DT's Blog

Wyatt Home Video 01

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:11:00 +0000

Wyatt recorded this on my 28th birthday, which was on July 27, 2009. We had a fun day!

Daytona Squirrels 02

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:03:00 +0000

This was a cool park that we found in Daytona while going to the beach and also to see the Daytona Cubs baseball game at "The Jack."

Caricature

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 16:55:00 +0000

This is a caricature that Wyatt drew of me standing next to him. For the best view, click on the jpeg for a bigger image.

What do you think?

Note the "Gotta Have More Cowbell" T-Shirt (I got it at a Rays game in '07).

These kids are sharp, I'll tell ya!

Our new home

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Fri, 29 May 2009 18:29:00 +0000

I have been wanting to take some pictures of our new home in Satsuma, but I just haven't had time. Things are busy! But I will get on that, because I am excited about sharing our new digs with you. We moved in with my Mom, Dad, and nephew Wyatt to share their house in Satsuma. Besides having a wonderful dream kitchen in their mobile home, they have room to house Angelina in Wyatt's room. Mama was wonderful enough to share her camper; we had it parked on the lot close to the house but far enough away to get some privacy. Alicia and I camp out there, and we are really starting to enjoy it. It is a 300-square feet flat with a small kitchen, a bathroom, and an upstairs "bedroom" that you'll just have to see to believe! Is it cramped up there? Sure, but we only sleep there... we don't spend a lot of time in there doing anything else. Right now as I type, I am sitting in our little office with all the speakers hooked up to my computer. That is how I am listening to Collective Soul and LOVING LIFE! You'll have to give me patience on the pictures--I want to put them on there as bad as you want to see them, so believe me when I say that they are coming soon. It really is quite cozy here, and we are in the process of organizing all of our "stuff" (and you KNOW how much of that there can be that accumulates). I have a habit of being a storage junkie, but I am trying to let go of the stuff that is just not that important.

Collective Soul

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Fri, 29 May 2009 18:15:00 +0000

I am lovin' this! I have always enjoyed listening to music from Collective Soul, but I have not been keeping up with them over the last few years. Apparently, they haven't been idle. In 2007, they released "Afterwords," which I am listening to right now as I work. If I have time (hmm...I don't know about that... I MADE myself write this entry, promising myself that I would have to keep it short), I will write up a full review, but for now, suffice it to say that it is GOOD. Vintage Soul.

You can get the songs at www.collectivesoul.com, if you don't already have a place to get them from. I use Zune Marketplace.

I also found out that they are touring, and they are coming to Lake Buena Vista on July 14. Shibby!

Another CD they have is called "Home," and it is one of those nifty CD/DVD combos that gives you a good reason to actually go out to a store and buy a hard copy. I am putting it on my Christmas List now!

Time of Your Life (Good Riddance)

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sun, 17 May 2009 17:16:00 +0000

Just wanted to post this metube video of my performance at Deseret Academy's 2009 graduation, held this past Friday, May 15 at the Ravine Gardens in Palatka, FL. Enjoy!

¡Viva la Verde!

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Wed, 13 May 2009 22:49:00 +0000

Some of you may already know--we have started our own organic produce business! It is called ¡Viva la Verde!, and we are going to be at the Jacksonville Farmers Market (1810 W. Beaver Street) each Saturday from 8:30 A.M. to about 2:00 P.M.

We have created a newsletter that we going to distribute before this weekend, and I wanted to see if you are interested in receiving it each week. Just reply with a comment if you want it every week, and you will get it--either from this address or that of my Mom. You can always opt-out, but I thought you would want to at least check it out. It has a price list for the week, plus other fun stuff that I know you will enjoy reading.

Mono Meals

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 18:13:00 +0000

Today for lunch, we had a mono-meal. In case you don't know, that means eating just one thing until you are full. It can be very satisfying, and the meal is very easy to digest, because your stomach only has to work to digest one type of food, with all of its various nutrients.

At the farmers market this week, we bought some watermelons on the cheap. Mom blogged about our picnic lunch yesterday, and we ate the leftovers from that today, along with one of the smaller watermelons that we bought for $4. I asked the guy that sold them to us if they get any cheaper over the summer, and he said that pretty soon, they would be so abundant that he would eventually lower the price to $1! That means this meal is going to be repeated in our family A LOT this summer!

So anyway, to today's watermelon, we added some Himalayan salt and some Mexican Fiesta seasoning, and it was delicious AGAIN! Not as sweet as yesterday's though, and the small one we ate today was seedless. I am kind of liking the flavor of watermelon seeds, even though it is something I have never really eaten in the past. They also add a nice crunch to the melon, and I have heard they are good for you. Does nyone know if that is true and why?

Farmer's Market

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 15:03:00 +0000

So we've decided what the next big step is for our family. We are going to start selling our raw creations at Farmer's Markets, starting with the Jacksonville Farmer's Market on Beaver Street. I am REALLY excited, and I know that I have been given this opportunity to excel at doing something that I love. Yes, I was let go by my job last week, but it has been an amazing week. I have not been sad, depressed, or discouraged. I know that Heavenly Father is preparing the way for us to do something great, and this will be another step towards launching the DT foundation and also our first raw restaurant.

We found out that we may not be able to do smoothies, juices, or ice creams on the spot as that could be in violation of the health code, but we CAN do pre-packaged foods. So we are going to experiment with our best raw creations and see what people like the most.

I hope you will support us in this endeavor, but even more than that, I am excited to see which of our creations YOU enjoy the most!

Stay tuned...

PB&J!

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 14:45:00 +0000

For breakfast today, we had peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, RAW-style!

It is a really easy meal to make. We just sliced up a few apples, spread some almond butter on the top of each slice, put some medjool date slices (and a few sliced-up deglet dates for variety) on each piece of "bread," and added a few dashes of salt. Mom taught us how to make this a few weeks ago, and I have been wanting to make it for all of us, because I knew Angelina would love it. And of course, she did!

Keeping up with DT

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 15:36:00 +0000

There are 2 new ways to keep up with me, if you are interested in that sort of thing.

The first is twitter. I don't know how regularly I'll "twitter", but I am on there at least. My page is:

https://twitter.com/trunkybeat .

The other is a cool thing I've learned to do with my RSS feeds. Feed-readers are an amazing thing, and now you can keep up with some of my favorite news articles, blog entries, sports stories, or life commentaries. Check it out, and I hope everyone starts doing this. It is a neat way to share interesting, thoughtful, or personal things without having to email a link to everyone you know. My feed reader of choice is google, and the link to my shared feeds is:

http://www.google.com/reader/shared/02053383542510281468

Let me know which stories are more interesting to you!

Raw Treats

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 02:45:00 +0000

Alicia's birthday was this month, and I made a few special raw treats for her on that special day. I made some almond mylk, which we don't make that often, either because it is messy, or because we don't have enough almonds in the house. The made some sweet milk (almond milk + agave nector) and chocolate smoothies, which were wonderful. I didn't take any pictures of the chocolate, because I think we drank 'em up too fast. That is SO good! But I did take a picture of some of the leftover almond mylk:

Almond Mylk

Now when one makes almond mylk, one doesn't want to throw away the leftover pulp, because raw unpasteurized almonds are a bit expensive. So one tries to find things to make out of this pulp. I decided to make some dehydrated almond cookies. They were pretty good, but I will make them better next time. The problem was they were too thin. That is, when I put them in the Excalibur to dehydrate, they broke apart when I pulled them out the next morning. I drizzled some agave on them, and I think we added some big slices of banana to eat with them to moisten them up. I gave the big one to Alicia. This was pre-dehydrate, and that is them sitting on the dehydrator tray:

Almond Cookies

I also made some banana chips. They were perfect--much better than my last batch a few months ago, which were cut too thin and stuck to the tray when dried!

Banana Chips

See how thick they are cut? That is the key.

So the chocolate mylk was the favorite treat, but I must say--drinking some sweet mylk with the dry cookies and some banana was VERY satisfying.

I am not a raw chef every day, but when I am I really enjoy it. And I treat my ladies right!

Raw Lunch

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 18:36:00 +0000

Welcome to Lunch!

This weekend is going wonderfully! March Madness from noon to midnight every day, and enough fresh raw food to be satisfied the whole time. I couldn't resist taking some pictures of our BEAUTIFUL lunch that we had today and sharing them with you. The colors were so wonderful. Angelina (have you seen her adorable new hairstyle yet?) and I were talking about how it is neat that fruits and vegetables love to be picked, eaten, and shared, and it is true! They project themselves in such bright and vibrant colors, and they taste so good in their natural, unmutated form. They want to nurture us!

Alicia is watching a set of DVD's featuring Dr. Graham and Dr. Rozalind Gruben in which they talk about some of these things. Something that Alicia picked up on that I didn't really hear when I listened to the DVD's earlier this month was that we shouldn't shun our sweet tooth. The fact that fruits are sweet and we tend to like sweet is not a coincidence! This relationship began in the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve lived as fruitarians. It is not an addiction like it is with some other foods. These foods are the best that we can eat, and they grow in abundance for us. I hope to one day live in a place that is more tropical so that I can have access to an even larger variety of fruit than is already available to me and my family.

The connection that we can have with our food is simply awesome.

Darius' Plate

Our lunch was a big salad. I learned from Dr. Graham that it is good to combine avocado and any citrus or high-acid fruit to make a salad dressing. So I imitated a recent recipe made by my mother and made a grapefruit juice and avocado dressing. We drizzled it over greens, tomatoes, green onions, and then topped it with a few orange slices and some previously-made Parmesan cheeze.

I must say, it was VERY good. I recommend that dressing to anyone, raw vegan or not. Angelina said that it was her favorite meal ever and asked if we could have it on her birthday. I am not sure if that means she no longer wants blueberry pancakes, but I think she does because I think she is aiming towards 3 specific special meals that day. Two down, one to go! This next picture was taken by her:

Angelina's Plate

By the way, that drink in the cup in the first picture is freshly-squeezed juice from a freshly-PICKED grapefruit (it is one of the only things we seem to know how to grow right year-in and year-out).

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 19:15:00 +0000

A funny thing happened to me this morning when I was getting ready for work. I was trying to decide between two shirts that Alicia had bought for me last week. One was grey and the other was this green shirt. Well, I didn't even realize today was St. Patrick's Day, but I thought the green matched better with the dark tan khakis that I had selected, so I picked it, and Alicia agreed. When I got to work, I overheard some co-workers discussing wether or not today was really St. Patrick's Day. I shot a quick look at my Dilbert day calander and saw that indeed, it was! Wa-hoo! No pinches for me today!

Another funny thing was that even before I heard them talking, I saw my boss wearing a lime-green shirt and thought, "Wow. That is a really hideous shirt. What was he thinking?"

More Learnings from Dr. Graham

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 11:47:00 +0000

Well, I started reading "The 80/10/10 Diet" again (doesn't the cover make you just want to grab a couple of peaches?), and I think the edition that I bought at his lecture that we attended last month in Miami has some additional sections added compared with the edition that I read last year. This one has two extra appendices: one is a section full of testimonials, and the other is an FAQ. I started browsing through them, and learned all kinds of new things that I don't remember reading before. The questions in the FAQ were very simple, and very chronological in the sense that if someone wanted to start living this lifestyle, these are the questions they might have, and in this order. Like one of the first ones is "Can I really eat all this fruit?", followed by "What about dried fruit?", "What about vinegar?", etc.

So as I read, I realized that I agreed with some of these teachings, and I disagreed to a certain extent with others. I want to make changes in my lifestyle and adjust according to what I was learning and feeling, so I started making two lists to help me "move in that direction," as Dr. Graham is so fond of suggesting. He says that if you don't make this transition overnight, the best that you can do is "move in that direction."

Here are my lists:

Foods that I want to start eliminating from my diet:

Dehydrated foods, including dried fruits (they are not a whole food if they don't have the water that originally came with them!)
Vinegar (I think I'm actually already there, but I didn't really know why. This is actually a poison! In chemistry class, they mix vinegar and water together to make acetic acid. Yeah. That is one of the ones that has the skull and crossbones on the outside. Vinegar is just dilluted even more, but a poison is still a poison.)
Sea Salt (Not that foods like celery that have sodium are bad, but EXTRACTED salt)
Condiments. Think of it this way: anything that can’t be eaten by itself as a meal shouldn’t be eaten at all. Time will tell how I can handle this one. I have always liked salts, spices, and things to make the food taste “better,” but I think I just need to start thinking of WHOLE FOODS that can create the same effect. Example: jalapeño instead of chili powder.

Foods that I want to eat very sparingly, or at least acknowledge when I do eat them that they are not the best things for me to eat. If I eat foods from this list, I want to start thinking of it as a compromise for me:

Seaweed and algae. Dr. Graham says that these should not be considered vegan since they contain creatures. He also says that we are only meant to eat things that appeal to us in their natural state, and you would gag if you were to eat seaweed or saltwater right out of the ocean.
Frozen Foods. I learned from a lecturer named Tanya Zavasta at a recent raw meet-up that when a food is frozen, the cells expand (which we all already know). For foods, this expansion causes the cell walls inside the foods to burst, and we don’t have a lot of research to tell us what this does to the nutrition provided by the food. Dr. Graham says they should not be eliminated (since this is one of the best food-preservation methods available), but that we should be aware that it is a potential compromise with the value that the food is providing us.

One thing that I am still pondering, particularly when it comes to Dr. Graham’s reasoning on consuming things like vinegar and sea salt: yes, these things will kill you in their concentrated form, but it is actually true that ANY substance is toxic at a certain concentration, even water! So the idea that these things are diluted poisons has got me thinking, but not necessarily in total agreement. One point, however, that does resonate with me is how something shouldn’t be considered a food unless you can make a meal out of it by itself. If you can’t do that then it should not be considerred a food that can be eaten at all.

I am enjoying reading the book again, and I highly recommend that it be read by you. I am also enjoying listening to his DVD series “Making Friends With Your Food,” with Professor Rozalind Gruben also lecturing.

This ain't no commercial, but for more information on Dr. Graham's program, including how to get a copy of "The 80/10/10 Diet," please visit http://foodnsport.com/. You can also get it on amazon.com. I think it is fascinating what Dr. Graham is able to do with athletes on a raw food diet. As he said in the lecture that we attended last month, if someone needs more fuel (calories) for an athletic lifestyle, it doesn't mean they need different kinds of calories, it just means they need more of them.

Badfish

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 20:51:00 +0000

I already posted about this in my online Journal (see http://trunkybeat.livejournal.com/3590.html), but I had to put it here for people that don't read there. Badfish is coming to Jacksonville! Badfish is a Sublime tribute band, and we all know that Sublime is the best mellow band out there, right? If you want to go let me know, and we can carpool there! It starts at 8:00 next Wednesday, March 11 at the Freebird Live at Jacksonville Beach. You can buy tickets by calling (800) 594-8499. Oh, and Scotty Don't will also be there. Can't wait!

Cancer is NOT a mystery

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 13:44:00 +0000

Ever since I was a kid, I was wondering how millions of dollars of research could supposedly be spent on cancer every year. "What are they spending the money on?", I would think to myself. And why isn't the answer being reached? If it is not being reached, why do they keep thinking more money will solve the problem?

Well, now that I have educated myself thouroughly (and as a cancer survivor myself, some of that education was painful, believe me!), I understand a little bit more about what the money is being spent on, but I know it is a waste. Cancer is NOT a mystery. The cure is already out there, as well as the prevention! PLEASE stop spending the money the way it is currently being spent! One day soon, I hope to launch the DT Foundation. Will it be a fundraiser for cancer research? YES! My family and I also hope to educate those that need it--those that want it. My family has always been big on education, and we want this information to get out there.

This post was inspired by an article that I just found recently:
http://www.detoxtheworld.com/blog-detail.php?ID=63

It is kind of a long read, but it is worth it. Over the last two years, I have been having some of the same thoughts that are presented there. I hope you will make the effort to decide for yourself if healthy living is worth it. I know that you will find out for yourself some surprising benefits. Do we live this way just to be healthy? Do we do this just to lose weight and look good? Is that the only reason for going raw, getting back to nature, and educating our family on the benefits of living this way? For me, the answers are no, no, and no!

I started living this way BECAUSE I was diagnosed with cancer. I'm not sure that I personally would have made this decision without that happening first. As unfortunate as that is, I suspect it is the same way with many of you. A life-or-death situation would have to happen before you decide to take the plunge. Well I am here to tell you that it does not have to be that way. You CAN do this! If you come up with excuses of why you cannot, then you really do not WANT to do it. I have been very blessed to receive this knowledge, and I know that my life is so much better than before I ever found out I had cancer. I know that my knowledge is not complete! I am always looking for new things to learn about my body and life in general. I know that my body and my spirit are much more in tune now, and that they will know if something new that I hear or implement is right or wrong. It is important that we keep searching for the truths that will make us happy and concious.

Low-fat Lunch

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 18:07:00 +0000

I just have to share a picture of the colorful lunch that I had at work today. The best part? It was tasty AND low-fat, which supports the direction my family and I are trying to go in keeping with the theory of the 80/10/10 diet (see "80-10-10" tag below).

The lunch consisted of some spring mix, apple slices, orange wedges, raisins, and sliced banana. No dressing needed!

Now of course I like raw salad dressings. I got to try a new type of guacamole this weekend--one that conisted simply of mushed-up avocado and grapefruit juice. It was so wonderful. And I absolutely love the ranch dressings that we've come up with, especially the caesar ranch!

Fruit dressings are great too though. They give you tons of energy and don't bog you down like some of the nut-based dressings that can make your diet more like 10/10/80 (80% or more fat), if you catch my drift. With this "fruit salad dressing," as I like to call it, no nuts are needed!

In case you are interested in the caloronutrient distribution, the meal was // calories from carbs/fat/protein. Here are the details:

Total calories: 578
% Calories from carbs/fat/protein: 92/3/5

The lettuce is about 12-13% calories from fat, but it is a low amount of calories in the overall meal (19!).

I got my information from http://www.nutridiary.com, which is a great place to keep a log of your meals and calories, or if you just want to look at the calorie distribution. It is really cool--you can create an account and save meals that you enter so that you don't have to enter them all over again later. If you have any questions, just ask!

2009 Book List

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 20:28:00 +0000

I want to create a list of the books as I read them this year. This will make me more accountable, as my goal is to read 25 books this year. If I get through that many easily, I will change my goal to 50.

Read so far:

Don't Bet Against Me! by DeAnna Favre
Green for Life, by Victoria Boutenko
Twilight, by Stephanie Meyer

Dilbert and the Way of the Weasel by Scott Adams

Working on:

Why My Wife Thinks I'm an Idiot by Mike Greenberg

Libro de Mormón en Español

Doctrine and Covenants

Our Heritage: A Brief History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Blindside by Michael Lewis

New Moon by Stephanie Meyer

Why We Want You to be Rich: Two Men, One Message by Donald Trump and Robert Kiyosaki

Updated 2/9/09 ~11:00 A.M. with a new book I remembered I finished in January.

3/2/09 update: I finished "New Moon" and wood like to start on Eclipse. I finished the Greeny "Wife/Idiot" book, the Trump/Kiyosaki book. I have also started reading "The Dilbert Future," by Scott Adams, which is quite entertaining. I think those are all the updates. I am trying to figure out how best to handle these updates. Maybe I'll just do a new post each time--maybe every quarter. That way, one can see the progress I've made throughout the year. Yeah, that's it! I'll post at the end of March.

Angelina Funny! Me Post!

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 20:23:00 +0000

I don't care if this saying came from Angelina's father, who's lack of urgency in signing the adoption paperwork is the only thing preventing us from adopting Angelina right now. He always has been the "funny" one of us Trunk boys. This is the latest term we've learned from Angelina: every time we see a school bus, I call it a short bus--it doesn't matter if it is short or not, it's just one of those things I think is funny. Well, she said, "That's not a short bus. It's a cheese wagon!"

When she repeated it again today, it still cracked us up. She can't tell an official joke to save her life, but some of the things she says in ordinary conversation are hilarious!

Finding the right mate, in a nutshell...

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 19:55:00 +0000

I am reading the book, "Why My Wife Thinks I'm an Idiot," by one of my favorite sports journalists, Mike Greenberg (the "skinny" half of Mike and Mike in the Morning--Alicia likes them too!). I got to the section on how much Greeny loves his wife, and he is talking about how crazy most women are and how crazy most men are for wishing they weren't married (you know the stereotype...). Here is a quote I would like to reprint:

"It is invariably in those moments when she is at her craziest that I am most aware of my love for her. That isn't a coincidence. Her craziness serves as a reminder that all women are crazy; the key is to find one whose craziness suits you."

Well said. I'm glad I found a women that loves me for who I am. I'm thankful for all she does to keep us together and keep our family happy. Yes, she is crazy, but she's my kind of crazy.

2009 Academy Awards

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 17:42:00 +0000

So the Oscars will be here in 3 weeks, and as usual, I haven't seen any of the movies nominated for best picture. Four of the five nominated flicks were rated "R," so that means the only one I would have even thought about watching was The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. I don't remember that one being advertised!

I just read that netflix review of it that I linked to above, and now I do remember seeing a trailor or two for it.

My personal favorites from last year were Iron Man, Hellboy II, Hancock, Star Wars: the Clone Wars, and probably Dark Knight (we own it, but we still haven't watched it!), but, as a fanboy, I am a tad biased. We've got a rented copy of The Incredible Hulk sitting at home too, waiting to be watched. We really liked the 2003 version, so I don't see why this one won't be even better. We are also looking forward to watching Superhero Movie, Transporter 3, Twilight, and MAYBE Witless Protection (with Larry the Cable Guy). Delta Farce turned out to be a real dud.

Speaking of fanboys, check out this Wikipedia List of Marvel Films that I found while typing this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_marvel_films

I had no idea there were so many sequels in production! This is a good thing. Hopefully.

Anyone watch Wall-E? It got nominated for six catagories! I saw it on DVD, and thought it was the worst Pixar movie ever made. Now, that's not saying much, because the rest of their movies are GREAT. So let me just say that it is not fun to watch. It takes about an hour to even get into what the plot actually is. I do like the ending though, and not just because that meant the movie was over!

2009 Oscar Ballot (PDF)

Here is a list of other american movies made in 2008: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_American_films_of_2008

2008 Films that I enjoyed:

Baby Mama

Bedtime Stories (an Adam Sandler movie without any profanity? And it was GOOD to boot!)

Eagle Eye

Get Smart

Iniana 4

Kung Fu Panda

The Longshots (yes, a Fred Durst movie)

Vantage Point

Alicia and Angelina watched The Spiderwick Chronicles last week, and they said it was good.

Worst movies of 2008:

Cloverfield

Wall-E

Leatherheads

Mama's Boy (what exactly has happened to Jon Heder since Napoleon Dynamite?)

Speed Racer

Your thoughts on last year's crop of movies?

Sunday Selection: Journaling

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 12:33:00 +0000

Having a journal is important. Not only can it help you sort out your feelings, but you can leave an imprint for your posterity. This can be very important! By reading the words of our ancestors, we can learn a lot, or at least become familiar with the things that our family has gone through. I can only imagine what some of our progenitors will think of the things that we write!

Anyway, I wanted to post a link to my new online journal:

http://trunkybeat.livejournal.com/

I just posted an entry on my thoughts as I was studying for Gospel Doctrine class at Church today. I guess you could say that is the REAL Sunday Selection for today. Check it out!

My mother showed me this livejournal site. It is cool because you can make each and every post private or public. This is neat because I would like to think that if I wanted to record something private in order to help myself, I don't have to feel obligated to share it.

Let me know what you think, and let me know if you sign up for your own online journal, so that I can know if you want to share it and get feedback.

An Open Letter to Elder Alexander

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 23:18:00 +0000

I was just cleaning out my inbox, and I sent an email to Elder Jarod Alexander, from our ward. He is in the Salt Lake City, Utah mission, so he is enjoying the cold there now. He has matured a lot there, even from just the few months that he has been out there, from what I can tell from his emails.

Anyway, most of the thoughts from the email seemed like a journal entry (albeit short) for my life, so I wanted to go ahead and post it here for posterity:

Hey dude; we are glad to hear that everything is going good. It has been pretty cold here as of late (30's-50's), but we have also had some warm days sprinkled in. You are lucky to see so much snow. Alicia wants to see it so bad!

The work here is going pretty good. The missionaries just moved, along with the Elders from the Arlington ward, to some pretty pimp digs on Ft. Caroline Rd. The Stake President has asked us all to fast as a stake this weekend for the work to progress, and also so that each of us will have a teaching opportunity. Alicia, Angelina, and I really love missionary work, so of course that is one of the things for which we are fasting.

I get to teach the Presidency Message in Elder's Quorum tomorrow. I get to pick the topic, and Home Teaching has been on my mind a lot lately, so I think I am going to go with that. Plus, I have always been considered a home teaching guru in our ward, so I think people look up to me for that. I will pretty much prepare the lesson tonight from scratch, although I will be able to simply use a lot of the thoughts I've been having as a base. Any ideas on how to get the home teaching numbers up in our ward?

Hope everything goes well, and we can't wait to see you again and jam!

DT

iLa Vida es Buena! (Life is Good!)

Darius S. Trunk

Baseball's Never Been Hotter....

noreply@blogger.com (DT) — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 21:47:00 +0000

Well, I called the Jacksonville Suns' front office today, to see when their promotional schedule would be released. They said that it is not ready yet, but to keep checking the web site.

So I asked them if they could tell me what Bobbleheads they were doing this year, and they were happy to oblige! They are doing only three this year, but they are some good ones:

Ivan De Jesus, Jr.
Clayton Kershaw
Southpaw

Great, right?!? Those are three games that we will NOT be missing this year!

It is still not up, but you can keep checking the following link to see their promotional schedule:

http://jacksonville.suns.milb.com/promotions/index.jsp?sid=t564

See you there!