Guess Who Forgot They Had A Blog

Me. That's who.
I would apologize for not posting in such a long time. But that would only work if people had been upset that I hadn't posted. So I won't. Because they aren't that upset I'm sure.
I suppose I'll just start by giving a brief synopsis of the events in my life for the second half of 2011.
I started my last semester of college. Weird. It didn't even really sink in until about halfway through that I was going to graduate and be done with college courses. Forever. And it was a pretty good feeling. Also, knowing that I would be around for the Spring 2012 semester, and not have to take ANY classes felt pretty good too. I was lucky enough to find a house to live in with a few other guys, one of which is the son of the owners. That makes it pretty laid back and rent is really affordable. It's my first year living with more than one person, and has been a blast! All 5 of the guys that have been here (not all at once) are great roommates and all easy-going in general. We've had some good times, and I'm sure these next few months will be no exception.
I am still involved in BSU, even though I graduated. They let me come back to play Bass in the band again until I leave for good.
I am now on a city-league basketball team in Maryville with about 10 other guys. We won our first game last night, by the way. That would make us, by all accounts, undefeated!
I was fortunate enough to travel to Florida with one of my [former] roommates and the one that took his room for this semester. He was hired for an internship in Ocala National Forest just north of Orlando. We had a good time driving down, of course. We thought it was cool that Smyrna, TN - where we went on a mission trip two years ago - was within 3 miles of being EXACTLY half-way. So we called them up and they were able to give us lodging for a night on our way down. The second night we camped a short distance from the beach. Daytona Beach, that is! It was a little chilly, especially for Florida weather, but it was still nice to be in the warm state. After dropping him off, we flew back from Orlando. That is the way to travel! It took us 36 hours to drive the 1300 miles down, but 2.5 hours to get back and was about the same price for a ticket as we spent on fuel. Oh well, lessons learned. (also, he was reimbursed for fuel by his agency later on, so that is good)
Many people have been praying for me as I go through the application process to get into the Highway Patrol Academy beginning in April. I am very thankful for all those prayers, and am also pleased to say that I have been offered a conditional offer of employment! This means that I will still need to pass a psychological and medical test before a final offer of employment is given, THEN I will have to get through the 6-month training in Jefferson City. As I have been from the beginning though, I am still not worried about it. I know that God has a plan in it all and that I will end up where He wants me. (I would be perfectly OK with ending up as a Trooper, by the way!)
I have taken up every oppotunity to use the phrase "...back when I was in college" in the recent weeks, and probably will continue to do so throughout the semester.
I enjoyed Christmas, as I do every year! It's my favorite holiday by far. I was slightly disappointed (and still am) that we didn't have snow (and haven't had snow). Now that I have a 4-wheel drive truck, it doesn't snow. Seems like I should have gotten one sooner and we could have missed out on some serious weather.
Speaking of the truck, it was beat up by the Maryville hail storm in August! As much as I would like to have a dent-less truck, the damage is hardly noticeable and the insurance company offered about half of what was left to pay off, so that decision was fairly easy. Afterall, it's a truck, it'll just add character. Also, I will probably have it so long that whoever buys it when I'm finished with it will not care about a few hail dents because it will have so many miles on it.
I am now trying to find a job for the next 3 months, but no one seems to want to hire someone for a short amount of time. Hopefully something will come together as I will need a little imcome for rent money!
I'm sure there's plenty more I could write, but that should be sufficient for now.