5K

I briefly mentioned before that I ran a 5K--this was...wow, over a week ago, now! It was the first 5K I ever ran--but it was really fun!

I planned on running the whole race with my friend, Annika, because we usually go for runs together during the week. Although my pace is a little faster than her's, she helps me set a better long-distance pace. The race started, and slowly Annika and I got separated, so I ended up running the whole race alongside another girl, Caity. We pretended we were an amoeba, and as we'd catch up with people we'd be like, "Phagocytosis!" Then they'd join our amoeba and run with us awhile until they got tired, then they left via "exocytosis!" lol. It was great. (yes, I'm a recovering bio nerd, what can I say? =P) It also led to good conversations--one of the girls we engulfed via phagocytosis had actually been an amoeba once in a play! What are the odds of that!?

Sprinting to the finish line

I made pretty good time, finishing at 26:37.

The toga runners sprinting to the end

Dave Williams, our philosophy professor, convinced a group of students to wear togas and discuss philosophy with him as they ran. It was hilarious--and they were actually going along at quite a spritely pace!

Dave and his students

Post-run philosophical debates. 

Group picture!

On a completely different note, did you know that if you step on fiberglass, duct tape can help get it off? I didn't...

Badger Pass

This morning I went with a small group of students to Badger Pass, the ski hill in Yosemite. It was our last time going for the season, so I'm really glad I got to go. I did boarding again--I'm getting better every time! I'm so excited to keep this up. I think there's a ski hill near Azusa I can go to...and during winter break I want to go a lot. Anywho...we took a lot of pics at Badger Pass today. Here's a small glimpse into my world today, lol:

Shreddin' da slopes!

Check out the cool background view

So us. lol

 Tonight after dinner we went to DJ's house and had a girls' movie night with his wife, Annette. We watched Horton Hears a Who, which was so adorable!

After the movie, most of us were either asleep, zoned out, or getting back massages, lol.

~Abbi

Bang

Today was Community work day, where we all pitch in for four hours (from 1-5) to help clean up camp. Altogether, the work we do in those few hours would take the Emerald Cove staff weeks to do. This is part of our community service through school, and part of our leadership class. Faculty split us into groups to complete three main projects: painting, clearing up brush, and digging. In my head I was thinking, "please, not digging, not digging!"

Guess who got digging. But I'm actually really glad I ended up on that team--it was really fun! We had to dig a trench from a building to the caboose so an electrical cord and water pipe could run to the caboose. The 18-inch deep 4-5 inch wide trench doesn't sound so bad, but there were tons of rocks and tree roots that we had to pickax through.

Pickaxing a nasty root.

Don't worry--no one was hurt.

The Digging Crew

Walking to put our shovels away, I saw this hilarious sign that said "Testosterzone," so I took a pic by it with some of the guys. Unfortunately, it's a bit blurry:

"Testosterzone"--I love how I'm the most manly-looking person in this picture, lol

 

Later on this evening my trek team had a reunion at DJ’s (the professor who was on my trek team) house.It was so great to spend some time with my trek team again. We had dessert, then played games. The group I was in played Bang, a really fun card game that's kinda like Mafia, but a lot better. It is a western game, where there are outlaws and deputies and a sheriff and renegade. I was a deputy. DJ was an outlaw. The sheriff shot him...can you imagine playing a card game with your professor, and then beating him? Ahh, I love High Sierra.

TGIT

Thank God it's Thursday! I never want to go back to five-day schoolweeks...=(

Today for dinner I decided to join the health class (which has 5 students), and go to Papa Don's, the health and PE instructor's, house for dinner with him and his wife. He talked about relationships, and then we had a special guest speaker, one of the ladies, Joyce, who works in the kitchen. She shared her life story and how it is important to make sure you are "equally yoked," as Corinthians says.

We were at Papa Don's for three hours, but the time went by so fast! And I got to play with his cat, Boo. I miss Didget so much. One of the things I really, really miss at college is cats. I never get to see them =(. It's not too hard to see the occasional dog, but I really miss just cuddling up with a book and Didget. Poor Boo, though. I pretty much smothered her all evening.

I have a couple more events that we did last weekend that I still want to mention. One of them was Clue. We played a large-group version of clue with the preview students, where we split into teams of 3-4, armed with the piece of paper from the Clue game, and went around to different rooms around High Sierra asking characters scenarios just like we would ask in the regular board game. Wow...my definition is so jumbled right now. I need to go to bed. It's 2 in the morning...oh my. I guess what I mean to say is that some people from High Sierra dressed up like Clue characters (like Professor Plum and Mrs. Peacock, for example), and by asking them for "clues" we had to determine the killer. It was really fun, although my team failed to win =(.

The Clue characters!

All the actors did such a great job playing their roles--and I loved the facial hair on Colonel Mustard (see bottom right, haha).

Oh, and in case you were wondering...Mrs. Peacock did it in the art room with the knife.

Panther Poles and Towers of Power

After I finished my shift at the archery range, I headed over to the ropes course. The ropes course had been closed so far our semester, so this was my first-ever time on it!

The first thing I climbed was the panther pole, which is basically a telephone pole, at the top of which you have to stand up and jump for a stuffed lion hanging in front of you. I was SO scared at the top! Like, I didn’t think I’d be that scared. But it is *really* high up. And it’s so easy to fall (although you are in a harness). And climbing up so that you’re standing on top of the telephone pole is SO hard. I was so scared I was shaking at the top, lol. But I’m really glad I did it. After I jumped, I swung back and hit the pole. But it didn’t hurt too much…

Climbing up

Trying to stand on top...

I made it!

Jumping for the Lion

After the panther pole, I did the Tower of Power. The Tower of Power is…well, here’s the picture:

Tower of Power

Basically, people race to climb to the top. It’s really tiring. 

First, you have to climb up the rope, then through tires, then moving horizontal poles, then moving vertical poles. After I did it, my forearms were SO tight. And the next day I found all these bruises all over my body from it, lol. But I made it to the top! The people in the pictures aren't me ‘cus I didn’t get a picture on it…but I did do it, lol

Climbing the Tires

At the top!

Preview Weekend

Agh! There's so much to blog about, I don't know where to start! I guess I'll start with preview weekend. This past weekend, students from main campus who are interested in attending High Sierra came to visit for the weekend. I did this last semester, and it was one of the funnest weekends of my semester. The night when we got there, we all went up to star rock and had a fire with s'mores. I also found Orion (the constellation) for the first time ever!

On Star rock around the fire

That was pretty much everything we did that evening. The next day, we all got up and ran a 5k. This was actually really fun! But enough of that--I'm dedicating another post all to that, haha.

After the 5k, we went back to campus where we had events available for both visiting students and High Sierra students. I volunteered to take an archery shift, so from 2-3 pm I dressed up like Maid Marion and joined Travis, garbed as Rambo, at the archery range.

Posing with Travis, er, I mean, Rambo

Thaaaaat's right, I still got it.

And I shot more than a few bulls-eyes!

Well, I did a lot more today, but I’ll have to add that in a different post, because this little jerboa needs to get some sleep!

(P.S. Thank you Stacey Mahuna-Brantner for term the “jerboa.” If you are not familiar with it, please google a picture of it because it is beyond-adorable.)

Wheatgrass

Every Monday night everyone goes to small group. At the beginning of the year, we each picked which small group we wanted to be in depending on what topics we wanted to cover. I picked to be in Colleen's group, because our topic is "Seeking first his kingdom" (Matthew 6:23). I love small group. Like, seriously, I look forward to it every week. This week, instead of meeting in Colleen's house like we usually do, we decided to go to Jamba Juice and have a mid-semester update on where we are this semester socially, spiritually, and academically. It was neat going off-campus to Jamba Juice--and I also tried a wheatgrass shot there! I didn't know popular venues like Jamba Juice actually carried wheatgrass (Mom, I guess you're not so crazy for liking it after all? jk love you =) ), but Jamba Juice offers it in little medicine cups as "wheatgrass shots." Our whole small group tried them! They leave a really bad aftertaste, but they're not too bad...it's just like eating grass. I guess it cleans out your system, too...

Raising our glasses!

 While we were still talking, Jamba Juice was closing, so we decided to move our discussion into the van. While there, Lisa set her camera on a self-timer and we took pictures. It was such a blast! haha

My small group. Starting in the back from L-R: Danielle, Colleen, Abby, Kylynn. Front: Kaylah, Lisa, Me