The Ward family FHE

Last Monday, I went downtown to see the new Joseph Smith movie, go to the new "I am a Child of God" section of the church history museum thinger, and have lunch with my family. I'm so friggin' lucky that my family gets along as well as we do. it could be a whole lot worse, and I'm so glad I've got what I've got. My family is rad.

The kiddies outside the movie theater.

Nana and the grandkids waiting for the movie.

So me, two sisters, a brother, a brother-in-law, my mom, two nieces, and one nephew hung out for a few hours. I think it was pretty impressive that we even made it, seeing as it snowed like crazy Monday. My sister took the drive with her family from Eagle Mountain, but I went to get my mom in West Jordan and we took trax. And I took a bunch of pictures. Hope you enjoy them! I'm really starting t accept that I'm a horrible picture taker.

Shelby and Sarah making temples at the new I am a Child of God area.

Carter drawing at one of the stations. If you click on the picture for the lager view, you can actually see the red on his paper.

Carter again. Behind each of these wooden windows is a picture of a story from the Book of Mormon, Bible, Pearl of Great Price, and Doctrine & Covenants.

Most of the adults.

Carter making a stained glass window.

Shelby posing with the Rod of Iron and the Great and Spacious Building. They had this whole wall of Lehi's dream, it was pretty cool. I told Shelby to pose for me and this is what she did. My nieces rock.

Sarah with her baby at the Nativity scene. She has her baby from the nursery with her. She took that baby everywhere! There were dress-up clothes for the nativity. From one of the earlier pictures, you can see that carter is wearing a shepherd's robe.

The kids playing church at the pulpit. I found out that Emity's kids LOVE playing church and giving talks. At the museum, Shelby even asked for a sustaining vote at one point.

Shelby reading bible stories on this giant scroll.

Isn't my family great? It was fun to go to these church related places with the fam. We have our monthly FHE, but the lesson is usually pretty basic, since we have to accommodate children from 6 months old to 10 years old. It also gave me new resolve to quit the cussing habit. I almost said a swear after dropping my camera in the church museum. Talk about awkward. Let's just say hooray for my favorite pseudo swear word, "DAMage!"

Why some people are made for each other & are you kidding me?

It's my blog and I'll rant if I want to.

So tonight, I was watching American Idol. If you don't watch the show, I'm sure you understand its concept. It's a kind of singing talent show where they let anyone try out "to become the next American Idol." Whether that means fame and fortune is debatable, but you know the premise, right?

Well, while I was watching it, my none-to-bright roommate and his whiny, loud kissing girlfriend were there. Between making out in front of and behind me and doing some homework, they were listening to and sometimes watching the show. Now, I've explained my frustration to some of you about the constant yet obvious or inconsequential questions that come from this roommate while watching movies or TV. Of all the ridiculous questions, I think his question while listening to American Idol takes the cake. While one particular contestant was in the middle of her audition, he asks, “Who is the girl that is singing?” Before I can answer, his girlfriend chimes in, “Yeah, who is that?”

Are you kidding me? These people are no strangers to American Idol. I’ve endured their over the top PDAs during the show before, and they’ve confessed to watching previous seasons American Idol. So naturally, I’d assume they understand the concept. The only response I could muster that also issued the correct amount of exasperation, confusion, and ridicule without being entirely rude was, “I don’t know her guys… I mean, I’ve never had her over before…” Seriously? The Fox network, spearheaded by Simon, Paula, and Randy, takes completely unknown people and tries to make a star out of them. And you want me to tell you who this one, single girl is during her audition? The very FIRST try out? Seriously? And not only one of you, but you BOTH have this question for me? Four words: made for each other.

If you think I’m being too mean, come on over while they’re both here and try to watch a movie. You’ll get tons of these gems. For example, during a commercial for Dirty Jobs, he asked if Mike Row was gathering these weird slime eels for their slime or the eels. Dude, I saw as much of the commercial as you. But I guess if I were in your position, I’d rely on the powers of deduction possessed by those around me more than my own, too. All I can do is sigh and silently shake my head.

Book club

Remember when I said I was in the "Smarty Pants Book Club"? Well, tonight I'm feeling a little smarty pants. Tonight my book club discussed that book to the left. Apparently, the author, Dr Glasser, is convinced that Freudian psychoanalytic procedures are ineffective and developed his own approach. He takes a much more action-oriented look at things. Rather than look at what happened to you in your past, he wants you to look at how things are going for you now. He also uses terminology that sets people (or their actions) in two categories: responsible and irresponsible. He says that each person has just a few basic needs: to love and be loved, and to feel worthwhile to others as well as himself or herself. Whether you are completely delusional and think you are a duck, or if you are just prone to depression, the common cause is an inability to meet these needs.

Now, I liked the principle behind the book. I’m all for taking responsibility for your actions and moving on with life. No one gets anywhere if we all sit in our rooms and sulk, wondering who is to blame for the problems in our lives. Even if you know who is to blame, it’s not making your life better. But while the principle works for the average Joe, I’m not sure that learning correct behavior or teaching responsibility to a schizophrenic person will cure them.

Another disagreement I had with the book is that I don’t think that completely ignoring your past is the best way to move on. Here’s a paragraph from the book:

“It is not only possible, it is desirable [for a person] to ignore his past and work in the present because, contrary to almost universal belief, nothing which happens in his past, no matter how it may have affected him then or now, will make any difference once he learns to fulfill his needs at the present time.”

I agree there’s no need to dwell on the past. But what if fulfilling your present needs includes a correct understanding of your past? How can you move on in a healthy state of mind if you think the physical abuse you endured as a child was your fault? If you think that the discord in your family life is your fault, because a verbally abusive parent told you so? I don’t think it is always necessary to confront an abuser or otherwise guilty party and speak your peace, but I do think that it is often necessary to realize that horrible experiences, like abuse, weren’t the victim’s fault in order for the victim to move on and have a normal life with normal relationships.

I do however, agree with the following statement from the book:

“If we do not evaluate our own behavior, or having evaluated it, we do not act to improve our conduct where it is below our standards, we will not fulfill our need to be worthwhile and we will suffer as acutely as when we fail to love or be loved. Morals, standards, values, or right and wrong behavior are intimately related to the fulfillment of our need for self worth and… a necessary part of Reality Therapy.”

So what do you think? Can most psychoses and bad or irregular behavior be explained by past experiences that must be reviewed and scrutinized to fully understand how to move on, or can most psychoses and bad or irregular behavior be countered and fixed by teaching and learning responsible behavior, while correcting irresponsible behavior? I’ll be honest, I haven’t quite finished the book, but I plan to. So what’s your take?

Update on the week from hell

So to add to last week, I found out on Sunday that a giant economy-sized bottle of liquid laundry soap opened up in my trunk. I bought it a few day prior, and having no specific place for it, left it in the trunk where I thought it would be safe. Silly me. Luckily I had a sleeping bag in the trunk, so it soaked up most of the spill. Most. I’m afraid to look under the cover to see how much is sitting in a pool under my spare tire. I’ll wait for that little surprise when I can get a shop vac and clean the rest out. Oh, mom, if you’re reading this, the sleeping bag is probably in your washing machine still…

Then today (Monday) I got in to work late even though I was ahead of schedule and going to make it in early. I realized about 500 feet from work that I left my work laptop at home. After shouting an explicative, I turned around and went all the way back home and got to work 20 minutes late.

Watch out everyone… I think I’m bad luck…

Worst. Week. EVER.

This week has been quite… cruddy. Starting with Friday last week, I started getting sick. I came to work Monday thinking I was on the mend, but I was getting worse. Then that night my compy crashed. I still need to take it somewhere. I’m trying to decide if I just want to get a new one and get rid of the crashed one. Maybe a lappy? I’ve gotten really used to the dual screen at worky, so maybe I’ll be an uber-nerd and do the dual screen set up at home. What do you think? (and I’ll stop adding –y to words. Really, compy, lappy, and worky are the only words I do that to.)

So Tuesday, I ate some nachos and a filling came out of my tooth. I think the dentist must have done a crappy job and the cavity kept growing behind the filling until if fell out. This was an abscess, not a cavity. Some would even say it was ginormous. I later had a drink of very cold orange juice (because I’m sick, right?), and nearly died. It hurt for like 5 minutes after Luckily, Christy and Matt were there to laugh at my misfortune and discomfort. Hooray for good friends, huh?

Wednesday, I went to work for a couple hours, then went to a new dentist. I told them about my ability to metabolize Novocain quickly (is that an ability or a curse?), and that the last time I had the nitrous oxide, it didn’t do anything. So they numbed me up pretty good, then gave me the gas. The nurse came in and asked me something, and I realized my legs were tingly and laughed at her. When I finally calmed down and told her, “No.” I was giggling again. I felt so stupid. I just couldn’t control myself. The dentist came in and asked me if I had grown up in Salt Lake, and a laughed so hard, I spit on him. I apologized so much, but I kept laughing because it was so stinkin’ funny. Then I started to get tired, and couldn’t hear what they would ask, so they had to ask twice, and I’d laugh again. We finally found an acceptable level, and I had my tooth fixed and watched Star Wars Episode I. Then went home and consumed far too much ibuprofen.

Thursday (today) I woke up and couldn’t open my eyes, they had crusted over. It was pretty sick. So I went to work for a couple hours, found a doctor, and now I have a prescription. Don’t worry, it’s not pink eye, just a little infected. Gross.

So I’m staying home from work Friday. I’m still sick, my eyes are red and bloodshot, and I have no computer. I don’t want to see what will happen next. I may stay in bed all day long. Oh, and the movie from new years will have to wait, seeing as it’s on my crashed compy… You lucked out, Emma…

Game over

Have you ever played laser tag and wondered what the hype was all about? I mean, I usually just wander around as bait for the snipers and little kids that just won't stop following me and shooting me in the back. The only real fun is to come up with a code name that will confuse the people you shoot. Whenever I go play laser tag, my code name is now Game Over. So every time I shoot someone, they look at the little screen on the gun to see who shot them and it says, "Game Over" right next to their ranking. Yeah, I know I'm funny. Well, I've figured out how to win at laser tag. I am bait for no one. I use what I call the little kid strategy.

The thing that used to bug me with playing laser tag with little kids is that proper laser tag etiquette (at least as I understand it) says that when you've been shot, you walk away in shame from your attacker, and they keep the high ground. Well, with little kids, they shoot you, then as you walk away, they follow you and continue to shoot you. I got sick of this and tried the same tactic on a group of little kids. While they are tiny geniuses in offensive strategy, they don't know how to defend when their own tactics are used against them. I cleared out two towers full of little kids. It was pretty funny.

So I went to a singles activity that happened to be laser tag. I wondered if this same strategy of pursuing my victims and attackers would work with adults. You bet your sweet bum it did! I shot one guy 14 time and one girl 13 times. And I got first place. As we were leaving the arena, my roommate Matt told me in a bragging tone that he got 7th place, and I in turn told him that I thought I got first, because every time I looked at the display on the gun, it said as much. Matt's immediate response was, "No you didn't." Still don't believe me? Well, have a look see below.

You can sorta see the 140 and 130 scores on the left from when I shot the same two people.

So there ya have it. The real test to see if the little kid strategy works as well the second game. Everyone wanted revenge on me, so I was a prime target. Well, here's my score card from the second game.

As you can see, I ranked 2nd. But my ratio increased to 10%! Before discovering the little kid strategy, I'd never gotten above 4% accuracy.

The person who got first place was Darin, a friend of mine. He also adopted the little kid strategy, but found one of those really nice girls who wouldn't retaliate, even in laser tag, and shot her 23 times.

So now laser tag is kinda fun. I sorta laugh hysterically after having shot someone more than 4 times, but it's all in good fun. I'd actually be interested in seeing how effective the little kid strategy is if EVERYONE is using it... so anyone want to play laser tag? :)

P.S. New Years post coming soon. I have some sweet videos, but I'm having some trouble editing them to make them brighter...

I belong to the Church of Jesus Christ

...of Latter-Day Saints.

Sunday in church, we had a high councilman and his wife talk in sacrament meeting. The sister, maybe in her 60s or 70s, told us that she heard brother Ballard give a talk where he said there are a lot of people saying awful things about the church "on the blog." She admitted that she didn't know much about the blog, and said she wanted to learn more about blogging, because to her it sounded like snowshoeing. She also told all us out there that have a blog should blog something good about the church to make sure we've got proper representation. So here's mine.

First, I don't understand writing anything bad about any church, really. As long as the basic belief is that if you do good and live a moral life, loving God and your neighbors, how can that be bad?

We believe that God is our Father in Heaven. He knows each one of us, wants us to be happy, and wants us to return to him. The gospel of Jesus Christ is His plan for us to do that. To help us understand this plan, God has always called prophets to guide his children. Where we differ is that we believe that he still does this. He called Joseph Smith as a prophet to restore truths that had been lost during the apostasy. With inspiration and power from God, Joseph translated The Book of Mormon, which is another testament of Jesus Christ. It is a book of scripture telling about the lives of people on the ancient American continent that believed in a Messiah, and lived the gospel as it was taught to them by the prophets God called for them. Jesus Christ even visited these people after his resurrection. The Book of Mormon and the Bible are scripture that help us understand God's will for his children.

Those are just some basic beliefs. The church also teaches people to be honest, chaste, and basically good people. We believe that the family is a very important part of God's plan, and there is a lot of focus on building strong families in the church. The church has made me a better person. I have stronger morals, stronger convictions, and probably a more loving and forgiving attitude because I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I'm not always perfect (for example, I say a few swears now and then...), but I try to live my life in a way that reflects my beliefs.

I don't think you need to be a member of my church to be a good person. There's good and bad anywhere you look. I think if everyone could realize this with an attitude of wanting to understand rather than scrutinize--in ANY religion or belief system including mine--we'd all be a lot happier, more tolerant, and better as a society as a whole.

If anyone reading this has more questions I can try to answer them, or you can visit lds.org and check out the page that talks about our basic beliefs. I'd also like to see what you other Mormons out there think. :)

The great HD adventure of 2007

So my roommate has become obsessed with HD. That’s Hi-Def or High Definition to the layman. Last week, he bought a HD TV, and with it, all the expensive cords and plugs that make stuff work on HD TVs. (Including a cord for my Wii. Thanks, bud.) Well, he decided there was too much “noise” on the TV with the other electronic devices, and wanted to exchange it for a different one. He found a great TV on Best Buy’s website (only slightly more expensive than the one he just bought), so off we went to the store to look at it. When we got there, it was actually 200 bucks cheaper than the online price, so he was very excited. He also decided to buy a Playstation 3. Not the 40 gig kind, because they don’t play the old PS2 games, but the more expensive 80 gig kind that will play the old PS2 games. The reason behind the PS3 was so he could get Blue Ray movies for his HD TV. So we also looked at those, trying to make the decision on which would be the best blend of action and plot to test the HD on.

Turns out, though, that the store didn’t have any of the TV in stock besides the floor model. But they did have one in the American Fork store. They wouldn’t hold the TV for him, and we were already at 106th south, so we decided to go to American Fork since we were already pretty far south of Taylorsville. We were already carrying around the PS3, a movie, and some other things, but we left them at the home entertainment counter and off we went to American Fork. At an average of 85 MPH. We had to get there before the TV was sold out!

We got there, and they tell us the thing is actually 400 bucks more expensive than the online price ($600 more than the other store), so we tell them we were just at the other store and the price there was much more reasonable. Why should they change prices between stores? The sales guy says his manager will let him match the online price, but that they can’t go to the 106th South store price because that was a misprint. I asked to see the guy’s manager, because how can you call the actual printed label that is out in front of the TVs a misprint!! That’s not a misprint, that’s false advertising. (As you can see, I got into the great HD adventure as much as my roommate by this point.) So, he says he’ll get his manager. The manager didn’t even bother arguing with us. I think when the sales guy said we wanted to talk to him, the manager got right on the phone with the 106th South store. When he came out from the back, the manager said that if we buy the TV there for the internet price, we can go back to the store on 106th and get the $200 from that store, since it was their mistake. Good enough. We decided since we now have the TV, we might as well get the PS3, the movie, and the other things we had, and go strait back to 106th to get his $200. Well, the sales guy brought to our attention that there were certain Blue Ray disks that were buy 1 get 1 free, and the movie we planned on getting was one of those. So we went to check out the movies, and the ones we wanted weren’t there. But they WERE back at the 106th South store. So we left with our goods, sans Blue Ray movies, and headed back to 106th. Oh, I should also mention that this is a 42 inch TV, and it BARELY fit in the back of my car. With one window down for the corner of the box.

So we take a much more careful freeway drive with no rear view capabilities to 106th to get some movies and $200. I, of course, stayed in the car to make sure no one would bogart the TV because the window was nearly wide open. (Cold freeway drive, by the way.) Then back to the condo where we of course have to set everything up, including all the other electronics we already have in the living room, and we HAVE to watch a movie on the Blue Ray player inside the PS3. We watched Mr. and Mrs. Smith, and only got to the part where Angelina hits Brad with her car after he accidentally shoots at her windshield. By then it was 12:45 a.m. and we both had to work in the morning.

So there you have it. And all I went out that night for was to get cheap candy gifts for my coworkers.

Tagged - very original title, I know

Well, I've been tagged by Brookey-pants. Apparently, I have to share 6 honest things about myself. I was prepared to divulge way too much information about myself, but I might not... Because I did give a sneak preview to a friend, I will still include that very honest item, but this might not be as deep as I planned at first.

1. I am going grey. That's right, I've got grey hairs. They're mostly above my ears and I think they're cool. It's really weird to think that hair just suddenly doesn't have pigment in it and I'm so fascinated by it that sometimes spend literally minutes in front of the mirror looking for them. And sometimes plucking them out.

2. I'm a Tori Amos fan. Yeah, I think she's rad. I have most her albums. I'd even go to a concert if I didn't think the proximity to angry chicks might have a sterilizing effect on me. In the mean time, her albums will have to suffice.

3. I wonder if I fool people into thinking I'm smarter than I am. I like to use big words, learn new stuff, and I'm good at trivia. But I think I've also got a way to sound smarter than I really am. Here's an example. I'm in a book club called The Smarty Pants Book Club, or SPBC for short. They read books like Middlesex, Man's Search for Meaning, The Power of One, Education of a Wondering Man, and The Audacity of Hope, to name a few. I only read bits and pieces of those books. Don't get me wrong, I would read the whole thing, but I think I'm into fiction a little more than all these grown-up thinker books. I need a break from them every now and again.

4. I have no winter shoes. I have some boots for serious snow, but no winter shoes. As a semi-related note, I don't currently have brown dress shoes or a brown belt. Or a nice black or grey jacket.

5. If I like you, I will probably emulate some part of you. For example, I call inanimate objects and intangible ideas "guy" thanks to Brookey. Like talking about CDs, I might say, "I like that band. Put that guy in the CD player." I also cuss a little more around my older brother because he says a lot of swears. And I sometimes use this weird voice when being sarcastic, because this guy at work does and I think he's funny. I also do heel clicks at nearly every social gathering where Christy is present. (Don't feel bad if I didn't reference you. If you're reading this, most likely there's something about you that I blatantly copy.)

6. I text WAY too much. My worst phone bill had over 2000 texts in a month. Don't worry, I have a plan with unlimited text and picture messages. my most recent bill had only 936 total messages. See, I'm getting better.

Don't you feel so informed about me now?? I'm going to tag Jason, Wendy, and Jenni (with two Ns), because they don't post as often as they used to and come ON guys...

TSO is more an experience than a concert

As mentioned in my last post, thanks to Jenni, I had the sweet experience of going to the TSO concert last Tuesday. And man, did we have awesome seats! We were down on the floor, right next to the sound guys, and right next to the hydraulic lift that periodically shot flames from its corners, lifted musicians about 3 stories up to play their solos, or shot fireworks. The arrow in the picture shows about where we were sitting. It may have been one of the most impressive concerts I've ever been to.

If you have any of their Christmas albums, you know that the music sort of follows a story. So the first half of the concert is the band playing along as the story is told by this guy.

They affectionately call him the voice of all voices and it fits him pretty well.

The story (obviously affected by the band's rock influences) is about a guy who goes into a bar on Christmas Eve, strikes up conversation with an unlikely old guy with his own bottle of whiskey who decides to share both his bottle and a story with the first guy. The story is about an angel that comes to earth looking for a prayer to bring back to the Lord. The story pauses now and then to let the band play some rockin' Christmas-themed music at each stop the angel makes along his journey across the world. One of the stories in the story (meta-story?) is also about a scene in a bar where the barkeep gives a stack of money to a girl who has run away from home, but has become somewhat of a prodigal daughter and wants to get home to her dad for Christmas day. There must be some significance of goodness happening in bars for the band. The story part of the show was accompanied by lasers, various singers from different genres, the occasional firework, and even snow. That's right, they made it snow in the Delta Cente... Energy Solutions Arena (sorry, still can't get used to that name change).

Anyway, the show was great, but I was surprised at how little pyrotechnics there were. I also thought the show was over after the Christmas story was done. Boy was I wrong! Once the Christmas story is over, then the party starts. One of the coolest things in the concert was how the lighting becomes part of the show. I'm not talking just about the lasers, Christmas colored lights, giant drapes full of lights to look like stars--although all that was present--but the lights hanging from the rafters moved around to give a new dimension to the show. I don't know how to explain it, so here's a picture of what they did to put focus on the drums.

Pretty sweet, huh? Well, amidst all the lighting, there were also giant flames bursting from behind the band, changing color from red to green to blue to yellow. A pretty sweet accent to hearing strings, guitars, and classical piano play Schools Out by Alice Cooper and even Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's Flight of the Bumblebee. Which is awesome on an electric guitar, by the way.

At one point, the lead guitarist and the electric violinist went out into the crowd to play, and then ended up strapped to a hydraulic platform that lifted them up into the air while they rocked out. I also think one very important requirement to be in the TSO is to have at LEAST shoulder-length hair, along with the ability to head bang for at least 20 seconds straight. Oh, and be awesome while you're doing it.

I bet you think I got some really great photos, huh? while our seats were great, they didn't really let you wonder up to the stage to take pictures (although a little girl and her mom got to go up to the stage at the end of the show and the little girl stood on stage, front and center, holding one of the guitars used in the show). I did try to take some pictures with my phone, but they're not so hot. Here they are below.

Thank goodness for the internet. But I had to share MY photographic proof that I was at the concert.