The Best Blue

So, this was fun and all...

But THIS

was SO much better!!! You may not be able to tell, but I think I just look happier to be chillin' in my cougar stadium. AND: we won. Hallelujah.

Pushkin almost had it right

This is one of my favorite verses of poetry. It's from Pushkin's novel written in verse Eugene Onegin. It is so lovely how he talks about love and looking for that special someone...until he ruins it by suggesting it's easier to just give up and worry about yourself. So sad! But I guess that's the kind of character Eugene was: a selfish turd (am I right, Michael Shields? you took Russian lit with me so you should know). Anyway.

But whom to love? To trust and treasure?
Who won't betray us in the end?
And who'll be kind enough to measure
Our words and deeds as we intend?
Who won't sow slander all about us?
Who'll coddle us and never doubt us?
To whom all our faults be few?
Who'll never bore us through and through?
You futile, searching phantom-breeder,
Why spend all your efforts all in vain;
Just love yourself and ease the pain,
My most esteemed and honest reader!
A worthy object! Never mind,
A truer love you will never find.

Happy weekend to all. If you have a special someone like it describes in the first part of this verse, good job! I hope you enjoy it. If you don't, then I guess take advice from the last half, and just love yourself. And know that I love you too!

Universe, You've Done it Again!

When I first got a flat tire a couple summers ago, it just so happened that my pops was in town to come and help me change it (he tried to teach me, but who pays attention to that?), AND we changed it in the parking lot of the Meadow Gold Ice Cream Factory in Orem, where a nice man saw the predicament we were in and brought us popsicles to help us out.

Yesterday, when I realized my tire was flat after driving a block down the street (I guess I had driven over a giant screw--how did that happen?!), there were two nice men right on the sidewalk who came and offered to change it. And, because they weren't trying to teach me how, they changed it way fast. But how nice was that? Moments like that remind me that I like people.

Now that I have acknowledged how lucky I am when I get flat tires, I have probably jinxed it. Next time I will be stranded on some road where I don't get cell phone service and I will have to figure it out all by myself... or just hitch-hike. But I'll just worry about that when it actually happens!

Happy Wednesday. This week is going as slow as a snail, but I'll survive. Loves.

Nie Nie

Tonight I got to go and listen to Stephanie Nielson, writer of the Nie Nie Dialogues, also known as one of the blogs that I love to stalk while I am working.

And I am so glad I did! She is AMAZING. No lie. It was for BYU's Recapturing Beauty Campaign so her talk was focusing on coming to terms with her appearance after she was burned in a plane crash. How she was so afraid to look in the mirror the first time. How her kids wouldn't look at her, and how her two year old thought her sister was his mother. It was emotional to say the least. But oh so inspiring.

The place was packed. So packed that they started way late so some snotty girl could keep shouting in the mic that people needed to give up their saved seats and get out of the aisles because of fire codes. Graciously Nie Nie pointed out that snotty girl was right: we do need to obey the fire codes in case of a fire. That's why I love her. She is not fake at all and not stuffy or snobby or "woe is me, let's have a pity party". She is completely legit. And classy. And they couldn't have picked a better person to kick off their campaign about appreciating the bodies that God has given us. She bore such a powerful testimony that God answers prayers and that He is so so conscious of everything we go through. It sure was a great evening.

So, if you haven't joined the Nie Nie bandwagon, just do it! And start with this video. I swear I cry every time I see it.

How to Offend Me

You may laugh as I write this, but I don't get offended that easily. Ok, maybe I should say I don't get SERIOUSLY offended that easily. And I think it's safe to say that I would never get offended enough to leave the church or stop talking to my family or something ridiculous like that. But today was the second time I de-friended somebody on facebook for saying mean things about BYU (they aren't even students here!). So, I guess that's how you offend me then: say stupid things about BYU on facebook.

I get mad at BYU. I make fun of BYU. When my fellow classmates do it, even publicly on facebook, I don't get mad. And you know why? Because we go here! We have the right to do that. All those dumb haters (who probably applied and got rejected) have no right! I don't go putting on my dumb facebook status all the ridiculous things about the U of U just to cause a reaction, so if you do that about BYU....I get mad.

Just for fun I will tell you about the times I de-friended these dummies for bashing my school. The first was right when I got back from Romania. One of my "friends" wrote me and was like, "welcome home, what are you going to do now?"

I said, "well I start BYU in a week or so."

His response: "oh, I thought a mission would have helped you learn a little sense to not go back to that dumb school. jk."

JK?! Well, you know what I am not "jk"ing about? De-friending you!! (And it's not like we were even friends in real life either. I hadn't spoken to him in two and a half years so no biggie if we're not facebook friends either...like that's so important anyway.)

Second time: this morning. I am already upset about BYU football: they let us down once again yesterday and it's still a sore subject. Then one of my "facebook friends" puts up some idiot status about crappy offense and crappy defense and a lack of purpose as a university equaling BYU football.

Oh no you didn't. DE-FRIEND. (once again this was someone that I haven't talked to in years, so no biggie)

Maybe I am being irrational but I don't care. Luckily most of the readers of this blog are pro-BYU (except for kimmy and jake burch) so I don't have to deal with anti-BYU ridiculousness on my own blog. But if it starts to happen (kimmy and jake: be warned) I won't hesitate to block it on this site. There will be no BYU hating on this blog if I have something to say about it!

So anyway, that's my Sunday evening rant. I still love you. K bye.

Two Years Ago Today

September 24, 2008.

I began my oh-so-good life as a missionary. So September 24 two years ago really was one of the longest days of my life, and the next day was even worse. But man, I loved living in this place. I didn't have a care in the world, except for that distant thought that one day I would have to approach strangers in the street and speak to them in a foreign language. But besides that, all that was expected of me was to study, soak up the spirituality, and eat. I didn't even have to clean up after myself!

The one not so good thing: I had to wear clothes like that (see above).

Happy weekend. I love you all.

BYU International Cinema: Third Time's NOT the Charm!

BYU really has a cool thing going for them, and that is International Cinema: Three foreign films a week, free, and the raunchy ones are edited. Along with some of my favorite people, I made a goal to go to international cinema at least once a week. And we have succeeded so far!

Week one: Il Postino. It was a charming little Italian movie.

Week two: Babette's Feast. This one is my favorite so far. I highly recommend it. It's a Danish film about a French woman who shows an isolated Puritan community on the coast of Denmark the wonders of good food. Kind of sounds like "Chocolat", but I thought it was better. And I was salivating for that delicious French food. In the words of Liz Lemon, "I want to got to there!"

Week three needs a little explanation as to why I wanted to see the film that I did. Years ago (three and a half, to be exact), I found myself in the wonderful land of China. Our last stop before heading home was Hong Kong, and being the broke volunteers that we were, we found a cheap hostel on the internet. The location was ideal, and it was the best priced for sure. It was located in this building:The ChungKing Mansions.

Can you say ghetto?! And it was. The bottom floors were full of porn stands and other stores, and crammed with people of all nationalities. The owner of our hostel even refused to let the big black guys into his hostel (maybe it was because they were shady, or chinese people are racist. Probably both), and when we told a lady in the Hong Kong ward where we were staying she asked, "HOW did you end up staying there?" So yeah, it was kind of shady. Turns out, there was a movie made inspired by the ChungKing Mansions, and all of its ghetto-ness.

Enter movie #3: Chungking Express. This movie was on crack. What started out as a mystery thriller about a drug deal going down in the ChungKing Mansions completely changed plot and characters half way through, with no connection between the two whatsoever. And what killed me was the second "plot." Girl works at restaurant and gets crush on cop (who was actually a hot chinese guy: those are rare in my opinion) who is still sad over past girlfriend leaving him. Girl starts breaking into cop's apartment everyday and does all kinds of things: re-decorates, waters his plants, dances around, changes the labels on his canned goods... I told you, this movie was on crack! Then cop finds out and instead of being totally creeped out, he asks her out!! Does that even work?! Maybe I should try doing that and guys would start asking me out. Oh wait, I am NOT going to do that because I'm not crazy.

Well, moving on. I can say one positive thing about the movie and that was the soundtrack. Particularly the cantonese version of the Cranberries song "Dreams."


This clip is seriously the most crack head part of the movie. Watch it, it's funny. And in case you were wondering if that was for real, YES, she is slipping him something in his water, and yes, she is searching his bed for bugs (I think).

I don't get this movie!! Maybe I'll stick to the European ones for next week.