TARP in pictures

This is one person's (brilliant) idea of what the government bailout looks like.

The TARP, in Pictures

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Humor Creative Writing tarp

One interesting character commented that it's a shame no one understands sunk costs... Hit tip Russell Roberts.

Boy Meets Girl

How many of these not quite traditional romances can you recognize?

1 - Boy meets girl. Boy discovers girl actually has two legs. Girl likes him anyway. Evil jack in the box feeds boy to a fish. Boy escapes, finds girl, and slays jack in the box. They live happily ever after.

2 - Boy meets girl. Boy kidnaps girl's baby brother. Girl chases boy just so she can reject him (ok, ok, and get her brother back). Heartbroken, boy becomes a stalker.

3 - Boy meets girl. Boy finds out girl is pregnant. Boy marries girl anyway. Evil king tries to kill the baby. They move around ... a lot.

4 - Boy meets girl. Boy gives girl a starring role in several movies. Girl karate chops boy a lot. And you wonder why boy hasn't ever popped the question?

5 - Boy meets girl. Boy kills girl's brother. They both commit suicide. We hope the rest of the cast has learned their lesson.

And what do they all have in common? I've seen or read them all this year - 3 of them this week. (Solution will be posted next week in the comments.)

Hyrum vs. Hamper

One of the advantages of being a sometimes work at home Dad is that I get to record events like this: R2-HyRum


Hyrum got stuck in one of our laundry hampers ...
"because he likes to play with the laundry," adds Joy. He particularly enjoys taking the laundry out of whatever basket or machine is available. "Putting it back in is more of a foreign idea."

In other laundry news, our washing machine broke Friday night just before we went up to the temple. It won't drain. Saturday we had the temple trip and then a church meeting for me in the evening, and today's Sunday, so the water is still sitting there waiting for me to fix the problem. That's the other good part of being a sometimes work at home Dad - my work hours are flexible enough to fix things.

"You fixed it once."

What We're Reading

Joy just finished "Abram's Daughters" a five book Amish romance that I'm encouraging her to blog about. Given that she got it for Christmas and finished it last week, she liked it a lot.

I am reading the third book in Star Trek's "Captain's Table" series as told by Sisko (it's alright), Yearbook by Ally Condie (more addictive than advertised with strong character development), and Fire in the Bones the biography of William Tyndale who translated the Bible into English. For work, I'm rapidly studying up on the foundations of ethics so I can write a chapter on Ethics and the Food System. This week I started thinking that it's been a few years since I last read my Tolkein, so I may head back to that soon.

Together we recently finished The Princesses of Bamarre (Joy's choice) and are nearly done with the second Harry Potter book (mine). I'm not sure what Joy will choose for our next one, but after that I think we'll be getting back to books 4 and 5 of the Chronicles of Narnia.

Hyrum spends the most time playing with the copy of the Book of Mormon we got him for his birthday, Goodnight Moon, and Brown Bear, Brown Bear. He's paying more attention when we read to him. He recently heard about Little Red Riding Hood in English and German, Brer Rabbit and Brer Alligator, and Horton Hatches the Egg. Some days he gets to join us at Hogwarts.

In the scriptures, I just finished Envy and today will be reading in the Book of Mormon about Ephraim (lot of Isaiah quotes) and Epistles before moving to Equality and Equity later in the week, and I'm in John 5 in the New Testament. Joy is ... somewhere further than the last time I talked to her, probably in Chronicles. [Up from her nap, she reports that Ammon is teaching King Lamoni and that "Chronicles is very difficult."] Hyrum just heard about how Nephi had to flee his brothers (2 Nep 5) and the TV helped Joy tell him about Alma's mission in Ammonihah. Joy and I are keeping up on our Sunday School reading in the Doctrine and Covenants, so we've got someone in every book of scripture this year!

In other media, we finished "the good part" of The Happiest Millionaire this week and are about to watch Darby O'Gill with our good friends, the Petersons, both for St. Pat's. We also recently finished Savannah Smiles about a little girl who runs away with two conmen whose hearts are softened by her tender smile. It goes down in history as having the most ambiguous ending of all time from a cheesy movie. I haven't quite finished Labrynth on my own yet and after that I'll finish West Side Story which we started together but now that Maria's brother is dead, Joy has no interest in seeing the sad parts. Hy has seen part of Monsters, Inc., Bambi, and Fantasia 2000. He prefers watching Wii. Joy continues enjoying the 6th season of Little House on the Prairie. "Yeah, I'm on the 5th CD."

Hyrum Meets Mud

Mommy decided to try again with the "making a mess on your birthday" idea.

"My second idea worked really well."

She took baby for a walk in the positively balmy 50 degree weather we had last week.

"And it's rained recently, so there were nice little puddles and some mud."




After all this, he came in and had a nice warm bath. The bink is awaiting sterilization.

He spent a good portion of his time rubbing his hand over the ground, picking up little pebbles, and smoothing out the ground.

"He would walk on the pavement, but once he got to the grass, he would stumble a little and choose to crawl."

"He wanted to follow the cat he saw, but when the cat came up to him, he backed up a little."

Happy Birthday Baby

Hyrum is 12 months old! He had a fun birthday overall, thanks to Mama's diligent and creative planning... though several things did NOT go according to plan. As far as Hy was concerned, the balloons and the presents were a hit, as was playing outside for the very first time. Joy describes it thus: "He discovered rocks ... and he splashed in a puddle as he lay on his side in it. He also followed a cat into a neighbor's yard." That will be in another post.

Here he is playing with two punchy balloons at once.


We had planned to give him a really fun morning. We set his food in front of him, including a favorite at Pop and Grandma's (mac and cheese), chocolate pudding, and his birthday cupcake. I did eventually convince him to take two bites of the cupcake. Otherwise, he was very dismayed by the change in schedule and menu. He smooshed up the cupcake and let it fall to the floor. We finally gave in and gave him green beans and yogurt, "two normal staples of his daily diet"

Pick your favorite caption:
~Dude, what are they feeding me here?~
~Hunh, I've sure got them fooled! They think I like vegetables~
~They tell me I'll like this stuff someday. I think they're full of ... chocolate pudding.~
~Don't they know this stuff will kill them? I'm not touching it. Well, okay, I'm touching it, but not with my tongue.~

"I think he was trying to put it back" It sure looked that way. He got some on his hand, looked at it "like, what happened??" and then he put it back in and tried to press the pudding off. He repeated it several times "to no effect!" "He didn't even need his clothes off cause he didn't get it on his clothes, or even his face! He didn't even rub it on his face."

Then we thought we be inspired by the birthday party some friends of ours threw for their kids and give him some time to be DIRTY. We put him in the tub with a container full of chocolate pudding. He looked around, standing in the tub, shivered, and wondered what was going on. I showed him that he could smear the pudding on the tub. He looked at me as if I were a madman. So I took some pudding and smeared it on his belly and gave his face a little warpaint.

That's when he finally broke down and cried. "He commenced to wail." Hokay, abandon ship! We cleaned the baby and got him into normal, dry clothes and let him play around by himself for a bit to restore equilibrium, "which he enjoyed a lot better."

We hid one present under a couple of blankets, which intrigued him. He lifted one blanket, then dropped it and went to his regular toys. We finally convinced the blankets would be fun, and unveiled THIS: a Little People car center thingy. He was pretty interested. When I sent one of the cars down the chute and it spun off into the kitchen, Hyrum opened his mouth and gave a decisive nod of his head that came right out of California: Cool! He enjoyed the rest of his morning while I went to work.

After work, we played a game with him that turned out to be more roller coaster than we intended: open the presents! We'd hand him a present, like this (~16-18 year old) keyboard I've been lugging around with me from our Nintendo days. His first reaction is delight. He plays with it enthusiastically. Then we take it away from him because he does need to get to his other presents and still get to bed sometime today, right? This he does not like. But then he has a new present for us to open for him. And he likes what he sees. Lather, rinse, repeat.


His other two big gifts from us were a $20 laptop that plays alphabet games and a free hippo walker/scooter/toy that we rescued from the Nursery junk pile and fixed. One of the cool things about the hippo is that the mouth moves up and down as it walks and it devours the things it runs across - the items are scooped up into its belly by a brush. I fondly remember using it in Nursery to teach Calvin about Jonah and the whale.

Hy also got his Very Own copy of the Book of Mormon because he really does love playing with the BoM and the hymnal. Maybe for Christmas we'll get him a hymnal. Pop and Gamma sent him some Disney clothes (a sweater, a onesie, and a bib) and the New Testament children's picture storybook. Gamma also crocheted Hy and me a couple delightful Leprechaun hats.

Why Mormons Build Temples

For Joy and me, there's really no more wonderful place on earth than the temple. We both volunteered at the Provo temple when we were single, and we felt so privileged to be able to serve together at the Palmyra temple. Joy was always touched at how big a smile lit up my face and my heart every early Thursday morning while we worked there. It's the most satisfying work on earth.

Return of the Retrospective 2

July 21, 2008

Hasn't been much of a stuffed animal boy. We give them to him mostly so he can throw them out of his crib.







Aug 15
"Needs more ketchup."

Joy says, "With his tendencies to bite, I don't know that Mommy would let him do that anymore."





Sept 24

6 months old and already standing. What a determined mover he's been! He does still crawl when speed is of the essence, but he walks for most of his movement. I'm rapidly running out of excuses to call him Baby Hy instead of Toddler Hy.






Oct 30
And there he is, plying his incredible cuteness. Good morning, Hyrum. Nice nap?





Nov 16

He was being cuddly just before we took the picture, honest! Hy is actually getting to be just a little more cuddly than he used to be - more willing to give us a nice, big hug first thing in the morning. They're very nice.









Some Sunday Nov/Dec

"Say, Dad, can I have a turn with the camera now?"






Dec 14

"Yes, mastah! Yes, mastah! I will get you more brains. ... Just as soon as mommy changes my diaper."





Also Dec 14

"This is my Dad. He's not the smartest looking cookie in the Animal Crackers box, but I like him just the same. Dad, could you please look at the camera?"







Feb 27, 2009
Hyrum discovers his first teething toy. He's up to eight teeth... and Daddy's up to no good teaching him how to stick things in his mouth. That took a good 10 minutes to manage, and even then I didn't see it happen. But he kept the ring in his mouth a good 5 minutes!



Mar 11, 2009
Hyrum turns 1 years old.

Wait a minute.

August 24, 1979
Derrill turns 1 years old. That's right. Pictures of Hyrum enjoying his birthday will be in the next baby post.

J: "I bet you were fun too, Derrill. That's the SAME smile Hyrum has. I mean, I may not think he looks exactly like you, but he has your smile."

"Africans have cell phones? Who do they call?"

So much in life is about our perceptions and understandings, and it takes a fairly wide variety of images to get a passibly correct idea about anything. Here's one picture from the multifaceted gem called Africa: Cell Phones.

Cell phones are transforming fairly large swaths of Africa - the western coast and particularly Kenya and newly Tanzania (the large red blob on the eastern part of Africa) are seeing massive widespread growth in cell phone coverage. (some) Rural towns without drinking water and sanitation have cell phone towers at the public school. Cell phones in Kenya do a good deal more than we make use of them in the US - they do their banking, job hunting, and find out market prices via cell phone. When I was at ATHGO last summer, our policy proposal dealt with using cell phones to increase political literacy, democracy, and participation - informing people of legislation that would affect them and giving them a forum to voice their opinions.


I found this short video today at Bill Easterly's blog where Kenyan businsswoman June Arunga discusses how some of the stereotypes we have of African poverty can stand in the way of the kind of investments that would help people lift themselves out. She was speaking at the Aid Watch conference at NYU.


June Arunga on Western Attitudes Towards Business in Africa from LF on Vimeo.

Again, this is one image of many. I'm not claiming cell phones will save the world. But it's a part, and it's a part less-understood.

Return of the Retrospective 1

SOMEONE is getting ready to celebrate his very first birthday. That can mean only one thing: It's time to review the year in pictures again! Many of you will remember my grateful retrospectives as he started gaining weight. I've missed those chances to show random unseen pictures. A couple of these you may recognize, but it's been a while, and they're cute, and they're just as randomly drawn.

March 23, 2008 - 12 days old


As Joy and I looked at these earliest pics of little baby Hy, Joy said, "I don't even know that baby anymore." He's a whole new person!










March 30 - 19 days
He always had such serious looks on his face as a newborn. Now his serious looks are when he's playing - very intense. Most of the time, he's my smiling son.








April 11 - 1 month
Ah, and there's that smile! Well, not quite. This picture and the next two courtesy Grandma's phone. It's not his First restaurant, but pretty close, and his first month birthday. He was fairly miserable that entire dinner, so Joy and I spent it apart as one got to eat while the other bounced and soothed the exhausted baby.








April 12
Blissful slumbers. Is my Hyrum really hidden somewhere in that face?










April 17
Is my Hyrum really hidden somewhere in that face?? I have been careful in general not to post his grumpy pictures, but he IS a baby and it's good to admit that fact occasionally. Actually, yes, that looks a lot like his grumpy face now, too, come to think of it. Joy agrees.









April 27
This shot is SO reminiscent of the first time we gave him a bink, clutching it with both fists. He still doesn't seem addicted to the bink - we reach for it well before he does. The bink is most useful in helping him sleep and as a signal that he's done eating. Pops it right in, looks at Mom, and says, "Sorry, Mom, no more's fittin in there."





May 28
"I'm getting ready for my first long walk. Half of me is gungho, ready to go. The other half is wondering what this contraption is all about and why Mom and Dad are making such a big fuss...."








June 15
Ah, now there's a baby I recognize.
"Heeeeeeeeeeeeere's Hyrum!"
I liked that Sunday outfit.





June 23
Hm, looks like our program of stuffing the baby was working well that week.
"Do me a favor, Dad, and don't show that to my fiancee, k?"
We were SO glad to get him on a bottle. Then to get him onto formula at 7-8 months. Now we're SO glad to get him off formula and into cow's milk. That saves us more than $15/week.



July 7 - nearly 4 months old
These days, we put the cat and butterflies in his crib and he attacks them pretty thoroughly. He chews on the butterflies and tries to separate the two of them, and he gives the cat a good whack every now and then to prove he's still got it.