I passed!

I passed my HRCI Professional in Human Resources (PHR) exam today. That's definitely good to have off my back. Now I can carelessly enjoy the rest of my summer!

Could our day get any "Fuller"?

We spent pretty much every waking moment last Saturday with our friends, Nate and Sara Fuller. They gave a rundown of the events on their blog here (including video footage of the monster koi pond), so be sure to checking it out. (Rumor has it that Deidra might be posting a koi pond video of her own - but that's just speculation).

Here's the details I will fill in. We had borrowed a car from Deidra's roommate (as explained here), so we could pretty much go wherever the wind blew. Unfortunately, we spent a lot of time in the car while I tried to figure out how to get us from where we were to where the wind was blowing us.

At Eastern Market, the breakfast was great, but what was even greater was watching how upset Nate would get when people would throw away their pancakes, french toast, or other breakfast items after only eating half of it. I'm pretty sure he would have stood right by the garbage and eaten everyones' extras for hours if Sara would have let him.

While at the Arboretum, we heard they were doing some sort of launch for alternate energy plants. That didn't really interest us too much . . . until we also heard that they were going to be giving away Ben & Jerry's ice cream. The lady told us we just had to endure 15-20 minutes of "blah, blah, blah" and then we would get free ice cream. She was partially right. The "blah, blah, blah" ended up being about 35-40 minutes, but we did get free Ben & Jerry's! I got the Half Baked on a stick, as did Deidra. I think Sara got Cherry Garcia, and somehow Nate scored one of each - props to him!

The National Cathedral was cool - even though I've been there numerous times. I had never been down to the crypt before, so that was cool. There was even a plaque saying the Helen Keller was interred there. Who knew? (Probably everyone out there but me.)

We ate dinner at our place mainly because none of us could make up our mind on where to eat . . . and because we're all cheap! It was actually nice hanging out with friends who were as frugal as we were.

It was a fun day, and I think I speak for both myself and Deidra when I say that we would love to hang out with the Fullers again. How about the Nats v. the Diamondbacks or the Reds? Or maybe while the Bergstroms are in town. They get in tomorrow night! I think Sara said it best when she told us that she just loved "merging the Logan and DC worlds" by hanging out here with Logan friends.

Kelly Kapoor on Scrubs?

So, Deidra and I have been watching Scrubs recently, since we borrowed the first season from some friends. As we were watching the 3rd episode by myself, I was positive that one of the medical interns was Kelly Kapoor from The Office (Mindy Kaling is the actress's real name). Anyway, Deidra doesn't think it's the same person. I looked at the credits at the end of the show and all over online, but nowhere does it say anything either way. So I'll let you all decide.

This clip is long, but all you need to do is skip to 8 min 30 sec and take a look. She's the only intern in green scrubs. It's not the best quality, but it's the best I could find online. Let me know what you think.

Two car family

When you live in a bustling city with great public transportation and gas prices are skyrocketing, what do you do? You go from having zero cars to having two! At least that's what we did last night.

Deidra and I wanted to go to the temple and we heard that renting a car through Priceline was the way to go. So I went to work yesterday morning with that topping the to-do list. By the time Deidra got to work, that mission had been accomplished.

Then I hear from Deidra that another old roommate is going out of town for the weekend and Deidra had talked her into letting us borrow her car. The only problem is that we can't cancel reservations made through Priceline.

So I got our rented car, picked Deidra up, went to the temple, stopped by the Bank's house (a couple from our Logan ward) where we were treated to a great 9:30pm dinner, and then went to pick up Deidra's roommate's car. A for about 20 minutes between picking up that car and dropping off the rental, we were a two car family. It was pretty exciting!

While we're on the topic of beverages . . .

This is why I love Shoppers - an entire section of different flavored Tang in the ethnic foods aisle. I bet most of you didn't even know there were different flavors of Tang. I never knew until my first trip to Shoppers many years ago. Unfortunately, they were out of the Strawberry Orange tonight, so I had to settle for the Orange Kiwi.

Air beverage of choice

I got Minute Maid Cranberry Apple cocktail all four times the beverage cart came through the aisle on our flights to and from DC. I'm not sure why exactly - I think it might be something about it not being carbonated, but still having a little bite to it. I would say that I get that same beverage about 80% of the time that I fly. Does anyone else have a preferred air beverage?

"All 'board!"

This weekend, a week after we left Utah for DC, we flew back to Utah/Idaho for my younger brother's wedding in Rexburg. Here's a run-down of the week's events.

FRIDAY:
Leave work and go directly to the airport, where I meet Deidra. We see Senator Crapo and spend some time chatting with Congressman Bishop, both who are also on our flight West. We get on the plane and there is nowhere for our carry-on luggage to go, because all of the overhead bins are full. So we have to check the bag, which defeated the whole purpose of us flying with just a carry-on. (When we land in SLC, we see an entire family who all have two huge carry-ons that they are taking out of the overhead bins. We don't know who they are, but they are our sworn enemies from here on out.)

After a 4 hour plane ride, we arrive in Salt Lake and go to pick up our rental car. Our only problem is that we forgot which rental car company we booked through. So we go to the desk of five or six companies before we find the right one. Then we begin our 3-hour drive to Firth. We stop in Brigham City to have a "quick" late dinner at about 9pm. We decide that we'll stop at Sonic, because you can just park, order, eat from your car, and go. Unfortunately, it took them 20 minutes to get our food. I definitely picked wrong there. But we eventually arrive in Firth around midnight and stay the night with Deidra's sister, Karisa and little Laney. Unfortunately, Karisa's husband and little Hudson were out on a father/son campout that night.

SATURDAY:
Awake to the alarm clock at 6:30am and get all showered and ready to head to Rexburg. But we definitely took advantage of Karisa's cinnamon-roll-style french toast in the morning. Mmmmm! She also packed us travel treats for our flight back, and candy for our drive. How cool is that?

After missing the Idaho Falls/Rexburg exit, we take the long way to the wedding in Rexburg, but still make it there in plenty of time. We attend the wedding, meet the bride's family, say hello to my family and friends, get pictures taken, go to the official post-wedding luncheon, and head back out of town.

Aaron, my best friend from high school (who lives in the Seattle area) was also in Idaho for a wedding. Unfortunately, it was an afternoon wedding in Idaho Falls. We tried to touch base with him on our way through Idaho Falls (and even drove around the temple to see if they were taking pictures), but to no avail.

Then we get a call from Karisa, saying: "Are you guys coming back here today, or just heading back to Utah? Hudson just got back and when I told him you guys had already come and gone, he said 'Already? Aw, but I miss those guys." That was enough to get us back to Firth on our way out of Idaho. We were there for only about an hour, but in that time, I got to see some of the many faces of Hudson:


The World-Renowned Baker


The Train Conductor - "All 'Board!!"


The Rough-ridin' Cowboy

It was so much fun to hang out with that kid. He's definitely one of my two favorite nephews.

While we were at Karisa's, Aaron called back. He and his wife were going to be in Blackfoot awaiting the wedding reception that evening. So we got back on the road and met them in Blackfoot. We didn't really have a place to meet, so we just went to Winger's and hung out for a bit in their waiting room and caught up. Whenever someone tried to seat us, we just told them we were waiting for someone. It was great to see them!


We then drove onward until we reached Kaysville and spent a very enjoyable stay at the Bergstroms. Daron and Lisa were great hosts and we got a great night's sleep.

SUNDAY:
Daron and Lisa cooked us a perfect pancake, cinnamon roll, and bacon breakfast to start our travel home off right. We checked in online and printed our boarding passes from their house before we left - and we are glad we did. Upon arriving at the airport and dropping off the rental car, we found ourselves in the longest security line I have EVER seen! Fortunately, an employee suggested we go to the International terminal and check in there. We ran over there, waited in a much shorter line, checked-in and quickly walked to our gate - getting there just as the plane was boarding.

Now we're back in DC again and we are trying to recover from our whirlwind weekend. Thanks to everyone who made it such a great experience!