Normon Mailer: Engineering a Relationship

So did you know Norman Mailer studied engineering at Harvard? At 16 no less.

More to the point, in The Man Who Studied Yoga that engineer turned writer clearly defined a problem which has eluded this engineer for decades.

She is too sharp-tongued, and she does not often give Sam what he needs most, a steady flow of uncritical encouragement to counteract the harshness with which he views himself.

Ok so maybe this engineer still isn't convinced that THE problem has been clearly defined BUT rather A situation. When someone abuses my inner child, I am told that I am responsible for feelings and that I am free to choose to act rather than react. Would this not also be true for Sam?

Well I think so, but if you read the rest of the story you'll find that they both need to work on their relationship skills. As Mailer pointed out, "Unhappily it is more complicated than that."

Dejavu All Over Again

Not even enough snow to cover the grass or bother with a photo of the vehicles... boring. Of course, when they predict a dusting I'll probably need that shovel.

Should I Grab My Shovel

So maybe I should have brought one of the snow shovels when I moved back to Alabama from Indiana. "They" say it shouldn't be as bad as '93 but "they" were predicting less than 6 inches before an "historic and major winter storm affected much of the Ohio Valley from the 22nd into the 23rd of December 2004. Two bursts of heavy snow, separated by a few hours, brought over two feet of snow across several counties north of the Ohio River in southern Indiana. Interstates 64 and 65 across southern Indiana were closed for a number of hours during this storm."  I had a bad feeling so I asked DesMerin to leave the end of semester LAN party with the nerd herd. We loaded up the dogs in the Bronco II and headed south for Christmas just ahead of the storm.  The photo below was taken after I had shoveled the drive a week or so later when we returned.

Of course, then I remembered "I'm with Stupid" . . . I can't remember if DesMerin and I listened to "Wisconsin Death Trip" on that road trip but we certainly did on many others.  So I'm listening to it now...

Myths & Reality

The following is "a 10-minute video originally produced for the large number of journalists visiting Salt Lake City for the 2002 Winter Olympics" which has been updated and was posted on the LDS Newsroom 4 January 2008 "to help counter persistent myths about the Church." Someday I may post more, but this sums it up quite nicely.

ME in Choir

Did you feel that ripple in space-time?

Several months ago, I told someone that if I were released from some of my responsibilities at church I would sing in the choir (never mind that I don't sing). About a month later I was released from one thing, but didn't go to choir (after all I still had multiple callings). Today, I was released as the Single Adult representative and I knew that my bluff had been called.

Maybe it will help if I have someone make me a recording so that my note is playing in my ear. Or maybe I will finally get myself that keyboard. When I was a kid I wanted to learn to sing, but all the singers I knew took great pleasure in tormenting me for my lack of talent. Somewhere along the way I became convinced that I should be happy with the talent I had and not covet others. Now I'm thinking it is a skill and to paraphrase DesMerin: You can learn to do anything if you want it enough to work at it for a LONG time even though you don't show natural talent.

The amazing thing was that when we messed up, everyone laughed LOUDLY and then tried again. It was fun. Imagine that, Ginny ENJOYING choir practice.

I think I will order a copy of "Beautiful Singing is Not Just for the Chosen" since it is not airing on BYU Television Online at the moment. Everytime I watch Professor Clayne Robison in action, I believe that I can to it. Maybe I'll check into those percussion and/or piano lessons while I'm at it.

Nerd Story 1

From one of my students:

My cousin said to a friend "Dude check that out" and motioned to a beautiful girl.

To which the friend replied, "I'm not interested in those memory cards."

Bubba Lov'n

Meet Bubba. 

We had a little fling back in 2002 and now we've reconnected.  I guess there's always hope.