Oh Christmas, how do I love thee so?

Oh Christmas, how do I love thee so? Let me count the ways...

I love riding the sleds with my cute niece.

I love playing pranks

I love ice skating with the family

And playing Crack The Whip

I love visiting with friends

I love playing dress-up with my awesome niece

And I love seeing random elk at Scheels

Oh Christmas. Wonderful Christmas. I sure do love you!!!

My Invisible Friends

Today my friends came to visit! Ivan, Chester, Phill, Lucy, Noel. They are so great. I took them to see the famous USU Bull

They had to stop for a picture on the stairs. Then Noel decided that she wanted a turn at riding the bull. And why not? She's invisible. No one was going to get her in trouble!

Then I took them for a tour of campus. Ivan had to show off his balancing skills

Noel tried climbing one of the trees

But then she was so tired! So she sat down to rest for a minute.

Then we dared her to try licking the flag pole. (You can tell she didn't grow up with a lot of snow.)

Her tongue got stuck to the pole and we had to help her out.

Then I took to them to the famous Utah State A. Noel and Ivan wanted to become true aggies, and of course we couldn't tell them no.

Then Matthew wanted to give it a shot. So Noel volunteered to kiss him.

But then I couldn't turn down the opportunity to join in the fun. So Ivan agreed to kiss me.

After that, we went back to the TSC to warm up for a little while. Ivan started showing off again. He jumped up on the handrail and tried to slide down.

Then Noel found the couch up on the 3rd floor and watched some TV while Kevin and Ivan played some foozeball.

Then we all went outside and the guys had a snowball fight.

After the snowball fight, we needed to get back to being productive for the day. So our friends said goodbye and headed home. I'm so glad they came!!!

...It's kind of like being a homeless bum

College life... Isn't it the greatest? It's almost like being a homeless bum.

As college students we couch surf. (I mean, who actually sleeps at their own apartment when you have friends with couches?)

We wear sweats and slippers in public. (Who needs to look dignified anyway?)

We beg for money. (Namely from our parents.)

And we pounce as soon as we hear the words "free food".

Fortunately, I have only done two of the previous four pitiful activities. (You can just guess which ones.) But last week I set a new PR for how many free meals I had in one day, and I feel like it might be worth bragging about.

It started out with ASUSU giving away free sandwiches as bribery for people to come up to their offices and talk to them. Well, lucky for me, I already all my time there anyway. So I reaped the benefits of the situation. Thank you ASUSU.

Then there was a "Lunch and Learn" at the business building. The student chapter of SHRM was hosting a resume workshop. So I went and got some tips about building a good resume and creating my personal brand, then I got to enjoy some delicious Texas Roadhouse. Thank you SHRM for feeding me so well.

Later that night, I was with Spencer and he said that Clayton was at the end-of-semester social for the AIS club (also in the business building). He said that they were serving pizza and that Clayton had invited him to come. As Spencer's adopted little sister, I got to go along for the ride. So we looked the event location up on the school's website, then headed up to campus. We got there just in time to grab the last few pieces of pizza, some sweets, and chocolate milk before the party ended. Thank you Clayton, Spencer, and the AIS club for the pizza.

So the moral of the story... being a college student (or a homeless bum) can be kind of fun. Now I feel even more inspired to move to Florida where I can be a beach bum/professional dumpster diver. :)

Rantings of an Economist- Part 2

The semester is nearly over. That means the end of economics classes with my hilarious professor. So here is a second post dedicated to him and his perspective on life. Enjoy these rantings of an economist:

"If you want to make a lot of money, you need to work for the government or be productive. I took the government route. But I recommend most of you take the productive route."

"If you're short and lousy at shooting, you're probably not playing college basketball. If you're short and can't shoot, there is no point to your existence." (This was while explaining why it's good if the opposing team fouls your short players in the final minutes of a game. Because if a guy is short, he must be a really good shot or he wouldn't be playing.)

"We should have Hollywood take over the government. Then everyone in the government would be really good looking."

"Light houses are just decoration now. They're like earrings on the coast."

"If you want to blame someone in our country, find the median voter and kick his ass."

"It's just as wrong to eat a car as it is to eat a horse."

"Trying to measure happiness is like trying to measure how much people enjoy eating snickers."

"Oprah is one of our cultural over-lords. Her and Taylor Swift."

I hope you've enjoyed this edition of Rantings of an Economist. I'm sorry that this is the end of the series.

Glimpses Into my Childhood

Here's a good reflective post for you. I felt like writing about some of my memories from my wonderful childhood.

When I think of my childhood I think of riding snowmobiles and four-wheelers. We used to tie a sled behind the snowmobile and pull it around the neighborhood or field. It was always so fun. We'd sit 2-3 kids on it, and see how far we could tilt it to the side without flipping it over. The best part is, that we still do it. When we go sledding still, Jashley and I will share a sled. We're so big now that we're crammed on there in really uncomfortable positions, but hey! it still works.

Another activity that I associate with my childhood, is playing night games. I remember during the summer trying to play night games with my sisters and neighbors almost every night. We would always pow-wow at Robertson's house, and pick a game. Then we would start playing, and end up arguing for a very long time about whether or not the little kids had to split up or if they could stay in a pack. Usually by the time that we finished arguing, no one cared anymore and we'd find something else to do. So basically there wasn't a whole lot of playing going on, but it's the thought that counts. Something else that goes right along with this is sleeping on the trampoline. During the summer, my sisters and I would sleep on the tramp as often as mom and dad would let us. To this day, it's still my favorite place to sleep.

One of my favorite games to play with my neighbors was Pirates. We'd split into teams with Cameron, Brett, and Adam Moore, and one group would be the pirates and the others would be the good guys. The pirates would catch the good guys and hold them captive on "their ship" (either the trampoline or the swing set.) Then the other good guys had to go rescue them. It was always so fun, but I remember that somehow it always turned into a game of house.  

When I was little kid I used to do this weird thing where I'd sit on the kitchen floor, pull my legs up to my chest so my feet weren't touching the ground, and spin. I'd sit there forever just spinning around in circles, sitting on the kitchen floor. It was really rather fun. You should try it sometime.

One of the most bizarre memories of my childhood was coming downstairs in the middle of the night once and finding Emily and Jashley, in Emily's formal dresses and having cowboy-style shoot outs while Le sat on the couch rolling with laughter. They'd provide the sound effects from The Good, the Bad, the Ugly (The one that I used to have as my ringtone, if that helps any), then they'd draw their imaginary guns from their hip-holsters and shoot each other. To this day, I still don't know why they were dressed in formal dresses, or why they were shooting each other, but I guess that's just the type of thing that we did in my family.

Another great memory from my childhood was when I learned my first swear word. I was watching the movie While You Were Sleeping. There's a part where one of the old men asks "What the hell is going on here?!" I thought that was funny, and that I was clever by quoting this movie. So I went and asked Jashley "Hey Jashley, what the hell is going on here?!" She laughed and told me to go tell Emily. I thought she laughed because I was funny, so I went and asked Emily "Hey Emily, What the hell is going on here?!" Emily also laughed and told me to go tell mom and dad. I thought I was supposed to go tell them because it was such a good one that they thought everyone should hear it. Apparently it was, but not in the way that I was thinking. So I went and asked my parents "Hey! What the hell is going on here?!" Then I got in trouble. Thank you Jashley and Emily.

All of these stories make me laugh. I had the best childhood a person could ever ask for. Great family, friends, neighbors, all living in a wonderful neighborhood. What more could a person want?

The girl who fainted

The day started out fine. Kelsey left the dentist office that morning feeling happy as can be. One her way to catch the bus, she sent a text to her mom saying "Wow! That laughing gas is good stuff!"

She felt slightly weak as she hustled across campus to meet up with her group members. She entered the business building study room as Eric, Jeff, and Jenny were finalizing their power point for the presentation they were to give on workplace bullying. The group moved together to the classroom where they were to set up for their presentation.

Jenny began the group presentation by asking the class-members what types of workplace bullying they had witnessed before. Eric followed her by defining what workplace bullying actually is, and giving examples of the different types of bullying. Then Kelsey spoke about the legal aspects of workplace bullying. She stumbled over her words a little bit, but the presentation continued as planned. After Kelsey's two bits, Jeff began telling the class about some strategies to avoid workplace bullying. That was where things took a turn for the worse.

While Jeff was asking for feedback on a given scenario, Kelsey's ears started ringing, and she started feeling disoriented. She shifted her weight and clasped onto the edge of the counter. She lost focus of what was going on, and the next thing she knew she was sitting on the ground and her group members and teacher were gathered around her. Her ears were ringing so terribly that it was almost a physical pain. Her friends helped her get to her feet, and Jenny walked her to the bathroom to recompose herself.

To comfort Kelsey, Jenny said that she had gone down really gracefully. Jenny had thought that Kelsey was bending over to pick a pencil off the ground, but then Kelsey slumped over and slid down the front of the table she had been holding on to. After the group had rushed over and gathered around, Kelsey had opened her eyes and regained consciousness.

After Kelsey had recovered from the event, she walked with Jenny back to the classroom. They sat through the rest of the class, and then reconvened with Eric and Jeff to discuss their next project. Eric told Kelsey that when she had collapsed, he had rushed over to her, but then realized that he did not know what to do once he got there. He said that in that moment, he did not remember any of his boy scout first aid training, and did not remember what to do with someone who had lost consciousness.
Jeff on the other hand said that when he saw Kelsey collapse, he started towards her, but then decided to keep his distance because he did not want her to feel too crowded when she came back around. The group joked that she had collapsed at the perfect moment. Jeff had just concluded and they had asked the class for questions, and that was when Kelsey slumped over and lost consciousness.

After discussing the event with her friends, Kelsey was feeling slightly less mortified at the fact that she had passed out and collapsed in front of 40 of her classmates. Although she would forever remember it as the most embarrassing moment of her life.

Rantings of an Economist

My Microeconomics professor is hilarious. We'll be sitting in class, and he'll go off on a random tangent for like 5 minutes, then refocus and continue with the lecture. When he does this, you can almost see the gears turning in his mind. As we've gone through the semester, I've kept notes of some of the funny things he's said. Hopefully they aren't "you had to be there" quotes. I tried to get ones that would just be funny in general.

"Jimmy Carter was a terrible president. And he was killed by a giant swimming rabbit. I'm serious. Look it up on the internet."

He has a theory that if you don't know what something is made out of, you can assume that it's made out of corn. Exhibit A) "Slurpies. What's in slurpies? Probly corn. Yeah! High fructose CORN syrup!"

"Anyone who's got any use for their guns: hunting, defending themselves,..... doing some murdering..... They aren't going to sell them."

Once someone asked if there was some way to come up with some formula for the government to calculate tax rates. Here are his reasons for why the answer is no: "1) the world is a complicated place 2) no one listens to economists anyway."

"Gregory Peck is nearly dead. He's not as great as he once was, but he's still awesome. you should show him some respect."

When discussing why politicians are too smart to believe all the things they say: "The fact that politicians provide this crap leads me to infer that there's demand for it."

"Let's be honest, losing a minimum wage job is only barely worse than keeping it."

"You want to ride a motorbike? Don't wear a helmet! We have a high demand for your organs."

In reference to Idaho: "You work hard, do well, then you have to screw something on your car that says 'famous potatoes'."

In reference to a picture of Joseph Schumpeter: "You look at this guy and you think 'yeah, he could be an ass-hole'."

"No one takes AIDS medicine for fun. It's not a good recreational drug."

"They've convinced us that if you refuse to pay for a diamond, you are a bad, bad person."

"You didn't buy the 120 pack of crayons and memorize the names? Apparently I was kind of obsessive as a child."

"Baseball doesn't need a salary cap; it's all randomness, so it doesn't really matter. It's not like football and basketball."

I hope you have enjoyed my documentation of the random rantings of an economist. Maybe I'll write another post at the end of the semester.