Yet Another Reason Why My Job is the Greatest

Coworker this morning: "Hey, can you look at that chart over there on the bulletin board, the one that says where to give unusual mail?"

Me: (refers to piece of paper on bulletin board titled, 'Unusual Mail') "Yeah."

Coworker: "Who does it say to give creepy handwriting from Canada to?"

Me: (finds line where someone has written "creepy handwriting from Canada --> Admissions") "Admissions."

Coworker: "K, thanks."


Intrigued, I ask to be able to examine this unusual, apparently common, piece of mail. Sure enough, it is from Canada. And yes, the handwriting is pretty creepy. It is addressed to "Bringham Young University."



Coworker: "Yeah, we've been getting these ever since I've worked here."

The real jackpot appears when we decide to help Admissions out and open the envelope ourselves.

Inside we find a generic, 90's-style, fold-out sympathy card, reciting things like "Our loved ones leave the world, but never our hearts" and other such corny adages. And then....

"To this may concern
I am leaving my apartment
The Osmonds' parents are
Dead. My parents are dead.
I miss my Mom.

The Osmonds are married.
I can't meet Donny Osmond.
Please give this card
To the Osmond Family.
Donny and Marie Osmond
Are in Les Vegas.
I hate Goderich."
(this last part had us puzzled until we realized that the card was sent from Goderich, Ontario)

With Sympathy
"Brenda C--" (I have abbreviated the culprit's name for privacy's sake)

I feel for Brenda, I really do. That sucks that her parents are dead, and that she misses her mom. And I know what it's like to hate your current place of residence, too, Brenda. So I'm happy for her. She says she's leaving her apartment, and this detail is confirmed on the front of the envelope as well (you can see it in the lower left corner). Way to take your life by the horns, Brenda.

The question is, how do I go about notifying Donny and Marie of this address change? I should probably start by forwarding this on to Les Vegas.

I stole a pen.

Ripped it right out of an envelope addressed to some Kristin Gillespie who was not in our system, therefore she does not reside at BYU anymore, therefore the pen inside is mine. It says Brigham Young University on it. I could use a good pen. I've been buying a lot of duds lately. Thanks, National Pen Company.

Also, good news all you faithful followers! I feel an influx of blog posts coming on, possibly with regular frequency, because I am so mind-numbingly lonely. Blogging, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Over and out.

Time to Kill

Here are some unconnected thoughts for you, from me, as of 9:32am, 7 Jan 2010:

• I love my job because I am being paid to blog.
• I am po'. It's my own fault. Thanks for the financial reinforcements as always, parents!
  
• Boys make me sad.
• I miss Teancum.
  
• And my family.
• I really enjoy BYU bookstore cinnamon sugar bagels with apple cinnamon cream cheese. Mmmm.
• Mail-sorting ruins the flesh around my nails.
• Casimir Pulaski Day by Sufjan Stevens is a great song and I am inexplicably obsessed with it.
  
• Speaking of great songs, thanks to Bryce for letting me kife "The Resistance" (by Muse) from him. Why is that band so rockin'?
• I made apple waffles on my new waffle iron yesterday and it was successful and delicious. Love it.
• Campus Plaza is kind of ridiculous in its ghetto-ness. It's cool though.
  
• Single student life is lonely. I hate it.
• I'm kind of a downer, huh.
• Well...
• Running makes me happy.
  
• And so does black-bottom cherry cream cheese pie.
  
• Also, I watched Wayne's World last night, and while it is pretty much really crude and dumb, I also found it to be undoubtedly comedic. I'm glad there are some movies like that.
  
• Yesterday in my abnormal psych class, I watched a how-to video from the 40's on performing lobotomies. Gross. And fascinating! Did you know that the Utah State Hospital is 125 years old? It is, like, a legit, creepy, old-time insane asylum. Maybe I should quit school and take a year-long tour of all the historic insane asylums of America. That sounds like a good use of my time and resources.
• My boss is the sweetest, most good-humored, old man ever. He is a Vietnam vet. His hands are really dry and crackly. He gives me the rock nearly every morning. I love him. I love old men.
  
• I have much respect for bus drivers, especially the ones who have been driving the same route for over 30 years. That is unfathomable to me. But then, I do have a lot of growing up to do.
• I only have one class today. That is happy.
• That bookstore bagel and cream cheese is sounding pretty applicable right about now. But then I'd have to leave this room and walk out in the cold and then walk back. Is it worth it? And when should I nap? Or should I? It's very important to schedule one's naps carefully.
• Deep purple and cranberry actually go pretty well together, I think. I didn't used to think so.
• Ok, I have a plan. I'm going to go buy a bagel, eat it, then take a brief nap in the B-wing bathroom, then go to class, then resume my nap until my friend (lets call her Lola) comes to pick me up and take me to Murray. Cool. Ready, break.
• Am I seriously going to post this? Yes. Yes, I am.
  

Now I Have Guilt

I did something uncharacteristically mean-spirited today and I feel I must confess.
So, remember that favorite napping spot of mine in the second floor, C-wing bathroom of the ASB? Yes, well, it's still my favorite napping spot, and I've taken to napping there nearly every day after the morning route. Today as I was falling asleep I had a thought come to my head, which went something along the lines of, "I wonder if anyone cares that I sleep in here. No one's ever confronted me about it. Huh."

Well. Call it intuition, or maybe foresight, but guess what happened next? I woke up about an hour and a half later and happened to turn over and glance acros the room, where my eyes found this neon sticky note taped to the edge of the counter, right where I could see it:



I was stunned. Who would write such a thing? Didn't they know I AM an employee? I didn't mean to impose on anyone, I just get really tired sometimes! Is it so wrong to want to take a nap in a vacant bathroom lounge? The hearted exclamation point merely added insult to injury.

I tried to go back to sleep, but of course my affronted mind wouldn't rest. Self-conscious distress quickly morphed into bitterness, so I made my way down to the mailroom where I knew I would find a sympathetic co-worker. Kathryn was just as outraged as me. After a bit of brainstorming, we responded with this:


"Dear passive-aggressive employee,
Do you always heart your exclamation points? Anyway, I am an employee here, but thanks for your concern" (followed by three obnoxious hearted exclamation points).

The more I read over that, the more immature it looks. It's probably the brattiest thing I've ever done. And of course as soon as I left it I felt instantly guilty for spreading contention. I will let this stand as another testament of the importance of abstaining from action in a moment of anger.

But. I have to admit... it certainly made our day more interesting. When we went around the building for the noon route, Kathryn checked up on the note to see if the offender had anything else to say, and she found it in an angry crumple in the garbage can, with a hole in it (?!).

On that note, you should all go here
(apologies for the occasional profanity on above-linked website)

Enjoy your workspaces, everyone.

Update-town

Yeah, ok, so maybe I can't attribute ALL of my blog absence to introversion. I really don't feel like my life is comprised of very many responsibilities/activities that might justify such a severe case of blog neglect, however, upon further thought I have decided that those few things that do fill my life are major time-sucks. So here they are (unfortunately, taking pictures has not been one of those time sucks, so most of these are going to have to be supplied by Google):


Ah yes, it is a familiar scene for each of us. This is me after a particularly draining day of the pursuit of knowledge. It's not that I don't like to learn; why, George H. Brimhall said that "It is a sin to be ignorant when there is so much opportunity for knowledge", and I think I believe him. Sometimes, though, just sometimes, I can't help but wonder if there isn't a better way. There's something very unsettling about this system we have of cramming our heads by day and partying it all out by night, only to rinse and repeat the next day, and the day after that, every day! And it's at this point that I ought to remind everyone that I'm only taking 12 credits. How on earth do my other, more ambitious peers do this every day without going completely postal? Beats me, but I applaud them whole-heartedly.


Speaking of postal...this quaint picture symbolizes me and my new job at the ASB mailroom. It really is a great job - I get there at 7:20 every morning, sort mail, deliver it to the all the important peeps working in the ASB, stay clocked in while I go about campus doing my thing, come back at 11:30 to sort and deliver packages, clock out, fine. So in reality, this really doesn't take up much of my time, but it's a significant part of my life nonetheless. I've always enjoyed sorting things (silverware being my only exception), and I like knowing that I am the appointed vessel to hand-deliver all the important pieces of mail to all the important people in the ASB. Plus, you begin to feel like you're real hot stuff because you're on a first name basis with Michael Colledge's secretary, you know that Carl Bailey prefers people to knock before entering, and you're sad that Mary Whipple will soon be leaving the records office to go serve a mission with her husband.

This picture represents me and and how much I freaking love my food prep class. Dude. Best class ever. We meet once a week to learn about food for an hour, then cook for three hours, and then we eat all our creations. Lest you need convincing, it is awesome. Today was egg week and my kitchen made a charming chocolate roll cake, read: giant ho-ho. Um, wow. Besides the obvious benefit of having all my meals covered every Wednesday, I really like the abundance of new, tried-and-true recipes I've gleaned from taking this class. Because I love you all, here is the recipe for the fabulous Salmon with Honey Mustard Glaze we enjoyed last week for meat week:

1 lb salmon fillet
Marinade:
1 T packed brown sugar
1 T margarine, melted
1 T vegetable oil
a T honey
1 T soy sauce
1 T prepared mustard
1 clove garlic, crushed

1. Mix marinade ingredients in a small bowl.
2. Place salmon, skin side down, in a shallow baing dish.
3. Pour marinade over salmon. Cover and refrig. 30 min.
4. Set oven control to broil.
5. Remove salmon from marinade. Reserve marinade. Place salmon, skin side down, on rack in broiler pan.
6. Broil with top 4-6 inches from heat for 10-15 minutes, brushing with marinade every few minutes, or until salmon flakes easily with a fork.
7. Discard remaining marinade.

Ok, so I realize we don't all have salmon lying around our kitchens waiting for the perfect recipe. But hey, I'm sure that honey mustard glaze could be a very nice supplement to pretty much any meat dish save ground beef, eh?



There's been a lot of running going on lately in preparation for the annual Rex Lee Run, in which my former roommate Jenn and I will be running the 10k! Woohoo! I think it's safe to say now, after several years of this business, that I really do enjoy running. I always look forward to blasting my ipod and turning off my brain for a good 40-min block of sweet tune-outage. This is probably due in part to the effects of that merciless homework system mentioned earlier. But don't worry all you worry-heads; I am always vigilant of potential rapists. Plus, I know ka-razy, too.

Yes, my first picture already hinted at this, but it's just too large a part of my life to leave out. I. Love. Sleep. I think I will always love sleep. Few things frighten me more than the prospect of having to carry out a full day on less than 7 hours of it. Recently, I have had the good fortune of coming across the perfect campus nap spot: The second floor, C-wing bathroom of the ASB, which has a little lounge area complete with psychologist couch and pillows. Plus, there is relatively little traffic since the ASB houses mostly male employees and this particular restroom has only to accomodate the second-floor ladies. I set the alarm on my phone, snuggle in, and I am out. It is glorious.



Of course, this post wouldn't be entirely honest if I didn't admit that the biggest time-suck, next to homework, is the boy. Not that he's not worth it or anything...but I do sometimes think I should be allowed to factor him in as three extra credit hours or something, just to make myself feel a little better about being such a deadbeat blogger, you know?