Dimitri the Stud

This left me laughing ALL NIGHT!!!

The story is… a girl was out with friends having drinks in Toronto. This guy approaches her and won't leave her alone - saying how cute she is. She finally gives in and hands the guy her business card to get rid of him.

The attached is an MP3 file of not one, but TWO voicemails this guy left. This goes down in the history books - especially the second voice mail. After hearing them you can clearly see why she didn’t call him back – instead she called in to the Z103.5 morning show & had them play this on the air.

Getting down to business

Last month before the new school year begins...time certainly does fly!!

This week I'm busy setting up all my research for the fall. I have been submitting quite a few IRBs (which is a little overwhelming when I think that soon I'll actually have to implement all of those studies), overseeing my advisor's honor student, recruiting an army of research assistants for the studies I am running this fall, continuing to run the newlywed study, and looking into applying for funding in the fall.

Some exciting news: I'm connecting with one of the new grad students from Taiwan and we're in the beginning stages of writing up a possible study to run in Taiwan. If that pans out, there's a possibility I could apply for NSF travel funding to go to Taiwan next summer to conduct research there. Also, I'm looking into attending a conference in Israel next summer. I'm debating whether to take out another student loan to do this, because if I do go, I plan on staying for at least a week to tour the Holy Land.

In yoga, I'm trying to negotiate classes for the fall. Right now, my UT classes are staying the same, but my Saturday morning YY class is changing to "Vinyasa" rather than "Hatha Flow," and my afternoon class at YY is switching from Flow to an Ashtanga class of some sort. Still a lot of red tape to get through, but things are quickly falling into place...

Madly in Love with You

I thought I posted these lyrics awhile ago...I guess not. I've been listening to Sean McConnell's song nonstop the last few days. It is supposed to be God's love song to us.

See you down there everyday
Trying to find a different way
To build some kind of ladder to the sky

Trying to find some way to see
Secrets of eternity, and they don’t come all at once
And you don’t know why

How do you think it feels to hear you screaming out my name
While all the while I’m trying to open up your heart
See you when you cry yourself to sleep
It’s tearing me apart

I know you wish you could see me
That’s the way it has to be
Someday you will understand,
don’t you lose your faith in me

I know you wish you could hear me
Sometimes it’s so hard to do
But every morning sunrise says
I’m madly in love with you
Yes I’m madly in love with you
Yes I’m madly in love with you
Yes I’m madly in love with you

I know that you’re waiting for,
A chance to come in from the war
If only a moment, if only a day

A place where you feel safe and warm
A sanctuary from the storm
Until all of these questions fade away

But I cannot count on all the signs
You’ve passed away as mere coincidence
And I'm running out of ways to break through
Like a lonely lover, waiting by the ocean
Ill never give up on you

My Michael Jackson phase

It is blazing hot in Texas - I think it's been a month of over 100 degree weather. Thank goodness for sun dresses!!

I opened up my flashdrive today to discover that while I was at home, my dad had downloaded and saved onto the flashdrive two youtube videos: one of Michael Jackson's debut of Billie Jean at Motown, and his 10 minute long Thriller video. Did I mention I'm going through a Michael Jackson music phase? I love my dad!

Learn and let go

Got little sleep last night since the dog (who slept in my bed) decided it was "playtime" at around 1 am and was bouncing around and licking my face all night. Still, she is so adorable I HAD to forgive her!

Many of my girlfriends recently had their hearts broken by men. I spent Saturday evening and most of Sunday with one of them, just listening to her story and helping her to work through the pain. One thing I have been realizing is that as women, it is easy for our emotions and hurts to color our perspectives. It is easy to see ourselves as victims and build up protective walls through warping reality until we find meaning and closure in what happened. It is easy to lie to ourselves to make sense of reality and to concoct reasons for the rejection outside of what oftentimes is the truth: you just were not the right person for him (which consequently usually means the reverse is true). But all that does is to leave us bitter, insecure, and angry at half of the population on the planet. Though it is good to learn from experiences, it is not necessary to dwell in them. Though it is good to learn to protect ourselves, it is not good to hold grudges against those who have hurt us.

Yesterday's sermon was on forgiveness, and the pastor shared a wonderful story from the Chronicles of Narnia that illustrated our need for Christ to sanctify us. Here is the transcript from that portion of the sermon:

Eustace is a little snotty kid, he’s mean and bratty and nobody likes him and one day he discovers a cave full of treasures… a Dragon’s treasure. He realizes he’ll be rich and could get back at everyone that’s ill treated him… he’s very excited, but he’s tired and falls asleep. And we all know that if you fall asleep on the dragon’s treasures with dragoness thoughts then when you wake up what happens? You turn into a dragon… He awoke and discovered he was in agony, he couldn’t talk, his friends thought he was a monster. And then Eustace encounters the Lion or Aslan and Aslan is the incarnation of Jesus… he’s the Jesus figure in Chronicles of Narnia.

“Well, anyway, I looked up and saw the very last thing I expected: a huge lion coming slowly towards me… So it came nearer and nearer… Well, it came close up to me and looked straight into my eyes. And I shut my eyes tight. But that wasn’t any good because it told me to follow it.” . . .

“. . . And I knew I’d have to do what it told me, so I got up and followed it. And it led me a long way into the mountains. . . . So at last we came to the top of a mountain I’d never seen before and on the top of this mountain there was a garden—trees and fruit and everything. In the middle of it there was a well.

“. . .The water was as clear as anything and I thought if I could get in there and bathe, it would ease my pain. But the lion told me I must undress first. . . .

“I was just going to say that I couldn’t undress because I hadn’t any clothes on when I suddenly thought that dragons are snaky sort of things and snakes can cast their skins. Oh, of course, thought I, that’s what the lion means. So I started scratching myself and my scales began coming off all over the place. And then I scratched a little deeper and, instead of just scales coming off here and there, my whole skin started peeling off beautifully. . . . In a minute or two I just stepped out of it. I could see it lying there beside me, looking rather nasty. It was a most lovely feeling. So I started to go down into the well for my bathe.

“But just as I was going to put my feet into the water I looked down and saw that they were all hard and rough and wrinkled and scaly just as they had been before. Oh, that’s all right, said I, it only means I had another smaller suit on underneath the first one, and I’ll have to get out of it too. So I scratched and tore again and this underskin peeled off beautifully and out I stepped and left it lying beside the other one and went down to the well for my bathe.

“Well, exactly the same thing happened again. And I thought to myself, oh dear, how ever many skins have I got to take off? For I was longing to bathe. So I scratched away for the third time and got off a third skin, just like the two others, and stepped out of it. But as soon as I looked at myself in the water I knew it had been no good.

“Then the lion said . . . ‘You will have to let me undress you.’ I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it.

“The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I’ve ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. . . .

“Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off—just as I thought I’d done it myself the other three times, only they hadn’t hurt—and there it was, lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly-looking than the others had been. And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then he caught hold of me—I didn’t like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I’d no skin on—and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone. And then I saw why. I’d turned into a boy again.”

[C. S. Lewis, “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader,” The Chronicles of Narnia (London: HarperCollins, 2001), 473–75]

Harried end to a vacation

I finally got back to Austin last night, made it to my front door, and realized that somehow my apartment keys had fallen off my keychain!! It was a bit bizarre considering my keys never left my bag while I was gone, but they were nowhere to be found. I called 3 locksmiths - none of them were available. Finally I gave up and crashed at my friend's place for the night. Woke up early to teach yoga all day (welcome back to Austin!!), and during my hour break got a copy of the keys from the leasing office and went a little overboard in making copies of the keys. I finally unloaded my luggage around 4pm. Did I mention my roommate had left for vacation and left the dog in my care (read: the dog was inside the whole time)? It was a bit of a hectic day. I just got back from grocery shopping and am sitting down to my first meal of the day: a frozen dinner entree (Kashi's Sweet & Sour Chicken, yum!!).

Through it all, I realize it could have been worse. I could have lost my car keys as well. I could have broken my phone (it had fallen into water on te trip). I could have not had my yoga gear with me (making it difficult to teach yoga all day). The leasing office could have been closed on Saturday. All in all, it wasn't so bad of an experience, though if you asked me at midnight last night, I would have told you a different story.

It was good to practice yoga with people again. Good to see all my students again and to find that I was missed. I've been feeling antsy about my life again, wondering if I'm wasting time and energy on things that don't matter. Yet, after an incredibly energetic and downright sweaty class this morning, I had this incredible thought as I watched my students rest in savasana: regardless of whether my teaching yoga plays any sort of role in my future or serves any purpose, I am SO BLESSED to have this experience. I keep weighing all my experiences and activities, but the truth of the matter is, I need to stop evaluating and start valuing what is currently in my life!

Jeremiah 17:7-8

But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord,

whose confidence is in him.

He will be like a tree planted by the water

that sends out its roots by the stream.

It does not fear when heat comes;

its leaves are always green.

It has no worries in a year of drought

and never fails to bear fruit.

The last few weeks

...have been full. It started off with David Swenson's 40 hour Ashtanga training. It was a tiring and incredibly long week, but both David and his wife Shelley are amazing sources of inspiration, both as Ashtangis and as a couple. I'm VERY glad I did the training.

Sunday afternoon before I left for the Midwest, I hopped on a barge with some folks from the Stone and spent the evening on Lake Travis. It was a ton of fun. The Lake Travis area is so beautiful!!
I headed to Kelleys Island on Lake Erie the following day for a getaway with the Kiss My crew. This year we rented a condo and explored the island. It was nice to have a week away from the Internet, sleeping in, and eating really good food. The last night, the boys on the trip and I spent the evening in Toledo where we watched the Mud Hens (Toledo's minor league team) play the Cleveland Clippers.
Afterward, we watched fireworks right on the field.
I've been back at my parent's resting and recuperating for a week now. Finally flying back to Austin and the heat tomorrow!!!!

101 in 1001

Giving this thing another try....