Those of you that don't interact with me daily may not have heard about our most recent addition to the family:

Those of you that do interact with me daily, I'm sorry that you now have

to experience me rave about this through another form of communication. 

Sometimes I start to wonder whether I've gone insane by being so obsessed with a blender, but then I just look up any recipe on the internet involving a Vitamix and there is always a shameless shout-out from the writer about how much they love their Vitamix.  Thanks Uncles Charlie and Hsin for the great wedding gift!

Mitt is a Mormon.  That should make me want to vote for him - but it doesn’t.  I have had enough exposure to Mormon men to know to doubt them - not as a whole - but rather from individual to individual.  I guess I just don’t assume Mitt is more virtuous, more honest, and more praiseworthy than Obama just because he’s Mormon.
So how do I decide who to vote for?  These are my most recent thoughts:
Our country has multiple cliffs coming up - the most important cliffs being, to me, financial cliffs and social cliffs.  What do we do about these cliffs?

.....I don’t know.  
What I do know, is that I agree more with Mitt on the financial stuff and more with Obama on the social stuff.  I think that the impending financial cliff is one that needs to be maneuvered with great caution by someone with great experience - and I must say that I would choose Mitt in this case.  I think that the social cliff - well, our country is flinging ourselves over that one wholeheartedly regardless of who becomes President.  Only in this social case, “going over a cliff” is not meant to have negative connotations.  At least not for me, as I support gay marriage (a fairly recent discovery of mine) and I am an advocate of women’s rights (also a fairly new interest of mine).  Therefore, I do not see this “going over the social cliff” as a negative thing.  Also, I must admit that I think that Mitt, our conservative-Christian-background-kinda-guy, will provide some good balance as our society experiments with these social cliffs for the first time.
So is my choice one between financial issues or social issues?  No, but I sure hope that, if Mitt is elected, that he can guide us down the financial cliff safely, and that our flinging ourselves off of the social cliffs will help us learn to fly.
Whatever the outcome of this election, GOD BLESS AMERICA.

I should probably be more embarrassed to admit, but sometimes I watch my wedding video.  Over and over.  And over and over.  I like it, ok?!  So today I watched my wedding video, and then even somebody else's, and was just feeling happy about love and life.

Then I stumbled across an article.  The story told that a woman in Tunisia was in the car with her fiance.  Three officers approached the couple.  One of the officers took the man to a nearby ATM to extort money from him while the other two officers raped the woman inside the car.  When the woman filed a complaint against the officers, she was charged for public indecency.

The story hit me hard, and not only because of the stark contrast to what my brain had been engorged with earlier.  Really unfair things happen to people everyday.  I'll admit, I'm not the most up-to-date on news and what's happening in the world.  I'm not well informed on the laws or culture in Tunisia.  I'm not a psychologist, and can't tell you anything about why people do what they do.

Maybe the cops are complete dunces.  Maybe the woman is lying and the police officers are actually honest, upright men.  Maybe the police force over there is corrupt and this type of thing happens everyday.  Maybe it was somebody else's fault entirely.

Regardless of the frequency or predictability of this situation, regardless of who is right and who is wrong, and regardless of what the outcome will be, I feel sad for everyone involved.

I hope I can do my part to stop these kinds of situations from happening, because nobody deserves this.

For those of you who might not be familiar with the university that I attend, there is a place on campus called the Testing Center.  It is most feared, dreaded, and despised place on campus.  At least for me.

Today, upon entering for the first time this school year, there was a group of student employees outside gathered around the entrance.  As I neared the door, I saw them spray a chemical, heard the words "black widow", saw the following,....

...and thought to myself "how appropriate."

With the close of summer looming nearer and nearer, I've been thinking back over some of the fun things that happened this summer.  One of these particular memories would have been very different if we'd have jumped on the bandwagon of the "facekini" craze happening in China.  Lament with me as you view these pictures, wish this was popular in America, and say goodbye to summer.

I love different cultures.

Welcome Home Day!

Check it out - today is Welcome Home Day in Provo!

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I like this video because he makes rooster noises, and then the roosters make rooster noises.

Then he laughs, then I laugh.

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Obituaries

I seem to have come across a lot of obituaries lately.  They make you think.

I read one where the man inspired people.  All the comments that people left talked about how he influenced, changed, and uplifted other people.  He died when he was 30.  I remember interacting with him when I was a 7th grader.  He was exactly as they had described him.  I hope my obituary can be true to my life.

One lady's obituary said she "died unexpectedly on a family outing."  I imagined that happening on our next family outing.  Heaven forbid!  It didn't say how she died though, and left me curious.  I hope that my obituary can satisfy a random passerby's curiosity.

I read one about a lady who was very old when she finally passed to the other side.  She was quoted as saying "If God calls me to him, it means I have fulfilled my mission on earth!"  ("Если Господь призовет меня к себя, значит я выполнила свою миссию на земле!" excuse the poor translation)  I knew her personally, and I happen to know that she was in inconceivable amounts of pain here on earth, and I wouldn't blame her for wanting to die.  But I also happen to know that she was constantly trying to "fulfill her mission" here on earth, and do everything the Lord expected of her.  I hope that my obituary reflects that I have fulfilled "my mission on earth."  (But only if I actually do ever reach that point.)


I also want my obituary to be funny, so probably I'm going to need Tayhoo Kid to write it for me.


May my obituary not need to be written any time soon.

Two of my recent, best decisions ever:

1) Marrying Mikey, my BFF (emphasis on the last F)

2) Having videography at our wedding.

Just being kids at Disney

     I looked over at my husband with tears in my eyes as the doctor started explaining to me what "differential diagnosis" means.  I couldn't really understand what he was saying, nor did I want to listen to what he had to say.  All I knew is he was sending us to the emergency room.

     I told my husband of less than a month that it was time to call my Mom.  I explained to her that we were at an urgent care clinic and on our way to the emergency room.  I didn't even try to mask that I was crying.  I told her of my possible diagnosis and then proceeded to tell her why I was actually crying: I wasn't going to be able to go to Disneyland with my friends.  I explained to her that my husband and four friends had been waiting for over 2 hours with me instead of using pre-purchased tickets to Disneyland, and now I was condemned to waiting four plus hours in the ER, which would mean, based on their resiliency thus far, that so were they.  My wise mother then said, "We're not here to go to Disneyland.  We're here to take care of each other.  That's what life is all about."  Then she added sternly, "Let Mikey and your friends take care of you."

     That was my favorite quote of the weekend.  "We're not here to go to Disneyland.  We're here to take care of each other."  So wise.  So true.

     On an unrelated note, my second favorite quote of the weekend was a question posed to my husband by the male nurse, probably in his twenties: "So is this your daughter?"

     Yes, that question was asked in reference to me.

     And now for the good news.  After an ultrasound, an IV, 4 prescriptions, and a good nights sleep, I made it to Disneyland (with a kidney and urinary tract infection) for an open to close, running ride to ride, acting like 6 married children, memorable trip.

Thanks for the good advice, Mom.

Thanks for taking good care of me, 4 friends.

And thanks for sticking with me through it all, Mikey.

This is for Moms of Olympic athletes.  What they didn't say is that the Moms are the ultimate Olympic champions.  My Mom is definitely one of them.

Website of the semester goes to....

www.simplynoise.com
(Quizlet.com was a close second place.)

25 cents and back to normal

I'm glad that I finally figured out what to do to get myself back into the pop-culture swing of things.  Something that has been going on this long has got to be good, right?

Featuring (this is only a few of them):

The One That Got Away

KATY PERRY

Marry The Night

LADY GAGA

Paradise

COLDPLAY

Someone Like You

ADELE

Lullaby

NICKELBACK

Red Solo Cup

TOBY KEITH

What I need to know is where's my Justin Beeebs at?

Also, this isn't a joke.