Disneyland is always an adventure.
Sometimes when I tell people about the five-day park-hopper passes my family buys, they say, "Five days? How can you spend five days at the same amusement park?"
I can spend five days or more at Disneyland because Disneyland isn't misnamed. Unlike other amusement parks, it truly is a land, a world of its own, a small country.
When I was in Europe, I only spent a few days apiece in Germany and Austria, and I didn't even begin to experience what those countries had to offer. I stayed over a week in Italy and still only began to make her acquaintance. Well, it's the same thing with Disneyland. I've never come close to doing all there that I want to do, and I doubt I ever will.
This time was my first time actually going inside Sleeping Beauty's castle. There's this cute display within that tells the story of Sleeping Beauty in a style I can best describe as pop-up book. Like, it's all in pictures but the pictures have depth and moving parts and little surprises.
It was awesome. Awesome enough that for a moment I actually saw some value in being a Disney princess. But that only lasted for that moment because then swords!
The Castle Heraldry Shoppe beckoned right outside the castle's doors. Going inside, I saw a flipping sweet pirate sword. And a flipping sweet model of Peter Pevensie's sword from Chronicles of Narnia. And some flipping sweet Greek daggers and Roman gladiuses like the kind they use in Percy Jackson.
I was suitably impressed. I love swords. I have a collection of short swords/daggers that I've purchased over the years at the Utah Shakespeare Festival. Granted, most of the swords had nothing to do Disney properties, but I was not complaining at all. When it comes to movies featuring awesome swords, Disney leaves a little something to be desired. Disneyland, however, always surpasses my wildest dreams. Again--swords.
I saw lots of swords that I liked, but I didn't buy any. And I was happy about that. See, before the trip started I decided I could spend only x amount of money on souvenirs. This is what we adults call a budget. And yes, I am an adult. I do still have some growing up to do, but overall I'm about there. I mean, I rip off my own Band-Aids. If that's not adulthood, I don't know what is.
Being as adult as I am, I knew I had to stick to my budget. Most of the swords exceeded that budget. The ones that didn't, I did not want enough to feel justified in spending so much money.
"Wow, look how mature we are!" I said to myself. Then I high-fived myself. It's way easier than high-fiving someone else, just lonelier.
Then I saw it.
Sting.
Sting the sword.
Sting the sword that belonged to Bilbo Baggins.
Sting the sword that also belonged to Frodo Baggins.
They say love at first sight doesn't exist. They say that the only emotion that can exist at first sight is lust.
There may be something to that. 'Cause the moment I saw that sword, I wanted it.
My internal dialogue went something like this:
ME: I want that sword.
ALSO ME: It costs more than our budget.
ME: It's Bilbo's sword.
ALSO ME: It's twenty-five percent over our budget.
ME: It's Frodo's sword!
ALSO ME: Plus shipping.
ME: It's Sting!!!
ALSO ME: It's backordered twelve weeks!
ME: Sting is so shiiiiny. I love it.
ALSO ME: What would you even do with it?
ME: It loves me.
ALSO ME: It's an inanimate object.
ME: I want it. I need it.
ALSO ME: That sword is the equivalent of x amount of hours at work. Think about this. Pretend that you worked x amount of hours, and your boss said, "I'm not paying you today, but I will give you this exact replica of a hobbit's sword instead." Would you be okay with that?
ME: Yes.
ALSO ME: You're ruining my logic.
ME: I wants it. I loves it. My preciousssss.
Only discipline gained from ripping infinite amounts of Band-Aids from my epidermis aided me in leaving the Castle Heraldry Shoppe without becoming the brand-new owner of that beautiful replica of beautiful Sting. It was quite painful, but the further away from the store I went, the more I was free from the blade's spell, and the happier I was that I had behaved in an adult manner.
Instead I bought myself a Phineas and Ferb t-shirt that says, "I Know What We're Going to Do Today!" and a Precious Moments Mulan. Because even adults need shirts with cartoon characters on them and Disney Princess dolls.
Saturday, June 29, 2013
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
The Funfetti Political Theory
I wish politics were more like this funfetti cake.
Wouldn't the world be a much better place if politics were happy? And fun? And tasted like sugar? Instead they're angry, and stressful, and their aftertaste is nothing but gross. As a rule of thumb, I avoid politics as much as possible.
Well, as much as I can avoid them, what with their being EVERYWHERE. Election season on Facebook is bad, but it just so happens that Nameless Utah College fancies itself a center of social activism. Thus almost everyone from my school posts politics on Facebook out the wazoo.
Me, I don't do politics on Facebook. Every now and again I might comment on something, or like a post. I'm not interested in arguing with people, though, and I know that's exactly what I'd be sucked into should I make any political posts. So I stay out of it as much as possible, trying to respect other peoples' right to their opinions, even when I really don't like those opinions.
Of those opinions, one in particular really bothers me.
I had a classmate who was smart and tough and who managed to get to college even when all the odds were against her. I knew we didn't agree on most things, and she knew we didn't agree on most things, but out of the things we did agree on a mutual respect and appreciation had developed. I told her several times how much I admired her, and she once complimented me on how mature I am (and funnily enough, she was being sincere). Our coexistence was peaceful.
One day, my classmate posted an article on Facebook, raving about how much she agreed with it. I clicked on the article and read away.
The thesis of the article? If people don't agree with your political stance, you should cut all ties with them. Because if they don't agree with you on these most important issues, why would you want to be acquainted with them, anyways?
"Hmm," I thought when I finished reading the article, "is that really any way to live?" I guess my classmate thought so, because within just a few weeks she had deleted me from her list of Facebook friends.
The reason that politics is so unlike a funfetti cake is because people take them way, way too seriously. Having a classmate delete you on Facebook simply because they know you disagree with them is just the icing on the cake (except I just said it wasn't a cake. So it's the, uh, non-icing on the non-cake). Way closer friendships, relationships, and marriages sometimes break up over politics. Or, on the flip side, people get into tirades against total strangers in the comment sections of online political articles, swearing at this individual that they've never met and insulting everything from their opponent's education to their parents to their religious beliefs, for no reason other than the fact that they just happen to disagree.
I'm going to tell it to you like it is. How is it?
It's stupid..
Granted, politics are important. They're a way for us to express how we feel and to put our two cents into the way our world is run. Politics and morals often intersect, too, and especially in those instances there's nothing wrong with taking a political stance.
In spite of all that, though, politics are still just politics. It's an imperfect, manmade system. And when it starts getting in the way of the type of life God would have us live, well, we're in trouble.
See, God has asked us to love one another. That's not easy, of course. Not much of what God asks of us is easy. Plus, people are so, so infuriating so, so much of the time. Especially when you have a deep suspicion that your political beliefs are "right" and theirs are "wrong."
But again, politics aren't morals. Again, they may intersect (a lot of laws deal with morality), but the relationship is complicated. No matter what politics decide, morality remains intact. No matter what we legislate, God's laws remain the same. So there's no sense in letting politics be so all-defining in our lives and in our relationships when they only mean so much anyways.
When you get down to it, everyone who takes a political stance usually wants the same things. Happiness, peace, prosperity, security, stuff like that. Show me a political group who doesn't want those things, and I'll show you a political group that's never really gotten off the ground. Humans pretty much all want the same stuff. We just don't agree on how to get there.
Suppose you are on the first floor of a building with some other people and all of you want to get to the second floor. You and a few others decide to take the elevator. A couple decide to take the escalator. The rest take the stairs.
Would you start yelling at someone who decided to take the escalator, "You're so ignorant, brainwashed and deluded! Only morons think that an escalator is going to get them anywhere!"?
Would you call after the people walking to the stairs, "I can't believe you chose the stairs! This decision defines who you are, and clearly you're the kind of person I never want to associate with again!"?
If you answered yes to either of those questions, you have another problem entirely. I can't do anything for you. Sorry.
If, on the other hand, you thought, "Okay, that might be a little ridiculous," can you see why it would be ridiculous to do the same thing over a trifle like politics?
All I know is, people are made up of so many things. To think that you really know who a person is simply because you know what political party they support is an insult to both them and to you. It's no different than defining a person by wealth, race, or religion. Until you get to know someone--see them playing with their nieces and nephews, look at their baby pictures, know their disappointments, hear about all the kind things they've done for their friends and all the struggles they've had with their weaknesses--any decision you might make about who that person really truly is would be superficial and weak.
Don't define a person's value based on their politics. Don't even start. Get to know who they actually are instead.
If you do that, and I do that, more people might start doing it, too. Then politics really can be like a funfetti cake. The Democrats can be the green funfetti. The Republicans can be the blue ones. The Communists can be the weird yellow ones that seem to be there but that are pretty hard to see. All the funfetti would be in the same cake, and even though the funfetti might not agree about how the cake should turn out, it might at least make the most of the experience of being in the cake together.
Then politics would be fun. And sugary. And covered in frosting. And able to turn lemonade sour when consumed with that particular liquid.
...I think this metaphor only goes so far.
Wouldn't the world be a much better place if politics were happy? And fun? And tasted like sugar? Instead they're angry, and stressful, and their aftertaste is nothing but gross. As a rule of thumb, I avoid politics as much as possible.
Well, as much as I can avoid them, what with their being EVERYWHERE. Election season on Facebook is bad, but it just so happens that Nameless Utah College fancies itself a center of social activism. Thus almost everyone from my school posts politics on Facebook out the wazoo.
Me, I don't do politics on Facebook. Every now and again I might comment on something, or like a post. I'm not interested in arguing with people, though, and I know that's exactly what I'd be sucked into should I make any political posts. So I stay out of it as much as possible, trying to respect other peoples' right to their opinions, even when I really don't like those opinions.
Of those opinions, one in particular really bothers me.
I had a classmate who was smart and tough and who managed to get to college even when all the odds were against her. I knew we didn't agree on most things, and she knew we didn't agree on most things, but out of the things we did agree on a mutual respect and appreciation had developed. I told her several times how much I admired her, and she once complimented me on how mature I am (and funnily enough, she was being sincere). Our coexistence was peaceful.
One day, my classmate posted an article on Facebook, raving about how much she agreed with it. I clicked on the article and read away.
The thesis of the article? If people don't agree with your political stance, you should cut all ties with them. Because if they don't agree with you on these most important issues, why would you want to be acquainted with them, anyways?
"Hmm," I thought when I finished reading the article, "is that really any way to live?" I guess my classmate thought so, because within just a few weeks she had deleted me from her list of Facebook friends.
The reason that politics is so unlike a funfetti cake is because people take them way, way too seriously. Having a classmate delete you on Facebook simply because they know you disagree with them is just the icing on the cake (except I just said it wasn't a cake. So it's the, uh, non-icing on the non-cake). Way closer friendships, relationships, and marriages sometimes break up over politics. Or, on the flip side, people get into tirades against total strangers in the comment sections of online political articles, swearing at this individual that they've never met and insulting everything from their opponent's education to their parents to their religious beliefs, for no reason other than the fact that they just happen to disagree.
I'm going to tell it to you like it is. How is it?
It's stupid..
Granted, politics are important. They're a way for us to express how we feel and to put our two cents into the way our world is run. Politics and morals often intersect, too, and especially in those instances there's nothing wrong with taking a political stance.
In spite of all that, though, politics are still just politics. It's an imperfect, manmade system. And when it starts getting in the way of the type of life God would have us live, well, we're in trouble.
See, God has asked us to love one another. That's not easy, of course. Not much of what God asks of us is easy. Plus, people are so, so infuriating so, so much of the time. Especially when you have a deep suspicion that your political beliefs are "right" and theirs are "wrong."
But again, politics aren't morals. Again, they may intersect (a lot of laws deal with morality), but the relationship is complicated. No matter what politics decide, morality remains intact. No matter what we legislate, God's laws remain the same. So there's no sense in letting politics be so all-defining in our lives and in our relationships when they only mean so much anyways.
When you get down to it, everyone who takes a political stance usually wants the same things. Happiness, peace, prosperity, security, stuff like that. Show me a political group who doesn't want those things, and I'll show you a political group that's never really gotten off the ground. Humans pretty much all want the same stuff. We just don't agree on how to get there.
Suppose you are on the first floor of a building with some other people and all of you want to get to the second floor. You and a few others decide to take the elevator. A couple decide to take the escalator. The rest take the stairs.
Would you start yelling at someone who decided to take the escalator, "You're so ignorant, brainwashed and deluded! Only morons think that an escalator is going to get them anywhere!"?
Would you call after the people walking to the stairs, "I can't believe you chose the stairs! This decision defines who you are, and clearly you're the kind of person I never want to associate with again!"?
If you answered yes to either of those questions, you have another problem entirely. I can't do anything for you. Sorry.
If, on the other hand, you thought, "Okay, that might be a little ridiculous," can you see why it would be ridiculous to do the same thing over a trifle like politics?
All I know is, people are made up of so many things. To think that you really know who a person is simply because you know what political party they support is an insult to both them and to you. It's no different than defining a person by wealth, race, or religion. Until you get to know someone--see them playing with their nieces and nephews, look at their baby pictures, know their disappointments, hear about all the kind things they've done for their friends and all the struggles they've had with their weaknesses--any decision you might make about who that person really truly is would be superficial and weak.
Don't define a person's value based on their politics. Don't even start. Get to know who they actually are instead.
If you do that, and I do that, more people might start doing it, too. Then politics really can be like a funfetti cake. The Democrats can be the green funfetti. The Republicans can be the blue ones. The Communists can be the weird yellow ones that seem to be there but that are pretty hard to see. All the funfetti would be in the same cake, and even though the funfetti might not agree about how the cake should turn out, it might at least make the most of the experience of being in the cake together.
Then politics would be fun. And sugary. And covered in frosting. And able to turn lemonade sour when consumed with that particular liquid.
...I think this metaphor only goes so far.
Saturday, June 22, 2013
Three Months
Hey, everybody on the internet. Today is the third monthiversary of the first post of Awkward Mormon Girl.
When I started this blog, I was hesitant for a lot of reasons. I decided, however, that if I was gonna do it, I was gonna do it, and I committed myself to posting regularly for a trial period of one year.
Now the blog and I have been together for three months. At this point, some people would decide to make things permanent, but my blog and I are a little more cautious than that. We're not quite ready to take our relationship to the next level.
Whatever happens, I have really enjoyed the journey so far. I get to write weird stuff, and then people find that stuff online by Googling, "why are mormon girls so awkward" and "morman girl on bike" and "jokes about recycling." They even apparently find this blog by Googling "mormon love stories," though if you ask me they couldn't have turned up much that's more irrelevant to that search than this blog. (Okay, scratch that, now that I think about it there are actually a lot of things that are more irrelevant to that search than this blog. A LOT. A sign of the times?) And these people who want to know about Mormon love stories or find some good recycling jokes, they find this blog, and they click on it, and sometimes they click on it a lot. Sometimes they even comment.
It's really quite amazing to think that words that I write could find their way onto the computer of a random stranger. It's even weirder to think that me sharing my words with them could prompt them to share their words with me. Recognizing this weird phenomenon makes me feel like I can make a difference in the world. Through a ridiculous blog, for sure, but still. Ridiculousness has its impact on lifetimes just like everything else.
And then there are the people that I know in real life. I can't even tell you how many people have come to me and said, "I've read your blog." Many of them have said, "It's really funny." Some have even said, "It's really helped me."
With feedback like that, how could I not be pumped up for at least nine more months? Answer: I couldn't. By which I mean I couldn't not be pumped up. Which is just a long way of telling you that I am.
By the way. If any post on this blog has ever made you laugh, if any of it has ever made you think, if you smile when reading this blog or just feel entertained, feel free to share it with others. Post it on your Facebook page. Read it aloud to your family. Mention it casually to anyone you think might need a little... well, a little of whatever this blog is in their lives. I'll do my best to provide it for them.
Happy three months to this blog, and to me, and to you. Things have been great. For sure we're twenty-five percent through the trial period. For maybe we've just scratched the surface of something that could last for much, much longer.
When I started this blog, I was hesitant for a lot of reasons. I decided, however, that if I was gonna do it, I was gonna do it, and I committed myself to posting regularly for a trial period of one year.
Now the blog and I have been together for three months. At this point, some people would decide to make things permanent, but my blog and I are a little more cautious than that. We're not quite ready to take our relationship to the next level.
Whatever happens, I have really enjoyed the journey so far. I get to write weird stuff, and then people find that stuff online by Googling, "why are mormon girls so awkward" and "morman girl on bike" and "jokes about recycling." They even apparently find this blog by Googling "mormon love stories," though if you ask me they couldn't have turned up much that's more irrelevant to that search than this blog. (Okay, scratch that, now that I think about it there are actually a lot of things that are more irrelevant to that search than this blog. A LOT. A sign of the times?) And these people who want to know about Mormon love stories or find some good recycling jokes, they find this blog, and they click on it, and sometimes they click on it a lot. Sometimes they even comment.
It's really quite amazing to think that words that I write could find their way onto the computer of a random stranger. It's even weirder to think that me sharing my words with them could prompt them to share their words with me. Recognizing this weird phenomenon makes me feel like I can make a difference in the world. Through a ridiculous blog, for sure, but still. Ridiculousness has its impact on lifetimes just like everything else.
And then there are the people that I know in real life. I can't even tell you how many people have come to me and said, "I've read your blog." Many of them have said, "It's really funny." Some have even said, "It's really helped me."
With feedback like that, how could I not be pumped up for at least nine more months? Answer: I couldn't. By which I mean I couldn't not be pumped up. Which is just a long way of telling you that I am.
By the way. If any post on this blog has ever made you laugh, if any of it has ever made you think, if you smile when reading this blog or just feel entertained, feel free to share it with others. Post it on your Facebook page. Read it aloud to your family. Mention it casually to anyone you think might need a little... well, a little of whatever this blog is in their lives. I'll do my best to provide it for them.
Happy three months to this blog, and to me, and to you. Things have been great. For sure we're twenty-five percent through the trial period. For maybe we've just scratched the surface of something that could last for much, much longer.
Friday, June 21, 2013
Dinner with the Obnoxiouses
Dinner was scheduled for six. Agents Awkward Mormon Girl, Little Sister, and Baby Sister (hereafter referred to as the Operatives) were to be picked up by their grandmother and her husband around 5:50. All would drive to the restaurant together.
4:45- The Operatives' grandmother calls the Operatives' mother and informs her that dinner would now be at five o'clock sharp.
4:47--4:52 The Operatives' mother tells Agent Awkward Mormon Girl that she is expected at the restaurant with her sisters in less than fifteen minutes. This change in time is said to have been made to accommodate the grandson of their grandmother's husband. There is some speculation that the grandson is intended as an object of romantic interest for Agent Little Sister, despite the fact that Agent Little Sister is, as they say, already taken. Speculation lasts for some five minutes, five minutes which the Operatives realize they should not have wasted as soon as they glance at the clock.
4:53--4:57- There is a mad dash for shoes, deodorant, face powder, and Agent Awkward Mormon Girl's car keys.
Definitely later than five o'clock sharp- After Agent Awkward Mormon Girl's skillful maneuvering of traffic, the Operatives finally arrive at the restaurant of choice, Chuck-a-Rama. Despite the lateness of the hour, the grandson of their grandmother's husband (hereafter referred to as the Subject) has not yet arrived. The Operatives and their dinner companions fill their plates from Chuck-a-Rama's ever-generous selection. After pleasantries, the Operatives begin a quick-paced, spirited discussion about friends, school, and life in general. The grandparents look on.
5:2something- The Subject arrives partway through the first platefuls. Introductions are made. The Subject appears to be a well-educated young man, older than Agent Little Sister but younger than Agent Awkward Mormon Girl, who is capable of carrying on an intelligent conversation.
5:2something--5:30- The Operatives continue their discussion.
5:30- The Subject tries and fails to enter the conversation.
5:33- Partway through sharing their very important opinions, the Operatives realize it might be polite to specifically ask the Subject about himself.
5:34- The Subject tells the Operatives about himself. He is able to hold their attention for several minutes before their Obnoxious tendencies come out and they indulge in one of the classic obnoxious traits: interruption. Automatically interrupting their new acquaintance, they begin a passionate conversation about the musicals they've done that the Subject has never heard of, much less been in.
5:40- Agent Awkward Mormon Girl comments on how her hearing has gotten increasingly worse as she's gotten older. Agent Little Sister begins a story about how sometimes she's not sure what people said, then figures out what they're saying a split-second later, but still says "What?" anyways. Then, when they clarify what they said, Agent Little Sister says, "Oh, I thought you said (something random)."
5:45- The story is very long.
5:52- Really long.
5:53- Partway through the story, Agent Little Sister makes a statement Agent Awkward Mormon Girl can't quite hear. Agent Awkward Mormon Girl says, "What?" Agent Little Sister repeats herself. Agent Awkward Mormon Girl responds with, "Oh, I thought you said (something random)."
5:54- Baby Sister points out that this is exactly what they were just talking about. The Operatives laugh at themselves, because they are hilarious. The Subject looks at them in confusion, because they are bewildering. Agent Little Sister doesn't get to finish the story that was interrupted when the conversation turns to the abject failure of the state in reforming the school system.
5:58- The grandparents try to add to the conversation but barely get a word in edgewise. The Subject gets several words in: "Yes." "I agree." "I know exactly what you're talking about." The Operatives allow the Subject to make these statements because they reaffirm their very important opinions.
6:00- The Operatives say lots of terribly important things that they are quite sure ought to be recorded for posterity. They are so satisfied with their own importance, they actually allow the Subject to talk.
6:06- Cautiously, the Subject tells the Operatives about his schooling plans. The Operatives tell him about their very own important schooling plans.
6:11- Dessert.
6:15- The Subject ventures the opinion that Hawaii is better than Disneyland. The Operatives waste zero minutes in correcting him.
6:15--6:18- The Subject is quite thoroughly proven to be wrong.
6:18- The Subject makes the mistake of reaffirming his opinion.
6:18--6:22- He is proven to be wrong again. During this time, his ice cream sundae melts, leaving him without even sugary deliciousness as a source of comfort.
6:23- The Operatives decide it is time to return to their home. They tell the Subject that it was nice to meet him. The Subject says it was nice to meet them too.
6:25- The Operatives leave. It is unconfirmed but suspected that the Subject immediately fell to the floor, clutching his bowl of melted ice cream and weeping in relief.
6:29- Driving home, the Operatives analyze their own social skillz. They realize the Obnoxious way of interaction is somewhat flawed. Agents Awkward Mormon Girl, Little Sister, and Baby Sister decide to be less harsh on their nextvictim acquaintance.
4:45- The Operatives' grandmother calls the Operatives' mother and informs her that dinner would now be at five o'clock sharp.
4:47--4:52 The Operatives' mother tells Agent Awkward Mormon Girl that she is expected at the restaurant with her sisters in less than fifteen minutes. This change in time is said to have been made to accommodate the grandson of their grandmother's husband. There is some speculation that the grandson is intended as an object of romantic interest for Agent Little Sister, despite the fact that Agent Little Sister is, as they say, already taken. Speculation lasts for some five minutes, five minutes which the Operatives realize they should not have wasted as soon as they glance at the clock.
4:53--4:57- There is a mad dash for shoes, deodorant, face powder, and Agent Awkward Mormon Girl's car keys.
Definitely later than five o'clock sharp- After Agent Awkward Mormon Girl's skillful maneuvering of traffic, the Operatives finally arrive at the restaurant of choice, Chuck-a-Rama. Despite the lateness of the hour, the grandson of their grandmother's husband (hereafter referred to as the Subject) has not yet arrived. The Operatives and their dinner companions fill their plates from Chuck-a-Rama's ever-generous selection. After pleasantries, the Operatives begin a quick-paced, spirited discussion about friends, school, and life in general. The grandparents look on.
5:2something- The Subject arrives partway through the first platefuls. Introductions are made. The Subject appears to be a well-educated young man, older than Agent Little Sister but younger than Agent Awkward Mormon Girl, who is capable of carrying on an intelligent conversation.
5:2something--5:30- The Operatives continue their discussion.
5:30- The Subject tries and fails to enter the conversation.
5:33- Partway through sharing their very important opinions, the Operatives realize it might be polite to specifically ask the Subject about himself.
5:34- The Subject tells the Operatives about himself. He is able to hold their attention for several minutes before their Obnoxious tendencies come out and they indulge in one of the classic obnoxious traits: interruption. Automatically interrupting their new acquaintance, they begin a passionate conversation about the musicals they've done that the Subject has never heard of, much less been in.
5:40- Agent Awkward Mormon Girl comments on how her hearing has gotten increasingly worse as she's gotten older. Agent Little Sister begins a story about how sometimes she's not sure what people said, then figures out what they're saying a split-second later, but still says "What?" anyways. Then, when they clarify what they said, Agent Little Sister says, "Oh, I thought you said (something random)."
5:45- The story is very long.
5:52- Really long.
5:53- Partway through the story, Agent Little Sister makes a statement Agent Awkward Mormon Girl can't quite hear. Agent Awkward Mormon Girl says, "What?" Agent Little Sister repeats herself. Agent Awkward Mormon Girl responds with, "Oh, I thought you said (something random)."
5:54- Baby Sister points out that this is exactly what they were just talking about. The Operatives laugh at themselves, because they are hilarious. The Subject looks at them in confusion, because they are bewildering. Agent Little Sister doesn't get to finish the story that was interrupted when the conversation turns to the abject failure of the state in reforming the school system.
5:58- The grandparents try to add to the conversation but barely get a word in edgewise. The Subject gets several words in: "Yes." "I agree." "I know exactly what you're talking about." The Operatives allow the Subject to make these statements because they reaffirm their very important opinions.
6:00- The Operatives say lots of terribly important things that they are quite sure ought to be recorded for posterity. They are so satisfied with their own importance, they actually allow the Subject to talk.
6:06- Cautiously, the Subject tells the Operatives about his schooling plans. The Operatives tell him about their very own important schooling plans.
6:11- Dessert.
6:15- The Subject ventures the opinion that Hawaii is better than Disneyland. The Operatives waste zero minutes in correcting him.
6:15--6:18- The Subject is quite thoroughly proven to be wrong.
6:18- The Subject makes the mistake of reaffirming his opinion.
6:18--6:22- He is proven to be wrong again. During this time, his ice cream sundae melts, leaving him without even sugary deliciousness as a source of comfort.
6:23- The Operatives decide it is time to return to their home. They tell the Subject that it was nice to meet him. The Subject says it was nice to meet them too.
6:25- The Operatives leave. It is unconfirmed but suspected that the Subject immediately fell to the floor, clutching his bowl of melted ice cream and weeping in relief.
6:29- Driving home, the Operatives analyze their own social skillz. They realize the Obnoxious way of interaction is somewhat flawed. Agents Awkward Mormon Girl, Little Sister, and Baby Sister decide to be less harsh on their next
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
I Know What We're Gonna Do Today!
So many false hopes. So many vain expectations. So many crushed dreams result from this fickle season that occurs each year between May and September.
That's right, I'm talking about summer. Every year when school gets out, I'm all, "Oh my gosh! Summer! Free time! Stuff I can do! Books I can read! Places to go! People to see! Time to sleep and to work and to sleep and to eat and to sleep! I CAN DO ANYTHING!"
*cue theme song* (Because I definitely have a theme song. I just don't know what it is yet.)
And to sweeten the deal, now I'm in college. Which means I have college summer. Which means I have a whole extra month of DOING ANYTHING.
ANYTHING.
Except we're more than a month into summer now and I have done NOTHING. Well, that's a slight exaggeration. I've done some things. But as usual, summer isn't anything like my fantasies built it up to be.
Last summer is on my list of the Top Five Most Productive Summers Awkward Mormon Girl has ever experienced, and I still spent like ten percent or more of it watching Netflix.
I watched Fraggle Rock, arguably the best show ever. I watched Lalaloopsy Land, arguably the worst show ever. Particularly I watched a lot of Phineas and Ferb.
See, Phineas and Ferb is about two brothers who decide to do one amazing thing every day all summer long. Also, they have a platypus. And Ferb has green hair. And a British accent. Basically, this show has everything going for it.
Every time I watch an episode it almost brings me to tears with its wonderfulness. I just come away feeling so inspired. I hear Phineas say, "Ferb, I know what we're gonna do today!" and I watch Phineas and Ferb build a rocket ship or give a monkey a shower, and I'm just all, "Yeah, Phineas. Yeah, Ferb. I want to do amazing things with my summer, too!"
And then I'm like, "Or I could just live vicariously through you." And then I watch another sixteen and a half episodes, including the one where they sing about how glad they are that they aren't spending their summer sitting around watching TV.
Phineas and Ferb is tricky like that.
Once again, I entered into summer this year with a determination to not waste it. And once again, I've had a very hard time doing just that thing.
For example, the other day I hit my snooze button twice, but I still managed to get up before seven-thirty. I was productive for several hours Then everything took a nose dive when I ate ice cream and watched Psych until I was brain dead.
I realized that watching so much Psych maybe falls under the category of "wasting summer," so I decided to be productive and make a dessert that requires boiling tin cans of sweetened condensed milk for three hours. And when I say tin cans, I mean tin cans. Like, the sweetened condensed milk is still in the cans. And you peel the labels off the cans and stick them in a pot of water and wait for it to boil. And then everyone in your house walks in and says, "Why are there tin cans in this pot of water on the stove?" And then you're like, "Don't judge me."
It's super weird. Also, not that effective. 'Cause apparently water has problems with getting hot enough to boil with cans of sweetened condensed milk in it. It takes way more than three hours for the water to actually boil for three hours. When it does actually boil, the water bubbles up around the cans like they're geysers or something, and then the cans rattle against the pot. They sound like dry bones. Or like an explosion waiting to happen. Something unpleasant, anyways.
I sat on the kitchen floor, eating more ice cream and listening to the cans rattle and watching Youtube videos by Rhett and Link on my iPod. After five hours of waiting for the water to boil for three hours, I realized I was once again wasting my summer. So I recruited my father to keep an eye on the cans and went running.
"Tomorrow," I said to myself as I ran off all the ice cream. "Tomorrow, I will do everything."
And so the next day I hit the snooze button three times and got up before nine. It took me about an hour to coax Little Sister to watch a movie with me, some two hours to watch the movie, and then like thirty seconds after that for me to revert back to sitting around, watching TV and reading teen romances and eating ice cream. That is all I did before heading to work at five o'clock that night.
Once I'd returned, I was forced to once again conclude that I was wasting summer. I needed to do something productive, and fast.
I was hastily trying to finish the special desserts I'd started the day before when Baby Sister came home in a blaze of summer sunshine and glory.
BABY SISTER: School's out! I'm going to have SO much time on my hands now. Awkward Mormon Girl, we should hang out all the time.
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: (perks up) Want to hang out right now?
BABY SISTER: Uh.... no.
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: (perks down)
BABY SISTER: But you know what we should totally do one of these days? Go to Disneyland. Like, really soon.
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Okay. Let's do it.
And that is the (mostly) true story of how I recently spent an entire week at Disneyland.
That's right, I'm talking about summer. Every year when school gets out, I'm all, "Oh my gosh! Summer! Free time! Stuff I can do! Books I can read! Places to go! People to see! Time to sleep and to work and to sleep and to eat and to sleep! I CAN DO ANYTHING!"
*cue theme song* (Because I definitely have a theme song. I just don't know what it is yet.)
And to sweeten the deal, now I'm in college. Which means I have college summer. Which means I have a whole extra month of DOING ANYTHING.
ANYTHING.
Except we're more than a month into summer now and I have done NOTHING. Well, that's a slight exaggeration. I've done some things. But as usual, summer isn't anything like my fantasies built it up to be.
Last summer is on my list of the Top Five Most Productive Summers Awkward Mormon Girl has ever experienced, and I still spent like ten percent or more of it watching Netflix.
I watched Fraggle Rock, arguably the best show ever. I watched Lalaloopsy Land, arguably the worst show ever. Particularly I watched a lot of Phineas and Ferb.
See, Phineas and Ferb is about two brothers who decide to do one amazing thing every day all summer long. Also, they have a platypus. And Ferb has green hair. And a British accent. Basically, this show has everything going for it.
Every time I watch an episode it almost brings me to tears with its wonderfulness. I just come away feeling so inspired. I hear Phineas say, "Ferb, I know what we're gonna do today!" and I watch Phineas and Ferb build a rocket ship or give a monkey a shower, and I'm just all, "Yeah, Phineas. Yeah, Ferb. I want to do amazing things with my summer, too!"
And then I'm like, "Or I could just live vicariously through you." And then I watch another sixteen and a half episodes, including the one where they sing about how glad they are that they aren't spending their summer sitting around watching TV.
Phineas and Ferb is tricky like that.
Once again, I entered into summer this year with a determination to not waste it. And once again, I've had a very hard time doing just that thing.
For example, the other day I hit my snooze button twice, but I still managed to get up before seven-thirty. I was productive for several hours Then everything took a nose dive when I ate ice cream and watched Psych until I was brain dead.
I realized that watching so much Psych maybe falls under the category of "wasting summer," so I decided to be productive and make a dessert that requires boiling tin cans of sweetened condensed milk for three hours. And when I say tin cans, I mean tin cans. Like, the sweetened condensed milk is still in the cans. And you peel the labels off the cans and stick them in a pot of water and wait for it to boil. And then everyone in your house walks in and says, "Why are there tin cans in this pot of water on the stove?" And then you're like, "Don't judge me."
It's super weird. Also, not that effective. 'Cause apparently water has problems with getting hot enough to boil with cans of sweetened condensed milk in it. It takes way more than three hours for the water to actually boil for three hours. When it does actually boil, the water bubbles up around the cans like they're geysers or something, and then the cans rattle against the pot. They sound like dry bones. Or like an explosion waiting to happen. Something unpleasant, anyways.
I sat on the kitchen floor, eating more ice cream and listening to the cans rattle and watching Youtube videos by Rhett and Link on my iPod. After five hours of waiting for the water to boil for three hours, I realized I was once again wasting my summer. So I recruited my father to keep an eye on the cans and went running.
"Tomorrow," I said to myself as I ran off all the ice cream. "Tomorrow, I will do everything."
And so the next day I hit the snooze button three times and got up before nine. It took me about an hour to coax Little Sister to watch a movie with me, some two hours to watch the movie, and then like thirty seconds after that for me to revert back to sitting around, watching TV and reading teen romances and eating ice cream. That is all I did before heading to work at five o'clock that night.
Once I'd returned, I was forced to once again conclude that I was wasting summer. I needed to do something productive, and fast.
I was hastily trying to finish the special desserts I'd started the day before when Baby Sister came home in a blaze of summer sunshine and glory.
BABY SISTER: School's out! I'm going to have SO much time on my hands now. Awkward Mormon Girl, we should hang out all the time.
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: (perks up) Want to hang out right now?
BABY SISTER: Uh.... no.
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: (perks down)
BABY SISTER: But you know what we should totally do one of these days? Go to Disneyland. Like, really soon.
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Okay. Let's do it.
And that is the (mostly) true story of how I recently spent an entire week at Disneyland.
Friday, June 14, 2013
That Sister
I had the following exchange with Little Sister today:
LITTLE SISTER: (talking about a musical she had done) The songs I was in was-
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Were.
LITTLE SISTER: The songs I were in was-
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: We cannot be related anymore.
LITTLE SISTER: WHO WANTS ME TO SPRAY THEM WITH WATER?!
And no, I did not take that out of context. Because there was no context. She just said that for no reason. At all.
Like I've said before. Little Sister is Terrifying.
LITTLE SISTER: (talking about a musical she had done) The songs I was in was-
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Were.
LITTLE SISTER: The songs I were in was-
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: We cannot be related anymore.
LITTLE SISTER: WHO WANTS ME TO SPRAY THEM WITH WATER?!
And no, I did not take that out of context. Because there was no context. She just said that for no reason. At all.
Like I've said before. Little Sister is Terrifying.
Saturday, June 8, 2013
Dachau
As a person of European-Jewish-Slav descent, I have a lot of interesting heritage to draw on. For example, one of my ancestors is this fellow named John Howland whose descendants include Ralph Waldo Emerson and Christopher Lloyd. He came over on the Mayflower, as did a bunch of other people I'm related to. One of them even fell off the Mayflower--which shows we're related more surely than a slew of DNA testing would.
There's a common theme in my ancestry: religious persecution. Somehow groups of people who were hated and scorned because of their religious beliefs all came together in the living, breathing forms of my siblings and I. We're descended from pilgrims and Puritans. My mother's father's family is almost pure Mormon pioneer stock. And on our father's side--we have the Jews.
My dad's family, the Obnoxiouses, came over from Germany to America in the late 1800s. We had Great-Great-Grandpa Obnoxious, who was married to Great-Great-Grandma Obnoxious, nee Generic-stein. Her father's name was Generic Jewish Name Generic-stein. Not even kidding. If I wrote a story with a character who had the same name as the father of Great-Great-Grandma Obnoxious nee Generic-stein, you would accuse me of choosing the most stereotypical Jewish name possible.
A while back, one of my father's sisters and my grandfather decided it would be jolly to head back to Europe and scope the place out, maybe see if they could find any interesting ancestral records for the Obnoxiouses or the Generic-steins or for specific offshoots of German-Jewish families that we know intertwine with ours.
Well, they didn't find any ancestral records. They didn't find anything to witness to the people who lived there and who must have left behind family members that would have produced multiple descendants. There were no Obnoxiouses or Generic-steins around. There was nothing.
How can this be? How can whole families and records of whole families and the least, tiny traces of whole families simply... disappear?
I'll tell you how. The Holocaust, that's how.
The Holocaust. It means something to everyone, I think. To me it meant knowing that had my family still been living in Germany in the 1930s, I would have been put in a concentration camp. It meant knowing that had Hitler not been stopped, eventually he would have made his way over here to the Land of the Free and put me in a concentration camp.
Never mind that I was born in the 1990s and that had either of those things happened, it would have been my great-grandparents and grandparents, not me, who would have suffered the consequences. Logic had no place in this kind of waking nightmare. It was always me I saw in the concentration camp, my face and my siblings' and my parents'. And so I read about it, and was horrified by it, and asked myself, "What would I have done? Would I have borne it well? Would I have made choices I could have been proud of?"
And then I would be glad, so glad, that I hadn't gone to a concentration camp, and that my branch of the Obnoxiouses, at least, had escaped the Holocaust by fifty, sixty years. We American Obnoxiouses get to lead safe lives. Hitler never touched our country. We don't go to concentration camps.
Well, most of us don't, anyways.
One of the first things I did when I went to Europe was visit Dachau, the first concentration camp in Germany.
The original building where they processed prisoners is still standing, toilets and all. It's a sort of museum now. We walked through and there were some displays but mostly I was looking at the aged walls and the fixtures, thinking of the people who walked through the gates all those years ago but didn't walk out.
The crematoriums are also still standing and completely furnished. I went in and looked at the gas chambers and ovens. The ovens are left open.
We looked at the memorials and ended up near the crematorium again. "It's awful in there," said one of my companions. "It's awful. You can feel it in the air..." She shivered. "Have you been in there?"
"Oh yeah," said another. "Let's not talk about it."
"Let's not."
Let's not.
There's a common theme in my ancestry: religious persecution. Somehow groups of people who were hated and scorned because of their religious beliefs all came together in the living, breathing forms of my siblings and I. We're descended from pilgrims and Puritans. My mother's father's family is almost pure Mormon pioneer stock. And on our father's side--we have the Jews.
My dad's family, the Obnoxiouses, came over from Germany to America in the late 1800s. We had Great-Great-Grandpa Obnoxious, who was married to Great-Great-Grandma Obnoxious, nee Generic-stein. Her father's name was Generic Jewish Name Generic-stein. Not even kidding. If I wrote a story with a character who had the same name as the father of Great-Great-Grandma Obnoxious nee Generic-stein, you would accuse me of choosing the most stereotypical Jewish name possible.
A while back, one of my father's sisters and my grandfather decided it would be jolly to head back to Europe and scope the place out, maybe see if they could find any interesting ancestral records for the Obnoxiouses or the Generic-steins or for specific offshoots of German-Jewish families that we know intertwine with ours.
Well, they didn't find any ancestral records. They didn't find anything to witness to the people who lived there and who must have left behind family members that would have produced multiple descendants. There were no Obnoxiouses or Generic-steins around. There was nothing.
How can this be? How can whole families and records of whole families and the least, tiny traces of whole families simply... disappear?
I'll tell you how. The Holocaust, that's how.
The Holocaust. It means something to everyone, I think. To me it meant knowing that had my family still been living in Germany in the 1930s, I would have been put in a concentration camp. It meant knowing that had Hitler not been stopped, eventually he would have made his way over here to the Land of the Free and put me in a concentration camp.
Never mind that I was born in the 1990s and that had either of those things happened, it would have been my great-grandparents and grandparents, not me, who would have suffered the consequences. Logic had no place in this kind of waking nightmare. It was always me I saw in the concentration camp, my face and my siblings' and my parents'. And so I read about it, and was horrified by it, and asked myself, "What would I have done? Would I have borne it well? Would I have made choices I could have been proud of?"
And then I would be glad, so glad, that I hadn't gone to a concentration camp, and that my branch of the Obnoxiouses, at least, had escaped the Holocaust by fifty, sixty years. We American Obnoxiouses get to lead safe lives. Hitler never touched our country. We don't go to concentration camps.
Well, most of us don't, anyways.
One of the first things I did when I went to Europe was visit Dachau, the first concentration camp in Germany.
The original building where they processed prisoners is still standing, toilets and all. It's a sort of museum now. We walked through and there were some displays but mostly I was looking at the aged walls and the fixtures, thinking of the people who walked through the gates all those years ago but didn't walk out.
The crematoriums are also still standing and completely furnished. I went in and looked at the gas chambers and ovens. The ovens are left open.
We looked at the memorials and ended up near the crematorium again. "It's awful in there," said one of my companions. "It's awful. You can feel it in the air..." She shivered. "Have you been in there?"
"Oh yeah," said another. "Let's not talk about it."
"Let's not."
Let's not.
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Like Riding a Bike
Today Baby Brother and I went on a bike ride.
Every time someone says, "It's like riding a bike," about something that once learned I should remember the rest of my life, I always think, "Then it's hopeless!"
See, I had quite a bit of trouble learning to ride a bike. I didn't learn until I was eleven years old, and only then after much trouble and toil. I then used those skills for just a short time. The other day when I pulled out Little Brother's bike, it was my first time riding since I was thirteen, tops.
But Baby Brother wanted me to ride with him. When Baby Brother wants me to do something with him, I find it very hard to refuse. He's cute and little and has big eyes, like a puppy. Or an anime character. Or a hobbit.
My first time on a bike in years and years went okay. Baby Brother seemed to have way more confidence in my biking skillz than I did. When we passed some hardcore bikers wearing hardcore biking clothes, he commented, "We are not as good as them." I found it very gratifying that Baby Brother put me in the same class as himself, because in all honesty he bikes much better than I do.
There were some boons, though. When I found I wanted to move to the side, my bike moved to the side like magic. I didn't fall over. Eventually I even remembered to use the hand brake instead of stopping with my feet.
Close to the end of our ride, I heard this weird whump-whump sound.
"Probably that's a normal bike sound," I said to myself. Yet the farther I went, the worse it got, until it was like a pestle in a mortar: WHUMP! WHUMP! WHUMP! At least, that's how I imagine a pestle in a mortar sounds. Haven't ground much corn or herbs lately, myself.
Eventually I got off and looked at the tires. The back one had completely separated from the frame.
Aside from that incident and also aside from Little Brother's bike being uncomfortable (girl bikes seats are way more comfortable than boy bike seats, which makes no sense if you think about it), Baby Brother and I had a lovely time, such a lovely time that we've done it twice more since then.
The second time Baby Brother suggested I take Little Brother's old bike, which is a child-size bike instead of full-size. I clambered on it. Lo and behold, I fit. My knees felt like they were up to my ears, but I could pedal. Also lo and behold, the bike handled really well. I took it for a spin on the driveway.
MOM: (looks out the door) What are you doing?
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Little Brother's other bike is broken, so I thought maybe-
MOM: No.
I took a razor scooter. Let me tell you, that was a mistake. The scooters nowadays are nothing like the scooters back in my day. Man, the scooter I owned had hand brakes and a board big enough to put both feet on and glide. This razor scooter was tiny, and flimsy, and it had no power. Every time we reached a crack in the sidewalk, the wheels would slam against it instead of going over, nearly bucking me off.
Today's ride went much more smoothly. I took Older Sister's bike. Baby Brother had a successful run around the neighborhood and then went on the bike trail near our house.
One problem, though--the bike trail runs through a swamp. We were biking along, minding our own business, when suddenly we were passing through these swarms of mosquitos. Hordes of mosquitoes. Gangs of mosquitoes. It was like we were Jets and they were Sharks and we'd come into their territory and now we were having a rumble.
These mosquitoes, somehow they managed to attach onto my skin as I sped through them. Immediately I began to itch. And itch. And itch. These literal suckers were driving me crazy. So of course I began to blow on them. Which meant that I wasn't paying attention to where I was biking.
Terrible things happened in that moment. Terrible things like the mosquito didn't seemed fazed at all. And I just itched more. And I almost rode off the trail into the underbrush. And had I actually done that terrible thing, Baby Brother would have laughed.
He didn't get to laugh, though. Though he did get to when I rode into a heap of pinecones on the way home. So I laughed when he rode into a clump of vines. And then I ran into that same clump. And then he ran into some rocks. And a fence.
Let's just say Baby Brother and I are still learning.
Every time someone says, "It's like riding a bike," about something that once learned I should remember the rest of my life, I always think, "Then it's hopeless!"
See, I had quite a bit of trouble learning to ride a bike. I didn't learn until I was eleven years old, and only then after much trouble and toil. I then used those skills for just a short time. The other day when I pulled out Little Brother's bike, it was my first time riding since I was thirteen, tops.
But Baby Brother wanted me to ride with him. When Baby Brother wants me to do something with him, I find it very hard to refuse. He's cute and little and has big eyes, like a puppy. Or an anime character. Or a hobbit.
My first time on a bike in years and years went okay. Baby Brother seemed to have way more confidence in my biking skillz than I did. When we passed some hardcore bikers wearing hardcore biking clothes, he commented, "We are not as good as them." I found it very gratifying that Baby Brother put me in the same class as himself, because in all honesty he bikes much better than I do.
There were some boons, though. When I found I wanted to move to the side, my bike moved to the side like magic. I didn't fall over. Eventually I even remembered to use the hand brake instead of stopping with my feet.
Close to the end of our ride, I heard this weird whump-whump sound.
"Probably that's a normal bike sound," I said to myself. Yet the farther I went, the worse it got, until it was like a pestle in a mortar: WHUMP! WHUMP! WHUMP! At least, that's how I imagine a pestle in a mortar sounds. Haven't ground much corn or herbs lately, myself.
Eventually I got off and looked at the tires. The back one had completely separated from the frame.
Aside from that incident and also aside from Little Brother's bike being uncomfortable (girl bikes seats are way more comfortable than boy bike seats, which makes no sense if you think about it), Baby Brother and I had a lovely time, such a lovely time that we've done it twice more since then.
The second time Baby Brother suggested I take Little Brother's old bike, which is a child-size bike instead of full-size. I clambered on it. Lo and behold, I fit. My knees felt like they were up to my ears, but I could pedal. Also lo and behold, the bike handled really well. I took it for a spin on the driveway.
MOM: (looks out the door) What are you doing?
AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Little Brother's other bike is broken, so I thought maybe-
MOM: No.
I took a razor scooter. Let me tell you, that was a mistake. The scooters nowadays are nothing like the scooters back in my day. Man, the scooter I owned had hand brakes and a board big enough to put both feet on and glide. This razor scooter was tiny, and flimsy, and it had no power. Every time we reached a crack in the sidewalk, the wheels would slam against it instead of going over, nearly bucking me off.
Today's ride went much more smoothly. I took Older Sister's bike. Baby Brother had a successful run around the neighborhood and then went on the bike trail near our house.
One problem, though--the bike trail runs through a swamp. We were biking along, minding our own business, when suddenly we were passing through these swarms of mosquitos. Hordes of mosquitoes. Gangs of mosquitoes. It was like we were Jets and they were Sharks and we'd come into their territory and now we were having a rumble.
These mosquitoes, somehow they managed to attach onto my skin as I sped through them. Immediately I began to itch. And itch. And itch. These literal suckers were driving me crazy. So of course I began to blow on them. Which meant that I wasn't paying attention to where I was biking.
Terrible things happened in that moment. Terrible things like the mosquito didn't seemed fazed at all. And I just itched more. And I almost rode off the trail into the underbrush. And had I actually done that terrible thing, Baby Brother would have laughed.
He didn't get to laugh, though. Though he did get to when I rode into a heap of pinecones on the way home. So I laughed when he rode into a clump of vines. And then I ran into that same clump. And then he ran into some rocks. And a fence.
Let's just say Baby Brother and I are still learning.
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