Well folks, it's been a crazy Spring/Summer. So here it is in a nutshell:
After the end of Winter semester I had 5 days off and started with classes again. I took one of my civilization courses for my generals and retook a Computer Science class I failed my freshman year. I hated that class the first time I took it, so I was really scared to take it, but I had to take it in order to get my GPA high enough to get accepted into the Information Systems program. It was an intense class. I had a lab due every week which took 10-12 hours a lot of the time. We learned how a computer works from the circuits in the computer and through the levels of programming language. I'll include an example of a program I wrote in binary to show you how exciting this class was! Anyways, I did really well in the class (I got an A- to replace my D-) and I got my overall GPA above a 3.0!
After the end of Spring term, Andrew (my brother) and I drove down to Las Vegas to meet up with my parents for a week. We stayed at the Tuscany Inn, a nice hotel just about a block off the strip. As you can see, Mom had a good time!
While we were there, Andrew went through the temple and received his endowment (a ceremony our church performs in the temple).
We all ate really well while we were there. My favorite dinner was was the Carnival World Buffet. They had everything! (including all you can eat crab legs-yum!)
Also, we decided to make a dam side trip that Sunday. Andrew and I, and I guess Dad a little, enjoyed making "dam" jokes, but Mom got tired of them.
On the way back, Andrew and I stopped at the St. George temple and did an endowment session there.
The rest of the summer, I have been working full time and playing in the rest of my time. My favorite thing so far was working as a pyrotechnic for the Stadium of Fire 4th of July show. We spent a week setting up fireworks and got to watch the show for free. It was really quite awesome watching the fireworks from the field we launched them from; you got twice the explosion and I loved watching the fireworks explode down towards us!
I really enjoyed working with Ian, Pat and Hector along with my old friend Andrew, Gary and Geoff.
Probably the most significant thing that happened to me this summer was being accepted to the Information Systems program! That's right folks, after 4 years I have an official major! I will graduate in April 2010, but I am hoping to do the Masters of Information Systems Management program, in which case I would finish April 2011. Information Systems is basically using computers to provide accurate information to business to help them make effective decisions and filter out irrelevant information.
I will add another picture post to sum up the rest of my summer activities, but that is the last 3 months of my life in a nutshell!
Around 2am, we stopped for the night at the Gray Goose Inn in Ogallala, Nebraska. I have only ever hear of it because it is a stop on the game "Oregon Trail".
So, day 2, Andrew and I slept in for a while and hit the road. We decided we didn't want to stop again, so we drove straight through, only stopping for food and the restroom when we had to fill up on gas. I drove during the day and Andrew drove through the night. All together, we drove for 23 1/2 hours straight over a distance of 1450 miles! Gas was cheaper everywhere we stopped outside of Utah. 89 octane gas in Iowa was $3.499/gallon. It's sad that I was excited for $3.50 gas. That reminds me, I was very pleased to see that a lot of new windmills had been built across the country. Europe, especially northern Europe, is still way ahead of us in harvesting wind energy. I don't understand why places like the west and mid-west don't capitalize on all the open land and high winds.
