March Madness

For those of you who know me, know I love this time of year. It is full of great things: spring skiing, my birthday, and most importantly the college basketball tournament. It also includes things like camping and hiking. I had planned with my friends to go camping in Goblin Valley.

For the last couple of weeks, the weather has been wonderful. It has tempted me, and made me want to skip class and go explore the great outdoors that Utah has to offer. It was weird though, I didn't go. I think its called being mature, I don't know, whatever, I am kind of bitter about it. The day before we were going to leave for Goblin Valley, we checked the weather and there was a flood warning for that part of the state. I was just...bummed. The one time I didn't want it to rain/snow and it did, after having 2 weeks of beautiful weather. We ended up going to Talyn's parents house and just "kickin' it". We watched a couple of movies, went to one of their friends house (major shootout to that family) and cooked food on their fire pit, and swam at their house. It was awesome to just be lazy. I have to give a big thank you to Camp family for supporting our weekend getaway. The food was great and the times were better.

Birfday Magic

For those of you who don't know, I am in another competition that I am determined to win, but probably won't. It's with Talyn, my girlfriend, and the game is this: whoever doesn't post every week has to take the other to get sweet potato fries. She may make claims that the winner gets taken to Texas Roadhouse, but it isn't true. Anyways, on to more important things. Since my last post, I

played snow football,

had a delicious bbq, and....

had my birthday!

I had my 22nd birthday and I was hoping to have a quiet evening with my friends and girlfriend; however, my plan was foiled, but in a good way. Talyn (shown above) got a hold of all of my closest friends and coordinated with her sister to throw a party for me at her sister's house. It was totally unexpected.

 Talyn is a really good liar (is that good?) and threw me off by saying we would celebrate my birthday on the 5th (the actual day). Instead, the party happened on the friday before. There were awesome treats there and the cake itself made the party. We finished the party by playing a dance game on the xbox kinect and called it a night. Thanks again to Kierra and Deveren for hosting the party. I had a couple of tests this last week and I escaped their wrath pretty well, beating the average handsomely on both. I also got to go snowboarding twice since the last post. On one of the days, there was a foot of new powder and it was awesome. The last time I went boarding, I took a nasty spill and landed right on my head. I didn't have a concussion (thank goodness for helmet that has speaker and a subwoofer in it), but I had some pretty nasty whiplash in my neck. Thanks again for the Harlan family for letting me stay with them in Park City and how awesome they are.

Top of Angel's Landing

Hiking to the top in the ice and snow

At Chichen Itza

The top of McConkey's

Well it has been awhile since my last posting but I think since I have no life (school is my life aka I have no life) its time to tell others about how awesome it is. I started back up at BYU this semester after a wonderful trip to Cancun, Mexico. Seriously, it was a great trip. Think about it, I literally walked around downtown Playa del Carmen with no shirt or shoes on and everyone still let me buy stuff. Honestly, the U.S. "hygiene standards" are a little inflated. Here at BYU I have a number of adventures so far but the highlights without a doubt are studying at the library, listening to a lot of audio books, and my personal favorite, studying at my apartment . I warned you, no life. However, in an effort to see the light of day, I have done the following: snowboarding around 15 times, gone on several dates with my girlfriend, and went camping and hiking in Zion's National Park. In all seriousness, the last three have definitely been the best times. In Zion's, we hiked Angel's Landing and honestly it was one of the scariest things I have ever done. I am sure in the summer time to hike up that ridge it is difficult because of that fatsos that take forever to walk up the trial causing a bottle neck for everyone else, but I did it for the first time when there was snow and ice covering said trail. The coolest thing is coming down because we got to slide down an ice patch and hope we didn't go too far and end up at the bottom of the canyon.  It also helped the fun factor of snowboarding to have your parents fly up and go with you. Always a plus. Despite all these great and wonderful things, I am torn. I want it to warm up so that I can go camping and fly fishing and not freeze my butt off, but I also want it to stay cold and snow more so that I can enjoy spring skiing. The difficulties I face being a 21 year old are immense.

Seattle/Alaskan cruise

We started our trip to Seattle by leaving from the airport and actually leaving on time and not having any traffic, a first for our family I believe. We went through security and their were no problems and in fact I got the whole row to myself on the plane. What a treat! Dad ended up sharing it with me but I had takeoff all to myself. We landed in Seattle around 11:15 pm local time. I love Seattle, well at least the downtown area that I saw. It was fairly sunny all 4 days we were there and to boot the temperature was perfect. The first night we just went back to the hotel and went straight to bed. We checked into the Maxwell Hotel, aka the pineapple express. It was a very nice hotel, but some of its accents were a little too much. We woke up the next morning and went to "the 5 spot" for breakfast and decided to order sandwiches to take with us for hike that we had planned. We then drove out to Snowqualmie about an hour away from Seattle and we took a little day hike. It was very beautiful and there was a lot of snow. The snow was all hard by that point but still up to my knees in some parts. There is a stream that runs along side the trail and the whole time there are rapids. It really was very picturesque. There were a few people but not a disturbing amount that ruined the experience. I enjoyed it very much and we even had to make a bridge to cross one of the steams. I was a little skeptical at first that we were going to be able to cross it because it was moving so fast, but we made it work. We were warned by a guide that we shouldn't continue, and in fact he thought we didn’t know where the trail was. We ended up going to a little waterfall but we had to turn around. We ate our sandwiches at the lake coming back and then made it back to the cars by 7 pm. We made it back to Seattle and we were very hungry but nothing was open, even in downtown Seattle. We tried to stop by 5 spot to see if it was open and sure enough it was. We ate at the same place 3 times in one day! A record I think. Then the next day we met the Facer family at the Pacific Science Center and enjoyed the day, but as science museums usually, quite lame. We did a ton of stuff over the next two days including: a boat ride around the bay, an imax movie, visit the space needle twice, play wiffle ball in front of the space needle, and the aquarium. It was fun to do all these things, but I learned that where we go doesn't really matter, but rather who we do things with. We can do many things see movies, watch games, play games, but really what stays is the memory of what you did or do with someone.

We boarded the cruise ship the day after we picked up Lauren, Aaron and Larry. It is an interesting experienceto be on a cruise. I guess Larry has been looking forward to this cruise for a long time. I am rooming with him and I get to see how he lives. He is an "old man". He has a laser focus on the task at hand and he doesn't like to change plans for anything. He is nice to have around, and it is great to see how much he loves the cruise experience. I tip my hat to him for wanting to do all these adventures at his age. We went to Sock hop night and Ron was picked for an Elvis dance competition. He won a bottle of champagne and I think bragging rights for years to come. The video is posted at the bottom. I have a mixed opinion of the cruise ship experience. I like not having to worry about traveling but it is really tacky and quite frankly I think it is destroying the environment and the grandeur of this area. Huge ships filled with fatter people don't belong in the treacherous wilderness of Alaska. I am not a huge fan and quite frankly I feel like we burden these people, mountains and waterways. However, I am not complaining at how close I feel with the great outdoors and the great time I am having with my family outside of the "boat". Out first excursion was a "fly" fishing trip. A plane with pontoons picked us up and flew us to a remote location about 30 minutes away where we hiked for a little bit and then we loved every minute we had in that stream. I learned a lot more on how to cast and now feel more comfortable. In fact I caught the biggest fish but it was totally by accident. He was about to show me how to cast better and a huge rainbow was on my line. We then kayaked in the Auke bay in Juneau, Alaska. I was paired with Larry so I had to do a lot of paddling. It wasn't too bad but I had a ton of fun. We also went "whale watching" and saw a pod of them as well as 2 orcas. When we pushed off to go kayaking we saw a sea lion who followed us for a little bit and man was it cool. The next day we took a hike in Skagway after we took a historic train. We hiked to a certain location so we could see a glacier. It was an easy hike and we caught a break because the clouds opened up right for us to be able to see the glacier. It was a great sight and right as we were leaving, the clouds covered the glacier and stopped anyone else from being able to enjoy the spectacular view.

College

The last couple of weeks have been a rush. I landed in Utah on June 19th, which was a thursday. Unfortunately, Liberty Square apartments suck at communication , and well I would say everything. I couldn't move in till Monday, unless you paid $30 to move in on Saturday. So I moved in Saturday in one hour, which apparently is a record. Living the college life is what I have wanted for years. Suck it Scena, and I know you love Katy. Hot Pockets are becoming my best friend. For July 4th weekend, I went to my Grandpa's cabin in Idaho. I took my two roomates, and drove 5 hours up there. We stayed in the cabin, and he cooked for us. It was good to have a free home cooked meal. We had a party on Friday, and of course we won annual golf tournament. Well it was because we had Larry Crabtree. I helped with fire works again. On the grand finale, we had a misfire and it shot down at the dock a bunch of times. It felt like we were at war. On Saturday, we headed over to Yellowstone, and I showed my roomates Old Faithful and the greatness that is Ernie's sandwiches. We left around 3 PM so we could get back at around 9 PM. I had to get gas and for some reason I couldn't. Everytime I tried to pump the gas, it shot out. I went to 2 gas stations and the same thing happened. Some guys started looking at the car and jiggled some stuff around. I was just going to test it once, and it worked. I don't know what it was, but Koreans can sure make a car. We arrived, and now I am watching Rush Hour 2. I would say a great weekend.

The Countdown Begins

Since it has been two weeks since my last posting, I have done a couple more things then normal. I went to my final Astros game before I go to college. It was against the Brewers, and I finally saw Oswalt pitch. I had never seen that so it was awesome for him to actually have a great game. It was a church activity, so we were upper deck and had 19 people with us. It was last mutual activity ever. We won (finally), but I was glad I was able to see it with friends and especially my dad. Which leads into father's day, but that is not in order.
On Wednesday, we weren't seeing patients so I went with my good friend to Schlitterbahn. It was great to ride Master Blaster, Dragon Blaster, and the surge river at Blastenhoff. I figured a way to get all the way near where the wave is made. I got smashed everywhere, but it was totally worth it.
I was given the Melchizedek priesthood on June 14th. It felt good for my entire Houston family to be there, but also to have my friend to be ordained right before me, and then give it to me. I was also proud to have my dad give to me. After we went shooting at the local gun range, swimming at home, and had awesome ribs, chicken, and a plethora of sides.
Last was father's day. It was great to be here for my dad. We put his present in a tree and gave him directions to find it. It was a GPS that would be giving him directions from now on. I think that he really liked it, and now he won't have to ask for directions. My dad is everything that I want to be. Patient, never angry, and funny to name a few. We cooked dinner and baked cookies. I kinda burned my cookies though. Until next time, DONE!

Graduation

I started off the week right on Memorial day. My cousin was in town, so we hung out and relaxed all day. It was nice to not have to do anything and not be nagged. We just kinda did our own thing. I loved it and wished we had only 4 day work weeks every week. It was really nice to see my cousin, and visit with her since I don't get to see her often.
Graduation was on May 31. I have finally made it. It was great experience to see how stupid everyone looked with a cap and gown on. I have a video of me walking through a doorway with a cap on; it is some good stuff. Everyone said they could spot me right away, because of my towering height. One of the students had to read some kindof statement, and he sounded like such an idiot. Everyone started laughing even the officers on stage. I got called up and then sat back down. The kid sitting next to me had a beach ball and I helped fill it up and we threw and everyone started passing it around. It was cool because nobody hassled us because they had no power over us.
Project grad was until 6 in the morning the next day. We met at the school went to Funplex and just had fun. Paintball, bowling, cards, and a bunch of free food. Almost everyone won prizes and my friend even won $500 on Southwest Airlines. All I got was a flash drive, but still cool. It was probably the last time I would see alot of my friends. Now I can be into Nostalgia.