With a glass of Chianti on my desk

Feeling a little like a lush since I'm finishing off the rest of the Chianti I didn't use in tonight's recipe, Drunken Tuscan Pasta from Rachael Ray's Express Lane Meals. I modify the recipe a bit to suit our household tastes, and will post the modified recipe shortly, but right now I've got a full stomach and need to be out the door soon for a birthday party tonight at the Book & Bean Café (Calvary Chapel's coffee shop outreach here in this fair city).

Got to hang out with my cousin Simon a bit today, as he had business to conduct with the vehicle inspection site in Royalton (where I worked one Saturday a month at the library for a year!) and tabs to acquire at the local DMV. Ah, small towns. Simon lives in the cities but they weren't able to get him in promptly, and the man needs to be able to drive his car, so he drove up here and called me for coffee this afternoon once he was free. It's been a while since I've seen him, so it was excellent to catch up and know that he needs some prayers and that S and I are informally invited for a non-specific dinner party with Simon and Eve sometime in February. Sweet!

In library school news, I am currently now very excited about my reference class, since Tuesday's assignment of partners for our project(25% of my grade—yeesh!). Me and another girl got our hands in the air to volunteer to present first, so we'll have that out of the way by the end of class on January 30th. This means I've started research on reference interviews and will need to gather some information from some current reference librarians and creatively, intelligently, coherently synthesize my ideas into a 3-4 page paper and collaboration with my classmate. It should be pretty great, actually. I am thankful for this blessing, since for a portion of my trip to St. Paul on Tuesday night for class, I just prayed for discernment about which topic to sign up for, and I prayed for some enthusiasm for this class, since I haven't been "feelin' it" this semester. Praise the Lord, because I'm now pretty jazzed about my topic and my ability to cover it.

My cousin, Erik Ringsmuth, is awesome!!

If you go to Echo Mountain's website, you can see my cousin Erik in his brown winter gear in the main photo. He moved back to Colorado this winter (last winter he worked as a lift operator there) to try his hand at some competitive skiing. He was in a skiing competition at Echo Mountain last weekend and got 2nd place!! We are about one step closer to full Ringsmuth family name recognition the world over.

La familia

Last night I had just finished eating some nachos when the doorbell rang. Normally, our "open door" policy is in place all the time, except that I had been taking a nap and my parents had left on a walk and had apparently locked up before leaving. I answered the door and lo and behold! It was my cousins Angie and Erik, come to hang out.

We had a glorious evening of wine and song and beer and playing Nerts (which is like double solitaire, on crack, played with as many people as possible, in fast forward) and dancing around to techno and talking about how we all love our extended family beyond reason. It was an excellent, wonderful time. I started to crash around 2am, and crawled off to bed.

S "sober dialed" me sometime during the evening, and this morning when he called, said I sounded really cute last night. I was like, when I am drunk, I am even cuter than usual? Not bad to know... and he said that I was like a happy child you want to scoop up and pack away to sweet dreams. Nice. At least I wasn't naughty.

I have a few days off here, and I'm going to finish reading "A Year in the Merde" and start with my LIS 703 homework, reading the introduction to AACR2 and the chapters of the textbook for the first course meeting on September 9. Not that far away; time to bite the bullet.

Oh Adlai, Adlai, what did you say

After I got home from work today, I was tired and hungry, but my cousin Angie called and so she came over and we hung out for a while before she went to see another friend with "boy troubles." I'm really glad Angie is back, and I hope we hang out more, even more than we did last summer which was only sporadically to do really Angie-Bethy things like going out for drinks and seeing "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" together.

After she left, I went to bed and napped for nearly three hours. Maybe I am coming down with something, or maybe I have whatever it is that makes my sister sleep so much. In actuality, my own sister is having her sleep studied at this moment, all hooked up and "looking like a robot," according to a phone conversation she had a couple hours ago with my mom. I hope they either find something wrong to fix, or nothing wrong at all, because dang does that girl sleep a lot. I don't think I could ever sleep 16 hours a day like she does, not that I would even try.

Obsessed with the latest Sufjan Stevens offering, but I haven't told S about it, just sent it to him and can't wait for him to listen to it and tell me what he thinks. He told me about Bloc Party; I told him about Sufjan Stevens. Fair trade?

Missing her

I went with my aunt Laura and cousin Christy to the airport today to pick up my cousin Angie who has been in Ecuador for the last 11 months. I really missed Angie and read her blog whenever she updated it. She taught English and from how it sounds, had a fabulous time for the most part and really wants to continue with that path.

Sometimes I look at my life and think, how predictable. That's not necessarily a bad thing, it's just that I know there are other options, I just don't choose them. I go with the things that seem intuitive. I guess I would like to challenge myself sometimes, but I am afraid of striking out and forging new ground when I know I have it so good.

In other South American news, Cata leaves tomorrow for Iowa to attend school there, this awesome girl from Colombia who has lived with my family for more than a year. I hope she does well, that she can accomplish her goals of working (the university here was not helpful with the work study stuff.. grr) and getting some credits out of the way in order to transfer back here next year.

I guess in a way, Angie's courage and Cata's courage give me a certain amount of belief in my own strength to do something similar. I don't know exactly what that might be, but I can't let my notion of what my life should look like interfere with what my life could look like.

A good time for all

Andrea and Emily enjoying their Freeze-pops. Lots more photos at flickr.

With fingernails that shine like justice

My legs are sore from dancing at Simon and Eve's wedding reception last night, but it was worth it. DJ Andrea Danger played lots of fun music, and I got to hang out with cousins and the couple's friends and eat good food (pasta) and cheesecake (chocolate). Cata and I came home afterward to sleep in our own beds, and my parents and Andrea stayed in the hotel one more night.

The wedding itself was a success, and I ran around getting bouquets and finding people and being the personal attendant to the bride. Helped do the flower girl's hair (my cousin Maggie). My vocal solo also went well, received many compliments even though I was rather nervous. Snuck out of the church near the end in order to be ready to bustle Eve's gown and hold her bouquet while she shook hands and got hugs. Somehow cut my finger on my own corsage and bled a little on the ribbon from her flowers, but got it cleaned up and to the reception in time.

I am so totally having a small wedding, having a destination wedding far away, or eloping.