Halloween 2008

I was too lazy to really plan this year's costume. In fact I was planning on doing nothing. But I couldn't stand to be a deadbeat two years in a row, so this morning I went with the standby costume I used several years ago: Australian Cowboy (Man from Snowy River)

I know, Lame. But doing nothing is lamer.

Costume from two years ago was better.

Last night I saw this on the office and thought the joker part at the beginning (:10 - :24) was hilarious. Especially considering there is another guy here in the office dressed like Indiana Jones and looks alot like my lame costume.

Here are the kids:

From Family

From Family

From Family

From Family

From Family

From Family

From Family

From Family

I told the kids I would confiscate their candy if they were pigs and left their wrappers everywhere. Guess how long they lasted. 3 hours. This morning I saw wrappers all over and the main culprit was Austin. I took all their candy and weighed it and it came in at 19.8 pounds. That was after they ate probably 2 pounds each. I'll now be responsible for giving them rations of the candy back on the condition that they put the few wrappers they get in the garbage.

Fun times.

Disappointed

Don't get me wrong Apocalyptica is great! I love the band, their music and their style. But tonight's concert was less than thrilling. Their spring concert on the other hand was overwhelmingly awesome. I asked myself why and have come up with the following reasons:

1) More violent music selection. They only played two songs that were mellow enough for me to really enjoy: Bittersweet and I Don't Care. "Eric" (Eicca Toppinen) prefaced the Bittersweet song mentioning that last time they came there were alot of ugly men in the crowd and dedicated the song to the pretty girls in the crowd. Whoah there Eric. Take a look at your drummer and don't tell me you think that guy isn't ugly.

They played "Betrayal", but not the followup part which is so much better: "Forgiveness"! Why didn't they play some of the old mellower songs like "Farewell", or "Faraway". A couple examples of songs they played which contributed to the violent atmosphere was "Hall of the Mountain King" and "Fight Fire with Fire" Since the song selections were consistently headbanging stuff, it leads to the next main problem with the concert.

2)Retarded Mosh losers. There was a little bit of moshing going on at the spring concert, but nothing major. This time it was much worse. When people mosh it should be with a group that wants to do it. When they push people that clearly are trying to protect themselves or their loved ones, its out of control. Which leads to my final negative point for the night.

3)In the Venue security. They reminded me more of prairie dogs, rather than badgers who weren't gonna take any crap. They were pansies and I saw them only take one guy out of a half dozen who was out of control, only to let him back in to continue his moshing 10 minutes later. What a joke of a venue. This is the last time I'm going "in the venue".

But I don't want to be all negative. Just like last time I enjoyed the way Antero conducted himself. Mr. Business. Playing the music, being professional. Laughed at how he pushed Perttu away at the end when he tried hugging him all sweaty. Why doesn't Perttu ever wear a shirt? I don't know which is worse, being fat without a shirt, or being bony without a shirt.

I guess I'm getting old and enjoy the more sober music Apocalyptica plays, which wasn't played much at all tonight unfortunately.

I'm sad that I was disappointed. I was so looking forward to this concert.

I'm married to an Angel

Today during Sunday School the discussion was about Christ-like attributes and what kept coming to mind for me was "selfless". Yesterday I had to take a trip to the dump to get rid of some old tree branches. Cathi went too. When we were done unloading, Cathi asked if we should help the guy parked next to us unload his stuff. He was a middle aged man who was alone unloading some pallets, and didn't look in great need. I said "No, let's go". She said, "It won't take long c'mon, let's help him".

My thought was "Great! If we help him then another fella will drive up and Cathi will want to help him. We'd be here all day!". I told her, "I have to go over to the metal recycling bin to drop off the old washing machine and then I'll whistle for you and I want you to go when you hear me." She agreed and she helped the guy.

When I muscled the washing machine to it's spot I whistled and Cathi was able to help the guy completely empty out his trailer. So when I think of being Christ-like, Cathi is the kind of person I look up to for actually doing it. I sure married up in the spiritual food chain.

What would you do?

It's tough to say what you would do in a given situation, cause it's a "what if". But what would you do if you were at a self checkout and found $20 in the cash dispenser when you started scanning your items?

I mean it could belong to anybody right? How would Walmart be able to track down whose it really was? What if giving it to the cashier over the 6 different self checkout registers just meant that the cashier would pocket it?

Is this a tough decision? What would you do? Comments appreciated.

Weezer In Salt Lake City

Last night I went to the E-center to see Weezer in concert.

The first band was Tokyo Police Club. The music was OK, but I didn't know any of the songs and none of the songs were all that catchy. They played from 7:30 - 8:00. Then the stage crew moved stuff around till 8:30 when Angels and Airwaves came out.

I heard that name before, but I thought it was the name of a CD Shop, not a band. Once the lead singer opened his mouth I recognized why I didn't know the band. In the past, when I heard this band on the radio I changed the station. His voice is too high pitched and nasally for my liking. But to top off having to hear that voice for an hour, I had to put up with his big headedness strutting around on stage using profanity. In one song he introduced it talking about sex like a sixth grader and using obscene gestures. What a doofus. One hour of torture to endure before hearing a great band. I wondered why Weezer chose such a wimpy and terrible band to open the concert. My theory is so that the concert goers could really appreciate it when the main show came out. It looks like Denver didn't like Angels and Airwaves performance either.

When Weezer came out they were all wearing white jump suits and they started out with "My name is Jonas". (This song introduced me to a name which I liked and gave to one of my sons, several years ago) It was great. I really enjoyed the way Rivers conducted himself onstage: Not one use of offensive language, and had a sense of humility and humor which was a breath of fresh air compared to the band before.

He spoke of his experience with his Daughter Mia, at the Discovery Gateway where she would go shopping at the fake grocery store. He told a short story how another kid there was selfish with the toys and unwilling to share with his daughter. He said, "but that's life, sad, but it happens". Which made me sad that it happened here in Salt Lake, but like he said, "that's life". I could tell he is a good Dad and a great role model.

My favorite song of the night would have to go to "King", sung by the Bass Guitarist, Scott Shriner who has a fantastic voice! Spot on!

Other songs that I especially enjoyed during this show were, "Pork and Beans", "Say It Ain't So", "Pink Triangle" and "Dope Nose" and of course "Buddy Holly"

Rivers invited the lead singer from Angels and Airwaves out to sing "Undone - the Sweater Song", which his nasally girly voice didn't do justice, but thankfully he was only out for one song.

What was really cool is they invited a whole symphony of local people onstage to perform "Island In The Sun" and "Beverly Hills". There was such a diverse group of instruments and people. Rivers went around and talked with the different performers. Man I like this guy!

I was hoping to hear "This Is Such A Pity" or "Pardon Me", but there are so many great songs by Weezer, they just couldn't play them all.

This was a great concert and I'm glad I went although it would have been a much better evening had they just played at 7:30 and then had the other bands go after so I could have left and still had a good night's sleep.

Another disturbing dream

Last night I had another nightmare where I woke up in a jump.

I was on a bike ride and stopped somewhere real quick and left my bike in front of a building leaning up against the front window in which I could clearly see. I saw another biker come by who was pulling a trailer with two kids in it. He quickly picked up my bike and laid it on top of the trailer and then told the kids to hold on while he tried to ride off with it.

I was only about 20 feet inside the building when I saw him do this and very easily could have run him down and given him the beating of his life. But so traumatic this experience was of seeing my "Humphrey" getting stolen made me wake up. Gee, I was disappointed that my mind wimped out at that point instead of letting me attempt to make a rescue. I had to laugh. I thought to myself, "You pussy. It's not like you were falling to you're death. Why did you wake up!"

Austin's First Priesthood Conference

I challenged Austin to take notes. If he gave me at least one paragraph per speaker and one page total we would go for ice cream afterwards. Here is what he wrote:

Richard G. Scott - Jesus Christ is the perfect example of a priesthood holder. To be careful in these latter days, and watch our moral values.

Jay E. Jensen - We must be like Jesus, and have mercy. We can always have Jesus' spirit. We need to dress appropriately at church. We can be forgiven.

James J. Hamila - Satan was cast out of heaven, and came to earth with a vengeance to cause other misery. Now he is trying harder than ever to bring us to his lowly state, we have to resist him and endure to the end. We need to be sober. Satan is using his alcohol, tobacco, smoking, bad language and pornography and by other means to lead us away. If we try our best and live righteously, we will live with him again. If we do fall astray we need to repent and perhaps seek help.

Dieter F. Uchtdorf - We can't help where we are, but we can try our best. We must accept our callings and doing our best is what we need to do on any calling. neither should we shirk from being asked to say a prayer. We should be happy that we get the opportunity. We need to not give up and we should do our calling. No matter what the excuse. Every calling is the same in the eyes of God. We should act like we are a bishop and take our callings seriously. If you are overwhelmed with your calling remember that the Lord thinks you can do it.

Henry B. Eyring - Our callings are hard but we must not give up. We need to do our best when the going gets tough. The Lord sent us to Earth to be tested. We need to have faith.

Thomas S. Monson - Our main responsibility is our family. We should share the gospel. We can make a difference. Three things we need to do:

1. Learn that we should learn


2. Do what we should do


3. Be what we should be

We must not neglect our callings. We should consider our callings as a messenger of the Lord. Even a prophet can lose his faith. Attitude is everything. When you have troubles, pray. We can be an example we can get answers through prayer. The Lord dedicated his life to saving this proud people but in our blindness we killed for trying to save us. The Lord will not lead us away now. We can trust him with our lives. That is why he is the king of the world. I will serve him.

Austin commented afterwards that the meeting went fast and that he was able to enjoy the meeting by taking notes. He was able to pay attention and not just day dream the whole time like he does during conference. I was proud of him and not hesitant to take him to Baskin Robbins for a double scoop cone.

Meeting a major goal - Bike from Pocatello to Syracuse

Cathi dropped me off at Grandma and Grandpa's house last night. We visited for a couple hours and I went to bed. The night's sleep was great, but it seemed like it went too fast. I got up had a bowl of cereal and left @ 6:15am. I was frustrated with how I couldn't really see the road too good even though I had a bright headlight. I missed one turn and had to backtrack a little. The temperature was warmer than I thought so about 30 minutes into the ride I stripped off all my long black pepper under clothes and wrapped them up nicely around my frame.

I was surprised how hilly it was. It was tough. I was able to build up my average speed to 17.2 mph at one point and it went back down at several points but I ended up at 17.1 mph.

When I arrived at Preston I stopped at several places to take pictures of Napolean Dynamite places. I included those in the video below. Had lunch at Logan's Heroes at the south end of Main Street. Had a very tasty sandwich. Had a stomach ache for about a half hour after that cause it was a big sandwich. Felt better though and started heading up the monster hill going to Brigham City. When I got to the top I was happy knowing that the rest of the ride was totally down hill. I got some serious speed the rest of the way and was able to take my average speed from 16.4 to 17.1 by the time I got home.

Cathi and the kids had set up a couple posters and were jumping up and down yelling "Yah Dad!" and stuff. It was nice to see them waiting for me in the front and happy to see me finish. I was able to really book it once I got to Roy. I had an accommodating tailwind from that point on. Was going over 23 mph down Gordon. Nice finish! Click the image below for a video.
From Biking

Drop the fear!

This financial situation we're facing in the USA isn't pretty that's for sure. But I read a blog post today that included a quote from Thomas Jefferson which was so full of crap that I had to post my own thoughts.

I'm not a financial guru, and the current problem is way over my head. But I doubt if the entire economy fell flat on its face that we'd have all these empty houses and everyone living on the street. That's absurd.

Terrifying dreams of Death

Last night I had quite a long terrifying dream which seemed so real. If you have any thoughts or possible interpretations, please comment! I'm open to accept your ideas.

It had been a week of storms in Salt Lake and it was flooding all of downtown. It was to the point where you couldn't drive anymore. I swam over to the Church Office Building downtown figuring it was the tallest building in Salt Lake City. (Why didn't I just swim over to City Creek Canyon to dry land?)

I was on the 26th floor and 50 foot waves were crashing into the building and the whole thing rumbled. I looked over the edge and didn't see roads or even smaller buildings. They were completely underwater. The water kept rising and the waves that were crashing into the building were now seen at the edge at the top, much like this picture. I went in the lobby and someone was watching the local news which said that all of the valley was underwater and thousands were dead. The phone lines were down and I was unable to find out the status of Cathi and the kids.

I was fearful they might have drowned. I prayed, but I felt as if God was angry and we were being punished and that I would soon drown. As the waves started splashing over the top of the plexiglass, I went inside and went up the two more levels to level 28 where the Church Security Department is. We talked about our options, and they didn't really have any. Then I heard the sound of steel breaking and stretching as the building slowly was tipping sideways.

Before the building completely tipped over I woke up. Man! What is up with that dream? That was a bad one! Lately my dreams have been very vivid!

The night before I dreamt I was a lifeguard at a beach area. I was really hungry so I went up the trail to the lifeguard house to get something to eat (which was against the rules for when you were on duty). After my meal and on my way down the trail to the beach, someone was frantically running up the trail screaming, "Help! Help! Someone has just drowned down at the dock." My heart sank knowing that I should have been there. I was fired, convicted of involuntary manslaughter, spent 2 years in prison, and then sued by the family of the dead kid. Woke up in a cold sweat.

Why the sudden recurrence of death dreams lately? I had another death dream before the lifeguard one, but I forgot it and didn't log it.