The New York State Fair

Michelle and I went to the famous New York State Fair last night. It was fun! We even got free parking because we didn't have any cash and the parking attendant, in frustration, said "Just go! Just go over there [to park]!" Even though he got mad that we didn't have any cash, we weren't complaining. We saw the famous exhibits that had been in the news, like the huge butter sculpture. They don't tell you on the news what it is of, you have to come see it for yourself. So i guess im going to ruin the surprise for anyone who is still going to go: it is of a cow jumping over the moon with a fork and a spoon or something standing next to it (its all from that old nursery rhyme. I don't even know what its called...Michelle recited the whole thing at the fair though). There was a funny German guy juggling fire and making off-colored jokes. He was actually really funny. I was surprised to find myself actually laughing out loud. He was rude and insulting to the spectators about things like race and ethnicity and stuff. I usually don't think that stuff is funny at all but he just cared so little about the people around him that it was for some reason funny. I don't know. We got milks for 25 cents each at the dairy exhibit. We bought grilled corn, fresh taffy, and saw all kinds of award winning chickens, pigeons, pigs, llamas, horses, goats, cows, bunnies, and many other animals. Some of them looked like they were sick and miserable in their little cages. If they have been in their since the fair started its been a week and a half for those little guys. You could buy a lot of those animals too if you wanted. The horses were beautiful. I don't think i had ever seen the real award-winning huge beautiful horses before. Michelle and I were awestruck at how massive some were. We were thinking they could easily crush our car if they wanted to. There were the ones with poofy white fur on their feet and little tiny ones that pulled around a little cart inside the barn on a track. That one was somehow trained to kick its feet up with real flare every time it stepped. It seemed to be a real proud horse. Oh yeah, and i met a guy from Peru at a Peruvian arts and crafts store. He told me i should go back to Cuzco (a city in Peru) and get me a Cuzquena. That would be a girl from Cuzco. I told him i was already married and put my arm around Michelle and he said, "no not a Cuzquena girl, a Cuzquena beer." And then i remembered that Cuzquena is also a beer from Cuzco, so that was kind of funny. All in all, i will be honest and say that it was about the same as most fairs i have been to in my life, like the Orange County fair and other ones. The nice thing about this one is all the animals that were there. If you don't care about seeing those...it might be just the same as any other fair. Don't get me wrong, we had a great time, and the free parking made it less expensive, but i think it may have gotten a little too hyped up from people we know at church and at michelle's work. But that's just one man's opinion...the other 400,000 people who have gone this year so far may disagree with me. Im not even saying it's bad though, it just wasn't a life-changing experience perhaps like it had been hyped up to be. We had a great time though and it was perfect for a weeknight and we would definitely reccomend it to anyone looking to get outside and have a good time. There is enough stuff to see and look at to keep you busy all day if you wanted to stay that long. Oh yes, one more thing, we paid one dollar for Michelle to see Tina, the world's smallest woman at 29 inches tall. She was real, but unfortunately we couldn't take a picture because our camera battery died. I looked her up on the internet and found pictures of her on someone else's blog. The pictures i found are of the exact same guy selling the tickets to see her, the exact same booth, the exact same sign, it made me laugh. I guess Tina tours the world pretty much. OK, that is all for now everyone.

Finally a Candidate Worth Voting For

http://www.thelopezfamilyonline.com/play.php?first=Chad&last=Wallace

Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs

Here are some pictures of where I go to school. This is the Maxwell Building at Syracuse University. I haven't even really gone in to any other buildings or ventured very far from the Maxwell Building (other than to get my ID card or little things like that). It just feels kind of weird to go to SU but not really have any idea what the campus looks like or anything. It is much different than doing my undergrad at BYU where i walked all over campus almost on a daily basis. I hope to see and get to know the entire campus, but honestly, I have almost no need to go anywhere else (all my classes and lectures are right here). Another big difference from BYU is that people smoke here (that is why there is a picture of an ash tray).

pictures of swollen tongue and arm

The picture of my tongue here shows the contrast quite nicely of how much bigger my right half is than my left half. The picture still does not do complete justice to how big it really was and felt. i think the picture of my arm shows kind of well how swollen it was...but like my tongue it doesn't quite do justice.

Missionary Work

Chad and I have really enjoyed the missionary work we have been able to do in Syracuse. There are so many more opportunities now that we actually live around people that aren't members. Chad has been able to teach with the missionaries several times and has had quite a few discussions with people at school about what we believe. He is a great missionary. I am always so proud of him when I here him explain the gospel to someone and bear his testimony. I'm so lucky I married such a great guy! Anyway, I have also been able to share the gospel at work. There is a girl there who is interested in finding a church to go to and she asked me what we believe. Before she even asked I had felt like I should try to share the gospel with her. After she asked I told her a little about it and she seemed interested so I brought her a Joseph Smith Pamphlet, the Restoration DVD, and a couple more things. She was excited to watch the DVD, but hasn't watched it yet because her husband wants to watch it with her. I have been praying that she will feel the spirit and have the desire to know more. I invited her to church and she couldn't come this Sunday, but she is going to talk to her husband about next. I love this gospel so much and it has been such a blessing in my life. I would love to be able to share it with her so that she can be as happy as I am.

Life in Syracuse

As Chad mentioned earlier, life has been a little crazy around here. I'm afraid to come home from work each day and find a new part of Chad swollen. lol. He is getting better though thank goodness. We are still enjoying living in Syracuse. The weather is still really nice, but its starting to get a little bit colder. I'm scared for winter to come. It's going to be freezing! Lately a few more people have been saying that it isn't really that bad. That's a little comforting, but I'm sure it's going to be a lot worse than Utah. Work is going great. I really love my job (most of the time). I have a new position now. Instead of just doing whatever anyone needed help with I am "the check in person." I'm in charge of checking patients in when they arrive, verifying insurance, helping with medical records and dictation, answering phones, filing, paperwork...just basic medical reception. It is such a busy office! Often we have 15 patients that will come in one 15 minute period because some days we have two doctors in the office, a nurse practitioner, a breathing technician, and an x-ray technician and they all see patients at the same time. The front desk can get a little crazy! I really enjoy the business though. It makes the day go by really fast. It is also nice to have some responsibility now instead of just helping with little tasks. I feel more productive and useful. If only medical receptionists were paid like nurses...

swollen

lastnight while watching Iron Man at the local dollar theatre here in Syracuse, i was eating a chocolate covered pretzel, and i realized my tongue was very sensitive. It kind of felt like a bee stung it. The sensitivity was kind of right on a particular spot, it wasn't the whole thing. After a few minutes i started getting annoyed that it was bugging me while I was eating. After about a half hour i realized it was actually numb and getting quite large. I finally told michelle (i hadn't menitioned it before because i knew she would worry in spite of some recent medical conditions). She could see h0w swollen it was even in the dark movie theatre. I made a few phone calls (to my mom who is a nurse and to the wal mart pharmacist) and it was obvious i was having an allergic reaction to something. About an hour later the entire right side of my tongue was frigin huge. It took up my whole mouth. I took some benadryl at home and waited to see if it got better. Luckily it did, or it would have been the second trip to urgent care this week. Right before i went to bed the left side started to feel sensitive like the right side had in the movie theatre, but i was too groggy from the benadryl to care. I just fell asleep and in the morning thank heavens i was ok. My mouth was sore is all in the morning, no real swelling i don't think. My left bicep yesterday also started to get swollen. It at first just itched like a bug bite during the day. By night time it looked there was gauze stuffed in my arm or something. It looked like there was literally something in there poking out, that's how defined the swelling was and how distinctly it was elevated above the normal skin. Do you remember how the joker put the cell phone in the bad guy's stomach and it was protruding in a very distinct and noticeable shape? that is what the swelling in my arm reminded me of (except for not a cell phone shape). Luckily that has mostly gone away too. My right arm did the same thing about a week ago, and I still have chigger bites on my feet from like 3 weeks ago or something . I'm a mess. (pictures to come shortly of the swollen tongue and arm).

This is a picture of when Chad and I went to the Sky Chief's baseball game. The Sky Chiefs are Syracuse's Triple A baseball team. They lost the game, but it was fun to watch anyway. The weather was great and we enjoyed the atmosphere and just being able to spend time together doing something a little different than the normal. We even ended up getting free tickets from someone when we were standing in the ticket line.

Camping

Pictures from camping at and visiting Niagara Falls.

This was called the Horseshoe falls. The water fall right behind us one side of the "horseshoe" that wraps all the way around to the other side of the waterfall you can see way in the background.

Niagara Falls

Michelle and I had a great time visiting Niagara Falls this last weekend. We went with our friends from the ward Dan and Jenny (and Dan is my MPA program as well). We left on Friday and camped at a place called Daisy Barn, which was basically like 20 minutes from Niagara Falls. It was fun to eat smores and roast weeners, etc. We also threw the frisbee around. Michelle and I have been trying to get a good frisbee since we got here so were happy to finally get one. I had a brilliant idea to play frisbee across the pond at Daisy Barn camping grounds. I threw the frisbee across the pond just fine...but eventually someone who threw it was not able to clear the pond. I will not say who...it was just someone i was playing frsibee with. So it took like 45 minutes to get it out, it was pretty funny. Its all good, we got the frisbee out as good as new. It was like the frisbee got a bath. Michelle and I decided to sleep outside on an air mattress. It was great weather: warm, clear skies. But at around five in the morning probably Michelle woke me up because it was starting to drizzle a little. I basically just ignored her or worse (in my half asleep state i may have actually just told her "no...lets just stay out here"). Anyways, after another half hour the rain woke me up and i told her we should go in the tent where Dan and Jenny were. The drizzle had turned to rain so we went in the tent, and it is good that we did because I could hear it really coming down on the tent. At any rate, it was fun to sleep outside. It was very calm and peaceful, and you could see stars and the trees. I could do it every night i think. The only downside is that when we got back to our house in Syracuse I noticed something was very wrong with my feet. Michelle counted somehting like 30 or 40 bug bites on the tops and bottoms of my feet. Yes, the bottoms of my feet, Weird huh? We beleive the diagnosis is Chiggers. A bug out in the south and east. Chiggers suck...they itch like crazy and burn like they're on fire if you start to scratch them. They appear to be srpeading, i think they may still be alive in my skin and eating me. I took an oatmeal bath to help, but i don't know how much it did. Anyways, back to Niagara Falls. It was cool to see this historic and cultural icon of our country. It is another place i can say i have been. There are basically three huge waterfalls that fall down into a river. On one side of the river is the US and on the other side is Canada. So i can say i have seen Canada, but i have not yet been there. We will need to go back with our birth certificates to be able to get into Canada and come back without problems. The picture at the top is at the bottom of the actual falls. We paid extra to be able to go down there. It was insanely windy and powerful. They make you wear sandals that they give you. We both got pretty wet. The picture above is not even that close to the actual spot where the waterfalls land in the river. We did go up there, but there is no way you could take out a camera and take a picture without ruining your camera. It would have been like throwing your camera in the ocean. So it is tuesday and i still have all kinds of Chigger bites...and they are either spreading or I am just noticing new ones. We will see what happens. Maybe i will post pictures of the Chigger bites.