Random Thoughts 31 (8/5/2012)


Monday, July 02, 2012
- Firefox has failed me for the last time. It crashes on me literally every time I try using it at work. That’s more often than IE!
- Random female characteristic I love in a girl (not required by any means). She can keep up over written mediums if I talk like this. 
- It’s crazy to me how an immodest woman can both draw the eye AND be a huge turn off all at the same time.

Tuesday, July 10, 2012
- I have an easier time going to weddings than I used too. Maybe it’s because years ago a larger majority of the people getting married were friends I may have been romantically interested in at one point.

Wednesday, July 11, 2012
- I love my job. I had nothing going on tonight, so I worked an extra hour. Then I said bye to John and ended up helping him for 30 minutes something that took me days to figure out. Then I went o say bye to Dinesh and ended up teaching him for 30 minutes something that took me days to figure out. I felt SUPER useful haha. Then I chatted with Jimmy and Randy for 45 minutes. Then ran into Darek (my VP) and talked to him for 45 minutes. Didn’t end up leaving the office until 8:30 haha. But I feel like I socialized all night, it just happened to be with people I work with :P.

Friday, July 13, 2012
- So a while back I talked about backing kissing in courting relationships to almost nothing. It’s not like I need the practice, you can tell physical compatibility even without, and it just makes you want to go further, so I’s just dangerous. However, I wonder if I backed off TOO much on cuddling and kissing. It’s usually part of the dating process. It’s not surprising I’m usually seen as just a good friend if we only do things good friends do. This probably has nothing to do with my dating success actually. I just need to better accept the Lords timing.
- Hmm, I want to eat, but I’m already sleepy, and I think I’ll get more sleepy if I eat. Dilemma!

Tuesday, July 17, 2012
- I wonder if part of why it was easy to fit in at work is because I get along with people older than me easier than with peers my age.
- So, you know how sometimes my leg will shoot straight out and shake around a little then fall to the ground in front of my foot rest? Well, today it landed right on the off switch for my computer's power strip. Hilarious. But I’m moving that power strip.

Wednesday, July 18, 2012
- This is how I felt about batman before seeing it.
   I didn't get on FB all day Thursday and Friday, just so there was no risk of expectation taintage. I saw it Saturday with Micah and Josh and enjoyed it :)
- So somehow a circuit got tripped at work and everyone but my computer and Todd’s turned off. Not sure how we’re wired to a different circuit. So I told everyone me and Todd were powering our computers with sheer force of personality.
- So I’ve been talking to a girl online (I meet one every so often) named Carrie. Super fun to talk to, seems cute, she’s an x-ray technician so there’s the hope a wheelchair isn’t weird to her haha. She’s been forward with giving me her number and flirting and she called tonight. So I had to break it to her that I’m in a wheelchair (she was going to invite me over for a movie, but she’s on the third floor :P) and pretty sure it was a deal-breaker. Could tell she got sufficiently awkward and I wasn’t sure what more I could do to alleviate it. We talked about some other stuff after and she had to go since her other friends were arriving for the aforementioned movie night. I’m not broken up about it or anything, I don’t really expect to find dates online, it’s just nice if I do. But it got me wondering if I should change my approach. I mean, I could put actual wheelchair pictures, and a funny statement about the whole wheelchair thing, so it’s there on the table right up front. I mean, I’m pretty sure any girl who wouldn’t talk to me originally is the type who wouldn’t date me for all time anyway. The difference is there a phase where I get to talk to them. I LOVE getting to know new people, it’s super fun! I’m wondering if it’s rude to girls like Carrie to let their expectations of non wheelchair Corby pile up, and then surprise them with wheelchair Corby. Who is pretty much the same guy mind you, but if they don’t get that I don’t particularly blame them. I’m not sure I’d have been willing to see. Maybe it’s time to switch the profile to handicap openness and see what happens though?

Thursday, July 21, 2012
- Last night was rough, really rough, both physically and emotionally. Last night I came the closest I have in years to breaking down and looking up pornography. I’m proud to stay I didn’t, I stayed clean despite the relentlessness of my mind that night. But I was also PISSED! Haha. Usually, if I’m ever tempted to look up pornography, in my mind I can be like “lol, no.” and move on and the temptation abates. Last night it wouldn’t leave me be! And on top of that I felt physically crappy (probably part of my lowered resistance :P) and couldn’t sleep from like 12:00 to 3:00. I finally started singing a hymn in my head and managed to fall asleep. The only thing that held me fast was I promised to myself and the Lord that if I ever broke, even just a little, I’d confess to the Bishop ASAP. And I didn’t want to have to confess haha. Thanks Bishop! Glad I stayed clean, but all around otherwise not happy about that night haha.
- So tonight I went over to Steph’s to discuss the crappy night I had just had. She has been doing a lot of research with pornography for her masters and her career path right now actually, and I wanted her advice. What I got out of it is anytime we’re relying on validation from any source other than ourselves or our relationship with Heavenly Father, we’re codependent on that validation. Basically I could still improve on being fully content single haha. But gratefully not ever day was as crappy as that one. Not any day is really haha, that’s why I was so annoyed :P.
P.s. the next day was back to simple resistance. For which I'm very grateful :)

Friday, July 20, 2012
- So we randomly had a “bug out” contest at work, where we had all day to just poke at the product and find as many bugs as possible, and I won! A nexus 7 tablet! Basically a google smartphone with a 7” screen and no phone haha. Good times, that makes two contests I’ve won at work. My ego is too big again :/ haha

Tuesday, July 24, 2012
- The church activity was indexing. It was way fun! I only got one batch done because I spent a bunch of time getting others set up and teaching them how to do it. Pro tip I for anyone reading this, do NOT go across s whole row, it’s super slow. I GUARANTEE you will increase your speed a ton if you index a column at a time. Do all the surnames then all the first names, etc… getting your mind in the same mindset for each column, and the columns auto-duplicating data when applicable, is SO helpful!
- On the way out of the activity I asked Alicia if it’s legal to take her out anymore, and if it’s even a good idea. She started giving me the “I love you as a friend” speech, but I didn’t need it, I had already suspected this. So it was sad to have that door officially closed, but it’s helpful to have closure all the same.
- So Naor (team lead at work) was at the Uruguay office for 3 weeks, and right after he left we got our three new hires haha. Dinesh, Jake, and Chad. Usually the team lead would help set them up and advise them and explain product and company background and so on. But with Naor gone it basically fell to me. I wasn’t getting much of my own work done for like a week, but I loved it. I like helping others be productive more than I enjoy producing something on my own. And in DSM they even recognized that’s why I wasn’t getting through my tasks and thanked me for helping everyone else out. What a great company. I love my job.

Wednesday, July 25, 2012
- Went upstairs to ask Travis about doing a background check on my PA I’m hiring. I’m going with a guy named John Rossi, the only thing he has against him is that he isn’t a cute girl haha. Sadly that’s not a necessary part of the job requirements. Anyway, I meant it to be a brief chat with Travis, but we talked or like 40 minutes, and I left with the conviction to draft a simple contact for me and John haha. I have a hard time having brief chats at work!!
- So I assume one of the big reasons Alicia isn’t interested in dating me is because I can’t be very physically active. And I figured this will be a problem with most girls. But it seems like Alyssa Quinn, who is quite athletic, is interested in me. If so that shoots down the assumption. I don’t understand dating at all. The good news is at this point I never really expect to haha, I just seem to try to anyway.
- Went down a 125 foot slip and slide tonight haha. With Alicia and Alyssa under each arm. Here's a link to the public video on my FB, but I don’t know if it’ll always work… 
- Had an interesting chat with Micah. He was getting pretty upset about the angry homosexual debates online. And I told him I don’t read them because they just bother me too, and he said he feels like he should be able to hold his own in a confrontation. And this was my response
“I can relate to the hold my own should I be confronted idea. And I'm just brain storming about this now... But I've been reading a book called "how to Win friends and influence people" and one of the recent sections was "you can never win an argument". It talked about how in an argument both people's egos flare and they dig in their heels regardless of their conviction to their original stance. And how even if you "win" an argument and lay down all the facts and prove the other person wrong, they still hang on to their opinion, and resent you for making them look like a fool. Being "confronted" sounds like an argument to me. As such, no matter how educated I am on the matter if I argue back with the material I've read it won't make any difference. If I'm having a discussion with someone with an opposing opinion, they won't be swayed with a Chick-fil-A article I read, or stupid bigot comment that I know how to counter. They'll be interested in the principal, and my stance on the principle, and why. Thus I really can't see in what scenario having read stuff that just upsets me is helpful at all. I'm just brainstorming out loud…”
In addition to that, I was talking to Alyssa about the debates and she linked some church articles on the matter. The most powerful of which was this link. It helped solidify my feelings on the matter, they are as follows.
#1. Marriage is ordained of God and explicitly listed in the scriptures as being between a man and a woman. Anything that is innately connected to marriage, like adoption, must stay available to only a man and a woman legally and lawfully wed.
#2. I’m fine with gay couples having rights to anything that isn’t innately tied to marriage. For example, hospital visiting rights. I see no reason why that should be restricted to a spouse, they can come up with systems that allow hospitalized people to pre-declare people other than their spouses who can visit.
#3. Homosexual tendencies are part of someone, whether due to the nature or nurture argument, they’re there. However, acting upon them is a choice, and a sin. I’m sure this is a point that there’s just no way to find common ground on. I don’t expect anyone to agree with me any more than I’d expect others to agree that heterosexual sex before marriage is a sin. Maybe in order to live the gospel, a gay person will never get to feel sexually fulfilled in this life, or never marry. But I run the same potential of lack of intimacy or marriage with my disability. We all have different challenges, designed to shape us in to who we should be.
#4. Drew likes to use the parallel of how gay people are being denied rights to how black people used to have their rights denied. He talks about how in 40 years we’ll look back and we’ll all feel like idiots for standing against gay marriage. There IS a massive difference between the two scenarios though. Nowhere in the scriptures does it say it’s wrong to have different color skin, or that only white people can have the priesthood, or so on. Those were incorrect interpretations or assumptions of men that needed to be corrected. However, the scriptures DO explicitly say that acting on homosexual tendencies is a sin. People with such tendencies are not any less of a person, “don’t judge me because I sin differently than you” certainly applies here. But it is a sin, it’s in the scriptures, we can never bend and accept or legalize it without also basically saying that our doctrine is subject to the whims of men.  It doesn’t surprise me that people like Drew, who don’t believe the scriptures are the word of God, won’t agree with me. But that’s fine. Everyone is just living the best they know how.
-  It is painful to watch someone who is an exclusive clicker operate a computer.

Sunday, July 29, 2012
- Commit to go for the girl the Lord lets you know to go for. It worked for Grandpa Campbell!

Tuesday, July 31, 2012
- “For those who are discouraged by their circumstances and are therefore tempted to feel they cannot serve the Lord this day, I make you two promises. Hard as things seem today, they will be better in the next day if you choose to serve the Lord this day with your whole heart. Your circumstances may not be improved in all the ways which you desire. But you will have been given new strength to carry your burdens and new confidence that when your burdens become too heavy, the Lord, whom you have served, will carry what you cannot. He knows how. He prepared long ago. He suffered your infirmities and your sorrows when He was in the flesh so that He would know how to succor you.” – Elder Eyring 2007 Aprilconference

Sunday, August 05, 2012
- Moving out in !!!8 DAYS!!! Holy crap! This is probably the last random thoughts I’ll post from home :(.I am excited for change, but I’ll definitely miss the ward here too. It’s become a great tight knit group like unto my Orem ward back in the day. I hope me and CJ can be part of making our new ward like that. Or that it’s already close :D

Random Thoughts 30 (7/1/2012)


Wednesday, June 06, 2012
- “’You get what you pay for’ applies to spiritual matters too.” – Elder Holland, October 2010
- “She gives me presents, with her presence alone.” – Jack Johnson, Angel

Sunday, June 10, 2012
- At ward prayer, someone shared a great talk from 1952 by President Kimball. It talked about how often times we can’t see the end from the beginning, we just need to take a step forward anyway. Nephi didn’t know how he’d get to the plates when he went in. Moses didn’t know how he’d cross the Red Sea. There was no ram in the thicket when Abraham went up to sacrifice his son. It was perfectly stated too, but I tried looking it up and didn’t find it. The search on LDS.org is not very good. It finds a bunch of hits with matching “the” and “of”s… but a 1952 talk might not be on there anyway :P.
- Was thinking about what I could be doing better and singing O Lord My Redeemer in the car, and the lyrics “And the more that I'd inquire, the hotter burned the fire. I found joy, beyond compare.” Hit me hard. How can I expect answers if I don’t ask questions?

Monday, June 11, 2012
- Me: Procrastinate. It's the only logical course of action. Kate:  what are you putting off? besides a fair amount of sex appeal ;). Me: That was the best response, I have EVER received, to any comment EVER

Wednesday, June 13, 2012
- So I just got an automated call that said “Hi this is Bob Bennett. I apologize for intruding on our evening with a robo call but I think this is important.” And I said “alright Bob.” And the call hung up, haha.

Friday, June 15, 2012
- I’ve come closer to really believing I’ll never get married in mortality than ever before during this past week. I dislike my lack of faith.
- Those who followed Satan in the pre-mortal world lacked trust in God to get them to eternal life. How often in mortality do we do the same? (prompted by Elder Eyering Oct 2010 Sunday morning)

Saturday, June 16, 2012
- Super awesome day! It started with a great episode of Legend of Korra, and ended with dinner at Neal’s place that night. But probably my favorite was mid-day. Micah and Josh brought their friend Cullen, and I got Rob and Spencer (DnD with Steph friends) over, and we made our crew for the Mistborn adventure game. It was super fun brainstorming with that bunch of guys! I’m super excited to get to play! But it won’t be frequent, lol. Thus far I don’t think we’ll meet up until July 21st at the earliest haha.
- Dinner at Neal’s was also good though. I wanted an excuse to see some Orem people. So we got Todd Schriener, Camilla Meyer, and Jorden Hobush over. Me and Jorden are supposedly going to go see the midnight showing of Brave (the new pixar movie) Friday, so that should be fun too. But the best part of the whole thing was after Neal took me back to my chair (I was stuck on his couch before) and we got to talk 1 on 1 for an hour. It’s good hearing him talk about wanting to be more motivated (church and life) although he doesn’t quite have the right motivators around right now it seems haha. Especially with Andrew getting married. P.s. Andrew Clark is engaged! Marriage in September. They won’t get married in the temple at first L Megan has a past. But as Neal understands it, Andrew is confident Megan is re-committed and moving in the right direction. I hope it’s the case, Andrew deserves someone who supports him in the gospel.

Sunday, June 17, 2012
- Another reason I love cats. Gambit sleeping, head on my shoulder, stretched out between my arm and my torso, with a paw on my face.

- So I’ve tried the solving a problem per week thing. And it’s been TOTALLY SUCCESSFUL! We found an apartment for me Cj and Josh. I took a half-day off and we all went shopping  12-4. Finally settled on Ventana apartments behind the Krispy Kremes near UVU. Way bigger than my Wolverine Crossing place, just as close to the freeway, and I’ll even have the roll in shower I want! Then the second week my objective was advertizing for bowel care help. I got sick mid week so that slowed me down and I haven’t posted these yet… But on Friday I made…

- If you feast on the scriptures, they WILL tell you all things you should do. If you look forward to scripture reading like you look forward to eating on fast Sunday. If every day is a scripture fast, you'll be worthy of the above blessing.

Monday, June 18, 2012
- Me: “OH YOU REMINDED ME OF SOMETHIN... I'm shouting aren't I?” Sarah “You are what we call cyber-shouting, yes.” Me: “Who does "we" include? I mean, I'd assume you and I, since we're (<-- see the "we" in that?) the ones having a conversation. But then if I'm included in "we", how is it that I'm being introduced to a definition already established by we? So confused...”
- I figured out why there are more awesome and physically attractive women than there are men. See, when someone lacks the standard "popular" traits, they tend to make up for it by developing an awesome personality. Good looks is the foremost requirement of "popular" people. My experience of girls as a whole is they never believe they're as beautiful as they really are. So, believing their looks less, they make up for it with awesome personality. But in the end they actually have BOTH!
- Audrey just called at random and apologized for “treating you like crap. And I don’t ever say crap so that’s saying something.” And it was nice. I have felt stepped on a lot and I was ready to let it just dwindle into whatever. But I also don’t like holding grudges. So I’m happy to do my best to go back like it’s a clean slate.

Wednesday, June 20, 2012
- “All I know is I don’t know how to be someone you miss.” Sappy Taylor Swift lyric that resonated with me today haha.

Friday, June 22, 2012
- Still pretty low on dating. I have an active run around type personality, so I tend to be attracted to similar girls. However, girls like that tend to be attracted to similar guys. Since I can’t actually run around and play ultimate Frisbee, or soccer, or go hiking, etc, I can’t seem to hold said type of girls interest. So it feels like I can’t have that type of girl. I also don’t want someone that feels like I’m settling for someone though. Whoever I marry deserves to feel like I love everything about them, I’m not good at faking genuineness. Anyway it adds up to feeling pretty hopeless. This was spurred a bit because I don’t think I have a chance with Alicia at this point when Marcus is interested in her (and her back) and he can do all the things I used to do but can’t now.

Saturday, June 23, 2012
- Youth activity summit! Awesome activity. Some of my favorite highlight quotes conveyed John Bytheway or Sheri Dew.
- “Regardless of your original intention, you will eventually become what you surround yourself with.” And “You are the average of the 5 people you hang around with most.” These really make me wonder about what and who Neal and Micah surround themselves with. But as far as I go? I think I’m doing ok. Not great but ok haha. 5 most common
     Sheri Dew:
“There’s a common lie that a ’balanced man’ deliberately guards against becoming too righteous.” (Elder Carlos)
- Fun dating activity idea. John Bytheway showed a clip from candid camera where people would walk into an elevator and face the opposite direction, and see if people would follow suit. It’d be fun to come up with and do some candid camera-like activities.
- Suggested number getting line I thought was fun haha "I'd love to get to know you better. And I'd kick myself if I didn't get your number!" The dating coach was fun, but her whole lecture centered on first interactions. I can get a number if I really want, or go on dates. Making any of those turn into meaningful relationships is the hard part.

Sunday, June 24, 2012
- Audrey is still awkward around me haha. She just reacts differently than before to my jokes or sillyness or serious comments or anything really. Goof.
- So sacrament meeting is a good time to make and review weekly goals, this week they were:
- Read a chapter in the BoM every day.
- Read a chapter in the OT thrice a week.
- Index a batch
- Temple (I only go bi-monthly)
    And I totally did them all. I also like to throw in a non reoccurring problem to solve, like fixing my car or deciding where to move. Haven’t always hit those goals every week.
- Awesome quotes from the fireside tonight with Dan Clark:
“If we became what we thought about, I'd be a woman by now.”
“I was so skinny I had to jump back and forth in the shower to get wet.”
“You’d make a lousy someone else, so who is the real you?”
“Self esteem and motivation don't change behavior. Behavior changes behavior.”
“There's a huge difference between being discouraged or disappointed, and being depressed.” So true by the way! I think people assume depression far too quickly when it’s really just discouragement, I know I’m currently discouraged :/.
“Ask not how to get better but why should I get better, and the how follows.” 1 Nephi 3:7
- “Don't be depressed about growing older. It will make you feel even older. Which is depressing.” – Sarah Flinders Blog

Monday, June 25, 2012
- Try reading scriptures out loud, like you’re recording it for posterity.
- I often feel like there’s actually nothing wrong and I’m just a big whiner when I show up to the doctors office.
- The weird thing about having a 9-5 job is I’m used to change. Classes changing, routines shifting… but with a 9-5, there’s hardly any change in routine. Weird. Note, stuff I work on between 9-5 shifts all the time, and it’s very engaging, I love being a developer J. But the “work 9-5” block doesn’t change.

Tuesday, June 26, 2012
- So I used to date cute girls with low confidence, and I haven’t for years now. But I had the thought I went for those girls because I had confidence in their potential. Have I lost faith in them? Or become more selfish in my expectations? Or was my preference shift really a good thing? I don’t know, or really care to answer it right now since I’m not focusing on dating anyway, but it was an interesting thought. And if I don’t write such thoughts down I stop having interesting thoughts.
- Sat next to Camilla from Ireland in institute. Every time she comments it makes me smile haha. Accents are awesome.
- Had to have CJ drive me to work in my new van today while my radiator was getting fixed in my old van. And #1 I really dislike being a passenger, I’m way too used to always driving haha. #2 since CJ was in Orem already, I spent the majority of the last 2 hours of work asking team leads if they could use an intern and telling them about CJ, then bringing CJ in and letting them have an unofficial interview while I went back to work. He basically interviewed for 2 hours straight, but it was good, we talked about it the whole way home. We have high hopes one will pan out :D.
- We all have the light of Christ. One of it’s roles is to act as our conscience. One of the easiest ways to chase it out is by blaming others. Did Christ ever blame anyone for anything ever?
- Even with the Gift of the Holy Ghost we still make mistakes, but it will warn us before we ever make a big mistake (Boyd K Packer, 2011). I don’t remember getting a warning before breaking my neck. I think that’s another small witness it was meant to be.
-  Learned a little tonight about the Holy Ghost’s role as the Holy Spirit of Promise. Who seals our actions in this life. This was a new one to me, I should learn more.

Wednesday, June 27, 2012
- Work chat highlight “I used to play video games, but then I took a wife to the knee” hahah.

Thursday, June 28, 2012
- Took the day off and went to Yuba Lake for a Higgins family reunion. It was pretty fun. I knew most everyone would be out on boats the whole time, and so I was excited to play this “fourteen across” solitaire type game I learned at a previous family reunion. But it was CRAZY windy! Like no fun to be outside windy, and throw stuff off the table windy. I had my computer though, and I wanted to play that game!! So I coded it up and managed to play twice (and fail, haha) before my laptop battery died.

Friday, June 29, 2012
- I keep waking up and feeling like after the events of the night, my life will now be significantly different. But it’s not, and I can’t remember what about my dreams would make me feel so haha.
- “And God created Saturn and he liked it, so he put a ring on it.” haha

Saturday, June 30, 2012
- Fun day. Josh is in Japan, so picked up Landon to play board games with me and Micah. We played Stone Age twice and I won both, the first by a fair margin, the second by ONE point! It was like 212 to 213 or something. After Micah left me and Landon went for a walk haha. Discussed philosophy and video games place in our lives (if any) and Andrew’s engagement and such… it was great. Then we came back and played Carcassone with CJ… with FIVE EXPANSION PACKS! So many extra rules! I got absolutely destroyed that game, CJ won by a ton, but it was fun.

Sunday, July 01, 2012
- I may have wrote this already, but I reversed a previous dating conclusion recently. I’ve talked long ago about how every girlfriend I’ve had was just a natural progression to togetherness, I didn’t have to try to go on multiple dates before they started to like me or I them, it almost always was just right up front there was a connection that led to a relationship. However, this is like a Hollywood version of relationships, and real life isn’t like the movies. So I decided maybe I need to try multiple dates, or take out great people who I’m not drawn to yet but think I could be. I’ve been trying that for a good while, it’s why I was pretty much going on a date a week or more for quite a while. But this extra effort stratagem doesn’t seem to be making any difference in my success rate. So I’m stepping it back to “if I want to take them out, I will. But I won’t force myself to try to find someone to take out if there’s no one that’s genuinely calling to me.” Maybe I’ll switch back to focused dating again after moving out, but this is the now.
- Can you get an answer to a prayer about what to pray and fast about? It seems like whatever you prayed about as a possibility, you didn't answer like "yeah that's a great idea!" That being said, today I’m fasting about finding and having the courage to participate in some sort of service. I’m still in a bit of a slump.  I’d like to lose myself in something good, something not alone at my computer, and something service oriented. 

Activities and irritation


Had a fun/sad/interesting/night Thursday (May 31 2012). And now I'm in a blabbing mode so I'll tell the whole story. It was a combined ward Thursday night activity that I didn't think I'd be able to go to because of work, but the late nights I've been putting in HAVE paid off! And although we were hoping to be done by two, we still got done by 4:30 PM! Which is 12 hours faster than our norm lately haha. Anyway with the amount of overtime I've been doing lately, I've generally been burned out and not feeling very social. I know I SHOULD still be somewhat social though so I committed to myself go to this activity anyway... a half hour late haha.

Tangent, it was "Riverton first ward Dutch oven cookoff that our ward is invited to!" As I expected, our ward turnout was not very good, and I have a theory of why, because it's how I felt when it was announced to us. Our activities committee made it sound like it was just the other ward, and we'd be tagging along. Which is essentially true. But it makes it sound like someone else is going to be doing all the work and we're just going to show up and mooch off their food. No one likes mooching or imposing. If our activities committee had said it was a combined activity and the other ward is providing the food this time, it would at least make it sound like we have a right to be there rather than we were coming as an afterthought. I plan to convey the importance of that phrasing difference to our activities committee if they're interested.

 Anyway, not feeling very social I was worried it would be terrible. Although I called Audrey and verified she'd be there. She hasn't talk to me for more than three minutes at a time in months, so I knew if she was the only one I knew it would be lame. When I got there though I saw a girl in the other ward who I used to home teach back in Orem. Aubrey (b not d haha) and I wasn't afraid to go talk to her. Which kicked me into comfortable enough mode for talking to other people I didn't know.

Anyway the real catalyst for this whole free write was my second thirty seconds with Audrey that night. She admitted to me that she never talks for me very long and she stops responding to my texts because I irritate her easily, which flipped on a light switch! I can totally tell when she gets irritated with me in person. I just never really thought that it was at me for some reason before. She's a pretty emotional girl, and most of them are usually happy excited feelings. But whatever she feels it's always very strong. Talking to her a little more later, it made me feel like I am to her how Jason was to me.

 It's funny though because she pesters me to post a new blog. It's going to be weird posting this knowing she reads it. So I'm not going to expand on everything I thought about. But I asked her why she cares to read my blog still. And she said "just because you say things that irritate me doesn't mean we're not friends." Which can be true, and I believe she means it. Sometimes I tend to think of things into much of a black-and-white. But really, my friends that irritate me regularly I rarely make an effort to see. Even those who don't bother me I don't have enough time to see. It would be awesome if I could hang out with Landon and Neal and CJ as often as I see Micah and Josh. But there's just not enough time in a week.

Anyway, I just don't like the idea of being annoying to anyone. I know you can't make everyone happy but I don't have to like it. There is a small consolation in that I had already came to the conclusion that me and Audrey are pretty different, and sometimes I felt bad that we don't text or talk as often as were used to. I've tried to spark such conversations quite a few times actually and they always died off. Now I know why, I guess I'll feel less guilty about it.

Random Thoughts 29 (6/3/2012)


Wednesday, April 25, 2012
- `These two phrases sum up my work day today.
    “I can explain it to you but I can’t understand it for you.”
    “Some people just need a sympathetic pat… on the head… with a hammer.”
- Make a copy of your patriarchal blessing that you can take notes on.

Tuesday, May 08, 2012
- Story time! Ok, one of the reasons Google is so successful is because they give their employees paid time every week to work on whatever they want for the company. Lots of projects which are big now with Google sprung from this time, and that’s why so many things are in beta haha.
Anyway, my company started doing something similar. Quarterly we have a 24 hour “creative spark” event where you work on whatever you want, and at the end everyone shares their ideas/progress and votes on a winner. I decided to participate in this one because someone proposed a great idea that I thought I could code. I won’t go into detail but basically it’s a tool that combines the inspection results from multiple technicians so you can compare what they said and come to a more consistent inspection standard. I LOVED working on it though! Programming is a creative process, building something, it’s very rewarding. Lately I haven’t got to create much though because we’ve had bugs or infrastructure problems to maintain or fix, hard ones too where it’s hard to feel progress. So when I got a chance to use some work time for real creating I loved it. I loved it so much in fact that I worked stayed until midnight that day haha, then all the workday up till voting the next. And guess what? I WON! $500! Good times.
- We got a new team lead finally. His name is Naor (now-err) and he was born in Israel but mostly grew up in Uruguay, random right? He’s super cool though. Raji was easy to get along with but it’s not like we’d be friends outside of work. I feel like if I’d gone to high school with someone like Naor we might have been friends though. He’s just cool and we get each other’s sense of humor. Spent a lot of time together at work too but more on that later…
- I realized a big reason I hate lying awake at night haha. Besides the obvious “I’m in bed, trying to sleep, but now I’m going to be tired tomorrow, and I didn’t even do anything wrong!!” aspect. With me I can’t really get up and do something (pre-break neck if I couldn’t sleep, I’d do some push/pull/sit ups, eat some food, and go back to sleep. Worked pretty well. Now all I can really do is think. And since nothing is going on at 3AM, all I can do is review the past or think of what I’ll do in the future. But I can’t even write stuff down so thinking about the future is annoying too! Actually my hospital bed and phone are a good combination… Although my phone is hard to use from bed lol.
- I may have mentioned this before, but it’s a really good thing I don’t crave junk food like most people. I mean, I’m not health conscious at all, so I’d gobble stuff up and probably have issues because of it. Heavenly Father knew this though, so He just made me with a low desire to eat junk food. Perfact! Haha.
-  Mark 10:13-16 Consider the Saviors tender approach with children. I can’t picture President Monson being like “ew! Get this child away from me!”

Wednesday, May 9, 2012
- So I don’t remember exactly when it was, I think the Friday before this Wednesday, but at 4PM they pulled us into a meeting and basically said “we haven’t released a new product in over a eyar because it keeps having problems. Most companies die if they go this long. We need to fix it and get it out the door ASAP!” So I worked 9AM-Midnight two Fridays and a Saturday, 9AM-6PM the Saturday of my birthday party, and 9AM to 6AM on a Monday (21 hour workday! A new record!) and 9AM to 3AM a couple other days. Work has been INTENSE! Here’s where the aforementioned lots of time with my new team lead has been haha. It has been great though. Wonderful camaraderie working into the wee hours of the morning as a team (and at a time when no one bugs you with side tasks!)
- I did get to take my birthday off to run errands. It was a Wednesday. I d renewed my driver’s license, had lunch with Kalia (way fun!) got my van repaired, vegged out somehow that night until Audrey came over and we opened my birthday presents with the fam. Some way fun stuff. I think if you have to do a gift with me, gag gifts are the way to go. I got a hand cross-stitched sign from Grandma Higgins that says “home is where the cat is”, the stickers to put on my new van, labels to mark my stuff that say “Corbinealious Brycetholomue Campbelliticus Maximus Danger III” and my cell number, and so on. Great day J

Saturday, May 12, 2012
- I KNOW I’ve mentioned this before, but I used to throw parties all the time, and now I don’t like to at all. It’s a little sad to me but it’s true. I decided to throw a party for my birthday anyway. And I was going through the standard stress I dislike of “well who do I invite that will get along? And I need to invite enough people that it’ll be a good turn out but not so much that it’s chaos…” and so on, and it was bugging me, so I was like “forget this, I’m inviting EVERYONE” and I literally sent the invite to like 230 people. I have slightly mixed feelings on the outcome but overall I’m glad I did it. I got to see a lot of people I hadn’t seen in a while, and it was fun. There was like 60ish people throughout the night (not all at once). The problem is I didn’t feel like organizing, so everyone just chatted. And pretty much everyone only knew who they came with. So my host instinct wanted to make sure everyone had a good time, and it just wasn’t feasible. I however did my best to ignore it, I don’t need to be responsible for everyone else’s fun, and I enjoyed myself enough, but I probably won’t do a mixing pot party like that again. Not without actually planning games to play or something.

Monday, May 14, 2012
- I love how cool everyone at work is. If you burn out you just go chat randomly with someone for 5 minutes and then go back to work haha.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012
- Diablo 3 came out today! And it is epic, especially multiplayer. I’ve been slightly less social as result of wanting to play it, but gratefully not anti-social haha.

Saturday, May 19, 2012
- So my cousin Celeste Poll passed away from cancer. Today was a benefit concert meant to raise money for a bone marrow transplant, but she passed away a few weeks before. They decided to do the concert anyway though, and they asked me to sing “You Raise Me Up”, which I did, and I feel like it went well. Anyway that ended at like... 4? I’d been playing a bit of D3 during the week, so I figured I should be social after the concert. I called Amannda Batton and we did dinner and discussed books. We ended up agreeing to swap and read The Host for Mistborn. (6/3 update, I finished the host last night and very much enjoyed it). Anyway, I’d discussed doing this same book swap with Alicia Williams, but she didn’t own the book so it hadn’t happened yet. I figured giving Alicia our other copy of Mistborn was at least a good excuse to see her though haha. So I dropped off Amannda and called Alicia to see if I could kidnap her right away, and she said yes! She was just getting off of work! Double win for spontaneity today! Usually it fails me nowadays :/. Anyway, I was just going to bring Alicia to my house to get the book, but my parents were going for a walk and invited us to join them, so we did. Then they invited us to watch “The Iron Lady” with them (kinda weird for someone like me who knew little to nothing about the history the movie was portraying) and we did. And me and Alicia CUDDLED! I went to bed super content that night haha.

Sunday, May 20, 2012
- Numbers 31:46 ends with a winky face!

Thursday, May 24, 2012
- “I invite each one of us individually to recognize that how we disagree is a real measure of who we are and whether we truly follow the Savior.” – Quentin L Cook April 2010 conference. I really liked this quote
- So last night was fun. I came home and found we’re babysitting my 2 year old niece, Becca. And she is SO CUTE! And was so excited to see me! She’s at the point where she says a lot of things, but it’s almost all gibberish besides “yes” and “no” haha. She understands you fine though. “Becca! Go pick that up and tickle your face with it!” pretty complex instructions, but she gets them haha. She was saying my name too though, and it was super cute. Then Haley (3.5?) and Megan (5?) came back. Haley thanked Heavenly Father that she’d get to play with Corby during the dinner prayer (in her princess voice) and Becca repeated “Corby!” mid prayer excitedly. Hard not to feel loved with all my nieces adoring me haha. We drove around the house sometimes with all 3 girls on my chair, it left me grinning all night even though they left at like 7:30.
- So I’m still trying to date Alicia, but I realized part of my worry with the whole thing. She doesn’t reciprocate in any way I can pick up on. I can’t tell if she’s just letting me take her out to be nice. I tell her how attractive she is all the time, or how I’d like to see her, but I don’t really remember her expressing the same back. I mean, she’s willing to go out when I try to take her out, usually if girls aren’t interested they turn down 3rd and 4th dates. And she DID cuddle on Saturday, including getting up and then laying back in my lap again (whereas usually girls won’t come back to the cuddle if they get up and don’t want to cuddle) but usually when cuddling someone will hold my other hand that’s not rubbing their arm, or they’ll rub an arm back, or they’ll move into you a little in a “I like that” way, and maybe Alicia just doesn’t express stuff in that way. But really I’m just not sure if she’s being nice or if she’s potentially interested. My usual past responses would be A. Bring up a DTR and find out, or B. stop taking her out and see if she says anything. I feel like I’ve often had DTR’s way too prematurely though, and I also often move on to trying to date other girls before I’ve even really given the current one a chance. Back to a previous analogy of trying to start too many fires and as result none light. So I’m trying to go with C. just keep taking her out when you can and see what happens.
- I love how Gambit switches sleeping places every few weeks. Sometimes it’s CJ’s bed, sometimes it’s the blanket closet, sometimes it’s the couch, sometimes it’s the foot of my bed… the current few week traditional spot for Gambit though, is he comes in at 4AM-ish, puts his head on my left shoulder, and stretches out his body along my torso between my arm and chest. Best cat cuddle position ever haha. And he’s still on my bed every day when I get home! Also makes me happy haha.

Friday, May 25, 2012
- Fought some zombies in my dream last night. Yeah, I’m awesome.
- Also, texting girls the preceding zombie statement as a conversation starter is largely inefficient. I tried it.

Sunday, May 27, 2012
- So my van finally came back from Arizona with the ramp modifications! It still needs the hand controls though… And one of the 3 guys working at Mobility solutions got terminally I’ll, so they’re way behind. They won’t even be able to start my project for 3 weeks. But! We put the alligator stickers on the van, so it’s official now :P
- So Micah FINALLY agreed to read Mistborn! Made me so happy! Haha. The first book took him like a month, then like two weeks for the second, then 3 days for the third. He’s still reluctant to really express enjoying them that much. Whether it’s conscious or subconscious he seems to want to find faults in it. But he did say he enjoyed them, and I think the speed at which he read book three speaks volumes. But whatever the case I’m glad he finally gave reading an actual chance. Maybe he’ll go back to his “books aren’t for me” opinion, but at least I feel like he was exposed to literature he’d like. If he wants more I have other Brandon Sanderson novels, or other good reads I can suggest…
- Been texting another girl I met online a bunch, Sariah. She lives in Florida, and she’s pretty attached to the place. So we’ll probably never meet, sad story. But it’s fun to talk to someone throughout the day.
- Better texting throughout the day is Sarah Flinders! Who lives in Orem! I met her at Natalie Haight’s B-day last year. And she is cute and awesome, I wanted to add her on FB that day, but I was flirting with Natalie a bunch and it felt like it’d be rude to go add and start flirting with her friends. But Sarah added me a few months later and we started talking slowly. At this point we text probably 4/7 days of the week at least a little. She’s a funny one. She is good at so much but she doesn’t believe it at all about herself, she struggles with confidence a lot. All I really can do is tell her how wrong she is when she expresses her supposed shortcomings lol. She’s also scared to death of relationships. I’m pretty distraught with dating too at the moment (not in the same way as her, haha) so I don’t really have  any plans to try wooing her, even though she has a large amount of traits I hope my spouse has someday. It’s good to have friends in the Orem area though. Of all the people I wish I had more time to see but don’t get to, lately she’s probably at the top.
- Finally got the 80% approval from Medicare to pay for my wheelchair! It’s going to cost me $4000ish out of pocket (ugh!) but it’s in motion now…

Monday, May 28, 2012
- I'm sitting in my van and I totally saw bird poop land on my windshield!!

Wednesday, May 30, 2012
- Alma 18. Ammon gets SO EXCITED when he sees his opportunity to restoring the flocks of the king, kinda a funny missionary experience to get excited about. But also very interesting and symbolic that literally gathering sheep is one of the first big things Ammon did on his mission…
- Been a rough few weeks at work. Reading sons of Mosiah chapters and a little sad I didn’t get to serve a full time mission. Ignoring the trials of housing and earning a living and dating in favor of just doing ones best to further the gospel for two years sounds amazing.

Friday, June 01, 2012
- So at church a few weeks ago the activities committee went to relief society with a bunch of cake boxes, and they had girls who wanted to pick one and sign their name and number on it. Then they took the boxes to elders quorum and had guys take them. A staged group date basically. The couple works out baking the cake, but they bring it Friday and there would be decorating supplies.  After church Brittany Jorgensen was like "Corby! My box is still there! Come grab it!" We are friends, I was fine with the idea of her being my partner at a group activity haha. I ended up working that whole evening and had to cancel though (I HATE cancelling on people, it's the worst.) And I'm a man of my word, so I promised to take her out next chance I got. She had to cancel the next one, which was funny. Anyway, I finally took her out tonight. I feel bad but I was actually dreading it a little. Our senses of humor clash a bit. And although she says we’re just friends and she’s not trying to date me, I still feel like she is interested and trying. Maybe she’s going for the “become his friend and then it can progress to more” route. Or maybe she’s like a guy and lying to herself without knowing it. But whatever the case I don’t feel convinced. Anyway the date was fine, we did Red Lobster and saw MIB 3. She did like 75% of the talking, maybe more, but it seemed to make her happy and I didn’t need to be heard really so it was fine.

Sunday, June 03, 2012
- So I so so wish I remembered my dreams last night in more detail. I remember there was a big long one with Audrey in it. She did something and I was SO angry at her (I wish I could recall what! I've never been angry at her) and I was running from her but she came after me. Also I could fly haha. Anyway I was still upset with her by the end of the dream, but I feel closer to her this morning for some reason. Weird huh?
- Moving, ahh what to say? Ok, CJ is moving out in the Fall for sure because he got accepted to BYU. I want SO BAD to move out, but I fear I waited too long to move on it, and I’m not even sure I can find health care still. However, I’m thinking this is a “step out into the darkness with faith, and the Lord will guide your feet. Er, wheels.” type scenario. There’s various problems though. #1 wheelchair housing is rare. #2 most places are full already by now. #3 the only time places are open to research is during the workday. I keep thinking when Summer arrives and I have more free time I can dig into figuring it out. But it IS Summer and my schedule doesn’t free up any more than any other time of year. So I really need to figure it out or take days off or both… For health care I’ll probably need to hire out of pocket a nursing student from BYU or something.  Moving out is definitely possible though, oh! And my cousin Joshua Rogers wants to come too! That’d be awesome! Just got to figure out how still.
- The farther you get from a target, the harder it is to hit it. True for both archery and The Gospel.
- I need to set weekly goals to solve specific problems. Find housing week, resolve health care week, etc. If I can solve such problems in one week haha. But often weeks go by without focusing on anything but weekly survival/happiness. I need some future progress in each week, and I think deciding on a focus will help that.
- I always feel like there’s so many things I haven’t talked about, but I suppose I can’t document it all haha.

Random Thoughts 28 (4/22/2012)


Friday, April 06, 2012
- It’s fun to see things I experienced in my WoW raiding days mirrored in the work place. Today, someone at work pulled me into a “chat channel” (skype convo) of the cool kids (some guys in tech ops). The social structure in the chat channel is just like guild chat with a big guild.

Saturday, April 07, 2012
- I frequently type ‘my’ when I mean to say ‘me’, weird.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012
- lol, “I’m not saying you’re stupid, I’m just saying you have bad luck when it comes to thinking!”

Wednesday, April 11, 2012
- I didn’t realize I was still relying on my interactions with Audrey to provide some feel of relationship type fulfillment. She has a boy now though (albeit one in Provo) and she doesn’t treat me the same. I think I was expecting that fulfillment but didn’t realize where I was getting it from before, as well as I didn’t realize it’s been gone. She didn’t do anything wrong, but I think that expectation was why I’ve been extra grumpy/lonely lately. After consciously recognizing this today though I imagine I’ll be able to expel it by dropping the expectation.
- I think it’s fair to say gospel answer that isn’t explicitly stated in the scriptures or by the prophets is received through the spirit.
- So along with my Audrey realization today, she used to tell me about everything. I caught a snippet of her journal (she’s told me various times I can read it anytime :P) and it’s clear there’s tons she doesn’t tell me anymore. It was a dating thing I glanced and I can understand why she wouldn’t tell me about dating stuff, but it made me wonder, should I try to re-open the channel of communication? Is that a good idea? Or part of the needed distance if we’re to ever have a chance? I think if I’m looking for the aforementioned relationship fulfillment from it, it’s definitely a bad idea right now, and I’ll only find disappointment. But if it’s truly as a friend it’s probably ok. But I can’t decide if it’s “ok” or dangerous and just puts me in a circumstance that I can learn things that make me unnecessarily jealous or keep my singleness more in my face than necessary. I guess if there’s any worry I should leave it be.
- Don’t go for hugs with people who just give half second brushes. They’re less satisfying than no hug at all.
- At conference I came with the question “can I get out of my wheelchair anytime soon?” I didn’t feel I received an answer. We listened to a talk by Elder Scott again today at institute though, and he said something along the lines of “if you don’t feel an answer, try to reflect on previous times when you might have already received an answer.” I have definitely felt peace that this is where I’m meant to be in the past. It’s been 7 years and I wouldn’t mind leaving this trial behind and regaining the independence and mobility of a fully functional body. I was thinking maybe it’s been long enough, or maybe it will just take enough direct effort and faith, but overall I think the original still stands. It’s not my preference but I can accept it still :).
- Elder Scott’s revelation formula. Fast, pray to find scriptures which will guide him to an answer, then ponder. (may repeat read/ponder steps :) )
- He also mentions physical health can be tied to our ability to receive revelation. I know when I’m wicked tired (hah! Wicked…) I certainly am not in a prompting friendly mode. I wonder if my consistent bladder problems are part of my spiritual retardedness.
- “When you write down your promptings, it’s saying thank you to Heavenly Father”. It doesn’t always have to be a new prompting you’re writing, remember the 7 times rule!

Friday, April 13, 2012
- A work day so crazy you end up eating corn dogs from the break room fridge with BBQ sauce just to survive!? Bring it on.

Sunday, April 15, 2012
- I feel like my life is on pause and I’m waiting for someone to hit resume, so part of my just wants to kill time until it passes. But I have no idea what I’m waiting on. Maybe this is the new normal, and I just need to get used to it and move forward
- “pray alone, aloud, and a lot.”
- So I’m pretty sure in various previous posts I’ve written down good questions to ponder, but then never came up with an actual answer. I decided I’ll try to go back and answer some of them. The first one I found is “When’s the last time you REALLY sat and thought about how you want to be remembered, or how you want people to see you? When’s the last time you wrote it down?” This is appropriate timing since I’m going to die tomorrow as result of a long chain of events begun by putting my shoes on the wrong feet. But that’s a tangent. Coincidentally, my cousin Celeste Poll’s funeral was yesterday. She passed away earlier in the week from Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. So how people do/will remember her was discussed a good amount. Mostly they talked about how pleasant she was to be around even when she was going through trials, her goofy sense of humor, and how sure they were she was living right. If I’m only remembered as the same three things, I’ll be totally happy. I’d like to add “a great father” to the list too. I’d like to have a more powerful testimony than I do now. People seem to believe I’m  perfect as is, so with any luck that means I do have a strong enough testimony and I’m just too hard on myself. I don’t really care if anyone remembers any vocational contributions I made. Yeah, I guess I could sum it up in “A righteous husband and father, and a person you walk away from feeling happier than before.”
- A good thing to do at sacrament meeting, commit “Father, into thy hands I commit my thoughts, words, and actions.”
- So it’s funny how attractiveness is in the eye of the beholder. Someone you find attractive following you around and wanting attention is cute, someone you don’t find attractive doing the same things is being a creeper.
- Similar note, I sat next to a cute girl in our ward named Elza, I doubt we’re a dating couple (always a great thing to be wrong about) but it means I often flirt with her shamelessly lol, which is more fun. Anyway half a sacrament I debated scratching her back. Because I love giving back scratches, and it keeps me awake haha, and she was leaning forward. I was afraid she (or anyone who noticed) would read too much into it, so I decided not to. Later in Sunday school, Brittany toldme I can playwith her hair haha, I DEFINITELY feel like she might read more into it. Funny how different interactions with people can be.
- While home teaching Kathryn, she mentioned a cool idea she heard once. Pick a trivial thing per day and think, “how would a holy person do this?”

Monday, April 16, 2012
- Reading my patriarchal blessing… It mentions being a teacher, which I remember, but something that I didn’t notice was it mentions counseling those in need. I didn’t realize this was in my blessing, but I definitely often find myself trying to help counsel others, I love it actually haha. Mostly dating advice, which is funny seeing as I’m still single myself… Most often relationship advice actually (dating or no).
- Lol, “Okay, I did some statistical thinking tonight and realized something. Did you know that if everyone who uses Facebook were laid end to end around the world, three quarters of them would drown?”

Wednesday, April 18, 2012
- Haha in institute the teacher was talking about “the light in their eyes” and he asked us to give examples of people w know like that, and I wanted to say “I’m taking one out Saturday!” but I figured no one would know who I was talking about haha.
- If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? The atonement does this! For me, I’d be more service oriented…
- The desire to make an ambiguous post about an undesirable emotion you are experiencing but don't feel like explaining to anyone can be quite strong sometimes.

Thursday, April 19, 2012
- Amazing how fast a bad picture or terrible post from a facebook friend can chase out the spirit and distract my thoughts for an hour.
- In a meeting at work someone shared their screen and it was solid white, and someone said “all we can see is a bunch of polar bears eating marshmellows in a snow storm.” lol
- So we went and saw Mirror Mirror as a family tonight, worth it. But afterwards was a surprise birthday party for Monica Ripplinger. Her house is just through a gate next to the South Jordan Middle elementary. We went over early so we could get my manual chair inside before she arrived at 8:30. I parked my van in the SoJo middle parking lot, only car there, and we got my manual chair and went through the gate. None of us (me, CJ, and Bryan) had ever been in the back before, and all the lights were off, so we went to the side and CJ hopped the big rickety fence to check the house number. On his way back over to our side of the fence Bryan was like “hey! There are people co- Holy crap it’s Monica and Josh!!” So he hurried and pulled me around the side, and dropped off the loud fence, and we giggles as silently as possible for like 5 minutes straight while waiting for them to leave. I can’t believe they didn’t see us. They saw my van, and I even leave tire tracks in the grass. Had they come around the side, they would have found me and Bryan sitting casually on the side of her house, next to the circuit breaker and gas valve. No big deal. CJ checked the invitation text again after they left, turns out the party was at Kelly’s house. WHOOPS! We went over and it was a totally blast :D.

Friday, April 20, 2012
- I really like long hair on a girl. End story.
- I enjoy that I have it so the UY team will all banter with me. For example
Corby: is that not how we’re doing it? If not, why not?
Bruno: Let me ask Nicolas, what you are saying makes sense
Corby: of course, I always make sense
Bruno: No, not always, but now you are
Corby: truth... hurts...

Saturday, April 21, 2012
- Today’s my one year endowment anniversary!
- Also, I had a great date with Alicia tonight. I took her out once a few weeks ago but I felt bland. We had a good conversation at dinner, but I didn’t feel like I was any fun. This time, we did dinner, and I was the me I like to be (which I believe is fun). Then we came back and played Blockus with Steph and Grant, then just talked and goofed off until midnight. It was fun :). Mostly I’m glad I got to be the me I like to be. I feel like if I take out a girl a few times, and I’m bland all those times. If finally I’m the fun version of me around them, they’ll be like “where did this come from? Weird…” But now been my favorite me once around her, it’ll be more natural for me to do so in the future. Yay :)
- I think one thing that helped my successful date was stopping video games with the guys at 6:00, even though I wasn’t picking up Alicia until 7:30. Video games tend to dull my non-gaming social skills/motivation. Having a break where I went back to non-gaming social (Steph was upstairs to talk to :) ) before leaving was probably helpful :).
- Oh! I also taught Grant “attack cat petting”. Charie, when she pets the cat, goes nuts and rubs him at rapid speed and shoves him around. It seems counter-intuitive, we tend to assume we should be gentle or Gambit will get bugged and leave, but he LOVES it. Grant would rub both sides of Gambits body rapidly and Gambit would stick his but as high as possible, and bring his face super close to the floor, and take little steps like he was trying to get away but couldn’t. But then when Grant stops Gambit immediately turns around and meows for more, it’s hilarious to watch.

Sunday, April 22, 2012
- I need to get independent again somehow, and soon. So I brainstormed this list of things to try…
Call grant/Barry and ask how they survive in a wheelchair.
Call nursing agency and find out of pocket costs.
Can I get back on Cigna? Since I had it?
Post on wheelchair forum, asking what others do.
Search for home health friendly insurance.
- I haven’t got around to the above list because the current book of the quarter is a web development self training kit which gets you a Microsoft certification. Awesome! So I’ve been doing self imposed homework lately haha. Life has been good :)

Random Thoughts 27 (4/3/2012)

Wednesday, March 07, 2012

- Mom made an interesting comment. Some scary laws have been passing which have the potential to diminish religious freedom, and Mom said “I always thought persecution in the last days meant everyone persecuting Mormons, but really it’s probably all religion being persecuted.”


Monday, March 12, 2012

- Hailey (age 3) said family prayer in her "princess voice" last night. Cutest thing ever.

- Whenever hear a dial tone now my brain sings “I need your arms around me I need to feel your touch.” And I’m disappointed when the drum line doesn’t kick in.

- I wish I could read one book and listen to a different book at the same time, it’d be easier to catch up on the books I’d like to that way.

- 2 Nephi 26:29 excellent definition of priestcraft. On this basis, part of why I don’t try to make a living on public speaking is because for me it’d be priestcraft.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

- Jacob 3:5 the Lamanites were more righteous in some ways than the members. I’ll bet this is true of pride/being judgemental a lot today. Members seem to be pretty bad.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

- Just signed papers agreeing to spend more money than I’ve ever spent in my entire life by a large margin. But in a few months I’ll have a new van I can drive!

Friday, March 16, 2012

- Went to the caucus meeting last night and actually really enjoyed it! I also found that rather than knowing like 5% of government processes I really know like 0.03% of government processes haha. I think it'd be cool to be a county delegate someday though.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

- Backup up your computer is hard when you’re a digital packrat L

Saturday, March 24, 2012

- If I ever feel bad about how rarely I update my journal I’ll just read Omni, they update like every 50 years!

- Omni 1:25 has no seed to pass on to? Do you think if he had a daughter we would have had a section written by a female in the BoM?

­Sunday, March 25, 2012

- Hmm, not much to blog. I reactivated my LDSPlanet subscription and have been having some fun conversations and a date so far, but nothing of extreme note.

- Temple miles! I should list these every time I post haha, but I don’t. I have them recorded somewhere so meh. That being said 513.4, 381.9, 294.2, 301.7, 167.8, 308.4, 343.4 (study), 379.5, 428.8, 322.7, 458.8, 441.5, 237.1, 612.0, 138.9, 533.4.

- I’ve had to go later in the week a few times due to speaking engagements or the like, and I don’t like having to wait until the weekend haha. It doesn’t make sense why it’s any different but I prefer early in the week. That’s why some of the listed miles spike from 237 to 612 and back though.

- Also, I’ve decided I’m not taking institute on a Wednesday again, or a Tuesday for that matter. If I get a speaking opportunity outside of Sunday it’s almost always one of those two days.

Friday, March 30, 2012

- Mosiah 3:12 I really respect people who make good choices without the gospel, I feel like it’s the only reason I do most the things I do, and some days it’s harder than others. Today is a hard day haha.

- Mosiah 3:19 another verse I’m failing at lately. I struggle with faith that I’ll get to have an eternal companion in this life. I feel like I can keep pushing forward with faith and getting hurt when I don’t get what I’m hoping for, or I can just not expect to have any success any time soon, but that feels like lack of faith to me. Neither scenario sounds terribly appealing. What I need to do is keep trying with faith, but try not to get hurt when it’s still not time yet.

Monday, April 02, 2012

- My team lead quit today to be a stay at home mom! And Aaron (the only other developer by profession on my team) is moving to a different team at the end of the month! It’ll just be me and people that came to dev from QA if they don’t hire anyone soon :/ and they’ve already been looking for a good while. Work’s gunna be hard the next while it seems haha.

- Overheard at work, “If I could pull it off, I’d be a stay at home dad, with my dog.”

Tuesday, April 03, 2012

- Ok wow, I had a bunch of notes on my phone. I should date them, because I have almost no idea when they were. But you don’t really care which day I wrote them down anyway, do you?

- The scriptures say “that men ‘might’ have joy.” Hard times are normal. We aren’t guaranteed constant joy even when living right.

- "And it came to pass" not “and it came to stay”. Trials happen, but they pass too.

- Only when we've reached a boundary can we stretch our boundaries. If we play small our boundaries shrink to accommodate us.

- Do not confuse motion for progress. A rocking horse moves a lot, but goes nowhere.

- Move! The Lord can't steer a parked car.

- Most people’s misperceptions of BYU rules is that they are not “right or wrong” rules, they’re “smart vs stupid” rules. Curfew isn’t a sin, and BYU isn’t saying it’s a sin to stay out late, it’s a smart guideline though.

- “One reason it's so easy to overuse digital activities,” says Ken Knapton, “an Internet safety expert, is that they lack the kind of natural boundaries that help us moderate other activities. A child stops playing softball when his or her arm gets tired or when it gets too dark to see the ball. It's much easier to ignore the subtle cues that tell us when it's time to stop watching funny animal videos, looking at friends' Facebook photos, or beating the next game level.”

- Great ensign talk on time wasting, had 10 signs you're 'overloading' in a digital world.

- I’ve noticed I seem to have much shorter dating cycles now that I’m older. Both parties seem to know faster whether it’s worth pursuing or not sooner. Maybe we’re doing it wrong.

- Avoid masks that hide your true identity. The KKK did things they might not normally do because they had masks. Many places online allow you to be anonymous. –talk by Quentin L. Cook

- I realized today why I don't care for nutrition. It's too much like politics. Most everyone can agree that there is a problem, like white bread or carbonation. But everyone has a completely different solution to what you should do instead. And their solutions are always backed by completely solid scientific documented evidence, even though said evidence frequently contradicts the completely solid scientific documented evidence of another solution. Plus I live at home right now, so my mom just gives me good stuff anyway and I don't have to care.

- It's amazing how much of a book you can read without a single word registering.

- I wonder how many words per minute the different apostles speak at.

- I find that my ability to focus on scriptures or gospel talks is directly proportional to my CONSISTENT focus and effort to seek gospel principles. A micro burst of faithful focus right before conference is insufficient.

And a few conference favorites (paraphrased)

- We can’t add calculate the sums of life’s circumstances, because we don’t have all the numbers. – David S. Baxter

- The fact something is good is not always reason enough to commit time and energy to it. – Uchtdorf

- “Don’t judge me because I sin differently than you.” – Uchtdorf

- ‘Do your fish ever thank you for feeding them? No? Are we like that with God? ‘And ‘The attributes by which we will be judged someday are all spiritual.’ – Russell M. Nelson

- Uhh, I could just paste all my notes here. I’ll stop…