It went well. I had fun. Homework calls though, now. A real update later.

I am going to see Sarah’s baby today! I can’t wait. The train ride will be an hour out and then an hour back in, and it will most definitely involve a time crunch, because I don’t get out of class until 3:35, I’ll catch the shuttle at 3:50. The train leaves at 4:44, so with any luck, I’ll be there on time.
Emma Rae Lavery is 7 lbs, 14 ounces and she’s beautiful. I spent so much time watching Sarah grow into a mother last year. I remember when she first started showing, I remember sitting through morning sickness, and this is the final product, a beautiful baby girl.
I love babies.

This bud of love, by summer’s ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet.

William Shakespeare

A detective who handled the case was shocked to see a juvenile who was convicted of armed robbery and placed under house arrest playing on the high school football team.
Detective Larry Chevez was attending his son’s football game at Kennedy High School last Saturday when he noticed a 16-year-old youth that he arrested several months prior playing on the opposing team. “I was amazed to see someone charged with an armed robbery with a handgun playing on the field,” Chevez said today.
The youth was charged with armed robbery of a pizza delivery woman and released from a juvenile detention facility and subsequently placed under house arrest. He was ordered by a judge not to leave his house except to attend school and is monitored by an electronic bracelet that was attached to his ankle.
He plays for the Colonial High School football team, coached by Tony Guarino, who gave an exclusive interview today. “We just taped the bracelet up real good,” he said, acknowledging that he is aware of the youth’s house arrest and constant monitoring. School superintendent Gary Hubbard addressed the issue by saying that juveniles under home detention are allowed to participate in school functions, adding that students are not always suspended for crimes committed off campus.

Once again, these are all fake stories, put into my textbook by means of a paragraph of information, and then I turned it into this. My teacher read it today and asked me if I had any prior experience and when I told her I didn’t, she told me that I have a knack for writing the news.
Yay!

I brought a long curtain, and laid it out on the beach. They set down their stuff, backpacks, shoes, and they left with their roller blades to go along the lake. I sat in my swimsuit in the oddly warm September air, and let the sun wash over me. I walked up to the water, and walked in up to knees, finding it too cold to actually swim in. As the sun faded into shadow behind the buildings, I watched the people around me. A little girl pulling a makeshift kite behind her. She was skinny, like little kids are, running back and forth between the edge of the lake and her mother, sitting in a beach chair a little ways away. Two men, laying on a blanket, enjoying the sun and obviously their mutual adoration of each other. A man in a thong, super toned and tan, actually jumping into the lake and swimming out to the orange and white buoys that mark the end of the pedestrian swimming area. I pulled my book out and read, uninterrupted, for the first time since I’ve been here. I took a picture of the sand, the city and the lake and sent it to him. It was nice to lay there, and to talk to him and to read and to watch everyone. When they came back, the sun had almost gone down and there was a little bit of a chill in the air.
And I finally slept well, for the first time in awhile.
He had a nightmare about me, and I felt bad, because I’ve been upset lately before I go to sleep and last night we talked for an hour before bed and we laughed and it was like we were hanging out again. As soon as I hung up the phone, I slipped into a peaceful sleep, and didn’t wake up until six. And then again at ten.
Fifteen days. I called and made sure that my miles were going to count for that trip. I’m excited, because he’s going to come out for last week of his winter break, maybe. I’ve been planning ahead, lately.

Well, here it is: It’s fake. And I only had limited details to work with, but here’s my final draft of a news article. Ah! Sort of exciting.

A 9-year-old Rockford resident’s challenge of a decision to close her roadside business led to victory today, allowing her to reopen her lemonade stand after it was shut down yesterday. A city code enforcement officer stopped by Stephanie Courhesne’s lemonade stand and forced her to pack up her things yesterday afternoon.
Stephanie’s father called city councilman Alyce Cycler to complain immediately. The councilwoman promised to have the issue resolved immediately and today, the code enforcement supervisor overruled the original decision.
After hearing about the decision, the mayor announced that she intends to become a regular customer of the lemonade stand, located on Highland Drive.

Stephanie Courhesne sets up her roadside lemonade stand outsider her home at 1186 N. Highland under the supervision of her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Adolph Courhesne. On weekends during the summer months, Stephanie charges a quarter for a cup of lemonade and a dime for a cup of water.
Her business is successful, bringing in about $3 to $5 a day, sometimes more when the weather is nicer. Stephanie must reimburse her mother for the cost of goods, but after that, she divides her profits between personal interest and her church. Ten percent of her profits go to the church; another ten percent goes into savings, and the rest is hers to spend “to buy toys, clothes, candy, and stuff.”
After she was noticed by a city code enforcement officer yesterday, she was forced to pack up her stand and take her cups, cooler, cardboard sign, and umbrella inside. Her father was upset, and after complaining to city councilman Alyce Cycler, the issue was resolved in less than twenty four hours.
The city code enforcement officer’s supervisor overruled the original decision and said that it was an error in judgement and also that Stephanie is welcome to sell as much lemonade as she can.
Stephanie’s lemonade stand is in a perfect spot, because Highland Drive is a popular place for people to jog, roller skate and walk near Lake Clarity.

and to cap off my better night:

James Spader won an Emmy for best actor in Boston Legal.

I don’t even know what it is about him, but James Spader….yum.

First off, happy birthday Aunt Joan! I hope you have had a wonderful birthday, and will have a wonderful year.
Secondly, in 18 days, I’ll be in Oregon. And I cannot wait. This is insane. I’ve never been so happy. And he’s 2,000 miles away. We’re getting through it, though, so that makes me feel as though this year will fly by and then we’ll have three months to see each other everyday next summer. It’s not at all like my last long distance relationship, where I was basically single the entire time. We see eye to eye on almost everything, he listens to what I have to say, we don’t fight, and if we do have an argument, he calms me down and then we talk it out. Strange, I know.
I’m keeping all major Jewish holidays this year. I explored a little bit of Judaism second semester of last year. I went to services, plays, and met a considerable amount of nice people. So next weekend is Yom Kippur, and I’ll be fasting for 25 hours. I will allow myself water, though, because since I’m not technically Jewish I can make my own rules. My friend Becky is actually Jewish, so it’ll be nice to have someone to guide me through my quest for religion.
Emily Bates, from St. Louis, came up to visit me this weekend and brought some of my stuff with her. It was fun, but a little strange, because her name is still on the door, as though she should have moved in.
In our crazy last few weeks in Colorado, we foolishly overlooked the two hour time difference and how it would affect our life. It’s weird, but so worth it. I wake up to his text messages and I fall asleep to his voice, and my obsession is completely returned by someone who’s not a no-good white-rapper-wannabe. It’s nice because he’s actually in college, learning things, and getting out and meeting people.
He’d be so mad if he knew I was typing this, but one of the last days that I was in town, we were having a picnic in the park, spending the afternoon sprawled out in the grass with just each other, and that’s when it hit me that I wouldn’t be able to do that anymore. My head was turned away from him, and so when I suddenly got silent, he knew, but wasn’t sure. I saw the grass and the sunshine and I just lost it. He asked me what was wrong, and once I knew I had to answer, I started crying. He let me cry for awhile, telling me all the things he knew I needed to hear, and when I finally looked up, there were tears in eyes too. When it was time to go, we just got up, and left. It was the second most beautiful afternoon of my summer.
Mike likes him. I like that. Mike is very protective of me. I can’t even wait to see Fruitypants in Chicago!!! Maybe it will kick-start his college application process. But even if it doesn’t, it’s weird not having Mike around. We’re completely different, that much is painfully obvious, but him and I are still super close. We get each other, even though we definitely didn’t hang out enough this summer, him and I are still playing the games we used to play over the dinner table when we were twelve.
I know, you’re all sick of hearing about young love, but I’m ridiculously happy. And you have to read about it.

Where we you?
I was in the bathtub, in Dad’s first apartment after the divorce. I was annoyed when Dad yelled through the door that he was turning on my tv because something had happened on the news. I got out, and then walked into my bedroom and stared. The tv was on top of my dresser, the blond one I’d had since I was a kid. It was set to images of the two large buildings in New York. One of them had flames shooting out the side. And all of a sudden, as I was watching, something flew into the screen and hit the other building. More flames, falling debris.
And then it hit them. Something bigger was happening. Not an accident, a plan.
September 11th wasn’t all bad. Two very important people were born that day. Emma and John are six today. Little babies who didn’t know what was happening to the rest of the world were in their own fight for survival. They’ll hear about it, and they’ll understand, eventually. They’ll see that somehow they emerged from that day as a sign of hope for the people who knew them, or who knew of them. Even though they are separate from the events that took place, they will always be associated with that day. It’s the circle of life: death and then birth. Or rather, birth, and then death. But it’s not quite that simple. It’s hope, and pain, and beauty, and the fight for something as important as life.
So Happy Tuesday. May you see beauty somewhere in the world today.

Fall is coming. And so is Emily. She’ll be here on Friday! I can’t even wait.
And then, of course, I only have a week after that until Mumu, Fruitypants, Aunt Sally and Grandma Mary get here.
And then after that, fall break and Oregon and Danny.
It’s going to be a great September and beginning of October.
I talked to Mike. He’s excited to come. Wants to do something exciting. I told him there was nothing he could do in Chicago that would be exciting. We’ll see.
Ah, the Wellness Center.
I will never appreciate what they do for all of the students of Loyola. My roommate, bearing swollen lymph nodes in her neck, a sore throat that looked nasty, even from my vantage point (which didn’t include the usual light and popsicle stick check), and a voice that would make a volverine purr with pain, went off to the Wellness Center only to be told that she was fine.
It’s strep.
I am currently debating even going back and asking for a strep test. I went last Thursday with a sore throat, and a cough that included both blood and green stuff, only to be told it was merely a cold and my lungs sounded clear. No strep test.
I’ll make an appoinment tomorrow afternoon.
Someone should say something to them about how inadequate they are. How hard is it, really? I used Steve last year as my “doctor,” since he is pre-med and probably knows more than they do. In fact, I always feel like he’ll at least offer you an answer instead of the usual cough drop and absolutely nothing you get there.
And don’t get me wrong, I’m not one of those crazed college students you hear about faking illness for drugs. I don’t think that any ailment can be solved with a prescription. I prefer not to put artificial medicines into my body, but when it’s strep, or something like that, I’m all about proper treatment. Especially because it’s such a contagious illness and I live in such close quarters with people.
Ah, such is life.
I need to get a doctor out here.
I love Danny. He stayed in last night so we could talk on the phone, and it’s wonderful. He wakes me up each morning (just like he used to do in the summer) with a cute text message that completely energizes my morning.
Steve and I might look into yoga.
I’ve been getting very domestic lately. You should have seen the homemade pizza I made. I kneaded the dough, let it rise, formed it and voila! Pizza crust. Then sauce, cheese, veggies, meat. Bake. Food. Everyone liked it.
I do dishes. I clean the house. I whipped out my “Mom-Voice” on my roommate’s boyfriend completely accidentally. He was like, “Katie, you sound like my mom.” Ah. Wow.
I just realized that I don’t really know what I want to do with my life except write. And suddenly, everything else is less appealing than usual. So I think I will just become a writer and then not worry about having an actual career. Because the 9 to 5 won’t make me happy. Did it work for any of you? I don’t want to wake up one day and realize that I never did anything I wanted to because I was worried about attaining status or making money (but then again, I’ll probably wish I had). So we’ll see.
I did write a sweet lead for a story in one of my Journalism classes. It had to be no more than 25 words, and while the rest of the class labored over it for quite some time, I had 21 words in less than 30 seconds. So, see, I’m not bad at this.