Raising Cain with Shane: Happy Father's Day

Happy Memorial Day (a month later) and Happy Father's Day (right on time)! 

I had originally intended to write some pithy and heart-wrenching exposition on how I cry whenever I hear "America the Beautiful" and how patriotism never dies, but then poison ivy infested my body and I decided that maybe America wasn't that great after all.

And I'm not even going to say I'm joking.

But there ain't no poison ivy that's going to come in between me and my love for my Dad, besides the fact that he says that I fell off the Ugly Tree and hit every branch.

Shane is the most fun-loving, swine-obsessing, courageous-hearted man I know. He loves God, his family, his country, and making my life a veritable hell with all of his teasing (but don't worry, it's mutual). My Mom has banned our bantering from all family group chats and the dinner table, but that won't stop us from annoying everyone in our proximity with endless inside jokes. I laugh more with him than anybody else in the whole world and I miss him so much when we don't see each other frequently.

I made a decision early on in life to spend as much as time as possible with my parents and family, which is something that I have never regretted. Doing so has come so naturally, as my Dad has always put us first above everything. He is such an impassioned person, who seems to lap up all the juices that life has to offer and then sucks out the marrow too. He is always learning, always dreaming, and always coming up with clever quips that he directs at me when my mom is out of earshot.

Shane is my ultimate hero, there's just no other way to say it. He wrote me a handwritten letter every week of my mission and has skied so much at Snowbird with me that my Mom begged him to cut back so that I would meet a man (cue the eye rolls). He has the kindest and most generous heart, paired with a fierce love of that which is right.  I love my country, largely due to the fact that he has given so much to serve and protect it. When I look at the flag and witness the greatness of the United States of America, I think of him, for he seems to embody all that I love about it. I am grateful to him and all others who give so much to make this place a wonderful (albeit imperfect) place to live, noxious plants and all. My Dad has inspired all of us to live good lives and to enjoy and value the most important things above all else. Most of all, he loves my Mom more than air, which I think is the most beautiful gift a father could give to his children. I love him so much.

What a man.

HIS CRAZY EYES KILL ME IN THIS. Also, I am so grateful for all of the other men in my life, especially that boy to the left with the frozen smile. He is going to be the most incredible father someday to all of the future Ostler-Birrell squishes coming our way. (Not pregnant)

The best ski buddy around. Taught him everything I know.

Moab Madness And Other Adventures

Sunday nights always seem to be a little melancholy. I tend to stare at my pictures from the carefree days before, stocking up on serotonin to get me through the midterms that never seem to end. Aren't they supposed to end eventually? When does the recess bell ring so I can go outside and hang on the monkey bars and pretend to be a sloth?

/// Weekends. The recess of a college student. ///

And seeing that it is much too late to right anything witty or charming or innovative, I am going the lazy just-paste-pictures-with-stupid-captions approach. Enjoy.

*And we all know how lazy I really am because I didn't finish this on Sunday night.  I even procrastinate on blog writing.*

Night mountain biking. Some suggest that this is dangerous but being bored and sad is also dangerous. You win some, you lose some.

Taking a picture of my shoes so I have an excuse to rest my aching bones while running. 

Getting up to the top of the trail and realizing that I have to run all the way back. (This is when I could benefit from having a boyfriend to come pick me up and buy me an ice cream.)

MOAB! I swear Elise is not nude in this picture. We went swimming in the Colorado. And it was deliciously cold.

Moab is Disneyland without lines or screaming children or overpriced Gumbo.

BECKSTEAD turned 21! This meant that we ate mildly gross Peruvian food, bought her a cat onesie, cracked eggs on her head and shoved her face in the cake. Peruvian culture is the best culture.

So majestic. This girl is the best sport ever. She was one of the biggest examples to me on the mission and I feel so incredibly blessed to still be her friend. Have her do her Penelope impression from SNL. She really is the Cat's Pajamas.

You know it will be a good Friday when your car has skis and a bike in the back. #blessed

My Father came out to see me again! He is just recently getting into the Chuck Norris jokes...I know I know, he is about 7 years late, that bandwagon set off when I was a sophomore in High school. 

GO TO DRAPER UTAH TO MOUNTAIN BIKE. Take the "Rush" trail because it is so so so so fun. Banked turns, jumps, and it's one-way on the downhill so you don't have to worry about collisions. And the dirt is PURR-FECT right now. Go go go! 

Sometimes people ask me if I get tired of my parents coming to Utah so often. I just stare at them and shake my head..."You just don't have a Shane and Sandy for parents so you don't understand." 

Evidence of the before mentioned: My Dad helped me attach pink, sparkly streamers on my mountain bike's handlebars. Only the pros do it. 

I have decided that there should be a new TLC show called "Camp Fire Wars: People Duking It Out Over Which Method Is Best." I have also decided that people don't understand the No-Judge Zone when it comes to quantities of A1 sauce. There is no such thing as too much A1 sauce on anything, especially tinfoil dinners.

Breakfast for dinner with the grandparents. Watching every PBS period drama ever made. Snoozing to Antiques Roadshow. Sunday Paradise.

Suggestion for those going to Moab to mountain bike. Check out the "Bar-M" trail system. It's just off the highway before you reach the town limits. This place is rad. It's fantastic for all skill levels and is just so so so fun.

According to this picture Mat and Camren are Siamese twins. If Moab is Disneyland, "Slickrock" is Space Mountain. It is the reason why you even go in the first place. It's also a great place to leave with giant bruises all over and if you're Mat, heat stroke from eating too many salted almonds and not enough water. 

Hooray for weekends! Sleeping under the stars, watching shooting stars, never brushing your hair, living like a gypsy. It's the good life. 

Now it's time to buckle down, put my nose to the grindstone, and work as hard as I can at school because the weekend will be here in 5 days. The countdown begins.

Playing Hooky

How glorious has this weather been, am I right? We're talking about 65 degrees in March! Sun! Vitamin D! But can we acknowledge that there are many setbacks to such tropical weather? For one, the fact that people are wearing sandals when their feet are clearly not "publicly presentable". Let's all just agree that feet must be prepped before the big sandal debut. Please and thank you. Also, how do people make lounging in the sun look so pleasant? My attempt at basking resulted in s.w.e.a.t. and fleeing back to the shade where I didn't feel like a melting grease ball.

No. I am not here to chat about Spring problems and all the twitterpated PDA on campus, I am here to talk about l a s t  w e d n e s d a y.

Looking at this picture you can probably guess that I wasn't cleaning whiteboards or going to class or going to my volunteer obligations on Wednesday. It was a ditch-everything-and-get-your-booty-to-Snowbird-because-it-just-snowed-22-inches day. If any future employers are reading this, I'll be straight up from the beginning. I skip everything if it has snowed. (But actually, if you are a future employer, I am just kidding and this is actually just a chapter of a poorly-written novel I am writing. I'm actually the poster child of responsibility.)

According to this picture I lick steering wheels when I get excited. It's whatever. And I just realized that my parking sticker from Sophomore year is still on the back of the rear view mirror. I should definitely take that off... 

I'm going to utilize a word that I loathe and detest and I'm sorry. THE SKIING WAS EPIC ON WEDNESDAY. EPIC EPIC EPIC EPIC. *cringe cringe cringe cringe* It was inhaling dry fluffy powder all day and eating sweet peppers on the lift and massaging sore jaws from smiling so much day. It was one of those days when you feel authentic. (ugh. Is anyone else grossed out with my writing style tonight? I'm so sorry I just used epic and authentic in the same paragraph..) It was one of those days where I felt so happy and free that I never wanted it to end.

But there is a slight hiccup to such ethereal joy. It's the black stain on a perfectly white square of carpet. It's called powder fever and it's a deadly thing. We were up at the top of Mineral Basin and the ski patrol hadn't opened it up for anyone yet. There were about 300 skiers at the top literally frothing at the mouth, waiting for the line to drop so that they could devour up that pow. We professed to being above "all that hype" and "it can't be good enough to stoop to that level anyway..." And yet we suddenly found ourselves at the forefront of the mob smacking our jowls, waiting for the line to drop...

And when it did. I can't really describe it any other way besides a reference to the wildebeests in The Lion King. Straight up anarchy and chaos. All I clearly remember is hearing a reverberating roar behind me and seeing Elise hurl herself into the powder, followed by about 299 other deranged skiers. It's all a blur, but I think I got the line caught around my head and looked somewhat like a wildcat who had been caught in a bear trap. Straight up savage. Somehow I extricated myself out and barged down the hill, whooping and hollering. I could see people colliding on every side of me but the snow was so goooooooood. Several somersaults later I was one of the first to arrive at the lift and if heaven isn't what we were all feeling, it's so not worth it. How does one describe the emotions following a pristine and crazed powder run? You can't.... and that is why this blog post is so badly composed.

I don't know how or when this picture was taken, but it seems to sum it all up much better than words. 

But where was Elise? In the mayhem that had ensued I had lost her. hehehehe. It's just so painfully tragic that it makes me chuckle. Elise had LOST HER SKI. On the biggest powder day of the year! 22 inches in Mineral Basin! Untouched manna from the heavens and she had LOST HER SKI.

You can see another victim of the stampede behind Elise in the yellow jacket.

She was the Mufasa in the whole Lion King scenario. Straight up massacred on the slopes. And all I can say about the whole thing is that skiing down 22 inches of freshly fallen snow is a lot easier than trying to find a buried ski in 22 inches of freshly fallen snow. Lesson learned: Don't be that guy. But if you do happen to be that guy, be like Ellis Island. She's the champion of optimism.

Thank you Wednesday. Thanks for giving me a day so achingly beautiful and a best friend to enjoy it with. (That had romantic undertones. Sorry.) And don't fret! We managed to get face shots until closing time so Elise's day wasn't ruined by being the victim of the powder frenzy.

To playing hooky on Wednesdays! Hurrah!

Car Alarms And Death Threats

I've been living in fear the last couple of weeks. It's like something out of a cheaply-made horror movie. Girl parks car. Girl receives threatening notes on car about her broken car alarm. Girl ignores notes. Girl receives more notes that seem to be more and more bloodthirsty. Girl fears for her life. Girl is found and killed for not fixing her car alarm. Credits roll. 

Except in my case, I was not killed and was kind enough to pay 80 dollars to get the dang thing fixed. Although in this situation I plead ignorance as the cause of my tardiness in fixing the problem. How was I supposed to know that my car alarm goes off "night and day," not allowing anyone to sleep? PUH-LEESE. Who needs sleep anyways?

Raul at the car-fixing place completely sided with me. How unfair to threaten calling the police! How cruel to call me "annoying!" Let's find the psychopath and duke it out! Thanks Raul for always having my back. Expensive as it was, I now can breathe freely knowing that a sleep-derived maniac won't jump me at night when I walk to my car.

Death Threats Galore

"Don't let me ask the third time."

And my favorite part. The first note was signed as "Windsor Park Residents." The second was from the notoriously evil "Windsor Park PRESIDENT." I just got shivers down my spine. 

Seeing that I was probably going to be murdered for my negligence, I decided to live it up these past couple weeks by basically going from one adventure to another. That, and staring at cadaver parts for my Anatomy Lab...

Eating out at Costa Vida and Cafe Rio....3 times....in one week. Hellloooo love handles.

Waking up to this. No words.

Saturday was a dream. A eat-powder-all-day-long-laughing-your-booty-off dream. 

This beautiful bracelet is the only evidence I have that I went country dancing. That's probably a good thing because our  rendition of the Dirty Dancing lift was subpar at best. 

Date night with The Illustrious Beckstead. 

Blading is life. And so are repulsive bad table manners at Cafe Rio.

Late night temple sessions by myself. I love this place. It's  my safe spot from all care and stress and hurt. I can't say it enough; God lives and loves us. 

That is my little noggin on top of that rock. It's so warm we can climb outside!

It is, in fact, possible to have fun in the face of probable cold-blooded murder.

When Parents Come To Town

Remember when you were that super angsty teenager who liked to stay at home and hang out with her parents all day?

That's not a thing? 

Oh. 

Well it was for me. If you all had Sandy and Shane's for parents you would all do the same thing. 

It can be a downside (if you can even classify it as that), because your social life involvinf youth of a similar age demographic goes down...drastically. But I could even argue that this is, in fact, a highly sought after perk in my book. 

So thanks to flight benefits and skiing, I have been able to spend several weekends in the presence of my very cool and laidback parents in the following fashion; 

When Dad Comes To Town 

We ski. 

And ski. 

And ski some more. 

Occasionally we ski too much and have to hobble into the lodge and get some sugar. And what is wrong with my eyes in this picture? I cannot quite pinpoint it, but I'm sensing a Quasimodo/Grim Reaper combo?

And back to skiing we go! With the sad little grass patches everywhere. Call Al Gore and tell him he finally convinced me on global warming. Pray for snow. 

We make a ruckus in dollar theaters and take pictures with flash. We are thoooossseee people. Guardians of the Galaxy. Hello! My type of movie. Mildly inappropriate jokes, dancing trees, and woodland creatures with semiautomatics. And that guy from Parks and Recreation. A plus plus plus plus. 

Did I say we wander? Well we do. Very aimlessly. 

We take pictures with 800 dollar indian dolls. Who looks more demented here? 

We eat other peoples food in fancy log cabins in Midway.

And we antagonize our soft hearted vegetarian relatives by sending them texts of this shirt. And then we buy it. Because nothing says MERICA more than a hunting t-shirt. 

When Dad comes to town we can talk openly about Taylor Swift;
"I just hope that Taylor Swift can find a good man to settle down with." -Shane Ostler

When Dad comes to town inappropriateness rises to new levels and people literally want to kick us out of their house.

When Dad comes to town I can't walk for days from so much skiing.

When Mom Comes To Town

Air hockey. It's like the faster paced, more ruthless version of Foosball. Which is quite unfortunate for me because my eye-hand coordination is quite shabby. The score of my mom and I: 10-1. Guess who won? 

Hey. Remember when I wrote that post where I talk about eating old candy off the ground? This popcorn just happened to be abandoned on the movie theater bench. And my mom and I ate it. It was oh-so-good and I haven't died of anthrax poisoning yet so I think we are good. 

That awkward moment when you realize that everyone can hear your smirks loud and clear during the world-famous acoustic demonstration at Temple Square. 

Eating Thai food in the hotel bed. For breakfast. With our hands. 

Watching my mom almost tumble to her death on this cliff. 

Indulging in overly pricey lodge food. 

SKIING

More skiing! 

We just can't stop skiing! 

And....Alex doing terribly at even more arcade games. And my smoking hot little bro. 

I do apologize for this extremely long photo-binge. But oh my goodness I do not apologize for how much fun I had. Mom and Dad, can you come back? Please???