Social Media is a Major Cause of the Mental Illness Epidemic in Teen Girls

We are now 11 years into the largest epidemic of teen mental illness on record. As the CDC’s recent report showed, most girls are suffering, and nearly a third have seriously considered suicide. Why is this happening, and why did it start so suddenly around 2012?

We sure seem to work hard to picture the world as worse than it really is to justify the mental health crisis. see Don’t be a doomer – Noah Smith

The way we have parented has reduced kids’ resiliency and then we threw a social media trap on top of that.

Pre-Social Media, maybe around 1999 or 2000 I did some, very unsophisticated, research for a psychology research design class. I surveyed a reasonably large sample of college students about their media consumption and their mental health. The survey was pretty granular and what I found was that there was no measurable impact from TV or movies or pretty much anything else, but fashion magazines had a significant negative impact on the self-esteem of women. I wondered at the time if that was because of the airbrushing and photoshopping that created unatainable beauty standards.

And as a society we just took all that and put it on steroids and then added the layer of being constantly judged by your peers. Pure poison.

There is one giant, obvious, international, and gendered cause: Social media. Instagram was founded in 2010. The iPhone 4 was released then too—the first smartphone with a front-facing camera. In 2012 Facebook bought Instagram, and that’s the year that its user base exploded. By 2015, it was becoming normal for 12-year-old girls to spend hours each day taking selfies, editing selfies, and posting them for friends, enemies, and strangers to comment on, while also spending hours each day scrolling through photos of other girls and fabulously wealthy female celebrities with (seemingly) vastly superior bodies and lives. The hours girls spent each day on Instagram were taken from sleep, exercise, and time with friends and family. What did we think would happen to them?

https://jonathanhaidt.substack.com/p/social-media-mental-illness-epidemic

I love you Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day!

I’m using an AI-generated portrait of Adrienne as a marker for the year when the Robot Uprising began. I assume that all future Adrienne Day posts will focus on her exceptional productivity in the lithium mines.

Last week I took Adrienne to a movie that I had already seen, but I was sure she would love. I’m really not much of a movie re-watcher, so I sat next to her in the theater mostly watching her watch the movie. She can’t hide what she’s feeling and she’s such an empathetic person that she feels it all, so I got to watch laughter and surprise and sadness and joy as the shifting light from the screen played across her face.

I wish I could have recorded it and sent it to the director and made his day.

I love how “all in” Adrienne is with every experience and every conversation. She never puts on a front of dispassionate coolness or hides behind an aloof mask. You always see what she feels, and it’s beautiful.

Also, she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day?

I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

I love you Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day!

I just saw some research about age at marriage and its effect on happiness. Much to the disappointment of people who think it’s crazy that kids at BYU get married so young, age at marriage wasn’t a factor in marital happiness.

We are coming up on 24 years of marriage! Since neither of us is in our 50s (though my back is in its 80s), you can guess we are part of the young marriage statistics.

Here’s the crazy thing, In 24 years, we have never had a single fight!

Oh man, I could barely write that… I’m assuming that 99% of you got to that line and got super annoyed and stopped reading. That means it’s just me and you actual “never had a fight” sickos. What is wrong with you people? You baffle me.

I’m really good at fighting. In fact, I got mad this morning because when I told Adrienne that I had a rough time sleeping last night, she said, “I know,” but I knew that she was actually saying was, “I know, because you kept waking me up with your tossing and turning.”Some people, like therapists, might tell you that “mind-reading” is bad for relationships, but that’s only when you are a lousy mind-reader. I am super good at it, and I knew that’s what she actually meant, and that was not a perfectly sympathetic response. It also made me feel slightly guilty, so I was totally right to get mad. I’m super glad I did because you can’t let those sorts of things just slide by or who knows what kind of stuff she would try to get away with next!

Don’t worry; the fights aren’t one way. I bet I only start 85% of them. I don’t get away with it either. I love that Adrienne has plenty of fight in her. She’s the loveliest human I know, but she cares deeply, she’s no one’s pushover, and she’s as tough as could be! I have always secretly wished someone would maybe try and steal her purse, and Adrienne could haul off and punch them. She is supernaturally strong, and being knocked out by a 5’3′ woman would be a pretty great surprise for someone who deserved it.

My 2022 wish for Adrienne is a year with fewer things that require her to be so tough but, I promise you, she is up for the task.

Also, she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day?

I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

Onward, Brave Cosmonaut!

Cosmonaut 
https://advisor.museumsandheritage.com/news/cosmonauts-birth-of-the-space-age-at-the-science-museum/

I went to the dentist this morning to replace an old filling that had gotten sensitive and was driving me crazy. They offered me laughing gas and, not feeling excited about drilling out the old filling, I readily agreed.

A few years ago we had tried laughing gas and it just did nothing for me, so they turned it all the way up this time. I started noticing some effects, but nothing dramatic. Here’s what went through my head,

I mean, I can feel it a little bit, but is it really working? What is it supposed to really feel like? Like, am I feeling that it is starting to work but it’s supposed to be way stronger and when he starts drilling I’m going to wish I had been breathing more deeply? OK, I’m going to take super deep breaths!

Now I can feel it! Hmmm… this is making me super high. Maybe that’s too much and I shouldn’t be breathing sooo deeply?

No, you can’t quit. Onward, brave Cosmonaut!

And that’s how I knew the laughing gas was working just fine…

I love you Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day!

Who would have thought that we basically wouldn’t have left the house since last Adrienne Day? Yes, it’s an exaggeration, but I wish it were a way more hyperbolic one. Because of some health issues, we’ve had to be very careful. We love to travel and explore, and that has all been seriously curtailed. It has sometimes felt like we are just living the same day over and over again.

We just watched the movie Groundhog Day. It’s fantastic. I have always believed that while you can’t necessarily choose everything that happens to you in life, you can choose how you respond to it, which can change your lived experience so much that it’s like choosing what happens to you – a lesson the main character painfully learns.

Groundhog Day is a masterpiece of existentialism, particularly in respect of the absurd element, with Connors claiming Sisyphus’s mantle of absurd hero. The film’s lesson is that we can escape from whatever dilemma we’re in by adopting the correct attitude. As Connors discovers, it’s a tough lesson; but to learn it is to gain the means to transcend the troubles of life.

https://philosophynow.org/issues/93/Groundhog_Day

Bill Murray’s character goes through a wild cycle of shock, delight at being somewhat omnipotent, and suicidal depression before he starts actually connecting with other people, particularly his love interest Rita. Those relationships not only make the endless cycle bearable but change him into a better man, finally freeing him.

Fortunately, I’m trapped in this Groundhog Day with Adrienne! She makes this bizarre time of life not only bearable but fun, and she definitely makes me a better man.

Also she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day?

I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

Missed Opportunities

Back in 2011 we were so naive.

THIS is how we told our kids we were going to have another baby? No explosions, nothing on fire… So lame! I’m not even sure we did anything for a gender reveal other than tell people who asked that we were having a boy.

I love you Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day!

Story time…

In college Adrienne and I had been hanging out a TON but weren’t dating yet.

At the time I was playing volleyball for BYU on an incredible team. I’m not being falsely humble when I say that I was not incredible, but that team sure was. We would regularly set attendance records and were always a top ranked team. My teammates went on to win the National Championship, be All Americans, play professionally, and a couple of them even went on to win gold medals in the Olympics! My job on the team was mostly to give the actually good players someone to play against in practice and very very occasionally see some actual playing time in a game.

In spite of my very minor role on the team I had a weird experience with a girl who 100% only liked me because I was on the volleyball team. That’s something that sounded just fine to me in theory but in practice was pretty lame. So, even though we had been hanging out I didn’t tell Adrienne I was on the team.

OK, lets actually be honest, my aim in not telling Adrienne I was on the team was maybe 5% because of this experience and 95% how cool she was going to think I was when I dropped that bomb on her. Yeah, I know, I know. I was 21; cut me some slack…

One night Adrienne asks me what I’m up to this weekend:

“Oh, I’ve got a volleyball game.”
“Like an intramural game?”
“No, I’m on the BYU volleyball team!”
“BYU has a men’s volleyball team??”
😯

I then tried to impress her by offering to put her on the guest list and get her into the game for free, but turns out she was busy that weekend…

I’m open to Adrienne debating some minor details of my recollection here, but nothing that materially changes how amazingly she shut me down! And, honestly, I loved it.

That’s one of the things I’ve always loved about Adrienne; she is totally non-pretentious. She is, in fact, allergic to pretension of any kind. If she likes or dislikes something or someone it is on its own merits. She couldn’t care less about impressing anyone, but I am still so impressed with her!

Also she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days
What is Adrienne Day? I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

I love you Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day!

OK, it WAS Adrienne day but I didn’t have a chance to post anything because we were too busy running around Maui and then taking a red-eye flight home. That’s a pretty good excuse though, right?

Every year my work (shout out to Podium!) sends the top sales people and top performers from other departments, along with a +1, on a celebratory trip. I get to go because I’m on the exec team, as much as I would like to credit it to me being a top performer…

I have to say, celebrating Adrienne Day in Maui seems like a pretty great new tradition!

One of the things we did in Maui was Snuba , a cross between snorkeling and scuba diving where your air tank is floating above you on a raft and your regulator is attached to it with a 15’ tube. I was really really excited about this, Adrienne was really really not. Adrienne is cant-wear-a-turtleneck level claustrophobic. Just putting on the mask on dry land makes her really uncomfortable. Add in a regulator in your mouth and being 15’ underwater…not fun.

Luckily, I am amazing at dealing with phobias or other things I find to be irrational. Well, as long as you think “That’s dumb. Just do it anyway and quit being bothered by it!” is helpful. In that case, I’m your man!

I may start charging for my patented therapeutic approach. Is there a food you don’t want to eat because it grosses you out? That’s dumb. Just eat it anyway and quit being a baby. Feeling super anxious about something? Knock it off! Anxiety sucks, so don’t get anxious.

Solved! You are welcome. That will be $500.
(Note: This does not work at all and I am a jerk for responding this way)

Adrienne was a champ to agree to try snuba anyway, but she said that she might bail out or just stay on the surface and that I should go on without her. The look in her eyes though the face mask made it pretty clear that this was not happening.

That’s why it was so amazing when I looked up to check on her again and instead of seeing her hanging out on the surface she was swimming down to me and soon enough we exploring the reefs together.

After our dive the guide was blown away, “I’ve never seen anyone make that big of a change before! That was amazing!” She was giddy. So was I. Adrienne is one of the bravest people I know.

Gliding across reefs 15′ underwater while holding hands is always going be a favorite memory.

Hey Paul Baribeau, would you mind telling Adrienne how I feel about her?

Strawberry – Paul Baribeau

To say that you are cute
Would be like saying that a strawberry is sweet
Because a strawberry has secret flavors
That are sharp, and tart, and red, and deep

And I would love to find you
Growing wild out by the woods
I would make a basket with the front of my t-shirt
And take home as many of you as I could

And to say that you are pretty
Would be like saying that the ocean is blue
Because the ocean is filled with all kinds of colors
And I see all kinds of things when I look at you

And I want to explore you
With my tennis shoes off
Standing ankle deep in a tide pool with my khaki pants rolled up

And to say that you are funny
Would be like saying that the night sky is black
Because the night sky is filled with stars and comets
And planets that no one has seen yet

And I want to look at you
Lying down on my front lawn
I’ll try to take you all in at once
But you just go on and on and on

Thanks Paul.

Also she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day?

I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

I love you Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day!

Look how stinking cute she is! Somehow she’s stayed the same age and I have aged exponentially.

I rolled out of bed this morning and tried to walk quietly on my way to the shower so I didn’t wake her up. I caught my left toe on a shoe I left on left on the floor, but I didn’t even notice that because that toe has been numb since my first back surgery in 2005 – The Hammer of Spinal Repair (Adrienne wrote that BTW). My right knee creaked as I walked, I had surgery on that in 2001, and I’ve had a bit of a limp in my left leg since I blew up my back a year ago and had to have a spinal fusion…

I trimmed my beard, partly to clip off the rampant gray hairs that have sprung up in the past year, and I had to squint a bit as I did it because it seems to take my eyes a lot longer to focus than they used to.

And then you have Adrienne somehow getting younger and better looking by the day.

Some of this is just science — I’m 6’6” and she’s 5’3 (if we are being generous), so according to this article, “Larry Bird will die young. Just ask him”, I will live to be 50 and she will live to be two hundred and forty-five. Some of it is really just that she’s too tough to age — I can’t even keep up with her anymore when we walk or hike. Some of it is the dark rituals… but I’m not allowed to talk about those.

Don’t tell anyone, but Adrienne has some gray hair too. The difference is that her’s are super cute and perfectly symmetrical and the kind of thing that people go to the salon to have done.

There isn’t anyone I’d rather asymmetrically grow old with.

Also she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day? I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

Maracaibo

I lived in Venezuela from 94′ – 96′ and the Maracaibo sun burned a deep love of the place and the people right in to my soul.

I’m still regularly in touch with many people there, so it’s been absolutely heart breaking to watch the country implode and know so many people suffering.

Because he is my twin, it feels like Joe was able to suck memories and motifs right out of my brain even though he’s never been to Venezuela, and he wrote a song about the place that moved me to tears.

Your foot really will sink in to the asphalt in the maracaibo heat, and the enormous lake Maracaibo hosts a never ending lighting storm called catatumbo, which is a fitting metaphor…

Maracaibo

Crossing the street leaves tar on your feet
Not even the pavement can handle this heat
It's a push and a shove for the ones that you love
But the stores are all empty again
If you don't want to break, you're gonna have to bend
There's a lightning storm that never ends
You can't say what makes you stay
With the border less than an hour away
It bulges at the seams with all your hopes and dreams
But you can't bring yourself to leave
So if you don't want to break, your'e gonna have to bend
There's a lightning storm that never ends, it never ends
If you don't want to break, you're gonna have to bend
Because this lightning storm never ends, it never ends, will never end
(Joe wrote and played the song, and his preternaturally gifted daughter sang it. )

I Love You Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

Adrienne and I were sitting on the couch the other night choosing a movie to watch and trying to get Reese to go to bed. I was obviously coming down with something because I had a fever and felt miserable. I NEVER get a fever. EVER.

Adrienne and I were joking back and forth and, even though I was legitimately miserable, I was having a great time too. Reese begged to stay up late and hang out with us because he was absolutely delighted with how much fun we have together.

I can’t blame him; we really do have so much fun together (Even when I have an absolutely unprecedented fever that means I had the flu worse than anyone has ever had it in history and I was so very brave about it and barely complained at all).

I ended up coughing my lungs out a few nights in a row and tried to fix it by soaking in a tub at 3am after taking my codeine cough medicine. In my sleep-deprived and syzurup-addled state I had the stereotypical silly-stoner moment of thinking I had a profound insight about the meaning of life and then was totally unable to remember it. I tried to dig back through my thoughts and recapture it, but besides, “God probably thinks everything we ask Him for is hilariously out of line” all I could come up with was “Spend your time with your favorite and your best.” Which, thanks codeine, I think is straight from the kids show Charlie and Lola, but is really not a half bad attempt at the meaning of life if you let it sit for a minute.

Adrienne is definitely my favorite and my best, and I’m never happier than when I’m spending my time with her.

Also she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day? I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

Emergency

At hospital for 6 month post spinal fusion follow-up X-rays. See an old guy collapsed against car in parking lot. “How can I help you!?”

“get wheelchair…” I ran to ER and grabbed wheelchair. Ran back and rushed him in to ER & up to checkin desk. “How can we help you?”

Barely able to speak, huffing and wincing in pain, he says “Did…I…leave…my…sunglasses…here?”

Do Not Set Sail, Oh Sailor!

My 6th grader brought this home from school yesterday. “I had some time after my math test and this popped out of my head. It’s a little dark…”

I’m a little confused why (and how) my 6th grader has Victorian sailor tropes popping into her head after math tests.


Do not set sail, oh sailor!

Do not set sail, oh sailor!

Do not set sail, oh sailor. Beware the seeping sin.

Do not depart on this acursed voyage, for the serpent will do you in!

The ocean yields up horrors, monsters waiting to pull you down.

As you sink, slowly suffocating, you begin to drown.

The water becoming our grave, you inch closer to death

The serpents teeth tear into your body, and you lose your final breath

So do not set sail, oh sailor. Beware the seeping sin.

Do not depart on this acursed voyage, for the serpent will do you in!

The best thing I’ve ever read?

“Alternatively, according to Clayton Swansen, a dolphin handler who worked in the Navy program between 2003 and 2005, the marine mammals are equipped with a bite plate that holds a shackle that the dolphins can use to disable an intruder. “They just hit the person in the leg and it attaches around their leg and they can’t pull it off until it sends a float up,” Swansen told Business Insider.

Bringing the Thunder

My 8th-grader banged out this poem in about 15 minutes. It’s probably the best thing you will read today.


Swiggity Swastical
My fake hand feels plastical

“But how’d you lose it?” you might wonder.
It’s story time, kids, and I’m bringing the thunder.

See, saving the galaxy’s my number one task
I fly between planets with an oxygen mask

Got in a fight with my evil jerk father
He cut off my hand, a five digit slaughter

“Rule the galaxy, as Father and Son!”
But my hand was gone so I felt done

I let go of that tiny iron pole
And fell like a rock through a high-up hole

Luckily my friend Lando caught me
Deciding to save me though before he fought me

We flew away in my homie’s ship
This was a really bogus trip

Then we went and chilled in a rebel blockade
That’s where my fake hand was made

So now you know why my hand feels dumb
But still, my story isn’t done

My homie Han got frozen stiff
And was almost thrown in a Sarlac Pit

But death never came that day
Main characters always find a way!

Away we flew at hyper speed
Freed at last from Jabba’s greed

Then we lead a final assault
The second death star had one tiny fault

We drove an entire ship inside
Launched some missles, “Open wide!”

The Death Star was reduced to pieces
Imperial plan had gone to feces

We landed, then, to celebrate
Stormtrooper meat is what we ate

Now you see why we are pros
Saving planets with my bros.

I Love You Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day! File Feb 09, 4 53 12 PM

I was looking back though my photos to find a good picture for Adrienne Day and ended up getting lost browsing through my instagram feed and smiling at all the adventures we had this past year. We had a couple big trips and lots of little hikes and family walks and sledding and tubing, and even just hanging out in the kitchen and cooking new things together.  Between my being a Scoutmaster and a few work trips there were also a several adventures that Adrienne didn’t get to join that would have been SO much better if she were there.

I love how Adrienne is always up for an adventure and that’s she’s such good company when we are on one. She’s fun and funny and smart and curious and everything is better with her around.

Also she is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day? I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.

The Manchurian Candy

Swedish salty licorice is the worst candy I’ve ever had by a factor of 10. It tastes like hospital disinfectant, gunpowder, and the tears of chimney sweeps.

It’s flavored with ammonium chloride. Read this and tell me if this is a food stuff:

“The mineral is commonly formed on burning coal dumps, due to condensation of coal-derived gases. It is also found around some types of volcanic vents. It is used as a flavouring agent in some types of liquorice. It is the product from the reaction of hydrochloric acid and ammonia.”

I’m sure it’s an acquired taste, but one that must be acquired the same way the Manchurian candidate acquired his love of communism, or Alex his distaste for ultra-violence.

If I ever had to debate against Nordic Democratic Socialism I would just point to this candy and win.

I Love You Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

It’s Adrienne Day!

No, we aren’t having another kid! This is just one of my very favorite pictures of us even though it is super grainy and not terribly flattering. I was thinking about all the things I love about Adrienne and this moment popped into my head. I feel like this picture is REALLY a picture of us. It captured who we are so well that I freaked out and destroyed my iPhone so it would release our souls. We were in the waiting room, waiting for what was almost certainly going to be an unwanted C-section to top off a pregnancy that had already been fraught. We were a little nervous and stressed, but we were together and we were laughing and we were ready to take on anything.

Sometimes I feel like we’ve had more than our fair share of practice with hard things in life, but the practice has paid off. When the going gets tough the Penrods will form Voltron and punch the Going right in the throat.

(If we were really Voltron we would have learned from the cartoon, and we would just immediately form the Blazing Sword and use it. It always took cartoon Voltron 45 min to figure out that they just needed to form the sword and the battle would be instantly over, just like happend the last 100 times)

This is pretty much exactly what we look like when dealing with tough situations, except Adrienne is hot.

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days

What is Adrienne Day? I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, on the other hand, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my own holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have been celebrating it ever since.

I Love You Adrienne, Happy Adrienne Day!

Adrienne

It’s Adrienne Day!

The summer before Adrienne and I got engaged I was working coaching volleyball camps. I would drive or fly out to some crazy little town and spend most of the week coaching high school girls and then come home on the weekends. I ended up in some interesting places, Truth or Consequences, New Mexico being a memorable one for the name alone.

When I was in Provo I spent every minute with Adrienne. When I was at a camp I spent every non-coaching minute thinking about Adrienne. Not just thinking about hanging out with her, but thinking about spending the rest of my life with her.

When we went to these camps we usually staying in the home of a parent of someone on the team, and in Truth or Consequences I can clearly remember excusing myself one evening to go for a walk. Their home backed up into some fairly wide open desert, and I walked around in the moonlight, trying not to step on cactus, and trying to decide if I was going to ask Adrienne to marry me.

It’s funny to think back on that and try to imagine what my thought process could have possibly been. What did I know about anything? I can’t believe I had to trust that idiot kid with my future! I would barely trust Young Josh to decide what shirt to wear!

And yet, somehow, that guy made an amazing decision.

You are kind of an idiot Young Josh, but you did good on this one. You should know that it all works out WAY better than you could have imagined. You couldn’t have chosen a better wife. You love being married to Adrienne. Just tonight you were reading through your journal and smiling at how many times you wrote something about just spending time with Adrienne doing even boring stuff like chores, and how often those entries ended with “A really nice day!”

You’ve had more than your fair sure of really nice days, and you owe an awful lot of that to marrying Adrienne. You did good Josh.

Also, she is still hot.

PS – go to class you idiot!

Take a minute out of your busy day and wish Adrienne a happy Adrienne Day!

Previous Adrienne Days [1. I need to fix some broken images in these entries!]

What is Adrienne Day?

I hate Valentine’s day. It is a cheesy, commercial mess of a holiday. I can’t stand it. Adrienne, however, I love. So, when we were dating and Valentine’s day was approaching I decided to take control over my holiday destiny and I invented Adrienne Day. I arbitrarily chose February 9th and we have celebrated it ever since.