That's Idaho for You

Well I got through the rexburg winters, with all of my digits, which is a bit of a miracle. It was cold and snowing, and there was plenty of falling down to be had by all. There were some frustrating days, when I would wake up and think spring was here, only to find an inch of snow after I finished breakfast.

Deborah told me that there are days in Rexburg where you experience all four seasons in the course of the day. It's true. I secretly thought that once winter semester was over, I'd be done with bizarre weather patterns. I was very wrong.

We have been experiencing rain. I mean lots of rain. Now that's not the weird thing. The weird thing is you never know when its coming, and your never know when its going to go. for the last couple storms, the rain has come in an instant. And while we stand outside in the rain we look out into the sky and see blue sky.

One day it began to rain and hale at our dorm. I looked out at the Taylor building, which is a three minute walk form where I live, and saw to my amazement blue sky and clouds so white and fluffy they seem to only be there for decoration.

Honestly its kind of fun. I mean I'll be walking to class and get sprinkles in the face. I won't know if its from the sprinklers, or the rain. It adds a little mystery to life.

One of These Things is Not Like the Other.

I remember the first time all of my roommates sat around together to eat. I looked at my roommates and thought, "One of these things is not like the other. One of these things just does not belong." I live in an apartment with a lot of, well lets say, Mexican influence.

Andy is a Mexican citizen and loves Mexico. When I'm talking to her, she will say things like, "That is what I don't get about Americans," or "You Americans are so, well I'm not going to say." She isn't antagoistic or anything, she is just patriotic. Andy is my psychiatrist. She is a Pychology major and loves to analyze people. When I come to her with a problem, she will come at my with something like, "You know you are very competative, so maybe you should remember that when you talk to her."

(Sorry Andy I only had pictures of you sticking out your tongue!)

Deborah described andy as the perfect latin woman. Whenever we have a cooking question we deffer to Andy. Today for example, she cut the watermellon, becasue I didn't know how. She is the one who knows when the meat is done and gets my zipper unstuck when I'm ready to cut my skirt off with scissors, more than any of us. I love Andy.

Nelva is from Chicago. Her parents are from Mexico, and she went to high school in Mexico with Andy. Nelva is logical. She likes understanding how and why thing work. Her major is mechanical engineering. Whenever she tells someone her major they always give her a look. That is a boy major, and you don't see many girls inthe Austen building. No she is not in that major to get a husband. She just likes understanding how things work.

The funny thing is, as much as Nelva like to be logical, she loves superheros. When she is one with her homework she treats herself to an episode of X-Men. Nelva has given us all super powers and evne made mock-ups of our super hero costumes. My super power is the power of persuasion. She is sad I can't blow anything up, but I like it alot, and I love Nelva.

Vicky is from Arizona, but her parents are from Mexico. She goes down there on vacation. Vicky is the girl to go to if you need any suggestions on hair, make-up, or outfits. Not only can she make a great outfit out of nothing, she has the ability to kindly tell you your outfit stinks. That is a true skill. Vicky and I are both the fourth kid in a fmily of five. We will sit and talk about the joys of sisters, and sibling ettiquite.

I love having Vicky in the apartment. If she wasn't there then we would talk a lot about hanging out with people, but we probably wouldn't do nearly as much of it. I love Vicky.

(I love this picture. After we took it, We looked at it and I was sad becasue you couldn't see my face. Nelva said, "Yeah tressa, your just to white." She misunderstood. I was talking about the hair in my face.)

Sometimes I feel like the minority in this apartment, and that I just don't know anythng. Here are some things I never knew: You can serve tortillas with just about any meal. You can curl your eye lashes with a spoon, but be careful, because suddenly you might not have any lashes. Some dysney songs are better in spanish. Finally my personal favorite, a woman is ready to get married, only when she knows how to cook rice. I am not ready to get married.

The funny thing is, while it's always noticable when my hair in particular, is caught in the drain, I don't feel like the odd man out. I feel very incuded, and cared for. I mean, if I ever feel completly awful, they sit me down nad comfort me with love and food.

I love my roommates

It Finally Happened

Well it finally happened. I didn't think it would happen so soon but it did. I have... A boyfriend. I know! Crazy!

His name is Shane, He was in a class with one of my roommates, and all of a sudden he started showing up at our apartment. It wasn't long before we would expect him and be a little disappointed if he didn't show up that day. He doesn't have a cell phone, adn is never near his apartment phone, so I used to call him our Phantom Friend. I also call him the apartment pet, but that's for a different reason. Just as a reference point, he was the boy who told me he loved me and then burst into laughter. Anyway I loved him coming over after that, because he just became an incredible friend. I thought it was so easy to talk to him.

One of the best things about our relationship, was that I did not feel threatened by him at all. We were just friends, and I never questioned his motives for a moment! Apparently I was out of the loop. I mean really out of the loop. While I never questioned his motives, every one else did. Everybody, including Deborah, knew he liked me, but knew that I just thought of him as a friend, so nothing was going to happen.

Anyway to make a very long story short, about a week and a half ago, I made some realizations about Shane. I started thinking that holding his hand didn't sound that bad. In fact I really liked the idea. Then I really started hating the idea of him liking and dating other girls.

Then to push me over the edge, he came to our apartment really frustrated. He said he felt like he shouldn't come over anymore. My roommates seemed to see this coming, but I was completely shocked by it. That idea put a huge pit in my stomach. That night Andy, my roommate/psychiatrist told me I needed to stop flirting with Shane because I wasn't being fair to him.

Faced with the idea of liking a boy, I began freaking out. I developed a stomach ulcer. When Shane finally showed up at my apartment after a few days, my imaginary stomach ulcer got bigger. Shane seemed defensive, and prickly, but once he warmed up he told me the reason he didn't want to come by anymore was because he liked me and he knew he didn't have a chance.

He was much more eloquent then I was. I said something like, "Well I have a confession to make. I started to feel... you know... It's like I, well even since Tuesday... Wow this is hard. I guess I'm trying to say, I like you. I like, like you in the way that holding your hand isn't a bad idea."

Shane is so sweet. He is so considerate, and patient when I have trouble expressing my feeling in a coherent sentence. Above all I feel so safe with him. It is so easy to be myself around him, and the best thing is he brings out my best self.

Anyway, I don't know what will happen next week or even next month when I go home, but right now I'm just enjoying spending time with my umm boyfriend.

We Just Want Some Food!!

Today we had one of those college adventures that everybody remembers. We just wanted to get some food. Today Vicky got a text that said Craigo's (an amazing pizza restaurant) had an all you can eat buffet for five dollars! This past week and a half we have all gone through phases of wanting to eat everything in sight. We thought this would be a good opportunity to fulfill the fansticy. (Vicky brought a big purse and zip lock bags. she was going to eat Craigo's for the rest of the week.)



Well we finally got into the car at around 9pm. All buckled up and ready to go, Vicky turned to the key, and nothing. Her car wouldn't start! The weird thing was her lights started flashing and the car made a clicking noise.



Still with a strong desire for Craigo's we changed our nice shoes for tennis shoes and started walking. It really is a short walk, but we are all starving and craving pizza. Andy thought about hitch hiking but nobody seemed to want to pick us up. Finally we saw the beautiful sign. We rushed to the door and just as we got to the door the open sign turned off!



We stared at the sign and the people inside the restaurant eating the pizza that was meant for us. Is was heartbreaking. By this time we were in some serious need of food, so we crossed the street to subway. The lights were off. It closed at 10pm. That was depressing.

Well how about Jack in the box? We went down the street, almost to the edge of town, towards Jack in the box. As we got to the parking lot, the woman behind the counter ran towards the door, and locked it. Jack in the box closes at 10pm.

Finally in desperation we went to McDonald's. We were so afraid that McDonald's would be closed. We were running out of restaurants in rexburg. Desperation set in when we saw that McDonald's was empty and a boy was sweeping up the play area. But we tried the door and it was a miracle. It opened. We lined up and all ordered off of the dollar menu.

We loved our food.

This is Not a Normal Squirrel

Every Monday and Wednesday I always see our local squirrel. When I first started seeing squirrels in Idaho I was strangely excited. I guess it reminded me of home, even though at home I only tolerated the squirrels. I am no longer excited to see this particular squirrel. I am frightened.

This squirrel is not a normal squirrel. It is fat, and has no fear of humans. When ever I pass it, I get about a foot away from him, and then he leisurely moves around the tree. I'm sure he doesn't care if I come close to him or not. He has just decided to keep up the squirrel human pretence to keep us happy.

This squirrel is mean. He is really really mean. Once I saw a bird picking at something on the ground, and this squirrel came charging at the bird. He was ready to attack the bird for what I assume was a wrapper. After the bird flew off the squirrel started yelling at the bird. He stood on his two hind legs and screamed at the sky. I'm sure he was insulting the birds mother, and warning him never to come back to Kerr Hall again.

Ordinarily I would name an animal that is so distinct in character, but not this one. I'm afraid that if he doesn't like the name, he'll come in at night and kill me. I wouldn't put it passed him. He knows where I live.

Eat, Drink, and go Crazy

I love my new FHE brothers. They are so sweet and very funny. Our first Sunday here they came to our apartment and introduced themselves. They were even so kind as to do some manly chores, like taking bikes off of cars, and moving a heavy TV. About five minutes after they left, we had a knock on our front door. There were two brothers, "Ummm can we get something to eat."


Apparently these poor boys had no food in their house, and were hoping for handouts. I realized that night that Mormon girls with marriage on their minds love nothing more than displaying their domestic capabilities to a bunch of cute single guys. We fluttered around the kitchen as they watched in amazement. They said they just expected a peanut butter sandwich.


All of last week we gushed over the thought of our brothers. No we aren't in love with them, but we have assigned each guy out to a specific girl. It didn't take long for us to decide that we need to invite them over again, and with that thought in mind a lot of chicken was bought.


Last Sunday my roommates and I sat in Sacrament discussing the meal and at what time they should come. Mashed potatoes won out over rice, before the fireside instead of after, and fried chicken instead of... well we realized we didn't know any other way of making chicken. That's about the time we realized that the chicken was still in the freezer. Vicky ran home to defrost it, and since she didn't come back we assumed she started on the rest of the meal.


Our brothers seemed pretty excited to come for dinner, which made us excited to make it. So the rest of my roommates ran home the start on dinner. We only had an hour to prepare.


Once we just home, that's when the problems really started. The chicken was still very frozen. Time ticked by as we tried every trick we could think of to defrost chicken. 30 minutes till their arrival, panic started. I said, "We need a back up plan." We had some beef Vicky was planning on making, and so we started cooking that. "But wait some of the chicken is ready." So we started cooking that. It wasn't cooking fast enough, and plan C was a box of frozen corn dogs. "Do you need to defrost corn dogs?"


I even made a futile attempt to call and stall until after the fireside, but no luck. These popular boys had plans. Our brothers even came five minutes late, and we had nothing ready. I looked around and realized that three frantic girls in the kitchen was enough, and I left to be hostess. I wasn't easy trying to distract three hunger boys from a partially separated kitchen with crashing and thud sounds coming from it.


Really in the end it was Nelva's superhero poster that got their attention. Finally, ten minutes later we put food on the table. For dinner we had: lumpy mashed potatoes, wonderful salad, tiny chunks of beef, tortillas, and of course corn dogs.


When we finally sat down to eat, it was really great. The boys were so excited to have "real food," and we were so grateful to serve anything! During the first few bites I was terrified that something would taste awful, and in reality we could have done a lot better. Our brothers didn't seem to notice. I think it was because they're boys.

You do some strange things at college.

I was going through some pictures today and found some of my favorites. Last semester in my old apartment we had a christmas tree. We would occasionally move it adn change the decorations. THis is my favorite decoration.

It's our pan-tree!!