The Dating Cycle

Minor Disasters

Do you ever have those things in your life that you repeat often, and you think, "One of these days, I'm going to lose my concentration and this routine thing is going to go very badly on me." Today that thing went badly. But humorously.

So, every Tuesday and Friday I water the plants in my office. We normally keep a jug here with water in it that we refill every so often, and of course the water was out today. Since there is NOBODY ELSE AROUND, I didn't really have anyone to forward my phones to in order to refill the water, and its just down the hall, so I simply hurried.

Now, we refill the water in the janitorial closet, which has a large hose attached to the water. Often, when I am filling up my water, I think to myself, "If I turned on the pressure too high, this hose could go flying and spray water everywhere." Which is normally what keeps me from turning it on high.

Well, I wasn't thinking today, and I stuck the hose into my water jug, and turned it on high, and BLAST! Water started spraying everywhere, I had to catch the hose mid-air, I had water dripping off my face, and I'm just grateful that nobody in leadership saw me. Though I will probably as to see it again when we watch the post-mortal review of our life, because I think it would be super funny to watch.

I am now very grateful that I don't have to wonder "what if?" when I think about turning the water to full pressure. Now I know.

I love power tools!

A couple weeks ago, I spent a Saturday morning helping my dad fix a tree that broke during a snowstorm last winter. The storm hit while there were still leaves on the tree, and the weight broke the tree in half. We were worried that the tree would die, but this spring it started blooming!! Dad contacted our local garden store about what to do. They said that we should have tried to fix it last winter when it first broke. "Okay, well, we can't do that anymore. What now?"

They suggested that we prune the tree to remove excess weight, then bolt it together where it snapped. Dad was going to climb into the tree to do the drastic pruning, but I convinced him to let me get into it instead.  I got to climb a ladder into the tree, then cut the branches using his chainsaw. SO MUCH FUN!!! There were a few moments where I felt off balance, but otherwise I felt pretty stable up there, and I really loved using the chainsaw.

My favorite moment came when dad told me to cut the branch that was directly over my head. To clarify, I pointed at said branch, and said, "Really? This one? This big heavy branch right over my head? You want me to cut it off?"

"Yup."

Trusting my dad, I cut the branch, and instead of falling right onto my head like I thought it would, it got caught in the other branches around it and only fell NEAR my head.

Anyway, we got the tree trimmed down, we used some fun pulley-systems to pull the broken halves back together, and now our tree has bolts right through its middle. It will now be our "Frankenstein's Monster" tree. Lets just pray lightning doesn't strike and set the tree to life.

Happy Spring!

Spring has come to temple square, which means that I have a very hard time concentrating at work because all I want to do is look at the flowers outside of my window. I've decided I want to create a planter for my back patio, which will be my little paradise at home - I'll have my deck chairs and table, a small bbq grill which I got for Christmas, and then as many flower/vegetable planters as possible. I'm excited, and I hope it will all fit.

And in an unrelated topic, (because I love to choose two unrelated topics and combine them in the same post), I love my nieces and nephews. There is really nothing more rewarding than walking up a hill and having your nephew run towards you and give you a huge hug, and then to have his younger brother jump into your arms and for another huge hug.

Did you notice how a huge theme of conference was on families and rearing children? Sometimes that can get hard to apply when you don't have kids. However, there ARE children in my family whom I love with all my heart. So, although I can't give my love to any children or a husband right now, I'll just give extra love to those precious 8 children whom I am honored call me "Aunty Em." (Well, they don't actually call my Aunty Em, but I'm trying to convince everyone that it would be awesome if they do. And if one of my future nieces is named Dorothy and she gets a dog named Todo, all the better.)

An open letter

Dear Guy Friend,

I get it – from the moment we met, you immediately felt like I was “one of the guys.” You trusted me, you felt comfortable around me, and you put me in the friend zone so fast I never knew there was any other “zone” with you. That’s fine. I understand completely about platonic feelings. But here’s the thing – you are still interacting with a woman, and you should at least try to act like a gentleman towards me. So, for the future, let me lay out some ground rules for our “friendship”:

1.   If you want to complain about other girls to me, be specific. I get it, you have been burned by girls before, and you are upset and hurt. If you want to rant to me, at least be specific. If you say “Mimi is absolutely insane,” I interpret that as: Mimi is insane. If you say, “Girls are insane,” I interpret that as: I’m a girl, therefore you think I’m insane. Thanks so much for the self-esteem boost.

2.   Don’t complain about dating. Again, I get it – you hate dating. Well boo hoo, so do we all. It hurts to put yourself out there, to be rejected, to go through the standard first date questions. Here’s  what hurts though – when you say that there is nobody out there that you want to date, and that all the good ones are taken, I’m sitting there thinking, what am I, chopped liver? Again, it hurts our self-esteem to think that we aren’t even good enough for you to take on a date. You’ll take an insane girl out and then complain about her, but you won’t take me – all that tells me is that I’m not good enough.

Okay, that’s really all I can think of. And as I contemplate this further, I’ve decided that I hate being “one of the guys.” I hate being a purely platonic friend. If you want to complain and whine, go find a guy friend to talk to. If you want to take me on a date, call me on the phone and ask for a date. And if you don’t want to take me on a date, then leave me alone. Because I need some esteem left to convince myself that someday, somewhere there might be a guy who actually wants me.

Sincerely,
Me

And more injuries. . .

I ran into a tree branch yesterday while playing with my nieces and nephews, and now I have a slight cut on my forehead. I feel like Harry Potter, except that while his forehead scar symbolized his mother's love and his triumph over a dark lord, my cut simply symbolizes that I got bested by a tree.

And my mother has now admitted that I am indeed a klutz. She thought for years that I was graceful, simply because I apparently did well in my ballet class as a child. But since I started pointing out to her all of my falls and injuries, she has now admitted it - I am indeed a graceful klutz. And proud of it.

Adventures in Renting

So, on a Thursday in July, I came home from work and noticed that my A/C wasn't working any more. Now, keep in mind, this was the NEW A/C unit that that installed the end of June. It barely lasted a month. It was blowing air, but it was hot. I quickly sent off a note to my apartment complex to put in a work order. I hoped that they would get to it Friday, but when I got back it was still warm. No word through the weekend (which, thank heavens, was a rainy weekend which kept temperatures down, otherwise I might have moved back into my parents house for a bit), so on Monday I contacted them again to see what was up. They said that the repair man was at my apartment now, and he should be fixing it.


The remainder of this story can be told by the notes that I found on my door each night, from the repair man.


MONDAY:

I determined the problem with your AC is on the roof, but I cannot go up there in the rain and lightning. I will put it first place for the morning. Thanks, Brian


TUESDAY:

Your AC was out of refrigerant, which should not have happened with the new unit. I re-filled it and it is now working good, but please let me know if it happens again, and I will do my best to solve it quickly. Thank you, Brian


Update: I came back @ 2:00, the refrigerant has all leaked out again. . . I will contact our specialist and let you know what we decide. I am sorry for the delays. -Brian


WEDNESDAY:

I have found the leak and am going to get parts. I have to go to Orem, and am not sure if it will be in stock or have to be ordered. Please know I am doing my best to solve this for you. Thanks, Brian


At this point I felt the need to leave a note for HIM, telling him that I understood and appreciated all that he was doing to help with my conundrum. I wanted to leave cookies to suck up to him and make him feel better about himself, but I was worried he might think that I spit in them, so I just made sure the note was extra nice.


THURSDAY:

A/C is working now. I need to fix a pipe, and your furnace door that I broke. I will be back in the morning. You may use the A/C. Some water may drip inside the closet, but it's not a big deal and I will have it solved.
Thanks, Brian


FRIDAY:

Everything should be working right. If something should go wrong please feel free to call the emergency line and I will do my best to solve it. (please don't tell others I said your A/C will count as an emergency, I usually don't count them as such) - Thanks. Thank you for your patience while I fixed it. -Brian

- We added all new oils to your A/C with all the modern gadgets - it should be the best in the complex now.

Note, on the front of all these notes is a printed page with an option to check whether the work was completed or not. He had a huge circle around "work completed" with a big smiley face. I think he was just as glad to stop coming to my apartment as I was to finally have my air conditioner working.

Happy August!

So, while I was gathering the pictures for last week's post, I saw this one from my family's trip up in Vancouver:

Two years ago exactly, my hair was that short. I was astounded by how long its grown since then, and I tried to find a picture of how long it is now to compare. I discovered that I haven't really had pictures taken of me in months (unless you count the work photo they took when I started here, which I still haven't seen. . .), except by my sister Sarah. And in each of those photos, I am generally wearing a hat or have my hair in a ponytail, since there are always little kids present and I have learned from years of aunt-hood never to have my hair down when playing with toddlers. So, the only picture I found to show how long my hair has gotten was from our recent family outing to the zoo (courtesy of Sarah's blog):

Not one of my more flattering pictures, but the kids sure were entertained. And you get the idea of how long my hair is now. I wanted to get a picture of me getting eaten by a dinosaur (its Zoorassic Park this year at the Hogle Zoo, which means there are moving dinosaur statues scattered through the park), but I thought that would be crossing the line into being silly.

Memories

So, I went to see Harry Potter yesterday (because what celebrates the pioneers quite like watching a movie about wizards and magic. . .), and they had a trailer for whatever new Twilight movie is coming out. I wanted to gag and run out of the theatre, but I also didn't want to miss Harry Potter starting, so I had to sit there, enduring pure torture. It made me think of the beautiful time two years ago when my roommate Emma, my sister Jenni and I burned a copy of Twilight. Since Emma is moving home soon, I thought I would pay tribute to her through reminiscing of that fun time in the summer of 2009.

So, we first decided to rip the book apart, then we stabbed it. Apparently this was in keeping with vampire lore (in the Twilight series, because lets face it, Twilight vampires are different than every other kind) on the appropriate way to kill a vampire. I really didn't intend for that to happen, it was just really cathartic ripping the book apart.

We then set it ablaze in our parking lot - I think if I wasn't morally opposed to burning books, I might make a habit of it. It was a really beautiful sight. . .

Here are Emma and Jenni, reveling in the flames.

Isn't it beautiful?!

Emma had to check to make sure it was really dead. . .

And then she celebrated our victory!!

Thanks for the memories, Emma. You're a dear friend, a wonderful roommate, and I will be forever grateful that we were randomly put together to survive that awful basement.

Stop the torture!

Whoever decided that it was a good idea to use "Its a Small World" as the song on an ice-cream truck deserves to be tied up, dragged into the street, and pulled behind said ice-cream truck for an entire day. Maybe then they would learn the error of their ways.

Just sayin.

The critters are after me

I know, I haven't blogged in forever. I could give an excuse how I don't have internet in my new place (which is true), but the truth is, I've gotten off the habit. If you can call my periodic updates a habit.

Well, here's the update all three of you that read this blog have been waiting for - an update on my new apartment! It's great, I love the high ceilings, love my balcony, and love how close it is to work. But, I have a few neighbors who have it out for me.

On my first Saturday living in the apartment, I enjoyed the fact that I could open up the windows and feel a wonderful breeze blowing through the apartment. I went into the living room to grab something, and there he was - a bee the size of a small child. I was amazed that he could even stay in the air! I might have freaked out, but I kept going about my business until I saw him go to the door. I quickly went and shut the other door so that he was stuck between the screen door and the real door. I tried to help him get out from between the two, but he wasn't moving, and I wasn't about to let him back in. So, I left him to himself and carried on. Later I went outside and noticed a small hive on the door, so I knocked it down and hoped that meant the end of my unfriendly neighbor.

The next morning as I left to go to church, I opened the front door (which is on the OTHER side of my apartment), and flying right at me, in full attack mode, was the bee! Now I know what you're thinking, it was probably another bee, it wasn't actually attacking me, it just was an odd coincidence. I don't believe you. It was the same bee, and he was mad and out to get me. I quickly closed the door, ran into the back room until I calmed down, then sheepishly went back to my front door, realizing how idiotic I was being, considering I belong to the more dominant species. . .

Well, last night I was going into my apartment, and I noticed a spider on the top of my door frame. I went ahead and unlocked the door, and right as I opened the door, the spider LEAPT from its spot and jumped onto my door, trying to get into my apartment. So again, I showed great maturity as I ran into the apartment and slammed the door to keep that stupid spider from getting inside.

I don’t know what is up with these critters wanting to get into my house - the AC isn't working, and its not like I have anything interesting for them to do inside. All I know is, I'm perfectly content living next to them if they stay outside, but if they want to get inside, this means war.

Age is Earned!

Two weeks ago, I went to the C-town singles ward that was newly formed, as it was exciting to see the process of a brand new ward come together and start out. Our first hour was spent mingling through forced "get to know you" activities. Which, luckily, weren't too bad considering we were in a church on a Sunday. So, a young man introduced himself to me, and asked what I do. When I told him, he asked how old I was. I was kind-of surprised that he would ask me my age right off the bat, but I'm used to dealing with awkward questions when talking with men, so I responded. "27! What?!" was his response. "I thought you were going to say 19!"

Now, I ask you, how is that a compliment? Everyone tells me "you should be grateful, you'll enjoy that when you're older." I don't believe them. I know that nobody really wants to look older than they are, but age is something we should be proud of. We have earned each one of our years, and each year represents lessons learned, challenges faced and overcome, triumphs, new friends, and amazing experiences. I want to be recognized for all of these! When somebody tells me I look 19, I think, really, I look like a teenager? What connotations come with teenagers? Being a ditz, inexperienced, unknowing, and unrealistic. If you're going to say that I look younger than my years, at least put me in my 20s. Stop saying I look like a teenager. I am in my late 20s, and while I'm still VERY young, I at least have gained more experiences than a teenager. (Sidenote: I have friends from the MPA program who try to avoid telling people they have a Masters degree, just so guys don't think they are "too old." I'm the opposite. When I mention I have a Masters degree, it's not to brag of my achievements - it's so people will stop and think, huh, maybe this girl is NOT a college freshman.")

End of rant.

Updates

So, I got a job. A real job, with grown-up pay and benefits. I can go to the dentist again! And because I have a real job, I also found an apartment with a beautiful private balcony, and tall pine trees around the complex, and a pool! I'm excited to feel like an adult again, and to have windows again :)

Ways to Stay Awake

So, I remembered this story as I was trying to fall asleep the other night. A difficult attempt most nights, but especially difficult as of late. Anyway, I thought I'd share this, instead of sharing anything from my current life. Because its my blog and I can do what I want.

Once upon a time I was a lowly grad student, working as a TA in order to pay the bills. Or at least pretend to pay the bills, because lets face it, the income from that job barely covered food and gas money. Anyway, it had been an extremely long semester, what with catching the swine flu, then pneumonia, then playing catch-up ALL semester from my 2 weeks of illness. I had never really worked to the wire during finals, but this week of finals was different. So, it was Thursday night, all finals were due Friday, and I also needed to complete my TA work by Friday evening as well. Luckily, my TA work was very easy - grade a bunch of tests using an answer key. I decided to pull my first all-nighter and grade papers through the night, finish my last final in the morning, and then crash at 5 PM when everything was finally in. How did I complete this feat, you ask? By watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." All night. Its amazing how much grading you can get done watching Buffy, and also how the scary elements of that show really help you stay alert (since you never know if a sound you hear is your roommate breathing or a vampire sneaking in to attack you).

Anyway, moral of the story - Buffy can help you do a lot of things. Survive work, stay up all night, slay vampires - anything you need.

Ah spring

After church today, I was a good girl and went to ward choir (because I've been skipping lately and felt guilty for not supporting). As we were singing, I felt something fall into my hair next to my ear. It felt like a piece of paper, and since the boy's row sits right behind us, and since I'm very used to the way boys act when they are in choirs, I assumed someone had been throwing something and it landed in my hair. So, I reach to pull it out, and instead, my fingers circle a wasp. Yes, a wasp landed in my hair, and it was super mad at the way I handled it. It flew off in a huff, I had a minor freak out, and all the choir was trying to figure out what happened. My thumb did hurt for a bit afterward, but a little cold water helped the finger to stop hurting.

All I can say is, who gets bit by a wasp in a chapel, in March?! Just special people like me.

Celebrity Crushes

I'm not really one to do normal girl things, so I thought I'd try it out and do a very girly thing - share my celebrity crushes/men I think are beautiful. Because I really just like looking at these men.

My first crush was on Gary Hobson from the TV show Early Edition, played wonderfully by Kyle Chandler. I still want to marry a man like Gary Hobson (just throwing it out there).





















I also have worked hard to develop a reputation as a geek (despite the time that Emma tried to kick me out of our geek club made for 2). While for the most part I love science fiction because of the great story lines, the space battles, and the fun adventures, I have to admit, there are some incredibly beautiful men in science fiction. Here is Michael Shanks from Stargate SG-1:






















And Joe Flanigan from Stargate Atlantis:





















And from the fantasy world, there is Prince Caspian, played by Ben Barnes. If any of you could track him down for me, I would be forever in your debt.






















And finally, there is the oh-so-wonderful Matt Bomer, star of White Collar.

Please please read this

Dear friends, as you know, I'm hardly ever serious on this blog. But, I do want to share a link with you about a topic that is very serious - emotional abuse. I have seen too many friends and family in emotionally abusive relationships. Some have gotten out before they were married, and others lived through an abusive marriage that broke the person that they originally were. Emotional abuse will break your spirit, and each of you is too precious to ever be broken like that. If you are in an abusive relationship, please seek help. And know that I will be praying for you and will be there to help in whatever way I can.

http://www.mormontimes.com/article/19757/Recognizing-emotional-abuse-in-dating-relationships

Why editing is important

There is a book that I have been helping find images for, and it has been the constant stress of work for the past few months. The man who wrote the book (a 94-year-old who loves to remind you that he might not be around much longer) keeps pestering my boss on the status of the book, who then pesters me, and I in turn pester the editor who always responds "next week I should have a working proof." 2 months after he first said "next week," I finally got a proof!!

When I was looking through the proof, I came to one picture that we had not actually suggested for the book. I want you to picture this image - two Korean women, one holding a bag of groceries, her head tossed back in laughter, the other standing in a doorway, holding a toddler in her arms, smiling at the other woman. The caption? "Humanitarian project in DR Congo."

Thoughts from Work

So, I haven't been posting as of late because work has kept me busy and squashed out any desire to get on the computer when I go home. To remedy that situation, I thought I'd share with all of you some random items from today at work.

• While walking from the parking lot, I realized I put on two different colors of knee-highs: one beige, and the other probably sun-tan. Not a huge difference, but one leg looks much more pink than the other. Reason #53 why I don't like the rule that I need to wear nylons.
• I smiled when I got into my motorpool car and heard a Spanish love-ballad blaring from the radio. Pretty great - I listened to the whole song.
  
• I've been helping with an insert that will be published in the Ensign this June. We've been pouring over it and discussing it for MUCH to long, as evidenced by the final caption the Ensign wanted us to write. The section of the article is on family finances, and the picture is clearly a couple working on their finances. My suggestion for a caption was this: "Husbands and wives should work together on finances to avoid the leading cause of divorce." I don't think the Ensign will go for it. . .
  

My mind is a blank.

I've decided I want to try my hand at composing music. I've been wanting to for years, but I have one hold up - I never can think of any lyrics, or even a good topic to try. I like thinking of melodies, I'll make up stuff on the piano, but I draw a blank when it comes to lyrics. So, the big question is. . .
Does anyone want to help me with lyrics? Or does anyone have a poem they want me to put to music? Please realize it will probably never be very good, and I might never share it with anyone, but if you have ideas to help me jumpstart my attempt at composing, I would appreciate the help.