Book-lovers, Smellers, and Warriors...

I recently stopped by the Savers in Orem and scored a good 6 or 7 books for just under $5. Ranging from the history of the Relief Society (printed in 1966) to Scottish emigrants, all in all the finding was quite pleasing. I suggest any of you stop by if you enjoy nonfiction works, they have plenty interesting works.

The smelliness of Savers is to be expected and yet can be reveled in. There are a sufficient amount of hipsters, emo-kids, and the like perusing the aisles, but fear not good ladies and knights: the victory is yours as you exercise the lightning eyes of the puma. Etc. and etc.

Attorney General Michael Mukasey Refuses to Say if Waterboarding is Torture, Illegal

"Attorney General Michael Mukasey has refused again to say whether waterboarding is a form of torture or is illegal. On Wednesday Mukasey testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee for the first time since the Senate confirmed his nomination to be Attorney General.

Mukasey admitted waterboarding would feel like torture if it was done to him but he refused to say whether it would be illegal for a foreign country to waterboard a U.S. citizen.

He told Senator Joseph Biden, that the cruelty of torture must be balanced “against the information you might get.” During the hearing Mukasey repeatedly came under harsh questioning from both Democrats and Republicans."

Check it out (transcript, mp3, podcast) on Democracy Now!

Beloved Church President, Gordon B. Hinckley, Dies at 97

Beloved Church President, Gordon B. Hinckley, Dies at 97

I was obviously saddened to hear the passing of such a wonderful person. President Hinckley has blessed the lives of millions as a prophet, seer, and revelator. I know he was and is a prophet appointed by God to lead the people of this earth to salvation and exaltation. I also know that the Church will continue in similar fashion to bring the message of the plan of salvation to all people, even after losing such a great man. What a blessing it is to behold light for light, and to be comforted by an unseen Spirit as to the eventuality of my future existence, and the great glory God has for all His children through His Son Jesus Christ.

Concerning the last three posts

These posts are some of my older poems, between 2-6 months old. Anyhow, I hope someone appreciates them who has not read them before. My mind is a labyrinth at times and so the symbolism does not quite carry as far as I might think it does. Please feel free to comment on them.

Through shaded veil and pine

Through shaded veil and pine,
To a shoreline of black snow,
I cursed the sky and wept while my ears hurried and sighed.

I then feared drowning more than cars.
I slid along the asphalt road,
Like a sound innocuous and cold.
I returned a donee of grace divine,
Resting on a love that held in the cry:

O God! Condescend to calm the heart and mind of Your child so resigned!

He answered in a calm: what, My son, is time?

Your blood fell on ground you laid

Your blood fell on ground you laid with love that exited from the pours of Your mind to work over the chaos.

Your formations caressed light and set one son here and another fainted.

Whose hands bled when another fainted and resigned in a car?
Whose heart burst when one son wandered alone with black eyes, with Lucifer and his snowy waters?
Whose voice cried out? Which voice cried out?

When caressed light fainted and One Son fell to catch the resigned, I felt it.

I agreed to lay down broken me, and then I agreed to take the mass and heave it with the chaos He worked over.

He bled with the mass and we felt that bust down the veils, the walls, and then worlds clapped when resignation turned over to heightened light.

How can a man wrestle the history of a nation and make his own unique?

How can a man wrestle the history of a nation and make his own unique? I often wonder if being a super-human has the potential of being something more than the title, or if my legacy will simply be a series of comic books faded by the suburban dissonance, by the consumer's prophets.

I eat an apple, a biscuit, my empty stomach as well, and find myself traveling to grass and stone, a sword in abbey. I am wrestling with history and a man who says the most asinine words in the primeval hours of fog. You can take back a gift, but you most certainly cannot take back the historian inside man. We analyze and forge a view of the viscera, the night colours, and the bleak horizons that must be trembling at the core of every character. This becomes our worldview when no argument of battle is heard on the carpet, in the dining room, or on the fields of trial.

I feel it is appropriate to be ill for the month to come. I hold the opinions in and let Columbia or Harvard take their swipes, their lugs, their essays, and bury me with the journals and letters, the apple core. I am a simple and struggling gentleman, yet a donee of new bones and flesh.

Sledding With Books

This is the most fun I've had outdoors for a good while. We used old text books Ryan had in the trunk of his car and used them until the covers ripped off. John (Boss) fell off a lot, Ryan went really fast, and I was mostly believable and pleased.

I love sledding with books.

The Abundant Life

I recently read a talk given by President Spencer W. Kimball that I found quite edifying. He focused on Christ's teaching found in John 10:10, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." He discusses how we can find that life and how we can serve others with the individuality we have within us. I heartily recommend it to all:

The Abundant Life

Intro to Public History

I just had a crash course in public history tonight as we convened for our first class period of the semester. I am quite pumped up for learning about all the fields of work within the public history umbrella: historical consulting, multimedia history, site preservation, document preservation, historical societies, archivists, historical parks, museums, family history & genealogy. All very exciting and mostly new, but it got me in the mood for searching online archives and the like.

I happened upon this Yiddish copy of "All Quiet on the Western Front" and had to post the cover. It is amazing to read about within the archivist world how the Internet, though massive and increasing in the amount of documents in digital form, there still is a huge lack of connection between all of the information. For instance: you have an archive in London that has uploaded all these emigration documents from the 1880s, but then the autobiography by some well-known poet, found on the University of Minnesota online special collections,
which describes his immigration to the U.S. in the 1880s is not connected via a simple web link. Anyhow, that all probably seems contrived, but it does mean something: that even though there is a ton of information on the Internet now, (primary source documents and such) there is still a huge gap in connecting all of this information to itself. Yeah...

If that didn't make sense to you, it probably won't make sense to me when I re-read this is like a day or so. Ha.

Hot tubbing?

When I was looking for Boss earlier this afternoon, I entered the UVSC Bookstore to discover him but instead heard a young fellow inviting his female friend to come "hot tubbing" with him this evening. In all likelihood, she is in a hot tub with the gent now. I have one slight problem with all of this, maybe it's a mind battle with colloquialisms.

I may be incorrect, but a person cannot actually "hot tub." Though it is true a man, woman, or an it, can enter or descend into a hot tub, a person cannot "hot tub." Colloquially, it is possible to do just about anything but alas I cannot bring myself to conquer this lion for the sake of the future nerd babies of my loins. I simply remained baffled by sweaty, figure-hugging, informal, water-time-space-sharing a la "hot tubbing."

I remain yours, yet pretentious as a lamb in foggy London.

A Good Start To School, and A Date

Thursday and Friday classes have now been experienced, and I rather enjoyed them. I really like my Peoples and Cultures of the Andes class, it's an anthropology course. Anyhoo, things are looking up and the semester should be a delight, Turkish even!

Pamela and Tod (me) went for a jog in the area, lively stuff. We had dinner and watched I Am Sam. I really enjoy this film, maybe it has to do with my association with men like the one portrayed by Mr. Sean Penn. He unfortunately is marginalized because he is a thinking man, and happens not to like President Bush.

Well... Before the film we went to the library and I randomly grabbed this book and was thoroughly amazed and dismayed by the images. A wonderful collection of a foggy age in U.S. history. Ta ta!