A week with the in-laws

Alrighty, we got here last Wednesday, and are leaving tomorrow, which means, sadly, that our vacation is coming to a close. :-( We have had fun being here with Rochelle's family. Her siblings are lots of fun to be with. It has been abominably hot for Oregon, 95 plus every day, and way too humid for my taste. The weather has kept us hiding from the sun inside, but we have managed to have fun despite ourselves. Tayler, Collin and I have played lots of ping-pong, pool, and chess, along with some pente and a little paint ball on the side. Collin is currently reading to me a list of jokes that got in the email some time ago, and has kept in a folder. We have also been witness to a bunch of different events while here. First of which, and our main reason for being here, was Anna's baptism. Other things we saw were Collin's piano recital, the Dance festival in which Marissa, Tayler, and Cara were all a part. Marissa also received her Personal Progress completion award. And last but not least Tayler recieved his Eagle Scout award. Well, I could write much more about all of this, and I probably will, but I think it shall wait until I'm at home wishing I could get another round of ping-pong in.

Procrastination is my (temporary) answer

Well, as the title implies, I have other things that I should be doing, and yet here I am, hoping against all odds that the material I should be studying will somehow seep into my brain while I do something... anything (!) else. Right now, "something" is giving the update on our fascinating life! Ok, so maybe it is not so fascinating, but it seems to be quite a whirlwind right now.
BJ and I had the pleasure of having both our fathers here with us on Father's Day yesterday. This was not exactly planned; but through a series of what you might call unfortunate events, we were able to host both of them. Now, don't get me wrong, it was not unfortunate for us that they were here! We were delighted to have both of them at the same time. No, the unfortunate part was some of the circumstances surrounding this event. To explain: We knew BJ's dad was coming; his wife (BJ's mom) was out of town, and we invited him over for Father's Day dinner. Then, I received news that my grandmother here in Utah was having emergency surgery, and that my dad was coming to be here with her and his siblings. He was here until Sunday night (Father's Day). So, while the reasons for him being here were less than desirable, we were delighted to have this unique opportunity. We all got to have dinner together (some of the recipes we used are posted in the recipe section of our website) and then we promptly left to take my dad back to the airport. Whew! As a note, my grandmother's condition is improving, but she will have a long recovery ahead of her. Our thoughts and prayers are with her, of course.
Today was the last day of classes for Spring Term, 2006! BJ has one more class to take before he graduates, and I have... dozens! Oh well, at least I am now finished with my generals. Anyway, we are leaving the day after tomorrow to go visit my family. The day after tomorrow also happens to be the first day of finals, and that means that we are taking our finals early. Tomorrow. Yikes. That is why I should be studying. I have a tremendous amount of material to cover by 9:00 tomorrow morning, and I feel like I have a long night ahead of me, as I have not made much headway on studying yet. That said, I guess I have had a long enough break, and will resume my dismal task.

Busy Day

Today has been one of the busiest days ever! In a good, mostly non- stressful way, of course. I worked this morning, as usual. BJ and I actually babysat our nieces for a good portion of the rest of the day. BJ had the girls for a few hours, then picked me up from work. We spent some time with the girls at the Bean Museum, the park, playing games (the likes of Chutes and Ladders, Candyland, and dominoes) etc. BJ went back to work for part of the time, then came back for an hour or two. I love children, and I have a lot of respect for parents in general. I usually experience a surge of that respect right after babysitting multiple children. I am not suggesting anything about my nieces (I think they are adorable, very smart, and fairly good- natured). It's just that babysitting kids makes me appreciate what moms and dads do, and the fact that parenting is a neverending babysitting job. I feel lucky, in that the parents that BJ and I have, and all of the members of our family who are parents, are great examples of good parents.
We were supposed to go to our dance class in the evening, but we were late, and pretty tired, (not to mention the fact that we are auditing the class, and are not trying to earn a grade) so we went home, only to walk 3 miles to go get ice cream at Stan's. Incidentally, THE Stan that "Stan's" is named after is BJ's grandfather. He sold the restaraunt quite a while ago, but the whole family still frequents the 1950's classic burger joint. It definitely has character, and some of the best fast food you'll ever try. Stan's is one of those places where if you have lived in Provo for any amount of time, you understand the kind of tradition that Stan's is; kind of a permanent fixture that draws college students, teenagers, and their parents alike. Everyone likes Stan's.

Today mate!

I'm afraid that my life is just not very interesting. I got up, went to work, came home, had dinner and went to dance class with Rochelle. Dance class wasn't especially exciting. We are in swing right now, and I enjoy that. It is my favorite dance, and although I already know most of the steps, it's fun to dance them, especially when Rochelle and I dance together. But now we are home, and the day is all but gone, and I have little to report here. And so, the best I can do for this blog is find some issue that I have feelings on, and speak my mind about it. Today's issue is found here: http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=296414 It's about the senate, and how they are elected. This may seem like a strange idea to many, but the senate has not always been voted for by the people, and it really isn't a good idea to have them voted in office by the people. They used to be voted in by the state legislature. It gave the states more power. Right now, the states have very little power on capitol hill. Right now, if the senate is to be concerned with state rights, it is because the people from that state are concerned with state rights. But honestly, how many people do you know who worry about the state government that they are in? In general, people feel that as long as the kids have a school to go to, and we have roads to travel on, I don't care who is in charge. But when the states don't have power, it destroys the structure that the founders set up for us. The founders gave us a very week national government, because they knew that there would be very little that the national government could do better than the states. Those few things (such as armies, and international affairs) were given to the national government to worry about, and the rest to the state government. So why should the states have power? Wouldn't that just mean that more states would mess everything up? No, not really. Every state wants to do well, otherwise they too get kicked out of office. The difference that is created here is that every state gets to do things a little different... they experiment, and the states that do the best get imitated by everyone else. So if we are having problems with our schools, let the states experiment with it, and keep the national government out. One or more of the states are likely to come up with some good ideas that work, and then we can all benefit. If the National Government is in charge, they aren't as likely to find a good solution. And we also have to consider the fact that every state is different. They are made up of different cities, and different people, and so maybe some states need one type of program while other states need another. The national government can't account for this. They simply give everyone the same plan, and hope it works for most of them. Of course, there are times when the national government needs to step in. When the civil rights movement was going on, the national government took control of some schools in some states because the states were not doing things right. This is a check on the states power, and is good. But this check does not mean that the states no longer get to make any more decisions. It means they made one very bad decision, and the national government needed to stop it. And so while I think it is unlikely, I want the 17th amendment repealed, and power given back to the states.

Back to School, Back to School!

Well, our short vacation is finally over. BJ and I have class and work today. I worked at the Bean Museum. I compile statistical reports and make/ give the employee of the month award. It has been a good job; I have been there longer than any of the other students working there now! I will only be working there a little longer, though.
Lately, we have been working on a new website. We had an old one that BJ made shortly after we were married, but we decided to buy a real domain name and get a site started that we could do more with. Well, BJ has wanted to do it for a long time, but was always too busy with classes. Now, with him graduating soon, he finally convinced me it was a good ideal, and we decided to have a go at it. It has been a lot of fun. It is not fully functional yet, but it has a few pictures up. We hope to have a bunch of cool stuff on it, like a family birthday calendar, more pictures, family recipes, games, BJ's photography portfolio, and other stuff as we come across it. It was fun to come up with the design for the main page. We made kind of a scrap-booky look by scanning things in that I made, and digitally altering them.
Something that I am pretty excited about is that my sister Marissa got in to BYU and will be attending in the fall. I am trying to help her find a good apartment; let me know if you have any good suggestions. We hope to have her contract all done with pretty soon.

Happy Memorial Day

Today is Memorial Day, and therefore a day off from school and work. Rochelle and I will be using it to wash cars, work on our web page, and study. Holidays are never as much fun as they should be when you are in school. But all the same, we slept in and have enjoyed the day thus far. I recently read the talk by President Hinckley from the Priesthood session of last conference. It is a sad thing that racism is still as prevalent as it is. There are many differing opinions on it at the time. Some people think it is all but gone, others think that it has improved but little since the 60's when there were riots and legal discrimination. I think I fall somewhere in-between. But I know it is definitely still there. In our previous ward, there was a couple who I met with for one of my classes. The guy was white, and the girl was black. The guy said that he was amazed at how differently they were treated when he was doing something and when his wife was doing something. They felt like people often looked at them as they were holding hands walking down the street. For that same class, we watched a video of a white guy and a black guy that were similar in almost ever respect besides for their skin. The white guy didn't always have an advantage, but he often did. As they sought for places to live, the white guy was given applications, and the black guy was told that the apartment had just been taken. If they went to get a car, the white guy got a better percentage rate, and a lower price. Jobs were open to him, and filled to the black guy in many cases. Racism is definitely still alive. Right now President Bush is trying to secure the Mexican border because of "terrorists." I doubt it has much to do with terrorists. Terrorists often are educated and well-off; they are probably more likely to come through normal routes than try to jump a fence with the National Guard right there. And yet we don't worry about the Canadian border. But these are all complicated problems, and don't have easy solutions. But one thing is for sure. President Hinckley is right. We need to treat all of our neighbors with love and respect, and though he didn't say it, I might add especially those who are discriminated against for any reason.

Stuff

As BJ wrote, we are attending school at BYU this spring. It is great weather- sunny almost everyday. A lot of people don't like how hot it is already, but I find that I don't mind very much, as long as it isn't cloudy. Sunshine= happy Rochelle. I am finishing up my general ed classes this spring. I am taking Humanities and Geology. I am planning to continue working at the Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum until the end of the term. When the summer term starts, I will start my new job as a research/ teaching assistant in the college of nursing (for one of my previous professors). I really enjoyed my classes last semester. It was great to finally be able to start putting all the things I have learned about medicine and nursing into practice. I did a clinical rotation at Orem Nursing and Rehab, along with 7 other girls. I had such a great clinical group; we all became good friends. I was sad to see the semester end.
This fall I will be up at American Fork Hospital. I am very excited. BJ is working on one of his last classes before he graduates in August, and he is keeping very busy working at Novell. We are taking one class together- Dance 280 (The Social Dance class we met in 2 1/2 years ago). We are mostly just taking it for old time's sake, as we have already taken several higher level dance classes together. It is a blast! BJ is such a good dancer, and this class is one of the highlights of my week.

Hi all you blogging bloggers

So, Rochelle decided that she wanted to become a blogger for some unknown reason to me, and guess who she assigns to write the first post, ... ME! Well so be it.

Today has been a busy day. This spring has nice because we get to sleep in fairly late every morning. We don't have to be anywhere until 10 am. That's unusual for us. And we make the most of those morning hours. We don't let a single one of them go to waste! We sleep until we absolutely have to get up, and then we get up. Rochelle will note that I'm worse than she is because I sleep longer than she does. Well, I can get ready in half the time, and so I sleep the other half. If our roles were swapped, I'm sure she'd do the same. Well anyways, Rochelle and I both went to work around 10 am. From here on it gets quite boring. I program. And I program some more. And I program some more. Once in a while, I'll talk to a fellow Homo Sapian, but for the most part, it is me and "Wasp", my computer. Programming can be fairly addicting though. I love doing web pages. I don't know why either. I try to get into other aspects of programming, but they just don't excite me much. I've even tried games that are for programmers where you program little bots to do battle with other programmed bots... nerdy I know, but I thought it might be good practice. But, alas, it was of no avail. I'm just not interested in programming unless it has to do with the internet. But I think internet programming is facinating for some reason. Don't ask me why. I don't know. But right now I'm programming a web page for work, and I have a hard time putting it down long enough to do anything else. I just learned a new protocol called XMLHTTP Request. It allows the web page to actively get more information to display and makes it much faster to use. For some odd reason, I thought it was one of the coolest things ever. Other people I showed it to were like... "uh, whatever..." but that's my life. People rarely understand the computer things that I am facinated by. Oh well. Well, Rochelle is now wanting me off the computer. My moment on the computer is over I suppose. Now I get to try and distract her while she is working... he he he. :-D
Hasta.
BJ