Ponderings in Palisades

Dear Family and Friends,

As I ponder this week, I am filled with a deep gratitude for a multitude of things.

THING 1:

This might be the most important thing. BYU beat Utah by the skin of their teeth (though we're praying the football players have decent oral hygiene). I'm sure you all know the gory details. BYU went up 20 to 6 and life was great. We thought the game was in the bag, when in typical BYU fashion we collapsed and let them come back 20 to 17 with mere minutes left. At that point I thought Annette would collect on our brand new life insurance policy (which we'll talk about later) when I died of an aneurysm. They tied it, the game went into overtime, Utah kicked a field goal and went up 23 to 20. BYU got a turn to overthrow the wicked Utes and had an amazing play, but it was called back for a penalty. Just when we thought they'd choke, Hall found Andrew George up the middle for a huge touchdown. The moral of the story...storming the field after a victory ROCKS! Annette and I lost all emotional rationale and went screaming down the stands, hurled our bodies over the fences, and went sprinting across the field to embrace our heroes. My sister Angela came, too, but almost got trampled to death when the football players muscled their way through the crowd and came right past us. Annette and I got to beat them soundly on their pads and boy did they smell like they had rolled around in the swine mire. The pictures below are as follows:

Picture 1) Everyone at the football game except Annette who was taking the picture (I look like a dufus)

Picture 2) Max Hall getting sacked

Picture 3) The scoreboard while we were rushing the field. Annette had a devil of a time taking this shot since her body was thrown around because she was in a mosh pit.

THING 2:

This thing is almost as large a blessing as BYU beating Utah (though nothing really compares). I got laid off. It was a dying company and my boss laid me off because he knew his head was on the chopping block and he had to get rid of me before he got it himself. My coworkers were horrified, but I had a sweet assurance from the Spirit as he and the secretary were telling me about it that this was a good thing that was supposed to happen.

I learned a lot working there, but I got to a point where I stopped learning because they were demanding busy work from me. I've always been interested in entrepreneurship and now I definitely know how NOT to run a business. I got to a point where I was stuck in a rut; it was awkward for me to quit or get fired for telling off my boss to his superiors for his indiscretions. I am incredibly proud of how well I performed on the job and for my advancing in continous improvement intiatives with NO INCENTIVE WHATSOEVER from management. I don't doubt that new employment is right around the corner.

How big is that corner? I don't know. Some of my friends have been laid off recently and got new jobs. The fastest turnaround I've seen was five months. The longest turnaround...well, over a year and they still don't have a job. I really think I'll find something good. I've seen some great offers for which I'm not only qualified but perhaps OVERqualified.

Unemployment isn't all bad. An aquaintence calls it Funemployment. It's nice to spend so much time with my wife and make more than two college students make combined. Also, we're SO excited to go see David return from his mission and not have a worry in the world about getting time off. Annette's school schedule is now our constraint. But speaking of school...

THING 3:

Another blessing of getting laid off is that it forces me to get my MBA which I've been dying to get since before graduating from diapers. Some of the big questions now:

Which school do I go to?

Does school reputation REALLY matter?

How much do we want to spend?

How fast do I want to accomplish this goal?

We DON'T want to go into debt (since we currently have none), so how do we accomplish this?

There are all kinds of questions, but we're working through them. I've started studying with a friend for the GMAT and we'll probably take it early December.

THING 4:

We're looking to get a new car. Since we refuse to go into debt, we're looking at trading the BMW straight across. It's now worth $4,000 less than when I bought it a year and a half ago. That's depressing. We're hoping that we can get a car that has more room inside, towing capacity perhaps, and most importantly can drive in the snow. We also would like an automatic since Annette hates driving a manual and downright refuses because it scares the fool out of her.

THING 5:

Speaking of Annette, I LOVE HER SO SO SO SO SO MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

THING 6:

We finally got a life insurance policy on me. I'm now worth much more dead than alive. There's a self-esteem booster for ya. Annette said she still wants me alive though. I can't imagine why. We'll probably take out a small policy on her, too, once we have kids which brings me to...

THING 7:

ANNETTE'S not PREGNANT!!!! Ha. Fooled ya.

THING 8:

Thanksgiving Day was neat. We went bounding through the woods. My family usually takes a hike and this one was a typical one. It was 6 miles through the freezing cold snow. Annette thought hiking in California was bad. It's better in Utah because your body goes so numb as it enters hypothermia that you don't even realize that you're about to die. Annette made a snow angel as pictured below. I did some interesting things in the snow, but we won't talk about them. She got some other great pictures which we hope you'll enjoy.

Thus it is. The End.

ASl Movie, All About Me

For my ASL class I had to make a movie all about me, so here is what it came out to be. There are no words, just sign, so I provided a transcript below. Capitalized words are spelled out and to just warn you, I wrote my thing out in ASL grammar, so don't think that since I have been in college that my grammar has gone to pot. Enjoy.

Hi, I ANNETTE MARTIN

My family lives in California. I youngest, born DEC 28. Oldest of four my sister COLLEEN. She married 3 children girls. Cute. 2nd oldest, brother, EVAN, intern Atlanta, Georgia. 2nd youngest DAVID, missionary in GUADALAJARA Mexico. Dad mom divorced. My mom, SANDRA 2nd marriage DEC. New husband, LARRY my new dad from Wyoming. I happy for my mom. JACQUES, my dad French, talks French good. I know little bit French enough talk with my Grandma Grandpa from France.

When I short I had 4 dogs, 5 sheep, 7 chickens, 1 goat, 30 rabbits. I love animals. I wish had dog, but no area for dog. I love to draw, paint, but not good, I practice. I like water paint best. I like photograph, I have many many photos. I like sew clothes myself, but time (not) enough, busy. I excited snow My major, Communication DISORDERS.

I married, my husband, he CHARLES. He wonderful husband. I met him 1 year past. When I visit my best friend, ROSE, she introduced him me. We live Orem, basement APT. He finish school. He engineer. He talks German Russian. He now learning Chinese. He smart. We love watch BYU football.

Finished

Little more:

My husband I play with children church in married student ward

I love to clean the house

My husband loves cook bread bacon meat

but I like to eat salad

Now Finished

A little catching up

Last Week (it was written last week, but I just forgot to post it)

We have been in desperate need of more storage space so we bought a $12 bed frame, 6 cinderblocks, and planks of wood from Charles’ dad. We now have our bed raised quite high with lots of storage space we are filling up quickly. It is nice to have more room and so thing aren’t so cluttered in other areas of our apartment.

On Thursday Charles and I held a Russian dinner at our apartment and had my three cousins over. It was lots of fun.

The next day after the dinner we had run out of forks, so here is Charles using the last remaining fork which is usually used for serving food, not eating.

On Friday Charles and I went to the movie theater to see our first movie at a theater together. We saw Harry Potter at the dollar theater. I really enjoyed it and am so excited for the last and final Harry Potter movie.

The BYU vs. Wyoming game was a nice and easy shut out of 52 to nothing. We were quite excited, but felt bad for Wyoming.

My mom and Larry came over Saturday evening and they got to try the Russian food that Charles had made. It was fun too see them again and talk to them.

Saturday evening we spent with our good friend Rose.

This Sunday we had the Primary Program and although we usually have 10 kids in Nursery, we only had 4 little kids today that came up with their parents to sing two songs. But it was nice to have so few kids in Nursery because that meant that Charles and I were able to attend actual classes. It was nice to hear all of the announcements in Relief Society and to know what was going on for the next month.

This morning I wanted English Muffins for breakfast so I found a recipe online for them and made a large amount. They were so yummy that we now only have two left.

This Week:

Charles and I were on campus one evening and we saw a guy wearing cargo shorts on a cold day which is weird, but not too weird, but then we noticed that he was wearing leggings under his shorts. Its weird enough that girls wear leggings, but when a guy does, that is just too much.

This week Charles decided to grow out his facial hair once to see how it would be. He didn’t grow it out very long, but it did get long pretty fast. So here is a picture of half of his hair shaven off.

I had an ASL Club meeting this week about becoming an interpreter. Unfortunately, the interpreters that were signing the whole time did not talk at all. I consequently missed most of what they were saying, but it was good practice in watching people sign. I did pick up on the signs that I knew which is always fun to know that I know a little bit of what they were signing. Although I didn’t understand most of what they signed, I did learn a lot through their body language and am excited to become really good at signing and would love to become an interpreter. I have started doing a lot more studying and looking up all sorts of signs online to be able to sign more things.

This weekend was Dancesport at BYU. Although I am in DANCE 181, County Western, I did not participate, but I sure had a lot of fun watching everyone perform. Everyone did so well in performing. Charles was so kind as to stay to the bitter end of it to see the little kids perform and the world famous people perform. We didn’t have any chairs to sit in and consequently stood for about four hours watching people dance.

For the BYU vs. New Mexico game this week, we went to Santaquin to watch it. But by half time it was snowing (the first real snow of the season) pretty bad and decided we better get home before we got stuck on the roads.

Charles was making the filling for three pumpkin pies at the same time, but he accidently 6 times the sugar instead of tripled it from the recipe. So he had to dig out half the sugar he put in, it was quite amusing. But he does believe that he got most of it out although it seems a hair sugary then it is supposed to be.

Halloween

This week has been a fun week!

Charles has been studying for the GMAT to apply to get his MBA starting next fall. We are really excited for that!

On Thursday we had a dinner group with two couples in our ward. It was lots of fun and it is exciting to get to know more people in out ward.

For the fall season Charles and I decided that we would make pumpkin pies from scratch, we unfortunately didn't realize that you don't need a really big pumpkin. So we now have a lot of pumpkin in our fridge waiting to be made into tons of pies. We will probably be having pumpkin pie through Christmas, but thankfully we both love it.

For Halloween Charles and I drove up to Boise, Idaho to visit my sister Colleen and her fun family. It was such a fun vacation for us. Halloween is so much more fun with little kids. We went trick-or-treating with them and had a blast. The little girls really warmed up to Charles much faster than they did to me. Our drive both ways was uneventful besides some awful traffic in random areas and kind of getting lots due to the fact that I was the navigator and am still not used to using exit numbers versus names for exits.

That was our fun week, until next time.