(Almost) Run over by a Redneck

Road rage. From silent insults to verbal and physical assaults, road rage affects all drivers. I wish to share a particularly funny (and frightening) incident of road rage that happened to me.

I was driving back from Zack's house at about 10:30pm on the Saturday of memorial day's weekend when a small white truck pulled out behind me and started riding my tail. He wasn't just tailgating me but riding so close I couldn't see his headlights in my rear view mirror. The roads were curvy and I didn't want to get in a wreck because of some idiot so I slowed down to 35-40. Apparently this only infuriated Mr. White Mitsubishi, so he proceeded to pass me on a double yellow while flipping me off. I wasn't surprised. I already knew he was an idiot, I just didn't know how much so.

He passed me, flipped me off and Logan and I laughed at this retard. Then, my shirtless, redneck friend slowed down to around 20mph and repeatedly flipped me off while staring out the window back at me. Kinda creepy. Logan and I laughed again because obviously this guy had to get somewhere important, which was why he slowed down to flip me off and show me what a tough guy he was.

Being the safe driver I am, I pulled off onto a side road in order to diffuse the situation. But apparently the freaker in the white mitsubishi decided he had more to stay. I pulled onto the road and found that he had turned around to come back for more. He pulled into my lane in order to block me off so he could have his say (or start a fight or who knows what). Anyway, I pulled onto the shoulder and went around him before gunning it all the way home. My car was not made for a 90mph high speed chase. However, it got the job done and he was unable to pursue me because of my amazing driving skills. Once I got around him I floored it and saw him trying to turn around to chase me down. Again, fortunately he appeared to have some trouble turning around and I was gone in no time.

So yeah, just thought I'd share that. So, be careful of other drivers, especially drunk rednecks.

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Analogies

Those who know me know that I love analogies. Analogies makes funny things funnier. They add emphasis. They help make difficult points clearer.

Anyway, here's an analogy I was pondering over. Last night Logan and I gave a combined lesson on the Holy Ghost. Logan explained some of the roles of the Holy Ghost (comforter, guide, etc). I tried to explain the gift of the Holy Ghost.

In my lesson I was trying to explain how the gift of the Holy Ghost is both a gift and conditional at the same time. The power of the Holy Ghost is different than only having the gift of the Holy Ghost. I was having a rough go of it, but I thought of a good analogy to make my point.

Let's say someone gave you a HUGE entertainment system. A 67" HDTV with BOSE surround sound---the whole 9 yards. So you get this awesome gift. Yet you don't have a single power outlet in the entire house. So you already have the gift, but no power to use it. So that's how the Holy Ghost is both a gift and conditional.

Also, if you haven't seen the funniest birthday video in the world, you should check it out.

Southern Weather

What am I looking forward to most about coming home to North Carolina? Besides seeing friends/family/etc? That would be warm summer nights. I just love going outside my house (in NC) and just enjoying being outside as the sun sets. Here, it has been cold and cloudy. 60s during the day is nice, but when the sun goes down, I just don't want to go outside. But yeah, I can't wait for some good ole' Southern Weather.

Google PowerPoint? Now Why Was I Going To Buy MS Office Again?

Well, a lot of people know how big of a Google fan I am, so I thought I would let you guys in on the newest addition to the Google Docs & Spreadsheet applications. Yes, Google will soon be adding a presentations section which will be comparable to MS PowerPoint. That's about all the details I'm privy to. I figured this would be a good time to examine products designed for home productivity and compare/contrast some of the different solutions out there.

I would like to briefly mention the three main types of office software out there. One is Microsoft Office. The second is Open Office. The third is Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

Here's what you need to know. Google provides a good, free alternative to MS Office. While you will lose some functionality, you will gain mobility. Google also allows you to collaborate on documents more easily than Office. So here's the bottom line. Because Google Apps relies on internet access, I would recommend Google Apps for people who are always in range of a broadband connection and don't want to pay for Office software.

MS Office gives you tons of features than are necessarily essential but can be both convenient and time saving. For example, being able to publish blog posts from inside Word. How about being to use Word to automatically insert bibliographies and switch between bibliography formats like MLA, Chicago, etc and automatically update references throughout the paper. The features are cool and timesaving but not essential. If you have the money, Office 07 is certainly worth a try. The competition between Google and OpenOffice has certainly made MS step up its game.

OpenOffice certainly has its strong points as well. OpenOffice offers less functionality that MS Office. However, you don't need internet access to work on documents like with Google Applications. Here's my take on OpenOffice. If you only occasionally use Office type applications and have reliable internet access—stick with Google Apps. If you use Office applications extensively or have spotty internet access and can't fork out the cash for MS Office, OpenOffice is the direction you should take.

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Blog Color Scheme Update

Yep, the blog has gone green. Green is probably my favorite color so I picked something that would reflect my amazingly cool sense of style. Anyway, I really like how it looks. If you have any suggestions, let me know. Oh yeah, check out the "Best of the Best" blog posts there to my right. There are some good blog tid-bits and fun memories for all.

And be sure to read my provocative opinions on Sociology and Race, located below.

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On The Topic of Race

Obviously, college is all about higher learning. Grade school is two parts common sense and one part busy work. While you learn a few interesting tid-bits, you are not mentally challenged in the same way that college does. I'm in a sociology class, which makes some interesting points and is all about observing and understanding social behavior. Don't get me wrong, this is a great science to study, but sometimes the "liberal" tint the book takes frustrates me. I think my general skepticism stems in part because my teacher wrote the textbook I use. In my case, sociology is just like dessert—one serving is good, but two servings of the same thing is just a little too much to digest.

Anyway, because I write on a blog that only my family reads, I can splash my opinion liberally wherever I desire. So I will. Here is a statistic from my book that I think is ludicrous.

Factor (relating to divorce %)	How much does this decrease the risk of Divorce?
Some college (vs. High School dropout)	-13%
Affiliated with a religion (vs. no religion)	-14%
Parents not divorced	-14%
Age 25+ at marriage (vs. < 18 marriage)	-24%
Having a baby 7 months+ after marriage (vs. childbirth before marriage)	-24%
Annual income of $50,000+ (vs. $25,000 or less)	-30%
Totals:	-119%

Since I enjoy destroying credibility, I copied this table directly from my book (minus the "Totals" row). I saw this figure and thought something didn't add up. I added the percentages and found that by following the advice of this table, you can have more than a 100% guarantee of not being divorced.

So, if I marry a Mormon girl at age 25 who has not suffered through her parents' divorce and I work as a successful software engineer making $75,000 annually (of course no children until at least 9 months after marriage) then I have a 119% chance of staying married to her. I will hold my teacher/textbook to that promise.

Anyway, on the topic of race, I have been reading the chapter on race. Here are several concessions I have.

Race is not biologically based, human DNA is more similar than different (with regards to social boundaries)
Non-whites (in the US) have suffered tremendous injustices since the founding of the US and before.
Racism still exists today on both a culturally conscious and subconscious level

Now, in my book/class, there is a plethora of statistics showing racial prejudice/discrimination in today's society. There are stats showing the average and infinitely higher (as the book says) quality of living among whites versus non-whites. The way the book makes it sound, blacks are cultural victims. Because of their race, they have been doomed to receive jacked-up mortgage rates versus whites and to live in higher average poverty than whites. The tone suggests that being white provides a social bonus, while being black/non-white is a large obstacle to any social/monetary success. Granted, I see the point, that racism is still a problem in today's society. But I realized that I am not going to get a better job because I'm white. I mean for crying out loud, if I could get some social bonus because of my race, why would I go to college and get a degree?

The book paints blacks as victims (keep in mind I speak to the majority who are not the rare victims of circumstance) and whites and instigators. Sure blacks and non-whites may have more obstacles to overcome than a white person, but they are not powerless victims (as the book depicts them). I believe each of us has power to control our lives. I could drop out of college right now and find a mediocre job and live a mediocre life. I could change majors, work harder, work less, get married, etc, etc, etc. My point is that we choose what we become. We each have obstacles in our lives. Some we place there. Other obstacles are placed there by others. Whatever the case, if we choose to be victims of circumstance, we are only victims of our own fear and laziness. It is infinitely easier to blame circumstance when the real challenge is choice. College is difficult. I have to constantly choose difficult tasks. I choose to write a paper due next week. I choose to wake up early (7:45am) to get to classes on time. I choose to study when it would be easier to say I have a hard 16 credit hour schedule plus working part time and can't study.

Instead of focusing of victimizations of certain ethnicities, we should focus on improvement. If someone is dissatisfied with their current position, try to change it. It may be harder for some than for others, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try. There are a few people who truly are victims, but they still have choices and chances for self improvement. If we do nothing to change our own position yet complain about it, then we are much more to blame than ANY external factor.

If anyone has actually read to this point, I applaud you. I'm sure I ramble more than most. But for you, oh faithful reader, I have an overreaching point that connects my proverbial dots. I don't want to major in sociology. Whoops, sorry for the letdown. Anyway, before I wrap up, here is a link to an uplifting post from one of my fellow bloggers and friends from high school. He makes some valid points and shows an example of someone who believes in choice and changing your circumstance—not letting your circumstances change you.

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A Really Patriotic Song

I'm a huge fan of music. My iTunes is 80 songs away from 3,000. With 8.7 days of music on my iPod, should you chance to see me, odds are I will have a pair of earbuds in and jamming to some sweet music. I don't say this to brag. I only reference the volume of music I listen to illustrate the fact that I keep "in touch" with the happenings of the music scene. Very rarely does one of "cool" or "hip" bands of the day sing about something truly inspiring, patriotic, or something that seperates itself from the rest of the music scene. Well, I have such a song. It is sung by The Almost, and their debut album is called Southern Weather. The song is their tribute (more or less) to the song "Amazing Grace." So, mom, listen to the song. You may not be a fan of this style of music (although I think you will), the message and meaning of the song very cool and very well done.

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Life at BYU

Before I step on any toes, allow me to preface this post by saying that I have really enjoyed going to BYU this semester and had some professors I really enjoyed and met some people that are super cool. This experience is (generally) atypical. Now that I've said that, allow me to elaborate on a particular annoying experience while at the Wilkinson Center (the center of BYU)

So Phillip and I were eating lunch together when a girl asked to sit down at the table with us. Now Phillip told me that he knew of her but didn't really know her. Phillip and I continued our conversation about missions/missionary work, since he is leaving soon on his mission. I told him about my last roommate and how he lived in Virginia and was called to serve in North Carolina. I also said that my roommate's father told my roommate that he was "sorry" (direct quote from my roommate's father) for his mission call.

This incredibly PRICKISH girl chimes (picture with snobbish inflection) "Well, your on the Lord's errand and where you go shouldn't matter."

Totally true. Let's pause and reflect upon my story. Did I ever mention that I felt sorry for my roommate's call? No. The irony/humor of my story came from the fact that my roommate's father, the one person you would expect to be the most supporting of a mission call, expressed a very atypical reaction. The point is humor, not to mock the mission experience.

I tried to explain myself by in various ways by saying that being called to a mission where you live or very close to where you live would be difficult because of how close you would be to your "regular" life, making the temptation to leave/slack off much higher. No, this girl would hear none of it. Every mission is perfect, as is every missionary. My point was only that certain mission calls could have very different challenges.

This girl continued to make equally snide remarks as the first quote! What's up with that? I think I know the answer, but I want to emphasize that this next portion is my opinion.

Because I have been extremely sick over the past few days, I haven't shaved. I was still feeling under the weather and woke up late today, missing my first class. I had forgotten to shave and so I looked a little scruffy running out the door. I felt that the snobby girl (as I will refer to her from now on) judged me because of my scruffiness and then made comments based off this superficial observation accordingly. Not even that, she heard a snippet of the conversation and decided to call me to repentance, if by nothing else than a snappy tone and "holier than thou" comments.

What does this mean for me and the rest of humanity? Your accomplishments do not determine who you are. They certainly provide indicators, but they are not you. In the case of snobby girl, just because someone attends BYU, does not give them any higher spiritual qualifications over anyone else. In contrast, at BYU there are many opportunities to hear from general authorities and have a very spiritual experience. But just attending BYU does not make you perfect.

Moral of the Story: Don't eavesdrop on conversations and then snidely interject. Offer an opinion, join the conversation before refuting the character of the people involved.

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A New Heart? Cool

Check this out. Scientists in England have engineered heart valves from stem cells. Apparently, this is the first time any part of the heart has been engineered in a lab. From what it looks like, we (the human race) could benefit from stem cell heart tissue within three years. That would mean that many people with heart problems could delay heart transplants or avoid them entirely by replacing portions of the heart with stem-cell-grown tissue. Even better, scientists also hypothesize that within 10 years we could grow entire hearts from stem cell tissue. This would increase longevity of patients and eliminate the need for lots of rejection drugs when replacing/repairing organs. Interesting to consider, eh?

Technology Lovers Galore

Hello fellow blogger people. If you have never read a post on this blog before, READ THIS ONE. I've compiled a short and sweet list of the must-haves of internet goers. If you use the internet, check these out.

Google News
Number one on my list is Google News. This is an oldie (in Internet years). Google News has been around since about 2004. It has been out of beta for a little over a year. And it is one of the most useful sources for news-alcoholics. Google News compiles news articles from all the major news providers like CNN, MSNBC News, ABC News, Fox News, The New York Times, The Washington Post, etc, etc, etc, etc. Right now, Google News pulls news from 4,500 different sources. Instead of browsing through different news sites to find out what's happening, Google News sorts out current events by topic and lets you pick which news provider when you want to read the full article. Trust me, just go to http://news.google.com and browse around. It's pretty cool. The first time you visit Google News, you will see some default categories on the left like "World," "U.S.," "Health," "Entertainment," etc. You can browse through these popular headings or do a search (like Xbox 360 if you are me) to find news relevant to you. Now, here is THE cool part. While browsing Google News (you must be signed in with your Google account), Google will start to figure out what interests you. It will then automatically compile a "Recommended" section that contains articles that you would like to read. Now, when I go to Google News, I rarely leave the "Recommended" section. Google News also lets you create your own sections (like "Xbox 360") so you don't have to do a search. Also, you can create e-mail alerts that notify you when "big news" is happening to a topic of interest. That's about it for Google News. Check it out, love it, use it. I never go a day without checking it.

Google Reader
I do apologize for the "I'm in love with Google tone," but the services they provide are certainly unique and par above the rest. So, what is Google Reader? Google Reader is just as essential (in my opinion) as Google News. Google Reader is a web based RSS/Atom feed viewer. Some of you are quite familiar with RSS feeds on your Google homepage. For those that aren't here is a post explaining RSS/Atom feeds and how that relates to your Google Homepage. Anyway, Google Reader allows you to subscribe to all your feeds, place them in folders, e-mail them, share them, sort them, organize them, star them (like Gmail), add tags (similar to "labels" in Gmail), etc. Basically, Google Reader is the perfect (web based) way to view RSS/Atom feeds. In order to make this applicable, here is how one would use Google Reader to view multiple blogs. If I were Kristen and had 15 blogs that I visited everyday, I would get tired of hopping from blog to blog and sifting through annoying load times. Google Reader would eliminate that. It automatically downloads THE ENTIRE POST from blogs (including pictures) and sorts the downloaded posts by date. Basically, you can view entire posts for every blog you frequent from one place. I won't go into features too much, but go to http://reader.google.com and check it out. It's worth your time.

Google Notebook
Google Notebook is no longer part of Google Labs. What this means: Google Labs looks cooler, has more settings to tweak, and allows for more control of sharing. You can allow people to read a notebook only, read and edit, or publish the notebook for the world to see. It's cool. Head over to http://notebook.google.com and play around. Its cool.

Google Homepage
Google Homepage has gadgets for these Google services: Google chat, Gmail, Google Calendar, Google News, Google Reader, Google Notebook, Google MP3 search, Google Docs, and some others. If you've used it, there is a Google Homepage gadget for it. Click "Add Stuff" from your Google Homepage and then search for "Google." All of the aforementioned Google services will be available to add to your homepage. They are very useful and very cool.

April Fools
This is one I wish was true. Head to http://mail.google.com and read about the new paper archive feature. Unless I'm way off here, looks like an early April Fools joke. My favorite line is the "Photo attachments are printed on high-quality, glossy photo paper, and secured to your Gmail Paper with a paper clip." However, Gmail was launched on April Fools day, so keep your eyes open for new changes to Gmail....ones that are real. Also watch out for Google's TiSP April fool's joke. This one made me laugh. It advertises free broadband by flushing a optical cable (provided by Google) down your toilet.

So there you have it. Technology from around the web. Enjoy, use them, and let me know what you think. If you want more details on certain features, just comment me. Until then, sianara

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Questions

Here’s a question to ponder. Cable TV and Cable internet. Both use the exact same cable to transmit data (coaxial). However, TV allows for streaming of live video with no “buffering” delays. Even Hi-Def channels (which transmit more data) have no delays while viewing them. So why is watching TV or clips on the internet so much slower. Watching Hi-Def trailers (forget HD movies) take an exponentially longer time to view. So my question is why? Does anyone know the answer to my ever-more perplexing question?

Oh yeah, if you stood in a sphere of mirrors, what would your reflection look like?

So yeah, if you have answers to my questions, or other cool questions that have always puzzled you, post them here.

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I Like Photoshop

Ok Guys, a quickie post for now. I've been using photoshop. So here is a picture of me. I was playing around trying to make myself subtly more attractive without making drastic changes. Anyway, see if you can pick out the photoshopped picture. Enjoy

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The Long Awaited Podcast

Here is my podcast...

Here is the link to download the file if you don't want to listen to it on my blog.

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Another Cool Analogy

I think of my blog as a place to post personal thoughts and feelings, however random they may be. Anyway, here is another musing I had as I walked up to campus. Its about 3 or 4 blocks, so I had quite a bit of time to ponder. So here it is.

I was contemplating my ordination to Elder and the nature of the Preisthood. We all (for the LDS population that reads my blog, readers of other faiths can still understand the analogy) know what the Priesthood is; that is the power to act in God's name. That's a pretty standard saying in LDS culture. But what does that mean?

I really pondered over the phrasing "...to act in God's name." I related that to my life. Giving someone the power to act in my name would be the same as givng them everything that makes me, me. For example, giving my father my social security card, my ID, my bank account information, etc. He would then have the power to do anything in my name. Giving someone that power shows a tremendous deal of trust. Imagine giving someone close to you the power to make every decision in your life. Things like class registration, getting a job, earning money; they have all that power. That is tremendous trust. That is the same trust God gives to us. He gives us the power to act as him, in his name.

Just some thoughts.

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Life is A Swimming Pool

So why is life like a swimming pool. That's a good question that I'm about to answer. I had this amazing analogy a couple of days ago when I was pondering about the course my life has taken up until now. This is what I came up with.

When we are born, we start in the kiddie pool. We wade around through elementary school/primary amidst toys while our parents watch over us and occasionally splash around in there with us.

As we mature we venture into the shallow end of the pool. Our family is all around us, as well as our friends. We play through high school, carefully shielded from the entirety of the pool around us. We realize there is more to the pool than where we are, but its too big to really understand.

Just to interject, I can't really complete the analogy, because I only can relate my feelings up until this point in my life.

Anyway, as we graduate high school, we climb out of the shallow end and wander towards the diving board. Our parents have yet to realize we have wandered off. Suddenly, we find ourselves poised on the end of the diving board, looking out at the pool, finally seeing everything for the first time. We find ourselves separated from our parents, poised over the deepest and scariest end of the pool. Its something we have to do alone, and the decisions we make on that diving board will affect the rest of our lives.

I feel like I'm at the end of that diving board, finally seeing my life for the first time. My mission, marriage, a career, my education, my family, all lays in front of me and for the first time I'm rushing to meet it. In the shallow end, we wade around without a grasp of what lies in front of us. Now, life is staring us hard in the face, and we have to dive.

Yep, that's my analogy. Enjoy.

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BYU-I Year In Review

Well, with barely over 24 hours until my departure from BYU-Idaho, I feel that this is a good time for a little reflection on this semester both the good and the bad. First off, a little award goes out to my parents and my siblings for their spectacular support over the semester. Research suggests that raising a child to age 18 costs around $150,000 give or take a little. Now, that translates (based on $60,000 annual income) to $1,080,000 over 18 years. That translates to $918,000 after 15% taxes. Take another 10% for misc. debt and expenses leaving the take home pay at $826,200. Now, $150,000 means that a parent spends 18.16% of their income on one child. How many people do you care about enough to spend 18.16% of everything you make on them. Now let's not forget the cost of raising children after 18. The cost of college (a 4 year college education) is probably decently close to the same $150,000 mark after book, tuition, living expenses, etc. So thank you mom and dad for you absolutely fantastic support of me over the years. Monetarily speaking, you've only given me 18.16% percent of your monetary possessions, but I know that you've fact given me 100% of yourselves, plus some change. And were it required I would give you 100% of what I have. That happens to total to the order of $0.72, but hey, its the thought that counts, right?

As far as my BYU-I experience, it has been quite an eye opener. The culture here is quite different from the culture of North Carolina. Rolling hills are replaced by snow capped jagged peaks that loom in the distance. Greenery is replaced by potatoes. Also, a town that is 98% or 99% Mormon is quite foreign. Its pretty cool no longer being the minority and my social/religious life has become one and the same. My educational experience here has been excellent as well. I have enjoyed all of my professors and I have learned so much. I really like my Computer Science teacher. He worked on Microsoft Word 97-07 editions. For those who don't know, MS Word 07 is the new version that will become public on Jan. 30th, 2007. In Word 2003 he did the research pane where you can look up word definitions. The point is that he is an awesome guy and really knows his stuff. I mean that guy knows computers. And he has a sense of humor, which is verryyy rare. Most amazing to me is learning how to program computers. For example, imagine you have 5 numbers that you want to sort lowest to highest. It would take you about 10 seconds. Imagine that you couldn't do that. Imagine that all you could do was tell if one number was higher than another number. Someone had to tell you to look at the first and second number, see which one is higher, and then either switch them or leave them the same. That's what programming a computer is like.

Back to my year in review. Another thing I have learned is that Calculus is evil. Yes, calc II was created by mentally insane people. You know, one day, I just realized that by adding consecutive nth-order derivatives that I can approximate functions through polynomials of order nth + 1. And I'll call it a Taylor series. And I'll put cool-looking Greek symbols throughout my formula so people will think I'm smart. That's what Calc II is like. I understood what I said about as much as you did. So I have successfully eliminated math as a possible career choice.

Overall, the year has been cool. I've enjoyed my time here and felt like I've experienced a little more of the world. Again, a huge thanks goes out to my friends and family. I really wouldn't have survived this semester without you guys. If you've so much as e-mailed me over the course of the semester, you've made a sizable impact on my life, and I appreciate it. Plus I loving hearing from anyone from NC, I miss my home land.

One last little story. Fortunately I have a laptop, so when I want to type a story about my roommate, I can just leave the room as I'm doing it. Anyway, I got a ride with him down to Provo this last weekend. I've seen bad drivers, but I honestly thought I was going to die! He was only going 5 over the speed limit, but when he would get get behind a car going slow in the left lane, he would ride up on their bumper, I mean realllllyyyy close, begin honking his horn and flashing his lights until they moved over! I mean, I honestly thought we were going to get shot! Anyway, I found another ride back from Utah, one that didn't involve my roommate so things went much smoother. Anyway, happy holidays to all! Merry Christmas and see you in North Carolina at 7:35am wednesday morning!

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Weather Forcasting Should Be Standard

Alright, what is up with Rexburg weather? I mean I thought weather forecasting was the same everywhere. Apparently not. So before I go to bed I check the forecast. The forecast is 'light snow.' Now being from North Carolina, I thought 'light snow' meant 'light snow,' when, in fact, 'light snow' actually means 3 inches of wet snow blowing in your face at 29 degrees with a windchill of 2. Ok, I'm exagerating; the windchill was closer to 14 degrees.

More to the point of the story, I thought that being only 29 degrees (that's reasonably warm by my Rexburg standards) I went out in a t-shirt with a AE sweater overtop and jeans. Whew! Snow was blowing hard enough into my eyes to make my eyes start to water! I think a few people thought I was bawling and have me some odd stares on my way up to campus. Rexburg natives, pugh! The point of the story is: weather forecasting is different for every area. So to prevent weather forecast confusion, I've added a North Carolina/Rexburg translation guide:

North Carolina Forecast	Rexburg Equivalent
Midly warm, high of 62	humidity 100%, heat wave of the century
Slightly Chilly, high in 50's	Getting toasty out there, DON'T BRING A JACKET
Very cold, possible ice on bridges	Standard weather pattern
Bitter COLD, lows in the 20s	Nippy in the morning, wear a hoodie
Blizzard of the century! STAY INDOORS	Light snow expected, wear a jacket, no gloves
Blizzard of the MILLENIUM	Mild snow, add the gloves
--no NC equivalent--	Mild to heavy snow---expecting 24-36 inches per hour

So there you have it, how to interpret weather in Rexburg. Seriously, there was 2-3 inches of snow on the road and not a single snow plow. I asked someone why and they said the snow plows don't come out until it snows!! I looked incredulouosly at her as I politely pointed at the 2-3 inches of white powder on the ground. I maid a mental not "not to talk to crazy."

Back in NC in t-minus 6 days.

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Why I Don't Like My Roommate

Ok, before I dive right into this post, let me comment on how hard it is to write a post entitled "Why I Don't Like My Roommate" when your surrounded by people who are your roommates. The one time I leave my room to put away some dishes, my roommate (who has been out all weekend, which was wonderful) walks in. I run (casually of course) back to my room in time to exit out of that screen before he could see the title of my post.

Now, on to the meat of this post. This semester draws to a close and I have built up quite a list of dislikes of my roommate. At the beginning of the semester, I though he would be pretty cool. The problem is, roommates who are complete opposites simply avoid each other and don't talk. Suffice it to say my roommate is in love with me and has no concept of "proper social courtesy."

Case 1---Listening to Music While Sleeping:

Every night, my roommate listens to music while going to sleep. This wouldn't be so bad, except that he listens to it from the speakers on his desktop PC. And the music is Gwen Stefani, and I despise rap/whatever-it-is-she-sings. So I go to bed 30 minutes later than him so I can turn off his music without waking/disturbing him. Keep in mind my roomie does have an mp3 player and could listen to his music through headphones. Anyway, in the morning he acts all upset that I turned off his speakers in the night. Pardon me for liking to sleep in silence like the rest of the world.

Case 2---Talking on the Cellphone at Night:

One night while I was going to sleep he was chatting it up with a girl at around 1:00am. I tried listening to my iPod to drown out his voice, but his piercing, high-pitched laugh (I'm not making this up) kept me awake. I ended bringing my blanket and pillow into the living room and slept on the couch.

Case 3---Running Tabs:

How many roommates keep running tabs of how much their roomie owes them. My roommate does. Thats understandable if your roommate constantly borrows money, but my tab on the year is less than $10.00! I mean honestly, how petty is that? Anyway, let's not forget how much he owes me. For example, my printer, which I let him use, and my paper in my printer, and my ink in my printer, etc. Ironically, Marc uses my printer more than I do! Anyway, I could go on and on but that's just the most obvious example.

Case 4---Music:

While I'm in the room alone, I typically play some music to listen to. Whenever Marc enters the room, and I mean nearly every time, he sits down at his computer and starts to play his music over my own! He doesn't even ask if he can listen to some. He doesn't put in headphones just blasts me into submission.

Case 5---No Personal Space:

Most people observe Personal Space Boundaries, or PSB as I like to call them. Marc does not. He constantly rearranges my things without asking me so it's hard to find my things. Not to mention he always uses my bed as a desk. Book, clothes, sheets, he puts it all on my bed. At the beginning of the year, I carefully placed his things back on his bed, but now, he places his stuff on my bed, and I place it on the floor.

I'm sure there are plenty more things that I could name off that annoy me, but these are just a few that I can think of off the top of my head. I'm not trying to be mean, but sometimes you just have to vent about somebody. Don't worry, my next post will be much more uplifting than this one. Oh yeah, as a side note, I will be returning to beautiful North Carolina in approximately 8 days! December 19th/20th I will arrive in RDU. See you then!

My New Template

So you were probably stunned by the sign-in page at the beginning of my blog, plus once you got in, surprised again by the new template. These are just a few of the new features of the beta blogger by Google. So, tell me how you like it and be prepared for my next post, which will sum up the things that drive ME ABSOLUTELY CRAZY about my roommate. (Which is why I have a sign-in page to view my blog). So yeah, tell me how you like the new blog....give me any suggestions...and be prepared for a full-blown roommate bashing. The post after the roommate bash will be of a more sentimental nature and offer my reflections on my first semester at BYU-I and my first semester away from home.

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Why Go To School When You Can Spend Your Life…

Have you ever seen something that took so much time and was so specialized that you sat in a stupor and wondered "How much time did that take?" or perhaps "That guy must not have a life!" Well, I have found such a video. Of course it's really cool to watch and will give everyone a chuckle. Even watching it twice, I must ask myself, where do you find out that you are good at rollerblading through a street full of bottles and making music by placing metal strips on the outside of your skates to hit the bottles and make individual tones. Yeah, head over to www.youtube.com to check this video out.

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Movie Review: The Prestige

Ok, I went to see a movie tonight and man was it good. Now don't get me wrong, this movie is not for the faint of heart. Still, it is one of the best movies I've seen in awhile. I would especially recommend it to dad, Ethan, and Logan. I don't want to give anything away, because it's a movie I would like to watch again (possibly as a family, over Christmas break). Actually, in order to preserve suspense, I won't give away any details, above that of the basic premise. The basic premise is that two magicians aren't big fans of the other. I can't give away any more details than that, and I won't even give away the primary mechanism that drives the plot. If you watch it (which I highly recommend), you'll find out soon enough for yourself.

So if I just spent a paragraph praising a movie and giving away absolutely zero details, what makes a movie good? Well, I think the most important part of a movie is the story. The Prestige does not dissapoint there. The story is expertly told. One of the more interesting things is that nothing is really given or spelled out for the viewer. The movie utilizies some flashbacks and other such techniques but gives no warning of its occurrence. I think it adds to the movie because it makes you more engrossed in it and more captivated by it as the story progresses and reaches toward the climax. Above all else, this movie will make you think.

One last paragraph here will be devoted to life at BYU-I. Hmmmm, let me see, what's new. Classes are wrapping up. With only 10 days of actual classes left, the year is rapidly drawing to a close. This year at BYU-I has been really interesting and enlightening in many ways. I've gotten a taste of the college life and know what it means to live on my own. Its tough but also rewarding. Another lesson of the "I" is how to survive in arctic-circle climates! I've also learned a ton about what I enjoy doing (career wise) and what things I should pursue over the course of my education and life.

Before I depart, just a little weather update. The high over the past couple of days hasn't gotten above 20°F, at least to my knowledge…and that's not including the windchill! Biking on snow is tough, but I manage. Certainly my daily 30 mile ride has been drastically reduced to around 5…possibly 10 depending on my mood. Side note: I would LOVE to do some biking over Christmas break. Anyway, all is well here. I love you all and can't wait to come home for Christmas. Thanks for all your love and support.

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Gmail Gets An Overhaul

Yeah, Gmail got an overhaul. The standard gmail interface has gotten a sleeker, trimmer look and (I think) looks more stylish than ever. In addition to the much cooler look, the details view for e-mails is improved. Gmail now includes domain keys (verifies that an e-mail from bobloblaw@yahoo.com was actually mailed from the yahoo.com domain) and a few other miscellaneous enhancements. Also, the reply button is at the top and bottom of the e-mail, and conversations update as soon as you receive an e-mail. Gmail will notify you that the conversation has changed―even if you are in the middle of a reply. Also, Gmail is now available (for those with cool phones) for download at gmail.com/apps. This only works for cell phones, but you basically download a gmail app so you can use more advanced functions of gmail through your phone. You can even open sound and picture attachments!

Yeah, so check it out today by logging in to your gmail account and check out all the new features!

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I Love Wake Forest

Ok, instead of using my Wake Forest Take Down blog site to tell about the latest breaking WF news, I've decided to just use this blog to keep all my thoughts and such together.

Many people in NC are band-wagon fans. They like whatever school is doing well in whatever sport. For example, a band-wagon fan loves Boston College or Miami during football season (ACC teams only) but can't get enough of Coach K or the UNC tar heels during basketball season. However, very few people are die-hard fans. A die-hard roots for Wake Forest during football, basketball, golf, and chess seasons. I am a die-hard WF fan and have been since 5 or 6. And since I have been 5 or 6, I've been accustomed to cheering for an often loosing team. The other kids at school would rabidly cheer on J.J. Reddick while I would lamely add, "how 'bout Eric Williams?"

However, now that I am away from my beloved NC, WF is going on a rampage. I'm just going to comment on the WF football season. Their current record is 8-1. Do you know the last time WF went 8-1? That would be 1944. Do you know what else? 8 wins ties a school record for most wins in a season. Holy Cow! I've got to say, fate, it would seem, is not without a sense of irony. The first year I move away (and to Idaho of all places) WF has an absolutely record breaking season. WF is ranked 22 in the nation. That's absolutely amazing!

Next, WF just played BC (no 16) and won 21-14. Many people said that WF was having a fluke of a season and that the honeymoon would end with a loss against Boston College. It would appear not so. With an end zone interception, WF kept up the pressure against BC all through the 4th quarter. I'm just in awe of this WF team. It's about time WF got some intercollegiate respect. Is WF number one in the nation? Probably not. Could they beat the no. 1 team in the nation? Possibly. Many people would disagree. They would scoff and say "when the planets align, yes." Well, WF is 8-1 and if they win another game it will be a first in the entire history of Wake Forest University. Now that's saying something.

Who knows where this season will end? I certainly don't know, but its gonna be awesome!

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MS Office 2007 (Beta 2)

Hey everybody, how’s it going? Yeah, it’s getting kinda late here, but I wanted to make a posting before going to bed. For all parties concerned, I’m posting this article from MS Word 2007. Yeah, what a cool feature. You can register your blog account through MS Word 2007 and then write an article from Word and then post it. How friggin awesome is that? So your typing a journal entry and suddenly you realize you’d like to post it to your blog. And for me, I often post my paper and such on my blog, so this would make that incredibly easy and efficient. Plus my grammar is atrocious, so typing the post with Word will make my articles infinitely more readable.

Anyway, those are just my feelings on the matter. With Word you can also set up a workspace so several people can view and edit a paper as one. Mom, if your writing a family newsletter, you can create a workspace and set it up so certain people can edit certain parts. That way I can edit the section dealing with me while Ethan can only edit his section.

So I’m not completely 2007 (Beta 2) pro, I will say that I have encountered a bug while printing. There’s a simple workaround and I think it’s just with my printer driver/setup. Also, compatibility with previous versions can act up, but only with documents with funky graphics and such. Overall, Office 2007 looks pretty amazing. It has a lot of features missing in any current-gen office software. Check out the beta if you want. Tomorrow’s post will have more day-to-day info., so stay tuned.

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Invisibility Cloak

Ok, this should be a record short post, but I just found a really interesting article about a cloak (more or less) that bends electromagnetic waves and microwaves (plus visible light) around an object.

Right now, its only partially invisible in 2 dimensions and there is a slight shadow, but the researchers (from Duke Unviersity) said the ultimate goal is invisibility in 3 dimensions with no shadowing.

The basic idea, is that carefully constructed materials can bend light around itself, making it invisible. We see things when light bounces off the object and some of it reflects back to our eyes.

Anyway, check out this article, its pretty interesting.

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Book of Mormon Test

Hey guys, I'm just dropping a quick note on this one. I installed the rest of the MS Office 2007 apps and one of the ones I tried was Microsoft OneNote (which is like a really beefed-up, super cool version of Google Notebook...it even includes all the cool sharing features plus some new ones). Anyway, I have to write an Ensign article (not really, but that's the premise) about a topic in Alma chapters 13-29. Here are the notes and ideas I've collected thus far. If you happen to have MS OneNote, then use this link.

Anyway, any feedback or cool ideas you have or thoughts to share I would really like. Oh yeah, download MS OneNote...it's really cool, well worth the $1.50 download charge.

Oh yeah, if you're wondering why to download OneNote, a couple of these features might entice you.

It's just like writing notes in a notebook...anywhere you click the cursor, you can write a note.
Sharing, you can share/collaborate/anything you want with other OneNote users.
You can use OneNote to create a picture file from a portion of the screen...see a picture you like inside a flash application and you can't download it...now you can.
Text recognition from pictures---this makes it super easy to convert text documents or pictures with text in them into actual text.

So yeah, check it out and check out my notes from Alma 13-16. I'll probably publish my notes for the rest of these chapters as well.

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Techno Update

Ok guys, I know that I'm a huge procrastinator when it comes to posting. Things have been extremely busy these past few weeks up here at BYU-Idaho. However, once this week is over, things are gonna be niiiiccceee.

First up, quick little dating review. I've officially gone on my 3rd date with Marianne, and I still can't tell for sure if she likes me or not. For my parents, especially mom and dad, I'm not too worried about the girl situation because I know that I'm going on my mission in a year anyway. However, thus far, I've really enjoyed the dates that I've gone on with her...oh yeah, and she's gorgeous. Enough about that though. The girl that hit me with her car (while I was on my bike) happens to be in my ward and the roommate of the girl I usually sit beside in Book Of Mormon. Craziness there ;)

As far as school goes, I got a 94 on my first physics test, which counts for 20% of my grade and I had my world civ presentation today, which counted for 25% of my world civ grade. Let's see what happens there. Also, I have a presentation in Physics on work and motion, etc. this Wednesday. I'm kinda dreading it, but oh well.

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On to other news, like the new Office 2007 Beta. So everyone who knows me that I seem to keep decently current with technology related info. For those of you who don't know, Office 2007 and Windows Vista (the new operating system, like XP) are coming out to consumers early next year (January or February). Also, if you didn't know, you can download both Office 2007 (beta of course) and the 1st release candidate of Vista. I'm a little too timid to download Vista since there could be some major issues with compatibility with my current software, but that means Office 2007 is fair game.

True to Microsoft's word, Office 2007 is a huge improvement over previous versions. 10x shinier, it has that "new software" feel to it. That's not what's most impressive. I have not conducted any tests, but it appears that Office 2007 loads a tad faster than 2003. Another neat feature is the absence of traditional menus. They are gone. Instead is a more streamlined and intuitive interface. It might take users a few minutes to become acquainted to, but it has a lot of new features that are easy to use and understand. Another cool feature is the level of integration. It works better than you imagine it could. One cool example is when inserting a table into PowerPoint. You click the button and in a few seconds your looking at PowerPoint with Excel open right beside of it. It gives you full access to Excel features and as you edit the tables in Excel, it changes the graph in PowerPoint. Its cool.

I haven't tested compatibility with previous versions of office, but I imagine it works smoothly with Office 2003 and Office XP. Its a cool download, although it does cost $1.50. I justify this by saying that I'm downloading a refreshed Beta 2, which is decently close to release software. Office 2007 will cost between $200-$400, and I've got it for $1.50. This should hold me over until I buy a new computer, in which case it'll come bundled anyway.

So yeah, check out the link/title of this post and see if you'd like to try out the Office 2007 beta. It's worth it, or at least I think so.

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BYU-Idaho

This post will be relatively quick since its getting kinda late and I'm really tired. I just wanted to share a few spiritual experiences that I have had while I've been here.

In my Book of Mormon class, I've found the Spirit to be present every day. Each day I feel a strong witness of the topics that we discuss. Not just little "oh, that's cool" moments, but Ensign moments, manifestations that I won't forget...ever. Also, in devotional, (not every week), but the way the speakers say something, the Spirit has born witness to me of the truth of many things and I feel so blessed to be a part of that. I'm not doing a very good job at explaining things, but I just want everyone to know what a spiritual experience BYU-I has been for me thus far. I just feel such a close connection to the Lord, a knowledge that when I pray he will answer. He's waiting to help us, we just have to be willing to accept things his way. I feel like all too often we have our own ideas about things and how things should work out, but when we seek to do the Lord's will, we receive guidance and blessings beyond our own abilities.

One quick personal story before I sign out. Last night I prayed specifically to be able to remember to say my morning prayers. It was a simple request. Let me background this moment by saying that I haven't said my morning prayers in at least months. But this morning, I remembered. It's so wonderful to feel the guidance and companionship of the Lord. Plus, saying my morning prayers really helped me throughout the day. I didn't get lost in Calculus and was on time to every class. The Lord is always willing to help, no matter how small or insignificant something (or some request) may seem. I'm just grateful for all the Lord has given me.

I bear my testimony that the Church is true, that Gordon B. Hinckley is a prophet, that Joseph Smith restored the Gospel and translated the Book of Mormon. I know Christ is the center of our religion and that he atoned for our sins. I like the words of Isaiah when he writes (from the Lord's perspective) "...my arm is stretched out still." I think this means that no matter what the Lord is always waiting and willing to help, no matter the sin or unworthiness we may feel personally. The tender mercies of the Lord are everywhere. I want everyone to know how thankful I am for the best family on earth and I'm thankful for how supportive you are of me and helping me through my homesickness. And don't worry guys, I'm not moving to Rexburg anytime soo-------ever. I'm just grateful for the Spirit I've felt. The Gospel related things I've learned here I can take with my anywhere. I wish you all a good night and hope to hear from you soon. You guys are great.

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Why Mom Would Like BYU-Idaho

Just a quickie for tonight. It's kinda late and I just want to share a quick little snippet into campus life here. Wierd though this may seem, there are hand sanitizer dispensers near every building entrance and exit. I think mom would be in heaven here. Even outside some bathroom/interior doors there are little dispensers to keep things squeaky clean. So yeah, if you're ever on campus, don't worry, because things will always be clean.

Anyway, physics and calc are pretty tough, but not impossible. My computer class is easy and fun, while religion and world civ provide a neat balance. Catch you guys round

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Life at "The I"

So I bet everybody has been eagerly awaiting my next blog post to see what I've been up to in college. Hold your breath no longer! I've finally gotten settled into life here and things are returning to a sense of normal.

First off, I would like to say thank you again to all those who have been praying for me over the past week or so. Moving off to college was a million times harder than I thought it would be. Leaving my family at the terminal was hard enough and then Ethan dropping me off at Rexburg was the final straw. It finally hit me that me living by myself would become the norm. I mean, I know that I have roommates, but I still feel like its mostly me watching out for myself. The best way to describe it is being independent.

The good side is that the homesickness has finally started to wear off. Not that I no longer miss my family, but the sadness I feel at being far away from them has been reduced to a manageable portion. Life has to go on and I've got classes and such to do here. Speaking of classes, I'll give everyone a quick little run down on my schedule.

My schedule is obviously posted above, but that doesn't explain what my day is like. Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays are the hardest, but still quite fun. I actually really enjoy all of my classes so far. The class I was most scared about was my Calc II class which start right where my high school AP Calc class left off. Fortunately my teacher is super nice and I think I'm really going to like her. My Calc I teacher (which I only had for a day) seemed mean and determined to make Calc I a difficult class. She even promised 3 hours of studying per hour of class time. yikes! I mean, I know I need to study in order to do well in my classes...but there is no way I need to study that much for a class. Especially not on average. Anyway, Calc II is way cooler and its exciting to start learning where AP Calc left off. Physics is probably my toughest class because it applies a lot of things that I didn't really learn in high school physics. In high school physics I learned several topics really well, but in college physics it looks like I may need to understand a lot more. Potentially my favorite class is the Intro to Software Development. Before we even got into how to actually program, I was writing some C++ code in the Linux lab. For those who aren't familiar with computer programming terminology, C++ is a Object Oriented (OO) programming language. Linux is an operating system much like Windows XP or Vista. Linux is common among programmers. Anyway, its pretty interesting to start learning a few things about how to make programs. Thus far all I've done is make the computer display some text and create conditional statements based on user input. Don't worry, it sounds way more complicated that it actually is.

The religion class is great as is World Civ. Both teachers are way cool and know their stuff. I especially like my World Civ teacher because he doesn't even need to look at a book to teach us stuff, he just knows it that well.

Lastly, I want to slip in a quick technological update. If any of you are using the internet (which all of you must be in order to view an online blog) go to this website and download the Google Toolbar. Granted, I have to really like a browser plugin before using it because I hate any performance slow downs and I hate plugins that take up precious viewing space. the Google Toolbar does neither. Once downloaded, check out the "Send To" button. Find a web page and click the "Send To" button and then click "Gmail." Basically, you send a copy of the web page you are viewing via e-mail to anyone. It's really a neat feature to show someone exactly what you are looking at. Anyway, that's all I've got for you guys today. Stay classy San Diego. I'm Ron Burgundy?

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Leaving Home

Where to begin....hmmm. It's hard to pick a starting point for this epic saga. I'll try my best to give a brief narrative of the events of the past couple of days and give some commentary without getting too emotionally involved.

As (hopefully) most of you know, I am no longer in North Carolina. I'm going to school in BYU-Idaho this fall and (probably) winter semesters. Anyway, my adventure started on thursday, August 24th. My family drove me to the airport in Raleigh where my flight was delayed from a 4:05 departure to a 6:50 departure. That meant that I would miss my connecting flight in Chicago. It ended up that I hung out with the family for awhile before returning to the airport and rebook my flight for the next morning at 6:45am. The only really bad thing about the early departure was that I had to get up at 4:40am EST. I honestly didn't feel too sleepy. The morning flight was nearly empty and went from Raleigh to Nashville and then to Las Vegas and then to Salt Lake City. On the way from Nashville to Las Vegas, I pulled out the laptop and watched several episodes of TV shows I had downloaded to my hard drive. It really helped to pass the time.

It was funny landing in Vegas. I (not having left NC much) thought it was funny that even the airport had built-in casinos. I even saw a 90-year-old woman staring down her slot machine. From Nashville to Vegas I sat beside a really nice couple. We talked about college and what not and they related to mom in being sad when children leave home for college. The last of her children had just left for college and she sympathized with my feelings of sadness at leaving home.

In Vegas I spent the better part of my time charging my laptop battery for the flight from Vegas to Salt Lake. In turned out I didn't even get to finish one episode of the TV show I was watching. Oh yeah, if anyone is looking for gift ideas...House Season 2 is looking really good right now. Or software to decode DVDs and copy them to the hard drive.

Anyway, I made it to Ethan's apartment successfully then I had to drive him to work. I went from there to Best Buy and bought a wireless router for his apartment and since I would need one in Idaho anyway. Probably the craziest part of the day was how little food I had. Kristen bought me a biscuit that morning around 5:30am and the next food I had was in Vegas at 9:30 (12:30 EST). All I had there was a pink lemonade and a handful of combos. My next meal was a chalupa at Taco Bell...weeee!

I'm starting to ramble, but I would like to share a few of my thoughts before I close. Leaving for college is scary and daunting, yes. But through hard and difficult circumstances can come great joy. As I used to quote "I never said it would be easy, I only said it would be worth it." This applies to me, I know. One "known" blessing is the blessing of coming home for Christmas. I know that the absence of college will make the reunion much sweeter. Of course other blessings may occur while at college, but those are up to me as I allow the Lord to work through me. My attitudes and desires will bear the greatest effect on how sensitive I am to the Spirit and how much I learn and grow from my surroundings. Life is like dinner. If all we ate was dessert (even though it tastes amazing) we would be unhealthy and suffer in the no-so-distant future. However, struggling down fruits and vegetables (although not as tasty as pie and ice cream) helps us both mentally and physically. Adversity can equal tremendous growth. It's all in how we handle the situations we face. Maybe leaving home and going to BYU-I isn't cake, but I can still enjoy the BYU-I broccoli salad. Just as long as it doesn't become celery, we should all be fine ;)

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New Laptop

Hey everybody. Continuing the my new tradition of late blog posting, here I am. But I bring a new song called "Don't Wait" by Dashboard Confessional. Check out the music video above. It's really interesting, especially if you watch it all the way through.

Anyway, new laptop. I just bought a new laptop a few days ago from Dell. I wanted to get a 14.1" screen because (instead of the 15.4" or 17") for battery life reasons. Plus it's a little more mobile than the larger laptops. I had been eyeing this one for awhile but it just didn't have as good of deals as its cousin laptops ;) ironically, one night when me and logan we're up kinda late, I looked at the laptop again (a little after midnight, August 1st) and it had identical deals as the other laptops. Cautiously I decided to go ahead and buy the it. $700 later and that thing is all mine!

The cool part of the story is that the same morning (about 9am) I checked Dell.com again and all the deals of the previous night we're gone. I don't know what happened, but for just a couple of hours I was able to get the deal I'd been hoping for. Yeah for me!

For those curious about what kind of laptop I got, here are the specs:

1.86 GHz single-core processor (Intel)
60 GB Hard drive (5400rpm)
1.04 GB of DDR2 SDRAM
533 Mhz FSB speeds
802.11 b/g network card
DVD/CD burner @ 8x (dual-layer burning support)

That's all I can think of off the top of my head. I think I'm forgetting something, so just comment any questions. My next post will follow the trend of the "Love" post, meaning it should be a thoughtful and reflective post of a different topic altogether. Oh and mom, go back to the top of the page, unpause the video and watch it. I think you'll like it.

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Love

Perhaps such a post as this should be written at a less cynical time in my life. Fear not though, for my dissertation is like a scary bedtime story. No matter what happens, it always ends happily ever after.

I was thinking in the shower about 10 minutes ago and my train of thought led me to love. I cynically remarked to myself that there is no such thing as true love. The more I thought about it I began to realize my own error. Among teenagers, true love is a rare thing, in fact, its practically nonexistent.

I know I'm rambling, but I will make my point. There are a couple of kinds of love and all of them must be examined to understand the point I'm making. Teenage love should be more appropriately called infatuation. Although not always the case, teenagers often mistake infatuation for a purer form of love. Infatuation is a physical love, with no roots in traits of personality, character, humor, etc. Infatuation is skin deep and both comes and goes as fleetingly as the wind.

The closest mortal approximation of true (or perfect) love is unconditional love. The best example of this is the love parents have for their children and the siblings love for another sibling. This kind of love is always present and based entirely in personality traits and not at all in looks. Unconditional love is loving someone for who they are, not how they look, dress, or act.

Now I'm nearing the realization I had in the shower. Unconditional love is not perfect love. Unconditional love can become perfect love, but it isn't always the case. Perfect love can only be felt in a state of Celestial glory. Because perfect love must be perfect, it must be eternal. The closest mortal approximation of perfect love is true love. Eternal marriage paves the highway for an eternity of perfect love between a family, but it is only a highway. It must be followed and each of us has the agency to choose that path or not.

My point is that perfect love is felt on earth. It is almost only found in marital relationships (especially the eternal variety) and between the members of a family. However, because of our mortal state, I believe a more appropriate name of perfect love is true love.

True love is like a seed. Just because its planted doesn't mean it will become a tree. Under proper conditions a seed can become a tree, living for hundreds of years (mortal eternity). Ok, that's as far as I got in the shower. A bit of a ramble, but still the good ending.

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Why MySpace is Stupid (and life)

Ok, first off, I'm going to give a paragraph synopsis of the last three or four weeks.

New Mexico Trip: C- this trips gets a C- because I don't like camping...at all. One week spent without modern conveniences...of which I am a huge fan. The only reason this trip didn't receive a failing grade is for two reasons. One reason was getting to spend some time with logan and my dad. The second reason was getting to spend time with my friends. Ok, the scenery was decent, but I spent the week looking at the person's feet in front of me. I would glance up to stare at 300ft high canyon walls! WOW! and the second day, guess what I saw when I looked up? Yep, you guessed it, 300ft canyon walls! WOW! and the third day, guess what I saw when I looked up? Yep, you guessed it....you get the picture. The canyon walls were kinda interesting, plus we saw some cool cliff dwellings. However, it is unlikely I will go on a camping trip like this one in the near future.

EFY: B+ EFY gets a B+ for being EFY. The reason it didn't get an A or higher rating is because I felt a noticeable maturity gap between me and some of the other participants. It wasn't terrible, but it was there. I just can't figure out what was missing. Plus, girls are gay. I apologize to all feminine readers of this blog...but its true. I have a few stories to tell, but they're too long and drawn out to write out here. Suffice it to say I was out-flirted by a friggin candybar. Ok, so he was human, but his name was Heath. Exactly...friggin candybar. Oh well, I'm over it now...but it does help to vent with writing. Hanging out with Logan and my friends was exceptionally cool.

Work: F- Yeah, work sucks. I mean not good. I really don't enjoy work because it's a complete waste of time. Free movies are nice, but the tasks I do are menial. It's like getting paid to do 3rd grade math for 10 hours at a time. It's ridiculously easy, but you know you have sooo much more potential yet it's not needed. Frustrating!

Ok, why MySpace is stupid:

1. You can only upload 12pictures
2. Picture must be less than 600KB
3. MySpace makes you compress the files to a size under the 600KB mark
4. MySpace uploads only one photo at a time
5. MySpace uploads photos until it gets to the 600KB mark before telling you its too big.
6. MySpace uses a billion subdomains to process server requests (purely technical complaint)
7. MySpace doesn’t allow scripting
8. MySpace doesn't utilize active scripting (check out picasa web albums---the comment feature)
9. MySpacece doesn't fully support IE 7
10. MySpace is home to hundreds of pedafiles
11. MySpace doesn't always work...MySpace screws up. Other sites don't.
12. Everyone has one...and no one shares my overwhelming hatred of it...thus I am doomed to communicate with others through the "Cursed Network" as I will now refer to MySpace as.

Oh Yeah, by the way, check out my pictures from EFY and YC here. Yeah, and you can still comment on my pictures. They're good

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New Mexico Camping (and Free Long Distance)

Ok, before I get started into the New Mexico camping trip rundown, I'm gonna do a quick software review. I'm taking a break from my typically Google oriented reviews and branching out into another software provider. Skype. Skype can be downloaded here. Skype is similar to other programs that allows you to talk to other Skype users (over the internet at 256-bit encryption) for free. This means a hacker would have 1.1 x 10(to the 77th power) different combinations of numbers to guess before gaining access to your private conversations. The best thing about Skype is that now you can make free calls to any land-line phone in the US for free. Just download the program, dial the number (in the +1336123456 format) and wa-la---free long distance. For all those with any connection faster than dial-up, I would recommend checking this out. At the very least it will save on long distance calls.

Anyway, on to New Mexico. I'll get around to posting some pictures today or tomorrow, but for now I'll have to paint a picture of the trip with my own words (ahh, I sound like a poet). The trip started at 3am in my house, where we left for good ole' RDU airport. 2 hours early for our flight, our time was spent sleeping in the terminal (of which I have many pictures). The flight was fun and within 10 hours we we're safe in Arizona's Tuscon Intl' airport. Our two guides picked us up and drove us to one of our guides grandparent's home---in the 109ºF heat. Yikes! That's like 42ºC for any who care (give or take a degree). We spent the night in the basement of the grandparent's house and the next morning---Monday morning---we we're off into the deserts of New Mexico. After a three-hour drive, we arrived at the drop-off point.

Enough with the minute description. To make a long story short, the week was hot, long, and tiring. It was also a lot more enjoyable than I thought it would be. Don't misunderstand me---it wasn't spectacular, but it was.....almost fun....at times. I will only admit this one---and grudgingly at that---but parts of it were genuinely fun. The only thing I didn't like about the trip was our guide's sense of direction. He was always wayyyy off when it came to distances. One morning he told us it was 1 mile to the nearest swimming hole. 6 miles later, we reached the swimming place. Yikes again! However, the place where we hiked was really pretty. Most of the week was spent in a narrow canyon with 300ft. high walls surrounding us! One cool point in the trail came when we found a hot springs deal. Heated by magma deep within the earth, hot and fresh spring water was delivered to us in a 4ft deep pool. It was really nice and everything. Without the natural setting, it could have doubled as a sauna. The only downside was the brain-eating amoeba that lived there. For that reason we couldn't dip our heads beneath the water as the amoebas would crawl up our nasal cavities and eat our brains. Yeah, I'm serious about that. Oh well, it was still fun.

Coming back to civilization was also weird. After being away from girls for a week, I found myself checking out the 40 year old waitresses at the Golden Corral. After a few hours my senses returned to normal.

Well, that's all for now. I'll post the pictures from the trip in the slide-show or in the blog for everybody to check them out. One other side-note (in the life of Adam) is that I've got my job orientation at 3:30pm at the movie theatre here in town. Looks like I landed my first job! Everybody wish me luck! Aurvoir!

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Graduation Day!

Wow, where do I start? It's been four years at Mount Airy High School and now I'm done with high school---forever!

In case you didn't guess from the title of this post, the new pictures in the slide-show, or the new song playing called "Graduation Day," then I'll tell you. Friday, June 3rd was my graduation from high school.

I've got to admit, actually being here feels a lot different than the journey. From as far back as I can remember, I really hated school. I had friends and everything, but I just didn't get excited about the whole concept. However, now that I've actually graduated I have a slightly more bittersweet outlook on the whole thing. Sure I'm glad to move on, but high school was fun. More precisely, senior year was fun. All my classes were with people that I enjoyed being with and the atmosphere had a maturity I'd been waiting for for four years.

Aside from all that, I'll be the first to admit I'm a little scared/nervous about heading out to college. I mean I've never been away from home for more than a week at a time to EFY. Now I'm living on my own some 2,000 miles away from home. And the next time I see my family could quite possibly be Christmas. Yikes! Ok, enough sadness. On the positive, I'm closer to serving a mission. That really excites me. I've been waiting to serve a mission ever since I my family sang "Called to Serve" in the car to keep me quiet. I'm also closer to coming home from my mission, getting married, and raising a family! No need to look too far into the future though =)

Let me describe my actual graduation and then I've got to head out. At graduation all the seniors took balloons and placed them on my Principal's podium while she read out the names of the graduates. It was pretty funny when she became buried in the balloons and no one could see her. I don't do the scene justice but it was hilarious. Also, when my principal pronounced us graduates the silly string was everywhere! Volleyballs, toilet paper, and streamers was flying everywhere! The coolest part was throwing my own hat in the air! That was such a cool, rush-like feeling. You see people do it on TV all the time, but actually doing it---it was cool!

Ok audience, I must go to bed. It is 2:11am and I'm leaving for a camping trip at 3am. I will be gone until 6/12/06. Sorry guys, no posting or content until then. But I'll post some cool pictures with my new digital camera (thanks again Kristen and Cory). Until then, enjoy the new song, "Graduation Day," by Head Automatica and enjoy the new pictures in the slide-show. Don't forget that if you click on the pictures, it will take you to a picture index if you want to see enlarged versions of the pics. That's all. Wish me luck in the deserts of New Mexico. Aurvoir and Sianara!

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Life

Ok, so I just wanted to give this post a cool title when in fact I actually have nothing to post about. Be prepared for intense rambling.

I'll write a few random thoughts about graduation, college, and life in general. First up, graduation. Service of Celebration was (I think) Monday. The speakers were nice, refreshments were so-so, and graduation tradition carried on like always. I only pose one question. Who thought wearing robes, strings, and caps with gay tassels was cool? Forget cool, what about just plain comfortable? As I was "robing up" for the S of C, I felt like some actor out of a bad Harry Potter Movie spin-off. And you know what else---those robes are hot! The air conditioning in that church was nonexistent! And it was wayyy too sunny! Oh well, I will admit that it was cool seeing old high school friends again (woah that sounds weird to say) and it felt like I was finally done with high school. I'm a little nervous and scared heading out west for college...being so far away from home. At the same time, it's kinda exciting to finally be done with high school and moving on.

Ok, that's all the rambling I have for today. I'll try and cook up something especially cool for my next post. Oh yeah, the slide-show should be back up sometime this week. My hosting site is down for awhile but should be back online soon. I'll even throw in a few extra pictures.

One last thought about the heart of my post. You know, life is all about change. Yet, life isn't a mix a "big" changes that alter the course of our lives. I think its more like a slow transformation. Although life still holds key moments---our past day-to-day actions slowly shape who we are so that when we come to big choices---we've already made the choice. Life is a river---always changing yet never ending. Always following the land---but a river does is not shaped by the land. Water shapes the land it runs on. So do we affect the world in which we live.

(I just wanted to write something poetic sounding) See you guys round'!

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Myth Busting

I'm in a pretty random mood this morning, so this post will be short.

Everyone gets those e-mails telling a brief horror story about "little Susan" who wishes she had only known not to flash her headlights at oncoming cars because it was part of a violent "Blood Gang" initiation ritual. Well, I decided to start finding out whether those e-mails were true, partly true, or straight-up hoaxes. My findings thus far have been very interesting. You can find all the information I've gathered thus far here at my Google Notebook. So far, what I will do to new myths is to post the original text of the hoax e-mail and then post clippings of the relevant information about it, plus Google Notebook automatically includs links to the websites I get my information from.

If you have a Google account you can search my notebook exclusively from the google.com/notebook page. Also, I made a heading for each new myth, so it makes it easy to scroll between the blue headings to find myths relevant to you. Also, if you have some sketchy e-mails, feel free to forward them to me so I can add them to my "myth busting" Notebook collection.

So far I have only busted two myths. One about the Blood Gang initiation ritual and the Dial *677 for emergency dispatch. So far both proved almost entirely false. Anyway, feel free to enjoy my Myth Busters notebook. Btw, prom (Kelsey's is tonight). Wish me luck :)

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My Theme Song

Ahh, this post will be fun. Ok. Everyone listens to music, right? I know I sure do. Every time I hop in the car, my first move is to lean over to the passenger side and turn on my CD player (I use a tape/CD adapter instead of buying a factory-installed CD player). And I honestly like nearly anything. Notice the nearly. Rap is out, as is almost all country. There might be a country song somewhere that I like, but few and far between. Practically nonexistent. As for music I do like, everything goes. From EFY CDs to classical to hard rock, I'll listen to it all. My favorite genre is some mix of soft rock, emo/indie whatever. However, as my music tastes have matured over the years, I have learned found certain songs that I like more than others. Some songs I really enjoy because they're from an artist I like, others sound good at first but soon loose their "coolness."

And, I have also realized I have a favorite song. One that hasn't gotten old through the many years I have listened to it. Ironically the artist is probably my all-time favorite artist as well. Anyway, the song (which is the only song currently playing on the site) is "Ocean Avenue" by Yellowcard. I realized it was my favorite song because I always seem to be humming it when no music is present. This thing is just classic. For the blog "Romantics" this song can literally be applied to any girl in some way, shape, or form. It doesn't really work so well for girls singing (or thinking) about guys. Sorry.

There you have it, the Theme Song of my life. A good soft-rock beat in combination with all-too-catchy lyrics makes an amazing song. Maybe if you guys (the blog readers) play your cards right, I might do a recording and put it in the blog play list instead :)

Happy Mothers Day everyone!

Prom Pictures!

Ok guys, here are 22 of my favorite prom pictures. I included a random splattering of me, Kelsey, and the two of us together. If you click on any of the pictures it will take you to an index of all the pictures so you can browser through them. I'm trying to post some enlarged pictures along with the index, but it isn't going so well, but it should be up soon. Anyway, enjoy, and to view all the pictures you can also click here.

AP Exams

Touchy subject eh? Made even more so by the fact that I cannot discuss any multiple choice questions for the rest of my natural life. Well, at least that's what the AP booklet/packet/instruction thing said. So if you ask me about second derivatives and answer choice "B" on my death bed...you will hear nothing from my lips! Ironically, the free response questions can be discussed...now. The actual time frame for free response questions is 48 hours before ones vow of silence can be broken.

Ok, this year I only took one AP class, although that one teensy-weensy AP happened to be AP Calculus. Ouch. Two semester class, 270 in-class hours, 180 days. That translates to approximately 16,200 minutes of sheer pain! Seriously, my AP experience was pretty good. The class was very mature and enjoyable. My teacher was absolutely awesome. She was the nice and kind Filipino lady and just a lot of fun. More interesting was the math that accompanied the class. It's amazing how fun math can actually be. Ok, maybe not fun, but interesting. Calculus seems to be a math of approximation. It works through estimation of a sort. In calculus we find the area under any curves. The trick is to get infinitely close to the right answer. Kinda hard to explain, but it's an interesting math.

Anyway, on to the exam. I took it Wednesday about 830, although it lasted until around noon. I won't divulge any details about the multiple choice, mostly because I can't remember any of the problems :) I will say that I felt fairly confident about the whole thing. Until I got to free response. On multiple choice, I answered almost every problem except for about two or three out of 50-something. However, on free response things work a little differently. Each question is worth nine points, and each part of each problem is worth a varying percentage of those nine points. Anyway, I started to work out the first problem and answer the whole thing under section 1a. Terrified, I marked out my work, and placed it under 1b and 1c---only to realize I had done the whole thing wrong. More marking out, and I've already used half of my available time for this one problem. To make a long story short, I think I still did well on the exam. Also, on one problem, I was give an acceleration function and I had to take it's integral to find velocity and the integral of velocity of to find position. I finished the problem and found velocity to be -7/3 all over 523 feet/second. That was wrong. I took the derivative of acceleration to find velocity. Once i got that wrong answer, I heard the ominous sound echoing around the room---"you have ten minutes left." Uh-oh. I have never worked a problem faster than in those ten minutes. Like a little child hitting a pinata at a birthday party, I attacked that problem like no body's business. I finished the problem and think---think---I got the right answer. Overall it was one crazy day! So that's my exciting AP story of the day. By the way, prom pictures will be posted soon, I'm at my sister's house and have a complete lack of prom pictures. Don't worry though, first thing monday the pictures will be on the blog. I'm trying to do a slideshow type thing on the blog, so hopefully I'll have that up and running by monday. Aurvoir and Audieu everyone!

By the way, I actually didn't describe any problems from the AP exam---they were all from a dream I had. Yeah, that's what it was. Because I would never discuss anything about the AP exam. Never. Oh yeah, it actually wasn't a dream. It was a nightmare :)

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PROM (and my college decision)

Whoa! Talk about your teasers! I know once everyone reads that headline, the first thing they will look for in the post(unless you alread know where I'm going for college) is what college I'm going to.

Don't fret.

I'll tell you right off before I get to the heart of the post---prom. Anyway, my college choice is BYU-Idaho. Since previous topics touching on this matter have been hotly contested, allow me to briefly explain my choice and the choices leading up to that decision. Many people may question my motives for going, which is an understandable reaction. After much prayer and fasting regarding the matter, I felt that BYU-I was the place I'm supposed to go. The peace I've felt in making that decision is overwhelming. Anyway, on to PROM!

I won't go much into pre-prom details, but here is a quick preface to prom itself. The stress didn't start getting to me until Saturday about 1:30pm. I still didn't know when Kelsey could come up or when she had to leave. Needless to say my heart rate maintained a steady 100-120 beats per minute! My plans to picnic on the parkway kinda fell through, so I was left with picnicing on my deck. The closer prom got, the more quickly my carefully laid plans crumbled around my feeble teenage mind :)

Allow me to say though, that as soon as Kelsey stepped out of the car, the stress of the day was gone. Seeing her made everything feel---right. Her parents drove her up (which was very nice of them, all though I felt bad they had to travel so far). We made pictures---which I will post soon---and then her parents headed out on a date while Kelsey and I enjoyed a scrumtrulescent dinner of salad, steak, and strawberries dipped in whip cream!

After dinner, we stopped by my Grandma's house on the way to the prom because she wanted to meet Kelsey. We visited for a precious few seconds before we headed for the Cross Creek Country Club for a night of fun and dancing. Like most proms, the dancing was a bit...different...from traditional church dances. It was nice having Kelsey there, since we could revel in our cool dancingness together :) After a few songs we took our prom pictures, after which we had to leave since Kelsey had to be at my house by 11pm. At 11:06, we walked in the door (whoops). It was just a plain good time. The only downside was how quickly the night was over *sigh,* and back to reality I went. But I get to see her again in TWO WEEKS! Which I know I'm probably the only one on this blog who cares about this, but it's my blog so there! Ha!

That's all for now, I will see you around. Stay tuned for some good picture posts, and a nice little post-AP Calculus Exam post thingy.

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About

My name is Adam. I have been blogging sporadically since 2005 and have always enjoyed the connectedness of it. I'm preparing to serve a full time, 2 year mission for my Church. I work at a Real Estate company as a catch-all IT guy. I love watching movies, I don't read a ton of books but when I start one I can't put it down until I finish. More to come!

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