The One Where Heather Reads Books

The BBC estimates that the average person will have read six or less books on this list.

(Bolded means I've read it)


1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible - Too Many Cooks
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert X
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Inferno – Dante
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo





Only six or less? I've got 38, punks.
Some of them I've read many times (HarryPotter, duh, Little Women, Gone With the Wind) and I've actually started lots of them but didn't think they were worth finishing or got bored (Bridget Jones Diary, Crime and Punishment, Heart of Darkness). And plenty of them I've had long intention of reading but have never got around to it (Tess of D'Ubervilles, The Little Prince, Cold Comfort Farm).

(rant One of my peeves is that when I recommend books to people, no one ever reads them. Of the few people who do read a book I recommend (or the books I force them to borrow), they tend to love it. end of rant)








And I can't end this book post without mentioning my favorite book of all time:

BAD KITTY by Michele Jaffe. Ok, if you're a guy you won't like it, or if you're a boring serious person you probably wouldn't like it either. But if you are a girl who is even remotely interested in girly things, you will enjoy this book. I remember picking the book up in the library one summer, mostly because it said "kitty" on the cover, I'll admit. I read the back cover and wasn't too impressed, but there wasn't anything else on the shelf that day so I took it home, read the first 3 pages and gave it my immediate loyalty forever and ever.
Maybe it's not the greatest work of fiction ever, and maybe sometimes it's a little silly, but,

whenever I am down, this book makes me excited for life again :)

Just read it, and then you'll understand.

so. tired.

i am so tired today and i don't know why. i'm so tired i cannot even use proper capitalization.

i feel like this cat:

how am i supposed to go to class in 40mns and stay awake and learn stuffs? i just wants to go tosleeeeeppp.

also, i want to build a blanket fort. so jealous of this foooorrrrt!

The One Where Heather Shares Random Stuff With You

GUYS!
I'm sorry I didn't post anything all during October. In my defense, reporting takes up so much TIME! Print Journalism is a major that takes up a lot of time, and it really depends on other people. You don't have control over when people will call you back, if ever. It can be frustrating. I find myself sitting around alot, waiting for people to call me back.
I much prefer it when I get to go out and actually cover an event, instead of just previewing things. Much more fun!
You get to go to things like this:

That's right, Yo Gabba Gabba. Haha, at least it made for very colorful pictures for my photojournalism assignment.

Read the article!

It was in a toy store called Blickenstaff's which was really cool. It kind of reminded me of that movie about the magic toy store that I never saw.
Mark enjoyed himself as well.

I actually think that is an awesome hat.

We carved pumpkins! For Halloween. But they're cool, so I'll let you see even though Halloween is already way in the past.

Can you guess whose pumpkin is whose?

Happy little anime pumpkin! Evil demon pumpkin!

I go through cycles when it comes to cooking. There are times when I love cooking and learning new recipes.
And then there are other times...
When I don't feel like cooking and would just as soon eat a nice pot of mac 'n cheese for three nights in a row. Of course, Mark doesn't really go for that kind of thing.
Just last week I sat there thinking that I should make something for dinner since Mark was supposed to be home soon, and I thought, Why can't we just eat tootsie rolls and milky ways for dinner? and then, Mark had that for lunch, so he probably won't want the same thing again.
What's worse, the fact that I consider leftover Halloween candy an acceptable dinner, or the fact that Mark actually ate that for one of his meals?

Games

Mark and I are enjoying newlywed life, but sometimes it gets boring with just us two around. So we end up playing lots of games.

We only had our deck of cards for a while and after we got tired of playing Speed all the time we went to Target and bought a few games with some giftcards (P.S. GUYS I'm not really an ungrateful person just a procrastinating one so the Thank You cards are coming I PROMISE!!).

Mark pretty much beats me at Scrabble almost everytime but I think that is only because I ALWAYS get Z,Q, & J EVERY TIME.

But then I get frustrated losing at Scrabble so I invented some new games to play.

The first one is called Tickle Mark Until He Can't Stand It Anymore.

Basically, what you do is start tickling Mark. He will want to be a manly man and pretend it doesn't effect him. That lasts about twenty seconds before he can't stand it anymore.

The other really fun game is called Scare Mark.

All it involves is jumping out and scaring him. It's hard to do in such a small apartment, but with a little creativity, it is possible.

(I used to jump out and scare Holly all the time at home. Holly is the best person to scare because she screams really loud and jumps really high. Mark doesn't scream but he does jump and freak out.)

My favorite day was last Sunday. Mark went in the bedroom to take a nap. I was in the living room, and I wandered out the back kitchen door because I was bored.

The window through which I creep

The blinds of the bedroom window were up about two inches from the bottom of the sill, giving me just enough space to peek in. Conventiently, Mark was sleeping on his side, facing the window.

I stared at him with my eyes as wide open as possible, wondering if the force of my gaze would make his eyes open.

After about 3 seconds I got bored of waiting, so with the lightest of touches, I tapped my fingers ever-so-gently against the window pane.

Mark's eyes opened slowly, curiously. They popped wide when he saw my creppy eyes looking in at him.

It was glorious how much he freaked out. He yelled and spasmed, then did it again. I busted up laughing, and once he realized it was just his freaky wife, he started punching the pillow and calling me the devil.

I came inside and laughed some more, ALOT more, then let the poor man go back to sleep.

I was still laughing about it later that night, and truth be told, the memory still makes me giggle.



Love ya Markie!

P.S. I added a list of the stories I have written for the Daily Universe so far this year to the side of the blog. If you are interested in things about Museums & Art at BYU, then you should probably read them. Also, if you are my mom you are probably the only one who cares. But then that is why my mom rocks and you don't. :)

August

Before August gets to far away, I thought I'd write about the most eventful month of this year. It started off with my mom, David, Holly, and Mark coming to Utah to help me pack up everything in my apartment and move it into me and Mark's new apartment that we would live in after we got married.

Mark was pretty sick during all this, and decided to share with his little fiance.

So when we finally made it back to Colorado after a hot sticky week getting invitations out and moving furniture in Utah, I had Mark's sickness (fever, sore throat, nausea) only ten times worse.
Which led me to spend a few hours on a Sunday morning in one of these rooms:

They gave me some medicine so I’d stop throwing up and an IV full of re-hydrating fluids. After about 30 seconds of having the IV in my arm, I felt soooo much better. After that, I was on the mend, except somewhere between that morning and a few hours later, I caught a wicked cough that’s still lingering even now. That’s gross if I got it from someone in the emergency room.

After that, the next two weeks were full of bridal showers, bridal pictures, ironing about a hundred chair sashes, and playing with the new family kitten, Kevin. Yes, she is a girl.

My amazing cheezburger cake made by Sister Cowser at my bridal shower. It looks exactly like a real ginormous cheezburger. I didn't even want to cut it because it was so beautiful.

And finally, the big day!

I haven’t gotten any of the photographer’s pictures back, but I do have some that my family has taken.

Yeah, I'll put up the nice ones when I have them. :)

The cake was GORGEOUS. The picture doesn't show it as well. Anyone want to help a girl out with putting pictures on blogger? I hate it.

And then, the honeymoon! Only, the first day didn’t go so well…

Mark and I were riding a tandem bike in Glenwood Springs. It was a beautiful ride, next to a river full of happy rafter and kayakers, and beautiful scenery.
Then, I lost control of the bike and went straight into a wall. Well, my face did. I could hear the people in the raft we were waving at go, “Ooooo!” before they continued to float on by.

Thanks goodness I was wearing a helmet. My sunglasses became a mangled mess, but they protected my eyes (though I did get a pretty weird bruise on my eyelid). After my face scraped along the wall, I landed on the ground with my knee and elbow.
Mark flew over me and landed on the concrete, but the little punk didn’t even get a scrape! I was a mangled mess while he got up, perfectly fine. He now has delusions of invincibility.


Oh, it hurt sooo bad. I rolled over onto my back, knee in the air because it hurt to much to put it on the ground. After a few minutes I could get up and Mark helped me move off the sidewalk and onto the side. My tooth had scraped along the wall, but luckily nothing happened to my teeth, and the engagement ring was unharmed! But I felt my face bleeding, my shoulder (ripped my Power Ranger’s shirt!), my knee, my hand, and my elbow. We called the bike rental place, but the only way to get picked up was to walk back to the rest stop we had passed a ways back.

Mark had to carry the bike, since it was impossible to straighten the frame now. I was limping along, clutching my elbow and bleeding down my face. People stopped to offer bandaids and reassurances that my face wasn’t wounded enough to scar. When we made it back to the rest stop, a nice guy stopped and after making sure I was ok, gave us some chocolate-covered strawberries leftover from his picnic.
So I got to spend the rest of my honeymoon with oozing sores all over my body and face (lots of comments from people asking me if I was in a motorcycle accident, haha.). Also, I had to miss horseback riding the next day because I was too sore to get out of bed.

I would only let pictures be taken of my "good side".

I did go kayaking and hiking, though! We went to Ouray, the so-called “Switzerland of America”. It’s a cute little town that’s basically a street lined with shops, surrounded by GORGEOUS mountains. It’s definitely worth going just for the scenery alone.

The last day of the honeymoon was the BEST.
I will have to change the side of my blog, because we went in a HOT AIR BALLOON!
And it was just as amazing as I always thought it would be.

Mark in the hot air balloon.

It’s a very gentle ride, and since you’re much lower to the ground than an airplane, you can wave at the kids who run out to see the hot air balloon, and all the dogs bark as you fly by. It was so great! I can’t wait to do it again someday.


After that we came home and after opening presents (!!! Even better than Christmas as a kid. Mark was worse than me.) and fixing some car problems, Mark’s parents drove with us back to Provo as they took his sister Jenny up to BYU-I.
I started school (working for the Daily Universe. I’m a cute little reporter now) and Mark has been going crazy at home all day as he looks for a job. We finally cleaned up A LOT of the apartment today and got a little more organized.


P.S. While Mark has been home alone, he discovered my Psych DVDs and now he’s hooked. He even bought a pineapple last night. I’m off to make pineapple upside down cake now.

Planning A Wedding Is Boring

So... planning a wedding is boring. Maybe it's just because I'm here in Utah and the rest of my family, including my fiance, is in Colorado, but I just never feel like planning wedding stuff because I have to do it by myself.

However, I feel like I've come up with some pretty awesome ideas on my own.

For instance, while figuring our how I want the cake to look, Mark sent me this lovely idea:

Yes! I want a giant cake of ME! After all, this is MY day, isn't it? Why shouldn't my guests partake of a giant replica of me? I think it will be Funfetti-flavored.

Also, tonight I was trying to make a decision on what picture/s to use for our wedding announcement. Looking at other people's pictures makes me think that maybe mine just aren't as cool...

This one makes me think of the hobos that hang around Provo City Library.

This one made me tear up. A girl without legs can still find love? They should make her story into a movie.

But, hands down, this one wins. It's like a movie poster for Honey I Shrunk...You!

Of course, I also have the wedding reception to worry about.
What about these adorable whale centerpieces?

My brother suggested we have some llamas at our reception. I kind of like the idea.

Actually, I'm REALLY starting to like the idea...

So, I'm pretty sure my wedding is going to be the best wedding. Or at least the most memorable one anyone's ever been to.

Engagement, what?!

Today is Tell the Truth Day, so I figured I better come out and tell the truth to everyone who has been wondering: yes, I am engaged!

Mark and I started dating when we were 17 years old. This picture is from 2007--the year we graduated high school together. It's also one of my favorite pictures of us. :)
Now that Mark's back from his two-year mission in Brazil, we decided we don't want to be apart anymore and are getting married on August 20th in the Denver, Colorado temple.
My future sister-in-law, Melissa, put some pictures up on her blog, if you want to see some shots of the night he gave me the ring (Happy 4th of July indeed!), and a sneak peak of our engagement pictures.

Happy Day!

The One Where Heather Thinks She Can Do Things

The other night I was flipping channels on the TV because I couldn't sleep, and I landed on the Discovery Channel, where they were showing a Man vs. Food marathon, which I have never seen before.

I watched, and decided it is my new favorite show.

How lucky is this guy? He gets his own TV show where he goes around the country, eating the best food ever. And TONS of it!

I decided I wanted to be him.

Does that not make you so jealous?
Also, I love how when restaurant chefs are demonstrating how to make their famous dishes, he calls the food "sexy". Haha!
But then, I got to the part of the show where he does the food competition. And as I watched him eat the spiciest sushi rolls ever, I decided "eh..." and then when he attempted the SIX POUND BURRITO (which looked so delicious) and I imagined the heartburn afterwards, I decided "not for me."



Yesterday, I was reading the news, and saw a story about a guy who was walking the distance of the Amazon river from source to the sea.
And I thought! "Amazing! I want to do it!"
I read some of his blogs, and looked at his pictures.



Beautiful!



Sleeping in a hammock in the rainforest, wouldn't it be inspiring?

Then I saw this:



And this:



And the other pictures of snakes and bugs and foot fungus... And I decided, "no." No, I will not walk the length of the Amazon ever in my life.

So those were my two bursts of wanting to do something crazy-awesome this week.

Then I went and played RockBand (and I was pretty dang awesome...in my imagination).

The One With The Family Motto

"Somebody's got to be unafraid to lead the freak parade."

That is the Daley Family Motto, inspired by the Big and Rich song, "Freak Parade." (I am telling the absolute truth here. After hearing that song for the first time, it was a unanimous decision by all members of the family. My mom has it on her license plate holder.)

While looking through some family pictures, I realized how true our motto has held up over the years.



We like the simple things in life, such as plastic turtles

(Marcus)

We do things in unconventional ways

(David, after jumping through the trampoline)

It takes us about 30 mns every time we want a group picture to actually get a normal one.

(Family, Christmas 2008)

We have a deep love for cats.

(David, Heather, Mom aka Jolinda)

Sometimes we are grumpy when we wake up in the morning.

(Holly)


We are very fashion-forward.

And we're not shy about staring at the neighbors.

(David, Dad, Marcus)

The One With The Best Mom In The World

I have the best mom in the world.

Isn't she cute?

She's all-knowing, all-seeing, and ALL-WONDERFUL! (I know this because she taught us to recite that phrase every time we questioned her judgment. And you know what? Turns out, it's true!) She can put in tile and hardwood floors, build picnic tables and bedframes, resize, repair, and set stones in jewelery, and make the best pea soup in the world. She laughs when other people fall down, and takes her kids TPing on Friday nights. She taught me that cake is a perfectly acceptable breakfast food, not to pull my wedgies out in public, and to never squirt her with water because she will get you back ten times worse.

I was about 13 or 14, and we were sitting at the table, eating dinner. We had all noticed earlier that there was a new garden statue sitting by the front door. It was a squirrel, holding an acorn in its paws.
"Where did that squirrel come from?" my brother asks.
"What are you talking about?" asks my dad.
"Out by the front door. There's a statue of a squirrel."
"A squirrel?" asks my dad, completely confused. "What's it doing out there?"
My mom immediately says, "Holding his nuts!"
We all bust up laughing, while my dad only shakes his head, pretending to be exasperated, but secretly laughing on the inside.
"You were waiting all day to say that, weren't you?" he asks.
And I don't doubt that she was.


Thanks, Momface, for all that you do for me! I love you and your pretty face!
Love,
Your Favorite Child
Heather

The One Where Heather Loves Kittens

My roommate just walked in and asked me what I was doing.
"Watching kittens."
I showed her the computer screen where I was watching a video of cute kittens playing in a tissue box.
And that pretty much sums up what I've been doing since the semester ended.

The One Where Heather Is Happy For Summer

Dear Blog,

I am sorry for neglecting you. However, classes are over and all finals are done, now it's time to play!

I am one semester closer to graduation now. Two more years, and I can join the real world.

But for now, I have a summer to do absolutely nothing but earn some money and play. What should I do with all this wonderful, school-free time?

1. Run away to Europe
An afternoon spent watching Harry Potter and Inkheart left me with a strong desire to go to Europe--just pack my bags and leave! London, or Italy, or France, or anywhere! But that dream quickly died when I looked up plane tickets. Why are plane rides so expensive anyways? Psh, it's only a couple thousand feet in the air!

"Let's have a dance party--in London!"

2. Become an internet celebrity
How hard can it be? Just do something stupid or awesome, and everyone will be watching you on Youtube! I don't know about the awesome stuff, but I could definitely do something stupid.

This video has over 36 million views.

3. Put pink in my hair
I have always wanted to do this, and with no testing center to turn me away, there's nothing stopping me! (And it would make my mom freak out! Two fun things in one!)

See, Avril Lavigne does it! I think it looks cute.

4. Learn the NSYNC "Bye Bye Bye" dance.
Don't laugh at me. I've always wanted to learn that dance. And this is the SUMMER OF POSSIBILITIES. So why not? With Youtube at my side, nothing will stop me!

Yes, you can find anything on the internet.

If I learn this dance (which may not happen, considering how horrible I am at dance-learning) I promise to put it on the blog.

What's on your summer vacation to-do list?

Friday Video: Shawn+Gus Forever

When I can't sleep, I like to look up things on Youtube. I love Youtube.
My favorite thing to look up on those late-night internet searches are Psych fan videos. If you've never seen Psych, I'm sorry for your sad life. Watch this video and maybe you'll realize you have a gaping hole in your existence you need to fill.





P.S. Sorry this blog has been boring. Finals are almost over and then it's time to plaaaaay. But until then, boring blog.

The One Where Heather Likes Hugs

April is National Poetry Month!

Every time I think of poems/poets, my mind always goes to Shel Silverstein. My dad used to read to us from Where The Sidewalk Ends when we were little. His favorite one was "Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout Would Not Take the Garbage Out". My favorite was "Ickle Me Pickle Me Tickle Me Too".

Here is a poem you should keep in mind when you run into an over-stressed, under-rested college student at finals time (aka: everyone I know):

Happy Poetry Month. Go hug someone.

Friday Video Loves the 90's

Forget 80's; the 90's were so much better. I remember about 98% of everything in this video.
A few things the video forgot: Beanie Babies! Michael Jordan! Polly Pockets! (the really teeny tiny ones) Fuzzy trolls! Windows 98! Y2K! That song about being blue! (da ba dee da ba di) Full House!
Things can never be that awesome again.

The One Where Heather Breaks The Law

I sort of had this plan where I'd never get in trouble with the law. No arrests, no fines, not even a parking ticket. The reasoning behind this is so that if someday in the future I ever felt like pulling off a big crime, like a bank heist, or I had to be an assassin, the police would be completely baffled because I would have a perfect record.
That dream has died.


Last Friday, I was pulled over for the first time ever. Now, I have to ask, what kind of pansy cop pulls over a girl on a scooter? I mean, really.
The reason he pulled me over? Because I had no license plates.
Yeah... I never bothered to get my scooter registered. After all the trouble they gave me in Colorado, I really didn't ever feel like going to the DMV to try again. I know I should have...but I never did. And I never thought it's be a problem--I've driven past dozens of cop cars over the past year and a half, and none of them have ever looked twice.
So, there I am, driving home from work, when I hear the little "whoop-whoop" of the cop behind me. So I pull over, half-hoping it was meant for someone else and the cop just drives past me.
Not so.

Cop: Is there a reason why you don't have any license plates?

Me: It's not registered.

Cop: How long ago did you buy your scooter?

Me: Umm... a year ago.
(ok, that's a lie, I bought it like two years ago.)

Cop: Ok, do you have insurance.

Me: (in my head) *dang it. forgot about that...* Um, no?

Cop: Ok, can I see your license?

So, I give him my license, he goes back into his car and does his policeman thing. In the meantime, I am left to pull up a comfy patch of sidewalk and wave at all the people staring at me as I sit there. Many things are running through my mind at this time.
I forgot about insurance...I wonder if people think I'm a drug dealer... Is he going to impound my scooter? I don't want want to walk home... How much is this ticket going to cost?...What is taking so long, seriously?... I wonder if I should cry. People say you should cry to get out of tickets...I feel like I could cry right now...

The cop finally comes back.

Cop: Did you know your license is expired?

Me: (in my head) *Oh snap!*

Yes, I had no registration, no insurance, AND my license was expired! I thought he was going to arrest me right then and there. At first I felt upset at that, but then I thought what a cool story to tell everyone at work the next day: "What'd you do yesterday?" "Spent some time in the slammer, you know, no big deal."

Instead, the cop gives me a ticket, tells me he should impound my scooter but he won't, so just drive it home and don't drive it again til I sort everything out. Which is way more upsetting, I think, than getting to go to jail.
So, I drove home, called my mom and had a panic attack, and now I get to figure out exactly when I will have enough time to walk to the DMV and have some more good times with government employees. Yippee.

Moral of the story: Not all cops are big tough guys who have better things to do than catch those big bad BYU girls on those darned scooters.

But since I'm already a criminal, I have decided to be a little more bad, which is why I'm writing this in the school library, eating goldfish crackers and cookies while I do it.
Yeah, I'm tough.

Friday Video: GLEE

Last season brought us singing and dancing and a kid in a wheel chair and fake pregnancy and real pregnancy and a kid in a wheelchair and all the amazing lines from the crazy cheerleading coach and high school drama and adult world drama and secret romances and bustin' windows of cars.
So how can you NOT be excited for the next season of Glee?!

The One Where Heather Makes A List

Lately, I've been having to deal with some Negative Nancys and they've been dragging me down into their Pit of Eternal Unhappiness. But, today I found a few words of wisdom courtesy of Yahoo News:

"When people lash out at you with a response that is totally
disproportionate to the situation, think about where their behavior is coming from. If all you're doing is ringing up their groceries, chances are it's not about you. That negativity is an outpouring of what's going on with them -- maybe they hate their job or are dealing with intense stress. Is their behavior appropriate or kind? Absolutely not. But it's a barometer for the state of their life, and not a reflection of who you are."

There was some other great advice, so if you feel you need some help dealing with those downers, read it here.

I also read a great list of the small pleasures that make life great. I thought about what's on my list of "the little things", and here's what I came up with:

1. sleeping in
2. going out to eat with friends
3. laughing
4. finding a great book to read
5. naps
6. wearing my pajamas all day
7. when my favorite song comes on the radio
8. milkshakes
9. saturday morning pancakes
10. hot chocolate
11. when a cat curls up with me
12. long talks with unexpected people
13. homemade cheeseburgers
14. when I sneak into an empty room at work and watch the sun rise over the mountains
15. when people say "thank you"
16. old pictures
17. shiny things
18. when someone sends me a happy text message
19. watching a new episode of my favorite TV shows
20. calling my mom
21. decorating cupcakes
22. when I'm so tired after hiking up a mountain, then looking down at the view
23. sledding
24. macaroni and cheese from the box
25. breathing the air after it rains
26. long car rides when you're with someone who understands talking isn't always necessary
27. a great hair day
28. sunshine
29. new clothes
30. painting my nails
31. silent snowfalls
32. hot showers
33. pretty flowers
34. crayola crayons
35. cran-grape juice
36. cheesy stories
37. bamboo plants
38. spending all day watching a movie marathon
39. sitting in the hot tub while it's snowing
40. sliding across the floor in your socks
41. that feeling you get when all your homework is done
42. saying random quotes that totally fit the moment
43. cookies just out of the oven
44. friday nights knowing there's no obligations tomorrow
45. the smell of vanilla
46. when my favorite author comes out with a new book
47. ...or rereading old favorites
48. watching funny videos on Youtube
49. summer mornings
50. scrambled eggs on toast

50 wonderful things! What's on your list?

Friday Video Love

It's Friday!

The Dutch equivalent of Wal-mart has awesome ads.
Wal-mart, take note.

The One Where Heather Grows Up

Last month, BYU gave me an nice birthday present: acceptance into the School of Journalism.

I always look this cute when I get letters.

When I tell people this, they inevitably ask me what I am going "to do".
I reply, "Get a job. " (duh)
Then they want to know WHAT KIND of job.
As if I have any clue.
So I pondered what I should be when I "grow up", and have drawn up the following list of jobs I would consider having:


A MUPPET
Who doesn't want to be a Muppet? I could be cute and furry and get to sing songs and tell jokes all day.

Muppets can be investigative reporters too.

A WRITER FOR A TV SHOW
I love TV so much that I think, what could be more fun than creating a TV show? If I could write for any TV show currently on television, it would be PSYCH, though I don't think I could ever be as funny as they are.

A SPY
When I was about 9 years old, my childhood best friend and I decided we wanted to be spies, just like Harriet the Spy. We had spy notebooks and came up with little bags of stuff we would need to go undercover. Of course, since we both lived in normal, boring neighborhoods, we never actually found anyone to spy on.

A SUPERHERO
I love superheroes. Mostly I want to be a superhero so I could have the powers, not because I want to save people. And I would probably end up abusing my powers. So I guess that makes me a supervillain. But I'm ok with that, as long as I could fly.

Superheroes get to hang out with other superheroes. I would hang out with him.

AN AUTHOR

I have always wanted to be an author, ever since I was in second grade. In fact, the before-mentioned childhood best friend and I started writing many things, including a tale about a loveable character we named Morty the Mighty Mouse. It was about three sentences long, and then we spent the rest of our efforts trying to get the cute boy on the playground to star in the theater adaptation we planned to write. Now, however, my efforts at writing novels have come along way.

Other things I would consider:
Magazine editor
Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Publishing editor
One of those people who gets to watch all the movies and decide what the ratings should be
Movie script writer
A ninja
Book reviewer
Evil overlord attempting to take over the world

What does this list tell us? Probably that I should finish my degree, and figure the rest out later.