July 23

I'm going to remember what I can about the day before Pioneer Day. However, since I haven't really considered Pioneer Day as a full holiday, that will make it a little hard.

2014. My brother took my nephews swimming, but Nathaniel didn't want to go, so my mom took him with her as she went other places. She ended up going to Susanne's house to watch Bountiful's parade. After a full day of working at home, I announced to my family that I was going to go watch the parade, so they decided to come too, and David drove and I had to tell him which street to turn on. We were able to park in front of Nan's driveway. Then we met them on her neighbors' lawn; the boys were told they couldn't have the neighbors' food. At one point I went into Susanne's house to get popsicles. We watched the procession; some high school bands got to dress coolly, but some had to wear their hot outfits. The boys were eager to get the free parade handouts; my mom remarked that they hadn't been taught manners not to get in other people's way. After the parade, we went to a firework shack near Dick's Market, where my brother picked out a lot of fireworks to set off. We got some tanks and some ground blooms. We lit off the fireworks at Susanne's house; David almost got burned from waiting too long to throw the "flowers." When we left, Ya-ping wanted Nathaniel to ride in my mom's car, since his carseat should have already been in it, but in fact my mom had not used his carseat. On the way home, we asked him about his imaginary families and houses. I said, "Do you have any dogs?" "We do have dogs!" "Do you have any cats?" "We do have cats!"--a cat named Bottom. My mom beat me to the next question: "Do you have any birds?" "We do have birds!" This is my journal for the day:
"After work today, we went to Bountiful's parade with the boys. They don't understand how to watch out for other people. Then we did fireworks with them. Qi-en really is the cutest."

2012. My ward's FHE was in the Regency Apartment lounge, where we watched 17 Miracles. I sat on a loveseat, and later my future roommate Scott, whom I was afraid of, came and sat right between me and the other person. (Later our friend Carissa told me she found that hilarious.) When Levi Savage was publicly rebuked for not having faith, Scott said, "I couldn't do that." In the scene where the kid eats the buffalo chip, Michelle Sutterfield said "Sick!" and then when he was being threatened by wolves, she said, "Is that the same kid who was eating that thing?" I believe that this was the same night that our "horse" friends Kristen, Hanna, Carissa, and Amberly came over to our apartment, since we didn't have class the next day. They talked about Scott having rearranged our apartment, and they loved the blog I had made; they made my roommate Cameron read it. Then they went and brought back an old creepy dating book with weird pictures and wanted us to make captions for the pictures. One weird picture had a guy looking at the side of a girl's face. I had two captions that I thought were perfect. One was a line from I Want a Dog for Christmas, Charlie Brown: "'I'm trying to have an expression of looking to the future with hope.' 'That's all right, I'm just drawing your ear.'" For the other caption, I began singing "Trololo" because I thought the guy looked like the "Trololo" singer. Everyone laughed, but only Amberly knew what I was talking about, so I brought out my laptop to show them the YouTube video.

2011. This was a Saturday. I think this was the year I gave Allie a pink owl for her birthday. These are some anecdotes I copied and pasted from an old blog:

• She wanted to play Apples to Apples. Which is strange because she doesn't really get what's going on. Anyway, when it was her turn to be the judge, her green card was "Nasty." Someone put "AIDS." She picked a different card, and then shortly after said, "I was going to pick AIDS but I had to pick this one. 'Cause we all know what that's like." My sister and cousin and I were all laughing hysterically, as quietly as possible.
• I discovered an entertaining website called "Not Always Right." I was reading this, and came across [a comic strip in which a mother asks for a "Playboy" for her son, but she really wants a Gameboy.] I had been reading some of the anecdotes aloud to my mom, and Allie insisted that I read this to her because it was funny. I told her, "I don't think you get it." So she told her herself. I still don't think she gets it. At least, I hope not.
• I turned on Hogan's Heroes. She said to me, "I wish this were Pollyanna." Then in the episode they brought in a small Nazi flag, complete with the swastika. She said something like, "I knew they were in another country. Australia!" This made me laugh, so she "corrected" herself: "Austria!" My mom caught on that she had seen the Nazi flag on The Sound of Music--hence thinking it was Austria's flag.
• I was attempting to play "Linus and Lucy" on the piano. I thought I was doing reasonably well with just the left hand, but then I heard her say, "Mark you need to fix that do better or you'll need to take piano lessons, too!"

I was also amused when I looked at the cover for the August issue of The Friend. It has a bunch of primary-kid drawings of Thomas S. Monson on the cover. But one of them doesn't look so much like the President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints:

Rather, I think it looks more like the President of the United States of America:



I pointed it out to my parents, and even Allie thought it looked like Obama. My dad said he had thought the same thing.

2010. In the morning I got up and got ready to go home. As I was driving out of Provo, I saw people walking home after participating in the World's Largest Water Fight. That night my dad turned on the news and I saw the water fight on the news, and I regretted that I didn't participate.

2009. This is my journal entry for the day: "Today we were blessed enough to have our lesson go through with Anna Hamilton, although it almost didn't. Brad and Carey's lesson didn't go through. I guess they had an emergency." Anna lived in a single-wide trailer and didn't own much; this might have been the time we brought George Sabin with us.

Leprechaun stories

When I was a little kid, I believed that all holidays are created equal, and subsequently I didn't realize that St. Patrick's Day is the most pointless of all popular holidays. Come March, my mind was turned to leprechauns, and I would invent stories.

In kindergarten, I decided to create a play that I would perform for my family. My mom had bought me a plastic leprechaun hat (and my aunt rescued it from blowing away outside the store on a windy day), so I would don it for my plays. My friend Hillary Ulmer had a gold-colored shiny cheerleader pom-pom, and I asked her if I could have it. I put it in a glass jar and that was my pot of gold, the stringy gold parts hanging over the jar. (I actually can't remember if I had that in time for the leprechaun plays, but I know I used that as a decoration for years. Sometimes I put the plastic hat on top of it, and one time our home teacher asked if it was Cousin Itt!)

Anyway, one day after school, I was planning on my leprechaun play, and my brother David, who was thirteen, wanted to help me out, and he wore the hat he got for Christmas. We went around improvising this play, but after a while it was too violent (with shooting) and un-leprechauny that I didn't want his help anymore. In the evening I gathered my family around while I performed my leprechaun play in front of our fireplace. It was kind of a day in the life of a leprechaun, and I would narrate things like "Now I'm asleep. Now I'm eating breakfast." And so on. When I was "sleeping," I would use a yellow crocheted blanket we had. I think I performed the play several times, and I tried to make sure I was wearing green every time, but soon I realized that if I did that, I wouldn't have any green to wear for St. Patrick's Day.

In first grade, we got some leprechaun window clings that really piqued my interest, and I even made a song based on them. One day in class, I raised my hand and mentioned that I had a song about leprechauns, so I sang my hokey little song. I think I mostly made it up as I went along, but I know the first line was, "I'm a little leprechaun a-sitting on a clover." I think I meant "toadstool," but for some reason it came out clover.

We also needed to write a leprechaun story for class. My copy of this story might be floating around the house somewhere. The only thing I remember is that it started out with a leprechaun going around collecting "horseshoes and brimstones." And by "brimstones" I meant "Blarney stones," not realizing there's only one Blarney Stone.

In second grade we were instructed to write a leprechaun story. Fortunately, I know where that is, so here is my transcription (there are some capitalization marks in it, but I don't know whether they were put there by me or someone else. I'm going to incorporate those edits):

My Leprechaun
One day I went outside to get the mail. When I looked down, there was a leprechaun on our door step. His back Was to my feet. I Caught it by the stomach. "Let Me go! Let me go! Me have to go to Ireland in 10 years! let me go! Let me go!"
I brought the leprechaun in. "I'm hungry," said the leprechaun. "So let me go and get food! let me go!"
"Wait a minute," I said. I will get you some food." I made him some Soup. He duck his head in the soup. His hat plopped up. 
"Ow," complained the leprechaun. "Me face Is burning!"
"You were'nt supposed to do that," I said. "You were supposed to do that when It cooled. And stop saying me instead of My. It's not proper english."
"But it is proper Irish," said the leprechaun. "Where's your pot of gold? Give me your pot of gold! And stay with me when you give it to me!"
"Okay," said the leprechaun. He didn't eat his soup, he Just went outside. Then there was a knock at the door. I opened it. There Was the leprechaun.
"Hi," he said. "Here's a pot of gold and a pot of silver. Bye." And as quick as a wink, he ran off. "That foolish leprechaun," I said "He's mean too, but I do have gold and silver." The end.

(I must say that I'm impressed that at eight years old, my only misspelling was the placement of the apostrophe in "weren't.")

Then in fourth grade, I didn't really have a story per se, but I took on a leprechaun persona. I was tired of Easter stuff before St. Patrick's Day, so as a leprechaun I said I hated Easter. On St. Patrick's Day, my friend Cody Zesiger and I played some game where I think he was trying to catch me. Before he went home, I gave him some mashed up shiny pipecleaners--gold, silver, and blue and silver (which I said was a mushed-up mushroom).

Halloween costumes

I'm going to remember all the Halloween costumes I've worn through the years. Usually I start from most recent and work back to the oldest, but this time I will do the opposite.

1989. Family pictures indicate that I was a panda bear. But obviously I don't remember that, since I was only one.

1990. Again, family pictures indicate that I was a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, but I don't remember what one. Just today, I was thinking how TMNT was a sizeable part of my childhood, even though I remember hardly anything about it now.

1991. My mom insists that I was a green butterfly, but I don't remember it.

1992 or 1993. One of these years, I was a ladybug. I remember one kid saying, "A little ladybug!" and I was offended because I thought he was making fun of me. My mom told me he wasn't.

1994. I was Santa Claus, but my beard didn't look good. I had pillows to make me fat. I had a purple arm cast, so some kids told me I should say that I fell out of my sleigh and broke my arm. I loved to wear that costume again at Christmas.

1995. I was a mummy, so when we went to Boo at the Zoo, I wanted my face painted with a mummy on it. During my school's costume parade, I held my arms out in front of me the whole time, so when we went outside and no one was watching us, I was relieved to put my arms down.

1996. I was a grim reaper in a felt costume my mom had made. I think my face was painted white; my robe was black with red trim. I carried around a little plastic scythe. I don't know how I managed that in elementary school; they probably wouldn't allow that today.

1997.  I was a jack-o-lantern, with leaves on my shoulders and orange and black curly vine things. I put pillows in the orange shirt to round it out. I remember my cousin Peter walking around in it, and the pillows dragged the shirt down and stretched it out.

1998. I was obsessed with the Wallace and Gromit shows, so I was Wallace, with a bald cap, a green sweater vest and red tie, and a stuffed dog that I carried around with me. Seeing the bald and the dog, someone thought I was Charlie Brown, but Ann Palmer, who was standing next to her, recognized me as Wallace. A few people knew who I was.

1999. Oh boy. I've always been a nerd, and in fifth grade I was especially nerdy, having a fascination with chess, even though I was horrible at it. I decided I wanted to be a chess piece, so I decided on a white king--a white robe, white face paint, and a white cross on my head. I doubt anyone knew I was a chess piece. They either thought I was a religious nut or a member of the KKK. I'm glad I didn't get arrested.

2000.  Taking the idea from someone mistaking my costume two years earlier, and with my fairly new-found interest in Peanuts, it was only natural that I be Charlie Brown. I wore a baseball cap (because I didn't want a bald cap) and his shirt (which my mom had made), and carried around Snoopy, who had been Gromit two years earlier. (He really looked more like Snoopy than like Gromit.)

2001.  Since I no longer went trick-or-treating, and my school had uniforms, there was no point in dressing up.

2002. Since my family was going to be out of the country on Halloween night, I decided not to celebrate Halloween that year, which was probably a bit silly.

2003. I didn't have much opportunity to wear it, but I wore a Charlie Brown ghost costume. You know, with all the holes in it.

2004. During the spring, during South Davis Junior High's spirit week, my mom had constructed a Fred Flintstone costume for decade day, so I wore that for Halloween.

2005. I think I wore the Flintstone costume to the mutual party, but when I took Allie trick-or-treating, I was a traditional ghost (with only two eyeholes).

2006.  I was a vampire, with a suit, a medallion, and a beautiful cape.

2007. I was a vampire again, but I think I had some enhancements. I painted my nails black, and I had a red and black bowtie.

2008. Elder Love and I wore identical ties, and I switched our name tags, so we were each other for Halloween. Only at district meeting, though.

2009. Nothing.

2010.  I was a vampire yet again--but this time, I had teeth to go with the costume.

2011.  A vampire again, but this time I was younger. I first wore my costume to a Halloween 5k, with red athletic shorts and a scary red-and-black skull shirt, with a cheaper red and black cape. I wore red shoes on Halloween.

2012. I only dressed up one day, and I wore the same simple vampire costume, but with red regular shorts instead of athletic shorts.

2013. You guessed it. A vampire, but with no cape. At a Halloween party, I got my face painted rather scarily.

I like my vampire costume, but it's time to move on.

Groundhog Day

Although I think Groundhog Day is the most pointless day printed on the calendar, I'm still going to try to remember what I can about it.

2013. In the day, my wardie Morgan Crockett and I had to go out knocking on people's doors to get them to sign up on our ward website. I didn't have a tablet or a smart phone, so I was less efficient, and several people lied to me about whether they'd sign up. (Remember that question, "Are you honest in your dealings?") While Morgan was talking to people at the Elite complex, I was standing out on the sidewalk, kicking ice around to try to get it to melt. I looked up at the mountains in the east, and I watched a van drive down the road, and I began to think that it was too incredible that our world happened by chance.

2011. That evening, I went to a test review session for my astronomy class in the BNSN. There was a girl there with some vending machine pretzels, and we were talking about the winter solstice. The TA said, "The sun is highest in the sky at the winter solstice." The pretzel girl said, completely serious, "Is that in August?" The TA politely responded to her question, but I couldn't believe a university student was asking such a question! Then I went to the humanities computer lab in the JFSB and posted the story on the Overheard at BYU Facebook page. I think I had to work on a project for my Web publishing class, and then I probably went to institute.


2010. My family came down to Provo because they needed to get our Subaru, since it wasn't working. When I got in the Suburban, Allie looked greedily at my planner, because for some reason she loved to look at my planner. Part of the object in her coming was for me to observe her speech for my introductory ELang class, and I got to observe those things. She said something to me, and said, "Do you renember [sic] that?" They took me to dinner at Brick Oven. I got a meal that came with a cookie, and when I got it, Allie began looking greedily (again) at it, sticking her tongue out. Susanne saw what she was doing, and said, "No!" But I gave her a piece of the cookie anyway, and she said the chocolate chip tasted like Nutella. (I was less strict about eating seasonal desserts then.) They asked Allie what her favorite February holiday was, and she said, "Valentime's [sic] Day and Groundog [sic] Day." Then we got back to my apartment, and they called a tow truck to take the car. I had to take Allie up to my apartment to use the bathroom. Then Allie was sitting on her mom's lap in the car, and Susanne pulled the door shut, and it closed on Allie's fingers. She began crying, so Susanne asked me if I could get some ice for her fingers. My mom also needed to use the bathroom, so she was following me up the stairs. I went really fast to get Allie's ice, and my mom got mad. My going faster than my mom didn't do much good, though, because my mom ended up taking the ice back down anyway. I asked my roommate James if she could use our bathroom, so he left the bedroom. As my mom was leaving, she asked him if he was keeping me in line (or something like that), and I thought it was awkward, because James hated all people. Later James asked me about my dinner and what I got. He didn't know Brick Oven served anything besides pizza.

2009. I remember our dinner at the Johnsons', a recently converted family whose daughter was getting baptized that week. They served us a meal that was tater tots on sour cream. I had tater tot casseroles multiple times in that area (but never before and never after), but I didn't like this one. Neither I nor Elder Wilson liked sour cream, but we pretended to like it. They offered us soda, and I didn't want one, but Elder Wilson wanted a Mountain Dew, and the nine-year-old daughter Danielle had a meltdown because she didn't get a Mountain Dew. Elder Wilson felt bad, but Jason (the dad) told him not to worry. Then we went over to the church to have them try on baptismal suits. This is my journal entry for the day:
"Today was a rather boring P-day. Elder Colton took almost two hours to email, and then we went to Spokane so they could play basketball. I was not pleased with the topics of conversation today. I think Elder Colton and Elder Wilson bring out the worst in each other. Elder Colton was shocked when I tried to bite him last night, but I warned him to be quiet.

"But the Johnsons had us for dinner--which was just all right--and then we went to the church so they could try on baptismal clothes. They seem really excited." 

2008. The zone leaders came to the house where we lived, and we watched President Hinckley's funeral on TV. Then Elder Gammon stayed in the area to work with me. We were walking around, and Elder Gammon said he felt impressed to knock on a house on Peone, but no one was home. When we were walking back to our house, he asked me if I shared the gospel with my friends before my mission. I told him that I didn't have any friends, but he didn't believe me. "Everyone has friends," he said, so I asked how he would define a friend. He said it was someone who you did things with. I told him that by that definition, I didn't have any friends. I told him a few anecdotes of irresponsible gospel sharing that I had done (or hadn't done). Then we drove over to a dinner appointment in the Northpointe Ward, and we tracted that street. The first guy told us not to come back. Another lady was not interested and said she had lived in Ogden. We knocked on one house and they didn't answer, but we heard a teenage boy say something like "I'm not a slut!" The next house was a member house. I was going to skip it, but Elder Gammon suggested talking to them anyway. So we knocked, and they let us in. We told them about our tracting experiences, and I relayed the experience we had had at the previous house, but I didn't realize that it probably wasn't appropriate for me to say that in their house. I asked how long it had been since the street had been tracted, and they said it was about a year. (That was my first area, so I thought that was too recent for comfort, but in later areas, I would have loved to find a street that hadn't been tracted in that time.) After dinner, a member in the Greenbluff Ward called and asked if we could come over. So I drove to their house, and they gave us some cinnamon rolls. We were meeting up with the other elders at Cold Stone, so Elder Gammon and I waited there. The last time we had met there, we had gotten ice cream, so I thought we were going to that time. Elder Gammon asked me, while we were waiting, if we should pray to start our fast. I said I wanted to wait, and he guessed that I wanted to get ice cream. But I said I wanted to wait for Elder Chun. We didn't get any ice cream. This is my journal entry for the day:
"Today the zone leaders came here and we watched President Hinckley's funeral and had lunch with the Welshes. Then Elder Gammon stayed with me in our area. We walked to a referral who wasn't home but we stopped by a less-active on our way back. Then we tracted around our dinner appointment and had a member visit after Tina Andersen, the lady to whom we gave a blessing after her car crash, gave us cinnamon rolls."

 1997. Our primary chorister, Karen Brunner, had some sort of Groundhog Day activity for us in primary. She loved clipart, so she had a clipart groundhog, and then she had some pieces of paper that had the sun shining on the groundhog (meaning more winter), or a cloud preventing shadows (meaning spring). I don't remember what the point of it was.

1996. I think it was snowing, so when our principal, Mrs. Park, gave morning announcements, she said the groundhog must have seen its shadow.

1995. My mom told me that the groundhog hadn't seen its shadow, and everyone seemed to kind of think it was a big deal. I had never heard of Groundhog Day.

December 21

As we inch ever closer to Christmas, I'm going to remember what I can about four days before the holiday.

2012. I remember wrapping Christmas presents. That night I watched Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July, with the intent of seeing if it could count as a Fourth of July movie. But since they didn't mention the Fourth of July until twenty minutes in, and the last half of the movie takes place July 5 and July 6, I decided not to count it.

2011. We had our work Christmas party in our break room, so all the people from other departments had to go elsewhere for their breaks. They had put strings across the room and hung those plastic candy-filled canes on them. We all got one, and then later we got to get more. I got red and green Sprees and I think one other kind of Christmas candy. They had even brought the radio up into the break room, which annoyed me a little, since radio Christmas music isn't very good. Our supervisor, Nate, thanked us for our work. Then we ate Subways. Then they told a bunch of us we could go home early. So I drove to Shopko in Bountiful to do my shopping, listening to Handel's Messiah on the way. I looked at various stores, and when I went to my car, it wouldn't start! So I called my parents, and while I waited I finished my shopping. My parents came and tried to jumpstart the car, but it wouldn't work. So then they called a tow man, and he tried to jump it, and it still wouldn't work, so he towed it. Then we went to dinner at Burger King, where in the background they played Rachel Platten's "1,000 Ships."

2009. In the morning, my mom and I were going up to Farmington to get me a new driver's license. I put in my He Gives Flowers to Everyone Cherie Call CD. When we got off the freeway in Farmington, I saw a car pull off on the shoulder, and I could tell they were doing a U-turn. I told my mom that, but it was too late and he pulled right in front of us. It was the first time I had been in an accident. The car started spilling liquid all over, and I tried to call 911. My phone was acting weird, but fortunately a police car drove by right then. The guy in the other car was very sorry and admitted it was his fault. I think Susanne came and picked me up to take me to the DMV. That day we discussed how our family home evening would be for the kids to deliver Christmas presents. Allie called it "Hamily Fome Evening." (Maybe that was a different day that month.) But instead of going to our FHE, I went to the singles ward FHE, which was a white elephant party. I grabbed a couple of CDs I no longer wanted, a Monkees compilation and a cheap Halloween CD. I went to the house where the party was being held. I almost went to the wrong house, but then I figured out it was wrong. The Christmas tree was a really fancy designer tree with gaudy candy decorations, and a cover album of the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer soundtrack was playing. They had pizza for dinner, and Peter Moosman, a vegetarian, was disgusted when he found out that what he thought was cheese pizza actually had meat on it. "Who puts toppings under the cheese?!" He said he felt sick. I thought it was funny, though now I would be a bit more sympathetic. Then we went downstairs for our white elephants. At one point I got a Cafe Rio giftcard, and later a Star Wars cup and a watch, but eventually I ended up with an IQ book and a CD of songs written by Orrin Hatch. The Down syndrome Matt Chidester ended up with a typewriter, which he was going to give to his mom. The party went late, and then I still had to come home and watch Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, which I did in the kitchen.

2008. It was very snowy in Davenport. We went to church, but a lot of people were snowed in, since they lived in other towns. There were very few of us at church, so we had a short sacrament meeting and went home, even though it was supposed to be the Christmas program. Elder Love and I put our boots on and got shovels and went around shoveling people out. We shoveled Sister Barnett's driveway, and she invited us in and gave us hot chocolate.

(Isn't Google cool? It made a snowy version of my picture without me asking!)

Then we went to shovel the driveway of a woman named Henrietta. We shoveled her car, thinking she could probably make it out the rest of the way. We didn't talk to her; we just did it. (A few weeks later, we went back to her house/trailer, and she asked us if we were the ones who had shoveled her car out. I expected her to thank us, but instead she complained that we had only shoveled one side, as if we had done some terrible, inconsiderate thing! Her entitlement mentality made us never want to help her again.) We did lots of walking and shoveling, but we did that a lot that month, so I can't remember specifics about this particular day.

2007. We went biking around to contact people. We visited a less-active who was the brother of a semi-active family in the ward. Elder Chun talked to him, and he said to me, "I see you're a little green around the ears," and I said, "Completely." Then we tried to see Cindy Neely (whom I had never met), but she wasn't home. We then went home, and I remember being on my bike, thinking, "Don't hit that small pothole on the shoulder," and I did and crashed. I was fine, though. We went home for lunch, and we talked with Sister Welsh, whom we lived with. That evening we went tracting in the Greenbluff Ward, and all the people said we could come back (although none of them were actually serious when we went back). Then we went to an appointment with Ashley Guiler, a less-active teenage girl. Elder Chun missed the road to turn on and ended up in a forested, steep, icy road. It was scary. We simply couldn't make it up the hill. I suggested going to the bottom of the hill to see if there was an outlet to a main road, but Elder Chun wouldn't (because there wasn't one). He told me to pray we would be able to get out. He would have me push, but I would just push myself away from the car on the ice. Eventually he got the idea to go on the side of the road where there were pine needles, and then we were finally able to make it out. Then we visited the Guilers, who gave us Thin Mints and hot chocolate. He told them the story of what had just happened to us, as an illustration of receiving inspiration (the inspiration being to drive on the pine needles). We left late (I was brand new and didn't feel it was my place to say what to do) and as we were driving home, the zone leaders called and asked to talk to Elder Chun. I told them he was driving, and they asked where we were. Here is my journal entry for the day:
"Today was quite an eventful day. This morning we went biking to contact a referral. I had many close calls on my bike. We contacted Sister Cunningham's less-active brother, who has a lot of faith in God but questions much of the deeper doctrine. He agreed to let us come back.

"On our way back home, I completely biffed it, falling directly on the road. Fortunately there were no cars. I am fine, although my knees were scraped through my suit, and I think one of my knees in my pants is a little thinner. A button came off my suit, as did a reflector from my bike. My suit is dusty so I will have to stop at the dry cleaner's on Monday, hopefully. I had debated not wearing my gloves on the way back. Fortunately I did so my hands are fine, not with the scrape that is on my glove. 

"Later we went tracting. We went to six or seven houses. Three of those had people answer--all of them agreeing to have us come back next week. The first was interested in our idea of a prophet on the earth.

"After that we drove around looking for houses of referrals. We could not find many of the houses.

"After this unsuccessful drive, we were finished before we had planned. We made an appointment with a less active member. On our way Elder Chun missed the road and we had a scary experience driving on a dark, steep, windy [as in winding], icy road with ditches on either side. Elder Chun tried to turn around but we had a very unsuccessful time driving back up the hill. I suggested driving down to the end of the road but it turned out (according to the sister we taught after) to be a dead end, so I'm glad he didn't listen. After failed attempt after failed attempt, we prayed. Elder Chun had the idea to try driving on the side of the road where it was not icy. Eventually it worked, and we thanked Heavenly Father for the successful serendipity of the situation. The roads here aren't maintained very well--that road was solid ice that when Elder Chung [sic] asked me to push, I was only able to push myself away from the car.

"We taught the family after that and got home after 10. Breaking mission code just a little bit..."

2006. I'm not certain, but this might have been the day that in my Spanish class, we were singing Christmas carols, and some classmates wanted me and a kid named Zach to sing in front of the class. I realized they probably considered us similar, but that bothered me, because I didn't want to be like him.

2005. Again, I'm not sure, but this might have been the night that we bundled the kids up and took them to Temple Square. Then we went inside one museum where there was a play area for kids. I came home and had some pumpkin cheesecake.

2004. We made suckers in my chemistry class, but we had to put the flavoring in before it cooled, and that ruined the flavoring. I got a school newspaper, and I took it home and read it. That night there was a power outage. I read some Edgar Allan Poe by the fireplace. I was going to take a shower and go to bed. Ya-ping and my mom questioned me taking a shower in the dark, but I did that all the time.

2000. We might have had our school Christmas sing-off. We sixth-graders sang "Little St. Nick" and "My Grown-Up Christmas Wish," which I thought was a dumb song. Mr. Williams (my teacher) went around throwing candy to everyone, wearing a poster that said "Sugar Plum Fairy." 

1999. I'm not sure, but this might be the day we gave our teacher our gifts in fifth grade, and I gave her a Barnes and Noble gift card. She acted excited when I gave her the envelope, and she said, "Is this what I think it is?" The night before I didn't want to lick the envelope, so I sealed it with water instead, and got the envelope a little wrinkly from water, and I worried Mrs. Call would think I slobbered on the envelope so that it got wrinkly.

1995. This might have been the day that the office ladies called me down so that I could sing to them, and then they gave me a fruit-flavored candy cane. Then I went back to the classroom and got my stuff, since school was over.

1994. This might have been the day that Mrs. Christensen, our kindergarten teacher, gave us little Christmas hard candies. She told us we couldn't talk with candy in our mouth because we might choke. One of my classmates was being silly and put her candy at the front of her nose like Rudolph, and Mrs. Christensen reproved her. I was talking to Ali Snarr, and she took her candy out of her mouth and said to me, "You're not supposed to talk with candy in your mouth."

Two days before Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is next week! I'm going to remember the things I have done two days before the holiday--namely, the Tuesday before Thanksgiving.

2012. I met with my editing group in my editing class. Some students were mad that we students had to be there but the professor didn't. After that meeting, I went over to the Cougareat and bought some pumpkin soup. I considered getting a donut with Thanksgiving sprinkles, but I decided against it. Then I got ready to go home. I had offered a ride to a girl in my ward, Larissa, so I went over and helped her put her stuff in my car. She ate leftover pizza while I drove. I went on Center Street to get on the freeway and had problems with lanes ending. Larissa and I talked about classes we were taking that semester and the next, and Larissa said she was taking a family history class for fun. My GPS got me off the freeway in the right place, but I kept getting lost when I took her to her aunt's house. I helped her get her stuff out. Then I drove home, turning on some Thanksgiving songs on my Peanuts CD. I was so happy to be home and share all my Thanksgiving candy.

2010. The news had been telling us all about a great blizzard that would be coming that day. When I got up in the morning, it was extremely windy and bitter cold. I went outside to try to pick up our trash can and the garbage that fell out of it, and I got super cold in just a short time--I remember talking to the guys across the street about how crazy it was. Then I went and got a haircut. I remember saying that I was worried about driving home from work in the snow. After the haircut, I went to Winegar's and got some apple cider to spice. I came home and put my spiced cider on. I was preparing for work when one of my leads, Dave, called and told me that they were sending people home and telling us not to come in. So I got to stay home. My mom and dad later came home and I told them how I had lucked out by not having to go in. I remember watching the storm come in; the clouds were really ominous. It was a good snowstorm, but it wasn't as blizzardy as they had predicted (and as I had expected, with how cold and windy it was that morning). I could only get blurry pictures.

2009. I was on exchanges with Elder Hansen in Pullman. We bundled up that morning--it was freezing, certainly not what I was used to in Lewiston. There was snow all over.

We went around various places that day. For lunch we stopped at Jack in the Box and I got a pumpkin shake with my meal. Later, we were near an apartment complex when Elder Hansen got a call from an Asian girl named Penny. He was telling her how he tries to be Christlike, and I heard her say, "You look like Christ!" We both silently laughed, and after the phone call, I said, "Did she say, 'You look like Christ'?" He told me how she had pasted his face onto the picture of Jesus looking down and holding the lamb that is on the Restoration pamphlet. He said she had made a cartoon drawing with Elder Keddington saying her only options were to get baptized. After the phone call we got out of the car and went to knock some doors, but I don't think anyone answered. Most of the snow had melted at this point. Then we stopped at another apartment complex, where there were signs telling the residents to keep their heaters on for Thanksgiving. We went and had dinner with a married couple. Elder Hansen told them how we had come out at the same time, and they might have known that we were going home in less than a week. I remember thinking that those members must have been thinking that I didn't act like I'd been out that long. Eventually we went back to Lewiston. When we got to our apartment, I said to Elder Hansen, "You look like Christ." Elder Keddington said, "Did you guys see Penny?" Elder Hansen explained that she had called him. Elder Keddington then told us the story how she showed them a PowerPoint with the picture of Jesus and said, "Who is this?" They said, "Jesus...?" She said, "No, who is it really?" and then came the mashup of Elder Hansen on Jesus. The night before, we had coined the term "ferociolicious," and Elder Keddington wrote the word on the picture I had drawn on the whiteboard of various scary things happening to Elder LaPratt, but he spelled it "Froiouslious."

2008. Elder Love called a less-active who lived way out in the boonies to see if we could come visit him. He reluctantly accepted. We drove out to really rural places. We went to a place that was a little gully in the middle of wheat fields where there were some houses. We were amazed at the frost at that location.

 We had a potential investigator to check on in that neighborhood, but I think I convinced us not to. (We should have, though, since we rarely went out that way. I think we didn't because it was getting dark and we didn't know where to park and just plain fear.) We checked on a less active someplace, not knowing what to expect, but she was very nice and let us in. She actually told us she went to the Medical Lake ward instead of the Davenport Branch because she didn't feel welcome in Davenport. She told us that her neighbors would probably be mean to us. Then we drove off to our appointment. He was the son of a member in a nursing home. He was nice, and we visited him and his sister. While we were there, I could hear someone watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving in the other room. When we left and went to our car, it was snowing lightly. The man came out and told us that he had been reluctant to have us there because his sister had lost her testimony--but she had been courteous to us as well. We were driving when we encountered a sign that said, "Water over roadway." We were out in the middle of nowhere. We got out and examined the water on the roadway, and this place looked just like a place I had seen in a dream in the MTC, in which my aunt's van got stuck on a muddy road. We were debating whether or not to drive through the river.

Elder Love worried that the ice in the stream might do some damage, so we turned around and went another way. In our travelings, we were amused by this sign. (We were in farm country, after all.)

2007. Susanne took me to get a splint for my sprained ankle. I think we stopped at Arctic Circle, and while we were there, I saw a bread truck fueling up at the gas station next door. Apparently the driver forgot to put it in park, because suddenly the truck went forward and the driver was running alongside it. It didn't stop until it went over the curb and hit the gas station sign. I might have watched The Munsters' Scary Little Christmas that night (since I had just gotten the DVD), but I can't remember if it was that night or the next.

2005. I can remember sitting in my biology class, wearing a yellow polo shirt with a red tie.

2004.  I probably had some apple pie ice cream. I remember studying my chemistry flashcards and finishing all the homework I meant to, which might have been the only time I did so in all of high school. I might have watched the Thanksgiving episode of Bewitched.

2003. I gave the devotional in seminary, although I can't remember what it was. I was wearing my yellow shirt. That night, I went with my parents to Hale Center Theater to see Annie. My mom pointed out a man wearing a toupee. My dad said at least it was better than Annie's, but my mom and I thought he said "better than Allie's," since baby Allie had some hair problems. When we got home, I ate chips and salsa and cheese.

1999. During lunchtime they always showed videos, and on this day they were showing A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving, which I had never seen before. I especially found the cooking scene amusing. There was a display of harvest vegetables, and they were giving them away, so I took some small pumpkins. That night my mom went to Toys R Us and bought VHS tapes of The Iron Giant and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. The Iron Giant came with a toy, and I tried to get it out but ended up destroying the plastic on the clamshell case. My friend David Christensen came over for a sleepover, and I think we watched both of those movies.

1996. We were having a Thanksgiving meal in the classroom. We all had paper Pilgrim and Indian hats and headbands and put our desks together like giant tables. The hot lunch people went and got their Thanksgiving meals from the cafeteria, while we paper sack people stayed and started eating. That afternoon we played some kind of game (maybe Bingo) with Reese's Pieces. Miss Slater said she picked that candy because of their fall colors.

Election Day

Some Election Days are bigger than others, but I'm going to remember as many as I can anyway. Election Day is the first Tuesday of November, unless the first Tuesday is November 1.

2012. I remember I kept checking the election results on KSL. Although I voted for neither Romney nor Obama, I was kind of hoping Romney would win, and I was disappointed when he didn't. But I wasn't as disappointed as my roommate Bryton, who had even gone campaigning for Romney.

2011. OK, so I don't really remember what happened this day. But I want to provide a link to a blog post I made in connection to Election Day that year, because I found a certain candidate's platform hilarious.

2010. I remember I drove down to the North Salt Lake offices to go vote, and I saw the Ulmers there. I said hi to them in the parking lot, but I don't know if they recognized me. People were wearing "I Voted" stickers at work.

2009. Here is my journal entry for the day:
"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, which surprised me, since I don't feel like I'm too good at teaching over there. 

2008. All the things I can remember are accounted for in my journal, except that I remember that I read aloud "The Raven" while Elder Love worked on tiling (which probably wasn't very kosher). At dinner, five-year-old Bailey Christensen asked what we had dressed up as for Halloween. Elder Love said he was a missionary; then I reminded him that he was me (we had worn identical ties and switched name tags). The Christensens commented on my very short hair, and Elder Love confessed that he had done it. Here's the journal entry:
"We helped with the Herrons' tile for most of the day. Not having much experience and fearing messing it up (since I never do anything right), I didn't feel like I was doing much. The times we weren't tiling we were waiting at the church to meet with Wanda but she didn't come. We also had dinner at a Mexican restaurant with the Christensens, and then helped the Stackhouses with a little moving. It was rainy and very cold today. I like my new sweater."

2007. I remember going with my dad to the Eaglewood golf course clubhouse to vote. I voted against the school vouchers, and thankfully they didn't win.

2006. My mom and I went up to the clubhouse to vote. We passed the house that my niece had dubbed "the spider house" because it had a giant spider at Halloween. They had all their Christmas stuff out already. After we came home, I watched the Election Day episodes of The Addams Family and Gilligan's Island. I realized that the Gilligan episode would be more suitable for a presidential election, but I realized I wouldn't be around for a presidential election for six years!

2004. Someone in my history class had some writing on his hands that someone else had written. It said, "Vote No on Proposition 3! Go gayness!" My chemistry teacher, Mrs. Duffin, drew some red and blue stars on the whiteboard with a note that said, "Vote today! If you are 18 (and registered)".

2000. I remember someone asked the janitor if he was voting for Al Gore or George Bush, and he said George Bush.

1996. I remember that our teacher, Miss Slater, gave us little pieces of paper with pictures of Bob Dole, Bill Clinton, and Ross Perot. She told us not just to vote for the best looking person, but that there should be another reason we voted for the people. I think most of us voted for whoever our parents were voting for. She tallied up the votes, and Bob Dole had the most, followed by Bill Clinton. Ross Perot had two votes. (David Christensen told me years later that he had voted for Ross Perot, because he interpreted "Don't just vote for the most handsome one" as "Vote for the ugliest one.") My mom made Rice-A-Roni for dinner.

1994. I think we kindergarteners wondered why there were all those grownups behind little curtains.

October 29

This time I'm going to remember what I can about two days before Halloween.

2012. Our ward was having a Halloween party over in Kiwanis park, so I donned my red shorts, black-and-red skull shirt, cape, and vampire teeth. I walked over to Kiwanis, and some people I passed complimented me for my costume. When I thanked them, they saw my teeth and were impressed. When I got to the party, there were few people in costumes. Joel DeVore was making hot dogs. I talked with my home teacher Westin and his friend Lisa. Somehow the term "phonology" came up, and that reminded Westin of "phrenology," and he told me he heard about phrenology being applied to Joseph Smith. Our activities committee announced that they wanted to show Hocus Pocus but couldn't find it, so they were watching Young Frankenstein instead. I didn't want to watch Hocus Pocus, but Young Frankenstein was even worse, so I left. As I was walking home, I noticed that the Mountain West Burrito was having a party--apparently it was their grand opening. I went home and turned on my computer. I was listening to "Alejandro" when our home teachers came by. They visited for a while. I had invited my horse friend Kristen to watch The Nightmare Before Christmas that night, and she came when the home teachers were still there. Eventually they left, and I started the movie. There was something weird with the sound. Another horse, Carissa, knocked on our door, so we invited her in and she watched the movie with us. During "Jack's Lament," my roommate Bryton fixed the sound. After the movie, I asked the three how they liked it (since they hadn't seen it), and they didn't like it as much as I do.

2011. In the morning, I went with my parents first to Winegar's grocery store. They went into America First and made their final house payment. The teller drew confetti and balloons on the receipt. My mom wanted to keep the receipt, but I don't think she did, just leaving it in the Suburban. After that, we went to the new movie theater in Centerville to see Puss in Boots. I waited for the credits because I feel that that's the true end of a movie, I wanted to see if there were any special features, and I wanted to learn who was singing at the end of the movie. Then we went to Walmart. We got Halloween candy for trick-or-treaters and I got caramel-apple-flavored cereal. After that, my parents went to Home Depot (I think to buy a mirror) but Allie and I stayed in the car. Then we went to Dairy Queen for lunch. I asked if I could get a pumpkin pie Blizzard with my meal, but the cashier couldn't understand me and my mom had to "translate."

2010. This might have been the day that "The Monster Mash" played on the country station at work, and my coworker Brandon rejoiced that they played a classic Halloween song. We would have swept up at the end of the shift, and the brooms always made me think of witches, and I may have thought about how the next time I came to work, Halloween would be over.

2009. I remember going to rake leaves at Sister Carter's house. She had Halloween cookies from the store. There were bat cookies, and I found it strange that they were white. This is my journal entry for the day:
"Today we did some of sacred planning but Elder Tamblyn was feeling out of it. Then we ate at Sister Carter's. Too many leaves stopped the mower so I raked instead. There were a lot and we didn't finish. 

"We were late to Deana's appointment so we didn't get to teach her. We tracted a little bit and saw some potentials. It was cold and misty all day. After dinner we tracted some more and such. We visited Tyson next door and found out Kim's being kicked out. Then we stopped at the Coopers' before our lesson with Mallary."

2008. We had spent the night in the house Sister Stackhouse was moving out of. I got up and ate Boo Berry cereal for breakfast. Elder Love noticed beer in the fridge and said that Sister Stackhouse would be mad about that (that might have happened the night before). I think Sister Stackhouse might have come later to move some things out. That day we were moving a pile of dirt for Jean Saunders Coultas, a less-active member. While we did so, I played all of The Nightmare Before Christmas in my head, just to see if I could. Sister Coultas made us tomato soup and grilled-cheese sandwiches for lunch. After that, we drove back to Ritzville. This is my journal entry for the day:
"Exactly one year ago today I was buying my temple clothes in a pumpkin shirt. I got up early to go to the store, and bought lots of candy. I can't believe how long it's been.

"We helped Jean Saunders Coultas, a less-active, by moving a large pile of dirt underneath her fence. That took a while but she made us lunch. We briefly helped Sister Stackhouse as well.

"Then we came back down to Ritzville. We tried to see a few people. The Carletons talked to us for a while. They're some of those digressing people. Then we saw Crystal--it was Edward's birthday--and went over the branch list with Brother Andrus, whose wife had her name removed."

2007. That morning I got up early and my mom and I went to Target because she wanted to buy my sister a Wii for Christmas. I remember waiting for it to open and discussing with another woman about how we had to wait until Monday since we didn't shop on Sunday. When we went in, all the Wiis were gone, but some other waiting customers were able to get their X-Box Guitar Heros. We looked at the Halloween stuff and I got a jack-o-lantern fleece blanket. We got a white pumpkin so I could carve it as Jack Skellington. I noticed candy cane Kisses, so we got those as well (I was less strict back then about things being in season). Then we went to Shopko. We looked at their clearance Halloween stuff. We got a silly bat decoration that descended on a string and made noises as it did so. Later that day we went to the Distribution Center so I could get fitted for my temple clothes. One of the workers complimented my jack-o-lantern shirt.

2003. I think I was with my mom and we were buying things for me to take the the seminary "extended devotional" (party) the next day.

1999. This was the school Halloween parade. I wore my ridiculous chess piece costume--a white robe and a white face with a cross on my head. Cody Egbert in my class was dressed as the devil. As we passed by the sixth-grade classes, I heard Mrs. MacAdams say I should go by the devil--that was the first time I realized people might misinterpret my costume. We got little trick-or-treat bags, and Hillary Ulmer wanted to use hers to hold her pretend knife. That might have been the night that I remember watching one of the Treehouse of Horror episodes of The Simpsons in the kitchen, and then later my mom turned off the lights and screamed. We asked what she was doing, and she said she thought it was Halloweeny.

1994.  My mom took my cousins to the hospital so they could see their new brother, Quin. After we got there and they saw the baby, Wayne told my cousins that there were donuts they could have, and Chancey and Jesse were excited. Then they told me I could have one too, and I was excited.

Last day of school

Public schools either just got out for the summer or are about to get out. That doesn't apply to me anymore. But I'm going to remember when it did--that precious last day of school. Now, I would be able to remember more if I had my yearbooks with me, but I don't, so I will have to go on what I can remember. I know I will remember more things after I post this.

2007. Both of my parents were gone that morning, and we had recently sold our "pink" car, so both the Subaru and the Taurus were gone, which meant I had to drive the Suburban to school. I was a little nervous to drive it to school, and I think I even had Susanne back it out of the garage for me. Then I drove to school and parked in the back parking lot. I got signatures from various people. I remember a discussion about how impersonal the "Hags" acronym was. I got a signing from Mrs. Jamison, who had been my French teacher. After she signed mine, she told me that she almost said she hoped I would get called to a French-speaking mission, but then she realized that she wished I would learn a harder language than French. (And then I got English.) She said that she wanted to know where I got called, so I should make sure it was announced in the Clipper. (That never happened either, neither when I left nor when I came home.) Eventually it was time for me to go home to get ready for graduation. I got in my grad garb and we took pictures of me in front of the fireplace. Then we went over to the "Turtle Building" for commencement exercises. People seemed impressed by all my honor cords. I had a light green one for science, a gold one for High Honors, and two light yellow ones for foreign language (one for Spanish and one for French). While we were standing waiting to go in, I remember someone saying they had asked Brian Mann if he was gay, and he had said, "No, but I support my brother," and they said that thought Brian just wasn't brave enough to admit it. Then we went in and sat down. We all had to fill out little cards with our names on them that the senior officers would read as we pretended to get our diplomas. I filled mine out as "R. Mark Melville" because I was in the habit of doing so (now I usually leave the R. off). They announced that there was going to be an opening remark by Jenelyn Perry, and when she got up she announced that it was a prayer for anyone who wanted to participate. I took off my graduation cap with others, hoping that I would put it on right again. When it was time to go up, I was surprised at all the cheers I got when they announced my name. But my cheers were nothing compared to Jacob Merrill's, the special needs kid who was after me. Then we had to wait in long lines to get our real diplomas. Then afterward I talked with my friend Houston Rowe. My family took pictures with me:

Then we went home and had pizza. The Thompsons also came over. Everyone had fun looking at my yearbook. Jesse read my emo poem, "I Am a Corpse," which was published in the back. He was surprised at how depressing it was and said, "It gets better." Allie looked at my picture. Of course, I was wearing that little fake tux in my picture, and there was a girl's photo next to mine. Allie pointed to her picture and said, "Who's that lady? Did you marry her?" Chancey, Jesse, and I all thought that was quite funny, so we laughed, and we were reproved by our parents, because apparently our laughter had interrupted Grandpa. After Grandpa told his story, we told them why we had been laughing. Since I was completely friendless, my graduation celebration consisted of watching episodes of The Flying Nun. One of the episodes made Sue tear up. After everyone left, I went online and wrote a blog post on my TV.com profile. (Apparently TV.com doesn't have blogs anymore, so I have to link to it on my Gamespot account, which you get automatically with a TV.com account.) I chatted with Jesse on Messenger. The title of my blog, "The time has come, the walrus said, to talk of many things," was a line from Lewis Carroll's "The Walrus and the Carpenter." I couldn't get quotation marks in the title, but Jesse told me that it was fine. He told me that the poem was about religions leading people astray before eating them up, with the carpenter being Jesus and the walrus being Buddha (because he's fat), but I didn't buy it.

2006. I wore my "Woods Cross Juniors" shirt, since it was the last time I would be a junior. I remember seeing seniors at school and thinking it must be sad for them, and I knew I would be in the same position the following year. At the moment I can't remember what else happened that day.

2005. The administration for some reason thought it would be funny to turn on the fire alarms that day, but it was mostly just annoying. (We had had real arson fires in February of that year.) I remember Natalie Cook was videoing people and videoed me and asked me to share something. So I shared words of "advice" from all the old TV shows I watched, such as "You cannot judge a doctor by the way he carves a turkey" and "Every silver lining has its cloud." (Yeah. I was really weird.)

2004. I remember encouraging my friend Houston to come up to the seminary building to get signatures. He did, but he left shortly after. I signed weird things in yearbooks--of all my school years, I think I was weirdest in ninth grade. Special-needs kids Jacob Merrill and Andrew Church had stickers they put in yearbooks. Brad Byington signed my yearbook saying he hoped I would go on  the scout trip that summer. (I didn't.) Houston and Josh Ferrer wanted to go to Mrs. Birdsall's classroom to play Scrabble. I told Mrs. Birdsall that I was going to take French the next year. There were some former students visiting her.

2003. The administration had had the brilliant idea that we should still report to all our classes that day, but there would be fifteen minutes between classes for yearbook signing. It only took a few periods for them to realize that was a terrible idea. During the science class, we got our cement boats we had made back (mine didn't float). During the choir class, Dennis Jones was really amused at what I wrote in his yearbook: "Witches--or is that Hags?" I rode the bus home, but when I got to the church/bus stop, no one was there, so I had to walk home. I remember my brother saying, "Well, that was anticlimactic."

2002.  This was the only year that school ever got out in May for me (it was May 31). I can't seem to recall what happened at school, but I think that night Jesse had a sleepover at our house, although maybe he only came over but didn't spend the night. There was a Powerpuff Girls marathon in which they counted down the best episodes. I was disappointed in their choice of the best one (the one where all the characters switched bodies).

2001. I brought my Niagara Falls four-color pen to sign yearbooks with. There was a fifth-grader who would talk to me because he liked my Charlie Brown shirt. He asked me to sign his yearbook, so I signed it with my attempt at a Charlie Brown drawing. Kari Fox had brought some Otter Pops, so she took them to the cafeteria freezer so they would freeze. We all signed yearbooks, and I lent my pen to someone, and it ended up missing. I was really sad. Montess Vilchez was crying, and someone said to her, "Don't cry!" But I was sad too, although I didn't cry. When it was time to leave for the day, the Otter Pops still weren't frozen. I had mine open in Laura Ulmer's car on the way home, and right by Walker's gas station, Shantel Cornejo and another girl jumped out into traffic, and Laura slammed on the brakes, making my liquid Otter Pop splash all over me and my yearbook. Laura apologized, and I wondered what made Shantel think she could dart into traffic like that. When they dropped me off, I dowsed myself with the hose, since I was sticky and I thought it was a good way to start off summer.

2000. We had to do a quiz on the states, and I was pretty annoyed. We also had to write a letter to ourselves. I can't remember what else happened.

1999. I remember Mr. Williams showing us a Looney Tunes summer vacation TV special. Then my mom and I went to the building where our eye doctor was; it was very rainy. Then it was time for David's graduation. When everyone was graduated, people threw their caps up, and one cap got stuck on a ledge. After his graduation, David had pictures taken with his friends Michael, Preston, and Heather. They were silly and moved their tassels back as though they hadn't graduated, and my mom had to tell them to put them back. Then we went to China Platter with Preston's family. Sara Hawkes (Preston's younger sister) asked David if he still had his Mad Hatter hat. Preston had a brother with blond splotches dyed in his hair.

1998. I think this was the day my dad had packed my lunch with cookies in it, even though I was going without sugar for a month to earn $20. I ate the cookies, but my mom later told me that I didn't get the $20 because I had cheated too much that month. It was raining while it was sunny, and Jacob Duggar said he didn't like that because it bugged him. Our teacher Mrs. Slagowski gave us some nuts in their shells. We had no way of cracking them. My friend Brian tried to break one open with a spade, but when he struck it, it just shot it across the room and didn't open it. I thought they would be good to use as Thanksgiving decorations, and when I got home I even glued strings to two of them (and put glitter on one) to use as Christmas ornaments. That night I had a sleepover at my house with David Christensen. I asked my mom to buy some peanuts, because I thought that would be a good snack, but then I learned David didn't like them. My brother David was watching The Simpsons; he said it was one of his favorite episodes (the one with all the short stories about Springfield). So I tried to come up with an activity to do with my friend David, so I came up with sledding down the stairs on pillows. But the bottom set of stars had the carpet pulled up, with tacks sticking out, so we could only sled down the top set. We watched The Pagemaster that night. David thought that the name of a literary figure in the movie was a swear word (I won't repeat it here because it will put bad thoughts in your head, since I just said he thought it was bad--even though on its own it isn't bad).

1997. Miss Slater cried when she read the poem she wrote about our class. My grandparents gave my sister a stereo for her graduation. (I don't think they ever got me anything, not that I really wanted anything at the time.)

1996. We signed yearbooks, and I think I might have been annoyed when administrative people signed near their pictures instead of in the autographs section.

1995. All of us clueless kindergarteners thought it was so cool to get  a book that had our pictures in it! We didn't know why we got them. I got a slip of paper that said my teacher for the next year was Miss Penman (who would marry over the summer and become Mrs. Taylor). I remember Hillary Ulmer telling her mom excitedly that she got a book with her William Boy in it (oh, kindergarten crushes, if you can call them that...).

When elementary school teachers were wrong

When I attended Orchard Elementary School, I thought that my teachers were smart people. But there were occasions when they were wrong.

Like when my third grade teacher said that Cinco de Mayo is the equivalent of the Fourth of July in Mexico. But that's false. Cinco de Mayo commemorates one small victory of the Mexicans over the French. Mexico's Independence Day is September 16, not May 5.

My fourth-grade teacher Mr. Williams was kind of a know-it-all. I remember once at Christmastime he gave us a bunch of Christmas words. One of the words was "manger." He told us that a manger is a barn, and he said that "Away in a Manger" could be called "Away in a Barn." But a manger is not a barn. That's a stable. A manger is a feedbox. The French word manger means "to eat."

It was Mr. Williams who taught me a stupid prescriptive rule, one that I followed for a long time. I wrote an Easter story that started off, "The funnest Easter I can remember," and he told me funnest wasn't a word. I had never heard that. He asked me to look in a dictionary to see if funner was in it. But now I know where that rule came from, and it's pure nonsense. Originally, fun was a noun. But if you say, "That was fun," it's hard to know whether fun is a noun or an adjective. But fun has now become an adjective, as in "That was a fun party." But stupid prescriptivists say you can't say "funner" because fun was a noun, and you can't add -est or -er to a noun. But today, fun is more of an adjective than it is a verb, and almost all (and maybe all!) other single-syllable adjectives take the -er or -est suffixes. If you're going to say funner is wrong, then you technically should say that more fun is also wrong. So take that!

In fifth grade, we used to rotate teachers. Mrs. Cowan was in charge of English stuff. And once she had to write the word business on the board. She wrote it as buisness. We corrected her, but she apparently had never considered the etymology or morphology of the word, and after writing it the right way, she said, "No!" and "corrected" it back to buisness.

I remember learning about the core, mantle, and crust in second grade. Then in fifth grade, the science teacher, Mrs. (or Miss?) Belnap, told us about more layers. There was the crust, the lithosphere, the outer core, and the inner core. I never fully understood what the lithosphere was, especially in relation to the core. But now I know that you can't talk about the core and the lithosphere at the same time. The crust relates to chemical properties (composition), and the lithosphere relates to physical properties.

The lithosphere and the crust are almost the same, except that the lithosphere is slightly thicker. The lithosphere is made of all of the crust and a little bit of the mantle. My teacher made it seem that the lithosphere was below the crust, but they're actually almost the same thing.

Then I had Mr. Williams again in sixth grade. Now, he was my favorite elementary school teacher, but sometimes, looking back, I question his ethics. He decided one day that our book that we would read as a class was the first Harry Potter book. But he hadn't read it, and he just played the book on tape, which meant that he didn't have to read it. Then one day he gave us a test on the book. But since he hadn't read it, he couldn't make one, so he Googled one. And he couldn't know how accurate the test was. And this was a terrible test. First of all, it had elements from the first three books, not just the first, so those who hadn't read all of them were at a disadvantage. But not only that, the test was WRONG! One of the questions asked which character had wizard parents. The options were Ron, Harry, Hermione, and maybe someone else. Of course, both Harry and Ron had wizard parents, even though Harry was raised by muggles. But the test said that Ron was the only one with wizard parents. So we challenged Mr. Williams about it. But instead of listening to us, he actually defended the test, even though he didn't know what he was talking about! Someone brought up that Harry's parents attended Hogwarts, and Mr. Williams said, "They were muggles who attended a wizard school." Um, no. That is completely false. It was obvious that he was making things up because he didn't want the quiz to be wrong.

People who are unteachable shouldn't be teachers.