One More Sleep 'Til Christmas

Baby Brother has eagerly been counting down the days until Christmas. Or, rather, the sleeps until Christmas.

When we were making chocolate truffles, he informed me that there were seven more sleeps until Christmas.

When we were making gingerbread houses, he informed me that there were four more sleeps until Christmas.

When we were in the movie theater watching Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens in IMAX and 3D, he got my attention during the movie. Was he scared? Did he need to go to the bathroom? No; he just wanted to tell me that he was excited for Christmas and that there were "three more sleeps until Christmas!"

But finally, it's here. The day that Baby Brother has been waiting for all along is here. There's only one more sleep until Christmas.

Tomorrow, Christmas will be here! So get excited.

Merry Christmas!

A Christmas Story

Context: Little Sister, Baby Sister, and I have a tradition of getting lunch together on Christmas Eve. Two years ago, we had a particularly special experience.

The first miracle was that we went to Chili's at all.

I don't really like Chili's. My sisters don't really like Chili's. We hold the Annual Little Sisters' Christmas Eve Lunch at a different restaurant every year, but we choose restaurants that we, you know, enjoy. Yet against all logic, we agreed that this year, we were going to Chili's.

So at Chili's we arrived, wearing our festive holiday outfits. And when I say festive, I'm not kidding around. We wore red, green, gold, and silver. Baby Sister had jewelry made from tiny jingle bells. We've even been known to put wrapping paper bows in our hair.

Your average restaurant is fairly empty on Christmas Eve, and Chili's was no exception. This Chili's had two sections, a bar and dining room to the left of the entryway and a regular dining room to the right. A few men were seated at the bar, but nobody was in the other dining room.

The hostess smiled when we walked in. She grabbed three menus and began to lead us into the empty dining room to her right...

...and then stopped. Something had stopped her. She stood there for a second, did an about-face, and led us instead to a booth near the bar. That was the second miracle.

Not that we wanted to sit by the bar. In fact, as we sat down I was wishing we'd been seated in the dining room instead. I learned when I was in Europe that people who have been drinking are often unpleasant to be around, and the Annual Little Sisters' Christmas Eve Lunch should not be unpleasant.

Almost immediately, the older man sitting closest to us turned around and began to talk to us.

"Do you want these chips and queso?" he said. "They make you order food if you drink this early, but I don't want them. I promise I've barely touched them!"

"Um," we said.

It is generally not a good idea for young ladies to accept chips and queso from strange men. I would normally never do it. I would normally never encourage my young sisters to do it. But something made me feel like I should.

"Thanks," we said. We gingerly dug into the chips and queso. We hoped that he'd leave us alone.

 

Photo courtesy of Little Sister.

But our new acquaintance was either socially inept, or a little tipsy, or very lonely to be drinking alone early on Christmas Eve, or a combination of all three of those things, because he didn't seem to get that we were trying to brush him off. He kept looking over at us and beaming at us and talking to us.

It is generally an even worse idea for young ladies to allow possibly tipsy men to begin conversations with them. I was aware of this. But after a few times of him not getting that we wanted to be left alone, I had a thought.

I thought about one of my uncles, who hasn't spent Christmas with his family for many years, partly due to choice and partly due to addictions. If my uncle were sitting alone at a bar on Christmas Eve (and, I reflected, for all I knew he was), I would want somebody to be kind to him.

I told my sisters this later. "We thought that exact same thing!" they said. And that was another miracle.

So, cautiously, we began to talk, really talk, to the man at the bar. We told him our first names and a little about ourselves. We told him we were sisters.

"No!" he exclaimed, genuinely surprised. "I don't believe it! You're sisters? But you look nothing alike!"

"It's true!" we laughed.

He shook his head in amazement. "I don't believe it!"

The next miracle came in an unexpected form.

The only thing that Baby Sister was super excited about for our Chili's lunch was ordering and drinking a bottle of root beer. Because root beer, of course, tastes better from the bottle. Baby Sister drank it heartily.

 

Baby Sister + root beer = true love

Now, Baby Sister is tiny, but when she burps, it's loud. Runner Bean once scored her burps on a scale of 1 to 10, and she got high marks.

So when Baby Sister burped partway through the bottle of root beer, everybody heard it.

BUUURP.

Us. The waiters. Everyone at the bar. They all turned to look at Baby Sister. Baby Sister doesn't really get embarrassed often, so she kind of just shrugged it off. And so everyone smiled or laughed, and the room got about ten degrees jollier.

Our friend was beaming. "You remind me of my little sister!" he exclaimed. "She's tiny, but boy, can she burp!"

He was excited when Baby Sister burped again (loudly again). "Just like my sister!"

We kept talking and talking to him about Christmas in general. And he kept talking and talking right back. Before we knew it, it was time for us to head home. Then we did discovered the last miracle.

Our waiter came over with a huge smile on his face. "Your meal has already been paid for," he told us. Tip and all.

Our first reaction was that the man we'd been talking to had paid for our meal. But then a man at the other end of the bar waved at us and said with a grin, "Merry Christmas!"

We were really touched!

We left an extra tip for our waiter, wrote thank-you notes for the queso and our meals, and wished everyone a Merry Christmas on our way out the door.

When we burst into the Obnoxious home, here's what was said.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: You'll never believe what happened!

LITTKE SISTER: It's a Christmas miracle!

BABY SISTER: THE BEST WAY TO SPREAD CHRISTMAS CHEER IS BY BURPING LOUD FOR ALL TO HEAR!

A Savior Is Born

I've been trying all day to write you a beautiful blog post that explains why it's so important that a little baby was born in a stable in Bethlehem 2,000+ years ago.

The manner of Jesus Christ's birth is not incidental to his life. He wasn't a normal baby that grew into a person who did amazing things. He was predestined for greatness literally from conception. And even before--my church believes that He was foreordained to be our Savior.

We humans need a Savior. After death, we can live with God forever. But only if we meet the conditions of being cleansed of our imperfections and of having eternal, resurrected bodies.

For us to be cleansed of our imperfections, someone has to suffer for them: suffer for our sins, our mistakes, our missteps. For us to be resurrected, someone has to "break the bands of death." That's the phrase they use, which in my personal interpretation means that if somebody willingly sacrifices himself and then comes back to life under his own power, death is destroyed. A door that once only opened inward is suddenly swinging on loose hinges, allowing people to both go in and come out.

The problem here is that, to my understanding, a prerequisite for suffering for other people's sins is to have no sins yourself. Mortals by definition are imperfect. Also physically incapable of withstanding that kind of suffering. And without the power to raise themselves from the dead. A god is perfect, and physically capable, and powerful, but a god has a resurrected body that cannot die.

The Savior could not be a mortal. He could not be a god. So God arranged a way for Him to be both. Born of a Heavenly Father and an earthly mother, Jesus Christ had the perfection and the capability and the power of a god but the mortality of, well, a mortal. He, and only He, could willingly suffer and die for us so that we might be cleansed and resurrected. That was literally what He was born for.

That's beautiful to me. I hope it's beautiful to you, too.

Merry Christmas.

The Christmas Dance

A few weeks ago, Baby Sister went to the annual Hometown High Christmas dance. Which she apparently has time to do when she's not being a lead in a musical, doing face painting, or getting nominated for Best Supporting Actress by the Utah High School Musical Theatre Guild of People Who Nominate Other People. Or whatever they're called.

Basically, you will never be as cool as Baby Sister so you should just stop trying. The end.

For the dance, Baby Sister donned a teal velveteen top with a brocade skirt, a combination of her own devising. I took her to buy gold jewelry at Target and she did her own hair and makeup because, again, she's cool enough and skillful enough to do that. She looked like a million and one bucks.

All of this dance prepping reminded me of when I was Baby Sister's age and went to the Hometown High Christmas dance.

The Christmas dance is the only dressy uppy girls' choice dance at Hometown High, so you better believe I was careful about who I asked. I decided to ask the Good Guy, for reasons that you probably understand from the moniker that he is herein given.

On the day of the day of the dance I, like Baby Sister, wore teal. I'd borrowed this pretty dress from Bessie, who'd worn it to Homecoming the year before. The dress's best feature was arguably a strip of black lace around the waist. I wore it with silver jewelry and my official school dance shoes, which were black and satiny heels with little bows on the front. I was pretty excited to wear this ensemble. I was also very conscious of the fact that it was a borrowed dress, and I was determined not to get it dirty.

Now, the weather had been pretty bad that day. Not as bad as the weather earlier this week, but bad enough that Shutterbug's parents insisted on picking us up after dinner and driving us to the dance themselves.

There was snow and ice everywhere when Shutterbug, Etch-a-Sketch and I went to pick up our dates. The Good Guy lived on a fairly steep hill, so we went carefully, carefully up to get him.

Shutterbug pulled into the driveway cautiously. I stepped out of the car cautiously and took a cautious step.

Cautious, but tractionless. My official school dance shoes went one way, my torso went another, and suddenly I was sprawled on the Good Guy's driveway.

I heard the car door open. "Are you okay?" Shutterbug said.

I was okay. And the boutonnière I'd brought for the Good Guy was also okay. But the front and side of the borrowed teal dress were all wet.

And so, in my awkwardly wet dress, I trekked up the driveway so I could go inside and awkwardly complete one of the most awkward rituals of all time aka pinning a boutonnière to a boy's lapel while his parents are watching. And taking pictures.

Recently, the Good Guy found a picture of us at the dance on Facebook and shared it. You know, to be all, "Ha ha, do you remember that, Awkward Mormon Girl?" That kind of thing.

And I was all, "Ha ha DO I EVER."

Snow Day

You know how sometimes in movies, when something bad happens and one of the characters lets out a huge "NOOOOO"?

Well, this morning, I woke up, checked the weather, and as soon as I saw that it was snowing my soul did a big "NOOOOO!"

And then it did it again when I opened the door and stepped foot in a foot of snow.

And again when I was lurching through the streets of Hometown.

And again when I saw the line to get on the overpass to Work City.

And again when my car got stuck on the overpass. (A friendly stranger got out of his car and actually pushed mine up the overpass.)

And then I was all snowed out and NOed out. So after about fifteen minutes of crawling on the treacherous freeway, I realized this was more than I could handle and I got off at the nearest exit to drive back home.

When I got home, my roommates were preparing to go to work. We all work in the same city, and when they saw that I was distraught at my lack of mad snow driving skillz they offered to drive me.

But then they stepped outside and saw the snow, and their souls also did a big "NOOOOO!" And then we all walked back into our apartment to wait until the roads were a little more clear.

Back in the apartment, there was hot chocolate and Christmas music and the light of our beautifully decorated Christmas tree. We all started talking about what we would do if we couldn't go into work today. A glorious fantasy of a snow day where we all stayed home began to dance in our heads.

Then the Christmas tree lights blinked off...on...off...on...off.

The power was out.

Immediately, we began to discuss flashlights and candles and emergency rations. This soon turned to talk of the zombie apocalypse, and how we would get weapons, and in which direction we would flee to get away from the zombies.

It was a pretty well-laid out plan. And so the glorious fantasy of the snow day was replaced with the exciting vision of surviving the zombie apocalypse.

But then we checked traffic and saw that the roads were now clear. Which meant it was time to go to work. Which knowledge killed both the remnant of the glorious fantasy and the momentum of the exciting vision.

Like good adults, we went outside to our cars, shoveled the driveway, and headed off to work.

I rode with Pepper to work and with the Seamstress home. And then, in return for their hospitality, I grandly announced that I would drive all of us to our ward Christmas party that evening.

I should now tell you that our party was at our church meetinghouse. Said meetinghouse is at the top of a hill. Hills are known for being inclined surfaces. Inclined surfaces are known for not being compatible with driving in the snow.

Remember how I got stuck driving up a slightly inclined overpass this morning? Remember how I couldn't handle driving in the snow? Remember how I cried? You don't remember that part, because I previously didn't tell you about it. But it happened. I cried quite a lot.

I don't know why I volunteered to drive up the hill to the party. And I especially don't know why I felt so sure that I could do it. But I changed into some party clothes, and I scraped the snow off my Honda, and I hustled my roommates into the car and I drove.

Calmly and easily, I drove the Honda up the hill. We went to the party. We ate. We left. We headed down the hill. We got stuck towards the top and had to be pushed by more kind strangers. Apparently there are lots of kind strangers when it's snowing.

Finally we were on our way down the hill, really down. As we slipped down the snowy hill, at long last my resolve began to break. I was amazed that I'd ever volunteered to go up the hill. I was amazed that we'd made it to the top. I was particularly amazed that I for some reason had also decided it was a good idea to go down.

Why do I do these things to myself?

In a show of bravado, I yelled, "Snow doesn't scare us! Only snow zombies."

But that was a lie, obviously. Because snow scares me. A lot. I would rather have faced snow zombies than snow. We had a plan for snow zombies. I do not know how to plan for snow.

But too late! Gravity had its way with us. We went down, down, down the slippery hill.

Here's some good news: we survived! Here's some bad news: there's approximately ten thousand days left of Utah winter.

I have another party tomorrow, but I'm getting somebody else to drive.

Eight Days of Hanukkah

In honor of Hanukkah, I have written you a song. Or rather, I have written new words for an old familiar song.

And before you're all, "Ooh, Awkward Mormon Girl! You're a practicing Christian even if you are of Jewish descent! It's probably not, shall we say, kosher for you to write Hanukkah songs!"

Well, guess what? A weirdly large percentage of Christmas songs were written by Jews. So...you know.

Also, I want you to know that I almost titled this post "On the First Day of Hanukkah My True Love Gave Me Absolutely Nothing Because I Don't Have a True Love," but I decided that was too long and whiney. So I didn't do that and you're welcome.

On the first day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
A Zealot named Judas Maccabee

On the second day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
Two games of dreidel
And a Zealot named Judas Maccabee

On the third day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
Three kosher pickles
Two games of dreidel
And a Zealot named Judas Maccabee

On the fourth day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
Four prayer shawls
Three kosher pickles
Two games of dreidel
And a Zealot named Judas Maccabee

On the fifth day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
FIVE GOLDEN SHEKELS (dramatic pause)
Four prayer shawls
Three kosher pickles
Two games of dreidel
And a Zealot named Judas Maccabee

On the sixth day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
Six plates of latkes
FIVE GOLDEN SHEKELS (dramatic pause)
Four prayer shawls
Three kosher pickles
Two games of dreidel
And a Zealot named Judas Maccabee

On the seventh day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
Seven Stars of David
Six plates of latkes
FIVE GOLDEN SHEKELS (dramatic pause)
Four prayer shawls
Three kosher pickles
Two games of dreidel
And a Zealot named Judas Maccabee

On the eighth day of Hanukkah, my true love gave to me
Eight days of miracles
Seven Stars of David
Six plates of latkes
FIVE GOLDEN SHEKELS (dramatic pause)
Four prayer shawls
Three kosher pickles
Two games of dreidel
And a Zealot named Judas Maccabee

'Tis the Season to Overschedule

Every December, I have two kajillion and three things planned. There are Christmas festivities, family in town, friends on break from school, service projects to participate in, good movies coming out, and all sorts of other loveliness. When I was in public school, I had many band and choir performances. When I was in college, I had finals. And often, work picks up before the end of the year. When I worked in fast food, I used to work two or three times as many hours during December as I did during the rest of the months.

One year, a fellow asked me on a date at the end of November. And I said, "Well, let's see. The next time that I'll be free is probably... December 21st." I think he thought that I was lying, but I most certainly wasn't.

If someone asked me on a date right now, I'd have to tell them to wait until next year. 'Cause I ain't got time for that. I have so many things going on between now and the end of the year that I feel like I'm about to spontaneously combust. Everything is happening at once. It's a good thing that I don't have to schedule time to breathe, because if I did, I would die.

Overscheduling is, I should mention, often the Obnoxious way. My family tends to live at the speed of light, moving from activity to activity barely hanging on by the seat of our pants. Sometimes it's a good thing: we do get things done. Sometimes it's a little much. Or a lot much.

So far, I've managed to juggle everything really well. Except for the fact that I've become a little, shall we say, loopy. I'm here. I'm there. I'm all over the place.

Over the weekend, I identified all the potential problems in a potential relationship with this guy I don't really know but kind of think is cute. First I identified all the problems; then I solved them. And I was like, "There we go! Things will definitely work out and we can get married sometime in the next year and have seven kids." And then I started writing a journal entry explaining all of this to my posterity and whoever else is going to read my journal. And then halfway through I was like, "Wait. What? Why did I do this? I don't even know anything about this guy. What is wrong with me? Why did I spend so much time on this?" The answer is that at some point, my rational mind became overtired from being worked so hard. It stopped working the way it usually does and instead started rationalizing things that don't make sense. And that's only the beginning.

On the way home from work today, I was crying. When I walked in the door, I was angry. And about five minutes later, I was peaceful and serene and preparing a pot of beef stew. And a couple of hours later, I was being vaguely charming at family home evening. And now I'm all giddy and happy and I don't even know. While I was in the shower, I composed a Hanukkah carol of my own devising (because it's the first night of Hanukkah, goyim.) I'm giggling while I write this.

I think I am currently a little what they call, what's the word, unstable.

But oh well! There are things that must be done, and I will do them. By the grace of God, I will get through this month.

A Fear of Doing Good

Something's on my mind.

It's been on my mind for a while now. A month at least. I've brought it up in my institute class and in the temple prep class that I teach. I think about it all the time.

It's from Doctrine and Covenants Section 6. I love Section 6. Section 6 has gotten me through the past year. It seems like every time I read it, I notice something new.

One day, I particularly noticed these verses:

33 Fear not to do good, my sons, for whatsoever ye sow, that shall ye also reap; therefore, if ye sow good ye shall also reap good for your reward.

34 Therefore, fear not, little flock; do good; let earth and hell combine against you, for if ye are built upon my rock, they cannot prevail.

At first I was like, "That's so weird! Why are we being told not to be afraid of doing good? Who's afraid of doing good? Why would anyone be afraid of that?!"

But then I thought about all those times I considered helping somebody out, but didn't. The reasons I didn't help them out usually weren't, "I don't have the time/money/desire to help." They were usually one of the following:

1) "They probably won't want my help."

2) "They will think I'm weird for noticing that they need help. They'll think I'm a stalker/have a crush on them."

3) "Someone else will do it better than I could."

4) "They would prefer that somebody else help them."

And so and so forth. In short, I don't help because I'm afraid of looking silly or embarrassing myself or butting in where I'm not wanted.

Isn't that weird? Humans are weird.

I know I'm not the only person who feels this way. When I mentioned this to my temple prep class in connection with how service prepares us for the temple, so many students told stories of how they helped somebody that they were afraid to help or how somebody else they didn't know well helped them. Their words taught me that most of the time, people are glad to receive help of any kind. We shouldn't be so afraid of offering service to one another!

Anyways, that's my spiel. It's Christmas. Let's serve each other and not be afraid. K thnx bye.

Update Post

Here's everything you need to know about what I've been up to lately.

First, Little Sister has staunchly insisted that Back to the Future Part III is one movie that she did not, in fact, watch without me during our summer marathons. In fact, she says she's never seen it. So there's that.

Second, I have been adding books to my Goodreads on and off. Right now I've got about twelve hundred read books added, and there are still many bookshelves in my parents' house that I haven't even combed through yet. Stay tuned for the final count.

Penultimately, NaNoWriMo came to an end today. My goal of five pages a week meant that I was shooting for 21 pages, but I ended up with about 28. I guess there were a lot of days where I wrote a little extra.

Ultimately, I often misspell "on" as "ob." Whenever I do this on my phone, it auto corrects it to "Brownies" with a capital B. I do not understand.

A Post for Thanksgiving

My post today shall be divided into two parts. First is the part that I intended all along, and the second part was foisted upon me this morning. (I'll explain later.) But, without further ado, here's what I was planning to say to you today.

I have a lot of things to be grateful for, as I always do. My religion, my family, my friends, my country, my excellent roommates, my talents, my job, my Honda Accord, my super sweet apartment, my chance to travel to New York City this year, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. But I am particularly grateful for my parents.

My mom works as an RN, but being a mom is way more important to her than her career ever has been. This is an unpopular way to live. The thing is, though, is that I've always really needed my mom. Not some motherly caretaker figure. Not an involved teacher, nor a good babysitter, nor a particularly caring daycare owner. My grandmother babysat me and my siblings a lot during elementary school, and I loved her and it was great, but it wasn't the same as being cared for by my mom. I firmly believe that moms have special powers that allow them to help their kids in ways that no one else can. Even as an adult who lives away from home, I still need her opinion or her help because someone else's just won't do. Someone else can't get things right the way that my mom can.

Then there's my dad. Some of the same people who say that fathers should share in childcare responsibilities also say that fathers shouldn't necessarily have the right to be involved in a decision to abort their unborn child. These are just a few of the mixed messages out there about what it means to be a father. It's my observation that some dads are confused and frustrated about their role in their kids' lives. They don't really know what, exactly, they're supposed to be doing.

Well, dads, I can't tell you exactly what you're supposed to be doing. But I can tell you what my dad does for me. Over the years, my dad has driven me to one thousand plus parties and sporting events and college classes when I couldn't drive or was too scared to drive in the snow or had a broken-down car. He's fixed fuses in my car. He's scraped the ice off my windshield on cold winter morning. He's waited up for me to make sure I get home safe. He's taken me to basketball games, Shakespeare plays, movies, delicious restaurants, and musicals. He listens to me rant, even when he can't agree with what I'm saying. He let me read the fifth Harry Potter book before he did because he freely admitted I was a faster reader than he was.

A few weeks ago, I had a migraine, and I called my parents to ask if they had anything with caffeine in it. What I meant was soda, but a while later my dad rang the doorbell. I dragged myself out of bed, still half-asleep, and saw that he had brought me some migraine-strength medicine.

I was barely awake and bleary and grumpy. "I already have migraine medicine," I grumbled. "I was asking if you guys had soda because I don't want to eat anything with this medicine because I'm not hungry." Then I shut the door and went back to bed.

After a little while, it occurred to me that I hadn't even thanked him for coming to bring me medicine. I felt really bad. But then the doorbell rang again. This time, my dad was standing there with two ice-cold bottles of Dr. Pepper that he'd bought for me at the store.

If you're sad reading this because your parents haven't fulfilled their parental responsibilities the way that my parents have, remember that you can be a parent yourself. And then you, too, can experience the parent-child bond, just from the other side.

The second part of the post is a poem that Little Sister wrote this morning whilst watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. The poem is about her experience watching the parade, and she specifically asked me to share it with you.

Acrostics and Stones May Break Out Groans

Toothless

Hi who are you

America

Ne-yo is a tinman

Kicklines

(here) For Broadway

U need voice lessons

Look, Ma, new bands!

After composing this interesting piece of literature, Little Sister then proceeded to do a close reading of her own work. Her scholarly notes are provided below.

T: When Toothless appeared onscreen, he was met with a "hoorah" and a general jubilee. We're thankful FOR YA, BUDDY!

H: Who are any of the people and why isn't the apple stem wearing green

A: America—see racism quotes above. (There was then an arrow to the following quotes: "Johnny Appleseed is a racist jerk," "I'm so sick of this racist parade.")

N: The Wiz Live! is coming and it actually looks pretty good. NEVER THOUGHT I'd say that but it's The Wiz so it can probably only get better.

K: Rockettes sorely disappointing.

F: Please have every Broadway show and also some of them twice, thanks.

U: I'm confused how you got famous but props to you.

L: SO MANY BANDS.

...Happy Thanksgiving.

Jerome Shalom and the Ham Sandwich

We were raking leaves when my brothers asked me what my NaNoWriMo story is about.

I briefly sketched out for the plot. Seeing that they were unimpressed, and feeling the need to defend my worth as an author, I said, "I've never been very good at plots. I'm more of a character person myself." Then I proceeded to tell them that sometimes, nothing really needs to happen in a book for it to be interesting.

"So somebody could write a book about someone going to buy a ham sandwich?" Little Brother snarked.

"Sure," I said. "It depends on who he meets on the way and what happens. Like if he loses his change on the way and then has to find it."

Baby Brother laughs. "And then the whole book is about him looking for his change and he meets a whole bunch of villain and doesn't even end up buying the ham sandwich!"

Little Brother named our character Jerome Shalom, which caused me to sketch out his backstory. "He's Jewish, and his parents make him eat kosher, but he's always wanted to eat a ham sandwich. So one day he sneaks out of the house to buy a ham sandwich-"

Baby Brother quickly sketched out about fifteen books of the Jerome Shalom series. First Jerome Shalom goes to buy a ham sandwich, but he loses his change on the way. While he's looking for his change, he discovers that his father is involved in a plot to rid the world of ham sandwiches. Then Jerome Shalom learns that his father actually stole his change. So Jerome Shalom recovers the change, but then his father puts him in prison. But then about three books later he escapes prison. Then he has to actually find a shop that sells ham sandwiches. And while Jerome Shalom wanders around looking for a sandwich shop, World War II starts, and he has to escape Hitler.

"We're not doing that," Little Brother said. Then I said that I had to go pick Little Sister up from the bus stop, so we all dropped our rakes and wandered inside and never figured out how Jerome Shalom escapes Hitler.

Winter Mornings

I have a love-hate relationship with winter mornings. And by "love-hate," I mean "hate." I hate the winter. The winter hates me.

Some of you naysayers will say, "But it's not even winter yet! It won't be winter until the winter solstice or whatever." But I will naysay your naysaying and say that once the snow comes, it's winter. And the snow has come. Briefly. And the cold came with it, and the cold hasn't left.

If you asked me how cold it was in my apartment, I would say that it's cold. And if you said, "But how cold?" I would say it's as cold as a deep-dish pizza. And then when you protested that doesn't make any sense, I would tell you that NaNoWriMo has exhausted my supply of good similes and distract you with a description of how I spend these cold winter mornings.

First, I sleep in for as long as I can possibly justify. Then, when I can no longer justify sleeping, I get out from under the covers. I wrap myself in a massive blanket that the Seamstress made me last Christmas, and I turn on the little space heater my landlord lent me, and I pray and read my scriptures and write in my journal.

By the time I'm done with that, my room is decently warm. However, the rest of the apartment is not. It's a rather large basement apartment, which is one of the reasons that it's as cold as a thing that isn't warm. So, in order to keep warm while I proceed to get ready for the day, I wrap the massive blanket around me and let it trail behind me like a majestic cape. It trails over the tile floor in the bathroom as I plug the straightener in. It trails over the kitchen floor as I "prepare" my breakfast of cereal or frozen waffles or once even leftover sushi that Pepper thoughtfully brought home for me. It trails over the hallway carpet as I walk around aimlessly trying to remember what I need to do that day before I can leave the house.

And then I get dressed in the warmest shirt I can find, and I leave the house bundled up. I drive to work or wherever it is that I'm driving that day. I do whatever it is I'm doing that day, and then by the time I leave it's warmed up considerably outside and my warmest shirt has become stifling and sweaty.

But, of course, if I wear a shirt that's not quite as warm, the weather invariably stays cold all day and I freeze to death. And then I wake up the next day and do it all again.

Texts from Little Sister

I've had a busy week! I've been participating in NaNoWriMo/sick/listening to Christmas music on the radio without any shame. So I do not have a written story for you tonight, but I do have this text conversation that Little Sister and I had. P.S. In the Obnoxious family, we tend to talk over each other a lot. And when we're texting, we may send a text even when we can see that the other person is still responding to our last text. 'Cause that's how we roll.

How to Use Peppermint Oil

Late last night, I had a headache.

THE SEAMSTRESS: Well, I just got some peppermint oil. You can use some if you want.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: How do I use it?

THE SEAMSTRESS: I'm not sure.

Pepper, who is more educated about folk remedies and alternative medicine and the like, was not at home.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Do I just put it on my head?

THE SEAMSTRESS: I don't know.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Here goes.

I poured some oil on my fingers. Then I drew a line across my forehead with it like my hand belonged to Rafiki and my forehead belonged to Baby Simba.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: NAAANTS EEN-VWEN-YAAAAAAA MA-BA-GEE-CHI-BA-VA!

Sometimes on this blog, I exaggerate reality slightly. But I'm not exaggerating this. I really did sing, "The Circle of Life," while rubbing peppermint oil on my head. And without commentary or further ado, the Seamstress and I bid each other good night and went to bed.

NaNoWriMo

I decided to do NaNoWriMo this year. That's National Novel Writing Month for all you non-writers out there. It's exactly what it sounds like: the month in which everyone in the nation frantically tries to write a novel of 50,000 words in thirty days.

I've tried to do NaNoWriMo before. Viola and the Fearless One and I actually formed a kind of NaNoWriMo support group that met (one time) on my bedroom floor.

It was not a successful support group, and NaNoWriMo was not a successful endeavour. I ended up getting really stressed out that I wasn't meeting my self-set deadlines and ended up accomplishing almost nothing.

I think the most stressful thing about NaNoWriMo is that, realistically, to accomplish your goal you have to write every day. Unless you want to write, like, eight hours on three days instead. Which I cannot do. Unless I want to spontaneously combust. Which I don't.

The last time I finished a novel, I did it using a formula that someone recommended in an article that I read once. The formula is this: don't write every day. In a week, take one day for God, one day for yourself, and give the other five days to writing.

This formula worked really well for me, so I decided to use it again for NaNoWriMo. Therefore, I am doing an abridged version of NaNoWriMo, where I did not make a goal to write 50,000 words but to write one page a day, five days a week during November. I will not finish any novels, but I'll get a good start on something that I can continue to work on.

It's been awhile since I've written any fiction. The process goes something like this:

1. Write two sentences.

2. Delete two sentences.

3. Write three paragraphs.

4. Take a break.

5. Reinterpret the secondary character's motivation.

6. Rewrite one-and-a-half of the three paragraphs.

7. Say, "This is the best thing I've ever written!"

8. Eat a snack.

9. Reread what you've written.

10. Say, "This is the worst thing I've ever written!"

11. Read something else for inspiration.

12. Have brilliant idea.

13. Write seven brilliant paragraphs.

14. Discover plot hole within the seven brilliant paragraphs.

15. Contemplate suicide by jumping into plot hole.

16. Pray.

17. Cry.

18. Solve plot hole.

19. Use SAT-level word.

20. Second-guess self and wonder if you have used SAT-level word correctly.

21. Look up SAT-level word's definition just to make sure.

22. Write three more paragraphs.

23. Conduct research using Wikipedia.

24. Write another paragraph.

25. Realize you have finished your quota for the day.

26. Celebrate.

27. Remember all the other things you have to do today that you have been neglecting.

28. Cry.

And so on and so forth.

Somehow, I made it through the first week intact. Well, here's to another three weeks and then some! We'll see how it goes.

This Is Halloween

My plans for Halloween to take Baby Brother and Little Brother trick-or-treating. As I mentioned, Baby Brother and I were Luke Triton and Flora Reinhold from Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box for Halloween. What about Little Brother?

When Little Brother found out that Baby Brother and I were doing a costume together, he became grumpy. Baby Brother suggested that Little Brother be Professor Layton, but Little Brother did not want to be Professor Layton.

Sometimes, being around Little Brother is exactly like this quote from The Wednesday Wars:

"I can't do this," he'd say.

"You can do this," we'd say.

"I don't want to do this," he'd say.

"You want to do this," we'd say.

"I don't even care about this," he'd say.

"You care about this," we'd say.

Sure enough, in the week leading up to Halloween, there was much moaning on Little Brother's part. The closer Halloween got, the more upset he was about not having a costume, and the more he was known to say things like this: "I'm not dressing up for Halloween!" "I hate Halloween anyways!" "I don't even want to go trick-or-treating!"

Our entire family did our best to talk him off the ledge of grumpiness, but it wasn't easy. Blessedly, two days before Halloween, Little Brother finally procured a satisfactory costume. It was more than satisfactory, actually. He liked the costume so much that he called me seven times within the space of an hour to tell me to come see it.

So everything was fine, right?

Wrong.

As Baby Brother and I prepared to go trick-or-treating, Little Brother dramatically announced that he would not be coming with us. He said this was to the effect that everyone in our neighborhood thought he was weird. And that they wouldn't get his costume. And that they probably thought he was too old to trick-or-treat, anyways.

We had another Wednesday Wars discussion. We pleaded, begged, and cajoled. But Little Brother stood firm that he would not, no would not, go trick-or-treating with us.

So Baby Brother and I left without him. And after about fifteen minutes of fun, we returned to try one last time.

"Please come trick-or-treating," we said.

And to our great surprise, Little Brother said, "Okay," and put on his costume.

This costume that he loved so much consisted of an otter costume worn with a moustache, glasses, and a newspaper.

"I'm an Otter Pop," he told me when he showed it to me the first time.

Little Brother is definitely a Ravenclaw.

The only other thing worth mentioning that happened that evening was that, when we were on our aunt and uncle's block, a police car slowed down near us.

"Hey, do you want some glowsticks?" one of the police officers in the car called out to us. Which isn't so different from a stranger saying, "Hey, kids, do you want some candy?"

"No, thanks. We already have some," I said, because we did. But also because my parents taught me to never take candy or glowsticks from strangers in cars. Even if those strangers are police officers. Especially if those strangers are police officers, because they should not be confusing children by behaving like potential kidnappers. Unless they were testing children by behaving like potential kidnappers. In which case, I passed and would like a certificate of completion.

Happy Halloween!

This year for Halloween, Baby Brother and I were characters from his favorite video game.

For all intents and purposes, we looked exactly like this.

The only person who recognized us was Porch. But that's life.

More details to come!

Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

I rarely win contests of chance.

When I was nine or ten, I went to the elementary school carnival and won the cake-and-book walk a few times...because I was one of like four kids competing and I did it like ten times. I won My Side of the Mountain, The Search for Delicious, and some baked goods to eat while I read them.

When I graduated from high school, they had a bunch of drawings at our all-night party. Everyone who participated won several items from the drawings. But even though I knew everybody won something, I was still thrilled with my prizes. I loved them. I felt like some great honor had been bestowed upon me.

However, these are the exceptions. I've been in a million drawings and a million other contests of chance over my twenty-x years, but I've only won things a few times. Once I was in a drawing with only two other people and lost.

You may be thinking, "Oh, that's how it is with everybody!" But I know some people who, I swear, win every contest they enter. The Chess Master used to win galoots of prizes in the drawings at the assemblies that marked the end of each year of junior high, while I didn’t win a thing.

The good news is that if the Hunger Games were a real thing, my name would never be drawn.

A few weeks ago, my roommates and I went to the State Fair. We ate ice cream and visited the Seamstress’s prize-winning jean quilt. We looked at handmade crafts and commercialized products. Pepper bought root beer and fried clams. The man at the fried clams stand tried to convert the Seamstress to clam chowder by giving her a free sample. The Seamstress politely tried it, then gave me the rest.

On our way out of the fair, we passed a Saladmaster booth. The ladies at said booth asked us if we wanted to enter a contest to win a free dinner.

We were like, “Please explain more.”

And they were like, “If you write your names, ages, and professions on these pieces of paper, you can spin this wheel. The wheel will land on a type of cookware. We will write down that cookware and then put your pieces of paper in a drawing. If your piece of paper is drawn, you will win a dinner and the cookware chosen by the wheel.”

We felt this seemed like a decent system, neither too invasive nor too good to be true. So we all filled out a piece of paper and spun the magical wheel of cookware.

If I recall correctly, Pepper and I landed on serving spoons, while the Seamstress landed on a set of knives. The Saladmaster ladies wrote down these items and promised that if one of us won, they’d let us know.

We went home and promptly forget about the whole thing.

Well, a few weeks later, I received a call from one of the Saladmaster ladies. She said that I’d won a free dinner!

I was all kinds of excited because free dinner!

LADY: You also won a serving spoon!

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Hooray!

The lady proceeded to tell me about the dinner that I’d won.

LADY: It’s a dinner show.

Sorry, dinner show.

LADY: Do you like fried chicken? We’re going to make you fried chicken without cooking it in oils or grease!

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: That sounds impossible, but cool!

LADY: And diabetic-friendly mashed potatoes!

AWKWARD MORMON: Ooh!

LADY: They’re really yummy!

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: I’d take your word for it, but I guess I won’t have to!

LADY: And a vegetable medley!

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Great! Vegetables!

We arranged for this exciting dinner to take place on a Thursday night.

Then, when I hung up, something occurred to me. When the lady said, “dinner show,” she didn’t mean a waterfront diving spectacular like they used to have at the lovely restaurant called the Mayan before its unfortunate closure. Or even dinner theatre, which I have enjoyed both here in Hometown and in places as far away as Kauai. She meant, “showing off Saladmaster stuff and convincing you to buy it.”

I’ve been to similar events before, such as Mary Kay parties. It’s always a little uncomfortable if you don’t want to buy anything, but it’s still fun. So I decided to go ahead with the dinner, pressure to purchase notwithstanding.

So that Thursday night, my roommates and I awaited the arrival of our Salad Master. (My father also waited with us, just to make sure that we weren’t willfully letting an axe murderer into our home.) Once our Salad Master had arrived, my father gave his stamp of non-axe-murderer approval. He left, and the dinner began.

Like many companies’ sales teams, Saladmaster’s representatives have a prescribed dialogue that they use to share their message. I will freely admit up front that I didn’t buy into their dialogue. I also found their business model curious. Even though Saladmaster is operating under the same principles as Mary Kay, the sales process felt a lot different than Mary Kay’s. I think this is because some of Mary Kay’s products meet needs I already have. They have superior eye makeup remover and they used to sell a great face wash. At the last Mary Kay party I went to, I even ended up buying a bottle of a new lightweight foundation because it was way better and easier to use than the foundation I had.

Saladmaster’s business, on the other hand, relies on convincing people that their cookware is adversely affecting their health. They essentially have to create the need. And if they manage to create the need, then they have to complete a second step, which is to convince people that their product is the answer to this need. I feel like this isn’t as effective.

Of course, I am not a businessperson by any means, so let’s leave off talking about the business model. What I really want to share with you is the experience of the Saladmaster cooking process, which I found endlessly fascinating.

First, the Salad Master started cooking the chicken. And guess what? She really did cook it without putting it in any oil or grease! She put the chicken in an electric skillet with some oil in a container underneath the skillet. The oil created heat that fried the chicken in its own fat.

Then she used the eponymous Saladmaster machine to grate some potatoes and onions, which she put in a pot that, like the skillet, operated as sort of a double boiler.

Before preparing the food, the Salad Master had shared with us Saladmaster’s theories about not peeling food, not cooking it at high temperatures, not cooking it with additional oils, nor cooking it with water. I could tell that some of these theories didn’t sit well with the Seamstress. So when the Salad Master put the potatoes on the stove to cook, the Seamstress brought out her Amazing Snark.

Most people have an Amazing Snark, but the Seamstress’s is more amazing than most. An exchange along these lines ensued:

THE SEAMSTRESS: So basically, you’re steaming the potatoes.

SALAD MASTER: No, because I’m cooking it at such a low temperature that there’s no steam.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: (trying to be diplomatic) So it’s like you’re steaming them, but you’re just… not… steaming them.

SALAD MASTER: No, I’m not steaming them.

After this productive conversation, the Salad Master began the vegetable medley. She grated carrots and cabbage and put them in a pot with frozen peas and corn. Interestingly, she did not mix them together. I think she said this would allow them to better retain their individual flavors.

After that, the Salad Master began to make us a cake! I had not known that cake was involved. Cake is almost never a bad thing.

First, the Salad Master put half a box of chocolate cake mix into a bowl. So far, so good.

Then she started grating zucchini into the cake. And carrots. And red cabbage. And radishes.

I was having a hard time trusting this cake.

Then the Salad Master went to our fridge and grabbed ketchup and mustard to put into the cake.

THE THREE OF US: What are you doing??? Is this necessary?

SALAD MASTER: Trust me, you won’t be able to taste a thing!

THE THREE OF US: But why are you doing this to the cake???

Some eggs went into the cake, and then the cake went into a pan on the stove.

Finally, the Salad Master grated more radishes, cabbage, carrots, celery, and zucchini together with some lemon zest to make a coleslaw. Instead of making coleslaw sauce, she squeezed lemon juice on top.

When everything was ready, we ate.

How was the special food? The fried chicken was quite good! The potatoes really needed some kind of seasoning or dairy. I did not care for them. The cole slaw was better than average, the vegetable medley tasted like vegetables, and the cake tasted like cake in spite of the vegetables and condiments. (Although we never did get a satisfactory answer for why she added the condiments in the first place.)

As you may have suspected, while we appreciated the dinner, neither my roommates nor I bought anything from Saladmaster. The only thing I was interested in was the skillet with the oil underneath, and it was very very pricey.

However, I did get my free serving spoon. It’s beautiful, and I love it. And since the Salad Master kept emphasizing that the Saladmaster cookware is made of titanium, the purest of metals, I suspect the spoon is also titanium.

THE SEAMSTRESS: (with Amazing Snark) You could just hold the spoon over the stove and cook something in that!

My Third Stitch Fix Experience

I scheduled my first two Fixes to arrive on Thursdays.

I wrote like three drafts of this post trying to explain to you why Thursday is the best day of the week for me to receive a box full of clothes to try on, but it was complicated to explain and I couldn't do it justice. To make a long story short, when I scheduled my first Fix I did a thorough internal analysis and a blood test plus a horoscope that led me to deduce that Thursdays would be the best days for my Fixes to arrive.

Because they let you schedule when your Fixes arrive. Which is pretty cool if you ask me.

So. The week of my first Fix, my email told me that Stitch Fix sent the package out on Monday. And I was like, "Excellent." Then on Wednesday afternoon, the package arrived.

Usually, packages arriving early are a good thing. But Wednesday is not a good day for me to receive packages for much the same reasons that Thursday is a good day for me to get packages.

At first, I was all, "Whatever. This is how it goes with packages. They never get here when you want them to." But then I noticed a special 2-day shipping sticker on the Fix box. And I was all, "Huh. How about that? It took exactly two days to arrive! What precise shipping! Surely, with shipping that precise, they really can control what day my Fixes arrive! I bet this time was just a test run to see how long the shipping to Hometown took. Surely when they see that my Fix arrived early, they'll sent the next one on a Tuesday so that it arrives on a Thursday!"

So I scheduled my second Fix to arrive on a Thursday. Again, it was sent on a Monday and again, it arrived on a Wednesday.

So I was all, "No worries! It looks like Stitch Fix sends their packages out a day early to be extra careful! So from now on, I'll schedule my Fixes to arrive on Fridays! So they come on Thursdays!"

So I scheduled my third Fix on Friday, expecting to receive an email on Tuesday saying that the Fix had shipped. But this time it was shipped on Wednesday and actually arrived on Friday as scheduled.

Okay, Stitch Fix. You get one point for getting the Fix here on the scheduled date but minus one point for foiling my plan! Which is zero points, Stitch Fix! Zero points for shipping!

So this is what my stylist said this time:

Hi Awkward Mormon Girl! I hope you had fun at your high school reunion and were able to rock one of your Stitch Fix Dresses! his Fix isn't as colorful as last time, but I still think you will love it! I did not have any polka dot jeans in this time around but I will definitely keep an eye out for next time, so I decided to instead send you a pair of the colored pants we just got in that everyone seems to love. Try the Liverpool Skinny Pant paired with the Ijoah Top for work or an event, it's a great dressy casual outfit. I also noticed some fun bangles on your pinterest so I knew you would love the Zad Arrow Bangle, just a great simple piece to stack with other bracelets like the Bay to Baubles Bracelet in your last Fix. For some warm autumn shirts i thought you would like the Staccato Sweater for a easy and fun layered piece. Xo Jessica

Maybe if I start signing my notes to her with Xo, Jessica will recognize me as one of her own kind and ship my Fixes on the day I want.

Also, what happened to the V in Jessica V??? Did the other Jessicas quit? Or maybe Jessica V. quit and they replaced her with another Jessica. But they didn't tell me because they hoped that I wouldn't notice.

I'm on to you, Stitch Fix. Super on. It's on.

Lest you be confused, allow me to explain that in this Fix I specifically requested some polka dot jeans and warm autumn shirts. I know of other people who have gotten polka dot jeans in their fixes, so I was pretty disappointed not to get some. I could use another pair of jeans.

Anyways, I opened up my Fix and saw lots of navy blue and a bit of olive green. I like navy blue. My American Girl Doll Molly came with a navy blue sweater outfit, so when I was a child every year I tried to find myself a navy blue sweater "like Molly's." Since then, I wear so much navy blue that my mother refuses to buy me navy blue clothes anymore. Conversely, I dislike olive green with a passion.

With those thoughts in mind, I began to try on the clothes.

Everly Lexa Dot Dress: I liked the pattern. However, I don't really like boxy dresses. Also, this was too short for me. Also, I'd bought two dresses in my last Fix and didn't need another at the present time. Verdict: Send back.

Zad Marigold Arrow Bangle: As Jessica mentioned, I had pinned several bracelets like this on my Pinterest board. This one was actually better than the ones I'd pinned. Verdict: Keep.

Liverpool Anita Skinny Pant: These pants fit perfectly! Since the shorts and skirt they've sent me before were too big, I think finding well-fitting pants is a small victory. And they did look great with the Ijoah top. However, over the summer I'd obtained forest green pants and did not need any more colored pants. Especially because, again, I'm not wild about olive green. Also, somebody please explain to me why these were called "pant" in the singular. Verdict: Send back.

Ijoah Nial Lace Overlay Top: I liked this immediately. I tried it with an undershirt, and it looked great, particularly with my forest green pants. Verdict: Keep.

Staccato Aleia Mixed Material Pullover Sweater: I could tell that my sisters would love this sweater, but it wasn't really my style. I usually don't like wearing baggy clothes. However, it was, as I'd requested, very warm. I decided I would branch out and buy it. Verdict: Keep.

Okay, everybody. I've tried Stitch Fix three times in rapid succession to see how I like it. Overall, I've really enjoyed it. I've decided that it's not sustainable to get a Fix once a month, because a) it gets to be expensive and b) I really don't need that many clothes. But I think it is something I will enjoy doing quarterly.

I will probably also continue to document my Fixes on this blog. Some people I know who can't seem to get into my normal sort of post have mentioned that they enjoy the Stitch Fix ones.

If you want to try Stitch Fix, try it! If you use my referral link, I'll get $25 in referral credit. Once you've signed up, you'll get your own referral link that you can use to get credit, too. Just get fifty of your closest friends and family members to sign up and then you'll have like a bajillion dollars in credit (actually $1,250, but same thing) and then you can get all the clothes you want!

My New Obsession

Several times over the past few years, my mom has said things to me like, "Do you keep a list of all the books you've read? You should. You should keep a list."

And I've always been like, "No, the effort of writing or typing out each individual book I've ever read seems really difficult."

BUT. Last night, I was looking at the Goodreads account that Viola convinced me to get seven years ago but that I've never actually used. And I realized that Goodreads has a super-handy reading tracker system that requires you to only click a picture of a book to put it on a "read" list.

And so I decided to do it. I'm embarking on a journey to record every single book that I've ever read on Goodreads.

At least, I'm going to try. Although I have a pretty great memory, I've been reading since the age of four. It's more than probable that I'll miss a few books here and there. Particularly the books I read when I was around seven and eight. We were given an hour or two of free reading time every morning in second grade. Childhood BF and I were in different classes, but we would frequently meet up in the library to check out books together. And we checked out a lot of books. A lot. The AR program tracked us as two of the most-read kids in the school. We would check out, read, and return multiple books each day. A lot of these books were from really long, really unremarkable children's series. I'll never be able to remember which of the books in said series I read and which ones I didn't. But I'm going to give it a good try, at least.

You guys. Today I added about half the books in my bookshelf on Goodreads plus all books I've read by those same authors. I've added the library books I've read recently plus all books I've read by those same authors. I've added a single shelf of books from my parents' house plus all books I've read by those same authors. And I'm at over 500 books!

I'm excited to see the final total. Stay tuned!

Back to the Future Day

It's October 21st, 2015! Which I know you know is the day that Marty McFly and Doc Brown arrived in the future in Back to the Future Part II.

I am fairly fond of the Back to the Future movies. In fact, Back to the Future was the first adult movie I ever saw...at the age of, oh, two or three. When our parents would watch it, we would sometimes watch it too.

You must remember that when Older Sister and I were young, our parents were still fairly new parents. It took them a while to realize that we understood what was happening in the movie well enough that we should not be watching it with them. From then on, it was off-limits.

PARENTS: You can't be in the family room right now. We're watching Back to the Future.

OLDER SISTER AND AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: But we've watched that movie before!

PARENTS: WELL YOU'RE NOT WATCHING IT NOW.

I didn't see the movie again until I was an adult. There were a couple of summers where Little Sister and I decided to watch entire movie franchises in their intended order. In this manner, I re-watched Back to the Future and first saw Back to the Future Part II. Unfortunately, I did not get to see Part III. I was working during those summers, but Little Sister was not. She invariably would get bored waiting for me to come home from work.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Let's watch Back to the Future Part III!

LITTLE SISTER: Sorry, I watched it while you were gone.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Let's watch Star Wars: Episode VI!

LITTLE SISTER: Sorry, I watched it while you were gone.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Let's watch Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade!

LITTLE SISTER: Sorry, I watched them while you were gone.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: ...

LITTLE SISTER: But you can watch Kingdom of the Crystal Skull with me!

Although I still haven't seen the sixth Star Wars or the second and third Indiana Jones movies, I did manage to watch the third part of Back to the Future this past weekend to prepare for this very special day.

And special it was! I wore my pants inside-out (and nobody at work even noticed). Baby Sister put together a super-awesome futuristic outfit, and Little Brother passed out flyers that said, "Save the clock tower!" at his school.

All leading up to today, everyone on the internet has been like, "It's October 2015! Where's my hoverboard? Where's my self-drying jacket? Where's my lace-up sneakers? Where's my Pepsi Perfect? Where's my metal hat that looks like a stainless steel pot?"

Well, Universal Pictures and Doc Brown offered a simple explanation in a YouTube video: "The future has finally arrived! Yes, it is different than we all thought. But don't worry! It just means your future hasn't been written yet. No one's has. Your future is whatever you make it, so make it a good one."

I kind of love this video, for one of the same reasons that I love the movies. The movies are all about how choices, even seemingly small ones, can change the future of an individual's life and even the world. That resonates with me on even a religious level. My favorite scripture even says that "by small and simple things are great things brought to pass." And the opposite is true as well. our daily small, seemingly insignificant choices can make us worse as surely as they can make us better.

For a comedic sci-fi movie, that seems pretty heavy. (Ba-dum-ching!) But joking aside, it's something that I try to think about every day. Are my current choices taking me to the future I want? Are your current choices taking you to the future you want? If not, choose something else! Be the master of your own density destiny.

Anyways, happy Back to the Future Day! Make your future a good one.

On a Roll

When Baby Brother was small, he was severely allergic to several kinds of meat, nuts, and fruits and vegetables.

One day, before she realized her son was allergic to everything, my mom gave him some carrots and told them they were good for his eyes.

A while later, Baby Brother came to her. "You were right, Mom!" he said excitedly. "I can feel my eyes growing!"

What he actually felt was his face swelling in an allergic reaction to the carrots.

Needless to say, Baby Brother existed basically on a diet of dairy and carbs and that's it.

There were two kids in our neighborhood Baby Brother's age with bad allergies. One was allergic to gluten. The other was allergic to dairy. I used to picture them eating lunch together in the elementary school cafeteria. Between them, they could consume napkins and some lettuce.

Eventually, Baby Brother grew out of his allergies. But, having eaten only dairy and carbs for so long, he had a natural suspicion and dislike of meat, fruits, and veggies and refused to eat them. Thus the world's pickiest eater was born.

Now, over the past year I've made some strides with Baby Brother. He now enjoys naan. And in July, he even tried a piece of calamari and found it tolerable. Still, I don't really know why earlier this week Little Brother and I decided to take him with us while we got sushi.

I wasn't expecting Baby Brother to eat anything, so I was pleasantly surprised when he asked me to order some calamari. He ate a piece or two of that. Then, suddenly, Little Brother was challenging him to eat a piece of sushi.

I thought it couldn't hurt, so I gave Baby Brother a piece of the Vegas roll. You can't say you don't like sushi if you haven't tried a Vegas roll. They're not what people typically think of when they think of sushi, but boy, are they magically delicious!

Baby Brother tentatively picked up the sushi with his chopsticks. He dipped it in the soy sauce as directed, then brought it to his mouth.

Then pulled it away.

Then brought it back.

Then pulled it away!

Then brought it back!

Lather, rinse, repeat. And repeat. And repeat.

LITTLE BROTHER: YOU'RE DRIVING ME CRAZY! JUST TRY IT.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Hey, trying new foods can be scary!

Finally, Baby Brother took a small bite of the breaded exterior of the roll.

BABY BROTHER: Hey, that's good!

A few minutes later, he took another bite! And another.

He was actually consuming food with nutritional value! It was a miracle.

We praised him. We told him that this was a basic roll he could get at any sushi restaurant.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: The sushi restaurant near our house puts fish eggs on their Vegas rolls.

It just so happened that one of our raw rolls had some fish eggs sprinkled on it, so we scraped off the eggs and gave them to Baby Brother.

BABY BROTHER: That's good!

He started scraping fish eggs off my share of the roll.

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: Okay, that's enough...

After we paid, Little Brother and I chewed some bits of ginger to cleanse our palates.

To our surprise, Baby Brother wanted to try some ginger, too. And he liked it!

AWKWARD MORMON GIRL: You're on a roll!

BABY BROTHER: Ha! Sushi! On a roll!

To conclude the story on a slightly different note, as we left, we thanked our waiter and said goodbye to him.

LITTLE BROTHER: Bye! Love y--

We laughed at him.

LITTLE BROTHER: IT'S HABIT!

Disenchanted

On Thursday, Little Sister frantically sent me a link to an article. At least, I assumed it was sent frantically from the all-caps words that accompanied the link.

The link was to an article that says Disney is filming a sequel to their amazing movie Enchanted. And the all-caps text was as follows.

Little Sister: WE ALREADY MADE THIS MOVIE

Little Sister: WE SHOULD HAVE COPYRIGHTED IT OR SOMETHING

Because, you see, the article said that this sequel is rumored to be called Disenchanted. But guess what? Several years ago, my younger siblings and I made a parody of Enchanted. And guess what we called it?

You guessed it.

So something is rotten in the state of Denmark. 'Cause it's possible that Disney is taking credit for our brilliant idea of a movie.

But. Let me tell you what I'm gonna do. I'm going to describe to you our beautiful movie Disenchanted. And then if Disney's Disenchanted is anything like our Disenchanted, you can help stand up for truth and justice and independent filmmakers who are also children.

Our story begins with the Fairy Godchild Princess (Baby Sister). The FGP opens up a storybook and introduces us to a picture of Lizelia. She tells us important things about Lizelia, like that Lizelia loves all bugs and animals. Also that Lizelia is engaged to Prince Sam, but Prince Sam was recently turned into a troll. Nobody ever explains how this happened.

It's important to note that Baby Brother was still toddler age when we filmed Disenchanted. He was assigned the role of Prince Sam the troll. However, toddlers are known to struggle with certain aspects of filmmaking, particularly the concept that they don't get to be in every shot. Whenever we tried to keep Baby Brother behind the camera, he would scream and cry and make it impossible for the camera to pick up on what the actors were saying. Therefore, we allowed him to wander freely in front of the camera, even during scenes that he wasn't supposed to be in.

So while Baby Sister aka the FGP is doing all this narration, Baby Brother aka Sam the Troll is talking over her and asking questions in his high-pitched toddler voice.

The camera next turns to Lizelia, who is an American Girl Doll voiced by Little Sister. Little Sister tells her animal friends how sad she is.

LIZELIA: I'm sad because my prince is a troll, and he's rude now.

Please note that Little Brother is audibly whispering Little Sister's lines to her from offscreen.

Lizelia inexplicably decides to climb on a windowsill. She even more inexplicably falls off. And then the most inexplicable thing of all happens: all her animal friends decide to jump off the windowsill after her.

This chain of poor decision-making leads Lizelia and her animal friends to land in a hotel room in Los Angeles, which is apparently what happens when you fall off a windowsill in fairytale world. Lizelia, now a human played by Little Sister, is so confused by this that she decides to take a nap on the floor.

While Lizelia is napping, Sam the troll once again walks into a shot that he is not supposed to be a part of. Lizelia wakes up long enough to exclaim that she misses Sam so much that sometimes she imagines that he is near her even when he is not.

Frederick von Hoozer Howzer, played by Awkward Mormon Girl, arrives home to discover that there is a strange girl in his hotel room. He makes an appropriate expression of surprise.

FREDERICK: Well, hay the horses!

Frederick and Lizelia have a conversation, during which it becomes apparent that Lizelia doesn't understand anything, including how to pronounce people's last names.

LIZELIA: Please to meet you, Frederick von Hoozer Howzer! Or is it Howzer Hoozer?

Lizelia explains the situation to Frederick, who gives another appropriate expression of surprise.

FREDERICK: Well, ain't that the darndest thing I ever heard!

He tells Lizelia where she is.

FREDERICK: You're in Cal-i-for-ni-ay!

LIZELIA: Oh. Can I eat California?

FREDERICK: Well, you could, but you'd have a mighty big stomachache after!

Frederick decides that there's no harm in letting a strange, naive girl stay in his hotel room, and the next scene is Lizelia waking up on Frederick's couch the next day. She decides that she needs to sew herself new clothes.

LIZELIA: It's highly not fashionable to wear this your whole lifetime in California.

After she sews new clothes out of couch covers and a tablecloth (which takes literally twenty seconds because she just touches them and says, "Sew sew sew!) she decides to clean Frederick's hotel room.

The next ten or so minutes is a dance scene with shaky cam while Lizelia cleans the hotel room with the help of the animals. This scene is notable for Little Brother shouted lyrics about cleanliness over other, popular songs that are playing in the CD player. It is also notable because towards the end of the scene, I realized that if we turned the camera off and on in a certain way, we could make people and objects disappear and reappear at will.

We used this new device judiciously and frugally to allow for maximum effect each time it was used.

Just kidding. We used the heck out of our new trick.

First Lizelia's animal friends disappear. Then Frederick says that he has to get to work and disappears also.

After the second of 10,000,678 costume changes she will undergo during this movie, Lizelia decides to try disappearing also.

LIZELIA: I'M GOING TO LEAVE NOW.

Nothing happens.

LIZELIA: (throws her arms up in the air) Poof! Poof! It's not working!

Leaving Lizelia alone with her struggle, we travel back to the fairytale world, where Prince Sam the troll is busy admiring himself upside-down in the mirror.

As you may have guessed from his inability to stay out of a shot, the toddler Baby Brother really enjoyed being filmed by others. However, his real love was to be given the video camera, flip the lense, and video himself. This resulted in an upside-down picture, but the kid didn't care whatsoever.

So to simulate Prince Sam looking at himself in the mirror, we let Baby Brother video his own face with the camera while we fed him his lines from offscreen.

ONE OF THE SIBLINGS: Say, "Ee-ee-ee! I'm so pretty!"

SAM:(accidentally moves the camera so that it's only videoing half of his face) Oh! I have one eye!

SAM:(accidentally moves camera again) I have two eyes! (moves it once more) ...I have one eye again.

Eventually, we got him to say the lines we wanted.

SAM: Lookit my farkly blue ice! Lookit my furly little teef!

(Translation: Look at my sparkly blue eyes! Look at my pearly little teeth!)

Cut to Sam sitting on a couch.

SAM: Prince Joe! Tum here!

Prince Joe (Little Brother), Sam's best friend and the FGP's betrothed, arrives with much fanfare.

JOE: (sings) I'm Prince Joe! La la la la la! I'm not the princess, I'm not the king! No queen no no no!

Sam asks Joe to go find Lizelia and take care of her in between now and the wedding. So Joe, with zero effort, disappears and reappears in Frederick's hotel room in Los Angeles.

So far, everything's going swimmingly, which is why it's time to introduce a villain played by Baby Sister. Our next cut takes us to Sam's mother, Queen Twre, otherwise known as the witch.

The witch's costume consists of a blanket that Baby Sister threw over her FGP costume and pulled over her head to create a kind of cloak.

WITCH: I'm Queen Twre, and I won't let anyone get in my way, especially my little troll son!

The witch monologues about her motives and plots. She doesn't want Sam to be king, but she especially doesn't want him to marry Lizelia. So she decides the best course of action will be to turn Lizelia into a mermaid.

Meanwhile, Joe tells Lizelia that he will babysit spend time with her while Sam gets ready for the wedding back in the fairytale world. Lizelia, who has once again changed clothes, agrees to a picnic.

Joe, Lizelia, and Sam ("I imagine Sam here with me all the time. But he's not really here; I just imagine him.") go on a picnic. Other than the fact that Lizelia tries to eat Joe's pen, it's a pretty uneventful meal until the witch shows up in disguise and offers Lizelia a soda.

Lizelia decides to drink the soda offered her by a complete stranger. But the soda, which is supposed to turn Lizelia into a mermaid, doesn't work.

The witch poofs in and says, "It didn't work!" She then proceeds to hatch a new plan. She starts singing, but then remembers how much she hates singing, and ends by singing a song that goes thusly, "I don't like singing! I don't like singing!"

The witch isn't the only person who hates singing. Suddenly, we cut to the Fairy Godchild Princess, the narrator at the beginning of the movie, to find out what's going on with her life. Voiceover tells us that everyone in the FGP's kingdom likes to sing, but that the FGP hates that stuff. She prefers to dance.

VOICEOVER: Until one day...

I should explain that, during this time of their lives, Baby Sister and Little Sister were in an obscure children's musical. Baby Sister, really, really wanted to sing one of the songs from that show in this movie. So much that she decided to sing it even though it added zero plot points.

FGP: (sings) IIIIIII... I feel a song coming on... and it's a magorious, something and glorious...

Please note that Baby Sister did not actually know the words.

At this point, Little Sister decided to create a new character. So she wrapped a blanket around her waist to make a costume for a new character and hopped in front of the camera, pretending to be a lady-in-waiting.

LADY-IN-WAITING: (sings) We, we feel a song coming on!

FGP, who does not want to sing with the lady-in-waiting, stops singing. They embrace and then poof out of the frame.

Next, the camera focuses on the front door. A lady wearing a blue bathrobe, chewing gum, and carrying a shopping bag walks in. The cameraperson remarks that this woman is not supposed to be on. The witch is supposed to be on!

The lady in the blue bathrobe remarks that she is the witch; she just changed and went shopping. She tells the cameraperson to follow her into the bathroom because she wants to show them something. Sure enough, she gives a lengthy exposition about her new plan and shows how she is poisoning the apple she just bought from the store. She seems very pleased with herself.

WITCH: Don't laugh at my gum!

She starts to sing and dance about the gum but then she remembers how much she hates singing and dancing.

Meanwhile, Lizelia decides to pass the time by doing crafts. She decides to make a model of a prince. However, she runs out of craft supplies partway through, so she cups her hands around her mouth and yells, "Frederick!"

Apparently that's Frederick's bat signal or something, because he immediately poofs in and yells, "Whaa-aat?"

He agrees to go in search of new craft supplies. He poofs in and out of the hotel room several times, bringing such things as crumpled paper, a hairbrush, a noisemaker, a pink bathrobe, and some marbles.

Even though Lizelia's betrothed, Sam, has blue eyes, she chooses to use brown marbles for her model prince's eyes. Guess who has brown eyes? Joe. DUN DUN DUN.

We move away from Lizelia's crafts to the scheme of the witch. She poofs in and comments on Frederick's pink bathrobe.

WITCH: I wonder... Frederick!

FREDERICK: Whaa-aat?

The pink bathrobe poofs onto the witch. The witch celebrates by dancing and singing about how much she hates bathrobes before disappearing.

Frederick, however, is much less jubilant. He vows that he will be avenged.

FREDERICK: I will get my bathrobe BAAACK!

Meanwhile, Sam calls Joe and asks him to take Lizelia to the ball.

JOE: Okay, Sammy! Whoo!

Out of spite, the witch destroys the prince statue that Lizelia made.

WITCH: (to the camera) Do you like my pink bathrobe? It is hot.

Things are finally going well for the witch. She is so jubilant that she decides to mess with the FGP by sending her to California for the ball. The witch's spell sends not only the FGP but also her hopping lady-in-waiting to California.

WITCH: I am going for the best person who wears bathrobes, even when she goes shopping.

The FGP appears in Frederick's hotel room.

FREDERICK: Well, hay the horses!

The FGP tries to tell her story to Frederick, but Frederick tells her that he's had enough of fairytale girls appearing in his hotel room. He disappears. From off-camera, Little Brother whispers, "Say, 'People come and go so quickly here.'"

FGP: ...People come and go so quickly here!

Joe tells Lizelia that they will go to the ball, where they will meet Sam. Then Sam and Lizelia can be married.

Lizelia is conflicted about this, but there's one thing that she's sure about.

LIZELIA: Just one minute... just one second... Frederick!

FREDERICK: Whaa-aat?

Lizelia invites him to the ball. First, though, she has to change her outfit, as usual.

Lizelia goes in and out of the front door, coming back with a different outfit each time while the camerperson (currently Baby Sister) comments on it.

BABY SISTER: I don't think so. Get. Back. To the mall. Mm-hmm.

Lizelia even tries on the pink bathrobe that the witch stole from Frederick.

BABY SISTER: What does the witch look like? Is she wearing anything?

Finally, Lizelia emerges wearing a beautiful red-and-gold ball gown. She's ready for the ball!

All the characters go to the ball. Lizelia dances with her betrothed, Sam, even though it is clear that she is totes in love with Joe.

Because the ball scene was done on a budget of negative dollars, it consists of me placing the camera at a stationary vantage point to video the dancing characters while I bang out a few songs over and over again on the piano.

We then go to Sam, who has left the ball to enjoy looking at himself upside-down in the mirror. He makes faces at himself and won't dance with Lizelia. She begs him to come back to the party.

SAM: (looks at Lizelia) Who are you?

This was not the line we kept telling him to say, but 'twas effective nonetheless.

Though hurt and offended, Lizelia finally gets Sam to dance with her. And while they're dancing, she sings a little song of Little Brother's invention.

LIZELIA: (sings) I don't know where I am. And now that I'm rescued by Sam, I don't want to go. Oh don't you know? I want to stay with Joe...forever,

Joe overhears Lizelia singing, and he stands there stricken. Like he's just had a heart attack or something.

Remember that song that Baby Sister wanted to sing? Well, she was ticked off with Little Sister for interrupting her earlier. Therefore she stopped the progress of the entire movie so that she could sing the song again.

FGP: (sings) IIIIIII... I feel a song coming on...

And this time, when Little Sister tries to upstage her, Baby Sister full-on slaps her.

Once that's done, the ball is over and it's time for Sam and Lizelia to go get married. Sam declares that he will go call a carriage.

SAM: I just walk down the stairs and I sall a sarriage!

While Lizelia waits for Sam, the witch pops in behind her. She offers Lizelia the poisoned apple.

WITCH: Eat it or wear it!

Lizelia looks at the camera in panic. Little did we know that Little Sister was afraid to bite into the apple because of her braces. And since Lizelia won't bite the apple, the witch just keeps talking. And talking.

WITCH: Taste it, or else I shall make you eat it more and then you'll die quicker!

LIZELIA: ...what?

WITCH: Just forget about that.

She tells Lizelia that the apple is special and that eating it will take her to a better world and a new life where Lizelia can fix her mistakes and find a better prince.

After the much-prolonged scene, Lizelia bites the apple and then collapses.

Joe and Sam rush to Lizelia's aid. Joe remarks that true love's kiss is the most powerful thing in the world. First Sam kisses Lizelia, but she doesn't wake. So then Joe kisses her, and she does wake. Joe is Lizelia's true love!

The witch, of course, is mad that she lost. She says she has the perfect solution! She turns into a snake, then a lizard, then a dragon. However, nobody seems to notice.

WITCH: It's not working!

So in the end, the witch just turns back into herself.

WITCH: Don't I look so much beautifuller than those other things? Look at my gorgeous legs!

It would seem that Sam comes by his self-centeredness honestly.

Speaking of Sam, now that Lizelia and Joe are together, that leaves the FGP and Sam without anyone. They get into conversation, and the FGP offers to use her magic to turn Sam back from a troll into a normal prince.

The FGP comments that now Sam is a prince!

SAM: And you turned into a frincess!

FGP: I already was a princess.

She begins to sing a song of true love to Sam, but he ignores her.

SAM: You're a frincess now!

Finally, the FGP gets him to pay attention to her long enough for them to sing together and kiss.

That leaves just one loose end to tie up. The witch poofs away to mourn her failure.

WITCH: I am sad and in doom!

Then Frederick poofs in and challenges her to a duel. Thus the battle for the pink bathrobe begins.

After a very cool battle with many visual effect, Frederick wins.

FREDERICK: I claim this land for Cal-i-for-ni-ay, and you know what that means, sister!

The bathrobe appears back on Frederick. The characters gather and exclaim that now they can have a happy ending!

Everyone poofs away, leaving Lizelia alone.

LIZELIA: Poof! Poof!

Nothing happens.

LIZELIA: This is so not a happy ending.

Then Sam appears with a sign that says, "The End."

Then we cut to the FGP, closing the book that she was reading out of at the beginning of the movie.

FGP: And that's the end!

Little Brother puts another sign in front of the camera.

LITTLE BROTHER: (from offscreen) The end! (flips sign) And the end.

So there you have it, folks. Disenchanted. Now, the Disney movie will likely not come out for a few years. But when it does, all y'all can be my witnesses that we created this movie long before Disney ever did. And if their version includes any of the elements from the movie above, such as magically disappearing or reappearing or toddler actors or pink bathrobes, then you can be witnesses in our lawsuit. I'm thinking we'd settle for our names in the credits, five percent of the movie's earnings, and a signed cardboard cutout of James Marsden.

The Massage

On Wednesday, my workplace invited some masseuses from a chiropractic establishment to give us each ten-minute back massages.

I'd never had a professional back massage before. The extent of my massage experience is from family and friends. The masseuse had to tell me how to sit in the special massage chair and how to place my arms and legs and whatnot.

"So where do you usually carry your tension?" she asked.

I felt like the sum of those words meant something different to her than they did to me, but I took a stab at what I thought she meant. "Probably at the base of my neck," I said.

She made a noncommittal noise and started massaging near my ribs. "Ten minutes is not enough for you," she said after a minute. "There's a knot here, and a knot here... You could use a whole hour."

Which is how I learned that perhaps I should pay more attention to my back and that it might be good for me to go get a longer massage. From someone not associated with a chiropractor, though. With my RN mother and a physical therapist uncle, I have inherited a healthy skepticism of all things chiropractic. As the masseuse was telling me about various chiropractic treatments that her place of employment offers, I said things like, "Uh-huuuuh," and "Suuure," while not really listening. The only reason I even believed her when she said I could use a massage is because I've had an incredibly stressful year and don't doubt that my back is full of tension.

"Well, you're done," she said after ten minutes. "Be sure to drink plenty of water today."

I wasn't sure if that was a general comment or some mysterious chiropractic wisdom.