Downton Abbey strikes again...

Several of you are aware of my particular fondness of Julian Fellowes' period drama "Downton Abbey."

Well, it's back for a fourth season, so emotions will be running high for the next 3 months or so.

Bear with me, folks.

To clarify, there will be absolutely nothing spoiled for anyone. I am aware that it doesn't air in the US until January, but it's currently being aired in the UK (and let's face it...the really desperate fans watch it as soon as it airs, no matter which country they live in. Where there's a will there's a way, I always say.)

Anyways, I will never provide details.
But there's no possible way to keep such intense emotions bottled inside one human soul, sooooo....

In short, here's my reaction to the most recent episode in the form of a GIF:

There, I did it. I released a little bit of my frustration with absolutely no spoilers. I'll just say that I was a little bit very extremely angered by what occurred in the episode.

I shall leave you with an open letter to a particular character who shall remain nameless....

(Come on, at least I was vague...)

Awesome Vocal Impressions

I saw this video on facebook a couple weeks back and thought it was fantastic. So, here I am, sharing it with all of you on my blog. :) Enjoy!

(This lady is a broadway singer named Christina Bianco, by the way. Her impressions of Zooey Deschanel and Julie Andrews are my favorites. :)

Healthy Dessert, Lychee Nuts, and Lizzie Bennet

Right now I'm eating gluten-free cookies and 100% organic (like grass-fed cows and all that) chocolate milk for dessert. Super healthy diet FTDUBS.

Which brings me to my next bit of exciting news...I'm rewatching the Lizzie Bennet Diaries!

What are the Lizzie Bennet Diaries, you may ask? Well, first of all it's a shame that you would have to ask such a question...
Secondly, they are a web video series which puts a modern spin on the classic story of Pride and Prejudice. The entire story is on Youtube...soooo go take a gander.

WARNING: The Lizzie Bennet Diaries consist of one hundred 3-5 minute videos. You WILL catch yourself saying, "I'll just watch one more..."

Seriously though, it's amazing how accurately they portray the original story and characters while still maintaining the "this could actually happen in today's world" feel. The creators are geniuses.
(also, Lydia Bennet says "FTDUBS" a lot in the series. So that's why it sorta popped up out of the blue at the start of this post...)

Okay. So back to the dessert. The reason I'm eating such healthy stuff is because my siblings and I went to the Dekalb Farmers Market in Decatur today. That's where we bought the organic chocolate milk and we also got....

LYCHEE NUTS! :D

As in, like....

MOMO! AVATAR! Ringing any bells? (it's only my favorite TV series of all time...)

Anyway, this is what they look like in real life:

They taste pretty good. The white part is what we eat. It's really juicy and sweet, it just doesn't have a whole lot of flavor. It's kinda watery. That's okay though because it still makes me happy that we got to eat fruit from the Avatar world. :D

So that's all. Bye.

April 4, 2014

It's the most anticipated date of the upcoming year. It's when Captain America 2 comes out. 

That is all I have to say.

A Fond Farewell

Last month marked my 3-year anniversary working at Chick-fil-a. It's amazing how fast 3 years can fly by. Three years ago I was a baby 16-year-old who had just graduated high school. I had no idea what I was going to do with my life. I didn't really like to think about the future, I just wanted to live for the present. I was starting to get all of this responsibility and adult stuff thrown at me, and I didn't like it one bit.

Around that time I started to experience a lot of growth and maturing, both mentally and spiritually. God used several events and people to show me that He is greater and more worth knowing than anyone or anything else in existence.

The reason I'm getting all deep and emotional is because today is the last day I will ever be a teenager. That's right. Tomorrow I turn 20.

At Chick-fil-a we are taught a "system" to help us remember how to treat our customers. We greet them with a smile, make eye contact, be genuine in our enthusiasm, stay connected, and finally we offer them a fond farewell as they go out the door.

As I pause and turn around to look back at my teenage years on the eve of my twentieth birthday, I want to bid a fond farewell to some of the best, worst, and most confusing and frustrating times I have ever experienced, all of which has worked to shape and mold me according to God's perfect plan.

I'm not going to go into much detail about my high school years (honestly, who wants to hear about those times? Yikes...), but I will say that from 9th all the way through 12th grade I firmly believed I was better than every other person on the planet and that they were all greater sinners than I was. Whoever put that thought in my head, I have no idea. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, and I was a living testament to that.

I remember not being happy or content to stay that way though. I often would draw near to the Lord, then fall right back out of the habit of reading the Word and praying. It frustrated me so much that I couldn't just stay on the "good" side and justify my belief that I was a better Christian and overall better person than all of my peers.
Through a series of events and people and sermons and family talks which came at the perfect time, I am humbled and overjoyed to say that God's grace is greater than my sin and His mercy is unfathomable. If I were Him, I would have given up on me years ago. I still fall short so often, but He is so good to remind me Whose righteousness I stand upon.

One question which always puzzles me but never fails to be asked on my birthday is "So, how does it feel to be [insert age here]?" I don't think I've ever met someone who has woken up on their birthday and suddenly experienced a drastic change of feelings caused by their sudden increase in age. It's not like one whole year of aging is saved until your actual birthday. That would be weird and sort of awkward and would definitely result in some drastic changes.
Tomorrow I will only be one day older than I am today, and I don't think I'm going to feel much different than I do right now. My only hope is that I will wake up tomorrow more in love with the Lord and more in awe of His grace than I am today. I pray that as I keep growing one day older my desire to know Him and seek His kingdom will increase all the more.

I feel it is fitting to end this post with a praise song. I praise my Father in heaven for my teenage years, even though I wasted much of that time striving for useless things. I praise Him for showing me grace through my selfishness and for listening to the prayers of such a wretch as I.

So I bid a fond farewell to my years as a teen and look ahead to what the Lord has planned next. If He can do such great things in the span of 19 years, I can't imagine what lies ahead.

A New Addition...

We meet again, blog followers.

(Which is amazing since my average posts-per-day is like 0.00000000000000000000001)

Anyways, I am here to talk to you about a special person who has grown very dear to my heart during the course of this week. I don't believe I've met anyone quite like him. He's brave, loyal, self-sacrificial, clever, compassionate, honorable...yet he is not without fear and still has much to learn.

You have probably guessed by now that I am talking about the magnificent Horatio Hornblower.

Now many may claim that since I have only just finished watching the television adaptation of the original novels, I do not have the right to accurately judge Horatio's character until I have read the originals. Well, this afternoon I will be heading to the library to pick up the first installment, thank you very much. ;)

I am very eager to read the original Hornblower series to get to know this character more. C.S. Forester wrote eleven novels in the series and only a few of those stories made it into the A&E series on TV back in the late 1990s. I HIGHLY recommend that series, but I'm telling you now that it is addicting...just be sure to watch them when you don't have a lot of stuff to do (there are eight episodes, each about 90 minutes long). :D

Now you're probably wondering what the heck the stories are about.
It's set during the late 1700s/early 1800s when the French revolution was taking place. It follows the life of Horatio as he begins as a 17-year-old midshipman on a British naval ship and gains experience in the British navy, leading to his promotion to Commander as Napoleon Bonaparte instigates another war.

That's as far as the TV series goes, but there are more adventures and promotions chronicled in the book series.

If you aren't into British history or movies about ships and stuff, you may not like it. However, I'm not a huge fan of 18th century British wars or naval battles and I still loved it. The characters are just incredible. I almost wanted to cry when I realized I had finished watching the last episode. The company decided not to make anymore because it was too expensive, apparently. Pfft. Losers.

Anyways, enough summarizing of the story. Horatio is an incredible character. He's a war hero, but when he's out of his element he doesn't really know what he's doing. He often knows exactly what to do when unexpected situations arise, but sometimes takes risks to do what he believes to be right. He is absolutely, undoubtedly loyal to his duty as an officer, but that loyalty turns into a problem when other aspects of life require him to re-examine his priorities. He is handsome and an absolute gentleman, but lacks any sort of confidence when interacting with women (it's rather comical at times).

In short, Horatio has become one of my favorite fictional characters in a matter of 4 days. I can admit with certainty that he is a new addition to my list of fictional characters I could marry...

The List (in no particular order):

Matthew Crawley (Downton Abbey)

Mr. Knightley (Emma)

Aragorn (LOTR)

Steve Rogers (Captain America)

Faramir (LOTR)

Horatio Hornblower

I've probably forgotten a few in there, but you get the point. ;)

Summertime

Well, it's been a while since I posted anything. Sorry 'bout that...
The majority of my time between now and the last time I posted has been used for school finals and research papers. Since school ended about a month ago though, I have been working at Chick-fil-a about 20 hours a week. The rest of the time I've basically been watching Netflix. And reading a little. And going to Panama City.

Speaking of Panama City, we recently got back from a 3-day trip down there. It was sooooo lovely. I could have spent the whole month of May down there. We decided to get a condo this time and it was THE BOMB.

We were on the 22nd floor. That's second from the very top. It was pretty righteous. It also made me feel a bit queasy looking down from our balcony. The best part was that we could go down the elevator to the first floor and literally walk around a corner straight to the beach. The ocean was our front yard. (I'm not trying to make you jealous...really.)

I think my favorite part was walking down to the edge of the ocean at night and rubbing the sand until it sparked. My sister showed us how to rub the wet sand really fast, and something about the sun on the sand during the day made it spark at night when you rub it. I'm not sure why. Something about science. (I'm an English major. Sorry.)

My other favorite part was doing a Bible study one morning on our balcony. The constant, cool breeze and the rich words of the Bible were both physically and spiritually refreshing. I listened to some Chris Tomlin and Sovereign Grace while looking out at the vast ocean which our God holds in His hands. It was truly awesome and wonderful.

I started reading Sense and Sensibility while I was down there. I have made it to chapter 9 so far. If you know me at all, you will mark that as quite an accomplishment. I'm a very slow reader (and an English major....? That was a good life decision on my part).

I also started reading Because He Loves Me by Elyse Fitzpatrick. I'm so excited to get started on this book because several people have told me that they love it! My dear friend Kimmy (who also works with me at CFA) is going to go through it with me. I'll keep this blog updated with how that study is going as we continue through it.

My daily Bible readings recently got more frequent. During this last semester of school, I really slacked on doing any sort of daily devotionals. I kept telling myself that I would make up for it as soon as school was over because then I would have nothing to do and could spend more time on it. But when Summer finally hit I suddenly had all the time in the world and had no idea what to do with it (I'm sure some of you can relate to that as well). It was one of those times when I knew I could do so many things but couldn't decide which thing to do. Often times Bible reading was at the bottom of the list. Being at the beach away from home, away from social media (mostly), and away from work gave me a desire to sort of "begin anew" and use the time beneficially. That was when I started reading Because He Loves Me. At first I really didn't want to  read it and almost put it down because it was sort of boring, but God is faithful and His Word always has a way of convicting you of sin and re-kindling a desire for God and a hunger for the Word. It usually doesn't happen all at once for me, but after reading through some verses Elyse Fitzpatrick put in her book and praying to God I felt refreshed and excited about meditating on Him and His promises. It's pretty easy to be reminded of how amazing He is when there is a bright blue and green ocean stretched out in front of you with manta rays swimming in the clear, shallow water near the beach. (okay, maybe I'm trying to make you a little jealous....only a tiny bit. ;)

God is great and always faithful, even when I am faithless and fail to abide by His Word. Something I heard in a John Piper sermon recently was that we should not only read but SWIM in God's Word every single day. There is such richness and beautiful truth and comfort in those verses that I cannot express. It tells us how we can glorify God the most, and that is the best knowledge anyone can have. We were created for glorifying God, the ocean was created to glorify God, the trees and the sand and the sky were created to glorify God, and all the seasons (including summer) were created to glorify God. Remember and be encouraged, my friends. Use this summer to glorify our merciful God to the best of your ability. Don't get too caught up watching Netflix like I have. ;) Let's try to make the best possible use of our time.

In lieu of doing what I'm supposed to be doing...

I'm sitting here writing on my blog because I really don't want to write about African-American identity and how it is defined by the dominant white population...
Well, that and I actually have something to say.

I guess this means that I've had nothing to say for a while. I think it's been like a year since I last posted something on here (at least it feels that way). Honestly, I think I did have plenty of things to say. I was just too lazy to post them. :)

So since we last talked lots of things have happened and changes have occurred. I find bullet points to be helpful at times like these...

• Fall semester ended
• Christmas came and went
• New Year! Happy 2013 everyone. Hope it's been good so far. :)
• Passion 2013 in January
• My dad lost his job
• My dad got a new job a week later
• My dad just left that job and got another new job
• This means that we have to move from our current location to another location about 20 miles away
• I was promoted to Team Leader at CFA back in September
• My cousin is married and is expecting a baby boy in June
• My sister bought a new car two days ago and it works like a dream
• I am working as a private tutor for a 4th grader
• I will potentially be working as a tutor at my campus next semester
• I just got a job editing a book for publication
• Our church got a new youth pastor
• I am officially on youth staff (since January)
• I am very very close to having an English degree
• I still have a lot to do to obtain an Education degree
• Pollen is everywhere at the moment
• Spring semester is over in 3 weeks
• I am currently writing an essay for a class entitled "Studies in the American Novel" (hence the blog posting...)

So there we go. My life for the past few months in a bullet point list. I just got a sudden urge to finish writing my essay, so I'm off to conquer the last page and a half. I will return soon, I promise. :)

P.S. Oh! I forgot about one more change that's occurred in the past few months. My laptop decided to malfunction and now every time I push the "A" key this happens: a;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
The semicolons will go on forever and ever amen if I don't press another key. If I didn't ba;ckspa;ce a;ll of the semicolons every time I wrote a; sentence; this is wha;t it would look like. Delightful. Oh yeah, and the semicolon key no longer works.  (see? I pressed it and nothing appeared in that spa;ce. GA:;;H.)