Life in Provo

The rumors are true. I almost got arrested yesterday. Last night was a good friend's birthday. My roommates and I wanted to give her an original birthday gift, a gift what would go down in history. We began to brainstorm what type of present we could get her that would be unique, memorable and yet achievable. One of my roommates shocked us all with his brilliant idea. Our friend's favorite animal is a duck. We decided that since she likes ducks so much we would get her one. We headed off to the south side of BYU campus. There, at the bottom of a huge hill we encountered our prey. We began to lure them in with chunks of delicious "Grandma Sycamores" bread. The ducks came in droves. Nobody can resist Granny Sycamore. I was armed with a large laundry bag, and my roommate had a big blanket that we planned on using as a net. As the ducks approached, I got my bag ready and made a dash for the birds. I missed by inches and scared the host of ducks away in a flutter of wings. After the first failure, we had the difficult task of regaining the duck's confidence. We used half of a loaf of bread to accomplish this, but that half was worth it. Within a half hour, we had the ducks within capturing range once again. This time, my roommate went for them with his blanket. Yet again, they escaped (I guess you have to be smarter than a duck to catch a duck.) By this time, it was getting cold and our friend's party was half over. We decided that the duck was no longer worth the praise we would receive as a result of it's capture. On the way back to the care we heard the officer.

"Gentlemen!" he yelled.

I looked up and saw the dark silhouette of a slightly overweight campus police officer. I quietly yet urgently whispered to my cohorts, "Guys, get in the car."

"Gentlemen!" came the voice once again.

"Hurry, hurry, hurry," I urged to them. My roommates and I nonchalantly drifted toward the car pretending not to have heard the officer's summons.

"Gentlemen, stay where you are!" the officer bellowed.

By this time, everyone but myself had made it safely into the car. After the third shout, however, I knew that we would be in for trouble if we did not pay attention to him. I stayed where I was and sighed under my breath, "Great." I then looked up at the chubby campus policeman. "Yes officer?"

"What are you doing?" He asked us as if it weren't obvious.

"Just feeding the ducks." I replied.

"That's not what it looks like to me. It looks like you were trying to capture the ducks."

"Oh%u2026" I replied.

I heard the static of his radio as he proceeded to report us in. "We've got a 40-40 here. Some kids are trying to capture some ducks." He then made eye contact with me and asked, "Did you know that's a citable offense?"

"No, I had no idea%u2026 do you know if it's only citable here on campus, or is it citable all over the valley?"

The officer didn't look too pleased with my response. "If they aren't your ducks, don't catch them." He stated flatly.

"Wait, that doesn't make sense. How can I own a duck if I can't catch one?"

"Buy one." Replied the officer.

"Are you serious?" I asked in a shocked tone. "You can buy ducks? Where?"

"Online. You buy them as chicks, and they grow into ducks. What did you want a duck for anyway?"

At this point, my roommates had rolled down their windows and were listening to the banter between myself and the campus patrolman. My roommate answered the officer's question with perfect timing. "They're good eatin'!" he shouted.

I think that for a moment the officer really believed that we were trying to catch ducks because we were starving college students. I smacked my friend over the head and told the officer that my roommate was an idiot. The authority then proceeded to question us until he had obtained all of our information and informed us that if we were caught 'duck catching' again, we would be cited.

Some may think that our encounter with the police officer was pure happenstance. I, however, know that it wasn't. I have seen history repeat itself enough times to know that whenever I do something even slightly contrary to what is morally expected of me, I get caught. If I watch a questionable movie, my mother is bound to walk in on the most risque scene. If I eat dessert before dinner, my hand will be caught in the cookie jar. If I check my e-mail at work, my boss is bound to be looking over my shoulder. When we began our duck catching endeavor, I had that nagging feeling that regardless of the selfless intentions of finding a stellar birthday present for our friend, we would be seen by the wrong person at the wrong time, and most likely be punished. Such is my luck. The noble intents of my heart get me into far more complex predicaments than anyone I know.

From - The Big Bags November '06

BYU students demanding that Gold's Gym stop being so damn sexy.

"Some college students in Utah County are calling some music videos pornographic, and they are trying to get a health club to take them off its screen."

Oh, dear. The list of their demands includes "no rated R movies or sexually explicit or racy PG-13 movies to play on the broadcasting network" and, AND, AND!! "install blinds on the aerobics room to block the dancing, which is very provocative."

Because it's making all these students have all sorts of funny feelings in their parts, and those feelings can lead to all sorts of horrible things. Like hand-holding, or maybe even squeezing the peaches in the produce section a little too hard.

(thanks to all those who sent me this link, I saw the story on the local news and of course they reported it like IT'S ABOUT TIME!)

From - Dooce January '08

There's been a lot of heated debate on the subject, but I think I can safely say, after four weeks of living here, that the fourth floor of Q-Hall in Deseret Towers is by far the most immature floor in all of BYU, and we're awfully proud of it.

But perhaps "immature" isn't the right word. Perhaps "fun-loving" is more accurate. One thing we like to do for "fun," for example, is shave each other's heads. Some guy named "Arnie" (I didn't realize anyone actually had that name until I arrived here) owns a buzzer, and any time someone gets bored, they go to him and have him carve designs in their hair. I am not personlly included in the category of people who like to have Arnie shave their heads, as it is against my personal code of ethics to go near anyone who possesses electric shaving implements if his name is Arnie. The same goes for people named Rufus, Dave, and Gus.

But I think the best example of the prevailing attitude on the fourth floor, the one that pretty much speaks for itself, despite the fact that I am going to speak for it, is the way everyone behaved during Open House a couple weeks ago. Open House takes place every two weeks at BYU, and it is simply a period of time when the women are allowed to go into the men's dorms, not just in the lobby, which they can and do hang around in all the time, but actually up into the men's rooms!

(Before you get the wrong idea, let me assure you that the men's doors must remain open, so that if there's any fornication to be done, it will be done in full view of everyone else. Also, these things are always held on Sunday, which presumably is the day when people are least likely to fornicate in the first place, being weary from fasting and all.)

Anyway, in anticipation of the first Open House of the semester, several of the guys on the fourth floor turned the commons room into a discotheque, complete with a glittering ball hanging from the ceiling, which they made by purchasing a styrofoam ball and gluing several dozen little round mirrors to it. They also found the soundtrack to "Saturday Night Fever" (don't ask me where; I don't think anyone will admit to owning it) and blasted it on the stereo.

The reason for this '70s resurrection (if you really think they needed a reason) was, obviously, to impress the women when they came to visit. And my, were those women ever impressed. They were impressed when the guys would grab them roughly by the arms as soon as they got off the elevator and shove them into the discotheque, practically ordering them to be impressed. They were impressed at how the guys hopped around and danced like a bunch of diseased birds performing a mating ritual. And most of all, they were impressed at how the guys cleaned up their bedrooms before their arrival, that is, if by "cleaned up" we mean "kicked everything under the bed and commanded their dirty socks to get up, walk down to the laundry room, and wash themselves."

All in all, the girls must have had a swell time, particularly after Arnie offered to give them all haircuts, free of charge.

From - Snide Remarks October '92

Dean and I went to a new-ish Indian food restaurant last night to try it out. For anyone in Utah, it's on Freedom Blvd. in Provo next to Honk's. The verdict in a moment, first I want to tell you about stupid Provo kid who was there.

Stupid Provo kid was there with nine of his friends. Listening to them for any amount of time would reveal many gems of stupidity, but my favorite came when it was time for them to order.

Stupid Provo kid didn't seem to really know what he wanted, but just asked that the waiter bring enough food to feed them all. He added "and we don't want to pay $50 for it!" Saying it in such a way as to imply that the concept of paying $50 for ten people was completely unrealistic.

He might have been able to stay well under $50 with the Wendy's dollar menu, but a quick glance at the menu (which is a huge sign up on the wall) revealed that the average cost of a meal was $7. I'm not sure what kind of gorilla math this kid was using, but unless many in his party are going to go hungry, his total was obviously going to be well over $50.

At the end of the evening his bill came to $82. He seemed a big flabbergasted and asked that the check be split up, even though they had not split the food in any discernible way. The waiter was obviously annoyed, but obliged.

Dear Stupid Provo Kid: You can't feed 10 people Indian food for well under $50. You're stupid.

From - A Gthing Science Project January '08

There are so many reasons to love Brigham Young University. For starters there's... well... um. Well they have the... hmmmm... I take it back. I can't think of ANY reasons to love BYU at the moment. This may partially be due to the fact that I'm not particularly happy with them today. Want to hear the story? I'm sure you do.

So, I have been growing out my sexy beard again for the past few days because, well, facial hair is freakin' sexy. Tonight, after spending the day with family and friends watching General Conference, I headed to BYU campus to perform with my swing dance team for the last time.

I showed up to the dance with just a few minutes to spare. As usual, there was the table full of three ticket-taker BYU girls dressed in blue shirts sitting at the door. Their job is to take your money and stamp your hand... also, apparently they are required to ruin at least one person's night per weekend.

I approached the little table and pointed out my name on the guest list. It was on 'the list' because I was performing that evening. As I started to enter the dance, one of the girls (the particularly bitter one) stopped me to give me the news that I couldn't enter the dance until I shaved. I informed her that I was not, in fact, a BYU student, so her rules didn't apply to me.

She replied, "It's a BYU event, so you have to shave if you want to participate."

"They've never made me shave before, and I've been coming here for a year now."

"Well, then the other people haven't been doing their job then." She replied snootily.

She then reached under her 'I-Hate-Men Table of Power' and handed me a single blade, plastic BIC razor with a bottle of crappy shaving cream. She might as well have handed me a piece of broken glass and a quart of motor oil. It probably would have done a better job.

"Oh no... I'm not shaving with that," I said. "That's suicide."

"Well then you can't come in."

"You give me 3 of those razors. One of them will only make it through my sideburns."

She pulled another two out of the bag. Since the performance time was drawing near, and I can only assume that my team was wondering where I was, I took the razors and headed to the nearest bathroom. Needless to say, I was pissed at this point.

After a painful 15 minutes or so of torture, I had sufficiently removed the necessary facial hair. As a result, my chin, jaw line and neck were a bloody mess. It looked like I had been attacked by a rabid badger who only eats juicy neck meat.

I made it back to the table full of embittered, unmarried BYU women seeking justice on any man who dared to get within a 30 foot radius of their table. One glance at my bloodied face and they burst into laughter. One girl even choked out an attempt at empathy.

"Awwww..." she sighed, with puppy dog eyes.

"Oh don't EVEN pretend like you pity me. Here's your freakin' shaving cream."

I slammed it on the table and walked away.

I don't think BYU can expect me to be attending any of their events any time soon. I have never wanted to break my personal mantra of never hitting a girl so badly in my entire life. Nothing would have given me more happiness tonight than to see that girl dangling from a flagpole by her granny-panties.

Nothing is worse than a cold-hearted, prudish BYU coed who doesn't appreciate a nicely groomed face of scruff.