HAPPY CHRISTMAS!

I was doing my Christmas Shopping yesterday (December 24) and while at Deseret Book, I made an interesting discovery. Why are these books for sale at Dessert Book? Because Normons (I guess that's the nickname for members of the LSD church) obviously worship the devil. In fact, didn't the Book of the Mormons have a Golden Compass in it? Jonas Smith (being a prophet) must have looked into the future and watched this movie. Then changed the name of the Golden Compass to the Liahona and wrote a book about it.

Sorry if anyone was offended by that last paragraph, I think anyone who has served a mission has heard people come up with stuff more ludicrous than this on a daily basis. One of my buddies who served in Chicago told me about how he knocked on a lady's door, and she told him of how she "had a friend" who was in the Salt Lake Temple when she saw one of the spirits that apparently wander around freely inside. She was so scared she jumped out one of the windows but wasn't hurt because she landed in the Salty Lake.


right.

Where Did Everybody Go?

For some reason everyone left town at the same time besides Ford, Tom, and me. Inevitable boredom has followed.
Here are a few things we've done so far:
Taco Bell - Eat food, heavy metal
Wal-Mart - Obtain dog food dish to poison Bernii (our neighbor's gay dog)
K-Mart - Purchased women's pajamas; started a choir featuring dozens of creepy singing stuffed aminals singing three different songs, none were in unison.
Thigh Food Home: Registered for online dating sites. Not to find love, but wholesome entertainment. I entered all my information but used a picture of Tom dressed up as a clown. (He looked creepily similar to that Bubbles guy who always shows up at birthday parties)
I also added a picture of myself and registered user names such as Steely Maverick, Maverick 6, and Patrick Fly.
Surprisingly, I've gotten a lot of response. Many females winking at me, inviting me to chat, etc. Some of them are just plain scary, but some of them are attractive and seem normal. Apparently I can wink back at them for free, so this may go on for some time, because they have a financial pitfall in place if you try to give them any information besides "I like to wink with you."
These little boxes pop up that say stuff like "take the next step! email (or chat with) her now for free!" I click on the link and the first thing it asks for is my credit card number, which for some reason I can't receive my free 3 Day Trial without giving to them. I guess they just keep it on file so if I fail to cancel by calling 3 separate 1-800 numbers during specified hours during my trial, they can immediately begin charging me $50/month due before using the service that month.
I might do it, I can always sue them for false advertising and get it back. The only reason I joined was because they said this girl ------------>
wants to talk to me, and I haven't seen or heard from her yet.
Then I had the realization that the girls I interact with won't know if they're dealing with me, or Tom in clown form. I don't want to disappoint anyone, but if I had the choice between dating Tom or myself, I pick Tom. I came up with a few good reasons why.
First, throw out the physical attraction factor which is usually so important in dating because I'm not into guys. This would be one of those relationships where we go out all the time, but don't ever touch each other. Kinda like in middle school, except without the notes.
Now the reason I would rather date Tom than myself is that I think I'd get lonely dating myself. I can keep myself entertained for a long time by watching movies, reading books, singing loud and out of key to the music I have turned up way to high so I can still hear it when I leave the room, talking to myself, solving world hunger, designing a playoff system to replace the BCS, etc. But eventually I'm going to want to go out to eat, and I don't really enjoy going to restaurants by myself. Also, Tom has 3 cars and an I-phone.
Please leave your thoughts, not on whether you'd rather date Tom or me, but on whether you'd date yourself or a friend. Also if you have any ideas of things Tom, Ford and I could do between now and whenever Rexburg becomes populated again, we'd greatly appreciate it.

The Ugly Place I've Often Called Home

For those who have never strayed from the I-15 or the stretch of Highway 20 between Rexburg and Idaho Falls, here is what you are missing.

There is a simple hike less than an hour's drive away from Rexburg where you can watch the sunrise over the Tetons. I've been wanting to experience this for years, but haven't found anyone who wants to do it with me yet.





Drive 25 miles from Rexburg in any direction besides due South to Idaho Falls and there is a good chance you will see something pretty. Drive farther and you may find something
breathtaking.








Why is this picture not as good as the other ones? Because I took it. I don't claim to be a photographer or have a nice camera.
I'm also sorry I don't have a better layout. The placement of text and images on Blogger isn't as simple as InDesign or even Microsoft Word.

Jim's Shorts

I was thinking today about gym shorts. They are named after the location they are designed for. I guess sometimes they can be called basketball shorts. For people who only shoot hoops and don't use shorts for racquetball, dodge ball, floor hockey, or just running and stuff like that, basketball shorts can be an accurate description.
But let's be honest, I haven't been to the gym for at least 5 or 6 months. Yet I still wear this article of clothing to bed every night. (excluding those occasions when I pass out on someone's couch during a movie) If I were to make a rough estimate, I would say about 95% of my friends (especially those of the male persuasion) wear them to bed AT LEAST twice as much as they wear them to the gym. So shouldn't we start referring to them as bed shorts?

Wayne's Wild World of College Football

I'm planning on sending a proposal to President Obama that includes adding me to his cabinet as Secretary of Sports and Recreation. Then I will just meet with the Commander-in-Chief briefly each week to make sure we have the same agenda, and he can focus on foreign relations and fixing the economy blah blah blah.

My idea is to have a 16 teams qualify for the playoffs. The champion of each of the 11 conferences gets an automatic bid, as well as the 5 highest seeded teams in the BCS that did not win their respective conference.

Seeding would be determined by end of season BCS rankings. The conference winners not ranked in the top 16 of the BCS would take the lowest seeds. Teams would be divided into 2 eight-team brackets.

Assuming the higher ranked teams win their championship games this week, and the losers of those games don't drop in the rankings, the brackets would look like this, with the higher seeded team playing on their home field:
Left side of Bracket:

#1 Alabama (SEC) vs. #16 Troy (Sun Belt)

#8 Penn State (Big 10) vs. #9 Boise State (WAC)

#4 Florida (At Large) vs. #13 Cincinnati (Big East)

#5 USC (Pac-10) vs. #12 Ball State (MAC)

Right side of bracket:

#2 Oklahoma (Big 12) vs. #15 Tulsa (Conf. USA)

#7 Texas Tech (At Large) vs. #10Ohio State (At Large)

#3 Texas (At Large) vs. #14 Boston College (ACC)

#6 Utah (Mountain West)vs. #11 TCU (At Large)

The only team with 2 losses or less that would be left out of the playoffs would be BYU, and they along with some 3 loss teams like Oklahoma State, Georgia, Oregon and Georgia Tech, may feel screwed when teams like Troy and Tulsa get in.

However, this is what makes every single regular season game important. If you lose more than 1 game in your conference, you know you're running the risk of not making the playoffs. If you can't finish in the top 2 or 3 of your conference, maybe you should consider moving to the SunBelt or Conference USA.

It's much better than the situation now where Texas feels they are getting screwed out of the national championship and Texas Tech and Boise are likely to be screwed out of BCS games altogether as they watch Cincinati, Ohio State, and BC or VTech play in the big money bowls.

This format also rewards the conferences with the better teams for the year instead of "honoring tradition" as the Big 12 gets 3 teams in. The Mountain West also gets 2 teams in while the Big East, Pac-10, and ACC only get 1 each this year. This way the little guy can't complain as much about getting screwed, and the big boys only have to worry about winning. Assuming the higher seeds win, the next round of my playoff format would look like this:
#1 Alabama vs. #8 Penn State (Holiday Bowl)

#4 Florida vs. #5 USC(Sugar Bowl)

#2 Oklahoma vs. #7 Texas Tech(Cotton Bowl)

#3 Texas vs. #6 Utah(Rose Bowl)

I'm sure there would be some upsets along the way, but for simplicity's sake, we're going to assume the higher seeds win every game again to help visualize the next round.
#1 Alabama vs. #4 Florida (Fiesta Bowl)

#2 Oklahoma vs. #3 Texas(Orange Bowl)

The National Championship game would rotate every year like it does now between the sites of the 4 major bowls. The Sugar Bowl and Rose Bowl would alternate every other year with the Fiesta and Orange Bowls between being semi-final and quarter-final games.The other bowl games I just randomly plugged in, but a system could be organized to rotate those games as well.

The 24 other bowls not included in the playoffs could still be held. There will still be 11 of the BCS top 25 available for these games and there should easily be another 37 unranked teams throughout the nation that have winning records. The quality of the matchups and the viewership of these bowls won't change much as they will all be aired between December 23 and January 1 while the 1st 2 rounds of the playoffs are taking place and people are off from school and work and watching 3 or 4 games a day.

In order to prevent the student athletes from being overloaded, the teams in conferences without championship games will only be allowed to play 11 games. (Instead of the 12 most of them are currently playing) Pac-10, Big East, Moutain West, WAC, etc, would be able to play every team in their conference but would just have 1 less non-conference game.

The teams that have conference championship games would be limited to 10 season games plus the conference championship for the 2 teams that qualify. The Big 12, SEC, ACC, etc, would still be able to play all 5 teams in their division. They could also play half (3) the teams in the other division of their conference(alternating each year) and still get 2 non-conference games each year.This way there are only 2 schools in the entire country whose teams play the maximum 15 games over the course of the year. It's not a flawless system yet, but it's close.

Idaho Falls Idol

The most hopeless state of pure boredom may very well be the BYU-Idaho 7 week break. A period of no classes between Spring and Fall Semesters where most students go home and try to land some type of temporary job. The students who are left in the ghost town have to get creative in order to avoid having their brain turn to mush.

It was on such a night that Wayne, Thome, Tyler and I discovered karaoke night at the PepperTree Lounge. Countless memories have followed in the smoky bar as we hang out with middle-aged (Wayne's label for people in their mid-30's) Idahoans looking for a good time.

My personal favorite involved a "piss drunk" (in his own words) gentlemen who I met in the men's room who considered it normal to converse with me as we both did our business in separate urinals. To everyone's surprise, this drunkard spontaneously joined on stage to form a duet in the middle of my rendition of 1980's rock ballad originally performed by Journey.

Another great night was when the hottest girl in the whole bar (which isn't saying much) openly expressed her interest in our own Wayne Bass (boomer sooner!) while she was on a date with some other dude. With the skills this guy's got, who can blame her?



Our most recent trip to the PepperTree was possibly the most memorable, as it was Wayne's last day in Rexburg (until next year) and Myke's first appearance. While none of us drank anything in the bar besides a shared pitcher of Coke, we decided it was not the best idea to attach the BYU-Idaho label to us in a bar. So Wayne decided that if anyone asked where we were from and what we were doing in Idaho, we'd respond that we played for the Chukars. (Eastern Idaho's best and only minor league baseball team) We came up with positions and everything.

We had our chance when a middle-aged (by real standards, not just Wayne's) woman who was sober enough to understand the humor of our presence and our performance came and started chatting with us. The scary thing for me was how easily I was able to come up with impromptu lies and deliver them convincingly when she threw us questions we weren't ready for.

Has dishonesty become a skill for me? I prefer to think of it as good acting. I think I was blessed with a skill that I've never tried to develop. If you don't believe me, ask Sac about the awkward encounter at Subway last March. The girl involved in it said she started feeling bad about the whole thing when it wasn't even real. I've never taken an acting class, maybe I should pursue this a little more. I wonder if Carl Weathers is available to coach me?

On a side note, here are more videos from our magical night of music:

The Adventures of Frodo Baggins and Samkon Gado

I've always liked music. The 1st "real show" (non-local bands) I went to was the Vans Warped Tour in 1999. The lineup included Blink 182, Eminem, Less Than Jake, Black Eyed Peas, Pennywise, Dropkick Murphys, Ice-T, Bouncing Souls, The Living End, a side stage band called Jimmy Eat World, and many others.

I went to 4 more Warped Tours after that with some other shows sprinkled in for fun during the other 11 months of the year. After graduating high school I decided that concerts weren't really my thing so much any more and that I'd probably go to only 1 or 2 a year.

I'm not one to dedicate much time to discovering new musicians on my own, I just have other things I'd prefer to do with my free time. However, I love it when people take the time to make me a copy of an album they enjoy and let me listen to it on my own.

It's because of these efforts by sharing friends (and my sudden desire to leave town every chance I get) that I went to not 1, not 2, but 3 different shows last week!

I'm not going to give an account of how awesome the shows were because it's been done. If you're curious check out the Nov. 15 post here:

http://benkeamy.blogspot.com/2008/11/weekend-of-epic-proportions.html

and the Nov. 18 post here:

http://justchecktheblog.blogspot.com/

The point of this post is to tell of my encounter with 2 of my favorite hobbitses.

Frodo Baggins

and his faithful sidekick Samkon Gado.

Now I've taken a particular interest in Samwise Gamgee because I drafted him in the 3rd round of the I Phelta Thi Fantasy Football draft after Team Boo snagged Sam's mate Frodo 1 pick before me. http://football.fantasysports.yahoo.com/f1/113064

Gandalf went in the 1st round between Dumbledore and Merlin, wizards are ultimately more valuable than hobbits. The Pahoran Stars took Han Solo in the 7th round based on his solid performance last year, which I think was a dumb move since space pilots rarely lead the league in consecutive years, and it's possible to pick up someone just as valuable in the last round, but whatevs.

All in all, while he wasn't as spectacular as Joshua James, I thought Samkon gave a solid performance. I think some people decided he must be terrible before they saw him because he was on American Idol and is therefore not "Indian Rock" enough. I'm not saying I loved the guy or anything, but I do have a soft spot for anyone brave enough to cover Nelly and Marvin Gaye in the same song.

I completed my music junkie week (which started and ended on Tuesday) performing live at a happening venue in Idaho Falls with Wayne C. Bass, Myke, Sac and Thome. I'll blog more about that once the videos are up on YouTube.

Welcome to My 1st Blog Ever!

Hey, everybody! I wanted in on the blogging world, so here it is my 1st post on my 1st blog! I wanted this to be good, so I'm posting some words that Sac thinks could be my best ever.

Personally I think his long-term memory is failing. Back in the Fall of '06 I was one of the most entertaining facebookers anyone knew. Fall of '07 wasn't bad for me either, since then I've gotten extremely bored of facebook and see it as an evil temptation I can't quite resist yet for fear of losing communication. The quality of my comments on that networking site have grown few and far between.

I'm hoping that soon none of my relationships will hinge on facebook and I will be able to avoid it as well as I've stayed away from MySpace my entire life.

Little known fact about yours truly, I'm color blind. It's true, I can't see race. Which is why I'm so confused on this whole "1st black president" issue.
1- I know some of you youngsters don't remember the 90's as well as those of us who are in our mid 20's, but back when Nirvana and Pearl Jam ruled the airwaves, it was common knowledge that William Jefferson Clinton was the 1st black president.
Why did Bill Clinton lose this title? I'm guessing it's because he married a white woman. Again, I can't see race, but I know that Hillary is white because people have talked about how this election could be historic because we could have a woman president OR a black president. No one said we could have a woman president AND a black president. This leads me to the following conclusions:
A) Barack Obama is not a woman
B) Hillary Clinton is not black
2- Why did they replace President Clinton as the first black president with someone who is not even all the way black? I know that Morgan Freeman, Samuel L. Jackson, Denzel Washington, and the great Will Smith are all black because of the roles they've played in movies. I know Barack Obama is only half black because he's spoken publicly about his white mother.
3- Nearly 2 years ago two African American men became the 1st black NFL head coaches to lead their teams to the Super Bowl. One of these coaches was asked "How far have we come to have not one, but two African American head coaches in the Super Bowl?" His response was "Maybe the fact that this is even a story is evidence that we haven't come far enough." He then said that story shouldn't be about race, but coaching style. That both teams had successful seasons led by Christian coaches who weren't dictators in the locker room. The same principle applies to our current situation in politics. Race is still enough of an issue that the first black man to do any thing significant is always going to be seen as a big deal.

That's why the media has been showing giant congregations of black people celebrating. That's why they've been interviewing African American pastors. That's why they kept showing shots of Jesse Jackson in the crowd crying while Barack was giving his acceptance speech. (Despite the reverend's comment months earlier that he would like to cut Obama's nuts off for calling out black fathers who abandon their children)Yes race is still an issue, more so than age. If John McCain was elected do you think they would show congregations of old people celebrating in nursing homes and assisted living centers? Do you think they would show shots of Tom Widdison and Wayne Bass (omg, they're like sooo old) in the crowd crying as President-elect McCain gave his acceptance speech?

*Note: This post is in response to an opinion of a respected contemporary that was posted on November 6, you can find it here: http://justchecktheblog.blogspot.com/

The BEST Halloween Ever!

Zach and I were going to be wrestlers for Halloween and arrive at the same parties separately and then see each other and start fighting in the middle of the dance floor.
Unfortunately, our singlets never arrived and we were left without costumes on Halloween day. We considered our resources and decided the best we could do was a tribute to Heath Ledger (R.I.P.) and that Jake dude from October Sky and Bubble Boy. Two of the manliest men this side of Wayne Bass.
The result was an All Hollow's Eve in which the entire city of Rexburg (at least the BYU-Idaho portion) lived in fear. Not of zombies, werewolves, vampires, and college girls dressed in skanky pirate costumes, but of cowboys attacking them in crosswalks, parking lots, and public sidewalks.
These ruff n tuff ranch hands didn't say many words, but they often gave loud hollers of "shoot," and "yeeee-haw" as they invaded the personal space of many innocent bystanders and danced to music that no one could hear.
Oh how I love Halloween.