Change of Plans

You know that "travel nightmare" all over the news? It's real, people. One of my sources says 9,726 flights have been cancelled. Would've been 9,723 without my Boston attempts, so I'm kind of famous. That's Ali's house, which I should be at...so much snow that it turned blurry.

I had a wonderful week in Cedar, then flew out from Vegas. After my first flight was cancelled they gave me a layover in SLC. Then...cancelled again. Luckily this cute family lives close to there and rescued me :) And made multiple trips to the airport so I could be on standby for more unsuccessful flights. It was kind of fun to watch a bunch of people in Red Sox apparel getting frustrated.

So after another flight failure, we headed to the Hogle Zoo. I am in LOVE with zoos, even though this one didn't have penguins? But giraffes and elephants are also high on my list, so it was ok.

 This turtle shell was way to appealing to pass up, but I don't think it was made for my size. It took some serious maneuvering to get in and out.

Jaren was way freaked out by all the animals, fake and real. I made him ride a fake tarantula, with him kicking and screaming through the whole event, and I don't think he has forgiven me quite yet.

We ate lunch with the giraffes! Because if you just hold out for a minute, you don't smell them anymore. I had flashbacks of my last trip to Hogle Zoo when one licked me. Then I had more sympathy for Jaren and his hesitant nature.

 Logan was much more cooperative than Lydia. There's an infant-sized monkey shadow behind her, but she wasn't having it.



 This was much more successful than the tarantula.

 Prairie Dogs!

Then this morning I woke up to Jaren telling me that we needed to go outside real fast and build a snowman! I'm not on good terms with snow right now, but I swallowed my pride. First we built a snowman, but Jenny has far more advanced skills...she turned it into a bear. She even wanted to dye it brown and black, but we had limited resources.

Now we're heading up to SLC in an hour for attempt #4! If the snow on this end causes problems, I may possibly remove winter from the position of my second favorite season.

It's getting serious.

Um, what?

So, I love my new roommate. Really I do. We were both (embarrassingly) terrified to meet each other at the beginning of this semester, but only great things have happened since. Can you blame us, though? I mean, there are A LOT of people at BYU. A lot of people.There are high risks.

But once I realized I was afraid of getting random roommates again, I knew I had to do it. Last chance, right? Enter Kimberly Bluth.

And now we're friends. I mean real friends, because she's the only person I know who loves Reese's as much as I do. Like, the dance-party-anytime, Office-on-Friday-afternoons-because-we-don't-have-a-TV, make-each-other-eat-baked-goods-so-we-don't-feel-guilty-eating-them-too, kind of friends. Oh, and apparently the trick-each-other-into-a-half-marathon kind of friends. 


Shoot.

You need to watch that video, for a lot of reasons. 
First, enjoy the beautiful Canyonlands. 
Second, be inspired by Mayor Moab's tender words. 
And third, feel the fear that fills you when you hear the man yelling at the runners, telling them that if they haven't gone to the bathroom they will no longer make it. Terrifying.


The Moab Marathon is a big deal. You have to enter a lottery to be able to run it. So one night Kimberly and I discussed our (slightly unrealistic and numerous?) New Year's Resolutions. 

K: "I'm not gonna bake all the time anymore."
M: "Yeah, I'm going to bed before 12:00 next semester; scriptures in the morning, too."
K: "My room's going to stay clean. Really though."
M: "For sure, and I'm going to be as cool as Willow Smith."
K: "Definitely. And I'm going to be on time for church."
M: "I want to run more."
K: "Yeah, I want to run multiple times a week."
M: "Yeah, I need to do a 5k or something. 10k maybe."
K: "Yeah, we need to do a half-marathon!"
M: "Yeah!! Half-marathon!"

What?
Then we found the Moab Half-Marathon and saw that registration is a lottery. Sign up in November, find out December 10th if you're in. We totally fell for the buy-now, pay-later game. The process combined two of my innate issues -- my firm belief in fate, and my suppressed love of gambling (which has only expressed itself in arcades, thank you, but that alone has made me very aware of it). 

We couldn't resist. Then I semi-forgot about it.

BUT December 10th did come. And we got it. 

March 19th seems soooo dang close. Bring on the training :)

Oral History Project (a.k.a. Mad & Dad Interview)

For Media History, I had an assignment to interview someone 60 or older who was involved with the media in their life.

I love my dad :)

Not that he's 60 or older. Oops.

Part of the assignment is posting the interview online. So that will be part of this post soon! The link has to be included with the assignment, so I did a little pre-posting to hold a place for my project.

Be excited. Be glad you're not transcribing it at 12:15 AM right now.

Know what else I get to do in Media History? Find Philo T. Farnsworth's grave (invented the TV -- he's a big deal) and take a picture by it. Did you know he was buried in Provo?

Did you know the Provo Cemetery has a State Street and a Center Street? Those are all the facts I'll throw at you for now.

Lost in Translation

Ali and I got new phones while she was home for Thanksgiving. It had to be done then because she's insistent that we keep getting the same phone.

I guess talking on the phone is more fun when you know it's the exact same experience on both ends?

So this week the LG Vortex rocked our worlds. Now we have scriptures, Jazz scores, dad's frequent forwards, and a variety of other distractions at our fingertips.

(No I will not tell you which of those Apps we downloaded first - priorities are personal.)

The new features are great, it was the basics we had to turn to the manual for - like how to call someone, how to turn the phone off, etc. Remember land lines?

Anyway, favorite new-phone moment: Voice Texting.  You speak into your phone, it writes your text for you, and sends it off. Perfect for when you're driving, or you hate your touch screen. Foolproof, right?

Wrong.

We practiced a little before dinner the other night. Ali held up her phone and said, "I'm ready to go, Mads."

But my phone got: "I'm a dumbass."

Guess we'll work on that.

All That Jazz

The whole family was together this year for Thanksgiving.

It's been a while.

The inside jokes came back fast. So did the sharing of past embarrassing moments.

So did contention. What? Didn't say that. (We're happy, really. Lots of love.)

And definitely a lot of the love for the Jazz.

Yeah, we beat the Hornets. But we didn't get on the Jumbotron.

It was not for lack of trying. 

The camera man was favoring cute kids and people with posters. 

Our dance moves didn't cut it for him.

Alison was in her element. I think Michael and Rachel had fun at their first NBA game, but maybe our Jumbotron efforts embarrassed them?

My parents are never phased by us dancing in public places.

We got hot dogs, but I think that just made Ali miss Hot Rod Hundley?

Then a Hornets fan stole the show. 

The Jazz Bear wanted to slide down the stairs on a sled, but the man refused to get out of the way.

Loser.

Then the timeout ended, and the Bear couldn't slide. The whole Delta Center (I will not conform to this Energy Solutions fad) booed him. 

But then we cheered when ushers took him out.

But then he came back. We watched a mother give him a finger-pointing lecture. 

I liked her.

The whole energy died in the place a little. 

Loser.

But then, the Bear came back from behind (foreshadowing of the Jazz-Lakers game tonight),

grabbed the stubborn Hornet man's hat from behind, tied it to a balloon ... and let it fly.

The man was not happy.

He did not cheer up at all when the Bear came from behind again and shoved a cake in his face.

Yeah, the energy came back. 

And yeah, he left.

And the Jazz? They didn't cheer him up at all either. 105-87, and we left happy.

Then we made it to Cedar in time to watch them play the Lakers tonight. You're welcome, Kobe.