Day 01 - 15 "interesting" facts

07/31/2010 - Counts as recent enough for me. Picture is shockingly (for me) completely unedited, so ignore all zits, dark shadows and whatnots. This was taken during my family's trip to Colorado. Thanks go to JP, who took the photo, and my grandma, Jo Ann Poulsen, who taught me how trick the camera into making me look skinnier than I really am.

I don't know if there are 15 interesting facts about me, but we'll see. So bear with me if they are uninteresting. 

1. I go through stages with clothing. When I was younger I hated jeans and tennis shoes, and now that's all I wear. 
2. I love berries, really really love blueberries, raspberries, and salmonberries. I wish they were more available and affordable.
3. I don't like pancakes, except for my late Grandpa's blueberry sourdough pancakes, which are amazing. 
4. I can't stand to take test with my hair down, when I'm trying to think I find it very distracting to have my hair on my neck and face. 
5. I think the most beautiful part of the body is either the arbor vitae or the optic chiasma. (I tried to find pictures, but I couldn't find a good one on Google.)
6. I love being in the mountains. 
7. I hate the winter, I hate the snow, I hate the bitter stinging winds, and I hate the gray, sunless skies.
8. I am absolutely terrified of talking on the phone. I have mini panic attacks every time I have to call someone. I'd rather text, or talk in person.
9. I am horrible at updating my blog, but I love reading others blogs. (Hey it didn't say it had to be 15 facts you didn't know, so I can include a really obvious one on here.)
10. I think my daughter is the cutest thing I've ever seen. (The second cutest thing is baby monkeys, which my daughter has been known to resemble, so she's even cuter.)
11. My husband thinks I'm an amazing cook. I think I'm a horrible cook. I have like 10 things that I ever cook, and I just recycle through them. And they are all just recipes that I follow the directions for, so it's not really to my credit if it does taste good, it's be the inventor of the recipe.
12. We need more bookshelves in our place. We already have a 5-shelf bookcase, a 3-shelf bookcase, plus one shelf on the computer desk, and one shelf on the entertainment center that have books on them, and we still have more books than space. Of course part of the problem is that the lower shelves are really underutilized, thanks to the subject of #10. 
13. I lose pencils at an alarming frequency. Taking a guess, I'd say I lose at least 1 pencil a week, sometimes more. It's very frustrating. (Shout out to my amazing aunt, G.P. who once gave me an amazing gift of a giant pack of mechanical pencils, actually that was only part of the gift - the rest was pretty cool too. But thanks, that pack has been my lifesaver.)
14. The color of my laptop, and that it has a cool texture, so I can run my fingers across it and make noise were large factors in picking the laptop I did. 
15. I got my laptop this year. My husband tried to tell me that I should use a laptop for years, and I resisted. But I finally had to succumb and admit, that I could really really use one, and it's made things so much easier.

Woohoo! I didn't think I'd be able to come up with 15, I was struggling there at the beginning. 

30 Day Blog Challenge

So I'm going to take this blog challenge I saw off of a friend's blog forever ago because now that I submitted my application I have nothing to do. (Not really, I still have tons, I just don't care as much anymore.)

So here is what to expect over the next month:

Day 01 - A recent picture of you and 15 interesting facts about yourself
Day 02 - The meaning behind your Blog name
Day 03 - A picture of you and your friends
Day 04 - A habit that you wish you didn't have
Day 05 - A picture of somewhere you’ve been to
Day 06 - Favorite super hero and why
Day 07 - A picture of someone/something that has the biggest impact on you
Day 08 - Short term goals for this month and why
Day 09 - Something you’re proud of in the past few days
Day 10 - Songs you listen to when you are Happy, Sad, Bored, Hyped, Mad
Day 11 - Another picture of you and your friends
Day 12 - How you found out about blogs and why you made one
Day 13 - A letter to someone who has hurt you recently
Day 14 - A picture of you and your family
Day 15 - Put your iPod on shuffle: First 10 songs that play
Day 16 - Another picture of yourself
Day 17 - Someone you would want to switch lives with for one day and why
Day 18 - Plans/dreams/goals you have
Day 19 - Nicknames you have; why do you have them
Day 20 - Someone you see yourself marrying/being with in the future
Day 21 - A picture of something that makes you happy
Day 22 - What makes you different from everyone else
Day 23 - Something you crave for a lot
Day 24 - A letter to your parents
Day 25 - What I would find in your bag
Day 26 - What you think about your friends
Day 27 - Why are you doing this 30 day challenge
Day 28 - A picture of you last year and now, how have you changed since then?
Day 29 - In this past month, what have you learned
Day 30 - Who are you?

Med School Application Explained

As I've been applying to med school I've been getting a lot of questions from family members, so I figured this would be the easiest way to explain to everyone. Applying to Med School is a 2 year process.

The first year is the Prehealth Evaluation Committee year. The fall of this year is the paperwork section. It is spent gathering letters of recommendations, filling out a data sheet about myself and my activities, and writing a 5 page autobiographical sketch. The complicated thing is actually getting those letter of recommendations, for each letter I had to fill out a questionnaire about myself for each person. Each questionnaire was different and several pages long. Then I interviewed for an hour or more with each of them as well, yes even though they all knew me very well. The data sheet was a little complex as well, since I had to calculate approximately how many hours I'd spent on each activity during the past 4 years. During the spring of the Committee year is spent going interviews with Committee members. These committee members than give you the go ahead to apply, or put a kabosh to it. They write a letter of evaluation to all medical schools informing them of their opinion of you. They can also opt to write a letter that says they do not recommend this individual and please don't ever admit them.

The next year is the Application Year. Typically students take the MCAT the summer/late spring before this year. This is what I did. And then they spend all of May and June in a constant state of stress filling out the AMCAS (American Medical College Application Service) application. (They might also fill out applications with a few other services as well.) The AMCAS asks everything about you. It is a painstaking and tedious process. There are sections on my childhood and demographic information like how much did my parents make on average in my childhood, and where did a grow up. One section is on course work. And I have to manually put in every class I've ever taken, the course classification and number, the class name, class type (lecture or lab), and credit hours. Since I started taking college courses in 2004, this was a lot of classes. I also had to track down transcripts from all 7 colleges I've ever taken a course from, also not fun. (I blame you Manti High.) There is an activities sections where I have to list of all my activities, their classification, hours  spent on each activity, a contact to verify the information, and write a short paragraph on the activity. The part I found the hardest is the personal statement, where they give you the very opened prompt of "Use the space provided to explain why you want to go to medical school. You have 5300 characters, or approximately one full page."

After the application is submitted that isn't the end. After AMCAS has verified everything and done a background check, the actual medical school receive your application. Then each of them send you a secondary application. Each school's is unique. After they review your secondary application, you may or may not be invited to interview at the school. Yes, this means that hopefully I will be flying all over the countryside this year. That is finally the end, and the school decides to accept or reject you.

As far as the numbers go, what most people say when judging an applicant is the GPA and MCAT scores. There are 3 parts to the GPA: the overall GPA, the science GPA (all science and math courses), and all other (anything not science). To be considered a competitive applicant all of those should be around or above 3.6, an A- average. With the MCAT there are 4 sections. 3 of the sections get a numerical score 1-15, these add up to the total MCAT score. These 3 sections are the Physical Sciences: chemistry and physics, Biological Sciences: organic chemistry, biology and human physiology, and Verbal Reasoning which tests critical thinking and reasoning. The fourth sections is a writing sample, where they give two prompts, and I had an hour to write two essays. This section is scores from J (lowest) to T (highest). Overall the highest obtainable score for the MCAT is a 45. The test scores have a bell shape distribution. The average is a 25. The average of those accepted is 32. The images show the distributions and percentile ranks. Click on the images to make them bigger.

I had told myself that I would be happy with a score that would put in X percentile. But because I couldn't just do that I'd set a goal to shoot for a score that would put me in the X+10 percentile. I got really close to that goal. No I'm not going to post my score on the internet, if you're really curious ask me.

To give you an idea of how hard this whole process is I'm going throw out a few numbers. Nationwide 82,000 people take the MCAT only 44,000 of those apply, and 22,000 get in. And that is of those who get to that point. There is no official data for this but when I started at Utah State there was several hundred pre-meds in my class, probably close to a thousand. There is 37 of us applying this year from Utah State. So less than 10% make it to even applying, and only half of those will get in. This is why I am a complete nervous wreck.

I am applying to 14 schools:
Loma Linda University - Loma Linda, CA (near LA)
University of Colorado - Denver, CO
George Washington University - Washington, DC
Emory University - Atlanta, GA
Tulane University - New Orleans, LA
Boston University - Boston, MA
Albany Medical College - Albany, NY
Drexel University - Philadelphia, PA
Thomas Jefferson University - Philadelphia, PA
Commonwealth Medical College - Scranton, PA
Medical University of South Carolina - Charleston, SC
Meharry Medical College - Nashville, TN
Vanderbilt University - Nashville, TN
West Virginia University - Morgantown, WV

And I think that covers everything.

Ice Cream is Taking Over the World!!!

Many people complain about how the candy companies have taken over the holidays like Halloween and Easter. I'm here to let you know about an even more subtle and insidious conspiracy. The ice cream companies have taken over an entire season, Springtime, especially the end of Springtime. They do not advertise their take over and so have avoided detection while spreading their plot to world domination. (They may or may not have teamed up with magazines like Shape, who have also taken over a season: Summer, a.k.a Bikini Season.) To illustrate my point and to expose their evil conspiracy I give you these examples:

Situation: It's the end of the semester and you are stressed about finals, the horrible tests that can determine your grade.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: You said up way to late studying for finals and you need a pick up to get you going.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: You wound up failing your finals despite all your studying.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: You completely rocked your finals and want to celebrate.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: It's the end of the semester, and you have to go through all the hassle of moving.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: All your friends are graduating, and you are going to miss them as they move away.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: You are graduating and you are so excited to be done with school. But you are also terrified of having to actually go out, find a job,  enter the real world, and in general figure out the rest of your life.
Solution: Ice Cream x 2

Situation: It's the end of the semester and you're boyfriend broke up with you because he is graduating / leaving to summer job / wants to be free during the summer.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: It's the end of the summer, you are sick of hearing about your roommates wedding plans, and you realize that everyone is getting married in the next couple of weeks but you.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: You are getting married soon and you need to celebrate.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: Your child is graduating from high school and will soon be moving out, and you are filled with sorrow at the thought of your baby growing up and leaving the nest.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: You are graduating high school, leaving home and completely excited to grow up.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: Sumer is approaching, you actually live somewhere with sunshine and it's starting to get really hot.
Solution: Ice Cream

Situation: You live in Logan, it's the last week of April and it's snowing.
Solution: Ice Cream, and plane ticket.

Yes, I might be going through an ice cream craving right now (and stress), but that has no bearing on any of my points whatsoever.

Feminist First Ward

Now a lot of you know that I am some feminist views, particularly concerning religion. However I am happy to note that there has been some change. There will now me a SLC Feminist First Ward, I will be commuting to attend that ward every Sunday, any of you may be welcome to join me. Here are the details about the ward:

(Taken in part from Feminist Mormon Housewives)


1.  Young Men and Young Women activities will function differently.  Every week, there will be two different activities, one physical and one of a homemaking or service nature.  The youth are free to attend either or both depending on their interests.

2.  All service-oriented chores – moving, shovelling snow, bringing meals, etc. – are to be shared equally between men and women both, with sign-up sheets for all circulated in both Priesthood and Relief Society meetings.

3.  Visiting and Home Teaching will be combined, with all messages to come from the same source.

4.  Enrichment meetings will be open to both men and women, and will cover a wide range of topics from Book Club to culinary arts to home/vehicle maintenance to crafts.  All adults will be given the opportunity to share their talents to enrichen our lives.

5.  Because we admire the Protestant tradition of donuts and coffee after meetings, we will host weekly pot-luck lunches after services.  These will be traditional pot-lucks, not the Mormon variety; while everyone is expected to bring a plate (unless financial or physical circumstances make it difficult) there will be no assigning of dishes. The ward will be providing herbal teas.

We know that there are a number of people who participate here who are interested in conservation and in alternative economic forms.  To that extent, we will be heavily encouraging a bartering system.  This will not be a formal part of the church; however, in conjunction with our weekly pot-luck, we will be encouraging members to bring eggs, garden produce, clothes, oddments, etc. to place on a communal “free for all” table.  We are trying to come up with a paper-free way of coordinating the exchange of services so that goods can be exchanged for services and vice-versa; any ideas are welcome.

6.  At least for a little while, the Genesis Group has agreed to come on-board as Music Supervisors.  Let’s face it, the traditional music and choirs can be a bit boring, so we’re really excited that Church leadership has agreed to let us form a traditional gospel choir!  (Can I get an AMEN!)  If you have any musical talents at all, please consider joining up. There is also some interest in forming a Hildegarde von Bingen special musical number group.

7.  The Mother’s Room – You will all be glad to know that we are going to have a proper Mother’s Room!  We’ve been trawling local DI’s looking for couches and chairs and we’ve got enough to make a really comfortable space.  While you will of course be allowed to nurse in the Chapel, our Mother’s Room will have great artwork with a feminist theme (Minercha Teichardt prints – kindly donated by Janet; and a poster of Judith and the Head of Holofernes – kindly donated by Quimby).  While the couches and chairs are comfortable, they don’t exactly match; if you’ve got good sewing or decorating skills we’d love your help pulling this room together.  We’re also looking for a microwave, if anyone’s got a spare.  (There’s one in the kitchen of the meetinghouse but we’d love to have a seperate one for the Mother’s Room.) We are looking to establish a Father’s Room with similar amenities.

As you can see this ward will be an excellent fit for me and my concerns for equality for all genders. 

10 Things I am Very Grateful For

10 Things I am Very Grateful For

1. I am so grateful for my husband. It's common knowledge that he is so sweet. But he is also incredibly supportive. He is always there for me, helping me whenever he can. Every test day when I'm freaking out (and all the other many days I'm stressed) he is there, comforting me, telling me I can do it.

2. I'm thankful for my daughter. I never want to take it for granted that I have a beautiful, healthy baby girl. Not only that, but she's also such a happy, well-behaved child. I am so lucky.

3. I am grateful for my husband's job. With a nationwideunemployment rate of 9% I'm grateful my husband is not in that category. I grateful that it's a job he really enjoys. And that it's flexible enough that if he needs to take some time off he can, or he can do a lot of the work from home.

4. On that same note, I'm grateful for our 5 minutes in the morning and evening. This semester our schedule's have worked out really nice. JP comes home after coaching swim team, helps me finish getting Gabrielle ready in the morning, so we can drop her off at daycare together. Then we go up to campus together, and we have five minutes every morning walking from parking to talk and be together. Then at 5 I just walk over to his office, and we go home together, we get another 5 minutes walking to the car to talk about our days. Those small little moments have been so amazing. They've made such a difference, and I enjoy how close I feel to JP.

5. I'm grateful for my parents. I have wonderful and amazing parents. They taught about me hard work, integrity, respecting others, and following your dreams, and so much more. I also want to say that I'm so thankful that my parents are still married, crazily in love 25 years later. (Trust me, go to their house and you'll see way too much loving going on.) They example has meant so much to me, especially as I go through my own marriage.

6. I am grateful for sunshine. I'm one of those people who is incredibly affected by the weather. Sunny days make me so happy. But living in freezing Logan, with it's long winter, and the constant inversion that comes with the winter, it can be a long time in between the days I get to see sunshine. So the days when it's sunny and bright I'm very grateful for the brightness, the warmth and vitamin D.

7. I am grateful for personal prayer.  Prayer has been a great strength and comfort for me. I'm thankful for my Savior, my Christ. I am thankful for the strength He gives me, and His love.

8. I am grateful for my education. I'm thankful for the opportunity. I'm also thankful for my particular school, too. It has been a perfect fit for me. I love the atmosphere of Utah State, and I like the education and experiences I've been having here.

9. I am grateful for my talents. I realize that might sound a little arrogant, but I don't mean to be cocky. But I was blessed with the ability to grasp scientific principles easier than some of my classmates. (Yes, I still study like crazy mad.) With the field I've chosen to go into, it's been (and will be) a huge blessing and help. I wonder though, if my talents were different, maybe my interests would be too.

10. JP and I have been very blessed. Things in life have managed to work out for us. We haven't had any major trials or hiccups thrown at us. Yes, there have been small bumps, but nothing terribly drastic, and nothing we couldn't handle. I'm grateful that we haven't had any catastrophes happen to us. All of the scary moments in the ER have managed to resolve themselves, no scary problems there. Our van is still running, the day it stops we'll be in a heap of trouble, and I'm so glad is still turns on when I turn the key (most of the time). Finances can get really tight, but we find a way to make it work. We've been able to find jobs when needed. When we needed a place to stay, we've always been able to find a house with minimal difficulty. Things like that, no trails that we couldn't handle. And yes, I'm going to go knock on wood now. We had it easy, and for that I'm grateful. I know our mountains will come (I want to go to med school, need I say more) so for right now I want to appreciate the calm and how blessed we are.

Updates for Sariah

I was told that I needed to update my blog. So here we go.

July: We went to the Larson family reunion. It was a lot of fun. I love camping with my baby girl, even though it's very hard and takes a ton of work to keep her warm, feed and safe. Then JP and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary. No, I don't remember what we did. Shh... don't tell him that. I think we had dinner and went to a movie.

August: I went to Panama!! It was incredible and life changing. I know everyone that reads this blog is on Facebook or has someone in their house that has Facebook. So just go on Facebook at look at my pictures there, so I don't have to repost them. You can also look at pictures from Gabrielle's first birthday on there too, you know the ones I said I'd post on this blog, but didn't.

September: School started, ugh. I was president of the campus rep team (disney) and the switched us to an e-presentation school, rather than a live presentation school, bummer and stressful. I taught human dissection, difficult but so much fun. Gabrielle went to daycare, she loves it. (JP's just been working this whole time, hence why no updates on him).

October: School continued, unfortunately.

November: school just kept going on and on and on...

December: School ended! Yeah! I did decent-ish, so little yeah. We had Christmas (mostly) at our home, which I was thrilled about, I even cooked a ham.

Sometime in between July and now, Baby Girl grew up. I think I may have to stop calling her Baby Girl. So I am pondering new names to call her, Child, Girl, Daughter, The Cuteness, Princess, Jelly Belly (going back to what we called her when I was pregnant), Ellie, GL, Gill. I know, I know to quote m husband, "Heaven forbid, you call her by her name." I would continue to call her Baby Girl, but looking at her, I honestly have to admit that I don't always see a baby anymore, just a young, curious toddler.

She's also learned some super cute thing, like giving hugs, kisses and holding hands. I can't decide which one is the best. Her hugs are these full body, I'm going to throw myself at you hugs with her mouth wide open in excitement. Her kisses vary from open mouth slobber to tiny puckered pecks. Sometimes, she'll go "oooh" afterwards. And when she holds hands she tries to interlock fingers. Her vocabulary, both spoken and signing is increasing rapidly. She's also getting into EVERYTHING, and driving me nuts. A couple days ago she pushed our cooler up next to the stove, climbed up and tried to grab things off of the stove, sending me in a whirlwind of panic. She loves reading, she is constantly handing JP and I books to read to her. She's also into clothes, shoes, jewelry and make up. Like really really into them, obsessed. She picked out her own outfit the other day, and told me to put it on her. Apparently being in PJs wasn't good enough for her. I don't know where she gets it from, especially the jewelry. JP is worried that she may turn into a girly-girl, and he's seeing the $$$ mount up. Oh, and one last thing, she loves taking baths. And she's taught herself (yes, with nothing from me) how to blow bubbles, stick her face in the water, stick her ears in the water, lay back in the water, and she even semi-floats.

For me, right now I am starting the application to Med School. Which is horrendously stressful, like nothing you can imagine. Yes, it's a two year process to get into Med School (not counting the undergraduate schooling). Right now I have to go through an Evaluation Committee. So this past semester I've been stressing out of my mind, writing autobiographical sketches and data sheets, finding people to write letters of recommendations, and general stressing out. Not to mention, trying to pick the 13 schools I'll apply too (I'm down to 26) and studying for the notorious MCAT.

There you go, I've updated. 6 months in half an hour, not bad I say.