I need advice on some more soccer drama. Here's the situation:
Last fall the Rush club (who I play for) had two teams, I was on the "B" team, though we finished with the same amount of points in our division as the "A" team. Then in the spring, several of the players from the "A" team made the high school team. Tryouts were just this past week, and I could not tryout because of my nose, but regardless, Becky (my coach) told me to not worry about it because they have seen me play before. Well she just called and talked to my mom and told us that at tryouts, only 7 of the players from last fall's "A" team showed up and are going to be playing with us. She told my mom that I have a spot on the team if I want it, but I would be 19th on the roster, meaning that I would rarely, if ever, play. So...
Being on the team:
Pros:
Get to play with high level of competition
Get to know players on the high school team better, meaning the high school coach might notice me or find out that I exist
Get better in preparation for high school ball
Get to play the sport I love, though not in games
Cons:
Big time commitment with little reward for my efforts
I would have to play with players (from the high school team) who I really don't like nor get along with
Don't get to play the sport I love, in games at least
Not playing on the team:
Pros:
Avoid drama
More time
Cons:
No chance of being noticed by the high school coach
Entire season of training and preparation to play high school lost
I don't know what to do...
Oh, by the way, I got my license yesterday. Stay off the roads. :)
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Friday, May 23, 2008
At Long Last
No, I haven't found out anything on my story, BUT I did break my nose in my game tonight. This marks the first serious injury I have sustained in a game, and it's been a long time comin'. Of course, I don't go looking to get hurt, but I have thought in the past that all good soccer players should, at some point in their career, get seriously injured during a game or practice. So yeah, it's not that bad and it doesn't hurt too much.
The way it happened is all kind of a blur, all I know is that I was marking this kid, the ball bounced up to him, and somehow the side of his head ended up embedded in my face. Well, that's an exaggeration, but it did hurt at first. He actually had to come out because his ear hurt, so apparently it was the side of his head, though I originally thought that it was the back. My biggest regret is that we didn't get a picture of my bloody face (no pun intended). It's crooked but not overwhelmingly.
Pictures [not bloody :( ] may be coming in the future, but unfortunately I'm on dial-up, so not for a while at least.
The way it happened is all kind of a blur, all I know is that I was marking this kid, the ball bounced up to him, and somehow the side of his head ended up embedded in my face. Well, that's an exaggeration, but it did hurt at first. He actually had to come out because his ear hurt, so apparently it was the side of his head, though I originally thought that it was the back. My biggest regret is that we didn't get a picture of my bloody face (no pun intended). It's crooked but not overwhelmingly.
Pictures [not bloody :( ] may be coming in the future, but unfortunately I'm on dial-up, so not for a while at least.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Thought Of The Day
Lately I've been thinking about the monotony of life. The more I think about it the more I seem to realize that time really is like a prison. It's the same everyday: Wake up, go to school (which is generally the same everyday), get home, do homework, do extra-curricular activities, go to bed. One of my favorite quotes says:
"The way we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives." In the end, am I going to look back on life and realize, "Dang, I did pretty much the same thing every day, my whole life was just filled with the same boring stuff over and over and over again."? I hope not.
I just want to do something crazy like...dance to "This Is Why I'm Hot" in front of the whole school, stage dive, and then run all the way home. But in the end, what would that profit me? Sure, I might feel like a rebel and defiant and everything, but we're still trapped. We're almost stuck in this big pit of time where everything seems rational. Everything points to God, yet at the same time the rationality tests your faith in God.
Have you ever thought about how all we are working towards in this life is death? Don't think I'm suicidal or anything, but really, what do we do? We keep the commandments (hopefully), endure to the end (hopefully), and die (for sure-ly). Then we move on to bigger and better things. However, there is one scripture (I know, I'm going Peter Priesthood on you) that comforts me regarding this matter. D&C 38:15:
"Therefore, be ye strong from henceforth; fear not, for the kingdom is yours."
And that is my thought of the day.
"The way we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives." In the end, am I going to look back on life and realize, "Dang, I did pretty much the same thing every day, my whole life was just filled with the same boring stuff over and over and over again."? I hope not.
I just want to do something crazy like...dance to "This Is Why I'm Hot" in front of the whole school, stage dive, and then run all the way home. But in the end, what would that profit me? Sure, I might feel like a rebel and defiant and everything, but we're still trapped. We're almost stuck in this big pit of time where everything seems rational. Everything points to God, yet at the same time the rationality tests your faith in God.
Have you ever thought about how all we are working towards in this life is death? Don't think I'm suicidal or anything, but really, what do we do? We keep the commandments (hopefully), endure to the end (hopefully), and die (for sure-ly). Then we move on to bigger and better things. However, there is one scripture (I know, I'm going Peter Priesthood on you) that comforts me regarding this matter. D&C 38:15:
"Therefore, be ye strong from henceforth; fear not, for the kingdom is yours."
And that is my thought of the day.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Sweet Sixteen
Well, yesterday was my sixteenth birthday. I got a phone! It's a Katar (or Kaytar, I can't remember), it's basically a knock-off of the Razor. I'm way happy, except for one thing: I STILL HAVEN'T FOUND OUT ANYTHING ABOUT MY STORY! WHAT'S THE DEAL?!?! I love BYU more than anyone on earth, but I'm getting a little frustrated, in case you can't tell.
Friday, May 9, 2008
Brief Breakdown of the AP Test
Multiple Choice: This was definitely my best part of the test, I definitely did well enough to pull off a 3 (3-5 is passing, 1-2 is failing)
DBQ (I know, most of you probably don't know what this is. I'll probably explain it in a future post, but I don't have time right now.): I didn't do great on this part, but I still think I did well enough to get a 3.
First Essay: Definitely the better of my two essays. I knew the topic pretty well and feel confident about it.
Second Essay: Definitely the worst part of my test, the topic I ended up picking (I'll explain how the test actually works in my next post also) was the changing role of women in 19th century Europe. Although I don't know this topic that well, it's not a very hard topic to BS, if you know what I mean, so I feel alright about it.
Overall I feel pretty good about how I did. It was still extremely hard and draining, but I'm pretty confident that I pulled off a 3. If not, life goes on, I'll be bummed, but again, my eternal salvation won't be in jeopardy or anything like that.
Adios for a while, our Crowley family is having a party over the weekend.
DBQ (I know, most of you probably don't know what this is. I'll probably explain it in a future post, but I don't have time right now.): I didn't do great on this part, but I still think I did well enough to get a 3.
First Essay: Definitely the better of my two essays. I knew the topic pretty well and feel confident about it.
Second Essay: Definitely the worst part of my test, the topic I ended up picking (I'll explain how the test actually works in my next post also) was the changing role of women in 19th century Europe. Although I don't know this topic that well, it's not a very hard topic to BS, if you know what I mean, so I feel alright about it.
Overall I feel pretty good about how I did. It was still extremely hard and draining, but I'm pretty confident that I pulled off a 3. If not, life goes on, I'll be bummed, but again, my eternal salvation won't be in jeopardy or anything like that.
Adios for a while, our Crowley family is having a party over the weekend.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
I'm Going To Have A Life Again!
The AP test is tomorrow! I'm apprehensively confident. Yeah, that's about it. Wish me luck!
Friday, May 2, 2008
Fun? Scary? Funny? Interesting? Ridiculous? You pick.
After reading a post from my cousins blog about his sister's hilarious softball game (visit mygeniusmind.blogspot.com, sorry I don't know how to enclose links, and quite frankly, I don't want to figure out right now), I started realizing all of the similar experiences that I've had, so I thought that I'd blog about them. I may need to break this into several posts, because the more I think about it, the more I realize the ridiculous amount of funny sports experiences that I've had.
Experience #1:
After getting certified as a soccer ref, I learned about the offsides rule. For people who don't understand, offsides is when the offensive team passes the ball to one of their players who is behind the defending teams defenders (if it doesn't make sense, don't lose any sleep over it). However, there are some other keys to this rule, one of which is that if there is a player who is in an offside position, but does not receive the ball, they may still be offsides. As the ref you have to decide IF THEY AFFECT THE PLAY. Keep that in mind as I relate this first story.
I was sidelining a 9-year-old girls game (meaning that I was a referee on the sideline) with to very good clubs. In my opinion, to have kids in that level of competition at 9 years old, girl or boy, and be putting the amount of pressure that their coaches and parents put on them, is ridiculous. Anyway, it was either tied or Avalanche was down by one, but either way, Avalanche got the ball came down on an attack. One of their girls was literally standing next to the goalie, COMPLETELY OFFSIDES! One of the girls shot the ball, on the side of the goalie that the offside-girl was on and scored. I raised my flag, figuring that no way under heaven was the offside-girl not involved in the play. The coach (luckily on the other side of the field) erupted. He was cussing at me across the field and freaking out, it was...exciting.
Experience #2:
You may remember me mentioning a while ago about scoring against a team whose players I know and have played with. During that game, lots of things happened, which I may tell you some other time. At one particular point though, the opposite sideline was getting frustrated about the game getting called one-sided. This was ridiculous however, because they were being WAY more physical/cheap (which isn't always a bad thing, but you can't be aggresive and not expect a few calls against you). At one point we had parents from both sides yelling across at each other to shut up and you're wrong and all kinds of crap. At this precise moment, one of my teammates who was on the sideline with me stood up, put his arms up with the thumbs-up sign, and yelled "TWO THUMBS UP FOR MATURITY!" It was seriously one of the funniest things I have ever seen.
Experience #3:
Another sidelining experience: This time U-15 boys, the two teams clearly hated each other and were extremely physical. One of the teams, like in the previous experience, was much more physical than the other team, and consequently was getting more fouls called against it. Again, the parents (who were right behind me) started getting frustrated with the center ref about calling the game fairly. One dad in particular was flipping out and cussing up a storm.
At one point in the game one of the firebird players (the team who felt it was picked on) received the ball on the sideline, and was shoulder-challenged by an opposing player, knocking him to the ground. I'll never know if this was a foul or not, it was probably the most borderline tackle that I've ever seen, but regardless, the center ref did not call a foul. This caused the sideline to erupt even more viciously, and provoked more four-letter words from the certain dad.
Of course the firebird player was also fired up, partly because of his ballistic sideline supporters, therefore he proceeded to chase the player down from behind and slide-tackle his ankles, with no intent of getting the ball. Upon this, the ref awarded him a straight red-card, which means that he was thrown out of the game and his team had to play a man down. Again, I'm not sure if this foul deserved a straight red-card, but after all the crap that the ref had received from the sideline, the call should not have been very surprising to anyone. Again, after this call, the sideline erupted again, provoking very colorful language from the man right behind me. Finally, the ref had had enough of this wonderful gentleman, and he told him,
"Sir, this is your last warning, if I hear from you again, I'll ask you to go to your car." After just a minute or two, the man erupted over a call again.
"I'm sorry sir, but I've given you your warning, and I need you to go to your car." the ref told him. The man stood defiantly and looked at him as if to say "Why don't you make me?"
"Fine," the ref replied and he blew his whistle three times, indicating that the game was over (by the way, the firebirds were losing by one) despite the fact that there was at least twenty more minutes of the game.
"Fine, I'll leave" the man said, realizing that he may cost his team the game.
"Sorry, I just blew the game, it's over, there's nothing I can do now." the ref replied. After we shook hands with the teams, we (the refs) noticed the rather-upset gentleman walking menacingly towards us across the field. At this point I was seriously scared for my life. The coach called him off and, with some convincing, he left, but I've gotta admit, I was scared to death to walk home.
This post is already really long, but because none of these experiences were particularly funny, I'll share one last one.
Experience #4:
My first comp team was the fogo tigres (fire tigers) coached by my dad and his friend Jose. We were playing a game in ogden with a horrible ref who knew every player on the other team by name, and never left the center circle due to her lack of running ability. Our assistant coach, Jose, has been the referee for games at a high level and recognized her inability to make good calls because of her poor positioning related to the play of the game. Jose kept begging her to get closer to the play so that she could see fouls more easily.
"I'm right where I need to be." she replied.
"Maybe if you were in good enough shape, you COULD get to where you need to be!" Jose said, finally losing his cool completely.
Yeah, he got a yellow card.
Still nothing on my story. Have you gotten anything, Kate?
Experience #1:
After getting certified as a soccer ref, I learned about the offsides rule. For people who don't understand, offsides is when the offensive team passes the ball to one of their players who is behind the defending teams defenders (if it doesn't make sense, don't lose any sleep over it). However, there are some other keys to this rule, one of which is that if there is a player who is in an offside position, but does not receive the ball, they may still be offsides. As the ref you have to decide IF THEY AFFECT THE PLAY. Keep that in mind as I relate this first story.
I was sidelining a 9-year-old girls game (meaning that I was a referee on the sideline) with to very good clubs. In my opinion, to have kids in that level of competition at 9 years old, girl or boy, and be putting the amount of pressure that their coaches and parents put on them, is ridiculous. Anyway, it was either tied or Avalanche was down by one, but either way, Avalanche got the ball came down on an attack. One of their girls was literally standing next to the goalie, COMPLETELY OFFSIDES! One of the girls shot the ball, on the side of the goalie that the offside-girl was on and scored. I raised my flag, figuring that no way under heaven was the offside-girl not involved in the play. The coach (luckily on the other side of the field) erupted. He was cussing at me across the field and freaking out, it was...exciting.
Experience #2:
You may remember me mentioning a while ago about scoring against a team whose players I know and have played with. During that game, lots of things happened, which I may tell you some other time. At one particular point though, the opposite sideline was getting frustrated about the game getting called one-sided. This was ridiculous however, because they were being WAY more physical/cheap (which isn't always a bad thing, but you can't be aggresive and not expect a few calls against you). At one point we had parents from both sides yelling across at each other to shut up and you're wrong and all kinds of crap. At this precise moment, one of my teammates who was on the sideline with me stood up, put his arms up with the thumbs-up sign, and yelled "TWO THUMBS UP FOR MATURITY!" It was seriously one of the funniest things I have ever seen.
Experience #3:
Another sidelining experience: This time U-15 boys, the two teams clearly hated each other and were extremely physical. One of the teams, like in the previous experience, was much more physical than the other team, and consequently was getting more fouls called against it. Again, the parents (who were right behind me) started getting frustrated with the center ref about calling the game fairly. One dad in particular was flipping out and cussing up a storm.
At one point in the game one of the firebird players (the team who felt it was picked on) received the ball on the sideline, and was shoulder-challenged by an opposing player, knocking him to the ground. I'll never know if this was a foul or not, it was probably the most borderline tackle that I've ever seen, but regardless, the center ref did not call a foul. This caused the sideline to erupt even more viciously, and provoked more four-letter words from the certain dad.
Of course the firebird player was also fired up, partly because of his ballistic sideline supporters, therefore he proceeded to chase the player down from behind and slide-tackle his ankles, with no intent of getting the ball. Upon this, the ref awarded him a straight red-card, which means that he was thrown out of the game and his team had to play a man down. Again, I'm not sure if this foul deserved a straight red-card, but after all the crap that the ref had received from the sideline, the call should not have been very surprising to anyone. Again, after this call, the sideline erupted again, provoking very colorful language from the man right behind me. Finally, the ref had had enough of this wonderful gentleman, and he told him,
"Sir, this is your last warning, if I hear from you again, I'll ask you to go to your car." After just a minute or two, the man erupted over a call again.
"I'm sorry sir, but I've given you your warning, and I need you to go to your car." the ref told him. The man stood defiantly and looked at him as if to say "Why don't you make me?"
"Fine," the ref replied and he blew his whistle three times, indicating that the game was over (by the way, the firebirds were losing by one) despite the fact that there was at least twenty more minutes of the game.
"Fine, I'll leave" the man said, realizing that he may cost his team the game.
"Sorry, I just blew the game, it's over, there's nothing I can do now." the ref replied. After we shook hands with the teams, we (the refs) noticed the rather-upset gentleman walking menacingly towards us across the field. At this point I was seriously scared for my life. The coach called him off and, with some convincing, he left, but I've gotta admit, I was scared to death to walk home.
This post is already really long, but because none of these experiences were particularly funny, I'll share one last one.
Experience #4:
My first comp team was the fogo tigres (fire tigers) coached by my dad and his friend Jose. We were playing a game in ogden with a horrible ref who knew every player on the other team by name, and never left the center circle due to her lack of running ability. Our assistant coach, Jose, has been the referee for games at a high level and recognized her inability to make good calls because of her poor positioning related to the play of the game. Jose kept begging her to get closer to the play so that she could see fouls more easily.
"I'm right where I need to be." she replied.
"Maybe if you were in good enough shape, you COULD get to where you need to be!" Jose said, finally losing his cool completely.
Yeah, he got a yellow card.
Still nothing on my story. Have you gotten anything, Kate?
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Words Starting With The Letter "G"
Gag Grove Good Group Gift Gilligan Google Gargle Glint Glide Gloat Gleam Grid Go Guy Glisten Girl Got Gasp Goulashes Gain Gal Greek Greed Get Gee Giraffe Geek Guacamole Gray Guess Gem Geese Grit Giggle Guile Gape Grimace Grip Gel Guild Guzzle Gas Gut Green Glee God Gay Grapple Gleam Grail Glee Give Gun Grease Grow Grew Gnat Gracious Gill Gob Gym Gone Granted Gushy Gnome Graft Grin Great Globe Gripe Glove Grim Geezer Gall Game Gate Gauge Gaze Gauze Guillotine Grisham Gear Grain Graze Grade Gross Grieve Glint
That looks like a lot less than how many it seems like I came up with. Just so you know.
P.S. No word on my story yet. I'll let you know as soon as I find out anything.
That looks like a lot less than how many it seems like I came up with. Just so you know.
P.S. No word on my story yet. I'll let you know as soon as I find out anything.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Update on my life, because it's my blog :D
Well, most of you have probably already heard (from my mom) but I got my results from the ACT test. My comprehensive was a 30, which pretty much shocked me. I'm not going to lie, however, it was MUCH easier than I had expected. But still, a 30? Without any preparation? I'm as shocked if not more shocked than everyone else. You'll probably remember from my post about taking the test that I was much more confident about the English portion than all the other portions. When it came back, however, English was not my highest section, Reading was. This surprised me, but there was only a 2 point difference between my highest section (reading) and my lowest (science-reasoning). So yeah, I figure that I'll study my rear-end off next year and end up getting a 28 or something. Who knows, maybe the fact that I didn't feel any pressure was the reason why I did so well.
I'm still waiting to see my results from the BYU young writers competition. Kate told me that last year her letter came at the end of April, so any day now I should know how I did.
About a week ago my dad challenged me to get my 14 day blood sugar average from about 200 down to 150. When I have told all my friends about this they have been very confused, so just to clear up any confusion:
My blood-glucose-monitor (the thing that I call my "tester") adds up every blood-glucose-reading that I've had over the last 14 days, divides it by the number of readings (you know, like finding the average of a set of information, it's not all that complex). As of last week this average was about 200. My target range is 80-150. Now some of you are probably saying "Oh, so he's not over by that much" while some of you are saying "Oh my gosh! Is he gonna die? 200? That's really, really, really, really, bad! Isn't it?"
Well the truth is that I HAD the first attitude. I am seeing now that, while I'm not going to die from a 14-day average of 200, I feel so much better when it is lower. Oh, and the reason why I'm suddenly motivated to bring my average down is that my dad is going to pay be 100 buckeroos to do it! Yippee! And he hinted that once I get it down to 150, there might be another hundred waiting for me if I bring my average down to 100!
Right now my average is about 175, but you have to keep in mind that I've only been at this for a week, which means that one of the weeks that my 14 day average is coming from was previous to the challenge. Right now I haven't had a test over 200 since Thursday. In case that doesn't seem monumental to you, IT IS! I doubt that I've gone for 3 days without being over 200 for over a year.
So, there's my life. The AP test is in 12 days, including today, not including the day of the test. That's keeping me pretty busy, so we'll see what happens.
I'm still waiting to see my results from the BYU young writers competition. Kate told me that last year her letter came at the end of April, so any day now I should know how I did.
About a week ago my dad challenged me to get my 14 day blood sugar average from about 200 down to 150. When I have told all my friends about this they have been very confused, so just to clear up any confusion:
My blood-glucose-monitor (the thing that I call my "tester") adds up every blood-glucose-reading that I've had over the last 14 days, divides it by the number of readings (you know, like finding the average of a set of information, it's not all that complex). As of last week this average was about 200. My target range is 80-150. Now some of you are probably saying "Oh, so he's not over by that much" while some of you are saying "Oh my gosh! Is he gonna die? 200? That's really, really, really, really, bad! Isn't it?"
Well the truth is that I HAD the first attitude. I am seeing now that, while I'm not going to die from a 14-day average of 200, I feel so much better when it is lower. Oh, and the reason why I'm suddenly motivated to bring my average down is that my dad is going to pay be 100 buckeroos to do it! Yippee! And he hinted that once I get it down to 150, there might be another hundred waiting for me if I bring my average down to 100!
Right now my average is about 175, but you have to keep in mind that I've only been at this for a week, which means that one of the weeks that my 14 day average is coming from was previous to the challenge. Right now I haven't had a test over 200 since Thursday. In case that doesn't seem monumental to you, IT IS! I doubt that I've gone for 3 days without being over 200 for over a year.
So, there's my life. The AP test is in 12 days, including today, not including the day of the test. That's keeping me pretty busy, so we'll see what happens.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Oh, the joys of seminary
Well, most of you have heard this story by now, but because it is such a good story, I have to tell it anyway.
Seminary started off normal on this particular day. We started with a hymn, then a prayer, a scripture, and then...the quote (Dun Dun Dun). The quote is usually just a glue-in that someone has in their scriptures or the like. On this particular day however (dun dun dun) Wyatt got up and began reading the quote. Many of you have probably already heard it, it's the one that says that when we get up to heaven people will ask us who the prophet of our time was and we'll say "President Hinckley" and "a hush will go over the crowd" and "people will bow in our presence" yada yada yada, completely not in line with doctrine. It's attributed to Boyd K. Packer at the moment, but as I understand it, it was previously attributed to other general authorities.
So after Wyatt shared that enlightening piece of false-doctrine with us he then proceeded to talk about how even thought we aren't fighting real wars today (umm, does the word Iraq come to anyone's mind?) we are fighting a spiritual war today (against the media, all that jazz). Although that statement wasn't completely true either, he did kinda bring it around in the end.
After Wyatt sat down, my seminary teacher, Bro. Schro. (Schroader) got up and explained how we don't really believe that people will bow to us, the only people that we will worship will be Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. The discussion got going about that quote and a couple people raised their hands to share experiences that they have had with that quote. One girl even wanted us to read it over again because she hadn't heard it (we didn't of course). Another kid, Kaz (I don't know if that's really his name, but that's what he goes by), talked about how his testimony had basically formed from that quote and how crushed he was when he found out that we didn't believe it to be true. Then he told us how he didn't come to seminary for a few weeks after he found out that it wasn't in line with doctrine (brilliant, right after Wyatt had shared it with us).
Then Bro Schro stated that he was glad that Wyatt had said what he did after he read the quote (about spiritual wars).
"I mean, did anyone NOT feel the spirit when Wyatt was up here?" Brother Schroader RHETORICALLY asked.
As if straight out of a stupid movie, Kaz raised his hand.
Seriously.
Kaz later went on to explain that after his experience with the quote (already mentioned), he was "prevented" from feeling the spirit as soon as Wyatt started reading it.
Umm...ok.
Eventually we got talking about the spiritual war that Wyatt had been talking about and the discussion finally moved past the "false quote." Then Nessa (the girl who had insisted on us reading the quote again [sorry but she is an airhead]) raised her hand and started talking about how wars are worse today than they were in revolutionary times because of new technology. Yeah, she started talking about physical wars...again. Brother Schroader kindly acknowledged the comment and then moved back to what we had been talking about before. After a few minutes, Kaz gave Brother Schroader a funny look.
"Is there something you want to say Kaz?" he asked
"No...I'm just trying to bite my tongue."
As soon as he said that, we knew that he was going to say whatever he was "biting his tongue" about.
"Well if there's something you want to say, go ahead, as long as it's appropriate.
"I'm just really bugged about what Nessa said about how wars are worse now because I think that having a 10 pound lead ball go through your chest and dying slowly and painfully is much worse than dying in an instant from a nuclear bomb."
Seriously.
Somehow Brother Schroader got us off the subject (again) and moved on. But little did we know, it would soon be his turn to say something stupid...
Brief interjection for backround info:
At Viewmont High the majority of the seminary teachers are fairly new to Viewmont, but one has been there for a while, Brother McConkie (yes, related to the apostle). He is notorious (contrary to the stereotype that may come with the name McConkie) for rarely teaching lessons and simply telling his MANY stories during class (everyone loves him, I guess "notorious" was the wrong word). Often "McConkie Stories" come up during lessons. Brother Schroader was going to tell us this story which I'm guessing fit in with his lesson: One night when Brother McConkie was a young boy he was laying on the family trampoline thinking about the universe. He was quickly overcome by the overwhelming vastness and incomprehensibility of it all. Eventually he decided that once you go far enough, you must just hit cement. This was enough to calm his mind for one night, however the next night he thought, "How thick is the cement?" On this particular day in seminary, Brother Schroader began,
"One night when Brother McConkie was young he was laying on his tramp...trampoline that is-
Seriously, he clarified between "tramp" and "trampoline." If you don't understand the homonym that Brother Schroader was clarifying, bless you. After a couple seconds however, me and my seminary class president (of all people) caught on. We busted up laughing and eventually Logan (our class president) excused himself for a few minutes because he felt the was being a distraction.
Within about ten minutes of this fun experience the bell rang.
And that is the story of my most enlightening seminary period to date.
Seminary started off normal on this particular day. We started with a hymn, then a prayer, a scripture, and then...the quote (Dun Dun Dun). The quote is usually just a glue-in that someone has in their scriptures or the like. On this particular day however (dun dun dun) Wyatt got up and began reading the quote. Many of you have probably already heard it, it's the one that says that when we get up to heaven people will ask us who the prophet of our time was and we'll say "President Hinckley" and "a hush will go over the crowd" and "people will bow in our presence" yada yada yada, completely not in line with doctrine. It's attributed to Boyd K. Packer at the moment, but as I understand it, it was previously attributed to other general authorities.
So after Wyatt shared that enlightening piece of false-doctrine with us he then proceeded to talk about how even thought we aren't fighting real wars today (umm, does the word Iraq come to anyone's mind?) we are fighting a spiritual war today (against the media, all that jazz). Although that statement wasn't completely true either, he did kinda bring it around in the end.
After Wyatt sat down, my seminary teacher, Bro. Schro. (Schroader) got up and explained how we don't really believe that people will bow to us, the only people that we will worship will be Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. The discussion got going about that quote and a couple people raised their hands to share experiences that they have had with that quote. One girl even wanted us to read it over again because she hadn't heard it (we didn't of course). Another kid, Kaz (I don't know if that's really his name, but that's what he goes by), talked about how his testimony had basically formed from that quote and how crushed he was when he found out that we didn't believe it to be true. Then he told us how he didn't come to seminary for a few weeks after he found out that it wasn't in line with doctrine (brilliant, right after Wyatt had shared it with us).
Then Bro Schro stated that he was glad that Wyatt had said what he did after he read the quote (about spiritual wars).
"I mean, did anyone NOT feel the spirit when Wyatt was up here?" Brother Schroader RHETORICALLY asked.
As if straight out of a stupid movie, Kaz raised his hand.
Seriously.
Kaz later went on to explain that after his experience with the quote (already mentioned), he was "prevented" from feeling the spirit as soon as Wyatt started reading it.
Umm...ok.
Eventually we got talking about the spiritual war that Wyatt had been talking about and the discussion finally moved past the "false quote." Then Nessa (the girl who had insisted on us reading the quote again [sorry but she is an airhead]) raised her hand and started talking about how wars are worse today than they were in revolutionary times because of new technology. Yeah, she started talking about physical wars...again. Brother Schroader kindly acknowledged the comment and then moved back to what we had been talking about before. After a few minutes, Kaz gave Brother Schroader a funny look.
"Is there something you want to say Kaz?" he asked
"No...I'm just trying to bite my tongue."
As soon as he said that, we knew that he was going to say whatever he was "biting his tongue" about.
"Well if there's something you want to say, go ahead, as long as it's appropriate.
"I'm just really bugged about what Nessa said about how wars are worse now because I think that having a 10 pound lead ball go through your chest and dying slowly and painfully is much worse than dying in an instant from a nuclear bomb."
Seriously.
Somehow Brother Schroader got us off the subject (again) and moved on. But little did we know, it would soon be his turn to say something stupid...
Brief interjection for backround info:
At Viewmont High the majority of the seminary teachers are fairly new to Viewmont, but one has been there for a while, Brother McConkie (yes, related to the apostle). He is notorious (contrary to the stereotype that may come with the name McConkie) for rarely teaching lessons and simply telling his MANY stories during class (everyone loves him, I guess "notorious" was the wrong word). Often "McConkie Stories" come up during lessons. Brother Schroader was going to tell us this story which I'm guessing fit in with his lesson: One night when Brother McConkie was a young boy he was laying on the family trampoline thinking about the universe. He was quickly overcome by the overwhelming vastness and incomprehensibility of it all. Eventually he decided that once you go far enough, you must just hit cement. This was enough to calm his mind for one night, however the next night he thought, "How thick is the cement?" On this particular day in seminary, Brother Schroader began,
"One night when Brother McConkie was young he was laying on his tramp...trampoline that is-
Seriously, he clarified between "tramp" and "trampoline." If you don't understand the homonym that Brother Schroader was clarifying, bless you. After a couple seconds however, me and my seminary class president (of all people) caught on. We busted up laughing and eventually Logan (our class president) excused himself for a few minutes because he felt the was being a distraction.
Within about ten minutes of this fun experience the bell rang.
And that is the story of my most enlightening seminary period to date.
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