days. Somehow, I don't think that's feasible--or rational, but when has rationality ever stopped me before. I'll just have to be okay without that amazing feat. Besides, my birth date is only 2 out of 3 anyway. Darn 1986 ruined it all.

--and if you really must know, yes I did all of this figuring in my head while getting ready for bed last night. I only did a quick check on my prime number spreadsheet to make sure I was right.

We also talked about a list I made--partially as a joke--about reasons why any woman would be unlucky to marry me. It covered a piece of notebook paper, front and back--without the fact that I'm very good at seeing the bad in me, but horrible at seeing the good in me. He said I should make a list about the good, but I would not be able to make that list as long as the other, just because I see good things in me as "normal, everyone is/should be like this"--and so tend to overlook them--and the bad things are "weird, specific to me and/or people you don't want to deal with for very long". Well, there's only about 4 hours until my third-to-last shift before moving, so I should maybe think about getting ready.

Fortunes

So, this morning, I opened a bottle of Jones Soda--Green Apple, my favorite flavor--and the cap told me that "The tide of change approaches." I have no idea where that cap got its information. What change? Just because in less than a week I go from having lived in 4 individual dwellings within 3 buildings within 2 cities to 5, 4, and 3 respectively, or that I'm having a roommate for the first time in my 24+ years of life, or that I'm soon to be attending community college, or that I'll be living four times as far from Des Moines--the city that I was born in and grew up in--as I've ever lived, or that I'll be attending a church that meets in a hotel and whose college ministry meets in a bar....That's nothing. Sometimes these things are way off.

One Week

I can't believe I only have one more week of work at Wal-Mart. The most fun of the remaining shifts will have to be the 9-hour shift on Sunday. I normally don't work longer than 4 hours....plus this shift ends at 10:30--2 hours after the last bus leaves the mall. So I get to walk home at 10:30, when I'm usually nearly asleep. I also get off at 10:30 today and Monday, which is exactly when the last bus leaves the mall, so I'll probably skip out a little early those nights. That's okay, though. I've been running into extra time lately, and we can leave up to 10 minutes early without being penalized.

Update on the last post: my back is getting better--or at least it seems that way. I haven't been hurting as bad as I was Tuesday, and even yawning doesn't hurt too bad.

Just for random news, I plan to get a haircut today, so the long hair is going bye-bye. It's been a while since my hair was short.

Ouch

I'm feeling very unlucky right now. I've managed to hurt my back (I'm not sure how, it started after a day of rest off from work, and has been hurting for three days) and acetaminophen doesn't help. Some things that cause instant, horrible pain are: sudden movements; yawning; sneezing; burping; and coughing. The fun thing about that is that my body is wired to have almost all of those happen on a regular basis--only the coughing is rare. Sudden movements come from little twitches that pop up every now and again. Burping seems to come any time I've consumed anything--even water (some of you have heard my rare gift for belching with nothing but water).

The two that are the most common are the sneezing and yawning. These come from lovely traits I inherited from my dad. The sneezing comes from ACHOO Syndrome--seriously, I'm not making that up. If you don't want to click the link, it basically says that exposure to bright light can cause me to sneeze, usually (for me) multiple times in succession. So, this means going outside can be quite painful for me--at least until my back stops complaining.

The yawning is likely a symptom of sleep apnea. I'm not 100% sure I have this, but I know my dad does, and I have many of the signs--tiredness during the day, low threshold of sleep during waking hours, caffeine addiction (this is actually more like a symptom of a symptom, but I'm still listing it), high blood pressure--and many of the risk factors--family history, overweight, overbite, large neck, male--so I'm pretty sure I have it.

Well, anyway, I just used a post to whine and complain. Thanks for taking the time to feel sorry for me--even if you didn't.

Just two weeks left

....until I no longer work at the North Ames Wal-Mart. It makes me smile a little to think about it: no more directing people to the bread aisle (which nobody seems to be able to find) or to the sunblock, no more waiting half an hour (or more) for a bus so I can go home, no more getting pulled into things like cutting fabric or unloading a truck or cleaning out a cooler, no more shaving at 2:30 in the afternoon, no more finding that someone has stolen condoms or cologne (which seem to be the two most common stolen items), no more trying to find a way to waste 15 minutes or an hour on break, etc. On the other hand, I'll miss the co-workers.

Anyway, my last day will be the 29th. The next two days shall be spent cleaning and packing up with my dad, then saying good-bye to Ames. My lease ends on the 31st at midnight. My new lease will start on the 1st at 4pm.

Other than getting ready to go, there hasn't been anything new going on. I packed up my Pez dispensers, and found that they've multiplied--145 as compared with 118 when I moved in.

I've only got three more days off before my last day of work--the 18th, the 21st, and the 28th. I'm not looking forward to that 6 consecutive work days. Oh well, if I must, then I must.

Now where is that monkey, I want to shoot something!

I'm going to let you all in on one of the few things that still makes me curse up a storm. Some of you may completely understand, but I figure a lot of you will think I'm making a big deal out of nothing. The thing I'm speaking of is, of course, dryers and their usage. Let me explain.

In my building, there are only three washers and three dryers--with 30 apartments. This sometimes causes an issue where some people can't get to dryers or washers or both. Of course, this issue is made worse when you consider that the middle dryer of the three takes about 5 hours just to get your laundry to only mildly damp. Now what makes me curse is when people leave their laundry in a dryer long after it is done. This is because I'm too nice to say "You've had way too --- long to --- get your (stuff) out of the --- dryer, so I'm removing it for you" if there is still a dryer that isn't "in use", even if it is the middle one. However, then I'm forced to wait for the slowest dryer in the building, and I get frustrated by the fact that it doesn't work. I usually end up waiting for another dryer to become "free" or just taking my clothes out, still damp and hang them up around my room--usually cursing the whole time.

Anyway, as you might have guessed, this happened just today, so there's almost nowhere to sit in my apartment, as there are damp clothes everywhere.

It's been a while

I can't believe it's been almost 3 weeks since my last post. Anyway, I feel I should update on my life--which is basically just work and sleep now.

I've been working on the driving thing--I've now driven two different beemers. The one I've been practicing in lately is an automatic, so I'm not fighting it as much. I've even been out on the roads a little--I drove home from the last real lesson, and then I drove home from connection group last night.

Anyway, so far on the job, I've cut fabric, mixed paint, caught 30 fish (yes, I'm keeping track--14 of these were today, even), gotten fishing licenses, and unloaded a truck. And apparently, they trust me with a $2000 scanner. Oh yeah, I also got my first paycheck today! I'd frame it, but then I wouldn't be able to cash it--and it would be a waste of money anyway.

I'm unsure how to feel about the big move coming up. On the one hand, I'm excited that in 38 days I'm going to be in Iowa City, planting a church with some awesome people. On the other hand, I'm sad that in 37 days, I'll be leaving a city that I've come to know as home, and the first place I've really felt at home. I guess that's for the best, though--if I get my way now, I'll never want to leave Ames.

Today's random moment, I realized how true this is today--but with me it tends to be more true with rabbits than cats.