*firmly regains seat on cloud 9*

*launches spitwads in the direction of cloud 8... just for fun*

Last night was good. Church was good and I had a surprise guest to accompany me which was cool. :) I enjoyed the sermon and I got my Communion elements, but I still... well, I'm too picky, and I'm missing the whole point of Communion by saying this, but, I don't particularly like the way they do Communion at the church I'm currently attending. I like the church. I like the building, I like the pastor, I like the people, but this one little item is plaguing me. At my church at home, the pastor breaks the bread, and then we each go up and break off a piece, and dip it in the juice and sit down. Here, the bread is pre-cut up into little white cubes. The first time I had it at Fredonia, they brought the bread and cups to our seats. This time we went to the altar to get it, but it was still weird. The pastor sat away from us. It wasn't personal at all. It was STRANGE to me. BAH. I am making a big deal over a stupid nitpicky thing that doesn't even matter. But... to me... I guess maybe it kinda does.

Today is Good Friday, so you know what that means... church again. :) It's cool though, I'm looking forward to it. I always liked the Good Friday services. It's a somber thing of course, I mean, this is the night Jesus died. But I like taking the time out to really think about it, and I like the quiet and the darkness of the services I grew up with. And then we'd go home and kinda muddle about for the next day and a half, until Sunday morning -- Easter! At home there's a sunrise service, 6AM on Sunday morning with breakfast to follow of course. When I was in high school, the youth group used to plan out and perform the sunrise service. We always had lots of singing (of course!), and a play or two, and a sermonette by one of the graduating seniors (if there was one). I wrote the play when I was a senior, and I really think it was one of the best plays I ever wrote, at least message-wise. It's really hard to write a play for a specific group of people because you want to give everybody a part, and you want everybody's part to be good (because you don't want to seem like you're favoring anyone over anyone else!). But... you do your best. That particular play, Ryan ended up with probably the biggest part... cuz... well yeah. :) But anyway, that was one of the best plays I ever wrote, not that I ever wrote very many. ;) Two or three Christmas extravaganzas, and two Easter things (I think). I also did the sermon that year, and I ended up staying up the night before Easter to write it. I think I still have it somewhere. I don't remember exactly what I said, except that it was about teddy bears. I talked about all my different ones, and I tried to bring in each one I talked about (except I couldn't find my koala bear, cuz he was buried in the store room). And then at the end, I put Teddy at the foot of the cross. Because... Jesus never had a teddy bear. (Or something like that.) People seemed to like it, and I enjoyed myself. :)

That's another tradition at home... we have a life-size cross at our church, and every year it gets draped in black for Good Friday, and on Sunday morning it "blooms". It's my mom's doing. ;) But I think it's a cool tradition. She covers the whole thing in silk flowers, all different colors, with white lilies woven into the crown of thorns around the top. It really looks beautiful and it really makes you think 'spring', with flowers throughout the church and everyone in their new spring dresses. And at the real church service we all sing "Christ the Lord is Risen Today" and "He Lives!" and other such joyful types of hymns, and it's really quite lovely! And then we go home and eat candy and fall asleep because we were all up before the sun for the sunrise service. ;) When I was younger we used to go to my grandparents' for... dessert at least, maybe dinner and dessert, and all the cousins would play and have a grand time of things. Those were the days... We don't do that anymore, since my grandmother died. I don't even know what we do now, if anything. I'm out here, at any rate, and I'll be spending Easter with my boyfriend's family, and I'm looking forward to it. :) In a few years I'll have my own Easter traditions, and maybe someday my little girl will write all about it in her journal. :)

So I'm feeling good today. Obviously I'm reminiscing a bit. ;) I'm looking forward to my afternoon and evening, though I don't know exactly what they hold (other than church). But it will be fun. :) I pretty much decided to forgo doing any work this weekend. I mean, tomorrow I intend to get some chores done (mainly laundry) and work on the research for a paper I've got coming up. And Sunday evening, when I get back from Joe's, I might do a little catch-up work for LaTeX. But it's a holiday, and it's a Holy Weekend, so I intend to relax and give it the respect it deserves. Work will get done, and I'm not in bad shape, and even if I don't do it at all I STILL won't be in bad shape. ;) So there's no point in stressing about it!

Right... so now... I'm skipping Files... as usual. I'm going to work on a cover letter, and then go to Combinatorics, and then who knows. Now I'm rambling, so I guess it's time to go. ;) Peace out, yo.

*reclines on cloud 9, munching an apple*