Stargazing

Reader, you catch me sitting in my study typing this Blog. Next to me, my husband is erecting his new telescope (not a euphemism). It is a bit like the Renaissance, apart from I would be using a quill and Paul would not have bought the telescope from Argos. Why has Paul bought a telescope? Well, you'll have to ask him. Why am I writing a Blog? So you can read it. I've actually had quite a busy few days. Youth group on Thursday night, Guest Night on Friday and Open Day yesterday.

Youth group was - well - like it always is. I'm speaking there the week after next so I need to psyche myself up for that one. The topic is the Parable of the Lost Sheep. Any ideas? Nope, me neither.

Guest Night on Friday was super cool as usual. Have I described a guest night to you yet? No? Ok, well as you know the college is split into five groups, A to E, and each has a guest night. The college throws these formal nights where the posh cutlery comes out, the dining hall is set up like a proper Oxford formal etc. and lit only by candlelight. The kitchen get their Michelen-star hats on and turn out some great food and the guests turn up in their glad rags to eat like posh people. The rest of us turn up in our non-glad rags and serve, wash up, tend the bar and babysit. I served for the first, babysat for the second, and served for this one. Serving is actually very good fun. I don't think my vocation is that of a waitress because it takes all the concentration I have not to drop things. But calling friends "sir" and "madam" is great fun, and the best thing is we get to eat the meal at the end (albeit at 12am...!) I am in group E, and our guest night is the last, at the end of April. I will have really deserved it by then!

Open Day yesterday was pretty good fun too. I managed to get coerced into being on the 'panel' and doing a meditation at the closing worship, and both seemed to go ok. I'm getting better at this whole speaking-in-public thing and I think the lectern managed to hide most of my shaking. The more I do it, the better I'll be when it comes to preaching an actual sermon, that's my thinking.

Talking of Open Days, can you believe it's a year today since I first stepped into Cuddesdon on my own Open Day? How time flies, and what a lot of things have happened since then!

I'm starting to look a bit fat, I think. Not pregnant fat, more 'too many pies' fat. So in situations where I've not yet revealed my condition (such as placements, which finish mid-March so I may not bother) I am having to wear increasingly baggy jumpers.

Oh and while I'm on the subject of placements, I've managed to sort out my 'Summer' placement to be over Easter so I don't turn up walrus-sized and don't get stuck in the pulpit. I'm going to New Marston, which I am soooo happy and excited about. It sounds like a really interesting church. And to be there over Holy Week is just the cherry on the cake. Roll on Easter!