Kicked Off the Train...

Did I really get kicked off the train? Yes, but not in the way you are thinking. About 1,000 people were booted off trains last night at 900 South where we had to wait for another train to haul us to Sandy.

There is never a dull moment when it comes to riding TRAX each day. As mentioned in previous blogs, I usually can always find something to blog about. Last night is no exception. The day actually started off rough when UTA had some kind of problem with the TRAX line around 2100 South. Because of that, all the trains had to share the southbound line, which was cause for delays. I knew this before getting on the train, but still decided to brave the situation. I made it to work only 30 minutes late.

The commute home was a different story. All went well until we got to 900 South. Here the train driver made an announcement that we all had to exit the train because she wasn't going any farther south. Another train would be coming to pick us up and take us on to Sandy. So, we disembarked and we waited. Another train came, everyone piled off and we waited. Another train came, those people piled off and we waited.

And we waited, and waited, and waited.

Did I mention that we waited?

After about 35 minutes of waiting the transit police showed up. Either they were worried the 1,000 unruly people on the platform might start a riot, or they just wanted to look cool by yelling at all of us to "stand behind the yellow line!!" I'm not sure why they showed up, but they weren't much help. At one point a cop yelled:

"You! Get off the track and get behind the yellow line! You! I am talking to you!"

Who? We all looked aimlessly around as he hollered, not exactly sure which of hundreds of people standing there, he was referring to. Then we heard one very disgruntled gentleman yell:

"If you'd get us a train, we'd get off the track!"

Police Officer: "A train is coming."

Another gentleman: "It better get here fast because my pass is going to expire in about four days!"

(Loads of laughter ensues, police officer walks away).

For the most part, everyone kept their cool, but we were all clearly frustrated with the situation. A UTA guy kept driving by in his truck yelling "We are doing the best we can". Really? Hundreds of people were stranded on a UTA platform with NO idea of when a train was going to come pick us up. There weren't even shuttles to haul us to different stations. Everywhere I looked people were on their phones calling for rides. Some were walking down the street to find the nearest bus station, and others were jumping into Taxi's that pulled up to the station.

After standing there for 45 minutes to an hour in the cold night air, a train finally arrived. All of us weren't able to squeeze onto that train, but we tried our best. And when the train started to move we all burst into applause and shouts of "Hurrah!" We were going to make it home after all.

Welcome Kaylee!

Today marks an important milestone. I am an Aunt again...for the 17th time! But really, this day is not about me.

My brother and his wife welcomed their 4th child into the world today. A little girl, weighing in at 7 lbs 5 oz. And she is 19" long. Her name is Kaylee Anne.


Kaylee Anne:



Kaylee with two of her three brothers:

Which Foreign Guy Should I Date?

Well, considering that my dream vacation is to go to the Australian Outback, that I love horses and everything that is remotely western and rugged, and that I currently have a crush on Myles Pollard and Brett Tucker...this was the absolutely perfect result to this quiz!

You Should Date An Australian!

You're a down to earth, outdoorsy kind of girl And you need a guy who can keep up with your adventures A rugged Austrailian guy is just your style Better start learning how to surf!

Which Foreign Guy Should You Date?


I am not sure I'm that outdoorsy or adventurous...but I will take the Australian for sure!! And for those of you who are dying to know who Myles Pollard and Brett Tucker are, here you go:

Myles Pollard:











Brett Tucker:











I'm not sure if it's the rugged looks, the cowboy hats, the aussie accents or a combination of all three that make me swoon, but all I know is that they are Hot, Hot, Hot!!

For the Good of the Party...

So I just heard that Mitt Romney endorsed John McCain. My initial reaction was "What? You've got to be joking!" But the more I've thought it over in the last 10 minutes, the more I'm beginning to see something interesting...

I still don't like John McCain. I have no interest in voting for him. And I never understood why Romney was so quick to drop out of this race. I never understood...until today.

I don't think this is going to be the end for Mitt Romney. I can't say for sure, but I get the feeling that Mitt is trying to set the stage for something. Something, should we say, like the Vice Presidency?

I don't know that it would ever happen, but he just seems to be timing everything so perfectly. And though he says it's for the good of the party, I can't help but feel that he has his own political aspirations in mind. And can we really believe that he and John McCain are all of a sudden best buds? Something just seems fishy...

But hey! It's okay by me. Having Romney as the VP would most decidedly give my vote to McCain. I guess we'll see what happens come September.

Trash Collector...

Last night on my commute home, I sat down on the train next to a lady who was reading the Salt Lake Tribune. She read it the entire way, but I noticed that after she would finish one section of the paper, she would fold it up and then shove it down next to her between the seat and the window. As soon as she finished the entire paper and it was all neatly shoved away, she put on her gloves and got her keys out of her purse.

Now, I had a hunch that she wasn't going to be taking that paper with her and in my mind I was trying to form how the conversation was going to go when she stood up to leave and I kindly mentioned that she forgot her paper. I had hoped that she would take the paper when she left so I wouldn't have to say anything. But when we got to her stop, she stood and walked away, leaving the paper behind.

And I didn't say anything.

It seems we always hear these stories in the news where someone said something to someone else and they ended up getting punched or stabbed or shot. The lady looked kind enough that I don't think she would have killed me...but at the same time, I didn't want to cause a scene. So, I let her walk away.

For the next three stops I sat next to that paper, irritated over the fact that people can be so irresponsible and so disrespectful that they leave their trash lying around for others to pick up. Aren't people taught to pick up after themselves anymore? Well, it's clear that most of today's youth don't, but this lady was much older than me...I'd assumed she'd have a little more class than that.

I got to my stop and I stood up to leave, but before walking away I took one last look at that paper. Then I leaned over and picked it up.

Commuting Nightmare...

Do you remember my post from a week or so ago where my roommates and I had to dig ourselves out of our driveway because we got about a foot of snow and the drifts were 3 feet high? Do you remember the question I asked at the end of that post? If not, let me refresh your memory.

"Why does this never happen on a work day?"

Yes, that is what I asked and today I got my answer. This DOES happen on work days and the reason why we usually hope it doesn't is because it's an absolute nightmare getting anywhere!

Take last night and this morning for instance. Yesterday it started to snow around 2:00pm. The wind was blowing pretty hard, but it didn't look that bad. I jumped on the train and headed home at the usual hour. I arrived to my car at the usual hour. But I did NOT arrive home at the usual hour. I arrived home an hour late. It took me almost 1 1/2 hours to drive 7 miles. I went 20 mph the entire way. The roads were covered in snow and traffic was completely backed up. But, I never lost my cool. I always say it is better to be extremely cautious than to end up dead in a ditch. And I figured that they'd have everything all cleared for the morning commute.

Boy, did I figure wrong.

Do you remember in my last post how I posted a picture of my roommate's car nearly covered by snow drifts? If not, let me just refresh your memory:


Well, that's what my car looked like when I woke up this morning. Did you ever think I would get out? Not me. I was outside at 6:15am shoveling and digging, shoveling and digging. Finally around 7:00am, I jumped in my car and slowly made my way to the train station. I drove those same 7 miles in about 40 minutes today, which was definitely better than last night. I got to the train station at 7:40 and a train finally showed up around 7:55am. Obviously, that's the time I am supposed to be to work. But the trains all seemed to be malfunctioning for some reason and so I didn't get to my stop until 8:55.

Oh, but at least I made it by 9am, right? WRONG! That would be too easy. I still had to catch a shuttle to my building. I waited for 10 minutes in the blowing snow, by this time looking like a wet mutt, and when the shuttle never showed, I just decided to walk. Normally the walk is about 10-15 minutes. But today, see, none of the sidewalks were shoveled and the walk is entirely uphill. So in my attempt to not slide back down the hill or go crashing to the ground, it took an extra 10 minutes to make the trek.

But never fear! I made it to work. I walked in the door with my nose running, eyes watering, chest burning, hair wet and ragged, face bright red and pants completely soaked up to my knees, at 9:30am.

It's days like this I am so glad I can shut the door to my office so nobody has to see me. And never again will I hope this happens on a work day.

Happy Valentine's Day!

This picture fits the occassion perfectly! At least for me. The reason is because I love tigers. They are my absolute favorite animal. They are fierce, yet graceful. But this post isn't really about tigers.

I had a boyfriend once who gave me a stuffed tiger simply because he knew how much I loved them. It's been 9 years now since I dated him but I still have that tiger. Even after I set it on top of a lamp and it caught fire (the poor tiger's bum is now completely roasted), I just haven't been able to part with it. Not because of who gave it to me, but because it represents not only my love of tigers, but someone else's love for me. He gave me something that I love. It wasn't jewelry or anything else fancy and expensive...but he knew I'm a much too practical person for such frivolous stuff like that anyway. This simple gift showed me that he truly knew me and understood me and that meant more than anything.

Which leads me to the point of this post. Valentine's Day. This is a day I used to despise for two reasons. The first was (and still is) because I thought it was stupid that there was one day out of the year that was set aside for people to spend money on someone and tell them they love them. In my opinion, that should happen everyday. But I think the main reason that I despised Valentine's Day was because I never had a Valentine. All my relationships either happened before or after Valentine's Day, so each time that day rolled around, I was still completely alone. And as all of us single people know, it's hard to be alone on a day where everyone around you is being showered with love.

But over the last few years, my opinion on this matter has changed. I haved learned that we don't need to have one special Valentine (though it would be nice). When I was up at Utah State, I had several very good friends, most of which were guys. One particular Valentine's day, I was working and I had gone to get some lunch. When I returned, I saw a single red rose sitting in a vase on my desk. Attached to this rose was a sticky note that said

"Happy Valentine's Day Camille!
Love, your Latin Lover".

I knew exactly who that rose had come from: just a dear, sweet friend (who, ironically enough, is not even Latino). It was nothing romantic but it still brought a smile to my face to know that he cared about me. Later that night, I had a TV night with another good friend (also nothing romantic). When he showed up at my house, he carried in his hand a massive heart shaped balloon that said "Happy Valentine's Day!" on it. When I asked him what it was for, he said he just wanted me to get a Valentine. Something so simple, yet it meant so much.

Since leaving USU, I haven't had those kind of Valentine's days. These guys are now married with families of their own. But it's because of them that my view of Valentine's day has forever changed. The day isn't necessarily about having one person to love who loves you back. It is about expressing your love to others in ways that will be meaningful to them. And it doesn't only have to be on Valentine's day!

So now instead of feeling sorry for myself over the fact that I don't have a Valentine, I have learned to enjoy the day for what it is: a reminder that there are important people in my life who I care about, and who care about me in return.

So to all of you out there who are reading this, I want you to know that you are MY important people. Thank you for being my friends and for taking the time to love me. You are the greatest people in the world and you will always be my Valentines!

Denver...

I just came across these photos from my trip to Denver last spring. My friend photoshopped these first two pictures just for laughs. Here we are on the boardwalk:

I know, I know. There's no boardwalk (or ocean) in Denver. That's why she created another one of us in front of the Molly Brown house:

One of my favorite things about this trip was the crazy costumes we put on or the funny pictures we took.

Me as Annie Oakley:

I have always had a fascination with horses and the wild west. This part of the trip was definitely the highlight for me, and I had way too much fun! If you don't believe me, just ask those who were there.

Me as a cowgirl:

Me roping a cow...on a legless horse!

Our entire gang, posing with the legless horse:

After that adventure we went to the Molly Brown house and tried on hats. I could not get this pose down! My friend kept saying "Look right through me". This is the best I could do, but it is very clear I will never be a very good model.

I always save the best for last. I told my friend I didn't want my picture taken with a pornographic sphinx. So, she promised to "censor" the photo for me. Does that really make it any better? Probably not, but it sure is funny!

There you have it friends... This trip was so much fun! We originally went to Denver to see "Wicked" -- which was great. But unfortunately, we have no pictures of that to post.

I'm not sure any trips are planned for this year, but I am making a list of places I want to go. So hopefully we can do this again real soon!

Name that Tune...

"You know this song, sing along!"

"EEEEEE!"

Mitt Quit!?!?!

I had heard Mitt was going to "make an announcement", but I refused to believe it until I heard it from him. So I just sat through his CPAC speech with my stomach in knots hoping and praying that those words would not come out of his mouth.

I kept saying "Please don't say it. Please don't say it" until finally, I heard this:

If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention, I would forestall the launch of a national campaign and make it more likely that Senator Clinton or (Barack) Obama would win. And in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign, be a part of aiding a surrender to terror. This is not an easy decision for me. I hate to lose. My family, my friends and our supporters ... many of you right here in this room ... have given a great deal to get me where I have a shot at becoming president. If this were only about me, I would go on. But I entered this race because I love America, and because I love America, I feel I must now stand aside, for our party and for our country.

After those words came out of his mouth, my mind was abuzz with questions. How could he do this? Why won't he keep fighting? Doesn't he know he's the only person who can fix this country? I had to get control of my thoughts so I could figure out how I really felt.

Disappointed. Discouraged. Scared. Unsure. Angry?

No. One thing I was sure of was that I wasn't angry. Mitt had to have felt completely right about this decision in order to make it. Not that it was easy for him. But he had to know he was doing the right thing. And he did it with such grace and dignity. How could anyone be angry about that?

One thing I believe in, is that everything happens for a reason and we have to trust the timing of the events in our lives. Obviously Mitt's time to lead this country is not now. But that doesn't mean it won't happen. Who knows what could happen four years from now.

This leaves me with a dilemma though. Who to vote for. I don't like John McCain. I feel like he is a wolf in sheeps clothing. I don't see eye to eye with him on practically anything. And on top of that, I can't stand watching him speak. His voice and his mannerisms drive me crazy. His little boyish grin gets under my skin because I always feel like somewhere underneath that grin is a smirk that says "I can't believe they fell for it". I just don't trust him.

So what to do? I already know I won't vote for Hillary which means it looks like my choice is most likely going to be McCain or Obama. Either way, I'll basically be voting for a democrat. Now instead of getting to choose the best person for the job, I get to choose the lesser of the two evils.

Bothered. That's how I feel. I'm bothered that now I have to pick a new candidate when I already had the best one picked out! But it's not the end of the world. Life will go on, as will this election. I just have to figure out what I'm going to do now.

Perhaps I will start a "Write in Mitt" campaign. If I write in Mitt then at least I can feel good about voting.

My Celebrity Look alikes...

I found this site through a friends blog and thought it was cool. I'm not sure I really look like any of these celebrities so I will let you be the judge of that.



And if you want to see me morph into Tiffani Thiessen, watch this!

%1

Delegates Schmelegates...

Okay, so Romney didn't do as well I would have hoped last night, but I am glad to hear that he is sticking with it. I still think he has a chance to win a few more states and then can hopefully even out the delegate count.

But it is that delegate count that I just don't understand. I thought I did, until this morning. I get the fact that some states are win-all and other states are split. That's easy enough. But every news station is reporting a different number of delegates for each candidate. I looked up seven different news stations online today and wrote down the number of delegates they have listed for each candidate. This is what I found out:

KSL
McCain - 613
Romney - 269
Huckabee - 190

CNN
McCain - 559
Romney - 265
Huckabee - 169

FOX NEWS
McCain - 613
Romney - 269
Huckabee - 190

MSNBC
McCain - 516
Romney - 207
Huckabee - 142

KUTV
McCain - 557
Romney - 266
Huckabee - 190

CBS News
McCain - 677
Romney - 152
Huckabee - 159

ABC News
McCain - 561
Romney - 222
Huckabee - 172

I didn't have time to look up any more. But of all of these, only two are the same: KSL and FOX News. Shouldn't the same number be reported by each station? McCain has a range from 516 - 677. That's a HUGE difference! Romney has a range from 152 - 269. And then I'm reading news stories that say Huckabee is ahead of Romney in the delegate count, but that is only true according to CBS News' results.

How is the American public supposed to really know what's going on if not one news station can report anything accurately? If they don't know how many delegates anyone has, then they shouldn't be saying whether or not someone is out of the race.

I want to know where I can get official results. This is just ridiculous!

UPDATE:

MSN.com
McCain - 719
Romney - 256
Huck - 194

Where did they get 719? That's not even close to any of the others! I have got to stop reading the news. It's clear they don't have a clue.

Off to Vote...

Well, technically I haven't voted yet, but I am headed there right now. It's no secret who I am voting for, but regardless of my choice, I hope you all made the effort to go vote as well!

Cheerio!

From the Comment Boards...

On hearing that Huckabee won West Virginia because McCain (or his campaign) told their supporters to vote for Huckabee in order to stop Romney from winning:

Well, this is West Virginia…a place where family trees don't branch out.

A New Era...

The new First Presidency was just announced less than 30 minutes ago! It was no surprise that President Monson was called as the new President, or that President Eyring was called as the 1st Counselor. I wasn't expecting President Uchtdorf to be called as 2nd counselor, but I wasn't really surprised by that announcement either. President Uchtdorf can really help with spreading this Gospel far and wide. Possibly to places it's never been before. This is going to be such an exciting change for the Church. I am really looking forward to having these three great men as our new leaders.

My favorite quote from the news conference came from President Monson upon answering a final question from the media. The reporter basically asked President Monson what their first item of "urgent" business would be once they leave the news conference. Personally, I thought Pres. Monson should have said "lunch", but instead he said a few words before finishing with:

"You can rest assured we'll be giving due attention to the present and the future... but not forgetting the past. For the past is prelude to the future".

When President Eyring was asked to put an exclamation on that statement, he replied "I thought that was the exclamation point right there!".

Oh, this is going to be great!

Getting Down to Business...

My roommates and I woke up this morning to a winter wonderland.

The thing that caught our eye was the snow drifts! Check out this snow drift behind my roommates car!

It all looked pretty cool at first, but it slowly started looking more like a nightmare once we realized we had to go to church. With 2-3 foot snow drifts and no HOA snowplows in sight we knew we were in trouble. Lori called a counselor in our Bishopric to see if church would be cancelled and he said "I don't understand. Why would it be cancelled? She said "We have a foot of snow out here and we can't get out of our driveway!". He said "Well, it's not even precipitating in Holladay!" Is that supposed to make us feel better?

Needless to say, church wasn't cancelled so we decided to get down to business! We all bundled up in our winter clothes and took to the snow. We did run into a slight problem though: we only had one shovel. So while one roommate used the shovel, the other roommate and I grabbed the next best thing: dust pans!

The dust pans may not have been very good for shoveling, but they did a great job scraping snow off the cars (which was my job).

After about an hour, we realized we weren't getting very far so we decided to call in reinforcements: the hometeachers. This is what hometeachers are for, right? We called one who was more than willing to come, and he even brought his brother.

So between five people, three shovels and two dust pans, we were done in about another hour. That's two hours total. It wouldn't have taken that long, but the guys went the extra mile and shoveled our neighbors drive as well, while we three girls shoveled the road (I mean, what's the point of clearing the driveway just to get stuck in the street?)!

The overall snow total at my house was 11-12". If any of us can walk tomorrow it will be a miracle. But just the same, it was a grand adventure. I love the snow!

Why does this never happen on a work day?