fishboy rides again

Good day on the trail: Better for some than others

2011-10-12T08:45:00.004-07:00

With the start of the semester, I didn't run much in September. I'm trying to get back on track in October. Yesterday, I was feeling pretty good about our run. Laura, the girls, and I did 4 miles together. Laura's pace was really good. If it weren't for the few stops that the girls make me do (to pick dandelions, to get a stick, to turn around to get items dropped from the stroller, etc.) Laura and I would have been on the same pace. Laura doubled back to do a portion of the run to let us catch up.

I love running with the stroller, but Chloe has the habit of taking off her shoes and socks once she's strapped in. We were finishing our 4 miles and I had only come up with two socks and one shoe. I missed where Chloe had dropped one of her shoes and I didn't find it on the way back home. Rather than accept the loss, Laura went up the trail again while I played at the park with the girls.

The good news is that Laura found the shoe, rolled off on the side of the trail in a little bit of brush. (They are probably our favorite pair for Chloe.) Even better news is that Laura clocked in another 2 miles (1 up and 1 back) to find the shoe. Just as I was feeling good about doing 4 miles for the day, Laura did 6 - and she pretty well bolted back once she found the shoe. Laura took 20 minutes to walk out to find the shoe, and only 10 minutes to get back to the park. Speedy. Good job Laur.

I think she's gonna be ready for her race at the end of the month.

SOMEONE needs to be committed! (pun intended)

2011-07-03T09:12:00.003-07:00

Since the first of May, I've been averaging about 17 miles a week. A couple of miles or more each week is just walking, but I've been running a respectable amount. I've been trying not to push myself too much, just get out and exercise 5 days a week. The distance for my runs have been determined by how far I can get away from home and still feel like I can get back without exhausting myself. Now has come the time to commit to a schedule.

After a run one morning, Laur and I stopped by the park to let the girls loose. While we let the girls have some play time, my wife was talking with a couple of our neighbors who were there with their own kids. The neighbors asked my wife if she was training for a particular race (nope, just running), and then suggested that she should run the Halloween Half-Marathon down the Provo River trails with them. This is a race that encourages costumes and benefits from being a down-hill run.

Now, if you're wondering where the possible mistake was, Laura mentioned the invitation to her sisters. Tammy replied to Laura's email with a phone-call and said that she is now going make the trip down from Alberta to do the half-marathon. Laura got herself committed to the race JUST AFTER she finally decided to herself that she wasn't going to do it.

Laura has run half marathons before, but she's had two kids since she last ran on that kind of a schedule. I've never run more than 9 miles in one bout (and that was helping to support one of her previous training sessions for a half-marathon). For now, I'm planning on helping with Laur's training. I've adapted a couple versions of an online training plan, and I'll be following along with her distances. I don't think I'll be running the race (someone's got to tend the girls and I enjoy cheering for Laura in her races), but I'll probably break my 9 mile barrier this time around.

Back to the possible problem: Do we need to stop talking to the neighbors?, my wife's sisters?, or just learn to say "no"?

Honestly, I'm looking forward to training with Laura for the race. It's always exciting to see what she can do once she gets started. She's always had my race day congratulations.

17 weeks to go!!!

Today

2010-06-24T04:54:00.001-07:00

Today, I defend my thesis.

The Wind-up

2010-06-15T16:06:00.000-07:00

My Thesis Defense is scheduled for Thursday, June 24, 2010. It's essentially the last day before my committee scatters into the wind. One for the rest of the summer, and one for good.

I've got good data. I'm just aiming for some sense of coherence.

Thesis timeline

2010-05-19T16:36:00.000-07:00

Here is the short version: TOO LONG.

Now for a little bit longer version: TOO LONG, but it may end.

And for further details:

My graduate studies have had a few breaks here and there. I didn't go to any classes for an entire year. (I did attended one class, but I didn't get credit.) I got married in the middle of one semester. I went through a strange change in my program of study and traded out one committee member for another the next semester. I still really like this former committee member (Hi, Cliff), but I moved from a thesis in Science Education to one outside of Education. Next up, there's no financial assistance during the summer. There's a year for you.

While I've been in school I'm sure I could have done more along the way, but some of the time has seemed to slip on by. After babies being born (we've got two you know) and Laura's surgeries following having babies (she's had two you know), I lost a little bit of time to just taking care of the family. Laura wasn't supposed to be lifting our girls for a good while after each surgery. Some class loads have been heavy some semesters, and it's hard to work your TA hours part-time and study full-time and see your wife at least some-time.

And then there is the total work load. ¿Who knew that there would be so much work to sorting all of these bugs? So many people have put some time into these bugs:
- a dozen and then some undergraduate students
- at least four graduate students
- 30+ secondary science teachers.

Some people have put in less than 10 hours. Others put in a few hours a week for a semester. A few have committed to a solid 10+ hours per week for more than a semester. I have no idea how much time I have spent with these bugs, but I'm sure I've pulled every sample out of every bag at least once, if not twice and many of them 3 or more times. SO MUCH TIME.

here are the numbers:
- 11 Orders of insects
- 13 Orders of arthropods
- 44 families of flies
- 66 overall taxa
- 71 samples sorted completely, and another dozen partially but we won't use their data.
(one bag got lost somewhere that we did want to sort, but what can you do.)
- Over 81% of the individuals identified was a fly of some sort. In non-scientific terms, you could say that we had "a lot" of flies. (one, two, many, lots).
- 62,497 individuals have been identified, and sized. (a few estimates were done with a couple of groups, but seriously... i checked the accuracy of our estimation procedure and 62,497 is the number I'm sticking to.)

I personally had gone through all of the samples at least once by Friday, March 5th. By then, every insect had a name label connected to it. There were bugs that still needed to be sized after that, but all of them were named. ¿Didn't I tell you that our experimental design guaranteed that every bug was going to get handled at least twice? YEESH.

Since March 5th I've consolidated multiple spreadsheets, corrected spelling errors from all of the different people who have entered this data on to a computer, and tried to make one coherent body out of this information we've collected. Spreadsheets, pivot tables, databases, statistical and community analysis software. With scientific names, there is a high propensity for misspelling. Misspelling really makes your data come out wrong when you're trying to explain how many groups of things you have caught.

I also spent time going back and identifying insects that were named wrong the first time through. There are a few names that I knew gave other identifiers problems. There were a few names that I knew that gave me problems. I got smarter, so I went back to as many of the problem children as I could find.

I have made quite a sum of graphs and charts this last month and a half. Today, I slapped some of the results together into PowerPoint. I had my Defense of Research. The Defense of Research is with your committee members. I basically got to say, "Here is my data so far," "This is how I plan to analyze it," and the committee tells me what I REALLY should be doing instead.

We collected in two habitats, during two summers, with two types of traps. From what I've analyzed so far the habitats are significantly different, the years are probably significantly different, but trap type doesn't seem to matter.

My committee likes my data. During the defense they wondered if I could do both a methodology paper (trap types) and a diversity paper from my data. Then, right at the end I remembered that I had done a bunch of Jaccard's similarity indices with my data. ¿Why did I do that? Nerd is the answer. The abundance analysis (#s of individuals per category) in my presentation says that habitats are different, but the richness analysis (# of types of bugs) using Jaccard's says that habitats are very much the same. My little "oh, yeah" at the end of the defense gave my committee even more reason to consider two publications. And if we don't get two publications, we lump the whole study into one submission and try again.

Here is some other good news. I was going to do a species listing of Bombyliids (Bee Flies) from the Escalante-Grand Staircase National Monument, but my current data will give me enough to graduate. I didn't present any data on the Bombyliids today, and my committee was fine with that. Riley would like me to finish my work, but my Master's will not depend on finishing the Bombyliid study. I can sort Bombys after I submit my thesis at the first of July. It would be good for me to work for another publication or two and I know too much about Bombys to just let them slip away. Above all, it's nice to know that I don't have to also have all of that sorting done by the end of June, in addition to writing up all of this work.

All week long I was working out how I was going to discuss the Bombyliid issue. I got exactly what I was hoping for: A place to work on those bugs if my time works out for that, but I can still graduate without knocking down that next mountain before July.

Here's to defending my thesis at then end of June. Whew!

Running again

2010-04-20T22:02:00.003-07:00

Saturday (April 17th) may well have been the perfect day for a run. Everything was great.

This past winter Laura and I bought an almost new double-jogger stroller which we have used for a few walks, and I have run with Maggie a few times. The cold weather which started out this month was gone. Our girls woke up happy and they let us get them ready. I needed to do my run for the day and Laura wanted to get out of the house too. Everything was ready for us to get out on the road. I pushed the stroller and we were on our way.

We ran one of my regular routes. It's a loop that goes down to center street from our house, over to Seven Peaks and on up around Kiwanis Park before cutting through campus to come back home. The whole route is just over 3.4 miles.

We got out of the house at 10:00am and the weather was great. The day wasn't too hot, there was enough sun and good fresh air. For a long stretch of the run we were looking at the high contrast of a snow covered Timpanogos against a deep blue as we ran along streets lined with blossoming trees. Being out with the whole family was great, but the surroundings really added to the day.

The route starts out with about a half-mile of flat, followed by nearly two miles of varying incline, before the final mile heading downhill towards home. Laur had to work for it, but she pushed herself and did really well. She's been exercising at home for the winter, but the cold weather and tending her girls has limited her options for cardio. I've been ready to get us all out there for a while. This was Laura's second run for the spring and she felt pretty good at the end of it. She was a little sore on Sunday, but we don't think that she pushed it too hard.

Best of all, it was fun to get out with the whole family. Chloe wasn't as happy as she could have been by the end, but Maggie is a nut for the stroller. She loved every minute of it. After a long winter of running alone, it was fun to have us all there.

Observations on Diego: i've seen too much

2010-03-15T19:53:00.008-07:00

Over Christmas break we found out that Maggie is a fan of Diego from Go Diego Go. Grandpa Evanson had DVRed a bunch of episodes. After seeing a couple of episodes, Maggie asked for Diego almost every day.

i may be projecting my own feelings onto Maggie, but i think that she at least likes Diego more than Dora. i feel a little better about that. Diego has animal stories and she can be quite cute as she says and signs all of the animal names. Her dancing and singing to the music is pretty good too.

Laura and i had avoided those kinds of shows for a long time; not having cable and much less TV in general made it easier to avoid the 30 minute commercials for kids. But now, Maggie's hooked.

To keep Maggie content from time to time, we have checked out a few DVDs from the library. I have seen too much Diego. ¿how do i know? i know because i have questions, queries and complaints about the strange place Diego comes from.
- gravity is SLOW: rocks, branches, ropes, and animals take FOREVER to fall.
- BRANCHES are DANGEROUS and apparently quite loosely connected to trees: i have seen parrots, marmosets, chinchillas, sloths, kinkajous (and possibly other animals too) barely escape these perilous limbs, and i haven't seen that many episodes.
- Diego is not very bright and needs more parental supervision: Adults are hardly ever around and for some reason and Diego is not the sharpest kid. Apparently he's to slow to realize that it's easier to get down a SNOWy slope with a SNOWboard than it is with a telephone. (idiot!)

And i keep waiting for the real animal lessons to kick in. i am a biologist after all.

Diego: Baby kikajous are afraid of harpy eagles!
Why?! Because harpy eagles EAT baby kinkajous!

or ¿how about this correction?

Diego: Help get the baby mountain gorillas out of the net before the poachers come back to cut off their hands to sell as ashtrays!

well, maybe those lessons won't happen anytime soon.

in the week or so before our requests for Diego from the library came up, Laura tried to find some episodes on YouTube. She didn't find any real episodes, but rather an abundance of odd Diego and Dora iterations.

i've seen a few video mash-ups, and have never been very impressed. i don't really like the music much, but i must say that this one isn't bad. they really synched up the audio and the video. watch for a bit. Laur and i got a chuckle out of it.

0z iEiO

oh..

2010-03-15T19:51:00.002-07:00

and officially... i beat the 80-year-old by almost 6 seconds... not that that makes me feel A WHOLE LOT better

Official times

2010-03-15T18:40:00.002-07:00

Here are the official times. I'm going to put them into that earlier post, but here they are for now:

	Finish time	Rank by Age	minutes per mile
Mom	45:06.6	1st of 1	14:32.9
Dad	38:59.14	3rd of 6	12:34.8
Dave	28:34.5	9th of 22	9:13.2

Things i forgot to include about race day

2010-03-14T09:34:00.003-07:00

i knew that i wasn't going to get my personal record for a 5k, but i did want to do well. of course race day felt a little jinxed.

i stayed up late a couple of nights last week to work on my thesis, and i think that helped me to catch the cold that my girls have. i started getting sick Thursday night, and on Friday the sore throat and stuffy nose were settling in.

The best part was Friday night. it was our family's worst night's sleep in two months or more. the girls weren't settling down and were restless all night. Laura and i didn't really get to sleep for the night until about 1:45am. i was back up trying to feed Maggie and get her back to sleep around 2:30. i think i was up again with Maggie between then and 6:00am (the night was one big blur), but for sure we were all up and out of bed with both girls at 6:00am. Laura saw every hour on the clock between the two girls, and by 6:00am she decided that she and the girls were up for the day.

Laura was good to me and let me go back to bed and i got some sleep between 6:30am and 8:00am. i was still asleep when my parents showed up to get to head to the starting line together.

the day wasn't completely jinxed. at least the rain and coldest temperatures waited until after the race was over. even with the less that ideal conditions, my race still felt pretty good.

Rex Lee Run 2010

2010-03-13T22:39:00.003-07:00

in 2009, i skipped the Rex Lee 5k for the first time since 2002. this year i was back on the track. i wouldn't say i'm a big fan of running or racing, but the Rex Lee Run is for a good cause (cancer research), it's close to home(right here on BYU's campus), and i can use it as an excuse to be more motivated with my weekly exercise.

today was my 8th time running the Rex Lee Run, my 9th 5k race and my 10th race ever. (somehow in 2003 i managed to do a sprint distance triathlon -- i just didn't know any better. i competed in the clydesdale category - i.e. fat guy category)

i started the race as usual - way too nervous and wondering how i was going to push myself through to the end. the crowd was typical - old, young, strollers, and at least one obviously pregnant lady. i saw the typical mix of former roommates, classmates past and present, neighbors new and old, and former students of mine. the course was slightly different, but followed the general path around the outside of campus. the race started a little late, and i walked around the outdoor track with my parents a couple of time before heading to the starting line out on the street just to keep warm. the rain didn't come until they were handing out the prizes to the winners.

i ran about as fast as i could, but didn't set any personal records. i wasn't sure if i could have pushed myself more while running, but after crossing the finish line, i felt spent. by my watch, i ran the race in 28'42". i'm content enough with that time. we'll see what the official time is next week. my best time was in 2005: 24'47". my slowest time is just over 30min, if we don't count the year that i ran with my nieces who were in the 12-and-under category (40min).

Items of note for today's race:
- my parents joined me for the race. Mom even ran in honour of one of her co-workers who's fighting breast cancer.
- Dad finished around 39 minutes (official time to come)
- Mom finished around 45 minutes (official time to come)
- Dad won THIRD PLACE in his age group: 65+
- Mom won FIRST PLACE in her age group: 65+. Now she has run the race 3 times and has a gold, a silver, and a bronze medal.
- Mom was the ONLY woman in her age bracket to run the race. The gold still counts! don't forget that she got out and did the race.
- The first place winner in my dad's age class was 80 years old.
- that same 80-year-old beat me, even though i did average a 9min mile. (¿how did i get beat by an 80-year-old?)

now i just have to cross the next hurdle. usually at this point in the year, school/work get busy and i take a slight break from my exercise regimen. by slight, i generally mean anywhere from one month to six, seven, eight, etc. months of sporadic exercise. most years it takes a long time to recover mentally from the 5k because i don't have an immediate goal and i'm not sure what to do next. i find excuses to not train as regularly. i'm hoping that i can keep going with my training, and keep my fitness levels up. maybe the idea of the 80-year-old beating me will keep me motivated to not have a break.

it was good to run the race again. it was good to run with my parents. i was a little sad the the weather was too cold for Laura and the girls to come and at least be a part of the crowd. overall, it was worth the time and effort, and i enjoyed at least some of the running and ALL of the finishing.

Time to run

2010-02-15T13:37:00.002-07:00

As of last Saturday (Feb. 13th), it was exactly four weeks to the Rex Lee Run. There is still time to train, if you're interested. The Rex Lee Run is around BYU's campus and still only costs $15, and you'll get the race t-shirt. The money goes towards cancer research.

Lots of families run this race, and I've had everyone from my parents, siblings and nieces run the race. I've seen plenty of baby strollers, retirees, a blind person, and a pregnant lady cross the finish line. They are going to have the timing chips that register your start and finishing times, so you don't have to be right on the starting line when the gun fires to get an accurate measure of your race. Even with the chips, you still may want to stay ahead of the strollers.

Last year was the first year that I haven't run the Rex Lee Run in the past 6 or 7 years. Between time and money (mostly the time) I didn't think I was ready to run. 2005 was my best time, and I had only gotten larger and slower in 2006-2008. I did run with my nieces (who were in the under 12 category) a couple of times. But last year I was so busy with school and home that training for a run seemed too complicated.

This year, I'm not sure how well I'm training. I am running, but nothing very complicated. 3 or 4 days a week, and nothing too strenuous. I want to run this year, even though I won't have much of a chance to break my best time: 24min 43sec.

If you're looking for ideas in how to train, check out these sources:
Hal Higdon's Novice 5k
Couch to 5k
Both of these can be adapted to your fitness level; start in the middle of the 8 weeks or whatever.

Today's Run

2010-02-06T23:07:00.005-07:00

My long runs on Saturdays over the last month have consisted of "how far can I get in an hour?". I've been getting in 5 miles or so on each run. I do some walking here and there and in the cool down.

To get myself to run the hour, I usually give myself a destination to try and get to. Sometimes I have to run a few extra blocks close to the house to finish, but this strategy is working well enough so far.

Today, I was a little more ambitious. I wanted to see how long it would take me to get to the Y-mountain trailhead. It took me 30 minutes to do the 2 miles to the trailhead. There was a lot of uphill and I knew the return trip would be shorter, so I decided to get in at least the first couple of switchbacks.

Two switchbacks turned in to three, three into four, and soon enough I was looking at how far I could get by then end of the hour. At the end of the hour, I thought I was close enough to the bottom of the Y to finish that much of the trail. I didn't realize how far I had gotten until I was on the last two short switchbacks to the top of the Y. I had missed the split for the leg to the lower end of the Y completely. The Y is covered in snow. You can still see the Y from the valley, but being so close and at such an obscure angle the snow masks it completely.

The lower two switchbacks were only partially covered in snow. The rest of the trail entirely covered, except for a spot or two. The way going up was a slippery one; digging in my toes to get up the trail. The way down was controlled sliding - yes, i fell -- once.

Here are the final stats:
Total distance: 6.14 miles for the round trip.
Total elevation change: 1699 ft (518m)
Total time: just under 1hr 54 min
To the trail head: 1.95 miles 30 minutes
To the top of the Y: 1.12 miles 43 minutes
From the top down to the trailhead: 17 minutes
From the trailhead to home: 24 minutes

My reward: I ate awesome food at a friend's wedding reception. It was the least that I could do.

Colbert Nation

2010-01-09T08:58:00.007-07:00

With our last night in Canada Maggie had a rough time going to bed. It was after 10:30pm and Maggie was tired. Laur grabbed Maggie to take her to bed and I turned on the TV to see when The Daily Show or The Colbert Report would be on. The Colbert Report was just starting. Maggie flipped her lid. Bad timing on my part.

Laura lay down with Maggie and tried to get her to sleep. After at least 10 minutes of wrestling with Maggie and all of her cries for "Show!", Laur gave Maggie to me. She and Chloe were going to work on going to bed instead.

Maggie sat quietly tucked under my arm on the couch and I turned the TV back on to watch the last 5 minutes of Colbert and the first 15 of The Daily Show. I don't know why she likes those shows, but she does. I watch them online some evenings at home. Maggie apparently enjoys watching people sit behind desks and talk about the rather informative fake news.

The last I looked at my watch it was 11:22pm, and Maggie and I were laying down on the bed together. Both of us were out basically until 7:30am, and after a bottle Maggie stayed in bed until after 9:00am.

It's silly that 20 minutes of fake news was enough to calm her down for the night. At the commercial break I turned off the TV and all she said was "all done". She's a nut.

Bad Dad

2010-01-05T12:26:00.003-07:00

My wife does not think it's funny when i say that our newborn looks like Yoda when she purses her lips.

Oh well... Chloda

oG B0E

Books on Palm

2010-01-05T11:43:00.000-07:00

I originally sent this out as a email to a bunch of friends in August of 2002, but was reminded of this while reading another book on my palm with plenty of errors.

---===---

so,

there is this program that converts a text file into a PDB file that i can read on my palm pilot. somewhere between the book getting scanned the first time into a computer text file and the final PDB, certain errors occur. for instance, occasionally the computer fuses something like "hut" and turns it into "but". or perhaps the word "in" is fused and appears as an "m". or maybe something will be split. "door" may end up as a "cloor". with that in mind, here is a sample sentence from Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Shadow".

"He looked down at his hands, nodded, then laid his head on his anus and sobbed."

aNUs has the same number of vertical lines as aRMs (in the lower case of course), but this by far has been the most disturbing off all of the errors i have encountered.

050404

End of the Holidays

2010-01-05T06:36:00.006-07:00

Well, we're coming to the end of a good extended holiday. We've been in Canada for over two weeks. This was only our second trip to Canada for 2009, so we were excited to get our girls up here to show off to the family. It's been a good time.

Chloe is still a mama's girl, but she has learned that she can be content in the arms of lots of other people besides mama's.

Chloe has also been quite curious. She has enjoyed watching her cousins and they have captured her attention for extended periods of time. Chloe has rewarded their attention with plenty of smiles.

Chloe has become much more vocal on this trip. Not a lot of jabbering, but she has found a strong volume for her shouting and hollering. Her noise-making doesn't seem to be directed at anyone, she just has to make a ruckus now and then.

I will feel sad for Maggie when we go home. She is going to lose a lot being back home. Maggie has had so many cousins to play with. She has been put on center stage so often here. Besides all of the regular play time with cousins closer to her age, Maggie has had plenty of time to show off all of her signs. There have been a few times where nearly everyone in the room, adult and child, have watched Maggie show off her knowledge. It is especially fun to have Maggie show off with the alphabet or her signs for feelings. "SCARED!" She is such a smarty-pants, and loves to interact, smile and laugh. She is has been so good to play and explore, even if some of that exploration has given Laura and I a lot to pick up after.

Besides exploring and having people to play with, Maggie may have other hardships when we get home. Maggie and I have been slumber party buddies for these past 16+ days. We've even laid down together for a couple of naps. She's a little rough at times. I've had both headbutts and kicks to the face, and she wiggles ALL OVER the mattress in the night. Even with all of her rolling around, it has been fun to peek over in the middle of the night and see Maggie's sleeping face. I don't know how she'll adjust to the the confines of her crib, not to mention having to fall asleep on her own at home. I hope that the familiarity of Maggie's crib and room will make up for not having me and her mom put her to bed in such a one-on-one manner.

This family time is so good for the girls and for us. I am sure that both our babies have learned a lot, and had experiences that will benefit their little souls. I will be sad to leave for all of us. Not only will we have to make up for whatever our girls will miss not being here, I am also going to have a wife to tend through her mourning. We're not sure when our next visit to Canada will be, and Laura is always sad to leave. We at least know that Grandma and Grandpa will be visiting soon.

Economic stimulus package

2010-01-03T13:39:00.011-07:00

To the Avocado Growers of the World:

I know that the economy is rough right now. The California farmers are feeling a particular squeeze on their finances. I am writing to let you know that my family is committed to buying at least one more avocado than we'll eat every time we buy avocados.

We like avocados. We eat avocados. We will continue to buy avocados, but somehow we mysteriously seem to count out one more than we can get to before that last fruit spoils.

We're just doing our part to support the economy.

Sincerely,
The Betts Family

()goZiB

Black Lung

2009-12-31T05:43:00.006-07:00

I've got to get my family out of Utah County.

The last week of school this semester, I could taste the air while walking to school. The car exhaust just seemed to hang in the air. I was so sure that the air quality would be rated poor, by the way my mouth and throat felt by the time I made it up the hill.

Oddly, the one site I checked gave Provo a green rating. But The Daily Herald reported a different story yesterday:

Utah Valley air ranked worst in U.S.

I hate to think what this air is doing to my kids' lungs.

Utah Valley's only growing, and the bowl that is Utah County is only going to hold all that car exhaust each winter. It's time to go.

Grumpy Rooster

2009-12-30T21:26:00.005-07:00

Yesterday, my over 2 year-old niece and my under 2 year-old daughter found some of Grandma and Grandpa's books that they brought back from their mission in Africa. They were good picture books and children's stories. The book they snuck into the other room had a big color drawing of a rooster on the cover: Le coq qui ne voulait plus chanter. (If my French is any good: "The rooster who no longer wanted to crow".) This is a children's story by an Ivory Coast author, Fatou Keita.

My niece was excited when she saw that I was willing to read her the book and we could look at all of the pictures. Turning to the third page as I continued reading my niece stops me.

"I'm gonna get another book."

I know I didn't pronounce every word correctly, but I didn't think my French pronunciation was unbearable. Maybe I'll just finish the book on my own.

* And what better to illustrate a post about an African story in French, than a painting by Spanish artist. At least the title is Le Coq (Joan Miro, 1940).

Insects: It's whats for dinner

2009-12-15T17:10:00.002-07:00

Dr. Riley Nelson, one of my academic advisers, hosted an informal potluck dinner for the the Entomology Class, the Entomology Club and assorted members of his lab. Attendees were invited to bring bug-themed foods. Most items were in the form of bugs: sandwiches pinned and labeled like bugs in a museum, foods decorated with legs, or even just labels on the food to remind you that some bugs have those shapes. Laura and I brought chips and salsa because... well... chips and salsa.

There was also one food item with plastic bugs embedded inside, but one brave girl actually fried some meal worms she'd bought at the pet store. Here in the States, mealworms are pet food. Elsewhere mealworms are sometimes people food. The little dish was passed around to everyone. With a little peer pressure more than half of the folks had a crisp treat. They tasted like a burnt chip.

After eating a couple myself, I had one more that I handed Maggie. She held it in her hand for a while. I saw her taste it a couple of times still holding it in her little fist, but by the time we got her out of the car at home she was finishing chewing up her little treat. That's when I let Laura know that Maggie was getting a little extra protein in her diet.

If you go here, you can see a few pictures and descriptions of bugs eaten around the world from Man Eating Bugs: the Art and Science of Eating Insects by Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio, a good book. A google search for the book has many of the pages and photos online. (The photo for this post came from Menzel and D'Aluisio's book.)

I like it

2009-12-06T00:58:00.000-07:00

I do like cool paper. It's part of why I took a bookbinding class at the University.

I also like bugs.

I think I'm a little partial to green too.

This little guy* is pretty cool.

You can check out the story here at NPR's The Picture Show blog.

!ORAGAMI!

* Leaf Katydid, by Brian Chan

Christmas Music: Not So Cheery

2009-12-05T07:32:00.008-07:00

In our house, we've been listening to Sufjan Stevens' Songs for Christmas. It's a collection of 5 EPs that Sufjan originally recorded to send out to his friends. I generally prefer not to listen to Christmas music, but I bought this CD set for Laura one Christmas after we spent a week constantly going back to NPR to stream Stevens' "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing". (That song has tragically been removed, from the LDS hymn book, but the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and others still perform it.)

There are definitely some songs/hymns that I really like, but the way that Christmas music has been treated does little to inspire me.

I am wary of any band or entertainer that puts out a Christmas album. I use that word "entertainer" loosely... it was the best I could think of at the moment so as not to use "musician" or "artist" which are more debatable terms under these circumstances. Christmas albums seem like a cheap shot at sales that somehow someone still concedes to produce as another offering to the undiscriminating masses. I consider the Sufjan Stevens EPs as a definite exception because he recorded 5 EPs over 6 years for friends and then decided to make it commercially available.

To me, most Christmas albums are a tribute to those who don't want to bother with making a real choice about what to listen to. "Harmless" is the only requirement. Just think about how many Christmas albums that fall into these categories: adult contemporary, country, and new age - a selection that runs from bland and blah to downright putrid. Just type in "Christmas" while searching for music on Amazon and you'll get a good picture of this bleak landscape. The inspiration that was required for Handel's Messiah or "Silent Night" is wrung out and replaced by the simple sales point of "hey, listen to me... I know all the words", not to mention the smothering by "original" compositions. bleh.

I think that the hardest part for me about Christmas music is how it is rolled into the mass marketing of the Holiday season. I am frightened of those, and I'm mainly talking about commercial enterprises, who play Christmas music as soon as the turkey's off the Thanksgiving table. Few things are more grating than the barrage of pop-culture mediocrity. There were some definite music fiends that I had to listen to as a missionary because of my inability to convince some of my missionary companions that any album with "Christmas" in the title was not automatically "inspirational" music -- Boyz II Men are definitely going to hell for what they've done.

Sufjan is half of the reason I am writing this post. The other half is because I heard a review of Bob Dylan's new Christmas album on NPR. After listening to the few samples of the songs that were included in that story, the first thing I'd like to say is: ¿Can someone please find Bob a losenge? His throat must be killing him..

Secondly, I do like Dylan's music. If you're not a fan of Bob or even dislike his music, one thing that can help you better appreciate his writing talent is to hear someone else sing his songs: Tim O'Brien's version of "Forever Young", nearly anyone's version of "Girl from the North Country", but I do like Sam Bush's rendition, and there are definite reasons why so many people have covered "Don'tThink Twice It's Alright" and "All Along the Watchtower".

With that preface, I have no idea why. ¿WHY?

¿WHY did Bob Dylan record a Christmas album?

Maybe you can listen to a track or two and tell me.

NPR's All Songs Considered has their yearly selection of Christmas Covers up and running, and The Annoying Music Show also has this year's post. Both programs have Bob Dylan, if that means anything.

* I stole the photo from New York Magazine.

Pop-culture Icons

2009-12-01T00:29:00.004-07:00

This video is just over a week old and last i looked, the video is less than 15k short of reaching the 8 million mark. That's crazy. It's easy to understand. I loved "Bohemian Rhapsody" well before the Wayne's World revival, and the Muppets from even earlier. Apparently I'm not the only one who thinks that this is a good mash-up of pop culture.

Will nearly 8 million views, you've probably already seen this. In case you haven't, here it is:

Some are smart - others, silly

2009-11-30T23:58:00.005-07:00

i was digging around on the internet looking for some alphabet flashcards for Maggie. Yes, Maggie is learning her letters. She has started to identify them off of labels, T-shirts, boxes, her blocks, etc. i was hoping to find a set of flash cards to use with Maggie so that we could have a little play time around letters - reward some of her curiosity with something easier to handle than shuffling through the letters on her blocks.

i found a few sets of flash cards with okay fonts, but i also found someone's not so bright idea: American Sign Language alphabet flash cards. These cards have the letter and the hand sign printed together. There is an important word in that last sentence.

If you know the ASL alphabet, there is this wonderful teaching tool generally located just past your wrist. If you want to teach your kids the ASL alphabet, learn the alphabet and then use your hands as the flash cards.

i know that the flash cards could be used to help an adult as a starter to learn the ASL alphabet, but they were in a section for kids. When i found the cards, they just seemed plain silly to me. Maggie would be served better by trying to read my finger-spelling than trying to interpret the drawings of hands on the cards.

Maggie's favorite letters so far: Z (a fun action letter), X ('x's are everywhere), R, P, Q and sometimes Y.

Baby Talk

2009-09-29T12:52:00.002-07:00

¿What's more fun than listening to an 18 month old say, "Ahhhh, Shirt"?

Well, having her tell you that she wants to "sit" with her soother still in her mouth is at least a close second.

Astonomy Hiatus

2009-08-12T23:40:00.004-07:00

I was too tired, too lazy, and too unorganized to go out and watch the Perseid meteor shower tonight. Even Google had said that it was a good idea to go watch.

Instead, I put in a DVD of Deep Impact. Stuff falls out of the sky in that movie.

Turns out I was too lazy to watch a movie too.

Well, maybe next year -- for the movie. (Maybe in two years or so I can work up to watching real meteors -- don't pressure me.)

We'll never get their names right

2009-08-11T23:41:00.001-07:00

The Baby = Maggie
Chloe = The Baby
Chloe = Maggie

We will never sleep

2009-08-11T02:06:00.000-07:00

When you have a sixteen-month old and a two-week old, you should not still be losing sleep because of the sixteen-month old.

There's always someone who'll do it

2009-08-09T21:47:00.004-07:00

Nothing says "Sunday Evening in Provo" quite as well as shorts, dark dress socks and flip flops.

There is nearly always something extra to see at the botany (duck) pond.

A Different Experience

2009-07-28T08:19:00.007-07:00

While this visit to the hospital didn't exactly feel new… we're only 16 months removed from the last c-section… this visit was definitely different.

Unfortunately for Laura some of the differences were not so pleasant. For example, receiving the epidural was much less comfortable. Less comfortable isn't quite right. The epidural was beyond uncomfortable. Laur was quiet, but I saw a long chain of her mouthing "ow, ow, ow, ow" as the doctor jabbed a needle into her spine. And this epidural didn't block out as much of the feeling as the epidural for Maggie. Laura felt much more of the work done on her in her c-section. With Maggie, I had to tell Laur that people full-on yanked with their body weight on her stomach. This time, she was much more aware. This extra level of sensation wasn't so good for getting sewn back up.

Adding to the discomfort of the surgery, our new baby girl is a big one. Chloe was measured at 9lbs6oz and 21 inches, and there was some major pulling to drag her out. The doctor even took the salad spoons after her. I'm amazed at how durable a baby is; the way they are yanked out into the world. The doctors pulled pretty hard on Maggie's legs to drag her out, and they lifted Chloe by her head and neck and she's still in one piece.

I watched both c-sections, although the anesthesiologist this time started out trying to tell me to stand at the head of the operating table. I did eventually move down to the foot of the table to watch like I did for Maggie's birth. This time, I had the camera. We didn't even think about bringing the camera in last time. Last time I wasn't sure if I was going to watch the whole operation or not, or how much help Laura would want from me. I got a few pictures and a few video clips of Chloe's exit.

Laur's anesthesiologist didn't give her the running play by play like the last one did, but he did pull down the curtain so that she could watch Chloe's exit. Between that and the video, Laur has seen a lot more than last time.

I don’t think that there was as much fluid with Chloe, but there was still a lot. Chloe's exit was less stressful (from the point of view of the baby) than for Maggie. Maggie had her cord around her neck, and was zipped right out to the NICU doctors to make sure things were okay. Chloe came out and had plenty of time to start yelling in the OR. What a screamer. I didn't follow Chloe immediately out, so I had time to check up on Laur for a minute and to see the placenta get pulled out. The placenta was a huge, lumpy, uneven, red mass. Between our giant baby, the copious amounts of fluid and the mass of placenta, Laur is easily down 20 pounds. Yeesh.

Fortunately Laur's recovery seems to be easier this time. She seems less sluggish, and getting out of bed for the first time seemed earlier and easier.

Chloe, being big, gave the doctors a few concerns. There was a lot of fluid to expel from her lungs, in part because she was a c-section delivery, and she was breathing a little fast when we got to the nursery; nothing too serious, but just enough to make them watch. They tried an oxygen tent for 15 minutes but eventually we went up to the NICU for a CPAP. Again, nothing too serious, but they just wanted to get her lungs expanded fully so they wouldn't have to worry the whole day long.

Probably the worst difference with this delivery was the waiting. For me, it seemed like the c-section with Maggie was so quick after the arrival in the OR. This time, I felt like I had to keep getting out of the way to wait some more for the initial incision. Laura had much more waiting time than me. Chloe was born at 1:21pm, but by 2:30 or so we were in the NICU. The NICU was supposed to be a one to two hour visit. The CPAP was supposed to be on for an hour. I visited Laur in recovery for a few minutes at 3:30, but it was a while before I really got back to her. There were a ton of births at the hospital yesterday, including at least two sets of twins, so everything was delayed. I sat in a rocker with Chloe for close to an hour waiting for the nurse to come and do the final check out from the NICU. We left the NICU around 6:00pm, and had to go back to the well-baby nursery to get all the stuff done that they didn't do in our last visit. I got to wait there for the nurses too. Laur didn't get to hold Chloe until almost 7:00pm. Laur could have been happier.

Above all, Chloe is a different baby. She looks like our baby, but she's not Maggie's clone. Chloe might have a chin dimple, but if she does it will be like Laura's: mostly hidden, but there if you look for it. Chloe does have big cheeks and a tiny chin, but she has more of a double chin than Maggie did. Chloe has a small mouth, with thinner lips – AND she closes it. Chloe has hair; maybe not as much as Maggie did, and not as much of a curl on top, but some wave to it. Chloe's hands and fingers seem different, and Laur thinks that Chloe is going to have Grandma Phyllis's nose. Chloe's nose does seem pretty distinct.

It's hard not to compare a little here at the beginning, but I think I've always had in mind that our two girls were going to be different; different looking, and different experiences. It will be fun to see how Chloe's temperament will develop. I'm excited to see her personality. It's good to have our baby here. Chloe has had lots of cuddle time with her mama, as they've caught up on some rest after their hard work yesterday. Laur is happy for this baby to be here.

"I can't believe it's all over… there was a lot of baby in there." -- Laura Dee Betts, 1:31am Jul 28, 2009

Chloe Dee Betts

2009-07-27T18:00:00.000-07:00

Chloe Dee Betts
9 lbs. 6 oz., 21 inches
1:21pm, July 27, 2009

Not a good day

2009-03-18T15:14:00.004-07:00

yesterday was a bad day. i'm just going to list two of the symptoms.

first of all, it was Saint Patrick's Day, and i ended up on campus without a single green article of clothing. if you know me you know that not wearing something green even at random is somewhat of a feat -- not one of my multiple pairs of green shoes, not one of my green ball caps, not even my green belt. no green from this little fish.

the second symptom requires some mental imaging: two giant spoonfuls of Life cereal through the nose (along with the rest of the cereal and milk that came out of my mouth). that's what i get for eating too fast and having a bit of a cough in the middle of gulping down the milk from my bowl. Life cereal is a little reluctant to leave your sinuses. cleanup wasn't the best.

Hoops

2008-11-07T11:52:00.002-07:00

i forgot to write about October's big event. i presented my prospectus and passed that phase of my Master's program. yes, it is a little late in my program for a prospectus presentation, but my program hasn't followed a normal schedule. i changed my thesis topic, changed my courses and dropped one committee member in exchange for another. all that adds up to doing my prospectus late in my Master's program.

my prospectus presentation was a good experience overall - it cleared up a few things for me to do in my research and writing and my project got a little smaller; a little more focused. the most important thing was that i passed.

the next in line was my oral exam. i was thinking that i'd taking that exam the week before thanksgiving. then my advisor announces that she's scheduled my exam for the 13th of November. ¿!? okay... i guess that's alright.

one of the side effects of the slightly early scheduling meant that i got to stand up in front of my Community Ecology class to lead the question and answer period on Wednesday of this week. one of my committee members teaches Community Ecology and he wanted to give the class an example of what happens in oral exams. i was definitely glad that i hadn't slacked of on that day's reading assignments.

the odd part about having to lead the discussion this week is that i am the only student who has had to lead the whole class in discussion. originally the plan for the semester was to take turns leading the discussion every other day; trading off between students and the professor. after i was picked first and led a less than animated discussion, the professor decided to change the discussion days to small groups. at least a couple of other students have had to get up to draw a diagram on the board and describe that diagram, but it hasn't quite been the same as what i've had to do.

getting back to the scheduling... i made a mistake and didn't make sure i met with the final committee member to secure the schedule. i made some attempts to meet, but those meetings got delayed. this gave my advisor too much wiggle room.

on Wednesday of this week (the 5th - the same day as leading the discussion), i got an email informing me and the rest of my committee that there were scheduling conflicts so my exam was going to be bumped up to today (the 7th). ¿¡what!?

now we come to the best part. on Thursday, as i was on my way to finally talk to the third and final member of my committee, i was followed into the room by my advisor. as i asked about the scheduling issues with Friday, i found out that my advisor had forgotten that i was scheduled for NEXT week. she didn't realize that she had bumped my exam forward a whole 6 days. yeesh.

i could have been a little more comfortable this morning for my exam. 8:30am, there i was. some of the questions were good, some were out there. even if i wasn't as comfortable as i could have been, i don't think i was nervous. Laura asked me if i thought i was ready, and i said that it didn't matter at that point. if they failed me, then we'd just reschedule my exam and the next try would be a little more focused.

---

well... i thought i wasn't going to find out the results until late this afternoon because one of my committee members had other places to be right after my question-and-answer period. it turns out that the other meeting was cancelled and my committee was able to meet right after i left the room. i found out 20 minutes ago.

i passed.

one more hoop is behind me.

Voting quandry resolved

2008-11-03T18:16:00.003-07:00

ever since the voter information packet came in the mail, i have had one question in my mind:

"¿can i vote for SUPERDELL?"

this may be my one chance to vote for this loony. ¿are there any oddball bragging rights earned for voting for Dell Schanze in the Governor's race?

then as i was looking through the information for the other candidates i can vote for, i pulled up Schanze's webpage just to see his platform... yeesh.

i think that Schanze is the only person in the world who could call Utah's current Governor an "anti-Christ socialist" and be serious about it. socialism and the Republican Party is an odd enough of a mix, but ¿the "anti-Christ" accusation?

Schanze has listed himself as "Christian" as his religious affiliation, instead of LDS (which he is unless he has changed his relationship with the LDS Church). i'm not sure if we should be grateful for that distinction. i won't be surprised if SUPERDELL announces that he has just revealed to himself, through his own divine intervention, that he is to start up his own fundamentalist christian church. if you know anything about this guy, expect to see the baptismal font right next to the gun range, WWDD billboards and commercials, and Schanze will be the only speaker at all of the services.

at least i have my answer. i can't vote for Schanze, even as a joke and even though my vote wouldn't have mattered in the race. i just can't be responsible for giving someone so unstable any sort of ground to stand on in order to justify his lunacy.

MONKEY!

2008-07-18T13:03:00.005-07:00

a fellow master's student and co-worker pointed at a sticker on his lap top and said, "See, I put this on here for you."

it was a sticker of one of the chimp characters from the upcoming movie Space Chimps that he had pulled from off a banana.

"i've got a nephew who looks just like that," i said.

my co-worker calmly reflected, "Oh, the one who was at the baby blessing?"

sorry Daxon, the secret's out.

(Limb, put down the hands from behind your ears.)

Fixing what isn't broken

2008-07-07T07:37:00.002-07:00

as i sat down to type up and edit a couple of blogs, i found a horrible fact.

!!!NERD ALERT!!!

for a solid fifteen years or so, i have been a regular user of some keyboard shortcuts using the ALT key and the number pad on the keyboard. it's a quick way to add symbols(¢£¥♂♀), or those handy diacritical marks when i would write stuff in spanish or french (éçêñ). but above all, it allowed for the quick use of "¿". i use "¿" so often, that when i write stuff for school or for my students i have to proofread to delete them all so i can appear more professional (or at least not so informal). it's just automatic to type these shortcut keys, and NOW...

the blog doesn't recognize all of these key strokes, and even interprets some of these key combinations as me trying to navigate away from the page i'm working on. i had to use Notepad to get the symbols that i put in this post, and even Notepad won't give me the degree symbol or the approximate sign (you know that wavy equals sign).

i use all these symbols all of the time, and if they don't work it's really going to wreak havoc on my typing skills if i have to slow down and remind myself to not hit those keys. the short cuts are so much easier than going through all of the mouseclicks and scrolling to insert a symbol. up until now practically everywhere you could type text accepted these shortcuts. somewhere someone is ruining a good thing.

¿who could i even complain to, to try and stop this horrible trend?

¿Recreation?

2008-07-07T07:31:00.003-07:00

a few years ago, some friends of mine informed me that the second week of july is "National Nude Recreation Week".

i just don't think that i have enough sunscreen.

happy holidays

¿Where'd the Cheese Go?

2008-06-11T23:44:00.001-07:00

Before it's too late...

2008-06-01T22:42:00.004-07:00

Let's face the facts. They have disappointed you. It's time to take some action before they disappoint you again. Notify them that you are expecting a change in their behaviour with this notice of disadulation.

http://disadulation.com/

Click here for further clarification.

Final Results

2008-05-31T21:59:00.003-07:00

Laura's been home for a few days now. After five nights in the hospital, Laura came home. Both Laura and i were nervous for her to leave the hospital with how hard it was for Laura to get around on her own. Surgery Thursday morning, on our way home on Tuesday at 1:00pm.

The doctor said that the cyst was easily the size of a football, but the biopsy came up with the expected benign result. There was some pancreatic tissue on the cyst, but i don't really know if that means the cyst originated from her pancreas or if it was just so close to the pancreas that the cyst started taking up some of that material too. i don't think the doctors know either. She'll get another CT scan later this summer to see if they caught everything.

Laur has done so well with the recovery. Bumps in the road (even the little ones) aren't fun, so she hasn't been away from the house much. We did take Maggie for her two-month check-up on Friday. For the first couple of days Laura couldn't get up off of the couch without some help. Yesterday and today, Laura has been getting off of the couch by herself while still holding Maggie. Laura doesn't look comfortable while she does it, but she's a little more self-sufficient each day.

Dr. Garry said that Laura might not feel like she's up to full speed until six weeks after the surgery. Laura says that she'd prefer 20 c-sections to having to go through this surgery again. It's just so crazy that Laura had that cyst and Maggie inside her all at once. Laura's really doing quite well, and Maggie and i both happy to have her home again.

Tales of Future Past

2008-05-27T00:27:00.000-07:00

Laura said that watching a TV medical drama from a hospital bed was a little surreal. The program seemed much more three dimensional with Laura's own IV stand and other hospital equipment on the boarders of the television screen.

There is something to be said about what the environment adds to an experience. Even with the convenience of DVDs, i still prefer to see a movie in a theatre where you can see the film where it is presented in it's intended format. In addition, the experience is different because you're seeing the film with a group.

The connection between Laura's program choice and Laura's environment reminds me of a time when i watched a movie just for nature of the environment. i didn't really like the movie when it first came out and i'm not sure if i liked it this time through either, but the opportunity provided by the presentation format was hard to pass up. The environment for the experience was provided by several people's visions of the future of entertainment.

i saw the movie Tron (one of the first major movies to use computer animation) that was recorded on a Betamax tape that had been recorded from a Laserdisc. (they even kept the message to turn the disc over in the middle of the video recording.)

my roommate had a whole bookshelf full of Betamax tapes and two working players. i needed to watch at least one movie for the early 80s throwback. how could i pass up on seeing Tron?

like i said earlier, i'm still not sure if i liked the movie, but the experience was worth it.

(the image in this post came from http://www.benzilla.com/ and you can find ben's professional portfolio at http://www.trainedchimp.com/)

Sleepovers with Maggie

2008-05-25T13:43:00.000-07:00

Maggie has had three nights with just me at home. we've done okay together. Maggie has been surprisingly good for me. she's been eating well when i feed her, sleeping a little longer than she was before laura's surgery, and only fussing a little for me as i try to take care of the night shift.

laura was worried to send maggie home with me. she doesn't trust me to play mom. all joking aside, i was worried about taking maggie home because i am a deep sleeper. our first night home, arriving after 3:00am, i was scared that i was going to have more problems than just waking up for maggie when she cries. i was sure that i was going to fall asleep in the middle of getting maggie ready for bed. during these three nights together i have drifted a couple of times while feeding her, but after a few tries at keeping the bottle in her mouth i usually wake up enough to finish the job.

Maggie starts out each night sleeping in her own space, but she ends up in my bed each night. she shares the bed well. i put her blankets over her, and then pull my sheet and blanket over top of that too. Maggie likes to keep arms out from under the blankets and free to wave around, so the extra covers on the rest of her are good to keep her warm.

Getting Better

2008-05-25T11:40:00.003-07:00

yesterday was not laura's best. laura had a rough night as they tried to decrease her pain meds. with such a long incision, it was hard for her to breath deep enough and i don't think that she rested well all night. for most of the day yesterday laura felt nauseated, and achy. she said it was like she had a bad flu most of the day.

by lunch time they had approved laura to start eating more than juice and broth, but laura only had a little apple sauce and some jello. some of that apple sauce came back up.

laura did get out of bed three times yesterday and made at least one loop around the floor each time. in the late evening laura started to feel a lot better, even with the second review of apple sauce.

Maggie was on good behaviour by then too, so we got to stay until 12:30am, keeping laura company. at one point, all three of us had drifted off to sleep.

today appears to be a much different story. laura got up and did two loops on the floor, had her bandages changed (laura got to look at the her suture and the incision is LONG), and even sat in the chair for a while. laura ate some of her mostly liquid breakfast, she's not as achy, and she's started into her lunch for today. best of all laura was feeling well enough to hold maggie for a little while, once maggie and i came back to the hospital for the day.

One Long Day: back at the hospital

2008-05-23T03:45:00.006-07:00

it's 3:25 AM and Maggie and i just got home from the hospital. this has been a very long day.

last night Maggie didn't let Laura get much sleep (only between 1:00 and 3:00am) and Laura was scheduled to be at the hospital by 5:30am.

once we checked in and were in the pre-op waiting room the nurse told Laura that she didn't know why the hospital didn't a call last night, because Laura's surgery had been bumped to the second time slot. Laura had been scheduled for the 7:30 surgery time, but now we had to wait for one surgery before us.

close to 8:45 (just past the three hour mark for us at the hospital) Laura was taken to the room where she'd get started with the anesthesiologist and i was sent down to the surgery waiting room where I'd have to guess on Laura's status for the next few hours.

i spent my time watching the hands move on the clock and waiting for the waiting-room nurse to give me updates on Laura's condition. this was interspersed with phone calls to Laura's parents and my mom. the first calls consisted of me telling them that Laura's surgery hadn't even started even though it was close to the time that we had expected that Laura would be out of her surgery.

i saw Laura's surgeon talking to the family of the previous operation just after 9:30am, but i was a little surprised when the nurse told me at close to 10:00am that Laura probably wouldn't begin until 10:20, because of the time it was taking to prep the OR.

two more hours of watching the clock hands and the nurse finally told me that Laura would be on her way out and going to the recovery room soon. now i was just waiting for the surgeon to come and talk to me to let me know how things went.

just after 12:15 i got to speak to Dr. Garry. Laura's surgery went well and they have no reason to suspect that the cyst was anything but benign. Dr. Garry ended up making a midline incision to open Laura up. the cyst was larger than a nalgene bottle and probably closer in size to a regular loaf of bread. the cyst wasn't really attached to anything, so they think that it had just formed as a bubble in the layers of membranes around the mesentaries. the top part of the cyst was close to Laura's pancreas so they had to be careful with that part of the excision, but they don't think that it was actually attached to the pancreas or anything else for that matter.

i was up in Laura's room before 1:00 and my mom and then Laura all arrived within the next half an hour. Maggie was good for me during the whole operation. being up all night may have been the reason she slept so much for me. Maggie was also very good for my mom. she fed well from her bottle and kept quiet or slept well in my mother's arms. my mom stayed until nearly 10:00pm, which gave me a little time to take care of Laura and i even went home for a nap of almost a two-hours.

this surgery is a lot harder on Laura than the c-section. not only did Laura have to go through her dreaded IV, but she's got the pressure cuffs on her legs again (to prevent blot clots, but unfortunately anchoring her to the bed and making her feel that much more helpless and claustrophobic.) the pain medication is taking more out of Laura, and the incision and surgery were much more invasive. Laura's even been hooked up to oxygen because of the way the pain medication makes her breathing so shallow. i don't know how long the incision is, but the dressing runs essentially the full length of Laura's abdomen, from sternum to waistline.

Laura has been tired, itchy and sore, and feels rather helpless when it comes to taking care of Maggie. after my mom left, Maggie was less pleasant. we walked the halls, and then walked the halls some more. Maggie wouldn't cry until we'd get back to the room. Maggie threw a couple of fits that were stressing us all out. i was tying to change diapers, take care of Laura a little and get Maggie to calm down and i wasn't doing well at any of them. Laura was completely spent. Maggie's crying and being tied down to the bed with a big sore spot where Maggie would usually lay is hard on Laura.

Maggie gave Laura a few moments to hold her, but finally i just had to pack Maggie up and take her home. mom and baby both needed some sleep and Laura wasn't going to get any with Maggie there.

It has a name

2008-05-21T02:17:00.007-07:00

This week i learned a new word from the A Way With Words podcast: philtrum

Here's the definition that Martha Barnette, one of the co-hosts of the show gives at her website under her "Learn a New Word" tab.

philtrum
(FILL-trum)

The vertical groove between one's nose and upper lip.

The ancient Greeks' word for "love potion" was philtron, the source of English philter, which means the same thing.

Though no one's sure why, the Greeks also used philtron to denote the dent in one's upper lip. Some have suggested that it's because the shape of one's philtrum resembles the type of small vial used to carry such a potion. Another possibility is that it's the site on the body where such a potion was often applied.

Martha also noted an idea from Talmudic tradition with regards to this lip indentation. The tradition starts with the idea that all babies still have a perfect knowledge of God while still in the womb. (Other sources say that the unborn child has a perfect knowledge of all things in the world.) According to the Talmud (Niddah 30b) just before each child is born an angel is sent who touches the lip of each child to make the child forget. Thereby child will not be able to speak what it once knew. The indentation is there to remind us all that this life is meant for us to study and learn the things of God.

One more time

2008-05-20T23:38:00.004-07:00

Today we went to the hospital so they could take some blood and review Laura's medical history before her surgery. i got to tend Maggie while Laur was getting poked. The bottle finally came off of Maggie's face and i held her up on my knee to give her a little air. The nurse looked over and said, "Look at that! Just like Daddy."

i was surprised how quick the nurse said the same thing i've been hearing from family and friends. To me, she just looks like Maggie, but i guess i'm going to have to accept that she looks like me. i hope Maggie is okay with it. Poor kid.

Too poor

2008-05-19T22:26:00.002-07:00

Today we got our notification letter from the IRS with regards to the financial stimulus package that every tax-paying american is going to get. With me only working part time hours and Laura now working as a full-time mom we were looking forward to some extra money in the bank.

i opened the letter and read "$782". ¿$782? Last i heard it was $600 dollars for each adult in the household. ¿Why only $782 and why such an irregular ammount?

On the back of the letter i finally read that the possible amount was $1,200 >>OR<< our "2007 net tax liablity". We get back the money we were supposed to pay in taxes.

i did a lot of scattered work last year for more employers than i would have liked as i waited to get back into the school cycle (and employment). Basically, we're too poor to get the full $1,200. For some reson the Goverment doesn't want to refund more taxes that we paid last year. RUDE!

Maggie's Twin - !GINORMOUS!

2008-05-16T12:45:00.004-07:00

well, we have the most definitive information so far.

one of the things i didn't talk about during Laura's first ultrasound was the extra surprise. after checking on Maggie, the ultrasound technician took a peek at Laura's innards to see if the ducts from the kidneys were kinked by the baby or if anything else was cramped. while you're in a doctor's office and someone is giving you an examination and they say, "oh", that's not the most comforting of situations. The "oh" was followed by an extended pause. then she typed "cyst" on the screen and pressed the button to take a picture of the display. this is how we were informed that Maggie had a playmate while she was growing inside of Laura.

right up to the ultrasound i had been teasing Laura that she was going to have twins. there they were. we definitely heard the jokes about how fun it was going to be that Maggie was going to have a little "cyster".

Laura had an MRI on the 3rd of December, just to make sure that the cyst wasn't a danger to mom or the baby. the MRI was suggested because the ultrasound tech couldn't tell if the cyst was coming from Laura's liver, her kidney or her pancreas. the proximity of the cyst to so many potential danger zones gave Laura an early trip to the hospital but nothing was found that made anyone nervous enough to do something before Maggie was born.

with Maggie born, Laura could have her CT scan without endangering Maggie. The CT scan was on Friday, April 18th, to see if the picture was cleared up with out a big swollen uterus getting in the way. still, no one said anything about what was up with the cyst. eventually Laura was told that she had an appointment with a surgeon on Tuesday, May 13.

Laura was getting her mind set for a surgery on the 13th, when we got a call they day before to let Laura know that she was going in for a consultation and not the surgery the next day. Laura's stress level bumped up a level or two because it was now apparent that the possibility of a "procedure" was being pushed aside by the likelihood of an "operation". Laura didn't sleep much that night. this fluid filled cyst was getting more complicated all the time.

Meeting with Dr. Thomas didn't do much to alleviate Laura's concerns. having one surgeon say that he wants to turn over the surgery to a liver specialist but he still hopes to be in on the surgery to see what is actually inside you is a little spooky. no one wants to be the interesting case that the other doctors want in on.

finally today, the 16th of May, we got to see the specialist. he did the regular consultation then the internet connection came through with the x-rays and we got to see the scans of Laura's guts.

This thing is Huge!

it was easy to see that there was an object inside of Laura taking up quite a lot of room.

the top of the cyst comes in behind Laura's liver and her intestines, even pushing the duodenum out of place a little. it does tuck around her gall bladder and the ducts from the liver but Laura is healthy (no jaundice or digestive disorders) and the doctor doesn't think that the cyst is malignant. the cyst at it's widest point seemed to push over to nearly the midline of Laura's torso, and it stretched down pressing Laura's kidneys to the back. it's crazy that Laura has something so big inside of her and that it was there for the pregnancy too. the cyst starts just under her rib cage and stretches down to the upper part of her pelvis. the cyst could come off of anything from top to bottom: off of her ovary, off the membranes around her guts, or off her liver or gall bladder etc.

i'm waiting to see how Laura feels once this thing is out. Laura has felt well, no jaundice or digestion problems. Laura had all of the blood tests during her pregnancy and even some extensive labs on her urine for a 24 hour period when she had some blood pressure issues.

between the multiple ultrasounds, the c-section and a CT scan it's all part of the grand tour through Laura's insides. Laura would be content if this tour is over soon. surgery will be next week sometime.

Good Words

2008-04-21T19:40:00.002-07:00

there are some things i just can't pass up.

one of my favorite words to use is "the interweb". i try and be helpful and let people know when they can just find something on "the interweb".

just recently i've decided that i will add "genetical" to my vocabulary - e.g. just because i was born via c-section and my baby was born via c-section doesn't mean that it's genetical.

i love an awkward silence.

(even if it's only a stutter.)

Things not to tell your wife: the first in a series of helpful hints for the domestic lifestyle

2008-04-04T10:20:00.004-07:00

First on the list for this week --

"Watch. If I press really hard on the baby's soft spot she'll sneeze."

(coming next week - "Things not to do to the baby")

Troubled child

2008-03-31T08:14:00.007-07:00

Elementary school is a confusing place and an often terrible place to send children, and by terrible i mean something that instills terror. Kids at that age are burdened by the juxtaposition of the desire to reason things out for themselves and the lack of experience and judgement to not come to faulty conclusions. Then we put a bunch of them together all at once for eight hours, thank you very much.

From my own experience, i can remember walking up to a girl and basically saying, "you are chinese". She was probably of Asian decent, but she was quite adamant that she was in no way chinese. i was definitely confused. Why couldn't she tell that she was chinese? She looked just like "chinese". my friends had told me just what "chinese" looks like. For all i know, she could have been adopted, and as young as we were she probably had no idea about any other ancestry besides being from Utah.

The reason i've even been thinking about this is because of all the talk about my Maggie looking like me. i've heard it plenty of times already, and i hope that her looks won't be too heavy of a burden as she grows up. i look back at my pictures growing up and half the time i can only see my mouth weighed down by heavy cheeks and hanging open and my heavy eyelids giving me a perpetual drowsy look. i look like i've got downs syndrome. i'm telling you truth when i say that someone was serious when they told me that they wondered if i was a regular passenger on the short bus. (Then again, maybe that question was in their mind not based on my looks at all -- yeesh. It was my destiny to be an awkward child.)

Maggie does have some of her mother's traits. As i've said before, Maggie's dimpled chin comes from her mother. In addition to her chin it is obvious that Maggie's feet and her hands definitely belong to her mother. These exceptions are also a comfort because it's not just facial features that can supply a little childhood anxiety.

i remember being on the elementary school playground, sometime probably before third-grade, and having an older kid sitting in the swings give his assessment of who i was. i will admit that i could put on a pair of shorts and the bottom hem of those shorts seemed to easly reach down to eclipse the tops of my socks. i will also confess that i could put on grandpa's hat and the hat wouldn't fall down over my eyes, but i could not convice this kid on the swings that i was not lying when i said i was not a midget. Short little kid with a long body and a big head - to what other conclusion was that kid supposed to arrive?

good luck Maggie. i'm sorry.

---------

As long as were on the topic of poor logic, check out a couple of episodes of what might be my favorite radio program: This American Life.

Listen to the prologue (six minutes) on Kid Logic and the prologue and first Act (18 minutes) of A Little Bit of Knowledge. Each program is good as a whole, but not quite as light-hearted as the opening minutes.

Maggie is Home

2008-03-30T10:37:00.006-07:00

Laura and little Maggie are doing well. Laura checked out of the hospital as early as she could and we were on our way home Friday afternoon.

here is a picture of Maggie sitting in her car seat wearing the outfit that Grandma Betts gave us for Maggie's trip home. Laura and i didn't realize how small Maggie is until we saw how oversize the newborn outfit is.

our first night with Maggie home went well. all three of us got some good, albeit interrupted, sleep. it's hard not to just let Maggie cuddle with you and fall asleep together.

Maggie's bilirubin levels were a little high when we left the hospital. today was a little cool outside, but the sun was out so we stripped Maggie down to her diaper and lay her in the sunlight on our bed. Maggie got a good hour of bright, warm sunlight shining on her little body.

we first put one of her socks over her face to shade her eyes, but in the end it seemed like her face was shaded enough to rest well in the sunlight.

watching her in the sun it was easy to see all of the little wispy hairs covering from her legs on up to where the wisps on her forehead fold into the hair on top of her head. the way she stretched and kicked in the sun was quite endearing.

look at the way she has spread those toes in the sun.

you can also see that Maggie was a breech baby with the way she holds her legs. she folds up into these little frog poses or this "little-Buddha" pose that we captured in the afternoon of her third day in the hospital.

Laura Stuttered

2008-03-29T16:45:00.001-07:00

Once Maggie was born, i went with the nurse out of the Operating Room to get Maggie weighed, measured and cleaned up. Laur didn't come. I guess the doctors wanted to sew her up first.

Once Maggie was relatively clean and wrapped up, i got to take her back into the OR so Laura could see her. Laura's head and shoulders were secluded behind the make-shift wall of a big blue sheet for the whole birthing event. Maggie and Laura needed a chance to meet each other face-to-face.

i walk over to Laura holding Maggie in for her to see. Laura with her first look at Maggie says, "She looks like yo- Bum chin?!?"

Maggie's dimpled chin is hard to miss and i think it's the cutest. Laur was just a little suprised to see such a prominant version of that trait. i like the dimple because it's an easy way to know that Maggie's her mother's daughter.

Blood and Guts

2008-03-29T01:59:00.003-07:00

it finally came down to the appointed hour. Laura of course didn’t sleep much more than a few 15 minute bursts during the night. she stayed up late and was up before 4:00am. i was rolling out of bed shortly after 4:30am. here is a picture of Laura on our way out the door to Utah Valley Regional Medical Center.

our hospital check-in at 5:30am was quick and soon enough the nurse was taking Laura’s vitals and Laura was getting prepped for the birth. the wait wasn’t exactly short, but the hospital staff was busy enough that we didn’t have much time to get antsy. Laura said that 7:30am is the first hour that the hospital schedules an operating room, and Laura was rolling down the hallway shortly after 7:15am.

all of the doctors and nurses were ready to go. i was wearing my nice white paper suit, booties over my shoes, a super-sized elastic-bound cap that must have been made for someone with two heads, and a face mask. white must be the choice to indicate that i was the one useless person with no medical knowledge in the OR: don’t ask me for help.

i wasn’t sure how i’d be during Laura’s c-section. i don’t think i’m particularly squeamish, but i wasn’t sure if i could handle seeing that it was Laura who was getting cut open. i held her hand until the first incision started and then i moved to the foot of the table to watch the operation. i kept checking with myself to make sure i could get a head start back to the chair stationed at the head of the operating table before i passed out, but i watched right on up to Maggie’s complete exit.

the early cutting involved an electric scalpel that cauterized some of the veins on their way in. Laura only had an epidural so she was alert for the whole birth. i wondered if the smell of burning flesh bothered her at all, knowing that it was her that was burning.

there wasn’t much blood all the way down to the uterus. i couldn’t really distinguish much between the different layers they were cutting through until they got down to the uterus. the nurse standing next to me told me that it was the uterus, but it was easy to tell that there was a solid, rounded surface that had been uncovered.

most of the c-section was uneventful. i did wonder how much Laura could feel when each of the two doctors grabbed a corner of the incision with both hands and leaned back with their body weight. it turns out Laura had no idea what was going on. she didn’t even know when Dr. Savage had both hands with a straight-armed-press onto Laura’s stomach to help force Maggie’s head out in the end.

Laura really liked the anesthesiologist because he gave the play-by-play and kept Laura updated on each of the steps of the operation and Maggie’s progress out of the womb. Laura wasn’t completely secluded behind the blue curtain hung across her chest.

with the uterus laid bare, the real action started. once they cut into the uterus there was enough blood flowing that they finally had to use suction. THEN they broke Laura’s water. Laura gushed. with all of the recent ultrasounds, you could see plenty of space around Maggie. The doctors with the ultrasound were looking for that sign of sufficient amniotic fluid when they wanted to try and turn Maggie so she could be born naturally. there was plenty of amniotic fluid, the suction was working over time and Laura still spilt out onto the floor.

there was so much to see in the remainder of the c-section that it is hard to remember exactly how it all happened. Maggie’s right foot came out first, and all alone. Maggie’s skin was gray and messy with a hint of purple, but what can you expect for someone living in those conditions. her little leg didn’t seem substantial enough to hang on to. she seemed so soft and squishy. the doctors used her leg and hip to help maneuver her bum, and finally her other leg out into the air. this was followed by more tugging and pulling to get the torso and arms of this rubbery mass out of Laura. i could see all of our baby except for the head.

at this point the surgical doctor, Doctor Jones, said that the umbilical cord was around Maggie’s neck. i think that ever since Laura heard that my mom lost a baby to a tangle with the umbilical cord, Laura has been nervous that our baby would risk the same danger. i can’t really remember much, but i do know that i saw the umbilical cord pulled flat against Maggie’s tummy and tightly tucked into the womb. it was just a few quick steps and the cord was cut and i was exiting the OR with a nurse carrying Maggie in her arms. the ICU call button had been pressed on our way out and before Maggie was fully settled in to the bassinette an ICU doctor and nurse were standing on either side of our baby.

i was nervous for our baby, but added to that i was worried that Laura was freaking out back in the OR. fortunately Maggie started to cry as she was laid down and pink flowed quickly under her skin from her head and chest down to her feet. Laura’s other fear about the birth was that Maggie wouldn’t be breathing when she was born and that we wouldn’t hear her cry. Laura even had nightmares about this. Maggie was crying, but on the other side of the OR door, so i was sure that Laura was in a panic not hearing her baby announcing her self to the world.

i almost told one of the nurses to go back into the OR to tell Laura that Maggie was crying. Laura had been wondering if Maggie was okay because the OR was so quiet. Laura had no idea that we had left the room. the anesthesiologist told her to listen carefully and Laura tuned in to the faint sound of Maggie’s screams. i was enjoying the unobstructed performance at full volume.

Maggie’s birth was a little bit of a scare for a moment, but it was easy to tell that she was going to be alright. Doctor Savage said that with the umbilical cord the way it was, a natural birth would have been a disaster. Maggie knew what she was doing when she wouldn’t budge when they tried to turn her a week ago.

Thanks to Drs. Jones, Groesbeck (the anesthesiologist) and Savage (Laura and Maggie’s Family Doctor) and the nursing staff at UVRMC. To the right is a picture of Maggie with Dr. Savage after she cleared Laura and Maggie to check out of the hospital.

She's my girl

2008-03-27T23:47:00.004-07:00

i sent out some pictures of our Maggie in the evening after she was born. for one of my friends, Maggie's picture apparently cleared up the question as to whether or not this new baby belonged to me. he's only joking when he makes those comments about the questionable paternity, and i know he jokes because he's not quite sure why Laura puts up with me.

Laura is sure that Maggie looks like me. other family members, even on Laura's side, have made similar comments here and there on the pictures i've posted. i'm not so sure if she looks like me. if she were similar to my baby pictures, i'd think she'd look a lot more Downs Syndrome-y.

i'm not sure who she looks like. she doesn't have attached earlobes like her mother, but she doesn't have four earlobes worth like me. it'll be a while before we find out if she's got more of my blue or her mother's hazel. her fingers and toes look like they'll be long and slender like her mother's. newborn baby-noses are almost all the same little button just above the mouth, but she's got a fair amount of lip which Laura claims to be from me.

probably the most salient characteristic Maggie has is her dimpled chin, which is a Tanner trait. Laura has a slight dimple in her chin, as does Laura's mother. Laura's Uncle Jim and her Aunt Linda have more promenant dimples than Laura or Grandma Phyllis.

as for how i feel about this baby, i think that she feels like my little girl. we've all been in the hospital for two days, so this separation from our home might not let the fact that our girl is ours settle all the way in. nevertheless, Laura is so happy to hold her and take care of her, and i can't help but cuddle this child again and again. i think we've got a fair understanding that she belongs to us.

In Mamma's Arms

2008-03-27T09:33:00.001-07:00

Laura is very happy with her new baby (and i am too). Laura seems to be recovering quite well. some of the nurses seem impressed at how well Laura is doing. once she was unhooked from the IV and other junk, Laur was immediately out of bed on her own to stretch her legs and back.

Laura's pain levels have been really low. she's only been uncomfortable a couple of times and she has been taking low doses of pain medication.

Maggie knows how to let EVERYONE know that she's not content, but it doesn't take long for her mom to calm her back down. it's fun to see Laura take care of our little girl.

Maggie's first visitors

2008-03-25T21:00:00.001-07:00

With no immediate family closer than an hour away, and all of Laura's family in Canada, any visitor on the first day is an exceptional event. Grandma Betts left her after-work meeting early to make sure that she got her time in with little Maggie. Grandma was happy to hold her newest grandchild.

This picture of Maggie and Grandma is important because it shows you how much hair Laura had when she was... oh, let's say FIVE. Maggie has most of her cousins beat on the Evanson side when it comes to the hair that they were born with, but on the Betts side she might be on the low side of average.

Grandpa Betts knew his duties as soon as he came into the hospital room. He greeted everyone quickly and then got right to taking pictures of Grandma and Maggie together, and a few of Maggie and her parents.

Grandpa did get his turn with Maggie, but gave Maggie up early so Grandma could have one more cuddle from Maggie before her grandparents left. (Grandpa knows his place.)

Maggie's first visit went well. We know she's got plenty of grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins eager to meet her.

Happy Birthday Maggie!

2008-03-25T18:44:00.001-07:00

Maggie Phyllis Betts
7 lbs 6 oz
19 in.
March 25, 2008; 8:00am
mom and baby appear to be doing just fine.

Maggie was born at 8:00am, via cesarean section. she wouldn't budge from her "heads-up" position even after an attempted turning the week before. she arrived one week early to the day. (i was hoping that she was going to be an April Fool's arrival, but i'm happy to have her here.)

i watched basically all of the delivery. laura had several ultrasounds over the last week and a half, so it was no suprise that all of Maggie's limbs were tucked up over her head. each one was a little struggle to pull out. she was out soon enough and crying well.

Happy Birthday Maggie!

The Cheese Stands Alone

2007-11-20T23:55:00.000-07:00

¿Tired of watching the paint dry?
¿Don't want to be accused of being a tree-hugger because your watching the grass grow?

To fulfill your observational cravings, ¿why not watch cheese age?
http://cheddarvision.tv/

thanks NPR.

just found out

2007-11-14T13:22:00.001-07:00

this morning we found out that we've got a little girl on the way. laura's just short of the halfway mark on her pregnancy and the baby will probably be born at the end of the first week of april or into the second week.

the baby looks healthy and laura and i are excited for all that is to come. having the ultrasound done makes this whole baby thing a little more tangible, even more so than hearing the heart beat for the first time.

i'm sure laura will inform me tonight of the name she has picked out. i may wait a bit before i pass on that news.

Little Things

2007-11-09T16:12:00.001-07:00

on my way up to campus today, i stopped by the botany pond on the south end of campus. for my Wetland Ecology class we're supposed to be putting together a PowerPoint presentation on some of the terminology and concepts from the curriculum. i was looking for Daphnia (water fleas).

Daphnia are little planktonic crustaceans that feed on the bits of algae and other junk floating in the water column. these little critters aren't much longer than a milimeter (although some make it up to 2mm and others as small as 0.5mm) and they swim around in little jumps by swishing their antennae with rapid little twitches.

to catch them, i just went to the edge of the pond and dipped in a 25mL vial close to the edge where i could see these guys swimming. the vial filled up with water and only a couple of Daphnia, but the water surface tension had temporarily affixed dozens of these arthropods to my skin as my hand passed through the water. i scrapped the Daphnia into the vial to take them too their photo shoot; one more slide for my assignment.

---

i also collected a leaf from a bunch of cattails in my neighborhood. who ever heard of someone growing cattails as an ornamental plant? this set of apartments thought it was a good idea, and i get to take a good picture of the lacunar spaces inside the leaf. the spaces help move oxygen down to the roots so the cattails can grow in wetland soils. Below are pictures of the torn edge of the leaf, and then i cleaned up a small section for a cross-section photo.

Someone needs to think first: one more dumb idea

2007-09-06T20:46:00.003-07:00

With the start of new school year, the BYU Bookstore is doing the usual fall cleaning of it's shelves. They're having their annual sale out on the sidewalks between the Wilkinson Student Center and the Library, trying to get rid of all of those extra copies of stuff that just isn't selling inside the bookstore. Sometimes there is a hidden gem at a fair price. More often there is a lot of stuff that is easy to overlook even with the hyped-up discount price tags.

Walking by the tables i noticed what just might be the best example of a dumb idea; a small book titled "How to Download Music From the Iternet". i should have stopped to take a real good look at the book, to see who was dumb enough to publish this book. the only person dumber than the publisher was the person who decided to purchase a copy for a college bookstore.

Even at BYU there were considerations to shut down Napster just because of the ammount of bandwidth that was being used by students pirating music. Here we are a good 6 years+ past the height of Napster and a good few years into the reign of the iTunes Music store, and someone thinks that downloading music needs to be explained, to college students. The book wasn't even much bigger than the original 30GB iPods, and i'm guessing that there was plenty of white space on the pages. How much novel information could they give anyone in such a small book? in any book? maybe the book was just a hard copy of the results from googling "download music". i can't even find the book in Amazon or with a Google search, to show how pathetic the little waste of paper looked.

Maybe i should have stopped and bought the book for a quarter or whatever fool price the book was marked down to. i'm always on the lookout for a lame selection to give away as a gag gift.

Rex Lee Run with the Family

2007-03-29T11:49:00.004-07:00

this was my fifth year running in the Rex Lee Run 5k. the run is sponsored by an on campus cancer research group, in honor of a former president of BYU who was president when i started college. this year, i got members of my family to run too. we don't really have a connection to cancer, but the Rex Lee Run has all kinds of runners of all ages and abilities. no one will look at you funny if you're not a record breaking runner. supporting a good cause is probably a big reason for the mix of runners. i always seem to run in to a few people who have since left Utah Valley, but make it back for the race.

The race results have been posted, but i'll try and make things easier for you all. i've collected a few of the stats for you, so you won't have to go and dig for all of the info. but i'm sure that at least some of you might like to check your age group just to see your name posted online.

Laura observed that the race day weather was the best she's seen for the rexleerun. one of the years Laura and i ran the race included a little bit of rain, a wet finish line and too much wind. this year, the race was on a great day; just cool enough to run and plenty of sun. with nine of us showing up for the race (Jonah is the ninth and should get SOME credit for his good behaviour on race day), six of the eight runners posted their BEST TIME EVER. (this is one of the great characteristics of your first official race - a guaranteed personal record.)

Jonah was the first to cross the finish line with Justin quickly in tow. Justin posted an excellent time of 34:30.72, which included time to feed Jonah some snacks on they way up the opening hill in the race. apparently the Ochre training program and long legs both combined for a great time. even if Justin hadn't had a stroller, 34:30 is a great time for a first time 5k.

next in line to cross the finish line were the Peterson's, Laura and i coming in just after the 40minute mark. the Peterson's definitely have plenty to be proud of. Rebecca and i were running well together for the whole race, only walking occasionally. "¿can we run to the light?... the next corner?" etc. was always followed by a response of "that's not far" from Rebecca. Laura made a great effort to catch up to Rebecca and i just before the mile 2 marker and we were all right together as we finished the last legs of the race.

the race ends with one lap on the outdoor track to the finish line. i looked back to see what i could do to spur Rebecca on to the finish and caught quite a sight. Katie and holly were catching up with Laura, Rebecca and i and by the look on their faces they were quite pleased with their extraordinary accomplishment. i wasn't expecting to see them so close behind, and i think that Holly and Katie knew they were about to pull off their own victories. Katie was smiling as she whipped around the corner and past everyone and across the finish line. i was sure that i could still see the smile on her face from the back of her head, as her little legs sped in a whir across the finish line. holly, Rebecca and i with Laura in step behind were soon to follow Katie's lead. apparently holly and Katie are quite the team to contend with. Katie definitely had a spark inside her for the whole race and she and holly kept making little deals with each other to the tune of "let's run past 5 more cones" or "run to the next corner" which combined for a great time for both.

not far behind at the 43min mark came mom and pop. adding to the great scores so far, mom came in at 43:14.41 AND in SECOND PLACE in her age group. the first place for the women 60 to 69 came in close to 39:30 and i think that mom has intentions to keep training to see if she can change that silver to gold next year. hopefully we can get at least as many people out for next year's race.

here are the official results.

Name	Time	Overall Place	Men/Women	Age Group
Justin	34:30.7	1168/1548	516/593	112th
Rebecca	40:08.5	1391/1548	830/954	13th
Dave	40:09.7	1392/1548	562/593	30th
Holly	40:09.8	1393/1548	831/954	35th
Katie	40:09.9	1394/1548	832/954	14th
Laura	40:16.4	1399/1548	837/954	36th
Joan	43:14.4	1453/1548	881/954	! 2nd !
Weldon	43:14.7	1454/1548	573/593	4th

if you're a little confused how rebecca and i beat katie and holly in our times, it's because of the electronic race timers. there's an electronic marker at the beginning of the race that registers the computer chip strapped to your ankle which is followed by corresponding markers at the end of the race. katie and holly crossed the finish line first, but they also crossed the starting line before rebecca and i, giving the difference of a few seconds added to their time.

you can go to http://rexleerun.byu.edu/ to look at the race results for yourself.

Beware the Longboard: i damaged my wife

2007-03-25T10:50:00.004-07:00

i thought she was doing so well. Laura was so good to put up with following me around on my longboard. Lesson 1 wasn't a catastrophe. Lesson 2 was quite good. Laura was comfortable enough that she let me buy a 2nd longboard for my birthday so that i wouldn't have to ride my little skateboard around as i tried to teach her. i had such high hopes for Lesson 3.

i got my first skate board in 1995, and used it to ride around Provo for a number of years. then i got a long board in 2004 and rode EVERYWHERE: lots of days to work, on all kinds of errands, and just for fun. i'm not a real down-hiller, but i've made my runs down the Provo Canyon Trail. i was sure that i was going to get Laura to learn to ride.

we bought my new longboard on the morning of St. Patrick's Day, and Laur and i were out and about by mid-day. Laura was doing quite well. we lived only a few blocks from a slight hill; most of the neighborhoods surrounding our house are flat and flatter. i thought that the hill would give Laura some confidence in her balance and her skills. she was looking like she was getting comfortable with riding.

we pedalled our way to the bottom of this incline, and then i went a few houses up from the level. a little bit of a hill should let Laura know how it feels to coast for a while and she'll get to see how it feels to move with the board. then i decided that one or two houses higher might give her more of that feeling, and then a couple more. finally, i was sure i had picked the best way to end the day with a large boost of confidence for Laura.

Laura was so brave. she didn't question me. she believed i knew what i was up to.

we had barely started and apparently it was too long since i was a beginning boarder. Laura felt like she was going too fast and froze in her stance on the board. the board moved with her static lean and she was heading into the curb. Laura decided to run off the board.

running off of your board is a perfectly good safety measure when longboarding. knowing how to do so can save your skin when you miss seeing a rock or other small obstacle in your path. the technique doesn't work so well when you're already leaning your upper body too far in front of your hips. Nor does it work so well when you're wearing sandals. i know that Laur was wearing Chacos which are more athletic in nature than most sandals, but i let her get away with wearing Chacos. (i thought that if i made her change shoes before we left, she might decide that the commitment to boarding was too much for her that Saturday.)

i heard Laura blurt out her distress, and i looked over to see her running and trying to catch her feet up with her shoulders. Laura said she was just trying to make it to the side of the road and on to the lawn of a house for a softer landing. a poor shoe choice combined with a change in the terrain ended Laura's efforts. the downhill slope of the road changed into a slight uphill as Laura reached the entrance of a driveway. this angle slowed her feet down even more and Laura was full on falling forward.

Laura said that as she prepared to go down that she knew she would break a wrist if she put out her arms, so she crossed her arms in front of her for a roll. unfortunately, she landed hard on her right forearm to start that roll. i heard the air just squeeze out of her lungs. i had seen nearly the whole thing and was absolutely sick about it.

i had let Laura down. i went one block too far, with her in the wrong shoes, and she had trusted that i knew what i was doing. when i got to Laura, her forearm was a ginormous bruise, even though the skin wasn't even broken. i felt like garbage.

Laura didn't even let herself cry. we walked the few blocks back to our house. i had a longboard under each arm. Laura was hurting and i couldn't stop feeling sick about it.

i think Laura's going to be okay. she is the first to admit that she bruises like a peach, and those bruises love to linger. i feel bad because i'm pretty sure that i've lost Laura as a longboarding partner. most of all, i feel really bad because i wasn't watching out for Laura like i should. i felt like i had completely let her down. we didn't get married for me to just neglect her safety. horrible.

i won't ever not feel bad about this mistake. (yeah, there was a double negative there, somewhere, but it should make sense.)

this last picture is a couple of days after the accident, when the blood that was in the big bruise has had a chance to settle into the rest of Laura's forearm.

The Subaru was supposed to last a little longer

2007-02-01T15:05:00.002-07:00

Laura and i had been back in Utah for 16 days. Except for the week that we had in Utah in December for our Bountiful wedding reception and to find an apartment, I'd been with Laura in Canada since the second week of November.

We got back to Provo and were on our way to getting settled into that stage of life. Laura went back to work for Dr. Donaldson, and I was looking for work before I headed back to school in September. Laura had quit her job in Cardston towards the end of November so we could get married and because of all of the interruptions we'd have due to the holidays and moving back to Provo. We knew we weren't going to be rich, but we didn't' have any debt and we both could work. My Subaru was long paid off, and with help from friends and family we made it through a December with neither of us working.

In that third week of January two of Laura's old roommates, Cindy and Megan, were volunteers up at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, and they had invited us to come up and stay over night and to see a film or two while we were there. Neither Cindy or Megan were living in Utah anymore. We had seen Megan for only a short time the day of our wedding, but we hadn't seen Cindy in a long time. Cindy couldn't get off enough work to make it worth while to come up to Canada from Colorado. Laura and i were looking forward to seeing both of them and the chance to play in Park City.
Of course i was being cautious and a safe driver. We were in no hurry to get to Park City. Even though it was Dark, it was barely 7:00pm and we had plenty of time to get to the Festival and find Megan and Cindy. i moved out of the fast lane once we got started up the canyon, so i could drive at a safe speed in the dark without being tailgated by the cars that wanted to go faster. The canyon was full of traffic, and i wanted a cushion of space around the car. Being married has made me a lot more worried about traffic safety, not that i've been a very aggressive driver in the past.

We were barely on our way up Provo Canyon and suddenly there was a car turning left across our lane to turn up Squaw Peak Road. Laur saw the car first and shouted for me to watch out. As soon as i saw the car moving, i knew there was no way out of a collision. There was so much traffic around us that i was worried that i'd get plowed into from behind if i slammed the brake pedal into the floor. I did have most of my weight into the pedal, but we still hit the trespassing car just behind the rear axle.

i wish i knew what that other driver was thinking. there was so much traffic, there was no clear way to get across the street. the wreck was a series of instances:
Laur shouted.
i saw the car coming into our lane.
i jumped onto the break pedal.
!!!CRASH!!!
All was dark in the car as Laur and i choked in the dust of the expended airbags.
i barely remember half a moment where i had some limited control of the car as it drifted in darkness to the edge of the road.
Cars were pulled over in front of us and behind us and coming up to our car to see if we were okay.
i apologized to Laura for getting in the accident.
We checked ourselves over to make sure we were okay and we got out of the car to survey the damage.
It was dark, but i could tell that the Subaru was done in.

Apparently there was a Ward activity up the canyon, so a lot of people stopped to make sure it wasn't any of their friends in the accident. i was a little bothered at how quickly they wanted to leave when we weren't in their Ward, but we did have some people stay to make sure the police got a witness report to the accident.

Laur and i had a small moment alone together where we just hugged each other and just let go of a little emotion. neither of us really knew what to do. That wasn't the way the weekend was supposed to go. i kept thinking about how we just inherited a car payment.

The other driver was in small Volkswagen Passat, and the collision gave him a solid sideways jolt. He was still in his car when i went back to see what we hit. I saw some people open the door of the other car and say, "He's not responding." The other driver took a few moments, but got out of the car just in time to walk to the ambulance and that was as much as i saw of the other driver.

We made our police report and borrowed the police officer's cellfone to call my old roommate Randall for a ride home. It was a weird night.

The Final Resolution:
Our Subaru was totaled - it lasted three and a half years for me.
The other driver only had a minor concussion, but we never found out why he decided to pull out in front of traffic. (He said he didn't really mean to. ¿?)
The rental company gave us a crappy car. i will never buy a Ford Focus - or rent one either.
We made it up to Park City the next weekend, but we saw a stupid film.
Laura and i are fans of airbags.
Laur's bruises were minimal; a miracle in its own right.
We ended up with a Kia Sportage - i think it was in part for the fact that there are three more air-bags in the Kia than in our Subaru.

Who Needs Sleep?

2006-06-09T10:55:00.002-07:00

"i do not have ADD," is a phrase i subconsciously keep telling myself again and again. "i don't have ADD." if i tell myself often enough, maybe it won't be true. i've never been officially tested, but sometimes i just have to wonder if some of my less endearing habits are only symptoms of a larger mess. every once in a while i feel like i am being honest enough with myself to take a critical approach to my own character and i wonder if i have weaknesses that remain as of yet undisclosed. the people who know me best also let me know that i'm not the only one who suspects that i have attention deficit disorder.

i will admit that i have a hard time getting my brain to settle down at certain times. if there is a task that is sufficiently large or complex, i have a hard time getting finished if i can't imagine the end in my own mind. my mind races back and forth trying to find the viewpoint where all of the intermediate steps can be seen. i stall in disatisfaction rather than accepting limited foresight in order to move on with what is presently available. some of the more intricate projects are even hard to start because my stream of thought gets caught in an eddy of its own making as i cycle through the possibilities of what might be "the best way" to tackle the challenge. there is an overdraft on my mental resources, as i try to estimate the most economic solution to the end goal.

on a smaller scale, i lose way too much stuff and i know it's not because my brain isn't capable enough to hold on to information. sometimes i think i have more than a knack for remembering trivia, from pop culture on down to stories i've heard from friends and roommates. then there are important daily things like my glasses, credit card bills or my car registration, my keys or whatever else was in my hand when i got out of the car that get put in "safe" places but my mind is too busy to take any notice. soon enough, i'm off again on another search for today's lost object.

somewhere inbetween these two examples lie the procrastination, the general disorganization of my personal space, the seeming need for constant stimulation - the feed from wearing headphones plugged into an mp3-player most of the day generally provides enough stimulation to calm down my mind. then there is the difficulty i've had my whole life of going to bed. growing up i HATED going to bed and i still have a hard time talking myself into laying down at a reasonable hour.

i can't go to bed unless it's the last thing i can do and my body is too tired to let my mind stay awake. i can have a relatively full and long day, but i will still need about an hour to myself just to complete a series of "one more thing"s that will let my mind be settled once my head hits the pillow. i know that if i go to bed too early, my mind will just get caught in a whirlwind of useless thought. there were years when i had to listen to music so i could stay still enough to fall asleep. the music would give my mind a constant stream of information to concentrate on, but not too much information in which i can get entangled. later i got an eBook reader and i could sit in the dark and read as the words would direct my mind into a calm long enough for my body to take over. i'd eventually fall asleep; the reader and my brain eventually turning themselves off.

after emptying my pockets onto the table beside my bed...

¿how did i get so many pennies?
pennies aren't very useful.
¿was the silver dollar more useful?
i haven't seen a 50¢ coin in a long time.
the 50¢ coin has a good weight for a coin toss, even better than a quarter.
they're are a lot of cultural uses of the coin toss.
a coin toss is a good choice for 50/50 option
what about the percentages for a die? -- 16.67% -- that's not very clean
what about two dice?
Still messy - doesn't account for 1 and there's only one way to get a 2, a 3, an 11 or a 12 but lots of ways to get a 4, 5, 6 or 7
9.09% is just a messy percentage
what about even/convenient percentages? -- 5%, 10%, 25%, etc.
i guess they make 10 and 20 sided dice
Weezer has that song
¿what about thirds -- can you get 33%?
¿can you get a three sided object?
"I've got a Dungeon Master's Guide, I've got a 12-sided die..."
a pyramid - oh that's four sides
four sides is good for a one if four chance.
"...I've got Ace Frehley, I've got Peter Criss..."
1/2, 1/4, 1/10, 1/20
¿do dice have to come in even-numbered sides?
how can you make a 3 sided die?
"...in the garage, Where I belong..."
i guess a coin technically has 3 sides if you count the edge.
You could just use 6 sided die and count 1 and 2 as equaling 1, 3 and 4 equaling 2, and 5 and 6 equaling 3
there was that football game when the opening coin toss had the coin stick in the ground on it's edge. "...No one hears me sing this song..."
you could make a 3 sided die if you made it spindle-shaped.
¿what is the percentage likelihood that a coin would stick on it's edge?
¿how come only biology texts use the phrase "spindle-shaped"?...

yes, i'm going to be up for a while, but i'm still not going to get tested for ADD. instead, i will still have my headphones plugged into my ears most of the day and i will still have to read myself to sleep most nights. i will continue to work on getting myself to do something now, even if i can't wrap my brain around all of the future possibilities. and finally, i'll keep going to bed when i can't do anything else and then, maybe, i will prevent my mind from hijacking the opportunity to get a full night's sleep.

even better than that, i just might be able to avoid the whole mess of convincing myself again that there is NO WAY to make an all-wheel-drive bicycle.

Warning Signs

2006-06-06T14:24:00.000-07:00

there are those moments when you can just feel that something isn't quite right. the feeling often arrives in the late afternoon or into the evening. you've been feeling fine all week, but you can't ignore those little hints that you'll be sick by this same time tomorrow.

maybe your eyes are a little itchy, or your throat is starting to tense up. your voice is absent of any kind of rasp or whisper right now, but there is a clear threat of a desertion within the next few days. a peculiar sensation registers in the hitherto unknown sensory receptors of your nose that tells you that you'll be giving up your sense of smell in exchange for being completely stuffed up by the time you wake up the next morning. ¿how does your nose know this? you can feel all these little half-symptoms and precursors of what will rise up as a full blown menace the next day, and you know that there's nothing you can do about it. you'll try the home remedies. you'll take some medicine in advance. you'll sleep just fine tonight, but you'll wake up tired and sick.

i wish there were some sense of purpose to these warning signs. it's not like a traffic cop giving you a warning to slow down or you'll pay the consequences. instead, it's the broad, evil grin of a practical joker who has completely cracked and they're looking at you straight in the eye. you know that no matter how many times you check under your bed, behind the doors, or in the closet, you will eventually "find" the "surprise" and you won't like it. something evil is lurking, and the event is non-negotiable. about all these warnings do for me is extend the suffering by adding a sense of inevitable doom. ¿why does being sick have to taunt you like that?

just the other night, i could tell something was coming on. i could hardly sit still. my hands were all fidgety, and i couldn't concentrate on anything. i couldn't think straight, with the same thoughts going over and over in my head. i'd have to keep a foot wiggling or something like that in order to get a few things done. rocking myself back and forth, i knew i was done for. it was going to be a full blown case of autism by morning.

It's Eating My Brain

2006-05-11T12:37:00.001-07:00

in 2004's Super-Size Me, a documentary about fast food, writer-director Morgan Spurlock notes the corrosive influence of fast food not only because of the poor nutritional value, but also the effect of fast food on american culture. Spurlock invites several people to recite the pledge of allegiance. standing on the sidewalk in front of the White House lawn several people give multiple efforts, but no successful recitations are presented in the film. then Spurlock invites them to quote the words to the jingle from the early 80s for the for the Big Mac. "Two all beef patties, special sauce..." and so on spills out easily.

i don't think Spurlock was trying to say that fast food or even jingles in general are the cause of memory loss, but there is something that should be noted: the way jingles etch out an apparent permanence in our brains. over 20 years later, that same type of corrosiveness still leaves its mark. perform a sad little experiment on the average american by singing a little "ba da buh ba bah" and see how many times you get "i'm lovin' it" in response. pathetic.

the ingredients for this mental deterioration are as follows: some simple words, a recognizable tune and endless repetition. the claws dig in and find a home. the words don't have to be good or clever. the tune doesn't have to be unique or even new. your brain doesn't even care if you like mcdonald's or whatever else they're trying to sell. there isn't even any respect for your value system. This last point was demonstrated by the shock on the faces of Spurlock's impromptu test subjects.

perhaps not quite as vile as some commercials are the theme songs to television shows. at least with the theme songs you are choosing to watch the program more often than not. you are intentionally supporting the product that the extended jingle was designed to sell. the same tactics are exploited, but without such malice.

i will admit that i know more words to television theme songs than i'd like to know. let's face it, i've seen too much TV. nevertheless, these songs have a knack for carving into your brain. the Brady Bunch and Gilligan's Island were well beyond the years in which they were filmed by the time i saw any episodes and it's been a long time since i found either show entertaining, but i can still sing along. i'm not the only one with that problem either. ¿which are your particular "favorites"? ¿The Fresh Prince of Bel Aire? ¿Cheers? ¿Friends? (i know that my roommate sings the "Thank You for Being a Friend" theme song from The Golden Girls more often than i am comfortable with.)

now let's come back to the present day. i have become the fan of another television show. along with that fandom, i think i'm well on my way to having another theme song burrowed into my brain for the rest of my life.

uuuuuuuuuooooooooOOOOWWWWAAAOOOOOHHHWWWAAAOOOOOOOEEEeeeaooeeeooooh!

Curse you LOST!... i'm going to be singing that song all week.

now i just have to be careful and not get addicted to watching all of those past seasons of 24 ("boop bip boop bip...")

Leave the Starfish Alone

2006-05-04T00:26:00.002-07:00

someone has to stand up and say something.

in the recent past the internet, rather than helping to disseminate knowledge, has been burdened with a lot of junk and people have passed that junk on to their friends. sure there were some dumb but relatively harmless pictures that came your way with titles like, "You Have to See This!!" or "You'll Never Believe it!!" but then there are the hoaxes that have the hopelessly naive people trying to get free trips to Disneyland from Bill Gates and sending their money straight into the wallets of some marginally clever Nigerian thieves.

prior to the advent of the internet, there were similarly viral stories that were able to creep into the vocabulary of seemingly sensible people. these are those stories that share some moral ideal, but through an unfortunately contrived tale. some of these stories are purported as true. other stories are told because they just seem "nice". there are probably even some true stories that have had some well intentioned embellishments or some editing due to forgetfulness.

listen up folks -- ENOUGH ALREADY!

passing these stories on isn't doing anyone a favour and this behaviour has been going on too long. Pope Gregory turned Mary Magdalene from a normal person into a whore with his good intentions in 591. it's time for the stories to stop.

the olive tree is not the only tree in the world to grow counter to the natural way that all other trees grow, giving the tree it's venerable status in the Bible.
a little girl was not saved from a car accident by a guy that looks like your culturally preferred picture of Jesus.
your particular religious faith was not miraculously diverted from the World Trade Center on 9/11.
the Pope does not have 666 inscribed on the inside of his hat,
we're all still looking for the scripture where Jesus defines the difference between "easy" and "worth it", and finally...
no one needs to save the starfish.

on behalf of the starfish, i would like to note that SEA STARS CAN WALK! their movement is unique in the animal kingdom, but they can still move and they move surprisingly fast. secondly, sea stars have sensory organs and enough brains to decide where they feel comfortable on their own. the fabled soul who was chucking starfish back into the sea would have at best made the sea stars uncomfortable, along with giving them a chance to take a long walk back "home". at worst, the idiot cast them out beyond where the sea star can find food and shelter or even get back to these necessities... killing them slowly. thanks a lot.

and one final word: that other metaphor is worn out too. (Jesus is tired of walking on the beach.)

things i should not do

2006-04-23T20:05:00.002-07:00

recently, on two separate occasions, i asked the same question to two good friends. these are the kinds of friends that i've known long enough that i can ask an honest question and they've stopped worrying about softening the edges of their responses.

each time i asked the question the friend was the only one there to respond, so i'm going to assume that each reaction was true to that person's feelings. i know that the my sample population wasn't statistically significant from a textbook standpoint, but for as long as each person has known me, i would be silly to assume that there isn't some sort of meaning to gain from their responses.

i'd ask the question and the response each time was a small pause followed by laughter. not heavy, gut-busting laughter, but laughing stilll the same. ¿what does this mean?

here was my question: "¿can you imagine me as a waiter?"

both of them had reasons for laughing.

one friend was sure that i would take advantage of being in contact with so many people, and the number of practical jokes would escalate. my sense of what is funny does occasionally short-circuit my sense of what is appropriate, so humour at the expense of others is a legitimate concern. the other friend's accusations were a little more serious. these comments focused on this idea that i'm too much of a snob.

¿what?

i'm not a snob, i'm just used to being right. sometimes i do extend that assumption of my "right"-ness onto things such as music preference, ideas about pop culture and other tastes. i try to let people have room to like what they want (i wouldn't want anyone telling me what to like), but there is the occasional hint that i have placed some opinions into a caste that should be disowned and shunned altogether. i assume a certain amount of logic in the way that i have approached my opinions, and any thinking, reasonable person would agree with me. if you're already having a hard time with this opinion, pardon me while i stare at you like you're an idiot. ¿do i need to spell this out step by step? the potential for social disaster is immense and possibly inevitable.

the possibilities are astounding:

"you're going to order that?"

"honestly, who are you trying to impress?"

"being loud is not going to improve the quality of service. the kitchen is a long ways away, and the surrounding tables apparently don't find you as funny as you think you are."

"i told you that it had mushrooms in it in the first place, and now you want to send it back?!?"

"quit stalling and JUST ORDER A SALAD! salad is salad."

i'm afraid that even when i would manage to keep my mouth shut, the eye-rolling would all too easily express "¿who is this idiot?"

okay, so i'm exaggerating here, but the exaggeration illustrates my fears. ¿would i remember to be patient? ¿would i be understanding that not everyone understands things the same way? ¿could i handle having to talk to people even on the days when i don't want to? i've had positions where i've been involved in customer service and i think that i was amenable enough to the patrons, but what would happen when customer service was the whole of my job?

people have certain expectations when it comes to waiters and waitresses and even the rest of the restaurant industry. a waiter just doing their job is what is expected. ¿don't most people tip just the typical 15% because they think to themselves that the waiter/waitress didn't do anything extremely wrong? it's almost as if people are looking for the things gone wrong instead of what their server did right. ¿would i have the patience to be happy and polite even when the customer hasn't given me much room for a day that isn't quite spot on?

i've done plenty of grunt jobs in my time. there were jobs when they just needed a body, from light assembly to janitorial work to delivering papers, but i've avoided the food industry at all levels. i'm just not sure i could work in an industry so tied to the appetites and expectations of other people. even the people behind the counters at fast food joints are faced with a business founded on a customer base of "i want...".

i will admit to being an introvert and that i'm impressed by those who can provide a smiling face to each customer each work day. i'm impressed by anyone who can deal with so much trash from the general public, both literally and figuratively.

so, when i stop by the fast food restaurant to grab a quick bite to eat, or when i've gone in for a more formal dining experience, i remind myself that the greeter, the waitress, the busboy, and the poor schlep sweeping the floor are all doing something i don't want to do. everyone needs to eat and these people are doing honest work by stepping in for those of us who have chosen not to prepare this meal on our own.

i will try and be grateful for what they do regardless of their position, and i will remain impressed that they continue to do it so well.

and one final word: i do try to not be so opinionated and i do like people, but sometimes... i just like to be by myself.

Bugs and Trousers

2005-11-15T01:54:00.002-07:00

all is calm on the email front and i get a one-line email from a friend.

"Dave – I have a question to ask you. Do bugs like trousers?"

then i'm left to sit there and wonder what inspired that question.

i am the TA for the entomology course this semester, but when that information is usually shared the reaction i get is, "Oh, bugs... hmmm..." it's as if most people are reacting as if they have almost stepped all the way into an oversized mud puddle. they're hoping to back track and if they don't say another word i won't bump them off that precarious edge into the scary abyss that is the world of creepy-crawlies. with just a one-liner and no context, i chalked that email up to the sender's tendency for corny jokes.

"as for bugs and trousers... i'm waiting for the punchline.", i respond.

the next email to me was essentially, "Actually, I was kind of hoping you'd have the punch line, but I can see how you are going to make me figure it out instead of just giving me the answer."

apparently my assumption was wrong. i try and excuse my poor judgement.

i thought that the "bugs and trousers" bit was another one of your corny-joke fits. i was waiting for you to send the punch line. and then when i don't have a response to your question, you say:
...I can see how you are going to make me figure it out instead of just giving me the answer.
i don't know what you mean, but apparently, things make sense to you. i'm happy for you. i can only think of one reason why you might be asking me about bugs and trousers, and i'll be sending you more information right away.

after having a little more time to think things through, i remembered that i had sent out an email to some friends about six months prior. maybe my roommate, the person who first introduced me to this positor of questions, had told her to ask me about bugs and trousers. one quick search in gmail and the answer to the original question was on its way.

Subject: Contemplating the Myrmecological Connection to Trousers

PANTS!!!

ANTS!!!

those six months ago i had the simple urge to draw an anteater and send it to some friends. maybe my roommate had decided that i hadn't sent the picture to enough people, and had suggested to the questioning one that she ask me a question sufficient to direct the picture her way too. i was satisfied that i finally got things right.

the reply to my solution:

Subject: just because you use words no one else knows like myrnamologicallisterson doesn't mean you are cooler than me

sheesh. you ask a simple question and get some sort of sarcastic remark back! i was being absolutely sincere! however, i see now that i should have added some clarification to the question about why bugs dig trousers...

...Have you ever noticed that when people tell a bug story, somehow trousers are always involved? weird bug + trousers = really entertaining story...

...i'll take my bug questions elsewhere next time...

somehow, i had failed AGAIN! ¿how often do people use the word "trousers"? that word was in the original subject line of my email with the drawing and in her question. i thought for sure i had solved the puzzle, but instead i had let someone down a second time. i was almost starting to question my own validity as an entomology instructor. for my own personal pride i needed to find an answer to "bugs and trousers".

so, i thought for a while, and gave the question a third try at a solution.

right now i can think of two categories that may help to explain the frequency of the bug-pant nexus.

1. the legs may just be more amenable hosts

legs are the body part that have only the feet between them and the ground. some bugs may choose the overland route and on to a foot and then the pants. plenty of people wear pants that brush the ground too.
as people wade their way through daily life, maybe our lower extremities are permitted to brush up against more things without our notice: leaning our hips against what ever surface may support our weight; the little things that brush against our legs as we walk.
even though most bugs have wings, gravity still applies. a bug may fall or be brushed off of a surface, and they are just landing on whatever is below. the probability of hitting pants on the way down is just a matter of topography.
pants are often thicker, and the lower portions of our pants typically hang loose off of our limbs. maybe there is less chance for us to feel the little critters crawling across the surface of our clothes and we perform less subconscious grooming. in addition, hands can brush off arms, shoulders, torsos, heads and hips much easier than the legs on down.

2. maybe the pants surface makes bugs more visible
granted, i just mentioned that maybe we notice less when it comes to bugs on the lower half, but some of those final ideas in the first category still may apply to this one.

a bug that we don't feel (and thereby may be subject to less subconscious grooming) may have more of a chance to get into visual range, or more of a chance to get into a perceivably threatening proximity.
a bug on our back may come and go before we've noticed it's presence.
when we sit, a good portion of our legs become a horizontal surface, and much easier to inspect than other body parts.

i'm not sure how you could test these hypotheses, but i think it is sufficient to say that the likelihood of bugs just being inherently attracted to some platonic ideal of pants might not be the most parsimonious deduction.

maybe i was thinking too much.

New York Doll

2005-11-04T00:57:00.010-07:00

i just saw a really good movie.

if you were looking for that faith promoting movie, you should probably look somewhere besides that Work and the Glory stuff. i just saw the movie you really want to see.

where else can you see:
mormon bishops & punk rockers
family history missionaries & iggy pop
a lesson on hometeaching & cross dressers
not to mention a band that inspired kiss, the clash, blondie, morrissey, motley crue and poison, and a final closing hymn from the LDS hymn book from such an unlikely source?

i just saw a special screening of a documentary that played at this year's Sundance Film Festival, New York Doll, the story of Arthur "Killer" Kane, the former bass-player of the New York Dolls. Kane worked his way through rehab, found the LDS church and just wanted another chance to get his band together again.

the movie was great. i would like to see it again. New York Doll is playing this weekend at the Broadway Theatre in SLC.

the movie is so good. go see it.

---

i saw the movie at a special screening with KUER's RadioWest. KUER hosted the movie at the Tower Theater in Salt Lake. Before the exhibition of the film, RadioWest broadcast an hour-long program about the film, Kane and his band, and their history and impact on the music industry. All of us seated in the theater were the audience for the radio broadcast and the movie, and all of it was free. (Unfortunately RadioWest does not maintain an online archive so you can't go back and hear the program.)

This is a picture of the band back in the day. Arthur "Killer" Kane is the furthest on the left.

i was so happy that i got to see this film and hear the radio program live. i knew that this film was automatically in my top ten favourites. i'm posting the review that i wrote on Netflix.com below.

---

After I saw New York Doll, this movie was all I could think about for the next few days. I went to the movie because of my interest in rock history and a curiosity as to how someone found a new faith, but I had no idea how much this movie would affect me. Although New York Doll was made possible because of the cultural significance of a rock band, you don't have to be a rock history geek to appreciate the heart of this movie.

Regardless of your familiarity with the musicians interviewed or your sympathy with any religious faith, New York Doll bridges the possible gaps by focusing in on the central human hope of finding redemption and purpose in life. The first views of Arthur "Killer" Kane, the central figure of the movie, presents a man who seems worn out and rather fried from a life involved in a long chain of disappointments and substance abuse. Soon enough you find out the ironic ability that Kane possesses. This broken man has a way of bringing people together and can somehow inspire hope and gratitude for such simple things. The one searching for healing becomes a healer.

Just as the musicians interviewed for this documentary, you will be won over by Kane's humble expressions of his fears, his troubles, his faith and the happiness he finds in the middle of his own poverty. If you are a fan of rock music of any sorts, SEE THIS FILM. If you are looking for a connection to the human soul, SEE THIS FILM!!!

Measuring Fitness: getting a low rating from Charles

2005-09-15T09:53:00.002-07:00

deep down. deep down inside, i'm hoping that someone, somewhere will consider me a scientist. i've studied in the desert. i've studied by the ocean. i've seen a whale leap from the sea and i've watched as a fertilized egg divides. i hope that someone, someday will see inside of me and say, "Biologist".

the unifying theme of biology is evolution. from single celled organisms on up to the complex behaviours of social animals, all find a home on the same evolutionary tree. this interconnectedness of the biological world was elucidated by Charles Darwin in his publication of The Origin of Species (1859). The complete title of Darwin's work was On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. if anyone is going to call me a biologist, i better know something about biology's central theory. i'm still studying.

there i was, in my graduate course on population ecology; a class focused on the way a population's numbers can rise and fall. the professor points to a 30 year old Ph.D. student who has five kids, and we discuss the reproductive potential of a population following that model of reproduction. then i started to feel bad.

natural selection measures the fitness of individuals. fitness is not how fast that individual can run, or how much food it can acquire (although these may be components of fitness). fitness, in the end, is how many offspring you produce that go on to produce offspring of their own. a hopelessness started to settle in.

a well-reasoning person wouldn't hire an accountant who's filing for personal bankruptcy to manage their assets. common sense would make you question the quality of an obese nutritionist. each person should know the common language of their field. if i were i biologist, i'd understand evolution and in turn i'd understand natural selection and at least something about fitness.

i am a 32 year-old with no children of my own, sitting next to a 30 year old with five. somehow, even with all of this studying, i have overlooked the idea of my personal fitness. one professor has called my attention, essentially placing my own self on the scale to weigh in on the field of biology, and has found me lacking.

Charles thinks i'm a joke.

Me and the Bears

2005-08-04T08:25:00.002-07:00

i've been lucky in life. good things have come my way and i've always had enough, if not more.
unfortunately, the collection and possession of things can be a snare that engulfs us, blinding us as to what really matters.

in an effort to distinguish what counts in life, there may be nothing that clears the vision quite like living without. i'm not saying that you have to move to a third world country, but time overseas can have a similar effect. what i'm talking about here is time in the woods. even if it's just for a short recreational time, your vision increases. a hike up a hill can make you appreciate a cool drink of clean water, even without the aid of artificial refrigeration surprisingly enough. riding the trails on your mountain bike gives a certain sense of the enjoyment of just being able to chose for yourself where you will go. camping overnight can help to broaden your understanding, but what will happen if you extend this trip to more than a weekend escape?

i've been lucky in being able to have more than one job that has sent me to the woods for a day, a week or even the whole summer. needs are nearly reduced to shelter, food, and water. walls, roofs, doors and floors become luxuries. the body quickly gets used to sleeping on the ground as it begins to realize that more important than cushioning layers beneath is just a flat place to lay. artificial schedules, like TV programming and the rotation of movies through the Megaplex, are replaced by a simple cycle of when to work, when to eat, when to sleep, sunrise and sunset. you give up being defined by what you own, and become what you have learned and the character you display. even social customs can be viewed under new light as you learn what you can live without. (i'll shower... ¿next week?)

i hope that this description doesn't sound too much like an transcendentalist's dream. i won't claim to have ever gone so far that i was completely cut off from the world outside of the woods. i have been far enough out that i stopped getting dirty because there just wasn't any more room for dirt, and i've carried my room and board on my back for a number of miles. it's out there that i've started to think.

each time i come back from the woods, whether it was a short day trip or a week long trek, i take a look at the dirt i've collected. fine dust has settled through my clothes onto my skin. wash water quickly turns brown with spinning clothes, and it's the second shower that finally washes away the remaining hints that i may have tanned a little in the sun. my boots have often been caked with mud. other camping equipment and the vehicle used to get "out there" have similar fates. as all this dirt washes down the respective drains i start to wonder if i'm taking too much from the environment. ¿how many pounds have i brought home with me, only to be cast off like second hand material? there's nothing wrong with that dirt, and had a purpose of its own. ¿was that dirt going to be the home for something new to grow? or ¿was it just simply helping to hold up that mountain side? i wonder if i'm treating the dirt the way it deserves to be treated ¿am i taking more from the environment than i'm giving back?

i think it's time to go give something back, and i think i know what i'm going to do.

(i'm gonna go poop in the woods)

and i'm going to feel good about it every time i do it.

Chances

2005-08-01T16:20:00.003-07:00

the pay period started out on the Sawtooth Wilderness, working around Stanley, Idaho. Stacey (my crew leader) and i had to change plans a little because of time constraints and some missing information on one of the plots. not being able to do that plot north of Stanley sent us down south to do a couple of plots around Ketchum. We were quite a ways away from our homebase in Salmon.

so, there i was. we were just getting off a plot on the Ketchum Ranger District. we hit the trailhead parking lot east of the Greenhorn Guard Station about 3:30. Stacey and i were putting our gear away, and making sure that i had everything to start up our next pay period. we were on our last day together for the current pay period and headed in different directions for our days off.

standing at the back of the work truck, unloading my work pack, i looked over at a few mountain bikers getting ready to ride the trail. i was wondering if i would like to ride the trail Stacey and i had just hiked. as i watched the bikers unload, one of them finally came in to focus. i started to take a couple steps towards the bikers...

"Dave?"

Jeremy Jarnecke, my last supervisor on the Uinta National Forest (that place that i worked for for the last 4+ years), his wife and a couple of their friends were getting ready to head out on the trial.

i finished making my way over and Jeremy and i had a short chat. we confirmed that i was on the clock and that he was on vacation. and then Jeremy said, "Wow. What are the chances that we'd both be here at the same time?"

i wasn't sure how to respond to that one.

(these kinds of things just seem to happen to me.)

I love hobos

2005-05-18T00:13:00.001-07:00

i can't help it

(for more on hobos, please see http://www.toothpastefordinner.com/111504/takin-care-of-hobos.gif)

I Like Birds III: birds of a feather

2005-03-31T02:36:00.001-07:00

It's easy sometimes when you just coast along
But like it or not something always seems to go wrong
Sometimes people build you up just so they can knock you down
Sometimes they will have you there 'cause they need someone around
Perhaps you'll receive invitations for tea
Perhaps you'll laugh and make them all smile
Or maybe you'll join them 'cause it had to be
Perhaps you'll forget you forgot for awhile

Birds of a feather are flocking outside

I Like Birds II: the cage

2005-03-29T01:42:00.001-07:00

But then this bird just flew away
She was never meant to stay
Oh to keep her caged would just delay the spring

I Like Birds

2005-03-27T21:17:00.001-07:00

I don't care for walking downtown
Crazy auto-car gonna mow me down
Look at all the people like cows in a herd
Well, i like
Birds

Dreams: Rabbit-man XII (Rivers turn to oceans)

2005-03-27T15:48:00.001-07:00

oceans tide you home

Hailing from parts unknown...

2005-03-20T21:00:00.003-07:00

wrestling

i like to wrestle. sometimes i wish i had done it in junior high and high school. i did go to a few practices my 7th grade year, and i probably even went to a meet or two. i don't know how i quit going, but i did. i guess it was just another sport that my parents weren't sure how to encourage or if they should. growing up i tried soccer, t-ball, basketball, and swimming. i never got any of them right. maybe staying in wrestling would have been fun. i think i could have done alright.

i think that the reason i like to wrestle is that it's such a all encompassing activity. you're using your arms, your legs, and everything in between to the maximum level all at once. at the same time wrestling is terribly exhausting and i'm always so nervous before i have to wrestle. it's a test of the basic elements that make up what you are... unable to be estimated, but confirmed measurements as you put your body up to the next challenge. to me, wrestling seems that it's an awful lot like rock climbing, except you don't have to worry as much about gravity. i'm still on the verge of a panic attack, but i'm just not going to fall.

maybe the fear before wrestling accounts account for the scarcity of wrestling. i've probably only wrestled twice in the last 10 years. the other reason i can think of for not wrestling is that i'm worried i'll pick an easy fight. ¿what good is it to beat someone that wasn't a challenge at all? i don't want to pick an unchanging match, so i'm sure get in well over my head.

i was down in New Mexico, working as a trail crew foreman at Philmont Scout Ranch. i had taken my crew over to visit another crew at the other crew's invitation. the other crew wanted to host a dinner, and we let them feed us some fried chicken. the after dinner tour of camp included the introduction of their wrestling ring. the other crew had pulled all of the rocks out of the ground in this space between a few trees. the ground had been tilled up through the search for rocks and multiple wrestling matches. i wanted to wrestle.

the two fears kicked in. the excitement that someone was going to kick my trash and the smaller concern that i won't pick a fair fight. so, i looked around the two crews and found the assistant foreman who was both taller and heavier than me, extended a hand in his direction and said, "you". the challenge was accepted and i was sure i was on my way to getting killed.

we both entered the make-shift ring and began the face off. i can feel the sense of complete panic just welling up inside of me. i've committed to the match by stepping into the circle, but i'm much too nervous for the match to start. facing each other we rotate as my mind shifts through all of the worst possibilities. i don't want to be the first to reach for my opponent, because i'm afraid that he'll take advantage of my poor attack. i don't want him to come after me, because then we'll be wrestling on his terms. you can see that my mind has already decided that i cannot win no matter what i choose. my mind continues enveloping itself in the mire of panic. i can already feel the suffocation of being pinned to the ground, unable to move in spite of all of my will to break free and the only physical contact we've made is with our hands brushing away outstretched arms as we make a few swipes to measure each other's reach.

wresting is never long when measured by a clock, but whether i'm winning or losing a time period to rival the history of the earth seems to fill my brain. i might not win this round, but while i'm out there i'd be happy to avoid being completely helpless as i'm held to the ground. i have put myself in the wrestling ring.

that was a few years back, but guys haven't changed much. everyone is still looking for some way to challenge themselves. i live in a college town just a few blocks south of campus, so it wasn't that strange to have the next door neighbor come by announcing the neighborhood wrestling night. of course i had to go. would i wrestle? maybe. i got nervous just at the thought.

i watched a few of my neighbors wrestle. one match went back and forth for so many times that it was hard to tell if there was a winner. would i have enough endurance if i had a match like that? i kept waiting to see if someone would get there that i could wrestle. i'm only 5'10" with my shoes on, but i weigh more than 210. i at least needed somebody close to my weight. i finally decided that one of my upstairs neighbors seemed the closest to my size. i was asked if i was going to wrestle and i went out to the floor.

i began a match again with the uncertain circling. i was out on the mat, but unwilling to complete my commitment. after too much time to size up the competition i heard someone say, "Aren't you going to wrestle?" Then we made real contact.

there are rewards to the panic that i can feel. the next few moments were frantic. at one point, i had rolled my opponent into the couch where the portion of the audience occupying those seats lifted their feet off the floor to keep from getting their legs pinned against the couch. i felt pretty good when my opponent's roommate said, "he's throwing you around like the rag doll that you aren't!" the panic was full on and i was scrambling.

the floor was covered with a bamboo mat, and my bare feet kept sliding across its surface as i tried to maneuver the other wrestler. all of that movement across an alternately smooth and rough surface caused me to peel the skin off of the inside edge of the pad of both big toes. i didn't know that i had self-inflicted that damage until i was moving back to my seat after the match.

i don't know if there was a pin to end the match, but we must have come to some agreement that we were done. i thanked my neighbor for the match and he said, "if it means anything i felt completely hopeless from the beginning." the open wounds on my toes were going to be a pain, but i had felt the high i had hoped for.

i don't know how long it will be before i wrestle again, maybe never. i'm moving out of the age-group where guys just do stupid stuff because they can. i hope all this doesn't sound like too much of a brag. i do realize that i might not be picking fair fights. i've never gone up against someone who's had a lot of wrestling experience and i might be misjudging my size-class to my advantage. i do know that i'll be tempted if the opportunity presents itself. i will feel the same panic, and i'll still probably wonder if i would have had fun if i had continued to practice and wrestle in school.

i just don't understand the music business

2005-03-16T21:25:00.004-07:00

i just can't get myself to watch MTV. it just doesn't mean anything to me.

my roommate flipped to the channel and started watching "Making the Band". if you're unfamiliar with this show, it's puff daddy's version of 'American Idol'. already the title is a little confusing. i grew up with the idea that a band consists of people who play musical instruments, but i guess i was wrong. "the Band" in "Making the Band" is basically just a bunch of folks who can follow the choreographer adequately enough and do some fancy karaoke while they wait for their pretty faces in the video to sell the record; the McDonald's version of music - mass produced, low quality, but it sells because the american public is afraid of what's not familiar.

and then there's puff daddy. okay, i know that he calls himself p. diddy these days, but i can't take either name very seriously. the names would be okay if it weren't for the fact that the diddy does take himself that seriously. ¿and how come the music industry takes him so seriously? ever since diddy's CRAPPY remake of Led Zepplin's 'Kashmir' (which followed that awful heisting of 'Every Breath You Take' from The Police) i've been trying to figure out just what the difference is between the puff and Weird Al; two guys with goofy names who take other people's music and put their own words to it. Al isn't unfamiliar with writing his own songs either, so don't start telling me about puffy's "original" works. Al has never had the same kind of respect from the music industry as puff and Al has had plenty of successful records to earn at least some respect.

come on Al. maybe you should just buy a little jewelry, put your name on some gym clothes and maybe you'll weasel your way into the hearts of the mainstream music industry. i'll be waiting to hear news about your upcoming show.

Happy "If Pets Had Thumbs Day"

2005-03-03T02:28:00.002-07:00

hey folks,

i just thought i'd wish you all a happy If Pets Had Thumbs Day.

the original art work is from www.toothpastefordinner.com, where you can find a huge archive of odd and funny doodles.

the joys of science

2005-03-02T17:59:00.001-07:00

"An intact frog loses water nearly as rapidly as a skinless frog."
- Animal Diversity, 2nd ed., page 313
(C.P. Hickman, L.S. Roberts & A. Larson, McGraw Hill, 2000)

---

"For Science" - They Might Be Giants - Miscelleneous T

Newscaster:
There has been a spacecraft sighted
Flying high above the sky
Sirens declare there's one among us from Venus

Lt. Anne Moore:
Volunteers, we need volunteers
Soldiers to meet them
Have no fear
Have no fear
You will be killed right away

Male Lead:
I will date the girl from Venus
Flowers die and so will I
Yes, I will kiss the girl from Venus for science
I'm so brave
I'm so brave
I'll be her love slave

Lt. Anne Moore:
He's so brave
He's so brave
He'll be her love slave forever

Male Lead:
Yes, I will date the girl from Venus
Flowers die and so will I
Yes, I will kiss the girl from Venus for science

Let's get those missiles ready to destroy the universe!

A Final Word on Peanuts

2005-03-01T15:30:00.001-07:00

This post was originally written in early 2004. This is where you can find the final conclusion as to why there is no longer a M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. newsletter.

---------

peanuts

the peanut is an interesting little fruit. the peanut is fairly simple and often easy to overlook and possibly undervalue. a can of mixed nuts touts it's quality by ensuring the consumer that the percentage of peanuts is less than half of the mix, peanuts being the cheapest nut of the bunch. the peanut is a metaphor for things small or of little value. the minor cost of an item may be expressed as costing only peanuts. unwanted and trivial comments have been referred to as coming from the"peanut gallery". one galaxy visible from earth's surface has beennicknamed "snickers" because it is peanuts compared to the Milky Way. (think about it.) even disparaging remarks towards a former president use the peanut as a measure of insignificance when Jimmy Carter has been referred to as a mere "peanut farmer from Georgia" who somehow made it to the White House. but the little bean still holds a place in society in pop culture and beyond.

one of the most long lived advertising spokesmen is Planters' Mr. Peanut. the peanut is a nostalgic baseball snack still sold inthe stands. ("buy me some peanuts and cracker jack...") the peanut is nearly the final result to which the airline food service has been reduced, and let's not forget Charlie brown and the other charactersfrom the classic comic strip "Peanuts". the peanut was a portion, and sometimes the only portion, of civil war rations for the southern armies, inspiring the writing of the then popular folk tune "GooberPeas". with efforts to make the peanut a more profitable crop, a healthy alternative for the land instead of cotton, George Washington Carver found some 325 uses for the plant. not only did the peanut become a leading crop in the South but it helped to place this former slave, educator and agricultural scientist in the public eye long before the civil rights movement, as he worked withthe U.S. Department of Agriculture and southern farmers.

even the peanut sandwich spread is nearly synonymous with childhood memories in America. ¿what childhood isn't measured with a few peanutbutter sandwiches at some point in time? there are plenty of creative variants to the standard PB&J wrought during those childhood years, and nearly everyone knows what side of the issue they stand on when it comes to creamy or chunky. when someone mentions giving a little peanut butter to a household pet, it gets a chuckle out of nearly everyone because so many have been there for themselves at one time or another. we should also recognize that there are more than just anational peanut day and month, but also national peanut butter and peanut brittle days and months.

it should be apparent that the peanut does have this capacity to be both common and significant all at once. the question could be asked, ¿when is the peanut ever out of place? here is a good place to start that story.

there's that place where you wear clothes that you don't wear during the rest of the week, the background noise of daily life is subdued, and thoughts are supposed to be focused on higher topics. sometimes that place is called church. enter the peanut. i had one, right there in my pocket. not just a single seed, but a whole legume, fibrous shell and all, and i was going to put it to some use.

seeing a friend who i thought would enjoy a little gift, i held my fist straight out, knuckles pointing towards the ceiling in the understood sign of "i have a surprise for you" and waited for the reciprocal sign of the receiving hand. the signs were given, a peanut was passed, and i left to the next meeting without a verbal exchange of any sort. not then, not later that day, or week or month or ever. the peanut itself was all the message there was. not that there hasn't been a verbal recognition later on as to the exchange of ownership of a little nut, but that is all that has been said and it was probably wasn't even that day.

now, ¿what is better than one peanut? ¿could it be any more obvious? more peanuts.

soon enough peanuts were being left behind on my visits to the apartment of the poor recipient of that first peanut. there were peanuts in the candy jar, a peanut taped to the front window, and eventhe title caption for a "Peanuts" cartoon for the front door. a peanut is easy to draw on a dry erase board, a simple blob w/ an odd little hourglass shape. a small jar of peanut butter was left next tothe couch. i sang "Goober Peas" every so often when they'd let me get one of their guitars in my hands. i even dropped of a belated birthday present of government issue dry roasted peanuts, straight from an MRE (Meals Ready to Eat).

the web is a wonderful accomplice. it's just so easy to cut and paste information about peanuts, George Washington Carver and even a few recipes and send them on their way. an email from the receiver of all these peanuts that announced her new email address was a fortunate little mishap that left me with a copy the addresses in her address book. not only did it prove to be an educational opportunity on the cultural value of the peanut for many people, but it was also a lessonon the use of BCC. soon enough, all those who had a mailbox large enough to receive a small MP3 got to hear Burl Ives sing "GooberPeas". that was followed by a couple of newsletters that, at least in part, discussed the merits of the peanut.

the best part about the email snafu was that now other people were asking my friend "why peanuts?" and with a little nudge, a younger sibling would sing his rendition of goober peas. i'm not even present and peanuts find their way into the conversation. ¿isn't that great?
after all this, the reason for the first or any of the subsequent peanuts has not been given. ¿are you sure you really want to know?

it was the end of christmas break. each roommate came back to school with his load of new clothes and other christmas gifts along with a fewthings that each mother thinks her child might need at school. one ofthe roommates came with a very odd selection: a huge bag, the bulk cereal variety, of peanuts still in their shells. ¿why would anyone's mother buy them a huge bag of peanuts to take back to school? they take up a lot of space and aren't very convenient. besides the production of the larger pieces of shell when trying to reach the seeds, cracking the shells open results in a fallout of little fibers and powdery flakes.

there it was; a huge bag of peanuts bought at random by someone's mom and left on the kitchen counter. soon enough they were being eaten, even though they weren't the most convenient. one sunday morning a few found their way into my pocket for the walk to church. (outside the dust and flakes are free to fall where they may.) i estimated one peanut too many; the extra peanut.

yes, ladies and gentlemen, rounds of entertainment through the peanut that lasted nearly two years can be attributed to the simple fact that they were just there on the counter one day. you could say there was no reason at all, other than the fact that i liked peanuts enough to eat them when they were free for the taking and i knew a few random facts and how to abuse the web. harassment via peanut for no reason at all.

"I hate television. I hate it as much as I hate peanuts. But I can't stop eating peanuts."
- Orson Welles (1915-1985)

MONKEY!

2005-02-13T17:27:00.001-07:00

it was a wednesday. the day before was february 8th, 2005; the last day of the year of the monkey. we were in the first day of the year of the rooster; the furthest point in the next twelve years from the next day in the year of the monkey. i've never been so depressed.

---

interestingly enough, many primate species establish or maintain the social order among the extended family or the larger troop through social grooming. while we see on the outside one monkey de-lousing another this is not a mere instance of cleanliness, but the monkey nit-picking is confirming their social status in relation to the monkey being groomed.

what may be even more interesting is how the primate species Homo sapiens cannot seem to resist a little minor social grooming. ¿who hasn't picked a hair or two off the back of the person sitting in the row in front of them?

Dreams: Rabbit-man XI (Oh I must confess, I was drawn... I was drawn to the ocean)

2005-02-06T02:27:00.001-07:00

I've bludgeoned your sailors, I've spat out their keepsakes

(The Second Edition of) NEWS FROM MAMA DEB'S HOUSE OF PANCAKES AND INTERNATIONAL RELIEF

2005-02-01T15:30:00.001-07:00

Ladies and gentlemen, devoted fans of the "deb green irregular"(referring to everyone's favorite newsletter, not deb green herself.) We, the faithful members of Mama Deb's House of Pancakes and International Relief (M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R.), have finally come to the arrival of another exciting newsletter.

Hopefully you all took some time out for National Peanut Day last September. Things were pretty busy in Mama Deb's kitchen and National Peanut Day wasn't given it's due share of respect or celebration. Oh well. National Peanut Month is less than three months away and March gives us 31 days in which to celebrate all things peanut.

Speaking of peanuts, due to recently acquired knowledge, several items including peanuts have found their place on the menu at M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. becoming rather precarious. Apparently peanuts are seeds, and seeds have this peculiar habit of coming from ovaries. With this startling news making itself known, anything ovarian in nature now faces the risk of being stricken from the menu altogether. The test menu is looking rather bleak.

At first the menu was only slightly smaller, but as further connections were made to seeds and ovaries, a continually increasing number of items on the menu have been walking the plank. The BLT has been forced to become bacon wrapped in a lettuce leaf, no mayo (mayo is made with eggs after all) nor bread (flour is made from wheat, which is a grain, which just happens to be a SEED). The listing for the vegetarian menu has been reduced to a mere section title immediately followed by the rapidly shrinking desert menu. The breakfast menu is a nearing a total loss.

We cannot offer you eggs no matter what way you like them cooked. With the recent loss of flour, all of the pancakes, waffles, crepes, etc. have also been relieved of their breakfast duty for the time being. Our most popular breakfast item, the Super-Duper Breakfast Trough, has been reduced from eggs, breakfast potatoes, pancakes, waffles, toast, orange juice, milk, peaches with cottage cheese, two strips of bacon, and two sausage links (with the ever present side of peanuts and the option to sponsor an orphan child) has been reduced to the bacon, sausage, potatoes, milk and cottage cheese. We have tried a multiple of combinations, but no matter how we arrange the bacon on or in the cottage cheese it just doesn't present itself as a visually appealing dish. Mama Deb has even threatened to strike the potatoes from the menu although we are working hard to convince her that a potato is just a root, and that there aren't any seeds in the roots.

On brighter side, the time we are saving by having fewer items to choose from on the menu has given us a chance to beef up the brochures on sponsoring orphans; more reading material as you peruse the menu for the components of a meal. With the menu turmoil raging here on the home turf, there are somethings to still look forward too. Mama Deb has chosen to take leave of the troubles here at home, in exchange for the troubles of Uganda for the Christmas holidays. She will be given a chance to get over her fear of ovaries (please no Freudian psychological analysis of that topic) in exchange for more rational fears, such as her fear of sharks(feel free to enlist Freud here all that you want). Uganda does have a large body of water after all, and you never know when the next shark population is going to make that brave move to cross the African continent and take the fresh water option of settling down for retirement in Lake Victoria. Maybe by January we will be returning to the original menu.

Mama Deb attributes the reason for this trip to Africa to her need for a change of pace, but we here at Mama Deb's House of Pancakes and International Relief have our own ideas. Rumour has it that she is going back for a few more drum lessons. We all remember Mama Deb's last trip to Africa, where she gave away all of her belongings and only came home with all the drums she could carry, and the few other scattered photos and souvenirs that she stuffed in those drums. At least this time around, deb will get to put her drum lessons to immediate use as she plays for change in various locations on the London leg of her "Away From the USA" tour.

Then again, maybe she is just looking for a change of pace. She has begun the habit of referring to herself as deBORah, and occasionally THE deBORah. At least she has outgrown the "goose" phase.

Well, that is it for this update. We of M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. thank you for your interest and hope for your continued subscription to the M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. newsletter.

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for more information on peanuts or the Ugandan Children's Fund, please contact deb green at debgreen20@yahoo.com

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And no for a final word, here are a few links for those of you who are interested. This American Life produces some of the best radio programs ever made, most of which are readily available online:http://www.thisamericanlife.org

Here are a few links in connection with some of the topics covered in this edition of the M.D.H.O.P.A.I.R. newsletter. Hopefully you will have some time to check them out online. They are all free for your listening pleasure.

Babysitting - Deb is going back to the orphanage, and here are some very interesting stories on babysitting. If you don't have time for the whole program, you really should forward through to the last 25 minutes and hear the true story titled "Yes there IS baby". http://www.thisamericanlife.org/ra/175.ram

Kid Logic - ¿What would an orphanage be without children? This is one of our favorite programs of all time. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/ra/188.ram

Music Lessons - when deb is not with the kids at the orphanage, she'll be honing up on those drumming skills. Here's a little homage to music lessons and some of the reasons why people take them. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/ra/104.ram

Dreams: Rabbit-man X (Down, down, down you go, No way to stop)

2005-01-30T03:48:00.001-07:00

As you fall, hear me call
no, no, no

Dreams: Rabbit-man IX

2005-01-23T01:31:00.001-07:00

a story

2005-01-20T03:10:00.002-07:00

it was after midnight.

i had to take a test the next morning.

i thawed some groundbeef.

i made a giant burrito.

i ate the burrito.

the end

Dreams: Intermission

2005-01-09T15:26:00.001-07:00

http://www.filmack.com/products/ClassicLobbyA.htm

A&W's fried cheese curds: a review

2005-01-07T19:02:00.002-07:00

surprisingly tasty

unfortunately priced

Dreams: Rabbit-man VIII (Chicken Boo)

2005-01-03T19:29:00.002-07:00

http://piratemonkeysinc.com/Pirate/index.htm
and in case you need some convincing, check out "Monkeys and Pirates are Funny"
http://www.ericdsnider.com/shop.php

Dreams: Rabbit-man VII (In the bear-trap of its tender warm embrace)

2004-12-27T20:50:00.001-07:00

Dreams: Rabbit-man VI (The lunchtime crowd, they won't even blink...)

2004-12-20T20:24:00.001-07:00

But what words rhyme with buried alive?

Dreams: Rabbit-man V (Little skinny chicken... big skinny skinhead...)

2004-12-12T16:53:00.002-07:00

Had a dream... Magic Johnson was there...

sleepy, grumpy or dopey

2004-12-06T12:54:00.000-07:00

so, i was trying to be good. i didn't watch TV. i studied some GRE. i hid from people. i was going to go to bed at a decent hour. i accidently fell asleep on my floor for about a half an hour. i woke up at 11:00. i got ready for bed. i wasn't as tired any more. i read some more. i got in bed again before 1:00 and sat there for a half hour.

nothing.

i was up until 3:30, at least. finally i could fall asleep again. then to continue the downward spiral, my alarm went off for 2 hours without any snooze breaks because i can't reach my clock from my bed. finally i turned it off, and slept for two hours after that.

yeah, i probably won't be in bed on time tonight either.

Dreams: Rabbit-man IV (Whatever you do, take care of your shoes)

2004-12-04T15:08:00.001-07:00

Your time is near, the mission's clear
It's later than we think