"Congratulations! You have been admitted to your first-choice major in
the School Of Architecture ( Architecture ) at UT Austin."
oh my
goodness...i just decided to pay another visit to my ut app status page
online...and lo and behold, i'm in!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
i'm so happy
words cannot describe the feeling. ut arch, ranked 2nd in 2006 and 9th
in 2007 according to design intelligence in undergrad arch, is so
freaking hard to get into, esp with someone as bad a classrank as me.
last year they accepted only 85 of 750 applications. omg.
thanks
to all who have given my advice, looked over my essays and everything.
and of course, thanks to God...i'm pretty sure it was all Him who put
me into the top 10% of all the applications. Thanks, love you, God.
oh
i've also been admitted into ta&m and pratt. hooray. so that's
3/4...still waiting on usc. but since utarch is my first choice, it's
been decided- i'm a longhorn. hookem.
These are two things I've always been pretty good with. I'm usually
patient with everyone. I've almost never been angry at someone else
outside my family my entire life, and I don't expect this trend to
change in the future. I'm a rather easy-going, slow to anger type of
person, who is willing to wait for others. I've also felt that trusting
God hasn't been a major issue for me. It seems quite easy to allow God
to take the reigns of my life, anticipating with confidence that he
will deliver me. Patience and trust. Simple things.
However, I've felt as if a tremendous test, a challenge pushing me to
my limits has been placed upon my shoulders within the past school
year. With my parents as the catalysts of this test, it's seemed nearly
impossible to contain myself and push forward, not erupting in an
uncontrollable rage against them. So many things, seemingly unfair,
have been forced upon me, and its has if I'm barely surviving with the
support of the Spirit.
First off, I still don't have car insurance nor a car to drive. I'm
over 18 and I basically can't drive myself anywhere a few miles away
from the house. Sure, there may be a few out there who are constrained
within these bounds as well, though I highly doubt it. And as bad as
that is, my sisters (nothing against yall if you're reading this) have
enjoyed privileges I've been deprived of at this age. Why did they get something I
don't have? I've only exceeded them with grades and violin, which are the
two things that concern my parents. And I haven't even been close to a
wreck, when both sisters have been in at least one. Don't I at least
deserve a chance? Then there's the lack of respect I receive. I've done
absolutely nothing in my entire life, which I can say with absolute
certainty, for them to think otherwise. I mean, I was isolated from my
parents for five weeks at UT, where I could've drank, had sex, gotten
tattoos, etc., but they still think I don't know how to look after
myself. I can't see Linda...which is simply because "I'm too young."
My parents will only allow me to hang out with her in a group right
now. And when was the last time you met a guy who's mother thought
girls
would molest him and take advantage of him? Also, only hours ago, my
dad suddenly said I couldn't ask jersey people for
fundraising money, and that if I didn't meet the $2300, I couldn't go.
Why? I don't know. It's not even his money. He's a pastor, you say,
he'll
let me do this type of thing, he'll let me evangelize. Psh, yea right.
Not this one. I don't even want to discuss the joy my parents seem to
receive when I stay home and do nothing, rather than go to prayer
meeting or go out, even after my homework is complete. And, there's
still so much more.
However, after talking about the linoch and my parents' views with
Char, I've realized, maybe it's all a test. The relationship with
Linda, the lack of freedom, the driving, the overprotection. One big
painful extended test. Maybe God realizes that patience and trust are
two of my strengths, or He just sees that I think they're two of my
strengths. Whichever it is, it's been so tough and awfully rough at
times, but it's obvious it's a time of growth He has prepared for me.
I've never faced anything as difficult as this. Long-distance
relationships are so difficult and basically only being with Linda
while other people are present isn't easy by any means. The tyranny of
my parents is so
overbearing and overwhelming. I've wanted so much to
simply rebel, ignore them, lie to their faces, and give up this crap
I'm taking for no apparent reason in the present. So many times I've
just cried out to God in desperation, pleading for help, after
suffering through so much frustration to the point of numbness. I
haven't faced a tougher challenge, but hey, I better be considering
this crap as pure joy, as James tells us to do. And gradually, I've
come to realize that it's only temporary. An entire year might seem
long, but Abraham, even though he was a hoss, had to
wait...for...what...I don't even know how
many years. I know God's telling me to be patient and to trust Him with
my life and its purpose. I'm looking forward, patiently waiting for the
reward and relief (which I'm praying is ut-arch acceptance) to come,
which may arrive within the next week, over the summer, or heck, even
in twenty years. Whatever it is, I'll be waiting on God.
All throughout high school, I heard how people said that you learn a
lot about yourself and your character during your final year. This was
something I asked God to reveal to me and also help me improve on. And
now, though the trusting and waiting still continue, I've discovered a
sense of peace that calms my heart, received chiefly through the Holy
Ghost and prayer (two things I've fallen deeply in love with). A
sensation of serenity and comfort of my life and its future has never
been more evident. Seems like the fear and uncertainty that so often
suffocates our lives dissipate, and a confidence in God's control
emerges when we trust our gentle and loving Abba.
It'll never be easy to endure, so if you guys could occasionally keep
me in your prayers, I'd appreciate that a lot. Thanks and God Bless.
"If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast."
Many times we are content with sitting on the sidelines, always hearing
about other's lives being changed in huge ways and God being so
important in their life. We go to church and hear people talk about
what God has been doing in their life. We go to events and conferences
that we hope will microwave our Christian maturity to well done. We
read books on how other's lives were changed. And that is good enough
for us, but deep down inside, we wish we could have that happen in our
own life. So we make promises to try harder. We recommit our lives to
Jesus. We might begin having devotions more often. But, after a while,
the desire dies off and the excitement has turned into duty and we give
up. Obedience makes the difference in a life that is sold out for God.
It is seeing what God does with our attitude of following what He has
in the Bible that brings about change in our hearts and a Christian
walk that is on fire.
Zach Conrad
I tell you, if you are serious about wanting to be like Christ, He is going to put you in circumstances where your only true choice is to become like Him.
Francis Frangipane
There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the
world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu,
Jewish or Buddhist (except maybe in Japan) religions, this reduces the
workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million
(according to the population reference bureau). At an average (census)
rate of 3.5 children per household, that comes to 108 million homes,
presuming there is at least one good child in each. Santa has about 31
hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and
the rotation of the earth, assuming east to west (which seems logical).
This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each
Christian household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000th of a
second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the
stocking, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat
whatever snacks have been left for him to get back up the chimney into
the sleigh and get onto the next house.
Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed
around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will
accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about
0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not
counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is moving
at 650 miles per second or 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes
of comparison, the fastest man made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe,
moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can
run (at best)
15 miles per hour.
The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming
that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized LEGO set (two
pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting
Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than
300 pounds. Even granting that the "flying" reindeer can pull 10 times
the normal amount, the job can't be done with eight or even nine of
them - Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload,
not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly
seven times
the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).
A mass of nearly 600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates
enormous air resistance this would heat up the reindeer in the same
fashion as a spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead
pair of reindeer would adsorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per
second each.
In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing
the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their
wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 426
thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip.
Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating
from a dead stop to 650 m..p.s. in .001 seconds, would be subjected to
acceleration forces of 17,000 g's. A 250 pound Santa (which seems
ludicrous considering all the high calorie snacks he must have consumed
over the years) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015
pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing
him to a quivering blob of pink goo. Therefore, if Santa did exist,
he's dead now.
Oh, and another lie, as many of you may know, is that today isn't Christ's real birthday.
YAY! Well, with that in mind, have a happy happy pretend birthday Jesus!
When I feel alone - I can go away
To place I know - where i see Your face
When the day is old - and the sun has set
IN Your hands alone - can my needs be met
You know my voice - You know my name
Yesterday today and tomorrow - You are the same
When I say today I love You then tomorrow let You down
When I tell You You're the Kind and then I try to take Your crown
When the things I do are different than the promises I've made
Your love for me never changes
When the well is dry - when I'm out of steam
You revive my heart - And You restore the dream
And when there's nothing left - in this world to do
I can close my eyes - and find sweet rest in You
You're the same - You are the same
You're the same - You are the same
