The Importance of Keys.

A tale in which Kathleen tells lies, almost dies, and realizes her dream of being a hobo came true.

Except don't get TOO excited, cuz I'm still alive and stuff.

So basically, I have keys. One for my bike lock, and another for the apartment. I have them on a llama key chain that my friend brought me back from Peru. It's been a great little set up.

On friday, I went to school, and then just hung out on campus studying. Then, I went to go get on my bike to ride to work, and I couldn't find my keys anywhere. I always keep them in the same pocket and they just disappeared. I upturned my entire backpack twice, and eventually just gave up. It was 3:45 and I worked at 4:00, so I decided to just leave the bike locked up and walk. I got to work just a couple minutes late, which ended up being fine.

On my way there, I called Tara to see if she could bring me my spare key if she was going out. But apparently she had left to go to the Reservation and visit her family right after she got done with school. So that was out. However, Tara is the biggest worrier in the entire galaxy. (I'm sure there are probably aliens in other galaxies that are worse, but as for the milkyway...) She was adamant about calling Hailey, (our other friend) and making sure I got home okay. I told her that wasn't necessary and if anything I would call Hailey and stuff. So I finally got Tara off my case and off the phone and I got in to work.

As I worked with all of my idiot co-workers, I was constantly analyzing the situation and the options I had to solve it. The facts: I had no keys, but I had a spare key in my room. For the immediate issue of getting home, I was either A: walking home or B: calling someone for a ride. Possible phone calls: Roommate #1; Crazy Jenny. Didn't want to go there. Roommate #2; Kelcey, who was working until midnight. Roommate #3 Tara, at the Reservation. So all of those phone calls would have been pointless. One other phone call was possible, my friend Hailey, who I know would have gladly taken me and all, but I didn't want to bother her cuz she lives out of the way and it would have been a pain for her. So I decided to walk.

When I got off work I was mentally prepared to walk home. It was only four miles and wasn't that cold. But then my number one fear in this world started to creep into my head... Rape. It is my biggest fear in the universe and Cedar City has some pretty bad statistics with it. So I called Hailey, but when she picked up I remembered how it was annoying for her to have to go out of her way again, so I changed my mind; I just told her we should hang out sometime, in a "how about tomorrow?" kind of fashion so that calling her wouldn't be as weird. But it was still pretty weird. I then hung up and proceeded to walk home.

It started out nice, I was walking on main street where there were lots of lights and, uh, witnesses... :)
Then I turned onto another street that had not so many lights or witnesses, not to mention the creepy dudes smoking on their porches...

I thought, "Hmm. I should call someone and talk to them for a while so that if I am attacked they will hear it!" And seriously, just as I was thinking this, my friend Hillary called me! She had some interesting and juicy news to tell me about so we talked about that for about 5 minutes, and then, lo and behold, my phone dies. Out of nowhere!! It wasn't flashing or warning me of its impending death at all earlier. SO I was confused. And a little freaked out. I was cursing myself for not telling Hillary about my location in case I went missing.

Oh well.

I continued down drug alley and all of a sudden the street light above me went out. My imagination went wild thinking of all the possiblities that could occur after a phone dies and street lights go out around you in those scary movies...

Sorry to give you awesome suspense, but actually nothing happened after that. Haha. A car drove really slow past me which was creepy, and there was a crazy drunk dude on the other side of the street but neither of them disturbed my journey. I crossed the bridge to the park and decided to get on the road with houses instead of going down the creepy bike path where creepers hang out. I saw lots of charming christmas lights that I don't normally see.

Then I crossed the path of a black cat. But I didn't think much of it. I finally got home without being attacked or raped, which was good. Tara texted me and asked me if I had gotten a ride. I didn't want her to worry or freak out or anything, so I lied and said "Yes, I got a ride. I rode on the wings of the angels." Which is technically not lying since maybe that's what happened... ha lucky for me she thought I was just making a silly joke and believed the part where I got a ride. So there's your lie.

Before I went to bed, I mapped out a master plan of how to get my bike back and how to efficiently get to work by 12 the next day. I would get my spare key, and ride the old red bike (that was still sitting outside) up to the hippie bike shop. I've been meaning to go up there and sell it to him for a while, and here was the perfect opportunity. The shop opened at 10, so if I got there, sold the bike to him by 10:45, I would have ample time to walk back down to campus, unlock my mt. bike, and get to work. It was a foolproof plan.

Until the bad luck of the black cat crossing came into play.

I woke the next morning, feeling proud of myself for not getting raped and for coming up with a genius plan. I went in my closet to get the spare key and it was gone. I had put it in my old glasses case so it would be safe and I would remember where it was... And of course. IT IS GONE. UGHHH.

I am mad because it is still gone.

I ransacked my room, it looks like a robber went through it 10 times. It's horrible. I searched forever, and all of a sudden it was 11:30 and I had to hurry and just use the old red bike to work. I realized halfway to work that the front tire was going flat. So that was awesome. I got off work at 7 and obviously it had completely deflated by then. I could only hope that this little tire wouldn't completely blow until I got home to fix it.

And guess what? It did me proud. :)

So for those keeping score, it's 4 for the unlucky cat, and 1 for me getting home on a flat! Woot. Sunday and Monday I did not go anywhere. I went running, but I didn't leave the apartment. I didn't feel like being productive and fixing the tire basically. Geez stop judging me.

That brings us to today. Which is Tuesday. I still have not left the apartment. And I am continuing this lazy pattern and am just catching a ride with Tara to take my final. We'll see how life goes. Also, with the assistance of youtube and the everyday lock picking criminal, my brain has given birth to some genius paper clip contraptions to pick my lock. If all works out, I will not have to fix the tire and I can just ride my mountain bike home today! That is currently my plan. I hope the black cat has worn off.

That is my tale for now. I hope you have not died of boredom. I understand it's not all that intense of a story, but it's kind of my life situation currently. So yeah get over it. The End.

Ballet Shoes.

What delicate little sheeves of fabric, what tiny precious instruments for the dance floor. Creating grace and perfection on the stage, as they allow the human foot to glide like oil on a canvas....

Yeah I hate them too.

Ballet shoes have pretty much been the bane of my existence this year. (I never thought I would say  that particular sentence in my lifetime, but there you have it.) They SUCK. Here is my woeful and detailed account of Ballet II, my Crazy Asian professor, and my unprecedented line of misfortunes with online ordering.

The  year began like any other. Except that it didn't because this is college... so nevermind.... Anyways. I was just beginning my adventure of college life and learning about the joys of purchasing those useless but "vitally important" things for school. I had waited to ask my professor what kind of ballet shoes he preferred before I bought them because I had no idea where to start. So he told me he liked canvas shoes the best and I got right down to ordering those suckers.

I got online, and found some super cheap ones and bingo I had ordered my first pair of ballet shoes. Pink, canvas, size 7, correct address entered, everything. Life was dandy.

 It continued to be dandy for about 2-3 weeks and then I was like, okay shoes from CA don't take 2-3 weeks to get here. So I called the company... and boy, did they have a genuine neanderthal operating that system. The telephone lady was so stupid. I had to explain everything twice and finally she looked it up on her computer. Apparently these cave-people had sent it to the wrong place, they'd mixed up orders. SO I waited for another 2 weeks for the order to get here.

Meanwhile, every single day the Crazy Asian was always asking for an update on the shoes. "Are they here yet?" "Are you tracking the order?" and he'd always end with the reminder: "I remind you that it is class policy for you to have the proper shoes." Ugh. I'm doing all I can crazy man, cool it.

After another week of biting my nails and checking my mails, the redirected order had finally arrived! I was so happy I was jumping up and down. The main reason for this excitement was because the Crazy Asian told me I couldn't come to class next time if I didn't have shoes. So with great delight I opened the box...

They had sent me size 6. And yes they were WAY too small. You can only imagine my reaction. Well actually probably not, I tried them on and I just started laughing maniacally. Like a regular lunatic. My roommate Tara was very concerned. I was amazed at the extent of my misfortune. So, out of a crazed frustration, I cut off the toes of my brand new, too small, too pink horrible shoes. Cut them right off. Then, I used some duct tape to lengthen the toe and MAKE them fit. I made a small triangular inscission on the sides so that the elastic would lengthen as well. When finished, I had created ballet shoes that not only fit, but also sparkled with that duct-tapey metallic shimmer!

JK they looked like miniature hobo sacks. They semi-worked but they were not, how shall we say, "asthetically pleasing"...

As my roommate Tara was watching all of this lunacy, she offered to take me to a dance store in Enoch. (Enoch, if you don't know, is like, 5 min away) Where I could pick up some shoes, actually try them on, and be done with the whole thing. So I agreed, we looked up the address of the store on Google maps and we were off! Funny thing though...

THE STORE IS IN THE TWILIGHT ZONE!!!!!

I'm not kidding, we went to the exact address from Google, (and we had double checked the address!)
It was on Tumbleweed Drive in Enoch. Considering all of Enoch is about the size of a Costco, we were absolutely certain there could not be TWO Tumbleweed Drives in Enoch. And yet. We got to the address and it was a house. In a neighborhood. Remote and all house-like. So we looked up the store on Google once again on Tara's smart phone, just to make sure we weren't crazy. There was a phone number on the page so I called it and it went to a machine that said, "Hi, you've reached the Johnson residence, please leave a message. Beep." So the phone number was wrong too? Then we thought maybe it's still a dance store because some of those crazy dance moms open their own dance store and operate it from their cozy home...

It was just too far-fetched, there wasn't even a sign out or anything. I was 100% sure this was just a random house but Tara said it wouldn't hurt to ask them if they knew where this mysterious store was. After all, if your home address was listed as "Image Dance Wear" at least twice in the Google search engine, it's probably a common occurrence for these people.... Right?? So I went up to the door and knocked and this teenage girl with a hideous face answered it. I timidly asked, "Do you know where Image Dance Wear is?" And she looked at me with that familiar stare I'd gotten from Tara earlier... the 'you are insane' look. She said she had no idea what I was talking about and slammed the door in my face.

Okay. SO either the CIA put the pig girl in that house to cover up the remains of the bombing of Image Dance Wear.... OR the store is in the Twilight Zone and pig girl is just that horrendous of a human being. Either way, it was the cherry on top for my failed crusade.

Dejected and thoroughly embarrassed, we headed home, to my hobo shoes. I wore them the next day so that I wouldn't get kicked out. Everyone was looking at me like the fat kid in elementary school. Also, while we were doing leaps one of my duct-tape tips flew off and hit another girl in the face.

After class I attempted to inform the Crazy Asian of the situation since he looked disapprovingly at me all class hour. But I had forgotten that I had gum in my mouth... guhhhhh. That is also against class policy if you wondering. So he 'chewed' me out on that one for about 10 min. I got the whole "You are a dancer, you should know that is not acceptable. You know better. This is not a dance 101 class." Crazy Asian, I am not chewing gum to attack your spiritual sanctuary you call a dance studio. It was an honest mistake that I forgot to spit it out. Did any of that leave my mouth? NO it didn't. I took it like a man. JK. But I was peeved at his rudeness, so I just left without the hobo shoe explanation and apology.

Later I got online and ordered some NEW ballet shoes. I made sure to get pink, canvas, size 7. Correct address, everything was in order. These came in less than a week, so that was exciting. Until I opened the box, to find 2 pairs of shoes. I guess they had messed up again, because I distinctly remember selecting "quantity- 1". That wasn't even the worst part though. I got one pair of shoes out to try them on. Sure enough, they were size 7, but they had sent me a different brand than before, so they were ENORMOUS. Like if Goofy took ballet, that's what they looked like on my feet.

So in great defeat, I emailed my professor and told him the circs and stated that I would be wearing my Irish dance shoes for the rest of the semester because I was DEF. not ordering online anymore. He said he was fine with that, but made it clear to me that if I "ever want to progress in the art, you will need the proper shoes." Okay dude. That's fine. Does it look like I'm dying to be a ballerina? Calm yourself.

I have been wearing my Irish dance shoes since and I'm not touching ballet shoes for a while.

And that, for now, is the END of my tale. It is a soap opera and a half. Congrats if you made it through.

Random Fall Thoughts.

 

IT'S FALL!!!! And this week has been full of random thoughts! I just thought I'd share some. (Did you see what I did there??)

Ha...Anyways.

SUU is extremely delightful to look at right now. The leaves are changing colors and you can just crunch on them as you walk down the sidewalk. It's quite pleasing to the feet. One thing that I'm missing about it being fall is this guy:

My beloved Heat Miser

I am still enjoying school. I regret not taking more credits; I tested out of a class, and then two of them are dance classes, so that leaves me with only 3 classes that I actually do homework for... I just feel like I could be getting more accomplished. Oh well. It IS nice to not stress about school and have time to work and do random things with friends!

I am in the SUU dance department concert that is coming up... and I REALLY wish I wasn't. I auditioned for a couple student choreography pieces and so I'm only in one piece. I just feel like it's a major waste of time and energy to go to rehearsals for one piece. Plus, I really hate all of the juniors and seniors in the dance department. They have more drama amongst themselves than your average circus of 12 year old girls. I guess I just thought the juniors and seniors would be cool, experienced humans, but they are really immature and annoying about stuff. (I know I exaggerate all the time, but believe me when I say this is NOT one of those times.) They take themselves way too seriously, and I usually just laugh to myself. They are so ridiculous.

On a positive dance note, WATCH this clip! I always watch it randomly because I'm creepy; this guy is so talented.

 

 

 

And yes, I often rewind to that moment around 1:10 to see his foot nearly touch is head in that leap. Don't feel embarrassed to do so.

 

 

 

MORE randomness:

My friend Darryl being a preppy school-girl? I dunno.



One of my best friends, Darryl, left on a mission this week!! Kinda weird. He called me to say goodbye since I didn't get to go to his farewell, and it was a little bit sad! I didn't think I would get sad, because frankly, I'm just not like that when it comes to humans and saying goodbye to them. But I will miss being random and weird with this Asian lunatic.

 

 

Again, I'm so glad it's fall and especially because it's Halloween time!! I love Halloween so much; I get mini depression everyday I come home and we don't have any Halloween decorations :/ It's definitely one of those moments you remember you live in a hobo shack. But I can't wait to figure out what I am going to dress up as!! I'm really really glad that my friends down here believe in Halloween celebration and cosutmes and aren't prudes about it.

And of course, I always have a random cheesy song that I'm obsessed with, so here is the latest one in case you'd like to participate in the obsession:

(Sorry it's long... the short version wouldn't upload.)

 

 

 

 

HAPPY FALL EVERYONE!!

Day in the Life!

I love SCHOOL. So here is my day in the life of me.

The SUU Library
(My second home)

 

I enjoy SUU. I love my classes, I love the campus, and I'm learning to love my piece of crap bicycle. :)

Every morning I wake up to my ducks quacking on my iPod. (Just kidding, my iPod died yesterday...but that's what used to happen.) Then I get dressed in some hobo clothes, make some measly breakfast, brush my teeth (cuz you were wondering if I did that...) and I'm out the door! I have a pretty good ride to school. It can be frustrating going there, because it's all uphill to the school and obviously there's the issue of my dinosaur bike and it's gears that slip a LOT. But it only takes me 20 min, even though it's slow-going. I always ride when the sun is coming up over the red-rock mountains. I usually pretend I am a Native American or Clint Eastwood's little sidekick. I ride on a bike path for the first mile, then I ride on this remote little road, with cute old houses. (That's usually where the Cowboy stuff stops.)

This is the Old Main Building. It's burned down several times
and supposedly it's haunted by a creepy girl.

So I get to school and if it is Mon/Wed/Fri I go get dressed in human clothes because I don't have dance classes on those days. Instead, I have math, then dance 1010, and then my intro to film class. This is an annoying schedule because math and intro to film are in the same building, but dance 1010 is clear across the world from it. So I have to whizz back and forth and back and forth. Plus some IDIOTS thought it would be a really good idea to remodel the most vital staircase on the whole  campus during fall semester...
Idiots.

One of my very favorite things about SUU is the luxury called TREES. Coming from Saratoga Springs, I am kind of tree deprived. I know the mountains are right there and all, but it's not the same as just walking on the sidewalk, with all the cute lamp posts and the trees. It's especially pretty now that the leaves are changing colors. (I'm a real weirdo, so sometimes I turn Ella Fitzgerald on my iPod and pretend I'm walking through central park in New York.) 

Doesn't do justice to the real thing. But oh well.

 

After my Mon/Wed/Fri classes I study in the library, or, now that I have a job, I go to work. Oh yeah...

I GOT A JOB!!!

 

 

Here. Here is where I got a job.

 

So anyways. After study or work, I ride home and make myself food and then study some more.

OR

I talk to my roommate Tara. She's pretty cool, she's a Navajo Indian.

Tues/Thurs. AKA TIRED DAYS.

I hate tues/thurs. Don't get me wrong, I like dancing and all, but oh my goodness. I get up at 6:00am on these days so I can have time to get ready and ride my bike to school by 8:00am for Modern III. We have a crazzy Modern teacher. She is hilarious, but she is also like an intense personal trainer from Gold's Gym or something. She's OLD too. I don't understand how she can do some of the stuff she does. The sucky thing about it is that not only do you "work-out" until you want to cry, you also have to make everything look good because it's dance. Also it's a two hour class and my attention span doesn't last very long that early...But on the plus side I've got some abs of steel now.

 

After Modern, I go to Math- Yeah, did I mention I have math everyday of the week?? Joy. Then I have a break, which I usually spend reading in the "living room" in the student center. (I can't find a pic. of it online) It's a huge open space with tons of couches in it :) It's super chill and I love it. Then to institute... there is a very creepy kid in my institute class, he has a mickey mouse voice, like when he was 14 his body grew, but his vocal chords did not? I dunno, but he's always squeaking awkward sentences at me.

THEN. Ballet II. With the Crazy Asian.

I'm pretty sure I've gained 10 pounds in muscle from ballet alone. It's hard. My professor is from the Philipines and he has a really thick accent. (Quiz=Queeez... to give you an idea.) He is fluent in French and this is where things get confusing. He instructs us in French (since it's ballet) but with his crazy accent, AND really really fast. I would be so lost if not for his physical demonstrations. I have a hard time coordinating my head and arms with my feet. I can usually master anything below the waist, but my upper body is still gorilla-ish since Irish dance has trained me never to use it. Needless to say, ballet usually makes me feel like an awkward monkey oaf.

 

And that is my schedule! I had an Information Literacy class, but I took a test-out exam and passed so I'm done with that.

 

Cedar City is fun, I usually hang out with Tara, my old pal Hailey, her fiance Brandon, and their weird friend Ryan (aka hammock boy for those who know of that tale) Hailey and Tara work together and are friends so it was just like one of those corny situations in some Cary Grant films where everyone is like "Oh my gosh, you know them too?!" I dunno. JUst like that. I've met some of their other friends as well, and some of them... are... interesting humans. :)

 

That is my life right now. And if you didn't notice, I stole these photos from the world wide web. I can't take any pictures because my iPod has finally realized it's got a shattered screen and is now useless. It doesn't respond to my touch and I've heard that's the point of the iPod touch. :/

 

The end. For now.

 

 

A long drawn out post about SHAKESPEARE...

....because I'm really bored in my college apartment.

 I can't wait for school to start because I'm really bored. So here is a very long post about shakespeare. You might have to read it in small chunks. Make little goals for yourself. I have faith you can finish it. :) So here we go.

Shakespeare! The week I've looked forward to since the same week a year ago when it ended. It is the best thing in the whole world!!! I love hanging out with my sisters, they are the best times I ever have, and the Utah Shakespeare Festival is pretty much top of the list for sister-time memories! We always have many adventures here. The main reason it is so entertaining is because its audience is made up of the hilarious elderly. Sometimes I forget that old people kind of run the entire universe.

The first play we saw was To Kill a Mockingbird. It was pretty good. I didn't like the actor who played Atticus though, so that was disappointing. Plus they had this creepy old lady actress who was being the "narration". She was onstage for the whole play, and she would just creep around in the back... It was weird. But overall, you've gotta just love that story :)
In between plays we would lounge around and read books, or go sit at the pool and read to give our white arms a little vitamin D. :)

Megan as Mary Stuart, Me as Queen Elizabeth

The second play was later that night at the Adams theater, Mary Stuart. It was pretty cool, those actresses were top notch. (Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary) I really liked it.
However, the most interesting parts of this play happened before and after...

 Before any of the plays start, they have the "greenshow" and everyone  mills around watching that and getting concessions from the people in costumes with fake english accents. SO Me, Megan and Emma all decided we could do with a small pre-show treat. We went up to the stand and began deciding what we wanted. Now, you must understand, at this point in time, I was super addicted to this iced coffee stuff:

THE BEST.



BUT. See how it says "Sweet & Creamy" in that adorable squigly writing? Yeah. So I saw Iced Coffee on the faux Shakespearean menu and I was like talking to myself in my head, "Oh man, remember how you're so addicted to that, you should get some." So I asked the dude if they had mocha iced coffee, and of course the annoying prat rattled on with his fake english accent for a sec, and I was so confused. He's like "Oh yea, we've got a bit o' chocolate flav'ring we add!" and I'm thinking okay, this must be his obnoxious way of telling me they had mocha. So to shut him up I said yes please, that would be great... *suspense*
While all of this is happening, Emma is ordering some chocolate ice cream from another "british" wench. The price for said ice cream was $2.50 and Emma was like, sweet this better be a big ice cream. Here's what they gave her:

$2.50

Hahaha :) she turned to Megan and I with this face, "$2.50" haha. Megan is happily munching on her delicious chocolate turtle cluster thing she ordered, Emma is pissed about her pathetic ice cream, and I am still waiting on my iced coffe. Finally the stupid guy is like "Iced coffee wit a bit o' chocolate!" I came up and got it from him, and then he's like, "There's a bit o' chocolate in the bottum, ya goin have to stir it up!" I just wanted to punch his face in. I inspected it, and indeed, there was "a bit o' chocolate" at the bottom. But it was more like hershey's chocolate syrup and it coated the bottom of the cup. It was not stirrable. I tried to stir it with my straw for about 10 min. I finally just tasted it and I about died. It was the nastiest thing I've ever put down my throat. Even with like 10 things of half and half and 20 packets of sugar and the "bit o' chocolate" it tasted like black death. Cold black death. At least he got the ice thing right. *Sigh* I threw it away. Luckily the play was good. I kept stealing mint life-savers from my grandma's bag of candy, and yes, they were truly "life-savers."

Emma is being the sad Jean-Val Jean from Les Miserables :)

The next day we saw Les Miserables. It was amazing. Seriously, it was so good. But. Emma did this thing where she withheld the tickets from Megan and I and then arranged them so that she sat in the middle of us. So Megan and I always sat by the crazy old people. In Les Miserables, I sat by this old guy who was kind of a hippie, he had long gray hair in a pony-tail with some radical sandals on his feet. He had. The WORST breath. It smelled so bad. Every now and then it would gently waft over to my nose and I swear...ugh. He was a very sweet man and he would get so into the play. Sometimes a song was so beautiful and touching to him that he'd let out a sigh of apprecitation... More like deathly sighs of appreciation 'mIrightt?? Maybe he'd had some black death iced coffee too.

Later that night we saw the Merry Wives of Windsor. This was my favorite Shakespeare play we saw :) It made me lol. The one jealous husband was played by this hilarious actor, he had the funniest physical comedy and he kinda looked like Arthur Weasley. (Funny tidbit: I almost ran him over on my bike yesterday, I was riding around campus and he came around a corner with his headphones in and didn't see me so it was almost fatal. But then we used our human reflexes and it was fine. He just smiled and laughed and I was just excited that I had almost crashed into a small celebrity!)

Anyways.

The next day. OH the next day! So Megan and I were waking up fairly early every morning to go running. On this particular day we got up around 7am and went out, not even that early, but for some reason, I was like WAY tired. I don't know why, but I was just, really really out of it. We went out, started running on the sidewalk by our hotel, and I tripped. You are thinking, okay, tripping happens all the time and yes, yes it does. (Especially in Cedar city, the sidewalks are crazy uneven.) So I tripped on this crack in the sidewalk, but my very tired brain just was not processing anything, so I had no reaction to it at all. I just fell. Flat on my face. Literally on my face, I didn't even realize I had tripped until I was on the ground. Megan was laughing so hard, I was amazed at the amount of control she had over her bladder that early. I slowly got up like a slug, still very confused and I finally registered the fact that I had fallen like a regular retard. Soon we were both laughing our heads off and all the people driving past in their cars were giving us frightened looks. And we were so tired we couldn't stop laughing. We tried running several times after that, but we'd just have to stop again because one of us was laughing uncontrollably again. It still makes us laugh when we think about it. It's especially funny, because whenever we retell it, everyone gives a small, half-hearted laugh, like "it's not funny guys."  Whatever. Apparently it's not funny. Shut up.

I am Scapin, Emma is the other dude whose name I don't remember. :)

SO on this day we saw Scapin. It was alright. It wasn't great. It was a lame comedy but they did the best they could with it. It just was dumb writing or something. Megan got pulled up onstage! She would kill me that I'm posting about it because I was supposed to wipe it from my memory, but I'm 4 hours away, and goodness, it was so funny! The main actor, David Ivers, came and was like dragging her up there. You could tell she was so furious. But she was an easy target, front row, right on the edge, and she wasn't 60+ yrs. She had to hit this guy in a sack with a rubber bat for a sec. The best part was after, my grandma! HAHA :) She's in love with David Ivers and she was all, "That was so funny when he dragged you up there Megan! I couldn't believe you went up! But afterall, HOW do you refuse David Ivers??"
OH grandma.

Emma being Titus Andronicus!

Later that night we went and saw Titus Andronicus. That play was crazy. It's a history and pretty much everyone dies. It's very gory, many people get their hands and heads cut off. It was Megan's favorite, but all the old people were balling because it was so tragic.
At intermission, we encountered another weirdo, we were standing outside the theater talking. I was standing in front of a garbage can and I saw this kid with an empty container headed straight toward me and I was like, "oh, I better move out of the way of this garbage can," so I did. But instead of throwing it away he made an awkward turn towards Megan and was like "Are you that girl who got dragged up onstage in Scapin?" Emma and I were fighting laughter so hard, I thought Megan would say no, but then she said "yes" in a stiff Hermione sort of voice. The kid was like "Oh cool." and then walked off. What? It was the weirdest exchange and he didn't even throw away his garbage! It reminded me of a Michael Cera moment of some kind.

That was the last of our experiences with plays :) Here are some photos of our random adventuring.


Megan being scandalous with Shakespeare.

Set for Mary Stuart

Megan's shirt was static-y to the chair and it made a funny, cancerous-looking hump.

"WE RUN THIS VILLAGE! buh duh na!" Jk. Bad joke.

She's a little shy :)

Set for Merry Wives of Windsor


We're Nerds for Shakespeare!!



Bryce Canyon!

So we had the Smith family reunion at Bryce Canyon this year. It was really fun, I always love hiking through red rock and hanging with the fam. The only annoying part is that like all of my cousins that we used to play with and adventure around with are married with kiddies so they're no fun to talk to anymore... Not that marriage and kids are bad, but I just can't relate and I get bored of their conversations now. :)

But my sisters and I had fun together as usual! Megan and I were hiking buddies. I also got extremely sunburned on my shoulders- second degree burns and they've got enormous blisters. It's nasty.

Also, this trip reminded me how I want to be an archeologist. It was my childhood "When I grow up, I want to be..." an archeologist. Of course when I was a childling I didn't know that term I just knew I wanted to go to egypt and dig up bones. *Sigh* Maybe someday.
Here are some pictures.

My head looks really big in this... haha :)

Cool desert tree.

Meganini taking cover from the blistering sun.

Megan and I were tired :)

Emmaline.



Hiking Buddies!!

Where we've been!



Graduation + Excited for SUU!

SO. I graduated. Like a month ago :)  haha so here are some pics.




First ever friend in Saratoga and only girl who has been in the same ward with me through 8 ward splits!! Haha talk about status. Plus random creeper in the background.

It's my real mom and Kenzie's 2nd mom. Haha. :)

Running buddy and orchestra co-survivor Hillary

Me and Grant Esser. AKA Professor Esser

My Fillipino friends Darryl and Russell!

BFF :)

I'm sad to say goodbye to things like dance company, running XC and track, easy classes, and random people I may not talk to again. Especially, I'm going to miss Irish dance. It's kinda weird to imagine life without it, I've been doing it for a long time and it's so routine. SO here's to my class and all the crazy crap we do! Two last performances!

Also, I'm getting very excited to go to SUU. I'm taking three dance classes, an intro to film class, a math class and information literacy. So super excited!! I went to orientation yesterday and I can't wait. However I did meet two of the snottiest girls alive and they're both in my dance classes :/ three guesses which school they're from? Oh that's right you only need one- LONE PEAK. snots. Oh well. I'm still pumped.



Sentimental

So I hate my blog, I think it's annoying. But whatev. I'll just keep posting anyways I guess, though it's life is hanging by a thread.

This is my very favorite song right now. I love it. Keane was the soundtrack of my summer before entering 7th grade; here they come, back into my life just before I enter the first year of college :) (Is that cheesy enough for you??)

My life is pretty great. I just have three more projects and two more tests, all will be done after this week!! I'm excited for all the senior activities, we have the senior dinner dance this Saturday and then Lagoon day next week. I will DEF. be spending that time with Brecken Bird. Just in case you wanted to know ;) I'm getting sad about saying goodbye to people!

My senior year of Westlake has definitely been my favorite. I know everyone says senior year is super stressful, (which of course it is) but I loved this whole year. :)

Music

Music is very consistent for me. My life gets kinda crazy sometimes and music is the one thing that stays the same. It's always been the same for me. Obviously I've been playing violin for ages, so it's always been there for me in the literal sense of things, but also, I think because it was always the one thing I was never worried about, and the one thing I never got competitive about, it became my comfort blanket. I can just go into the music room in whatever mood I happen to be in and play. I play songs I played years and years ago, and I play them horribly. I play songs I'm learning currently and play them up to tempo without caring how awful it is. I play really slow songs and make them sound nice and then I play fast songs and try to hold on :) I play the piano. And guess what? I'm horrid at that too. I drive my family absolutely nuts by playing the piano. But I love it and it doesn't matter to me that it's not perfect music because it's just expression. SO I suppose this is me awkwardly saying I LOVE music :) haha

Aside from playing it, I live for listening to music. I would not survive one day without my iPod. It's ridiculous. I love all kinds of music and I love that I can just choose a mood to be in or coordinate my mood with all the different music genres. If I'm feeling relaxed or contemplative I'll pull out some classical music. Or if I just am really angry I'll cliche myself with teen angst stuff like My Chemical Romance or Paramore. If I'm in a party-ish mood, pop music, a creative/imaginitive mood, perhaps a soundtrack like the Village. Sometimes I feel artistic and I listen to really weird modern stuff like Radical Face. I am so so weird about my music and I'm probably a certifiable lunatic because of it. But whatev. Music saves my life!

Here are some of my favorite randomly genred songs for your listening pleasure if you ever are bored :)


                                             Vivaldi, Concerto in D for classical guitar
                                                                      (Relaxed)

                                       Famous Last Words by My Chemical Romance
                                                                    (Hard Core :)

The Village: Gravel Road

(Soundtrack)

Welcome Home by Radical Face

(Nostalgic mood? I guess? I don't know how to classify this)

You Make me Feel... by Cobra starship and Sabi

(party mood)

I have to say, I know this is the dumbest song ever. I still can't figure out why I like it. It's stupid music, but I like it for some mysterious reason... try not to judge me to harshly :) haha 

Warning Sign by Coldplay

(Chill out mood)

And lastly, Misguided Ghosts by Paramore

One of their more chill songs, and it's just another chill-mooded one, I just really like it right now.

If you feel like I need to be tested for multiple personality disorder or something, I will understand :) I'm a rando.

MORE DANCE.

You didn't think it was possible did you?

STATE FESTIVAL. It was extremely fun. And awesome and so worth every penny and long hour of practice!
On Friday me and four other senior girls on my company went up to SLCC by ourselves for a dance scholarship audition class. (It's just a modern technique class where people from every college in the state watch you, so it's for multiple scholarship opportunities) It was taught by Cain Keenan. He is the coolest man alive! He's extremely gay though. But yeah, he is such an amazing dancer and I love taking classes from him!!

Then on Saturday morning we rode a bus up with the whole company for the actual state festival stuff at the U. We started with a partnering class where you learn to do lifts with people and such. We learned a really awesome combination from Natasha Washington. I was partners with this kid named Diego on our company, he is a new addition and his first style is ballroom so he lifted me with ease and it was super fun.

Then we had an amazing modern technique class with "Brad"... He looked like Tom Hanks mixed with the grown-up version of cartoon Andy from Toy Story 3. And I totally called it; he was gay too! Anyways, Brad taught us a combination to an Opera song... yeah. It was weird, but they assigned him the music so it's not like he wanted to do it to opera, so I'll partially forgive him. But not completely because he had us do this jump to the floor thing and I went for it and I landed right on top of my knee and it STILL has a bruise that's multi-colored and larger than life. It was a protruding goose egg those first two days.

Us and Brad!

After Brad's suicide class we had lunch and got ready to be adjudicated. Then we walked down to... KINGSBURY HALL! Gah. It was so cool. You walk in and it's all quiet and the old guy at the desk directs you to the dance studio in the basement of the backstage. We warmed up and then went up onto the stage to meet the judges. We were grouped with West Jordan and Tooelle high schools as well so it went in an every other school fashion. After all the performances we went back to the studio in the basement. A few people in our other piece (the Transformers hip hop) told me it was the best they'd seen my piece danced which was a great morale booster! The judges were really great and they had good feedback. One lady was an extreme chatterbox so they ran out of time for detailed commentary, but the judge from UVU said she loved mine!

When we got back from adjudication we took a contact improvisation class. It was so cool. This man and lady were professional contact improvers; they just lean and lift each other with their backs and cores and they hardly ever used their hands. It was SO cool to watch. They didn't fall out of anything either, they were so quiet and gentle with landings. I found this video with them in it, it's not super great, I wish you could see what I saw! But if you fast forward to about 2:45 ish there are some cool lifts in there.

Us and the Improvers!

After contact improvisation we had an hour break. I got to know so many company members a lot better and it was nice to chill out with everyone. Then we had an African dance class! It was Congolese African (from the Congo) The lady who taught it studied in Africa; she was really cool and extremely knowledgeable about the style. They also had live drum music, it was so fun and awesome! Charly and Megan-- One of the drummers was the creepy long blond-haired tall one who was creeping on us at sugar space!! Crazy.

Then we ate dinner and went to Kingsbury Hall for the ending Gala show thing. Every school can showcase one of their pieces so we did Inception. It was the coolest thing to perform on that stage. I loved it. And so many other schools had amazing pieces, it was an awesome show. After the show they announced scholarships and awards. I didn't get any of the scholarships from the class I took on Friday, BUT. I got the "Meritorious Student Choreography Award"!!! They only give out six of them for the whole state, sorry to brag, but I'm going to. :) haha. It was just one of those few successful moments I've had ya know!

Anyways, after that extravaganza, we went to ANOTHER class. We were all really really tired, but it was the best one by far. It was called a contact improv jam session. So we went in with some other schools and this brittish lady explained the rules and then we "jammed". You could do anything you wanted it was just contact improving whatever for an hour. At first people were awkward about it but by 20 minutes in you would be lifted up by random people, contacting with someone you didn't know or never even seeing their face. I got picked up by some huge kid and was in the air spinning... I don't even know how it happened but it didn't even scare me because you just learn to trust people.  Everyone was just dancing and moving and lifting each other in the air. It was so cool. I can't even explain it. And it probably sounds really psycho and weird, and it probably is! But whatever :)

It was fun and if you read this whole thing you deserve a medal!