Dreamy Athletes

Posted by Brittany Karford Rogers (BA ’07), Associate Editor

Known for good pizza, Brick Oven, Sini discovered, was also a place to spot the men’s volleyball team. Enjoying a pie after a home game, she and her friends recognized some of the players and were fortunate to be accompanied by one of her roommate’s aunts.

“My roommate’s aunt is like a scholarship person who knows everyone who’s in sports at BYU,” says Sini. “And she told the players to come talk to us.” In fewer words than Sini used, he was beautiful—though the players are “all pretty cute.”

Waging War

Posted by Elise

Once upon a time there were two cunning and mischievous roommates, both named Elise. No one knows what prompted their actions (boredom, most likely), but one dark and stormy night they kidnapped and held hostage the two flags that hung in their guy-friends’ apartment. The prized spoils were tacked to the wall and ceiling in the two cohorts’ bedroom, beyond the chalk line of honor that prevented the boys from retrieving their hostages.

The initial kidnapping set in motion a devious and elaborate plot to capture the Elises’ prized DVD collection and use it as collateral. The girls counterattacked by stealing keys, cell phones, name tags, and their foes’ collection of DVDs. The war escalated to include chases, wrestles through doors, decoys, betrayals, and alliances. Finally the UN intervened and suggested (for that’s really all the UN can do) that the two parties call a truce and return all POWs. The troops were sent home and the treaty was sealed with a pinkie swear. The war was finally over.

Good Steak Dinner

Posted by Mitch

Last Saturday I cooked a great dinner for two girls: bavette steak with golden potatoes and beurre rouge. It took two hours, but it was well worth it.


To top that off, one of the girls made an excellent angel food cake with raspberries. It was a delicious meal! I know that it's not typical, but it just goes to show that with a little brain power and a few extra bucks, great things can happen at college.

A Thorough College Education

Posted by Braden

As part of Student Development 358R (a class for resident assitants), we learned about effective methods of communication and how to handle crucial conversations. To do this, we made a case study of a specific conversation that our teacher happened to have recorded: the proposal scene of Pride & Prejudice.

From Darcy and Elizabeth's encounter, we learned the importance of stating your intentions, recognizing when another person feels uncomfortable or threatened, and some good general dos and don'ts for proposing to somebody someday.

I'm fairly positive we all paid much closer attention and learned more that class period, watching scenes from a chick flick, than if we had covered the same material in typical textbook-style fashion.

Love Is in the Air

Posted by Braden

It's February, and love is in the air!

The number of couples in my ward has easily doubled since first semester.

There's talk of engagements among the freshmen girls.

I've heard a lot of plans for Valentine's Day this weekend, from both official couples and non-official couples!

The other night, one boy in the apartment that shares a corner with mine was giving his roommate kissing lessons:

"Now, when she starts fiddling with her keys, that's a good thing. She won't stick them in the lock yet; she's hinting that she wants you to make a move. Take a half-step forward so that she gets the idea that you catch her hint. Then you go in 90 percent and wait for her to come in the last 10 percent. However, you'll want to save the first kiss for your date next weekend on Valentine's Day. I know it's painful to wait, but it'll be worth it, trust me. So on your date this weekend, you should just give her a hug."

"Can't I at least give her a kiss on the cheek?"

"No, that'll confuse her. If you start moving in and she doesn't know whether you're aiming for the lips or the cheek, she won't know what to do, and a very awkward collision of faces could occur. Go for a hug."

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

etc.

It Starts

Posted by Braden

Yesterday that thing that I always knew was going to start happening, but couldn't see actually happening, finally happened: I got a Facebook invitation with the title, "Justin and Mollie are getting married!" I probably should have been quieter—a few of my roommates were already asleep—but I started laughing. Hard. Somebody MY age . . . getting MARRIED . . . NOW?! It doesn't make any sense. We're too young. What is she thinking? Is she sure she's ready for such a large change? Once the engagements start, they won't stop coming for a while. Who will be next?

After a few big breaths and a little more laughing, I got a hold of myself. But man, marriage? Already? I suppose it's a little bit more fathomable for girls, but still. I guess I'd better get used to it, though, 'cause no matter what I think or do, it's gonna keep happening.

Too Good to Be True

Posted by Laura

It was hard to wake up this morning after having the luxury of sleeping in over the holiday break. This semester all of my days start at 8 or 9 a.m., which is a bit different for me (last semester every day began at 10 a.m.). Yet, though I am not a morning person, I was able to wake up with time to spare. As I reached my first class, statistics, I noticed that something wasn't right. Every single person in the room was a girl! I hadn't started learning statistics yet, but statistically, that shouldn't happen in a math class. It turned out I forgot a zero in the room number and mistakenly entered a marriage, home, and family class. It's amazing the difference one number can make. :) Despite the confusion, I was still able to make it to the packed statistics classroom on time.

After I made it out of statistics, I had Dance 280, Church history, chemistry, and Book of Mormon. I was really looking forward to my last class, Book of Mormon, because I'd heard from multiple people that the teacher was really good. When I walked in, I was shocked. I thought that somehow, being in a very girl-dominated major, my luck had changed. I walked into a class that was 99 percent male. At that point, I thought it was definitely going to be my favorite class of the semester. But then my luck crumbled underneath me when the teacher said, "How many of you in here didn't realized that this section was an RM section?" I sheepishly raised my hand and realized that it was too good to be true. After switching class sections multiple times, waiting for an opening in the section with this teacher who I'd heard was so good, I signed up for an RM section. Luckily, the teacher was nice about it and offered to let me stay in the class, but after singing "The Spirit of God" with a class full of boys and being the only high voice, I decided to transfer.

Still, I am so excited for this new semester! I sincerely loved my classes today and can't wait to learn in them.

Dates, Dates, and More Dates

Posted by Brittany Karford Rogers (BA ’07), Associate Editor

Via Skype, Sini's oldest brother, Oaquim, informed her that something was different: “She has the opportunity to spend more time with guys. It shows on her face,” he says.

Here are a few highlights of her semester's dates:

• Her first blind date--a date with a friend's boyfriend's friend--entailed a BYU women's volleyball game followed by grilled s'mores and an outdoor volleyball game at Heritage Halls. A boy there with another girl noticed Sini and asked her out the next day. "He asked me to go four-wheeling," Sini says.
  
• Then there was Homecoming: after hours spent sitting next to Sini in Symphony Orchestra, in classes, and in church, Spencer Jensen worked up the courage to ask her to Homecoming. Though Sini was performing in Spectacular on Thursday and Friday night, Saturday was wide open. "We went with a group of his friends to the Old Spaghetti Factory and then to the casual dance," says Sini. "It was a good time."
  
• The most awkward date of the semester was a setup arranged by her "Sandy mom"--the mother of her friend who served in Finland. The blind date took Sini to Brick Oven and mini-golfing. "He didn't talk much," says Sini, adding, with emphasis, "He's, like, 25."
  
• Her favorite date of the semester took her go-carting, to "the Sonic," and to watch the movie Cars in a park.

Fish Here

Posted by Brittany Karford Rogers (BA ’07), Associate Editor

Freshmen girls send subtle messages through dorm décor and signs in windows. “Looking for a date?” asks a giant crepe-paper sign in Sini's apartment, complete with a blue pond stocked with fish labeled with the names of the tenants. “Fish here.”

My Side of the Story

Posted by Elise

Ha ha! OK who wants to hear my side of the story?

In our apartment we always use the back door, so it took until noon to discover the door with all the note cards. I walked into the lobby to screaming girls: my roommate and a few friends. They all attack me as soon as they see me. “Look at the door Elise!!!! Its for you!! Oh my gosh!”

So I start out with the sudoku, and of course I’m flustered and have to start over once or twice before I finally figure it out. Oh, and just as a side note, there was a little confusion because my roommate is also named Elise and nothing on the door specified which Elise, so . . . we had to guess based on some of the words on the door. The Fibonacci sequence was the clincher.

My roommate (the other Elise) said, “OK, I have no idea what that even means, so it must be for you.” Then we had to pull out the laptop to look up the Fibonacci sequence, because no one wanted to do that much math. And of course we find all the right note cards and, ta-da!

But here’s the problem: at this point, I had 40 minutes until chemistry and Braden is in that class! I wanted to have a creative response and there was no way I could throw it together in time. So I had to just pretend that I hadn’t seen the door yet and act like I had no idea anything was up. That was SOOO tough!

So then I ran home and got to work. Any girl who’s ever had a creative ask knows the pressure of having to respond creatively and quickly. The Rubik’s Cube was actually my mom’s idea. The spy code words (random phrases about jailbirds or something) were my roommate’s idea. Good thing my other roommate (Daniele) works in the library. And of course peanut butter was a must. And . . . I don’t know where the Russian war book came in, but why not?

All in all, it was crazy and, of course, really fun!

Homecoming Shenanigans

Posted by Braden

I had an exciting Monday. :) I asked someone you all may know (Elise Biancardi) to Homecoming Spectacular, and she replied in pretty much the most awesome way I have ever seen.

Part One:

I felt like I should do something for Homecoming, but I didn't really feel like going to a dance. I don't mind dances, but they're not my favorite thing. There is this Homecoming Spectacular thing going on, and I know a girl who would like to see it and who I would like to go with--and that's where it started.

The night before I asked, I filled out about 100 notecards, each with a word and a number. I also found a sudoku puzzle online and attached with it a key for converting numbers to letters. Once the sudoku was solved and the numbers converted to letters, the circled boxes spelled out "Fibonacci." The Fibonacci sequence told my "askee" which cards were relevant; only the cards with numbers that were in the Fibonacci sequence mattered. The 100 notecards were taped to her door--all over her door. The relevant words spelled out: "Elise, will you make Homecoming Spectacular extra spectacular by going with me this Friday night? --Braden"

Along with these cards were a bunch of other cards which had words, phrases, and names like elephant, yellow, date, evening, Erziehung und Wissenschaft, Jason Mraz, not, both, many, David, Chadd, Dwight, John, etc. I made sure that a bunch of the names were of people she knew by looking up her ward's Facebook group and grabbing names from there--creepy, I know, but worth it for the extra confusion, I think.

I taped all the cards and sudoku puzzle up, took a picture, and left for class.

Part Two:

I got home that night around 6 p.m., and my roommates told me that I had received a present about an hour before--a Rubik's Cube with letters and numbers taped to the different faces. I solved that to get a library call number: "HBLL UA 776.P63 513."

I ran to the library to what I think is the Russian military history section--I'm not sure, I can't read Russian--and on p. 513 of that book was an envelope with my name in it.

In this envelope were step-by-step directions leading me to the second-floor periodicals help desk, which the directions said I needed to get to before 7 p.m.


I found the previous clue at 6:50 p.m., so I walked quite briskly through the library, as running is frowned upon, to the described location.

There I found a girl named Daniele, as described by the clues, and spoke the words, "The jailed bird flies at morning." She replied with the second half of the . . . sonnet? . . . and gave me a box.

In that box were Reese's peanut butter cups (I love chocolate and peanut butter!) with colored tops that, when placed in the rainbow spectrum, spelled out "ABSOLUTELY." And Braden rejoiced.


Nobody in Ohio ever responded in sweet ways like that--man, I love Mormon dating culture!

Distractions

Posted by Braden

The first night our FHE sisters came over to say hi, we were talking with them in the hallway when a smoke detector went off. We didn't think much of it and went on talking. After 20 seconds when nobody had done anything about it, we wondered why it wasn't being turned off. Then all of a sudden Cory goes, "My onion rings!" and runs in to rescue what used to be his onion rings but were now something black and crispy. Turns out, only the one side was burnt, so we ate the other half. But my, how distracting FHE sisters can be! :-)

Petty Little Freshman

Posted by Adam

One of the major downsides of being a freshman is the fact that, while being a pre-me, not a single girl on campus is interested! So here's the story. I go to my social dance class and I meet this girl in there, the name of said girl will remain unknown for her safety; she seemed like a pretty cool girl, and one of those people where you can tell a friendship will easily spring. So we danced for a good 30 flirty seconds and then switched partners and so forth.

After the class I headed to the Cougareat to grab some munchies. As I, a lonely freshman, look for a table with people I can meet, I see her sitting at a table by herself. She spotted me and invited me over to sit by her. I've often been told that I look at least 21, although I'm only 18—this can work for and against me. In most cases it's best to let the opposite sex just assume you're older, because when they find out, as "nameless girl from my social dance class" did, all conversation is shut off, and all interest in being peers is eliminated. I mean, I wasn't trying to date this girl, I was just having a friendly conversation, and it was a good solid conversation up until, "Oh . . . (awkward silence) . . . you look older than you are." After that point I probably got a good three sentence fragments out of her little mouth.

I mean honestly, are we freshman really that different? I mean, sure it's my first year of college, and maybe I don't own a car, or maybe I don't have a major, or maybe I don't have the refined stamina of an RM . . . but it's not like I'm a third grader or something, I can still carry on a coherent conversation with someone. Sigh, if this had been the only instance where this had happened, I wouldn't be making a fuss, but I have experienced this three; count em, three times, and am getting quite tired of it. In fact I have firmly resolved that I'm going to tell people that I'm 22 and just got back from Madagascar on my mission. It's goof proof, if not a little sacrilegious, but I want a woman!