Thought Box

Hayley's Tri-Dip Tray (Guac, Roasted Red Pepper, and Green Salsa)

Per tradition I held my Annual Super Bowl party, and it was once again a wonderful success!  The turnout was a little lower this year, but when you factor in my smaller apartment and that I am not as interested in impressing people as I may have been previously, I’m pretty OK with the overall size going down; Besides, most of the important people were here.  Oh, and the food was fantastic!

Aside from the game, which was a disaster this year (hate. packers.), one of my favorite aspects of the Super Bowl party is seeing all of the exciting food that people bring.  I annually include in my invitations a small tidbit suggesting that people bring their favorite “Big Game” snacks, and once again I was not disappointed.  We had a plethora of dips, a homemade Super Bowl cake, delicious rib roast, some steak, and a handful of other treats.

Hayley's Corn and Black Bean Salsa Fresca

Did I eat too much?  Yes..  Was it worth it? I think maybe so!  My buddy Lowell brought the rib roast this year, and I was honestly a  little disappointed since he typically brings the most delicious ribs ever.  That was, of course, until I tried the roast..  W-O-W! It may have hurt the gut a little, but hurt never tasted so goooood.. As bad as the Packers made me feel, that rib roast kept me going when the Steelers were really not looking good early on.

As for the game – could there have been a larger disappointment? Thank goodness it was fairly close in the fourth quarter, but a Packers win is a depressing Packers win either way… One of these days the Bears will figure out how to win something and I can forget Super Bowl XLV!  Right? Dreams come true.. right?!

One highlight I find worth mentioning is the fairly awesome halftime show.  No, I’m not a huge Black Eyed Peas fan, but come on!  That was pretty rad. I was making the comment to everyone, “Hey, this isn’t too bad for the Black Eyed Peas, eh?” when all of a sudden Slash appeared on stage playing the opening strains to Sweet Child of Mine (which is a top 5 rock song IMHO). I may or may not have squealed..  Just a little.. And then they brought out Usher? I gotta give it up to Wil.I.Am for pushing the envelope – he really brought it. It was nice to see a Super Bowl Halftime Show that didn’t have some 90 year old rock star, and I’m glad the Black Eyed Peas kind of nailed it..

Crystal's homemade Super Bowl cake, with rice cereal football on top

Oh, and the REAL highlight of the Super Bowl (since I hate the Packers and don’t really care much for the Steelers) was the wonderful Captain America trailer! You may not be as excited as I am (as I am mildly obsessed), but it looks AWESOME!

Anyway, before I nerdgasm, I’ll wrap this up.  Here are a few more images from the party, with credits for food justly given.

Another shot of Crystal's Cake

Spencer's fantastic steaks - grilled to perfection, as always

Crystal's deviled eggs (scrumptious edition)

OMG! Josh Brown came!!!

Sorry I didn’t get a picture of everyone that came; I only pulled the camera out one time to take pictures of guests and I know I missed some people.. Thanks to all who came, and here’s looking forward to a bigger and better party next year!

I just turned a year older, and hopefully wiser too, on July 6th…  I had a really fun and noteworthy adventure all day, so I’ll share a bit.

8:30am -wake up and harass Crystal for taking so long to wake up. (btw, my friend Crystal Gerber, from BYU, came out to celebrate and visit!)

9:15am -harass Crystal for STILL not waking up

9:45am -harass Crystal about getting off the couch, getting her swimsuit and such on, and getting in the car

10:00am - leave for Galveston Island! FYI – the drive is longer than I remember… Not a problem normally, but Crystal was STILL sleepy…

11:05am -realize I need money to park at the beach… Or at least that is what the high school age’d youngin’ told me when I got there. I asked if there was a birthday discount and he looked at me like I was speaking french… So, we went to Walgreens and bought suntan lotion (which I didn’t use) and lemonade and got $10 in cash back at the register.

11:15am - park at the beach! Note: swimming at said beach is fun, but realize you will end up a mile down the beach since the current runs diagonally rather than the way you’d expect.

12:30pm -Crystal says, “Ewww!!! I’ve got crabs!”

1:00pm -leave the beach and drive to Saltgrass Steakhouse on Seawall Blvd (still in Galveston). I got the half-rack of ribs off of the lunch menu and just about died… If you haven’t had the ribs at Saltgrass, do yourself a favor!

1:45pm -leave Galveston Island. This is when I realized that I was super sun burned… Actually, I realized when I got inside the 610 loop in Houston and noticed that my left arm was tingly. I was adding to my burn with some trucker tannage on the way home. ick

3:00pm -realize I don’t have a checkerboard cake pan set! Annie and Travis stole mine (though I guess I originally lent it to them for Travis’s birthday last year… Anyway, I love Williams & Sonoma because they had one for $25, thus saving the day.

4:00pm - go to Target to get supplies and argue with Crystal over a “It’s My Birthday” button that she insisted on buying and demanded that I wear the rest of the day.

6:00pm - leave for Buffalo Wild Wings and meet up with about 15+ of my awesome friends! I love BWW, and I was really happy to see everyone there to celebrate with me. I got to catch up with a few people I haven’t seen in a while, and I ate some of the most delicious food…

9:00pm - return to the house for cake & ice cream deliciousness! This is when everyone decided to embarrass me by going around and individually telling me why I am loved… It’s awesome in theory, and I certainly appreciated it, but holy cow was I embarrassed… Yikes!

10:00pm -did NOT get a kiss from Chera. I just want everyone to know – she’s been making a big deal about me “dreaming about a kiss” from her on my birthday, and I didn’t ask for one nor did she offer one. End of story.

11:30pm - got all kinds of phone calls from great friends in Utah, and made a couple call backs as well. I really do have a lot of quality friends in a lot of different places. I’ve seriously been blessed!

12:30am (the 7th) - End the night by watching The Fugitive w/ Crystal while we both fell asleep…

I really feel blessed to have such great friends and people who care about me. I didn’t include info about my family, but my parents and sisters were calling me all day long to share their love for me. I got one of the coolest gifts ever in the form of a Luau Murder Mystery Dinner set! I’m pretty excited to pull that one off someday! haha… Thanks again to everyone!

Here are some attached pictures of the festivities:

It’s been a fabulous week since my last posting! I wanted to write this last weekend, but I’m glad I held off because it’s a little more exciting to hear the good news rather than speculation on good news!

From the looks of things, I’ll be heading to Houston, TX sometime this summer to start work for ExxonMobil! I don’t know if I could be happier at this point with this opportunity… Back in the Fall I was a little hesitant to head down there since I felt I could head home with a lady friend and be closer to family and the culture I love in Chicago, but now that I’m single (for now) Houston’s singles wards are appealing. Oh, and the biggest factor is that Jason and Erin are going to be down there, so I have psuedo-family in the area. I have plenty of other friends working for Exxon, but with Jason and Erin there I feel 100% comfortable transplanting myself and making the big move.

Some of the things I love about ExxonMobil:

• I can change jobs w/i the company – I don’t have to go on a major job search when I get tired of what I’m doing and I want to try something new
• They spend a LOT of money on IT, so I know I will have plenty to work with and I won’t be struggling to find resources like if I worked at a smaller organization
• The pay and benefits are SICK! My starting salary is right up there with some of the highest I’ve heard friends from across the country getting, and the 401k and pension plans aren’t anything to scoff at either.
• They have a vested interest in making sure I’m happy and that I have everything I need. They despise turnover, so they’ll make sure I am trained, content with my job, and moving in directions I want to go.

Added benefits:

• It’s very possible I could be moving into my first home w/i a year’s time. This will most likely depend on whether or not I get married anytime soon, because I’d rather rent and save if I’m single – but the option is definitely a possibility since the cost of living is significantly lower.
• The weather in Houston will let me play year round! I certainly love the snow, but at about this point in January I really wish I had the warm weather back so that I could be sitting on the front porch, playing outdoors, and walking to school w/o feeling like my arms are going to fall off!
• I mentioned this before, but having a strong support base in the area will be GREAT! I have several friends down there who I am excited to be working with and living around.

There are other things to definitely be excited about, but those are some of the bigs ones.

In other news, we’ve had a lot of fun around here recently. Last Saturday we held our first annual (and possibly last) Prohibition Remembrance Day party! We had the house filled with root beer, apple beer, nacho dip, and fun lovin’ Mormon kids! Honestly, it was a ton of fun. We read about the Prohibition Amendment, it’s sad demise, and how Utah blew it for the rest of the country (tsk tsk…).

My buddy Kevin hosted the party with me. Talk about a good kid! You’d be hard pressed not to think he’s great, I’ll leave it at that… I met a bunch of his friends, including a young lady who may or may not have caught my fancy… HA!

Oh, and here’s a picture just to give you idea of how much non-alcohol was consumed…