the world is crazy today. not my world. at this very moment my world is calm and uneventful. but it just seems like there is so much going on around me. it's a gorgeous day here in chicago. gorgeous for october 31st, that is. it's probably 40-50 degrees outside, which still seems very cold but i know i'll learn to appreciate it soon when those arctic winds arrive. the sun is shining, there is a pleasant breeze blowing. the leaves are all turning and falling. which is beautiful. i guess i'm willing to sacrifice the warm weather for awhile to see the leaves turn. that IS why they turn colors and fall right? because the temperature gets cooler? i mean it just seems logical because in places where it's warm the trees stay green all year round, so i've heard, so i just figured that it's a temperature change thing. which is amazing. that something as simple as a drop in temperature could produce such vibrant oranges and yellows and pinks. seriously. some of the trees just look like they are glowing. you drive under them and they look like they are on fire. you can't help but drive slower. these sights are not meant to be passed by at 40 mph. and as beautiful as this is, i've heard that new england is ten times better. which i can't believe, but then again john pillen said it, and what he says is quite nearly divine so i guess i'll believe him.

so i got to wear THE DRESS on tues. night. it was the college banquet. it lasted for over 3 HOURS. i was about ready to start beating my head against the table i was so bored. i mean you can only listen to someone talk about new college dorms for so long. the school i go to is small. tiny. seriously. think of the smallest college you've heard of and then divide that student population by 20 and you have the number of students that go to my school. oh sorry. "school." and we are fully accredited, AND it's been around for awhile, over 50 years, but i guess the college never did any formal advertising, so all of the students were local or had heard about it from around the states and overseas by word of mouth. and we have never had the facilities to accomodate very many students in need of housing. it's a vicious cycle; you need the funds to grow, you need growth to get the funds. but i guess the means have been provided, at least in part, because christian life college is now building real dorms. $1.3 million worth of them. they just poured the foundation this week. they should be ready to go by spring. anyway, back to the banquet. you can only hear so much of this stuff before you just wish that you were dead. the speaker mentioned something about how the new dorms would be equipped with state of the art safety features, to which i started thinking and ignoring the rest of what he had to say. state of the art safety features. brainstorm with me what possibilities are available here. i'm thinking some sort of microchip inserted under your skin that delivers an electric shock once every five minutes that you do not come home by curfew. or perhaps the apartments come with ready-made chastity belts, seeing as how we all are bible college students. and i'm sure all the furniture and appliances will be of the 3-year-old and under variety. you know, like if you go to mcdonald's or any other fast food establishment they say that if you have a child under 3 who wants a happy meal to ask for the special toy for kids under 3 that does not have small parts that they can swallow and choke on. they will probably put those plastic lock deals on the cupboards so that we can't open them to find and ingest deadly chemicals. maybe they will throw in a few straight jackets just in case. it's good that they are concerned about our well-being. but regardless, i want you to know that i enjoyed wearing the dress. it was a good time. i was really tired yesterday though, the morning after. jeanna was too. i guess we were just so busy emoting ourselves and being beautiful and charming that it just wore us out. that's okay every once in awhile though.