Perspective and How it Applies to Chemistry

When you think of a chemistry class, what is your reaction? Many shudder, others cringe, and there is a general distaste for the subject, or there is in my peer group (being an English major the sciences tend to scare a little). With that as my natural reaction, I was a little nervous when I walked into the large lecture room in the frigid basement of the Science Building on Tuesday afternoon for my 2:30 Chem 1110 class. I was thinking to myself, "well, I aced high school chemistry, but that was 4 years ago". Having picked the class because it fit into my desired time frame, and not for the sake of any professor who was teaching it (not that I would know before hand any of the science professors), I was nervous that I would end up with an unreasonable professor who would just drone on about the periodic table and wouldn't look up from his notes except to stare down his nose at us disapprovingly. This has not been my experience previously, of course.

On the contrary, my high school chemistry teacher was a round, engaging, and very clever man who knew what was going on in his classroom but let the delinquents think they were getting away with their foolishness until their tests came back with no score because he saw them copying/discussing the answers with a friend. ... but I digress...

At 2:30 on the nose, my professor walked into the room, he was a skinny man with white hair (where hair remained) surrounding a bald crown. I heard the girl next to me mutter with slight amazement that he was the DEAN of the Science Department (being an English major, I really wouldn't know what the dean of the science department looks like, so I took her at her word). Professor Eves introduced himself, and spoke about the class. It seemed that most of the students were in there because they were required to be there for the nursing program, nobody mentioned filling a General Ed requirement. My blood froze. I thought I was in the wrong class ( I later checked, and the course does fill the General Ed requirement which is my reason for taking it). I was delighted, as the eighty minute course progressed, to find that Dr. Eves is really a very pleasant fellow. Utah bred, and very knowledgeable about the material, he assured the class that he was going to prepare us for the standardized final exam quite well, and that we shouldn't be concerned about passing it because SUU's students have always been well above average in the past decade or so.

I titled this post "Perspective" and you're probably still not sure why. Well, I wanted to focus on my perspective walking into class on Tuesday, and my change of perspective walking out of class this afternoon. I decided that this class can be easy, or it can be hard, I just have to let myself think it's going to be fun to learn this, and it will be fun. Because that's the light I'll be shining on it. (feel free to check on me in a couple months and see if I'm still enjoying my CHEMISTRY class!)

That's all for now, until next time,

PenningJade

The Little Things

Growing up my dad always said, "don't sweat the small things." Well, small is to little as priceless is to invaluable (otherwise known as synonyms), and everyone always says it's the little things that count, so why can't I sweat the small things? They count. I want to be concerned that my home is clean because I want to show that I am a neat person (after all, cleanliness is close to godliness), I want to be aware of the state of my hair because I want to keep it healthy and long so that when I do decide to cut off it it can go to a good cause....

Okay, so not the best examples. But like picking up a piece of trash that you see when you're at the park, or helping someone carry their groceries when they've got more than they can handle, these little things mean a lot to me. Not when I do them, because it's easy, and makes me happy to help. but when I'm the recipient of such actions, or the witness, I want to shout from the highest mountain (or maybe just Sunset Peak) how much that means to me that there are still people who do stuff like that. So maybe society isn't all bad, maybe, just maybe there is still a big group people doing the little things every day to make other people's lives easier. Are you one of those people?

The T-Bird Has Landed

I know it's a pretty un-original title for a post, but I couldn't think of anything more exciting. I have finally made it to school. The summer is over, and I don't have to go back to work in Holiday again! Among other things, this summer taught me patience, relaxation, the fact that I'm too young to really know the world yet, and that even though someone likes me I don't have to like them, at all...

This was a lot to learn in 4 months, but I did, and I am glad that those lessons are over with.

Moving on to where I am now, I am back in Cedar City, with an education on my mind. I am excited to be learning more about the beautiful language I have been given, and better ways to manipulate people with my words... I mean... better ways to manipulate my words to communicate...

I am living off campus this year in a house with 9 other girls. There are 6 girls "upstairs" and 4 more of us in the basement. It's freezing in the basement because the thermostat is upstairs, so we have no control over that. There's a funny-fishy smell in my bedroom that I would like to get rid of also, but other than that the place is perfect. There is tons of space, and we have a great group of girls. It's only a short ride from campus, so I can sleep a little later. I really do love school.

My ward is GREAT there were these really cute guys in one of my Institute classes last semester and I was sad when the class was over because I would never get to see their faces again, but... they're in my ward! ;) not that I go to church (or Institute for that matter) with the sole intent of seeing cute guys, that is just an added bonus to the already great experience of learning more about the gospel. My Bishop seems pretty nice too, and many of my dear friends from Juniper are in my ward also.

I have a great schedule of classes, and plenty of time to work, I just need to find a job.

Well, I gotta get to class. Have a great day!

-PenningJade

Sunshine and Summer Time

Well, life is back to normal, kind of... normal as in I'm back in Sandy, and I've become used to being back with my family. Aside from some drama in the family, and the migraine I've been dealing with off and on for the past few weeks, life is great. I love my job, I love my life, and I love all of you. I wish I had more time to post, and will post more when my laptop is fixed, but for now I have to share the computer, so I have to get off.
Wishing you and yours a great day,
PenningJade

President's Day Disaster/ Prayer Works (Period!).

Hey, people out there, How's life? Mine is going great!  Everyone has their problems, but the ones I have seem to hide themselves inside flowers and text books, so I haven't got many complaints.

I don't have much time to blog, I just wanted to update and tell people about my President's day adventure.  I’ll set the scene first: It was 1:00 in the afternoon on President’s day, and I was out geocashing with some friends in an old 1996 Ford F150. The roads we were taking seemed to be nothing more than ATV trails. They were covered in a blanket of snow that had fallen the night before. On our way back from our destination, we accidentally navigated ourselves into a deep puddle, and got stuck. The excursion hadn’t been well planned; it was a spur of the moment activity. We had only figured on being gone from the dorms for about 2 hours so we hadn’t brought anything but light sweaters, and a couple water bottles.  Well, when the truck got stuck, we tried everything we could think of to get it out. We worked for about twenty minutes before I suggested we should probably say a prayer, which we did. Then the truck still didn’t move. Still unaware of the danger we seemed to be in, we tried to get a hold of someone to come pull us out of the puddle. We looked, and only one of the four cell phones had a signal. We tried to call our friend B who has a truck (I’ll have to tell you about him some time, he’s a scream), but he was in the middle of something, and said he’d call us back. Then the phone died. We still didn’t panic, but we were a little more aware of our situation, so the two guys who were in the group offered to climb a near-by hill to see if they could get a signal. The rest of us stayed in the truck and prayed. I don’t think I have ever prayed as hard as I did that day. It was nice to know that God was there, watching over us. The excursion to the top of the hill had been unsuccessful. This left us two choices: 1, Hike out the perceived six miles to the highway, or 2. Stay in the truck and pray that B would come find us. I didn’t feel right about the first option, everything I’ve ever learned told me to stay in the truck and keep everyone together. So we sat. and waited. We realized B didn’t really have our exact coordinates, and he would need those to get to us. We tried removing the battery from the phone and replacing it to see if we could squeeze a few more minutes out of it. It worked and we were able to send the coordinates we pulled off the GPS. It only worked because of a prayer, because the second the text was sent, the phone died again. After that we sat and waited and prayed. At about 1 in the morning, we saw some lights on the horizon. Rescue had come. We had spent 10 hours in the truck, as the temperature slowly dropped to around 6*. Everyone (except me) looked like they had just returned from an alien abduction, they were hungry (we hadn’t eaten since 11 that morning) they were cold (6*) and they were tired (1AM!!!), but I was still just fine… (I frequently skip a meal or two, I am somewhat impervious to cold, and I rarely make it to bed before 2AM, so, I was just an hour after my bedtime.) After the paramedics checked us out, we went to bed, safe and sound.

I learned a few things from that experience; it’s nice to have fun, but even better to be alive. Being scared makes being hungry seem unimportant. Keeping a good sense of humor is vital in scary situations, and prayer works. Period! 

Well, that's all I have time for for now, wishing you all the best!

-PenningJade

I'm nineteen!!!

I had my birthday last week, and now I'm older. More details to come when life isn't so hectic...

Merry Christmas!!!

I just wanted to wish everyone a merry Christmas, and I will see you again in the new year!