Ha! I Just Hit Waluigi into a Bus!

I spent the evening at Demk's house unlocking MarioKart Characters. Mind you, I was texted about it right as I was falling asleep for a much needed nap.

I walked into the house, and was literally handed the controller as Demk and Star said hello and asked why I had fallen off the face of the earth for the day. Apparently Demk had tried to get me over forty minutes before... but I have no recollection of that event.

So I sit down, and go to Mirror Mode - Star's favorite character is Rosalina. Because she's blond, wears blue and has a Star that giggles and twirls. Super cute.

And I failed. Epically!

(During Moo Moo Meadows)
Me: "It's like I'm magnetically attracted to everything that will slow me down!"
Star: "Katy, don't drive in the grass... you might stay in first if you avoid the grass"
(A few seconds go by where I find all of the grass patches and slowly drudge my way through them. Reminder that I'm the one playing because I'm supposed to be really good at this game)
Star: *laughing* "Wow..."
Me: (as I'm trying to avoid hitting the friggin' moving cows) "AH! MOO-MOO's!"

I did manage to hold down first and went on to the next race where, rather suddenly, a diagnosis came to mind.

Me: "Why do I always fail SO BAD on the third lap?"
Star: "I don't know..."
Me: "It's like I peak on the second lap or something."
Star: *giggles* "... that's what she said!"

Yeah... that's what she said...

About an hour later I'm on Moonview Highway. With traffic. And bombs. And everything that was right is left because I'm in MIRROR MODE. I have also resorted to being rather violent -- I upgraded from the light weighted Baby Daisy to the medium weighted Daisy to the heavy weighted (because of the SUPER cute Star) Rosalina once I unlocked her... JUST SO I COULD HIT THE OTHER COMPUTER PLAYERS! But I had to go back and re-do some stuff for Bowser Jr. (oh my gosh... I'm a closet chick gamer... )

So I'm barely dodging the traffic and the bombs but every once in a while the phrase "Aw, I just got ran over and now I'm FLAT!" was coming out of my mouth. With Star supportively laughing in the background while playing scrabble with Demk.

But I get into this intense smashing match with Waluigi. This usually does not happen because I'm playing against eleven computer players.

Star: "Wow..."
Me: "I know..." *manages to make Rosalina hit Waluigi into a moving bus and watch HIM go flat!*
Me: "Oh my gosh! I just hit Waluigi into a BUS!"

It was epic. Not as epic as Rosalina's star. Cutest Star in the world. One of the reasons I love Super Mario Galaxy. Because, deep down, I'm still a thirteen year old who has a soft spot for glitter and stars that giggle and twirl.

Good Night

Multiple Status Syndrome

Life is a whole big mesh pot of things that don't go together.

I blame the above statement for my inability to be content with just one or two facebook statuses per day....

Today I woke up a little earlier than normal to finish some homework... which, incidentally, also made me run behind on the whole "getting ready" regiment:

Shower. Clothes. Teeth. Face. Hair.

Put my school stuff together (mental checklist). Find my glasses, keys and wallet (which by the end of every single day are never in the same place). Leave (hopefully on time).

Now, when I initially wake up, I check my email and facebook. Saying that out loud sounds completely bizarre and almost sick, but I do. I had updated my status something like:

"TGIF! Happy July, too!"

-- because I am both excited it's Friday, and a combination of horrified and excited that it's July.

Approximately half an hour later I'm out of the shower, dressed, and I'm trying to not looked like a friggin' drowned rat! I look at my reflection and I have one thought:

"Oh my heck...I need a haircut. My hair is a MOP"

I watch my reflection crack a stupid grin because of my unusual wit.... 

But seriously... my hair was very mop-like. Flipping,waving, going... EVERYWHERE, but managing to look very heavy all at the same time. I didn't even want to begin the damage control...

But I do, chuckling to myself at weird moments (it's a good thing no one watches me in the morning). Then I turn around to find my school things (check) and my wallet and keys (check, check) and my glasses...

Took me 10 FRIGGIN' MINUTES to find my glasses...

Then -- I had a thought. FACEBOOK STATUS. I grab my iPad and pull up my facebook, thinking this status will be too hilarious that no one will notice I updated my status less than an hour ago anyway...

Only, when I wrote the status I only remembered the part about my glasses -- so I had to comment on my own status like seven seconds later about my hair. Five minutes later I finally located my glasses...

and had convinced myself that was the dumbest status ever -- who comments on their own statuses about their hair being a mop? Weird people, that's who... so I'm either weird... or I could delete the post and hope no one saw it to begin with. 

So I deleted it. Then I had a day filled with interesting... moments. All of which I want to transform into a magical, witty, "you-can't-help-but-comment" status. But, as usual, two minutes after I post it... I delete it.

I don't know what I feel weirder about: The fact that I updated my status probably close to ten times today -- all funny, unique and (during the school semester) normal as far as my kind of statuses go. OR the fact that only about three or four of them are still on my facebook... withstanding the test of time.

A few that didn't make it: 
Like when I referred to my bread stick today at the Pizza Factory as a Pepperoni.
When a bug got caught between my eye and my sunglasses... how does that even HAPPEN?
When I read an email with travel plans to China and was literally thinking "Holy freakin crap" for about fifteen minutes before someone else's status caught my attention and now my mind is completely on a different planet...

What is WRONG with me!?

What's Your Childhood Trauma?

I was a highly imaginative child. Along with that I would also say that I was introverted, sensitive and incredibly tall for my age.

I also had thing really horrible habit of forgetting a towel before hopping in the shower. *clears throat* and I'm NOT going to mention that home video that has my butt naked eight year old self running down the hall...

... or the fact that it is in my older sister's possession, who wanted me to watch it with them so they could laugh until I got so pissed off she hasn't mentioned "home movies" in a few years. On a side note if I ever find a man who loves me, and then can watch that video and still think I'm sane enough to marry... 

Anyway -- I think I had a pretty healthy, normal childhood. I tried to rebel. The 5th grade talent show comes to mind... but for the most part I was a good kid. It took me until 6th grade to realize it was easier to just do my freaking homework than it was to intercept my report card. The worst part of this was my parents knew I was smart, just lazy. Which equals disappointment... which is the worst thing in the world!

But really, I hate homework. I do. So much. And I do it. I sooo do it. I even read my textbook reading assignments... 

Let's draw the line of childhood sometime immediately following graduating high school in June of 2007. Nothing really horrendous had happened to me. I think the worst day of my teenage life, at that point, happened at a Field Show Tournament and I can't remember much of the details. 

Then, BAM! I'm in Cedar City and had just finished my first week of class EVER and I have to wrestle with a strange man in the middle of the night... 

But, still, I went to counseling and I hardly ever get reminded or think about it like I did when I was a freshmen. 

I'm trying to remember a story, or an incident that is my childhood in a nutshell. And no, those of you who were at the Music Department party, it's not when I would ask if we were going to "Sizzler" at church on Sunday when I was a little girl. It's also not defined when I glared at other flute players in elementary school and just couldn't understand why they couldn't play what was so obviously written down in front of them...

I guess it's somewhere in between the moments surrounding things like Wind Ensemble going to Washington DC in 2005 and we all started having a snowball fight outside of the lobby at the Dekelboum Concert Hall and everyone was looking at the kids from Barstow High like we were INSANE, or when, during the same trip I realized I loved American History?

Maybe it reappears when I call my dad and chat about what we used to do in High School. Like, when I was  a Senior, he would always call me out of 4th period (I was the French Teacher's TA) to take an extra long lunch with me at Del Taco. Or it could be when I would have to strip down on the side of one of the buses after the award's ceremony during Marching season when I was Drum Major as a Jr. and Sr.? With my BEST FRIEND Ariel!? Trying to get into our normal clothes without showing the world everything!? 

It could've happened sometime on the charter bus on the way to San Francisco in 2004 - because it definitely didn't happen on the way back from San Francisco a few days later...

Thinking back even farther - it might have happened when I spent hours with my brother, Ben, playing video games and going around town with a bunch of our friends. When it was me and him against our oldest sibling, Elizabeth? That when he got a horrible sunburn (he's a red-head) in our pool one day because he refused to wear a shirt... and I had to peel his skin off? Or have to deal with him yelling "KADE!" from across the house until I came. 

That's how I got that nickname... 

I still feel like her. 

Katy: The Very Cranky Lady

WARNING: I am probably going to make reference to how much I hate being a "girl" if you know what I mean. So either stop reading or prepare yourself to know a little bit too much information...


Have you ever had a night where you didn't even start on the homework until 9pm? And it ended up being over three hours of grueling academic experience?

Before I begin, let's rewind back to this morning or early afternoon (it actually feels like this happened yesterday but WHO CARES?) After I got done with Psychology, I headed over to the Music Library whereupon I quickly found out that every. single. individual jazz part that needs to be filed away (thus ending the Jazz portion of the new and improved music library) is completely missing. As in... the chart is not THERE. As in... there are MISSING JAZZ CHARTS!!!! ... and I got a paper cut :'(


I was texting one of my good friends - we'll call him Guy. This ambiguity could be very entertaining.... Before I know it I'm getting coaxed into calming down... "Deep breath" "Don't hurt yourself" And all I really wanted to say was "No... you don't understand... there are Jazz Charts missing!" 

... but I did realize I probably needed to go home and sleep. In fact, this was Guy's advice. I knew he was right. But I couldn't just go home. Don't you hate days like that?! But, I did, however, leave the Music Library. 


I went to my car and picked up my textbook for CSIS 1000 and headed over the ELC to do my assignment for the day. There is something about these assignments and instructions that make it take me like an hour to do it. So Thorough. So Wordy. So Pointless. So time consuming. So annoying...


Forty-five minutes later I think my eyes were watering from staring back and forth between the textbook and the computer screen. and my brain is pretty much numb. AND I think my frustration/annoyance level was climbing up to about a 7.

On a side note: I'm having one of those months where Midol is not enough to make me normal... I'm hurting. I'm sore. I'm moody as Hell. I don't know where my appetite went! It's like I'm just so uncomfortable below my stomach that I'm not even aware that I'm RAVENOUS!

Anyway - so I go home. I start laundry. I take some more Midol. I don't get any more comfortable and I'm too freaking lazy to find my heating pad...

I have this assignment for Psychology that I'm turning in tomorrow - a paper demonstrating that I read Chapter Two and practiced the SQ4R study method. This Chapter is about the biological reasons why we do the things we do.

Let me tell you something: I don't care why we do the things we do today. All I really care about is how I'll feel at the end of the week...

I didn't care about how the brain works in 2007 at Freshmen Orientation with Jill Wilkes. I don't care now...


But, alas... I do care about my grades and the fact that I need to know this information. But I remember thinking, rather vividly:

"I haven't been sleeping well anyway. I'll just take it easy and start it when I feel like it, even if it's at 9pm"


... and that's exactly what happened.

I started the assignment at 9pm.

I surveyed. I made up questions. I read the chapter. I did NOT recite it. I reflected on the material. And I wrote down the review.

I had to have a caffeine break considering I actually fell asleep (and would've been asleep for the night) at like 7:30pm but woke up in a panic thinking I never got the assignment done...

I went to Maverick with my roommate. We'll call her - Rocker. I think I entertain her greatly - especially when she hears random sounds coming from my room like "Ugh!" "I DON'T CARE" and hysterical laughter when I get on facebook, or start texting Guy among other friends...

I tried to chose the most caffeinated beverage that was both there and something I allow myself to ingest. I decided on Mountain Dew: Code Red and some chocolate... can't forget the chocolate...


I did some math in my head:

This Chapter is thirty pages long. I had been at it for two hours and had ten more pages left. So that's about ten pages an hour, which means one page every six minutes.

Rocker's advice: "Maybe you shouldn't have done the math...."


Anyway, an hour later I'm done. And all the Code Red did was make me burp like an overweight alcoholic in his early 40s....


And now I can officially say that completing this assignment has not made me feel any better -- and every time I hear a sound from upstairs I'm afraid they're going to have sex again...


Sighs The End.

You Know You're in a Pit Orchestra When...

As most of the people who know me already know, SUU Opera is performing the Mikado this week and we've had a couple of rehearsals in the last few days to prepare for it.


"The flowers that bloom in the spring tra-la!" has been stuck in my head since Saturday. Along with my part from "Our Great Mikado, Virtuous Man." 

Yeah...


Here are the five things I have issues with in a pit orchestra:


1. My butt and back kill after the first rehearsal and every time I sit down for more than twenty minutes after then I feel it! This lasts until a day or two after closing night...
2. Sunlight anyone? I can only take so many hours in the "pit." Hello? I'm DOWN HERE!!!!
3. I feel like fresh air is the only thing that can save me from the almost tangible aura of sweat, breath and other bodily functions. 
4. Watching various string players play with their mouths slightly agape, looking everywhere but at the conductor and playing everything too long and half a beat late.
5. The rehearsal schedule ruins my evening social life. If I had one, anyway... :)


Here are the five things I love about pit orchestra:
1. (This is really cheesy) Being an important part of a major production.
2. Looking across the orchestra and seeing at least five or six close friends. Many opportunities to have silent conversations in between playing about making a silly mistake or how awesome something sounded.
3. Knowing that the French Horn player chuckling at the third time I've botched a passage is actually laughing at my facial reaction because she's sitting that close to me.
4. The look on Gerry's face when something is going wrong... and when something goes right.
5. Occassionally glancing back at the Trombone and Tuba player, both of whom are doubled over in silent laughter about... drool....


Anyway -- COME TO THE OPERA!


You know you're part of a pit when you fall asleep with the music still stuck in your head...

We're Not Married

Before I begin, I would like to apologize for the length of my last blog post. I was bored, and I got going on flute/piccolo playing. My bad...

So - it all started when at some point last semester Brandon and I needed to go over to the Education Department and talk about setting up his placement at Barstow High School.

We had just turned in graduation paperwork, and block application, and in my case education department application, and we were tired of being treated like crap. So on the way over to Old Main, Brandon was like "If we run into any problems, I think I'm going to lose it!"

Now... let's be honest here. That's not a good idea, so I tried to keep the reign of Brandon's temper. We approach Dr. Bowler's office a few minutes later and he's busy, so we wait, somewhat awkwardly, in the hall. He noticed our presence and barks, "What do you need?"

And it's at this point that Brandon starts losing it. But instead of exploding, he can't really form a coherent sentence - so I talk for him. The information is communicated that it's about student teaching placement in California. And Dr. Bowler gets slightly grumpy and says, "Ooo, California isn't good."

Brandon starts to get all puffed up, and I have to calm him down before we were actually invited into Dr. Bowler's office. I calm him down by rubbing his arm, telling him everything's going to be okay.

And we walked in. One thing led to another and it slips out that Brandon would be student teaching with my dad. It is at this point that Dr. Bowler says "Well, you can't do that. It's a conflict of interest."

Then we all stand there, with our mouths slightly agape. Then... it dawns on Brandon.

"We're not married!"

Then Dr. Bowler looks surprised as he says, "Well, that's not what you gave me..."

So - ever since then, everybody thinks that Brandon and I are either related, dating, or married. None of them are true.

He's just the big brother I wish I never had...

The Case of the Sore Buttocks

If a kid asks where rain comes from, I think a cute thing to tell him is "God is crying." And if he asks why God is crying, another cute thing to tell him is "probably because of something you did."


I have a theory -- I must make God laugh. For yesterday morning He was the only person who saw what happened to me! 


What kind of weather would that translate to, by the way? Cedar City weather? When it snows in the morning and warms up by Noon? If that's not showing a sense of humor I don't know what does...


BUT - back to yesterday morning.... I work at Cedar Middle School three mornings a week this semester with Allan Lee and David Palmer. I help out the Varsity Band and get great experience as a future music educator. I also realize things like the fact that I kind of have issues with the age 6th graders are. And maybe this issues are kind of severe and I need to work them out before I accept a Middle School gig which is probably looming sometime in my future...


Anyway! I need to wear professional attire, which includes dress shoes. Dress shoes have AWFUL traction. Horrendous. Almost non-existent.  - But these dress shoes I have, as far as dress shoes are concerned, are not too bad in the traction department. So, I sign out at the front office and I'm thinking about what I need to do back on SUU Campus and I'm in the parking lot in approximately 15 seconds....


Then I have one of those experiences where time slows down. It's probably more like my mind had red warning flags blasting, but for the sake of the story -- time slowed down... 


My right foot slipped out from under me... and in my effort to regain my balance I try to catch myself with my left foot. But, alas, my left foot slipped on the very same icy patch of doom! I had a very clear moment of thinking "I'm going to fall!"


And then I fell... right on my butt. Like, I'm not kidding. Directly on my butt! My butt came in contact with the icy asphalt and the impact must have traveled from my tail bone, through my spine and out the top of my head. I say out through the top of my head because the top of my head hurt. 


I sat there, stunned, thinking, "Oh my gosh - that really hurt!" And, after looking around to see if anyone saw me, I started laughing. In amongst said laughing were repeated "Owe"s and "Holy crap"s. I eventually got up and, really, by the time I got to the Rotunda for breakfast and time with some friends I didn't hurt anymore.


Cue this morning -- I slept really well last night and I woke up to my alarm and when I turned to turn it off, something was off.... I was a little sore from conducting the pep band at last night's basketball game, but the twisting of my hips caught my attention.


My butt... is so sore! It's not my tail bone, like it probably should be! It's the place just below my lower back, on both sides a little closer to where my hips are. And - I found out in the Block - when I laugh too hard the top of my head kills. 


That's right, ladies and gentlemen - the reason for my discomfort during walking, shifting in a chair, and the effort it takes to stand up and sit down, is because I'm pretty sure I have two pretty epic bruises forming just below my back... 


Thank heavens it doesn't hurt once I'm sitting down....