Oh man, oh man! It's snowing! Hard core!

Eehehehee!
Snow! It's snowing. Everything is turning white! Ahahaa! And we are already having snowball fights! :)
I also built a snowman.

Anyway, that's it for recent developments. In less recent news we have a few mildly interesting stories...

The Orchard
So... my Book of Mormon class has a party at my professor's orchard. Fun fun.

We pile out of the big university vans and toward a huge table full of raw hot dogs and hamburgers. Brother Wilson's first question was, "Soo.... who wants to cook?" He said this while motioning toward a big barbecue. Okay, so all the girls shrink away, probably thinking about how manly a job barbecuing things is. So I look over at the boys... Oh dear. They are also shrinking away from the grill as if it were toxic. Looks like a job for... JENNA THE BURNINATOR! I volunteer. Oh joy. Now I am slaving over the grill, hoping NOT to burninate anything. Then everyone saunters off into the depths of orchard... and I am left all alone.

Well, of course smoke follows beauty. And since I was the most beautiful (and only) person there, all the burger smoke drifted right in my face. Coughing, I finish grilling and look around. I'm all alone with the food... but I hear screaming and laughing farther in. I abandon the food and run off to find my friends.

There it is.

The zipline of death.

I approach as Roy comes zooming down. He is caught, and then Michelle goes. She is caught by a few guys. I stand next to Zach. "Have you gone yet?" he asks placidly. "No, I was grilling, remember?" "Ohhh... yeah." Eventually, I say, "Okay, I'll go I guess."

Everyone seems quite excited that I'm ziplining. Why? I wonder. Everyone was going, and no one seemed to excited, except for when Helen went Superman-style.

I jump on. Backwards. Just to mix things up.

Roy and Clifton start pulling me up to the top. I look down when we reach the top. "We're gonna race you, okay?" Roy yells up at me. I laugh. "Go ahead." They launch me... and take off as well. Hm.

I am falling backwards, and it wasn't as exciting as I though it'd be. So... just to make things more exciting, I started kicking and yelling like I was about to die.

That did the trick. ZOOOOOOOOM! I hear screaming behind me. THUNK! I hit the either the knot in the steel rope or a body, I'm not sure. I bounce high in the air, my feet just barely missing Erik's poor face. My head also missed the ground by a single centimeter.

I am out of breath from laughing so hard. Hillary is hyperventilating. "JENNA!!! Don't ever do that again! If you had gotten hurt I would have been legally obligated to help you!" Apparently she's medically trained... and just had my life flash before her eyes. Which I think is weird since she knows nothing about my life... :)

Hillary and I walk back over to where the food is. I grab myself some food and make my over to the campfire. Fun, I guess.

I get bored quickly... so I call up my Dad and talk to him.

Then things get boring again.

So... Brother Wilson brings out the marshmallows, looking warily at me as he sets them out next to the roasters and the campfire. I smile. "Don't worry... Rachel is here to duel with." Brother Wilson, a little relieved, leaves me with the marshmallows. I start roasting them.

Now I don't really like marshmallows... I just like burning them. I say so. Brother Wilson laughs. "Jenna, you missed your calling. You should have been a cub scout!" I look up at him, saying quite seriously, "Well, sorry, I wasn't born a boy."

There is laughter. I happily burninate the marshmallows. Hillary comes to burninate them with me. So does Ryan. I talk with Ryan for a while. We get into a debate about -- hair? He insists it takes guys just as long to do their hair as girls do. After unsuccessfully trying to persuade him otherwise, I just shake my head.

Then... there is an apple fight. BAMMM! Ryan is pelted. I laughed, and I would have joined in... except I'm already covered in bruises (not sure why, I blame sleepdancing). Yay?

Ryan and I talk some more about the most random things. Smiles. (His photo-smiles are really creepy!) Also the potential deadliness of the marshmallow roasters. Then we all burst into songs and sang hymns around the campfire for about half an hour.

Then we set off for the vans so that we could go home. I realize that I haven't nicknamed Ryan.
"Hey! You don't have a nickname yet! I've nicknamed nearly everyone except you! There's Cliftonius, Tsar Alexander, The Willinator, Isaacle... but I haven't nicknamed you!"
"Uhhh...."
I pause. "My dad calls you Grape Man 'cuz I told him about how I asked you to preference!"
"Oh... Grape Man? Grape Guy? ... Grape Crush?"
I laugh.
"Oh wait... that sounds like... never mind..."
"You know I'm going have to call you that now..." I am laughing so hard on the inside because he doesn't realize how accurate this is. Poor boy.

He also promised to bring some Grape Crush (the soda) since I'm never had it before... and thus my childhood is not complete (I was wondering why I hadn't grown up yet). He starts trying to figure out where he can get it... ooh, he sounds serious :P I'm excited... for soda.

When we get back on campus and pile out of the vans... Ryan walks me home. I joke about getting kidnapped between his hall and mine (they are right next to each other). "Well, anytime you need an escort..." "Haha, 3:30 in the morning?" I say it jokingly... but he said he wouldn't mind much, he has to get up early anyway. I think this is ridiculous and tell him so. And then I go inside. Where I am immediately teased by my roommates. Ugh.



Preference

Hillary, Rachel, and I decide we all want to go the Murder Mystery dance in Heber. Hillary has a car, but with three couples... well, let's just say there's not enough seats and it's a forty-five minute drive.
"Okay... so who are we throwing in the trunk?"
"Robert's the smallest... he should go in the trunk!"
"Yeah... but... he's the date of honor. I mean, Hillary's the driver..."
"Oh... good point!"
"Oooh... let's throw Ryan in the trunk!"
Hillary pipes in. "You could sit on each other's laps!"
Rachel and I give horrified looks to her. In near unison, we both exclaim, "I'm not sitting on Ryan's/Clifton's lap!"
Hillary, wide-eyed gasps, and then says, "No no no no! I meant -- I meant that Rachel could sit on Jenna!"
This seemed much more... comfortable. To both of us.


Cold Hands

Oh man, it's cold today. Jackie and I run off to the central building to exchange our dollar bills for quarters. On the way back, I realize my hands are pretty much frozen.

"Argh!" I say. "My hands are freezing! I need a man on both sides to hold hands with!" Jackie laughs so hard.

Later tonight, Jackie comes home, with bright red hands and covered in snow. "Ahhh! I need like... five warm coats and a boyfriend!"

So... we, the women in 126 Robison Hall, have come to the consensus that boyfriends are good for keeping warm. Except none of us have one :P



Well, that's all folks! I hope I'll actually have something interesting to write about next week! (I should, the preference dance is next Saturday!)

Dueling and Little Brothers.

My week has been splendid busy. It was homecoming week, and I am happy to say that I successfully avoided a date.

Avoiding a date? Why would Jenna avoid one of those, might you ask? Well. I don't remember if you recall, but I went on a date with a very quiet guy named Jon. And, uh... well, it seems he likes me. And he's an RM. (Oh no!) I keep hearing things from my roommates about him, such as, "I saw Jon today... he kept asking about you..." "Jonny likes you Jenna!" Thus, I have become victim of many many Jenna's-going-to-marry-Jon jokes.

Well, see... we all suspected that he would try to ask me to homecoming. And thus, we "accidentally" lose my phone. I never see him during the week... only at Family Home Evening, and occasionally at church. We figured that if he was going to try and ask me, he'd call. So we "accidentally lost my phone". And then we "miraculously found it" after the homecoming activities were over. And lo, and behold! There were a few missed calls from Jon.

But enough about that. My classes are going well... my job is going well... and I think (except for the homecoming thing) that my social life is going well.

On to the highlights of the week.

Our Book of Mormon teacher, Brother Wilson, decided that we were going to go see the leaves as they were changing color. Thus, he took the entire class down into the canyon, and took us into a little campground for a picnic.

Oh no, some of you may be thinking, Jenna gets crazy when she's camping.

Don't worry. I didn't do anything that bad... The boys start the fire (at my complaint asking why the boys get to do it, I get the reply "Because we're Eagle Scouts!!!"). And after it is started... nothing. Everyone is just socializing. There are hot dogs for roasting, and everyone is just... talking. Except... wait! Ryan! He gets himself two hot dogs and starts to roast them. He must not have been lying when he confessed that he was starving. I grab, Rachel, my roommate, and drag her over to roast hot dogs too.

We put the hot dogs on a pitchfork like roasting object... that feels like... well, a weapon. Rachel notices this too. We ignore the urge to duel and roast hot dogs. I sit by Ryan eating them, and Rachel sits by me. Everyone sees us enjoying food, and they realize, "Oh... we have to cook our own food!" And off they go to the fire.

Soon, I am done with my meat. Both Rachel and I are still itching to duel.

BAM! We are suddenly in a pose-off. Rachel appears like Batman, except with a roasting fork raising high above her head, pointing at me. I match the pose, but I do it so much more elaborately. Then the pose-off moves to our facial expressions. She raises one eyebrow incredulously. I raise the opposite eyebrow, and tilt my head to the side. I am aware of everyone's eyes on us, but I really don't care... and I suspect, neither did Rachel.

BAM! We are no longer posing... we are sword fighting miraculously with roasting apparatus. Then, from one of the boys (not sure if it was Clifton or not), "All you guys need now are flaming marshmallows on the ends of those!" Rachel and I both stop mid swing and realize we are both thinking the same thing.

BAM! We dash off to the marshmallow bag, spearing them incredibly with marshmallows. Oh, we reach the campfire at lightning speeds, thrusting our marshmallows into the hottest flames... My marshmallows are flaming beautifully. So are Rachel's.

BAM! We are back to sword fighting, but the flaming marshmallows certainly make it so much more interesting. A flaming marshmallow goes flying through the air as I knock it off Rachel's roasting stick. Her face at this instant tells me that I have just upped it from duel to war. And it was war. She stabbed at me more amazingly, and I dodge them more miraculously... and then. Finally. I have knocked all the marshmallows off of Rachel's stick, and I realize too late that I have taken it too far. Rachel swipes for my belly... and kills me. I act out an incredible death, falling to the forest floor, crying, "Alas! I am marshmallow'd!" And then I die.

I soon tire of looking like a dead person, and get up. Sweet, everyone is looking at us funny... and Rachel is yelling triumphantly. Brother Wilson, who has never seen me or Rachel outside of a Book of Mormon class, looks shocked, but starts picking up the carnage (not-so-flaming marshmallows...).

After all that, Brother Wilson decides we all need to see where Squaw Peak is, the makeout point. We go up there, and it was windy and beautiful... so I run up at stand on the rock wall, with my arms spread all eagle like while having a brief conversation with Ryan. Then... a faint push. I turn around, and there is Clifton, whom my roommates have declared our little brother (even if he is both older and bigger than all of us). Brother Wilson is calling out "Don't pair off, guys!"

Clifton has asked for it. I could have died... well, not really. But it does sound better that way, when you are about to attack someone. I revert into battle mode, prep for the attack, and then... I ruffle his hair? Oh wait. That would have been a more suitable attack for Hillary, who had long hair... but... Clifton had short hair, and ruffling it made no difference at all. I start thinking of a new attack, as Clifton laughs... and then he dashes away, up around the bend... I set off at a run, screaming, "OH NO, YOU DON'T!!!"

I am almost caught up to him. Then Clifton has to ruin it by pointing out that we have paired up and that people might assume we are doing something we are not... and after all, this is Squaw Peak. Frozen for a millisecond... then I bolt off in the opposite direction, screaming, as little brother chases after me. Hillary misinterprets the scene, and yells, "Don't worry, Jenna, I'll save you! Get behind me!" Thankfully I don't have to suffer the humiliation of hiding behind someone else, because Brother Wilson calls for us to all pile into the vans.

Yesterday, Clifton came over to mooch off of our sausage and eggs... like a little brother. Hillary wasn't there, so she totally misinterprets when I casually ask Rachel, "Who was it... I asked, "Are you playing with my ears?" this morning, and was it Clifton who exclaimed, "Yes!"?" Rachel nods, laughing.

Hillary on the other hand had been lying down in bed. At hearing that Clifton had been playing with my ears, she bolted upright, screaming "WHAATTT?!?!" She then proceeded to hyperventilate, and I could see her thoughts in her head, not believing that little brother would play with Jenna's ears.

To relieve her pain, I point out that I was wearing ogre ears at the time. Hillary starts to reverse-hyperventilate... and gasps for breath. Clifton wasn't playing with Jenna's real ears... that's good.