The bane of my existence:

What exactly is a bane anyway?

Drawing on the poetic meaning of the word "bane", this means that the subject is a perpetual thorn in the speaker's side, a chronic cause of trouble and difficulty and even suffering. A useful phrase to pull out when you're all out of swear words to describe a certain coworker, roommate, or college professor.

Originally referred to a kind of poison, and as Webster 1913 points out, an especially deadly one at that. Today the poisons all have obscenely long names straight out of a chemistry textbook, so "bane" has moved on to a more poetic meaning. You may sometimes hear of someone describing another person as "the bane of my existence"; the toxic metaphor has not been misplaced.

Ya. That describes it.

I. Hate. Full. Moons.

For some reason that is beyond me, I get insomnia when the moon is full. I know, I know, sounds ridiculous, bizarre, peculiar, and a little creepy, but all werewolf jokes aside, its true.

Its been this way for as long as I can remember. Whenever the moon is full, I lie in bed for hours, and no matter how tired I am, it takes FOREVER to fall asleep. And then when I finally drift off, it is not into peaceful slumber as one hopes for, but rather, I spend what is left of the night tossing and turning and having ridiculously strange and disturbing dreams.

It is beyond annoying. Its my dads fault though. He's the same way, but no one else in my family seems to suffer from the same ailment. In fact, hes the only other person I've ever met who complains of something so strange. Although, its probably not something people generally admit to.

And its not just one night, oh no. When its a full moon, the agony usually lasts for about three nights, and no matter how exhausted I get, there is nothing to be done. Sleeping pills? Bad, bad idea. I shudder at the thought. Seems logical, but makes it soooo much worse.

So, if you see me with dark circles under my eyes, frazzled hair, and a grumpy expression, check the phase the moon is currently in, and chances are good that it will be nice and full and mocking me with its bright and sinister...fullness.

By the way, anyone seen the moon lately?

777 1/2

This has been the longest weekend of my life!

My Mom & I left early Thursday morning and drove for eight hours to Hurricane, Utah where we stayed the night at my cousins adorable house. Hurricane is basically the smallest hick-mormon town I have ever seen, but its cute and seems like a nice little place.

Friday morning we left my cousins house and drove the four remaining hours to Provo where we promptly got a hotel and I cleaned up to go to my appointments on campus.

I wandered for awhile around BYU's huge campus looking for the right building and room. I finally found what I was looking for, and met with an academic adviser who was very kind and sweet, but not a lot of help.

I left her office much earlier than anticipated and set off to find my next appointment location. I very quickly realized that it was in the next building over and that I had some time to kill before my next appointment, so I called my friend Chase who got me into this in the first place, and luckily, he was on campus at the time, just a couple of buildings over and had some free time, so he came to meet me. It was really fun to see him and catch up for a few minutes(love ya Chase!).

I then met with a financial adviser who was about as much help as the academic adviser had been, and I started feeling a little discouraged as I tried to locate my car, but soon realized that it was not a completely wasted effort, because I at least got to see and get a feel for the campus and talk to my old friend Chase.

That night, my Mom and I went to dinner and two movies(ya, two movies in one night is not that unusual for us. What can I say? We're movie people).

The next morning we drove around for a ridiculously long time trying to find the SLDC(It's a long story). We drove all the way to Bountiful because the dumb girl who gave us directions told us to get off the freeway on 90^th street, which apparently is Utah slang for 9000 South, which is the actual name of the street. She knew we were from out of town, why would we know that 9000 South is sometimes referred to as 90^th Street? We ended up driving way out of our way and having to come all the way back, but we found it in the end. The point is, we spent all morning long doing something that should have taken an hour or so, at the most.

That afternoon I called a few places trying to find somewhere to live. This being the main purpose of the trip, I began to get discouraged when the first few places I called were no longer available, or would not become available until later than I am hoping to move.

After a few tries, I talked to a woman about a duplex and made arrangements to see it that afternoon. When we pulled up to number 777, this is what we saw:

Cute, huh?

I loved it, but was still a little unsure.

We went inside and checked everything out and found that it was small, but cute, and should work for what I need. I was pretty sold, but then I was informed t hat I would actually be living in the back duplex rather than the front, which I had seen.

I was informed that it was the exact same layout, and was taken outside, where I saw this:

Apparently there was more to this house than I realized.

Upon closer inspection, I discovered this:

How cute is this? It was love at first sight! I know its cheesy, but 7771/2? I love it! We didn't even look at any other places, I told the lady I had to have it, paid the deposit, and as of July, I will be living in 7771/2!

I'm so excited! Its a really cute little place and the other girls that are living there seemed nice, and its really close to campus so I can walk, and I'm so happy and relieved to have found a place!

We returned to the hotel, bummed around all night, and left early this morning for the twelve hour drive home, feeling pretty good that although the trip was not exactly all that we had planned or hoped for, we accomplished our main goal.

So, to sum up: We found me a placed to live, but basically accomplished nothing else. On the plus side, we laughed a lot, sang a lot, and made a lot of U-turns. :)

Guess What?!?

No I'm not engaged, you sickos.
Why is it that lately whenever I ask someone that question, people just automatically assume that I'm getting married? It drives me nuts, but that's another post entirely. Anyway, my actual good news is this:


Dear Alicia:

We are delighted to inform you that you have been admitted to Brigham Young University to begin Fall 2008. Through your preparation and personal achievements you have distinguished yourself from a very strong group of applicants. We believe you will make a positive contribution to the BYU community. It is a great pleasure to welcome you to our campus to pursue your educational goals.

We look forward to having you on campus. We encourage you to maintain the standards outlined in the University's Honor Code. You are to be commended for your accomplishments!

Warmest regards,

R. Kirk Strong
Director of Admission Services


Yep. Its true. I'm going to BYU.

Whenever I tell anyone this, they all ask the same questions, so here are the questions and my answers, in case you wondered:

Q: What is your major?
A: I don't know.

Q: Where are you going to live?
A: I don't know.

Q: When are you leaving?
A: I don't know.

Q: Where are you going to work?
A: I don't know.

Q: What classes are you going to take?
A: I don't know.

Q: What made you decide to go to BYU?
A: I don't know.

Q: When are you going to figure any of this out?
A: Ya, you guessed it - I don't know.


So, basically I have no idea what I'm doing, all I know is that for some reason I'm supposed to go to BYU. How exactly do I feel about this? Let me try to describe:

I feel excited, scared, nervous, happy, terrified, grateful, cheerful, uneasy, joyful, concerned, glad, tense, stressed, delighted, agitated, pleased, distressed, alarmed, and anxious. And that's just how I feel at this moment. It's complicated.

And to top it all off, I just received a call from a girl I worked with at my old job. Let me give you some background first:

I used to work at a Physical Therapy office and it wasn't the greatest job in the world, but I really loved it there. The people were I worked with were great, I loved interacting with my patients, they were training me to do tech work during slow times at the front desk, the hours were good, I got benefits, and I was good at what I did. To make a long story short, they closed my branch in the beginning of January and I got laid off.
I now work for a CPA, and in my desperation to get a job after being laid off, I took a major pay cut and now work with crabby people who expect me to have been born with an internal and extensive knowledge of all things accounting, which I was obviously not blessed with, I get no benefits and am always given the dumbest and most pointless tasks and am treated like an idiot if I do even the tiniest thing wrong.
Basically, it kinda sucks, but has been getting better over time. I have been kinda happy though that I will be leaving in a few months and can find a new job.

So, enough background, back to my story: Yvonne called me this afternoon from the Physical Therapy office(she worked at the other branch, the one that didn't close), and after catching up for a few minutes, she informed me that she had found a better job and was looking for someone to replace her. Since I was already trained and knew everyone and they already knew they liked me, I could basically have my old job back, no questions asked.

Ouch.

I could have gone back to a real pay check, people I like, and be able to do something I like and am actually good at.

Oh, the cruel ironies of life.

I know without a doubt that I'm supposed to go to BYU next semester, so I turned it down. Not nice, not fair.
I really didn't mean for this post to turn into me whining, but I'm a little bummed that I can't go back. I mean, the PT office wasn't perfect by any means, but I was happy there, and I obviously have mixed emotions about going to BYU. I know that that's where I'm supposed to be, but I don't know why I'm supposed to be there. It just better be a dang good reason, that's all I'm sayin.

I know this post is getting ridiculously long, and if I haven't bored you to tears yet and you are still devotedly reading, either you love me much more than I deserve, or you are laughing at my pathetic life and the reasons I find to whine. Either way, let me conclude with this, I'm planning on going to Provo next weekend to scout out apartments and jobs and talk to a counselor.

Hopefully I will find an amazingly adorable and ridiculously cheap place to live, a fantastic job, and decide a major, at which point the PT job will become a thing of the past and I will be able to confidently answer everyone's questions.

Cross your fingers for me.