Enjoying Company

So this weekend, we have Rusty and Patrick up from Kenai.  They were amazing and brought me both Arby's and Jersey Subs!! Two of my all time favorite restaurants :) thanks guys

This morning, my friends Jessi, Mike, Monica and Morgan all came over to watch the Nanook Hockey team play their first NCAA Division I tournament.

Last weekend, Britton was gone, but I hosted 5 brothers from UW and 2 from UAS. It was a fun group gathering and slumber party.

I love having people over and I have no idea why we don't have people over more often.  I enjoy the apartment being a little messy from other peoples messes.  I LOVE cooking for people.  I love anticipating their arrival.  My goal over the next while is to have more events here.

ttfn, cooking bacon-wrapped, cream-cheesed stuffed jalapenos and also garlic mashed potatoes

Chuck

I love Chuck. The tv show that is.  It's one of a few shows that I like to watch religiously.  I just watched this weeks episode, and I can't believe Casey was dismissed! :(  I kind of hated him, but he belongs on the team.  Oh well.  I can't wait til next week's episode to see what Casey does... and to see if Walker moves back to DC with Colonel.

so I might have said the wrong thing

Last night, when Britton called me we talked for a little while about how our days went.  Then I suggested that we should get married on an April 9th, because it was practically smack dab between our birthdays. And he replied that ok in 2020 we can do that. and I told him that I didn't want to be 30 before I got married. I don't even want to be 25.  I don't know why, but I have this fascination of being younger than 50 and celebrating my 25th anniversary (with Britton)!  This is what my parents will be doing in less than 4 years - they'll still be 5 years away from they're 25th.  I want to be able to say that! But, I don't have a boyfriend who feels the same way.  I don't want to be 30 when I'm having my first kid.  I want to be able to meet and play with my great-grandkids... when that day comes.  All of my grandparents are alive and doing fantastic, but none of them are very old.  If I have kids in the near future (more than 3-4 years from not, but less than 10), all of my grandparents (minus some tragic incident) will be able to have the joy of seeing them grow up.  I don't know why I feel so strongly about this, and I wanna say that I'm willing to wait for Britton, but I think he should consider my thoughts too.

Homework, oh Homework!

My little brother called me today asking what my favorite poem was for an English assignment he is working on.  This is the only poem I could think of! It's one that I did in 4th grade for a poem competition.  Hahaha, I remember all of the facial expressions and everything.  I wish I had a picture.  

Homework! Oh, Homework!
I hate you! You stink!
I wish I could wash you away in the sink,
if only a bomb
would explode you to bits.

Homework! Oh, homework!
You're giving me fits.
I'd rather take baths
with a man-eating shark,
or wrestle a lion
alone in the dark,
eat spinach and liver,
pet ten porcupines,
than tackle the homework,
my teacher assigns.

Homework! Oh, homework!
you're last on my list,
I simple can't see
why you even exist,
if you just disappeared
it would tickle me pink.
Homework! Oh, homework!
I hate you! You stink!

By Jack Prelutsky.

Picking the lesser of two evils

So this has been spring break this week.  And instead of do nothing, I worked 32 hours.  I also have cleaned my apartment.  There is a lot of homework I should get started on, but having a clean place to live seems so much more important.

Tweeting on a Jet Plane

So upon looking at a professor's website, there was a link to a song called Tweeting on A Jet Plane.  You should probably listen to it and think about recent events. :)

oatmeal

http://www.quakeroats.com/about-quaker-oats/content/create-your-day/default.aspx?id=29916

This was fun and definitely made my morning better

emotions

I just want to cry, in fact typing this will make me cry.

1. I don't know how the conference is going to go. 
2. Britton is leaving me for almost 2 weeks.  This will be the first time I've been home alone for more than just a weekend and I'm not really looking forward to it. 
3. School is stressing me out because I have no motivation to do it. 
4. I'm fat and I don't have the motivation to fix this either. 
5. I'm broke and don't have time for a 2nd or 3rd job.  

Hopefully once Britton gets back things will be much better, but until after my conference I'll be freaking out. 

By A Friend's Nephew

Check out "Dream Another Day" by my friend Gwen's nephew.
the lyrics are as follows:




If she were here and the mood was right
I would blow it
With something silly I would say
Still she'll be in my arms tonight
Though she don't know it
Because she's miles and miles away

But a dream can sweep the facts aside
And keep her at my side
Where she can make a promise she'll always stay

Though all it takes is the morning light
To overthrow it
I can still dream another day

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=354051096841&ref=nf

Snoopy on Love

Apologizing

from: http://vi.sualize.us/view/74145630f76b62f391c4c81b5a3c0a61/

A dream at the fair

So parts of this dream have happened before...

I was in fairbanks at someboby's house when my parents showed up. We
all hung out for awhile because the snowstorm was making it dangerous
to drive. After a little while, all the snow was gone! So we went to
the fair. On the way there, we got stopped by the police like 16 times
because apparently there was a no driving law in place at that time.
We eventually got to the fair and after getting tickets, we went on
the train in a cave ride. The operator didn't hear that there werw
maintinence people in the tunnel and let the train go anyway. It was a
close call for several of the workers, but everyone survived. I then
$et up with friends that I hadn't seen in years and we went to this
little yard sale shop. The owner knew all of my friends, but for some
reason we hadn't ever met before. After looking at all the stuff, we
decide to sit down and make jewelery. I was working on a pair of
earrings that had a red and orange bead on the outside of a big
bumblebee bead. Then for some reason, no one could find the box that
had the clasps and hooks/posts in.

Then I woke up and realized it was an hour later than usual and started my day.

--
Sent from my mobile device

"Play difficult and interesting things. If you play boring things, you
risk losing your appetite. Saxophone can be tedious with too much of
the same."
~Steve Lacy

Health Care Reform

I'll admit, I almost always ignore the national news, especially when it comes down to the politics of things.  Recently, in my Social Stratification and Inequality class, we watched Michael Moore's film "Sicko," about several nationalized health care systems in comparison with the United States' system.  One of the first scenes is about a man who had to choose between the tip of his ring finger ($12,000) or the tip of his middle finger ($60,000) because he didn't have adequate health insurance.  It talked about how insurance companies are in it to get rich, just like every other corporation, verses trying to make sure every American citizen has the opportunity to live a healthy life.  If the man had lost his fingers in another country (Canada, the UK or France [we didn't have time to watch the part about Cuba]), it's likely he would have been able to keep both of his fingers, with no or extremely little cost to him.

Personally, I believe that if we were to model our system after one of the countries in this movie, or even aspects of all of them, and offered free health care to all, our country would be better off.  Sure, the class and status of doctors might be lowered, but do they really need 4 houses or 3 sports cars?  Can people change their mindset from money to helping people?  I'm down for paying a chunk of my paycheck towards a system that will allow me to seek health care when I need it.  Currently, I'm uninsured, because, guess what?  I can't afford it.  I'm one of like 6 million Americans that strives to live safely and avoid getting hurt.  Last November, however, I failed to do so.  I'm currently waiting on a slow system to get me all of my paperwork in order. Thankfully, they cut my bill by 35%, but the total from all of the bills is still greater than $1000, that I don't have.

Americans live shorter lives than people in the countries with nationalized health care.  We're stressing about money from doctors bills.  We take the "fix it when it's broken" approach versus a preventative care approach.  If all Americans were to quit being stupid with their decisions and care a little more about their bodies, we'd live longer too.

Like I said before, I don't know the specifics of the health care bills that are going through Congress, but I think people should watch the film "Sicko" before complaining so much about a nationalized system.

Making decisions

Have you ever made a decision without knowing all of the information?
I have. And I have done .it recently. It's backfired on me and I don't
know how to fix it.
I was informed of a situation involving a couple members of a group
I'm in, however I heard it second hand from someone who wasn't
involved, but is the head of the part one of the people involved is
in. All he knew is what was in the situation and police reports. He
asked me if I felt the person involved should step down because of an
action this person made involving someone they are leading and
teaching. Without hearing the other side of the story, and without
reviewing the bylaws, I agreed with the person not involved amd the
counterpart of the person involved that the person involved should
step down. However the group that the person involved is teaching
didn't understand why both parties were not being punished. After
hearing the whole story, I didn't feel that either party should have
been punished from our group because it wasn't a group function.
Within this group disciplinary action is only to be assigned after all
parties involved have a chance to state their story to the exec board.
When approaching the person not involved, I worded my (and the
majority's) feelings wrong saying you instead of we and without
stating that I shouldn't have agreed in the first place. The person
involved reacted rudely and strongly against me and rudely criticized
my leadership skills. The person not involved has also been making
decisions and demands that have not been made before and it seemed the
person not involved reacted as if everything revolved around that
person. Its bullshit and the things that were said should not be
affecting me so strongly, but I can't get it off my mind and I really
don't want it to bring me down anymore. I know those involved are on
my side.

--
Sent from my mobile device

"Play difficult and interesting things. If you play boring things, you
risk losing your appetite. Saxophone can be tedious with too much of
the same."
~Steve Lacy

Final score

Mens baskestball final score: 77-74

--
Sent from my mobile device

"Play difficult and interesting things. If you play boring things, you
risk losing your appetite. Saxophone can be tedious with too much of
the same."
~Steve Lacy

Mens baskestball

Northwest Nazerene up by one with 30 seconds left

--
Sent from my mobile device

"Play difficult and interesting things. If you play boring things, you
risk losing your appetite. Saxophone can be tedious with too much of
the same."
~Steve Lacy

Rules

Rules are there for a reason and are meant to be followed.  We have national rules, rules of the road, rules for students, codes of ethics for working, rules for sports, bylaws for clubs and organizations and rules of the house you live in.  Lately, in my life, people have been breaking the rules or just not following them.  It's frustrating.  I won't go into details because I don't feel it appropriate for the internet, but come on people, make better decisions.

Governer's Cup 2010

This a post I wrote for the Univerisity of Alaska Fairbanks Student Ambassador's Blog 

As a part of the Nanook Traditions: Winter Carnival, the Governor's Cup was played.  The Governor's Cup is a hockey tournament between the Alaska Nanooks and University of Alaska Anchorage Seawolves.  I can't remember how many years its been played, but I do know that the Nanooks won the cup this year after losing for the past three years. 

Here are two of my brothers from Alpha Phi Omega with the Governor's cup.

This year, Alpha Phi Omega teamed up with the Student Activities Office (SAO) and ASUAF (The Associated Students at the University of Alaska Fairbanks) to fund a motor coach to Anchorage to watch the first game played at the Sullivan Arena.  For $30, students got a ride to Anchorage and back, a t-shirt, a ticket to the game and noisemakers.  A pretty sweet deal to cheer on our team on away ice.

 Final score UAF 7-UAA 4. By the way, our student section over there was almost louder than the 4,000 UAA fans.  

After our first two goals, we sang our school's fight song, here are the lyrics:

A photo from the Anchorage Daily News sports front page of our student section at the Sullivan Arena.  

(http://www.adn.com/2010/02/26/1159357/governors-cup-hockey.html) 

Some more Nanook pride:

Chancellor Rogers made an appearance at the Sullivan Arena with his wife, Sherrie.  

The second game packed the Carlson Center as the Nanooks played on home ice! Only 82 seats were available at the start of that game.  So, pretty much packed!  It was amazing! More of the t-shirts that the SAO ordered and passed out to almost the entire student section. 

And the pep band: 

The place was roaring, I can't even begin to describe it.  Check out the highlight video at the Alaska Nanook Hockey Blog.  If you're interested in any more info from a fans' perspective, you can find that too in the Nanook Hockey Blog.  

  During the intermission between 2nd and 3rd periods, the Tradition Stone made an appearence.  After one of their players was ejected (for punching one of our players in the head), their coach was ejected (for throwing a water bottle at the ref) and one of our players was ejected (for something that was "A stupid decision, I should have backed off" [from the player at the post conference]) we won 3-2!   

As for the other Winter Carnival Activites, I was too tired to attend, but I head that the showing of the unreleased to the public: Boondock Saints 2 was a success, as well as the kareokee night!

Right now, I'm looking forward to a week off of classes (though I'll be working on papers and the like) for spring break.

Mercedes
ps: all photos were taken from a friend's facebook because my camera was broken that weekend. :( 

Activities

As promised, here is my activity update.

First off, pep band this semester is now over.  Hooray and boo! I have my Thurs/Fri/Sat nights back! But I love playing my saxophone with a group at the same time.  Perhaps instead, now I will join the Fairbanks Community Band.  I would love to have a reason to practice.

Next, APO.  I'm so ready to be done... some people frustrate me beyond belief.  I will NOT run for president again because I'm sick and tired of having my leadership abilities scrutinized.  We are hosting the section 8 conference in 2 weeks and have about 28 people registered.  I'm not the only person that should be doing things.  and some people need to stop claiming that the chapter is theirs.  others need to step up and take some leadership action.

third, my new favorite, student ambassadors.  this group of people, while we don't know each other very well, is a group of fantastic people.  I love going to meetings because things get done.  we each know our responsibility and what has to get done in order to be successful.  it's amazing.