Yes! Believe it or not... Logan does have a Zoo

Taylor and I took a lovely trip to the zoo. It was quite a lot of fun, and upon entering we had to count our ears... we determined that we only have two each... we didn't quite make it up to 12. ;)
I think that by far our favorite exhibit was the exciting species of dolorus miserabolus. More commonly known as pet rocks...

The dear little family... look how adorable they are!

I decided to go strutting with some bird that looked a lot like a parrot... minus the green. I highly recommend the activity to anyone who wants to give it a try.

The peacock was feeling very 'show-off-ish' as he sat on the fence and posed for pictures.

Basically it was a lot of fun. Taylor didn't really believe that the Zoo existed. When we pulled up she said "Wow! There really is a zoo... I didn't belive you."

And now this leaves me to pose the question... what in heavens name would possibly motivate me to lie about there being a zoo in Logan? I still haven't figured it out. Tay will have to let me know sometime. We had lots of fun, especially trying to find it. You see: I couldn't remember where it was, just that it was on the south west side of mainstreet... but I did remember that the road curved right before... so we drove around looking for a semi-familiar curvy road, and viola! It worked! We were quite proud of ourselves.

Books, Not Diamonds, are a Girls Best Friend

I spent my entire night reading. Yup that's right, and it was a book I've read before too.

I love to read. It's the characters that draw me in. I mean the plots and the intrigues, the settings, and the dramatic endings are all very good and well, but it's the characters I fall in love with. I get lost in a world different than my own, one where the ending always comes out happy in the end, and even when it doesn't there is a certain poetic justice to how it all turns out. The characters struggle and grow, they experience real emotions, and as I read I am right there with them, inside their skin and their brain, learning and experiencing with them.

Man... this is such a nerdy thing to blog about, but I really don't care. People find all sorts of ways to escape from reality, I just happened to choose books.

So for everyone out there who hates reading, find a simple book with a good plot and loveable characters and give it a whirl... for those of you who know exactly what I mean... slip into a story and take a short break from the stress of life. Revisit an old friend, or go make a new one.

Feelings are Fickle things

Not fickle as in they change a lot, but in that they don't make any sense at all.

Something can make perfect, absolutely wonderful sense in my mind, and my feelings will disagree with whatever I've thought out.

I'm sick of it.

Do you know what else I am sick of? Overanalyzation. (I'm pretty sure that's not a real word, but I don't even care. You know what I mean.) I long for the carefree days when everything made sense. The biggest mystery in life was why playtime was always so much shorter than work time.... actually I guess that's still a mystery. Go figure. But now I have the ability to psychoanalyze *it, and it's just crap.

*Not that I want to psychoanalyze play and work time, but all the other mysteries of life...especially people. Those are the ones that drive me crazy.

Rigoletto

What is true beauty?

It's does not lie in our face, our clothes, or even our words. True beauty is shown through what we give of our spirit, the kind things that we do for those around us. I believe each person has a beautiful spirit, and they become a beautiful person when they show it through service towards their fellow man.

So it's interesting that everyone get's caught up in looking beautiful, when the only way to be truly beautiful is to forget to spend that extra hour in front of the mirror and choose instead to spend it helping someone else.

"Love is only something we read about in books my dear" -Mrs. Fieldmouse

In the movie 'Kate and Leopold," Kate tells Leopold that she sometimes wonders if Love is like the grownup version of Santa Claus. A fairtytale for adults that keeps us endlessesly searching, but that we never really find. Of course in the end she is proven wrong when she realizes she has found her 'one true love' --but that question hit a chord with me when I heard it.

I was reading a short fantasy book tonight just for fun. A retelling of cinderella as it were. The author approached it in a way different than most, and when I finished it Kate's musings came to my mind. And I started to wonder if the 'true love' junk we hear about all the time is all it's really cracked up to be. Probably not right?

Well, I had just about decided that the love we read about in cinderella is completely false, and feeling a bit sad that fantasies don't come true, when I looked up at a picture of the Salt Lake Temple that my Mom has hanging on the wall. And I realized that I was looking at love. Heavenly Father made us, and he knows what makes us most happy. His love is the perfect kind. Family, friendly, generally, and of course, romantically.

So I guess Kate was wrong. Love isn't the grown up version of Santa Claus. It's more real than the nose on my face. Thank heavens. Isn't this world a lovely place?

Sunday is my favorite day of the week

Heavenly Father loves me. And he helps me fix problems that I didn't even know how to define, much less solve. I'm glad that he is watching over me. I'm glad that he hears and answers my prayers even if it's not always how I think I'd like them to be answered. I have been truly blessed this week by him, and gratitude prompted me to get up and bear my testimony in sacrament meeting today, which is always a completely nerve wracking experience for me. I shake and my heart pounds and half the time I don't even know if the words coming out of my mouth make any sense at all...

Anyways.

I stayed up late last night and slept in this morning... thus when my phone rang and woke me up I answered it and prayed that I wouldn't sound like a frog. The bishop asked if I would be able to come see him, and I wholeheartedly agreed to come meet with him two hours later. I then hung up the phone and fell right back asleep.

My meeting with him went well, and church was great. I was sustained today as a member of the compassionate service committe. Basically I get to watch out for the other sisters in the ward and try to help those who may be having a rough time. I am super excited, and nervous at the same time. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve though.

Tonight was busy: a fireside, getting set apart, practicing a musical number, ward chior, ward prayer, and talking to Gentry about compassionate service, then my home teacher's came over and I got in a few game of mancala in with Jay after that.... whew. But I like staying busy, it's so much better than being bored :)