If you ever want to cry...

Watch the "I'm a Mormon" videos from Mormon.org. Wanna feel uplifted? Watch the "I'm a Mormon" videos from Mormon.org.

If you haven't been to Mormon.org, do so. It is great.

I love watching these videos because it is so uplifting to see people living with the gospel as the priority in their lives. It's amazing.

Here's a good one to get you started:

This is the lead singer from the Killers, Brandon Flowers. Amazing testimony about having children and not "outgrowing" the church.

Love.

Rachel vs. The World

I am currently involved in an epic battle. Ok, not epic. Just a battle.

UTA is the bane of my existence. I absolutely hate taking the bus. But my lack of a car situation requires that I do so. At UVU you can buy a discounted bus pass for being a student. I purchased a pass my freshman year and renewed it my sophomore year. So imagine my fury when I went to take the bus to work last week and my pass didn't work. So today, I went to campus connection at my school to figure out what the problem was.

Flashback to January...

After attending a friends birthday party, I lost my pass and had to get a new one. I went to campus connection. They made me pay for a new pass ($20) because they have no record of which students have previously bought passes (which is absolutely ridiculous that they have no record of the transactions that they do! They are taking people's money they should know exactly who paid for what!!). I paid and went on my way with the promise of a new pass.

Let's look at the definition of the word "new": not existing before, recent, discovered recently or for the first time.

Therefore the pass I paid for in January was a brand new pass that expires in JANUARY because I had to get a brand new card. 


Now, move your minds forward to today:

I walked over to campus connection and the girl there informed me (for the first time ever I might add) that all bus passes expire on September 15th regardless of when they were purchased. Also, it is UTA's policy "not ours" that passes are paid for by the card, not by the person.

W T POO

She also said that her manager could help me if I would like to talk to her. I said I would. So we went to the manager's office and I had a nice little chat...or rather, she did.

She gave me this 10 minute speech on how she trains her people to tell each customer the above information  and has advertised the bus pass expiration date all over the school. Obviously this is not the case because in the 3 times I have paid for a bus pass I never once was informed of their policies or the expiration date of my bus pass nor have I ever seen a flier or advertisement about any sort of expiration date. However it was advertised that your bus pass was good for a whole year without explaining the conditions.

I demanded that I get my $20 back. I paid for a new pass that was advertised to be good for a year and I assumed my pass would work until next January.

She couldn't help me. Instead she suggested that I take it up with the Dean of Students so he can approve it and I can get my money back. But he has to approve it. Which means I have to fill out a form, meet with him, explain my situation, etc. I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THIS CRAP!

I was fuming! I cannot believe the lack of customer service and complete disregard for my situation. They do not understand their student demographic at all! We are starving students. I don't currently have a car in my possession so the bus is my main form of transportation. With the rising cost of tuition, books, and living expenses I don't have the means to pay for a $40 (yeah they raised the price of that too!) pass that I HAVE ALREADY PAID FOR! 

Not to sound like the newspaper kid from Better Off Dead, but I want my $20. 

I will win. I promise. I must win. 

e.e. cummings

The joys of being an English major:

dive for dreams

or a slogan may topple you

(trees are their roots

and wind is wind) 

trust your heart

if the seas catch fire

(and live by love

though the stars walk backward) 

honour the past

but welcome the future

(and dance your death

away at the wedding) 

never mind a world

with its villains or heroes

(for good likes girls

and tomorrow and the earth) 

in spite of everything

which breathes and moves, since Doom

(with white longest hands

neating each crease)

will smooth entirely our minds 

-before leaving my room

i turn, and (stooping

through the morning) kiss

this pillow, dear

where our heads lived and were.

And...

somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond

any experience, your eys have their silence:

in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,

or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me

though i have closed myself as fingers,

you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens

(touching skilfully, mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and

my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,

as when the heart of this flower imagines

the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals

the power of your intense fragility: whose texture

compels me with the colour of its countries,

rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes 

and opens;only something in me understands

the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)

nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands

Beef

A girl in one of my classes today told me that I look 18. Of course she was bragging that she was so organized because she is 26 and has been going to school since 2004. 

She made me angry. I am not 18. I haven't been 18 for three years. You know what I have to say to that?

I'm 21, I have been going to school since 2009 and I have a year left. Suck it Earth!

You would tell me if I looked 18 right?

On a lighter note,

Thank you all for the birthday wishes. I had a good day.

Also, I now have 40 pairs of shoes. Can you say addiction? 

I love this picture. I think it's the mustache. 

I know I review stuff a lot....

But it's because I am constantly reading and seeing new movies!

Yesterday I saw the new Anne Hathaway movie One Day. I really liked it. It was very creative and extremely beautiful. It made me want to move to London and never come back.

The whole movie is focused around the same day (July 15th) every year from  1988 to 2011 and how this couple spent the day either together or apart. It's sad, it's happy, and I won't tell you how it ends but you might hate it.

If you have a chance to see it do. I must warn you however, there is a little nudity. Not like sex-scene nudity but like they are on the beach and there is a group of nudists there....not sexy at all.

Beautiful.

Gone With The Wind

Gone With the Wind is my favorite book.

I used to say that I didn't have a favorite book.

And then I read GWTW. 

My life changed. 

I. LOVE. IT. 

I finished it today for the second time and about cried. It's so beautiful. The writing, the images. the characterization, the story...everything. 

If you have never read this book it is a good summer read. It's a good anytime read.

Please read it. I promise you will like it. A lot. And if you don't, don't tell me because then I would have to hate you and I don't want to do that. 

*totally stealing my mom's copy of the movie to watch and cry over this week LOVE IT*