Happy Birthday Rochelle

Well, I know this is a few days late, but we have been pretty busy lately, and haven't had much time to blog. I got off work early on Thursday to be with Rochelle, take her to lunch, go see the Potter movie, and then have dinner with mom and dad. It was certainly a good day. On Friday, after I got home from work, we spent the evening with a couple who are good friends of ours (Scott and Danielle) who are leaving Utah for grad school. (We will miss you guys!!!) On Saturday, I went to work to make up the hours I took of on Thursday, and afterwards met Charles and his date and ate out and went ice skating.
All and all, today has been my first chance to say to Rochelle HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! on this blog. So... having said that... may I just add to that, that it has now been 3 years since we got engaged (that is our unofficial engagement). I believe our unofficial engagement started with these words: "I want to marry you someday." Well that 'someday' happened to be a month and a day away. Much sooner than we expected when we first contemplated marriage. But since that time, I have been happier than ever. Rochelle has been a great blessing in my life, and I am very grateful for her.

I love you Rochelle!

Birthdays and other sundry events

It has been a good week for us, not too busy though. Of course the highlight for me was my birthday, which BJ was able to take half a day off work for. We had lunch together at a restaurant called Guru's, and it was good. Then BJ took me to go see the Harry Potter movie, which we enjoyed, although like most people, we felt that things had been rushed and changed a bit. However, it was done well, and we are now looking forward to the book (should be arriving today, but we can't open it until our road trip next week). After the movie, BJ's parents took us to one of my favorite restaurants- P.F. Chang's! Yum! One thing that BJ got for me which was a complete surprise was a car iPod adapter thingy which transmits your music to a previously-static-y radio station of your choice. Pretty fun stuff. I got some other things for my birthday which I really like and I got to talk to my family. Marissa called me on her lunch break, I talked to my mom on the phone, and my dad called me from the mountains on his camping/ kayaking trip.
On Friday, I did some more painting outside- actually I finished up the job! And in the evening we had dinner with our friends the Kershaws, who are moving to Nebraska this week for school. We will miss them.
Well, the Harry Potter book just arrived! Um, I am having major temptation! What if someone spoils it for me before I have the chance to read it?! Ahhh! Maybe we will have to start reading it before then... I don't know! The mailman said he had a truckload of books for people just in our complex! Hah! But I was the only one home so far. Interesting.
Tonight we are going on a double date with Charles and... someone. I think the consensus is that we are going ice skating. Fine with me- sooooooooo hot outside!
Many of BJ's family are en route to Hawaii right now... too bad we couldn't go, but fun for them! We expect pictures, ok? soon? :)
There is plenty of other stuff coming up this week, but I will tell about that later, when we know for sure what we are doing!

Skool Daze

So, it is Sunday and I should probably be getting ready for Church, but I decided that I'd rather blog, just so long as I don't spend to much time. I have been reading more lately, than I believe I have ever read. I have never been a fast reader, and have continuously had homework and such to worry about, and therefore never did much reading for enjoyment. There were times of course where I read all of The Lord of the Rings and other such things here and there, but never a time before when I simply wanted to find a book to read simply for the sake of reading. This is something that I always wondered if it would happen when homework went away. And lo, and behold, it did. I guess I can add this to my reasons why school stinks. ;-) Of course I'm an advocate for education and always will be. But I always felt like very little of my education made a desirable effect on me. Usually, it was simply a game to see what the best grade I could get was with the least amount of work. Terrible, I know. But I feel many teachers design the class in such a way as to make it nearly impossible to approach it in any other way. So, I think to my self, what could be done to better our educational system. This is a very complex question... a question that I know many readers of this will have strong opinions on. First of all, I realize that not all schools suffer from the same problems. Problems in downtown LA are not felt in the farming lands of Idaho. And the problems for education for elementary age students are vastly different than high school students. And of course, college is a world of its own. So, since I don't have much time, and I could spend hours laboring through the problems of each level of education and in each region, making opinions that are all prejudice to one degree or another and short-sighted, at this point, I don't think I will offer an opinion at all. But I simply want to ask each of you to please comment and answer the following question.

If you had a magic wand, and could make one change to the schooling systems that your children have/are/will go through, what would the change be.

Please submit a 2 page double spaced paper in Time New Roman 12 point font. Your papers are due this Friday at start of class. All late papers will be marked off 10% per day. This paper will be worth 100 points, or 1/10th your final grade. Hee hee!

Have fun, and I can't wait to hear what you all have to say.

Happy 7-11 Everyone!

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Get your own

So... I really don't have much to say today. I am home right now because I am going back to work later tonight. We are pushing a release, and Dave my boss said he wants me around as it happens... just in case. What that case might be, I don't know, but I'll be around I guess. (It's better than being a square!) So I came home early, gave Rochelle a kiss, and she fell asleep within 15 minutes. She spent the morning painting stuff for my parents outside. While she was happy for the opportunity to be outside and earn a little extra money, I don't think she was used to the heat. It wore her right out. So she is now sleeping peacefully. I'll wake her up in a bit if she wants to be woken up... otherwise she can sleep just as long as she wants. Her birthday is coming up, and we need to go shopping for her. I'm excited to do so. I sometimes struggle to get through the hours of shopping for clothes, but I always enjoy the smiles and cheeriness that come later.

Charles came over last night, and we had a good 2 hour discussion about girls, life, and work. We had strawberry shortcake, and enjoyed his company. Charles is one of those guys who keeps you laughing. Whenever I am around him, and no matter what our conversation, there is always humor scattered through the talk. I really appreciate that. It is good to enjoy life, and to laugh a lot.

We are going to be going up to Oregon in just over two weeks. We have pre-purchased the latest and greatest (we hope) Harry Potter, and Rochelle plans to read it to me while we drive. We'll see how long that lasts. Rochelle and I enjoy reading together, but we struggle to finish books together. So what typically happens is that we start the book together and finish separately. When the plot gets intense, usually one of us can't help but to just read a little bit more, and a little becomes a lot and soon the book is finished. But it is fun to try all the same. We are looking forward to our hike and camp-out in Oregon with Rochelle's family. We will be camping for several days, and making friends with the bears. (Hopefully they aren't having the same problem Utah is with bears.)

Well... I don't have much more to say, but I hope you enjoyed the 4th of July pictures. Sorry I'm so late in posting. I really haven't been on the computer outside of work for... over a week. I check my email at work, but that's about it. But I have caught up with everybody's blogs and now am finally posting another entry in my own. I'll let you know more when I have something new to report.

Have a happy 7-11 day everybody!

My turn

It is my turn to blog, and I am afraid I don't have much to report this week... I guess I will catch you up to the workings of my recent life...
I spent my last day in Buenos Aires touring the U.S. Embassy, meeting the Church Area Presidency, and going to the Buenos Aires Temple before hopping on our plane to come home. It was very good to be back, although I miss the many friends we made. There are a few things that I have really come to appreciate, which I know I took largely for granted. Those things are:
-Five star bathrooms (flushing toilet with a seat, has toilet paper, has running water, soap and something to dry hands with... none of those things could be taken for granted... you might be lucky enough to find a bathroom with TP, but you can bet you had to pay if you wanted some!)
-Carpet (you never realize how lovely carpet is until you don't see it for a while. I was so excited to see our industrial grade carpet when I got home!)
-Heating/ cooling systems (We experienced the coldest week on record for the last 40 years or so in Argentina- freezing temperatures, and of course we didn't think it would be so cold, so we had brought no coats... needless to say, it was sort of.. well.. cold in the unheated hostels we lived in.)
-Fruits and vegetables (we ate mostly meat and pasta and it was very good, but... I have been loving all the summer fruit since being home! YUUUUUUUUUUM!)
-Peanut butter! (Many of our wonderful friends in Argentina had never tried it... they really don't have it there...)
-Earplugs (really, my salvation and the only way I could get any sleep those 6 weeks)
-The ability and total confidence to be able to communicate completely any thought, desire, need, or idea to anyone as needed or wanted. (I will NEVER again think badly of anyone living in the U.S. who is having a hard time communicating in English (as their second language). I experienced quite a lot of anxiety, stress, etc. etc. when I first arrived in Argentina and hadn't gotten in my Spanish speaking mode yet. I was afraid I guess, and I even knew that I would be able to go home in 6 weeks! Imagine what it would be like to move to a completely new place where no one can understand you and you can't communicate- either adequately, or at all. You can't talk to the people at the grocery store, doctor's office, hospital, restaurant, your neighbors, schoolmates, coworkers etc. How terrifying! And you know that this place is your new "home"- you may never again go back to the place you grew up. I have a new appreciation for people who take a leap like that, who struggle to be able to communicate, and who must at times despair that no one understands them, and some people even hate them- people say things like "You're not welcome in this country if you can't speak English." While I realize that can be a frustration for all involved, I also know what it is like to be yelled at for not speaking or understanding clearly, and I know how wonderful it is when someone is sympathetic and rephrases or patiently explains what they mean. Smiles and soft tones (rather than loud exaggerated pronunciation) make understanding so much easier! OK, maybe that's enough on that subject for the moment...)
-Clean air (We lived downtown, and all the smog, car exhaust, and cigarette smoke (Young, young girls smoking everywhere- to lose weight they said) were hard on the lungs when we were walking several miles each day.)
-Clean water (we drank bottled water out of necessity, which wasn't so hard, only inconvenient, and expensive, at restaurants, when you can't get tap water or free refills!)
-My health (I got sick twice in 6 weeks... incidentally, I am fairly sick now, and have been since Tuesday, the difference being that I have access to all the comfort and familiar medicines etc. I could want.)
-Easy communication (this refers to more than just language- We relied on email and methods as unreliable as Skype and other internet methods. We couldn't use our cell phones to make the long distance calls home. Nice to be able to call people up now- just to say "Hi!" if I want.
-I appreciate the way the gospel is the same everywhere you go. (Even when I couldn't completely understand the lesson or talk given, I could feel the Spirit and the kindness of the members at church.)
I actually made a whole list of things I appreciated. I don't have that list with me now, but these are the things that stuck out the most to me. I may add more things at a later time!