On the attainment of my majority.

Well. Today I am twenty-one years of age. I wish I could think of something suitably weighty and impressive to say, but the words are not coming tonight. The sun has returned to the position in the sky it was in when I was born (barring precessional affects), yet the main thing I can think is that today I can do something I have never been able to before: rent a car!

Yes, twenty-one is the minimum age to rent a car for every car rental agency in Hawai`i, though with an additional under-age fee slapped on (not removed until twenty-five). Not that I currently have any major need to rent a car (I've been getting along just fine), but it may come up in the future, and it's nice to have that option now.

Today I finally received all my grades, and was mildly surprised to see that I had made an 'A' in every class. I say mildly surprised because I have a tendency to over-work myself, and this semester I took that to an extreme. It's not easy to admit, but it was a stupid decision on my part (and those of you who told me I was crazy -- you were right!). It was a very difficult semester for me, so the fact that I managed to pull through is very satisfying. Though as always, I cannot claim credit for what I have accomplished; soli Deo gloria!

In other news, I have my sister Abigail to thank for the tripod that allowed me to take the following picture of me posing with my circular version of the periodic table:

(in case you're wondering, the alkaline and alkaline earth metals are at the top; the rare earth metals [the Lanthanides and Actinides] make up the right side with the hard-to-see white magnets; the yellow are the transition metals; the red are non-metals and the green are semi-conductors [or metalloids])