The ride-along that...wasn't

So, I'm up in NorCal for a few days, and my deputy-sheriff-brother Ross offered to take me on a ride-along.  Basically I sit in the patrol car and help him bring down bad guys and punish parolees (or something like that).

I've never been on a ride-along, so I thought it would be fun.  Everything was set: be at the gate at this time so I can let you in, we'll cruise the county, and then when you want to, you can go home.  Okay, sure, sounds good!

Ten minutes before I leave, Ross calls.

"Hey, have you left yet?"
"No."
"Well, don't.  They're going to induce Audra."
"Okay.  Well, have fun!"

So, instead of a ride-along, I got a second nephew!  Audra was induced last night and Andrew Harold was born this morning.  He's a pretty cute lil baby!


Still holding out hope for that ride-along, though...maybe next time.

Fifteen

Sadly, my book count went down in 2011.  I blame it on getting engaged, teaching school five days a week, and getting married, all very good things. :)  Looking at my list, I read twelve-fourteen of the books after I got married.  I guess I was a little busy; haha!

I read parts of several books on marriage, but I didn't actually finish any of them, so I didn't include them here.  If you want the titles, I can give them to you in an e-mail.

Here is the key that I came up with last year:
Key:
* fun
# favorite
+ career reading

And without further ado,

Jennica-Ayelet's 2011 Reading List

Middle East
# Princess, Jean P. Sasson - the story of one of the many princesses in Saudi Arabia.  It was shocking, to say the least, but "a real page-turner."  Recommended by my grandmother

Honeymoon in Tehran, Azadeh Moaveni - an Iranian-American journalist who married another Iranian and lived in Tehran.  It was interesting to read between the lines to see her growing paranoia about living in Iran.

Walking the Bible, Bruce Feiler - a Jewish-American explores the region and stories of the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament.  He visited places like ancient Ur, Egypt, Jordan, Israel, and Sinai.  This too was an enjoyable read, though I constantly had to be aware of his secular worldview and counter it with my own worldview.

The Media Relations Department of Hizbollah Wishes You a Happy Birthday, Neil MacFarquhar - this book took a while to get through, but I did like it.  It covered many different countries in the Middle East and included history and personal anecdotes of encounters with many different people.

# With Lawrence in Arabia, Lowell Thomas - I am really fascinated by Lawrence as a result of this book.  I even watched the really long movie, "Lawrence of Arabia"!  Lowell Thomas is an excellent writer who traveled to different countries as a journalist, I believe.  I've read another book by him (see below) and am looking forward to reading more.

The Good Daughter, Jasmin Darznik - another Iranian-American author.  Darznik told the hidden story of her mother's first marriage to a man who ended up being mentally "off," if you will, and her triumph over obstacles, in spite of living in a society with strict social rules.  The story was fascinating, but the writing was bad.  Sad.

# Down the Nile, Rosemary Mahoney - I loved this book.  You can read about my amazing discovery here.

Beyond Khyber Pass, Lowell Thomas - The second Lowell Thomas book I read, this time about Afghanistan.  It was intriguing to read some of the history of the country as well as to follow Thomas' personal anecdotes.

The Bookseller of Kabul, Asne Seierstad - Another book about Afghanistan, this one written nearly 80 years later than Thomas', I believe.  Seierstad lived with an Afghan family for several months and later wrote their stories in book form.  The content was informative, but I think something was "lost in translation" as it was originally written in Norwegian.

# Guests of the Sheik, Elizabeth Warnock Fernea - This was one of my favorite books of 2011.  Elizabeth and her husband Robert moved to an Iraqi village in the 50s, I think it was, in order for Robert to conduct anthropological studies.  Elizabeth interacted with the women of the village to help Robert with his research.  It was engaging, entertaining, and informative.  After spending two years in the village, the couple moved elsewhere in the Middle East before finally ending up in Texas as university professors and experts in Middle Eastern culture.  I loved this book.  I have two more books by Elizabeth Warnock Fernea that I want to read.

Persian Adventure, Anne Sinclair Mehdavi - an American girl who married an Iranian man and went to visit his family in Iran a few years after their marriage. This book had several entertaining stories, and I read it rather quickly.

Christian
# The Reason for God, Timothy Keller - Another favorite book of 2011.  I am a huge fan of Timothy Keller.  I found this book to be very helpful, though I will have to reread to remember why exactly. Oh dear.  Any way, one two-fold point he made that stuck with me was that 1) we are worse than we hoped and thus have no reason to be proud and 2) God loves us more than we dared believe and thus we don't have to prove anything to anyone.  I am looking forward to rereading parts of The Reason for God as well as reading The Meaning of Marriage.

A Chance To Die, Elisabeth Elliot - a biography of Amy Carmichael, missionary in India.  I read a biography of Amy Carmichael when I was little (thanks, Mom, for having missionary biographies around).  I was excited to read a book about Amy, especially one that was written by Elisabeth Elliot.  I found out that Amy traveled to a few different countries before she settled in India and that she was a human with some rather *interesting* ways of doing things.  It is definitely worth reading.  One of the points that Amy made in a few of the letters recorded in the book is that you should not go to the mission field unless you are totally committed to the Gospel and the work in the country; any and every thought of "romance" should be abandoned.

Et Cetera
Gentlemen's Agreement, Laura Z. Hobson - I took this book to the Dodgers game back in July, but I didn't read it there (I was afraid I was going to be bored).  My mom likes the movie by this name, but I've never watched it myself.  This book is about Jewish prejudice following World War II and about prejudice in general.  The mindset of each of the characters was carefully delineated in the book, showing how different people view prejudice and how they can change.  I thought it was a good book.

The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood - This book had me captive.  I wouldn't recommend it, necessarily, but I was stuck in the pages until the end.  I even asked Amos to make dinner one night because I wanted to finish it (he's a nice husband).  This is basically another book about super-controlled future society; I would put it next to 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 on my shelf.  I thought it was very well written.

Sometime in the not-too-distant future, I might put up books that I want to read this year.  I've already read one so far this year!  I'd better write it on my list...

Sundry statements

I didn't forget about posting my book list from 2011.  I will do it...soon.

Amos and I have been married for six months now! :)

Here is a good article about the recently departed Christopher Hitchens.

Crazy story: A friend of ours, who lives just a few doors down, is five months pregnant.  And she just found out two days ago!  Sophia and Philippe have been married for almost six months, and she had no idea until recently that something might be up.  Sophia is half Japanese, so Philippe is calling it a "ninja baby." haha!

Others' thoughts...

I've read some good posts on other blogs in the last few days and months, and I thought I'd share them here. :)

We Need Boring Christians via Relevant Magazine
I'm slowly becoming "unromanticized" about living overseas, and I think it is good.  And yes, I still want to go.

On Thriving While Living/Traveling Elsewhere via Voye'm
Knowing why you're there and learning to react appropriately

Challies.com via Tim Challies
Amos says Tim Challies is one of the most widely-read Christian bloggers, and he reads his site almost every day.  I've started reading his blog, too, and I really like it (maybe because I agree with most of what he says, haha!).  Anyway, Challies is a youngish Christian writer who writes from a conservative perspective; he also links to several other useful and interesting posts.

List of unusual deaths via wikipedia
Because I'm morbid and a friend posted this on facebook in the middle of my writing this post.
Example of an entry:  2002:  Richard Sumner, a British artist suffering from schizophrenia, went into a remote section of Clocaenog Forest in Denbighshire, Wales, handcuffed himself to a tree and threw the keys out of his reach.  His skeleton was discovered three years later.  There were signs that he may have later changed his mind.

For Christian Men: The Lessons of Herman Cain via Al Mohler
Integrity is essential, in both men and women.

Church-Planting among the Unreached: Gritty Wisdom from Brad Buser via Gunner Gunderson (four parts)
Thoughts and tips on living and ministering cross-culturally with other workers.  I need to read this again because when I found these posts, I actually started at part four and didn't get a clear picture at first of what Brad Buser was trying to communicate.

True forgiveness

These are rather rough, semi-formed thoughts, but I wanted to share them anyway.

I was reading parts of Isaiah 53 last night, and the last verse struck me:

...yet He bore the sin of many,
and makes intercession for the transgressors.
-Isaiah 53:12c

We all know that Jesus took our sins upon Himself.  We all know that the Father will forgive us if we accept the work of Jesus in our place.

But do we ever think about the fact that Jesus is talking to the Father for the ones whose sin drove Him to the cross and ultimately the grave?  The ones who were behind such anguish that He pleaded with the Father for another way to pay the price?

Sometimes when we forgive, we hope never to see the person again because of the pain or betrayal.

Yet Jesus not only paid for our forgiveness, He continually brings our needs and requests before the Father.  He talks to God about each of, asking that we would be made more like Himself, that God would orchestrate the events of our lives for His glory and "for our good always."  Jesus talks about each of us, having forgiven us, having overlooked the initial willful rejection of Him, having drawn us to Himself with His love, and now having us in the palm of His nail-scarred hand.

Merry Christmas, from our ever-loving, ever-living, ever-forgiving, ever-interceding Savior.

Joy to the world!!!  You need not be condemned to hell for your sins.

Our neighbor, Soren

Soren is our neighbor.  If you just thought, "Soren Kierkegaard!" yea!  I'm not alone.  I've never met anyone named Soren before.  I've actually only talked to him once, even though I've been married and lived here for almost six months.  We don't see a lot of him, and I frequently think that he must be irritated by hearing my oft-repeated Owl City songs through the thin walls.  Hopefully he has headphones.

Anyway, our little house is rather small and shares a wall with Soren's.  His house is the mirror image of ours, so our two bathrooms have a common wall.

Tonight I was washing my face in our bathroom, I could hear Soren doing something in his bathroom (try not to think about it), and Amos was in the kitchen.  In the process of getting the Crock-Pot down from its perch on top of the fridge, Amos knocked over the cereal container, making a lot of noise that he thought I could hear.  I didn't hear anything, though, until he yelled, "Don't worry, I'm oh-kay!!"

Without thinking of our neighbor, I raised my head, facing the shared wall, and yelled back, "What are you doing in there?!"

I'm guessing that Soren either thought,
"Should I respond?  What is she talking about??"
or
"Weirdo.  I gotta move."

Don't...

I don't have much to say.

Ummmmmm, I finished some little crafty projects.  I think they look nice.

Zeus is still alive.  Sometimes he sleeps under his heater. :)

I had an interview today for a high school right down the street.  I'll find out by Friday if I got it.

I'm reading The Arabs by David Lamb.  I was disappointed to learn that he didn't write any more books about the Middle East, though he did write an updated version of The Arabs.

Amos and I went to our church's Christmas party on Sunday.  One of the best parts was watching a guy in a motorized wheelchair pull kids around the ice rink behind his chair.  It was awesome. :)

Only eleven more days till Christmas!

The little house

And finally, pictures of our little house. :)

The front, complete with clover and a rose bush :)

The front room with bookshelves and a coffee table/bookshelf

The other side of the front room, with more books :)

The small kitchen with announcements and missionary prayer cards

The other half of the kitchen with shelf, bridal bouquet, and Christmas tree

Master bedroom with the quilt I made and curtain I need to finish

The other side of the room

Our backyard.  The hammock takes up a lot of the space in the summer

Finally, our little Christmas tree with Amos' present! :)

Windy

Amos and I have wanted to go to the Huntington Library and Gardens for a few years now, but it is really hard to get tickets for their free day. Our friend Rachel had several free tickets that she was giving away, so we decided to take a trip this morning!

We left a little before 10:00 and headed down multiple freeways to Pasadena.  As we got closer to our destination, we started seeing splintered trees and severed limbs along the edges of the freeway.  Getting off on the surface roads, we saw more downed trees and blacked out traffic lights.  We drove up to the gates of the Huntington only to be told by two cheerful guys that the gardens were closed because of the power outages.  We decided to drive back through some other roads to see more of the cracked and dismantled trees.  Amos commented that I was just like my dad, who loves to check out all disasters.  One day Dad took off work to go check out the broken and flooding Folsom Dam; "you have to see these things while they are happening!"  The terms "ambulance chaser" and "rubbernecker" come to mind.

Anyway, we took some pictures of the carnage.  You can click on them to see a larger version.

This tree is being held up by the powerlines

I don't think this tree hit the house, but it was close

Road block!

More powerlines and road blocks...

If you look on the left, you can see the asphalt that was cracked by the tree roots

Just stuff...

1. We sang this song from Sovereign Grace in church today.  I am a big fan of Sovereign Grace music as it takes lyrics from both Puritan prayers and the Bible.

2. My brother Scott and sister-in-law Ashley are waiting to adopt a little baby from Uganda.  My old IBEX friend Nate and his wife Miriam have been waiting over two years to adopt two babies from Rwanda.  Gunner and his wife Cindi adopted one little boy from Uganda several years ago and two boys and one girl from Rwanda this summer.  Please pray that Scott and Ashley's baby and Nate and Miriam's babies come home soon.

3. I don't know what to do with my free time sometimes, but I feel like I should DO something with it... *sigh*

4. In other news, Christmas is only a month away!  As our pastor said today, "we set apart the days to celebrate the birth of our Savior."  Our Savior; the Muslims' Savior; the Hindus' Savior; the atheists' Savior; your Savior; my Savior.

Zeus

Well, there's a blog post title I never thought I'd use!  We decided to name our new fishy friend Zeus.  Amos ordered him a personal heater and thermometer today so that 1) he can be warm, poor guy, and 2) so we don't accidentally fry him. :/  When it's cool in the house I tell Amos, "I'm going to put the sweater on Zeus."  No, I don't mean a literal sweater, with holes for his tiny fins, but that would be funny!  His "sweater" is a fleece blanket folded a few times and secured with a binder clip around his bowl to keep him warm.  We also turn on a light above his bowl for a little extra heat.  Yes, the poor fish needs a heater if he is going to survive in our little home.

So far Zeus is a good fish.  He swims around or hangs out in the bottom of the bowl with the little flattened marbles.  Zeus does have a problem, though; he won't eat his food.  There are so many water-logged pieces of fish food at the bottom of his bowl right now!  Apparently bettas can go about two and a half weeks on a hunger fast before they will actually eat their food.  I think they are fed different food at the store because Zeus really doesn't like this kind, even though it is specified as betta food.  He will suck it in and spit it back out a few times before it slowly sinks to the bottom.  We have another type of food that he likes, but some websites say it's like candy and he needs to eat his "real food."  Hopefully Zeus will give in soon!

Here are some photos of him.  Hopefully you can still see what he looks like.

Zeus, chillin' in his sweater :D

He's a very nice color...

Our fishy friend, Zeus the betta fish

Ferdinand? Bertram? Jonah?

Call us sick, call us morbid, call us weird.

One of our friends just got a betta fish, and she accidentally killed it by not putting enough water conditioner in the water when she introduced her pet to his new home.

Poor Charles.

Charles' death inspired Amos to get his own fishy friend.  Our little fish has a big, round bowl and some blue and green flattened marbles for landscaping (waterscaping? aquascaping?).  He likes to stay right below the surface of the water like a miniature submarine.  Amos is afraid the poor dude is going to freeze and give up the ghost, so he's looking into a heater for him, which is probably a good idea considering how cold it gets in our little house.  Apparently one brand of heaters has a tendency to boil fish, so we won't be getting any of those.  I didn't know this, but companies also make tiny, leaf-like hammocks for bettas that come attached to a suction cup so you can stick it to the side of the bowl.  Whoa.  One reviewer says his fish loves it and looks "as deliriously happy as it's possible for a fish to look."

Alrighty then.

I came up with a few names for the fish, but Amos hasn't officially approved any of them.  First I thought that Bertram would be a nice name.  Then I thought of Jonah (my personal favorite), and finally Ferdinand.  We shall see!

I just hope he doesn't end up christened Bluey or something weird like that. ;)