Easter is over in less than an hour from the time I'm writing this sentence. Then we enter one of those lulls with no major holidays. Which means I get no candy or dessert until the patriotic season that starts Memorial Day weekend. I hope that this year I will not faint and my knee will behave properly and my spring classes will be laid back enough that I will be able to do more running and that the combination of running and no candy will get me more in shape. (Run-on sentences can be fun.)
Like always, Easter week wasn't particularly Eastery.
On Monday I actually addressed this issue. They asked me to give the spiritual thought for FHE. I talked about how we do so much more for Christmas--there are fourteen songs in the Christmas section of the hymnbook but only four in the Easter section, we get school off for Christmas but nothing for Easter, etc.--all this despite the fact that Gordon B. Hinckley said that the Babe of Bethlehem would be just another baby if it were not for Easter. I said that I suppose the reason for less emphasis on Easter is because it is more important, so important that we don't put it on a shelf for a year but rather should remember it all year round.
That FHE activity was a talent show. I sang the seven original verses I wrote to "Follow the Prophet." I have verses about Jeremiah, Amos, Zechariah, Alma, Samuel the Lamanite, the Brother of Jared, and Joseph Smith.
On Tuesday night I stayed up to register for classes for fall. I signed up so that I could graduate in the fall, but I still have to decide if I want to graduate then or next April. (Fun fact--our term "fall" is short for "fall of the leaf"; I also think that "spring" is short for "spring of the leaf.") I registered for geology Field Studies (it will be so awesome! I feel a little guilty taking it if I don't need it), Old English, the Senior Course for my major, Introduction to Comparative-Historical Linguistics, Technical Communication, and Swimming for Nonswimmers. If I decide not to graduate yet, I might drop the Comparative-Historical Linguistics class and take Groundwater or something instead.
On Wednesday I had a test for my Old Testament class. It was my last midterm of the semester. I didn't do very well; I didn't have time to prepare. Hopefully I did well enough. Then that night I had to finish modifying my science-and-religion paper. I think I actually had to make the paper less interesting to fit the assignment, but I don't think it was too bad. Maybe I'll share it with you once I see my grade.
Then on Thursday I finally caught up on some reading for my Early Modern English class that was supposed to be finished long ago. It feels so great to be caught up. That night I went to the temple and I went running. I hope to do more running now that I'm caught up. I have holiday shows I watch every year, so Thursday I watched It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown.
And on Friday I was excited to go home. It was my half birthday, which meant I could eat whatever I wanted. I ate a million calories in the form of four cookies, a miniature key lime pie, and tons of leftover conversation hearts. I drove my home teachee Kayla to the airport. I neglected to see another car and pulled out in front of it. He honked and Kayla gasped. I felt so stupid. When I started driving, the sun was right in my eyes, so I had to put my sunglasses on. But then it got dark and I couldn't see well because the glasses were dark and an old prescription. It was kind of a harrowing drive and I got off on the wrong exit. But that's why I use GPS, so that I'm never lost for too long. Then I got home and discovered that my parents had bought me a DVD with three new Easter TV specials on it. That night I watched Here Comes Peter Cottontail and one of the new ones, The Easter Bunny is Comin' to Town. (I'm a sucker for Rankin/Bass. I can't wait until Halloween so I can watch Mad Monster Party? again.)
On Saturday I went to a funeral. My sister is named Susanne, so this family friend is known as "Other Suzanne." I didn't know Other Suzanne terribly well, but I still knew who she was. I didn't think it was terribly sad. That may sound callous, but Other Suzanne had a lot of health problems. She was severely diabetic and had been completely blind for more than thirty years. Her husband died (I think rather unexpectedly) just before I came home from my mission. She had no children, but her funeral was well attended. I guess it was fitting for a funeral to be held the day before Easter, in remembrance of the resurrection.
My cousin's little boy Nathan, aka Wallace, was at the funeral and kept us entertained. He is twenty-two months and hilarious and adorable. Even though I don't see them that often, he knows my name. He made sure that all six of us adults had a hymnbook. If someone put theirs back, he would make them hold it again. He went around and pretended to give us haircuts. I did get a real haircut yesterday, but I think Wallace would have done a better job. He also kept making me put my hand in front of my eye, and then he would do a little breathy laugh. I was the only one he did it to. I wonder if it was related to my big glasses.
We had our Easter festivities. We got our baskets, and I ate all my candy yesterday and today, since it's out of season tomorrow. I expected that my Easter DVD would be my only non-candy present, but I was surprised that I got Frankenweenie on DVD/Bluray/3D Bluray (even though my apartment only has DVD and at home we only have regular Bluray). I will have to watch it again and decide if I should count it as a Halloween movie. I count the original Frankenweenie as a Halloween show because of the eerie theme and because there's a scene with Halloween decorations in the background. Either of those things alone would not merit a Halloween declaration, but both of those combined do. But they took the Halloween decorations out of the remake. So I have to decide if the eerie themes, and the fact that I count the original, merit counting the new one as a Halloween movie. (Similarly, I only count Mad Monster Party? because of the eerie theme and because it takes place in October.)
Why am I talking about Halloween on Easter? We also colored eggs and I watched three Easter shows, Here Comes Peter Cottontail: The Movie and the other new ones, The First Easter Rabbit and Yogi the Easter Bear. I am so utterly juvenile.
Then today I went to church in my home ward. I feel more and more distant from that ward; it has changed so much. I was unimpressed with the Sunday School teacher who used Powerpoints in his lesson. Then today we had our family Easter dinner. Wallace continued to be hilarious. Then I had to drive another girl from my ward, Amber, back to Provo. I drove better with her than I did with Kayla. Then I got home and my home teacher Westin visited me (he's the son of Governor Leavitt).
And now I'm going to be tired tomorrow. But that's nothing new.
And Easter just ended!
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Sunday, March 24, 2013
The Jay Eff Ess Bee
Of all the buildings on campus, the JFSB (Joseph F. Smith Building) is the one I feel most at home in. It's a relatively young building. When I was a junior in high school in 2006, I came down to BYU in the spring for the French language fair. I think it was brand new then, because in 2005 the fair had been in the McKay building. (At least I think that's where it was--I haven't been in the McKay building enough to know for sure.) The JFSB is a pretty building. It has outdoor gardens on every floor but the basement. There are lots of windows and a giant courtyard. The walls of the courtyard are made of travertine.
The JFSB is the home of the College of the Humanities and its departments, including Linguistics and English Language (my major). The basement is full of classrooms, and I usually have at least one class down there. (There is no phone reception down there. Most of the upper floors are just offices. It makes me kind of sad that the place with the most traffic and most use is the basement.)
Since I spend so much time there, it's difficult to fathom not being familiar with it. But I think the geology folks aren't too familiar with it. This week for Historical Geology we had a field trip to the Museum of Paleontology. I think that's one of the most underappreciated buildings on campus; many people don't even know it's there. Which is a shame, because fossils are awesome. Unfortunately, it's not very big, even though we're a major university. The College of Eastern Utah (now part of USU) has a bigger and better museum, even though it's a small-town college. Anyway, when we got done, I asked one of my classmates if he could give me a ride, since I wouldn't be able to make it back to campus in time for class. I told him I needed to go to the JFSB. He had to ask, "Is that the glass one?" He knew which one it was, but he had to confirm it, whereas someone in my major would know immediately which one it is. I think it's kind of funny he would have to ask, since the JFSB is directly northwest of the Eyring Science Center, which is where most of the geology stuff goes on.
So it was kind of funny this week when I attended a lecture for extra credit for my Geology of Planets class (I could count it for Historical instead). The lecture was in the basement of the JFSB. It was weird to go down into the basement, which I am so familiar with, and see all of these geology people, when they don't normally belong there. I asked one of my classmates if he had often been there, since he was a geology major. He said he'd only been there once, for an interview. Of course, he may have been an outlier, since he's new at BYU (and even I didn't have a class in the JFSB until summer 2010, having started winter 2010). The lecture was on climate change. It was pretty interesting. The year 2012 was unusually warm on Earth. There is a bridge in Greenland that was demolished by all the meltwater; the water hadn't been that high since the bridge was built in the 1950s. It drives me absolutely crazy when people put their fingers in their ears and say global warming doesn't exist. You should trust scientists when it comes to science, not Republicans. (Or Democrats for that matter.)
Classes alone make me spend a lot of time in the JFSB, but I especially spend a lot of time there now because BYU Studies, where I work, is on the first floor. I have been there for nearly eleven months now. I'm lucky to work there, and I only applied last year on a whim. It's a really good environment, paid internships are hard to find, and I get to make my own hours. There was once a gospel question that I acquired on my mission, and that question has now been answered from all that time I spent working on writing abstracts for those crazy Hugh Nibley articles. Thankfully I'm now done with Nibley, and I don't think I would ever choose to read him again. But he did answer my question. This summer I'm not taking classes and I'm just going to work. Provo is awesome in the spring and summer, and this summer I won't have to worry about homework. It's going to be great. (I found out this week that I could graduate in December instead of April next year. But I have to decide if I actually want to graduate then or prolong my schooling.)
My first time in the JFSB as a BYU student was one of my first days here three years ago. I went in to change my major from English (since when I registered I didn't know there was an ELang major) to English Language. Boy, am I ever glad I did that. It seems to me that there are two sides of the English major, writing and literature. Writing is very valuable and praiseworthy. But literature? Analyzing literature seems like one of the most pointless things ever. I think that Shakespeare is saying this because of this and this and this. People actually find that fun?! How do you know what the author is thinking? While English majors are off analyzing the fantasy world of literature, we Linguistics and English Language people are analyzing the real world and how people speak. I also think that English majors are more likely to be prescriptive grammarians than ELang majors. ELang converted me to descriptivism. Prescriptive grammar relates to all those silly arbitrary rules: Don't end a sentence with a preposition, use the nominative form with a copular verb, don't use a double negative. We ELang people care more about how people are actually talking, not how they "should" be. I feel kind of bad about something I did this week. For my Early Modern English class, we are reading Hamlet. Our homework consists of analyzing the play from its language. Apparently we are doing that because EME writers were educated that way. But it feels like literary analysis to me, and in my homework I mentioned that I didn't like literary analysis. I think I made the professor feel bad, because she gave us other options for homework. But she's a very nice lady, and I think she understands.
I also feel bad for another thing I did this week--I had a bunch of pennies sitting on my desk, and I wanted to get rid of them, so I went to the gas station/convenience store across the street and bought a small package of Cadbury Mini Eggs using 50 cents of pennies and some other coins. Usually the gas station has no one else in it (I think South End Market probably took a bunch of their business), and I was the only one there when I started paying, but then some people came in and had to wait. I feel bad I did that to the cashier. At least she got some coins for the register.
I was quite glad it snowed this week. I'm still waiting for a year when I see it snow nine out of twelve months, and I was worried it wouldn't snow this month, so I was glad it did.
But this week I noticed that the giant pile of snow in the JFSB courtyard is finally all melted. The pile had snow from December, and it lasted like three months. But now it's spring and it's gone.
The JFSB is the home of the College of the Humanities and its departments, including Linguistics and English Language (my major). The basement is full of classrooms, and I usually have at least one class down there. (There is no phone reception down there. Most of the upper floors are just offices. It makes me kind of sad that the place with the most traffic and most use is the basement.)
Since I spend so much time there, it's difficult to fathom not being familiar with it. But I think the geology folks aren't too familiar with it. This week for Historical Geology we had a field trip to the Museum of Paleontology. I think that's one of the most underappreciated buildings on campus; many people don't even know it's there. Which is a shame, because fossils are awesome. Unfortunately, it's not very big, even though we're a major university. The College of Eastern Utah (now part of USU) has a bigger and better museum, even though it's a small-town college. Anyway, when we got done, I asked one of my classmates if he could give me a ride, since I wouldn't be able to make it back to campus in time for class. I told him I needed to go to the JFSB. He had to ask, "Is that the glass one?" He knew which one it was, but he had to confirm it, whereas someone in my major would know immediately which one it is. I think it's kind of funny he would have to ask, since the JFSB is directly northwest of the Eyring Science Center, which is where most of the geology stuff goes on.
So it was kind of funny this week when I attended a lecture for extra credit for my Geology of Planets class (I could count it for Historical instead). The lecture was in the basement of the JFSB. It was weird to go down into the basement, which I am so familiar with, and see all of these geology people, when they don't normally belong there. I asked one of my classmates if he had often been there, since he was a geology major. He said he'd only been there once, for an interview. Of course, he may have been an outlier, since he's new at BYU (and even I didn't have a class in the JFSB until summer 2010, having started winter 2010). The lecture was on climate change. It was pretty interesting. The year 2012 was unusually warm on Earth. There is a bridge in Greenland that was demolished by all the meltwater; the water hadn't been that high since the bridge was built in the 1950s. It drives me absolutely crazy when people put their fingers in their ears and say global warming doesn't exist. You should trust scientists when it comes to science, not Republicans. (Or Democrats for that matter.)
Classes alone make me spend a lot of time in the JFSB, but I especially spend a lot of time there now because BYU Studies, where I work, is on the first floor. I have been there for nearly eleven months now. I'm lucky to work there, and I only applied last year on a whim. It's a really good environment, paid internships are hard to find, and I get to make my own hours. There was once a gospel question that I acquired on my mission, and that question has now been answered from all that time I spent working on writing abstracts for those crazy Hugh Nibley articles. Thankfully I'm now done with Nibley, and I don't think I would ever choose to read him again. But he did answer my question. This summer I'm not taking classes and I'm just going to work. Provo is awesome in the spring and summer, and this summer I won't have to worry about homework. It's going to be great. (I found out this week that I could graduate in December instead of April next year. But I have to decide if I actually want to graduate then or prolong my schooling.)
My first time in the JFSB as a BYU student was one of my first days here three years ago. I went in to change my major from English (since when I registered I didn't know there was an ELang major) to English Language. Boy, am I ever glad I did that. It seems to me that there are two sides of the English major, writing and literature. Writing is very valuable and praiseworthy. But literature? Analyzing literature seems like one of the most pointless things ever. I think that Shakespeare is saying this because of this and this and this. People actually find that fun?! How do you know what the author is thinking? While English majors are off analyzing the fantasy world of literature, we Linguistics and English Language people are analyzing the real world and how people speak. I also think that English majors are more likely to be prescriptive grammarians than ELang majors. ELang converted me to descriptivism. Prescriptive grammar relates to all those silly arbitrary rules: Don't end a sentence with a preposition, use the nominative form with a copular verb, don't use a double negative. We ELang people care more about how people are actually talking, not how they "should" be. I feel kind of bad about something I did this week. For my Early Modern English class, we are reading Hamlet. Our homework consists of analyzing the play from its language. Apparently we are doing that because EME writers were educated that way. But it feels like literary analysis to me, and in my homework I mentioned that I didn't like literary analysis. I think I made the professor feel bad, because she gave us other options for homework. But she's a very nice lady, and I think she understands.
I also feel bad for another thing I did this week--I had a bunch of pennies sitting on my desk, and I wanted to get rid of them, so I went to the gas station/convenience store across the street and bought a small package of Cadbury Mini Eggs using 50 cents of pennies and some other coins. Usually the gas station has no one else in it (I think South End Market probably took a bunch of their business), and I was the only one there when I started paying, but then some people came in and had to wait. I feel bad I did that to the cashier. At least she got some coins for the register.
I was quite glad it snowed this week. I'm still waiting for a year when I see it snow nine out of twelve months, and I was worried it wouldn't snow this month, so I was glad it did.
But this week I noticed that the giant pile of snow in the JFSB courtyard is finally all melted. The pile had snow from December, and it lasted like three months. But now it's spring and it's gone.
Sunday, March 17, 2013
A great day to be a geologist
Today is St. Patrick's Day, and I got lots of comments at church for my outfit. I'm wearing green glasses (an old prescription that I can't see very well out of), a shamrock tie, an orange belt, green pants, and green socks. I think I even had people yelling out of cars complimenting me. People might think St. Patrick's Day is my favorite holiday because of my dress, but in fact it's my least favorite of the eight holidays I formally celebrate. Last night my roommate Bryton and I went and got mint Oreo Blizzards, since it's the last time I can eat milkshakes until pumpkin time (unless someone invents an Easter or Fourth of July milkshake). Then we came home and watched the St. Patrick's Day episode of Bewitched and my roommate Scott joined us. At other universities, college kids get drunk at St. Patrick's Day. At BYU, they watch Bewitched.
But I won't dwell on St. Patrick's Day, since I'm Facebook fasting today, and most of my pageviews come from Facebook, so St. Patrick's Day will be over before most of you read this.
Yesterday I had a field trip for my Historical Geology class. It was nowhere near as fun as Death Valley, but it was still pretty fun.
We went up to Spanish Fork Canyon. At the mouth of the canyon are some windmills, which you can see from BYU on a clear day. We got out in the cold, 7:30 a.m. wind and talked about faults and Lake Bonneville. After we left, I noticed some faceted spurs, which are triangular landforms that form at faults. I was disappointed I didn't see them sooner, but I asked Dr. Britt at the next location if that's what they were, and he confirmed it. I was glad that I was able to recognize the landform without being told what it was. I mean, I had some clues, since we had been talking about faulting in the area, and I knew there were faceted spurs elsewhere near Spanish Fork, but I was still glad I recognized it.
Then we went to some places I had been for my Dinosaurs! class almost three years ago. (I'm getting old.) I'm not sure if this location had limestone or siltstone or something else. There were a bunch of Triassic bivalve shell fossils there; I gathered a mediocre one. (I got one last time I was there). Then we went down the road to a Triassic floodplain. This place mostly had trace fossils in shales. I don't really like walking on shale; you sink and it gets in your shoes. Plus, the trace fossils weren't that interesting, although someone found some small footprints, which were pretty cool.
We went to another location of the same formation, the Ankareh Formation. There were lots of rocks in the road there; I'm glad I wasn't driving. This place has a lot of sandstones mixed with siltstones and things; it has been upturned.
My favorite part about this place is the phytosaur tracks. You can see them in the bottom of this sandstone: The phytosaur made a mark in a stream, and then sandstone came and filled the tracks in. Sandstone doesn't erode easily, so the silty rock eroded and the sandstone stayed in place, preserving the mold of the tracks. Phytosaurs were ancient Triassic reptiles that looked like crocodilians, but they weren't. If you look closely, you can see the tracks in this picture.
Then we went to this place. If I recall correctly, this was Jurassic sandstone that was upturned, and then this valley was filled in with sediments.
Then we went to a place of lots of limestone. This was probably my favorite part of the trip. We climbed this mountain searching for fossils. Fossils were a little harder to find, but I did find a few. The only one I kept is a rock full of fossils. At first I thought it was an ordinary conglomerate rock. But then I looked closer, and I noticed not only bivalve shells (like clams) but gastropods as well (fancy snails). It was really fun to walk around on the steep slopes, the warm March sun shining on us, smelling sulfur from the small pond at the bottom of the mountain. Our professor always says, "It's a great day to be a geologist." And that's what I was thinking. Except that I'm not a geologist.
Then we saw some conglomerates from alluvial deposits. Then we visited a tufa formation. I had never heard of tufa before. It's a porous limestone that forms from springs and I think around plant roots. I found a leaf fossil, but I didn't keep it. I didn't like this place. It was the most slippery, and the rocks were the sharpest, and the rocks were loose, so I kept worrying about sending rocks falling down the mountain on top of people. Plus, we had to climb through a barbed wire fence. The opening was plenty big enough (it had been cut), but it was still a little disconcerting to go through, especially since we were walking on slippery rocks.
When I learned about tuff, the rock formed from volcanic materials, I wondered if the word tuff was related to the word tough, since rocks are tough. So I looked in the Oxford English Dictionary and discovered that the words aren't related; tough is Germanic and tuff is Latinate, from the Italian word tufa. So, having just learned about the rock called tufa, I looked up its etymology, and I found out that tuff and tufa have the same etymology, even though they are quite different rocks. (How nerdy can you get?)
The rest of the trip was less interesting. Our last stop was a coal seam. It seems that you only hear about coal in geology and at Christmas: Santa gives coal to naughty kids, Frosty's eyes were made of coal, and Bob Cratchit asked Ebenezer Scrooge if he could burn more coal for heat.
Field trips alone make geology classes worth it.
But I won't dwell on St. Patrick's Day, since I'm Facebook fasting today, and most of my pageviews come from Facebook, so St. Patrick's Day will be over before most of you read this.
Yesterday I had a field trip for my Historical Geology class. It was nowhere near as fun as Death Valley, but it was still pretty fun.
We went up to Spanish Fork Canyon. At the mouth of the canyon are some windmills, which you can see from BYU on a clear day. We got out in the cold, 7:30 a.m. wind and talked about faults and Lake Bonneville. After we left, I noticed some faceted spurs, which are triangular landforms that form at faults. I was disappointed I didn't see them sooner, but I asked Dr. Britt at the next location if that's what they were, and he confirmed it. I was glad that I was able to recognize the landform without being told what it was. I mean, I had some clues, since we had been talking about faulting in the area, and I knew there were faceted spurs elsewhere near Spanish Fork, but I was still glad I recognized it.
Then we went to some places I had been for my Dinosaurs! class almost three years ago. (I'm getting old.) I'm not sure if this location had limestone or siltstone or something else. There were a bunch of Triassic bivalve shell fossils there; I gathered a mediocre one. (I got one last time I was there). Then we went down the road to a Triassic floodplain. This place mostly had trace fossils in shales. I don't really like walking on shale; you sink and it gets in your shoes. Plus, the trace fossils weren't that interesting, although someone found some small footprints, which were pretty cool.
We went to another location of the same formation, the Ankareh Formation. There were lots of rocks in the road there; I'm glad I wasn't driving. This place has a lot of sandstones mixed with siltstones and things; it has been upturned.
My favorite part about this place is the phytosaur tracks. You can see them in the bottom of this sandstone: The phytosaur made a mark in a stream, and then sandstone came and filled the tracks in. Sandstone doesn't erode easily, so the silty rock eroded and the sandstone stayed in place, preserving the mold of the tracks. Phytosaurs were ancient Triassic reptiles that looked like crocodilians, but they weren't. If you look closely, you can see the tracks in this picture.
Then we saw some conglomerates from alluvial deposits. Then we visited a tufa formation. I had never heard of tufa before. It's a porous limestone that forms from springs and I think around plant roots. I found a leaf fossil, but I didn't keep it. I didn't like this place. It was the most slippery, and the rocks were the sharpest, and the rocks were loose, so I kept worrying about sending rocks falling down the mountain on top of people. Plus, we had to climb through a barbed wire fence. The opening was plenty big enough (it had been cut), but it was still a little disconcerting to go through, especially since we were walking on slippery rocks.
When I learned about tuff, the rock formed from volcanic materials, I wondered if the word tuff was related to the word tough, since rocks are tough. So I looked in the Oxford English Dictionary and discovered that the words aren't related; tough is Germanic and tuff is Latinate, from the Italian word tufa. So, having just learned about the rock called tufa, I looked up its etymology, and I found out that tuff and tufa have the same etymology, even though they are quite different rocks. (How nerdy can you get?)
The rest of the trip was less interesting. Our last stop was a coal seam. It seems that you only hear about coal in geology and at Christmas: Santa gives coal to naughty kids, Frosty's eyes were made of coal, and Bob Cratchit asked Ebenezer Scrooge if he could burn more coal for heat.
Field trips alone make geology classes worth it.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
(Can't think of a good title)
Ah, March. That time of year when lemits is in full bloom, and it's good weather to do lots of things outside, but there's too much going on to do so.
Last week I went running three days in a row, but all that lost time meant that this week I had to catch up on all the homework I didn't do. It was a pretty busy week.
I had to write a paper about science and religion. It actually turned out better than I expected. I talked about how intelligent design shouldn't be taught in school because it's not science, and that you don't have to choose between believing in science/evolution and believing in God--you can believe in both.
I also had to color a geologic map of Mars. While I was coloring it, I realized that geology takes me back to elementary school. We have to color things, we learn about rocks and dinosaurs, we go on field trips, and we play in a sandbox.
And speaking of geology, I got an exciting email this week. I want to take Geology 210, the field studies class, but the headers say it's for geology majors only. But it's listed as one of the electives for the minor, so I didn't understand why it would count for the minor if only majors could take it. So I emailed the professor in charge of the class this summer/fall, explaining the situation, and he replied, " Until our curriculum committee gets it together, please feel free to sign up." I'm excited to take it! (The only reason I can think of that it would count for the minor but only majors could take it is in case someone took it as a major but then switched to the minor. Then it wouldn't make sense if it didn't count for them. But I don't think that would happen often.) That class will be worth three credits but it's all over before the semester starts--which means I'll have a lighter semester!
I was also busy because this week I went on as many dates as I did in all of 2012. I need to start getting serious, since I graduate in a year. I have a hard time going on dates because I don't like to bother girls by burdening them with my presence.
Then this weekend was stake conference. Since I'm an assistant clerk, I had to go to the Priesthood leadership meeting. That means I went to three meetings.
But I'm feeling optimistic. I've finished my biggest papers of the semester, and I think I only have one more exam between now and finals. The snow has mostly melted (but I still need to see it snow this month), and this weekend I'm going on a field trip. Then it's St. Patrick's Day, and then the Easter season starts. (I'm sad the Easter season is only two weeks this year.)
I've never been so happy about warmer weather!
Last week I went running three days in a row, but all that lost time meant that this week I had to catch up on all the homework I didn't do. It was a pretty busy week.
I had to write a paper about science and religion. It actually turned out better than I expected. I talked about how intelligent design shouldn't be taught in school because it's not science, and that you don't have to choose between believing in science/evolution and believing in God--you can believe in both.
I also had to color a geologic map of Mars. While I was coloring it, I realized that geology takes me back to elementary school. We have to color things, we learn about rocks and dinosaurs, we go on field trips, and we play in a sandbox.
And speaking of geology, I got an exciting email this week. I want to take Geology 210, the field studies class, but the headers say it's for geology majors only. But it's listed as one of the electives for the minor, so I didn't understand why it would count for the minor if only majors could take it. So I emailed the professor in charge of the class this summer/fall, explaining the situation, and he replied, " Until our curriculum committee gets it together, please feel free to sign up." I'm excited to take it! (The only reason I can think of that it would count for the minor but only majors could take it is in case someone took it as a major but then switched to the minor. Then it wouldn't make sense if it didn't count for them. But I don't think that would happen often.) That class will be worth three credits but it's all over before the semester starts--which means I'll have a lighter semester!
I was also busy because this week I went on as many dates as I did in all of 2012. I need to start getting serious, since I graduate in a year. I have a hard time going on dates because I don't like to bother girls by burdening them with my presence.
Then this weekend was stake conference. Since I'm an assistant clerk, I had to go to the Priesthood leadership meeting. That means I went to three meetings.
But I'm feeling optimistic. I've finished my biggest papers of the semester, and I think I only have one more exam between now and finals. The snow has mostly melted (but I still need to see it snow this month), and this weekend I'm going on a field trip. Then it's St. Patrick's Day, and then the Easter season starts. (I'm sad the Easter season is only two weeks this year.)
I've never been so happy about warmer weather!
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Journey to March
March has arrived! I'm pretty glad about it.
We have passed the midterm point of the semester! There's only a month and a half left of school! Then I get a few days--and then I'm in school again. But spring term is always more fun than winter semester.
This week they posted the schedule for fall semester. I had been thinking that I might graduate in December, depending on if the senior course for my major is offered in the fall. Well, it is offered in the fall, but not all the other classes I need are offered (or else they overlap). I will have to look a little more closely, but it looks like I'm not going to graduate in December! Hooray! (That's not something you hear often.) I don't feel ready to graduate, and I think April's a better time to graduate than December, and I will be able to take whatever I want my last year, since I have most stuff done.
I think in the fall I will take my major's senior course, Old English, Groundwater, some writing class, and Swimming for Non-Swimmers (since I can't swim). (This is still very tentative--registration's not even open for a few weeks.) I also sent an email to see if I can take the geology field studies class. I don't know if I'm allowed, since I'm just a geology minor, but I hope that I can take it. That would fill up my necessary credits, but the course takes place before fall semester actually starts, so I would really only be taking like twelve credits, even though I'd be enrolled in fifteen. But if I'm not allowed in the class, I'll have to find something else.
The lemits weather allowed me to go running three days in a row this week! I don't know the last time I've done that! That may not be the greatest for my schoolwork, but it makes me feel great. Considering my running speed and my running time, I estimate that I ran about twenty miles this week.
On Monday I went back to the dentist. He was surprised with how well the bleaching had done, but he thought my tooth was still a little dark, so he put more bleach in. Now my dead tooth is lighter than the rest of them.
Then yesterday we had a "Morning Mourning Bash" for my tooth. We ate cereal and a guy who lives across from me, Alex, read a poem about my tooth. It was pretty funny.
I feel that as time goes on, my blogs get less and less focused...
We have passed the midterm point of the semester! There's only a month and a half left of school! Then I get a few days--and then I'm in school again. But spring term is always more fun than winter semester.
This week they posted the schedule for fall semester. I had been thinking that I might graduate in December, depending on if the senior course for my major is offered in the fall. Well, it is offered in the fall, but not all the other classes I need are offered (or else they overlap). I will have to look a little more closely, but it looks like I'm not going to graduate in December! Hooray! (That's not something you hear often.) I don't feel ready to graduate, and I think April's a better time to graduate than December, and I will be able to take whatever I want my last year, since I have most stuff done.
I think in the fall I will take my major's senior course, Old English, Groundwater, some writing class, and Swimming for Non-Swimmers (since I can't swim). (This is still very tentative--registration's not even open for a few weeks.) I also sent an email to see if I can take the geology field studies class. I don't know if I'm allowed, since I'm just a geology minor, but I hope that I can take it. That would fill up my necessary credits, but the course takes place before fall semester actually starts, so I would really only be taking like twelve credits, even though I'd be enrolled in fifteen. But if I'm not allowed in the class, I'll have to find something else.
The lemits weather allowed me to go running three days in a row this week! I don't know the last time I've done that! That may not be the greatest for my schoolwork, but it makes me feel great. Considering my running speed and my running time, I estimate that I ran about twenty miles this week.
On Monday I went back to the dentist. He was surprised with how well the bleaching had done, but he thought my tooth was still a little dark, so he put more bleach in. Now my dead tooth is lighter than the rest of them.
Then yesterday we had a "Morning Mourning Bash" for my tooth. We ate cereal and a guy who lives across from me, Alex, read a poem about my tooth. It was pretty funny.
I feel that as time goes on, my blogs get less and less focused...
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