"Memory is a way of holding on to the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose."

Up above my bed I have probably 40 some-odd pictures hanging on the wall. Some of these pictures are quite magical. Most of them are just ridiculous. But they're all snapshots of a short moment in time when I was unconditionally happy and it shows. Every single picture brings back memories and makes me smile, if not laugh. Crazy candids of the Harry Potter premiere, going through a carwash in the back of a pickup truck, dress up nights, whether that meant "going out on the town" kind of dressing up or "let's look like freaks" dressing up, being goofy with any and all of my dear best friends.

Looking at these pictures brings mixed feelings. Of course there's nostalgia. I can look at a picture and it immediately takes me back to Fall '09, Winter '11, Spring '10, Halloween any given year, etc. It makes me miss it. It makes me long to go back and relive it again. I would seriously go back and relive my entire college experience, even the bad, because of these wonderful moments and memories I have captured on my wall.

But surprisingly the nostalgia isn't as overwhelming as I would think it would be. At least not most of the time.

Usually as I look up at these pictures it's the stories that I remember that shaped my life and who I am today. It's because of these people that I've grown the way that I have into the person I am.

It's because of these times and these people that I am able to at any given moment throughout the day burst into random laughter because I remember something hilarious that was said or done. I know what joy and happiness feel like. I know that life can be wonderful and fun, even in the midst of the hard stuff. These pictures and stories weren't from a time in my life that was all fun and games and everything warm and fuzzy. There was crap. There was hard stuff. There were days that I thought I would die from exhaustion, whether physical, mental, emotional, or any combination of the three. But even when it was hard, there were still these good times that made life worth living.

So as my last thought I want to leave with you for 18 months:

Make sure you are enjoying life. 

Find those people and things that make you unconditionally happy. Make memories. Look back at them with fondness, but not longing. And mostly, look forward to the new wonderful moments that your future holds.

Dating Blogs...Over Rated or Truly Helpful?

The other night after I got done with my round of reading all the blogs I follow, I had an interesting thought. Not really a new thought, but one that I hadn't thought super hard about before.

We over-complicate dating. How? By trying to give too much advice.

I've always thought dating was much more complicated than it should be. Especially being out at BYU and seeing how screwed up the dating scene is. I'm convinced that it's about the same 25% of the population that is going on dates all the time. (I get that number from my experience sophomore year...any given weekend it was the one same roommate out of the four of us who was on a date...usually with a different boy every time.) I won't get into any logistics of why I think that is, but rather I will tell you what I think dating should be.

Dating should be a guy seeing a girl--a friend, acquaintance, or perhaps even a stranger--and thinking, "Hmm she's attractive and I think I would enjoy spending time with her," and then asking her on a date. The girl should be flattered that a guy is interested enough to invest an hour or two and perhaps even a little bit of moolah and go out with him having an optimistic attitude of having an enjoyable time, whether she's likewise interested in the guy or not. After the date, each can individually evaluate how they thought it went and perhaps think about future intentions and let it either progress from there or be done and call it a nice time with a friend.

But, this is obviously not how it is in real life, and there's not really any way to get people to start seeing dating in such a way. Oh how I wish there was a way to uncomplicate it though.

For the past several months I have been following the Anti-Austen Blog. At first I loved it. I was addicted. I was enchanted. I thought these girls were geniuses and amazing.

And then I don't know if I just really opened my eyes or if the quality of their blogging declined or what, but I became a bit disenchanted. I don't mean to dis on them at all. I still read their blog and I enjoy it and they do have good insights sometimes, but I'm just saying I'm not an adoring fan like I once would have claimed to be.

The thing that really triggered my thinking on this subject today was that on their past couple of posts, the Anti-Austens linked to a couple other blogs: Dudes Discussing Dating and The Brothers' Guide to Guys. Of these three blogs I have mentioned, I think that the most useful would be The Brothers' Guide. It's brand new so there's only a handful of posts, but so far they seem pretty clean cut and to the point. And actual helpful tips and lessons. For example, they have already touched on lessons such as door step scenes, post-date texts, and a very basic overview of the "four flirty senses." But even so...I think that with all of this "Dating Help" we are in fact doing the exact opposite of their intention and we're complicating it.

It makes people, males and females both, over think and try to analyze everything, which just drives everyone crazy. And I think that all of this advice bouncing around just makes it worse. People are either generalizing when they make all of their suggestions, or they are specific to what they think or like. Well, let me tell you something...everyone thinks and feels differently about most things, and especially about dating and relationships. Each person has their own lists of likes and dislikes, and making all of these suggestions and do's and don'ts just doesn't always help everyone in the end. For example...I have learned through experience that baking isn't an automatic free pass into a man's heart. All of those times in Relief Society where they told us all you had to do was give a guy baked goods to spark interest....lies.

But, despite knowing that these things don't always work, does that make anyone less interested in reading all of these dating and relationship blogs and advice columns? Nope. Sure doesn't. It does make me grateful for my 18 month hiatus that I'm about to take from the dating game though. And upon my return...we'll see if I'll have to study up to start playing these games again. I'm kinda banking on not.....

"So turn it on, turn it up, and sing along..."

Since I've been home, I've been listening almost nonstop to country music. Ok, that's a little bit of an exaggeration. I've listened to lots of other music too, but everytime I turn on the radio, it's country. And for some reason it's usually CMT that draws my attention on the rare occasion I'm craving music videos.

But I've been trying to figure out exactly what the draw of it is. Why do I keep going back to country? Even after my note-to-self to stop listening to it about a month ago, I just can't let it go.

I've decided it's because country is more real than a lot of other music. The songs tell real stories about real emotions. You listen to a song and you can connect with the singer. You feel like you're there with them going through whatever they're going through, happy or sad. You can feel what they're feeling. And I think that's something that I have to have. I've always known that's how I judge whether I like a book or a movie, so that makes sense that I feel that way about music too.

I don't know, maybe I'm crazy. I'm not saying that other music isn't any good. There's tons of other music out there that's quality stuff that I love too. But I just feel like country is less likely to let me down.

Part of it might be a little tiny piece of me trying to find my Southern heritage. While I wasn't born in Georgia, we moved here when I was two and this is all I knew until I moved to Provo at age 18. And there's something about the South that makes you proud to call it home. Maybe anywhere can do that to you, but nowhere else can do it with fried chicken, boiled peanuts, and red Georgia clay. So maybe listening to and loving country music helps me feel connected with the place I grew up.

And I think I would feel this way even if dancing had never been involved with this genre of music. But who's to say that cha-cha-ing by myself in the kitchen when a fantastic song comes on the radio doesn't make the song that much better?

Maybe the reason I adore country so much is because of the gems like this that it produces:

Newest song on my wedding playlist?

Yes please.

(The recorded version is better.)

Anyways, I guess my purpose today is just to make sure you know about my undying love for country music. I am not ashamed. And I will now leave you with words from one of my favorites, Brad Paisley, who says what I was trying to say, but much simpler, and I echo his sentiments:

"So turn it on, turn it up, and sing along.

This is real, this is your life in a song.

Yeah, this is country music."

Oh My Gosh.

I think that I just barely, like seconds ago from this moment, decided that I might be alright getting married here:

I have never had the desire to get married in Salt Lake. I always felt like it would be "too cliche." It seems like most girls want to get married there, and non-conformist Stephanie didn't want to just be one with the crowd.

But in the current event of me not having a life to occupy my thoughts, I think about my future more than is healthy and I pretty much have planned most of my wedding. (Yes, I am ashamed to admit to this fact. Yes, you may call me a hypocrite. But I think that it will be time well spent when I can plan a wedding in no time with a record low amount of stress. Haha. Yes, I realize that everything I'm saying is utterly ridiculous.)

Anyways...one of the details that I definitely cannot pin down until I have some more concrete details established (you know, like who the groom is gonna be for sure because I still haven't gotten a response  to my proposal from William Moseley) is the where. I have no strong attachment to Atlanta. The only people that would really benefit would be my parents and a very very select few friends. Unless I marry someone from here...but that won't be the case if I have anything to do with choosing who I marry. Oh man my ADD is showing tonight. I always said, "It'll just depend where he is from and what would be most convenient for his family." But Salt Lake was never an option. I was even just playing around with the idea of another temple in the Salt Lake/Utah Valley area...Mount Timpanogos? Draper?

And then...what is wrong with Salt Lake?

Eh. Whatever. I've still got a while to smash out all of these wedding details. I'm sure that when I get home in 18 months my wedding will have changed dramatically from what it is right now. Plus there are probably some more vital things to worry about first since William isn't seeming like a very viable prospect at the moment.

"Singing Myself to Sleep..."

There are three songs I am currently addicted to at the moment. And now this is where I share them with you.

I fell in love with this one the second I heard it. I never was particularly on the Jason Mraz train like a lot of my friends, but I think this one is quite magical.

This one has some pretty cute lines in it. Not their best, but it's catchy and He is We never seems to fail me.

And this one...probably my favorite. It's a fantastic one to sing along to. I think I'm gonna check out more of Christina Perri's stuff.

p.s. what's up with all of these "official lyric videos" all of a sudden?

Grow...Don't Fall

In honor of the month of love, I have yet another related topic to discuss about the "L" word. A little bit more of an objective discussion than some of my past posts. Maybe. Probably not.

Today I want to dispute the phrase falling in love.

I've given a lot of thought to this saying, hearing it so often in books and movies and on tv and in everyday life, especially while living in Provo, Utah. And I've heard some small disputes here and there. This made me want to gain my own opinion about it, so I've spent some good time mulling it around in my brain, and I'm ready to deliberate.

I will agree that "falling" in love is not the right term to use. Not when you're using it next to the word love at least. Maybe we could change the phrase to falling in infatuation or falling in lust. I think those would be more fitting.

Let's discuss exactly what this phrase is implying. When we say that someone has fallen in love, we're saying that in the time that it takes for you to trip over something and fall down (less than a few seconds worth of time) the deep feeling of love has developed. Hmmm.

I think that it takes much more than a few seconds to be able to know a person well enough to claim that you love him or her. I think that people often mistake what love really is. And it's no wonder...I just looked up the definition of the word love. That's some ridiculous stuff.

My definition of love: when you care about someone so much that your greatest desire in life is for them to be happy. And you would do anything you could to help them achieve that happiness. Hmm..of course there's more to it than just that, but I think that's basically love in a nutshell. You're free to dispute that if you'd like. I'm not Merriam or Webster.

Anyways, the term that I have chosen to adopt instead of "falling" is to "grow in love" with someone.

This actually goes along quite well with an analogy that I came up with for love a couple years ago. (This used to be a common pastime of mine...especially late at night with Marjorie. Dang, we came up with some good analogies back in the day. Not all specific to love.) But in this particular analogy I compared love to a ladder. A really, really tall ladder. Maybe one that even goes on forever. Well, when you say that you're "in love" with someone, you are saying that you are on this ladder. But where? Perhaps you are only on the first rung. You're just starting to love that person. Maybe you're on the second, or third, or fourth rung. Maybe you're on the hundredth rung. Only you can really say where you are. However, that's not the point of this analogy. The point is that if you are truly in love, you're climbing that ladder. You're progressing. Your love is becoming greater with each rung. It's growing.

I think that this is how the best, deepest, truest love works. First, it starts with a real foundation. That ladder can't be hanging halfway off a step, can it? It has to be on a hard, flat, sturdy foundation. How do you start with a foundation when it comes to love? Focus on getting to know a person. Get to be friends. Put your friendship above those feelings of attraction...at least for now. Then you'll get to see him or her as a real person, not just a piece of meat.

Once you've got your ladder on that foundation, then you can start climbing. It's more likely that it will be easier and progress nicely. That love will grow naturally because that's what true love does. It grows a little bit every day. It's like that Brad Paisley song, "Then" (definitely on my wedding reception playlist). He keeps looking back at moments throughout their relationship and saying, "And I thought I loved you then."

So the next time you're tempted to use the phrase "fall in love" for any reason...stop and think about it. If you "fell" is it really likely to be love? Just saying...

Isn't he stinking cute? 

I luh him.

All in a Name

Alright, confession time. Sometimes the articles that people read from the Facebook "Washington Post" intrigue me and I read them. An even more embarrassing confession...sometimes I read the Yahoo ones too. (But at least I have enough sense to change my settings to private so that the whole Facebook world doesn't know every little thing I do with my life. And really, have you people never heard of Pandora or Grooveshark? I don't want to be notified every three and half minutes that you're listening to a new Kelly Clarkson song. Facebook has crossed a line of ridiculousness--a ridiculous that I actually do not like--but that is a tangent that I will refrain from discussing right now.)

Anyways, I just read an article entitled "10 Illegal Baby Names". And it just made me think for a bit about the gift and responsibility that comes with naming a child. The article only discusses countries in Europe and Asia and talks about all of the strict laws about naming babies that some of these countries have. Some countries have a list that you have to look at and pick a name off of. Immediately my mind jumped to, "Wow, I'm so glad I live in America where I can name my child whatever the heck I want."

And then I thought...maybe we should have some kind of restrictions or rules. Some people give their kids  pretty unusual and well...dumb names. As someone going into education, I have worked with lots of interestingly named children. There aren't any that come to mind immediately as being so crazily ridiculous that I need to mention them here, but there have been some that I've looked at and kind of scoffed at, thinking, "Really? You poor child."

So then my thoughts developed into the inquiry of why do people feel the need to give their children psychotic names? Do people really crave that huge of a sense of individuality that they have to invent strange names for their baby? Do they ever stop and think, "How will other people react to this name? Will they be able to spell it? Pronounce it? Say it without laughing?" I don't think most people who invent strange names do think about it. They just decide because they invented the name it must be cool and their child will obviously love it.

Now I will admit, it doesn't excite me to think of my children having common names where they will have to be distinguished by their last initial. That would be annoying to have three other people in the same room as you with your name. You don't have to look up the top 20 names of the year and name your child accordingly. Goodness knows that in my teaching years I'm gonna have plenty of Bellas and Jacobs and Edwards running through my classroom (I am very much shaking my head at this moment). But really, I think that there is a line that can be crossed too easily with giving your child a strange name.

I guess my plea is this: think before you write that name on your baby's birth certificate. Think about how this name is what this human being is going to be stuck with for the rest of their life. They will have to write it daily on homework assignments and later on all kinds of various applications. It will be on name plaques on desks and doors. It will be found in directories and labeled on personal belongings. A weird name can make a person seem foolish. Don't doom your child to be prejudged as a fool by their name. Let them pull that one off on their own.

For My One and Only...

Harry Potter.

Yes, that's right. I just called a fictitious character my one and only. But, it's true. He's always there for me. To make me laugh, to make me cry, to make me bite my nails because I'm terrified, etc. That is love.

Yesterday Audrey texted me and reminded me of these gems that I had oh so quickly forgotten about. They helped me get through my dark patch in October without killing anyone, and I will now immortalize them on my blog by sharing them with you.

Yup. Still funny.

Confessions of a Romantic

Have you ever been all "love"-d out?

Tuesday was Valentines Day. Despite my relationship "issues" it was a good one. A great one, in fact. One that involved a package from Brasil a week and a half before I was expecting it. A package that included both wonderfully thoughtful gifts and ridiculously adorable gifts. Perfect.

Wednesday night, I couldn't sleep. (That's kinda becoming the norm, unfortunately.) After tossing and turning forever, I finally decided to pull out Persuasion. It had kind of become my secret weapon to fall asleep. It's always a wonder to me why everyone adores Jane Austen so much? That book was bloody boring. In 300 pages, she told a story I could have told in 30 with the same amount of important detail. I only had about 25 pages left of the book, and I finished it. And then realized why everyone loves Jane. Somehow, in those last several pages, she hooks you. You're intrigued. Which dashing gentleman is going to prove his love and worth so that our heroine protagonist can finally have that eternal bliss she has deserved for so long? And even with the lack of tangible detail, the story still made me sigh. I turned off my lamp and had to just lie there, thinking about the happy end to the story.

Thursday I took myself on a date. Ever since I saw the trailer for The Vow back in like November I have wanted to see that movie. I was very relieved when my report date wasn't until after the release of this movie (unlike The Hunger Games which I'll have to wait an extra 18 months to see). I have been kind of wanting to go to a movie by myself. It seems like a very independent and brave thing to do. So I grabbed some candy, went to the movie theater, sat on the side where they have the two seats by themselves and sprawled out, and cried. It was a good movie, but I haven't decided whether I like it or not. I say it was good because it made me cry. I think that anything--a book, a movie, etc.--that makes me cry is good because that means it built enough of an emotional attachment that would make me involved enough to cry as I watch the characters go through their painfully heartbreaking situations. But just because I deem it good in that sense doesn't mean I liked it. I didn't dislike it. I just can't decide if I liked it. In the end though it doesn't really matter...it made me cry and then I came home and just moped around all day.

That's when it kind of hit me...I was tired of love. I was tired of how it is a constant tugging at my heart. It is a constant reminder of what I want, what I have, but what I don't actually have.... Mostly love makes me long for a time machine. And I hate that I want that. The next 18 months of my life are supposed to be fantastic. Hard, but fantastic. But I won't be able to focus and let it be fantastic if I let myself be distracted by this wretched "L" word I've got going on.

You know the most exasperating thing of it all though?

As much as I might say and try to convince myself that I'm tired of love and that I don't want it running my life...I'm not fooling anyone. Least of all myself.

A Quick Thought On Love...

“I am satisfied that happiness in marriage is not so much a matter of romance as it is an anxious concern for the comfort and well-being of one’s companion. Any man who will make his wife’s comfort his first concern will stay in love with her throughout their lives and through the eternity yet to come” 

-Gordon B. Hinckley

Aren't they the most adorable couple you've ever seen in your entire life? I want a marriage like theirs. So to the man I marry (whomever that may be...): study up and follow President Hinckley's counsel. I'm pretty sure he's got a good idea of what he's talking about.

A Current Frustration

Why, as women, do we feel the need to be so self-destructive?

What is it that makes us make ourselves feel like crap? Is it something that we are taught to do by society, or is it in our very nature and altogether unavoidable?

I just don't understand how I can be so sure of something, feel so strongly about it...and then my mind finds little teeny, tiny things to pick at that make me question or doubt or worry about the thing that I was so sure about moments before.

What the heck? It's quite annoying.

My Latest Life Lesson

When you don't want to do something, that means you should.

Some examples of when this is good advice to follow:

• exercising
• reading scriptures
• praying
• fessing up to something
• doing some kind of service for someone
• eating a salad instead of ice cream

I am realizing though that this is a very generalized statement and there are definitely some circumstances when you should not to follow this advice:

• if you don't want to jump off a cliff
• if you don't want to marry someone
• if you don't want to let someone rob you
• if you don't want to wear a swimming suit to play in the snow

So, it certainly isn't all inclusive to say that whenever you don't wanna do something, do it. But I think you're probably an intelligent enough person to know when it applies and when it doesn't.

This was a much better thought before I tried to write it down.

A Deep Lesson I Learned Just Moments Ago

I was sitting here on my bed, shivering. I was wrapped up in a blanket, but I wanted to read. It's hard to hold a book while wrapped up in a blanket, and since I didn't want to expose my arms to the chilled air of my bedroom, naturally I wished I had a snuggie. I even tried to logistically figure out how I could make my blanket into a snuggie.

And then...I put on a jacket.

Problem solved.

And lesson learned.

(I will give you the freedom to learn whatever

 lessons you may from my experience.)

A Few Notes to Self

1. Stop listening to country music.
2. Exercise. It really, truly changes your mood.
3. Accents are sexy. There's no other word for it.
4. Curly fries are delicious, but when you haven't had fast food in weeks, they are kind of evil.
5. Start a project. TOMORROW.

Why I Love/Hate Pinterest

Don't spend all day pinteresting. (Yep. I just verbified that word.) It will make you hate your life because you will want to...

• cook and bake and make all of those wonderfully, amazing, fattening foods
• workout till your body actually looks that hot
• get a make over so you have flawless hair and make up
• go on a shopping spree and fill your room with all those super cute clothes, shoes, and accessories
• get engaged so you can plan the most wonderful wedding the world has ever seen
• get married so you have a husband to try out all that lovey dovey stuff with
• have kids so you can try out all of that awesome stuff that will make you the best mom in the world
• craft until your heart explodes from the excitement of having such an adorable home
• clean until everything sparkles like it does in commercials
• pet a cute baby animal and/or give it a bath
• and be clever and/or wise enough to be quoted.

And let's face it ladies...that just can't all be done in one day.

ABCs of My Chrome

Sometime in the past year I converted to Google Chrome. Best decision of my life. Well, that's probably a bit of an exaggeration, but I would certainly suggest its use to anyone who wants a simpler web browser.

Anyways, one of its features that is my favorite is that as soon as you start typing in the url to whatever site you want to visit, it automatically fills in what it thinks you're going to type, based on your previous visits. It makes it very nice to click, type "g" and enter, and BAM! there's my email.

I thought it would be interesting and perhaps telling about a person if you entered each letter of the alphabet in the url bar and saw what google auto places for you. So, here is my list:

A- mazon.com
B- logger.com
C- armike.com
D- ictionary.com
E-
F- acebook.com
G- mail.com
H- omedepot.com
I- mdb.com
J- oann.com
K- ohls.com
L- ds.org
M- aps.google.com
N- etflix.com
O-
P- interest.com
Q-
R- edbox.com
S- helfari.com
T- ranslate.google.com
U- sps.com
V- erizonwireless.com
W- eather.com
X-
Y- outube.com
Z-

The blanks meant google could come up with no guesses based on my previous web browsing. Overall quite relevant, although a couple are pretty interesting. I don't remember being a home fix-it buff.

Happy FebRuary!

You know how when you're in elementary school and your teacher tells you something and it is an automatic truth that you must live your life by? Well, at least that's how it was for me when I was a kid. For example, my 2nd grade teacher, Mrs. Willis, told us that whenever we eat an apple we should wash it beforehand. And not just rinse it off. Because you know how there's that little sticker that you have to peel off? Well, water isn't gonna wash off the glue from that sticker, so you've gotta use some soap too! So, still to this day, I always wash my apple with soap, no matter the ridicule I get from my friends.

Well, another one of those things is that one of my teachers emphasized that the second month of the year is spelled F-e-b-r-u-a-r-y, not F-e-b-u-a-r-y, so we need to pronounce it as such. For some reason that hit me hard and since then I have always made sure that I pronounce both of the Rs in February.

Just try it. It almost makes the month seem not quite so gross.

TToML 25: The Finale

Well guys, it's been great. I've definitely had lots and lots of good laughs remembering all of these stories. I hope you've gotten at least a couple chuckles out of it all.

And now I want to tell you about Challenge Points.

Last Winter, Lindsay and I saw our friend Collette's facebook status that told a story of some guys she saw in a hallway and one of them said, "Challenge point: penguin slide down the hallway." We thought that was awesome and McKensey and Marjorie were down. We made a scoreboard on a whiteboard in 109 and the game was on. Anyone could issue a challenge to someone at anytime, and that person was free to accept or decline, penalty free. In the end it kind of ended up being a tie, but I will now commemorate some of the best challenges that we earned points for.

Lindsay pinched Nick Tanner...'s butt.

McKensey penguin slid on actual ice.

Ben Evans (a later addition to the game over the summer) drank orange soda through a "straw" made of a Kraft Singles slice of cheese...and then ate the cheese.

I rubbed ashes all over my face once and ran around the quad and also ate many strange concoctions, including a TVP filled pancake.

But Marjorie takes the cake, easily. One night as we were gathered around the hot tub as we did quite often, I was staring at her sweaty socks that she had taken off and set down there on the ledge. I knew there had to be something awesome I could challenge her to do.

"Dip your sock in the hot tub, suck the water out of it, and swallow."

No hesitation.

And if you know anything about the RG hot tub, you know why that is deserving of an automatic win forever.

TToML 24: Dodging Bullets

Summer 2011.

This past summer, a couple guys in the ward decided to put together a game of assassins. Basically the objective was to use nerf guns to shoot the team that you were assigned to "kill" while trying to avoid being "killed" yourself.

Freshman year, our apartment actually set up this game for our ward, with the difference being that water was the kill weapon. And it was during winter semester, so we were running around campus with water guns in our pockets and water bottles at the ready. We had some great stake outs and awesome kills during that game, but it fizzled fast because there were too many people who kept trying to alter the rules. It was fun and we got really good at sneakily taking round about ways on campus and stuff.

Anyways, this summer there were some moments that I thought were more noteworthy (and fresher in my memory) to share.

On the night that the game began, there was one group of 3 girls who were after Dan Johns. They knew he worked at a Walgreens, but had no idea which one. They called all of the Walgreens in the area asking for Dan and finally found him. Then they staked out the place and killed him as he got off work. Well done, ladies.

I was teamed up with McKensey, and we were prepared to kick some trash. Well...McKensey got killed like the first day on her way home from work. She was ambushed and one of her sisters had actually locked the apartment door for once. I was determined not to get killed though.

It was kind of an advantage that I didn't technically live at RG. So there was no worry of getting ambushed leaving for work. I did like to come and chill at RG at night after work though, but I came up with a great way to get into the building undetected. A couple nights in a row I parked down by King Henry, and with gun in hand snuck back between Brown Stone and RG and climbed in McKensey's bedroom window. It was fantastic to see Kevin's and Sean's surprised faces when they found me sitting in the living room of 109.

But then...Kaly left the kitchen window open. She was hanging out in the quad because she was dead and had come to ask us something and had simply slid open the kitchen window. Well, she didn't close it, and everybody failed to see the problem with that except for Kevin. It was a cheap shot, but he got me before I had even known what had happened. I was really ticked for about 5 minutes, and then I realized, "Wait, this means that I can actually go hang out with my friends in the quad and I don't have to be trapped in this flipping hot apartment!" I was angry no more and had a lovely evening eating jalapeno cheetos with my friends at the picnic table.

Margie and Megan got back from their family vacation in the midst of the game, and Marjorie was killed within 10 minutes of being home. Emily just came up and shot her while she was carrying a load of stuff in. Then Megan later got killed because Lauren asked Margie if she could hide from someone in their apartment and so Margie let her in...where she promptly walked over and killed Megan.

What's the point of this story? No idea. Maybe to warn everyone that "Assassins" is fun for about a day, and then it just sucks because you can't live life normally. I guess I'm glad I'm not a spy.

TToML 23: What Goes Around Comes Around

Winter 2009. Living in Heritage Halls.

The story I am about to tell you does not bring me great pleasure. I shake my head at the immaturity we showed. But, I do believe that it is a story to share because it has a great lesson to it: Karma.

Somehow in addition to the towel popping freshman year, we had another way that we loved to inflict pain upon each other. This we called the Boob Punch. I think by the name it's pretty clear what was done.

I still wish I knew exactly how this started or why it was so amusing. Of course, it was only amusing if you were not the one who had just been punched. We had a general rule that this was a thing to be done in the privacy of our own apartment. Some penalty was supposed to ensue if done in public or when people were over.

We all had many times when we were the victim of this cruel doing, but there is one night in particular that I wanted to tell about.

This certain night a random assortment of our guy friends were over at our place and we decided to go to the park. As everyone was headed out of the apartment, I ran and grabbed a jacket. As I opened the front door to join everyone, Lindsay, out of nowhere, slugged me good and hard. And Lindsay's blow had not only hurt me like only a gifted woman could ever know, but it had knocked the wind right out of me. It's one of those moments that would have been priceless to have captured on film:

I collapsed to the ground, gasping for air and clutching my chest as my FHE brothers stood outside the door, their eyes and mouths open wide at what they had just witnessed, as the door slowly closed with me lying on the ground still inside.

It took me a good five minutes to recover. I think that is the only time in my entire life that I have had the wind sufficiently knocked out of me like that. At that time I only glared at Lindsay, vowing that somehow she would indeed pay.

And she did.

Later that very night, while we were at the park it happened. We were in the process of crossing a big stretch of grass and all the way from the other side of that field, I heard Marjorie's fist resoundingly make contact with its target, and as I turned to see the aftermath, Lindsay was lying on the ground, gasping for air.

Karma's a witch, isn't it Lindsay? Muahahaha!

TToML 22: Distracting and Entering

Summer 2010. Living in 110 at RG.

So, this one night, when I was in bed and asleep, Marjorie, McKensey, and Makalyn had an adventure.

As I was not there I do not know all of the nitty gritty details, nor do I think I want to know.... But I will tell you what I do know.

There was an apartment that they knew to be empty. All of its occupants had either moved out or were out of town. So naturally what had to be done? As Elric so graciously distracted the quad by throwing a huge stump around, they slid one of the windows open and one of them climbed in and ran to open the front door. They then scampered around the empty apartment, doing who knows what. All I know is they said one thing led to another and then....

TToML 21: "It's like, REALLY pink!"

August 2011. Everyone was moving into the house.

One day Lindsay and I were sitting in the living room just chilling. School hadn't started yet, so of course we felt like we didn't need to be doing anything productive. It was then that we were talking again about the poop brown walls in the room. They were nasty. Who the heck would think it was okay to paint a room that color? Beats me.

Then all of a sudden we both sit up and look at each other and are like, "Let's paint the living room!"

So we called our landlady to figure out what we had to do...we went to Lowe's and spent forever debating about what color. We decided on a deep raspberryish reddish maroon kind of color. We took the paint color sample to our landlady to get it approved, then we went back to Lowe's and bought the paint and supplies we needed. By the time we got home, I was pooped like the color of our walls. Okay, too far, sorry.

Linds and I get everything ready.
Furniture out of the way? Check.
Tarps laid out? Check.
Painting clothes on? Check.
Paint trays and rollers ready? Check, check.
Windows open? Check.
All edges taped? Check.

Then we go to pour the paint in the trays, and holy wow...that is not the color that we thought we ordered. The test spot they did with our paint there at Lowe's had looked good...but this was not right. This paint was pink. We looked at each other and decided to try painting a bit. Maybe it dried a lot darker than that. Plus we were painting over brown.

That's when Lindsay started freaking out. "I will not have pink walls in my living room!"

I didn't think it was that bad, but I let her go and take the paint back. I'd had enough of Lowe's for the day. She came back with a darker shade and we commenced painting the room. The result made us both much happier.

But we were only able to paint 2 of the 3 walls that day because we had a piano in our living room that belonged to a girl who had moved out like 3 weeks previously, yet she hadn't cared to come get her piano from our house yet, and we didn't want to have to move the piano to paint that wall. Finally after like a week and a half or two, we got tired of having 2 deep raspberryish reddish maroon walls and one orangish brown wall (that wall wasn't even the same ugly brown color that the other two walls had been. what the heck?) and so we just moved the dang piano and painted.

And that is the riveting story about how our living room got painted.

"It's like, REALLY pink!"

Poop brown wall turning pink.

The most decent representation of the finished wall.
Ignore the pirate...she couldn't get the boot cover off.

TToML 20: "Ice"-capades

February 2011. Living in 109.

So at Roman Gardens there is a swimming pool in the quad (best thing ever, btw). In the fall as it starts to get cold, management somewhat drains the pool and then slaps a cover over it. Done. Until the middle of summer when they finally get around to maybe getting it somewhat ready for people to illegally swim in it...

Anyways, today is not a time to complain about that. My story today takes place in the winter, so the pool is closed with the cover over it.

One night we were chilling in the living room and someone said, "Dude, that would be awesome if the swimming pool was an ice rink!" We all agreed and momentarily thought about the possibility and then moved on.

But actually, McKensey didn't move on, which shouldn't surprise anyone. Several nights later we were bored and she said, "Ok guys, let's go check out the pool. I think we can skate on it."

I was extremely reluctant, but I put on my coat and headed out to the pool. We all circled it several times, doing what we could to test the surface. It actually seemed pretty solid. It appeared that there was a layer of ice, probably like 4-6 inches thick that was on top of the pool cover from all the rain and melted snow that had frozen in the frigid winter temperatures.

We looked around at each other, debating whether it would be safe to actually step on the ice. Then McKensey said, "Wait! Lemme go grab the bowling ball!" The summer before, Ben Brooksby had bought a bowling ball at DI for the case which he converted into a camera case, discarding the bowling ball. It had mostly been floating around the quad for a while.

So McKensey brought the ball over and was like, "Alright, I'm gonna roll it across and see if the ice holds it..." And it did. We tossed it back and forth a few more times and then promptly decided that if the ice could hold a 10 lb bowling ball, it could definitely hold 4-5 young adult women.

Okay, our logic wasn't quite that skewed. I was the first brave soul to test the ice. It felt super sturdy so I urged someone else to join me, and eventually there were 4 or 5 of us on the pool.

We first started with unconfident scooting across the ice. Then we got a little braver and started to run and slide. A little bit of figure skating might have ensued. And then we realized we had a bowling ball...someone ran and grabbed a broom and we took a stab at curling. It's probably easier when you have an actual curling rock with a flat bottom than a spherical shaped bowling ball, but at least we can say we tried.

By this time we had attracted attention from several people throughout the complex and had a small audience watching our ridiculous adventure, but thankfully the managers were as inattentive as was normal. It was about this time though that we started to hear small crackling sounds around the edge of the pool, so we wisely decided to quickly dismount the pool and call it a night.

So the lesson we learn from this story? A bowling ball is the only indicator you need to see if a frozen swimming pool will hold the weight of you and all your friends.

TToML 19: Mission: Almost Impossible

April 2009. Heritage Halls.

Three of the six of us living together had birthdays that fell during spring/summer, meaning we weren't gonna get to celebrate them together. And it wasn't fair. So we decided to pick random days to have a surprise unbirthday for Margie, Mikki, and me.

The day that we chose for Marjorie we had some problems though that we didn't quite anticipate.

The main problem being...she came home early from class. We were baking her a cake (yellow with chocolate frosting--her favorite), but wanted it to be a complete surprise. When there was about fifteen minutes left one of us spotted her out the kitchen window, obviously coming home. We scrambled like crazy people to try and figure out how to disguise the smell of cake in the oven. We opened all the windows and Sara ran around the entire apartment spraying our Febreeze so that the entire place smelled like "purple." Surprisingly this actually worked and Margie didn't suspect anything.

But then she parked herself in the kitchen and would not budge. How were we gonna sneakily get a cake out of the oven if she was sitting right there? We tried to secretly scheme different ways we could get her out long enough so we could smuggle the cake to a bedroom.

Lindsay went to her room and was yelling for Margie to come look at some new shoes she wanted to order online.

"What kind of shoes?" Margie yelled back. 

"A new pair of Chucks!"

"I know what Chucks look like." 

"No, these are really cool!" 

"What do they look like?" 

"You just have to come see!"

"I don't want to!"

We probably tried another couple little things, but nothing worked. It was like 5 minutes after we needed to take the cake and things got desperate. 

Margie had put a couple slices of bread in the toaster. They popped up, she went to get them, and that's when Sara saved the day. She swooped in, grabbed the two slices of toast, and booked it to the opposite end of the apartment. Margie just stared at Sara standing at the other end of the hallway, smiling with a piece of toast in each hand. "Are you serious?"

The second Margie was headed out of the kitchen to retrieve her toast I grabbed a hot pad, retrieved the cake and ran to my room with it. Thankfully my room was the closest to the kitchen. I hid it in my closet and returned to see how things were playing out. Sara had successfully distracted Marjorie so she had no idea I had just taken her birthday cake out of the oven.

From there it was easy enough to secretly frost the cake and keep it hidden until later when it was time to party. Best part? We had baked the cake in a Care Bear shaped pan, but then we just frosted the entire thing with chocolate frosting. Can you imagine what that might look like? Something like this...

Yes. It looks like a giant turd. Actually it was very fitting. :)

It was also that night that 5 of us devoured 2 huge slices of asphalt pie at Winger's in about 3.345 seconds flat. The waitress literally turned around for a few minutes and then when she turned back it was all gone. Yes, thank you, we are ladies.

TToML 18: Jeepers Creepers

September 2009. Living in 110 at RG.

Alright, so early in the month, I started going country dancing regularly with Lindsay and Ben and Aaron Brooksby, others joining us often too. Regularly means pretty much every Wednesday and Saturday night until May. I loved it. I had forgotten how much dancing really meant to me, and this helped me to remember.

Anyways, on this particular night that my story takes place, we had actually only been dancing a few times before. But there was this guy...in my journal I named him Creeper #1. (I actually mention 3 different creepers from this one night...I am apparently a creeper magnet.) He asked me to dance and I always give a guy a first chance, so we danced...and then he asked me to dance again. Now, I was in no way interested in this guy at all...I obviously thought he was kind of a creeper by the name I gave him, but I had no reason good enough to decline, so I had to dance with him again.

At the end of this song he said, "Hey, can I have your number?" "Oh..umm...." "I don't have my phone on me tonight, so let me go grab a piece of paper and you can write it down. Stay here and I'll be right back, k?"

I ran straight for Aaron and said, "Aaron help me! I don't wanna give that guy my number!" So he laughed, grabbed me, and we ran for the back corner of the gym. We chilled there, out of view, for most of the rest of the night. We were able to practice some stuff and I wasn't so worried about Creeper #1.

But then...Skippy came. There was a huge fan there in the corner where Aaron and I were, and so at one point while we were standing by it, this kid came over to cool down. He glanced over at us and then said to Aaron, "Wow, aren't you the luckiest guy in here tonight?" We were both like, "Huh? What'd you say?" "Oh I was just saying you're lucky, man. How'd you manage to have the prettiest girl here tonight?"

Aaron and I looked at each other and laughed. "No no...we're not together, we're just friends!" we both explained. Wrong thing to say. We shoulda just gone with it.

"OOOHhh. Well...looks like you've got some competition now, buddy. So cute stuff, who's it gonna be, me or him? C'mon, be honest. You can choose him if you want to, that's fine. I mean, you did come here with him. And you guys would have cute kids. BUT I mean, we would have really cute kids too, you know? So is it him or me? Hmm? Come on, you've gotta pick!"

I was laughing so hard I couldn't stand it. Who the heck was this kid?! He had been standing next to me for hardly a minute and had the audacity to talk about us having children together! I was amused and a bit flattered, but not at all impressed. And his name was Skippy. That's a dog's name. Or a brand of peanut butter that as a college student I couldn't afford. Not a man that was going to win my heart.

So when I was unable to catch my breath from laughing to tell him who I chose, Skippy said, "Okay, well you at least have to give me a chance by letting me dance with you once. C'mon, let's go dance."

Thankfully he only made me dance with him once and did not ask for my number..or maybe by this point in the night I had figured out how to say no, I don't remember. Skippy returned to me Aaron, who I'm sure was laughing extremely hard at the situation--he often loved to laugh at my expense--and I probably declared it was time to go. I had been creeped on by enough guys that night.

The next time we went dancing I agreed to go only under the condition that Aaron and Ben would do a better job at saving me from having to dance with creepers. They did a pretty good job most of the time after that, except on nights where Aaron wanted something to laugh about later.

TToML 17: The Worst Week of My Life

February 2009. Living in Heritage Halls.

Late one night, I believe it was a Sunday, my roommates and I were all just chilling, doing our own thing. I suddenly remembered that I had these little wax strips that are for waxing small areas of your body, such as your face. Well, I wasn't doing anything else, so I pulled those out and announced I was going to wax my upper lip if anyone wanted to join me. And well, it kind of became a party.

Two of us were being waxed, two were the waxers. Let me tell you, that wasn't a super pleasant experience. Waxing hurts.

After it was all said and done, we went about doing our own things again. Well, twenty minutes had gone by and my upper lip was still stinging more than I thought it should be. I asked the other waxed roommate if she was having any such discomfort and she answered negatively. I examined my face in a mirror and discovered that where the waxing was done, it was bright red. And kind of shiny. And that meant that not just hair was pulled off by that wax strip...skin came too.

That's when I kind of started to freak. I had a second degree burn on my face!!! Ha that's what I felt like at least. We ran around like crazy people trying to figure out what I could do, but the damage was done. It looked like I had a red mustache.

It's ok. Laugh. I find this picture disgustingly hilarious.

I was so embarrassed. It was not the kind of thing that you could hide with make up or some sort of accessory. The only thing that could have hidden it was a mustache. Maybe I should have worn a fake one. Oh well, too late now.

So I think I might have stayed home all day on Monday because I was too mortified to go out in public. But I realized that I couldn't stay inside forever. I decided that I was just gonna have to swallow my pride and go to class and try really hard not to bring attention to myself and my red mustache.

Well, then on about Wednesday or Thursday, I blew it.

I was spending the afternoon in the library studying for a test I was gonna take that evening. I was making some flashcards and in doing so, I was cutting the note card in half, because really...what a waste to use an entire 3x5 index card for one word and a short definition.

Well, as I was cutting, my scissors somehow found my finger and snipped through my skin.

This picture might not do it justice, but it was gross.

It actually didn't hurt like it sounds like it should, but it was just kind of shocking, staring at my finger thinking, "Oh my gosh. My scissors just sliced through my finger." Then the blood started coming, so I hurried and threw everything in my backpack and ran to the nearest bathroom (in case you didn't know, I'm kinda squeamish when it comes to blood), which happened to be the huge one in the 2nd floor atrium, you know right next to periodicals.

So I'm standing at the sink, washing my hand, breathing deeply. I look down and watch as the reddish water goes down the drain. "I think I'm going to be ok," I say to myself.

And then I'm opening my eyes to find that I'm lying sideways on the bathroom floor with two girls standing over me, almost freaking out.

Long story short the campus EMT people came to check me out and make sure I was ok because I hit my head when I fell. It was then as an extremely attractive man was checking my vitals that I realized not only did I still have a fairly decent red mustache going on, but I had neglected to put on any kind of make up and my hair was in a gross pony tail. I was probably wearing sweats and hoodie. If I hadn't just cut my finger open and passed out I would have been more embarrassed than I was.

You might think this is the end. I mean what else could happen in that one week? Oh, if only that had been it.

On Friday afternoon, I was feeling pretty okay about life. I had survived the week, miraculously. I was sitting in someone's room, tossing around a thing of lotion that looks like that one right there. Nothing dangerous about that, you say? Well let me tell you...you are wrong. Oh so wrong.


So we were chatting and I was tossing the lotion and then the corner at the top of the tube thing SLICED OPEN my hand. And of course it was my uninjured hand.

It was one of those injuries that hurt a lot more than it looks like it should. Like a paper cut. It stung like none other. And how do you put a bandage on the palm of your hand? Long story short...you don't. Unless you're a pirate.

And that was the worst week of my life. Well, physically worst that is. I feel like it was one of those times that there was a greater force out there that wanted me dead. Thankfully I was able to prevail and somehow survived, even without scars...although those could have been some pretty cool scars.

TToML 16: Half Empty...or All Empty?

October 2011. Living at the house.

One night Lindsay was unhappy about something. Audrey and I caught her being unhappy and tried our best to make her un-unhappy.

Lindsay has a cup that she usually keeps in the fridge with water in it that is awesome and zebra-y. She said, "I want my zebra cup..." and started to head upstairs to grab it.

Audrey stopped her and said, "No, let me go grab it for you." So 10 seconds later Audrey was back with the cup. But it's empty...

She hands it to Lindsay. Linds takes it, looks at it, and takes a slurpy sip to suck up the last few drops in the bottom. "Thanks. I feel so much better now."

Audrey claimed it wasn't clear that Lindsay asking for the cup meant she wanted it to be filled with water.
"I thought that the cup just brought you comfort or something!"

From then on if Lindsay asked for her zebra cup, it had to be dumped out before it was handed to her.

TToML 15: Accidents Happen

Winter 2011. Living in 109 with Linds and McKensey.

One night we were just chilling in the apartment, not up to much. I got up and went to the fridge (I feel like this was a dangerous thing for me, I'm not sure why). I came back empty handed, but Lindsay was waiting for me by the oven (meaning she had me trapped in the kitchen).

I don't remember what we had been talking about or doing, or why she had the urge to do this, but she suddenly grabbed me and started tickling me.

Now, a good trick that usually works to tell people to stop tickling you is to tell them you have to go to the bathroom. So I did that. Except, well, I really did have to go.

"Lindsay, stop! I have to pee!" I cried through fits of giggling.

Oh, but that only egged her on. "McKensey, come help me! Don't let her get away!" If any of you know McKensey, you don't need me to tell you how encouragable she is.

Now I have my two roommates holding me down, tickling me, and I've collapsed to the ground screaming, "Let me go! I really have to pee! I'm gonna pee my pants!" and they are just laughing, paying no heed to my warning.

So you know what I did?

I peed my pants.

And they couldn't say I didn't warn them.

TToML 14: The Egg is On the Move...

Sophomore year. Living in 110 at RG.

I remembered this at the grocery store today and loled. I knew it had to be today's story.

I don't remember exactly when this story took place, but I'm thinking it was probably like right after Christmas break because it had to do with a completely un-stocked grocery store. I think it very well might have been the time that we saw Matt Meese there too...we may or may not have creeped on him. Just a little.

Anyways, the four of us were grocery shopping and stocking up on the essentials. We went to go grab some eggs and found that there were NONE left. None, except a couple cartons of brown eggs which we were a little bit leery about...and a huge 5 dozen stack.

We debated for probably like ten minutes on which we should buy. (At that point we were still cute and buying stuff to share.) Marjorie was very adamant that we did not get the 5 dozen. Why? No idea.

Finally the other three of us overruled her, saying it was gonna be much cheaper in the long run to just buy the huge carton. There was nothing Margie could do. Although she did refuse to be seen as we carried that carton around. I still don't understand this, I just know that it was and still is hilarious to me.

Also...another quick egg story. Freshman year. Someone randomly said, "I think I'm ovulating." We decided that saying "the egg is on the move" was a good censor for that. But disguised that euphemism by saying we had a mishap while we were baking. We were weird.

I apologize to those of you who don't find any of this funny today. Definitely one of those "you had to be there" times.

TToML 13: First Impressions

Summer 2010. Living at RG with Marjo.

Alright, two stories tonight. They both involve my dear friend, McKensey, and they are two of the first impressions that I got of her before she became one of my best friends.

Story one: This is the first memory I have of McKensey. It was probably earlier in the Spring actually when this happened. But it was a Sunday, after ward prayer, and everyone was just chilling in the quad like normal. There's this one particular crabapple tree in the quad whose trunk grows very near to the balcony. If you stand on the ledge that's down around the quad, it's just a short arms length away. Well, I don't remember the specifics of who I was with or what I was doing, but I look over and see this girl stuck up between the first and second floor of Roman Gardens. She had sort of climbed up the tree and was leaning back against the railing and the side of the floor for the second story walkway, and her feet were on the trunk of the tree holding her up. (Ok, I just went facebook exploring to see if I could find a picture in the quad with this tree, and no luck. So I drew one for you.)

Like so:

But now she was trying to get down and finding that she didn't quite know how to do that. It was one of those situations that was much easier to get into than out of. So I just remember Sara and perhaps another person or two over there trying to figure out how to help her down and I just laughed because it was a funny situation.

Story two: This happened in the summer. At this point McKensey and I were friends, but not good ones. We had hung out in the same group several times and I liked her, but still didn't know her very well. So one day I was standing outside my door, just looking out into the quad. It was probably a Saturday and we were bored and couldn't figure out what to do. Well, the manager, Dave, happened to be walking around out there and McKensey was out by the pool. Here is the conversation I witnessed:

"Hey Dave, have you noticed anything missing around here?"

"Uhh..."

"Like the 'No Diving' tile for the hot tub...?"

"Oh, yeah, actually I had noticed. You know anything about it?"

"I may or may not...but you'll never know until my garbage disposal is fixed."

"Umm you need to put that back. I could get you in serious trouble for stealing from the complex."

"......Oh. Okay."

I laughed so hard! It was obviously supposed to be funny and only somewhat serious, but he totally didn't get the joke and reacted in a bit of a hostile way. This girl and I were gonna get along mighty well.

Needless to say, the tile found its way back home, and McKensey's disposal got fixed by Nate since Dave was obviously never gonna get around to doing it.

TToML 12: Indecent Exposure

Winter 2009. Living in Heritage Halls.

One of our favorite pastimes Freshman year was playing a game we called "Lap Tag." Why is it called that, you ask? Not really sure...but it's not quite as dirty as it sounds.

Here's how you play:
Odd number of players. One person is "it" and everyone else pairs up. Everyone sits on the ground with their partner, we preferred in a semi-circular formation (you could do a full circle, a line, whatever your fancy). You sit with one person in front of their partner...usually the person behind kind of straddling the person in front (ok yeah, the word straddling is impossible to not make sound dirty). That person who is "it" stands an equal distance from all partnerships, about 5 yards or so away. "It" look around at these partners and calls the name of two people who are sitting in the front. The object is for these two people to race to get up and tag the person who is "it." The catch? The person in back does not want their partner to succeed. So what do they do? Tackle them. Wrestle them to the ground. Make sure they do not get away from them. The person who does succeed in escaping and tagging the "it" person now has a new partner and the one who failed and is probably sprawled out on the ground somewhere is now "it."

We would play this game for hours. In any kind of condition. Warm, cold, rainy, snowy, muddy. (The mud was quite fun, I must admit.)

While I'm sure there are many funny stories I could tell about specific game play, I don't really remember that many. I know a young man grabbed my butt once without intending to, but that's about it. I could go into the real strategy of the game in figuring out who to call on so that you get paired up with a good partner, but that's not anywhere near as entertaining as this story is that I'm about to share.

There was one night where I was hanging with the roomies and probably some other people, when it was somehow decided that a game of Lap Tag was going to take place. Of course we were in, so we rushed back to our place to all change into our appropriate Lap Tag clothes, you know the kinds of t-shirts and sweatpants that you didn't really care if they got grass stained and that you could be somewhat modest in while wrestling.

Well, as we were all heading in to change, our dear friend Chris slipped in the apartment with us. I knew he came in with us and assumed everyone else did too. We were all in various states of being ready to go when I was standing in the hallway with Chris. It was then that I heard Amy's voice saying, "What are you guys we-AHHH!" And turned to see her bare legs diving back into her bedroom. I quickly spun around to see Chris facing the end of the hallway where Amy had just been, a look of shock on his face and a scream coming from his mouth as well.

Amy had just walked out of her room without any pants on and Chris was the one who saw it all.

I'm pretty sure I was laughing so hard that I had to sit down right there in the hallway and try to regain my composure.

From then on, one of the many catchphrases of our apartment was,

"There goes Amy dropping her pants again...."

TToML 11: Tools, Camels, and Running Away

December 2011. Living in a house.

My last Friday in Provo, we decided to make our annual trip up to Temple Square to see the Christmas lights. We being me, Lindsay, Marjorie, and Audrey.

We stopped first at Panda Express for dinner. Junk, I could eat there once a week. Love it. While we were there, this guy came up to our table and was like, "Hey. Can you guys tell me the truth? If I button my jacket up like this, do I look like a tool?" We all kind of looked sideways at each other and offered our muttered answers, "No, not really." "Maybe a little." "It's kinda tight, but not that bad." Etc.

As soon as he was out of immediate earshot we all looked at each other and said, "Tool."

After shoving our bellies full of amazing yummy food, we headed to the mall. What were we going to do at the mall? Naturally we were gonna get our picture with Santa. Duh.

That was great. I haven't gotten to sit on an old man's lap in some time, so it was nice. In the meantime, Audrey was stopping every 5 minutes to talk to people she knew. Sheesh. Don't you hate those people who know everybody when they're in a public place? We tried to give one guy our opinion of what he should get his girlfriend of 2 months for Christmas. I don't think he appreciated our ideas as much as he should have.

Anyways, after a quick purchase at Forever21, we were on our way.

When we got to Salt Lake, there's always that awful time trying to figure out where to park. We obviously didn't want to pay for parking, but free parking is not as easy to come by as it should be. Thankfully I turned up the road that goes up behind the Conference Center, and there was a spot on the side of the street that was big enough for my monstrous Gertrude. And let me tell you, that was the most beautiful parallel parking job I have ever done, and it was on a hill. I wouldn't shut up about it all night.

This was one of those times where we didn't have any direction, no plans, we just wandered around being goofy...and it was fantastic.

One favorite moment of the night...we approached one of the nativities and Audrey freaked out. "Look at the camels!! Oh my gosh, take a picture of me with the camels!" These are fake camels, mind you. Lindsay asks, "What kind of camel is it Audrey?" "It's a dromedary, it has ONE hump, CAN'T YOU COUNT?" We almost died laughing.

Second favorite moment...
We were around to the front side of this nativity, waiting for them to start the show and tell the story, or whatever it is they do. We were trying to find a good place to stand when Audrey gets frustrated and says, "Come on, let's go over there!" and starts maneuvering through the crowd. We start to follow and then I turn around and say to Linds and Marjo, "Run away, run away." If you ask them to tell the story, they will quote me with a voice not unlike the guy who sang "Happy Birthday" to Lindsay that one time on youtube. Audrey finally discovered us hiding at the other end of the crowd and wasn't happy. Although, I wasn't happy either because my voice is not monotonous and nasally as my friends were portraying it as they continually kept saying, "Run away, run away."

And then...we drove home and went to bed because it was 11:30 and we were pooped. And as seniors in college, staying out past 11 on a Friday night will do that to you.

This was a lame story today. I apologize. There are much better stories in store, I promise.

We Interrupt Our Regular Programming to Bring You...

some freaking funny things. This is not part of my series, but because I have tears rolling down my cheeks, I must share these hilarious videos I just encountered. [And it's not even that late, so I can't be too delusional yet, right?]


Thanks to Marjorie Allen

This is where the tears came...


Thanks to Ben Evans

TToML 10: One Man's Trash...

April 2010. Roman Gardens.

It was the tiny break in between Winter semester and Spring term (you know, the two generous days BYU gives us). One of those evenings I was hanging out with Aaron and Nathan Brooksby. I don't remember what we were doing before, but then one or both of them had the brilliant idea that we should go dumpster diving. A lot of the complexes around had rented those big huge dumpsters so people could dump their junk they didn't want as they were packing up and moving out.

We first started just going next door to Centennial and checking out their ginormous dumpster. This eventually led to us getting in the car and driving all around town, making brief stops while one of the boys jumped out and checked the dumpster to see if there was anything that might be promising. This process produced an almost 100% fail rate. We were too late. If there was anything good in those dumpsters it was already buried underneath real trash, and we certainly weren't that desperate.

If I remember correctly, Aaron suggested that while we were out we should go stock up on some pallets so we could do a bonfire sometime, and that there were some out at the KMC that he had seen at work. For some reason they decided that this required us to have a hatchet or something, so we ran back to RG to grab whatever tools they wanted. During our pit stop, I found that Lindsay and Amy had just returned home from their weekend road trip to California, so I invited Lindsay to come and join the adventure.

So the four of us set back out, but somewhere along the way we changed plans. I don't think we ever ended up getting pallets or any kind of wood. Instead we stopped at every pizza place between campus and I-15 to check their dumpsters, and eventually made it to Krispy Kreme.

We had been wanting to hit up the Krispy Kreme dumpster all year. Lindsay had heard stories of people dumpster diving there and getting huge bags full of perfectly good donuts that had to be thrown away because they weren't "fresh" enough anymore, so naturally we had to try our luck at getting free donuts.

Well, we pull up. Nate sneaks back to the dumpster and then the back door starts to open. He darts back to the car and we get out of there as fast as possible. There was no way we were gonna give up that easily though. After going and driving around a nearby traffic circle about 5 times we headed back and tried again. This time Nate successfully makes it to the dumpster, reaches in and snags a bag, rushing it back to the car.

We headed over to the Walmart parking lot so we can check out our loot. It was a bag almost completely full of donut holes. It was amazing. We all started shoving our faces, and then we came across the rubber glove. After about five seconds of us all staring at it in disgust we threw it aside and keep eating. But then someone remembered that we had previously been digging through real dumpsters with real trash. The look on Nate's face was  priceless. We quickly put down the bag and went inside to wash our hands before we touched anymore.

Those donut holes were fantastic and lasted for like a week as breakfast and snacks. And thus our Krispy Kreme dumpster diving hobby was born.

TToML 9: Never Say Never

Summer 2011. Roman Gardens.

This past summer we spent a great deal of time in apartment 346 with our friends Ben and Daniel. Well, in the apartment that is straight across from theirs, we often stared at the unusual collection of things in the window, mainly their life-size Justin Bieber cardboard cutout. That might not seem like an unusual thing...but it was a boys apartment.

Well, one night McKensey was on one (not that that's unusual). She saw that that apartment's door was wide open and nobody appeared to be in the living room. Naturally she schemed for all of .133 seconds and ran around to the apartment, ducked inside, and was out with Justin Bieber before anyone even knew what she was up to. She ran back to 346 as fast as she could manage while carrying Justin and stood him up next to the door in a place where he would not be visible to anyone outside of the apartment.

We tried to convince her that she needed to go take him back, but she insisted that it wasn't for keeps. She just wanted to see if the guys even noticed.

If they ever did, they didn't seem to care. I don't know if McKensey was expecting there to be signs posted all over RG with an offered reward for any information, or what. We didn't even know those guys. They were in the other ward.

So we have no idea what kind of fretting happened while Justin was missing. All we know is that Ben and Daniel didn't insist on kicking him out. They let JB chill with them for like a week.

But finally it was Sunday and I guess McKensey's guilty conscience got to her because she decided she needed to give him back. Of course she had to wait until they were gone, which was when our ward was in the quad for ward prayer. So she sneaks up to 346 to get Justin, and inconspicuously walks around to the other apartment. But does she just set him by the front door? No. Does she open the front door and put him back where she found him? No.

She opens the window to the bedroom that is right next to the front door and proceeds to shove Justin through, head first. By this point she is not very inconspicuous anymore. Just about everyone that's down in the quad, except for Bishop, has their necks craned up to the third floor, trying to figure out what the heck she is doing. She finally got him all the way in and slid the window closed. "Done." She brushed her hands off.

Again, we never found out what happened when someone found Justin Bieber in his bed, but the next time McKensey tried to open that window, it was definitely locked up tight...something I would suggest everyone do if they are ever living at Roman Gardens with McKensey Roberts.

TToML 8: Called to Serve

Today's post is not actually a story from my time in college. It is a story from my present.

Last April, the Lord told me in His own way that He wanted me to serve a mission. I fought it, hoped He would change His mind or that it was really something else He had in mind for me, etc. In October though I finally embraced it and started my papers. In December, right before I moved home, my papers were turned in.

Then it was the hardest waiting game of my life. Seriously, I don't think it's something that anyone can fully understand unless they've been in the same situation. Knowing what you've signed up to do and how important it is, but not knowing where you're going or when or what language you're speaking....it's hard.

So finally, after waiting for a month, it came.

I have been called to serve as a missionary of 

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the 

Colorado Denver South Mission. 

I will be speaking English and will report to the 

Provo MTC on March 14, 2012.

I'm so excited for this amazing opportunity to serve the Lord and share the Gospel with the people of Denver. It's going to be an adventure and I know that there are great things in store. I'm sure that time won't move quickly enough until then.

TToML 7: Would You Eat It with a Mouse?

Junior year, living in 109 with Linds and McKensey.

In this apartment we had the tiniest fridge in the world. With four people (we had another roommate who isn't ever involved in these stories, as she thought we were crazy) trying to share a refrigerator, there is very little room to spare.

Therefore, we had to improvise. And this is why living in Utah can be awesome: in the winter, outside is a constant sizeless refrigerator. On occasion it's even a freezer, but that's not as constant.

So yes. We used outside as our fridge. Now, not all the time. It's not like we had our ketchup and jam and milk all lined up outside our front door. Just those extra big items that you have once in a while, like a 2-liter of soda or a pizza. I thought it was very resourceful.

Well, this is not all to my story, don't worry. Outside our apartment (until the fire marshal declared it a fire hazard) we had a couch. A big, old, scary, gross couch. We fondly called it the Cougar Couch. The reason is two fold: 1) we covered it in navy blue sheets, thus sporting our school spirit as BYU Cougars, and 2) underneath the sheets it looked like a cougar and mauled the couch to death.

There were some awesome times on that couch, but those are stories for other days. The point of the Cougar Couch in this story is that it held our pizzas and other items when needed. And it also housed things that ate our pizza.

You see, there was this one time that McKensey was storing a pizza on the couch. We had done it before and no harm done, so naturally she did it again this time. Well, the next morning, we found that the box had been tipped over, off the side of the couch. One of us picked it up and set it back on the couch, not thinking much of it.

Well then later, McKensey decided that she wanted a piece of pizza. A reasonable thing to decide. But when she went to get a slice, she made a new discovery. There was a slice that had been significantly nibbled on. Notice the use of the word nibble. I don't mean a bite is missing. I don't mean there is just a crust. There was a wild creature that nibbled on a piece of the pizza. And this isn't like my crazy battery-stealing-hobo theory. There was a hole nibbled through the pizza box that we had failed to notice earlier.

And then we remembered Trisha, our next-door-neighbor, telling us that she had seen a mouse in the little pathway in front of our apartment. And it was then that we realized that the Cougar Couch housed more than our overflow refrigerator items.