Ten Years

Well its hard to believe its been ten years since 9/11. Like most people, I remember that whole day pretty well. Christy and I had just come home from early morning seminary. There was about half an hour we could spend at home eating breakfast and getting ready for school. Mom was up and eating with me. I had Trix, but it was tasting funny because I was taking liquid penicillin for an ingrown toenail problem. Christy came down and said that some hijacked planes had been flown into some buildings in New York and the Pentagon.

I knew it was a big deal, but as a 15 year old (well, a week shy of 15) I couldn't conceive of what had just happened. As we drove to school we listened to the radio and they were describing the scene. I just remember mom saying something like "this is a war." The rest of school day was odd. The teachers had a meeting to decide if they were going to send us home. They decided to try and have a normal school day, but you could tell they were upset. I still hadn't seen any images, all I knew were what others were saying. When they said the towers had collapsed, I again couldn't imagine what had really happened.  I just assumed that only a small part of the buildings collapsed.

When I finally got home, I was able to see all that had happened on the TV and on the internet. Mom had been glued to the TV all day while she was making paper bag angel centerpieces because she was in the Stake Relief Society presidency.

It was a strange new time that began 10 years ago. I had just started high school. Just started seminary. everything was changing. My first youth conference was the week following 9/11. I remember on the way home there were people on the corner of mission and walnut waving flags and cars honking as they drove by. The air traffic that usually crosses the sky above our house was gone for a while. I remember dad was up one morning as we left for seminary and pointed out to us the combat jets that were patrolling the sky. I also remember the next month during General Conference when president Hinkley announced that he had just gotten word that the US had begun dropping bombs in Afghanistan and the comfort he tried to bring to us.

It is even more strange to look at photos from that time. In my memory, I'm the same person so I don't imagine me or others really as they were. I just remember everyone as they are. But here are some pictures from the summer of 2001 and my birthday 7 days after 9/11

Time sure flies! Of course if you think of all the good times and bad times that happened in between, it seems a bit easier to believe that its been a decade.

Jimmy and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

I remember mom used to read me this book when I was little, probably because I was never really a morning kid so my days didn't always start out smooth. But last Saturday, 8/27, started out bad and only got worse.

It was my first full day back in Sacramento. I had orientation at 9am so I was sure to get to bed early. I woke up, showered and was running late as usual so I skipped breakfast. I hopped in the car and had 20 minutes to get to campus. Plenty of time. But then I realized the that front tire was flat. Crap! So I ran upstairs, grabbed my bike and rode off to school. I got there 10 mins late and I was all sweaty, but I made it.

The rest of orientation went well, although it was somewhat awkward since everyone else was already friends so I had to sort of break into different cliques. But it was finally over so I went to the book store to see if I could buy a parking permit so I wouldn't have to be late for classes on Monday. I got to the front of the line and then they announced that the system was down so they were only taking cash purchases. Crap! So I went back home to await the tow truck that would bring me and the car to the tire place.

He showed up and instead of towing the car, just put on a spare. I paid him $85 and went off to the tire place and got there 2 minutes before closing. They were pleased to help me though. But instead of just replacing the tire he told me that the tires were at the legal limit of how worn a tire can be so they wanted to put 4 new ones on. $500 later he takes me over to the car and wants to know the mileage. Its a digital meter so I put the key in the ignition and turn on the electronics to see the mileage. Then the guy distracted me and I ended up shutting the door with the keys locked in. So I wasn't going to get the tires changed today and I was stranded all the way across town in a crappy neighborhood. So the same towing company came to my rescue again.

He noticed the previous receipt and asked what that was about. I just said I was having a very crappy day, and he agreed and said he'll be needing $75. I pulled out my debit card and he asked if I could pay in cash because he was out of credit card slips. Luckily there was a bank just across the street so I went over and pulled out four 20's and he then told me that he has no change. What t he crap?! So I said keep the $5 because I just want to go home and sit in my room and not touch anything. I grabbed some groceries at Walmart, which was maybe not the best idea because I really wanted to mow everyone down with my cart. It takes a lot of patience to shop there and mine was all used up that day.

But I finally made it home and was so glad to be able to rest and not have something go horrible wrong. In the grand scheme of things, it isn't thw worst day anyone has ever had. I often remember this thing my brother Cory said about bad days. He said something along the lines of "its hard to have a bad day after going through chemo therapy." I would certainly rather learn that lesson from him than on my own, but I also feel like some of the bad things that happen to me happen for a reason. Not that I cause them or I'm being punished, but I think you can learn from some things and it can make you better. As I've looked back on that disaster of a day, I think it did a pretty good job at preparing me for what is sure to be a tough semester. I am going to have to deal with bad luck and interacting with strangers and make new friends and I'm going to have to be able to stay calm.

The days since have gone pretty smooth in comparison, although I did lose the car in the parking garage for a bit lol, and I think its in large part to me being mentally prepared for something to go wrong. We had to give a presentation for our second day of class, and while everyone else was freaking out, it just didn't phase me much.

So all is well now, but I feel like it might have been more enjoyable had my first day been more like this childhood story book:

Amazon Doesn't Know Me As Well As It Thinks

I logged on to amazon.com for some mindless browsing. It often recommends items based on things you've bought or looked at. Well, today it gave me this selection of things to consider buying:

Ok. I can see how it would recommend most of that. But the horse mask? What on earth? haha! So weird!

4th Of July

No fireworks this year due to city budget cuts :(  Got to see a 4th of July show at Disneyland though so its ok I guess. But Shawn and Kim and Wesley came back to Fremont to celebrate the 4th and Shawn's birthday. Cory, Kristal and the kids came too. We went to the parade in the morning. It has a lot of room for improvement there. haha.

We sat right under a street sign aptly marked "Liberty"

Then it was time for our 4th of July BBQ!

Butters enjoyed the bbq too!

Then we had cake and broke open a pinata for Shawn's birthday!

Soo much candy!

The next day we went to the beach. We started work on the obligatory pit digging right away.

It got pretty deep but was never truly "finished"

Before heading home, we hit the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk!

Now everybody is gone and its back to my mundane summer. I'm pretty exhausted from all the walking around Disneyland, waking up early for family activities, digging pits and walking around the boardwalk. Its almost tragic the way when I'm so busy I wish I was able to rest more and when I have all the time in the world to rest I wish I had something to do. Just have to look forward to Shawn, Kim and Wes coming for another visit in august!

Disneyland!!!

Last week I fulfilled my promise to myself to go to Disneyland to celebrate getting into the graphic design program! Couldn't get mom and dad to go, but me and Christy drove down on a Tuesday morning and met Shawn, Kim and Wesley in Anaheim. We were going to do just 3 days, but since we all got there in the afternoon, we decided to spend the extra $20 for a 4 day ticket and spend the afternoon and evening at Disneyland.

On Splash Mountain the first day!

On "Its a Small World"

Shawn and Wes in line for Roger Rabbit

Trapped in the dog pound

Me and Christy watched a parade while Shawn and Kim changed Wes before dinner. Then we saw there was no line for the Teacups! So we got on and got pretty dizzy just in time to put food in us. Village Haus over in Fantasy land has some real yummy pizza. Way better than the Pizza Port in Tomorrowland.

Christy and Kim waiting for Fantasmic

Me and Shawn Waiting for Fantasmic

We sat down and then this Mexican lady saw that there was literally a square foot between me and the next people, so she came over and stood sideways with her butt just inches from the side of my face! I could feel body heat radiatiing off of her. It was aweful! Then she started to wave down her family to ome sit there too. They all found their own spots amongst the crowd and finally this lady moved her fat butt because I refused to give up an inch of my spot. Some people can be such turds. But aside from that, Fantasmic was great!

Shawn had a birthday coupon for this really good pizza restrunt in Downtown Disney. We got a big pizza and gilatto for dessert.

The waitress was great! She was very nice and knew to refill our drinks before we asked. She even took this picture for us.

On the lase day Shawn managed to get a hold of some very exclusive tickets to the Lilly Belle. Its a caboose that they sometimes run on the end of the Disneyland railroad that had the interior designed by Walt Disney's wife. The conductor told us a bunch of stuff about it but it was sooo hot that day and the car had no AC. He was himself sweating buckets and losing his train of thought. 

After all that heat, we decided to go on Splash Mountain! They stopped us right before the second drop due to a "log jam" which I think they had done before so it didn't seem unusual. Then we saw a ride operator walking through. Then we started going again but since no logs had gone through there was a lot of water at the bottom. I was in the very front so I got completely soaked!

After the second drop we approached the final drop. Before we could get to the lift hill the ride stopped again, but this time they shut off the music and flipped on all the lights. They again said there was a log jam and that a cast member would be with us shortly. So the guy shows up and announced that he was going to be pulling each one of us off the logs and we'd be evacuating the ride. I would have been really mad but I was already soaked, I knew it would be a unique experience to stand inside of Splash Mountain and see behind the scenes and I knew they'd be giving us a free pass to ride something else. The above picture is me in the emergency exit corridor next to a dangling cord. Right after Christy snapped the picture they shouted "no photography please!"

The whole gang in front of the castle. Shawn's zipper was slightly down because the button was broken. He asked how long it had been like that and I mentioned that I had noticed it at lunch but I didn't say anything because I thought the zipper was broken and that he knew about it. hehe.

After dinner we all got caramel apples to eat while waiting for the fireworks show.

It was a pretty great trip! By the end we were all so tired, but now that we aren't there we all wish we were back there. We are hoping to go back at Christmas time with mom and dad so there will be more photos. We were too busy having fun to take a lot.

The Verdict Is In

I'm in!!!! 40% acceptance rate woot!

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Here We Go...

This is going to be one tense weekend for me. I will be submitting my portfolio to be reviewed by a committee of graphic design faculty at Sac State to decide whether or not I will be one of forty people accepted into the bachelors program. I will turn it in tomorrow the 12th and I will pick it up on the 16th and thats when they will let me know my fate.

Already my stomach is in knots just thinking about it. A lot of my classmates are making preparations for rejection but my plan B was to to work on a  marketing minor that I just found out isn't available anymore due to budget cuts. Only business majors can take marketing  classes now. What awaits me next semester will either be oodles of graphic design or German and ancient Greek history. I don't really want to think too much about it. A lot of my classmates are saying that they will give up on graphic design entirely if they don't get in. For me, I really don't see any option other than success. Theres nothing else that I really want to do. Maybe start a chain of pizza restaurants?

Whichever way it goes, I know that I'm going to need a nice long vacation this summer. Something....Disney perhaps?

A Semester of Work

So here is the sum of my semester's work for my final studio class before my portfolio review

Thats all going to be bound into a book tomorrow. You'd never know from looking at it how much time, money and effort has been dumped into such a simple looking thing. I suppose thats one of the things I will have to explain to future clients; just how much work they are actually asking me to do for a simple logo or brochure. Anywho, so theres my fish symbols and then we had to do these color things to demonstrate different color interactions and they were a pain in the butt to find and an even bigger pain to cut out and glue. Then the last page is a layout with text and my symbol.

Its getting exciting!

To Mom:

Rosie O'Donnell

Today I was walking back to my apartment and spotted this sticker in a car window:

Its hard to read but is says "Guns kill people...Like spoons made Rosie O'Donnell fat." 

Beautiful.

Gotta Enjoy the Little Things

Seems like life is always playing small jokes to make me smile. Heres the latest one that I stumbled onto in our "recently watched" folder on netflix:

Hope you guys get it. hehe

71 Days

Seventy one days ago I started a project for school. Today I finally have a finished product. I spent my 4 day weekend wrapping it up, which included an average bed time of 4am with the exception of last night(morning?) when I finally laid down at 7am. I have my completed symbols of a clownfish, both a brave and a skittish symbol, and we are also required to submit a booklet detailing the entire process of how we went through the project. Its basically the "making of" guide. It was a tremendous undertaking in and of itself though. Because it is going in my portfolio to be reviewed in May, it had to be perfect. It cost $20, which seems steep to me, but whatever. Hopefully my teacher wont find any flaws so I wont have to fix it and print another. Anyway...here is my designs, 71 days in the making:

This is what Butters has been up to while I have been working:

Making a fort: 

Napping:

I would have rather done both of those things rather than my homework. She's been a very good doggy even though she has been really bored with the lack of a back yard to roam around and me being so busy. I wish you could plop a dog down in front of the tv like you can with a kid. Now that I'm finished I'll have to start paying more attention to her. lol.

Best Mom Ever!

For one of my assignments in school we have to cut out like a billion tiny 1/2 inch squares from colored paper. They are all about perfections so the teacher suggested that instead of using scissors or an xacto knife, we should buy a 1/2 inch square hole punch. Seemed simple enough. So I went on amazon.com and my first casual look around resulted in nothing. So I went looking around at some craft/scrapbooking stores. Nothing. Scoured Amazon.com. Nothing. I searched all over google and ebay. nothing. I tracked down the manufacturer and they apparently don't make the 1/2 inch square hole punch anymore. So I called up mom. She had checked the stores in fremont earlier but I was all out of ideas and was going back to her for help. So she went to work. Somehow, through some sort of maternal sorcery I suspect,  she found a craft website based in WA that had the exact punch I was desperately looking for! It seems like such a small thing and I probably could have survived cutting out the squares one by one, but this will make the rest of my semester go so smoothly.


Its a few months before mothers day, but I have the best mom ever. Since most of you who read this have the same mom as me, I'm sure you understand. I'm not sure what people do without mothers and I'm really glad I never had to find out. Thanks Mom!