Happy 2008

It's official. It's the year 2008. Wow.

For New Year's Eve I once again attended the YSA dance, this year in Mount Vernon. I'm pretty sure I've done this every year since...2002 to 2003. Wow, that seems like a long time. While I don't know very many people left out here in Virginia, I still thought it would be fun to go. After all, who could break a long-standing tradition like the one I've created over the past five years. So, even though Ruthie and Jeremy were unsure about going, I convinced them, we all donned matching black and red outfits ( haha so they weren't really matching and it wasn't really planned, but we did all wear these colors) and we set out to have the time of our lives....OK OK, so not really, but still.

I always find it interesting who I randomly see at these dances. There are always random people I recognize from BYU, or other such individuals about whom I have to wonder, "Why are THEY at my dance!" Yes, five years of attendance allows me to think of it as MY dance. Then there are the people who have probably also attended such dances for the past 5 years and who I recognize from girls camps and youth conference. And then there are the characters and the old people. That pretty much sums it up.

These dances never make it quite clear as to what the dress code is and usually everyone has a hard time actually following it. I believe this year it was technically semi-formal. However, no matter what it is "actually" supposed to be, we always have people in anything from jeans to full-out formals and tuxedos. Kinda funny and potentially awkward. I now tend to stick to the perfect medium - I wear a skirt and make some effort on my hair.

The highlight of the evening was running into my friend Kasey from my London study abroad. It was still the beginning of the dance and like....8 people were dancing. (yes, it's a church dance and they always start out lame) I hear some say Karianne?? and wow it's Kasey. Such a surprise! The classes in London were the last official BYU classes he took, and then he moved to d.c. to work. I saw him at graduation in August and hadn't even remembered he was in D.C. So that was a total shocker. But it was really really fun to see him.

Anyways, I can tell that it's late and this seems really random. But it's 2008. The first thing I think of when I think 2008 is 2004....kinda weird but I think I think in even numbers and for some reason that's the first thing that pops in my head. 2004 was a big year for me so it's kinda crazy that it's a good 4 years away. Maybe I'll look into what those 4 years have brought later. Also, no worries, I think I will be thinking about some New Year Resolutions to work on ... Ok, I'm drifting off...this is getting more confusing,...and so I'm off! Love ya 2008

No Breaks, No Gas

So being home and driving a bit has reminded me of a "game" my sis and I would play on our road....and not the most safe of all games. Being in Virginia, our street is very curvy and hilly, so we turn off of the main road and encounter a decline which gradually flattens and becomes a slight incline...and then you come to our relatively steep driveway. So the "game" is to at a certain point early on on the street you stop using the gas or breaks...and then see how far up our driveway you can get after the various hills and turns. We never got too far....probably like a 1/4 of the way into it. We would often chicken out and use the breaks, or cheat and sneak a little gas power in there....or start playing way too close to the end so of course we'd get all the way up....anyways...random

the PINK life

So the trend continues. I now have three sisters who are official Mary Kay consultants- Julie, Ruthie, and...Susie. We went to a Glamour Lash Out Party that Julie was a part of where we did basic skin care and glamour make up, including fake eyelashes (to help prepare for the upcoming New Years Eve festivities). The party had two "regional directors" I believe and about three other consultants and their guests. Julie had 5 guests there. It was more formal of a party and at the end they had a little informational thing with prizes and question and answer time...basically to encourage us to ask them questions about a Mary Kay business and why it's so great and stuff. Then they ask, on a scale from one to ten how likely do you feel about starting your own business. Ruthie was first and she was like, actually, I think I'm going to do it. Yay for her. Susie said she thought she might but didn't know if college students did this type of thing. The people told her that she should do it do take to Spain to become more familiar about the products and well then it might turn into something she could do more than selling pest control this summer....in the long run, it could probably get her more money too. (The lady there started seven years ago and now, on top of sales, she gets a check for $20,000 A MONTH) So Susie agreed after Julie offered to pay the 100 dollars to get the start up package. (Which has a 90% money back guarantee by the way-...so if she decides she doesnt want to really do it, she can still get 90 bucks back.) I said I was like a 6 (because they wouldn't let you be middle of the fence) but that I just didn't see myself doing it right now, but maybe in the future a ways. I was the last one to go and my sisters were all like...ooo Karie you should do it too...you know, sister "peer" pressure. I just don't know. I'm not sure if I could see myself actually doing it, or if I want to...the little extra money that it provides might be nice - typically doing 2 hours a week brings in about 11,000 dollars of profit for you a year. And that's just two hours. Pretty much one sale covers the start up cost...and then you have "your own business" I guess we'll see.....

MP3 FIESTA!

Ruthie told me about this site a couple of days ago and as I look into it, well, it seems pretty cool. It's a site from which you can download music legally for just 10 cents a song. You just have to pay up front with a minimum balance of 20 bucks....which gives you just about 200 songs. Kinda crazy. Anyways I think I'm going to start using it and if you are at all interested please use the link below to start your account- it will give me 5 dollars on my account, otherwise 50 songs!


http://www.mp3fiesta.com/?user=1416805

Yep...Frontier still stinks

OK the second half....I was expecting them to pull themselves out of my negative customer satisfaction....but no... OK it's really not horrible horrible, but I've had a lot better service other places. For example, their choice of snacks kinda stunk. I had potato chedder skins but it was either that or spicy peanuts or coffee granola bars. Our flight attendant was pretty friendly and kinda funny plus we sat in the exit row so we got extra leg room. So that was nice. Again, it wasn't horrible horrible and I was starting to think that it was just me being picky. But then the baggage claim time came along. First it was like a half hour wait until anything started coming out...and then well, we were the last ones waiting around and Susie's bag still didn't come. Turns out it got stuck in Denver (but not our other three bags) and it won't be arriving till tomorrow...and THEN they will ship it to us. Let's just say I wasn't exactly a happy camper about this whole Frontier thing.

Also, what's with their slogan: A whole different kind of animal....it doesn't even make sense

Frontier Stinks

Okay, so I don't remember if I have flown on Frontier before but I have officially decided that they stink...and so far it's only been like an hour and a half flight to Denver. But yea, they stink. First, no Sky Caps....maybe not that big of deal but sometimes, like today, when Susie is moving home all of her stuff, we kinda might have a difficult time lugging it into check in ourselves. Second, I thought it was rather odd that the guy who let us on our plane simply tore our tickets like they do when you go to a movie theater. The seats...were alright...I admit there was a lot of room but we got put on the very back row where you cant move the seats back at all and it kinda sucked. They also have the individual tv screens on each seat but then they make you pay to watch a movie. LAAAME. Watching a movie on a flight for free should be expected. Then, the flying itself didn't seem all that great...maybe it was the weather ??? but it was the worst "turbulence" I've ever seen on a flight. Anyways....just a simple bad impression on Frontier. We'll see how the second half goes.

Fall 2007....Done, Complete, Finished

So I finished what I expect to be my last semester at BYU ever. And it's kinda crazy. The last four months weren't anything like I expected them to be. In fact, they were completely opposite of every expectation I had. While it hasn't quite hit me that I am completely done, I've have looked back and realized I've done a heck of a lot this semester. There are several things that I definitely neglected and I probably didn't do as well in several areas of my life as I would have liked. But I can't believe that I actually accomplished some of the things that I did. So I present: My Semester Accomplishments

1. Successfully working four well-paying on-campus jobs

People say I'm crazy, but when the opportunities came, I just couldn't turn them down. I didn't work because I needed the money, but because I loved the experiences each job offered and the chance I had to further develop my skills. I wonder how many people actually have this many jobs on campus in one semester. (Wow, I've actually had 6 on-campus jobs at BYU including the Daily Universe and staff for Stadium of Fire) I also wonder how many people they actually let defy the hour limits....by the end of the semester, I'm pretty sure I had no limits on what I could work. It started as 20, went up to 25 for the design job, got an additional 20 a week of the editing job, and then of course, the TC has special privileges concerning hours during finals. I never, however, worked all four jobs in one week- the most I did was three: Finals week = 45 hours, 1st week in November = 40.

2. Designing the layout for an entire 34-page alumni magazine

This was such an amazing opportunity and is really the essence of what I really really want to be doing for a career. I have no idea how I will find out about future chances to completely design small magazines, but if I could do this one every year, I would jump at such an opportunity. This has been an amazing portfolio builder and I have loved every second I have spent working on it. (Yes, redesigning the cover like 17 times was a bit much but still very fun.) I have yet to see the final product-hopefully that will happen the first of January-and I hope everything will go smoothly and it really will look amazing.

3. Securing a freelance editing position for as long as I want it

Freelancing is always a bit hard to jump into, so I am completely thrilled that I have this set up already to last for as long as I want it. I went to the interview thinking that I wouldn't take the position - afterall, I simply didn't have enough time. But after they talked about what I would be doing and that they really wanted the position to turn longterm and have me work from home or whatever I end up doing later in life...well, can someone really turn that down?? I love that it is for magazine content, so the articles are short and semi-interesting....I just have to make it all the more so and perfect for the intended audience. In my last editing class, I kinda dreaded every assignment but that's because I know that I never never want to go into book editing, or anything for long, boring, technical writing - No thank you! But....I'll take this magazine one!

4. Making it through 3+ "cuts" and securing an internship with the Church Magazines.

This was such a long process and I had so many up and down thoughts about the whole thing. But now that it's here and secure, I'm really excited and amazed at the opportunities that keep presenting themselves to me. I'm going to be writing for the Ensign and Liahona, kinda a big task considering the multi-million, international audience. I've always enjoyed writing and have always been told that I'm a good writer, but it's kinda interesting to really see where it takes me. I actually just received feedback on my internship portfolio that I turned into the Comms department and the professor gave me really good feedback on my writing style. In all of the writing work that I've done, I haven't very often had a completely objective person tell me what they think about it (as compared to an editor or boss). I always wonder what the people from the jobs I apply to really think about my writing....is it about average, above, etc....I just don't know. Anyways, I think this opportunity will be really good for me to strengthen this aspect of my skill set just a little more....plus give me a little time to find-hopefully-the perfect thing to do after the NEXT four months.

thanks sis

So it's 12:30 a.m. and I just got to the library. And, before I can dive into the work that I've put off until this early hour, I of course have to check my email, facebook, and now blogs. My sister Christy had recently sent me an email about how she liked that I had a blog so I made sure to check hers. I loved her most recent post and think that, while some stuff is a bit different than what I think, the bulk of it covers a lot of my same thoughts. So instead of repeating...heres a link: Sick of Blogging

My short response to what she said: Christy, I loved your blog. Thanks for your comment as well...I do think I express myself more in writing and while I'm sometimes hesitant to freely advertise my blog, it is nice having some sort of place where you can let loose on whatever is going on. Sometimes I just pretend that no one else can read my blog...but then it is nice having people understand a bit more. I enjoy your blog and hope you keep it up!

just a little thought

So I've realized that we really live in a selfish world...but it's hard not to. Everyone is living a completely different life and is facing completely different issues and decisions. And, as a result, everyone is really focused on themselves most of the time. Maybe this is something I've noticed is because I am personally too selfish and am noticing how everyone is only focusing on themselves (and not on me :)...jk I don't expect that). But it's interesting. I guess it has to be a give-give situation. Sometimes you really need to talk about something and so they do...but the more than likely the other person has something to talk about as well. I really don't think this is making any sense or even getting across the idea I've been thinking about at all...but it's an interesting compromise to focus on what you are doing and offer the considerate amount of attention to other people, and to maintain a consistency through every relationship.

Dilemma dilemma

Do something you might not entirely enjoy v. Do nothing at all?

The guys goatee, my lack of sleep

I've never really cared one way or another about BYU's grooming standards for guys. Yes, it is good for some people who should never ever have facial hair, but all in all, it doesn't bother me one way or another....today I had my first unpositive (I thought negative was too strong) experience with it. It's not horrible but just one of those things you go..."are you serious" about.

We didn't know what to do for the cover of the magazine I'm designing for the longest time. The things we wanted kinda fell through and we didn't seem to have any quality pictures that were big enough to print on a cover. We had one really cute photo that was semi big enough...but it ended up looking like a cooking magazine. So when we finally thought about using this next photo, it seemed to work perfectly. It was by far the largest photo we had so we didnt need to worry about resolution...the background was kinda busy but we were able to cut that out and worked with colors and I finally got something that I liked. We wanted to send everything to the printer tomorrow but when we had the high-ups look at everything, they said we couldn't because the guy has a goatee, which is against the BYU standards so we can't distribute that on our cover. Hmmm. I guess it makes sense but still! We aren't saying he's a student and I'm pretty sure everyone is aware that some people do grow facial hair at some point.

So it's back to the drawing board for me. I thought I'd be done with my crazy schedule this evening but, alas, I am not. I have kinda put off sleep until Tuesday. I've got an average of 4 or 5 hours a night for the last week. I'm getting in a bad habit because I'm tired all day until about 10 pm and then I'm completly awake and have no problem working until 3:30 in the morning. Hopefully I'll get back on track soon. One more 16 hour day on campus won't kill me right....right?