A day of fruit and comedy

That is what today is full of: fruit and comedy.

I cut a watermelon for the first time this morning. It wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be. I think it probably tasted better because I'm the one who cut it too. Besides watermelon, I've also eaten a nectarine; it wasn't quite ripe yet but still good. My breakfast was even fruit-centered: a smoothie w/ strawberries, mango, orange juice and banana. Oh, and there was a little vanilla Greek yogurt thrown in for good measure, so while it's not fruit it's still delicious.

As far as the comedy is concerned, I'm dedicating today to The Office and, perhaps my new favorite show, Jerry Seinfeld's Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee. Those who know me well or know anyone in my family should already be aware of the fact that Seinfeld is probably my family's favorite show overall. Somewhere in our house you'll find all 9 seasons on DVD, plus a Seinfeld poster that I just realized I forgot to bring with me to school this year. Basically anything Jerry Seinfeld does I love. His new web series is no exception. It is literally what the title says: he picks up a comedian friend in a cool car and they get coffee. I think my favorite part of the show is seeing Jerry crack up at what his friends are saying. He obviously says funny things as well but he definitely sets up his friends for the best jokes/lines. It's like he's trying to showcase their talent, which is great. It works. So far the show's guests include Larry David, Ricky Gervais, Brian Regan, and Alec Baldwin.  (I'm currently in the middle of the Alec Baldwin episode.) They're all between 10 and 13 minutes long, so it's not terribly time consuming but long enough to get you involved. I highly suggest checking it out.

I suppose another thing I should mention about today is the fact that I'm going to finish Sherlock Holmes, as in the book by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It's kind of comedy, I guess. By far my absolute favorite part of reading it is seeing the adaptations made in both the films of Sherlock Holmes and the BBC television show Sherlock. To me, the television show does the better job of staying true to who Sherlock is, but you can be the judge of that yourself. If you do decide to watch the show, be prepared for intense drama and lots of terrible cliffhangers, and by terrible I mean awesome and perfect and the kind you really hate to love.

As far as summer days go, eating fruit, watching comedies and reading are not bad activities. I mean, it's not quite as adventurous as spending the day w/ friends at a rope swing, or as carefree as walking around Ikea, but it's still pretty good.

Last YouTube video I watched: Girl Pockets

Taking a break

I've been studying for a good part of the afternoon and feel the need for a little break, even though after church, Becca and Trent came over and we had sweet potato fries and pancakes for lunch. It's a winning combination, I know. We've had lunch together a number of times this semester and it's great fun.

I only have two actual finals; one is tomorrow and the other is on Tuesday. I alternate studying for them so I don't get worn out on one subject. Later tonight as I study I will probably focus solely on my history final, though. I'm quite excited to be done with this semester, even though I will be staying spring and taking a few classes. I've been assured that spring is much more chill than other semesters so I'm not worried.

Perhaps the most exciting part of spring will be leaves returning to trees. I've never been in Utah in spring and I hear it's pretty nice, though I doubt anything can rival the actual forested and not desert land of the Midwest. Nevertheless, it should still be a nice little experience.

In other fun news, I hit my head on a cupboard door today; rather a cupboard door hit my head as I opened it. There's a pretty nice bump there now. And right after this head-knocking I knocked off the counter a bowl filled with pasta, which was a shame because that pasta was going to be delicious.

While I'm writing this I've got The Office going on in the background. No matter how many times I see these episodes they are still hilarious. Right now I'm going through season four and am currently watching "Launch Party," an episode I quite like because of Jim and Pam pretending to be the computer and messing with Dwight. Brilliant. I'm looking forward to watching the "Dinner Party" episode very soon as well. I'm sure tomorrow in the library I'll get to it.

Time to get back to studying, though.

Last YouTube video I watched: Dawes - When My Time Comes, Live from Coachella

My show

I'm pretty sure one of the subjects I blog about most is The Office. When I come to think about my life over the last few years, that show is one of few constants. Not even just the last few years, either. I've been watching since the very first episode of season two and it didn't take long for me to go back and watch season one.

It's crazy to think that The Office has been on almost as long as Seinfeld was; it has nine seasons, in case you didn't know, and The Office is currently on season eight. I'm still pretty much of the opinion that it should've stopped when Steve Carell left but I've definitely not stopped watching. I feel about The Office the same way I felt about LOST: I've just watched it for so long that to stop would be silly. However, LOST had a lot more questions I wanted answered compared to The Office.

If you ever walk past me in the library, that's probably what I'm watching too. It's my default studying show. And my default relaxing show. And my default I don't know what else to watch show. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, how a perfect date would be watching The Office. Though I suppose I've already had that date, I'm definitely not opposed to doing it again.

Well, that's enough about that wonderful show. I want to give a shout-out to my friend Kaitlin who wrote this awesome post about our little picnic to the park with Cafe Rio. She's an awesome photographer too, so of course there are gorgeous pictures along with some nice words. Kaitlin is one of my neighbors and was in my Italian class last semester; I got to see her every day last semester because of it. Basically, she's wonderful.

And now because I'm in the mood to put pictures on my blog because I've been reading Kaitlin's. So here's a few pictures from my freshman year of college because I'm all nostalgic and such. The end of the school year always does this now. I can't believe it's been basically two years since I lived in good ol' Heritage Halls.

My friend Catherine took this candid picture of Jordan & me
at the ward's closing social. This was almost exactly 2 years ago.

No blog post about freshman year is complete
without a picture of Matthew McKay.

Warren & Phil sharing a delicious strawberry concoction.
I always call this one "Sharing is caring"

Now that Brooke is married we don't pull pranks anymore.
But this was definitely our finest hour of freshman year.

And now I'm going to get back to studying. What a joyous night it shall be with my books.

Last YouTube video I watched: Introducing Lizzie Bennet

In the past year

Every year of college thus far, on my birthday or soon before or after, I have made a video mentioning all of the cool things I did in the last year. I won't link to the video here because I have a strict no-linking-to-my-own-videos policy, but those of you that really want to find it will be able to.

The moment after I hit the publish button I suddenly remembered a bunch of things I did that didn't make it into the video. It always seems to happen that way. I'm going to list some of those things here, along with some things I came to learn in my 21st year of life while I was 20 years old.

-On my way home to Wisconsin after winter 2011 semester, I stopped in Iowa to spend the afternoon with my best friend, Kate. I don't mention Kate very often on this blog and that's totally uncalled for on account of how she plays a huge role in my life. We went to this cool little restaurant and had cashew butter sandwiches. They were extremely delicious. Seeing her was amazing since we only saw each other very briefly over Christmas break.

-I didn't get a haircut. The last time I got a haircut was August 2010. I'm most definitely due for one, though only a trim, since this year (junior year) is the first time in college my hair has been a length I really like.

-I had hypoxia in my, I think, right eye. Or was it my left? I don't recall at this point. Basically, my eye wasn't getting enough oxygen and I had to put in tons of eyedrops that were literally steroids and wear my glasses for a while. I would say the majority of people I've met at college have never seen me in my old glasses; there's a reason for that. Everyone knows me by my black nerdy glasses these days, so it might be hard to imagine me not liking my glasses but I just really did not like my old ones. Besides the fact that I had to wear glasses I didn't like, eye pain is some of the most horrible pain I've ever experien

-I learned a lot more about patience this past year. For as much I wanted letters during my sophomore year of school, the summer and fall semester of 2011 have taught me over and over again the reason I write letters at all, as has this semester thus far. Since my last birthday I was very lucky, getting letters from Jordan literally once a month. They were amazing letters too. I haven't gotten one from him in a while now, but whenever things seem to be going off-track, a letter from Matt finds its way to me.

-Speaking of Jordan and Matt, I learned even more how much they care about me. It's a lot. I wish I could convey more clearly how I feel about those boys and how they feel about me, but my relationships with them are quite inexplicable with words most of the time.

-I realized how much my relationship with Marcas still affects my decisions today, and how much it means when people hear the whole story. I know I haven't mentioned him in a quite some time in my writings here; I don't even know if he ever was mentioned by name on this blog, though I imagine he had to be. (I know at one point I moved a post about him over to my journal-blog). If you've heard the Marcas story in its entirety, know that it means you're a big deal. In Utah, I think 3 people know it. And only 1 person from home does.

-I found a lot of confidence in myself this past year, in so many ways. I guess I'll list a few things that I feel more sure about that I had not felt good about before: how I look, my dating life, the fact that I have a future and I really am good at writing. It's a pretty vague list, but the repercussions are felt every day on all three of those points.

-Watching The Office can cure all injury, physical or otherwise. Watching The Office with friends works even better.

-My version of "um" is most definitely "I don't know." In relaxed/philosophical conversation when I'm trying to explain myself, my answer first is (almost) always "I don't know," at which point I will then explain what I mean. I never noticed that before until fall semester; I say noticed but it was pointed out to me that I always say it. Besides it being my "um," it also kind of means I do actually know but don't want to completely explain myself, so I say that to stall a bit and think up the best way to say whatever it is that I don't want to say in a way that sounds legitimate. Sorry if you've had to experience any of those things; I know people get annoyed by it. I'm really trying to work on doing it less.

Last YouTube video I watched: Mario Bros. vs Wright Bros. Epic Rap Battle of History

On friends and keeping them

This semester I have committed myself to a large amount of responsibility. I have a very full 15 credit schedule and one class that's basically a part time job for which I don't get paid. Upon my return to Utah, I'd even kind of sworn off irresponsibility, at least on weeknights. I need to and even more so want to do really well this semester.

Monday night I decided would be my last hurrah of irresponsibility. On about 20 minutes notice I went to a movie w/ one of my friends. We'd wanted to see the movie Moneyball for months and it finally arrived at the dollar theatre. The plan had been to see it on Monday but we'd never really nailed things down as to what time and who was going to come; before he texted me around 9:30 I assumed we'd just be doing it another night. It ended up being the two of us, but I loved that. We hadn't seen each other in weeks due to break and the busyness of the first week of school. I'll be honest, the next day I was extremely tired, more than I had ever been the previous semester even though last semester I stayed up at least that late or later most nights. I'll be honest about this too: it was completely worth it.

Maybe seeing a movie with someone isn't the best way to spend time together but it was enough to remind me how necessary irresponsibility can be at times. The night didn't lend itself to much conversation, but what we had was enough, at least under the circumstances. Just being around a good friend, someone I know is interested in my life and what I'm doing, is perfectly wonderful at times. I think one reason I wasn't worried about talking a lot was because I know we'll have plenty of other opportunities to talk in the near future.

Even though my busy semester hasn't been overwhelming yet, I'm glad to have already been reminded of the great opportunities I have to spend time with friends and to act a little less responsible. Friendship is fantastic. And at college, your friends are your family. You have dinner together and talk about life's problems and shoot the breeze and sit around complaining about how much life can suck and you talk about how awesome life is and somehow the topic of romance and dating always comes up no matter and your favorite Friday nights end up being the ones where you're sitting on a couch watching The Office. Those are the times you don't even have to talk. You just sit and watch and enjoy each other's company, as crazy as that sounds. My parents always used to make my brother and I stay at the table even after we were done eating dinner because they "enjoy our company." It was annoying then because usually I wanted to go watch TV or read a book or start my homework. But in college, enjoying one another's company is an art.

One of my fondest memories from last semester includes me, The Office, my red fleece blanket, and a good friend sitting in (mostly) silence. It was a Friday or Saturday night and sort of late but not terribly so. Despite all of the great things I did last semester and even last year, trying Thai food, getting a package from Jordan completely out of the blue, watching Jimmer, and going on some truly awesome dates, watching The Office that night kind of beats out all the rest. It wasn't irresponsible per se but it's the kind of thing I know would be good for me to do again this year because of how incredibly relaxing it was.

The give and take of friendships has always fascinated me because of the different ways in which people maintain these relationships. Sometimes it's completely effortless on both sides, and other times one person has to nudge things along a little more. By far, the friendships I've valued the most are the ones in which things are what I call effortlessly effortful. Basically, you're both putting in plenty of effort and making things work, whether it be initiating times to hang out or being there for each other when life gets hard, but it doesn't feel like you are. Everything just flows. It just feels natural and nice, despite the fact that at times you might be working hard to keep things how you want them.

At this time I must bid you all farewell. I have some reading to get done and writing this blog post is about as irresponsible as I can get tonight. I hope school is going swimmingly for all of you.

Last YouTube video I watched: Hank and Katherine Play Super Mario Bros. Wii #36

Hitting the books and Jim Halpert

What with today being the first of two reading days, aka days in which we just study all the time in the hopes of doing well on our finals, it was time for me to really bust out my DVDs of The Office. For literally years now I have studied while watching the lovely Jim Halpert and his friends. I did really well in high school and in college thus far so I like to think it's what really helps me. I believe I've gone through about six or eight episodes thus far. Maybe nine or ten. Who's really counting?

This morning I finished my American Christianity study guide and I've already gone through a bunch of stuff for my natural hazards class. I've yet to start on my history material but that exam is on Wednesday, the last one of the three I'll be taking so tomorrow will probably be most dedicated to that.

This blog is kind of my official break for studying. I'm trying to get a lot done so tonight when I go to the tumbling gym I don't have to feel guilty. One of my closest friends is getting married this summer so this will probably be our last big hang out before that happens. I'm stoked, to tumble and to see her get married.

I keep trying to think of other things to include in this post so as to prolong the inevitable return to my study guides and textbooks but I don't have much else to say.

Except that I love Jim Halpert.

Last YouTube video I watched: Hott Butt in Costco