Quinn is Essential

Hello from MO, everybody!
Ooh man, this has been *such* a fun week!

I feel like I should explain the joke title of this entry. My first night here at the Burks' house, someone mentioned my blog, and Micah said, "'The Quintessential Ashley Michele'...you know what 'quintessential' means? It means 'Quinn is essential'!"
I wasn't even done laughing at it before Quinn Hamp was knocking on the door. LOL. And I was told I should rename my blog for just a day and see who I can scare with it. Hehehe.
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I spent the first couple of days teaching Daniel, Rachel, Jonnah, and Samuel--ranging in age from fourteen all the way down to five--how to knit. They picked up on it so quickly!! "Gum" they're smart!

Ah yes...."gum"....one of the Ashleyisms that pop involuntarily out of my mouth. The Burks (and a few others, I guess) find them too amusing. Let's see, I've said "Gum", "I had the devil's time of it", "shucky-darn", "oh my cow", "oh, I love that", "oh, I hate that", "hee-hee", and "ding, ding, ding!"
It seems like every time I open my mouth somebody laughs. I don't mind it, but it gets confusing when everyone spontaneously chuckles, and I'm being perfectly serious. Hee. No, Quinn, it hasn't proved discouraging yet. Just confusing and entertaining. ;-)

But it's not like the Missourite vocabulary is free of eccentricities, either. I'm already picking up on "Oh my soul", "green", "monkey" (EVERYthing's "monkey"!), "wretched", and "ever" (like "gum ever", which is such a lingual clash, it should spontaneously combust on the page.)
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Throughout the last week, I've been referred to as "The Red-headed Chick From Pasadena". Why? Because when I was in the van with Mrs. Burks and Jo, Jo's big brother, Aaron called. He was calling to let Mrs. Burks know to expect company, b/c Quinn and his brother, Cory were, coming over. Mrs. Burks asked why they were coming, and Aaron said, "Well, I told them the chick from Pasadena was coming in tonight, and we thought we'd make it a party."
Ha!
And in the same car ride, a discussion--argument--over my hair color ensued. Jo and Mrs. Burks swear it's red.
It's not red.
It's brown.
There are a few guys I know from work, and they would call me Red. I hate that!! La mujer es ella morena!! (wait, is that right?)

Anyway, red, brown, whatever you want to call it (brown.), it's all about to change. On the way to the revival on Wednesday night, Joanna and Rachel pulled out

Two

GRAY

hairs!!

Yeah.
I was ready to cry when Mama Burks thought she'd pulled a THIRD, but it proved to be only a rogue platinum blonde strand.
Dude. I'm going gray!
I was telling people, I had joked about this year putting gray hairs on my head before their seasong, but it was JUST a JOKE!
*sigh*
Bummer.

I saved the first one. Maybe I'll scrapbook it or something. Ashley's First Gray Hair. Ha.
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A whole bunch of the older guys...Josh, Jason, Charlie Barkowski (one of the guest preachers), Quinn, and Nate Fetters...all did a race thing today. I think Quinn did five miles running and biked twelve. And the guys ran a couple. Josh took home a Gold medal in his bracket, Charlie took Silver....and Nate....took Lawn Chair.
Yes.
O, the irony! He was apparently running faster and better than Charlie and Josh, but because he's still in High School, they didn't have any medal for him.

I was telling Amanda, it's like that Charlie Brown special they show every Haloween:
"I got a gold!"
"I got a silver!"
"I got a lawn chair..."

How sad...
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And once again, I have no clever salutation.
Love, peace, and chicken grease.

"The [formerly] Red-headed Chick From Pasadena"