Creepers

I work at a Car rental agency-and I'm often the only one in the office at night.  There is a night lot attendant but he's usually busy in the back w/the cars or at the airport with the cars.  So, seeming completely alone, some customers think they can take the oppoutunity to have some fun and make jokes that wouldn't be made if another person were around.  It makes me angry.

Today was one such day.  Its the first customer of the day too-Cornelius.  He come in with a Friend, I don't know his name so we'll call him Mr. Stupid-but Mr Stupid was only here because he was the friend  to bring
Cornelius to pick up the rental car.

Anyways, so I'm standing behind the counter at the computer entering all of Cornelius' info from his drivers license, and apparently Mr Stupid is smiling because Corny here says "Awwww look at that, you're making him smile."

I think...uhhh.....excuse me?

"Your making him smile" corny says again

I could see where this was going, and I quickly was very glad that I have a boyfriend-makes it really easy to tell someone why I'm not going to give them my number

Then Mr Stupid says "For reals...*something somthing* but I'd love to have your number."

uhhhhhg I knew it......  So I kindly say with an aw-dang-it-curtesy-smile, "I'm sorry, but I'm in a relationship-your flattering, but sorry."   Then they kept at it-during the entire rental. I'm serious, now that I think about it, I was only at the very beggining of the process entering how many days the rental would be when they started their shenanigans.   He continued to ask my name-I told him the truth though in hindsight I should have given a fake name-becaues then I could have laughed at them-Heres how that part of the convo went:
Mr Stupid: "Whats your name anyways?"
Me: "Melanie"
Corny:  "I knew it-it had to be Melody or peggy or somethinglike dat"
Me:  "It's MelaKNEE"
Corny: "Oh-well we're gonna have to change that right here and now, because you've got a song about you here"

in my head:      ....uhhh.....

There was another point before that that Mr Stupid said I looked like spongebob-then they tried to play it off as a compliment.  Corny said "who works at a car rental just up the street" to the tune of the spongebob song "Who lives in a pineapple under the sea"    ...That actually was kinda funny/creative.  He msut use it alot.

And when I was at the payment screen Mr Stupid asked if I was a gemini.  Again in my head: ....uhhhh....
So I told him no, I'm a saggitarius, and asked why-can't remember his answer but then I told him I don't really follow those anyways....I Hope he felt dumb.

So finally, the worst part-I hit the print button and then have to walk away from the counter to get the papers-as I walk back (not making eye contact) Corny says again, "I knew it, I knew it I knew it."

"knew what?" I ask  (<---stupid question)

"You've got an apple bottom"

o_O

In my head:  AHHHHHH!!!!!  GET THEM OUT OF HERE!!!!

Then they said my a** was fine and I stopped listening and went into auto mode trying to get them to sign the papers as fast as I could and praying that there isn't anymore damage on the car so they can just leave!!!!

It was horrible!

Funny Maps

I found this on a friends new boyfriends facebook-and it made me laugh but I don't think I could put it on my facebook because it just wouldn't seem right.....

but, its kinda hilarious.

I like Africa, Antartica, Alaska, and India's descriptions the best....

Happy Birthday Dad!

Its a tender topic, and so many emotions and feelings run around with this special sacred spot in my heart.  I think of him more often now than I think I ever have before.  I see other girls and their dads, and I just miss him so much.  Today is my dad's 52nd Birthday-but 12 years ago he was in a fatal accident at work.  In honor of him on his birthday, I just wanted to share:

In his patriarchle Blessing, it says "...thy home shall be a home filled with Sunshine, with joy and peace and harmony; thy children shall grow and nurture righteousness, and they shall rejoice for having you as their father..."
I must say, I feel that that promise has been fufilled.  Though not always were we harmonious growing up, I think we do love eachother, and we love our father.  And though some of the other blessings in his blessing confused me at first, I reread mine, and one of the first things it says to me is "I bless thee to know that thy Father is found among the great and Noble."

I sure miss him alot, and I do wish that I could have him here to guide me-especially at this hard scary time in my life, but I know that God has his purposes.  I know, that my family is eternal-and I know that I will see my Father again.  It makes it a little easier to be apart for so long.

I love this song when I'm sad, and I might be a little sad right now, but here ya go:

http://www.lds.org/churchmusic/detailmusicPlayer/index.html?searchlanguage=1&searchcollection=1&searchseqstart=285&searchsubseqstart=%20&searchseqend=285&searchsubseqend=ZZZ

Please, for those who knew him, leave memories of him in the comments.   :)  I like to hear the stories.  I only knew him for 8 years!

Little Sisters are the best.

It was an interesting night.  

To start off, me and Elyse were playing just before dinner, so there was a fight to get her to the table to eat.  But then when Kimmie put noodles on her plate, and she started eating before prayer I just told her "you get to pray because you ate first"  So without a fight (which lately prayers have been a struggle...she'll go off and be loud and we just ignore her) she asked for help and said a wonderful prayer.  It was word for word what her daddy said, but hey, she prayed.  Well, then we had FHE, and she wouldn't listen to the lesson and almost went to bed.  We had a very quick distracted lesson by mommy, but made it through.  Then it was a fight to get out the door for activity (which was go look at birds).  Then at Creamers feild it was a fiht to get out of the car, then back to the car-after finally getting home we had dessert, and she calmed down till she was done.  So, I decided lets burn off energy and go on the trampoline.  She was having a ball but then wouldn't listen to come inside for prayer, so she had time out in her room while we said the closing prayer because Kimmie had to leave.  Then, I went to check on her, and she was on the toilet sobbing.  So I talked to her, and then conversation eventually went this direction:

Me: When we love mommy and daddy do we tell them?  

Elyse:  Yea

Me:  Well, Heavenly Father Loves you, Thats why we say prayers, so we can tell him!

Then after some hugs and goofyness it went this direction:

Me: Where did Daddy come from?
Elyse: I don't know
Heavenly Father
Where did Mommy come from?
I don't know
Heavenly Father
Where did Robin Come from?
I don't know
Heavenly Father
Where did Liam come from?
I don't know
HEavenly Father
Where did Melanie come from?
I don't know
Heavenly Father
Where did Lysie Come from?
I don't know
Where do you think?
Jesus!
Thats right!
Where did Daddy come from?
I don't know
Where do you think?
Jesus!
Yeas!
Where did mommy come from?
I don't know
Where do you think?
Jesus!
Where did Robin come from?
Jesus!
Where did Melanie come from?
Jesus!
Where did Lysie come from?
Jesus!
Where did Liam come from?
Jesus!
Thats right Elyse you are so smart!
You forgot Jordan and Travis!



Then still a little later, I grabbed the big fanc family version book of mormon (has lots of pictures and definitions...cool book) And Then my mom was about to send Elyse to bed but I gave her the option to sit and read with me or to go straight to bed, she chose to sit w/me.  So, starting with the testimonies of the witnesses at the beggining of the book, we read.  When we came to Joseph Smiths she was getting distracted so I asked her some questions:

Do you know who Joseph Smith is?
Yea
Who is he?
A prophet!
Thats right!
Who told you that?  was is at church or did mommy tell you?
Mommy told me

What is a testimony?

  It keeps us safe

Thats right!

Then I had her read, I would read a little and then she'd repeat.   Slow going, but good stuff!  After a little of that she got antsy and went to help mommy, then it was time to go to bed, so she came back to sit with me.  I had started reading towards the back of the book because I think we're there for institute, and I was reading about the Brother of Jared.  She read with me only a little part, but heres what was soo cool about all of it, my mom asked me to take her to bed, so we go up there (had to dare her she couldn't beat me upstairs to get her to go) and I say its time for a goodnight prayer, and she protested just once, but then said the prayer all by herself:

Heavenly Father thank you for this day, thank you for family, and thank you for light,  please keep Robin safe, thank you that Jesus Loves me, in the name of Jesus Christ Amen.


I love that little girl SO stinkin much.

Somebody Slap me!

Or give me a quick pinch or something-I've started daydreaming!!!  On the drive home from Travis' house this evening, I started daydreaming-I could just picture the scene:

I go to visit Travis at work, and who's there?  None other than Harrison Ford.  Han Solo, Indiana Jones, Henry!  Oh and I'm in love with this idea, as I walk up timidly to perhaps one of the biggest hunks of all time, he grabs me and dips me into a kiss.  :P  I sent Travis a text asking what he thinks of this idea, he hasn't responded.....

Jedi

Okay, call me a geek, but I love love LOVE Star Wars.  I'm not the biggest geek as in I can't tell you every detail of the movie, the actors, the production and all that stuff that those big geeks know because they spend all their time obsessing over it, but when the final film came out, episode 3-and the story was complete, I fell in love with it.  I had always enjoyed it, and the original films are better than the cheesy new ones, but the cheesy stuff is still enjoyable-and, the storyline as a whole is AMAZING.  I may or may not have pulled it into a Sunday School lesson when I was 14 as an analogy to the plan of salvation....

Anyways, so, with that little brief History, now you can understand how AWESOME the following statement is.

I'm DATING a JEDI! 

Well, I guess he's a padawon learner.....

Thats Right, my boyfriend who was cool before, just became a HUNDRED-MILLION times cooler.  :P  Travis got an intership with Lucas Film in the IT department of the "Jedi Academy" and has now become an official part of "The Force."  It rocks.  He'll start May 24th, and work there through some time in August.  I'll be about an hour away during June and July while nannying my cousin for me uncle.  Not as cool, but just as exciting if you ask me.  While Travis solves peoples problems from an office (granted its probably the coolest and funnest office you could dream of) I'll be soaking up the Sun while playing with my 6 yr old cousin Alex.  And, my uncle lives 3 miles away from an Arthur Murray Dance Studio-which I plan to take full advantage of.  This summer is gonna rock!

Oh What a beautiful morning!

Actually, this morning was NOT very pretty.  IT was drab and gray and not at all like the last few mornings, and I almost let that get me down.  But, Victory!  I'm in high spirits!  I guess It started with last week and my long overdue attitude adjustment.  Cuz guess what, when you become appriciative of all your blessings that you generally take for granted, Heavenly Father is so much more willing to bless you more!

Its reminds me of this one time, my 2nd semester at school in Idaho-all my roommates were kinda neat freaks.  Erin admitted to just not looking in my room (she also admitted to being a bit compulsive, and having to have everything at right angles and in its proper place) but all of them, Emilia, Dana,  Erin, and Raquel were pretty good at tidying up.  I like to think that I'm pretty good about it, I don't have anything growing, just mostly lazy as far as putting clothes into a hamper and papers in a nice pile.....and I don't make my bed much either (working on that right now).  Anyways, there was this one sunday when everything was adding up, and I was stressed about my to do list-on the top of the list was teaching RS lesson that day-on come what may and love it.  On my way out the door, the stupid toilet overflowed-which I cleaned up but in a rush job.  I knew when I got home from church I needed to mop the floor with bleach water.  So, after church though, a million other things came up, and it was getting late and I still hadn't had time to bleach the floor, and Dana and Erin were being kinda obnoxious reminding me about it, and so when I finally was able to start it, they made a huge deal about oh FINALLY and blah blah blah and it was just SUPER Frustrating.  I had the attitude, if you wanted it done 5 hrs ago, you could've done it.  And its not like they were walking on the floor directly, in the meantime I laid down my clean towels-so I was annoyed because I was doing the best I could and they didn't seem very appriciative or helpful.  Anyways, the next day, when I got back from class, I found on my desk a note from our dear sweet Erin-expressing apology and grattitude for the night before.   I'll tell ya what, it changed my attitude, and from then on out, I was much more willing to do more of my share, and to make those sorts of things more of a priority.  Moral of the story:  Same goes for HEavenly Father.

As evidence of this gratitude blessings principal, let me tell you what has happened in the short week since my attitude adjustment.
First, right away I was happier.  And that directly affected my relationships-there were some apolgies I needed to give out to several people whom I love.  And, though they had some fault also, It didn't matter so much to me, and it still doesn't.  I feel better because I know that part of the problem was me, and I'm taking actions to fix it and make it better.  Heavenly Father helped me to see that.
Second, going to work ( I might have shared this already) I found myself perfectly content.  I havn't really liked my job since I started it a year ago-theres some perks, but several times I was ready to quite.  However, I don't hate it so much.  Again, attitude adjustment, even though I don't plan to be at the car rental for forever, and people there still do obnoxious things, it doesn't bother me so much.  Cuz, that doesn't really matter.
Third, several peices of life fell into place.  I know what I'm doing for school.  And, I'm doing it in half the time I thought it would take!  Also, I know how to accomplish my dance goals, and I'm more confident in my ability to accomplish them.  I learned of several oppoutunities last week-I'll be in Livermore Cali this summer, and living w/my uncle so I can nanny my cousin, and theres a dance studio 3 miles away.  :)  LOVE IT!  I'm not sure on details but I want to either intern there, work there, or just take classes there.  Get some expirience so that when I come back to Fairbanks next fall, I can try and teach some classes!  Then theres another studio that I want to go work with after I finnish the MA program, and from what I read, it sounds like after working with them for 3 yrs, your practically ready to open your own studio franchise!  Sounds like my cup of tea!  Woohoo!
Fourth, Conflicts and problems that arose during the week jsut didn't fase me as much.  I still have concerns and worries, but they're not as big a deal now, because I know that Heavenly Father loves me, and that conflicts and worries are part of mortality.  The other Part of Mortality is living happily in spite of them.  And so thats What I'm gonna try and do.  So, YAHOO!
Its just interesting to me that all these little peices came together only after I gave thanks for my blessings.  I'm certain it had everything to do with that.  It was no coincedence.  I've been trying to figure it all out for a LONG time, the last time I felt so certain and sure and happy about everything was......a while ago.  I used to think that the summer after my graduation wasthe happiest time of my life, but in retrospect, the happiest times of my life are the times I'm being thankful for what i have.  The times when I'm unhappy is when I'm not focusing on my blessings, or the things that I presently have.  One of my weaknesses is to get down on myself because I get ahead of myself.  I wish for things to be in this perfect happy state that will happen eventually-but if your so fucused on eventuallies, you can't truly appriciate or enjoy now.  And now, is glorious.  Now is hard, but beautiful and exciting.  Why should I wish I could just fast foward to when things will be like I've always dreamed they would be?  Half the excitment of life is the anticipation of how it will be-so enjoy that anticipation.   Things never seem to turn out the way I expect them to anyways, so when I do get to where I want to be, I'll be a different person and will want something else, so if I'm to be happy, I gotta enjoy now.   I guess thats it.

An Easter Conference

I must say that my heart is full.  This easter weekend, I had the oppourtunity to listen to the servants of God.  Our Beloved Prophet, President Monson, gave a beautiful talk this morning.  All the talks were wonderful, but his was so SO fitting of Easter.  He didn't cry Repentance-but he told us of the Fathers love.  Several talks today were eleoquent statements of testimony on the Love of God the Father and his Son Jesus Christ, but while President Monson was speaking on the topic of eternal life and the trials we face, it just hit me.  My Heavenly Father Loves me SO much!  He loves all his children SO much.  How beautiful is it that on this conference morning, a beautiful easter sunday, he would have his chosen servant speak to us on eternal life.  After the world has been devastated by the natural disasters that so frequently have shaken and torn apart the earth in the last 3 months, Heavenly Father would direct our Prophet to assure us that this is mortality.  That we will die physically, but that our Spirits will live on, and that we will be ressurected.  Just as Christ died, and then broke the bands of death, so will we if we have faith in our Savior Jesus Christ and seek to emmulate his example.

I know my Heavenly Father lives, that Jesus is his son.  I know that they love me so much, they provided a way to overcome mortality, they made it possible for me to be with the ones I love for Eternity.  This world is not the end, nor is that thing we call death.  There is no end to progress, there is no end to life.  This knowledge of my Savior and Heavenly Father brings me peace and Joy.

Attitude Adjustment

Mkay, So, the last few months have been rocky.  I couldn't figure it out.  Then, between Sunday night and Tuesday morning it all slowly peiced itself together and I had some amazing slap in the face sort of moments-where all my questions and concerns and worries came crashing to understanding and peace and Joy.  OY!  I love it, its amazing to me how much my attitude rolls over to the rest of my life.  How, it can twist my understanding of a situation and thus allow my to either be miserable or totally at peace with life the way it is.

Once such understanding that came to light and really just struck a chord it never quite touched before-was about the idea of Perfection.  I'm not perfect and no matter how hard I try, I'm not going to be perfect-yet.  Someday, after I leave this mortal life, long into the eternities, I have hope for becoming perfect like my Heavenly Father.   I think I understood that, but I didn't really register it on the radar of my happiness.

Another thing that I realized:  Things are hard, and things aren't what I want them to be like all the time.  But they are just as they are supposed to be as long as I'm doing my best.

And one Last thing to document:  When stressed or worried, its because I'm failing to recognize my blessings.  When I stop and quit fretting about things not being how I want them, and think about all that is good and precious to me, I know that I am the richest person on earth.  And, I can be happy.  Not in spite of my worries and troubles, but with my worries and troubles, and because of my worries and troubles.

I love this song now with more understanding and appriciation than ever before:

When upon life’s billows you are tempest-tossed,
When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,
Count your many blessings; name them one by one,
And it will surprise you what the Lord has done. 

Count your blessings;
Name them one by one.
Count your blessings;
See what God hath done.
Count your blessings;
Name them one by one.
Count your many blessings;
See what God hath done. 

Are you ever burdened with a load of care?
Does the cross seem heavy you are called to bear?
Count your many blessings; every doubt will fly,
And you will be singing as the days go by. 

So amid the conflict, whether great or small,
Do not be discouraged; God is over all.
Count your many blessings; angels will attend,
Help and comfort give you to your journey’s end.

And this one:

There is sunshine in my soul today,
More glorious and bright
Than glows in any earthly sky,
For Jesus is my light.

Oh, there’s sunshine, blessed sunshine
When the peaceful happy moments roll.
When Jesus shows his smiling face,
There is sunshine in the soul.

There is music in my soul today,
A carol to my King,
And Jesus listening can hear
The songs I cannot sing.

Oh, there’s sunshine, blessed sunshine
When the peaceful happy moments roll.
When Jesus shows his smiling face,
There is sunshine in the soul.

There is springtime in my soul today,
For when the Lord is near,
The dove of peace sings in my heart,
The flow’rs of grace appear.

Oh, there’s sunshine, blessed sunshine
When the peaceful happy moments roll.
When Jesus shows his smiling face,
There is sunshine in the soul.

There is gladness in my soul today,
And hope and praise and love,
For blessings which he gives me now,
For joys “laid up” above.