I have awesome friends.

As always, I'm just full of things to talk about. My life is kind of ridiculous, but also ridiculously amazing.

I'll start off with the Crystal Ball last Saturday. I don't think I've had so much fun since LeakyCon. I cannot overstate how much I love the folks from hp-ohio. Save for my friend Jordan, whom I've know since eighth grade, I had never met anyone in the group more than once before last weekend, but I feel like I've known them all for years. I got to the beautiful castle grounds about 3 PM, and I went down to the event center to help finish up the decorating. Everything was blue and white and silver and gold, so beautiful and full of magic. Jenny, who was in charge of the ball this year, did such a fabulous job of planning everything. We had lots of fun going through the three tasks of the Triwizard Tournament, and I won the third task by finding where Scabbers was hidden, so I got to keep him! He's adorable, not a filthy, backstabbing traitor. Jenny and Philip taught everyone to waltz, which was a lot of fun. The food was just heavenly, and we danced the night away to a great mix of current pop, pieces from the movie soundtracks, wizard rock, and standard awesomeness like "Jump, Jive, and Wail" and "Thriller." After the ball was over we all went down to the pool house. The pool was supposed to be heated but it was actually freezing, so as many people as possible crowded into the hot tub and the sauna. I didn't have my swimsuit, so I just sat at the edge and dangled my feet in the hot tub. We finally went to bed around 3:30 in the morning. I was exhausted, but it was totally worth it. I can't wait to be able to see all the hp-ohio folks again!! If the weather cooperates, I'll be seeing some of them on Tuesday!

My second occasion to revel in my friends' awesomeness this week came on Tuesday, a very important day in human history. The final season of LOST premiered on television, and as always, I watched it with one of my best friends, Helen. She goes to Marietta College, which is a few hours away, so we always sit on AIM during the show and call each other at the commercial breaks. Helen was totally on fire this week! She called so many things before they happened and she came up with several extremely interesting theories. I'm not even going to go into a LOST discussion here because I'd wind up writing for hours, but I'll just say that this season is going to be every bit as insane and mind-blowing as we all anticipated. If you're looking for some good LOST discussion, you should check out this made-of-awesome blog.

My final instance of awesomeness this week was last night/early this morning. It was decided that a party was in order, so party we did. I've said it before, but I'll say it again: I can't overstate how much I appreciate my friends making accommodations for me as far as alcohol is concerned. I hate alcohol. I've had sips of wine, of a mojito, and of margarita before, and even though they might have had other good flavors in them, I couldn't get over the taste of the alcohol. I can't even imagine drinking beer because it smells so awful to me. And even if I liked alcoholic things, I wouldn't be drinking at a party anyways because I'm only twenty. Call me a square, but I'm not a fan of breaking the law. Anyways, my friends made sure there was plenty of Dr. Pepper on hand for me, and they taught me to play beer pong with cups full of Dr. Pepper mixed in with the cups of beer, even though that kind of messes with the rules because I couldn't help drink the other team's leftovers when we lost. I surprised myself and everyone else by being more than halfway decent at the game, and I don't really think being sober gave me much of an advantage. I may be laying off the Dr. Pepper for a while, though, because between two rounds of beer pong and a game of kings, I drank well over a liter.

Yeah, my life is kind of ridiculous. Even so, I wouldn't trade it for anything. :)