every day i check the book

There is no question in my mind that the finest blog out there is Kacy Faulconer's Everyday I Write the Book.

When I first heard about blogging, in the mid-aughts, my friend Ben Blair told me that I should have a blog, and that Kacy Faulconer had one. Immediately I knew that blogging was legit. Because why else would Kacy Faulconer do it? She doesn't do things she hates. She doesn't do stupid pointless things.

I first met Kacy at Dixon Jr. High school in Provo. The year was 1986. We had a computer science class together. This was when computers could talk to you and start nuclear wars if you programmed them wrong. Kacy and I had a teacher named K Johnson and she had a haircut that looked like someone put a bowl on her head and then curled all the hair hanging out. Flat on top, curly at the tips. It was amazing. She was super mean. We drew pictures of her and passed them back and forth, and we were never caught. We were also never caught when we hijacked a computer game called "Ask Eliza" and changed Eliza's answers. You were supposed to ask Eliza a personal question, and then Eliza is supposed to give helpful advice. Kacy and I hacked it and had Eliza swear back at you or tell you that you were fat. No matter what you asked! It was the best of times.

Kacy and I stayed close all through school and even into BYU, where we would often loiter and smoke fake cigarettes outside of our Book of Mormon class during freshman year. She has always been a good time gal. Had I known she would someday be a best friend to my wife I might have acted a little more dignified.

The good times continue on her blog, where she is irreverent, honest, and brutally funny. Which she manages to do without being mean or cruel. It's a fine line she walks, and she does it with such wit and panache that I'm always in awe of whatever she writes. And she often writes about ordinary, even menial things. The magic of her writing makes everything seem important, and wickedly funny. Here's to you, Kacy Faulconer! You're the true original.

ice capades

First off, watch this video. Watch the whole thing. It's short.

Then, imagine that this girl is named Deb, and that this is going through Deb's brain:

"OK, Deb. You got this. You are going to go out there and nail it. You have a classy black outfit from Chicos. There are hot hockey guys out there and they totally got your back. OK, I'm walking out there now. I'm Celine Dion. I have this. I practiced, you know, a few times. Ooh! Watch that ice! Haha I'm totally fine. I know exactly how far to hold this mic from my mouth. I got this. I'm singing now. I sound really great. I sure wish people would be a little more quiet for this, but whatevs. You guys like vibrato, right? I'm nailing it. I hold my notes just long enough for you to hear my training. Why does my tummy feel funny? As if I'm about to bomb a line? I sure love the Twilight series. Oh, crap! Why did I just think about the Twilight series? I think I just sang the twilight part too early. I JUST SANG THE TWILIGHT PART TOO EARLY! I think I might be Canadian! I think the devil just grabbed my tongue with a double pronged cork puller! My mom warned me about this! She told me to practice and I was too busy dropping coin at Chicos and the Undertease store. My mom told me I would fail. She's told me all my life. She's right! I just bombed the national anthem and now everyone knows I hate freedom. I want to swear soooooo bad right now! What am I'm going to do? I know - apologize! SUPER FAST. Done. Nailed it. I just squeaked out the meekest little "sorry" you have ever heard and now I'm busting through these hockey chimps and they are looking at me like my face is a puck. Which is totally how they are all the time. I dated a hockey guy in high school, you know. That guy was a keeper, whoo boy! He drove a pinto and bought me a Charleston Chew and called it dinner. Well, it takes a lot more than that to woo a lady, my man! A lot more. Especially if she's got training. With vibrato like mine I deserve at least the Sizzler. I high tailed it right out of that relationship (as soon as I got my Sugar Ray CD back) cuz I don't chase waterfalls! I cannot believe that I just beefed that song, you guys. I'm hiding in a corner behind two hockey dudes and wedged into the corner of a Gatorade dispenser. Is this mic still on? I have friends out there. I have fans! They are probably so mad. I would be. They paid a lot of money to hear me sing this. I don't even know what to do. I'm feeling so much inertia right now. I am trying to think what Katie Couric would tell me to do. She'd probably tell me to get right back out there, wouldn't she. She did. They fired her from the CBS News even though she had sexy, waxy legs and still she kept coming back. And now she has a daytime talk show with strict rainbow-colored clothing codes for the audience. Oh man. I should probably go back out there. Are they booing out there? Yes. No. Are they? Is it me they are booing? I'll show them. I paid good money for this jacket! I'm going back out. I totally know this song. Anyways, I have the words written on this piece of paper. Deb is a doer. I got this. I'm going back out there. Nothing happened, y'all! Keep movin'! Cue that track and let's have a do over! I'm confident and I totally have this. I owe it to our fallen. "What so proudly." I know it. Everyone has probably forgotten by now. I'm going to sound great! I'm walking out. Moving through, you hockey bums! Just one more step onto the ice, now! I got this..."

Zzyzx!

Once, my brother was driving with his wife to Las Vegas. She made the comment that they never talk while they drive they just sit and stare out the window.  His response was that's what everyone does.

Still he took note.

The next time they were driving to Vegas (apparently this brother has a gambling/drinking/stripper problem...though there is also a Temple in Vegas so maybe they were going there) he had thought ahead.  He had taken a week and prepared, on his phone, a list of interesting topics to discuss on the drive.

So, just at the moment when the day to day conversation had piddled out he asked, "What are your thoughts about the rights of a polygamist to marry multiple times as it relates to the rights of homosexual marriage?*"  

Taken aback but intrigued by the topic they engaged in a discussion.  When that had run it course he hit her with, "Don't you think the decision have mortgage insurance last the life of the loan, as opposed to it's current 80% drop off, was egregious?!*"

She, noting his effort, joined in and they continued to discourse at 85 miles an hour.  The time flew by and he told me that they really did connect and really got into some big topics that did impact their lives.  The sun was setting and they were still laughing and speeding and talking and liking and then, when the topic of the voting rights of inmates came to an end, she noticed him flick out his phone, down by his leg, scroll down for a moment and then offer up, "Didn't you think Amanda totally redeemed herself in the reunion special of Project Runway?"

"Do you have notes?!"  She asked.

"What?!"

"Are you getting conversation topics from your phone?!"

"Yes, but I was the one who made them?!"

"Is it so hard to talk to me off the cuff that you had to get a crib sheet?!!"

"No, well, yes, but they took me a week and..."

"IT TOOK YOU A WEEK TO THINK OF SOMETHING TO SAY TO ME?!! AM I HARD TO TALK TO? "

"No! You just said we just stare out the window and so I came up with an agenda!"

"Well now I have an agenda! To shove that phone up your scrawny Zzyzx hole!"

******

Alright, well I wasn't there so I don't know how it went, but what I do know I understood both sides.  I wrote this from the point of view of my brother who told me the story and who I promptly, and without permission, stole it from.  But, if his wife's initial concern was we have a hard time talking on these long trips, then his abundant effort to fix it was actually an admission that said problem did exists and required abundant effort to fix!

He thought he nailed it, and then he got nailed. They sat in silence for the rest of the trip, even though his phone pulsed with engaging suggestions. And I know what you are going to say, I'm actually thinking the same thing right now, he should have just laid it out from the begininning, "So, I know how you think we don't talk on these long trips so I have spent the week coming up with interesting topics if we find we need it."

Then she hasn't been duped. She's not the one on the outside of a scheme, she's part of the scheme.  I don't know a lot about women, but I know they love a good scheme.

The best part of this story was when he was telling me about the conversation they had before he got caught. He really did remember what she said and how the whole thing felt nice and interesting and thoughtful and he learned things about his wife of over a decade that he hadn't known. And so he didn't tell this story the way I told it, his was borring and intimate and shared the blame between the two of them, he also never told me she said she'd shove the phone anywhere.  But I have to write a blog and I can't just tell stories about how much one of my brothers thinks his wife is still interesting and funny and sees things such a particular way that it still baffles him that he got to marry her.  NO ONE CARES! They want to hear a good phone shoving story and that, gental readers, is what you got.








*Not anywhere near the actual questions
   

A well thought out post, about the things I, well, thought out...

Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity. -Voltaire

Well, I ate too much.

I was going to sit down and write a brilliant blog about some clever nuanced thing that only I noticed, but then I ate too much.  Why?!  Why don't I just stop when my platter is full...that's one thing, my sister-in-law didn't want to dirty dishes (and why would she?!  I sure wasn't going to do them!) so she used paper plates...the thing is, the only paper plates she had in the house were these huge oval platters!

 Boom.

Good Heaven's why do they even make those?!  A pack of TWENTY FOUR!  Anyway, I filled mine up twice.  I know I know, but she didn't tell me that she had made dessert, certainly I would have only had one platter of food had I had known about dessert.  And worse it was these little raspberry and lemon glased cookies...so you really had to have at least seven before the taste of Honey Lime Chicken enchiladas even began to get out of your mouth...not that I wanted it out of my mouth...no, quite the contrary, there was a time where I would alternate a cookie bite with a enchilada bite...salty then sweet is my bingeing combination, I could eat the following combinations until my gut split down the center and the following ingredients would spill out...un-chewed:

• Popcorn/Milk-Duds
• Lays Classic Potato Chips/ really Dark Chocolate Chips
• A fist full of rock salt/ Peanut butter M&M's
• Chicken Enchiladas/ Lemon Raspberry Glased Cookies

I knew I had gone too far.  I did.  I knew it.  But that was two platters of Enchiladas, rice, refried beans, a small stack of blue berries and pineapple, and seven Lemon Raspberry Glased Cookies later...then I stopped.  I mean, I'm not a psycho!  I know when I've had too much, but tonight, I just couldn't stop and now I feel horrible, both physically and emotionally...I mean, I just started a new diet today.  For reals!  Today I had, like, a glass of water for breakfast, a hard boiled egg (three days old) for lunch, came home cranky from work to find out we are going to my sister-in-laws (whose some kind of wonder cook) house for dinner but that I would have to wait until 6:30 (6:45) to eat.  It was a perfect storm.

BTW, this is what one of those platters looks like full of food and not crisp and white in the packaging:

  2x

Great Mouse Detective! What have I done!  This post is giving me heartburn, honestly the only thing worse than eating too much food is to then search the internet for pictures of big platters of food.  I've ACTUALLY had some Alka Seltzer this evening...for it's intended purpose! You think Ken is old??!  That guy plays racquet ball! (I used the "Q" spelling to make it sound fancier) I do not play anything...hide and seek sometimes with the kids, but thats only to snuggle down in the quilt closet and catch a nap in the middle of the day, not a lot of calories burned.

It's not even that!  I'm a mid-middle aged married man, I suppose to be chubby!  I'm sure if Ken had some church activity where everyone was swimming, he would have to leave his shirt on because he would be humiliated to whip out his racquet ball abs in front of Sister Christiansen, the Ward Librarian. 

But I can't take this out on Ken, though I hope he enjoyed his brussel sprout for dinner, no, this was my doing.  My wife only ate half her platter and she's in a fine mood. Not me...it's 11:45 PM and I'm writing this blog that is making me sick to think about the sick things I sicked in my mouth and the whole time I've had to be sucking in my gut so my fingers can reach the key board!  WELL I'M DONE!  I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE!  I CAN'T EVEN BREATH IN MY OWN HOdijlsjksdnnfydsnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNF,MFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFASDMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMNKMNVVVVVVVVVvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvweeeeoiioweiiiiiiievvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvkh=wpl

Sorry.  

Apparently at some point my gut hit the CAPS LOCK button.

Which Kid Am I Raising?

So my friends little boy...ok he's twelve, broke his nose wrestling.  At first I was not sympathetic, you put you son in a girls swimsuit and make him fight other one-pieced boys getting his nose smashed in is a pretty reasonable result.  But then he had to get surgery and they had to re-break the nose and set it delicately back into place.  He makes it through the surgery just fine and gets home nice and drugged up and the next day he is feeling good and wants to go over to his friends house, which he does and in the first 3 mintes of being there another twelve year old walks up to him and asks, "What happened here?" and slaps his nose. It should have fallen off.  It was only held on by a small bandage and the Dr told him not to do anything to it for a week so it will set back into place.  Then Eddy Haskel comes over and pushes it to the left.  Obviously it was so painful but he was in front of his friends so he fights off tears and calmly calls his mom and says, "I'm done here, could you come pick me up?" Of course he doesn't tell his mother, because she will be mad, either at the friend or him or both (turns out Moms just get mad at themselves for not saying, "No, you just had surgery and your friends are idiots, stay home.") so she finds out when the kids mom texts her this huge apology and offers to pay for any damage done.

So here we are:  On the one hand twelve year olds are dumb and we should know they are dumb and we should put them in boxes with holes until they are...what am I now, 34? Yeah, 34. I should not have to be in a box but they should.

On the other hand, let's imagine the other kids mother.  Twelve years in and she realizes she raised, that kid.  The kid who has such a lack of awareness to walk up to another human being who is bandaged in the face and think, "That's my joke!  I'll swat the freshly BER-OKEN appendage and everyone will think I'm hilarious."

The trouble is... it could have been me.  It could have been anyone of us at that age.  Your desire to be liked far out weighs your desire to be reasonable.

When I was 15 I had a saying, if someone said something or did something that put me down in anyway, I would just shrug it off and say, "Oh, yeah?  Well, you're fat."  Easy. Clear. Final. I would say it to anyone, guys, girls, teachers, strangers. (I had a lot of teacher and strangers putting me down I guess) Well, then I was sitting in English next to Brenda, another 15 year old and she helped me out with my grammer.  I had made such a simple mistake that I thought it was funny.  She wasn't mean in correcting me, on the contrary, she was always real nice to me, which is why I thought it would be real clever if I gave her my signature line.  "Yeah well...you're fat."  And I went back to my paper.  Like, 10 minutes later I notice Brenda quietly shaking in her seat, her wrists limp in her lap, tears sneaking down her face, which was red trying to hold them in.  It actually took me a moment to figure out what had happened, it wasn't until she gently corrected me again, "That was the meanest thing anyone has ever said to me." she said with zero emotion, just as a matter of fact.  I remember trying to explain that I called everyone fat and that I did it all the time...this did not help my case, in fact it made me meaner that I did it all the time and to lots of people. Even as I said it I could hear that I was that kid.  Dumb. And I couldn't take it back.

I remember this story crystal clear and, no doubt, that nose whacking kid will remember that moment for the rest of his.  He thought he would be the hero and instead had to sit there while his mother, humiliated texted a stranger his apologies.

I was going to blog about how we text things that are too uncomfortable to talk about, but then I remembered Brenda and being that age and that boy and remembered I have little boy, who already thinks he shows his love by slapping other babies in the face (he's 9 months! Come on!) and realized I didn't have a leg to stand on, but then I realized, none of us do.

I am so glad that I finally finished with that phase.  And too bad for Milo...it's a comin'.