CrashText

Recent Eavesdropping

2006-05-11T10:48:00.000-06:00

I’ve been working with my son’s scout troupe lately, and overheard this conversation on the way back from a camping trip recently…

[Older Scout]: (As the van is slogging up a hill) We’re going too slow. We may need to lighten the load by throwing some of the younger guys out the back.

[Whiney Young Scout]: Nuh uh! If you do, my mom will sue you!

[Older Scout]: No she wouldn’t. She would sue the scout master.

[Whiney Young Scout]: Well, she would sue you too!

[Older Scout]: (amused) Well, I’m going to sue your grandma.

[Whiney Young Scout]: No you won’t. You don’t even know where my grandma lives!

Whiney Young Scout had a good point about the unknown identity of his grandmother. But what I want to know is: what ever happened to ‘My dad is going to beat up your dad’?

The Reason I Haven't Posted In So Long...

2006-05-09T09:58:00.000-06:00

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Tagged, But Never Bagged!

2006-02-27T12:32:00.000-07:00

I've never actually heard of this 'tagging' thing, but since Dalton Girl was kind enough to tag me, I'm gonna do it.

Four Jobs I've Had
1. My first job (aside from paper-boy duty) was as Bottle Boy. I sorted all the bottles and cans that people returned for deposits at a small grocery store in Portland, OR. Strange fact that I learned – apparently it is a legal requirement that all beer bottles be returned with a half-inchof rancid beer and/or a couple of cigarette butts left in the bottom.
2. Software tester for WordPerfect.
3. Software tester for crappy financial planning software.
4. Software tester for Top Spin – the best selling tennis video game ever. (All in all, I think the bottle boy gig was probably the best. Cause hey, every once in a while… Free soda and bottle caps!)

Four Movies I Can Watch Over and Over Again
1. Raising Arizona
2. Cabin Boy
3. The Blues Brothers
4. Breakin 2: Electric Boogaloo (Just kidding – I had to put a smarmy answer in there somewhere. I’ll say The Purple Rose of Cairo instead.)

Four Places I've Lived
1. Portland, Oregon (If you live a good life, say your prayers and read your scriptures, when you die, you’ll go to Oregon.)
2. Provo, Utah
3. Gifu, Japan
4. Kent, Washington

Four TV Shows I Love
1. Lost
2. Smallville (I know it is stupid, but I like it anyway. I’m a sucker for super-hero shows, even if everyone acts they should be on Dawson Creek.)
3. Boston Legal
4. Spongebob Squarepants

Four Highly Regarded and Recommended TV Shows That I've Never Watched a Full Episode of
1. Survivor (or any other “reality” show, though that Makin’ Play-Do Sculptures With The Stars looks pretty good.)
2. Will and Grace
3. CSI: Anything
4. The A-Team (I’m pretty ashamed of this one. Please don’t tell.)

Four Places I've Vacationed
1. Disneyland
2. Sedona, Arizona
3. My parent’s house
4. Deborah’s parent’s house

Four of My Favorite Dishes
1. Gyoza (as made by my wife, who was taught by Dalton Girl – Thanks D-Shimai. See I still remember and love you.)
2. Pizza from The Flying Pie Pizzeria in Portland.
3. Steak from the Stony River steakhouse in Atlanta, Georgia.
4. My own special blend of Fruit Loops, Apple Cinnamon Cheerios and Sugar Smax. It’s like a sugar bomb in your mouth!

Four Sites I Visit Daily
1. Ain’t It Cool News
2. PVP Online
3. MacRumors.com
4. IGN.com (Game news)

Four Places I'd Rather Be Right Now
1. The Justice League command center
2. Aboard the Enterprise with Captain Kirk on the Bridge
3. Eating lunch at the cruise ship buffet at a table with Gordon B. Hinkley, Steven Jobs, Walt Disney (after he is thawed out and cleaned up) and Mary Tyler Moore.
4. Floating down the Lazy River with my loving family

Four Bloggers I Am Tagging
1. Clariticity
2. Clariticity
3. Clariticity
4. Clariticity (Let’s face it. Banzai and Leslie-Chan are the only two people on the planet who read this. And since she tagged me, there aren’t a lot of other choices. Thanks for reading it though – even though I go months without updating. It is nice to know you still care.)

A Typical and Telling Conversation

2005-12-23T17:08:00.000-07:00

Deborah: And the angels said, "Peace on earth, goodwill towards men."

Rachel (age 7): And women!

Samuel (age 9): And wolf-men!

Hannah (age 5): And dogs!

Benjamin (age 12): (Says nothing. Just rolls his eyes toward heaven as if pleading for help.)

Not Entirely Unlike A Rolling Stone

2005-12-15T15:15:00.000-07:00

Kidney stones.

Ouch.

Yup. Apparently, I was bitten by a radioactive oyster, and now my body is producing cheap jewelry for the masses.

Well, okay – it was only one stone. But it felt like I had swallowed a whole barrel full of red-hot, poisonous gravel. Still, much like a very special episode of Mr. Belvedere, there are many lessons that can be learned by enduring pain.

1. It is possible to hear yourself say, “don’t you have anything stronger than morphine?”
2. There is nothing quite so surreal as discussing your urinary tract and the contents of your pee with your in-laws over Thanksgiving dinner.
3. It is possible for a grown man to cry, even without making him watch a 3 hour production of The Vagina Monologues performed by BYU’s Young Ambassadors.
4. Upon hearing of your condition, 98.7% of all people will compare the passing of kidney stones to childbirth.
5. Over all, kidney stones are the better end of the bargain, since you don’t have to save money to put them through college.
6. People will forgive you of any debt or obligation if you just start a sentence with the words, “I’m sorry, I meant to [insert your obligation here], but I've been kind of busy trying to get rid of these kidney stones…”
7. Given enough time, drugs and daytime television, you can pretty much endure anything.
8. The old adage, “this too shall pass” has layer after layer of meaning.

That about does it. Sorry, I meant to come up with 10 lessons, but I've been kind of busy trying to get rid of these kidney stones…

In case you are wondering though, I'm done with all that now. I am stone free and high on life.

A Friend Indeed

2005-10-17T20:24:00.000-06:00

It’s my fault I suppose. I was listening to the Mulan Rouge soundtrack while doing the dishes. But while I was driving Hannah and her pal to preschool, I heard her say, “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend. Boys are friends with circles and rectangles.”

Ahoy Matey! A Fine Talk Like A Pirate Day To Ye!

2005-09-20T12:06:00.000-06:00

Avast. Arrr. And let us not forget Aye Aye.

I have no idea what these words mean, but they are way fun to say. And today is the day to do so.

So shiver your timbers, pour yourself a mug of grog and go wild.

Here are some links that may help get you in the mood…

• The official Talk Like a Pirate web site.
• A pirate name generator. Mine is “Pants-Down Argus”
• A flashing monkey with a special message just for CrashText readers.
• The Pirate Movie on Amazon.com, in case you want to really get in the mood. You can never go wrong with Kristy McNichol (I used to be in love with her. She was the only one who could sooth my broken heart after Valarie Bertinelli married Eddie VanHalen.)
• And finally, a fist full of pirate jokes.

My Hero Mario

2005-09-17T14:05:00.000-06:00

Every once in a while, a company out there will surprise me. Instead of going for the tried and true formulas, they try something new. It is rare – but sometimes you do see something new under the sun.

I know, I know. The preacher would think me vain for saying so. But the preacher never played Nintendo.

You see, Nintendo revealed the new control pads for their currently-in-development game system, Revolution. Take a look at the pictures below or this movie and check it out for yourself.

Where as every other games system on the planet has always used a standard D-pad or Thumb-stick on the left, buttons on the right layout, the Revolution controller is completely different. It looks like a remote control. But it can sense when you move or tilt it and will react accordingly. So no more pushing buttons to swing that bat or wield that sword. Go ahead and swing, Baby. Swing!

So while there is danger for Nintendo in creating such a non-standard component (because it will make development harder for cross-platform titles who made just decide to skip the effort), I think it is great. It is refreshing to see someone in the game industry who remembers what it means to play.

The same can be said for the current generation of handhelds; while Sony’s PSP has bigger numbers (in sales and raw computing power), the Nintendo DS introduces the concept of using a stylus and motion sensitivity to games.

So way to go Nintendo! Keep the imagination flowing. Don’t try to differentiate by increasing the pixels per inch or microprocessor speed. Innovate to differentiate. (That rhymes, so it must be true.)

Amber Needs Clariticity

2005-09-08T14:11:00.000-06:00

I took the kids up to visit the grandparents in Farmington over Labor Day weekend for a last splash in the pool for the season. On the way, I noticed something strange. All of the amber signs on I-15 displayed the message, “DUI Laws Enforced.”

Huh? What exactly does this mean? Are DUI laws typically not enforced, but for Labor Day weekend they decided to give it a try? Or does it mean that DUI laws are enforced, but others are not? Could I have knocked off a liquor store to celebrate the concept of labor in our great nation without fear of repercussions? I’m just not sure.

In order to avoid this type of confusion for future holidays, may I suggest that the Amber folks use a message more along these lines?
• Caution: MADD mothers will beat drunk drivers senseless while tourists videotape the whole incident so it can be played endlessly on the news for the next six months.
• Alcoholic automotive administrators are asses.
• Cops are working while you are playing – and boy are they pissed.
• Your slurred pleas for a “warning” will only result in additional tickets for insufficient air pressure and broken headlights.

A Haiku for Troubled Times

2005-09-07T10:48:00.000-06:00

Pernicious land mine
Elephant beast of burden
Peg leg pachyderm

Death of a Cliché

2005-08-29T14:25:00.000-06:00

There are some sayings in our culture that had meaning that everyone understood at one point, but have since become meaningless. Here are a few that come to mind. Let me know if you can think of any others…

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”
I never understood this one. If the Trojans had inspected their gift horse a little more closely, they might have avoided getting sacked. Of course even stranger is why they named condoms after the Trojans – I would think the folks who opened their gates to accept a gift from the gods that actually contained a horde of sneaky little soldiers would be a bad image for prophylactic makers.

“They are selling like hot cakes.”
Honestly, when is the last time you saw people lining up for hot cakes? Egg McMuffins perhaps, but I just don’t think hot cakes have the pull they enjoyed with previous generations.

“What are you waiting for? Christmas to come?”
I went to Costco this weekend (Saturday, August 27 to be exact), and saw the first Christmas decorations of the season. Yup. Right up there next to the Halloween candy and Summer deck furniture, stood a giant tacky Christmas train made out of bright lights and snow-white wire frame that you can put up in your front yard today. So unless the meaning of this phrase changes to indicate you are waiting for something that never really goes away, or something that started out as a religious family gathering and has instead transformed into a year-long marketing blitz, I’m afraid this cliché too must join the legion of the defunct. May it rest in peace (on Earth).

Marriage, where is thy sting?

2005-07-23T17:23:00.000-06:00

Now if this isn’t a sign of the times, I don’t know what is. It seems that “’Til death do us part” has the ring of too much permanency to it for some folks at who find themselves at the alter. So they are replacing the offending phrase with something a little less binding – phrases like “For as long as we continue to love each other,” or “As long as our marriage serves the greater good.”

What a great idea. Take the actual commitment out of the equation. Here are a few more alternate phrases people might want to use:

“’Til someone sexier or richer comes along.”
“As long as there are no diapers to change.”
“’Til work on Monday do us part.”
“As long as the Mets continue to dominate.”
“As long as you don’t get fat.”

Less Bang for Your Buck

2005-07-19T22:38:00.000-06:00

So I’m relaxing in my room the other night, watching a Seinfeld rerun, when Hannah walks slowly out of the bathroom carrying a fist full of hair and a pair of scissors.

Hannah: Hey Dad, where did this hair come from?
Me: Oh no. Hannah! Did you cut your hair? (Asked rhetorically)
Hannah: No. (Mustering all the cute persuasion that only an innocent four-year-old can)
Me: Really? Then why are your bangs missing?
Hannah: I don’t know. I think I lost them.

Let’s see… How would our legal system handle this?

Even if the bangs are cut,
You must not spank the butt?

Harry Potter and the Half-Crazy Muggles

2005-07-16T17:09:00.000-06:00

Last night for Date Night, I cunningly convinced Deborah to have dinner with me at the Outback, which just happens to be within walking distance of Barnes & Noble. B&N, as I’m sure you know, was just one of the thousands of bookstores across the land having Harry Potter pre-release parties with books going on sale at 12:01. So after a delicious steak dinner, I casually suggested we go check it out.

Now I am a card-carrying geek to be reckoned with – and I have the stacks of comic books and action figures to prove it. I’ve been to Star Trek conventions. I’ve waited for hours in long lines for release day Star Wars tickets. If it is nerdy, silly or of geek report, I’m all over it. But I was still unprepared for what I saw last night.

The place was packed. Those who didn’t come dressed as witches or dementors wore complimentary Harry Potter glasses that were passed out at the door. Children, college students and grandparents alike competed in dragon coloring contests and potion mixing contests. People were scarfing down Berties Bott’s Every Flavore Beans like, well… like candy.

The festivities were a bit too crowded and it was still 2 hours from midnight, so we headed back home. But I was really impressed with how much fun everyone was having. The parking lot was filled like the mall a week before Christmas, but unlike stressed and sweaty holiday shopping, these people were actually having a good time.

I came back at midnight, hoping to snag a copy of the book once the crowds had died down, but I was in for an even bigger shock – the crowds were now bigger than ever! Lines stretched out of the building and down the building for city blocks. The Media Play down the street had the same thing. Thousands of people lined up and happily waiting for their wizardry fix.

I can’t stand waiting in lines, and by the look of things, it would have taken a couple of hours to get my hands on R.K.’s latest gold mine. So I drove down to Wal-mart where they had a couple of pallets sitting out front and bought mine with a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Magic Brownies to go along with it. No waiting on aisle 5!

Anyway, here are my predictions for how the book turns out. (I’ve only ready the first couple of chapters so far and these are predictions I’ve had for months – so don’t worry about spoilers.)

1. Death or banishment for Dumbledor. I figure since he handled Voldemort pretty easily at the end of the last book, he has to be out of the picture for the last book to be suspenseful. So it is either off to Azkaban or a dirt nap for the Headmaster.

2. Draco Malfoy will finally side with Harry Potter. Come on. He’s a teenager – joining the Order of the Phoenix would be the ultimate rebellion against parental control.

3. The Half-Blood Prince is none other than the Dark Lord Voldemort himself.

There you go. Remember, you heard it here first, kids.

Over Thinking in the Key of G

2005-07-13T21:53:00.000-06:00

Forgive me a moment as I wax geek-esque, but I’ve been thinking about Star Wars lately and have to get something off my chest. (KC, you can jump off here, cause this is gonna be way too deep for you.)

In the Phantom Menace, we are told that adorable little Anakin, although destine to become über-bad-dude Darth Vader, will “bring balance to the Force.” This is just kind of dropped on us without explanation and generally, everyone pretty much accepts it without question. Lucas himself made it clear that this prophecy applies directly to Anakin – and he is the one who fulfills it – not his offspring.

Who made this prophecy? We don’t know. How exactly is the Force currently out of balance? We don’t know that either. How does he accomplish this task? Most people assume that by eliminating the Sith, Anakin fulfills the prophecy – both master and apprentice die in the end of Return of the Jedi, so there is no one left to perpetuate the dark side. But how does eliminating one side bring balance? I would think that would knock thing off kilter more than anything. Of course he also killed everyone on the light side of the equation too, so maybe bringing balance is an ironic euphemism for cutting both sides down to nothing.

Well, here is my theory: Anakin brought balance to the Force by clearing the slate and passing the best of both sides on to Luke.

The Sith are evil – everyone can see that. They have pasty complexions, bad teeth and wear black. They are brutal and selfish and nasty. What positive traits could they possibly possess that future Force-philes could benefit from? Well, they feel.

At every turn, Anakin is told to control his emotions. Qui-Gon stoically and unapologetically takes him away from his mother and leaves her in slavery and poverty. His love for Amidala is forbidden and Yoda tells him to sever all ties to anything that would bind him to life.

This philosophy is preached to Luke as well. Yoda and Obi-Wan both plead with him to let his friends die instead of risking a rescue attempt at Cloud City.

On the other hand, the Sith embrace their passions. They hate. They love. They feel. They don’t deny the emotions, good and evil, that make us human.

So now Luke has a clean start and can start the Jedi order from scratch, but this time the Jedi can be allowed to love. If you follow the novels or comic books, you know that Luke marries and has a child.

So how is that for an interpreation of ancient Jedi prophecy? Be sure to tune in next episode as I evaluate the characters Scrappy Doo and Hello Kitty as archetypes of Fruedian theory.

There Can Be Only One Mr. Krabs

2005-04-13T12:49:00.000-06:00

These are strange times we live in, my friend. Have you ever sat down in an easy chair and started petting a cat on your lap? And then the cat looks at you and starts belting out Barry White tunes while a spinning disco ball descends from the ceiling and your grandmother dances out of the kitchen while French kissing John Travolta? No? Well me neither.

But I did have this experience – I was watching the Spongebob Squrepants movie with my kids the other day (excellent movie, by the way). After the movie, we watched some of the extra features, which included a cool documentary featuring Jasques Cousteau’s grandson and interviews with various cast members. Everything is going along fine, when all of the sudden, they show the face of Clancy Brown – the voice of Mr. Krab. I knew the face immediately.

Mr. Krab is really none other than Victor Kruger – the nefarious Kurgan from the original Highlander movie! What I thought was just another happy-go-lucky crustacean capitalist, is actually a bloodthirsty immortal killing machine! Who would have thought? I mean the guy's name is Clancy, for heaven's sake.

What’s next? Will we find out that Bart Simpson is actually a woman? That the governor of California is really the Terminator?

Sometimes, truth really is stranger than fiction.

To All Those Who Thought My Rant About Fast Food Workers Went Overboard...

2005-03-24T09:01:00.000-07:00

I give you... the finger.

That should splash some mud, eh?

Things That Make You Go, Huh?

2005-03-21T11:21:00.000-07:00

There are some things that once said, can never be taken back. Things that when looked at in hindsight, reveal more about the speaker than perhaps he meant to show.

Case in point: the following analogy has been running around in my head since I heard it and I can’t get it out. Sometimes it makes me want to laugh; other times rage or cry. Maybe I can purge the demonic phrases out of my skull by offering them up here for public scrutiny.

Me: So when we spoke last week, you said you were very happy with my work.

Former Boss: Yeah, last week I was. But if you compare your work with others, then I’m not very happy.

Me: Huh?

Former Boss: If there were a mud puddle in the parking lot, and you drove through it, the splash would go about this high. [He holds his hand up, signifying a region about mid-calf.] Some of the others on the team are making splashes this high. [His hand shoots up to the waist region.]

Me: So I’m being fired because I don’t splash enough mud?

Former Boss: Exactly.

You think maybe that isn’t exactly mud they are splashing around?

A copy of a copy of a copy…

2005-03-14T14:59:00.000-07:00

So at some point, The Powers That Be, decided that instead of coming into a restaurant and interacting face to face with a waitress, we should just wait in line, purchase everything at a counter and then sit down and eat. For efficiency sake, they then decided that there was no need to get out of your car, just order your food at the drive-up window. That was bad enough, but then they had to add the severe discomfort of a speaker system, complete with static and faceless forced courtesy.

But now we can take the human to human interaction even one step further away – McDonalds is planning on outsourcing their drive-through order taking service. Your food will still be assembled by pimpled McJobbies inside (I say assembled, not cooked because everything but the last-minute frying is done elsewhere and delivered ready to go.), but your order will be taken by someone off-site. You could be driving through a McDonalds in Texas and give your order to someone in a New York call center.

Sigh. It’s just a hamburger folks. Does it need to be all this complicated? This high-tech? This impersonal?

I suppose on the plus side, there will at least be someone who speaks your language to take your order. But what does this do to the workers inside the building. After working at McDonalds, what have they gained besides a French fry stench that won’t ever wash out? McDonalds accepts millions of dollars from the US government every year because they train unskilled workers so that they can be more productive citizens (at least that’s what I read in Fast Food Nation, a fascinating and chilling look at the industry). What are they training their workers to do exactly? They don’t really know how to cook anything. And now they won’t even learn how to interact with people. All they will be able to do is push buttons, wipe down counters and assemble happy meals. Thanks for nothing, Ronald.

Asia Needs Women

2005-03-10T11:59:00.000-07:00

Years of state encouraged birth control and male financial dominance are catching up to India. I understand the concerns they had about over-population, but clearly the plans have gone amiss. There is now a shortage of women. Many men are growing up and finding that they can’t find anyone to marry. The overall birth rate in Asia is shrinking and the average age of the general population is shooting up. Just goes to show that conventional wisdom isn’t always long-term smart.

Knock Knock

2005-03-09T16:50:00.000-07:00

I heard the following knock-knock joke from 'Lil Ruff's pre-school carpool pal. You know, you can't buy education like this...

First Person: Knock-knock.
Second Person: Whose there?
First Person: I'm a pile-up
Second Person: I'm a pile-up who?
First Person: giggles uncontrollably, waits 72 milliseconds and starts over.

The Last Stand of a Decade

2005-03-01T02:36:00.000-07:00

When Rocket Girl proudly counts out loud for our amusement and edification, she always pauses on the nines. Her normal cadences is to hurriedly dash through the ones through the sixes, punctuate the sevens and eights with a drum-roll like build-up, and then dramatically elongate the nines as she catches her breath for her majestic unveiling of the tens. 313233343536, 37, 38, 3-----9, pause, pause, pause, 40! [Repeat until 100 – the Everest peak of the counting mountain climb.]

So that is where I find myself today – in the elongated pause before 40. I just had my 39th birthday. I even made an iMix to celebrate the occasion.

The good news is that I won’t have much longer to stress about all of those life-goals I resolved to accomplish before the age of 40. The bad news is, I have got to get busy.

Here are a few items from the list:
1. Reach a lean weight for a man of my height and build by either losing 50 pounds or growing 36 inches taller.
2. Write and publish a novel.
3. Go sky-diving
4. Learn to snowboard.
5. Adopt a baby girl from China.
6. Ride my bike from Portland, Oregon to Portland, Maine.
7. Spit off the Eiffel Tower. (I actually did this one – ask Kevin)
8. Spend a day at a nude beach. (Note: goal #1 is a prerequisite for this one.)
9. Celebrate New Years Eve at the great Shrine of Ise in Japan.
10. Learn to cook like those guys at Benihana’s.

Hmm… looks like this will be a busy year. Wish me luck. ☺

Tom Petty - Prophet or Long-Haired Hippy?

2005-02-22T11:48:00.000-07:00

A couple of years back, Tom Petty and his heartbreaking crew released an album entitled, The Last DJ wherein he laments the loss of independent, free-thinking disk jockeys. Amen to that Tom. DJs used to pick the music they played. They had opinions. They told it as they saw it.

Now they all play the corporate play list and bore us with trite little diatribes denouncing the evils of shoppers who purchase 15 items in the 10 item or less express register.

But even Tom may not have seen this one coming. There is a new radio station in the Salt Lake area that has eliminated DJs altogether. Jack FM has little pre-recorded blurbs that it plays between songs and commercials. But it has no live announcers of any kind.

So is this a good thing or bad? I don’t miss the hackneyed humor. But is this one more step towards a dehumanized society? When was the last time you called a company and a real person answered the phone? Who bothers to chat for a moment with a bank teller instead of driving up to an ATM instead?

If you think I’m wrong, and that we still communicate just as much and as well face to face as we used to, be sure to click on the little comment button below and leave me a message. Just be sure to wait for the beep.

Mr. Dursley Would Not Approve

2005-02-18T23:02:00.000-07:00

There is something going on in Provo. Strange folk have been sighted, wearing cloaks and butterfly painted faces. Staves and swords are brandished in broad daylight. What could have brought these odd types out into the open so? Are they celebrating the Boy Who Lived? Nope. It is their annual trek to Life, the Universe and Everything, a symposium of science fiction and fantasy at BYU.

As a true blue, card-carrying member of the Geek For Life Club, I had to attend. And while I found the lectures by successful science fiction writers and game designers to be fascinating, I have to admit I enjoyed the people watching even more.

I’ll admit there were not a lot of costume wearers, but plain outer clothing does not hide the inner geek. You could be decked out like Mr. Abercrombie and his pal Fitch themselves – as soon as you start contrasting the relative merits of Deep Space 9 vs. Babylon 5, the jig is up.

You would think this would be a light-hearted gathering of people who enjoy discussing their favorite books and movies. You would be wrong. These guys take this stuff way too seriously. Don’t believe me? Just try calling Star Trek “Science Fiction” instead of “Speculative Fiction” or at the very least “Soft Science Fiction” and see how fast a room full of social outcasts can transform into a well-organized lynch mob.

My favorite section was a discussion of how to create mythical animals to populate your speculative fictitious worlds. We discussed the pros and cons of the “Chimera” method of melding two or more distinct animals into one (i.e. a pegasus or griffin) versus the “Enhancement” method such as adding abnormal attributes to an otherwise normal creature (i.e. giant blue oxen or sharks with frikin lasers attached to their heads). Big Ben designed a a Sleeta – a cross between a sloth and a cheeta. The Sleeta is a slow and mellow animal with brief bursts of caffeine sugar rush. I thought my friend Todd came up with the best though – The Buffunkalo! Half buffalo. Half Skunk. All Terror.

How do you spell “incompetence?”

2005-02-17T19:15:00.000-07:00

Big Ben participated in his school spelling bee today. He did great – he was in the top third of the students who represented the best spellers in the whole school. I was very impressed with all the students who participated. The final three blew me away. These third through sixth grade kids were spelling words like pneumatic, gubernatorial, quintessence and dozens of other words I wouldn’t dare type without a spell checker.

The ones who did not impress me were the teachers who quizzed the kids. Along with mispronouncing several words, these two pillars of learning clearly didn’t know what many of the words meant. When asked to define the word cochlear, ("A spiral-shaped cavity of the inner ear that resembles a snail shell and contains nerve endings essential for hearing." - Webster), the teacher mumbled, “I think it has something to do with worms.”

But hey, at least she took a decent stab at that one. She gave the kind of lame-ass sample sentences that I used to in grade school and always got slapped down for.

“I studied horticulture in school.” (I’m glad she studied something, I suppose.)

“My olfactory system isn’t working well.” (Too bad. Cause if it did, she would know she stinks!)

She may just as well have used a good defining phrase like, “ineptitude is a word in this sentence.”

You Are What You Eat (up your time with)

2005-02-16T22:40:00.000-07:00

In the immortal words of Tyler Durden, "You are not your job."

That's true, right? You, the immaterial essence of you – you are not a mail carrier. A grocer. A car salesman. You, me, we are all something more than the label. We go beyond the titles and vocational check-lists. Right? There is more to our spirits in the material world than a resume and a paycheck. The daily grind is what we endure so that we can do/be who we want. No money, no honey.

But isn't it true that you are what you spend your time doing? In older times, people took on the names of what they did. Mr. Smith. Goodwife Baker. The Tanner’s boy. Fletcher. Miller. Forrester. To them, you really were your job.

Maybe we can’t escape the fact that what we do with the prime hours of the day shapes who we are. There are those who would deny it, but how serious can you take them? I saw a porn star on Donahue a few years ago (okay, more than a few), who said that her job was just her job. And that when she went home to her boyfriend and girlfriend at the end of the day, work stayed at work and the three of them had a normal, healthy life. Hmm… Okay. How about the mafia hit-man who coaches his son’s soccer team. When he tells the kids to get out there and “kill ‘em,” don’t you think it might be taken a couple of different ways?

You see where I’m going with this, right? So what happens when you lose your job? Do you lose your identity? If you are “between gigs” are you between lives? In a world where the first question you ask new people you meet is, “so what do you do?” who are you when you have no answer?

Freedom Festival Pictures

2004-07-05T13:29:00.000-06:00

50 hot air balloons taking off all at the same time is a sight to stir your soul. All part of the Provo Freedom Festival. Enjoy!

I have to see how this works...

2004-06-17T14:06:00.000-06:00

Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Eve

Whose woods these are, I think I know
His house is in the village though
And he will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake
The only other sounds the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake

The woods are lovely, dark and deep
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep
And miles to go before I sleep.
--Robert Frost