Ellie's trip to Europe

Ellie has spent the last month in Europe with her friend (Meghane), her friend's mother (Christine) and brother (Michael). It has been a huge adventure for her. It has been wonderful and epic for her, but at times very difficult. I have asked Ellie to take notes about her days so that when she gets home she can write up an account of her experience. She'll be home in about a week. This is from the morning they left Logan. Here is Ellie in Vienna:

Lately Been Listening To:

BYU Kennedy Center podcasts speeches from guest lecturers (free on iTunes). I just listened to Ezekiel Lol Gatkuoth speak on the past and future of Sudan.

I highly recommend the lecture.

Lately Been Listening To:

Just finished the audiobook Hidden Empire by Orson Scott Card. (downloaded from Audible)

It has everything I like about OSC's writing, but how it ended disturbed me. I was fine with the twist, and the ideas the conclusion is based on is interesting to consider. I just hated HOW things happened between Cole and his Jeesh at the end.

That story was definitely built for a videogame.

Here are some recent ride reports of trips I've been on:

The Tour of Idaho

Moab in November 09

After visiting Bodyworlds in SLC we took the girls to build-a-bear workshop.


Watch Build a Bear Workshop in Family Videos  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Here are the girls and Ellie's friends at Ellie's birthday party this summer.


Watch Ellie's Birthday Party 08 1 in Family Videos  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

From Jeffrey Holland:

"Let people repent. Let people grow. Believe that people can change — and improve," he said. "It that faith? Yes! It is hope? Yes! Is it charity? Yes! Above all it is charity, the pure love of Christ."

Here is the news article it came from

Hear the voice of a man who personally knew Joseph Smith! Wilford Woodruff knew him in the 1840s, and here he is talking about him in the 1890s.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUU9CqrtFiU&feature=related

From the Weekly Standard's blog:

The Los Angeles Times reports today that Canadian Dr. Andre Lalonde, executive vice president of the Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in Ottawa, is worried that more women might choose to keep rather than abort their Down syndrome babies when they see Sarah Palin with Trig.

READ THE WHO THING HERE by scrolling down to Safe, Legal and Frequent:

From Orson Scott Card:

"We are what Sozhenitsyn accused us of being. Unwilling to listen to and learn from him, we are acting out the tragicomedy of national decline. Is there still greatness in us? Just as the dying British Empire . . ."

Read the entire article here

Piper Palin:

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Heather brought our girls to a circus that came to Smithfield. The local newspaper did a story on it, including a multimedia presentation that includes pictures of and audio from the girls.

Here's a link

It hasn't rained much in the last couple of months, but it came down hard tonight! It was in the 90s today and I heard the guy on the radio telling people that there was only a slight chance of rain and so don't let it keep them from attending the Cache County Fair. Oops!

We stood in the gutter and let the water run over our feet. The water was warm, I guess due to how hot the road/dirt was that the rain hit.

Online Videos by Veoh.com



Online Videos by Veoh.com

I got an email about a woman who was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize but lost out to Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" presentation. If every claim Al Gore made in that show was accurate/scientifically sound, and if in fact we can follow his recommendations to our global redemption, then he deserved to beat this woman out for the prize.

If, however, his claims are NOT scientifically sound, then it is a travesty that he would be given the award over this woman.

I just got back from a motorcycle trip from Missoula, MT to Banff National Park, AB, CA.

Click here for the trip report.

I was mentioned on the Dr. Phil show in this episode:

Spanking Scandals

I downloaded and listened to a speech by David O. Mckay. In it he read one of Edgar A. Guest's poems and a quote from John Altgeid.

John P. Altgeid

Young men, life is before you. Two voices are calling you—one coming out from the swamps of selfishness and force, where success means death; and the other from the hilltops of justice and progress, where even failure brings glory.

Two lights are seen in your horizon—one the fast fading marsh light of power, and the other the slowly rising sun of human brotherhood.

Two ways lie open for you—one leading to an even lower and lower plain, where are head the cries of despair and the curses of the poor, where manhood shrivels and possession rots down the possessor; and the other leading to the highlands of the morning, where are heard the glad shouts of humanity and where honest effort is rewarded with immortality.

Myself

by Edgar Guest

I have to live with myself, and so,
I want to be fit for myself to know;
I want to be able as days go by,
Always to look myself straight in the eye;
I don't want to stand with the setting sun
And hate myself for the things I've done.
I don't want to keep on a closet shelf
A lot of secrets about myself,
And fool myself as I come and go
Into thinking that nobody else will know
The kind of man I really am;
I don't want to dress myself up in sham.
I want to deserve all men's respect;
But here in this struggle for fame and pelf,
I want to be able to like myself.
I don't want to think as I come and go
That I'm for bluster and bluff and empty show.
I never can hide myself from me,
I see what others may never see,
I know what others may never know,
I never can fool myself -- and so,
Whatever happens, I want to be
Self-respecting and conscience free.

Star Wars explained!