Work

Today I am at work. In the soils lab. I've decided that our slogan should be:

The BYU Soils Lab: where we grow grass and weed and grind all day.

Just throwing it out there...

A Brush With Death

My horse's name is Abigail. She is part thoroughbred, part quarter horse, and part Satan. Her redeeming quality is that she is fast. Very fast. On the opposite side of the spectrum, Mr. T, the horse my mom usually rides, is the sweetest most kind horse ever to exist; but he's still pretty young and not as seasoned as Abby. When I came home for summer, my mom and I decided to switch horses since she had been riding Abby and since I was only going to be there a short while, it would be more enjoyable to ride Mr. T..

We entered a barrel racing competition one weekend and I drew last. They had watered the indoor arena down so it wouldn't be super dusty, but they watered it too much which made the ground hard to run on and by the time it was my turn to go, the ground was looking pretty bad. I ran to the first barrel and right before I turned Mr. T tripped. I could feel his feet fighting to gain back balance but it never came. I was hurling forward towards the ground and I thought, " He's not coming out of this. I need to bail... now." I was almost level to the ground when I let go of the reins and put my hands out to catch myself. Praying that my feet would come out of the stirrups, I landed on all fours and crawled to the fence, afraid that in his attempt to get up I would get kicked in the head. I looked back and could see his body folded over his neck and I gave up hope of him being alive by the time I stood up. But he was. As I rose and turned around he had just gotten up and was shaking his head. I could hear Amy, the announcer, ask if I was okay and I nodded towards the stand. I slowly made my way to him, clasped the reins, and stroked his neck. By the time I stood up, my dad had jumped the fence into the arena, ran across, and was by my side when I got to Mr. T., my mom following right behind him. After making sure I was alright, my parents made turned their attention to Mr. T., just standing there quietly. He seemed okay, so we all walked out of the arena together among applause from the crowd. At the trailer we gave him some Bute, a rub down with cool pack, and walked him around outside for a while. He acted as if nothing happened. Friends and a lot of people we didn't know came over to see if we were okay and to congratulate me on being alive. A fact that I was grateful for. My favorite quote from my mother during this whole ordeal: "...and you didn't even cry!"

Here's a link to the first barrel photo. We haven't decided yet if we want to buy one.

My Name Is Chelsea, And I'm A Mac

Today is the day I became a Mac. That's right. In case you didn't notice in the little bulleted list of things I did during my absence, my computer broke but I never bought a new one. Until today. And what did I buy? A MacBook Pro. It is fantastic. Granted, I've only had it for half of a day, but still. I love it. It's so sleek and cool and even better: it makes me sleek and cool, too! I don't know how it does it.

Anyways, that is all.

Back From the Dead

In case you haven't noticed, this blog has been void of new posts since St. Patrick's Day. Sorry about that. It would take too long to tell all the things I've done between then and now, so a short billeted list will have to suffice.

• Secured a job for summer semester - Thank you Dr. Hopkins!
  
• Finals - went well
• Computer broke during finals - not optimal
  
• Moved back to Idaho - living in paradise
  
• Went to North Carolina - my nephew is so cute!
  
• Went to Hawaii - I thought Idaho was paradise...
  
• Came back to Provo - so far so good

So that's pretty much it. I'll post pictures sometime. Maybe.

As of late I devote the majority of my time working. I work on the 2nd floor of the Widtsoe building. It's pretty legit to say the least. My top three favorite things are:

1. I get to wear a lab coat every day. (except for when we do field work outside, which is even better than the coat)
2. All the doors have keypads that unlock only after entering the secret password. And I can unlock all of them. And I do it nonchalantly, despite the fact that really I am celebrating a private victory inside.
3. All the people I work with are awesome to say the least. This makes my job especially fun.
   

My daily tasks vary depending on what needs to be done. It's always changing. Some days we go out to the farm and do field work, sometimes I do experiments in the lab, sometimes I'm a secretary; sometimes a maid; sometimes a TA. Right now I'm analyzing nitrous oxide samples with the Gas Chromatograph. Say that five times fast. Actually, I just did and it wasn't that hard...

Basically my job is a lot of hard work, but it's super fun. And I am just happy to have it :)

Happy St. Patrick's Day

A video to commemorate the glorious day of St. Patrick.

Sorry I haven't written is such a long time, but I will catch you up.

Someday.

For Reasons Unknown

Right now I'm supposed to be filling out the reasons BYU should give me money to go to their school. Right now I'm supposed to have reasons BYU should give me money to go to their school. The allocation of the money from the Department of Plant and Wildlife Sciences is determined on the following things:

• GPA... Not great
• Need... My parents pay for my schooling
  
• Professional goals... TBA
  
• Activities utilizing your major... Backpacking across Europe?
  
• Leadership/extracurricular activities... Activities Co-chair?
  
• Extenuating circumstances... I've got to have some kind of emotional damage
  
• Two letters of recommendation... Luckily my professors like me. I hope.
  

We'll see how this goes...

What's Up?

I hate the phrase "What's up?" Every time this phrase is said in passing it's awkward. Let's just face it: Nothing is ever up. Ok? The only acceptable variation of "what's up?" is "WAZZUP!" from this video:

The topic of this post comes from an encounter I had today in which a guy from my biology class last semester passed me on campus and after he said "what's up?" I replied, cooly, "Mmmmmmnothing..." It was awkward.

The video comes from fond childhood memories of my friend Kristen and me saying, "WAZZUP?!" all the time after we saw it.