what happened to unbiased?

Since elections are almost upon us, at work we've been doing almost nothing besides political surveys and polls. my favorite kind are what we call "two minute specials"  basically, are you going to vote, in this election, who are you voting for, and does this make a difference to you at all.  most of them really are unbiased, and we can't tell who is doing the survey.
one survey we are currently working on, takes place is Bexar (say it BEAR, not BEX-ar) county.  its the same basic idea.  here's a list of names, do you have a positive or negative oppnion of the person?  great, in this election, who are you voting for?  and now i'm going to read you some information about the two candidates, to see if it changes your vote.  it goes on, at that point, regardless of who you said you were going to vote for, for about 5 minutes about this one candidate.  telling all the great things he's done for the county, and that he's been there for so long, and whatnot.  well, thats great... but what about information about the other candidate?  oh yeah.  lets throw in two negative statements about her, so that no one will remember her, and won't like her.  thats a good idea, and it won't bias it at all...

right...

Park Ranger

During some homework for a class, i got the opportunity to look up a job descriprion for a park ranger. i enjoyed it, and wanted to share. after all, its what i will hopefully one day be doing. :)

PARK RANGER
Do you like working directly with the public? As a park ranger for the National Park Service, you (1) interpret and explain park resources to visitors; (2) facilitate visitor enjoyment of the park and its resources; (3) help ensure visitor behavior that protects park resources and gain friendly compliance with the laws and rules for safe use of the park; and (4) encourage visitors to develop a sense of stewardship of park resources. You research and present interpretive programs, and present a variety of formal and informal programs including orientation talks, environmental education programs, conducted walks, demonstrations and campfire programs. You tell visitors about park facilities and resources such as visitor centers, campgrounds, historical sites and auditoriums. Other duties may include gathering information for reports, compiling statistical data, assisting with search and rescue efforts or helping to combat wild-land and structural fires.

life

its been a while since i've actually updated my life, so i thought that i would do so, since i have no time, and am trying to put off doing my taxes today. :)

-starting with the most recent, my mission papers have made it in to the stake president as of today. as to when i'll be able to meet with my stake president, that is still up in the air. he is out of town a lot, which is rather frusturating, but i always planned on waiting a lot longer to talk to him. he is the stake president after all. and hey, at least i still get to talk to him sooner than expected. things with my councelor apparantly progressed faster than thought, according to her, which was a wonderful thing to hear.

-i actually have stopped my counceling. i stoped it right after my old councelor left, and i had to get a new person. i'll admit it, this seems to be turning into a habit, and i need to stop doing so.

- i still work at sears, but i'm no longer the only one on my team! we got a new gal just the other day. so, although she is currently doing training all morning, i'll eventually have another person to work with, and the load wont be quite as heavy. it came at a convienet time, because they hadnt been all about giving me days off, and now that i'm doing a class, i'll be going out of town to take tests.

-as mentioned, i'm currntly taking a class through BYUI. its an online religion class (new testament to be exact), and is turing out to be a lot more work than i ever planned it to be. i have a couple hours of reading monday-friday, and sometimes on the weekends. i had figured a lot of reading, but not as much as it actually is. i do love the class though. its teaching me some perspectives that i never would have thought about. its wonderful to be learning again.

-i'm no longer teaching the really cute sunbeams. i'm now teaching the CTR 9-10 class. its an interesting experience to feel like you know nothing when your teaching them. the kids are way way smart, and it sometimes amazes me just how much those kids know.

-rachel has left, but oddly, i'm not doing too bad. i expected a whole onslaught of a bunch of crap that happens with my bad depression, but it hasnt come, and i've been able to stay really happy. i guess that means that he therapy i did for those three months really wasnt a waste of my time and money. i do miss having her around, and all the fun we had together, and the house is now really quiet. it does mean we can eat things she really didnt like though, like spinach things, and things with peaches in them, and rhubarb! i've missed being able to have rhubarb things. :)

-for the first time in 21 years, i now have my own room. its kinda interesting to be able to have things in my room how i want, and to sleep not 5 feet off the floor. becasue of it, i spent a few days and rearragned things all by myself (okay, technically dad did take the beds apart, but only because i didnt get to it the day before since i was sick), and i'm proud of how the room now looks. :)

-i've started, or, more like, tried to start a daily yoga and cardio routine, but it hasnt really happned. between my class and what mom needs me to do during the few hours that i'm home and she isnt, i've found myself lacking in time. its something that i need to try and do better at though. it would help if i would prioritize my time, and not play as much. :)

-happy day for me, i've planned some trips up to good ol' rexburg to get out of the house. admitidly, two of those trips have educational reasons behind them. i need to go and take my tests somewhere, but instead of deciding to just take them here in utah, i'm going to save a lot of trouble, not time, but trouble, and take two trips up to rexburg to take some tests. it will be nice to get out of the house for a few weekends. :) i'm also going up to see the opera they are doing. one of my old roomates, RL, is a music minor, and she told me she was going to auditoin for the opera. i'm going to go up and support her being in the opera, or if she didnt make the cuts, i'm going to go and watch it with her. i just wish i could stay a little longer that trip. its a trip up the night of the opera, and leaving early the next morning. :( it should still be fun though.

- last, but not least, i've kept up my photo a day blog. its been a wonderful thing to do in my life. its made me look for the good things in life, and its helped to keep my mind where it needs to be, and focusing on what it needs to focus on. i just wish that i could do it for a bit longer than will probably happen, since eventually i'll be leaving on my mission, and i doubt my mission president will allow me to keep posting. maybe i'll just invest instead in a whole buch of those disposable cameras and take them with me, with instructions to my sister to upload them for me if possible? we'll see when the time comes.

sldkfjasdl;fjasdl;fjsad;lfj

the day started out interesting enough. it started out with going to work, and starting to work the freight. nothing new, nothing exciting. then i get a page over the intercom, before the store is even open "melinda, please come to customer service." i get there, and my manager is wearing rubber gloves, a mask, and goggles. something just had to be up. why else would she be wearing those? so i find out. apparantly Champion Breed pet food, not just the dog food, not just the cat food, but all of their pet food (dry, not wet) is somehow contaminated. we had to get rid of EVERYTHING! lots of 50 lb. bags of food and all. and yes, i even had to wear the gloves, mask, and goggles. it was the least plesent thing i could have done that day, or so i thought. i get done helping with that, and still have about half my shift left, so i go to work more freight. then i notice, "i'm not jingling like i should" i look down...my keys are gone. i look in the stock room, i look over in Pantry, where we were working the pet food. i ask C and T if they have seen any keys lying around. "no, but i'll keep my eyes out" sad thing is, this is the most important keys i had. my car, mom's car, my house, and the shed. all ones that honestly, no one wants missing. finally, i give up, and go on break, just so i can look for my keys. not what i had planned for my break. i had been planning on hopefully taking a power nap. i've been way way tired recently, so it would have been a blessing. it was not to be. i eventually go and look IN my car to see if they somehow came of my D-ring i keep cliped to me. yep, sure enough, they were sitting on the seat. so, i call mom. she hasnt left for work yet, thankfully, so she can bring me the spare, right? apparantly i shouldnt have tried. she was home, but i got a good yelling at, (over the work phone nonetheless!) and she hung up on me when she finally found them. she had claimed that she would be late for work. but here's the thing. she had told me just the night before that she could go in to work late today. lucky for me i rememberd it. i'm just glad that i didnt actually have to meet her to pick up the keys, but i am sorry for the really nice customer service lady. she had to deal with mom. poor gal. so i get home, and help rachel pack for going to stay with her daddy et al. for the next five days (we get her christmas morning, sometime after 9:00. we have no clue what we are going to do with ourselves that morning.) things seem to go smoothly, till i double check that she has everything. rachel has been...best way to describe it is PMSing, but she isnt old enough for it. i just hope that whatever it is causing it will stop soon. its getting to me, and i'm having problems keeping my temper with her. she gets upset at me, and things start to go downhill. we eat lunch, rachel not really all that happy, then we get in the car to get to trax. happily, she falls asleep on the way there and is happy when she wakes up. we get on our way, rachel absolutely loved riding trax! it was great. get to the wells fargo building to go donate blood, and find out "oh, your iron is actually okay, but you have too fast of a pulse" stupid people. thats why you do blood pressure, and not just pulse. some poeple have horrible pulse, and will never be able to, but have really really good blood pressure. i wish it was the ARC doing it. then i could have actually done something worthwile today. instead, i wasted an afternoon, and six dollars, and felt even worse about things. just alsdfjdasl;fjadslfjasd;l.

Egg Beaters

work

i spent about six hours at work today rearranging womens socks and underwear. wasnt it great that i got to come home, and do all the wash, dealing with all the same things? i also am now a proud new owner of a letherman! haha! i'll never be without a knife at work, (stupid recieving always has them all) or even out in the woods! :)

a day of accomplisment

i got so much done today! i was so proud of myself. i finished my shirt

i voted

and i cleaned the bathroom, after having the job for the last month or so

(before)

(after)

i even finally printed out my deferment, now that registration is next week. i feel so accomplished. :)

random thoughts

it shouldnt be 100 degrees in salt lake in september!

Since we live in utah, there is absolutely _no_bloody_way_ we are going to sell over _25_ new coffee makers. its just not going to happen. who authorized the shipment? do they not realize that we have another _50_ coffee makers sitting on the shelves, also _not_ selling? its utah! we wont be selling them. if anyone needs one, come to my store, and you can have all the bloody coffee makers you can ever want.

brooding, though really not healthy, is something that humankind does a lot. okay, so maybe human kind doesnt do it a whole awful lot, but i've noticed that i personally do it a whole awful lot. i should probably stop, otherwise i'll end up...who knows where, doing who knows what. something i'd regret eventually. only problem is, what do i think about all day at work, since my job doesnt require a whole bunch of thought? just where does this bloody coffee maker go? oh look, like all the others, it doesnt have a home. where does this sheet set go? look, it goes here. and then i proceed to unload about 50 other sheet sets off the cart, none of which requires thought.

conservationing isnt just a statement, its a way of life. you cant just move to conserve one thing, like energy. my family has gotten fed up with the fact that i enjoy concervationing. i turn off lights when no one is in the room, even if someone is comming back a minute later. they arent there then, so why have it on? rachel was going through a stack of old school papers. mom had been going to just throw them all away. she and rachel both got rather fed up with me when i said "why dont we take those to the recycle bin, and save some trees" oh well. you cant make everyone happy. you just have to choose the winning party. :)

skin is amazing stuff. sure, i already know that i'm quite likely to die of skin cancer. thats what happens when you have very fair skin, and forget to wear your SPF 50 sunscreen everyday when wandering around campus, so you come home sunburned...every single bloody day. but, although i did come home all sunburned most every single day i was in rexburg, its also made it so that i'm more UV resistant at lower altitudes. just a thousand foot difference, and i can spend all day in a lake, forgetting (as always) to wear my sunscreen, and i come home just extremely lightly burned, and its all better the next day! if i had tried something like that up at school, i would have come home burnt and almost to blisters. i've gotten blisters just for sitting in the gardens for two hours, forgetting my sunscreen!