Random Summer Stuff

My summer is going pretty well! I have had a couple fun trips. One with friends to Oceanside, CA, where we stayed in a condo right next to the beach; and another with my Dad to Pinetop over Memorial Day Weekend to play in a golf tournament.

Oceanside was a blast as the company was great and the ocean, while slightly cold, a great time. The condo was amazing (shout out to Bryan and his relatives for hooking us up!) and it was a really relaxing weekend. On the way home my car stopped in Yuma, AZ to watch the Gila Valley Temple Dedication. That itself was a wonderful experience and I will probably always remember President Eyring's admonition received in Pima, AZ, to 'Get Eddie,' or whoever figuratively is the wandering sheep in a person's individual life/family.

The golf tournament in Pinetop was nice. Dad and I played mediocre on the whole, but one good day (Saturday) got us past the cut and we ended up getting 5th out of 17 teams. While it is only golf, I've gotta say we (especially dad) could care about it a lot. It is nice to have the competitive juices flowing and the pressure on the line. Hopefully next time I will respond a little bit better!

Most of my days are consumed by job applications and bar studying. I have submitted dozens of applications around the Valley the last few weeks and not much has come through yet. I am keeping my hopes up but also accepting the reality that I might be in St. Louis come September. One comfort if that becomes reality is that I might be in DC starting next Spring or Summer for a job with the Foreign Service. I have applied to be a Foreign Service Officer and have gotten really excited about the career possibility. I have an all day interview in DC on October 7th, after which I will have a really good idea of whether or not I will be getting the job.

Bar study is tedious but I am trying to push through. I really just have no interest in law, I don't know how I survived three years of law school. We'll see how things turn out, I'm down to a month!!! Ahh!!!

Oh yeah, included are a couple pics of my new apartment.

I Survived! Or Graduated

Yesterday was graduation day! Hurray!!! I'm done. I've had a lot of people ask me if I'm proud or happy or whatever. To be honest, I think the biggest emotion is just relief. I survived probably the worst three year period of my life and dedicated tons of hours to something I had no interest in or passion for. Many people have complemented me on not quitting and toughing it out and say its a big accomplishment. For me, law school was the first time in my life academically where I wasn't a rock star so I don't feel too proud of my record or accomplishment. However, in areas outside of law school I do feel fairly good about the last three years. I served a lot in the Church and tried to help many people, I learned a ton about myself and how to be happy in life, and maybe most importantly, for the first time in ages I am looking forward to the future and what it might hold.

In this post are pictures of graduation including my dad, Professor Matheson, Platte Nielson (my best friend/colleague at ASU and basically my counselor until I started seeing a real one at BYU), and I've asked my mom for one off her camera but she hasn't delivered yet.

The Start

So I've been meaning to start a blog for the last month or two, even looked into www.lifesadanceyou learnasyougo.blogspot.com but the site was already claimed :( Last night at my birthday dinner two of my best friends and I came up with random things for each other to do over the next year. Dave suggested I keep a blog, so here it is!

My fortune cookie was something along the lines of 'You Would Do Well To Work As A Team In The Coming Week'. Interesting with finals coming up, hopefully some fellow students will be generous with outlines and help me get past this final semester.

As for the two cartoons, I didn't have any pictures of the night so I googled Chinese restaurant pictures and came up with these. I thought both were appropriate as Cassie had a ridiculous parking job in the ghetto and I worried her car might be damaged while we were gone. As for the dog one, I probably ate a fair amount of dog during my time in Hong Kong and if not we always had the joke from childhood trips to El Golfo about eating Smokey dog.