Anyone Say Differently?

Hello and welcome to another bout of blogging by your very own, Steven Brown. I know I said there would be at least one more blog post from last semester, but that never made it past an unfinished compilation of jumbled thoughts collecting virtual dust in the “Drafts” archives. I posted it, unfinished, and that's just going to be that. As for those “job woes,” I had a fantastic off-track semester, work-wise. I went back to working for Hand and Ortho as a PRN Technician. Essentially, I was like a mercenary tech. If another technician (AKA aide) needed someone to cover a shift, they could call me. If a team felt like they needed extra help, they could call me in to work with them. I had steady hours at our South Temple clinic, but those accumulated to about 13 hours/week and I needed more work to gear up for another semester. I ended up working more hours than some of the “regulars” did. I even got a little overtime some weeks, which was quite nice. It's nice when you've worked with every therapist in the company except for two. That is a total of twelve therapists, for those who were curious. That's twelve different styles of handwriting (ranging from legible to ancient, forgotten languages), twelve different ways of doing things, almost twelve different names for each and every exercise/activity/procedure/etc, and twelve (divided by four) ways my point has been made. Drowning was not an option. It was still really fun.

Moving on, this semester has had a promising start. What I mean by that is that it's promising to not be the best one ever. Let's see if I can't make it break that little promise, shall we? So far, I have not found any sort of groove for doing school work and that leaves me wandering through the mire of assignments and lessons rather aimlessly; just barely slogging my way through to the next day. That, my faithful readers, is no way to live. The good news is that winding path I've thus forged is providing guidance for what kind of groove to establish. Live and learn, as the adage goes. Still, the most stress-reduced way is to have that groove right away and then maintain the discipline to stick with it. I guess that's not how life is supposed to go, though. We fine-tune ourselves through pushing through the muck and mire that lays before us. Why can't it be a nice meadow or something more often?

I had the recent experience of a long-lasting relationship (who-me? Never!) which terminated after surviving the whole long-distance thing. It was surprising to me that it had lasted the 4 ½ months of being spread over a couple of states considering all previous long-distance relationships went sour after about 2, give or take a couple of weeks. I have felt God's hand throughout the entire process and didn't always follow, I'm sad to say. But, at the beginning of this still fresh semester, I could not ignore what I knew had to happen, so we met somewhere as a pair and left as individuals one stormy night. It didn't make sense to me why it was to last so long being apart only to end the day after seeing each other again, but as I go along, I'm given understanding little by little and only as much as I need to know. I think sometimes we forget just how true Wesley's statement really is.

It's interesting to note, though, that we, like trees, cannot grow strong and sturdy without opposition and pain. Just a little something from the most recent CES Fireside.

On the flip-side of that, life isn't just pain: it's full of wonderful things as well. For instance, my birthday is coming up soon, isn't that something? I don't care who you are, a birthday should be a wonderful thing! Anyway, I'm sure everyone can think of at least 25 things that make life worth living, and then go on with the list. So instead of going on and on about it, I'll just let you all conjure up that list if you so desire. It's a good exercise, anyway. I learned in my statistics class that people who record at least five things they are grateful for every day tend to view their quality of life higher than they would otherwise. It was statistically proven to me...through one study...imagine that.

Anyway, it's time to just post this one, as-is, also. It was supposed to be posted on the 26th of last month...I'm slowly getting into a groove of sorts so I will be able to fit this into my weekly schedule and you will have regular blog posts again. Makes me wonder if people are still reading this nonsense.

End of an Era

 So this was supposed to be finished and posted about 5 months ago...Anyway, it's a new semester, so this is going up as-is. Ta-daa...
...Or so it feels. The semester is over along with every academic thing inside of it. Now I'm footloose and fancy-free until April! Sort of. Now I'm really looking for work, but before we get into that, why not fill y'all in on the goings-on of these last couple of weeks.
First off, this picture is of all the ticketed events that I attended over the last four months. I didn't have anything better to illustrate the end of the semester, so that's what you're getting. Merry Christmas.
With the end of the semester came the end of my two-semester-long class of Human Anatomy and Physiology. I'll be sad to say goodbye to that class; these last two semesters have integrated it into my life so wholly. It will be strange to be taking classes in the Spring Semester and not have Anat. and Phys. What really made the class was the teacher, Bro. Shaw. In my opinion, he is one of the best teachers at the school; certainly one of the best I've had. He really made sure that you understood what was being discussed. He would do everything in his power to help the students out in his classes. It was more work for him, but it was okay because he loves the subject. You could tell, too. Sometimes I think he had too much fun in his classes. Something I really loved were his tests. It was the way he made them: I have laughed in every single one of his tests without exception. They were pretty darn great.
Anyway, I won't know my final grades until tomorrow, but I feel good about this semester-nothing lower than a B, I hope. There's something a lot different about the final weeks of this semester, and I owe it to someone special. Without her, I think I would be needing this guy on a daily basis. Amongst the wide variety of things that eat time and cause stress, I have been a lot more peaceful. It's a fascinating development.
Don't get greedy.
Now for my job woes.

Almost a Month Later...

All right, it's time for a break from homework and all the craziness. A lot has been coming up in the last month or so and this has been the thing to head to the back burner. My apologies to the very few who the delay may have affected.

This year I came away from November with three Thanksgiving dinners under my belt. The video pretty much sums up how I was feeling. The break was really nice-fantastic, even. I did a little bit of homework (thank goodness not a terribly large amount was required of me), but mostly spent time with family and friends, thankful to be able to do so. My last day in Utah involved making apple cider using the golden delicious apples from our tree and my Uncle John's cider press. Before you even start pressing the chopped-up apples, the weight of the apple mash on top press the bottom ones and give you, what Uncle John said, the "cider lees" (Isaiah 25:6). That's the good stuff, the most desirable of the press, and rightfully so! It was really sweet and pure. As a roommate of mine would say, it made me all kinds of happy. We didn't have any other types of apples to mix in with our own (aside from two red delicious...), but it was still a very tasty cider. Unfortunately, the day turned into the next one and it was time to head back to the frozen tundra of Rexburg and back to the grindstone.

I had given my roommate that I actually room with (referred to as a cell mate by another roommate of mine) a ride down and back and as we came to our bedroom, this is what we saw:

This just so happens to be our bedroom door

So we got brave and opened it to discover:

"Christmas came early? Hey, I had something just like this!"

If you look closely at the picture to the right, you'll see that even my Tibetan prayer beads were wrapped. Everything was so neatly packaged up in old copies of the school newspaper, The Scroll, and, as you can see, our floor was covered in them. By my desk, it seemed that the culprits just got tired and dumped the remaining stack. Cleanup was "fun", but we managed to get it all into one garbage bag. I contemplated spreading the cheer abroad or even performing a counter-prank with it (we knew who had done the deed almost the moment we saw our door), but decided to avoid prank wars in these final, hectic weeks and threw it all away.

Now it's back to the usual work, work, work, except more-so now that the semester is coming to a close. The whips are crackin' and the students are groanin'. It's hard to imagine that the piles of work we've been given will actually be gone in just a week and a half. The silver lining to that, I guess, is that it helps us stay focused on school and learn what we need to learn rather than daydream about Christmas Break and not learn a blessed thing these last few weeks. Still, it feels like a very thin lining.

On top of that is a lot of church stuff. People still having to get their tithing settlements done because they missed their regular time, others making the regular appointments, and poor Bishop Jones and I having to get it all scheduled and work it out with him being gone most of this week and having our schedule fiddled with this next Sunday. There's going to be a multi-stake meeting this Sunday in which the entire school will gather in the BYU-Idaho Center (our own mini Conference Center) from 4-6pm where we're going to be let in on the particulars of a massive reorganization of the campus-wide stakes. Because of that, we're only having the first hour of church, sacrament meeting. We'll see what goes down in the multi-stake meeting.

Penultimately, I've started seeing a young lady. Apparently I'm really good at finding someone only to have to either break up with her or enter a long-distance relationship. She and I met last year this semester at a weekly social and hit it off really well. I determined that I would ask her on a date the next time I saw her and just like that, I didn't see her again until this semester. We got to talking here and there and I finally asked her out and our first date was the Friday before Thanksgiving Break. Now here we are and things are going well. I'll keep you updated as we go along.

Finally, just some random things going on around here. One thing is that it's freezing cold up here but there's no snow on the ground. All we have are little ice mounds left over from before Thanksgiving. My roommate and I got egged the other night while walking home from swimming. The egg hit the ground and splattered a little bit on our pants, so it wasn't that bad. It was reported to the local authorities. The next day I was walking around finding eggshell and frozen yolk and whites every here and there. I went laser-tagging for the first time in ages with my elders quorum on Saturday. It was really fun because there were a lot of people-mostly kids having a birthday party. In some instances it was like playing "Whack-a-Mole". They would just keep popping up. The difference was that the "moles" fought back.

Anyway, this is rather long, so I'm ending it here.

Triple Eleven: The Day of Magic

Say hello to the old font which seems easier to read.

Today is a magical day for those who actually care that today's date is made up of a single number (this day would have been more impressive in the year 1111 instead of 2011, but I suppose I'll refrain from raining on too many parades). Weddings, movie releases both in theaters and DVD/Blu-ray, video-game releases, concerts, celebrations, parties, induced labor, pagan rituals, the moon refraining from waning (thus altering its faze-cycle), cats and dogs living together, etc. are events taking place on this day to immortalize the three elevens that make up the date for those who don't include the full year when they write it. I, personally, will be attending a wedding reception and a celebration of the day that will involve good friends, good food, and Martinelli's Sparkling Cider. The other way I'm celebrating the day is by treating it like any other day and attending my classes and doing homework (plus this blog) before the festivities (the first 5 seconds are all you need to watch, it just gets annoying after that).

In reality, though, the day is actually set apart to remember those who have served in our nation's armed forces. It's Veteran's Day and let's not forget it! Remember those who have fought and died for our country and the cause of freedom. Their sacrifice has been great in many instances. We're indebted to them for what they have done for us-honor them.
In the way of my perfectly ordinary life (at least it's ordinary for me), life has been a-okay. Tithing Settlement has come upon the ward. At first it seemed nightmarish, being the one responsible for making sure the Bishop met with every ward member, but having two assistants has been a tremendous blessing. I owe those two guys a lot. We tackled that monster and have come out on top thus far. Keep your fingers crossed that everything goes as smoothly as it has!
Anatomy and Physiology is a crazy blast, as it usually is. We've been going over the respiratory system and are now diving headlong into the digestive system. There's so much to learn about our body, it's crazy. It's even more-so when you think about all the things in the body that we still don't know about, which is still a vast "black box" despite the advances we make. Something interesting about the digestive system: It has more neurons in it than the spinal cord. In fact, it can be a stand-alone system if needs be. That's why when someone is paralyzed from the neck down or something like that, they can still eat and get nutrition.
Anyway, I'm still working on that research paper, so I'd best get on that! I have one week before it's due!

Happy Hallow-...Dia de la...What Day is it?

Oh drat, it's been a while since I last posted. Life has gone a little to the crazy side these last couple of weeks: I've had midterms. It hasn't even been that bad though. The worst of it has been my research paper for my English class. The teacher is making us do it in a specific way that is taking me a really long time; it will be miraculous if I get it finished on time. It might not be so bad if it was my only class, but since my Anatomy and Physiology class and Exercise Physiology class also have homework that I can't slack on, it's killer. It also doesn't help that I found out I had been doing the research wrong from day one and had to start it all over again the other day.  Like I said, it might be a miracle to get it done on time.

At any rate, the picture up top there is an electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG). It happens to be my ECG taken in lab a couple of weeks ago via placing sticky electrodes on my wrists and ankles (I had a bald-patch on my right leg from ripping the electrodes off)-which explains why it's so rough in nature instead of having nice, smooth lines. The machine has a little to do with that as well. For those who aren't familiar with an ECG, prepare yourselves for a little education! It's a measurement of the electrical impulses traveling across your heart. It's the little machine that goes "beep! beep! beep!" It has a baseline (which is not easily seen in mine) and the deviations signify an impulse: an upward wave is typically going "down" the heart and a downward wave is typically going "up" the heart. The waves are given letters: P is the one right before the big wave (atrial contraction), the big wave is called the QRS Complex (essentially ventricular contraction) (Q is the small dip, R is the big spike upward, S is the spike downward), and the T wave is the one right after the QRS Complex (ventricular "re-polarization" to get ready for next contraction). When the heart speeds up, the P and T waves get closer together, or "You get a little P in your T" (Bro. Shaw) as you can see to the far right of the above picture. There is also a way to use the diagram to figure out roughly what angle your heart sits at in your chest, but I'll spare you the details.

 I found a little something the other night. I was heading off the library to deprive myself of a social life and ensure that I maintain a healthy grade in English when I ran across this little kitten. Someone had accidentally dropped a jar of spaghetti sauce on the sidewalk and this little gal came out and started licking up the mess, obviously starving. The guy who dropped the jar, along with his brother, started dumping water to wash the sauce off the sidewalk, which the cat immediately started lapping up as if it was the only wet stuff she had seen all day. She was comfortable around people and had no problem with me coming up to her. Turns out she's a major snuggle-bug. I decided she needs a good home and a warm place to stay for the night, since it has been getting progressively colder, so I was going to keep her in our apartment, but my roommate's allergic to cats. That wouldn't have worked out so well. Fortunately, I found someone who could give her shelter and took her over there. This morning she was taken to the animal shelter and hopefully she'll have a good home soon.
In other news, Fictionist came to town in a celebratory tour of signing on with Atlantic Records. They played at Sammy's and had two warm-up bands, Tighty Willis and Moth and the Flame, which were both pretty good. I enjoyed their performances for the most part. If I had one critique for Tighty Willis, I would say that they could stand a little lyrical work for some songs and for them to either get rid of the saxophone or make the saxophonist actually play it. It seemed more like he was trying to hurt himself with it rather than get music out of it. As for Moth and the Flame, what I heard I liked. It was during their performance that I got a little lesson in how to be blind, but more on that in a little bit. Fictionist was fantastic last night. I thoroughly enjoyed their show before I had to leave for another commitment. I made sure to buy their EP though, and here it is:

I have a friend who is going blind from the peripherals-in. In other words, she has tunnel vision that will get worse until she's totally blind. She went to blind school to learn how to cope with it and be independent. Part of that was being given a special mask that blocks out all sight and learning to use a cane. Her and my roommate (he had just been learning for fun) came to the show and it was during Moth and the Flame that they decided to have me give a whirl. It was fun, I crossed the intersection nearby in all four crosswalks without trouble (even though it was really scary) and I was even able to find my own way back to where the band was playing. Funny story time. So I crossed the first sidewalk and heard someone say "Hello Steve!" It turned out to be a good friend named Charlie, so I reached out my hand toward him and said, "Come to me." Then I heard a different voice saying, "Uh, no thanks." That voice belonged to a complete stranger, one of about five guys, who happened to be walking between Charlie and me at the moment and ended up sidling around my outstretched had.
Anyway, starting last night, winter has begun to set in officially. That's right, Rexburg has been bedded down in the cold sleep of snow and ice. If anyone loves the snow and related sports/activities, this place is a dream come true. I grew up in a place where having a few inches of snow meant school was cancelled. I'm not too keen on anything but sledding, really. Ask some of my friends who have taken me snowboarding. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go hibernate or something.

Brain in Skull: Sure...

Lately, I had been running around on my own while my brain remains snugly secured in my bed. That was mostly due to a cold that was trying to take over my body. To counteract that nasty little bug, I was hopped up on varying cold medicines most of the time; namely NyQuil and Day Relief PE Liquid Gels. Yeeha. That made going to classes and fulfilling my calling an interesting experience. I frequently caught myself starting to lose focus and try to remain vigilant only to lose a few minutes and hope that nothing important was said in that time. Upside to that: that cold didn't get the best of me. Boo-ya.
This next bit of information is brought to you by Anatomy and Physiology II on the cardiovascular system. So as a fetus, your heart starts out as simply two pumping veins that are bigger than you and are superior to(above) your head. You grow faster than your heart, so as you develop, you pass the heart in size and get to a point where the heart is chin level. Meanwhile, the heart is folding in on itself and developing into the four-chambered beauty we know and love. As you continue to grow, you start bending in on yourself and as you do that, your chin pushes your heart into your chest, where it remains for the rest of your life. Is that nuts or what? I love this class.
Anyway, Yellowstone was markedly colder than last time, but still a blast. This time we ventured south to visit Old Faithful and the other geysers. Pictures from our latest adventure are found on Facebook. This time, we drove through a herd of bison. We remained on the road and didn't hit any of them, but they were all around and within arms reach at points-it was a treat!
I am in the midst of homework such as reading reading reading, an analysis paper, and studying for tests; so nothing is really new there. The preparation for the Idaho Falls Christmas Brass Extravaganza of Awesomeness (named it that just now) is going well, though haltingly at the moment. There's not enough time in the day to do everything I want to do, but "c'est la vie," right? Right. That's why it's important to seize each moment you can to have fun, which is where I'm off to right now! Mmm...lunch...

Assisted Dating Yellowstone Blood Alarm

All right, so it's been a whole week since my last post. What is there to tell? Seems like there's a lot, actually.
This picture right here is from last week. The nice early-October, panic-inducing flurries. Rexburg does this every year. There's the harbinger snows and then it goes back to Fall for a little while. We are currently in the Fall phase; otherwise known as the calm before the storm. I'm just hoping for a few more days of good weather because tomorrow I'm planning on a date that involves outdoor activity. Keep your fingers crossed.
This last Sunday held some excitement. I finally got my two assistant executive secretaries set apart and they are ready for action! That brings a nice relief to me. They were a part of roughly twelve people to be set apart that Sunday. Right after Sunday School- as we were just exiting the classroom- the fire alarm went off. The entire Smith building (where our church is held) was evacuated, meaning about 3-4 wards dumped out onto the sidewalks and lawn areas. The alarm was the real deal, so the fire department, police department, even campus security showed up and we were all dismissed for the day. With that announcement, we lost about half the people who still needed to be set apart for their calling in the huge migration off of campus. The rest of us went to another building and borrowed some rooms. Everyone else had to come in on Tuesday to be set apart.
The cause of the alarm, you ask? Well, in the clerks' office, there's a little box right under a smoke detector. There was an arch between wires that sent off just enough smoke to set off the detector and the rest is history. Nothing too exciting; no flames, no billowing smoke, nothing of that nature. Thanks goodness, too. Turns out the Smith is an older building and has no sprinkler system set up in it. Therefore, if there really was a fire, there would be nothing to suppress it and it would crawl easily through the building. That brings to mind something that a lot of less-active members/non-members in the mission would say to my companion and I when we would invite them to church. They would say something to the effect that the building would burst into flames, explode, or demolish in a horrible fashion if they stepped one foot inside the door. Now, if a less-active or non-member had stepped into the Smith this last Sunday, I might have believed them about that kind of spiel.
This last Tuesday we had our weekly campus-wide devotional. This week the speaker was Elaine S. Dalton, the General Young Women's President of the Church. She had a very good talk that she presented. In that talk, she, like so many other general authorities, chastised the guys/tried to light a fire under us about needing to stop just "hanging out" with girls and asking them on dates. I find it interesting how the young women don't catch anything about dating, like how to stop messing with a guy's head/playing lots and lots of "games", making yourself available, etc. Anyway, a part of that let us fellas know that when a girl says "I'm busy", that we should try again and make it more personal. After all, persistence without being overbearing is key in many aspects of life. Overall, the address she gave was great, encouraging us to "Dare to do greatly".
In Anatomy and Physiology II, we've been learning about the blood, that life-giving, life-stealing connective tissue coursing through our veins. I'll try to keep it brief. Basically, I learned how Jaundice occurs and is eliminated, which is related to why human waste is the spectrum of colors that it is, and exactly why the blood type O- is the "universal donor". I also learned about hematocrit (red blood cell percentage) and lipid-profiles (cholesterols, fasting glucose levels, things of that nature) in lab today along with the blood typing. There was equipment for us to do our own blood tests if we wanted to. The only one I was really interested in was my lipid-profile, but you have to fast for 12 hours beforehand and I had failed at that. I already know my blood type and I knew that my hematocrit test would result in a higher-than-normal number. It's all fascinating stuff, per usual, but takes a lot of focus and brain power. Thank goodness I'm out of the days of this...somewhat.
As a closing note, this weekend has some real promise to it. One reason is that there's a bunch of us who are planning on a trip to Yellowstone National Park. That's two times in almost as many weeks. This time we head to the southern portion of the park for attractions like Old Faithful and the like. One of our friends has never been, which inspired this trip, and she's in for a real treat!