My name is Jennifer

Today was a successful day in the health and beauty of Jennifer.

2011-11-15T00:10:00.003-07:00

For starters, Lindy and I actually got up and went to the gym at 6:45 this morning. Good job, us! We used to do so every day, but we've been slackin lately. Second, I did arms today and I feel AWESOME about it. Good job, me!

When we got home from the gym, I actually ate breakfast. And it wasn't like leftover tacos, either. It was Special K cereal. Seriously, that in and of itself constitutes as a healthy day in my eyes. Plus I ended up wearing an extremely cute outfit. Here's a picture of it, except I have demon eyes and I'm leaning on a super sketchy limo we found at Lin's.

Moving on! Okay for the rest of the day, I walked to and from school (as usual), ate fairly heathy foods, etc. However, this is the part where I stop boring you and start telling you stuff that may ro may not intrigue and/or inspire you.

Once upon a time, I was stumbling and I came across this website. To simplify your life and to cater to the needs of my mother and her poor dial-up internet, I'll give you the abridged version of what said website says. But first! A story.

As a poor, unemployed, starving college student, it's not very often that I get to set aside my homework for half an hour and just have a few minutes where I just feel pretty. I get myself ready in the mornings and that's fine, but it just doesn't have that extra special feeling where you want to ask all of your friends to touch your hair or your face just so they can be awestruck at how incredible soft they are. Fortunately, the internet has special things in store for those who like fancy things but can't afford them even a little bit.

To begin, the hair!

If you're anything like me, split ends and frizziness make you just want chop your hair off altogether. But please, learn from my mistakes and DON'T DO THAT. Instead, DO THIS.

Olive oil. Simple as that. All it takes is about 2 tablespoons (give or take a little, depending on the amount and volume of your hair. Just the 2 tbsp. did it for me.) of this golden goodness, really. Just massage it into your hair well because it feels awesome and because you need to stimulate your little roots. Wrap a warm, damp towel around your head in kind of a turban and leave it on for 30-45 minutes. Once your all done, wash your hair as many times as it takes to get the oil out (I'll be honest, having a ton of straight up oil in my hair is not my favorite feeling, so I washed my hair twice) and towel dry. I would recommend allowing your hair to air dry completely, if that's an option for you. No need to take away that last extra little boost of refreshment from your hair, right?

Moving on!

The facial mask. This one is super fun, and slightly delicious. Combine 2 tablespoons of honey, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, and 1 teaspoon of nutmeg. It should be pasty with little tiny chunks of spice in there. Slather your concoction all over your face, but preferrably not in your eyeballs. No bueno. Leave the mask in place for about 30 minutes. For time purposes, I did this at the same time as the hair thing. As you can see here. (Please don't make me regret putting this on the internet.)

Yummy.

While I was waiting for afore mentioned pamperments (yeah, I just made that a thing) to work their magic, I decided to step it up and go for manicure/pedicure. Unfortunately, this is where I get product-y. I already happened to have these little magic guys from Bath & Body Works, so here's my little advertisement...

Those ones don't really require much explaination, I don't think. But the good news is that they work reeeeeally well. I'm actually in the process of developing my own version of the hand scrub stuff, and maybe the foot scrub after that. We shall see. I'll keep you posted on that as it develops.

Finally, a little trick that I actually found at a different website while stumbling. Again: quick rundown.

1 tablespoon of plain gelatine.
1 1/2 tablespoons of milk.

That's it. Mix the two whole ingredients into a disposable container (trust me on this) and put in the microwave for like 10 seconds. Then you have to move FAST, because it's gonna set up real quick. With either a popsicle stick or a makeup brush that you don't care if you ever use again, apply this really weird smelling, very hot substance onto wherever you feel like you need it. I just did it on my nose and chin. (Note: this stuff has some SERIOUS grip. By all means necessary, do NOT make contact with eyebrows. I mean it.) Let it sit for about fifteen minutes or until you're afraid to flick your face because you think it might fall off. Peel the mask off, and HEY! You have a new face.

Alright, boys and girls. But mostly girls. This poor, unemployed, starving college student has got to get to bed. Among other things (i.e. time, money, food, warm clothes, dates, etc.), sleep is one thing I just don't have enough of. Hope you enjoyed this very special edition of stuff that involves my hilarious wit and charm.

I la la love you! And come back soon.

And then I made incredible muffins.

2011-11-07T11:58:00.002-07:00

One time, I decided to make some ice cream muffins with my friend JT. It went like this.

Pre-step one: Preheat your oven to 425 degrees fahrenheit.

Step one: Purchase the following items. (Brand and flavor of ice cream may vary. Size may not.)

Step two: Let ice cream sit long enough to soften and mix without a ton of effort. Mix entire pint of ice cream with 2 cups of self-rising flour. Mix until smooth. A lot smoother than this.

Step three: Take a cute picture of yourself in an apron with a spoon covered in the stuff you just made.

Step four (not pictured): Fill muffin cups about 3/4 of the way and put in the oven for 20-25 minutes. Do the toothpick thing. It’ll probably be delicious. Oh, and then they’ll look like this.

And hey!! You just made some muffins out of ice cream.

Good job. And good night

Halloween.

2011-11-04T16:20:00.000-06:00

Perfect.

Oh, also.

2011-10-20T15:36:00.003-06:00

I dyed my hair. Calm down, Mom, nothing drastic. I just went back to my natural color. (Or as close as I could get for now.) My hair got pretty sunbleached over the summer, but since I haven't been outside as much lately, my roots have been growing out and it was driving me CRAZY. So here are some before-during-after pictures.

I know this one is slightly weird, but I forgot to take a proper "before" picture, and this was the most recent one I had. I took it to send to Kimberly to show her my idea of French braiding.

During!

And after.

I realize it looks pretty much exactly the same as in most of the rest of my pictures, but it really is noticeably darker. Like I said, it's pretty much my natural hair color.

Still, it was a good experience. I dyed my own hair last night. I'm so grown up. (:

Sometimes I get crafty.

2011-10-20T14:44:00.007-06:00

On the very, very rare occasion when I feel like I need to get a little more scrapbooking done in my life, a funny thing happens to me. You may recall this from another experience I had last year, but when I get started on a project, there is no stopping me. No matter how many annotated bibliographies, media watch journal entries, or memory strategy activity assignments I have, I have no higher priority than to complete my project.

I was recently inspired by a couple of websites to do this project. Plus, my walls have been almost completely bare since I moved in, and it's gotten to the point of mildly depressing. Anyways, so I went to the scrapbook store--

Wait, WHAT?? I sent this picture to my mom with a text saying "Mom. I am in a scrapbook store. On purpose. VOLUNTARILY." To which she responded "Who are you??" I'm pretty sure I'm turning into her.

Anyways, I bought a bunch of cute paper and some plain cardstock, then went home and proceeded to write some little words of advice on each one. Here are some of my favorites. They range from fairly deep to simple, silly things that just make me smile.

Anyways, that's my craftiness for the day. Not that big of a deal. Oh, and there's about 38 of these that run in a straight line around my room at about eye level. I really like the placement and such.

Hope you enjoyed this edition of how I spend my days.

Come back soon!

Reunited at last!!

2011-10-15T10:51:00.003-06:00

I'm spending my fall break with my best best of best friends--Best Friend Kyle! I got here yesterday afternoon and so far it's been a pretty good trip. I FINALLY met his family, then he took me on a date to get sushi, then we came back to his house, made inside out Oreos (reduced fat... gross), then just chilled and did the best friend thing. Today I get to go shopping with Mama Kyle while Kyle Kyle is at work. After that... I don't actually know. We'll figure it out.

My point is: so far, I love this weekend. (:

Sushi!

LOVE.

My bad.

2011-10-06T23:54:00.001-06:00

I'm awful at blogging.

But the good news is I got the app for my phone, so I'm about 12% more likely to improve!

We'll see how this goes.

Can you guess what these things have in common?

2011-09-21T23:25:00.003-06:00

1:
--When my internet declares I no longer have internet access, even though I’ve already been online for like an hour.
--When it’s faster/easier to blog, Tweet, Facebook, and watch Netflix from my phone than my computer.
--My actual internet.

2:
--My checkbook.
--My history book.
--SoBe LifeWater.

3:
--My carton of chocolate milk.
--My checking account.
--My stomach.

4:
--My hamper.
--My trash can.
--My to-do list.

5:
--Jay Brannan. (super chill artist I am currently listening to)
--A deadbolt.
--This granola bar.

6:
--Going to the Pastry Pub then on a walk with Devan.
--Free Thai food.
--Being told by my English professor that the first draft of my paper is fantastic.

7:
--Criminal Minds Season 7 Premier.
--Criminal Minds Season 7 Premier.
--Criminal Minds Season 7 Premier.

Answers!

1: Things that make me think my internet is run by actual seamonkeys.
2: Things I really hate opening.
3: Things that should be full but are dangerously empty.
4: Things that should be empty but are actually rather full.
5: Things that are preventing me from throttling my through-the-wall neighbor that will NOT shut up.
6: Things that were the highlight of my day.
7: Things that completely blew my effing mind.

You can call me Rachael Ray.

2011-09-19T00:08:00.004-06:00

But please don't really. What I mean is that I'm still on that cooking/baking spree I mentioned a while ago, only now it's mostly just cooking because that seems a lot more practical. Plus it turns out I'm kind of good at it.

A few weeks ago, I was in the middle of making dinner (lemon chicken with a side of green beans and French bread with oil and vinegar) when my bishop dropped in to get to know my roommates and I. Turns out, he was extremely impressed to see that I like to make my dinners from scratch. (When he came over, I was cutting up the raw chicken, and had the corn starch and lemon zest and everything already measured out for the sauce)

Anyways, that little encounter resulted in getting an assignment with two other people to be on a cooking committee for a ward "Break the Fast" dinner next month. Hurray. Bishop also has a bad habit of talking me up to anyone he can. However, it is a boost to the ego, which results in nights like this one.

Tonight, I was inspired to make fettuccine chicken alfredo. However, rather than buying the sauce out of a jar like I did the last time I made this dinner, I decided I wanted to try making it from scratch.

GOOD CALL, ME.

It was absolutely incredible. I actually had some friends come over so they could have it with me. Because I really don't like making these awesome dinners just for myself. I don't know if it's actual charity so much as maybe me fishing for compliments, but either way, no one can really complain about it.

In case you're wondering, I'll share the recipe I used for the sauce. It made this much. (About 4 servings.)

1/4 cup butter
1 cup heavy cream
1 clove garlic, crushed (I bought garlic cloves, but they weren't very crushable. So I used garlic salt to taste, and it worked very well.)
1 1/2 cups freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley (that was my favorite part to do...)

Melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium low heat. Add cream and simmer for 5 minutes, then add garlic and cheese and whisk quickly, heating through. Stir in parsley and serve.

And I always have some chopped up cooked chicken on hand in my freezer for occassions such as this, so I just thawed that, then threw it in with the sauce and let it hang out there to warm up while the fettuccine was still cooking.

Anyways, it turned out really well. And as you can see, I'm a big fan of aprons. But that one is my adorable roommate Lindy's. I kind of want my own. If anyone feels like donating an apron or the fabric for one to me, I'd be okay with that. (:

I look good in aprons.

Well this was a fun update.

On my new hobby.

Which is cooking.

For multitudes of people.

While wearing an apron...

I'm such an old lady.

This is absurd.

2011-09-01T21:59:00.002-06:00

Last year, I did not have a vehicle at college. While it was midly inconvenient at times, I was actually okay with it for the most part. Here is why:

I lived on campus.

I had a meal plan, so I never really needed to go to the store.

Most of my friends lived in the same building as me, so the issue of "I never see my friends!" never really came up. And the ones that I didn't live with just lived down the street, so I could walk.

A lot of colleges don't even allow freshmen to have cars.

This year, however, it is proving to be more than a little annoying. For the following reasons:

Now that I have to cook for myself, I am forever thinking of things I need to get from the store, and I hate asking my friends for a ride to Walmart, because I feel like that mooch friend that everyone hates. I feel like they're all going to start ignoring my calls before the year is out.

Free parking in my apartment complex. It hurts.

The Biggest Stunt guys all live 8 miles north of here, and since none of them really have functional vehicles, I'd hate to ask them to come get me just to hang out. If I had a car, I would go see them occasionally.

I can't go home unless I happen to find someone else that is headed that way.

I am in desperate need of a job, and there are only so many places within walking distance that I can apply to. (Yes, Mom, I've even checked on-campus jobs.)

My inspiration for this post stems from the fact that I am stranded at my stupid house while literally everyone I know is at a bonfire. Or doing homework. Result: I want to be at the bonfire because it is barely 9:00, I have all my homework done, I look absolutely adorable, and I want to be spending time with other people. However, all of my friends with vehicles are either already at the fire or too busy with homework to go. (Which is when I say "That's why you do your homework in the afternoon, champ.")

I'm just so, so frustrated all the time. I hate the feeling of being stranded and depending on other people. Poor Lindy has gotten to a point where she actually pities me and lets me borrow her car from time to time. And when that happens, I am just super paranoid that something is going to happen to her car while I'm driving it.

My point is: not having a car freshman year really isn't that big of a deal. Even at the time I was okay with it. But that this point, I just get so frustrated every day that it's causing a great deal of stress in addition to what I already have going on.

And I don't know what to do.

In the past 48 hours,

2011-09-01T00:01:00.001-06:00

I have had a surprisingly high amount of rather humbling experiences. (And by "high", I mean like 3.) I'm really not the kind of person that's all into "signs" and stuff, but I kind of feel like I've been punched in the guts by a pretty heavy realization. I don't know if it's because I just finished reading a book about what happens to a person that allows sin and offense to fester within their soul and it just scared the living daylights out of me or if it's just time to understand what an infant I've been lately, but something has to change

As most of you may know, I really kind of hate people. A lot. Yesterday, I saw this random girl for the first time in my life. I looked at her outfit, how the was playing with her hair, and the way she was inexplicably puckering her lips while observing the people around her, and I verbally declared that I absolutely hated her. I wish I could say this was an exaggeration, but it's really not. Literally just the way this poor girl looked was enough for me to announce that I wanted to punch her in the face a hundred times.

To explain my "humbling experiences", they were pretty much all the same. Between yesterday afternoon and today between classes, I held genuine, civil conversations with three of the top five people that I bear more hostility toward than any other individual on the planet. Really. The other two people don't even live here, but I happened to run into the three that do. I don't know what came over me to sit down with these individuals and just have a normal conversation, but by the time I walked away, I actually noted that I was not filled with rage or any kind of negativity at all... and it was nice.

I feel very Grinch/Ebenezer Scrooge-y saying all this, by the way. And I'm really not sure if anyone will actually read this, but I feel like I need to somehow publicly declare these feelings or I might later pretend they never happened and go back to my hateful ways. I'm not saying I'm "turning over a new leaf" or anything. I'm not reinventing myself as a person, because there will always be those people that just rub me the wrong way, and I will not actively enjoy being in their company. However, I've just realized that every day, I waste so much time, energy, and emotion being so angry at so many people, many of which that haven't even done anything to offend me. Just their personalities conflict with mine, so I declare a hatred that isn't deserved.

So while I have absolutely no intention of going out of my way to befriend all of these people that bug me, I'm just so tired of putting forth the effort to be angry every time I even think about them. One guy was such a sensitive subject with me that even hearing his name pissed me off. But after talking to him today, I thought how stupid it is that the reason I started "hating" him was because of something he said in bad taste in January. January. That was seven months ago, and I have been festering in rage all this time. It's absurd and ridiculous and childish and stupid and I'm just tired of this routine.

It's time to let go.

It's time to change.

And I have done so.

I have no enemies.

And I am content.

Things I've Learned From Watching Criminal Minds

2011-08-28T19:20:00.003-06:00

If you leave a door/window open/closed and it is the opposite when you come back, run away.

Tim Curry can literally play any character.

I want to work for the BAU.

DON'T TRUST THE GARBAGE MAN.

Always be nice to the weird kids. They can usually wield a semi-automatic weapon pretty fiercely.

Shemar Moore was carved by the gods.

When you're on a road trip and all you can find is a semi-sketchy motel, keep driving or sleep in your car. (Learned that from Psycho, too.)

Meth is bad.

Seemingly useless trivial knowledge can potentially save lives in the event of being abducted by a serial killer.

When dealing with a violent individual that has multiple personalities, become bff with the nicest one.

200!

2011-08-27T12:28:00.002-06:00

Really? I've had this blog for how many years and I am JUST NOW hitting 200 posts?

Man.

I suck.

In other news, I've finished my first week of classes and so far, so good. I like all of them, though they all require significant amounts of reading. Which is fine, I mean I love to read, but it is also very time consuming. My PVA teacher (bless his heart) actually cut down the amount we have to read for his class. We were going to have to read 3 novels (Agains the Grain, Bruges-la-Morte, and The Picture of Dorian Gray) by mid-October, but he very graciously brought it down to one book. I think I'm going to read Gray because that story has always intrigued me.

The rest of my classes are going well. Even PE 1093! I went to the gym 3 times this week (in 3 days) and my body feels like it is on self-destruct mode. Cardio on Thursday, weights on Friday, cardio again this morning. Mostly the weights is what destroyed me. But hey, that just means it's working. (:

Well that's the update for the week. Stay tuned. (:

P.S. I'm quickly realizing that I'm not good at grocery shopping. Either I'll buy the wrong thing or have something in mind that I want to make but forgot a vital ingredient, etc. So if anyone feels inclined to perhaps send me food, cooking pans/utensils, gift cards, etc., feel free to attain my mailing address from my cute mom. (:

She lives!

2011-08-23T23:48:00.004-06:00

I apologize for sucking at blogging this entire summer. I really have no excuse, unless you blame the hamster that runs the internet at my house by running on a wheel. Otherwise, it's totally my fault. Anyways, I thought I'd bring you up to speed.

My job was awesome.

Warped Tour weekend was super fun.

Elk Ridge was splendid.

That's pretty much my whole summer.

In other news, I'm now moved back to school and I LOOOOVE it! Here are some pictures of me moving all of my stuff over. (I borrowed my friend's truck. Side note, I loaded the whole thing by myself, AND moved it all into my third floor apartment by myself. I'm an animal.)

My apartment is absolutely adorable, and I really love it. I have the same roommate as last year, Lindy, with the addition of two new ones, Kelsie and Nicole. So far we all seem to get along pretty well, and it has already been an astronomical improvement over the atrocity that was last year's experience with roommates.

Because I get this question a lot, I will now share with you what classes I am taking.

Arts Retrospective

American History

Models, Methods, and Professional Issues in Psychology

English--Writing on Dystopias

Institute

Circuit Weight Training

I was also in Math 1050, but then I learned that I only need 1030 for my major. Plus I was taking 17 credits, which is an absurd amount of work, especially when all of my classes are the kind that involve a loooot of reading every night. Plus my professor was one of those senile old men that find it necessary to speak very loudly and very slowly. I often got the impression that he was chastizing the class for not already knowing the material, and frequently spoke very condescendingly. Needless to say, I didn't feel like I was going to rock Math 1050's world by stickin around, so I dropped it today. I actually feel much better about this semester. (:

In other news, the social life here has taken quite a start. I went to a slip-n-slide last night that I was only expecting like 40 people to come to... it ended up being well over 250. It was awesome. Really, I feel like if this is any kind of foreshadow on the rest of the year, I am in for the time of my life! I am already having wayyy more fun this year than last year. (With the exception of my very best friend Kyle and the beautiful miss Ashley both missing out of my life this time... sad face.)

However, I really am looking forward to this year. I feel like it's going to be a good time. Let's just hope I'm right. (:

Sad panda.

2011-07-27T16:02:00.000-06:00

I miss Best Friend Kyle more than anything. If I could have anything, it would be $300 for gas or a plane ticket to Washington. I would literally have no problem driving 17 hours straight if it meant I got to see my best friend. I miss him to a point that it actually hurts me a little more every day. Dramatic as that sounds, I need him back in my life. I'm just not the same.

I am a robot.

2011-07-27T12:08:00.001-06:00

I know, I know.

2011-07-07T18:33:00.004-06:00

I suck at blogging in the summer. Which is ironic, since that's when most of the good stuff goes down. I wish I could give you the details as to how my summer has been going, but I don't really have time at the moment... plus I'm kind of lazy.

--I got an iPhone 4 and I love it.

--I got to see my adorable friend Ashley!!

--I quit my crappy job at the restaurant because $5/hr. just wasn't cutting it.

--I got on with the BLM through an internship with Workforce Services and it is AWESOME to the Nth degree.

--I may have destroyed a tire on a government vehicle whilst doing a regular patrol.

--I changed the tire BY MYSELF, no thanks to the [swear word] guy who showed up to "help" and all he did was tell me that what I was doing was wrong (even though when he tried to correct me, he did it in an even more complicated way) and condescend me by saying things like "You're not going to like this, but you're going to have to get dirty." That was a very, very brief synopsis of the rage I feel about that whole situation.

So yeah, there is my life in a nutshell at the moment. Wake up, go to work, come home and crash. But hey, it's a job, and a very fun and well-paying one at that. So no complaints here. (:

A list of things I miss about the place I lived six months ago.

2011-06-21T00:16:00.002-06:00

In no particular order.

--Perpetual cell service/fast internet
--The Biggest Stunt shows.
--Various 24/7 service establishments. i.e. Walmart, Denny's, Roberto's, Subway, RedBox, etc.
--Always having a place to go longboarding.
--Usually having someone to go longboarding with.
--Being able to meet new people.
--BriannaCarleyDevanCoryRomeoChaseCaydinBillyDanielTonya... all still in Cedar.
--Single's ward.
--Little Caesar's.
--A decent gym.
--Dorm life.
--Hot tubbing [legally].
--The variety of films showing in the movie theaters.
--Having my very own mailbox.
--Being able to have Girls Nights without having to plan a week in advance or saving up for gas money.
--Walking home from... well... anywhere.
--Shaved ice stands.

I can't wait to go back. I love being home, but still... there's something about being on your own that makes everything so much more exciting.

I apologize.

2011-06-16T14:33:00.003-06:00

I really should update my blog more, but in reality, my internet at home is run by a hamster on a wheel. And the only time I come into town is to go to work, and I obviously can't just be bloggin up a storm while I'm trying to wait tables. Speaking of which:

I have less than two weeks to go before I'm done with this awesome crap-paying job. I got on with the local BLM and I start on the 27th. So woo hoo for getting at least minimum wage from now on!!

Alright that's really all I've got to say for now. Good night nurse.

So far...

2011-05-20T13:55:00.002-06:00

This summer is not going as I originally planned. I only have two friends in town, which I rarely get to see because of the crazy hours of my spontaneous and loosely-defined job. Meanwhile, I am (once again) single, and it freakin blows.

I need to find a morning/day job to keep me occupied. Because I frequently find myself trapped at my house alone while my family is working and has all of the cars. And what do I do while I'm there? Sit around and wallow in my self-pity of one job and my overwhelming singleness.

Pity me.

I'm going to work now.

I AM YOB.

2011-05-16T14:27:00.002-06:00

I found a job for the summer. Unfortunately, it's only at night and it doesn't pay as well as I'd like. I am a college student, you know. I'm still trying to find a job for the morning/day shift, considering I am just wasting my time every day before 4:00, and since I don't even work every day.

Oh well.

If you have any ideas of places I could work in my area, give me a jingle. I'd quite appreciate it.

Love you and stuff.

And also

2011-05-06T15:18:00.003-06:00

I miss my best Ashley friend pretty fiercely. I so so so hope she can come back to school next year and live with me. I think I'll cry every day if she doesn't...

(Hint hint, Ash.)

This is Boyfriend.

2011-05-06T15:15:00.001-06:00

We're ridiculous. I moved home today and had to leave this fella behind. Sad day. /: Oh well. He doesn't live that far away. We'll see how this goes.

In retrospect.

2011-05-04T18:39:00.004-06:00

My freshman year of college has officially come to a close. I’m going to do my favorite thing and take a moment (just kidding, this will probably take like 3 hours to do) to tell you about things you probably don’t care about.

This year, I:
-Moved out on my own.
-Learned that I really, really love drinking water.
-Went the whole year without ever declaring myself a psychology major, even though I’ve known what I was going to major in since 10th grade.
-Found out what a neatfreak I am.
-Went periods of time where I ate only pizza and Easy Mac.
-Learned to love working out every day.
-Stopped working out every day because they closed the school gym.
-Went completely broke. Twice.
-“Sent off” a missionary.
-Didn’t read a single book that was unrelated to a class.
-Became so addicted to fast internet.
-Became a “professional” [unpaid] photographer.
-Lost a best friend.
-Went on my first blind date.
-Was on the radio.
-Became a True T-Bird.
-Wound up with the best roommate I could hope for.
-Made inside out Oreos.
-Met an amazing girl that I hope will be my roommate next year, because I love her so.
-Decided that I love Tosh.0.
-Got a creepy birthday present and sold it on eBay.
-Made rainbow cupcakes.
-Went on a six mile walk.
-Ate more hamburgers than anyone should ever eat in their lives.
-Became well-known to the Denny’s nightshift crew.
-Met and started dating my first boyfriend. He’s pretty cute.
-Made cotton candy with Boyfriend’s mom.
-Dyed my hair for the first time. It didn’t really last.
-Saw The Maine in concert twice.
-Became extremely close with a girl I’ve known since 9th grade, but never really spent time with, and now I can’t imagine being without.
-Stayed close with my best friends from high school.
-Went to at least five missionary farewells.
-Met some people I hope I never see again.
-Learned to appreciate “hardcore” music.
-Saw “HP 7P1” at the midnight showing with one of my best friends.
-Almost fought a girl over a sneeze.
-Went rappelling off the side of a mountain.
-Spent copious amounts of time at Walmart.
-Have grown my hair out longer than it’s been since 9th grade.
-Found out throwing up can actually be really funny. (“It’s not funny. I can’t effing breathe.”)
-Ate sushi for the first time… and really liked it.
-Got like 4 different viruses on my laptop.
-Stayed up for 45 hours straight.
-Rode my longboard most of the way across town.
-Rode on three (or four?) different motorcycles.
-Fell in love with an angel.
-Got strep throat for the first time in my life.
-Only cried three or four times.
-Met my best friend in the entire world.
-Had my life changed forever by my best friend in the entire world.
-Said goodbye to my best friend in the entire world.
-Changed.
-Matured.
-Learned.
-Laughed.
-Lived.

This is not a wink face. This is the face I make in my mind when I have to wait and see what happens next.

Still finals week 2

2011-05-04T10:53:00.001-06:00

Three down...

And that's it. The "half" final I've been mentioning is an optional psychology exam. But since I already have an A in that class, and it would only replace my lowest test score (my lowest one being a 91%), I don't see much point in taking it.

I chose not to show my face in this picture for 2 reasons. 1: In every picture I took, it looked like my left eye had no eyelashes, and that freaked me out. And 2: I am THRILLED to be done with school, but I’m not sure how I feel about how my test went. And I wasn’t sure what facial expression could show that.

Sooo in other news...

I'M DONE.

Still finals week

2011-05-03T11:58:00.000-06:00

Two down...

One and a half to go.

I'm going to punch myself in the face. Twice.

Finals week

2011-05-02T11:37:00.001-06:00

One down...

Two and a half to go.

The New Guy

2011-05-01T00:05:00.007-06:00

Meet Caydin, the new frontman for our favorite band The Biggest Stunt. For a long time, Cory was doing the clean vocals and Chase did the screaming, but they both came to a point where they were kind of over multi-tasking. So after holding a few "auditions", their friend Caydin stepped forward and said he'd like to try it. He ended up blowing everyone away. He has his own style that meshes with the band, and he also has great stage presence, which is really important.

So naturally, after Caydin was officially in the band, we had to do new band pictures. Here are a few of my favorite individual and group shots.

Cory

Devan

Chase

Romeo

Jump

Standing

Grass (my favorite)

TBS

Color in black and white

And in case you were wondering, Caydin fits right in with the boys. I love these kids with my whole heart, and it makes me so sad that I have to go a whole summer without seeing them pretty much whenever I want. On the upside though, there's always next year. (:

My Best Friend

2011-04-28T18:24:00.001-06:00

Finally decided to pay a visit to our humble dorms for the first time since he moved out.

He has been gone way, way too long.

I love Best Friend Kyle. (:

I know I say this all the time

2011-04-20T13:39:00.003-06:00

But I really, really miss Sly. I got a letter from him today, complete with a picture of him in a 3-piece suit--classy, right??

His letters always make me giggle. In the last letter I wrote to him, I wrote it while I was super cracked out of my mind on 5-Hour Energy Extra Strength, so most of my stories were ridiculous. I told him my situation of having to be awake for the next 43 hours, and I instantly imagined him laughing at me and saying "silly girl" like he always does when I'm just being ridiculous. In the letter I got today, I was literally shocked at how it began:

Jennifer--or--super flighty girl on energy shots,

I don't really know what to say. I guess I'm not at a loss for words... it just seems that I don't really have to say anything for you to know I'm rolling my eyes, then saying "silly girl" followed up with a sideways smile. You make me laugh. :)

It made me smile that I totally called his reaction. Also, I shared with him my favorite quote from the song "Head Full of Doubt/Road Full of Promise" by the Avett Brothers. You've probably seen it quoted on some blog of mine or whatever. Anyways, it goes likes this:

"If you're loved by someone, you're never rejected. Decide what to be, and go be it."

I love that quote so much. I wish I'd heard it when it was time for me to choose a senior quote, as stupid as that sounds. I just like to share it with anyone I can. Anyways, to that, Sly had a response that almost made me cry:

I really liked your favorite quote! I agree with it. I believe one or the most important things in life is to become! Become who you were in the premortal existence. The moment we decide that's who we are going to be is when we will find our true path.

I know it probably sounds hokey to everyone else, but I loved it. Things can get tricky and scary and unsure and all kinds of other negative adjectives sometimes, but it's good to know that there are always people kind of on the lookout for you.

I just miss that guy, is all. But he's doing a good thing in Georgia, and I'm so, so proud of him for that.

But still.

I love us.

2011-04-16T06:23:00.000-06:00

Me and Ashley... we love Denny's.

The Egyptian Tortoise

2011-04-13T17:02:00.002-06:00

Where have these things been all my life?

And why don't I have one?

I was going to say "This is an outrage!"

But really, this thing is too cute to allow me to be mad about anything.

Like, ever.

My Brianna Friend.

2011-04-12T15:43:00.002-06:00

Today I was reminded of why Brianna is my best friend. When someone tried to say something negative about me to her, she had my back and stood up for me, even though the person was also her friend. Sometimes that's a hard thing to do, but she did it.

Because we are best friends.

And I love her. (:

Just kidding.

2011-04-09T19:38:00.002-06:00

I told you I'd keep you updated on my story as it progressed.

Well it progressed. I actually hung out with the "10".

Turns out he's not that cool. It's fine though. At least I know, right?

The end.

NEVER AGAIN.

2011-04-04T14:34:00.004-06:00

BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD idea.

Last night, I decided that I really, really needed to get my speech and PowerPoint perfected for Communications today for when I had to present it. I also had some other homework that I needed to work on, but I didn't even get started until like 9 pm, because I'd gone to visit some friends that had gotten in a motorcycle accident. (By the way, for those that were listening to my play-by-play reports, they're both home and are pretty much fine. Just lots of road rash and sore muscles. Billy has a concussion and Jayden sprained his wrist, but they both made it to all of their classes today.)

Anyways. Long story short... I haven't slept since about 7:45 yesterday morning. Yes, I was sick and stayed in bed most of the morning, but I couldn't ever fall asleep because either Molly would be getting in and out of the covers, or I would be getting important texts relating to the accident. Soo... yes. As of now, I have been awake for approximately 32 hours straight. I got all of my homework done, a missionary letter sent, my workout done, I went to all of my classes, gave a speech (and did absolutely horrible, in case you were wondering), and here I am. Taking a break from my other mountain of homework I need to do before I can take a nap or even go to bed tonight.

Please. Don't ever give me one of these again. They taste awful, first of all. And I have heartburn that can only be related to a volcano.

This is so unnatural.

For Kyle

2011-03-31T20:32:00.001-06:00

Kyle: I call being the hound. Me: That's fine. I'm kind of a fox anyways. Love you, Best Friend. (:

Inspired by a text message to my friend Billy.

2011-03-30T15:06:00.008-06:00

The other night, my friend Billy invited me to go hot tubbing with him and a few other friends. And by "a few other friends", I mean "eight or nine guys, most of which I have never met". It was interesting.

One of these people that I didn't know happened to be highly attractive, both physically and personality-wise. He was a cool guy and after talking, I decided my interest had been piqued. But I have a deep, deep fear of ever mentioning how single I am to an attractive guy's face and then have them say something to the effect of "You know what? I think you would really like my girlfriend's brother." So I pulled a chicken move.

A while after I got home, I texted Billy and said "So on a scale of one to ten (one being married/gay and ten being 'on the lookout'), how single is _____?"

This inspired me to create what I'd now like to introduce to you as the Average Person's Easy Guide to Singleness.

0: Dead
1: Married/gay
2: Engaged/co-habitant
3: In a very serious relationship
4: In a steady relationship
5: In a new or unstable relationship
6: In an unofficial relationship (I like her/him, s/he likes me, but that's about it)
7: Single, but interested in someone else
8: Single, but not really looking for anything
9: Whatever happens, happens
10: On the prowl or "Let's DO this [thing], Brian!"

There. I hope this aids some of you in your search for the perfect single person.

P.S. By the way, he was a 10. Soo... more on this story as it develops.

P.P.S. This story has slightly developed. So far so good. That's all I have to say.

I Love Me

2011-03-30T08:37:00.001-06:00

I love my eyes. I love my teeth. I love my lips. I love my cheeks. I love my feet. I love my hands. I love my gate. I love my nose. I love my ears. I love my belly. I love my butt. I love my tongue. I love my toes. I love my elbows. I love my muscles. I love my knees. I love my taste. I love my smile. I love my hair. I love my back. I love my bones. I love my veins. I love my pancreas. I love my lungs. I love my larynx. I love my sweat. I love my shoulders. I love my blood. I love my moles. I love my art. I love my moves. I love my spine. I love my skin. I love my height. I love my lobes. I love my liver. I love my shins. I love my neck. I love my thighs. I love my ankles. I love my thoughts. I love my soul. I love my music. I love my pride. & I love you.

--Jason Mraz

I didn't know that was allowed...

2011-03-29T13:13:00.002-06:00

Today I checked my Facebook and found a direct message from my friend Garrett, who has been on his mission since July. I was a little bit baffled, since most missionaries aren't really allowed to get on Facebook. But as I read his message, I learned that he has actually been called to also serve as an "online missionary." What this means is that he created a separate account on Facebook as well as a blog to help bring people into the gospel. I didn't know they did this, but I did a little investigating and found out it's really kind of a cool thing. Anyways, I just thought I'd share this. Here's the link for his blog. Enjoy!

Of course.

2011-03-22T20:13:00.001-06:00

I would be the person to walk into a world-famous lingerie store and walk out with only a bottle of overpriced laundry detergent.

I have a problem.

But hey. It smells fantastic.

Oh dreams. Again.

2011-03-16T21:06:00.001-06:00

1: I had a dream last night that me and Jeff Ure and some girl named Brittany that was apparently my best friend were all in the same Fossil Studies class. We were supposed to be studying for a test, but we decided to go to some random middle school basketball game instead. When that was over, we decided to go to Six Flags. But when we got there, it was raining. That made us very sad. So we came back and studied anyways. The end.

Something is horribly wrong with my brain. So many things are wrong with that dream.

1: I barely even know Jeff, and we definitely don't have any classes together.
2: I don't have any friends named Brittany, let alone best friends.
2a: In my dream, I made the connection that Brittany was Jeff's little sister that was my age... I'm not sure, but I don't think he has any sisters my age?
3: Fossil Studies is not a class offered at SUU. I'm not sure if it's even offered anywhere.
3a: I would never take that class, even if it was available.
4: I don't know any middle schoolers here, so why would I go to their game?
4a: I hate "little league" basketball. It drives me crazy.
5: I've been to Six Flags while it was raining... it really wasn't too bad.

Now I'll tell you about the dream I had while I took a nap this afternoon.

2: In my dream, I was laying on my bed sleeping, exactly like I was in reality. I woke up to find Romeo sitting at the foot of my bed, Cory standing on my desk, Chase on my desk chair, and Devan sitting on the floor.I said "Oh, hey guys! How'd you get in here?" I realized I was holding a cracker, and started to eat it. They told me that my roommates let them in, and I was cool with it. We talked for a little bit, then they all started giggling, and finally Romeo said "You know none of this is real, right?" I asked him what he was talking about, so he pulled a banana cream pie out of nowhere and threw it at Cory's face. And Cory just laughed. Then they all told me I was dreaming, and to try and wake up.

So I did. But this time, it was dark outside, and everyone had traded places. Chase was sitting on my bed, Devan was on the desk, Romeo was on the floor, and Cory was in the chair. I was still eating a cracker. They started talking, and I said "Wait... is this a dream again you guys?" Then all of them did the elbow thing and said "Ahhhh she got us! Oh Jenny, you're getting good! Okay, now try to really wake up."

So I did. This time, I woke up in reality. No crackers or band members. Talk about an Inception-esque dream.

I always have crazy dreams like this. And I usually remember them. Don't even get me started on the one about Denzel Washington and the Buick. I wonder why my "unique" dreams are so vivid?

Thoughts?

Dear Gym Crush,

2011-03-16T19:13:00.002-06:00

I asked Kate Nash to write this song for you, from me. She took some of her own liberties (for instance, I did not proceed to get drunk and cry, and everything that my friends said? Yeah, that was for a previous crush. Oh, and I hate CSI.), but it's generally pretty accurate. Hope you see where I'm comin from now. (:

We Get On by Kate Nash

Simply knowing you exist ain’t good enough for me
But asking for your telephone number
seems highly inappropriate

Seeing as I can't
even say hi
when you walk by

And that time you shook my hand it felt so nice
I swear I've never felt this way about any other guy
and I don’t usually notice people's eyes but…

I’ve conducted a plan
To bump into you most accidentally
but
I was walking along
and I bumped into you
much more heavily than I'd originally planned.
It was well embarrassing and
I think you thought that I was a bit of a [twit].

I just think that we'd get on
Oh I wish I could tell you face to face
instead of singing this stupid song
but yeah I just think that we might get on

So I went to that party
everyone they were kind of arty
And I was wearing this dress
'cause I wanted to impress
But I wasn't sure if I look my best
'cause I was so nervous
But I carried on regardless
strutting through each room
trying to find you

And when I saw you kissing that girl
My heart, it shattered
and my eyes, they watered
and when I tried to speak I stu-uttered

And my friends were like "Whatever,
you'll find someone better,
his eyes are way too close together
and we never even liked him from the start.
And now he's with that tart,

and I heard she'd done some really nasty stuff
down in the park with Michael.
He said she's easy
and if your guys with someone that's sleazy
then he ain't worth your time
cause you deserve a real nice guy"

So I proceeded to get drunk and to cry
I locked myself in the toilets for the entire night

Saturday night, I watch Channel 5
I particularly like CSI
I don't ever dream about you and me
I don't ever make up stuff about us
that would be classed as insanity

I don't ever drive by your house to see if you're in
I don't even have an opinion on that tramp
that you are still seeing

I don't know your timetable
I don't know your face off by heart
but I must admit that there is a part
that still thinks that we might get on
that we might get on
that we could get on
that we should get on.

Sometimes I make treats.

2011-03-13T00:15:00.003-07:00

I saw these rainbow layered cupcakes in a little brochure and instantly wanted to make them. It took 2 hours and a lot more effort than I'd originally anticipated, but they were worth it.

Delicious? I think yes.

I hate conflict.

2011-03-09T00:42:00.004-07:00

I really, truly do. And I don’t generally take things like this public, but this is a blog and its purpose is for me to express myself. Plus this is a better outlet than venting my frustrations on the pour souls of the common room or fighting it out via Facebook like I’m 13 years old. I hereby declare that if you read this and feel offended in any way, it was your choice to read it or not. No one is making you listen to me. So here I go.

Nothing is more frustrating to me than a hypocrite.

For instance: “All Mormons are narrow-minded and judgmental.”*

Excuse me. But is it or is it not true that what you literally just said is a critical over-generalization? You say Mormons are narrow-minded because of their generally conservative beliefs, yet here you are claiming that every single person of the LDS religion is the same prejudiced human being. Is that not narrow-minded in itself?

I understand that everyone has their own beliefs. Not only do I have my religious beliefs, but I have opinions about politics and issues in society and professional football teams and candy bars and everything else, because why? Because I am a person with a mind. However, I do not in any way try to persuade others to believe the same way I do, unless they ask me about what I believe in. If I disagree with someone, I acknowledge the fact that they have a valid point, and politely declare that I will consider what they’ve had to say. That sounds like a load, but it’s true. I can’t stand when people won’t listen to my side of an argument, so who am I to refuse to hear theirs?

I do have one exception. The one belief I will press on anybody and everybody: Everyone deserves an opinion of their own. I am completely fine with it when someone tells me straight up that they don’t believe in the same things that I do. But one thing I absolutely will not tolerate is when they go so far as to tell me that what I believe in is wrong, and I shouldn’t believe in it either. If I don’t force my opinions on you, don’t you dare take it upon yourself to force your mind on me. Obviously I believe my faith to be true. If I thought it was a load of crap, then I wouldn’t believe in it. It’s as simple as that.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, so think what you will about me and my religion, but don’t ever, ever try and tell me that what I know and feel in my heart is wrong. Because I will defend it to the death, no matter what you try and tell me that society says.

There. I’m off my soap box. Continue with your day.

*This was inspired by a real conversation, but the girl who said it made a point to say “NOT all Mormons are judgemental and narrow-minded.” And I really appreciated that. I just used this as an example of something I do hear a lot.

Amazed.

2011-03-03T22:55:00.003-07:00

Nothing about this day has been special enough to achieve “what a spectacular day!” status.

Except.

I was walking to the gym earlier and saw the most amazing shooting star I have ever seen in my life. It wasn’t a normal white-light-falling kind of thing. Not only did it last a full 3 seconds, but I swear on my life… it actually had sparks. You know when fireworks explode, and then all the little pieces come trickling down, and they’re still a little twinkly… that’s what it was like. The fact that I’d seen it, and knowing that if I’d left for the gym 5 minutes earlier or if I’d been texting or if I’d been trying not to step on any cracks in the sidewalk (which I do, all the time)… all of those things put me in a very pensive, appreciative mood. I've been walking on air ever since.

Looking back, today was nothing special. But looking forward, my life is, and tomorrow could be.

I love everything.

Explanation?

2011-03-03T15:54:00.001-07:00

Perhaps this giant bowl is the reason I burn through cereal so fast.

But it's SO GOOD!!

I really love cereal. (:

Wake up, 18!

2011-03-02T18:10:00.003-07:00

Ohh... so that's why I never type papers on my bed...

I may or may not have drooled a little.

Gus, don't be this crevice in my arm.

2011-03-01T11:51:00.002-07:00

You know those days when you just KNOW everything is going to go horribly? Like, you wake up late, and since you went to bed with your hair wet it's just just too crazy to do anything with so you have to wear a hat? And then you don't get to eat anything for a long freaking time? And then, even though you signed up for one research study to participate in for your psychology class, you get there and find out someone else has taken your slot, so then you have to do ANOTHER study while you're waiting for the other person to get done, and then you have to do THAT one, too? You know... those days?

Well I'm gonna be honest with you. All of those things did happen to me except for one: I woke up this morning knowing it was going to be a super, super day. And you know what? So far, I'm right.

1: It is National Pancake Day. Know what that means? FREE PANCAKES AT IHOP. This is not a drill. I'm going there with Brianna very soon, actually. Whoo!
2: The snow is melting!
3: My gym crush added me on Facebook. And you know what else? He wrote on my Wall. Yeah. It's kind of a big deal.
4: I made a big big big decision last night that makes me feel better than I have in a very, very long time. It's kind of amazing, actually.

Anyways, I just thought I'd show off how super my day is going, and it's barely even noon. (: Have a splendid day, everyone!

Let down.

2011-02-24T19:48:00.003-07:00

"Jennifer, I think your problem is that you put everything you have into every relationship. You put in so much time and effort and heart into one person, and you expect to get that much back from them. And when you don't, it breaks your heart and makes you wonder what you've done wrong, when really you're the one doing everything right."
-Chelsea V. Howells

Nailed it, Chóse.

I need to learn to stop having so much faith in people.

Fun facts...

2011-02-21T14:15:00.000-07:00

I saw this on someone's blog and thought it was a cute idea. I'm a very simple person, but sometimes I can be taken as complex. Here is a list of a few quirks about myself that you may or may not know...

...I hate being late.

...I love the show "Psych", and I quote it on a daily basis.

...I value the word "personal" in the phrase "personal hygiene."

...Nothing is more attractive to me on a guy than helmet hair or bedhead. No idea why.

...I don't like gold jewelry.

...I hate typing or texting without correct grammar.

...I have an unnaturally intense fear of crickets.

...I am literally craving pizza 24/7.

...I love birds.

...I love bird clothes/accessories/jewelry/etc.

...My favorite author is Jodi Picoult.

...I love watching old movies, especially westerns.

...I intend to marry Cam Gigandet and/or Sean Faris. (But I mostly mean the "and" part... but I'll let them fight it out of they have to.)

...No, seriously. The way I feel about Cam Gigandet can be compared to the way a 13 year old girl would feel about Edward Cullen, Taylor Lautner, and Justin Beiber... combined.

...My nose wiggles when I talk. Especially when I say things like "beware", "BMW", and "bowling ball."

...My upper lip "disappears" when I smile really big.

...My best friend Kyle drives me bonkers on a daily basis. He is super annoying to me, but I don't know how I'd function without the little snot.

...My favorite number is 8.

...I don't usually like people in general.

...I hate ketchup.

...I'm 19 years old and have never been in a relationship.

...I own two half iPods. One is like the second one ever made, and has a battery life of about 3 1/2 seconds. The other one is slightly newer (the first video iPod), but the backlight doesn't work, and neither does the right headphone. Sooo... yeah. Two half iPods.

...I can play Solitaire for hours on my laptop.

...I can almost quote "Hot Rod" by heart.

...I really love working out.

...I hate the snow.

...I'm mostly likely going to be working in Florida this coming summer. Whoo!

...I can type extremely fast.

...I currently have three dream careers: Marriage & Family Counselor, professional photographer (portraits & weddings mostly), and owning my own coffee shop.

...I don't like painting my fingernails.

...I like to watch shows like Project Runway and America's Next Top Model mostly so I can look at how they do their makeup and to learn new tricks.

...I have a scar from a jellyfish sting that can only be seen when I'm tan. (Sooo... like never.)

...I listen to all kinds of music. i.e. classic rock, rap, folk, metal, bluegrass, musicals, country, alternative, church-y music, pop punk, techno, jazz, soul, etc. I can usually be happy listening to just about anything.

...My skin is allergic to cheap shaving cream. It's true.

...I literally have the cutest mom in the entire world. And I tell her that every time I talk to her.

...I love when people read my blog.

There. Now you know a little more about me. Fun for you. (:

That Sly Dog

2011-02-18T13:22:00.003-07:00

Today was a good day for mail. I got two missionary letters and a wedding announcement. This post refers to one of my top 5 favorite missionaries in the field at the current time.

This is a picture of one of the pictures he sent me in the letter that I got today. (His name was already printed on there. He called this is "glamour shot" photo. What a duck.) He also wrote me a note on the back of it that literally made me cry, but you know me... the fact that I cried really isn't that big of a deal.

This next picture is one that he sent out in his weekly e-mail. Mostly it just made me giggle because it portrays fairly accurately what his personality is like--just a weird guy. In his letter, he said "I'm never going back to scissors/knives for any of my cutting needs. Chainsaws only from now on! J ßGreat discovery."

Last semester, I got to know Sly (his name is Justin, but I've only ever called him Sly... weird? Maybe.) through a very peculiar set of circumstances which I won't go into. It's one of those you-really-had-to-be-there things. But he was also in my Psychology class, which is a little less weird. Anyways, he and I got to be really close about a month and a half before he left on his mission. It's always kind of a bummer when you make a really great connection with someone, and they leave shortly after (déjà vu, anyone?), but it was still a great experience spending so much time with this amazing boy. I've never met someone who found so much fascination in watching the tip of my nose when I talk. (Yeah, it wiggles. Try not to stare next time you talk to me.) He left in December for the MTC, and went to Atlanta Georgia after that. He seems to be doin some good there. (:

Anyways, I guess his letter today just got me thinking a lot about him and I just miss him a lot. Don't know why I wanted to share on here, but I guess it just makes me feel better.

He drove a motorcycle, so once it got cold/snowy, we had some good adventures walking to the Denny's down the street.
Thanks for reading, folks. It means a lot to me. (:

Ten months and 25 ideas later…

2011-02-14T14:16:00.002-07:00

Once upon a time, Rendon promised me he’d take me on a date. That was last May. We were supposed to go sometime over the summer before we both went to school and were even FARTHER apart then we already were, but that never happened. We also discussed many, many different ideas for dates, varying from minigolf to baptisms for the dead to a USU basketball game. Instead, this is what went down.

On Friday, through a series of complex vehicle changes and after a total of 5 hours of driving, Jasmine and I found our way to Chase's house. Clay, Hayden, Tristan, and Gordon were also there, so we had a little movie party and watched "Paranormal Activity 2"... it was the second time that week for me, so I was considerably less scared than everyone else. Specifically Jasmine and Gordon.

On Saturday, everyone got together (only this time with the addition of Nick and Tristan's friend Shanlee, and minus Gordon) and left for Orem! We had decided to meet up with Rendon at the mall, so we just went there to kill some time.

Rather than go into great detail (which I've been known to do) about every single thing we did that day, I'll sum it up for you as follows...

Activity: The Mall
Verdict: Fun
Short story: Before Rendon got there, we were all sitting at some tables at the end of the mall. Jasmine sat at a table closest to everyone by herself. A creepy lookin old man came out of Payless and just sat down and started talkin her ear off. She didn't look like she was in distress, so I just kind of looked at her and though "Huh. How awkward." and continued making plans for the rest of the day with everyone else. Turns out that old man was like out of his mind, which makes the whole thing WAY funnier. Later, Jasmine about flipped a nut and yelled at all of us for making her suffer through like 10 minutes of out of control random conversation with a complete stranger. We all just said "Well you looked like you were enjoying yourself."

Activity: "The Roommate"
Verdict: Actual movie: Stupid. Watching the movie: Fun.
Short story: Rendon hates scary movies. He doesn't get scared easily, so he thinks they're stupid. But the thing is, this movie wasn't even scary. It was just demented and weird and a little gross. I was covering my eyes for the only "scary" parts, but only because the chick in it is a whack job. So for the whole movie, I was curled up with my feet on the seat and usually grabbing Rendon's arm or leg whenever I got freaked out, and he would just be laughing and saying "This is so dumb." Normally that would make me mad that he was being such a poor sport, but even I have admit... the guy had a point. The movie was a joke.

Activity: State wrestling tournament
Verdict: Fun
Short story: If you don't know, Rendon wrestled all through high school, and was the state champion last year. (I don't know how he did in the past... last wrestling season was the first one I knew him for.) Anyways, it was really interesting to be watching wrestling with someone who was so into it. I've always liked watching, but I obviously don't know as much about it as he does. Every once in a while, he'd get all excited and go "Oh! There it was! That was my move! I made up that toss, and he just used it!"
Short story #2: I know, I'm cheating. Anyways, the 3A state champion for like the 145 weight class is named Tanner Sweat. But when they announced it, I heard "Taylor Sweat", which kind of sounds like "Taylor Swift." So I turned to Rendon and said "Swift?" He shook his head and said "Sweat." "Swift?" "Sweat." "Swift?" "Sweat!" "Taylor Swift?" ".......Tanner Sweat." So now that's a joke we've got goin on. It made me giggle. (:

Activity: Dinner
Verdict: Super fun!
Short story: Originally we wanted to go to Chili's for dinner, but there was 1 1/2 hours waiting time. Second choice was Applebee's, but it too had a ridiculous wait time. Fuddrucker's was right next to Applebee's, so we walked in there, then realized that literallly none of us actually wanted to eat there. So we went across the street to Golden Corral and settled on that. When I got my straw, I took off the top part of the wrapper and attempted to blow it at Rendon's face. Just my luck, the end of the straw had been clamped together along with the wrapper... dangit. Oh well, it was an interesting artifact to uncover. Hurray for that!

Activity: Wal Mart
Verdict: Always Fun
Short story: We all went to the back of the store and found the $5 bin and literally spent like 20 minutes just going through the movies. None of us had actual intentions of buying a movie, but it was fun looking to see which ones they had in there, and saying "Here, you'll love this!" while handing a Barbie movie to one of the boys. Someone tried to do that while handing Rendon "27 Dresses", but he just laughed and said "Nah, I'm good. I already have this movie on my iPod." Foiled!

Activity: Driving with Rendon (like, throughout the day)
Verdict: An adventure.
Short story: Don't take that verdict the wrong way. Rendon is a super safe driver, and extremely level-headed. At one point, some guy blatantly cut him off, and all Rendon did was wave to the guy to let him know he wasn't super pissed. It has me a little worried... there's no way a person can drive and never, EVER get mad. Someday, he's just gonna blow... Anyways, the passenger's side door on Lucille (Rendon's Toyota Celica) is broken, so I was never able to let myself out. It takes a particular combination of pushing the lock/unlock button in the right order for the door to actually open, so I just let the big guy take care of that for me. He was also faithful about opening the door for me to let me in, so points for gentlemanliness!

Overall, it was really just a super fun day. I always love spending time with my Millard boys, so it was a great day in general. I don't get to see Rendon nearly as often as I wish I did, but I guess there's really not much I can do about that. Ah well... I guess the best I can do is appreciate the times when our paths do cross. (:

Rendon and I at State Wrestling. What a duck. (:

My take.

2011-02-14T10:24:00.004-07:00

I feel like it's necessary to do a short post on how I feel about Valentine's Day. Because I thought about it a lot this morning, and this is my conclusion:

I, Jennifer, as a single college female, have completely neutral feelings for this holiday.

Traditionally, it's viewed as either a genuinely sweet holiday set aside specifically for time to be spent with the person you love, or (for most single people) a superficial, commercialized day wasted on people who should really show love for each other every day, while making single people feel lonely and miserable.

If you can't tell, I used to relate to the second option. Fun fact: never in my entire life have I had a Valentine. (Or a boyfriend. But that's beside the point.) I have had instances where I've been part of an "item", but it was unofficial, and almost always in the fall/winter. Shoot, last year I got "dumped" a month before Valentine's Day. That was kind of a bummer

But let's look at this thing logically. Granted, people who are all "in love" with each other should probably show that they are on a regular basis, not just once a year. On the other hand, people who do do special things on Feb. 14 are generally people who also show their affection year round, they just take part in this holiday due to tradition. I don't think anyone should necessarily be pressured to do something special just because it's Valentine's Day, but I don't see the problem in going all out once in a while.

Now for the single folks. You never see more complaints on Facebook about being single than around Valentine's day. But here's what I find hilarious: the majority of people (at least the ones on my friends list) that are complaining about what a "stupid waste of a holiday" this is are people that really don't need a Valentine. I mean really? You're like 14. It's oooookayyyyy if you don't get a dozen red roses from your 9th grade crush. And to be honest, I don't see why it's so important to find a special someone "in time" for Valentine's Day. It doesn't matter what time of the year it is, if you have someone you care about, then good job.

I've come to the conclusion that single people who complain about Valentine's Day don't think it's stupid. They don't think it's overrated. They don't even think it's corny. They are just wishing they could be one of the couples that are constantly being complained about. Say what you want, but you know it's true.

I'm completely content waiting until I find someone good enough for me to spent large amounts of time on, and I can honestly say that this day doesn't make me sad or lonely. In reality... it's just Monday.

Anyways, I'm just gonna step off my soapbox now. Sorry about that. I'm not even sure if any of this makes sense to anyone but me, but I thought I'd share anyways. Want to know why?

Because I'm 19 and I do what I want. (:

Neatfreak 47

2011-02-10T22:59:00.004-07:00

That's my song of the day for yesterday, and for good reason. My two suitemates are gone for a week, and for some reason that was inspiration for me to clean the crap out of our bathroom. To put it lightly, our bathroom was a death chamber of loose hairs, crusty toothpaste, and old food. In mine and Lindy's defense though, we always make a point to keep our side of the counter clean. So ours wasn't too bad... but the other side was... uhh... aesthetically offensive, let's say. Here are some "Before Jennifer's Mad Crazy 3 ½ Hour Cleaning Rampage" pictures.

Please notice: nothing in that trash can is the kind of stuff you normally put in a bathroom garbage can... ?????

.......I have no words.

Ew?

Bathroom floor.

Entryway. (What the used Q-Tips...???)

UNHAPPY.

As you can tell… it’s pretty gross. But I punched that crap in the face like a freaking champion. You may or may not be able to see the really dark spots on our floor, but it’s from hair dye. If you’ve never had an experience with trying to get hair dye off of tile, let me give you some advice: DON’T GET IT THERE TO BEGIN WITH. And I mean that with my whole heart. I had to use a brain-cell-destroying cocktail of Windex, Oxy Clean, and a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser. Not to mention over 35 minutes worth of pure elbow grease, and all I got it down to was mostly faded. Now the spots just kind of blend in with the speckle-y pattern. And now for the “After Jennifer’s Mad Crazy 3 ½ Hour Cleaning Rampage” pictures.

Yay! Empty trash bag!

Yay! You can barely see the dye stain!

What I forgot to take pictures of was the before and after of the counter.I cleaned everything off, wiped it down with a Clorox wipe, then 409ed that crap ‘til you could do surgery on that bad boy. Oh, and I washed the random crusty dishes that were just chillin on the counter… gross.

So yes, this is basically a post bragging about how awesome I am at cleaning. But let’s face it… if I didn’t post pictures, no one would believe how OCD and neurotic I have become since I moved out of my parents’ house.

I can’t even describe my pure joy of living in a spotless room after having it be so gross and germy and sticky and makes-me-want-to-vomit-y.

Yay. (:

Trigger happy.

2011-02-08T10:57:00.006-07:00

Yep. That's me.

Let's ignore the fact that I look like a whack job...

Like I said, I'm borrowing Dad's fancy digital Pentax SLR for a little bit, and I have just been dying to take pictures left and right. It snowed today, which normally would infuriate me beyond all reason. However, it wasn't a yucky wet snow, which is what usually annoys me. It was the pretty, fluffy snow. That, added to the fact that it was kind of sunny out put me in a serious photography mood. I sent out a plea on Facebook ("Raise your hand if you want go with me to take pictures in the snow today...!") and got a few responses from good friends of mine. I had pretty decent photo shoots with each girl, and all of them were in different settings. I had a lot of fun editing the pictures later, espcially Brianna's. (For some reason, her's seemed very edit-able.)Anyways, for your viewing pleasure are some of my favorites from each shoot. For more, you can go on my Facebook and look at the rest. (:

Brianna is so freaking adorable. Like... I don't even know what to do.

This was my favorite picture of the entire day, especially after I edited it.

Footprints in the snow...

Meet my roommate! I love the railroad pictures.

Balance beam.

We both had the same idea to use her cute umbrella. (:

Good ol' Bessie. (:

Ta da!

I absolutely love this picture.

So yeah... that was my adventure today. I really do love photography, and I'm so excited for when I get to have my own fancy SLR. (:

I certainly do not love dead people. No sir. I do not.

2011-02-04T00:21:00.007-07:00

Sometimes I can't sleep. As a result, I stay in the common room with some neat folks and watch an old school Stephen King movie that gives me the creepety creeps. For instance: "Rose Red." I am getting freaked out to the max. Turns out I really do not love dead people.

Mmmm... yummy.

I also made a deal with everyone in the room that I would someday attempt to look just like this guy. I couldn't find a picture of his "scared" face, but that's the one that I have to make when I walk around campus from now on. Awesome. (:

In other news, I didn't have any classes today. I only have one class on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and since I had a test for that class today, regular class was cancelled. WHOO! I got up at 6:30 to take out the trash (we won't go into why), went back to bed, and didn't get up until 1:45 in the afternoon (which, in reality, is probably why I can't sleep). On a scale of one to sweet, it was awesome. (: I got up, took two hours to put my hair in a bun and get my make up on, went and took my test, came home, cleaned, and that's literally all I remember doing. I'm pretty sure I spent the rest of the day either watching Psych, eating, or writing a paper for my Psychology class.

By the way, this might be one of my favorite papers to write, ever. I have to write about a dream that I have and write a paper about it using one of the three following options:

Off-line: The theory that our brain uses dreams to consolidate information gained throughout the day so there is more room the next day.
Problem solving: The theory that while we sleep, we use dreams to work through problems that we can't figure out consciously due to barriers and thinking "inside the box."
Psychoanalysis: The theory that dreams are our brains fulfilling unconscioius wishes and desires.

I picked a rather specacular dream I had the other night about James Roday and I'm choosing to use psychoanalysis to write about what I think it means. It's a pretty personal paper, but my teacher made a point to tell us not to worry about what she'll "think" of us after she reads the papers. Plus she's a pretty cool lady, so I'm not too worried about it.

It's really interesting trying to break down your dreams, you know. You have to think about every aspect of your life and what the smallest things in your dreams could mean. It's a very soul-searching experience. I rather enjoyed myself... like I said, it's one of my favorite papers I've ever written. (:

Alright, well it turns out I can't really focus on a blog and a movie at the same time. This is mostly a distraction to keep me from focusing on all the nasty dead people in this movie... gross. /:

Jennashbrikellasmine.

2011-02-02T21:48:00.004-07:00

Sometimes, me and my friends Ashley and Kelly and Brianna and Jasmine like to get together and eat chicken dinner. Kelly makes THE BEST chicken I've ever had, so it's always a treat to go to her house and have dinner. (:

Sometimes, we eat cake. And Jasmine likes to look very shocked.

But this time was different. I'm borrowing dad's camera for a little while, and I thought it'd be fun to play around with some ideas. I introduced the idea of long exposure to the girls, and this is what followed:

This was... not an easy picture to do. Turns out dryers aren't very comfortable.

Family portrait. (:
Whoo! I love my Cedar Family. We are well taken care of. (:

Quite cute.

2011-01-30T15:39:00.001-07:00

Quit cute indeed. (:

Downhill.

2011-01-27T18:53:00.002-07:00

I know it's time for me to do a post that isn't a bummer, but today has simply not been my day.

Why?

Ask Allie Brosh.

She knows what's up.

Especially on this particular subject.

Thank you and good night.

P.S. Pair of fresh shaved legs = the best feeling on a day like this.

P.P.S. The phrase "pair of fresh shaved legs" never fails to get the song "Going Away" by Meg & Dia stuck in my head. Just throwin that out there.

Called it.

2011-01-25T23:26:00.005-07:00

You may recall the following statement from a previous post from about a month ago:

"Hey Jennifer, where's your other half?" and "Hey Jennifer, you look weird and awkward walking places by yourself. You look like you need to have a best friend next to you."

That's referring to what I predicted people were going to say to me once Best Friend Kyle made his final exit from SUU. Well... let's just say I was half right. People are definitely saying those things... just not to me. I've actually had people asking me if I'm depressed because Kyle is gone. I'm really not sure how to feel about this.

Honestly, I'm really surprised that this has come up. I mean, I don't think I'm depressed. I'm certainly not sad all the time, and it's not like I'm constantly thinking "Oh, if only Kyle were here..." Granted, I have my days when I really just need my best friend. But I'm not like in a perpetual state of misery simply because my "other half" is 7 hours away.

On the other hand, I have noticed that I've become much more reserved and kind of quiet (two of my favorite phrases to use when defining "socially awkward") this semester, but I attribute that to the fact that if I don't do absolutely stellar in my classes this semester, I lose my scholarships and I'm basically screwed. As a result, I've been confining myself to my room most hours of the day studying and doing homework. If I'm not in my room, then I'm either at the cafeteria or at the gym (which is technically me doing homework, since I'm in a Circuit Weight Training class), and that's almost a guarantee. I wouldn't necessarily say this is because I'm depressed... I just have different priorities this semester. Who knows?

No one knows.

I'm not entirely sure why I'm posting this. I guess this is kind of the closest thing I have to a journal, since I haven't written in a journal regularly since my junior year of high school. Writing has always been a good emotional outlet for me. It helps me sort out thoughts and emotions. And you, lucky reader, get to be in on it.

This semester is different in a lot of ways. I'm definitely more stressed about schoolwork, considering my final grades will affect a huge decision I'm going to have to make. My friend Sly who, under different circumstances, would've asked me to be his girlfriend and I wouldn't have hesitated to say yes, left on his mission in December. So I miss him an awful lot. I'm also having a harder time with my living situation this semester. Turns out, I'm kind of selfish when it comes to my personal hygiene stuff. I have a big, big problem with people borrowing my body wash, toothpaste, brush, razor, etc... and yes. Those are all current problems. Gross, right?

And of course, there is Kyle. I do miss him really, really fiercely. Some days more than others. I still text him every day without fail, and we Skype fairly often, but it's obviously not the same. I would love more than anything to be able to take a trip to where he lives and just spend a few days with him, but I'm not so "weird and awkward" enough that I let the fact that I miss him affect my outward emotions. At least, I don't think so.

I forgot what the point of this post was supposed to be. Was it to say that I'm not a clinically depressed maniac just because Kyle is gone? Was it to say how much I miss him? Was it to say how much I miss last semester in general? Was it to tell you how wildly exhausted I am, due to an extremely intense workout I had an hour and a half ago? Maybe it was to say that I really shouldn't blog when I'm in a tired/hungry/missing-Best-Friend state of mind. Who knows?

No one knows.

Good night.

Rainy days and Mondays...

2011-01-24T16:05:00.006-07:00

Trick! This totally is not a sad post. Shoot, it's not even raining. It's just kind of windy. That title mainly seemed appropriate because of the word "Monday." Ah well.

Anyways, the real point of this post is to tell you exactly why this day has been one of the most genuinely spectacular ones I've had in some time. Granted, last weekend in Fillmore was AWESOME, and I got to see The Maine in concert (again) this last Saturday, which was also awesome. But today was one of those days that would normally seem like a regular day for the lack of great events, but no... today was something special.

It started out a little odd. I didn't sleep very well last night, so I was woken up at 5:30 by my suitemates talking pretty loud. It's okay though, because my alarm was set for 6 so that I could go work out before my first class at 9. Yes, I know some of you read that line again, while others may have actually puked a little... but I actually really enjoy working out before classes. It's a really great way to start my day, and there are about 45,000 less people in the gym at 6:30 am then there are in the afternoon. (If you go between 2-7 ish, you have to actually wait in line to get on a treadmill. It's awful.) My solution is to either go in the morning or late at night, around 9:30. Since I generally have things going on at night, I choose to go before classes. Plus, then I have the mentality of "Man! This is going to be a productive day! I mean, it's not even light out and I'm already doing something worthwhile!" I really do love it. And I highly recommend it. (:

Moving on. I got my hair done on Saturday, and today was the first chance I had to leave it down so you could actually see the new coloring in it. (In case you're curious... the bottom part is dyed kind of a darker brown, while I have lowlights fading into the layers up to the top. I know it sounds really gaudy, but it's more subtle than it sounds.) So that was nice. (: Also, my classes were just fun today. I got my math homework done in class, I learned lots of interesting things about sleep in Psychology (and I got an assignment to dream... that's literally what she said), I kicked a quiz's butt in communication, and I made a new friend in Film. Overall, not a bad academic day.

After my classes got over, I checked my mail and discovered that not only did I have a letter from Elder Sly, but he put a picture in there. Which I always love. AND THEN! I checked my e-mail, only to learn that I had a package! I'd been expecting my psychology book and a package from Ashton, so I wasn't sure which it would be. Much to my pleasant surprise, I went to the post office and picked up BOTH of those things! Yes! I got a letter and two packages all in one day! It was really splendid. (: Also, in the middle of all the excitement, I got a text out of the blue from none other than Best Friend Kyle. It didn't say much, but it really meant a lot, and it made me miss that boy a whole lot more than is comfortable.

A little while later, I headed to the gym (yes, again. I didn't get my workout done this morning!) with Jasmine, but there were like 100,000 people in there. I wasn't in the mood to stand in line waiting for weights while being surrounded by a bunch of huge guys, so I decided to leave and come back later tonight. On my way out though, I saw my dear good sweet friend Carley! I haven't seen her in a while, so I ended up talking to her for a long time, and it was just good to catch up. Also, she gave us a ride home in her cute new car. What a kind gal. (:

Later at like 5, Jasmine and I went to the "Living Room" of the school, where there was a "Meet the Greeks" thing going on. See, today is the beginning of Rush Week, and they were offering free pizza. Catch: you had to pretend to everyone that approached you that you were genuinely interested in their sorority. Kind of a bummer. But still! I got free pizza, and I got reacquainted with some people that I met at the beginning of the year, and I'd forgotten how sweet they were. So that was neat. (:

At 7, I had to go watch a movie ("Singin' In The Rain") for my film class, so I dragged Jasmine along with me. Also there were the people that I re-friended at the Greek thing. One of them officially invited me to sit with them in our film class, seeing as how I've been bouncing from seat to seat sitting by some pretty strange people. That was definitely a good thing. (:

Next on my list of awesome things that happened to me today came from when I went to the gym for the second time. I could give you the whole story, but it's one of those things I'm choosing to keep to myself until the story has a chance to develop a little more. But basically: this fellow that I have a giant crush on was at the gym. (: That's usually where I see him, but I've seen him occasionally around campus and other various activities. Anyways, I always get excited when I see him, but it's even better when he comes and talks to me. Which he did tonight. And I may or may not have giggled like a little girl inside my head the whole time we were talking. (:

To top off the night, I randomly Skyped some friends that I graduated with, including (but not limited to) Ben Cserepes, Kasey Fox, Patrick Lopez, Dustin Reidhead, etc.

My point is... today could be considered a regular day. But in reality, it was extraordinary. I love this day. I love my friends. I love my family. I love Best Friend Kyle. I love these oyster crackers that I can NOT stop eating. I love my life. And I love you. (:

You could definitely call me a happy camper. (:

And away he goes...

2011-01-17T23:19:00.005-07:00

This weekend was one full of barking, wrestling, and foul smells. Yes, friends—I spent the weekend in Fillmore. Jasmine and I were invited to go up with my friend Chase to attend the missionary farewell of our friend Josh. You probably remember that I have a bunch of friends from that ridiculously tiny (and extremely smelly) town. Let’s recap to keep you updated.

I met Rendon and Clay at Freedom Academy in August of 2009. I went to their senior homecoming dance as Rendon’s date, and that’s where I met the rest of the gang. The ones I know best (besides Rendon and Clay) are Chase, Hayden, Josh, and Tristan. Also among their group of friends (whom I don’t know as well) are Nick and Gordon. Last summer, the first 6 came down and spent a few days horsing around at the sand dunes, and came over to our house for Norwegian pancakes. So that was a bonding experience for us all. At the end of the summer, Rendon moved up north for school, Clay moved to Cedar City, and the rest stayed in Fillmore. Chase eventually moved to Cedar City as well, but not to go to school.

So that brings us back to now. Josh is going into the MTC on Wednesday, so obviously Chase wanted to go home for his farewell, and he invited Jasmine and I to come with. This blog post is the story of my weekend adventures in Fillmore.

Friday:
Jasmine and I got done with classes at 1, but we didn’t end up leaving Cedar City until around 3-ish. When we got to Fillmore, we were able to get settled in at Chase’s house (that’s where we stayed all weekend) and Jasmine met his parents. We pretty much bummed around the house for most of the afternoon, and then most of the crew came over and just watched TV with us. After a long time, we decided that we wanted to do something, and the final decision was to go explore the natural hot springs that are in that area.

(By the way, I forgot to take pictures until Saturday morning… sorry!) In the end, it was me, Jasmine, Chase, Clay, Hayden, Tristan, Josh, Nick, and Gordon that went. We had to walk a little ways to get to the “hot pots”, which was kind of sucky because it was like 18 degrees outside, and I was wearing flip flops. (Don’t judge me. Chase told me to come prepared to go to a hot tub, so of course I brought flip flops.) Once we got to the hot pots, I discovered that they are definitely not as exotic as they sound. First of all, there were already four or five people there, mostly between the ages of 25 and 40, and they were all slam blasted drunk out of their minds… it was actually really funny to hear them talk. Other than that, the whole thing was covered in moss and other various mystery slimes and it kind of smelled weird and the fact that it was dark made everything so much creepier when something touched your foot… but it was still a way fun excursion. (: I was very worried about the trek back to the truck, considering I was wet on the way back. Somehow though, I managed to make it back.

When we got back to the house, I realized that I’d left my intended pajamas laying on my bed in Cedar City, so I had to borrow a pair of pajama pants and a Millard (yuck) Track & Field shirt from Chase. I’m not sure if he knows it yet or not, but I have no intention of returning those pants. They’re just too comfy. (: Anyways… thus ends Friday.

Saturday
Saturday, I was woken by Jasmine’s voice saying softly “Jennifer, Chase’s mom made us breakfast if you want.” I’m pretty sure I mumbled something incoherent, and instantly fell back asleep. What felt like 3 seconds later but was apparently 15 minutes, I was woken again by Jasmine’s voice—this time, not so soft—saying very excitedly “JENNIFER! GET UP! THERE’S BACON!!!!” It wasn’t so much the volume of her voice that really woke me up as the pitch of it. (Jasmine gets really excited about bacon…) So that’s how my day started. Also, throughout the entire day, Jasmine was constantly spewing out ridiculous, very quotable lines. The following is a (pretty much) complete list of “You had to be there…” Jasmine-isms from Saturday only:
-It's goblehbleh!
-I think there's a movie called the Spawn of Saintan...
-You owe me for being so awesome!
-Eww Jennifer... he has feet!
-WAAAAIT.
-I shanked you!
-JENNIFER!! You look SOO cute!!! (This one you really had to be there for)
-WHAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO BE LOOKING AT???!!!
-What is happening??
-What am I supposed to do??!

Yeah… it was entertaining. Anyways, we had plans to go to Salt Lake later in the day, but we couldn’t leave until Hayden got off work at 3, so we just hung out at the house all morning. Jasmine, Chase, and I watched some movies for a few hours until we decided we should start preparing vehicles for our journey. I thought we were just going to put gas in Chase’s truck, so I didn’t even bother getting dressed. Turns out though, we had several errands to run, including going to the grocery store where Hayden works to get the keys to his van, and vacuuming out said van. So I got to run around all over Fillmore wearing a tank top with a nice coat over it, some oversized men’s pajama pants, my nice Rocketdog boots, and Chase’s foam trucker hat… I looked awesome.

Yayyy for looking like a bum!

Look at the camera, Chase! Vaccuum the van, Chase! Do work, Chase!

Vans! Yeah!

Haha Jasmine and the quarters...
Eventually, we got everything done, we went back to Chase’s house, I actually got ready, and the time finally came for us to head to Salt Lake. Rendon didn’t see much point in driving ALL the way down to Fillmore from school on Friday, driving ALL the way back up, coming back to Fillmore AGAIN that night, then driving BACK up to school on Monday. So we just decided to meet him in Salt Lake, then have him drive back that night, and then he’d just go back to school on Monday. So I rode in Hayden’s van with Jasmine, Chase, Hayden, and Tristan, while Clay, Josh, and Nick rode in Clay’s car.

On the road to SLC!
The drive to Salt Lake was fairly uneventful. Unless you count the fact that we drove about 15 miles going 11 mph due to some construction on the freeway, so we didn’t exactly make it in time to meet Rendon when we said we were going to meet him. We ended up deciding to just meet him at the car expo that we were planning on going to.

Took this in the middle of our traffic jam... thought it was funny to see a Hybrid with a body kit. haha
And yes. I just said car expo. If you don’t know these boys, here’s something you should know: they’re all really into cars/ATVs/motorcycles/anything with an engine. So as Jasmine, Tyler (Rendon’s friend that he brought down with him for the weekend) and I walked around and looked at the shiny cars, all the guys were drooling over the insides of the new trucks. Rendon actually went so far as to teach me some stuff about cars… I’m not sure how much of it I retained. Mostly I just remember the phrase “travel shock.” And I think that’s about it.

This Aston Martin once belonged to Michael Jordan... fancy!
One thing they did have there was a van advertising a certain brand of speakers. They had two people at a time get in this van (which I’m pretty sure was made up purely of subwoofers) and they played some very bass-heavy songs. They actually provided ear protection, just in case. They also pointed out the Panic button in case it “got to be too much”… yikes. /: I’ll let you judge from this picture approximately how loud it was…

Once we got done at the car expo, it was the unanimous decision that I was hungry. Well… alright, I guess everyone else was hungry, too. Chase has yet to get over the fact that I get extremely lucky every time I go to Olive Garden, so he demanded we go there so I could “work my magic” and get everyone free food. Sheesh… talk about pressure. /: Anyways, so we went to Olive Garden, and no, I did not get anything for free. BUT. I only ordered soup, salad, & breadsticks, and the waitress told me that my soup would be brought out with everyone else’s entrees, even though everyone else who got a soup as a side would have theirs out in a few minutes. I was kind of upset about that. But when she brought out everyone else’s soups, she accidentally made one extra, so I got my soup like 15 minutes earlier than I was supposed to! So even though I didn’t get anything for free, per say, I still got pretty lucky. (:

It was a close call, but everyone made it out of Olive Garden alive. A few of the boys got the Tour of Italy, and Italy came extremely close to winning. But the boys conquered, and celebrated the victory by eating some chocolate cake. Does anyone else think boys have zero brain power? Anyways, we made it back that night safe and sound. Everyone came over to Chase’s house hoping to catch the end of some race that they were all following, but I guess we just missed it. Instead, Clay decided to try on one of Chase’s dad’s old prom tuxes. Since Clay is a good friend of mine and I fear for my life if I posted it, I won’t post the picture that I have of him in it. Let’s just say… it was a little snug. And very baby blue. And extremely polyester. And I’ll let you do the rest of the math. (:

Sunday:
After such a late night, it was kind of rough getting up early enough to not only get ready for church at 9, but be there early so that all the friends could sit together on one bench. This is a “congratulations” to Jasmine and I for getting ready in under half an hour. We’re awesome. Anyways, we ended up getting the whole back row to ourselves for friends of Josh, which was kind of fun. I was sitting between Rendon and Jasmine, and whenever it was time for a hymn, I shared a book with Rendon. He and I both sing the parts written into hymns, and after the meeting, his friend Tyler told me that he quit singing after the first song because he liked hearing mine and Rendon’s voices together. That comment made me miss X-Press an awful lot, but it also made me feel pretty good. (:

As for the talk, Josh did a really good job. He’s a really quiet guy, so he was extremely nervous about giving his talk in front of so many people. At the end, he kind of started choking up, and as I looked up and down the row at his best friends, I saw that a lot of them were tearing up as well, and some of them were actually crying. It was really touching to see how much these boys care about their best friend, but it’s also good to see how much they love each other.

After sacrament got over, everyone headed over to Josh’s house to help his mom get all the food together and get it ready to take over to the senior citizen center, where the lunch was to be held. However, she pretty much had an army of helpers, so we ended up shifting over to the senior citizen center just to get out of the way. The lunch was AMAZING (carne asada tortillas… mmm), and the company was pretty good as well. (:

Ohhh Chase... (:

Once we were stuffed, Chase took Jasmine and I back to his house, where we all crashed on the couch while watching Transformers. At like 3:57, Chase woke us up by reminding us that his grandma had made dinner for everyone, and we were supposed to be at her house at 4. Thank you, Chase, for the heads up. /: So once again, I stuffed my face with some ridiculously delicious food that was not even close to being fixed for me. Goodness… I’m such a mooch. /: haha

After our second dinner, we reverted back to our natural positions on the couch. Around 6 or so, I got a text from Rendon saying that his family was going to play some games, and did we want to come over and play with them? It took some convincing for Chase (he almost let me drive Jasmine and I in his truck over to Rendon’s house just so he wouldn’t have to get dressed), but we ended up going to the Shields’ house to play Phase 10. That family is so much fun. (: Obviously I’ve known Rendon for a while, but I’ve also been friends with his little brother, Dallin, for about a year or so. I met his parents when I went up for their homecoming dance last year, and have seen them at other various competitions and events since then. However, I did get to meet his older brother, Aaron, for the first time. Turns out his family gets almost as ridiculous during card games as my family does. (:

When everyone got burnt out (and by “everyone” I mean “Rendon’s dad”) of Phase 10, everyone kind of went their separate ways. Jasmine asked about the likelihood of getting a tour of Fillmore, and we decided that wouldn’t be a bad idea. So me, Jasmine, Chase, Rendon, and Tyler all piled into Chase’s truck and we drove around for like an hour and a half exploring the back roads of Fillmore, Utah. By this point, we had decided there wasn’t much point in going back to Cedar a day before we needed to, since there was no school on Monday. Jasmine and I are professionals at overpacking, so we happened to have enough clothes to last us one more day before we left. This being decided, we thought it’d be fun to go exploring on four-wheelers the next day. With that plan in mind, we decided we were all beat (why, I’m not sure. All we’d done pretty much the whole day was eat and sleep.), and headed back to Chase’s house and called it a night.

Monday:
I woke up around 10 to Jasmine telling me that Rendon was at the house. I took that to mean “Hurry up and get dressed, we’re leaving soon.” So I didn’t even bother taking a real shower or even really getting ready. I took a quick rinse-off shower, pulled my hair up, put on the bare minimum of makeup, and got dressed. Little did I know it would be another 3 hours before we left, due to the fact that Chase’s gas tank got flooded with water over the winter and wouldn’t stay on, so we ended up having to borrow his grandma’s Polaris. Also, he and Rendon had a GREAT time trying to bolt down a seat in the back of the Rhino so that someone could ride back there. It was entertaining at first… then extremely boring.

Bored faces... Jasmine just looks REALLY pissed. haha

Finally, we were ready to go. Jasmine rode with Chase on his grandma’s four-wheeler, while Rendon, Tyler and I rode in the Rhino. I’ve gone offroading with Rendon before, and it was… an adventure. I was pretty excited for this excursion. (:

Rendon's friend Tyler bracing himself in the backseat...

Whoo! What an awesome fella!

Jasmine and Chase before the ride...
The ride was SUPER fun. The mountains in that part of the state are very different than what I’m used to, but they’re pretty in their own way. Also, there was a bunch of snow left on the ground, so that made things interesting. Jasmine and Chase got SOAKED from the knees down, but the Rhino’s half-doors kept me fairly dry. Also, I hadn’t come prepared with appropriate shoes for four-wheeling, so I had to borrow a pair of Chase’s shoes. And a jacket. So I wasn’t too worried about getting wet/muddy. (: Eventually though, Rendon and Tyler had to head back up north, because it’s a pretty long drive to where he’s going to school. After he left, the remaining three of us didn’t have much left to do except say ‘bye to Josh one more time, then head back to Cedar City.

Beautiful...
Overall, the weekend was definitely a success. I had SO much fun hanging out with my Millard boys… but then, when don’t I have fun with them? This was the most I’ve ever done in Fillmore, but that’s probably due to the fact that I spent 4 days there. I plan on spending another weekend there in a few months when Hayden prepares to leave on his mission (fun fact: Hayden is a very tall, kind of pale-ish redhead that is going to be serving in the Philippines… tell me that didn’t make you giggle to visualize), so I hope that one will be as much fun, if not more.

A [Jennifer] by any other name would [be] as sweet.

2011-01-11T00:25:00.007-07:00

What is it with me and nicknames? They just keep coming out of nowhere. And I seem to be accumulating more. Let's recap, shall we?

-Gloria
-Hulk
-Waffles
-Batman
-Jeffner
-Jeff
-Fif
-Fiffer
-Fif-a-jif
-Slagathor
-Stipinwoya
-Jenenefinener (yeah that one takes some time to figure out)
-Yeah Yeah
-Nope Nope (for my bad mood days)
-Moo
-Jorddan (but only with 2 D's)
-Diego

Etcetera. Lately, the members of The Biggest Stunt (who, by the way, I'm coming to love more and more every day. Those guys are freaking sweet) decided that there really isn't even a point in me having a name at all. Romeo actually insisted that I've been introduced to him as Jennifer, Jen, Jenny, Amanda, Roger, etc. So our conclusion was that if anyone says a name that doesn't belong to anyone else in the room (i.e. if I'm with the band and someone says "Hey, _____" and the "_____" isn't Cory, Romeo, Chase, or Devan/PeTA), then they're referring to me. I have responded to Amanda, Gizelle, Donald, Jessica, Alfie, and many other various titles.

The latest one came from when we all stayed up a little too late, and we began talking about--brace yourself--Dragonball Z. Cory, Chase, and Romeo started assigning titles to everyone, and I somehow ended up as this chick:

Let's get one thing straight though: I would NEVER wear that outfit.
Android 18. Considering how late it was when we came up with this, I am actually very surprised at the fact that everyone in the band and Romeo's girlfriend/PeTA's best friend/my down-the-hall neighbor Michelle still calls me Android 18, or even just 18. It always kind of shocks me, because "Hey, 18!" sounds like "Hey, team!" and I become quickly confused. Oh well... new nicknames are always fun.

I guess I have no reason to complain. I love nicknames. (:

Today.

2011-01-05T21:27:00.004-07:00

"Beautifully" by Jay Brannan

Every time he goes, she dies
Every time he comes, she cries

He was her long, bright future
In the middle of a wrong, dark road
He loved her, but he wasn't too sure
If he could return the love she showed
When she said, my love extends
Beyond the realm of being friends
He kissed her head
And quietly he said

It's not that you're not beautiful, you're just not beautiful to me
She said, how beautiful do I have to be?
When I look in the mirror, you're the only thing I see
And I have loved you beautifully

Well, ten thousand tears passed by
But she never let him see her cry
And he called up down one night
He said, let's get in the car and just drive

He talked a lot about loneliness
But why, she didn't know
And some song about Memphis
Was playing on the radio
She said, let's stop the car and slow dance
Won't you just give me a chance?
He took her hand
And hoped she'd understand

It's not that you're not beautiful, you're just not beautiful to me
She said, how beautiful do I have to be?
When I look in the mirror, you're the only thing I see
And I have loved you beautifully

Well, she'll burn that bridge
And build a house
And swallow the smoke in her mouth
She'll feel the burn
And then make the choice
To put the fire in her voice

It's not that you're not beautiful, you're just not beautiful to me
She said, how beautiful do I have to be?
When I look in the mirror, you're the only thing I see
And I have loved you beautifully.

Raise your hand if you never, ever want to go through another January 5th. Can we just skip this day in the future? Please?

I'm sorry. Today has been a rough anniversary for me. Cross your fingers for me that next Jan. 5 will be a lot better than the two preceding it...

Aim small, miss small.

2011-01-03T23:38:00.003-07:00

In the past, I have been known to throw out some pretty high-aimed resolutions every January 1st. Such as:
--Meet Jared Leto
--Pet a dolphin
--Drive a Mustang
--Own a Mustang
--Invent something even cooler than a Mustang
--Go to college (actually... this one was somewhat achievable.)
--Etc.

In 2010, I came to the conclusion that I am an "optimistic realist." Basically, that allows me to be both a pessimist and an optimist, depending on my mood that day. For this purpose, I'm choosing to be a realist. High goals? Pshhh. Overrated. Below is a list of New Years Resolutions for 2011. (Which, I'd like to point out, sounds ridiculous when you say it out loud. Like it's even a year... pshh. Whatever.)

--Brush my teeth every day. (Done. I promise.)
--Wear my retainer sometimes. (Done.)
--Take out my contacts every once in a while. (Done.)
--Watch the first four seasons of Psych in under one week. (Done... don't judge me.)
--Pick a favorite NBA team. (Done. Jazz. Whaaaat!)
--Be invited to go snowboarding. (Done.)
--Go on a date. (Ehh. I've got 12 months.)
--Don't kiss my date. (I'm actually really good at this one.)
--Use sticky notes. (Done. My Elder Justin C. Sly friend would be so proud.)
--Write to at least one missionary (out of the nine on my writing list) at least one time. (...working on it.)
--Be awesome and hilarious. (Done and DONE.)

I know you're probably wondering "Why in the world didn't I think of such brilliant resolutions?" The answer: I have superior thinking capabilities to most people. It's okay if you're intimidated.* The real feat here is the fact that I have secretly come up with some other resolutions that actually resemble real goals. HOWEVER! I refuse to share them with you, in the event that I come through as my usual self and lose steam after a short while of trying. That way, I can pretend that I pulled them off, when really all I did was go to class on time for a whole week. (:

Actually, that last one isn't half bad...

In other news. I'm going back to school this weekend, and I am super pumped. It's been a fun break being home, but I'm about burnt out of driving to my middle-of-nowhere home on roads covered in 2 inches of ice. (Not that Cedar is much better weather-conditions-wise, but at least I don't have to drive in it.) Plus, what can I say? I miss my friends. I'm ready to go back.

But for the time being... I sleep.

*Note: I have literally done nothing but watch Psych for like 3 days straight. So if you are gathering a sense of self-centeredness, mocking, and hilarity, that's because my inner voice is literally that of Shawn Spencer/James Roday. And there's literally nothing I can do about it. Now I want you to reread this entire post with his voice in your head, and you will understand the direction I'm coming from. Oh, and I literally just used the word "literally" five times in one paragraph. Thank you, and good night.

This is a post about an annual celebration of that one time that I was successfully born.

2010-12-22T21:47:00.005-07:00

Yes, boys and girls, this is a birthday post. Because yesterday, December 21, the first day of winter, the shortest day of the year, was also my 19th birthday. (Fun fact: 12/21/12, aka the "end of the world" is my 21st birthday... eerie, right?)

Honestly, 19 is really not that big of a deal to me. There's really nothing I can do now that I couldn't do when I was 18 (besides buy cigarettes in Utah... whoo hoo.). I guess there is the perk that I no longer sound like I am literally fresh out of high school. Soo that's good, I guess...

Anyways, I'll just tell you about my day. I got up early enough that I'd be able to curl my hair before I went to town to have lunch with some friends. Unfortunately, after I spent an hour curling my hair, I remembered why I never do it--I hate how my hair looks curled. /: So with 45 minutes left before I had to leave, I had to dunk my head and start all over. Ahh well... I guess that wasn't really relevant. But hey... it's my blog. I do what I want.

Kimberly and I took Missy to town, then went to Mom's work so I could get her car, that way Kimberly and I would both have vehicles. Then I went to the Three Bears in Kanab and met up with my dear good sweet friends Brianna and Carley! (I'm sorry, I had planned to take pictures, but completely spaced it. /: Dang it!) We had a delightful lunch, and Carley was thoughtful enough to give me a pickle for my birthday. What a sweetheart. (: haha

After lunch, I went and visited my dear good sweet friend Jasmine, since she was unable to come to lunch with us. While I was there, she gave me a present! It was "The Invention of Lying", aka one of my favorite movies ever. It is absolutely hysterical. (:

When Mama got off work, Kimberly and I met up with her and we headed off to St. George! Why? To PLAY of course! First stop was Asia Nails to get manicures for all three of us, and I got a manicure and a pedicure. Because it was my birthday.

After we got done with our nails, we headed off to Applebee's for dinner. Kimberly not-so-discreetly told the manager, who was just routinely checking up on his patrons, that it was my birthday today. As a result, I got a team of Applebee's employees chanting their ridiculous Happy Birthday song to me... but I did get a free dessert. So I got over the embarrassment pretty quick. (:

Me and sister at Applebee's... I love Applebee's.

We had some shopping to do at various places, including the mall. We went there, and I got to meet up with my friend Tim that was in St. George at the time. Mom felt bad that I didn't "have anything to unwrap" for my birthday, so she said I could go pick out something for her to buy for me... she was also quick to point out that the offer expired at midnight, so I better get on it. Tim came with me to go shopping while Mom and Kimberly went to a cupcake place to buy me a birthday [cup]cake. When they got back, we all said 'bye to Tim, and us girls went to Spoon Me!

I've been wanting this shirt forever. It says "Use Me, Reuse Me, Spoon Me"... hahaha I love it.

On our way to Spoon Me, Mom handed me a small box and said it was my cupcake. I just smiled at her and held it, intending to open it when we got home and I could put a candle in it. But she looked really bummed, so I went ahead and opened it... and then it was my turn to look bummed. It was coconut. I hate coconut. Then Kimberly, barely able to contain herself, handed me a much bigger box and said "Fine, you can pick from one of these." Fortunately, the bigger box contained 5 more cupcakes that were flavors that I didn't hate. (:

Since we were gone all day yesterday, we decided to have the traditional big birthday dinner tonight, when we could be home, and Dad could be there. I decided that I wanted to have breakfast for dinner, because honestly... who doesn't love breakfast at night? Mommer and Popper arrived today around 5:30, so we got to have them here for brinner as well! We had bacon, eggs, grits, and--my favorite--biscuits and gravy. Balicious. (:

After dinner, we broke out the cupcakes! We put candles in all of them, then I got sang to. Again.

Once I blew out the candles, everyone took their pick of flavor. Mmm. (:

Overall, it was a pretty good birthday. Here's to many more, yeah yeah? (:

And then I found $5!

2010-12-19T01:21:00.004-07:00

All day today, I have been emanating the vibe of a surly teenager. Why? I literally have no idea. Because inside my head, I've been like this:

Those are "crazy, hyper" spirals. Not "stinky, don't stand too close to me" spirals. And a yelling "AHHH ALSKJFISDOSOI NONSENSE!" mouth. Not a "YAYYY I LOVE WEARING TOO MUCH WHOREY LIPSTICK!" mouth. My point is that I have been in the weirdest mood all day long, and I haven't felt it has been an appropriate day to share my strange mood. So instead, I looked really pissed off instead. (And now I am resorting to using the same word twice in one sentence. How annoying.) On the other hand, it has been kind of a rough week... which may have contributed to the outward appearance.

I'm not entirely sure what my point is. What I am sure of, however, are three things.

1) It is past my bedtime.
2) I am eating chips and salsa.
3) My birthday is officially in 2 days.

That is all.

CHIPS AND SALSAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!

*Illustration inspired by Allie Brosh... read her blog. Do it. Or your life will be sad and pointless.

Same day, different post.

2010-12-09T14:39:00.003-07:00

I realized that I have been slacking a lot on my blog, and I apologize. Earlier today, I was getting ready for the day and it struck me how much I had to write about. First of all was my recent photography excursions (see post below). But I also had some more personal stuff I wanted to share, and I feel like it deserves its own post. Heads up, though... this is a long one.

Over the past several months, I have had a LOT of new experiences at college. Some were incredibly beautiful, memorable events that will remain with me forever. Others were devastating blows to my life as I knew it. However, both are to be expected and endured whenever you take on a new chapter of your life. One thing I want to expound on comes from the place I have been the most since moving: the dorms.

There are so many people in this building that have made such a huge impact on me. Some of them are leaving after this semester and not coming back, possibly ever. Others are leaving, and I literally could care less. I know that sounds like a mean thing to say, but it's true... you can't like everybody. (But don't worry, Mom... I'm still nice to everyone, even the ones I don't like.) What I want to do is mention just a few of the people that I live with that have impacted me this semester. Note: this isn't a like an exact list of the only people I like in this building. Just putting that out there.

1: First of all, I want to talk about my adorable roommate, Lindy. Before college, we didn't know each other too well. We were pretty much just friends at church, but I'd always liked her. One day in Sunday school, my teacher asked me where I was living. When I told her my building, Lindy said "hey, me too!" We talked about it a little bit, and we both decided we really didn't want to have random crazy roommates, so we decided to request each other and live together. I never exactly had "doubts" about living with her, but I thought it'd definitely be interesting to live with someone that I was only kind-of friends with. But much to my sheer joy, it has turned out perfectly.

Lindy is a spectacular roommate in every aspect. She's clean, which (usually) makes me be clean, which makes our room look great, which makes me feel great. Also, she is so, so cute and is always so much fun to talk to. I will talk to her about literally anything, even if I know she doesn't really care. There will be sometimes when I just tell her a story without telling her any background about the person it involved, so it probably doesn't make any sense whatsoever, but she listens intently and laughs at the right parts or says "Oh no!" at the right parts. I love how comfortable I am with her, and I love that we leave each other cute notes every once in a while. It's always nice to know that when I come home, I have someone that will listen to whatever I have to say (which is usually a lot), and sometimes gives me Christmas treats. (: So basically, I absolutely love Lindy.

2: If you read my post below already, then this introduction will sound familiar to you. This "shout out" is for my dear good friend PeTA. PeTA lives on the 3rd floor of my building, is very, very sweet, is actually named Devan, and is a vegan, so he very quickly turned into PeTA (not sure about the random capitalization, but whatever). At the beginning of the semester, I could only stare at him because he is a perfect cross between Adam Mathis and Justin Powell, two guys I went to high school with my freshman and sophomore years. Anyways, I've always found PeTA to be an intriguing character. He has some very unique views of the world and the animals in it, but I respect him enough to let him keep those views and he respects me enough to not try and force them on me.

My favorite thing about PeTA is that he has always gone out of his way to give me a hug or ask me to smile or tell me I'm pretty. He can always tell whenever I'm having a bad day and does whatever he can to make it better because by golly, he doesn't want me to be sad ever! I'm not entirely sure if he knows what a difference he makes, but on a day when it feels like everything is falling apart, it means the world to have someone step in and remind you that there are people who love you. And it's those simple reminders that make you remember exactly why you love those people back.

3: Now I want to talk about a guy named Jd. Jd is Best Friend Kyle and Charlie's suitemate. Funny story: at the beginning of the year when I only hung out with Kyle, Charlie, Emily, and Curtis, I'm pretty sure Jd hated us. And none of us really liked him. Eventually though, our little group of 5 friends kind of fell apart, leaving only me, Kyle, and Charlie as tight as we were before. Over time though, the three of us realized that Jd is actually a pretty cool guy. I would often walk into my room and find him sitting on my floor talking to Lindy. At first, I was a little hesitant about the situation, until I started talking to both of them whenever I came home. It turned out that Jd was a pretty funny guy, and a lot cooler than I'd originally given him credit for. Jd has come through for me several times when I needed someone to make me feel better. When I had strep throat a few weeks ago, he was the one who got two other guys together and gave me a blessing. Also, when I had had a genuinely terrible day last week, he didn't hesitate when Jasmine asked him to take me to buy ice cream to make me feel better. Jd has been a very good example to me, and it's partially because of him that I've started to become more spiritually active. And for that, I am so, so grateful to him.

4: When I first moved in, I already knew two of the people in my building. One was Lindy, and the other was my neighbor Jasmine (we went to high school and graduated together). The first Friday in the dorms, I was on my way out to go hang out with some people from Kanab, but I saw a bunch of people in the common area watching a movie. They all asked me if I wanted to come watch, but I said I was on my way out. When I got outside and met up with the kid that was picking me up, it struck me that I really didn't want to start of the year strictly with friends from Kanab. So I told him that I was going to stay and have a movie night with the people I was going to live with for the next eight or nine months. And that's exactly what I did. When I came back upstairs, there were significantly more people there than there were the first time I walked by. One of those people was Jasmine.

To be quite honest, my first response was "Oh man... Jasmine is living here..." It's not that I didn't like Jasmine, because I really do and I always have. But she tends to get very loud and high pitched and random whenever she gets excited. And she was very excited that night. But after a couple of days when she got more settled in and everyone wasn't so new, she became a lot more chill. Anyways, Jasmine and I are pretty much together most of the time. It's gotten to a point where people call us by the others' name. I can't count how many times I've been called Jasmine this year. /: But Jasmine is really someone that I have needed this year. Like Lindy, she's an amazing listener. She always says she feels bad for not knowing what to say whenever I vent to her, but in most cases, that's all I need: just someone to listen. She and I have definitely had some crazy times together, but they're always fun. I have a lot of people asking me if it sucks to hang out with someone from Kanab all the time, but I really like it. This way, it helps me connect my past to my present. So for that, I love her. (:

5: The last person I want to talk about is someone that I am going to have a really, really hard time not seeing every day after this weekend. Best Friend Kyle is going home for Christmas and is not coming back. He recently decided that he wants to try and go on a mission instead. So he's going to go home to work on his papers, which means he won't be coming back to SUU for 2 1/2 years at the very least. Worst of all, he lives 7 hours away, so it's not like I can see him all the time. I'm afraid that even as I'm typing this, I'm already crying at the thought of saying goodbye to my best, best friend.

The same night that I mentioned seeing Jasmine was the night I met Kyle. Lindy and I had locked ourselves out of our room, and my phone wasn't working, which meant I wasn't able to reach the RA on duty to let us in. So we were stuck hanging out in the commons until someone came to let us in. During the movie (it was "She's The Man"... why do I remember that?), I said something about how wildly attractive Channing Tatum is. I heard some guy say "Yep, he is definitely my man crush." I turned around and saw a much closer, more realistically attractive fellow. Yeah I'm just gonna say it, I think Kyle is really attractive. It's not really a secret. Anyways, after the movie was over and I was still locked out, I made it a priority to go talk to Kyle and make him love me. Alright maybe not that last part. However, over the next few weeks, we begun hanging out almost constantly. Why? We had/have SO much in common.

One night, our group of 5 friends were all hanging out in Kyle and Charlie's room when someone said something about watching "Aladdin." Kyle and I didn't really want to watch it, but everyone else did... so they left. For the next 2 hours, Kyle and I talked about so much stuff that I never thought I could talk to anyone about. When everyone came back in, they immediately assumed that he and I had just been making out the entire time. But in reality, he'd sat on his 9-foot-tall bed and I sat in Charlie's chair while we talked about our families, our high schools, choir, our favorite composers (ironically, it's the same guy: Eric Whitacre), how we eat sandwiches, our best friends... everything. He even let me punch him in the face one time.

Ever since then, Kyle has been my very best friend. There is nothing I can't talk to him about, nothing I'm afraid to say to him. I have shared my dearest spiritual experiences with him, and we're able to connect in a way that I've only had in one or two friends in my entire life. The natural assumption of everyone in the building was that we were dating, but we definitely have a different kind of relationship to date. In fact, he and I have a joke about how we are always, always together whenever he sees a hot girl or I see some guy that I've been diggin, and it always looks like we're a couple. We even used to get those "Aww... what a perfect couple. I approve of this union" looks from people--sometimes random people, but usually people that we both know. It's like they knew we weren't dating, but they "knew" we were. It's going to be hard enough when he's gone, but what's going to make it even harder is the fact that I know people are going to say "Hey Jennifer, where's Kyle?" and "Hey Jennifer, where's your other half?" and "Hey Jennifer, you look weird and awkward walking places by yourself. You look like you need to have a best friend next to you." I don't know what I'm going to do. Kyle is my fall-back guy in every situation. Had a bad day? Talk to Kyle. Need a lunch buddy? Call Kyle. Need a workout schedule? Ask Kyle. Need someone to cry to? Find Kyle. Have a stupid joke/story? Tell Lindy. And then tell Kyle. Granted, we both have Skype and have agreed to use it to maximum capacity (too bad the internet at my house sucks, so I won't even be able to Skype him for like a month after he leaves...), but obviously it's not the same.

I guess the best I can do is appreciate the fact that I've had someone as incredible as Best Friend Kyle in my life for the past few months, and hope that our paths cross again someday. But still... I can appreciate all I want, but I'm still going to be semi-heartbroken when he's gone. I'm always going to remember Kyle as being one of my greatest friends of my life, and I'll always hold him dear to my heart. I hate to make this sound like an obituary, but I can't help it, considering I have no clue when I will see him again. I'm sad, but I hope I'll see Best Friend Kyle soon. I love you, bud.

P.S. Mood shift. This is my 43rd blog post of the year. Judging from 2008 and 2009, I need to do 4 more. I apparently like to end my years at 47 posts...??

The Biggest Stunt

2010-12-09T13:59:00.005-07:00

Some of you might be aware that I've recently had the opportunity to take advantage of whatever I learned in my Photography class this semester to do some special pictures for friends. First, I was asked by some friends of mine to do their engagement pictures. Here are some examples.

Next, I was asked by my friend Chase if I would come with him to St. George one weekend to be the photographer for his family's family portraits. This one was a little different than the engagement pictures, because a) I only knew one of the 7 people I would be taking pictures of, and b) I was getting paid this time.

That little excursion didn't go exactly as planned, unfortunately. St. George is known for its warm, sunny climate. However, that weekend was pretty much the only weekend in the surrounding months where it was cloudy, rainy, and freezing. Since the family had two children that were barely controllable inside, we figured it would be a joke to try and get them to look cute and not hating life in the freezing cold. So we just ended up taking pictures inside their rented condo, which wasn't too bad. I did feel bad, though, because I basically did exactly what a tripod could have done, and Chase's mom still wanted to pay me. Oh well... I hope I did something spectacular. /:

Anyways, my most recent of these opportunities came a week or two ago when I got a text from my friend PeTA (more on that name later) saying "Hey, this text is going to anyone we know who knows anything about cameras and picture taking and stuff. If you would be willing to take some pictures for us, that would be wonderful. Unfortunately, we wouldn't be able to pay you with anything but love and giving you credit for the pictures. But you would get lots and lots of both!"

PeTA lives on the 3rd floor of my building, is very, very sweet, is actually named Devan, and is a vegan, so he very quickly turned into PeTA (not sure about the random capitalization, but whatever). Anyways, when he said "anyone we know", he was referring to him and his band, The Biggest Stunt. When I got that text, I had just found out that I'd gotten a really good final grade in my Photography class, so I was definitely in the photographing mood. I responded that I would love to help, and it was on from there.

So yesterday, my dad happened to be coming to my city anyways, so he brought his nice Pentax digital SLR to let me use. I was pumped. So around three or so, PeTA showed up with his band, consisting of Cory (lead guitar/vocals), Romeo (guitar), Chase (drums/vocals), and himself (bass). We had a fun day of shooting at many various locations, and some of them turned out a lot more like "best friend" pictures than band pictures, but they were fun anyways. The guys were an absolute riot to work with, and I was having the time of my life. After we got done exploring sets around town, we went back to Cory's house so they could practice, and I could get some pictures of them actually playing. A lot of those ones actually turned out really, really awesome. Plus, I got to hear them play!

Later, PeTA told me that he was shocked at how well I was able to get everyone to work with me. He was expecting to get maybe one good picture, but I assure you--we got plenty. We took over 270 pictures, and it was tough having to choose the best ones. Below are some of my favorite ones (after editing). The one at the very bottom is one of PeTA (and Romeo in the background) that I absolutely love. He isn't a big fan of it, but for some reason I just really love how it turned out. Sooo I voted it into the finals. (: By the way, the music they play is "melodic metal" (I think that's what they called it?). So it's a lot of really heavy guitar, but to be honest... I actually really liked it. Is that weird? Anyways, I just thought it was interesting, because even if someone tried to judge any of these guys by the way they look, these are actually some of the coolest people I know. They were also very polite and considerate, and were not quiet about their appreciation for me taking their pictures. By the end of the day, my self-esteem was taking a walk in a lovely park with these fine fellows. (:

Found this in a graveyard of signs. Probably the coolest photo set ever.
"We don't need metal to play metal." Ha. Good one!

Love you guys. (:

Take me home.

2010-12-04T00:25:00.003-07:00

I think I'm just about tired of school for the time being. Finals are coming up next week, and I am half-prepared for them. Unfortunately, this week has been more stressful on me mentally and emotionally than finals week could ever have a chance at being. I'm just ready to have a break from school and go home and spend time with my family. I miss them a lot. Especially my mama. She's really cute. Just look at her.

Come here, Christmas. And also birthday. I want you now.

Ill.

2010-11-12T22:19:00.000-07:00

I have been quite sick this week.

Now I am not.

Thank goodness for that.

Seriously?

2010-11-03T13:42:00.002-06:00

I have literally worn a different outfit to every single one of my classes today. If I can't even decide what clothes to wear, even after I've already been dressed for 6 hours, how am I supposed to decide what I want to do with the rest of my life?

Oh college. How you outwit me.

Why do I do this to myself?

2010-10-28T22:02:00.008-06:00

This is why I never scrapbook. Because once I get an idea in my head and I actually get going on it... there is no stopping me. And there is certainly no stopping if it isn't perfect.

You might have seen my room recently. Pretty much my entire wall (and then some) was covered with pictures in a checkerboard pattern. But I realized the other night that I didn't like the set up anymore, for several reasons. a) I barely talk to most of the people that were on there. b) When I did this at home, SOOO many pictures fell off the wall, and I was always too lazy to fix it. So I'd have empty spaces all over the place, and it was just really ugly. c) I just needed a change. So I got pictures of my best friends (plus my car and a band... I needed them to complete the pattern), some of my family, and my missionaries.

I choose not to disclose exactly how long it took me to make the Friends, Family, & Missionaries labels. It's rude to let your OCD show in public, you know. Let's just say there came a point where I was praying Lindy would come home so I would have a reason to quit and just go to bed.

I decided to do something special for the missionary section. I gave all of the guys (T-Dub, Trent Howard from Freedom Academy, Mark, Tyrell, Mike, and Thomas... I know Tyrell doesn't leave for like 2 more weeks, but I just decided to put him up there so I wouldn't have to go through this again when he actually does leave. haha) their own little nametags. Sometime in the near future, I plan on putting their addresses up there as well. I think it'll be a little more encouragement for me to write to them. /:

Since Mark left most recently (he went into the MTC yesterday... sad face.), and since his nametag turned out to be my favorite, I'll share that one with you.

So yeah. Basically, I've come to the following conclusion: I do enjoy crafty things, and I like to think I'm kind of good at them. But in reality... I get WAY too stressed over perfecting the dumbest little things, so for the sake of my blood pressure and life expectancy, I'm going to keep the scrapbooking to a minimum.

2010-10-19T11:45:00.003-06:00

Jennifer is sad.

Why?

Best Friend Kyle is gone all week.

Jennifer doesn't really know what to do.

Jennifer must now resort to math homework as a source of entertainment.

Best Friend Kyle is usually Jennifer's lunch buddy.

Jennifer must now eat lunch alone.

Stupid Best Friend Kyle ruined Jennifer's week.

Jennifer is sad.

FINALLY!

2010-10-14T15:57:00.003-06:00

For the first time since I can remember, I finally, finally, have fast internets! I was so excited when I came to college, because I thought I would be getting rid of slow internet for good... I was so wrong. For some reason, Lindy and I have pretty much the only room in the entire building that has slow internet. On a good day, we MIGHT have 3 bars.

Eventually, we'd had enough. So Lindy made an appointment for a techie guy to come fix our internet. Obviously, he couldn't do much about fixing our signal. But he set us up so that we just had to buy some Ethernet cables and call it good. So even though I am, once again, plugged into the wall to get internet, it's finally fast. And the good news is that we can still use the wireless if we want to go into the kitchen or the study room.

So what do I have to say about that? WHOO!!!!!!!!

My favorite thing.

2010-10-12T00:27:00.001-06:00

Thank you, Wal Mart. For cheap peanut butter.

One time.

2010-10-04T18:54:00.004-06:00

Recently, Jasmine and I have been hanging out with some friends named Tim and Ben. On Saturday, they invited us to go rappelling in the canyon with them and two other friends. Neither of us were exactly experienced with rappelling, but we decided to go for it anyways. It ended up being a LOT of fun! It was definitely sketchy, no doubt about that. But it was a heck of a lot better than sitting in my room and watching ESPN all day on Saturday. (:

We just like to take pictures of all of our adventures. (:

Yeah... we were kind of high up. That's our van.

Aaaaand there goes Tim.

MAN I'm awesome!

Definition of Jennifer

2010-09-28T11:37:00.004-06:00

So I walked into the commons and saw a bunch of people sittin on the couch and they were all laughing. So I went and sat down, and Kevin said "Okay, Jennifer's turn" and pulls out his iPhone. Turns out, Kevin was putting everyone's names in turn into urbandictionary.com to see what they were defined as on there. These were the top results for Jennifer. (Pretty accurate, I'd say...)

1. A fun, outgoing person. Generally smart but can be a total blonde at times. Someone who likes meeting new people and smiles a lot. A person who never would just turn on people. A very good friend. Someone you can trust. When she's mad, stand clear she might blow her top. But a person who doesn't get mad easily so you don’t have to worry about that.

She always smiles! She is such a Jennifer.

2. She has the most beautiful eyes and hair. She smells that of a fall evening, and her voice will typically seranade you.

What is it about those Jennifers that always intrigue me

3. A really sexy, funny, smart girl that every guy wants.

Dang, you lucky duck, your gf is a total Jennifer!

4. A funny girl. Really smart, and usually doesn’t act her age (whether it is acting older or younger). Jennifers have amazing eyes, and love to laugh and smile. They generally enjoy the finer things in life. They have trouble showing their feelings, and take some time to warm up to new people. They don't trust easily, but that shouldn't stop you from trusting them, they are very trustworthy. They need someone who will listen to them and give their honest opinion. Jennifers are very blunt, and speak their minds often. They are caring and usually very sexy. They know how to flirt in a very subtle way that drives men crazy. They know how to get what they want. Jennifers are very good friends.

Man: Dude, I met the most amazing girl today. She's funny, and smart, and has amazing eyes.

Man2: Yeah man, cool. What's her name?

Man: Jennifer

Definitely lovin that. Mine was the only one of the immediate group I was with that didn't have anything negative. (:

Cedar South Swag

2010-09-27T23:07:00.004-06:00

SUU currently has a flag football tournament going on. They announced it several weeks ago in order to give people a chance to get a team together and maybe throw the ball around a bit. However, what they didn’t know at the time of announcing was exactly how seriously Cedar Hall South was going to take it.

We have a lot of boys in Cedar South that played football in high school and really, really miss it dearly. The person that sticks out the most in my mind is my best friend Kyle. He was kind of a football star in high school and would’ve played for SUU, but he threw out his shoulder over the summer and has to sit it out for this year. So anyways, our boys got EXTREMELY pumped about it. I mean… they held practices, made plays, held tryouts, attempted to get jerseys (they ended up just deciding that everyone on the team had to wear basketball shorts and a gray shirt), assigned offensive/defensive coordinators and a head coach, got a team name (Cedar South Shockers), and a team cheer (“OH MY GOSH!”… yeah we won’t go into the back story of that one). Basically, these guys have just been lovin life ever since they’ve found something to do.

As you might have guessed, the tournament started today. Kyle (head coach… ha) designated me to be the team photographer, so here are some of the ones I got. I wish I didn’t just have a little point-and-shoot, but… ah well. Work with what you’ve got, I s’pose?

Hike!

Yeeah... Carter is TOTALLY in the zone...

Nice catch by Mama Matt!

Biggest fans. (:

Cedar South Shockers' cheer section. (Jasmine says she looks dumb in this picture... but I disagree vehemently when compared to PeTA.)

Best friend/head coach. (:

Me and That Guy! (We really are friends, and he really does have a name that I really do know. But he's just always been That Guy to me. haha) Cedar South Shockers got Cedar South Swag.

He made a point to wipe some of that stuff on my face as soon as I took this picture. Great guy, right?

We've just got some good times goin for us here. (:

Crap.

2010-09-20T15:01:00.001-06:00

There is a corn flake floatin around somewhere in my computer.

Not sure what to do about that.

Because We're Awesome.

2010-09-16T18:16:00.007-06:00

Once upon a time, my friend Jasmine and I were wandering around the Centrum before Photography started, because we were a little bit early. And also because I had a Lifewater that was absolutely impossible to open, so I was on the lookout for someone who could open the stupid thing for me, preferably a guy that I already knew. So we sat down on a bench while I was wrestling the bottle cap (I’m serious, that crap was welded on there), and some guy came out of a room across the hall and was like “Are you going to be on the show?” Jasmine and I were baffled, so we just said “Um… no…?” Which came with a response from the guy saying “Well you can’t sit on that bench unless you’re going to be on the show.” Then some other guy came out from the room behind him and said “Don’t listen to anything he says. He’s just trickin ya.”

The first guy was named Nate, and Jasmine and I ended up talking to him for a minute, and we all just kind of hit it off. We were just joking around and teasing each other, just doing what I always do. Turns out, this Nate guy is in a radio broadcasting class and he has his own hour on SUU’s radio station (Power 91.1… if you’re interested. Haha) in the mornings, and he asked Jasmine and I if we’d like to be guest speakers on his show. And we said “Well… why the heck not?” So he gave us an assignment to research some stuff online and to come with an opinion to voice on the radio the next morning.

So this morning at 6:45, Jasmine and I headed over to the radio station place and sat in the waiting area of the station. And waited. And waited some more. Finally, at approximately 7:07, Nate showed up and actually looked surprised to see us. Of course we gave him crap for it, but we eventually got the ball rolling, and we had an hour of air time!

Jasmine and I waiting for Nate... we look torn. Don't judge us. (:
Radio head!
This was on the machine that they use to interview people with vocabularies that are well-known to be... colorful. I saw it while we were live on air, and I had to turn away from the microphone because I was just giggling. (:

The topic that we were assigned to research is a non-profit organization called Clean Media United. Basically, it’s a group dedicated to the cause of clean positive media in all of it’s forms. So they’re against like profanity, violence, sex/nudity, etc. in movies, TV shows, radio shows, music, books, and any other kind of media you can think of. It’s really pretty interesting. For more information, you can visit cleanmediaunited.org, search Clean Media United on YouTube, or join the Clean Media United group on Facebook. I’m on there. (: This does sound like a commercial, but I promise this wasn’t part of the deal for me getting to be on the radio. I just think it’s a really good thing, and I’m a big fan of the whole organization.

Anyways, the whole experience was just fun. Nate would show us how the different gadgets worked, he let us request songs to put on in between our talking time, and we just had a fun time talking and everything. He even let me borrow the CD that the show was recorded on, so I got to put that on my laptop to have forever and ever. (: It’s awesome! It was just a fun day. Especially since one of my life dreams has always been to have my own radio show, so this kind of contributed to that aspiration. Good times. (:

Definitions.

2010-09-08T01:22:00.003-06:00

So there I was, laying in bed trying to sleep after a long hard day. Unfortunately, I tend to think when I go to sleep. And this time, I actually build half of a blog post in my brain before I finally said "FINE. I'll type it up just to get it out of my head." So here we go. This is the kind of thing I think about as I'm falling asleep at night. So it has potential to sound both abstract and infantile.

For anyone that knows me, you know I love words. I love spelling them, I love learning new ones, I love using the big ones, I like overusing some... I just like words. A lot. I love knowing the difference between words like whether/weather, they're/there/their, to/too/2 (which is NOT a word, so don't ever use it as such. Not even in texting!), which/witch, etc. I also am a fan of punctuation. Soo knowing the difference between its/it's, we're/were, he'll/hell, she'll/shell, we'll/well... you get the idea.

One word in particular has been standing out to me lately. You are probably very familiar with it. Some more than others. You use it on a daily basis, some (like me) on a minutely basis.

"Like."

This word bears various degrees of significance based on your generation. For instance, I use the word "like" astronomically more than my father does. I also use it for multiple definitions. This is the part where I tell you all the different kinds of "likes" there are.

Comparison like: "Holy cow... that lady looks just like Dustin Hoffman. How unfortunate."
Approval like: "Hey! I like that skirt a lot!"
Filler like: "Well he was like 'Do you want to go out?' and I was like 'I don't know, do you?' and he was like 'Whatever.' So now I'm just like... what?"
Action like: "I feel like smashing a bowl of porridge into your currently gaping face."
Emotional like: "Dude, I'm really starting to like the guy down the hall a lot."

That last one is the one I'm going to discuss further. For a lot of people, to "like" someone is to pick out your favorite person out of a large body of people and treat them as such. You pay more attention to them, you find them the most attractive, you want to spend time with them, etc.

However, it has come to my attention over the past several years that this particular "L" word is about as difficult as me to apply to myself as the even bigger, meaner "L" word. My personal definition of "liking someone" is as follows:

Liking someone: When, out of the vastly wide variety of people you know, there is one person who sticks out in your mind at all times. When they are literally all you can think about. When you truly do not want to spend time with anyone of the opposite gender besides that person. When you can see yourself being in an actual relationship with that person.

See? My version is a little more intense than the average definition. (Oh, and just for the record, this hasn't been brought on by anything in particular. I mean, I haven't just started "liking" someone which inspired me to do this. I just was thinking about it.) So using this explanation, I find it interesting that throughout my entire high school career, I have only "liked" two or three people. The last one, I began diggin him around the start of my senior year, and it took a very, very long time to get over him. But when I did like him, I found absolutely no interest in talking to other boys, which ultimately screwed me over, because I lost a few friends along the way. Which sucks. But still, he was the person that I cared about the most, so I consider him to be someone that I legitimately "liked."

Obviously, I'm a human being, and I have had a few crushes here and there over time. To me, a "crush" is just someone that I think is exceptionally cute and awesome, but I wouldn't really ever consider dating exclusively. Therefore, I don't have a problem with having multiple crushes. In fact, I have at least 3 or 4 right now. But I don't "like" anyone, because that would mean I was interested in dating only that one person, and not in anyone else at all.

I really don't know why I'm sharing all this right now. Probably because I just want to get it out of my head and into my blog. This is one of those things that goes through my head and comes out online. But what can ya do? That's what I get for having my own laptop and fast internet and insomnia.

And just for kicks and gigs, here's a nice crazy picture of me by best friend Kyle.

Getting better.

2010-09-04T16:02:00.002-06:00

I guess the combination of having my own laptop and having fast(er) internet has resulted in me wanting to blog about anything and everything. This one is just me showing off how thrifty I am. (:

This first picture is--ready?--my calendar! My RA had one like this hanging up in the hall to let everyone know about the activities going on this week. And I was very intrigued by it, so I decided to make one for myself that showed whenever I have homework due and birthdays and such. I'm pretty proud of it. (: Funny story about the September label: I didn't have any cute colored paper, so that yellow paper is actually my French syllabus that I got the first day of school. (: hehe I'm so crafty.

This next picture is of my homemade bike basket. Whenever I go somewhere, I always need the following: my keys (because my lock needs a key... life would be so much easier if it was a combination lock. haha), my phone, my T-Card (to get back into my building), money, and sometimes my camera. However, that is WAY to much to fit into my pocket, not really enough to make it worth bringing my big ol' backpack, and if I put it all in my regular shoulder bag, then the bag just hangs exactly where my knees hit when they go up and down on the pedals. So this was my solution: the bag that my top sheet for my bed came in. (: I just put the light stuff in it (I didn't want to risk putting my phone and camera in there, then having the snap come loose and have everything hit the pavement at 15 mph.) and snapped it shut around the middle of the handlebars. It actually worked really well! I looked a little stupid at Lin's when I was trying to dig a $10 bill out of a sheet bag, but whatever. It worked out alright, but I really think I would rather have an actual basket that I could just put my purse in while riding. Ah well. It's good for now. (:

What can I say? I'm a problem solver. (:

2010-09-01T19:17:00.002-06:00

This is how I spend my time at college.

Being sad because I have tons and tons and tons of math homework to do all the time.

This is how Kyle spends his time at college.

Rubbing in my face the fact that I always have homework and he is allowed to frolick and play as he pleases.

Stupid math.

The First Week

2010-08-28T21:32:00.004-06:00

The original intent for this post was to be a blow-by-blow replay of my first week of classes. But in reality, I am actually at college still, and I have actual homework to be done, so it's gonna be a quickie.

For starters, I love my classes. The only one I don't exactly love (Math 1010, duh) isn't even too bad, because it's the same math I took in 10th grade. Plus, there are four other people from my high school in there, and one girl that I went to Freedom Academy with and I really like her. The rest of my classes are Psychology 1110, Art 1050 (aka Photography), and two freshmen courses that are required. My Tuesdays and Thursdays are AWESOME... I only have math, which is from 10-11. Then I get to spend the rest of the day catching up on homework from the day before. Joy. (:

Second, I absolutely LOVE living in the dorms. I used to be kind of embarassed by that, but now I like to rub in my friends' faces the fact that not only do I not have to cook for myself, I live less than 4 minutes away from my first class (walking), but I also make it a regular thing of making new friends every day. I do have my little group of friends that I hang out with on a regular basis, but I still can just walk by the common area, see some people watching TV, and just go chill with them and be friends after an episode of Family Guy.

It was still a fun week, though. On Thursday night, I got to go see The Maine perform in St. George with my friends Kyle (friend from my floor), Starms, Mark, Kevin, and Chandler. The ride there was...... interesting. And the concert itself was AWESOME! I really love The Maine. I had only showed them to Kyle the day before the concert, but then he went all crazy and was like "alksje;lfajsldjs I LOVE THE MAINE!" so he really wanted to go. It was an adventure indeed. (:

Me and Kyle in the middle of the action.

Unfortunately, this is the best picture I have of the actual concert. There was too much jumping around to be able to hold my phone/camera still.
So basically, it was a successful week. We're awesome.

College...

2010-08-22T12:17:00.003-06:00

For anyone that hasn't read my dad's post on our family blog, I'll let you know now: I'm finally all moved in at college. Today is Sunday, and I arrived here on Thursday. And in those few days, I've gotten to be better friends with several people that came here from my own high school, and I've also made a ton of friends on my floor. In particular, I have a group of friends that lives on my floor that include me, one other girl, and three boys. We've all gotten to be pretty good friends, which is awesome because none of us have ever had any previous connection to the other. Two of the boys aren't even from this state, so they came here knowing absolutely no one. The four of them think it's silly that I can pretty much walk anywhere on campus and see someone that I went to high school with. (:

Alright well I'm actually getting ready to go to church, so this is going to be a short one. It'll be interesting to see what it's going to be like to go to church in a Young Single Adult ward... /:

But first! Some photos for your viewing enjoyment.

This is the Carter Carillon clock tower. I took this while there was a seemingly endless stream of freshmen walking underneath it from west to east. The idea is that after that first day, you don't ever walk under the clock tower until you graduate, then you walk under it from north to south (or south to north...?). Then there were walls of people on either side clapping and high fiving. It felt like a freaking rock star.
My cute, cute bedspread, courtesy of my cute, cute grandma. (:

All the freshmen got shirts and we got to tie dye them. Mine was legit. (:

My RA (Resident Assistant) decided to decorate the hall with monsters. This is the one for my on my dorm door. (: It's because I am just so double smiley!

Heck Yeah Summer!

2010-08-11T08:30:00.000-06:00

I know this is a really stupid looking picture, but whatever. The point is, this picture is from.... ready?

Warped Tour!

That’s right folks, I went to my first Warped Tour this year! For those of you who don’t know what it is, it’s very simple: it’s a tour. With bands. The end. The girls and I have been planning on going together for an extremely long time now, but it didn’t quite end up working out that way. On the way up to Salt Lake, it was me, Brianna, Chanelle, her boyfriend Kelin, and my friend Carter. It was kind of a random thing to have Carter there, but he really wanted to get a ride up, so we were willing to tote him along.

We decided that we’d rather go up on Friday (the concert was on Saturday) than get up at like 5 am on Saturday to go, so everyone loaded up Chanelle’s van (which, by the way, is the only vehicle I ever want to take on a road trip again. It is AWESOME) after I got off work on Friday and headed on up! My dear sweet kind loving brother Keith and his equally fantastic wife Rachelle were gracious enough to allow me and my four friends stay in their house for the night. It was really kind of a last minute thing, so I really appreciate them putting up with us, despite my lack of planning. (:

The next day, the boys (Carter, Kelin, and Keith) stayed at the house while Rachelle, Brianna, Chanelle, and I headed for the Gateway to do some shopping, since Chanelle had never been there. We met up with Chelsea while shopping, and eventually were able to successfully kill a couple of hours before Warped Tour started at 11. When the time came, we all headed back to the house, said our goodbyes to our incredible hosts, and took the van to the fairgrounds. For some reason, we decided to park the van behind someone’s house that was offering parking for $7. I’m really not sure why we chose to park in a sketchy lookin back yard, when there was a perfectly good parking lot at the fairgrounds, and it only cost $5. Weird.

I wish I could literally relive the entire day for you. It was just so incredible! Some of the bands I ended up seeing (if you don’t recognize some or any of the following names, don’t feel bad) Hey Monday, Every Time I Die, Reel Big Fish, Fake Problems (more on that later), Riverboat Gamblers, Andrew W.K., The Cab, Mayday Parade (also more on that later), and probably a lot more. And in between shows, you could always walk around to the bands booths, buy their stuff, and possibly meet the band. Or if you were REALLY lucky, you and your friends would just be strollin around and have some guy come up to you and start talking ridiculously fast about why smoking sucks, then find out he works for the anti-smoking TRUTH campaign. He was funny. (: And after only a minute or five of our time, we ended up getting free shirts and suspenders!

So about Fake Problems. Recently, they’ve become one of my favorite bands. They just have a really unique sound, and the guy has a crazy sounding voice, but in a good way. They also wrote the song "Heck Yeah Summer", which this post is named. They have another one that's awesome and it's called "Life's A Drink, Get Thirsty!" Anyways, Chelsea, Brianna, and I were just walking around enjoying the essence of Warped Tour when I heard a familiar voice. Lo and behold, Fake Problems! I had no idea they were going to be there. So we went to their stage, and there were only like 20 other people there, if that. So we were very close to the stage. So close, in fact, that while I got some video footage of it on my phone, you can see in the video that the lead singer (Chris Farren I think is his name) like acknowledge the fact that I’m taking video and play it up. It’s sweet! So I just have this video of him pretty much singing to me. Meanwhile, there was a guy walking around selling their latest album for $5. I thought “well I’m just going to buy this eventually, where it’ll probably be like $10. Might as well get it now.” So I did. After their set was over, we went back to their tent/booth thing just to see what kind of shirts they had, and what did I find instead? Chris Farren and Derek Perry (bassist)! I asked them to please sign my CD, and they were very excited to do so. Then, looking around and seeing that there wasn’t really anyone else at all interested in meeting these fellows, I asked if they took pictures. They both smiled real big and said “Well yeah! We’d love to take a picture with you!” So Mr. Perry moved aside the assortment of shirts to let me behind the table and into the booth, and we got this sweet picture!

Seriously, those guys were so cool. I hope they're at Warped Tour next year.

This was the CD i had them sign. The album is It's Great To Be Alive.

MAN I love those guys! That made the entire trip for me. They were really sweet, too. And I’m just gonna say this, but I did not expect Chris Farren to be that hot. Judging from his voice, I thought he’d be just like this grubby middle-aged man. But he can’t be older than MAYBE his mid-twenties, and he was very clean shaven and attractive. The guy from The Cab, on the other hand—total opposite. He has a really sexy voice, but looks like a cross between Justin Timberlake and an Ewok. (The JT part isn’t really a compliment.)

This is Fake Problems performing. If you can see Chris Farren's face up close, he looks just like my friend Keith. It's awesome. (:

We had predetermined that we were going to leave after Mayday Parade performed at 6, because a couple of people in our group needed to get home ASAP for various reasons. That story is a good one… Mayday Parade was one of the most popular bands at Warped Tour, so I’m really not sure why they didn’t get the main stage. Anyways, I sacrificed seeing Anarbor just so I could get to the stage that Mayday Parade would play on like half an hour early. First mistake. I got a liiiiiittle too close to the front, so I had the entire weight of everyone behind me shoving me into the people in front of me when the band came out. That was awesome and all, but also quite stressful. At one point, the lead singer said that he would give a high-five to any crowd surfers who made it to the front. That created a frenzy of people jumping on top of the crowd, most of them bashing me in the head/face with their nasty concert feet. At one point, some guy tried to pick me up and throw me on top of the crowd but I wasn’t havin any of that nonsense. After the first song, Brianna and I just had to move back. We ended up somewhere in the middle of the crowd which ended up not being too bad. Other than the whole “do I have a black eye from that one?” thing, the concert was pretty rad. Everyone was singing along and being awesome… man I love Mayday Parade. (:

We did leave after them, which ended up sucking for me, because Dropkick Murphys was at like 8, and they ended up being a sick concert. They did “Shipping Up to Boston” and “The Dirty Glass”, which are two of my favorite songs by them. Also, they allowed some fans to get up on the stage with the band at one point, two of which were my friends Chasen and Jod. But still, we had a fun drive home, which Chelsea came on this time. (:

Conclusion: Warped Tour is definitely something to look forward to next summer.

P.S. I move next week. Whoo!

2010-07-12T14:25:00.000-06:00

Only in a small town would you see a repairman using a tractor to deliver your refrigerator. Good grief.

Fly.

2010-07-06T09:11:00.000-06:00

It’s common knowledge that certain songs remind different people of particular events, time periods, other people, feelings, relationships, whatever. It never ceases to amaze me at what kinds of things a certain song can dredge up from the deepest corners of my mind and soul. Examples:

1: Any song from “A Muppet Christmas Carol” will send me hurling back in time until I land on my couch on 307 E. 14^th St. on Christmas Eve, getting pumped for the next morning. It has been proven that if I don’t watch that movie at least once during the month of December, I literally will not get into the Christmas Spirit. At. All.

2: “The Hotel Song” by Regina Spektor will always and forever remind me of Carley and Chelsea singing that song on every single softball trip we ever went on as freshmen. For some reason, they latched onto that song like it was candy, invented dance moves and everything to go with it, and sang it on every trip. I had that song memorized before I ever even heard the version done by Regina Spektor herself.

3: “My Life Would Suck Without You” will, in my mind, always belong to Rhees. This Kelly Clarkson single was released during the first EdNet class I had with him, and he sang it pretty much every single day. What a guy.

4: “The Longer the Waiting” by Josh Turner, “Kiss Me Thru The Phone” by Soulja Boy Tell ‘Em (don’t judge, please), and “Vanilla Twilight” by Owl City were the three most prominent songs in a long-distance relationship that I had a while ago. Whenever one of these sneak up on me when I’m not expecting it, I tend to start thinking about the person with whom I had this relationship, which is never, ever a good thing for me to do in excess. So every time I hear one of these songs, I usually have to skip it if I can because they tend to bum me out for obvious reasons.

5: “Paper Planes” by M.I.A. was the favorite song of the summer of 2008. That was the last summer that Ashley, Nikiah and I were together. Nikiah moved that fall, and Ashley and I kind of had a falling out the following summer of 2009. Ever since then, nothing has ever been the same. But that summer, the three of us were together constantly. And one of our favorite activities was to drive my big green Dodge Dakota around town and blast this song, attempting to sing along, even though we didn’t know what most of the words were even saying. To this day, I can’t sing along with this song without doing the hand motions that Ashley and I invented.

Moving on: my inspiration for this blog is to be blamed on Sugar Ray. A few days ago, I was just messin around on iTunes and found “Fly” by Sugar Ray. All I had to do was think about the chorus in that song, and I was taken back. For some reason, whenever I hear this song I get this image of me sitting on the floor of the girls’ bedroom in Lumberton playing with Barbie dolls while Sarah’s radio was on. Basically, “Fly” by Sugar Ray is the song of the ‘90s for me. You’d think it’d be something by the Backstreet Boys or Ricky Martin or the Spice Girls or Britney Spears or N’Sync or any number of other overplayed pop artists of the ‘90s that would be engrained into my tiny 6-year-old brain for the rest of my life. But no, it was that one song. I’m pretty sure I even remember the music video.

Anyway, I was just thinking about that song and how it can somehow force my entire childhood’s worth of memories into four minutes and fifty-three seconds, and it seemed like a good thing to share. Now for feedback: what songs remind you of particular events? Stages in your life? Holidays? Relationships? Please, share. (:

Decisions decisions.

2010-07-02T13:21:00.000-06:00

I wish I knew what to do with myself. As of right now, I am an undeclared major. Brianna is a science major, Chelsea is a psychology major, Carley is majoring in something to do with humanities/service or something like that… I don’t think Chanelle has a declared major yet. But still! My point is, I am way too indecisive. Let’s take a journey throughout my past “dream careers”, shall we? I’ll go in chronological order, assuming I can remember all of them.

The first profession I remember wanting to pursue was to be a kindergarten teacher. But that was around the time when I was actually in kindergarten, and I thought we were the bomb dot com. Fast forward about thirteen years, and I can’t stand any children that I have no direct connection to. For instance: offspring of family members, younger siblings of friends, kids in my ward, my own kids [eventually]… that’s about it. Other than that, I pretty much don’t dig kids.

Next, I wanted to do nothing but be a marine biologist. But that was before I knew exactly what “biologist” even meant. I just saw “Zeus and Roxanne” and decided that all I wanted to do with my life was play with dolphins. It was a good idea at the time, but then a certain sibling of mine who shall remain nameless (I’ll let you all stew in the guilt of wondering if it was you) told me that when you’re a marine biologist, you have to dissect dolphins. That was the end of that dream.

I did have a brief phase when I wanted to be a car mechanic. That was also my Mustang obsession phase, so I think we can see the connection there.

Another short commitment to plans was when I wanted to be a radio DJ. I still think that’d be freaking sweet, and I would have a hard time saying no if the opportunity was literally thrown in my face. But I don’t have a whole lot of motivation to go out of my way to pursue that particular career.

A few years ago, I began weighing the options that psychology would give me. I considered being a school counselor/therapist, child psychologist, and the most recent version was Marriage & Family Counseling. That was actually very recently, to the point where I’m already signed up to take Psychology 1110 at school, and it is my top choice to major in. (Psychology, that is.)

Unfortunately, my own relationship problems kind of shut down most of my hopes of being able to fix other peoples’ relation issues in a professional setting. Ah well. A few weeks ago, I began wondering what it would be like to open and own my own coffee shop. Yes, I did just make a post about how sick I am of my job, but that’s not my point. I just love the idea of owning my own shop, but I don’t know how realistic it would be. For one, I don’t drink coffee, so I wouldn’t be much good in being able to judge how good my own products would be. For another, a certain parent of mine who shall remain nameless pointed out that a huge majority of restaurants fail within the first two years. Plus, I would have to get a business degree, which I’m not sure I’d have a whole lot of motivation to do.

And that leads us to now, where I am wondering what kind of schooling it would take to become a makeup artist. Yes, I know that’s cliché for a teenage girl to say, but whatever. It struck me today while I was watching “America’s Next Top Model” and “What Not to Wear” with Chelsea that all I ever look at when I watch TV and movie is the makeup on the people on there. I mean, my favorite part of “WNtW” is when Carmendie gets to transform people with makeup. A common misconception by people, especially those who believe that they don’t want to cover up their “real selves” is that makeup does just that: cover up who you are. But the truth is, makeup is not made to change the way you look. It is designed to enhance the natural beauty that you already have. It only begins to hurt your image when you abuse it, like wearing way too much eyeliner or foundation or whatever. See? I guarantee no one could care about this nearly as much as I do, but that’s because I really like it. So as of this moment right now, my “dream job” is to be a makeup artist on some kind of show, be it a sitcom, reality show, game show, the news, etc. I like the idea of being able to bring out someone’s beauty that they already have, and I’ve already had some experience with friends. Shoot, I’m practically already a professional! Now, my only problem is to figure out a major to fit this dream career, and to see if I can stick out this drive until I know for sure if I really want to it or not… /:

Long time coming.

2010-07-01T11:18:00.000-06:00

For the past two years, I have been one of those obnoxious people that hear someone else complaining about their job, then I'd jump in and say "Ha! Sucks for you! My job is the bomb dot com!" However, the magic of being a barista in a small town has slowly, but surely been wearing off over time. Ever since I began working full-time again (well, as full time as I can get, considering the hours), I've started to realize how much I would rather be home sleeping. Or eating. Or running. Or doing anything other than working. It's not that I don't like the people I work with (they're really actually pretty cool), and I still like what I do, and I've always hated European tourists that don't speak English, so that can't be the difference... I don't know. I wonder if I'm just impatient to move and just go to school full time. I'm getting pretty antsy.

I think part of my problem is that I have an awful lot of pet peeves that are making work a very stressful place for me to be. As some of you may know, I'm a very irritable person. Some of my work pet peeves are:

--When the door to the pastry case gets left open.
--When the steampots don't get rinsed out right away.
--When there are espresso grounds left all over the counter.
--Seeing coffee drips on the cupboard doors.
--When people expect me to wait on them, when there is a sign above the register clearly stating "ORDER HERE."
--Having to bus tables. That is not my job.
--Customers who don't speak English, and refuse to even try.
--Dishwater that has food floaties in it. Gross.
--Annoying music.

I really do have issues with getting irate very easily. But oh well... what can ya do? Only like 5 or 6 more weeks, then I get to go to college and blow all the money I have worked so hard for. Yay.

Big fan.

2010-06-25T19:22:00.000-06:00

For the past several months, two of my friends have been embarking on an adventure called---making a band. These two friends then collected another friend of mine, so now there are three band members, and this band happens to be called...

Is that abusing my former power as Student Body Public Relations officer and the use of the school marquee? Perhaps. But it was worth it, because that is my favorite band! These guys are really talented, and I love to just chill with them whenever they have a "jam session." However, due to certain circumstances, their fame and glory will have to be postponed for approximatly two years. But let me tell you what, they're gonne be sooooomethin else when they come home. Here's to Member This Day. (:

(This is only the two original members of the band. The third one is currently in Michigan, and will be there for the next month. Bleh.)

I love you guys. (:

Chupacabra fiiiiiiight!!!

2010-06-17T14:46:00.000-06:00

I know, I know, I KNOW I suck at blogging! But you see... I'm extremely lazy, and have been ultra busy the past... however long it's been since I posted last. And while I do feel bad about not telling y'all about my awesome sauce senior trip, and also about graduation (which the majority of people who read this blog actually attended)... I'm afraid i feel disinclined to fill you in now. Sorry, but like I said... I'm kind of a bum. /:

In other news! I got my laptop, finally. Thanks to everyone who sent me dollars for graduation, because that's what paid for this feller. It's so cute though! Let's take a look, shall we?

See? Cute things. (: Anyways, I've been playin with it pretty much every spare second I have. But really, can you blame me?

Anyways, I s'pose I'll give you an update while I'm at this blogging thing. Like I said, I graduated last month, so I'm kinda just chillin for the time being. Well... not entirely. I'm still working at the little coffee shop that I've been at since two summers ago. As of last Friday, I am now the longest standing employee there. /: Yikes. I'm pretty much working every day, with a few exceptions throughout the summer that allow me to have vacation/college orientation/dentist appointments/dates. Yes, brothers, dates. I'm eighteen, get over it. (;

I'll be moving/headed to college in August, by the way. I got lucky and was able to coerce--I mean work it out with a girl in my ward to room with me at school so I don't have to be with a random stranger. However, I have found out the names of the other two girls that will be living in our apartment, and I've never met either one of them. /: Ah well, it's an adventure, right? I'm really excited to go to school, though. As of now, my classes are as follows:

--French 1010 (I am really, really excited for this class...!)
--Math 1010 (Not so much this one.)
--University Studies 1000 (It's a required freshman course)
--Psychology 1110 Lifespan Development
--Library Media (Also a required freshman course. It's mostly online.)

I was in Art 1050, which is an Introduction to Photography class and I was SO pumped for it! Buuuut I had like 18 credit hours... a full load is 15. /: And since I am an undeclared major trying to decide between Psychology and potentially French, I figured I should probably keep those classes. And it'd be a bad idea to drop math, so there went photography. ): Ah well... perhaps I'll take it another year. One of the main reasons I wanted to take it in that particular time slot anyways was so that I could be in a class with someone I knew, because my friend Matt is in there.

Well folks, that's about all I've got for the time being. I think I might be better about blogging now that I have a fun new toy to blog on, but we'll see how that actually goes.

Oops...

2010-05-11T20:04:00.000-06:00

I just realized that I never posted on State Solo & Ensemble. Sorry, folks.

Chanelle and me bein cute in the Beaver dugout...

On April 23rd, the baseball and softball teams had a game in Beaver the day we had to head up north for S&E, so we (I went with softball) went to Beaver for the games, then the music bus picked us up on the way to Salt Lake. The ride to Beaver was fun... Chelsea, Chanelle and I all got the very front seats of the bus. You'd never expect it, but those are actually the best seats for the following reasons (like you care):

• Our bus driver was Brent, and he’s awesome. So we just talked to him the whole time, and he always let us decide where to stop and eat.

• I was able to catch the air from Brent's little personal fan, so I never got too hot.
In this case, we were the farthest we could possibly be from the rancid baseball team.

• Whenever the boys did get too stinky, Brent would spray some air freshener, and we got the effects first.

Also, I heard the funniest story on that trip that I have ever heard in my entire life. Period. This is no exaggeration. I know I laugh at a lot of dumb things, and also at a lot of genuinely hilarious things... but this by far surpasses anything I've ever heard. To prove it, here is a picture of me after a solid 15 minutes of laughing. (Just so you know, I'm actually laughing right now just thinking about that story.)

I know it looks like I'm crying (or, if you’re Taylor Armstrong, like I’m in labor)... but you would be too, if you had just been laughing to your fullest extent for a quarter of an hour. My muscles were in agony... but I just kept laughing.

Moving on. Softball lost their game against Beaver, but baseball won. Whoo! From there, we piled onto the music bus. I ended up having to sit by myself, surrounded by people that I never talk to, so it wasn't a very thrilling ride from Beaver to Salt Lake. Once we got there, though... it was good.

I had the same roommates as I did in California, so it was me, Chelsea, Chanelle, and Jamie. We were so excited that our room had a balcony, so we opened the door an explored. While one of us—I won't say who was in the bathroom, Chanelle decided to close the screen on the door to keep the bugs out. The unfortunate soul that was in the bathroom came out, was still excited about the balcony, was not aware there was a screen in the door to our balcony... and plowed through it. I’ll tell you this much… at the time this occurred, I was plugging my phone into my charger, and Jamie was making her bed. You do the math. Anyways, after we fixed the door, we all headed down to the pool area and had a grand ol' time there until we had to go back to our rooms.

Oh. We have all kinds of fun. We do what we want.

The next day, we all actually got ready to go on time. Weird. We got to Lone Peak High School pretty early, so we had time to run over to Wal Mart and play!

Me and Chelsea found some treasures at Wal Mart...

Chelsea and I had a struggle with our song. The schedule told us that we were supposed to sing in this one room in the seminary building. So we go there, sit, wait… eventually, the judges said “Umm… we don’t have anyone after those girls. We have our lunch break now.” Turns out some of the schedules were messed up on a few events. Ugh. So we ran around like crazy to find our room in the seminary building… no such luck. Finally, after asking around a LOT, we found out we were actually supposed to be singing in the high school. (And for the record, this school is HUGE. So to be running around all over the place in poofy dresses and stilettos is a feat to be challenged. I dare you.) But we had to hurry up and sing our other song (a double quartet, “Cantate Domino”) while we were at the seminary building. THEN me and Chelsea had to haul over to the school. By the time we got to where we were supposed to be, we were like half an hour late and out of breath and dying of thirst… not awesome conditions to be singing at a state level. But we did our best and ended up getting a 1- (the equivalent to an A-), so I guess we didn’t suck as bad as we could have. Oh, and I don’t know if I mentioned it before or not, but she and I sang “Homeward Bound” arranged by Marta Keen.

Immediately after Chelsea and I got done, the whole group had to warm up to perform. We had like 5-10 minutes to do so, so we actually were kind of warming up as we all ran to the auditorium to perform. The performance went alright. I cried at the end, though, because I realized that I would most likely never, ever again compete with a choir. Sad things, huh? Anyways, once we got done I went and sat in the audience with Chelsea and Chanelle so we could watch Millard’s choir which was right after us. You might recall that I have some really good friends from there, and my best of those friends is in that choir. Also, his dad happens to be the director, whom we fondly refer to as Bob, though that’s not actually his name. Fun fact: the director of the Millard Majestic choir is also the man that established/invented X-Press over 20 years ago. Neat things! I really like Bob a lot though, he’s a neat guy. He came in and watched us while we warmed up, and he was kind of goofin off during one of the songs in order to loosen us up and get us more involved in the song. What a guy.

Finally, we were able to go change and grab some longboards. I got to stop and talk to Rendon before we went on our merry way, so that was cool. I don’t get to see that kid nearly enough, I swear! Anyway, me and Chelsea just decided to longboard all over the campus until we had to leave. (Chanelle was tired, so she decided to take a nap on the bus.)

Eventually, it was time to go. After gathering all of our kids and me saying ‘bye to Rendon, we split. This time, I sat with Starms on the bus and he made the trip a lot more interesting. Chelsea came back after a while, and we just had a little party.

I really am going to miss these competitions. State Solo & Ensemble is my favorite competition every year. And this year was no different. (:

It's the final countdown...

2010-04-30T20:04:00.000-06:00

I have less than a month until I graduate. Chelsea, Brianna and I made paper chains with a link for each day until graduation. I showed it to mom, and all she said was: "That chain isn't long enough."

So close. Yet so far.

Here am I

2010-04-11T16:12:00.001-06:00

I realize I get really lazy with my blogging, but here is my defense this time: between going to Salt Lake for spring break, Sterling Scholar, and school in general, things have been CRAZY! This is the first time I've been on a computer in like 2 weeks basically. So yeah... my bad.

First of all, I just want to let you know that Sterling Scholar is now officially OVER! We had the regional competition on Thursday the 11th, where the winners and runners up were decided. Unfortunately, only one kid from my school got anything. But he did win the math category, so that's good. We're all real proud of him. (:

Now on to my main reason for posting: PROM! ......again. About a week ago, my awesome awesome friend Taylor (more commonly referred to as Starmfaund, Starms, Starmy, or Champ) asked me if it would be okay for him to ask me to prom. The reason he had to ask for permission was because he was giving me like a week's notice. I was all for it, so on my way home from Salt Lake last weekend, we stopped by Taylor's friend Craig's house, where Taylor was stationed. I went inside to find Starms with a guitar, and he sang me a song... that he wrote himself! He owes me a recording of the song, because I actually really liked it. The main line went "Jennifer, come out and say 'Taylor, I will go to the prom with you.' We can have the time of our lives. Jennifer, I want to go to the prom with you." It was awesome. To answer, I put together some little "YES" flowers and put them in a flower pot with a note attached saying "Taylor, I'm so glad you PICKED me to go to prom!"

Over the course of the next week, I located a dress and was involved in helping to decide what to do for our day date. Taylor's friend Helaman asked my friend Chanelle to prom, so the four of us were a group for a day date. The plan was to go night boarding at Brian Head the night before prom so we wouldn't have to worry about ending the date on time. I've never been snowboarding before in my life, so I was particularly nervous about night boarding. We left Friday afternoon for Brian Head, and had a fun ride there.

Me and Chanelle in the car... don't ask me why, but this is how my smile looks in every single picture I took that day. Yikes.

Helaman and Taylor... He Man just wasn't up for a picture, I suppose. ha

But such is our luck, we showed up to Brian Head... only to find out that night boarding has been closed for the season. Yikes.

See? There's that face again. But this one was kind of on purpose.

Instead, we decided to head on to Cedar City for our date. We found a little park with some tables and set up our dinner there. After our picnic dinner, we went and found a bowling alley and spent the rest of the night bowling. I have some pictures of that, but they're on Chanelle's camera and I have yet to obtain them. In the end, it was my favorite date of all time. Just the fact that we had to be spontaneous and create our own fun made things so memorable.

Taylor and me at the bowling alley. Gah... that face...

On to Saturday. I had to work that morning, so I left smelling like coffee, bagels, cigarettes, and Clorox. Ah well... such is the nature of my job. After I got off, I went to Chanelle's house to take a shower and deodorize myself. After that, I went to a sophomore girl's house to have her do my hair for me. Then I headed home, did my make up, got dressed, and waited for my date.

Aww how precious...!

That corsage was absolutely gorgeous.

We had dinner at Taylor's house, provided by his mom. Him and He Man forgot to put their names in for the school provided dinner. That turned out to be okay, though, because the dinner we had was super tasty. The dance itself was alright. The juniors this year entered into some contest to win $1000 to spend on prom, and they won. The decorations were actually pretty rad. The theme was "Hollywood Night", and it was rather sweet.

Me and Chanelle at the dance... look how cute she is!

In the end, I had a way good time all around. Starms is literally in the top 5 funniest people I have ever met in my life, and I just love that kid. All in all... I think this prom was astronomically better than my own. But still...

There's nothing better than a good day, except laying down to sleep and knowing you'll remember it for a long, long time.

Meditation

2010-03-24T22:39:00.000-06:00

We had our final practice interviews for Sterling Scholar today. As some of you may know (because I've been venting about this all day), I started out these interviews spectacularly. But as time went on, and as I listened to and heeded the opinions of approximately 30 different people, I kind of began a self-destruction pattern. My interviews got worse and worse. Today was the worst one of all time. I don't know if it's because I'm just trying to please everyone or if I am just strung out beyond all recognition. But either way, it's not good.

Part of my problem is that there is one question I can never answer: "Tell us about yourself." What does that mean? Do I talk about myself in an English sense? Or as a person in general? If I go with the latter, do I talk about myself academically, socially, religiously, personally... what? So I asked the lady that's been helping us with the interviews these questions, and all she told me was "It sounds like you need to get to know yourself better."

I really took that into consideration, and I spent the rest of the day wondering what that meant. Obviously, I'm pretty well acquainted with myself. I know my likes and dislikes, my favorite movies and music, who I dig these days, etc. I wondered what Mrs. Helper Lady meant by "get to know yourself better." So I decided to pull a Joseph Smith and go wandering in nature to find out what was going on with myself. I located my long-lost bicycle, cleaned him up, filled up the tires, and I was off.

I found a nice little place that was far enough off the road that I wouldn't be seen by passing Germans, but not so far that I had to hike very far with my bike. I sat on a blanket and passed the time by reading and responding to some missionary letters, reading my book (East of Eden by John Steinbeck. Quite riveting.), and recording my thoughts.

I don't know if I've exactly "reinvented" myself or anything to that effect. I did not learn anything new about myself. There were no epiphanies great enough to shake the very foundations of my existence. But I did sort out a few thoughts and emotions that I've been struggling with the past couple of months, and it gave me a chance to let go of the awful day I'd been having and allowed me to start over at 4 in the afternoon.

The overall experience gave me a sense that I'd just received a mental massage. Usually "me time" involves a bubble bath and a self-inflicted (yes, inflicted) pedicure and some form of a chick flick. But this was different. This time, it wasn't about making myself feel good. It was about giving some credit to the good feelings that I aleady have that have been overshadowed by the worried, strung-out, depressed feelings brought on by Sterling Scholar, school in general, and whatever else. I don't think this whole meditation thing was a quick-fix to make me suddenly 100% happy all the time, but it really gave me a drive to re-prioritize my life.

I really am a happy person in general. And I guess sometimes, I just need to remind myself of that.

Success!

2010-03-20T14:36:00.001-06:00

We had Region Solo & Ensemble this past Thursday in Beaver, and I'd say it was a pretty successful day. I went with X-Press ton sing 3 songs as a group, plus I had 3 small groups that I was involved in. These were: "Homeward Bound", a duet with my dear good friend Chelsea; "My Shepherd Will Supply My Need", a group with Kelsie, McKenna, Chelsea, Aaron, Matt, and Landon; and "Cantate Domino" with Chelsea, Jamie, Kelsie, Ben, Ian, Matt, and... Andrew I think? Anyways, "Homeward Bound" and "Cantate Domino" both got the highest rating available, so we get to go to State. Unfortunately, "My Shepherd Will Supply My Need" didn't do well enough to move on to state... bummer.

The trip was fun though. As soon as I got there, I went inside the church where the individual groups were performing, then I remembered that I'd left something on the bus. So I turned around and started haulin back up the stairs, but then a pretty solid thing stopped me. I looked up and saw my good friend Rendon! He thought he was pretty funny. But then I just said "Well hi. 'Scuse me." So I hurried past him, only to be trucksticked and bear-hugged by Rendon's little brother, Dallin. By the time I finally got outside, the bus was just barely pulling away. Dang those boys.

Anyways, the point is that we did pretty good at region. Both judges gave us a Superior rating on our group songs ("Let go, why do you stay me?", "When Allen-a-dale went a-hunting", and "Carol of Joy"), so that made us feel quite nice. Oh yeah, the lady that was judging mine and Chelsea's duet was the director at Honor Choir--go figure. So I knew from experience what she wanted to see and hear... so I gave it to her. I was like making eye contact with her and gettin to be all kinds of emotional. When we got our judging sheet back, it said something like "Part 2: Thank you for showing how much you care for this song and allowing the passion to show in your face." That's right. Go me.

Well, I suppose that just means I've got work to do for State so that I can improve on everything. The main reason Chelsea and I are doing "Homeward Bound" is because anyone who's group gets a Superior rating at state gets to sing that song at our end-of-the-year concert... and my mom really, really wants us to sing at that concert so she can hear it. What a cute lady. (:

That's all for now. Tune in next time.

California!

2010-03-07T18:26:00.000-07:00

As some of you might be aware, the KHS music department usually takes a trip every year to California to do some kind of competition, performance, and/or workshop... and of course, to play for like 3 days. This year was the last chance I had to go with X-Press, and I took full advantage of it. (:

Day One: We left after school on Wednesday the 3rd and headed to Vegas to see "The Lion King" performed at THEhotel. Let me just say... that play was amazing and a half. The costume design and choreography absolutely baffled me. Everything about it (except for young Simba's voice... that bothered me. It was extremely nasal for some reason, and you could tell it was on purpose.) just blew me away. And I have to confess... I was absolutely bawling when Mufasa died. It was really sad, okay?!

I know you can't see our faces, but I was goin more for the sign.

After the play, we loaded up on our chartered bus (most of us changed into pajamas of some sort), got a bite to eat at the In-N-Out in Las Vegas, then we were off to California!

Day Two: We arrived at our hotel in Anaheim at like 4:00 in the morning... that was fun. /: We all pretty much crashed immediately, only to wake up at 8 to be at the gates of Disneyland at 9:30. Hurray!

My roommates--Jamie, Chanelle, and Chelsea--and I waiting for Disneyland to open! I'm really not sure why I'm making that face... but I apologize.

I finally found my Knight in Shining Armor!

We loved the Teacups!

The four of us just played around all morning in Disneyland, running around from one attraction to the next. See, Chanelle has never been to Disneyland before--shoot, she's never even been to California before--so we felt it necessary to get all kinds of fun things in, even though we were fairly sleep deprived.

Later in the day, everyone in X-Press met at the gates of Toon Town so we could go to our workshop. Of course, me and my friends got there early so we could play and take some pictures. (:

Aww... what a guy!

Didn't take us very long, did it?

Once we all got together, we headed to the "back stage" of Disneyland. You might remember me telling you about the California trip as a sophomore when we recorded in one of their studios. Well we did that again this year! What it was, we all went into a recording studio, they gave us music, and we learned 2 Disney songs ("Steady As The Beating Drum" from Pocahontas and "The Circle of Life" from The Lion King) and recorded us singing, and put the track over the movie. So we got a copy of the DVD that has the clips of those two movies with our voices singing. It's pretty neat, actually.

The rest of the day was left up to us to do whatever we wanted, as long as we were back at the hotel by 9. (Since it was Thursday, Disneyland closed at like 10.) We went to the regular rides, such as Small World, Splash Mountain, Thunder Mountain, Indiana Jones, etc. My favorite part about these rides were probably the pictures that they take during it. Most of the time, the four of us would say "Okay, what faces are we gonna make for this one?" But a couple of times, we'd either say "Just make the scarediest faces you can" or they would just come.

Somehow, I got roped into being in the very front of the ride. I was not happy about my wetness. Hence the unhappy face. ha

This was taken mere moments before I lost my footing, fell backwards, and whacked my head on a decorative rock that left a lump right behind my left ear. Ow.

We had fun entertaining ourselves in line for Indiana Jones. At one point, we were trying to take some weird picture with some of the scenery, and Chelsea turned to the family behind us and said "We're so sorry. You can go ahead of us if you want. We're just being ridiculous." Then the lady said "No, that's okay! You girls are pretty entertaining!"

Somewhere along the way, two of the boys with our school group joined up with our little group, making it from four to six. But then, when we were heading for California Adventure, Chelsea, Chanelle, and I were running. Then Chanelle veered into some novelty store to get something for Kelin, and Chelsea and I lost her. We turned back to find her, eventually did, but we'd lost the other half of our group. We thought about getting back up with them, but decided that we might as well just make it easier to keep up with everyone and have it be just the three of us.

After a couple more hours, we decided to be done with Disneyland for the day. So Chelsea, Chanelle and I went back to the hotel, changed out of our still-wet clothes and into our sweats, then went next door to IHOP. We were all still absolutely delerious from lack of sleep, so everything was hilarious. We ordered our food, and enjoyed every bite of it. Our waitress was a really nice girl that just made everything that much better, so we left her a nice note saying where we were from and that we really appreciated her "cheerful demeanor." After IHOP, we went back to the hotel, changed into our swimsuits, then went down to the pool area and just hung out in the hot tub. We didn't have to be back in our rooms until 11, but by the time Mrs. Terry came around to make sure everyone was there and to put tape on our doors, all of us were pretty much asleep. When she knocked, we all called "not it" to determine who'd have to get out of bed to answer the door.

Day Three: This time, we had to be ready to be on the bus by 8:45 and dressed in our formals. The bus took X-Press to an auditorium-type-thing about a mile and a half away from our hotel, where we went in and warmed up for like 20 minutes. Then we went out on a stage and performed three of our songs ("Neighbors Chorus", "Gloria Hodie", and "I'm Gonna Rise") in front of national-level judges. When we were done with those, we went back to our warm-up room and worked on our madrigals. Then we went back again and sang "Let go, why do you stay me?" and "When Allen-a-dale went a-hunting"... not my favorite songs. But oh well, I still try my best on them. Anyways, the point of all this wasn't a competition, but it was more of a rating system to see kind of how we rank nationally. We ended up getting a Silver rating (top 20%) in both Chamber Choir and Madrigals, so that wasn't too bad. My only problem with the whole thing was that I was exhausted. After we sang, there was some middle school jazz band that had to perform, so we had to wait like 45 minutes for the awards, then we could leave. I wish I had a picture of us all waiting, though. When the jazz band wasn't playing, every single one of the altos were curled up in some position in the seats trying to sleep. Fortunately, I always wear my SUU sweats underneath my formal dress, so I was all kinds of comfy.

Eventually, we got back on the bus and headed back to the hotel so we could change before going back to Disneyland. Except this time, we decided to go to California Adventure!

There wasn't a J, so I had to settle with the "A" for my last name. (:

Oh we're goin places.

Like I said, Chanelle had never been to any of these places before, so of COURSE we had to take her to the Hollywood Tower of Terror! That one is definitely my favorite ride at California Adventure. We got Fast Passes for it, then waited in the regular line and rode it the first time. Then we came back like 15 minutes later to use our Passes to ride it a second time. Then later in the day, some lady gave us 7 Fast Passes that she didn't want to use, so we gave away the 3 extras and rode it a third time.

This was supposed to show how "scurred" we were... but this is actually genuinely frightening picture. Chelsea looks like an alien.

We weren't too scared after all. (:

Ironically, the Tower of Terror was actually not what scared us the most. It was Mickey's Fun Wheel that killed us almost. That's the big ol' Ferris wheel that has the sliding cars, if you have any idea what I'm talking about. The line for it was fun, though. We got behind these 4 guys that were about as funny as it gets, so we were all line buddies. But once we got on the ride, and Chelsea's deep fear of Ferris wheels kicked in... that's when it got a lot less fun.

This is obviously a staged picture, but we were actually scared once it started going. Like, to the point where we all ended up sitting on the floor of the thing and we were all holding hands.

Later in the day, we decided that we wanted to go back to Disneyland after all. Once again, our friend Ian joined up with us, so we had 5 people in our group. We did Splash Mountain again (why?!), and got possibly one of the greatest pictures ever. It's almost a close tie with the Splash Mountain picture of sophomore year.

This was sophomore year. Common denominators: me and Ian.

Yikes.

Double yikes.

Chelsea really, really didn't want to get soaked. So what did she do? She stuck her souvenirs inside her big purse and used the plastic Disneyland bag as a poncho. Genius.

After that, we went on the Haunted Mansion, Space Mountin, and various other rides. Finally though, we were just worn out again. We didn't stay for all of the fireworks, so we got out before the mad rush of people swarming the EXIT gates. The girls and I swung by McDonald's and got some dinner to go, then we sat in our room and ate while watching "Friends" before passing out for the night.

I couldn't not take a picture. It was perty. (:

Day Four: We had to wake up early enough to get ready and pack, because we were finally leaving Anaheim. For the first day of the trip, we didn't have any kind of music-related activities to do... it was just a fun day to play at Six Flags Magic Mountain! Unfortunately... it was like 40 degrees, and it was supposed to rain. All day. So what did it do? It rained. All day. Actually it was more sprinkling and it was off and on, but still! Chelsea, Chanelle, Jamie, and I were among the first like 20 people of the day to ride X2, and our faces were being pelted by 50-60 mph rain the whole time... not that awesome. The same kind of thing happened with The Goliath, but we worked out a system:

Cute, I know. At first, all of us were being really bitter and complainy about the situation, and we were actually keeping in touch with Mrs. Terry to see if we could possibly leave the park earlier than planned so we could get home sooner. (We weren't going to leave until the park closed at 6.) But as we were sitting at a food court eating genuinely awful $12 lunches, I looked at Chelsea, Chanelle, and Jamie and said "Why are we being all pissy? We're here. We paid a lot of money to ride these rides and have fun, not eat gross food and whine. So as of right now: we are happy and we are having fun." And it actually worked. For the rest of the day, we just dealt with the rain and had fun despite it. We even found out a plus side of being forced to stay at Six Flags from open to close: that anyone else who lived nearby decided that today wouldn't be a good day to go play... so the park wasn't too busy. We actually got to stay on the Goliath like 3 times in a row. We also had fun on Tatsu... ha.

This ride is done while you're hanging from the rail. So after the ride is over, and you're waiting for the nice Six Flags employees to let you down, you're kind of just suspended in the air. That's why my face looks so red. Oh well.

Anyways, we spent the rest of the day just playing. Like I said, there were barely any lines for the rides. The longest one we waited in was for the Terminator: Salvation, which was ironic for two reasons. 1) We didn't even want to go on it. We were just killin time before we could get on the warm bus, and 2) It's a brand-new ride, and we didn't even know that. But it actually ended up being really cool. The whole pre-ride thing was way intense.

FINALLY, we got to get on the bus. Our self-discovered good moods had begun to wear, and we were ready to go home. All of us were wet and cold and ready to change into our comfies and snuggle with some blankets. We drove until Barstow, then we stopped for food, then headed the rest of the way home after that. We got to Kanab at about 5:00 am, and I still had the half hour drive home... it was unreal. As in, I was still delusional, and the huge amounts of fog combined with the icy slush covering the road made it feel like a whole new demension as I drove home. In the end, I finally got in my own bed at the exact same time that I usually am getting up for school.

In the end, this California trip was, without a doubt, my favorite one ever. Between having my best friend with me, spending time in good weather (for the most part), and a complete lack of high school drama (don't judge.), it was freaking sweet. I guess the third time's the charm, right?

I love us. (:

Silly us...

2010-02-28T20:12:00.000-07:00

We love Winter hot tubbin'. (: