Crunch time!

• 4 days until 91.5 WCIC Sharathon 2010
• 6 days until I leave for Dakar, Senegal. HOLY COW!
• 46 days until the season premier of Glee
• 49 days until 91.5 WCIC's Opening Act (I'm the main coordinator)
• 64 days until I turn 24
• 92 days until I'm Mrs. Wineinger.

I have come to understand that i can usually tell the validity of my task when i type into google, "Checklist for (FILL IN TASK HERE)" so I was feeling really good and slightly less overwhelmed when I specifically found a checklist for packing for Senegal. Granted it was another blog, but shoot! I'll take what I can get. I officially leave in less than a week. This time next week I will be in the air to Dakar, Senegal in Northwest Africa (Take note that when I get there it will actually be 5am of Friday)

My laundry is still sitting in a pile in my room. My two suitcases that I'm going to bring are down stairs waiting to be brought up. I have rolls of wrapping paper that I plan on unrolling and folding up to bring. I still need to shop for extra things and finalize all my bills so that everything get paid for while i'm gone.

I feel soo behind. I'm still finishing up Sharathon (our station fundraiser) stuff, making sure my interns, who are very awesome i might add, are fully trained for starting Opening Act without me. God has taught me something truly valuable right now! I cannot do ANYTHING on my own. And right now, I am pretty ok with that. I just got to relay on the one Man who's had my back even before I was born, and not sure why i can't fully do that.

I just listened to a really great sermon by Mark Driscoll about planning... we all know that im the most type A as they come... NOT! so listening to him and how he helped his wife manage over time was really helpful. Only thing is...I need someone to keep me accountable and up to date with my planning... and all i have is...

I say, anyone who wants to all over the state of il from Pearl City to Anna, we meet once a month for an accountability group... ha. It's worth a try.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don't get me wrong. There are two highlight this spring and one is Senegal and the other is my wedding. I CAN NOT WAIT FOR THIS TRIP! Once I have the chance to think of packing it will get done very well... but i got to allow for time.

We are the World

I know some people that really dislike this video but I don't care how famous they are, I still get a knot in my throat when I watch it... some of my co-workers were watching and it prompted me to watch it...

Sometimes I get genuinely concerned that we forget too fast. Sigh... this is a little bit of history.

# of Days until Significant Events in my Life:

• 5 days until my last round of immunizations for Africa
• 37 days until 91.5 WCIC Sharathon 2010
• 39 days until I leave for Dakar, Senegal.
• 79 days until the season premier of Glee
• 82 days until 91.5 WCIC's Opening Act (I'm the main coordinator)
• 97 days until I turn 24
• 125 days until I'm Mrs. Wineinger.

To write all of that out is kind of intimidating, but always good to see on paper. I am mentally prepared for about 1/2 of that. I have no doubt that I will survive. I have a huge fan club behind me, but how intact I will be after that is completely different.

My sister got married on new years eve. That was an awesome day! Moments happened that day that could never be replaced. What an experience. And I got a new brother; his name's Andy, and a niece and nephew, Maddie and Austin!

My wedding planning is going well. I attach some of the pictures that I am using as ideas. I think it's going to be fun. We are stumbling over a few little ideas but nothing detrimental. Nathan had his last first day at SIUC this week CRAZY!

I'm truly kicking myself right now because it has taken me almost four days to write this blog. I have some really great thoughts about what I want to write about and then I get home and get too tired to write about them, or Mac chews something and I get distracted. This is also a very similar story for my house. I start to clean it and then I get totally down or distracted and then I change my mind and sleep another night with a really tall pile of clothes at the foot of my bed.

I think my dear fish, Phish, is on his last leg. I have been doing my best to make sure he has all the water he needs even though the cats think this is their personal drinking bowl. He's floating slightly cockeyed around the tank at an nth of a pace. If i put food in there, it tends to sink to the bottom before he catches it... sad day. He's that animal that really makes me think about where i've been these past years. I got him when I lived in carbondale before I had Forrest...when we relinquished the fish tank in the living room...he came home for two summers, and three christmases, he moved to nashville with me, and then he moved back home and then here with me. Forrest chased him often at the apt in cdale and frisko chases him around the bowl now. He's lived a full fish life...and of course he's still alive so I shouldn't be talking like this.

Man...I created this blog to kind of allow myself to grow up on virtual paper, and I feel like i'm failing a little. I'm on paper yes, but still chatting about childish worries i seem to never grow out of. Something else I was thinking about today was a spot i heard on the radio about moms with kids understanding that their house doesn't have to be clean all the time...and I was thinking what about single women with no kids.... is it ok then too?

Anyone want to start a small group...im desperate. im drinking coffee right now so i feel about as sparatic as these last three paragraphs. Ok...i think this about as good as I'm gonna get for a while. I'm feeling like the next post will be a picture montage... i havent done one in a while.