Extreme Planning

If there was a TLC show called "Extreme Planning" I would definitely be on it.
I know there are many people who hate planning things (John would be one of them) but I am just the opposite. I LOVE planning things. At this point I have my meal plans for next week already figured out and they have actually been mostly done since Monday. In my defense planning out my meals helps me stay on track throughout the week, helps me avoid having to go to the store multiple times a week by not having all the ingredients I need and helps save money because we don't go out as much because there is no food in the house. I also have workout plans through the end of January in the works and I have most of my vacation scheduled for next year (and that was done weeks ago).
I usually set up my bill pay well before things are actually due and make plans about how much money to save based on how much our bills our each month. I have even been working on budgets for next year based on the insurance changes that will be taking place in January.
I like planning so much that I actually got in trouble last week for filling out my time card in advance. I would go in on Monday or the Friday before and fill out my plan for working that week. When I have to go to court everyday this helps keep me on track and helps me plan when I will have time to work out and what meals to cook on which nights based on what time I might get home but apparently this is a no-no and now I have to fill out my time every day like a normal person and it has been bothering me all week!
I don't know what it is but I like having a plan and knowing what my schedule is on a day-to-day basis,  that way when I have down time I know for sure that there is nothing else I should be doing because everything is already done and I can just relax.
Unfortunately, that also means when things pop up and change unexpectedly I can get a little stressed. I would like to pretend that I am flexible when things like this happen but I am pretty sure John would say just the opposite.
But there is an upside to being a crazy-obsessed-planner lady. My mom and John and really anyone else involved in my wedding would tell you that it went pretty smoothly, thanks in part to my obsessive list-making and planning. I always have the ingredients for some sort of meal in my house and I rarely forget about important dates or things that need to get done.
I can't help it, I guess I am just a planner at heart!

Football Can't End in a Tie

I have always discredited soccer as a "real" sport because it was the only game I knew of that could end in a tie (and because I grew up in a house in which soccer was mocked but that is another story for another day).
I have seen baseball games go into more extra innings than regular innings, a college basketball game then went into seven, yes seven, overtimes and the longest college football game ever also went into sever overtimes.
Even in gymnastics, figure skating and other sports in which judges decide the outcome their isn't ties, they have tie breakers to decide what happens when two people get the exact same score, so there is always a winner and always a loser.
Until now, soccer has been the only sport I know of where players, coaches and fans are okay with there not being a winner at the end of the game. But yesterday the football game between the Rams and 49ers ended in a 24-24 tie. I heard this on ESPN while I was cooking dinner but dismissed it as a mistake by announcer but nope that is actually what happened.
Apparently I haven't been paying much attention because this has happened before, most recently in 2008 but that is not the point!
The point is as a fan I expect there to be a clear winner and clear loser and I don't know care how many overtimes it takes to get there.
The NFL recently changed their overtime rules so unless the team who has the ball first scores a touchdown, the other team gets a chance to score, which eliminates the receiving team from simply getting in field goal range to win.
So in the case of the Rams vs. 49ers both teams got a chance to score and neither team did and so the game ends. Why not go into sudden death like teams did with the old overtime rules? Both teams got a chance, so the the next team that scores wins. Obviously the overtime in the NFL isn't perfect but ending in a tie seems like the worst possible solution.

I didn't watch the game on Sunday and I obviously wasn't there but ending in a tie just seems like a let down. If I was a player I would be pissed if I spent all that time getting hit over and over again for nothing really. 

And then you wonder what kind of implications the tie will have for the playoffs? How does a tie factor into a teams record? It all seems very confusing and unnecessary. 

This isn't soccer people, this is football and there needs to be a winner, whether it takes one or seven overtimes to get there. 

* I am making an addition to this post after having read another column that said even many of the players playing in the game on Sunday didn't know it could end in a tie. If the players on the field don't know the rules there is definitely a problem. 

Twitter is addicting

I am going to resist the urge to spout off about political things and possibly offend everyone I know and instead am going to write about my new found addiction to Twitter.
I joined the twitter world begrudgingly. I only did it because as a journalist it is pretty much the only way to survive or get jobs, when applying for jobs potential employees ask for your twitter handle. But now that I have figured out how twitter works it is actually pretty fun. You can see random bits of information from anybody you want. You can follow celebrities, athletes, TV shows, news people, cities, just regular joe's, pretty much anything you are interested in you can probably find on twitter.
It turns out Twitter is also a pretty convenient way to get information fast. I, for example, follow all of the different police departments and cities in Utah County so when there is breaking news I know about it pretty quickly. It is also WAY better than facebook for quick information and you don't get the mile long rants from people because you can only tweet 140 characters, two sentences is not enough for ranting and I love it.
Twitter wars are also amazing. When two people go back and forth about nonsense it can be really really funny.
Since I only recently joined twitter I don't have a lot of followers and in an attempt to gain followers I have become what my coworker refers to as a "twitter whore" it sounds way worse than it actually is. It really just means I started following a million (really only 191) people in hopes that they will follow me back and I can one day have hundreds or thousands of followers.
So far I only have 45 followers and I don't tweet a lot of things, mostly because I feel like people don't really care about what I have to say, but I still spend a significant amount of time on twitter seeing what other people have to say.

Good Clean Fun

I was recently switched to the crime and court beat at the Daily Herald and every day I watched as people dressed in prison garb with chains around their waist and handcuffs on their hands and feet stand before a judge and get sentenced for various crimes, most of them involving drugs or theft and I wonder where everything went so wrong?
Then I see things on facebook about how people are upset because their were cops patrolling the streets so kids don't smash pumpkins all over and how it is ridiculous to pay cops to ruin kids "good clean fun." I might mention, I do agree that cops should and do have better things to do than keep kids from smashing pumpkins but that is not the point.
While I think smashing pumpkins is silly, as far as I know, it isn't against the law. Although, I could easily see it being classified as vandalism. BUT the kids don't buy the pumpkins themselves, they steal them from other people. I actually wrote this on the facebook status as a comment and someone replied, "well they would just rot on people's porches anyways." That may be true but they are my pumpkins and it is my right to decide if the pumpkins rot on my porch or not and in the case of my mom her pumpkins were stolen several days before Halloween, so she didn't even get to enjoy them for the holiday.
Yes stealing pumpkins is a minor thing and yes they would just rot on my porch but that is not the point! We are raising kids in a society where petty theft is being considered "good clean fun."
I saw a guy get sentenced to more than a year in jail today because he stole a magazine from a convenience store. A magazine!! Granted this was his third theft, which classifies it as a third-degree felony, and I don't know the circumstances of a the other thefts but a magazine costs less than $5 and this kid is now going to spend time in jail because of it. If we are teaching our kids that is it okay to steal pumpkins than the jump to magazines or other seemingly small items can't be that far off.
If I had stolen and smashed pumpkins when I was in high school and my parents found out (which they would because they always do) I would've been grounded forever. I got in trouble when I was a little girl (like 7 or 8) for taking the pennies off my dad's dresser because they weren't mine.
The point is I learned at a very young age if it isn't yours don't take it, it seems like a pretty simple concept but apparently the message isn't getting passed along. If there are parents out there who think it is okay or even encourage their kids to go steal pumpkins on Halloween, then it is no wonder that our jails our full of people with theft charges against them.
Yes, I might be over exaggerating just a little bit because after all we are just talking about pumpkins here, but I don't think under any circumstances should it be considered okay to take other people's stuff no matter how small it might be.

Moving can be confusing

As I am sure most of you know, John and I moved this past weekend to a new apartment is Sandy. The move went well, it took most of the day Friday and Saturday but we are mostly moved in now and adjusting well.
Willy on the other hand seems to be so confused about what is happening. The first two times we went to the new apartment, before most of our stuff was there, he pooped on the floor.
Then all day Saturday as we were moving stuff he followed John up and down the hall back and forth to the moving truck the whole time he just looked like he wasn't sure what was going on.
Now that we are mostly moved in the poor little guy just looks confused. This is what I think  he would say if he could talk.
"What are we doing here? This is my couch and all my stuff is here but this doesn't look like my home. Why is my food in this corner? Mom, when are we going home?"
When I got home from work yesterday he wasn't even excited he just looked like, "Oh what are you doing here?" Like he is expecting us to take him back to the old place any second now.
It is kind of sad but kind of funny too. Ever since we got Willy when he was a tiny baby puppy we had lived in the other apartment so it makes sense why he would be confused.
The good news is John "accidentally" left him out of his kennel yesterday when he went to work and he hasn't had any accidents since we moved in so at least he seems to be past the poop in the house stage but hopefully he learns to like his new home soon!

Remembering to be grateful

I have a lot to be grateful for. I have a great husband, an awesome family, a nice place to live, the cutest little dog ever, a car the runs and job to go to everyday. But sometimes when things don't go the way I want them to I struggle to remember all those things.
I recently applied for a sports writing job, a high school sports writing job, something I have experience doing, love doing and thought I would be perfect for (maybe I am a little full of myself). I put together what I thought was an awesome application and thought I would for sure at least get and interview (again maybe I am a little full of myself but I was confident about my ability) but I didn't get an interview. I got the email from the hiring person this morning, it was literally the first thing I saw when I woke up and checked my email on my phone (damn you technology) and I have been bummed since 6:30 this morning.
To add to my melancholy I also recently got my beat switched at the Herald, meaning I am now covering Crime and Courts instead of Health and Higher Education, a move I wasn't thrilled about. I liked what I was writing about and didn't want to switch. I am slowly learning to like the crime and courts beat more and more but its kind of a love/hate relationship right now and its definitely not sports.
In talking with a friend today, she reminded to keep my head up and remember that right now it is good to even have a job.
I have been sulking all day because for the time being I don't get to write about my topic of choice, while there are people out there who have no jobs and no way to feed their families or pay their bills.
Not only do I have a job I, for the most part, have the job I want. I get to write every single day and get paid for it. I get to go out and interview people and let the public know about what is happening and why its important. I just have to keep telling myself "I get to write everyday, I get to write everyday, I get to write everyday", because sometimes it is hard to remember to be grateful for what we have.

Preoccupied

All I can think about right now is cooking and baking super delicious foods.
I want to throw a brunch party or maybe just a regular party and cook all sorts of awesome things that people will love. I want tons of people to squish into my little apartment and enjoy themselves while they eat the food I made.
 I want to make pumpkin spice lattes in the crock pot and pumpkin french toast and tomato basil soup and spinach dip and baked french toast and homemade mac and cheese and cheesecakes and cookies and banana bread and pretty much anything else you can think of!
I even started making a list of the treats I was going to make for Christmas and the friends I was going to give them to. Then I started thinking if people would rather have a plate full of desserts dropped of at their house or a something savory like homemade bread sticks and soup? Then I wrote a message to some of my girlfriends about a brunch party, realized halfway through my apartment is a giant disaster because I am moving in a few weeks and I don't really have the time or space to do such a thing right now and deleted that. Then I thought about calling my mom and asking her if I could be in charge of breakfast the day after Thanksgiving and imagined myself getting up really early in the morning to make a delicious breakfast for my family and I am not a morning person!! Then just now as I was writing this post I thought maybe I should call my mom and volunteer to cook all of Thanksgiving dinner, which I am sure she would take me up on and I am sure I would regret later when my mind is less preoccupied by food.
Its not even that I want to eat all that food, I mean I do and I probably would, but my main motivation is just cooking it all. It is literally all I have thought about for the past 4 hours.
I already decided I am going to make banana bread with some old bananas at my house and give it to my family when I see them at my little sisters volleyball game on Saturday, which will hopefully help cure a little of my cooking craziness but this is just further evidence that I need to open a bakery/cafe. It is a dream I have always had but I have to find a way to make it a reality, even if it takes 10 years.
In the meantime I will day dream about food while I work and cook tasty things when I can and hopefully get hired by someone to cater their party or family get-together (see here if you want more details about that) and continue to work on my skills.
But for now Pinterest and the many recipes I have pinned are calling my name, I have to see what else is out there for me to dream about making.