Buff Woman

Last night, I was working out at the gym and I saw the most interesting human being. At first glance, it was clearly female. The earrings, long hair tucked in on itself, feminine facial features gave this away. However, I couldn't help noticing the bulging muscles. This individual had biceps, triceps, and shoulder muscles that I would be proud to tout. I couldn't believe that this person was a woman so I found myself staring at her intermittently, trying not to come across as creepy. I would casually glance over at her and hold my gaze for a few seconds at a time in disbelief. As to his/her age, I would guess around 40. It was evident that she had spent many years working on this powerful figure of hers. Previous to this experience, I thought such ripped, burly mamas are only to be found at body-building competitions. Apparently they are sometimes in your neighborhood gym.

Mitt Romney's blunders

I don't want to be too much of a critic, but I saw a couple things in the second debate that I didn't really like about Mitt Romney. Don't get me wrong; I think that he is the best Republican candidate. I also think that he did a fabulous job in the first debate. But the second debate was more competitive and a lot of more difficult issues were raised. Let me tell you what irked me in the second debate.

On the hypothetical terrorist situation, I don't think that Romney's response would lead to a better America. I will have to say that he did a good job of prefacing this botched answer with an approach to prevent attacks from ever happening. That would be the ideal situation. I am no expert on international relations, but I certainly liked Ron Paul's insight. By the way, I found each of his answers well-educated and intelligent. There is some truth to what he said about the US provoking attacks towards itself. Instead of us clinging to the notion that we never make mistakes, and everyone else in the world should fall into place with our ideals, maybe we should look into some of the underlying reasons why some other countries hate us. To me, this is going to the heart of the issue. If you follow Mitt's policy on doubling Guantanamo and continuing to use enhanced interrogation techniques, I don't believe attacks against us will stop. We are all human beings on this earth and we as Americans should start treating others with the respect that they deserve. I attended Dick Cheney's commencement address and he talked about being grateful for second chances. I believe that many of these terrorists are in need of second chances. We know that many of these terrorists are simply brainwashed patriots believing that they are doing the right thing. To the extent that we can rise above the terrorists in baseness, the world will become a better place. Senator McCain, as an experienced veteran, understood this fact and did a good job of explaining his views on torture. Also, I didn't understand how Romney can claim that we don't torture, but yet it is fine to engage in enhanced interrogation techniques. Some techniques that I found included in this category seemed like torture to me. Check out this article if you want to see the 6 techniques that fall under this category. Torture is defined by the United Nations Convention Against Torture as "any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. If, through these interrogation methods, one can die, (as has happened in Iraq) I don't think it is appropriate for us to continue.

In conclusion, I don't want to be inconsiderate of those who have been affected by the terrorist acts in recent years. We all want justice for those behind such deadly attacks. However, in our pursuit of making sure that this doesn't happen again, we can't stoop to their level. I feel like this is something that the infamous VP Daniels on 24 would do and it would only lead the United States to be more isolated and hated in the world. We must rise above the terrorists in our treatment of others in the world. I believe that through diplomacy and international talks, the world will rise above terrorism. TO

Moving to Boston

I accepted a job offer far away from home in a magical land called Boston, Massachusetts. My job title will be a research assistant in a lab at Harvard Medical School. I am so stoked. It is well known that much about getting a job is in connections you make. This job was no different. Richard Carey, the current lab assistant whom I will be replacing, was my connection. He graduated from BYU in Bioinformatics a year ago. Undoubtedly, he did a great job as he was able to recommend me to Dr. Gygi. Steve Gygi, the professor in whose lab I will be working, is in the Department of Cell Biology. He gave me the unofficial job offer a week or two ago and I was excited to accept. I will most probably be working with a team of bioinformatists in his lab writing programs and analyzing his database. The kind of work is right up my alley and I feel I will do a stellar job. I want to work in this capacity for a year and then go to law school. It's gonna be sweet applying a lot of the things I learned at school to real-life problems. What also makes me excited about this transition in my life is that I will be living in Boston, one of the coolest cities. This city is home of the Red Sox, tons of historical sites, and Harvard. There's gonna be so much to see and do! I plan on making the trip over there by car as this is the cheapest mode of me getting over there with all my stuff. Because I am expected to be there on the 14th of May, I will probably be leaving Provo next Thursday. If anyone wants to accompany me on my trek across the United States feel free to let me know. It will take at least 40 hours of driving, but on the bright side, we will check out scenery from all across the United States.