I will be a genius

I haven't been on here for a while. The break was very nice and relaxing. Hardly any technology was involved.

I'm doing some pretty awesome research and I'm finishing it up in the next few weeks. I'm hoping to get it published online at some point.

https://byu.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_51I8UUaNaZ4arxG

I'm a penny pincher, you can be one too part 1

I sometimes tend to be tight-fisted, a miser, stingy, cheapskate, moneygrubber but I can also be thrifty, prudent and frugal.

I mean there's nothing wrong with buying expired food and eating it, right? I can walk out of the grocery store with my shopping cart full of food and I don't spend more than $30.

How do I do this? I shop as this little known dive in Salt Lake City that gets expired food or cancelled food shipments and then they sell their stuff for super cheap.

We'll get blocks of cheese for a dollar. Cookies for a dollar. Candy for a dollar. Sometimes we'll get these things for even cheaper. And don't think they only sell the cheap stuff. Most of the food they sell is top of the line.

There are some guidelines though, I don't buy any sketchy stuff. I have some dignity: No produce, no dairy except cheese, no meat. I mostly buy bottled juice, canned goods, packaged goods and frozen goods.

The place is disgusting. People push and shove to get food. And like I said, sometimes their some sketchy stuff there.

I like to take a couple weeks break before going back so I can rid myself of feeling like utter filth, but the deals are great and the food tastes great too--most of the time. We've been going there for months and no food poisoning yet.

The Sara(h)'s in my life Part 1

I remember looking at her upside down, when she was less than a year old. She looked like an alien, I still wonder if she is.

From diapers to ten-year-old, my youngest sister--of the ten of us--is not an alien but she's a sleeper.

While potty training she would fall asleep on the little toilet with her head resting on the adult toilet. One time she fell asleep on the floor, in front of the door and another time on the dresser.

Sara, the bedhead. My first semester back from college, I remember sitting on the couch at 11 a.m. and Sara walks out of her room, barely awake, goes to the bathroom, comes out of the bathroom, looks at me and with that Sara voice says, "WHAT?"

I love Sara for her wittiness. There hasn't been a time when I talked on the phone with her that I wasn't blown away by her intelligence; from math to telling me jokes for a half hour.

Gotta love that kid.

The Sara (Sarah)'s in my life, part 2

Soup. She offered to help me drag my suitcases in after I had lugged them through six inches of snow, after I had spent twelve hours travelling.

I readily said "yes."

I didn't know that the soup and bread would soon turn into a beautiful friendship. We had spent the semester before as FHE siblings but never became close. And then, suddenly, we were sharing a room and eating soup.

And moments after we finished the soup, she was dancing to gypsy punk rock music and singing for me--Start Wearing Purple. Some of my favorite songs came from this grand woman: Rabbit Heart, Skinny Love, Manic and I, Welcome Home.

Sarah is one amazing person. With style, class, beauty, and music she expanded my knowledge and creativity in ways I never imagined.

Sarah writes music, sings and performs music. She can pretty much do anything, she's gifted.

But Sarah goes a step beyond being gifted. Her kindness to me and others has always been genuine. After breaking up with my sorta boyfriend, Sarah was immediately there to console me. I remember eating junk food in the park and flipping through Cosmo and laughing at all the ridiculous things in there with her. I remember us sitting down and making a list of things I was going to do to get over the guy who sorta broke my heart.

Sarah has chosen to dedicate her life to others, even before she graduated with her bachelors in Sociology, she was serving as many people as she possibly could.

The fondest memory of Sarah was the wedding day of our friend Sage. We were beat. Sarah and I had spent the night before packing and cleaning and we didn't finish until the next morning, right before we went to the wedding.

We ran into Billy there--I feel like I used to run into Billy a lot, places and times I'd never expect to see him. Weird.

Anyway, right after we went to Olive Garden and ran into my Stake Patriarch, who "anonymously" paid for our whole meal.

We were on a high. And so we decided to drive to Utah but then realized we were going to Montana and then realized we didn't know where we were going, we were just going. We ended up in the middle of nowhere and adventured for a while before going back to Rexburg and crashing on the floor of what would be my future apartment.

There are so many amazing, cherished memories that I have with Sarah and I hope to have more.

Da bears

There are some days where I am full to bursting with opinions and thoughts and then there are days--like the past few days--that I doubt my opinion and I lack the ability to update this blog.

I will post something for you tomorrow ... hopefully.

I'd rather write about Evita than vampires

Yeah. I turned Evita into a blood sucking vampire; not appealing.

Blood ran down my neck, I felt woozy, the vampire stared at me with love, lust and horror on his face. His nose began to run and ... Not. I made you look.

This isn't going to be a vampire book, I don't even know if I can guarantee blood, or lust or violence or even some language that would make a rapper blush.

But you'll only know if you read on.

Twenty one, thats how old I am. I am currently working on my masters, on becoming a prodigy, but I am also currently working to get out of my bed as this very moment too. What can I say, I'm a working woman, dedicated and stuff.

I guess thats why I suddenly felt the need to write a book. I once thought "I'll write it about vampires" but then Stephanie Meyer--did I spell that right?-- beat me to the punch.

I also considered wizards, elves, worms and snot.

Thats one thing I can guarantee, this book will be a little runny. I mean, I've gotta capture every audience and kids love snot, farts, boogers and poop jokes, so I'll be sure to slide some in every now and then.

The music I'm listening to is a little runny, like my nose. Promise to not make fun of me? Evita. I'm listening to Evita and to make it worse, its the Madonna version. I was stuck on some modern, radio stereotypical rap crap but I switched back to all my old classic stuff, if you consider Evita to be a classic anything.

Moody Blues is the next thing I will probably listen too. Am I moody? No, but they're not either.

Anyway, this is all very random but I am going to write a book. Something horrendously embarrassing and very honest.

I'm not going to try and make money off it, heck I may not even bind it but if you want to read it, there will be a chapter posted on here every now and then.

Read it.

I will eat food out of a dog's mouth

You know how much I hate dogs? Well, if I get 500 hits on my blog in one day, then I will put a video/photo up on here of me eating food out of a dog's mouth, unless you have any other ideas? Please feel free to comment.

Also, if I get 1500 people to take this survey, I will do something else crazy and put a video up for everyone to see. Click the link below to take the survey.

https://byu.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_51I8UUaNaZ4arxG

Staff Sgt. Gibbs: Is he really guilty?

Staff Sgt. Gibbs

I don’t know why, but I feel this is an issue I must write about. I want to discuss the sentencing of Staff Sgt. Calvin Gibbs, of Billings, Mont.

If you haven’t read the story, here is a link for it. Read it and then read the rest of this—because I said to and because it’s an important part of history and the news.

So, a lot of comments were posted on this story on major news websites; many condemned Gibbs to hell, many were sympathetic and many blamed desensitization for why Gibbs did what he did—I don’t think this is completely right, especially in this situation.

Here are some of the comments, one is from the Washington Post, "When you take a kid out of his normal environment and turn him into a killing machine by returning him to this hell hole known as active duty, numerous times (vs national draft and one tour), what do you expect? "

Or from the Huffington Post

" Every soldier responds to death in wars differentl­y. Some are simply overwhelme­d when confronted with the carnage of human life and loss of friends in combat. Every man has a breaking point and some men are much more fragile than others and respond differentl­y. We read about war and watch it on TV however, when you are participat­ing, it is a most terrible experience­."

Yes, I feel that men are scarred from war. They will be prone to violence, to anger, to sadness, to depression.

But I do not feel that this endorses a soldier to target and kill an innocent civilian for no reason except sport.

I give this example, if you were in the United States and you shot a woman walking down the street, because she was a woman and you didn’t like women, you would be tried and likely given a life sentence.

This is how I see Gibbs and his sentence. Plus, if you factor in that not only did he kill these people and set the scene up so that they looked as if they were a threat (by planting weapons on them or saying they fired at him) but he also chopped off their fingers, pulled out a tooth and took photos with the victims to use as trophies.

I believe a person can become desensitized but this goes beyond desensitization, this is full out premeditated, blatant killing.

I will point out that these people aren't the majority, and so I would like to pay tribute to those who don't get satisfaction in killing but know that they are defending their life, their liberty and their family. God bless you for your sacrifices.

Also, what are you feelings on all of this?

To all you momma's boys out there

You ever know a guy that pretty much talks about his mother all the time? They say a good guy is a guy that treats his mother right, I'm a supporter of this but what about a guy who doesn't just treat his mother right but also has an oedipus complex?

I still remember, I went out with a guy who could do nothing but talk about his mother--total turn off. He recently was married. I wonder if she reminds him of his mother?

Sometimes these mommy boys are just down right creepy. There was a guy in my ward when I was younger who breast fed until he was five--talk about being stuck on someone, literally.

She would just whip it out at the pool and tell him to come get his lunch. Weird.

But, they're not all so blatantly obsessed with their mother. I'm just putting out a warning for you women.

Don't date a guy that you can completely control, a guy that enjoys that. Gross. Do you know how you really sees you? They see you as a mother figure that they can have sex with.

If you feel like the dominator in your relationship, then do something about it, unless you enjoy being the mother figure in your relationship, then by all means whip it out for him and the babies.

Celebrity twitter screw ups: Ashton Kutcher

What exactly is the point of Twitter? In some ways I feel like its great for getting quick updates on the news in a timely manner. Some people use it like Facebook, or they use it to build up their businesses by posting witty remarks on the news or other such things.

I feel like celebrities are big proponents of Twitter. It seems they use it almost the same way we use Facebook. They put up personal posts and a lot of times its about things happening in the news or its things they accidentally tweet out to the masses.

I even think of Anthony Weiner, the political figure who pretty much ruined his career when he accidentally posted a picture of his junk--wrapped in some tight briefs on twitter (of course, I knew it was coming, you know what they say about men with big noses ... ).

The latest blunder made by a celebrity, Ashton Kutcher, who at the beginning of this most recent scandal with Paterno and his old assistant coach.

He really made a blunder. Turns out he was misinformed. Coach Paterno should've been fired. He knew what was going on and did nothing about it. I read some of the court case, there was ample evidence and it wasn't lovely.

I have to admire what Kutcher is doing. He's admitting fault, he's admitting ignorance and it sounds heartfelt. Hopefully he learned his lesson.

Anyway, its interesting how many others have screwed up on Twitter. I've found a little list for you.

Aaron

I think its time that I wrote a post about Aaron.

I've never met anyone who knows more about Power Rangers, Vampires and dark forces. If I ever need to know something about Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I know where to go.

Aaron has always been a great cousin and a great son to his parents. He seems to treat his mother and father with respect. He has a great love for animals and kids, which is admirable.

I remember visiting Wheeling, West Virginia in the summer for our family vacations. My brothers loved staying at Aaron's house and goofing around playing video games and eating junk food.

West Virginia would definitely not be the same without Aaron there.

Thanks Aaron for making West Virginia what it is to me today.

I wear name brand clothing, so I am beautiful

The price for this scarf is just ridiculous. 

Let me tell you about Kaitlin.

She has managed to inform you on her opinions on all the things listed at the top of her blog site, except one thing. She has failed to mention anything about your clothes, her clothes, their clothes but now she will cross that bridge ... and burn it.

In order to under for you to understand my feelings on clothes, you must understand how I dress myself.

I like to match. My clothing must make sense. Of course, most people feel this way. But besides matching, the way I choose what I wear is by how cheap I get it.

For example, today I am am wearing $4 tights from Forever 21, a $4 dress from Target with a black skirt under it from Kohls that I bought for $8 (it came with a belt too). I am wearing socks that I stole from my boyfriend and my boots, which fully cover my man socks, are $20 from Payless (I've had them for four years now).

Would you care for me to go on? My underwear is cute, its black with a little bow on the front. I think I purchased a 6 pack of them from Walmart for $5 and my bra is my most recent purchase, I bought that from JcPenney, on sale for $8. Its an obnoxious turquoise color but it fits great and I bought it for $30 less than its original price.

In case you can't tell, I'm cheap. Thats how I determine what I wear. If its appealing to the eye, if I can get a lot of wear out of it and if I lose next to nothing by buying it, then I buy it--its as simple as that.

This past year I received a ton of free clothes from a lady in the ward. Some of them were sketch or skanky, so I cutsied/modested them up and I wear them all the time.

I don't say no to free clothes, and I always wear them -- as long as they are mostly new, clean, not someone's underwear, and somewhat in style.

So, now you know a little about my style and why I am about to criticize yours.

WASTE. What are you doing with your money?!?!

I see people throwing their money down the drain for name brands and specific styles.

I mean, are you really going to buy a scarf for $20-$35? Or even $200?

Nonsense. Utter nonsense. Everyone complains about how broke they are and yet I see all of those supposedly broke/poor people spending loads of money on clothes.

Find deals, go without, take whats given to you. Just because its not from American Eagle, Abercrombie & Fitch or some other lame place, doesn't mean its worthless.

Let your goodness define your beauty, not your clothes ... stupid.

Sage

I remember when I first met Sage. She was in hair school in Rexburg. Oh man, and we were so young.

18-year-old girls with their heads full of dreams. She was friends with the roommates I had the semester, the Wyoming roommates, specifically Star Valley.

I heard so much about Star Valley that semester and then I actually went there for Thanksgiving and had some fun adventures.

I think the first time Sage and I really interacted was when Michelle and I went to get our hair done for a school dance. We had all asked dates, picked out dresses and now we were getting our hair done.

It was then that I fell in love with Sage's ability to make my hair look amazing. Actually, I remember when Sage and I parted ways in Rexburg a while back, we thought we wouldn't really see each other again. I figured I'd never get my hair done again because no one would ever do as nice a job as Sage.

But surprise, surprise. I landed an internship with Deseret News and Sage was living in Utah. Although we both have crazy schedules, we still manage to see each other more frequently than all my other friends from college.

There are so many wonderful things I could say about Sage. I think the thing that has impressed me the most is that Sage is one of the most self less people I know.

I am so impressed with her outlook on life. If you ever are luck enough to meet my beautiful friend Sage, you will meet a young woman who is mature, intelligent, and charitable.

Thank you Sage for being such an awesome example.

Don't hate me cause you ain't me

Peter's recent blogpost on how I read his blog about me, got me thinking--I know, it surprised me too.

I could only respond to Peter in one way, "Don't hate me cause you ain't me." The only reason Peter is blogging about me is because he wishes he were me.

I've been reading the most interesting blog, by this couple, and I can't help but hate her too, because I ain't her.

And so, like Peter, I find myself blogging about someone I wish I could be and who I hate because I know I can't be. I mean, I could get a lot closer to being like her than Peter could because we are both female. Sadly Peter will never be that much like me because we differ in gender.

Anyway, this girl that I habitually stalk has everything: a hot boyfriend, a cool camera, awesome dance moves--can you see why I hate/envy her?

But I also wonder how often we take ourselves and compare ourselves to others by looking at their blogs, their Facebooks, their websites--just the way Peter and I do.

How much time is wasted in stalking and hating on people and what their doing in their pictures and videos. I know everyone must hate on me because I only do awesome things with my life--just look at the awesome photos that I've put on this blogpost.

Everyone must hate me cause they sure ain't me.

Nose picking lessons

Who: Peter Nguyen

What: Nose Picking Lessons

When: Whenever you like

Where: His backyard, behind the tree, where no one can see

Why: Because he's the best, even better than Kaitlin

How: With his/your finger

All you need is a finger! The lessons are free!

Perry and Cain: Poking each other like children

And so the finger pointing begins. Are these really candidates that we want running for President?

Cain gets accused of some sex scandal that happened years ago. He denies the allegations, while in the process of digging dirt on the initial dirt digger.

Cain believes Perry dug up this whole sex scandal and so then he turns the finger on Perry, who then points his finger at Romney. Looks to me like Perry standing in the middle of these three candidates with his arms wide open, fingers pointing, and placing blame wherever he can.

But, I'll show both of them a finger--the one between my index and ring finger. I don't know if I can vote for men who squabble like children.

And the bickering continues. Perry faces accusations of being drunk or on drugs at his last speech.

I can't help but wonder what will come up next. Who will face the finger next?

Latest Victim: James

I remember the first time I met James. It was my second year at EFY, I think I had just turned 16.

It was at the first dance for the week and I was standing by the wall--like I always do--when this kid asks me to dance. It was one of the many times that a young man had taken pity on me and decided to make themselves the highlight of my night.

Well James did more than that. What was just a dance turned into a friendship, I remember keeping in touch with him until he left for his mission, just a little over a year after that first meeting--I believe.

We emailed during that time. He would tell me about college and I would complain about high school.

After he left for the mission, Stormin Mormon--I believe that was his email or something--and I didn't really talk anymore. I think I wrote him one letter at the beginning and he wrote one back.

It was after his mission, and after I had added him on Facebook that James and I talked again.

I never would've imagined that he would start hooking me up with guys while he was in North Carolina for college and I was at BYU-Idaho.

But he did.

I remember he set me up with a guy and we went out on a Friday night. I worked the next morning, at the college newspaper, and someone hacked into my Facebook account while I was out for lunch.

So, I'm sitting down for lunch when I get this phone call from James. I hadn't talked to him verbally in what was years.

"Are you engaged?" he says in disbelief. After a couple minutes of reassurance and an explanation of what I assumed was a hacking (and I found out later that I was right), he hung up.

I remember him saying something like, "You went on a date with another guy last night and you're engaged today?!?!"

I went on several dates and had some good times because of James. Being set up by someone so far away was hilarious at the time, and I still laugh to this day.

I've always seen James as some kind of genius and of course, a friend. Thanks James.

I've decided to stalk Peter today

Peter, I know you've wanted to be stalked and so I have stalked you (PS: Love the new family photo ... eerie, how did I know about that?).

So, here is my blogpost about Peter.

I remember I hated Scroll [college newspaper] my first year. I was shy, young and withdrawn. But, after a year, I began to change. It was Winter 2009, Peter was editor-in-chief and Ryan was managing editor. I decided from the start that I didn't like my job and I didn't like them, which is an awful attitude to have but keep in mind that I was a baby at the time.

The semester before was my first time getting paid at Scroll. My editor taught me nothing. She would throw a page at me, tell me to do it and then fix everything she didn't like on that page, without offering any guidance.

But the semester after that, I was doing something different. I was in charge of the whole Campus section because my editor had ditched me. So, 18-year-old Kaitlin took over. I remember telling my little group of students what to do and giving them guidance but I kept thinking in the back of my mind "Why should they even listen to me? They're all at least a year older" (Age difference was HUGE to me at the time). I actually cried after the first week.

But after those first couple weeks, I truly began to appreciate Peter and Ryan. Peter at first was intimidating to me but after offering to help me with my pages on a Saturday, when I was the only one left there, my feelings changed.

I still consider that to be one my favorite semesters at BYU-Idaho. I had to opportunity to build networks and even more importantly build lasting friendships.

Thank you Peter for helping me learn to love something I thought I would always hate.