John Journal

Another Saturday, another blog entry while Carrie does her graduate school home work.

First things first- Regular readers may be interested to know that pictures have been added to the original blog and will hopefully be part of the weekly installments here on the blog. We bought a digital camera last week as a graduation present from the Cranes, and for the first time in awhile I didn't feel like I was being tricked into buying something there that I didn't need or want. However, we did figure out one money-saving trick. Do not buy your equipment accessories at Best Buy. The digital cameras cost the same as cameras at Wal-Mart. But Best Buy wants you to buy your memory card, carrying case, and batteries at their store as well. All of those items cost significantly more at Best Buy than at Wal-Mart. That's the John family hot tip o' the week.

The highlight of the week was the 4th of July holiday. We started off the day right with the traditional Provo parade, rumored to be the biggest in Utah and one of the biggest in the U.S. I love any parade that has both a giant inflatable Garfield and 150 LDS missionaries. I don't think there are too many places in the world where you walk down the street and a stranger offers you a delicious pancake breakfast, but such is life in Provo, Utah. While we are excited to be moving away from Utah in August, I am sure there will be some feelings similar to ones that rebellious teenage college students feel their first semester away from home...as the immortal Janet Jackson sang, "You don't know what you got 'til it's gone." It is nice to live in a place on a student budget and not ever feel in danger on the street.

After the parade we spent the afternoon getting sun at Seven Peaks, another Provo perk. We have spent the last two summers going to the Peaks almost every Saturday. We are too impatient to wait for the rides, so we spend most of our time in the lazy river or the wave pool or laying out. In fact we have gone to Seven Peaks three times this week, which is probably a record. Having season passes makes it easier for us to justify going for only a few hours at a time. It has been so hot here the last few weeks that the water park has been great, though we burn our feet on the walkways every time.

We finished off the holiday with a fun BBQ with the rest of the John family and Anne. Daniel made delicious hamburgers. It was funny because after he was given genuine compliments on them he asked: "Did Carly make you say that?" After coming back inside from the grill, Carly unknowingly said,"Daniel loves it when you compliment his burgers," hinting at what we should do. After dinner we watched the Sandlot for the second 4th of July in a row. I guess it is a tradition now. After the movie we scampered off to campus to watch the firework show from the Stadium of Fire at the football stadium. We would have gotten closer but we were running late. After the show we lit some fireworks of our own in a nearby parking lot, though our fun was curbed by local restrictions due to recent dry weather and wildfires. The stupidest moment of the day had to be when I tried to throw a bumblebee firework and it hit an overhanging tree and landed in a bush. Luckily nothing caught. We all had a good time and in general made fools of ourselves, a fact that these pictures will support.

Last night we went on a date- a short visit to Seven Peaks and Oceans 13. During the week Carrie introduced me to the Scarlet Pimpernel which was great. Reading Les Miserables at the same time, I thought it was interesting to get another author's position on what the French Revolution was like. And that is right, I am reading Les Miserables. Inspired by Jill Crane, I started reading her copy of the book a couple weeks ago and I re-obtained the book a couple days ago by trading her Harry Potter V. We all want to read it before the movie comes out, which we plan on seeing.

Carrie has been very busy with work and graduate school, but she has promised to be a contributing author to this blog in the near future. There will also be another blog in the future about my job since there have been some requests. This week I will take some pictures and write to you about my work friends. If people have comments or requests for future blogs feel free to make comments. Personally, I thought Emily's response from last week was very funny, but mostly because it poked fun at Carrie.