Summer Vacation

Well, summer is over and so should my lack of blogging come to an end. I just realized that from June to August I only posted three times. Dang. Ridiculous. What can I say - life got/is busy and the blog became last place on the priority list. And I work in front of a computer all day, so after work I have very little desire to get back in front of a computer monitor.
How about the political landscape? Wild, wild stuff. I've thought many times about posting some talking points concerning who I will vote for and why...I mean, it's not a mystery since I'm morally, socially and economically conservative. But one of these days I'll tell you why I'm voting for Cynthia McKinney and why she is the person who should be leading our country in these trying times. I just haven't had the energy for that 2000 word rant. I'll leave that to this blog Paula directed me to.
Why haven't I had the energy? Two things, really. One is college football. The season is young but it is here and I love it. My Cougars are 2-0 after a win over the Washington Huskies in Seattle; unfortunately, the fact that our QB had a 75% completion rate for almost 350 yards and our RB picked up over 130 yards on the ground or that our TE still leads the nation in receiving after 2 weeks or that our special teams blocked the game tying (not winning) PAT. The focus by the pundits is on the correct call of a crap rule. If you want to read an entertaining and totally bias blog, go to this blog by Adam. He's a Florida and SEC homer and rags on the non-BCS schools, but I like Adam so I'm directing traffic.
The second reason I'm usually spent is because I arise every morning to teach a religion class. It's true. Let me give a little bit of a rundown about what's going on.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is run by a lay ministry - no one gets paid. Not the Bishop in charge of the congregation, not the Stake President who is in charge of 6-10 congregations, not the Sunday School teacher...no one. These people are called from the general membership of the Church to serve. I've been asked to serve in a number of callings through the years. Anyway, I'd been teaching the 14-15 year old Sunday School class for a few months when I was asked to teach Seminary. Seminary is a class for high school aged students to attend daily before school. Each year a different book of scripture is the topic - this year is the New Testament. So, every morning I get up around 5am, shower, throw on a shirt and tie and go teach Seminary from a little after 6 to just before 7.
I get a lot of sympathetic looks and comments from people, but I really enjoy it. Why? Well, first of all you spend a lot of time studying which has been very beneficial; of the 14 potential students (I teach freshman and sophomores) on the roll, I have 12 out regularly and that's pretty impressive. Early morning seminary is not for the faint of heart and I give props to the kids for showing up every day and staying awake.
There are my weak excuses for not blogging more. If anyone still reads this thing.

Six years

Yesterday was an anniversary date I’d be remiss not to mention.
On Wednesday, May 16th, 2001 I flew out of Atlanta in four button suit, white shirt, tie and black name tag; I landed in Denver, Colorado and caught a connecting flight into Cody, Wyoming. I landed a little after 12 pm. My parents and siblings were all there with the exception of Nathan, who was anxiously engaged in the cause in Philadelphia; my grandparents were also there; my high school friends Bryan Tipton, Nick Wilson and Travis Marchant finished out the number. It was the first time I’d seen any of them in two years, five days.
For two years I’d dedicated everything I had and was to something much greater than myself; as sweet as it was to see familiar faces it had been much more difficult to leave. It wasn’t until four days after the most incredible experience of my life (to that point) ended that I allowed myself to think about what I’d just left behind. It wasn’t a pretty sight.
Now, on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007, I continue to reap the rewards of those 24 months of an occasionally flawed but loyal time of service to my God. Incredible as it seems, words fail me.

A Call To Arms

To the faithful readers, good to see you again; to the occasional passerby, greetings; to the crazy people, um…yikes; to the new visitor, welcome.
If I was a drinking man, I think this would be a hangover Monday. I’m dead tired; Sunday’s are not a day of rest for me anymore – they are flat out tiring. Yesterday, for example, I was busy with church from 9:30 to 6:30. What do you do? I’m trying to up and going this morning with some recently purchased 90’s tunes via iTunes. Inside Out (Eve 6), Santeria (Sublime), Zip-Lock (Lit), Water’s Edge (Seven Mary Three), Self-Esteem (The Offspring), Plush (STP)…just something to shake my mind loose from the cobwebs.
Fortunately I was spared this morning’s conference call with our offshore team in India. That would have been especially cruel irony to my beleaguered mind.
I was involved with my first one on Friday. Terribly brutal; Root-canal-minus-Novocain kind of brutal. There’s just something lost in translation and – this is going to be hard to believe – they don’t find me remotely funny or clever. I know; I couldn’t believe it either. Crazy but true. After it was over, I just dropped my head on to my desk, weeping in despair. (Kidding. Crying? There's no crying in Secuirty.) I said to my manager I was sorry it went so poortly and he told me not to worry about it, that most calls are straight business and humor isn’t something us and the Indians have in common.
I don’t often touch on church related items here at Cyber Commorancy; it’s not that I’m opposed, I just don’t. But I am here. And the irony is that I’m doing it in the same post I mention Santeria.
Yesterday in Elders Quorum our lesson came from a talk given by D. Todd Christofferson in the October General Conference entitled “Let Us Be Men”. It was one of my favorite talks then and I was happy to have it as a lesson; should I have sons, it will be something I will give them as they enter their teenage years. What it means to be a man has become so convoluted in today’s world that without specific direction, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find example of true manhood. Well, you can click on the link to the talk for a more inspired approach to what it means to be a man; I’m going to go on a little diatribe about what I think makes a man here below.

A man takes responsibility for his actions. No ones perfect, but a man doesn't use that as an excuse for his shortcomings. When he does falter, he fesses up and doesn’t blame society or the government for his errors. It's his bad and he'll take care of it; and if he needs help, he'll man up and ask for it. But he doesn't pass the buck.
A man sacrifices passion to principle. Today a man is measured by the number of women he’s been with or the size of his bank account or his athleticism. Right. Like it’s hard these days to have sex with strange and random women; a real man puts off impulsive, base desires for a greater good – righteousness.
A man acknowledges his weaknesses. It’s not easy to admit fault and shortcomings, which is why it really takes a man to do it. No one is perfect; no one expects us to be perfect. So don't be a poser because we all know you're lying. A man can embrace his weakness and make it a strengh. And then not make the same mistake again.
A real man is a leader because he’s a good follower. Playing off the last point, no matter who you are, there’s always someone who’s done it better; no man is going to get it all down pat in this life. That's why mortality is a probationary state, a proving ground for the eternities. A real man can admit that and learn from those who have; as he learns, he leads those who are learning.
A real man honors women. Treating women like play toys or objects not only degrades the sanctity of womanhood, it undermines the fundamental design of manhood. A woman – no matter what the feminazi movement says – is special and precious; they should be treated as such. I mean seriously, do we really want our daughters to act like boys? I hope not.

There's my diatribe. If it came across as coarse and preachy, I told you the talk by Elder Christofferson was better. Be a man and take responsibility for reading a sub-par discourse. (Ha ha ha) Let's answer the call to arms, to step up to the plate and do that which we were created to do. Man wasn't created in the image of God (the perfect Man) to be subpar. Our challenge, fellas, is that we do it. Buck up and be men in the truest sense. Let’s “rise from the dust and be men”, being “true at all times in whatsoever thing [we are] entrusted.” The last thing the world needs is men after its kind; it needs men after His kind.