St. George

This past weekend, Ken, the Greenwood's custodian, invited me to play in a softball tourny in St. George. This the first time I have played softball with adults since 1993.
I had a great time. I was the second oldest guy on the team.
Let me tell you...there are some softball fanatics out there. Ken invited guys he knew that liked to play. We haven't played together before. We played teams that have been playing for years. Needless to say we got spanked pretty bad. I'll tell you what I had a good time.
I got to meet Little Ross while I was there. However, he was in the ER with an IV. I tried to tell him there are better ways to get attention. I'd like to thank Jason for the little bit of humor. Jason wasn't home when ALee took Ross to the hospital. When he arrived home the neighbor told him that they had just taken Ross the hospital. Jason's first thought was, "They couldn't do that we buried him 3 months ago." It took him a minute to realize it was Little Ross and not his father-in-law, who in fact was buried 3-4 months ago.
Similarly, when mom called to tell me that Dad is gone. My first thought was, "Where did he go? Did he go get a Coke or something?"
Then mom said he's not breathing. "Oh, he's gone." I sure do miss him. Even now sometimes I forget that he had died.

OLD Man

Congrats Rwanda!!!!!

An article in TFK (Time for Kids magazine) said that a shop in Butar, Rwanda is the first to serve soft serve ice cream. This just happened in the last couple weeks. All of the ingredients can be obtained locally. If I remember correctly the name of the shop is called Sweet Dream.
I take so much for granted!!!!!!

OLD Man

I have a Confession

My confession is this. I have been painting the outside of our house. It has been on my Honey Do list for 3 years. If I keep it up Jen might think that the stuff that has been on the list for several years just might get done. Time will tell. I may have to rest for about 3 years before I do another item on the list.
Though that is my confession I really want to celebrate a small discovery. I am afraid of heights. Climbing trees and ladders have not been my strong suit. However, I have discovered that as I have been painting my house that the fear that I've had climbing ladders is nonexistent. When I realized this I felt great. I just wanted to share my small celebration with you. In life we need to celebrate what we can no matter how small or insignificant.

Family Update

We have been in school a week shy of a month. I am enjoying my class though it is bigger than originally anticipated. Being a teacher requires flexibility.
For the most part they behave pretty well.
Outside of school life is moving quickly. Marching band starts on Mon and seems to go non stop until the first week of November.
Ashley is going on a choir tour in April. It sounds like a fun trip. I told her that I could go as a chaperon. She asked why. I said, "That's what parents do." I'm not sure she liked the sound of that. It soooooo boring to have your parents along.
Nathan is finishing up his bicycling merit badge this weekend with a 50 mile bike ride on the Rail Trail near Park City. As of last night he wasn't looking forward to this. He was hoping to borrow his sister's iPod so he could listen to the BYU game. Nathan has earned about $40 rent his iTouch to his sisters. If he were smart he'd save his money to buy him a 32 or 64 gig iTouch and still rent the one he has now. Bell rang. Bye.

OLD Man

Obviously, I have put Brian and Carly in the freezer for a while. I haven't scheduled my time appropriately to add anything more to their life. I can't say that mine is very hectic, but planning is not my forte. I think Jen will be more that happy to confirm that. In our relationship I'm the one with my head in the clouds (I understand that I have left myself open, so fire away. I won't let you see me cry).
Also, I became tired of deleting all of the Korean porno links from my comments. Why do people have to do that? If they want to comment go ahead, but don't leave that garbage on my blog.
School is going pretty well. So far, I think that I'm doing pretty well with 27 students. Realize that I was to only have 19-21 and yes even adding 2-4 students changes the class drastically, let alone 8. To all my extended day colleagues...you get paid much more to teach more students. You can't complain.
Joe if you read this blog you need to read Wednesday Wars. It is excellent and should be right up your alley.
It has been a busy day with regional stake conference. Three meetings today and a general session tomorrow. I am somewhat worn out, but can't sleep currently. Why do the kids have to sleep in the family room? It is hard to watch a movie with them on the couch and floor. That may be the only good childhood memory they have. They do it quite often and they love it. The hard part is agreeing on a movie.
To you readers that can't find anything else better to read I say, "Good Night."

OLD Man

Writing Assignment for my class

This summer the family went camping. The gloves I was using to move my dutch oven got burned pretty bad. Thankfully, my hands were not in them. I brought them in for a writing prompt for my students. Here is one of my responses to the prompt:

I had met the family living in the house once. Driving to and from work every day I saw that house being built. As I watched the process I became curious about this house. When coming home late from work I would sometimes stop and snoop around.
This home was of modest size. It looked like it might hold a family of six or seven. When snooping around I often thought that I’d like to build a house very similar to this one. I even wondered if the family would let me use their floor plan when it came time to build a house of my own.
After the family moved in and seemed settled I stopped and asked if I could take a tour of their house. I had explained that I often would snoop around the house on my way home from work and felt that I should ask for their forgiveness for doing so. Because of my curiosity I wanted to see the finish product. Mr. and Mrs. Jensen were very gracious with my desire to tour the house and chuckled when I asked them to forgive me for looking through their house as it was being built.
On this particular day I had left work early. When I was getting close to Jensen’s house I saw smoke. When I turned the corner flames were barely licking their way out of one of the bedroom windows. It seemed as if none of the neighbors had noticed the smoke or flames coming from the house. I called 911, but knowing that the fire department was miles away I entered the house and followed the screams and cries I heard.
The fire was in the baby’s bedroom. I leaped through the flames in the hallway and grabbed the baby from her crib. Tucking her body into mine I again jumped through the flames and ran outside to a neighbor that had just arrived at the house.
The cries I had heard earlier were coming from downstairs. I raced down the stairs and saw through a wall of flames Mrs. Jensen at the door of what I remembered to be the laundry room. She was crouched into a ball on the floor crying and screaming. The look on her face lacked hope of getting out of this experience alive. I skirted the flames the best I could. I crawled to where Mrs. Jensen was sitting. I the flames were getting hot and suffocating. The noise was deafening. I knew that I had to coax her into action. Just before we were to move a beam from overhead fell. I caught with the back of my hands. Fortunately, I had grabbed my gloves from the truck on my way into the house.
The time it took to move the beam was only seconds, but seemed to take eternity. The path I found to Mrs. Jensen was still clear. I crawled behind her coaxing her along the way. By the time we reached the street the fire department as well as the paramedics had arrived.
The baby was fine and was playing with the mother from the house next door. Mrs. Jensen received burns on her back. The back of my hands were burned from where the beam had fallen on us. Thankfully the gloves took brunt of the burns.
The gloves have lost their use, but will remain in my truck to remind me that…

Swamp Coolers

I would like to say that I HATE swamp coolers. Oh, please excuse me, they are called evaporative coolers. Did you hear the sarcasm? I have changed the motor in my cooler 5 different times in the last 2 weeks.
I hate how everything soaks up the moisture, especially the sugar and salt. We have to turn it off to cook anything on the stove. I hate how it looks in the window. I hate how it leaks water all over the carport.
I do appreciate the cooler temperature. So...I guess I can put up with the I hates until it cools down. How does that send for a spoiled child?
The bishop of ward told me to go buy some Farr's ice cream mix, cut up some peaches and strawberries and pour the ice cream mix, unfrozen, over the fruit. This sounds very creamy, but fattening. I can almost taste it. This is what I want right now.
That's all I have to say for the moment.

OLD Man

The Question Continues

“Have you thought about my question, Brian?”
“I am not sure that I understand the question?”
“What’s to understand? Do you like my daughter?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Good what was so hard about that?”
“Duane is there a difference?”
Duane looked at me for a moment as if contemplating the answer. “It seems to me that people can love someone, but treat them poorly. However, it seems to me that people who like each treat them the way people should be treated. That’s why I asked.”
I thought about it a moment, but I guess my life experience hasn’t taught me that yet. I don’t want to learn it personally either.
“How did you and Melinda meet?”
Duane chuckled. It was nothing special. She was my sister’s roommate at college. My Mom wanted me to drop something off at her apartment. Monica wasn’t home. School had just started, so I hadn’t met her roommates yet. When Melinda answered the door I was speechless. You’ve seen the movies where the guy sees a cute and all of sudden can’t speak or move. That was me. I had to pick the jaw up off my floor. It was a good thing that Monica had family pictures on display or Melinda would have called the cops. After what seemed like an eternity I was able to gain enough wits about me to give whatever I had to Monica. Then I left. I was pretty sure that I had no chance whatsoever to get a date with her after my great first impression.

The Question

I went around to the back of the house, picked up a lawn chair and moved it away from the house. I wanted to enjoy the late spring/early summer cool air. I have always enjoyed star gazing. I took astronomy in jr. high, but don’t remember much. I can find the Big Dipper and that’s where it stops as far as the night sky goes.
While gazing at the stars I thought maybe I thought maybe I’d take an introspective look at my current circumstances. We both know that if someone had told me at Christmas that I was going to be engaged by May, I would have laughed out loud, pointed and said to the soul making this revelation, “YOU, are certifiably nuts!”
Up to this point in my life I have preferred to keep life predictable. Carly is not going to let me live a predictable life. I’m okay with that. She has been good for me and I suppose has brought me out of a shell, my shell.
I am amazed at how much love I feel for this woman that I barely know. She is many things that I am not. Though I know she does, she acts as if she doesn’t have a care in the world. She loves to read. We have been on a couple of dates where she has taken me to the park to read. During school I hardly ever read. While she was reading I pretended to read. I read enough to answer a question or two. Sitting down to read a book seems so foreign to me, but she loves to do it. We both love ice cream. That’s a good thing. It hasn’t happened very often, but I like the idea of being in the same room with her and not have to talk. There have been a couple of nights when I have called and told her that I don’t really need talk, I just need her on the other end of the line.
Sorry for the mushy stuff, but I needed to admit it openly.
I do know that I need to get back into school and make a plan for my life. We are heading that direction. I have been greatly blessed; there is no doubt about that.
I am nervous about going to visit my Mom next week. Actually, I may be more nervous about talking to brothers and sister.
The last few days have been wonderful. Carly’s family has been very accepting of me. They feel genuine in their acceptance of me. I had forgotten how much I liked open space. I am starting to feel clusterphobic just think about going back to the city. The quicker we get out of the there the better.
“Mind if I join you, Brian?”
“Oh, what?”
“Do you mind if I join you? You look lost in a world that seems like a nice place to be.”
“Sorry. Hi Duane. I’m just taking some time to think about all that has happened over the last few weeks.”
“I imagine it has caught you by surprise. Would you care to share any of your thoughts?”
“I was thinking how much I have been blessed. She is bringing me out of shell I’m not sure that I knew that it existed. I obviously had a crush on her for a while, but was too chicken to anything about it. I still feel embarrassed about running her over that day, but I am grateful that it happened. We have been very busy doing things together. I am grateful to have a running partner. She sets a pretty good pace.
“Brian, have you thought about the question I asked you the other day?”
“I have, but I don’t understand what you mean by it.”
“Think about it, do you like my daughter?”

Some more of Cube 5 and Me

Becca this is for you!!!! Here are my last 2 additions. If you missed something read the book when it comes out ;) hahahahaha!!!!!

Carly and I went for another walk. I really like here. I was not missing the sounds of the city. For a few moments I started regretting that I only had one day left before I had to return. Thanks to Carly I was pulled away from thoughts of returning to work.
“How do you like my family?”
“Well, as I said at dinner, I feel that I have known them for a long time. I hadn’t planned on asking your Dad if I could marry you within the first 2 minutes of meeting him.”
“Wait, you’ve already asked my Dad if you could marry me?” Carly said with a touch of irritation. “Why didn’t you tell me you’ve done that already?” This question came with a bit more irritation than I was comfortable with.
“I don’t know. It all happened so fast that I haven’t even thought about it since it happened.” I said with some regret.
“When and how did it come about?”
“Your Dad caught me out in your car cleaning it. He didn’t know you were coming for one thing and then to see a strange person rummaging through your car…” I walked quietly for a moment and then continued. “He’d said something about seeing if your family approved of me. I felt that your Dad likes things straight forward, so, I figured he knew why I was here and I came right out and asked him. We talked for a few minutes before we came into the house on Thursday. The wrestling was his idea. That surprised me, I didn’t take him for a prankster.”
“He doesn’t show that side of him very often, but he’s lots of fun when he does.”

“He asked me if I liked you, he said to listen the question carefully and I couldn’t answer him until Sunday morning when he and I are suppose to go for a walk.”
“You like me don’t you?”
“I love you Carly, you know that.”
“Brian you didn’t answer the question. Listen. Do you like me?”
“Yes, I do, but I don’t understand the difference.” I stated with more than a bit of frustration.
“Look Brian, you said yourself that my Dad seems straight forward. Answer the question and then tell you don’t understand the difference. Ask him to explain it to you. You might be surprised where it gets you.”
“Should I be nervous?”
“I don’t know I am the first daughter to get married; and unfortunately you are the guinea pig in-law.”
“Thanks.” With that being said I pulled Carly close and gave her a squeeze. The rest of the walk was done in silence; that comfortable silence that two people share.
When we reached the house I told Carly that I wasn’t ready to go to bed, and that I wanted to enjoy the night sky one last time before we headed home to the smog drenched city. With a kiss good night Carly headed to bed.