Happy Birthversarygiving

So I had a really great time this week. I went home and celebrated Jed's 1st birthday, Ashur's 5th birthday, Thanksgiving, and my grandparents 50th wedding anniversary. I even managed to survive my dad killing a very large deer and Sebastian and Rocky eating it's guts after escaping the yard. I also managed to write 2 papers and revise a third. Horray for work ethic. I'm supposed to write a paper assessing my leadership shortcomings. Please send me your comments (or don't). I hope everyone was thankful for many things. I am thankful for only 8 more papers and 11 more days of school. After that I have my life back and we can hang out. David is coming home on December 13th or 14th. He had to postpone his trip to work more. The good news is he should be in Little Rock until the wedding.

My Homework Ate My Life

I am officially a slacker at blogging. Nothing very exciting has happened to me lately. I kinda stay up all night (literally) writing papers and reading. Eleven days until Thanksgiving and 9 until Thanksgiving break! I need some time to finish up all the papers I have due at the end of the year. This weekend is the Slate 60 conference and famous people are supposed to be there. Maybe I'll actually meet some of them. I'm going tonight and tomorrow. A lot of you have been getting on to me for my poor blogging skills, but if you actually enjoyed any of that post you have a higher threshold for boring than I.

OH YEAH!!!!! BEST WEEKEND EVER!

I had the best weekend. Friday a bunch of us went to see Lucero at the Village. I really like the new album, and I never get tired of hearing them. I really felt like I was home.
Yesterday we all went to Julie's Halloween party. Everyone had great costumes. I was very impressed. Now that I had too much fun, I need to get to work. Hope your weekend was as fabulous as mine.

Scary dirt devil

When thinking of dressing up scarily for Halloween, you might think of a devil, but not a dirt devil. Rocky seems to have an unhealthy fear of this contraption. Click here to see him run in terror.

Rocky is having the BEST WEEK EVER!

I adopted a two-year old pure mutt yesterday. His name is Rocky and he's been at the shelter since he was a baby. He knows his name and I can't change it so to make it cooler, he's Little Rock Carpenter for long and Rocky for short. He's sweet and loves Gator. Unfortunately, I left both the boys in the spare room because it was raining, and they ate some mineral oil. This could end very badly. David is really excited to take him to Baton Rouge. Here's his sweet face.

Duluth, Minesnowta

David and I had a really great weekend. I won't get to see him again until December, so it was much needed. We ate ribs at a cookoff at the park, we drove up and spent the night at Lake Superior, and we watched two mediocre movies. It was really nice to get to see eachother. It was definitly the most relaxing weekend I had had in awhile. Minnesota is having a really beautiful fall. The leaves were spectacular. Spectacular, spectacular. I'm officially moved into the new house. If you are in Hillcrest, come on over.

Here I am with Madeline Albright

I look really old. I need to start dressing younger. Maybe it's the massive amount of work they keep assigning me. I also basically finished my speech, group project, and paper. I AM AMAZING! I can now waste time making photo collages, blogging, and watching Grey's Anatomy.

Day in the life....

Some of you may be wondering what I've been up to, since I am the worst blogger ever. Some of you may not, but here goes anyway.
This weekend I worked on a paper that was a mock addendum to a Hope VI grant application that Little Rock recieved. They are tearing down 100 deteriorating units of public housing and replacing them with accesible, affordable, single-family homes. It's a really great idea. I got to write a paper about the renewed mission and vision of the Little Rock Housing Authority as a result of recieveing the Hope VI grant. Here is my fabulous mission statement

The Little Rock Housing Authority is committed to replacing deteriorating public housing with affordable, accessible, safe, energy-efficient, desirable housing in Little Rock, AR, and providing residents with the tools needed to succeed in becoming economically self-sufficient. (Purpose) Through physically tearing down unwanted public housing units, and replacing them with ideal ones, and metaphorically tearing down skill, education, and support barriers, and building up programs that foster self-betterment and community contribution (business), the LRHA provides a new hope and support system for residents who deserve a better life (values).

It's not their real statement or anything. It's just what I think it should be. I get to pretend to be a person that writes mission statements. So fun, it's like Halloween.

Last night Katie and I began painting her new house. We finished both bedrooms, after 4 hours, 2 arby's meals ( I know, gross) and a few Lucero albums later. Elizabeth stopped by after her volleyball game. If you haven't talked to her lately, pat her on the back, she is busting her butt at that school. I am officially the most lousy painter, maybe it was the arbys, maybe it was how late it was, but I managed to spill paint all over myself, butter yellow paint. Anyway, I came home and read a chapter from a book entitled moral philosophy, and two more articles about ethics. My favorite part was when one of the articles mentioned that President Bush said the American people were sacrificing after 9/11 by waiting in longer airport lines. Poor us.
This morning I tried to move some stuff while wearing heels, this is a very bad idea. I attended a lecture given by John Hofmeister, President of the Shell Oil Company's leadership team. It was disheartening. I told him that the crisis in the Middle East and global warming will never be resolved if we keep using oil for fuel, and asked how funding for research for alternative fuel compared to funding for finding more oil. He said they spend 250 million a year on alternative fuel research, that gets a big BOO from me. Tonight Katie and I are painting again. If you want to come over, we will have pizza and PBR. The perfect dinner combination.
Tomorrow I am volunteering at Francis Allen with the most perfect preschoolers ever. Thursday I have a lecture from Robert Goodwin, head of the Points of Light Foundation. Friday I have a lecture from Susan Rice from the Brookings Institution. Then I get on an airplane to go visit David, the only time I'll get to see him in 4 months. I am missing dinner with Senator David Pryor, but it's okay, because I get to have dinner with David Carpenter. I have class in an hour, I haven't eaten anything, and I still need to read like 100 pages. Then we have a student government meeting. I think most of you know how I feel about that. So if you got through this boring post, then you probably know what my life is like. Sorry I'm so bad about updating and keeping in touch. I have a pictures of Katie painting, but I forgot my cord, so I'll post them later.

For your amusement

So my new, cool friend Jamie says that my blog has been ceasing to amuse her. So here are some things that I find very amusing:

Gator pooped on the floor last week and I took a couple pictures in an effort to embarrass him out of doing it again, as if dogs can be embarrassed, if they could, they probably wouldn't poop right in front of you. Anyway, if you want to see these monstrosities (which you probably do) click HERE FOR POOP, and Here for Gator feeling bad about it.

Last weekend the Clinton School students headed up to Fayetteville to do some really good work, like make a cheerleader pyramid and learn that Jason has a hidden talent better than any talent I could ever imagine. Watch the video

Katie and her eclectic magnets, esspecially the one with the baby orangutans in medical scrubs are hilarious.

Paul Hill and his super lunch box.

The terror level sign at the Flying J in Russelville.

A picture of Ashur holding Jed which is very similar to the Britney Spears almost dropping Sean Preston picture.

How do you stop injustice?

Hello all. I've been a total slacker when it comes to updating this thing, but I'll give it a quick go. This week I was priviledged to see the famous Dr. Cornel West speak at Philander Smith College in Little Rock. Cornel West has written several books on race in America and is a professor of religion and African American studies at Princeton. He spoke for several hours on a Friday night and I wasn't bored once. It was a profound experience to be surrounded by a group of educated people recognizing that race does indeed matter. The inequalities we experience in this country are inexcusable. Dr. West said that after 9/11 all Americans experienced what it felt like to be violated, subject to random violence, and hated for who they were, but African Americans had been experiencing that all along. Through all this injustice, there was never a black Alkadea, but instead the production of some of the greatest lovers of humanity. In the words of Dr. West himself, “Who wants to be well-adjusted to injustice? What kind of human being do you want to be?” This school is so wonderful, because it provides me with opportunities to question what I know, to open my eyes and look around at the "whole world" and not just what is easy to see. If any of you get a chance, come to some of the lecture series at the school, you might see something new.