Famous?

Clark and I play this game sometimes, it's like 20 questions, but we don't limit the questions to 20. So, you could call it "Unlimited Questions." One person things of something, a noun, and the other person has to guess what it is by asking yes or no questions. It really is quite fun, and we can think up some funny things. It's also funny to hear the questions they ask and apply them to the answer. For instance, last night we were playing and I had thought of "toast." Clark was asking questions.
"Is it alive?"
"No."
"Is it man-made?"
"Yes."
"Is it famous?"
Is toast famous? All people know about it, so in that respect it is. But I don't know many people who would think about toast and think, "One of the most famous foods in the world." Or better yet, "One of the most famous man-made objects in the world." Makes you think about the definition of famous, doesn't it? Lots of people know about rocks, are they famous? Or just the big ones we call mountains? And while we're at it, what about infamous? "He must be so famous, that he is INfamous." Name the quote, and I'll think you are famous.

Randomness.

Well, we finally went to the temple and did a session. Let me just say that the St George temple is beautiful, it's really gorgeous. I would highly recommend it to everyone. But, a funny thing happened while we were there. We got through the session, and we're in the celestial room, just sitting, enjoying the quiet moment of reflection, and this girl comes up to me and asks me if I used to live in Provo, which of course I did. So then she asks me if I know someone named Michael Richards. Flashback: I went on one blind date with a guy named Michael Richards. When I went home for a summer, I met a very nice girl in my parents ward, and she had a brother who was also going to BYU. So in the fall, she set us up on a date. I went, and had a good time, but I never really saw him again. In part that was because it was right in the middle of the whole Tyler mess, I wasn't dating him, and then I was, and then I wasn't. I think his sister asked me if I had fun a few weeks later, and I told her I did, but I was kind of seeing someone. Anyway, I'm thinking, yeah, I knew this Richards kid, but not that well, I'd met him a grand total of once, how would anyone connect me with him? As it turns out, this girl was with us on that date, with her now husband, who is Michael Richards's cousin. She remembers that date so well because they have a picture of them from it, and it hangs on their wall, and it was just such a fun date for them, and now they are married. HOW RANDOM IS THAT? Someone I met once, 4 years ago, and she remembered me, and had enough courage to come up to me after the session and talk to me (for which, I commend her. We need more people like that in this world). And not to mention the fact that we are both now in St George, not Provo. Weird. Life is full of odd coincidences, isn't it?

in the middle of our street

Well, here are more pictures of our home. This is our laundry chute. How cool is that? Now we just need a washer and dryer to go with it. That will come with more paychecks. It's in our bathroom, which is just a bathroom, nothing exciting, so I didn't post a picture of it. We have a 2nd half-bath downstairs.








Our "study." Our computer is in here too.














Our bedroom.

Our dining area.

Our kitchen.

Our living room.

The other view of our living room (notice, no couch yet).

The spacing on this thing is weird, I apologize for being technologically challenged. So, that is the apartment in a nutshell. The bedrooms are upstairs, along with the full bath. It's pretty nice, I enjoy living here. And it is a HUGE step up from our cinderblock palace at Wymount. So, for all you getting ready to come visit, get excited to see the real thing. I don't know if these pictures will make people more or less inclined to come see us. . . hopefully more!

Our house

Well, I've decided that I need to have some pictures of the new place up here. So, here we go. This will be a real feat if I get any pictures on here, as I am not what you would call a computer pro. Oh, lookie here, I got one! This is the outside of our townhome. I guess we might need to have a different entry for the different pictures? Well, anyway, this is where we live!

Church = Good

Well, I must say, I love the church. We went to church on Sunday. It was good. It was great, actually. No, I didn't talk to anyone new, didn't meet anybody, but it was just good. I might not know a soul in our ward, but I know that they are all members of the church, and they all have testimonies, and they all are nice. I really needed to go to church this week. Things were said in the sacrament meeting talks that just really hit home. And the Relief Society lesson was exactly what I needed to hear. I don't know if other wards are on the same lesson, but it was all about family history and saving the dead. So, hello, I have very little to do, we have a temple in this city. . . put it all together and what do you get? HAPPINESS! I haven't been to the temple yet this week, I'm waiting to go with the enrichment group we have on Friday morning, but I am going to go. And that thought is enough to make me happy. I also would like to do some more family history work. That gets to be a little bit more frustrating because I don't know where to start, or really what needs to be done. I even took a class on this, I have started many times, and I always just get to a point and I really have no idea what to do. Gotta work on that. And the stake extraction program needs helpers. I've moved to St George and become an old woman, I love it! I could even try to do some temple work, maybe. I'm kind of thinking that I'll try to find a part-time job, that way I can still be housewife extraordinare, and have some income, and have something to do, and have time to do other things that i love to do. I'm feeling much more motivated this week, and excited about the prospect of doing things I like to do.

Clark is working overnight tonight. He did this last night as well. I don't sleep well when he isn't with me, and especially not when I am home alone. I had a bad dream on Sunday night, woke up at 5 am terrified that someone was going to kill me, and even with Clark there I couldn't sleep. And then, of course, the next night all I could think of was that dream. Silly, I know, but for some reason it doesn't seem as silly when it's late. I kept turning off the light, freaking myself out, turning on the light, reading until I was tired, and then the cycle repeated itself. About 4 times. I am sure that if anyone could see our bedroom window they would think I was crazy. On and off, on and off. But I finally got some sleep. Not much, but some. I'm tired tonight, I'm hoping that I just zonk out quick. And tomorrow it is back to normal, hooray! I'm even thinking I might take a bath tonight. I haven't done that in years. Oh, I know the last time I took a bath, it was after I climbed Mt Timp, the next day, I thought I was going to die, and a hot bath sounded so good. So I did it. Yeah, that was about a year ago. HA, time for my annual bath. Admit it, I'm hilarious.

The Orange Vest

So, I was looking at Old Navy's online website today, just checking out the deals and what not. I never buy anything, I just like to look and see what they have and prices and things. It's like shopping without spending money! And without getting anything. Anyway, I came across the "Chevron Striped Vest." A puffy vest with stripes. I happen to own one of these vests. I got mine at Old Navy a number of years ago, probably like 5 years ago, for the low price of $7.50. I thought it was a great buy, it's orange, I love that thing. It was in their clearence section at the store. So, I was a bit surprised to see it on the Old Navy website, it's true what they say, fashions go in and out and back in style. Anyway, the price tag on one of these new vests was on sale for only $29.50. So, I guess I bought at exactly the right time. Who knew that thing would be of value to other people (again)? I guess I can strut my stuff in style again. As soon as it is actually cold, which may be a long way off for St. George. . .

Rambling ahead. Read at your own risk.

So, it's 12:17am and I can't sleep. I was so tired earlier, I was falling asleep at like 10:30. And then, I got all uptight because we didn't pray, and woke myself up so we could pray, and now I'm wide awake. And I can't get back to sleep. And of course, Clark is sleeping just fine. So, I'm bored. What else is new? I really need a hobby. I need to do something for my mind, I am kind of going crazy here. I feel like I do nothing to stimulate learning. And I know no one in St. George, that doesn't help. It gets kind of lonely to be here, alone, all day, and then not sleeping at night. I hope that I get to meet new people soon, but I'm not entirely sure how I will do that. I have the ward, and that could be good, but I am so shy it is ridiculous. I don't know how to talk to people, and most importantly how to first approach people. I have this stupid fear that no one will want to talk to me, that no one will want to get to know me. And sometimes I can't blame them. I really don't do anything that exciting. Maybe we need to subscribe to the newspaper, at least then I'd be informed on world events. And I'd love to get involved in the community, I just have no idea how to do that. And getting a job would be good, I know, but I don't know what I want to do. I hated that last job so bad, and I'm not entirely sure why. I liked so many of the people I worked with. There were some bad apples, and the pay was less than desirable, but there were so many good things too. I just don't want to find another job only to hate it just as much. This is a boring post for anyone else to read. I'm just rambling on as I sit here in the darkness, trying to grasp onto some purpose for my life. But sometimes I just need to write things down for me, not for other people. It just needs to get out of my system. I'm just so frustrated that I have nothing to do right now, nothing that I want to do anyway. I want to talk to people, to bounce ideas off them, to share thoughts, and to listen. Unfortunately the only person I know in this town is sleeping. There is a part of me that misses the single life, the staying up late and talking to friends, having friends, talking online to friends, knowing that someone would be up no matter what time it is. I love being married, and I love Clark, I just miss the other friends. If anyone ever wants to comment on this blog, or email me, know that it will always be welcome. I am such a dork, I am afraid to initiate contact with people, even with old friends. But if they called me, I would be thrilled. I sometimes wonder if I am thoroughly messed up. Or maybe it's the late-night-no-sleep talking.

Yeast. The final frontier.

Well, we are here. And it's not that bad. St George is a nice place. We had a small problem with the property management people (they took exceptionally long processing our application, like 2 times as long as they said they would, and thus we were here with a truck, waiting to be accepted [please, have you met me? why wouldn't you accept me], and I got a bit upset with them, but it all worked out in the end), but now things are good. Everyone here is nice, and helpful (with the exception of Jensen Property Management). We even went to 2 post offices, and both of the postal workers actually seemed ready to help us and (gasp) cheerful. We got all our stuff unpacked, we are a bit more settled. Now we just need to get our phone hooked up and our internet up and running, then I'll feel much better.

Everyone keeps asking what I am going to do down here. Well, the truth is I don't know. When we were moving to Evanston, there was so much traveling with Clark's training that I hadn't planned on looking for a job until January. So, now I have no idea what to do. I might look into physical therapy, I might look into clerical work, I might look into doing something at home. Who knows. I guess at this point I'm just taking a break, enjoying not working for at least a few weeks, and enjoying the fact that we make enough money for me to take my time finding a job that I will enjoy. It's nice to not have that stress of being the breadwinner hanging over me. My main goal is to be a good housewife for a bit, and then take it from there.

Ah, my real goal is to conquer my fear of bread. Not to eat, to bake. I have this strange fear of making bread, in particular of yeast. It's this weird thing, it's active for pity's sake. Active. I don't even know what that means! And you have to activate the stuff. And then things have to rise, and there is kneeding, it's a huge process. I've made some bread before. I made the most terrible loaf of bread known to man. I did manage some rolls at some point after the terrible loaf, but that was at least a year ago. So, my goal is to figure this stuff out. It's a simple thing to most people. It's just so hard for me. But if I can overcome yeast, I can overcome anything.

This is it, don't get scared now.

Well, this is it. The pressure is on. This is big number 8. It'd better be good. For those of you who don't know, 8 is my absolute favorite number. I guess it has something to do with being born on 8/8.

Today was a pretty relaxing day. We starting packing some things, and I came to realize that we have a lot of stuff. We packed up everything we owned in April and trekked up to Salt Lake, where most of our things went into storage. Then we took the stuff we thought we needed with us and came to Clark's parents' house. We were a bit limited on space, so some of that stuff was kept in a large suitcase (just some more wintery type clothing, long-sleeved shirts, cords, things like that). About a month ago, Clark's sister came to visit, and we had to move out temporarily, so we gathered together what we thought we would need and put the rest further back in the closet. We've been back here for like 3 weeks. And I forgot about half the things we owned that are here in this house. Packing that stuff up made me remember all the boxes and boxes of things that are tucked away in our storage unit. It is a testament that we can live without those things, we did just fine. But it is also a wonderful thing to remember that you have stuff! We have furniture! We have our own, comfortable, lovely bed! We have books of all kinds! We have dishes! I'm so excited for my blue glasses that I can hardly stand it. I love those things! And I think it's a good thing to rediscover all the things you love. It's like Christmas, only instead of getting new things, you are getting familiar things. And I think that is almost better.