In Case of Fire.

My apartment complex has three elevators.  All of them are accompanied by signs that look like this:

The ones we have, however, have black text with a white background, which is much easier to read.

I like the design of these signs much better than other ones I've seen.  For example, this sign seems to be encouraging running straight into flames in the event of a fire, which I believe is quite counter-productive:

All of the "In Case of Fire Signs" are accompanied by braille text at the bottom; giving the same instructions again to all the seeing impaired.

Well, I noticed that some jerk has been systematically scratching the little braille bumps off of the ''In Case of Fire" sign.  What if some poor blind person who knows how to read braille actually takes the time to read that sign in the event of a fire?  Since there are dots missing, the braille could say something else entirely.

But hey, at least it's not as bad as what they did to the girls' elevator:

This Is the Story of My Life

So during the spring term, I was enrolled in a 2D Design class.  Visual Arts is my minor, and my passion (if that's not too corny to say), so I was looking forward to the class.  However, I was NOT looking forward to the class schedule.  Tuesday and Thursday--4:00 to 10:00 PM.  That's six hours in one sitting!  I was already fairly swamped with the drawing class I took winter semester, and it became something of a tradition to stay up until 3 AM completing art projects during that time.  So this was something of a concern  for me.

Well, I got to the classroom early on the first day of classes.  There were only a couple of other girls in the classroom at the time.  And then another girl walked into the class.  And then another one.  And another one...

About three minutes before class started, most of the students had filed into the classroom and I came to a wonderful realization--there were only two other guys in the whole class!

The situation only improved:  one of the guys was at least 60 years old, and married.  Then, as we went around the room and introduced ourselves, I learned that the other guy was only 19 and was going to be going on a two-year mission for the LDS church soon.

So in other words, I was the only available guy for the girls in the whole class.  Ka-freakin'-ching.

I decided to strike up a conversation with the girl sitting next to me.  She was pretty and seemed nice. 

The people you make friends with in the first couple of days of class are crucial.  Not just because they can be helpful study buddies, or even that it's nice to make new friends, but because once you get to know the person sitting next to you, you are socially obligated to sit next to them for the rest of the semester.  At least that's the way it works in my mind.

*names have been changed.

So far, so good.
We were making pretty good conversation. . . until:

Side note: do any of y'all have any idea how hard it is to draw a hand in MS Paint?

I almost blurted out "You're married!!?!?!"  But instead:

That's right, out of all the girls in the class, I made friends with the only one that was married.  

Well, Becky turned out to be pretty cool and a really good friend in class, even if she was taken.  I figured it wasn't the end of the world.  There were still another 18 girls in my class.  And, to my knowledge, they were all single.  So I would keep on hoping, even if I was now obligated to sit by Becky (which I want to stress was not a bad thing).

A couple weeks later I got a stressed email in my inbox.  A girl in my 2D Design class who we'll call Jessie sent a mass email to all of us classmates saying that she had been sick for the last week and asking if any of us could help her out with catching up on assignments.  I saw another opportunity to make a friend and potentially find a date, so I volunteered to help her catch up.

The next day, after class ended, I helped Jessie catch up on the art projects she missed by telling her what the projects were (they were color theory collages), showing what my collages looked like, and giving her some pointers on how to best create these collages.

  

I decided to try to strike up a conversation:

This is the story of my life.

Yo' Mama--Harry Potter Style

In honor of the release of the final Harry Potter movie this weekend, I'm posting a list of yo' mama jokes related to Harry Potter.  I did not create any of these.

Yo' mama's so fat, the Sorting Sat put her in the House of Pancakes.

Yo' mama's so fat, her Patronus is a cheeseburger.

Yo' mama's so fat, her wand is a Slim Jim.

Yo' mama's so fat, a Bogart morphs into a treadmill in front of her.

Yo' mama's so fat, she has to Apparate in sections.

Yo' mama's so fat, she got stuck in the Floo network.

Yo' mama's so fat, she tried to eat Cornelius Fudge.

Yo' mama's so fat, Dementors can't suck her soul out in one sitting.

Yo' mama's so ugly, Voldemort calls her "She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Naked."

Yo' mama's so ugly, Hogwarts is named after her face.

Yo' mama's so ugly, a basilisk looked at her and it died.

Yo' mama's so ugly, that instead of a kiss, the Dementor gave her a nice handshake and a promise to call her sometime.

Yo' mama's so ugly, she walked into Gringotts and was immediately given a job application.

Yo' mama's so nasty, she has her own Bertie Bott's jellybean flavor.

Yo' mama's so nasty, even the Whomping Willow wouldn't hit that.

Yo' mama's so skanky, she's known as the Whore-crux.

Yo' mama's so dumb, she brought syrup to a Quidditch match because she heard there'd be Quaffles.

Yo' mama's so dumb, the Stupify charm makes her smarter.

Yo' mama's so fat, they have to split a movie about her into two parts.

Sunday Night with Sharpies

"Harry Potter and the Deathy Hallows, Part 2" comes out this weekend.  In honor of that, I have given myself a nice little tattoo:

That's right: Death Eater dark mark tattoo for the win!  I made it with Sharpie markers on a Sunday evening.  

I then had to give the spiritual thought in ward prayer right after, so I got to show my sweet new body art off the the Bishopric and the whole ward!  They were. . . amused.

Update:  I made dark mark tattoos for my friend and myself when we went to see the final Harry Potter movie.  Here are some photos:

I was going for the 'emo Death Eater' look. Also: Bellatrix Lestrange and a hastily put together Harry Potter.

Come on, you know that's pretty cool.

TNRB vs. HFAC

I'm a business management major who is minoring in visual arts.  It's a pretty eclectic mix.  The business school is housed in the Tanner Building while all the artsy majors are in the Harris Fine Arts Center (HFAC).

The Tanner Building is filled with ambitious people--mainly guys--who sometimes dress kind of stuffy and tend to have a stereotype of being very careerist and competitive.  In fact, one student at BYU said that if our campus was Hogwarts, then the Tanner Building would almost certainly be the House of Slytherin.  Here's my breakdown of the standard business student dress code:

The art students on the other hand, are a more diverse crew, and have a more eclectic style:

 I believe this is what the internet refers to as 'hipsters.'

But being in the HFAC every now and then is a nice break from the Tanner Building.

Nine Dollars

The other day while walking home from work, I found nine dollars on the side of the road.  Provo had been somewhat stormy all day, so the money was gently fluttering in the breeze.  I quickly picked all the bills up before a stronger gust came through. 

As a bit of background, I am as broke as. . . well, a starving college student--so it was nice to see a little bit of luck come my way.  Then I saw a receipt right next to where I found the bills.  It was for a three entree meal at Panda Express, which was about 25 yards from where I was standing.  The person paid for their meal with a $20, and received $9.24 in change. According to the time on the receipt, they paid for it about ten minutes before I found the money.

I looked around for this mystery Panda Express customer and couldn't see anyone.  Then I walked into the Panda Express and looked for someone that had a three entree meal, and I couldn't see anyone that fit that description either.  At this point I decided that whoever it was that dropped the $9 was probably long gone and I should just keep the cash.

Is it weird to feel slightly guilty about this?  

I mean, I was basically rewarded for not finding the owner of the money.  I could have asked the cashier if they remember who got the three entree meal.  I could have left the money with them in case the customer came back for it.

But truthfully, I doubt that person would have gotten their money back regardless of my actions, so perhaps my guilt is coming from a similar, but different, source.  Maybe I'm just feeling guilty for not doing enough random acts of service lately.  After all, I could  be doing a better job of holding the door open for people, I could do the dishes in my apartment more often, and I could be more diligent with my New Year's Resolution of giving out five compliments a day.

I recently taught a Sunday School lesson title "As I Have Loved You, Love One Another."  The lesson focused mainly on the last supper and Jesus' final discourse to His apostles before His death.  One of the big points of the lesson was Jesus' example of service by washing the feet of his disciples.

The commandment Jesus gave right after performing this act of service was "That ye love one another; as I have loved you," (John 13:34).  Do you realize what a tall order this is?

Only a chapter or two later, Jesus says "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."

"Ye are my friends," (John 15: 13-14)

Kind of makes my five-complements-a-day resolution seem somewhat insignificant in comparison, doesn't it?