UVU

Utah Valley University sends you a birthday card for your birthday. Does BYU send you a birthday card for your birthday? BYU has a lot to learn about being nice... and birthdays.

Cold

Once it gets below a certain temperature its just cold. It all blurs into one long degree from absolute zero up until that certain temperature. I think that temperature might be 30 degrees F for me. Above that temperature I can tolerate everything, but below it, its all awful.

I like the snow, I think its beautiful. I like the winter too. But, when it won't quite make up its mind I think its just kind of depressing. There are sad patches of half melted snow all over the ground covering green grass. The sky is gray to the point you can't tell where the sun is.

I can recall two times in my life when I have been the very coldest, or when that cold was the least tolerable to me. I was walking out to my car up at Dover. I got up to my car and tried to open the door, but it was frozen shut. I couldn't even get to my ice-scraper. I walked back inside and called Lisa, who I was going to see and who is getting home off her mission in 8 days, and I told her it was too cold for me to go out. I crawled under my electric blanket and tried to sleep. It was dark, but I think it was only 5:30pm. I also recall that weekend it got down to 2 degrees. The next night took Lee's Dad's binoculars (these are no ordinary binoculars, they require a tripod!) out into the middle of the street and found a comet in the middle of (or very near by, I don't recall exactly) Cassiopeia. I think it was Comet Holmes, but there were so many comets during those few months that its hard to remember. It was still just as cold, but the company made that cold tolerable. Funny how that works.

The other time I remember being the coldest, or that cold being the least tolerable was last night, as I was trying to find my car in the gigantic UVU parking lot. I parked in a hurry because I was late and I am always thinking of something other than where I am and what I am doing, so if I do not take very special notice of exactly where I parked my car it is very likely I will not remember. The funny thing is I remember exactly what I was thinking about when I parked my car. It was a Dr. Seuss rhyme that I was playing with in my head and imagining what it would have been like if Dr. Seuss had written Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and if Marshmallow Popcorn had been around back then how he would have included it, which he certainly would have. Anyway, that was really cold looking for my car last night. I didn't have a coat and it was windy. At one point I crouched down behind some ridiculously large Ford truck to hide from the wind. I never thought I'd be glad to see one of those. That was cold. It was like ice in my bones.

Sometimes I fantasize about going to work in Antarctica because I could hear Weddell Seals (trust me, you really want to click on that link and listen) and see penguins and the Southern Lights, which I imagine are just as good as their northern counterparts (The Polar Aurora on Saturn on the other hand I think are probably the best). If I ever do go to work at either of the poles I imagine I will amend my thoughts about 30 degrees and lower all being the same. But, maybe the company of lights and seals would make it tolerable.

A Serious Man

I have seen a lot of sad movies lately. This one was by quite far the saddest and most hopeless. But, it was also thoroughly enjoyable, funny and really good. I'm so very confused. I think the movie is basically half way between Barton Fink and The Man Who Wasn't There.

Ben Kahoe

I am not sure why I like this guy's paintings and I don't know why these two are my favorite so don't you dare ask me.

If I had money, I would go here and buy one.

Also, if I had written a children's book, I would ask him to illustrate it for me, but then it would probably turn out too sad and too scary.

Some Movies

I saw Where The Wild Things Are and The Boys Are Back in the last few days.

First, I want to say that I think its not okay to judge a film adaptation by how it compares to the book. Films aren't books and when one is based on another the second one is usually not as good a work of art as the first. I think that's because when filmmakers decide to adapt a book into a film, they typically pick from among the best (and why wouldn't they? Who'd want to adapt an awful book?) and so they are starting at a disadvantage. I wonder if this makes any sense.

Second, I want to say that I thought a few similarities in the films were interesting. Where the Wild Things Are is confusing some people because the book is for four year olds, but the film is for adults. Mostly the movie is about relationships and how we are all super insecure and sad and ofttimes act like children.I read one critic who said he was annoyed because all of the Wild Things seemed to be completely emotionally dysfunctional and damaged beyond repair. I think that in reality everybody acts like that to some degree or another because we have all been terribly hurt, let down and damaged. Each one of those wild things was just a different insecure aspect of people Max interacts with or himself.

I thought the most interesting thing about The Boys Are Back was when the children and adults acted, respectively, like adults and children. Clive Owen sure was great, especially that scene where he nearly breaks down and then holds it back in. I think we have all probably done that at times.

Jade, its good. Go see it.

That movie made me think of something else. I know nothing of women except that they are the same as girls, just older. The same goes for men and boys. And, I was thinking its very funny how boys (and men) really just like fighting, dirt, stinkiness and slimey things. That seemingly will disgust some women, but, ladies, its a good thing we like all of those things because it's what makes us like you because it's what you're made of. That's not an insult. Remember? We like that stuff.

Lastly, I would like it noted on the public record that I fully intend to raise my boys as though they are the Lost Boys, I am Peter Pan and my wife is Wendy. So, there is that. Future wife you have been warned.

Three Trees I love

These are the trees I probably love the most.


This one I used to climb up and jump out of. If you climbed high enough you could see the entire Salt Lake Valley. At night time you could see the Jordan River Temple glowing. I am too big to climb high enough now because the branches would certainly break.




In this one I found my very first bird nest with little eggs in it. If you climbed up onto the roof of my house with binoculars, you could look down into the nest and see. It was especially exciting when the baby robins hatched.





This one I planted years ago. It's a Weeping Willow. When I planted it, it was about an inch in diameter. Now its about 18 inches in diameter and still growing. I doubt this Willow will ever grow as big as the one at the house where I was born (which my father built), but the people who bought that house cut it down. It was so big that they never could get the stump and roots out so now there is this huge tree stump in the middle of their front yard. I doubt this is what they wanted, but it serves them right.

A Party?

I think we should all have some sort of Party about this

THE BQE- A Film By Sufjan Stevens from Asthmatic Kitty on Vimeo.

Also, I think my favorite thing about Sufjan Stevens is that I used to like the Flute. Then for years, I HATED it. And now I like it again.

Also Also, sometimes when I am running and Fanfare for the Common Man (Yes, I have that on my running playlist) comes on, I feel like I can keep running for a very long time. Rocks would consider the amount of time I feel like I could keep on running to be very long, indeed. This song is majestic and I like it for that. It seems like it is being played on the finest instruments, by the finest musicians who live very noble lives. Wasn't it written for the WWII soldiers who stormed the beaches of Normandy or something like that? I dunno. Sufjan Steven's music, on the other hand, seems like it is being played by forest animals who have whittled their instruments out of whatever they could find and taught themselves to play during the hibernating months. I like it just as much. I think the small squirells play the flutes and the smaller ones play the piccolos. Bears, of course, are on percussion.

Also Also Also, I have never nor will I ever stop liking the French Horn for any reason.

On a completely unrelated note, I just want to say that I am fascinated by ne0-feminist-indie-hipster-domestic mothers like this one. I think its cool. Generally, people can be pretty cool.

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Is anybody else excited about The Fantastic Mr. Fox? Well, I certainly am. And look what I found
Yep, that's a link to Roald Dahl himself reading an excerpt from the book and its free. And, of course that's what he sounds like. Of course.

Anna Karena, I call her Annie.

Two in one day. Sorry. But seriously, THIS!





Does anybody else think Serge Gainsborough is kind of a weird looking, French version of Thom Yorke?

Also, Yes, Ashley, this is now your ringtone.

Regarding the desire to create

There seems to be in some people an insatiable desire to create. Picasso said, "We artists are indestructible, even in a cell or a concentration camp I would be almighty in my own world of art. Even if I had to paint my pictures with my wet tongue on the dusty floor of my cell." That's pretty much what I got from this movie, which I thought was pretty good.




Sometimes I think there is a perception that Men more than Women have that insatiable desire to create. I think sometimes I have that perception. I think its probably not true, but if it was I wonder if it has anything to do with childbirth? What say you?

Also, its rainy today. Anytime it rains I think of the following song and then I think of people running from the rain in slow motion to this song. I think that I saw something like this when I was young and it has stuck with me very strongly. If you know what this is and maybe you saw it too, please let me know. Its ruining my brains trying to think of it.

I remember seeing people in Uganda run from the rain all the time. People are afraid to get wet there. I welcomed it, it was so cooling. Man, that place was hot. And there were lions.

Not in my car, out-siiiiide.

when something is this good, I don't keep it to myself.
http://www.paranoidus.com/director/7/edouard-salier/379/raphael-saadiq-let-s-take-a-walk/6/

also, if I married a black girl, our kids would be this cool.