Sidewalks and Streetlights

I am from a very small town. Very small. 500 People, give or take. Let me give you a little taste of what I am talking about. I just completed the trek from "The city that never sleeps" (Provo) to Cowley "The city that has more Simmons and Godfreys than it does Gas Stations.". This summer, I returned home to Cowley for a little under 2 months and worked in a Bentonite mine (for more information about bentonite, check out http://www.cetco.com/). During the time that I spent here, the main street in town was completely torn up. They had heavy road construction going on for months. I forgot about this, and expected to see Cowley as I had always known and loved it when I pulled in late last night.

What I saw took my breath away.

To get to my house, you simply take your very first left as you come into town, and we are the first house on the right, after you go past the lumberyard. However, I was so enraptured in the beauty of the new additions to my town, that I drove the entire main street just enjoyed how nice everything looked. Granted, Main street goes on for less than a mile, but still I enjoyed every second.

It took me almost to the very end of the town to figure out why everything looked so good. Not only did we have a new beautifully paved highway, but I also noticed that for the first time, we had sidewalks and streetlights the entire length of Main Street. Imagine that! A sidewalk right by my house, and classy streetlights to boot!

Home will never quite be the same.

Yeehaw!!!

One day Jory had to transcribe some fiddle music for a class (or something like that). His homework is so much easier than mine. He just has to watch YouTube clips of musicians all day. In his defense, he actually has to study music, so I guess it's all right. Anyway, he said, "Tyler, come in here." I went. He showed me a video of some guys playing this song. Then we just played it. Random. Cool.

I scream...you scream...Tyler screams for ice cream!

This last Saturday night was a night of revisiting and creating old and new memories for me. Tyler and I were naturally hungry (we being men, and surely hadn't eaten anything for over an hour), and we set off to see what the city that never sleeps had to offer (it being only 8:00) by way of gluttony. Our destination: A little place called Doc's Pizza.

http://www.docspizzabuffet.zoomshare.com/

Doc's Pizza is a little place off of University Parkway in Orem. It is remarkably similar to another popular pizza buffet chain that I am fairly well acquainted with called CiCi's pizza that we frequently dined at on my mission in Tulsa Oklahoma. I have heard rumors that there is one, or there are plans for one in Utah.

http://www.cicispizza.com/_template.php

A lot has changed since I last ate there. Back in the glory days (as a freshman before my mission) we frequented the buffet for its incredibly reasonably prices. $4 per adult! It was almost too good to be true! We probably spent more on pizza than we did on tuition, and even more on gym memberships to counteract the effects of the pizza. Not much has changed in that department, besides the fact that tuition has gone up. Luckily, so has the price of the pizza. Would you believe me if I said that the current price is $6? Granted, that does include salad, bottomless soda, and ice cream...

...segue...

We finish our meal-It was great, by the way, that hasn't changed. They do charge you a dollar now if you leave any food on your plate at the end, which is definitely ghetto. It makes sense though, as a freshman we used to go in and pile all of our crusts on a napkin in the middle of the table, and we would leave with an enormous pile of crusts spilling all over the booth, so I guess I can't complain too much... Anyway, we finish our meal, and Tyler says: "Are you going to get more pizza, or what"? To which I replied: "Nah, lets get some ice cream".

"No thanks" said Tyler, while Doc's breathed a collective sigh of relief. "I don't really feel like ice cream". "Pffffft. What do you mean you don't feel like ice cream"? I countered. "its free"!

Long story short, I of course prevail and Tyler saunters back over to the table with a tall ice cream cone in one hand, and an empty cone in the other". "I really like cones" he said.

As it turns out, thats not all that he liked.

Over the next 15 minutes, my friend who "didn't feel like ice cream" returned not once, but four times to the ice cream machine.

We may or may not be welcome back.

The human squeegee

Tonight Jory and I had to run to the store to grab some punch for the ward fireside. It rained earlier today, so the windows on my car were wet. We were pulling out of the driveway when I noticed that I couldn't see out of my rear window because it was all covered in water and condensation.

"I'll go wipe it off," said Jory.

"Ok, but not with your body", I responded.

What I meant was that I didn't want Jory to inconvenience himself by using his hands or sleeves to wipe off my car. (He is known for scraping off frost and snow with his credit card.) That was what I meant. Jory saw this poorly worded comment as the perfect opportunity to be ridiculous.

I shook my head as I watched Jory jump repeatedly, belly flopping onto the rear window of my car and slowly sliding off. He effectively used his hoodie (and his entire body) to wipe off the window. Good work, Jory. And good laughs.

Please take our poll...

t.

Impromptu cheese party

Take a good, long look at that picture. If I had any say in what Heaven will be like, this would be my first proposal.

For about a year now, I've been telling people how much I want to throw a cheese party. I've talked about fine cheeses, grape juice, tuxedos, and live music. I haven't actually done anything about it, though.


Tonight, the planets aligned. That's the only explanation I can think of. There I was, standing there in our dirty downstairs kitchen. I was dressed in my pajamas and still recovering from a nasty case of the flu. This is when I realized that I have everything I need (minus the music and the tux). I turned to Jory (who is always standing somewhere in my immediate vicinity when I get these kinds of epiphanies) and told him to close his eyes. I did some digging and found two chocolate covered strawberries in our fridge and a tube of Ritz crackers in my bedroom. He was delighted. These extra goodies perfectly complemented the three cheeses (that were neither cheddar NOR american) that we happened to have in our fridge and the jar of fresh, home-made grape juice my mom dropped off today.


I apologize to those to whom I have long promised a cheese party. This one just kind of happened.


Also, I think there needs to be qualifications for attending such a party. I used to assume that everyone could appreciate cheese. My naive dreams were crushed when I shared a piece of Gouda cheese with Jon this evening. He said, "It tastes just like cheddar."

"Thou Shalt not Covet"

I am a firm believer in the Ten Commandments, but what did Moses know about iPods? I don't imagine that Aaron had a second generation iTouch that he was constantly waving in front of Moses' face. Surely the children of Israel wouldn't have had to wander in the wilderness for 40 years if they had had the Google Earth or mapquest application to tell them how to get to the promised land. Maybe they wouldn't have had such a problem with the food that the Lord provided for them if they had been able to google: "101 mouth-watering manna meals: how to convert your food from God to food for Gods". Would wandering in the wilderness really have been that bad if the Children of Israel could have played guitar hero every night to Psalm 118? No way, life couldn't have been better. Obviously since Moses had never known about iPod Touches, there was no way that he would have (note it is would have, not could have) included the 2nd Generation iPod Touch in this command to not covet anything that is our neighbors, right?

Tyler, my roommate, has but one fault. He actually has an iPod touch. Yeah. He has his own. I know what you are thinking: how is that a fault? Simple: Tyler in having this iPod causes me to commit sin. Not on purpose, of course. He is like a beautiful women. Its not her fault that she is pretty, but what happens to guys when we see beautiful women? We lose our minds! Not that we need them (our minds) when dealing with gorgeous girls or any girl for that matter, for any "well-thought-out" decision that seems logical to us will surely not make any sense to the female mind. Unfortunately for us, there is currently no iPod app available for purchase that we can download that will help us with this problem. The trouble is, it would have to be written by a Female, and that would never work, because by the time the program was written she would have changed her mind and would have to re-write the application, thus making it out-dated before it was even dated (pardon the dating pun).

I digress.

What is a guy to do? Not only do I have girl problems, but I have Tyler practically prancing around with his iPod. I look over at him right now, and I can't help but admire the way the light pleasantly plays off of his face from his Fireplace app (it actually emits real heat!). Its like this every day. If he isn't listening to classic Disney soundtracks and singing along with them at the top of his lungs, he is challenging us to Guitar Hero right in the palm of his hand. Doesn't he know what he is doing to us all? Does he ever stop to think that maybe, just maybe we don't all have access to pointless little games and applications right at our fingertips? I mean sure, I have a "computer" oh yeah. Reeeall cool. Yeah, I have "musical instruments". Sure, I can listen to music on an iPod "classic". But why should I have to? Who wants to play games on a big fancy 17 inch screen when they could be playing on one that is 3.5"? Why should I waste my time with a $3000 saxophone when I could be using the ocarina app? And who wants to carry around a device that is -get this- 3/4 of a centimeter wide, when I could be carrying one that is 8 mm thin! What do they think that I am, made of pocket space? Now I look back at him, and his once pleasing bone structure under the flickering light of the fireplace looks more sinister than sweet, more fiendish than friendly.

Could life have gotten worse?


"Jory, guess what I bought today?"
Things got worse.

"Jon, if it is an iPod touch, I hate you".

"hate away, my friend".

How dare he call me a friend. Doesn't he know what he was doing to me? The agony that I go through every single minute of every single day, when at every turn, something reminds me of Tyler, and in turn that reminds me that I don't have what he has? I go to a wooded area on campus to be alone, to be away from technology, until I realize that everywhere around me there are things that are not straight like a stick, but are in fact, sticks, and what do I think of? Tyler. I see statues, and I hug them because I know that they don't have iPods and I hug them for this very reason and what happens? They don't hug back. They just stand there cold and heartless, completely devoid (not to mention incapable) of emotion, not returning the hug. What do I think of? Tyler. And then? iPods. I don't have one. Tyler does. I don't. Tyler does.

Now Jon has one too?

Knowing that life would be unbearable from henceforth and forever without a precious to call my own, I did the only thing that I could do. I logged on to eBaY and weighed my options. Should I hold out for a 16 gig, or could I really do without it? Did I really need to be able to fit 8,000 more songs? No. besides, the 8 gig came with free shipping. As fast as anyone has ever double-clicked a mouse before, I clicked. I triple clicked. I clicked as fast as my stubby fingers could go, and I bought that iPod, darn it. I bought it real good.

Take that, Jon.

...ring...ring...

"Hey Jon, guess what I bought"? I said, smugly, very surely satisfied with myself.

"...<laughter>..."


"...Jory, now would be a good time to tell you that I didn't buy an iPod, I bought a book..."

...

Jon obviously has more faults than Tyler.