Reasons to Love* Rexburg #2

The University Bookstore has lots of cute signs like this one, all with happy, bubbly, idealistic thoughts: "Always Kiss Me Goodnight", "All Because Two People Fell In Love", etc. You know the types.

And don't get me wrong, these are good things. It's good to remind ourselves of the goals and philosophies we want to incorporate into our lives.

But I have to draw the line with this one. "Live Simply", cut out of sheet metal, with a star and twine for decoration. Yours to display in your own home for only $20.

Um... wait.

$20 for a sign that reminds me to "Live Simply"? Isn't buying the sign a violation of the very lifestyle it encourages? If you're so in love with the concept of Living Simply that you want to buy a sign to remind you to do it, then I think you may have missed the boat.

Reasons to Love* Rexburg #1

The David O. McKay library has a bit of a tradition. A daily ritual, if you will. Every night at 11:20, an announcement comes over the P.A. system: "The David O. McKay library will be closing in 10 minutes. Please take all materials to be checked out to the circulation desk." This announcement is especially annoying when it comes on when you are on a roll with whatever project you're working on. Knowing that by the time you pack up, walk home, and get everything set up again you will have forgotten that brilliant idea to add to your essay adds to the sense of urgency. Like you're a spy working against a tight deadline, and have to transmit some important information to HQ before the building blows up. Or something like that.

So if it weren't bad enough that you have to rush to finish your thoughts, it's made worse by The Music. As the announcement ends, a song begins to play. It's a different song every night, but they all have the same quality: they are so incredibly obnoxious that they make it impossible to think, thus rendering the last 9 minutes of possible productivity completely useless. Sometimes the songs are so bad you want to run out of the library. Which I suppose is a fairly decent strategy for the students who work in the library and probably want to go home and sleep.

But tonight was different.

After the usual announcement (on a side note, I realized tonight that they never actually say that you have to leave the library and go home. Just to take all materials to the circulation desk. Hm...), a song began to play. But it was not like any other library closing I had heard before...

Hakuna Matata- What a wonderful phrase! Hakuna Matata- ain't no passin' craze!

Best. Library. Closing. Song. Ever.

And I couldn't help but want to dance as I walked down the stairs, through the East and West wings, and out the door. I did manage to call Teags, and left what I can only imagine is the World's Coolest Message on her phone. Because cool things like this just don't happen every day. And that's why this is a reason to love Rexburg.

*in this series, love may or may not be the actual emotion felt, depending on the level of sarcasm of the day.