Miranda's Alter Ego or "The Miranda Freak Show"

Miranda has found a new and somewhat embarrassing role in our new locale; she’s become the fashion project for various females. For those of you who know her, you know that outward appearance (particularly clothes and makeup) fall rather low on Miranda’s priority list (somewhere after getting up really early to exercise but before spending hours reading Cosmo).

So, some wonderful and generally entertaining ladies in the ward have been subtly encouraging her to try makeup, do stuff with her hair, and get new clothes. So what has been the end result:

“The Miranda Freak Show”

(Miranda’s title, not mine)

So her friend convinced her to get a leopard print skirt and “hooker” boots. After she got her outfit together she went to her friend’s house for the runway experience. Unbeknownst to her she had missed an appointment with another friend who owns a salon to get her brows plucked and her hair straightened. (She didn’t know about the appointment because she did not set it up; her first friend did, but had neglected to tell her about it.) Anyhow, so she went from friend A’s house to friend B’s salon and was squeezed in. (At least she called home and asked how I felt about her straightening her hair, what a nice wife.)

(Well, here's proof that Miranda really does have multiple personalities)

The next day was Sunday and actually did become the “Miranda Show” (I don’t think she was freaky). We sang in the choir and sat on the stand and more than one person told me they had to lean over and ask their spouse who the new girl was. Miranda was very much the center of many people’s attention and she liked it a little less than she likes going to the dentist (not a semi-annual experience for her due to her utter disdain).

Comments of the day:

“Who’s that sitting next to...? No, that’s not Miranda.” (This turned into a long discussion between the husband and wife as they tried to prove each other wrong).

A friend of ours came to me and said, “I hope you don’t mind that a happily married man told your happily married wife that she looked Smokin`”

The bishop (a good friend) said, “Wow, I’d date her”

And one of the Laurels noted that she was “Sexy” (not a word that Miranda really wants her young women to be using).

Miranda could probably add some more comments, but you get the idea.

As noted, she did not really like the attention and between the added work and the embarrassment is unlikely to do this on a regular basis...but it might be nice to see happen more often than her trips to the dentist.

Miranda said if she had to be a freak then at least I had to wear suspenders for her...sounded like a good deal...so here I am.

What's the Use of Friends?

Friends are there for the good times:
And the bad (like when BYU loses):

Friends are good for games:
For covert ops:
For weird family torture rituals:
Friends keep their eyes out for you:

Sometimes, friends even take 1400 miles detour just to decorate Easter Eggs (okay, maybe not just for that):
Friends get you into trouble,
But then, they can get you out again, too:
Oh yeah, and it’s nice when they have cute kids:

Well, I figured I do an "Ode to the Merrells" for Tom's birthday. Happy Birthday Tom!! Thanks, for being you and having such a great family, you've all been great friends and we're better for having you in our lives. (Thanks to others for letting me reminisce a little.)

Chiaphobia

It has been brought to my attention that some of you feel that I spelled Quijote wrong. You feel that I should have used the English spelling of the word which replaces the ‘J’ with the letter found between ‘W’ and ‘Y’ in the alphabet. While I am sure that I could bore you with a thousand reasons why I have elected the current spelling, but I will limit it to two:

First: Don Quijote is a Spanish character in a Spanish book written by a Spanish author and it takes place in Spain. So, I feel justified in using the correct spelling. (I don’t plan on spelling my name different if I go to Spain.)

Secondly, and more importantly, as far as I am concerned there are only 25 letters in the alphabet. I don’t believe in the letter between ‘W’ and ‘Y’ and therefore will not be using it in my blog.* Okay, the truth is I have Chiaphobia. No, that’s not the fear of Chia Pets, although they should be feared as they are disturbing and if ignorant people were to keep feeding them they would eventually gain sentience and kill their owners (It happened once, see the front page of the New York Times dated January 15, 1983, or just look at the information I have included from a very reliable source.**) Chiaphobia is the fear of the letter between ‘W’ and ‘Y’ (Chi is the Greek name for that letter and as it does not contain unsaid letter, therefore I can use it, but it would be confusing if I substituted Chi into the middle of words…how dumb would that be.) Anyhow, for those of you who love the Chi-Files or waited in line to watch Chi-Men I, II, and III; sorry, go get your Chi somewhere else.

*Disclaimer: this in no way represents nor should be should be construed as a contractual agreement with my devout readers.

** “Chia Pet is commonly seen just sitting there on the middle of the table or counter, but this is just its menacing way of quietly planning out its neCHIt attack on the victim. The average Chia pet has to eat 1 person per week to survive.

Local Wal-Marts are now beginning to carry a new type of pet food: This is guaranteed to keep your Chia pet from eating you to death or a money back guarantee!

It is made from puppies imported directly from China and processed to provide several weeks worth of bottom-saving alternative nutrition. The Chia Pet is a highly poisinous creature that can spit a stream of it's Ch Ch Ch Chiaaaaaaaah poison accuratly up two 20 feet, thus preventing you from running because it's very close to the effects of acid the difference is that it will send you into convulsions and eat through your skin. You won't be able to scream anything but " CH CH CH CH CHIIIIIAAAAAAAAAAH PET!!!!" If you don't believe me you can check the Nevada police records, The file will state " Victim of homicide case # 1120, neighbors state that all they could hear was " CH CH CH CH CHIIIIIAAAAAAAAAAH PET!!!!" and then a vicious eating noises." So if you ever think about buying a Chia pet think again.” http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Chia_pet

Ice, ice everywhere and not a frozen pole to stick my tongue to

Hope you found that last account amusing. Here are some pictures of what happened in our life this last week. The first two are in our yard. Fortunately we did not get as much ice as last year or as much as other places around us. The other pics were taken less than an hour from our house. What looks like a snowy wonderland is really just a lot of ice. It was actually quite impressive.

General Laziness

I must apologize to all of you who have been faithfully following my blog. Your devotion has been true and, well devout; but here I have failed in my proper duty of posting on a weekly basis, as a minimum. I did so well the first week and have now become a disappointment to you and the world at large. This will change. I have yet to be defeated by my many responsibilities or my general laziness.

Speaking of General Laziness, I think I have been well acquainted with him over the last couple of years. Here’s the story:

Once upon a time in a land far, far away (Provo) there was a small hamlet (BYU). While being apprenticed to an evil tyrant (BYU Spanish Dept) our great hero decided to embark upon a masterful quest with his sidekick (at this point the sidekick was Aaron…he succeeded on the quest where Dan failed…or the quest changed or something). We argued that we lived in a great country and we should do our part to improve it by subjecting ourselves to torment and ridicule and join the Air Force (okay so the ridicule only comes from the Marines).

Thanks to the inspiration of Aaron, Dan decided that he should look at being a Chaplain. (Aaron decided to go into Air Force finances and continues with them to this day. So what, that his noble quest has succeeded better than our hero’s. It’s not like sidekicks are stupid or something. Where would The Lone Ranger be without Tonto; the Inspector Gadget never would have succeeded at solving a single case without Penny or the dog; and think about the great lines we would never utter without Robin, “Holey, rusted metal, Batman.”)

Back to the narrative: In following said pursuit I enrolled in my Masters program and joined the Air Force Reserves. I went through sissy boot camp. (It was for doctors, chaplains, and lawyers; they cleaned our rooms and made our beds for us…it was really a disappointment actually, but Miranda liked that I came home ripped…a state that no longer is.) At the end of my Masters, due to reasons too numerous to elaborate upon, I filed the appropriate papers to be discharged from the AF. They were filed in Feb 2005.

Here is where we meet our nemesis, General Laziness. I never heard anything from the AF about my discharge. I called regularly for a few months and nothing so I left them alone. In Feb 2006 I asked them what was happening and they said “It’s not on their priority list.” So I left it alone and contacted them various times to tell them I had moved (which has happened all too regularly in the past 5 years).

Finally, I move to Tulsa (July 2007). I hadn’t updated my address with them yet and the church Military Relations Office calls and says, “The Air Force thinks you’re AWOL.” That’s Absent Without Leave, or Absolutely Weird Old Lout, either way it’s a bad thing. Seems General Laziness after 2.5 years lost my paperwork. Fortunately, I did not and I forwarded it to them (including the letter from the church dated when they should have discharged me) and avoided telling him how dumb I thought he was which is good because then I would have been AWOL, Absolutely Without Life.

In another demonstration of his competence, General Laziness never forwarded my changes of address to the rest of the Air Force Reserves as was my understanding and while they discharged me in July of 2008 (note one year after they said I was AWOL, maybe it’s American With Obstreperous Lady, but that doesn’t really apply, so who knows), I only found out about my discharge in Feb 2009, only 4 years later. (Maybe what none of realizes is that the war in Iraq has been over for a couple of years, but the paperwork won’t show that until 2011).