Boy Band

Posted by Braden



My ward had another talent show as part of our final activity for the year. My old roommates, whom I sang with at the last talent show, and I couldn't pass up the opportunity to perform again, so we prepared and performed "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys. Now, performing "boy band" music at a ward talent show is not an original idea. I've seen it done before plenty. But the boys never actually sing—they lip sync. We sang—in four-part a cappella sweetness—and the girls absolutely loved it, naturally. :)

The funniest part was seeing some of the boys dressed up for it. I have one roommate who is the farthest thing from punk possible. Thus, when he wore a sideways cap with a pink tie and a black shirt with a skull on it, a lot of people were quite surprised. He said a total of seven people came up and told him that they hardly even recognized him at first when he got on stage with us! And now that we've got our songs prepared, we're going to go lighten a few burnt-out peoples' days on Thursday by visiting them in their lobbies all "punked" out and ready to sing songs by their favorite group from middle school.

Living in a Pigsty

Posted by Braden

My apartment is not often very clean. My room is spotless; our kitchen is filthy. My roommates care less than I do about keeping everything in it's place and washing dishes immediately after they've been used—and one of them sleeps on the couch in the kitchen more often than he sleeps in his bed (literally; four of the past five nights he's been asleep in the kitchen when I come in for breakfast in the morning). Normally, living in dirtiness like that would drive me crazy! But it just doesn't seem worth it to try to change four other boys' living styles to accommodate my own, so I changed mine—I just never spend time in the kitchen. If I'm home, I'm in my room. When it IS mealtime, I go in, heat up my food, find a chair, scrape off a few square feet of the table to use, eat, put my food away, wash my dishes, put them back in my cupboard (I always use the same plate, bowl, cup, fork, knife, and spoon), and go back to my room. During that brief amount of time that I am in the kitchen, I try very hard to not pay attention to how filthy the kitchen is. Likewise with the fridge and freezer—I use one little corner on the bottom shelf of the fridge, and I keep my burritos in the back right corner of the freezer. Our fridge started to smell terribly from all of the old food the boys had left in it from previous meals, so one day they decided to clean it out. They found five Tupperware containers full of rotting food hidden throughout the fridge. Not starting-to-go-bad food—food already fuzzy and blueish-green.

Like I said, normally, living in such a way would drive me absolutely crazy. Instead, I retreat to my isolationist attitude of letting them live the way the four of them prefer to and finding my own little space to use that I keep separate (little pockets in the fridge, my own dishes, my own clean room, etc.) It's not the ideal way to live, but knowing that this is a temporary arrangement makes it all better. If these guys were my family or more-permanent roommates, that would not be so good, and we'd have to find a way to reach a long-term solution. I'm just really banking on the fact that my wife is going to be as compulsive about keeping a tidy house as I am!

The Hunt

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

All six tenants of Sini's apartment decided to room together as sophomores, and the hunt for off-campus housing began. Knocking doors all over the south side of campus, they decided on Park Place. “The place we found looks like a Russian subway station to me,” says Sini, “but the once I saw the inside, it was all right.”

Lucky Duck

Posted by Ashley

I can't believe how fast these two semesters have gone by. Seems like I just arrived at college, when in reality I will be going home in less than two months for summer break. I have been thinking about how lucky I was to get such great roommates.

I didn't know any of them before I came. At first it was really hard because three of them knew each other and the other two knew each other. So I was the only one who didn't know anyone. We haven't had any serious issues or fights. Actually, I don't remember any apartment fights. The only issue we have had is people not cleaning up their messes. I haven't had to worry about people stealing my things or eating my food. We all get along great and it has been a fun year.

Having roommates that I get along with so well has made the transition of living on my own a lot more easier and enjoyable. I will be living with three of them again next year. And I know we will be friends for life.

In Need of a Haircut

Posted by Ashley

.I was in real need of a haircut to get rid of my split ends. I mentioned this to my roommates, and one of them said she would cut my hair.

I'm not sure why, but I agreed. I trusted her, I guess, and I knew she wouldn't give me a mullet or some other interesting hairdo. Plus it was free, so who could pass that up?

We went to Wal-Mart and bought hair-cutting scissors. That night my roommate cut my hair. She gave me a trim and some layers. The next night she decided she wanted to give me more layers and I agreed. So now I have my own personal hairdresser who lives the next room over, and good news: I am living with her next year too, which means free haircuts for another year.

The Saga of Finding Housing

Posted by Ashley

My roommates and I found what we thought was the perfect place to live next year (see this post on Feb. 9). We waited and waited and waited to hear if we got the contract. We finally had to contact the management again, and they said to wait another week. When we called back the following week, they informed us they wouldn't take us because they only wanted tenants who would sign full-year contracts or spring and summer contracts at that time.

Why didn't they tell us that before? They said they'd hold our applications until the end of summer. Uh, HELLO! We would like to find a place to live—we can't wait that long.

So my roommates and I got up early on Saturday and went and stood in line at 7 a.m. in hopes of getting an apartment at the complex that was our back-up plan (a place we weren't too excited about, but we need a place to live). As we moved closer to the front of the line, the manager informed us that there were only two completely empty apartments left—and we were the third group in line. The complex assigned six to an apartment, and the group in front of us only had three people. If there was a half-full apartment available, the group in front of us could take it, leaving us with the last empty apartment—and allowing the six of us to live together.

The manager went to check, but came back with bad news. There weren't any apartments with three contracts still available, so the group in front of us would take half of the last empty apartment.

We were bummed, but we decided to continue waiting in line. We're lucky we did, because the manager was wrong: he came out later and told us there was one apartment that still needed three people, so the group in front of us could take those spots. After waiting for five hours, we got the LAST full apartment.

What a day! We decided to go to Brick Oven to celebrate (it was my first time there). While we were eating, Cosmo showed up and we got a picture with him. It was a great Saturday.

Self-Guided Tour

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

While visiting her home ward in Sandy, Utah, Sini’s roommate signed all of her roommates up to help clean the Draper Utah Temple—then undedicated and open to the public—without their consent.

“We loved it,” Sini says. “But I was dusting—there was no dust. They clean it every night.” After cleaning they were free to walk around on their own. “When you go on a tour, it’s kind of fast,” Sini says. “We got to spend as long as we wanted.” They lingered in the celestial room. “You know, it’s cool to get to see the whole temple, because usually you don’t—baptisms, that’s all I can do right now. It was fun to be there with our roommates and do that kind of thing. It was really neat.”

Kimball Hall Winter Olympics

Posted by Braden

We had another hall activity this past week: the first-ever Kimball Hall Winter Olympics Classic!

Why did we do it? Well, first of all, it satisfied the requirements of a "cultural" activity: the boys were assigned to teams from different countries, which we provided trivia facts about. We also played the national anthem of the winning team at the closing ceremonies. On the program proposal, I stressed that the boys felt cooped up in the cold weather and desperately needed outdoor physical play. Also, since a lot of the boys will be leaving on foreign missions this summer, it was an opportunity to get them excited for experiences that involve other countries. That's what I wrote down, anyway. For the most part, these boys just wanted to have a ball playing outside in the snow.

Then it didn't snow for two weeks. And all the snow that we did have melted. So we adjusted. The event began with the opening ceremonies. We split the boys into countries (we decided to just go with two, Ireland and Spain). We then passed a torch through the building (using a big flashlight since open flames aren't allowed in the buildings, particularly not when they're being carried through multiple flights of stairs by running boys). We blasted the Olympic theme song and officially let the games begin!

The first event was icicle archery! With no icicles, however, we used dough balls! The boys threw the balls from the third-floor balcony down to a target that we had on the ground. The second event was snowball shotput! With no snowballs, however, we used a volleyball! The third event was a sled race! With no snow, well, the boys didn't have a hard time making those sleds fly through the grass and dirt. The last event was going to be beach volleyball in the snow, but due to melted snow, the courts were sandy swamps. Instead, we had a Popsicle relay throughout our hall: run up three flights of stairs, down three flights, pass off the Popsicle, repeat. The last guys to get the Popsicles had to eat them to finish the race.

At the closing ceremonies we had doughnuts and apple juice for all, and pounds (literally, I bought three pounds) of candy to be divided between the two winning teams—the winning team got two pounds. Much fun was had by all, even without the snow!

Livin' on the Street (In a Box)

Posted by Ashley

One question seems to be on everyone's mind: Where to live next year? Three of my roommates and I have decided to live together again, and we've spent the past four Friday afternoons looking at apartments. We were about to give up and just live in a box on the street because we couldn't agree on a place: it was either too expensive, too "ghetto," too far away, too ugly, or unlivable due to some other reason one of us came up with. We were getting sick of looking.

Finally, last Friday, we agreed to make a final decision after checking out one more place. We got there and unanimously agreed we would not live there, but we decided to check out another place right next door. That place was better, but still not perfect. My roommate had a prompting to ask one of the tenants where she lived before. She seemed to really like her last place, so we decided to go check it out. The building was pink; we felt like we were in Mexico by the look of it. We practically had to drag one of our roommates closer to check it out. We knocked on a door and were welcomed inside, and the apartment was great.

After each place we visit, we have a team meeting. This was the first team meeting where we all felt good about an apartment. We submitted our applications that night and returned on Saturday to pay our deposit. Now we just have to wait to hear if we were accepted. It was just amazing that we were guided to that place; by the look of the exterior, we never would have checked it out on our own. So that goes to show you: never judge a book by its cover.

Housing! AAAAHHH!!!!

Posted by Elise

We barely started winter semester and we’re already scrambling to find housing for next year. It’s a little bit ridiculous. In the process of looking for housing, we realized that many housing complexes have a stigma or stereotype. Of course, the stigmas aren’t important enough to sway our decision, but I think they are so interesting. I wonder how those stigmas started. They seem like self-fulfilling prophecies to me. For example, if a certain complex has X reputation, it will attract X kind of people.

I think stigmas are ridiculous and I’m baffled by how prevalent they are. My roommate and I were thinking of living in a complex that apparently has a “partier” stigma attached to it. Here’s the conversation we had with probably five different friends on five separate occasions:

Us: We’re thinking of living at ___.


Them:

(Raised eyebrow.)


Us:

What? What’s wrong?


Them:

Oh it’s nothing. . . . I was just gonna say . . . but it’s not a big deal.


Us:

C’mon.


Them:

Well I just heard that __________. But it’s not a big deal. It’s not like people actually believe that. Just forget I mentioned it. (Friend is squirmy and apologetic.)


Us:

(Laughing on the inside).

Floor Discrimination

Posted by Braden

During first semester I lived on the third floor of my hall. This semester I live on the first floor. Last semester I figured it was all the same, the only exception being that I had to climb two more flights of stairs whenever I came home from classes. Now I know the truth.

The third-floor people are a little more isolated. There is more activity in the first-floor lobby. If somebody's doing something stupid in the first-floor lobby, I'll hear it and get to watch. Before, I probably wouldn't have noticed the noise, or I wouldn't have cared if I had. On Thursday, three people wanted to play spades and they needed a fourth. My room is right there connected to the main lobby, so they hollered, "Hey Braden, wanna play spades?" and I did, so we played. Had I been on the third floor, that would not have happened, and I probably would have done something else or gone to bed 30 minutes earlier.

It's not just my hall either—I've noticed that in the girls' hall, too. The ones who live on the third floor have their own friends—roommates or corner buddies or whatnot—but they don't often spontaneously hop into activities with the first-floor girls; they don't really know the first-floor girls very well because they live two floors up! And since everyone enters their rooms from the outside staircases, there's no pressing reason to interact with other floors in your hall outside of planned hall activities.

Now, I don't think it's necessarily a terrible thing that needs fixing, or that the upper floors are purposely excluded in any way, but I did think it was interesting. Life really IS different on the first floor.

The Hunt

Posted by Laura

It's that time of the year: people are out searching for the apartments they'll be living in next year. A bunch of girls have knocked on our door, asking for a tour of my apartment and interviewing me about the ward, the boys in the ward, rent, and maintenance. Even though it's still the beginning of winter semester, you have to start thinking about the location and the roommates you are going to live with next fall.

The apartment complex that I am living in is really competitive to get into, and the management holds its drawing for contracts in February. I have loved my apartment! Even though I am one of the minority freshman who decides not to live in the dorms, I have loved the location, the ward, the roommates, and all of the new experiences that have come with my apartment.

I've also had a few of my close high school friends, who are planning on attending BYU next year, over for a weekend. Incoming freshman often don't know how important it is to start the housing search early, whether they are looking for off-campus housing or reserving a spot in on-campus housing.

My Own Room

Posted by Braden

I have my own room this semester—and it's SO nice!



I no longer have any need for a lamp, because I turn off the lights when I go to bed, and nobody ever wants them off before I do.

I no longer need headphones, because everybody in my room likes the music that I play when I play it.

I have floor space—more than just enough to walk on! I can come in, take off my shoes, and leave them in the middle of the room. Then I can hang my coat on my extra chair to dry.

I have two closets—aka "a ridiculous amount of storage space"—and I've made sure to put something in every single one of the drawers, simply because I can.

I'm getting so spoiled from all of this! Realistically, this is probably the last (it's also the first, coincidentally) time in my life that I'll have my own room. I should have plenty of time to readjust before my next semester—sharing a room with a missionary companion for two years ought to do that for me.

Moving In Again

Posted by Braden

At the end of last semester, I packed up all of my stuff into suitcases and boxes again, and moved it down two floors into the kitchen of my new apartment. When I arrived at my apartment Thursday night, the unpacking process began . . . again . . . in a way awfully similar to the way first semester began.

It gave me a chance to reorganize my things, so that was nice. Little things that had bugged me all semester last year, but never enough for me to do something about it, were finally fixed. For example, "why do I keep my cans in the eye-level cupboard when I could be sticking my bananas and breads here and stick the cans in the cupboard under the counter? It'd make more sense to keep the heavy stuff lower, and now I won't need to leave my bananas on the counter." So I changed it. Looking at my closet now, I can see which clothes I didn't wear once last semester, and stuff them in an obscure cubby hole instead of having them take up the high-premium space in the main part of the closet. My wastebasket, instead of being placed by the door where I'd need to throw trash at it (only successfully so about half of the time), is now under my bed, within arm's reach of my computer desk chair, where I spend most of my time when I'm in my room. It's nice having a second try with all of these trivial things!

One thing that has changed--I was the second boy to show up at my apartment last semester, so I grabbed a very conveniently placed bathroom cupboard, and my favorite fridge nooks, and that little cupboard in the kitchen. Moving to my new room this semester, I was the last boy to move in, since I'm the only new roommate, so I grabbed whatever space the last guy had! Sadly, he didn't use my favorite fridge nook or particularly favorite bathroom cupboard. It's not a terrible thing, but I keep on opening the wrong doors in the apartment and being somewhat confused for a brief moment each time before remembering that even though this is the same layout as my last apartment, it's a different apartment!

Along with that have come other changes. These guys have dinner together most nights of the week. They do "community milk," and they use the dishwasher most of the time instead of hand washing the dishes they used and putting them back. I'll be curious to see what "apartment policies" I'm going to have to adapt to, because whatever they're already doing, the four other boys are already used to and most likely prefer! On the plus side, instead of hard rock heavy on the bass coming from the next room, I think I hear MoTab right now. :D

There's the Silver Lining!

Posted by Braden

I am going to be the Resident Assistant of my hall next semester!

Typically, only people who have lived in on-campus housing for a year can become RAs, but since my current RA is leaving on his mission, I decided to apply for the position in my own hall! I filled out the application, went to the interview, and found out over Thanksgiving that I'd gotten the job! It required a few changes in my plans--I'm not allowed to take more than 16 credits, I need to take a two-credit student development class during the semester that I have the job, I'm going to be working 20 hrs/week now, and I had to adjust my plane ticket back to school so that I'll be able to get back in time for training on the Friday before the Winter semester starts, which makes my very short Christmas break even shorter! I think that all these adjustments are most definitely going to be worth it though!

It's a little scary--I'm going to be checking kids in as soon as January 2nd, and as of right now, I have absolutely no training. My training begins on, well, the 2nd! I don't know where a lot of things are, how a lot of things work, and who a lot of people are, but I'm sure it'll all come along soon enough.

It was interesting to me though, looking back at what made this opportunity possible to me. It was kind of a bummer at first that I was placed on the third floor of the hall in the very back corner campus, farthest from all of the buildings that I have class in. Had I not been in this hall, however, I wouldn't have ever thought to apply for the RA position (since my RA probably wouldn't have been leaving on a mission at the semester). At the beginning of the semester, I audition for Men's Chorus. When you audition, unless you plan on leaving on a mission, you typically agree to do it both semesters of the school year. Men's Chorus practices each day from 4-5; the student development class that you NEED to take if you want to be an RA meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 4-5. Had I made Men's Chorus, I wouldn't have been able to even consider this RA position, even if I had thought to look into the opportunity. And now I think that this is the best arrangement I could have hoped for from the beginning of the school year, had I known all the possible outcomes--the leadership experience I'll get, the money I'll be able to put in savings, and the chance that I'll have to lead, work with, and help the other boys in my hall would not have come easily in any other way.

Thank goodness for bad days that enable even better days in the future!

Now or Never

Posted by Braden

There are some things in life that only college kids are stupid enough to do. For typical people, at no other time in their lives are they quite so able to eat funny things, sleep odd hours, and do, well, stupid things. I felt like I had neglected the last of those three activities, so when the opportunity presented itself soon after finals, I took advantage of it.

It was Wednesday night, we were all done with our finals, and a guy suggested, "Hey, we should go jump in Utah Lake to celebrate!" Of course, we all told him that he was crazy, but a girl with a car offered to drive, and before long he was putting on a swimsuit. The girls offered to make us hot chocolate afterward if we did, so then before long, I was putting on a swimsuit too.



On the way to the lake, we saw a sign outside that showed the temperature was 20 degrees Fahrenheit. The lake was hard to get to and didn't have very well-defined banks, so we went to Provo River instead! We got out of the car, shivered at the breeze coming through the canyon, stripped down to our swimsuits (just the three boys), jumped in the
river, sat down, rolled around, then ran back to our clothes and blankets.

It actually wasn't so terrible--I couldn't feel my feet after the first two-ish seconds in the water. Feeling in my feet came back about 20 minutes later, but during that time, there really wasn't that much discomfort; it just felt like novocaine for the feet. Then we went back to our home base at the girls' house, and they made us hot chocolate!

We did notice blood on the kitchen floor after we'd been home a few minutes. We had no idea whose it was since none of us could feel anything. After we found the offending heel that had been cut on the rocks in the riverbed, we noticed blood on the carpet, and we spent the next hour getting it out.



The whole escapade was a rather pointless, thoughtless, careless, stupid thing for us to do . . . but I didn't die, and now I have a fun story to tell about the crazy things I did in college!

Trading Spaces

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

Randomly assigning strangers to be roommates, especially six freshman girls, can be a gamble. By the beginning of December, one girl in Sini's apartment wanted out. "She felt uncomfortable around us," Sini says. "Everyone else was sharing food; she didn't. We were not allowed to talk about boys, kissing, holding hands--anything like that. She thought it's not right to kiss before you're married or engaged." After mediation with an RA, the affronted roommate opted to move into Wyview, where she would have her own room. In the shakeup, apartment 46 absorbed a new roommate, a friend from down the hall.

With friends like these, who needs a pet cricket?

Posted by Braden

I run my life by guilt:

• "I should probably be studying . . . OK, I'll do it now and play later."
  
• "I need to start getting some work/leadership experience for my college resume . . . alright, what options do I have?"
  
• "I probably shouldn't eat ice cream right before going to bed . . . alright, I'll just wait until breakfast in the morning to eat something"

My roommate now serves as an anti-conscience for me, and it may not be altogether unhealthy.

Me: "I probably shouldn't eat anything before I go to bed..."
Him: "Oh, suck it up--go eat something!"
Me: "You know what? Yeah, I think I might!"

Me:"I'd love to . . . but I should probably finish the chapter while I'm here and in the studying mode . . . "
Him:"Oh, you're always studying! Go play volleyball. The homework will get done; it always does!"
Me:"That's true--I will finish it tonight before I go to bed. OK, see you in a few hours!"

Me:"Yeah, but I can't just NOT attend the lecture . . . it's free information!"
Him:"You've been to the last five that the college hosted. You've earned a day off! Stay home and do something for fun!"
Me:"I don't know that I have time for something fun . . . "
Him:"Shut up--we're playing Super Smash Bros. Get over here!"
Me:"OK. That sounds good."

It's different . . . but now that my id has a little bit of a boost, I find myself doing a lot of things that otherwise I wouldn't be doing. Not bad things, just simple little enjoyable things that I wouldn't normally be able to convince myself to do. Thank goodness for complementary roommates!

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.”

It's Pulla

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


You could compare it to a cinnamon roll, but it's so much better than that. It's pulla, or at least one kind of pulla. Sini says the Finnish make it all the time, and Monday night, she instructed her FHE group in the art.

The dough seemed simple enough to whip up (eggs, flour, sugar, yeast, butter . . . some other stuff). For many, the dough alone was too good to resist. Sini was slapping hands away from the bowl even before the guys  piled on heaps of butter, sugar, and cinnamon. 

After creating the little pulla pinwheels you see above, there was a special thumb press that was supposed to add aesthetics (think of making a "thumbs down" sign and then jabbing your thumb into the dough), though no one quite mastered it. Even harder was making perfectly spherical pullas—the next level of difficulty in the tiers of pulla-making (the bread comes in multiple shapes and sizes). It takes a lot of muscle--watch Sini demonstrate below.

After all was said and done, the FHE group left Sini's kitchen smelling sweeter than they found it, which is hard to do considering the smell of fresh-baked brownies wafting when they entered. She's quite the cook. One roommate was munching on Sini's homemade bread throughout the evening, another was raving about her walnut chicken, and the guys praised her weekly confections.

And did you know that Sini can sing BOTH verses  of Book of Mormon Stories in Finnish? Yep, much to the chagrin of her FHE peers, who collectively insist that there is only one. What an FHE mom.