Movie Mania

I am going to start compiling a list of movies that I want to see. That way, when I have time to watch something, I can think of something that I'd like. I always blank when it's time to choose a movie!

Here are some movies that I have on my list:

The Ten Commandments (I'm in a Charlton Heston-y mood)
Thoroughly Modern Millie
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Parts 1 and 2
Dan in Real Life
**Edit** Dark Matter Thanks for the recommendation, Erin!
**Edit** Akeelah and the Bee Thanks for the recommendation, Casey!
Ghandi (We just watched Prince of Persia with Ben Kingsley in it, which reminded me that I wanted to watch Ghandi)

What movies are you hankering to see? Do you have any suggestions for me?

Harry Potter Rap

I few weeks ago, I was sitting in the Terrace in the Wilkinson Center on BYU campus, doing some homework.  They frequently have people perform there during the day, especially to advertise for upcoming performances by various groups.  This guy came and sang this song, and I was seriously cracking up about it.  Thank you, Natalia, for posting this link so that I could relive the moment.

Ugh!

It's the scraping-ice-off-the-car-window time of year again!

General Conference Weekend

General Conference is a time for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints to listen to the words of our prophet and apostles, as well as other leaders in our church. Whether you gather in Salt Lake in the Conference Center or Tabernacle, or watch conference from the comfort of your own home, it's a wonderful time to hear from inspired people, and a cause for reflection that can last all year long. Conference happens twice a year, in April and October, and the talks are printed in the church magazine The Ensign, with the original video being posted on the internet here.

Even though conference weekend was several wees ago, I wanted to write about it. My top 10 reasons for loving conference weekend this year:

1. My mom and dad visited. My parents like to come up to Utah and attend as many sessions in the Conference Center as they can. So we got to spend time with them, play some games, and chat a lot. They are some of my favorite people!

2. Dave and I went to a farmers' market that Saturday. We had been meaning to go to the farmers' market for several weeks, to check out their produce, and also just to get into the fall spirit! It was fairly small, but still fun to wander around and gawk.

3. We bought some things at the farmers' market. One of the items we bought was a spaghetti squash. Yummy! We also bought a bag full of small onions. Dave and I love onions, and we use them in everything. So even though the onions are small, they'll last us a long time. The last thing we bought was some jalapeno jelly. Have any of you tried this before? My friend Erin Roundy told me abut it, so when I saw it I had to try it. It's sweet jelly, but it has a jalapeno kick! It is so good on toast.

4. I got to go to church in my pajamas! I love being able to sleep in and then wrap up in a blanket on the couch to listen to conference.

5. Favorite talk #1 - President Uchtdorf spoke about slowing down and getting back to the basics during the rough periods of life. He is a humorous speaker, and really touched my heart about my need to simplify.

6. Favorite talk #2 - Elder Christofferson spoke about using our time and freedom of choice wisely. Mostly he spoke about consecrating our lives. When I was a missionary I dedicated a lot of my study time to studying the law of consecration and what that meant to me personally. It was nice to hear this talk and be reminded of that.

7. Favorite talk #3 - Elder Oaks spoke about personal communication and priesthood communication. I always love Elder Oaks's talks, and I really felt the love of my Savior through this talk.

8. Favorite talk #4 - President Monson spoke about gratitude. I am working on writing in a gratitude journal everyday, so this was a very interesting talk to me.

9. Favorite talk #5 - Elder Ballard spoke about addiction. I loved this talk because when he spoke about overcoming addiction, he gave such a powerful testimony of the Atonement.

10. Spending time with Dave! We had a great weekend together, one that was spiritually uplifting and a lot of fun.

Weekend in Colorado

Last weekend Dave and I drove to Colorado to bring his aunt Angee back home.  We got to visit this beautiful city:

 

 

Denver was really fun to visit.  We spent time with Angee and her husband Don.  We also stayed with Dave's cousin Tiffany and her husband Joe.  And we got to play alot with Tiffany's daughter, Madi.  Such a cutie!

There were some train tracks right by Tiffany's house, and we had to wait for this really long train.  It made me think of waiting to cross the tracks in Flagstaff.  I like trains!

On Friday, when our family was working, Dave and I decided to go to the Denver aquarium.  Check out these awesome pictures!

One huge, ugly fish!  These kinds of fish can live up to 100 years.  Crazy.

A shark.  Dunnnn-DUN!  Dunnnn-DUN!

A large sting ray.  We got to "pet" some sting rays in a petting pool.  They felt like a really soft rubber.  Fun!

I love this picture!  Look at all these colorful starfish, anemonie and coral!

This doesn't look like we took the picture, but we did.

This was the scariest, biggest shark in the tank.  JAWS!!!

Jelly fish.  This tank is a jelly-filled.  (Those of you who like Strange Brew will get it.)

A saw-tooth shark.  At least, that's what we called it.  I don't know it's real name.

We also went to this really cool cornmaze while we were in CO.  I told Dave earlier this year that I really wanted to go to a cornmaze in October.  So he asked his cousin to look up cornmazes around Denver.  This is the one that we found:

There were 24 (I think) checkpoints in the maze.  You used a little map of the maze to find your way around, and at each checkpoint you used a hole punch (each with a different shape) to mark off the checkpoint on your map.  I think that people who got them all could enter for a prize.  We couldn't get to all of them.  We were with Tiffany and Madi, and Madi's legs were just so short that there was no way we could get to all of them.  She's almost 2.  But I wanted to go to a few, instead of just wandering around aimlessly, and Dave worked with me to read the map.  He's such a sweetie!

Not Even a Woman

***Warning!!!***This post may contain some highly offensive material to women who dislike being put down and laughed at for being a woman. Don't worry; I was offended too.

Today I went to a graduate student society activity at BYU. It was a "what every grad student should know" lecture, and I thought it would be very informative, which it was. There was one speaker who talked about student debt, how to decide how much to take on, and how to manage it. He also talked about how getting out of debt as soon as possible allows you to start investing your money in ways that makes interest work for you. All good advice.

The second speaker started out good too. He talked about how students need to balance their lives as graduate students. There needs to be a balance in pride and humility. There needs to be a balance in patience and desire to achieve. And there needs to be a balance between hard work and enjoying life. All of this sounded like good advice too.

It was when he started to illustrate these points individually that the offensive stuff came out. He was talking about how he thought he was really cool when he was a graduate student. He was accomplishing lots of stuff and getting good grades. He thought he was important in his field. He was "The man." Then he said that the more he interacted with professionals, the more he realized how stupid his pride was. He wasn't "The man." He wasn't even "The woman."

!!!

I couldn't believe he said that! Oh no, it's bad to realize that you're not the man in your field. But the humiliation to realize that you're not EVEN a WOMAN!!

I know that he didn't mean to say it this way. He probably had no idea what he was saying or how some people could take it. So I was willing to let it go and listen to the rest of his speech. But I was surprised to hear quite a bit of giggling coming from the female portion of the audience that thought that the degrading statement about women was actually funny. Wow. There are some women who will laugh at anything. That's all I have to say.

(Dave's thoughts: Having become closely acquainted with a woman over the last couple of years, all I can say is: she really is "...always a woman to me..." Cue Billy Joel...) (Oh, and don't mess around with Merry when she's feeling feministy.)

Ben-Hur

Over several weeks, Dave and I watched various segments of the epic film, Ben-Hur. We had to watch it in segments because it is LONG! It's 3 hours and 32 minutes long. I'll give a summary in this post, but a longer synopsis can be found here.

It wasn't until after I watched the movie that I found out that it was subtitled "A Tale of the Christ." I knew that the movie was famous for the chariot race scene and that it had Charlton Heston in it, but that's about all I knew. So I was surprised to see as much religion in it as it had. The movie details the life of Judah Ben-Hur (Charlton Heston), a Jewish prince in Jerusalem under Roman rule. His life is paralleled by certain events in the life of Christ that influence Ben-Hur. He is falsely accused by the Roman tribune who was his childhood friend, and spends the rest of the movie trying to get revenge from him and from the Romans who enslave his people. But his heart is eventually softened by the teachings of Christ which are told to him by the woman he loves.

I've seen Charlton Heston in some pretty funky roles. Can anyone say Colonel George Taylor in Planet of the Apes? Or Detective Thorn in Soylent Green? But I really liked him in his role as Judah Ben-Hur. He is such an intense actor, and this was one of his most well known roles. The movie won 11 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and it won the Oscar for both Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor. If you haven't seen it, I would highly recommend it!

Fall Hike

After our adventure at the rock, Dave and I went further up the canyon and had a fall hike!

The air was crisp and the leaves were starting to change in spots.

It was a beautiful day.

This picture is kind of dark, but I wanted to show that Dave and I were actually there in these beautiful surrounding!

We hiked up to Big Springs, which is the meadow where we got engaged.

Here's a shot of the mountains from the meadow.

It really was a fun day!

Jumping in at The Rock

I have been meaning to post this for quite a while. Dave and I like to have fun on the Provo River, and one Friday we decided to go for our last jump of the season at The Rock.

This is the rock that President Monson has talked about playing at when he was young, so you know this boulder has witnessed a lot of fun over the years.

Here we are, walking on the railroad tracks from Vivian Park up the Provo River to where the rock is.

Dave humors me by posing for the blog!

Here is the picture of the rock again.  This was around September 15th (I can't remember the exact date) and it was starting to get cold here in Utah.  And up the canyon at this spot, it was a bit chilly.  And that was before getting into this ice cold water!

Here are the after shots!  Dave was thinking, "Why do you have a camera in my face?"

And I was thinking, "Wow, that was invigorating!"