A Sample of My Work From Work

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Here's a sample of something I've written for my job. I figure many of you would find this to be amusing, if not quite as passionate as my normal posts. I promise that I'll have a real post up in the next day or so.



Grownups Like Toys Too

Last week I sat in my apartment – playing a video game – Kingdom Hearts 2. It’s a video game that mixes Final Fantasy with Disney characters. I can hear you laughing, “Disney with Final Fantasy? What’s next – Looney Tunes and Star Wars?” No – really – it’s an excellent game. So there I was playing it, when in walks a girl, “WHAT are you doing? Playing a video game? But you’re 28 years old! Grow up! Be serious! Get a life! Go get a real job!” And she left, leaving me in peace with the relaxing glow of my PS2.

People often expect you to grow up and act serious once you start getting old. The truth though is that grownups like toys too. If you took the most grumpy old man, like say a 75 year old English professor, and left him alone for 3 hours in a room full of Slinky®s, Legos, a Sand Pit, Virgil’s Aeneid, and the complete works of William Shakespeare, you’d find him in the sand pit surrounded by 15 foot tall Lego towers and 20 foot tall sand pyramids with Slinky®s racing down the sides. And yes, the professor would have used the books, but only because he wanted to make his Lego buildings an extra 6 inches taller.

Work is what grownups must do! Work work work! All day long, with nary a fun thought in mind! The grownups trudged back and forth, writing documents, stapling them, rewriting documents, and stapling those too. And then grownups discovered that it’s not work itself that’s important – it’s the appearance of work. As long as they can say they’re working – it doesn’t really matter if what they’re actually doing is playing. And so they invented cars, and computers, and Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, and bicycles. Instead of calling them “toys” they called them “hobbies”, and instead of “playing with them”, like you would do with a train or a sand pit, they would “work on them” so they would appear to be working by all the other grownup people!

There are a few jobs out there where you can be lucky enough to get paid to play. “What?! What are these jobs?” Simple – it’s jobs like being on Mister Wizard, or Jack*** (***=word that is inappropriate in some circles and means ‘buttocks’ or ‘donkey’. So the show could be interpreted either Jackbuttocks or Jackdonkey). “Well, how can I get these jobs? Those sound like fun!” Simple – you have to be either:

1) a complete nerd who’s really good at science and has spent their whole life studying science type subjects

or

2) A person who has absolutely no nerves left in their body and so they are willing to do crazy stunts like falling off of buildings or getting punched in the face repeatedly by a professional boxer who has twice as much body mass as you do.

“What? You mean I have to be either a complete nerd or a total moron?” Yes! That’s right!

But these nerds & idiots have so much fun – and they get PAID for doing this!

In Jack*** they drive around golf carts all over the fairway and treat them like they’re off-road vehicles – doing donuts on the fairway and jumping into and over every sand pit and water trap on the course.

On the show MythBusters they get to work on how to destroy a bridge by having a thousand soldiers marching over it in synch, or go figure out if quicksand can actually kill people and disprove it by building your own sand pit full of quicksand and then swimming in it.

So be a nerd or an idiot, and you might actually get paid for playing. Or as a grownup, if you care about “being grownup”, you forever face the consequences of having to appear to be hard at work. As for me, I stopped caring about appearing grownup years ago. Now I’m off to play in my sand pit with my Star Wars toys to make a life-size Luke fall in the life-size Sarlacc pit. I love my 40-acre sand pit.

Christian Farmer is web content specialist who is very opinionated on a wide variety of subjects for which he has no official credentials. For more information on toys, see http://www.justoutdoortoys.com.

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How I Contributed To The Novell Work Dynamic

2 months ago, I arrived to work at Novell building D - at 8:00 a.m. - prompt and ready to spend the day productively. As I got out of my car, I noticed that my pants were caught in my socks. I hate it when that happens - it's one of the most embarrassing and devastating things that can happen to you in your business career. So I fixed them, and made my way on up to my cubicle.

At my cubicle I noticed my pants were still stuck in my socks, so I went to fix them again - and out dropped a pair of my underwear. What the crap? How in the world did a pair of underwear get stuck in my pants? This had never happened before in the entire 28 years and 4 months of my life! Why did it have to happen now - while I'm at work, and on the one day I didn't bring my backpack in so I could carry them out without embarrassing myself? So I popped them in my desk drawer.

On Wednesday my car was in the shop - so I couldn't go to work. That night I decided I'd had it with Novell, and was sick of the job. But I couldn't just quit with my underwear stuck in my desk. So on Thursday morning I showed up at 7 a.m. when no one was around, grabbed my underwear, dropped my badge off at the front desk, got home by 7:30, and emailed my supervisor telling them I was done with Novell.

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Tech Support - It Sucks On Both Ends

In our modern times we have come to depend on many an invention - technical inventions. And along with these technical inventions has come many a technical breakdown in products, and along with these breakdowns, to ensure their customers that they will always be there for them and wish their customers everything that's good in this world, companies are providing extra services - loving caring services - for their customers: "We'll give you tech support on all our products!" they cry!

"We care about you!" they say! "If anything is wrong, we want to be there for you, because our customers are the best customers in the world! And to prove it to you - call our trained technical loving caring professionals, they will hold your hand and guide you and love you and make everything all better!"

Then you go and call them, and it's somebody who's falling asleep or who sounds bored and irritable, and frankly they aren't caring nor do they even care about caring. They don't even know anything at all about the product, the Sony Cybershot DSCW50 6MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Zoom that you purchased. Oh sure they could tell you loads about the Cybershot DSCW 49a with 4x digital zoom, but the DSCW50 they know nothing about - they didn't even know it ever existed. And so you do the only thing in your power that could possibly make you feel better - you cuss out that Technical Support Representative over the phone.

I worked in technical support for 9 months for a place called Big Planet (yes - I'm aware that probably violating 5 different copyrights as well as contract agreements that I had with Big Planet when I gave them my 2 weeks notice - but frankly - I just don't care) and I am here to tell you that it is usually not the fault of the people that you talk to on the line for tech support that you're frustrated and angry, except of course for the tech support assistant who just got sick of talking to people so when the customer called he just put them on 'mute' for 30 minutes - so for 30 minutes you could hear the customer saying, "Hello? Hello? Is anybody there?"

You might think that the Tech Support Assistant you're talking to is just trying to drag you along and put you on hold. In all reality - they hate being on the phone with you as much as you hate talking to them, if not even more so. Every second that you're on the phone with us is one less second that we could be playing javanoid (http://www.javanoid.com/). Actually that's not true - it's altogether possible to play javanoid while on the phone with clients. "Okay - click on 'SMTP preferences'...blast! I only have 1 life left!" "Huh? One life?" "No no - not life - SMTP preferences - then next...good...good...you're doing good...aw, CRAP! no lives left!" "huh?" "Right - click on 'apply' now 'ok'....good...we're almost done..."

The truth of the matter is a lot of tech support people are disgruntled mainly because while you've been on hold for 40 minutes becoming disgruntled they've spent the last 40 minutes dealing with somebody whose iPhone has stopped working all of a sudden even though it worked perfectly well every day for the last 6 years and they love their iPhone, and is there anyway they can get a new one even though 5 years ago they stopped making them, and have explained 4 times over, first in a bored voice, then in a kindly voice, then in an irritable voice, and finally in a firm yet kind voice that there are no new sources for iPhones and they might just have to go out and buy a computer to get on the internet and no there is nothing you can do for them, because frankly the tech support person is the lowliest rung on the lowliest ladder of the lowliest branch of the company. They have as much power of persuasion in their company as you have over Microsoft's next version of Windows.

And then people call in and expect you to give them support on things that aren't even your company's products, like this person that expected me to help her out with her printer - this is the exact ticket I wrote:

Christian Farmer Dec 8, 2004 9:42 PM (MDT)
Delores called in, I was the first one she talked to, then Leona, then Kevin. She gets on and says she wants a calendar to run down one side of the page instead of the other. I told her that I was sorry but that we don't support that. She asked me that we do support, I told her that I do technical support for big planet products. She then said "do you want me to switch to AOL?" and wanted to know what she paid us for. She asked me if I could refer her to someone else to take care of it and I said, "Do you have any grandchildren?" she says "What?" and I said "Do you have any children?" and she goes "You're a turkey, you're an a**hole" and hung up.

So in summary - you might hate being on the phone for tech support - but most tech support workers like it even less, so the next time you call in to tech support - be kind to them - and you'll make the world a happier place. Otherwise they might end up burning things to relieve stress like when we burned many iPhones - both InfoGear & Cidco:

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Your Friend The Jaw

On my mission I rode a bike every single day for 22 months straight, minus 5 or 6 days for minor illnesses. Because of this I learned how to ride without hands very well - I would ride for 10 blocks straight without hands, and if it wasn't for those darned traffic lights I never would have had to put my hands on the handle bars even to stop. I even rode off a 10 inch tall curb without hands - and was rather proud of myself for doing so. Then one day we were late for an appointment - really late - and I rode my bike without hands from the street up onto a curb. I'd successfully navigated this same spot over 90 times without hands - a 100% success rate - but this time I lost control and flew out of my seat from going too fast - so that only my feet were in contact with the bicycle. Thinking quick - I grabbed for the handle bars - accidentally slammed on the front brake - executed a magnificent flip right into the concrete - and broke my jaw.

If I had just fallen off the bike it wouldn't have been so bad - but no - I had to grab for the handle bars and flip into the concrete transferring all my momentum right into my jaw and mouth, breaking 6 or 7 teeth, and my jaw in 3 places.

At the hospital there was a plastic surgeon - in a purple suit coat (not mauve, not burgundy - purple- like a grape Otter Pop) and an orange tie. He kept on trying to convince me to have some procedure done that night where they would cut open my jaw, and put a metal plate on it. My dad (who's a dentist) and my Stake President (who's an orthodontist) insisted that that shouldn't happen.

During the night in the hospital nurses kept on coming in to prep me for surgery, and Elder Gibbons had to keep on telling them, "No - no surgery". It was like the plastic surgeon was a used car salesman who coudln't take no for an answer.

In the morning nurses came in with cheerios. "He can't eat that." "But it's bland food!" "It doesn't matter if it's bland if he can't chew it."

In the end we went to 2 different hospitals, 2 different oral surgeons, a root canal specialist, and a dentist to get all my teeth work done, and over $10,000 of oral surgery & dental work went into my mouth. Since I was on a mission it was all paid for by church insurance.

My jaw was wired shut for 7 weeks. Luckily you can talk with your jaw wired shut, and still ride a bicycle so I was able to go around tracting still. I learned how to say the phrase, "I broke my jaw, and it's wired shut - can you please put my food in the blender?" in spanish (Me fractulé la mandibula - puede ud. poner la comida en la licuadora) for dinner appointments. I also carried around wire clippers in case of vomiting.

In the first week I tried to make a smoothie out of a pizza. Yes - I know - making a pizza smoothie is wrong and disgusting - but let's see YOU try having your jaw wired shut without getting desperate. For Thanksgiving the people we ate dinner with put some turkey and gravy in the blender for me - and honestly - it was one of the best tasting meals I've ever had.

When my jaw was opened back up I had to do stretching exercises where I would force my mouth to open wider with my fingers. I tried to eat a sandwich at a party - a normal sized sandwich - and I couldn't get it in. I had to smash the sandwich with my hands to be able to cram it in there.

From then on every missionary was asked if they were riding their bikes without hands. All because of me and my jaw.

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A Light & A Body

We have for you once more short story time. These are all 100% true stories, although exact factual details might have been lost over the years.

Number One
One night I fell asleep in bed while reading. This was around 11:30 p.m. Next thing I know someone's saying my name: "Christian...Christian...Christian...CHRISTIAN!!!

I woke up: "Huh? Wha...What!?"
"Do you want me to turn your light off?"
"Meh...I...I don't care! Yes!"

I couldn't fall asleep again for another two hours.

Number Two
A few years ago we knew a girl, Malesa, who was a nursing student at BYU. She had a nursing class up at the University of Utah, or The U, where she swore that they told her that if you promised to give your body to them for a cadaver when you die, they would pay you $10,000.

I started thinking - that is a LOT of money. Imagine what I could DO with Ten Thousand Dollars! I was planning on donating my organs anyway when I die, so what's wrong with selling my body now for $10,000? So I started calling up The U to find out how and where I could sell my body. This actual conversation actually happened - just ask my old roommate Greg - he was there to hear me try.

I called up their help line.
"Can I help you?"
"Yes, I heard you guys have a program where you let people sell their bodies to science? How can I do that?"
"Um...hmmm...I don't know...would you like to try the nursing school? Their number is 801-581-7728."
"OK - thanks!"

I call up the nursing school:
"Hi - how can I sell my body to you guys for science?"
"Um...sir...that's actually...illegal."
"Oh - blast."
Needless to say, I was a bit disappointed at not getting $10,000.

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The Insanity of Sleepiness

Once in a while everybody has a day or two where they're struggling to get things done. Why? Because they're tired - not tired to the point where they could sleep for a week, but just tired because they've, let's say - stayed up until 2 or 3 a.m. playing video games or reading an exciting book.

And then these people, in their brain-addled states, begin to get wonderful ideas - wonderful beautiful ideas that wouldn't possibly come into the brain of a person who has slept enough. Ideas like thinking it would be a fun prank to drive down the highway in the wrong direction during rush hour.

This was the state of mind I was in one night when I checked my email - and lo and behold there was an email from President Cecil O. Samuelson, President of BYU - Brigham Young University - telling us that if we ever needed anything we could just email him. This is not a good email for someone who's tired to read, especially a tired college student who's sick of school and wants nothing more than to be done with it.

So I got up my guts - and ranted for a long time to President Samuelson. I don't really regret it - but it didn't accomplish anything. I should have just stated, "Why can't we have a general major at BYU?" But no - I had to write something that I thought was funny and informative and witty.

I tell you - emails sent while one is tired should have a huge disclaimer, "Warning - this person was exhausted when he/she wrote this. Any information contained in the email should be read with 5 grains of salt, and either all, none, some, or very little of the information may actually be what the sender intended to portray. They thought it was funny when they wrote it, but now that they've gone back and reread it, they realize that it is crueler than something those two old men that sit up on the balcony on the Muppet Show would say."

And here I am rambling again - because I'm tired. Meanwhile - enjoy the email below that I sent to President Samuelson at 3 a.m.

Oh yeah - his response said something like, "You're a negative fault-finder. We have tons of people graduating. What can I do for you? Read through this 3 pages plus you sent me and then you go think about what you've written, (implied) and never ever send me an email ever again.



Hi President Samuelson,

Thanks for a direct link to you. I'm supposedly a bright young man, received a 3.79 GPA in high school--joked around too much, and scored a 33 on the ACT's. I'm not saying this to impress you in the least, but just to impress upon your mind why my college career is so frustrating to deal with.

Currently I am on Suspension from the University. Why? I really don't know. 4 years ago I had a great GPA--3.74 or so while majoring in Microbiology. I was determined to go to Medical School, and was focused, and knew why I needed good grades to reach that goal. I decided Med School wasn't for me, and since then my GPA has dropped to below a 3.0. I've spent the last 3 or 4 years wandering around without aim, and no end in sight. I choose a major, and I can't stand it. I choose another major, and it's not for me. I go to take an interests test at the career center, and they tell me I like everything, and will pretty much get bored of almost any career. To be frank, I've run out of options. And the most frustrating part of it is that, it seems like there are many people graduating from college who haven't learned a darn thing from any of their classes. I know someone who had no idea who or what Moby Dick was, and they received a Bachelors Degree in Secondary Education I believe. I worked at the TNRB computer lab, helping business students out with their homework. It is very frustrating to see these students getting degrees left and right, when you are stuck behind yourself, but you are the one helping to make it possible for them to graduate.

I currently have 110 credits, and I can't graduate from the University for at least 2 years, because I lack a major. Without a diploma, I can find no decent job, yet to tell you the truth, I feel like I already received the education I need to make it in almost any job out there, minus engineering and other very highly specialized fields.

Now you're going to tell me how a degree is not about earning money. It seems to me that it is a fancy little test you take to earn a license to earn more money. This seems like a negative perspective on education you say. This may be true - but I have spent much time in classes, and feel like the majority of this education I am receiving seems to be busy work of similar sorts. Granted the information occasionally changes, and the difference in information can be useful, but how many little 7 page papers do I have to write to prove that I am well versed in the art of communication via the English language? How much busy work do I have to be assigned to prove that I am capable of completing a task? There have been multiple times when I signed up for a class, only to learn that my friends who had the exact same class but under a different teacher had 1/2 the homework we had to do.

There are many oxymorons presented in the goals of a degree. People say it is about education and not about money. Then you proceed to earn a degree, and every single person out there asks how do you plan to support a family on the program you are in? How do you plan to support YOURSELF even? What is the point of a degree then I ask you.

President Samuelson, I appreciate the University Experience, but I have nothing to prove for it. What are my 110 college earned credits going to do for me? It proves I can't pick a major. Is there no possibility for an 'open major' major? A chance for graduation showing that I am a well rounded individual with a couple of minors for focus? I have no desire to complete these classes, because I see no end in sight. I am on the brink of becoming a permanent Garbage Man for lack of thought of what else I can currently do with my life. Personally, I would love to write. Supposedly I have a gift for it. I write things, and people in my ward love to read them. But right now I have nothing to show that I can write, except for a bunch of flyers I have written up for ward functions. I finally realized that I would love to write for a living, and would be good at doing so, but it feels like it is too late for me to start on that path.

What incenses me about this is the fact that I write up these flyers, 3 to 5 hundred words apiece, in about 1/2 hour, and skim them for grammatical errors. Then I proceed to the Daily Universe, and find blatant errors everywhere, even in headlines for some articles. How much time can it take an editor to read articles and correct these things? Where is the quality in our productions?

I might appear to be rambling, but I am trying to put down all of my thoughts on my university experience in as concise a manner as possible. People say that the purpose of a University is to foster independent thought. I have found it to be the opposite. People are brainwashed into cliched terms and answers much of the time. They rigidly accept what their professor gives them, memorize it, and spit it right back out at them. It’s like they don't even take the time to digest the food. In many cases they don't even taste it and respond to the information they are learning. Just take a bit in their mouths, say, "Oh you're right" and proceed on further. Professors often seem to expect a certain answer from you in an essay, or answers to the test. One of my professors even went so far as to dictate the conclusion we were supposed to arrive at for our essays. Perhaps I am writing about these topics because I am merely angry and impassioned about this. But to a large extent I expected to find College to be somewhat more challenging than high school. Rather it seems to be a place where high school type answers are expected, only on a much larger volume. Is it not possible for something to be done to regulate what material Professors teach in their classes? The Professors seem to be treated like High Royalty. Our society is becoming ruled by a hierarchy of little clubs that determine who should join them and who shouldn't. You major in one thing, and you are expected to know certain code words and use these code words often in order to graduate in that major. I am not talking about highly specialized words such as SNRNP, or other biology terms, but rather in the business school, they are taught to use large words that are mind numbing, and have no feeling behind them. Words like paradigm, facilitate, and other words that you have to use to sound like a business man. How are we supposed to change the world for the better if the University only reinforces the cliched stereotypes that are out there? It not only reinforces us to use them, it almost coerces us to do so.

Please don't respond to this email by telling me that 'this is how the game works, and you need to learn to play the game'. The rules of the game stink. The rules of the game have been gradually developed over the years by supposed Intellectuals who have become stagnant in many ways. The rules of the game are loved by many, because they love following it, and if you love something you refuse to change it. They might not have started out loving the rules, but the rules were already there, they didn't make them, how can they change them? The professors love the rules. They treat the rules like they are Immutable Laws of Existence that can never be broken. Yet these are institutions set in place by mankind.

I guess my main point is that, I feel constrained by the University. And I feel trapped by it. Not only by the programs, but with some of the methods of dealing with grades. Some of my friends in other universities have 75% of the semester to back out of classes. During winter of 2003 and winter of 2004, I think I would have dropped out of my classes in the beginning of March if this were possible. I thought it wasn't possible, until I was talking with another student who had dropped all of her classes in March without receiving any demerits on her overall GPA. I just wish there were more clarity on the programs and policies. Believe me, if I had known I could drop those classes instead of destroying my GPA even further, I would have done so. If I would have known about it I would have. But in all of the University Catalogs it says, 'Cannot drop past this date' so why should I have even bothered to try? It seemed like a final sentence of doom, and I accepted it. If I had known that something could have been done about it, I would have done so. It's too late now though, the semester is come and gone.

And another thing. The Daily Universe mentioned that there was a class offered which taught people to speed read, and retain almost everything they read. Why aren't we taught this as Freshman? If this is such a great study tool, why isn't everybody taught it? It sounds like a huge advantage, and I wish I would have had it sooner.

All these things may seem negative. This happens in surveys. If I find something positive, I don't feel like it needs to be corrected, so why mention it? I am frustrated to have come so close to graduation, and yet not have it. I am frustrated to be so close to having a stamp of approval saying that I have skills, yet not have that little piece of paper. What can you do for me President Samuelson? There are others like me out there - supposedly intelligent people who just can't figure out what they want to do in college, and are now damned in their secular progression because of that quality.

I hope this makes sense. I have no idea what this is going to accomplish, but at least I can get my feelings down in some form or another.

Thank you for your time President Samuelson,

Christian T. Farmer

Here is a copy of a flyer--hopefully it makes you laugh.

Sledding Saturday

Time: 11:00 a.m. Saturday, January 17th
Place: Cinnamon Tree Lounge
What to Wear: Lots of Layers of Clothing
Refreshments: hot beverages and snacks, lounge, 1:00 p.m.
Ideas for Sleds: If you do not have a sled, be creative. We taped trash bags to our upper bodies and arms and it worked well, and also kept us nice and toasty. Try other things too

Okay everyone, it is time for us to go out and enjoy the wonderful pleasantries that are only available this time of the year. “So”, you reply, ‘Yes, it is indeed time for the superbowl.” I’m not talking about the superbowl you ninnies!! There is more to winter than just professional football players going head to head, with a truly brilliant display of strategy, speed, strength, and agility. I’m talking about enjoying the wonders of mother nature, the marvelous fact that snow has much less friction than grass, and thus allows us to slide down it at wonderfully fun speeds, and yet it is also soft, and thus allows us to crash without causing much damage and pain to our physical bodies. It’s a wonderful sensation which cannot possibly be described here, and must be experienced in person in order to comprehend. Sledding began as a tribal rite of passage in the ancient land of Sweden. When young men came of age, they needed to prove their virility by wearing only a loincloth, and sliding down a 3 mile tall mountain on their back side in the middle of January. Those that were too fearful to do this were held in great contempt, banished from the tribe, and forced to live a nomadic existence for the rest of their lives. To celebrate this wonderful tradition, we will be doing similar things. Though we greatly care about preserving the integrity of this event, we will not be sliding down a 3 mile tall mountain, nor will anyone be wearing only loincloths. In place of a loincloth, please wear all of the following: pants, shirts, jackets, hats, and your choice of gloves or mittens. We look forward to seeing you there in celebration of this wonderful, extremely authentic and not at all made up cultural ritual!!

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More Short Stories

More humorous short stories. Remember, I said humorous - not touching, moving, life-changing or inspirational. If you want inspirational go watch Oprah.

When I was about 7 or 8 years old, my mom was filling up the bathtub for me so I could go get myself clean. I go to get in the tub and there I found my 4 year old sister in the tub, with all of her clothes on, including her shoes and socks. She thought she heard Mom telling her to get in the tub and not me.

I got in an accident in high school, was only doing like 10 mph when we collided with the other car. It looked like no damage was done to my car, but just before I turned it off I heard the engine revving up really loudly. "I don't think I should drive it home," I told the cop. "It looks fine. You'll be fine. Take it on home, all will be fine." So I drove the car on home with my mom following me in another car. The volvo I was driving started idling faster and faster, and soon I was doing 50 mph without even touching the gas. I soon left my mother behind. We get home, "Christian Thomas Farmer - what do you think you are doing driving that fast?" "But Mom! I couldn't help it! I wasn't even touching the gas!"

In high school I had a friend who could eat really fast and also eat a lot. Now I know what all of you are thinking, "Yes, I eat really fast too, and could probalby out eat your friend. I come from a large family just like I'm sure your friend did too so we had to eat fast before the food was all gone." My friend came from a family with 2 total kids in it. One day we each ate 1/2 a large deep dish pizza. He was still hungry so he had 2 double quarter pounders with cheese, fixed himself a milkshake, and ate 4 puddings, at which point we were out of food. He would eat cereal with the large salad serving spoons to get the food in his mouth fast enough. He would try to do the same with Jello pudding cups. One day a grownup friend of ours, Dean, walked in on us in the kitchen, and here's my friend, trying to jam a salad sized serving spoon into a pudding cup. Dean just gawked at him for a few seconds, turned around, and walked right back out of the room.

For you BYU students out there, you can go into Route Y and change your personal information. Under there they have a spot that says "preferred name". My coworker and I were fooling around with it, and she showed me that you can put spaces and all sorts of characters into your preferred name. So I put in: "I love Brittany A Shuman", and we had a decent laugh at that and forgot all about it. A few months later I get this phone call from my mom, "Christian, who's Brittany A Shuman?" Turns out BYU with their glorious form letters put "Dear I love Brittany A Shuman" at the top of my letter.

I have the ability to grow hair that is very thick and very curly. I grew out a fro one time, a nice big luxurious curly fro, and wore it everywhere - to school, to play, and even to work. One day at work I couldn't find my pen. I looked everywhere for it, but couldn't find it underneath the desk, under my keyboard, next to the phone - my pen was nowhere to be seen. And then my supervisor said, "Nice pen Christian". I reached up and felt my hair - Blast! I had left it in my fro!

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Ever Wanted a Door Made of Snow?

And now we have a picture of a really sweet prank:


I heard a bunch of people laughing outside my apartment - and came out to see just what the heck was going on - talk about a sweet sight. Evidently the guys who did it to the girls put it up, then ordered a pizza, and just sat outside and watched as people would walk by, pause in astonishment, run to their apartments, and run back out with a camera. This is now in my top 5 favorite things I've ever seen - along with the Coliseum, St. Peter's Basilica, and the fountains at Versailles.

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They Rued The Day

So at this one place I worked last year, which may or may not be mentioned in this article (okay - it is - i just wanted to sound all mysterious and cheesy like Tom Cruise does in many of his movies), our employers gave us this form to fill out for our "self-evaluation" asking us to honestly justify what we were worth as employees. One coworker told me if I were to just put down so much information and overwhelm our employers it would be hilarious, plus he would give a free dinner. To quote him, he told another coworker, "I didn't think he would do it, until I remembered just who I was dealing with." So read on if you wish folks - it's 3644 words long of me joking and poking fun at management terms. To quote another coworker, "This is great! You say everything we want to say but are too scared to!"

Not Yet Full Performers

*Goals Met – hmm – I never set any goals really, and once they were set I was thinking ‘saves – well – I’ll try, but I won’t be pushing too hard to keep these people from using dial-up’ or ‘proactives – what the heck is a proactive anyway?’ sure I use the term but I still don’t think I’m completely sure of what it is and since I’ve been here for 6 months and 12 days as of January 24th, I feel like I should know these terms but I don’t. Can we make up a glossary of Nuskin terms for the newcomers? That way when Jason says something like GWP or DWP or best of all ADR they can look it up to see what it means. And the terms have to be defined in real-life terms that people can understand, not things like “a website utilized by distributors to actively increase revenue via the upselling of more product”. Hmm, but I’m supposed to be evaluating myself not others here.

*Takes Ownership of Calls – I’m still scared to call some people back when dealing with scoring issues. Plus I’m still confused as to what DEFINES ownership. It seems that the system of escalation only places the escalated ticket as being in the active call list of the first person to escalate it – I have placed a few extra pieces of escalated information on a ticket that was already escalated, and the ticket was never placed on my active ticket list – but I was still emailed about it 3 weeks later when the person needed a response. And at that point I was scared to call them back – it’s not fun to call back and tell a person that their machine is scoring correctly – especially when you have already done this once before and then they INSIST that it is scoring correctly. It’s like trying to tell an insane person who likes you (romantically) that you don’t like them back but they keep on insisting that you will in the end. It just doesn’t work sometimes to tell them ‘NO!!’ What am I supposed to do about it? Well, I’ll just have to learn to plug away at it and bear the pressure. I’ve also decided that I need to make up a sign on the wall that says “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like me” so that whenever a scoring call back goes awry I can look at that and be in my little happy land, and then I’ll be able to handle absolutely anything.

*Time Management - This could definitely be managed better in that I could always be researching the website for more answers on where different things are found. However I believe that playing ‘javanoid’ in between phone calls is a big stress reliever, and sometimes helps me to perform phone calls more accurately. By picturing all of the little shouts of anger that I have going on inside my head and envisioning the blocks in javanoid as being tiny little complaints like ‘Please don’t tell me about your pet dog’s runny nose and how you wish there was lifepak for pets because I can’t do anything about it and the queue is really really long right now and both myself and every other person in the call center and every customer/distributor on hold at the moment wishes that I were off of this call right now so that I can handle more phone calls and make this a more efficient place!!’ it helps me to have less stress when dealing with customers, and thus allows me to deal with them in a more efficient and happy manner. Also it gives me a better sense of self-worth when I beat javanoid. However, no – I am not a full performer and could definitely do some, nay many, things more efficiently than I am now.

*Goals Are Increased As They Are Met – I never set goals when I was supposed to. I know that I said I would, but I didn’t, and for this I am truly sorry. Plus, I really should have put up a little piece of paper for me to put tick marks on for every save that I have performed. I would have about 3 or so tick marks on there by now. Plus, I’m not really sure if I ever did meet my goal – I can’t remember what it was, which is another thing I must do more efficiently and proactively if I am to increase my goals as they are met.

*Know and Understand Nuskin Values – I believe that I know most of them but I’m not really sure what they are. I haven’t looked at the ‘Values’ section of insite in a while and my current value system is based on ‘do whatever possible to get the customer satisfied as quickly as possible so that I myself might be satisfied as quickly as possible’. This might seem like a selfish point of view but I believe that the customers & I have the same goal – be on the phone for as little time as is possible. For the other values I must read up on them more often – and then I will sit and ponder them and if I still don’t understand them I will pester the range rovers about it until they are sick and tired of me contacting them and will block me from their instant messenger list. Hopefully the latter won’t happen, but it is a feasible possibility nonetheless. Not a probability, but a possibility.

*Positive attitude toward work – I must admit that there are times when I do wish to come to work, but there are many times when I really truly dread coming to work. Most of the time I am also rather willing to sacrifice $19.14 by going home two hours early so that I may remain sane. I have a positive attitude towards my coworkers, but not always towards the customers. However, I believe that if I keep on telling myself, “I love dealing with iPhones and customers who think we should still sell them” I will eventually believe myself and be able to become a ‘Full Performer’ in this category as well.

*Positive attitude toward Distributors – There are many distributors that are a pure joy to work with, but the minute I hear the words “I am a blue diamond!” (spoken so that you can hear the exclamation mark) I immediately tune out much of the conversation and wish to not help these people even though I know that I should because they are the footing of the company and without them we wouldn’t exist. Even though I know that it’s rather hard to care when you’re being verbally berated. Now some blue diamonds, like Mark – hmm – can’t remember his last name – are real pleasures to work with – but I have yet to develop a complete positive attitude about 100% of the distributors.

*Partnership with Work Force Management – my partnership with work force management exists and I use it properly. However I probably haven’t been up to the exceptional level as of yet, because I have yet to bake a full 10 course meal for work force management. In working conditions we do great – as far as being partners, I didn’t realize that I was a partner with work force management. Yes, they’re great people, but I personally believed that it was more like they were the leader and I was the lacky. I will have to use the ‘partnership’ version more often and try to implement some of my ideas about the workplace. Like I always thought that we should have a ‘disco theme week’ where we have strobe lights and disco balls and don’t forget the smoke machines, and we all wear polyester and bell bottoms, and Kevin can grow a fro, or if he can’t grow one he could possibly wear a wig. We can have gold chains – not real gold mind you, but rather, fake gold – that have the Nuskin logo on them. Now that I realize this is a partnership relationship I will have to go about implementing this. If I am incorrect in interpreting this partnership relationship please don’t tell me until after I have fully implemented Disco Week. I’m sure everyone will enjoy it.

*Works on each call to build positive relationships with Distributors and Customers – I’ve never actually used this as a focus on my phone calls. I never thought of the distributors having a relationship with me – I would generally think of them having a relationship with their customers, but never thought of them having a relationship with me. I was better at this when I first started, but have since gotten to the point where I don’t always listen to what people say. I even do this when talking with my parents and siblings these days as a force of habit, and really need to work on not doing that. For both the distributors sake and for my family’s sake.

*Shipping agents offer appropriate exceptions and incentives – when I do become a shipping agent, I will concentrate on this. At the moment all I can do is visualize and prepare myself mentally for the challenge, and am currently trying to think up appropriate ways to offer exceptions and incentives to people. One thing that I thought of but probably isn’t appropriate is to include a picture of me smiling in every package that I ship so they can come to know that I shipped it with care. It probably also isn’t quite appropriate to offer to not only ship the product for free, but to give the customers a little cash inside the package along with the product. It would be great if we could always do that, but we can’t, and pretty soon they’d be wanting us to offer these incentives all the time. For this reason I will perform a random opinion poll of 10 different people on each of my ideas before I put them into action.

Full Performers

*Schedule Adherence Standards Met – as far as I can tell I am within the correct schedule adherence standards – however I am currently unsure of where my schedule adherence lies. I know that I should be better about this that I should always be asking “Brook!! What is my schedule adherence?” However, most of the time when I have that thought – lo and behold a phone call comes in – and not just any phone call – I mean the phone calls where it’s about scanner scoring and the person says to you, “I’m not sure I can trust this product” and you give them the best answer that you can make up, without giving credibility to your ability to properly analyze scanner scores, since I have no ability to do so I must never claim any ability to do so or the distributors will be after me with questions like the press goes after George W. Bush. – “why won’t it do this? How come the scores don’t stay constant? How come the scanner can’t predict how many years are remaining in my life and how that will change if I use LifePak for the rest of my life?” either that or it is a phone call where the poor unknowing person has signed up for yahoo high speed internet and can’t send any emails, and then end up calling up Yahoo only to find that they can’t GIVE us their password, and when we do reset it and they have to reset all of their wireless routers and you STILL haven’t been able to fix the problem. All of a sudden I find myself forgetting to ask Brook what my schedule adherence is, and then it will pop up at some random time – most likely on a Saturday at 11:00 when Brook isn’t there, and then I’ll forget to email him as well. I’m sorry Brook – I’ll email you about this right away so that I can find out how lousy my schedule adherence percentage is and start correcting the problem right away. I vow to have 110% no – make that %175 schedule adherence – I’ll find some way to do it and do whatever it takes to get it done.

*Welcome Screen Tickets Logged Appropriately and Resolved in a Timely Manner – This seems to be able to be split into two different qualities here. For the first half of this I am a full performer – sometimes logging too much for tickets. Granted I haven’t reached the point of detail where I say that the person breathed a little more sharply at this point of the call than he had been in the rest of the calls, but sometimes it feels like I type much that isn’t necessary into the ticket – like I could work on phrasing things better. The ‘Resolved in a Timely Manner’ section I have become much better at. When I first started working here I had absolutely no idea what to do with the active references, I just thought it was a pretty little number so I didn’t start calling any of them back until around November or so. However the ‘resolved in a Timely Manner’ section should still come under the ‘NOT YET FULL PERFORMERS’ section so consider this part to be in there, since I sometimes achieve that goal, but do not always achieve it in as timely a manner as possible. I will become a full performer for this part in time, however to become exceptional I would need to start calling them back before I actually received the phone call. In order for me to do this I will build a time machine, and then go ahead to see who will be calling me up at what times, and when their problem started, so I can start calling them instead of making them call me. Only then will I be an exceptional performer.

*Schedule Adherence – see above for this answer, I believe you would much rather not read the same thing twice – if I am wrong then write me back and tell me to write this thing twice. Or highlight this in yellow and write in big letters in bold red ink BAD!! WRONG!! If you do that I will write the same section twice – I won’t even cheat by copying and pasting.

*QAS errors limited – Um, I’m ashamed to admit this, but I have no clue what a QAS error is. I can’t even think something up like Queens and Sons. So for now I will just assume that I am a full performer until I am told otherwise.

*RMA Errors Limited – Remanaging Mass Atomically – if that’s what this means then I would be an EXCEPTIONAL performer. However since I don’t know what this is either, I will just have to assume that I am a full performer, nothing more nothing less.

*Communicates Their Needs to Their Team Lead – I believe that I go to my TL in most cases when I need something. However, I don’t believe that we have yet developed the level of trust where I could trust him with everything. For example, I’m still scared to tell him when I’m thirsty and to ask permission to go fill up my water bottle – I should do this more often. Or if I happen to get a paper cut I probably wouldn’t go tell him that I needed a hug but would instead sit at my computer with a stoic look on my face and just hope that he would know instinctively that I need one.

*Motivated – In most cases yes, but I’m not sure that I’m motivated by the proper motivations. Plus I’m not as happy or as energetic as I could be. I don’t have signs on my cubicle saying that ‘I Love Nuskin!’ Nor do I try to talk my friends into buying iPhones or signing up for us under Dial-up. For some reason I don’t feel motivated about this yet, but I feel that this will come to me with time and patience. Perhaps much time and much patience, but come to me it definitely will.

*Displays Ability To Work As a Team - Yes, I do exhibit this trait in that I am willing – not always fully willing, but many times grudgingly willing – to take phone calls from people who are a little hard to handle and who I was very very happy when we were accidentally disconnected and then I tried to call them back but couldn’t reach them and they called in and requested to talk to me – yes, I am willing to take those calls. I am also very willing to not be selfish about taking all the calls for myself and will gladly (not grudgingly) transfer a call over to another tech agent when the person on the phone requests to do so.

*Uses the proper channels of communication with other departments – As far as I know I do, and since this is a self-evaluation, I must say that this is definitely true. There is that one time where I kind of spammed the whole call center with an email, but luckily my team lead corrected me on this misbehavior and showed me how to retract the spam before it truly became spam. In the end it only turned out to be an email to about 25 people instead of to 500 or so people. I have since changed my ways, and will no longer spam people. I also use the Sales Range Rovers on occasion, without understanding if it was proper to do so. However when I did this it was for a proper reason. Another thing I do is occasionally send out emails just for fun to other departments – I have to admit that I’m proud of my little essay I wrote up about Movie Magic DVDs, and ever since I got the thumbs up from Steinbrenner I’ve offered multiple people from other departments the chance to read it. And of course they say ‘yes’ because they’re polite lovely people who don’t want to hurt my feelings even if they didn’t want to read it and then I send them a copy of it via email. This can probably be misconstrued to be not using proper channels of communication for other departments – but I still believe that I am within the limits of full performer when it comes to communicating with other departments.

*Maintains an appropriate, positive attitude toward others - This partially depends on what is meant by 'others'. If when you say ‘others’ you mean coworkers, then yes I do. If when you say ‘others’ you mean customers then I must admit that I have sometimes wanted to remove the vocal cords from some of the customers, and this probably can’t be considered ‘an appropriate, positive attitude’ but when dealing with coworkers, I must say there’s not a single coworker that I actually don’t like working with. They’re all pleasant and nice and they even understand when I have to beat up Kevin’s frog and cause a little noise to get my stress out. Hmm, that might not be appropriate or positive either, so in order to become exceptional I will have to get rid of that as well.

*Positive feedback from distributors – I have gotten positive feedback from some distributors, unfortunately I can’t recall the reference #’s at the moment or exact names. One lady from St. Louis actually mentioned wanting to meet me when I came home from the break. I probably won’t meet her, but it was definitely a nice sentiment.

*Offer opinions and suggestions on process improvements – I do offer these whenever I have them. I probably offer them too often in some cases and should instead worry about the things that I can change and not worry so much about the things that I cannot change. However, it is awfully fun to worry about things you cannot change sometimes, if only to make yourself feel better about yourself and say ‘If I was in charge – this would be better by doing this’ even if I know it’s not true and if I was in charge I would become burnt out in two hours of being in charge and would just try to maintain the status quo.

*Participates in the Hot Dog Program – I have once so far even though it was shot down and will do so twice more at least. Granted two of the ideas are actually Kevin’s but he commissioned me to write them up for him, and they’re very good ideas and hopefully the company will implement them.

Exceptional Performers

*Overtime Hours Are Worked Only When Approved by Management – all of my hours I’ve ever worked overtime (0 hours) have been approved by management. I have 100% in this field, and that counts as an ‘Exceptional Performer’ in my book.

*Does not waste company resources – I am using my own printer paper to print this document – and my own ink – thus ensuring the continuing success of the company. I figured that if every employee – all 3000 or so – printed up 5 or so pages a day pretty soon that would be costing the company $750 a day in printing charges alone. Think about what this could do in the long run – in one year that would cost us $273,750 which would be the equivalent of about 10 or 11 newly hired tech support workers’ salaries which could no longer be hired, which would lengthen the queue, which would increase distributor dissatisfaction or decrease distributor satisfaction depending on how you look at it, and soon we would all be out on the street, just because we wanted to read a funny story that was sent to us by a third cousin in an email.

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BYUSA Elections: Your Farcical Entertainment For The Year

Every year around this time many students suffer from overwhelming boredom and complete studying burnout, and luckily for those students every year BYUSA comes through in full flying colors in their goal to provide students with activities and entertainment throughout the year and thus relieve the stress and pressure that students feel. They provide a beautiful activity that can entertain and make people laugh like no other, and make people forget their winter depression. “Just what is this miraculous activity?” you ask? You haven’t been able to guess it yet? Why it’s BYUSA President Elections!

Yes every year when you think you couldn’t possibly go on any further, up come these candidates in these elections, with their prancing and their preening and their kowtowing to people of every state, running around campus just hoping to shake everybody’s hand.

“Hi there! How are you doing? Feel my firm handshake - there - doesn’t that make you think that I would be an able leader and would sincerely represent your issues in the University? Yes - that’s right - I care, about you! I promise you with all sincerity that I will stand firmly in whatever metaphorical chalk circle that I draw for myself!”

And they shove a flyer into your hand talking vaguely about how they will fight vigorously and strenuously to make sure that YOU Mister Average Joe or Miss/Misses Average Jane Student will be firmly represented by them to the university, and will make sure that your needs are met and voiced in University Meetings the whole year round.

And then once they’re elected they drop off the face of the planet, and the only thing that you, The Average Student, ever see or hear about them is an occasional article in the newspaper written by them on how the university is doing well and the students are well and the teachers are happy and everybody is just peachy and that because of their (the constant vigilance BYU is a state of happiness.

Luckily this year we have an article from someone on the inside, BYUSA Vice President (former BYUSA Vice President by the time you will have read this article) Max Hunsaker. Let us delve into some of what he has to say now.

“Over the past three years I have worked with each student body president and can agree that some promises have not been fulfilled.”

Yes, this is very true, albeit a bit of an understatement. Since my days of a freshman in 1996 I have heard many promises by BYUSA and so far the only one to come to pass is: The Cougar Eat now accepts debit cards as a legal form of currency. We students do not blame this on the Presidency, for we know that they would dearly like to bring changes to pass, but they have very little power to do so.

What is the function of the Presidency anyway? When University people are thinking of making changes in policies are they required to report to the BYUSA President first? Before the Bookstore implemented their new buyback policy did they first run up to the BYUSA President and say, “Excuse me Mister/Madam President, we must have your opinion on this policy before we put it into effect!” Or perhaps the Route Y people went to the Presidency and asked for their concordance with the idea of fining students $25.00 for not updating their personal information? Of course they didn’t! Would they do it in the future? Of course not! Why should they? The BYUSA Presidency has no power to do anything, no actual sway in matters of actual policy changes. They have as much power to effect change in this university as cute little squirrels and chipmunks do to stop construction companies from tearing down their homes to build human homes. Would you listen to a squirrel if he asked you not to tear down a tree?

Next quote by dear old Max: “I am waiting for the day that students stop blaming BYUSA for the actions of people they themselves elected.

Are all BYUSA people so out of touch with the students? We ‘students’ or ‘civilians’ don’t mourn your actions but rather your lack of ability to take action! What does BYUSA actually do for the university anyway? “ Last semester alone, more than 33,000 students attended the activities provided by the association.” This is all fine and dandy and you all deserve gold stars for your efforts, but why should we average ‘students’ care when you’re going to pick a new BYUSA President? Why should you represent us as a student body? Why should we not elect instead one of the hardworking janitors, who have served more than 11,000,000 students per semester in restroom services alone, to represent us? What better way to show our gratitude for a job well done!

And what better way to show our gratitude to BYUSA in future elections than by nobody voting at all.

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The Worst Landscaping Ever

We now present to you the Worst Landscaping Job Ever:


(Click on the picture to enlarge it)

This house is so weird looking that it belongs on a TV show or movie set, or in another country, but definitely not the United States. It's located at 520 East 2000 South Orem, UT. Look at this satellite picture of it! It's the house in the bottom left corner of the picture with the pink lines around it - You can see these walls from space!

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The Poor Fool, He Had No Idea What Hit Him

So today my roommate got the hankering to bake a cake - so that's what he did.

He worked hard at it - put some nice icing on it - it was a beautiful looking cake. Then he went to taste it. The top was awesome, not dry at all, then he bit into the bottom. "Well, hmm....that's odd," he said and he put the cake up for grabs from everybody, warning everybody that it tasted just a bit funky. I tried a piece just to see what it tasted like, tried the bottom, "Well, this is odd - but I swear I've tasted this before, just not in a cake...kind of...smokey..." I said to myself, then something hit me.

"Dude - I know what's wrong with your cake! This cake pan you used - it's the pan that I use when I barbeque." "What?!" "Yeah - you know the pan I stick under the meat with some water in it to keep the meat moist, and to catch the meat drippings? That's this pan your cake is in." "Ohhhh...that's hilarious!" "Yeah it is - don't worry - it's cleaned out and everything." "K - good, let's just leave it here and have everybody else taste it, but not tell them about it, and see if they notice anything."

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The Worst Sin of Them All

So I went home for a few weeks over the Christmas break - and was hanging out with my 2 sisters and my parents (I only have 2 siblings so all of us were home for Christmas) and we were genuinely enjoying each other’s company. Laughing, watching movies, playing board games, talking about life in general, and then all of a sudden the mood changed, a wave of tension came over us, and a horrified voice came from the bathroom, “Christian - how could you do this?” Do what? What did I do this time? It was something that men are accused of daily, something that brings more horror to the minds of women than seeing you burn a copy of Pride & Prejudice right in front of their faces: I had left the toilet seat up.

Now this will be getting 2 different reactions from everybody out there:

Reaction Number 1: “Oh my goodness gracious! I totally agree with those girls - no decent young or old man could ever do such a thing! It’s sick – sick I tell you! I hope to high heaven that he never marries. I must warn all my daughters/sisters/cousins/friends/acquaintances/bitter enemies to stay away from this wretch of a man!”

Reaction Number 2: “Yeesh! It only takes 2 seconds for you to put the toilet seat down! You’re acting like I took your pet hamster and threw it down the stairs….hmm, that sounds like fun….”

If you gave Reaction Number 2, you are a man. If you gave Reaction Number 1 you are either a woman or a man who has been married for a very long time and has forgotten what it is like to be a single man.

This is something that has been plaguing men since the dawn of the toilet. The second John Crapper’s wife saw the toilet, do you think she said, “Oh – how nice – no more trips out to the outhouse in the middle of winter!” Why of course she did! And right after that she said, “You best not be leavin’ that there toilet seat up John.”

This is something that all married men are scared of. If George W. Bush was trying to hammer out a peace treaty with say Osama Bin Laden, and he wanted some common ground they could talk about, all good old Dubya would have to do would is say, “You know 2 months ago I left that there toilet seat up for the first time in 10 years – and my Laura just let me have it.” And Osama would chuckle and say, “Oh yes, I know just what you mean,” and pretty soon he would understand that deep down all humans are similar to each other and all males have become the keepers of the sacred position of the toilet seat.

In some ways I can understand the women’s position – they want the seat down for various reasons:

"It’s gross! I don’t want to have to touch it to put it down!" That is a very good point! Females are very dainty and delicate and should be protected from having to ever touch the toilet seat.

"I hate it when it’s in the middle of the night and I don’t turn the light on to use the bathroom, and then the toilet seat is up so I fall in!" We men honestly wouldn’t mind if you turned the light on to use the restroom in the middle of the night. If it gives us the right to occasionally leave the toilet seat up we’d be darned ecstatic about it.

"When it’s night time and I need to pee, I’m too darn tired to realize the seat is up and sometimes I fall in!" Yes - this is true, doing complex things when you’re groggy is often very hard. May I just point out that men are often just as groggy as women are when they wake up in the night time, and men often have to wake up to pee as well. What do you think would happen if a man was too groggy to think about putting the seat up first? Would this be a desirable thing?

"But can’t men pee while sitting down?" It is much less efficient to do so. We prefer efficiency.

"But it’s so much work to put the seat down all the time!" Technically, from a physics viewpoint it’s more work to put the seat up than to put it down, because when you put it up you’re fighting gravity therefore requiring more force than when you put the seat down. May I also add that if we aren’t required to put the seat down every time we use less energy over all, and as we all know energy conservation is a good thing because the more energy we expend the more entropy we cause, and the more entropy we cause the sooner the Universe will die. Of course this will still happen quite a few billion years off or something, but the best time to plan for the future is today.

"But leaving the toilet seat up is just WRONG! I’ve been taught that my whole life by my parents who always taught the boys to keep the seats down!" When you say wrong, do you mean that is against the law? Are you saying that if a male leaves the seat up he can be thrown in jail for committing a crime? Or are you saying that it is wrong in a religious sense and any male who violates this sacred tradition is thus condemned to an millennia of suffering and punishment and forced to constantly put toilet lids down for the rest of eternity?

Ladies, we are not demanding anything that we are not entitled to! We only ask for toilet seat privileges equal to your own, and for a little understanding if we leave the seat up!

If you truly desire, in your heart of hearts, to never ever have to see the atrocity of a toilet seat left up ever again you only need to do one simple little thing: buy your males a urinal.

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Sleepers of Insanity

There comes a time in every person's life when they must do certain things, and the things that they must do most often are breathe, sleep, eat, & drink. Just as everybody sleeps nearly everybody has said or done something stupid while in their sleep, something that if they were to do it while they were awake would cause so much embarrassment that in the moment right after they did these things they would choose to jump in a car and drive to Alaska to live the rest of their lives gutting Salmon 18 hours a day rather than ever remember having done these things. We now present to you true cases of "Sleepers of Insanity".

Story One
I was spending the night over at my friend Matt’s house. First thing I heard in the morning was Matt: “Hey! What are you doing? Wake up! Wake up!” “Huh...? What's goin' on?” “You just stole my pillow out and threw it on the ground!”

Story Two
The day before I was transferred into my next area, Elder Johnson, who was going to be my next companion, woke up to find his companion, Elder Smalley, standing over his bed, mumbling, “Elder Johnson! We have to go to the library, so we can get some plastic, so we can choke people!” “What’re you talking about? Dude – go back to bed! You’re sleep walking!”

Story Three
It is nigh unto impossible to wake me up when I’m really tired. I have 3 alarm clocks that I put at different places around my room and then purposefully place things in the way between them so that I’ll trip on them and they’ll wake me up. In Calculus class senior year of high school I fell asleep sitting up at my desk with my head resting on my hand. The other kids in class tried to wake me up, first by yelling at me. Nothing. Then they slammed a calculus book down on the desk right beside me. Still nothing. Then they slapped me on the back of the head, and my head shot forward off of my hand. STILL nothing. When I finally woke up they said, “Man, you sleep HARD!”

Another time I told my roommate to wake me up after a 15 minute nap. 15 minutes pass by he says, “Christian, are you awake?” I took my pillow and threw it at him, “WOULD I DO THAT IF I WERE ASLEEP?” He decided to let me sleep longer.

Story Four
In the MTC one guy was awake around 3:00, and then he heard another guy, Elder Fox, saying in his sleep, “Sigame! Yo soy El Diablo!”

The Stupidest Sleeping Story of This Article
This is a true story – I was there when it happened. This guy woke up in the middle of the night desperately needing to use the restroom, like so many of us often have to do. He was really sleepy and the only thought in his mind was, “i gotta pee!I gotta pee!” He did the duty that nature called him to do, and he did it well. Unfortunately though, he had accidentally done nature’s duty in the room next to the bathroom, and had more specifically done this duty all over the computer keyboard.

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A Grievous Error

So I got this email in my candidbyu@gmail.com inbox the other day:

Though I love the newsletter I have decided that right now I just am to busy to use the information and the newsletter is just piling up unread in my inbox. Therefore I request that you remove xxxxx@xxxxxx.com from your mailing list.

Sincerely
Name of Guy Who is NOT Your Cousin


Turns out that what I thought was my cousin's email address was actually THIS guy's email address, just some random stranger, and I've beeen sending him emails once or twice a week for the last four months.

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The Crack Song

For those of you who know him - this is Carl singing about crack, as in crack the drug.

Mp3 Format
Wav Format

I strongly, and I mean strongly recommend that you download this file onto your computer first and then listen toit. And unless you're like SUPER obsessed about quality, I recommend the mp3 format because it's only 783 k whereas the wav format is like 8300 k.

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Fun With Pictures

Today we present Fun With Pictures. We're bound to have more fun with pictures in the future. These pictures feature me with a partially shaven head and a really weakly grown beard which has since grown in better. Enjoy!


For those of you who aren't sure what this is - it is the BACK of my head - there you have the collar of my shirt along with the back of my ears.



There is my left side of my head - along with my beard and a few other features which I'm sure you can work out for yourself. After all, if you're able to read English I'm sure that you're also able to understand which part of my face is an 'eye' and which part of it is my 'nose'. If you do not feel capable of this, please enroll yourself in a basic anatomy class at your local college.



This is the right side of my face. I believe that I am currently facing roughly North North-East in this picture, I think. If that's true then I was facing roughly South South-West in the picture before and then hmm...90 degrees away from that would be - hmm....if I had a pen and paper I could draw this...West North-West? Well - whatever's approximately like 15-20 degrees or so above West on the compass...is that right? Well - anyway - you've got the picture. At least you probably would if I was able to be at least somewhat coherent in this paragraph.

And there you have it: Fun With Pictures - Part 1. We will have more fun with pictures in the future.

If you thought any of the above explanation was rude or patronizing to your sensibilities, and you demand satisfaction, feel free to either 1) leave a comment or 2) email me at candidbyu@gmail.com. Only emails written in the Chicago style, 500 words exactly - no more no less, double spaced, with proper in-text citations will be accepted. If I find any emails without proper style I will regard them as 'refuse' and will discard them in the rubbish bin. Many thanks!

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Language: Your Barrier to Communication

Today we present another segment on language. We all use language as a tool for communicating ideas from one person to the other, ideas like, "I like soup" or "I hate tomatoes". These are very important ideas that must be communicated eloquently to other people - if not we would all either die of starvation or, even worse, end up eating terrible nasty things like tomatoes or olives once in a while. And the absolute most wonderful thing about language, is that if one uses it improperly, especially while learning it, language can be an awesome wonderful source of humor to yourself and others, just like in these wonderful small stories below.


English Version
A couple of missionaries, Elder Bell and Elder Gibbons, in Miami had just met a lady, (Quick sidenote: bienvenido means 'welcome' in Spanish), and they said to her, "What's your name?" (Of course they asked her this in Spanish. For the full spanish version go to the paragraph immediately below.)So they said to her, "What's your name?" "Bienvenida" "Gracias. Now - what's your name?" "Bienvenida" "Gracias, and...what's your name?" "Bienvenida" "Gracias..." And after a while she explained to them that her name was "Bienvenida".

Spanish Version
Dos misioneros, Elder Bell y Elder Gibbons, acaban de conocer a una señora, y le preguntaran a ella su nombre. Ella les dijo a ellos, "Bienvenida" "Gracias, y como te llamas?" "Bienvenida" "Gracias - y como te llamas?" "Bienvenida" "Gracias..." Y despues de un rato ella les explicó a ellos que su nombre era 'Bienvenida'.

One of my roommates, Rao, was from India, and he asked me & my roommate Greg, "Can you give me a ride to compoosa?" "Compoosa?" "Yes, they sell computers." "I've never heard of that before." "Nope - me neither," said Greg. "Here is an ad," said Rao and he handed us an ad for CompUSA.

There was a sister missionary, still new to Spanish, and she was listening to a long story that a lady was telling them. At the end of the story she said, "Oh, que bueno!" (How wonderful!) And her companion turned to her and said, "It is NOT wonderful that her house burned down."

Another sister missionary had no clue whatsoever how to speak Spanish at this point in her mission, and so she got in the habit of just nodding her head and saying 'Sí' to make them feel like she understood. So she got in this really long conversation by herself at church, and then Elder George came over to her and said, "You just offered to cook their family dinner."

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Moustache Day Status Report

We just wish to report that Moustache Day was indeed a success! A complete and total success! We may not have had 7000 Moustached Men & Women walking around campus, but word about it definitely spread far and wide, as illustrated by this story:
My roommate Ben was standing around there, in his university shirt because he works for BYU and all, and somebody ran up to him and said, "Hey man! Where's your moustache? Don't you have school spirit?" People who never even knew me or heard of my name before in their life (not that that's a hard feat mind you) had heard about Moustache Day and thought it was a BYU Sponsored Event even! I hope Moustache Day keeps on giving and the only thing left for it to truly become a success in my opinion is that it becomes a tradition at BYU for years to come, and I want to thank each and every one of you for the hard work that you put forth to make Moustache Day a true even to cherish for the rest of our lives!

By the way - there is no 'rest of the article'. That's all there is, folks!

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Tracting Stories: The Good & The Bad

Couple of quick stories from the mission. They're not spiritual religious experiences or anything, just funny things that tend to happen on the mission.

Elder Evans and Elder Bell were a companionship - two of the first missionaries I lived with. Both funny fellows - Bell had a nice full set of hair and so did Evans. But Evans was worried to death that he was losing his hair. He'd run his fingers through his hair, and look at the amount of hair that would be there, and we would say, "Don't worry Evans - not that much is coming out," "Oh yeah? You do it!" And then we would run our fingers through our hair and we'd have just a small tiny amount less than him, "See! I am losing my hair!" So one day they're out tracting, and they see an Aloe Vera plant, and Bell says to Evans, "You know, I've heard Aloe is good for hair loss," "Really?" They had knocked on the door several times but nobody was coming to answer it. So Bell says, "Go ahead, just take a little piece off and try it." "You think I should?" "Yeah - how will they notice a little piece?" So Evans goes to break it off, and a whole foot and a half long section comes off. "Aw, Fetch!" he cries - so he goes to break another little section off to make it a little less noticeable, and another huge chunk comes off instead, "Aw, fetch!" So here's Evans standing in the door with two huge foot long pieces from the Aloe Plant and wigging out. And then the owner opens the door...

There were a couple of missionaries out knocking doors - and they came to this one guy who'd evidently run into missionaries before, and was sick of talking to us. They start to talk to him, "Hi this is Elder Smith and this is Elder Young," and then the guy pulls out a machete and starts chasing them with it. They both got away and everybody was happy, the missionaries were safe and the guy was sitting peacefully in his apartment. A couple of months later another missionary, Elder Gibbons, tracted into Machete Man, and he starts BRT'ing with him. BRT stands for Build Relationships of Trust - missionary term for chatting with people, getting to know them, asking them where they're from, introducing yourself etc., you know - shooting the breeze, chewing the fat, making small talk, etc.) with him. Gibbons BRT'ed so well that Machete Man gave him his machete.

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Hair Trimming: An Art Form

So there I was, shaving my head... so that I'd have the 'bald headed bearded look'. It's usually an easy way of getting a haircut, and the shorter the haircut is the longer you have to wait until you cut it again. But this time my hair was too long and it kept on gumming up the razor. My only two real options for shaving it were either to take a shower while shaving so it would rince all the hairs off my head while I'm shaving, or to go have a barber do it with clippers and pay for it, and who wants to pay over 10 dollars just to get their head shaved?

And here I was, I was almost done - almost there - I was close to finishing - over 78% done. And then I ran out of hot water. And now I'm sitting here with a couple of weird patches of hair left on my head, waiting for the hot water to come back. I thought I could just go down and use the same hair clippers Grandpa used to cut their dogs' hair with, but when I called them up turns out they'd given the hair clippers away already. Pictures will come soon - I promise.

Speaking of Grandpa's hair clippers, back when Dad was in high school, Grandpa was cutting my Dad's hair and he was almost done too, and was trimming up the back of Dad's neck. "It's not quite even" Grandpa said, and trimmed a little more, "It's still not quite even," and Grandpa kept on trimming Dad's hair, evening it up, until Dad had no hair left, but at least it was even.

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Key West Sucks During the Holidays

Last Monday at noon I was chatting with my friend Dave online. He says to me, "So - roadtrip?" "Sure - where?" "I don't care - you?" "Miami?" "How long?" "If we drive hard - tomorrow" "Let's do it"

In we got into the car, and off we went. I was supposed to go to a family party that night, but I decided the road trip was more important. I'd been having 2 days of family parties already, and frankly, out of 34 people at these parties, I didn't think my presence would be missed that much. My immediate family did tell them I was in Tennessee though. "What's he doing in Tennessee?!"

So on we drove - through the night, and through the next day, through traffic and clear sailing.

I looked down for a few seconds at one point on the highway in Georgia, looking for some snacks that we had down there, and Dave says, "Hey man!" and I looked back up and there was somebody with their brakes just slammed on - so I slam on the brakes, but couldn't stop in time - so I swerve off the highway to the left shoulder - and almost gave Dave a heart attack. Wisely, he was on guard ever after that point.

We made it to Miami around 12:30 a.m. Wednesday Miami time - and being that I had lived there for 2 years on my mission, I drove Dave around some of the streets and showed him various places, and then we drove down to a better part of Miami to look for a hotel. On entering downtown Miami we had immediately locked all of the car doors. It's not necessarily a place you want to get lost.

Miami is a crazy place. Miami may be located in the United States, but when you go to Miami, it's like visiting another country. Some stats about Miami (taken from here): 2,341,167 live in Miami-Dade. In the city of Miami proper, 362,470 live there, and encarta.com says: "Hispanics, who may be of any race, made up 65.8 percent of the city’s people." And from personal experience of living in many parts of Miami, the county residents are around 65.8% Hispanic too. It's probably even higher, because a lot of them are probably scared to take part in the census for fear of being deported. Dave called up Amber, and he told her: "It's like we're in Mexico - most of the signs are in Spanish."

Now many of you people are thinking, “Oh – awesome! I want to go to Miami and eat some authentic Mexican food!” No! Bad people! There is more to Hispanics than just Mexicans! In Miami actually they have very few Mexicans. They have a lot of Cubans, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans, Colombians, quite a few Peruanos, Chileans, Guatemaltecos, Honduranians, Costa Ricans, Ecuadorians, a few Argentinos, and a few Uruguayos. I met more of each of those countries than I met Mexicans.

It was wonderful using my Spanish again. We went to a Nicaraguan restaurant, and I was doing good, not quite back on form, but I was fluent again. I decided to go in for the kill and ask for a Chia drink. "Y una china!" I said! Blast! I had just accidentally ordered a Chinese woman.

Miami drivers there are absolutely insane. In Miami, you do not need to actually pass any tests in order to obtain a driver's license, you can just go out and buy one. It might not be legal, but it can be done. During a traffic jam on the highway, a Garbage Truck just drove right off of the highway, over the grass, and onto another road.

We then decided to head down to Key West. Thought it would be great to spend the night there, then drive up in the morning. To get down to Key West – you go on a 2-lane highway, for 138 miles, crossing over 5 mile long bridges between the Keys, going only 30 mph in one place so as not to kill any Endangered Key Deer. And then we got down there, at 9:30 p.m. and we drove to a hotel – it was full. We drove 3 more miles to another hotel, it was full. Dave got online to check out available hotels, while I called up my sister for help at home. There was 1 hotel with a vacancy in all of Key West during the holidays, and that cost Fifteen Hundred Dollars.

So we turned right around and headed as far up Florida we could go that night, away from Key West with its No Vacancy signs, away from Miami with its $95.00 a night Red Roof Inn prices (something we had paid $40.00 for in Georgia), and made it to Ft. Pierce, where I noticed the Treasure Coast Inn was $10.00 cheaper than and decided to stay there. We drive up, we both say, “Hey, this is a decent looking place!” We go inside the room, and I can honestly say that this is the worst place I’ve ever stayed in, EVER, in my whole entire 28 year long life.

The place smelled of mildew and a couple of other smells mixed in. The tile was peeling off the wall. Dave and I were both scared to look underneath the beds for what we might find under there. Dave went to take a shower, and there was a friendly little cockroach in there saying, “Hey! I’m your hotel shower buddy!” The water was slightly red-tinged and smelled funny, so I decided that in this case, no shower would be better than any shower at all.

Then I drove for a couple of hours, and Dave took over, and using Ft. Pierce as motivation, he drove 1004 (also the exact amount of words in this article. Yes – exactly the same amount) miles from Daytona Beach, Florida back home to St. Louis, with nary more than a 15 minute rest for gas, food, or a potty break.

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What a Wonderful New Year!

I just want to take this time to proclaim a Happy New Year to everybody! It's been a great vacation at home. For more vacation details, read on:

Started off by hanging out with the whole Farmer Family for a baby blessing, then we played monopoly with the cousins. Incidentally I won 2 out of 3 of the games. The game I lost it was 3 people who merged to play against me, and I say this oh so modestly: it still took them 2 hours to take me down.

Then on Monday at 12:00 noon my friend Dave and I finally decided to go on a roadtrip, and then after some very thorough packing and careful planning we left at 12:30 p.m., and on Tuesday night around midnight we made it to Miami. Now you're all saying to yourselves "Why were you in Miami?" Now if ever it was possible to ask a stupid question, I believe that would be the question. I also believe the correct question to ask in this case is: Why NOT be in Miami?

Got back from our roadtrip on Friday at 4 a.m. - Dave successfully drove for 1004 miles or so from Daytona Beach to St. Louis.

I then thought to myself: "Why not drive to Kansas City to purchase Arthur Bryant's?" and I successfully made it to Columbia Missouri when my brain finally answered the question I asked it 2 hours before: "It's only 6 a.m. you idiot, and Arthur Bryant's doesn't open until noon!" So I turned right around and made it back to St. Louis at 8 a.m.

And then celebrated the New Year with friends I hadn't seen in years, and will soon be regretting this when I need to wake up five hours from now to go to church. But you're supposed to "live in the moment" eh?

More on roadtrip and other events later - I've got to run if I want to make it to Arhtur Bryant's and back in time for church.

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Multi-Level Marketing (MLM): A New Business Opportunity!

There is a huge sensation sweeping Utah - I mean just SWEEPING it! All over the place - from the far northern lands by Logan down to the southern hills of St. George. "Just what IS this sensation!?" you cry? "I must, I say must, know about this!" Okay okay - I can tell that you are all chomping at the bit with insanity, just waiting to hear what it is. Are you ready? Okay - here we go: It's Multi-Level Marketing, or MLM for short! And it's so wonderful that tons of wonderful Utah companies are using it in order to provide YOU with more value, give YOU more bang for your buck, and give YOU a chance to stay at home with your family while making just tons of money while hardly lifting a finger!

First off a lesson on MLM. MLM is a valuable new tool to SUPPLEMENT your income by only doing a little work a day and having fun while you sell valuable, HIGH quality products to your friends at the low prices of $9.00 for a bar of soap, or $8.00 for a tube of toothpaste. Soon, with just a smidgeon of elbow grease and the MLM’s patented new system of income inducement, you could possibly find yourself as rich as Bill Gates, and all this without leaving your home. All you have to do is get your friends to join and buy products, and soon YOU, yes – YOU, will be a qualifying EXECUTIVE at our company leading a team of SALES AGENTS or people who distribute products if you will, to pave the way for a brighter future for the rest of the world. If you have any questions at all, feel free to call our quality controlled Distributor Help Line who we’ve trained to know the answer to any question you could possibly have. And if they don't know the answer, they'll just make one up in order to give you the feeling of assurance that we care and are truly knowledgeable about our products!

Making money with MLM is very easy - here - let me show you how to do it. I am here to help you in this business because I am your friend and I care about you, and friends help each other out. First off - let's show you this piece of paper. Look at it. See that pie chart on the bottom right? That proves that multi-level marketing makes people money. And here's a quote by John Petershmidt, a not-so-well known billionaire stating that if he had done Multi-Level Marketing he would have been 20 times richer than he currently is! And then at the bottom right we show irrefutable proof that to make tons of money you only need to talk to 20 of your friends and get them to join you as a sales-force, and then they'll get 20 friends, and soon the whole world will be rich! Rich I say!

The only thing that you'll have to do to invest in this great opportunity is pay us $1000.00, and then just get your friends to start buying our lovely products or to also pay $1000.00 and join our sales force and you'll be right on your way to making tons of money while being able to stay home with your family at the same time!

"Why didn't you say one single word about the products we'd be selling?" you ask? Oh you guys are so cute when you ask about things! I promise that we'll get right to those in just one second as soon as we discuss these other things important things!

"This is just like a pyramid scam!" you say? Oh no no no! This isn't a pyramid scam! Please never never ever mention those words ever again. They are highly shunned by our company for the simple reason that our company is NOT a pyramid scam at all since it actually promotes the selling of VERY high quality products at VERY low prices while pyramid scams do not.

So you just give me your money and we'll never mention the words 'pyramid scam' ever again, and eventually we'll talk about some of the wonderful valuable products not available anywhere else in the world and in just a few months we'll all be happy, and it's all thanks to Multi-Level Marketing.

And remember our slogan in all you do: Multi-Level Marketing is the only possible way for people to make a decent living.

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Christmas with The Farmers

It's time for me to go home, to spend Christmas with the Farmers. No, I do not mean I will spend Christmas in a rural area where the air is clear and the grass grows tall and people truly know the meaning of the word 'neighbour'. No, in this case I mean Christmas with my family - The Farmers.

Back when I was growing up we would all (and by all I mean EVERY member of the family from my Grandpa Farmer down to the Great- Grandkids)gather together to celebrate Christmas. Being that we lived within a 10 minute drive of each other, with my Grandpa just 5 houses down the street from us, this was usually rather easy to do.

We would start celebrating a week or 2 early, when we went out and looked at Christmas lights. This was one of my fondest memories - a bunch of people would gather together in a couple of cars, and then the rest of us would jam into my Dad's suburban, with very few of us having seatbelts on and about 7 or 8 kids jammed in the back without seatbelts on. My dad would be the one driving the suburban, of course. It's his pride and joy and absolutely nobody else is allowed to touch it. It's a 1976 brown suburban, slightly rusty in parts. The 'Suburb' part of 'Suburban' fell off however, so it's no longer a Suburban, it's actually an 'an'. And as we drove around to look at lights we would sing 'Bye Bye Miss American Pie', the real Don MacLean version, none of this fake Madonna garbage for us, and to this day it's still my favorite Christmas Carol.

Whenever we would go over a big dip in the road or over the railroad tracks, dad would go about 50 mph over them, making all of us unseatbelted grandkids in the back bounce around like crazy.

And right now, as my Grandma Farmer reads this, she's groaning and saying to herself "Oh...no...They didn't! Oh, my conscience! Those grandkids will be the death of me with their playing hockey and horseback riding and wrestling and driving too fast!"

And then we would finally all gather together in the same house for Christmas Eve, and all talk at the top of our voices to make ourselves heard. This may seem loud and boorish for most of you, but this is absolutely necessary for us. We all speak rather loudly, even the shy ones.

True story: when I talk to my family on the phone and I'm sitting in a chair at the table, not even slouching, I can put the phone down on the table, face up, and still hear them loud as a bell. This is not a complaint - this is a statement of fact. I do it as well. If I ever call any of you on the phone, I advise you to have your phone turned down to the lowest volume possible. If it has one, you should use the 'mute' button.

And here we are all talking amongst ourselves, with nobody really able to hear themselves think, and Grandpa Farmer saying every 3 minutes, "What'd they say?" Then Grandma, "Fred, turn your hearing aid on!" "My hearing aid is on Gene! I can hear every word they say - now what'd Susan say? I couldn't hear because you were talking!" My Great-Aunt Coleen said of us, "I think they're all deaf!" And there you haveit: Christmas with The Farmers.

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