Yesterday I was waiting for my laundry to be done. I have been at my parents house for the past week-and-a-half for various reasons, including a doctor appointment in Clearfield, a Teach For America ALL-DAY interview in Provo, and also for the pursuit of some type of employment. I was scheduled to make the five hour drive home after my laundry was done, but not really having anything at my apartment to get back to (except THREE letters from Kelly, which came only hours after my departure :( ) until Thursday. I was packing my stuff when I was persuaded by my little sister to come to yoga with her. I enjoy exercise. I love hiking and biking (although I always scuff up my leg with the pedal. I'm skilled that way.) and I am known to ice skate or run, can do more than my fair share of push ups (a little memento of my old marching band days) and I exercise every morning with my ball and weights first thing when I wake up. Despite all this, I have never tried yoga. I've never exactly looked down on it--I mean, it looks serene and all, but it's never really been something that I saw and thought "I want to be a yogi!!!" either. Well, I put my trip off a day and tried it last night. It was wonderful! I absolutely love yoga! It was hard, and I could feel myself working and stretching, but it was relaxing at the same time. I loved the feeling of working my muscles but also meditating simultaneously. It was absolute serenity. I wish I had money because I would sign up for a yoga class 6 times a week! There was a part where my leg was folded under me in a way I didn't think was humanly possible, and I could feel my hamstring stretching, but we just held it for 10 minutes on each leg and just kinda lay there. It was nice. At the end we just sat there and concentrated on who am I for a few minutes. You know, I'm not much of anyone, but I'm not so bad either. It was nice to think of who I am to other people: a daughter, a sister, niece, cousin, granddaughter, friend, student, neighbor, confidant, roommate, stranger, just some girl, or that special girl. And I thought of who I am to me. That's harder, you know? Try to think about who you try to portray yourself to be, and who you really truly are inside. I don't think I'm too different from the Dani everyone else knows, but I know all my weaknesses that I try so hard to hide. I know who I want to be and realize that I'm not quite there. It was nice to have some time in a quiet dark room to just exist and think. I didn't have to think about what to do next, what I have to do on my honors presentation, what I promised to who, finding a job, or what my hair looked like. I don't even give myself that luxury before I go to bed or when I get up in the morning. I'm always going here or eating this or reading that or writing to someone or at least thinking of what I'm going to do next. I think I enjoy my life. I really do. I see beauty all around me and thank God for this wonderful earth and the people who have come in my life and the trivial things like dry socks, a comment on my blog, or a friendly smile, but it's for a moment or two and then I'm on to the next thing. I really do need to take more time to meditate. I'm a meditation/yoga convert! Thanks Cami!
P.S. I have delayed my trip back longer due to the 2 feet of snow we got today. Oh well, I exercise through shoveling our driveway and our elderly neighbor's driveway, not as fun as yoga, but probably more practical for today.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Creative Commons
One time in my Honors class we had a discussion about Copyright and how it sometimes limited amateurs from creating Remixes and stuff and posting them on YouTube. It was pointed out that remix has been part of music for CENTURIES.
The Death chant from the Middle Ages, Dies Irea, is in SO MANY things. It's in Berlioz' "Symphony Fantasitique"; it's in the modern piece based off of the first written story "The Epic of Gilgamesh" by Robert W. Rumbelow; it can be heard in the soundtrack of the horror movie "The Ring." This is merely scratching the surface of ONE piece.
Vanilla Ice was, well, iced for using David Bowie & Queen's bass riff from "Under Pressure". I agree this was proper punishment. What he did was wrong. This is why copyright is important, but what about the amateurs? Amateur literally means "for the love." I'm talking about people who take other people's works and mix them up and create something new, but give credit where credit is due, and don't make money off of it. They do it simply because they love it.
Videos are taken off YouTube everyday for using other people's copyrighted works. They didn't SELL the song, they aren't making a profit, they aren't making free copies for people's iPods, they aren't taking the credit for writing it. Honestly, it's free advertisement for song writers. I can't even tell you how many times I've been on YouTube and heard a remix and bought one of the original songs, or saw some homemade trailer for a movie I was never interested in, but then saw the movie because of it. I'm not saying I'm anti-copyright. It's important for artists to receive credit and the money from their creations. As a musician I am fully supportive of this. I just think that Creative Commons has a good idea. Check out this talk by Larry Lessig. He explains it better than I do.
Pretty much what I'm trying to say is there are only 12 notes total. That's it. That's all we have to work with from the dawn of time to today. There are only so many ways to mix it up. Do the math you math people. So I found this video that illustrates how the same four chords in the same order and rhythm can be traced through popular music history. Eat that copyright people! Get Creative Commons!!!
The Death chant from the Middle Ages, Dies Irea, is in SO MANY things. It's in Berlioz' "Symphony Fantasitique"; it's in the modern piece based off of the first written story "The Epic of Gilgamesh" by Robert W. Rumbelow; it can be heard in the soundtrack of the horror movie "The Ring." This is merely scratching the surface of ONE piece.
Vanilla Ice was, well, iced for using David Bowie & Queen's bass riff from "Under Pressure". I agree this was proper punishment. What he did was wrong. This is why copyright is important, but what about the amateurs? Amateur literally means "for the love." I'm talking about people who take other people's works and mix them up and create something new, but give credit where credit is due, and don't make money off of it. They do it simply because they love it.
Videos are taken off YouTube everyday for using other people's copyrighted works. They didn't SELL the song, they aren't making a profit, they aren't making free copies for people's iPods, they aren't taking the credit for writing it. Honestly, it's free advertisement for song writers. I can't even tell you how many times I've been on YouTube and heard a remix and bought one of the original songs, or saw some homemade trailer for a movie I was never interested in, but then saw the movie because of it. I'm not saying I'm anti-copyright. It's important for artists to receive credit and the money from their creations. As a musician I am fully supportive of this. I just think that Creative Commons has a good idea. Check out this talk by Larry Lessig. He explains it better than I do.
Pretty much what I'm trying to say is there are only 12 notes total. That's it. That's all we have to work with from the dawn of time to today. There are only so many ways to mix it up. Do the math you math people. So I found this video that illustrates how the same four chords in the same order and rhythm can be traced through popular music history. Eat that copyright people! Get Creative Commons!!!
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Wingsuit Jumping!
Hey all,
I know it's been awhile, but things here are...boring. I am still in Cedar City even though I graduated from SUU in December, and I'm still looking for a job. I have substitute taught at the high school a couple times. Since I look about 16 years old, everyone was incredulous that I was actually the substitute. Fortunately, high school boys think I'm cute or something, and in every class it's the males that help me out and even scold their classmates for being disruptive. Ha ha ha. Other than that, I have the best friends in the world, so I do a lot with my roommate Janalee and I'm at Becky's house about every other day for The Office or Sunday Supper and whatnot. We even played Mafia a couple weeks ago! In high school that game was all the rage. I remember at one girls camp we played it for 3 days straight with Old Maid cards because face cards weren't allowed.
Last Thursday I was able to go to the play "The Seagull". My good friend Bryan was in it as Semion Medvedenko the school teacher. I had a really good time, although through the whole play I had that song from the Wedding Singer stuck in my head ("You love her, but she loves him, and he loves somebody else! You just can't win. And so it goes till the day you die. This thing they call love it's gonna make you cry. I've had the blues, the reds and the pinks. One thing for sure: LOVE STINKS! Yeah-yeah!") Tragically that's pretty much how the play goes. It's like the biggest love...polygon ever. But I know quite a few of the people involved in it, and I have to say, you just can't top a guy in a three-piece suit. I was going to go again on Saturday with all of my friends, but I got sick and they ended up having an amazing-fun adventure without me afterward, involving a spur-of-the-moment trip to St. George, In-N-Out, and an appearance of Bryan's previously unknown alternate personality, Willy the Walrus.
So really why I decided to write on here today is because I found an amazing video. I want to do this! Maybe I won't honeymoon to an Irish cottage, but do this instead. But Kelly is horrifically scared of heights, so we'll probably be sticking to the rocky beaches of Ireland. (Or, more likely, no honeymoon at all, what with the jobless state we're in, and the fact that we could be spending our honeymoon moving across the country for Teach For America. Well anyway, enjoy this! It's freaking incredible!
wingsuit base jumping from Ali on Vimeo.
I know it's been awhile, but things here are...boring. I am still in Cedar City even though I graduated from SUU in December, and I'm still looking for a job. I have substitute taught at the high school a couple times. Since I look about 16 years old, everyone was incredulous that I was actually the substitute. Fortunately, high school boys think I'm cute or something, and in every class it's the males that help me out and even scold their classmates for being disruptive. Ha ha ha. Other than that, I have the best friends in the world, so I do a lot with my roommate Janalee and I'm at Becky's house about every other day for The Office or Sunday Supper and whatnot. We even played Mafia a couple weeks ago! In high school that game was all the rage. I remember at one girls camp we played it for 3 days straight with Old Maid cards because face cards weren't allowed.
Last Thursday I was able to go to the play "The Seagull". My good friend Bryan was in it as Semion Medvedenko the school teacher. I had a really good time, although through the whole play I had that song from the Wedding Singer stuck in my head ("You love her, but she loves him, and he loves somebody else! You just can't win. And so it goes till the day you die. This thing they call love it's gonna make you cry. I've had the blues, the reds and the pinks. One thing for sure: LOVE STINKS! Yeah-yeah!") Tragically that's pretty much how the play goes. It's like the biggest love...polygon ever. But I know quite a few of the people involved in it, and I have to say, you just can't top a guy in a three-piece suit. I was going to go again on Saturday with all of my friends, but I got sick and they ended up having an amazing-fun adventure without me afterward, involving a spur-of-the-moment trip to St. George, In-N-Out, and an appearance of Bryan's previously unknown alternate personality, Willy the Walrus.
So really why I decided to write on here today is because I found an amazing video. I want to do this! Maybe I won't honeymoon to an Irish cottage, but do this instead. But Kelly is horrifically scared of heights, so we'll probably be sticking to the rocky beaches of Ireland. (Or, more likely, no honeymoon at all, what with the jobless state we're in, and the fact that we could be spending our honeymoon moving across the country for Teach For America. Well anyway, enjoy this! It's freaking incredible!
wingsuit base jumping from Ali on Vimeo.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
President Barack Obama
I just watched President Obama's Inaugural Address again online. I don't even know what to say; I just wanted to remark about this momentous occasion somehow, but words fail me. I'm so excited to see what the next four years will bring, and I'm so glad to be a part of this piece of history, even if it was only casting a ballot for him, and watching him on TV. I wish I had gone to his rally in Las Vegas. I didn't have the money to get there, but the people I was going to go with were just a couple yards away from him.
I know this isn't much, but I'm so happy. His address made me cry. Thanks for all the hope you've given America and good luck President Obama!!!
I know this isn't much, but I'm so happy. His address made me cry. Thanks for all the hope you've given America and good luck President Obama!!!
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Kelly
I can barely type because I'm kind of almost jumping up and down at the moment.
Kelly's flight plans were just emailed to me by his mom. He will land in Salt Lake City at 1:35 on April 10th.
85 days!!! That's right, I've finally decided it's okay to count down. Despite what most of my geriatric ward members believe, (and even some of my best friends *cough*BECKY*cough*), I have not counted down prior to this. I did know that he had 100 days left from January 1, but that's because KELLY told me that on the phone on Christmas Eve. I actually scolded him about that and said, "Get back to your mission, Elder." I don't want him coming home with any regrets about wasted time or efforts or anything. When he comes home I want him to be completely satisfied about putting his whole self into the Montevideo Uruguay Mission for the entire two years. Good thing I already know he's done this and will continue to; he's such a good person and I admire him so much. When Kelly does something, he gives it all he's got, and he does it right. I'm so proud of him and how much he's grown since his baptism in 2005. I wish I could shout to the whole world how amazing Kelly is, how blessed and grateful I am that he is in my life and I've been able to share so many awesome experiences with him, and how much I love him.
Kelly's mission has blessed him so much. His testimony has grown, as has his love for the gospel, the Book of Mormon, and Joseph Smith. It's almost hard to believe the young man writing these letters is the same guy who was Bible bashing with me at Country Boy Dairy in June 2005--the same guy I cried with on the hill at Beus Park because neither of us could see how our relationship could work out, but we couldn't see it ever ending either. Kelly is more outgoing and confident. I think he's even more patient and understanding, and even humble--I didn't even know humans had the capacity to become more patient, understanding, or humble than Kelly already was! He is absolutely awe-inspiring.
Almost more amazing is that although I've been left behind, I have grown so much. I am more independent and well-rounded. I have developed interests and pushed myself out of my little comfort zone. I've come to realize I have talents and that I am an interesting person. I'm not so scared about what others might think of me, so I am more outgoing and confident, too. Some people have told me how suprised they are that I'm funny--thanks to those of you with a refined sense of sarcasm, because you actually get my so-called wit. No one can say I am just Daniandkelly (affectionately dubbed "Danelly" by some friends our sophomore year when some people honestly didn't know if it were "Dani and Kelly" or "Danny and Kelli".) A lot of my friends have never even met Kelly! (But believe me, they know about him.) Kelly is forever my other half, me in male form, and my best friend, but I am somebody and no one can take that away from me.
That being said, I AM SO EXCITED TO SEE KELLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Kelly's flight plans were just emailed to me by his mom. He will land in Salt Lake City at 1:35 on April 10th.
85 days!!! That's right, I've finally decided it's okay to count down. Despite what most of my geriatric ward members believe, (and even some of my best friends *cough*BECKY*cough*), I have not counted down prior to this. I did know that he had 100 days left from January 1, but that's because KELLY told me that on the phone on Christmas Eve. I actually scolded him about that and said, "Get back to your mission, Elder." I don't want him coming home with any regrets about wasted time or efforts or anything. When he comes home I want him to be completely satisfied about putting his whole self into the Montevideo Uruguay Mission for the entire two years. Good thing I already know he's done this and will continue to; he's such a good person and I admire him so much. When Kelly does something, he gives it all he's got, and he does it right. I'm so proud of him and how much he's grown since his baptism in 2005. I wish I could shout to the whole world how amazing Kelly is, how blessed and grateful I am that he is in my life and I've been able to share so many awesome experiences with him, and how much I love him.
Kelly's mission has blessed him so much. His testimony has grown, as has his love for the gospel, the Book of Mormon, and Joseph Smith. It's almost hard to believe the young man writing these letters is the same guy who was Bible bashing with me at Country Boy Dairy in June 2005--the same guy I cried with on the hill at Beus Park because neither of us could see how our relationship could work out, but we couldn't see it ever ending either. Kelly is more outgoing and confident. I think he's even more patient and understanding, and even humble--I didn't even know humans had the capacity to become more patient, understanding, or humble than Kelly already was! He is absolutely awe-inspiring.
Almost more amazing is that although I've been left behind, I have grown so much. I am more independent and well-rounded. I have developed interests and pushed myself out of my little comfort zone. I've come to realize I have talents and that I am an interesting person. I'm not so scared about what others might think of me, so I am more outgoing and confident, too. Some people have told me how suprised they are that I'm funny--thanks to those of you with a refined sense of sarcasm, because you actually get my so-called wit. No one can say I am just Daniandkelly (affectionately dubbed "Danelly" by some friends our sophomore year when some people honestly didn't know if it were "Dani and Kelly" or "Danny and Kelli".) A lot of my friends have never even met Kelly! (But believe me, they know about him.) Kelly is forever my other half, me in male form, and my best friend, but I am somebody and no one can take that away from me.
That being said, I AM SO EXCITED TO SEE KELLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Teach For America
I'm interested in education. I mean, I want to be a teacher someday. I am in the process of applying for Teach For America. It's a non-profit organization that sends college graduates to underprivileged areas of the United States to teach in effort to narrow the achievement gap. It's hard to get into, the training is "rigorous" (according to my sources), and I just moved up the latter a little!
I sent in my application a while ago and today is the day the third deadline applicants find out if we qualify for a phone interview, and guess what! I get to SKIP the phone interview, because I have been invited directly to the final interview! SWEET-FREAKING-NUGGETS! (I just had to share the news with someone, since my mom isn't answering her phone, Kelly is 6,000 miles away, and I don't know how excited he'd be about it anyway since he doesn't exactly want to come home and then move right away again. But he'll follow me anywhere. He said so. And even if he's not happy for himself, he'll be happy for me.)
I sent in my application a while ago and today is the day the third deadline applicants find out if we qualify for a phone interview, and guess what! I get to SKIP the phone interview, because I have been invited directly to the final interview! SWEET-FREAKING-NUGGETS! (I just had to share the news with someone, since my mom isn't answering her phone, Kelly is 6,000 miles away, and I don't know how excited he'd be about it anyway since he doesn't exactly want to come home and then move right away again. But he'll follow me anywhere. He said so. And even if he's not happy for himself, he'll be happy for me.)
Monday, January 5, 2009
Dani's Fabulous Call From Kelly/Christmas/Hanukkah/Graduation Party/New Years/Trip to Logan/Break in General!
I finished school on December 11, 2008 and headed home the next morning. It was so great being home with my family! They are all so cool!
I spent the next week working for my dad's office. I spent days in a storage unit going through boxes of medical files. I had to pick out all the ultrasound film and separate it from the normal paper so it can all be shredded. I have 52 paper cuts to prove it. Oh, and these pictures:
A bunch of boxes that I had to go through and a little baby ultrasound. Aww...
On Christmas Eve I got to go to Kelly's parents' house and talk to Kelly on the phone! I was able to talk to him alone for about 30 minutes. It was awesome. He has a release date: April 10!!! Three months! He has really loved his time in Uruguay, but I think he's getting a little excited to come home and see/marry me. (But seriously, who wouldn't be?) I told him to get back to his mission and he can think about me sometime around the afternoon of the tenth of April, and on P-days when he writes to me, but not in the same kind of way. But it was so wonderful to talk to him! I love him! I love him! I love him!
The next day was Christmas...obviously. We all slept in quite a bit and had my mom's cinnamon rolls for breakfast, and to keep from breaking tradition, we all had our orange juice too. My grandparents always used to spend the night before Christmas at our house and one of the rules is everyone has to eat breakfast before we can start opening presents. To my grandpa (Pop) this included orange juice, no matter what you were eating and it didn't matter if you had just brushed your teeth or not. Then a Mythbusters marathon was on TV, so we ended up chilling and watching a few episodes of that. Then we has biscuits and gravy for brunch, and finally got around to opening our presents around 1PM. I drew Kevin's name this year, so I got him a couple movies: Ironman and Leatherheads. I got a really cool exercise ball and some little weights so I can be super-hot when Kelly gets home. I also got another teapot to add to my collection! It's SO CUTE! See?
And I got some new clothes and some money and candy. Kevin gave me a Stephen Colbert I Am America (And So Can You!) desk calendar and The Tales of Beedle the Bard. Kelly's parents gave me a scarf and the movie Little Women, and his brother and sister-in-law gave me a fragrance diffuser and a little mirror for my purse. And my friend Becky gave me season 3 of "The Office". I love that show.
We gave my 84 year old grandma (Mimi) a new TV because her old one sucks and also for the change in February. She opened the box and sat there looking at it like, "What?" and then we told her to look at the picture on the box. Well, there was a picture of the TV, but on the TV was some people white water rafting. She didn't notice the TV part. It was pretty much hilarious. She thought we were sending her down the river. She got pretty excited when we pointed out what it really was.
When we were all done opening presents, Cami carried her hoard to her room and the rest of us went back to the family room and there was a giant new TV for us! We spent the rest of the day setting that up and taking the old one down to Bryan's nest where he hooked up all his stuff to it. Cami came out a couple hours later and was pretty suprised to see us all watching more Mythbusters on a brand new flatscreen.
Christmas was great! Mythbusters, jammies, cinnamon rolls, turkey, a nap, and seriously freaking out my grandma. What better day could you ask for?
We also celebrate Hanukkah at my house. Really all we did this year was light the Menorah, but it was still pretty fun. We don't have Christmas lights on our house, while the rest of our neighborhood goes all out on the holiday grandeur. People probably go down our street thinking Ooh! Ahh! Grinch. Oo-wait! The Grinches are Jewish.
The day after Christmas, our good friends the Marsdens decided to throw me a graduation party. It was pretty fun. We just ate and talked and played Loaded Questions. I also got a book called You Can Do It! and 20 bucks. Sweet.
Over the next week I pretty much vegged at home a lot. It was blissful. Kevin and I did go hang out with our good friend Kory and he bought us dinner at Lee's Mongolian Barbeque, and then we went back to his house and watched the end of the Jazz game and all of "Muppets From Space".
On New Years Eve my best friend from high school, Katie, and I went to a party in Salt Lake called First Night. It was pretty fun. We heard some awesome groups and watched some jitterbuggers and firedancers. We also heard a horrible group called "Acabella" singing so-called showtunes. These guys were terrible! They sang to canned music, had absolutely no sense of groove, and I'm pretty sure that quite a few of them were tone deaf. Fortunately we left that one early and followed it right up with the most amazing big band! AWESOME! They were in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and all the senior missionary couples were dancing with each other. It was pretty cute. And the band was great!
On New Years Day my Mom and sister and I decided to have a girl's day and go to a movie. Well...we saw Twilight. I have to tell you I wasn't too excited to see this one and was actually pretty embarrassed to be seen walking into the theatre. I had a great time though! The movie was terrible!!! But it was so much fun to make fun of. I thought I was going to be attacked by a bunch of angry preteen girls and their mothers at the end of the movie for all the snotty comments I made to my sister. I think Cami had the best zinger, though. When Edward is having a flashback about becoming a vampire and he's laying on the bed "dying" and then Carlisle attacks his neck to bite him, but it really really just looks like he's giving him a hicky and Edward really really likes it. And Cami perfectly placed the "Emporer's New Groove" line: "We all coulda been spared your little 'kiss of life'!"
But seriously, want to see what Twilight is like? This is spot on:
(I would like to take this moment to say that the following video has some swearing and one pretty inappropriate comment. Those of you who only watch PG movies should probably skip this one.)
The day after that my whole family went up to Logan to spend one more day with Kevin before school started and I headed back to Cedar City. I got back about 1 this afternoon, and drove through a snowstorm to get here. *sniff* ...I miss my family.
I spent the next week working for my dad's office. I spent days in a storage unit going through boxes of medical files. I had to pick out all the ultrasound film and separate it from the normal paper so it can all be shredded. I have 52 paper cuts to prove it. Oh, and these pictures:
A bunch of boxes that I had to go through and a little baby ultrasound. Aww...
On Christmas Eve I got to go to Kelly's parents' house and talk to Kelly on the phone! I was able to talk to him alone for about 30 minutes. It was awesome. He has a release date: April 10!!! Three months! He has really loved his time in Uruguay, but I think he's getting a little excited to come home and see/marry me. (But seriously, who wouldn't be?) I told him to get back to his mission and he can think about me sometime around the afternoon of the tenth of April, and on P-days when he writes to me, but not in the same kind of way. But it was so wonderful to talk to him! I love him! I love him! I love him!
The next day was Christmas...obviously. We all slept in quite a bit and had my mom's cinnamon rolls for breakfast, and to keep from breaking tradition, we all had our orange juice too. My grandparents always used to spend the night before Christmas at our house and one of the rules is everyone has to eat breakfast before we can start opening presents. To my grandpa (Pop) this included orange juice, no matter what you were eating and it didn't matter if you had just brushed your teeth or not. Then a Mythbusters marathon was on TV, so we ended up chilling and watching a few episodes of that. Then we has biscuits and gravy for brunch, and finally got around to opening our presents around 1PM. I drew Kevin's name this year, so I got him a couple movies: Ironman and Leatherheads. I got a really cool exercise ball and some little weights so I can be super-hot when Kelly gets home. I also got another teapot to add to my collection! It's SO CUTE! See?
And I got some new clothes and some money and candy. Kevin gave me a Stephen Colbert I Am America (And So Can You!) desk calendar and The Tales of Beedle the Bard. Kelly's parents gave me a scarf and the movie Little Women, and his brother and sister-in-law gave me a fragrance diffuser and a little mirror for my purse. And my friend Becky gave me season 3 of "The Office". I love that show.
We gave my 84 year old grandma (Mimi) a new TV because her old one sucks and also for the change in February. She opened the box and sat there looking at it like, "What?" and then we told her to look at the picture on the box. Well, there was a picture of the TV, but on the TV was some people white water rafting. She didn't notice the TV part. It was pretty much hilarious. She thought we were sending her down the river. She got pretty excited when we pointed out what it really was.
When we were all done opening presents, Cami carried her hoard to her room and the rest of us went back to the family room and there was a giant new TV for us! We spent the rest of the day setting that up and taking the old one down to Bryan's nest where he hooked up all his stuff to it. Cami came out a couple hours later and was pretty suprised to see us all watching more Mythbusters on a brand new flatscreen.
Christmas was great! Mythbusters, jammies, cinnamon rolls, turkey, a nap, and seriously freaking out my grandma. What better day could you ask for?
We also celebrate Hanukkah at my house. Really all we did this year was light the Menorah, but it was still pretty fun. We don't have Christmas lights on our house, while the rest of our neighborhood goes all out on the holiday grandeur. People probably go down our street thinking Ooh! Ahh! Grinch. Oo-wait! The Grinches are Jewish.
The day after Christmas, our good friends the Marsdens decided to throw me a graduation party. It was pretty fun. We just ate and talked and played Loaded Questions. I also got a book called You Can Do It! and 20 bucks. Sweet.
Over the next week I pretty much vegged at home a lot. It was blissful. Kevin and I did go hang out with our good friend Kory and he bought us dinner at Lee's Mongolian Barbeque, and then we went back to his house and watched the end of the Jazz game and all of "Muppets From Space".
On New Years Eve my best friend from high school, Katie, and I went to a party in Salt Lake called First Night. It was pretty fun. We heard some awesome groups and watched some jitterbuggers and firedancers. We also heard a horrible group called "Acabella" singing so-called showtunes. These guys were terrible! They sang to canned music, had absolutely no sense of groove, and I'm pretty sure that quite a few of them were tone deaf. Fortunately we left that one early and followed it right up with the most amazing big band! AWESOME! They were in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and all the senior missionary couples were dancing with each other. It was pretty cute. And the band was great!
On New Years Day my Mom and sister and I decided to have a girl's day and go to a movie. Well...we saw Twilight. I have to tell you I wasn't too excited to see this one and was actually pretty embarrassed to be seen walking into the theatre. I had a great time though! The movie was terrible!!! But it was so much fun to make fun of. I thought I was going to be attacked by a bunch of angry preteen girls and their mothers at the end of the movie for all the snotty comments I made to my sister. I think Cami had the best zinger, though. When Edward is having a flashback about becoming a vampire and he's laying on the bed "dying" and then Carlisle attacks his neck to bite him, but it really really just looks like he's giving him a hicky and Edward really really likes it. And Cami perfectly placed the "Emporer's New Groove" line: "We all coulda been spared your little 'kiss of life'!"
But seriously, want to see what Twilight is like? This is spot on:
(I would like to take this moment to say that the following video has some swearing and one pretty inappropriate comment. Those of you who only watch PG movies should probably skip this one.)
The day after that my whole family went up to Logan to spend one more day with Kevin before school started and I headed back to Cedar City. I got back about 1 this afternoon, and drove through a snowstorm to get here. *sniff* ...I miss my family.
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