Today I was feeling super stressed about everything. I have an 8-10 page long paper due at 5 p.m. and as of this morning when I woke up, I had about 4.5 pages. Today was the last day of classes for geology, math, biology, and writing. I didn't do my math homework, so I had to rush to do that too. Overall, I was just pretty stressed and didn't know how I was going to finish everything that was due today, let alone anything coming up with finals and everything. After lunch, I was walking to biology class, still super stressed out, and then superman runs up to me and says "Good luck with the end of the semester! I know you'll do awesome!" and then he runs off. That made me pretty happy. Then, a few seconds later, batgirl runs up to me and says "Go conquer those finals!" Now, I was feeling pretty happy and not too stressed. Then 3 people walk by, 2 girls and one guy, and the guy is playing the guitar, one of the girls is singing, and the other girl is stomping out a cool rhythm. After I enjoyed that, I passed my bishop on campus and he said "Hi Lauren! Good luck on finals!"
I'm so thankful for all these people that made my day become so much better! I was able to completely finish my paper by 3 p.m. so now I have 2 whole hours to relax before I have to go to writing class! I want to thank all these people for making my day amazing even though I have no idea who they are! So thank you, random people, for making my day turn from super stressful to super awesome!
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Tons of Fun! And Only 18 More Days!
I get to go home in 18 more days! This makes me sooooooooooo happy because I have really missed my home and family a lot. I wish that I could have gone home for Thanksgiving, but unfortunately home is far away and plane tickets are expensive. I did have an awesome time in New Mexico though! I got to shoot tons of guns! This one was my favorite
I shot other guns that were more powerful than the shotgun, but I don't miss with the shotgun. I would miss with the other guns though. That's why the shotgun was my favorite.
I also went exploring around New Mexico and found some Native American petroglyphs. Here are a few of them, but they're kind of hard to see in the picture
New Mexico was a ton of fun! I had some great Navajo food, went shooting, explored the tiny mall there and made fun of its ridiculous mannequins, explored the WalMart which is bigger than the mall there, bought cow print footie pajamas, and had a great time!
Here's me and Kayla in our matching footie pajamas!
Thanksgiving was a ton of fun, but I really miss my family. My little sisters have been calling me a lot recently though. They're counting down the days until I get home too! They don't really have much to say, most of the time it's just them singing some song that they made up.
Even though there's only 18 more days until I go home, it's going to seem like longer than that because of all the work I have to do. I have finals coming up very quickly, and a lot of projects due before that. I also applied for a job at the Cannon Center because I think it's good to have money for stuff. Like textbooks for next semester....those are expensive! And it may also be good to have a little bit of money for fun stuff too.
Speaking of fun stuff, I'm trying to have as much fun as possible in my last few days of this semester at BYU as well as balancing out working on school work. Today I went to Emily's surprise party which was a lot of fun, even though there seemed to be an unnecessary amount of candy throwing happening. I don't understand why somebody would waste perfectly good candy by throwing it at people.
Tomorrow the world's biggest donut is being served in the Wilk, so I'm definitely going to eat a piece of that! Tomorrow is also the Helaman Halls Christmas party, and there will be all sorts of fun stuff like an ugly sweater competition, gingerbread house competition, and lots of hot chocolate!
On December 6th there is a Helaman Halls formal dance. I haven't decided if I'm going or not. If somebody asks me then I'll go, but if not then I probably won't. It seems like the type of thing that would be much more fun with a date. I know some girls are planning on going without a date, but I don't think I'd go without a date.
The Hobbit comes out on December 14th! I've never been to the midnight premiere of a movie before, so I decided to get tickets to the midnight premiere! I do have a final on the 14th, but I should be fine. I'll take a nap before going to the movie, so I should get enough sleep.
And I think that's all the fun stuff I have planned so far. Unfortunately I don't have much more time to fit in fun stuff because I still need to finish a 10-page paper for writing class, make sure to do all my math homework and make sure I understand it all, read the Book of Mormon for 30 minutes per day, study for finals, and do more studying for finals. I'm not used to studying. I never studied in high school, but I know I should probably study now, especially if I want to try to get good grades. I've tried writing up a schedule, but let's see how well I'll actually follow it. But I only have to survive for 18 more days! Then I get to go home for 3 weeks!!! So excited!
I shot other guns that were more powerful than the shotgun, but I don't miss with the shotgun. I would miss with the other guns though. That's why the shotgun was my favorite.
I also went exploring around New Mexico and found some Native American petroglyphs. Here are a few of them, but they're kind of hard to see in the picture
New Mexico was a ton of fun! I had some great Navajo food, went shooting, explored the tiny mall there and made fun of its ridiculous mannequins, explored the WalMart which is bigger than the mall there, bought cow print footie pajamas, and had a great time!
Thanksgiving was a ton of fun, but I really miss my family. My little sisters have been calling me a lot recently though. They're counting down the days until I get home too! They don't really have much to say, most of the time it's just them singing some song that they made up.
Even though there's only 18 more days until I go home, it's going to seem like longer than that because of all the work I have to do. I have finals coming up very quickly, and a lot of projects due before that. I also applied for a job at the Cannon Center because I think it's good to have money for stuff. Like textbooks for next semester....those are expensive! And it may also be good to have a little bit of money for fun stuff too.
Speaking of fun stuff, I'm trying to have as much fun as possible in my last few days of this semester at BYU as well as balancing out working on school work. Today I went to Emily's surprise party which was a lot of fun, even though there seemed to be an unnecessary amount of candy throwing happening. I don't understand why somebody would waste perfectly good candy by throwing it at people.
Tomorrow the world's biggest donut is being served in the Wilk, so I'm definitely going to eat a piece of that! Tomorrow is also the Helaman Halls Christmas party, and there will be all sorts of fun stuff like an ugly sweater competition, gingerbread house competition, and lots of hot chocolate!
On December 6th there is a Helaman Halls formal dance. I haven't decided if I'm going or not. If somebody asks me then I'll go, but if not then I probably won't. It seems like the type of thing that would be much more fun with a date. I know some girls are planning on going without a date, but I don't think I'd go without a date.
The Hobbit comes out on December 14th! I've never been to the midnight premiere of a movie before, so I decided to get tickets to the midnight premiere! I do have a final on the 14th, but I should be fine. I'll take a nap before going to the movie, so I should get enough sleep.
And I think that's all the fun stuff I have planned so far. Unfortunately I don't have much more time to fit in fun stuff because I still need to finish a 10-page paper for writing class, make sure to do all my math homework and make sure I understand it all, read the Book of Mormon for 30 minutes per day, study for finals, and do more studying for finals. I'm not used to studying. I never studied in high school, but I know I should probably study now, especially if I want to try to get good grades. I've tried writing up a schedule, but let's see how well I'll actually follow it. But I only have to survive for 18 more days! Then I get to go home for 3 weeks!!! So excited!
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Stress+Late at Night+Laundry+Obnoxious People=A Very Grumpy Lauren
This past week has been rather stressful. Teachers are trying to cram things in before Thanksgiving break, projects are due, essays are due, there's just a lot of stuff to do. Also, it's getting cold. I do not like when it gets cold. I've stayed up pretty late every night this week working on projects and other school stuff. This is normal for what I had in high school every day, but for college, it's the most stressed that I've been so far. I get kind of grumpy when I'm super stressed. ...Okay, maybe really grumpy. And staying up late really doesn't help that at all.
Right now I'm up super late because I need to pack for Thanksgiving break, and in order to do that I need clean laundry. That has been more of an issue than it should be. I was planning on doing my laundry after FHE. We went ice skating, so it was later than normal and I figured that most people wouldn't be doing laundry at 11:00 on a monday night. Well, I guess I was wrong! It seems like everybody in the building wanted to do laundry now. There are only 5 washing machines and I needed 3 to do my laundry. Thankfully, when I went down there 2 had just opened up, and one only had 3 minutes left. So I managed to get all my laundry started in the washers. However, the dryers is a whole different story. There were 2 open when I went back down to the basement to switch my laundry. I had enough stuff that needed to air dry that 2 dryers would be just perfect for me. I opened up both of the dryers and was starting to load my stuff in, when this girl walks in the basement and sees that there is still one dryer that I have not yet put my stuff into, so she rushes over to her washing machine, grabs all of her clothes up in a bundle, runs over to the dryer I was going to load my whites into, shoves all her clothes in, slams the door shut and starts it. This made me very angry. It's now 12:45 a.m. and I am very tired and just want to sleep so I said "Excuse me, you saw that I was about to put my stuff in that dryer. That was really rude!" And she said "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't know you were using this one. You can use it when I'm done!" And she walks away. She definitely knew that I was going to use that other dryer though. I am thoroughly frustrated at this point. Now I'm left with the option of letting my laundry finish drying and then putting in my other load of laundry meaning I'll be up until nearly 4 a.m. when I still have class in the morning, or I could be somewhat rude and take the laundry out of the dryer that's done and go put it on the ironing board. I was done with being nice at this point because I'm tired, and I still feel the leftover effects of stress, so I just unloaded the other person's laundry that was finished and left it on the ironing board. Sorry, but I needed to get my laundry finished. Now it's 2 a.m. and my laundry is finally done! Yayyyy. I'm going to sleep and I'll pack in the morning. Hopefully I'll be less grumpy then because I'll have to go to class and then spend a few hours in a car with Kayla and her dad and brothers and I don't want them to think that I'm a super grumpy person.
Right now I'm up super late because I need to pack for Thanksgiving break, and in order to do that I need clean laundry. That has been more of an issue than it should be. I was planning on doing my laundry after FHE. We went ice skating, so it was later than normal and I figured that most people wouldn't be doing laundry at 11:00 on a monday night. Well, I guess I was wrong! It seems like everybody in the building wanted to do laundry now. There are only 5 washing machines and I needed 3 to do my laundry. Thankfully, when I went down there 2 had just opened up, and one only had 3 minutes left. So I managed to get all my laundry started in the washers. However, the dryers is a whole different story. There were 2 open when I went back down to the basement to switch my laundry. I had enough stuff that needed to air dry that 2 dryers would be just perfect for me. I opened up both of the dryers and was starting to load my stuff in, when this girl walks in the basement and sees that there is still one dryer that I have not yet put my stuff into, so she rushes over to her washing machine, grabs all of her clothes up in a bundle, runs over to the dryer I was going to load my whites into, shoves all her clothes in, slams the door shut and starts it. This made me very angry. It's now 12:45 a.m. and I am very tired and just want to sleep so I said "Excuse me, you saw that I was about to put my stuff in that dryer. That was really rude!" And she said "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't know you were using this one. You can use it when I'm done!" And she walks away. She definitely knew that I was going to use that other dryer though. I am thoroughly frustrated at this point. Now I'm left with the option of letting my laundry finish drying and then putting in my other load of laundry meaning I'll be up until nearly 4 a.m. when I still have class in the morning, or I could be somewhat rude and take the laundry out of the dryer that's done and go put it on the ironing board. I was done with being nice at this point because I'm tired, and I still feel the leftover effects of stress, so I just unloaded the other person's laundry that was finished and left it on the ironing board. Sorry, but I needed to get my laundry finished. Now it's 2 a.m. and my laundry is finally done! Yayyyy. I'm going to sleep and I'll pack in the morning. Hopefully I'll be less grumpy then because I'll have to go to class and then spend a few hours in a car with Kayla and her dad and brothers and I don't want them to think that I'm a super grumpy person.
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
What Happens in Mormonland When a Liberal President Wins
*Disclaimer: This is just me rambling at 1 in the morning about how fed up I am with politics and people complaining about the election, so it may be best if you just ignore it because it's probably really stupid.
I am so glad this election is over. Seriously. I hate all the contention and political arguments. However, being at BYU in Provo, Utah when Barack Obama was elected to a second term was not a fun experience. People here overreact so much! People were sitting around watching how the election was playing out, and the minute that it was announced that Obama had won people were shouting and saying that this country is headed to hell and that Satan is going to have hold of the people now......seriously??? We've had four years of Obama as president so far and it's not the end of the world that he was reelected. It was too crazy so I had to leave to go for a walk. I needed more steps anyways for the women's step study that I'm participating in, so hey, let's kill two birds with one stone. I can get away from everyone freaking out over politics and I can raise my step count for the day at the same time! Yay!
But anyways...sometimes I just go into my sassy mode and I get really mad and just want to sass people out. Seeing some of these statuses really made me want to go into my sassy mode, but I refrained...then I thought I should do something, so I made this status instead:
"To all my fellow BYU students...and anyone else who is freaking out about the results of the election saying it's the end of the world and they want to leave the country: Just a few things for you.
#1: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has issued a formal declaration of their support for the president: http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/statement-on-election-result If they can congratulate and support Obama in his win on the presidency then you can too.
#2: Article of Faith 12: "We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law." Obama is your president, so you can honor him and show him some respect, even if some of his ideas differ from yours.
There is no excuse for some of the very rude statuses that I have seen. Both candidates did a very good job with their campaign, and the election was very close, but Obama has won, so I think we should all just accept that and move on with our lives."
I'm pretty proud because I think I managed to say what I was trying to say without sounding too rude or sassy.
I'm just so glad this election was over and I can't wait for everyone to go back to living their lives as they have been. Ughhh. Being in the middle of Mormonland during an election like this is not fun at all.
I am so glad this election is over. Seriously. I hate all the contention and political arguments. However, being at BYU in Provo, Utah when Barack Obama was elected to a second term was not a fun experience. People here overreact so much! People were sitting around watching how the election was playing out, and the minute that it was announced that Obama had won people were shouting and saying that this country is headed to hell and that Satan is going to have hold of the people now......seriously??? We've had four years of Obama as president so far and it's not the end of the world that he was reelected. It was too crazy so I had to leave to go for a walk. I needed more steps anyways for the women's step study that I'm participating in, so hey, let's kill two birds with one stone. I can get away from everyone freaking out over politics and I can raise my step count for the day at the same time! Yay!
But anyways...sometimes I just go into my sassy mode and I get really mad and just want to sass people out. Seeing some of these statuses really made me want to go into my sassy mode, but I refrained...then I thought I should do something, so I made this status instead:
"To all my fellow BYU students...and anyone else who is freaking out about the results of the election saying it's the end of the world and they want to leave the country: Just a few things for you.
#1: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has issued a formal declaration of their support for the president: http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/statement-on-election-result If they can congratulate and support Obama in his win on the presidency then you can too.
#2: Article of Faith 12: "We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law." Obama is your president, so you can honor him and show him some respect, even if some of his ideas differ from yours.
There is no excuse for some of the very rude statuses that I have seen. Both candidates did a very good job with their campaign, and the election was very close, but Obama has won, so I think we should all just accept that and move on with our lives."
I'm pretty proud because I think I managed to say what I was trying to say without sounding too rude or sassy.
I'm just so glad this election was over and I can't wait for everyone to go back to living their lives as they have been. Ughhh. Being in the middle of Mormonland during an election like this is not fun at all.
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Halloween
I have to start this post off by saying I have never seen anywhere more excited about Halloween than Utah. It's crazy here! There are more Halloween decorations here than I've ever seen in my life. There are Halloween shops and costume stores all over the place, there are haunted houses around every corner, and everyone is super excited. I've never known that people took Halloween this seriously before coming out to BYU.
I felt that seeing as Halloween was such a popular holiday here, I needed to figure out a costume for the Halloween parties that I would be attending. I have a pair of pleather pants, so I figured I'd be catwoman. I found a cool tutorial on pinterest for how to make a masquerade mask, so I made one all black for catwoman.
This is a picture of the mask I made in the process of drying. I cut up a cheap shirt that I bought at DI and then used puffy paint to make cool designs. The results were pretty good!
Unfortunately, at the Halloween dance, masks were not allowed, so I had to paint one on instead. It looked okay, but not as good as the real mask. And, while I'm speaking about the dance, I just want to complain about how I got kicked out. They told me that my outfit was inappropriate, and I could understand if it was because my pants were too tight or something, but no, it wasn't because they were too tight, it's because they were pleather. I was told that I was not allowed to wear pleather pants because pleather has a bad connotation. Girls wearing just leggings were fine, but I had to go change because apparently wearing pleather makes you a harlot or something here at BYU. Also, another thing I saw at the dance was a lady trying to kick out a guy for wearing a kilt because she said he was cross-dressing. He managed to win his case by arguing that a kilt is technically a man's article of clothing, so he was doing no such thing. The lady seemed reluctant to let him go back to the dance floor, but then finally agreed that he was fine when other students started backing him up and saying that he should be allowed to wear a kilt without being told he was cross-dressing.
Now, for actual Halloween. I did not wear a costume around campus to classes, but many people did. I saw Frodo, quite a few Waldos, many Batmans, a lot of nerds, a weeping angel, the tenth doctor from Doctor Who, power rangers, teenage mutant ninja turtles, Santa, Buddy the Elf, Black Widow, Captain America, some golden sea creature fish thing, and a bunch of stuff that I wasn't sure what they were supposed to be, mostly it was girls with teased up hair and a lot of makeup and prom dresses....maybe some kind of zombie princess? I don't know, but there were a lot of them.
Then at the nighttime, I wore my costume; pleather pants and mask and all, because it looked too good to not wear. I just had to avoid any authoritative looking figures that might tell me that I needed to change because they have an issue with pleather. During visiting hours, Kayla and I went to Ryan's room with some other people and we had a classy Martinelli's party, drinking sparkling cider out of crystal wine glasses. We felt very fancy.
After that, Ryan had a pumpkin that was half-frozen that he wanted to do something with, so we went pumpkin bowling out on the basketball court. Unfortunately, the pumpkin thawed rather quickly and didn't work as a bowling ball for long, so Ryan started seeing how high he could throw it in the air.
And the pumpkin kind of just mushed everywhere, but the good news is that all the splatters were only the ice melting, and the pumpkin stayed in mostly just large chunks which were then disposed of.
Later, we went over to the Cannon Center where they were holding a dance-off for all the RAs in the dorms. I'm proud to say that my RA was in the group that won! And guess what! This time nobody in the Cannon Center told me that I couldn't wear my mask or my pleather pants, so I feel very accomplished!
Another note about this week. Helaman Halls started a giant game of Humans vs Zombies. It is so much fun! We have 200 people playing, and on monday we started with 3 original zombies. They have to tag the humans to turn them into zombies. I made it for 42 hours as a human before I got ambushed by a group of zombies. I had no idea that zombies could run so fast! Now I need to tag a human before I die. Zombies have to tag a human every 48 hours or else they starve and die. Too many of the humans are cheating though. They just sit in their rooms all day! Or they go to a big Helaman Halls activity and take off their wristband so that nobody knows they're a human. Tonight the number of zombies passed the number of humans, so the zombies are beginning to win!
Well, that was my Halloween!
I felt that seeing as Halloween was such a popular holiday here, I needed to figure out a costume for the Halloween parties that I would be attending. I have a pair of pleather pants, so I figured I'd be catwoman. I found a cool tutorial on pinterest for how to make a masquerade mask, so I made one all black for catwoman.
This is a picture of the mask I made in the process of drying. I cut up a cheap shirt that I bought at DI and then used puffy paint to make cool designs. The results were pretty good!
Unfortunately, at the Halloween dance, masks were not allowed, so I had to paint one on instead. It looked okay, but not as good as the real mask. And, while I'm speaking about the dance, I just want to complain about how I got kicked out. They told me that my outfit was inappropriate, and I could understand if it was because my pants were too tight or something, but no, it wasn't because they were too tight, it's because they were pleather. I was told that I was not allowed to wear pleather pants because pleather has a bad connotation. Girls wearing just leggings were fine, but I had to go change because apparently wearing pleather makes you a harlot or something here at BYU. Also, another thing I saw at the dance was a lady trying to kick out a guy for wearing a kilt because she said he was cross-dressing. He managed to win his case by arguing that a kilt is technically a man's article of clothing, so he was doing no such thing. The lady seemed reluctant to let him go back to the dance floor, but then finally agreed that he was fine when other students started backing him up and saying that he should be allowed to wear a kilt without being told he was cross-dressing.
Now, for actual Halloween. I did not wear a costume around campus to classes, but many people did. I saw Frodo, quite a few Waldos, many Batmans, a lot of nerds, a weeping angel, the tenth doctor from Doctor Who, power rangers, teenage mutant ninja turtles, Santa, Buddy the Elf, Black Widow, Captain America, some golden sea creature fish thing, and a bunch of stuff that I wasn't sure what they were supposed to be, mostly it was girls with teased up hair and a lot of makeup and prom dresses....maybe some kind of zombie princess? I don't know, but there were a lot of them.
Then at the nighttime, I wore my costume; pleather pants and mask and all, because it looked too good to not wear. I just had to avoid any authoritative looking figures that might tell me that I needed to change because they have an issue with pleather. During visiting hours, Kayla and I went to Ryan's room with some other people and we had a classy Martinelli's party, drinking sparkling cider out of crystal wine glasses. We felt very fancy.
Here are Kayla and I! I'm catwoman and she's a country cowgirl.
Ryan was just himself for Halloween. He did enjoy acting fancy while drinking his sparkling cider though.
Adam was the Doppler Effect for Halloween.
After that, Ryan had a pumpkin that was half-frozen that he wanted to do something with, so we went pumpkin bowling out on the basketball court. Unfortunately, the pumpkin thawed rather quickly and didn't work as a bowling ball for long, so Ryan started seeing how high he could throw it in the air.
And the pumpkin kind of just mushed everywhere, but the good news is that all the splatters were only the ice melting, and the pumpkin stayed in mostly just large chunks which were then disposed of.
Later, we went over to the Cannon Center where they were holding a dance-off for all the RAs in the dorms. I'm proud to say that my RA was in the group that won! And guess what! This time nobody in the Cannon Center told me that I couldn't wear my mask or my pleather pants, so I feel very accomplished!
Another note about this week. Helaman Halls started a giant game of Humans vs Zombies. It is so much fun! We have 200 people playing, and on monday we started with 3 original zombies. They have to tag the humans to turn them into zombies. I made it for 42 hours as a human before I got ambushed by a group of zombies. I had no idea that zombies could run so fast! Now I need to tag a human before I die. Zombies have to tag a human every 48 hours or else they starve and die. Too many of the humans are cheating though. They just sit in their rooms all day! Or they go to a big Helaman Halls activity and take off their wristband so that nobody knows they're a human. Tonight the number of zombies passed the number of humans, so the zombies are beginning to win!
Well, that was my Halloween!
Saturday, October 20, 2012
Random Stuff
I love doing random, spontaneous things. I think it's a lot of fun, and it can lead to meeting new friends!
Randomly deciding to watch a movie, or go shopping, or go hot tubbing is a lot of fun!
Yesterday, Kayla and I were walking around, and we saw the Campus Floral store. We decided to go check it out because we hadn't been there before. It ended up being a super cute boutique type place with a lot of cute scarves and jewelry and hats and shirts. I found a hat that I thought was super cute, so I bought it. I don't even wear hats that much, but sometimes those random impulse purchases can be great.
Here's a picture of the hat!
Today the random thing that I did was go hot tubbing super late at night. I was playing card games with some people in the lobby, when some of our friends walked in wearing bathing suits and carrying towels. They said they were going hot tubbing, and asked if I wanted to come, so I said yes and changed into my swimsuit. It turns out that none of them knew anyone in the apartment complex we were going to, but they just knew that there was a hot tub there. We walked around until we found the hot tub, but, of course, there was a lock on the gate to get into the pool. It was also about 11:30 at night and the sign said that the pool closed at 11:00. We were trying to figure out what else to do, but then the apartment manager walked by and said he could open the pool up for us! So we got to go hot tubbing super late at night. The hot tub was really, really hot though, so we spent a lot of time in the swimming pool because it wasn't too cold in the pool. It may have just felt relatively warm compared to outside though, because it was about 40 degrees outside. It was a lot of fun though!
After we were done swimming, we left and decided to go to Wendy's and get food. The drive through there was open until 2:00 a.m. but inside was only open until midnight, and we didn't have a car. Thankfully, a car pulled up and said that we could order food with them! The person driving the car looked familiar, and I found out that he was also from Oakton Stake. Then as we were eating our food outside, it was getting really cold, and we were all damp from the pool, so we all went home.
Today was pretty fun!
*Adding a new story to random stuff now, a day later
Last night I got a text from my friend Anna, from high school. She was in town in Provo, so today we spent the day together and went out to lunch and saw some other people from back home. Then she had other plans for the evening, so I went back to my room, and then to dinner with some girls from my hall. While we were at dinner we saw a bunch of guys from our ward and they were planning to go to the dollar theater to see Batman: The Dark Knight Rises right after dinner and asked if we wanted to come. We said that of course we would love to go! Well, it turns out the movie theater was a bit farther of a walk than we expected, but we got there on time to see the movie! We ended up with a group of about 20 people who went to see the movie. That was pretty fun too!
Randomly deciding to watch a movie, or go shopping, or go hot tubbing is a lot of fun!
Yesterday, Kayla and I were walking around, and we saw the Campus Floral store. We decided to go check it out because we hadn't been there before. It ended up being a super cute boutique type place with a lot of cute scarves and jewelry and hats and shirts. I found a hat that I thought was super cute, so I bought it. I don't even wear hats that much, but sometimes those random impulse purchases can be great.
Here's a picture of the hat!
Today the random thing that I did was go hot tubbing super late at night. I was playing card games with some people in the lobby, when some of our friends walked in wearing bathing suits and carrying towels. They said they were going hot tubbing, and asked if I wanted to come, so I said yes and changed into my swimsuit. It turns out that none of them knew anyone in the apartment complex we were going to, but they just knew that there was a hot tub there. We walked around until we found the hot tub, but, of course, there was a lock on the gate to get into the pool. It was also about 11:30 at night and the sign said that the pool closed at 11:00. We were trying to figure out what else to do, but then the apartment manager walked by and said he could open the pool up for us! So we got to go hot tubbing super late at night. The hot tub was really, really hot though, so we spent a lot of time in the swimming pool because it wasn't too cold in the pool. It may have just felt relatively warm compared to outside though, because it was about 40 degrees outside. It was a lot of fun though!
After we were done swimming, we left and decided to go to Wendy's and get food. The drive through there was open until 2:00 a.m. but inside was only open until midnight, and we didn't have a car. Thankfully, a car pulled up and said that we could order food with them! The person driving the car looked familiar, and I found out that he was also from Oakton Stake. Then as we were eating our food outside, it was getting really cold, and we were all damp from the pool, so we all went home.
Today was pretty fun!
*Adding a new story to random stuff now, a day later
Last night I got a text from my friend Anna, from high school. She was in town in Provo, so today we spent the day together and went out to lunch and saw some other people from back home. Then she had other plans for the evening, so I went back to my room, and then to dinner with some girls from my hall. While we were at dinner we saw a bunch of guys from our ward and they were planning to go to the dollar theater to see Batman: The Dark Knight Rises right after dinner and asked if we wanted to come. We said that of course we would love to go! Well, it turns out the movie theater was a bit farther of a walk than we expected, but we got there on time to see the movie! We ended up with a group of about 20 people who went to see the movie. That was pretty fun too!
Saturday, October 13, 2012
Homecoming Dance....Sort Of...
So tonight was the night of BYU's homecoming dances. There was a 20s themed formal, a 50s themed semiformal, and an 80s themed casual. Ryan asked me to the 50s themed semiformal. Kayla was also going with Mitchell, and Braiden was going with Emily. We all went to a diner beforehand and then over to Center Street for the dance. However, tickets were all sold out when we got there. Everyone else except for me and Ryan had tickets, so they went and danced while Ryan and I went to find something else to do. We ended up finding a comedy show by this group called ComedySportz where they have 2 groups that do improv comedy stuff. It's kind of similar to Whose Line is it Anyway? and it was pretty fun! Then after that was over we went outside to discover that it was raining....again. It's been raining all day. So we walked back to BYU campus and went to the Creamery to get some ice cream. Afterwards, the rest of the group got back to campus and we played Quelf, which is one of the weirdest board games I have ever played.
Well, anyways...here are some pictures from when we were at the diner!
It actually took so many attempts to get a good picture of me and Ryan where one of us didn't look stupid. We ended up taking 8 different pictures. 3 of the pictures had closed eyes, in 2 of them there were really weird faces being made somehow, and 2 where there was a super bright glare off of the metal thing behind us. Thankfully, we got at least one good picture.
It ended up being a really fun night, even though homecoming was all sold out! Provo is a fun place to explore and find cool things like the comedy show!
Well, anyways...here are some pictures from when we were at the diner!
Here are Braiden and Emily
And Kayla and Mitchell
And me and Ryan.
It ended up being a really fun night, even though homecoming was all sold out! Provo is a fun place to explore and find cool things like the comedy show!
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Superhero!
My roommate, Katie, and Sam from down the hall got a bad guy arrested today! I think that qualifies them as superheroes!
Here's the story:
Katie and Sam were leaving for church, a little late, so pretty much everyone else was gone. They open up the door to the stairwell to leave and see a creepy, balding middle aged man coming up the stairs. Males aren't allowed up in the hallways, except for during visiting hours, and this seemed really weird, so Sam said, "Uhh...can we help you??" He said, "I'm going up to the mezzanine to meet with the bishopric." Katie and Sam both thought that was really weird, because why would an older man be meeting with a bishopric in the mezzanine of a girls dorm when it's not even visiting hours? So they called the campus police. The police showed up at the dorms and found the guy, so they arrested him for trespassing. It turns out that this man fits the description of different reports of robberies that they've had from over a year ago, and they've been trying to catch him since then! Thankfully they've caught him now!
Here's the story:
Katie and Sam were leaving for church, a little late, so pretty much everyone else was gone. They open up the door to the stairwell to leave and see a creepy, balding middle aged man coming up the stairs. Males aren't allowed up in the hallways, except for during visiting hours, and this seemed really weird, so Sam said, "Uhh...can we help you??" He said, "I'm going up to the mezzanine to meet with the bishopric." Katie and Sam both thought that was really weird, because why would an older man be meeting with a bishopric in the mezzanine of a girls dorm when it's not even visiting hours? So they called the campus police. The police showed up at the dorms and found the guy, so they arrested him for trespassing. It turns out that this man fits the description of different reports of robberies that they've had from over a year ago, and they've been trying to catch him since then! Thankfully they've caught him now!
Saturday, September 29, 2012
My Day Today
Well, today I had an interesting day. I went to my classes like normal, then there was a football game. BYU played Hawaii today, and the beginning of the game was somewhat concerning. By 7 minutes into the first quarter, two of the Hawaii players had gotten injured so badly that they needed stretchers and ambulances. That was somewhat concerning.
Anyways, fun stuff about the game today! We did cool stuff with the colors we wore. Even sections wore white and odd sections wore blue and it ended up looking pretty awesome!
The whole stadium was pretty much stripes like that. This was just the best picture I had because the sun was at a weird angle.
Next, let's play Where's Waldo?
Do you see him? I'm not joking! There's actually someone dressed up like Waldo in that picture! If you look around a bit then you should be able to find him...maybe. I thought it was really funny to see Waldo walking around the bleachers in the football stadium, so I just had to take a picture of him.
If you need help finding Waldo, here's a zoomed in picture of where he is:
Now you should be able to see him!
The next funny moment occurred when Kayla and I were leaving the game. Some of the trashcans that we saw were so funny! And if you don't believe that trashcans can be funny then just look at these.
Broken refrigerators? Rusty school bus? Well, I don't know about you, but that's definitely the first thing I think about bringing to a BYU football game to throw away in their trashcans! I just have so many rusty school buses sitting around that I don't want anymore, so I think I'll just take them to the stadium during the game to try to shove them into that tiny trashcan right there.
After I left the game, I went to a "Stop Light Dance" in Helaman Halls. There was supposedly a color code that you were supposed to wear. Green if you were single, red if you were taken, and yellow if "it's complicated." I think most people there ended up wearing blue because they thought it was a nice, safe color. People wouldn't be creeping on them for advertising that they were single, yet not avoiding them for being taken or just not talking to them because they don't want to be involved in the "it's complicated" mess. The dance was a conclusion to our Safety Week where we learned about being safe on BYU campus. We got a certain amount of raffle tickets for the different activities that we attended throughout Safety Week, and during the dance they had a raffle drawing to see who won the prizes. There were two different prizes that you could enter your raffle tickets for. One was the "date night" package which included a really soft BYU blanket, a DVD, and 2 coupons for free ice cream at the creamery. The other prize was called the "monkey prize" which included a Helaman Halls t-shirt, a BYU sock monkey, and a BYU water bottle. They had a few winners for each, and I ended up being one of the winners for the "date night" package! Here's what I won!
Now all that I need is to find a guy to go on a date with...
After the dance I went and sat on the hot spot in front of Hinckley Hall with Jess, and then a bunch of other people joined us. I think that hot spot on the ground is going to become a frequent hang-out spot. It feels really great on chilly evenings with a nice, warm blanket like the one I just won. Hot chocolate is a nice addition too. Or popcorn, like we had tonight. Overall, I think that today was a great day!
Anyways, fun stuff about the game today! We did cool stuff with the colors we wore. Even sections wore white and odd sections wore blue and it ended up looking pretty awesome!
The whole stadium was pretty much stripes like that. This was just the best picture I had because the sun was at a weird angle.
Next, let's play Where's Waldo?
Do you see him? I'm not joking! There's actually someone dressed up like Waldo in that picture! If you look around a bit then you should be able to find him...maybe. I thought it was really funny to see Waldo walking around the bleachers in the football stadium, so I just had to take a picture of him.
If you need help finding Waldo, here's a zoomed in picture of where he is:
Now you should be able to see him!
The next funny moment occurred when Kayla and I were leaving the game. Some of the trashcans that we saw were so funny! And if you don't believe that trashcans can be funny then just look at these.
Broken refrigerators? Rusty school bus? Well, I don't know about you, but that's definitely the first thing I think about bringing to a BYU football game to throw away in their trashcans! I just have so many rusty school buses sitting around that I don't want anymore, so I think I'll just take them to the stadium during the game to try to shove them into that tiny trashcan right there.
After I left the game, I went to a "Stop Light Dance" in Helaman Halls. There was supposedly a color code that you were supposed to wear. Green if you were single, red if you were taken, and yellow if "it's complicated." I think most people there ended up wearing blue because they thought it was a nice, safe color. People wouldn't be creeping on them for advertising that they were single, yet not avoiding them for being taken or just not talking to them because they don't want to be involved in the "it's complicated" mess. The dance was a conclusion to our Safety Week where we learned about being safe on BYU campus. We got a certain amount of raffle tickets for the different activities that we attended throughout Safety Week, and during the dance they had a raffle drawing to see who won the prizes. There were two different prizes that you could enter your raffle tickets for. One was the "date night" package which included a really soft BYU blanket, a DVD, and 2 coupons for free ice cream at the creamery. The other prize was called the "monkey prize" which included a Helaman Halls t-shirt, a BYU sock monkey, and a BYU water bottle. They had a few winners for each, and I ended up being one of the winners for the "date night" package! Here's what I won!
Now all that I need is to find a guy to go on a date with...
After the dance I went and sat on the hot spot in front of Hinckley Hall with Jess, and then a bunch of other people joined us. I think that hot spot on the ground is going to become a frequent hang-out spot. It feels really great on chilly evenings with a nice, warm blanket like the one I just won. Hot chocolate is a nice addition too. Or popcorn, like we had tonight. Overall, I think that today was a great day!
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
Utah Autumn
The past few days here in Provo have been beautiful! The weather has cooled down, but it's not cold. There are low clouds everywhere. Yesterday when I was walking to class I saw some clouds floating upwards to the sky from about where the tops of the buildings were. It seemed almost magical and I really wanted to take a picture, but I didn't have my camera with me and my class started in 5 minutes. The clouds stayed around the tops of the mountains and in the canyons all day yesterday. Most of them were still there today and I was excited to see snow on top of Mount Timpanogos when I woke up this morning! I thought that it was so beautiful to see the snow on the mountain with misty clouds surrounding it. This time I had time between classes, so I ran back to my room to get my camera and take a picture.
I love seeing the snow on the mountains, so hopefully it will stay up there for a while and off of the ground! I'm not ready for it to be that cold yet. I like the fall weather where I can wear long sleeves and skinny jeans with boots. I also like my nice warm sweaters! Last night was kind of chilly, but not too bad. Kayla and I both felt like it was a hot chocolate kind of day though, so we bought some hot chocolate mix and made some. Then we went and sat on the hot sidewalk square outside while we drank our hot chocolate. I really like this weather and I want it to stay like this! Too bad that I know that it will have to get colder.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
I Need to Learn to Sleep
It is currently 2:12 a.m. and I am sitting here in my dorm. I can't sleep. Well, I haven't really tried yet. The problem is that at college there are so many things to do that are so much more interesting than sleeping! I think that talking to people is the biggest distraction, because people here are so much fun to talk with! Usually some of my friends and I, and occasionally random people I've never met before, will all sit around and talk until about midnight when it gets too cold out to stay outside, and at that point you aren't allowed in each other's lobbies, so we just go to bed. However, today was a different story. When Ryan and I were going to dinner we found this spot on the sidewalk that was unusually hot. We pointed it out to everyone that walked past it. After dinner, Ryan and Kayla and I sat there because it felt so nice and warm, and other people would stop and talk to us. At about 11:00 we had a pretty large group of people sitting on the warm spot on the sidewalk. Some girls walked by with a bunch of glowsticks and gave them to us, so we arranged the glowsticks to say "The Hot Zone" right on the hot square of the sidewalk. So many people would walk past and ask what "the hot zone" was, so we'd tell them to feel the sidewalk there. It was actually quite amusing watching how many people thought it was the glowsticks that were making the sidewalk really hot and a lot of people asked us "What did you do??? How did you make the sidewalk hot?" In reality, the sidewalk was hot because all the sidewalk squares have heaters underneath them to melt the snow and ice in the winter, but this one was broken, so it was just always on. Well, anyways, the sidewalk felt really nice there and we all sat there and were talking, but the problem was that the cold didn't force us to leave at midnight like usual, so we were just sitting there until about 2 a.m. when Anna finally got up and said "Ok, I think it really is time to go to bed now, so I'm leaving" and then we all just left because we knew it had been time to go to bed for the past 2 and a half hours but we just didn't feel like moving.
Hopefully I can learn to go to bed at a decent hour from now on! College people just need to stop being so interesting so that I can get some sleep!
Hopefully I can learn to go to bed at a decent hour from now on! College people just need to stop being so interesting so that I can get some sleep!
Friday, September 21, 2012
A Proposal on the First Date?
Just for any of you who might be freaking out right now after reading the title...no, I am not engaged, and no, I was not actually proposed to. It's all a joke.
So last night I went on my first date at BYU. Kayla and I were sitting in the lobby of one of the buildings one day when the volleyball players came by and handed out flyers about the volleyball date night. We thought it would be fun, so we both found dates and all went together. Kayla went with Austin and I went with Ryan. The volleyball game was great, and BYU won! After the volleyball game, we heard about a surprise party for someone that we all knew from Late Summer Honors, so we went to that. We needed to find places to hide, but there weren't many places to hide, so Ryan told me to go sit on the bench and then he pretended to propose to me and that was how we were "hiding". It worked though because Anna didn't notice that it was anyone that she knew! Then we all surprised her and had a fun time hanging out and eating cookies for her birthday. After that we all went and got ice cream at the creamery and it was a lot of fun!
Well, that's the story of how I was proposed to on my first date at BYU! Haha
Sunday, September 16, 2012
The Most Insane Game Ever
Well tonight was the big rivalry, the "Holy War", the BYU vs University of Utah football game. It took place at the U of U, so here at BYU in Helaman Halls we gathered together at the Cannon Center to watch the game projected onto a big screen. There were some chairs, and then everyone else sat on the ground on blankets and pillows. I was with Braiden, Shanti, and Julius up at the very front on the ground to watch the game, and it was a ton of fun. So many people were together in one place cheering for BYU and during commercial breaks we would have games and dance parties and it was a lot of fun.
The thing that made the game ridiculous was the ending. The score with 8 seconds left and BYU in possession was Utah 24 and BYU 21, and it was just ridiculous. We ran it and got to the 30 yard line, and then Utah stormed the field because they assumed they had won, but then it was decided that there was still one second on the clock, so BYU got to punt it and try to make it in. Utah blocked the punt, and we thought we had lost, but then there was a flag on the play because the Utah fans started flooding the field too early, so we got another chance to punt it! If we made it then it would be a tie and we would go into overtime. We didn't make it. The ball hit the post and bounced off. Everyone in the Cannon Center watching the game was so stressed out during those last few minutes! It was the most ridiculous thing I've seen in football. We were all really bummed that we lost, but then someone pointed out that it had just turned to midnight and if we went into overtime we would have ended up playing on the sabbath, so that's why we lost. Well, I guess I can accept that reasoning...
The thing that made the game ridiculous was the ending. The score with 8 seconds left and BYU in possession was Utah 24 and BYU 21, and it was just ridiculous. We ran it and got to the 30 yard line, and then Utah stormed the field because they assumed they had won, but then it was decided that there was still one second on the clock, so BYU got to punt it and try to make it in. Utah blocked the punt, and we thought we had lost, but then there was a flag on the play because the Utah fans started flooding the field too early, so we got another chance to punt it! If we made it then it would be a tie and we would go into overtime. We didn't make it. The ball hit the post and bounced off. Everyone in the Cannon Center watching the game was so stressed out during those last few minutes! It was the most ridiculous thing I've seen in football. We were all really bummed that we lost, but then someone pointed out that it had just turned to midnight and if we went into overtime we would have ended up playing on the sabbath, so that's why we lost. Well, I guess I can accept that reasoning...
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Chopped Off
My hair has been needing a haircut for a while now. The layers were getting shaggy and I would find split ends that had split at least half an inch up my hair. I was planning on getting my hair cut before I left Virginia and came out to college, but that obviously didn't happen. I knew that if I didn't schedule an appointment soon then it would never happen...or at least not until my hair got really, really bad. So last night I went online and scheduled an appointment at the Paul Mitchell Studio 1030 Salon, which is new in the Wilkinson Student Center. I got a $5 off coupon during new student orientation and figured that it was a perfect time to use it. So I scheduled an appointment...then I realized I had no idea what I wanted to do with my hair. Did I want to just trim it up a bit? No, I wanted something different. I just didn't know what I wanted. So I went to pinterest to look for ideas and I discovered I really had no idea what I wanted to do with my hair. I found 19 different pictures of hair that I was considering. Most of them were between chin and shoulder length, but there are so many different cuts and styles that I could choose that I couldn't make up my mind! Thankfully some of my friend gave me their input. Ryan decided that he is now a hair expert, and he was a big help in discussing the pros and cons of different hairstyles. I still hadn't decided what exactly I wanted when it was time for my hair appointment, but as I was sitting and waiting for my appointment I finally sort of decided on what I wanted. I picked two of the pictures and told the lady cutting my hair that I kind of wanted a mixture of the two pictures, and she did a pretty good job!
Here's a before picture and an after picture:
My hair is a bit shorter in the back than it is in the front. I love how it feels so much lighter and softer now! This is the shortest I've ever had my hair. It was pretty close to this short when I cut it in my sophomore year of high school, but not quite. I think that I like it short though!
Here's a before picture and an after picture:
This picture is a few months before the haircut:
And this is the after picture! 
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Only at BYU...
This blog post is dedicated to the little quirks that BYU has. These are all little things that I've seen or heard during my time here so far. BYU has to be the weirdest place on earth, but I love it anyways!
Couches in all the women's bathrooms
Free bridal guides in the tunnel to the freshman housing
Cookies sitting on sidewalk lights
Babies in classes
"I pray about my science experiments and hypotheses to know if they're correct. You can feel free to do that too"
A poster reading "Single male now accepting applications for moderately good-looking (8.5 out of 10, at least) female. Please prepare yourself for an interview by reviewing the following questions: 1. Do you make good salsa? 2. Are you alive?"
"Let's hear a cheer for the #1 Stone Cold Sober campus!!!"
"Learning all the acronyms for these buildings is going to be harder than any of my classes!"
People pairing off into couples after 2 days of school
"That's against the honor code!"
Girls singing in the shower....and the girl in the shower next to her starts harmonizing with the first girl
Church music playing from the bell tower
"Your dress is so cute and modest!"
"Dude, could you tell if that girl was wearing a CTR ring or a wedding ring? I don't want to start flirting with a married woman"
"It would be a great date idea!" - referring to pretty much anything on campus
Couches in all the women's bathrooms
Free bridal guides in the tunnel to the freshman housing
Cookies sitting on sidewalk lights
Babies in classes
"I pray about my science experiments and hypotheses to know if they're correct. You can feel free to do that too"
A poster reading "Single male now accepting applications for moderately good-looking (8.5 out of 10, at least) female. Please prepare yourself for an interview by reviewing the following questions: 1. Do you make good salsa? 2. Are you alive?"
"Let's hear a cheer for the #1 Stone Cold Sober campus!!!"
"Learning all the acronyms for these buildings is going to be harder than any of my classes!"
People pairing off into couples after 2 days of school
"That's against the honor code!"
Girls singing in the shower....and the girl in the shower next to her starts harmonizing with the first girl
Church music playing from the bell tower
"Your dress is so cute and modest!"
"Dude, could you tell if that girl was wearing a CTR ring or a wedding ring? I don't want to start flirting with a married woman"
"It would be a great date idea!" - referring to pretty much anything on campus
Saturday, September 1, 2012
Weirdest Dream Ever
Here is my weird dream from last night. I have no idea what caused this type of dream, but I woke up very very confused and amused that my mind could create something like this. So here is the story of my dream for your amusement at how ridiculous my mind is:
I was at my BYU Late Summer Honors thing which started on August 16th, so back in time a little bit. There were only 170 students here because that's how many are in the Late Summer Honors program with some small, one-week long classes. For some reason Justin Bieber was one of the students there. The girls didn't go all crazy over him like you would expect, but instead treated him just like every other guy here and he was able to fall into a normal friend group like everyone else, being friends with some people and not really with others. He ended up becoming friends with my friend group and would hang out with me and my friends here a lot. Then actual school started, so there were about 30,000 more people here and it was kind of crazy because there are so many people! Then Justin Bieber wanted to see me again, so he asked me to go see the Avengers with him at the BYU dollar theater, which is actually playing right now, so this whole dream seemed so weird and real. I went with him to the movie, but by this time everyone else from BYU was here and it went crazy. At first there weren't many people in the theater, but then the crazy Beliber girls noticed that Justin Bieber was there and he was with a girl that was not them, so they spread the word that Justin Bieber was there and soooooo many girls came to the theater. It was really crazy! The theater was packed full! They all started trying to talk to him and we had to run away because of all the crazy girls. It was just unsafe in that theater. Then it got super crazy because the paparazzi was there and taking pictures which of course were all posted on major websites so that everyone knew that Justin Bieber had taken some random normal girl to the movies. All the different places on the internet were going crazy with comments from all these girls and I had to hide out in this basement place at BYU...I'm not entirely sure exactly where it was, but a bunch of girls were posting death threats online and stuff, so I couldn't be out in public. Then this is where the dream got a little weirder and I don't remember what happened, then I woke up.
I have no idea what is wrong with my brain that made me dream something like this! It was so weird and felt so real and I was scared that crazy psycho Belieber girls would kill me!
I will now make attempts to interpret what this dream means:
1. It is a bad idea to become a Belieber because they are psycho crazy people who make the world ridiculous.
2. Justin Bieber is secretly in love with me even though he has no idea who I am.
3. I need to get more sleep
I was at my BYU Late Summer Honors thing which started on August 16th, so back in time a little bit. There were only 170 students here because that's how many are in the Late Summer Honors program with some small, one-week long classes. For some reason Justin Bieber was one of the students there. The girls didn't go all crazy over him like you would expect, but instead treated him just like every other guy here and he was able to fall into a normal friend group like everyone else, being friends with some people and not really with others. He ended up becoming friends with my friend group and would hang out with me and my friends here a lot. Then actual school started, so there were about 30,000 more people here and it was kind of crazy because there are so many people! Then Justin Bieber wanted to see me again, so he asked me to go see the Avengers with him at the BYU dollar theater, which is actually playing right now, so this whole dream seemed so weird and real. I went with him to the movie, but by this time everyone else from BYU was here and it went crazy. At first there weren't many people in the theater, but then the crazy Beliber girls noticed that Justin Bieber was there and he was with a girl that was not them, so they spread the word that Justin Bieber was there and soooooo many girls came to the theater. It was really crazy! The theater was packed full! They all started trying to talk to him and we had to run away because of all the crazy girls. It was just unsafe in that theater. Then it got super crazy because the paparazzi was there and taking pictures which of course were all posted on major websites so that everyone knew that Justin Bieber had taken some random normal girl to the movies. All the different places on the internet were going crazy with comments from all these girls and I had to hide out in this basement place at BYU...I'm not entirely sure exactly where it was, but a bunch of girls were posting death threats online and stuff, so I couldn't be out in public. Then this is where the dream got a little weirder and I don't remember what happened, then I woke up.
I have no idea what is wrong with my brain that made me dream something like this! It was so weird and felt so real and I was scared that crazy psycho Belieber girls would kill me!
I will now make attempts to interpret what this dream means:
1. It is a bad idea to become a Belieber because they are psycho crazy people who make the world ridiculous.
2. Justin Bieber is secretly in love with me even though he has no idea who I am.
3. I need to get more sleep
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Shin Splints, Blisters, and Thunder Thighs
There is so much walking to do here at BYU! There's the giant hill to walk up to get up to the main part of campus, there's walking around between classes. There's just a lot of walking. I'm not used to doing all this walking, so in the first week I got shin splints. Not fun. That just makes walking much harder to do because it hurts every time you take a step! I also made sure to only wear shoes that I knew I was used to wearing and that had never given me blisters before. Well, surprise, surprise! My shoes that had never given me blisters before, and that I'd worn nearly every day in high school and over summer gave me blisters. Thankfully I have a nice big box of band-aids to help cover any blisters and hopefully prevent new ones. The "Thunder Thighs" part of this title hasn't happened yet, but it's sure to happen from all this walking we're doing. On the first day of walking up the hill from Helaman Halls to the main part of campus, Kayla, Catie, Vera, Paige and I noticed that it was really giving our thighs a workout! So now, whenever we're all going up that hill together we shout "Thunder Thighs!" because we can feel our thigh muscles really working. Hopefully all this walking will help me burn off all the calories from the delicious food here!
Monday, August 27, 2012
First Day of School!
Classes started today! We no longer are having dance parties every night, we now have homework assignments. We're all exhausted from staying up so late all the time. I really do need to go to bed earlier. I was tired in between classes today, so I took a nap.....on the grass. It felt really nice there and I made sure to set an alarm on my phone so I'd wake up in time for the next class. The alarm woke me up and I kind of jumped and there was a group of girls walking by that laughed at me and gave me a weird look, but whatever. They're just jealous that they didn't think of the idea to take a nap in the grass. Because today was the first day of school I had to take the traditional "First Day of School" picture. So here it is:
Classes went well today! I think they all should be great classes! Today I had Geology, Calculus, Biology, and Writing. Tomorrow I have Book of Mormon and Calculus, and Thursdays I have a Civil Engineering class. Hopefully this semester will be fun and not too much work! A kid who came to BYU from China told me I had an Asian workload and I was crazy for taking so many classes like that and not any "fun" classes. Well some of those classes seem like they could be fun! Of course there are definitely some fun classes that I could take that I'm not, like social dance or underwater basket weaving, but I'm not taking those! Maybe some other time.
Today was also our first Family Home Evening as a ward and we don't have our "families" assigned yet, we had a big ward meeting and, of course because this is BYU, we did speed dating. This has to be the school that pushes dating the most out of any other school around. It seems like nearly every announcement for anything relates to dating. Some things I've heard:
"Here is the schedule for the movies we're showing that fulfill Great Works requirements for the Honors Program. They're all free, so guys, find a girl and get a free date! Maybe go to the Jamba Juice next door afterwards!"
"Your freshman mentor will give you a pass that gives you $2 admission to some of our programs that would normally cost much more. So guys, you know what that means! You can take a girl out on a $4 date!"
"There's a pretty good restaurant in the MOA. It's kind of fancy. It would be a good idea for a date"
"I know you all are enjoying this dance, but it's starting to rain out here, and if you go into the Wilk there's a dating game just waiting for you!"
"The campus floral store works on your meal plan! Guys! That means you can buy flowers for a girl and take her on a date using your meal plan!"
Oh BYU....
But anyways, the first day of classes was good! My professors all seem great, and I don't think I'll have too much work! I think that I'll definitely plan on taking many naps in the grass though because that felt nice!
Saturday, August 25, 2012
New Student Orientation
I've already been at BYU for a week, so I wasn't sure how fun or useful the New Student Orientation would be. The first day, after everyone moved in, each hall area had a carnival and dance party. There were a lot of games to play, a lot of food to eat, and too many people to meet! It was all pretty fun though! Then for the real start of orientation we were put into pretty random groups of people and forced to be friends with them because we had to spend all day with them. Whatever, my group was pretty fun and I already knew a few people in it from Late Summer Honors. On the first day of New Student Orientation we played games with our group to get to know each other and then we walked around campus and saw a lot of stuff. The library tour was when it actually started being a fun orientation because the tour guide we had was very enthusiastic about everything. Later we had a presentation about the honor code which was actually really, really funny! I think everyone now has the angels singing "That's against the honor code! That's against the honor code! That's against the honor coooooooooode!" stuck in their heads now. All that was fun, but there's still more fun coming up! After the honor code presentation we all went to the football stadium for a pep rally type thing. First we made a Y shape on the bleachers and then we did cool stuff like the wave and a weird swishy arm thing which looked really really weird. Well anyways here are some pictures of that thanks to the BYU Facebook page!
In this picture believe it or not, there are still people coming up to be seated in their spots! I was seated kind of in the very middle of the bottom part of the Y. Then finally, after a longggg time waiting, we got everyone up on the bleachers and into the Y shape!
We also have a time lapse video of the formation of the Y and the wave and it's all pretty cool!
Then after all the fun with making the Y we had a pep rally where we were introduced to all the freshman sports players. We saw the cheer team, some of the football players, some of the basketball players, some women's soccer players, volleyball players, and we also saw the marching band! Then we ended the whole thing with an awesome fireworks show! There's a video of that too!
That was pretty awesome. And that was just the first day of orientation!
The next day for New Student Orientation we met up with our groups again and then we continued on touring the campus. After that they had meetings for the major you were interested in, and at the engineering meeting all the different types of engineering tried convincing me they were the best. They all shoved papers at me and told me a bunch of information that I don't even remember now. Then there was an information fair where we got a ton of free stuff from all the different companies on campus trying to get us to buy their stuff. There was also a service fair where a bunch of different service groups were trying to get you to serve for them. A lot of the service opportunities looked really great, but I probably won't have the time to do most of them, and I'll just have to pick one or two to do. After that there was a banquet for women interested in engineering and that was pretty fun because I got to meet a lot of other girls who are also interested in engineering. My friend Mary from my Late Summer Honors class was there and she's a lot of fun!
After all this stuff was over, we had our choice of activity to pick. We could go hike the Y, go on a scavenger hunt, play giant twister, see the movie The Color of Paradise, go to the art museum, go to the dinosaur museum, or go to the planetarium. Mary and I decided at the banquet to go see the movie because it counts as one of the Honors program Great Works experiences. We decided to see if anyone else wanted to go with us, so we walked over the the building in Heritage Halls where Travis, Nick, and Austin were staying. First we went to Travis's apartment because he texted us and told us he was there. When we got there Travis was not there, but two of his roommates were. They were really funny and totally trying to hit on me and Mary. Well anyways, we then left to go to Austin's apartment to see if he was there. We knocked on the door and waited a while, but nobody answered. Then we went a few doors down to Nick's apartment, and right as we knock on the door Mary gets a text from Nick saying "I'm making brownies and my friend thinks she gets some but she actually doesn't! Ha!" So he couldn't come to the movie with us until his brownies were out of the oven. Then we hear a door down the hall open and close and we look over and see Austin sitting there, locked out of his apartment. He said he had been in the shower and was putting on clothes to answer the door, then he went outside to see who it was, but forgot his key and the door closed behind him. Mary and I felt bad for being the cause of him being locked out of his room, but it was also really funny. He had to run outside barefoot to try to find his roommate who had a key. While he was getting back into his apartment we found Travis and Nick's brownies had finished baking, so then we all walked to the movie together. The movie was actually a really well-made movie! It had a lot of symbolism and deeper meaning, and I really wish I could speak Farsi so that I didn't have to rely on the subtitles because I feel like some of the dialogue was slightly different in translation than it would be. We had a group discussion of the movie afterwards and it was really interesting seeing everyone's input on the movie. After that we went to the Friday Night Extravaganza and learned a bunch of new dances, then we got to eat ice cream! The ice cream flavor that the BYU creamery made for our class was called Seriously Chocolate. It was pretty much just chocolate ice cream with Oreo pieces in it. After all that fun we all went over to Austin's apartment to watch a movie, but then we realized that we wouldn't be able to finish it in time for the curfew of being in an apartment of someone of the opposite gender, so we just hung out and talked instead.
Tonight there is another dance party! I think that will be my 5th dance party since getting to BYU 9 days ago. Even when there hasn't been a dance party there have been fun activities every night! I think all the fun activities will slow down a bit once classes start on monday, but I think it will still be a lot of fun!
The next day for New Student Orientation we met up with our groups again and then we continued on touring the campus. After that they had meetings for the major you were interested in, and at the engineering meeting all the different types of engineering tried convincing me they were the best. They all shoved papers at me and told me a bunch of information that I don't even remember now. Then there was an information fair where we got a ton of free stuff from all the different companies on campus trying to get us to buy their stuff. There was also a service fair where a bunch of different service groups were trying to get you to serve for them. A lot of the service opportunities looked really great, but I probably won't have the time to do most of them, and I'll just have to pick one or two to do. After that there was a banquet for women interested in engineering and that was pretty fun because I got to meet a lot of other girls who are also interested in engineering. My friend Mary from my Late Summer Honors class was there and she's a lot of fun!
After all this stuff was over, we had our choice of activity to pick. We could go hike the Y, go on a scavenger hunt, play giant twister, see the movie The Color of Paradise, go to the art museum, go to the dinosaur museum, or go to the planetarium. Mary and I decided at the banquet to go see the movie because it counts as one of the Honors program Great Works experiences. We decided to see if anyone else wanted to go with us, so we walked over the the building in Heritage Halls where Travis, Nick, and Austin were staying. First we went to Travis's apartment because he texted us and told us he was there. When we got there Travis was not there, but two of his roommates were. They were really funny and totally trying to hit on me and Mary. Well anyways, we then left to go to Austin's apartment to see if he was there. We knocked on the door and waited a while, but nobody answered. Then we went a few doors down to Nick's apartment, and right as we knock on the door Mary gets a text from Nick saying "I'm making brownies and my friend thinks she gets some but she actually doesn't! Ha!" So he couldn't come to the movie with us until his brownies were out of the oven. Then we hear a door down the hall open and close and we look over and see Austin sitting there, locked out of his apartment. He said he had been in the shower and was putting on clothes to answer the door, then he went outside to see who it was, but forgot his key and the door closed behind him. Mary and I felt bad for being the cause of him being locked out of his room, but it was also really funny. He had to run outside barefoot to try to find his roommate who had a key. While he was getting back into his apartment we found Travis and Nick's brownies had finished baking, so then we all walked to the movie together. The movie was actually a really well-made movie! It had a lot of symbolism and deeper meaning, and I really wish I could speak Farsi so that I didn't have to rely on the subtitles because I feel like some of the dialogue was slightly different in translation than it would be. We had a group discussion of the movie afterwards and it was really interesting seeing everyone's input on the movie. After that we went to the Friday Night Extravaganza and learned a bunch of new dances, then we got to eat ice cream! The ice cream flavor that the BYU creamery made for our class was called Seriously Chocolate. It was pretty much just chocolate ice cream with Oreo pieces in it. After all that fun we all went over to Austin's apartment to watch a movie, but then we realized that we wouldn't be able to finish it in time for the curfew of being in an apartment of someone of the opposite gender, so we just hung out and talked instead.
Tonight there is another dance party! I think that will be my 5th dance party since getting to BYU 9 days ago. Even when there hasn't been a dance party there have been fun activities every night! I think all the fun activities will slow down a bit once classes start on monday, but I think it will still be a lot of fun!
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
College - Part 2
Now I have finally finished unpacking and sorting my stuff! Just in time too, because my roommate arrives tomorrow morning and I don't want her to think I'm a total slob. I managed to fit all of my clothes and shoes into my closet! Then I got some friends to help me put my bed on risers so I can have storage underneath. Here are some before and after pictures of my room:
Yay! It all fits! My bed is super tall now though. I have to jump to get on it! But now my room looks much nicer!
I also have to talk about the food again because I just love food. There is always pretty good food in the Cannon Center! But today there seemed to be a few mishaps there. During lunch we heard a plate drop and shatter, and then when Kayla goes to get some pink lemonade this happens:
The nozzle just fell off of the drink dispenser and into her cup of lemonade. She didn't know what to do, so we just left it there until one of the workers walked by who knew how to fix it.
I should also post an update on my late summer honors class. I had my midterm yesterday and that was one of the easiest tests I've had ever. It was easier than pretty much any test I had in high school because I didn't get multiple choice tests in high school. I got my test back today and I scored 100%! My final for the class is tomorrow and I'm hoping that it will be just as easy. I hope all of college is this easy! I really doubt it though, but the easiness is nice while it lasts.
Tonight we had a dance for everyone in late summer honors. It was kind of fun....but kind of not seeing as the ratio of girls to guys was 3 to 1. Large amounts of girls would congregate by the water and brownies during the first 10 seconds of a slow song, because by that time all of the guys were taken. Hopefully at the next BYU dance that I go to there will be more guys.
More people are starting to move into the dorms now. It's no longer just the 140 of us late summer honors kids. I was taking a nap today when a gaggle of giggling girls ran down the hallway and woke me up. I'm going to miss having the peace and quiet of only 3 people on the whole floor, but it will be fun to meet all the new girls too!
I also have to talk about the food again because I just love food. There is always pretty good food in the Cannon Center! But today there seemed to be a few mishaps there. During lunch we heard a plate drop and shatter, and then when Kayla goes to get some pink lemonade this happens:
I should also post an update on my late summer honors class. I had my midterm yesterday and that was one of the easiest tests I've had ever. It was easier than pretty much any test I had in high school because I didn't get multiple choice tests in high school. I got my test back today and I scored 100%! My final for the class is tomorrow and I'm hoping that it will be just as easy. I hope all of college is this easy! I really doubt it though, but the easiness is nice while it lasts.
Tonight we had a dance for everyone in late summer honors. It was kind of fun....but kind of not seeing as the ratio of girls to guys was 3 to 1. Large amounts of girls would congregate by the water and brownies during the first 10 seconds of a slow song, because by that time all of the guys were taken. Hopefully at the next BYU dance that I go to there will be more guys.
More people are starting to move into the dorms now. It's no longer just the 140 of us late summer honors kids. I was taking a nap today when a gaggle of giggling girls ran down the hallway and woke me up. I'm going to miss having the peace and quiet of only 3 people on the whole floor, but it will be fun to meet all the new girls too!
Sunday, August 19, 2012
College - Part 1
The Late Summer Honors class that I've been taking is called Engineering for Earthquakes. It's actually a pretty fun class! At first it seemed like this class would be really hard, but after talking to some kids in the other classes I think that this one is pretty fun and easy! I mean, we build towers out of blocks and then try knocking them over by yelling right next to them. How awesome is that?! Other classes have to read whole Shakespeare plays and do a packet for homework. Our homework is to build a bridge out of paper. I think I chose a good class!
One of our tasks was building a bridge out of paper and dowels that could be able to support 10 pounds pulling down on it. If it did that, you got at least a 93%, if it didn't, then you just missed out on 70 points of a 100 point assignment! We had to do the calculations to figure out how much force each piece would have to take, and then we made pieces appropriate for the task they needed to do. This is what my group's bridge ended up looking like!
And this is our bridge after it broke...
The class has been really fun so far! It's only a week long and I get a whole credit hour for it! I have my midterm test tomorrow and then the class ends on wednesday. Hopefully I'll still see some of the people from my class around campus because they're all really fun awesome people! I've had a good time making friends with the other students in my class as well as others that aren't in my class! On Saturday night some of the other girls in Hinckley Hall and I baked some brownies and had a little party where we invited people over to eat brownies and socialize. We even met some new people who walked past our building and smelled brownies and decided that they had to investigate where the wonderful smell was coming from! I've had a lot of fun meeting new people and making friends! The classes are really fun too! Only at BYU would you have a class prayer before testing out paper bridges to help ensure that it wouldn't break. Haha I love BYU!
Oh.....and something new I just found after I originally posted this! BYU is so weird! Look at these events on the sports calendar!
Ok, so this one I can kinda understand just because it's a funny thing to do.....but the next one?????
"Kiss someone for 12 minutes today" ......seriously???? Ok, something is wrong with BYU..... Hahaha
And you know what the best part about this picture is? You can't see it in this picture, but it says 12.12.12, but they put it on November 12th, not December 12th!
One of our tasks was building a bridge out of paper and dowels that could be able to support 10 pounds pulling down on it. If it did that, you got at least a 93%, if it didn't, then you just missed out on 70 points of a 100 point assignment! We had to do the calculations to figure out how much force each piece would have to take, and then we made pieces appropriate for the task they needed to do. This is what my group's bridge ended up looking like!
The skinny pieces were in tension and the cylindrical pieces were in compression. We did the math to be sure that they'd work and support the 10 pounds, and it did just that! We kept adding weight until it broke, and it broke at about 15 pounds.
The class has been really fun so far! It's only a week long and I get a whole credit hour for it! I have my midterm test tomorrow and then the class ends on wednesday. Hopefully I'll still see some of the people from my class around campus because they're all really fun awesome people! I've had a good time making friends with the other students in my class as well as others that aren't in my class! On Saturday night some of the other girls in Hinckley Hall and I baked some brownies and had a little party where we invited people over to eat brownies and socialize. We even met some new people who walked past our building and smelled brownies and decided that they had to investigate where the wonderful smell was coming from! I've had a lot of fun meeting new people and making friends! The classes are really fun too! Only at BYU would you have a class prayer before testing out paper bridges to help ensure that it wouldn't break. Haha I love BYU!
Oh.....and something new I just found after I originally posted this! BYU is so weird! Look at these events on the sports calendar!
And you know what the best part about this picture is? You can't see it in this picture, but it says 12.12.12, but they put it on November 12th, not December 12th!
Thursday, August 16, 2012
College!
I started college today! Yay! I'm taking a week long late summer honors class called Engineering for Earthquakes which gives me a credit hour. Today I moved into my dorm and met a lot of new fun friends! Then I went to class and met some more people. In class we worked on some basic physics stuff and had a little lab where we tested the tension strength of different lengths and widths of paper. I already have some homework, but it's not too hard.
Some good news is that we located my missing textbook! I ordered one textbook on Amazon because it was cheaper there than in the bookstore, but somehow it got lost somewhere in the mail. The tracking system said that it was delivered, but I did not have it, so that was a problem. After a bit of searching my mom located my textbook and will bring it by tonight before she flies home tomorrow.
Oh! Something else I have to talk about! The food! There is so much food here! I have to restrain myself or I'd get fat from eating all the good food here! Well anyways, I think college will be a lot of fun!
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Exploring
The past few days I've been having fun in Utah, spending time with cousins, finishing up some college shopping and doing some fun shopping as well. I managed to find 2 new dresses that touch my knee! I keep getting too tall for all of my dresses. I also got some new pairs of boots to keep my toes nice and warm during the Utah winters.
Today to have a bit of fun instead of just sitting around the house I went exploring in the nearby mountains with grandpa and cousins. We found some fun springs with little nature trails around them. There were a lot of butterflies that we tried to catch and we were successful in catching one! After that the cousins had to leave, but my mom and my grandpa and I stayed to explore more of the mountains. We took a truck up a road that looked interesting. It ended up being really bumpy and going really high into the mountains, but it had a great view of the valley and the other mountains around.
This was one of the cascading falls. There were quite a few that we passed by. The springs would come up out of the ground and cascade down the mountain. I thought that it was pretty cool.
This picture is a view from on top of the mountain road we went exploring on. Mount Timpanogos is in the background and it is a pretty tall mountain! It is the second tallest mountain in Utah and its elevation is 11,749 feet. These mountains were all glacial mountains, carved out many many years ago by glaciers. We saw some horizontal stripes on a lot of the mountains and we were wondering how those were formed and then we figured that it was most likely were the glacial deposits were as the glaciers descended. I had a fun day today exploring the mountains! Timpanogos Cave sounds like something fun that I'll have to do another day! There were so many things to do there. I'll just have to come back exploring again sometime!
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
College Is Expensive!!
Today I said goodbye to my brothers and sisters and my dad. My mom is staying with me in Utah until I'm dropped off at college next week. We waited to do a lot of my college shopping until we were out here in Utah so that we didn't have to transport all of it, so today, for my birthday, we went college stuff shopping! I had to spend my own money and I realized how expensive it all is! Towels and shampoo and bedding all really adds up to be a lot of money! I already bought one textbook, but I have to buy the rest of those. More money. Thank goodness I had a job this summer!
Sunday, August 5, 2012
Family Fun
Driving out west has the benefits of being able to spend more time with all the family that lives in Idaho and Utah that I don't get to see that often. Yesterday was the Smith family picnic where I had fun talking with cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandma Smith! Today we went to Utah and I was able to meet some of my mom's friends from high school and their kids as well as some of my cousins on that side of the family! At both gatherings we exploded a watermelon using rubber bands and it is pretty awesome!
This is a video of us at the Smith family picnic exploding the watermelon. It's pretty fun! The explosion here was much more dramatic than the explosion with the Wood cousins. Today the watermelon took its time cracking apart before it exploded. This little trick has been quite the hit among family and friends. The only problem is that it makes half of the watermelon disappear into shreds, but it's a good sacrifice for tons of fun!
Now that I'll be going to college at BYU I'll see a lot more of my cousins! Yay! Lots more fun times ahead!
This is a video of us at the Smith family picnic exploding the watermelon. It's pretty fun! The explosion here was much more dramatic than the explosion with the Wood cousins. Today the watermelon took its time cracking apart before it exploded. This little trick has been quite the hit among family and friends. The only problem is that it makes half of the watermelon disappear into shreds, but it's a good sacrifice for tons of fun!
Now that I'll be going to college at BYU I'll see a lot more of my cousins! Yay! Lots more fun times ahead!
Saturday, August 4, 2012
So I Got a Blog
Well this past week I've moved out of my house and packed up everything that I need for college. My bedroom has already been emptied out and claimed by William. I start my late summer honors classes in Provo on August 16th and then orientation is a week later. After that I will officially be a college student at BYU! I decided it would be a good idea to make a blog just because I can. Be prepared for a blog full of the amazing adventures of my life and stuff like that.
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