Happy New Year!

Well I have been gone, long gone! I am so sorry for my lethargy in posting on here but the whirl of the last month or so has been hectic, I've been off work and enjoying the Christmas break so let me give you a whirl through the fun as I head into the new semester starting tomorrow! I've been gone a while so this might be a bit long!

When we closed out last semester I decided it was holiday time so I chose to cram into a slightly too small Ford Escape with three other men and travel 21 hours through the depressing wilderness of the state of Kansas to the slightly more impressive and fun Rocky Mountains of Colorado to hit some American skiing! To some up the trip in one word...awesome! You may have seen on the news that the Denver region was struck by a freak strom, the worst since 1913 in fact, with 4 feet of snow descending on the city and the mountains, well I was slap bang in the middle of it screaming with delight at the crazy amounts of snow to frolic around in! It was easily the best snow I'd ever skied on and is most definitely sitting at the top of the "best ski holidays ever" tree!

Yes...that's me lying flat on my back in one of the back bowls of the Vail resort buried in the ridiculous powder that just wouldn't stop dropping out of the sky! Oh...and here is a nice view too.

It was at this point that things got slightly interesting, the weather was so bad that Denver International Airport was closed, this was bad for the trans-Atlantic visiting British friend Ben who had to wait for it to open. Secondly Interstate 70 was closed, this was bad for us as it was the very road we were supposed to be driving out of Colorado on! We were stuck in the mountains for an extra 12 hours but thankfully at 4am in the morning after a few hours sleep we were able to get on the road and enjoy slip sliding back through the miserable Kansas along the ice of I-70 and back to Ohio, unfortunately not in time to avoid having to pay an extra day on the hire car but it was definitely worth it!

I got back on December 23rd and after sleeping a bit headed up to Columbus to celebrate Christmas with my girlfriend Shannon and her family (yes the girlfriend thing is a last month thing too!). I had a really great Christmas despite being 3,500 miles from home, I was made to feel really welcome by Shannon's family and got to speak to my own lovely family on Christmas Day! Still a first Christmas away from home is always going to be different!

After Christmas I raced back to Cincinnati (slightly late unfortunately) to meet my good friend Pete Whitfield at the airport! Hooray, another British visitor! Pete flew in for a holiday and also to attend Christmas Conference, so after another night's sleep (you're beginning to understand the lack of updates, right?) we drove out to Indianapolis, Indiana to join over 2,500 staff and students from the Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Michigan to focus on the Lord, hear teaching and spend a day sharing our faith with the people of Indianapolis. It was a really fun time, great to connect with friends I haven't seen in a while and meet with God. On the day of the outreach I had the privilege of going to an Indianapolis trailer park and giving a "box of love" (a box of food and essential supplies) and sharing the Gospel with a family there. It wasn't easy seeing how people lived there, it was kind of a smack in the face in respect of what we think of when we think about American life but it was great to meet those people, seek to help meet their needs and share Christ with them. New Year was a fun time as we all met together to pray and worship the Lord as 2006 became 2007 and also had a big party with dancing and fun games, including inflatable jousting which I was challenged to by my girlfriend, I wouldn't like to say who won but sadly the pictures won't upload!

The past few days I have had chance to spend time with Pete which has been really fun, I was able to take him to do some very American things like watch college hockey, shoot guns and spend our nice strong pound on cheap American goods! He left yesterday to go back to the UK, hopefully he took with him lots of love for everbody he will see!

So now it's time for the new semester starting tomorrow! I'm excited about what is to come over the next few months and excited to see what God is going to do in the lives of both Christian and non Christian students on campus...and of course IN ME! Watch this space...