In Which I Supplicate for Financial Assistance

It is no secret to long-time readers of my blog that for several years I have aspired to participate in a volunteer program in Africa. Well, it is finally happening!! I am scheduled to go to Tanzania this October with Global Service Corps (GSC).

This October I will be participating in GSC's Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security Program near Arusha. While there, I will be participating in rural trainings in bio-intensive agriculture, poultry vaccinations, and other projects that work to improve the food security and nutrition of Tanzania’s most vulnerable populations. GSC is a non-profit organization that has been operating since 1992. Since then, GSC has designed and implemented sustainable community development programs in Kenya, Tanzania, and Thailand. GSC has partnered with some of the leading organizations in international development, including the Food and Agricultural Association of the United Nations, Africare, Heifer International, and Programs for Appropriate Technology in Health.

What I will be doing in Tanzania!

 I'm really excited for this opportunity and have been working to raise money for this program. The fee for my 4-week program is $3,771. This fee includes in-country training and orientation, project administration and oversight, meals and accommodations, and local transportation. I want to invite anybody that is interested to make a donation toward my program fee. Any donation, no matter how small, is greatly appreciated! I understand that not everyone will be able to donate, but know that I also appreciate your thoughts and prayers! 


Any donation made to GSC on my behalf is 100% tax deductible and goes toward my program cost. If you would like to make a tax-deductible donation, please contact me at k.stovall86@gmail.com. Alternatively, you can donate on my behalf via PayPal:

I greatly appreciate any and all support and consideration! I promise I will fill my blog with amazing pictures and stories from my time in Tanzania! If you have any questions or comments, feel free to email me or leave a comment.

Thanks!!

What the...?

A few weeks ago I read an article linked by a friend on Facebook titled, "'The Demise of Guys': How video games and porn are ruining a generation." Basically, the article discusses some of the negative impacts of video game and porn addictions. Now, I can understand why men would feel a little defensive about this article given the title; certainly not all or even a majority of men suffer from either of these addictions. Still, I was shocked when I read the comments posted on this article. This article had nothing to do with women, other than to point out that video games and porn addictions are not conducive to a successful and healthy relationship. And yet it was a common pattern throughout the comment dialogue to attack (sometimes quite viciously) women. Many of these hateful comments expressed this basic sentiment: "If women  _______ (stopped whining, stopped expecting communication in relationships, would stay in the kitchen, were more attractive, or my favorite, would "give it up" more) then men wouldn't need these outlets."  Seriously, people? Disturbing. Oh well, right? Brush it off as trolls being trolls. 


Until I found this: A female video blogger and pop culture critic recently started a Kickstart campaign to fund her newest project of "Tropes vs. Women in Video Games." And the backlash was much worse then the comments I found on this article. In fact, several online video game forums organized online attacks against this women, including changing her Wikipedia article to include racist, sexist, and just all-around offensive language, and flooding her youtube channel with equally hateful comments. 


And all this made me think. What is the deal with this link between video games and misogny? Really, what makes some of these video gamers so defensive, but more than that, so prone to verbally attack women? As a disclaimer, I know many men who play video games who are respectful men and good husbands. But the fact that so many men defended their video gaming by attacking women in the first example, and so many video gamers attacked this woman just for wanting to point out some of the sexist tropes in video games in the second, strikes me as not just coincidental. 

So am I opening this up for your discussion (I mean for the 6 people who read my blog). What do you think is going on here? 


Here are the links so you can do your own research:
http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/23/health/living-well/demise-of-guys/index.html?is_LR=1
http://www.feministfrequency.com/

As promised

Remember a few months ago when I promised I would post pictures of me as a brunette? I didn't forget. I just wanted to keep you in suspense. But the wait is now over!

I think sometime in the next few months I will lighten it and eventually return to blonde. But it has been fun to try something new.


So what do you think?

Confession time....

Is it pathetic that Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You" makes me feel a little lonely?

Also, I can't get Justin Bieber's song "Mistletoe" out of my head.



 




Coming soon! A picture of my new hair! And a brief summary of my first trip out of the country.

Quarter-Life Crisis!!!

The other day I posted on Facebook that I was having a crisis in which I couldn't decide what to do with my life. Since I never update my status with anything serious, I thought people would recognize that I was exaggerating a bit. But then my friend Christa told me that it actually sounded pretty serious. So if any of the three people that read my blog also saw that post, know that I am fine. I'm not on the verge of shaving my head or joining the Peace Corps or anything. Actually the Peace Corps may not be a bad idea...

Despite being "fine," I do turn 25 next month. Don't tell me it's not that old. It kind of feels like a big deal to me. And although my reflections on what to do with my life were not inspired by my impending birthday, they are getting exasperated by it. So let's backtrack about 8 months. I was working as a diet clerk, with no expectation that a dietitian job was going to be coming my way anytime soon. I started researching international volunteer opportunities (something I have done about 5 times before in my life) and found a great program in Tanzania. So I think about it, have a few arguments with my dad, and decide to go for it. I submit an application and deposit, and start planning to go this fall. Almost immediately my current job becomes available, and I know I can't let that pass me by. But Tanzania can be deferred. So I take my current job and defer my program. I can defer for up to a year with my current deposit. Which means I have until September 2012 to go. So it's been something I've been mulling over in the back of my mind whilst loving my new job.

When I go to Tanzania, I will hike this mountain.

Fast-forward back to present time. I really like my new job. And I love my friends here in Vancouver. But I am living with my parents (not so bad, but, you know, there's a stigma, need to take care of myself, spread my wings, teased by my siblings, etc) and I feel a little stagnant. I miss having a big goal to be working towards. College degree! Internship! Job! Now what? (Don't say marriage. You'll be dis-invited from my blog). I have always been fascinated by global health, especially the hunger problem throughout the world. I have no experience in this area, but a big part of me feels my dream job would be to work with a program that promotes sustainable solutions to the problem of hunger and malnutrition in impoverished areas of the world. But I really have no idea what I'm talking about because I've always lived in middle-class suburbia and I've never even left the country (Wait. I've just decided how I'm going to celebrate my 25th birthday. Watch out, Canada. I'll be coming soon!). So that is the great thing about this volunteer program: I give  2-3 months of my time and hopefully know if it is something I want to continue to pursue before I decide on grad school.

So that is the nature of my current crisis. Do I go to Tanzania? When do I go? Can I earn enough money by then (got to have enough to make car payments while I'm gone)? Fortunately, my job as it is currently won't be an issue. Since I am relief and receive no benefits, I just have to ask them not to schedule me for a few months. At least that makes it easy.


Oh, and I will be dying my hair as my official "quarter-life crisis." Stay-tuned. I might post pictures. But I make no promises.

(ps. I realize I make frequent use of parenthesizes. I have decided to make the text within smaller for your reading convenience.)

That's a little embarrassing...

....that's it's been a year since my last blog update. Oops. I'd make some grand comment about how I've been out living my life, and don't have time for trivial things like blogging or Facebook, but I seem to make time for things like "The Daily Show" so that argument doesn't really hold. So, dear friends and family, accept my sincere apology, and prepare yourselves for the thrill you've been waiting one year for...an update on my life. It is going to be riveting.

My place of employment

Let's start with the job. Have I mentioned that I got a job as a dietitian? No. That's right. Last time I wrote I was unemployed. Okay. I am living the dream. Kind of. I got a job as a relief dietitian, which means I work as needed. Which means I don't qualify for benefits. Oh well. Dad came to the rescue on that one. So far I have been getting a good amount of experience and have been LOVING my job. Really. It has been so great. What a relief to find, after 5 years of working towards it, that you really DO love what you studied. Whew. The other dietitian are great, too. We have potlucks, share recipes, and eat delicious cake when birthdays come around. So to summarize, work is awesome.





On to the next topic. What will that be...not dating. Nothing to report there. I know you are all dying to know, because what could be more entertaining than a single girl spilling her guts about the barrel of laughs that is LDS dating. But to quote The Princess Bride, "get used to disappointment." Really, the reason comes from both the fact that I am not that forth-coming about my dating life and that I rarely have anything interesting to report. Also, anybody can link over to this blog from my Facebook page, and I don't want the guys I've gone out with to know what I really think. I've got to maintain some mystery.

So, not dating. How about my social life in general? That revolves 99% around my wonderful YSA ward. I do really like my ward. I've made some really great friends since I've moved here. In fact, sometimes I wish I had more time to sit around and do nothing like I used to do (yes, I'm a loser at heart). Between FHE, institute, weekend activities, midweek fro-yo trips, and whatever else comes up, my parents and Dexter rarely see me.

In other news, I recently accompanied my ward choir as the pianist, and it was terrifying. But I live to tell the tale, which I actually won't bore you with here. It happened, though. Also, I detest my laptop. I can't tell you how many times I've been tempted in the past 4 months to pick the d*** thing up and throw it against the wall. Yes. My laptop makes me so angry, that I use minor curse words and then censor them out, so that I don't offend. The cursed little thing is currently sitting at Best Buy, awaiting my pickup, finally fixed (dare I dream?). Here is the progression of my laptop trouble: virus, Best Buy, wait for Dell to send operating system disks, give up and pick laptop up from Best Buy, find operating system disks, de-bugging by brother-in-law, freezing, backup all data by transferring bits at a time to mom's laptop, reinstall operating system by brother, transfer all files back to computer, work for a while, freezing again, progressively worse freezing, Best Buy, blue screen. So cross your fingers for me. This laptop could drive me to insanity.

I hope this update was everything you dreamed it would be after 13 months of waiting. See you all in another year! (I'll try to be better about updating, but let's be realistic....)

Because I said I would...

I promised some of my friends in Utah when I visited them recently that I would update my blog. Apparently they noticed that I haven't written in a while...so I guess there are still people that will read what I have to say. I don't usually have that much to say, actually, because my life feels mostly uneventful. So here is a list of things I have been doing since I moved to Washington.

• Finish the clinical assignments for my internship
• Went to Boston (Natick, actually) to help John and Dakin before they moved
• Studied for the RD exam
• Passed the RD exam
• Ate a cheeseburger and fries to celebrate becoming a dietitian
• Put the finishing touches on my resume
• Applied to a few jobs
  
• Played with John, Dakin, Luke, Zachary, Elizabeth, Donna, Mark, Mia, Sam, and Nate for about two weeks
• Drove down to Fremont
• Held Madeline for the first time
  
• Went to the beach
• Got my eyebrows threaded
  
• Ate at China Chili's
• Attended Madeline's baby blessing
• Commenced the drive back to Camas
• Ate at In'n'Out
• Arrived back in Camas
• Received certificate proving that I am now Katherine Stovall, RD
• Applied to more jobs
• Interviewed at Adventist Medical Center
• Left for Utah
• A whole bunch of other stuff (visiting friends, canyoneering, family reunion)
• Broke my phone
  
• Road trip across southern Utah with family, during which we drove to the north rim of the Grand Canyon and stared at multiple rather large clouds that settled into the canyon.
• Flew back to Washington
• Discovered that in a two week period no new jobs have been posted in the Portland area
• Got a new phone
  
• Began writing a blog post
  
• Realized this list was too long
• Stopped writing in list form

Anyway, now that all of the summer vacations are over, it is time to really figure out what I am going to do with my time. Because there is only so much job searching/applying you can do in a day before you run out of new things to look at. Maybe I should look into the possibility of selling plasma again...Hmmm....