R.I.P. Bic

I was going to update all of you on my date, but this is far more important.

At the beginning of every semester (and sometimes multiple times during the semester), I go to the BYU Bookstore and pick up a couple packs of  BIC Ultra Round Stic Grip Ball Pens. They are the best pens on Earth, and I absolutely love them.

Why? Becuase they’re not nice enough that you have to be constantly worried about losing them or borrowing them out. Also, they don’t bleed through paper as easily as the super nice ones. Pens are way better than pencils, because it looks so much more satisfying and legitimate when you write with them. And these ones are the best. You never have to rewrite things because the ink wasn’t present the first time you tried to write it, but it also doesn’t smear when you accidently rub your hand over it.

Have I convinced you? These are the best pens in the world. Everyone agrees. I know this because no one ever gives them back when I let them borrow one. (Okay, this happens with most pens, but usually only with pens the borrower is satisfied with. I’ve never gotten one of these back!) People love these pens.

So WHY did BYU stop carrying them?

There I was, preparing for school to start in August, going downstairs in the BYU Bookstore and heading to the place where my Bic pens are kept, and there they weren’t. I looked everywhere. All I could find was the same type of pen in blue. But you can’t take notes in blue! Writing in blue is five times worse than writing in black.

I thought it was a fluke, and didn’t sweat it, since I still have some from last year. However, I’ve been running low (I lose pens a lot) and so I went there again today. Cautiously. Trying not to get my hopes up. And yet, I was crushed again. I searched all over. They were not there.

How infuriating. Why couldn’t they have removed all the blue pens? Or any of the other 50 different kinds of pens they carry?

Therefore, I bought two other pens. And spent almost twice what I would have if I had gotten a pack of 8 of my favorite pens.

And they probably don’t even work.

 

 

Although, one IS made out of a recycled water bottle!

Take THAT, The Man.

Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog

Rachel Z. introduced this little movie to me last Friday. I had never heard of it, but apparently it was a huge deal during the writer’s strike. I thought it was really good, although I’m going to have to watch it again to fully appreciate it. What makes it good is that it takes one little concept and creates this 45 minute movie that really demonstrates it.
The fact that it was a sing along blog kind of weirded me out, but the songs are actually really cute.

Here’s what the plot line is:
”The story of a low-rent super-villain, the hero who keeps beating him up, and the cute girl from the laundromat he's too shy to talk to.”

Anyway, here’s the trailer. Doesn’t do it justice, but ah well.

 

This is just the beginning of the movie. Obviously you don’t have to watch it, but I thought the first two or three minutes were really funny and cute. Definitely a good start to the character development.

 

Thanks Rachel for introducing this to me!

Happy Birthday to Jamie!

It’s my sister’s birthday today!

Usually I try to find funny pictures, but how about ALL the pictures of Jamie’s face?  :)

Anyway, I absolutely LOVE my sister! She is so much fun. Here are some of the things I love about her.

Jamie is super good natured. For example, she has a terrible memory, but she just admits it and laughs it off.

Jamie is by far the bravest one in the family. She is also the most determined. Jamie is the only one who would do extreme sports without a second thought, and I admire her for that.

Jamie is dedicated. She stuck with diving and Japanese, and lots of other things, even though they were hard. I’ve always admired her for that.

Jamie always lets me play with her. Even though she’s really busy, she still finds time to do things with me, and lets me hang out with her and Matt.

Jamie lets me drive. She also drives fast when we are driving to and from Utah. So I let her drive when we need to go fast.

Jamie has really funny road rage. No one would ever take her road rage seriously.  ;)

Jamie was the best roommate ever. Period.

Jamie is really friendly to everyone, and makes everyone feel special and important. Everyone loves Jamie. I remember at Stake dances when everyone would ask me how Jamie was doing. People even asked me to dance so they could ask how she was! It was ridiculous, but Jamie is just that nice to people.

Jamie makes really good cloud cookies, although I can’t vouch for her “experiments”  ;)

Jamie is a lot of fun and is always up for doing fun things, unless she’s tired. Haha!

Jamie lets me borrow her clothes. She also lets me steal them.

Jamie is very forgiving.

Jamie takes the gospel seriously and is an excellent example to me, at church and at home.

Jamie is the best journal keeper I know.

Jamie lets me listen to whatever music I want in the car.

Jamie is really good at including people in the fun things she is doing.

 

Jamie is such a great sister to me, and I love her!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JAMIE!

 

He’s saved in my phone as “Nick Marb Guy”

I got asked out by a random guy on campus today. I hear about these stories all the time, but it’s never happened to me.

I was walking into the MARB and this guy just started talking to me. We talked for a minute or two, and then he asked me if he could get my number because he’d “like to get to know me better”. I didn’t see any harm, and I was kind of shocked, so I gave it to him.

We’re going on a date on Wednesday. We’re just going to walk around campus. I’ll be sure to have something I “need” to do in case it’s super weird. He’s sort of “strait off his mission” kind of awkward, although it’s probably just him.

We shall see!

Fiesta a La Casa

Sorry this took so long. I haven’t had the internet for the last week…

After the disappointing BYU football game on Saturday, Diane, Rob, Michelle, Heidi, Sarah, and I went to the Pizza Pie Cafe. I love that place. I think Jeff and I went to it like 6 times in two or three months. I love the salads and the interesting Pizza flavors they have. (Is flavors the right word there? Probably not…)

I am really bad at putting myself in pictures, so I only got two pictures of me today. And I’ll probably get in trouble for one of them…

Anyway, we all had a really good time at the PPC. I really like this apartment. The other day their door was open, so I just walked in and talked to them for awhile. And Diane, Heidi and I watched Gilmore Girls the other day, which was fun.  :)

This picture was just for fun. It absolutely was not because we had too many people in the car, and so I had to be in the back.  ;)

 

That night was the FIESTA at LA CASA.

La Casa is this sweet house on the corner of 700 N and University. Everyone who lives anywhere near it knows it as the house with the trampoline and tandem bicycles. It is the coolest house. Unfortunately, it is not BYU approved, and since BYU is cracking down on that this year, they might have to move. That would be a major bummer for the ward.

The cool thing about La Casa is that it has a patio on the roof, and you can have parties up there.

The picture above was taken from the roof, looking down on the other half of the roof.

The party was a lot of fun, and the boys who live there made a really funny skit that they performed for us that was their version of the Count of Monte Cristo. They even had some songs, which was funny. 

After the skit was a dance party and a mustache contest. It was a lot of fun, and I’m really glad they are all in the ward!

This is my roommate Mckenna and her friend, Richard with their mustaches.  :)

Tuesdays With Morrie

 

On Thursday, Lauren and I went to see Tuesdays With Morrie at BYU. Kara had warned me that it was really sad before, so I brought a bunch of tissues.

When I got there and looked at the program, I was super excited because Matt Meese was playing Mitch, the student. Matt Meese is one of the biggest reasons I love Divine Comedy. I have no idea what the show will be when he is no longer a part of DC.

It was kind of weird at first to see him in a serious role, but I really enjoyed the show. The first ten minutes or so was really fun, because the actors interacted with the audience a bunch. There were some really funny parts, and I was glad Matt Meese was playing the role.

And then towards the end of the play, it got really sad. I am a baby, so I started crying about 5 minutes before everyone else even shed a tear, but it was nice to hear the entire audience sniffling by the end. I love that sound.  :)

It was a very cute play, and the two actors were amazing. One interesting thing they did was leave the stage crew onstage the entire time, and so we could see them helping the actors with props and things. It was a little strange at first, but I ended up really liking the change. Also, every set was on the stage at the same time, but it worked out really well, and I think the simplicity was really effective for the telling of the story.

Lauren and I with our tickets.

Hiking Timp

Sunday night at ward prayer, a guy from La Casa mentioned that he and some friends were going to hike Timp that night and anyone was invited. I talked to him a little about it and decided that it was probably now or never, and decided to go.

When we got there at midnight, there was a group of 13 people that were coming with us. I was one of the drivers. When we got to the base, fate was not on our side. To make a long story short, we accidently went on the wrong trail so we had to go back to the beginning. When we got back, some nice guy told us that we should probably pay the dues so that are car didn't get booted, since over 100 got booted last year. All I had were coins, and when we put them into the envelope, it wouldn't fit into the spot available for the envelopes so we just shoved all the coins in individually and hoped they would accept it. :)

We didn’t get a very good before picture. I’m didn’t even show up in any of them. Ah well.

Then we went on another wrong trail. This experience was definitely the blind leading the blind. A couple people in our group had hiked Timp before, but it was several years earlier and they were just followers. Luckily we turned back after only after about 10 minutes of hiking. That trail may have led us to the top, but some guys convinced us to turn back when they said they had been hiking that trail for 20 minutes when they heard a car pass. We figured that probably wasn't the right way to go…

When we finally we going on the right trail, 4 members of our group decided that this was not what they had bargained for, and decided to leave and go to some hot springs (which they ended up not doing). This group included the people who had initiated the hike, so we were left with 8 girls and 1 guy. Not ideal circumstances…

Joan and I took the lead. My flashlight was pathetic so I basically just relied on Joan's except for a couple times when I got out my iPod and used that. It was pitch dark. We kind of joined up with another group at the beginning, so there were like 30 of us. The hike up was just long. You had to watch every single step so that you didn't trip over some root or rock. After probably an hour and a half or two hours, we kind of stopped and asked the people behind us if they needed a break. This girl replied "We're not in your group" in a not-very-nice manner. We waited until they all had passed and then realized we were no longer with our group. It was only Joan, another girl (in the blue BYU sweatshirt) and I. We waited for a couple minutes but when they didn't show up, we decided to keep going. Since it was a bunch of girls, we figured they had probably just needed a lot more breaks than we had taken.

I couldn't believe how long the hike was. Even though prior to the hike, I knew that it was going to be close to 6 hours to the top, I don't think I was really mentally prepared for that. At about 3:30 am, my feet started not responding quite as fast as I would have liked… I found myself stumbling some, but not very much at this point. I was also starting to regret that I hadn't made up for the lack of eating on Fast Sunday, and had only eaten a sandwich, some carrots and a bowl of cereal. It was starting to get extremely cold too. Out of the three of us, I was definitely the most prepared for the cold. Poor Joan was only wearing underarmour, a t-shirt and pants. She would have been wearing shorts too if I hadn't made her change before we left. Luckily I brought an extra hat for Joan, and happened to have 3 gloves, so I gave one to the other girl and tried to get Joan to take the other one, but she wouldn't.

The hike was primarily silent. No one talked because we were all pretty tired, both from lack of sleep and because the hike was pretty strenuous at times. We all knew we needed to conserve our energy. Us three girls were rarely by ourselves, which was nice. We would join up with one group, and then pass them, and then join with another one ahead. A little after 4, I started having a pretty hard time and convinced my group to take a slightly more substantial break. That actually helped me out a lot, but my mind was really starting to wear down. Joan was doing fine mentally, but she was getting extremely cold without a whole lot of protection.

We got really close to the "Saddle" and the winds starting coming more frequently and much harder and they were literally like getting hit by ice. Every time a gust would come, we would all turn our backs on it to try and shield our faces. We were in this highland type place by then, and there was not going to be any protection from the wind for awhile at least, and we were starting to doubt whether or not it was smart to continue. Joan kept saying she was legitimately worried for her body because it was so freezing. She said she couldn't feel either of her arms. We stopped to discuss our option when we saw people coming up the trail. It was our group! We were really happy to see them.

We all huddled in a group and discussed our options. There were a few that really felt like they needed to go back down now. There were several reasons for that. People were not prepared for the cold, and we thought we were ahead of schedule for the sunrise, so we would be getting there and then sitting in the freezing winds for a sunrise and then have the entire hike down, which we knew would take several hours. Then Lucy said that some guy on the trail said we were about 2 hours from the top. I think that was the deal breaker. We had already been hiking for over 4 hours, and the thought of hiking for two more was not appealing. Also, we weren't as on schedule as we thought we were, so that was not ideal either.

A couple people would have gone to the top. I wanted to finish, but then I finally accepted that it was only my pride that made me want to keep going. I didn’t want to go down without making it to the top. We considered having one car leave and one car continue, but decided it was better to stay as a group. The final decision was to start down. It wasn't a half-hour before we knew we had made the right decision.

The hike down the mountain was one of the most mentally challenging things I've ever experienced. I kept remembering a guy from my ward saying that he fell asleep several times on the way down while he was walking, and then woke right back up. I could definitely tell I was close to that stage, and it really scared me. Most of the hike is not exactly hiking through plains or anything. On the contrary, most of the time it was an extremely narrow path that had an extremely steep drop on one side. We had several scares, although we were extremely blessed in that none of the scares actually produced an accident, although Lucy hurt her ankle (but was an extremely good sport) and everyone stumbled and fell several times. It was mentally challenging because:

1. it was 5-7 in the morning, and all of our bodies were hating us for the lack of sleep we were giving it.

2. We had already been hiking for 4-5 hours and our legs, backs and the rest of our bodies were exhausted (I mean, when's the last time I've done physical exercise even close to this!?)

3. It was still pitch black. We couldn't see anything except what was right in front of us. It was almost worse when it got like 2% lighter, because then we could see how dangerous the path actually was.

4. We all knew (although were trying to forget) that the hike down was going to be several hours, and although we wanted to know that soon we would be sitting in our cars and then going in our nice warms showers and beds, we still had a long time before that would happen.

5. I knew I was going to have to drive when I got back down, and I was very concerned that I wouldn't be able to.

And then my stomach was screaming at me to stop and eat something substantial, but every time I took a bite of granola or something, I just felt ill.

Jacquelyn was the group's mom. She’s amazing. Whenever anyone needed to stop and rest a minute, or eat something, she was there waiting with us, and talking us through our tiredness. When we finally got down to where we were passing people on our way up, she was super energetic and wishing everyone luck, while I would merely grunt, and that was only if i felt obligated to.

I’ve never been so happy to see cars as when I finally did. The last fifteen minutes was terrible because you kept expecting to see the cars around every corner, but they were never there.

When we got there, I had Lucy, Tracey and Chelsea reenact how cold it was. This was the best they could do.  :)

We dragged ourselves out of the car to take an after picture. I knew I would be glad if I did, and I really am.

The drive home was scary. I’ll leave it at that.

I took two 3 hour naps and did homework in between on Monday. At FHE, it was just as bad as I thought it was going to be when people asked if we made it to the top. We defended ourselves well though.  :) I had a good time talking to some of the girls about the funny things about the hike though, so that was a good experience.

It was really hard to walk up the stairs the next two days, because my right leg was so stiff and my groin hurt, but overall I wasn’t as sore as I expected.

It was a good experience, and I’m really glad I did it. If I were to do it again though, I would not go for the sunrise. 5:00 AM would be perfect, and would eliminate most of the issues I believe. The sunrise was really great and the hike would actually be beautiful if I could have seen any of it. By the time it was light enough to see how pretty a hike it was, I didn’t care. Haha.  :) I would like to do this hike again though, with the lessons I learned. In a year maybe.  :)

Horray for Timp!

 

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BYU Football

Yesterday was the first BYU Football game this semester. I forgot how much I love those games!

 

Reasons why I love BYU Football Games:

1. The overall excitement in all the fans before the game.
2. Everyone wearing BYU shirts and colors (and that BYU has super good colors, navy and white is so much better than green and gold or purple and gold…)
3. We say a prayer before the game.
4. Everyone sings the National Anthem.
5. Our cannon has a name, and everyone knows what it is.
6. Our mascot is always clearly one of the few black guys on campus, because he is always doing stunts and break dances that few white guys could keep up with.
7. The commercials and ads on the big screen are so clearly directed to the Mormon audience.
8. The Darth Vader cheer.
9. The Lord of the Rings cheer.
10. That song they always play right before the game or after halftime or if they think we don’t have enough enthusiasm. The “Go Cougars” one.
11. The specific bleacher “B! Y! U!” Cougars! cheer.
12. There’s always one guy in the seating group who always knows exactly what’s going on so gets asked a million questions during the game.
13. The army people who do push-ups every time we score.
14. The fact that the Cougarette’s do it too, but no one really cares.
15. The scenery! You can’t get much better than the mountains right next to the stadium and a great sunset during the game!

And lots more reasons. Two things I wish were better? 1. That you could actually hear the band during halftime. 2. That the key of the fight song was slightly more singable. 

Anyway, it was a really fun game, and I’m even happier that we won! And I'm even happier that we beat UW! Again!