Why I love the Olympics...

Many of you know I am pretty much obsessed with the Olympics. Since the good old days of 2002, I've been equipt with my purple volunteer coat, my lanyard of pins and my USU beret (you know you all payed an arm and a leg for them). I've been reminiscent of my days at Olympic Village... being a bridesmaid at the Brazilian bobslet team wedding, ripping my pants when the Canadian Hockey player fell on me, my sign getting ripped on the Today Show by our very own Al Roker.

I am one of those people that feels extensive amounts of USA pride during the Olympics. I love the red, white and blue. I wear my olympic pins daily and change my desktop background on a daily basis. I often feel that my cheering helps our teams to victory and in turn I take their accomplishments as part of my own. I use phrases like "we took home the gold" and "that was one of our best times yet". When they break the world record... I break the world record... when they drop the baton... I drop the baton... when they cry... I cry. I've shed many a tear, both happy and sad.

So hears to you Michael Phelps, May and Walsh, Shawn Johnson and that little 12 year old Chinese gymnast. We did a great job...Go USA!

Single & Steadfast: Lessons in Hope

Apparently being single affects my self-worth, significance and success. As much as I love the Ensign, I have to admit this just confirmed my fear that there is in fact a line between being married and being single, and the "marrieds" of the world just don't know quite what to do with us "singles" out there.

One of my favorite lines in the article is ... "Watching younger siblings marry and begine their families has been painful. Prone to depression, (we'll insert Katie Jo here) doesn't feel socially skilled. She hasn't had a date in four years." Prone to depression? Seriously? I could think of a lot of things that would push me into depression before being single would. (and I have had a date in the last 4 years- not going to say how many, that's not the point).

So I guess I'm supposed to set some goals to become "attractive to my potential marriage partner". Again...Seriously? Have they been to my ward? My FHE? My Institute classes? Not a lot of options out there people. My satisfaction, meaning and happiness is not based on being single.

After reading this you might think I am one of those cynical singles. I promise I'm not a menace-to-society as many people think. In fact, I think I contribute quite a bit to society. I have a great job (with many other successful singles I might add) and I enjoy my life. I haven't lost hope ... if anything I consider myself lucky. I get to do things in my life that most people will never experience, and when marriage comes along it comes along, but it doesn't define who I am.

Tribute to Tim

So I have to tell you about my student worker Tim. He has "claimed" all year long that he can cook... really cook... and yet I had not seen anything to prove that this was true. So now he is getting ready to leave on his mission to Ireland (yeah I hang out with 19 year olds... back off) and he decided to show us this hidden talent.

Tim decided made dinner, well actually he had to bring it out in courses... and yes...it was delicious. First we started off with the burchetta with fresh tomatoes, olive oil, basil and cheese.

Next we had salad: fresh greens, pears, toasted pecans (which Tim toasted himself), feta cheese and a rasperry vinagarette dressing.



Main Course: Crusted parmesan chicken with fettuccini. Sauteed zucchini.
Dessert: homeade rasperry cheesecake.








So Tim, you've proven yourself... you've proven that you are an ok student worker, a great cook and an all around incredible person. We sure are going to miss you!

Look how happy you've made us:

My Hate Crime...

As many of you know I have pride that Logan, UT is nationally ranked as the "safest metropolitan area". Usually weekly police blotter includes things like sheep escaping on main street. In all my years in Logan, I think I've just witnessed my first hate crime ... against me.

So I woke up Wednesday morning to see my favorite, yes- favorite, trumpet vine (that crawls up the South end of my house) cut off and thrown about 30 ft away in the neighbors back yard. Not just pulled down, I'm talking sawed off and wires clipped.

Evidence A

Evidence B

Evidence C

Evidence D

After talking to the neighbors (or I as I like to call them witnesses)... I found out that they heard something in the middle of the night, still don't know who... or why. Do know one neighbor drug it to the back yard so they could get in and out of their house but everything else... still a mystery.

Did I call the police? You bet I did (and it only took them about 40 min to respond). The first question Logan Police Department asked me was ... "Is someone upset with you?" Seriously? Mad enough to cut down a tree?

So if I've upset you... I'm sorry, but maybe we could have talked about it instead of cutting down my trees- or if you insist on the tree cutting, at least cut down that damn Russion Olive in my back yard, but leave the trumpet vine alone.


If you have any information on the crime, please let me know. I'll be looking at some tapes, gathering evidence. If you think you're getting away with this, you're not. I have a case number and everything. I mean I have my suspisions... the EFY kids have been on campus this whole week. Sketchy.

Finding the Perfect Gift...

I know many of you have struggled like I have when buying gifts for other people. You want to find that PERFECT thing.

My advice: do something that shows you actually thought about what to give them. I'm going to give you an example. For my birthday this year I got two very unique gifts, I guess you could say they both put a lot of thought into their gifts.

Gift #1: Trent
I got a text from my dear friend Trent saying he needed to give me a my present... that it included 2 wheels and ended in rasperry shakes. For the next two hours I was on motorcycle ride to Bear Lake. Could this gift be any better ?...out in the sun... straddling a beautiful man... on a Harley. (I don't think so)





Gift #2: we'll call him "Rusty"
When I bought my house, I worked with a wonderful Loan Officer. He was great to work with and I get things in the mail from him periodically. So I wasn't surprised when I got a birthday card in the mail from him. I was a little thrown off when I opened the card and out dropped a $1 lottery ticket from ID with the words "win big". Wonder what that means... hmmm. Now I'm not going to lie, I thought this gift was hilarious...just a little odd coming from the man who helped me get my house.



So obviously these two people knew me very well... and knew the perfect gift for me. So good luck with that perfect gift and when all else fails, buy a lottery ticket.


(Thanks Trent)

EUROPE...

Ok get ready for the worlds longest post...

For as long as I can remember I've wanted to go to Europe. This was a pretty big year in my life... turning 30, finishing the masters, etc so I decided to reward myself with my long awaited trip. My friend Jenn and I did a 14 day cruise to Northern Europe. What an incredible experience.

This was one of the only problems I encountered. It equaled an 11 hour plane ride and a diet coke this size. This seems more like a shot glass to me. I'll have you know I did very well with the diet coke consumption on the trip... I told myself I was trying to cut back when in fact I think I was just too cheap to buy it. I'm saying this with a 32 oz sitting on my desk right now.

The first stop on the trip was London, England. Absolutley loved London- love the accent, love the phrases "lovely"and "brilliant". Learned that "holiday" is vacation... I love being on holiday.

THe second day we were in Europe, Jenn and I split up. We both had life-long dreams to fulfill: She wanted to go to Wimbledon and I needed to go the Queens Birthday. So I spent the morning at Buckingham Palace with thousands of my closest British friends, paying tribute to the Queen.

This was our ship. Yeah it was huge. It was actually ranked the best ship in the world the last three years in a row. I was so excited to meet some young, wealthy eligible young men on our cruise, or at least some nice gay guys to hang out with. I even had a $50 reward if I could get Jenn to kiss someone on this trip. As you can see in the background of this picture, the average age on this trip was about 80 years old, which made the trip hilarious. Nothing like drunk senior citizens dancing.



Amsterdam, Netherlands: No I didn't hang out at the red light district the whole time, we actually went on a tour of the windmills and were able to see how they make wooden shoes.

Berlin, Germany: Jenn's favorite place next to Disneyland. This is me at the Berlin Wall... and yes I ate some bratworst and sourcrout (I have no idea how to spell that). Now that I've tried it I don't think I should ever have to do it again.

Stockholm, Sweden: by far one of my favorite countries. Everything is on the water and it is beautiful! As we left the country we went through all these little islands listening to Abba songs- nothing like a little "dancing queen" to make your trip complete.

Helsinki, Finland: Incredible churches. Most of the town was shut down for mid-summer... I'm talking the whole city was deserted. ps- the lady didnt' really enjoy me trying on these furs... I think she could tell I didn't quite have the funding to buy.

St Petersburg, Russia: Wow is all I can say. Such amazing history. The first day we were there we did a canal tour around the city and then the second day we did a tour of all the Romonof Castles.

This sunset in Russia was about 12:30 am. Then the sun comes up about 3:30... never actually gets dark there in the summer. Somehow the day we did the tour of the castles we got in the most disfunctional tour group possible. Most of the group would wander off and we would spend half the time looking for them. THe picture above is my least favorite member of the group. He ran into me at least 20 times... apparently his pictures were most important.

Copenhagen, Denmark: I was so excited to go to Denmark. My dad's side of the family is from here and ever since I could talk I learned things like "ka da snuka da dansk?" (That's do you speak Danish for those of you that don't know the language... it's spelled phonetically mostly because I don't know how to spell it). Spent two full days looking for this damn licorice my brother just had to have but it was well worth it... you're welcome Curt.


This is Fredericksburg Castle in Denmark.
One of my favorite things about a cruise is the people you meet. This is a picture of our dinner group on the cruise- Charniel and Imade our servers and Sam and Jean were our dinner guests.

Sam and Jean are from Scotland originally, but now live in England. They were wonderful. They helped me learn my British words, couldn't believe I didn't eat with my fork and knife together and Jean had a way of making me the guinea pig and trying all the strange things on the menu.

This is Alex, our Maître de. He was my crush for the trip, beautiful man... beautiful accent.

One of the funniest things ont he trip were these purell hand sanitizers. I guess they had some sickness on the ship the week before we came so these little babies were everywhere. In the bathrooms, dining rooms, halls, elevators. They met you with them as you entered the ship, any food establishment and might as well have set them by the side of your bed. I probably went through 3-4 gallons myself (and yet I was still sick).

It was an amazing trip... saw the most incredible things and will laugh about many things for years to come!

Turning the BIG 3-0!

So any of you that know me know that I have been dreading turning 30 ever since I hit 25. I planned on sneaking away to a hotel and spending the night with my friend jack daniels, but my friends and family decided a surprise party and drawing even more attention to my age was a better idea. I had suspected this would happen, but I'll give them credit they seemed so unorganized that they really did get me.

So I would like to do a quick tribute to the year 1978:

- The President of the United States was Jimmy Carter
- A new home cost $54,750... a new car $5,400... gas $0.63 per gallon
- Famous People: Ashton Kutcher, Topher Grace and Katie Holmes were born in 1978 as well as Kobe Bryant (not really proud of that one)

-Movies: Grease, Superman and Animal House

- TV: Taxi, Mork and Mindy (you all tried the nanu-nanu thing didn't you... if you didn't then yes, I am old)

- Music: We Are the Champions, Kiss You All Over, Hot Child in the City and Take a Chance on Me

As you can see, 1978 was a great year and we all have a lot to be thankful for.

So instead of having a breakdown about my age, I had a breakdown about how lucky I was to have such wonderful people in my life... no, seriously there were tears. Thanks for such a great birthday!