Well, not always. But I've ridden the bike twice...twice count 'em twice...this week. Total of 31 miles so it looks like I did a good, consistent job. And appearance is what really matters, right? That puts me in the neighborhood of Lyndon Station, Wisconsin. On Google Maps I counted five bars in the town of 455. Since 2000, 32 people have either died (one guess how) or moved away (one guess why). Interesting thing about Lyndon Station: it near the "Granddaddy of all Trails", the Elroy-Sparta State Trail. They turned a defunct railroad into a 32 mile hiking/biking trail. At first when I read "Granddaddy of all trails" I thought more in terms of "mother of all trails" and thought, "Oh, yeah? Like bigger than the Appalachian Trail? That's a good Chamber of Commerce they have up there in Lyndon Station, doncha know." Then I read on and it was the first such trail created. Oh. Ok. Oldest. Granddaddy. I get it. Chamber of Commerce fell a couple of notches in my estimation, but still high because they came up with Granddaddy. Nowadays, if you say "Mother of all somethings" it forces you to think of Saddam "Mother of all battles" Hussein. Remember him? Mother lasted only about three weeks and then settled into early retirement. There is a place with the grandiose name of "Lemonweir Bottomland Hardwood Forest State Natural Area", which I like to call "LBHFSNA". Just a pet name I have for it. You should read up on these little towns, I ride through. They can be very interesting places. Well, anyway.
This week was so busy around here. We did get spend some good time with Loni and that is a highlight of our week each week. We love that.
I did a tv spot with Channel 11 in Tri-Cities which will air on Thanksgiving night at 11 pm Eastern (10 pm Mountain, 9 pm Pacific). It was funny. They called and set this up a few weeks ago and it was tough to find a date and time the George, my boss, and Rob and Mallory, the tv mets could film in the studio. I dig this stuff. I eat it up. No, really, I am not shy about being on the camera and in the spotlight. Really. Seriously.
But George hates it. He is the Arch-Introvert. If he has to give a ten minute talk about something he knows, he prepares for weeks and then when it's over, he...just...dies in an armchair and flips channels and stares. Me, I'm ready to do it all day long and then party. Gears me up.
So I drove the hour to Johnson City while he...get this...got out his laptop and worked on the Excel spreadsheet of the data he had gathered on rainfall for the last 100 years at the Tri-Cities airport and ran some calculations on El Nino years and their relationship to said rainfall. That's what he had to talk about. And we know this stuff. We were cautioned that we only had two minutes max for each interview, so I really had to talk fast and keep it simple. George is trying to find things to say. One hundred years of data and he has nothing to say about it? It was funny, though the longest hour drive of my life. So we got there late because he pattered around the office stalling. We walked in and the camera guys fitted our mics on and they gave us a last run down on the plan. George says to me, with his deer in the headlights look, "You go first." "Ok." So I do. I don't know how long it actually was, probably a minute and a half, one take, and then I went back over to the back of the studio twenty five away, and George turned around and saw me and panicked. "ARE YOU THROUGH ALREADY?!" He had been boning up on his data. I said "Yes, one take. Top that!" He looked like a condemned man going up to the podium. The guy spent about three minutes going over everything except what George had studied and my heart went out to him. But he was great. Then on the way home I drove again because he was exhausted and I jabbered on and on, he sat and stared for half an hour and then asked me about totally unrelated stuff. I'm still jazzed. I'll bet he is still sleeping it off.
Today we watched Tennessee JUST LOSE by THAT MUCH to Alabama. They beat themselves with penalties at the wrong times, and turnovers, and the kicker missed four field goals: two of them his own fault, and two blocked by the same guy. Then we watched BYU do its normal thing and choke on national TV. Good thing it was only on Versus, the same people that bring you Wreckage and the International Goodwill Curling Games live from Yellowknife. sigh...
In the Dirty Dawg College Football national competition, I dropped 34 places to 127th out of 488. Dave Durfey, who rags on me all the time about beating me week after week, dropped 148 places to 186th. I am gleeful. I was about to text him in the middle of the contest when he texted me with "I suck". I had to agree. Every Monday Kennedy, his daughter comes into seminary and says, "Hey Brother Boyd. My dad wonders what it feels like to be so bad at college football." Now he knows.
Tomorrow we have church and then Loni might come over for dinner and help with homework. She is doing well at school but wasn't feeling well today or she would have come over. Get well, Loni!
Still trying to get Out West on a transfer. Nothing much coming around right now. Please pray that we will get something soon, the Lord willing. Pray for us all, we all need help of some kind.
I won't go into all the details here, but relatively new member of the church and I had a long talk last Sunday. He was feeling down and I usually do and I ALWAYS see the cynical side of things, but he doesn't know that. As we had a heart to heart I could tell he was really bummed. I told him the Spirit was telling me that we needed to give each other a priesthood blessing. He got out his cheat card and I went over the routine with him, but when he started I had to help him out, so as I sat there with his hands on my head, I said all the words and he repeated them out loud. Perfect. He said only one line and it was inspired by the Holy Ghost: "I bless you to see the cheery side of life". There is no way that he knew to say that. Only God knew. I appreciate it. I told Cindy about it and I've been laughing about it all week. I have seen the cheery side of life. One line. Sometimes that's all you need or that is required. No flowery speech, just Nephi's plainness.
I love you all.
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