-An explanation-
There is a (I) after this adventure because this isn't actually the big Adventure.
This is the preliminary adventure, where I visit all of my lovely friends in Washington and then swing by San Francisco to pick up my visa! More on that later, though -- right now, the focus is Washington!
-Important Information Everyone Should Know-
I will be in Washington from Thursday, January 31 to Monday, February 4. I will be IN WASHINGTON and I want to see all of you Washingtonians before I leave!!
I realise that a lot of my posts make it look like I hate being at home. That is absolutely not true -- I love Salt Lake, and I love spending time with my family at home. But I also love keeping busy and having a lot of things to do, and that is unfortunately just not the case when I've been at home for a long time. Without things like classes, homework, lacrosse, work, clubs, meeting with friends, and general shenanigans keeping me running about, I tend to alternate between a dull, bitter lethargy and endless energy built up through pent up frustration. As you can imagine, neither of those are a lot of fun for people around me to deal with (nor are they much fun for me to deal with).
That's one of the reasons why I am beyond thrilled to be able to visit Washington in just a few days! I intend to keep myself busy visiting people, stopping by meetings and practices, and in general poking my nose around where it doesn't really belong. My goal is to be so exhausted by next Thursday that I collapse at home and sleep for days. Actually, I changed my mind. My goal is to run around and visit people and have them so exhausted that by the end of my visit they collapse and sleep all weekend. Because, really, you guys probably all need the sleep anyways.
-A confession-
I love you guys a lot, and I really miss you.
But I'm still not going to hold back any of the energy that's been slowly building up since the beginning of January.
Aren't you excited to see me now? ;)
Monday, January 28, 2013
Thursday, January 24, 2013
Adventures on Ice
This morning, I woke up to a thin sheet of ice covering EVERYTHING.
Well, literally, I woke up to a cat jumping onto my belly. But that's neither here nor there. I checked my phone and saw that I had received a message from my mom, warning me that the roads were "really icy." However, this was coming from the woman who worries about me driving when there is barely an inch of rapidly melting snow on the ground. So I thanked her and told her I would be careful, and then went about my business. I'm currently house-sitting for a family, taking care of their dog, Elsie, and cat, Snowy. Elsie is very excitable -- she loves being let out, so when I opened the door this morning she rocketed out the door, skidded down the steps and landed, paws splayed, at the bottom. Seconds later, Snowy rushed out. She made it out a little more gracefully by simply skipping the steps, but at the bottom waved her paws about wildly to keep upright.
I watched them and giggled a little bit -- silly animals, didn't they see the ice all over the steps? Then I felt a little bit bad for laughing at them, but to be honest, it was quite a funny display. I carefully side-stepped down the steps, arrogantly ignoring the hand-rail. Upon reaching the bottom, I gave a sigh of relief, then promptly slipped and fell. If Elsie and Snowy had voices, and if they had been paying attention to anything but their food bowls, I'm sure they would have been laughing.
The rest of the morning passed smoothly enough -- de-icing my car was a bit of a struggle, but it was kind of worth it to be able to slice through the ice with the scraper. I felt a little bit like insert superhero-who-can-slice-through-ice. It was pretty sweet, let me tell you.
Upon arriving home, I realized that my car was simply not going to make it up the driveway. My car struggles up the driveway at the best of times, and while I can coax it up the driveway in the snow using 4 wheel drive and a bit of luck, it absolutely refused to even attempt to tackle the ice.
I parked in the street and stood at the bottom of our driveway, hands on my hips, wondering how exactly I was going to do this. The ice didn't look too bad from there, and just because my car couldn't make it up was no reason I shouldn't be able to do it. Today's newspaper lay sadly on the left edge of the driveway, about 7 feet above the base of the driveway, so I decided I would hike up and heroically rescue it from its icy prison.
I took one step up the driveway -- and promptly slid back down. I tried side-stepping, running, taking large steps, taking small steps, skipping, jumping, cartwheeling, swearing, bear walking, penguin sledding, and a brief stint walking on my hands, but to no avail. The newspaper sat there, just daring me to try again.
"Well, FINE then," I snapped. This obviously wasn't going to work. After accepting a handful of mail from our amused and relieved mailman ("Hey, Downton Abbey came in! Sweet!"), I turned to the snowbanks lining each side of my driveway, each towering over two feet. I sighed, and resignedly plunged into the snow.
I finally made it to the house 5 hours later (or something like that), soaking wet up to the knees. I stood in the kitchen, staring out at the driveway, which stood twinkling innocently at me in the smog light. There at the base sat the newspaper, still gleaming with ice, and probably amusement at my struggles. I glared at it and stuck out my tongue.
See if I care. I'll just do the crossword online.
Take that, newspaper.
Well, literally, I woke up to a cat jumping onto my belly. But that's neither here nor there. I checked my phone and saw that I had received a message from my mom, warning me that the roads were "really icy." However, this was coming from the woman who worries about me driving when there is barely an inch of rapidly melting snow on the ground. So I thanked her and told her I would be careful, and then went about my business. I'm currently house-sitting for a family, taking care of their dog, Elsie, and cat, Snowy. Elsie is very excitable -- she loves being let out, so when I opened the door this morning she rocketed out the door, skidded down the steps and landed, paws splayed, at the bottom. Seconds later, Snowy rushed out. She made it out a little more gracefully by simply skipping the steps, but at the bottom waved her paws about wildly to keep upright.
I watched them and giggled a little bit -- silly animals, didn't they see the ice all over the steps? Then I felt a little bit bad for laughing at them, but to be honest, it was quite a funny display. I carefully side-stepped down the steps, arrogantly ignoring the hand-rail. Upon reaching the bottom, I gave a sigh of relief, then promptly slipped and fell. If Elsie and Snowy had voices, and if they had been paying attention to anything but their food bowls, I'm sure they would have been laughing.
The rest of the morning passed smoothly enough -- de-icing my car was a bit of a struggle, but it was kind of worth it to be able to slice through the ice with the scraper. I felt a little bit like insert superhero-who-can-slice-through-ice. It was pretty sweet, let me tell you.
Upon arriving home, I realized that my car was simply not going to make it up the driveway. My car struggles up the driveway at the best of times, and while I can coax it up the driveway in the snow using 4 wheel drive and a bit of luck, it absolutely refused to even attempt to tackle the ice.
I parked in the street and stood at the bottom of our driveway, hands on my hips, wondering how exactly I was going to do this. The ice didn't look too bad from there, and just because my car couldn't make it up was no reason I shouldn't be able to do it. Today's newspaper lay sadly on the left edge of the driveway, about 7 feet above the base of the driveway, so I decided I would hike up and heroically rescue it from its icy prison.
I took one step up the driveway -- and promptly slid back down. I tried side-stepping, running, taking large steps, taking small steps, skipping, jumping, cartwheeling, swearing, bear walking, penguin sledding, and a brief stint walking on my hands, but to no avail. The newspaper sat there, just daring me to try again.
"Well, FINE then," I snapped. This obviously wasn't going to work. After accepting a handful of mail from our amused and relieved mailman ("Hey, Downton Abbey came in! Sweet!"), I turned to the snowbanks lining each side of my driveway, each towering over two feet. I sighed, and resignedly plunged into the snow.
I finally made it to the house 5 hours later (or something like that), soaking wet up to the knees. I stood in the kitchen, staring out at the driveway, which stood twinkling innocently at me in the smog light. There at the base sat the newspaper, still gleaming with ice, and probably amusement at my struggles. I glared at it and stuck out my tongue.
See if I care. I'll just do the crossword online.
Take that, newspaper.
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
The Adventure of the Tangled Yarn
You guys.
I just spent an hour and a half untangling yarn.
An hour and a half.
In case you wanted to know, that's about the amount of time it took to listen to a lecture about bonobo sex (among other things) with a couple of Beatles songs tossed in at the end.
Well, ok. I didn't start out intending to spend an hour and a half fighting with a tangled, knotty fiend from hell. It all started out because I wanted to listen to a series of lectures entitled "Global Problems of Population Growth" (if you're interested, you can find it here). I have a hard time just listening to lectures, especially if I'm not taking notes. I have occasionally been known to bring jars of Play-Doh to class with me, to the amusement (and sometimes resentment) of my peers. So I decided that today would be the day to learn to crochet!
After pestering my brother for clues as to where I might find his crocheting materials, I finally unearthed some yarn and a needle from a pot next to the fireplace (what?). A few Google searches later, and I was ready to go!
At first, I actually felt as if I was doing quite well. I taught myself to tie a slip knot, and moved onto the chain stitch. According to the pattern, I was supposed to crochet 224 stitches, and then turn around and come back for step two. I made it to what seemed like 224, and then prepared to turn around and come back. That's where I ran into problems.
You see, I made it through step one mostly by admiring the pretty pictures and imitating what they had done. Step two told me to run the hook through both loops for the second row, but there were no pictures. No pictures at all. I assume they figured that if you can make it this far, you must clearly be a competent crocheter, and therefore no longer need pictures. I felt like a child who has been told that they could no longer read picture books, and must instead move onto chapter books. In other words, I was a little bitter...but mostly just lost and confused. All of a sudden, the innocent chain I had been holding turned into a snarling, writhing mass of loops that refused to behave or at least give me a clue as to which loops I was supposed to be mauling. I struggled along for a while, and then decided for whatever reason that this would probably be a lot easier to figure out if the yarn was thicker. Please do not ask me why I thought this.
The thing about the thicker yarn was, there was half of a hat attached to the end of it, from the days when my brother was into crocheting. Well, he wasn't going to finish it, and I decided that I needed the yarn more than he needed the half hat, so I started unravelling. And the hat continued to unravel. And unravel. Soon I had a mountain of yarn sitting next to me.
I began to dig through the pile in search of the end, which I had inconveniently misplaced as soon as I had finished unravelling the half hat. Unfortunately, this just served to tangle the mess of yarn even further. By the time I found the end, the yarn was so hopelessly tangled that I couldn't hope to do anything with it. I decided to try to roll it up to make things easier, dropping the end again in the process. I reached a knot less than a minute into my yarn rolling process, and upon failing to untangle it (and probably making the whole thing even worse) I decided I would just start from the beginning and untangle the whole thing. This, of course, meant finding the end yet again. I eventually did manage to find it again, and overall the whole process, aside from being excessively lengthy, was rather what you would expect -- a lot of trial and error, a lot of swearing. But at long last, here I am, one lecture and a few Beatles songs later, with a lovely little ball of yarn sitting next to me on the couch.
The fucker.
I just spent an hour and a half untangling yarn.
An hour and a half.
In case you wanted to know, that's about the amount of time it took to listen to a lecture about bonobo sex (among other things) with a couple of Beatles songs tossed in at the end.
Well, ok. I didn't start out intending to spend an hour and a half fighting with a tangled, knotty fiend from hell. It all started out because I wanted to listen to a series of lectures entitled "Global Problems of Population Growth" (if you're interested, you can find it here). I have a hard time just listening to lectures, especially if I'm not taking notes. I have occasionally been known to bring jars of Play-Doh to class with me, to the amusement (and sometimes resentment) of my peers. So I decided that today would be the day to learn to crochet!
After pestering my brother for clues as to where I might find his crocheting materials, I finally unearthed some yarn and a needle from a pot next to the fireplace (what?). A few Google searches later, and I was ready to go!
At first, I actually felt as if I was doing quite well. I taught myself to tie a slip knot, and moved onto the chain stitch. According to the pattern, I was supposed to crochet 224 stitches, and then turn around and come back for step two. I made it to what seemed like 224, and then prepared to turn around and come back. That's where I ran into problems.
You see, I made it through step one mostly by admiring the pretty pictures and imitating what they had done. Step two told me to run the hook through both loops for the second row, but there were no pictures. No pictures at all. I assume they figured that if you can make it this far, you must clearly be a competent crocheter, and therefore no longer need pictures. I felt like a child who has been told that they could no longer read picture books, and must instead move onto chapter books. In other words, I was a little bitter...but mostly just lost and confused. All of a sudden, the innocent chain I had been holding turned into a snarling, writhing mass of loops that refused to behave or at least give me a clue as to which loops I was supposed to be mauling. I struggled along for a while, and then decided for whatever reason that this would probably be a lot easier to figure out if the yarn was thicker. Please do not ask me why I thought this.
The thing about the thicker yarn was, there was half of a hat attached to the end of it, from the days when my brother was into crocheting. Well, he wasn't going to finish it, and I decided that I needed the yarn more than he needed the half hat, so I started unravelling. And the hat continued to unravel. And unravel. Soon I had a mountain of yarn sitting next to me.
I began to dig through the pile in search of the end, which I had inconveniently misplaced as soon as I had finished unravelling the half hat. Unfortunately, this just served to tangle the mess of yarn even further. By the time I found the end, the yarn was so hopelessly tangled that I couldn't hope to do anything with it. I decided to try to roll it up to make things easier, dropping the end again in the process. I reached a knot less than a minute into my yarn rolling process, and upon failing to untangle it (and probably making the whole thing even worse) I decided I would just start from the beginning and untangle the whole thing. This, of course, meant finding the end yet again. I eventually did manage to find it again, and overall the whole process, aside from being excessively lengthy, was rather what you would expect -- a lot of trial and error, a lot of swearing. But at long last, here I am, one lecture and a few Beatles songs later, with a lovely little ball of yarn sitting next to me on the couch.
The fucker.
Friday, January 11, 2013
The Adventure of NOT Destroying the House
To travel
would be an awfully Big Adventure.
Planning is
exciting, and travelling is an Adventure. Unfortunately, waiting is the
inevitable pain-in-the-rump intermediate step, one that I tend to struggle
with. As many of my friends have found out over the years, I’m not very good at
waiting. I get impatient, and if you give me enough time, I come up with really
absurd projects to pass the time (see my freshman year photo album on
Facebook). Given that I will not be travelling to Chile until the end of February, well,
I’ve got quite a bit of time.
In order to
keep myself from going crazy (and to keep my parents from prematurely kicking
me out of the house), I’ve come up with a list of things to do while I’m at
home. Mind, this list is far from complete (actually, I came up with it about
ten minutes ago) and I may or may not actually end up doing any of these
things. But it kept me occupied for a good ten minutes, and hey, maybe some of
these things will serve as a replacement for re-arranging all of the kitchen
cupboards next week.
- Practicing Arabic
I actually audited a test-run Arabic class last year, and I have the CDs and textbooks from that class. I figure now is as good a time as ever to bring my Arabic alphabet up to scratch!
- Learn calligraphy
I’m not a very artistic person. Actually, one might even say I’m painfully bad at drawing and...well, visual arts in general. Some of my Pictionary sketches have nearly reduced my best friend to tears (well, we can’t all go to art school). But I figure, learning calligraphy is just like learning to imitate fancy writing, so it can't be that bad, right? Right?
- Practice origami
By practice, mostly I mean learn origami in the first place. Cheap supplies, lots of internet help – definitely something that could keep me occupied for a few hours.
- Learn to knit
I’ve actually tried to learn to knit before, and for whatever reason it’s really painful to me (physically, not emotionally). My knuckles get really mad at me, and overall whenever I’ve tried to knit it ends up being a very short lived endeavor. But the last time I tried was a few years ago, so maybe the time is ripe for another go!
- Duct tape crafts
I’m not actually sure what this would entail – I saw a book about it somewhere, sometime. But we do have a lot of duct tape! Anyway, duct tape is pretty amazing stuff, so any duct tape craft is guaranteed to be pretty awesome, even given my lack of artistic ability. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.
- Practice juggling
I really do need the practice.
- Learn yoga
I am quite interested in learning yoga – if I can, I’d like to take a class next year. But in the meantime, I may as well look up some poses online and give it a whirl! It looks like a lot of fun, and it fits right in with the next activity.
- Exercise
Because, let’s be honest, I could use it. I am climbing a few times a
week, but a little cross training never hurt anyone!And it's a good way of getting rid of some pent-up energy.
This is
just a quick list of some of the more interesting options I have available. Actually, that's not true. This is a quick list of options that I might actually follow through with. There are always things like creating the world's largest rubber band ball, hunting down bears, learning to live in the wild, creating recipes using only materials found in my backyard, learning to play the flugelhorn, or handmaking soap. And who knows, maybe I will pick up the flugelhorn! But for now, I think I'll stick with yoga.
If you have
anything you would like to add to my list, by all means let me know! I am open
to all suggestions (well, within reason). Maybe I’ll set up a challenge for
myself, or something – you send me ideas, I show you the results of that idea.
Hmm, that’s a possibility…well, I’ll keep you updated!
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
The Adventure of the Tricky Title
I'm not great at coming up with interesting titles. Actually, you could probably say that I'm painfully terrible at it. My paper titles usually tend to run along the lines of "The Effect of AIDS Education on Women Empowerment in Sub-Saharan Africa" or "El tiempo en Continuidad de los parques." Informative, yes. Interesting? Well, maybe not so much. So I put quite a lot of time into coming up with a title I could be proud of.
Some of you may be a little bit confused about the title, and how on earth it is relevant to me and/or my studies in Chile. So, a little bit of backstory:
My freshman year of college, I ran across a magical movie called How to Train Your Dragon. My roommate and I watched it to death -- I want to say we watched it probably seven times in a semester? Maybe more than that. We can quote passages if you prompt us. Anyway, at one point I changed my name in her phone to Hiccup, and the name stuck -- now, more often than not, she calls me Hiccup instead of Becca.
So, as you can see, the title of this blog pertains to me just a little bit, and not at all to my studies in Chile. But it made me giggle for a good 5 minutes when I thought of it, so I'm going to call it good!
Some of you may be a little bit confused about the title, and how on earth it is relevant to me and/or my studies in Chile. So, a little bit of backstory:
My freshman year of college, I ran across a magical movie called How to Train Your Dragon. My roommate and I watched it to death -- I want to say we watched it probably seven times in a semester? Maybe more than that. We can quote passages if you prompt us. Anyway, at one point I changed my name in her phone to Hiccup, and the name stuck -- now, more often than not, she calls me Hiccup instead of Becca.
So, as you can see, the title of this blog pertains to me just a little bit, and not at all to my studies in Chile. But it made me giggle for a good 5 minutes when I thought of it, so I'm going to call it good!
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