Identity Crisis

I got on my blog the other day and I realized that I really didn't like the way it looked. I liked the book background thing I had going on but it just wasn't looking good. So...I've got this up and...it's alright I guess. I don't know. I'm not sold yet. If you have any suggestions, or want to come on over and design my blog yourself, I'd be more than happy to let you do that. I'm not exactly what you'd call the creative type.

The biggest news of the week--it's Friday, and I'm alive!! It really is a miracle. Hopefully the next few weeks will be equally as miraculous. On that note, I pretty much have no time to be blogging right now so let's get right to it.

On Tuesday night, some friends and I went to an Ingrid Michaelson concert in Salt Lake. We got up there at about 7 and waited in a line four blocks long, in the snow, for about two hours. Definitely a great way to start the night. By the time we got in there, the viewing options for someone just over 5 feet tall (yours truly) were pretty limited. My roommate and I finally found some decent standing room over by the bar. I learned something that night. Smelling alcohol for long periods of time gives me a headache. Good thing those drinking days of mine are behind me.

At one point, the snow was pelting horizontally. That was neat.

The four of us waiting in line (Hilary, Lauren, Jenny, me).

Using my scarf as an umbrella. More effective than you might think.

When we walked out of the building at about 11pm, I was astonished to find a solid two inches of snow on the ground. And there was no sign of it stopping. Well, I don't know why after living in Utah for almost 5 years I haven't learned to keep my snowscraper close at hand starting in September, but after I used my hand to clear the car of snow we were good to go. Until we got on 215 (the freeway). The clincher was when, as I was going 25 down the one lane that had been carved out of the snow, the SUV in front of me somehow spun out across all four lanes of traffic. Luckily, there was almost no one on the road so they were fine. But, that's when we decided our life expectancy would increase dramatically if we stayed the night at Jenny's house, which we happened to be about 10 minutes away from.

So we got there at about midnight, decided we were starving and ate everything we could find (sorry Jenny's parents...) and tried to get some sleep.

Jenny let us borrow some great clothes. Which included

these Texas boxers that Hilary was only too happy to sport.

My car in the morning. I was clearly not amused. I knew there was a

reason I've been saving that Toy Story 3 coloring book in my car...

it made a stellar snow scraper.

So Ingrid? An adventure. But what's life without a little bit of that? You might not believe me, but I actually did have a good time. Ingrid is hilarious and sounds even better live than recorded. We're going up for another concert next month. So...better luck next time?

Another Ragnar

After we ran the good ole Wasatch Back in June, most of my team decided to sign up for the Las Vegas relay race in October. Having just spent about $100 to be in pain and run 18 miles and not get any sleep, I opted out of the Las Vegas race. But I still got pulled into it. Turns out they needed a driver, and I was available so I decided--what the heck. I'll go and drive.

For those of you who may not be familiar with the Ragnar Relay series, first of all--they are amazing. They have them all over the US and each one is a total of about 200 miles. You gather up a team of 12, and two vans and then run. Their tag line is very appropriately, "Run. Drive. Sleep? Repeat." And there you have it. So what did I do this weekend? I drove an Expedition full of 4 smelly boys and 2 slightly less smelly girls through the Las Vegas desert. For 29 hours. For future reference, if you have any plans to run one of these--don't pick Vegas. A couple of our runners got lost on the course in the middle of the night and...I can't vouch for any of the other ones but the Wasatch Back at least is way better. So pick a good one.

This is a picture of me at probably 2am, standing on the side of a road in the middle of the desert, wearing an orange reflective vest (that we found out wasn't actually reflective so we had to stick some reflective tape on it...) holding a bright orange flag and a bottle of water. This is also about the time I thought to myself--what on earth am I doing here?

Here's the whole team before we started running. Mike bought a purple bandanna. Then Ben bought one. And then Brad bought one. And then...suddenly, it was team uniform and we all had one.

The finish line was at the Red Rock Casino in Las Vegas. We were supposed to get a couple free rooms there but apparently they ran out and we ended up staying at the Venetian right on the strip! In these huge suites! So that was pretty darn cool. Although, I still had to sleep on the floor because there were 8 of us in there. Oh well, beats the driver's seat of a car (which is where I slept Friday night/Saturday morning). So, I guess the cool part of this race is supposed to be that in ends in Vegas but we got there and I suddenly remembered--I hate Vegas. I feel like it is the perfect embodiment of everything in the world I live my life trying to avoid. It's a dirty, sleazy and uncomfortable place. So what did we do there all night? Well, what any good group of Mormon kids would do:

Watched the Bellagio fountains.

And got our picture taken with the Coca-cola bear. Naturally.

Because what else do people come to Vegas to do?

When we thought we were all going to die of exhaustion (at about 10pm...), we wandered back to the hotel. We left to drive home at 5 the next morning and I was completely astonished at the number of people that were out and about. Way more than I expected. I guess the no clocks and windows in those casinos really does trick people...

Fall

I spent this last weekend hanging out with my pal, Jen (aka--my sister). On Friday night we drove up to the outlets in Park City. I'd been dying to go there forever and even though Jen has been there several times recently, she still took me. What a sacrifice... :)

We spent quite a while trying to get the perfect picture but...

turns out a car is a really bad place to try to take a picture off of, and

I accidentally ruined every one just by being in it. So this is unfortunately the best we have.

I finally got aviators. Which I'm pretty sure I've been meaning

to do for years now. Hopefully they're still cool. But I guess I make them

look pretty good. So, it's a win-win either way really.

Saturday night was when the real party started. Jen invited me over once again to have dinner in a pumpkin. You really carve out a pumpkin, mix up some meat and rice and stuff, and then throw it in the pumpkin and put the whole thing in the oven. It was delicious. But it took a while. So in the interim, we made caramel apples. Naturally.

Just excited to be there. And so naive.

Jen holding dinner. Well done!

Ok, so Jen and I have never made caramel apples before. No one warned us that it is a very involved science. So, we started the night off by making some really ugly ones.

And, we ended the night with some slightly less ugly ones that were

exciting at the moment, but by morning looked just as bad as the first batch.

BUT--we had a great time. And maybe learned some things not to do next time. If we are ever brave enough to try again. And also, I do realize that I am sporting the button-up shirt/sweater look in all of these pictures. I just wanted to be positive that when you think to yourself, 'who do I know that wears more button-up shirt/sweater combos than I've ever seen?' there's zero hesitation before my name comes to mind.

Happy Fall!

Busy!

Here's a few quick random updates from my life.

A couple weekends ago, Jen and I were able to go to the first

session of general conference at the conference center in Salt Lake.

It was a good time. And sunny. That's why we all look really weird.

Jen's roommate Jen (yes, it's confusing) and her friend Mary came with us.

We had wicked good seats. This is taken from my camera without

any zoom. I think we were about 15 rows from the front.

Jen begged me not to put this picture on here but I just can't help myself.

I think it's hilarious! I obviously caught Jen rather off guard as she was

chewing her headache-preventative granola bar.

About a month ago I bought a bookshelf. One of those $25 ones from Walmart.

Thus, I didn't have very high expectations for it. But is it too much

to ask that the bookshelf be completely vertical?

Apparently those stipulations are more than Walmart can handle. They told me they'd give me a new one if I brought this one back in but it's not exactly easy to take apart and...I just don't think it's going to fit in the back of a sentra. So I decided, what the heck. We are just going to embrace this topsy-turvy piece of furniture. And you know what, I think it was a great decision.

Today I came home from school to do some homework and our toilet was running. It's been doing this a lot lately. Marie's fiancé (gotta love fiancés!) told us he'd fix it but he hasn't gotten around to it. I was pretty annoyed by the constant running water so I decided to fix it. Since I had no idea how to do that, this is the best I came up with:

A hair tie and a twist tie. Maybe I missed my

calling as an engineer somewhere along the road?