Three days before Thanksgiving

This time, I'm going to remember what I can about the Monday before Thanksgiving.

2013. In the evening, I watched the "Turkey Day" episode of The Beverly Hilbillies. After it was over, my roommate Scott said, "Except for the terrible cigarette commercial, that was the best Thanksgiving episode we've watched"; I told him it was better than the show's previous Thanksgiving episode. I wanted to go running, since I was super excited that I had later classes the next morning. I ran up 900 East, since it was too dark to go in darker neighborhoods. I only ran for about half an hour, since that's all I had time for. I wanted to see what an always-decorated house looked like. They were all decked out for Christmas, which wasn't too surprising, since they put up Easter stuff right after Valentine's Day. I was surprised to see a new intersection and new stoplight patterns.

2012. In the evening I was watching the Thanksgiving episode of Bewitched when there was a knock at the door. I paused the show to answer the door, and it was two of my horse friends, Kristen and Carissa. They came in, and after a minute Carissa asked if they could watch Bewitched with me. I told them, "They've been transported back to the first Thanksgiving," and I think they thought the episode was over before it was. They stayed and visited. My roommate Cameron came home and visited as well. The horses told him we were getting into the Thanksgiving spirit; he said, "By watching Bewitched?" and I said it was the Thanksgiving ep. There was talk about going to Gygi's in Salt Lake (I clued them into the pronunciation) and about going to bars--even though they wouldn't drink, I still thought that was inappropriate. Cameron said he had gone to a bar and someone had snapped his suspenders. As it got close to midnight, I told them they needed to leave, since it was almost curfew.

2009. For dinner, we ate at the Bartschi family's house. There was conversation about me going home (I'm not sure how they found that out). I told them of a video I had seen on my brother's blog where Franklin was putting a stuffed alligator to bed, and my mom had commented that she hoped he wouldn't fall on the new baby. That made me suspect that they were trying to keep the announcement of a new baby a surprise. (I found out later it wasn't meant to be a surprise; they just forgot to tell me.) We visited a former investigator named Jordan (a girl). Then we met our zone leaders at the stake center to go on an exchange. They told me I needed to take warm clothes, even though it was warm in Lewiston, so I think we drove back to our apartment so I could get a coat and some warm things. I put in my retainer, which made me speak with a slight lisp, and somehow the word "ferocioulicious" got coined, which sounded especially funny with my lisp. Elder Keddington wrote "ferocioulicious" on the picture I had drawn of Elder LaPratt, but he wrote it as "Froiouslious," which isn't even close. Elder Hansen mentioned the "Wicked Witch of the West."

On our way up to Pullman, Elder Hansen was listening to a CD of covers of seminary songs. I began talking about my Cherie Call Ocean in Me album and the lyric, "Now the Great and Spacious Building has me scrubbing up the floors; I've got to find a way to tell them I can't work there anymore." Elder Hansen made a remark about me liking LDS music. This might have been the time there were tumbleweeds all over the road out of Lewiston. It was really cold in Pullman, and there was snow on the ground.

2008. We traded our car with the elders in Medical Lake, and there was a jewelry charm hanging on the rearview mirror of the car we got. That night we had dinner with the Zellers, a part-member family. I think we had lasagna with elk meat, which I didn't like. The previous night we had had elk meat taco salad (or something), and I could tell it didn't taste like beef. When I ate the lasagna, I thought, "Maybe elk does taste like beef," since I thought it was beef lasagna, but then I found out it was elk, and I didn't like it. I shared the scripture in Alma about living in tdaily.  This is my journal entry:
"Today was an ordinary P-day with shopping, e-mail, bowling, and such. We had dinner with the Zellers. The greatest anomaly was trading our car. It's almost the same on the inside so it's hard to get used to the white. It's older than our old one but has fewer miles. I don't think Elder LaPratt, with whom we traded, likes me that much." (Elder LaPratt was just an evil person.)

2007. In the morning, I was sad to say goodbye to three-year-old Preston, knowing that I wouldn't see him for two years. I asked at the Nashville airport if they could arrange for a wheelchair to meet me at the Dallas airport, since I had a sprained ankle. When I got on the plane, we had to wait because there had been a power outage in Dallas. Eventually we left, and indeed there was a wheelchair waiting for me in Dallas. Then I got on one of the airport vehicles, driven by an Indian (as in from India) who didn't seem like he knew what he was doing. We picked up some other handicapped people, and we went all over the place and had to keep switching vehicles. It was ridiculous. At one point I went and sat on the floor because I hated standing on one foot. Their lack of efficiency made me miss my flight. I went and talked to the lady at the desk and she told me that I might be able to get on a flight that night, but if I didn't get on that one, I would have to wait even longer. I got some coins (since I had no cell phone) and was able to get a hold of Susanne to tell her my situation. While I waited I read the sixth Harry Potter, since I hadn't finished it yet. I might have finished the book on the plane. I was able to get on the next flight, for which I was grateful. When I got on the plane, a man was in my seat. But a flight attendant let me sit in his seat, which worked out well because it was an aisle seat while my original one was a middle seat. They put my crutches in the overhead storage. When we landed, a man asked me if I wanted him to take down my crutches. As I was walking through the Salt Lake airport, some people said, "That's a terrible way to travel!" When I exited the terminal, my mom was holding sleeping four-year-old Allie and had a wheelchair. I sat down and she gave me Allie to hold while she went to find my luggage. I think she said she had just taken the wheelchair, and I might get in trouble for holding Allie. I was excited when I got home that I got my DVD of The Munsters' Scary Little Christmas, but I don't think I watched it that night.

2006. It seems that I might have been working on a Thanksgiving paper for AP English. It was a late-night writing session, since it was due the next day.

2005. There was a Thanksgiving seminary lesson that day. We made origami turkeys and read a Psalm about thanksgiving.

2003. I think I went to Kmart with my dad because I needed to get tortilla chips for a seminary "extended devotional" (party) the next day. I also wanted some Christmas candy for the Christmas season, so my dad got Christmas Peanut M&Ms. I actually wrote a journal entry that day, stylized with decorative letters:
"Thanksgiving is this week. It will be Thanksgiving vacation, so tomorrow is Friday and today is Thursday. Gee, the week went by quickly. Tomorrow is extended devotional and since I'm on the activities committee, I signed up for devotional. We went to see You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown at the High School on Saturday, and tomorrow we're seeing Annie at Hale Centre Theatre."

 

The Sunday before Thanksgiving

I'm going to remember what I can about four days before Thanksgiving, which is always a Sunday.

2013. Oddly enough, I don't remember much about this day. I would have had to be at tithing settlement, I'm sure. I think I went home teaching, and we took turns saying what we were thankful for. I think Autumn Tullis told me she liked my turkey tie--which is always a favorite.

2012. My home teachee, Zach, who was also the Sunday School president, asked me to teach the marriage and family prep class with Laura Molnar. I went over to Laura's apartment, Elite 6; I hadn't met her before. I asked her the typical where-are-you-from-what-are-you-studying questions, and then we discussed our lesson plan. When we gave our lesson, we mostly just asked a lot of questions. That night, my roommate Scott and I went over to Elite 5 to see our home teachees, Emily and Natausha. Someone else was there who Scott knew but I didn't; he called me Mr. Turkey Tie. After we had been there for some time, Megan Ward said, "You're wearing a turkey tie!" Her roommates thought it was funny that she just noticed that, since their friend had drawn attention to it when we got there.

2011. After church, we had a linger-longer Thanksgiving dinner. I think I talked with Meleea Larsen while we were in line. I was happy to have pecan pie, but it was a little hard to cut with a plastic knife. That night we had a fireside with Sheri Dew. She made reference to the time she almost got married, but she didn't tell us the whole story. Jon Schmidt played his own version of "A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief."

2010. I wore my turkey tie to church, even though I hadn't planned to, and I was glad I did. I blessed the sacrament, and afterward the Wortleys, who were a married mentoring couple, noticed my tie. That night I went to Peter Moosman's house for home teaching, as we home taught someone who was his home teacher. His mom had Thanksgiving decorations up, and she had a lot of the same things I had, including the Fisher Price Little People Mayflower. I was glad to see that I wasn't the only one who considered candy corn suitable for Thanksgiving. Our home teachee asked Peter if his mom decorated that much for Christmas. Peter said no, but his sister Michelle corrected him.

2009. We had dinner with the Hastings family, and their daughter Sammy was throwing up in another room. I think Sister Hastings wasn't there for some reason. The other kids were laughing about the throwing up. This might have been the time I pointed out a funny blurb in the Ensign--one issue had shown a picture of a man being sucked into a TV because of a video game addiction, and another issue told of a kid who had seen that picture and said to his friend, "Let's go outside so we don't get sucked into the TV!"

2008. We attended the Davenport Branch. The Corrigan family spoke; Sister Corrigan she hated Thanksgiving, even more than St. Patrick's Day. That night we had dinner at the Kieffers'; they had a bowl full of tree seeds that looked like tiny pumpkins. We went downstairs in their house to show them our promotional video for Christmas around the World. This is my journal entry for the day:
"Today was a good sacrament meeting. We sang Thanksgiving hymns, and the new family, the Corrigans, gave excellent talks.
 "After church we saw a few people, including Sister Henrietta Camel, and the part-active family the Moores, whom we can teach. We had dinner with the Kieffers, and a member visit with the Wilkersons.
"Two years ago today was Thanksgiving. In the morning we went to the store and bought crackers for my niece, then had Thanksgiving in Fillmore in an empty house. I remember watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving on a portable DVD player."

2007. I was in Nashville, and I was preparing for church with my new mission slacks. The water just beaded up on the pants when I was ironing them. I thought that was impressive, but I was not impressed that they literally tailored the pants three inches too big. We loaded up in the car to go to their stake conference near the Nashville Temple. When we got in the car, I helped buckle three-year-old Preston, and I told him he couldn't do something. He said sadly to his parents, "Shu-shu [uncle] talk to me!" I think this was the day when Ya-ping was getting after David for something, and Preston said, "Mommy! Don't talk to Ba-ba!" We all found that funny, and David said something about him defending him. We got to the conference late, so we had to sit on a stage at the very back of the last overflow. I liked the speaker's talk about him talking to a guy who attended church in blue jeans and later got baptized. As we left the stake center, their friend called out "Melvilles!" On our drive home, David was asking me questions that he thought I needed to answer before I went on my mission. I was annoyed by them. That afternoon, we took bikes to go let me practice. We were at a school parking lot, and I was doing a fair job riding around. I wanted to take one last jaunt behind the school, and I tried to turn and fell. My ankle really hurt, and I couldn't move it. I was hoping David would come around, since he was on the other side of the school, and see that I couldn't move. I seem to remember seeing a nickel on the ground. David eventually came around and saw that I was hurt, so then he got the car and helped me into it. Then we drove back to their apartment. He was trying to call our parents to get insurance information, while I sat in the car thinking. I was supposed to go into the MTC in a week and a half. Could I go with a broken leg? It was nice to think that I might be able to stick around home for the holidays--but that meant that when I came home, I would come home around the bleak time of February. Eventually we went to a medical place. In the waiting room, Preston saw Peanuts on a comics section of a newspaper, and said, "Is that Charlie Brown?" None of us knew that he knew who that was. Some teenage boys were making funny noises at him, which made him laugh. I felt like a bad uncle, that strangers were entertaining him but I wasn't. Then we went to a hospital. One of the doctors was in David's ward; when I said I was worried I might have to postpone my mission, he said they would probably let me go with a broken leg. Eventually, they came and told me that my ankle was sprained, and I felt silly for having to go through all that for just a sprain. She wanted me to try to walk on it, but I couldn't, so she said, "That's not going to work," and they got me crutches. Then we returned to the car. Preston had noticed that they had taken off my shoe, and he was worried about that--"Shu-shu shoe?" he repeated several times. At one point, Ya-ping got a little impatient with him asking, so she made a frustrated noise, and he started crying. On our way home, they stopped at the store because they needed milk for Preston, even though it was Sunday. At home, I wanted to watch the Thanksgiving episode of That Girl, which I had brought. I remember being able to maneuver around enough to take a one-footed shower and get down on the air mattress. We made arrangements for me to go to the airport the next day.

2006. I remember sitting in my room doing homework while watching a documentary on the Pilgrims. My mom had made some pumpkin cake cookies, which I was delighted to have.

2004. Sue's family came over to see newborn Preston. At one point, my mom was holding Allie and said to her, "Do you want Uncle Mark to take you out to look at the turkey?" That made Allie immediately put out her arms for me to take her, as she loved going out to the inflatable turkey. Sue was saying, "Are we going to watch a Christmas movie?" Jesse said we should watch The Nightmare Before Christmas, since it was "perfect" because it was between Halloween and Christmas. I wanted to watch an episode of The Munsters, "Grandpa Leaves Home," since I suspected it was a Christmas episode but wanted to be sure. Sue was referring to the show as "The Monsters," and my mom had to correct her. She liked the line, "There's a showbiz family for you; they even go home with their makeup on!"

2003. We had one of those meetings where you share your favorite hymn. I got up and told a story involving "Hum Your Favorite Hymn," and then I said I wanted to sing "I Believe in Christ." (I only remember this because I kept a journal at that time, but the journal entry is a little personal.)

November 26-30, 2013

Time to think about what went on last Thanksgiving time!

Tuesday, November 26.  My corpus linguistics class was cancelled, but when I went to my Old English class (I entered the building via a different door, since I didn't have class before it), there were only three of us there. Our professor told us that she would note that we were there that day and give us more points than the rest of the class, but she dismissed us. I might have gone to get pumpkin soup for lunch and get some Bookstore pumpkin fudge. Maybe I got the fudge after my writing class; I don't remember. Then I drove home. That night, I asked my mom if she wanted to watch Garfield's  Thansksgiving, but she didn't. That night before I went to bed, I made a Facebook post saying, "If you start your Black Friday shopping on Thanksgiving, you can't be my friend anymore." I had had my smartphone for just over a week at that point, so I didn't have all the settings set how I wanted, so after I had gone to bed, my phone vibrated because someone had commented on the post. I think that was what made me figure out how to turn off the vibrating from Facebook, since I didn't want to keep being awakened at night.

Wednesday, November 27. My mom and I went to Costco in the morning, where we bought pumpkin and pecan pies. Then we drove out to West Valley because I wanted to go to Port of Subs so I could get a Pilgrim Griller, a sandwich with turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce. My mom liked hers, but they were expensive. Then we went to the Distribution Center, where I wanted to get a Pearl of Great Price manual and a MoTab CD, Sing Choirs of Angels, because I needed a recording of "Away in a Manger" for my hymns playlist. I was going to pay for them, but my mom did. Then we drove to Winegar's to grab a few more things. I wanted to listen to the Mamas and the Papas CD that was in the car, so I skipped to the album's later songs. As "Somebody Groovy" was playing, we saw a girl in another car dancing very energetically, and it seemed to match up with what we were listening to. Then we went home, and my mom took a nap while I updated my hymns playlist. Then I realized that I had two versions of "God of Our Fathers, Whose Almighty Hand"--one with an extra verse, and one with the verses out of order. That afternoon, I went running, and when I was going past the Bountiful golf course, I saw a bunch of wild turkeys. That made me so happy, and I decided that I would cross the street when I turned around so that I could see the turkeys better, but when I went back past them, the turkeys were all gone, even though they were close to my turning-around point. That night I turned on my Thanksgiving playlist while I helped clean. Allie and I helped peel apples for my mom to make apple pie. Eventually, she said we had peeled enough, so we could eat the apple that was peeled but not used. I was surprised when Allie immediately took the apple and took a bite out of it. I was going to cut it up to share.

Thursday, November 28. In the morning, my family had turned on the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. One of the performers was Lady Antebellum, and they were singing songs from their Christmas album. Allie said, "Do you like her?" Later we had to go to my grandparents' house to pick up chairs. The 99.5 radio station seemed to only play commercials. I switched to 98.7, which was just talk, and the guy was talking about children's bodily functions. My mom told me I had struck out twice. Then I switched to 97.9, and Lady Gaga's "Applause" came on; my mom asked me who it was. A repairman came to take out our old, obsolete swamp cooler. While he was here, he agreed to do something else--maybe patch up the hole? I think he had been late. After he left, my dad asked me to help him turn the light fixture in the bathroom upside down, because it was too dark in the bathroom with the present configuration. He dropped one of the screws, and it landed in the sink, but fortunately I grabbed it before it went down the drain. My dad said he was glad I was there. Then I went running, and when I was near the Bountiful golf course, a kid, probably about 10, said, "Happy Thanksgiving!" I was a little disappointed not to see more turkeys, as it was Thanksgiving Day, but when I got home I made a Facebook post about seeing them the previous day. In the late afternoon, relatives started coming. When 2-year-old "Wallace"/Nathan came in, he called the Pilgrims on our front step "Grandma and Grandpa." Peter said, "Those are Pilgrims, not Grandma and Grandpa." They told me that Wallace knew the "This Is Halloween" song, so at one point he was lying on the floor, playing on an iPad, singing the song. I lay down on the floor to hear him, and as soon as I did, he got up and left, which Peter found funny. I think at one point he was "playing" the piano and singing "This Is Halloween." Peter was telling me that he had the Duck Dynasty Christmas album, and he told me I should listen to it to see if I thought it was so bad it was entertaining, or whether it was just bad, because he knew it was bad. Jesse and Lisa came, and Jesse told me how dismayed they were that his in-laws had their Christmas tree up and the kids there were watching a Christmas movie. The turkeys weren't quite done when we were ready to start, so we starting eating without turkey. Wallace ate my last candy corn sucker, and at one point he put his sucker down on Quin's shoulder--Quin was simultaneously amused and annoyed. (Later that evening, he asked where I had gotten the suckers, and when I told him Macey's, he said he wanted to go there.) After dinner, I was telling Susanne how much I liked the Buzzfeed article she had shared with all the GIFs. Susanne was showing them to my dad, and he was really laughing, even though he hardly ever laughs. Renee was looking and laughing as well. At one point I showed Susanne my roast turkey socks, and April was trying to get her attention and said something about "talking to your brother." After people had left, my mom and Susanne were saying that Renee was high on something. I turned on my Thanksgiving music while I did dishes, and my mom sat in the living room and sometimes sang along. She felt bad for not helping, but she had done a lot of work that day, and I was fine washing them. Then I went to bed.

Friday, November 29. I think that in the morning I started playing some of my new Christmas CDs. I loved the songs on the Lower Lights' latest album. That afternoon, we went to meet my aunt Sue and some of her family to go see Tangled, which was new in the theaters. When we got in the car, I put in the new Kelly Clarkson Christmas album. We were on the freeway when "Run Run Rudolph" came on, and my mom said it wasn't very Christmassy. Nan said she liked it, then asked who it was. When we were at the theater, waiting to go in, Wallace was identifying the animals on the display for Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2. We got in the theater early, as the previous showing was ending. I was looking at things on my phone, and my dad told me I needed to watch the credits so that I wouldn't watch them after the movie. We got to see the giant snow monster put Elsa's crown on after the credits. I was looking at pictures on Awkward Family Photos, and I was amused by another ugly Easter bunny picture. Throughout the movie, other viewers were laughing and overly enthusiastic; they clapped at the end. After the movie I went to the restroom, and Wallace asked where I had gone. Sue was telling my mom that one of the voices in the movie was Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but Nicole corrected her. Then we drove to my grandparents' for some reason. On our way there, we were having a conversation about American Idol winners--Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood have been the most successful, but sometimes you hear about Daughtry, and Phillip Phillips has had decent success. I was confused with Kelly's singing "Just one cigarette more" in "Baby It's Cold Outside," since I thought she was strongly anti-smoking. I wanted to go to Target because one of the ads the previous day advertised walrus lounge pants, which of course I had to have. On our way to Target, we went to Home Depot. While my parents were looking at boring things, Susanne and Allie and I looked in the Christmas stuff. I found a blue-dyed poinsettia, which I thought was awesome, so I got it. When we got to Target, I was talking about what I should do with my poinsettia once Christmas was over. My mom said I should throw it away, as it's hard to get them to bloom again; I said I could give it to the office where I worked. We looked for the walrus pants and couldn't find them, but Nan found walrus socks. My mom was going to ask at the clothes help desk, and she discovered there was a cart near the desk with some walrus pants in it, but there was no tag. They told us we could buy them. We looked through the Christmas stuff and got some teal and pink ornaments for my new pink tree. I also got some Christmas-shaped Goldfish and Wheat Thins, and I might have got some Christmas Tic-Tacs. My mom got mint chocolate and peppermint white chocolate M&Ms. At some point on our outings that night, a car was driving down the road with their headlights off. I said, "I hope they crash into a pole." My mom and Susanne said, "You would say that just for not turning on their headlights?" and I said, "That's why I just said a pole." (I now agree that was too harsh.) I think that night I watched the Addams Family Christmas episode, and I think I also watched a Beverly Hillbillies episode. My mom watched with me (and encouraged me to watch more), as she was working on something in the room.

Saturday, November 30. At our house, Susanne said we should hide the M&Ms so Allie wouldn't eat more. She was dismayed and said she wouldn't eat more. I asked her why, then, she would be unhappy with them being hidden, if she wasn't going to have any more. I helped put lights on our tree. Then I drove back to Provo. I showed my roommate Scott my blue poinsettia, and I said if we had red and white poinsettias, it would make Fourth of July poinsettias. He said you couldn't mix holidays like that. I started some laundry, and Scott asked me why I didn't do my laundry when I was at home. I think I told him that I had done some of it. He went out and got a live Christmas tree and set it up with a friend while listening to Christmas music, including Debra Fotheringham's "With Wondering Awe." I think he popped popcorn and had a friend string it. I had things I had to do--maybe homework. I listened to samples of the Duck Dynasty Christmas album and texted Peter to tell him I thought it was entertainingly bad. He asked if I was going to add it to my playlist; I said no because I didn't watch Duck Dynasty. I think I was listening to my own Christmas music. This was back when Scott was still a decent person and would talk to us.

November 3

Since I've already remembered things that went on November 1 and November 2, it's time to move on to November 3. This date had some surprisingly significant memories--Death Valley, Taiwan, and a funeral.

2013. After church, I showed my roommates all the Thanksgiving candy I had bought. Scott said I was going to get diabetes. I was on Facebook when my roommate Jordan invited me to like the Provo YSA 2nd Stake Digital Mission page, so I did, and I was the very first one to like it, he said--I liked it even before he did. My roommates left, and I turned on the CES broadcast while eating a candy corn Blo-Pop. I think I also made spiced cider; it was a cold, rainy day.

2012. In the morning, we all piled into the geology department vans in Death Valley for our day's adventure. While we were sitting in the van getting gas, one of my classmates (whose name I can't remember, but I will call her Megan) said she learned from our classmate Rachel that I was an English language major, which she didn't know before. She said two of her roommates were ELang majors and told me her names. I told her I knew that Courtney Clarkson had been in one of my classes, because I remember our professor asking if she was related to "American Idol winner" (Kelly Clarkson). We stopped at the Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes, then broke up into groups and went around analyzing the dunes. It was a warm day. I remember my classmate Trevor picking up a pile of sand and saying, "It has lithics in it." I wrote that down in my notes, since I was collecting speech characteristics of the geology department. I also wrote down "Did you drop acid on it?" since putting hydrochloric acid is one way to determine rock types. We saw scorpion tracks and an animal burrow.

In one of the interdune areas, we licked the ground to determine the texture. We climbed to the top of the biggest sand dune, where we sat down as a class and heard a lecture. I had a hard time paying attention. I asked "Megan" to take my picture, and then we headed down the dunes, back to the vans. We saw another class out on the dunes. While we were having a bathroom break, we ate some little oranges. As we drove along the road, Dr. Radebaugh pointed out to us some clay textures. We later pulled off on a side of the road and ate lunch, where the ground was made of volcanic ash and crumbled easily. After lunch, we drove out on a rough gravel road to visit the Racetrack Playa. I ate a pumpkin Kashi bar on the way. There was a sign instructing people not to move the rocks, which had been moved naturally along the ground. We looked at the rocks and their tracks, and someone estimated how heavy one of the rocks was.

Dr. Radebaugh apologized to a guy out taking photographs, and he said he wanted us in his picture because he worked with a BYU grad. We climbed up to where the rocks came from; we were at a limestone outcrop with a sharp "rip your pants" texture. She explained the theories about what made the rocks move, the most likely one being wind pushing them along ice. (This was before they knew the real explanation.) When we went back to the vans, some other tourists were unable to start their car, so they rode back in one of the other vans. We drove to the Ubehebe (yoo-bee-hee-bee) Crater; one classmate was saying it gave him the "heebee geebies." We got there a little later than planned, so we didn't have much time. Dr. Radebaugh asked me if I had ever seen a volcano before; I don't remember what I told her.

When we got back in the vans, Dr. Radebaugh played her iPod. It had songs like "Just the Two of Us" (which took me back to third grade) and the unedited version of John Mayer's "Heartbreak Warfare." When "Shut Up and Let Me Go" came on, "Megan" said it was an interesting song and I said, "Good old Ting Tings"; she didn't know who the Ting Tings were. When we got back to camp, we ate fajitas, and a nomadic man from the next camp over ate with us. "Megan" asked him if he had read the Book of Mormon; he said he was Buddhist. I asked him if he had read the Dhammapada; he said he hadn't.

2011. It was a very long day. I remember working with my coworker Michelle, talking about how it was dark outside, and we had arrived at work when it was dark. She said we could say something like, "When I was young, I used to go to work before the sun rose and got home after it went down." I also was talking about how music from the previous year took me back to that year; she told me I could change the radio station to one that was like the music of the previous year. After I got home, I went to Winegar's. There was a "Happy Thanksgiving" sign out front, but lots of Christmas stuff inside. I bought some clearance candy corn Dots (which they don't make anymore) and a bag of bulk candy corn taffy. I had gone to the store to get tortillas for a work party the next day. It's possible this was the day  that when I got to the store, a lady and her daughter asked if I could pretend to be the daughter's boyfriend for some reason, but I declined.

2010. I was delighted to learn that I unexpectedly got a scholarship for when I returned to BYU in January. If I had been in school that fall, I wouldn't have had a scholarship for fall or winter, but because I took fall off, I got one for winter.

2009. I don't really remember this day, but this is what my journal says:
"Today was one of the first days in a long time that Elder Tamblyn was healthy for all of the day. Therefore, we were able to get a lot accomplished, visiting the Heaths and Sister Adair. We did some light tracting in the dark, which I hate. We had dinner with the Larsens and my back tire got flat. We met with the Piquets. Michael told me I should become a professor or a teacher because I'm a great teacher, which surprised me, since I don't feel like I'm too good at teaching over there."

2008. I remember going to Walmart and looking at their clearance Halloween stuff. I think I got some decorative gourds. I remember wondering out loud if there was any chocolate left, and another customer said it was all gone at that point. I got lots of candy corn: regular, Indian, and chocolate caramel, and I think I got candy corn taffy as well. Elder Love got a big bag of sugar-based candy. At the elders' house in Cheney, Elder Love cut his hair before cutting mine. He forgot to put the right size comb thing on the end of the clippers, so he started before he realized what he had done. At that point, it was too late, so he gave me a super short haircut. He told me I was going to be mad. I looked in the mirror and had to look away in shock. I remembered the episode of Gilligan's Island where Gilligan proclaimed, "I'm bald!" As we were getting in the car, I found a giant leaf and put it on my head to cover my baldness. I vaguely remember dinner with the Moores--the wife was active but the husband wasn't. This is my journal entry for the day:
"Today Elder Love helped a lot with the Herrons' tile while I studied and such. We went up to our typical P-day places. I bought a huge amount of Thanksgiving stuff, including four bags of candy. And the Moores gave us candy. Between what we bought, the Herrons' candy, the Moores' candy, and Amber's candy, I am going to get so fat.
 "We bowled briefly. Then Elder Love cut his hair, then mine. But he put the wrong comb on the clippers, and my hair is the shortest it's ever been in my life."

2006. We drove down to Fillmore for my Grandma Judy's viewing. Around this time, my mom's friend Jackie's son's wife's mom had died from falling down stairs, so Susanne told me that the third person (since they always happen in threes) was one of Ya-ping's friends' baby. At the viewing, Susanne held up three-year-old Allie to view Grandma Judy and said, "Pretty, huh." Ya-ping told Preston (not quite two) she was sleeping, so he waved "Night night!"

2003. I think I was watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving while doing my homework, and I didn't focus well, so I vowed that I could no longer watch TV while doing homework. My mom was kind of frustrated with me with me not taking my homework seriously.

2002. It was a Sunday in Taiwan. It was "Elder Melville's" last Sunday there, so they had him speak. They asked my dad to bear his testimony, but he mostly just told about our family, with David translating. When talking about me, he said I liked to put lots of lights up, and David clearly said something that wasn't what he said--it sounded like explosions. At one point when he was speaking, he said, "Frankfurt, stand up," and all the Taiwanese were surprised I was fourteen--since I was both fat and taller than they were. Another speaker talked about him in her talk and talked about the way he did Taiwanese signs with both hands. I went to the youth Sunday School, where a youth translated for me (I think they had lived in Colorado). It was awkward for him, because the teacher was talking about the world's standards on chastity and how wrong they were. After church, I remember Susanne saying she wished we knew what David was really saying. I remember a few different gatherings, and at least one of them occurred on a Sunday. There was one with a large supply of food, including Domino's seafood pizza, fried squid tentacles, and duck. I didn't like the duck and didn't try the others. At another gathering with the deaf branch, there was an American-style chocolate cake, which wasn't overly sweet, but the Taiwanese didn't touch it, except for one guy who kept going back to it.