Death I Can Understand

My grandfather has an uncanny memory, he has memorized more poems than most people have read in their lifetime. Unfortunately his memory for verse is not rivaled by his memory for attribution. The following is a poem he recited to me and I transcribed. He doesn't remember who wrote it, and it appears nowhere on the internet. I suspect he actually wrote it (which he has been known to do) and has mistakenly assumed that he memorized it from somewhere else. So here it is, the unattributed poem, making its first ever internet debut. It isn't long, and it's rather depressing; but it's well written and deserves to be written down somewhere:

Death I can understand.
If you had died I still might know content.
Believing in that world where here and there are blendt,
To find you all unchanged.
But what fate planned this grief?
And why at life’s not death’s demand
must we who know the lovely art
of soul, and soul completeness part,
but both live on, grow old and change?
It is this life, so sadly strange
I do not understand.

You know what really ticks me off? Everything.

As those who know me well (read: at all) know, things grate on me easily. Especially people. I don't really have a high tolerance for stupidity (or arrogance, or ignorance, or feigned ignorance, or bad hair styles, or slow talkers, or close talkers, or people who act like everything is an inside joke, or people who constantly quote movies that no one else likes, or those guys who...ok you get the idea.)


In fact, that's one of the main reasons I named my blog "Semper in Excreta" which means, always in excrement. I didn't make up the phrase, but I can relate to the sentiment.

One of the many beaches that make Californians better than you.

Anyway, my most recent point of aggravation is Californians. Not all of them mind you, only the ones who think that they are somehow entitled to a higher degree of awesome just because they come from the state. Let me first say that I have meet socially awkward Californian home schooled shut-ins who rival even the most sheltered Sandy, UT Mormons. Your state does not make you special. Just because you are from the same place as someone cool, their coolness does not rub off on you.


But I'll be making that point later. What got me on this was a post on the "Overheard at BYU-Idaho" Facebook page saying that everyone needs to write to In-N-Out and tell them to build an In-N-Out in Rexburg. Well anyone who knows a lick about franchising knows it's not as easy as this folks seem to think it is, but that's beside the point.


My point is that there were mixed reactions to a Rexburg In-N-Out. There were some who love in and out and would want one here, their opinions are valid. There are those who think it's over-hyped and disgusting, also valid opinions. But then there were the Californians. Here are some of their comments:

Rachel: "Hmmm. There's no way Rexburg even deserves on In-N-Out."                                      

Scottie: " I want that place to stay local."                

                  

Nathan:"in n outs should not be where you cannot keep two palm trees criss     cross"           

So, I decided it was time for me to put in my two cents. I sense some of you already cringing.
This was my first reply:

Perhaps someday I'll be worthy of this culture...

Alex: So, I like In-N-Out and everything, but one of my biggest pet peeves is someone who thinks that they are somehow more entitled to something simply based on geography. Your sports team is the best just because the city they represent is in the same state as you? Ignoring the fact that you have absolutely no connection to anyone on the team. Your state obviously produces the highest quality iteration of it's most popular export, even though neither you, nor anyone you know, is involved in the production process.

Likewise, people assume that just because their parents happened to live in the south west, the are automatically entitled to In-N-Out, as if it somehow belonged to them exclusively. Unless you personally hold a significant portion of shares in the In-N-Out corporation I'd prefer nobody talk to me about who is and is not "deserving" of an In-N-Out.

*I've hiked the skirt of The Himalayas, I've spent significant amounts of time in more than two thirds of the lower 48, and been to more European countries than that. I'm well traveled, and well cultured. But because I happen to live Rexburg right now, you have the audacity to tell you I am or am not worthy of a certain fast food chain just because you grew up with one a few blocks down the street?

 *It should be noted that several of the statements in the preceding paragraph are false, but were included only to prove a point.

So yes, by all means Scottie let's keep it "local." Because I'd hate to think that they'd abandon their roots of 248 locations in 4 states to actually expand their enterprise. I can't think of anything more local than that.

Come on guys, you've turned a 3 star fast food restaurant into a faux-religion and placed yourselves at the head of the decision making council. I don't really care if Rexburg gets an In-N-Out, I'm just sick of some of these never-left-home Californians around campus thinking that they have the monopoly on cool because they were the racial minority in their high school.

Let's all just accept that people really aren't and can't be defined by where they grew up, and that everybody's home state is equally as awesome and crappy as everyone else's. 

I was proud of myself, as only proud people can be. But I figured that wouldn't be the end of it. A few hours later, I got this well punctuated reply.

Johnny: "Alex if you were from California, you would understand but good essay though. You should turn it in to your english teacher now."  

        (Liked by 1 Californian) 

Ok I can tell when a thick skull just isn't going to break. I tried reason, but it failed on these oh so proud parishioners of In-N-Out. The only option seemed clear (the only option that is that allowed me to gratify my pride that is). The only way to fight stupidity, is with a greater degree of stupidity. It was time to troll. So I responded with this:

Alex:  " If only you weren't from California Johnny, you would understand In-N-Out. 
What you don't realize is that in a recent study, Wisconsinites actually proved to have the deepest love for In-N-Out, and the most profound understanding of the inner workings of the franchise. I know it's unbelievable, but it's science, and you can't argue with that. Unfortunately both you and I bow to our Wisconsin bretheren when it comes to 'understanding.'"

I doubt this will be the end of it. Like they say, "arguing on the internet is like racing in the special olympics, even if you win you're still....." actually I'm not going to finish that. The point is, where you're from does not make you who you are. Who you are makes you who you are. I don't understand how that is so hard for people to grasp. If you're from California, cool. If you like In-N-Out, all the better. Just be content enough in your own ability to like something that the experience isn't cheapened for you as more people start to like it. If  you don't want a restaurant in Rexburg because the food and service sucks, that's one thing (I'm looking at you Sammy's). If you don't want it there because you've gotten the weird delusion that the restaurant means something more to you than to the people of Rexburg and they are undeserving of it, you're an idiot, go grow a mustache and eat and Sammy's.

A Little Project I'm Working On

Now sponsored by Philosoraptor

Take a look at this picture of [Philosoraptor]. Do you see how he's saying to himself, "I have not yet but till this very moment truly lived"?

*If my placement of the question mark after the quotation mark bothered you, please read the following paragraph. If it didn't bother you, skip the next paragraph and pretend like I never interrupted you.

Oh, wow, random tangent, please open up a blank folder in your brain and set that last thought aside for a moment. Do you see what I did there? Do you see that closing quotation mark followed by a question mark. That is the only correct way to punctuate the sentence I just composed. The concept in this: The sentence I composed was a question, but the quotation was a statement. Therefore, the question mark, which belongs to the sentence as a whole and not to the quotation, belongs outside the quotations marks. The other rule that must be followed is that each closing quotation mark gets exactly one punctuation, so the quotation doesn't get a period even though it is a statement. Please start doing this everyone.


Alright, back on track. Did you study [Philosoraptor]'s face? Did you grab a hold of that emotion? alright, with that in mind I have a request of all my loyal followers (all six of you).


I'm putting together a list of music that--for lack of a better title--I've called "my list of emotion-inducing music." I'm not talking about any emotion though, I'm talking about music that induces that emotion. That once you finish the song you ask yourself, "wow, why have I refused to embrace the beauty in life until just now?" 


Obviously a list of this type would be fairly subjective, but I think there is a certain degree of objectivity to really touching music. So this is where you come in. In whatever way possible, let me know some of your favorite emotion-inducing songs, and see if they find their way onto the list (obviously it's my list, so no matter how great a song is I reserve the right not to ad it). But who knows, you might turn me on to a new song or artist that has yet to change my life.


I'm hesitant to post the list, because so far it's the culmination of about 15 minutes of brainstorming, and is therefore nowhere near inclusive.


But what the heck, here it is so far. I wanted to avoid it turning into a "look how hip I am" list so I included anything that came to mind no matter how overplayed or well-known it is. If you haven't heard some of them and want to listen, the asterisks (*) indicate the songs that I know for sure have at least one swear word in them, you have been warned:

The List:

Arcade Fire -                  Bon Iver -                       Bon Iver -                       The Bravery -               Colin Hay  -                    Coldplay -                      Death Cab for Cutie -     Death Cab for Cutie -     Death Cab for Cutie       The Decemberists - The Decemberists -      Joshua Radin -               Lucy Schwartz -              Mumford & Sons -          Mumford & Sons -           Noah & the Whale -         Oasis - Regina Spektor -             Snow Patrol -                 The Weepies -               William Fitzsimmons -

Intervention Skinny Love Blood Bank This is Not the End Waiting for My Real Life to Begin Fix You I Will Follow You into the Dark What Sarah Said Marching Bands of Manhattan Red Right Ankle This is Why we Fight Winter Life in Letters Little Lion Man* I Gave You All Blue Skies Wonderwall The Call Run The World Spins Madly On Song of the Sparrow

Since this is so subjective, I'm going to create a secondary list of the songs contributed by others, if you say one that happens to be one of mine that I didn't ad, I'll probably just steal it, otherwise it'll be on the list bellow.

The List (According to others):
I reserve the right to be creative

Billy Ray Cyrus -  Cursive -  The Format -  Israel Kamakawiwo'ole - Less than Jake - Leeland Mewithoutyou - Panda Bear -     The Postal Service -    The Real Tuesday Weld -  Sigur Ros -   Styx -

Achy Breaky Heart The Recluse Inches and Falling Somewhere Over the Rainbow The Science of Selling Yourself Short Tears of the Saints The King Beetle on a Coconut Estate Comfy in Nautica Such Great Heights Last Words Von Show Me the Way

Again, don't confuse this to be a list of my favorite songs, they're just all the songs that I think invoke a certain emotion.

contributions are not only welcome; they are, as you can clearly see, necessary.

Valentine's Day is Dead to Me.

Yesterday I had a brilliant idea, inspired by a friend's Facebook post. I was reminded that Valentine's day has gone from the third or fourth most fun day in elementary school to a completely useless holiday in college. I realized the sole difference was the Valentine's shoebox. So in an attempt to revive that same spirit I loved so much in elementary school I woke up early this morning to make a Valentine's card shoebox. This is the story.

The Prep

I had an old Airwalk shoebox that I thought would work well, step one was to cover it up, because only the lazy kids who didn't smell very good had undecorated shoeboxes in elementary school. I decided to use an old edition of the scroll for the base decoration.

I then proceeded to cover it with hearts and words I printed out, the most important of which was my name, what good is a Valentine's shoebox without your name on it. Else how will they know to whom they're giving the Valentine?

Class the First

I didn't have high hopes for the first class of the day, I don't really do much talking in that class so I doubted I'd get much attention other than confused glances, and I definitely wasn't expecting any Valentine's.

I was right. 

The most interested conversation I had about the box went something like this?

 Kid: "What's with the box?"

Me: "I'm trying to bring back the valentine's shoebox tradition, it's in case anyone wants to give me Valentines."

Kid: "Oh."

And then the class ended. I managed to snap this pic before I headed out the door.

(you'll note that I added several candy kiss sayings to the box to make it seem more festive. I couldn't find my red marker, so I had to go with black)

Class the Second

Someone was nice enough to take a picture of me and my shame.

Now this class I was a little more excited for. I do a lot of talking in this class, and I actually know people, so I figured I'd get some comments and at least a few hastily scrawled Valentine's added to the bunch. Still no luck, people just were not interested at all. My favorite comment was from a kid with whom I talk a lot in this class, it went like this.

Kid: "Why do you have that box Alex?" (He uses my name as often as possible in conversations, I don't know why)

Me: "Oh you know, just trying to bring back the holiday spirit, whatever happened to the awesomeness of elementary school Valentine's days?"

Kid: "...we're not in elementary school anymore Alex, we grew up."

It quickly became apparent that using such a large box was a bad idea.

That one cut deep.

Class the Third

Third time's the charm right?

 

I was certain this class would be better, it's about three times the size of my second class, more people means more potential Valentine's cards right. Right, technically. I got about an equal number of comments, but one girl had apparently come to school prepared this Valentine's day, she had a binder full of cards ready, and was quick to fill it out and add it to the box.

Otherwise, like the previous class, all the box served to do was make it hard to work on my desk.

In Summation

After a long hard day, I was excited to get home and tally my bounty.

 Here are the results:

All things considered, I was quite proud of the box.

Lid's off! Let's look inside!

Oh, just as I suspected. One card.

Fortunately, it was a scratch and sniff that smelled like chocolate. Which easily counts as two cards.

What did I learn from this? I learned that apparently the real meaning of Valentine's day has been lost to my generation. Everyone is too busy holding hands with and buying gifts for their significant other to take time to think about the real reason we celebrate this holiday. If we can't even take time out of this busy season to stop and fill out small tear off cards for people we hardly know, how can we possibly hope for a day without war or violence, a day when we can all live in peace? We can't, and until people start thinking about what really matters again, we may never see that day.

Some people may claim that it's time for me to start growing up. I would argue the opposite, I think it's time for people to finally admit that they really haven't grown up at all.

**UPDATE** 

The spirit of Valentine's day is not dead! I returned to my room to find that one of my roommates had taken time to remember what the day is really all about, and had acted accordingly. There is hope for the world yet.

That's so gay

I watched a YouTube video a while back that really got my goat, not because it says "don't say gay" and I like saying gay. Just because to prove what a terrible person you are for saying gay, it uses a really inaccurate analogy. This isn't the lover of the evolution of a language in me talking (though he enjoyed this post as well) this is the semanticist in me talking.


In the case that the people use "gay" in both these videos, it's being used as an adjective. "That top is gay" could have just as easily been said "That top is blue", you know, adjectives. Now they then say, something like that's like saying, that top is so 'girl wearing a skirt as a top'". Bad analogy. "Gay" functions both as a noun and an adjective. 'Girl wearing a skirt as a top" is only a noun, and therefor can't be used as an accurate substitution in this case. Well nouns can be used as adjectives (I call them adjectivized nouns, even though that's not a real term) gay in the cases presented in this video do not represent said "adjectivized nouns" they are simple adjectives. While the denotation of the sentence doesn't change, the connotation changes immensely.


A more correct analogy would be like saying "shoot man, that car is so white!" You could understand many different things from that sentence, the first is that the car is in fact white in color, another is that the car is something that the speaker relates heavily to something else it deems "white" a "white person" something very clean, or the inside of an Oreo (maybe the car was parked between two very large tires). Admittedly this too isn't the best analogy, but at least it's semantically correct. The difficulty comes from the already ambiguous and multi-faceted connotation of the word gay (if Middle English is to be appealed to at all).


To accurately process something that someone says, the key elements to consider are not the audience's understanding of the sentence, but rather the context, and the speaker's understanding of the word, and most importantly, the speaker's understanding of the audiences understanding of the word.


The moral of the story is, Hilary and Wanda were not only semantically incorrect in their assessment of the individual conversations, but showed a lack of understanding of denotative language, in that those being confronted probably never had the noun "gay" in mind when using its adjective form, just as someone who calls a very unattractive, silver colored car "white", may not be trying to offend me, a white person, but may simply be saying it reminds them of the inside of an Oreo which, as their experience would dictate, is also what they commonly associate with the word. The damning facet of language is, it is only useful to the extent that it succeeds in relaying a thought or concept to another person. If language misses it's mark, blame the person for the thought, or the language for its inability to relate it, but just as you shouldn't and don't blame good language for a poor thought, you can't condemn a well intended thought for the language by which it's expressed.

Semper giving up on things

When I originally undertook to start this blog I thought to myself, "what kind of blogger do I want to be?" The answer was obviously the type that comes across as both intellectual and down to earth. The kind of person that people both liked to listen to (or read in this case) and felt like they could benefit from listening to.
Well I have the down to earth part down pretty well, at least I think. Come to think of it, I don't really know what that term means. Like most English words and phrases I know, I didn't learn it by looking it up, I just learned it by hearing it said by a lot of people in a lot of different scenarios until I narrowed it down to my current understanding of the phrase. Which, based on context, I have to assume "down to Earth" really just means, "thinks a lot like I do." So if you find me "down to Earth" perhaps we should be friends.

Where was I?

Oh yes, "semper giving up." Feeling as if I had the "down to Earth" part down, I thought it was time to move on to the intelligent part. Which was more of a leap for me. People often take me for an intellectual, I consider that to be one of my talents; not being intellectual, just tricking people into thinking I am. What I am is witty, which doesn't require intelligence, it requires fast recall. What an exceptionally witty person does is say exactly what you would say given enough time, they just say it sooner than you do. But quick on your feet doesn't apply to blog posts. Anyone can be witty, given an infinite amount of time. The trick for me was honest to gosh intelligence.
 Luckily for me I was taking a Latin class at the time, which happens to be the universal language of smart people. So I thought--again to myself--"Latin! I'll include as much Latin in my blog as possible, then people can't possibly deny my intelligence!" Well four or five blog posts later, I realize I've more or less used up all the Latin wit I can muster. And so continuing in a long line of things that seemed like a good idea at the time (cue OK Go song) I abandoned my dreams of a half Latin, half English blog examining the the finer things in life. And it became a one man forum for me to shout and mumble and spout all the things that really get my goat (there's another one I never quite understood, "get one's goat" what the heck does that mean?). It's my own little padded room if you will.
So welcome, I think it's too late to change the name, but I'll let it sit, it's kind of grown on me. And I suppose it still fits. As long as you're here, you're semper in excreta.

Semper Persolvo

 Good news, I've found myself with I'm cheating on today's entry, this is an email I just sent to a "bloke" from England who's somewhat anti-Mormon, but is surprisingly civil. We've been engaged in a moderately productive back-and-forth for the past few months and I thought I'd start posting my replies to his emails.

Bobby,

Good news, I've found myself with a bit of time to answer a few of your questions. I'll keep it brief this time to avoid deleting two hours of work like last time.

Concerning the origin of Man. I believe that it started before this world was created, at least in a spiritual sense. I believe the reason God has such a vested interest in our salvation is because we are literally his spirit children. My main reasoning behind this is that, if we existed as nothing else but a notion in the mind of God until we existed spiritually, that would mean God created this Earth with the intent to eventually cause us to become in some cosmic way which we don't understand. In other words, why would he bother, what is God's motivation behind creating a bunch of people and putting (at least the first few) on an earth that he, in his omniscience, knew would eventually start to really suck. 

Why would he create beings to be put on an earth where they would suffer, be killed and persecuted, and hate if it didn't have to be that way? What is God's end game? In most theologies (as I understand it) If we do attain Heaven (which is only possible for the maybe 15% of these creations of God that have ever even heard the name Jesus Christ) we will be angels, or servants, or subservients to God, however one might call it. At any rate, I don't know of many religions that believe that God ever created us with the intent of ever allowing us to become "equals" with him. If that is the case, would that imply that this whole painful, troublesome existence is only an inspiration to get us to accept the sacrifice of God's son, so we can be saved and continue to live under his loving and all-knowing rule for eternity. I don't know, something in there just doesn't seem to add up. What do we get out of this? Happiness and peace? Yes, but by that same theology we could have had that without all the trouble, why didn't God create us into a world without the opportunity for sin. Why didn't he just create us right into that state of happiness and bliss that we're all striving for? Especially because, as many believe, Salvation is only through God anyway, why doesn't he just save us from the get-go and save us the trouble? He want's us all to reach Heaven right? He wants us all to be happy?

In my mind, and as I believe, the reason he doesn't is because this life is but a small part of our eternal existence, we lived with God in eternity before this life, and we are striving to return to him after it has ended. The purpose therefore of this life is for us to gain the experience we need, learn what we need to learn, grow as we need to grow, that we may have the beginnings as we exit this life of what we will eventually need to attain all that God hath. If God is the epitome of light, knowledge, and perfection, I can't understanding how a loving being wouldn't want us as his creations to be equally filled with the same attributes if we are capable of it.
I believe this life is equally pointless if all I need to do is believe in Christ, speak his name and accept him as our savior. If that were the case there would be no use for commandments, no need for a punishment, the only people who would believe that the commandments applied to them would also believe they were saved from the punishments of the commandments. I think it was against this exact attitude that Christ spoke when he said, "Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven." I from this understand that even those who proclaim Christ as their Lord will not necessarily enter the kingdom of heaven unless they also do the will of the Father, i.e. keep the commandments. 

In summation, I believe God created us first as spiritual beings, and then so that we could progress and attain all that he has, he set in motion the creation, I personally believe (this is not LDS Doctrine, but is also not refuted by LDS doctrine) that the creation took place more in the manner that scientists now call "the big bang" and that the process described in the Bible is metaphorical. I believe that in doing so he set a sequence of events in motion that eventually allowed for tabernacles (bodies) that would be fit to house his spirit children and it was from that point (after the fall of Adam) that we began to be conceived naturally, provided with bodies, and enter into this mortal probation as we gain the experience necessary to progress in our eternal course.

Thanks again for your questions and answers, I look forward to having the time to answer more.

Alex Lystrup