Testing, testing, one, two, three

This morning I took a test which will determine whether or not I can receive a teaching license in the state of NV. It was supposed to be a test that college students in NV take to get in to their respective education programs, and I took a similar, harder test in UT while I was still in school.

The test is comprised of three parts; reading, writing and mathematics. Although I'm no dummy when it comes to math, I haven't had a real (calculus) math class (does an athletics statistics class really count as math?) in 11 years or so. I studied a bit in anticipation of the challenge the math portion of this test may have presented me.

As chance would have it, I ended up scoring better on the math portion of the test than I did on the reading portion (the written portion will take some time to get graded). Granted, the reading portion was the first part of the test and it was early for my brain to be functioning properly, but still.

I have a degree in English. I read books ALL of the time. Should I be thinking of getting a math endorsement? It is much easier to grade because there is only ONE right answer...

Funny thing...

Since the weather was so nice today, for our afternoon session of PE, we decided to create our own frisbee golf course. My classes have recently been interested in playing frisbee, and we even made up our own version of ultimate frisbee, so I was excited to see how accurate our aim is becoming.

We all took turns deciding what our target was, and what the par was for each hole-it was a lot of fun. Once, one of the students said they wanted the target to be the out house that was set up in the park. I had just seen someone go in to the out house, so suggested that we have another target.

Later, on another student's turn, the out house was once again suggested. We decided to go for it because we were positive it was no longer occupied. It was a par 3 hole, and we were pretty far away, but the out house was a straight shot from the tee. One student had a great first throw that almost went all the way to the out house. The rest of us slowly made our way up to him. When it was his turn to throw again, he let it fly and it hit the out house with a very loud thud, which was soon after accompanied by a very loud scream and a small out house tremor. Oops! I was almost rolling on the ground with laughter-we didn't finish that hole.

January? Are you sure?

Where did winter go?

Northern Nevada has been showing a warming trend over the past two weeks, almost to the point that it's been warm. I'm a huge fan of winter weather, bundling up, and playing in the snow-but nature has been forcing the flowers in my yard to start poking through the ground. It was rather nice to do some yardwork yesterday, and very pleasant to get the motorcycle warm on a little ride around town.

There will most likely be more of winter to come before true Spring arrives, but until then, I'm going to enjoy the sunshine as much as possible.

The Mouths of Babes

When I was hanging out at my brother's house a while ago, I was telling my brother and his wife a story about this one time when my childhood best friend and I got in to trouble. We had done something that wasn't too serious, but when we were caught, we were told that we should probably repent. My friend remembers that she didn't feel like she should actually repent because she didn't feel like she had done anything really that wrong, so she didn't repent. As I was sharing this with my brother and sister-in-law, their three-year-old was working on a 'project', fixing his parachute man.

The next day, when I saw my brother, he told me that when his son got home from church, my brother asked him what he had learned at church. His son told my brother that he had learned about Samuel being on a wall. My brother then talked to his son about Samuel standing on the wall, telling the people to repent. The conversation eventually led to his son responding by saying, "Kelsey needs to repent."

Interesting what a three-year-old will pick up on in a conversation. He had been focused on his 'project', but heard and picked up on the important part of the story-repenting. He's right too. I do need to repent, every day even. I am so mortal and fallible. I struggle to always choose the right and treat others like the children of God they are. I'm grateful for the simple reminder from my nephew that I need to repent. I'm also grateful for the opportunity I have to make use of the atonement, and make changes in my life.

Truly Moving

Haha. We were truly moving it to do a one day field trip to San Fransisco last Friday. We left at 6:45 in the am and took 23 students and 4 faculty members on a field trip to the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park to see an art exhibit. This was no ordinary art exhibit. These paintings are usually housed in the Musee d'Orsay in Paris, right next to the Louvre. We saw some Seurat, Signac, Gauguin, Cezanne, Monet, Renoir and even Van Gogh. Although I am not an art connoisseur, I do enjoy it, and find it very fascinating.


We went through an exhibit of Neo-Impressionist artists. They were all really wonderful, and I loved the style of Pointillism.

One of my favorites was this painting. I don't know the name, and couldn't find it online, but this photo doesn't do Paul Signac's HUGE painting justice. It was so vibrant and colorful. I stared at it for at least five minutes.


The section of the exhibit devoted to Van Gogh's work was very busy the whole time we were there. I did get a chance to take a long gaze at this amazing piece of art though. This is Starry Night over the Rhone by Van Gogh. There is no better way to describe my experience with this painting other than it was spiritually moving. It's almost like I could feel the passion of the artist when I saw his painting. Such a cool experience!


After the Museum, we took the students to the beach because some had never seen the ocean before. It was a good time!


Then we drove over to the Golden Gate Bridge, but it was SO foggy that we couldn't really even see the bridge, even as we drove across.


We stopped at In N Out on the way home, and were impressed with how well they handled so many of us. We made it back by 10:00 pm. We spent way too much time on the bus, but I think the teachers had more fun on the bus than the students did. I love hanging out with my co-workers; we really are a lot like a family at our little school.


Oh, did I mention, that I drove the bus half of the trip? Yes, kind of a big deal to drive a bus for that long, in that city, on those hills and narrow lanes, with that kind of traffic, and those types of drivers. We didn't die!

Fresh Decade

A friend brought me some fresh flowers at work-and I get to start a fresh, new decade of life. I'm actually excited about being 30, believe it or not. I like the idea of new things, and I'm sure this new decade will be filled with adventures galore!

My family flew me home for my birthday. It was awesome to have lunch with my dad and go to a movie with my sister and nieces, even though the movie stunk, it was fun to be there with my family.

One of my friends also drove up to say happy birthday in person, and she created a new friendship with my niece.

Later that night I got to spend time with almost everyone else. We played and ate, and played and ate. (Most Bushmans are REALLY good at those two things.)

I am a huge fan of Chinese food, so we had a mix and match night of sushi, egg rolls, pot stickers, take out Chinese and rice. It was great! I got to sit at the kid table too!

My sister-in-law made my favorite cake-German chocolate. My niece with the one sweet tooth (she really only has one tooth), decided that she couldn't wait for everyone else.

But it was okay, because she shared...

Then, I started a small forest fire on the cake, my family sang a song, and I blew the fire out. (What strange traditions we have.)

Then I spent the night with my buddy, and woke up the next morning to watch How to Train Your Dragon (probably my new favorite movie) with the rest of the boys.

It was a great bday, and great time spent with my family. I can't wait for Christmas break!

Real Efficiency

Although I'm not a huge fan of television in general, there is a particular genre of shows that I really don't understand-reality. Maybe it's because the 'reality' that exists in these shows is a far cry from any form of real life that I've been able to observe or experience, or maybe it's because the people chosen for such 'reality' roles rub me the wrong way. Either way, I'm just not a fan of reality tv.

I caught a glimpse of the show The Biggest Loser the other night, and then Survivor a bit later. The contestants on the 'game' of Survivor were gaunt and hungry, the 'contestants' on The Biggest Loser were, well, big. I have recently been noticing how 'efficient' our nation tries to be. We have drive-up windows, automated entries in nearly every store, self-check out lanes, debit/credit cards, 'value meals', the internet, online purchasing, online dating, online education, digital cameras; the list could go on and on. I'm not usually a fan of most of the 'efficiencies' society has incorporated, but I have a suggestion for a new type of efficiency. I think that we should minimize the number of reality tv shows out there by combining them, thus making television watching more efficient.

Wouldn't you just love to watch contestants from The Biggest Loser try their hand at Survivor? They would not only lose weight, but have to work a lot just to keep a shelter over their heads, a fire burning and food in their big bellies. It would bring them back to the basics in life and help them understand the luxury that food is and help them appreciate it more? I'd call it The Biggest (or maybe the smallest) Survivor. ( :

Another couple of shows that could be combined are The Bachelor and Sister Wives. Isn't that basically what The Bachelor is-one man with many women? The contestants may have to be limited to those who come from Colorado City.

And what about Extreme Home Makeover and Hoarders? I'd really like to see Kutcher's Punk'd step in to an episode of Hell's Kitchen, or any reality tv show for that matter. Having Project Runway and Say Yes to the Dress combined would be really cool too. It would be fun to watch the Kardashians on Wipeout, or a Toddlers and Tiaras version of American Idol. I wonder if Real Housewives would be Smarter than a Fifth Grader, or what Pimp My Ride would do to the boats on Deadliest Catch. What are some other combinations that would be fun?

It sickens me to think that there are over 800 reality tv shows that have been created in the past twelve years or so. The only one that I have ever really enjoyed is Man vs. Wild. Bear Grylls is kind of amazing, and he shares great information on his show.

If only we could be more efficient when it comes to reality tv shows...