At least for a little bit, the academic olympics are on hold, so regular programming will resume on the blog (nice thing about the olympics is that your tv gets hijacked with something. . . academic olympics -- well, let's just say I did you a favor sparing you from providing you with a play-by-play on studying for a statistics exam). I'm coming out the easier side of what I think will be one of the most challenging weeks of the semester. I've still got some really tough Rorschach work to come, but this week was a double-whammy with our first stats exam and a research proposal. The rp isn't due until Tuesday (thought it had originally been due on the 15th but got moved back) BUT I knew I wouldn't be able to focus on stats unless I had a majority of the rp done and not hanging over my head. I spent ALL weekend and Monday on it and really made some good progress. I got helpful feedback from my prof on Tuesday, so should be able to wrap it out without extreme stress this weekend (YAY). Tues night was taken up by Assessment reading. So, yesterday I had 24 hours to get it together for the stats exam. I studied FIVE CONSECUTIVE HOURS. No, I wasn't a crazy outlier as far as studying. We finished class at 2 on Wed and about 8 of us got together and studied until 5 when we had a classwide, organized study session with the instruction assistant (IA). It was all super helpful and the study group was really productive (usually I DON'T do group studying or. . . well, anything. . . well at all - but it was great talking through the outlines of his lectures). We all felt about the same coming out of it - some we def. knew - a lot of them we could get narrowed down to 2 answers and had to take a complete crap shoot.
Phew. So grateful it's done! Glad I don't have to dread spending 20 hours on it this weekend! 3 or 4 should suffice. Hooray!!!
Other recent goings on. . . obviously, I was a lame Valentine's date but we did get to celebrate Philip's b-day on Sunday. Philip has now coined the special-ops-types bible study as the "Killers' Bible Study". We had a ton of fun. I made Philip a giant cookie since he's not really a cake person. I love this group. Everyone is SO REAL. We joke about "boozing up" and some of the guys drinking beer as we go through the study (don't let your imagination run away with you though, this isn't some drunken craziness --- most of the guys drink a pint. . .). It's the kind of group where you can use the word "ass" in a sentence to really drive home the context of the story and not be judged (though it provides a great opportunity to poke fun at someone, "way to be the guy who just cursed at bible study while you're drinking your beer. . .").
No, don't get me wrong. This is not a group of hypocites. The farthest thing from it. There are people in this group who have made huge sacrifices for their families, their marriages, their countries and live in a way that just makes you say, "wow, there is something different about that person" --- because they emulate Christ and have a profound impact on their world without going all scary, crazy, weird churchie type (don't get me wrong, I still love those people too, bless them, but you really don't have to be a social reject to have authentic faith). These people live Christ. They're sacrifical They love deeply. These are the people on this earth that I want my life to look like: their faith is real and evident as they make a huge impact in their families a
nd their careers. [Mind you, if anyone in the group struggled with this our "Christian liberty" would be practiced differently, (see 1 Cor 8:4-13), but we're all of the mind that living out our faith is about how we live and how we love. Not about the presence or absence of alcohol in a beverage or complete absence of 3- or 4-letter words in one's script (but again, don't get me wrong that this is a grace-free-for-all/"we're forgiven so we'll live how we want and it's okay!". . . If you want to have a discussion about the limits of Christian liberty, we can do that another time I don't have the fortitude for any more discussion tonight.). It's not about pretending to be perfect or holier-than-thou.
Plus, in military culture you can't be to skweemish about alcohol because it is a cultural thing (this does NOT mean that drunkeness has to be and certainly any kind of irresponsible behavior with any alcohol in your system is NOT TOLERATED and carries more strict concequences than in any other "work culture" that I know of). It's still an in-transition cultural thing back to the US from the UK because, no joke, beer would be served in the church basement at potlucks in England. . . . I still remember my friend Tammy telling me about an incident similar to this and she just thought, "what would the Baptists at home think of this?" (the alcohol being served thing went down at a really great Baptist church in Mildenhall). We just laughed thinking about it. . .
Personally, I like what John Acuff has to say about these things. Yeah, the best way to describe this group is a John Acufflike crowd. Real.
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