Fordpride

Looks like England wants to be its typical self for my family visiting this week.  But, to be fair, we've got some sun (maybe?) in the forecast, so that's encouraging.  I hope you're bringing your raincoats, family!   And I hope you're ready, England, for the invasion of the Fords. (they don't know it yet, but i'm hoping that at some point we can buy/wear matching t-shirts.  and thats just one of my unsaid plans...)

There is a beauty store/pharmacy/random other things place here called Boots. Boots provides hours of entertainment when I'm trying to find the perfect lipstick or just want to get out of the rain. Boots also has disposable cameras.  Buy one get one free.  Bam. I bought a couple before the trip to Italy and Janna was nice enough to take them as her own.   A sampling of her work: Love me a Boots camera  And Italy.

Today I sent someone an email with some information that I should've sent a couple months ago.  No big.  The best part, though, was the automated response claiming that she 'only worked on Mondays and Tuesdays'. I seriously had to step back and try to remember what day of the week it was, because when I woke up I swore it was Tuesday, but maybe I got lost somewhere in those couple of hours. Nope.  Still Tuesday.  The mystery remains... When I was younger I used to want to be a veterinarian.  Those were the days when I felt inclined to help the animal species.  To love them and make them better when they were sick. Now, I feel quite the opposite.  There are some animals in the world (i.e. the dogs currently still living at home) that I wish would not be so living.   It was a weird shift change, going from wanting to help to wanting to hurt, but it happened.  I think now I'm just in an indifference stage with them. ...

Memorial Day always makes me miss my Grandpas.

First off, I just want to know how any woman in a big city stays put together for one whole day?  Whenever I live/go to any big city for any amount of time, I get ready in the morning and then by noon I am a mess.  Especially when its hot.  There is no way I stay looking anything good for longer than an hour.  And when I get sweaty I don't get that pretty glistening-I get odious.  Any tips are appreciated. On that note, you'll notice I took zero pictures of myself during this experience.   I had a kangaroo burger for lunch.  I would have bought some zebra patties, except I'm pretty sure they wouldn't have survived the 5 hour bus ride back home.  Yes, you caught me.  I paid the extra 50p for cheese. This was all at the Borough Market, a cool little food market that sells some really random things (other interesting/popular spots were the duck sandwiches and goat-milk ice cream). There is also more normal food. ...

Spoiler Alert: I just end up singing Justin Bieber's song 'boyfriend', but I change it to 'girlfriend'.  So you don't have to watch.  I'm not offended. This is what I do.

Today I had to give a presentation in my last class...ever. (until i decide i want a ph.d?) It was just an introduction of my dissertation topic, of which I will try to spare the blog community from until it's the only thing I have to talk about in my life (i.e. probably the end of July when it will be consuming my entire life-you're welcome ahead of time). The presentation went smoothly, about as smooth as I could have hoped, and it's an area that my professor is unfamiliar with, which meant less intimidating questions during the Q&A.  She said she actually learned things from me-bam!  Academic world, watch out.  Cynthia is coming. (cynthia=my business name) Our presentation has been a 'pass/fail', meaning some people only 'just pass', which actually means the exact same thing as 'pass'.  Some things don't make sense in my head, either. Point of this story is, after class we had to go with our professor while she made copi...

Remember when you were little and you would think about your future?  And you would envision something that just seemed so perfect and right?  And then you were so excited to get older because you knew, you just knew , that what you thought would happen would actually happen. And then...you got to that age that you dreamed of, and you realized life is exactly not what you had planned.  In fact, oftentimes, it is on a whole other level. Me.  I never thought that I would live with, and share one, single kitchen with 14 other people, mostly from China (but also a couple from India).  In England. Or I never thought I would be able to watch the same Seinfeld episodes over and over again. I never thought I would be able to get my Masters degree.  And I most definitely never thought I would be interested in teaching English to people who have no idea what I'm saying.  And like it. I never thought I would actually have the chance to eat do...

I've spent more or less the last three days stuffed up in my room, with all intentions of making as much progress as possible on my dissertation. It has been rather boring.  But exciting, because I love doing school work.  So much.  (NOT TRUE) I have this desire to travel and go to a few more places before I leave England, but I also know I need to get some stuff done on my dissertation, so I've been trying to be pretty adult about this.  Which means boring.  I'm struggling between "You're in England.  Take advantage" and "You're a grad student.  Be responsible".  My life is so hard. So I keep telling myself that if I get as much done as possible by Wednesday, I can take a trip this weekend.  Hold me responsible, friends.  My goals are totally reasonable, so I think I can do it. Also, York has had a lot of beautiful days this past week.   I love you so much more when there is no rain.

This weekend was pretty good.   Some friends and I drove down to Birmingham on Friday night (just over two hours away) and made it back by sunrise on Saturday morning.  It was only made possible by our 2 am trip to the cheap fast food joint "Big Johns" where I consumed a pizza that was so hot my mouth is still recovering from the burn. So awesome, right? I was going to make a video of said evening, but I got lazy and so I technically only have footage from the car ride.  Also, I still need to make a video of Italy-now there is some good stuff waiting for you there. Saturday my friend John, or rather his girlfriend, called me up and invited me to go over to the beach with them.  I may or may not have still been in bed, but 10 minutes later they came and we headed over to Scarborough. I love that place.  It even makes fish and chips mo' betta. Even when its freezing.   (the sun was playing games with my heart all day) ...

Yesterday I was able to Skype in with my family in Colorado... (i just refound this picture.  look how little they were! kids grow up so fast.  donald.me.erik. 2005) and with my brother Donald, who is serving a church mission in Hong Kong... and two of my brothers in Utah. Technology makes the world seem so much smaller!  And yesterday, I really liked that. All made possible by the internets.  And our Mother. A late Happy Mothers Day to you, Mom!  You are the best.

It's about time I spend an entire blog post about a very special man. Reed, or as I like to call him sometimes, Reedster.  But it really depends on the day if he is Reed or Reedster.  And if he's wearing his glasses.  They make a big difference. Reedster has been like a bonus brother the last few years, and a very big supporter of this blog.  I haven't seen him for awhile because he had very messed up priorities when I was in Utah a few weeks ago, but I forgive him.  Even through the hurt. Oh, how I miss these moments: Happy Birthday Reed!  Now go getcha some! 

Fun facts from my recent days: Fun fact 1: Did you know that in England they don't believe in warm tap water?  It's either third degree burn hot or arctic tundra cold.   Fun fact 2: Did you know that you can hang cheese in a bag out of your window and it stays good for days?!  Well, it at least tastes fine.  The real effects are TBD. Fun fact 3:  The University of York has a strange love affair with fire safety.  Required at the beginning of the year was a lecture on how to r eact to fire.  There are also frequent fire drills.  You remember how in elementary school you would have maybe one..two a year?  Because its not hard to figure out: fire alarm=get out of the building. Well, turns out university students here need a lot more practice than that, resulting in the alarm going off at 9 am this morning and me, after contemplating hanging out in my room and hiding from the fire safety guys, reluctantly heading outside with th...

Justin Bieber recently released a video for his new song Boyfriend .  Since that fateful day, there has been an uproar (or a quiet muffling) of people who say that his video copies, or imitates (flattery?) NSYNC's video from ten years ago, Girlfriend . Suspicious.  I will get to the bottom of this. First off, the videos.  Starting with NSYNC: (i forgot how much i love JT.  i do) And now, JB: Ok.  Let's take a look here. Well, first off, I have some gold shoes that are very simliar to JB's.  Not only is he stealing his video ideas from NSYNC, he's taking his fashion sense from me.  Which...I am fine with.  You're welcome JB. Also, the other day I was thinking about Lance Bass so I looked him up on the Facebook.  He is most def hotter now than ever before: (via his fb page ) This also reminds me that I had a dream that night where I had to marry a member of NSYNC and I ended up marrying Joey! ...

I don't have any really cool stories from my real life this week, so I'll just post some more pictures from Italy. Although, the weather really pulled out a winner today here in York and it was absolutely beautiful.  One of the best days in recent memory. And I did see a midget in a lab coat outside one of the science buildings on campus a few days ago.  I kid you not, I laughed, by myself, for a good solid ten minutes. Cinque Terre: Janna's birthday dinner!  Also, one of our most favorite meals of the entire trip.  Thanks, Ely. Hands down, one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.  

We went to Vatican City. And we climbed the stairs to the top of St. Peters.  551 (is that right?) stairs, to be exact. Some people might not say its worth it.  I totally disagree.  I would do it again.  And again. And the Colosseum.  Bam.  Brian almost got in a fight with a guy on the bus outside the Colosseum, it was weird.  And Brian would have totally won had it come down to it.  But we are peacekeepers.