Force to be Reckoned With

Welp, folks, the ratings are in and BYU basketball is now #3 in the nation, in both the AP and the Coach's poll!!! Ok, maybe you're not so into basketball, but seriously you don't even need to be to be utterly blown away by Jimmer Fredette. I searched YouTube for "Jimmer shooting a basket from China" and I totally found it! Watch it and be mind-boggled, my friends.

In other news, I just ate casserole for the second time in my life (I know, what kind of Mormon am I?!?!), I should be writing a research paper proposal about Romania's involvement in the Holocaust, and a couple hours ago I wrapped up a pretty successful film shoot for a series of Spanish films we're making for the Center for Language Studies. I was blessed beyond belief when I got home from my mission---God hooked me up with a sweet job working on campus in the ARCLITE Lab. We make movies. Simple as that. But not really that simple, because I know nothing about film production, which is what I told my boss when he hired me, but that seemed to make him like me more and now I'm assistant producer on this Spanish film project!

Time to do homework. Ciao.

You got JIMMERED!

As a penny-pinching freshman at BYU, I wanted to get the most out of my $100 All-Sports Pass when football wasn't in season. So I went to games that I wouldn't typically go to, like soccer, volleyball, and basketball. And that's when I fell in love with BYU basketball. It made me realize just how boring football is (sorry, but I'm much too A.D.D. for the stop and go of that game). Throughout my sophomore and junior years I continued to follow Cougar basketball, to the point of getting a job at the Marriott Center (our home court) so I could watch the games for free before having to mop between roughly 3,000 rows of bleachers until the wee hours of the morning.

Before my mission, Jimmer Fredette was talked about. 18 months later, the kid basically rivals Lady Gaga in celebrity status! He's a machine. He shoots (and makes!) baskets from like China, or farther. And he's currently the top NCAA scorer. I couldn't have picked a better time to come back

to America! [IF YOU DON'T KNOW WHO JIMMER IS, GET WITH IT, PEEPS! Watch this. Oh, BYU humor...]

One of the first major events on my road back to post-mission normalcy was when I waited in the stand-by line for 4 hours with my friend Jakob, attempting to get into the sold-out BYU vs. San Diego State game. BYU was #9, SDSU was #4. Big game, folks. Well, long story short: we got in, the game was nothing less than exhilarating, and we crushed the Aztecs by 13 points. Poor kids thought they were unstoppable! They were previously undefeated, until they got JIMMERED!

Flash-forward to...TODAY: the Cougs played SDSU again, this time with their home-court advantage (not to mention the fact that they wanted hardcore revenge). Not gonna lie, I was skurred! Annie and I went to Legend's Grill (on campus) to watch the game on the big screen. SICKEST GAME EVER! Simply put, I am EXTREMELY proud to be a Cougar. Click here to watch him score a record 49 points in one game against Arizona this season. Like I said, the kid is a machine!

Tonight we hit up a karaoke bar in Salt Lake. It was another one of those defining moments of post-mission adjustment and, might I add, made me proud to call these crazy people my friends. Check me out in my Jimmer shirt ["YEAH, he shoots from there!"].

Scribo Ergo Sum

I entered the beloved BYU Testing Center after a mad study sesh that started at 5:45 a.m. with my friend and colleague, Kara. We had spent 4 hours straight reviewing/discussing/inventing cheesy acronymns (that WORK) for our History305-Enlightenment midterm. And by golly I was not about to let it defeat me!

I headed for the music room (the secret, quaint, inviting room on the 3rd floor of the Testing Center. Why anyone would opt for the massive, non-music hall of 500+ desks about 5 inches apart is beyond me. Everyone coughing and gagging and nervously tapping their pencils, etc. No thanks). Perhaps students cough in the music room, as well, but its drowned out by the sweet sound of Paul Cardall, Itzhak Perlman, and Debussy. One time a Testing Center employee slipped the Lord of the Rings soundtrack into the playlist.

After a solid 50 min., I completed the multiple choice section of the exam. Time to move on to the essay portion. I love writing. But I find that reactions to my writng are across the board. Some professors (or TAs or whoever is lucky enough to grade my papers) dig my style; others are a little less easy to please. It's always a toss up. I stared at the Blue Book and pondered the prompt. "Compare and contrast the absolutist states of Louis XIV, Frederick the Great, and Peter the Great. Discuss the meaning of "state-building" in an absolutist monarchy." I glanced at the clock on the wall behind me. One hour before I had to be at a meeting. One hour to BLOW THIS ESSAY OUT OF THE WATER! I threw all inhibition to the wind and wrote everything I wanted, how I wanted. I talked about the trend-setter Louis XIV with his high-heels. And how Peter the Great chopped off everyone's beard in an attempt to "Westernize" Russia. I spiced it up with witty comments about Hobbes and Locke and Descartes (some of the greatest Enlightenment thinkers). I talked about what would happen if Hobbes and the Russian Boyars were locked in a room together. In my conclusion, I stated that Louis, Frederick, and Peter taught us 1.) how to successfully and unsuccessfully run an absolutist state, 2.) how to appreciate democracy, and 3.) what's hot and what's not---heels: HOT, beards: NOT.

I chuckled the whole time I filled that there Blue Book and I'll be darned if Downtown Kendall Brown (my Enlightenment professor) doesn't chuckle, too. That was by far the best experience I've ever had in the Testing Center. Especially after I turned in my test, moseyed downstairs to look at the score screen, and saw "Perfect Score!" displayed on the banner next to my ID number. 100% baby! I think I've seen that banner maybe one other time in my history as a BYU student. Usually it says "You Suck" or "How Did You Get Accepted into This School?" (that's my interpretation of it, at least). In order not to piss off those around me who may have failed their exam, I concealed my excited. I smiled slightly:) So, now I'm waiting for my grade on the essay. If it's good, I'm posting it on here for the world to see. Yes, I'm that proud of it.

Because you asked....

...I obliged. Welcome to my new blog, where you all can step into Sarah's Mad World: her observations, bright ideas, college life, post-mission adjustment, discoveries, eccentricities, and (needless to say) opinions of, well...everything. Drink up, me 'arties!