Pumpkin Carving

I just wanted to post a couple of pictures. The other day a couple in our ward invited our newly formed group of young couples to come carve pumpkins at their new (bigger) apartment. I haven’t carved a pumpkin or roasted pumpkin seeds in quite a number of years, but Scott and I have been having a great time hanging out with the other young couples in our ward and decided to go. Here are the results:

Our pumpkin: cleaned out by Scott, carved by me (with the help of a stencil).

The group of pumpkins. I think we should go pro, don't you??? :)

Unexpected Call

It was certainly one of the most random pick-ups ever (though definitely beaten out by the Russian who, out of nowhere, flat-out proposed to me on an airplane once). It started in my American History class last Thursday.

"Hey, can I borrow your cell phone for a quick sec?" A guy leaned over to me in the middle of class and asked this in a whisper. "Uh, sure." I said. "Just take it outside to use it."

He did, and came back into class very shortly afterward, handing my cell phone to me with a "thank you". I thought to myself that it must have either been a quick conversation, or he didn't reach whomever it was that he was trying to get ahold of. "No worries," I replied and went back to taking notes.

This morning I received a voice message from a number I didn't recognize. I've been waiting for a call from someone named Dan, who is supposed to fix the huge hole in our roof, and thought it might be him. But it wasn't; it was the guy from history class (whose name I can't pronounce). Apparently his "quick conversation" consisted of him using my cell phone to get my number. I nearly choked on the carrot I was eating when I heard the message, and then burst out laughing.

I debated whether I should call him back right then, or wait until 2:00 when we had class together and talk to him face-to-face. Neither option sounded particularly tantalizing. Hoping for a voice mailbox, I opted for the cowardly technique of calling him. Unfortunately, he answered. The conversation was short and as awkward-less as I could make it; I told him that I was flattered but I was also quite married.

I didn't see him in class today; I hope it wasn't my fault.

The Play's The Thing

I was really nervous about the auditions, but I left feeling like I did pretty well. The question was: is "pretty well" good enough? I went in competing against people of quite varied talent level, and some of them I wasn't worried about. But there was a group of guys who knew the director quite well and had been in the Theatre Department at PGCC for at least 2 years. The other trouble was that the show consists of only 3 parts - 3 male parts. The director had said she was willing to accept females for a mixed-gender cast if she found the right ones.

And I got in! The play is The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Abridged, and it's hysterical. 3 of us do all of Shakespeare's plays in 90 minutes, switching out roles and condensing the plays until there's nothing left but the funny parts.

The best part is that I get to play Hamlet...you can just picture it, can't you? :)

Pride of the Police Force

It had already been a long day. I had taken a Sister in my ward to the hospital at 2:45, and now it was a little past 9pm. We sat in the drive-thru at CVS, waiting for her prescription to be filled. A cop was parked near us, in the small and dark parking lot around the side of CVS that the drive-thru was on. He seemed to be having fun playing with his car - fiddling with buttons and knobs, flipping the lights on and off, and inspecting the decals that said "Police". His buddy drove up. The second cop's car was identical to the first's, but the two officers went through the whole fun process - again - of examining the features of their cars. Their conversation went from their cars, to inappropriate comments about some girl they know named Emily, back to their cars.

"Hey, man, I tried the lights yesterday. I turned 'em on, just to see what people would do, and zhoop, zhoop (imagine this sound accompanied by hand gestures indicating cars pulling over), all those cars pulled over!"
"Yeah, it's great, isn't it?"

The two looked extremely impressed with themselves. The pride of the police force then proceeded to turn their flashing lights on, backed up few steps to admire their handiwork, and began practicing whipping their guns out of the holsters reminiscent of the Old West. I rolled my eyes.

I admit I was tempted to get out of my car and confront the second cop about my feelings on his bragging about his misuse of authority entrusted to him by the city (or county, or state - I can't remember which level of government his car revealed that he worked for). But I didn't - even though I did confront some random guy in traffic the other day and told him I thought he was a jerk (I walked up to his car while he was stopped at a stoplight). But he couldn't arrest me and didn't have a gun.

I doubt that criminals who were in mid-crime last night realized how lucky they were that these two officers in particular happened to be on duty.

Remember to Breathe

We've officially lived in our new apartment for a whole week now. Sure, we've had furniture and stuff in this place for a good month now, but moving in has been a slow process. I've been holding my breath from the beginning, wondering if everything was going to go as planned.

I started packing in the middle of July, and did that for 2 weeks. The third week I was in Utah. The fourth found me frantically cleaning the old apartment for inspection, moving carloads of stuff to our new place - box by box, bag by bag - and unpacking what I could. The next week and a half Scott and I were in Texas. But last Tuesday we returned home, and, aside from a new (used) futon from Salvation Army and a $5 bookshelf (we were so lucky to find it - nothing around here is that cheap!) from Value Village, not much in our apartment has changed. But only now do I finally feel settled.

It's nice to let out the breath I've been holding for a month and a half! I think my face was turning purple...

An All-Too-Familiar Face

We went to church twice that day. First to 9am sacrament meeting at the local LDS chapel, then to St. Christopher's Episcopalian church for 10:30 mass with my father. Scott had not remembered ever going to an Episcopalian service before, and afterward he peppered my dad with sociological questions about the structure and policies of the church. Thank goodness there was no mention, and therefore no debate, about the actual religion.

I was looking forward to attending the LDS meeting, and for once Scott and I made it to church on time. (Why is it so difficult to do when we're at home?) We walked in right as the bishop was welcoming everyone to church on that lovely Sabbath morning, and settled in to the last row before the music started.

And then I saw him. Sitting at the sacrament table, dressed in white shirt and tie, was a man who was the spitting image of my stepfather - plus 15 pounds and 10 or so years. I froze. I finally tore my eyes away, and to keep myself from looking back at him I forced myself to stare straight ahead. The whole thing was extremely unnerving. A few minutes went by and I couldn't hold my gaze ahead any longer. I glanced back at the mystery man. I swear, it's him. Could it really be? No, of course not - but, sacre bleu, it looks just like him, only there are more wrinkles (stress, or age? very hard to say) lining his face. But he's got Richard's same brown hair, the same mustache, the same sad, tortured eyes. Even the way he holds his hands in front of him is the same. Oh, please, Lord, don't let him look at me. But the man did look. I turned away quickly, pretending to be fascinated by the hymnbook in my lap. I stole another glance. He caught me, and again I looked away. It became almost a game - I would stare at him and study his every feature, comparing them to Richard's, until the man would catch me watching him - and I would look away and pretend that I wasn't. Every time I looked at him panic would rise in my throat; it was like a horror movie that I couldn't help but watch, though it made my stomach churn to look.

This went on for a good 10 minutes. Only once was I not fast enough in glancing away, and our eyes locked momentarily. I very nearly vomited. The man stared at me curiously and I thought I saw (though very well could have imagined) in his eyes the very same fear and inner turmoil that was Richard's. I physically could not tear my eyes away, and I thank the Lord that the man broke the gaze first. Oh the panic I felt! It was all I could do to not run, shaking and in tears, from the room. But I stayed, and let the anxiety flow out of my fingers as I gripped my scriptures until my knuckles turned white.

I survived one Sunday but I don't know if I could handle much more than that. If I lived in Killeen I would go inactive pretty quickly - or attend church in a different area. I know that sometimes people stop coming to church because they don't like certain people in the congregation - but has anyone gone inactive because somebody looked like a person that they didn't like?

Not What I'd Planned

The look on the dentist's face as he examined my x-rays was not one that any dental patient would want to see. It was the look of one bearing ill news. He sucked air quickly through his gritted teeth and said frankly, "Well, it looks like you're in an awful lot of pain." "Yeah, it feels that way too," I laughed weakly. I was trying to be brave but was terrified, for good reason, of what he might say next.

A root canal was the order of the day - that very day, in fact. The dentist insisted that I have it started within the hour, hoping only one operation would solve the problem. I began to cry. All the pain that I had been trying so hard to hold back was released, mixing with tears that signified my terror at facing the root canal.

The bad news: they wouldn't, though I begged, put me to sleep for it.
The good news: they promised that it would all be over by lunch time.

Lunch time? I think I can handle that, I told myself. But I cried all the same. For the next hour while I waited I sat in silence, only speaking when spoken to and certainly not drawing out my answers. "This isn't how it's supposed to be!" I thought indignantly. "I'm on vacation! Why am I stuck in a dentist's office?"

For all my crying and worrying, it went pretty well. My mother-in-law sat with me the whole time for support. She's wonderful. The dentist and his son (who actually did the root canal) were both very kind, and did everything they could to make me feel comfortable. Of course, no matter what, root canals aren't exactly comfortable - but they did the best that they could. Only a few times during the procedure did my knuckles turn white from clenching the chair arms and did the pain squeeze silent tears from my eyes. I'm sure there have been worse root canals in the history of the world. :)



Honestly, it was the feeling ill and vomiting from the pain medication for 3 days afterward that really got to me.

A New Toy

I get the best birthday presents ever. Last year my husband gave me a LoveSac, and this year I got the Primary Songbook and....

A Dwight Shrute bobble head!!! It's a lot of fun and has provided minutes upon minutes of entertainment so far.

Everyone has my permission to be jealous.

It's not really a fire

One of the things I'm looking forward to the most about moving to a new apartment is the likelihood of getting my peaceful Sunday afternoons back. I haven't had them for a while. Most weeks it's the guy downstairs blasting his deluge of random music (I've heard both Reggae and ABBA) at wall-shaking volumes, but yesterday something else woke me from my attempt to catch up on sleep lost at Girls' Camp.

It was the (very loud and obnoxious) fire alarm.

"Oh, no" I moaned, as I slowly rolled out of bed. Scott checked the hallways but there was no sign of smoke, so we decided it was a punk kid pulling the alarm for fun. I called 911, explained the situation, and the volunteer fire department came out to turn it off. Unfortunately, the guy had broken the alarm when he'd pulled it, so it took the firemen 40 minutes to disable it. Stupid kid.

Prank alarm-pulling happens a lot in this complex (not a single person evacuated the building quickly, they only left after about 20 minutes when they couldn't take the noise anymore) - but then again so does arson. There has been a rash of fires recently, and the sign in my stairwell put up by management asking for information about the arsonist has been burned at the edges by a lighter. Someone thinks they're funny, apparently.

I don't.

Off to Camp

There are reasons I'm looking forward to Girls' Camp this next week, and reasons I'm not. I'm super-excited to using my new tent and sleeping bag for the first time, but not looking forward to the muggy weather. Although I can't wait to get outside and just enjoy nature, I'll miss hot showers. Bed bugs surely won't follow me all the way to camp - but ticks, mosquitoes, and spiders will gladly take their place in eating me alive. Also, I'm not sure how I'll survive without my computer for a week. Or my husband.

I leave in 30 minutes - here's to hoping I make it back alive. :)