It didn't end there

This afternoon, I got my third test back in chemistry. I now have a 100% total in that class. All I need is a 70% on my final to still get an A. It's starting to get a little easier to breathe.

I think I had a pretty good day.

So far so good...

Today, I got my grade back for test #5 in my statistics class. Turns out, that my grades have been so high that I am exempt from taking the comprehensive final. Whew...that is a load off my back. Now, I can spend a little more time on the killer chemistry final that I have to take. Although, to be perfectly honest, I don't want to spend all my time on chemistry. I am already burnt out on the subject.

After leaving statistics, I came to the library, and the first thing I did was check my university email account. I got an email from my nursing instructor, and I thought that I would share it. I was quite surprised. Here it is:

Because your healty habit paper was excellent, I have chosen it to use as an example or the National League of Nursing (NLN) accreditation visit to ULL College of Nursing. However, I can only use your paper with your permission and a signed consent form. Could you let me know asap if you would mind me making a copy of your paper and using it as an example for the NLN? If you reply that this is ok, I need for you to stop by my office at your conveinence to sign a consent form.

Thanks alot,
Mrs. Stefanski

Now, shouldn't that help me out to get into the accelerated program? Mais la!

Chris Young

Well, it is official. Chris Young is the newest Nashville Star. This boy is a great country artist. He can sing, play guitar, and write. It must be a wild ride to be on such a show. I didn't get to catch every episode, but I saw the first one and a few in between. I saw Chris in his first performance.

From the beginning, I figured he was going to be the winner, but the final three were all in my predictions. This was a tough year because everyone was great.

This show is so much better than American Idol!

Biggity Biggity Back

I have been without my computer for a week, and I finally have it back. It's always nice to reunite with old friends. Now, I just have to remember all my favorites to add them again.

Finals are next week, so if you want to find me, try looking at the library.

Wish me luck!

Virus

My brother and his girlfriend have been exposed to a stomach virus. They were both here all day yesterday. She started showing symptoms today. Now, tonight FLUF is coming back here to sleep. Essentially, this means that he's going to come home, blow his infectious breath all over, and use my bathroom.

How exciting, I'm sure I'll get his nasty germs. I have tests this week. It'll be great to think and squirt at the same time.

Put Emergencies on ICE

Programming a simple acronym into a cell phone could be a useful resource for paramedics when they're trying to reach a victim's loved ones during an emergency. In light of last summer's terrorist attacks in London, a British paramedic was struck with the idea of doing just that, and the country quickly adopted the practice.

Here's how it works: Cell-phone users program "ICE" (short for "in case of an emergency") followed by a person's name and phone number into their phones' contact lists. If a person is injured and unable to communicate, the paramedics can easily know who to call and how to reach them.

Though an ICE campaign like Britain's is beginning to catch on, members of the International Association of EMTs and Paramedics are hopeful the practice will become more prevalent.

YOU, Spring 2006

Don't Waste Your Time

Just to let some of you folks know, I am no longer capable of sending or receiving text messages. So, don't waste your time and/or money.

Diamonds on the top

...and the bottom row ain't gold.

Ok, I'm listening...

Now, where's my treat??

The Mayor of Ebenezer

Each of us has someone that has significantly touched our lives. Born March 14, 1920, in Ebenezer, he spent his life defending our freedom and praying for our souls. He was the only grandfather whom I have ever known, and I called him "Uncle Bob."

Thursday, April 13, 2006, was the last day of Uncle Bob's life, and he is greatly missed by many. He fought in World War II, where he received a purple heart for his duties. He later served in our armed forces as a drill sergeant. Also, he spent more than 50 years as the caretaker of the cemetery of the Ebenezer Methodist Church.

Almost anytime that you would pass by the church yard, there Uncle Bob could be seen either mowing grass, getting rid of weeds, or just talking to people in search of their relatives. We called him "The Mayor of Ebenezer" because no one knew this area or the people as well as he did. If anyone had a question, it usually ended up in Uncle Bob's kitchen, over a cup of coffee or a cold drink.

Uncle Bob is my grandmother's uncle. He came from a family of 10 children. He was brothers with my grandmother's father, on my dad's side of the family. Last year, I wrote about a dream that I had of my grandfather's funeral. As I can still vividly recall this dream, I remember standing right beside, almost touching, my Uncle Bob.

Today, I escorted Uncle Bob to his final resting spot beside his beloved wife. It was a tough day for my family, but I know that the highest price to pay for life is death. I will always miss him, but I am grateful for the time that I had. I am a better person for having him in my life.

He's Getting Big

I can't have everyone thinking that Buster is still as small as he was in the pictures that I posted way back when. Before, I mentioned that I picked a fiesty puppy, and boy did I ever! Buster is all or none. That boy is either full-throttle, or he is out of gas. He is into everything now. If I'm looking in a cabinet, he is right there with me.

He sure knows what it sounds like when he's about to get a treat too. When he hears any sort of wrapper, he runs up to me and sits at my feet. (He doesn't get a treat unless he's sitting.) That's how I crack that whip. Good things are rewarded. You have to earn things. Nothing is for free.

He just turned 2 months old, and he is in the puppy "terrible twos" from what I read somewhere. I have noticed that he's starting to listen a little less, but it may be that he's in a new place. I'm house/dog-sitting this week for someone else, so he's in a new environment. Yesterday, he pee-peed on the floor, and he looked at me and took off running. He knew exactly what he was doing. He's no fool.

This week, Buster had his first play date with a neighbor dog. The dog's name is Pecote, and he's a black chiachuahua. Pecote's owners must not bathe him too often because he STUNK. Also, he peed all over the place. That was such a bad example for Buster. The funny thing is that Buster was scared of Pecote at first. Although, Buster is not scared of Maddie. Maddie is the dog that lives in this house, and she's a weimaraner. Maddie is big as an ox, and Buster is constantly giving her a hard time. Finally, Buster quit running away from Pecote, and gave him hell. He seems to always be trying to start a fight. He thinks he's 10-feet tall and bullet proof. There's the picture of Buster playing with Pecote on Maddie's big bed. Little four-pound Buster thinks he owns the bed now.

I'll end with a couple pictures of Buster, of course. Good thing his nose was clean!

1, 2 FEMA's Coming for You

After Hurricane Rita passed through the region of Southwest Louisiana, I noticed something a little strange on Atkinson Road, in Crowley. A trailer that had been previously abandoned with the windows blown out and a torn up roof was covered in tarps, after the storm. This trailer had been empty for quite a while, and no attention was given to it during previous thunderstorms.

Low and behold, now near that trailer sits a FEMA trailer. Yes, this is another example of trashy people trying to get all they can out of the government, even going so far as to post a fraudulent claim. Is there a way to prove this? I am not sure.

I have heard about people making untrue claims often, in recent times. I hope they know, the government is looking for you, and they are going to get their money back one way or another.

Stepping Out in Lafayette

By Jennifer Moses
Sunday, March 26,2006; W16

After settling into Louisiana's Bayou Country, her love of dance was rekindled by the Cajun and zydeco music all around her. But with a husband who likes to sit it out, what's a frustrated, toe-tapping woman to do?

It's a Saturday night, and I'm out past my bedtime. Way past my bedtime.

Not only that, but I'm dancing in the arms of a killingly good-looking stranger. I'm pressed up against him among the gyrating, tapping, prancing, two-stepping, sweating bodies of couples all around us here in El Sid O's, a club with the appearance of a long-disused filling station. It's tucked away on a desolate street of modest, one-story and occasionally abandoned houses near the interstate, on the wrong side of the tracks in Lafayette, La. We've come to El Sid O's ($8 cover, $2 a beer) on this sticky Saturday night to get a taste of the real thing: the homegrown, Creole-infused meld known as zydeco, a brand of music that recently has begun to leak out past its origins in Southwest Louisiana with its irresistible, driving rhythm. And tonight's attraction, Keith Frank, is the real thing. A Creole by birth, he's a self-taught master of accordion, drums, bass, guitar, scrub board, keyboard, piano and even harmonica. His band includes his sister on bass and brother on drums.

Like just about everyone else in the world of zydeco, Frank came up -- as we say in Louisiana -- surrounded by musicians: his daddy, his uncle, his paw-paw. It's in his blood.

My husband and I parked in a weedy lot and threaded our way self-consciously through pickup trucks and ancient Oldsmobiles to the club's entrance. I feel even more self-conscious now, but my dancing partner, no doubt sensing my nervousness, is going gentle with me. He is tall and muscular, and at least 10 years my junior, with skin the color of sun-soaked oak and the compact, lean build of a runner. In short, he is a god. But he doesn't seem to know that, and, holding me tight, he leads with utter confidence. It's as if he's willing my feet to move and my hips to sway in time with his.

Not five feet from us, Keith Frank and the Soileau Zydeco Band is shaking the roof off the rafters with the kind of music you can't not dance too -- characterized, like most zydeco, with a down rhythm as sexual as anything in music, punctuated by the frottoir (a metal washboard typically played with spoons) and the accordion. Only this isn't your old man's one-two/circus music/polka accordion. This is a squeezebox -- the accordion as aphrodisiac.

I'm turning in my partner's arms -- step, step, step-back -- and back again, and then again. It's ecstasy.

In truth, I'm dancing with a god not because of my good luck or wily charm. Rather, when his date -- a slim young woman with long hair down her back, a cowboy hat perched pertly on her head -- appeared next to me at the sink in the ladies' room, I told her point-blank that I'd pay money to dance with her boyfriend. She said that he wasn't herboyfriend, but her cousin, and that she'd ask him to dance with me.

Which, this being Louisiana, where people are unbelievably friendly, he did. Meanwhile, my husband sat still as a rock, utterly unaware that if I didn't get pulled onto the dance floor, and soon, something profound and deep-seated and central in me was simply going to bust. (He later told me that he doesn't do zydeco -- that it's too sexual, too loud, too rhythmic. He was just as happy to let me get my ya-yas out with someone else.)

El Sid O's, which is known for, among other things, its custom of serving booze by the half-pint, is hopping. Zydeco, unlike Cajun, is mainly played by, and for, black folks, and the crowd tonight is primarily African American. The men wear cowboy hats and sharp suits or red straw boaters and matching red shoes; the women wear tall strappy sandals and sparkly slacks so tight they look poured on. Everyone is dancing: young with old, fat with skinny, ugly with gorgeous, and black with white. And why not? It was just last summer when Katrina and Rita wiped out a good swath of South Louisiana, but here in Lafayette, not only are most buildings still standing, but folks can't help themselves. Dancing is encoded in their French-African-Caribbean-Louisiana-Catholic-Native American-Baptist gene pool.

My dream dance partner's name, I learn, is Herman Stevens. He hails from Lake Charles, works as a contractor in the family business, has a wife and three kids, and learned to dance by watching his parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles. "You know, I came up that way," he says.

I wish my husband and I had come up that way, too: We're both about as East Coast as you can get, with a crushing self-consciousness about anything approaching laissez les bon temps rouler (let the good times roll). There's one major difference between us, however: I love to "hear" music in my body, and have known how to dance ever since my grandmother taught me when I was 7 years old. He hears music in his ears. Shaking his groove-thing is something that doesn't exactly come naturally to him. But having experienced this kind of exhilaration, I'm determined that my wallflower days are over. The only question is, can I keep finding willing partners, or am I ultimately going to have to dance solo?

Cajun Country -- or Acadiana -- is a stretch of Southwest Louisiana roughly defined by the Atchafalaya River to the east, the city of Lake Charles to the west, Highway 190 to the north and the Gulf of Mexico to the south. It is home to hundreds of dance halls, bars, clubs, restaurants and even churches, where on any given day you can find people grooving down to a live band, enjoying a crawfish boil, or both. But, for me, it's all about the music and the dancing -- the ramshackle lounges in tiny towns such as Cecilia, Eunice, Mamou, Butte La Rose and Erath that don't always show up on maps. Lafayette, a small sprawl of a city with a pre-hurricane population of about 110,000, and a post-storm population of some several thousand more, is at the heart of the region. Viewed by New Orleans, some 135 miles east, as a kind of poor relation, a country bumpkin with rough manners, Lafayette has always struck me as the second-born sibling who dedicates his life to outshining the brother who came first: If big brother invented Dixie-land and modern jazz, then little brother would show him up with Cajun, zydeco and swamp-pop (a blend of New Orleans R&B, country and blues, performed with a Cajun accent). During the day, this dead-flat city of low-lying buildings, suburban neighborhoods, heavily trafficked boulevards, mom and pop shops, sprawling strip malls and crawfish stands seems like no more than an overgrown small town. Its historic downtown of two- and three-story, red- and yellow-brick buildings is still handsome and intact, but its outlying sections are somewhat dreary and have none of the charm of, for example, the famous French Quarter of New Orleans or the stately historic houses of Natchez, Miss. It's at night that the city comes alive, showcasing one of America's remaining folk cultures.

Cajun Country continues to be like no other place in the United States, with an ethos and culture unique to itself, primarily thanks to Mother Nature. The region is set apart from the rest of Louisiana geographically as well as culturally and linguistically (with Cajun French still widely spoken), with its landscape of bayou, swamp, riversand coastal marshes. All this is courtesy of the Atchafalaya Basin, the largest freshwater swamp in the United States. For better or worse, the swamp is rich in natural resources, particularly oil, and, over the decades, more and more of the wetlands have been destroyed for profit. The wetlands are shrinking at the rate of two football fields every hour: Over the past 50 years, an area the size of Rhode Island has become part of the Gulf of Mexico. Until Interstate 10 was built across the basin in 1973, the region was almost entirely isolated, protecting its indigenous culture and allowing it to flourish without outside influences.

The original Acadians were French Catholic colonials who, having been kicked out of the Acadia province of Nova Scotia by the British in the 18th century, wound their way down to Louisiana, which in those days was still held by Catholic France. Most of the good land along theMississippi and farther east in New Orleans was already claimed, so the settlers headed west, directly into the swampy lands of bayous, crawfish, muskrats and alligators. Today, the area is still largely Cajun (the word is a corruption of "Acadian") and, unlike North Louisiana, primarily Catholic. There is also a large Creole population of African Americans who were brought up in French-speaking families and are of Caribbean descent. Cajun French is still widely spoken, and if you tune into KRVS Lafayette or KEUN in Eunice, you'll get an earful of Cajun, zydeco and swamp-pop, with French-speaking deejays. One way or another, the culture of music is so pervasive that chances are good your hairdresser, dentist or air-conditioning repairman works nights as a musician. The music -- which goes hand in hand with the dancing -- is as much a part of the culture here as the heavily seasoned, flavorful food: hot and spicy, down-home and delish, nothing fancy, and everyone's welcome.

When I tell my friend Durwood in Baton Rouge about my plan to get more dancing in my life, he immediately says I have to meet Hadley Castille -- an old-time Cajun fiddler. Castille has been keeping people in Cajun Country dancing for most of his life, and maybe he can give me some insight into why this music is so irresistible. So one day I drive from Grand Coteau up Interstate 49 -- 18-wheelers, billboards, pickup trucks, wildflowers -- until I get to the town of Opelousas. There I hang a right on U.S. Route 190, another right near the sign advertising same-day surgery and a final right on a quiet road threading through woods and surrounded by the buzz of a million insects. I reach Castille's comfortable, neo-Acadian cottage, which is propped up on arise. At the door, he greets me with the kind of smile you usually reserve for long-gone children. Castille, who has a wonderfully expressive face under a mop of thick white hair, brings me inside, where my eyes are immediately drawn to his collection of fiddles, one in the shape of the state of Louisiana.

Like just about every other musician in South Louisiana, the 73-year-old Castille never had any formal instruction; he learned to play the fiddle from his uncle. He walked to dances in his bare feet so as not to ruin his one good pair of shoes, grew up speaking French and one day, when he was young, experienced a revelation. "I must have been about 11 or 12 -- my father brought home a radio," he says. "I tuned in and heard something I'd never heard before, Texas swing. I couldn't believe what I heard. I stayed up all night listening to that radio and wore the batteries out." Castille took the mischievous sound of Texas swing, with its teasing fiddle, darting melodies and -- unlike traditional Cajun music -- swaggering hints of cowboy, and turned it into what's now Cajun swing. It's played on two strings with a back-and-forth, wave-like movement of the bow, and produces a fuller, richer, more complex sound. Today Castille -- who for years earned a living as a plumber -- performs with his son, Blake, and teenage granddaughter, Sarah Jayde Williams.

His bow glides up and back over the strings in a demonstration for me --a black bowler on his head, his entire face alive with feeling. He keeps time by the slow tapping of his foot. "The melody? You see -- it's carried by just the one string." The room fills with a wild, playful music that's so alive, so vibrant that it's as if the small instrument in his hands can barely contain the big joy inside it.

My feet are tapping, too. I long to inhabit that music, to start dancing right there in his living room. But I'm too self-conscious to get up off the sofa.

Next I head to Louisiana State University's "leisure school," on LSU's leafy green campus, under live oaks and magnolias, past the university lake, fraternity row with its big, Southern-style brick buildings, the wide expanse of the parade grounds and the massive neo-Gothic law school. In the student union, up on the third floor, is the Atchafalaya ballroom, a large, unfurnished, characterless room surrounded by dirty windows. Roland Doucet is teaching Cajun dancing to yet another group of people who somehow missed out earlier in life, and I want to see if there is anything I can glean that might help me light a fire under my husband. What I find are about 30 couples, at least half of them with a willingness to learn but no natural ability. The class is a godsend because, as Doucet says when I explain my struggle to loosen up my husband, who is a professor at LSU, "The hardest people to teach are professors and engineers, because they want to learn how to dance with their heads, and half the time don't even know where their feet are." Whereas the majority of Cajun dancers learn not by memorizing the steps but rather by copying what everyone else is doing, which is how Doucet learned to dance. Only his story has a twist: Like just about everyone else in Doucet's hometown of Vinton, his father, Haywood Doucet, played the fiddle in a Cajun band, which meant that if his mother wanted a dance partner, she had to ask one of her four sons.

As befitting his second-job persona as a dance instructor (his day job is installing and designing custom rugs; he also hosts a Cajun radioshow on WXCT here in Baton Rouge), the 55-year-old Doucet addresses his mainly middle-aged students as "ladies" and "gentlemen." As in: "Gentlemen, remember that the most important thing you can do when you're dancing with this lady is to look her in the eye and say, 'Honey,I'm sorry.'" Or: "Gentlemen, make sure you're stepping back with your left foot, because she's going to be stepping forward at the same time with her right, and if your big old foot is in the way, she'll rupture you."

The secret of his classes is that he breaks the dancing down into small, manageable steps, segregating men and women on either side of the room, and repeating each move over and over until his students feel confident enough to try with their partners. At first the method seems like overkill. I mean, how many times does it take to learn how to move your right foot two inches farther to the right and then bring your left foot in to join it? On a cue from their teacher -- the formerly separated couples are floating around the dance floor, the men guiding their partners in large, graceful circles, the women accommodating the husbands' and boyfriends' leads as if they've been doing it all their lives. As for me, when I see Doucet cutting in to dance with a pretty older woman with curly white hair, and the woman, in turn, relaxing into his embrace, as if she'd been waiting for him her entire life, I feel abolt of pure envy.

Unlike zydeco, most Cajun music is sung in French -- and danceable even for oldsters and young fogies. So even my husband will dance to Cajun music. Or so I'm hoping. We've come to Randol's, a big barn of a place with red-and-white checked table cloths and a commodious dance floor in Lafayette. There are numerous other good, family-style restaurants in Acadiana where you can dance, as well as enjoy excellent high-end dining-- Catahoula's in Grand Coteau and Cafe Des Amis in Breaux Bridge, with its zydeco brunch on weekends -- but we've come to Randol's because we heard that the band alone is worth the trip.

Cajun music, which tends to be played by and for white people, is typically slower-moving and sweet-tempered, having evolved around the turn of the 20th century from fiddle music played at house parties to an accordion-based sound big enough to fill up old-fashioned dance halls.

All around us diners are feasting on huge platters of fried fish and potatoes, jambalaya, gumbo and spicy-hot boudin to the sounds of Kevin Naquin and the Ossun Playboys. The food of South Louisiana has a French-Creole accent: crawfish bisque (prepared in a rich roux), sauce piquant, boulette (hush puppies seasoned with onions and crawfish tails), cracklins (fried pork skin), etouffee (various kinds of seafood simmered in a rich spicy stew), dirty rice, maque choux (highly seasoned corn).

These days the place is filled with FEMA and Red Cross workers, insurance adjusters and National Guard members. But the regulars are here, too: Long-married couples, little girls with their daddies, and women with their best girlfriends dance gracefully in the typically circular pattern of the Cajun waltz and two-step. "Maybe they'll order a beer, or a cold drink, but most of 'em come for the music and dancing,"says Rusty Randol, the head chef. "We see the same couples over and over again."

As usual, no sooner are we seated than I'm filled with a kind of yearning. How could it have happened that I married a man who can't dance? Doesn't he notice that my feet are tapping on the floor and my fingers are drumming on the table? How can he just sit there, when all I can think of is finding one of the many elderly gentleman who might not mind ditching his wife for a minute or two in order to dance with me?

But then, just as I'm about to burst at the seams, my husband turns to me, takes my hand, asks me if I'd like to chance it and leads me forward. And a minute later, the two of us have joined the circle, dipping and swaying to the accordion and fiddle as best we can. The other couples glide like swans around us. "That's it," I'm saying. "One, two, three, one, two, three." Actually, the Cajun waltz is about the easiest dance in the world to learn -- you just move your feet in a simple left-right-left, right-left-right pattern, pausing slightly on the third beat for emphasis.

The song comes to an end. It's time to quit. But then something happens. As the band launches into another tune, my husband takes my right hand in his left, puts his left at my waist and begins gliding me backward. Only this time there's no need for me to count out the beats, or jump away from his feet or even make sure we don't crash into another couple. Something about the tune -- its sweetness, or perhaps its pace -- seems to have embraced my husband, leading him out and away from himself and landing him right smack in the middle of Acadiana. When I glance up at him, I see that he's smiling. Around and around we go, in time with the other couples but lost in our own time, too, until I no longer know where I am, how I got here, or how I got by for so long without this.

Jennifer Moses is a frequent contributor to the Magazine.
© 2006 The Washington Post Company

Dreams....wow

Like most people, I don't always remember my dreams, but sometimes there is a dream that will stick out amongst the others.

My dream last night started out with me entering a large department store. I remember thinking that it was Wal-Mart, but it was more of an upper-class Wal-Mart. I'm not even sure if those exist. All I know is that they don't exist here.

So, I walk into the store, and it seems that they are trying a new stragegy. Right past where you usually get your buggies, and a little past the mile-long row of closed cash registers is another cash register on a fold-out table. There's an older woman there that I know from somewhere. She is really sweet, and we chat for a good while. Soon, she is replaced by a younger guy around my age. I know him as well, and a couple other guys join us in conversation. Upset, the older woman, who was previously there, summons a manager to break up the group chat. I found it strange that it was perfectly fine for her to do such a thing, but when someone else is doing it...Well, that just rubs her the wrong way.

So, I proceed further into the department store, taking notice of the shiny black floors and nicely stained wooden shelves. I kept thinking to myself, "Wow, this is a really nice Wal-Mart." By the way, this dream is in color. I have heard it said that we do not dream in color, but I find that I always dream in color.

I end up meeting up with a friend of mine, Erin, that I worked with at Lafayette's Restaurant. We were pretty tight then, and we are still good friends, we just do not get to see each other or talk as often as before. We wander around the store, but not really doing any shopping. It does not take long for Zee to find us, and fuss at us for doing or not doing something. Zee is the owner of Lafayette's restaurant, and he told us that he was following us around the store with the security cameras. I have always noticed that he distrusts everyone, and to me this is a way of projecting his own dishonesty onto everyone else.

We begin to wander to the back of the store, and the department store turns into a nice hotel. There were stone-like walls, black granite countertops, and I remember thinking that it reminded me of the new Drury Inn here in Lafayette. I have never been there, but I somewhat have an idea of what it looks like because I have seen inside through the windows.

Zee also owns the hotel, and the girl at the front desk tells us that there is a "secret locked hallway that leads to the attic." A secret locked hallway? That sounds right up my alley! Now, this hallway is secret and locked, but she has the key, which she gives to us.

We unlock the door and immediately there is a staircase leading up to a single door. We open the door, and it is the door to the attic. I never go in, but Erin does. The door is at the far right of the attic, and inside the attic, all the way to the left of the doorway is an eyeball sitting on the rafter. The eyeball looks fresh with all of its nerve-endings still in tact. However, we knew that it was not recently placed there. The eyeball is always there, and it never decomposes or dessicates. It is not looking straight at us, but it is facing the same way as we were when we opened the door.

After taking notice of the eyeball, and a little freaked out that an eyeball is sitting on the rafter, we look in the general direction that the eyeball is facing. There sits a guy in a blue shirt. This really frightens us because we had not noticed him before, and how would he be in a a secret attic that was locked?

He told us that he was sent by God, and that we must join him. I looked back at the eyeball for what seemed like a half of a second, and when I turn back, Erin is sitting beside the man as if to join him to be with God.

I get this intense feeling that he was not sent by God, but he is a demon who is trying to trick us. Still standing just outside of the doorway, I had never entered the attic. I begin to scream at Erin to run. I had to scream more than once because she was in some sort of trance, but she soon snapped out and tried running to me. It was a difficult task because he kept trying to pull her down, and she was tripping over rafters and insulation.

I felt like this was a battle of her own that I could not help her in. I stood at the door, and all I could do was encourage her and keep her motivated. As I said, I could not physically help her; she could only help herself.

I continue to scream, and she continues to fight and struggle. Bright flashes of blue, pink, yellow, purple and white lightening repeatedly fill the room. At the top of my lungs, with everything in me, I do all that I can to encourage Erin to save herself. The demon is putting up quite a battle, and it is not an easy task for her. I tell her she can beat it just like the other demons that she has been faced with in her life. She's a strong person, and she can overcome anything.

Finally, she is only inches in front of me, and I wake up from my sleep.

I wanted to call Erin, but I'm not going to call her at 3am on a school night. All I can guess is that she was able to overcome the struggle since she was at the doorway. I'm shocked at how vividly I can recall this dream, but it touched me so deeply.

I did end up calling Erin and sharing it with her, and she was glad that I didn't call her at 3am and freaking her out. We tried to pick it apart and analyze it. She is a psychology major, and we both think that it is deep, dark, and interesting.

Buster Update

A week ago today, I got Buster. He is growing so fast. He is getting better at using the bathroom outside, crying less, and he is also learning how to sit and stay. He is a good puppy, when he wants to be. After all, he is still a puppy.

Don't get me wrong, every now and then he makes a mess. He gets upset from time to time when he's alone, and he will take a poop in his playpen. The good thing is that he does it on his "pee pee pads." The bad thing is that he is so worried about being alone and wanting someone to hold him that he ends up walking in his poop and walking all over his pen. It has not happened in a couple of days, so I'm hoping that it's getting better.

He loves playing with his toys. He has tons of fun with balls because they roll away, and he can pounce on them. Outside, he attacks leaves, pine cones, and tall weeds or flowers. The boy loves to play. He can go on and on, but when he decides that he is tired, he will just curl up and any spot will do.

Now that he's becoming accustomed to being away from momma and the family, we can start working on his behavior. I can't have him chewing everything around him. He'll end up tearing the house to pieces. He has come so far in just a week, and I think, by next week, he will become even more obedient. Maybe he can be a show dog! Haha...Well, maybe not. I don't plan on being that strict with him. I just want him to be a happy puppy that doesn't tear everything up, uses the bathroom outdoors, and knows how to act in front of people.

On a separate note, I get a kick out of reading bumper stickers. I saw two, on a truck, that was on campus, and I had take a picture of them.

Friends

FRIENDS: Never ask for anything to eat or drink.
BEST FRIENDS: Helps themselves and are the reason why you have no food.

FRIENDS: Call your parents and grandparents by Mr. and Mrs.
BEST FRIENDS: Call your parents DAD and MOM and Grandpa, GRAMPS!

FRIENDS: Would bail you out of jail.
BEST FRIENDS: Would be sitting next to you sayin "DAMN!" We fucked up!

FRIENDS: Have never seen you cry.
BEST FRIENDS: Wont tell everyone else you cried... just laugh about it with you in private when you're not down anymore.

FRIENDS: Asks you to write down your number.
BEST FRIENDS: Has you on speed dial.

FRIENDS: Borrow your stuff for a few days then gives it back.
BEST FRIENDS: Lose your shit and tells you, "My bad...here's a tissue."

FRIENDS: Only know a few things about you.
BEST FRIENDS: Could write a very embarrassing biography on your life story...

FRIENDS: Will leave you behind if that is what the crowd is doing.
BEST FRIENDS: Will kick the whole crowds ass that left you.

FRIENDS: Would knock on your front door.
BEST FRIENDS: Walk right in and say "I'M HOME."

FRIENDS: You have to tell them not to tell anyone.
BEST FRIENDS: Already know not to tell.

FRIENDS: Are only through highschool/college. (aka: drinking buddies)
BEST FRIENDS: Are for life.

FRIENDS: Will be there to take your drink away from you when they think you've had enough.
BEST FRIENDS: Will look at you stumbling all over the place & say, "Finish that! Drink up bitch! You know we don't waste!"

Unbelievable

Rebecca told me about a story that was featured on the news. This new phenomenon is called unschooling. Basically, the unstudent makes all of their own decisions of what they are going to do throughout each day. If they want to learn something, all that they have to do is look it up online. Also, if they decide they want to go out and play, there is nothing to stop them.

I think this is wrong on many levels. I didn't review the entire website, and I remain unsure of all the details. Still, this doesn't teach the youth how to think and learn as a group. It encourages anti-social behavior. Also, when the kids grow up, as the tend to do, how are they going to cope on the university level? Better yet, how are they going to hold down a job? It is not exactly acceptable to have playtime in the middle of the work day, and if they have no experience working with others, it will be miserable for all parties.

Also, as a child, they may be unaware of reputable websites that are out there on the internet. The internet and magazines are filled with information written by people or groups with zero credentials. This just means that they may be teaching themselves the wrong information.

Have you ever tried to look up mathematical or chemical equations and calculations? There isn't much out there, and some of the ones that exist, that I have seen, are quite vague.

Some things are just better with a teacher.

As random as it gets

As I go throughout my day, I think about things that I want to write in here. Ideas after ideas flow through my head, but when it comes down to it, I have nothing. So, I'm just going to put a bunch of random thoughts that I have, which don't make any sense.

I just detailed my car, and tonight I hit about 500,000 bugs on my way home.

I'm tired of parents fussing their kids in public, but never following-through.

Today, the song "I'm in love with a stripper" was playing on the radio, and I decided that I really like that song. It makes me wanna go out and have fun. After that song played, Eminem came on. I don't like him. He's an angry little Toby.

I think I have an eye infection, and I lost my glasses.

For my nursing class, we had to develop a healthy habit. I listed my goal was to run 3 miles, 3 times a week, within a month. I reached my goal early, last week.

When will Chuck Huebner quit wearing that orange suit?

I got Buster Saturday, and he's so fun. He slept pretty much the entire day Saturday, but I played with him today. I think I wore him out.

People ask stupid questions in class. I think it's annoying when the teacher just finishes explaining something, and someone raises there hand and asks, "Can you explain: blah blah blah?" I just wanna scream, "That's just what he freakin' said!" Today, people started asking questions about something they should have read in their email (and the syllabus), while the teacher was calling roll. I thought that was inconsiderate.

I can't stand the girl whose last name sounds like "Apple Jelly." I hope she reads this. She's a moron.

I believe in radio to the power of X.

I wonder if I should tell this guy I know that his girlfriend wants to trick him into getting her pregnant?

Do you think Tom Cruise's baby's momma is going to get post-pardom depression?

I should have bought a lottery ticket tonight.

I have a Faith Hill song stuck in my head. It's "I'm the Lucky One."

I've picked out what songs I would sing on American Idol. Have you?

After tomorrow, the worry about my income taxes will be lifted from my shoulders. I'm happy about that.

I've lost 20 pounds since this past summer.

I'm petty, but if you're a regular, you already knew that.

I like working nights better than days, for now.

Lori Meaux-Steele is a man.

I'm going shower. Have a goodnight.

America has voted

All I have to say is: Thank the Lord Brenna Gethers got kicked off American Idol tonight. She's got a nasty little attitude, and I'm convinced that this will be the last we will see of her. The only other place that she may be seen is in porn "to try and get her career started."

Allons a Lafayette, Louisiane

I have never been one to go to all ends to celebrate Mardi Gras. Well, other than celebrating the literal meaning, "Fat Tuesday." Mardi Gras is the last day, for us Catholics, to cut lose before the Lenten season. Practical Catholics typically give up a favorite food or activity during this season, and before we give it up, we have to get that one last day of feast.

The pomp and splendor of Mardi Gras was made popular in New Orleans but has since spread across the state and beyond. The Marquis de Vaudreuil, a person of elegant manners and sophistication became Governor of the French Louisiana Colony and served a term from 1743-1753, in the capitol of New Orleans. His sponsorship of a regular series of balls, dinners, and formal social engagements increased his popularity with French Officials and members of the upper class in New Orleans, all of whom were hungry for this type of atmosphere. It is believed that he is responsible for the pageantry that we see in some Mardi Gras celebrations today.

Contrary to popular belief, the first-known Mardi Gras celebrations were not celebrated in New Orleans, but in Mobile, in 1703, before New Orleans existed. Mobile was a prior capitol to Louisiana, and is now located in present day Alabama.

Still continuing are some non-commercialized raw Mardi Gras of Southwest Louisiana, rich in all of its original traditions. Colors of Carnival is a tradition that began decades ago, when blacks were not welcomed at white Mardi Gras festivities. Some began creating their own costumes, using boxes to make hats and masks, which afforded them the secrecy to celebrate with lack of restraint. Additionally, The Independent has a great article outlining some of the Mardi Gras activities more common to the black Creole communities in Lafayette and New Orleans.

Another type of Mardi Gras common to Southwest Louisiana is the traditional Cajun Courrir de Mardi Gras ("Fat Tuesday Run"). It consists of a gang of locals masking their identities with hats we call capuchons (tall cone hats) who knock at doors in the neighborhood demanding charité ("charity"), in other words, ingredients to make a communal gumbo. Chickens are chased in designated yards and fields, caught, skinned, and cleaned. At the end of the day, a gumbo is made from the total of all communal charity received, and the entire neighborhood meets to eat the gumbo. This link offers great pictures and descriptions of the Cajun Courrir de Mardi Gras.

This year I decided to laissez les bon temps roulez, downtown Lafayette. I only went downtown on Mardi Gras day, and it was the disappointment of the year. The parade was short, and there was about a 30-minute gap, which separated the parade into two parts. The floats were extremely low budget. I've seen better parade presentation at the Rice Festival.

Most of the people who were interviewed on the news said that they enjoyed Lafayette's "family friendly festivities." To me, this means it sucked. I wasn't asking for anything vulgar, but some spice of the culture would have been welcomed.

Thankfully, quality entertainment was not far away. Our little party crew consisted of Aaron, Amber, Chad, Cypress, John, and myself. After the parade we went to The Blue Moon Saloon, which if you haven't been, I highly recommend it. The bar area is outdoors and completely covered. It is on a wooden deck, and they are good to count on for a great band. The entertainment Tuesday consisted of Joe Black, Horace Trahan, and Asparagus AllStars.

I never knew that Horace Trahan was close to my age. Below is a picture of him during his performance. While his band was setting up, some girl actually approached me because she thought that I was Horace. She wanted a picture, but unfortunately for her, I am just me.
After Blue Moon, we went to Artmosphere. Six String Rodeo was playing there, and my picture of the band didn't come out to good, so I'm not going to post it. When I first walked into Artmosphere, I saw quite a show, and it wasn't from the band. There was a little squabble, and Cypress got a punch in! That's my girl! I was glad, that plug deserved it and so much more. Not to discredit Six Finger Rodeo, I thought they rocked. They played some good ole' boy country music, and you can't end the night much better than that.

I'm glad I decided to get out of Crowley. I celebrated with a great bunch of friends, and I don't need a special holiday for that. We'll have fun regardless of the circumstance. I'm sure we'll be causing trouble again sometime soon.

Oh, and Cypress and I ate at some little Chinese place behind Mel's Diner. I had seen the place before, but never had the pleasure of eating there. They have the best eggrolls I have ever tasted in my life. They told us that they were homemade from scratch. The buffet is only $5.95. I encourage you to check it out.