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!

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!

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.

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.

If you forward this post to ten of your friends…

When email first really became a thing I would constantly get mass-forwarded emails. Do you remember those? Bill Gates wanted so badly to give me a ton of money if I would just help him track emails by forwarding them

“My name is Bill Gates. I have just written up an email-tracing program that traces everyone to whom this message is forwarded to. I am experimenting with this and I need your help. Forward this to everyone you know, and if it reaches 1,000 people, everyone on the list will receive $1,000 at my expense. Enjoy. Your friend, Bill Gates.”

I still remember a friend of a friend of a friend being getting mad at me when I sent a link showing that tampons did not, in fact, contain asbestos. Goofy political conspiracies, inspiring but not true at all stories… all sorts of things that could be disproved with a little common sense and a quick google search.

Eventually people matured enough that they stopped sending those out. Or maybe they all just got mad at me for checking Snopes and replying to their dumb email in 3 seconds and they just didn’t include me on future forwards. Luckily, whenever I get nostalgic for those days I can just go to Facebook and look at my stream.

Thanks Facebook!

Million Dollar Idea – Baby Background Checks

Think about it. We have a baby coming any day now and we are going to bring him home from the hospital and let him live in our home from now on without knowing anything about him at all! Who is this guy? He could be a total jerk and we are just going to let him move in with us?

This is a huge market. Thousands of stranger babies are born every day. Wouldn’t you sleep better knowing a little more about that little mystery man’s background?

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Evolutionary Failure Part III

I just choked to death on a cherry coke and coughed it all over my office like a custom-built Cherry Coke in-office sprinkler system. It looks like I murdered an Elf in here (everyone knows they bleed cherry coke).