September 16

I'm going to remember what I can about September 16. September 16 is Mexican Independence Day, but that's not important to me.

2014. In the morning, I made this Facebook status: "Don't you hate it when you sleep late because you were dreaming about a talking sinkhole?" During my lunch break I went over to Kneaders for lunch, my first time going to the one at City Creek. I was looking at the desserts, trying to decide what seasonal one I wanted to try. I'd never had a Kneaders sugar cookie, so I got one. They had leaves and acorns; I think I got a leaf because it was bigger. It was way too sweet and it wasn't the greatest cookie. I went to institute that night and they had donuts with fall sprinkles, so I could eat them. I was talking with Jackie Gubler, and she told me she had been on a diet from desserts. I told her that my way of limiting them was to only eat seasonal desserts, so I could eat the donuts they had that night. I think I took some home, and a girl in charge of institute began closing a box of cake donuts to take away, even though she had just told us to take as much as we wanted. I journalized as follows:
"Today I walked over to Kneaders for lunch and got a sickeningly sweet sugar cookie. I had a rough time focusing today. Tonight I went to institute, where there were donuts with fall sprinkles."

2013. I went to Kneaders in Provo, the second time I had ever been to Kneaders. I remember loving the Mideau CD I had in my car. I looked at all the pumpkin desserts they had and settled on an expensive, but massive, piece of pumpkin chocolate chip cake. I was a little annoyed with how expensive the meal was. As I was eating my dinner, the workers were talking about 5ks, including the underwear run in Salt Lake, saying a lot of guys probably went to see girls there. Some other customers came in, and I think they asked for the same cake I had; as they left and saw my cake, one of them sad to me, "That's the best cake!" I awkwardly responded something like "I'm excited to try it." After I finished my meal, I began eating the cake, which had cream cheese frosting. It was delicious (and I hate that word), and I was excited to eat the whole piece. However, after I got halfway through it, it became sickening. I think I didn't finish the last third of it and took it in my car, just keeping it on the paper plate. I drove back to my apartment and put it in the fridge. Then I went up to campus to finish working on a Mono Lake water budget project for my groundwater class. It was a harrowing experience, staying up late to finish a huge assignment. My motivation for finishing (besides the due date the next day) was that when I went home I could finish my cake. I might have ordered Jan Terri's latest album, No Rules, since it came out on September 17, but maybe I waited until the next day.

2012. At some point in the day, I bought the BYU Singers' version of "Awake, Ye Saints of God, Awake" to add to my hymns playlist. I went to my home ward, and after church, my mom said to me, in a little bit of an annoyed tone, "Did you hear my news?" She had just been called as primary president. I told her that I thought she was going to tell me she was pregnant; she said she would shoot herself if that were the case. I drove back to Provo, admiring the red mountains on the way back. My roommate Bryton asked me to help with his home teaching. We visited Hannah Russell, and they talked about the crazy BYU-Utah football game from the day before. I think she was talking about her views on science not conflicting with religion. Bryton said he would want to see us engage in a deep conversation because we both were very intelligent; we talked a little bit about global warming but generally agreed on the issue. After we were done, I began putting up Halloween decorations in my apartment, and my friend Carissa came over to visit. I had cut out orange and black drippy letters from construction paper to spell out "Get Down Goblin," so that I could incorporate the framed Jan Terri picture in the decorations. Carissa suggested putting the pumpkin/ghost lights outside of our door. She also found a weird knife thing in our "drawer of requirement" and tied a string to it and hung it on the front door. I wasn't too fond of the idea. (And then someone ended up stealing the tool.) I also shared my candy corn Oreos with her, my roommate Scott, and his girlfriend Mary. I wrote a blog post, and I journalized as follows:
"Today was the primary program, and after church, Mom got called to be the primary president. I drank grape juice and tonight I came back to Provo. The mountains are beautifully covered with red trees.
"I went home teaching with Bryton to see Cassie Fox and Hannah Russell. Then Carissa came over while I was decorating for Halloween. Then I wrote a blog post."

2011. I was at work at the Distribution Center, and in the morning some of my coworkers and I were called up to the leads' office because they had donuts for us for working late earlier that week. I think my coworker Michelle knew that I hadn't previously been eating desserts, so she was surprised to see me eating one. I explained that I could have it because of the fall sprinkles. (That might have been the first time I explained it to her, but maybe she had known about it before.) Later that day, a group of us were working together on a special product, and there were leftover donuts; Michelle told the others not to have the ones with sprinkles because they were the only ones I could have. At some point, one coworker quoted the following: "If I don't do it, then nobody else will, and he'll never exist." I was pleasantly surprised that someone else knew that quote from the relatively obscure It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown; I said, "I know what that's from," and another coworker said he didn't know what it was from. Then I drove home; I think it was a rainy fall-like day, and I think I was listening to the Corpse Bride soundtrack.

2009. I was on an exchange with Elder Masten, and we went around seeing a bunch of potential investigators. He was annoyed that we weren't teaching anyone. We stopped in the church to use the restroom, and he tried to scare me when I came out. We were walking on Grelle Avenue when I told him that earlier someone had driven down the road and thrown an apple at us; he said he would have thrown a rock at them. We also talked about people we both knew from East Wenatchee, since I had served there before he had. I wrote this in my journal:
"I wasn't too fond of my day with Elder Masten. The day itself wasn't the greatest, but it was worse with Elder Masten having a somewhat negative and judgmental attitude. It wasn't too bad, though. We just saw a bunch of random PIs."

2008. I think the man we talked to lived on Fancher Heights in East Wenatchee, and his sister was in another room laughing at the things we were saying. Elder Duncan sometimes had a chip on his shoulder, so he got in defense mode, which aggravated the man. I think the Timothy Tucker we met gave us cherries, either on that occasion or another one, because he worked for one of the local agricultural companies. I journalized as follows:
"Today almost everyone was nice to us. We ended up talking to this guy who had questions but he didn't seem too receptive or sincere, and he got mad when Elder Duncan was being defensive. We met Timothy Tucker, an inactive friendly person."

2000. I don't really know, but it's possible this was the day my brother went through the temple prior to his mission. I was putting up plastic ghosts with newspapers in them while my cousins were at our house. We went to Ho Ho Gourmet for dinner, and one waitress kept refilling our water glasses, even if we had only taken a sip or two from them.