Outted

Jenny, who is home in Texas visiting for a few weeks, texted me this afternoon to let me know that I had been disowned. Apparently, Barack Obama sent me a letter. In Mama Willardson's eyes, this was worse than if I had announced that Alec Baldwin and I were to be married in the fall and that Susan Sarandon would be performing the ceremony.

Mom, I am not secretly campaigning for Obama, nor have I given him any money. I'm not sure how I got on this mailing list. However, I can't in good conscience vote for John McCain. So that means I'll either be riding the Obama train or writing in Jeff Johnson's name. I hope you can still love me.

Say Hello to My New Love

I don't know how I managed to miss three seasons of So You Think You Can Dance, but I regret every minute of my life I didn't watch this show. I am 100% hooked.

I'm not sure what captivated me so fiercely--maybe it's because I don't have a single rhythmically-inclined muscle in my body. All I know is, I've got a fever, and the only prescription is more SYTYCD (is there a more unwieldy nickname for a television show? I can't think of one). A show so powerful it made me not only like, but PURCHASE this song:

Jenny and I have spent the last three months avoiding this song at all costs. Until last week, I could not respond to this song with anything other than white-hot hate. But 90 seconds with Katee and Josh melted this cold, cold heart. Tonight, I bought another song featured on SYTYCD, a catchy 80s-pop throwback by the Veronicas which Jenny said makes her "want to run in place." In a good way.

Now every Wednesday night we find ourselves saying things like "Mandy Moore's choreography was a lot stronger on the contemporary dance" and "I'm bummed Napoleon and Tabitha didn't choreograph anything for this week" and "Look at her lines!" We laugh, get chills, make fun of Mary Murphy's outrageous commentary, and cry (I'm not even ashamed). I defy you to watch Twitch and Kherrington dance the Viennese Waltz, inspired by their choreographer's handicapped daughter, with dry eyes. Jean-Marc dans la maison!

If These Clerks Could Talk

A woman calls in to ask when her husband's next court date is for the domestic violence charge he was picked up on last night.

Woman: You know, it was really inconsiderate of the judge to set his bail so high. I don't have $2,000! Maybe he should think about that when he decides bail.

Me: (incredulous pause...maybe your husband shouldn't beat you)

Take This, Jenny's Disneyland Blog

As many of you know, I visited sunny California with Adam, Ben and Steve a few weeks ago. I've driven to California, oh, eighteen times since I moved to Utah in 2001, but never with three boys. Needless to say, it was a vastly different experience. Given that Adam was involved, the trip had to be as high-tech as possible, complete with internet in the car, dvd player, GPS, and a radar detector:

GPS was pretty controversial because Adam insisted on using GPS directions for places I already knew how to get to, and I was very bad at listening to what the polite woman on the dashboard instructed me to do. To Adam's credit, though, I was completely sold on GPS by the end of the trip. Directions aside, it tracks your average speed, moving time, and other helpful stats, and you can use it to find the closest anything and then make it tell you how to get there. We used to joke that Tyler and Jeff could find the nearest 7-11 in any city in the world. Well, GPS actually could. And did.

Anyway, the following is a photo journal of those four glorious days. I already want to go back, which is convenient since Bridget and I have a trip planned two weeks from today :)Is there anything more satisfying than the view of Provo fading slowly behind you?

High on the thrill of quitting Best Buy and his first vacation in a year. He hides it well.


Vegas is gross. I will never understand the draw.


Speaking of gross. Literally one of our very first views in Orange County. You're welcome.



Jenny challenged us to beat her "impressive" Disneyland record of fourteen rides set the previous weekend with Maddi and Michon. Anxious to out-do her (and update her on our progress throughout the day through various taunting text and multimedia messages), we left bright and early, making it to the gate about 20 minutes after the park opened. Our secret? Efficient usage of fast-pass distribution. I think I could write a research paper about the sophisticated techniques we employed. A special thanks to Steve, my junior fast-pass analyst.

1. Indiana Jones, round one, 8:40 a.m. I'm really disappointed in the changes they made to the end of the ride. Lame.

2. Jungle Cruise

3. Indiana Jones, part deux

4. Buzz Lightyear (I am lame)

5. Star Tours

6. Big Thunder Mountain. This is my best attempt to intimidate Steve into ceasing his continual candid-shot-taking. It didn't work.
7. Pirates of the Caribbean (woot woot!)

8. Space Mountain
9. Splash Mountain, aka Typhoon Mountain. The woman in front of Ben was wearing a garbage bag and was mumbling the entire time about how she didn't want to get wet. Of course, we got completely soaked, to the point that my cell phone has been glitchy ever since.
10. Autopia

11. Buzz Lightyear again. Steve, who once wrote a statistics paper about the merits of different MarioKart characters, smoked all of us at defeating the evil Zurg.

12. Honey I Shrunk the Audience. After Splash Mountain, I forced Adam to wear my sweatshirt like that in hopes it would dry out before dark.

13. Haunted Mansion
14. Pirates of the Caribbean

Since we had already beaten Jenny and were still completely soaked from Hurricane Mountain, we decided to take a quick afternoon break. We ran home to Wini and George's to change out of our squishy shoes and grab some dinner. The tension as we took this next picture was palpable, with Steve ready to pounce if the kindly 50-year-old man behind the lens took off with his 3-day-old camera.
15. Tiki Room, which we really hyped to Ben as a classic. I don't think he understood. I'm not sure what this random stone shrine is supposed to be, but Steve felt compelled to take a picture in front of it. I think if Brooke and Steve were to go on vacation together, all the cameras in the world would explode. Although it did mean that Adam and I managed to double the number of pictures we have of us together in one weekend.


16. Matterhorn, where the boys all refused to "bunk up" with one another in the awkward two-person tandem seats

17. Big Thunder Mountain

18. Pirates the third. Thanks to Fantasmic, there were about 15 people in line when we got there. Yes, Steve was That Guy who takes pictures inside Pirates of the Caribbean.

19. Haunted Mansion. The ride was literally stopped because there was no one on it.
20. Space Mountain. Not pictured, because Steve and Kristin were racing to use their fastpasses while Ben and Adam kindly saved spots for...

21. Fantasmic!! Which brought tears to my eyes. Definitely my absolute favorite part of the Disneyland experience. I tried to post the surprisingly high-quality 23-minute video Steve took, but gave up after Blogger crashed twice. Brooke, I know you would have watched it. These are my feet resting against the edge of the fence across from Tom Sawyer's Island. Front row seats!

The crowning achievement of Steve's amateur Disney-photography career.

22. Finding Nemo, which I'd never been on and absolutely hated. I thought I was going to die in that tiny submarine. (My expression in this picture reminds me of the face Ryan does when you tell him to smile for the camera)

It was the most successful Disneyland trip in recent memory. The weather was perfect, the lines were short, we did everything we wanted, and were surprisingly cheery and ache-free at the end of the day. This led me to conclude that the secret to all-day happiness at Disneyland is threefold: Dr. Scholl's gel inserts, a fresh pair of socks at midday, and a dose of Advil at 6:00 p.m.

We rounded out the blissful weekend with some quality time with Wini and George, and of course with Wendy, Jeff, and their gorgeous children. Ryan and Audrey somehow manage to become more adorable each time I see them, as evidenced here:

and here:and here.

They were so adorable, in fact, that Wendy and I couldn't resist taking these, which ended up feeling like test shots for our alternative lifestyle Christmas card.

And my personal favorite:

Just call me Rosie O'Donnell.

Subway...Eat Fresh! (But change your clothes after)

Okay, for all of you who spazzed out over my "i.e. Brooke and Wendy" comment, I apologize. I didn't mean to imply that Brooke and Wendy are my only readers, just that they had commented on my previous post and requested to see pictures. I'm sorry I haven't posted them yet, I just haven't gotten around to uploading my memory card. I'm on it, though!

My question today is this: Why, upon entering a Subway establishment for any period of time, do you come out smelling so bad? Inside Subway, the fresh bread smells delightful. It's almost comforting, all those carbs in the air. But those molecules somehow bond instantly to my hair and clothes and it's all I can smell for the rest of the day. I was thinking about this today, after meeting Jenny and Adam for lunch. I was about to text Jenny and say "I smell like Subway" when I received this text from her "Smell yourself. You smell like Subway."

Then, about five minutes later, I was walking past my friend Jessie at work and she said "Oooh, you smell like Subway!" I think 9 out of 10 people could identify the Subway smell. Why does no other restaurant have a distinctive post-visit smell? Why is it so long-lasting? And, perhaps most troubling, why can I not identify what exactly that smell is? I was trying to figure out how to describe it for this blog, and all I could come up with was Subway. It doesn't smell like bread, or cookies, or anything else they sell at Subway. And now I have to breathe through my mouth for the rest of the day. Why don't they have drive-through Subways?

Dear readers (i.e. Brooke and Wendy),

Yes, I did take pictures, and yes, I will post them soon.

Love,
Kristin

Dear woman two cubicles over who listens to a book on tape all day,

If you're going to force the rest of us to listen to that every day, at least have better taste in literature.

Love,
Kristin