The Aftermath

We made it out alive! There may have been a few points where we thought it would be otherwise, but all in all, we conquered the trail.

The picture above is actually from the day after, when we went to meet our friend Billy and his dad, and went to Bickle Knob. It was a nice relaxed day after the insanity of the previous 24 hours. If you look carefully, you will see that we spell out T-I-R-E-D... which we definitely were!

We ended up hiking the whole North Fork Mountain Trail in 24 hours... when originally we had planned to do it in about 36. Why? Because we are insane.

But it was incredibly awesome to see the views we got to see, and to know that we pushed ourselves past any thinkable limit and hiked 22 miles straight in one day (the 2 beginning miles were hiked the previous night before camping). All in all, it was worth it I think. Would I do that whole thing again? Maybe not. Unless I turn into a superhero. Then we'll see.

More details to come...

The Death Hike

So a group of 7 of my friends and I are going on a little hike this weekend. And by little I mean 24 miles.

I have never done anything remotely similar to this in my life, but I'm pretty excited about it. We will be carrying in all our own water (dude, that's a lot of added weight) and supplies to camp Friday and Saturday night on the trail. When I say I've never done anything like this, I mean, I've never hiked that long, had to hike carrying supplies, or even camped outside for real. (Unless you count the youth advance when I was 15 at a campground or having a tent set up at Relay, which I don't.)

So all in all, I may die. It will be a fun death though I am sure. I'm quite positive I will come back from the weekend with all sorts of insane stories to tell or embarrassing moments when I realize how much of a city girl I really am. (I mean, I do claim being from suburbia... that has to say something.)

Still... it will be an adventure. And if I die, well, it has been nice knowing you all, and blogging about my randomness. :D

How much can $1 buy?

Alright, on top of being busy constantly, I always have about a billion things going on in my mind... and yes, many of them are usually bouncing around at one time. From what does arsenic do to these cells to poverty around the world to recycling to cleaning my apartment to hanging with friends to the good book I am reading to watching a movie to what I have to do for work to coffee to so.zo to the kids I work with to family.... well, the list usually doesn't end... and it is all happening rapid fire at any point in my brain.

So as I was driving down to KY at 60mph (yeah, like a grandma, but I got 30 mpg in a CR-V!) I was thinking about tons of things. I was kind of hungry cause I hadn't really eaten that day. I was planning on holding out for Sonic (one of my loves) I just got too hungry to wait. So I decided to stop at a McDonald's to get something. Now usually I would never do this, because McDonald's in and of itself kind of grosses me out. But I had a coupon for a free chicken sandwich, and I figured, hey, its free, and I'm hungry. (Side note - the buttered bun, bad idea McDonald's.) I went through the drive through and got my free sandwich and a sweet tea (ok, it's horrible for you, but I am southern, right?).

So my whole meal ended up costing me $1.06. Pretty cheap. That made me happy. Especially since everything has gotten to be more expensive recently.

BUT, I got to thinking. Do you know that about 1 billion people live on less than $1.08 per day? Yeah, they probably live entirely on what I just paid to get a sweet tea. you can argue what you will about things being cheaper in other countries and whatnot, but come on. Reality is that we take for granted what we can do, and what we can buy. There are many times I don't even bat an eye when paying $4.00 for a latte. How spoiled am I?

And in reality, what could my money that I spend on extras do for someone who lives in extreme poverty? Maybe just my little bit couldn't do a whole lot in the grand scheme of ending poverty, but what about everyone's little bit?

Can the rich afford to help the poor? Most definitely. Will we? I sure hope so, but it will take changing the way we look at what we have and can do. I mean, could we all give up a coffee or a fast food meal a week? Sure. Is it easy, pretty much. But will we change?

busy, busy, busy

So much for having a boring summer.

I thought at the beginning of the summer that life was gonna be so much simpler because a lot of what I did during the fall and spring was ending until next fall. No more seminars and journal clubs, a break from KidSTUFF, no summer hours for so.zo, no exsatio, friends going out of town for the WHOLE summer... you know, a huge change.

But boy was I wrong! I have had so much to do lately that it is hard to keep up... and it seems I have just hit the beginning of my busy summer! I'm writing a manuscript (for real this time), trying to finish up some experiments for that and doing other experiments, and writing my dissertation proposal for lab. That is a lot in and of itself... and takes up a lot of my time. On top of that, my weekends are pretty much booked solid through the end of July. Where has the time gone?

I mean, don't get me wrong. I enjoy being busy. When I'm not I go kind of nuts. It is just that I had expected one thing out of the summer and I am getting quite another!

I guess sometimes our expectations are just dead wrong, huh?

The Alderson Family Reunion

It is that time of year again... the weekend after Father's Day. It may not sound like a big deal, but in our family it is.

This weekend I traveled to Kentucky for our annual family reunion with my dad's mom's family, to begin my string of insane summer weekends. My family here is a pretty interesting group of people. I used to go to these reunions a lot when I was a little kid, and then stopped when I was about 11 or so. When I moved to Morgantown, my dad made me promise to go to the reunion every year, first so he could "make sure to see me at least once a year" and second because it is about as close to being the exact halfway point between Morgantown and Nashville as you can get.

Well, I'm usually not to thrilled about coming. Nothing against anyone here, its just that I really don't know anyone. The past two years my cousin Carla has come up too, and last year my sister also joined us with her kids. they always make it really fun, and it is nice to see them too. but this year for various reasons neither could come.

I was kind of nervous about going by myself. You see, the generations span many years in this family, so in "my generation" I was 10 years older than the next oldest! And then from the next generation up I was about 10 years younger. Kind of in the middle.

BUT. Oddly enough, I did really enjoy myself yesterday. I got a chance to talk with family that I never would have taken the time to if Carla or Jenn had been here. I wish I had my camera... because I took a sweet picture of me and my cousin (ok, I have no idea how far away, but cousin works) Roxanne using my mad self photography skills. It was pretty fun all in all.

After the cookout, we usually split up for the afternoon and then meet again for dinner as a whole group. Well, this year we were split into two groups. The "young" ones (those with kids in my generation) went to get wings an the rest wen to get Mexican. I was invited to go with the wings group, which also had the parents who were closest to my age. I really did think about going with them, but decided that I should probably go to Mexican and hang with my parents some more since that is what I kind of originally came to do.

I'm kind of sad that I didn't get more time to hang out with some of the cool people here. Well, I guess there is always next year!

Please Don't Send Me to Africa!

I wrote a few weeks back about our creative expression that we do in our canvas groups. Well, in our last one we were encouraged to think about a problem that has been on our mind, and come up with a creative way to share it with others or solve it, or something along those lines.

Recently I have been thinking a lot about extreme poverty, and the little that we as rich Americans do about it in the rest of the world. And how blind we are to it. I thought of doing something deep and profound, but the words of one of my favorite childhood songs rang in my ears.

When I was a little kid I used to listen to a tape by a guy named Scott Wesley Brown. He recorded a lot of great late 80s and early 90s cheesy Christian music. But, there was always one song in particular that stuck with me over the years, and that no matter when I thought about it, I knew every word still. A couple years ago I was telling my dad that, and how I wish I still had it on tape, but that it had long been lost. He knew what I was talking about since it was in our limited amount of tapes we would play on all family vacations, with things like Rich Mullins, Wayne Watson, Amy Grant (before she went to the dark side), and Degarmo and Key (which, if anyone has a CD of their stuff I'd LOVE to hear it). He bought me a CD set that had the song on it! It was once again in my music collection, and is even on my ipod! Anyway. Back to my point.

I decided to use this song to maybe make people think about our complacency as Americans. How often do we say we are wholly committed to God, but really we mean, "I am wholly committed to God as long as he doesn't ask me to do anything I don't want to do, give up anything I love, or be in a situation that makes me uncomfortable."

Watch the video above, and through the sarcasm, think about how it might reflect what is in your own heart. I know regrettably if often times reflects mine.

Bloody shoes and near death experiences

I had every intention of blogging last week, but did I? Nope. You see, I somehow managed to get some sort of winter weather type virus in the middle of June. So instead of blogging, or doing much of anything else, I laid on my couch and slept, at least when I could.

So now I am feeling better, and I thought I'd jump right back in with a little story from yesterday. I went out after church with a few friends to have lunch and then to go walk along one of the rail trails. We walked the Cheat Lake Trail which I had never gone to, and it was pretty nice. (The other Rail Trails don't have HUGE houses to gawk at along the road!)

I have some new Teva hiking sandals I got on clearance this weekend, so I thought I'd wear them (they are oh so cool). Apparently they don't like my feet though. On the way back (after already walking about 2 hours) one of my friends asked me if my feet hurt. My response? "No, why?" Well, apparently I had a blister on the back of my foot that was bleeding. Yup, and i didn't even notice it. Perceptive, aren't I? Well, I have broken in my new shoes with a healthy dousing of blood along the back of the left shoe. I'm kind of proud. Makes me feel like I did some really intense hiking or something even though I didn't. :)

BUT, the best part of the day was also when we were walking back. Two of my friends were pretty far ahead, and three of us were kind of together. The other 2 had run ahead to take a picture of an "awkward butterfly" so I was about 15 feet or so behind. A biker yelled from behind, "On your right!" Now, if you are ever on the trials, you know this is common to have someone yelling at you to get out of the way so they can pass. It is just normal. What isn't normal is that she said right not left. Usually bikers will pass on your left, so you just move over to the right side. Makes sense.

So I thought it was weird, but kind of started moving to my left so she could pass on my "right" and realized she was already very close to me and on the left side of the trail! She came within inches of colliding with me (thankfully we both had very fast reflexes). But seemed pretty mad at me for being in her way. I'm still not sure how she didn't know her right from her left. She had passed us going the other way with no issue. I found out later that she apparently had yelled the same dyslexic type directions to my friends ahead of us. Hmmm. Maybe she was home schooled. ;) I'll never know.

Morals of the story: 1. When breaking in new shoes it is always a bonus to shed blood. 2. When biking/blading on a trail, make sure to yell "On your left!" when passing on the left side. You are, after all, on their left!

Getting to know me

That's me and my favorite sister. Okay, my only sister, but she's my favorite one nonetheless.

My sister sent me one of those random surveys the other day. She does this about every few months or so, and always lists me as the person least likely to respond. (Luckily she realizes I'm busy and doesn't mean it as an insult.) Anyway, I thought I'd take some time to fill one out and put up some random info about me.

This is a compilation of 3 I have gotten.... so enjoy!

1. What is your occupation? Student.... officially I think I am listed as "research fellow" yeah, that sounds cool.

2. What color are your socks right now? white with yellow

3. What are you listening to right now? nothing

4. What was the last thing that you ate? a fudge striped cookie

5. Can you drive a stick shift? definitely not

6. If you were a crayon, what color would you be? cerulean

7. Last person you spoke to on the phone? Megan

8. Do you like the person who sent this to you? Indeed I do :)

9. How old are you today? 24

10. Favorite drink? Depends on my mood... probably Guarana, OJ, or coffee of some sort

11. What is your favorite sport to watch? Dance/gymnastics, and Baseball!

12. Have you ever dyed your hair? oh yeah

13. Pets? nope

14. Favorite food? anything with curry

15. Last movie you watched? All the way through I guess Meet the Robinsons, otherwise I watched part of Mean Girls the other night

16. Favorite Day of the year? That's a tough one. I'd have to say April 25th because it's not too hot and not too cold. All you need is a light jacket.

17. What do you do to vent anger? Maybe hold it in, maybe call a friend and talk it out, and even getting better at being confrontational when necessary. :)

18. What was your favorite toy as a child? Felxiblocks

19. What is your favorite season? Winter

20. Hugs or kisses? as in candy? Kisses...

21. Cherry or Blueberry? Both

22. Do you want your friends to email you back? well, seeing as this isn't an email, that would e pointless

23. Who is most likely to respond? Well, Jenn would probably write a comment if that counts

24. Who is least likely to respond? everyone else

25. When was the last time you cried? When Trey was finishing his sermon on Sunday about having an impact on kids

26. What is on the floor of your closet? All kinds of stuff. Maybe I should finish unpacking and putting things away soon.

31. Who inspires you? My friends

32. What are you afraid of? Not having an impact on the world, and being a bad example to those who look up to me

33. Plain, cheese or spicy hamburgers? Cheese

34. Favorite car? Cracker-vehicle

35. Favorite cat breed? dead.

36. Number of keys on your key ring? 6

37. How many years at your current job?3

38. Favorite day of the week? Sabbath

39. How many states have you lived in? 2

40. Do you think you're funny? sometimes. sarcastic? always.

SIX LAST'S:

1. last beverage - OJ

2. last phone call – Megan!

3. last instant message – Interestingly Megan too...

4. last cd played – Avenue Q soundtrack

5. last time you cried - When Trey was finishing his sermon on Sunday about having an impact on kids.

6. last text message sent to you says – Okay. wish you were going. but have a good evening. :)

Random Music Playlist:

Put your Music Player on Shuffle, and write the first line of the first 20 songs, no matter what it says. See who can correctly guess the song and artist. (Googling the lyrics is cheating! This one is all straight from random knowledge!) This is where you guys come in.... leave a comment and see if you can get them right! Have fun, and see if any of you have as random a taste in music as I do!

1. Somewhere Over the rainbow, way up high

2. Her face is a map of the world, is a map of the world

3. What do I, and what do I, what I do to need to see myself in a better mood?

4. Its a cold and wet December day when we touched the ground of JFK

5. You can't stop an avalanche as it races down the hill

6. Takes a second to say goodbye, say goodbye, oh oh oh

7. Life lines, and suicide crimes he found me in a state

8. One man lived to bring a vision, one man died to save a nation

9. You're a painting with symbols deep, a symphony

10. I've had it up to here, so let me make it very clear, because in fact I'll never clue you in again

11. I'm unafraid of anything in this world, there's nothing you can't throw at me that I haven't already heard

12. I'm feel crazy, hope is hazy right now

13. I couldn't wait to get up today and see all my friends who are waiting there for me

14. 1 here comes the 2 to the 3 to the 4

15. wake up and smell coffee, rise and shine the early bird gets the worm

16. She's so sophisticated, I'm such a zero

17. Madam blueberry was a sad little berry, she lived all alone in a house on a tree

18. I'm around the corner from anything that's real

19. I come from the land where the mullet attacks, business up front, party in the back

20. Is there is a time for keeping for keeping your distance? A time to turn your eyes away?

Our Creative Creator

Man it has been a while since I've had any time to write anything.

Lets jump back to last week. On Thursday night we had our first Telios Canvas Group meeting of the summer. What's a canvas group? Well, you should ask, and I'll tell you! But that isn't the point right now.

Trey led the meeting, and talked about Creative Expression, one of our 4 practices in canvas groups. It was pretty cool, because he facilitated a discussion about what it means to be creative.

You see, we often recognize that we are mad in the image of God. God is the Creator, and we in His image are made to be creators as well. A lot of us don't think of ourselves as very creative though.

What do you think of as creative? When this question was posed, mainly we all responded with art, movies, music, drama, dance, writing, and other things that could be seen as "creative arts". Now think about it this way: When you do something in a novel way, that's creativity.

So when Bono created the (Red) campaign to help eliminate AIDS in Africa, that was a pretty darn creative idea. When Watson and Crick came up with the structure of DNA, man, that was creative. You see, thinking outside the box is a form of creativity.

God is the ultimate Creator. What do you experience daily that makes you aware of Him, or His goodness? For me, it can be nature, brilliant tv writing, the minds and thoughts of others that I cannot comprehend, emotions, good coffee, and so many other things.

One thing I thought of during the discussion the other night was kind of geeky as usual. When asked what we saw as amazing creation or beautiful I said DNA. Why? It is so simple, yet carries such a complex message. It baffles me that our God thought not only of the expanse of the universe we can see with our eyes, but also of the expanse of the universe we cannot. There is a whole other world of sorts going on inside each of your cells at this very moment that you are completely unaware of. So many complex signaling interactions that scientists are still figuring out new things every day. The video above is a pretty cool representation of what it might look like inside a cell if you were able to take a video of it. Although you may not know what the parts are you are seeing, and may not even care, take a moment to watch the clip and think about the amazing, creative God we serve that could come up with such an amazing miniature universe inside every living thing.