Hi 'migos!

Hello mine comrads. I didn't really think about posting, and then I saw the above video and I knew I had to share. Unfortuantely, I've also set up this whole precedent of writing long strings of meaningless text underneath such awesome videos, so here I am.
So it snowed! Quite a lot, actually. I arrived back in the SLC airport last Sunday night to a decent snowfall (I mean, it wasn't a storm/blizzard or anything like that, but it was pretty impressive).
Then it was right back into work; school hit with a vengeance. With school, as well, came a determination to do fun things (Theatre/the vocalz). Last Wednesday was a big day for my voice: I was not only auditioning for a mask club (scarlet pimpernel) but that was the day that the audition for the school of music was due as well (I'm trying to double major; I honestly don't remember whether I've talked about that in past posts. But I am. I want to do double major in computer science and voice performance). So that was a lot to do. Then, on Friday (or maybe it was Thursday), there was another mask club audition, for a play taken from the Dave Barry book Guide to Guys. I ended up making call-backs for it, which was cool because I made callbacks but not cool because it meant I had to wake up early on a Saturday, at like 9 (*gasp*). It was actually really cool! Then, on the way back I ran into Emily and she invited me to come to her flute recital (for her 160R class). It was actually really neat! There are some things that one can do while playing the flute that I didn't think were possible (in a good way). We had a super cool ward activity that night, a Christmas-themed scavenger hunt. After that, I went on a group date to the best-of-Semester Divine Comedy show. It. Was. Amazing. They had great skits, including an inception spoof and others, but one of the best things was this video they showed.

I, personally, cannot think of a better portrayal of the stereotypical BYU culture. I lulzed a lot at it. Also, pay attention to 1:50: the two coming out of the creamery are in my ward.
This week: more auditions! (oh, and school ended. W00t!)
I auditioned for Men's Chorus on Thursday (again, but for Winter Semester). I'll find out on Monday those results. I also auditioned for another mask club, called hands of a lesser god, which is done partly in sign language. I probably won't make callbacks for that either, but it would be cool to be in. Following that I was able to see the last mask club of the semester, which was a clipping from a broadway play; it was called next to normal.
So....that's my week. I'm updated. Chill y'all.

Hogwarts

So I know that a lot of you are probably wonder "Jansen what happened to you? Were you attacked by velociraptors? Did you fall into the ocean? were you in a coma induced by too much BYU Creamery chocolate milk?" All of these are stupid questions. Yeah, I said it. All of my velociraptors are domesticated; they wouldn't attack me. Also, I live in Utah. There is no ocean. Finally...well, maybe that last one has some merit.
But enough about me not being here on the interwebz. I figured, that, to make up not posting for so long, I would tell you EVERYTHING I've been up to for the last month. Then, I realized that that would be boring (and I really don't remember anyways) and so decided to give highlights.
Highlight number one: Halloween. So, this is my first time being in college, i.e. away from home, during Halloween. It was a lot different for several reasons: 1) I didn't go trick or treating, nor did anyone I know. 2) our dorms got trick-or-treated unto by the residents of the somewhat nearby married housing. 3) Stake wide Halloween dance! I have to admit, that my costume was in no way original; I was given the idea by Dezzy, but I knew what I was doing because my sister had done it in a previous year: I was an iPod commercial.

No, I did NOT dress up as a black person. Utards can be really, really stupid some times. Trust me, I did get that question. Of course, there were the smart people from outside of Utah that picked up immediately on what I was doing, so that was good.

Highlight number 2: Daylight savings time ended (or started? hmmm). That was cool for a myriad of reasons, none of which I feel like writing or remembering right now.

Highlight number 3: university chorale sang in devotional! Hooray! It was the coolest thing we've done in chorale yet, and apparently the cameras focused in on me several times. I have no idea whether devotionals are recorded, or just broadcast, but I've looked for videos and haven't been able to find any.


Highlight number 4: Minecraft. I posted a video showing something someone had done in classic mode with it in my last post; I downloaded the game about 3, 4 weeks ago and quickly became addicted. However, my video game addictions usually don't last too long: I kind of burnt myself out on it and since have been able to have a normal life.



Highlight number 5
Harry Potter. Need I say more? perhaps. But not right now.

Highlight number 6
I came home! (confession time: I started writing this post before I actually came home, and now I'm on the plane back to SLC, so I thought it only appropriate to add this). I was able to see all (okay, most) of my friends at school, which was pretty cool. Of course, seeing my family again was amazing, especially my youngest brother who has grown up so much. On the other hand, there are so many things that just haven't changed whatsoever, which is just weird. to me; I think this is because I've gone through so much change in the last 5 months, that when I got back home and everything was so similar to when I had left it, it was just kind of a reality check. Thursday, of course, was thanksgiving, and even writing this now I am in a happy place, just remembering all that delicious food. Yummmmmm. I'm glad I'm not from Canada, and able to go home during BYU's break to have thanksgiving with my family. Friday was a good day for me to catch up with my friends, from both church and school, and then Saturday was my brother's baptism, which was just lovely, especially because I was able to baptize him.
'kay, I'm done with this post. ENJOY. Or else.

o hai

So today was possibly the least busiest Saturday I've had in a long time. In the past few weeks, there's been a football game, or a service project, or something else that has taken up a large portion of my time. However, today I got up to play racquetball (voluntarily, I might add). On my way there, I saw all these kids on campus. I looked closer and saw that there were all boys. I looked even closer and saw that some of them were wearing scout uniforms, and then I saw the "pow wow" signs around campus, and realized that the scouts were having some kind of merit badge college/activity. That brought me back, so I promptly returned to the present. I went and played Racquetball with this friend of mine from my chorale class, and while he was kind of a boss I think I did pretty well. After racquetball, I came home...and did absolutely nothing productive. So, that happened. After that, we had a ward activity which was actually really cool. It was a date drive, where the girls dorms in the ward prepared date ideas, and all the guys dorms brought cans of food that they used to bid on the dates. Our dorm got a date, doing kid related things, which makes me happy because I like being a kid. Immediately following that I went to HumorU by way of the creamery, with a date (she's from Connecticut, so she's already all kinds of legit). It was probably the best HumorU show I've seen thus far; they had two new people, one of whom was a ventriloquist (I've never seen a legit ventriloquist live). Then, fun story; on the way out I ran into Emmanuel and James Nnah whom I haven't seen in forevers! And that was cool. That was my day. yay!
Also, welcome back to my life.

{song lyrics here}

The following is an account of how I broke the rules. This morning during Book of Mormon, I broke tradition and looked for wireless networks (I say broke tradition because there are never networks available in my classroom, but I looked for some anyway); I found one that was coming over from the testing center, but when I tried connecting this came up:

....
I'm actually writing this from a dark corner, and may or may not still be on campus...this is in case the testing center is hunting me down right now. I don't know when I'll be able to come back to civilization..maybe I'll just wait out the semester, grow a beard...

If you have any food, or soap, please leave them in a low-security environment and leave me a message about where I can find it. I don't know how long I'll have to avoid them

That's how I say it with my Klingon accent

So, I've had some time to think, and reflect, and ponder...and I've come to the conclusion that my blog posts are kind of boring. All I do is a day-by-day description of my life--and that's no good.

Instead, I think I'll talk about things that I want to, in non-chronological order.

So I was looking at my blog the other day...and I came across this (sorry about the shoddy quality). But you have to admit: this is quite impressive. Somehow, there have been 19 people from Turkey checking my blog. I don't quite know how. It is rather frightening to find out that my black market contacts in China have been able to find me online. I might want to change that. But the weirdest part, to me, is found by comparing operating systems with browsers. The most views have been on windows.....but I have most views on Safari. That means that some people out there are using...Safari..... On a PC. *cough*blasphemy*cough* Also, someone with an iPhone-for-old-people (also known as an iPad) has been looking at my blog (so what it if was only once. It counts!).

That was my perusing. I've had a quite good week; I have not yet heard back from my interview from last week, which disappoints me because I want money (sadface :( ) *update: I just talked to Gariet, who already had a job working there, and he told me that there are already new people, so I most likely didn't get it. Yippee...

This week: I went to the gym. Twice. It was way intense. Especially considering how I've never actually worked out at a gym before; sure, they showed us around the weight room when we were in high school, but we never had consecutive classes where we just went and worked out. And I didn't want to go in when I didn't have class, because why would I go to school if I didn't have a good reason? Anyway, all this to say that I'm way sore, but it feels good.

And I was just going to post this, but then I forgot about it.... last thing I'll do before I send it to the (digital) presses is to tell you all (yes, even you canadians/turkey-ans/poles/south koreans/chinese/etc.) about the dates I went on. Thursday night I had an awesome date with a girl named Alaina, from my ward: we made dinner (this awesome pasta/chicken thing) while watching 30 Rock (the live showing) and then went to the HumorU show. It was full of lulz, as well as being quite awesome. Then, on Saturday, FSCC had a bowling activity with the intent that we could bring guests/dates. I invited Aubree (also in my ward), and it was awesome. The place was in Heber, but Our Fearless Leader (OFL) drove us through the mountains, which was pretty except for the end of the drive when we all though we were going to die (Yay!). However, we made it to the little bowling place safely, and they had food, and OFL paid for it all (which is awesome).

Kay, now I'm done. And now I can post to my own pleasure, not feeling pressured to update every little detail of my vida

Today. Has been like the best day evar. J totes.

Hey so GUESS WHAT I'm posting again. What. Is. This. You must be asking yourselves in excitement and awe.
*edit: I started this on Monday but became really tired of writing about my wonderful day. Now I'm finishing it. And writing about the rest of the days until today.
I am here today to tell you about the wonderful and magnificent day I had today (Monday).
I had classes and stuff...but then they were over. After math I went to the ESC to do my Geology lab. upon finishing that, I went to the door to see that it was raining. It was just your usual lame desert rain, but as I kept walking (and singing) though it, it increased in intensity until I was walking through inch deep water. Needless to say, I took of my shoes and splashed happily across campus. I got home and threw my stuff in the hall, then went back out to play in the rain. Behind my building, someone had started a a mud slide on the grass. Over the course of a good 15, 20 minutes, more and more people came. It was pretty awesome. However, I did get grass and muddy water all over myself and my clothes. On the upside, I partook of hot chocolate with Katelyn and Kristen.
On the downside, I lost my phone. I had thrown my bag, wallet, and phone into the hall, then run out to play....when I came back my phone was missing. Note that my wallet was not missing, nor were any of the contents of the wallet removed. However, my phone was not there. I immediately assumed it had been stolen, and went to change all my passwords and disable my phone, to limit personal information that such a thief might have access to. I also borrowed my roommate's phone to call and text my phone to breathe out threatenings to whomever had done the deed. I called the university police to report the happenings, and an officer came over to collect a statement and check things out....while there we found my phone. While it was close to where I had left it, the placement of it were rather suspect. My theory is that someone had taken it, then their guilty conscience (and my threatenings) convinced them to return it, so they hid it.
But I did find it!
At 6:30 we had family home evening: it was a ward-wide activity about indexing, which was awesome (due in no small part to the free food that they gave us :). Upon coming home (around 8) I studied for Geology. Now, the testing center is open until 10:00, but the last test is handed out at 8:00. I studied diligently until I looked at the time and saw that it was 8:44. I knew I needed to go to the testing center by 9:00, but didn't know if I knew the material well enough. I took about 10 more minutes to read through the last bit of the material then dashed off. I got on my bike and got to the testing center right as they said it was closing (but in the good way: I got in). With my blood rushing, and breathing high, I whipped through the 76 questions in about 30 minutes, not quite sure what to expect. Turned in the test, walked down the stairs, and looked at my score: 97% baby! First test in the semester, and I did quite well. That night, I found Leverage season 3 online and stayed up to an undisclosed time.
Then there was Tuesday. Tuesday was interesting: I got up earlyearly in the morning to go to book of mormon, then came back and went to sleep. However, I did not have the foresight (or the awakeness) to set an alarm..so when I woke up and saw that it was 12:01 I kind of panicked. Rushed to get ready and get my stuff together, then realized when I got to the ESC that I didn't have my walk-in lab, so I had to negotiate with the secretary of the Phys/math office to print it off of my computer. Luckily, I was able to make it into class before they were all turned in.
That evening I went to a google internship seminar or something...I went because of the free pizza which they provided immediately following: brick oven (also, there was root beer). Some time after that, I asked someone to the divine comedy show this weekend: fast forward to Wednesday morning; they were all sold out. Cooooool.
The rest of Wednesday was way busy: after classes I devoted myself to my CS test. I spent a long time in the library, and finished it up at home before bringing it in to the lab to turn it in. It worked, as much as I could tell. That evening RHA had a fall- and soccer- themed activity at Heritage, which I went to for free food but stayed for great company. Getting home at around 11:00, I took 15 minutes to write a one page paper for geology, then went for a job interview at the RB at midnight (for late-night custodial). Crossed fingers!
El Jueves fui a mi clase del Libro de Mormon otra vez, pero no he recibido bastante dormido para funcionar durante la clase. Como magico, no me acoste durante la clase, pero fue muy dificil pagar atencion cuando mis ojos no quedaron abriendo. Regrese a casa, y me acoste por dos horas mas. Me desperte con bastante tiempo para desayunar y ir a la ESC para hacer mi laboratorio de geologia. Claro, despues de eso, tenia la clase de geologia. Siguiendo, paso unas horas en la oficina de Y-serve, pero tenia que salir porque necesitaba ir a True Blue Football, una actividad muy buena que es parte de los actividades de Homecoming esa semana. El punto de este actividad es tener divertido en muchisima espuma azul (para entender eso de que lo hablo, cambiare mi foto de perfil muy temprano, y podran ver). Entonces fui a otro actividad de homecoming, que se llama BYU Spectacular. Estaba en el centro Mariott, y muchos grupos diferentes se nos presentaron; El coro de mujeres, los embajadoritos, la orquesta filarmonica, las cougarettes, y otros personas y grupos. Fue magnifico. Despues de eso, paso tiempo a las casa de Dezzy y Courtney.
And now today is friday! and I'm in class! and I'm finally done, after starting this post on monday. Lovely :)

I wish upon you all a good weekend.

It's Conference Weekend!!!

This whole procrastination thing is really taxing to me; I feel like by the time I get around to posting, I end up throwing up text all over the blog, not making it interesting. So take this as a goal to post more regularly (conference has given me an idea as for what to do with my blog).
Until then, I will continue with my massive week updates.
Last Wednesday was a day of frantic business and then relaxation; I had a 600 word essay that was due by 5:00, and my last class of the day got out at three, so I was busy doing that..during class..it was all good. It was just contrasting how Aristotle was perceived in his own day compared to today.
I'm sure I did something that evening, I just have no idea what it was
Thursday: I rode my bike to Book of Mormon, then I went to get it registered. It costs 1 WHOLE DOLLAR to register one's bike...nbd. Then I went to visit freshman mentoring, to get out of it, and they told me that I had taken everything they needed me to, so I am good. After fall, I no longer have to deal with freshman mentoring.
Then I had geology. Bam.
That evening I got to see my Dad and Logan again!! They came out for conference (this weekend) and we went out to Magleby's for dinner (which was an interesting experience in and of itself, and something that I could probably spend more time on if I wasn't talking about a large span of time).
Friday I had a ton of classes, and *finished* up my lab fr CS 142. I completed all the requirements, there was just one aesthetic thing that I couldn't figure out. However, upon asking the TA for help, he refused, saying that since that part was under extra credit he could do nothing to help me. I am very frustrated at him.
But after that my dad came to pick me up, and I left provo without looking back.
So, then, we had this day called Saturday. Now, Saturday is a special day (because it's the day you get ready for sunday. Besides that, though), because it's General Conference! This is the first time I've had conference at the actual time happens. All during my life, I've been on Eastern time during conference, which is 12-2 and 4-6, (and 8-10 for priesthood). But I am in Utah, and used to the time, so I had conference at 10! (which meant I had to get up before that. Oh well. It was worth it!) The first session I got a lot of notes on, especially the first half. The second half of it was spent in the car on my way back to provo...
*explanation sequence* So, the reason why Dad and Logan are out here is because Dad has made it a tradition that when we turn twelve, we get to go out to priesthood session (Janessa went out for the General Relief Society boradcast). Preisthood session was that night, and of course for attending the session one needs to dress up buuuuuutt..... I forgot to bring my church clothes with me *end sequence*
....so I was going back to provo to pick up my clothes, and listened to elder christofferson's and elder uchtdorf's talk on the way.
We got back after the session ended, and Grandad took me to get a haircut
we listened to the first session, then left at 3 to get to Salt Lake early.
We got there at ~4:00, and were able to get into the conference center after parking and walking. Fun fact: there are these people near the center who aren't quite right in the head...they have some beef with us and have decided that the only thing they can do about it is act like foolz and yell a bunch of stuff...of course, everyone ignored them, but they were there anyway.
Priesthood Session was amazing, of course! (we had really good seats). We met up with some old family friends, the Carlsons (who moved to San Antonio ages ago). Got Ben and Jerry's (which made me happy. Yummy ice cream is yummy). Today we finished up conference; Grandma made us breakfast and an amazing lunch.
I really don't feel like putting in details about random things
So bye.

Z0mG!

Hello fellow cybernet-arians! It is that time of the day (read: week) again where I get to spill out my soul upon the pages of this blog (does it even have pages?)
So.... I've done...stuff.. in the past week..Like for example on Po'akolu I went to class and did stuff..
I'm really blanking on what I did on wednesday.
On Po'aha I didn't have BoM, so I got an extra 3 hours of sleep that morning. I woke up in time to get ready and go to geology, which was awesome more than usual (the usual being the fact that I have Prof. Skinner teaching the class) because for the end of the class he took us outside and demonstrated how the addition of mentos to a 2-liter of diet coke is similar to the buildup of pressure in a volcano. On the way back from class I ran into Amanda, which was nice because I pretty much hadn't seen her since summer term. We caught up and chatted, and I remembered to ask if she was interested in my committee for FSC which she was (which was awesome) because my committee needs to be great and awesome. The rest of the day I don't really remember what happened except for something that evening that I'd rather not relate.
Po'alima: went pretty quickly. I had the usual classes (and voice lesson) throughout the day, then at 4:30 I packed up my things and went to the Y serve office to get ready to go on a retreat. Explanation: the retreat was for Y serve program directors, and I guess that the freshmen service corps council members qualify as program directors. It was up in cobble creek canyon, at this place the church owns called spring haven. It was pretty cool; it was youth conference style with group meetings and breakout sessions where they talked to us about personal mission statements and the purpose of service within the office and our individual programs. We stayed overnight of course, but that meant waking up at 6:45 Po'aono morning for breakfast and continued talking-to. We got back to Provo at about quarter to 11:00, at which time I promptly went to bed for an hour or so. Then I hung out until the game, which was good for the first 10 minutes and then just went downhill from there. I ended up leaving in the last 7 minutes of the game, and the score didn't improve in that time. Sadness.
That night I went to bed way early, for the purpose of making up for lost sleep (I think I went to bed at 10:30). I also had to be up for an early-morning stake leadership meeting (at 7:00 AM. Yippee.) Following that I went right back home and slept for an hour, then got up again to go to ward council at 9:30, for church that starts at 11:00. My business continued: after church ended (2:00) I had hall meeting (3:00) then had to do various home teaching (4:00-5:00) and then ward choir (6:30-7:30) followed by ward prayer (~8:00-8:30). Following that I was rather sleepy, so I retired.
Po'akahi went well, but it was a longer day than I was used to. I got up for 10:00 CS class, during which I figured out how to do the lab which is due Friday. Unfortunately, that ended up distracting me the next class during which I was suppposed to be paying attention to early medieval literature...
Chorale was its usual self, then I had a lunch break, followed by linear algebra (which has kind of become a little boring, to be honest). After that I went to the blood drive, where I gave double red cells (they take twice as much blood but they give back the plasma and platelets and such) then came back home and worked on my lab, finished it up mostly (I just need to create a GUI for it). After that we had FHE which I ended up ditching because I was so exhausted (that whole lack-of-oxygen thing). I went to bed at 8:30. Yes, I said 8:30. I was tired enough to go to sleep but my body was not used to going to sleep at such an early hour. I ended up waking up every hour, hour and a half or so. That made this morning pretty good, with all that sleep; I made it to Book of Mormon and I paid attention, and then the best part of the day: I made cookies for my home teachees. I had to grab some ingredients from the creamery and borrow some dishes, but I ended up making them. It's a toll house recipe that doesn't use any liquids except for (melted) butter and eggs--but it's quite a lot of butter. They're goooooood. I had geology, during which I learned about sedimentary rocks (don't let me forget to take the quiz on that tonight!) even though I was feeling out of sorts. I'm blaming my lack of red blood cells for that. I had my FSCC meeting after that, during which I laughed way too much (the lack of oxygen) and then I came home, watched Chuck, then wrote this up, and then decided to go and do some homework. Ciao!

too legit to quit

Some of you may be wondering: "why is the sky blue?" and while I can, in fact, answer this question, I'm not going to.
Some of you probably aren't going to be reading this for another week or so because of my recent posting history...so sucks for you.
Today was alright...I woke up to my alarm at 7:30, then turned it off and slept until 10:00. Equating Book of Mormon class to Seminary probably isn't such a good idea, because I now actually have the power to skip-and have virtually few consequences.
Oh well.
I worked a lot today on my Computer Science lab; we were given a partial class that simulates a checkers game, and expected to complete it, and create two new classes (one an object constructor for the players of the simulated game, one the driver) to carry out the simulation. I worked on it and ended up finishing it right before Geology. Geology was AWESOME because a) we graded our walk-in labs (and I got a 100%) and b) we learned about VoLcAnOeS. <--That's right. VOLCANOES. That stuff is legit. And somewhat frightening at the same time.
Immediately following Geology I went to the CS lab to pass off my lab; the lab was fine but the TA did help me with some finer points of Java, for which I was (am) grateful.
I had my FSCC meeting today, which was quite long, actually. The end result of it is that I need a committee for marketing/publicity/advertisement...which is a shame because no (BYU) freshmen read my blog anyway so this shout-out is initialized as null (you can tell I've been working with Java a lot today).
brm b-drm.
I visited with Bethany, Danie, Emilie, (<--oxford comma!) and Amanda today--funny story: I was walking over to Whitney (hall), and was about to go in, when the fire alarm went off (all of heritage did fire drills today) and they came out the front door--they're wicked awesome (even though most of them are Utards--oh, sorry, I meant Utahans. Freudian slip) though I only got to spend a limited amount of time with them because I had to go to my own hall's fire drill (and for volunteering as a door guard, I got over 9000 starbursts. Okay, maybe not so many) but it wasn't a big deal or anything.
(Annoying long run on sentence. Usually I would CDO-out over this, but I guess my grammar senses are weakened past midnight. Go figure.)
I then hung out for a short amount of time at Bowen 14, and then returned an hour later to go running with Kaitlin, Aurora, and Aimee. Disclaimer: I had not been running since May. At least. And I only swam like 3 or 4 times during summer term. Yet somehow, in the high altitude even, I was able to keep up. It made me happy (see? --> :) After that I just chilled and such, took a look at my next CS lab, watched CHUCK-
Ok. Chuck was amazing. Season opener, right? It picked up right where last season left off, and didn't rely to heavily on either romance (season 3 opener), Chuck's nerdiness and general naivete (season 1 opener), or violence/action (most of season 3). I'm excited for the season to continue. Also, Fringe and 30 Rock both start on Thursday (30 rock party anyone? oh wait--no freshmen read my blog. der shame.) and then Stargate Universe starts next Monday. *Excitement!*
For some reason, unbeknownst to me, I'm still awake. This is going to be bad in about 8 hours when I wake up.
Side note! I reconfigured my router today so that my DS can connect--for mi famiglia, that means that I can (conceivably) play you. On....some game or other (PS-if you find my lost Kirby DS game, you can have it).
Tim is going into the MTC in like a day or two; that's exciting :) (The MTC, for any non-mormons out there (yes, Utards (They're Utahans!), there are some out there) is where we brainwa-I mean, train our missil-I mean missionaries to go and be awesome. BTW, there are over 9000 missionaries. Just btw (read: Bee-Tee-doubleyou. Or Bee-Tee-dubs).) <--talk about nested statements. What a plethora of ponderous potpourri!
RT is watching Sumo Wresting on the japanese channel. Again.
Good night seattle.

emotions are tricky things; kind of like pink elephants playing the didgeridoo

Dang but the time flies by. I might have mentioned how my first week absolutely crawled, but these past two weeks have passed faster than a speeding bullet shot by a gun held by superman as he is flying at his top speed (for any aspiring physicists out there, feel free to try and calculate the speed of that bullet relative to a stationary bystander. End paren. )
Lessee... things I've done since last friday
boychik, I dunno
Oh right! OK:
So that Saturday I woke up early (~6:30) to play racquetball. Immediately after that (ish) we had a service project! The Freshmen Service Corps had it's first activity (which you can see in the pictures, not all of which are up yet). We worked at the Provo Library (The old BYA building) on the tree rings, as well as general landscaping activities. Then we went to North park and did some more little straightening and cleaning activities.
The rest of the day, I'm sure I did something important....which thing was our stake conference. Unfortunately, even though I don't feel like it, I am an adult so I have to go the saturday night session (*complain..*).
But the night turned out well; HumorU had their last 'Best of Spring/Summer' show that night at 10, and Katie was kind (read: awesome) enough to go with me. Again, the whole car thing; we grabbed dinner at the creamery before the show..all in all it was a good time.
Sunday was exciting because Scott got his mission call! Edmonton, Canada, English speaking, reporting January 20-somethingth.
Last week was just school...I didn't have that much homework (that whole not-having-American-Heritage-or-First-Year-Writing thing :) I actually finished my homework for the week on Wednesday (ignoring, of course, my walk-in labs for geology. But those don't really count, anyways due to the easiness thereof). So, mostly, I just drifted around, hanging out with people in my ward, and some old friends from summer and stuff. It was a pretty chill week.
This past weekend was kind of chill; I was sustained on Sunday in my new calling; Service Committee co-chair. That, plus my position in the FSCC...and I feel like someone's trying to tell me something.
mehhhhh
and now it's Monday...and i'll try and update more frequently (?) (because that means anything..

To say that Provo is a small world is like saying the atlantic ocean is damp

Today is Friday
It is a good day to live
Fridays are awesome
This was my Haiku of the week. BTW, this week has gone by a lot faster than last week has...I can't believe that it's really already Friday.
Anyway, boring review of my week start now. On Tuesday I had to wake up at 7:30. I was not very happy about that. I feel like that class is becoming seminary. Luckily I only have to take it for the semester; winter will be a new schedule, free of early morning religion classes. One upside of the class is that I found out that Kristy from my old ward is in my new class (Autumn is as well, but I already had seen her the class before) which is neat. The rest of the day saw me going to the first devotional of the semester (Pres. and Sister Samuelson both spoke). I then had to run to Geology, but made it in time. After class I had an FSCC meeting (we have a service activity on Saturday!). Following that, I did a bit of homework, then went and visited with friends and new people from my ward.
Wednesday I had computer science, followed by music 201, in which we watched this production of Oedipus Rex from the 1950s--one of the trippiest things I've ever seen. All of the actors were wearing masks, and one of them looked like Darth Vader. Afterwards, I chilled (and napped) for the two hours before my Linear algebra class, went there and witnessed Dan Blake write wayyyy too many matrices on the board. After that class I socialized some more; I had everyone from Fox and most from Bowen and Felt. Thursday I again woke up early for BoM; walked there with Kristy. After class I came back and actually did some prep work for CS (I read ahead in the text book. Yippee). Then there was Geology again, after which I came home and took a short nap. Following that, Bethany came over and chilled for a bit, but because my roommates are so entertaining (that was sarcasm) we left, and went to her apartment (where her roommates actually are entertaining. Also, really nice). I believe I am making a return trip there today, and they are coming to my apartment Saturday to watch the BYU-Air Force game (away). Also, they convinced me to take university chorale (*insert bitterness about men's chorus*) which they are in as well. After spending time with them, I went to audition for a new group that is starting on campus, called Glee: Provo, in the spirit of glee. (It's being headed by my old EFY counselor from last year--shout out to Travis!) Following that, I went to watch the divine comedy auditions (they run yesterday and today--I'm auditioning today) to get ideas and see how/what others are doing. After an hour of that, I went down to Helaman halls for Rachel's birthday (yay!). Following that, I was really tired so I didn't end up doing much socializing; I went to my apartment and did my linear algebra homework
Then I went to sleep.
Then I woke up and started
my day. It's Friday.
second spontaneous haiku of the day. This should be interesting.
Also, I'm auditioning for Divine comedy today. erk. ...okay. I should probably pay attention now. Bye!

Run and tell that Home-home-homeboy

So I found out today that Skype is free... "you are so dumb/you are really dumb--for real" I KNOW! Stop yelling at me :(
Anyways you should totally add me so's I can use it sometimes (or however it works)
I'm not going to do a whole rundown of my activities this past week, because the majority of my time was spent talking to people; my FHE sisters, people from summer 186th ward, and others. So on thursday I went to CaryLynn's birthday party. It was totes awesomeness. I met lots of people. Friday saw me on a date with the awesome Dani at Divine Comedy (which was also awesome; they spoofed Harry Potter and Avatar. All amazing). Saturday was TEH F00TB4115 G4M3 (props to anyone who understands that). I have to admit, it was quite hard for me to get into the spirit of things; we were on the east side of the field, which meant that we had the late afternoon sun on us for the first 2 1/2 quarters. Also, UofW was ahead of us for basically the first half, which contributed to my apathetic spirits. However, as the sun set and the Cougars rose, my spirits soared. And ultimately, we reigned victorious. It was teh funsauce. Sunday turned out to be an interesting day, people-wise. I went to church as normal, then after Ward Prayer I just felt like meeting people--so I went and met people, and met people, and met people. I probably met ~50 people that night, starting with those who hung around after ward prayer and then going over to Bowen and making the rounds there. This morning I went over to Fox and did rounds there; I think, out of the girls, I only have about 20 people I don't know yet. Then there's the guys... but I think I should be able to meet my goal of meeting the whole ward by the end of the week. Then, this evening, we had an AWESOME FHE where we had a breakfast picnic outside in our pajamas. It was really fun. Now I'm done. Bonus video.

Double rainbow all the way

This has absolutely zero relevance to my last two days of life, but I figured that going back into school and all this would be a good opportunity to teach you about one of the the memes o' the internet.
So, yesterday was Tuesday, I intended to go swimming in the morning, waking up at 6:50 to get to the RB by 7:00 and swim until ~8:00...unfortunately, I was misinformed; the pool hours during the fall are from 6-7:15. Annoying. I spent the morning returning a text book and preparing for my secondary audition for Men's Chorus, went at 11:00 for an 11:30 audition. I think it went alright.. the woman was kind of intimidating so I was nervous, and messed up on tonal memory and sight reading and my prepared piece and everything pretty much. But callbacks list goes up tomorrow so I'll be able to judge based on that (for those of you who saw my status, I just called it callbacks, but it was really more like pre-callbacks. I had a preliminary audition, which is essentially just to weed out those unfortunate American Idol wannabees from people who can actually sing--this was the secondary audition to determine who will make callbacks). While there I met this nice girl named Miranda, who had had previous experience with the auditions, and was also pleasant to talk to. I had to go from that audition to my Geology class, with possibly one of my favorite teachers ever, named *mumblemumble* Skinner, who is extremely funny. Unfortunately, I had to cut out of class early to go to my book of mormon class, due to bad scheduling (and an extremely poor job by the freshmen mentoring department). After BoM I went straight to the FM office to get my class changed, because it stunk. In the process of doing that I found that I had a hold on my classes due to the fact that I still had to pay for the voice lessons I'm taking this fall; it's an extra charge outside tuition. Got that kind of ironed out, and finally got back home. I then proceeded to hang out with all of my AWESOME FHE sisters. I'm really glad for my FHE group; I lucked out big time. The unfortunate thing is that because of the dimensions of my ward, I have to split time among my sisters, but it turned out to be ok. Jeff accompanied me to visit the girls in Fox, after I was in Bowen for a while. The rest of the night is kind of a blur, but seeing as how it's already 1:00 the day after, I'm not surprised. I'm pretty sure I went to bed at some point, and then woke up this morning.
My first class was at 10:00, so I got up and prepared for that, completing my Lin. Alg. (Math 313) HW before leaving. Computer science was really boring, and I wasn't really paying all that much attention as we talked about hard drives and input/output devices. After that was Music 201, which was cool; we talked about Homer and the Iliad, which is in dactylic hexameter. I went from there to an orientation kind of thing for CS, which turned out to be not really helpful in learning how in the world I'm supposed to program in Java.
Then I had some free time, so I came back and ate some lunch and did random things on facebook/teh interwebz until it got close to 2:00, which was when my Math 313 class was. That was a nice break from the college-y feeling; we just did stuff with Matrices. It felt like I was back in a nice old high school class...except with smart people (some of whom were married) around me. After that I came back and visited with our Fox girls, then over to Bowen which led to a trip to the library where I got my 313 HW done. I then went back and decided to visit Fox 49, where Dani and Emily live (who were in Harris over the summer but were my friends as well). Surprise surprise, Rachel was also there! It was a really neat reunion, and I ended up walking back to Helaman (where Rachel now resides) with her and Dani. But, because Helaman visiting hours are weaksauce, I couldn't come in. Coincidently, while waiting outside, I ran into an old friend from EFY Plymouth last year (That Awful Crisis!), Leslie. I ended up hanging out with her and some other people I met there, played volleyball (on some really cold sand) and saw some kids playing Ninja with lightsabers. On my way back from there, I ran into two people from my NSO group (who by this point had found out that I was younger than they were), CaryLynn and Taylor (M). That was neat, and I talked with them for a while, as well as getting invited to CaryLynn's and her roommate's birthday party tomorrow, which should prove to be awesome. Then, because I stayed an talked with them, right as I got back to my hall, and old friend from my ward last term walked by, saying that he was going to go visit some friends in Fox. I went along, and found out that I had already met his friends. We chatted and had a good time until 12:00, when the lobby visiting hours finally ended. Then I came back here and decided not to post until I ended up doing so. GOod n1gh7.

Day one

Here's a bit of history for you all. In the mid 1800s, the fledgling mormons lived in Nauvoo, Illinois, which used to be a swamp before they drained it and settled it, soon becoming the largest city in the state (yes, bigger than Chicago back then). Of course, the world hates us X) so they were driven out (again) and eventually found their way out to Utah.
The real question is what they did with the swamp they drained. The answer? It comes back to Provo every fall in the form of >6000 freshmen. I swear it's like walking through mud, except the mud has faces and it's moving all around. I think I'm really just making a reference to the viscosity..HI IT'S ME THE BLOG AND I'M UPDATING AGAIN WOW LOOK AT THAT. I must be turning over a new leaf or something...or I am just putting off going to sleep (Huzzah!).
Today I woke up at ~8:00, ate breakfast, and then headed off to my first class, computer science. It's a great feeling you get when you go a half hour early to your first class only to realize you're in the wrong building. Luckily, I was able to find my way to my real class just in time for it to start. Happily, it only lasted 50 minutes (unlike my 2 hour classes in the summer). I went straight from the Talmadge building to the JFSB, where I had my first class of Music 201 (again with the Aussie. I love that me defeating freshmen mentoring worked out so well :D). Then I had a break, during which I found Bethany and met some of her roommates, then I went to the bookstore, where I saw 8 people I knew, including Mike M. from my home stake...had lunch with him but it was really relaxed, mostly because we didn't feel like waiting a bajillion hours for restaurant food. To say that the cougareat was packed is like saying the pacific ocean is damp.
Then, at 2:00 I had linear algebra, where I connected with an old EFY acquaintance, and found out that Dan Blake, also from my home stake, is in my class (except that he's older than me-I'm pretty sure Joe (EFY kid) and I were the only freshmen in that class. OOOHHH YEAH). After that I came home and napped... was woken up at ~7:00 for our ward FHE activity--I finally was able to meet all of our FHE family (redundancies aside) then hung out with them for the rest of the night. I met tons more people. (muahaha)
yep. bye

WoWZ3RS!

I would like to tell you a story. A story about a youth, yearning for his home-away-from-home and how he finally returned there.
So on Tuesday I finally was able to get back to campus, but not to stay. No, I was there to train as a Y group leader for the New Student Orientation (NSO) that ran from Thursday through Saturday. Training was fun, and then I hung out with Katie (who is de bomb) and helped her move in and stuff. Went home and was bored, then went to sleep, then woke up
Wednesday I moved in. It took my Kelly grandparents' truck and some tricky maneuvering once in the parking lot on campus, but I got most of my stuff in (the other stuff I had forgotten :/ ) Unpacked in a matter of an hour and a half, or so, then went over to find Courtney and Dezzy who were also moving in. I also was able to meet most of my roommates on Wednesday, which was neat. then stuff happened.
Thursday I woke up at 7:20 so I could be ready for Freshmen at 8:00. NSO on Thursday consisted of spending two hours on Helaman field, a devotional thing at the Marriott Center, then the cougar walk which was walking around campus and spouting information to the freshmen. I got a lot of sun, and was also really dehydrated, ended up getting a headache later that day... then some other stuff happened and then we had this tradition of honor show where they essentially talked about the honor code. 'Twas good stuff.
Friday I got to wake up early again (whoopee) and go to a devotional at the Marriott Center with the freshmen. After that we let them loose to go look at their individual colleges/majors. After lunch we retrieved them and took them through this exhibit in the JFSB, called Education in Zion, just about the history of education in the church in general, and then BYU in specific. Then we broke, and were supposed to have this activity later, but it got rained out. Imagine that. Saturday I woke up again to go to the temple; I was mistaken for an RM while I was there, which was interesting. Later that day I ordered my textbooks, and hung out with people. I also had something like a three hour nap to make up for the lack of sleep I'd been getting the previous few days. That night was the Saturday Night Finale for NSO; I went for the dating game, which just proves that BYU is a marriage-obsessed environment (not the fact that they had the game, but the attitudes of the people involved in it). After that was Divine Comedy, which, as always, was AWESOME.
Sunday
Today was neat; my new ward has church at 11:00, which is like the perfect time for churchiness. I'm now in the BYU 118 ward, and I've already met most of my new FHE group; needless to say, they're really awesome.
I'm tired of this, and am going to go meet more people. (There's a lot of those here)

Lions, Atlantis, and Zerg, Oh MY!

This is kind of an overlap, but it's a short post anyway. I just felt like putting in a few things I've done this week since I came home. And I was able to fit them all into the Wizard of Oz catchphrase ::D
Thing number 1
Lions. Yeah, I know I already talked about Lion King, but it was amazing. End of story
Thing number 2
Atlantis; Stargate Atlantis, that is. I've been watching it. Only have about a season left.
Thing number 3
The last item of the title, and the subject of the *amazing* video above. Starcraft 2. I have family who loves me; on Thursday my uncle picked me up after he was done with work, brought me home for dinner and to game ::) Actually, the dinner was quite good. Fun fact: Western-Asian fusion=Mexican. We had some kind of chinese beef, which was westernized by the wraps we put it in--add a little lettuce, some tomatoes, and viola! a viola! Just kidding. It was more like a burrito than a big violin.'
Oh, and I had church today. I was debating whether or not to go to the singles' ward, or my grandparents' ward, until I found out that the singles' ward started at 9:00, and my grandparents' ward started at 2:00. Easy decision there, for late sleeper here :)
Also, Kaylee from firefly is in seasons 4 and 5 of Stargate Atlantis. That makes me very happy.
ummmmmm Oh, shout out to BK who starts college tomorrow. Sucks to be him XP
Things
Sauce
ZOMBIES!
Good night.

Head hung low

Good! Now that their attention has been diverted by the amusing movie, I can breathe a sigh of relief from having to defend myself from the raving *hordes* of blog readers that have been coming up with assassination plots to punish me for my inattentiveness. Oh; they're starting to pay attention. *ahem*
HI! OVERWHELMING POSITIVE PERSONALITY
and cut to blog
LAST TUESDAY:
It was a day full of studying. I studied for/did my take home BoM final. I probably did some fun stuff as well, but that was a wicked long time ago, soooo sorry :\
LAST WEDNESDAY (the beginning of the end): I resolved my BoM final; ended up with an 89.85 (rounding please BYU?). Spent a good portion of the day studying for Music 202 Final. I also did a lot of packing; I put together all my kitchen stuff and other things I didn't think I would need over the next two weeks (including all my extra contacts :\ Good thing my natural eyesight isn't terrible *cough* Trent *cough*). I also had to drain off my meal plan, so I went to the creamery and spent some 50 bucks on assorted items (with the intent that they would help me in the future: flour, batteries...good stuff like that).
LAST THURSDAY (the end (?) of the end): Trent was the first to leave the apartment. It was sad(ish. Kind of. Ok, not really). I bought him lunch so I could drain off the rest of my meal plan; ended up with $3.48 left. I went from that lunch to take my Music test; ended up getting a 90% (yay!) which made me happy (yay!) and redundant (yay!). That was the day I left. My dad and brother came out to Utah that day and picked me up. I said goodbye to all my dear friends (and some frenemies as well (just kidding. I don't have frenemies)) and then left them all in the dust 3:)> It sure was good to see them again. That night we ate dinner at the Kelly's house, and had fun with all sorts of relatives.
LAST FRIDAY: We woke up in a lazy fashion, and went over to Tutu and Gdad's house. I brought my 3 bags of laundry (I didn't economize on space; all that were in the bags were clothes. I just stuffed them in. So sue me). Tutu is awesome because she does a whole bunch of laundry for me (Thanks Tutu!). I don't really remember what happened the rest of the day; we probably did fun stuff.
LAST SATURDAY: woke up early in the morning to go ballooning! And boy do I mean early. Pics are up on facebook (as of last saturday :p ). By 12 we got back to Tutu and Gdad's house, and loaded up for our EPIC TRIP OF COLORADOness. *background:* The reason my dad and brother were able to come out to Utahland was because my dad had a conference in Keystone Colorado, so got his company to pay for the airfare. Following will be a departure from day-to-day retelling of events.

DE TRIP: We spent our first day driving north and east towards Vernal, Utah. We got there and booked our hotel for the night, then went and spent the rest of the day at Dinosaur National Park (pictures also up on facebook). Didn't get to see any dinosaurs; there was a severe lack of Chrichton-y occurence. Stayed in Vernal that night, had a really nice breakfast and went to church at 9:00 (so I was up early again). The ward we went to weren't really that used to visitors (we could tell). Then we drove and drove and drove and got to Keystone sometime that afternoon/evening; had dinner at this nice pizza place and crashed for the night. Monday saw us doing fun things; we went minigolfing, went to see Inception (which I really, really liked. Talk to me if you want to hear my thoughts. I don't feel like padding this post any more than necessary), and took a chair lift to the top of one of the mountains they have up there (considering that at the base of said mountain we were already 9,321 feet in the air, you can be sure that it was pretty high). Monday ended and Tuesday came; we went kayaking in the little lake there in the resort. That was also the day that my dad gave his speech, which he did while Grandad, Logan, and I were Kayaking. We spend most of the day driving back, but took a *little* detour to see Arches National Park. Now, that place is amazing. Absolute feats of nature. However, it was quite hot that day and the 3 hours we spent in the park were a little bit of overkill. Pictures will be up soon (along with pictures from my Grandad's camera from the trip. The most efficient way of sharing those, that I could come up with, was just to put them on facebook. So that will happen).

We got back to American Fork at around late:atnight and crashed.

TODAY (for me. For all those people I left back east, it's already tomorrow. Except that for them it's today, just not today. Comprende? :)

Last time I have to get up early for a while (I hope). Got up at 7 to go to the Timpanogas Temple; our timing was really good. We got in right before another ward did, so we only ended up being there not even an hour (which is good). Came back and worked on some stuff; Tutu and Grandad needed a new computer so we went shopping for that (and I went with to get a new wireless mouse. Mine had been inadvertently left in the hotel. In Colorado. Yeah.....). Came back and were setting it up; the best thing about it is that I get their old computer. Granted, it's a desktop, and kind of old, but it allows me to finally use Ubuntu without having to worry about lost functionality or loss of Stargate Atlantis. Also, it means I have two computers for the fall ::D As we speak, Ubuntu is installed and Evolution is busy downloading all my emails from the server. Then, at quarter to 1:00, Tutu, Grandad, Great-Grandma (McQuivey), and I all piled into the car to go see Lion King in Salt Lake. It. Was. Breathtaking. The issue you run into with a show like that is that the story is so well known, so to distinguish one's self, you have to focus on other features of the production. This broadway group did so (as anyone will know if they've seen a production) by using amazing costumes. Simply amazing. Words fail to describe the awful intensity of the costumes; and I am using the composite meaning of awe-full. (For those of you (you know who you are) it was full of awe). And the music was great--we could see the two setups of congas from where we were, and it was great during a musical number to be able to look over and just see their hands all over the drums. Before leaving, though, we said our goodbyes to Dad and Logan, as their flight was leaving at ~4:00. They're probably home by now(ish). After the show, we stopped by Olive Garden. 'Twas yummy. Then, we came home, and Logan and Dad were of course not here. And I've been chilling. It's been great. Then some part of my subconscious suggested that I finally get down to this blog thing... and I agreed because that part of my subconscious threatened to stab me with a knife if I didn't; Oh, wait, that was inception. Silly me. But wait, it's done!

Except for right now, it doesn't make much sense because I'm not actually in college, and the blog is supposed to be about college.. Oh well. Time to retire. And publish this. And hope there are still people who will read this kind of garbage. Especially since it's soo long. I know I wouldn't really want to read it. Boooooring.

Bonus for all of you who read to the end.

Ein Duetsches Requiem y L'Histoire du Soldat

lame excuse and then CUT TO THE BLOG:
So I don't really feel like doing a play by play of my week since last monday, so I'll just go with highlights.

Last Monday for FHE we went to Bridal veil falls (where Trent and I went on our double date the week before) except this time, we actually climbed the waterfall. It was probably the most frightening thing I've ever done, but I stuck through it and got to the top in one piece (actually a little bit more than that; the water added some extra mass). We found another way down than actually climbing the waterfall down, but that path was very dusty so my shoes were a total mess after that (I haven't worn them since then).

The main thing I did last week was stay up late and sleep in. Since bio lectures were over, I didn't have to wake up so early, so I developed an extremely healthy pattern of reading webcomics until CENSORED in the morning, and then sleeping until near noon. Needless to say, I didn't post that much :P.

I took my Bio test on Wednesday; it was only 25 questions, and so my one wrong answer cost my 4 points, which was annoying, but meh. I can't complain, seeing how it is the only class right now that I have an A in (which is ironic, because today is the day that we are supposed to be studying for finals tomorrow and Thursday, but my concentration is all like meh so I decided to do something productive and finally do a blog post).

Thursday was actually a departure from my laziness^theextreme; I got up early and went swimming, then on the way back I decided to stop by at my *favorite* place ever, the freshmen mentoring office. There's a whole long story that I don't really feel like getting into, regarding my bundles and changing them around, but the end result is that I applied for special permission to not take my bundle, but to substitute History 201 with Music 201 which is better than plain history, and helps me towards my music minor, as well as a bunch of other good arguments like that. That made me happy. Another productive thing I did that day was beat Ocarina of Time (w00t!). Also, I picked up my Ukulele and played around, which was fun; I especially worked on Izrael Kamakavivo'ole's Somewhere over the rainbow (which was funsauce). I also rewrote my BoM essay (which, conveniently, was due that day) and turned it in. Here's hoping I have some degree of success with it (remember that 'A' I was talking about earlier? Yeah, I need one for BoM, too. Which reminds me; I need to study for that. Scott Albright, where art thou?). My Friday was wicked chill; with no Bio (still) and no Music (because it's Friday) I slept in again and started playing Majora's Mask. At some point in the day I went down with Dezzy to get tickets to another HumorU show that they were doing; instead of doing stand up comedy, though, this time they did a "movie mocktacular." Explanation: they picked three movies that were produced by BYU, but that were wicked old and somewhat cheesy (read: hilarious to make fun of). And that's exactly what they did. They played three short movies from '77, '66, and '69, and had commentary on them. It was a bit scripted, but it was enjoyable.

Saturday rolled around, which was awesome by virtue of being Saturday I don't remember doing much--I slept in again (now this is just getting old) and played both majora's mask and battlefront (on my DS). I did do something somewhat productive, though; I imported all the songs that I would need for my Music ID test come Monday onto my computer, so I wouldn't have to waste time later doing so. The culmination of Saturday, though, was the Divine Comedy Alumni show that evening. Divine comedy is like HumorU, but better. Instead of stand up, it is skit humor, and I loves it. Two especially great skits they did were parodies of musicals; they did the Marriott School Musical and Latter-day Miserable. After the show I hung out with Melissa and Katie, but then Melissa had a 'date' with her 'study partner', so Katie and I just hung out, which vas cool.

Sunday came the next day, as it generally tends to do, and it had me at the piano all of sacrament meeting. Ward choir was performing two musical numbers; luckily only one of them was accompanied. However, the day before, Tatiana had asked me to fill in as pianist for sacrament, because everyone else was unable to. So, that meant I was not only playing for ward choir, but three other hymns. And that's not even counting prelude and postlude music. It went well, though; I pulled it all off. I was kind of falling asleep in priesthood meeting, but then sunday school woke me up because my amazing teacher Taze baked >100 cookies. It was yummy-making. That afternoon our ward went on a walk to the temple, which was cool. Many pictures were had by all. (also, sorry about not having pictures, but I'm just going to put all my pictures from my phone onto facebook after the term is over. It's a lot easier on me). I also studied for my music ID test. That evening saw me and two other individuals working on our bio presentation for the next day (which has an interesting story attached to it). Monday morning is the day of our bio presentation, so I set my alarm to 8:00 so I can wake up and be there with plenty of time. I woke up, sure enough, but someone was in the shower so I decided to just wait in my bed for them to be done. I woke up at 9:02. Class starts at 9:00, and our group was supposed to go second. I rushed, you have no idea how much adrenaline was going through my body. I literally made it into the classroom right as the first group finished their presentation. If it wasn't for my bike, I would have been in a lot of trouble. Miraculously, I made it. Best thing about it was the perfect 50/50 grade we got. I felt like including it here, so you can see the awesomeness thereof:

After bio, I came home and studiedstudiedstudied. I broke for lunch in the cougareat, just so I could get out of the house, and ran in to Mike Marcasciano there, which was neat. He was on his way to take a physical science test, and I was actually studying for my test as I ate (I brought my laptop). The moment of reckoning came...and I did horribly. Out of 26 questions, I probably got 5-6 wrong. The worst was the first example, which was actually part of Wozzeck, but since it didn't have the Sprechstimme singing, I dismissed it. It was bad. The result is that I havetohavetohaveto do well on my final. At this point I'm aiming just to keep my head above water--somewhere around B-, B territory.
But ignoring that annoyingness and moving on; we had our last FHE last night, the whole ward together. It was alright; really good food and decent desert, followed by a slide show. I don't know if anyone else knows this about me, but for some reason whenever there is a slideshow or some such thing at the close of an event, I am severely under-represented. In this 15 minute slideshow, I was in some three pictures. This isn't new; far from it. It happens all the time, in fact. Maybe it's just something about my vampiric nature... :X''' Whatever the case, that was that. I was bored after that, until I found out that Stargate Atlantis is on Netflix instant queue. That made me veryvery happy. I watched it. Then I went to sleep. Then I woke up. Now it's today. Now I just sound stupid, so I'm done. Bye.

The first steps are always the hardest

Have you noticed how it seems the blog titles have stopped correlating to my actual blogs? yeah, me too.
So...last time I blogged was..some other day. Thursday? I could go check
yep, thursday. So, anyway, I guess I should talk about what I did Friday.
So, I slept in, because again I didn't need to go to class. I spent the day doing really productive things, such as uploading an emulator onto Katie's computer, and then playing Zelda. I beat the shadow temple, and got part way through the spirit temple. I also played the piano, and ate food, and I'm pretty sure I took some kind of nap. The only notable things I did happened starting at 7:30--but I'll preface that by telling you that the HumorU show was that night. As opposed to Divine Comedy, which is skit-based comedy, HumorU is all stand up. But, unlike other stand up, HumorU is clean. Completely clean. Now, back to what I did at 7:30. I got two tickets to the show, for the purpose of bringing a date. My date was Erin, whom I had met the summer previous at the Plymouth, NH EFY. We had a small dinner at the creamery before heading over to the Maeser building (also known as the farthest point on campus from Heritage). The show was really great-most of my FHE group was there as well, and so since then we've quoted it multiple times. Ironically, the group was started by an Arab non-member, who made a surprise appearance. I absolutely loved having the jokes pointed into our campus; it's a perspective that I missed. After the show/date, I hung out with some of my FHE group. We basically chilled until 12:00, when we had to leave our apartment (visiting hours), but instead of leaving it at that we hung out outside, playing music and random games. Finally, we just decided to go to sleep outside. We got various blankets and pillows, and just camped out on the grass behind Bowen hall. We all were in varying degrees of sleeping, some people talking while others slept. I fell asleep for real at around 5:00 (my phone was dead by that point, so I wasn't really sure), but I had fallen asleep a few times before that, so it was all good. We finally got up and went back to our own beds at around 8:00. I slept until 12:00, then woke up and made some german pancakes for myself and some of our FHE girls. Unfortunately, something went wrong, and they weren't as good as they could have been, but I got good reviews on them anyway. (In case you couldn't tell, I have now segued into Saturday). Saturday continued with more chilling/playing around, but I got somewhat tired as we got into a game of volleyball, so I came back and showered (don't question the causality of events--they just happen). I started fasting around 4, my last meal being a burger from the creamery. Things I did that night-ish: I followed a circuitous logic chain regarding the nature of human self-identity, until I finally broke out of it to a hopeful conclusion. I am attempting to recreate my logic in an essay, so hopefully if this made no sense to you, you'll be able to read it when I'm done. Also, I met more people: Emma, Jenna, Nate, Jacob, Alex, Paul, Maddie, and I already knew Kaitlin. We watched the end of Sherlock Holmes with them. Then, I kind of went to sleep while writing this post....
fast forward to today: I got up by 9:40, got ready for church, went to church, had church, then stayed at church to practice for choir, which was an hour after church. Finally, choir ended, and I came home and ended my fast and ate food and typed this. Now I'm done.
Bio #3

Richard Anson Call

Anson is the shortest of everyone in our apartment. He hails from Austin, Texas. Yes, he is Anson (and I am Jansen), and he is from Austin (and I'm from Boston). Weird, I know. He is somewhat of a mac freak (has a macbook, iPhone, and his dad has an iPad). He has a ginormous house (even for Texas standards). He was a techie in high school, coordinating the lighting for several shows at his school. He enjoys building. He enjoys doing occasional farm work, including on the ~500 fruit trees on his family's property. His favorite thing(s) ever is(are) cooking, being with his family (some of whom were here today in Sacrament meeting), water sports, general sporty activities, and hanging out (and Melissa). His pet peeve is being ignored. If he had 10 days left to live, he would travel and spend time with his family. Classes he is taking this term are: Living Prophets, Mass Communications, and Anthropology.

How

Insert personal commentary about blogging in general, and the general awesomeness of the above video.

Stop personal commentary and talk about what I did.

Wednesday: I slept in. The last day of lectures for bio was on Monday, so I slept in. Slept until about 10:30-ish. Got past the water temple, and got the hover boots from the shadow temple. Also, during that time, Rachel stopped by and hung out with me (oh, and Trent was there too). 'Twas oodles of fun. I also practiced my choir songs, and generally just killed time until my music class. We learned about american people--Charles Ives and Aaron Copland, as well as others. Class got out typically late ~6:20, so I just came back and chilled some more.. (I know, wicked productive. Hey, it's a balance thing. Tuesday was good. Wednesday was just...meh). Around 10-ish Chris came by and we went to go meet more people. We met Bethany, Emilee, and Lauren (Kristy wasn't there and we already knew Daneka). They're pretty fun--it's a great icebreaker to start reading people's quote walls (though sometimes it goes just a little bit too far). Then I played some Halo with Chris, but not for too long (I did have to go swimming in the morning)

Thursday: I got up and went swimming. I had bought goggles the day before, so I was ready for it all. I actually did a lot better than Tuesday, but ended up getting a really bad pain in my neck from the breast stroke (having my head point forward that whole time). That was followed by NOT OoT, surprisingly enough. I decided to finally start reading my new Rick Riordan book--The Red Pyramid. Being somewhat of a mythology geek, I really like Riordan's stuff. BoM at 2-4, followed by more reading and a nap. Then, at 7:00, I had a Boston Stake reunion! Mike and Jacquie are both out here for the summer as well, and we haven't spent any time together as true Bostoners. So we finally got together and talked, caught up, got some ice cream--it was great. Jacquie is in Heritage-she's staying in Fox right now. Mike is way out in Wyview, so he had to wait until 8:45 for his bus to come, but it was alright. Jacquie had to leave at 8:00 because her home-teachers decided to finally get around to home teaching--even though she had never met them before. After Mike left, I went to this hall meeting about how to check out of our rooms after Summer term was over. Essentially, it boils down to "ask the HA." Then, Chris and I went to introduce ourselves to more people. We started in the basement, with 10-we met Serena and Corrie, and it turns out that Corrie is taking harp lessons, and she totally got is unto a practice room AND I PLAYED A HARP! I was so happy. I love the harp, and it's always been a dream of mine to learn to play it, and it's actually pretty simple! The strings are set up in a diatonic scale, but then there are pedals you can move to change the key and everything. It's really neat. Also, did I mention that I PLAYED A HARP?!? I did. After getting back from the HFAC, we went up to 17 (Autumn's apartment) and met (almost) everyone from her apartment. Besides Autumn and Amanda (who I already knew), we met Lisa, Emilee, and Hallie. Again, the quote wall is a great ice-breaker. In totally related (random) news, Chris showed me how to change my phone so that the date displays in Hawaiian. Swieckt! (I just made that up. Sick+Sweet). Anyway, That brings me tooooo

Bio #2

Chance Austin Bozeman

Chance is my awesome home teaching companion. He hails from Gilbert, Arizona, where there are four different stakes that go to his school (there are roughly four stakes that have membership within the entire state of Massachusetts). He likes to play basketball, run/workout, go to the movies, flirt with girls. He likes music (unfortunately, his favorite is country, and he hates heavy metal)--but he likes it as long as he can dance to it. His pet peeve is dirtiness *cough*neat freak*cough*, and if he had 10 days left to live he would go to Europe (specifically Italy) and sight see.

He wants seven kids. His ideal temperature is 72 degrees. He enjoyed his childhood, and wouldn't trade it for anyone else's. He loves his parents. He can't wait to meet his wife.

He is currently taking Book of Mormon, Writing and Rhetoric, and Ballroom Dance. He enjoys his ballroom class, even though it is early in the morning and he claims not to be that good.

Donesauce.

Productivity FTW!

Hi. It's me. Today I went swimming, and have been tired all day. Even so, it was a good day. I went swimming, then came home and made some German pancakes while playing around on scratch (I've made a snake game). I'm glad that I went swimming, but I need to be going a lot more. Good thing that's what I'll be doing, every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. At around 1, Trent suggested doing a date-hike, and I readily agreed. We decided to go up to bridal veil falls, but I had to go to Book of Mormon before I was able to ask anyone. After class, I came back and asked Autumn (who is in our ward, and who is coincidentally the ward choir director) to go, and she said yes. Trent and I prepared a nice picnic-y lunch and we went and picked up our dates at 5:30. It was pretty fun: it was amazing hiking in the canyon, while at the same time there was a river to our side. I didn't feel like I was in the desert, except for the sheer rock cliffs above us (which were pretty cool). We kind of just walked, and then found this nice big rock to eat on. On our way back, there was a small water fight, but I am happy to report that there are no casualties. It was really neat; Autumn and I were able to carry on a really nice conversation the whole time (i.e. there were no wicked awkward pauses). Afterwards I was bored, so I went out and met people. With Chris (who isn't in my apartment but is in our building) I went up to random people's doors and chatted for a while. I met: Casey, Lauren, Hannah, Sutton, Ryan, Jessica, Jen, Allison, Marin (it's her birthday today), Jessie, Parker, Carter, Tanner, and Ben. It was really neat, though I wish I had done so sooner, what with only 2 weeks left of the term.

That's pretty much it. I don't feel like doing a bio. I'll see about doing one tomorrow morning.

Good night!

Things in that dark that go "NI!"

Hi! Yes, indeed, I am posting two nights in a row! *GASP* It's a miracle (also I just don't have other work to do). Today I went to bio. It's a good thing I did, because it ended up being the best bio class ever: he brought his alpacas. It was really cool; there was a five day old newborn alpaca that was really cute. I did take pictures, but putting them up would be too onerous of a task to undertake, so instead I'm going to put them up on facebook or something...later. After bio I went back to the ranch and spent my time productively *cough* Ocarina of Time *cough*, as well as taking a good 40 minute nap (see my status from last night for explanation of why I was so tired). Music (at 4) was okay-we talked about Ravel, Puccini, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, and people like that. When it was finally over I talked to Chance about home teaching our last people, and we ended up home teaching them soon after; right before family home evening, in fact. Then, for FHE we went swimming. It was a very good decision (Thank you Anson!) though it revealed the fact that I have HORRIBLE cardio-vascular. Trent and I decided that we would go swimming in the mornings, which means I need to be getting to bed with good time tonight (hopefully that means that Foster will be done on the computer soon, and I can get to sleep). After swimming I came home and wrote my final paper for bio! I don't have to do any more! Hurrah! Then it was done. Now I'm done

..Almost :)

Finally: Bio #1 !

Trent Nathaniel Taylor

This is Trent. He hails from the great state of ..Utah. Yep, that's right: he is the one Utahan in our apartment (Saint George). He is about my height (which is tall' ish''), and has some horrible disease that requires him to wear these funny things on his face to help him see. His claim to fame is that he is the "coolest person alive." He is the one other person in my apartment who sings, which helps me keep my level of sanity (notice I didn't say helps keep me sane; I passed that point a while ago). Trent is majoring in theatre, as well as doing the pre-med program. Though he sings, he doesn't go for musicals; he is strictly a straight theatre guy. He is a very ebullient person, and thrives among groups of people. He is clean, though not the biggest neat freak in our apartment.

Currently, he is taking Book of Mormon, University Chorale, and Theatre History. His favorite thing to do is: "sing dance act swim play the piano." His pet peeve is: "when people don't clean up after themselves" and "really mean people." If he only had 10 days to live he would "take his friends and go to disney world. He would go snorkeling, skydiving, and then build an orphanage in Brazil." He is usually up for anything fun, even hiking the Y at 1:00 in the morning. In our very first conversation, I found out that he had played Kingdom Hearts and that he sang, and I knew that we would get along.

The (real) end.

Gah

Hi all. I have been trying to go to sleep for the last three hours. Nothing has worked. So, in a fit of desperation, I am going to do a complete blog post of all my activities since last Wednesday.

WARNING: This is going to be text heavy, but hopefully it will involve enough mental stimuli to tire my brain to the point where I will finally be able to sleep.

Wednesday: Bio. Bio class and bio test. Class was boring (big surprise). Test was alright; 94. No class for the rest of the day, because Music was canceled (the professor had something else to do). So I kinda chilled for the rest of the day until Anson showed me the N64 emulator he had downloaded. There went the rest of my day. I think by the time I went to bed I had gotten past the first two dungeons of Ocarina of Time.

Thursday: more of the same. Woke up late (No, I'm not saying how late I went to bed) and got some pointers from Trent who had played the game as a child (I must confess that I had never played OoT in my life). Took a brief break for Book of Mormon from 2-4, but then continued on in much the same vein. Got past the fourth temple that night.

Friday: Good news for the summer-attending BYU student: a Utah-only holiday called Pioneer day. To be fair, it is on the 24th, but they gave us classes off on Friday, too. That meant I could sleep in (yay!) but not by much. The reason for this was because BYU was holding a little something called Cougar Cooldown. I'd explain it, but I think this video does a better job. It was buckets of fun, though some of those balloons hit quite hard. I got hit, the very second time, square in between the eyes; had to turn around and throw balloons backwards until I could open my eyes again. Associated with the water balloon fight was a blood drive, and I figured why not. I have blood, and am always making more. I might as well. It actually was a really neat experience, and I was not much the worse for wear because of it. Note: I love Utah. I totally struck up a conversation with a random couple that were in line ahead of me. The other thing I love about Utah; they had just gotten married a month before. The actual giving of blood wasn't a big deal-it went faster than I would have thought. Then, a nice surprise: after giving blood I went over to talk to this girl I kinda knew-she was a friend of Chance's. As it turns out it's a good thing I did, because she happened to ask me out on a date. I readily accepted, of course.

The date was wicked fun; it was Rachel (my date) and four of her roommates that all got dates. We had breakfast for dinner (I cooked the eggs-scrambled, first time ever. I did a pretty good job), then went to see a show put on by a camp that was going on at BYU-YASE. It turned out to be pretty neat. Trent, who had gone to that camp the previous year, knew someone on the inside and got us in. They did a wide variety of musical numbers, as well as solo pieces (one of which was ridiculously funny-it was from the musical The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. We left early to do other fun things; played volleyball and then went back to their apartment to make (and eat) cake in a cup-a really cool recipe by which you make cake. In a mug. All in all, it was a really fun evening.

Saturday--went to my grandparents, did my laundry (for free!) and spilled chocolate milkshake on my computer. Yippee. It seems to be working alright now, but I kind of freaked out. It is not a good feeling to watch chocolate milk shake drip from out of your computer. The day continued improving; I spent at least an hour searching for my flash drive, the one I got such a good deal on (and the one that has all my N64 roms on it). Needless to say, I couldn't find it. The day did improve, however, with the fact that I went on another date. This one was a group date within my FHE group; we had a nice picnic at the JFSB, then went skittles bowling at the wilk (which gratefully was still open on pioneer day) and finished it up with ice cream at the creamery and a nice few games of catchphrase.

Sunday-Woke up at 10:20. Church started at 10:30. Made it there 5 or 6 minutes late, but it was okay (especially considering how late of a start I got and how far away the church building is of a walk). Choir practice went alright, but I have boatloads of practicing to do for two weeks from now. After that, I pretty much just wasted time; spent some of it with my FHE group but after ward prayer (at 8) I realized how tired I was, and how trying to do anything productive would be a waste of time. So, I went to bed. Or tried to. Of course, I'm still up now four hours later, so what does that tell you? I must be some kind of a freak. Oh, and to add to that that apparently I've started snoring within the last four days. I thought Foster was kidding. He does that. But he seemed to be serious. I have no idea what the cause could be, but it worries me. I am not a snorer. It needs to stop.

And so does this post.

Bios this week!