Images of Mexico (so far...)

Jen (and George) and I before we eat in the middle of our trip to Mexico.
I love how everything is colorful in Mexico, including the train!

In Mexico City, there was a ton of graffiti. But as you moved out, it slowly disappeared.

There were many of these little...cartels? Stores? around.

Stupid emergency sign. Ruining my picture.

It's very hard to take good pictures on a speeding bus.

The main area of our apartment. All we get is spanish channels, so...viva mexico!

There's three rooms like these in each apartment. So 9 girls to an apartment. Guess who gets kicked out of the bottom bunk to the top bunk? Moi.

Mmmmm! REAL Mexican food. Simple yet good.

Journey to Mexico

I have never been outside of the US. My parents have taken biking trips, Dad lived in Sweden for two years, Emily went to South Korea and Rick went to Portugal. I love listening to their stories of life outside of the US.
I go to Mexico for my first time outside of the country. I tried to remember as many things possible from the journeys today, since we will be staying inside a compound, and never emerging into the real world of Mexico, never mingling with the people of Mexico.
I have to say honestly I loved Mexico City, despite all the horrible things that can happen there, such as kidnappings, drug dealing, corrupt police officers, etc. The city was huge and clustered, many many people smashed into a small area, yet they make it work. They make it look quaint and doable. I loved the brightly painted homes, despite the fact that it would look “trashy” in everyday American neighborhoods. It was nice to see (a very small glimpse) of what life is really like in Mexico, at least in the cities. There’s little cartels everywhere, people selling their little bundles of wares. There are many stores on the ground floor, then homes up above. Then a garden on top of the building, along with a string of clothes hanging to dry. Despite all the evil seeming to lurk in dark corners, these people have found a way to live, and to enjoy life.
I feel that in the states we just want more and more stuff (I’m guilty of this), and we’re never truly grateful for what we have—we don’t even use the stuff we have til it has been fully used or served its purpose. Something “better” comes out, and we must have that product before we’re done using the one we currently have.

The food isn’t anything like the “Mexican” food we get in the states. It’s much less greasy, much simpler, but tastes just as good, or even better! (The meat….well, I never liked meat anyway. The beans and rice and tortillas were amazing.) We flew in, and got on a charter bus (we’re bundled in for a 5-6 hour ride), and halfway through the ride we stopped to eat. The place we ate at had many restaurants and stores where we could explore a bit (in very large groups) the interesting thing I found in this area was the fact you had to pay two pesos to use the bathroom.

In one of the little cute stores, I found no food or candy I recognized, except for the candy Mrs. Sullivan (my Spanish teacher from middle school) would let us try out. I saw my favorite—dried mangos covered in sugar and chili powder. The most interesting and confusing combination of tastes for the tongue. I offered some to everyone, and most of the swimmers tolerated it, two actually liked it. The one person that gagged and spat it out and flipped me off with a red teary face was none other than my coach, Greg. The teammates who witnessed this with me were almost rolling on the floor with laughter! I tried to be sympathetic, but I deemed he overacted way too much. I plan on saving a bit of the candy so mom and dad can decide for themselves whether it was worth gagging over.

Youngest

I had to steal this picture from Meg. This is a picture of Sammy, taken by Sara(h?). This picture fits this post perfectly.

Being the youngest has its advantages and disadvantages. I'm not going to compose a long tedious list about the pros and cons, but simply a post about nothing or something.

One of the wonderful things about having my siblings over for the holidays, whether it be Thanksgiving or Christmas, is to see them and their kids. More than seeing them, I get to observe them a bit. Yes, I observe, even though I'm always reading or staying in a corner.

To watch the way my siblings look at their spouses (or vice versa) is just so cute. I think it's wonderful that everyone has found their other self, their other half, and they work as best friends, as partners, in bringing children into this world, to protect them, to teach them, to raise them.

It's fun to observe mom and dad, especially since they know each other so well, to see them tease each other, to "bicker" in a loving way. To enjoy each others' company.

It's fun to play with the nephews and niece, to watch their wonder, imagination, and playfulness, to watch them learn little (and big) lessons of life. To watch Sammy and Carter work on smiling, being cute, crawling, lifting those unproportional heads. To watch Willie and Micah work on sharing, playing together. To see Oscar grow so big, so curious, so smart. To see Poppy (the lone girl of the group) be sassy and sweet.

I think families are awesome. I see that everyone in my family all has that one essential ingredient to a happy family: charity. I see it in the way they treat each other and their children. Thank you so much for your good examples!!!!

I'll have my own one day, but it won't be too soon. I'm not selfless enough yet. Nor mature. I'll wait until I have more of both. Oh, and I probably have to meet someone to make the equation work, right? :)

Christmas 08

I hope you guys all had a lovely Christmas! I enjoyed it very much, spending time with family. I'm grateful for holidays where we can get together and enjoy each other's company.
(I'm putting these pictures of Lindsey and Emily on here to see how long I can get away with it...)

Emily kept up the yearly tradition of knitting or crocheting something. She actually taught herself to knit!

Carter always is happy on Grandpa's shoulder or sucking on Grandpa's fingers.

Sammy and Carter!

Sammy

Carter is so adorable. He's learning to smile more and more.

Micah's starting to look so old! (Especially on camera.)

I is a coledge stoodent dat is no longer a teenager

Well, I got to start off my 20th birthday with waking up at 5am to cram a little bit more math into my brain before my final at 8am. I have to say, I did...*okay* on the exam. Not too confident there. But it's done and over, and now I'm absolutely free from intellectual thinking for about a month! (Not free from swimming though, that happens when piggies fly and eat hot dogs. Actually, I'm pretty sure they already eat hot dogs...) After my exam, I looked at my phone to find I had 13 text messages and two missed calls and two voice mails. It's a birthday! What's the big deal? :)

I'm at the burb, turning in my books, then I'm going to go get some academic advising from the physics advisor, then run up to the dorms to check out of my room, then I go to swim practice (need to find lunch sometime), then I should be on my way home! I cannot wait.

And on birthdays, the day doesn't feel any different. Sure, I have a green ribbon in my hair to celebrate the occasion of my mother going through tremendous pain to bring me into the world. I'm officially no longer a teenager. Doesn't feel any different neither. Maybe it hasn't kicked in yet. Maybe it'll hit me later. But now? Well, I'm me. No different.

Dang. I was hoping to get some superpowers.

Results from Princeton meet

The results on Utah's swimming page isn't working, hence why poor maddie can't find it. I posted links from the Princeton site, hopefully these will work for ya!
(Helpful tip: When the page loads, and if you're only interested in me, hit control+f on your keyboard, and type in "edge." This works on most pages on the entire internet and is very helpful when doing research. :)

Day one, Friday

Day two, Saturday

Day three, Sunday

And you might notice I didn't swim the 100 free individually on Sunday night. My coach wanted me to do my best on the relay, in attempts to get a NCAA-A cut. We were close. We'll definitely get it at conference.

Stream of consciousness during a physics midterm.

Focus, focus....steady....

Wow, what's that it in my hand? A cool mechanical pencil. Green. Has a good quality eraser. I love erasers. And...huh, the desk seems really blurry with this yellowish paper on it. Why do I feel that this paper is important? Focus...ah! Heh. It's my physics test they wouldn't let me take on Wednesday because the professor felt that it was too early to take it it was originally set for Friday but I told them I was going to Princeton. I told them a week and a half in advance, yet the test wasn't quite proof-read and printed for me to take it on Wednesday. Professor felt like Monday was too late though. So right after a bleary weary fun long swim meet with prelims and finals for three to fourish...or was it five-ish days? After waking up 4 AM on monday morning eastern time, traveling about 7 hours, I had to go straight to the physics building to make up this test. A test? Oh yeah, while my brain was playing around with how frustrating the situation is, I haven't even started the test. And I had to miss all the reviews for the test that are usually very helpful in learning how to actually apply the material we learned. Hmmm.... Oh yes, the test is still sitting in front of me. Hmmm...let's try playing around with this equation here, and see if I come up with a remotely correct-sounding answer. Who throws a wad of gum at a cylinder rotating on the z axis anyway? And we have to assume so many things. Not practical. But makes things simpler, I suppose. A sphere rolling down an incline. Assume it never slides, only rolls. Doesn't make sense. Gravity will cause the sphere to slide a little bit, even if it's the smallest fraction. Wow, my brain does not feel connected to my body. Just jumping all over the place. Ah, there's the proctor. Oh, only six minutes left? And....two of five problems I haven't even started on, let alone looked at? Great. Just great.
C'mon brain!

(grinding gears, stalls)

C'mon!

(engine comes to life for an instant, stalls once more)

NOOOOOOO!
(turns in test, don't even remember much until after waking up from a two-hour nap in the dorms....until now....)


Wow, some days can be a bleary shmeary blur where it passes right by you, yet you remember not much.

Oh, great. Now I just reminded myself of one of my favorite classes I took at the U. A literature class, we read Virginia Woolf's book "To the Lighthouse." It was pretty much all in stream-of-consciousness format. So confusing at first, yet so rewarding at the end. Now I want to go back to majoring in english. I'll minor in math. Think that'd go well? Nah. Me neither. Hm. I do know I want to teach. I also know I'd have fun teaching math, english, and physics. Would it go over strange if I majored in teaching english, and got a master's in math or physics? Yeah, yes it would. Now I'm just babbling at the end of a rather long, disappointing, and endless post. My apologies. I will think up something genius next time! Perhaps a poem?

Hello Princeton!

For those of you who don't know, I'm at a swim meet for the next three days in Princeton. We arrived when it was dark, so I haven't seen much yet. I'm excited to see what the light will bring! :)

Thanksgiving Weekend

Thanksgiving weekend was a wonderful break from school (not really from swimming, because "break" is unheard of in the swimming world). It was wonderful to see Rick, Collette, Oscar, Poppy, Emily, Carvel, Megan, Reed, Will, Sam, Lindsey, Bryan, Micah, Carter! Whew...

However, going back to school has made me realize that it is a torturous holiday: Gives you a tiny taste of freedom for the brain, then makes you plunge right back into a couple more weeks and finals!

I wonder if our little walk on the river the day after Thanksgiving will become a yearly tradition?
I have no idea how Sam could sleep in such a position. But he did.

We went to see the lights that night. 'Twas PACKED! I don't think many of us had fun, but it was worth it for the kids, and to pay a visit to beloved Temple Square.

Notice the hundreds of people on the other side?

I've decided that temples, especially the Salt Lake City temple are very photogenic.

Three

The three lessons I want to learn (and master) from swimming in college are:

1)Learn to do hard things.

2)Learn to have fun doing hard things.

3)Learn to have fun doing hard things, and make it fun for others.

Psychology Paper #3

For our third and final paper in my psychology of adolescence class, we have to pick an interview from NPR's "Radio Diaries." These diaries are simply audio diaries of various teenagers around the country. We pick one of these kids, and analyze them and their interview using everything we've learned in the class. The three stories that interested me most was Josh who lives in New York City, he has Tourette's Syndrome.

Juan also interested me,

but I think I'll do my paper on Ricky. His father is a strict atheist, but now that he's older, he's not so sure about his father's beliefs. His story spiked my interest the most, and I think I have some good ideas already. :)

Now that I look at all the kids who are interviewed, all of their stories are intriguing. I'll have to look at them all when I finally get the time!

flailying.

I watched everyone else do it. It looked so simple and so easy. Except everyone else was either flailing or flying off like little lemmings, with little cute "ahs!" and "oooahs," just like the little cartoons on the game Rick used to play. When Greg finally gave me permission to get off the bike and change into my suit, I was so excited to try it! I was going to show everyone how it's done. First I had to warm up, and hope that they were still doing the drill. They were!

I climbed up the ladder and stood on top of the high diving boards. Then it hit me what I was about to do. I started to breathe a little more quickly, panic squeezed my heart. We had folded up one of the mats we stretch on and put it on the end of a diving board. Then there was a hose squirting water on it, so to make it really slippery. It was simple enough: Run at full speed onto the makeshift slip'n'slide, and do a perfect dive into the water.
Two keys to this drill: Keep your body low, because if you jump onto the slip and slide and a steep angle, the board will push you up, causing your legs to fly over your head and make you back flop. Hard.
Key number two: If you do key number one successfully, keep your body TIGHT in line, and you'll be just fine! Simple, right?

Right.

I look up to realize I'm the last one going, and EVERYONE is at the bottom, watching ME. "Okay, this is it. I'm finally going to do something diving-oriented well." I visualized my approach, the landing, everyone cheering.

Well, everyone did cheer... I ran maybe a little too hard, flopped onto the slip'n'slide from a little too steep of an angle. The diving board belched me out, I thought I was doing great until I realized that I was facing the ceiling...and I hit the water with a perfect-10 backflop.

Wait for it...wait for it... I pop up, everyone's cheering....wait for it...wait for it... my colossal tidal wave hits the gutters and disappears...wait for it...

aha!

OWWWWWWWWWW!

But, of course, I don't let anyone see that it really, really, really hurt. I smile and say, "well, I'll have to work on that." And inside my body was screaming at me, "NEVER EVER DO THAT AGAIN!"

Just buy one of these

For those of you who have mice problems: buy one of these frogs. I couldn't watch the video for more than a minute, though. I was listening to the song...

*ADDITION* So, dad asked me if this really would happen in the wild. After googling and looking around, I've discovered that these frogs are commonly known as "pac-man" frogs. (I wonder why...) What I found the most interesting was the fact that these frogs digest their prey in their MOUTH. MMMM!
Lara from the site The Hungry Frog Web Page says:

"These frogs can definitely handle mice as a meal but not as a staple diet! I have seen one too many pac-man's being grotesquely over weight b/c there owner ownly fed them mice. Rodents are very high in fat and I would recommend that you only give your frog mice once in a blue moon as a "treat". My frogs would love for me to give them mice all the time but it is really not that heathly for them. My frogs eat mostly fish (very high in calcium)."

I don't know about you, but these frogs in the video seem overweight. They're HUGE!

And to the question whether this really happens in the wild? Well, that's not distinctly answered. Pac-man frogs apparently eat anything that can fit in their mouths, including other frogs and snakes.

Tampering with HTML code

yes, if you look at my blog, you can tell I have been tampering with the HTML code in my blog layout. I hope to find a perfect look soon. I'll be experimenting lots, so just warning ya.

Facebook...

So, I have come to the conclusion that deleting my facebook account will make my life easier and free up some time.
However...when I go to delete my account, the only option facebook will give you is to "deactivate" your account. It's like putting your computer in the sleep mode. It doesn't really shut down. By deactivating your account, facebook saves all of your information, and you are still visible to the world. I wanted to DELETE my account, deleting all my activity, all my footsteps, everything.
I googled how to do this particular task. Everywhere it said you had to call customer service, or e-mail facebook. One particular person had to threaten facebook with legal action before they did anything. One source suggested you delete every friend you have, every picture, everything you ever posted. For one being on facebook for 1 1/2 years, that is a LOT of stuff, a daunting task.
Luckily, I found a group on facebook that helps you through the process. Only from here did i find a link that led you to a page on facebook saying "do you really want to delete your account?" I knew I found the holy grail. I clicked on it, only to have a message telling me that it will deactivate my account, wait for 14 days, then it will delete everything. If you log in even once during this time period, it will cancel the process.

I think facebook secretly wants to take over the world, and the first step is to make sure that everyone onboard can't leave. They're betting I'll be tempted to check facebook in the next two weeks. Well, they lost one possible candidate for brainwashing.

first snow and library

Yestermorning, I found the day to be bright, clear, and with a quarter of an inch on the trees.

After breakfast I emerge upon a snowstorm!!! It snowed for hours.

After practice the snow finally stopped, and the sun came out. I forgot my camera when we were stocking the stadium. It was a BEAUTIFUL view of the entire city/valley! Everything white and crystal clear, with the most radiant sunset.

This is a random leaf I saw this morning and happened to have my camera.

My friend and I decided to explore the new sections of the library we've never seen before. This was one of my favorite spots. At the time, the power was out all over campus, so it's dark in the library. This section I'd like to dub "The Sloth Area." There were soft cushiony chairs everywhere, but not one of them were available. All of them were occupied by a sleeping student. Not one of them was awake.

Ceiling of Marriott library. Quite artistic. Whoever designed this building knew what they were doing.

Psychology 1230=AWKWARD!!!!

So, I take this class on mondays from 6-9 pm.
Today's topic was "Love and Relationships among adolescents."
Usually we break into groups of 2-3, and discuss something. Today we had to discuss our relationships when we were teenagers, what boyfriends (girlfriends) you had, and to look back and see how that relationship helped you grow and develop, whether it was healthy/unhealthy, etc.
Two members of our group talked a lot. One said nothing at all because they know nothing of the subject. I won't tell who was who.

Smile (and stifled laughter)

I have to ride a stationary bike for the first half of practice everyday. This has its pros and cons. One of the perks? You get to see the things that happen on deck that you don't usually see while you're swimming.

I saw my coach running...only to wipe out flat on his back. His look on his face will be forever imprinted in my memory. (I've never seen anyone get up so quickly!)

You wish it would just go away!

Whenever I was in this situation in middle school and high school, I fantasized that in college, and later on in life, I would know exactly how to handle myself, or even that it would never happen to me again.

Alas, I'm in college, and, once again, I clumsily handled the situation.

What does one do when they have a runny nose that will never be subdued? I was in a class that goes for three hours. After the first three minutes, my nose was runnier than ever. I quietly excused myself and went to the bathroom to blow my nose (and stuff lots of toilet paper in my pockets). Luckily, I was in the very back row, so all of this was pretty much unnoticed, except for my constant sneezing and sniffling.

Unfortunately, my toilet paper supply was wet and decaying after 20 minutes. So I used my sleeves. That worked well, until I realized that I was smearing more snot onto my face. So I wiped my nose with my hand and wiped it on my pants. Then my pants started feeling wet. I swear, the human body can create enough snot to drench a normal person. Disgusting that may be, it's true.

So the sleeves are useless, the pants are useless...determined to remain in class, I tilt back my head to help clear it. The nose definitely cleared up! Until...something was draining into my throat. No one wants that!!! (I gagged. The student sitting next to me jumped slightly. I think he was napping.)

So after the first hour and 15 minutes, we had a little break. I explained to my professor I was ill, and she kindly understood and excused me.

Now I'm on my comfortable bed, with a whole roll of toilet paper beside me. I'm very happy for a person in my situation.

Update...

So, I haven't written a blog for a long time (almost 20 whole days!), so I decided to update y'all on all the nothings that make up the something called my life. :)

-The shoulder situation: Hurts as always, so coach has me ride a stationary bike the first half of practice, then swim, in efforts to keep the shoulder somewhat happy.

-The major situation: Still have no idea what I'd like to major in, but all counselors I've visited and talked to want me to try engineering. I have to say, engineering has always fascinated me, specifically nuclear engineering, but nuclear is graduate work. I have to major in an engineering program they offer, then apply to do nuclear. So, we'll see if that really happens.

And I realized that's all I pretty much have going on. I will say, physics is getting more and more interesting, and I'm starting to enjoy it, even though I don't know how to do problems over half the time. I'm also enjoying Calc 3 more than I probably should.

I just wish I had more time to study it more, then I'd probably actually "get" it.

By the way...

I forgot to tell y'all how my first meet went. It went really well. The fastest I've ever gone at the beginning of a season! I went a 23.50 in my 50 (my best is 23.15, my senior year of high school I went a 23.52). My 100s were at or below 52.5 (I did a lot of relays, so I swam the 100 free a total of 5 times over two days) My lowest 100 split on a relay was about 50.9!

The pictures above were the only pictures I took on the entire trip. It's on the bus ride going to Boise. Yeah, we were tired.

Running with the ball

After a serious talk in coach's office, we have decided to let me run with the ball and come what may.

I hope I run fast enough to not get pummeled.



I only post the ones I like:

Jimmy Dillies will present "Dessins d'enfants"

Abstract: One of the key groups in arithmetic is the absolute Galois
group. So far, it has been eluding the mathematical community. In 1984,
Grothendieck suggested to understand this group by looking at its action on
dessins d'efants. Dessins d'efants (literally 'children's drawings') are
graphs drawn on Riemann surfaces, such that two neighbouring vertices have
opposite colours. In this talk we will define what the absulote Galois group
is and see how it acts on those naive objects that are dessins.

There will be pizza and discussion after the talk.


(I get an e-mail every week about the discussion for math majors for the week...)

Update on ze shoulder

So…many of you probably already know I’ve been having several problems with my left shoulder in the past year. It all started with tendonitis, turned into an impingement, disappeared over the spring, came back in the summer, I took a break from swimming altogether for about a month, and despite that rest, my shoulder is in quite a bit of pain.

Two Mondays ago, I saw a doctor and they took x-rays. Everything turned out normal (big surprise there!). Doctor informed me after examining me that I probably had an inflamed or irritated rotator cuff. He said that I won’t damage it any further, but the pain will likely increase over time. (didn’t make sense in my head, but okay.) The pain got bad enough I went back yestermonday and got a cortisol shot in the shoulder. As of right now, my shoulder feels worse than ever, I can barely raise my arm above my head. But I was told that this is normal, I have to give the shot a few days before it actually takes effect.

Coach informed me that I won’t be swimming in the first couple of meets. He is, however, tempted to make me swim a couple of events (just 50s) to see how the shoulder holds up. If it doesn’t perform well, he’s red-shirting me this year.

Let’s just hope this shot works. And if it does, there is no certainty as to how long it will last: it varies from a couple of days to 5-6 months.

So, there’s your update for you!

vexation frustration irritation dissatisfaction heartache

Full story: Coach told us NOT to take the recruits out drinking on the recruiting trip. On Saturday night, half went ice blocking, half...went drinking. Next day (sunday) we have a mandatory team meeting at 11:00. Two people are no longer on the team for their decision to have a party at their house. One captain has lost their captaincy, and will not be allowed to travel with the team for the rest of this semester.

Coach is very embarrassed, disappointed, angry, sad, etc. I don't know what I would do if I was in his shoes. He's disappointed in those who got drunk, drank. He's disappointed that those who didn't go to the party didn't do anything about the ones who did. He's also disappointed in those who didn't even know about the party because that shows they aren't very involved with the team.

After 10 minutes of yelling at us (and crying a tad too), he left the room. And all of us had heavy hearts. One of the boys who was kicked off the team was mad that someone told the coach about the party. He said that the team should've come to him, should've held this meeting, then turn to Coach. His justification for his actions was that all of the recruiting trips he's been to, there was beer present. It's just a normal ingredient. He didn't think he'd actually get caught, let alone be punished.
Sadly, many teammates agreed with him. "We should've had this meeting before going to Coach." My question is...would they have taken the meeting serious at all? I don't think so. Teammates would've just scoffed at those who were warning, and continue on with their stupid actions.

And this isn't the first meeting we've had about drinking problems. This is the third. My lovely team got drunk then went to a football game, drunk in front of the entire student body.

Hi, I'm Natalie, and I'm a member of the "we party hardest" swim team, and I'm embarrassed to be here.

What could've I possibly done different? I honestly didn't know about the party! Gah!

So...

It's back to underwater training. Oh, joy. As of this week, four team members have already quit the team. Two of them were my closest teammates and now they're gone.

Training is already really hard, I'm already struggling with school, but thank goodness for a genius sister who is willing to help me understand physics better.

And I don't even know why I'm taking physics. I really would love to go into something where I can help athletes/people rehab and recover from surgeries, muscle strains, etc. It'd be awesome to go into athletic training, but that's not an option for me since I swim...
I'll have to think about this some more.

Ho hum. Not much is going on.

But I will say it's always wonderful to run into a good old friend in the library. Thanks for the smiles, Nat!!

Have you thought this through?

After seeing this video, I wonder what would happen if I had only Whoopi's two lines to say to my coach when he's mad.

I understood the part about the food...

I got the following e-mail from the mailing list for people who plan on majoring in math here at the U.

"Mathematics Undergraduate Colloquium
Wednesday, Sept. 3
12:55
LCB 225

Mark Zajac will present "Depolymerization Can Drive Cell Migration"

Abstract: Cell migration promotes wound healing yet allows cancer tospread. I will present a two-phase model for the solid cytoskeleton andfluid cytosol inside a crawling nematode spermatozoon. This modeldemonstrates that disassembly of the cytoskeletal polymer network canprovide most of the force that drives a cell forward. The drag forceexerted by cytosolic fluid also plays a significant role.

The model also shows that cytoskeletal anisotropy is required. The model uses level set methods to provide an implicit representation ofthe cell surface. Testing the model requires image processing, which can becast as a minimization problem, leading to a differential equation.Tracking cytoskeletal features makes use of correlations.

-----

There will be pizza and discussion after the talk."

Engineers

You know what's frustrating? You think of a lot of good things or experiences for your blog, but then you don't get around to it, forgetting it completely. Hence why I'm blogging in between classes. So I won't forget!

I'm all settled here at the University. I met my new roommate, Kaylee. She's a senior, and she's awesome! Her friend Anand (pronounced something like "AHN-and") is over all of the time and cracks me up. He is Indian (from India, not Native American...) and he is as American as we come. However, he has an arranged marriage to someone in India, and gets to go there every so often. I thought that was just a stereotype, yet it's not. Arranged marriages still happen today!
Anyway...back to Anand. He's a Civil Engineer major, and he has a lot of amusing stories about engineering and engineers in general. I thought I was a nerd until I heard that he has even taken a shower in the engineering building. Apparently, many of the engineering majors have bad enough hygeine, that they installed showers in the building they so often visit, hoping to give a hint.

...And the stereotypes about engineers? A lot of them are actually true. Sure, not the whole fits the stereotype, but at least a good 75% do. Heh.

...The good thing about being a friend with an engineer is they have a lot of resources. For example, the book I need for physics isn't in in the bookstore. The silly bookstore didn't order enough, so now I have a 2 week wait. Unfortunately, my first homework assignment is due on this Friday. I happened to be telling this to Kaylee, and she told Anand, and he brought the physics book over with the step-by-step solutions to the problems on the homework if I get lost.

Hmmm....I like engineers. The ones with social skills anyway...

The finished product...

Let's just say it's a good thing I actually don't have the real software to make movies. I had way too much fun making this one!
It's low quality, but it was one that was actually free and easy so...yeah.
Maybe someday when I'm rich and old, I'll finally buy some decent software and waste my time like I just did.
(But it was fun!)



if the youtube video doesn't work, try this one, I suppose.

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Random pictures

So after an exhausting day at Lagoon, going to bed at midnight, my dear mom wakes me up early in the morning. Blast! I forgot I had to go on a hike!
We drove up through Milcreek canyon and started the trail from that side of the mountain. Our destination? Gobblers Knob. These fellows thought the trail was quite steep, but I have to disagree with the times they gave that it takes to hike up there.

The first part is dreadfully steep with lots of rocks rolling under your feet. Then you emerge on the hike material I'm more familiar with. Dirt. And a gradual ascent. Unfortunately, after Alexander's Basin (which was gorgeous, don't know why I didn't take pictures...oh yeah! I was struggling to keep up with Emily and Mom), the uphill gets even steeper.

Even worse? We lost the trail. So we decided to climb over the boulders and little rocks that like to move under your feet. If you fell, you had to be wary where you put your hands: we were in thistle city.

The view was beautiful and it made it pretty much worth it. Fortunately on our descent, we found the trail we should've come up. It consisted of really steep switchbacks about 10 feet across (if that).

Yup. I wore my chacos. And it was worth the dirt. Mom and Emily complained that the steepness smashed their toes inside their shoes. My toes were dirty and breathing air. Ahhh...

This is mom's hibiscus she's so proud of and has to take pictures of it every year. I don't blame her.

Pullman!

According to many, Pullman is an ugly, hillish place.
But I have to disagree. My third visit here has convinced me that a love for Pullman is an aquired taste--and a knowledge of where one should go for fun.

This may be your first (and only) impression of Pullman. Lots of golden wheat, lots of hills, can't quite see anything.

But fancy this! Trees? In this area? No...

Even Trolls dwell in caves and grin mischieviously at you.

The slides in parks are very steep and wet (well, when it rains). And you fly off the end like superman!

....But perhaps a little...wetter than Superman.

Here is grandma, being Princess Poppy's royal throne.

Here's the father troll, not quite sure how he's going to catch a frog.

And here's my favorite picture of all.

(If you wish for pictures on our little 32 mile bike ride to and from lovely Harrison, visit the Oatmuncher's blog.)