Birthday Trip 2016

So I told Robyn that this year I wanted a trip for my birthday.  However, one of the funnest things about a trip is actually planning it.  So I also told her I wanted to plan my trip.

The trip began on my birthday, and I told her that my birthday was up to her to plan.  She did an excellent job.  She told me to get off at 3, and she bought us tickets to see the new X-Men movie.  So I got to hang out with my friends Jean, Cyclops, Wolverine, Mystique, and Professor X.  It was a fantastic way to kick off the trip.  That evening was spent in a hotel in Salt Lake to give us a head start in our travels.

For my trip, I decided that I wanted to see a few of the things in Utah that I had heard about but never actually experienced.

The first of those things was the Golden Spike National Historic Site.  Every child in Utah learned the song about how the transcontinental railroad was completed in Promontory, Utah.  It's a little site in the middle of the desert in the middle of nowhere.  But we drove out there and checked it out.

You have to get a picture next to a sign as proof you were there.

They had a whole reenactment where the train pulled up and people gave speeches and then drove in the final spikes.

Who doesn't love trains?

It was just like in 1869.  I bet back then everybody at their phones out taking pictures.

I made Robyn stand on the railroad for a picture.  She totally didn't get run over by a train.

The next location I took us to was the Spiral Jetty.  It's also in the desert in the middle of nowhere.  It sits on the shore of the Great Salt Lake.  It was made by a sculptor and depending on the level of the lake, sometimes it is below water and sometimes it is not (like right now).

Selfie with the jetty.

I made Robyn walk the whole spiral with me.  She tried to cut across, but I wouldn't let her cheat herself from the full experience.  We got to the center and had to take a precious pic.

Doesn't she make the spiral look precious?

The next event wasn't a place I'd heard about my whole life like the first two, but it was on my Utah bucket list.  We went to the Eccles Dinosaur Park in Ogden.

They had mosquitoes in amber, so I'm not sure what the holdup is.  They should clearly have clones some dinosaurs by now.

There were lots of bones to look at.

They had an indoor museum that was more of the traditional natural history museum, and then outside they had lots of dinosaur statues.  There were little signs that could teach you about the different dinosaurs, so it was fun.

Just hanging with the triceratops.

Look how calm she looks even though she's about to be eaten.

That concluded our Saturday activities, but fear not!  There was more fun to be had on Sunday.

We wanted to have some sort of church experience, and another thing on my Utah bucket list was to attend a taping of Music and the Spoken Word.  They were doing a memorial day special and it was really fun.  There was a TV that was showing the live broadcast, and I liked to watch the cameras move around and see how they achieved the shots that were being shown on the TV.

Before the broadcast they explained to us that it was live and that the acoustics in the tabernacle are very good, so we need to be very quiet.  I was totally reverent.

We didn't take any pictures inside the tabernacle (they weren't allowed during the broadcast and before and after there wasn't much to take a picture of.)  But naturally, we got a selfie in front of the temple on our way out.

The next Sunday event was to visit Gilgal garden.  It's a little garden tucked away in a residential neighborhood.  I had seen pictures of the Joseph Smith Sphinx and had wanted to check out the whole garden for a long time.

Pictures of signs: very important.

When I saw it I just started grinning and laughing.  I think Robyn was embarrassed to be with me.

I told Robyn I needed a picture of her in front of something.  She chose this arch and those giant books behind her.

At this point, it was about lunch time and Robyn wanted to be home.  I only had one more stop on my list and it was the Summum Pyramid.  It's a pyramid that actually performs mummifications.  (Who knew that was still a thing?)

Robyn didn't even get out of the car, so I had to take my selfie with the pyramid.  After seeing X-Men: Apocalypse, I was pretty sure Apocalypse was hiding inside and probably acquiring new powers he would use for world domination.  But I didn't see him.

Finally, we could head home and take a good afternoon nap in our own beds.  I'd say it was a successful birthday trip.

The Post Office Thinks I'm in California

So whenever I feel frustrated with the fact that Post Office prices have doubled over the last 15 years, I think about how terrible they are at their job and then I feel even worse.

So here's the deal.  In the month of May there are like 4,000 birthdays over the course of 2 days in my family.  (And by 4,000 I mean 3.)  We celebrated one of those birthdays this past Saturday.   I purchased the present roughly a week before, knowing that Amazon could get it to me in plenty of time.

Amazon said it would arrive on Wednesday.  I always trust Amazon.  Amazon is my most trusted friend.

On Thursday, it hadn't arrived yet, so I checked the website.  It said the package had been delivered.  But since I hadn't received it, I was a little confused.  I clicked on the "track package" button because it usually has notes about whether they left it with a neighbor or at the back door or something weird like that.

Well, the delivery notes were a little weird.  But it wasn't at my back door.  It was in Norco, California.  It just said, "Delivered:  Parcel Locker.  Norco, CA."

I double checked the address I had given them.  It was definitely to my house in Lehi, UT.

I'm just trying to imagine how that even happens.  The guy driving the truck is like, "I have a whole truckload of packages.  I bet at least one of them belongs in Norco, and that does seem like a big parcel locker.  I guess I'll leave them all here.  I bet no one will notice."

I got online to chat with an Amazon representative.  They were very helpful.  They told me there was nothing they could do to retrieve the package because it was delivered.  (I was hoping Amazon would send stormtroopers to break in and get it back, but alas, that didn't happen.)  But they asked if it would be acceptable to ship another copy.  I said that would be very acceptable.

You want to know the best part?  Apparently whoever owned the parcel locker decided to forward the package on to me.  Now I have 2 copies.  One as a gift, and one for me.

I guess this post office blunder gave me a free book.  That might help to pay back the ever rising postal costs.

My Nominations for the 2016 Hugo Awards

I just got an email from the administrators of the Hugo Award.  It turns out that all nominations are due tomorrow.  So I finally sat down and figured them out.  As always, my reading of new stuff is a little bit sparse, so even though I can nominate up to 5 in each category, I don't have 5 works in most categories.  But,  I do have some great ones even if the slate isn't full.  Here they are.  I linked to where you could get these works where possible.  I also put a link to my review on the ones where such exists.

Best Novel
The Dark Forest is the sequel to last year's Hugo winner.  I am loving the series and looking forward to the third.  It's one of the most unique science fiction stories I've read in a long time.  Of course, the other two I nominated are excellent as well.

The Dark Forest by Liu Cixin (My review)
Chimera by Mira Grant (My review)
Library of Souls by Ransom Riggs (My review)

Best Novella:
The New Mother was fascinating and a little bit frightening.  An excellent story.  Of course, Rolling the Deep is about scary mermaids.   Both are excellent.

The New Mother by Eugene Fischer -  Asimov's April/May 2015
Rolling in the Deep by Mira Grant (My review)

Best Novelette:
Pareidolia by Kathleen Bartholomew and Kage Barker  - Asimov's March 2015

Best Short Story:
When Your Child Strays From God by Sam J. Miller -  Clarkesworld July 2015
Tuesdays by Suzanne Palmer  - Asimov's March 2015
Cat Pictures Please by Naomi Kritzer - Clarkesworld January 2015
Holding The Ghosts by Gwendolyn Clare - Asimov's March 2015

Best Graphic Story:
Ms. Marvel, Vol. 3: Crushed  by G. Willow Wilson

Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form):
Star Wars: The Force Awakens 
The Martian 
Jurassic World  
Terminator: Genisys
Avengers: Age of Ultron 

Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form):
Doctor Who - The Zygon Inversion 
Doctor Who - The Zygon Invasion 
Agents of Shield - Melinda 
Grimm - Wesenrein 
Agents of Shield - Afterlife 

Best Professional Editor (Short Form):
Ellen Datlow 
Hank Davis 
Sheila Williams 
John Joseph Adams 

Best Professional Editor (Long Form):
Toni Weisskopf

Happy Birthday Padre!

You guys.  My dad turned 60 today.  Sixty!  He's older than iPhones.  He remembers when you could go to the gate at the airport to greet your friends when their plane landed.  He remembers when there wasn't an internet!

Oh wait.  All of those things are true of me.  Blast!  I guess I'm pretty old.  But my dad remembers when there wasn't a me.  Now that's old.  I'm pretty sure he cried when the dinosaurs died.  I would have.

I was going to post a throwback Thursday pic on Facebook to commemorate this day.  But when I started looking through my pictures of me and my dad, it turned out I couldn't just pick one.  So I figured this was a better venue.

Here are a few pictures and memories of my dad with me and my family.

My dad had a beard once.  True story.  Even more surprising is that there was a time when I was cuter than I am now.

Look at all that loot.  I bet you never had matching pajamas with your dad.

I spent most of my childhood trying to look unhappy about stuff. Little known fact:  I think giant shark jaws are super cool.  Thanks for taking me to Sea World mom and dad!  Sorry I looked like I hated it.

Sometimes I even looked like I was having fun.

At least in Yellowstone, Zack is the one that looks like he hates it.

People put cups on their face.  It's a thing.

We've had many adventures at Bear Lake

Weren't the Padre and I the cutest hikers in Hawaii?

Mom and dad even flew to South Dakota to see me.

Thanks for all the memories Padre!  Happy sixtieth birthday!  I look forward to at least 60 more years of memories.

2015 Stats

I'm a numbers guy.  I like to see stats.  Every year I like to publish the highlights of the previous year, mostly reflecting on numbers.  I'm pretty sure no one else cares that much.  But I like it so I do it.  I usually post this in January.  But I noticed this was sitting in my drafts and hadn't yet been posted.  I think I was trying to come up with some more numbers and think of more highlights, but now it's just embarrassing that I haven't posted it and it's March.  So here are some of the highlights and stats from last year.

1. Read 57 individual works totalling 10,376 pages
2. Went inside 4 new temples

• Payson Utah Temple
• Spokane Washington Temple
• Boise Idaho Temple
• Portland Oregon Temple

3. Walked 659 miles and biked 326 miles for a total of 985 miles.  (I know it's totally embarrassing that I was that close to 1000 and didn't go over.)

4. Wrote on this blog 43 times.  (My worst year ever.  I'll totally do better this year.)

5. Attended Worldcon for the first time, and even got to attend the Hugo Awards.

6. Set foot in 5 states

• Utah
• California
• Idaho
• Oregon
• Washington

7. Travelled 15,471 miles.  (That's total distance travelled according to my foursquare data.)

I'm sure there are more numbers I could have shared.  I feel like I'm missing something.  I'll try to get you better numbers next year.

Escaping the Room

Have you heard of escape rooms?  It's a new trend that I only heard of 5 or 6 months ago.  My sister suggested that we should try one as a family.  We selected one in American Fork, and it turned out to be a lot of fun.

I made Robyn stand next to the sign before we went in.

So here's how it works.  They lock you in a room.  (In this particular one, the room happened to actually be a trailer in the parking lot of the One Man Band restaurant.)  They set a timer, and you have a limited amount of time to get out.  In this case, the timer was 45 minutes.  I imagine that's fairly standard, but I'm sure it could vary.  When the time runs out, if you haven't gotten out, they let you out and you lose.  But, I preferred to pretend that if you don't make it out, you die.  I felt like that was a little bit more motivating.  Spoiler: We survived.

As we initially looked around the room, there were lots of things to explore.  There were a number of boxes with combination locks, there was an exercise bike, there were locked cupboards and various other mysterious objects.

As you explore, you discover that there are different puzzles that, when solved, reveal clues to solving other puzzles.  Many of the puzzles, when solved, reveal a combination for a lock, then you have to find the lock that it goes with.

 It was super fun to work as a family and solve the puzzles together.  Here are a few pictures from our adventure as a family.

Mom solved a maze puzzle to acquire this key.

It took us a while to figure out what the books were trying to reveal.

Robyn is having things revealed to her in the box.

Those pesky books.

Padre may have broken off a piece of the cupboard while he was trying to figure out a clue.  Don't tell anyone.

This particular box had a locked box inside of it, so it was extra tricky.

 We cut it a little close.  We got out of the room with 3:22 left.  When you open the door, the time stops, so naturally Robyn and I had to take a selfie with the clock.

And here's the whole team.  We totally got out alive.

I totally recommend it.  The puzzles are challenging enough that you get to feel smart when you solve them, but it's all very doable for a group to achieve together.  It also allows you to work as a team and have fun together.

You totally need to give it a try.  And let me know how you do.

Next time we need to try one where a bomb explodes and you die if you don't solve it.  I bet we could do it even faster with proper motivation.