Wacky Wednesday!

7:00 AM: KNOCK! KNOCK! KNOCK! A strange old man hand delivers my car tags. States that they were in his mailbox two weeks ago and that he had come by every day since at different times trying to catch me. I was never home, go figure.

8:00 AM: Drive to work through clouds. No really, there were clouds--everywhere!

8:30 AM: Thank Jesus for the breathtaking sight as I top a hill with valleys on both sides with the end of the clouds also in view, floating over the valleys like a canopy of cotton.

9:15 AM: Nonverbal client throws glasses in floor in an attempt to tell me he's mad that I asked him to sit back down so he wouldn't fall.

10:20 AM: Very verbal client tells me that the reason he had to come to the nursing home was this: he'd heard that I worked there and that the torture of speech therapy was actually "quite pleasurable torture".

11:00 AM: Client with developmental disability beats me at Scrabble even though I played the longest word: "blouse".

12:30 PM: Coworker comes into breakroom and threatens to stab me with fork if I eat his food. Then tells me I am allowed one spoonful of his potatoes if I replace it with cheese from my macaroni.

1:55 PM: Client tells me that he hates to break it to me, but there's no way I'll get him to function like he did when he was 30. Then, he proceeds to be the first client I've had at this facility who thanks me for all my hard work and dedication to his well-being.

4:30 PM: Nursing home resident at another place stops me in the hall and tells me I'm a sweetheart and need to be the speech therapist seeing her neice. Said resident was a client of mine when I was a student and refused therapy 3 times in a row.

5:00 PM: Long term client who I have grown very fond of gets swallow study results back--YAY! Diet upgrade to more "real" food/drinks! WOOHOO!

6:30 PM: Run around like a blindfolded turkey on Thanksgiving  morning in preparation for the evening's Awana meeting while trying to read over my lines for the message time lesson.

6:45 PM: Try to compose myself as the Sparks director walks in disguised as "Professor Spark"--complete with lab coat and spiky hair.

9:00 PM: Drive home with a smile on my face and a heart full of love for the darling little Sparkies I have been blessed to get to know.

Once Upon a Day So Dreary...

...I found myself quite ridiculously cheery!

Today was the dreaded day: Comprehensive Exams. All that studying (err, reading to refresh the mind) paid off. Or maybe it was the nearly 6 years I've put into my studies in this intriguing field of speech-language pathology. However it was, those tests were not difficult and I breezed through them. I don't think this is a false confidence (though it could turn out as such!). I felt quite smart as I finished up and walked out of that auditorium.

Thank you, Jesus, for being with me through these years.

Last nigth in Perspectives, the speaker mentioned how the secular education/training some people receive IS their seminary. It's their training for a higher calling. God heals the whole person--their physical needs as well as their spiritual and emotional ones. He calls people to medical ministries, to become teachers, to even become lawyers (I guess! hehe) for His higher purpose. We can use the gifts He has blessed us with to help someone else and bring Him glory!

Isn't that just...AMAZING? I sure think so!

In other news today, my landlord came out to check on me because my neighbor was worried. Apparently, 3 hours ago I opened my car door and finally took my carpet shampooer out. Only, I left the shampooer by the car AND LEFT THE DOOR WIDE OPEN. I would be worried if I saw that in my neighbor's yard, too, for three whole hours. And if I knocked on her door and she didn't respond (I was in the shower).
Poor Mrs. H, she was so worried about me and I was completely oblivious to the pain I had caused everyone just by my careless memory lapse!

Dry Snow!

As many people know, Arkansans seldom see real snow--the kind that covers the ground completely, like a huge white sheet of fluffy whiteness.
2011 has shown us a much different side of winter. Instead of our one or two small snowfalls, nixed with sleet and icy danger this winter, Arkansas has received quite a bit of actual SNOWFALL--and little of anything else these past few weeks. Of course, overnight the temperatures have frozen the slushy roads, but that's so much different than having sleet crash down and coat the whole of our grasses with their slippery, dangerous--yet beautiful--iciness. So I don't really know how else to describe it, okay?

I was up into the wee hours of the morning finishing off a Jane Austen novel, so my eyes did not transition to wakefulness until about 11:00 this morning. And when they did, boy, was I in for a surprise! I opened the back door to take Stella out for her morning walk only to find myself in the prettiest white wonderland I've ever experienced. Yes, it was breathtaking. I knew it was going to snow, but somehow assumed we'd miss the bulk of it and just get a few wet flurries that aren't all that fabulous. But no, this was no "few wet flurries." THIS was the real deal. I tried to ball up a snowball to throw at Stella (not out of cruelty--she absolutely loves to chase and smash them), but the snow just wouldn't stay together. Then I thought I'd try to make snow ice cream, but remembered I don't have any eggs. What a shame 'cause there's enough snow to go around!
So the snow is beautiful. We have at leat 6-8 inches here. However, it is completely useless. Except for snow angels. And spotting Stella's messes for easier backyard cleanup. Though I did enjoy nearly falling over in the deep stuff trying to run like they do in the movies...and helping a neighbor clean piles of snow off of her car. Yeah, that was pretty fun.

Otherwise, I've been stuck in this house doing schoolwork and trying to find out our exact snowfall accumulations (no thanks to google, weather channel.com, katv.com, or fox16.com...pretty much nobody cares how much snow was dumped on Conway!)

With no snowballs or snow ice cream, I'm pretty much set that I prefer functionality to beauty in the case of snow.

Well, I did enjoy making that snow angel and being able to walk around without soaking myself to the skin with wetness. So there is some good in it.

Best of all was the neighbor. Who knew some of the kindest people out there live right around the corner. Or across the street. Everyone should take the time to get to know their neighbors.

I'm done rambling for the day. Tune in next time to hear me ramble on about some other non-important topic. :) Or don't. It's ultimately your choice. :) :)