A Good Man Gone

Today marks the passing of Gordon B. Hinckley, beloved prophet and President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. President Hinckley died at age 97. He has spent the last three years of his life as a widower. Without a doubt, he is now over-joyed and relieved to be with the girl of his dreams once again.

For those of us who loved and revered him, we cannot be overly dismayed by his passing. Though his presence will be greatly missed in all gatherings wherein we might expect to be received by a welcome smile followed by a wave of the cane, we wish him not to be trapped back here in this tabernacle of clay. He's left us for a holier sphere. One in which he has begun an eternity with his sweetheart.

He lived such a full life, marked with temple dedications, buildings erected, barriers broken down, hearts opened and lives changed. He was the prophet who when the twin towers fell, when persecutions arose and when evil men sought to threaten our faith and freedom, he like Elijah of old could say with assurance and love "Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them" (2 Kings 6:16).

For me, he was the prophet as I passed from adolescence to adulthood. He was the prophet when I came to believe that there was more to this church than a massive body of saints. He was the prophet who signed my call to serve a mission in Brazil. He was the prophet I testified for 2 full years to be God's living mouth piece upon the earth. He was a man of great accomplishment, to whom I would listen for guidance and encouragement. He knew so well the issues facing us, not only as a church, but as an entire world. Though a man of great knowledge, he was given power to speak comfort to those whom he never knew personally and to understand issues he may never have suffered from himself. He truly was God's prophet to the world.

I feel it appropriate to quote here and excerpt from his last address to the world as a whole in the October 2007 General Conference. He said:

"May the windows of heaven be opened and blessings showered upon you as the Lord has promised. Never forget that this was His promise and that He has the power and the capacity to see that it is fulfilled. I so pray as I leave my blessing and love with you in the sacred name of our Redeemer, even the Lord Jesus Christ, amen."

Many times it would seem that President Hinckley was bidding us a more permanent farewell. And even though it didn't seem that way in this last address to the world, in retrospect these sweet words are as beautiful of a parting message as anyone could have hoped for.



For further information on the late President Hinckley, please visit http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/

May we all keep the memory of this great servant alive by reading his words, doing the things he asked us to do and becoming all that he asked us to become. Great as he was himslef, he had no personal agenda. He only relayed to us what God wanted us to hear.

Fu Mandle Bar Shoe Stache

A little less than a month ago, I started growing what I initially believed to be handle bar mustache on my face. Shortly thereafter, I was brought to the realization that the intended facial hair design was falsely dubbed, but was more accurately referred to as a Fu Manchu. As if I hadn't had enough startling corrections, I was yet again reprimanded for my less than thorough understanding of mustache nomenclature. As it turns out I most definitely do not have a Handle Bar mustache or a Fu Manchu. The style of mustache I had chosen to dawn some 20-30 days ago is simply informally referred to as a 'Horse Shoe' mustache! How silly I feel after having so stubbornly insisted that my superior comprehension of contemporary facial hair led me to believe what I had grown was a Fu Manchu and contrary to popular belief, not a Handle Bar mustache. For further validation on my comments, please refer to the following wikipedia articles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fu_Manchu_moustache
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handlebar_moustache
I would also like to take this opportunity to apologize to those of you whom I may have mislead. I openly acknowledge the fact that I was wrong to ever call my mustache a 'Handle Bar' or 'Fu Manchu' mustache.

On a much lighter note, good luck to the Lakers tonight. They will be playing the San Antonio Spurs. My guess is if Kobe keeps playing like he did two nights ago against the Nuggets, we have a very solid chance of beating the Spurs, despite current injuries. This Laker team became very deep after the first part of the season. They are fortunate enough to be able to win against good Western Conference teams like the Nuggets without the likes of Andrew Bynum (left patella subluxation) and Trevor Arriza (broken foot). To help make up for this loss, the Lakers have extended a 10-day contract to 7-foot center D.J. Mbenga. Though not quite the big name center that some of us Laker fans would have liked Mitch to have acquired, we must remember the following: Few, if any of us, had heard of Trevor Arizza before he came to Los Angeles. There is a good chance that Mbenga will contribute some valuable minutes to this team. In any case, it's 5 extra fouls we can afford to give if Kwame or Ronni gets in trouble.

I'm loving life, the Lakers, my family, my friends and the fact that the pain in my partially finished root canal has subsided. Unfortunately, I will need to have the procedure finished tomorrow. That means, I will be in some sort of discomfort for the weekend. Nevertheless, I will enjoy life!

Sundance baby, Sundance.

Today was my first day back at work after a beautiful weekend in Utah. While in the beehive state, my time was evenly divided between Provo, home of my alma matre, and Park City. For the last 4 years of my life I have attended the Sundance Film Festival. Until this year, I have hosted friends from across the U.S. at my apartment in Provo durring the festival. This year I have returned to Los Angeles and thus, traded in my status as a Park City Local for a tan and blonder hair.

Needless to say, I was not about to let the distance nor the cost of the trip detur me from returning once again to Utah for the Sundance Film Festival. For me, the experience is not so much in the films, parties, celebs or music. It is the reunion of good friends and conversations shared amidst the cold air and chaotic mess of Hollywood vacationing in Utah.

Personally, I take advantage of the location of the event and spend most of the day time snowboarding at Park City Mountain Resort. Along with my regular attendance to the festival, I am a regular season pass holder at PCMR and as such, make as much time as possible for riding on the mountain. With the extreme cold and large volume of snow to date, I really enjoyed the beauty of the outdoors streaking into my peripherial as I tore down the mountain.

I only saw one movie and spent one and a half days on the mountain. I had a toothache on arrival to Utah. I blew more money on food and other people than I probably should have. It was cold and I came home without my snowboard. I slept on a mildly comfortable couch for four nights. And even though I make mention of these things, they are not the things I most consider. What has remained in my mind and migrated into my heart, thus becoming part of me, is the time spent with my brother. Getting to know his girlfriend and the things that make them happy and laugh. Seeing my other brother enjoy himself in a way only a young man who is only now becoming a man can do. Bumping into old friends on Main St. and making festive promises of future, out of tradition, meetings and outings. Making unlikely friends with unsuspecting fellow wait-listers. Listening to a good friend pour his heart out about his family and other things personal to him. Attending church in Spanish. Eating dinner with loved ones, old and new. Speaking Portuguesse with Brazilians on work exchange programs. Hitch-hiking around Park City. Walking across campus with a backpack on and feeling like a student again, with a hunger for learning that I could only get in a University setting. Sitting in on a class and taking notes. Congratulating a long time friend and his wife on their recent conception. Loving, laughing, sharing, sleeping, listening and growing. It was all I wanted it to be.

"Ooh Child....."

Just before getting back to work last week, I spent 90% of my two and a half week winter vacation traveling. I was in Las Vegas, Park City, Salt Lake City, Cancun Mexico, Aspen Colorado, and Mesa Arizona. It was a lot of flying and driving. I enjoyed it all..... well most of it. Since nothing really eventful happened this weekend (with the exception of my pending root canal) I thought I'd post an older story from my journal. Here it is:

As a part of my recent travels, I needed to make a flight from Denver Colorado to Phoenix Arizona. I was coming from a day of snowboarding in Aspen to my cousin’s wedding. I was pretty tired from lack of sleep and long flights. Prior to my day in Aspen, I had spent a week in Cancun Mexico with my family. All the time changes and long flights had started to wear me out. Then to spend a day on the mountain, really wearing myself out and drive 4 hours to the airport only to miss my flight by a few minutes really just made me feel frustrated and down. I had never missed a flight before. I got stuck in an awful snow storm while driving through the Vail Pass. I had planned for this and even after slowing down to between 30-40 mph for about an hour, I knew I could still arrive on time. It wasn't until I hit a traffic jam created by the police that I began to realize how late I might be. They were trying to diminish the volume of cars going through this one tunnel on the I-70 headed to Denver. To do so, they literally stopped traffic and made us wait for an hour. By the time I got my rental car returned my flight had taken off. So, I was able to get my flight refunded. Still, I needed to be in Arizona that night. That meant that I would need to get another plane ticket. I tried to get a little lady who worked at Frontier Airlines to make a deal for me (which, without going into much detail, wasn’t all that far-fetched). It didn’t work, so I had to forfeit over a lot of money to get a last minute flight. Even then, I needed to run to the gate to catch it. I had been traveling without my cell phone for about two weeks at that point. I had no real way of contacting anyone to tell them that I would be coming in at a different time. So, I was a little stressed, tired and frustrated as I waited for the tram to take me to my gate. As I waited, the most interesting thing happened.

I was standing at the loading gate for the tram, tired and hot, holding my two bags. As I stood there, in a crowd of about 15 people, I heard a man approaching with a rather brisk step. His pace was quite reflective of his attitude, cheerful and confident. I heard him begin to sing, and as he walked on by me, he looked right in my eyes, from about 10 feet away, and without breaking his step sang the intro to the song Ooh Child by the Five Stairsteps. The words go like this: “Ooh Child, things are gonna get easier. Ooh Child, things are gonna get brighter.” He didn’t stop to talk, he didn’t even wait for a reaction. He just motioned towards me with his hand as he strolled on by, singing and looking right at me. The words of that song hit me and I really couldn’t help but smile. It was then that I realized that God was just finding a simple way to comfort me and lift my soul. That song will always have a greater meaning to me now. I’m thankful for the hand of the Lord in my life that day.

The Roots (canal)

I didn't write yesterday because I realized that I would need an emergency root canal today. So.... that's really lame. It totally puts a damper on my day. I wanted to go surfing this morning. I suppose I could have, but I was just really bummed. Maybe this will motivate me to wake up early and either surf before work, or surf after. I'm really bummed because this procedure will take more than one visit. I leave Wednesday night for the Sundance Film Festival. I would really like to have everything done before then. Hopefully I will. I've never been to this dentist before, so I'm not sure what to expect. I'm really lucky to have found a close to home dentist, in my insurance network, open on Saturdays that does root canals. It was a crazy rush last night to find him.

As far as the typical events of yesterday went, it was a long boring Friday at work. I was glad when it was over. I was sad when I realized I wouldn't be going out because there was a gaping whole in my back left molar. I'm hoping that I will feel well enough to go out tonight.

I watched the Laker game last night. I love the Lakers. I love it when they win. Last night we beat the Milwaukee Bucks. Historically, they've caused us some grief. Interestingly enough, the last time they won a championship, Kareem Abdul Jabaar was sinking un-defendable left handed hook shots for them. Despite the historical performance between these two teams and Kobe Bryant's viral upper respiratory infection, the Lakers came away with a very decisive win. It was a good game. The guys are really picking up some momentum right now, which they will need to get them through the latter half of this months schedule. I'm excited to watch the team stand up to some of the best in the Western Conference, and see how we measure up.

So, this entry was boring and probably not worth reading. I'll put something a bit more exciting in later tonight. At least I can post a cool design. PEACE

Sour Kraut & Equal

The most bizzare thing to ever be eaten is sour kraut with several packets of equal poured over it. That's what I saw Dan eat while we waited for our food at Nate 'n Al's Deli in Beverly Hills.

I was really bored at work today. And despite the insurmountable opposition to my creativity and productivity created by large corporate office politics, I refused to be found indulging in a mind numbing session of Spider Solitaire. For some reason I'd rather shamelessly lay down on the floor in my cube and sleep before playing simple desktop games. Thankfully, I had to leave work early today to accompany my brother as he went through the LDS temple for the first time. This he did as part of his essential preparation for a two year missionary service in Mexico City. It was a very pleasant experience. I always feel great peace in the Los Angeles LDS temple.

So, nothing to exciting today. I'm tired and I want to sleep now.

Blog Bandwagon

I wanted to start a blog. So I did.