And you thought you knew us...

After dinner tonight we were watching a bird, which flew away after being scared by the appearance of Sugar, our interested if completely incapable hunter of moving creatures, large and small. Our dinner conversation took a turn that was typical of us. After thoroughly discussing our cat's hunting history (dismal) and determining she would never survive much past our demise, Michelle remembered a commonly held maxim about pets: if you die in your home, dogs would not eat you, but cats would. Michelle's interpretation of this somewhat dubious fact is that cats are smarter than dogs because they have better survival instincts. We then went on to speculate about our specific cats, and Brandon's observation was that the cats would probably starve unless some other scavenger opened up a body first. Then, in his words, the cat would finally notice and think "Hey! There's meat! Where did that come from?". we all agreed, and reflecting on what a weird (and yet completely normal for our family) conversation that was, we had a laugh and I decided to write it up. So now you know. Normal people really are just people you don't know that well.

Hey all!

Happy New Year. Or whatever this is. We are freezing here. Actually today is very warm, compared to recent days/weeks (months? - it seems like it). It might actually get above freezing. Well, I have lots to write of course and little time, like usual. I will post a picture that we took over the break so that you can see that we are still alive and somewhat healthy. We planned on getting a "real" family picture, but it didn't happen for reasons I won't bore you with.

Cameron is back at school now, and is working on a research project using an electron microscope and measuring very small objects. Something about ... well, truthfully, I don't fully understand what they are doing, or at least why what they are doing is important. If you want to read about it, you can go to: http://www.physics.byu.edu/faculty/chesnel/

Jamie is the Young Women's president now, and is adjusting to the weight of her new responsibility. I am still working on "catching up" at work, but the stress is lower this semester. We are still on track for a visit to the west this summer. There is more to write, but I have to get to a presentation today. FYI: If you are bored and want to seem some remarkable music, here are a couple of excellent videos you might check out.

Diana Krall interpreting an excellent Joni Mitchell song. My favorite version - Case of You
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGrsc5FeQDs

Paul Simon offering an solo acoustic verion of the Beach Boys' Surfer Girl. He is an amazing guitarist.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXHsARkfDbw

Something fun from Sesame Street and James Taylor - love the tuba bass.
Jelly Man Kelly
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjNteHSCCSg

I love this version of another Joni Mitchell - I guess she is the theme this time. Big Yellow Taxi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsPh_8Dxl3E

Joe Walsh and Don Felder jamming. Often the Eagles are "super-produced" by the "Lone Arranger", Glen Frey. Here they are jamming and doing some interesting things. There is actually a decent amount of Eagles jam material available now. Incidentally, their Farewell I tour DVD is well worth the price.
Turn to Stone – Eagles jam
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh3_SSZElXg&feature=related

Enjoy!

(Books and movies next).
P.S. I almost forgot this one. It is a tender song from the movie Once. I won't recommend the movie because it is rated R, but this song is very nice.

Movie song: Falling Slowlyhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoSL_qayMCc

This Is Bran Signing on

Christmas was good. Michelle and I got digital cameras, and so I have material to blog about.

<- yes, we had picture battles. one of the joys of digital film.


Cameron, before he goes to a job interview. [/jk]

that day, Michelle did not change out of her tick pajamas. the freak.





Our lovely Christmas tree. Some ornaments were hand painted.




























Black goes with everything.


























Granma sent us some ornaments with $20 stuffed in their torsos. Thanks Granma!

The blue head is mine. I like it better that way.




Taking pictures from a moving car. so much fun.


















If you want to see my blog, it is here: http://tatterofmime.blogspot.com/
So, there's 7000+ words for you. Ja ne!

Setting a Record

I seem to be setting a record for how long I can go without putting up anything in our blog. I've decided to follow the good advice of a friend (hey JP!) and start doing shorter less thorough entries, and also encourage my family members to put up their entries as well.

In that spirit, here is my latest entry. We are very happy to have been able to arrange to have Cameron come home for Christmas, so we will have us all together for Christmas, which we haven't had since 2005 (which I can't believe!). We plan on taking a family picture or two, which we'll post sometime. Another big recent event is the boy's friend Andrew Tryon recently left on his mission (Las Vegas, Spanish speaking), and so we got one last picture of the four pals together. Andrew and his brother Josh, Kevin Groesbeck and Brandon have been a friend group for years, and I had them all as scouts. They were an interesting bunch; much more likely to go for merit badges in reptile study, nature, or leather working than climbing, hiking or fishing. Indian Lore is another merit badge that seemed to generate interest. Anyway, they are growing up and becoming more independent.

That's all for now. I have a few reviews of movies, books, and songs that I will post sometime around the new year, but taking good advice, I will post this instead of waiting until it is all ready. Merry Christmas everyone!

What Doesn't Kill Us...

well, you know. I finally turned in my promotional materials to apply for full professor last week. It was a huge burden, and now...well, I would feel lighter, except I'm behind on everything else because of it. Soon I will be sane (he feverishly whispers, preparing to cackle madly as he fades into the night). Maybe not sane, but at least only as crazy as I used to be.

Other things that have been going on: Jamie took Lauryn and Brandon to Nelson Ledges, and they went through "The Squeeze". Fun was had by all.

Michelle was part of a Young Women activity where they had them come up a red carpet, and then read about their YW projects as if they were Oscars. The picture is Michelle in her new dress and shoes. And yes, I'm buying a gun. :)

Two comments overhead recently:
1) It took a Carter to get a Reagan.
2) Now we'll be living socialism in a way we have only read about before.

I guess it is always a matter of perspective. My only comment on politics today is that for a guy that was all about positive change and reaching out to help everyone, Obama sure is surrounding himself with a lot of contentious, "old guard" kind of democrats. If I were an observant Obama supporter, I imagine a few seeds of doubt would be entering into my heart about now.

Mini Book Reviews

Left To Tell by Immaculee Ilibagiza (Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust)

This was a fairly quick read, and very inspiring, once you get past the sheer terror and horror of the happenings. This story has been told in other ways (Hotel Rwanda, Shake Hands with the Devil, etc.), but never in such a faith-affirming way. Imaculee was a college student when the holocaust-level killing went into effect in Rwanda, and her story is harrowing and horrifying, although her suffering was mostly due to extreme discomfort in her hiding spot, and having to witness seemingly countless killings. In many ways it reminded me of the ending of the Book of Mormon, and it made me think of how the Book of Mormon was edited to be relevant to our time. The most compelling aspect of the book was that it documented how a person can go through such horrible events and come out with love in her heart. It is a testimony of the power of the Lord to help us forgive and thereby become free. My one negative comment about the book is that the Tutsis and Hutus relations are portrayed without substantial context. Reading her account you almost come away with the idea that the Tutsis were not involved in substantial violence, which is not the case. A simple consultation of the wikipedia entry for Rwanda will fill you in on some of the history. There is definitely enough blame to go around on all tribal (and colonial power) sides.

Maxwell Institute - http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/

There are some great articles here highlighting excellent Book of Mormon scholarship. A few of my favorite articles so far are:

DNA and the Book of Mormon: A Phylogenetic Perspective by Michael F. Whiting
http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/jbms/?vol=12&num=1&id=311&cat_id=488

This is probably the most complete article I have read on the limits of DNA testing in assessing Book of Mormon claims. Highly recommended.

Nephi's "Great and Abominable Church" by Stephen E. Robinson
http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/jbms/?vol=7&num=1&id=168

This does a great job explaining how "great and abominable" can refer to one specific church among many others that are not "great and abominable" at one point in scripture, and the apparent contradiction that comes in 1 Nephi 14:10, in which we are told that the devil's church consists of all those organizations not associated with the Church of Jesus Christ: "Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil." It is especially relevant to us out here where about 35% of our ward are former members of the Catholic church. He makes it clear why the term cannot be applied with any accuracy to the Catholic church as we recognize it, and yet how many churches and organizations could have the term applied to them in a different context.

Long time, no write

I missed the whole month of September...my apologies. I can only plead chronic busy-ness. With our Criminal Justice program director on sabbatical this semester, I am running the criminal justice program as well as the sociology department and that has stretched me to the limit, I'm afraid. I had to cancel a conference in November in St. Louis (with apologies to my friend Theron - yes, that is not a typo - who lives there). We have been internet friends for over 10 years and have never met, and we were hoping to change that, but alas, my rapidly fleeing sanity will not allow that. Maybe he can come for Thanksgiving?

Well, on the Cameron front: he finally went up to Grandma and Grandpa Lawson's place and came back with his car. He is pretty excited. Of course he'll still have to put gas in it, so he may not be driving that much. His classes are pretty rough this semester, so he is doing a lot of homework, and not enjoying the student life quite as much as he had hoped. There is always next semester, son. Or summer. Or...wait, we are supposed to enjoy the moment, so I guess we should all try to focus on the good and worthy aspects of where we are.

We had a great stake conference last week. One family tip that I enjoyed was, "The secret to changing your kids is that you can't change your kids. You can change yourself, you can change elements of the environment you share, but then you have to let them take the opportunities to change themselves. The best you can do is to provide change opportunities." I may have done the quote a little damage, but you get the idea. Jamie and I are in a Sunday School class about families, and we have decided to focus our family home evenings this month on teaching the kids how to teach. We are using the "Preach My Gospel" book - I think it starts around p. 175, but I don't have it in front of me so I'm not sure. "Lesson one" seemed to go well. We discussed the importance filling your mind with the words of life, and of asking commitments of the people you teach. Then we committed ourselves to a half hour of private spiritual study a day, so that our hearts can be filled with the words of Christ. I have high hopes for us. We'll see how that goes. Maybe writing it here will keep it in my mind. More later...