A Weekend at Home

Hey guys! I know I didn't update like I promised, but I have a valid excuse. Thursday night was both late and stressful, so I didn't write anything and then on Friday I got to go home for the weekend, and family is more important than blogging.

Now that the obligatory excuse is done, let's talk about what I remember happening (which isn't much sadly) in the days that I've missed.

Thursday

Okay, so on Thursday, I went to my Animal Physiology class, and we actually got to watch some videos about eating behaviors in animals. One of which just happened to be killer whales catching seal pups along a coast. This meant I was able to add to the discussion and talk about other feeding habits, which made me happy. The other class that I had that day was my Vertebrates class. We did discussions like normal, and I got invited to another snake lab. This time, I was going to watch and help a little as we put the last two snakes under anesthetic and did a terminal surgery. Both of them weren't really healthy, so we just put them under and didn't wake them up again. It was really cool, since Megan (the graduate student that is letting me tag along) was collecting a lot of different things during the surgery. She musked the snake, took out both adrenal glands, took out the embryos to do cross sections and dna examinations, and even drew blood straight from the heart. Snakes have only two chambers in their heart, and it isn't as heavily run by pressure, so it doesn't really harm the snake. You can do it even if it isn't a terminal surgery.

The snake lab was really cool, but it meant that I missed dinner, which comes important later. I went to choir that night. We're performing for Elder Holland when he comes to give a devotional in a couple of weeks here on campus, and the songs were really cool. It was nice to be singing in a choir again, even if I'm in the alto section this time (I'm not comfortable enough with the amount of people to be on the opposite end of the room from Maren- it floods with people really easily when the time comes to leave). After that, and a little bit of socializing with Jessica and other members from last year's ward, Maren and I headed back home.

That's where the day got a bit rougher. You see, it was storming out, with thunder and lightening. We had to walk home with the occasional flashes of lightning lighting the sky. I don't do well with storms, and dry ones make me really nervous. Good news was, that the farther we went, there was actually rain. Bad news is we got soaked and the storm was worse closer to our dorm. We had to run to the dorm because we were getting drenched in the downpour, and after singing for most of the night, I was having a hard time catching my breath. I made it up to my dorm, still breathing kind of heavy, but I was okay, and took a shower to rid myself of the rainwater that was making my clothes and hands all sticky. However, some of my roommates were holding a party that night, and didn't give me any warning, so I ended up hearing it going on just as I came out of the shower. This normally would have been fine, but a lot of things just came crashing. I was hungry, anxious from the storm, already out of breathe, and there were now people in our dorm that I didn't know.

So I ended up having a panic attack in my dorm. I'll spare the details, but Meagan and my roommates came to my rescue. That's why I didn't write on Thursday. I was okay by the end of the night (thanks to my support system and the ever helpful Crumbl cookie delivery service), and ended up crashing after 11 only to wake up early the next morning.

Friday

Friday was better. I went to my Evolutionary Biology class, which we're still covering review stuff, which is nice, and I'm re-learning stuff in a way that makes a bit more sense now. Nothing super interesting happened in it- we talked about E. coli. I went back to the dorm to pack for when Mason and his crew would show up, and then headed off to Aikido. That was fun, if a bit strenuous. We learn mostly self defense in that class, and a good chunk of it was just warm ups and learning some Japanese phrases. I had to book it to my next class though, which I was almost late too. We talked about pigeons and watched some videos on said pigeons. My favorite is the tumbler pigeon. You guys should check them out. The equilibrium center in their brain is apparently messed up so they do flips in the air to fly straight.

After that, Mason was here to pick me up, and it was a long 4 or so hour road trip back home where I hung out with Dad and Mom while Mason dropped off his friends. I even showed my dad some of the stuff I learned in Aikido that day.

The Weekend (Plus Today)

So this weekend we did a little bit of shopping and we finished Avatar: The Last Airbender again. Mom made us some food that we had asked to be made, which was delicious as always. And one of the best parts (besides getting to lounge about with Mom and Dad, because they are the best) was Grandma Sully made spaghetti!!! As you are all aware, I love spaghetti. It made my day even better. I even got to talk with Jason about snakes and other reptiles. And Andrea was visiting too! It was a great weekend, even if it was short.

This morning, we watched this weird movie (Mason's obsession with weird films hasn't been tempered by college. It's grown.) about spies. It had Harrison Ford in it, and had one part that made me doubt it was PG, but, hey, it was the seventies. We got a huge load of food packed in the car, and with Sarthac, made our way back to Utah. I just finished putting away the groceries when Mom reminded me to do this. So here it is.

That's what you guys missed.