Do You Smell?

During my trip to Long Beach last week I came to a realization, I hate people that wear perfume and cologne. It seemed like at every turn my nose was greeted with a new scent. So many different strong smells is quite jarring if you think about it. I certainly did this week.

I guess I’m pretty spoiled when it comes to people wearing scents around me. My workplace isn’t exactly conducive to waking up in the morning and feeling like you need to look fab-u-lous. If fact it’s really funny to see a new female engineer start. In the beginning she shows up, hair all blow dried and down and with a full face of makeup. Then slowly but surely, the hair turns into a wet ponytail and you’re lucky if you get mascara and eye liner. I can poke fun at this because that is exactly what happened to me. Every time I look at the picture on my badge, I chuckle to myself about the energy I had to spend time on looking so good under my hair net and safety glasses.

Sorry back to smells, the point of that story was to show even the ladies at work don’t take the time to wear perfume. My shampoo and hand lotion (which is usually only slightly scented and if you, like me, use the Huggies lotion, smells like babies.) is good enough. I can’t remember the last time I actually put perfume on. I don’t even know where my perfume is. I don’t think I even need to say the male engineers don’t bother with smelly stuff. We’re lucky they wear matching socks most days.

It really made me feel bad for people that are allergic to that type of stuff. Seriously, how would they leave the house in Long Beach?

Maybe I’m just a scent Nazi. After marrying Shad I refused to buy him his Old Spice body wash (do you think he’ll be embarrassed that everyone that reads our blog now knows he uses body wash instead of a bar of soap?) because it smelled like old men to me and I hated how it made our bathroom and bedroom smell like old men…everyday.
So did this post distract you from the fact it tells you nothing about my trip to Long Beach except for the fact it smells (good?) there? Nice. There are two reasons for this:

1) I left my camera (and thus pictures of Long Beach) in Cali with my sister so they could take a picture of themselves at UCLA for her in-law’s Christmas card this year (I don’t know).

2) Because I don’t have pictures of Long Beach, I don’t really remember what I did there for 5 days. I’m not kidding. I have the worst memory ever when it comes to the question what did you do today or this weekend? Shad asks me that every night and I usually just say I was in meetings all day because I honestly can’t really remember what I did. I guess it’s a good coping mechanism to separate the stress of work from home but honestly that’s no excuse for not remembering what we did Saturday night on Monday morning.

Yosemi - me?

Shad and I just got back from Yosemite National Park on Monday. Neither of us had ever been (neither had our friends Jared and Jen that went with us) so it was way fun to wander and find what the park had to offer.

Being from Utah, I was surprised at how many lakes there were this late in the season (most of the waterfalls dry up in August).

What is it about a log in a lake that makes you want to climb on it?

I wasn't causing any trouble on the log, promise.

The trees in the park were so big. This one had been hit by lightening and split. Jen told us to get in the hole and look happy so we did.

This was probably my favorite stop of the trip. Tenaya Lake. We were driving to go to another lake but as we drove past this one and I saw the white sandy beaches I insisted we stopped. It ended up being a good time. The water wasn't even that bad so we got to play in it.

Day two, we found ourselves hiking around the valley in the main part of the park.

Here we are relaxing by a river. Notice the man in his boxers in the back ground getting ready for a swim. He wasn't even European. Ah the people you meet in national parks.

Nevada falls, one of the few that still has water this late in the year.

Day three was Giant Sequoia day. There are a few groves of Sequoias in the park, this is the biggest. The trees were so cool. It made the gross curvy road to get there that made both Jen and I sick worth it.

The wood from one Giant Sequoia is equal to 100 acres of forest. Too bad they're really fragile so when they fall over they literally shatter.

Here I am demonstrating how one of their pinecones is bigger than my head.

For our last night in the park we waited on a ridge to watch the sunset. So pretty.

Today I'm headed back to Cali to attend the Society of Women Engineers national conference in Long Beach. It's going to be a blast. I hope the house is in one piece when I get back.

Sweater...

What is it about the cold that makes you want to curl up in a ball on the couch and not come out until it’s 80 degrees outside again? If I had had that choice this weekend, guarantee I would have done it.

Instead of laying on the couch, I was very productive. Friday night our friends Tosca and Ben had a little get together at their casa to celebrate finally being moved in. It’s a super adorable condo and I love both of them to death. Unfortunately for Shad, he got stuck at work late and didn’t make the departure cutoff so I went it alone. I’m sure he had a slamin’ Friday night at the house with our puppy though. I had a great time visiting with friends and hearing ridiculous stories from Ben and Ty about their antics while in the Green Peanuts together.

Saturday morning I got up and went tutoring and then returned home to watch some conference and get ready for craft day with Jen and Danielle. We had originally planned to do mosaics but that plan got nixed due to none of us finding something we wanted to mosaic and another opportunity came up that couldn’t be delayed. Instead we helped Jen get her Halloween costume together.

What is she being, you might ask? To which I have to respond that it’s amazing and there were lots of pictures taken but because it’s a surprise and the surprisee might glance at our blog before Halloween, you, my friend are going to have to wait. Jen’s sister is getting married on Halloween in Ohio and to celebrate the holiday in style, costumes are allowed and encouraged for the reception. Jen, looking for any excuse to get out of her bridesmaid dress early, decided to opt for a costume.

After craft day and priesthood session, Shad and I enjoyed a delicious dinner at Bistro 258. If there was one thing I could change about Ogden, it would be the lack of delicious nicer restaurants. If we’re down in Salt Lake and get to have dinner, it’s almost too hard to decide. In Ogden I always have to make a choice do I want a nice dinner (which leaves us with one maybe two options) or an okay dinner. It’s a hard choice and part of me says at that point, just make dinner, which is good for our wallets but not as satisfying.

Sunday was couch day while we watched conference. Well, I watched conference, Shad slept through at least half of conference. It was such a nice relaxing Sunday.

So you know how some people say that their kids are their punishment for being a really stubborn kid or a really out of hand kid or for never sleeping when they were little? I think Dublin is my punishment for hating the cold. He loathes it. Yesterday when I got home from work, I went to let him out. He rang the bell like a good puppy and at that moment it started to snow outside. I opened the door for him to go out and he looked at me like I was crazy. I tried to get him to go out, I even tried to push him but when a 75 pound pit bull doesn’t want to go outside, I’m not going to get him to go outside. Luckily it stopped snowing and he happily went out after that. I’m going to have to buy him a sweater.