Monday, January 30, 2006

it's easy to become jealous


the furball keeps the bed warm 'til i get home.

Friday, January 27, 2006

change is good

i recently took one of those internet blogging test things. the title of the test was "what color should your blog be?" i had to answer all of these silly questions about myself and what i choose to blog about. i think i even had to answer a question about what color underwear i was wearing that day. the very scientific result of the test was that my blog should be purple. i went with the next best thing and chose this template...it is the color of pea soup. i'm going to test it out for a few days and see how it suits me.

my mom used to force feed me pea soup when i was little. i hated it. one time i told her that if she made me eat it i would throw up. she laughed and made me eat it anyway. later that night i actually DID throw up. my threats usually didn't work that well. over the years my despise for pea soup has diminished a bit. sometimes i even buy canned pea soup at the store. baby steps...baby steps. and now my blog is the color of pea soup. what next? --SN

**note: the site has been changed again. my mom told me to.

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

pow!

that was the sound the gun made at the start of my first official race, the calvin spring classic. my sister asked me to write about this, our finest hour (or half hour depending on how technical you are).

race day. i believe that both my sister and i were filled with a lot of apprehension that day. as hard as we tried to play it cool, i'm pretty sure we were both pretty nervous. if anything our giggles as we "prepared" gave us away. niether of us had run in a race since junior high track and field day. now, both of us were fairly well-ribboned from track and field of days past, so besides our nerves perhaps you might have sensed a little cockiness as well. we schippers like to boast of days past and i don't know about her, but i still have those ribbons tucked away in my "special box."

the first thing we had to do was pick up our goodie bags at the registration desk. we watched carefully as the other racers tied their official " race chips" to their sparkling white running shoes. we followed their actions precisely making sure to lace tightly. we pinned our numbers to our shirts without creating that "pinched fabric" look. and we did some stretching exercises, laughing as some of the more athletic looking runners were "warming up" by running laps around the parking lot in their black, sleek stretch pants and their wicking t-shirts. we congratulated ourselves for not looking like some of the older dutch moms that surrounded us.

soon, someone with a bullhorn gave the warning that the race was about to begin. not knowing that we were making a huge mistake, my sister and i lined up directly behind the starting line right along side of those long-legged runners in the sleek, black stretch pants. we had seen chaplain cooper, "coop, " Calvin's chaplain near the front so we didn't think twice about our decision. little did we know at the time that he is a seasoned marathon runner. but we didn't want to be near the dutch moms for pete's sake. they had hips! they were wearing sweatpants!

the gun went off. the pack began their 5K journey. but to our surprise everyone was sprinting! when the gun sounded those people surrounding us took off, FULL FORCE. my sister and i HAD to sprint with them or risk being trampled by the pack. i was out of breath in ten seconds. spent. wasted. i felt like i could run no further. i looked at my sister and i knew that my face mirrored her look of panic. she looked at me and with what breath we had left we started laughing. "why is everyone running so fast?!" she screamed. "i don't know...but i can't keep this up much longer!" i answered. we decided to move to the side of the street and slow down. soon we were running at a much easier pace and quickly catching up to the back of pack...or, they were catching up with us. soon we were surrounded by dutch moms.

that was the longest three miles i have ever run. i was tired. i was sweating. and i couldn't keep up with sweatpants. the worst part was when good ol' chaplain cooper kept running ahead and then running back to cheer on those of us bringing up the rear. he probably ran three times the distance that i did. i wanted to pull his shorts down.

luckily my lovely hubby caught this wonderful day on video. you can see me huffing at the two mile mark. i can barely manage a wave. then you can see my sister run by, trying to ignore the camera, trying to look determined. and then there was that exciting scene at the end. i saw brett with his camera so decided to show off a bit. there was an older woman running slightly ahead of me. she was wearing sweatpants. i wanted to waste her. so, i winked at the camera and took off. i passed the woman and probably made her sweatpants flutter a bit in the wind of my speed. i was thinking i had it in the bag and i was already congratulating myself when suddenly this gray blur went wizzing by me. the woman decided to put up a fight! i couldn't believe it. i picked up my speed again and we were head to head down the home stretch. she passed me, i passed her...and then she passed me...and then she beat me.... these were the official "chip" results:

169 Snoeyink, Valerie        Zeeland MI            18  225   74   28:47  9:17
312 Schipper, Sara Grand Rapids MI 25 226 75 28:47 9:17

the numbers that are important here are the 74 and 75. She stepped over the line
before i did. the "chip" never lies. i did beat my
sister though. sorry katy.

311 Hoffman, Kathryn Grand Rapids MI 28 244 84 29:57 9:39
-SN

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

angels

every christmas season at my church they hang these huge white and purple cloth angels from the ceiling. each of them has a golden trumpet. i don't know who the artist is who created these angels, but she got it right on. this is what i think of when i think of angels--huge, magnificent beings, strong and ready, praising God with sounds of the trumpet.

i believe in the work and the power of angels. that is b/c i have encountered them 4 separate times in my life. my mom has a lot to do with my belief. whenever i go anywhere for work or pleasure she tells me she prays that my guardian angels would protect me. she believes in the strength of my guardian angels and tells me that i probably have some of the strongest, mainly b/c she was involved in my first angel encounter. i was about four at the time and i do not remember this event. but this is how my mom tells it. Logan, our dog, and i were following her up the stairs of our two-story home. we lived in an old house with beautiful hardwood floors (read, the stairs were hard). when our posse reached the top of the stairs the dog decided to jump up on me. the dog was huge, at least huge compared to a skinny four year old. his weight knocked me over and i proceeded to fall down the stairs head-first and backwards. my mom helplessly watched me fall, or as she recalls "float" down the stairs. She said it was as if i never even touched one stair. She doesn't even recall me hitting the bottom, but rather that i was "placed" there. she said my neck should have been broken. she said SOMETHING should have been broken...but i got up with barely a tear shed. she believes that my angels were put to work that day and haven't stopped working since. what's interesting is that my oldest sister happened to be standing at the bottom of the stairs when i fell. she remembers the same thing. i like that story.

my second encounter with an angel happened when i was wrecklessly traveling through central america. i say wrecklessly b/c i did a lot of stupid things. it was nearing the end of the trip. my friend natalie and i were to catch a bus the next morning for the 14 hour ride home from guatemala to honduras. the only problem was that natalie woke up with the worst case of food poisoning i've ever seen. she was letting loose about every 15 mintues. there was no way we were going to get on a bus. she decided that she didn't want to stay in the hostel where we were any longer. you know when you're sick sometimes you don't want to stay in the same place where you were sick? that was the situation. so we gathered all of our earthly belongings, hitched them onto our backs and just started walking. first we were mobbed by kids high on glue. they were trying to grab at any loose item they could find. their eyes were wild. a sad thing, but also a very scary thing. then we were hassled by every man on the street. it's a machismo culture. we were stared at, pawed at, glared at, winked at...we wanted out of there. then, while taking a rest in the central park we saw that day's newspaper. "tourists robbed!" it said. we were out of there. it was then that i realized that i had forgotten my passport back at the hostel tucked safely under the mattress (where else would it be?). stupid, stupid, stupid. natalie was too weak to walk all the way back to retrieve my much needed document. i had to go alone and i was really scared. i began my walk- half-run back to the hostel with my fists clenched. i was ready to swing at anyone who tried to come close to me, child or not. as i was walking i felt the back of my arm being taken into somebody's hand. i turned to punch the person belonging to the hand but stopped when i realized that it was a little old man. he spoke in perfect english. "what are you doing here? this is no place for you! why are you walking here alone? where are you going? i will walk you there." i couldn't argue, so arm in arm we walked back to the hostel. when we got there i went inside to the front desk and asked the woman if i could get back into my room. i turned to thank the man only to find that he was gone. i ran outside and peaked around the corner. nowhere. he was gone. sometimes huge, magnificent angels come in the form of little, old, english speaking guatamalen men. i walked back to the park and nobody paid me an ounce of attention. it was like they couldn't even see me. that night natalie and i stayed in the best hotel in all of guatemala.

my third encounter happened on a run. i was running on the Kent trails with my friend Jenne. These trails cross roads. some are busy some are not. since it was early in the morning, most of them were not busy. i would only half-heartedly look both ways as we crossed a street (every mother gasps). well, at one corner i looked both ways, but failed to notice the white van that was quickly approaching. Jenne stopped. I kept going. i remember that i had an instant dilemma in my mind. it lasted only a millisecond. i thought, "why did she stop? why did she stop? why did she stop? why am i still running? what's coming?" it was then when it felt like i hit a wall. no, the truck did not hit me. i think an angel did. i think my angel spread it's arms and legs and created a barrier. and i ran into him and got stopped cold. i stopped so fast my knee even buckled. i looked to my left just as that white van was screeching and skidding around me, leaving burning rubber marks in its wake. i turned around to find Jenne wide-eyed saying, "what are you doing?" just testing my angels i guess...

my fourth encounter happened recently. it involved me, my kitchen, boiling milk, and a blender. i was trying to make this mexican hot chocolate that we received as a christmas gift. to make it you need to heat up the milk, cut the chocolate into chunks, put it all into the blender, and then blend your way to a cup of warm, sweet bliss. now, i've always had problems with blenders. so you can imagine the next few events. i had tested the milk and it was hot. it was boiling! so i poured it into the blender onto my cut chocolate chunks. i put the lid on. i pressed blend. suddenly the lid shot up to the ceiling and this bubble of hot chocolatey milk burst upwards into my face and onto my outstretched arms. i screamed b/c the whole thing scared the crap out of me. brett came in an immediately started laughing. i was covered from the top of my head to my toes in chocolate milk. it was dripping from my head and smeared across my glasses. my exposed arms, where my sleeves had been pushed back, were already becoming sticky with this sweet mess i had created. it must have been quite a sight! i went upstairs to wash up. that's when i noticed the slight tingling sensation on my arms and face. i rinsed off with cold water. then i saw this bright red line across my left arm. a burn. i checked the rest of my exposed skin for burns. nothing. no burns on my face. none on my hands. the rest of my arms were ok. the tingling that i felt was where the boiling hot milk had got me. but, there was just that one, thin, red line across my forearm. to me, it was my angel saying "this is what could have happened." i'm kind of fond of my burn.

i like believing in angels. i like to think about those instances in my life where things could have gone differently. then i like to blame my safety on these huge heavenly beings that play trumpets every time they score. keep praying for my protection mom...i think it's working. -SN

Friday, January 06, 2006

rec room redo

so i've been on this new kick lately. i've just recently discovered that you can win awesome prizes from local television stations. currently i am in the running for a new snowblower and a $500 gift certificate to Bill and Paul's Sportshause. to win the snowblower it has to snow at least three inches in one day. so far this winter that has only happened three times and i have yet to win (they are giving away 8). the kicker is that i checked the names of the winners thus far and this guy i went to high school with won one. bastard. i will have to wait until the middle of february to see if I won the cash.

my newest winning venture is going to be to try to win a new "rec room." to qualify i had to write a 200 word essay about my current rec room and send two photos of said room. i'm still tweaking the essay but thought i would post it here for any comments. please feel free to give me your ideas, i really want to win this one.

my essay:

I flip on the light. I tentatively begin my descent down the basement stairs. I know that as I near the last step the tune of “Stayin’ Alive“will undoubtedly start my hips to wigglin’. And I will be unable to control myself from striking that all familiar pose that John Travolta made so popular. Welcome to my 70’s style rec room.


Entering my basement rec room is definitely equivalent to entering into another era, an era where pants were belled, hair was big, carpets were wildly striped, and walls were made of fake wood paneling.

Let me give you a brief tour. Following the various degrees of orange and black stripes in the carpet you find yourself surrounded by half-painted wood paneling. If you look closely you will notice beams of light shining through the cracks in the wood. Upon further inspection you find that all of the windows have been covered up giving the room that much sought after “dungeon look.” Special spaces were cut elsewhere for…a t.v. perhaps? A bar? We’re not sure. And last but not least there is the fake fireplace/electric heater that we are afraid to turn on.

Please help us escape this 70’s nightmare!

Tuesday, January 03, 2006

this didn't help

i don't remember what the sun looks like. all i can see when i gaze out of my window is a gray, blank sky. there is no hint of sun anywhere. believe me, if there was i would be the first to know. i often find myself turning my head quickly towards the window in the off chance that i will see the smallest hint of a shadow. but nothing. there aren't even outlines of clouds! it's just utterly and totally blank.

the other day brett and i were watching the weather in the hopes that we may see the sun icon shining over the seven day forcast. but instead of giving us that gift, the weatherman informed us that in December west michigan was the cloudiest place in the WORLD. not the state, not the country, not the western hemisphere, the WORLD.

i don't belong here.