Introducing my "new" car!

I suppose since I let everybody know about the death of my old car, I should let you know that I now have a functioning car. It took about two months after the death of my other car to get this one functioning, but thanks to the efforts of mechanics in my hometown to get the car to pass emissions, and thanks to friends Katie and Hank to fix the radiator (yes, Hank did the work, but Katie was the one to offer her husband's service in the first place, so she gets an assist in my book), AND thanks to Emma's cousin who tightened up the battery cable, I FINALLY have a functioning car.

So, I now present to the world my "new" car: A 91 Honda Civic hatchback, sold to me by my younger sister who decided it was time for a better car, and had not yet found anybody to buy the car off of her. Yes, I am that lucky girl who gets to buy hand-me-down cars from her little sister.




















Jenni named the car "The Puddle Jumper." Now, most of you are probably wondering what that name even means. The puddle jumper is a ship in Stargate Atlantis, a small shuttle-type ship built by an ancient race of really smart people (creatively called "The Ancients"). It is called the Puddle Jumper because it is small enough to fit through the stargate (which, when active, looks like a big puddle of water).











Don't they look similar?! This is not simply a case of us being geeky and naming things using Stargate references just because we are love the show (which might happen). I think there is no other name appropriate.

It could always be worse. . .

One of those faces

One day, I received a phone call from my high school best friend, who just became friends with somebody I met during my summer internship. Yes, the Mormon world is small. Last night the three of us got together and had a great time chatting and enjoying a night out on the town. As we were talking, I heard all of their ward gossip, and realized something: I really enjoy being one of those people that everyone confides in. I could tell you all the ins and outs of the relationships in J & J's ward, and I'm always up to date on E2's friends and group, and the latest changes in H & H's dating lives. I love it. I just couldn't tell you a single thing about my OWN ward . . .

My mom and Donny. . .

Today was one of those special days when I had the thought, I really want to curl up and disappear into complete and utter oblivion for at least a week. However, I had no luck in finding anyone who would knock me out and just put an end to the crappy day, but I did have a few dear people who thought of more constructive means of ending my bad mood. I guess that their solution of just making me happy seemed like the more humane way to remove the dark cloud over my head.

The first solution offered was by my dear roommate, who simply said, "Lets watch Chuck." Just the THOUGHT of watching an episode of Chuck brought a smile to my face. She still needed to finish her workout, so I played the piano and sang for a bit, which also is a sure-fire way to make me happy. (Have I mentioned that if I could marry an inanimate object, I would marry a piano in a heartbeat? That's how deep my devotion to the piano runs, and how much joy I find in spending a few minutes with those wonderful 88 keys. . .)

So, after watching an episode of Chuck (which happened to be the episode with the best kissing scene EVER), I got a phone call which was the final nail in the coffin of my bad mood. It was from my dad, who had an adorable request: he wanted me to call in to "Dancing with the Stars" to vote for Donny Osmond for my mom. Now, the phone call was pretty straightforward, but it was the tone of my dad's voice that made me giggle. Dad's tone said the following:

"Your mother still has a school girl crush on Donny Osmond. Yes, isn't it adorable? I'm basically calling just to keep her happy and because I derive great amusement in seeing her act like a teenager again. You'll help feed my wife's silly mood? Thanks, your a good daughter. You now have leave to mock your mother through your tone, too."

Yes, my mom acted like a school girl who wanted to make sure her crush made it another week into the competition. Ah, the joys of youth. . .

I missed my nap!

In a moment of sheer insanity last spring, I decided to run for the student council of my Masters program. The other insane part of this is that I chose to run for the most time-intensive position, that of Internal Relations VP. Thats just a fancy word for "council secretary." I am in charge of scheduling rooms, coordinating activities between the other council members, creating agendas, and maintaining the student lounge. One of the sub-duties of maintaining the student lounge is coordinating weekly lounge activities.

When I first began brainstorming activities, I thought of one that I was actually excited for: a Rest and Relaxation activity, aka Return to Kindergarten Day. The plan was to provide kindergarten-style snacks (fruit snacks, animal crackers, juice in mini-cups), and let people have naptime. Mostly, I wanted an excuse to lay down and not worry about entertaining people.

Well, I scheduled the activity and got everything ready, including sending out a fairly amusing email (if I do say so myself). BUT, thanks to my professor who I work for needing a project a day earlier than he originally said, I spent the entire two hours of the activity working with the other TA on said project, instead of taking the nap I had been looking forward to for weeks.

Did I really expect to sleep? No, of course not. I can't sleep on an airplane, let alone sleep in a public place like the lounge. But I still feel jipped.

The Daedalus, 1994-2009

The Daedalus, a Pontiac Grand Prix, passed away this past Friday, October 16, 2009, at the age of 15. The Daedalus entered into the life of Emily Davis in 2007. She loved him immediately, mostly due to his stellar stereo system. He helped Emily move to her first apartment after her mission, and consistently fulfilled his mission of helping Emily get to work on time. After Emily moved to a different part of town, the Daedalus started suffering from a series of mechanical problems, including a faulty starter. Rather than throwing in the towel and giving up, he overcame this setback and went into remission for the next year.

After living in Salt Lake City for approximately a year and a half, the Daedalus moved Emily to Provo, Utah, where he had a run-in with the law: he was towed for parking illegally (though multiple witnesses testify there was no way to know it was an illegal parking job). After reuniting with his beloved owner, he faithfully served her and became one of her only allies in what they both considered to be "enemy territory." He was never ashamed of his red coloring, and knew that he was helping his owner show her true colors as a U of U fan.

Sadly, his good health did not last forever. About 6 months ago, he started having problems with multiple systems, including electrical issues and transmission problems. On Thursday, October 15, while being driven by his owner's roommate, his air conditioning pump seized up and caused the entire engine to fail. He was declared dead the following morning by Dave the mechanic.

He is survived by his owners: Emily, her parents, her cousin Fielding (his previous owner), and whoever owned him before Fielding. He will be donated to Kidney Kars on Monday, October 19. Those wishing to offer their condolences can post comments to this blog post.

Tis the Season

In the past two weeks, I have had both the swine flu (we think) and pneumonia. Oh, and I lost my voice to top it all off. As you might imagine, it has not been my favorite week. However, I managed to use the week as a learning opportunity. I learned the following during my week of lung-crushing torture:

1) I'm actually a social creature. I've always known that I'm okay with solitude. I've lived on my own on two occasions, and really enjoyed myself both times. This past week, however, I think I went a little crazy after staying home by myself ALL DAY. I missed seeing my friends, and spent a great portion of each day wondering when my roommates would come home and entertain me. I suppose I enjoyed both of the times I lived on my own because I could leave and visit people and do social things. While I was sick, however, I couldn't leave my house, and went slightly insane from spending hours doing nothing except staring at a TV set. So, lesson one: I really do enjoy people.

2) When I'm sick, I develop a smoker's husky voice. Which is actually pretty cool. Especially when I use an Armenian accent, since the huskiness makes my accent actually sound authentic.

3) Doing drugs is fun; at least its fun when the drug involves a nebulizer and you get to pretend that you are using a water pipe.

4) The part of my brain that gives me motivation to do homework decided to turn off when I got sick. I'm still trying to find the switch to turn it back on. If anyone finds my motivation, please return it to me as soon as possible. . .

5) I don't make a good first impression when I'm sick. I got a phone call from a guy my friend wants to set me up with, and managed to say about four ridiculous things during the one minute conversation. All done while sounding like a smoker. If the date turns out to be anything like that phone call, its going to be one of those bad date stories in HIS arsenal of anecdotes.

That's about it. I can tell you what I did NOT learn during my week: I did not learn a single thing relating to public administration.

Ode to my Mac Friends

I have never been a trendy person. My favorite jeans usually come from Shopko, and my shirt of choice is usually a t-shirt. When I started my grad program, I was made aware that there are trendy computer brands and not-so trendy brands. I quickly learned that the IBM I bought using my neighbor's employee discount is basically the Shopko jeans of computers. And Mac computers are as cool as they come.

Why might I equate Mac computers with designer jeans? Mac people have told me. Just within the last year of living in my new town, I have had five roommates, a friend, a professor, and over a dozen classmates who are always willing to point out the superiority of a Mac over a PC. Last week, the friend and my roommate were discussing something Mac related, while I stood there wondering how to re-enter the conversation. I finally made some crack about my computer and the duct tape holding its screen together, but the hour was late and my wit decided to go to bed early that night, so my comment probably made no sense. As is often the case, I later thought of what to say to defend my PC. This is what I would say if given the opportunity again.

Three (of many) reasons that a PC is better than a Mac:

1. Lowered Expectations with a PC: The other day, my roommate was trying to hook her Mac up to our television, and somehow her screen went blank and she couldn't get it to work again. She didn't know what to do, this had never happened before. My other roommate rushed to her aid, since she has been using Macs all her life and should know what to do. They both became worried, as they had never seen anything like this before. I, on the other hand, was amused. You poor Mac people, I thought, you have put so much trust in your computers that you don't know what to do if something goes wrong. I, on the other hand, am able to be calm when something goes wrong. Because something goes wrong with my PC on a daily basis. When MY computer screen goes blank and everything disappears, its nothing new. I have no expectation of greatness, and therefore no disappointment when the computer does not live up to its potential.

2. Forced Relaxation: Today I had a few precious minutes to work on a flyer for a student club, and was using Publisher on a computer in a lab. Nearing the end of the project, I opened my email account to download an image to put into the flyer. In my attempt to download the simple image, somehow Picture Viewer froze. Which caused Publisher to freeze. Mozilla Firefox of course felt left out, so it decided to freeze as well. Some might refer to this as an inconvenience, or evidence of the evils of PCs, etc. I, however, saw this as a friendly reminder from my computer that I need to slow down take life in stride. The computer was being considerate, you see. I had the chance to read a few pages in my book as I waited for it to come back online, which might not have happened without the computer crash. Also, because the crash happened quite literally the moment before I was about to hit the "save" button, I was given the opportunity to start over on my flyer. Maybe the computer was trying to tell me that my first draft wasn't good enough. Finally, who needs to be on time to class? I'm the TA for the class the computer crash caused me to be late for, so dramatic late entrances are supposed to happen.

3. Technology should reflect reality: Life is disappointing. Relationships fail, economies crash, pets die, jobs fall through, health deteriorates. Why should I expect anything less from my computer? My PC knows it would throw me for a loop if something in my life actually worked out as planned. So it breaks, shuts down without warning, or decides to take 15 minutes to start up just to remind me to stay in reality and be prepared for disappointment.

So, the next time my friends have a discussion about how aesthetically pleasing their Macs are, or how reliable their Macs are, I will be prepared with the following response: "Yes, all that might be true, but can your computer do this:


















"I thought not."

And it is for these reasons, my friends, that I will stick with my Shopko jeans and my IBM Thinkpad. That is until I have buying power again. At which time, buying a Mac is on the list right under "Buy a car that does not have a direct connection with the devil." But that is for a different post.

Call me Ms. Fix It!

About two years ago, my brother and sister-in-law gave me an electric keyboard that they had inherited from her parents. When my brother and I were moving the keyboard, the base of the piano broke in half, but it was still played just fine. With each subsequent move, the base has continued to break into more pieces and has become more unstable. So, this past weekend I decided to actually fix the base!!



I put an angle bracket on each corner and a metal bar to hold the two sections together.















This is how the piano looks now.















Look at how well it all fits together!

Apricots

I love apricots, and this summer I am lucky enough to live in a house that has an apricot tree. The unfortunate bit is that the tree is next to the sidewalk, and people in my city have no qualms about picking the fruit from the tree, even if I or one of my roommates are sitting outside in plain view.

Rather than actually say anything to these rude pedestrians who refuse to ask for permission, I simply try to pick all the good fruit before anybody else can. Which led to my climbing the tree the other morning and standing on a branch that may not have been completely stable. I have been climbing trees since I was a kid, so I was not terribly concerned with where I was standing, but I had the feeling it was not the most stable of branches.

It wasn't.

As I was reaching for an apricot, I heard the branch crack underneath me. Again, being a life-long tree climber, I was of course holding onto a stable branch with my free hand, so as the branch collapsed, I was left swinging in the tree with nothing underneath. At this point, I swung up to a higher branch and managed to salvage my bag of apricots. The only injury was a small cut in my hand from the branch I was holding onto. But the tree branch is currently lying on the ground with no hopes of rejoining its fellow branches.

Moral of this story, if you ever want to feel big, have a tree branch break underneath you. And if you want to feel like Tarzan, make sure you are hanging onto a stronger branch when that happens so at the end of the day you can say, "I swung through a tree today."

I'm Willy Wonka

I was walking on campus the other day, and noticed that when my hair is straight, my shadow looks like Johnny Depp's Willy Wonka. This might inspire me to wear it curly more often.

Defying Gravity

I have a hard time expressing myself through written language, and an even harder time expressing myself through oral language. Music is my preferred method of expression. No matter what mood I am in, no matter what emotion I want to convey, I can usually find a song that expresses my feelings much better than I could do on my own. I don't know if this is a good thing or possibly unhealthy, but it’s the way I am, and I enjoy it.

Well, when I think about my dating life, unfortunately the best songs to express my "situation" are usually the depressing songs. "On My Own" from Les Miserables, "I Know the Truth" from Aida, or "I'm Not that Girl" from Wicked. Yes, that is my dating life. Being alone and being the one whose heart is broken from unrequited love. Granted, I've had to break a few hearts myself, which is never fun, but the long standing trend is never finding anyone who cares for me in the same way that I care for them.

However, the other day I was listening to the song "Defying Gravity," also from Wicked. I absolutely love the lyrics:

Something has changed within me,
Something is not the same
I'm through with playing by the rules
Of someone else's game
Too late for second-guessing
Too late to go back to sleep
It's time to trust my instincts
Close my eyes: and leap!

It's time to try
Defying gravity
I think I'll try
Defying gravity
And you can't pull me down!

I'm through accepting limits
''cause someone says they're so
Some things I cannot change
But till I try, I'll never know!
Too long I've been afraid of
Losing love I guess I've lost
Well, if that's love
It comes at much too high a cost!
I'd sooner buy
Defying gravity
Kiss me goodbye
I'm defying gravity
And you can't pull me down

So if you care to find me,
Look to the western sky!
As someone told me lately:
"Ev'ryone deserves the chance to fly!"
And if I'm flying solo
At least I'm flying free
To those who'd ground me
Take a message back from me
Tell them how I am
Defying gravity
I'm flying high
Defying gravity
And soon I'll match them in renown
And nobody in all of Oz
No Wizard that there is or was
Is ever gonna bring me down!

I love the part, "And if I'm flying solo, at least I'm flying free." Yes, I might have a sparse dating life, and of the dates I've been on, most fall into the "bad date" category. But, at least I'm not tied down in a bad relationship. While I don't want to be forever single, I definitely think that being single and happy is a much better situation than being married to a man who doesn't love me for who I am. So, I will continue to fly solo, and that is okay.