Day 20 (1/24/11)

Today I learned my UofU Muss righteous indignation lives on. And it lives on in the form of my wee midget, Alisha. She burst into my room this evening and ranted for several minutes about an article in the Provo Herald in which a Y official called the Muss 'adorable' and he kept giving it an acronym of M.U.S.S. (Mighty Utah Student Section). This bugs her because the Muss is not adorable, rather it is ferocious and spirited. It also is not an acronym, "The Muss" comes from the school fight song: 'No other gang of college men dare meet us in the muss'. The muss is the field of battle, the realm of chaos. So what part of that is 'adorable'.

The acronym thing use to bother me a lot when I was on The Muss Board. We were fighting constantly with it, and somewhat gave up after ESPN magazine and Kirk Herbstreit each listed the acronym meaning in articles. But the fundamentalists still know all about it, so in this case, the rant I would typically give was, instead, addressed to me.

Ah, the joys of a Legacy!

Day 19 (1/23/11)

I love to read.

Anyone who knows me, knows that this is a fundamental part of my make-up. I love and thoroughly enjoy reading. As such, I got a Kindle for Christmas, a device I have been truly enjoying for the last month. But today, I finally caught on to Amazon.com's scheme.

See, they have a section of free books, they rotate part of limited time deals. I've quite enjoyed uploading some of them and reading them, okay, when I say some I mean like 50... Anyway, it finally dawned on me today why they provide these free. It's to get you hooked on the author. I enjoyed the book about a woman living in the 1800's who was blinded in a wagon accident, it was redundant and predictable, but for a light afternoon read it fit the bill ('cause it was free). I decided I'd see what else the author had written, but all of her other books were between 5 and 10 dollars. See what I mean? I figured it all out. Those silly, trixie people!

'Cest le vie. I did find some of the books in our local library system, so I requested them in to read old-school.

Day 18 (1/22/11)

Okay, I admit to having completely irrational favorites. Things for which I have no real reason or way of backing up my opinion. For instance, even though they all taste the same, I like the white "Snaps" best. My favorite planet is "Jupiter" and my favorite star is "Betelgeuse".

It's this later information that concerns today's education. The Australian News recently reported that Betelgeuse is going to complete the Super Nova process sometime in the next million years. I have to say that really irks me. Last week I find out my astrological sign may be wrong, and now this. How are you supposed to take it when the very stars seem to be against you?

Well, if the worst occurs, not only will my favorite constellation be wrecked (Orion), but I'll also have to pick another star. Gotta say, it is danged inconvient.

Day 17 (1/21/11)

I'll admit, I'm not as active on the facebook scene as I know many people are. I get on once every couple of months, then I am pretty good about logging on every day for about a week, before I once again slack off for a couple of months. I am a terrible facebook friend.

Because of this, when I logged on the other day to look at some pictures a friend of mine posted, of her new Grand-daughter, I went to the friends page and learned that they no longer list them alphabetically by the first name. I was quite frustrated until Alisha told me I could type the name in the "friend search" at the top of the page and it only searched my friends. I hadn't done it prior because I did a search when I added these people, I didn't want to have to sort through all the people of the same name to find them everytime. But what can I say, at least I learned something new from it.

Day 16 (1/20/11)

Today's education comes from the continuation of the house-hold purge. Today I found out that we still have my Dad's old air tank and regulator. He used to Scuba, back in the 70's, and we've had the equipment ever since.

I'm not sure what to do with it. If I ever take up Scuba I will likely want updated equipment. In the meantime, what do I do with the old stuff. I can't imagine that taking an air-tank to DI is a good thing.

Guess I'll have to contact Dive Utah and see if they can give me some direction...

Day 15 (1/19/11)

There are so many "National" days in this country. I'm sure there is a web-site somewhere so I can keep track of all of them and celebrate them appropriately. However, since I've not yet taken a few moments to do a Google search, I'll have to rely on information passed on to me from different sources. In this case, I recieved my info from my lil sis, Alisha.

That's right, today is "National Popcorn Day!" I have to admit, this is a celebration I can get on board with. Alisha and I invested, last week, in a Carmike Cinema popcorn bucket. We pay 15 dollars for a 1+ gallon bucket for popcorn, then for the next year, we can fill it for 2.50 a pop. So I filled up our bucket (got funny looks when I turned around and left the theater) so we could enjoy popcorn at its finest. Greasy, salty and fresh from the popper. Yum!

Day 14 (1/18/11)

Sometimes our education comes in the form of a Blast-From-The-Past.

I have started a house-hold purge of use-less stuff. Between the never-been-used Christmas decorations, old coolers and wooden oars, I have come across some of my Dad's old toys. My Dad was always a "Gadget" guy. This is a trait both Trevor and I took on, as we are definitely "Gadget" people.

Anyway, I came across an old "Memory Pocket Tone Dialer". It's from the early 90's, and is a small device that can be pre-programed with your phone numbers. This way any phone could have your best number's speed dial programed to go.

The funny thing is, as I was looking up on the internet what this was, I found that you can do some minor adjustments on the circuit board to mimic the sounds money makes in a pay phone. Essentially, you can program this tone dialer so you never have to insert money at a pay phone ever again. I have to admit, I find that somewhat tempting... Not that I use pay phones very often, but it just seems like a geeky-cool thing to do.

Day 13 (1/17/11)

Ah, today's education experience was deeply personal and seemingly came out of left field. As today was both a holdiay from school and work, my Mom and Sis and I sat down to have a movie marathon, a tradition for Martin Luther King Jr. Day for years. In this case, we decided to have a "Bones" marathon. We only started in the afternoon, since I don't do mornings. However, as we approached 9:00, Alisha told me we had to shut off "Bones" because "Hawaii Five-0" was on.

This was when I learned that Alisha and I have very different tastes in men. That's right, I like to watch "Bones" for the witty writing, but also for the eye candy that is David Boreanaz. I like the tall, dark-haired, and broad shoulder-ed type. However, Alisha wanted to switch to "Hawaii Five-O" for her eye candy of Scott Caan. He's short, blonde-haired and scruffy faced. I was out voted because my Mom likes the other guy on "Hawaii Five-O".

All I can say is there is no accounting for an individal's taste. But... where did I go wrong with Alisha? She used to be all about tall and dark, when did it become short and blonde?

Day 12 (1/16/11)

My Mom was complaining that the "On-Demand" feature of our comcast cable did not yet have the latest episode of NCIS uploaded. I've been toying with the idea of hooking my laptop up to our TV, which we did do a week ago to learn about cruise information in the Carribean. I had thought about hooking up to hulu.com and playing the episode, but then I learned that CBS doesn't contribute to hulu. As a result, I had to search further.

The result of this search led me to "The Pirate Bay" and the wonderful world of torrents. I'm not going into my 'gray-scaled' activites here, but lets just say, we got to watch NCIS and many other TV episodes since...

Day 11 (1/15/11)

Today I learned the ancient and noble art of Divination. That's right, I sat down and went through a 20 lesson course on Tarot cards. I requested a pack of tarot cards for Christmas, and was fortunate enough to pick out and order them myself. I found the process somewhat fun, but it's going to be some time before I remember the meaning of each card.



Alisha and I pulled a one-day tarot card (kind of like a horoscope). I pulled the "Knight of Cups".

My day reading meant that I needed to evaluate how I was being influenced by daily events. Essentially I was being ruled by too much emotion, and not enough practicality. I am prone to flights of fancy and illusion, and I needed to be a bit more pragmatic.

Ironically, Alisha pulled a card that told her to be more childish that day. I guess this was to even out the energy of me being more responsible. I tell you, I may start doing the card a day to see how my Tarot reading falls out each day.

Day 10 (1/14/11)

Today, I was thrown off completely. I learned that I'm not what I think I am. I know this doesn't make sense.

Really, what it comes down to is my astrological sign. I have been, since birth, under the reigning sign of Cancer. However, according to a researcher in New Delhi, the earth has moved slightly in the last 3,000 years, and because of this adjustment, there are in fact 13 zodialogical signs and the dates of the previous 12 have changed.

I'm sorry, but this is not acceptable.

Cancer people (me) are loyal, dependable and caring. Additionally, they are moody, self-absorbed and contradictory: on one side, they have the perseverance and drive to do what needs to be done, they are self-sufficient and do not need to depend on other people for the material and physical things in life. On the other hand, they depend on people for emotional support and encouragement.

However, according to the new chart, I'm a Gemini. Gemini's are witty, imaginative, adaptable, impulsive and superficial. Gemini are extremely independent. They will not be pinned down by anyone or any rules. They need to experience the world on their own. Change and freedom are extremely important to Gemini, they will never let anyone dictate them, they are extremely independent and freedom is essential to their mental well being.

That's not me at all. I don't want to change to fit my astrological sign, it would just be crazy. So you know what, if anyone asks, I'm still the self-absorbed Cancer I have always been.

Follow the link above to see if your sign has changed...

Day 9 (1/13/11)

I've never made stew. Part of it comes from my general dislike of stew. Well, that's not completely true. I don't like the tomato part/flavor of the recipe my mother has always made. Because of this dislike, I've never tried to make stew. However, my Mom volunteered me to make dinner for a family she visit teaches. Her teaching companion gave her some thick pieces of steak (previously frozen), so we decided a hearty stew would likely be the best way to go about incorporating the meat.

I'm told the result tasted good. I didn't try it, but had my Mom taste a bite since I don't like giving food to people if I'm unsure of the results. Alisha is jealous (she said it smelled really good in the house), so I'll make some again either this weekend or next week so she can have some. But, I'll likely leave out the tomato since I don't like it.

Day 8 (1/12/11)

Today, I learned how to use a new blogging software for 'work'. While I spent 2 hours going through it and watching the demonstration, I'm still not sure how much I took in. I tried messing around with it at home, but it's not really working out. I hope it comes together soon since I don't really enjoy wasting my time.

I'll check it out more later, if it ends up working, it should make it easier, but if not...

Day 7 (1/11/11)

First, what a freaking cool date! Seriously, can't be out-done until November.

What I learned today was more of a personal education. I met and learned about two new individuals. The first is a person to whom I am a new visiting teacher, and the second, it a person who is my new visiting teacher. For privacy I won't mention names, but I will mention that they are both very nice women, who both have young children. Makes things different when 'connecting' to them, as I can't share any motherly-experiences. But, it's all good. I have other ways to get along with others.

Day 6 (1/10/11)

Today I learned some of the ways to play Sims 3. I've been playing around with it for a couple of weeks now, not really understanding the game, but I'm pretty sure I could play it now. I'm not quite sure I understand the nuances of the game, or the point, but it is somewhat entertaining.

Day 5 (1/9/11)

Today, I both taught and learned.




While it wasn't so much of a quantifiable educational experience, I did research and learn about possible Caribbean Cruise destinations and activities. We've already started researching the possibilities for Alisha's Graduation trip. She would like to spend a week in Orlando (you know, Disney World) and then a week long RCCL Western Caribbean Cruise. A very fine idea indeed.

My teaching came in the form of teaching Alisha how to make chocolate souffle's. She didn't believe they would be as easy to make as I told her, but I trust she is now on-board with the idea of souffle's being both easy to make and delicious to eat. (Oh, indeed they are yummy)

Day 4 (1/8/11)

Today, my Home Teacher helped me learn the first step to patching up a drywall hole. Well, I guess the second step since creating the hole would be the first one. Joseph helped me to measure and cut out the holes in the bedroom and the ceiling below (from the leak we had in the fall). Then we fitted in new pieces of drywall, and fixed the pieces with screws.




I cut and fitted the piece in this picture all by myself. Next time he comes over he's going to show me how to tape and mud the edges. A particularly useful piece of knowledge gained, that's for sure.

Day 3 (1/7/11)

Today I had to repot and decorate a ficus I keep in our living room. I first got this as a small plant in a soup bowl. My Grandma sent it to me when I got my tonsils out when I was 24. I've had to repot this guy several times. This time I trimmed all his lower branches off, styled the top of the remaining branches, and then braided the bases to make the large bush into a small tree.

However, these were all things I knew how to do prior to proceeding in this task. What I leaned today is how to use Sheet Moss. This is the green stuff around the base of the branches, and the top of the pot. It helps with moisture control, as well as decoration. However, if you go to use some, just know in advance: IT GETS MESSY! I ended up with dirt piles on the carpet and tile where I performed this project. Fortunately, it was a dry mess, so vacuuming worked to clean up quickly.

Day 2 (1/6/10)

I spend a lot of time at my desk. It's where I have my computer, printer, video editing system, iPod speakers, and all manner of other things. It's also where I work on the majority of my projects. Because of this, my desk gets a lot of wear-and-tear. My desk is one of those cheaply put together wood with laminate covers, and over the years the abuse has caused the edges to come off. I'm continuously gluing and taping the edges back on.

I've tried numerous glues over the years, and today I tried one I've never worked with before: Gorilla Glue. I've seen it used over the years and I know it has a nice strong grip so I put it to use. One of the things I found most intriging about using it was the necessity of misting it with water. I'm not quite sure how it works, but what a cool chemical process that uses water as the activating property, and then expands to 3 times it's original size.

Day 1 (1/5/10)

My mom was watching Charlie's Angels on TV, and I couldn't remember the name of the 3rd Angel. I remembered Jacyln Smith and Farrah Fawcett, but the name of the last one eluded me. The stipulation was that this was the last of the original Angels. To solve this I turned to my friendly computer and went to imdb.com to look up the cast. The answer: Kate Jackson. I'll be honest, I'm not sure I really ever knew that...

New Years Resolution: 2011

It is often said we learn something everyday. I firmly believed that when I was still in school, but as I've traversed this mundane world in which I exist, I've become more skeptical of this assessment.

As a result of this fallen ideal, I've decided to make 2011 the year of learning. However, I will not be actively seeking knowledge, rather, I'm going to sit down every evening and go over the days events for the taught lesson of the day. This will allow me to put the old adage to the test. My hope is to post each day the things I have (or have not) learned.

So here is to 2011! May the learning comense.