America

I wanted to say that I love my Country. It's not perfect, we've made some mistakes, some big ones, but for the most part we've learned from those mistakes. Taking a look at America's history we can see that if a whole country can make great changes, so can an individual.
Think about slavery- America didn't start it, but put an end to it. We moved away from the false traditions, and beliefs of our ancestors and created a new way of living, while keeping their good traditions and beliefs.
Women, for hundreds of years, were considered to be less than men, to be unintelligent, and weak. In 1920 women gained the right to vote in America, after years of many brave, and amazing women fighting for it, and suffering for it.
During WWII we put innocent Americans into camps, because their "blood brothers" in Japan attacked us. But we learned that this was wrong; when September 11, 2001 occurred we did not repeat that mistake.

America has led the world in liberty and freedom for all.

These are just a few examples of the changes that America has made. I hope that if we do need to make changes that we won't change in a way that would hinder us, but will be as progressive as the above changes were. When making changes we need to be very careful. We need to be sure that we do not deny anyone freedom, even for the sake of doing something that sounds good. We should study out the consequences of what we want to do; just because we do something with good intentions doesn't mean good will be the outcome. As America is facing some major turning points we should not rush to make a decision about anything, as good as it may seem to be. We need to slow down, and be wise, or we may undo all that our Fore Fathers, and I would add, great women, have done.
As I said above, I love America, and I will always Pledge my allegiance to this country, to the Constitution created by our Fore Fathers, and to the Freedom and Liberty of anyone, anywhere.

Feeling a little better

So we figured out why I couldn't import the video into imovie. I thought that I'd opened up a lot of space, so I didn't think that was the issue, but it was. It was because we needed to empty the trash! So that's what we did, and now we've got the space. I'm importing a video right now. Now we just have to figure out how to change the format of the dvd's that we don't still have the raw footage off, but I'm actually going to have to run to class soon, so that will have to wait.

imovie

I hate imovie right now-especially what I call the spinning techno colored ball of death-which is the equivalent of the little hourglass that pops up when it's downloading something, or taking you to another page. But this colored ball of death is more annoying than the hour glass, because it pops up randomly, and over nothing!! Then I have to sit there waiting for it to go away so I can get back to work. Everything seems to be going wrong with imovie as of late. First off I need to import video from dvd's- earlier I had imported the video from the video camera, and then burned it onto the dvd's, and then because space was limited, I had to delete the video to make room for more. Now we have to figure out how to take the dvd video, ripp it, to change the format, and import it back into imovie; everything I've tried, including HandBrake, and videomonkey, and some other one, I can't remember, have all failed. Well I may have been the one to fail at using them, but still the end result is the same. :S I also need to import video from tape into imove (which is how I did it to begin with) but imovie won't import it, no matter what I do! We have a deadline, and it's coming up soon, and we have no video!!! I don't know what to do. Right now I feel like one upset, tired, no good chica. Anyway I've got to get back to trying to figure out how to do all of this. Grrrr! :(

R.C.

So awhile ago I had this idea, to help me remember my goals, and to keep focused on what is really important to me. I can't remember what scripture I was reading, but it was about Christ and confidence. I decided my motto, or whatever you might call it would be R.C., to Remember Christ, Confidence, Charity, and Covenants. I think there was another one, but I can't remember it off the top of my head. :) Anyway I ended up asking one of the girls I work with, who was taking a jewelry class, if she could make a charm for me, which she did, it is a copper and cobalt blue charm. Then my cousin, who I had talked to about my idea, bought me a necklace, that is kind of like a locket, but it is clear and holds charms in it, and she got two initial charms with R.C. in it. So I now have two reminders, and both have a certain importance to me. It is nice in those moments when I am feeling overwhelmed and I'm wearing one of them to reach up and grab it and to remember not only who I am, but whose I am, and what I want. I think that I'm going to get something like this for some of my friends. :)

Complications- me no likey!

So the guy thinks because I don't like compliments that I have mental health problems, so he had to re-evaluate our friendship. He decided to compromise with me though! Ahhh!!! I tried to be polite about things and to think even more about the changes I do need to make, not for him, but just to be an emotionally happier and healthier person. I've already known how I need to change, and I've been working on it pretty much my whole life, but I realized I do need to try harder. I spoke with my Branch President about all of this, which helped calm me down, and to appreciate the guy a bit more- I mean I already understood where he was coming from, and I knew he wasn't trying to be mean about it, but it had been kind of a slap in the face the way he talked to me about it. President helped me to focus on his intentions a little more. But he told me that he too was concerned by some of the things he said to me and so he told me to be careful with him and to probably talk to him about it. So I'm going to try to find a time to sit down and talk with him, but I'm so nervous- I have such a hard time in situations like these, to form my words, and my thoughts, properly, so that I can coherently, and respectfully, explain myself. I don't want it to turn into a situation where either of us feels put down or misunderstood or disrespected. I would like both of us to listen, and learn. I don't think that there will be anything between us other than friendship, and I will need to somehow tell him that too- I don't know if that's all he's planning on anyway, or if he's looking for more, at least now at this point. But if he is wanting more, and I tell him it can't go beyond friendship I think he'll just end all of it, which will be sad, but I'd understand. It's just the more I get to know him, the more I feel that it wouldn't be able to work out- we'd both be worried about past things recurring, and I think we'd be butting heads a lot, both feeling that we couldn't just be ourselves around the other person. Anyway I'm so tired right now with all that's going on this week-work, school, church, family things, and the guy thing. I think I slept wrong too, because I have a huge headache, though I think it's gone down slightly, but it's been making me queezy, and I haven't been able to think very straight or concentrate well today. Anyway I need to get back to work now.

compliments

So I am probably one of the oddest ducks out there. I hate compliments!! They drive me crazy! When someone compliments me I feel even worse about myself, and I feel suspicious; I start worrying that maybe they are really making fun of me, or whatever. Well the guy that I previously wrote about has complimented me a few times, and each time I never knew what to say, and I just felt stupid because of them. He's a pretty upfront guy so I decided last night to be upfront with him and to tell him to stop complimenting me-I think I came across not only as a loony, but also as a jerk. AHHH! I need to get my head screwed on straight. I need to figure out how to at least graciously accept compliments, even if I don't believe them. Anyway I feel tired, and my neck hurts, I didn't sleep well last night, and so my head is foggy, and I am extremely tense! I just want to go back to bed and sleep until next week! :( Okay, okay, I'm going to focus on the positive- I think an individual can choose to be positive, and I'm going to choose to be so!! I'm going to be happy and enjoy today- school has started and I'm going to have fun with it, and the next time I talk to "The Guy" I'm going to be nice and positive towards him. I'm not even going to mention the compliment thing.

Could Not Sleep Last Night

So yesterday evening we had Carianne's going away party at Marci's- it was fun, though I admit I ended up texting the guy a lot during it, which I feel bad about. There were some good laughs with everyone though. I really enjoy the people I work with. I'm going to miss Carianne, but I know she's going to have a blast, and do awesome in Russia!
Anyway I ended up going to bed around 11 pm last night, which is pretty early for me, I was exhausted! But then I ended up waking up early in the morning and could not fall asleep, I was tossing and turning and was just plain uncomfortable. When I finally did fall asleep I was still tossing and turning, never fully asleep. So when my alarm went off at 7:30 my head was hurting, so I thought, okay I'm just sleeping for a little while longer. Then the next thing I knew my mom came downstairs and was asking us if we were going to go help clean the church building. I was partly asleep and part awake, and I think I was saying yes I was, but I was so exhausted, I just wanted to sleep a little longer. (side note, this month is our singles' branch's turn to clean the church building-it was supposed to be at 9 in the morning.) Well the next thing I knew I was waking up again and I believe it was 10:30! At that point I should have gotten up and gotten ready and gone over, just to see if they needed any help, but I thought they are probably done by now, and then I just layed there and started stressing about the guy. I feel horrible- I may drive by the churh, because I started thinking that there might not have been a big turn up of people, so if that's the case it would take them a long time. I do believe that more people would be available to clean the church later on Saturday than in the morning, but I still need to make more of an effort to help out. :S So this is the selfish, but repentant, Olive signing off. :)