yeah it's been a while since my last  post so i thought i'd do the update thing.

things are pretty good. just got midterms over with last week and i'm starting to work on my final papers; i have three of them and they'll all be around 20 pages. i've never written one paper that's 20 pages let alone 3 of them. i'm finishing up my research and have started typing and i think i'll be otay. other than that i'm just reading like crazy still.

work has been good. we had a couple of crazy people come in last week, which is something i'm gonna have to get used too. i guess crazy people always seem to find their way to the building at some point in time. one might call it a crazy people magnet. last week on thursday we had a guy come in asking me if we had anything with our address on it and as i was getting him something he continued to ask me if i knew who cleetus(?) something was. i said i didn't really know and then he just blew up. apparently this cleetus guy is a bad man and we should kick him out 'cause that's what the guy started yelling in various phrases as he left the building. then, this lady comes in and the other guy i'm working with comes over to me and says that we got another one. when he asked her a question about the tour she responded, "they're all dead". yeah, crazy, i know. so he gave her a quick tour inside the atrium and then politely showed her outside. i guess that's what you should expect when working at a scottish rite temple.

church has been great. the preaching is awesome and the people there have been very welcoming. rob and i have been able to meet a lot of people and we just had our membership interviews last week.(in order to be a member of the church that ask you a couple of things and just make sure that you are in fact a Christian). a lot of the people there also have really cool jobs. i've talked to people who have worked in the state dept., the IMF, International Justice Mission and this conflict resolution group called Concordis International, it's been awesome.

anyway, i'm flying home for thanksgiving and might even be in columbia for the mu vs. ku game. if that works out i'll try and post something here and if you happen to be in the area we will hang. later.

so these recent weekends have kept me pretty busy. the weekend before this last weekend i flew to st. louis for my sister's welcome back from iraq party. it was good to actually see her safe and sound. the party was a little crazy. i have to say i was cutting a little rug all night long and playing a lot of trash can frisbee. we stayed up until about 2am central time, and i had to be at lambert by seven or so for my flight that left at 8:15am on sunday. i actually rode to the airport on the back of my mom's south african male-friend's motorcycle. it was pretty cool. so i get back to arlington by way of amtrak and metro and do the normal week thing while trying to cram in all the reading that i didn't get done over the weekend. also, during the week rob and i were able to hang out with dave wyatt who was in town for a couple of days.

then this past weekend rob and i woke up about 6:00am or so to get me to dulles airport for my flight to minneapolis that left at 8:35am. in lacrosse, wi my uncle was going to be named festmaster of oktoberfest. it was a huge deal so a lot of family was going to be there, so i had to go. so i arrive at minneapolis and had to wait around for my brother who was flying in from detroit. as i'm waiting i decide to go to the starbucks that's there and get something. as i'm cashing out i notice that somebody had invaded my personal space perimeter. i look over and this girls says to me, "do you know who i am?" and i did happen to know her, it was amber berger. she and vernon were going to the piper conference that was going on that weekend in minneapolis. so i got to catch up with them and tell them about what's going on with school and stuff and they told me about life in texas. it was an unexpected surprise for sure.

so anyway, i get to wisconsin and after going to the mall and buying dress clothes for the ball, which i didn't know i was supposed to have, we head to the festmaster's ball. there was about 500 people in this convention center all dressed up in either real nice clothes or liederhausen (sp). so they announced my uncle as festmaster and he gave a speech to the whole crowd. at one point in the speech he acknowledged my sister had just gotten back. he went on to say that all of the 6 collins brothers were enlisted men during the vietnam war, and commented that it took a female collins to be an officer. he then asked all the former enlisted men in the room to stand up and salute my sister. it was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. people rangeing from their 20s to their 80s, those who had served in the current war and those that had served in WWII stood up and saluted my sister. it was awesome, the whole place went nuts as did we.

afterwards they had a band and we did a little bit of dancing and partrying that night. i think we finally got to bed around 3am. we got up the next morning and went to the parade which lasted for a few hours. at around 11am my relatives started drinking again, they're insane. so i hung out with them all day pretty much. we went to the fest grounds and saw a couple of live bands. the best one was an 80s throwback band called Brat Pack Radio. they played every quintessential song of the 80s, it was awesome. so i got back to my cousin's house about 1am or so and then woke up about 8am so giff, my brother, and i could make our flights back.

it's been a couple of jam packed weekends with another one on the way. this weekend rob and i are heading to va beach with our church for a college/intern retreat. hopefully i can get all my reading done for class in the mean time.

ok, quick post. rob and i went to a ben harper concert and it was really good. lot's of people and lot's of pot smoking.

i just started my job today working at the Supreme Council of Scottish Rite of Free Masonry for the Southern Jurisdiction (www.scottishrite.org). i answer phones and sometimes give tours of the building. anyway, hope all is going well with everyone, will talk later. peace.

so i thought i should make a post due to the fact that i'm typing from the floor in my plush apt. in arlington. the kitchen is a little bit smaller than i expected but in all the apt. will work out nicely. there are a lot of nails that stick out through the carpet so walking around barefoot can be treacherous. rob and i went to target tonight and bought a lot of the stuff that we needed for a functional apt\artment. you know, stuff like t.p. and hand soap.

when we were leaving we were stopped by a lady asking for some money, which happens quite often out here more often than i thought. rob gave her some money and said God bless and we'll be praying for ya, i think her name was santina. i noticed while she was talking to us that she had cuts on her forearm and she kept scratching the inside of her elbow. i don't know if she did drugs and the money would only be used to serve that purpose, but she was deffinitely a person that was strung out by life. whether that be due to circumstances or the inevitable search of every person to find a purpose and joy in life, she was deffinitely a person that was in desperate need of Christ. it just reminded me that things in this world are temporary and never fully staisfy. do all the drugs you want, drink all the booze you want, your heart will still feel empty and lacking. even if somebody helped all the santina's in the world, what's the point if there is no God, no heaven. moving out here to dc has started me thinking about many things about God and where i'm heading. it's been good. and being with rob is working out really well. we've pretty much made it ok to convey any random thought at any time to each other and debate the substance of each question we have. it's been really good. i just hope that we can continue during classes, when things start getting busier. anyway, this post is entirely too long. perhaps there will be more thoughts later.  

so here are the plans as of yesterday.

today, thursday, i will be heading down to columbia and staying there until sat. probably. while down there rob and i will be taking our stuff to a place in columbia that will then move it to arlington for us. then we'll both leave on sat. and meet up again in columbia on the 17th in which case we will drive to louisville and stay with jess for the night and then continue to arlington the next day. we'll arrive on the 19th and my classes start on the 21st, so i'm looking forward to that.

anyway, just wanted to let you guys know i was going to be in como tonight. as of now i'm planning on going to beth's thing tonight and maybe doing a supper thing on friday. let me know if you want to hang. also, still looking for a place to stay those nights, just thought i might throw that out there.

anyway, take care all you crazy kats.