Flag me down

Yesterday, Saturday, I worked all morning on a proposal for my final project in one of my classes, and when I finally finished it I felt like celebrating, so I went on a bike ride. There is this road called Lake Mary Rd. and so I of course assumed that I would be riding by a lake, and that sounded like a very picturesque ride. So I started on my ride, and towards the beginning of my ride not three inches from my tire I saw this:

In case you aren't aware, I do NOT do spiders. They are the bane of my existence.

Anyway, I was fortunately able to forget about the spider because as I got out onto Lake Mary Rd. the view was beautiful. I've never consciously decided that pine trees were beautiful trees, but they are everywhere here and I have developed a deep affinity towards them.


Well next on my ride I got to lower Lake Mary, and this is what I saw: ***

Pretty sad excuse for a lake right? Apparently there is occasionally water at Upper Lake Mary, but as I wasn't prepared for a 40 mile ride I had to turn around. Maybe next time I'll get to verify whether there actually is a legitimate source of water out there. I'll keep you posted.

After turning around to head home, I glanced down and noticed this perched on my leg:

I continued checking on my new little friend for the remainder of my ride and Lady, as I like to call her, stayed on my leg regardless of me being in or out of the saddle and even against high speeds of 30 mph Lady hung on to my spandex clad leg. I don't know if the spandex helped her cling on to my leg tighter, but she stayed with my for approximately 10 miles. Unfortunately I lost her when I was only about 2 miles from my house. I was sad to see my new friend leave so abruptly, but glad that i could transport her to a new environment, the NAU campus. Hopefully the next person she attaches to treats her kindly.

Anyway, that is an accounting of my eventful bike ride. Hopefully the next ride will be as eventful...

***Disclaimer: All footage and pictures are taken with my phone, and as such the quality may not be excellent. Hopefully you can look past any such inadequacies and find an appreciation for the pictures.

A Trip to Mesa

Last weekend I went down to Mesa for the weekend for a cousin's wedding. At this point I have to say that I live in one of only two acceptable places to live in AZ, Flagstaff and Sedona. It was so hot in Mesa, I barely survived the 2 days that I was there. For those of you who think I exaggerate, you've obviously never been near me when I am hot...I get a little irritable. I hate being hot and basically make it an uncomfortable experience for others as well.

Anyway, it was fun to spend time with my family and all of the extended family. I offered to be chauffeur for my parents and brother Paul, who flew in for the weekend. So I set out on Friday September 11th to pick everyone up at the airport.

This is a picture of me heading out of Flagstaff.

It was actually a really pretty drive. The clouds here are amazing, the sky is covered in them! Here are a few pictures to give you an idea:




Along the way I saw this road sign which made me smile:


As I got closer to the Phoenix airport my dad called and told me that their flight was delayed, it is only an hour flight, but by this time I only had about an hour left in my drive and they hadn't even left yet! Rar! I arrived at the airport and sat in the cell phone lot for approximately an hour and a half waiting for their plane to arrive. Here is a picture to demonstrate how much I enjoyed that experience:

But, I was able to do some work as I waited, so I felt productive/

Well I finally collected my family, we went and grabbed some dinner and then headed to the hotel. The ceremony the next day was beautiful, it was really nice. Here is a picture of the couple as they came out of the temple:


It ended up being an enjoyable weekend. Thanks Derek for getting married so the family could all get together.

Well, as you may have guessed I have been working on this post instead of homework. I'd better get back to researching language policy and planning...wish me luck...

Rainbows, rain and football

This is a picture I took of the sky today while out grocery shopping. Unfortunately it was taken with my phone and so it isn't the best shot, but you get the idea. By the time I finished my shopping and headed out of the store it was pouring rain! I love the rain, the weather here in Flagstaff is so fun!

Since it was such a rainy day outside, I naturally had a desire to do some baking. I got this fun idea to make some rainbow cupcakes the other day from a friend's blog...

I think they turned out pretty well, what do you think? Baking at such a high elevation requires some alterations to recipes, so I had to experiment a little bit but they didn't fall, they're still moist and delicious, so I think that I did pretty well for my first jaunt into baking in Flagstaff.

Also, the other day I played basketball with a bunch of people and the next day this random bruise appeared on my knee. I have no idea how I got it, I don't remember any collisions, but here is a picture of that:


And finally, because today was BYU's first game vs. Oklahoma, I wore a BYU shirt all day, and they ended up winning! Wahoo, what a deal! Now, I am not suggesting that I was the essential factor in the win (that would be crazy), but it was an exciting win. Hooray BYU, 1-0!!!

And we thought steroids were bad...

Earlier this week I was listening to an NPR report about people using drugs or surgery to increase their effectiveness in school or their career. Trying to boost performance seems to be a chronic problem among athletes, the steroids thing is beyond out of control, but now there are the academic dopers, kids whose parents have them take Adderall, ADHD medicine, so that they will be able to focus and do better in school. According to the journal Addiction, one in four college students misused ADHD medication, and the Partnership for a Drug Free America reported that 1 in 10 kids between middle school and high school age are using drugs like Adderall or Ritalin without a prescription. In addition, people also give Tiger Woods a hard time because he had lasik eye surgery, and thus has an advantage over the other players as his eyesight is not better than 20/20. I've heard all of these things before, and have my own opinions about them, but check out this new one- click on the title of this blog and be prepared to be shocked...

Heads Carolina, Tails California

Well somehow I have ended up in Flagstaff, AZ and not Carolina or California, oh well. I have committed to being better at updating the ol' blog, so we will see how it goes. Anyway, I drove Friday afternoon in a U-haul towing my car. Yes, it was a fabulous drive. I think that the fastest we went was 65 mph and that was downhill. Needless to say, it was a very long drive. But now I am in my new home for the next two years, well for the next little while at least. So here are a few pictures of the place...

View from my window



I realized when I was unpacking that I have a lot of clothes. And I don't know why that is, I'm not a fancy dresser, I think that I just like to have options. Well, that is all good when I have limitless space, but there is no space here for me to hang my coats and dress pants, and where to put all of my shoes?

Closet:

And new "mobile" closet at the foot of my bed:


Some pictures from around campus, now these aren't the greatest pictures because, don't judge me too harshly, I was driving when I took these pictures. Gasp- I know, dangerous, but I did it for you, so that you could see what it was like!



Driving down street around campus

The skydome

And yes, the mascot of NAU is the lumberjack. Fantastic, right?

Also, Saturday night it smelled like a fire outside, and then Sunday we could see smoke- it was a fire about 14 miles away. I was convinced that I had brought some bad fire karma to AZ, in SoCal we have a fire season after all, but then I talked to my sister who lives in Mesa and she reassured me that there is generally a fire or two in AZ every year. Talk about relief, I thought that the burning of the forest was going to be blamed on me and the neighbors were going to come with their pitchforks and kick me out of town! (Although, it might be axes instead of pitchforks...) Here is a picture that shows the sky Monday evening:

And finally, I went to a grad student orientation today and towards the end they had a raffle and I won! Wahoo! I can't believe it! When they announced that the prize was a family of four pass to Meteor Crater I told my table that I wanted to go there, and I won! I think this could be the start of a great time here in Flagstaff...