Diary of a Traveler

Over Spring Break, I ALWAYS flee Utah...I'd be crazy not to. This time I went to D.C., New York City, and made a quick little visit to Miami. D.C. was mainly inspired by my desire to visit with one of my best friends and all time favorite roommates, Amy...who now has a husband, Eric. It was delightful! We had loads of fun and tons of laughs and I even became a pro at the game Settlers of Catan...well, I lost everytime, but... So, about the laughing... Amy and I both have this condition (Mandy, her sister, has it too. So does Brynn). Brynn and I named the condition "Attacks" a long time ago. What happens is basically this: something really weird and trivial happens that some might not even think is funny, but somehow it brings on this insane laughing attack which then turns into heaving sobs and tears...not tears just from laughing too hard; REAL TEARS! REAL SOBS! My theory is that we are all quite happy-go-lucky-hyper people most of the time, but we are also deep thinking emotional beings who supress those feelings a lot and when the "Attack" comes our inner soul just bursts out with random emotion. At least that's how I think it works for me. Amy and I both had one of these said "Attacks" at different points during our visit. Amy:

Her Attack was brought on by me getting slammed in the lower abdomen by the swinging metal bars at Eric's work that only open for a brief second after he swipes his ID to get in. We all tried to make it through on one swipe and I was last...
Me:

This one was brought on by the bitter cold Siberia winds that were whipping all around the Washington monument as we waited to go up to the top. I did not have enough clothes on and there was NO SHELTER anywhere and I just basically lost it. Here are some of my favorite photos from the Nations Capital:

In front of Capital Building

View of the White House from the top of Washington Monument

I love Arlington Cemetary! It has such a heavy powerful spirit that makes me feel patriotic, AND the perfect rows of headstones do wonders for my OCD

Good times...Eric was a great tour guide!

Off to NEW YORK CITY I go! I met up with Davey, my excellent co-coordinator at EFY, Rob, my favorite pal from Orlando who also lives back in Utah now and even drove me across the country, and Jen, my little buddy that I teach with at the Snow Springs institution for mostly disrespectful children. It was beautiful weather and we had a fantastic time! We stayed in a slightly shady part of Brooklyn, but inside it was nice and comfy. Check out the "Recent Entertainment" section of my blog to read about some of the shows we saw. Here are some photos:

Davey, Rob, and I on the ferry over to the Statue of Liberty

They added a Harry Potter section at the FAO Schwartz!

Have I mentioned that Central Park is the third happiest place on earth?


I love walking across the Brooklyn Bridge...we did it two mornings. It's even better at night, but that didn't fit in to our schedule. (By the way, last time I was in NY with Jamie, Erin and Adam we thought we were walking across the Brooklyn Bridge, but it was the Manhattan Bridge...ha ha! I just realized that this trip)

This next sequence of pictures is my happiness and joy with my cream cheese, nutella, and peanut butter bagel from the Peanut Butter & Co.







Traveling always has it's ups and downs! Luckily the ups most of the time out-weigh the downs. I had a rough hit this time though when I flew from NYC to Miami to train some counselors for EFY this summer. They lost my luggage for 24 hours so I did the training with no make-up, jeans, and flip flops after washing my underwear in the sink and drying them with a hair-dryer. THEN when I got my bag back it was mutilated and all my programs I bought from the Broadway shows I saw had been stolen from the front pocket, along with a songbook I bought and other various paper materials. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr! Therefore, I will keep no pictures to remember the Miami experience.

These are a few of my favorite things...

Babies are my favorite...there are few things I enjoy doing more than holding a 7 hour old new born. SO, when I got the call from Daniel that Carrie had Chloe Ruth Carnley yesterday at 6:10 a.m., I made the spontaneous decision that I was going to call in sick to work and drive the 4 hours to St.George...which then led me to bust open Lisa's bedroom door, wake her up, and say,"Wanna go to St. George today?" It was that easy. We were off! We surprised Carrie and Daniel and just showed up at the hospital. It was a reunion of 3 roommates who have lived together for a total of about 5 years of our lives and now we have a baby! Welcome Chloe!

Spring Holidays

It was really great to have family around for the week of Easter! First, Pam was up from California with Chad checkin' on their new sweet house that has become Kevin's bachelor pad. We played on St. Patrick's Day, hence the green, and went furniture shopping. Leslie, Luke and the famous adorable large baby Aubrey came down from Idaho too. Later my family rolled in from Oregon for Easter. We had a fantastic weekend of sunshine, running, shopping, movie watching, basketball, pool, skiing and even some indoor surfing! Mathew and Derrick are getting to be such big boys and they are so much fun...I'm super proud of them. I always love having my brother and Lisa around. Thank Heaven for family!

Eyeball Identification

Guess who's eyeball is who's!!! Your choices are: Me, My mom, Lisa, Jamie, Derrick, Mathew, Kevin

I surrender...

You know...I am in that unique generation that has pretty much seen all the wild technology advancements in the past 10 years and can actually almost be young and spunky and "with it" enough to keep up on it all...the pager, the internet, email, the cell phone, the text messaging, the myspace, the facebook, and now...the blog. But that doesn't make it any less obnoxious. I mean, my life was just dandy in high school when I had a pager for my parents to let me know I must call home from a pay phone at Disneyland, and when I sent real letters in the mail to my friends and family, and when I played the old school Mario Brothers Nintendo MAYBE once a week. I have mixed emotions about all this communication craziness. I have real problems with Junior High age kids having cells phones and sending text messages all night long to bully and pester other kids or spread the latest gossip or write inappropriate things that are beyond imagination. My high school life was much more enjoyable, in my opinion, because I DIDN'T have to spend time putting stupid comments on my friends myspace pages and have such low self-esteem that I thought about creating a fake identity on the internet for creepos to find. With all that being said, moderation in all things (including technolgy) can enhance our lives in some ways. I mean, I admit I had a GOOD three hours of laughter on the phone with my high school pal, Carrie, searching through myspace a couple years ago and finding a bunch of randoms we almost completely forgot about...fatter bellies, facial hair, spouses, children, crazy jobs, you name it. But, I've fought this blogging thing for a while now because it seems to be a pasttime for married folks, especially who have cute children. AND, by the way, I love looking at these said blogs and reading about the happenings in the lives of friends and loved ones. You know internet technology is taking over when you find out a friend moved to different state by reading their blog (Mandy). However, I've been sufficiently harrassed by enough of these fabulous friends that I will give ya'll a quick blurb about my single life and some pictures every now and then. Plus, Jamie jumped in first so I know there's at least one other unmarried (that may not last long) perfectly normal cool fun person blogging. Right?