Annika and I decided that the blog will heretofore be my domain, while the weekly email will be hers. Since each will contain much of the same information, I liken the situation to the scriptures. While her email may be compared to any number of modern biblical translations, my blog post is more like the inspired version of the weeks events. I'm only kidding, of course, as I learn as much from her emails as you do. And since her emails have historically been sent on a very regular basis, this blog is probably the lesser, and maybe less interesting, of our information flagships.
A few weeks ago, Red mentioned that I had sliced a considerable piece of flesh off the back of my hand while making a salad. I'm happy to report that the wound is nearly healed. But let it never be said of me that I don't put a little bit of myself into everything I make.
That's about all I have to say about events past. If I try to catch up to what I've missed since I last posted, I'll never catch up to the present. SO:
This was a pretty busy week. I wrote my first paper and made my first presentation of the semester. I always worry about the first one, especially having been away from school for the summer. The paper and presentation were a reaction to theories about fear appeals in persuasive messages. Hmm. I also had to grade an exam in the class I TA for. Annika helped me with that, which was extremely helpful. I like my job, but I hate grading tests. My other biggest thing this week is that I bought Adobe's Creative Suite CS2 for the computer so I can learn the programs. It's basically Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, GoLive, and Acrobat. Professors at school are always talking about how often the programs are used in advertising, PR, and marketing, so I figured I'd better learn them. It will be a process, but my plan is to have them down pretty well by the time I graudate. I know I'll use them on my graduate project, which will be an advertising campaign--for whom, I am not yet sure, but I'll post it when I find out.
Annika's week was very busy as well with her work at the high school. Those kids don't know how lucky they are to have her as a teacher. I see her stress about them, pray for them, and prepare with the tenacity of a starving lion to teach them anything she thinks will benefit them in the long run. Maybe one day they'll look back and see the impact she will have made on their futures.
Emmy is getting cuter everyday and constantly learning new things. She can do half of a pull-up if I hold her feet out from under her. She can almost crawl and is also learning to clap and make the sign for "Amen" after prayers. She loves to turn the pages and touch all of the puppies in her puppy book, and she prefers to feed herself slices of grapes and banana, pieces of bread, and frozen peas rather than eat the baby food we buy for her.
General conference was great; it gets better every year. Elder Bednar's talk in Priesthood meeting about young men becoming missionaries before going on missions was fantastic and timely. Too many missionaries go out and come home without ever becoming missionaries. Elder Won Yon Ko's talk on sacrifice was also superb. Did you see him bow to the audience after closing?
Now football. The Sooners won last night, which is fantastic, but we'll see how they perform next week against Texas. I'm going to be optimistic and predict a good game. Last night's BYU game at SDSU was pitiful. The Cougs were completely deflated. Let's hope they do better against New Mexico next week. If BYU plays like they did against TCU, UNM won't stand a chance, but I'm not predicting a win, just hoping for one. UNM looked good at the beginning of the season, but after losing to UTEP and getting murdered by TCU, I'm not sure they're as good as I thought they'd be.
This has been a pretty long post, so to the faithful friends and family who have read the whole thing, here's a virtual high 5 and a couple of pics.
Me and Emmy playing the airplane game.
Red, Gremlyn, and Bub on an evening walk at Sutton Park.
