But Twin Draftguard Provides an Air-Tight Seal!!

So Christmas happened! Bracken and I went up to his parents' house in glamorous Preston, ID. The festivities included a bajillion-kajillion games (which I actually enjoyed), mountains of never-ending home-cooked meals, lots of extended family, and an AWESOME new Kindle!! Hooray!! It's pretty and black and has unlimited, free 3G! Like I said, awesome. I've been downloading books like mad. After getting a long list of free classics, I have about 47 books and only paid for one of them. Actually, I didn't even pay for it because my $25 kindle gift card took the honors. And I'm sooo not even done! But I will be busy reading those for a while.
Now that the holidays are pretty much over, the wedding planning is back in full swing. And actually, last night Bracken pointed out that I was the one playing video games and he was the one looking up wedding things online. (As you may have gathered, those roles are usually reversed.) Hey, it's not my fault I've become hopelessly addicted to Dance Central, just one of a few games that came with a brand new Kinect that was delivered to Bracken's doorstep this week! And what's more, we have no idea who sent it! Who does that?? Our new anonymous best friend, that's who! If I could play Dance Central while sleeping, I would. It's that addicting. AND, Bracken got Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows for the Kinect!! I'm marrying a genius. (For those of you who don't know what a Kinect is, it's like a Wii remote game but twenty times better. It hooks up to the Xbox and has some cool laser reader thing that reads how you move your body, so you can play games by actually standing up and moving around with no remote.)
All this talk of Kinect has made me want to play, so I'll add some pictures and leave with a shaking fist at the off-and-on blizzard that's been sweeping Utah this week. Stop it!

This is the game that took over about 90% of our said game-playing. It also teaches Italian. ...no, really.

I'm actually reading the first book of this trilogy they have on the screen riiiight nooow. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. 

So FREAKIN excited about Christmas!!

Cousins Table!! Bracken wasn't invited.

After the initial shock and "What the hell!?" of the self-moving Santa hat, Grandpa was thrilled to wear it...

It's like crack.

Please Sign In If You Are Visiting For Any Reason.

Oh hi, Mark! I mean blog! I just saw Aly's blog and read about a million and one posts and got insanely jealous of her travels and decided I should probably write a new post since my last one was...that one time that I posted last.

As seen on Bracken's blog, TA DA! We're engaged! Let the villagers rejoice and the wedding planning begin! ....or maybe I had most of that done before I actually had the ring on my finger and I'm not a total creeper. I am naaahhht! But the date, venue, temple session, dress, decorations, cake, invitations, and various other things may or may not have already been bought/decided upon before the morning of November 21st. I would mention it's on March 25th at the Logan temple, but hey, my three followers are my mom, my sister and my fiancee himself, so....hmm.

Yesterday was the third Globe University/Minnesota School of Business/Broadview University/work party at Thanksgiving Point. Joy. I came in to work at nine to "help" wrap the Secret Santa presents (I put "help" in sarcastic quotes because I was doing it all before doing the female guilt-trip on those standing by and watching). Whilst ushering in the Christmas Spirit, I snipped my finger pretty dang bad. Like deep. And gushing blood. And it hurt. Mica put ointment and a band-aid on it, thus demonstrating the great Medical Assisting education she's receiving here at our fine institution. Don't worry, I survived. Once the presents were wrapped, I got in Staci's 4-runner and we headed up to the Garden Room at Thanksgiving Point in our business attire. As per usual, the food made me sick, the awards were rigged (don't even get me started on the award our campus got for..what was it? Matt Moon's contributed processes adapted at our campus?.....), the company founders gave some stuffy speaches, blah blah blah it got out a half hour early.

THEN, I went and picked up Bracken...or rather rose him from the dead after pulling an all-nighter to finish a final project...and we were off into the construction traffic on the good ol' I-15 to meet Grandpa at his place for my birthday dinner. I was getting stressed cuz we were running late due to the afore-mentioned construction traffic, leaving Grandpa about 5 messages/missed calls letting him know we were coming. We made it to his house just a few minutes after 5, knocked on the door, and no one was there. After waiting in the car for a good 20 minutes, we headed back onto the 2-15 West. Right as we reach the entrance to I-15, my phone goes off with a reminder that my birthday dinner is in 15 minutes...DING DING DING! My fried brain goes off and suddenly remembers it was at 6, not 5. By this time I had gotten on the I-15 NORTH and got off on the first exit, followed it around and parked in some KFC parking lot in who knows where. I get ahold of Grandpa, tell him the story, and we're off to meet him at his place. Only problem is I'm now lost. We park in a church parking lot and I do the girl thing and cry. Greeeaaat. After I pull it together, with some help from Bracken since he's amazing like that, we find the freeway, get to Grandpa's, and have a delicious dinner at Maccaroni Grill in Salt Lake. (Thanks for nothing, 60-70 minute wait at P.F. Chang's.) It's ok, though, Maccaroni Grill was even better.

Wow, this is a lenghty post. Better add some pictures...uh...here:

Other than that, I'm waiting on a check from corporate so I can get paid for Thanksgiving *shaking fist*, school's almost over, work is...work, and I'm gonna go make more paper snowflakes for the windows now. Promise I'll blog again soon. To all...three of you out there. Get excited!!! XD

Kills 99.99% of Germs

Today has been entirely too long. I woke up at 8:30, went to a work meeting from 10 AM to 3:15 PM (yeah, don't even get me started on that huge waste of time that just caused even more problems than what was trying to be "solved"), had a 2 hour lunch break from 3:30-5:30 during which I went home and played Freecell because I couldn't sleep, came back and get to stay until 10 PM. One more hour to go until freedom...one more...
On a lighter note, I got free Rumbi's. That was actually the only good thing about the "meeting". I like to "use quotes" to convey my "abundant sarcasm".
On an even lighter note, pay day is tomorrow! FIIInally. I actually get to start setting money aside to save this paycheck! I've forgotten what that feels like, but I imagine it's wonderful. I'm also going to spend some of that money on a couple shelves and a small entryway table from DI to display my heart-stoppingly gorgeous witch boot on. Yes, I've become addicted to the strong substance that is arts & crafts again. Thank you, Wendy Rawlings. See, in this instance, being an enabler is a good thing!
OK, I'm all out of interesting things to say. I guess I'll go fold, stuff, and mail a sizeable stack of letters that have been pushed off onto me by one of our loveable Admissions Reps. Again. ..perhaps I should have used the sarcasm quotes. I think you get it.

Sheriff Officer T.J. Hooker

Yes, yes, I am still alive. I know all 2 of my followers were sincerely worried for my well-being. ...except both of you have seen me quite recently. But that's beside the point!

School is school, work is work, blah blah blah. New discoveries (with pictures because that makes it more interesting for me):

The Panda Express in AF's food is comparably more delicious than the ones here in Orem/Provo. Figures.

• Burlington Coat Factory has some GREAT sweats for super cheap. Got me some Jordans and ...what was the other one, Bracken? Polo? I dunno. But they're both big and super comfy. A++.
  
  


• My running skills are laughable compared to what they used to be. :(

• The Water Gardens theaters are still open and, better yet, are only $3 per movie and $1 for concessions!!! Say whaaaa??





• Teeny tiny spiders are deciding it's that time of year to start invading the Gilbert. Poor decision, spiders. You're all going to meet a sticky and then watery grave (compliments of my toilet).





• Winco has my favorite of all time Greek yogurt with honey! Now it won't just be a fond memory of UK food, but an everyday occurrence!









• I'm heavily addicted to Harry Potter Lego video games. Bracken finally found a game I'll play and, what's more, won't stop playing. Well done.

And finally, this majestic beauty I was lucky enough to encounter on my way to Biology last week:



I hope that braided rat tail leaves you with a warm, fuzzy feeling that will last until my next post. Ta!

Be Sure to Drink Your....Ovaltine???

Hmmm. I feel as though there's WAY too much to write on an update scale. Let's just say I had the best freaking vacation EVER in the UK!! I can't get enough of that place. It's like I walked into a Disney movie. Especially in Chelmsford. I bought 8 pairs of shoes, lotsa clothes, souveniers that include a pretty kick-ass jersey for Bracken, and I STILL have some money left over! And some British pounds in my wallet that I need to get exchanged. Probably asap. Or I may just hold onto them and sleep with them under my pillow because I'm a creepy UK stalker. Not stalker from the UK, but stalker of the UK. Seriously. I can't stop talking about it. People are most likely starting to get super annoyed with my "When I was in London/Ireland/Scotland..." comments. I don't blame them.
Uuummm....what else? Bracken's the best ever, but that's nothing new. Everyone knows that. ;) Sorry, ladies, I clearly won the Ultimate Golden Trillion-Dollar Trump-Card Prize in the men department. And I'm not sharing.......Verna.....
Oh! I'm apartment hunting! I found some good'ns online and am gonna scope them out next week before work. This time around I'm getting either a studio or one bedroom apt. No more roomies. I'm done with that. And the only one that I'm looking at that is remotely close to BYU is the Branbury...and I like that one the best so far. BUT, I still haven't seen any interiors of said apartments as of yet.
Anywho, I'm super bored cuz Bracken's at work and I'm watching a VH1-style truTV countdown special, The World's Dumbest Daredevils 7. Yes, refer to Bracken's last post on his blog, and you will find he is completely correct. We really do watch only the quality shows.
Uuugghh, I still have two more albums to post to facebook, too. Maybe I'll do that with the last hour I need to occupy my ADD-riddled mind. Wow, how many Nutrisystem commercials are they really gonna make? One was clearly enough. I bet it was all Marie Osmond's fault. "Meeee...MEEEEEE....MEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!"
I really should post some pics from the trip on my blog, too...I'll do that later. If ever. I'm lazy.
Byeeee!

Everything's comin' up Millhouse!

Poor seester and family! They've been having a rough time of it across the pond. Ellie's fingers smashed, visit to the hospital, James spending a stranded night in his uninsured car hours from home, getting lost in the labrynth of roundabouts and tube stops, faulty vending machines, screaming baby, blah blah. But from the sound of it, Ellie's fingers are fine now and they got the car insured, so all is well.
I'm so psyched to go visit them with KK in a month!! Freakin' sweetest trip ever. Yeah, one month away. Seriously. Still don't think it's hit me yet. I think I'll spend my joke of a shift today looking at Britishy pictures online and rereading our tour itinerary. Multiple times. And then once more. I also need to figure out the whole lack of camera charger situation, stat.
Speaking of purchasing electronics, I finally got an ipod adapter for my car! It's a pretty momentous occasion for me, so hide your pity and just agree that it's awesome. I'm a little behind the times with my techno-gadgety purchases, and I think I know where I got that from...*cough* parents not getting a DVD player until I was in high school *cough*.
Other current events: impromptu date night with Bracken last night. All-star line-up with Zupa's, Robin Hood (brought my giant movie purse/Mary Poppins bag full of sugary goodness), Cold Stone, Just Friends, Community, and some Human Giant. You may commence your jealousy.
Spanish class, same old same old. Lovin' it. Still can't decide if I want to try to test out of the next class or two...probably not since I still want to do the complete program.
Ummm...I think that about sums it up for me. Now off to play some Text Twist and look at the aforementioned Britishy pictures. I mean, put in a hard days' work with all the things I have piled up to do. Oh wait, there's nothing.
Ta!

Lime popcorn, nacho-rific mashed potatoes, and a plate full of snickerdoodles.

Oh hello, there! Time again to update the ol' blog. Okay, the new blog. Don't worry about it. Anyhow, what's been going on lately? Wehehellll....

Spanish couldn't be an easier class and I even have a sweet makeshift Community-esque study group! We have a lovably bickering brother-sister combo (Joe, the brother, being a wicked good cook), a witty Ukranian girl, me, and now some other new girl who I've only met once but is so far so cool. And, just sayin', we all got A's on our chapter 1 test today. BAM!

Bracken got me re-hooked on Glee. It's like crack. But then again, so are numerous other things. Like Sangria/Jarritos, Half-Baked Ben & Jerry's, buying clothing that has been vastly reduced in price, superb movie marathons, Text Twist, blah blah blah a lot more.

So now with my new work schedule, not only do I work less hours and have substantially less stress to deal with, I get to actually LEAVE THE DESK the last 2 hours of my shift and stop answering phones! It's like freakin' Christmas. Also, I'm now considered the night time security...yeah....stop laughing. I can cause some serious damage..with my scathing remarks and advanced skill at sarcastically cutting others' self esteem? Yes.

Okay, I've gotta go make my first round and intimidate any potential crooks now. I feel like putting a picture in here...we'll see what I come up with. OH! WAIT! Of course! It's gotta be the prize-winning picture of the birthday girl yesterday! That's right, yesterday was Staci's birthday. And me being an amazing friend, what did I do? I went to Target and got her the following: Rock 'em Sock 'em Robot rings, neon-colored feather pens, whoopie cushions, a bday sash and ribbon, creepy eyes glasses, a $1 garter, a tirantula puzzle, a giant novelty pen, a glittery unicorn and rainbow card, and I think some other stuff I'm forgetting, all piled into the coolest Transformers bag ever. Here's the pic:

Lark on my Go-Kart

Oh, herro! Just got out of Spanish 1010 and I couldn't have picked an easier class. Hooray for an easy A this semester! We learned the alphabet today. I made sure to take vigorous notes. I'm also hoping I can park in the church parking lot that says institute parking only, cuuuuzz I didn't buy a new parking pass.
In other news, Dana and family moved to London on Monday! We had a Happy Birthday, Ellie/Goodbye Haymores party on Sunday at James's parents' house. Ellie was confused with the whole dig-your-hands-in-the-cake theory at first until James showed her there was actual cake under all the frosting.
I started my 4-10 shift this week. Sooo much better than the 7:30-4:30 slave labor I was doing before. Good luck to Karie with handling the beast that is the full-time front desk day shift. Now I get four hours between class and work, which today has been spent playing some ipod solitaire, buying my Spanish workbook after waiting in the longest line ever seen, buying a Jamba Juice, and now blogging. I still have just over two hours til I have to be to work and partake of the free Cinco de Mayo nacho bar and fruitlessly attempt to avoid cape girl and watch the Suns game on GameCast. I mean work really hard and stuff.
Speaking of the play-offs, my Lakers all get gold stars for their victory over the Utah Yazz flute last night. Well done, boys. Also kudos to Steve Nash for being effortlessly amayzazing.
Until next time, ¡Hasta luego! (Yes, that was covered in class today.)

Little Girl, Don't Get Me Cherry! It Upsets My Stomach.

Hey hey hey! Staying at the Draper residence until Thursday so I can watch their 4 dogs while they're in California! Really liking the whole not having to drive to and from Spanish Fork thing. Plus, they have a massive TV. Several awesome things happened this weekend.

1. I was introduced me to Human Giant and it is without a doubt the funniest show I've ever seen in my life. Thank you, Bracken.
2. I just had the greatest potato salad made by man at Dana's "Surprise" Going-Away Party. (I say surprise in quotes because Dana was in fact the one who invited me to it, but everyone still said "Surprise!" when we came through the door.)What made it the greatest potato salad? NO ONIONS! Andrea's my kind of cook.
3. I bought some sweet purple suede flats that were on sale at Target. They're my new favorite shoes.
4. I slept for, like, 5 hours on Saturday. Definitely needed that.

On a side note, creepy early-twenties cashier at the Sev is super creepy. I was, understandably, taking my time picking out which pint of ice cream I felt like on Saturday night, and upon turning around with my selection, found creepy cashier literally 5 inches away from me, just standing there. I was also the only one in the store. He also never gave a reason for his personal space invading. Luckily the ice cream was delicious.

Dana got hip surgery on Friday night and guess who has two thumbs and was a great sister and sat in the waiting room for five hours? This girl! (If you can't tell, I'm pointing my aforementioned thumbs at myself.) Apparently I was in the wrong waiting room, but the surgery still took that long. Then I went upstairs and asked where her room was. A nurse told me she would be brought up to room 397, so I waited there for a good 15 minutes before asking another nurse who told me she was already up in room 494. Lo and behold, she was right and I finally found my poor, crippled sister. Everything turned out fine, she just has to be on crutches for the next week and is supposed to start physical therapy even though she's leaving to England in one week...

In NBA Playoff news, I don't wanna talk about it.

As for today, I had a nice Sunday that consisted of watching Sleepy Hollow on TV, going to church with Bracken and remembering why BYU wards kill me slowly inside, watching the Cavs shut out the Bulls and Lebron sink a half-court buzzer beater, stuffing absurdly large spoonfuls of cookie dough ice cream into Bracken's mouth, going to the Haymore's "Surprise" Going-Away Party and discussing Dana's herpes, James's being sterile, Kyle's stripper-theme ringtone he has for Jenny, the difference between the Haymore's dad teaching his kids to grab chickens after he chopped off their heads (the chickens, not the children) and our dad's testing Stephen Covey teaching modules on his kids, and now lounging around with 4 dogs. All in all, a good day.

OK, I've written enough for now. Time to go watch that extremely large TV and attempt to ignore the ominous presence of work and finals that I'll be drowning in tomorrow. Ta!

Like A Boss

Well today was a real treat. Who needs the use of their body and the ability to swallow their own saliva? Not this girl! I'm way to advanced for that. It's a result of hard work and dedication. No, seriously.

Anyhow, last 3 of the 4th quarter in Lakers-Thunder game 2. I gotta say, my team's done better. However, Gasol looks like Joe the Camel and I appreciate that. I still love ya, Lakers!

Hmmm...supposto have a second draft for my research paper by tomorrow...can't really do homework at work this week since I'm supposto be training Karie to mighty morph into day-shift Admin Assistant by May 1st...and yes, I've been saying 'supposto' on purpose. Funny story. So Ryan sent Brigham an e-mail yesterday that included the word 'supposto'. We concluded he was attimpting to say 'supposed to', but obviously missed by a long shot. As an inevitable result, Brigham shared this with the rest of FA and myself, and every e-mail we sent out that day included the word 'supposto'. Since laughing at other people's grammatical errors is so satisfying, we've decided we'll have a designated Word of the Day (one such grammatical error found in an e-mail received that morning), and use it in every e-mail we send that day. It makes work that much more tolerable, and that's always welcome.

Went to Los (Hermanos) tonight with KK, Shawna, Lisa, and Dain. Only thing better than the best endless chips & salsa anywhere was K impersonating the senile, deaf, cross-eyed, mustached, cowboy hat wearing, Icelandic creeper who consistantly comes into the bank. To make it even more impressive, she impersonated him reenacting the recent volcano eruption and potentially resulting plane crashes. Uh-may-zing.

Alright, folks. Tomorrow's another day, and hopefully I'll miraculously pull a second draft of my research paper out of my ...brain. Until next time, I leave you with this picture of where I'll be in two months and say, "I'm better than you. Na-na-na boo-boo, stick your head in doo-doo". Peace!

Hey, kids! I betcha thought that I was dead!

Wow. All I gotta say. Woooow. Just watched the hilarious train wreck that was my one-act from high school...good times @ Mount Carmel in 2005. Plus, total up-the-skirt shot that I could do nothing about because I was balancing atop shoulders at the end. Wasn't high school fun???

Anywhooo, hey look, maybe 3 people that know I made this, Chelsey has a blog! The world can rest easy now. Shhh, shhh, it's ok. I know you want to read all about my life and the inner workings of my infamous brain.

To start you off on this magical journey, I'll take advantage of the opportunity I have to bore you to death with the latest details of my life.
1. Coming to the end of this semester @ UVU, and boy will I ever miss Library Research!
2. Kaylene and I just moved in to Chris & Shelly's place for the summer while they're gone doing
summer sales for Apex. Free rent makes the 30 mph Spanish Fork Main Street almost worth
it!
3. Finally getting to work part time starting in 2 weeks...2 ominous, forever-long weeks...
4. LONDON in just about 2 months!! Mind the gap!
5. In complete and utter contrast to my previous 13 or so years of schooling, I've actually
managed to get all A's on my essays for English 1010 this semester. No, it's not a joke. I
will take monetary forms of congratulations kindly.
....aaand those are the juicy details of my intense life in the fast lane. Also, KK and I watched the first three episodes of Gavin & Stacey, compliments of the burned Season 1 DVD from Dana & James. Glad to report it is indeed hilarious. The Brits have mastered witty humoUr, no doubt. Alrighty, sports fans, that's about all I got for tonight. Wait, that reminds me. Congrats to my boys, the Lakers, on their first-game victory against the Thunder on Sunday! Keep this up and I'll take you all out for delicious, frosty milkshakes! Until next time, stay classy, San Diego!

PS: Let it be known that this blog is dedicated to the devilishly debonair Sir Bracken Rawlings.