Switchfoot Concert

Yesterday Nicole took me to my first rock concert (excluding seeing TSO in Austin, that was technically FHE) where a venue in Salt Lake City was hosting several popular bands. We went to see Switchfoot and Anberlin, two of our favorite bands.

I've never been to a real rock concert. I really enjoyed the music and how well the musicians performed. It was the first time I've ever seen real rock stars acting like rock stars on a stage making a bunch of fans go crazy.

Switchfoot's music is awesome A: because it's rock music, B: They don't just scream the whole time, C: Their lyrics are meaningful and usually have to do with charities they've worked for or experiences that inspired them, D: They're sincere people, they really love their music and fans, not seeking the sleezy things they could seek that come with being rock stars. They really are in it for the good they can do with their music.

Being in the audience was interesting...we got there an hour early almost and there was already a dense ball of people right in front of the stage. When I say dense, I mean like 2 people per square foot almost. Nicole and I tried to stand on a curb to see over the crowd but tall people came and stood literally an inch in front of us. Most of the time all I could see was the back of some dude's head.

The concert was outdoors, changing the atmosphere a bit from what you might normally expect of a rock concert. But that didn't stop people from doing silly things. Up close to the stage people like to shove, push, and try to work their way to the front. You have to stand your ground well. People also like to crowd surf and throw things. You have to keep an eye out or someone will land on top of you. Nicole and I laughed as people tried to crowd surf up to the stage but were yanked down by security guards.

The music was loud! It was so loud I couldn't hear anything for 2 minutes after they stopped playing. I could have told the stranger in front of me my deepest darkest secrets during a song and they wouldn't have been able to hear me say anything. 

Watching the crowd at the venue was entertaining. There were all kinds of people, from old geezers who still like to rock to young middle school kids with their older siblings. There were LDS kids, high school students, and even some pimps with their ho's. Budweiser was being sold all over the place. Almost every corner of the venue had some drunk people passed out with medics and friends trying to revive them. Why do people drink beer?

Overall the music was excellent. It was like listening to Beethoven's 9nth only the volume was turned up to the "jet engine" amplitude and people were aloud to jump up and down and scream and sing along. I really loved it and would go again to hear Switchfoot anytime.

Seattle Weather on the Wasatch

This weekend Nicole agreed to let me go for a hike! So I went to hike the highest peak

around that I've been meaning to get up for a few years, Provo Peak. Provo Peak is at

an elevation of 11,068 ft. It was a beautiful day, the weather reminded me of my Seattle

days; soft wispy clouds and blue skies.

The hike to the top itself is relatively easy and anyone can do it in about 2 hrs. I however was unable to drive to the trail head (the road requires a tougher vehicle than the Saturn). So I decided to borrow Nicole's Bike (a.k.a. Rancor) and ride about 10 miles (both ways) from where I parked the Saturn to the trail head. The bike ride involved about 1500 ft of elevation gain (both ways). By the time I reached the trail head I was already mostly exhausted. Somehow I made it though, the view was totally worth it! When I came home Nicole made me a delicious dinner! She's the greatest!

Ram, Roosters, Dinosaurs

Ram:

I don't have enough ram. It bothers me. And by ram I mean computer memory. And by not enough I mean that I literally get messages from my computer. "INSUFFICIENT MEMORY!!!!!!!111!!!1!!#!!#$!!!!" I think my poor laptop is having self-esteem issues. "I can't vectorize that image! It is way too awesome for me to compute!" *computer brain explodes* Basically I have NEW COMPUTER LUST really badly. I know exactly which model I want, and every two days I go to the Dell website and build it and stare at it and drool.

Larp Tarp, you've been my friend for the past 3.5 years. In fact, I've had you almost as long as I've been employed at the Creamery. You have put up with hours of roommate abuse, two trips to Houston, working way too hard to open iTunes and giving me 10 FPS when I play StarCraft 2 on the lowest possible graphics settings (which is frustrating but THANK YOU for running it despite your terrible piece of junk integrated graphics card). I love you. But your warranty expires in August.

Roosters:

I've started designing t-shirts for Threadless.com, a t-shirt company where artists submit their work and the community rates the designs. If your design gets chosen to be printed, you get $2000 and a $500 gift card for the site.

I am not an artist. It's amazing how much you can fake art in a program like photoshop. I probably won't win even if I submit 100 designs. In fact I will probably get discouraged really soon and give up *attitude problem*

Oh, about the rooster...Rosie the Rooster (RIP) has made his way onto a t-shirt design. It is missing something. I think I will put newspaper text on top of his feathers. Gotta appeal to the hipsters.

I have lots of ideas but I lack the skills to put probably half of them into production (ewok in full-combat armor, an illustration of Orion and Taurus killing each other, and then when you turn out the lights you will see the glow-in-the-dark constellation of them, some ideas involving the use of UV ink, etc...) so until I learn how to do art I'm a bit of a sitting duck.

When (if) my lame cat design gets approved, I will post the link. Don't feel obligated to vote if you think it's junk.

Dinosaurs:

I learned that one of my best friends in high school wrote a book called "Love in the time of Dinosaurs" and it's supposed to be this wacky mix of kung fu and dinosaurs and other awesome things.

So I bought it. Really excited to read it.

PENNIES!

When you work somewhere for a few years and you are there so often that you no longer experience any sort of mental stimulation during your 30+ hours per week (not like stocking fruit is a mental challenge) you go a little crazy. In my case, I have started my own charity to myself, funded by the pennies and dimes those sports camp kids leave on the floor.

I have acquired over $5 in the past two weeks. At the end of the night I go and sweep the dining area out and I've found a dollar's worth of assorted change.

So now instead of inventing useless newsletters to type or rewriting "The Quickie Guide to Produce" for the fifth time, I now employ the use of the broom to try and keep the store a little less disgusting and to engage myself in a hunt for negligible change. Double win.

This fund is going to be my "I CAN'T WAIT TO QUIT THE CREAMERY!!!!!" fund, which will not be spent until that glorious day when I clock out for the last time and hand over my managership to my successor.

Where did the Creamery hatred come from?

Maybe I'm still paranoid about getting stomach flu.

Maybe I'm just cranky. It's hard to work a lot of hours at a very small store. I like it much better during the school year...I will probably feel better once school starts.

I get six hours of sleep most nights of the week. When your next shift starts eight hours after your evening shift, you can't get a good night's sleep. Anyone who knows me well knows that I get uber cranky when I'm tired.

Cranky also means that I will probably make fun of you in my mind if you ask me a stupid question before 9am. "Are these day-old bananas?" Actually those were probably picked a month ago. "Do you sell apples?" Look slightly to your right. I forgot to tell you to open your eyes first.

Maybe I've just been at the Creamery too long. It will be 4 years by the time I leave. That is 18% of my life being a Creamery employee. I know, poor me.

I honestly think it's one of those blessings in disguise. Personally, I'm terrified of the "real world" after I'm done with school. What kind of job am I going to have, if any? Where am I going to be? Scary stuff. The Creamery is familiar and safe. Something I've relied on for years. Something has to happen to help me get out from that cozy blanket. I have to *want* to work somewhere else, and that will ultimately help me to find a job that I can enjoy and will allow me to use my brain. So I've concluded that my feelings toward the Creamery are going to be that push to help me get out into the real world; to seek out something that isn't a grocery store; something that isn't so "comfortable."

I'm sorry, Creamery. I really do love you. I just don't think it will work out in the long term, so I'm letting you know that we're breaking up in December.

WAR

Today, Will and I declared war. Our enemy: the Fungus Gnat. Tiny, 1/8 inch flies that lust after soil, and I have a lot of indoor plants. 

Every ten seconds one flies right in front of your face. Every time you go back to a glass of water you have to check and make sure one didn't drown itself in there first. 

I wouldn't be able to count the number of gnats on the fly tape by the window. 

I don't want to think of how many I might have accidentally swallowed in my sleep. 

I love my plants...but they have to go. This is war. 

Okay, it's not like there's a giant cloud of them. They are attracted to the light from our computer monitors and we're always in front of our computers. Also that would explain the success rate of the fly tape by the window. They love light. We must draw them to the light...and then KILL THEM. 

But how do I get rid of my beloved plantaloons?

They don't like my avocado tree. I'm keeping that. I refuse to get rid of my ficus. I don't think they like my philodendrons either, which is good because they never get watered. I think I'll also keep my peace lily. I will get some sand and put a 2-inch layer on the top soil layer of the plants I have to save. They can't survive in sand. 

If that doesn't work, I'm turning to chemical warfare. I suspect that they may also be breeding in a couple of the drains. Bleach them out. I hate maggots with a fiery passion fueled by pure disgust. 

I am thoroughly disgusted by our infestation, but we will conquer. 

Three Large Carrots

...made probably the worst lunch a person could have before they went on a five-hour mountain hike. As such, I found myself quite fatigued a little way before we reached the summit. Thankfully Will had some cashews and ancient fruit leather that I munched on and I was able to *survive* the rest of the hike. However, when I got home I laid down for two hours and did not get up :)

Some of the thrills we found along the way were:

-Multiple "river" crossings, including where the river decided it wanted to go down the trail
- Wild rhubarb sightings
- Gorgeous springtime forests of birch trees and other plants that had started to bud
- A couple feet of snow at the summit; still packed hard enough that it was manageable to walk on
- What we thought might have been bear poop (confirmed with a google image search)

 Yay, we reached the summit!!

The view from Squaw peak...which we hiked two weeks ago.

Also, we made a pact to not buy any more bakery goods from the Creamery, as we are getting fat. We have also rediscovered grilled cheese sandwiches and an intense passion for Gatorade, which probably isn't too much better than eating day-old brownies every day. Ah well.

Plantaloons

Last semester I took a class on indoor plants called "Interior Plants and Landscapes." The best part of this class was that almost every week we got to take home a plant or two which meant I accumulated a lot of plants...fast. By the end of the semester, I had accumulated the following plants (some in multiple pots)

- Heart leaf philodendron (regular green and Brazil varieties)
- Mother Fern
- Dieffenbachia
- English Ivy
- Golden and N-joy Pothos
- Variegated and non-variegated spider plants
- Some variety of begonia that I don't remember
- Burro's tail
- String of pearls (I chucked this one when it decided it didn't like humidity and got nasty)
- Amstel King ficus being trained into a bonsai shape
- Baby Madagascar dragon tree (living outside as it is breeding fungus gnats)
- Peace lily
- Arrowhead vine
- Gardenia (now living outside and covered in spider mites)
- Warneckii dracaena
- Lemon-lime dracaena

and the other couple plants I had before them, most notably my avocado tree named Kashyyyk (after the Wookie homeworld). I threw the other ones away because they rotted.

As it turns out I'm not exactly the green thumb I hoped to be. All my plants have fungus gnats so I've hung fly tape to catch them. It's funny what bringing home one infected plant can do. The infestation has decreased dramatically but it's still disgusting to think of maggots crawling around in the potting soil.

Now I'm worried about spider mites. My baby ficus was next to my infected gardenia so I washed the ficus in the sink. The ficus is one of my favorites so I hope it doesn't become infected. I should probably wash my gardenia as well, as the infection is pretty bad. However there is so little light in our apartment (half-basement, north-facing) that my plants are having a hard time and the gardenia is a high/intense light plant so I will probably just chuck it.

I think the plants make up for not having any animals in the apartment. I've had fish for the past five years but I'm not allowed to have them right now :( Can't wait until we can get a dog and a cat.

Apartment Tour

Just a few shots of our new place for the inquisitive minds :) Not too impressive, but comfortable indeed.

 Our table and chairs set from Target

 We need some different pictures to put in these :)

Our ugly couch! We are getting a new cover for it...

 Our "desk"

 Our kitchen, which never can seem to stay clean :)

Yellowstone!

Nicole and I traveled up to Idaho Falls to see Mark and Cadence Fillmore's wedding reception. Congrats to them, they looked sharp. Plus their reception was beautiful. Unfortunately we forgot to take some pictures to share...

We decided to make the most of our travel and see Yellowstone as well! Thanks to Emily and Andrew for taking us in for a few nights and showing us around!

Buffy the vampire buffalo walks again!

Anyone want to guess what this used to be?

Yellowstone bacterial mat, looks like OJ to me...

We got to see Beehive Geyser go off!

Wile E. Coyote. If you zoom in all four feet are in the air.

Thanks Emily and Andrew! Thanks for coming with us Michelle!

Weird Things We Really Like

Two weeks into our marriage we realized that there are a few things that we really get excited about every day, including:

- Day-old bakery goods at the Creamery ($.75 for breakfast for the both of us? Heck yes!)
- Our daily episode of Chuck or Futurama
-  "Pwning n00bz" on League of Legends or playing StarJeweled, a mod for StarCraft II

And among other favorites:
- Visiting the turtles at the duck pond
- Going on walks
- Riding our bikes home from the Creamery at night
- Elk and buffalo
- Cream of Wheat cereal
- Having our own apartment
- Quiet time where we can talk or take a nap
- Katamari Damacy

...and the fact that my BFF and I don't have to part ways at the end of the day :)

-Nicole

What exactly does "Two Degrees Kelvin" mean?

Theoretically it should be "Two Kelvin." I must have been half-asleep when that inside joke of ours came to be.

Oh wait...I was.

Scene: Lounge of the apartment complex where Will used to live. Big-screen TV, a microfiber couch and matching loveseat, a lamp held together by duct tape (which was eventually replaced) and very noisy upstairs neighbors.

Situation: Typical weekend evening; we were both exhausted from the week's activities. Usually on the weekends we would commandeer the lounge and use the TV to watch Futurama or play some PS2 games. That night, I was the one nodding off in the middle of a conversation. My mind wandered to such things as star formation from very cold clouds of gas and dust called giant molecular clouds (pic).

Will had just finished saying something to me and in my half-conscious, nearly asleep state I blurted out, "We should be frozen to about two degrees Kelvin."

And so "two degrees Kelvin" was born. We use it to describe our level of exhaustion. Four degrees is pretty tired, 2.5 is nearly dead, etc, until you reach two degrees Kelvin, then it's definitely time for bed.

The other weird thing I remember saying was something like, "I really don't want to live in Salt Lake. I want to stay here (here=Provo, BYU, Happy Valley, etc.) forever," which is definitely NOT true. Apparently I am a liar in my near unconsciousness. I guess there are worse things!!

-Nicole

Pictures of our new apartment! It looks great thanks to Nicole's cleaning prowess and the Shark Vacuum we received from the Borders side of the family. After the first round of vacuuming we concluded that the previous tenants (some sort of cave-people) didn't own a vacuum. The carpet looks almost new (besides the claw marks and burns in various places).

(our new bed! a Temper-Pedic knock-off -- feels awesome)

It's our first post! Nicole and I decided that Emily and Andrew's blog was pretty cool so we thought we'd keep a blog too. It's been two weeks since our marriage (tomorrow...)! Here are some pictures of our trip to Zion Canyon National Park. We stayed at the Zion Ponderosa Resort Ranch high on the east side of the park. It was windy and sunny.

(Nicole enjoying the shade on the way up Angel's Landing)

(Nicole with Angel's Landing in the center background)

(The upper most emerald pool's waterfall)

(awesome beetle that Nicole spotted)

(We are not the first BYU students up Angel's Landing)