Being Thankful: Day Two

Today I'm thankful that I have an artistic brain. That's not to say that I'm particularly creative or that I am able to produce great literature or moving pieces of music. In fact, I would say that I can't do those things. I don't feel incredibly talented at creating art. However, my brain is wired to appreciate great art, whether it be painting, photography, literature, or film, and I'm grateful for that. I love well thought out ideas that are executed to perfection. I love dissecting films and books to find the driving force behind the story, behind the characters.

Tonight I watched Inception for the second time, and the brilliance of the story blows me away. The simple idea that transforms itself into complex plot and dynamic characters. The genius mind that recognized the idea as being worth pursuing. The visionaries who translated the paper version to vivid images.

This is what I want to do with my life: I want to create art. But until I can get to a point where I know how to do it effectively, I'm incredibly grateful that I can look at the art that others have created and see the beauty in it. Without art, life would be dull and colorless, and that wouldn't be much of a life at all.

I get lost in the beauty of everything I see,

the world ain't half as bad as they paint it to be.

If all the sons, all the daughters, would stop to take it in,

then hopefully the hate subsides and the love can begin.

-"Come Home" by OneRepublic

Being Thankful: Day One

This past year has simply flown by. It's ridiculous how much faster time goes when you're not living your life in four-month chunks. And now it's November (already), which means it's time for more thankful posts. I did this last year, and I really liked it. I found myself looking for something every day that I could write about in my thankful post, and it felt really good to constantly be looking for the good things in my life. So today I start my month of daily thankful posts, which I hope I can make an annual tradition.

Today, I'm grateful that Cora lives with me. Don't get me wrong, my other roommates are also awesome, but Cora and I just understand each other. We have the same sense of humor. Plus, we understand each others' families, which is also a huge thing. The amount of inside jokes we have that stem from our families is rather astounding. People often look at us funny when we burst into laughter about something that no one else understands. It's fantastic. Plus, today's her birthday, and I figured no longer being a teenager deserved a blog post.

Thanks, Cora, for being the awesomest roommate/cousin ever.

Customer service is a pain in my behind.

So remember how I posted a couple of months ago about how I bought a totally awesome refurbished Samsung Blu-ray player? Turns out that the totally awesome Blu-ray player is so awesome that it won't even play Blu-ray discs. Sound like a problem to you? Yeah, me too. I played one disc all the way through clear back when I first bought the player, but I have tried four discs since (I don't have a lot of Blu-rays, so don't judge the low number) and none of them has worked. DVDs work fine, but not the Blu-rays.

I looked up the product online and found out that I have a 90-day warranty. Sweet. So I called Best Buy, who told me to take the player into the store, where they could look at it for me. So the next day I went to the store on my lunch break so they could look at my player, and I was told that because it was a refurbished model, they couldn't send it into Samsung for me. I needed to call the number I called in the first place so they could help me. Fantastic.

I went back out to my car and decided to try calling support again while I had some time. They tried transferring me, but I was told that their systems were down so they couldn't help me. Now that is what I call good service. I was really frustrated, so I made myself feel better by buying lunch at Zupa's. Because Zupa's never disappoints.

After work, I called Best Buy's support again, and the call was disconnected. It was getting ridiculous when I finally got ahold of someone who had a working system and could look up all of my information. It turns out that the Best Buy warrantee on my player had run out. I still had a warrantee through Samsung, but I had to call Samsung and get help from their customer service. That would have been nice to know the first time I called.

So I called Samsung's support and spent a good 35 minutes on the phone with a lady with an accent from who knows where. She kept trying to convince me that my player wouldn't play the Blu-ray discs because my firmware wasn't updated, even though that was the very first thing I tried. Then she tried telling me that I just needed to wait for the next upgrade that they were working on right then and that would come out in the next few weeks. There was no way I was waiting for a few weeks hoping the upgrade worked while my warrantee expired. No way. The lady finally agreed that something was wrong with the player when I told her that one of the discs that wouldn't play (How to Train Your Dragon—way cute movie, by the way) played perfectly fine on three—yes, three—other Blu-ray players, one of which was the same exact model as mine.

After this ridiculous process, I was hoping there would be very little I was required to do to get the thing fixed. I spent a lot of money on it—I deserve to have a working player. Unfortunately, my saga wasn't over yet. I was told that I had to fax in my receipt to prove that I bought the product. The fact that they had record of it didn't matter. So I had to wait two days until I was back at work so I could fax the dumb receipt. Then I had to wait for a phone call with the rest of the information I needed. Luckily, I got the call the same day I faxed the receipt. The lady on the phone told me the address and that I needed to ship the Blu-ray player to Samsung on my own dime. Awesome. But I guess it's better than paying for a new player.

Finally, a week and a half of phone calls and $20 later, my Blu-ray player is in the mail. It should get to the repair place in California on Thursday. Then they will have to look at it, fix it, and ship it back to me. In about two weeks (at the longest), I should have a fully functional Blu-ray player back where it belongs, hooked up to my TV so I can watch awesome-looking movies. Because even watching DVDs on a regular DVD player isn't the same as watching DVDs on a Blu-ray player. I need my Blu-ray player back. Seriously.

Chills. I have chills.

This trailer looks AMAZING. So does the other one. Basically, I think the final Harry Potter movies are going to be the best yet by a long shot. With two movies, I would imagine that almost everything in Deathly Hallows (which is my favorite book of the series) will make it on screen. And I can't wait.

I already have my tickets to the midnight showing. And I'll be dressing up. Am I a nerd? Oh yes. But I don't really care.

Concert Number Six

On Wednesday, Faith, Cora, and I drove up to Salt Lake to see Sherwood. Yes, again. I will see them every time they're in northern Utah because they're just that awesome.

The first thing we noticed when the band got up to set up was that they were one member short: Dave was missing! I was so sad. It was still a pretty awesome show, but it just wasn't the same without the three-part harmonies and the extra guitar. I really missed Dave. Luckily, both Nate and Mikey informed us after the show that Dave just couldn't make this tour—he hasn't left the band or anything. Hopefully he'll be bouncing around the stage next time I see them.

As much as I love Sherwood, this wasn't their best show. Though that was partially because the Avalon kind of sucks. They were having sound issues all night, which was annoying. Plus, there really wasn't any dance area, so there were a bunch of people jammed up in the three feet of open space between the stage and the first bench. It was annoying.

Mikey was hilarious, though. He usually runs all over the stage, jumps around, and throws the tambourine, but he was having some trouble. He knocked over some amps, dropped the tambourine multiple times (once it ended up in the audience), and he stood on his keyboard and almost knocked the whole stand over. It was great fun.

The best part of the night, though, was when Nate announced that they were going to sing "Make It Through." He then asked, "Who knows this song well enough to come up and sing it with us?" Obviously, my hand shot in the air ASAP. Nate saw me and pointed right at me, so I got to go on stage and sing backup for one of my favorite bands. It was pretty awesome just to be on stage with them. I highly enjoyed myself. It made me wish I could sing with a band all the time. Being in front of an audience is so much fun, I love it.

All in all, it was a great night. We got to sit and chat with Mikey and Nate afterward, which is always fun. I think I've been to enough concerts now that they're starting to recognize me, which is pretty cool. And they announced that they're making a new album, which is great. That means they'll probably take a break from touring for a while to write and record it, but once they're touring to promote the new album, you better believe I'll be buying tickets.

This is why I can't find new TV shows

A couple of weeks ago, I signed up for a free month trial of Netflix so I could try out the instant streaming on my blu-ray player, which probably wasn't the wisest decision. Now that I have experienced the wonders of instant streaming, I'm not going to be able to say goodbye to it. I'm stuck paying that monthly fee now. Crap.

The other problem with instant streaming is that I have become completely addicted to another TV show. I guess it's not a terrible thing, since my last major obsession ended last year. There is no more "Lost" to fill my TV needs. But much to my joy, the first four seasons of "Bones" were on instant play on Netflix! I had watched a few episodes and I liked the show, but I hadn't allowed myself to get addicted. Until now.

Cora and I routinely watch at least two episodes a night. Our current record is seven episodes in a day. (Which, by the way, included going to church, taking naps, going to ward prayer, and playing games with a group of friends. That, my friends, is pretty impressive.) The show is ridiculously addicting. It's got a great mix of drama and comedy. They manage to crack jokes while looking at a mangled skeleton. I'm not sure how the writers pull it off, but they definitely succeed.

And besides the fact that the show is really funny (and also kind of creepy at times...pathological killers freak me out), Seeley Booth is friggin' hot. I don't care if this makes me sound like a teenager. I mean, look at him:

That's all the evidence needed. Plus, his character is fantastically attractive. And wears good jeans. Booth has fast become my favorite male TV character.

Basically, I'm completely addicted. I'm super excited for the new season to start next week. All I have to say is that if Booth and Bones don't get together in the first freaking episode, I'm going to be angry. They've dragged it out long enough. In the meantime, though, I'll satisfy my cravings by continuing to make my way through the first five seasons. Netflix instant streaming is pretty much the best/worst thing ever.

Let the Craziness Begin

What craziness, you ask? Well, in about 24 hours, I will be sitting in my seat at LaVell Edwards Stadium watching BYU kick off the 2010 season. And I turn into crazy Lindy during the football season.

I am so weird. I freaking love sports. I know I've posted about this before, but I'm posting about it again. Because hey, it's my blog, and I can write about whatever I want. And football is on my mind right now. I'm literally squirming in my seat right now because I'm so excited about the prospect of watching BYU play Washington tomorrow. It has been nine long months since the last Cougar football game, and it's about freaking time for another season.

The beginning of a new football season is always exciting. I seriously get chills just thinking about sitting in the stadium and watching my Cougars run onto the field. Is that weird? Yeah, probably, but I don't care.

For me, Cougar football is a family affair. I've been watching BYU play for as long as I can remember. I've been dealing with the BYU/Utah rivalry ever since I started elementary school. Let me tell you, growing up in Salt Lake as a BYU fan isn't the easiest thing to do. Not that anything awful ever happened to me, but I have endured some verbal abuse. Much like the Ute fans down here in Provo get, I'm sure.

Even going to football games is a family thing. The games have never been a social thing for me—even when I was going to BYU, I would get an all-sports pass with my brother and sit with him and about seven of his married guy friends. But it didn't matter, because I was there to watch the game, not to chat. I got to listen to some interesting sports talk from those guys, which was really fun.

And now that I'm all graduated and have moved on from the student section (sadly enough), I buy my own season tickets and go to games with my dad and my two brothers. And I love it. I love talking sports with them and soaking in everything that they know. They know way more than I do, so I learn a lot from them. Especially my father, who really needs to be a sportscaster somewhere. He'd be so awesome at that job.

BYU's recent announcement that they are going independent with an eight-year contract with ESPN has only increased my excitement for Cougar football. I know, I know, the change won't happen until the 2011 season, but this could mean big things for BYU. Sure, it could also blow up in everyone's faces, but I'm looking at the bright side here. And I think there are a lot of very positive things that could come from this. I think it's about time BYU did something different.

I'm not going to give any kind of predictions for this year's team. BYU lost a lot of starters last year, so there are a lot of newbies coming on the field this season. It could be very interesting. I'm just hoping the young guys step up and surprise us with a great season. I definitely wouldn't mind BYU winning the conference championship their last season in the MWC. I'm not expecting it, but it'd definitely be sweet.

The bottom line is that I bleed Cougar blue through and through. And that won't change any time soon. Go Cougs!