November 23-29, 2014

Time to remember Thanksgiving week from a year ago.

Sunday, November 23. During Sunday School, I talked to Keith Savage, determining that we had been in the same ward in Provo. He had lived in the Wellington apartment complex. He didn't remember which ward it was, so I said it was with Bishop Taylor, perhaps my favorite bishop. He said he was a good bishop but he didn't love him as much as our current bishop, Bishop Eyring. After church, my home teachers, Michael Angerbauer and Nathan Loveridge, came by. I had told my family they were coming, and I think I had to tell my niece, Allie, to turn down her TV downstairs. Mike did most of the talking, and he said he liked our house, I think in reference to all the Thanksgiving decorations. I told them they were mine. Then he asked if I had dietary restrictions in case he brought me goodies, so I explained my peculiar habits. That night my grandparents came over, and we went downstairs on our big TV so I could show them family history things. On FamilySearch, I showed them the names I had reserved, and Grandma said, "Oh, there are some Burrells." I showed them Puzzilla and Roots Mapper. Grandpa sometimes had a hard time hearing. I journalized as follows:
"This morning I had to brush snow off my car before church. I wore my turkey tie but didn't get as many compliments as I would have hoped. I passed the sacrament and learned that Keith Savage from the 18th Ward in Provo is in my ward now.
"This afternoon my home teachers, Mike Angerbauer and Nathan Loveridge, came by. Then I napped, and this afternoon I blogged. Grandma and Grandpa came and I showed them FamilySearch. I didn't do as much as I wanted to do." 

Monday, November 24. I went to my ward's Thanksgiving dinner FHE at our first counselor's house. I was dismayed at all their Christmas decorations, and they even had Christmas music playing. One table had Pilgrim and Indian decorations on it. I sat at a table with a bunch of other guys; Boyd asked people what their favorite movies and TV shows were. I said Nightmare Before Christmas for the movie, but I can't remember whether I was asked about TV; I would have said Gilligan's Island. At one point we had a devotional (I can't remember whether it was before or after dinner), and we sang "Silent Night"--but while everyone else was singing that, I sang "For the Beauty of the Earth" instead. Our bishop said he appreciated the Bennetts' decorations because it reminded him of the previous Christmas being together. Peter Moosman couldn't eat the turkey since he was vegetarian, but he couldn't eat the mashed potatoes either, since they had been catered and had bacon in them. I had some pie; I think I had pecan pie. When I went outside, Andy Davis talked to me because he hadn't met me before; he said he was supposed to get a picture for the online directory. I told him I already had one uploaded. He asked me what I was doing, and I told him about work. Then Shannon Kelly came out and joined the conversation too, since she also worked for the Church History Department. I said that that day I had been reading about how the pioneers wanted to destroy all the wildlife in Utah. Shannon said that the previous year, the topic of Sunday School study had been the Doctrine and Covenants, and the teachers sometimes said things she knew weren't right, since she worked for the Joseph Smith Papers. Andy encouraged her to speak up in those situations. We stood out in the cold talking for quite a while. Then I went to Winegar's grocery store to pick up some items for pumpkin pie. I think I saw some pumpkin spice whipped cream, but I didn't get it. Then I went home and my mom helped me to make the pies. I actually think she did more work, but I did my best to put the store-bought pie crusts in the dishes. While we were making them, we watched Garfield's Thanksgiving, and my mom laughed when Jon came out in a ballerina costume.

Tuesday, November 25. After work, we loaded up our Suburban to head out to California. I brought my little bag of leftover candy corn of various sorts and my pillow in a Thanksgiving pillowcase. I also brought my tape deck adapter so that we could listen to my Thanksgiving music, which I had saved to my phone. I had actually put some CDs in a CD case to listen to, but we forgot it, and I felt bad. My dad had brought some tapes, so we listened to them, including one that was Simon and Garfunkel's Central Park concert. My mom said her sister would get mad when she would sing "Wake Up Little Suzie." I hadn't heard the song since I was a kid, so I didn't know how sensual it was. I remember passing a sign pointing to Iosepa, and I said, "Wasn't that a Hawaiian community?" Later I turned on my Thanksgiving music, and at one point my mom said I had weird Thanksgiving music. I remember some of their specific reactions to some of the songs:

• When Nicole Westbrook's "It's Thanksgiving" played, they had to turn the volume down; my mom said it had a lot of bass. She asked how I found it, so I explained that it had been a viral video in 2012.
• When Kory Kunz's "Thanksgiving Day" played, Mom asked how I found it; I explained that I had happened to see it on the back of a CD at the BYU Bookstore and remembered that it existed.
• When Jolene Taylor's version of "Now Thank We All Our God," I explained that it was meant as missionary exercise music; Mom said it sounded like little kid music. She later said she liked the version of "For the Beauty of the Earth." Or maybe it was the other way around, maybe she liked that "For the Beauty of the Earth" first, but then I said her other songs were weird.
• When "Sliced Turkey" was playing, they began singing along, "I'm bringing home a baby bumblebee." Mom asked why that was in my playlist; I explained that it wasn't "I'm bringing home a baby bumblebee," and it was in my introductory piano textbook, which said to play it "with a little Thanksgiving."

Jon Scmidt's version of "For the Beauty of the Earth" was playing when we stopped for dinner in Elko. We were going to Arby's, but then I noticed we were passing a Port of Subs, and I wanted to go there to get a Pilgrim Griller. My mom dropped her phone as she was getting out of the car, and it cracked a little bit. My mom and I both got eight-inch sandwiches, but my dad got a full-size one. My mom got a drink, and I was disappointed she got diet soda instead of Powerade. She said it had fewer calories than Powerade. My dad had some leftovers, since his was a bigger sandwich. I thanked them for letting us stop at Port of Subs, which my mom and I preferred to Arby's, but my dad was visibly disappointed that we didn't go to Arby's. Then we stopped in Winnemucca at the hotel we usually stayed in.

Wednesday, November 26. We got in the car, and I'm sure my dad made some joke about me not forgetting my shoes, since I had left some shoes there in 2012. I resumed my Thanksgiving music. Eventually, "Little Birdie" from A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving came on. My dad said we had already heard it, and I said that we hadn't; it was a cover of the song that previously played. My mom interpreted it as a hint to listen to something else, so they turned on the radio. I think they found a country station, or maybe it was classic rock. The DJs shared some trivia, saying it was a day when a lot of people would order pizza, not wanting to mess up their kitchen. They said "Jingle Bells" was originally written as a Thanksgiving song, which of course I already knew. They also said some things that made me uncomfortable. There were some Port of Subs commercials advertising the Pilgrim Griller, which I had just had. As we were coming out of Donner Pass, it was quite scenic, and I asked if I could turn my Thanksgiving music back on while we were still in a scenic area. I explained that the shuffle feature had decided to put both original versions of "Little Birdie" next to each other. I commented that the version of "Linus and Lucy" was the best one. And I think all three versions of "Jingle Bells" were near the end of the playlist. Then the playlist ended, and I just played my favorites playlist. When Taylor Swift's "I Knew You Were Trouble" played, Mom asked whether the music was supposed to sound that way. Lady Gaga's "Telephone" was playing as we exited off the freeway near David's house. We drove to their apartment, which had leftover Halloween eyes on the front door. I knocked on the front door and tried to open it, but it was locked; I heard Ya-ping inside say "It's Grandma!" Four-year-old Nathaniel took an instant liking to me. He was telling me about all the characters you could be on Super Smash Bros. and what you could do with them; I can't remember whether he was sitting on my lap or just next to me. I asked him if he liked school; he said no because the other kids said he was yucky. He also had to show me his ABC games, educational games on the computer. They were saved in a bookmark, and I think he disrupted a page where David wanted to buy something on sale. (He later got in trouble with Ya-ping for not ordering it in time.) David said to Nathaniel, "Do you have an audience?" Nathaniel was in the chair and I was standing, so I asked Nathaniel if he wanted to sit in my lap, but he didn't. I asked Nathaniel if he knew what holiday was the next day, and I asked if he knew what we did on Thanksgiving. He knew we ate pumpkin pie, and he said he had pumpkin pie at his school. I asked him how many moms he had, since the previous summer he would give a number in the hundreds or thousands; he said, "Two, because Grandma is one of daddy's moms." At one point in the day, David and Ya-ping went to San Francisco with my dad to get Mexican food for dinner. I asked the boys if they wanted to go to the playground; Nathaniel was the only one who did. He loved climbing everything. I asked him what his full name was; he said "Nathaniel Melville." I said, "Or is it Nathaniel Qi-en Melville?" to which he responded "That's a totally stupid name." He said that his dad's name was David Melville, but his old name was David Boyd Melville, and he called him that when he was a kid. I said, "Were you alive when he was a kid?" and he said, "I was a baby. I said, 'Hi David Boyd Melville!'" There was a little Chinese boy who kept saying things in Chinese. Nathaniel said, "I don't understand you. I only understand English. I don't know Chinese." The little boy said, "Chinese?" Then Nathaniel said what I knew was a "bad" word in Chinese; I told him he needed to stop or we would go home. Before we left, he pointed out to me that the Chinese kid wanted me to move the zipline handle to where he could reach it. Nathaniel found a leaf on the ground and said we could make a bouquet with it. At another point in the day, my mom and Ya-ping went to Costco and got pecan pie and some pumpkin pie almonds, which were very good. I told Mom and Ya-ping about the funny things Nathaniel had said. That night we watched A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving; Preston was intrigued at the mention of Miles Standish, and both Franklin and Preston gave a small history of the Pilgrims. They wanted to watch the Pilgrim episode of This Is America, Charlie Brown, but that would have to wait.

Thursday, November 27. I woke up and asked Nathaniel if he knew what day it was. My dad had gone running and encouraged me to do the same, but I was reluctant. Ya-ping and Mom went shopping, including to a dollar store to get a tray for the turkey. Ya-ping wanted the boys to go out and play, but it was too cold. I was watching Free Birds that day, and David asked if it was OK if we watched it that morning while it was warming up for the boys. I said "yeah" and Ya-ping gave her approval. She later asked for an explanation of what was going on in the movie; in typical fashion David explained in Chinese. Then we went out to play; I was wearing red shorts and roast turkey socks. The older boys went and played on the field with their dad and my dad, while Nathaniel again wanted to climb the playground.

 I was holding a large frisbee with a hole in it. To free my hands, I put it on my neck, and Nathaniel said, "Your shadow looks like a clown." I asked if he liked clowns, and he said, "No! Why would you ask that!?" Then David came over to get the frisbee. Later in the day we ate our meal. They boys didn't care for the food. Mom said, "This is a traditional Thanksgiving meal," since they hadn't really eaten one before. David had said he wanted spicy Thai. Preston did, however, love the "salad" my mom makes with whipped topping and Jello powder. That night, at the request of the boys, we did watch the "Mayflower Voyagers" Charlie Brown episode. Afterwards, Preston said, "In Free Birds, Miles Standish was the bad guy, but in Charlie Brown he was just a nice guy." David said the truth was probably somewhere in the middle. (Now really, most people are nice, so I know of no reason to just assume he was less than nice, especially since he wasn't spectacularly nice in the Peanuts show.) I told Preston that Miles Standish was our ancestor. David asked Preston if he thought he was our ancestor from his mom's side or his dad's side, but he didn't get it.

Friday, November 28. The next day we talked about going to Six Flags, which wouldn't open until later in the day. I put on my new Santa socks, and I asked Nathaniel what was on them. He said, "Snowmen. I mean Santa Claus." Then we went to Six Flags and got on the shuttle from the parking lot to the park. I was amused at the graffiti that I assumed meant to say "4 Ever" but instead said "7 Ever."

We went on a few rides near the entry, then Preston and Nathaniel wanted to go to another ride, but when we got there it was closed. I called my parents (while the park speakers were playing Christmas music) to meet up with them. We found them. Later we walked through the shark building, and we ran into some of Ya-ping's friends, whom they had gotten into the park. David was in line for a ride with the two younger boys, but then Franklin decided he wanted to go ride the train, so I took him. I was glad he was willing to go with me, since in previous years he wouldn't have been. We didn't talk too much, as it was hard to hear, but we talked about favorite holidays. He liked Christmas, and I was surprised Valentine's Day was among his favorites. The ride operator asked for a group of three, but since there were two of us, I didn't speak up; but it turns out he meant three or less, so once I figured that out, I spoke up and we got on the train. I couldn't figure out how to open the door, but a girl in the seat in front helped us. We rode the train through lit trees. Later, Franklin was talking about the time the previous summer when I had sat on our weight bench and lifted him like a weight. He was saying he could be a weight for Halloween. Then we got in our car and I helped buckle Nathaniel. Preston asked, "What time is it?" I said, "It's seven o five," and Nathaniel said, "You mean seven zero five, because o is a letter." I said, "You're right, I do mean seven zero five, because o is a letter." My mom said something like, "Take that, English person." Then we went home and watched the three-minute Christmas clip of the Peanuts Motion Comics Collection. They thought it was funny that Linus was mad about getting the presents he wanted.

Saturday, November 29. We went to Point Reyes National Seashore, where, despite the name, we didn't see the seashore. We walked along the Earthquake Trail, a short, paved loop. Nathaniel and Preston ran it and got way ahead of us. I wanted to keep up with them, but I didn't want to miss out on the geological interpretive signs, so I ran from sign to sign. I was fascinated by the replica of the fence that was displaced during the 1906 earthquake.

 When I caught up with the boys, I told them that they had missed the cool fence.

 I watched Nathaniel play around the tree stumps and picnic tables. He wanted to hide from his dad and scare him, but I don't think it worked out like he wanted.

 On our way back, we put in a short Christmas tape my dad had brought. I was saying I didn't like many winter songs, like "Baby It's Cold Outside." David said the lyrics were perhaps in poor taste but it wasn't as bad as some people said, and it was still an awesome song; I said I agreed but thought it was an annoying song. It was raining, so my dad turned on the wipers; later it wasn't raining, and David said, "Are you going to turn the wipers off?" since they made a squeaking sound. Then we went to Target. We looked in their movies; my dad got Hotel Transylvania because it was only five dollars. I saw She's a Good Skate, Charlie Brown and some Magic School Bus DVDs. We looked at food we could get for our trip, so we got grapes, bagels, and lunch meat. I wanted to get gingerbread Pop-Tarts, but they didn't have any, so I got the sugar cookie ones instead. They got Doritos for the boys. We looked through the Christmas goodies. I wanted to get chocolate peppermint granola bars and fruit snacks, and Franklin said, "Thanks Uncle Mark," and my mom told him that I hadn't said I was going to share with them. She wanted to get candy cane Tootsie Pops. Preston liked the "snowflake" Ritz crackers, and I said I refused to buy them because they had eight points instead of six, and David said, "Wait, is it impossible for snowflakes to have more than six points?" He seemed like he didn't believe me, and I was surprised he didn't know that. When we were checking out, the cashier said, "Getting ready for Christmas?" and I think he asked where we were from. We went back to the apartment, and I think my dad did some awkward lane changing out of the parking lot. I went to watch my Christmas show of the day, the weird episode of The Bob Cummings Show, and Preston said, "This isn't Charlie Brown." Nathaniel took one look at the black-and-white and said, "I don't like this movie." He went to play his ABC game. (He played them a lot during the trip and at one point printed snowmen, which annoyed Ya-ping.) Preston kept asking, "What's up with the grandpa?" in the episode. After it was over, we were watching Hotel Transylvania. David asked me if I could watch holiday movies out of season. I said for one thing, I didn't even know if it was a Halloween movie. David told Nathaniel we were watching a movie, and I don't think he realized that the black-and-white episode was over, so he said, "I don't like that movie!" David said, "You'll like this movie. It has pumpkins in it," since he loved the pumpkins in his ABC game. After the movie they watched a short on the DVD. David said it was a better movie than it deserved to be. The boys ate the Doritos we had bought.

 David made "fake eggnog" with spice and pudding but no eggs. He gave me some and asked if it tasted like eggnog; I said it did because I could taste the nutmeg. We also ate the "winter" Oreos with red filling that we had bought. The boys played the Clue game that we brought for them, and Nathaniel told me that he could see through my cards.

Pioneer Day, 2012-14

A few years ago, I made a post about Pioneer Day, so I'm going to remember those that have happened since that time.

2014. In the morning I wanted to pick apricots so my mom could make something with them. Nathaniel wanted to help me, so I went out with him and he climbed on top of our swingset to reach the fruit. I put my arm around him, and he kept saying, "I got it! Wet [let] go!" Of course I didn't; I  told him I would be very sad if he fell down. I came in with the colander full of apricots and said to my mom that some of them were a little green, winking that Nathaniel had picked some that weren't quite ripe. Preston said, "Did Baby pick them?" Nathaniel said, "I didn't know!" (Indeed, Preston had picked plenty of green ones himself the year before at the age of eight.) Then we went to a McDonald's in Salt Lake since the boys all like it for some reason. Franklin put his chicken nugget on his straw, and Preston followed suit, and they drank soda while eating nuggets. Preston said they should make nugget-flavored soda.

Then we went to the mall to go to the Lego Store. Nathaniel didn't bring shoes, so he had to wear Allie's girly shoes, which he wasn't too happy about. I carried him across the parking lot, and while I was doing so I asked him who was cuter, me or his dad, and he said me, because I was younger even though I had bigger legs. [I just asked him in 2015. He said, "That's a hard choice....It's too complicated. I think you because you're not as old as my dad."] We went to the Lego store, where there were bins where they could fill cups with Legos. He didn't like to get Legos from bins with Disney Princess covers, so he didn't get white flowers, but he got purple and pink flowers, since they weren't in Princess covers. There were some orange Legos with a Princess cover (Allie said, "The orange could be for the pumpkin carriage," and my mom said the covers probably didn't necessarily mean anything to do with princesses), so Nathaniel didn't get the orange ones, but he loved to get some clear ones, even though they did come from a Princess cover. Ya-ping tried to fit more Legos in Preston's cup by shaking the contents of one cup into another. I could have told her it wouldn't work, and indeed it made it worse. As she was doing that, David said, "This is where Preston gets it." David wanted to see whether Nathaniel wanted to fill up a cup or get a cheap set, and he wanted both, causing David to say, "That's not an option." Then we went to Chinese Gourmet to meet my grandparents for dinner. While we were waiting, we tried to get Ya-ping's niece to speak English, but she was too shy to do so. Susanne said she didn't know she could speak English. At the restaurant, it was the first time I ever had Mongolian barbecue. We came home and David's high school friend Preston Hawkes, for whom David's Preston was named, came over. I had been in my room playing on the Super Nintendo but I went out and gave him an update on what I was doing in life. Nathaniel loved talking to this big Preston; he was telling him he knew Chinese, but Preston thought he was talking about his knees. David said that Nathaniel was by far their easiest four-year-old. I asked Nathaniel to tell Preston how many moms he had; he didn't respond, but Preston said, "That's a lot. Anything more than one is a lot." David said that one day he just started talking about his new mom, which made Ya-ping ask David why he said that. They talked about their crazy friend Mike Bishop, and Preston said he was still Facebook friends with Mike's ex-wife. Preston talked about his younger brother being a jerk in public without knowing it, and he said he (Preston) didn't usually like to swear but he called someone a bad name. He said he would have to visit David when he was with his son, and David said they could take them to the Exploratorium. This is my journal entry for the day:
"Today I picked apricots and Nathaniel helped me. Then we all went to McDonald's and then to the Lego store. We went to dinner with G'ma and G'pa. Tonight big Preston came and visited. I'm going to miss those kids."

2013. I think it was a little boring, so I made a blog post about pioneers. (I could write a much better blog today.) That night I went running, and when I got back a bunch of people were lighting sparklers, so they invited me to do so too. We got on the apartment staircase to take pictures. (I found a picture, but I feel weird stealing someone else's picture.)

2012. I made this Facebook status: "I've never really thought of Pioneer Day as much of a holiday. However, I am grateful for my pioneer ancestors who went through such hardships and sacrificed so much, working 'with might for a cause that's right' to establish this great state of Utah." I spent the day looking at words in Isaiah in the Oxford English Dictionary and writing a paper about it for my Isaiah class. I hadn't been running in a while because I had knee problems, but I went that night, and as I was up on campus in front of the testing center, I looked out over Provo and saw aerial fireworks. Then I went home and drank Powerade.

July 1-5, 2014

Memorial Day weekend has me thinking about patriotic holidays--specifically the Fourth of July, so I'm going to remember what I can about the Fourth of July last year.

July 1. I got up early and called my boss, and he told me he wanted me to create his Wikipedia page. He wanted me to look at other Mormon historians and pattern the page after theirs. I'd never done any Wikipedia work before, so I spent the day learning how to do it and writing his bio. That night I pulled down my bicycle and pumped up the tires, and I went biking. I biked near Lofty Lane in North Salt Lake and passed a family lighting fireworks. This is part of my journal entry for the day (parts of it have things I shouldn't put on the internet):
"I got up earlier than usual today because I needed to call Reid. He wants me to create his Wikipedia page, so I've been trying to do that.
"During my lunch break, I went to Winegar's. After work, I did some light organizing, then played some Nintendo.
"I almost went running, but then I decided to go biking instead. It was fun to be on a bike again. I had to get on the sidewalk to avoid some fireworks. Then I lifted weights, and then I watched Bewitched."

July 2. This might have been the day when I told my dad that a lot of the work I had been doing on Wikipedia had been lost. He said "Oh no" like it was a horrible thing, but I wasn't that worried about it. I was wearing my blue-and-white-striped socks with red stars when I went biking again that night. I went up to Gary Way via Centennial and went on David Way. I wasn't gone very long. My dad seemed disappointed I went for such a short time and said he wouldn't have closed the garage if he knew how soon I would come back. Late that night, my mom came home with my sister-in-law Ya-ping, my niece Allie, my three nephews, and Ya-ping's niece.


July 3. I was working from home, as usual. When I was working on the Wikipedia page, I got this funny Captcha image, so I put it on Facebook:

My aunt, Sue, was going to the zoo, so she invited my nephews to go to it. Preston and Franklin didn't want to go, but Nathaniel did, so my mom took him there. When she came home, she said that it was funny to see him shy when he met up with Peter. I reminded her that he was shy at first when we met them that summer but quickly warmed up. Later Peter came back with him, and it had taken him a very long time to get to our house because he got extremely turned around. As soon as he got to our house, Preston and Franklin became very noisy, so I had to go work in my room. Then Sue and Nicole and the babies Nathan "Wallace" and John "Bruce" came over to go up to the fireworks with us. At one point, I went downstairs and my mom and Susanne told me Nathaniel had been talking about his other moms. Susanne said, "How many was it he had? [Some number in the thousands]?" and Nathaniel chimed in, "And wifty," which we all found quite funny. We walked up to the fireworks, and I brought my patriotic Goldfish with us. Ya-ping made the boys take jackets, even though it was the middle of the summer, which I thought was ridiculous. We passed the Anderson house, and Sue stayed behind and talked with them. Preston was getting way ahead, even though he didn't know where we were going. At the top of the hill just as we enter the golf course, Franklin was bawling, and I think it was because Preston had hit him with his jacket and the zipper hit him in the face. I think Franklin's crying was excessive, but I told Preston he needed to be careful, and he gave some excuse I didn't entirely buy. After we had secured a spot on the grass, Nathaniel needed to go to the bathroom, so I took him. There were long lines, and he kept asking why it was taking so long. We had an interesting conversation, which went something like this:
"Why is the sun in half?"
"That's not the sun, that's the moon."
"Where did the sun go?"
"It went down already."
"Is the sun made out of fire?"
"Kind of." (Keep in mind that I was talking to a four-year-old.)
"Is it made out of lava?"
"Nope."
"Preston said it was made out of lava, but he was lying. Is the moon made out of fire?"
"No, the moon is made out of rocks."
"Why did they make it like that?"
"Because a really long time ago, in space, there were lots of pieces that stuck together and became rocks, and then lots of rocks stuck together and made the moon. And the earth."
"That happened a really long time ago?"
Allie met her friend Katy and played with her. We were missing "Wallace," so we assumed he had gone with Allie. A little later, Peter suddenly got up and ran over to catch Wallace, who was wandering on his own in a large group of people. When Allie came back to us, we said, "Did you know that Nathan followed you?" She said yeah, it apparently not having occurred to her that she should have made sure he was still with her, so we told her to be more careful. Susanne distributed glow sticks to us, and Nicole gave some Goldfish to John. We could hear distant music playing. One song was Pharrell's "Happy," and Preston said, "Why is the 'Happy' song from Despicable Me 2 so popular?" When Katy Perry's "Firework" was playing, we knew the fireworks would start soon. During the fireworks, Nathaniel got a little scared, saying, "They're getting woser [closer]!" He cuddled up to Sue for protection. Then when they were over, we walked home. I carried John in his stroller down the rocky hill.

July 4. That morning, Preston went outside and got stung by a wasp. He came inside and said he was stung; he looked at the sting and said he still had the stinger in him because he could see a little black dot. Ya-ping looked at it and also saw the dot, but I looked at it, and I said I thought it was just where some blood had filled in where he had been poked and then dried. Franklin said, surprised, "You know about science?!" I made a Facebook status that day that said, "I love America! But I don't feel that I have a right to say I'm proud to be American, because I didn't do anything to be American." Sue was at our house again and said she thought it was funny. I think she also complimented my flag socks. I invited the boys to watch a Fourth-of-July-themed movie, Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July, but initially only Preston wanted to. He asked me when it was made; I said 1980, and he said, "It's pretty good for its age." Later, the other boys came in. When the bearded villain Winterbolt flew in on his sleigh, and Rudolph said, "It's a sleigh all right, but it's not Santa," Nathaniel said, "It is Santa Claus!" I had to explain it just looked like him. At some point that day, our AC broke. My mom and Ya-ping had gone shopping, and I stayed with the boys. Franklin saw a Monopoly game in our closet, and he wanted to play it, but I said it would be hard and complicated, but we could try it. Well, both Preston and Franklin were distracted by watching cartoons, so I basically had to do everything, which was annoying and stressful. Franklin wanted to buy every property he could, but Preston didn't. At one point Franklin said, "I like this game. You said it was hard and complicated," and I thought it was weird he said that, since I was the one doing everything in the game. Mom and the girls came home with hot dogs and a watermelon. Ya-ping cut the watermelon the weirdest way I have ever seen. She put the Monopoly game away, which I had left out in case the boys wanted to continue playing, but she put it away hastily, and I had to go back and organize all the money again. That evening, she was on the patio talking to David, and I was lighting the fire pit to roast the last patriotic marshmallows with the boys. When I started the fire, it flared up, and Ya-ping gasped--then I heard her saying my nickname in Chinese on the phone, presumably telling David why she gasped. We had s'mores, but some of the boys just wanted marshmallows. That night we went to Susanne's house to light fireworks. The first ones were parachutes, and the boys were arguing over who got them, since some exploded or disappeared. Sue said she would take them and later that evening there would be a number-guessing game to see who got them. My mom said she was just going to tell them it didn't matter, but Sue's idea was to make them forget about it. (It worked.) Susanne's neighbors had huge fireworks. I shared my red, white, and blue Tic-Tacs with the boys and everyone else, and when I was waving my sparkler, I pretended I was conducting music. Then we went home and I got on my computer, listening to a few of my Fourth of July songs before bed. Here's my journal entry for the day:
"An OK Fourth. I stayed home most of the day. When the girls went shopping, I stayed home with the boys. Preston watched Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July with me. He asked how old it was, then said, 'It's pretty good for its age.' Then Franklin wanted to play Monopoly, which kind of stressed me out. Then I had to grill on the barbecue, because Pops was trying to fix the broken AC. Then we went to Nan's and lit little fireworks while her neighbors did big ones."

July 5. My family was going to a wedding for my first cousin once removed, and we stopped at Susanne's house beforehand. I, on the other hand, was going back to Provo. I found that my clip-on sunglasses had the plastic coating melt so that they had a permanent smudge on them. I got back to my apartment, which was a mess because it had just been painted. I decided to try out Spotify, so I downloaded the program and listened to some odds and ends. I think I was discovering how useful a tool it would be to find holiday music, and I listened to Ed Sheeran's "Sing."

December 5, 2009

Some of my previous posts have included the first time I met two of my nephews, Preston and Nathaniel. But since my middle nephew, Franklin, is turning 7 this week, I'm going to remember the day I first met him. He was born while I was on my mission, so I didn't get to see him until I was home five days, when he was twenty-two months.

In the morning, my parents and I went to the airport to meet Ya-ping, Preston, and Franklin. My dad and I went up the escalators where new arrivals came down, while my mom waited at the bottom. We were waiting and waiting, when suddenly I saw some kids run up to my mom. I thought, "Who are those girls, and why are they going up to my mom?" Then I realized they were my long-haired nephews, so we went down and met up with them. As we were going up the elevator, I tried talking to Franklin, who was very shy and clinging to his mom. Ya-ping was saying, "You look different!" In the car on the way home, I was  turning around and tickling Franklin on his leg, which made him giggle, which made my mom laugh. He also began singing the "Elmo's World" theme song: "Ma, mawmo, maa!" We got home, and Sue had brought Peter over to see them. My parents and I went to our church for our ward Christmas breakfast. Lots of people (such as Evan Gubler) were coming up to me to welcome me home. They told me that I had gotten taller, but I think that was just an illusion because I wasn't as fat. The guests for our party were bagpipers, which I found annoying and un-Christmassy. We left early, and when we got home Peter was playing with Preston. I tried to talk to Preston, but he just responded by blowing raspberries.

That afternoon, we had a large trip with family to different stores. It included me, Mom, Susanne, Allie, Ya-ping, Franklin, Sue, Peter, and Quin, so of course we drove in the Suburban. Jesse might have been there too, I can't remember. Preston had been napping when we left, so he didn't come with us. First we went to DI, I think because Ya-ping wanted to get clothes and stuffed animals for the boys. While we were there, Allie said, referring to the Thompsons, "They like Franklin more than me!" My mom told her that I was still around her, while the others were playing with Franklin. At one point, Quin told her, "We get to see you all the time, but we don't get to see Franklin as much." Then we went to Walmart, and as we were going in, we had a conversation about elderly relatives on Facebook. At one point, my mom called my dad, who was home with Preston, and when she was done, she said that he had said that Preston was fine now that he had stopped crying. We went through the Christmas candy aisle, and I wanted to get mint miniature candy bars. But then Ya-ping said she wanted to get miniature Snickers with Christmas wrappers, and I couldn't justify getting two things of candy, and I resented her choice of generic candy over special mint varieties.

When we got home, Preston was watching Harry Potter on TV with my dad, which Ya-ping wasn't too happy about, because she thought it was violent.

December 30

Today is December 30, so I'm going to remember the December 30s of the past.

2013. It was our last full day in California, and I was wearing my red-orange pants. While the other adults had gone someplace, Ya-ping wanted me to accompany the boys to the park at their apartment complex. They showed me how to get there, and I supervised them playing, particularly Nathaniel.

Suddenly, there was a hubbub around one of the park's garbage cans, as one of the janitors was freaking out. There was a rat in the trash can, and it was trying to jump out. My nephews wanted me to hold them so they could see it, and some of the other people worried about me doing so, since the rat was trying to jump out, and it got close on occasion. I took a picture on my phone, and then another janitor showed up, and I was able to show him the picture, because I don't know if he believed the story.

He made fun of the first janitor for being afraid. Eventually they put a stick in the garbage, and the rat was able to climb out, and it ran into the bushes. I think Preston was trying to coax it out of the bushes. Then we had to make a stop in the apartment again, and Preston was trying to come up with an excuse not to go back. He said he was scared of the rat running loose, but I knew that was an excuse, because he sure wasn't afraid of it when we were there. When we went back, Nathaniel brought his little bike. He left it on the playground while he went playing, and then Preston said, "Uh oh," because we noticed a woman pushing a little girl on it. Of course, Qi-en didn't like that--"I don't want her riding it." I said, "Then go tell her," and he said, "No, I want you to," and I thought it was more of the job of the adult, so I took him and I went up and said, "Can he ride on it?" She got off, but then Preston told me that he could tell the woman was mad because she was talking angrily with a friend (they weren't speaking English). It was weird enough to ride someone else's bike, but to be mad when you get kicked off--that's excessively odd. Although Franklin had been good for most of our visit, I think he had a screaming fit that afternoon. That evening we were going to go out to eat, and I think Franklin wanted to go to McDonald's, but we were going to a Chinese buffet. Franklin was upset about that and felt entitled to his way. I remember talking about some of the events of December 30, 2010, concerning Franklin, while we were at dinner. When we got back to the apartment, Preston wanted to sleep in the living room with my parents--and since he was given permission to do so, the other boys wanted to too. They then began to get every blanket and stuffed animal they could find and pile it on the couch.
David told them that there wasn't enough room for all of them to sleep on the couch with all their stuff. Preston was willing to sleep on the floor, but something triggered Franklin that he got possessed, all because his dad said there wasn't room for all of them on the couch. He had a screaming, crying fit. David told him to go to his room and that he had five minutes to calm down, or else he wouldn't be able to sleep in the living room. He screamed and cried on his bed for a long time. Eventually David went in to talk to him, and said, "You've been crying a long time." Franklin was coming up with some excuse: "When you were five years old..." David had to say, "If being five years old means that you're too young not to have a fit, then being five years old means that you're too young to sleep in the living room. Do you understand?" He did end up letting Franklin go back to the living room, and Ya-ping said to him, "You're too nice." In the meantime, I was trying to find my phone's charger, and David found every one in his house, but none of them were mine. It turned out that I hadn't brought mine, so I don't know I had been charging it while I was there.

2012. My parents and I were driving home from California with my grandparents. It was very early in the morning, so I spent a lot of the time sleeping. Donner Pass was snowy, but I slept through much of it. At one point, my mom asked if it would disrupt Grandpa's hearing if they listened to music; Grandma said it didn't matter. At one point they turned on the weird CD my dad had bought my mom, "The Best of the 80s." I didn't like that choice for a Sunday, so I listened to churchy music on my new MP3 player, including the Lower Lights and Jan Terri's "Follow Jesus." We made a stop at a Nevada gas station/casino, and we had to make a stop in Winnemucca to get gas. We also had to stop at the hotel we had stayed at on our way there; Grandpa said, "Why are we stopping here?" and it was because I had left my shoes at the hotel. When he saw that, he realized why I had worn "red tennis shoes" (they were actually Vans) at Preston's baptism they day before. I think our last stop was in Nevada not far from the Utah border, and I had snacked on enough snacks that I didn't need to get to get food. We dropped off my grandparents and then drove to our snowy, icy driveway. As we were bringing stuff in, we discovered that Grandpa had left his hearing aid stuff in our car. That really disappointed my mom, because it was late and she didn't want to have to drive out again. She called Grandma and asked if it was OK if she returned it the next day; it was OK. I stayed up late writing my year-in-review post.

2011. This time, the visit with my nephews took place in Utah. We all got in the Suburban and drove to the Utah Museum of Natural History. Ya-ping had some gummy bears she was sharing with the boys, and I had one too. I carried Nathaniel through much of the museum. He kept pointing to dinosaur skulls and saying, "Wehh, wehh." I thought he liked the skulls, but later he did the same thing with pictures of archaeological finds. Those surely could not have interested him, so I think he was "talking" just for the sake of talking. We picked up pizza on our way home for dinner. Once we got home, I went running; it seems like it was for 53 minutes. I was astonished to see a "Welcome Home" sign for a missionary (it was up a few days early); the dates of his mission were 2010 to 2012, and I was weirded out that someone who left after I came home was coming home. I got home and reported on my running; Peter was at our house, and he said that running 53 minutes sounded horrible. That night, Nathaniel had fun creating a bridge between the couch and the table.

2010. Once again visiting my nephews, this time in Nashville. We went to an Indian restaurant for dinner; it was kind of a buffet style. They had some spicy food; I remember my mom saying, "If you grew up eating this, can you imagine how bland American food would be?" Franklin was not quite three. They fed him some spicy stuff, and he would convulse because it was so hot, but then he would beg for more. My mom said, "Why does he do that?" Preston said, "Look at Nathaniel!" because he was staring at a baby girl.

2008. Elder Love was being transferred out of Ritzville and Davenport. We drove out of Davenport in the morning, and in Washington, they don't believe in clearing the roads. A car had turned into the middle turning lane and was coming in traffic but apparently didn't look in his blind spot and hit the car in front of us. They pulled off on the side and we kept driving. Elder Love went to his new area in Spokane's South Hill. We went into the apartment, and Elder Love said, "Who's our district leader?" The other elders told him it was him; he was stunned. I can't remember where I met Elder Wilson, but then we drove back to Davenport. We got gas at the Indian-run gas station in Airway Heights. Elder Wilson got a hot dog, so I thereby learned he wasn't a health nut, although he was fairly healthy. I drove slow because it was all snowpacked. When we got back to the Herrons' house, the couple we stayed with, I told Sister Herron about the wreck we had seen. This is my journal for the day:
"This morning almost to Airway Heights we saw a wreck. A car was turning on to the highway from the median. He didn't look and their sides hit. It looked like they were dancing with the way they moved across the snow-packed road.
"The roads in Spokane were crazy. Snow was piled up in the center of one way streets, and lanes were narrow with all the snow. I was nervous to have to drive. Elder Love asked who the district leader was in his new area, and he was shocked when they said, "You." President hadn't told him he would be district leader.
"We traveled safely to Davenport, with a nice long procession behind my slow driving. We went to the Stackhouses and the Adamses to introduce Elder Wilson."

2007. When we taught Sunday School, this may have been the time I brought up my reading of Job. When we taught the youth, Elder Chun said, "What is a missionary's favorite thing?" The youth all guessed things, including cookies, but the answer was "referrals." This is my journal for the day:
"Today Debbie and the kids came to church, and the bishop of the Northpointe ward committed everyone to bring one person into the Church in 2008.*
"Then Kristy Whalen came to the Greenbluff ward, which was exciting. We had to teach Gospel Essentials, and then we had to teach the youth. Those both went well.
"*That is, invite one person to hear a lesson."

2006. I was invited to a YSA activity, since I was 18. We met at the Jones home. I was wearing pink socks because I was very OCD about what clothes I wore around New Year's. We took off our shoes, so my socks were very obvious, but no one said anything. We went down to the Joneses' basement to play Scene It. Not having seen many movies, I wasn't very good at it. But there was one sequence that involved a picture that gradually faded in and you had to guess the movie. I knew it was It's a Wonderful Life immediately. In another part of the game, I knew Inherit the Wind when no one else did, because I had watched it in Mr. Glover's AP US History class; I told everyone that it was airing on channel 11 soon. We went to Clark Planetarium to see a laser music show. They played Christmas music while showing lasers and animated clips. They played overplayed songs like "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree." I thought it was cheesy, and it was worse because Christmas was over.

December 21-27, 2013

It's time to remember last year's Christmas week.

December 21. I remember lying in bed while I heard my mom talking on the phone. She relayed stories about Nathaniel to Sue, and she was talking to her friend Jackie and I heard her say she would have to tell me something. I found out that what she needed to tell me was a funny ambiguous statement that Jackie had misinterpreted the night before; my mom had texted her something like, "We are in Fillmore for a wedding, and the reception is terrible." She meant the cell service was terrible. Sometime that day, we went to Chuck-A-Rama. At the table, there was conversation about gay marriage being legal in Utah. My mom said she didn't think gay marriage should be illegal but she didn't like the way the law had been handled. My dad said her opinion was because she had listened too much to David; Susanne said she had lots of gay friends ("well, not a lot"), including a couple with an adopted kid, who Allie said was really cute. There was also talk about the movie Elf, which I don't watch. Allie asked why not, and I said it was because of language. She said, "There's not any inappropriate language in that movie," and Matt chimed in and said there was some. My mom also talked about a person in their primary having to give a heartrending lesson because she had a toddler die. I got a brownie covered with Christmas sprinkles, and I noticed that some of them had fall sprinkles. I got some peppermint hot chocolate as well. I think Jackie came to our house that day and asked if my mom had told me the "reception" story. Jackie said she thought, "That poor girl, having a terrible reception!" That night we got Arctic Circle for dinner. My mom got eggnog and gingerbread shakes, which looked identical, even though the advertising showed that the gingerbread one was a chocolatey color. We watched Miracle on 34th Street. Allie was with us, and said, "This reminds me of Saving Mr. Gates, even though I've never seen it." I mouthed to my mom what an incredibly weird thing that was to say.

December 22. In the morning, my parents pointed out to me an ad in the newspaper with a hilarious typo:

That afternoon, I made gingerbread, using both a special Christmas cookie sheet and Christmas cookie cutters. Frosting was made and I used it to add details to the gingerbread cookies. I also made wassail. Then we watched the DVD of the MoTab/King's Singers concert.

December 23. I went with my mom to perform various Christmas tasks. (I know Allie was with us at some point, but I don't remember her being with us at the beginning.) We went to a mall in Salt Lake because my mom wanted to get slippers for my grandma. She asked a saleslady, "Where is the lingerie?" and I thought "Where are the slippers?" would have been a more appropriate and more accurate question. We met up with Sue, Nicole, and their two boys. We traipsed all over the mall, including stopping in a store with earrings in case I wanted to get them for Allie. There was a guy working for an LDS DVD company who tried to offer us a free movie; I felt bad that everyone ignored him. When we went to the Hallmark store, Nathan/Wallace was playing in fake snow and yelling at anyone else who tried to play in it. We admired their monthly Peanuts ornaments and I ended up getting an ornament of Jack Skellington on his little automobile from Christmas Town. Allie, ever obsessed with playing with Wallace, rode with Sue while my mom and I went some other places. I remember having some minty candies in the car, and we went to a shoe store to see if they had slippers that my mom wanted to get for Grandma. Then we went to a Sprint store to get my Grandpa a smartphone. They didn't have any blue phone covers, so my mom got a green one instead. It seems they also gave us some headphones. The rest of the family went to go see Saving Mr. Banks at the theater, but since the movie doesn't fit my standards, I didn't want to see it. I went to Walmart and Target. Walmart was very busy, and I think I was annoyed at a cart in the parking spot. I had to park the car, move the cart, then pull completely in the spot. It seems that as I was taking the cart back to the store, a lady took it from me, since there weren't any carts there (I wasn't planning on using a cart anyway). I looked at Christmas CDs, but I didn't get any. Then I went to Target, where I got earrings for Allie. I was delighted to see a set of holiday socks--socks for Christmas, Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, and the Fourth of July. Of course I had to buy it. I also bought some red and green Goldfish crackers. Then I waited around in the car while I waited for the movie to be over, trying to watch YouTube music videos. After the movie, we all went to Sears and looked at clearance Christmas stuff; Sue gave us the Lego set Peter had bought for my nephews. Then we wanted to go somewhere for dinner; since my grandparents were with us we went to Zupas. My mom got a dessert to share, but there weren't any seasonal desserts. I showed Wallace my Nightmare before Christmas shirt, and my mom mentioned that when I was a kid I would have my thumb in my mouth, my finger in my nose, and another finger in my belly button. We watched my grandparents drive off, my grandpa driving somewhat recklessly, not using his blinker and such. My mom said, "What do you wanna bet they die while he's driving?" My dad had had some kind of dental work that day, so on our way home my mom went to Orange Leaf so we could get frozen yogurt, one of his favorite things. Of course, I was delighted to see that not only were there three Christmas flavors of yogurt, there was an abundance of Christmas toppings. We went home and gave the yogurt to my dad. That night my mom and I watched Christmas for a Dollar, and I was ashamed to admit that I liked it.

December 24. Strangely, I don't remember what happened this day. I know we watched White Christmas, and I certainly was packing for California.

December 25. In the morning I turned on my Christmas playlist, but I just turned it on from the beginning. But one of my presents was Kelly Clarkson's Greatest Hits: Chapter One, which had "I'll Be Home for Christmas" on it, so I stopped my playlist, put the new song in it, and then put it on shuffle. When the Lower Lights' bluegrass version of "Once in Royal David's City" came on, my sister said that a famous actor was good at playing the banjo and tried to find it on Spotify on her phone. I think she tried to find other songs, and Matt said to her, "There's already music on." She tried to advertise Spotify to me; I said I heard that Google Play was the same idea, and Matt said that Spotify was better. I saw she had a Halloween playlist, and I said, "Wow, your Halloween playlist is bigger than mine," but I think most of the songs weren't actually Halloween songs. We finished our preparations to go to California, and then we went to my grandparents' house for brunch, where Nan snapped this picture:

Among other breakfast items, my grandparents made spiced apple cider. I was astonished that it tasted like the powdered kind, even though it wasn't. Peter remembered me quibbling about the usage of cider and wassail, but he got it backwards--I think wassail refers to the drink with apple and citrus, while cider is just apple cider. Jesse asked me what I got for Christmas, and I told him I got a slow cooker. He asked if I was going to make anything special in the slow cooker; I told him that I might make corned beef and cabbage at St. Patrick's Day, and he said, "That sounds terrible." Then we went to the airport. While we were waiting to board our plane, I was listening to Christmas music on my phone and experimenting with saving music in Google Play. I noticed a little thumbtack icon at the top of my phone, but at this time I didn't realize that I could swipe down from the top and see app notifications. On the plane, my dad told me that he had put a peppermint candy bar in my stocking because he thought I would like it because it was seasonal; he had gotten it from work. I was eating it and he asked if he could try some of it. When we landed, Ya-ping picked us up and drove us to their new apartment. Baby was excited to talk to us, but we couldn't call him "Baby" for long; it was on this trip that he told us he wasn't a baby and we couldn't call him that. In their room, he said, "That's brudden's bed," and I said, "That's your brother's bed?" to which he said "Uh huh!" I thought "brudden" was how he said "brother," but I soon learned it was how he said "Preston." He told me that he had "hixteeng buses," and for the rest of the visit he told us about his sixteen ("hixteeng") new houses and moms. He kept talking to us, and David said, "He's not usually this talkative." He took a Wii game to show us, and Preston yelled, "Don't shake it!" Nathaniel kicked him, and my mom said, "Oh, no," and he had to go to time out in his room and cried. Later, he jumped on his dad and said, "I almost [unintelligible] my dad." I said, "You almost what your dad?" to which he said, "Uh huh!" That made everyone laugh. (Apparently he said "killed.") That night we watched Monsters University (David had to keep telling Preston not to give things away) and then It's a Wonderful Life. Preston kept asking what was going on in It's a Wonderful Life.

December 26. When I got up, Ya-ping had made me a Jack Skellington hat. We took BART, the Bay Area Rapid Transit, to go to the Exploratorium in San Francisco, where my mom bought passes for us to be able to return to the museum and be more economic. We drank from the toilet drinking fountain and played with the other exhibits, including the spinning chairs, the ball jump that does math, the peg board where you can make marble ramps, and others. There were a lot of people there. We then went to a park across the street, in the middle of the city. My mom and Ya-ping walked to Subway to get us dinner while the boys played on the playground. I watched Nathaniel to make sure he was safe. Then we ate our dinner. We saw a man running shirtless, and my mom said he must be cold, but it really wasn't cold. David wanted to do running races with Preston, me, and my dad. I won every time. We walked past a place where people were ice skating, and I reflected that I probably will never go ice skating in my life. Then we returned to the BART station; David said to Franklin, "What's on Uncle Mark's shirt?" He said, "A cat in a space suit." David said, "Can cats really wear suits like that?"

December 27. I think I remember sitting on David's couch, listening to my music from 2013 and sharing my Facebook Year in Review.

July 2-5, 2013

I'm going to remember the days surrounding the Fourth of July last year, which I spent in California with my brother's family.

July 2. I got up and got dressed in my red shorts and blue shirt with a red "76" on it. We were going to Six Flags that day. We had a fifteen-year-old girl with a weird name with us, and I think another young women's leader and another young woman came. Once we were at Six Flags, I think we went on a couple of rides, and I followed the young women's leader and the two young women to a ride that wasn't for the kids. The leader asked me how old I was, probably because I was so awkward and quiet. I asked the teenage girl I was sitting by on the ride if she had been to Six Flags; she told me she grew up in a family that usually went to Disneyland. After the ride, my head hurt, and I didn't feel up to more rides. I met up with my family, and I ended up taking Baby (when he still let us call him that) into a play area, but I would have preferred to sit down. We saw the walruses out playing. Franklin said some R-rated things about one of the walruses, and later the walruses engaged in some adult behavior, and Preston said he thought they were married. Then we went to go to one of the shows, all while I didn't feel very well. I thought the show was too circusy and not dolphiny enough. We went to a gift shop to get things for the boys. I really wanted a walrus shirt, but they didn't have any in my size, even when I asked. My mom told the boys they could get something not at Six Flags if they wanted, which I kind of thought defeated the purpose. Baby wanted some green candy, but we tried to talk him out of it. We were leaving, but Baby didn't want to leave. So David stayed with him while the rest of us walked out to wait for the shuttle. I really did not feel well at this point; my head hurt, and I was really impatient for the shuttle to come. Baby decided he didn't want to stay after all, so they came and joined us. I got on the shuttle and had to rest my head. When we got to the parking lot, my dad accompanied me to our car so I wouldn't faint and because my mom was worried about me. I got a Gatorade and some patriotic Goldfish from the back and took them up in the seat. Then we went to lunch at Taco Bell, which Preston wasn't happy about. My mom told me I should get some sugar, and I reminded her of the time on October 13 when I had felt faint and got a pumpkin empanada at Taco Time and she had told me it wasn't good to have sugar when I felt like that, and then she told me she had been wrong on that occasion. I got a slushy drink with my food. Then we drove over to Toys R Us, where my mom was going to buy the promised toys instead of the Six Flags toys. I stayed in the car and slept, and I think it was really windy. Preston came out a little early, and he wanted to pee in a bottle, and Ya-ping reluctantly agreed. But when David came out, he rightfully reprimanded Preston for wanting to do that and told him he couldn't. They had bought a Perry the Platypus karaoke machine and some toys inspired by garbage. Then we went back to David's house, where David set up the karaoke toy for the boys to play with. They liked playing with it, but it sometimes caused some arguments between Franklin and Baby, and my mom said if they couldn't play nice we'd have to put it up. Later, I found Bewitched on, so I watched it. Preston seemed to like it, and laughed at the moving chair. Then the inferior I Dream of Jeannie came on; in this episode, Tony told Jeannie to get all the women's clothes out of the room, and in so doing she accidentally took the clothes off of the women in the room, exposing their slips. David asked if that was appropriate for his kids to be watching, and I said it was better than the movie Brave, and my mom agreed that it wasn't sexual and they were only in their slips. David tried to defend Brave as more appropriate, but it was obvious he was just trying to be right, because his argument had no substance.

July 3. I was awake, but I felt sick, so I didn't want to get up. I heard Preston saying he wanted to watch "the witch show," but they told him it wasn't on. Then I heard the boys playing the Beatles karaoke David had found. David went to work and Ya-ping and my mom went to the store. My dad was on his computer, and I could hear Baby and Franklin arguing over the karaoke machine. Remembering what my mom had said to them about playing nice, I went out and took it away from them and put it up. Ever-happy Baby was fine with that, but Franklin was mad and started hitting me. Preston was on the couch chuckling, and Franklin went over and screamed and started hitting Preston. I pulled him away and told him he needed to go to his room, and he said defiantly, "No!" I didn't enforce it, but he seemed to get better, although he still had some screaming fits during the day. Ya-ping and my mom came back, and Ya-ping set up a table for us to eat sandwiches. She had a thing that cut sandwiches into heart shapes, and Franklin refused to eat such a sandwich because he associated the heart shape with "a woman." That night, David took Franklin and Preston (maybe Baby too) in the car to go find some fireworks to watch. David talked about memories of our grandparents, memories I was too young to remember. Somehow the topic got turned to Twilight, which I have never read or seen, and I remarked how when I was in high school, I heard good things about it, but now everyone makes fun of it. Then David said that's because I'm not surrounded by teenage girls anymore. Then he said that teenage girls also like Justin Bieber (and I also said One Direction). Preston asked if Justin has so many girls in love with him, why isn't he married? David explained that he's still destroying his life. (This was before some of his more recent legal trouble.)

July 4. In the morning, we were figuring out what we wanted to do. David left with the boys to go to some park, basically without consulting us. When he returned, he said that that park's festivities weren't that good. I was so amused by the bags my nephews got that I had to take a picture with my mom's phone to load it to Facebook.

I got on my dad's little computer to do my scripture study and look at my Facebook. Sarena posted about Thurl Bailey singing to her; I "liked" her post, hoping she would know I wasn't mad at her, despite some pretty harsh words I had made relative to a comment she had made on my status a few weeks earlier. We had bought a charcoal grill for David, but we didn't really know how to use it. It took a really long time to cook, and all it did was smoke, so we ended up with smoky chicken. I was in the backyard with Baby, and he was shyly handing me the gray rocks from their backyard. At some point David was chanting "USA" because of my t-shirt. Later we went to Baby's school to play on the playground there. Franklin was better at climbing on the climbing wall than Preston was. We also brought a kite, but we didn't seem to have much success with that.

Later, we went near the bay to watch fireworks. When we got in the car, Baby was really sad about something, but we couldn't understand it. Then he started crying, which made him even harder to understand. It turned out he was sad no one was sitting by him in the backseat of the Suburban. I had to bring my water bottle with me because my throat hurt really bad. It was a very uncomfortable Fourth of July, and I was sad that I didn't get the familiar smoke smell and booming sounds of the fireworks, because they were all far away. It was kind of cool, however, to see multiple shows at once. Then we went home, and I think my mom and Ya-ping went to a store, and my mom got me some lime cucumber Gatorade, since my throat was so sore.

July 5. I think I had taken a popsicle out of the freezer, and Franklin saw me with it, and said, "Why do you get one every day?" But in fact he had eaten more sugar than I had that day. Later David saw my Gatorade and said, "Lime cucumber?" I said I loved it. At one point, Franklin saw my Gatorade and said, "I want a big Gatorade," since the ones we had brought were little ones. But I told him it was the only one there was. I think I went to Costco with my parents to get things for our drive back home. I packed up all my stuff to go home so we could leave in the morning.

December 23-26, 2012

With it now being the Christmas season, I'm going to remember what I can about the goings on of last year.

December 23. We went to sacrament meeting, but then we came home to get ready for our long drive. We heated up microwaveable sandwiches and loaded up the car. We had to drop Allie off at her house, and then we proceeded to drive. My mom wanted to listen to Messiah, so we put the CD in. As we were driving west, I began dozing off. My dad apparently couldn't stand the last song on the CD--ten minutes of a falsetto voice singing "He was despised and rejected of men..."--because he turned it off and turned the radio on. I wanted to listen to religious or semi-religious CDs that day, since it was Sunday. We listened to various MoTab CDs, and we wondered why there was a tunnel in the middle of the desert. My mom liked the Jenny Philips CD (which I find rather *meh*), but my Lower Lights CD wouldn't work. Eventually we stopped in Winnemucca, NV, and found a hotel to check into. My parents have become accustomed to sinning and breaking the sabbath when they're on vacation--we decided to go someplace for dinner. I said I wanted to go to Jack in the Box, because I thought they would have Christmas shakes. We went, and I got an eggnog shake. My dad asked me how I knew that, and I told him it was because I went to Jack in the Box in 2009 in Washington. We went into our hotel room, and I pulled out my laptop and wrote a blog post. I think I had some of the gingerbread cookies I had made that week, and we watched the MoTab/King's Singers concert. I took off my shoes and put them by the bed (and then forgot them in the morning).

December 24. We got up early to keep driving to California. I think there was a dusting of snow on the ground. We passed where someone had slid off the road, and another person tried to flag us down, but my dad didn't see him and kept driving. The man waving us down had a look on his face like "Who do you think you are?" We had to drive over Donner Pass, which was kind of scary because it was snowy. It was very pretty--lots of snow-covered pines--but scary. Lots of people were stopping on the shoulder to install tire chains. Dirty snow got all over the car, and the rear window was so caked with mud that we couldn't see out of it.

We kept listening to Christmas music, and my mom told me that she liked Lady Antebellum but she didn't like the Lower Lights. We eventually got off the mountain and got into California. We cleaned off the rear windshield at a gas station and went to Carl's Jr. for lunch. The cashier was an old lady who asked us where we were from. I got a jalapeño burger, and she intentionally mispronounced it "juh-LAP-uh-no." While we were driving, we got a call from Preston (or maybe I had to call). He seemed surprised to hear me on the phone. Then Baby wanted to talk to me--he told me the ABCs and counted on the phone. He kept talking, and it was hard to understand. My dad said to my mom, "He must be talking to Baby." Eventually we got to Dave and Ya-ping's house. Preston and Baby seemed excited we were there, but Franklin was indifferent. We were sitting in their house with the door open, and their landlord just walked in. It was a little uncomfortable. Later, my mom and Ya-ping and I went shopping at Target. When we got out of the car, I wrote "Merry Christmas" in the mud on the car. We looked at Christmas candy for stockings, and I wanted a box of Christmas Dots for mine. We bought a ham and supplies for funeral potatoes. We got eggnog, since David likes it. I think we got peppermint white chocolate M&Ms and peppermint marshmallows. We went home and had to take Dave to work, so we all piled into the Suburban, because we were going to take the boys to the temple visitors' center. Baby was in the back trying to get my attention, but I didn't know it until David told me. He wanted me to hear him count: "One, two three, four, five, six, leven, eight, nine, ten, leven, eight, nine, ten!" (Apparently he thought seven and eleven were the same.) David asked Preston a math problem, and then he asked Franklin, "What's one plus one?" Preston then said, "What's one times one?" David said to Preston, "What's the square root of four?" "Preston said, "That's college stuff," and David said, "That's what you were doing to Franklin." We dropped David off, and I asked the boys if they wanted Christmas Tic-Tacs. I asked whether they wanted red or green. Then we went to the temple. The visitors' center was really busy, which we hadn't expected. Baby correctly identified the Christus statue as Jesus. The sister missionaries invited us to go on a tour, and one of the sisters said I looked familiar--she had probably seen me at BYU. We looked at some of the lights on the palm trees on the grounds. Then we went back and got David and went home. David showed the boys How the Grinch Stole Christmas! He hadn't realized that Chuck Jones had been involved on the special. I watched White Christmas--David asked why it was what I watched on Christmas Eve, and I said it was because it was longest. I had to turn the volume down for the boys; even Preston came out and said it was too loud. David talked to me during the whole movie. Then we went to bed.

December 25. The boys weren't like I was as a kid, getting up early to open presents. I think they got up after all the other adults (except me, since I like sleeping). I had some breakfast--I can't remember what it was, except there was eggnog. The boys came out and opened their presents. They got electric toothbrushes, but Baby just liked to play with his. He was quite pleased with his Thomas the Train underwear, and my mom was pleased with her Nexus. David turned on a Christmas Pandora station, and as it played Michael Bublé, I said, "I have this album." Baby and Franklin were both really nice and shared their candy with me. I even said to Franklin, "You don't need to share with me, because I have my own candy," but he said he wanted to share anyway. He liked my Rudolph pajamas and called the Abominable Snow Monster a yeti. It was a rainy day (I really hoped it would snow, even though I knew it was unlikely), and my dad went out to wipe off all the mud from the car. We had dinner of ham and funeral potatoes, and David was trying to get Preston to try the potatoes. Preston kept asking what it was, and David kept saying, "It's cheese!" I said, "It's potatoes," and David had a panicked look on his face and motioned to me not to say that. I didn't know that the boys had an aversion to potatoes, and Preston refused to eat them "because they had mashed potatoes in them." I will never forget the way David looked at me. I thought about saying, "There aren't any mashed potatoes in there," but I didn't know if it would work. David set up my new laptop for me. I wrote a memory post and texted my cousin Peter to let him know. I also got a text from Hanna, one of my horse friends. I wanted to see how my speakers worked, but mostly it was an excuse to play Christmas music. I played "Rock and Roll Santa" and "Monsters' Holiday," to which David said, "There's a Christmas version of 'The Monster Mash'?" I looked at funny Santa pictures on Awkward Family Photos, and I showed them to my mom. Baby saw one weird-looking Santa and said, "Is that Jesus?" He kept jumping around on my mom, going "Hi-yah!" I got out my camera to take a video, but this is what happened:
That night I watched It's a Wonderful Life.

December 26. The next morning we took down the Christmas tree, which was a poorly designed tree. Then we needed to go to the airport to pick up my grandparents. Nathaniel always liked to go for rides, so he went with us. When we got to the airport, he was in the backseat, and I'm pretty sure he was saying, "I hate you, Eter!" My mom thought he was saying, "I hear you." Then he said he wanted me to sit by him, so I got in the back. We must have stopped at the house, because my grandma was surprised there wasn't a tree for the boys, and we just explained that we had taken it down. We took my grandparents by the Oakland temple, where a girl was having her Quinceañera. We went to dinner with my grandparents and with Baby. I remember feeling sad looking at all the Christmas trees and knowing Christmas was over for another year. That night I switched my Christmas pillowcase to a New Year pillowcase.

Things Franklin used to say

I first met my nephew Franklin on December 5, 2009, when he was not quite two. I met him at the airport and he was really shy. But he quickly warmed up. In the car on the way home, he was singing the "Elmo's World" theme song. For the next month, I heard him sing that song so much that it was more like his own theme song. The original song says, "That's Elmo's World," but he would sing it, "Maw, mawmo, maa!" The tune was right on, although the last note was a little flat. He would hold out the last note dramatically, and sometimes he would shake his head while he sang it. "Mawmo" was how he said Elmo, although a video indicates that prior to that time he did know how to say "Elmo" without the initial m.

He didn't say very many words, but he did learn my name was Mark, and he liked me. I remember one day I came home from Christmas shopping and he excitedly told his mom that I had come home (using just the word "Mark"). He inherited Preston's dramatic "Uh uh" when he didn't want something, and he would yell it. Once I was playing Minesweeper and we were talking about the bombs; he thought we  were talking about his "bum." He was very good at humming and he would often hum "Jingle Bells."

The next time I saw him was a year later, at Christmastime in 2010, when he was not quite three. I got him a toy stingray, and he knew what it was and could say "stingray." I think he even knew the difference between whales and dolphins.

I had often heard about the linguistic phenomena of overextension and underextension. I had witnessed overextension from Allie (for example, when she would say "bunny" to refer to all small mammals), but I had never seen underextension. But I think Franklin had some. He has a tendency toward physical violence, so on that trip he would hit me, and I would say, "No hitting!" He would say, "I not hit you, I punch you." I think that's underextension because he didn't think that punching was a kind of hitting.

My brother likes to play a game with his kids called "I'm thinking of an animal" where you think of an animal and everyone else has to guess it. On December 27, we were going to a store and playing that game, and we learned how Franklin played. When it was his turn, he would say, "I'm thinking of an animal." Preston said, "Is it an alligator?" Franklin said, "Uh huh!" No matter what Preston would say, he would always be correct. Franklin apparently didn't understand the concept of thinking of his own animal.

Here's a video I took of him playing with the dartboard my sister got them for Christmas. You can hear him say "I break it again," "Can you help," and "I did it!"

Then another year passed, and suddenly Franklin was really shy, even though he really warmed up to me in 2009 and 2010. They came and visited for New Year's in 2011/2012. On the way home from the airport, he was talking about zombies (from the Plants vs. Zombies game), but I really can't recall him saying much else that time.

Then they came out for a day in June 2012. The only thing I remember him saying at that time was "Uncle Mark, do you like Doctah Peppah?"

Then I visited in August last year, and I observed a strange speech phenomenon, one that he still does, even though he's gone to speech classes. Like many kids, he says his r's and l's as w's. But peculiarly, if there is a consonant cluster with one of those letters, he says it as an f. "Try" is "fy," "play" is "fay," "slow" is "fow," "strong" is "fong," "Quin" is "Fin," "tree" is "fee," "swim" is "fim," and so on. The only exception I can think of is "Preston," which he says as "Peston." It's weird, because I know that most of the time he can say the first consonant. This sometimes causes problems: Once he was biking, and I told him he couldn't bike far away because I had to supervise Baby and Baby went slow. He said, "What if I bike fowly?" I said, "You bike fully?" He said, "No, fowly." He meant slowly. Even though he couldn't say the consonants, I was impressed with his adverb use. Although he can't get the phonology down, I think Franklin's done really well with syntax and semantics.

One day they were creating their own Angry Birds games with clay, and Franklin said "bird" without an r, just like they would in England. I can't transcribe it because you wouldn't be able to understand how he said it.

We visited last Christmas, and he said some really R-rated things. He doesn't say those as much now, although he still says some inappropriate things, but they aren't as bad as they were.

Then we just barely visited them again. He still says the consonant clusters as f's. I also noticed he says "tary" instead of "scary." Next time I see him, I'll have to observe the conditions under which he says t. Hopefully, however, his language will be better sorted out by then. Sometimes when he would say "fay," I would try to get him to say it "play." He would say "pway," which is pretty acceptable for a five-year-old. I know he can say the consonants, but I don't know why he doesn't.

Once we were talking about my mom's children and grandchildren. My mom said, "I won't have any more grandchildren until Mark has kids." Franklin said, "But Uncle Mark is not a woman!"

My sister and mom think they are hilarious when they tell the joke that goes, "Ask me if I'm a tree." "Are you a tree?" "No!" Yes, that really is the whole joke. Well, Franklin started making his own variations on that joke using explanations as to why he's not a tree or whatever. Sometimes these explanations are logical, sometimes they're just absurd. For example:
"Ask me if I'm a fee [tree]."
"Are you a tree?"
"No, because fees don't have underwear!"

"Ask me if I'm a gumball machine."
"Are you a gumball machine?"
"No, because gumball machines are aliens!"

Then on our way to the La Brea tar pits, he came up with this one--even though he didn't even know what a tar pit is:
"Ask me if I'm a tar pit."
"Are you a tar pit?"
"No, because I don't have big armpits!"
That made my mom and sister laugh really hard, so Franklin got the impression that he had really created a clever joke, so he kept telling it over and over. He thought it was clever because armpit and tar pit rhyme.

Sadly, this is all I can remember now. This is a result of me not seeing him very often and of him being very shy.