Qualities of an Italian guy

I had an emotional connection to the main guy, trying to analyze why. Why?



Lorenzo Jovanotti Cherubini, Italian singer
His music video: Mi fido di te

Civilian Life

Time flies when you're having fun, hence the 2 months of incommunicado.

I'm in my "Living with Plants" class which is roughly 75 minutes of an older man telling us interesting factoids about planting season and unusual flowers. Not necessarily geared towards helping us succeed on tests, but if this was a club & if I had time to be in a plants club, I would stay entertained.

There are 2 kittens hanging out in my apartment bathroom right now & I'm having separation anxiety. Last night, my sister H and her roommate texted me a picture with 2 kittens and I zipped over there with Tanner and we named the black one Hiccup and brought him home to my apartment. Camped out on the couch with the kitten deciding my collarbone/neck area as his preferred bedding location. I woke up abut 7 times during the night: turkey bacon feeding, lace ribbon-playing, etc.

Rekindled my love of the movie "Warrior" last night (before kitten love), is that movie on Netflix? (No. Redbox?) The story plot always draws me in with its ability to have levels of reasoning and justification, you can't make snap judgments on its characters. It's also got the "Olympic appeal", lots of fit people and muscles I've never seen before (ex:Tommy's shoulder muscles, he looks like he's been studying with bad posture for too long).

I watched a fairly traumatic movie about an hour ago called "Rome, Open City" in my French & Italian film class. Some traumas: a pregnant mother being shot while running, a torture scene complete with man's vocal pain, a shooting squad firing on a priest, and children getting beaten for coming home late. It was pretty rough. It's a powerful depiction of life in Fascist-controlled Rome, this period in Italian history was graphic. It made me imagine how God feels when He sees these events happening in real life. I felt a deep sadness.

We have a guest speaker with an intriguing display of plants on a metal rolling cart and a table covered with colored seeds in plastic bags. His name is (?) and he's telling us about plant propogation. He has a perfect white noise voice. His subject material is told with a moderate level of vigor, his visuals are appealing, but every second is made apparent that this information is not testable. I love plants, I would like to grow some in my near future.

I am going to Lowe's Extreme Sports for a church activity tonight (family home evening) which costs $8 and a signed waiver. It's a big gym with lots of trampolines, swings, and a diving board with foam pits everywhere. What would you do if you knew you could not fail?

I can't stop imagining that I'm a mom for those 2 kittens. All I want to do is get back to the apartment and play with them.
"What's the one thing you do NOT do with African violets?" (That is a question that was just asked by the speaker) Answer: Over-water.



Ward prayer last night was our apartment with Joel's apartment so since we're all best buds, we paired up and presented someone from the other apartment. Ian & I were paired up, gosh that was fun. He told everyone to check out my Facebook profile picture & I told everyone that he has a younger brother in Taiwan, he's from Taiwan, Ian is Taiwanese, be careful what you say to Ian because he'll call you racist. :) Everyone already loves him and knows this so it was all in good fun.

The speaker chopped up a plant and now the room smells of skunk.

A Wal-Mart trip is in order: I am fresh out of apples and other essentials. Does anyone else appreciate Wal-Mart as much as I do? I get a thrill from people-watching, good deals, and general grunginess of spirit. I find that Wal-Mart changes people, regardless of who you were when you entered between the Greeter and the metal detectors.

That skunk plant is from South America and is also called a "dumb" plant because if you eat it your mouth goes numb for a few hours. Stories go that messengers would receive messages and then eat the plant so they couldn't share the message until they got to their destination.

Feeling actual angst at being separated from my kittens since 12 noon. I'm going to slip out at the next natural pause in presentation.

People on the front row are struggling with aforementioned skunk plant. Plant phenomena.

Peace up, A-town,
Courts xoxo

A Bientot!

I am serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Tahiti for eighteen months! I'm not allowed to blog during that time. So, feel free to look at my mission blog.
xoxo CAC

Just a Little Castle Shopping.

I really would be happy with a cottage (or an apartment, if I don't live in the English countryside) but I would also be down for living on an estate or in a castle.

Castle homes!
I narrowed it to my Top Three: 835 Chiltern Rd., 54 Creemer Rd., and 2633 Roundtable Blvd..

Snow flurries/blizzard but nothing slows down in upstate NY, mom and I still went to the gym. Have a healthy day!

Xoxo Coco

I Am a "Dreamy Idealist"

I, Courtney, hereby freely admit of my own free will that I pursue freedom of spirit by having a free mind.

I am a huge nerd for personality tests. This is mainly because my answers used to change all the time (and I still change things frequently) but I'm finally starting to see some core trends. There are a few tests that are dumb but I highly recommend you take this one: Jung and Brigg Myers Personality Test and 41 Questions. 1 Personality.

I urge you to find meaning in your life by being a little more introspective.

"The unexamined life is not worth living." ~Socrates

If you're interested: My Personality Results

lotsa love xoxo Coco

Insomnia, It's a New Thing For Me.

So I don't believe in/think about aliens and UFOs as a significant portion of my thoughts, but it would be a plausible explanation for the craziness outside my window that woke me up around 130 this morning. Sounded like a helicopter, lots of light, stayed for about 20 seconds and then when I got up to check it out, I pulled the curtains aside and it was gone. Since I live in an upscale suburban neighborhood, I'm not sure what other possible explanations there can be.

After going to the zoo yesterday in arctic temperatures (animals we saw were cute, but many were hibernating or something) I took a 2 hour nap and it slightly messed up my sleeping pattern. I read "An Abundance of Katherines" (is that the title?) by John Green (who I freaking love as an author) until 12ish. His books honestly capture what I love about reading: unique, believable characters who have credible issues that are not easily solvable. So anywho, woke up at 1245 to take my labradoodle puppy outside to pee, possible alien contact at 130, the house "settling" was eerily loud (possible intruders), then waking up at 420 to drive my dad to the airport. I've had a rough night/early morning.

P.S. I have another blog for my upcoming church mission to Tahiti at Tahiti Papiti, feel free to check it out if you're at a loss for more internet intrigue.

So anywho, thoughts about life: the unexamined life is not worth living, happiness and MEANING are what people want from life, it's easy to make people care about you if you take a genuine interest in them, it's okay to be a hopeless romantic as long as you don't forget reality. Remember that guy who rocked my world from the airplane flight? Remember how I told you that he went to Rochester Institute of Technology? It turns out that it is pretty close to the airport so when I saw the exit for that school, I almost caused a car accident by abruptly turning off the highway. (Not really, it was only like me and two other cars on the road, but it was a pretty sharp turn all the same.) The Rochester Institute of Technology must be pretty cool in the day time, but at night it was just kind of boring and I almost got lost trying to get around campus. It's highly prestigious so I do plan on visiting again.

I'm officially going to write a few books. I plan on writing a few "religious" books where I talk about religious beliefs in a very conversational way with relevant stories and insights. Possible title: "This is Why" or "What is so Bad about Being Good?". Also, I want to write a book about social dynamics, a book called "spectrum of love" where I talk about guys in my life (different names will be used of course) and analyze what worked and what didn't. I will have to be super professional and intelligent about doing that, but I think there are a LOT of insights I could offer to people in similar circumstances. It's similar to the delightful shock we crave from Taylor Swift songs: kind of rough that we know her men's flaws, but people seriously relate and learn from her lyrics. Adele also.

I'm working at the Palmyra Temple from 830-1 and there is a possibility of collapsing from exhaustion but it has been quite an eventful night and I flipping love reading and thinking about my future books. I had a lot of insights and observations about life last night that I'm too tired to recall at this point, but will post when they resurface.

P.S. I love learning French, c'est tres amusante.
P.S.S. I have the mind of an 80-year-old woman, but I have to admit that I love getting a lot of sleep.

Four Degrees Fahrenheit

That's how cold it is in 84604 aka Provo, Utah. My sympathies to you lovely people.

Myself? So cold in upstate New York that I took a time-out halfway through the day and curled up on the couch for a few hours while reading the Happiness Project. (read it if you see it).

This is a lazy post, only read if you are feeling laxadaisical or else you might be irritated at the pace.

So it has been officially a week since BYU Winter Semester started and I have not been attending, which has strangely not been weird. About 3 weeks before I go into the Missionary Training Center and I am ready. I got a watch today so that was bascially my last necessity, so now I'm good to go. But really, I got an international driver's license today (no test, a little worrisome) so I guess I can go drive in India now if need be.

For all male inquirers wondering about my domestic skill set, I made the Perfect Banana Bread yesterday. Unfortunately you will have to wait about 18 months to pursue me.

Our fence is almost done being built and I made a supreme pizza. I watched Cake Boss and finished my 6th vision board. I visited the bird store and did some laundry.

I legitimately have not been bored with being at home. It. is. wonderful. I have to earn my keep by walking our adorable puppy and babysitting my cute little sister.  I get Netflix and I don't have to do any homework. Life is good, people. I think I'm enjoying it too much actually, would you all judge me if I dropped out of school to write a few books?

I plan on dedicating 3 solid days to immersing myself in the politics of America. I will go through all major news networks and read at least one article from each one, should be interesting.

I hope everyone else in the world is doing splendidly, I am amazed that I have people from all over the world who read my blog pretty frequently. Thank you!!

This is what I see on my statistics page:

Entry	Pageviews
United States	5977
United Kingdom	650
Canada	369
Russia	340
Australia	337
Germany	314
Singapore	245
India	243
Philippines	173
Greece	103

It is mind-blowing and so very cool.
Good night, off to read some more of my book!
love, Courtney