I am allergic to the letter Y.

It's a Saturday, school doesn't start for four days, yet I'm writing this from a computer lab in the Wilk at BYU. I promised myself that this semester I would look into people's hearts before I became annoyed with them. I promised myself I would be nice and shirk off people's ignorant comments. I promised myself I would get to know people before I decided whether I liked them or not. I've been on campus a total of ten minutes, and so far I haven't succeeded. I am just as annoyed with this place as I was when I left it in April. It's going to take some brain re-training.

On a side note, the girl sitting next to me is on an Air Supply fan web site--this one, in fact. Yes, Air Supply. The band that sings "All By Myself."

The other day I was driving up to Dave's, and I was caught behind a school bus. I was being patient. I stopped the perfunctory distance allotment behind the bus and its flashing lights. I waited as all the children laughed and cheered and scurried home to watch their afternoon cartoons. I also scrutinized these children, our leaders of tomorrow. These children were perfect clones of their adult counterparts. There were young boys, outfitted in plaid shorts, white K-Swiss and abercrombie kids t-shirts--bros-in-training, release date TBD. There were a few edgier kids, sure-fire My Chemical Romance devotees starting this time next year. There were the band geeks, lugging their person-sized trombones and tubas. Then there were the geeks. Oh, lowly geeks. As a child, you almost don't have a choice whether you're a geek or not, since so much depends on how your parents dress you and what they buy for you. I was a geek, but it was my choice, because my older sister was very popular. I chose my station. I remember reading a few years ago about how in times of affluence, people dress their children like themselves. This started in the Renaissance; any painting you see of the aristocracy of that era surely depicts the adults and their miniature counterparts in identical clothing styles. We've seen this the past few years also, as five-year-olds wear mini skirts and numerous adult stores have launched children's lines.

Yesterday, my dad, my brother-in-law and I went ATVing up in the Uintas, some of the most gorgeous terrain I've ever seen. When I was a sophomore in high school, I took one of those career tests, and it told me to be a park ranger. A) Because I am a good oral communicator. B) Because I love nature. The yearly salary initially discouraged me from this path. For some reason, I was under the illusion journalists actually made money. Anyway, my dad tried to go up this steep hill on his ATV. I conquered it with minimal difficulty, but my dad panicked and ending up revving--in reverse--into a tree. The ATV was fine, but we had to tow it out. Later he got stuck in a mud puddle. Whenever I saw my dad in the distance on his little green ATV, I pretended he was Yoshi and I was Luigi, and we were in a MarioKart race, and I sang songs from "The Sound of Music" at the top of my lungs the whole day, because the Uintas start looking like the Alps. (When my Great-Grandpa Walter Ruefenacht came to Utah from Switzerland in 1910, he wrote home and told everyone to come to Utah because it "looks like the Alps").

Rory and I invented the term "Cougster," which refers to BYU hipsters. They ride cruisers and wear cut-off shorts and Vans and American Apparel t-shirts. They bathe more frequently than hipsters, but only because they go to church on Sunday. Also, they host dance parties.

I am really excited to move away in four months.