WEATHER

Hmmmm, the winter weather seems to have arrived earlier than expected--which is even more funny than if it had arrived tomorrow, because as it is, the temperatures went from 68 degrees to 30 degrees in less than 24 hours! In fact, this morning the temperature seemed to drop about 20 degrees within about five minutes--it was really weird. It is super nasty, rainy, slushy, gray, cold, windy, and gross out there right now, but that is only the beginning. We now have a "Winter Storm Warning" and are supposed to get a half-inch of freezing rain tonight, followed by four inches of snow tomorrow. I just can't wrap my mind around going from 68 degrees to this so quickly! I guess it's good though, because now the children who were here for interviews today got to see what the weather is really like during the winter here. Yesterday was not an accurate representation.

I spent all day today giving tours of the campus and shuttling children from the graduate lab over to their interviews with the professors at the library. It was quite a hectic day, and the tours weren't very fun because it was so gross outside. My shoes are totally soaked, and my jeans are soaked clear up to just below my knee! The children still enjoyed the ghost stories though. And, they were giving away free Krispy Kreme doughnuts over at the student union today--in celebration of Krispy Kreme's 50th anniversary, so that made the children happy. Are they giving away doughnuts at all Krispy Kreme locations today? I had to give tours with Alisha, and I was about ready to pop her on the head--she totally drives me crazy :-) Well, I'm going to go read to Dr. Hardeman.

Pseudo Spring

"Weird" doesn't even begin to describe the weather here in Illinois. "Highly-irregular, abnormal, and subject to change frequently" is closer to the truth. It is 68 degrees outside right now!!!!!!! It is seriously 68 degrees outside. The sun is shining, a cool breeze is blowing, and it is the perfect spring day. HOWEVER, on Tuesday--the day after tomorrow--we are supposed to have a high of 30 degrees, low of 19 degrees, and a snow storm. Craziness. The prospective HA students who are coming into town today are going to get a false sense of what winter weather is like in Charleston. I think that the impression Mom and I got when we came to visit last February was more accurate. Oh well--we'll enjoy the warm weather here while it lasts. It's supposed to be pretty nice tomorrow too, which will be good because I have to give a bunch of campus tours to the prospective students, or the "children," as I call them. Some of the children are coming by our apartment today to check-out Campus Pointe, and then they are all going out to dinner. I'm opting for the dinner-less option, so I'll just head straight over to the Dudley House to help Dr. Small set up chairs and things before our "Interview Weekend Commencement Program" this evening.

Today I have suffered a severe bout of tiredness and overwhelmity (that's a new word I made up)--due, I believe, to yesterday's escapades. I didn't have a chance last night to go into great detail about the trip to Tuscola, but let's just say that venturing though the thorn forest and over the drainage ditch was slightly hazardous to my health. My left knee has numerous cuts and bruises on it, and I think I still have a few little thorns in my legs. Then, last night's birthday party was crazy--as I knew it would be. I had big plans of going into my room, closing my door, and going to bed early, but that is easier said than done with an apartment full of drunk girls :-) Not everyone got really drunk, but Aly was wasted. They were all talking nonsense, but luckily they decided to go home rather than stay overnight. It took until 1:45 a.m., however, to get them out the door.

Last night I learned far more about all of my classmates than I ever wanted to know. Alisha was rambling all evening--but she was drunk on Welch's sparkling grape juice instead of alcohol. She seriously gave us too much information about herself--except that she is still holding fast to her secret tie to the Mormons. :-) However, now almost everybody knows that she used to be a Mormon because I had to explain to them today why Alisha was so upset when Kristen left a copy of the Book of Mormon in our graduate lab at school. I had given Kristen a copy of the Book of Mormon, but then the missionaries left her a copy along with "The Restoration" DVD, and so after watching the DVD, she brought it and her extra copy of the Book of Mormon to the lab in case somebody else wanted to borrow them. Catherine took the DVD home to watch, but the Book of Mormon was still in the lab, and I guess that Alisha kind of freaked out about it yesterday. I was not there when this happened, but I heard that she was saying how it is inappropriate to have religious material at school. Then, rather than doing it herself, she insisted that Laurie put it in one of the cabinets so that the visiting students wouldn't see it today. Aly and I had to go over to school this afternoon to work on some things, and Catherine and Laurie were wondering what the deal was with Alisha, so I just explained it to them. There's always something to be dramatic about around here! :-) I think I know why I've been feeling so drained of energy lately--I need to have better nutrition. I didn't think it was possible to forget about eating, but lately I've been finding myself forgetting to eat during the day, and that is not good. I will do better--and will then probably feel better!

Tiffy Mississippi

Today is my roommate Aly's birthday. These days I call her "Alygator." She loves it when I say "See you later Alygator." I also call her Alybama sometimes too. She is turning the big 23 today, and since she and I both love the Disney Channel, I gave her a Hannah Montana wig for her birthday. She wanted to take a picture of me in it, so here I am! I look a lot like her, don't you think? Maybe my pop star name could be Tiffy Mississippi. We also thought that we looked totally cool in our shades this afternoon, so we took a picture of ourselves. I am finishing up preparations for the big birthday party/sleepover tonight. Aly wanted a sleepover, so we're going to watch a bunch of girly movies, paint nails, and the whole nine yards. We're also eating Italian food, and most of the girls will be partaking of some alcoholic beverages. I told Aly that the drunk girls have to use her bathroom tonight, and I don't want to wake up with any drunk girls in my bed! I had to take Aly to the liquor store this afternoon--which was weird. I hate liquor stores. I just stayed in the car while she went in, but it was still weird.

Earlier today I had some interesting adventures up in Tuscola. Dan and I had to go take pictures of some things for the exhibit, and I of course made him stop at Flesor's Candy Kitchen so I could have one of the BEST Reuben sandwiches in the entire world!!! We got our photographs--but I must say, Dan is waaaaaaaay too hardcore. As I was following Dan across some fallen trees on top of a frozen drainage ditch trying to avoid the tree branches covered with large thorns while trying to get a picture of the interstate, I thought, "This is insane." Aside from a few thorns in my jeans, however, no harm was done. I'm just glad I got my Reuben :-) Well, the masses are arriving, so I am off to fix some food.

Happy Leap Day!

Happy Leap Day, everyone! I wondered this morning if, like daylight savings time, Benjamin Franklin invented the concept of "leap year," but I investigated and found out that leap year is actually attributed to Julius Caesar in 45 B.C.--a little before Ben Franklin came up with daylight savings. So, February is a little longer than usual this year, but at least it's still a tad shorter than the other months. Here's one last picture from last night--only, unlike the creepy one with the portal to another world in it (I like Lindy's description of what it looks like), the one you see here was staged. If you look in the corner of the mirror, you will see a spooky face, but that's actually Laurie standing by the bed with a flashlight shining on her face.

This weekend is the big "interview weekend," where all of the prospective students for next year's Historical Administration class will be coming to campus to be interviewed by the professors. I didn't come to interview weekend last year--because it was only about two weeks after Mom and I had been out here for the Illinois State History Symposium, so I got to do my interview over the phone. There are supposedly about ten people coming this weekend, but as far as I know none of them will be staying here at Aly's and my apartment. My job is going to be giving campus tours to everyone. Maybe I'll make it a ghost tour! :-) ha ha ha. Don't worry--my current infatuation with ghost stuff probably won't last very long. I kind of go through phases of different things I'm interested in--right now it's ghosts and Jesse James. I am very intrigued by Jesse James. One time I saw a bank he supposedly robbed in Independence, Missouri, and I've seen his name carved on the wall of the Mark Twain Cave in Hannibal, Missouri (but he's probably not the one who carved it there).

In the past 24 hours, we have experienced all kinds of weather--last night when we finished bowling, we came outside and there was a mini-blizzard going on. It was snowing really hard, and there was ice on everything. Then, this morning it was cloudy and slushy and gross outside. Then, it started to rain really hard. Then, the sun came out and it got really warm. In fact, there was just a hint of the spring in the air. It's supposed to be 59 degrees here on Sunday, but then back down to a high of 30 on Tuesday. Pure craziness! I'm ready for spring to come for real.

ALPHA

Here is Agent Tiff from the newly-created Abraham Lincoln Paranormal Historians Association (ALPHA)! I put on my ranger shades today and realized that they make good ghost hunter specs too. :-) All those ghost stories I was telling last night made me want to go inside Pemberton Hall today, so when I was over on campus, I stopped in. It's a really old building--but it does look kind of ominous from the outside, don't you think? I didn't want to go upstairs though, because that would be weird since I don't live there, but I could tell that it's kind of a creepy place. I did my hair in piggy tails today! It's just barely long enough to do that. Why was I wandering around Pemberton Hall instead of going to class today?--you may be wondering. Well, Dr. Barnhart has decided to abandon us. He says it's because he needs to go take care of his mom in Ohio, which is a very good excuse, but he's still around campus. We see him working at the library and stuff, which makes us think that he's so engrossed in the book he's writing that he doesn't want to take the time to teach class. So, we didn't have Dr. Barnhart's class today, and our Digital Applications class with Mr. Riccio ended last week (unfortunately we still have class with him on Tuesdays!), so I had zero classes today. But I was able to sleep in a little, which was nice, and get some random things done.













This evening we finished filming our movie at the Dudley House. It was a great time to look for ghosts. Laurie and I even went back into the haunted bedroom upstairs, where the disgruntled ghost supposedly lives, but we didn't see it. I did, however, snap a picture of the master bedroom, and there appears to be a strange object on the table by the window. Very strange--especially since there isn't anything on that table in real life. What do you think it is? Tonight I need to go bowling because Kristen and Alisha are part of the graduate student council, and they had to organize an activity, and they decided to organize a bowling night, and we don't think a lot of people will be there, so we decided we need to go support them. So, I'm off to go bowling!