ok, so i took another quiz today - but only one! :)




Which OS are You?


note: the reason you LU students can't see this pic is b/c the site is blocked, but it is one of those that can be bypassed. once you actually view the site, the pic will appear on my blog. if you don't feel like going to all that trouble to see it, the image reads: "you are windows 98. you are a bit flaky, but well-liked. you don't have a great memory, but everyone seems to know you. a great person to hang out with and play some games."

i'm kinda disappointed - i thought i was alot better than windows 98, but apparantly i'm not user-friendly and am considerably outdated.

i also came across the official website of the moon today. they even have an application to become a member of the independent republic of the lunar moon. interesting stuff...

as my cousin put it, "mr. rogers went to the land that wasn't so make-believe."

things i have learned in the last 3 days

~my blog template can be messed up without my intervention (and i will try to fix it soon)

~sore feet take a long time to recover

~there are 388 engineers at letourneau

~of these, only 29 are women

~there are many guys on this campus who don't have alterier motives

~i gain more from sleeping in 3 out of my 5 classes than listening to the professor

~i am not alone in my spiritual stuggles (and any other struggle for that matter)

~texas can be cold

~i will never be able to capture my thoughts into words, but often my face communicates them perfectly

~a large number of geeks have a full set of social skills

~it is possible for me to get all my homework done

~it is possible for me to get a decent amt of sleep

~it is not possible for me to get all my homework done and get a decent amt of sleep

~dr. graff believes that cats go to hell. he is a very educated man and knows alot about God, so i believe him on this one (i learned this last week but decided to include it here anyways)

~when i hang out with geeks, i can use technical jargon in non-technical sentences and they don't stare back at me with a confused look

~i have been stalker-less for 3 months!!

~85% of christians live outside of the US

~no matter how much i get done during the week, i will always need the weekend to catch up

~forgiveness (no matter for how small of an issue) is impossible with my strength alone

~appearantly, a short and easy assignment for computer architecture cannot be completed within 3 hrs - even if i am working with 3 brilliant people

~the book of ezekial is much more interesting than the book of isaiah

~if i get more than 6 hrs of sleep the night before, even mornings can be enjoyable

~if i get < 6 hrs of sleep, morning = mourning

~even tho someone picks out a cake for herself, she can still be surprised by it

~users like it when i walk into their office saying, "IT is updating our inventory..." because then they get a short break from sitting at their computers (and every one of them thanks me for it)

~for 3 of my classes, faithfully completing the homework doesn't help me at all to prepare for the tests

~it is not possible to get the LU blocked-site page in the computer labs

~apoktaino (this is how it's pronounced, not how it's spelled) is greek for "i kill!"

~for my alarms to have any chance of waking me, they must be set to go off in the AM, not the PM

a random and wonderful weekend

on friday 41 took g2 out to fazoli's. yes, they used their yac cards (the buy 1 entree, get 1 free deal), but it was still really nice to not have to pay anything. a few months ago that would have really gotten to me, but i'm learning to appreciate it. (i'll tell you more about that in a future blog entry. :) ) anyways, we had lots of laughs and many digital pics to remember it by. the beautiful rainbow on the way there was a wonderful addition to an already excellent evening. i realized that g2 has done an activity with 41 for the last 3 weekends. it's been great getting to know those guys better! they're a wonderful bunch!

there's a friend on campus that i've had the opportunity to get to know this semester and this weekend we realized that we hadn't talked for awhile. so we decided to on saturday night. we ended up hanging out for 2.5 hrs! he is someone that really has a heart for God and loves to talk about it! we both shared how God has been teaching each of us alot lately, especially about trust. we are both in completely different situations and the only thing we can do is lean on God. it was nice that he was able to understand where i was coming from on that issue.

for sunday lunch, there wasn't much to eat. so my roommate and i each had some ice cream topped with oreos and a waffle for desert. (it's always necessary to make sure you have room for ice cream with toppings!)

then for supper i went to eat at a professor's house. it was so nice to have a home-cooked meal and to sit at a dining-room table to eat!

ok...so maybe i had too much fun with all these quizzes...but they're so much fun! :)





Ooooo Shiney!

What Random Object From Ydoc Nameloc's Room Are You?







Even Superman once worked in a team

Take the Cartoon Hero Quiz?.





Good Grief
What animated winter holiday character are you?








Strong, Silent, Baddie-buster

Find out what anime character cliche you are.

to us: the dazed and confused

right now i have alot of ideas to blog about, but just haven't gotten around to it. so here is another copy-and-paste blog. i received it as a forward tonight from my 1st college roommate. it got me thinking about a few things, so i thought some of you might be interested as well. enjoy...


Being "Twenty-Something"

They call it the "Quarter-life Crisis." You may find yourself straying from the crowd more than any other time in your life. You start realizing that there are a lot of things about yourself that you didn't know and may not like.

You start feeling insecure and wonder where you will be in a year or two, but then get scared because you barely know where you are now. You start realizing that some people are selfish and that, maybe, those friends that you thought you were so close to aren't exactly the greatest people you have ever met and the people you have lost touch with are some of the most important ones. What you do not realize is that some of the ones you have given up on are realizing that too and that most of them are not really cold or catty or mean or insincere, but that they are as confused as you are.

You are beginning to understand yourself and what you want and do not want. Your opinions have gotten stronger. You see what others are doing and find yourself judging a bit more than usual because suddenly you realize that you have certain boundaries in your life and add things to your list of what is acceptable and what is not.

You are insecure and then secure. You laugh and cry with the greatest force of your life. Sometimes you feel great and invincible, and other times you feel alone and scared and confused. Suddenly change is the enemy and you try and cling on to the past with dear life, but soon realize that the past is drifting further and further away and there is nothing to do but stay where you are or move forward.

You get your heart broken and wonder how someone you loved could do such damage to you. Or maybe you lay in bed and wonder why you can't meet anyone decent enough to get to know better. You love someone but maybe they love someone else too and cannot figure out why you are doing this because you are not a bad person. One night stands and random hook ups start to look cheap, and getting wasted and acting like an idiot starts to look pathetic. Maybe it seems like almost everyone you know is getting married, and maybe you really love someone too, but you just aren't sure if you're ready to commit for the rest of your life yet.

You go through the same emotions and questions over and over, and talk with your friends about the same topics because you cannot seem to make a decision. You worry about loans and money and the future and making a life for yourself. While winning the race would be great, right now you'd just like to be a contender!

We are in our best of times and our worst of times, trying as hard as we can to figure this whole thing out.

"leave my wedgies alone - they're mine to pick!" --j mo

check out the "No Way to Treat a Pig" headline on this page. i really like pigs, but this is just wrong...

who needs sleep?
well you're never gonna get it
who needs sleep?
tell me what's that for
who needs sleep?
be happy with what you're getting
there's a guy who's been awake
since the second world war --bare naked ladies

last night i was up until 4, the night before it wasn't much earlier...so i think it's time to call it a day.

prayer life, browsers, and sad memories...

i have so much going on in my mind right now...i wish i could think straight enough to relate it verbally, much less on paper (or on print at least)...but here i go...

tonight i was reading in 1 peter and chapter 4, v 7b really jumped out at me. "Therefore be clear minded and self-controlled so that you can pray." i wonder how clear-minded i am right now. and i know my self-control hasn't been the best. maybe i'm over-simplifying things here, but does that alone explain why my prayer life hasn't been the greatest lately?

moving on...i've been trying out phoenix and mozilla as recommended to me after my praise of opera. i really liked some of the skins in phoenix and the extensions were really great too. but i sorely missed the 'continue browsing where i was last time' feature that i contantly rely on in opera (maybe it's there somewhere, but i couldn't find it). if i could have updated my blog with it, i would have kept it just so i wouldn't have to use internet explorer, but alas... so then i tried mozilla. here again, i couldn't find my desired start-up option. unlike phoenix, mozilla actually gave me a decent-sized window to write my new blog entries. i don't know if this had anything to do with it, but it was around this time that i noticed some of my profile was missing - the date column, blogger logo, etc. so i messed around with my template (while still in mozilla). it saved the changes all right, but when i went to update some more, it always lost the previous changes. so grudgingly i used internet explorer to add my lost html and blogger tags. mozilla didn't have any exciting features that opera was missing, so i uninstalled it also. in my opinion, opera is still the best browser around! :)

about a year ago, mom started having problems with her laptop keeping its charge. a guy at work told her that it was a motherboard problem and it would cost way too much to fix. so she gave it to me at the beginning of the school year to mess with - if i couldn't get it working it was mine to keep and if i happened to fix it i had to return it to her. i really wanted to not try to figure out the problem and just keep it around to play with...but tonight i finally looked at it. it turns out that if i give the power adapter cord just enough pressure against the port, it works fine. i finally got it propped just right and started looking around on the computer. napster was still installed as well as netscape 4.78! those were the days! :) i looked at a few of the documents just to see if any of them were mine...i found one called 'january 8, 2000.jpg' it was an old family picture...before my parents split up. life was totally different then... of course we were all smiliing in the picture, but i had to wonder how happy we really were. it was nice to be able to say to people that my parents still loved each other and that we were all together. we weren't part of the outrageous divorce statistics - we were on the other side...the good side...the side that churches like to see. our church as a whole doesn't even listen to mom's side of the story, but that's a whole other issue... she hasn't been officially kicked out, but often it feels that way. a church, of all places, should be somewhere to feel loved and supported. dad is...but she isn't. (there's many ironies there...but here isn't the place to discuss them)

some christians like to say that divorce is always wrong. i agree that a couple should not split up before adamantly trying to heal the marriage. but sometimes one of the individuals just doesn't put in the effort necessary for this to happen. it's my opinion that my parents' divorce was best for all involved. (if anyone of you want to disagree on that, feel free - i would love to hear your views on this)

well...i think i should end my ramblings here and get some sleep...

this weekend some family friends come to visit me. they were directors of the camp i went to since i was little. then they moved to kansas and he was my boss when i worked at a lumber yard during my hesston days. so basically i know this couple and their kids really well. they came saturday afternoon and left a little bit ago, so we didn't have all that much time to talk. but it was still extremely fun times! we had lots of laughs, "remember the time when..." 's, and other excerpts from my 22 years of memories!

i realized how much i miss reminiscing about memories made more than 1.5 years ago. i sometimes talk about past memories with old friends and family, but there's just something about having a whole evening (including 2-3 hrs of talking at the jalepeno tree) to remember the years past. the stories just keep on flowing and you continuously remember things that you had forgotten about. i'll be up later than usual tonight finishing homework, but i would never trade the sleep for the fun i had this weekend!

thursday night

thursday night was wonderful! at 10.30 my roommate and i went over to our brother floor. a family of one of the 41ers was in their lounge chatting with some of the guys. his mother started telling stories and, before long, a whole bunch of guys and us 2 were surrounding her. usually when parents tell stories in this setting, they are embarrassing ones. but these were the kind that the guy was chipping in with snipits that she had forgotten. she mainly told about all the things he built as a child - a clothes dryer, humidifier, smokehouse, boats, timer with a siren to remind him to take out the trash, etc. it was extremely entertaining!!

then we went back to do some homework. at 1.00 a bunch of us g2ers brought cupcakes to 41 for Single Awareness Day. we stayed there for about 1/2 hr talking to the guys. there were lots of laughs and lots of pics. :) a few of us were talking to 1 of the guys about the story behind his nickname. he said he didn't really have an interesting story behind it. one of us mentioned that was really too bad. i said that it's really cool to have a good story. he was like, 'what is the story behind your's zippy?' out of the blue, becky said 'story time with zippy!' and sat on the floor in front of me. like a graceful domino effect, everyone else followed her lead. before i knew it, they were all sitting cross-legged waiting for my 'story.' i was laughing so hard that i had to wipe the tears from my eyes before i could begin. they all listened attentively and clapped when i was finished. it will definitely be a night to remember!

thanks 41 and g2 for all the memories, past and present!!

for the last few days my brain has been running in safe mode (important components weren't accessable) with intermittent freezes and blue screens of death even then. i guess sleep deprivation will do that to a person. after a long nap earlier today, i'm much better. :)

one of my goals for this semester was to try harder to live a balanced life. i haven't done too bad thus far. last semester i played way too much solitare, hung out with people quite a bit, and didn't get any sleep. i'm alot busier now, so it's very necessary to prioritize my time better. i haven't played any solitare and i do more of my homework during the day. i haven't even been doing too bad with getting enough sleep, except this week...

while i've done well with my goal, i've been wondering if it needs to be adjusted. i haven't had as many conversations that really make me think about life, God, and my beliefs...i had those all the time last semester (which was a major reason of why i didn't get any sleep). so in a sense, this semester i'm focusing more on immediate things (homework, sleep, etc) and less on what's eternally important - if i try harder to take care of myself i'll be in a better mood and be able to function better, but won't necessarily be focusing as much on the people around me. in another sense, the better i do in my classes, the better i will be at my job after graduation (theoretically anyways), which will make me a better witness then. i wish there was a specific formula i could follow to find the exact balance, but alas...

more bloggers!!

3 bloggers have recently joined in the fun. they're all fairly interesting as far as i can tell. check out what my roommate and schooby have to say. i really want to mention another one, but he wants to remain nameless at this point...hopefully not for long cause he has some really thoughtful things to say...

not enough sleep

i am the type of person that doesn't do my homework as soon as its assigned (i know not many of us do, but i'm noticing more and more of these unusual people). i calculate about how long it will take to complete what needs to be done and fill in the time up to that point with visiting people or simply wasting time. i wouldn't say that i procrastinate as most people define it. i start my papers, programs, and other non-daily assignments at least 1 or 2 weekends before they are due. so i guess i'm kinda in the middle of the "procrastination spectrum." in the last 2 years of college, my calculations have grown to be off enough that i don't ever get near enough sleep (b/c normally i stay up until everything's done for the next day). i came to the realization this week that no matter how much i have to do, i will never finish everything and get enough sleep. and by "enough" i don't mean as much as i desire, but enough to function on.

this is very discouraging. i know it is in my power to fix, but my mindset will have to be totally converted to a very different part of the spectrum of procrastination. it is possible, but...........

i wish i could graduate from the questions.

it seems like i've been struggling with the same questions for a few years now. i've made some progress, but don't have many more answers than when i started. the art of forgiveness, miracles vs. coincidences (is there even such thing as a coincidence??), patriotism, pacifism, war in general - these kinds of things. i like to have straight-forward answers...maybe that's my problem. with forgiveness, i wish i could have a list of sequential steps that i need to go through. i want to complete each step before proceeding to the next. when i reach the end of the list, i don't want to have to think about it again because the process should be complete.

this week i had an unexpected, 2-hr conversation with a member of administration. the person was asking a random question and was going to share the answers with the RA's or chaplains or some other group like that. i gave an answer and then we just started talking about random topics that come up in our lives and questions we have been struggling with. (i couldn't believe how many questions we are both attempting to answer!!) one of the things brought up was that of the complaints that consistently show up on evaluations of retreats. our student leaders want black-and-white answers. they want to be told exactly what they have to do to accomplish their tasks as leaders on this campus. the intent of these retreats, i am told, is to train them spiritually for the tasks at hand and to get them to wrestle with questions. the point is to provide support in their quests, but not necessarily straight-forward answers.

i wonder if this is drastically different than other, less-technical universities. as programmers, engineers, pilots, and other technically-minded people, we are often given a step-by-step procedure of how to accomplish our tasks or calculate the desired answers. my professors often use the phrase "the standard operating proceedure is: ...." because of this, have we trained ourselves to always have this mindset? or maybe it simply comes naturally - and that is why we're in the particular field of study in the first place. i am also told that people in the "non-technical" majors also want black-and-white answers. so does this mean that we, as a particular age group or as college students, naturally want cut-and-dried answers? or are the technically-minded people rubbing off on the rest? the administration is primarily non-technical - so is this the main reason they notice it after every retreat?

"we are more like adolf hitler than we are like Jesus Christ." --c.s. lewis

this week in class, dr. graff was talking about the sin in our lives and he gave the above quote that really made me think. we strive to be like Jesus, but at the end of the day we have acted more like this repulsive murderer than like Christ. we may think about our sins more and maybe even feel guilty about committing them, but we don’t sin significantly less than non-christians. something that i read for prophets today gave me even less encouragement..."can the ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots? neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil" --jeremiah 13.23. this is something that God said - not a foolish human. interesting...

things that helped me thru this week:

~honey butter popcorn
~loud music
~taco bell
~digital cameras
~2 alarms and a roommate to wake me
~im
~cat-naps during class
~programming parties with friends
~the hive
~my roommate's cooking and encouragement
~outlook reminders
~a spontaneous 2-hr conversation about letourneau, spirituality, patriotism, denominations, pride, and other thoughts on life
~laptops
~hot showers

i didn't spend much time with God specifically, but He sure made His presence known thru these things, which were all unexpectedly refreshing.

i was regretting the past and fearing the future.
suddenly the Lord was speaking: "my name is I am"
He paused. i waited.
He continued, "When you live in the past with its mistakes and regrets, it is hard. I am not there.
My name is not I WAS.
when you live in the future, with its problems and fears, it is hard. I am not there.
My name is not I WILL BE.
when you live in this moment, it is not hard. I am here.
My name is I AM. --helen mallicoat

i made it thru the terrible part of my week! everything went decent and i even got a few hours of sleep each night!

one of my favorite parts of working in IT is that i get to go into offices and see all of the encouraging sayings, Bible verses, and pictures that each staff-member has in their cubicle / office. last semester i was in the registrar's office and i was struck by a card someone had on her monitor (the quote above is what was on it). i commented that i liked the card, so she went and made a copy for me! so now it's on my monitor...

two weeks ago, i needed to pick up the director of long-distance learning's computer. while he was finishing up some emails, i had a chance to look around his office. he had a painting on the wall by jean leon geromewhich which was titled the christian maryrs' last prayer. in it, a group of white-robbed Christians were praying in the coliseum in ancient rome. in the corner of the painting, lions were being let out to devour them. yet, the praying men appeared to be full of peace. it is a surprisingly bright picture; it's almost cheerful! i mentioned that i really liked the painting and he started sharing with me about some of the history of the martyring of Christians in the coliseum. he told me the reason rome stopped this practice was not because the people weren't entertained by it anymore, it was because Christians started having such an impact on roman culture. Christianity was spreading so fast and influencing rome so much that they were basically forced to stop it. they realized they weren't killing from a small minority anymore - it was quickly becoming a majority!

"and i reach out and i touch You and i know that i need You
to reach out and to touch me and i know
i know that i need Your touch" --kutless

because of the insane amounts of homework, presentations, and tests this week, i won't be blogging until at least thursday. just thought i would let you all know...

i realized last week that i get more out of deep conversations than anything else at college. i would venture to say (tho i'm probably wrong) that perhaps college is the only place to have spontaneous talks as we do here on a regular basis. i can learn academics on my own or online - classes definitely help with this, but aren't absolutely necessary. the social interaction i once thought was unique to dorm life can be experienced in other settings, tho i can't think of any off the top of my head. is it possible to have spontaneous, deep conversations with random individuals in a place other than a college setting? i hope so, but can't come up with any at the moment.

highlights for me:
~many 4+-hour online chats my 1st year of college with someone i have known for years, but never really talked to. we discussed God, how He relates to the cause of our suffering, and how we should deal with it.

~a 4-hour talk my 2nd year of school about friends, our struggles, life asperations, guys, and God.

~on the way to hcjb last spring break, i drove the 4-8 am shift. the only other girl on the trip kept me awake while we talked about our dreams, what God had been doing in our lives, and where we thought He was leading us.

~last spring while hanging out in a friends' room, i began talking to her roommate. we eventually started reading the Bible together and praying for each other. she has become a wonderful encouragement for me with my walk with God.

~this summer, on a weekend trip to arlington, i had a 1-hour chat (it would have been longer, but our trip ended) with a friend i had hung out with alot, but never really had a real conversation with. i don't remember what we talked about specifically, but it did make a huge impression on me.

~also this summer, i had the opportunity to take a friend home with me. we had some really memorable discussions about the passions God has given us.

~last weekend, i had a 3-hour conversation with a floormate i've never really talked to about how God has been working in our lives.

~of course, i have had a countless number of these memorable conversations with my 4 roommates throughout my years of college (95% of which occur when we are both in dire need of sleep).

this list may not have interested you, but i write this to express my appreciation to all of you who are willing to open yourself up to those of us who aren't necessarily that close to you. i wish i could relate to you how much i have benefited from these, but don't have the words...

"it's a beautiful day; don't let it get away." -u2

behind the nickname

i realize that many of you don't know the story behind my nickname, so i thought i'd fill you all in tonight. during the 1st week of classes each fall, the members of g2 get together to pick floor nicknames. when it was my turn, i didn't really know what to share that would inspire a good one. i liked to play snood, so that was almost picked. after a few minutes of not getting anywhere, people just started throwing out ideas. i went to hesston college...that reminded someone of charlton heston. in ten commandments, he played moses. (that was almost selected as my name) moses' wife's name is zipporah, so they all decided on zippy. with time, some started calling me zipporah hesston. then one day, i was eating with a good friend and she randomly called me zippy jean. so my full name is zipporah jean hesston.