Oh yeah, and those vampires--

4:39 PM Edit This 3 Comments »
SPOILERS~SPOILERS~SPOILERS~SPOILERS~SPOILERS
I almost forgot about Twilight! Naughty, naughty Mallory!!
Okay, so my grade for Breaking Dawn: *insert spitting noise here*
The ending was awesome, and I enjoyed Jacob's perspective. But this book pretty much took everything I DON'T like about the Twilight series- Stephenie Meyer's indulgence (meaning she can't not write about something she thinks of, and she puts in all her own personal fantasies which are a little over-the-top), Bella's whineyness, everybody else thinking Bella's some heroic martyr who is just soooo self-sacrificing and brave, really repetitive and superfluous descriptions, everything being just the BEST possible or the WORST possible thing like that that anyone anywhere has ever experienced, and pretty crappy writing quality- and multiplied it by ten. I mean, the punctuation alone in that book needed some s-e-r-i-o-u-s work. Stephenie's an amazing storyteller, but her writing leaves much to be desired.
And, okay. Bella's sex addiction FREAKED. ME. OUT. Me, Megan, and Jordan were seriously worried about our future personalities after reading the island. And Bella's tranformation was just plain gross. It did not add a single thing to the story. It was just Stephenie Meyer being overdramatic again and putting crazy stuff in there that were so unnecessarily and frankly, creepy and sick.
Buuuut... I loved Jacob's perspective on stuff, and I LOVED the ending- her endings are what really make these books great, and the Volturi make the story pure awesome any time they show up. I did enjoy reading the book, but I only read it again to make sure of my opinion of it. I'm probably not going to read it again for many, many, many years.
And some people say that Twilight is the next Harry Potter, or Meyer is the next J.K. Rowling!
HA!
WRONG!!
Harry Potter is just completely in a league above Twilight. Like it's not even possible for there to be a competition between them. I can read Harry Potter an infinite amount of times (I've read the first one 16 times) and it will never lose any of its enjoyment. And I realize new, special little things she threw in there every time. The Twilight books just aren't that kind of quality, and they certainly didn't have the 10 year of meticulous prior preparation that Harry Potter had. So, sorry. No contest.
I'm currently reading the now-legit leaked pages from Midnight Sun off of Stephenie's website.
Um, can we say deeelicious?
I believe we can indeed.
THIS is what gets us addicted to the series. Edward. The high concentration of Edward in this one- not to mention finally getting his perspective- is nothing short of amazing. This one I could read a good six or seven times before it began to lose its luster for me. I have read Twilight 4 times; it's still my favorite book of the series. New Moon is my favorite ending, though.
Oh, and Renesmee? Are you FREAKING SERIOUS! Someone get the vampire child abuse police on Bella RIGHT NOW!
And I forgot- I loved the wedding. That fantasy area I had no problems with. And Bella as a vampire is so much less annoying because she isn't constantly worrying about other people's physical safety. I think becoming strong must have made her finally realize how stupid her worrying was.
So yep. That's my jurisdiciton, biased as it is. Whatever. I'm not even going to bother finding a new obsession for the present- getting good grades needs to be my obsession for now. But Harry Potter always has that special corner in my heart- and Mugglenet still gets checked multiple times daily. =)

My verdict...

3:51 PM Edit This 6 Comments »
Hhhhokay. Hi. Where do I begin? Um, I'm in college now. I moved into my dorm on Wednesday. It already feels like home- not HOME home, but you know. Like the same way the bedroom in my Grandma's house where I always sleep feels like a home. Or the couch in Megan's living room where we frequently waste tragic amounts of time. Or Mr. Lev's classroom where I had AP Bio, env. science, and spent tons of time after school in environmental club.
Aaaanywaaaay, I'm pretty much settled in now. I'm in an apartment-style dorm with 5 other girls, split into 3 bedrooms, a bathroom, and a kitchen. I love my roommates already, but I promise none of us got up in testimony meeting today to tell everybody so. It's bound to happen at some point, but we at least resisted this first time. The girl in the bedroom with me is McKenzie and she lives really close. She's SO nice and very friendly. Julie and Krista share another of the rooms, and they already knew each other. They're very bubbly, and they know how to get the dance parties going. :D In the other room is Caitlin and Somers. I've only seen Somers once because she's in Idaho with her family right now, but I've spent a lot of time with Caitlin and she's a fun time.I've been busy busy busy these past few days with orientation stuff. I've found all of my classrooms and I feel moderately comfortable getting everywhere I need to- during the day, anyway. Night time is scary because I can't see the mountains to orient myself, and everything looks different, but luckily I've always had groups to go with after dark. My orientation group has been super fun, and I've made some friends within it. Yesterday there was a dance in Brigham Square, and it was great. I saw Scott from the St. Paul Stake there and we chatted a bit, but neither of us have seen Jonathan Thibadeau yet. He's around here somewhere... among these thousands of people... somewhere...... :) Anyway, after the dance my bud Jake had an after-the-dance dance in front of his dorm, and pretty much everybody from Heritage Halls came and we had a good time. I was so BEAT afterwards.
My new Bishop is hilarious. He kind of reminds me of Chad Erickson. Hee. His wife led Relief Society today, and he came in halfway and their bantering cracked us up!
Happy Valley has really got my head spinning. It's aptly named, I can tell you that. Everyone (well the vast majority) is so FRIENDLY and there's none of the usual social barriers that exist among people who've never met. It hasn't mattered one bit that I didn't know a single person when I got here. For example, here's my best story of the week:
So on Thursday I didn't go on the tour with my group because they don't do me much good, and then at noonish I went to this field to meet up with them for lunch and the rest of the day's doings. I was just standing around looking for my group and waiting for them to come into the field. I was wearing my Pickle Pack t-shirt, which I'll explain since I bet all of .5% of the people reading this will know what that is. It's this shirt with a pickle on it that shows you're a member of the Pickle Pack, which is a fan club for this podcast I'm obsessed with called MuggleCast. "Pickles" is kind of a lame but fun catchphrase/inside joke of the people who listen to or host the show. Anyway, I'm standing there by myself and all the sudden this girl I've never even SEEN before runs up to me and starts jumping up and down shouting, "PICKLES PICKLES PICKLES!!!" It took me a minute to understand what was going on- imagine if that happened to you- but once I did I was so excited! She was a member of the Pickle Pack too and neither of us EVER expected to meet someone else who knew what it was, so we were super psyched. We talked for a while and then got each other's numbers so we could talk later. That's one of the "codes" of this group of people... if you see someone wearing a Pickle Pack shirt, you MUST say hello and then be friends. It's very Mormon-like in that sense. :D So yep- I made a friend by wearing a shirt with a pickle on it.
I'm super nervous about my Honors Calc II class now, because I found out we don't get to use calculators- not just on the exams but AT ALL. AHHH!! I'm not positive I'll survive it. But I'm still determined to be a math teacher, so I'm giving it a shot.
Oh, and I met a guy from the Anoka stake today who's in my ward, and two guys who live in Utah now but used to live in Burnsville. So that was cool. I think I've actually danced with the guy from Anoka at one of the dances, but I didn't say anything about it in case I was wrong. I have to say, BYU boys are so much easier to be around than the ones at Forest Lake High School. You don't have to smack their heads for swearing or plug your ears during their dirty jokes. They're just GOOD, which I'm totally not used to.
All in all, I absolutely LOVE BYU. This place feels like it was meant for me. It's weird not being unique anymore. I've always been kind of the top of my class, and most of my friends were from AP classes and such. I felt nerdy around many of my friends because I liked school and, not to be snotty or anything, but I was really good at it. And I was one of the only Mormons in high school, and my standards singled me out a lot. Plus I was kind of famous for being a Mormon. It was like the second thing people would mention when introducing me: "This is my friend Mallory- she's a Mormon!" But here EVERYBODY is really smart, and likes to learn for learning's sake instead of just doing what was necessary to (maybe) pass a class. I'm surrounded by Mormons, and I have to say the dress code is like a breath of fresh air. It really does feel good. So I've stepped into this bubble where there are thousands of people I fit in with perfectly- Mormon, peppy, enthusiastic, smart, pretty nerdy sometimes, friendly, and raring to go!! Okay, so the constant happiness does get a little annoying, but if that's my biggest problem with the people here, then I'll take it. After all, I'm a pretty optimistic and happy person myself- I just didn't realize how much MORE so some people were.
I've always felt like I'm an adapter- I get used to new places and situations really quickly and without it phasing me much. I WAS a little homesick the first night right after my family left- I went into the shower to cry a little bit so people wouldn't come and ask me what's wrong (I HATE that- there's nothing worse in the world than attention when I cry, so I usually avoid crying quite well) But I slept it off and in the morning I was over it. I still miss everybody and I think about you all the time, but I'm not sad. Just wistful. I wish I could bring you all with me. Wanna come live in my cinderblock? (Actually my dorm is a lot nicer than I expected. we even have actuall walls for 3 of the 4 walls in my room and in the kitchen and bathroom, and everything works, and we have walk-in closets. And I have way more space for my stuff than I anticipated! I actually have EXTRA closet and drawer space. Wild, I know.)The vacation in Montana and Utah was lovely as well. My cousins are pretty much the bomb, and I'll just leave it at that.Oh, and you know that "freshman 15" thing? Not gonna happen for me. I'm walking soooo much, and I'm actually eating less than I usually do both because there's less time to do it and because I have to watch my budget. But I do have a new addiction to strawberry frosted shredded wheat. I've eaten it every morning except today. :DI'll update soon, probably next weekend after I've gone to all my classes and I get a chance to relax a tiny tiny bit. Love you!

Sallying Forth

10:34 PM Edit This 3 Comments »
Well, kids, this is it. Tomorrow morning my family and I are waking up at the buttcrack of dawn (4 a.m. for you more gentle-spoken folks), piling into the van, and heading off to follow the sun. We'll be in Billings, Montana for 5 days, then we'll be going to Yellowstone to camp overnight. Then we're going to Utah to visit the family until it's time for me to move into my dorm and begin life as student of BYU.
W-O-W.
I've been in a kind of panicky state for about two weeks now, not so much from nervousness about college itself, but because every time I see something or someone I love I start thinking, "What if this is the last time I ever see them?!?!" I feel like I shouldn't even blink for fear of missing something I want to remember. And the more I try to hold onto the time, the faster it darts past me. This is not a new sensation (which is a great song, by the way). I felt the same way sporadically from the time we found out we were moving to Montana to the time we found out we didn't have to, during the entire last month or so of high school, during my trip to Costa Rica... it always happens in exactly the same way, and yet it always floors me a little bit. I'm a very nostalgic person; the very idea of relinquishing memories appalls me. That would be why I'm such a packrat- you can ask my mother about that one.
So, as I'm currently in a fit of heightened desperation to cling to all the people, places, and things I'm attached to, please excuse what I'm about to say, which I am certain will be corny and cliche, yet true.
I love you all so much. You may not have noticed, but today at church I was kinda staring at people a lot. I urgently felt like I had to ingrain your faces into my mind as much as I possibly could. Some of you have practically raised me, and I've seriously contemplated kinapping many more of your children than I think you'd care to know about. I LOVE Minnesota, I LOVE my ward, I LOVE my friends from school and everywhere else. Thus far my life has pretty much been charmed, and I've known and loved some incredible people. You probably know who you are. And if not, then I haven't done my job properly. Thank you for being unbelievably cool people and for making the last 11 1/2 years full of pure joy.
Whew. I really did just exceed my own mushy record. But I meant it, I promise.
So... see you in no more than 8 months, I trust. I may or may not come back for Thanksgiving or Christmas- it's likely I won't be back for both of them, though. I'm going to leave that one up to fate for now. Don't be strangers! My new address will be:
80 Penrose Hall
Provo, UT 84604
And you can always leave comments on the blog, facebook me, or email me! malallory@mywdo.com

Stay beautiful!
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