Lazy by Choice

Beehives

2012-01-21T12:03:00.000-07:00

I know a lot of people are going to think this is weird. I'm prepared for that.

For a long time I have had an idea of selling something online. I have read a lot of books about it, researched it, even attended a little class on it. I am really interested in Search Engine Optimization stuff, which is the process of getting your site to rank well in search engines. I have also figured out how to build websites. I have bought lots of books on these topics and researched it a lot. All I needed was something to sell.

We all know that my dad has been into beekeeping for the last few years. An unusual hobby, for sure, but one that is catching on quickly. There are a lot more beekeepers out there than you would think. In fact, as I have begun to tell people about this new project, people often respond with "Oh, my uncle/cousin/neighbor is a beekeeper."

So thus the idea got started. What if I sold beehives online? Ecommerce generally works best with a niche market. It would be something that I could have made close to home; there are plenty of carpenters looking for work nearby. Beehives can be stored for a long time and can be mailed. It seemed like a good idea. So I'm doing it!

I called the site Lost Creek Bees because some of our beehives are kept up Lost Creek Canyon where my grandpa owns land. You can now visit my "Buy a Beehive" page or my Pictures of Beehives page. The About the Beekeepers page is still being worked on, but you can visit it anyways. And if you want to buy a beehive, go ahead and order. They are still being made but will be done soon.

So there you go. I'll keep you updated on how it goes!

The older I get

2012-01-13T18:35:00.001-07:00

It seems like there a few things out there that increase in pleasure for me proportionally to my age. Meaning, the older I get, the more I like them. Here are a few things:

Sports: Watching sports, reading about sports, going to sporting events, thinking about sports, following people who play sports, playing the sport itself.
Reading the news
Reading non-fiction (love)
Talking to family
Politics: Reading about politics, thinking about politics, debating politics
Fishing
Cooking (latest fad for me is Curry)
Eating Salsa (and I ate a LOT of salsa as a kid)
Going to plays/orchestras/classy events (embarrassed about this one)
Google Earth (Google Earth every Sunday afternoon)
Doodling in church
Getting to know new people
Reading National Geographic (every night before bed. So nerdy)

And things that I grow to dislike more with age:
The BCS
Greasy McDonalds food
Playing Nintendo (sadly)
Halloween (if its even possible to dislike Halloween more than I do now)
Stress
Working out (hahahaha)
Watching TV (not that I ever really did, but now I REALLY don't like it)
Eating Frosted Mini-Wheats (sigh... I miss you too)

Five Crowns Domination

2011-12-31T19:08:00.001-07:00

So I was playing cards ("Five Crowns" to be exact) with my mom, Melodie, and Jay this Christmas break. To give some background to this story, I had pretty much been the dominant force during any family game that had happened recently. This of course irked everyone else, who had constantly been beaten down game after game.
And thus it was with this game. After 5 straight rounds of me "laying down" first, their anger turned to threats that if I kept winning, they were going to kick me out of the game. The next hand... I layed down first again. That's when they kicked me out of the game.
I consider this a badge of honor. Being kicked out of the game for being too good.
And they wouldn't even let me play Ticket to Ride at all today.

Its the most wonderful time of the year

2011-12-22T14:49:00.000-07:00

So I had the awesome opportunity this month to go shopping with the ward for needy families. Our ward raised a bunch of money in a charity auction recently and someone needed to go buy all the stuff for the kids. I'm glad I got invited to come along.Me and another guy were in charge of getting stuff for a 10 year old boy, a 12 year old boy and a 16 year old girl. I felt just fine about the boys, but the girl I was kind of nervous about. How do you try and buy clothes, for example, for a 16 year old girl? What do they like? What do they think about all day? I have to admit this is a demographic that I am very unfamiliar with.By the time it was all done, I was pretty happy with what we got for everyone. So much so that I felt the need to tell everyone about it, and blog about it. We got everyone a movie, 2 awesome books (hello Harry Potter for the girl, Whimpy Kid for the boys, etc), and awesome toys. At least I thought they were awesome, I hope they do too. I got this mini-hoop for the 12 year old, and I loved it so much I got one for myself that is now hanging in my cubicle at work. Thank heavens a girl in my ward volunteered to help us pick out the clothes for the girl. (We received many compliments on our good job with that) ;), and I thought we did good picking out the other stuff we thought she'd like. We got her the book, The Help, so hopefully that goes ok.It turned out pretty great, plus you feel all warm inside when you help out needy families.

Not Cool

2011-12-04T14:55:00.001-07:00

I am generally a healthy person, and I am super grateful for that. I rarely get sick, and when I do it goes away in a few days. It is a huge blessing, but it sure stands out a lot more when I do get sick. Such is the case today.

To make a long story short, my roommate Stan and I both ate something (we still have no idea what) that made for a rough night. I was unable to go to any meetings today, which makes me sad, and now we are both sacked out on the couch like something out of "Night of the Living Dead." I actually am now feeling pretty good, but I sure wasn't a few hours ago.

It's times like this that I am grateful, not only for good health, but for the miracle of modern medicine. I know that even if I were to stay in bad shape for a few days, I could always go to the hospital where the doctors would know what to do. And even if someday I caught something really nasty, the likelihood of major health problems occurring is minimal. I remember always being scared of getting sick while on my mission because I didn't quite know what would happen if I went to the hospital. I don't worry about that here.

A little rest and I'll be back to being awesome in no time.

Whole Foods Diet

2011-11-19T13:27:00.001-07:00

For work this month, they had everyone who wanted make a fitness goal. Since excersise ain't really "my thing", I decided to go with a nutrition goal.

A nutritional goal was good for another reason as well: I have always been curious about how hard it would be to do a strict whole-foods diet. After reading a few great books (aka In Defense of Food), I have been a lot more food conscience.

So I decided to go on a week long whole-foods-only diet. I will tell you how it went.

Here were the rules. I couldn't eat anything (anything!) that was processed. No refined sugar, no refined flour, no Yellow 5, no High Fructose Corn Syrup, no "Natural Flavorings", just plain old fashioned food. That was pretty much the rules.

And so...
Breakfast:
My breakfasts ended up being pretty much the same thing every day: either homemade whole wheat bread with honey, or plain oatmeal. These were both pretty easy to do. I made the bread in the breadmaker and the oatmeal was easy in the microwave.
On Saturday, I went all out and made homemade whole wheat banana pancakes in the blender. They were super easy and delicious. I didn't need to put honey or butter or anything on them to make them good. I got the recipe off the internet. I cooked some bacon to go along with them.

Lunch:
I stuck to homemade lunches, made from scratch. I had "Red Beans and Rice", a favorite of mine with brown rice. I had a chicken noodle soup I made in the crock-pot. I had apples and other fruit. I had leftovers from Sunday dinner, meat and potatoes.

Dinner: Wasn't too bad. I ate a lot of homemade salsa on different things. I had eggs and bacon one night, whole wheat pasta with cheese and salsa another, more fruit, pickles, milk, more brown rice, etc. One night I even had a surprisingly filling banana and raspberry smoothie.

Snacks:
I have now discovered popcorn. Sprinkle on some salt and lightly butter (no margarine). I bought a large container of unsalted peanuts, and they have been great.

It wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be, but it was more inconvenient than I thought, too. It shocked me the number of things I COULDN'T have. The most striking example is when I went to reach for the chicken stock that I usually use to make Red Beans and Rice. I checked over the ingredients almost as a formality, and sure enough, there was "Natural Flavorings" (which are anything but natural). This happened on day 1 of the diet. I took a deep breath, put the chicken stock back in the fridge, and used water instead.
Needless to say, candy was out. I also couldn't go out to get sushi like I wanted to, because of the white rice. 99% of things out of a can or box was out. Halfway through the week, I got tired of homemade salsa and went and bought some expensive canned salsa that took me 10 minutes of scouring the salsa aisle to find.

Conclusions? I concluded that I did feel better and had maybe a little more energy. I felt good about what I had eaten and knew I was making healthy choices. I never once overate during that week. Tortilla chips are usually one of my favorite things but they make me a little sickish afterwards; I never had that feeling once during the week.

However, maybe the "last 5%" isn't worth it. If I were to implement this kind of diet permanently, I would feel fine about cooking usually with brown rice, but eating white rice with sushi at a restaurant. I would feel fine about the occasional modest dessert. In other words, I would feel ok about going 95% of the way with the diet, but the last 5% is probably not really worth it.

Oh. And I lost 2 pounds that week.

NYC part 1

2011-10-26T20:55:00.000-06:00

Melodie and I went to NYC last week. I know you have all been dying to get the details.

We left early Wednesday and got to NYC late that night. We were going to do something cool that night, but we were mostly just tired so we just went to bed. Yea. That's how we roll.

Thursday we went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I was expecting it to be like a 4 out of 10, but I will say that it exceeded expectation. It was more like a 7 out of 10 for me. I was mostly blown away that I actually RECOGNIZED some of the paintings. You know its famous if I actually recognize it. I probably can recognize 20-30 paintings in the world. Welp, some of them were there. Its very interesting to be browsing an art gallery half-asleep and then come across a painting where you are like 'I saw that paining in a book'! And its by this French dude whose name I think I recognize! So that was a good experience. P.S. I swear half the Met is just painted vases. Vases from everywhere. I tried to skip as many vases as possible.
We then walked around Central Park a little, then Melodie went shopping, as is her want. I was ok with it too, because I needed a break. My feet were killing me. In fact, my feet were killing me about 90% of the time. Not used to all that walking.
Thursday night we went and saw Wicked. New favorite musical (except Les Miserables, but that goes without saying). It was fantastic. The story was fun, the music was great, all around good.

Friday we went and saw the Statue and Ellis Island. Funny story: We stood in the eternal security line next to a couple visiting from Paris. They were both learning English, and were eager to chat with us. They liked New York, but they said it was "very different" from where they lived. I told them New York was very different from everywhere. They didn't like the food here; they thought the people were nice; I told them about my mission to Brazil where I learned Portuguese; we told them about the tiny town we come from; they told us about how they had three kids (triplets); etc etc etc. We had a great chat. There was also a sarcastic British dude behind them that kept interjecting with comments during our conversation. At first I thought it was annoying, but then I realized that it was really funny. So many stereotypes playing out.
Friday night we went and had dinner with one of my old roomies.

Saturday we went to the Museum of Modern Art. There was a lot of good stuff there, but there was a lot of DUMB stuff there too. Some of the art was downright idiotic. I wanted to go up to some of the people admiring the art and say "Do you really understand this, or are you just pretending??" But seriously.
Then Melodie did more shopping. As is her want.
Then that night we went to Phantom of the Opera. I like Phantom. Music is great; story line is creepy. It was a great bookend to our vacation.

We flew back super early and spent most of Sunday in a daze. At least I did. Its good to be back. Me and big cities are only casual acquaintances. If I had to live in NYC, I would probably last about... a week. If that.

Give up

2011-10-06T20:39:00.003-06:00

So this spring, I was driving in the car with a few siblings on our way to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. We passed some pretty podunk towns and houses along out way out there. As we passed one especially forsaken stretch of houses, something clicked and I spoke up:

"Ya know, if I ever just give up, I'm moving here. I'll live off the government and eat roadkill and catfish from that river. I won't buy new clothes for the rest of my life, and maybe I'll get a dog. Wouldn't be that bad. I'll probably die of a snakebite when I'm 60."

I personally thought this comment was witty and amusing, as I'm sure everyone else in the car did.

One interesting thing about this is that I find its surprisingly relaxing to do worst case scenarios. On life. Example: OK, first, I go to work tomorrow and get fired. Next, on my way home, my house burns down and I find the because of a technical loophole, I have no fire insurance. Third, for no explainable reason, a "pinch" goes off (like in the family-feature film "Oceans Eleven") and completely wipes out all electronic information at my bank and I lose all my money. Lastly, as I am sitting in the smoldering wreckage of my hopes and dreams, The Shark walks up to me and slaps me on the cheeks. (The reason this would be so devastating is that if only the first three things happened, I would be like "hey, no big deal, I'll just live on The Shark's couch". But if Shark suddenly turned on me, then, and only then, could this be worse case.)

So there is the worst case scenario, but even then life isn't so bad, because I can always go live in a dilapidated farm in No-Wheres-ville, North Carolina.

Or I can move to Montana and build a cabin with my bare hands, and eat trout and berries.

Or I could move to Brazil and sell popsicles on buses. (I swear 50% of Brazilians do this anyways.)

Or I could be one of those guys that walks across America for some humanitarian/ civil rights/ liberal cause.

Doesn't sound so bad. Maybe I'll try and do the Montana thing anyways.

Compliment

2011-09-21T20:24:00.001-06:00

I received an unexpected compliment the other day. I will share.

So I had to run a quick errand at an apartment near BYU campus the other day. I had to park on the street, and of course there was hardly any street parking available. I finally found a spot nearby that looked big enough for my car, and with one quick flick of the wrist, I parallel parked.

As I was coming back to my car a few minutes later, there was a dude walking along the sidewalk right next to where my car was parked. As he saw which car I was getting into, and the narrow gaps that existed between the car in front and back, he smiled and said "Good luck getting out of there!".

I just smiled back and said "Thanks". But what I was screaming inside was "Dude, little do you know I just pulled into this tight spot, on my FIRST TRY!!! Bah ha ha ha ha ha ha!!".

Darrell. The man, the myth, the parallel parking legend.

Really Lazy

2011-09-16T11:33:00.000-06:00

OK, lets get one thing out of the way. I named this blog "Lazy by Choice" because I thought it was funny. Check that, it IS funny. But I actually am not really a lazy person normally. I like to be up getting things done, trying new hobbies, meeting new people, etc etc etc.

Except for the past couple weeks.

These past couple weeks I really have been lazy. Its seems like out of nowhere my energy and ambition have just dropped dramatically. All I really want to do is curl up and take a nap. I'm trying to think of a cause for this sudden shift. Right now I'm blaming it on the rampant allergies that I have been experiencing. Allergies seem to make me tired.

I know its a phase and it won't last long, so I'm trying to enjoy it while its here. Things that used to stress me out haven't been doing so lately. I have a to-do list that I normally keep tabs on, and I have barely looked at it recently. It's great.

Now, I realize that there are pros and cons to this phase. A pro is that I feel relaxed and unhurried. A con is that nothing gets done, and if I were to stay in this phase forever, I would really end up the washed-up loser I have described in previous blog posts.

But I hope this lazy phase sticks around a little longer.

Total. Moron.

2011-08-30T09:10:00.003-06:00

So this morning I took full advantage of an opportunity to make a fool of myself. I never like to let these opportunities slip through my fingers.

The morning begins as usual. Wake up late, get ready, walk downstairs, get lunch from the fridge. I walk out to the car... which isn't there. Anywhere. Its gone. I had a very clear memory of where I parked it when I came home from work, and it wasn't there. It was gone.

I stay cool. I'm the type of person that people from Henefer would say "He'd forget his head if it wasn't attached to his shoulders" and I am fully cognizant of this fact, so I stay cool. I'm like 'surely I moved it and parked it somewhere I don't remember'. So I walk around and try and think what happened. Nothing. Nothing.

After about 5 minutes of this, I come to the realization that my car has now likely been stolen. I sometimes don't lock my car (Oops) and now I was paying the penalty. I get out my phone and call Provo Dispatch. They send over an officer.

This whole time my mind is going a hundred miles an hour, trying to think if I might have taken an evening excursion yesterday and not remembered. The only place I went was to a chapel next to my house last night... but my roommate Stan drove. Surely he drove. I remember that he drove. Right? Yes, surely he drove.

I think it was sometime when I was scanning through my Geico Insurance Policy when it hit me: I had driven the night before. I had gone to the chapel and promptly forgotten that I had driven, and proceeded to get a ride home with someone else. Which caused my car to still be parked at that parking lot.

After calling back the Dispatch and apologizing, my roommate was kind enough to give me a ride to recover my.... stolen.... car.

Wow. That really just happened.

Nephew

2011-08-16T15:55:00.002-06:00

So my sister Natalie had a baby yesterday. He's their #3. I'm not going to give you the name or post any pictures, because I don't want to steal her thunder. She said she's going to do a blog post on it soon, as soon as she gets back from the hospital.

Melodie and I went up last night to the hospital to see her. I think the funniest part of the night was watching Ethan and Libby's reaction to it all. They didn't seem to know or care what was going on. They just knew that people were telling them to stop running around, or jumping on mom, or yelling. And they certainly did not want to be in any pictures.

It was nice to have Nat close by so that we could go see it all. Congrats Nat!

RSL box seats

2011-07-30T22:40:00.002-06:00

So Melodie got some tickets from her work to go to an Real Salt Lake game today. What was special about these tickets is that they were Suite seats. And she let me go with her.

That's right, we were in the seats that usually only rich people get, where you watch the game from behind glass, where you get free food and beverages, and great parking. The price for the tickets was printed on them, and they were literally 14x more than what I paid for tickets last time I went to a Real game. The food was even good, much to our surprise. Which was a good thing because I was hungry. I... ate a lot. I was going to confess here everything I ate but it would gross you out. So I won't.

In the end, the other team won, but the real winners were Melodie and I. Hopefully her boss dishes out more tickets like that in the future.

Podcasts

2011-07-21T14:29:00.002-06:00

I don't know if I've talked about podcasts yet on this blog, but if I have, its worth repeating. I've been into podcasts in a big way lately.

For those of you who don't know what a podcast is, it is basically a half hour "program" where someone will talk about something on a theme. Each week there is a new one that you can download and listen to.

For example, on of my favorites is called Planet Money. Planet money consists of about 3 or 4 reporters each week talking about a different topic around the economy. Last week they did one on the economy of North Korea. The week before it was an interesting podcast about bitcoins. Its the same people each week which makes it nice.

Here are my favorite podcasts. I subscribe to them through iTunes, it is really easy to do.
Planet Money
Stuff You Should Know
Freakonomics
Radiolab

Boring

2011-07-11T11:56:00.002-06:00

Here is a confession. Its a confession about a personality quirk.

I think my threshold for boredom is below the level for most human beings. Meaning, I get bored easy. This was brought to my attention once again the other day when I was making an hour and a half drive, and I couldn't find anything entertaining on the radio. I finally ended up listening to the BBC on AM radio.

(Aside - I love AM radio. Give me talk radio any day. )

Its the little things where I get bored. I was painting the other day with the fam and I found that almost the second I started painting I wished I had a book on tape or some Jack Johnson blasting in my ear. If I'm doing something mindless at work I am not content if I don't have a book on tape or podcast going.

I also have little patience for boring or poorly made movies. Most movies I like just fine but there is a small handful that I really can't sit there and watch.

Now, I don't think that I necessarily have ADD or anything. I think it just stems more from the fact that I have like 1000 books that I want to read, slash, things I want to do that sometimes I get ansy to get done with the current project and move to the next.

Of course, this comes from the same guy that can sit for hours fishing and loves listening to soccer on the radio. Huh. Maybe I'm not bored. Just weird.

Blood Donation

2011-06-21T08:32:00.002-06:00

Let me just say up front that this story embarrasses me. I hate that I am this way. And yet I'm still willing to share this story with all of you. That's the kind of dedication I have.

So I go to donate blood yesterday. Read the little booklet, fill out the form, get my finger pricked, etc and they finally put me in the chair. They stick me and I'm off to the races. I had filled the little bag up halfway in like three minutes.

Now let me pause here to say that I wasn't sure how this was going to go. The last time I gave blood was like 3 years ago, and all I remember from that is that I had to lay down on the floor like a stooge for like 15 minutes afterwards because I was so lightheaded. Little did I know.

So about 8 minutes in, I am sitting there chatting with the Red Cross dude when I start to feel a tingling in my toes. I think 'that's not good'. The tingling then appears in my fingers, and I start getting nauseous. I break out in a cold sweat. I then say to the worker guy "Uhhh... I'm feeling really sick and I'm going to pass out." He immediately springs into action and props my feet up more, puts ice bags behind me and on top of me, and goes and gets a barf bag in case I lose it (having him hold a bag over my face was probably the most embarrassing part). By this time I'm looking like a ghost, and my vision is starting to swim. I am in a bad way.

He tells me "ok, cough really hard". I start doing so, and I can feel myself starting to feel slightly better. I then give it all I got and start coughing hard. He explaines to me that coughing gets your circulation up, and it was working for me. So after about 3 minutes of me on the brink of unconsciousness, I finally start to pull out of it. I get a little color back in the face, and THANK HEAVENS by this time, the bag has been filled.

I lay in the chair for another 10 minutes, then I went and slammed 5 (yes, 5) of the free juice things. And I finally felt better.

Makes me feel like a total whimp.

Remodeling

2011-06-12T18:44:00.002-06:00

This week I got my first taste of remodeling a house. It was a lot cooler than I thought it would be.

This came about because the family recently acquired my Uncle's house. It is somewhat of an old house and we thought it would be great to remodel the bathrooms, redo some of the walls, do new carpet, and make some adjustments in the kitchen.

We started by ripping out the carpet and hauling it to the dump. We then made many more trips to the dump after we cleaned out the backyard, ripped off some of the walls, and demolished one of the bathrooms. Granted, this was a day of demolition which any dude would enjoy, but it is cathartic to tear down something with plans to rebuild it more awesome. Its kind of like mowing the lawn. You get the satisfaction of your yard looking better.

So I'm pumped about remodeling this house.

Back in the Saddle

2011-06-03T20:04:00.002-06:00

I know I've been missing from the blogging world lately. I have thought of a whole legion of excuses for this behavior, but the real reason is that I was just lazy. Let's be honest with each other.

But to recap, I was in the Outer Banks with the fam, then I actually ended up driving back (long story). An interesting tidbit from the drive back was that I actually ended up in Missouri the day that tornado came through and destroyed that town. We caught the north end of that storm, which was the right end to catch. We simply had to suffer through golf-ball sized hail and blinding rain. I looked over at mom during the hail storm and she said "We're going to be pulverized in here!" And we really thought we were.

This last Monday (Memorial Day) I threw a bbq at the house. We invited the whole ward, and everyone else that wanted to come. We really didn't know who was going to show because it was on Memorial Day, and people generally are doing other stuff. Turns out we had like 60 people show. It was awesome. Lots of people brought stuff and we had seriously twice as much food as we needed. Lots of leftovers.

On an unrelated note, I am really excited that I am writing this blog post from my front porch! It is now (almost) warm enough to sit outside and "porch".

Porch (verb): To sit outside on one's porch.

I'm super pumped for summer.

Sushi

2011-05-06T12:15:00.002-06:00

Why has all my blogging lately been about food? That's weird.

Anyways, yesterday me and some people went out to sushi. That's right. Raw fish. I had never really indulged myself before in the joys of sushi, (I had only skimmed the surface) so I was somewhat apprehensive. But I was going with people that knew their sushi business, so that emboldened me.

Can I just say it was fantastic. We ordered 12 rolls for 5 of us, and everyone dove in and loved it. My favorite was called the "Wasatch", which was a simple rice-seaweed-tuna combo. Wow.

A total success. I'm jumping on the sushi bandwagon.

Rosemary Bread Part 2

2011-04-25T21:59:00.002-06:00

This post is just to confirm that I'm still not over how delicious the Rosemary Bread is. It still continues to blow my mind. And everyone who tries it.

Nat called me a few days after I posted the recipe and told me about how everyone at her house gobbled it up. Me and some people Saturday cleaned up almost an entire loaf. Eating it with olive oil and Balsamic vineagar makes it even better.

Try it.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Super-Easy-Rosemary-Bread-Machine-Bread/Detail.aspx

The weekend of food

2011-04-18T09:31:00.003-06:00

This was the weekend of food.

It started off with a bang when I went to my bishop's house on Friday night with my BFF neighbor Tracy (that's what we refer to each other as). Our bishop's wife is from Thailand and is a great cook, and back in December I had bid in a charity auction for dinner at the bishop's house. Best idea ever. She made like 10 native Thai dishes, and it was all that we and the two other couples could do to made a dent in the delicious food. I ate way too much, let's be honest with each other. Highlights: two kinds of curry and spring rolls. Wow. It was great.

Then Saturday mom and dad came down and visited Melodie and I. (Steph was not around). We went out to Brick Oven. Great pizza. Ate way too much.

Then Sunday was the proverbial icing on the cake. Due to us having stake conference at 2 p.m., a group of friends and I had "Classy Breakfast". This consisted of like 10 fantastic breakfast dishes. Highlights: Delicious egg concoction in ramekins, scones, some kind of Latino strawberry drink, and brown sugar grapefruit. For the third day in a row, I ate until I could hold no more. Sidenote: We could only discuss classy things at this classy breakfast. Things like classical music, art, and general high-brow subjects were encouraged. This was more of a challenge for some of us than others.

That's a great weekend.

Guitar

2011-04-09T20:48:00.002-06:00

So I play guitar. And by "play" I mean "hack at the". But what I lack in raw talent I make up for in loudness. As Dave Barry would say, my talent to noise ratio is very high.

I taught myself guitar about 10-ish years ago. I just taught myself a few simple things and haven't progressed much from there. I've played on an off during that time. I also sing along now with most of the stuff, and I'm just trying to be objective here: I am *probably* the most terrible singer you will ever hear. If you have the misfortune to hear.

Being a guitar hack is fun, which is why I have made this lifestyle choice.

I called the police today

2011-04-05T22:16:00.002-06:00

... To report a malfunctioning stoplight.

Now that I work in the "traffic industry" (I put that in quotes to make it sound more legit) I now have less patience for bad traffic lights than I did before, if such a thing is possible.

So this particular stoplight in question was, two weeks ago, green for about 3 seconds at a time, and this was along a heavily trafficked street at rush hour. About 5 cars could get through at a time. It took me 8 minutes to get through the light. I was really mad.

So I saw the same thing happening again today, and without hesitation at all I pulled out my phone and called the Provo Police (not 911). 30 seconds later, they had a squad car on the way. I, by this time, had cut through a parking lot and averted the problem.

But it made me feel warm inside to know that I'm helping the flow of traffic on the job and off the job too.

Rosemary bread

2011-03-28T09:17:00.005-06:00

I made rosemary bread in my breadmaker last Saturday for some friends, and it was a smashing hit. It was easy easy easy, and it is really good.

It was such a hit that I made another loaf yesterday morning, and as soon as we got home from church, me and the roommates ate the whole thing. In like 5 mins. So then I made another loaf. Which I am eating some of right now.

We discovered that it is extra delicious dipped in olive oil or balsamic vinegar. In fact, right now I am just eating it plain, and it is still delicious. How have I not discovered this until now?

P.S. By popular request, here is the recipe: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Super-Easy-Rosemary-Bread-Machine-Bread/Detail.aspx

BYU basketball in the basement

2011-03-21T12:03:00.002-06:00

So, as we all know, the BYU basketball team is having a great year. They have the best player in college basketball on their team, and they have so far gone further in the tournament than they have in 30 years. This was a great year to have inherited a projector in the basement.

So the madness started early in the season when BYU went to UNLV, and they game was being shown on CBSC. CBSC is an obscure channel that no one gets, so I sent out an email on the ward email list inviting people over to watch the game that didn't have the channel. One thing led to another, and pretty soon every away game I was inviting the ward over to watch the game at my house.

Things really got out of hand when BYU and SDSU played in the MWC championship. I probably had 25 people in the basement all cheering. But things really came to a head last Saturday during the Gonzaga game, when I counted around 27 people in the basement, all freaking out during the game. There were even a few people that came that literally couldn't find anywhere to sit, so they decided to abort. It was awesome to watch the game with that many people.

And it helps when Jimmer is life size on the wall, projected in front of you.

New blog

2011-03-14T21:17:00.002-06:00

So I decided to start a new blog in addition to this blog. This is going to be a picture blog where I post a picture every week or so.

This will give me a chance to display some of the pictures that I have been working on with my cool new software. The link is on the right.

Enjoy!

Taxes

2011-03-08T09:12:00.002-07:00

Doing my taxes for me is like the perfect storm of awfulness.

A) I really dislike organizational secretarial work.
B) There is pressure to do it right.
C) It makes me sad inside how much I have to pay for taxes.
D) It takes forever.
E) Its hard.
F) My taxes were really complicated this year. I
1) bought a house
2) had rental income
3) bought and sold stock (this one was a mess)
4) started a business
5) It seems like there were a few more nightmare things that my mind is already trying to forget

PS
Did you know that income tax evasion is the charges by which they could finally catch Al Capone? Apparently there wasn't enough hard proof of any of the other stuff he was involved in. So that's pretty interesting.

I'm a washed-up loser.

2011-02-23T22:41:00.003-07:00

The other day my brother came home from his mission (Yea! Welcome Home!) and he and my other brother started wrestling in the front room that night. I was lounging in the family room at that time. Melodie heard the wrestling begin and she turned to me.

"Dar, you should go in there and remind them who is boss."

Me, looking into the front room.
"I... can't."

"Why, Dar?" (Laughing expression)

Frowny face. Sad voice. Lowered head. "I'm a washed- up loser."

Now don't get me wrong, I think I could still give B a run for his money. I will never concede that B is tougher than me. He beat me a couple of months ago when I was sick and now he thinks he's all tough.
But Mr. Returned Missionary is like the young male baboon that challenges the aged alpha male's dominance in the troop. It is the circle of life. There comes a point when the young and strong rise up and the old and weak shrink away. And it sure doesn't help that he has a good 2 inches on me and probably 30 pounds. *Sigh*.

Yea. That's me in the foreground with the LOSER sign pointing at him. In case you didn't get that part.

What I think about all day

2011-02-19T13:28:00.006-07:00

Probably one of the most frequent questions I get asked is: Darrell, what does an incredible mind like yours think about all day long? What is the day to day workings of your grey matter? What do you focus on, what do you really ponder on each day??

I'm now happy to reveal the answer. In pie chart form.

I would say this gives a rough average. Obviously it fluctuates depending on circumstances. Fore example, on game day BYU sports goes up to 99%, where I try to keep 1% free for things like food and water. Or, if Martha has just nailed me good on facebook, then I'd say "Funny things to write on people's Facebook walls" goes up to like 90%. So you can see how it fluctuates.

Right now crock potting is way up there. I went to a cooking class this morning (long story) and now I am totally pumped to get back in the proverbial crock-pot saddle.

Car lengths

2011-02-10T21:45:00.002-07:00

Need to know how long a car is? I can tell you, just by looking at it. In a fraction of a second. But seriously.

Try me.

Volkswagen Jetta: 14.5 ft
Ford F-150: 16.5 (no cab) 17.5 (Dual cab) ft
PT Cruiser: 14.3 ft
Honda Civic: before about 2006: 14 ft. After: 15 ft
Chevy Blazer: 15 ft
Geo Metro: 13 ft.
Dodge Ram, extended cab and bed: 22 ft
Semi-truck, regular size: 60 ft
etc etc etc

I just did all those off the top of my head.

How, you are asking yourself, did I gain such a useful skill set? I have been carefully honing my skills at work, hour after hour, looking at cars and then recording their lengths.

See, I work for a company that does traffic sensors. The sensor will record the length, speed, and lane of a car (don't worry, it doesn't record the license plate). In order for us to measure how accurate our sensor records lengths, we have to know how long the car actually is, and then we can compare that to what our sensor recorded. Well, someone has to go through hours of video tape and carefully record the exact length of each car. And that person is me.

So, keep hitting me.

Jeep Wrangler: 14 ft
Jeep Liberty: 15 ft
Jeep Cherokee: 15 ft
Chevy Suburban: 19 ft
etc etc etc

I just keep dreaming that someday this meaningless skill will come in incredibly handy.

Projector meets Nature

2011-02-03T22:13:00.002-07:00

So I have a projector and surround sound set up in my basement. It came with the house. The projector projects on the wall, and it takes up a good 75% of the wall. It is a pretty cool little setup. It is good for watching sports, great for watching movies, good for watching youtube clips, but... where it really shines is when we pop in the nature documentaries.

Don't laugh. Because the people that have seen a nature documentary on my setup know that is actually really really cool. We watch Planet Earth, Life, Nature's Most Amazing Events, and Blue Planet. For example, there is one shot in Planet Earth where they are in a helicopter and they pan over the top of Angel Falls. One second, they are following a normal looking river along, and the next minute, the ground basically falls away to an enormous breathtaking green valley, where you can see the mist from waterfall just beneath. It is amazing.

Or my personal favorite where they somehow set up cameras in and avalanche path, then triggered the avalanche. For about a full minute, the wall turns into an avalanche rushing towards your face. The first time i saw it I watched it 3 times.

You've never seen a nature documentary until you've seen it on a projector.

360 photo of Panorama Point

2011-01-28T18:14:00.003-07:00

Here is one of my favorite 360's that I've taken. I took it while in Capitol Reef National Park last October, while I was there with some friends. I used Photoshop to clean it up and Lightroom really made it look nice. Fittingly, the place is called Panorama Point.

Panorama Point, Capitol Reef National Park, Utah in Utah

How long does it take to toast a pop-tart?!

2011-01-26T16:21:00.003-07:00

One of my favorite Brian Regan clips of all time:

"People don't have that kind of time? Who doesn't have time to toast a pop-tart?"

I think one of the reasons I like this video so much is that I often think of it day-to-day whenever I feel hurried doing something that I really want to do. For example, if I'm sitting around chatting with a friend, but thinking in the back of my mind of something else I "should" be doing, I remember Brian Regan. How long does it take to chat with a friend? 'People don't have that kind of time?' Yes, I look into the philosophical with Brian Regan skits.

Another thing that reminds me of this skit is when I call a girl to go out with me, and it is a scheduling nightmare to find a time that works for her. Now I realize that much of the time she just is trying to find an excuse not to go out, (and I'm fine with that, whatever), but I feel like sometimes these girls really wouldn't mind going out but are ridiculously over scheduled. I just want to yell at them: "This date will take an hour! Who doesn't have time to toast a pop tart!? If you seriously don't have one hour in the next week, maybe you need to loosen up your schedule."

So let us all take Brian Regan to heart, and make sure we have time to toast our metaphorical pop-tarts.

Quality

2011-01-20T12:13:00.002-07:00

Here is a quirk about me. "Quality" has never really resounded with me. I haven't seemed to internalize the idea.

It has always been for me that 'you tell me what needs to get done and let's hack our way to getting this thing done'. 'Hack' is a great word for it. For example, in piano. I have never really been into dynamics, or fingering, or note perfection, or staccatos, or any of that. I only have ever been concerned in whatever gets the song out of the piano. Sort of 'lets just learn the notes and move on' type of thing. I only care about the details when it is important for getting to the finish line. Another example: clothes. If they cover my body, are comfortable, and Melodie/Mom don't complain, then we're good.

This has come to my attention because photography is becoming a hobby of mine. But I'm starting to realize that artzy things like photography naturally clash with the personality trait of mine. Photography is about details, getting it to look nice, patiently waiting for all the right conditions; and there isn't really a finish line in photography, its just kind of 'how good can I make this look' type of thing. By nature I just want to be like "Lets just take a picture and get on with it" but I'm realizing I may have to not be that way.

So I'm a hack. In true hack fashion, I'm not going to reread/edit this blog post now that I'm done writing it. Its done, lets move on.

California Dreamin'

2011-01-13T21:02:00.002-07:00

Dang, it has been so cold and dark this last week.

But when I look outside at the barren frozen wilderness, there is good news: this is the worst of it.

And not only that, I remind myself that there are places that look like this:

Not only that, but here in a few I am going to Cali Cali to a friends wedding. Granted, its not going to be Tahiti by any means, but it will be a nice break from the tundra.

The Break

2011-01-06T09:01:00.002-07:00

Christmas break this year was great. Every year I get a week break from work, from Christmas to New Years. This year I went to Idaho (aka, the land of freezing icy cold wind) with select members of the fam to visit the cousins up there. It was awesome!

Why was it awesome? Can there be anything better than laying around, chatting with fun people, playing extreme volleyball at the church, not having to worry about, well, anything?

Ok, I guess there can. Laying around, chatting with fun people, playing extreme volleyball, not having to worry, AND having it warm outside. Because that was definitely not the case where I was.

In unrelated news, go Cougar basketball. Great win last night.

Adobe

2010-12-31T14:58:00.006-07:00

I just got some new software from Adobe and I'm super pumped about it.

I got Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop. I have just begun with Photoshop but I have gotten into Lightroom. It is so cool! The difference between Photoshop and Lightroom is that with Photoshop it is mostly drawing and modifying on the photo. Lightroom is just making your pictures look great. Its like iPhoto on steroids.

Here are some before/after samples from Lightroom:

Its great.

I also got Dreamweaver but it hasn't come yet. That is software for making webpages. Once that comes I am ... going to make a great webpage.

Gift Giving

2010-12-24T19:34:00.002-07:00

Confession: I *might* be the worst gift-giver in the history of the planet.

I rely solely on Melodie for my gift giving needs. If Melodie does not help me, I am as helpless as a small child in this area.

Here is a common conversation between Melodie and I:
Melodie: It's Nat's birthday tomorrow.
Me: Crud! It's already April!
Melodie: Did you get her a gift?
Me: (dumb look) Gift?
Melodie: Yea, like a gift for her birthday.
Me: Oh right! Crud! I always forget about these things!
Melodie: Well, you'll be happy to know that I got her something, and its in the mail. I knew you'd forget so I told her it was from you and me. You owe me $30.
Me: Thank you thank you thank you.

Or again:
Me: Melodie, I got Mom's name for Christmas. How do I handle this situation?
Melodie: Well, what would you like to get her?
Me: *thinking*... She might like an air-soft gun? Maybe like a gift card?
Melodie: Those are the worst ideas ever.
Me: Oh, right. Well, what should I get?
Melodie: How about I just get something and wrap it and put her name on it. I'll just have you pay me.
Me: K. Try not to make it more than $30.

Let me just apologize in advance if I ever have to get a reader of this blog a gift. It's really not because I'm ultra dumb, or thoughtless, or I really think that you love air-soft guns. I just have a block in my brain that severely impairs me in this area.

BYU football independence

2010-12-15T15:28:00.006-07:00

Allow me to be a gloomy black raincloud for a second. I'm going to point out a flaw in BYU football independence.

So it was reported today that BYU has ALREADY accepted bowl invites for the next two years, providing that 1) they are bowl eligible and 2)They don't get a BCS bid. You may think to yourself "great! What's wrong with this?" I am going to point out that this is definitely not great. Because this just means that I already know exactly what is going to happen with our football team. This really just kills any merit-based reward that I can cheer the team on towards.

Before, at least we had a conference that we were always striving to win, and that gave me something to follow as a fan. After we went independent, that went down the drain, but I was like, well, at least as independents we can work towards getting in a decent bowl game. Now that has been stripped away too.

Allow me to show you exactly how next season is going to go:

Sept. 3 -- at Ole Miss
Sept. 10 -- at Texas
Sept. 17 -- Utah
Sept. 23 - Central Florida

These first 4 will be fun games to watch, for sure, but we are sure to lost at least one. Fair enough? That kills us from getting a shot at the BCS.

Then look what happens:
Sept. 30 -- Utah State---------BLOWOUT
Oct. 8 -- San Jose State------BLOWOUT
Oct. 15 -- at Oregon State-----mild interest
Oct. 22 -- Idaho State----------BLOWOUT
Nov. 5 -- at Louisiana Tech---BLOWOUT
Nov. 12 -- Idaho-----------------BLOWOUT
Nov. 19 -- New Mexico State---BLOWOUT
Dec. 3 -- at Hawaii--------------BLOWOUT

So, we are going to finish the season with around 2 losses, maybe be ranked around 25th in the polls, and then we are going to go to the Poinsetta bowl. There, I just told you how the season is going to go. Sports should be about the excitement of uncertainty.

Besides getting our games broadcast on BYUtv (which will be great), I am unconvinced that I have gained a lot as a fan from going independent.

Kicking rear at the Ward Christmas Auction

2010-12-14T14:37:00.003-07:00

So yesterday was our ward Christmas Charity Auction. Basically the idea is that everyone signs up to do an act of service for someone, and then everyone bids on that item. For example, I offered to cook someone dinner in the crock-pot, and then everyone bids on that item and the proceeds go to charity.

So this year I decided that it was no-holds-barred. And I took away some fantastic stuff.

Most notably, I got some fresh homemade wheat bread made by our Bishop's wife. I had it for breakfast this morning and it BLEW MY MIND. I am going to go out on a limb here and say its the best wheat bread that I can ever remember having. Wow. So worth it. So worth it.

I also took home:
10 lbs of grass-fed beef (for $20. A steal!)
Homemade cinnamon rolls
2 tickets to the Jazz
A Thai dinner (also cooked by the Bishops wife... you have no idea how excited I am for this)
A cheesecake
A curry dinner

I defiantly am feeling great about all these things. Plus, all the money is going to a good cause, so double whammy on the goodness.

Maybe that's my problem

2010-12-01T09:05:00.006-07:00

So today I visited my friend Cabeza's blog. That is where I found out about this site urlai.

According to Urlai, the blog "Lazy by Choice", quote, "is probably written by a female somewhere between 26-35 years old. The writing style is personal and happy most of the time."

Crap.

I sound like a woman on my blog?! Is that why no girls like me? Do they read my blog and think, "this is a pretty weak-sauce dude"? Do potential employers see this and think "things just aren't adding up with this guy?"

And I also like the line of reasoning: 'This blog is personal and happy. Therefore, the only conclusion we can draw is that it is written by a woman. Since everyone knows that men are incapable of happiness.'

Hopefully since I used the word "crap" earlier on in this post, that will lower me down on the "personal and happy" scale, and I maybe I can do this test again and it will think I'm a dude.

P.S. Obviously urlai does not take into account the profile pictures of the blogs. Because I'm pretty sure very few girls on the planet would make their profile picture a picture of Jason Bourne with things blowing up all around him.

Books Twice

2010-11-24T22:00:00.002-07:00

I have this thing. Its where I read books twice. In a row. Also I do this with podcasts and conference talks, and any other thing of this nature.

Not all books, just books that I really like. The thing is that I probably understand it, no joke, 5 times better the second time reading it. Especially books that contain a lot of information. It seems like a totally different book the second time I read it.

Some books in my little collection I had read 4 times in the past 2 years. OK, I can only think of one, "China Road". Wait, "The Alchemist" too. Wait, "In Defense of Food" too. So maybe more like 3. But most books I own I have read at least twice.

Anyways, reading books twice is the way to go.

Dear Google

2010-11-18T10:29:00.002-07:00

Dear Google,
You make my life so easy. Some people say you are taking over the world. I say, bring it on.

Please keep being awesome and providing wonderful free services.

Sincerely,
Darrell

Google Earth, here I come

2010-11-12T09:52:00.002-07:00

Some of you know that I have a minor obsession with Google Earth. It started about 2 years ago. Since then I probably spend about 2 hours a week or more looking at different parts of the globe. I love looking at the pictures, the landscape, the cities, everything. I then read the Wikipedia articles about random places to learn more about them.

But about a year ago, a new Google Earth obsession started.

There is a feature in G.E. that is like pictures on steroids. It is called "360 cities". The idea of 360 cities is very simple. Instead of just looking at a normal picture of something, you actually fly into a viewer that will show you everything around where that person was standing. So the person will take a boatload of pictures of everything around him, stitch them together, and you can look around in 360 degrees and see everything that he saw. It is awesome!

Well, I would like to announce that as of yesterday, I am now an official Google Earth 360 cities contributer. I finally got my pictures onto Google Earth! I had to sign up with 360 cities, buy some expensive stitching software, meticulously discover how to take good panoramics, publish them in 360 cities, and then wait for months to have them reviewed for Google Earth by a panel. And this week they passed the panel, and now the show up on Google Earth. I'm super excited about it.

So, if you are interested in seeing them (slash, seeing my name show up in Google Earth), open G.E. and enable 360 cities. This is done by going to the "Layers" window, maximizing the "Gallery" menu, and enabling "360cities". Then, type in Provo, Utah into the search bar. When you get to Provo, look for a red button-thingy up by the where the temple is that says "360" on it. Then click on it, and then click on the image that pops up. You should fly into the image and be able to look around. Woot woot!

For more viewing pleasure, right after you click on the red "360", click on my name. It will take you to a page that will show you all of the panoramic pictures I have done. Right on!

Favorite Websites

2010-11-08T13:39:00.003-07:00

OK, so here's how it works. Using Firefox, my one and only web browser, I am going to type all the letters of the alphabet one by one into the URL bar and see what pops up. These websites that pop up first will be the website that I most visit starting with that letter.

A: Audible.com, honorable mention Amazon.com
B: Bing, honorable mention byucougars.com
C: CNN.com (I hate that this popped up, I really don't like CNN)
D: Desnews, honorable mention dilbert.com
E: ESPN
F: fishingwithworms (of course), honorable mention facebook.com
G: GrooveShark, honorable mention Goodreads
H: Hittite.com (boring)
I: iGoogle (home page)
J: JetBlue (I have been here a total of twice, guess J's are very common)
K: ksl.com (love the classifieds)
L: Yahoo News... don't know why this came up for L... maybe its because I visit this website nonstop
M: Yahoo Mail (my yahoo email would be one of my horcruxes)
N: Yahoo News, honorable mention National Organization for Marriage (I give money to NOM all the time, I love those guys)
O: Yahoo News, again (looking away sheepishly)
P: PcbFabExpress.com
Q: Questar Gas (lame)
R: RottenTomatoes (which is weird because I feel like I've been to this website maybe 3 times total)
S: San Francisco Bay Area News
T: This American Life (wouldn't have it any other way)... PS If you haven't yet discovered This American Life podcasts, they are great.
U: UtahRealEstate (I'm a burgeoning real estate tycoon)
V: VerizonWireless (everytime I visit this site I prepare myself for a customer service nighmare)
W: Wikipedia (I would have been horrified if it would have been anything else, I love Wikipedia)
X: Yahoo News... I happen to read the news A LOT
Y: YouTube
Z: Zions Bank

Now you all know the websites that I most visit.

Anticlimactic

2010-11-02T09:09:00.004-06:00

So I went to vote today. I knew it was going to fail. In the back of my mind, I just knew there was going to be some hiccup that would prevent me from voting. I just knew it.

I get to the voting place, which was in an elementary school. (Yea that was weird). I go in, wait in line, and then show them my ID. The look around for my name that was supposed to be on the list they had... and looked... and looked... my name wasn't on the list.

So then, they had to take me into a special room, and two different people tried to explain what I had to do now, which was fill out this special form, and then I had to show them both where I had lived before and where I lived now, and ask me 100 times why I didn't live at the address on my drivers license (Henefer, where I haven't lived for 9 years) and gave me a special ballot, and reminded me that I needed to re-register when I moved and bla bla bla bla bla.

The thing that was going through my head the whole time was Brian Regan's "Its just going to be a big nightmare. That's our policy."

So the upshot was that I did vote, but for my vote to count I need to show a proof of residency to the county clerk by next Monday. Problem is, after today, the voting is over and the winners are basically declared. Jason Chaffetz and Mike Lee will have already packed their bags and filled out a change of address form. So its basically useless for me to take that extra step (which I will probably do anyways, just so I can say I voted for real).

But at least I still got an "I voted" sticker.

Live like you were dying = bad idea

2010-10-27T15:01:00.003-06:00

I've had a cynical streak recently with regards to cutesy sayings/stories along the lines of "Live each day as if it were your last" and "treat everyone like you were never going to see them again" and "live like you were dying".

I know the point of these cutesy sayings/stories is to make us slow down, cherish our relationships, and accomplish our goals. But in reality it really doesn't do any of that. Let's be honest. When we hear these things it mostly just makes us feel guilty. It just reminds us of things that we feel like we should be somehow doing, but since we really don't understand/want to do those things, we just feel guilty until mercifully we forget about the story.

And what we would do if we only had a short time to live would be really bad ideas for us, who in reality plan to keep living. For example, if the doctor told me today that I have exactly one year to live, I would do the following:
1. Liquify all my assets.
2. Quit my job.
3. Buy a beamer.
4. Give up trying to get a girlfriend.
5. Take my friends to Tucanos once a week.
6. Take an extended vacation to the Caymans with my family.
7. Eat a lot of pie/ice cream/junk food/etc etc etc.
8. Etc with the riotous living.

So, if I'm really going to live like I'm dying, I am now effectively broke, jobless, fat, and lazy, and I have no girlfriend and no prospects.

So thank you, cutesy 'live like you were dying' story.

Homemade Salsa

2010-10-25T13:08:00.002-06:00

I have been really into homemade salsa recently. As in, I eat it every day. What could be better than delicious healthy homemade salsa?

At the risk of being sued by my mom, I am about to divulge the recipe.

Tomotoes (3 or 4)
Onions (1)
Peppers (like 1)

Chop up and add:

1 TB brown sugar
1/4 cup vinegar
Salt to taste, about 1 TB
1 tsp cumin

Eat and enjoy. Its almost better on day 2 than it is on day 1, cause the flavors mix.

Dudes

2010-10-07T20:39:00.002-06:00

I had a funny thing happen yesterday that made me glad I'm a dude.

Me and about 5 coworkers went out to the loading dock at my work to help unload a few things. As we made our way across the manufacturing floor we could see up in front of us a large weigher that the shipping department uses to weigh shipments. We all slowed down looking at it, and then all looked at each other. We then did the only natural thing that a bunch of dudes do: We all took turns standing on it while our exact weight was shown in big red numbers off to the side. (Keep in mind that I work with a bunch of middle aged guys, not all of whom are always in peak physical condition). As the last dude, and obviously the heaviest, got on the scale, he told us "You guys are weak. I've got you all beat". As his numbers shot past all of ours, everybody started cheering and clapping like he had just won some sort of competition. It was hilarious.

Being a dude. It's the little things.

Christmas

2010-10-01T15:06:00.004-06:00

OK

So I heard from a reliable source (Melodie) that Costco apparently has already ushered in the Christmas season with gobs of decorations, gifts, etc, for your purchasing pleasure. Its not going to be long before the rest of corporate America follows.

I am already repulsed.

Let's get one thing straight: Christmas is my favorite holiday, I look forward to it every year, I'm excited to go home and see family and get people gifts and eat turkey and the whole works.

BUT

I am determined this year that what happened last year will not happen. Last year I got so deluged by X-mas "crap" (Let me define "crap" here: Advertisements) that it totally turned my off to the whole season. Seriously. I was looking forward to Christmas being over so I didn't have to deal with the inundation by corporate America upon all my senses day after day. And I was disappointed that I had this attitude. I don't want to have Christmas ruined by Christmas marketing.

So this year I am not going to "do" Christmas at all until December 17th. AT ALL. No Christmas music. Ignore all ads. No Christmas stories, no Muppets Christmas Carol, no White Christmas, no Bing Crosby, no caroling, no candy canes, no graham cracker houses, no anything. Christmas does not exist in any form, in any way, until December 17th. I make an exception for the First Pres Christmas Devotional, but that's it. After the deadline, I'm going to be so full of joy and goodwill that it will scare you, but not until then.

I feel so good about my decision. I am going to enjoy Christmas this year.

Utah Valley Property Managment

2010-09-20T19:03:00.002-06:00

So I've been thinking about starting up a small business for awhile now. The reason being that I've already been managing my parent's condo here in Provo for awhile now, and its not too bad. I felt like I dealt with enough landlords (good and bad) while at BYU that now I can be at least a decent landlord. So now I think I'm going to take the whole property management thing to a new level. And call it Utah Valley Property Management. Isn't that a great name?

So, if you know of anyone that needs a killer landlord for their BYU condo, let me know! I'll give them a great deal and their tenants will love me for just being a normal human being with them. I feel like resonable landlords in Provo are a rare commodity.

Remember the part where

2010-09-16T17:15:00.003-06:00

So the funniest thing I can think of right now is the phrase: "Remember the part where..." and then you fill in the rest with anything you want. For example, you go up to your friend who owes you $20 and say, "Hey, Isaac, remember the part where you owe me $20?" And then he is free to reply with "Remember the part where I paid for your gas on that trip we took??" and then I am free to respond with "Yea, but remember the part where that trip was before you owed me $20?" And etc etc. I feel that this phrase can be a great way to bring up awkward subjects.

A minor variation on this theme is the phrase "Remember that one time..." This is best used to throw a new light on a situation you are in. For example, if you have been waiting for your pizza for like 1/2 hour and are bored, you say in a slightly perturbed voice "Remember that one time we waited for our pizza for like 27 hours??" Or, lets say you have been watching 'Planet Earth' for the last three hours with your roomies, you can say "Remember that one time we watched 3 episodes of Planet Earth at once?"

I feel like these phrase can be an effective way for people to think you are cool. It worked for me once.

b-ball

2010-09-10T12:26:00.003-06:00

So it seems like lately I have been playing a lot of pick-up basketball. I played with some wardies last night and some co-workers at noon. It just seems like I am always playing. Maybe its just an illusion because I have played a lot in the last 2 weeks.

I'm glad that people play and invite me to play because this is pretty much my exercise.

That and I'm still chasing my dream of playing in the NBA.

Bread

2010-09-08T10:44:00.002-06:00

So Melodie and I had a Labor Day bread-making palooza. Aka Melodie just mostly taught me how to make bread by hand. Isn't she smart? Who does these things?

Ok, actually most dedicated housewives probably know how to make bread from scratch, but its something that I've been wanting to learn for awhile. So now I'm really excited to try it out for myself.

Next step: cinnamon rolls.

College Football 2010

2010-09-02T11:50:00.002-06:00

College Football starts today. This means two things:
1) The world is right.
2) The blog posts about college football will start again.

Which I know everyone is excited about. I know I'm excited about it.

Piano

2010-08-22T18:33:00.003-06:00

So the piano tuner came this week to tune the 100 year old piano that now resides in my front room. I was looking forward to this because the piano was badly out of tune. It had been sitting in my parents house for the last 5-ish years, before that had been in Grandma and Grandpa's house for some 30 years, and before that had been in the Coalville church house. I was looking forward to returning this great piano to its former glory.

But I got bad news. The tuner began twisting the pegs that held the strings, and some of the pegs wouldn't really hold in place. Many of them were loose. He said this sort of thing could be repaired... for $800. Almost the price of a decent used piano.

So we reached a compromise. Since there are three strings to each note, he put a damper in that dampened the two outside strings of the problem notes. Then he tuned the middle string as best he could. The piano sounds a lot more in tune now, but I don't get the powerful full sound that I used to get. Maybe someday someone will take an interest in repairing the piano (maybe that someone will be me) but for right now I guess this will have to work.

I found this picture on Google Images and this is what my piano looks like:

Rocking Chair

2010-08-10T12:15:00.003-06:00

So a couple weeks ago I bought a rocking chair. A legit rocking chair. I'm going to use it to sit on my porch.

The reason that I know its legit is because I bought it from an old man off KSL. I called him and he was like "Yes, my friend, the rocking chair is for sale, just go get it off my porch and leave the money under the mat." The phrase 'get it off my porch' was my first tip-off that the rocking chair was legit. The second tip-off that this was the real deal was that he then said, "Its pretty old and might need a coat of varnish." Which I gave to it as soon as I bought it.

The only hiccup in the transaction was that apparently this old dude hadn't told his wife that he was selling it which led to a very awkward encounter between his wife and I. So I proceed to follow the instructions of the old man and remove the rocking chair from the porch and put the money under the mat. I was in the process of doing this when his wife opened the front door and gave me a look that said "Uhhh... What do you think you're doing?" I then jumped into a monologue of how her husband had told me just to take the rocking chair and leave the money. She was finally like "Well, he didn't tell me, but I guess if he wants to sell it..." That just made me feel uncomfortable and so I handed her the money and beat a hasty retreat.

But now I have a great rocking chair for porch sitting.

360 panoramics

2010-08-03T14:11:00.006-06:00

Let me tell you about my latest fascination. It is called 360 photography and it is awesome.

The gist of it is that you stand in one spot and you take pictures of every angle around you, so that everything that you can see (front, back, bottom, top) is covered by one or more pictures. You end up with about 80 pictures total. Then you "stitch" these pictures together and form one huge picture.

The magic comes when you upload this to the internet and they have a special viewer that lets you fly into the center of the picture and then use the mouse to scroll and look around. So essentially you see everything around the photographer when he took the picture. It is awesome! You can check out a few that others have made at 360.net, including this one that is one of my favorites.

So I have been experimenting with this and after many tries I finally made one that works. It has watermarks all over it because I am using demo software, but here it is. The weird black stuff at the bottom is the tripod; it didn't stitch very well.

Wilford Woodruff mission antidote

2010-08-01T09:51:00.002-06:00

I found this today and I couldn't help but share it:

"When I arose to speak at Brother Benbow's house, a man entered the door and informed me that he was a constable, and had been sent by the rector of the parish with a warrant to arrest me. I asked him, 'For what crime?' He said, 'For preaching to the people.' I told him that I, as well as the rector, had a license for preaching the gospel to the people, and that if he would take a chair I would wait upon him after meeting. He took my chair and sat beside me. For an hour and a quarter I preached the first principles of the everlasting gospel. The power of God rested upon me, the spirit filled the house, and the people were convinced. At the close of the meeting I opened the door for baptism, and seven offered themselves. Among the number were four preachers and the constable. The latter arose and said, 'Mr. Woodruff, I would like to be baptized.' I told him I would like to baptize him. I went down into the pool and baptized the seven. We then came together. I confirmed thirteen, administered the Sacrament, and we all rejoiced together.

"The constable went to the rector and told him that if he wanted Mr. Woodruff taken for preaching the gospel, he must go himself and serve the writ; for he had heard him preach the only true gospel sermon he had ever listened to in his life. The rector did not know what to make of it, so he sent two clerks of the Church of England as spies, to attend our meeting, and find out what we did preach. They both were pricked in their hearts, received the word of the Lord gladly, and were baptized and confirmed members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The rector became alarmed, and did not venture to send anybody else."

How great is that?

In Defense of Food

2010-07-29T08:51:00.003-06:00

K. I have a book review.

The book is called "In Defense of Food" and it blew my mind. I say "blew" in past tense because I actually read it for the first time like 6 months ago, and since then I've read it twice more. This is probably the best book I have read in the last year, and one of my top 5 of all time. It is SO GOOD.

What this book is about is what you should eat. But its not really a diet book like you would think. This book basically talks about the manufactured food that is being sold to us by big food corporations, and how it is making America/Westerners fat and sick. It talks about the rise of 'nutritionism', and points out that nutrition changes its mind every 6 months and it still isn't making us thinner or healthier. People still living on native diets are virtually free from heart disease, cancer, and diabetes, while those eating the Western diet are plagued by these diseases.

It really is fascinating. It is really down to earth, and during the whole book I was like "This just makes so much sense!" It is an easy read, and if you like it, then read "The Omnivores Dilemma" by the same author, Michael Pollen.

I introduced Melodie and Mom to this book, and now its all that we talk about. We had like a 3 hour conversation about it last week. So everybody now needs to check it out from the library.

Road Testing

2010-07-22T21:18:00.002-06:00

Most of you know that I work for a company that does traffic sensors. These sensors do different things, like turn the light green for you, count the number of cars that drive past, record the speeds of the cars that drive past, etc. Recently I have been doing "road testing" for some sensors, a.k.a. go sit in the hot sun and have lots of people driving past stare at you.

What road testing involves is setting up the sensors on top of our company truck. The company truck is a piece of work. It was built in like 1940, overheats regularly, and has a huge weird looking cabin/room thing on the back that looks bizarre. I park this right on the side of the road and raise up our sensors on top of it. When this is all done it looks like something from the Twilight Zone. Then I sit down next to it and proceed to Radar Gun all the cars that drive past. (I do this so that we can compare the speeds the Radar Gun gets with the speed the sensor records). People drive past and as they look at me and I can almost read their minds: "What. the. heck?"

Yea, that has been work for about the last month.

Shopping for books at DI is a Zen experience

2010-07-14T22:25:00.003-06:00

So every now and again I'll go shopping for books at DI. Shopping for books at DI is a very Zen experience, and I'll tell you why.

But first, when I was driving to DI, I looked over at the stoplight and Robbie Bosco was in the car next to me. This is remarkable for three reasons.
1. I know who Robbie Bosco is.
2. I can recognize him on sight.
3. I thought it was cool enough that now I'm blogging about it.

Anyways, I got to DI and had to get into the zone. Because when you shop for books at DI, you have to get into the zone. You have to let your impatient worldly thoughts go and become like the stalking tiger. You have to be infinitely patient. You have to let a lot of sub-par choices go by, and hold out for the one you want. You have to be persistent. You have to be willing to accept defeat, but believing enough to keep going. Because the fact is, you never know what nuggets are hidden there among the endless wall of romance novels, Chicken Soup for the Soul, Calculus 3rd editions, and cookbooks from the 1970's. You have to always keep searching. You have to have the singleness of mind of a Zen warrior.

Good thing I have Zen warrior training.

In the end, I left with two gems, "The Armchair Economist" and "Night". I got them for a total steal. Thank you, DI.

New blog name!!

2010-07-12T21:12:00.001-06:00

Yes, I decided to rename my blog.

I need to properly eulogize "Here's The Thing" sometime; it has served me well over the years.

In an upcoming post I will dive into where "lazy by choice" came from. And yes, it is a little tongue in cheek.

Health

2010-07-08T11:34:00.003-06:00

I have always had a question about something: How much should I worry about the fact that I don't exercise?

In other words: Is it really worth the trouble? I have tried a few times to get into exercising but I never have been able to pull it off. I mean, I usually stay active, I play bball on thrusdays, frisbee on saturdays, usually I am running around a lot, I occasionally fight with Melodie (which I guess really doesn't use that much energy because she is such a whimp), and I play my guitar and piano and stuff. I just wonder if exercise really would give me so much better health as to justify it.

The jury is still out.

P.S. I generally hate exercising, it usually leaves me with a headache afterwards and I feel drained the rest of the day. Isn't that weird?

b-day

2010-06-30T13:30:00.004-06:00

What does 27 feel like? Take the most amazing thing you can imagine and multiply it by... 3. Or something like that.

So it seems like b-days get less climatic as you get older. I went home last night to pick up a piano for my new house (yea!) and my thoughtful mother had prepared some delicious homemade cake and ice cream. While we were stuffing our faces, Meldy asked mom and dad what they got me for my birthday. They kind of looked at each other and shrugged and said, I don't know, nothing? :) Then mom said, 'we had good intentions to get something, but we just haven't gotten it yet.' The funny part is that until that moment I hadn't even given one second of thought to the fact that sometimes you get gifts on your b-day. A little bit different experience from when you are 10.

But b-days are still fun, none the less.

Don't mess with Texas

2010-06-17T17:19:00.002-06:00

So for a few days I am on vacation in Dallas, Texas, because my sister lives here. I hope you want to know about my airplane trip because that is exactly what I am going to write about.

But before that, speaking of airplane trips, I was on my way home from Denver a couple weeks ago and we were flying over central Utah. For some reason I have in my mind that central Utah is the basically the home of bad weather. I somehow picture that central Utah is constantly in a state of blizzards, sandstorms, tornados, oppressive heat, hail, etc etc. And this experience didn't help. Cause we were there in the airplane and we hit the worst turbulence that I have ever experienced in an airplane. I was scared. Legitimately scared. The airplane was literally rocking violently up and down and being shook. I had a window seat right next to the wing and there were a few times I could swear that the airplane was being blown sideways. I think that everyone else on the airplane was as nervous as I was, but everyone was trying to be cool and pretend like nothing was happening, like we weren't being shaken like a cork in the waves.

Which reminds me of another airplane story. I was coming back from Brazil with my parents. I had fallen into a deep sleep (it was the middle of the night on a red-eye). Suddenly I woke up abruptly in a cold sweat. As in, my face was cold but it was soaked in sweat. Yea it was weird. And all I knew is that I had about 60 seconds before something in my body went terrifically wrong. I had no idea what, but I knew that something was very wrong with me and I needed immediate help.
I woke my dad sleeping next to me and all I could really say was "I don't feel good." He replied exactly what I would have, something to the effect of "go find your mom" and turned over and went back to sleep. Well, mom was a few aisles behind and so not knowing what else to do, I got up and went to find my mom. By this time I stood up and got to the aisle was in a BAD way. I was getting tunnel vision and couldn't really organize my thoughts. I had to hang on to the overhead bins to stay standing. I looked around, couldn't see mom, didn't really know how she could help anyways, so I just kind of stood there for a little bit. I remember seeing a light at the back of the plane, and deciding that I would go back there. I stumbled back there, knowing that I had about 6 seconds before something really really bad was going to go down. There were a couple of stewards back there, who looked up from what they were doing and one of them said to the other quickly and calmly: "Grab him quick. He's going to faint." They both grabbed me, laid me on the floor, and raised my feet. I immediately felt better, but still had to lay there for probably 15 mins in that position to get my strength back. As I lay there, the steward explained to me that I had gotten altitude sickness or something weird like that and that I didn't have enough oxygen in my brain.

So that was a bizarre experience. What I thought was most interesting about this is that when I woke up, I knew almost to the second how long I had before my body was going to shut down. It was almost like I had a built-in time bomb red readout like you see in movies.

Anyways, I can't even remember what I originally set out to blog about. Oh well, it was probably something boring anyways.

Soccer

2010-06-12T15:27:00.002-06:00

I have a few thoughts on soccer that need sharing.

I love soccer. It is fun to play, engaging to watch, requires athleticism and yet is playable to most, has intuitive rules, requires almost no equipment, etc etc etc. It is an all around great sport, and its no wonder that it has arisen to the world prominence that it has.

Here is the problem that I have with it.

I feel like the team that comes out and plays the best doesn't always win. In fact, I think the final score is just a crapshoot most of the time.

This is because soccer is such a low-scoring game and it is incredibly hard to actually score a goal. It seems that there are way too many times when the inferior team gets lucky and scores a goal on a fluke, and they wind up beating a team that completely dominated them the whole game. I guess one way to say it is that luck plays into the final score way more that I want it to. I want the team that comes out and plays the best to walk away with a victory in an athletic competition, not the team that got completely owned the whole game but happened to win 1-0 just because they got lucky near the goal one time.

Do not let this confuse you with something completely different: the upset in sports. I love it when a team is way over-matched on paper, but comes out onto the field of play and successfully outplays a team that should have easily beat them. For example, BYU-Oklahoma last year. No one thought BYU could beat Oklahoma because of how great Oklahoma's team was, but BYU came out and straight-up played better than Oklahoma, and deserved the victory. I am not talking about this type of situation. I am talking about a situation where some bad team get out played the whole game but ends up winning on a fluke. I don't want to see people win on flukes in sports.

I'll give you an example of what I'm talking about. Real Salt Lake (Salt Lake's professional soccer team) barely made it into the Major League Soccer tournament last year. As I understand it, RSL was a mediocre team that barely got into the tournament. And they won the whole thing. I feel like this type of thing happens way too much in soccer. I want this type of Cinderella team in a tournament to be rare.

Hockey has this same problem, by the way. Baseball also manifests this problem at times. Football has only a tiny touch of it, and basketball has almost none of this problem. That's one of the reasons that I love watching basketball so much.

Copa Do Mundo

2010-06-11T10:13:00.001-06:00

I saw this video on Alyx's blog and loved it.

And I'd like to give a shout out to my team, Os Brasileiros!

First Sunburn

2010-06-06T11:29:00.003-06:00

Every year the same thing happens. On the first truly hot Saturday of the summer, I go out and spend the entire day outside. I apply sunscreen in the morning, but for some reason that doesn't seem to prevent me from getting burnt. I'm pretty sure this is just a ritual that all white people have to go through every year.

I didn't get burned that bad, but it is definitely enough to be noticeable. The trend for me seems to be that after getting burnt in early June, I don't seems to get burnt bad again the rest of the summer. Maybe its that my skin kind of darkens, or maybe its that I remember the horrors of the first burn and apply sunscreen more religiously. Maybe a combination of both.

Rocky Mountain High

2010-06-01T12:21:00.004-06:00

Last week I went on a business trip. Yes, you heard that right. A business trip. I'm kind of a big deal now in my company. At least that's what I tell myself every morning.

They sent me to Bora Bora and gave me a Lambourghini as a rental car. In my dreams. No, actually they just sent me to Hawaii and got me one of those new Hummer things. I was there to direct our important business of selling coconuts... and pineapple... ummm... to tourists... OK, so it wasn't there either. But it was, in fact, Denver, Colorado. But I really did get a rental car, and it was a Ford Focus looking something like this.

The trip wouldn't have been so bad if it weren't for the fact that I had to get up at 4:30 in the morning on Wednesday to catch my flight. I have never been hit by a semi-truck, but I think that is the closest feeling that you can get. Also, I didn't bring my computer, so I had no internet during the whole trip. What a trial. Also, I was there by myself, so there were a lot of cool things I COULD have done after hours, but it was like 'I could go see downtown Denver... by myself' or 'I could go swimming... by myself' or 'I could go drive around and see the country... by myself'. So one night I ended up going to a movie and the next night I watched the NBA on TV.

So that was my trip. Maybe next time they'll send me to England. I know we have some sort of business that we are doing there.... I think.

house house house

2010-05-24T16:55:00.003-06:00

So I have been sort of MIA in the blogging world for a while. That's because I was moving and then trying to furnish... my new house!

Yes I moved, and I live down kind of by the cemetery now, if you know where that is. It is actually a townhouse, so it has no yard and no garage and is connected onto a bigger complex (all kind of bummers) but it is pretty nice.

Things are still getting put together. We don't have any furniture in the front room yet (unless you consider three guitars laying on the floor as furniture), we still don't have wireless internet (a necessity), and we are still missing some bits a pieces, but by and large it has come together nicely. I have decided that I am going to get the rest of the stuff off of KSL classifieds and craigslist.

I'm living there with my buddies Dave, "The Shark", and Stan. Its pretty cool. I'll have to post pictures of it here pretty soon.

sweet tooth

2010-04-30T09:50:00.002-06:00

I don't have a sweet tooth, by any stretch of the imagination. The reason this has come to my attention recently is because this week for some reason I cannot get enough candy in me.

I don't know how the general population is, but I don't find myself craving sweet things very often. Most days I won't eat anything sugary at all. This last week was different. I have eaten tons of M&M's, candy bars, granola bars (which are pretty much candy bars anyways), lemon squares, etc. Why? I don't know. Its weird.

And the thing is, most of the time I don't even like eating sweet things. Maybe I just needed more energy this week. And another thing- I have been very sleepy this week too. I blame the weather.

Virus

2010-04-20T16:12:00.003-06:00

Right now I am sitting at my work computer, waiting for our IT guys to come fix my machine. Why does my machine need to be fixed? It just got demolished by a virus.

Now, when I say "demolished" I actually mean "rendered completely unusable". I've never had a computer virus do such a complete job before as this one did. In a matter of like one hour, I was barely able to boot my computer. It was like the black plague of viruses. Luckily I didn't lose any data or anything.

Sometimes I wish that every time I got sick, I could just reinstall my operating system and feel better.

Stock Market

2010-04-13T13:23:00.004-06:00

Allow me to blog about the latest fun game that I play: the stock market.

Yes, I do play the stock market. The real stock market. My friend Steve got me into this about a year ago. I know that it seems like a really grown-up/odd/expensive hobby, but actually it is none of those things. It is fun! You can buy and sell shares of whatever stock you want through a company called Scottrade. It is a flat $7 to buy any stock at any time, and a flat $7 to sell.

Now that hopefully I've convinced you that I really do buy and sell stock on the stock market, let me tell you ("brag") about how one of my stocks has been doing. I will not talk about all of my stocks at this time, because some of them are still "maturing" (aka they are currently in the toilet). But my Google stock is not.

I bought 1 share of Google stock back in early April of 2009. As many of you remember the stock market was having a little bit of trouble back then and most people were trying to find their way out. Not me. With my always thrill-seeking personality and bold, daring action, I jumped right in. And the following happened:

It has grown 94% as of today.

Allow me to put that in perspective. Most people who invest in the stock market expect to get out around 8% a year if its an OK year. If they have a great year, its 10%. A killer year would be 12-15%. And yea... I just did 94% in a year.

Bwah ha ha ha ha!!

In some future post I need to toss around ideas about how to spend all the billions of dollars I am making with this. The money was won very frivolously, so I feel that it should be spent the same way, very frivolously. (I'm thinking a lot of orange soda and a hot tub...)

Plan B

2010-04-08T13:57:00.002-06:00

Let me run something past you. Work with me here.

I have always had a sort of idyllic Plan B for life. It consists of the following things:

1) Pull all my money out of everywhere. Sell pretty much everything I own.
2) Move to Tahiti, or somewhere similar.
3) Buy a beach hut, not unlike the one you see above.
4) Buy some great fishing poles and a pair of shorts and sandals. And a guitar.
5) Fish all day in the ocean/rivers.
6) If I catch more fish than I need, I wander into the local village and trade for food besides fish.
7) After fishing I imagine myself playing a lot of guitar and drinking a lot of coconut milk.

There are really only 2 flaws in the plan:
1) What about medical treatment? What if I get bit by a shark? Can the local medicine man really heal me?
2) Far away from friends/family. But I justify this by imagining myself as a popular vacation destination for all family trips.

Now that I think about it, why isn't this Plan A?

Note to Self

2010-03-20T12:33:00.002-06:00

Note to self: don't ever try and put in your contacts soon after cutting up onions and hot peppers.

So this morning I decide that I'm going to make a delicious recipe. This recipe called for hot peppers and onions, which I cut up on my cutting board. I'm sure I must have washed my hands after at some point but apparently it wasn't a very good job. I then go and put my contacts in.

As soon as my first contact hit my eye, it felt like my eye was on fire. I didn't realize what I had done at this point, so now I'm stumbling around the bathroom with a fireball in my eye saying things like "Ahhhh!!!" "What the freak?" "Holy Moses" "Ahhhhhhhhhh......" "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" and all that. At first I think that I must have used something like hydrochloric acid instead of contact solution. I grab the bottle I had used and tried to read through my swollen tears, and it seemed to look OK. After more stumbling around the bathroom and trying to put my thoughts together, I finally manage to procure the offending contact, which I promptly throw across the room. Of course, that does little to relieve the pain, so after washing my eye out about 20 times and a lot more "What the freak"s finally the pain dies down and I'm able to open my eye again. By this time I had put two and two together and figured out that it was probably a really really bad idea to handle objects destined for my eye after cutting up hot peppers and onions.

Needless to say I think I'll wear my glasses today.

Bracket

2010-03-17T09:03:00.003-06:00

Here in my bracket for this year's March Madness. And yes, it is the winning bracket. Provided Jimmer doesn't get sick and Tavernari doesn't ever shoot the ball.

Christmas music

2010-03-09T13:43:00.001-07:00

Dear Bing Crosby,
Thank you for making arguably the best Christmas album ever. So much so that I listen to it in March.

Sincerely,
Darrell

Book Review

2010-03-07T19:16:00.002-07:00

So I am finishing up a book right now called "Undaunted Courage", a book about Lewis and Clark. The style of the book was actually a really boring, but you kind of had to look through the staleness and realize what a crazy expedition that was. They were literally the first white men to see the western half of North America. They had to fight through pretty much every type of natural hardship that you can think of.

The question was posed to me: Would you have gone with them if you would have had the chance? The answer would be, that I would be torn, but in the end I would not have gone. Too many mosquitoes, unfriendly Indians, and eating horse meat. I prefer to read about it.

Musings

2010-03-03T12:26:00.003-07:00

So I have been musing lately.

A day or two ago, I had a random memory of something small that happened almost exactly a year ago. The memory itself wasn't what I have been musing about, rather the passage of a year from then until now, and all the stuff that happened during that year. Tons of new people, new house, new roommates, new hobbies, new plans, etc etc etc.

This was something that would always surprise me on the mission, as well. The mission is so chaotic, that it seems that I could reflect back only three months and remember myself as a totally different person. It seemed the stuff I was worried about back then had totally disappeared, and I was on a totally different track. This would always encourage me, because then I could look at my present problems and realize that they were mostly inconsequential and would most likely not even be an issue three months from now.

These are my present musings.

U2

2010-02-22T10:08:00.002-07:00

Guess what I'm going to be doing on June 3?

Watching these guys.

U2 Q&A with Darrell:
What is your favorite U2 song? "Where the Streets Have No Name"
What song gets stuck in your head the quickest? "Elevation"
What song were you singing at Curtis all weekend? "One"
What song do you have memorized on the piano? "With or Without You"
What song is their most underrated? "Angel of Harlem"
What song is the best to rock out to? "Sunday Bloody Sunday"
What song of theirs is the best 'summer song' ever written? "Beautiful Day"

The fisherman and the buisnessman

2010-02-10T17:01:00.004-07:00

Here is a story that I really like. It was told me by my Dad, and my sister Nat also really likes this story.

A few years ago, a very rich businessman decides to take a vacation to a small tropical island in the South Pacific. He has worked hard all his life and has decided that now is the time to enjoy the fruits of his labor. He is excited about visiting the island because he’s heard that there is incredible fishing there. He loved fishing as a young boy, but hasn’t gone in years because he has been so busy working to save for his retirement.

So on the first day, he has his breakfast and heads to the beach. It’s around 9:30 am. There he spots a fisherman coming in with a large bucket full of fish!

“How long did you fish for?” he asks. The fisherman looks at the businessman with a wide grin across his face and explains that the fishes for about three hours every day. The businessman then asks him why he returned so quickly.

“Don’t worry”, says the fisherman, “There’s still plenty of fish out there.”

Dumbfounded, the businessman asks the fisherman why he didn’t continue catching more fish. The fisherman patiently explains that what he caught is all he needs. “I’ll spend the rest of the day playing with my family, talking with my friends and maybe drinking a little wine. After that I’ll relax on the beach.”

Now the rich businessman figures he needs to teach this peasant fisherman a thing or two. So he explains to him that he should stay out all day and catch more fish. Then he could save up the extra money he makes and buy and even bigger boats to catch even more fish. The he could keep reinvesting his profits in even more boats and hire many other fisherman to work for him. If he works really hard, in 20 or 30 years he’ll be a very rich man indeed.

The businessman feels pleased that he’s helped teach this simple fellow how to become rich. Then the fisherman looks at the businessman with a puzzled look on his face and asks what he’ll do after he becomes very rich.

The businessman responds quickly “You can spend time with your family, talk with your friends, and maybe drink a little wine. Or you could just relax on the beach.”

(I borrowed this version from http://www.livelearninvest.com/the-businessman-and-the-fisherman-story/)

So, really, why should I kill myself at work? What is the point of getting money, when, if I wasn't so worried about getting money, I could do the stuff I like anyways? I have to laugh at the idea of working these tremendous work weeks in pursuit of money. If you ask people why they are so worried about money, they will say something like "So I can earn enough to have peace of mind, so that one day I can relax, and have time to do the things I love." Hmmm... don't you see the irony there?

That's one reason why I love working at the job I have right now. I rarely work over 40 hours a week, I always have lots of time in the evenings where I can go home and play basketball and go fishing and cook in my crock-pot and bother Melodie.

I could keep talking about this subject for awhile, because its been on my mind lately. I have been reading a book called "Approaching Zion" by Hugh Nibley that talks about this subject. This book has been AMAZING, and it is totally reforming my attitude about money. I highly recommend this book for anyone.

Wallpaper

2010-02-09T11:04:00.012-07:00

I'm really picky about my desktop wallpaper. I have to have a really good one that I like. And ever since I got two monitors at work, that has made my job harder, because I want the wallpaper to go across both monitors. I tend to change my wallpaper about every two months.

Allow me to display some of my favorites. For some reason, they uploaded really small.

Single monitor:

Dual monitor:

And the one I currently have:

The best decision I made today

2010-02-02T10:42:00.002-07:00

So I'm sitting here at my desk freezing to death for the past two days. For some reason our building people have decided that they wanted to turn down the temperature in the building right during the coldest, nastiest time of year. Defies all logic. What I needed was a space heater.

The worst part was that I can see Home Depot across the street, and I knew I could get one there. Finally I couldn't take it anymore. I jumped up, ran across the street, bought a space heater (which I love) and was back at my desk in 15 minutes. You have no idea how much joy it has brought into my life.

It was the best decision I have made today, for sure.

battery fix

2010-01-26T11:49:00.002-07:00

This week was my first success in fixing a car by myself. It was my friend Rachel's car, and she was having problems with the electrical system. Whenever she would turn on the lights or turn on the heater, all the car's electrical system would act like it was going to crash. The car also wouldn't start sometimes. We tried a few things, they didn't work, finally we ended up getting a new battery for the car, and it works now! I know that this doesn't seem like it would have been too hard to debug, but I would proud nonetheless. Now her car runs again. It made me feel cool.

Cookbook

2010-01-20T22:34:00.003-07:00

Confession:

I bought a cookbook. On Amazon. It came today and I'm really excited about it.

So here is the story. I have always been a terrible cook. My problem is that I am super duper impatient, I hate measuring the stuff and having to mix it up just right. When I cook, I basically hack the food, throw it in the pot and call it good. If I use a recipe, I take a few cursory glances at it and then basically do my own thing anyways.

Which is why I love CrockPots so much.

CrockPots are so forgiving. Then are perfect for my "style" of cooking. I can get away with just hacking the food, throwing it impatiently in the pot, and then running off to do something more important, like write in my blog. And it always turns out great! I don't have to do anything dumb that you usually have to do in cooking, like fluffing the egg whites or stirring the dry ingredients together or not burning the chicken or boiling the pasta too long or nonsense like that. I just grab the ingredients at the store, and toss them all together, and in 6 hours I have delicious food.

So this cookbook I bought is a CrockPot cookbook. Its basically impossible to mess up these recipes. This is going to be great.

WWII books

2010-01-14T22:20:00.002-07:00

So I think that something that has been an interest for me for the past while is now officially a hobby. And this thing is reading books about WWII. I have read 11 books so far on it, with many more to come.

I am totally interested in everything about it:
The of heroism.
The escape stories.
The bizarre rise of the Nazis.
The "old-school" warfare involved.
The Jewish survival stories.
The strange alliances. (ex. US and Russia)
D-Day.
The societal/historical ramifications.
etc.

I am happy to recommend any books for anyone.

I love living close to the Marriott Center

2010-01-07T20:27:00.003-07:00

Because I can do what I did last night.

I went to institute and got home at 8:30. BYU basketball had a game that had started at 8, so I turned on the TV and started watching on and off. In the second half, the game started to heat up and I was drawn in. With about 10 minutes left in the game, I was glued to TV. Then Tavernari hit a 3 pointer and I jumped out of my chair and yelled "I can't take it anymore!" At which point I ran down to the Marriott Center and got there with 8 minutes left in the game. And I was able to watch the rest of an awesome game live.

And it was awesome. So awesome.

NC

2009-12-31T09:32:00.003-07:00

So the fam and I went to North Carolina for Christmas to see my sister and her family. While we were there, this happened:

It was pretty mind blowing.

We also visited Kitty Hawk, the site of the first flight by man ever. I learned a lot about the Wright brothers:

And I went to some of this:

And I played a lot of this:

A successful trip, I would say.

What would be my Horcruxes?

2009-12-11T08:59:00.002-07:00

Good question.

I just realized after sitting here staring at this for 10 minutes that this is very hard to do. But I will try.

1. My brown sandals. These things have been with me for like 10 years. Or more. I think Melodie told me one time that they are out of style big time but I chose to ignore her because I like them so much.

2. My yahoo email account. I don't know how this would work. But I still want this to be one of my horcruxes.

3. My fishing pole. 'nuff said.

4. I'm thinking a diamond of some sort. Because diamonds are indestructible, right? Wait, I just forgot how you destroy a horcrux. Dang it. Oh well.

5. My mountain bike. Cause I love mountain biking.

6. Uhhh... can't really think of anything else. Guess I only have to split my soul 5 ways.

Wow. I need to re-read HP 6&7. In a big way.

Hate it when that happens

2009-12-07T08:19:00.003-07:00

Oops.

That is what I thought as I got in my car today and viewed the clock time on the dashboard. Normally I get up at 7:45, and I'm in my car by 8:15. Today I looked at the clock in the car and it said 7:30. I paused and thought: That's weird, somehow my car clock got off. I then decided to verify with my cell phone. Yep. 7:30. I had somehow managed to set my clock alarm an hour early. So I just woke up and hour early. Dang it.

The funny thing was, as I was realizing this, I was like 'What do I do? Do I go back to bed? Do I just drive to work and get there early? Well, I'm already dressed and ready and in the car, so I may as well just go to work early.' So I did. And I somehow chose to use this precious extra hour of work time to blog.

Swearing in contemporary literature

2009-12-03T10:59:00.002-07:00

OK, since when did it become vogue to use foul swear words in contemporary literature? Let me explain what I mean.

I have bought two books recently off Audible.com that have both been sort of travel books. One talks about the future of China and one talks about a study this guy did about happiness in different countries. Both contained, early on in the book, a certain foul swear word. And of necessity I was forced to stop listening to the book, because I didn't know again when this certain word would offend my ears again.

Also, I recently checked out two books from the library, both of which were New York Times bestsellers. One was by an author that most people reading this would recognize the name (OK, it was David Sedaris). Both of these books, again early on, used FOUL swearing, and I had to take these books back because I quite frankly don't want to be reading locker room language when I'm told I'm reading great literature.

Wow, has "modern literature" really become completely classless? Do these authors think people really want to read this trash? Its just too bad, because now I'm scared to buy books for fear that the book's language is going to disappoint.

Freezing Fridge

2009-11-29T19:47:00.003-07:00

So the past few weeks/months, our fridge has been acting more like a freezer than a fridge. We put in milk and out comes slushy milk. Our eggs get frozen and break. Our produce gets frozen and ruined. Our cheese is frozen and crumbly. Our tortillas get frozen and dry. Even the pumpkin pie in the fridge got frozen.

We have tried to look on the bright side by saying things like "Think of it like we have a slushee machine in the house". But it just isn't the same.

At least we have Shakespeare magnetic poetry on our fridge. That makes it tolerable.

Days of the Week

2009-11-21T12:27:00.002-07:00

Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday
CollegeFootballDay
Sunday

Wall to Wall with Martha

2009-11-17T10:53:00.002-07:00

So my friend Martha and I have had this running joke for some time, where we write funny/mean/embarassing things on each other's facebook wall. For those who are unfamiliar with the facebook wall, it is a very visible place where anyone who visits you page can see what others wrote. It is a really fun game Martha and I play.

I copied our funniness here for your viewing pleasure.

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor So my roommate was telling me that you followed a girl home from campus to ask her out?! that's kind of weird dar...
Sun at 8:52pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Yea, I'll totally come Speed Dating with you on Friday! hahaha, isn't this like the 5th time you've gone in the last month?! You'll have to help me out, though, because its been awhile since I've gone.
November 3 at 10:35am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor I'm SO glad we finally found you a new pair of pants yesterday. Even if they were girl's jeans. I don't think anyone will notice!
November 1 at 10:56pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden I loved your halloween costume. Who thinks to tie dead fish all over their body?! hahahaha
November 1 at 10:15pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden I cannot BELIEVE you went swimming in that sick sick canal and you had to pull 10 leeches off you. You are going to be pulling gunk out of your ears for the next 2 weeks. And your hair too... sick.
October 16 at 1:38pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor I had so much fun on our date! I loved that your mom showed up to tell the waiters it was your birthday, I never would have known! It was also really fun spending the rest of the night talking with her and looking at your baby pictures! Such a great night!
October 16 at 12:41pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden haha, yea, I'm excited for our date too. So you're in a singles ward? I remember what that was like. It's amazing how fast you forget in three years. Sometimes I wish they wouldn't have made me go back to the family ward, lol.
October 8 at 3:54pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor OH MY GOSH! I would totally love to go on a date with you! Saturday at 6 will work great! Just come pick me up, you know where I live, 105 A. Richards Hall, in Heritage Halls, you know, the dorms, right by the creamery. Can't wait!
October 5 at 8:56pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Whoa. Hold on there. I never said your addiction was the reason we broke up.
September 29 at 2:15pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor My Dad said you called him today!? He says we have his blessing! I can't believe this is finally happening!
September 28 at 11:28pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Thanks for leaving those cookies on my pillow with that nice note!! I don't know if I'm THE best mini-golfer you've ever played with, but it was still nice of you to write :) Yea, we'll have to get together again sometime.
September 23 at 3:06pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor Hey! That was so fun seeing you at my stake dance! I'm so glad that you don't have a problem dating me, even though I am only 15! You're the best! URAQT! LOVES!
September 21 at 10:45am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden There's something in the way you laugh that makes me feel like a child.
September 9 at 11:02am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden We were introduced and we both started groovin
I said, I dig you baby but I got to keep movin
...on, keep movin on
August 19 at 4:30pm · Comment · LikeUnlike · View Feedback (1)Hide Feedback (1)ooop

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Hey bro-
thanks for making Harry Potter happen.
July 16 at 10:35am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor you got it snuggle bunny!
July 9 at 9:13am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Hey sugar cakes, make sure you get me a ticket!
July 9 at 9:03am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor
Darrell,
Thanks so much for inviting me to your family reunion! I'm sorry I couldn't go... I just usually don't meet guy's families right after our first date. I know you said we hit it off, but I think I might need some more time before I meet your family.
July 6 at 5:25pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor HAAAAAPPPPYYY BBIIIIRTTTTTHHHDDAAAAYYYY!!!!!!!
June 30 at 8:53am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Hey Martha! Hey, I don't really have the money to help you pay off your gambling debts right now. Let me know how things go, and in six months we'll talk again. See ya!!!
June 21 at 5:41pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden HAPPY BIRTHDAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
June 15 at 1:20pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden No, I'm not dating anyone right now... why do you ask?
June 13 at 7:28pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor if you like it, then you shoulda put a ring on it (oh oh oh, oh oh oh oh oh oh oh, oh oh oh).
June 10 at 12:23am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Martha, you're a fine girl; What a good wife you would be; But my life, my lover, my lady, is the sea.
(dooda-dit-dooda), (dit-dooda-dit-dooda-dit)
June 9 at 2:08pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden why do i keep running from the truth? All i ever think about is you.
June 4 at 9:24am · Comment · LikeUnlike · View Feedback (1)Hide Feedback (1)
Mitchell Wright
Mitchell Wright
Does she have you hypnotized? So mezmorized?
June 4 at 6:12pm

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor please stop calling my mom. no matter how much she likes you, it won't convince me to marry you.
June 3 at 12:18pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor look, i don't know if we can hang out anymore. i mean. we went on one date, a BLIND date. and you proposed! i just don't know how a girl is supposed to come back after that.
May 29 at 10:59pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden please come back to me.
May 29 at 8:39pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor for the last time! we're not dating! i gave you a hair cut, that was it!
May 27 at 4:36pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Well, I don't know if "dating" would be the term I would use to describe our relationship. Lets talk about this later.
May 27 at 2:27pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor stay away from me, creep!
May 24 at 11:08pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden i had such a great time last night! Thanks for going out with me. I really liked what you said about you being good with children. That is so important these days. I'll call you soon, for sure. :)!
May 24 at 10:26pm · Comment · LikeUnlike

Martha Proctor

Martha Proctor your mom called. your ballet lesson for today is canceled.
March 26 at 11:12am · Comment · LikeUnlike

Darrell Dearden

Darrell Dearden Hey! I heard you won the National Women's Cole Slaw Wrestling Championship! Congratulations!
March 26 at 11:11am · Comment · LikeUnlike

New Format

2009-11-14T17:24:00.002-07:00

I decided that I really hated the old format of my blog and that I really needed a new look. So now my blog looks different.

But don't worry, the writer of this blog will still continue to bring you all of the nonsense, rants, petty complaints, deep thoughts, updates, political analysis, college football, advice, wonder, lies, and good wholesome entertainment that you have come to so desperately crave from this blog

Singers

2009-11-09T12:21:00.002-07:00

Who are Darrell's favorite singers, you may be asking yourself right now. Well, wonder no more.

Keep in mind that this list is based on singing style/quality of voice/easy to listen to, not necessarily how much I like their music. If that makes sense.

Sting
Ben Folds
Michael Buble
Sinatra

I'll have to add more as I think of them.

Halloween

2009-11-06T08:45:00.002-07:00

Halloween is not my thing. It never has been.

I hate dressing up, I hate scary movies, I hate costume parties. OK, I do like candy and fall, but overall, Halloween is never something I look forward too. In fact, it is my least favorite holiday.

This year I decided that I was not going to cater to Halloween. I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul. Because it seems like every year, I dread Halloween, then people talk me into going to Halloween parties, and then I always hate them. Always. So this year I decided that I was not going to any party that was remotely close to a Halloween party. So I didn't. And I was much happier.

It happened like it does every year, people kept trying to get me to come, but I held my ground. I had made a commitment to myself, and I stuck by it. And Halloween wasn't a problem for me this year. I didn't get much candy, but thats ok.

In unrelated news, I had a dream last night that I went back in time and was observing BYU 20-30ish years ago. I immediately stuck upon the thought that I wanted to go and find my parents and see what they were like back in their BYU days. But in my mind, I remembered that I couldn't talk to them or disturb them in any way, because then I would end up like Marty McFly on 'Back to the Future' and then have to hook my parents up myself. Hahahaha, I think the funniest part of my dream is that I coherently remembered 'Back to the Future' and that actually changed the decisions I made in the dream.

Teeth

2009-10-28T22:32:00.003-06:00

Let's talk for a second about my teeth.

My teeth are basically perfect. I am saying that as a statement of fact. I have never had braces. I have never had a cavity. I have never flossed regularly. They have never given me any sort of grief. I did have my wisdom teeth out, but that was more awesome than painful. They didn't knock me out for the wisdom teeth thing, they just numbed my mouth and then stood over me and started grinding. Which was awesome. Point is, all I've done with my teeth my whole life is to brush twice a day and they have never ever needed anything more than that.

Until this week.

I went to the dentist last Monday afternoon (so, like 10 days ago). He did the normal cleaning, the x-rays, all that. And I got the normal lecture on how I was not flossing and I needed to start doing that. He was finishing up and complimenting me on my great teeth when he mentioned, almost as an afterthought, "Oh, and there's a cavity in there that we need to fill."

At those words, I felt my world begin to crumble around me.

Ok, not really that bad. But I did balk. I probably stammered something shaky like "Huh? What?" He was like, "Yea, there's a cavity on the right bottom side of your mouth. We'll need to set up a return appointment so we can fill it." I didn't know what to say. I felt stupid saying "Are you totally sure? This has never happened!" So I just mumbled "ok" as I watched all my teeth bragging rights shatter forever right in front of me.

So that's it. I went from having 'stellar' teeth to just 'great' teeth in the blink of an eye. I feel like I'm dealing very well with it. I've even started flossing sometimes.

Fire Alarm

2009-10-23T21:03:00.004-06:00

So

Two nights ago the fire alarm went off in the house upstairs (I live in the basement of a house). It scared me to death. I thought it was the battle call to Armageddon. There is now way to gracefully come out of REM sleep in .01 seconds. After the initial terror-filled moment, my next instinct was the one that I think everyone has: The overwhelming desire to find the fire alarm and smash it with a baseball bat.

This is the natural thing to want to do. I don't know of anyone who, upon being awoken in the middle of the night by a fire alarm, actually thinks there's a fire. If ever there was a fire, I'd be hosed. The report in the police department would be: "Darrell was alerted to the presence of the fire by his correctly functioning fire alarm, but unfortunately soon after he completely destroyed the fire alarm and then went back to bed. Where he died."

But back to the fire alarm going off upstairs in the middle of the night. It thankfully quit going off soon after, and I finally was able to relax my frenzied mind and tense muscles. I was just drifting back off to sleep when BEEEEEEP!!!!!!!! BEEEEEEP!!!!!!!!! BEEEEEEP!!!!!!!!! The fire alarm started freaking out AGAIN. Let's just say that I hated my life right then. So much.

The story does not end there. To make a long story short, the fire alarm freaked out again like this another 3 times that night. And then the same thing happened last night. I did not sleep very well these two nights.

Fire alarms are the worst.