Engineering Banquet

Every year the engineering department has a banquet to recognize the seniors. They are knighted into the "Order of St. Patrick" who is apparently the patron saint of engineers! There was a speaker, and the seniors made a hilarious video of their JBU engineering experience.

All dressed up and ready to go

We had problems with the self-timer on the camera (hence Thomas's funny expression)

Waiting to be knighted

Thomas about to have his head taken off about to be knighted "Sir Thomas Congdon of the Order of St. Patrick"

Repeating their "vows" after being knighted

The seniors! Minus a few...

Happy Easter... a week late!

We had a really busy Easter weekend (lots of school work). We took some time out to remember Easter Sunday (or Resurrection Day, as we have heard it called here, if you're rebelling against the "commercialization" of Easter!) and we also had brunch with the Wrights. I made hot cross buns, in true British fashion.

Some pictures of our day:

Easter basket 

Anna is excited about chopping up fruit :)

Hot cross buns! Hot cross buns! One a penny, two a penny, hot cross buns!

Potato/roasted pepper/spanish onion dish

Sausage egg casserole in the oven

The table

EEEEKKK!!!

So I was wide awake at 3am, and out of the corner of my eye I see a movement on the floor next to our bed. I looked down and there was a spider just hanging out on a pile of papers. Thomas was fast asleep so I grabbed a book and slammed it, but it got away. I managed to slam it again right before it crawled under our bed... which would have been disastrous, because there's no way I would have found it under there. It was a light brown color, so I looked it up on google and sure enough - it's a brown recluse!!! eeeeeekkk!!! Violin-shaped body and all the right markings. I spent the next hour researching all about them... BAD idea... because now there's NO WAY I'm sleeping in this house until I have exterminated all possibilities of ever having another brown recluse inside. For those of you who don't know, brown recluses are the second most poisonous spider in the US, after the black widow. And they are very prevalent in this area. And they like to hide in dark places... like closets, inside clothes and shoes, and in/under BEDS! And all the websites say that if you find one brown recluse spider, there are bound to be more around.
I'm still wide awake and it's nearly 5 am... I'm probably going to be up until Thomas gets up and I can use every form of pesticide that we have in this house, strip the bed, wash all the sheets and clothes, clean out the closets, shake out our shoes, vacuum the carpets (which are an unfortunate brown color very similar to that of brown recluse spiders)... etc. I've already written to the maintenance department to see if we can get an exterminator.
So much for sleep. Sigh.

Brown recluse

The one I just killed (on top of my philosophy paper...)

A picture of a brown recluse spider bite (for those of you who think I'm overreacting)

Officially freaked out and not sleeping until all spiders in this house are dead,

~ Sarah