fake fortune

i got this in my fortune cookie at the Chinese New Year celebration on Saturday.

uhh... that's not a fortune. that's like printing story problems on Laffy Taffy wrappers.

dumb and numb

English and i just watched one of the dumbest movies ever... A Prairie Home Companion... and we even listen to the radio show - and like it - most weekends (although we've enjoyed it less since Garrison started singing so much). but the movie was so incredibly lame. we couldn't even watch the whole thing. it was insufferable. wahhhhhh! i can't believe how dumb it was.

first sign of spring

crocus in the front yard

'spring keeps her promises... no cold can keep her back. i want you to remember me that way.'
- Natalie Merchant

local art

believe it or not, Sanpete County is a hotbed for artists. since moving here and joining forces with the Snow Art Department and the Central Utah Art Center i've been lucky enough to meet, and in some cases come to know personally some of the best artists in Utah... one of which, in my opinion, is Kathleen Peterson. we used to be acquaintances but now we're good friends and i feel it's a privilege. well, i just finished her website.

Valentimes

at the sixth grade Valentine's dance we had dance cards to ensure that everyone would be dancing and not feeling like a total loser. we signed each other's cards before lunch so at the dance we were prepared. i remember i danced with (in no particular order - i promise):

Jason Watson
Tyler Call
Danny Kofoed
Rob Nelson
Brad Hague
and a couple other boys.

i didn't want to dance with Drew Chisholm but i think i did (oh, what a saint).

then in eleventh grade i went to a Valentine's dance with my three best friends and our dates. we had dinner at Gippetto's Pizza, took a great dance photo, and during the actual dance my date was convinced that someone was shooting rubber bands at his back when it was really me tapping my fingers out of nervousness. after the dance we decorated heart-shaped cakes with frosting and candies. my date and i went with a Van Gogh theme and thought ours to be the best of the batch.

ten years later, i'm still totally in love with this guy and we're making curry and sugar cookies for Valentine's Day. wow! how cool is that?

i love you English!

Wal*Mart greeter guy

it's cool that Wal*Mart had a greeter to say hi and put hot-pink stickers on items you're returning. it's cool because it's a job that the older, less mobile folks in our community can handle. most of the greeters that work at the Ephraim Wal*Mart are pretty mellow, saying 'hi' or 'hello' as an expression of acknowledgement. but there's this one greeter guy...

this guy is average height and weight. he looks like he's about 53 years old and he's got white hair that he parts on the side and combs back. his face is kind of square-shaped and his mouth is always poised. he's got a pretty intense look. not creepy intense but conviction intense. and the look is emphasized because he wears glasses - the kind that a lot of average men wear that aren't square but aren't circle either - the kind that look very practical and sort of industrial. anyway, of course he wears his royal blue Wal*Mart vest and usually grey slacks (a cotton-poly blend would be my guess).

he's very attentive. he greets with vigor. usually it's 'welcome to Wal*Mart!' and every now and then he throws something else in with it ('welcome back to school' in the fall, 'welcome to where it's warmer' just the other day, and so forth and so on). and he always makes eye contact.

sometimes he's the greeter as you leave... so i guess that would make him the good-byer? in any case when he's doing that job he says, 'thanks for shopping Wal*Mart.' but it's kind of all run together and in a Sanpeter accent - more like, 'thankfershoppinwohlmar.' and of course, eye contact.

i've made it a sort of game to try to sneak by him to avoid and contact - especially when he's good-bying because the 'thankfershoppinwohlmar' makes me laugh... and cringe at the same time. i want him to re-lax and just say 'thanks' or even a nod will do. i mean, i go to Wal*Mart pretty often since it's really the only place to buy things here in Ephraim so 'thankfershoppinwohlmar' is starting to bug me. i know i should just let it be but man! it's so annoying.

'thankfershoppinwohlmar.'

'thankfershoppinwohlmar.'

'thankfershoppinwohlmar.'

find a penny, pick it up

i'm a firm believer in picking up 'lucky pennies' as my mom calls them. i'm not superstitious either - i'll pick up a penny no matter which side is facing up (someone once told me that if it's tails up, it's bad luck... whatever).

well these days picking up pennies just ain't happening, which bums me out because i get quite a bit of enjoyment from it. but picking anything up off the floor is rather uncomfy so i avoid it when i can. the thing is, now that i've entered this stage of pregnancy when my belly is quite the bulging mass i drop things much more often - like i've lost my coordination as a side effect to growing another person. is this some kind of joke? ha ha! laugh at the pregnant lady who dropped her Gandolfo's stamp card and has to get down on one knee to pick it up. hee hee! look how she keeps dropping the slides she's scanning in the teacher's computer lab and has to crawl under the desk to get them. wa ha ha! did you see how she glared at the fork she just dropped for the second time? what a hoot!

yeah, yeah. hilarious.