Happy Birthday Little One

It's not every day that your baby sister turns 22.  I remember 22.  It was a pretty good year.  My guess is that your 22 will be very different than my 22.  I hope that you have some high hopes, and some big plans for the upcoming year.  Maybe I'll finally convince you to go skydiving with me or something.  Unlikely, but possible. 

I wanted to celebrate the occasion, but apparently you did too, and understandably, your uncool older sister/roommate came in below friends and boyfriend on the list of people to party with on your birthday, so I thought I'd document the celebration for you. 

I even took pictures:



Since our family has never really been great at celebrating birthdays I didn't know exactly what to do, so I bought you a cake and I put candles on it for you. 

Since you weren't here, and I didn't want the candles burning the house down, or ruining perfectly good angel food cake, I had to blow them out for you.  Don't worry, I mentally sang you happy birthday.  I did it mentally for several reasons, first, since you weren't here, I figured I might as well sing it in my head where it sounds better than out loud where I would be reminded of my terrible singing skills.  Second, I didn't want to kill the neighbors with said singing skills, and finally because I thought my thoughts would travel faster to you than singing out loud. 

It seemed wrong to sing happy birthday and blow out candles and not eat cake.  Since you weren't here to eat it yourself, I helped myself.  It was pretty tasty if I do say so myself.

I ended the celebration by watching a few episodes of our TV show.

It was a great birthday celebration.  I only wish you could have been here for it.

With Love,

Your Older Sister

Anywhere in the World

I've recently had a thought.  This semester is in rapid descent.  The middle of the semester somehow came and went without my even noticing.  The middle of my LAST semester as an undergrad.  I think we're down to something like 5 weeks left of classes.  Five weeks of mind numbing lectures and ulcer producing papers.  And then finals.  My last five finals.  The end of sitting for hours on end in the testing center, searching out the best seat (because we all know that the seat one chooses in the testing center is the biggest factor in how well one does on their test).  No more driving to Provo for classes.  No more spending hours and hours in the Smith Fieldhouse.  No more papers.  No more assignments.  No more laps in the RB pool.  I was thinking about all these things, and how strange it would be. 

And then it hit me. . . .

I COULD GO ANYWHERE!!

In all honesty though, the idea of ANYWHERE is a tad on the daunting side.  How do you choose something when your choices are ANYTHING?  All of a sudden the reality of the vastness of the world set in.  It's easy to forget sometimes when you live in Utah.  I'm pretty sure that six degrees of separation in Utah is really two.  Everyone knows someone somehow.  It's actually kind of creepy sometimes. 

I've always liked the idea of taking a map, throwing a dart at it and moving where ever the dart ends up.  I still may do this, however, there are some things that are must haves as far as the place that I end up, so I sat down and started to make a list of the most important things.  Here is my list so far:

1.  Red Fire Trucks

Beauty isn't it?  I may or may not have been guilty of firetruck chasing on the day this picture was taken.

So my friends, in an effort to narrow the scope of ANYWHERE just a little, I ask you, what color are the fire trucks where you live? 

Dear Henry

Dear Henry,

I want to start by apologizing for the trauma you were forced to endure this week.  I don't know if officially becoming a Utahn is more or less painful than becoming an official Californian as I have yet to do the latter, but I can imagine the transition is not free of pain as there is now little to distinguish you from all the crazy native Utahns out there.  Just stay true to yourself.  Those of us closest to you know your proud roots. 

I know it in no way makes up for the trauma, but I do hope that you are appreciating the new gifts you also received this week.  it does seem that the new tires, and alignment adjustment have you in a better mood, as it has taken a lot of coaxing to convince you to that it's OK to drive under 75 miles an hour.  I know it's been a while since you've been able to drive so fast, but just so you know, I really can't afford a ticket for going 20 over in a work zone right now, so while I do want you to enjoy your new found health, could we try to keep the celebration within reasonable limits?   I respect your dream to be a great racer, but now is not the time to fulfill that dream. 

In other updates,  I've been working hard to find you a steering wheel cover before the sun completely eats the top of the steering wheel away, but I can't seem to find one with fire trucks on it.  We may have to just go with something simple, but as it's just now coming into winter, I think I have a few more months to look before giving up completely.  I also promise to continue working to untar your front end as soon as I am out of school and have some extra spare time on my hands.  It will happen, it's just a very time consuming process.  I have also been considering changing out your antenna topper, but haven't yet found anything suitable.  Would you like to take a trip to Disneyland sometime to see if we can find something there?  Perhaps sometime this spring?  Just let me know, and we'll add it to the schedule.

Sincerely,

Your Driver