how cold? ICE cold!

The last year and half felt like the quickest 18 months of my life. I'm one class short of my master's degree and, as of today, back in Utah until I enter the MTC in March. I already miss Tallahassee. It felt so foreign when I arrived. I felt lost and lonely, especially the first semester. This past Sunday my bishop had my roommate and I speak (since it was the last Sunday in the ward for both of us due to missions). I think I could have named every person in attendance. Granted, it was post-finals so a lot of people had already peaced out of Tally, but it felt so good to see so many familiar faces. What a wonderful group of people! I learned a great deal about myself, and about how to serve. There are kids (grown ups?) there that are just good. I hope they keep that goodness with them, wherever life, or the Lord leads them. He certainly needs their goodness, or at least His other children do.

Another bitter-sweet moment was seeing my parents as I came down the escalators in the SLC airport. Sweet because, well, they're my parents. Bitter because outside it was somewhere in the 20s. I wept a little inside for the 70 degree weather I had so thoughtlessly left that morning. My parents promptly fed me (hurray! all I'd eaten the entire day were Biscoff cookies... which are quite delicious, but they only give you 4, tops, on the plane... lame).

With schooling mostly done, mission is sinking in more, in exciting ways. Here's to an eventful week!

Going Postal....

I hate waiting for mail.

*grumble *

Sci-Fi-Actiony

This is my most recent class assignment. Our teacher gave us a dialogue scene between two people and left us free to "interpret" the scene into any genre we chose. I went with "sci-fi-actiony."

Mind the Gap...

It's been a while since I've blogged. Everytime I sit down to start a post I remember something else I should be doing. Like now, for instance, I should be studying. :-)

Life has been busy the last several weeks, but it's been a good busy. I discovered I was 3 credits short of graduating this semester (I was planning on graduating in April, so this was a pleasant surprise). I went and spoke with the graduate student adviser and he told me I could take an online class from BYU and just get it transferred over to FSU and voila!

Meanwhile, the job hunt was fruitful. I had an interview at the Gap a few weeks ago. It was a group interview (weird) and I thought I'd done poorly on it so I decided to soothe my ego with a brand new pair of Gap jeans. Two days later I got an email saying I got the job (wahoo!). Too bad my employee discount (50%) didn't kick in until then, haha. Oh well. Good things come to those who wait, I guess. So far the Gap has been enjoyable. I like working in the GapKids section of the store better than the Gap adults. I just seem to be able to strike up conversations better in GapKids (we get lot of grandparents in GapKids). Yesterday was LONG. My shift was from 1-5, but after every shift all employees have what's called an on-call shift. Usually we don't have to work the on-call shift, but yesterday they informed me I needed to work mine (sigh). So at 5 I took an hour break (store policy) and then spent the next three hours putting a bunch of merchandise away. I enjoy organizing things, but I was just tired and ready to go home. I finally rolled into my house at about 9:30. My roommate was so funny when I walked in.

"Rebecca!!!!! I haven't seen you ALL DAY!! I've been so lonely...."

More to blog about later...

"Jamming"

Big To-Do

1) I'm taking a hiatus from facebook until I get ALL my internship applications in.
2) In an effort to be more productive, I'm posting my to-do list on my blog...


Thursday
2 PM interview at Buckle (EPIC fail. it's never a good sign if the best thing you could say at the end of the interview was, "I'm good with people and I'm a quick learner" Crud.)
Sometime afterward:
-clean room
-clean bathroom (check, check!)
-edit FDM project
-compile items for mark. internship with FableVision
5:15 - 6:45 Institute (I played soccer instead....)
7 PM - 8 PM TNT (capture the flag! it was awesome)
afterward:
-finish above to-do list

blog

I'll be playing around with my blog design over the next few days. :-P

Harry Potter and the Midnight Showing

I dressed up. I wore a white button up, khaki pants, and black dress shoes. I printed out a Gryffindor coat of arms, laminated it and taped it to my shirt. A friend loaned me his maroon and gold tie and I was set. My hair was even in braids (pig tails). The tie was a little long (said friend is 6'4", ha... I'm 5'2", yep), but other than that I thought the outfit looked pretty darn good. Another friend at the movie theater took of picture for me with my phone. I texted it to my family and my dad's response was classic: "Where's your wand?"

I'm comfortable with my nerdy-ness.

In other news, I've learned recently I have bad aim when throwing things, and I'm not very strong. We had two ward activities involving water balloons this week. One was capture the flag. For hits to count the balloon had to 1) hit the person and 2) actually break ON the person (no bouncing). I failed as a flag guard *hangs head*.
(The other water balloon activity was just an all-out water fight. I stopped tying the balloons and started using them to squirt water at people. Much more reliable...)

Friday a bunch of friends went to the Keys for the weekend. I was a little pouty about not being able to go (previous obligation), but I was determined to have more fun than they were. I probably didn't, but I think we came pretty close. About 10 of us got together and made homemade pizzas. The original plan was pizza and a movie, but we had such a talented bunch it wound up being a sing-a-long. Some guitar and lots of piano, I think we all had a good time. Psh, and all the other kids got to see were some lame fish. Ha! Beat that! Thankfully none are aware I have a blog.

Today was a particularly laid-back day. I picked a friend (and future roommate) up from the airport, read, napped, crocheted, baked. It was lovely, although I wish I'd had more to do. Back to the gym next week and more job hunting. And packing.

post-finals

Is there anything better than chipping away at a stack of books that has accumulated silently over the past six months, taunting you with rows of cleverly written titles and colorful covers, and a full day with nothing but sunshine to keep you away?


No, there isn't.


"The Penderwicks" -- Excellent. Summer adventure at its finest. Highly recommend. Finished and the day is only half over. What joy!

Summer Lovin'...

Don't get excited. The title of this post just means I happen to love summer. I've been transferring a few of my larger items over to the apartment I will be staying at in the Fall. One happened to be my book case and I was left with the task of choosing which books I would actually use over the next few months. Largely due to my indecisiveness, I wound up with a stack of about 16 books I "plan" on either reading or using over the summer. Three days into my break and I've yet to start chipping away at it. But the prospects are still very exciting. In any case, the books got me excited about summer and its accompanying leisure. Even with classes, somehow the time to read the things I want to read creep in. What fun!

Speaking of school (which I wasn't really), once I figure out how to shrink the file size down for my final project I'll post it on the blog. It's not spectacular, but it was sure fun to do.

For the longest time... whoooooooaaaa...

I thought I would give a quick update. I keep meaning to write a nice long post, and then find something else that needs getting done. But things are going great here in Tallahassee. The past few weeks have been interesting. I'm not sure I could have anticipated the types of experiences I would have here.

My classes are everything I could hope for. Each project we're assigned is a delight, and no exaggeration. Last week I had to make an MP3 player using Flash animation. From design to programming, the Wednesday I spent on the project was enormously relaxing. The rain was pouring outside, giving my room the dawn-like, soft morning glow that hits the sky just before the sunrise colors break the horizon.

I've always loved the rain. When I was a little girl I rearranged my room so that my bed was flush against the large double window in my bedroom just so I could watch the thunder showers. I always felt safe in our house, but I would get the biggest thrill watching the pine tree outside my window sway as though it would snap in two from the wind. Curled up with a good book... such is an ideal day for a Ventura. We're kind of nerds. I think we're okay with that.

All else seems to be going well. I mentioned earlier it had been interesting. I'm a bit private and the idea of bearing my soul for all the internet to see doesn't really appeal to me. But suffice it to say, I'm pleased with how I've handled things. I've never been one prone to melancholy. A day or two of feeling sorry for oneself is more than enough. I've noticed, too, that when I'm down I like to bake, particularly if it means inviting people over to enjoy what I've baked. It's both productive and gives me the opportunity to lift someone else's spirit. For that reason I'm terribly grateful for two parents that taught me how to truly enjoy food: for and in the company of others.

Conference, of course, was wonderful. The dear institute director provided a dutch oven lunch for all the YSAs between the Saturday sessions. He made everything himself (except for the rolls) and it was delicious! Dessert was a blackberry cobbler... there was a bit of difficulty staying awake during the second session after such a satisfying meal. Brother B (our institute director) had his whole family there and upon his suggestion I ran to the local CVS to pick up some playing cards. He, a few of his kids, and some of the other YSAs played Scum for a good while before the second session. Brother B. is extremely competitive... but was still the Scum (if you haven't played... well, if you're the Scum you're LOSING). Needless to say the smack talk was flying at that table!

One aspect of conference that I've found both interesting and uplifting is the balance that seems to strike amongst the talks. Some talks seem to be the swift kick in the pants I think we all sometimes need while the next may be the Balm of Gilead we were also seeking. In the course of one session you feel the extremes of both. In everything I think it's a testament to how much the Lord loves each of His children; how deeply He desires us to just do the right things and return to live with Him, and still how intrinsically He knows our aches and pains.

A good weekend and a good week ahead. I'll try and do better posting. :-)

Word.

I saw this on my sister's blog. Ha, ha, I agree!

Your Word is "Think"

You see life as an amazing mix of possibilities, ideas, and fascinations. And sometimes you feel like you don't have enough time to take it all in. You love learning. Whether you're in school or not, you're probably immersed in several subjects right now. When you're not learning, you're busy reflecting. You think a lot about the people you know and the things you've experienced.

What's Your Word?