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.