It is just like premature ...

The Associate

By John Grisham

This is what it seems like to me – Once Grisham reaches enough pages to be done he just finishes. All the character build up, all the plot development, it just doesn’t matter. I have noticed this trend in several of his books and it is just frustrating, especially because I really like his writing style and enjoy his books. It is like quitting a marathon at mile 25. Great story, crappy ending – could have used another 100 pages to really thresh it out.

Church News

This is different
Times have changed a little. Back in my day we were counseled as missionaries to stay out of the water, so no swimming at all. I remember being at the beach, the Welsh coast, and feeling somewhat guilty about wading up to our knees. Anyways the Salt Lake Tribune has a great column called Hello, My Name Is; and the recently featured Vaun Williams. Vaun is a 90 year old and wheelchair bound former flight control engineer and pilot. In his biography he shares this little gem:
While serving an LDS mission in Hawaii, he got permission from his church leaders to swim 12 miles from Maui to Lanai.
We went from 12 miles of open water swimming in shark infested waters to feeling guilty about wading in the Irish Sea. That is not a good thing.

The San Francisco Chronicle had a great little article about a Bishop’s Storehouse and the basics of the church welfare system. I highly recommend skimming the story and get to the comments section. The real education here is to get an uncensored coverage of what is really being said and thought about Proposition 8. The rudeness, ignorance, and misinformation knows no bounds, and that is just from the members of the church. The stuff from the nonmembers is much worse. Through the several 100 comments you can truly grasp what we as individual members are up against on BOTH sides of the argument.

Of course the big story of the week seems to be HBO’s series Big Love. Don’t get me wrong, the dynamic of 4 people in a fully committed, religion based, polygamous marriage is endlessly fascinating. As it focuses on relationships and what it takes to make the marriage work, I think the show has its place. Unfortunately they have now decided to focus on the religion aspect, including the Temple ceremony. That is too bad and smacks a little of desperation. For me the most perfect TV show with religion as a main character was The Vicar of Dibley. The program was funny without being sensationalist or disrespectful. At no time do you feel like being religious is a bad thing, or you are ignorant for having faith.
The New York Times does a summary of events, including HBO’s pre-apology. What is a pre-apology anyways? I know it’s wrong, but since we really don’t care we are going to do it anyways. And please remember the Church does not endorse any boycotting, so anything you hear towards that end is just some regular Joe Mo’s opinion, and not doctrinal truth. Since I discussed it before I won’t go beyond saying boycotts are pointless and ineffective.

I Read it for the cover

STARGIRL

By Jerry Spinelli,

I see this Book on CD when I am at the library and have always found the cover art to be intriguing. Typically I have considered checking it out, but something else always seems a little more interesting. But this last week I had a 14 hour drive for business (7 hours each way), and since I needed several books I finally got it. At roughly 5 hours long it is a beautiful tale about the stress of high school (and on a larger scale, life), the pressure to fit in, and the joy in just being yourself. It is the story of a new girl at school, her uniqueness of spirit, and the boy who wasn’t quite strong enough to love her. There is a sense of regret at the end, but I believe there is a sequel I need to read. Maybe he addresses that, but then again real life always has a little regret.

Of Interest, the late John Ritter is the reader on the audio book. I think it must be nice for his children to still have their dad read to them as they grow up.

Unimtentionally Funny - The best kind

Queens of fundraising / These men don't drag their heels when it comes tosupporting causes

A gay comedy quartet based in Utah is performing a drag queen routine to raise money for the local gay & lesbian teen center. Good for them I say because if anywhere needs a place for gay teens to feel safe and hang out it is Utah. But in the article they are asked how it is going in Utah, given the states very strong LDS presence and influence – any repercussions? Group leader Don Steward’s response is classically ironic:
"The LDS faith is not a monolith. Members are more flexible than the national media would have us believe."
"It's not like the Baptists down South. Religion is much more intrusive in those states. The LDS Church just lets you know where it stands; it doesn't really get in there and micromanage like the Baptists do.”
Nothing like refuting one stereotype by using another one. I am sure his intentions were innocent, but it is very funny all the same. No matter who you are, minority group or not, bigotry is still present if you look.

**Please note, picture is not of group member. Real images and video can be found at linked news story.

**Please also note, the guy in the picture I did use looks fabulous.

SHUT THE HELL UP!!!

I had to have harsh words with Lisa today. As you know she holds down a variety of part-time jobs, like tax preparer, substitute teacher, and taste tester for a major food company. Well it was the latter that was frustrating her and she was complaining to me about the upcoming schedule. Well, for men everywhere I quietly stood up and began my speech.

"I love you, and respect your efforts in life, but don't you sit there and start moaning about your lot, complaining to those around you, you just need to Shut the HELL UP; because you are living the dream of every red blooded American male - My God woman, You Are Getting Paid To Eat BACON!!!!!!!!"I mean seriously, she goes in for 30 minutes, gets all the bacon she can eat, AND they pay her $20? I know men who would kill for that job. Speaking of bacon:

Maple Bacon Lollipops

Bacon Scarf

Diet Coke with Bacon

Bacon Flavor Floss

Bacon Dispensers - available in restrooms worldwide

And everyone's favorite Bacon - KEVIN

Mormons in the News

First up is a great video of Harvard Junior Rachel Esplin participating in a Day of Faith program, in which students of several faiths discuss their beliefs. This is making the rounds because of her incredible poise and presentation, even getting a mention in the Boston Herald.

Day of Faith: Personal Quests for a Purpose - 3. Rachel Esplin from Harvard Hillel on Vimeo.

Chad Hardy, the creator of the Men on a Mission calendar, met with BYU to discuss getting his degree - Denied! I guess Chad finished school in 2002 and left, but unfortunately he was still a few religion class credits short of a degree. Away from campus he also left the church and everything went quiet out there, until he came up with the concept of a Mormon missionary calendar. So he rushed to get the religion class done through Independent study. The calendar came out and he was consequently excommunicated. Then BYU got involved and denied him his degree for behaviour unbecoming a student or something close. So the question is can a private university deny a degree to a student they do not want to be associated with even though he has completed the coursework? Well I predict we will find out as this is probably heading to court. Example news article from The Houston ChronicleFull disclosure, I totally looked like this off of my mission.

On the more fun side, Reed Harris decided to propose to his girlfriend Kaitlin after Institute class at the local Wendy's - totally romantic I know. So he invites their friends and then gets everyone Frosty's (ummmm - frosty!!). Then he hides the ring in hers and they hold an eating contest. Bottom of the cup and no ring - that's right, she swallowed it and never noticed. Off to the ER for X-rays to verify she "had" the ring and the engagement was on, and so was the worldwide publicity. This site even has the phone cam video of the swallowing.

McKay Hatch, and can I say that is almost the perfect Mormon name; to be a winner his middle name needs to be Orson or something similar. Anyways he started a No Cussing club which got a lot bigger notice than it probably should have. Now his local city council has implemented a citywide no cussing week. Cute, but do not read the comments to any of the hundreds of stories out there, unless you want to learn some really creative profanity - Lord bless the anonymity of the internet. Please visit the website to become one of the 20,000 bloody members worldwide!

Last and least is the Illinois member and Bishop in the Nauvoo Stake who took it upon themselves to write a very charged email to the general area membership stating that a gay civil unions bill in the state congress would destroy life as we know it. Of course this got out and the kid hit the fan. Why do extremely political people believe we all feel the exact same way they do about the issues, and thus they feel it okay to share there views whenever they want? Just stop annoying us with your emails, start a blog and then everyone can ignore it and not think you a total tool.

To be fair to the men, Chad Hardy is also releasing his Hot Mormon Muffins calendar this year, featuring LDS mothers.

Blind Faith

Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche
by Haruki Murakami

Fast approaching the 14th anniversary on March 20, the religious terrorist group Aum Shinrikyo released Sarin gas on the Tokyo subway system in 1995. Officially they were following a doctrine that the sooner they bring about the end the sooner salvation would come; unofficially it shows the danger when religious fervor meets mental illness unchecked.
Murakami, a novelist, had recently returned to Japan after spending 8 years abroad, and was living two hours south of the city at the time of the attack. In hearing the news reports he became interested in the stories of the victims and undertook to interview as many as would let him. Given the do not cause problems, do not talk nature of the Japanese this proved quite challenging, but he eventually got approximately 200 people to consent. The English translation only contains a sampling of them. After the book came out it was seen as one sided so he endeavored to interview current or past members of Aum Shinrikyo, and eight of those are contained in the English version.
As with any account of victims of terrorist actions (see Love from Greg and Lauren) or violence (see I am the Central Park Jogger) you come away with a great sense of waste. The overwhelming delusion of what the perpetrators were trying to accomplish, and the futility of their results. It just brings devastating sadness to a few, and destroys whatever they had. Books like this (see Massacre at Mountain Meadows) need to be read so we the silent majority don't become sheep to the few megalomaniacs out there. The sad fact of life is people will just go along to go along, even if they really don't want to be where ever it was they ended up. And by the time they get there it is too late.
Most poignant to me was the story of Tatsuo Akashi, whose vibrant younger sister Shizuko was paralyzed on one side of her body and had her mind reduced to a toddler without any memories of her past. Because his parents are elderly, he is the head of the family and as such he travels an hour by train after work every other day to sit with her until visiting hours are over, then travels an hour back to work where he can then spend another hour going home. He has kept this schedule up since the attack. The day before she had spent the night at his house with his family and was going to ride the train into work in the morning. Seeing how long that would take he offered to drive her to the local underground line so she would not have to travel as much. This is what he lives with now, saying "Looking back on it now, if I hadn't suggested that to Shizuko, she would probably never have suffered like this." How did this or any attack bring anyone closer to their God?
Well worth the read so these people are not forgotten and so you can inoculate your own soul, because regardless of what you tell yourself, we are all susceptible to performing great evil; especially if we do not we could.