Knitting Therapy

Well, not woes, really. I'm in the library.... updating... gotta go to work in about 10 minutes. I spent the last hour and a half reading about civilians in war, and how civilian status was really created by the formation of chivalry codes in the 900's, and how no one's really paid much attention to it until the wars of the 20th century... and even then, it was ignored most of the time.

There was a bit in one of the readings about how the U.S. firebombed German and Japanese cities near the end of WWII, just before Hiroshima. The author (Hugo Slim) noted that about as many people died in the firebombings as in the atomic blast. Now, as many of you know, my dad's a big fan of the History channel (Or, the Hitler Channel, as Prof Woods prefers). I've seen most of the documentaries, read most of the books... how don't I know about this? How could knowledge of such atrocities have totally passed me by? It must've been mentioned somewhere, right...? But now, all I want to know is how Americans can get away with being high and mighty about keeping civilians out of conflicts when the firebombings killed thousands and thousands of civilians who were holed up in their cellars to avoid the fighting.

Civilian protection is a nice thought. I just wish it worked. I wish people would be as idealistic as I was. I think Prof Feldmann is trying to turn everyone as cynical as Grinnell has made me.

Am very very worried about the little sister. She's still having roommate problems, and now she's not sleeping at all. She doesn't talk about anything except her schoolwork, and it just sounds like she's not in a good place, mentally. The school doesn't want to let her move out - but she really really needs to. I'm not sure if the problem is not sleeping, or if it's something deeper. Maybe Mac just isn't the right place for her - but if it isn't, it easily could be too late for her to transfer for next year, unless it's to the U. She'd be lost there. Maybe Hamline could be a possibility, or she could see if Lawrence still looks good - def not Grinnell, it's too isolated for her - but something has to be done.

Some of the problem is most certainly the amount of time she spends running. 2 hours at the gym every single day is just too much. She doesn't get time to do non-school-things, when that much time is spent on the treadmill, and she seems to feel like she's trapped in this homework-sleep-run cycle. However, she's also virulently opposed to cutting any of the exercise time, and I just don't know why. She said that knitting and running are the only good things about her day, and that she barely knits anymore because she doesn't have time - is there some way I could try to convince her to get off the treadmill and knit, instead? I just don't know what to do to help.

Any suggestions? Because I could use them. Even the dumb ones.