somber and elated

ok, I’m not really both at once. here are the reasons why I ought to be somber, and why I’m too elated to do so.

today at work mick sr held a council with all employees letting us know the current state of the company: not good. everyone was given the option of either moving to part time (20 hrs/week), or voluntarily leaving as part of a forced reduction. the second option would come with a week’s severance pay and eligibility for re-hire. of course, there will also be some mandatory layoffs, because we can’t keep everyone. luckily I get to be part of the “core group” consisting of administrative positions that will stay full-time. the risky part is that we can only guarantee full-time, or even part-time, work for the next 30 days. after that mick will reevaluate, and if things aren’t looking any better — well, it’s been fun.

but it isn’t really worrying me. I feel so absolutely ecstatic about going back to utah. I’m so super happy, like I haven’t been in a while. I mean I’ve been happy and all, but this is extra. lots more. isn’t it interesting that I made this decision right now, without knowing quite how much trouble mha is in? good timing. not on my part, but good timing nonetheless.

I sent out an email to everyone-ish letting them know I’ll be moving back, and asking for help finding housing. oh yeah, and I told seestur this morning. nemelka, q, and kamikaze all wrote back, sounding just as excited as I am. q actually called to chat for a while, and said he’ll keep an eye open for spots in the apartments near him. kamikaze was the first to reply, and said since she’s taken over the solarwind house I’m welcome to live there if I want. I’d be sharing a room with her the first semester, and then moving into seestur’s room after the wedding.

hm…it’s quite an idea. kamikaze says her friend who’ll be in the third room is also an english major, huzzah! I do love that house. my doubts come mainly because what if it’s too fun? am I really committed to this independent study thing, and will I be able to get work done? the tv was always on over there when nategust and nickelcade lived there. and we all know how I feel about tv. movies I don’t mind. maybe since seestur is engaged she watches less tv? more time with q? maybe? anyway. after I thought about it a while it seemed kind of silly to move back to utah for mainly social reasons and then try avoiding being social. yeah.

so there’s my elation. ryan has his 2 finals tomorrow, everyone cross your fingers that they’ll go well!

twelve pound yesterday

I’m delighted to report that ryan got his package (which, due to my forgetfulness, was only 11 lbs) and enjoyed it thoroughly. or hated it, but lied and said he enjoyed it thoroughly, which works just as well for me. almost.

haven’t slept well lately. I stayed up last night until about 12:30, because I took a nap from 3-8:30, and then (of course) couldn’t get to sleep at bedtime. ish. bedtime-ish. I woke up about every hour, with unpleasant dreams in between. not fun. the worst dream was this morning about 5:20, when I ought to have been already up and getting ready for work, but I don’t remember my alarm going off at all. it probably did though. anyway, it was almost a nightmare, and I thought of calling ryan to make me feel better. but that seemed rude, it being so insanely early in the morning.

I’m trying very hard not to fall asleep right now. if I take a nap, I’ll have the same dilemma as yesterday. I’d rather just get a good night’s rest tonight.

it looks like quite a few people will be let go at work. mick wants to completely change directions for the company; finish up the few projects we have now, and then start moving towards…something else. no one has really told me. lauren and mick jr have been trying to plan things out for the next few weeks, and I luckily know I’ll be staying. the work won’t be fun–they’re going to make me prep pec again, dangit–but at least I’m keeping my job.

did you know it’s really ineffective to try convincing God that what it seems like He’s telling you to do is really not all that logical? I attempted it the other night when I was praying about what to do this coming fall semester. “now look,” I said, “it just doesn’t make any sense to go back to utah. it isn’t reasonable.” after about three minutes I finally gave up, gave in. I knew what I needed to do; hey, it’s even what I want to do, but it seemed so irrational. in fact it still seems kind of irrational, but now I have divine backup, right?

so there’s my news: mika will be returning to utah at the end of august. indefinitely.

it’s an interesting story. when I was talking to ryan monday night I said, “have you ever wanted to do something that really didn’t make any sense if you thought about it logically?” he replied, “of course. lots of times.” until I asked that question it hadn’t occurred to me that I really wanted to go back to utah, that I was ready to go back. but I continued, “I think I want to come back to provo. but it’s so unreasonable.” ryan did a very good job of pointing out all the logical fallacies I was using as my arguments, most of which were based on the assumption that money is the only deciding factor in what one should do with one’s life at a given point in time. by the time we were done talking I was fairly convinced that I wanted to go back to utah more than anything else right now — however…it still didn’t make sense to do it. so I prayed about it, and regardless of the fact that I claimed it didn’t make sense, it seemed like the only thing to do.

yesterday I went in and had a talk with mick sr and told him I was tentatively considering moving back to utah at the end of summer. why did I phrase it like that? even when I talked to my dad about it I said, “I think I’d like to go back to utah.” but the truth is, I’m going. I know I’m going, and no one can change my mind about it. it’s a fact, not a possibility. I guess I didn’t want to seem like I had made a giant decision without consulting anyone (again) or thinking about it very much (read: new car).

and you know what? I’m so excited! I can’t wait. it probably helped my decision along a lot when I found out that ryan will be back at byu this next year. good times, very good times. I plan to keep this as a surprise for kimberlee.

well, what else would it be? if I talk to her about it she’ll try getting me to live with her, or be in her ward, or we’ll plan all sorts of things to do together…when I’d rather just keep life a little more casual than that. than her energy level, I mean. I’m not going to be her roommate again, not even for this one semester. which means I’ve got to find somewhere else to live. wrote jennifer an email asking what her plans are, and am trying to get ahold of aubrey.

no further updates at the moment…

serendipity

man oh man. I was up late last night — like, 2am late — so decided to go to rockville branch today. I walked into the institute building and who is the first person I see? …elizabeth felix!!

it must be more than two years since I’ve seen her. she’s living in sacramento, but comes down to fairfield about every other weekend. she said she almost changed her mind about going to rockville branch today. holy hannah am I glad we were both there! now I have a friend again! and she’s got lots of connections to…everyone, pretty much, and if she were my link in a big group of people I’d have nothing to worry about. elizabeth is one of the most awesome people I’ve ever known. huzzah!

church was decent. it was branch conference, so president clark came and spoke. I do enjoy his talks, and just listening to him in general; he’s very well-spoken, and puts in good amounts of humor. he also brought one heck of a sword to use as a…what’re they called? “visual aides.” yeah. this thing had to be three and a half, four feet long. massive. musta been heavy. he also taught the sunday school lesson, which wasn’t quite as interesting, and then we were going to have a combined priesthood/relief society during the third hour. all of this in the same room. my attention span ended about two-thirds of the way through sunday school, and I knew there was no way I’d ever make it through the last hour. so I skedaddled. got elizabeth’s number and email first, of course. imagine me prancing around on my tiptoes out of sheer joy, because I can have a life again.

I made cookies last night. sort of. it was the recipe chelsea-next-door gave me, for the ones that always come out with really dry dough…I forgot that the way I made them last time was to mostly melt the butter first, and add 1 cup of sifted flour at a time. that way it wasn’t dry. well, last night I didn’t do that; when I started mixing everything together, it wouldn’t mix, and there were clumps of butter everywhere. aha, I thought, I’ll just stick it in the microwave and melt the butter. the rest of it’ll be fine.

so I put it in the microwave, the butter melted and the dough came out wonderfully. then I added the chocolate chips and started stirring them in.

surprise, they started melting.

my shouts and cries to “stop it! stop it!” were to no avail. I ended up with chocolate cookie dough, instead of chocolate chip cookie dough. needless to say, the cookies didn’t turn out quite as planned.

I watched the terminal while I baked. can’t say that I really enjoyed it. granted, it certainly doesn’t even make it onto the list of biggest wastes of my time (read: honors econ at armijo), but the best thing I can say about the movie is that I’d watch it again if I thought my life was awful. the poor guy, honestly.

tonight at dinner I made kendy leave the table in anger, and storm into her room sobbing. in my defense, it was 98% unintentional, and I didn’t think she’d overreact that much. I was, like always, making strange faces and noises, and she asked me if I could please stop. “whoa!” I exclaimed. “I think that was the first time at dinner you’ve ever politely asked me to stop.” she replied, “well, since I did ask you nicely, I’d appreciate if in the future you didn’t make comments like that.” I could see it was really getting her, but do I pull back? no, full speed ahead. “I’m sorry, but it seemed pretty true to me,” I said.

yeah. at that point she got up and stomped off to her room, slamming the door shut but doing little to shut out the sound of her crying. should I feel bad? …probably. but since it was one of the first times, if not the first time, that she’s bothered to be polite instead of just shouting “mika! stop it!” — I felt I should point it out. if you think about it, it’s kind of a weird compliment, saying she done good. kind of. anyway, one of my pet peeves is the fact that she demands I stop something that bothers her even a little bit. whereas if I ask her to stop something that bothers me she acts like there’s no reason for me to be bothered by it. whatever.

in other news, I think ryan gets back from his hike today. maybe he’ll be driving up to logan tonight and talk to me on the way? that’d be nice.

confession: I made a countdown chain. yes, it’s true. 8 weeks until jarom is home. to be honest, I feel better now that I have it — it’s awfully long, and makes it seem like there’s plenty of time till he comes back. never mind the fact that soon half the chain will be gone.