i was going to post something profound,

possibly about the excellent lecture on race and education that I attended last Thursday.

But it’s now the fifth week of school (1/3 done!) and you know that what we really need is a good laugh.

So go visit Cake Wrecks for the most hilarious collection of ugly, messed up, or just plain strange cakes you’ve ever seen. You have to love the internet.

Now if only I could get the internet to do my homework, I would have more time to post on my blog.

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in which i seek some zen, and enjoy titling my blog posts like the chapters of 19th century novels

Today I, like my fellow blogger Dan, am celebrating that mystical moment of applying for a degree with the registrar’s office. . . . For me, the experience is coming a semester late, which, due to my rampant senioritis (it happens to the best of us) makes it a very, very sweet moment.

Also, how weird is this — another fellow Messiah blogger decided to adopt my blog template (you have good taste, my friend), and her birthday is apparently a mere one day before mine. Freaky. I have an internet doppelganger!

In other news, I am attempting to zen out as I transition into being 22, reaching graduation, getting married, finding my very first full-time, year-round job, etc., etc. I’m sure you’ve all heard graduates wonder how long they’ll be unemployed before, so I’ll spare you my account of the perennial question facing recent college graduates. No, I do not have a plan.

Instead, let’s talk about pumpkin. I don’t really like pumpkin pie, but in my More with Less cookbook (favorite standby of Mennonites everywhere) I discovered a recipe for pumpkin soup which tops my charts. Delicious! I also felt happy because none of the pumpkin was wasted! We dug out the meat (mostly), used it for the soup, roasted the seeds for snacks, and then Greg carved the shell into a cranky, mustachioed man.

That means it’s really fall! Pumpkins! Cool weather! The color orange! People mowing their lawns and harvesting their squashes! Can you tell it’s exciting? Pennsylvania has a great autumn, with more pronounced changing of the leaves than I’m used to. I enjoy it a lot. And some of my Messiah people are getting inspired to bake breads, have community meals, or cookouts, or in other ways make great use of the fine weather we’re currently enjoying. It’s good.

Now if only I could get them to stop assigning me more reading, I’d be golden. . . .

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apparently, i am a trend-setter.

I discovered today that another Messiah blogger is using the same blog template! Should I feel uber-hip now? I mean, clearly the person who designed this look is pretty much amazing. But I have never trend-sat before. It might be harder than it sounds. Do you think I have to get ridiculous sunglasses or anything?

Wait, you’re thinking, you’re updating a day early! Why yes, yes I am. Why? Because Greg and I have done something awesome. We cooked chicken together. Not just any chicken, though! We roasted a whole bird. A whole free-range bird, I might add. And we only called our respective mothers about five times about how on earth one deals with an entire chicken.

We still haven’t decided what to do with the gibblets. Apparently my grandma used to put them in turkey dressing? Greg thought maybe his housemate’s cat would like them.

But in any case, it’s a gigantic victory in our quest to eat healthily — in a way that benefits not only us but our environment. So I’m pretty proud. We’re waging a revolution in our diet, basically: there’s another chicken waiting for us at Greg’s family’s house, along with 18 jars of tomatoes we canned with his mom, and some jars of grape juice she made, and cans of peaches, and frozen corn, and various other fanastic comestible items. And Greg’s mom also said she could get ahold of some more free-range eggs for us. Yay!

Greg also spent some time this week saving seeds from heirloom species of tomatoes. Next year, we’ll have heirloom tomatoes (Lord willing. I think saving seeds can be fairly touch-and-go for beginners). There’s one particular kind of heirloom tomatoes I think would be absolutely fantastic to find. . . apparently, the tomatoes never quite ripen on the plant, so you just pick them green and store them in newspapers in a cool, dry place. Then, in December, you pull them out and over the past six months they will have magically ripened in your pantry! How does every person on the planet not want one of those plants?

I know, I know, I blog about food too much. Maybe when I graduate I can become a food or lifestyle writer for a magazine or newspaper. That would be rockin’.

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you can tell i’m hungry when all my metaphors end up being about comestibles.

I am here with a brief announcement: I will now be primarily updating this blog on Thursdays instead of Fridays. This is because my Fridays have become important sanity-retaining breaks from the grinding schedule of the rest of my week. Of course, less classes on that day just means that I have more things like appointments with doctors, meetings with my fellow Minnemingo editors, and meetings with professors who hopefully will be able to help me graduate in December. Since if I don’t, I will have a mental breakdown.

It’s too bad only entropy gets done on its own. Why can’t I sprinkle a little sugar on my homework, stick it in the oven, and bam! — in about an hour, it will be completed and smell lovely, like a cake?

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