Weird things happen when children are left unsupervised

Because it's Christmas, my sister Anne came to visit from Delaware with her husband and two children. On the night they arrived, my two brothers came over to visit with their families (including two more children). At some point, all four children--ages 7, 3, 2, and 18 months--went into a bedroom to play. The adults were all in a different room sitting around talking. After about an hour, we realized that we hadn't heard any noises from the children--no crying, screaming, fighting, nothing. Totally unusual for children of any age.

When we went in the bedroom, we found all four kids sitting in the portable crib--along with every toy in the house--playing contentedly. (You can't really see it in this picture, but the little girl in the back left is actually sitting on a chair in the crib and the two smallest children are sitting on piles of toys.)

This was weird because, first of all, we weren't sure how they got themselves and all the toys in the crib to begin with. It was also weird because they were all so happy to be in a confined space together, when normally they fight--especially the siblings--in much larger spaces, like whole houses.

And who knew a portable crib could hold that much weight?

The portable crib has continued to be a popular play spot. The 2-year-old can monkey in and out of the crib without assistance, and the 3-year-old just uses a step stool. At our extended family Christmas party, my parents had to pull my 9-year-old cousin out of the crib because they decided he really was too big.

Not everything about the current economy is bad

Note: So I think my last post was lame. Too long. Too boring. If you didn't read it yet, don't bother.

In more interesting news, the recent plunge in gas prices fills me with happiness and joy.

Despite the fact that I own a car and commute to school almost daily, I've have never been concerned about gas prices. I mean, in order to go places I have to drive my car, and in order to drive my car I have to fill it with gas, and the gas must be purchased at whatever price the appears on the big gas station marquee over which I have no control. So complaining about gas prices is about as useful as complaining about the weather. Given this, I generally prefer to not even notice the gas prices.

However, I did notice when I was spending fifty dollars every two weeks to fill up my (very small) car. I couldn't really do anything about it, but it was kind of hurting my bank account.

Then one day, I pulled up to a gas station and saw $1.98 listed as the price of regular unleaded. I pulled up to the pump, got out of my car, and stared at the price listings in confusion. $1.98? Two months ago it was $3.99 for the same grade of gas. I was about to fill up, but the pump was broken, so I decided to just go to a different store--I don't have time to waste on gas stations with broken pumps, and I was a little suspicious of the price.

I drove past a second gas station, and it too listed $1.98. I still thought it might be a fluke, so I drove to a third gas station. Regular unleaded: $1.98.

I pulled up to a pump and sat in my car for awhile wondering if this was some new form of fake gas everyone was selling. Then I considered that maybe it was a lower grade than usual, and maybe it wasn't even the kind of gas I'm supposed to use in my car. I got out my cell phone and seriously considered calling my dad (who was out of town at a funeral) to ask if this gas was acceptable for my car. After about five minutes, I got out and filled up my car for a total of about $20. $20! In the two and a half years that I have actually owned my own car, I don't think I've have ever filled up for as little as $20.

And last week when I drove down State Street, I noticed big gas station marquees listing gas at $1.49. I actually wanted to go fill up my already full car just for the sake of buying gas at such a shockingly low price.

Aunt Linda, part 2

Most of the time I say that toddlers are my favorites, and I totally choose to play with one-to-three-year-olds over babies or older kids, but I've discovered that seven-year-olds are tons of fun, too.

My oldest niece, Rebecca, is seven now, and occasionally I take her out to do something fun, just the two of us. Going out with Rebecca is preferable to staying in, because if we're at home, she'll try to convince me to play some sort of torturous 'pretend' game (like 'house'--except we often have to be animals), and let's face it, most adults (including me) kind of suck at 'pretend.' But if we go out, we can do things that I like, too, like shopping and eating and watching Disney movies.

Crucial components of a good Aunt Linda outing: more sugar than your mom would ever let you have in a week and some additional indulgence or allowances.

Several months ago, I took Rebecca out for ice cream. Of course, I let her get two different kinds--she wanted three--one in a fancy cone (chocolate-dipped and sprinkle-covered) and one in a cup. She originally wanted both kinds on one cone or two separate cones. But I figured that two scoops was a little too high for kid to eat before the melting set in, and I had visions of the top scoop falling off. I also didn't want to be responsible for holding cone #2 while she ate cone #1. So I convinced her that if she got one scoop in a cone and one in a cup, she could eat the cone at her leisure and the cup would be waiting for her when she finished. (I have special logic skills when it comes to sugar consumption.)

Afterward, we stopped at the pet store (apparently a favorite place for Rebecca) and looked at puppies. She fell absolutely in love with a little pik-a-chi (which cost something like $500) and called her mom to tell her about the puppy. The Rebecca named the puppy and started picking out little puppy clothes and pink rhinestone collars--Rebecca has really good taste.

When I took Rebecca home, I apologized in advance to my sister-in-law Kristine for the fact that she would be hearing about this puppy for the next several days, weeks, months, etc.

Earlier this week, I took Rebecca out again. This time, we went to watch High School Musical 3 at the theater. We got a huge rootbeer and skittles and Rebecca picked our seats on the back row. But after we came back from a mid-movie bathroom break (maybe the soda wasn't such a good idea), she decided we should sit on the front row, which was also fine with me.

After the movie, I wanted to do a little Christmas shopping, since we were already at the mall. We went to Bath&Bodyworks because they were having sales and my mom wanted me to pick up a few things for her there. I don't know if Rebecca, my super primpy-princessy niece, had ever been to Bath&Bodyworks before, but she loved it. She tried on lotions, perfumes, body sprays, body creams, bodybutters, and lip gloss. She actually had a different scent on every finger and both palms and the backs of her hands, and her wrists, and all sides of her neck. And she washed her hands once so that she could come back and try on more.

It was really useful to have her there because I don't like trying on all the different scents, but, of course, I want to know what they really smell like before I buy them. So Rebecca became my little tester, and she was more than willing. She also helped me make important purchasing decisions. When I asked her which scent was her favorite, she started smelling all over her hands, and then held out her left hand and pointed to the palm--and which bottle did that come from?

Then we went to Claire's boutique and tried on tiaras and hats and bangle bracelets. And then it was really late, so I took her home--and apologized to Kristine for fact that her daughter would probably smell like Bath&Bodyworks for the next week or so.

Rebecca is already planning our next outing: shopping followed by dinner followed by more shopping followed by ice cream. Sounds good to me.

I understand that spelling is hard . . .

which is why we have spell check.

Normally, I ignore simple spelling and punctuation mistakes on blogs, online comments and reviews, etc. But sometimes, people are just ridiculous.

A few minutes ago, I was reading user reviews of a pie recipe on FoodNetwork.com. (I love the Food Network, by the way.) Most people gave the Triple Chocolate S'more Pie recipe four or five stars and raved about how easy it was or how much they loved it. But one less enthusiastic reviewer (named "Anonymous) only gave the recipe three stars and wrote, "It's ameture."

I read the comment and said, "What?"

I mean I know what the commenter was trying to write, but Mr. (or Ms.) Anonymous totally failed when they misspelled half the words in the comment. And "amateur" is just one of those words you shouldn't use (in writing) if you don't know how to spell it--I mean it sort of makes you look like . . . an amateur (of the English language and life in general (and computers, since you obviously don't know how to spellcheck)).

Anyway, people are funny--or stupid, take your pick.

Reconciliation

As an undergrad I did my best to avoid visiting my nemesis, the dreaded Harold B Lee Library. I put off library trips as long as possible and when I did venture inside, I kept my visits brief. On such visits, I usually experienced great frustration in two areas: searching the library catalog online and searching the actual book shelves. I always had trouble finding useful resources in my online search because the library site is not very user-friendly, and I always had even more trouble locating any potentially useful resources on the shelves because, well, they were never where they were supposed to be. Inevitably, the book I most wanted to check out was not on its designated shelf--even though the computer said it was checked in and available. Additionally, I found it difficult to study in the library because most of the chairs are hard and food is not allowed. (Now I realize that experts say you should not sit in soft chairs or eat while you study, but when I have I ever listened experts?) Also, I get just a little nervous every time I walk through the library security scanners. Also, I can never find a computer in the library. Also, when I do find a computer, it is next to someone who smells weird or is talking on their cell phone. Also I have no sense of direction and since the library is really big, I get lost there sometimes. Also, the library is cold, and therefore depressing to me.

However, in my first semester of graduate school, the HBLL has been phenomenally useful. Every time I go there, I find not only the book I am looking for, but several other books excellent books on the nearby shelves. I usually leave with two bags full of treasures, AND because I'm a graduate student, I get to keep them for three whole months. So I have forgiven the HBLL for the previous years of torture, and we are becoming very good friends. (I even spent a few hours studying there a few weeks ago, and discovered that on a Saturday afternoon, during a football game, the library is quite empty and nice to be in.)

My current stack of library fun (minus three volumes which were hidden in my room):

So, now that I'm friends with the library, research papers are much easier. Between the library and Google Scholar (love it), I'm pretty well set.

Aunt Linda

When I was eighteen, and my older brother had just gotten married, I was dying to get a niece or nephew--now I have three nieces and one nephew (nowhere near as many as Melissa, but still fun). And when the kids come to visit, I make a special effort to be the favorite relative--and then I give them back to their parents.

At a recent family dinner, I was sitting next to my seven-year-old niece, Rebecca. When Rebecca reached over and snitched a piece of turkey off the platter with her hands (as opposed to a fork), her mom got after her for not using good manners.

I leaned over and said, "Snitching's okay--you just have to make sure no one is watching."

Kristine, her mom said, "That's right. But someone is always watching. So you can't ever take food off the plate with your hands."

"True, someone is always watching, but some people don't care whether you snitch food. Adam [my younger brother who also has no children] might be watching, but he really doesn't care," I explained. Adam affirmed this. "And I don't care. And Grandma Marshall [my 83-year-old grandmother] doesn't care. So really you just have to be careful not to snitch when your mom watching."

Rebecca really appreciated this little insight into life--even if her mom didn't.

Curse of the Pink Shirt 2

* Today I went to campus to meet my brothers and sister-in-law for lunch. I really didn't think much about what I was wearing--pink shirt with a white skirt because I was going to the temple later.

Shortly after I sat down at a table in the Cougareat, a fiftyish woman walked up to me, "Do you mind if I sit here? I hate to take up a whole table for myself."

I hesitated, thinking of the three people who would be joining me at the four-person table. "Well, I'm waiting for some people, but they won't be here for awhile. So you're welcome to eat here."

So she sat down and ate her lunch. When my brother Adam and his wife, Bonnie, showed up, the woman offered to move to a different table. But I told her she could stay because we preferred to sit further back, and I had only sat at this table near the walkway in order to watch for my family--which is true.

While Adam and Bonnie waited in line for their food, I snagged another table and started reading letters to the editor in the Daily Universe. But after a few minutes, a random girl sat down across from me and started rummaging through her backpack.

"Um, are you just stopping for a second to find something in your bag? Or are you planning to stay?" I asked.

"What?"

"I'm kind of waiting for three other people, so if you're planning to stay and eat . . ."

She left.

After that incident, I put my bag up on the table to make it look more occupied. Then I pulled out my water bottle and some food and spread everything out on the table, so that no one would mistake my saved seats for available ones.

The Cougareat was not that crowded today, but something about the pink shirt makes people think it's a good idea to sit by me.

(And when I went to the temple, still wearing the pink, two different older gentlemen went out of their way to greet me. Not bad, but still a little weird.)

I really have to be more careful about my wardrobe choices. *

Self-Control:

It's official, I have none.

Even though I had a million hours worth of studying I should have done this weekend (which for me includes Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday), I still found time to

1. Go to the store . . . three times.
2. Beat my high score on Mahjong--which took a lot of tries because I had a very high score.
3. Play two or three hours of Scramble of Facebook. (Anyone want to play me?)
4. Watch a new made-for-tv movie on the Hallmark channel (totally cheesy), most of The Cheetah Girls: One World (I don't even like the Cheetah Girls), two new episodes of Disney channel shows, a rerun of Gilmore Girls, and at least one rerun of Seventh Heaven (although it might have been more).
5. Sleep in past 9 every day except Sunday--I have church at 9:30.

Of course, I refer to everything listed above as "breaks" from studying, but some days it's more like I study during my breaks from totally wasted leisure time.

So, in an effort to reduce my "breaktime" options--and therefore reduce my break time?--I removed Mahjong from my computer. I hope don't have to resort to removing the Scramble app from my Facebook page because I'm really good at Scramble, and I enjoy beating everyone I know at something. And I don't really have any control over the existence of the television (and it's many fascinating cable channels) in my home. So I'm just going to have to learn not to touch that oh-so-seductive remote during study hours--good luck to me on that.

I'm hoping that at some point in my life I will become a dedicated student, or really a dedicated anything. But for now, I'm just going get some sleep and re-align my priorities tomorrow.

Interjections

Sometimes I learn things in school that might actually be interesting to people outside the field of Linguistics.

Last week in my Semantics class we studied interjections. (For those of you who don't remember grade school grammar class, interjections are words like "oh," "dang," and "wow" that we interject to express emotion.) My professor explained--in very scientific terms that I no longer remember--that as far as the geography of the brain is concerned, normal speech is processed in one region of the brain and interjections are processed in a completely separate region.

Which means that when children are learning to speak, you can repeat the word "mama" to them a hundred times before they say it back, but they only have to hear you say "uh-oh" or "dang it" once before they start repeating it over and over again. While the normal speech functions are developing in one part of the brain, the injections part of the brain is also developing. And as the interjections part is developing it's just waiting to pick up on interjections. So when kids hear interjections (including swear words), even if they are embedded in a sentence, their interjection receptors are triggered and ta-da! they start using those interjections--whether you want them to or not. (Both my sister and sister-in-law lamented they day their sweet little two-year-olds picked up "dang it"--but I'm sure there are much more offensive words they could be using.)

As an interjection illustration, my prof also shared this excellent story: When he used to visit his mother in a nursing home, he also visited with another woman there who had suffered from a stroke. The stroke destroyed the part of her brain that controlled normal speech functions, but not the part that stored interjections. As a result, her only way to communicate with other people was through swear words. This man would sit and talk to her, ask her questions, tell her stories, whatever, and she would just swear back at him.

One day he explained to her the whole scientific process of how the speech part of her brain was gone but the interjections part was still in tact and that he understood that when she was swearing at him, she was only trying to communicate.

Her response: "Smart-A--"

Curse of the Pink Shirt

Many years ago (like back in the Southridge days), I had favorite pink, polyester shirt that I wore frequently. And although I really loved the shirt, I noticed that weird things happened when I wore pink, as opposed to other colors. More people talked to me--classmates, random strangers--and when I walked through the quad and the Wilk, I was targeted more by the people handing out flyers and promoting . . . stuff. The difference between the number of flyers I received on pink shirt days versus other color days was disturbing. And I concluded that something about the pink shirt made me seem more approachable--not always my goal in life.

Fast forward to today:

I went to the Cougareat to finish my reading assignment for my next class. I chose the Cougareat because I wanted to be able sit at an actual table and eat while I studied--which isn't possible in most campus study areas. However, since it was 11:00 on Thursday (opposite the Tuesday devotional), the Cougareat was particularly busy. Hoping for some level of seclusion, I chose a small table against the wall on the furthest end of the seating area.

Twenty minutes into to my reading, a guy I've never seen before, asked if he could sit at my table. Of course, I was fine with that. I could see the tables were pretty well full, and I don't care if someone else wants to quietly eat their sandwich at the same table as me.

Unfortanately, this particular person did not eat his sandwich quietly. He asked me what book I was reading. Then he asked about my field of study. Then, of course, I felt obligated to ask him about his life. I tried to return to my book--Language Universals and Linguistic Typology--several times, but Stan, the senior in manufacturing engineering from Colorado who will be working in Seattle for Boeing when he graduates in December, just kept the conversation going. Don't get me wrong, he was a very nice person, and we could probably be friends, but I really needed to finish my reading assignment for my next class.

When I got to class, I was explaining to my classmates why I didn't finish the reading, and I glanced down and realized I was wearing a pink shirt--not the bright polyester one from before, obviously, this one is cotton, baby pink. But pink, nonetheless. And pink is the cursed color when you don't want to make friends. Pink is approachable.

So next time I know I need to study between classes, I will choose my wardrobe more carefully.

School Started Last Tuesday

And although I spent nearly my entire Saturday diligently working on homework, I will be up very late tonight (probably into the early morning hours) finishing assignments for tomorrow.

Yay for graduate school.

(The preferred spelling is actually yea, but so many people confuse yea with yeah that I often choose the more colloquial spellings of yay and ya. And the scriptural yea means something completely different and further adds to the confusion--just in case anyone was questioning my knowledge of the English language. In addition, since the yay spelling resembles the word hooray, it further suits this particular usage.)

The World of Customer Service Presents: Intelligent Emails

As some people know, I currently work as a customer service representative for a family history website. (No, it's not Ancestry.) So I spend my wonderful time at work answering phone calls and responding to emails from customers. Most of our customers are totally nice, sweet elderly genealogy nuts. Some are demanding and whiny. Some are angry and mean. And some are just plain confused (and confusing.)

Customers purchase subscriptions to the site in order to have access to different genealogically relevant records and databases. That's it. That's the service. They pay money, log in, and start searching for their ancestors. But you'd be amazed by how many questions and how much confusion this generates.

So one of my favorite emails to get from customers--and we do get it often--goes something like this:

why can't i find my family

Yes, they do leave out any punctuation or capitalization.

Another popular version:

I CANT FND ANYTHOIMG ON YOUR SITR

The all caps and obvious misspellings are also very common. Sometimes the combination of misspelled words and poorly constructed sentences is so acute I have to email the person back and ask them to clarify their question before I even address the real problem.

But the really great thing about the emails above is that they give me no information with which to help them. "I can't find my family" isn't even a question, it's just a statement. And there could be any number of reasons why they are unable to find the information they want on the website. But without knowing what information they are even looking for (a surname would be nice), or what searching they have already tried, I can do nothing for them.

We get these emails so often that I have wondered what kind of mindreader these customers think I am. They seem to think that by looking at their email address and reading the urgency of their detailed message "I can't find my family," I will magically know how to find their great grandfather's grave (obviously that's what they're looking for), or their biological mother's current whereabouts, or their entire personal pedigree.

Oh, the bright lights that exist in the world.

Tips for emailing (or otherwise contacting) a customer service department:

1. Be specific about your questions, suggestions, or concerns.
2. Don't swear.
3. Tell them who you are. If you have an order or an account with the company, give them your order number or some sort of customer ID so that they can help you specifically.
4. Read stuff. You're literate--go online and check out the company's policies and FAQs. Chances are, they've already answered your question. (However, if you can't find the answer online, don't be aftraid to contact them about it. They are getting paid to help you.)
5. Proofread. Please.

New Favorite Sport--to Watch

Back in the 2002 Winter Olympics I discovered the awesomeness of curling, which often aired late late at night, (my favorite time to watch tv). Curling is great mainly because the people look so funny sweeping the ice. I mean, I'm sure that it requires skill and all that, but it's really sort of a ridiculous sport.

BMX biking, on the other hand, is a completely different kind of awesome. These athletes are crazy--they could potentially die mid-race (which I don't think is a concern in curling). I only caught two BMX races this Olympics, but they were amazing. I found the wipe-outs to be totally satisfying, and while I've never had an interest in extreme sports before this, if X Games ever comes here, I'm totally going.

So if you missed the BMX races this year, look for it in 2012. Definitely a great addition to the Olympics.

An Artistic Soul

My mom's birthday was last week, and my niece Rebecca wrote a poem about grandmas to commemorate the occasion. A natural-born artist (drama and all), this six-year-old stayed up very late the night before writing a multi-stanza free verse poem.

Here are the last two stanzas--the awesomest ones:

They [grandmas] have a big house
when they have lots of kids
and some go to college,
some go to kindergarten,
some go to second grade, some
go to happy places like
Chuck E Cheese, some go to
pre-school, some are brand-
new, some go to 8th grade,
some go to 1st grade.

After school they celebrate.
They say good-bye and then
they do fun games with you. Then
they have ice cream and say good night.

Basically, I just like the part about Chuck E Cheese. And the fact that it sort of just goes on and on without making a lot of sense.

Big Sigh of Relief

I'm starting a graduate program in linguistics one month from tomorrow. As most of you know, I did my undergraduate in English, which is a little bit different. And since it's been awhile since I took a linguistics class--or any class for that matter--I decided I might want to study up a little before school.

So back in about May, I pulled out all my old linguistics books and decided to start reviewing the textbook from one of my favorite courses, History of the English Language. The book is called A Biography of the English Language by C M Millward.

Now the author's name, "Millward," should have tipped me off to something because Millward just sounds like a really old, stuffy-type linguist, the kind with the monotone voice, she probably has the same haircut she wore in the sixties. Millward is also probably socially awkward since she spent all her time alone in her room studying runes and Old English pronunciation. She has probably read Beowulf aloud. To herself.

And to others--which is worse.

(There are actually a lot of "interesting" people in the linguistics world, and sometimes when I meet them, I question whether I really belong in this field. So much more comfortable with the English crowd.)

Now if I didn't take a hint from the author's name, I should have at least noticed the pale, split-pea-soup cover of the book. It doesn't exactly scream, "Read me! I'm fun!" (I would post an actual picture of the book here, but you would fall asleep looking at it.) Inside the book there are about five maps/diagrams and the rest is text. No pictures. No color. Just big chunks of text. Text that goes on and on and on forever.

I tried really hard to read A Biography of the English Language, but, frankly, I was bored out of my mind. And I had no idea what it was talking about. And I quit reading it, and ignored my linguistics studying for awhile.

But I was a little concerned about the fact that I am starting a graduate program in linguistics and the linguistics book I tried to read was pretty much death. I mean it would be at least slightly inconvenient to finally start graduate school and discover I don't even like subject.

However, a few months after my failed reading attempts, when the book was buried deep under a pile of clean/dirty clothes, I remembered a very important fact from my History of the English Language class: We didn't use the book.

We had the book, but we didn't actually use it very often. Our assignments and tests were lecture-based, and the lectures were really interesting.

With that wonderful idea in mind, I pulled out a different linguistics textbook earlier this week. Linguistics: An Introduction to Language and Communication. This textbook has not one, but four authors, all with interesting, or at least normal-person-sounding names like Adrian Akmajian and Ann K Farmer. I could be friends with them. The cover is bright yellow with blue and yellow designs on it. It's a pretty happy textbook. Many graphs and diagrams, some of which could almost be considered pictures. Still no color inside, but the brightness of the cover makes up for it.

And the really good news:

I started reading the book, and I love it. Chapter 2, "Morphology," is so fascinating. I'm actually looking forward to the exercises at the end of the chapter. I'm pretty sure I'm going to do awesome on them because I totally get this stuff. I'm actually registered for a morphology class this fall, and now I really excited for it.

So I really do like linguistics, and I really can study linguistics in graduate school.

Good to know.

Who knew graham crackers could go bad?

The other day I found a partial container of cream cheese frosting in the refrigerator and pulled out an opened package of graham crackers to make my favorite snack. My mom commented that the graham crackers looked a little pale, but I figured it was just a different brand or something and started spreading frosting on one square. But then I noticed an odd smell, sort of a cross between musty and rancid. I sniffed around the kitchen a little bit to find the source of this new foul odor--it was not the sink or the garbage can, it was the graham cracker.

Totally sick.

I threw the package away and got out an new package from the same box, assuming that the graham crackers had spoiled because they had been open for too long. The new package looked similarly white, and as soon as I opened it, I caught the same awful smell and chucked the whole thing in the trash.

"Maybe the graham crackers went bad," my mom said.

"Is that possible?" I said.

"Well, see if there's an expiration date on the box."

I pulled out the now empty graham cracker box a located a small stamped "best if used by" date: October 2007.

Apparently, we don't eat graham crackers very often at my house. But my mom and I are pretty sure we fed some of the well-beyond-shelf-life crackers to my nieces and nephew as they have visited over the past year. Disgusting. Fortunately, they are all still alive.

And since I found another new box of graham crackers--brown, crisp, fresh-smelling, and still good until some time next year--I still got to have my snack.

Important life lessons learned:

1. Any food with an expiration date really can go bad.
2. Graham crackers are supposed to be brown, no matter what brand they are.
3. Small children have no sense of taste or smell.
4. Spoiled graham crackers are gross, but will not actually kill you.
5. People who don't eat graham crackers very often should not buy the big box, even if it is more cost effective.

For Lindsay--

I keep forgetting to respond to your questions about grad school, so here is a brief update:

After being accepted to 4 schools, traveling to the other side of the country, and falling in love with the state of North Carolina, I have decided to attend . . . BYU.

I will be returning to our alma mater this August to pursue a master's degree in linguistics because BYU has one of the most diverse and nationally recognized linguistics programs in the country. And because it costs less. And because it's just the right place for me to be at this time (no matter how many of my friends and family members think I need to experience life outside of Utah).

Jet skis aren't as stable as they appear

Last week I went to the lake with my family and we rented a jet ski (and a canoe--but who really cares about a canoe when you have a water vehicle with a motor?). The jet ski riding was going really great until I decided I wanted to ride on an inner tube tied to the back of the jet ski. Apparently, people do this all the time.

We were instructed at the dock to have the tube rider (me) sit on the back of the jet ski until we got past the buoys and the "no wake zone." Then we were supposed to stop the jet ski and pull the tube up close enough to the jet ski for me to climb on. My mom was driving and my dad was going to be the spotter (to make sure I didn't fall off and that the rope from the tube didn't get caught in the motor).

We got out past the "no wake zone" and stopped. I pulled the tube up close, and started to get on. But with three adults on the jet ski, we quickly experienced weight distribution issues: as soon as I had one limb on the tube, I was in the water. I turned around to see my parents also in the in the water and the jet ski rolling on its side. Of course the motor was off now, since my mom had the magnetic key attached to her, but we had been warned that if the jet ski rolled we shouldn't turn the engine back on in case it had gotten water in it.

So there we were, stuck in the middle of Jordanelle Reservoir, holding on to the sides of our now-silent jet ski.

The water was cold. About 55-60 degrees. But the sun was shining, so it wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been, and we adjusted quickly to the temperature.

We could see the dock, but the boathouse (with all the people who could have potentially sent help) was blocked by all the boats. So the three of us started swimming, while holding on to the jet ski (because we didn't want to leave it behind--it was a rental after all).

We didn't move very quickly, and I decided that I wouldn't want to be stuck with either of my parents in real crisis situation. My dad was a little panicky at the beginning, and my mom start bemoaning our fate later on. I kept trying to defer decisions (like whether we should turn the jet ski around, or which side of the jet ski I should swim on) to my parents--after all, they're my parents--but really I felt like the one in charge. Which was a little weird.

My mom, unfortunately, was wearing jeans, like full-length denim jeans, and a heavy t-shirt, so I guess the swimming was a little harder for her. She kept saying "We're never going to make it." And I kept saying, "We're fine, mom. The dock is right there. We can see the dock. And we're almost past the buoys."

5 reasons why this was not an actual crisis (and therefore not worth panicking about):

1. We were all wearing life jackets, which were so effective that even after being thrown from the jet ski, our hair was still dry.
2. Jordanelle Reservoir is not very big, and we could see the dock (as well as the opposite shore) the entire time. If the situation had been really serious, I could have abandoned the jet ski (and my parents) and swam for help
3. There were other boats on the lake nearby.
4. We are all healthy adults--no heart conditions or special immediate medical needs.
5. Frankly, the whole thing was pretty funny. I mean who falls off a stupid jet ski? And how many times in your life are you going to be stranded in the middle of a lake with your parents?

After about 40 minutes, we were rescued by an older gentleman and his grandsons in their very nice motor boat. (Check "being rescued by a boat" off my list of things to do in life.) They tossed a rope down, which I tied to the jet ski, and then we climbed aboard for a ride back to the dock. I've seen similar boat rescues in at least a couple dozen movies, and I have to say it was pretty great. Definitely lived up my expectations.

Good news: there was no damage to the jet ski, so we didn't incur any fines.

It took about 24 hours and three very hot showers for me feel like my body was restored to its normal warm temperature.

All in all it was a pretty good adventure.

I suppose it was inevitable--everyone's blogging now, right?

I remember years ago running into random people's blogs while doing internet searches on everything from brownie recipes to BNL. The blogs were pretty much all lame, cluttered, and obnoxious--seemingly the product of some pathetic teen angst. This was back when there weren't a lot of good blog sites and people just set up their own websites for blogging, which meant that page designs were all painfully ugly (like pink backgrounds with red text) and the sites showed up in search results on Yahoo (this was before Google took over the world). Whenever, I ran into one of these blogs, I thought, "Wow, blogging is really stupid. And so are the people who do it."

Then I started hanging around with some people who were always talking about their friends' blogs. Their friends' blog were apparently very funny, and these acquaintances (casual friends, I suppose) also felt that their own blogs were very funny, not to mention very important. But I was already so biased against blogs that the more I heard the word "blog," the more I determined I didn't really want to be friends with this group of people, and I eventually gave them up altogether.

Then my good friends and former roommates started sending me links to their blogs.

I remember the first was Beck (aka Erin), my MTC comp. She moved to Boston, so she wanted to start a blog to update her friends and family back home. (Not an unreasonable desire.) But when she sent me the link to her blog, and I clicked on it and really realized that someone I already knew and respected had a blog, a little part of me died inside.

So I ignored Beck's blog, and those of my many other friends for the next almost two years. Friends kept sending me links. I kept pretending they didn't.

This year I started warming up to blogs as my coworkers kept showing me (in person, not just sending me the links) posts, pictures, and videos on their own blogs. It's hard to ignore the blog when it's already on the screen in front of you and the person who created it is sitting two feet away telling you which post to read.

Finally, this week, former roommate Melissa emailed me links to her blog and to our friend Peter's, and I actually clicked on them. I read posts. Voluntarily.

And I liked it.

Peter's blog was funny. I laughed out loud. Melissa's was great, too. After I read Peter's and Melissa's, I went to Lindsay's and Kay's, and finally . . . I set up my blog.

So, here I am, blogging. But since I still sort of cringe at the word "blog"--it's one of the uglier words in the English language--in future, I hope to use the actual term as little as possible.