Persist

Originally Emerson's thought, this was Heber J. Grant's motto: "That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do; not that the nature of the thing is changed, but that our power to do is increased."

I nabbed it from the Gospel Principles book. Most often, I've encountered this quote in lessons at church designed to motivate us to be persistent in strengthening weaknesses. And it has been motivating to me. I see it when I practice the piano, or exercise or speak eSpanish -- we really do gain ability in the things in which we persist.

But this last week, I realized that the idea works in the negative sense, too. To rephrase: "If we persist in being a jerk, being a jerk becomes easier for us to do; not that the nature of jerkitude has changed, but our power to be a jerk is increased." Same goes for lying, sleeping too much, plucking the heads off of flowers, not doing dishes, petting cats up their spine instead of down, watching TV, being critical of others, eating chocolate oranges, etc...

I'm not sure I've concluded anything yet from this thought, other than to take pleasure in the little victories of agency well used. In what do you persist?

Unrelatedly, I found this snippet from Ralph whilst searching for the quote up top:

"I hate quotation. Tell me what you know." - Emerson, Journals (May 1849)

To borrow from the Bible: "Amen!"

Geneous

What other name comes to mind when I mention the names Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il? Obviously, Jason. Jason, the former Korean Dictator of Mountain View's Italian Club circa 2001, who narrowly (it may actually have been a landslide) beat out our only authentic Korean (sorry, Dan). Jason, the eater of hot dogs. Jason, the both selfish and generous consumer of popcorn. Jason, the Netflix. Jason, the man who-just-made-it-through-this-week. Jason, my (former) roommate.

He's in Texas now, which is weird. I've lived with him for the past three solid years, starting from the time I bumped into him in the Clyde and he asked, "Do you want to come live in the Glenwood?" Jason's great, and I'll miss him. We had fun in high school (ask to see the movies sometime (the jingle was ... ba, da, da Rob or something like that)), and we've had fun in college. He really is a great guy. May you sweat well in Houston, Jason :)

By far, Jason's greatest quality is his salad, which is what prompted me to write this post. I made his salad today for my family. And they liked it. In fact as my brother, Dan, pointed out, today was the first time we've ever heard the sentence, "Can you pass me more salad?" spoken by my dad.

Which leads me to another thought about which I've been thinking recently: generally speaking, I like heterogeneous things more than homogeneous things. This was not true growing up, specifically with food. I used to prefer my food to be consistent throughout -- no surprises. But now, I think I enjoy a sandwich which has a little more tomato in one bite, and a little more meat in another. A couple weeks ago, I had the Big Apple from Gandolfos on Center Street in Provo (it's the best Gandolfos I've found). That sandwich was awesome! Every bite was a little bit different. Random variety really makes life more exciting, and enjoyable.

Similarly, a heterogeneous mixture of humans is generally superior to a predictable section of society. And a picture of asymmetry is more beautiful than symmetry would be. But, and I haven't thought this all the way through, it's a little more difficult to appreciate the heterogeneous. Just like my younger self, if you're unwilling or unable to appreciate the different things, the brilliant flavors, views and personalities will be lost on you. Or worse, you will detest the difference. (Oh, the reason Jason's salad led me to this thought is that it is very heterogeneous -- forgot to mention that)

That is NOT to say that everything which is different is good, as modern relativists claim. Nor does it mean that any crackpot notion of reality or opinion or persuasion is made good by its crackpottedness. It IS to say that the "good" umbrella is an umbrella, not a raincoat.

This is a picture I took of a flower my mom planted:


And in the words of the skeleton: I sleep now.

maPost

I'd like to dedicate this post to Megan. And since this is my blog, I can do whatever I'd like on it. And so I will dedicate this post to Megan.

This post is dedicated to Megan. It became dedicated upon my writing the previous sentence.

I moved home yesterday. Last night, I slept in my old, very comfortable bed with a cool breeze blowing through the wide open window.

As I came into the kitchen this morning for breakfast (bacon, eggs and grits ala marvelous Mom) I noted how different Mom's kitchen is from my former kitchen. There are cookies everywhere! And unlike in my apartment, when a cookie is eaten, the quantity does not diminish -- there are an infinite number of cookies! There's bowls filled with fruits and vegetables. Nearly all the things in the fridge are both consumable and not pickles nor carrots. So, that's great.

I had a mullet on Friday. But my camera cable's packed away somewhere, so the pictures will not be in this post.

Also, I finally joined Facebook.

That's all for now.

Except that, for this post to be properly dedicated to Megan, it must include a playlist:

All the Music on This Computer's Desktop Playlist:
- Major Tom

This is a real update.

This is a test

Edge of the World

I had a really good day last... I think it was Thursday.

After working for a little in the morning I went to Harmons for lunch. I drove to a nearby church, snatched the red checkered blanket from my trunk, chuckled to myself that it was, indeed, a red checkered blanket, layed it on the grass at the edge of a tree's shadow, took off my shoes and slowly ate my lunch. If memory serves, I also had a package of Pepperidge Farms cookies -- either the butter-sodden, shortbread Chessmen or the thin-n-crispy, chocolatey Brussels.

To save the entire package of cookies from extinction, I cut my excursion short. On a side note, I have a goal this summer to purchase a package of cookies -- whether Pepperidge Farms or otherwise -- and to eat only one cookie per day. I don't know if such a goal is possible; my gut says that it wants to eat the cookies, so I'm thinking it'll be difficult.

Anyway, a couple hours later I left work and headed home. But, on my way home, on a whim, for the first time, I stopped at the Edge of the World park and flew my kite. The park has always invited me to visit: it sits atop the bench overlooking University Avenue (as well as the rest of the valley) with no fence or foliage guarding the drop. From within the park looking West it really looks like Earth ends with the lawn.

I don't remember what else happened that day... but at least the remembered was excellent.

I made the following video from the web cam in the testing center. 10:30am is particularly exciting.


And this comes from the Brimhall building's web cam.

Harses, harses, harses

So, I never wrote about a few Tuesdays ago when I went horseback riding with my cousins. I took the day off of work and homework, and drove out to Spring City (near Manti) for a very relaxing and very fun day.

We ended up combing the horses a lot,

galloping a bit, going up a mountainish place and chasing a small herd of deer. Jacob's horse seemed to have asthma... he was wheezing the whole time. But Jacob was breathing okay.

After riding we played a few games then went for a "hike" in one of the local canyons. We only went a little ways up and played a lot in the snow. Here's one of our guides juggling:

Everyone after all the snowball fights:

As I was driving home that evening, I just kept smiling -- it was so fun. I love my cousins (and my aunts and uncles).

In other news, I graduated from BYU last week:

You're invited

Tomorrow (Thursday) from 1pm to about 4pm in the Garden Court of the Wilkinson Center:


That's my senior project. The car uses a camera to navigate a course of pylons. Come see!

Also, this is my FHE group's video:

http://vimeo.com/3860150

Three years ago

Wow... I can't believe it's been almost three years. In October, right around General Conference, it will have been three years. Time really has flown, and so much has happened to me since that day.

Nearly three years ago, I bought this bottle of hair gel:

Now the goo's depleted. Goo. I guess most of it's... on my pillow... huh... that's a strange thought. Some made it down the shower drains of the 'Oood and my current bathroom. Campus has received a fair dusting, as have California, St. George and Arizona -- though in very small, very dry flecks. My usual strategy is to gloop my hair up, let it harden, then run my hands through my hair until it's soft.

The stuff runs at about $3 per bottle. As a diligent saver, I would have needed to put away 5 cents from each pay check to save up enough for the next bottle. That's neglecting earned interest and inflation. Supposing a 4% annual savings rate and 4% annual inflation, I would then need to retain 5 cents from each pay check. Still pretty cheap. I suppose I could devote one day in 15 scouring parking lots and sofas for a nickel. And if luck turned up a dime, I'd be set for an entire month.

On two unrelated notes:

I've been studying like mad for my EcEn 451 midterm, and as I've been studying, trying to learn (and succeeding in learning) various things for the class, once in a while, I've been struck by my overuse of commas, and I've also had feelings of, "Hey, you're learning something that you could actually use to find employment -- you're learning useful things." You might say that this contradicts the last sentence of my previous post... but the feeling is more of "this is useful, you're putting good things in your head." It's similar to learning some Spanish, then being able to speak to someone in Spanish -- you know? that satisfying feeling of accomplishment?

And:

We spoke today about Post Modernism in my English class. It was kind of eerie. Post Modernists (should that be capitalized? ... well post modernists wouldn't care) are relativists... and don't believe in convention or standards -- reality as we perceive it isn't real... it's just become real because of how we perceive. Anyway, it's all very circular and makes only half sense. Following it to its end seems to lead one to atheism... and don't-believe-or-stand-for-anythingism.

BUT, it was eerie because a lot of what I do follows post modernist thought -- the things I think are funny. I'm rambling... so, you know how your having a conversation amongst a group of people, and then you start conversing about yourselves conversing -- that's post modernism. People of earlier ages didn't ordinarily do that. Or when you make fun of singing in a song. Or when you mock dating conventions as you date. Or speaking conventions as you speak. Or blogging conventions as you blog!!.

Okay, enough of that.


That's a daffodil from two nights ago.

Wasteland

One day this week I wore white shoes, my fancy blue jeans, a brown belt, a grey and blue sweater over a brown shirt with a black jacket. Is that okay?


(This picture depicts how we went to the BYU-Utah basketball game. Ammon's year is accurate. Steve's and mine are not)

Also this week, in my favorite class, Dr. Talbot read aloud T.S. Eliot's poem, The Wasteland. Dr. Talbot speaks Latin, German, French and Spanish (as best I can tell -- I have a feeling he started with Latin), so he had no problem switching to the various languages as he read. It was so nice to go to a class and just listen to poetry. No PowerPoint (aside: PowerPoint is to education as Agent Orange is to forests). No equations. No code optimizations. No bickering about points on homework. And in fact (this one deserves another paragraph)...

Dr. Talbot revealed a great secret just prior to reading the poem. He spoke for a minute about how intellectuals and professors find all kinds of symbolism and meaning in The Wasteland. They find great ideas and wisdom. It was truly a revolutionary poem. "But," he said, "do you want to know the reason I like it?" (he actually repeated this question several times during his explanation of the poem's intellectual merits)

"I like it because it sounds nice." He enjoys it in much the same way that we enjoy good music, not because of the words at first, but because of the sound and the feeling it evokes. "In fact," said he, his love of literature and poetry in general is primarily not from intellectual study of the works, but whether or not he likes it. What a relief! Since my first English class in Jr. High, I've wondered what's wrong with me! All these teachers naturally find all these deep meanings and expect essays to be written in comparison and contrast. Find the theme, find the point, find the technique, get inside the author's head. Finally I have an English teacher who's honest enough to admit the true reason he likes literature -- and it's the same reason I like to read: I just like it! I enjoy reading the stories. It's fun. I like the puns and the tricks. I like meeting characters and watching them go about their lives. I love alliteration.

After the initial draw, secondarily he enjoys an intellectual perusal of the literature. So, stop it, all you English teachers. Stop making me feel like a dolt for just enjoying the "music" without listening to the "lyrics." I don't mind learning deeper meanings, but don't pretend like you read it primarily for those deeper thoughts.

No one will have made it to this paragraph... I usually stop reading posts that are this long. But one more thing I noticed. During Dr. Talbot's reading of the poem, I noticed one kid, in the back of the class -- a kid in my major with whom I have a class or two -- doing his homework. He couldn't be bothered to care about dumb English. He's too cool for that, I guess. How could English possibly help in real life? I'm just glad that I have been trained to enjoy things that aren't redeemable for cash.