Irks, Excitements, and Reasons to Graduate Quickly

Hello to all. It's been about a month since I've gotten on here and written anything. A little minor thing called EDUMACATION keeps getting in the way.

Anyway, the reasons for today's post are three-fold. I wish to express my annoyances with recent things, my excitement about Jennie's and my life, and other things.

Recently, I've been very upset with my wireless phone provider. This past May, I renewed my contract with them and purchased a new phone, an LG Chocolate (the first version). The second generation of Chocolate had already come out, but this one was an approved, pre-owned version, and it was only 50 bucks.

By the time August came around, the touch-screen part of the phone had gone out on me, and without it, the phone is worthless. I can't do anything with it. I took it to the store in Idaho Falls to get it fixed/replaced. They replaced the phone saying it must have had some kind of software error. I accepted that and took the replacement. Little did I know that no more that two months later, the replacement phone would restart the starting process over and over and over again, without warning.

Since the loading process wouldn't stop, the phone never fully loaded. I was forced, yet again, to get a replacement Chocolate and lost all the contacts from my phone! Needless to say, I was fairly irked at this. I didn't want another Chocolate, but the phone company has a policy that they can only switch to a new model of phone after a certain number of times replacing the original model.

So, I gave my dad (the lead name on the account) a call. He pays the company for our family plan, so he gives this company a nice chunk of change every month. They called me up and offered to replace my 3rd Chocolate with a new LG Envy2, which I'm very happy with. All it takes to get what you want is pulling a few of the right strings.

Last Chance Before School

Well, as a last-resort to try and get out of town before school started, Jennie and I decided to invite our friends, Mike and Courtney Hokanson to go to Yellowstone with us and make a day trip out of it.

It's kind of been a tradition for me over the last several years to make a trip up through there every summer. How could we make this one any different, especially before the baby comes and we'll have to limit our traveling?

Our first stop was Mesa Falls in Island Park. The falls are always breathtaking and so fun to see. We'd gotten an early start, and so it was still very chilly when we got there. You can see Jennie was all bundled up in her jacket, and a hoodie, but I was only wearing a long t-shirt and another short-sleeved one one top. I was freezing.

Later on, we stopped at Big Springs and saw the huge fish there. It hasn't been as good recently as it was when I was a kid b/c of the stupid seagulls that have, somehow, found their way there.


Our drive up through Yellowstone was very pretty, but pretty uneventful.

One funny thing, though, is that while we'd stopped at Old Faithful to see the geyser, we got there about 40 minutes before it was supposed to go off. We ate our lunches and enjoyed some time chatting. After that, we froze to our bones waiting for that stupid thing to go off. We waited a half hour (15 minutes either way of when it was supposed to go off) and decided that if you've seen it once, you've seen it a bunch of times. So, we took off to more interesting things.

On the drive down the south exit of Yellowstone, everybody in the car was already pretty beat. So, while they slept, I drove. They missed a very pretty drive, though.

We ended up in Grand Teton National Forest where we hiked around the south end of Jenny Lake and to Cascade Falls. It was a beautiful hike, but Mother Nature couldn't make up her mind as to the weather. When we first started walking, it was cold enough that we could see our own breath and we could have used a good cup of hot chocolate. But after bundling up and walking for about 15 minutes, the sun came out and we were sweating up a storm. We had to carry our coats with us through the whole two mile hike. Suffice it to say, we were slightly annoyed.

After the hike, we were completely famished and HAD to have something to eat. We'd wanted to wander the stores in Jackson Hole for a little bit, but decided that eating was more important. And, with Jennie pregnant, it's better to take the food.

We had an awesome dinner at Bubba's Barbeque. I swear they have the best beef brisket in the world.

On the drive home, though, I asked Mike to drive the rest of the trip b/c I was running on maybe 3-4 hours of sleep. I didn't sleep well the night before. One of those "little kid on Christmas Eve" kinds of things.

Anyway, we loved our trip and can't wait to do it again next year with our baby. Love to all.

Big News!!!

Jennie and I found out near the beginning of the month that we were pregnant.

After going to the doctor this week and having our first ultrasound, we decided to make it official among friends and family. So, here's our first baby picture.

When we were filling out all the paperwork that needed to be done for insurance applications, etc., we were asked to list a due date. We hadn't been to the doctor yet, and so we weren't quite sure what to put for a due date. We did some quick math and figured it would be near the end of March or beginning of April. So, we listed April 1st as the date for our baby to come.

Lo and behold, the doctor told us April 1st is going to be our due date. MAN!, we're good.

A Weekend Away

So, despite the fact that this has been a relatively uneventful summer, Jennie and I have had a few opportunities to get out of Rexburg for a day or so.

On Aug. 2nd, we were up at 3 am so that we could drive to Boise to attend my best friend Mike's wedding. It was a beautiful drive and a beautiful day. I kind of liked the fact that there was little to no traffic on the highway at 5 in the morning.

I should mention that, since we were going to be driving on a relatively deserted highway, I had the bright idea to bring a small 1 gallon jug of gasoline, just in case. Little did I realize that the fumes from the gasoline would get out from the can, and cause us both to be very nauseous. Jenny, especially, was feeling very green.

Once we got to Boise, we had a little trouble getting into our hotel because we were there at 10:30 am and the real check-in time was supposed to be 3 pm. The wedding was at 12:30, and we were supposed to be there at 12:00. Suffice it to say that we were a little bit panicked because we had been driving all morning and didn't exactly look our best.

We drove around for a little bit to make sure that we could find the temple from our hotel. It was only about a 6 minute drive. The desk manager at the hotel pulled a room from her sleeve and got us in so we could change and get to the wedding.

When we got to the temple, we went right into the waiting room. Courtney's Grandfather was a sealer, and gave a wonderful ceremony. I've known Mike for a long time, and I've never seen him so happy. He and Courtney both were radiant.

We had a great time and really enjoyed the festivities after the reception at Courtney's house. I did my usual thing with helping to decorate the car. I've had years of experience and really had quite the finesse the job required.

The drive back to Rexburg went without any hitches, and we were glad to be back so we could take a nap and really get some rest.