Hi-ho, hi-ho...

I've been crazy busy- working two jobs can keep you on your toes. 

It's been very strange being back at the dealership. I've worked there on and off since high school and you know what they say- the more things change the more they stay the same. It really hasn't changed that much- there are a lot of different people but there are also a lot of the same ones who've been there forever. I kinda feel like I've grown up there since I started working there so young and it was my first full-time "real" job. This time I'm filling in for the runner for the summer. It's the perfect summer job- for me at least, I'll need little to no training, I get to drive around (which I actually like doing- and bonus- I don't have to pay for the gas or use my car- I get to drive a demo- a new car- not a fancy new car- the base level model, the windows have to be hand-cranked- I didn't know they still made cars without automatic windows!) I also get to read while I'm waiting at the DMV- again I realize this might not sound like fun- but we get to sit in chairs while we wait and while they process our paperwork, so really I get paid to sit and read and now that I'm temporarily done with school I can read whatever I like- it feels like such a luxury! (I know- I'm a nerd).  

Anyway, working at the dealership has me reminiscing. When I first started working there I was also working at the Hallmark store in Cottonwood Mall. They recently tore down the mall and have some huge development planned, I drove by there the other day and took some pictures- it's kind of sad- but look how pretty the mountains are in the back ground.

The joys of flying stand-by...

My sister works for an airline which means my parents can fly free, so when I decided to go to Virginia to find an apartment I asked my dad to come with me and help me pick out a place. The only problem with flying free is that is also means flying stand-by. I had tickets but my dad didn't, so I felt like a complete jerk when I had to leave him in Richmond because there weren't enough seats on my flight. He was able to get out of Richmond on the next flight but missed the connection out of Atlanta and ended up spending most of the day in the airport but finally made it home about 6 hours after I did. 

The trip was productive, I looked at a lot of places and finally put a deposit on one- hopefully everything works out and I'll have a place to live. 

Here are some pictures from Williamsburg....

Oh the places you'll go...

Cheers from Williamsburg. We arrived here safely, you might think we'd be out but looking for apartments but alas, after a red-eye flight my dad has sacked out and I generally can't sleep during the day so I've time to kill- luckily this hotel has free internet access.

So here is the first of what will likely be many pictures... the view from our hotel room...

The American West Center

I thought I'd take you on a tour of the U's American West Center, where I've spent much of my life for the last year. This might be kinda dull, but it's a cool old building, built in the late 1800s, it is on Fort Douglas and was Officer's Quarters back in the day (not all that long ago), here we go...

Here's the front of the building.

And the entry way.

Here's the conference room, you can't see it very well, but the table was built in 1906.

At the top of the stairs, the door on the right is my office (well the office I share with 6 other people).

Here's our office.

And here is the scary basement- it is less scary now that John and I cleaned it out. 

And the back of the building.

Who are William and Mary and why do people love them?

A couple people have asked me about William and Mary so I thought I share some of the school's history (and learn something myself so I can answer people's questions). I got this information from their website- www.wm.edu/vitalfacts  I'm just offering some highlights.

The College of William and Mary is the second oldest institution of higher learning in the US (Harvard is the oldest). It is located in Williamsburg, Virginia. I believe it is the first school to become a university in the US- but it kept its traditional name. 

Land was set aside for the school in 1618, but plans for the school were abandoned in 1624 after an Indian uprising left 347 colonists dead. The school didn't get its start until 1693 when King William III and Queen Mary II granted a charter for the school.  

Thomas Jefferson attended in the 1760s and James Monroe in the 1770s. George Washington was the first American to be Chancellor of the College- he served as such from 1788 until he died in 1799.

In 1861 the College Building served as a Confederate barracks and almost all the students joined the Confederate Army. In 1862 federal troops occupied the campus (and the rest of Williamsburg). The school suffered a lot of damage in the war and had to close in 1881 because of lack of funds and was revived in 1888.

In 1918, it became the first co-ed state college in Virginia.

Jon Stewart graduated from William and Mary in 1984 and received an honorary doctor of arts degree in 2004. 

It is 1 of 8 schools to be deemed a "public ivy," a public ivy is a "state-assisted institution which offers a superior education at a cost far below that of Ivy League schools."    

Enrollment- the school has about 7,500 students- 5,500 of them are undergraduates. (I believe the U's enrollment is about 25,000).

I'm headed there next week to find housing I'll post some pictures of the campus after my visit. 

Yippee!

Graduation was a week ago- but I'm actually finished now! I've graded the finals and rewritten my last two papers and now I can spend the summer relaxing... and working two jobs... and moving to the other side of the country...

My War

As mentioned in an earlier post, I'm reading My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell. In the book he mentions that he blogged while he was in Iraq so I checked out his blog My War. I haven't actually read his old posts yet, I wanted to wait until I finished the book, but today I noticed that there is a new post on his blog- the Army has recalled him- he might be going back to Iraq. 

The book is great, it is the funniest war memoir I've read but it is also touching and heartbreaking. I would recommend the book- or at least checking out his blog.

Mmm coffee...

(Disclaimer- Jenel you might not want to read this!)

I thought I'd plug my favorite coffee shop- Just Add Coffee. The location is not great for me, as it is in Taylorsville, so I don't get there as often as I like- but their frozen chai lattes are totally worth the drive. 

If the name sounds familiar it's probably because they have been in the news in Utah because of their t-shirts. They had a t-shirt that said "Just Add Coffee" and featured the hand of God pouring coffee in to the Angel Moroni's trumpet. This upset the Mormon Church who sent them a letter asking them to stop (also claiming copyright on the angel). The owners pulled the t-shirts but now have a new one which is basically the same but the angel is cut out of the picture- so it's just the hand pouring coffee and now the caption below the picture says- "The Lord Giveth and a Church Taketh Away." I believe the have another t-shirt which features two missionaries and says "Just Add Coffee," but it's not on their website. If you're interested click on the link above and check out their web-site they have links to some of the articles about them.   

More singing kids...

Today my other niece had a concert at her school, kids are so cute.

As you can tell by the picture the rest of the audience enjoyed it too.

An idea for the next Disney movie...

The other day my niece was playing with her princess dolls and I asked her why she had taken all of their heads off she replied- "They're zombies." 

Let me tell you, there is nothing scarier than a headless zombie in a princess dress.  

My proposed title for the Disney movie- "Princess Aurora, Headless Zombie."

War Memoirs

For some reason I love war memoirs. It all started with a Vietnam War class I took a couple years ago when we read Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried and If I Die in a Combat Zone, Box Me Up and Ship Me Home, and I've been hooked ever since, so I thought I'd make a list of my favorites;

My current favorite is House to House: An Epic Memoir of War by Staff Sergeant David Bellavia with John Bruning. It was so intense. It's about the second Battle of Fallujah and the major house to house (hence the name) urban fighting it took to take back the city. If you are thinking about trying out this genre for the first time you might not want to start here- build up to it- I think it is the most intense book I've ever read. 

Another favorite is One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer by Nathaniel Fick, I like this one because it shows how difficult it is to be a leader in combat- you can tell he cared about his people and didn't want to take stupid unnecessary risks with their lives- he seems to have taken his responsibility to his men very seriously. I've noticed that most the books I've been reading are about Iraq- I'm not sure why but there seems to be more memoirs about Iraq than Afghanistan- so I like that Fick talks a little bit about their tour in Afghanistan before focusing on Iraq.

Roughneck Nine-One: The Extraordinary Story of a Special Forces A-Team at War by Frank Antenori and Hans Halberstadt was a fun read- it is very Hoorah for lack of a better word- after reading a few books by men who never really expected to be deployed and therefore were pretty bitter about it (ie- The Last True Story I'll Ever Tell- not that I blame John Crawford for being bitter)- it was actually nice to read a book by someone who enjoyed being in the military. And while the men in this book wanted to fight and talked about "piling them up" (them being enemy dead) the book still acknowledges that war is not pleasant and that it has its costs.

I just finished reading I Love my Rifle More Than You: Young and Female in the U.S. Army by Kayla Williams, this is the first time I've read a war memoir by a female soldier- and I really liked it. Sometimes the writing is rough- I couldn't figure out if that was just her style but it seemed like there were a lot of fragment sentences that I found distracting but I think she was trying to make a point- I don't usually notice stuff like this- but it was hard to ignore. Overall, I think she does a really good job showing how difficult it is for women in the military and how hard it is to know how to act when everything they did was judged by the men around them and always seemed to come back to their sexuality. I also like her discussion of her frustration of bad female leaders and her argument (only briefly mentioned) that the Army is basically a communist institution.

I just started reading My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell.  It's still to early to make a recommendation- but so far- so good. I really like how blunt he is even if it doesn't always make him likable although it often makes the book really funny...      

What do women want?

Apparently they want botox, lazar hair removal, teeth whitening, a makeover, and jewelry.

I went to the "What a Woman Wants Show," at the Sandy Expo Center with my sister and my nieces yesterday. The majority of the booths had to do with physical appearance, there were also booths that sold shoes, handbags, or jewelry. I should note that there was a booth for the University of Phoenix- but there was no line there.

It was fun though, my nieces got their hair done at the Sweet and Sassy booth and left a trail of glitter (aka fairy dust) behind them.

Dog-sitting again

I'm dog-sitting again, it seems like I spend more time at other peoples' houses watching their pets than I do at my own- luckily I don't mind. Laura recently suggested I make a career out of it- maybe I'll bring that up the next time a professor tells me how abysmal the job market is. 

This weekend I'm hanging out with my parents' dog, which means I'm not getting paid, but at least their dog is fun. Here she is...

Conference after conference

Thursday I presented at my 3rd conference of the year (and fourth ever). 

The first one I went to this year was the Art of Gender in Everyday Life Conference. The best part of going to a conference, besides all of the academic stimulation, is going to all of the exotic locations where the conferences are held. This conference was in the very exotic... Pocatello!

A week later I went to my next conference, the Southwestern Historical Association Conference in a slightly less exciting locale- Vegas. Of course I painted the town red- if you can do that from your hotel room while you're working on your thesis- I'm such a WILD girl!!

At my most recent conference I presented with my American West Center cohort on our digitization project at the Utah Library Association and Mountain West Library Association Conference. This actually was my best conference so far- turns out librarians show up to stuff! At the other conferences there were maybe 10 people in the room including the speakers, at this conference we presented to an audience of over 40! (And we were competing against the LDS Fiction Extravaganza). And better yet people actually seemed interested- it was great.

The day before the conference the Director Emeritus at the American West Center gave me some very wise conference advice...

"If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit!"

     

Graduation!

I Graduated! Yippee! I didn't want to walk but I knew it meant a lot to my parents- so I did- and I'm so glad I did. I guess it's a good idea to celebrate an accomplishment like this- it makes it feel more real some how. 

This first picture is of all the students lining up outside for the procession.

Here's the procession in. It started late but went surprisingly well. Mario Capecchi was the Commencement Speaker, he is the first U faculty member to receive the Nobel Prize. His talk was good except he went on and on about Global Warming- it was kind of a call to action-  but awfully gloomy.

Singing kids

I went to my niece's Spring School Program tonight, which was a tribute to the '50s and of course- my niece was amazing! She stole the show. However, I must say that there is nothing as funny as Pre-K and Kindergarten kids singing Hound Dog.   

Saying goodbye to the U...

I can't believe my time here at the U is almost up. Today I stopped by the Student Services Center on my way to the final exam for the class I'm grading and cleaned out my box. This is where I had my office while I've been the SI Supervisor. Here's the outside of the building- 

I can't believe I worked there for 4 years- it seems like I just got the job- hell- it seems like only yesterday I was still working at the car dealership.