Duck Tales

So, I'm sure several students have taken the normal walk from the south end of BYU campus to those skyscraper stairs rising up to the dreaded testing center. Before making the ascent, I've seen several students stop and look around at the sight. The overpopulated duck pond is becoming increasingly active as the weather is warming up. Now it should be brought to everyone's attention that these ducks (I took this picture, even if it is a month too late) have been occupying this pond 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Yes. They were here all winter. Snow, ice and penguins go together, but ducks rarely fit into the standard mental image of winter. What compels them to stay? Perhaps they are too fat to fly because of the extreme generosity of students who are all too willing to throw their sad attempt at a meal to them (I honestly have never seen them fly. If anyone else has, please let me know). Or perhaps they have fallen in love with Provo, like so many here, and refuse to ever leave. Maybe they have mutated and grow extra feathers or are slowly changing into cold-blooded creatures. Whatever the reason, it is weird. Another issue remains. Last year, I'm pretty sure, there were only a dozen ducks. Now there are, I have counted on two separate occasions, approximately 50. Why the rapid influx of fowl? I believe it is because parents think that a cute little duckling will make a fine present for their child. They make the purchase, oogle at the stumbling lump of yellow and black feathers, feed it, care for it, and then ... reality. The duck begins to grow, said duck is making a mess indoors, the child shirks their feeding and cleaning responsibilities, the duck makes a permanent residence in the bathtub and on occasion the toilet. Soon parents are thinking of a way to solve the issue and they all come up with one, the obvious, solution. The BYU Duck Pond. So late at night, they take their ducks there and let them loose. Like I said, the ducks just sort of appear there. Never have I seen them fly in, never have I seen them fly out. It's the only explanation. If you've got another, I'd love to hear it.

A Bunch of Randomness

So, today was a really good day. Melissa and I went to Salt Lake to see Bravo Broadway, where we heard a bunch of fantastic Broadway songs with the Utah Symphony and some visiting Broadway artists. It was probably the best thing I've seen in a long time. Stuff like that really gets me worked up. Well, I was so excited after the performance that I somehow (not going to say how and embarrass myself) I fell down. Here's the resulting injury.

Granted, it isn't that bad looking under the gauze and tape, but it was bleeding pretty bad. We had to go inside, clean it up, and when it refused to stop bleeding we asked the emergency man (I don't know his title) if he had some type of first aid kit. So he took care of it for us and I was able to drive home. Somehow, I'm still able to type this relatively quickly. So I kinda hate it when things happen because you're just being stupid. Really, that's what happened. You want to know what else happened to me the other day because I just wasn't thinking very well in the morning?

There, that's what happened. Quite unfortunate, I must say. Your toothbrush in the toilet isn't the greatest way to start the day. But it was a very good day. Hope yours was too.

Is that my voice?

Have you ever heard yourself on someone's answering machine, or
recorded your voice on tape for some reason, and thought, "Is that really how I sound?" I once had on old girlfriend (no offense if you read this) who told me she didn't like the sound of my voice. I wasn't being an idiot or using a 'tone' with her. It was just my regular voice. I really didn't think it sounded that bad. Sure, I'm a loud flamboyant person who tends to attract too much attention to himself, but I didn't think I had a high squeaky or annoying voice by any means. I thought it was reasonably deep too. Well, I did some research on why our voices sound different to us than they do to other people. After learning some, I realized it is pretty common sense.
A person's voice sounds quite different to himself or herself compared to how it sounds to other people. Your speech structures (the larynx, tongue, etc.) vibrate and create sound waves while speaking. These sound waves travel out of your mouth and through the air and into the listener's ears. This is how other's hear you. If this was the whole story, then your speech would sound the same to you as it does to anyone else.
However, you also listen to your own speech through a second pathway. You listen to yourself through your head. So, the vibrations caused by your speech structures cause you to hear your own speech through the tissues of your head. This second pathway alters the quality of your sounds, particularly the relationship between the low and high pitches. Because of this alteration, your speech through the second pathway sounds different to you compared to how it sounds through the first pathway. It's usually sounds deeper than it really is. So guys, sorry. Your voice is not as manly as you think. Girls, good news. If you thought your alto voice sounded like a man, you probably don't.

Look Alikes

I've had a lot of people come up to me and say, "Hey, is your name John?" I tell them no, and they apologize and say I just look like a John they know. Or someone gets to know me a little and says, "You're just like one of fmy friends back home. You even look like him." I guess I just have one of those faces. It happens all the time. I served a two year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Thailand and I always got comments about how I looked like Tom Cruise. Everyone there knows Tom Cruise. Maybe it's just because I'm short and not blonde like him. I think all white people look the same to Asians. It goes the other way around too, until you live with them for a while. You all know what I'm talking about.


Since I've come home I've had a lot of people continue their celebrity look-alike game with my face. The first one I ever got was Matt Damon. I was pretty happy about this choice. He's the flavor of the month with the Bourne series out there.




The next guy, I'm sorry to say, was Ricky Martin. They said there was so much resemblence that I had to take a picture with their poster. I reluctantly did so. I still don't think we're look-alikes, but I'll let you decide.



This brings us to the most recent addition. I was working the other day and someone came into the office and told me I looked like the young and famous David Archuleta. Well, his name is David. That's a plus. He said that we not only look alike except for our hair, but that our voices sound the same. For those who don't know me personally, I'm sorry you won't be able to test this out. Go to the David Archuleta link on my sidebar! So next time you're walking down the street, and you see Matt Damon, Ricky Martin, or David Archuleta, you should stop them and say, "I know someone who looks just like you!"

Coming back...

I'm coming back to the blogging world. It's been a while since my last post, but I have a lot to fill people in on. Basically, life is great. I've got a lot of stuff going on all at once, but somehow things are coming together. Melissa, my girlfriend started a blog which made me repent and realize the error of my neglectful ways.

I used a picture from back in October to make it seem like there wasn't such a gap in my blogging. This is a picture of the time we decorated pumpkins to roll down the hill. It was great fun. Mine shattered at the bottom. Melissa is really the joy of my life right now. I've got a lot of really great things going for me at the moment, but none of it would be half as exciting or meaningful without her. She's definitely my best friend. We've known each other for over two years, unofficially (long story ... if you really want to know you can ask, or you can go to her blog and ask-her version is always better ;), and we've been good friends for a little over a year. Life is always fun with your best friend around.

Perspective

Well, I'm trying to optimistic about the next few weeks ahead. This last Friday evening I had a grand time with some of my friends making dutch-oven peach cobbler. Always delish. Well, we ate, mingled, came back and said goodbye. I went to put the ditch oven away in the shed and was just lifting it over the bicycles when the lid slid off the top ... right onto my toe. Now, when it first hit I think I was just in shock. I stood there for a second and thought ouch! Mmmf! Yeeow! Surprisingly no swear words even came to mind. All I did was limp inside panting ouch, ouch, OUCH, OUCH!!! As I got to the bathroom I couldn't stand it much longer. I was approaching the limit of my anti-pain reserve. I ran cold water in the tub and stuck my foot in it. That did it. I fisted the wall, tightly clenched the shower curtain and my teeth and muttered MOTHER MOTHER MOTHER!!! Then I decided I probably shouldn't take my Mother's name in vain so I just started breathing loudly. Anyways, it was a new experience for me. I've never smashed my toe or my fingernail severely before. To the naked eye there wasn't any serious damage done except a bruise on about 1/4 of my toenail. I couldn't even sleep the first night with the blood heavily pulsing through my toe. I could feel each beat. Well, by Saturday evening the bruise had spread leaving my toe looking like this.
Yep. So it's pretty exciting right now. It was the first time I had worn sandals with my church clothes since my mission during monsoon season. It has gotten a lot better in the past few days, but I still haven't been able to do a whole lot of things. I definitely still had a chance to do our ward slipn'slide which was a blast, but I haven't done any running or dancing, both of which I was really looking forward to this week.
Well, it's really not that big a deal. Just one of those things that happens. It could have been a lot worse. I'm pretty sure that if I hadn't moved my foot a little when the lid fell that it would have landed on a joint or something. It's only the end of my toe, but I could have broken one or two toes that way. Now I only have to lose a toenail. I feel great about that.
And a public announcement for all that know me ... I finished the first Harry Potter. Critique? All I have to say is the rest had better be better than this.

Summery

Ha ha. What a clever title. I thought I'd just add some pictures and a few explanations of what I've been up to this summer.


Here we decided to make a late night trip to the playground. This crew is a lot of fun. I think we played lava monster (you can't touch the ground) and had chicken fights too.


This was a fantastic night. We decided to go up past Vivian Park and camp out for the night. We had entirely too much fun. We bought some pizza and took it up with us. There was a late night visit from two policemen who were hilarious, though innappropriate at times, who were there to bust an alcoholic party. We never saw it but they said it was in the area. We weren't even sure if we were allowed to camp there and I don't think they had permission to tell us we could either, not being rangers but policemen, but they did.


As you can tell, learning to play the guitar still hasn't improved my luck with women. That's a definite red light, there.


We also had some fun jumping and I, of course, was completely uncooperative.


We also went to rodeo in Lehi. Good times. The guy from Downey Idaho got one of the best scores. I'll have to say that it was better last year, but it was still a lot of fun.




And there's always time for one more BBQ up the canyon on a hot summer day. I actually dislike Dorritos.


This is the Telefund crew together before we went to see Harry Potter in the Imax. It was awesome. I'll have to say that I've been prideful in my defiance of reading the Potter books, but this last one made me want to read them. It was by far the best one I've seen. The last scene in 3D ... sweet damage.


Again, with the Telefund. We went to Sara Schmidt's house in Draper for FHE. Her mother's a professional story-teller, so we went and listened as she took us to far away lands.


Their monster-dog tried to eat me.


Here's our photo shoot with Cecil (the diesel, inside joke) O. Samuelson and the Telefund.

It really has been a good summer. I've enjoyed myself way too much and I haven't even taken pictures of half the things I've done.