Ape

Does anyone know my friend April? She is great. Now that we are enjoying Marissa ending her hiatus it made me wonder why Ape doesn't have a blog. Or, perhaps she is one of those people who make comments sometimes but I have no idea who they are and I figure they are either Bryant's friends or someone he met on the street who told him they had a blog. But I don't think so. So my proposition is that April starts a blog even if she just tells us what she eats for breakfast every now and then, I just think it would be nice to hear about her and her thoughts too. Either about her breakfast, or other things as well.

by the way, if anyone wants to check out a really cool blog that is linked to many others, I recommend checking out: http://www.kactiguy.blogspot.com/

productive waste of time

I have a hard time wanting to go to my spanish conversation class. We just sit around and talk so I keep thinking how much I need to do other things. Of course, I decided I would just bring my homework and draw during class. What Spanish class haven't I drawn in anyways? (some teachers give me better reactions to that than others. some of them think I'm just not paying attention. They just don't realize I wouldn't be paying attention whether or not I was drawing) I got SO much done during class, both this week and last week. I wish we had class everyday so I could sit there and draw and get my homework done for other classes. When I'm not in class it's too easy to be distracted, I do things like sit here and write blogs and I never get anything done. Or talk to my roommates, or visit the chinese boys, or que-ever (that was for Erin). Maybe I should just start finding random classes to go to so I'll actually do my homework. I should go to accounting classes. I need to find a good accountant really soon. Too bad John moved to CA.

more failure please

I know I'll be famous someday because I keep failing at things. It seems like anyone who is famous has great stories about how they failed so much at first, they were broke, or starving, couldn't walk, etc. Then somehow they became the best at what they do, were really famous and we all admire them. I didn't get into the illustration program the first 2 times I applied. I had one professor tell me my style was getting me no where and I should try cubism. I don't know if that list is long enough though. I could include my freshman GPA, many dating experiences, my attempts at being an opera singer, etc. etc. but I don't know if that stuff relates to my failures as an artist. I think I need to find some more ways to fail really big in art and recieve major rejection so I can hurry up and become famous.

sorry, this might be boring

First of all, I would like to encourage everyone to try audible.com. It's amazing. I just go running or draw or eat lunch or clean my room (you know, on the rare occasion when that happens) and I get smarter at the same time. It's amazing. I get so anxious to go on long runs because it gives me time to "read" so much. When I went running yesterday I listened to all the latest information in the science world, like stuff about diseases, the Korean research and bio ethics. I'm finishing up Bill Bryson's A History of Nearly Everything, which is very interesting and then I'll be starting Mere Christianity, which I've been trying to read forever but haven't yet.

I'm going to try and blog more often about things that I read for 3 main purposes:

1. try and get myself to retain more of what I read
2. enlighten others with interesting (or semi-interesting to not-so-interesting) knowledge
3. I bet there's some other reason I haven't figured out yet and 2 is just too small to make a list

So today I listened to more of Bill Bryson's a history of nearly everything, about what the world was like 400 million years ago and all these different time periods I've never heard of. 99.9% of all species that have existed on earth are now extinct. Scientist think there has been anywhere from 30 million different species to 4,000 million. The bones in the museums are mostly all just plaster casts, even in NY and London. Species learned how to fly to avoid getting eaten. There have been 5 major time periods of extinction. There were once guinea pigs the size of rhinos and rhinos the size of two story houses.

choose your poison

One of my friends mentioned to me how dumb it is that people run up and down 9th East because you're just breathing in all that pollution as cars drive by. I never thought of that before, I always thought 9th East was just convenient. So I tried running through neighborhoods instead, I didn't get too lost, but suddenly I was breathing in all this smoke, like someone's house was on fire. That happened to me twice. I decided anywhere you run you're going to breathe in something gross.

bueno, asi es la vida

Ethics

One of the most interesting principles to me in economics is how you can pay someone for something and it then diminishes in value. When I was listening to a discussion on the ethics for women selling their eggs they were discussing this concept. It comes up with a lot of medical type of donations, like donating blood. I have decided that is why I don't allow my friends to pay for haircuts. They value is just too high to give it a price, recieving money would just diminish it's value.

Toxic Plasmosis

To those of you who have cats, especially ones that use jackets for litter boxes (not to point fingers at anyone...Eve!) I wanted to make sure you're aware of the possible dangers of Toxic Plasmosis that I just learned about the other day thanks to Science Friday. This is especially important if you also have a pet sea otter that you care about. Please everyone, be cautious.

President Becca

I would just like everyone to know that President Becca is my new official title since I have creamed everyone in foosball and therefore was offered the position. I was happy to accept. With my new power I plan to cure world hunger, bring peace to all nations, and find the perfect eternal companion for everyone. For everyone that would like to join the foosball club I will let you know more information at a later date. And I would just like to thank everyone for their support and encouragement that enabled me to become the foosball champion I am today.

arranged marriages

Dating. it's such a headeache, blah blah blah. I like all these boys that will never ask me out blah blah blah If they do ask me out either I'll find out really odd things about them or vice versa blahblahblahlblalhblahblahblahblabhalhb I think I understand more why they had arranged marriages. People just gave up finding someone on their own and told someone, just find someone for me. Fortunately, I'm not at that point yet. blah blah

fate of the world

Some of you might not be aware of this but I just found out the fate of the world rests in my hands. I am working on some illustrations that go along with some Book of Mormon stories. I was informed that I could influence kids and the perception they have of these Book of Mormon characters their entire lives. From talking with one of my friends about this I realized the impact this could have on the entire world. If I don't draw these illustrations correctly these kids may never gain a testimony of the gospel and therefore drop out of church, drop out of school, do drugs and make movies like Flightplan.

the odd ones

I wonder if you took all those really odd roommates and put them in the same apartment if they could figure out why they were put together. Some of you might be thinking I'm talking about my current roommates because you think only odd people live in foreign language housing, but actually my oddest roommates were at other apartments.

Earnst: the new look

Remember that guy Earnst? 80's? Did I spell his name right? The guy who goes to jail on one of his movies and he's pretty goofy and he has a closet full of all the same outfit. I think that's a great idea. yeah, I guess I like to have variety and occassionally even be creative with what I wear, but overall I'm not sure if it's more of a hassle than it's worth. I don't like having to think about what to wear or what clothes to buy so I can look semi-okay, or whatever category my clothes actually fit into, I'm not really sure. I think I almost had the Earnst closet going for me my freshman year. I had tons of clothes that looked almost exactly the same, I could pretty much wear the same outfit everyday if I wanted to. For now, I think I'll stick with the variety plan, because that's what is in my closet and I'm not ready to break my habit of conforming to society which seems to think it's a good idea to always being wearing different outfits. I think on average I wear 4-6 outfits a day. a different outfit for every activity. maybe that's why I'm tired of deciding what to wear.

money money money

somehow I'm going to become a fanatical budgeter. I have to keep track of every penny I spend and what I spend it on and how many miles I drive. Insane eh? As an artist I can deduct tons of things from taxes, which I will have a lot of because with freelance work they don't automatically make you pay it. I haven't figured out if I think that is a good thing or a bad thing, but I don't have any control over that at this point in my life so I'm not going to worry about it. I think I'll start by simply saving receipts, and either write everything down somewhere or use a program. My mom said she really likes budgeting. I didn't know that was possible. I just like having way more money than I need so I can buy stuff without thinking about it or worrying about deductions. I wonder if there are terms for different budgeting styles. I bet there are classes for this stuff. anyone have any tips? successful experiences from budgeting? ideas for a good place to go running?

the eternal email

Sometimes I am dissatisfied with my vocabulary level and I think I'll do things like learn a new word everyday or read more books. Occasionally I would look up things online with webster and I decided it would be a great idea to get the word of the day email, I enjoyed it for a few months and then after awhile and lack of reading many of them I decided it was time to quit getting those daily emails. So I scrolled to the bottom where it will typically say to unsubscribe reply and say "unsubscribe". But do you know what it says at the bottom of websters: If you want to stop receiving these emails- then change your email address! What are they smoking? no way! So this is a WARNING: to anyone thinking they might want to learn some new words by receiving a simple word of the day email decide carefully if you want to check that email everyday because you could be receiving it FOORRREEEVER!

(I realize I can just block their emails, but I decided the better option would be just to read them. I succumbed. That's probably what they wanted me to do)

the best ride

I really love my scooter. I think that is something significant to be able to say even in the middle of winter. I guess it's really not that cold out today, but I have so much fun just driving that thing around. I just wish there were little jumps along the road. Every now and then there are little dips and that's fun to feel like you're getting alittle air (I'm sure I'm not though, but it would be cool if I did). I think when I'm older I'll take up dirt biking. I think that's what they call, when you ride a motorcycle on some dirt track with jumps and you do flips and stuff with it. And stuff like they did at the rodeo. I wonder how long it would take to learn that stuff? Then I could cut my hair into a mullet also.

why isn't this fun?

I remember being a kid and birthdays were just as much fun as any other holiday, you got to do special things and get presents. I thought it was a pretty good deal. But now, birthdays aren't so great. And I'm not talking about the getting older stuff, birthdays just seem to cause so much awkward attention. I was talking with my friend about this and we're not fans of having people work so hard to make the day special for just you. I don't know what it is, I love having parties, but for some reason I don't like it as much if it's for my birthday. I think I feel obligated to make sure everyone has a fun time. I really don't understand it.

So I was trying to think of ways to change this not-so-great birthday setup and I propose that we have shared birthdays. Maybe it can be by the month, or you can just get assigned a birthday buddy where you share your birthdays. Anyone else agree? It could be a new New Years tradition- you pick a new friend to share a birthday with. And you could have a different birthday every year, variety is always nice right?

and by the way, if anyone thinks they're any good at foosball, I just beat the president of the foosball club yesterday so I'm looking for another good challenge. bring it.

blog beginning

So, to my friends that already have blogs, I'm pretty curious how much time you spent reading the terms and use before agreeing to have a blog. I just realized this might not have spell check, that could get interesting. I think my usual system is that if I have a friend who has already agreed to the terms of something then I feel it's got to be a safe thing to agree to because so far I haven't seen their life ruined by it. I wonder who gets the great job of writing out those ridiculously long contracts.