Random Thoughts 23 (12/4/2011)

Sunday, November 06, 2011

- Maybe the only difference between times you were confident with your spiritual attunement and now is your attitude? Right now you wonder if it’s a prompting, but before you’d just go with it?

Wednesday, November 09, 2011

- “It's kind of a weird world we live in, where being anti almost anything is a horrible taboo, but being anti-religion is so acceptable it's almost popular.” – Micah

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

- “I respect "I don't know" far more than a made-up answer. The former represents honesty, the latter...cowardice” – A tweet I saw

Thursday, November 24, 2011

- I tend to code with the expectation my code shouldn’t get any longer for some reason. I like to keep it as small as possible… But really you generally can’t add a new feature without adding new classes/methods/variables…

Friday, November 25, 2011

- So I went on a date tonight with a friend I haven’t seen in like a year or more. When we came out of California Pizza kitchen we found some douche with a rich car had parked on the lines on the handicap space next to my van, so I had to have my date back my van up so I could get in. I guess I didn’t explain it very well, because she put in the brake, put it in reverse, let it idle out, and then tried putting it back in park without braking. Needless to say, that didn’t work. However, the moment where I’m yelling “forward! Push the lever forward!” the van made impact, came to a sudden stop, and I see my date fly backwards in my van was absolutely priceless. The look on her face when she got back up was equally so. Luckily there was a pole right behind the parking space, so we didn’t hit a car. And the pole had a big cement square around it, so it was mostly just tire impact. Could have been a few thousand dollars worse, rather than just a good story. Ahhh…

Sunday, November 27, 2011

- Talking to someone during a decision making period is almost more interesting than the actual decision...

- An alarm clock app that makes you do simple math in order to stop/snooze the alarm? BRILLLIANT!

Monday, November 28, 2011

- Memo to self, don’t bite the nail you used an hour ago to poke around in your ear. Regrets follow.

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

- I like the way this scripture is phrase, Helaman 4:23 “…and the judgments of

God did stare them in the face.” In the FACE! haha.

Sunday, December 04, 2011

- Ok, so a lot of these next few random thoughts I had any time over the last while. I wrote them in my phone to transfer here later. It’s now later.

- I saw a pic of a paper taped up in a bathroom that said “Warning: objects in mirror may be distorted be societal standards of ‘beauty’.” SO dead on! Definitely a sign in a girls bathroom. I find that girls tend to believe the grungiest version of themselves is what they “really look like” but the most beautiful read-for-church version of other girls is what those girls “really look like”, and when comparing the two they always feel not good enough. It makes me sad. It also makes me glad I’m a guy haha.

- For being someone who genuinely wants to make sure everyone feels comfortable, I am really bad at making people who are particularly different from me feel comfortable. I mean, I was the home teacher of a girl 19 year old girl who had a 4 year old and was just starting to get away from drugs. And I could get her to come to the activities, but if it was just the two of us talking I don’t feel like I made her feel like she had a friend in me. Someone she could trust yes, but not someone she could hang out with. I was very grateful for other ward members who did fill the role as friend when she’d show up. But I still feel a little bad I don’t seem to be able to be friends with everyone. If there’s nothing in common I just don’t know how to make the interaction enjoyable :/

- I need to find ways to serve. I feel I have a self sustaining testimony, but I should pray for a testimony strong enough to share.

- I’ve found my over the top flirtation is not always a good tactic for confident girls. I mean, I mean my over the top as a joke. My favorite reaction is when I give this ridiculously over exaggerated compliment and the girl calls me a dork or something haha. With non-confident girls the flattery works even if they now it’s cheesy. If it’s a confident girl that doesn’t recognize it as a joke though, it seems a big turn off for them, it makes me look desperate methinks. Oops.

- “Whether you get a goose egg or golden egg depends on the chick you choose.”

- I seem to think I need to respond to super enthusiastic girls with as much enthusiasm as they show me. Why? Is it possible I could have a great relationship with a girl who likes to jump around and “just dance” even if I don’t like too? Generally I assume “a girl like that wants someone to bounce around with them, and I’m not like that, thus she’d be dissatisfied with me”. Anyone who knows me knows I can be hyper and wild, but the dance party style wild is just awkward for me haha. Even pre-chair, I never enjoyed it :/

- So I did almost nothing yesterday. Just video games with Josh and Micah, then CJ then CJ Mason Bryan haha. It’s funny though because when I was going to quit at 6ish CJ came out and was like “I finished my homework! I get to play!” and it’s like I felt obligated to play with him (even if watching. It makes the game more fun for both people). I didn’t notice until the end of the day that I felt that way though, because I wanted to join anyway haha. I had the thought though. If Jason had come back right as I was getting off, and wanted me to play with him, and he had been productive all day, I probably would have shrugged him off and did what I felt anyway haha.

- Went on a date with an amazing driven smart beautiful but 18 year old girl Friday haha. I met her because I was asked to speak in an institute class by a lady in my family ward. The girl I ended up taking out struck me as super cute there, and I didn’t get her number on the way out. But the next day I called my institute teacher and asked what the girls name was and if I could have her number haha. I’m not sure I’ve ever been so bold. Thinking about asking her out just didn’t make me as nervous as asking girls out usually makes me though. She’s a perfect example of the super enthusiastic personality I described above, so my knee jerk assumption is it’s not a high dating probability. My only counter evidence is how not worried I felt about asking her out…

But anyway the real point of this post is in talking to her, and seeing how motivated she is and such and what she’s doing, and then trying to answer questions about what I’m doing, reminded me how stagnant I am. More importantly how I’ve been playing small. I mean, I am content now at my current level of stagnant (which is dangerous :P) but I finally admitted to myself that night that there are all sorts of goals I’m unwilling to make because I think I know much trouble it will be with my limitations. For all my talk of moving forward with faith, it seems I’ve really selected a small amount of categories I’m willing to wade into without guaranteed success chances (Ie: dating) but there are many I don’t want to do because I think I’ve got it all figured out and so I don’t want to act unless I can set up the perfect circumstances (Ie: moving out.) I need to sit down and think, “what goals if nothing held you back?” and then find ways to make them work anyway. Like a road trip, or moving out. Lol even thinking about these now, the problem for me is that the solution to these things is just imposing on people, and I don’t like to impose if I don’t have to. Either way, I’ve become more complacent in my chair the more I think I’ve got it figured out, and I should shift back into “I can do anything I put my mind to”. Well, I mean I still believe that, it’s just there seems to be a growing set of stuff I believe I can do if I wanted, but the effort doesn’t seem worth the gain. So I don’t know exactly what should shift, I just feel like something should.

- Temple miles! I didn’t post these the last time it looks like, so these are all the weeks since July 28 haha. I’ve still gone every week by the way. I think twice I was sick and only spent 90 mins studying in the parking lot rather than going IN the temple. But that still counts as going to the temple that week in my book. Anyway 332.2, 594.2, 961.3, 202.1, 574.9, 455.5, 435.3, 402.2 (made it due to date bail!), 614.2, 520.7, 474.1, 448.3, 479.2, 611.9, 516.7, 245.3, and 255.9. (note I text myself this number, and then pull them off my archived text history in Gmail, but it’s got the dates too if I ever want them…)

Update 11-6-2011

So I wrote a letter to a missionary friend today, and I decided it was a good recap of life right now. So here's a big excerpt from it haha.

If I remember correctly, when last I wrote, I was working weekdays 9-5, attending the temple weekly, institute weekly, and I was single. I was also feeling pretty stagnant. I didn’t feel like I was progressing in any meaningful aspect of my life. No measurable learning, feeling of spiritual progression, or even hints of dating opportunities. It was pretty disheartening all around.

The past few months, so much has changed, yet nothing has changed haha. I still work weekdays 9-5, I still go to the temple weekly (a few times attending a session didn’t work out, so I studied in the parking lot for an hour, but I still went to the temple haha), I still attend institute, and I’m still single (although I had a girlfriend, story to follow). But I’ve had great outlook changing experiences with each of these categories.

My job is amazing. I was so blessed to stumble into this job. The people here are all just great, everyone cares about everyone, even the high ups care about the bottom people. In fact, I didn’t even realize some of the friendly guys I ran into and joked around in the halls with were big wigs until after the fact. Anyway, one evidence of how much the company cares about it’s employees is they pay for private career tutoring. They have us take a test which determines our strengths, and then do their best to provide opportunities for us to participate in tasks (or move to positions) which play to our strengths (which provides great job satisfaction by the way) and it’s just awesome. In a one on one career tutoring discussion I expressed my feeling of stagnancy and lack of growth, and she recommended I keep a “work journal” where just once a week or so I write down a few bullet points of things I learned in the past week. That way I can look at it and see some quantifiable growth. It has made a huge difference, I feel much better in this category now.

It didn’t stop there though, a few weeks after I started the journal, we had a meeting to announce a radical and exciting shift in the way we are going to develop stuff here. I can explain the concept to you if you’d like, but it sufficeth me to say it’s a method I’ve always wanted to try since I heard of it, but it was never feasible before. It’s a method that takes a huge overhaul in the company and so most development industries haven’t made the shift. But it will make it so rather than taking 6 months to get a new version of our software to our customers (like it takes now) we could do it daily if we want. For your gee-wiz collection, it’s modeled after the Facebook development model (which everyone thought was crazy at first, btw), not that Facebook ever amounted to anything… so yeah. Intellectual progression need totally being satisfied right now, and I’ll be getting leading edge experience with a company who is willing to invest in me until I learn it.

Spiritually I feel like I’m being a worthy valiant member, yet I still didn’t (don’t) feel very in tune with the spirit, and it kind of frustrated me *sheepish look*. It’s like I feel entitled to it. A big thing that hit me during conference though was towards the end, Elder Cornish said, “Don't be discouraged when you don't learn to be attuned to the spirit all at once. Like any foreign language it takes time and practice.” I was like, “oh, duh! It’s not like I can start being valiant and expect to be a spiritual powerhouse the following week!” and so I’ve been more patient. I’m still trying my best though. And even if I can’t tell if something is a prompting or not, I try to follow it anyway.

Dating… So for some reason I decided to try a online LDS dating site (I feel dumb admitting that for some reason, but oh well) and I met a few people and had a lot of fun conversations. I decided though that it was making me less happy with my singleness for some reason. It’s like when I felt lonely I’d go to the site hoping to be instantly gratified, but of course it didn’t work. Conference Sunday I decided to cancel my subscription. But I got on the website anyway and started chatting with someone new haha. She turned out to be super awesome and the conversation was really great. I’d been telling my brother Mason we’d play something that night though, so I reluctantly was trying to taper off the conversation. However, she had mentioned she loves playing games with her fam. So I said “well, if I was feeling extra creepy, I’d invite you to come play games with my fam. If you were my close friend though and you told me you were going to meet a guy you’d just found on the internet an hour before, I’d Probably discourage you.” To which she replied, “I grew up with four brothers, I think I can handle myself”. So she ended up coming over, and we had a fun time J. It was impressively brave of her too.

We talked a TON over the next four days, went out Thursday night, talked till midnight, and then Friday morning we decided to officially hook up. Yes, five days after meeting. Seems weird, but I know tons of people who hooked up that fast and are still married. I complain when dating isn’t going well, why should I hold back just because it was going TOO well? She didn’t have any red flags, I didn’t have any momentum with other girls I’d be losing, I couldn’t see any reason why not (besides my instinct to take it slow anyway…) it was actually great. We set down kissing boundaries right up front that made chastity danger a breeze, we got along great in general. I didn’t really have any emotional attachment to her though. No “spark” or “magic” or whatever you want to call it. I had this amazing lesson on revelation two weeksish after we got together, and I prayed about Tiffany the whole way home asking what I should do. I didn’t really get a “yes break up with her”, but for some reason the idea of listing myself as in a relationship with her on FB gave me anxiety haha. So as best I could guess that was the “stupor of thought” category. I’ve found that if I keep debating doing something I don’t want to do, it’s probably from the spirit. I didn’t want to break up but it kept coming up. And in my effort to follow the spirit in big things as well as small things I to the Lord “ok, I’m breaking up with her, hopefully this is the spirit, please stop me if I’m wrong!”

So we broke up, it was probably one of the smoothest break ups ever. Basically I told her how great she is but how I just don’t feel it and as best I can tell it’s a prompting, and I let her see how frustrated I was about the whole thing haha. And I was frustrated. I still hadn’t found any red flags, she was genuinely physically and intellectually attractive to me, I just didn’t have the emotional “magic”. It really bothered me that I found an eligible gear who would date me back that I still didn’t to keep just because of some magical feeling I can’t control. But luckily, since that was the truth, I could just convey that to her, and she didn’t feel like she wasn’t good enough or anything like that. Thus the smooth break up. I felt so much peace after going through with the break up, so I’m sure it was right, I’m just not excited to keep doing the singles thing haha.

Random Thoughts 22 (11/6/2011)

Tuesday, September 06, 2011

- It’s funny how much I (and many of my friends) avoid making plans with just guys when every time I hang out with guys it’s so socially fulfilling (saw Micah, Neal, Landon, and Andrew these last few days…)

- Brother Bartholomue taught apostasy wasn’t just not knowing the truth, it’s acting against the truth. It’s not that the early church lost the truth, it’s that they had it and chose not to follow it. Are we any better? Apostasy against covenants, priesthood, ordinances, and the temple?

- Our generation seems content to “know” the truth or “know” the answers to gospel questions. But we hate it when we have to do stuff. Fulfilling a calling, doing home teaching, attending the temple. Am I in a state of apostasy?

Thursday, September 08, 2011

- I think for such girls immodesty is like swearing. They realize it's inappropriate but they do it anyway because they don't think it's a big deal. I'd argue immodesty is a much bigger deal than swearing though...

- So I’m loving working out, it does just make you feel good. Also, I love that the person I worked with this time said “watching you work out is like an anatomy lesson, you can see every little muscle!”

Friday, September 09, 2011

- So I’m working with code that sends texts, and every time I get a text I get all excited until I’m like “Dangit!! It’s me again!”

Monday, September 12, 2011

- I had a dream last night I was on a bus with Will Smith, and they were going to film new fresh prince of belair episodes, and he wanted me to audition…

- So I was driving on the freeway this morning, lost in my thoughts, and I realized I hadn't seen any construction in like 15 minutes. For a minute there I was worried I was driving entirely the wrong direction. "No construction!? This can't be Utah County!"

Thursday, September 15, 2011

- It’s really embarrassing showing up in the same outfit as someone else, right? This is why I’m never going to a nude beach.

- This is when I wrote my Neuroworx note below.

Saturday, September 17, 2011

- I had enough upright tolerance to “go for a walk” around the neighborhood in my manual chair today. I’ve like, never ever done that before. I was always so light headed it was an option, and then the idea never occurred to me to do so after I got more stable. It was fun.

Sunday, September 18, 2011

- I may have made this observation before… But I think it’s interesting that in the Book of Mormon the enemies of the church tended to try to convince people there’s no Christ, but they still had a religion, or the Law of Moses. But nowadays Satan seems to be going for convincing people there’s no God, or need for religion altogether.

Friday, September 23, 2011

- So I was feeling pretty smug about the supposed amount I’ve accomplished despite being in a wheelchair. However, I haven’t done anything cool for a wheelchair, basically I just continued to do normal things (drive, graduate from college) despite my wheelchair. I haven’t done anything difficult to do specifically because I’m in a wheelchair. Neuroworx has been interesting…

- I don’t think I ever mentioned, back when we went to Lake Powell, we listened to Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card. And not only did his super interesting boo make the seven hour drive there and back super easy for me to stay awake through (I never dozed either way) but! He saved us $5000! When we got to the lake it was like 11:00, and we started undocking the boat, but we wanted to finish our chapter first, so we delayed like five minutes. In that five minutes, a ranger came up and told us if we got in the water now I’d be a $5000 fine! If we hadn’t delayed to listen, we would have been in the water already!

- So dating 18 year olds is weird. But that’s the main audience that seems available. And my dad married my mom when she was that young and he was 27. Sometimes I wonder if I need to date an amazing but still immature young girl and train her up haha.

- I’m feeling like I don’t have enough listeners in my life at the moment, everyone wants to talk at me but few want to listen after they’re done lately. I’m feeling a bit selfish because of it haha, oh well.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

- Mason posed a brilliant question during scripture study yesterday. If we have to be transfigured to be in the presence of Christ, will everyone be transfigured at the second coming? I have two theories. #1 we know that even many members will not know the second coming has taken place. I think people tend to think of the second coming as some unexplained explosion of fire with Him at the center. No, He will probably come somewhere silently, and only those in His presence need to be transfigured. #2, he appeared to Mary and the Apostles after being resurrected right? Apparently He can appear without having to be in a glory that needs transfiguring.

- For someone who claims to be able to do anything he sets his mind to, I sure can be lazy.

Monday, September 26, 2011

- I feel.. .attachment numb today?

Thursday, September 29, 2011

- I’ve decided I’m definitely not a workaholic, nor a playaholic. But it’s harder to find balance than it is to just overindulge in one! Haha.

- The only thing as crappy as no free time is too much free time.

- I’m like a Brandon Sanderson missionary. I go around trying to give people his books, while promising if they read one they’ll develop a testimony of its awesomeness for themselves.

Monday, October 03, 2011

- UGHH! It’s so hard to tell the difference between personal fear/insecurities vs promptings haha.

- I said something in a text today that I regret bringing after I sent it. But somehow, they didn’t get that message. Divine malfunction?...

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

- The Hunger Game is the reading equivalent of a song with a catchy beat but disgusting lyrics. (it’s a well told story, but a terrible story to tell.)

- Funny how many things take time. It's clear as a general rule humankind must be really terrible at learning patience haha.

Friday, October 14, 2011

- Elder Uchtdorf hit it right on the head when he talked about people focusing so much on the golden ticket that they forget to enjoy the candy bar. Getting married is definitely my proverbial golden ticket sometimes. “The happiest people I know are not those who find their golden ticket; they are those who, while in pursuit of worthy goals, discover and treasure the beauty and sweetness of the everyday moments. They are the ones who, thread by daily thread, weave a tapestry of gratitude and wonder throughout their lives. These are they who are truly happy.”

Saturday, October 22, 2011

- “When Dad grows up he wants to be like Gambit” – Mom, after Dad caught a mouse with a bucket and peanut butter.

Wednesday, November 02, 2011

- I realize that I sleep much better when breathing through my mouth. Anytime I get a real good sleep I wake up with a dry mouth which I hate, but it’s worth it. I wish I could actively breath through my mouth to fall asleep but it just doesn’t work. My mouth is not at rest while partially open, so I have to consciously focus on keeping it open. And feeling the dryness set in while awake bugs. Darn.

- I just realized how grateful I am that even though I can’t use the muscles in my fingers, I still have feeling in them; Partuclarly the index finger and thumb. I was holding a yogurt and eating it with a spoon and thinking about how precariously balanced both the yogurt cup and the front loaded spoon were in my limp fingers. But I could tell they were stable (enough) because how the pressure was allocated in my fingers. This would be a lot harder in absence of that feeling haha.

Thursday, November 03, 2011

- Yesterday was an awesome 12 hour day at work (which never happens btw, meaning I never have to work late). Everyone was getting stressed. So, naturally, I got really hyper and boisterous.

Friday, November 04, 2011

- So I read the first two chapters of Alloy of Law today, and then when heading to my car I spit on the driveway and almost got it on myself. My first thought was “that was dangerous” but then I was like “dangerous? I must lead an interesting life if getting a little spit on me is ‘dangerous’.”

Neuroworx

What a day! Well so I went to Neuroworx for my weekly work out. I mostly am working out posterior shoulder muscles, but I do some biceps too. My biceps are already pretty strong though so we want to catch my other muscles up.

Three random thoughts from today. My experience there today.

#1. The last two times I went I was the only non-staff there (It’s an after-hours program). But this time there was a guy named Barry(sp?) who I actual met way back five years ago when I went for a short while. Barry is on his 16^th year as a quad, making it over half his life now. He is pretty much the same muscle picture as me, except he’s actually got a small functional bit of triceps now. But anyway, he has been independent with transfers (before he had trace triceps) since about five years out. Which means, if I’m understanding all the relevant factors correctly, I could be too.

Me and Barry were talking afterwards, and he asked if I’d thought of getting in a manual chair. Let me back up, five years ago when I first went to Neuroworx for a while, I was struggling a ton with orthostatic hypotention (low blood pressure, particularly while sitting up). I had a chest binder and tedhos and everything we could think of, and if I tried to exert myself physically even for like two minutes, I’d get super lightheaded and my muscles would burn from lack of oxygen. Now, my blood pressure is MUCH more stable. Today I went and did 15 minutes of cardio, and three sets of five different exercises all of which made the muscle in use burn enough that I couldn’t do another rep. My blood pressure is definitely more stable now. So when Barry mentioned a me being in a manual chair, this is the first time the thought entered my mind in a “you know what, that’s actually a possibility!” way.

However, I asked him what the benefits of manual chair vs power chair are, and he basically said “you just get to move more, keep your heart going, better quality of life.” I still am a bit skeptical about the worth-it-ness of the manual chair. I have experienced first-hand how exerting myself physically does just seems to release feelings of happiness and usefulness. And so if wheeling around all day just that effect as a bi-product I can see the appeal. I guess I’m just a bit skeptical about the consistency of that, or the potency. I feel like sporty people just seem to get more a sense of fulfillment just because they’re doing something physical in general. As a non sporty type, working out just for the sake of working out doesn’t make as much sense. Although as mentioned I have been experiencing the appeal, and so it’s making more sense. Part of my mind just isn’t convinced that making my life more difficult in various ways, on purpose, would “improve my quality of life”. However, I am, for the first time ever I believe, open to the idea, because I see it as an actual possibility at this point. Something it never really felt like before.

#2. (yeah, that was just number one.) I now know where to find the wheelchair meat-heads haha. Apparently, the wheelchair rugby group does all sorts of other biking/rafting/high adventure activities. Once again those activities in themselves still have a moderate appeal at best. As a social person, the biggest draw for such an activity in my mind is it would be a great date activity haha. On the social train of thought though, it would be a place to actually interact with other wheelchair guys/girls. This is all sorts of wrong of me but I still somehow don’t associate myself with “that group” in my mind. I see myself as not in the “normal” group either, I love all the wheelchair jokes and uniqueness of the whole thing. But I somehow don’t see myself as one of the wheelchair people either. Two tangents on this, A) it’s surprising it doesn’t make me feel terribly lonely feeling like I don’t fit in either group. B) Probably the real solution is I shouldn’t differentiate either group, we should all just be people wheelchair or no, oh well. Anyway, it might be good to participate in other quad friendly high adventure things. Definitely open to the possibility. Definitely going to need some more toning to get there haha. I’ve only been at this Neuroworx thing for three days over three weeks! Oh full time jobs get in the way of EVERYTHING.

#3. I found out today that there’s a procedure they can do to attach tendons from muscles I do currently have use of to my fingers, so basically I’d have some semblance of grip and release. It would be all gripping and releasing at once, so not individual use. And it’s still not like “normal”. But it’s definitely a conscious grip and release, how cool is that!? I asked if Barry could think of any reason not to, and he was like “no, but don’t rush into a decision”. So that could be very interesting. It’s also like a 6-8 week recovery though, which doesn’t mix well with working haha. Totally going to research further though!

So, in short, going back to Neuroworx to see what I can learn? Totally worth it! Learning tons for now J so much to explore!

Random Thoughts 21 (9/4/2011)

Saturday, August 27, 2011

- So… went on a date with Brittany Bird. We ended up at walmart buying a crab, and the old (like 65+ type old) employee helping us started ranting about how there’s not enough employees because the top management is supposedly hoarding the money blah blah… but the best part was when Brittany said “I’m sorry!” and he goes “Don’t say you’re sorry! Never say you’re sorry! There’s three rules, never let them see you sweat, never say you’re sorry, and no good deed goes unpunished.” Funny old guy… not the best take on life though, if he was being sarcastic it didn’t come through :P.

- That night I went out with Cari DeCoursi (yes, two dates the same day, so sue me). She told me the story of how she had gone on a bunch of dates with a guy in her ward, and after one recently they had DTR , she was willing to keep pursuing the relationship, but he said something like, ”you know how the world has this image of what a girl should look like? I just kind of struggle that you’re not that.” Holy crap, I wanted to kick the guy in the nuts. Men like that should be allowed in public. Cari said it’s probably the rudest thing anyone has ever said to her. the next day she was over crying with her mom though, and apparently that’s the day I decided to text something along the lines of “Cari! I miss your beautiful face! When can I see you again?” and it made her day. Yay for inspired timing I suppose? I sure didn’t feel like I was acting on a prompting when I texted haha.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

- So during scripture study we read a scripture where the author was about to say more, but felt he had to stop. And we of course were like, “I wonder what that stuff is?” Cj offered a good theory “maybe we’ve been getting it all along at a slow rate through modern prophets.” Which I like, but, I think it’s not correct due to 2 Nephi 32:6. We of course are getting great and new advice from the prophets, but not new doctrine, which I think is more what the author who couldn’t write more was referring to.

-Went to the ER Tuesday night! My cath stopped draining and we (me and mom) went to put a new one in, but my bladder clamped up and we couldn’t do it. And my blood pressure kept rising painfully… so I took the emergency drug that is supposed to lower my blood pressure a crap ton. Even with that in my system my blood pressure was above 180-200 until we solved the problem. It’s one of the few times ever I remember being in so much pain I literally cried. We called 911 and an ambulance took us to the ER (hopefully ambulance rides are covered under my insurance…) during the trip the drug I took finally alleviated most of the pain, but my legs shook constantly in pain until we got a cath in 45 or so minutes later. After the pain though the whole thing was kind of fun. I joked around With the hospital employees and such… Dad even came with this time. Kind of fun to show him what our hospital adventures are like J.

- Once we got everything at the ER worked out and were just waiting for them to finish paperwork so I could go home, I texted Robert (my manager) something like “Hey Robert, so I had a bit of a medical emergency and I’m at the ER right now, but it looks like we’ve got everything worked out and we’re just waiting for them to let us go. I’ll probably need to sleep in tomorrow and I’ll be a little late for work, sorry! Thanks for your patience!” so apparently, Robert only got the second half in the morning that just said “I’ll probably need to sleep in tomorrow and I’ll be a little late for work, sorry! Thanks for your patience!” and he was like “what the?... have we been too lenient with Corby?” glad we got that straightened out haha.

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

-Did lunch with Natalie Haight! It was super great. We got to have a pretty deep conversation about dating (not each other) and stuff. I think I actually see Natalie more regularly than any other girl I spend time with, and I see Natalie like monthly… Further evidence of my campfire analogy in my last blog haha…

Thursday, September 01, 2011

- Real life girls are just as beautiful/physically attractive as movie girls, but they have a personality to go with it. Whenever I’ve met movie looking girls in real life they have all the wrong motivations/aspirations (if any). It makes it easy not to date them though because no such girl would be interested in a guy in a wheelchair anyway.

- Almost got in a car accident this morning, had to veer between some construction barrels into the unused but finished portion of the road to avoid rear ending someone. Apparently they had slowed to their ridiculous stop because a construction barrel was rolling around on the freeway though. Good times.

Friday, September 02, 2011

- “I want, when I die, them to find me sitting in my chair with my face having fallen on the keyboard and having just typed seven thousand pages worth of the letter 'Z.' In this way, I'll have written even after I die.” – Brandon Sanderson

Sunday, September 04, 2011

- So I think I’ve mentioned this in blog posts before, but I’m going to apply to do a CS masters at BYU. Mostly due to the stagnantness I feel with my life now. I didn’t think I’d miss school THIS much! I was even a bit jealous when people were posting status’ about the first day. Anyway, one thing needed for applying is to take the GRE. The GRE is a test that examines your records and tests your reasoning/logic skills. I went online and took all the practice problems and actually had fun haha. I enjoy proving my knowledge or discovering where I lack (in areas I care about :P. Lack of knowledge in bio-chemistry doesn’t bug me at all :P).

Random Thoughts 20 (8/28/2011)

Tuesday, August 02, 2011

- I realized something weird. I think I like reporting in, and telling my managers about my bug progress, and when I leave for lunch or what not. Odd.

Saturday, August 13, 2011

- Oook a few rants. So I was out to dinner with a new friend (Julia) and she made a comment along the lines of “you like to have every night planned, huh?” it had a “you’re not very spontaneous, are you?” energy to me, and I wanted to deny it, because I consider myself a spontaneous person. But in truth lately, I haven’t been. Or at least if I am technically a spontaneous personality, I’ve made so many plans I haven’t had time to be spontaneous. I really plan most nights.

I used to be super spontaneous. I was great at living in the moment. I used to drive around to friends houses late at night and throw marshmallows at their window to get their attention just to chat a while. Even when I threw parties in high school I didn’t have any rhyme or reason. It’s not like I was known for having a monthly party. If I felt like throwing a party, I did. Even when I moved out, my instinct any time I went to get food was to check if I could find companionship in the process.

Now, somehow, if I don’t have anything planned I feel useless. Part of my contentment I know as that even if everyone said no, I’d still have video games to play. I feel mostly lame playing video games alone now though (although they’re a great social activity), and I don’t have any other consistent activity I enjoy. All of this basically adds up to me being less content.

I had an “ah-ha!” while praying the other night though. I have not been acting on the confidence I have that everything happens for a reason. I have been clean, and going to the temple every week, and so I have this expectation that I should be worthy to be guided into constant growth opportunities or “useful” things to do. But my life hasn’t been living up to that expection. On days I’m doing nothing I feel like I’m failing somehow. But, I feel at peace having to made the choice to stay home (for now). I think as long as I stay worthy and listen, I can stop feeling guilty about “wasting” time when no other plans came to fruition.

- At the moment I’m still terrible at vegging, when did this happen?

Sunday, August 21, 2011

- “For every thousand hacking at the leaves of evil, there is one hacking at the root.” – Henry Thorough

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

- I titled the left side of my left monitor towards me an inch so it's facing more directly at me, and I feel like everything has changed.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

- I used to be a professional handicapped person (I got paid for it!) but now it’s just a hobby J

Friday, August 26, 2011

- Where do construction workers park? There must be a construction bus.

Sunday, August 28, 2011

- So… Karissa Kim loves this fantasy series called the Belgariad. As a general rule, I Karissa Kim has good taste in stuff, so me and CJ decided to read the Belgariad series (5 medium-small books). I learned something interesting about my reading preferences though. To me, it’s not just enough to have a random adventure in a known world. I love discovering what’s going on along side with the characters. I realized this because the Belgariad drove me CRAZY. They give you a prophesy about the main character in the prologue, and then he embarks on an adventure with people who know who he is, and he keeps asking them who he is and they tell him to shut up or clean the dishes. Having the characters continually have discussions about something I the reader already knew about made me want to gouge my eyes out. And it took the rest of the joy of the small discoveries in the world out of it. I completed book two and the main character still doesn’t know he’s anything special. Two complete books of them lying to him and avoiding his questions! Ugh! On the way to Lake Powell we read Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card, instantly and massively intriguing. And while there I picked up Fablehaven and read the first third, also entertaining, and I decided “yeah, I’m not finishing the Belgariad…”

- I had a bit of an aha, which I haven’t thought through in detail so this will be kind of a free write. But, I have concluded I’m even worse at dating than I thought haha. Or at least, the way I date leads to the fact I have friends but no girlfriends. I mean, I even call many of my dates “friend dates” and if people are like “oooOOOooo a date! What are you going to do?” I’m usually like “I don’t know, she’s a good friend so I don’t think it really matters much”. I started doing these friend date style dates and luncheons because I found showing romantic interest scares girls off, and so I don’t even get a chance to spend time with them. At least if I put their mind at ease in regards to romantic pursuit we can spend time together, thus there’s theoretically a higher chance of romantic opportunity, and I think this theory is still moderately true. However, I think I may be unconsciously wussing out.

Most of my previous relationships have taken no effort to begin. I spent time around someone, we enjoyed each other’s company a lot, we end up spending progressively more time together, finally we discuss it and decide to date. That’s been the trend for almost all my relationships. I don’t know how to pursue otherwise. I can however think of one big difference. For example, back when I ended up dating Katie, I found her on MySpace, and the first message I wrote her I was pretty forward, forward enough that now I’d be worried a girl would think I’m a creeper if I said those same things. Part of the reason that worked with Katie was because she had a kind of low confidence, and responded well to being complimented. But part of it (and a part I feel I’ve lost) was my confidence. I knew I wasn’t a creeper, I didn’t analyze or second guess what effect my words might have on her, I just said what I wanted to. She told me she had emotional walls, I told her I didn’t care and it wouldn’t be a problem, and it wasn’t! And I had an excellent dating experience with her. Now, in a similar circumstance, I think I’d be less forward, and I’d back off a little when they expressed fear of relationships. As such, I remain single.

Another thing I realized is I don’t know how to keep momentum going. I basically take a wonderful girl on a date, we have an ok time but nothing magical happens. I take her out because I’d be totally open to something happening. But when the date is just ok, I figure it didn’t work this time, and I end up not going on another date for like three months. It’s like I have ten fires I’m trying to start and I keep rotating using my flint and steel on each pile for 20 seconds, and when it doesn’t start I try the next pile. By the time I get back to the first pile again, my previous efforts have left nothing to build on.

As always, I’m not really sure what to do with this information/theory. It’s like previously I just had the confidence, and me and someone clicked, and a relationship happened. I have frequently had such confidence lately, and been around people, and we didn’t click in a relationship way. So that alone isn’t it. As always it’s just not something I can force or plan to move forward with, especially given the uniqueness of each girl I may be interested in getting to know or pursue. But yeah, there’s a dating rant haha.

Random Thoughts 19 (7/28/2011) Primarily A Rant

Monday, July 11, 2011

- So, I was feeling anti-social and didn’t want to go to the activity tonight. I have somewhat mixed feelings on whether I should force myself to go when feeling socially lame or not. Sometimes I get there and get invigorated and I’m glad I went. But sometimes I go and I’m socially blah, in front of people I’m attracted to, and I’m sad I showed them that side of me haha. Today was close to the middle but leaning towards the “my blah showed up”. But overall it’s probably good that I went. Oh well.

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

- I think I can be officially deemed a ‘former gamer’ at this point in my life. Someone asked if I play some new game that’s out and I hadn’t even heard of it. I’m proud of this haha.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

I, am a maelstrom of emotion. Since graduating my fears of what might happen have come true. Which is funny now that I think about it. If I predicted this, why didn’t I do more to prepare/prevent it? the answer is simple, I felt like I was doing something about it, and maybe I’ve been doing well, but tonight, it just doesn’t feel like it’s been enough. Here’s what it is, I don’t feel like I’m progressing. I don’t feel like I’m working towards anything, I don’t feel like I’m growing into anything. I know this life is about learning, and I feel like I’m stagnant, and that every day that goes by is added to the useless category. Also, I entirely rationally realize this is irrational, even selfish as my mom has pointed out. Irrational because I AM growing, the stuff I’m learning at work is DEFINITELY valuable. I’m learning tons about work environments, management strategies, dealing with the specific people around me, coding techniques, cool development tools, and sound design patterns; All the while earning more than double my monthly spending. That, in its self, should probably be pretty satisfying. In addition to that, since I received my endowments on April 21^st I have been back to the temple literally every week. I do find some peace there, but mostly I go because I know it’s a good thing to do. I wish I was more motivated by the service aspect of it.

Which brings us to the selfishness of my whole outlook right now. Why should going to the temple (or doing anything really) be about me? Me feeling fulfilled, me feeling like I’m progressing, me gaining something at all. Why do I have this feeling I’m wasting time? And here’s the stupid part, you know what for some reason makes me feel like all these things wouldn’t be a waste of time? Marriage. For some reason, in my mind, once you hit marriage, time isn’t wasted, it’s kind of just like a “endure to the end” mode for your personal life, and a “provide a stable environment so you can have kids and they can progress too” mode. Money, is not motivating to me. An attribute I do still like by the way, and it’s funny that I’m frugal as I am when money is such a small deal in my mind. But I guess, to me, the whole purpose of money is to provide for a family. If not that… what? And another oddity, I see a friend going to China and teaching them language for 4 months as a really good thing to do, that counts as progression to me. It’s like another unique experience counts as progression… for them. But for some reason, the thought of doing such a thing myself doesn’t carry the same usefulness. Finding health care in China would be a lot trouble anyway. Maybe I do need to do something that extreme though.

All of this is particularly keen on my mind tonight because I had a plan, and it shifted, and now I feel like I’m floundering again. I’m currently living at home. For some reason, living at home keeps a semi constant shame in the back of my head. It’s funny how many people think I’m a yellow personality. If I were primarily a yellow, I guarantee I wouldn’t worry about wasting time this much. I need to get better at living in the moment. I’m good at doing it with individual circumstances. I don’t feel lame at work, or at FHE, or at church, or on a date, or with friends. I can just be in the moment and enjoy it there. Tangent, I still love my job, it actually keeps getting better even. Anyway, it’s just the nights I have nothing going that I feel this waste. Which is probably appropriate seeing as I’m doing nothing at the time. Go figure.

Anyway, I got a call from Dan Garner mid-summer wanting me to move to Provo with him and Alex King in August. Two huge social and spiritual studs from my Bluffdale Arts Council days. Epic! I prayed about it, didn’t really get an answer either way, and decided to go for it. I kept feeling uncomfortable like something wasn’t lined up yet and I shouldn’t sign the contract, but I did anyway. A few weeks passed, and I kept feeling more apprehensive about the whole thing. I can name specific “reasons” that came to mind, but at this point I’m pretty sure they were just excuses I was finding to justify my apprehension. Last night I prayed about it after a session, and honestly I still mostly got nothing, I’m basically basing my whole decision off the fact that the thought of moving out makes me more nervous than staying here. I’m not someone to allow myself to be ruled by my fears though. If it’s just me being insecure, I’ll go for it. But in my efforts to be as in tune to the spirit as possible, I’m trying to follow my gut instincts, even if I don’t see why, and even if it’s a tiny thing. Moving out despite my gut instinct was the only exception, where I ignored my gut. Well, now I’m not moving out. Surprise! I talked to my wonderful mom about it, I think I’m going to start going to Neuro-Works (physical therapy) and see if there’s anything new I can learn, or if there’s ways I’ve atrophied that I can repair. And it feels like less of a waste when I write it now than it did when I first had the idea. In fact “I’ feel less like a waste than I did when I started writing this whole blurb. Venting is great. Ahhh… Anyway, I’ve left out a ton of details, but I don’t care. Having put my decision down in writing and throwing it to wind has made me feel better. Goodnight Neverland!

Oh, I haven’t been adding posts for my temple miles (since I haven’t been posting at all…) they have been as follows starting June 24 to the present day. 359.9, 317, 344.7, 434.4, 136.8 (twice in one week!), 435.2, and 451.7.