Despite 3hr ochem exams every week...

This really is the good life.

I just heard this song on the radio in my car. At 1:20 when he says something like "my friends in LA", the radio version I heard said "my friends in UTAH!" and I was surprised that Utah had gotten a shout-out. Tricky radio people.

"When you're happy like a fool, let it take you over"

I just bought this album.

La Missione Italiana di Milano

So remember how I got called to the ITALY MILAN MISSION?!?!

Yeah, I do, too.

I'm so excited I might explode. Seriously. I just used the "find a meetinghouse" tool on lds.org and looked up all of the wards and branches in my mission district. I counted 25 branches and 22 wards, including a military ward in Pordenone and a military branch in Vincenza. I am so excited. I love Italy.

Some random thoughts:
-on my study abroad I took a class called "the history of the LDS church in Italy". I think all the reading for that class might pay off.
-Italy/My mission borders Austria, France, Switzerland and Slovenia.
-Some cool towns you may have heard of that are included in my mission: Milan, Turin, Verona, Bologna, Modena, Trieste, Genoa, Bergamo, SIENA (!), Pisa, Florence.
-I'm so excited I could DIE. I'm so excited.
-My Italian speaking skillz need A LOT of work. I know what I'll be doing this summer, that's for sure!
-I love Italy. I really do. I really seriously would have been thrilled with any call, and honestly, I didn't think I'd get called to Italy, but I can't wait to go back and get to work.
-BAHHH I'm just so blinkin' excited!!!!!!
-Even though O-chem is ruining my life, I feel awesome. This is the best. I can't wait until August 31st!


Oh, and did I mention that I'm totally, ridiculously, uncontrollably excited to serve a mission? In Italy, no less. Because I am. I am very excited. In case you haven't noticed. Yep.

Potere è volare

Remember this post? It was the first post on this blog and in it I said that I didn't really know when or why I decided that I wanted to learn Italian and study abroad there.

I think I know now.

Yesterday I received a very interesting letter:


Dear Sister Soh:

You are hereby called to serve as a missionary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. You have been assigned to labor in the Italy Milan Mission. It is anticipated that you will serve for a period of 18 months.

You should report to the Provo Missionary Training Center on Wednesday, August 31, 2011. You will prepare to preach the gospel in the Italian language.


Did you catch that last bit? In the Italian language.

If you think God, Our Father in Heaven, doesn't have a plan for you in your life that is specific to who you are and what you need, you are outta yo' mind.

Praise to the Lord

Today is a good day.

A seriously good day.

:)

Like it always does

I apologize for posting so many videos lately. No one probably even watches them. Oh well.

I'm officially obsessed with this song. It's just so sexy and smooth. I've probably listened to it 50 times today and watched the video at least 10 times.

Happy Raptor Day!

Apparently today is the Day of Raptor, aka Raptor day! In honor of this great day (which I didn't know even existed until about a week ago), I encourage all of you to do something that raptors like to do!

Here are a few examples of things to do today:

Play with your friends!

Ride bikes!

Go dancing!

It's a glorious day! So get out there and celebrate, people! Raptors, ftw!

p.s. I heard something on the news about people saying today had something to do with Jesus, but I didn't know what all that was about, nor what it had to do with raptors. But as I thought about it, I realized that like "all creatures of our God and King", Jesus must love raptors, too!

I miss my coufritwin

I was thinking about how when I get back from my mission all of the people I know will probably be graduated and moved away from Provo. It's a bummer, but at this point it's a non-issue. Maybe I think that most people will forget about me while I'm gone. That's understandable and a little bit expected. I mean, our lives are changing faster than Heidi Montag's facial structure. And I hope that most of my friends will move on with their lives in the 18 months I'm gone and get married and all that. The scary part came when I came to the following conclusion:

I'm really terrible at making friends.

I'm actually really shy. I have been since I was a little kid. I'm also terrified of people. They really intimidate me. After a few weeks of observing the people around me, I can start to make an effort to get to know them. And it takes serious, concerted effort for me to do so. Perhaps people are hesitant to reach out to me, I think because I'm tall and a little stoic, especially when I'm new because I'm too busy internally freaking out to remember to smile and look approachable.

The funny thing is, I don't think this will be an issue for me when I'm on my mission. It certainly wasn't a problem for me at Disney. I think it just depends on what my job is (literally and figuratively).

Anyway, the whole reason I started thinking about this is because on Monday I wore my Pope necklace and today I wore my Hanson tshirt and despite being around people all day, no one seemed to notice them. Except my grandmother, who saw my Pope necklace and laughed.


After reading over what I've written so far, I realize that this post makes no sense. So I'll stop here.

Ain't no shame, baby do yo' thang

Look, I was born in '89. I can't help it if the following songs are inextricably linked to my soul. I could listen to them over and over for the rest of my life. Sing them at the top of my lungs in the car. And elsewhere. Forever. I just die when I hear them. Sighhhhhh.













Admit it. You know you love them, too.

Baby, why you frontin'?

My mission prep teacher, the infamous Brother Bott, talked to us in class yesterday about "young women and missions". I'd prefer not to talk about what he said specifically because I'm still a little upset about it. What I do want to say, however, is that a casual comment that I made before class started came back to bite me during the lesson. I apparently led him to believe (from the one sentence I said before class) that I've intentionally, adamantly refused to allow men to court me because I desperately want to serve a mission, essentially robbing myself of the chance to get kick-started on my eternity and become a wife and mother in Zion because I'm so focused on something (a mission) that is not my responsibility because I'm not a priesthood holder. That I've intentionally kept hoards of young men at bay. That I refuse to date them.

BAHAHAHAhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahhahahahahhahhahahahahahhahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahhahahhahahahahahahhaHAAAAAAAAAAA

*gasp for air*

Ha.

I'm puttin' your patience to the test

Don'ts:
-Don't you hate when you lose respect for people you didn't have very much respect for in the first place?
-Don't you hate when people who don't even know you try to make you feel like what you know is right isn't, in fact, right for you?
-Ochem lab is such a beast. I don't have time for all of this!
-I don't know what my favorite flower is. I may not even have one!
-Don't you love when people say nice things to/about you and they really mean it?
-Don't you think we could all be a little bit happier if we didn't think so much?
-"Just don't fall recklessly, headlessly in love with me" -Robyn
-Could my cousins get any cuter? I don't think so. They're pretty darn cute.
-Katie, you have a lot to do tomorrow. I know. Don't remind me. Sigh.

Life is simple in the moonlight

The following months have a common trait:

February 2008
June 2008
April 2009
August 2009
January 2011
May 2011

Can you guess what it is? Don't read the next line until you guess.

Hey, jerk, I said don't read this line until you guess!

Ok, well if you haven't guessed by now, you never will. The common trait of all of these months? In each one of them I have given a talk in church! That's right, folks, six. In the past three and a half years. Six.

The last one doesn't really count yet, though, because I haven't done it yet. I'm speaking in church tomorrow. My second week in the ward. Yep.

And now I should probably go work on my talk.

Kthxbai

Call me back

Today was (is) a beautiful day. Even though I had ochem all morning, I got out of lab early and went to the Wilk and had lunch. As I walked home, I thought about how awesome the world is and how nice it is that the temperature is finally warming up. I was about 3/4 of the way home when the thought occurred to me:

Katie, you idiot, you rode your bike to campus today. 


Happy Friday.

Life-changing

I hate frosting.

I just think it's gross. I can't stand it. I don't mind cake, so if there's frosting on a cake, I'll just scrape of the frosting and eat the cake. Same with those sugar cookies with the pink frosting on them, although the cookies themselves are pretty gross so I usually just avoid those all together. And those trendy, new cupcake shops that sell these half cake, half mondo tower of frosting treats? Thanks, but no thanks. Sorry.

So this week I was craving cake. I don't know why. So I made some cupcakes. Great idea, right? Yeah, until I remembered that I live alone and the only person available to eat said cupcakes was me. And there was no way on earth I could ever live with myself if I just let myself eat all 30 cupcakes I had made! Fatty McFatfat!

No. So I decided to give some of my cupcakes away so I wouldn't eat them all. The only problem? I DON'T LIKE FROSTING. Therefore, I hadn't frosted the cupcakes. You can't give away unfrosted cupcakes! That's like making chocolate chip cookies for someone without putting in the chocolate chips! So I had to make some frosting for these darn cupcakes. I say make because I didn't have any frosting on hand (surprise surprise). I hate butter cream frosting with the passion of a thousand suns and so refused to put that evil topping on my beloved cupcakes. Instead, I poked around the Interweb and decided to make this frosting.

Curse the evil that is deliciousness of unhealthy things because I actually liked the frosting. I didn't love it, but I liked it. And eating my little frosting-topped cuppycakes?

I thought I had died and gone to heaven with every bite. FROSTING HATERS: make this frosting. IT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE.