Cavernous, art deco coffee shop in what once was a car dealership. free wifi, open til midnight, no overwhelming music. stupid name. pretty great.

…stupid Dilbert cartoon.

Today was a good day. I uprooted a wart that has been waxing and waning on my finger for the past six months. After several different methods of removal, I decided to try the straight application of salicylic acid. That treatment started two days ago. The bottle, being a puny entity, suggested a single drop be applied twice a day and proceeded to claim it would be a journey of about five weeks.

That is all well and good, but what of the microwave generation that wishes the fungi removed about 4.7 weeks sooner?

Needless to say I drowned the wart in acid like a drunkard drowns his sorrows–straight, for two days, and to the disregard of loved ones’ behests.

By this evening, the infected area had softened up. Probably not anywhere near enough to remove even the top-most epidermal layer, but since when has raw meat not-yet-ready to be partaken of really stood in my way? So, I grabbed my trusty pin needle and pair of tweezer and set to poke-tweeze-repeat mode.

I hurt. I bled. I got light-headed. I physically removed all empirical traces of the wart.

I now have a crater in my finger reminiscent of high-altitude photographs of strip mines. It’s a lack I love. I would do it all over again if I had the chance–masochistic satisfaction, friends. In fact, I cherish the moment so much, I chose to continue it and even memorialize it through a little something I like to call art.

May have found something strange enough to merit your looking at. You decide.
Strange. Very strange indeed. I am beginning to really dislike OU. I received this in my inbox this morning.

OUTSTANDING STUDENT FATHER SCHOLARSHIPAll undergraduate student fathers who are currently enrolled in at least 12 hours and plan to enroll full-time for both the spring 2007 and fall 2007 semesters are eligible to apply for this award. Selection will be based on outstanding achievement in one or more of the following areas: academics, university and community involvement, leadership, service and honors and awards. Applications are due Wednesday, October 11, 2006. The selection committee will be composed of the executive officers of the OU Parents’ Association. The award includes recognition at the Parents’ Association Business Meeting on Friday, November 10, 2006 and carries a $1,000 ($500 per semester) cash award.

Okay… see if my morning time train of logic makes any sense whatsoever. I have no doubt there are some outstanding student fathers. I have no doubt some of them attend OU. I have no doubt some of them are wonderful fathers and still maintain a great GPA and have won awards. But I wonder why an award about how terrific a father one is includes outstanding achievement in: 1)academics 2)university and community involvment 3)leadership and 4)service and honors awards. I was in a sorority, I know how these things work, and to win these things in other competitive fields (I don’t know how tight the competition is in the student father field), you have to be really involved. I mean, to the point that you are going to meetings for leadership things at the very very least twice a week at night until things pick up and then you’ll be attending every night and doing countless hours of community service whilst keeping up your grades. Thus, amounting to having about a 60 to 80 hour a week job. This is entirely possible for a lot of people. Some people are simply wired like this. But I have to ask myself. . . How outstanding of a father are you really being if you are never home??? I wonder why the categories don’t read: 1)generally reads to his child 2)disciplines his child in love 3)has figured out a way to support his child financially 4)loves his child. Oh, right, because you can’t count those intagible things up on a computer.

I am simply a student wife and I find that immensely more difficult than my unmarried student state. I have all but abandoned various OU activities and general “student life” to devote more time to my new family life (I am still enrolled full time mind you, I simply don’t go to 5 clubs and if it is between talking something out with my husband that we have been fighting about and finishing a project or paper perfectly for the next day…. usually, we talk. And Clint is: potty trained, makes money, and cleans the house (to name a few in an entire slew of things he does for me). Hmmm….

It isn’t so much that there is a sholarship and award for it…. it is the categories that one must fulfill in order to win the award. BAH!

In class last week:

Professor: “The belief in predestination is an unstable worldview that the human mind simply will not come to terms with and has therefore died out in the world. “
Nicole’s reaction: . . . Silence.

What would you do? Anyone? I need help.

Let’s see. I’ve been breezing through college with a blessed full ride scholarship and parents who were more than willing to foot any extra bills, exactly like many people here at OU and exactly the opposite of a lot of others.

Today was a doozy. The first thing I saw this morning when I got up, pretty much, was an e-mail from the University of Oklahoma telling me ever so politely that my bill was up online and I could give it a happy peak if I wanted to see the not so happy damage. And damage there was indeed. I won’t go into specifics, but to me (and for our budget)…. this was a whole lot of money. Panic immediately ensued. The stream of consciousness thoughts: we can’t afford this, my parents have to pay for this, how crule of them not to, we need to be saving money, how will we ever be able to meet our budget/pear our budget down if I keep wasting our money, waste, yeah waste, this is a huge waste of money, I could be working full time and we could be making money instead of having to pay it out to someone, what will we do, oh dear…. depression.

I immediately called Clint. I am so lucky to get to talk to him pretty much whenever I want to during the day. He quickly assessed the situation, drenched any feelings of guilt with love through the gospel and assured me that everything is more than fine both pragmatically and emotionally. He is so wonderful.

But back to money. It is important to have a budget, it is important to save, it is important to be able to retire at some point in one’s life and to be able to serve your family by providing necessities and (some, not all) wants for them. But how much more important is it to know that God is Sovereign, that He will (and is) provide(ing) all our needs. How much more important is it to be a mom or dad or husband or wife or friend who isn’t at the office 18 hours a day?? I realize there are seasons of extraordinary buziness, of course. I have had these seasons, and I expect I will have more as will my husband. But (an illustration a friend and my husband often use to put things into perspective) when I’m on my death bed am I going to look back on my life and say, “Golly Moses, I really wish I would’ve spent more time making money.” Hmmm… I’d say no.

Again, work is important, responsibility is important, but money is not God. Keep praying that idols will be uncovered daily. It is a good thing. It is indeed.

Note: Both Clint’s parents and my parents are extraordinarily generous with us and any feelings of them needing to do more financially for us are completely unfounded and irrational… in case that wasn’t clear.

Clint and I recently went on a vacation/one year anniversary trip. First we headed to North Carolina where we were greeted by Matt Howell and we had the wonderful priveledge of spending a weekend with recent newlyweds, Matt and Kathryn. They were so generous to give the very large majority of their weekend to us (including taking time out for studying, relaxing, and getting ready for the coming week)! Everything was wonderful. It is great to be around friends who ask such great questions. I love to hear Clint answer questions from other people because I learn so much about him. Of course spending time alone as a couple is invaluable, but I think we don’t get enough really great interaction with other couples. Hearing what Matt and Kathryn had to say about the answers we were giving them and about their relationship was very thought provoking and helpful. Thank God for such honest, loving friends. These serious conversations juxtaposed with all the laughing and yucking it up, which seems to be inevitable when hanging out with the Howells, made for a pretty incredible weekend.

Next up, Russ and Katherine were so generous to meet us and take us back to Russ’s parents’ house. I cannot believe their generosity. You might know, they had been in India for a month, flew back for Katherine’s father’s wedding, drove to South Carolina to hang out with family and friends and do work, and in the midst of all of this they took time out to pick us up and host us. Wow. We had a wonderful time with the Edwards as well. Russ was our guide/driver up into the mountains where we slid down a big rock. I didn’t go the first time because the water was so freezing, but when I thought about the shame it would bring to my brother if I didn’t slide I decided I’d best go. It was fun and freezing. My brother will be proud.

Next up, we stopped in Chapel Hill, North Carolina in our rental car that I drove the whole entire way to see my cousin, Brooke, who is there getting her Ph.D. We got to see the lab where she works and even got to see a strand of something do something when injected with something – pretty cool. It was great to see her and to catch up on family news.

We ended our trip in Washington D.C. where we stayed with Clint’s sister. She was our tour guide/driver all over D.C. which was very helpful. We saw art and monuments. Hooray for free admission to most things in D.C. The first night we were there we had our first anniversary dinner on the roof or top floor of Hotel Washinton, we sat in the open air looking over the White House and the Washington Monument as the sun set. It was lovely. I’m glad I was eating there with Clint and that we were celebrating one year of being married. I can’t even imagine how horrible it would have been to have waited until this summer to get married. We went to the aquarium in Baltimore the next day and saw sea horses and sharks and frogs and bats and lots and lots of other things. I recommend acquariums. Then I got to meet Chris Earls, who is kind of an adopted family member, on Clint’s dad’s side of the family.

As most of you know, we made it home without anyone blowing up the plane fortunately. And I look forward to starting another year of married life together. Hooray.

Have you ever considered how unnecessarily noisy software is on television shows and movies? Many a year ago, I had to watch three consecutive hours of television and documenting station breaks, commercials, promos, and so on for a broadcast class. The third hour had me watching CSI–don’t ask me which city or country, as I don’t care. For those unfamiliar, CSI follows decades of TV police dramas. Anyhow, I remember not enjoying it. But, I thought it extremely funny how many bleeps and bloops the investigators’ software made.

Zoom in on a fingerprint = whoosh
Scan a hair sample = long, ascending beep
Enter key = blip

Apparently the CSI labs across the nation are just big, cacophonous, concentration-destroying workplaces. But, perhaps the low, blue lighting, the stylish glass walls, all the beautiful 20-40-somethings, and the numerous big-screen monitors, all of which seem to be commonplace with the laboratories and headquarters in the modern police drama, would make up for the unnecessary computer noise.

Ever since seeing that CSI, I have noticed that almost all movies and tv programs cannot resist the noisy software. Perhaps there is a media heritage to all this. Think back to 50’s and 60’s sci-fi for a moment. Do you not conjure up images of noisy supercomputers with huge panels with expanses of back-lit buttons, flashing randomly? How about all of those analogue beeps and blips? It’s all the same–just digital nowadays.

There are actually companies “out there” that are contracted to create the fake software for TV and film. It makes you wonder if the computers at these companies have OS’s that are cram-packed with these noises bound to every keystroke.

And, on a sidenote, how about the send/receive noises on instant messaging programs? Who in the hell thought it a good idea to make that default to the program? Vomit.

Someone (Josh Spears? Ryan Brown? Norman Maynard?) once told me that one of the professors they knew had all their keys (on their keyboard) bound to noises extracted from one of the keyboard-like interfaces on the U.S.S. Enterprise. Having to work within an audible vicinity would fast get my foot into a noisy, head-kicking mood.