Dear Sicky:

Over the last few months, with the out break of the Swine Flu, BYU has instituted a policy concerning sick students. If you are sick, contact your professor and DO NOT come to class. At the start of last semester, signs were everywhere. Literally. Every building was practically plastered in them. It was, however, for good reason. Why spread a sickness when the majority of the people living in Provo are students who have to go to class and the last thing they want is to get sick. I personally turned into a hand washing/hand sanitizer maniac. I was not going to get sick.

This policy of "if you're sick, please don't come to class" was and still is a good policy, despite the fact that The Swine is essentially dying down. It did, on the other hand, give people license to say that they had the flu and could not attend class for a week, when in reality these people were perfectly fine and decided to go to Disneyland instead of class. I'm not mad about that. THIS is what I'm mad about. I will preface with a story.

In my Advanced Molecular Biology class, I sit in the back of the room, in the same place every day. There is a boy who always sits behind me every class period. The other day, I sat down only to hear sniffling and snorting. That's right. He was sick. I looked over my shoulder only to see that he had bloodshot eyes and a red runny nose. Now, the fact that he was sick would have been bad enough. But no, he's not just sick, he's a mouth breather. As in "hey, sorry, but I can't breathe through my nose so I hope that it's okay that I breathe really loudly through my mouth instead and I hope you don't mind if I'm breathing RIGHT on your neck" mouth breathing. Needless to say, I felt so germy by the end of class that I wanted to bathe in hand sanitizer. But, oh. It gets worse. Just moments after leaning forward to get as far from sicky boy as possible, he started coughing. More like hacking. And the worst part was, he didn't really cover his mouth. As my roommate Emma said, "Doesn't he realize he broke like, 17 cardinal rules about being sick by NOT covering his mouth?" No Emma, I don't think he did realize. Now he was spreading his germs more by not covering his mouth and I was getting the full effect of it. I thought it couldn't get worse. But it did. He was sniffling and I knew he was going to sneeze any second. Oh boy did he. On me. At this point, I gagged. In fact I almost threw up in my mouth. I was ready to give him a piece of my mind when the bell rang and he was up and out the door. I turned to my friends in the class who just stared at me. One said "That...was foul." The other said, "Seriously? He has no manners."

So, to the Sicky Boy in MMBio 441: If I get sick within the next few days with a cold, I know that you are the one who gave it to me. I know where you sit every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning from 9:00 to 9:50. And I will come to drop off my bills for Tylenol and Nyquill to you. But I will not stay in class because I don't want to get other people sick. And I'll even wear a mask just for their benefit. But it will be because of you that I will be dying and I will show no mercy. You will pay me back and I will enjoy every penny. So you had better hope that my antibodies and white blood cells are awesome because if they aren't, it's on.

A word to all- please do not come to class (or if you don't have class, don't go out in public) if you are sick. And if you do decide to come, don't cough or sneeze or breathe on people. It's yucky. And it makes other people sick, which is generally not a good thing. Bring some tissues and sit as far away from everyone as you possibly can. That would be favorable.

Two Goals, One Objective

This blog is about goals. Two goals I made over Christmas break in particular. One short term, the second not so short term. Keep in mind that both goals are not only ridiculous but AWESOME.

Over Christmas break, I made several short term goals that could be fulfilled over the break. These goals included reading several books, figuring out how busy my schedule this semester would be, making my mother's Christmas madness a little less crazy, and so on. But the most important goal was that I needed to get at least 10 hours of sleep each night. And since I am gradually becoming an old lady, that meant falling asleep by about 10 every night, 11 at the latest. At this rate, I did not get 10 hours of sleep a night. Oh, no. I far exceeded my goal, typically waking up at about 9:30 or 10 depending on how late my evening was (yes I stayed up till midnight on New Years. Granted, I was lying on the couch with my blanket, in pajamas, drinking wassail, and long blinking every five seconds while watching Star Trek with my dad. But I made it!) Sleep has never been more amazing. I think I would rather sleep than eat or maybe even breathe. But that kind of sleeping is called dying, so let's not go there.

My second goal is what I like to refer to as the "Spies have hot bodies, so why can't I?" goal. In other words, I aspire to look like the spies on television. Two spies in particular: Sydney Bristow from the now cancelled "Alias" and Sarah Walker from my favorite television show, "Chuck". On the one hand, both of these women are actresses and thus have personal trainers, wardrobe people, stunt doubles (to make them look cooler than they really are), and are basically born smoking hot. Since I have none of the first three (too non-talented in the actress department) and I've never really seen myself as a natural "bombshell", this goal has quickly evolved into the second most "difficult-to-achieve" goal I've ever tried to reach. But my motto is that NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE. So, I will embark on a journey to look somewhat like this:



Ooorrrrr this:



I don't think it will be too much of a stretch to have expectations to look slightly like these women. It's not like I'm going to go all Octo-mom and get plastic surgery to look exactly like them, facial features and all. That's just creepy. But I figure if I work out, I'll have a shot. I suppose the biggest work out will be this summer when I spend my time hiking and basically playing outdoors all day. Even if this goal seems unrealistic, I could care less. I just like that it gives me some motivation to be smoking hot.