100 Things

On occassion, I like to jump on bandwagons. Having seen this on other people's blogs, I really wanted to jump aboard. Being a writer by trade, and being the middle of 10 children, I seek attention. Writing 100 things about myself seems like a drop in the bucket. I likely will keep this on the positive side and not delve into many negative aspects of my life. I'm guessing this will take me less than a half hour to do. I'm timing myself now.

100. I've loved BYU football since I was very young. I have memories of falling asleep during the 1984 championship game, but I woke up in time to see them win. In junior high and high school, everyone knew I was good for a debate on why BYU football was the best.
99. I broke my foot at the age of 7. My family was moving to a new home and the movers accidently dropped the piano on my foot.
98. From age 5 to age 7 we lived in a laundromat--well, we lived in a house connected to a laundromat. At night we'd skate around the washing machines.
97. My dad taught me to roller skate, and I've always loved it. In college, I frequented the Disco skating scene every Saturday night at the Classic in Orem. A night combining two of my loves: skating and disco music.
96. Growing up with 10 kids in a family made our house the ground zero house for neighborhood kids. On Sundays, all the neighborhood kids would meet at our house for games. The favorites were capture-the-flag and kick-the-can.
95. At the age of 18, only a week after graduating from high school, my family moved into my dad's carlot. This time it wasn't a house attached to the carlot, it was the carlot. The recession of the 90s was financially difficult on my parents, so to save money, they sold the house and moved into my dad's carlot in Burley. They never declared bankruptcy and scraped their way out of a massive debt. They now live in a home in Burley.
94. Basketball used to be my favorite sport, but after my sophomore year in high school, I didn't like it much anymore. Two sisters on our basketball team died in a car wreck during the season, and somehow, I lost the love.
93. Volleyball is probably my favorite team sport now. When my girls get older, I'd like to join a team. Currently, I'll occasionally play for the ward team when time allows. I played volleyball for my high school team. My favorite position is middle blocker. We didn't have very many tall girls in my school. I was the tallest at 5'9", but to appear taller, the program had me at 5'10".
92. I train for triathlons. I find I'm not very good at motivating myself to exercise, but if I put a goal out there, I'll try harder. I've never not completed a triathlon I signed up for.
91. I've finished one marathon, the Tops of Utah. I think my time was 4 hours 33 minutes.
90. I hoed beets for my friend Jana's dad for two summers when in junior high. For a whole summer worth of work, we made about $40. We would work for about 30 minutes, then take a 1-hour break. We weren't the hardest of workers, but we had fun. We'd always stop by the canal afterwords to clean ourselves up and swim.
89. One time after hoeing beets, my cousin Monica wanted to drive Jana's dad's flatbed truck back to the swimming hole (canal). She was driving pretty fast and almost missed a corner, but quickly turned the wheel to make it just in time. I was sitting in the very middle of the flatbed. I went flying off the back and rolled in the dirt to my landing spot. Nothing was broken, and nobody mentioned nothing to no stinkin' adults. Got my drift? Keep it zipped.
88. When I was 6, my mom left the car running at my Aunt Norma's house while she went in to drop something off, leaving me and two of my younger brothers and sisters inside. I decided to investigate the stearing wheel and mechanisms. Next thing I know, the car was traveling backwards. The car hit a fence, and a man living at the house ran outside and was able to jump in the car and stop it.
87. That would be a fine enough story if the exact same thing didn't happen when I was 11! This time we were in Albertson's parking lot on a Sunday morning after cleaning the bank. Dad was treating us to some doughnuts. He went in to get the doughnuts and left me in the car with the car running. I hadn't been behind the wheel of a car since the first incident, but I was going to figure out how to work it this time. Nope. I managed to put the car in reverse, but I couldn't get the shifter back into park--or stop. I tried two times, then jumped out of the car as if I was the Fall Guy. The car kept rolling backwards. It went across four lanes of highway and into the Ford dealership. It crashed into a Cadillac, then continued to roll into a new truck when it finally stopped. But don't worry, I was safe.
86. I'm probably the world's worst panicker. I do not want to see me in a situation where I might actually need to use my brain to survive. Brain shuts off in times of trouble. The most recent incident that convinced me of this is I left the bathtub water running with my 18 month old and 3-year-old in it while I ran to get the phone. When I came back, my 3-year-old had jumped out of the tub behind me and managed to shut and lock the bathroom door. I freaked. I tried using the little unlocker doohicky, but I was panicking too much to make it work. I called 911, and the operator kept putting me on hold. So then I ran to the garage, grabbed a shovel, and beat the door in. There was my girl sitting in the tub looking innocent. I turned off the water and got her out of the tub. I later tried the unlocky thing again, and of course, it worked.
86. I've probably worked since I was 5. My dad had a custodial business on the side, and he'd employ neighborhood teenagers and his kids. When I was 5, my job was to push the vaccuum. I worked for my job cleaning banks and other buildings until I was 16 and got a "real" job working as a cashier at Kmart. I got paid $4.25 per hour, but that was more than what Dad was paying.
85. I worked early morning custodial at BYU for three years. The first year I worked at the meat slaughtering and equestrian building (saw them slaughter pigs and a cow), then the LDS Motion Picture Studio (we'd watch ESPN's SportsCenter in the theater room). The next year I worked at the Lee Library (played hide-n-seek in the bottom with all the lights off on Halloween). My third year I worked at the Smith Fieldhouse.
84. I worked for the Daily Universe for a year. Best job on campus. I think I made something like $9.00/hour. I was on the copy desk and then the copy chief.
83. Kulani and I lived in WyView for 6 years. They were brand new when we moved in. We still got asked almost every Sunday from newish people in the ward: "Are you new here?" No, we've outlived everyone here, and we'll likely outlive you.
82. When I was 11 my best friend and I started a club called the Snerds. We thought it was clever because the "s" was for "smart nerds." We had a few of the neighborhood kids join our club. My little sister Mary was the only one who took the initiation challenge. She wore a funky tie to school, and I think we may have made her eat dog food.
81. Those Jorgensen books of my youth--you know, like the one about the ugly girl who is given dogfood by the popular girls--get me every time.
80. I had two cousins that went to the same school as me and were in the same grade: Chet and Monica. It was awesome. Almost all of the my dad's side of the family lived by us, so we'd get together often at Grandma's house in Heyburn for food and games. I loved getting together with my cousins.

This is harder than I thought. It's been an hour. Oh, I have much more to write, but I'll take a break for now.

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