Ok, so I was just updating my profile information on facebook & every time I began to type something in, facebook tried to guess what I was writing & give me a little pulldown menu of options. At first it did a good job-- under education I typed B-r-i & facebook guessed Brigham Young University. Well done, facebook. Then I went to type in my current residence--- P-r-...facebook guessed Prague. Fail. Here's an overview of the person facebook would have me be:
Current residence: Prague
Grew up in: London
Employer: Nebo School District
Position: King
Suddenly I don't feel as though I am living up to my potential. Someday, though. Someday I will be the king of Nebo School District.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Rain in Winter!!!
I am so freaking happy right now! I just got back from doing one of my very favorite things-- driving in the cold rain with the windows down & the heater cranked all the way up. I LOVE IT!!! I have always loved the rain & when it's cold outside, this is by far the best way to enjoy it! Maybe I like it because of the mix of hot & cold air hitting me. Maybe I like having both those opposites at once. Kind of like sweet & salty Nature Valley granola bars. Except now that I think of it, I actually hate sweet & salty granola bars, so that can't be it. Maybe the reason I like driving in cold rain with the heater up is that I'm defying nature. “Ha! Big bad rain cloud thinks he's gonna make me all cold? Well, I'm crankin' the heater & rollin' down the windows! What now, sucka'?”
I think I especially enjoyed the rain today because it was just that-- rain. It is December 9th and the stuff falling out of the sky was rain & not snow. I feel very good about that. If we can keep this up until March, I will be happier than a mouse with an Easy Cheese IV. Snow is pretty & all, but when you have to wait for the bottom 8 inches of your pants to thaw out every time you come inside, it loses a bit of its charm. Now, I know there are those who would say, “There is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing.” Well, then buy me a freakin parka because nothing I have seems to cut it. Actually, those people are probably right. I should probably dress warmer. But even with warm clothes, my face is still cold. What do I do about that? I can't cover my face up because I have this annoying addiction to air & as it turns out, you can't breathe when you swaddle your face.
Ok, enough about snow. (It's really not that bad--- ok, so maybe I even like it a little.) Back to the rain. So, this drive wasn't even that long. I merely drove to Sportsman's Warehouse where I purchased some worms for my kindergarten class (I love teaching the letter W!) and a few Christmas gifts for some Sportsmen. Ok, so one gift for one sportsman. Ok, fine. One gift for my brother. I'm pretty sure I would actually be safe writing on here what I bought him because he probably doesn't even know I have a blog, but just in case, I'm going to lie and say that I bought him a big hairy cross-eyed elk head that was hanging on the wall & wasn't even for sale until I flirted hard core with the managers (a.k.a. The Brawny Man & Paul Bunyan ) who finally gave in & sold it to me for a very reasonable price.
In reality the only man I spoke to there was the salesman who said I looked lost.
Wow, I'm really babbling. So, anyway, the drive wasn't even that long. Just to Sportsman's Warehouse & back. But, it was fan-freaking-tastic!!! I'm really glad I got to enjoy it because despite my attempts to will nature into bypassing snow altogether, there's always the chance that I will wake up tomorrow & find myself back in the snow covered reality that is Utah. Will I mope & be depressed? No. Will I curse the snow & wish I lived somewhere else? No. I'll probably sip a little hot chocolate through a minty grasshopper cookie, put on an embarrassing number of sweaters & suck it up. In fact, if this winter is like many others, I might even find myself running barefoot in the snow at some point with some crazy friend. Whatever happens, I'm glad I got my rainy drive in tonight!!!
I think I especially enjoyed the rain today because it was just that-- rain. It is December 9th and the stuff falling out of the sky was rain & not snow. I feel very good about that. If we can keep this up until March, I will be happier than a mouse with an Easy Cheese IV. Snow is pretty & all, but when you have to wait for the bottom 8 inches of your pants to thaw out every time you come inside, it loses a bit of its charm. Now, I know there are those who would say, “There is no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing.” Well, then buy me a freakin parka because nothing I have seems to cut it. Actually, those people are probably right. I should probably dress warmer. But even with warm clothes, my face is still cold. What do I do about that? I can't cover my face up because I have this annoying addiction to air & as it turns out, you can't breathe when you swaddle your face.
Ok, enough about snow. (It's really not that bad--- ok, so maybe I even like it a little.) Back to the rain. So, this drive wasn't even that long. I merely drove to Sportsman's Warehouse where I purchased some worms for my kindergarten class (I love teaching the letter W!) and a few Christmas gifts for some Sportsmen. Ok, so one gift for one sportsman. Ok, fine. One gift for my brother. I'm pretty sure I would actually be safe writing on here what I bought him because he probably doesn't even know I have a blog, but just in case, I'm going to lie and say that I bought him a big hairy cross-eyed elk head that was hanging on the wall & wasn't even for sale until I flirted hard core with the managers (a.k.a. The Brawny Man & Paul Bunyan ) who finally gave in & sold it to me for a very reasonable price.
In reality the only man I spoke to there was the salesman who said I looked lost.
Wow, I'm really babbling. So, anyway, the drive wasn't even that long. Just to Sportsman's Warehouse & back. But, it was fan-freaking-tastic!!! I'm really glad I got to enjoy it because despite my attempts to will nature into bypassing snow altogether, there's always the chance that I will wake up tomorrow & find myself back in the snow covered reality that is Utah. Will I mope & be depressed? No. Will I curse the snow & wish I lived somewhere else? No. I'll probably sip a little hot chocolate through a minty grasshopper cookie, put on an embarrassing number of sweaters & suck it up. In fact, if this winter is like many others, I might even find myself running barefoot in the snow at some point with some crazy friend. Whatever happens, I'm glad I got my rainy drive in tonight!!!
Thursday, May 20, 2010
My Room
I just wrote out a to-do list that is 19 items long. Some of the things are important, like "Register for District Summer Inservice" and some of them are not so important, such as "paint toe-nails". Regardless of the importance (or unimportance) of any of these things, I am not doing any of them. Instead, I am sitting on the floor of my room, with my laptop atop my lap (imagine that!) writing on my blog & listening to Beatles music. I am terrified to start this "to-do" list because I know that the first thing I need to do is to unpack my room. This idea terrifies me.
You have to understand something about this room right now: It's bad. It's really bad.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not a chicken when it comes to messy rooms. I've conquered my share of messy bedrooms growing up. I keep my room pretty clean now that I'm older, but there have been times in my life when I could really do a number on a bedroom. (Usually with a little help from whichever sister I was sharing a room with.) My favorite book has always been Jillian Jiggs because it's about a delightful little girl who has a delightfully messy bedroom due to the fact that she is delightfully creative. Every time she tries to clean it, she thinks of a new fun game to play using the stuff in her room & she gets sidetracked. Basically, she rocks. She is my hero. Growing up, I related to this book because I, myself, had such a horrendous room at times. I've had messy bedrooms that made grown men curl up in the fetal position & cry for Mama.
And I cleaned those rooms.
No problem.
In fact, I usually kind of enjoyed it.
My room right now, however, is in a league of it's own. I recently interviewed for a job teaching kindergarten in Northern Utah. Upon getting hired, I moved back up to Provo, got an apartment, & moved all of my stuff into it. All of my stuff. That means my own normal collection of clothes, shoes, books, goblets, etc. along with all of my stuff for teaching kindergarten. Kindergarten is very stuff-intensive. It can be hard to keep the attention of 25 squirrelly little ankle-biters, but if you bring out a puppet or a set of binoculars or a giant stoplight that really works, all of a sudden their eyes & ears are glued on you & they're ready to soak in anything you feed them. For this reason, I have A LOT of kindergarten stuff. My bedroom is currrently lined with boxes upon boxes of kindergarten stuff. Once summer school ends and I am able to move into my new classroom, it will all be gone, but right now it's in my room.
This makes unpacking very difficult. I have spent the last couple days trying to attack this beastly room by methodically sorting things out and going through them. I stacked all of the "my stuff" on one side of the room and all of the "kindergarten stuff" on the other side of the room. My room looks like a giant chess board with all the pieces set up on opposite sides of the board. I hope nobody moves a pawn out to the middle because that's where I sleep; In the middle of all the boxes, on a mattress that I just bought. The mattress isn't that glamorous; just a cheapy I bought at Ikea because it could roll up and fit into my car. I like it, though. It's definitely a step up from the sleeping bag I was sleeping on before. Between all the boxes, the mattress, the sleeping bag, the camping stuff, and the random picture of Freddy Kreuger that I somehow ended up with (how terrifying is that?), I find myself the owner of a very intimidating bedroom.
I figure that I have three options at this point:
1. Slowly, but surely start to chip away at the stony wretch of a bedroom that lies before me,
2. Consider it an opportunity for personal growth and learn how to pole-vault over the boxes to get from point A to point B,
3. Wait until I see some poor unsuspecting passerby out my window and then act out one of those dramatic scenes from the movies where the woman throws all the man's stuff out the window & yells, "And don't ever bother coming back!!!" (I think this option is my favorite. I think I like the idea of chucking stuff out a window to make more space & I'm sure I would relish the look of confusion & fear on the poor man's face when I threw "his" blocks & puppetts at him. Plus that, it would give the neighbors lots to talk about.)
You have to understand something about this room right now: It's bad. It's really bad.
Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not a chicken when it comes to messy rooms. I've conquered my share of messy bedrooms growing up. I keep my room pretty clean now that I'm older, but there have been times in my life when I could really do a number on a bedroom. (Usually with a little help from whichever sister I was sharing a room with.) My favorite book has always been Jillian Jiggs because it's about a delightful little girl who has a delightfully messy bedroom due to the fact that she is delightfully creative. Every time she tries to clean it, she thinks of a new fun game to play using the stuff in her room & she gets sidetracked. Basically, she rocks. She is my hero. Growing up, I related to this book because I, myself, had such a horrendous room at times. I've had messy bedrooms that made grown men curl up in the fetal position & cry for Mama.
And I cleaned those rooms.
No problem.
In fact, I usually kind of enjoyed it.
My room right now, however, is in a league of it's own. I recently interviewed for a job teaching kindergarten in Northern Utah. Upon getting hired, I moved back up to Provo, got an apartment, & moved all of my stuff into it. All of my stuff. That means my own normal collection of clothes, shoes, books, goblets, etc. along with all of my stuff for teaching kindergarten. Kindergarten is very stuff-intensive. It can be hard to keep the attention of 25 squirrelly little ankle-biters, but if you bring out a puppet or a set of binoculars or a giant stoplight that really works, all of a sudden their eyes & ears are glued on you & they're ready to soak in anything you feed them. For this reason, I have A LOT of kindergarten stuff. My bedroom is currrently lined with boxes upon boxes of kindergarten stuff. Once summer school ends and I am able to move into my new classroom, it will all be gone, but right now it's in my room.
This makes unpacking very difficult. I have spent the last couple days trying to attack this beastly room by methodically sorting things out and going through them. I stacked all of the "my stuff" on one side of the room and all of the "kindergarten stuff" on the other side of the room. My room looks like a giant chess board with all the pieces set up on opposite sides of the board. I hope nobody moves a pawn out to the middle because that's where I sleep; In the middle of all the boxes, on a mattress that I just bought. The mattress isn't that glamorous; just a cheapy I bought at Ikea because it could roll up and fit into my car. I like it, though. It's definitely a step up from the sleeping bag I was sleeping on before. Between all the boxes, the mattress, the sleeping bag, the camping stuff, and the random picture of Freddy Kreuger that I somehow ended up with (how terrifying is that?), I find myself the owner of a very intimidating bedroom.
I figure that I have three options at this point:
1. Slowly, but surely start to chip away at the stony wretch of a bedroom that lies before me,
2. Consider it an opportunity for personal growth and learn how to pole-vault over the boxes to get from point A to point B,
3. Wait until I see some poor unsuspecting passerby out my window and then act out one of those dramatic scenes from the movies where the woman throws all the man's stuff out the window & yells, "And don't ever bother coming back!!!" (I think this option is my favorite. I think I like the idea of chucking stuff out a window to make more space & I'm sure I would relish the look of confusion & fear on the poor man's face when I threw "his" blocks & puppetts at him. Plus that, it would give the neighbors lots to talk about.)
Five minutes have passed since I wrote those options and I still can't decide which one I will carry out, so I think I'll just add "decide on option" to my to-do list and then I will go to bed.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Rings, spiders, and a jaguar with no legs.
Spiders don't usually bother me. Bees- maybe, roaches- definitely (they make me scream like a banshee), but spiders- not so much. In fact, I've had several roommates who would ask me to kill spiders for them because they didn't want to do it & it really didn't bother me. Lately, however, I've had some close encounters that have freaked me out a bit.
I got back from Taiwan a little over a month ago and stayed with my parents in Vegas for a while. Then I spent a while visiting my sister & her family in California where I had a wonderful time playing games such as, "Space Pirates", "Wii step aerobics", "Throw the kid on the couch", "Did you seriously just punch my butt?" and "Who will the baby barf on next?" After a while, I made it back up Hurricane, Utah, where my car had been waiting patiently for me for the last 7 and a half months. Since I was going to be making a trip up to Provo, I decided to check the oil & whatever other fluids I could identify (brake fluid, wiper fluid, fluidity fluid, you know-the usuals). As soon as I popped the hood, though, I noticed about 20 big daddy long leg spiders hanging out in the guts of my car. Not cool. Now, I'm aware that daddy long legs are not dangerous. Some say they're not poisonous; others say they're oober poisonous, but their mouths are too small to actually bite you or something. Whatever the case may be, I know that a daddy-long-leg is not going to send me into the hospital. This knowledge, however, did not help in my present situation.
Somebody once asked me if I would rather come home and find 100 poodles all over my front room or 1 legless jaguar on the floor. While the thought of a sharp toothed jaguar (likely ticked off my the fact that his legs are all awol) squirming around the floor doesn't exaclty appeal to me, I'd take it over the 100 poodles any day. 100 of anything is scary. Think about it: 100 poodles. 100 flies. 100 alarm clocks. (sick. I hate those things.) 100 clowns. 100 babies. All scary. The sheer quantity is terrifying. That's kind of how I felt when I encountered the spiders under my car hood. There were 20 spiders all up in the parts of my car where I needed to reach my hand down into in order to check fluids. I don't care if they're harmless, it's not gonna happen.
I got a broom and tried sweeping out the spiders for a while until a man I didn't know pulled up into our driveway in his truck, got out and said, " That's no way to clean an engine." I explained the embarrassing truth and he explained that he actually thought I was trying to put out a fire. After that guy left, my Dad came out & helped me check the fluids. Somehow he could do it a lot better than I, since he didn't reflexively pull his hand away every 2 seconds like I did. I love my dad.
Another week went by and the spiders under the hood had been forgotten about. Then a few nights ago, I decided to go through some of the stuff I had stored in my grandparents' garage while I was in Taiwan. My little sister, Haley, and I went out to the garage and began moving around the intimidating mound of boxes. My grandpa had been so kind as to cover my mound with a giant tarp; but tarp or no tarp, if you leave boxes in a garage for 7 and 1/2 months, you will get spiders. I managed to avoid the spiders for most of the time we were out there. I found the things I needed to find and then just as I finished replacing the tarp, Haley pointed to the arm of the sweater I was wearing and yelled, "Oh my gosh! Lindsay! It's on your arm!" I was only mildly freaked out at this point as I yelled, " Get it off! Get it off! What is it? Get it off!" Haley responded with a very convincing, " I can't!!!" I twisted to try and see the back of my arm (you know...the movement you make when you try to lick your elbow...if you haven't done it, please try now & tell me how it goes). On the back of my arm was not one, but 5 big daddy long legs. Once again, not cool. I’m telling you, it’s the sheer quantity that freaks me out. The second I saw them, I screamed and started flapping my arms, trying to fling the spiders off. I flapped my arms so hard that two of my rings flew off of my left hand. The spiders, however, held strong. I was finally able to brush most of them off and destroy the little jerk who was trying to crawl inside my sleeve, but I was still paranoid. Things went as follows:
Me: Haley! Do I have anymore spiders on me???
Haley: No.
Me: Check!!!!! (holding out my arm)
Haley: (giggling) There’s nothing! We need to find your rings!
Me: Who cares about my rings! Check my other arm! (holding it out) Check my legs! Check my hair!
Haley: (laughing uncontrollably) There’s nothing on you!
Me: That was terrible.
Haley: (suddenly serious) Eew! Right by your ear!!!
Me: BWAAAHH!!!
Haley: Gotcha.
Me: Punk!
After my heart rate returned to normal, we looked around for the rings for a little while. We found one, but the other one never turned up. That’s ok, though, because I wear six rings and that’s possibly too many anyway. Kids always comment on the fact that I wear a lot of rings. All I can say is, at least it’s not 100. 100 of anything is scary.
I got back from Taiwan a little over a month ago and stayed with my parents in Vegas for a while. Then I spent a while visiting my sister & her family in California where I had a wonderful time playing games such as, "Space Pirates", "Wii step aerobics", "Throw the kid on the couch", "Did you seriously just punch my butt?" and "Who will the baby barf on next?" After a while, I made it back up Hurricane, Utah, where my car had been waiting patiently for me for the last 7 and a half months. Since I was going to be making a trip up to Provo, I decided to check the oil & whatever other fluids I could identify (brake fluid, wiper fluid, fluidity fluid, you know-the usuals). As soon as I popped the hood, though, I noticed about 20 big daddy long leg spiders hanging out in the guts of my car. Not cool. Now, I'm aware that daddy long legs are not dangerous. Some say they're not poisonous; others say they're oober poisonous, but their mouths are too small to actually bite you or something. Whatever the case may be, I know that a daddy-long-leg is not going to send me into the hospital. This knowledge, however, did not help in my present situation.
Somebody once asked me if I would rather come home and find 100 poodles all over my front room or 1 legless jaguar on the floor. While the thought of a sharp toothed jaguar (likely ticked off my the fact that his legs are all awol) squirming around the floor doesn't exaclty appeal to me, I'd take it over the 100 poodles any day. 100 of anything is scary. Think about it: 100 poodles. 100 flies. 100 alarm clocks. (sick. I hate those things.) 100 clowns. 100 babies. All scary. The sheer quantity is terrifying. That's kind of how I felt when I encountered the spiders under my car hood. There were 20 spiders all up in the parts of my car where I needed to reach my hand down into in order to check fluids. I don't care if they're harmless, it's not gonna happen.
I got a broom and tried sweeping out the spiders for a while until a man I didn't know pulled up into our driveway in his truck, got out and said, " That's no way to clean an engine." I explained the embarrassing truth and he explained that he actually thought I was trying to put out a fire. After that guy left, my Dad came out & helped me check the fluids. Somehow he could do it a lot better than I, since he didn't reflexively pull his hand away every 2 seconds like I did. I love my dad.
Another week went by and the spiders under the hood had been forgotten about. Then a few nights ago, I decided to go through some of the stuff I had stored in my grandparents' garage while I was in Taiwan. My little sister, Haley, and I went out to the garage and began moving around the intimidating mound of boxes. My grandpa had been so kind as to cover my mound with a giant tarp; but tarp or no tarp, if you leave boxes in a garage for 7 and 1/2 months, you will get spiders. I managed to avoid the spiders for most of the time we were out there. I found the things I needed to find and then just as I finished replacing the tarp, Haley pointed to the arm of the sweater I was wearing and yelled, "Oh my gosh! Lindsay! It's on your arm!" I was only mildly freaked out at this point as I yelled, " Get it off! Get it off! What is it? Get it off!" Haley responded with a very convincing, " I can't!!!" I twisted to try and see the back of my arm (you know...the movement you make when you try to lick your elbow...if you haven't done it, please try now & tell me how it goes). On the back of my arm was not one, but 5 big daddy long legs. Once again, not cool. I’m telling you, it’s the sheer quantity that freaks me out. The second I saw them, I screamed and started flapping my arms, trying to fling the spiders off. I flapped my arms so hard that two of my rings flew off of my left hand. The spiders, however, held strong. I was finally able to brush most of them off and destroy the little jerk who was trying to crawl inside my sleeve, but I was still paranoid. Things went as follows:
Me: Haley! Do I have anymore spiders on me???
Haley: No.
Me: Check!!!!! (holding out my arm)
Haley: (giggling) There’s nothing! We need to find your rings!
Me: Who cares about my rings! Check my other arm! (holding it out) Check my legs! Check my hair!
Haley: (laughing uncontrollably) There’s nothing on you!
Me: That was terrible.
Haley: (suddenly serious) Eew! Right by your ear!!!
Me: BWAAAHH!!!
Haley: Gotcha.
Me: Punk!
After my heart rate returned to normal, we looked around for the rings for a little while. We found one, but the other one never turned up. That’s ok, though, because I wear six rings and that’s possibly too many anyway. Kids always comment on the fact that I wear a lot of rings. All I can say is, at least it’s not 100. 100 of anything is scary.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Southeast Asia!!!
I guess it's time to catch up! I finished teaching in Taiwan, spent a week traveling to places in Taiwan that I still wanted to see, and then starting on January 1st, came to Thailand for a vacation! Thailand has been wonderful! It's absolutely beautiful! We did a trek through the jungle near Chiang Mai, rode elephants, did some "whitewater" rafting & bamboo rafting, checked out Bangkok, saw more cross-dressers than I've ever seen in my life, (although our trek guide referred to them as "ladyboys"), etc. After that, we headed to Southern Thailand & spent several days lying on the beach, sleeping in beach bungalows, and scuba diving. My favorite things I saw while scuba diving were a sea turtle & a black tip reef shark. Two nights ago we took a sleeper train to Malaysia, where we are now. We took a nice little jungle walk today through the Cameron Highlands and now I am sitting in a little "internet room" about the size of a bathroom stall trying to hurry and write this because in a few minutes I need to catch a bus to Kuala Lumpur! I am really loving traveling, and seeing tons of amazing things, but I'm also really happy that in exactly 2 weeks I will finally be home! I'll try and post pictures soon. Right now I have to catch that bus!
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Favorite Moments from Christmas in Taiwan
1. Making a Gingerbread house out of wafers. We realized halfway through that it looked like a Taiwanese house (tiles, all right angles, etc.) ,so we tried to make it look even more so by adding a scooter, clothesline, and a banana tree.
3. Acting out the Nativity Scene with the Primary kids at church.
4. “Secret Santa” gift exchange with the other teachers here. (As you can see, our gift wrapping supplies were limited… my favorite was the present wrapped in old progress reports!)
2. Dancing with students at our school’s Christmas dance. (…Even though the students were pretty much forced to dance against their will. Secretly most of them liked it, though!)
3. Acting out the Nativity Scene with the Primary kids at church.
4. “Secret Santa” gift exchange with the other teachers here. (As you can see, our gift wrapping supplies were limited… my favorite was the present wrapped in old progress reports!)
5. Running into Santa Claus. We were taking a train to Hualien on Christmas Eve and a Taiwanese Santa (complete with a shaving cream beard) came down the aisle passing out fish flavored candy.
6. Hanging out our stockings. We met up with some the other teachers at the hostel on Christmas Eve and they had us set out our “stockings” which were all filled with mahvelous things in the morning!
7. Christmas dinner! After arriving in Hualien on Christmas Eve, we were STARVING! After looking for a place to eat, we finally found some delicious dumplings and steam buns at a little restaurant in Hualien.
8. On Christmas day, we spent most of the day riding on scooters and walking around Taroko Gorge. It was kind of cold & rainy, but Taroko was beautiful, so it was definitely worth it!
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Something I've been contemplating lately...
I have gotten at least 4 itchy mosquito bites in the last 24 hours. About 30 minutes ago I killed a mosquito that had snuck up on me while I was sitting on my bed. It made me think. -- That mosquito was probably thinking he was about to have a nice snack (a.k.a. my blood) when he was suddenly squished, thus ending his short and creepy life. That would probably be a lot like a human being smashed by a 300 foot tall hamburger. One second you're thinking. "Wow! Look at all that food! I can't wait!" The next minute, your food kills you. If I wasn't so blasted itchy right now, I might actually feel sorry for mosquitos.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)