Major Changes

Ha. Double meaning title.

I'm seriously considering changing my major. I was originally going to major in Psychology and minor in Spanish. Now I want to double major in English and Education and have Psychology and Spanish as my minors. The minor part won't be too hard to fulfill- I already have most of my credits done for those. But this is definitely going to set me back a ways.

Psych just hasn't been feeling right. I want to help people, but I'm not employable as a therapist in the field I want. I want to work in a drug rehabilitation center. But they generally only employ people who have been through some sort of treatment before and can empathize with the patient. I don't think I'm hard core enough for that.

So I've been thinking about teaching high school English. I know I'm good at English. I've got all the grammar rules down pat. But there's another part that's appealing to me. I wanted to be a therapist for a while. But if there's one thing I learned from high school, it's that it's a lot easier to talk to a trusted teacher than it is a therapist. I feel like I could still make a big difference in people's lives, and hopefully keep them away from needing any residential treatment.

So that's that.
I'm also moving to Virginia. I don't know when it will happen. But it's going to. I'm thinking after I graduate with my bachelor's degree. I'm hoping to move out there with Dano, work for a year, and then finish up school out there. I don't want to live in Utah anymore.

In other news, I got a house :) Colton, Carlie, David and I are all living together next semester, for the whopping price of 118 dollars a month. We got a screaming deal.

I've been kind of terrible about blogging, so this is just gonna be a catch-all post.

I went to the U2 concert in Minneapolis. It was seriously one of the most emotional and breathtaking experiences of my life. Absolutely fantastic. Here's a picture.

(L-R) Kristine, Me, Alyssa and Nicole.

It poured rain. Bono was wonderful. I sobbed like a hungry infant on multiple occasions. We wandered around downtown Minneapolis at 2 in the morning, so that was an interesting adventure. I tasted feta cheese. It was a nice night. :)

I've been working a ton lately. Raking in the big bucks :)

I only have 28 days left in Minnesota. I'm not really looking forward to going back to Utah. I want to see my friends, but I don't care so much about the rest of it.

Dani, Robyn and I have a weekend planned that I'm so stoked about! On the 22nd of September we're going to go to Ephraim and stay until the 25th, which is a Thursday through a Sunday. On Thursday we're going to stop in Provo and Dani and I are getting tattoos :) We're both getting a 22 on our ankle. 22 was the apartment number we met in. It's all-encompassing of our experiences there, good and bad, and our friendship. We're going to visit all of our old haunts and some old professors. It's going to be so friggin fun I can't even stand it!!

Well. That's my life lately. Oh. The other night it's possible that I got drunk and created a couple of blogs about people I hate. They've got a good review so far. Hit me up if you want an invitation to them. :)

Buck Delinski

Buck is a man I work with. The best word I can think of to describe him is "character." You can say he's ridiculous, or that he's weird, but none of those do him justice. He's a character. A real piece of work. I just don't ever wanna forget him, so I'm writing about him now :)

Buck tells people he took Sharon Stone to his high school prom, and that they dated steadily. He talks non-stop about this chair he's going to buy. It's a recliner with a built in fridge for beer that vibrates. He talks about getting this chair and never leaving his trailer again. Most of us believe that might actually happen.

He wears a black wool shirt unbuttoned to the top of his stomach. And hes not a skinny guy. He's huge, actually. He wears black super baggy sweat pats, and a bandana around both his neck and his forehead.

He spends 20 bucks a day on lottery tickets, and is absolutely convinced he will win one day.

He has a Golds Gym membership, but only uses it for the whirlpool after his night shifts are over.

He really is nice....but incredibly lazy. He spends most of his time looking for a chair, and very little of it working.

That's about it....the description doesn't do him justice.

Minneapolis!

So on the 4th and 5th of July I got to take the Audi and go on a little trip to Minneapolis! It's about an hour and a half south of here, and it was an absolute blast. I just went by myself, which I kind of prefer. That way you don't have to listen to the opinions of other people when you're deciding what to do, and can spend as long as you want wherever. So I drove down on the 4th. This was my first view of the city, and I was already in love :)

So my first stop was the ballpark for a Twins game. It was HOT. But so much fun. The Twins won, 7-0, so that's always good :) I had awesome seats, right along the first base line, but still in the shade. It was just perfect.

It was packed for fourth of July, and was so so much fun. I can't even get over it.

After that I went and checked into my hotel, which was super sketchy. I felt like I was gonna get murdered in it. It's one of those places where a serial killer stashes his bodies in horror movies. I checked in and went to the Mall of America, which was AWESOME. Enormous. I spent an embarrassing amount of money on underwear from Victoria's Secret, which I am currently in love with. I checked out quite a few stores, and then headed back to the hotel. I turned in for the night, and then in the morning went to the Minnesota Institute of Arts.

It was awesome inside. I could have spent days there, but I had to limit myself. I went back to the Mall of America after that, and then headed home. It was just a short trip, but it was so much fun.
Alyssa invited me to go to a u2 concert with her, so hopefully if i get work off i can go to that. we'd make a weekend of it and go to the sculpture gardens and the institute for a while longer, and then go to the concert the next day. It would be a ton of fun. I don't think I've blogged abut alyssa. She's so so nice. Holy cow. She is one of the only people who invited me to do anything, and was really genuine and nice.

This is her and her fiancee, Lance. They both are amazingly nice and smart and wonderful. She is a kidney specialist, and he is about to take the bar exam.

So that was my outing :)

I'm already almost halfway done with this little summer adventure of mine. The days are long but the weeks are short.

The past few days

So there's a bunch of random stories that have happened that I just want to get jotted down. The other day I thought was going to be awful. I started out by pulling ash at work. The boiler had been down and so the ash was really bad. Basically if the boiler is down then stuff doesn't burn well, and then the ash is really hot and clumpy and hard to pull. So it was like that, and as I was pulling it, it got clogged. Not a big deal, it happens a lot. So I was using this rake thing to unclog it. It got pulled up into the machine, wrapped around the clinker grinder, and got stuck. They tried to get it out with an electric jack, with a hammer by trying to bang it out the other way, and ended up having to cut it out with a welding torch. I felt like an idiot, but everyone said things like that happen all the time, so it wasn't a big deal.

The other day I signed up for extra work, so I didn't know what exactly I was going to do. They ended up having me move sand bags all day. It was the hottest day they'd had all month, and there was 95 percent humidity. It was crazy. I ruined my favorite Neil Diamond shirt :( Super upsetting. I ended up working 16 hours that day.

Tomorrow I get to go to Minneapolis. I'm stoked! I'm going to a Twins game, to the Minnesota Institute of Arts, the Mill Museum, the Aquarium, Legoland :), and the Mall of America for sure. I don't know quite what else I'm going to be doing. I guess just whatever strikes my fancy. :) But I'm really excited about it!

Ron, Kenny, and Asshole Danny

Oh the people I work with. I'm not technically on a crew, but I have been working with some of the same people again and again.

The three that are my favorites are Ron, Kenny, and Asshole Dan.

Ron...is super attractive to me. I know, it sounds weird. He looks almost exactly like the coach from Forever Strong. Not Larry Gelwix, but the other one. Super intense blue eyes. He's attractive. And he's really funny. He invited me to the bar when we get back on day shift, and to go to a Twins game while I'm in town.

Kenny is great. He's really short, like 4'11. He looks like one of Santa's elves. Him and Ron interact...and it's hilarious. I wish I could think of a good comparison. But I can just sit and watch them talk and listen and it kills me. So funny.

Danny...is an asshole. A lovable one, but still an asshole. He smokes a pack of extra long cigarettes every shift, chews a tin of tobacco, and drinks a bottle of whiskey a week. He's a supervisor, and so when he's around we kind of have to look like we're busy...but it's not too bad.

I just really like the people I work with, and am excited to keep working with them and go to the bar.

Birthday!

I just barely realized that I forgot to write about my birthday weekend. It was a blast for sure. Let's see. On Saturday we had a party at First Dam. It was super chill, just a bunch of people and food. It wasn't like a big thing, I just wanted to see people before I left for the summer. I believe the people who came were Cody, Jessey, Sissy, Kea, Noelle, Texas, Mckenna, Moriah, Cherisse, Colton, Cat and James and their baby....I feel like I'm missing people. But it was really fun :)
Sunday I basically just had a family day. Opened presents and such and Texas came over to have cake. Sheri and Calvin brought over cinnamon rolls and a card for me, which was super nice.

The loot: I got a hollowed out book with a flask and a bottle of rum from Moriah. Texas gave me the new Foster the People album, which I LOVE. Listen to their song pumped up kicks here. My grandma gave me 40 dollars. From my family I got 2 Billy Joel CDs, a couple of memory cards for my phone and mp3 player, a GPS, a New York Yankees license plate frame, and some earrings. Jessey and Sissy got me a Billy Joel vinyl!! That was super exciting :) It really was just an amazing day.

IHAVETHEBESTJOBINTHEWHOLEWIDEWORLD

I really love it. I'll explain it, but it sounds really boring. Sorry. I'm just ecstatic about it :)

So I got there and clocked in at 5:40 this morning. My trainer got there about five minutes later. He told me and the other lady, Paula, what we would be doing. Starting out with absolutely nothing. Until 7:15. :) Then we go and pull ash. Basically there's these giant containers, three of them, that contain ash. You take a giant, 40 pound steel rake and rake it towards you. It gets sucked up into a vacuum and taken to the ash silo. That takes about 2 hours. Then we chill for a while longer. After that we go out to the south building and fill these giant things called grizzlies. We drive the front loader around and fill the grizzlies up with coal.

Ha it sounds like I work in a coal mine. You get a little dirty, but it's super entertaining. After you fill the grizzlies, it's lunch time. So we take an hour lunch, and then go underneath the mill and clean up.

We basically sweep whatever fell off the conveyor belt and make sure there's no build up in a bunch of random hatches. We scrape shiz off and climb around on railings. It's nice :) After that we take some environmental numbers from a bunch of different gauges, and write them in the environmental book.

Then we drive the front loader again, and pile up all the piles of coal that have come in. So there's room for more.

Then we take another break. After that we straighten up and head back to the control room, where we do nothing until the shift is over.

It's a 12 hour shift, but it's not nearly that much work. He told us we could bring a book and just chill in the south building. It's really nice. I love it :)