Arizona Baseball!

It's back folks! BASEBALL is BACK! And I for one couldn't be happier! 

Well it's actually kinda been back for a month, because I do live in Arizona and all. And Arizona is home of the Cactus League. And the Cactus League is awesome. Mostly because it begins a month before the regular season and I have a plethora of games at my disposal to attend on a daily basis in a 20 mile radius.

MMMmmmm spring baseball!

 I actually only attended 2 spring training games this year... the games may be at my disposal, but I certainly don't have money at my disposal... But I digress.

{Cactus League opening day! February 27, 2014; Camelback Ranch home of the Los Angeles Dodgers}

{March 4, 2014; Cubs Park, home of the Chicago Cubs}

MMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm BASEBALL!!

I love baseball so much! (In case you hadn't heard.)

And that season opener in Australia sure was fun. Fun fact: Australia is 18 hours ahead of AZ. So a Saturday evening game in Australia is a 2 - 5 am game in AZ. And we all know that anything that happens at 4 am is usually completely horrible or completely awesome. In this case, 4 am baseball was awesome! Except for the loss.... the Dodgers are REAAAAALLLY good this year... :/

Awkward Picture, Sorry,

(I've got a foot theme going this year....)

Anyway.

Tonight was the home opener and it was a doozy! It was one dang awesome game. The outcome could have been better, but it was still super exciting! And even better because we had 4 out-of-staters with us! Seattle Mariners and Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim fan out-of-staters at that! We dawned Rebekah and Brandon in Sedona red and watched them cheer their hearts out for Arizona baseball!! (but really we watched them like creepers... they were sitting 4 rows in front of us.... haha family unity at its finest!) it was awesome!

{Opening day! March 31, 2014; Chase Field home of the ARIZONA DIAMONDBACKS}

Until next time, 

Arizona.

Dbacks FANFEST 2014

One of my favorite parts about baseball season happens before the season even begins: Fanfest. You can take tours of the whole ballpark, go in the clubhouse, see the world series trophy, watch interview sessions with the players, get autographs and pictures with the players... basically it's just the best! I look forward to it every year. And last year I won the instagram contest and got free tickets to a game, so that was nice. This year Kayla got 2 free tickets from and a few of us got a buy 2 tickets, get 2 tickets free coupon.

Here's some pictures from this years scavenger hunt:

Already looking forward to next year! 

#scavenge

It’s my blog I’ll hashtag if I want to.

A year-ish ago one of my sister’s decided to go paleo. So like she took all the processed junk out of her diet. She basically became a modern-day scavenger, meaning she only ate what people could hunt and gather. (Only she lived in modern day America, so really she just bought what others had already hunted and gathered). And the whole time I thought it was weird. I mean what would it be like to really hunt and gather your food for every meal.

But then Hannah met food trucks.

And that’s the closest thing to scavenging I’ll ever get. But boy is it awesome! It’s like going on a scavenger hunt for dinner! Hahaha. But a little more innovative than say, the pilgrims, because you just get on the worldwideweb  to one of the greatest technological advances ever; social media: (twitter, Instagram, facebook; take your pick,) and hunt down sites or posts enlightening the whereabouts of different trucks. Then you go to the place they say they’ll be when they say they’ll be there, and scavenge for the actual truck. Guys, it’s so fun!  But you’re right, it’s not really like hunting and gathering… Still,  I try…

(Also every Friday night from say 5ish to 9ish? maybe? the Gilbert Food truck court has a variety of food trucks. Start there if you don’t think you’re ready for real scavenging... they always have something)

2 weeks ago I ventured down there to partake of the {chedda truck}. To get #cheddawasted of course! 

 And might I say, it was de-LISH! (fyi they got a newly painted truck which made its debut today!)

And then Dana Park was hiding the {mywafflecrush} truck in its parking lot. So we went down there, and about 5 people from the front of the line they ran plum out of waffles. But they increased morale by giving the next few people in line a coupon for a FREE waffle! And wouldn’t you know it, they were going to be at the new Cubs spring training facility the very next day for the grand opening… and I was already planning on going. Booyah.

So the next day…

Waffle yum.

Then approximately 7 days later...

More waffle yum. The {wafflelove} truck was at the Orange patch on McKellips, so I HAD to go… to see which one was better of course (wafflelove is my profesh opinion. Love at first bite, after all (oh and these were both chocolate filled with strawberries and cream, but try the nutella with raspberries and cream. YOU WON'T REGRET IT!)).

Then today I found out there is a greek food truck {extra virgin greek food}. Wow. 2 of my very favorite things morphed into one: Greek food and food trucks. Naturally, another must. So I journeyed down to Gilbert again, but the Greek truck pulled up right at the same time we did, so they weren’t ready for customers… So I had to settle for a Queen’s Gyro at Carh’s Kitchen. (Obviously, I was in the greek food mood)

 As I was waiting for my food, the Greek truck opened so Matthew went and ordered this beauty.

 Papa Stavro Fries: fries, gyro meat, lots of feta cheese and tzatziki sauce. HEAVEN! 

May the scavenging bug get to you soon! It's awesome! 

Last Final

What would life be like if there wasn't drama for your last testing center test of your undergraduate career?

I wouldn't know.

Yesterday I took a test in the testing center. I got there and the line wasn't that bad, so I was in high spirits! I took my test and was outta there lickety-split because I needed to stop by the bookstore and then get home before my clothes finished in the dryer (I didn't want a stranger to take my clothes out - especially if they weren't dry yet!).

I walked into the hallway to see my score, and I didn't see it. It wasn't there! I figured they were probably backed up because of the finals week mayhem. So I went on my way to the bookstore.

I got home, got my laundry 3 minutes after the dryer finished (and my clothes had already been taken out, put on top (STILL DAMP) and a new load had been in for 1 minute... they didn't waste ANY time!!), and went to the testing center's website online to check my score.

You can't see your scores unless you have Mozilla Firefox.

I download Mozilla Firefox.

My score wasn't there.

Now i'm getting anxious.

I call the testing center (I seriously didn't want to walk back up to campus, it was cold!) and told them of the situation. They took down my information and said they would check it out and get back to me. I started compulsively checking to see if my score changed every 30 minutes. Nothing.

All day, nothing happened.

Then finally, the test appeared under my section but where the grade was supposed to be it said, "See instructor." I didn't know what that meant, but it satisfied me a little, at least they found it!

Fast forward to tonight. I received the email correspondence between my professor and the testing center administrator person... They still hadn't found my test and they looked EVERYWHERE. But my professor said I could just retake it because he was already out of town and didn't have another test I could take.

I guess that should be good news, but mostly it was lame.

So I went back to the testing center and the line was halfway through the crossroads! Luckily I got to go straight into the administrator's office and get it all sorted out. It took forever but finally I was back in the testing center taking the same test I took yesterday, in the exact same seat.

And that's that.

But the best part? I would have been fine just not taking the test either time. On the last day of class my professor brought Christmas cheer with him. He went out of town for a conference and missed the whole last week of class. He missed 2 other days this semester for his associate dean duties. So. He decided, on the last day of class, to DROP OUR LOWEST EXAM! I already had an A in the class so no matter what I got on the exam, he would drop it and I would still have an A...

So I didn't feel bad for the huge advantage I had over the other students... I didn't even need it. That's probably why he didn't care so much...

It's the {Little Things}

Finals week is NEXT week! I graduate NEXT FRIDAY! That's in 8 days, people! In 8 days my 8th semester of college will be over. I don't even know what to think about that. It's crazy... and more crazy... and weird... and scary. But also exciting!

Anyway, here are a few things that have brought joy to this painful part of the semester.

1. My roommates and I hung up stockings on our paper fireplace. Each time one of us goes to the store we buy a little something-something to put in them for each other. (Lots of chocolates, gold glitter eye liner, Mexican sodas, nail polish, more chocolate, etc). It's just fun.

2. The other day I was writing my own theory of personality. It had to be 1500 - 2000 words. It was extremely hard to keep it so short. When I finished my first rough draft I looked down at my word count: 2000 words on the money. IT WAS A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE.

3. This morning when I checked the weather I saw the most beautiful thing. There was a SUN next to the 18* high. A SUN. We have a cloudless, snowless, BEAUTIFUL sky today, friends.

4. The highs for the rest of the semester are in the 20's and 30's!! No more highs in the single digits!! :) :)

5. Today the crosswalk in front of the Hart building only had a few pieces of ice left. And we could see them with our naked eye.  The sidewalks on campus are also slowly becoming more visible. (The roads all over Rexburg, not so much...) BUT THE ICE IS MELTING... slowly but surely.

6. Because of number 5, we get to enjoy the beauty of  the snow covered trees and grass (seriously snow is beautiful) because you don't have to stare at your feet the whole time you walk to avoid falling to your death.

7. I've lost my footing many-a-times but I haven't fallen yet! But I have seen some pretty epic tumbles.

8. Last weekend I walked to Nielson's in shorts. It was -1* outside.

9. Last Saturday we had a 72 hour stake indexing blitz starting at midnight Saturday morning. I went around lunchtime on Saturday and they gave me free food! Like a legit meal!

10. One of my professors decided to drop our lowest exam score! He's missed a few days this semester and will miss the whole last week of classes, so we've had to know at least one chapter for every exam completely on our own without any lecture on it at all. He felt bad because people really struggle with his classes anyway... we're not complaining!

11. Scabbers can do the maze in less than 7 seconds, operate the skinner box like no rats business, and is a master on the ropes. And he could do this ALL before Thanksgiving. Which is lucky because I now only have to go to the lab for 10 minutes to feed him most days. Hallelujah!

Power Outage

This morning I woke up a little after 6 and it was FREEZING! I tried turning on the heater but I couldn't get it to work. Then about an hour later I received this text:

Awesome. (But at least I wasn't just stupid and incapable of turning on a heater.) 

There's just something in the air when unusual things like this happen. It's annoying, but also a little exciting.

 An hour or two later I received this text:

It wasn't snowing outside but I checked the weather on my phone, it was a whoppin -10'! That's frigid. (we could have gone up to campus, but that would require a lot of effort and going out in the more-cold) So we all gathered in our front room huddled in blankets without light, heat, internet or anything. We were all starving because we didn't have anything to eat without using the stove, microwave or oven. (We're so dependent on electricity!) 

I did make hot chocolate with the water out of the tap... it worked for the first 2 minutes. But then it quickly lost its warmth. 

We were all home and bored so we decided to bring warm vibes to our apartment by building a fireplace out of paper! I did this my very first semester of college (and everybody thought it would look super dumb... but I did it anyway, and then everyone ended up LOVING it) I showed my roommates the pictures from that:

     2009

and they loved it too! (Even if it was floating above a couch)

So we made this:

     2013

Who doesn't love green brick? I mean, come on! That's getting into the Christmas spirit! 

Then we decided to clean our apartment since we were all still home and needing something to do:

Then about 11 we received a text saying power was restored on campus. So we got ready in our only source of light - the window

But classes still didn't start until 12:45. So, after all that, when there honestly wasn't ANYTHING else to do, I began studying.

A few hours later we eventually received power in our apartment. It was wondrous!