December 31, 2013-January 1, 2014

Another year is coming to an end, so it's time to remember what happened at last New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

On December 31, we got ready to leave my brother's house after a weeklong visit there. For some reason, Nathaniel rode in the car with us to the airport while David drove. I did the old pretend-my-hand-is-a-spider with him, and he kept smacking my hand when I got close. When we got to the airport, I said, "Goodbye, Qi-en!" While we were waiting to board the plane, I checked my grades for the fall 2013 semester. I saw that I got an A- in Groundwater and a B+ in Field Studies, which was a little disappointing, but a little pleasantly surprising. The rest were A's. My mom told me we would be sitting in row 16. I said "hixteeng," since that was how Nathaniel said it, and that seemed to be his favorite number at that time. My mom caught on to my "hixteeng" reference, and said, "He's so cute." On the plane, I put my phone on airplane mode, but I listened to the songs that were saved on the phone, listening to songs that were popular in 2013, came out in 2013, or were New Year songs. When the flight attendant came by, my dad and I got ginger ale; my dad said he always got it on planes. When we arrived in Salt Lake, Susanne took us home; I entered the house through the garage door, and our cat had made a mess of the basement, so I had to clean it up later. I came up and saw our leftover candy canes, and I was glad that I could still eat them. We looked on my mom's new computer at the pictures from California, and I used an unflattering one for my profile picture.

I turned on my New Year music while we did that. That evening, I turned on all my 2013 music on shuffle. My dad told me he liked the mix, but that may have been because there was a fair amount of religious music. My mom kept laughing at the Jan Terri songs. Then I was surprised when Kelly Clarkson's cover of "Run Run Rudolph" came on, and my dad said, "Is this the singer you and your mother make fun of?" Later I told that to my mom and he said maybe he couldn't tell when people were off pitch. In the evening, my mom and I went to Temple Square because Cherie Call was singing in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. We went in and sat down, and lots of people were talking to a man behind us. It was apparent he was a pretty well-known person, and I remember one person criticizing another musician who was Mormon for singing Bruno Mars. I predicted some of the songs Cherie would sing, and I think I got all of them right. I was especially glad she sang her New Year song, "Starting Again, Again." She had live accompaniment, but she just used a minus track on "Marry Me." After we left, my mom wondered who had been sitting behind us. I told her I wondered if it was Jon Schmidt (I don't remember how I came to that conclusion), and my mom said she had heard him say that, so she knew I was right. Rather than  go home and be bored (since my dad probably went to bed), we called my sister to see if we should go visit them and ring in the New Year with them. She agreed to have us come, so we went down to their basement. We might have put on silly party hats. After 2014 arrived, we went upstairs and had sparkling cider, and Nan, Matt, and I cheesily clinked our glasses together "to 2014." (We didn't know that it would be 2014 when Matt would leave them.) Allie showed off her karaoke machine, but I think she was too shy to sing. Susanne gave me some cinnamon rolls that I took home. On our way home, I wanted to see if 99.5 was playing the top 2013 songs yet, but that wouldn't start until the next day. I think they played "Sweater Weather." I liked the golden-lit trees near Susanne's house.

The next morning, January 1 (which technically began the night before), I got up and my dad had eaten a cinnamon roll, which was fine by me. I remember getting on my computer and listening to my New Year and 2013 music again. I journalized as follows:

"New Year's Day, just sitting in my room, waiting for us to leave for our traditional New Year dinner. This is going to be a big year. I'm nervous. I will graduate, and therefore I have to find a job. I thought I would be able to stay at BYU Studies until August, but it turns out I can't. I hope the semester won't be too difficult so that I can spend time looking for jobs."

We drove out to 7200 South to go to Golden Corral, my grandparents' favorite. I think my dad was sick, so he didn't come with us. The radio station 99.5 was playing the top songs from 2013, so I turned that on. I was surprised when Owl City's "Good Time" came on, since that was more of a 2012 song. I wasn't social at dinner and didn't want to talk to many other people. My grandparents wanted to take pictures of everyone there, which got a little awkward. I remember Sue saying she wanted Jesse and Lisa to have kids because she didn't want Chancey to have any more. On our way home, we stopped at Toys 'R' Us to look at their Christmas clearance stuff (in California, we had seen some Rudolph toys, but they didn't have them in Utah). Allie had been promised a bicycle for Christmas, but she didn't want one, so she picked out Legos instead. I was disappointed she didn't want a bike. On our way back to Susanne's house, we got into a conversation about P!nk. Susanne said she loved the song "Just Give Me a Reason," and I said I hated it. And then it came on a minute later. They dropped Matt off and did some things in the house, while I waited in the car and listened to the radio. We went to Maverik to get gas when they announced the "number one song"--Kelly Clarkson's "Catch My Breath," which surprised me. Then we went to Target. I remember looking at the clearance candy, thinking I could have it for just a few more hours (before candy became forbidden again), but I wasn't really hungry for it since I had eaten lots of desserts at Golden Corral.