New Addition.

So this past Friday I got my first (and probably last) tattoo. My best friend Laura drove with me up to Lancaster to go to the parlor I wanted to get it at as they are Christian based and ridiculously friendly. She really wanted to be there for it so we made a road trip out of it. I was extremely nervous but they were so nice to me, mainly through sarcasm which, if anyone knows me they know this is the true way to my heart lol. So I was very comfortable there and it ended up not hurting nearly as much as I thought it would. It hurts more after that during because it's like a horrible sunburn. But I absolutely love love love it. It couldn't be more perfect. Thankfully I haven't encountered much negativity about getting it, even grandpa approved! So that's been nice. Well that is basically it!

Money Money Money... sigh.

I'm feeling a little discouraged, and also strangely empowered right now. I just came from a Peer Minister meeting with LCM and we got some pretty grave news. Basically regardless of whether or not we pass the Quadrennial Review I mentioned previously, the Lutheran church simply does not have money to give us. We pretty much have the option of throwing in the towel and saying that's it LCM is done, or doing everything within our power to find funding. We need some way to get around $6,000 per month. Pastor Dan is incredibly committed to making this work, and we all decided that so are we. So now we need to start going to everyone we can, other churches, foundations, corporations, absolutely anyone and anywhere, to get money to keep going. Our budget goes to the end of the year but in the mean time we need to get going. We are looking at this as a challenge to prove our faith, and we know God will get us through it. This is just a push to reach out. So we are reaching, as far as we can. If anyone has any ideas at all, or would be willing to talk to their church about either contributing or making an announcement to their congregations to ask for donations to LCM@USC, please please please let me know and I can give you information about what we do and anything, I can even come make an announcement, seriously anything. This is not just to Lutherans, we do a lot of ecumenical (interfaith) work, and we are more or less just a Christian fellowship so if you are not Lutheran don't count yourself out. We can use some help right now. If nothing else, at least send us your prayers.

The Ride Begins.

Hey hey hey! So I like to think of semesters as roller coasters (oh yes, I'm going all metaphorical on your ass; although if you want to get technical... it's a simile). They start off all slow and nice and you see the syllabus full of all the stuff you will eventually have to do which leads you up the big hill. Then you get to the top and you better freakin' hold on because once it goes over that peak it just does not stop until the end. Well my friends... I'm at the top, so here we go! I have a midterm tomorrow, a book critique due next Friday, a paper due the following Thursday, another paper due the next Tuesday... and it just keeps going. The worst part about it is that once you get to that point, it all goes by SO FAST because you are always working on something and waiting for the next deadline. Dear time, can you just chill for a while? Like what's the rush? Slow down.

In other news, I've been selling Girl Scout Cookies for my little cousin Marin. In a week and a half I sold 96 boxes for her. I should get like an honorary Girl Scout patch or something. My aunt Maya is coming down on Sunday to drop them off and we are all anxiously anticipating the delivery of these cookies. (I'm also doing my best to get my football friend, Devon Kennard, to come over while they are here to meet my cousin Shane who idolizes these guys. Devon is more than willing to do it, he's a super amazing guy, but he has to drop friends off at the airport and doesn't know what time he'll be back. Cross your fingers.)

Pastor Dan is in Oregon this week for a conference thing... I really have no idea actually. All I know is that he left us Peer and Prayer Ministers in charge of making our lounge look beautiful for our Quadrennial Review on Monday which is pretty much some really important people from the Lutheran Church coming to see what we have been doing for the past four years, how we've grown, etc, and deciding whether or not to continue our funding so that our group can still exist. So it's kind of a big deal. If we don't impress them, LCM@USC dies. AND HE LEFT US IN CHARGE! What was he thinking? So we (pretty much 5 of us) are frantically trying to make something nice of this mess of a lounge we have. Sunday night (leave it to college kids to be last minute) we are making collages out of pictures we've taken of events we've had and stuff then rushing over there to put them up. Problem is that none of us have the picture files; Pastor Dan does and he is in Oregon! It's just pure chaos. God, please help us!