overly obedient

Today a memory randomly flew into my mind while I was teaching.
Years ago I worked at the MTC Copy Center (which tons of people heard as "Coffee Center" and ended up well confused). One day an elder brought in a project but had forgotten his cash. Normally we'd tell the missionary to bring it back once he had his money. This time I jokingly told the elder that he needed to do twenty push-ups to rectify his blunder. I turned away to do his job fast and looked back to tell him that it'd be done in a sec, but he was gone. His companion was still there, so I was really confused. Then I looked outside the copy center and the elder had dropped to do the push-ups.

Sometimes jokes get swallowed up in the missionary flare for obedience.


And I chuckled in class for no reason apparent to my students.

UVU DS/Mark of the Beast

So I'm walking by UVU's digital sign board (there are 2 in our building, that's why I post on this so much), and I see this professor with the mark of the beast. Or at least something to that effect:

 

If you look closely, you'll see it:

It was the weirdest thing. So I asked about it, why the professor had the mark of the beast. It comes from this picture:

They did great at editing the white board, but sorta ignored his face. Oops.

Also, if you look closely, you'll see the student playing a bubble bursting game:

Latest in Awkward Signage

Maybe the people who make the UVU signs get what's going on. Or maybe they're all about post-modern shock value? I dunno. But I really don't get how Star Trek relates. Am I missing something?

My Birthday Card

Part 1:
I have a tendency to leave errrrr... goofy pictures of Tom Jones and The Hoff in a coworker's office and office drawers, just for funsies, you know. I even had her convinced that the Germans celebrated something called Hoffmas, which occurs during the fortnight 90 to 75 days before Easter.

Part 2:
Sting just released a great album called Symphonicities. I told my boss about the album, and I also happened to mention that I thought Sting was rather sexy.

Part 3:
I get to work today and, after a while, I open up my drawer and see this, which had me belly laughing, in tears for about 3 minutes before I regained my composure:

Sting as Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen in Dune

If you don't know what this picture comes from, you are very lucky. Dune is a terrible, terrible movie. Here are some clips to show you just how wonderful it is.

Part 4:
The best part of Dune? Captain Picard with a bald mullet.

Self Discipline > Office Health Gimmicks

Subtitle: But it's not like office health gimmicks are a bad thing

UVU is doing this thing called Spring into Shape. (Notice that the webpage is titled Sping into Shape, the letter R being optional, I guess.) It was the topic of discussion on and off today at the office. People were talking about how it was a great motivator, working in groups and stuff to accomplish goals, how the success rate will be higher. (And don't get me started on the UVU goal of drinking eight 8oz. glasses of water. Yeesh.)

My point was that working in groups, in the end, has nothing to do with success, that it's only self discipline. A coworker made the good point that when she was in this group and had to present something once a week, she made sure she did it. It wasn't like it was graded for a class, she just made sure she did it because they met together.

I countered that with, "Exactly, you weren't graded. In the end of things you accomplished what you did because of your self discipline. What if you missed a week of doing your stuff? You didn't. You controlled your time to accomplish what you wanted. It was all self discipline in the end, which is a good thing."

Scottie tonight made the point that it's very empowering to understand this. What we accomplish in life is all based on our ability to work toward something and persevere through difficulties (with Divine Help for eternal good measure).

It's all about self discipline.
And I have great faith in our ability to accomplish our goals. This concept gives me great hope.


Signed,
Vanessa "Aiming to take the theory of it all and turn it into a daily practice" Swenson

Fail Door

Construction at our office in DE just finished up. This time was much better than last time. But they've struggled with their doors. One was put in backwards, so they had to knock it out and do a switcharoo. One wall wasn't long enough to touch the door frame of another door. etc. etc.

But the ABSOLUTE BEST door blunder is shown in the following video my coworker and I took:

I could be a sober Norm

You know that TV show Cheers and the barfly, Norm Peterson, the erstwhile accountant and corporate executioner? I've thought for the last few years that I could follow in some of his footsteps. I'm not going to take up drinking, but I have thought about dropping any other profession and becoming a painter.
Anyway, that's all. I like painting houses.

Halloween

I wore my costume today at work, instead of tomorrow, the real Halloween. You've gotta wear your costume to school, right?
Anyway, here are pictures, some are prep pictures, some are the final dealio. See if you can figure out what I am. Answer at the end.
1.
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7.
8.

Did you figure it out? I'm a stereotypical south Utah County chica. As you can see from picture #8, I am wearing a bumpit. What a terrible, terrible idea. But, in the end, it made my costume easier. Picture #3 shows off the blue and green eye shadow that I bought specifically for the day, as well. Oh, and the shirt and denim vest are DI specials.

About 10 minutes into class today, one of my students sorta stopped what he was doing and said, "I'm sorry, it's just so hard to take you seriously when you look like that." Another friend of mine couldn't look at me without laughing.

My sister was sure that I'd get a date out of it.

I think my favorite part of the whole thing was the fact that a lot of people couldn't tell whether or not I was really serious about what I was wearing. I think that's really saying something for Utah County, don't you?

Another blunder posted for Larissa

I like gum. I also like to try new flavors of gum. This means that I have a lot of packs of different kinds of gum in my room. Mostly I put them in my Gum Bowl, which is a bowl made to look like a basketball with a goofy face on it.
I was explaining this to my coworker, about how I love gum and I said, "I'm just a dru........." At this point I put my head onto my desk and start to laugh. She doesn't know why I'm laughing, so I tell her I'm a gum addict. To which she responds, "Drug addict, huh?"

Man, I'm batting a thousand.

Mental Lapses lead to awkward Freudian Slips

I got used to using bigger spoons in Brazil. A couple of years ago, explaining this to Scottie, I said, "I'm really a big spooner."

Then today I was thinking about how I tend to drink a lot of water at work. I almost said, "I'm a heavy drinker."


But something that I did on purpose? I brought up the Chastity Talk Bingo that I made. I knew this would lead to an awkward moment of people having to think and mumble--while at work--about the dreaded Chastity Talk.
I know, I am a jerk.