Weekly Christmas Newsletter

Baby Has Arrived

2010-01-31T09:17:00.003-05:00

Sunday, Jan. 31, 2010

Well, today is Kathryn's due date and we're happy to announce the baby is already here! While most people seem to be getting Newman-related news off of Facebook these days, there is not a complete audience intersection (for example, I know my Arkansas readers don't get the Facebook news so I figured it's worth posting here, too. Apologies to my duplicate readers for hearing the same stories and jokes twice....

Thomas George Newman was born on Monday night (Jan. 25) at 11:33 p.m. He was 8 pounds 7 oz.

Kathryn had been having some contractions for the week or so prior, so I didn't think too much of it when she said she was having contractions when I called at 5:30 to say I was heading home. She got me at the train station at 6:30, and then had about a 1 hour Family Home Evening (not sure why we did an extended one that night but we did. Kathryn ran it which included some requirements for Webelos). In between teaching, she was recording her contractions on her new i-Phone app that allows you to just push a button to record the start and end of each contraction and then it tracks it and does all the math for you. (You can even email it to your doctor....now that's one cool App).

At 7:30, I ran the bedtime routine while Kathryn labored in front of the TV watching the new Jane Austin "Emma" movie that she had taped from PBS the night before. At 8:30, I had the kids all to bed and she started to get serious. Knowing that most of the labors go all night, I wasn't worried and spent the next hour doing work email to delegate things off as I figured I'd be out on Tuesday.

When Kathryn started packing around 9:20, I figured she was really thinking this was it. At 9:45 I started timing her contractions. At 10, I called our neighbor Heather to say that we'd probably be calling her that night to stay with the kids.

At about 10:20 after Kathryn got out of the shower, she agreed we should call the midwife. The contractions were only about 40 to 45 seconds long but they were between 2 to 4 minutes. But she was handling them so well, I don't think either one of us thought it was imminent. The midwife said "get in here."

Heather arrived by about 10:40 and we were on our way by 10:45. It is a 30 minute drive to the hospital which is in Sleepy Hollow. All of our other kids were born in White Plains, but we changed for Thomas as policies had changed and we couldn't do a V-BAC at White Plains.

I ran about 5 stoplights....there wasn't any traffic so it seemed silly to wait at the light. Heck, I even drove in the left lane!

About 3 minutes to the hospital, she said she wanted to start pushing. Kathryn later said the drive was like one long contraction. We went in through the ER and the attendants didn't seem in too much of a rush so Kathryn said "Hey, I'm having a baby here, let's get this show on the road....Let's move!"

She was in the hospital room at 11:15 p.m. and I got up there a few minutes later after parking the car. She was at an 8. At 11:29 she started pushing. At 11:33 we were holding our new baby.

It's funny because Josh had always said the baby would be born on Monday, Jan. 25. As the labor started going fast, I told Kathryn that hey, this could still happen.

She got into her private room around 1:30 and then we waited for them to return the baby. So I slept on the Murphy bed in the room until about 4:20, saw the baby again, then drove home to share the news with the kids when they woke up. Sammy had crawled into bed with Heather. I found Matthew wandering around the house wondering where I was. Each kid was so excited. Josh was sad when he heard my voice because he assumed the baby hadn't come. I said no, it happened so fast I'm already home! They just couldn't stop dancing and celebrating. Josh later said we should all kneel down and have a prayer of gratitude.

I went back to the hospital after the kids went to school (and Sammy to a neighbor) and stayed til about noon, then picked up Sam and got the kids out of school early so they could come meet their brother. They fought over who would enter the room first and who would hold him first but if that's the only side-effect to the family dynamic, I'll take it.

Because he was born before midnight, it counted as "the first night" at the hospital so Kathryn was released on Wed. afternoon.

Two final things:

• At one point, the nurse came in during Kathryn's stay to ask a series of questions, one of which was "do you want us to inform your pastor". She pointed at me and said "Well, he's my pastor...." I thought afterward that I wish that when they said "Do you want us to alert your pastor" she had said "No need. He already knows....after all, he's the father". Or "No, that's OK. He knows since it's his baby." Missed opportunity.

• Whenever you tell someone a new baby name and they respond with "Oh, is that a family name", I think that means they find the name unusual and so they are looking for a justification for such a weird name. We haven't really heard that much with "George" but I just thought about that as I think I do the same to others when I hear names outside the "top 100" list of names. (For those wondering, Thomas is at about 50 on the charts).

Living a watch-less life

2010-01-08T10:50:00.003-05:00

So I broke my watch in mid-December. It fell onto a tile floor during my monthly interview with President Bench and hasn't worked the same since. I haven't gotten around to replacing the watch.

I can't remember a time living without a watch strapped to my wrist. In fact, I literally check my watch about every 3 or 4 minutes for an update, so I was curious to see how I'd survive without knowing what the exact minute was.

Surprisingly, the withdrawal has been painless. There's plenty of places to check the time (like my computer and my i-Phone) but I do miss it the most while walking to the train (to ensure I don't miss the train) and in business meetings (when I like to have the watch laid on the table so I can keep to the time limits -- checking the phone isn't a real kosher option as it looks like I'm checking text or email, which is rude).

But I think it has relaxed me a bit not having a way to check the time every few minutes.

FREE! (or mostly free)

2010-01-01T11:14:00.002-05:00

With the high cost of living in New York, anytime you can pull off a free (or mostly free) activity, it's worthy of shouting it from the rooftops.

Some recent successes:

• We went to the New York Hall of Science in Queens on Dec. 29 (Wed)...total cost (beyond tolls): ZERO! We purchased a Brooklyn Children's Museum pass that allows access to other museums including this one, so entry was complementary. Found street parking. Ate lunch in the car on the way home.

• Date night with Kathryn to see Invictus on Tuesday night (Dec. 28). My boss gave me a fully loaded Fandango gift card, so the movie was free. PLUS we had watched a couple's children a week or two ago, so the wife agreed to stay here at the house while the kids slept and we were at the movie....no babysitting fee!

• Post Thanksgiving Friday night date night. We went to a free concert performed by local musician students at the New York Historical Society and found free street parking. We then went to dinner at Hill Country down by my office. Yes, you guessed it -- free street parking! Just had to pay for dinner (yummy bbq). We even took the non-toll way home from Manhattan into the Bronx.

• Our office party was virtually free because the party was free and -- yup -- free street parking right in front of the venue. BUT we had to pay for a college-age babysitter, so that was more expensive. But when the only cost is babysitting, well, that's batting above average

• Kathryn took the three older kids to the Chipmunks movie the day after Christmas with the Fandango gift card....FREE OUTING! Bonus: I got to stay home with Sammy and he fell asleep so I had 1.5 hours of quiet in the house on an afternoon. Unheard of!

• We also had a free outing to the Wrights' Christmas party a week before Christmas as the party was free and our favorite babysitter said that she had to perform free service prior to her Catholic Confirmation, and babysitting counted. So she asked if it would be OK if she babysat for free that night. Um, OK! But, we did pay for it on the drive home due to a bad snowstorm that made me think we wouldn't make it home -- and then I wouldn't make it home from taking the babysitter home.

• And lastly, we look to start the year off with a free date tonight. There is a Primary party tonight that is a drop-off -- and Sammy is now Primary aged! So we have a 1 hour 15 minute window and going to Panera Bread for dinner thanks to a gift card from another friend for Christmas.

Happy New Year!

Best Day of Week for Christmas???

2009-12-24T13:55:00.002-05:00

Hi all:

For starters, now that the official Christmas Newsletter has gone out -- and potentially resulted in some more viewers to the weekly Christmas newsletter -- I wanted to welcome any new readers and to state that I'm going to make a renewed effort to provide an update to this blog at least once a week by Friday afternoon. I know, I've said that before, but here's to a New Year.

So I'm a big calendar man in terms of studying it and debating in my head the value of which calendar mode is best. To clarify, there are only seven types of calendar options (forgetting Leap Year) based on the year starting on a Sunday, a Monday, a Tuesday, etc. The only dates that get affected are birthday, 4th of July, Thanksgiving (early or late in Nov.) and Christmas as so much else is just a default Monday.

For years, I've said Tuesday was the best day for Christmas. But I'm leaning toward Friday as being right up there. I really liked this past week at the office as it's just a tad too short and too close to Christmas to be taken too seriously. (A Saturday Christmas does result in a more serious work week, I feel). Christmas Eve on a Thursday is great (I'm making the assumption that I get two days off for Christmas....so the Friday Christmas ensures I get Christmas Eve off).

I like having the day after Christmas being on Saturday....a perfect day to just enjoy your presents before having to go back to Church on Sunday. We had Christmas on a Friday 5 years ago, and get it again in a mere 5 more years. Lucky us!

While Tuesday is a great Christmas Day, I do remember that we spend Sat, Sun and Mon "running out the clock" looking for ways to keep the kids busy while we wait for Christmas to come. Then, as soon as Christmas night is over, it's immediately back to work. Not good.

Do you have a favorite day for Christmas? If you are like my kids, I'll bet it's not Sunday! :)

Post your thoughts as to which day for Christmas is best. (And sorry if this incoherent....the kids are making a ruckus behind me so it's hard to write cohesively and concisely).

Merry Christmas!!!!

Mark

Palmyra et al Family Vacation - PT 2

2009-11-17T15:28:00.002-05:00

A now a continuation of our trip to Palmyra (see last post for the first half)

Saturday was our church site day. The weather was a lot warmer than Friday (which was cold) and it was actually a very pretty, a bit crisp fall day.

We went first to Hill Cumorah, which was about a 20 minute drive. It's a nice visitor's center, and they were just waiting for us to come in (it was a slow day). The sister missionary was really wonderful and did a great job engaging the kids. NOTE: always better to get the sister missionaries as tour guides than senior elders. The sisters are fun, engage the kids, know how to gauge their attention temperature and move along whereas the senior elders kind of have forgotten what it's like to have antsy kids.

I've never really spent a lot of time at the visitor center, but could have spent longer in the back with the exhibits. With kids, it's about a 20 minute visit...with no kids it could be an hour. The boys then climbed the Hill Cumorah and the girls drove to the top.

We then drove to the Joseph Smith farm. The area has changed since the last time I went there. For starters, they had found the original site of the first Smith home (site of the Moroni visit) and have rebuilt that to be as authentic as possible, down to homemade nails. (In fact, they had to use manufactured nails at the end to be done in time, and Hinckley saw them and commented on that during the dedication...he was assured they were temporary. The whole house was built by hand to keep it authentic).

After you visit that house, you walk down a trail to the Smith's second house, which is the original house and has stood since 1820s. (I had visited that before). You can see the hearth where the plates were actually hidden at one point. And the tree planted in the yard when older brother Alvin died (now it's a big tree). Then you can walk into the Sacred Grove.

I would have enjoyed more time in the Grove, but the kids weren't really going for that. So we took the short path But at least we made it there. Afterward, we drove to the temple which is also on site (and is also new, too). Across the street is the stake center. (Incidentally, the old stake center near the Hill Cumorah is now the city's town hall).

We then drove into town and saw the Grandin Printing Press building, which was a favorite of all of us. We again got a sister tour guide and had a wonderful time. It's spiritual, historical, and interesting. Fun to learn how they actually printed it. Kids do enjoy this part. From there, we drove out of town, saw the Alvin Smith grave site, the Erie Canal (which Josh is studying) and then the Martin Harris farm.

From there, we stopped at McDonald's near the Thruway and drove to the Whitmer Farm. It's about a 45 minute drive and not tons to see there. There is a chapel which has a small visitor center, but nothing too earth-shattering to see at the visitor center. The highlight is to go to the re-created cabin out back where the church was organized. We have a senior elder here, and it kind of dragged.

We drove back to our hotel and went to Chilis for dinner. Go for the "2 for $20" which gives you an appetizer, two main courses, and dessert. Not bad!!!

Then swimming and off to bed.

Sunday, we tried to go to church in Canadagia but found a locked building (stake conference?) and started the drive home through the Finger Lakes and through Ithaca. It was a pretty drive, but a bit windy, and Josh felt queasy for much of it. And the drive felt longer with the kids awake and not always happy. Plus, why do kids always say they need to use the bathroom 5 minutes after you just stopped for someone else to use it?

We went through Ithaca, and down through Binghamton so we could go see Harmony Penn (near Oakland, PA). It's a little road that takes you to the Harmony site, which just has a statue and some historical markers (plus a cemetery) but no on-site presence. A little out of the way, but worth the visit.

Instead of doing I-80, we came across I-84 just to make things different.

All in all, a very satisfying vacation, not overly expensive, and I really enjoyed it. Wouldn't really do anything differently. Family was at the perfect age to do this trip before the new baby in January....

Palmyra et al Family Vacation

2009-11-17T15:11:00.002-05:00

Hi all:

Some friends have asked for details about our Church Sites trip on Nov. 6 to 8, so here's a little travelogue that may help in your planning, along with our highlights.

We left on Thursday night around 5 p.m. as the kids had Friday off for a school conference. I was surprised that the mapping systems said it was fastest to go on I-80 through NJ and Penn. to Scranton and then up through Binghamton and Syracuse, and then on to Rochester.

Driving at night definitely has its perks and its drawbacks. It was great the kids all fell asleep at some point. But I had some heavy rain in NJ, and then snow going over a peak outside of Syracuse, and all that in the dark wasn't fun. But the new Honda van drives smoothly and that was part of the reason for the trip.

We arrived at the Homewood Suites in Victor, NY around 11:30 p.m. -- it took us about 6.5 hours with stops, snow, and rain. I'm a big fan of Homewood Suites as it has sleeping for 6. This unit had one big bedroom with two doubles, then a small pullout couch for the little boys in another room -- along with full fridge, microwave and oven. The rate was $150, but we knew of a promotion that got it down to $135. We felt it was the perfect location as it was just off the Thruway and perfectly situated between Rochester and Palmyra, which was convenient. We liked the free hot breakfast each morning, the pool was the right size (and actually warm) for the kids, and low hassle.

On Friday, we got in the van again and drove to Niagara Falls. I had never seen it and I was actually very impressed. It's about a 1.5 hour drive, I believe. We arrived around 9:30 or so. The Maiden of the Mist boats close in late October, so we couldn't do that. But the state park was free except $10 to park (which allows you to park at the welcome center and then over on Goat Island....I never mind paying a little into the system to keep it up and running).

I knew that the view is more impressive from the Canada side, but I also knew that all U.S. citizens need a passport when driving into Canada now. Unfortunately, I didn't look closer to see that kids with a birth certificate can go sans passport so we could have driven across as Kathryn and I have passports, but alas, we didn't. Something for next time.

But the view from where we were was amazing. I'm surprised we could get so close to the edge at the top of falls. It's not really very fancy but I like that it's just kinda simple and I like that the safety experts haven't shut down such close access. All in all, we spent about 1.5 hours there.

(For the record, the towns on the NY and Canada side look very cheezy and dated...yet again, kind of refreshing to not see everything all "Disney-fied". It is what it is)

We then drove back to Rochester to the National Museum of Play (and Toy Hall of Fame). We felt this is the best kids museum we've been to. We arrived around 2 p.m. and stayed until about 5:30. Lots of open space, no crowds (as it was a weekday), and fun things for everyone, including a well stocked arcade of video games familiar to me (Asteroids, Tapper, Defender, Q-Bert, Popeye, Ultra Bowl, Berzerk). From a career perspective, it was fun to walk through the Toys Hall of Fame and identify the Hasbro stuff.

We returned to the hotel (about a 20 minute drive) and tried to go to Chilis, but a 45 minute wait at 5:15 at night. Well, what else do you do in Victor? So we went to Denny's which was surprisingly fun and good. The highlight was Sammy making a biscuit snowman. Then a visit to the pool and everyone collapsed into bed.

Sat and Sun. to be covered in my next post....

General Conference

2009-10-03T05:53:00.002-05:00

So it's general conference weekend, and I was thinking about how my listening and/or viewing of it has changed over the years while being in New York:

• Single, living in the city from 1994 to 1998: We would have to go to the stake center (which is now a temple) to view all the sessions. Sometimes, on Saturday, we'd go to Dallas BBQ between sessions 1 and 2.

• Newly married and living in Tuckahoe: We actually got a session or two on cable, but as I recall, they had a habit of cutting off after one hour.

• Married and living in Tuckahoe: the cable option stopped after LDS member David Checketts stopped being the CEO of the cable company. We'd take turns attending sessions at the Scarsdale chapel with the other parent staying home with the kids

• More married and living in Tuckahoe: Internet broadcast seemed to work well, but just audio for us. We "only" had one computer and it wasn't on wireless, so we had to squish into the upstairs "office" room and listen to it up there.

• More married and living in Tuckahoe: Kathryn's greatest upgrade suggestion: still broadcast the audio on the computer on the 3rd floor BUT broadcast it downstairs via the baby monitor

• Even more married and living in Tuckahoe: Wireless router and a laptop at work (that came home on the weekends) allowed for us to have conference "live" (no baby monitor) in any place in our house. Video wasn't reliable enough for us yet

• Eastchester house: video better and we can watch it as a family on my laptop or our bigger desktop computer. The system "skips" a bit and a 2 hour session ends up taking 2 hours and 10 minutes. I bring home a speaker from work to amp the sound.

ª Oct 2009: Eastchester, four kids, one on the way: we can now plug the laptop into the flat screen and watch it on TV (just like Utah!) We will plug the laptop into the internet router with ethernet cable to hopefully enjoy a 2 hour session in 2 hours.

GOOOOO Conference!!!

Mark

Good thing I market "Boys Toys"

2009-09-09T20:49:00.002-05:00

Well, we'll continue to need Star Wars toys and be playing with Transformers for many years to come .....

Our 5th baby, due Jan. 31, will be a boy. Fun times!

Mark

Summer Travel Recap

2009-08-26T19:17:00.004-05:00

Hi:

I'm welcoming a co-author tonight as Josh helps me recall the best and worst moments from our summer trip out west. These are in no particular order:

GOOD
• Cherry Hill water park
• Josh and Kathryn going to Yankees game at Angels Stadium (and taking Amtrak there from San Diego)
• Dad's birthday breakfast at the diner in Coronado with just Josh and Caroline
• Kids' reaction to finding out that we're having a 5th baby in January
• Our "first night in San Diego" hotel including nice pool
• Collecting sand dollars on the beach
• Seeing Dad when he arrived in Utah after being away from the family for a couple of weeks
• Dad taking Sam and Matthew to Legoland....LOVED the water park portion
• Seaport Village on our arrival day in San Diego
• Day 2 of the Rytting Family Reunion in Utah
• Being with the Sackewitz kids for most of our time in Coronado
• Lagoon, for those who went -- Fun Day with Parker for Josh, who didn't go
• Going with Grandpa to Shivers -- just Josh and Caroline
• Mommy and Daddy getting their i Phones -- and the little ones getting to play with them
• Mommy's high school reunion and trip to San Fran (including seeing Uncle Don and family)
• Marching in Children's Pioneer Parade
• Annual Sackewitz BBQ and fireworks
• Hiking Desolation trail with older kids -- though it was longer and harder than anticipated

BAD
• Waiting in the hot sun for autographs that didn't happen at Angels game
• Matthew getting lost at the "first night" hotel for a very short spell...just long enough to panic his parents
• Mom falling off the wagon....literally...at This is the Place State Park
• Enterprise claiming we had damaged the rental car and then having to deal with the paperwork

Returning to Blogging

2009-08-21T10:25:00.003-05:00

Hi all:

If I haven't alienated my one follower -- and the one fan in California who, during a 'author mix and mingle' at an LDS chapel said she loves the blog -- then I'm going to get this blog active again.

As rain is forecast for this weekend, washing out the trip to our boss' pool, I'll have time to actually post something witty and insightful....or at the very least, my travel highlights.

Cheers.

Mark

I've lost my medallion status :(

2009-06-04T19:21:00.003-05:00

Well, I now have to be part of the huddled unwashed masses when flying Delta. I've been defrocked. Delta took away my medallion status . Turns out they expect you to fly often to keep that status.

Last week, I had my first Delta flight since last August. I checked in and found out I had to pay $15 for baggage. I asked when they started charging for medallion passenger. They said "We don't.....you aren't." ARGH.

I now don't board in group 2....I boarded in group 8. Bye bye potential upgrades. No more access to the super secret toll free line that goes to U.S.-based operators. I'm just like everyone else.

Then again, the price for Medallion is flying often, and after this last flight, I realize that's a high prize. I think if they want to torture terrorists, they should have them fly coach in a window seat on Delta. Tack on a red eye on the return, and it's one of the inner circles of Dante's hell. And I didn't even have kids with me!

But the trip was a success. I was in Pasadena for the Transformers Convention, and we got a great big story in the New York Times. So who's complaining?

Mark

I've lost my medallion status :(

2009-06-04T19:21:00.000-05:00

Shipping a Car

2009-05-12T16:43:00.002-05:00

Well, we begin our ODYSSEY of buying a car in Utah and shipping it to New York to save the cost of a rental car in Utah this summer.

As the only real cost incurred by buying the car in Utah that is unique to the equation is shipping the car, that's really the deal breaker to pursue. So I did some online checking today.

Quite simply, it seems that I can get a rate between about $800 and $1,000. That seems pretty standard. But reading all the bids scares you a little bit because they all seem to warn you how the other guy will rip you off, not ship your car for weeks, etc.

But nothing that has scared me off. I'm confident we can find a good shipper that won't eat up our savings. We may have to pick-up the car in New Jersey vs. have it delivered to our door, but that's do-able.

So I'm going to proceed with the assumption that the fixed cost of buying a car in Utah is $1,000. Next, I'm going to officially reserve a van for our entire trip in Utah to know exactly how much that would cost. I know it's more than $2,000, so it appears we'll at least be $1,000 ahead in doing this.

Keep your hands at 10 and 2, and stay tuned.

Mark

Disney World, Day 5 (Animal Kingdom)

2009-05-07T12:47:00.003-05:00

Well, it's time to bring my memories of our Disney World trip to a close. This probably won't be as detailed but since it's been about six weeks, well....

To finish with the last day at Magic Kingdom, once we got home, Josh wanted to go swimming. I had promised him that all day if we stayed to the end. So at 10 p.m. at night, we were out swimming. I get cold kind of fast, but I was happy to do it. I brought back virgin drinks from the bar for me and Kathryn.

We were all really excited for Animal Kingdom as it was a new park for all of us.

We started by having an 8:10 a.m. reservation for a character breakfast at the Tusker House in Africa. That allowed us to enter the park an hour before it opened, and walking up there with the park closed with kind of fun. It felt a lot like the Bronx Zoo.

The meal was great and definitely felt authentic African in terms of some of the tastes from my mission. Definitely one of my favorite meals of the trip. And the classic Disney characters made it special, too.

The breakfast is situated right next to the Safari ride. When the rope was dropped, we scooted over there. Of course, in typical Mark fashion, I raced to get us a Fastpass before we got on it. Not that we needed it, but just because "we could". I sort of bought into the hype and couldn't stop with Fastpass!

The safari ride is fun, and then walking through the exhibits at the exit were good, too. Then Kathryn headed down to Camp Minnie Mickey while I did a fast tour of the park fetching Fastpasses (three for Everest and 2 for Dinosaur). I met her down there in the Camp and they had just had a great experience catching Chip and Dale (Sam's adopted favorite characters) as they came out for their character greetings. It was a very personal experience and was a highlight for Kathryn. It helped Sammy was carrying their stuffed animal counter parts.

Then we just chilled until the Lion King show started at 11 a.m., which is high energy and I felt fun.

The next big thing we wanted to do was the Nemo show, which wasn't until 1:45 p.m. But the time evaporated fast. I rode Dinosaur first, and was kind of disappointed. From the opening of the park 10 years ago, I've always wanted to go on it, but it didn't pack the punch I hoped it would. Just felt like driving around in a jeep looking at Dinosaurs. Pales big time to Indy ride in Disneyland. Then I did Everest, and the theming and all that is great from a distance, but I thought the roller coaster experience didn't deliver on it feeling like Everest. Maybe my bar is too high.

Kathryn and the kids did some of the dinosaur area rides during this time. Then we did traditional fast food type lunch before rushing to the Nemo show....can't believe it was time already.

The Nemo show is the best show in Disneyworld, and the best thing at Animal Kingdom. Worth the price of admission right there. As good as Lion King on Broadway. The puppets and all are just really really great.

I believe Kathryn did Everest next while I watched the kids. At 3 p.m., they did the bird show, which they all enjoyed. Sammy was asleep so I walked around and shopped and scouted out a place for the parade. That's a really great parade, and we had a good place and I even stole a chair for Kathryn to sit in. We then used our earlier fast pass to hit safari again.

Time was already getting tight as the park closes at 7 p.m. I did the Boneyard with the kids for a while, and Kathryn either did Everest now (instead of what I said a moment ago) or did another ride with Caroline on the "Wild Mouse" type ride.

The day ended anticlimatically with us trying to get our last purchases, missing dinner, and my worrying that we'd miss our flight at 9 p.m. Not one of the best Mark moments of the trip.

But we left, made it to the airport on time, got dinner at McDonalds at the airport, and were the first passengers on a new JetBlue plane. We got home without incident.

Overall, a great, great vacation that we will remember forever! When we return (and we will) we want more time at Epcot and more ability to just explore and be leisurely at Animal Kingdom.

Phew!

Mark

An Odyssey to Save Money on Cars

2009-04-29T13:04:00.003-05:00

Hi blog fans:

Yes, I still have one more day to detail on our Disney World trip.

But here's a preview of next big thing. From the family that orchestrated a simultaneous closing on our old and new house, and from the guy who over-researched every last second of their trip to Disney World comes: "Save Money by Buying a Car in Utah and Shipping it to NYC???" I call it my "Odyssey to Save Money on Cars".

I started researching vans to rent while in Utah for our annual visit. We're staying nearly a month due to a High School reunion scheduled at the end. Mini vans for that long cost in the range of $2,000. "Wow -- that could be several car payments right there" said my smart wife.

"Ah, you're right!"

The timing might be right for us to expand our auto family. And the name of this adventure is going to see how much will it cost -- or how much will I save -- AND at what price hassle-wise. I'll bring you along every step of the way as I evaluate such things as:

• Honda Odyssey OR Toyota Sienna
• Turn in the mini van OR become a two automobile family
• Purchase in Utah OR purchase in NYC
• Buy OR Lease
• negotiating with dealers via the internet only
• comparison of prices in NYC vs. SLC
• how to ship a car cross country
• drawbacks of buying in Zion and owning it in Babylon
• Plans to drive the car back out to Utah (i.e. road trip) in 3 years when lease is up (if I go that route)

The goal is to get the van we want with at least a $1,200 savings (shipping a car is $800; a rental van would be $2,000) and taking delivery within the first 3 days Kathryn arrives in SLC. Can it be done? Stay tuned to my special reports.

We may set off a trend amongst my fellow Westchester / Salt Lakers.

Mark

Disney World, Day 4 (Magic Kingdom) (part 4)

2009-04-23T19:23:00.002-05:00

Our final hours at Magic Kingdom were fun. After the Haunted Mansion, we weren't quite sure what to do, so I did what I do best, which is ran down to get another Fastpass, this time on the Jungle Boats. Kathryn stayed with the kids by the Mark Twain-type steam boat and had the kids eat their peanut butter sandwiches. But then we went to the fast food place in Fantasyland that overlooks Small World for a real dinner of hamburgers, pizza, etc. It was completely empty and so it was very stress free.

Then I made a mad dash off to Big Thunder for one more ride as I had remaining Fastpass to cash in. Kathryn took the kids to Adventureland and they did the Flying Carpets one or two times. I picked up some more Fastpasses at Big Thunder because why not? Then I caught up with Kathryn just as they were getting on the Flying Carpets. Kathryn asked me to jump the fence and join her on the ride because Sammy was having his biggest meltdown of the trip. I ended up running up the exit and jumping in one of the carpets and taking Sam. It was not a pleasant ride with Sam screaming the whole time and me not quite sure what I had just inherited. But considering how good he was the majority of the time, he's allowed one bad moment.

But I felt uneasy entering the ride through an unauthorized manner....if I did that at an airport, I'd be arrested.

Then we did the Jungle Boats again. It wasn't as fun as Wed. night as the skipper was still very good, but we very much loved Skipper Mike.

Then we headed back up to Fantasyland, and I was thrilled that Josh had finally talked himself into going on Big Thunder (guess that's why I got the extra fast passes). It meant we had to fight the parade crowds to get to the ride, but it was worth it, because I didn't want Josh to leave without going on it as I knew he'd regret it. So Kathryn was happy to keep the three in Fantasyland, and Josh talked all the way down about how excited that he was overcoming his fear and doing it. I could tell he was nervous in the line, but he didn't chicken out. And he actually seemed to enjoy it! Too bad it was at night because for the first time on the ride, daytime would have been better to enjoy all the scenery and nuances. But it was a very big victory for all of us.

Kathryn stayed in Fantasyland and among other things went on Dumbo one more time. She really wanted to ride Dumbo at night, and she had a great missionary experience while waiting in line, so maybe that's why.

It was a challenge to meet up again as they close the access to Fantasyland. Fortunately, the fireworks got delayed, which allowed us some time to escape. We kept on the phone, I saw her as she walked by on Main Street, we joined up and got out of Dodge just as the fireworks were starting. So we saw the fireworks from the monorail and left with that picturesque memory. Magic Kingdom....done!

Disney World, Day 4 (Magic Kingdom) (part 3)

2009-04-22T16:05:00.002-05:00

I may now be getting the order mixed up just a bit on our Friday afternoon after 3 p.m.

But I know Caroline and Matthew and I went to Toon Town to ride the Barnstormer Coaster and Josh, Mom and Sam went on Snow White. I took Josh and Matthew on the Autopia again (that was a real big hit for Matthew, so I'm glad we could do it again).

And of course, I picked up another Fastpass, as that was the theme of the day. This time, we grabbed another Winnie the Pooh (why not!) and got a bonus Fastpass for PhilHarmagic. It's kind of a marketing ploy, as I'm sure they knew crowds were light there so they were being sneaky to get people to fill up the theater. But we felt like we won the lottery! Wahoo - bonus!

So back in Fantasyland, I took Matthew on Dumbo again (he was very happy to wait 45 minutes...he loved the flying elephant). Kathryn used our earlier Peter Pan fastpass for the others. Then they got ice cream, and we joined them once we got off the flying elephant. We did the Winnie the Pooh ride on the Fast Pass, and then the Philharmagic. When you do it right, you don't need to wait in lots of lines!

Getting into about 5:30 p.m., we decided to have me and Josh go on Haunted Mansion (I hadn't been yet) while Kathryn took the rest on Small World. Caroline went on it 3 times, and she still says it was a favorite. I didn't think I was going to get on Haunted Mansion, so I'm glad it worked out. I read later that they have added recently a "stair room" which is like one of those classic drawings where the stairs all go up and into each other, but also look like they go down, too, if that makes any sense. But I enjoyed Haunted Mansion more than I ever have. I'd dare say it's better than Anaheim, which surprised me.

Just one more posting and we'll finish Friday night...then off to Animal Kingdom on Saturday.

Disney World, Day 4, Magic Kingdom (Part 2)

2009-04-18T13:17:00.002-05:00

After lunch, we decided we kind of want to make one more full circle around the park before the end of day. My intention was to end early and go home and swim. No, I'm not a big swimmer, in fact I kind of hate swimming, but Josh had said he wanted to, and I was thinking we had or would have done everything.

We started after lunch with the Country Bears show as it was about to start, so no wait. Hadn't seen it in years, so that was fun for me, but it could use a bit of a refresh. The kids liked it well enough, though. And Sammy fell asleep, so thus began his afternoon nap as he did transfer. Yea!

We cut across the park with Sammy asleep in his stroller and went to the Monster's Inc. Laugh Factory show. It's part of their new wave of technology where it's computer animated graphics and such, but it's personalized, if that makes sense. So it's an animated character, but he's performing in real time. We got to text in jokes ahead of time, and some were used in the performance. The premise is that laughter provides more energy than scaring kids, so they need to get us to laugh. It really is just like using the old stadium trick of aiming a camera at the fans and then adding commentary when it shows up on the Jumbotron. But it's fun and you laugh, and Matthew seemed to place this at the top of the list of favorite attractions. (Kathryn stayed out with the sleeping Sammy).

If I'm not mistaken, Kathryn now agreed to take Matthew on the Rockets Ride, which had a 45 minute wait, but for which he was more than happy to stand in line for. After all, he was a Jedi now! Kids CAN stand in line and be patient if it's something they want. Matthew really surprised us.

So I had to kill about 10 minutes until the window would open up to get our next Fast Pass (it was nearly 2 hours since I had gotten the passes for Peter Pan, which we hadn't used yet). So I stood by the machine at Buzz Lightyear just waiting and waiting for the clock to hit 1:15, while Kathryn and Matthew were on the Rockets. It's like the Amazing Race! Once the clock hit, I put in our tickets, then we scooted over to the Castle to watch the Performance that they do several times a day. It has Princesses, dancing, characters, etc. Sam slept through much of it, but it was getting pretty warm over there by the end.

We met up together again around 1:45 p.m. I took my turn on Space Mountain while Kathryn hung out with the kids and I think bought some souviners. Space Mountain is dark....it's even darker when you forget to switch out of the sunglasses! Glad to enjoy one last ride before they start a revamp of it starting today. Can't explain why, but definitely more fun at Orlando than Anaheim. When I had my turn, I let Kathryn go (using FastPass) and I took the four kids alone on the Tomorrowland Transit. That's really a big hit!

Unless I'm mistaken, we got done with that and it was time for our FastPass on Buzz Lightyear, so we did that. I think we were moving out of Tomorrowland (for the last time) around 3 p.m.

Disney World, Day 4 (Magic Kingdom) (part 1)

2009-04-17T10:43:00.003-05:00

Wow....being out of town with the Monopoly tournament has thrown me off my writing rampage. Let's return to the narrative.

FRIDAY, MARCH 20
We knew Friday was going to be a less stressful day (and less structured) as we were back for our return day at Magic Kingdom. We had knocked out so much the first day that there wasn't a lot of pressure of trying to hit everything. The kids were adjusting to the regiment of park touring, we had no specific times or schedules (i.e. shows or meals), and we knew the lay of the land.

We had a McDonald's near the hotel, so we brought in breakfast before we left. Then off to the MK. We got there a bit later as we now knew getting there right at 8 a.m. for a 9 a.m. opening was a bit too early. Of course, we were still in position by before the park opened.

Unlike Wednesday, they did a full blown Disney welcome via the train and lots of characters at the entrance. So that was fun.

The race up Main Street is truly a race....should have been smart enough to realize that the lands would be closed, so no need to hustle quite so much. Today we were going off to Frontierland. When the rope dropped, Kathryn led us through a back alley to get ahead of the rope line walkers, but alas, the Disney folks had anticipated that, too, so it didn't matter. And to be honest, we could have been a lot less "hurry up" as the crowds weren't bad. But once you start in that mentality....

Fearing the worst (and remembering the day at Hollywood Studios) I grabbed Fast Passes for Big Thunder then I took a crew on Splash Mountain (they are next to each other). I tried to get Josh to go, but he wasn't quite ready for that one yet. So I took Matthew and Caroline. We had talked about doing switch-off (as we knew Sam couldn't go), but the policy has changed, and now it involves the Fast Pass line, but that doesn't open til 9:30 or so. So I kind of felt 'stressed' during the ride wanting it to hurry so Kathryn could ride crowd-free, too. We got done, and the lines were still very low for Kathryn to go (and she took Caroline again, I believe).

I stayed with the boys and they found a little play area that they loved. Very simple and basic, but sometimes kids don't need or want much.

After that, we did Big Thunder in turns (I think Caroline went twice -- once w/ me and once with Kathryn) but Matthew steered away from it, as did Josh (though he went later in the day and loved it).

This is now when I turned into a Fast Pass machine!!! I had learned that you can get a new one every 2 hours and that they don't monitor the expiration time. So I figured that we'd stock up on them and get one literally every 2 hours. So around 10:15 or so, I darted off to Tomorrowland to get two for Space Mountain. (After missing out on Rock and Roller, I wasn't going to miss Space Mountain) and Kathryn kept the kids. After I got back, it was Josh's turn to get to go on a favorite ride, so Kathryn took Josh and Matthew on Haunted Mansion (up very near Fantasyland) and I took Caro and Sam on Small World. It was a good trade-off and everyone was happy.

We did early lunch (again, lesson learned from Hollywood -- even if not hungry, eat early for the kids' sake and for the crowds sake). We walked down to Pecos Bill in Frontierland, which was doing some back tracking. Even sillier, we got down there and then decided to get three more Fastpasses on Peter Pan (right next to Small World). After all, 3 passes were going to waste (as we had two for Space Mountain). So Matthew and I ran up to get those while Kathryn ordered lunch. Matthew loved sticking the cards into the machine to get them.

Lots of indoor seating at Pecos Bill, good "fixin" bar for the burgers, and everyone felt happy and relaxed.

disney World, Day 3 (part 4) (Hollywood Studios)

2009-04-09T18:28:00.002-05:00

At the pace and amount of details I add, I'll be writing about this trip until we go the next time! But it was so much fun, I want to capture every moment so we can relive it.

So Kathryn was the queen of scoring us fun meal reservations. At Hollywood Studios, she got us a reservation (two months in advance) at the 50s Prime Time Cafe. It's basically what the title says -- a diner-themed place set in the 50s with old classic TVs and TV shows running.

They make you feel like your in "mom's house". The waitresses tell you to get your elbows off the table. They look for "clean platers". They even "do the airplane" to make Mom eat her greens if she hasn't eaten then when she comes to clear the table.

We had a great waiter who was in character, but not over the top -- which is good because I don't know how the kids would have reacted. But he did ask Caroline and Joshua to set the table. He was originally from Long Island, so we bonded on the NY front. Matthew didn't eat much, but boy was he creative playing with his action figures, gold fish crackers and silverware. It was good food and fun, and came at a good time in the day. I'd go back again. We had S'mores for dessert. Oh yeah, and a vanilla Coke. THAT was needed.

Refreshed and with the hottest part of the day behind us -- and the crowds majorly thinned -- we used our fast pass for Toy Story Mania (at about 5:45 p.m.). Even more fun the second time. That's one ride they've really nailed it terms of perfection. Too bad the line is so long.

It was too early to go wait for Fantasmic, so we had a little time to kill. This would have been a perfect time to do the Back Lot Tour, but alas, it was closed (though it hadn't been scheduled to be closed). That's a good attraction, but we didn't majorly miss out.

So we took the kids on the Great Movie Ride. It's entertaining and relaxing and fine. We had chosen to avoid it because I remember Alien being in there and it was pretty gruesome. We figured the kids would just need to deal with it because we needed something to do. So we warned the kids. Caroline scrunched up next to me as we got closer to that part. Josh was OK. Matthew kept saying "Where's the alien!" He couldn't wait to see it and was very excited at the prospect. (Being a Jedi, I suppose...) The good news is it's not as bad as I remember and you only see him up in the ceiling. So I'm glad we went.

If I'm not mistaken, it was now about 6:45 p.m. and the parks and attractions were fairly quiet. We literally walked right on Star Wars. I mean NO ONE in front. I took Josh and Matthew (his third trip.....he seemed to memorize it because he does repeat the phrases now).

With Fantastmic at 8:15, we decided it was time to go to the arena. Glad we did....getting there an hour early and we sat in one of the last available sections on the far left side. You'd think one hour early would be plenty early but no. The time went relatively quickly with the kids playing games on my phone and Josh/Matthew playing with the action figures.

Fantasmic is great. Matthew fell asleep for it (of course). I wish Disney wouldn't make it so gruesome. The dragon couldn't be larger or scarier. Tone it back a bit!!! But definitely worth seeing. (Turns out they had not been doing shows every night the week we were there....Disney cutting back on performances to save money, so we were lucky).

Then the obligatory exodus with crowds and Matthew asleep in my arms. Easy exit and drive home (no need to take a parking shuttle).

Next up: Friday's second visit to Magic Kingdom....and it was a great one. Then Saturday at Animal Kingdom, which was Kathryn's favorite park.

Disney World, Day 3 (part 3) (Hollywood Studios)

2009-04-08T16:08:00.002-05:00

So the Jedi training is by far the greatest thing that happened to Matthew at Disney World. Kathryn had hoped he would be selected, but she didn't want to get her hopes up too high. But Kathryn knows how to "work it" and made sure she had our cute kid up front but not being too stage mommy.

Kathryn has all the real details on this, but a handful of boys (and one girl) got invited up during the 2:20 p.m. show. They put a cape or robe on him, and then they go through Lightsaber training. Then, the crown jewel: Darth Vader shows up and they each get a turn "dueling" with the Dark Side. Again, Kathryn can share the whole play by play, but Matthew truly feels he's been ordained a Jedi. He now says he doesn't have to get married as Jedis don't get married. He's not going on a mission...because Jedis don't go on missions.

Caroline and I saw the last bit and it was very cute (with a sleeping and still stinky Sammy in my arms).

After all the fun and hub-bub with the Jedi training, it was time to stake out a place for the parade. One of Kathryn's friends says this is the best parade of the bunch. I strongly disagree. It was weak. Kind of like an ad for the Presidential Council on "get up and move". The 3 p.m. parade is themed to Pixar, which is great, but once the parade stretches out, the floats stay where they are and you just see one float for a very long time. In our case, one of the army guys stood in front of our area for 20 minutes leading the kids through dance moves, exercises and people jumping on trampolines. I kept wanting to see the floats further down in the parade. Watching the parade wasn't too bad in terms of crowds. Kids got ice cream.

It seems like many leave with the ending of the parade. We headed to the Muppet 3D movie, and it was EMPTY! It was nice to be inside where it's cool. It served as a good break. My favorite line in the movie is from Sam the Eagle: "The finale is titled A salute to all the nations of the world, but mostly America."

I believe Kathryn then took Matthew on Star Tours again via a Fast Pass while we walked the Streets of America. Dinner is next at the 50s Prime Time Cafe....dinner bell rings at 4:35 p.m.

Disney World, Day 3 (part 2) (Hollywood Studios)

2009-04-07T14:39:00.002-05:00

So it's now about 12:30 p.m. in our journey.

The challenge with Hollywood Studios is that so much of it is based on shows. What that means is you really have to plan more than other parks because you can't just fill a 20 minute void with a quick ride on the merry go round. It also prevents you from truly doing everything because most of the shows end by 5 p.m.

So we decided to split up which was a smart move. Kathryn took Matthew and Josh to the car stunt show that was to start at 1:20 p.m. I took Caroline and Sammy to go see Beauty and the Beast. At some point, Kathryn bought Matthew some non-Hasbro Star Wars action figures from the gift shop near Star Wars. Smart move! That entertained Matthew for quite a while while waiting for the show to start. I really liked the gift shop purchases we made as they were things that the kids played with right away (like the lightsaber, Toy Story blaster, etc.) (Oh, Kathryn and Caroline went to the store on the "Main Street" area while we were on Star Tours and got her the MInnie Mouse princess stuffed animal she wanted. Sammy got Wheezy, the penguin from Toy Story. He's pretty darn cute. Funny thing is I hear the first one they picked up didn't have a working squeaker. Isn't that the whole plot of Toy Story 2?)

We should have done lunch early, as the touring book recommends, as finding a short line around 12:45 p.m. wasn't easy, and the kids were getting hungry. Not sure what Kathryn did, but I ended up going into the ABC Commisary on the way to Beauty and the Beast and was able to get chicken nuggets et al. The line was manageable, and my two kids were great. I was rushing us a bit because we didn't want another bad experience getting closed out of a show.

So we made the trek to Beauty and the Beast with full tummies. I checked the waits and Fast Pass availabilities at the "Main Street" and saw they were gone for Rock n Roller Coaster (as it's near Beauty and the Beast, I had thought I could get one for me and Kathryn. Darn....that is the best ride in all of Disney World, in my opinion. But that's OK...we totally went into the vacation saying it was for the kids and anything we get is just gravy.)

The Beauty and the Beast show was as good as expected. Caroline loved it and Sammy fell asleep (after pooping...so I just tried to position him up wind from other patrons). I was texting Kathryn and learning that they made it to the show just fine, Matthew loved playing with his Star Wars figures while waiting for the show and all was well.

I hear they liked the show....I think they said one part of the show was having technical difficulties, but Josh and Matthew thought it was fun.

I then carried the sleeping (stinky) Sammy through the crowds with Caroline in tow to catch up with Kathryn and the boys. They had gotten out earlier than us. I stopped and got me a frozen lemonade and had hoped to get Caroline a shake but the machine wasn't working. But we worked our way over and stayed in a restaurant that overlooked the Jedi Training stage....and discovered that Matthew had been chosen to be a Jedi (in the show that started at 2:20 p.m.)! Best best best moment of the whole trip for Kathryn and Matthew. Matthew still talks about it. Every dollar spent for the trip just paid off! Details in my next post.

Disney World, Day 3, Hollywood Studios (Part 1)

2009-04-06T20:02:00.002-05:00

Thursday morning, and time to tackle a new park: Hollywood Studios. I felt less pressure heading into this park thinking that we could master it without much trouble. But the crowds were massive and it dampened our enthusiasm somewhat.

The park opened at 9 a.m., and we were there early, as usual. We didn't feel the need, though, to be at the Pole Position spot by the rope. We kind of thought we'd just be mellow about it. So we were back just a little bit. We figured that the real rush would be to Tower of Terror and Rock n Roller Coaster. Turns out the real rush is to Toy Story Mania. It's a dis-jumbled mess. It didn't help that we were a bit unfamiliar with the park, so we were just part of a cattle run. And the corridor to get you to Toy Story is too narrow -- especially with an army of strollers jockeying for position.

When we arrived in the area, there was confusion as to whether we were in the line or the line to get Fast Passes. We were in the correct line and the wait jumped up to 45 minutes pretty fast. (Shortest it would be all day). At one point, Kathryn encouraged me to go get a FastPass for Little Mermaid, so I jumped out and claimed one for 10:30 a.m.

My touring plan that I created said we'd do Toy Story twice right in a row when the doors opened and then move on at 9:20 a.m.. We laughed about that! It was around 10 before we had gone on it once. But it is a super duper awesome ride. Perhaps the best ride we went on at Disney World. You ride in these cute cars and wear 3-D glasses. It's all done virtually, though -- I'm told without the glasses, you'd just see silver screens. Then you go along in a fun house and stop in front of a screen and it becomes a shooting gallery where you score points on what you hit. Some of the items you hit then react with you -- for example, a water balloon shot results in a mist of spray hitting you. It's kind of the same idea as Buzz Lightyear in Magic Kingdom, but much much cooler.

Oh, and there's the Mr. Potato Head in the waiting area that is fully interactive and isn't just on a computer loop.

So then we made a split-second decision and decided that we liked it enough that it was worth waiting in line to get a Fast Pass to ride again. Kathryn took the troops down the road to Mermaid and I waited in line to get the tickets. It was starting to feel very warm already. Somehow I was able to catch up with Kathryn and the kids waiting for the Mermaid show, which I thought was pretty amazing....but then Caroline had to go to the bathroom.

So Kathryn swam upstream with Caroline, got her to the bathroom and talked her way back into the line. I took the three boys in, and luckily Kathryn got into the same audience with us to watch the show. A little manuevering and she ended up with Sammy on the front row, and I had the other three back with me.

The show was good, and we liked it, but after seeing Nemo at Animal Kingdom, I realized this paled in comparison.

It's now 11 and we've done 2 things. The day before, we had knocked out 7 in that short of a time....of course, we also had to deal with "let's go home." But still, this had the "not my favorite park" feeling happening.

We rushed like mad to make the Indiana Jones show at 11:30. Alas, we arrived at 11:10 a.m., and it was already full. Due to what else we wanted to do, we knew we weren't going to get to to see the show at all. One of my bigger disappointments as that was something I thought the kids would really enjoy....and I like it too. Drat.

We had to regroup. We puttered around a little bit between snacks and my trying to get a FastPass for the Lights Actions Car show (after being sold out of one show, we didn't want to take a chance. We were told you could get a FastPass for this show and it didn't count against other Fast Passes. Alas, they weren't doing Fast Passes for it this day).

So we hit Star Tours, one that we knew would be a Matthew favorite. We should have jumped just a few minutes sooner because it was like a 10 minute wait....but a show must have let out because it went up to like 30. I took Josh and Matthew while Kathryn hung with Caroline and Sam. They watched a Jedi Training show....which was good learning for later. Matthew really loved the line for Star Tours, and actually seeing 3CPO and R2D2. (He got on a Star Wars kick earlier this year and loves everything about it). It was magical....like watching a kid meet Santa. I was glad Josh was riding on Star Tours, because it's a good intense ride that's not too scary.

While waiting in line, I formulated our new game plan, which would involve one half going to see Beauty and the Beast, and the other going to the Cars show. More on that in the next post.

Early Season Baseball

2009-04-06T13:53:00.003-05:00

Hi all:

I'll return to the play-by-play of Disney World in a day or so, but today is the first real day of the Baseball Season. I see the Red Sox home opener has already been postponed in Boston. It's pouring rain here in NYC....and I hear the same is predicted in Baltimore, where the Yankees open. Some games are threatened due to snow.

When will MLB learn? It would be better for all, eliminate some catch-up double-headers and often return travel to certain cities if the first two weeks of the season featured games exclusively hosted in warm weather cities and/or domed stadiums. Who wouldn't be in favor of that? What fan wants to sit in weather not suitable for skiing, let alone watching baseball?

It's not perfect, but there's nearly enough warm weather venues to go around - for each league, it could be set up to have only one cold-weather venue for the first week or two of the season:

NL (with 16 teams, they need 8 warm weather places)
• Florida (Miami)
• Atlanta
• Los Angeles
• San Diego
• Houston
• Arizona (Phoenix)
• San Francisco

AL (with 14 teams, they need 7 warm weather places)
• Tampa
• Toronto (dome)
• Minnesota
• Los Angeles (Angels)
• Oakland
• Texas (Dallas)

To be fair, I looked over the schedule again, and it's not as bad as some years. Maybe they did wise up. But why aren't Tampa and L.A. Dodgers hosting games today instead of being on the road?

Disney World, Day 2 (part 3) (Magic Kingdom)

2009-04-02T18:30:00.002-05:00

It was now about 5:30 p.m. and we were ready to test out a new land: Toon Town! Kathryn took some kids to try and catch some characters in the State Fair tent, and I let Matthew blow off steam in Donald's Boat. He didn't want to leave there. Eventually, Kathryn found the line for characters was too long, so she, Matthew and Caroline decided to try Goofy's Barnstormer, a fun little roller coaster.

I kept an eye on Sam (and Josh) in the boat and another little playground.

Kathryn encouraged us to push onward as it was now around 6:30 p.m. So I did one of my famous dashes across the park to see if I could get Fast Passes for Jungle Cruise. While there, I checked out the line for Pirates, and it was less than 10 minutes. So I sprinted back, and got the family back to Adventureland.

We then mimicked our early morning success in terms of "rides per hour". We essentially did everything in Adventureland in one hour: First it was Pirates, then the Magic Carpet, then the Tiki Room, the Swiss Family Robinson tree house (I like that it's not Tarzan), and then the Jungle Cruise.

The Jungle Cruise is DEFINITELY more fun at night as the skippers are more relaxed and are funnier. The kids loved Skipper MIke. They loved a joke about the dancing natives losing the key to the men's room, we loved him humming "Small World" while going through the scary dark cave, and his comment that while he didn't know where the cave would take it, odds were -- being Disney -- it would end in a gift shop.

It reminded me of when Liz (my sister) and I did Jungle Cruise at night many years ago at Disneyland. We still laugh about the jokes...it was just so dry. I don't think we had ever done it at night.

At this point it was now about 8:15 and the parade was coming our way (it goes through Frontierland in Magic Kingdom, unlike Disneyland.) Kathryn found a place that sells ice cream that was just closing down, but we got ice cream, went through a passageway and saw the parade, which had many components of an Electrical Parade. We then figured we'd see the fireworks, but of course it was time for the Matthew and Sammy sleepfest.

So we made it to the Castle area and kept an eye on Sammy in the stroller and held the sleeping Matthew while Kathryn and the olders went for a better view of Tinkerbell and fireworks.

I couldn't really see it, but Kathryn said this was her favorite night time program.

Then, much to my dismay, we joined the throngs at exiting the park in mass. Matthew got heavier and heavier, and I felt my arms were losing their elastics, like a rubber band. Down the street, up the ramp to the Monorail, on the Monorail, down the ramp, onto the parking shuttle. Of course, once we get to the car he wakes up.

But a very very satisfying first full day that even got some swimming.

Hollywood Studios, here we come!!!!

Mark

Disney World, Day 2 (Magic Kingdom) (part 2)

2009-04-02T12:33:00.004-05:00

When I last posted, I was writing about the Wednesday experience at Magic Kingdom (our first full day in "the World"). We had left the park 3 hours after a gang-busters start.

I was actually pleasantly surprised at how quickly we got home, despite having to catch a Monorail and then walk to the car. I know Kathryn was very frustrated by this turn of events, but as I had said from the start, every moment of this trip was going to be magical for the kids....even the ones away from the parks. In their eyes, going to the pool was as big an "E ticket" as Big Thunder.

Sammy fell asleep on the drive home and mercifully transferred, so he got a GREAT nap....Josh cooled off with a cool bath and then napped, too....Kathryn caught a few zzzs too.

I took Matthew and Caroline to the pool. They loved it! We stayed for an hour or so. They had life jackets which helped. Having a huge, uncrowded, outdoor pool in springtime was really a treat to the kids.

Fortunately, we had dinner reservations at 3:45 p.m. which forced us to get back to the Park. We arrived with no hassles, even though we had to ride the parking lot shuttle and then the monorail again. We got in just as the parade was going on Main Street. It was great....we were able to see the majority of the parade (and cross that off the list...I'm not a big fan of camping out for Disney parades) without investing any wait time. I thought it would be a zoo to get up Main Street during the parade, but they did well with crowd control and we had an open path -- then we ditched under the rope and stayed to watch for a time.

We made it to the Crystal Palace and had a wonderful experience. Josh started saying he felt 100 percent better and the mood improved. The buffet was very yummy and Daddy got a full tummy. It was a Pooh and Friends character dinner, so we got visits at the table from Pooh, Tigger, Eyeore and Piglet. Some may complain that for all the money and effort you only get a brief moment with the characters, but I disagree. I liked that they came to us, and we could just be prepared to move fast and shoot our photos and get our autographs.

This is an area where Kathryn excels. It's like managing a Hollywood shoot. When the characters come, she has the autographs (bought at Target, not Disney) turned to the right page, the camera ready, etc. I think the staff learned quickly that we would respect the characters' time (even though we had 4 kids) and not monopolize them. I also like that there's plenty of time for the kids to eat BEFORE the characters come over.

I always made a point of thanking the characters....it can't be easy and I know it's hot. I like to think they don't get thanked a lot and appreciate someone appreciating their work.

I felt like we'd probably only stay another 2 hours, but Kathryn encouraged us to push onward, and we stayed the rest of the night, and it was a success. We walked right on Buzz Lightyear because I had gotten FastPasses before we left the park. That's the best trick -- they don't enforce the expiration of the Fast Pass, just the entry time. So while our pass had expired at 2 p.m., they didn't care....so we'd start stockpiling them (because you get one every two hours) and then use them when it was convenient to us.

Kathryn and I think Matthew and/or Caroline got an immediate second ride as their vehicle hadn't worked, so that was a nice bonus. Then, the little boys wanted blasters from the Toy Story gift shop. I don't know where Matthew and Sammy got into guns, but it's actually kind of cute to see them engaged in such an authentic boy behavior. It's harmless. The blasters didn't shoot anything...just lit up. Really kept them entertained. We went from there to seeing Buzz Lightyear standing in the Carosel (sp?) of Progress and got his autograph and photo -- posing with the Toy Story blasters. Then the gentle Tomorrowland Transit (people mover) which Matthew claimed as one of his favorite rides.

I had thought this may be as far as we could push it due to the morning issues, but as stated earlier, we made it the rest of the night. The rest of the day to be covered next posting.

Mark

Disney World, Day 2 (part 1) (Magic Kingdom)

2009-03-27T12:17:00.003-05:00

We woke up Wednesday morning armed with our touring plan for Magic Kingdom. I had studied the plans for weeks from the Unofficial Guide, and then tailored them to our needs. Our focus was to knock out Fantasyland and then some Frontierland, not knowing how long we'd last.

We made good time to the ticketing center and rode the Monorail. We were inside the gates awaiting the opening by about 8:20 a.m. (the park opened at 9 a.m.). The wait got a bit long, and we started to sense crowds would be bigger on this trip than thought. I told the kids to look forward to the opening welcome where the characters arrive on the train...well, it was very modest on Wed. with just Mary Poppins and a couple of others waving....but they did do the train version on Friday.

We made it under the entrance tunnels and up Main Street. Matthew was upsetting the plan....he needed Mouse Ears NOW! This is not the time to shop, Matthew! I kind of dragged him up Main Street and distracted him.

Then they hold you at the castle before you rush to the rides. That was good...we got back up to the front of the line.

We rushed to Dumbo and made the 2nd or 3rd flight of the day. I should have been greedier and asked for 3 elephants among the 6 of us....we learned for the future. Then we were a machine. We did Winnie the Pooh twice. My plan said to do Peter Pan next, but Kathryn said "no line on tea cups...let's do it". So we did that...the girls report seeing Alice in one of the cups. Then Matthew really wanted to do the Autopia (I don't think it's called that at Magic Kingdom, but you know what I mean). We kind of knew we wouldn't have any happiness until we did that. That's a tough ride for splitting up due to height restriction to DRIVE and another height that won't allow little littles on it. Not sure how that worked out (maybe Kathryn stayed off with some????) Anyway, I think I rode with Matthew and Josh, allowing Matthew to steer.

The Peter Pan line was growing, so we grabbed a Fast Pass, and rode Small World while we waited. Really like the MK version as the boat isn't just in a canal, but it's like a whole lake, if that makes sense. The colors were brighter and more vibrant than I remembered. I'd be happy to ride that many times.

We then did the new Mickey's Philharmagic 3D film which was just starting. It has Donald chasing a sorcerer's hat through many new classic Disney movies. Fun, fun.

We had a few more minutes to wait for Peter Pan, so we got Matthew his mouse ears, and Josh got a snow globe. But then Josh started to not feel well. We think perhaps it was the teacups that did that. He was hot and uncomfortable and completely miserable. He just wanted to go home and lie down and take a cold bath. So much for our plans.

We got him to go on Peter Pan and I prayed he wouldn't puke over London. That was my one Peter Pan ride, and I didn't really enjoy it worrying he was truly sick. We needed to call a time out. But we had seen 7 attractions (and ridden 8 times) in 2 hours, so we had done very well, IMO.

Kathryn took Josh to first aid where they said he was fine in terms of fever etc. and I fought crowds at Casey's Corner on Main STreet for lunch. This was our "Tomorrowland at 4 p.m." moment feeling despair and like the trip would be a bust. The other kids were happy and open to leave, too, so we got Josh from First Aid (he had been lying down) and headed home, less than 3 hours after entering the park. (I did run and get Buzz Lightyear Fast Passes before leaving).

To be continued....

Disney World, Day 1 (Epcot)

2009-03-25T10:03:00.002-05:00

We hadn't told the kids about the trip to Disney World, but instead waited until they woke up on Tuesday morning. I'll admit we were a bit underwhelmed with their excitement. I think it was just too big for them to get their heads around. It took several minutes until they understood what we were saying.

I chose to book our trip on JetBlue because they are so reliable. In the end, that's ended up being true, but temporarily, it wasn't. The 9:45 a.m. flight was delayed after we boarded because they couldn't close the cargo door. So we all had to get off, without being given info of what would happen next. This is when I started to see the entire trip through the eyes of "The Amazing Race" reality race-around-the-world TV show. Every time we would make a decision, I'd envision talking to the cameras about whether or not it was a good idea.

Ultimately, they found us a new plane, so I'm glad we didn't try to swap to another flight. (Even if we had, our luggage would have gone on the first flight and I would have had to go back to fetch the bags, so it was just best to stick with the flight we had.) JetBlue had some good personnel, and one person who had been very helpful searched for us in the food court to ensure we made the new flight. So we were now about 2 hours behind schedule.

The younger boys seemed to be so happy just to be in the wide open spaces of the airport. They just seemed to skip and play and such. On the train from the gate to the terminal in Orlando, Matthew was introducing the whole family: "Hi, I'm Matthew, and this is my whole family. That's mom...her name is Kathryn...."

We had another bit of a delay at the rental car counter. I went with Budget to save money and because -- unlike the mighty Hertz -- they were located on-site, so no shuttle needed. I went downstairs with Sammy, who had a major tantrum kicking and screaming on the floor while I secured the car. They promised us a van in about 20 minutes. So we waited, while the clock ticked. Matthew wanted to get in shorts NOW, so he started to undress in the waiting area of the airport. I took him to a restroom to change. Funny -- he has no problem pulling off every last stitch of clothing in front of the public, but in the restroom, he wouldn't allow me in the stall as he changed his pants.

In dealing with the parking lot Budget space, they told me they had a van in slot 325 as the other van hadn't come. I went over and it was a car. They assured me it was a van. I went back again .... I swear it's a car! I explained to the attendant the difference between a van and a car. Eventually we were on our way.

I did a quick check-in at the All-Star Music resorts to just drop off our bags. Then off to Epcot. We entered the park at about 5 p.m. -- had the flight not been delayed, we would have been there at 3 p.m. as scheduled. But some Epcot was better than nothing. (With the way the Disney passes work, 5 days for the family cost us a grand total of $15 more than 4 days....so Epcot was only costing us $15, so every minute was "bonus").

The plan/hope at arriving at 3 p.m was a fastpass or two may still exist for Soaring or Test Track, but alas, no such luck at 5 p.m. May not have been an option at 3 p.m. either as it was crowded and the wait for both was 135 minutes, so I bet they "sold out" of fast passes in late morning.

We immediately did Spaceship Earth, and Matty said "I've never been in Space before!" Then we did the boat ride for Living with the Land. Then the fun (and one of my favorite rides) Nemo ride in the Seas exhibit. Very cute and well done. I'd ride it again if I could. Kathryn then toyed with waiting 135 minutes for Soaring, but ultimately did not. We ate and headed to the World.

We quickly were able to do the Mexico ride (which is now Donald Duck themed) and then scouted out space for the Illuminations. We took turns using Fastpass on the Norway ride (as we waited for the show in Norway). Kathryn got the kids "MIckey Mouse lightsabers" and Matthew and Sam were in heaven. They just danced and waved and it was very funny, though at the time I kept fearing they were going to bonk someone. Some nice people next to us helped keep me relaxed.

The show was good. Then I carried Matthew out of the park asleep (first time of many for the week). We felt like it was a good first day. Josh was saying how this was the best day ever, best vacation ever, etc. I think we succeeded.....

TOMORROW: First experience at Magic Kingdom

Disney World Recap No. 1

2009-03-23T15:26:00.002-05:00

Over the next few days I hope to make up for my dormant posting by posting multiple posts about our trip to Disney World last week. Here's just a few top-of-mind thoughts to get things started:

• Best Thrill Ride at Disney World: Rock 'n Roller Coaster at Disney Hollywood Studios (we were unable to ride it this year)

• Best Ride at Disney World: Toy Story Mania at Hollywood Studios (worthy of the crowd mania at park opening -- even had a 15 minute wait to get a Fast Pass!)

• Biggest Disappointment Ride: Dinosaur at Animal Kingdom. I had read about this many years ago and couldn't wait to go on it. Very disappointed by it...quite lame. Not much cooler than seeing the dinosaurs in the tunnel of the train at Disneyland in Calif.

• Slightly Disappointed Ride: Expedition Everest in Animal Kingdom. It's a bit of a cross between the Matterhorn and Big Thunder. The overall appeal and look to it is great from the outside, but the ride itself seems to lose it's theming and for me, didn't live up to the Disney style of roller coasters. And sure it was fast and high and whatever, but I thought it was kind of tame -- and I'm not one to demand zillions of thrills for coasters. It didn't deliver on the potential I thought it would have.

• Best Parade: Animal Kingdom

• Worst Parade: Hollywood Studios

• Ultimate Disney Pricing Genius: "Mickey Mouse" light-up lightsabers that cost $5 at dusk, then automatically get re-priced to $7 when it's dark.

• Best Show: Finding Nemo the Musical at Animal Kingdom. Equal to "Lion King" on Broadway.

• Attractions that we didn't get to enjoy due to circumstances that I really wish we could have enjoyed: Indy Jones stunt show, Rock 'n Roller Coaster, Soaring, Test Track.

• Disneyland vs. Magic Kingdom: of rides in both parks where there's a difference between the two:

BETTER AT DISNEYLAND
-- Pirates of Caribbean (miss the opening bayou setting, and just better throughout...FL version just doesn't make much sense. Though it has improved with changes beyond the Johnny Depp additions)

BETTER AT MAGIC KINDGOM
-- Small World (better boats, more "lake" to float in vs. just a canal, bright and vibrant, and no disney characters hiding in the displays as they now do in Calif...but I do miss the clock in Anaheim).

-- Haunted Mansion. Maybe I've never done this at MK before as I think it was closed or too crowded, but a couple of cooler rooms inside. I was surprised and wowed.

-- Space Mountain, but I can't tell you why

-- Jungle Boats: I was a purist and liked Anaheim better, but now I like MK with its added little 'cave' in the attraction

-- Tree house -- like that it's still Swiss Family Robinson, not Tarzan

• Missed attractions that are only in California: Indiana Jones ride, Matterhorn

• Reunion let-down: Country Bears. It's gone from Disneyland, and I hadn't seen it in years (it's at Disney World). It's kind of tired and old.

• Favorite Ride to Enjoy Again: "People Mover" (called Tomorrowland Transit in MK). Just a simple easy way to chill and enjoy a view of the park.

• Favorite '3D interactive' show (each park now has one): Mickey's Philharmagic.

• Record number of attractions enjoyed via Fast Pass in one day: SEVEN (Big Thunder x 2, Space Mountain/Peter Pan (half of our family for one, half for the other in this cycle), Buzz Lightyear, Winnie the Pooh - which earned us a bonus one for PhilHarmagic -- Jungle Boat)

How I Endure Unpleasant Activities

2009-02-11T13:04:00.002-05:00

When I was a kid, I couldn't wait until Christmas. It seemed like the distance from the current date to Dec. 25 was too long and would never pass. So I created a game. I'd figure out how much time was left between the current date and Christmas. Let's say it was one week. Then, I would go into the past the same length of interval to see what I was doing to see if that seemed like a really long time ago. So again, in the example, what was I doing one week ago. Then I'd say: "Well, that's not so long, I can make it!".

Now that I'm older and jaded, I do the same thing, but with unpleasant tasks. I think I started it on flights out west with the kids. As hours seem like days in that situation, I do it by hours and minutes..... "We only have 5 more hours on this flight. Five hours ago, we got up and started driving to the airport...." (Flight delays would really throw off this game, but fortunately, we haven't had any when traveling with the kids).

I'm playing the game right now. Toy Fair is next week, and while it's fun to be with the new toys and we work with great people, it's an extremely stressful period. But this time next week, it'll all be done. This time a week ago, I was searching for my desk, filing cabinet and other essential tools of being a bishop that had suddenly vanished from the bishop's and clerk's office. (There was a remodeling project at the chapel that I wasn't informed of....all is well). That doesn't seem like that long ago.....

So I can make it!

From the mouths of kids...

2009-01-20T16:51:00.002-05:00

Last week, Matthew said the opening prayer in Family Home Evening. He said "And bless that nobody gets killed during Family Home Evening." Some might say it's just a modern-day wording of "get home safely", but considering the full-contact nature of many of our family home evenings, I think it's more of a sincere prayer.

Happy to report that no deaths occurred either last Monday or this week. In fact, no animals or humans were harmed in the creation of our most recent family home evenings....

Christmas Summation

2009-01-12T21:46:00.002-05:00

Last year, I did a quick round up related to the success of Christmas gifts...and their longevity. Not to brag, but I think we did pretty good!

• Basketball standard for Josh: A

It helps to have clients in high places (we do work for Lifetime based in Clearfield, UT, and I was able to get some help in getting a basketball standard). We had it shipped to a neighbor's house then snuck it in after hours on Christmas Eve. It came in a million pieces, and the best Christmas gift was having that same neighbor call on 12/26 and offer to assemble it. What a relief....it called for 15 different tools; 10 of which I had never heard of!

But we now have an adjustable hoop in our driveway and it's been a real hit with Josh. When the weather is nice, we've had some nice basketball playing time. That will only increase once we get into spring. But it's a perfect thing to keep him active, get off the computer and Wii and is enjoyable. Yea, yea!

• Little Pet Shop toys for Caroline: A

Again, it helps to have friends in high places. A friend from a fellow agency sent me their 'clearance' LPS stuff a couple of days before Christmas. We used them to round out Caroline's bigger gifts, yet she seemed as pleased -- if not more so -- with the Pet Shop stuff. In fact, she said at one point that Santa must read minds as she hadn't even told Santa or her parents she wanted some LPS VIPs, yet she got it. Lucky guess, so to speak!

• GeoTrax for the younger boys: A+

OK, it's made by our rival toy company, but it's awesome. Matthew researched it out and knew exactly what he wanted this year. The Toys R Us catalog came in late November, he saw it and never wavered. He learned about it online, and he told Santa it's what he wanted.

We set it up on Christmas Eve (we had 3 sets combined) and he was thrilled when he saw it. They played it so much on Christmas we went through a set of batteries in one day. He continues to love it and it's got great creativity to it. No Santa regret here.

• Webkins: A-

The older two love their webkins, and Kathryn found the hard-to-find ones they wanted. Plus, they did a gift exchange to each other to get one more. They got what they want, and it makes them happy.

• Littlest Pet Shop Guess Who: A-

Simple easy game that can be played in 5 minutes before bed.

• Big TV for Kathryn: A+++

Santa can keep surprises. I ordered it online and had it sent to the same friend who got the hoop. Kathryn didn't have a clue. In fact, we said no gifts to each other. She really thought I believed that and hadn't gotten her a thing. On Christmas Eve she said "I wrapped a couple of things and put under the tree with a tag from you to me".

I snuck it in with the hoop, then wrapped it after she went to bed. After we saw the Santa stuff, I took her downstairs to see the big wrapped gift. Even then, she had no idea what might be in the box. The surprise when she unwrapped it was worth every penny. And she deserves it! She's hinted and waited for a good TV for 10 years of marriage -- in fact, we were still using the same TV that I brought into our marriage -- and it was 3 years old then! Sometimes husbands get it right (but not often)

• "Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs" for Mark: A

I had asked for one gift, and it was this book. It contains personal memoirs from famous and not famous people of exactly 6 words. Almost like a haiku! They are extremely insightful and funny. Samples: "Afraid of everything; did it anyway." "She said nothing could go wrong". "Made some good choices; got lucky". Here's one I wrote through the prism of a bishop: "Everyone deserves a mulligan or two."

• Funky Winkerbean comic books for Dad: A+

My dad and both love this comic strip but haven't seen it for years. I found some collection of the comics on line and gave it to him as an early birthday present when he came out after Christmas. Major major hit!

I Love NY

2008-12-22T07:49:00.002-05:00

So living in NYC has a lot of challenges, so when you find an "I love NY" day, you have to celebrate it. In this case, it was actually two days.

Friday, we had a gorgeous snow day. It wasn't so bad that I could justify staying home from work, which is fine, because a snow day in the office is fun, too. Madison Square Park looked beautiful as the snow fell. Certainly, snowy NY isn't so pretty a day or two after a storm. But while it's happening and right after, it's totally beautiful. I'm very fortunate to have an office with such a great view of a park.

The storm and closeness to Christmas meant the clients had really evacuated already and I could just get things done without interruption.

I had to walk home from the train station to the house on Friday night (about 1.25 miles) as I didn't want Kathryn out on the roads. But the neighborhoods were so quiet and festive with lights that it was kind of fun.

Then on Saturday morning, I left the house around 5:30 a.m. to do the first session at the Manhattan temple. One of the blessings of NYC is having our intimate little temple. And at that time of the morning, it's not very busy --especially after the storm. So you feel like it's your own private temple. The first session is Spanish, so I have to wear headphones, but that's OK.

I bumped into the temple president afterward, who greeted me by name. That's always nice. I worked with him exactly a year ago in helping a disabled member attend the temple for the first time, and somehow he remembers my name and face. Can't imagine a temple president in a Utah temple making a point of greeting me personally.

Then, I wanted to head to my office to get all the left-over toy samples to distribute to families in the ward. So I exited the garage on 66th Street and drove across Central Park. Again, freshly fallen snow in the park looks beautiful.

I decided to drive down 5th Avenue to reach my office. I thought it might be crowded with tourists o'plenty, but it was early enough, and NYers don't awake from their slumber til mid morning. So I drove down an empty 5th Avenue, and went past the decked-out Plaza Hotel and FAO Scwartz. Then, under the big star hanging above the street. Then all the very decorated department stores and their windows that make 5th Avenue famous. Went by St. Patricks, and even got a glimpse of the Rockefeller Tree. It was so fun that I actually think I should take the kids for a drive along 5th Ave. early morning as part of a new family tradition.

Passed the main library....for some reason, no wreaths around the lion's necks this year.

Coming up to the Empire State Building, you almost miss it. You would think the tallest building in the city would dominate the road, but it's kind of hidden and you have to make a point of looking for it or you'll miss it. I ended down by the Flat Iron building at 23rd street, which is my favorite 'hidden treasure" of the city.

Then I escaped into my office, loaded up the van with Star Wars toys and headed home. Later that day, Kathryn took the older two kids into Grand Central and a Nutcracker performance (not THE famous performance but a nice one all the same).

With all the challenges of NY, you have to recognize the good and the fun that makes living here so great. Quite honestly, I'm happy to put up with the tough things because the good moments are so awesome. I love NY!!!

Print Edition on its Way!

2008-12-16T16:58:00.003-05:00

Hi all:

Well, I had to let the online version lapse a bit while I got my feet underneath me on that bishop calling thing -- and I had to focus my attention to creating the annual print edition of the newsletter. But it's written, printed, and the first wave is out the door. The final copies should be in the mail by the morning.

Surprisingly, several of you have stated in your Christmas letter to us: "Hey, what's the deal? Where's the newsletter?" I'm happy to see that it's been noticed that I'm running a bit late. It also helps reinforce whose list we are because they like us and who just sends us a return card out of guilt because they got our card first.

Let me warn you that -- in keeping with the cutbacks and layoffs -- the newsletter is perhaps 60 percent less funny than previous years. No, this is more than just me trying to be like a campaign manager who manages expectations before his candidate debate. I just didn't have the time or the creative energy to keep it to previous year standards. The clock was ticking too loudly. It's still got a funny note or two, but don't un-subscribe after one weak season.

If you want to be part of a marketing focus group related to this year's letter, feel free to post comments here as to what you like in this year's letter or what you'd like improved in next year's version. I'll try next year to follow the politicians and make a product that appeals to all and offends to none. After all Christmas newsletters by committee is where it's at! :)

Yours in holiday cheer,

Mark

Best Moments at Yankees Stadium

2008-11-13T19:43:00.003-05:00

Well, the old stadium is really closed. Just yesterday I heard that they crated up Babe Ruth from Monument Park. We're excited about the new stadium as the old stadium really was archaic, but it does hold some great memories. In no particular order:

1. Josh's birthday party. Probably his best birthday EVER. School let out for the summer earlier that day, then all of his friends came to Yankees Stadium for a behind the scenes look. They got to sit in the dug out, walk on the warning track, visit the locker room, and sit in the press box. It was a beautiful summer day.

2. Best game I ever attended was July 1, 2003. In fact, when media and others sum up some of the best games ever, this was one of them. It was a Red Sox game (I think my only Red Sox game I attended). It was played as if it was Game 7 of the World Series. I went with Jason from my office, and it was magical. A batter was hit early in the game to start the bad blood. A couple of great home runs. But then it went wild as Derek Jeter charged a foul ball and ended up several rows into the stands. He came out bloodied and left the game. A-Rod moved from 3rd to his former position of shortstop (his first time to play SS for the Yankees). The Red Sox moved in an outfielder a couple of times to add an infielder to get a guy out at the plate...forcing players to switch gloves. They even had a play people thought was a triple play....before they realized that one Red Sox player was tagged out twice (which only counts once). In the end, the Yankees won in like 13 innings, and the crowd started chanting 1918 (the last time they had won the World Series). On a DVD we recently watched highlighting the Red Sox rivalry, this was featured.

3. First game at Yankees Stadium as an intern. It was against Oakland, and we sat in the bleacher seats. It was April 1993.

4. Mormon Night at Yankees Stadium. I think it was 2005 or maybe 2006. Matthew came and cheered like crazy, even though he was just a baby. My friend Mark was in town and came, too.

5. A game against the Twins on Labor Weekend when we had seats in the outfield. We were within a few rows of catching an A-Rod home run.

6. Yankees vs. KC on Friday night of Memorial Day weekend 2006. This was when Josh's Yankee fire got ignited within. My parents came and my brother, too, as he had just defended his thesis at NYU. The Yankees actually lost, though we left in the middle of the 9th due to a rain delay from a major cloud burst. But it all just clicked that night for him.

7. Perhaps the greatest game viewing experience we'll ever have. Our home teacher, who works for Sony (a major sponsor) got us tickets for Josh's birthday right behind home plate on the front row (though there were some "folding chair seats" added in front of us that were actually on the grass, but still.....) We actually didn't know our seats would be THAT good. It was truly, truly amazing.

But we're excited for the new stadium. If we can get tickets -- and afford them -- I'm sure it will be a great stadium. But it will be hard to match those memories....

Mark

New Calling

2008-11-02T23:11:00.004-05:00

Well, for the first time in 10 years, I'm not serving in the stake.

I was finally released from stake service and was called to a ward calling. I am now the President of the Priest Quorum in our ward. There's a lot to learn with that, so I may not post any fun items or such for a few days. But I'll return, I promise!

Mark

"For Better or For Worse"

2008-10-15T15:25:00.002-05:00

I'm returning again to my mention the other day of how I heard that the creator of the comic strip "For Better or For Worse" had divorced from her husband. I said it made me sad as many of the strips seem to be autobiographical and be a recipe for a successful marriage.

I'm writing again because three specific strips illustrate what I was saying and are worth preserving here:

(NOTE: though these are spoken by a guy character, it's obvious the artist was a female as guys aren't normally capable of being so wise in their words.)

1. The husband walks in from work and looks at his wife. He says "Hi honey, you look beautiful". She responds with "AKKK!" (oh wait, that's more a "Cathy" phrase) "I look horrible. My hair is a mess, my jeans are stained, I don't have any make-up on", etc. He says: "I know...but I'm looking at you...and you look beautiful".

2. The couple is on a Caribbean vacation, walking along a beach. There are lots of beautiful 'babes' in bikinis. The wife starts to feel a little self-conscious and says "Wow...there sure are a lot of beautiful women on the beach." The husband says "You're right....and I'm with one of them".

3. The husband comes in while the wife is working at her desk. He says "It's a beautiful fall night. Let's go for a romantic walk, just the two of us". She protests, saying she has so much to do, a column due for the local newspaper, lunches to pack for kids, etc. He says: "If you were single and the man of your dreams called you and asked to go on a long walk together, what would you do?" In the last frame, you seeing them out for a walk arm in arm.

I feel those same sentiments toward my wife.

Mark

PS I learned from Kathryn that one of her friends in California has been following this blog for some time....just wanted you to know that made my day when she told me. I'm not a big commenter on blogs, nor do I expect many comments on my blog, but it's nice to know a few people enjoy my ramblings.

An Autumn Drive in New Jersey

2008-10-10T20:45:00.002-05:00

It seems like about once every early October I get to do a 2 hour drive in the northeast to a client meeting.... either north to Massachusetts or south thru New Jersey. Today, it was the southern route. It was just a gorgeous drive...full fall colors haven't completely set in, but just having pockets of color as an accent is even more beautiful. As I headed into Princeton, I drive over a river / lake that is really pretty.

To help the time pass on the New Jersey Turnpike (which is NOT a pretty part of the drive), I listened to my sound track from Damn Yankees. It made me think about the musicals I used to see when I first came to New York City nearly 15 years ago.

Damn Yankees is certainly one of my top two or three. While one might not think it is on the surface, it is really a classic love story and has the right moral. I saw the mid-90s Broadway version perhaps 5 or 6 times. I'm one for finding something I like, and taking all my visitors to it when they come to town. As Broadway goes, it was one of the cleaner shows, though a male actor dropped a towel in a locker room scene to expose a bare butt. (When I took BYU interns, they were shocked, horrified and felt like I had taken them to the type of shows that used to litter Times Square.) I did get to see Jerry Lewis in the role of the devil a couple of times and he was great. And it's just got fun peppy dancing and songs.

Another favorite was Crazy for You, which is like the Mamma Mia formula where they took a bunch of Gershwin songs and made a story around it. It was just so laugh out loud funny. The star at the time was a really good physical comedy actor. I'd pay to see that again anytime.

The Fantasticks is another show that I think is just brilliant. I saw it about 8 times down in the Sullivan Theater (I think that's the name) where it ran and held the record for longest running, consecutive showings. It did finally close...and came back to Broadway last year in a bigger theater, but that's one that had to be seen in the small intimate theater. I think it held less than 100.

One last obscure show I saw 3 times but have never heard of since: "Two Piano Four Hands". It's a two-man show of really great piano players who illustrate the life of pianists. They came in and out of roles starting with the piano teacher forcing the kid to do his scales, then moved to when they were teenagers to the point that it became an addiction of sorts and that's all they did was practice rather than play sports, etc.

The end has them playing "Piano Man" in a bar....because what else could they do with these incredibly developed, monotone talent, so to speak (in other words, they played the piano and excelled in that talent to the exclusion of becoming well rounded). Extremely poignant and funny. Never been able to find this performed elsewhere....it takes just the right actors to pull that off who have the musical training.

That's my Broadway Beat.

Mark

PS -- On a completely unrelated note, never estimate the power of a cardboard box. I suppose that's why it was actually inducted into the Toy Hall of Fame. The three younger kids had the time of their life playing with the box that packaged the new dishwasher. Never seen them so happy or be so creative. Who needs real toys? (Oops...that's bad for me).

Are you listening?

2008-10-08T15:56:00.002-05:00

From a talk I gave two weeks ago in the Bronx....

=============

"Hopefully I don’t embarrass the bishop too much, but one morning, I took a train to work that made stops in the Bronx. As I exited the train, I noticed someone that looked like Bishop Kelly. As the crowd edged forward off the platform and I got near to him, I wasn’t 100 percent sure it was him, because I’d only seen Bishop Kelly in “Bishop clothes” and he was dressed more casually. So to hedge my bets, I got within ear shot and simply said “Ian” (that felt safer than saying ‘Bishop’). I got no response, so I edged closer and said “Ian” again. I finally worked myself up to being right next to him, and I noticed he couldn’t hear me because he was groovin’ to his I-Pod. While standing right next to him, I said “Ian” for the third time, but to no avail. Not wanting to scare him by tapping him on the shoulder, I let the moment pass and didn’t say hello.

I use that only to illustrate a point, not to be judgmental, as the Bishop certainly is allowed to listen to an I-Pod. My point is simply to ask ourselves how many times Heavenly Father has attempted to communicate to us through his still small voice but there wasn’t an occasion throughout our day when we could receive the signal because of our "noise". The spirit might even increase his volume or level of intensity, but if we'd blocked off the receiver, so to speak, we won't get the message. And after trying to deliver it a handful of times, the spirit may simply give up, thus depriving us what we could have learned from or benefited from had we provided a "quiet zone" in our day to receive radio signals from heaven."

Blogging at Piano Lesson

2008-09-25T18:46:00.002-05:00

Who knew I could pick up wireless here at my son's piano lesson (which is at his teacher's house). As I listen to scales and blues, here are some random items:

• Our two year old has a bias toward the numbers 5, 6, and 7. He continually counts "1,2,3,4,8..." No convincing otherwise can undo this.

• I asked my boss for a $700 billion loan. She said no. On that front, isn't is a mathematical coincidence that all of the nation's bad debt adds up to exactly $700 billion? Seems like they just picked that number at random. I'd feel the number was more legit if it were something like $700 billion, 400 dollars and 28 cents.....

• Woo-hoo! Radio Shack still carries cleaner for VCR machines. A whole world of video tapes are waiting to be watched again as soon as I get home from the piano lesson. Family movie night on Friday: Back to the Future!

• I was proud of Josh at his first baseball game last Saturday. He's playing with older kids, which isn't easy. And they play real rules, now. He didn't get to play the full time as they have 13 players, and when he was at bat (as No. 11....all kids hit, but only 10 can take the field) he struck out (though he did finally get a walk). But at the end of the first game (it was a double header), he helped preserve the team's victory! He was out in Right Field, and the play was in the infield. The shortstop or second baseman threw the ball to first to get out the batter, but it was a bad throw. But Josh, being the eager player that he is, ran up to 1st after the batter hit the ball to back up the 1st baseman. Good he did, because Josh got the overthrow, and when the runner tried to advance to 2nd, Josh threw to 2nd to get the out. YEA! They ended up winning 6 to 4. I told him he made the best of his limited playing time and opportunities to field.

• I've said before that Sprite is the default drink. No one 'chooses' it, but you get it because there is no other good option. On a plane, for example, I have to get it because I don't want caffeine and there's nothing else. It's just never a first choice drink....you drink it because it's there.

Well, I think ketchup is the same way. I like every other condiment more than ketchup. Mustard (yellow, not dijon) is always my first choice for ANYTHING...or BBQ, or ranch. But I will take ketchup for fries and such if nothing else is offered.

That's it for tonight....nice to do blogging at piano, but hard to fully compose my thoughts, so forgive if this isn't coherent.

New Noggin Schedule

2008-09-13T13:07:00.002-05:00

This is a record for postings in one week!

So Noggin, the cable 'preschool' channel, changed their line-up after Labor Day.

As I get up with the wee ones a little before 6 a.m. every morning, it was a big deal to see how the schedule changed (as that's what I turn on and then try to fall back asleep).

It used to be 64 Zoo Lane at 6 a.m., and Obi (I think that's how it is spelled) at 6:30 a.m.

Zoo Lane is such a gentle, tame, nice show. A little girl lives near the zoo, and the animals come out each night to tell her stories from their days in the wild. It seems to be from Australia, but I don't know why I say that.

Obi is just plain weird. It's a puppet show without the puppets. Just the hands. Who came up with that? They put eyes on the hands, and that's the characters. Once there was a foot, too.

Well, those shows are gone. Now at 6 a.m. we have Wow Wow Woobzie. (Again, pardon spelling). Weird, but harmless.

6:30 is a big improvement: Max and Ruby. I think this is out of Canada, but it's a sister bunny, and her baby brother bunny. Just so fun and innocent. Favorite kids show out there right now.

For those keeping score at home, 5:30 stayed the same with Lazytown....a show that kids sit down and are inactive for to learn the benefits of not being lazy. Hmmm. I can totally do without that show....if I can convince the kids to turn to the 24-hour PBS channel, we can watch Arthur at 5:30, and that's actually pretty engaging to the adult in the room.

Family Home Evening

2008-09-09T09:50:00.002-05:00

Three posts in three days....I may have to change the name of my blog.

Anyway, I witnessed genius last night in Family Home Evening. Just a small shift that made mountains of difference in our Family Home Evening.

After we walked in the door from fetching me at the train station, Kathryn just jumped right into FHE by having the kids draw pictures. No opening prayer or song....and that was the genius.

For our family, having a formal opening leads to major discontentment. Issues arise as to which song to sing, I didn't get to chose it, how come I don't get to say the opening prayer, why does it have to be a baby song, etc. So we just eliminated it. (If we continue with this, maybe Kathryn and I will open FHE with a silent prayer to ourselves).

But by asking them to all start by drawing a picture, it eliminated jockeying for "who gets something that no one else gets".

Josh did a very detailed picture. Matthew and Sam just scribbled but were engaged for a long time. So it was an easy way to tailor the lesson to reach both the older and younger kids.

Then she asked Josh the first questions, and they were "deeper" than what got asked to the other kids. After Josh answered questions first, he didn't feel the need to answer the little kids questions as he already demonstrated his proficiency.

The younger kids stayed engaged in the lesson -- they kept coloring, but at least they weren't running around, and I feel like they do pick up something.

I think part of the genius was simply not expecting them to sit still for the first 10 or 15 minutes....start right off with something that engages them and lets them use their motor skills....then the learning comes later.

On another note, I do believe that each word is significant in "Family Home Evening".

It should be just your own family....not an extended ward activity, lots of extra guests invited, etc.

It should be in the home....not an outing to the zoo or such. (Sure, there are exceptions, but....)

And it should be an evening...not just 15 minutes, not Sunday afternoon. It's "evening". After the lesson, I (for once) opted to not feel distracted or wanting to do my own stuff. Rather, I set aside in my mind that I would play toys with the three younger kids for a full half hour before doing stories, etc. for bed. The computer and TV stayed off all night. FHE should be "an evening" set aside for the family, not just the lesson time.

OK, that's all I have.

Mark

For Better or For Worse

2008-09-08T13:59:00.002-05:00

So, I read an AP story this weekend that left me a little sad. I had heard that my much-loved comic strip "For Better or For Worse" was wrapping up. It has always been one of the best written comic as it has been very real, with the characters growing and changing and maturing. That's so rare in the comic world. But even more so, it was such a sentimental strip with many strips just being heart warming than funny.

I'm not sad that she wrapped it up as it's gone for 29 years. And the final Sunday strip wrapped up story lines and flash forwarded to highlight what happens to the characters in the future. Now, it goes back to its origins telling the story when the 'grown kids' are back to being just young 'uns and will mix new strips drawn in the old style with recycled ones.

I'm fine with that.

But at the end of the story, it mentioned that Lynn Johnson, the cartoonist, had split from her husband after more than 30 years. That depressed me. Perhaps it's because I always felt the comic mirrored their life, and while it wasn't always perfect, it always seemed to 'make it'. In a weird way, it was inspiration that good will prevail and faithfulness and family life can succeed.

Now it feels like the strip and its senitimentalism -- was a bit staged.

As a bit of a comparison, perhaps that's why we hear of stories of people who want us as LDS to succeed in keeping our standards. Why people sometimes WON'T let us compromise our standard because it provides hope to them vicariously that while they may not be able to live the standard or have the faithful family life, it still exists in society and is achievable.

But when someone you respect and admire falls, it makes you feel just a touch if anyone can make it....speaking more on the LDS person remaining faithful than simply my personal feeling to see that a cartoonist's marriage failed.

Not sure if this all makes sense....but then that's why I like to blog....I don't have to be completely articulate and can just let it be a first draft of my thoughts, so to speak.

Mark

Some More About Summer

2008-09-07T22:04:00.002-05:00

A few other thoughts about the summer that didn't make the last cut:

• It's fun to watch the wheels work in Matthew's mind. I could just see them churning when we were on Joyce's boat. He just had his eyes gazing out on the water and the splashing of the wake, etc., and you could just see he was absorbing all the stimulation. I see that now at nights as he scans the Richard Scarry "Busy People" book. He sits on his bed for 15 minutes just looking at all the pictures and studying them.

FYI -- that's the exact same copy of the Richard Scarry book that I got in the hospital when I was 7. And now the kids are playing with my Richard Scarry toys from that same era.

• The one glitch in our water skiing trip was when Sammy threw the safety flag into the lake and saw it sink. "Flag go Bye-Bye!"

• We visited Promentory Point on the way home from Idaho. It's where the transcontinental railroad met. I wish we had had more time but we got a late start due to the fire alarm at the hotel in the middle of the night. (FYI -- I wrote asking for a credit of one-half the bill due to the fire alarm, and received it. Yea for writing a letter!) Anyway, at least Josh and Caroline will have a point of reference when they study it in school eventually. Probably only kids in their class who will be able to say "I've been there".

• Best water park ride EVER: The Rapids at Cherry Hills. I LOVED going to Cherry Hills. Just mellow and the right pace for me...and the kids. The rapids aren't over-the-top, but just enough adventure, and getting wet that I loved it. Never been on a better one in my life. Perhaps best 30 minutes of my summer when I just went down in again and again.

• When we lay outside at Joyce's sleep watching a movie before going to bed, Matthew saw a star, and said the "Star Light, Star Bright" poem. His wish: that daddy would sleep next to him outside. It's nice to be the loved Daddy.

And for new stuff now...

• I bought the whole WKRP in Cincinnati series on DVD. Fun to see that some of those episodes really hold up! Also enjoying my Hawaii Five-O DVDs that I watch on business trips.

• In a year of obscure moments, perhaps the biggest was hosting 8 Elvises in Las Vegas at the Eiffel Tower restaurant for a Monopoly World Record. More to follow on that in my Christmas Letter.

Random Summer Sign-Offs

2008-08-27T14:11:00.002-05:00

Sitting in the Vegas airport awaiting flight home after staging world record Monopoly attempt that involved eight Elvis impersonators within the replica Eiffel Tower. Could my job be any sweeter? I submit to you it cannot!

Some random nuggets from my week in Utah with the family earlier this month:

• We've deemed a new color on the color wheel....it is called "Coronado Blonde". That's the bleached-out color our kids hair gets after being to Coronado. Even our brown-haired kid's hair goes much lighter, so he's Coronado Brown.

• We went to the Twin Falls Temple Open House. Matthew didn't want to put on the little shoes to protect the carpets. Why? "Because you told me Booty is a bad word, so we can't wear the booties....."

• We had to evacuate the Twin Falls hotel at 3:30 a.m. when the fire alarm went off. It ultimately was a false alarm, but they didn't know that for quite some time. That's a scary experience to think "Gee, this might be real." Packed up the sleeping kids, grabbed the wallets and got out.

• When wondering if we should eat at Shari's in Twin Falls, Kathryn asked the restaurant if they "had multiple locations". They said, yes, they have many restaurants across the west. As a chain-lover when it comes to restaurants, I see that as a seal of approval. (It's also part of a big inside joke with me). But because they could confirm that there were others just like them, we ate there.

• Good to know I can still water ski. It may be only one lap around Hyrum Lake once every 3 years, but it counts.

• We fell in love with Idaho, especially Twin Falls. New game plan when I leave NYC: get a professor job at College of Southern Idaho in Twin Falls

Next posting: High School Reunion!

Vacation, Day 9

2008-07-18T20:58:00.002-05:00

Sunday, July 13

Well, time for our annual parting from one another -- I head to Newark and back to work for a few weeks, and Kathryn and the kids go off to Utah for time with the cousins.

My flight is at 8 a.m., and Kathryn and the kids don't leave til 10 a.m.

Uneventful flights for both of us. I drive home listening to the comedy CD Liz gave me of Brian Regan. We heard much of it on the way to the ball game on Friday. Very funny stuff. Keeps me laughing.

I get home to find everything at home in order.

My first night of "freedom" without kids or family responsibilities. How do I celebrate? I read the new Parenting magazine cover from cover. Wild times!

Vacation, Day 8

2008-07-18T20:55:00.003-05:00

Saturday, July 12

Well, our last day on the beach. There's never any guarantee we'll be back next year (we've gone 4 years in a row). Always hard to say goodbye to the beach, though we had had an extra day or two at the start of the vacation, and I think we were ready to be done with the beach. As great as a vacation as it is, it does involve work. As a kid, it was all about just sitting and reading and worrying about yourself. Instead of reading a few novels, I successfully read one short story....and that's fine with me.

I wish we had taken one last stroll down the beach at the end as the water and the light gets so pretty just after 3 p.m. But that's OK...the kids were ready to go.

Vacation, Day 7

2008-07-18T19:49:00.003-05:00

FRIDAY, July 11, 2008 (MY BIRTHDAY)

It's always super-special to get to spend my birthday with the family (that doesn't always happen) and on vacation.

Highlights included a Navy jet fly-over at the conclusion of singing Happy Birthday on the beach (the Navy trains pilots at the north end of the island, so they fly over all the time), a huge dolphin encore in the water (the closest I've ever seen them to shore, and it was like they were actually playing!), and even fireworks (details to come).

I also went to Subway to get lunch for a few of us....when ordering for multiple people, I sure prefer some place like McDonald's. Subway takes me "drive thru ordering" phobia and multiplies it by a ton. Too many variables to try and get straight, especially when the line is already out the door. Ugh.

That evening, my major present was getting to go to a Padres game with several of the family, including Kathryn and Josh, my Dad, and Liz, her husband and their son. PETCO PARK is a beautiful field...though I think it's a little weird to name the park after a pet supply store. But going to a game there is just a joy. We were on the very back row of the stadium behind home plate, which turned out to be a bonus! We could see over the top to watch the train and light rail yard, ships in the harbor, and, as mentioned above, fireworks toward the end of the game!

The Padres, though in last place, played well! They won 4-0. We got to see Jake Peavy, a great pitcher, and the all-time saves leader Trevor Hoffman, too. The Padres had 3 triples (well, one was an error). Oh, and it was free beach towel night AND $1 hot dogs and soda.

I sat next to my dad for the first few innings and it was just nice to chat for a long time.

It was the perfect birthday celebration. Exactly what I hoped for.

Vacation, Day 6

2008-07-18T19:44:00.002-05:00

Thursday, July 10

Matthew will now pee in the ocean, but doesn't go out far enough....just stands at the edge of the water and goes. Ah well, it's saving me a trip to the restrooms.

We see dolphins today! They're out a little ways, but they are definitely there. They stick around for a while.

Kathryn got a jogging stroller for the trip that is great for allowing Sammy a way to fall asleep on the beach. The only challenge is pushing it across the sand from the stairs to the water's edge, which in Coronado is a hefty distance. Pushing it makes me think what it must have been like to push a handcart, though I guess that was more work, with less of a pay-off (i.e. a beautiful beach).

That night, we somewhat impromptu-ly decide to go to the San Diego temple. John's wife Jennifer agrees to drive us in their car....perhaps it's a bit weird to arrive at the temple with one man, and two women, both with the same last name as the husband. Ah well.

I had a really peaceful time at the temple and am so glad we went! I think I can't fully 'unwind' when I go to the Manhattan temple because I'm trying to figure out which train I'm going to take home. But just sitting in the chapel waiting for the session was so peaceful, reading 2 Ne 10 (I'm not doing so well on my reading). It was all about just "being in the moment".

That temple is a bit over the top....the only thing they didn't include were cup holders in the chairs. Looking around the session, perhaps that would have been a good idea.

Vacation, Day 5

2008-07-18T19:35:00.003-05:00

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

It's our off-day from the beach. We always like to take at least one off-day from the beach during the week to give our skin a break. We hadn't done the zoo ever (hard to believe), so it fit the bill. Thanks to my sister for letting me borrow their car. My brother's family came along with us, too, in their car.

Of course, we were the first car in the parking lot (do we know any other way?) It's cheaper than Sea World, and I think worth what they charge. We took a tour of the zoo on a bus, then explored on foot.

No surprise...the kids loved the pandas and koalas. But I think I was surprised at how cool the hippo was.

It was an overcast -- and thus, cool -- day. And the crowds weren't there throughout the morning. That sure made it a pleasant visit. Our package allowed for rides on the Skyfari, which Matthew loved. (In fact, at the end of the day, we did one more round trip with Caroline just to enjoy it again).

By 1 p.m., we had seen most of the zoo, and then went to a sea lion show, which I didn't think lived up to expectations (perhaps I expected Sea World). We trudged on to the children's zoo, then I was hot and miserable. We packed our own lunch so we could splurge on treats. Great idea as nothing in my life tasted any better at 2 p.m. than a $4 ICEE (with $2 collectible straw as they don't offer straws to save the environment or the whales or something). I submit that nothing has ever tasted nicer or frostier in my life. I was one satisfied customer. I also got to finish all the kids' soft-serve ice creams.

We went for a ride on the little train outside the zoo in Balboa Park. That, too, was one of the biggest hits of the day.

As we had a free car, we went back to the swimming pool down "the Strand". Just long enough to cool off!

That night, I watched "Shall We Dance" (the original, Japanese version), which is a favorite for me and Kathryn, while Kathryn lay next to me and slept and occasionally woke up to read a subtitle or two. Hey, it had been a long day.....

Vacation: Day 4

2008-07-18T19:30:00.002-05:00

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

How did Matthew go from Newark to San Diego without using the bathroom? On the beach, it seems like he wants to visit the yucky bathrooms every hour or two.

We've tried to teach him it's OK to pee in the ocean. He's not a fast learner on this front.

The walk feels like a 1/4 to 1/2 mile, but it's probably not even close to that. Just feels that way with the sand. But I think he just likes the walk and alone time with dad. He is constantly just stopping along the way to sit down, chat, make a sand angel, etc.

While the walk and the very smelly bathroom are bad, the worse part is he expects a shoulder's ride back to the camp afterward -- every sandy little cuteness that he is.

We're bringing our lunch down every day, and I don't mind because I've become re-acquainted with an old friend: relish! I can eat turkey every day when there is relish!

We watch the Incredibles that night with various kids.

Vacation: Day 3

2008-07-18T19:16:00.002-05:00

Monday, July 7, 2008

I love the local PBS station, and always have. They seem to have mastered the right mix of programs from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. to keep the kids entertained until it's beach time. My only complaint is "whiny-boy Cailou" is now on at 6 a.m. But then it's non-stop great hits!

6:30: Zoboomafoo -- it's an animal show that we only see in San Diego. Always a huge hit!

7 a.m. -- Curious George -- so cute and innocent and just pleasant. I've been known to stop on a Curious George episode when flipping channels on a business trip.

7:30 a.m -- Clifford -- nothing wrong with the big red dog. Cute and nicely done.

8 a.m. -- Wordworld -- this is new to me, but apparently Caro and Matthew have seen it before, and they LOVE it.

8:30 -- Dragon tales (OK, the weak spot of the line up. I'm SO over that)

9 a.m. - Super Why. Never heard of it, but a big hit!

Good day on the beach. Great waves again. And great to have all the cousins, grandkids, my siblings, parents, etc. on the beach.

None of my siblings claim the parents....score for us! Extra "free dinner out"! Went for Mexican.

Vacation: Day 2

2008-07-18T19:10:00.002-05:00

Sunday, July 6, 2008

How to spend Sunday on vacation? Always a quandary. If we had a car, we'd probably try church again, like last year. Then again, we ended up going to sacrament meeting and just sitting in the foyer (that's such a Mormon word) with cranky kids.

We settled on a trip to a local park to play with the kids, then a family home evening in the condo that allowed the kids to give reports that they had prepared on animals we would see at the zoo later that week.

I took the older 3 kids swimming at the pool where we have rights to swim courtesy of the Condo. It's about 4 miles away (we travel by cab). It was a good diversion for the kids. Caroline went to an on-site science class that she considered one of the highlights of the whole trip (they made a super ball). Go figure....glad I let her do it!

Then I took us to our newest find in Coronado: the library! For $5, we could get guest library cards, and check out lots of stuff! Tons of books for Josh to read, plus several bedtime stories for the younger kids, and even some kids videos, and a foreign video for the adults ($0.50 per video). Plus, they have a great play area in the library with puppets, puzzles, a train going around up high, and other nice displays. Definitely going to return to the library again next year! That seems a perfect Sunday activity on vacation.

My brother John and sister Liz and their families arrive that evening.

Vacation: Day 1

2008-07-18T19:04:00.002-05:00

Saturday, July 5th

It's like being a part of the best Easter Egg hunt ever!

Our new tradition is to go to down to the beach at sunrise on our first morning at Coronado. And why not? With the time zones, the kids are already up by 5:30 a.m. local time.

The hunt is for sand dollars. At low tide, they are everywhere. You just run from one to another stashing into your bag. And you have the whole beach to yourself. This morning, it was a really brilliant sunrise in terms of the lighting.

We also headed to the rocks to see sand crabs and other little critters and birds.

Then it's off to the fancy diner for breakfast, another first morning tradition. As a bleu cheese lover, I was a major sucker for the bleu cheese omelet...can't believe I've never seen that on a menu before!

The beach waves are AWESOME, AWESOME! Best in years for boogie boarding....big enough to scare you, but not so big as to wipe you out (too much).

With no other grandkids around yet (they arrive on Sunday), it's easy to monopolize the grandparents for free babysitting. Kathryn and I get to have a great dinner at the Hotel Del Coronado across the street. Great food, and even greater view! Some gourmet hot chocolate from the coffee bar serves as the perfect ending to a perfect start to the vacation.

Vacation: Day 0

2008-07-18T18:55:00.003-05:00

Friday, July 4, 2008

It's time for the annual trek out west, which begins with a week in Coronado, the peninsula across the bay from San Diego.

While our official time in my parents' timeshare doesn't begin until Sunday, we choose to leave today. For starters, a couple extra days in California means more time (hopefully) when are kids will acclimate to the time zone and won't get up at 3 a.m. local time.

But flights were easier to obtain on the evening of July 4th. Apparently it's actually a smart day and time to fly. In fact, airlines often schedule the fewest flights of the year (to date) on that day than any other day. Who knew?! That gave me hope that if thunderstorms pop up and delay flights that there will be less flights to clog up the runways when the storms pass.

We fly out of Newark and all is well. No flight delays at all! Knock on wood, I have had horrible travels on business trips, but never with the family....I always bargain with the Lord to make it that way.

Matthew flies from Newark to San Diego without using the bathroom (the toilet on the plane scared him).

Continental served dinner, which is nice....but in a way, slightly annoying. I'm kind of now prefer the no meal approach as it's just one more thing to juggle while entertaining the kids, and the kids don't eat the plane food anyway.

We land around 9 p.m. local time and -- surprise -- FIREWORKS! From above the baggage concourse, we can see THREE separate displays! Such savvy planners. But alas, the payback is major traffic getting from San Diego to Coronado. Ah well...we landed with no kid incidents, so what else matters?

How to Get Invited Back as a Guest

2008-06-29T20:19:00.003-05:00

We've had a lot of great guests (both friends and family) over the years, but the visit by Kathryn's Uncle Don and Aunt Sally took things to a new level this weekend. Here's what made them the ultimate house guests:

1. Don, who is quite handy with tools and such, did several things around the house that have been on my list for quite some time. These included:

• fixed the 'dangling' microwave as it hung from only one screw beneath the cupboard
• hung two bi-fold closet doors
• inspected the garage door 'intercept eye' (he couldn't fix it, but now I know it needs a part)
• hung the curtain rod in our living room
• hung the curtain rod in our upstairs playroom
• installed an electronic smoke detector and carbon monoxide detector in a spot where an old smoke detector hung out of the ceiling looking pathetic
• installed a new chandelier
• installed a dimmer switch on the chadelier switch
• put handle back on one of our French doors

2. Sally was pretty amazing, too. She sewed and hemmed the drapes we hung, made homemade cookies twice, became Caroline's best friend, and blew dozens of bubbles for Sammy.

3. Todd, their 15 year old, taught Josh all the ins and outs of his new Wii, then also played baseball with Josh a ton. He also helped me get a bunch of old junk out of the attic that our previous owners had left behind.

4. On top of all that, they treated us to dinner the first night...then offered to pay for the babysitter (we said no). And Don went with us to the school playground twice to help us entertain the kids.

5. But it was more than all the great things they did for us. They were just so fun to have around, especially for marathon rounds of cribbage at night. Even if they had not done work on our house, it would have been such a great weekend just having them here.

The only thing is they potentially could have stayed til Tuesday morning, but opted to leave this morning to go see other parts of the northeast. They certainly didn't wear our their welcome...perhaps we simply wore them out instead. :)

Now the bar has been set for future guests. :)
Just kidding...we'll take any and all guests that we can get to come see us in NYC!

(Let's see if I can't get another couple of posts before we leave on vacation for the 4th).

Mark

Memorial Day Weekend, Pt. 2

2008-05-31T21:25:00.002-05:00

So once the holiday weekend actually began, I took Caroline camping on the Father's and Daughters campout at Camp Liahona. I really dislike camping and wasn't looking forward to it at all. But I have to say it was actually wonderful.

For starters, camping with daughters rather than sons is a piece of cake. They are so happy and easy to care for. Caroline wanted to help put the tent up, then it was like playing house once we could get inside. The girls don't go running off into the forest or such. All the girls (it was mostly Primary-age range) played so nicely together and were inclusive. They built some things in the sand on the beach, and no one tried to destroy it.

For me, the value of the trip was seeing Caroline genuinely smile the entire time. I'd never seen that. It was such a treat for her to have Daddy all to herself and for it to be a 'girl time' instead of the brothers dominating.

Oh, and at 9 p.m., she said "I think it's time that I go to bed."

Not too bad....

Memorial Day Weekend: Pt. 1 - Toronto

2008-05-29T14:59:00.004-05:00

So, I picked up a new city, a new state (kind of), a new country, and a new baseball stadium all in one day last week. I had my first trip to Canada as I went to a Hasbro meeting in Toronto. Struggled to get any of the Canadian money....the ATMs just wouldn't work. But other than that, the airport was nice and efficient.

We went to a Toronto Blue Jays (vs. Angels) game at what used to be called the SkyDome. I got us wicked lost driving into Toronto, so we got to the game late (about 7:45 for a 7 p.m. start). And trying to get the parking payment system to work below the stadium was like using the ATMs. But what a stadium! You walk through the main door (like a giant convention hall) and then WOW! there's the field and such. It's a huge place, and yet the stadium itself seemed intimate.

We had seats in the lower section behind home plate. They won't let you walk to your seats when a batter is up....have to wait til a batter finishes (feels so tennis). And they have cops (no Mounties) lining the foul line between innings to I suppose prevent lawless people from running on to the field.

I missed the most golden opportunity to get a foul ball! I was with a client and someone from work, and we weren't really focusing on the game, when a ball flies over the backstop net. It came right at us, which is a lot more scary than I thought. We actually all kind of dove under our seats (chickens!). The ball landed a few rows behind us (we were in an area without other people right around us. I didn't think to try and grab it or see where it went. Well, it bounced and landed literally in the seat next to me. I only know that because some bloke came over at the end of the row and took the ball out of the seat and claimed it. I don't blame them, but I feel like an idiot!

Coolest feature at the game? They sell ICEEs via the in-aisle vendors. But alas, I didn't have any Canadian cash.

It was actually a really good game....Toronto won by one. Too bad we kind of weren't watching it too closely. But it had some home runs, a triple, some bloop singles, a double play, etc.

The dome was closed...when we left, we knew why as it was kind of a chilly night. (Redundant in Canada?)

Watched the news that night...surprised by how much coverage they gave to things in the states, including the weather. Like they were giving forecasts for what was going to be coming across Colorado and Wyoming. I live in New York, and we don't care about the weather out there.

We did see the CN tower lit up...that's pretty cool.

Stake Conference in the Bronx

2008-05-04T20:41:00.002-05:00

As strange as it sounds, I really like our need to be creative when hosting stake conference in the Bronx. It's just such a New York-type thing.

In theory people can take the Metro North train to the meeting, but realistically, most choose not to. It involves about a 3/4 mile walk up a hill from the train station, and the train schedule is close, but not perfect, for the meeting times.

So instead we pull a "loaves and fishes" with our 22-space parking garage underneath the chapel.

In the early days of living here, they filled the 22 spaces and that was it.

Now, we double-park (or quadruple park, or whatever) to fill every last inch with cars. We had a high councilor several years ago who accepted the assignment and he was a master at it....our own pioneer, if you will. He has been released, and it now takes a quorum army to do what he did by himself. One Elders Quorum took last night, and another took this morning. About 6 to 7 people are guiding cars into the slots (involving major backing up and praying that no cars get dented).

Last night, the neighboring ward's quorum volunteers got 67 cars in. As we are a numbers-driven church, our ward's quorum set a higher goal of 70 cars for today. I asked for the totals when I left to drive home: 73 cars, 1 taxi and 1 motorcycle...a new Stake Conference record!

(In the defense of the other ward, one car that was imbedded deep in the garage had to get out between the leadership and adult session, and they claim that they lost a few car spaces by shuffling them out of there).

After conference, "the last shall be first" and the last two cars truly prevent everyone else from leaving. If you came late, you'd better plan to leave early.

The rest of us just mingle around in a cave of bumper-to-car-door cars waiting for your space to open up to exit. All are out within 15 minutes, and it's just kind of New Yorky to hang out in the garage.

(I've suggested we move to the annual stake picnic to the garage after stake conference....pass around some potato salad, say a blessing, and call it an activity).

As they used to say in a column in the New York Post: "Only in New York, kids, Only in New York!"

Cleaning Out

2008-04-20T21:03:00.002-05:00

We are doing some major remodeling at our office. We have closed one half of our office for remodeling, and moved people to the basement and the 12th floor during the work.

As I had to abandon my office, it was a great time to purge. I tossed tons of stuff and it was very liberating. Files that I hadn't used in years. Old 3/4 inch videotapes that I'll never view again. Files of clients that left us years ago. The landfill may hate me, but I feel a lot freer.

I've been thinking how that accumulation happens in a house. It really is just a natural process. The other day, I read an article talking about the high calorie count of some restaurant entrees. It did the math, and said even if you just eat that many extra calories by going to the restaurant once a month, over the course of a year you'd add XX amount of pounds...and XX amount of pounds in XX amount of years. Just one simple meal can add that much....a little like Elder Uchdorf saying that being one degree off when flying around the earth would get you off course by 500 miles.

How does that relate to home clutter? Well, we all save stuff, whether it's books we finished reading, art projects of kids, old tax records, etc. I don't know the number, but let's assume we naturally add another 100 pounds of stuff to house a year. (Not hard to assume if you include heavier purchases) In 20 years, that's ONE TON more stuff than when you moved in.

I guess my point is just the need to regularly and routinely have a purging process to simply stay at par. To avoid being overrun, you need to eliminate at least as much as you accumulate each year or else you're losing the war.

Notes from the Cruise

2008-04-09T11:00:00.003-05:00

Well, sadly, it's now been a full month since our Caribbean Cruise launched. But I still have great memories of a nice relaxing week.

So what impressions remain in my head after being home for a month? Here's just a random few:

1. We're really 'Anytime Dining' people. That means you don't have a set time to go to dinner nor have an assigned table of dinner guests. Quite frankly, I sit through enough client dinners where I need to make small talk and pretend to be friendly that I don't need that on a cruise. (I know, I'm anti-social).

I liked the Grand Princess (which we took this time) better than the Caribbean Princess (which we took last time) because the "Anytime Dining" rooms had more personable "tables for two". I went on the cruise to become reacquainted to my spouse...and having private tables to have private discussions during dinner was AWESOME!

2. We were big fans of going down to the dining room for breakfast. Nothing wrong with the buffet, but we kind of liked having a "served" breakfast every morning.

3. On our first cruise out to St. Thomas and St. Maartin, it really felt like we were out in the middle of the ocean and far away from the world. This trip was kind of circumference of Cuba, so I kind of felt less isolated (unfortunately). I liked feeling like there's no civilization for miles around.

4. I like being entertained by a comedian! There's always a moment when you worry they may cross the line, but if they don't, it's so much fun. It's something I don't think I could do here in NYC...can't imagine there's a lot of "TV clean" comedians at the clubs. We also liked the comedian juggler.

5. As my brother and his wife were sailing on the same ship two weeks after we did, I set up a scavenger hunt on the boat to find certain words/letters, etc. It was actually a lot of fun for me! My favorite was sticking a business card in a Shakespeare book in the library....it was still there when he came to find it.

Off on a cruise

2008-03-08T10:44:00.002-05:00

As most of you know, my parents were gracious enough to provide Kathryn and me with a cruise....so we're outta here!

We're sitting at the Fort Lauderdale airport as it's too early to go to the ship, so thought I'd just say this is, indeed, still an active blog, and that more will be written when I return.

But some random thoughts that have floated in my head in the last week...

• I was in LA last week for a meeting....can you not help but smile when you are in California?

• My rental car out there looked like a hearse. Odd.

• I stayed at the W....very fancy and fun, but a tad too trendy and chic for me....I think they would have liked to deny me entry if they could. As I spent just from 9 p.m. to 4 a.m. in the room, it's a little excessive. But if Kathryn and I could stay there together some time....

• LA loves cars, but don't love to give you a place to park. I had to use a pay lot to park my hearse and go to In n Out burger. But that's worth it.

• On a whim, I did a session at the LA temple. I was already dressed for the part, and my meetings were pretty close by. It was a fun experience. Since I went several years ago, they've remodeled it so you travel room to room to watch the video, not just sit in one place.

That's about it.....catch you on the flip side of the cruise.

Mark

E-Mail Bankruptcy

2008-02-23T15:57:00.002-05:00

I've heard people talk about declaring email bankrupcy....they get so many emails that they feel they can never get back on top of them to respond and act upon all of them.

They simply trash them all, start clean, and hope for improvement moving forward.

Not a real bad idea....I get more than 200 a day (though half go straight to my junk folder). But if I'm out for a few days, it will take me a week or two to sort through them all, read and learn what I'm supposed to learn, or provide a response.

Bankruptcy doesn't sound too bad.

Mark

Monopoly

2008-02-02T23:58:00.000-05:00

Hi all:

Tired of the Primaries? Well, vote in an election where you can make a difference!

Monopoly is creating the first-ever WORLD edition of the game, with a game board featuring the greatest cities in the world. What are those cities? YOU DECIDE!

From now until Feb. 28, you can vote for 10 cities once a day at www.monopoly.com. You'll need to create an identity based on your email address the first time you vote, but then it's very simple.

There's a ballot of 68 candidates, with the top 20 making the board. (The final two spots are reserved for "Wild Cards").

New York City -- the greatest city in the world -- is faring well, but just slipped to yellow. Don't you think it should be a blue? Help get us back up there? Surprisingly, the actual number of votes dividing the leaders isn't huge, so every vote counts.

And while I love all the world cities, I think the U.S. should have AT LEAST two on the board. Vegas is the next likely to get back up on the board, so, please consider voting for them.

One other note: if you vote for cities ahead of NYC based on the leader board, you don't really give a 'push' to NYC, so you may want to omit voting for them, even if you love London. Otherwise, NYC doesn't move in the rankings.

Here's wishing eternal Free Parking to all who vote early and often (daily!).

Mark

Apostles

2008-02-02T23:57:00.000-05:00

The problem with becoming an apostle is knowing that you will either become the prophet one day or else die trying....

Mark

The Unwritten Policy

2008-02-01T22:22:00.000-05:00

When watching the kids who are still in diapers, there are times when you suspect that they have a dirty diaper -- and you know you can confirm it by sniffing the child's bottom. But you also know that if you sort of "ignore" the initial whiff (and don't do the confirming 'bottom sniff') you can pretend you didn't know the child had a dirty diaper on your shift...and it hence becomes the responsibility of the person who inherits watching said child next.

In cases like this, it's a matter of "Don't Ask, Don't Smell"

Mark

Two more thoughts...

2008-01-26T14:28:00.000-05:00

1. What is the statue of limitations in terms of how long a completed jigsaw puzzle must remain sitting on a dining room table before being dismantled? Is there a formula based on the amount of time it took to complete it? We took three weeks finishing this triangular-shaped balloon puzzle....and now that it's finished, it seems very unsatisfying to put it away. Yet should we keep it forever as a trophy to the world showing what I did?

Two to three days seems about right....just to reinforce to each of us that we achieved a great accomplishment.

(It's kind of like books in a bookshelf. Why do we keep books we've already read? As a tribute to what we read? If we never think we're going to read it again, we should immediately donate it to a library...why take up valuable house space showcasing what we've already read.)

2. Sometimes I worry that we aren't doing enough for food storage.
But then I cleaned out the car the other day and realized we're just keeping our food storage in the car! I probably vacuumed out a day or two supply of Goldfish, fruit snacks and other sundry items that seem to preserve quite well. And better to have it in the car than in the home as it's mobile in case you have to evacuate. Plus, no matter how many goldfish crackers are in the car seat already, it seems like you can always fit more, so storage is never an issue.....

Mark

New Year Musings

2008-01-24T20:24:00.000-05:00

Ah, the New Year. A time when things get busier in the toy industry than during the holidays (as we gear up for the NEXT holiday season). As such, my blog has suffered -- this after the potential surge of readership that could have occurred after mailing my Christmas card.

For those faithful who waited patiently for some new content, here we go:

• Noggin, the pre-school channel, is now 24 hours a day. It used to just be 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Lucky me...I got to experience the first "overnight" Noggin as I was up New Year's Day around 4:30 with one of the kids. Yes, there is a market for 24 hours pre-school channels.

• Matthew has no desire to be potty trained. Before Christmas, I made a run to Target and saw how much pull-ups cost! So I've now decided to deduct the cost of the pull-ups from the monthly amount I used to set aside for his college fund. If he doesn't have enough to make it through school, well, it's not my fault.

• Giants vs Patriots....not as good as Red Sox/Yankees, but fun all the same, especially as we get to play the underdog for a change in the Boston/New York relationship.

• Getting a window seat in a row of three on my morning and evening train to the city is very important to me. 95 percent of the time, it means you have an open seat next to you as very rarely does someone attempt to sit in the middle seat. (Across the aisle are rows of two). I'll gladly sit in a row of three close to a stinky bathroom if it means getting a coveted window seat of a three. I'd rather put up with the smell than miss out on my desired seat.

• I feel like I've arrived. We're doing a worldwide Monopoly vote campaign right now (I'll write about that later, but visit www.monopoly.com) and I get to do a radio interview in a few minutes with the largest station in South Africa. I couldn't be more excited.

• My next talk in church is going to be: Lessons from assembling jigsaw puzzles that can be applied to home teaching.

• I think Environmentalism is the new world religion....or at least it's the replacement for organized religion in some people's lives.

• I can now add a new name to list of famous people I've worked with in my odd career: Miss Universe.

I'll try to write some more powerful insights in the next few days.

Mark

Christmas Gifts

2007-12-31T11:08:00.000-05:00

A roundup and ranking of Christmas Gifts:

• Ball Pit for Samuel (18 months): I'm a big believer in the "Wow" factor of Christmas morning, meaning when the kids enter the family room, there is that magical "Willy Wonka"-esque feeling of "This is the best day of the year". (I'm also a big believer in presents that are "things you can do/enjoy on Christmas day" - even if they get tossed out afterward.)

So it is with that principle we agreed to let Santa bring a $19.99 ball pit for Sammy, knowing it wouldn't last long. It didn't...the seams popped within a couple of hours. But during those first few hours, it was big, bright, colorful, full of wonder and adventure, so it did its job. Plus....bonus! 20-some odd plastic balls for Sam (who is a ball lover) to still play with.

RANK: 3 Christmas Trees out of 4

• Indoor Trampoline that incorporates electronic game component for Matty (nearly 4): Great idea in theory....still sitting unassembled in the garage in practice. We literally had 5 adults trying to assemble it on Christmas night before we gave up at 1 a.m. in fear that we'd bump into Santa's arrival (or Josh's traditional awaking at 3 a.m....which happened at 3:20 a.m. this year). It actually made me yearn for assembling an IKEA item...or at least to have their instruction booklet. We made it through the first 18 steps, and hope to do the last 12 (for a total of 30....no kidding) before next week. Next time, just get a pre-assembled jogging tramp.

Rank: 1.5 Christmas Trees out of 4 (which should change to 3.5 out of 4 when assembled)

• TV Show Newhart on DVD. This 80s TV show represented our family's family home evening as we'd all gather on Monday night to watch it. While it's not officially out on DVD yet, there are some companies that sell complete copies of TV series for a very reasonable price. Not sure how they pull it off...sort of the military "don't ask, don't tell", I'm guessing. Seemed to be taped off of Canadian TV. (If you want the web site, let me know and then you can check out all the series that are available) At any rate, MAJOR hit for my Dad.

Rank: 4.5 Christmas Trees out of 4.

• Headphones: I thought I'd get some nice but inexpensive headphones for Kathryn for use at the gym. Didn't realize I ordered high tech ones used in studios with fancy equipment. The plug is long and not standard for music players, gym equipment, etc. Can't return it as I ordered online and opened it. (Anyone want them?)

Rank: 0 Christmas Trees out of 4.

• PlayStation Portable with MLB game for Josh (age 8). We relented and allowed Santa to bring one for Josh. It's awesome, but hard to master. In the end, Josh was back online playing the more simple "MiniClip" games by Christmas night. I think he was a tad disappointed that it's harder to play than he imagined. But in the long run, this will be a good gift.

Rank: 3 Christmas Trees out of 4.

• Jam Pack Jam: This is the new Cranium game for the season. I had read about it in a magazine gift guide (as I spend so much time trying to get toys/games into gift guides, it's nice to see from a consumer point of view that it works!). The idea is you have 14 objects and must try to get 4 or 5 of them into the trunk of an SUV AND close the trunk. If you don't, they all pop out like in Perfection. Simple concept, but it has enthralled all of our kids, plus our cousins, and grandparents who were visiting. The sign of a great game: the "game" mechanic doesn't really matter as they're as happy to just play the 'toy' component....meaning, they're just happy to take turns cramming as much into the car as possible. Highly recommend! It's only about $20.

Rank: 4.5 Christmas Trees out of 4.

• Jigsaw puzzle of NYC subway: I bought this as a gift to myself at the Museum of Natural History on Friday. We finished the 500 piece puzzle in two days. It's relatively easy for New Yorkers as you can quickly determine where each piece will fit in the puzzle ("Oh, that's a Queens subway stop"...."that road is in the Bronx"). I've never seen Caroline and Josh work together so well on a project. In the end, we had 7 people ranging from 3 years old to grandparents racing to assemble it. Who knew? This can be ordered online...I can share the website for anyone wanting it. It's $15 online (shipping extra), and $18 in store

Rank: 4 Christmas Trees out of 4.

Christmas Newsletter - Cutting Room Floor

2007-12-06T15:46:00.000-05:00

Holiday greetings to the 6 or 7 of you who visit this site (and welcome to any newcomers resulting from the holiday mailing):

When I started the blog, the goal was to provide a place to create a weekly version of my Christmas newsletter -- as well as to have a type of "director's cut" of the newsletter in December since it can't all fit into the two printed pages of the mailed out newsletter.

Below, you'll find some things that didn't make the letter -- either because I just thought of them after mailing out the letter (which always happens) or due to space restrictions. As with most director's cuts, you'll soon realize that what got left out initially wasn't all that great...hence why it got cut! But to remain true to the objective of the blog, I figured I needed to list them:

• When asked how many children we have, Mark likes to apply the same scientific principle that allows weathermen to declare the "Real Feel" temperature is colder than what the mercury reads, so he'll say "We have four children, but as they are all under the age of 9, the "Real Feel" is like having 8 children!"

• We are constantly disarming Sammy of pens, pencils, etc. otherwise known as "Sammy Weapons"

• One of Mark's greatest accomplishments was to learn self-restraint and not look ahead on his daily Dilbert calendar

• Matthew drinks apple juice like it grows on trees

• Kathryn has figured out the next big LDS commercial venture: General Authority trading cards! Collect the whole set! Learn amazing General Conference facts. Get an Apostle's coveted Rookie card from the first year he served as a General Authority

• Samuel is our Kung-Fu Grip baby as he always has to grasp a toy, stick, or something else in his fists at all times

• All Caroline wants for Christmas are her two front teeth

• In the new house, Mark can no longer play his favorite game of "Find the freezing draft coming into the house"

• Mark fears that all the kids will finally sleep through the night about one week before Josh starts going to early morning seminary.

House Notes

2007-11-25T19:36:00.000-05:00

Well, we've been in the house for nearly 8 months. And I think we're finally to the point of feeling "we're done" with major renovations, etc. It helps actually having pictures up on most of the walls. Now the last touch is waiting for our new couch to arrive in about a week.

Some random notes:

1. After 8 months, I still can't remember where the silverware drawer is. I continually go to the left of the dishwasher to find silverware, even though it's never been kept there. It seems like the logical place for some reason, but it's really over by the store.

2. After 6 months, I was still trying to turn off the light in Josh's room with the light switch even though the light switch is linked to an electrical plug instead of an overhead light. I finally outsmarted myself by moving Josh's lamp over to the other side of the room so that the switch does, indeed, turn off the light.

3. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to get a toilet to stop running? This is the new toilet in our main upstairs bathroom. It didn't run with the old toilet, but has already run since we've had this one installed. The plumber adjusted it once, and last week, we had them install a new 'flapper' as they said that was the problem. But it still runs for about 8 seconds every 15 or 20 minutes. It drives me crazy. I'm open to solutions.

4. Speaking of solutions, my Swiss train watch has an issue now, too. The hour hand has gotten pushed ahead somehow, so that when it's 10 o clock straight up, the little hand is about 1/4 of the way past 10 o clock. It's off just enough to be annoying.

5. Don't ask me if you have turn the key left or right on the front door to unlock and lock it. It continues to be trial and error every day. I should learn that.

6. My favorite touch that was added a week ago was a great sunset picture that my Grandma painted at Laguna that features me and my 3 siblings. It's just the right set of colors to match the gold color of our family room.

7. I'm still learning the art of tip-toeing around the house at night without waking up kids. Haven't mastered all the creaking floor boards.

8. One thing I don't like is the light switch in the play room upstairs. For some odd reason, it's over in the opposite far corner from the entrance. So you have to turn it off and then navigate a completely dark room which can be deadly with toys on the floor.

9. One thing I liked in the old house was that when I heard strange noises, I just thought it was the neighbors in our 'duplex-style' house. So I could just discount it. But now when I hear noises, I have to investigate because it might actually be something!

That's it for now. I have to focus this week on the "YEARLY" Christmas Newsletter, so I probably won't write until I have that finished.

Mark

Cooperstown

2007-11-12T21:05:00.001-05:00

Josh and I took a road trip last weekend to Cooperstown, the mecca of baseball fans. He and I have been planning it for several weeks, and he was definitely excited!

When I got home Thursday night with the rental car, he wanted to go outside and 'check it out.' At 2 a.m. on Friday morning, he was too excited to sleep anymore and asked if I'd come lie down with him. He was definitely ready to get up when the alarm clock went off at 4:45 a.m. He said something to the effect that this was going to be the greatest day of his life.

We hit the road around 5:20 a.m. It's a long drive -- about 4 hours straight up to Albany, and then back down along rural roads for the final hour. The fall colors were beautiful....I like to say they were a brillant, subdued hue, a little like the colors you see after it rains on chalk drawings on the sidewalk and they all run together. I really forget how beautiful New York State is....it's much more than Manhattan. I really want to explore more of New York State.

One note about "Never Lost", which is the Hertz GPS system. It's very good and helpful, but sometimes it just doesn't have a common sense feature. After reprogramming it for "Shortest Distance", it took us along the east side of the lake instead of the west side (which makes more sense and are wider roads). Yes, it was shorter as the crow flies, but not what I would have taken.

We made it to the Hall of Fame around 9:45 a.m. and found parking on the street (there's no parking lot and it's just a really small town.) We spent the first couple of hours looking for answers to the scavenger hunt quiz that they provide for kids -- with the prize being baseball cards, so this was definitely a "Josh activity". Some of the answers were really obscure. Quite honestly, I think it could have been done a little better. It was kind of like taking a test that didn't focus on the real learnings but pulled out very random facts. But Josh liked it. After finishing the first one, we did the second one, so he could get both sets of free cards. Then we did the Scouting one, so he'll get a Scout patch. That one was better....each question tied to a point of the Scout Law. "A Scout is Friendly...speaking of Friendly, Wrigley Field is known as the Friendly confines. Find the exhibit on Wrigley and ...."

We toured the museum exactly how you are NOT to do Disneyland, according to the kid Disneyland books. Specifically, you shouldn't shoot around the park like a ping-pong shot out of a cannon. We'd see something on the 3rd floor, then he wanted to see the art exhibit on the 1st floor, then remembered something on the 3rd floor he wanted to see, then back to the 2nd floor, etc. throughout the whole day. But it was fun and I let him choose to agenda and make the decisions, so I just went along for the ride.

Lots of great things to see, though it wouldn't be too amazing if you weren't a big baseball fan. But Josh is, so it all meant something to him. They had just finished putting up the 2007 World Series exhibit, and he loved seeing that.

We had lunch at a diner-like restaurant up the street -- chicken nuggets, fries and hot chocolate. Then we went back to the museum, but by 2:30 p.m., he was worn out. After the requisite visit to the gift shop, he wanted to go check out the hotel. He walked into the Best Western and said he wanted to stay there for 2 weeks. (Funny, I was thinking how it was below the standards of most hotels I stay at during business trips). We got to room 207 and he wanted to unpack and claim spaces, choose his bed, etc. Then he wanted to swim. I really don't like swimming, but the water wasn't horribly cold, so it wasn't too bad.

We went to the Pizza Hut in the parking lot for dinner, and he was basically falling asleep (he kind of gorged on bread sticks). So he wanted me to get him home quickly and I thought he'd fall asleep. But after 10 minutes, he was OK again, so we rented "Everyone's Hero" (an animated film about Babe Ruth's bat) from the video store in the parking lot and watched it on my computer. He was asleep by 8.

It snowed overnight and it gave the area a quaint little Christmas feel to it. It continued to dust snow for the early morning. After our continental breakfast, he decided against the morning swim (YEA!) and we got to the museum when the doors opened at 9 a.m. There wasn't anything new to see, but he just wanted to see it all again. And once again, we went from floor to floor in no particular order.

Finally, around 11:15, I suggested we head home, and he was very relunctant. He knew there was nothing else to see, but he just didn't want it to end ("Can't we stay another night?"). It was almost like admitting defeat. But he agreed after we said goodbye to the gift shop one more time. The drive home was fine (the snow disappeared and it was a beautiful fall drive). We dropped off the rental car, took the train from there to home, and Kathryn picked us up at the station after being at soccer.

All in all, it was the absolute perfect trip for Josh and me. It's really fortunate we live so close to it and it's such a passion for Josh. I think we'll both have memories for a long time.

Home Repairs

2007-11-06T21:15:00.000-05:00

I get a real sense of satisfaction...almost a runners high, if you will...when I get "home to dos" crossed off my list. Partly because I rarely know how to solve them going in, and partly because it seems like there's never a fast fix.

But I'm doing pretty good lately.

When we turned on the furnace, the blower (aka "fan") seemed to be malfunctioning. When the furnace would turn off, the blower would still blow. I kind of put off calling for help, thinking it might be something that could just fix itself on its own -- or that I'd figure out a solution.

It was very gratifying to learn it WAS something...some timer mechanism that was busted. The part was a mere $25 and the total fix job was less than $150. Thrilled to pay it as I now have worry-free heat!

The same day that was fixed, the dishwasher started to leak. But I've learned to not rush to call a repairman on clothes and dishwashers. We've been wrong two or three times before. Alas, waiting was the right call, as the leak seems to have sealed itself and it hasn't been a problem sense. Saved the cost of a house call.

I've struggled with our wireless router ever since we got the Mac updated at my office. So I bought a new Apple router (the other one was Linksys) because the old one had had its issues other times, too. It didn't solve it at first, but after calling Apple, and being told to unplug everything for 2 minutes and restarting, it worked perfectly! Did we need the new router? Maybe, maybe not, but I have worry-free wireless now, and that's worth it!

One of our newly installed toilets "runs" every 15 minutes or so. I bit the bullet and am having the plumber come back to install a new flapper. Having it run is like a Chinese water torture (thinking of wasted money and water), so it's worth my piece of mind as I know I'm not capable of simple plumbing repairs, despite what people say.

Lastly, the tire light came on in the car this weekend. Often, I assume it's probably a mistake and forget about it. But I've learned from experience and arranged for the service station to immediately check it out....only $22 later, we have a screw removed and a tire patched.

Yea! Like I said up front, it's a great feeling to get these off my list!

Matthew, Mark, Luke & John go to Yankees Stadium

2007-10-24T12:52:00.000-05:00

I've learned that Josh's obsession with the Yankees can provide a fun backdrop for learning more spiritual things. For example, I've had him memorize some mastery scriptures by using the jersey numbers of players to remember the references. ("Alma A-Rod, Jeter" would be Alma 13:2, as an example).

I came up with another application the other night when tucking him in and he asked about the Gospels in the New Testament. He asked why there are four books that essentially tell the same story.

I explained to him about Matthew, Mark and Luke being the synoptic gospels, meaning those three books contain a lot of very similar material, whereas John has a lot of unique material.

I then said: "Imagine that Matthew, Mark, Luke and John went to Yankees Stadium to see a game. Matthew, Mark and Luke all sat together in the upper deck where we normally sit. Then, they each had to write a report for school."

"For analogy purposes only, pretend that Matthew thinks pitching and defense are the most important elements of the game. And pretend that Mark thinks hits represent all the highlights of the game. And let's say that Luke is a big fan of Jeter and A-Rod. Their reports are all going to say the same thing -- that the Yankees won 6 to 4 -- but they'll focus on different details with the game. Matthew will explain the pitching match-ups, Mark will talk about the home runs and doubles, and Luke will focus on the stats of Jeter and A-Rod. But in the end, their message was the same: The Yankees won."

To explain why some of the three include some elements and others skipped it, I suggested that you imagine each writer went out for a hot dog at different points during the game and each missed a half inning or so.

And what about John, who gives a much better eye-witness account? He was sitting in the dug-out for the game!

The analogies could be taken further, based on real content within the scriptures. For example, Luke covers more early stuff like the birth of Jesus, whereas Mark doesn't. So it could be said that Luke got to the stadium for batting practice whereas Mark didn't arrive until after the National Anthem.

Or, based on stories of the resurrection and such, it could be said that one writer went to the post-game press conferences and locker room interviews, while the others listened to those reports on the car radio on the way home.

This isn't anything earth shattering, but I thought this is kind of clever and fun, and worth passing along. Teaching our kids is all about customizing it to their frame of reference.

Two Ideas for Instructing Kids

2007-10-22T15:15:00.000-05:00

1. My daughter's Primary teacher has a great idea for encouraging three slightly rowdy boys to sit still during the class time. It's kind of a new twist on Musical Chairs. He sets his watch alarm to go off in random intervals. Any kid who got his/her seat on their seat and feet on floor when the alarm goes off gets a piece of candy. If it goes off and they aren't sitting down -- no candy. He does it a few times throughout the lesson. If the boys get crazy, he just says "I'd sure hate to see the alarm go off right now." Pure genius!

2. I had a random thought last week at FHE. Would it be such a bad idea to have a "Jr" and "Sr" FHE? The older two kids are at a completely different levels than the younger ones in terms of comprehending lessons. Why not have a break-out class for the younger two so the older two are given a 'deeper' lesson. We could start as a whole family for prayer, song, scripture, etc., then have each parent teach two of the kids. Divide and Conquer!

Don't Buy This Album!

2007-10-21T23:31:00.000-05:00

If you ever see "Forever 80s" -- a three-disc set with 10 songs each for an amazing $10 -- in your local music store, resist the urge to purchase.

I rarely splurge and buy something for me...and when I did, I got janked!

A couple of weeks ago, I went to Radio City Music Hall to buy tickets for family members coming to NYC for Christmas. I had a few minutes before I'd have to head to Grand Central to catch my train, so I went to FYE, looking for the new Fresh Aire/Mannheim Christmas Album (which I'm told is out, but haven't been able to find yet).

Unable to buy my desired CD, I was lured into a display with the above-mentioned 80s CD boxed set. I checked out the back and saw several great songs that I have yet to purchase from i-Tunes or have on CD. I thought I'd hit a gold mine.

On the train, when I opened the set, I read something in the insert that surprised me. After describing the songs and their iconic value, a sentence started with the simple phrase: "While these songs are not sung by the original artists..."

Then who are they sung by?

I had failed to see the phrase: "The Countdown Singers" on the cover.

In other words: "Songs you know...performed by artists you don't"

Or "All your favorite songs....by a non-familiar group"

Maybe: "You've heard the songs for years....though you've never heard this artist"

What about: "You love the songs...but will hate the singers."

"Jump" by Van Halen is just enough off to be comical. Instead of a guitar doing the riffs, it's a keyboard. "Amanda" just doesn't have that tone of sincerity like Boston. And I don't know if they really spit out all the lyrics in "End of the World" before the music catches up to them.

Then again, I've gotten more than $10 worth of humor and laughter out of this, so I suppose it's worth it. And it's taken me down memory road.

It's kind of like being back at my high school proms when no-name bands performed the hits of the day -- so it's a high school Prom album (sans a Forever Young rendition...a staple of any good Utah HS dance)

So now I have a great 3 CD set of 'cover band' music. I'm not feeling any 'power of love' on this.

Mark

It was a Corolla, not a Ram

2007-10-07T09:29:00.000-05:00

October 7, 2007

I've been wanting to write this for a while, but it's been a bit crazy.

As a member of the High Council, I speak in wards and branches throughout our stake. We've adopted a new procedure that results in our giving two talks on one Sunday, but then getting the next month off. (In the long run, we give the same amount of talks, but prepare only 6 instead of 12, and have only 6 Sunday tied up with speaking assignments instead of 12).

For some time this summer, I had worried about my August speaking assignments, down in a building in our stake that isn't overly accessible by public transportation. We only have one car, and we need that to get my family to our home ward. With all the other buildings and units, I could find a way to make it work, but I knew the August assignment would be a challenge. I could easily handle the morning assignment, then drive home and get my family to church, but getting back to that building for the afternoon assignment wouldn't be easy.

I looked at car rentals, Zip Cars, taxis, buses, etc. The best we could think was that my family would sit in our home ward building for an extra 1 hour 15 minutes after church waiting for me to come fetch them.

But I had prayed off and on for a solution, knowing that "when you're on the Lord's errand, you're entitled to the Lord's help" (a paraphrased Monson quote).

The speaking assignment was on the Sunday after our annual family trek out west. We arrived home late on Saturday evening and had basically figured we'd go with "Plan B" (kids waiting at the chapel). But as we pulled into our driveway, there was a Corolla parked there. Kathryn said "Oh, I forgot. I told one of our friends in the ward that they could park their extra car in our driveway while they were out of town as they couldn't keep it in front of their house due to street cleaning rules".

Though it was a Corolla, it was my "Ram" that the Lord provided at the 11th hour.

When we got inside, we found the car keys (the Corolla had been dropped off when a neighbor was picking up the mail, so they left the keys), and a VM saying "feel free to use the car if you need it."

The perfect solution. Now I could get to my assignment without a problem.

Perhaps this all sounds a bit silly, but it was a major deal to me. Yes, it was nice to have a solution. But more importantly, it made me realize -- again -- that the Lord knows me personally and really will help pull solutions out of a hat, if I will put the problem in his hands. I never would have imagined that solution, so it shows that sometimes we just have to put it in his hands.

To end on a bit of a humorous note, I was thinking about the calling of a new apostle this weekend. The real bugaboo about being called as an apostle is that you know you'll either become the prophet someday.....or die trying!

I'm still pushing for "Popcorn Popping" to be sung as an intermediate hymn at Conference....but I'm not holding out hope.

Mark

Don't Give up on me

2007-10-02T22:56:00.000-05:00

Hi all:

Just wanted to let you know this is still an active blog. I've got three or four blogs written in my head, but just haven't put keyboard to screen yet. I hope to have at least one original post before the weekend, so please check back.

Thanks!

Mark

Dis and Dat

2007-09-08T22:16:00.000-05:00

1. As you all know, our family is very devoted to the Yankees. As late as about 3 days ago, I really felt they'd finish 1 or 2 games out of the wild card race....they just seem so close, yet I felt they would come up short. But I'm changing my tune after tonight....you heard it hear first: they WILL get the wild card.

2. I'm a big fan of a new kids' show: "Mickey's Mouse Clubhouse" on Disney Channel. We found it during our time with Kathryn's family while in Utah. It's really quite the rip-off of Nick's Dora, which is a tad interesting to see Disney, the former king of children's animation, stealing from the new leader. But I don't mind the rip-off (which includes a journey involving three places and a 'backpack'-like item that has solutions for obstacles. It's cute, simple and innocent. And best of all, I enjoy it. Plus, it's nice to see there's now a frame of reference for Mickey and his friends for the new generation...up til now, meeting Mickey at Disneyland didn't mean that much to them.

3. As Sept. is the new January in my book (as Kathryn says), I'm trying to make sure I read a little of the Book of Mormon FOR ME each day. I do read it to the kids each night, and read the NT (or some other church stuff) on the train, but I've decided to read a little of the BOM each day (even weekends). I'm just choosing favorite chapters to read since I'm reading so little.

A phrase I found intriquing: 2 Ne 2:5 -- "Men are instructed sufficiently that they know good from evil." Is that still true? Yes, we all have the light of Christ, but are today's youth (outside of the church) REALLY being instructed sufficiently on good from evil? I've been thinking lately how it is SO accepted to "live with" or "be with" one another before marriage...it's not just tolerated or not shunned...but expected and considered the new norm. Even "good" people I know outside of church follow that route. That's why I feel that most of the world is NOT being instructed sufficiently on good vs. evil. Someone preaching those values from the rooftops would be considered as out of place today as the hippies of the 60s preaching that traditional values were no longer valid.

See also 2 Nephi 2:8 (first phrase) as to the urgency and need to proclaim the gospel. That would have been a great 'rallying' Scripture when I was on a mission.

4. Does anyone else, when getting their Ensign, race to the back page to see if there are any "Name Withheld" letters to the editors?

5. The new TV season doesn't look too great. I am interested in "Back To You" as I love stories set in newsrooms. And, hate to admit it, but I actually am intriqued with the Caveman show based on Geico commercials. There's been worse places to find a premise.

Mark

Napping

2007-08-26T22:26:00.000-05:00

Napping is misunderstood in this country. People who nap are considered old, lazy or party too hard the night before. Yet we offer no such stigma to those who must eat or use the bathroom.

Absurd comparison? Not at all.

Nobody questions the need of workers to have breaks to use the potty, which is a bodily need. Nobody questions the need of workers to have time to eat a meal -- or snack - throughout the day to keep their energy level high.
But everybody questions the employee who says he needs to take a nap in the middle of the day.

Yet all are bodily, human needs. In my mind, a nap can be as necessary and important to productivity as eating or visiting the restroom during the work day.

I'd suggest we create a national nap day, but beyond being afraid of the stigma associated with leading such a charge, I'm afraid that those 'celebrating' the day would simply sleep away the day and hence make such a celebratory day a tad ironic.

But I encourage you to claim your rights as humans and take a nap at your desk this week. Trust me....it does wonders!

Mark

California vs. New York

2007-07-23T11:14:00.000-05:00

On our recent trip from the Empire State to the Golden State, I noticed a couple of differences:

• In NY, they beg you not to make a U-turn, and if you do, they force you to take a separate U-turn lane that takes you up and around....and, technically, avoids an actual u-turn. In California, they seem to not only welcome but encourage U-Turns. I saw lots of actual signs showing the various ways a U-turn could be done legally.

• Don't even think of turning right on red in NY. Yes, they are legal, but it seems like very intersection posts a sign that overrules the state law by saying "no right turn at this intersection". You can make all the right turns you want in California.

• California seems to have more state pride...or at least more pride in their state flag. Have no idea what the NY state flag looks like (I think it's navy with a state seal something on it). But in California, the Bear Republic flies everywhere. I think New Yorkers are New York CITY lovers first, and kind of forget that we're associated with a state, too.

• Don't stand on the roadway in California when waiting to cross the street....DANGER! But in New York, it's kind of like taking a lead-off from first base. You get a "jump" on crossing the intersection by going as far into the crosswalk as you can without being picked off by a car. (Be careful of the 'brush back' drivers who send you scurrying back to the safety of the sidewalk.) Nobody stands on the sidewalk in NYC to wait for the light to change, but everyone does in California.

• California = friendlier people

• California = cleaner places, cleaner people

With no intended diss on my home state, I just seem to smile more and like life a lot more when I'm in the Golden State. "California Dreamin'....."

Mark

I've Returned to the Colonies....

2007-07-19T12:18:00.001-05:00

Hi all:

Whilest on vacation in San Diego, I was alerted to the need to attend a meeting in London on Tuesday of this week. So I flew home from vacation Sunday (as planned) and headed to London on Monday morning, spending two nights 'across the pond.' Had a jolly good time.

Some comments, impressions, travelogue, etc:

• I often feel the world has become too homogenized....it all looks the same no matter where you are. In fact, at Heathrow, I saw the EXACT same ads I had just seen at JFK. But then you get into London and you realize there are still a few places that are unique and have their own soul. You may be able to shoot a movie in Canada and make it look like a US city, but you could never make another city look like London.

• Spent most of my time in meetings and client dinner, but had a little time to enjoy myself. Absolutely incredible weather! We stayed near Buckingham palace, and walked around a bit to Piccadilly Circus, No. 10 Downing Street, Parliament and my absolute fave: Big Ben (cast against a navy night sky....we stayed to hear 'him' bong out 10 p.m.)

• England isn't known for its food. (Glad to get a Big Mac when I returned.) But there were some highlights: my traveling companion and I found a small little Indian restaurant on Monday night that was fantastic. Loved the Worchester-sauce pretzels on the plane. And at the airport yesterday, I had a carbonated Passion Fruit, which was very much like my famed Schwepps Granadilla soda from South Africa. And you can't beat Cadbury chocolates!

• Not trying to be mean, but an observation: there's a lot of Brits with big noses.

• My taxi driver to the airport wore a Yankees cap. He said they get the games occasionally live at 2 a.m. and he watches them before driving his shift.

• What's not to love about Virgin Atlantic? First time on them...I was a Virgin Virgin. Their in-seat entertainment in coach rocks vs. Delta's first class cabin or JetBlue's TVs. About 50 on-demand TV options and at least a couple dozen movie on-demands, too. Crowded flight over but very open on the way home. And they constantly feed you...even ice cream bars!

• I've flown from Heathrow to the US three times prior to yesterday, but this was the first time I've flown from Heathrow to NYC (JFK). (The other times were to Chicago after my mission, LA after my study abroad in South Africa, and Wash/Dulles after Kath and I went there). NY passport control pretty fast....odd that I cleared JFK customs and claimed luggage FASTER on Wed. then when I flew in to JFK/Terminal 3/Delta on Sunday night....Delta/NYC is known for their slow luggage return.

• My room in London was not much bigger than our youngest boys' room at our house. Tiny!

• London TV seems to cover only 3 stories a day. When I was there, it was all about David Beckham coming to the US, and a new proposed law that makes EVERYONE an organ donor UNLESS they opt out (vs. the other way around where you have to proactively state you are a donor).

• Felt a lot like being in South Africa (as South Africa was a British colony, it has a lot of similarities). Road signs use the same font.

• When flying to a foreign country, choose a carrier from that country. From the moment I got on Virgin, I was in the UK (they're just so darn British). I can imagine an American Airline flight would be just like flying from Atlanta to Chicago.

• Thing to do next time: Go on the "Eye" ferris wheel. Wanted to this time, but ran out of time.

Yes, This is Still an Active Blog

2007-07-06T22:41:00.000-05:00

Hi all:

Thanks for your patience....June got busy with the launch of the Transformers movie (we handle the marketing of the toys for the movie). I have a lot of pent up things to write about -- including my review of the movie -- but alas, I have been a slaggard.

We leave on vacation to San Diego tomorrow afternoon. But I'm leaving Kathryn and the kids out west and returning to work, so when I do, I'll plan to do a better job of updating my blog site -- including (gasp!) perhaps postings every few days! So please make sure you come back and visit when I return from vacation. And thanks for visiting!

Mark

Baseball

2007-06-11T19:48:00.000-05:00

I've decided that baseball is definitely the best sport. That's surprising, because growing up, baseball was my least favorite sport -- it was all about football, and basketball if it involved the Jazz.

So what makes baseball so great? Here are a few reasons.

1. It's perfectly made for TV. There's already built-in time for commercials, so the game isn't unnecessarily stopped for a commercial break, breaking up the flow.

2. The last 60 seconds of the game (in terms of the clock) don't last for 60 minutes. Sure, there are a couple of things that prolong the game at the conclusion, such as bringing in new pitchers, but for the most part, the game can't drag out at the end simply by calling time outs, fouling, or throwing the ball out of bounds.

3. On that same front, my complaint about basketball is that you can be up by 12 with one minute to go, and then it's foul, foul, foul and the whole game is decided by sloppy hitting of opponents and by shooting foul shots.

4. Baseball is smart enough to realize that there are times when it's not nice enough outside to play. Football players must be tough and play in tornadoes. Baseball has the good sense to head inside if it rains.

5. You get souvenirs. If the ball goes into the crowd, it's yours to keep.

6. Even if you're getting creamed, you have to keep playing. In basketball or football, you just run out the clock. In baseball, you still have to get through several more innnings.

7. When a player comes out, he's out for the game. Makes for great strategy.

8. Except for the Pitcher and the DH, you have to play offense and defense.

9. The playoffs are a fair representation of the actual season. You never play a team 7 times in a row in basketball, but in the playoffs, you do. But in baseball, you regularly play a team multiple times right in a row, just like the playoffs.

10. Baseball commentators actually have interesting things to say. I actually ask Josh to be quiet during the broadcasts and miss the commentary when I go to the stadium because it's so fascinating to learn the strategy and hear the rationale behind things.

11. Each game is SO different based on who the pitcher is. It completely changes the complexion of the game.

12. The final score is so interesting. Soccer is always like 1 to 1. Basketball is like 100 to 98. But baseball could be 1-0, 6-3, 10-2, 10-9, etc, and it is so telling. In other words, each game is so fascinating.

I could go on, but we've already written into extra innings. Go Yankees! (They're only 9.5 back now!)

Mark

PS -- Here's the plus one for the night. We got some Monopoly game pieces on the Space Shuttle and two of my team members got to go watch the launch last week. Guess what the area code is for the area in Florida with the Space Center? 3-2-1. Cool!

Dis & Dat

2007-05-27T19:29:00.000-05:00

1. This weekend was the Father's & Son's campout. I look forward to camping experiences about as much as I look forward to being shot out of a cannon. But I must guardingly say it was a non-horrible time. In fact, it was kind of OK.

2. I asked Josh ahead of time who he was most excited to spend time with at the campout. He said "you, Daddy." I said, "That nice, but which FRIEND are you most excited about seeing up there." He said "You, daddy."

3. Matthew was playing doctor last week and I was the patient. I let him check me out with the doctor tools. I told him my ear was sore and asked if he could give me some medicine. He said, "No" and then put his hands on my head and gave me a blessing, saying "bless daddy to have a good day at school in the name of Jesus Christ Amen."

4. Josh had a good baseball game experience this weekend. He played 1st at one point, and caught a throw that got the runner out. But then the runner tripped on Josh and he got just a little hurt. He called out to his coach and said (because he'd been hurt) that'd he wanted to be the DH. The other coach responded by saying...."Sorry kid, this is the NL".

5. Josh played a ton of baseball at the father's & son's. I actually left him in a ball-playing area to take Matthew to the lake, and didn't tell Josh. He said he was scared, but said "I started looking for you, and then I said a little prayer, and then you were right there!"

6. While driving to the camp-out, I saw a sign for a weigh station that made me think of the old Johnny Carson routine when he would discern the answer from a sealed envelope, and then read the question. In that spirit, the Great Carnac would have said: "What does an exhibitionist instructor teach his students?" The answer (and the sign): "Open When Flashing"

7. Our sacrament meetings often have all three speakers speaking on the same topic. Today's HC speakers were assigned the topic reverence, and so the other speakers were assigned the same. As she was setting up for her class, the Sunday School teacher said that she was a little disappointed as she had non-member friends, and had hoped it would have been a more "uplifting" or "Christian" talk. It got me thinking...themes and such are fine, but it's probably a smart policy if bishoprics always ensure at least one talk is a "Jesus" talk....something about the atonement, his life, why we love him, etc. Can you imagine a non-member coming on "tithing" Sunday? "Gee, not only are those Mormons non-Christian because they don't talk about Jesus in their meetings, but all they want is for their members to pay money". We should always plan sacrament meetings with an eye to a non-member attending for the first time.

8. I was reminded of the following in HP meeting today. Elder Christiansen, an Area Authority 70 from Boston, taught us that we always think the way to convert is to serve our neighbors. He said it's the opposite. Most people in the world want to serve others. It's part of their DNA. It makes them feel good. But they don't know how, when, or where to serve, and deep down, they're wanting that experience. So rather than dropping off a casserole to the neighbor, it would be better to say: "This neighbor just had a baby. Some of us from church are taking turns bringing in meals for the family. Would you like to have a turn?" What converts, too, is the feelings of the spirit, and having a positive service experience does that.

GO JAZZ!

Mark

Let's Go, Yankees!

2007-05-20T19:25:00.000-05:00

Our family are big-time Yankees fans. We're not having the best season this year, but we're having a lot of fun, and it's amazing how much revolves around the Yankees in our household.

I've been meaning to write this for the past two weeks, but two weeks ago, Josh and I went to a game at Yankees Stadium on an absolutely beautiful Saturday afternoon.

I've gone to many Yankees games since moving to NYC and I always love them. But I never really converted to being a Yankees fan until early last year. I think it's my tendency to root for the underdog and hope for a "good story"....along with liking to swim against the current and not appear to be a bandwagon jumper-on-er. After all, I cheered for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers for years as a kid when they literally couldn't win a game or two a season. (And I still have what some have called that hideous orange Tampa Bay jersey from high school....which I wear on occasion).

Secretly, I was kind of happy when the Yankees blew a 3-0 lead in the best of 7 with Boston a couple of years ago and Boston went on to win the World Series. It just seemed like such a great story. And did the Yankees really need another championship?

I tried to be a Mets fan...because that's kind of different and they aren't traditionally all that great (though this year they are). But they're just so flippin' boring! Their games -- even when they win -- are just ho hum. Win, lose or called on account of rain, Yankees games are the greatest.

Josh and I's game together was against Seattle. The game started at 3:55 p.m., and we left home at 3:10 p.m. because he had a baseball game earlier in the afternoon. That's what's great...even on a weekend game, you don't have to leave too early to make it to the game. We just cruise down the Bronx River Parkway, take Exit 6, and there's a lot right there waiting for us. Boom!

Parking is now up to $14, but we still think that's a bargain as parking in Manhattan is easily $25 or more. (Even our cheapo lot we used for the temple has tacked on a $5 surcharge for minivans making that around $13...guess they see an opportunity to "tax" just the Mormons by going after mini vans).

I was the second to last car to get into the lot before it was full. They made me park in a very odd little diagonal spot that required tricky backing in (good thing Kathryn encourages that on our home driveway).

Then it's a short walk through an overpass that has a homeless guy playing tunes on a piccolo or flute or something like that. Josh asked if we could toss in some coins on the way home. Sure, why not?

We found a mostly overlooked entrance, which was great because they still had caps to give away, even though it was now 3:45 p.m. Yea! Free Yankees cap (with a Hess gas company logo on the back).

We ran and made it through the worn down and crumbling stadium and got to our seats before the first pitch. These tickets are courtesy of work, so they're better than what I pay for....which means they are lower, but we're in the right field outfield.

Josh and I of course wore our Yankees jerseys...I have one for Marino Rivera and Josh wore A-Rod. The stands are filled with people wearing their favorite jerseys, including legends like Thurman Munson. When you arrive, you're with family.

Wang was pitching and he's one of Josh's favorite pitchers. He pitched a PERFECT game into the 8th inning (that means no hits, errors or walks) which is super rare. Had he made it a perfect game, it would have been like only the 4th or 5th in the 100 plus year history of the Yankees. So every pitch from the 5th inning on was exciting. Everyone applauded every strike. We all knew we could possibly be viewing history.

Alas, Wang gave up a home run in the 8th. But the Yankees won 8 to 1 so it didn't matter.

Josh was the expert of our area. When fans around us would ask questions to themselves about things they had missed, Josh would turn around and explain why so-and-so was in, or what had led to the person getting on base, etc.

What makes the atmosphere so great?

• they have a "subway race" on the video scoreboard between one of the innings which is worth the price of admission, in my book. Though it's gotten less cool and now Dunkin Donuts sponsors it and it's cheesy. The race has gone commercial. Bah!

• 7th Inning Stretch: They sing God Bless America before Take Me Out to the Ballpark.

• The announcer. Can't remember his name, but his voice is legendary. He feels like Baseball.

• YMCA! When the grounds crew comes out to rake the field in the 6th inning or so, they do it to the tune of the Village People's YMCA. You don't expect that at something as large as the Yankees. But it's tradition! And the grounds crew drop their ranks at the YMCA part to lead the crowd through that. Everyone dances. It's so hokey yet because it's the Yankees, it's not hokey, and it, too, is worth the price of the ticket. Even during the sacred World Series, they still do YMCA.

• Best tradition? When the Yankees win, they cue up "New York New York" by Frank Sinatra. The first few notes chime in about 3 seconds after the final out or game winning run. It's the sound of victory and accompanies you all the way back out to the car. (When they lose, they play "New York New York" by Liza Minelli.) I rank hearing Frank Sinatra at Yankee Stadium as one of the top 10 best things in New York City. It really almost brings tears to the eyes.

Let's hope the Yankees can turn this season around. At 10 games out, they now are underdogs, which makes me even a bigger fan than before! I hope the new stadium -- opening in 2009 -- will keep the same feeling and traditions.

In no particular order....

2007-05-03T14:40:00.000-05:00

1. I spent the day up at Hasbro's Games division on Tuesday, which is just over the border from Connecticut in Western Mass. On the drive up, there is a sign for "Margate Prison (Seasonal)". What happens to the prisoners when the season ends? I guess I wouldn't fear a 12 year sentence as it's more like "12 years....or until the first snowfall"

2. Someday I will make a list of what are the greatest 'access perks' that I have enjoyed while working at my PR firm in Manhattan. High on the list would be getting to go on a factory tour of Hasbro games where they make all the great games. It's nothing fancy in terms of presentation, but it's just really cool.

3. I'm all about loyalty....or perhaps misplaced loyalty. I've been going to the same dry cleaners for the past 7 years. I don't know the employees' names, but I feel committed to them. I act as if my small amount of money I spend with them is essential for their survival. If I go away, they'll be short on their earnings.

But by moving, they're just a tad too inconvenient now. Especially because Kathryn drives me to the station, and she lets me off right in front of another dry cleaners. Couldn't be more convenient. I felt "dirty" patronizing them yesterday for the first time. Who knows if it'll continue....they are a whopping $0.35 more per shirt. (But, I don't have to plug a parking meter, so maybe that should be factored in....)

4. Speaking of loyalty without knowing names, next door to the new dry cleaners is our barbershop. I've been going there for 7 years. There are two barbers. Never once have I found out their names. When I went on Saturday, I think I heard someone call them Louie and Tom, but I can't verify that. Lame on my part!

5. While at Hasbro, I asked them to bring back "EMERGENCY!", a great board game from the 70s. My friend Mark and I played it a lot. My mom sent it out to me a while ago and the kids like to play it. It was based on that great 70s TV show of the same name. I don't remember much about it, but I remember we loved the show. Kind of the ER of its day.

6. During my client meetings, we started discussing favorite old-time TV shows, etc. It was a tad embarrassing how many specific details I remember about all these shows. But I realized a fellow participant in the room was cool when SHE brought up a favorite show of mine: "It's Your Move". It starred Jason Bateman after he left Silver Spoons and lasted only 1 season. We taped all the reruns that summer, but I have no idea where they are now. Anyone else remember that show? It was really clever.

7. Turns out my former HT here in New York served in the same mission as I did, under the same president (I at the first of my president's tenure, and my HT at the end). We've known each other for years and never connected that. Even though he came to our house monthly and sat in our living room with a Table Mountain picture, he never connected the dots. Funny.

8. Josh and I watched Field of Dreams together on Monday night. He's so in to baseball that I knew he would love it. Some may say it's hokey, but I honestly think it's one of my favorite films. Such great lessons illustrated in it. Can't believe that I first saw that movie "half my life ago". I was 18 when it came out (or younger, maybe) and now I'm 36. Such an inspiring film.

What's New?

2007-04-23T21:55:00.000-05:00

It's been a couple of weeks since I wrote....my apologies. Some top of mind thoughts tonight:

1. Out here in the East, attending a Good Friday service is a big deal. It's funny how I'm considered to be so non-religious because us Mormons don't go to church on that day. A couple of colleagues were a bit taken back that we went to IKEA on that day. But we more than make up for it 52 Sundays a year!

2. Speaking of IKEA, I'm writing on this great little two-seater couch in our playroom. It was around $151 and the best find from IKEA in a while. Very comfortable and just the right touch for this room.

3. Our neighborhood has a little bunny rabbit that hops around the area lawns. For those who know me well, they know that's a huge plus for me as I have always had a thing for baby rabbits. The kids call him Cottontail. (I wanted to call him Carmel after my pet rabbit from when I was in first grade, but I was overruled.) He just sits on our lawn quietly, though we haven't been able to get up close enough to pet him yet.

4. The Yankees need some pitchers in the worst way!!! They're letting all of A-Rod's homers go to waste. And why were we ever crying for A-Rod to be traded? I can't remember....

5. I walked to the train station this morning. I forgot how much I missed that since we moved. It is now a 1.25 mile walk, which is about 1.16 miles further than at our old house. But I left at 5:30 to catch a 5:59 a.m. train. It was very pleasant. I forgot that the walk to the train served as my morning prayer time.

6. I have a new plan for keeping the Sabbath. Too often, I let work hang over me during the full weekend as I plan to "log on" Sunday night and finish my Friday afternoon work that didn't get done or make a jump for the next week. And it really ruins the whole weekend for me. So now I'm attempting to avoid that...and when I do, it makes a huge difference for me.

My solution: I plan to get to work on Mondays super early (hence my 5:30 a.m. walk to the train this morning). Then I have about 1.5 hours to get stuff done before clients get to their offices. It also means I have to go to bed early on Sunday night....which I don't do often enough.

A side benefit: I feel OK leaving work "one train earlier" to come home on Monday night, which lets us start family home evening before all the kids unravel.

One simple thing -- honoring the Sabbath -- with a lot of side benefits. Let's see if I can keep it up.

7. The annual merit badge seminar was this weekend. I always kind of dread it, but I lucked out with a good group of boys. My best teaching idea: they have to teach a technique or skill to the class. I printed up some of the "Worst Case Scenario" items from the internet, and had them teach how to fight off an alligator, jump from a building into a Dumpster, escape from a car submerged in a lake. Bizarre enough that they liked it.

8. By moving from our old house, I no longer have to master parallel parking. But now Kathryn is forcing me to do a different parking skill: back in to the driveway. She likes to do it and by default, I kind of have to do it, too. I kind of thing it's rather pretencious (I can't spell tonight) to back in, but I suppose the neighbors won't run us out of town for that.

Mark

Blogging from the New House

2007-04-08T20:49:00.000-05:00

1. We've decided to decorate our house in a Scandanavian motif. More specifically, we bought more stuff from IKEA. For those from Utah (which is getting an IKEA soon): Warning! IKEA is a bit like a drug. I think their big catalogue is actually a form of Home Furnishing Porn.

I continue to have a love/hate relationship with IKEA. Nothing is more fun than shopping there. But the do-it-yourself portion isn't always the easiest thing in the world. Fortunately, this latest venture resulted in extremely limited pain in relation to assembly...but that's not often the case.

I wish someone would invent an electric allen wrench, which is the the major source of sore hands.

2. Fuddruckers and Newman women (or soon-to-be Newmans) don't seem to mix well. We always stop there on our way home from IKEA. Once again, Caroline spilled her milk shake creating a chocolate river under the table. Happened last time, too. When Kathryn and I dated, we went to the one in Baltimore and she spilled a couple of water glasses on the table. And yet we keep returning.

3. Is there such a thing as "sick days" anymore? Seems like for me and my clients, rather than taking a sick day where we turn off the phone and computers and rest, we simply say: "I'm not feeling so good today...I'm actually going to stay at home today, but will be on email and am accessible by cell phone." The electronic age has made it harder for us to completely "turn off" work when we are sick, on vacation, etc.

4. It's a mild form of self control, but I'm pleased nonetheless. I have a Dilbert daily calendar on my desk at my office. Most years, I skip ahead at some point when I'm bored to see future cartoons. But this year, I vowed not to look ahead. It's a mild form of self control, but I'm proud to say I've withstood the impulse to 'read ahead' this year.

5. I think someone was taking flash pictures during sacrament meeting today. Seriously. I thought I saw a flash go off once and then heard what sounded like a one-time use camera being wound. Then it happened again, and the winding sound. Can't imagine why anyone would want to record our sacrament meetings...they're barely worth noting in a blog.

6. Things I miss about our old house: disposal, walking to the train, feeling more comfortable in my kitchen, having toilet paper roll holders installed (that's this week's project), my little "mail slot" on the stair well, a fridge with a higher "fridge to freezer" ratio than what we have now, a bigger dishwasher. Also, the old house was an attached home, which is another way of saying it was like a duplex....meaning someone owned the other half of the house. When I heard strange sounds, I just assumed it was the neighbors and didn't investigate. Now, when I hear sounds that scare me (footprints upstairs, pipes hissing, etc.) I can't igmore and most investigate. I liked just assuming it was an easily explained sound vs. thinking there's a monster upstairs.

7. What is nice about the new house: having a doorbell that works, heat that is non-radiator, dimmer switches already installed where we want, a shower that is only a shower and not also a bath, double-paned windows to make the house warmer. a huge walk-in closet for me that fits my dresser and filing cabinet, too.

8. Last week during the move, I didn't shave for more than a week because I couldn't find my razor. I'm pleased to say that it was to the point that the BYU Testing Center would not have let me in. But that was about the extent of it.

9. I'm still not fully feeling like I'm in my routine. I think part of it is that I've been out of my office for 5 of the past 10 business days. (3 when we closed, one for Good Friday, and one for a trip outside the office). Plus, we have General Conference last week, so even the Sunday didn't feel like a Sunday. I'm a routine guy and I'm still feeling a bit discombobulated.

10. "The Office" returned to high form this week. "Why do I have to bring Toby? He's like the worst person on the planet." "Michael, are you wearing a woman's suit....you look like Hillary Clinton." "I am not a real hero. The real hero are those who put on costumes and fly around with capes."

11. Joke of the night from Josh: How do you get a tissue to dance? Just put a little boogie in it.

12. Yankees update: so far, they've played pretty stinky. But Saturday's game was very memorable. Josh had been watching it off and on throughout the day. The Yankees clawed back into the game. In bottom of the 9th, Yankees down by one, 2 outs, bases loaded, 2 strikes, A-Rod at the plate. SLAM!!! Home run! A-Rod gets a lot of grief from NYC fans, but for one moment, he was quite the hero. It was cool to watch it live.

We've Moved!

2007-04-01T21:44:00.000-05:00

Well, the move finally took place this past week. What a stressful process. I now hope we never move again....and at that point, it's a move out west. But it all turned out well.

Just some random observations to get me back on track as to posting on my blog...there's so much more to be written about the move, but here's a few nuggets:

1. In most areas, we upgraded. But I do miss having a garbage disposal and an ice maker in our new kitchen. But not deal breakers.

2. I officially begin my first new commute in more than 8 years. Our two houses (one rental, one owned) were three doors apart, so my commute hasn't really changed since moving to the 'burbs of NYC. I'm going to miss having the freedom to walk out the door on my schedule to catch the train rather than having to have Kathryn load up the kids and drive me to the station.

3. We finally have a door bell that works.

4. Thrilled about having forced air (and that means central air, too). I'm thrilled to say adios to radiators and their non "on-demand" approach to delivering heat.

5. You know you're finally comfortable in a new place when you feel safe wandering around the house at night without turning on lights. That hasn't happened yet. I try it...but without success.

6. Why don't our bathrooms in our new place have toilet paper roll holders?

7. Why did the sellers take the mailbox? Odd.

8. Our neighbors have no idea what they're in for!

Church News

2007-03-18T23:31:00.000-05:00

So much to write, yet so little time as we move this week to our new house a mile away from our current abode. So I'll save some of my nuggets for next week.

But I wanted to let everyone know that Kathryn had a great article published in this week's Church News about a new branch that was created in our stake. I believe it's page 13, and it's a full page.

On a related note, a couple of thoughts about the Church News:

1. It kind of follows a double standard when it profiles new mission presidents, temple presidents, General Authorities, etc. Why is it the style to publish the age of the priesthood holder, but never the age of his wife? Of course, I'm smart enough to know why that is, but if it's not relevant to know the wife's age, why is it relevant to know the male's age?

2. Of course, I'm glad they publish the male's age. I always look to find the youngest-called mission presidents. And I've noticed a trend. If you don't want to be called as a mission president when you are super young, don't work for the church!!! Seems like all 39 year old presidents are CES, BYU or some other job with the church. Working for the church seems to be like putting a red beacon on your head that says: "Hey coach, send me in as a mission president while I'm young".

3. If all callings are of equal importance, in theory, and the most important callings are HT, father and husband (for males), why do they list all the former callings of a new mission president? Does their past experience need to be listed to show they are qualified? I thought "he that is called is qualified", so shouldn't that be enough? And how relevant is it to their calling at age 65 that they were a Sunday School president at age 25?

Daylight Savings Time

2007-03-11T20:02:00.000-05:00

A short post today...I used some of my writing time drafting a letter to "Sue Sue" on her mission instead of blogging:

1. I don't have an issue with the whole Daylight Savings Time in principle. And I really like the earlier start time as NYC is at the start of the Eastern Time Zone which means it can really light really early in the morning, which means kids rise earlier. (Mid to late March was always like "running out the clock" to get to Daylight Savings Time as it would get sunny too soon).

But here's my issue: What idiot decided that 2 a.m. would be the PERFECT time to lose an hour? Sure, it works great in the fall when we gain an hour. Who doesn't love an extra hour of sleep. But seriously...does anyone really desire to give up an hour of sleep? Why don't we lose that hour when we're doing something we hate....or at least gets us to the weekend faster? How cool would it be if we lost that hour at 4 p.m. on Friday....we'd all get to leave work early and have a longer weekend.

For that matter....nearly ANY hour lost during the work week would be preferable to having one less hour on a weekend.

I realize from a practical matter it has to be the nighttime. But at least make it Friday night to Saturday morning so we have a couple of days to adjust to it before having to go to work

2. We've been doing a lot of packing...and purging...this weekend. When I looked in one trash bag, I saw a handful of Christmas toys for the kids from a couple of years ago. Makes you think about the "shelf life" of the things we buy.

I wondered if our purchasing habits would be different if we had to have an "exit strategy" for every item we bought (i.e determining ahead of time when and how we'd discard the item after it had served its usefulness). If we had to commit to keeping -- and using -- something for a full year (under threat of a penalty for not adhering) I think we'd second guess a lot of our purchases. Just think what that money could be used for. Even realizing that some of the things we buy are more disposable than we think (i.e. we'll trash them in a year or so) would provide a sober reality.

And if we were brutally honest, we'd probably admit that 90 percent of the things we buy for our kids for Christmas get tossed aside within three months. Of course....being a marketer of toys, I can't have too many realize that or I'd be out of a job.

Training from an Area Authority 70

2007-03-04T22:54:00.000-05:00

Admittedly, last week's posting was lame, but I was tired yet still wanted to keep my promise of a "post a week".

Tonight, here are some thoughts and such from an early morning training we had with Elder Kim Smith, our area authority 70.

1. To the older men in the audience who were bishops: Don't think you can't relate to the youth. Pres. Hinckley is 96 or so and can you think of anyone who relates better with the youth than he?

2. Did you know that the only time a President does NOT choose his councilors in the church are when it's a YM president? The new handbook confirms that. The Bishop calls the President of the YM AND the councilors as they oversee a specific group of boys within the AP.

3. We must all ensure the church is keeping true to the Church Handbook. As a councilor, it's OK to point out that something isn't according to handbook. The handbook represents safety, and we should all protect ourselves by doing whatever it takes to adhere to it.

4. YM need to learn how to SERVE, not just be entertained. After all, missions and EQ sure aren't about being entertained!

5. Bishops are too quick to write welfare checks. By doing so, they are preventing a unique teaching opportunity from occurring.

6. When someone seeks welfare assistance, a Bishop should ask how their extended family is helping them out as that's the first line of defense. He shared an example of a brother to whom he wasn't close that needed help. The Bishop told him to ask his family first, and he said he was embarrassed. But now he and that brother are very close. (So, to my family...anyone need help?!)

7. Elder Bednar had said at a training recently that the Devil has increased his intensity so if we are at just the same level of spirituality as in the past, we're actually losing ground. (It's like my company....if we make the same amount of money from year to year, we actually make less profit as salaries have gone up, rent has gone up, etc. and we have less left over as profit). If you are doing LESS than you have normally done, you're losing ground twice as fast. So we need to make an active effort at increasing our level of spirituality.

Mark

Another Sunday night...

2007-02-25T21:03:00.000-05:00

1. The worst part about showing a house when trying to sell it is you can't find your stuff anymore. For example, Kathryn straightens up before each visit, and stashes things. I spent 15 minutes the other night trying to figure out where the new tube of toothpaste got tossed, and never did find it. I used the Dora toothpaste instead.

2. I had a 7 a.m. Stake Priesthood Meeting this morning. Josh didn't want me to miss it, so he was "kind enough" to set my alarm clock last night (unbeknownst to me) for 4:20 a.m. It woke up me, Kathryn and Samuel...which meant I had to get up with Sam...which dominoed into the other kids waking up. Thanks Josh! (Kathryn did spot me at 5:30 and let me go back to bed for 30 minutes).

3. I don't know where the nail trimmers are either.

4. I put on my list of things to do this weekend: Eat a lot of chocolate. I made that goal. I think my problem with creating lists is I've ben adding the wrong items to the list!

Don't have much else to talk about tonight...need to go catch up on my sleep!

Mark

I've returned from a one-week hiaitus

2007-02-18T21:05:00.000-05:00

My apologies to the legion of readers who wondered why I didn't post last Sunday. I was in Toy Fair mode, and was simply exhausted. But with Toy Fair in my rear view mirror, I'm back on my game.

1. Consumer Alert! Delta no longer allows you to buy a half-price ticket for a child under the age of 2. If you want a child to have a confirmed seat, it's full price. This just went into effect the end of December...even the Delta clerk I spoke with didn't know that.

2. I'm a "run out the clock" kind of guy. Whenever there is something I dread, I think forward to determine the number of hours/days until the unpleasant task will be done. Then, I count backwards and create a comparison by figuring out what I was doing in the same amount of time in the past. Then I'll say: "The bad thing will be all done in the same amount of time it has taken to get from when I went to Church last Sunday to now. That's not so bad! I can make it".

Initially, I played that game as a child to while waiting for Christmas to arrive. As an adult, I started doing that with bad things when I traveled with kids. "In 6 hours the plane will land and I'll be done with this experience of traveling on a plane with kids. 6 hours ago, I was going to bed...that doesn't seem that long ago. I can make it!"

3. You heard it here first: the hot toy for Christmas 2007 will be Squawkers McCaw, a Furreal Friends Parrot for $69 that is very cool and really realistic. (And yes, we rep that toy).

4. It pains me to see jetBlue enduring their PR nightmare. It's such a domino effect...how do you ever even fix the problem once it starts?

5. Sammy looks really good in yellow...it matches his hair well.

6. If you are the last speaker in a church meeting, it is your responsibility to make sure the meeting ends on time. I spoke in a Spanish unit today, and I didn't stand up to speak until 2:35 p.m. (the meeting ended at 2:40 p.m.) In that situation, bare your testimony and sit down. Nobody learns anything...and the spirit leaves....after the scheduled close of the meeting.

7. Miracles happen every day. We are still living in an era of miracles.

8. This whole house-buying and house-selling situation has given me such an increased understanding of faith and being led by the Spirit. More important than what the Spirit has directed me to do is learning better HOW the spirit works and having more trust in it.

9. I saw George Lucas this week. I didn't meet him, but saw him 3 different times as he toured the Hasbro Showroom and checked out the Star Wars toys.

10. Looks like we're going to get the new Monopoly: Here & Now game set on to the next Shuttle mission. I've been invited to watch the Shuttle launch, but don't think I'll be able to make it due to the time commitment involved.

11. I'm fearful that "The Office" has not necessarily jumped the shark, but just lost it's sharpness. The last 3 or 4 episodes have been weak.

12. The NBA All-Star game in Las Vegas is a good idea.

13. Someone routed a list of Ten Good Reasons to Elect a Mormon President. My favorite: At the inauguration, he would swear on the Bible 'as far as it is translated correctly.'

See you next Sunday night!

Mark

Post Super Bowl Musings

2007-02-04T23:33:00.000-05:00

Well, the Bears lost. While I went into the game knowing that I'd be happy no matter which team won, I've always been a Bears fan. Why? When I was in kindergarten, my friend (who is also named Mark) and I were playing football in his backyard. He said "I'll be Dallas and you be Chicago". Ever since I was assigned that team, I've been a Bears fan. (Do team affections ever have more rationality to them than that?)

I remember gettinga Bears jersey in kindergarten that I still have -- mainly because Santa brought a XL instead of a Small, so it had to be hemmed, which meant the "60" on the jersey was completely cut in half. I ended up wearing it in high school.

I also got a Bears helmet that year, too. That came too small, so my dad had to cut off the foam padding over the ears so I could get it on.

Needless to say, I was super excited in 1985 when the Bears won their only Super Bowl appearance before tonight.

I've liked the Buccanners (pardon the spelling..it's late) from Tampa, too. I think I was always drawn to them because they were the biggest losers EVER in the NFL. Kind of like how people like the Cubs or Red Sox because they always lose and you like to root for the underdog. When I was young, the Buccs were a new team, and lost every game one season. In a weird way, I can very much relate to the Buccs more so than, say, the "America's Team" Cowboys. Call me a Charlie Brown, but I think all of our lives have more failures than we care to admit, and as such, I could easily relate to the losing of the Buccs.

So you can imagine my excitement a few years ago when the Buccs won the Super Bowl.

In an interesting twist, the coach of the Colts, who won tonight, was the coach of the Buccs until the season before Tampa won it all (he got fired when he couldn't get them to the Super Bowl). So while I'm sad the Bears lost, the Colts victory is kind of a victory for my Buccs, too, and that's OK.

Thoughts I Pondered On During High Priests Meeting

2007-01-28T22:08:00.000-05:00

1. We finally got some cold weather in New York City, which meant it was time to trot out the old "real feel" temperature. "It's 18 degrees outside, but with the wind chill, the "real feel" is minus 74!!!

As much as I mock on that as just a way to hype the weather, I think this technique can be applied to kids. "My wife and I are raising 4 kids...but with the "all under the age of 8" factor, the "real feel" is like raising 7 kids!"

2. Favorite orange soda brand: Fanta.

I've always like Sunkist, but the caffeine in it (yes, it has caffeine) knocks it out. Minute Maid orange (not sure if it's still made) is high on the list. And the relatively new Tropicana Twister Orange soda (not the pseudo-juice products) isn't all that bad. But Orange Slice was the worst.

3. Does anyone else have a phobia of eating food in front of others? I realized I have a food phobia when I was asked to choose a sandwich to order for a client lunch. I chose tuna on a croissant because it's soft and easy to chew. Can't stand trying to be like a savage and rip apart a crusty-style bread that is topping meat that must be ripped apart.

But beyond that, I hate to ruin the pleasant experience of eating by worrying about the niceties that you must put on when eating in front of company. Granted, everyone knows from looking at me that I'm not a major eater. But I like to eat. It's enjoyable. But it loses any pleasure if I have to share a meal with someone I don't particularly like.

4. I also have "overhead bin" phobia. That's the fear of delaying the plane because my bag won't fit in the overhead bin. It's shared space, and jockeying for space up there just makes me nervous. I can count on three fingers the number of times I've used overhead space on a flight when I was flying on my own.

5. Oh, we bought a new house this week. GULP!

Random Items

2007-01-21T19:38:00.000-05:00

Life has gotten a bit crazy, and will continue for a few weeks, so I may not have the most amazing posts of all time in the next few Sundays, but I resolve to at least write SOMETHING to say hello. So keep visiting!

1. For those of you who may be trying to teach the New Testament to your kids this year in FHE, here's a topic guide that we used over the course of 7 weeks last year that worked nicely:

week 1: Jesus' baptism, 40 day fast, calling Apostles
week 2: Sermon on Mount
week 3: Miracles (spotlighted 3 or 4)
week 4: Parables (spotlighted 3 or 4)
week 5: Raising from the dead (2 stories)
week 6 : Last Supper and Sacrament
week 7: Crucifixion and Resurrection

2. In reference to my posting last week about shows I want on DVD, it turns out my friend Mark in Salt Lake City works at a company that will be putting Hawaii Five-O onto DVD this spring. Get your credit card out and BOOK IT DANO.

3. How long must the flags be at half staff for President Ford's funeral? Doesn't it seem like that was forever ago?

4. Why does New Jersey (and Oregon) require you to utilize full-service gas stations? It's the law...you can't pump your own gas in those states. I was out in NJ this Friday and had to refuel a rental car, but decided to forget it as it's so much slower to have to use an attendent. I can refuel in 38 seconds...so what benefit is there for me to wait for slow-poke attendent to do it for me? Stupid! Like it's unsafe to pump your own gas. 48 states can't be wrong!

5. Many of you have heard me say it before, but my definition of an optimist is a parent of young children who still sets his alarm clock at night. This week has proven that, with a couple of 3 a.m. and 4:15 a.m. child awakenings.

See you next Sunday.

Mark

Product Review: Baseball Game for Dad & Son

2007-01-14T23:13:00.000-05:00

Harry's Grand Slam Baseball is a home run! I found it in a catalog featuring classic games and ordered it for Josh for Christmas from Out of the Box Games. It's about $15 and can be ordered online (see link).

http://www.otb-games.com/grandslam/index.html

It's a great, simple replication of a real baseball game that can be played in 15 to 20 minutes. It's easy to grasp and has just enough "managerial" elements to make it more than just about chance and luck. Most fun twist: you can opt to take a chance and play a special card that represents either a pinch hitter or relief pitcher...but there's no guarantee or improved odds that the card will deliver what you need. But in a pinch, it's a worthwhile gamble.

Josh and I play it literally every night before bedtime. It's the perfect Dad/Son game to end the evening. I'd say it's great for boys who already have an interest in baseball and grasp most of the rules and little nuances of the game ... probably ages 1st to 3rd grade is the sweet spot.

In No Particular Order...

2007-01-14T22:52:00.000-05:00

Thoughts from the past week...

1. Very good football weekend...my preferred teams won 3 of the 4 games (San Diego losing was the one dark spot). The four potential Super Bowl match-ups are: a) "The Midwest Bowl" (Chicago vs. Indy) b) "Super Bowl 20 -- the sequel" (Chicago vs. New England) c) "The First Timers' Bowl" (New Orleans vs. Indy), or d) "The New Bowl" (New Orleans vs. New England). My preference: A (go Bears) or C (go Saints)

2. I did a quick overnight trip to San Francisco this week. I was reminded that San Francisco homeless are MUCH more agressive than New York City homeless. Overall, NYC may not be known for our friendliness, but New York City homeless are definitely friendlier than those in SF (and Washington, for that matter).

3. Why do pilots feel obligated to share the temperature of your destination in Celsius? What's more, they often seem to say "Centigrade" instead of "Celsius". Are there that many metric nuts who fly and demand it? Seems like metric fanatics probably automatically convert from F to C in their heads anyway, so this feels unnecessary.

4. I want the new i-Phone from Apple that was announced this week.

5. I saw something the other day that DVDs have officially surpassed videotape in terms of number of households of something, something (don't remember the specific). But as a fellow Dad of young kids pointed out to me, videotapes actually rock vs. DVDs when young kids are in the homes. How many times do I try to run a kids' DVD only to find one of the kids has ruined it by placing their syrup-laced fingers all over it. (I even saw Matty licking a Thomas DVD once, which didn't help its playability). And the scratches they collect... But stick in an old-fashioned videotape and you've got 30 minutes of no worries. If you have (or will have) young kids, keep the videotapes.

6. Perhaps it's a sad commentary on my work/life balance (the theme of the movie), but I found Adam Sandler's "Click" to be very motivational. (Kathryn and I watched it last night). I'd heard bad reviews, but I'd give it a solid 3 out of 4 stars. A tad too many "S" words, but Click is a quality flick.

7. TV shows that I wish were on DVD: Hawaii Five-O, Family Ties, Wonder Years, Night Court, WKRP in Cincinnati, and Alice. I have the Dukes of Hazzard (season 1) if anyone wants to borrow.

8. If the Beastie Boys decided to do kids' songs in their later years, I know what their first big hit would be: "You've Got to Fight....For Your Right....to POTT-Y!"

See you next week.

Mark