Movies

We saw Ocean's 13 last night. I thought it was really good. I'd recommend it to a friend.

Interesting Quote

Here is an interesting quote from Richard Bushman.

What questions does Mormonism answer? David Brooks had those interesting columns a few months ago about how people will die for meaning, and Charles Taylor was on the TV lately saying the spiritual questions are the big questions, which I think is very close to David's sense of meaning.

What Mormons really try to do is to offer a story – a story of human existence that begins in the world before and comes to this world. It answers the classic questions of whence, why, and where. It's not just something that stands above Mormons, but is imbued into their minds. It's related to the Christian story of fall and redemption, which is another story of the meaning of life, but it extends that story into the pre-mortal life and into eternities hereafter.

Over and over again, I talk to people who joined the church, and I say, why did you become a Mormon? And they say, it answered my questions. I don't know exactly what they mean by that, but there is a sense that their perplexities about life somehow were put to rest by what the Mormon missionaries told them.

You can find the entire text here.

Plant

Things that I really don't like today

1. The DMV

Ordinary post

I've posted a lot of pictures recently. I thought I'd just write an ordinary post instead. My good friend graduated from the U of I last week. At my friends graduation, Jawed Karim, the co-founder of YouTube, spoke at the ceremonies. I posted a few clips on YouTube. He gave a pretty good speech. I've been having some trouble getting my router to work--not sure what the problem is. I'm not sure if that is the correct use of the hyphen. I checked with wikipedia. It's the dash, not the hyphen, that I was actually looking for. They have a good example of how the hyphen and the dash are used:

The use of a hyphen where a dash is intended—especially when the intent is to interrupt rather than connect ideas—can confuse readers, since the word-connecting hyphen often conveys the exact opposite typographical meaning of the thought-separating long dash. wikipedia

I was not aware of that. And now I can go free, free from the prison walls that my hyphen-dash confusion had created and now bound only by the enigmatic semicolon.

Nest under my deck

Not sure what this bird is

Robin

www.panaramio.com

CAS Exam 3

I took another actuarial exam today. It was pretty hard, but I feel like I did slightly better than I did last time (which is good, because last time I just barely missed getting a passing score). Now that the exam is done with, that means I get to relax for the next 6 to 8 weeks until the results come out.

Small Bird

www.panaramio.com

Flowers

www.panaramio.com

Rabbit in the morning

A Rabbit

He just sat there for a really long time.

Unit Coin

I tutored a guy in Excel. He was home for two weeks before going back to Iraq. When I told him he didn't have to pay me, he gave me this coin as a gift.

American Tree Sparrow

Mourning Dove

Blades of Glory

We went and say Blades of Glory last night. I really liked it.

TMNT

We went and saw the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles last night. I thougt it was pretty good. They have 50 cent bring your own bucket nights on tuesdays.

A bird doing some kind of shakey thing

Cricket

My neighbors are playing cricket in their backyard. I think they are from India. The dad and the son are taking turns pitching and batting. The mom and daughter are watching. Oh wait, the daughter is batting now too. How cute.