The end and the beginning

So it has been another few weeks since my last post, but trust me when I say life has been busy and finding anytime to be alone to write up here and sort through my thoughts about stuff is quite the impossible task. Seriously, being alone has never been so hard to come by. I guess that's what happens when you have such great, crazy, amazing friends. They make sure to fill up your time and then school fills in the other hours and then just barely enough sleeping and eating to get by on fills up the rest. Never a dull moment these past few weeks. There was so much we did, it was quite ridiculous. I guess I should start off with the Six Flags Magic Mountain trip since it was probably the most monumental by far. It has actually been on the planning process since sometime in the beginning of January when Will and I decided that we really wanted to go to Magic Mountain just for the fun of it. He had never been and I just happen to be a die hard roller coaster fan. So it went through numerous phases of being planned and unplanned (including at one point either hang gliding there or somehow getting an RV to drive there) before the details were finally hammered out, the tickets bought, the people picked to go, and so on and so forth. In the end the group that ended up going was Sherrie, Courtney, Regan, Will, and me. And I don't think a better group could have been picked to go. We all somehow match up with each other perfectly - balancing out each other's insanities and craziness, introvertness and extrovertness, and so on. Plus we ended up being seriously one of the closest groups of friends I have ever been in. My really, really close friends back home in Mesa is the only one that could probably really top it. Anyway, it was a blast. One of the best ideas of the whole semester and one of the best and most fun activies of my life so far. I even found who I want to room with after my mission is over - Will Casper. Granted, he has been wanting to room with me ever since the beginning of Marchish, but I was never really sure if I wanted to back. There are so many people from Mesa to choose from, or the roommates I have now, but in the end after this trip I can finally say I am pretty sure he is the best option for a roommate for me. The only problem is that he happens to be a major slacker, but you couldn't find a more loyal, caring friend in the world. And there are very few who understand me and read me as well as he does. Call it a rare talent. I also found out this trip that my love life could very well just be the lamest such story in history. I am such a coward is what I learned. I liked both girls that went with us earlier this semester (much earlier) but had always been afraid to act on it because of my bad luck and experiences with such things in the past. However as we talked and talked waiting in lines or on the long drive home, I learned that they had both liked me when I had liked them (and I had liked them at different times, just clarifying - I am not a player). All it would have taken is for me to have told one of them that I liked them in January or February and this semester would have turned out a million times differently. But oh well, everything happens for a reason as well I figured out. One, I would not have become good friends with Will at all if that had happened, not even close or Regan for that matter. Two, I would have blown through a lot more money and got a lot lower grades which I can't really afford either so in the end it all works out for the better I guess. Just kind of funny the things you learn about the choices you made in the past and how much differently life could have been. Another interesting event that happened with in the past week was that Jared decided to have a yearbook party. He made the yearbooks and the food to go with them. But for some reason, I always end up being the one to invite all the people and planning out all the activies at the party. No one else ever steps up to the plate so if I don't do it, parties end up, well, lame. Regardless, this one was a brilliant idea. It allowed everyone to be able to say goodbye to each other and for us to take a very long trip down memory lane of all the crazy stories and events that have gone on for our freshman year at BYU. I also got voted quite a fair few of those personality awards. I managed to snag most outgoing, best at throwing/planning parties, one with the craziest late night plans, most likely to win a Darwin award, most likely to make Aaron a sandwich, and best at cutting hair (don't even ask). So maybe the last three are not the most enviable titles I found out a lot about how people actually perceive me because I honestly have no idea. I still am caught up from things that happened years ago in junior high and the beginning of high school when all I was thought of was extremely shy, a bookworm, and rather plump. The bookworm I don't mind, but the other images I have been constantly working on since about the beginning of my junior year in high school to change. And I guess change they have. I get called a "stick" now about my weight and got voted most outgoing. Boy have I have changed. But Im not always the biggest party animal, in my more personal messages I got a lot of comments from people about how nice I was, or how I was a great listener, or I am "the most amazing friend ever" (thanks Will). It just really made my day to know that people actually care about me and think highly of me because a lot of the time I really can't see how they do or why they would. It was the self-esteem boost I really needed going into finals and the end of my freshman year. Also, this week I went on probably the most random, crazy date I have been on ever. I took Courtney, Will took Sherrie, Tayler took Regan, and Jared took Amanda and it was a blast. We started off by thrifting for the most outrageous outfit we could find for each other. Mine ended up being a Jamaican dude/druggie thing complete with Aladdin green pants and I ended up getting Courtney in a baseball uniform. Then we went and ate at Red Robin and ended off the night by sitting around talking by a bonfire at the Central Building of our aparment complex. The stares we got and the laughter we got made the entire thing worth it. It was just a blast and and a great closer to all the best friends I have made here at BYU because that is probably the last time we will hang out in a group again. I plan on writing each of them and note and delivering it individually but altogether, last night was it. It was the end. And I am crazy sad to see it go. I really do want to go home, but I really don't want to lose all my friends and the atmosphere that is BYU. There is nothing quite like it anywhere else. So much fun, but always clean at the same time. Lots of work, but so many people to help you out. It just rocks and I am going to miss it terribly because it will never be the same again. When we all get back from our missions, I will room with Will and that will be awesome. But most of the girls will probably be married or engaged. Most of the guys I probably will only catch glimpses of between classes or something. It just won't be the same. Maybe it will be even better, butI doubt it. This year would be such a hard thing to top as far as college experience goes. Not going to lie. It is just hard to watch it go and it is a heck of a whole lot harder to say the goodbyes than I thought it would be. Anyway, finals and classes are going pretty sweet here at the end. I managed to score all A's so far on my finals with the exception of a mega retarded biology one but even that was still a B. I have one final left to go tomorrow and then a crazy amount of packing and cleaning to do. Also, finding time to write all those invidual thank you/friend notes is going to take awhile but I really need to do it. I just have the strongest feeling that I do. So here is some pics of my last days as a freshman, enjoy! This is a pic of Whitney and I when we all went out to breakfast before finals

This is Courtney and I on our date night!
This is everyone who went on our amazing group date!

This is all the guys that went.

Freshman year has started to wind to a close....and I am not quite ready to consider saying goodbye to everyone...

So, it has been a long time since my last post. A very long time. But I suddenly let life get busy this month and then all of sudden you just run out of time to spend an hour or two writing up here and organizing all the pictures you took during the week and such. Anyway, I have been having way too much fun lately complete with studying crazy hard complete with trying to do my best in everything that I do. Which means sleep has been lagging behind a little bit lately and I probably haven't been eating as healthy as I should or really want to. This past week has held a lot in and of itself and I think I will start writing about that first. Last Sunday, the Draper temple dedication took place and they broadcasted it to the Marriot Center for all to see. It was an amazing spiritual occurrence and definitely worth the hype that the bishopbric has been putting into it all semester. I have been to temple dedications before, but I was too young to really concentrate and understand everything and get all I needed to out of it. This one I finally listened and got everything out of it that I should have which makes for a much better and more uplifting experience. After that we went over to Will's sister's house to play games and just enjoy some Sunday R and R. She and her husband were really nice and they have a two year old son named Max who is pretty much the bomb. We played Rage! (which is a card game kind of like Rook or Oh heck! or whatever else you want to call it) and some Catchphrase. It was a lot of fun and totally worth it, although we did miss ward prayer and tunnel singing and the like which was kind of depressing but sometimes it is just nice to get away for a while from the BYU campus and forget about the stress and hyperactivity of college for a while. I usually need a few hours of this at least once a week and since I had been unable to go to Uncle Karsten's and Aunt Julie's the week before, I was sorely needing a breather. And Will's family was gracious enought to provide one and make my day and my week that much better and easier for me. Monday was back to school as it always is after the weekend and I got through school all day and then ended up playing around with Sherrie and Regan for a few hours watching Youtube videos and getting some homework done. I saw by far the trippiest video on Youtube ever, it is the music video for "Lollipop" by Mika and only watch it if you either want an epileptic seizure to occur or you want to kill a few brain cells trying way too hard to understand anything they managed to stuff into that movie. I also managed to go run get a book approved for history during that time which is due in about a week and a half along with a 3 to 4 page paper about it. I picked a book entitled "The Rise and Fall of Alexandria: Birthplace of the Modern Mind" which so far has turned out to be one of the most fascinating reads yet. I always knew Alexandria was an interesting city and far ahead of its time on philosphoy and invention and such but I had no clue how truly far ahead it was. It was like the ultimate gathering place for all the smarties during that time period and all they did was study every possible subject know to man at that time. How cool would that be? Your only job is to keep learning your whole life through as much as you possibly can by studying the world around you and reading what has already been written about it. There was no specializaiton, everyone studied some of everything and managed to get quite good at it. That would be like my dream come true if such a thing were possible today. To just keep learning new things all the time throughout your life and somehow make a living doing it and just enjoying the countless hours of time to read, write, and experiment. But the modern world is too fast paced to have such indulgences, way too fast. You need to pick a major, study it for four years, then decide if you need to study it even further in grad school and once you finally graduate with the degree you want, work in that field for forty or fifty years and then finally retire and travel the world or go on missions or whatever until you eventually end up dying and hitting the next life and doing whatever it is exactly we end up doing there. Its not a bad formula, but I just wish sometimes that we got to the opportunity to learn more while in this life. The opportunity to explore more of the realm of human thought and knowledge. But I guess that is what the eternities are for: getting to know everything we missed out on during this life and truly knowing everything. Be that as it may, I found a new subject that I absolutely find truly fascinating and that is geology. Just throwing it out there if no one reading this has really studied it at all yet, but the Lord truly created an amazing world for us to live in with much more complexities than we can really ever comprehend until the next life. Anyway, getting back to Monday. Sherrie, Will, Regan, and I ended up going to the Nickelcade to see what it is all about. It was awesome! There is a $2.25 entrance fee and then all the games cost anywhere between 5 cents to 25 cents, nothing over that. Cheapest arcade I have ever been too and one of the most fun. We played skeeball, DDR, Gauntlet, car racing, motorcycle racing, Bubble Bobble, air hockey, all the classic ticket earning games, some shooting games, an 18-wheeler racing game, an ATV game, and countless others for a few hours. The greatest find though was a new take on DDR that involves using your hands instead of your feet. You have an upper left, upper right, lower right, lower left sensor that you have to run your hand under when the game tells you to do so in a DDR style format. It takes a couple run throughs to get used to, but after that the game is pure fun and dancing mayhem. Pefect for a group of college freshman just wanting to have some fun. It was amazing. Tuesday was another great day after I managed to get all my homework and classes out of the way. I played some racquetball for the first time in ages and greatly enjoyed it. The only issue was that I got pegged hard in the eye during the beginning of the first game that I was playing against Will and let's just say it hurt really bad and managed to get my eye to swell up for the next couple days. Be that as it may, I still managed to have a blast and play really the best I could missing all my depth perception from not being able to see out of one eye. After the end of the game, some of us headed over to the movie theater to go see "Knowing" which starts Nicholas Cage. It was an end of the world flick about the destruction of the world and those who try their best to survive it. It was an awesome movie until about the last twenty minutes and then it quickly transformed into the most stupid movie ever made. So if you want to see it, go ahead. But ditch the last twenty minutes and just create your own end to the movie or you will hate yourself for spending the money to go see it. Wednesday was another good day with the excpetion that I somehow managed to lose my temple recommend and so could not keep up my weekly temple trips that I had becomse so accustomed to. It was kind of heart breaking. I had been looking forward to going all the week leading up to it, like always and then at the last second I managed to discover that I had no idea where my temple recommend was. And no idea where to start looking to find it. That provided a kind of depressing crusher for the day, a really big one. But I am planning on getting a new recommend today after ward prayer in order to attend the temple this week. Wednesday night I also managed to play some more racquetball and enjoyed it yet again. Except that Greg played this time, and he creams me completely. I really need to practice more and get better at it because Will and I lost to him, not terribly but bad enough. Wednesday was also Psych night which is always a welcome night during the week just in order to laugh my head off for an hour and a half. We managed to get the whole first season finished recently and now just need to have a marathon in order to watch the second before the end of the semester. Thursday was finally a chance to do laundry again day. And do laundry I did. At least 5 or so loads of it at Uncle Karsten's and Aunt Julie's. And it was nice to finally get another break and get some homework done and play with Bryn and Brooke. I taught Bryn how to play war and memory with her deck of Disney princess cards. Also, I watched some "Sleeping Beauty" with her and worked on some homework with her. I love playing with Bryn and Brooke. Brooke and I just played with the random assortment of toys they have over there and ended up getting into a tickling war which was sweet. Im going to miss seeing all of them every week when I go home soon. I am looking forward to seeing my immediate family a lot, but I am going to miss the family I got to finally get to know really well during my time up here at college. Just saying. That night I also managed to stay up way too late going to Walmart or Wendy's like seems to happen randomly now. The stuff that happens when you have a car and your friends and you want to have an adventure at midnight. Good thing I decided to not have 8:00 classes this semester, it really paid off considering the fact that I sleep till 8:30ish every morning. And even then I probably should sleep more, but I usually wake up then and start getting ready for the day to start, which happens at 10 each day with my first class. When I go back home, it will be hard to adjust back to going to bed much earlier and, the getting up I can do. Its the getting tired at a decent time that is so difficult. But if I work really hard everyday, I should be exhausted enough to get enough sleep to get through the summer. Friday was finally the weekend again, which is something always looked forward to and appreciated especially since this is going to be the last normal weekend of my entire freshman experience. Kind of sad to see it go to tell the truth. Friday night we finally managed to squeeze in some Quelf for the last time. We had quite a big group of people playing and an even larger group wathching. Funny how that works out that people enjoy watching others be humiliated so much, but I thinks it's all great fun. I met Will's younger brother Michael that night and he is a pretty cool kid (and he's 17). We also ended up hitting Walmart that night and then taking a mini tour of northern Provo to enjoy the view that if offered by the mountain roads. Saturday I spend doing homeowork all morning and early afternoon which was a needed push in order to get all the stuff read I needed to for history. I also managed to start liking a new TV show called House. But it's a lot more full of adult content then I really like so I might stop watching it. I just wish they would make TV shows clean these days, because they are founded on great ideas but then they throw in so much unneeded stuff that it ruins the entire thing. Saturday afternoon, we headed to Holi of the Festival of Colors in order to celebrate the arrival of Spring in the Indian tradition by throwing color chalk up into the air at everyone possible. We got there too late to actually by any colored chalk but still managed to get covered in it from the explosion of it from everyone else. It was sweet. There was about thirty seconds to a minute where it was almost impossible to breathe because of all the chalk that was in the air and when it was all said and done, I ended up covered in almost every color imaginable. After that, we headed to Iceberg to enjoy some dinner and food while still all colorful and see the kind of looks we would get from people. And we did get plenty of interesting looks. After that we ran home and showered to get all of the color off. I manged to cover the entire shower in purple from my hair and it took about 5 minutes of spraying water everywhere to get it all to go down the drain. We went to the hot springs later that night and I didn't find them that amazing, but oh well. We also watched an edited "Galdiator" which everyone kept telling me was one of the greatest movies ever made, but I didn't find it that great at all. It was a good movie with good ideas, but it would have been much more effective to read that story in a book than watch it on a screen. That brings us to today, Sunday where I have work soon so this is the end of this post.

Thought of the week: "I sometimes wonder if the manufacturers of foolproof items keep a fool or two on their payroll to test things."
---Alan Coren

Song of the week: "Six Songs Collide" by Norwegian Recycling. The perfect mix of songs that I love to death - it has "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz, "Superman" by Five for Fighting, "Here Without You" by Three Doors Down, and three other amazing songs. I got it on a CD from Will, and he is letting me keep it because it is just that amazing :)

Pictures of the week:

These last two weeks have been eventful to say the least. There were tests, trips, games, movies, friends, family, competitions, and the list goes on and on and on. First, I had to survive through a midterm in social recreation, biology, geology, and history. More than eventful to say the least and a lot of hours of reading and reciting and studying and applying and it just never seemed to end. Somehow, I managed to make it through it all getting all A-'s or B+'s. So not too shabby at all. After I managed to survive through all that I was ready to party and relax all this week or so I thought. There was still more than enough work to keep me busy and running around. Reading t-keep up with all my classes has kept me very busy. Especially history reading - reading from the textbook and then reading the entire Iliad has kept me going. Its very hard to keep up sometimes, just finding time to focus and read and understand. Then there is always geology reading and quiz and biology reading and quiz. Then throwing together stuff for the social recreation class. Like this week we threw a pirate party on Monday for an assignment and then provided twenty minutes of entertainment on Tuesday with a Goldilocks and Three Bears skit, a mind reading trick, and the Virginia skit that all the girls knew from girls camp. I had to look up and find a preopener for this next week and get it all planned out so we will see how that goes tomorrow night. I also had a concert during these crazy two weeks and it went rather magnificently. It was the most hilarious concert I have ever participated in. The band ended up rebelling against the conductor and they had a nerf gun war and then shattered a violin that was falling aprart on stage in front of everyone. It was amazing. There is nothing quite like trying to play the Romanze by Mozart while attempting to dodge incoming nerf bullets. This weekend was my escape weekend. I got the chance to get away from it all and took it. I went to Idaho Falls, Idaho with Will Casper and hung out with my awesome grandparents. We took the bus up on Friday night and got there around 10 at night. Saturday we went snowmobiling up by Island Park and it was truly gorgeous and lovely. Plus snowy, very snowy. Snowmobiles are much better than quads on the smoothness factor, not going to lie. Also, it was much easier to control and automatic which was a nice addition compared to my quading experiences. Grandpa also caught me up to speed on everything family history there was to learn in Idaho and it was fascinating. I also went up to pick up a red Saturn Vue, which I find to be a simply astounding vehicle. It got me through two major snowstorms (and that was the first time I had even driven in snow, period). It looks pretty, has comfortable seats, and runs like a charm. These past two weeks have also been missionary insanity as many, many people have gotten their calls or started their papers or finished them and sent them in. Yet, I am able to do nothing. I just have to sit and watch everyone else and wait for my turn which still seems to be an eternity away. At least right now anyway. But I am excited for it and ready to be of service to the Lord in that calling as soon as I am old enough and able to.

Stress has come back

School finally got fun and crazy again. Two weeks to take five tests, so I have been studying like mad after the teachers finally put up a study guide, took them long enough and it doesn't leave much time to get them all filled out and study when you are doing five of them. Anyway, Monday was President's Day and a much needed break from school and classes. I slept in (a bad habit I am forming on holidays and weekends, although it's only till 9 or 10 at the latest so it is not too bad). When I finally got up, I was feeling really kind of sick and it showed when I talked and the fact that I couldn't really eat. So I watched the newest episode of Psych (they had finally posted it) with Will, Brad, and Karen. Then we proceeded to find a way to get to Tucano's, a Brazillian grill that serves amazing food and they just keep bringing it to you. They have a huge salad bar you can visit and get all the food you want there and then they proceed to bring all the slabs of meat to your table and slice you off a piece of it. There had to be around10 different meats they brought and some grilled pineapple. Im not going to lie, the pineapple was some of my favorite, but so was the garlic sorloin (only time I will admit to liking steak - all the other steak they brought I still didn't like) BBQ chicken, chicken wrapped in bacon, turkey, pork, and so on. I still was feeling a little sick but managed to eat enough to stop feeling hungry and was able to keep it down despite my stomach doing all sorts of odd flips and turns. Then we came home and watched The Return of the King, while I studied some more for my map test for history the next day. And I continued to study for the rest of the day until Kelly Ann and Whitney came over to try to make scones. Everywhere we tried to find a kitchen, someone was watching a movie though so we ended up at Courtney's place where somehow someone managed to start a grease fire. So after we cleaned that up we headed to back to Kelly Ann's place to finish them and play games. We ended up playing psychiatrist and "have you flirked...?" both really fun group games and there was quite a sizable group - Regan, Will, Kahi, Matthew, Whitney, Kelly Ann, Kelsey, and me. Fun times. Tuesday was Monday classes so that came back to haunt me and made that day much, much harder than it needed to be and the week feel so much longer. But I got through it and then headed over to the testing center to take my map quiz. I ended up missing two, which was really frustrating because I had studied hours for it, but at least I still got an A I guess. Tuesday night we had a ward activity where we went to a roller skating rink which I haven't done since I was in 6th grade or before. I started out ok (roller skating is MUCH more balanced than ice skating) but got progressively worse over the two hours as I got tired. I ended up getting some serious bruising on my hip, knees, elbows, and a few other places. Still have most of them right now. But I wasn't the only one who wasn't amazing at it - Regan and Courtney both joined me in falling over a lot and so I wasn't the only one who kept getting laughed at. After we got home, I made some smoothies and Regan brought over Killer Bunnies and we proceeded to play and I lost really bad because I never managed to get a bunny or keep one alive long enough to mean anything. Wednesday was hard because it was an exact repeat of what Tuesday had been in classes and I had them all day with no breaks. But I manged to survive somehow and was more than ready for the weekly temple trip that evening. We went up to the temple in our larger group again and proceeded to do the quickest baptisms and confirmations I have ever done. We were in and out so fast. And the coolest part was that they recognized my hair cut I had gotten the day before and said I looked awesome in it. Ok, so that was not the coolest part, the coolest part is the spirit of the place, but still the fact that people noticed I finally got a hair cut made me feel better about it because I had just let my roommate Brad cut it for free. And it turned out looking alright, not perfect, but alright. After that it was time to go home and study and then start serving the crockpot BBQ chicken I had made that morning. It was so good - I used chicken breasts, Dave's BBQ sauce (from the infamous restaurant that Dad enjoys so much), some freshly squeezed orange juice, honey, and a can of caffine free coke. They tasted amazing and made the whole day seem worth it. Good food always does somehow. After that we watched three episodes of Psych and hit the halfway point of the first season. We just have to get through the rest of it and the next season before the end of the semester which I hope we will do. The show is so funny! Thursday was finally back to an easy day for me and I went and did laundry and took somewhat of a nap on their couch until Bryn's friends came over and then I gave up. I still mangaed to fill out my geology study guide fro my midterm this Wednesday and go through all my history notes for my midterm tomorrow. So needless to say, got a lot of work done and got some really good food in the process - we had raviolis for dinner, which is something I haven't had in a very, very long time. I came back in time to clean like crazy for my cleaning check that night and was able to pass off all my jobs with flying colors. Then it was back to studying. Friday was a good day as well because I only have to make it through three classes plus I play racquetball at 7 in the morning. I have managed to teach Rachelle, Kelly Ann, Courtney, and Will how to play racquetball since the beginning of the semester and got them hooked on it like I am so we play every Friday morning. Friday I had work and that ended up being much crazier than usual but I got through it and got food afterwards. MTC dinner = always amazing because its free and we get all we can eat. After that I came home and then went to a game night at Courtney's place and played some fun games of UNO and Jenga and Phase 10. Saturday I got up late (again) and then started studying like mad for my history midterm that is tomorrow. I managed to fill out all the reading questions from the whole semester and went over all the dates and concepts and themes of the course. But she doesn't give us much of a clue to study so I just tried my hardest to touch bases with everything we have gone over so far in the course. The test is supposed to be 40 multiple choice questions and two essays. Kind of sounds like the AP test format I took all throughout high school so I hope I can do ok. Im studying some more again today and will do some more tomorrow morning and right after classes before I head over to the testing center to take it. I am just hoping and praying to do my best, which is hopefully an A or close to it. I also played four square on Saturday with Perry, Ryan Chapman, Matthew, Tanner, Will, Aaron (my roommate), another Aaron and a girl named Mary Celeste. It was fun because I have never truly played the game before and we made up all sorts of wacky, weird rules to make it more interesting and keep getting people out and move the game along faster. After that and studying all day I headed to work again because I was working for Alyssa. That was not so bad because I managed to get a job that I enjoy better and we got free dinner again after it was over! Two days in a row is awesome plus we also got free cheesecake that night! Yum! After that Whitney came and picked me up to take me to Kelly Ann's where they were making dinner (which I had to decline eating because I had just stuffed myself at the MTC) and then we went and played night games at the park. We played a really fun game called ninja tag which is like lava monster except the monster is blindfolded. Then we played duck, duck, goose and then finished off the night with some mafia in my lobby. After which Will, Aaron, Brad, and I watched Transformers because Will had never seen it before and the sequel comes out this summer. That takes up to today where I am getting really anxious about all my midterms and not at all sure what is going to happen there. I have studied a lot, but Im not sure if it is the right thing - especially in history's case. But I am praying for help and we will just have to see how it all goes. If I can survive to going to the temple Wednesday night, I will survive it all. That is what I am shooting for and after that the week will become a million times more relaxing. Also, I hope my headaches stop, but so far no luck there. Not yet. Another also, if you read feel free to comment please!

Thought of the week: "There comes a point where you just love someone. Not because they're good, or bad, or anything really. You just love them. It doesn't mean you'll be together forever. It doesn't mean you won't hurt each other. It just means you love them. Sometimes in spite of who they are, and sometimes because of who they are. And you know that they love you, sometimes because of who you are, and sometimes in spite of it."

Laurell K. Hamilton 'Anita Blake: Incubus Dreams'

Song of the week: "Light On" by David Cook and "Hanging by a Moment" by Lifehouse

Picture of the week: I have once again failed...but I am going to remember my camera this week, promise.

Living in the moment

This week was much like the last one - no big assignments, no tests, no hard school stuff at all really. Just another week to relax and enjoy the Provo area and the people that reside in it. No complaints about that really, nothing possible to complain about. I even got people to start doing their own dishes - quite a miracle and it kept the kitchen cleaner all week than it has ever been before. Monday I got the kitchen clean and started instituting a program that for every dish that people left unclean in the sink, they would have to pay a quarter. So they have to load it in the dishwasher, or if the dishwasher is full, wash it by hand and put it away in the cupboard. It has worked magnificentally so far and I hope it continues to work for the rest of the semester. Monday night we had family home evening at the Roberts' home, he is second counselor of our ward bishopric. It was great fun - we just had a lesson, got to know each other better, and finished the night off with ice cream sundaes of which I ate wayyy too much. But hey, calories don't count on family night. Or valentine's week in general for that matter. So I keep telling myself. Tuesday was a fun day as well. Got slightly more studying done, but not by much - I read all the things I had to read and it didn't take very much time at all. I did get a good solid couple hours of practicing in though and it felt wonderful. The cello is amazing and I would do well to remember that and keep up my practicing all the time. Those two hours flew by so fast it was ridiculous and didn't leave much time left before I had to head off to my recreation class where we presented our favorite songs. I led mine, but was not my usual charasmatic, engaging self because I have been having really bad headaches recently. It really makes it hard to lead the party when you have to think through a cloud of fog at all times. But I got through it and it ended up being a bundle of fun and well worth it. After class, we came home and Jared threw a hamburger cook out to prove to us that he could make cheaper, much better tasting burgers than Legends Grill. They were certainly cheaper, but not nearly as good. They weren't terrible, but there was a huge taste difference for those who were eating. So Jared lost. Although it was more fun because a lot more people were involved. Not that they really bought anything, they just kind of subsisted off of Jared's mercy at buying all the meat, buns, and condiments. After burger night was over (which might become a commonplace occurence), I went to Tayler's 19th birthday party where we played Apples to Apples for quite a few hours. It's an amazing game, but once you have exhausted all the cards, it gets a little bit old. The cake was amazing though - spice cake has always been a favorite for me - nothing compared to red velvet cake made by my grandma, but definitely one of the better cakes known to mankind. Wednesday was temple day, which is always such a happy day. It is something I look forward to everyday is getting to go to the temple on Wednesday and enjoy the spirit there and the comfort and peace that it brings. All worries and concerns are melted away and life is so simple and pleasant and everything just feels right. No sadness or depression or anger or frustration, just peace and joy. Plus, my recurring visits have been noticed - most of the temple workers recognized my face and said they look forward to seeing me again next week. Also another plus - the devotional this week was about the blessings we receive by making time to attend the temple on a regular basis. Talk about awesome promises! I seriously can never wait for the next Wednesday to roll around usually. I just want to keep going to the temple so bad. Wednesday has also become crockpot day mixed with Psych day. Sherrie and I bust out one of her crockpot recipes and throw it all in before we head for classes in the morning and then eat it after getting back from the temple and then watch two or three episodes of Psych. Good times. Thursday is laundry, do homework, babysit (and therefore rewatch all the great Disney classics with Bryn) day. Plus I get amazing dinners and lunches. Family visiting = amazing, relaxing, a nice break from the hectic life of college life and friends. I also attended an extra credit lecture on Thursday night about the life of Charles Darwin. He is quite a remarkable man and has a huge list of achievements to his name and the lecturer was entertaining to say the least. It was well worth giving up an hour to go see it. Plus extra credit for geology is always a nice bonus. After the end of the lecture, I came back and watched the Shawshank Redemption (edited). Will had it and had been wanting us to watch it with him for quite a few weeks now so I suggested we watch it and we did. It was an amazing movie and very deep and effective and moving. Movies about prison usually are I guess. It also had a happy ending, which is always a good thing. Tragic endings are very effective at making the audience feel and think and all that jazz - but sometimes the audience needs a happy ending just to prove that the world is not all bad, that there is always hope, that good wins out in the end always. Greg and Jared headed out to San Diego Thursday night as well. I hope they are having fun. Friday was a fun day after I managed to make it through all of school and work. We went to LOL (a improv comedy troupe that does skits much like Jesterz in Tempe and also as clean) and had a good time laughing at other people. They were not quite as good as the people in Jesterz, but they don't get paid either so I guess they don't have to be. After that I came home and studied some and then proceeded to play ping pong and talk with Courtney and Rachelle and Will and Aaron and Brad and Regan until 1:3o when all the girls had to leave. Then we watched the new episode of Psych online and I went to bed quite exhausted and needing it. Saturday morning I woke up sick and with a headache and promptly went and got drugs for it, the same stuff Mom found for me last year when I was at home. Excedrin - killer good stuff. I then proceeded to try to organize a LOTR marathon, but I failed to get any people. They were all asleep so I ended up watching The Two Towers by myself while studying for my map test for history and my recreation midterm this upcoming week. Will joined me halfway through the movie and we plan on watching the other two and getting more people to do it by the end of this weekend. We will see if that actually happens. Saturday was also Valentine's Day (I had a date for the evening so it was not Singles Awareness Day as I had thought it would be). There was a huge dance that the Residence Hall Association threw for all the on campus housing in the Wilk. It was called "A Time for All Seasons" and it was amazing! There was minigolf, dancing, catered sandwiches from somewhere delicous, chocoloate fountains, lemonade stands, caricature drawing, kareoke, limo rides, and movie clips of kissing scenes from all sorts of famous and popular movies. It was awesome! I got asked by Karen Chandler who has become quite a good friend of mine since the Christmas Pary last semester that I threw. That had to be one of my most brilliant plans all semester because it is how I made so many good friends that I now have such as Regan, Will, and Karen. The problem is that everyone now expects me to pull it off somehow again this semester and I don't know if I am up for it, but I will try. Anyway, Karen and I had a great time. It was like being back in high school and going to one of those dances, it was just a blast that I got to have with a really good friend. Plus I got to ride in a stretch hummer for the first time ever! Talk about sweet! Today was ok, I had to work and now am trying to decide how to plan out the rest of tonight and tomorrow since it is a day off school and almost all my roommates are gone except Brad. I need to visit Kahi and catch up with him for one. Plus I need to meet Kelly Ann's friend who came down from BYU-I for the weekend. Plus I need to plan out at least one more segment of LOTR time. Plus a snow trip tomorrow for everyone. Plus going out to lunch tomorrow with Will. Plus tunnel singing tonight. Plus studying some more for the map test and the midterm. So I will manage to keep myself busy, no worries.

Thought of the week: from the Shawshank Redemption:
Andy Dufresne: That's the beauty of music. They can't get that from you... Haven't you ever felt that way about music? Red: I played a mean harmonica as a younger man. Lost interest in it though. Didn't make much sense in here. Andy Dufresne: Here's where it makes the most sense. You need it so you don't forget. Red: Forget? Andy Dufresne: Forget that... there are places in this world that aren't made out of stone. That there's something inside... that they can't get to, that they can't touch. That's yours. Red: What're you talking about? Andy Dufresne: Hope.

Song of the week: "Ocean Avenue" by Yellowcard. Its an upbeat song that is fun to sing along with. Plus it accurately describes most college people's lives I decided. I am an anamoly by waking up early and getting to bed at a somewhat decent time.

Picutres of the week: Karen and I at the dance!

A week off.

So this week was pretty much a week off of anything school related for me. Sure, I did all the reading that I had to do and went to class and whatnot. But there were no tests, no papers, not much of anything really. Just a whole lot of free time to chill and get to do some pretty crazy stuff. Monday night started it all off, or course, like it usually does every week. Although, I guess I should accurately start with Sunday and first start by stating my disappointment with the Superbowl and great despair at the loss of the Cardinals. I did convert a few Cardinals fans, however, and had some people who were strongly against me and I ended up being the loser. But oh well. Its not like I could help the team do any better than they did. I did learn that I am one of the only people in my room who watches TV or movies on Sundays. To me, its a great bonding experience, and to them Im not sure what it is. So I was kind and went to a room a couple doors down to watch the Superbowl and enjoy the company of people who didn't think I was the devil for watching it on Sunday. I guess people are just raised differently and I just need to accept that fact, even if it means watching something like a Disney movie on a Sunday can then be taken to be a bad thing. Monday night Kelly Ann and I started building the largest marble shoot I think BYU campus has ever seen. It spanned out from our dorm and down all the stairs into the basement and ended up right near the base of the ping pong table. It had it all: jumps, drops, curves, dominoe tower to knock down at the end, and a three months worth collection of toilet paper and paper towel tubes. It was magnificent. Although, by the end only half the marbles ended up making it all the way down, but still you can't have everything. We spent a grand total of around 2 1/2 hours getting it all constructed and messing around with it. And then just played with it until we were forced to take it down around 11:30. By the end, we had Brad, Courtney, Whitney, Greg, Aaron, Jared, Will, and even some others working on it. I guess I should mention that Regan helped by pointing out all the faults and flaws in the design. He seems to relish taking that job a lot. Tuesday was free grand slam at Denny's day. A truly wonderful invention. My morning class was cancelled which was great because it meant that I could end up waiting in line outside the restaurant for the 45 minutes it took to get in and the same time it took our food to get to the table. But it was free, which was the important thing. Free food is always amazing and worth waiting for. That took up most of the morning, as I am sure anyone could see. Tuesday night was my fabulous night class where I had to lead my group's entire relay set up and get everyone excited and pumped up for it. I was up in front of everyone the whole time and had a blast doing it - and yelling and screaming at the top of my voice and making sure everyone was having fun and so on. I don't think there is a better class anywhere ever invented than that. Simply a blast plus an easy A for three credits. After that, I went to Legends Grille and had a hamburger which turned out to be delicious. They make them in big hunks of meat which tastes just right especially with the homemade toasted buns that they use. Then I came home and watched Batman Begins for fun and to waste some time because I honestly had nothing else to do and not much energy left to do it with. Wednesday turned out to be Psych night because the first and second season finally arrived in the mail on Tuesday. We watched the pilot episode for the series and saw how the whole crazy awesome show started. It was a very long pilot, but it was still awesome and fun to watch. My only problem with the show is swearing. If they could just fix that and take it out, the show would be almost perfect. After that I watched Dark Knight to finish up a Batman two days. The movie still creeps me out to no end and I don't think I should ever watch it again but there is something vaguely addicting to watching the movie and seeing how all the characters can spiral downwards into madness and despair based upon the actions and terrible misdeeds of a single person. A single person can have such a major effect on the entire world around them, its ridiculous. Thursday was laundry day (as usual)! But it gave me the chance to catch up on all my homework (history reading) and to get some napping in on the couch, eat delicious food, and play with Brooke and Bryn and review my Disney movies. Its a time I look forward to every week in order to relax and just get away from the crazy insanity that is college life. Thursday night I felt like being random and so got people to come with me to Walmart and play some pretty intense games of Sardines. Its quite amusing to see how people can hide inside the store and how extraordinarily long it can take to find them or for some people to find them at any rate. Brad, Whitney, Kelly Ann, Kahi, Will, and I played there and had a blast doing it. Friday I had a date night once I survived through all my classes and work and it turned out to be a lot of fun. I took Sherrie so naturally, it was more fun than anything. Best friends usually make for the best dates. We went to Knight Games, which was supposed to be a mini-Renaissance festival but turned out to be somewhat of a fluke. It was still fun though, at least a little bit. After that we played some murderous sardines in the HFAC and Sherrie and I were the first and only ones to hide because no one could ever find us. We were that good at finding the perfect spot. After the building closed, we came home and played Imaginiff and Quelf in the lobby and had some ice cream sundaes to go with it. Sherrie and I lost Imaginiff terribly, but won Quelf by a landslide. So apparently we can't think the same as anyone else, but we can out-random anybody. We finised up the night watching the new episode of Psych. Yesterday was Saturday and it was as busy as the rest of the week. I started off with racquetball at 8 in the morning and managed to roll my ankle pretty bad. I then headed off to a geology lab and then went snowshoeing in the moutains. If you wear shoes that aren't waterproof, snow manages to numb a swollen and throbbing ankle fairly well. Plus the gorgeous scenery and sheer fun of hiking made it a blast. I went with Will, Stephen McNary, Sherrie, and Colten and we ended up hiking all the way to the top of Squaw Peak, which was never the plan to start off with but we ended up doing it and once we started up the peak, we just couldn't stop. The snow was amazing - almost all of it was fresh and powdery and clean. And the view at the top was stunning. We ended up sitting at the top for a full 30 minutes before we felt the need to start thinking about coming down at all. The snowshoes in themselves were just fun too and I have to say I wouldn't mind doing it again. Not in the least. After we finished that (and it took almost all day) I came home and called Adam for his birthday and tried to go see Humor U but it sold out in a ridculous amount of time - all of about ten minutes. So we play Cranium at Courtney's apartment and I went to bed around midnight exhausted and sore but extremely happy and at peace with the world. It was nice to just get a week to do some of the things that I have not had the opportunity to do yet and to go outside my normal comfort range and do something adventurous. This week I plan on starting and sticking to a schedule. Waking up around 7 every morning and then proceeding to get in an hour workout (basketball, volleyball, running, racquetball, etc.), reading the scriptures, showering, indexing, and then whatever time is left for breakfast and some cleaning up. That way I can start feeling like a productive person and not like Im just wasting my life away doing nothing. Also, Wednesday night will be Psych crockpot night. Monday night is FHE. Tuesday night is class and some special dinner set up (whether going out to eat or making something fancy). Friday night will be smoothie/movie night. Im going to need to find movies that are G or PG and perfectly clean in every way, so if you have any suggestions, let me know please! And then Thursday or Saturday Im going to start making a date night, or at least once every other week. So I plan on keeping myself busy and on track for the rest of the semester.

Thought of the week: "I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we will only tune in." ~George Washington Carver. This is something I rediscovered as I was hiking up the mountain and seeing all that God has created and the beauty and the majest contained therein.

Song of the week: "Superman" by Five for Fighting. It has always been one of my favorite songs and one that always hits me deeply. I listened to it a lot this week.

Pictures of the week:

The Marble Tube
The Date Night
Snowshoeing Extravaganza!

The Good Life....or should we say the Easy Life

Life this week was pretty much learning how to get back into the swing of things again because I had two midterms that I had to take one day after another. It was exciting and moved along fast enough so that it never felt like time was going by too slow or anything. Monday was home teaching day or so Stephen McNary and I decided. Girls are decidedly much different than guys. We ended up home teaching to them for over an hour and a half. I guess most of it was just chatter and talking away trying to get to know each other. But the lesson still took up a pretty decent chunk of time. It was about the first presidency message on missionary work and making sure to live our lives according to the gospel so that we can live the way we teach and set good examples for those who are not memebers of our faith. After that I came home and started studying for my biology test which was going to happen the very next day and decided once again that biology as a freshman in college was much easier than biology as a freshman in high school. Mr. Higbee made us work hard for that class in 9th grade, a lot harder than I ever truly realized until I came to college and saw how honestly slow biology could be taught. We spent a whole freaking month on the scientific method. That is ridiculous. Not only did I learn that back in 5th grade, it is also way too easy to not cover in just one day no matter how you teach it. Unless it is biology 100 at BYU I guess. Then you can take a whole month and bore every single student to tears. But I was more than prepared for the test. I scored a perfect on the multple choice and then am fairly confident I achieved about the same on the free response. Tuesday was take the test day and go to my one class and hit devotional day. The devotional was interesting and convincing. It had to do with an engineering professor who works in the weather explained global warming and how humans have managed to play quite a decent sized role in it. He said things would probably never get to the disasters of the Day After Tomorrow or anything, but that global warming was a real and driving force that was both natural and greatly expidtied by the ways that humans now live their lives. After the test was done I came back to my apartment and started to study for my geology midterm to take place the next day. For some reason, teachers always have to plan their tests to happen on relatively the same block of time leaving a lot of free open days and then crazy insane testing for two or three day straight. Don't ask me how that works or makes sense. My recreation class on Tuesday night turned out to be a blast as we planned our way through leading our set of relays we have to do next week and planning our two outside parties that are necessary to throw in order to get an A for the class. How much more awesome of a class could you get? You HAVE to throw parties in order to get a good grade. I just wish there were more classes like it, enough said. Sherrie, Aaron, and I went to Legends Grill right after that and got some good food that is a bit on the pricey side but adequate. The desserts are simply amazing though. Wathcing Back to the Future came next and I rediscovered that 80's movies got away with an awful lot of questionable material. There was a lot more swearing than I remembered there being. I love the movie, but for a PG it really blew me away. A study party for geology came next and it lasted for a couple hours until the girls had to leave for curfew. I spent a lot of time stressing over and studying for that test and took it the next day and found I had spent time kind of studying the wrong material but had studied enough of everything to still manage to get an A. But I now know better for next time, memorize how to read all the graphs and charts and understand exactly what they mean and how they apply. The format was very similar to the science section on the ACT test. Reading and interpreting graphs, tables, and pictures and then answering a few questions on each one. My hopes for that class have now greatly increased as long as I can continue to study and understand the basic underlying ideas behind everything. Its not too bad that I can only comprehend only half of what I read, I just have to understand the basic definitions and differences between everything and I will do fine. Wednesday was spent at class all day and then taking the geology test which I could not find out my score too right away. Very frustrating. We retake the test again in class on Friday with open book, open note, and open friend. And then she adds the two scores together for our final test grade. Its a brilliant idea and takes a lot of the worrying out of taking the test, but still I really want to know my score after the second I turn the test in like I get to for every other class. But I will get over it. Plus it just proves to me again that AP death at Mt View High School in Mesa, Arizona, was much harder than I ever gave it credit for. The AP classes that I took in high school more than overprepared me for college and I guess that is the reason I don't appear to study or work as hard as I should. It is easy. Which drives my roommates crazy. Greg can never seem to come to grips with the fact that I spend less time on school and schoolwork than him and rarely ever visit the library and yet still get a much higher GPA than him. I owe a great thanks to Snyder, Helsel, Ries, Canaday, Hansen, Temme, Wessel, Higbee, and even Bisanz and Bird and Martin from junior high for that. Plus a few others. People who weren't afraid to push and push hard to get us to achieve our best because they knew we could live up to it and do our best. And it worked, there were a huge number of fours and fives from them on every exam. Canaday even got me to get a four on the physics section. And then I hit college and realized that most school wasn't really that hard like I had been led to believe. Sure, there are days when life gets really difficult and everything seems to get crammed in together, but compared that happening on pretty much a daily basis in high school, college is a breeze. I have heard that once you are finally past all the GEs and in your major classes, then things actually get more difficult, but I will wait and see. So far there has been nothing that hard or aggravating really at all, except for the fact that it is just too easy. And teachers are afraid to push at all. Thursday I went and did my wash at Uncle Karsten's and Aunt Julie's and enjoyed some of the best food I have had since coming back up to Utah made by them. Plus I got all my history reading done and then watched an episode of Psych. I think I have finally managed to get addicted to a TV show like the rest of my friends back at home did long before me. Psych makes me happy when I watch it. Its clean, funny, and still involves the whole murder mystery thing of Law and Order, but parodies it to a very great effect. I ended up ording the whole first and second season online from Walmart and they are supposed to come in sometime next week. Im excited because I like it a lot. Plus I managed to get Aaron, Greg, Will, and Reagan all addicted to it with me. With Sherrie soon to follow suit. We watch the new episode online, projected every Saturday night, or at least all the guys do. After all the girls have already had to leave. Friday night was another smoothie/movie night this time with much better smoothies on my part and watching Enchanted. I have had to resort to finding extremely clean movies because of the people who want to come and watch them. That means all PG-13 are out and most PGs. So we shall see what other movies I can come up with for the rest of the semester. There is always Princess Bride and anything Disney I guess. And that is what I plan to stick to. After the movie, we played Cranium and then some rousing games of Mafia until 1:30 in the morning. Good times. I got up around 8 on Saturday to go play racquetball with Courtney. I have not played in a very long time and I had a blast finally getting to play again yesterday. We plan on playing at least once, if not twice a week for the rest of the semester mixing in other work out stuff throughout the week. Like basketball or running, etc. A geology lab came next followed by going to visit Sherrie's brother and playing a hilarious card game entitled Munschins. It is done as a spoof of Dungeons and Dragons and Magic, but is much simpler and funnier to play. It is awesome, beyond awesome. After that, I went to the Jon Schmidt concert which was truly fantastic. He is an amazing perfomer and so was the cellist Steven Nielson that performs with him. I wish I could play as good as Steven. He makes everything look so easy and fun and plays everything so beautifully. I sound terrible in comparison. Or like I just started playing instead of starting about 8-10 years ago. And Im fairly decent at the college level! But he is thousands of levels past that and I could only just sit there and watch and listen in amazement and pure pleasure as he bowed and plucked and everything else you could imagine in perfect pitch and tone. After that came watching the beginning or Prince Caspian and then Psych night. Now its Sunday morning and I am writing this. This week will be fairly eventful but minus all the tests of last week, which Im good with. So until next week, so long.

Thought of the week: From Pysch:

Shawn: “I plead the third.”

Gus: “The third amendment says that a soldier can’t be lodged in your house. You mean the fifth.”

Shawn: “I’ve heard it both ways.”

Song of the week: "Waterfall" or "All of Me" by Jon Schmidt. I wish I could play them on the piano because they sound amazing every time!

Picture of the week: This is Jon Schmidt with the ridiculously hilarious wig he wears for his song about Bumble Tuna. He = amazing. As always, the rest of my picture from the week can be spotted on Facebook under the Freshman Memories albums.