Week 2 is coming to a close, but it's far from over yet. As soon as I'm done with this entry, I plan to get cracking at this week's CC essay on the concept of justice in Aeschylus's Orestia. That will be no easy task. Then I have a Soul Purpose meeting tomorrow morning, work in the Habitat for Humanity home around 11:30 AM, and at 4 the Kantorei and Chorale leave for our overnight retreat.

I am discovering that my commitment with the Lutheran Leader Scholarship program is a bit more time-consuming than I expected. It actually sounds like I'll have to drop Soul Purpose for it. But so it goes; I wouldn't be able to attend Valpo financially if it weren't for the LLS scholarship, the Presidential Scholarship, and a smaller musical scholarship, anyway.

Of course, a 20-credit schedule and 6 hours of work at the VUCA every week don't help the craziness. I'll do what I can do within the bounds of my existence, I guess, and try not to go absolutly nuts. At least I enjoy the things I do, although I also enjoy free time, but that's another story...

The highlights of the week have included going to the dunes with the Lutheran Leader Interns, hearing Weston Noble speak at colloquium (wow), and having my first voice lesson with my new instructor. All great experiences.

View from my dorm on the outside world...
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Hello world. It is 10:49 P.M. CT, and here I am, finishing the last [crucial] task set before me tonight. It will be a busy weekend, so it was good to get what work done that I could. Tomorrow I will attend part of a Soul Purpose meeting/rehearsal, but I'll be leaving early for the Lutheran Leader Intern retreat (which as it turns out really isn't a retreat at all -- we're staying on campus and basically hanging out [in a formal sense] and planning a high school youth leadership retreat for late October). The retreat will last all day. Then on Sunday I will be off on an excursion with my fellow Christ College-ites to Chicago for an informational cruise that will enlighten us concerning Chicago's renowned architecture and some free time on Navy Pier. This I'm excited about; it's been a little while since I was in Chicago. (I must be addicted or something... I'm sure I was there with my family this past year...)

For a bit of insight into dorm life, I have provided a picture of a Lankenau shower. How lovely.

Signing out-
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School continues to go well, if not always terribly smoothly. I just returned from some voice practicing in the VUCA, which is always fun when I can find the time for it. I still need to do some major Aritstotelian reading, so I'll try to keep this entry short.

My family visited me this weekend, which was such a nice way to get out of the normal rythm and spend time with four people who I miss more than anyone. Don't get me wrong, all this busy-ness that I've been a part of has kept me from feeling too lonely/nostalgic, but I realized today and yesterday that the place where I truly feel at home is anywhere that I can be a part of the five-person picture that I know best. So it was nice to be with the folks this weekend.

I've noticed that the pictures that I've been posting have been too large to fit on the screen. If you want to see those pictures in their entirety, you can scroll around them if you have one of those rolly things that lets you scroll up and down and side-to-side. From now on, however, since apparently the pictures taken with the camera provided for me for this project are too large, I will sacrifice quality for size and try to minimize the pictures to a small enough size. Or maybe I'll just make them in a separate window. Or both. It's a surprise.

Here is a picture of my roommate, Mike.

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And here is a picture of the post-risen sun from my dorm room.

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Signing out,
-John ><

Sorry; that picture of the sun was much too big to fit even in a pop-up window. Here it is, but smaller.

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Spanish 204 continues to be work-intensive. Here's a picture of the stack of flashcards i just made for the Chapter 2 vocabulary:

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Finally, fall is coming! The briskness of the air is so refreshing, and there are even leaves on the ground now to crunch through! I'm wearing my green jacket when I go outside, which is wonderful and which I had missed. I also am doing well on my CC papers; my last went from the B+'s of the last two to an A-, besides the fact that I just enjoy writing them (although it takes me forever). And I'm doing well in voice lessons, singing Come Raggio di Sol and Amarilli, mia Bella. I just wish I didn't have this PE test looming over my head this week...

That's all for now, I suppose. Signing out,
-John ><