Summary of Past Few days

Let me think... 

Well, I guess I'll start with mutual last Wednesday. For mutual we organized a fishing trip for next week. We practiced some fishing stuff.

Thursday was a blur of schoolwork and hanging out with my cat. I feel I'm becoming less and less organized daily as new things come up and things don't go the way that they were planned. I MUST NOT FAIL! I need to go through some more meditation, prayer, studying, and planning. I will never give up on myself; I will become the person I want to be.

Today I slept in and missed seminary. I feel really irresponsible, and llame on the inside. Keenan, get over it! Just don't let it happen again! Gee, when will I learn? Worrying only weakens my ability to change my world. I don't want that. Just plan more, and be more diligent with your plans. Come on! Get some honor and backbone!

On a more positive note, since today no work was assigned, I decided to follow my father to work and work in his class. That's right. I got to jobshadow my own father. I got to sit in his class just like a regular student in the alternative center. I brought my guitar and played some music for all of the students in his class and some other teachers and office ladies. I think they enjoyed it. :) Dad's got good friends at work. :) I did do some schoolwork at dad's school, but I was not as focused. I did a couple of tests that I shouldn't have done for the sake of getting them done. That is the story of my school life. I need to develop more diligent, patient study habits! It's something that I really need to pray about. God will help refine me; I just know it.

I'm hoping to finish the script for Hatmen 4 tonight. If things go as planned, I should get a lot of the shooting done in the morning with Sabrina. This will be one that she and I will work on together. It'll be pretty fun. 

I've been enjoying rock climbing at the YMCA. It's something that I like to do for fun after my workout. My friends Sky, Tes, and Daisy often work at the rock wall. They're some old friends from homeschool PE. Sky and Tes are identical twins, are 16, and sang in the community choir when I used to go. Daisy has a slight natural British accent, which leads me to think that her immediate family is from Europe. I love hanging out with those guys (literally, as in, on the rock wall)!

I love good music. :)

Henry's amazing millionaire story

Okay, I have to write this down before I write anything else. My brother just got back from seeing a really rich guy's office, and it inspired him to make up this story about him being a millionaire.

So he goes to school for who knows how long to be a surgeon, right? When he finally gets out, he says, "Oh no, I'm broke!" because he is out of money. He goes to a surgeon office and asks for the job. They say, "Sure" and then he does surgery on somebody's knee.

When he gets his paycheck, (which is one million dollars) for the month, he throws all of the money in the air and screams "I'm rich!!"
Suddenly he has really fancy stylish clothes, a Batman Car (like the one from Batman Begins), and a mansion. He is walking through town one day, and sees me in some old junky Honda. I say, "Whoa, Henry-"

But then he says, "What are you doing in that?? Jimmy, get over here!"

Some guy named jimmy comes up to my little vehicle and smashes it up with a baseball bat. I begin to yell in anger, but then I gasp as another Batman car comes driving up. I say, "Wow! Thanks Henry!"

I open the car door, and there are a million dollars on the seat. I start thanking him again. Then he says suavely, "There's more where that came from." He looks off-screen and sees a safe. "Open it up."

He didn't say who opened it, (maybe he meant to say that it was me that opened it) but somebody did, and an avalanche of money came out.

Henry screamed , "NO!!" like my dad always does, and the money flooded half of the town! When Henry woke up, he was in the river, with piles of money everywhere. He yelled, "Who did this??"

Some random guy in the crowd raises his hand. Then Henry says like a Nazi drill Sargent, "Kill 'im." While pointing in the guy's direction.

All of a sudden, Henry gets another paycheck. He cries, "NO!!" Once again as the money avalanche fills up the other half of the city.

"Oh great, now everybody is going to steal my money!" Henry cries to the world, " 'call this a democracy!! Ah well."

And so he and I left town and went to go see his mansion, which was enormous, and Henry begins to ride his dirtbike in his living room. That's right, in his living room! I ask, "Hey, can I use your bathroom?" To him after he gets off.

"Oh yes, come see!" He opens the door and reveals a golden toilet. I am in there for half an hour. He says, "Keenan?" and opens it up and finds me still admiring the golden toilet.

"Can I have it?" I plead to my brother.

"Sure. Hey Jimmy, go get another toilet!"

I take the toilet to my humble little house, and my wife says, "Honey, where did you get that?"

I say, "Henry gave it to us; isn't that nice? I'm going to go sell it."

And so I leave, sell the toilet for (wait for it) one million dollars. I then buy a more decent suburban home for my family and me to live in. When Uncle Henry comes to visit, he exclaims "What is this?? Jimmy, you know what to do."

An enormous wrecking ball comes out of nowhere and smashes the house to the ground. I start to scream, "No! My new house! That was a million dollars!"

"Shhyut up," Henry says, "okay, bring it in."

An enormous crane comes out of nowhere, holding a mansion just like the one that Henry had. It was placed on the remains of my demolished house. It WAS Henry's mansion, but he only gave it to me because he had gotten a new one twice as big!

Henry and his sons (he had 3 boys, one 18, one 15, and one 10) then rode dirtbikes in their living room again, in their new mansion. I'm there with my much younger children to check out the new home. When we go to his game room, Henry stated "Okay, this room is for adults only. And my sons, since they are... trained." My kids protest, and then I say, "Alright kids, go to the playroom!"

The playroom is the size of the gym at the YMCA.

So we go into the game room, and it is filled with computers and technology. Henry has all of his most favorite games and ones that he wished he had there. There are also movies, and Henry sticks in Newsies (because he knows that I used to like that movie a ton when I was a kid). But after watching it briefly, Henry says, "I make my OWN movies." with madness in his eyes. He throws in another DVD of himself driving around town on a motorbike with an airsoft gun, shooting people as he went through town on a mad rampage.

He says to me, "Hey, remember when you were on your mission and I was 16? Watch this." He sticks in another DVD.

"Wait, you didn't tell me you did all of this while I was gone. YOU LIE!" I cry (just to make things more dramatic, I guess??)

The video he put in was one where he borrowed (or rented, in another way he told it) the bishop's car. It's almost just like the other video with the airsoft gun and the rampage, only he takes the car for a wild, extreme  spin. But the movie ends when he is captured by the "cops".

Just totally randomly, there are two policemen that appear in the game room. They watch the movie, and then say, "Wait, we forgot to punish him for doing that! Get him!"

A bunch of policemen come out of nowhere and Henry somehow gets away in his Batmobile. They take me and throw me in jail, thinking I was the one to blame. Henry's three sons run to the caution room. There is a sign on the door of the room that says, "If the police ever show up, come in here."
So they come out in iron man suits. That's right. Iron man suits. They give their dad a call with a built in cell phone: "So dad, what do we do now?"

"Blow the whole place up!!"

So they explode the mansion with all of their guns and whatnot, and then fly away. A lot of rich people come out of nowhere and tell the police, "Henry stole all of our stuff! That's why he's so rich!" And so Henry becomes a criminal at large, but they think that I am Henry!

So they lock me up, and Henry and sons (in his secret lair) develops a bomb that can blow up half of the planet. So Henry brings the bomb to the jail to break me out, right? Well, he uses it and I somehow survive the blast. The problem is, that I am now falling into the center of the Earth because half of the Earth is now gone! But, of course, Henry flies in and saves the day and takes me to the other side of the planet.

The End

I'm sorry, this is a really really rough draft. I just needed to get the idea down. My little bro thought this story up in 15 minutes. It probably doesn't sound as good when written down, but the way that my little brother tells it makes it hilarious.

Op, too late. I'll write my journal entry tomorrow.

Oh, forgot to say!

Yesterday I found out that Hayley, the investigator who has been coming to seminary with us this year, got baptized last Friday! I am so happy for her!

Monday after the awesome weekend

Ah, today went alright, I must say.

Woke up, read scriptures, went to seminary, learned about listening to the voice of the Lord, ran home, did 3 math lessons, 1 gov, got short story done (finally), did some work in Latin, went to Sabrina's volleyball game, went to the park for family night with the Jarvises, went home, played a quick round of Galaxy Trucker with Gretel, got ready for bed, studied scriptures some more, checked fb and gmail, and wrote in my blog.

Scripture of the day: Isaiah 40:28-31.

Tomorrow will be AWESOME! Another day to work and learn!

Friend-filled Weekend

This whole weekend was so cool...

On Friday morning at 6:30 Sabrina and I met Cassidy and her mom at Elmers to drive us to the Open house in Scio about three hours or so away. It was a pretty fun morning, I must say. Cassidy is one of the most hyper individuals I've ever met, and she made the ride up there pretty interesting with her unique randomness. At times when we simply sat and read, I felt like I had a lot of time to just ponder. The book I brought with me, 7 Habits (shortened title), has really been helping me shape the way I see my world and the possibilities that I have, along with, of course, my study of the scriptures. 

Not long after we got to the school we found a group of awesome people known as the Baxter family. I "met" Ceana (who is in my grade) online last February, and have since become good friends. Kaeli, her 13 year old sister, is 4 inches taller than her! Caiden, who is 10, is a good natured young man who has really red hair: a trait that he alone has in his immediate family. Colton, the 7 year old, is the sweetest little guy I have ever met. Throughout the weekend the child held my hand, sat on my lap, and leaned on my arm. Then there was Ky: the 4 year old, and Kelsi: the 2 year old.

I had a good time meeting my teachers, playing music, singing a song on karaoke, and meeting many acquaintances from school at the Open House. Allie Holmbeck, another dear friend, finally got there at around 12. There was supposed to be some kind of college seminar, but for some reason that did not happen. Maybe we were at the wrong place at the wrong time for it. 

The time flew by way too quickly; it was over by 1:00. Just to have more time together, the moms decided to go get ice cream. Our quartet (Ceana, Allie, Cassidy, and me) got to stick together for a lot longer than originally planned. Out of pure spontaneity, Rory (Ceana's mom) invited us over to her house a half hour away while Allie and her mother went to a doctor's appointment in Portland. The plan was that she would pick us up after the appointment and drive us home. And so we went to the Baxter home and played board games, played at a nearby park, watched Youtube Videos, ate pancakes and scrambled eggs, cleaned dishes, sang, and played piano. Cassidy got sick and had to lie down after vomiting a bit. That kind of put a damper on the visit. 

Out of spontaneous planning once again, the moms decided to let us stay for the night. We got to hang out ALL NIGHT LONG. No, really. Ceana, Allie, and I stayed up till 4 A.M. discussing forever and topics related to it. Well, Allie went to bed earlier than Ceana and me. Though it was against the Word of Wisdom to stay up at such a late time, our talk felt really spiritual and insightful. Ceana and I chat online often, and it was so fun to speak to her in person that night!

In the morning, I awoke earlier than anyone else. I was considering going upstairs and jumping on everyone, but I decided to be polite and wait. When Colton, who has adopted me as his big brother, awoke, I told him to go and attack Ceana. Allie, who unfortunately heard our plot (I speak WAY to loud), stopped the child in his task. That morning Allie's mom said that they would have to leave right after breakfast to get home. But thankfully, we were permitted to tarry for a time. In fact, we got to go to the pumpkin patch with the Baxter family that day! We took some fun pictures there, and then, finally, had to leave. Ceana and Kaeli sneaked into our car and told Allie's mom to steal them. That would've been cool, and we would've been able to go to church the next day together! But Rory said that they already had the responsibility to sing in church in their own ward, and so they obediently left the car. 

The ride home was fun too; we bought some food from a grocery store and snacked on food the whole way home. I played some guitar, got high on sugar from eating too many cookies, and then fell asleep. When I awoke, we were back in Grants Pass. It was the most fun trip I've had since Ed Week. It was so good to be around such dear friends!

Today was a good Sabbath. I really felt the Spirit in sacrament meeting, Sunday school, and Priesthood. I feel rejuvenated. I have been prompted to attempt to achieve order once again in my life. One of my most favorite verses ever is D&C 88:119. If I am ever going to have an organized, successful family of my own, I must internalize the value of order in my own core. I feel that was the main thing I was prompted of today. 

This evening I was privileged to go to Charlie Jarvis' baptism. My little cousin's family is another fantastic family that I look up to. It was a very spiritual program and tears almost came to my eyes during it. The song "A Child's Prayer" was sung by 8 of the 9 children that made up their family. It was very very touching. Jefferson, the 17 year old, accompanied them with his guitar. He has a lot of musical skill; he accompanied all of the other music for that evening on the piano! Though his most favorite strength is his (state-wide known) sporting skills, his mother still makes him study music. It makes me think of Hercules' early years.

After the spiritually potent program I once again got high on sugar (only this time from cupcakes!), talked to some friends and family, and then went home. I really need to stop doing that; it's not godly to eat so much sugar at once! Maybe I should try another dessert fast... no, just internalize moderation!

A good day. :D

Ah, yesterday was a zombie day for me. I felt ill in the morning and did not go to seminary. I did the little amount of schoolwork I did sprawled out in front of my laptop on my bed. I have promised myself: "no... more... late... nights... during... the... week..." My body does not function much at all when I don't get enough sleep.

Seminary today was pretty wild, as Sis. Brinkerhoff called it. The teacher that teaches the juniors and seniors was gone, and the substitute teacher was not available, and so the huge junior and senior class joined ours today. We played a game that went a bit rough this morning. It was some complicated guessing type of game like battleship only on a large scale that somehow included answering questions about the Restoration of the Aaronic Priesthood. It didn't really make sense to me and I didn't feel like I learned very much. But hey, if you don't learn from a situation, then who is to blame?

I talked to Jared Pearson after seminary: a senior who is interested in organizing a music group. I meant to discuss the idea in more detail with him, but after class he rushed to the cars in haste, almost shooing me away with his body language. He obviously didn't want to discuss it. I think he assumed that I would be at seminary early to talk about the group before class. Ug, I must get up earlier if I'm going to do that.

Today was one of the most productive school days I have had in awhile. I got a lot of Latin done, a math lesson, and I got a couple of science lessons done too. :) I just love the flexibility of ORCA! I had fun at the Science LL too; I'm really excited to meet many of my classmates this Friday at the open house in Scio. It's going to be a fantastic event!

Today I got to watch Sabrina play a home volleyball game. Her team lost, but it was a lot of fun watching the game anyways. I don't like watching sports much usually, but today I really found a thrill in watching some pretty good volleys. It was fun seeing how long both of the teams could keep the ball up in the air. Some players did some pretty impressive dives. It was cool; I love volleyball!

After working out a bit at the YMCA after that, Sabrina and I went to mutual after grabbing a quick dinner and scripture thought from home. Tonight was a ward combined service project. There were other things being done, but some of the deacons and I got to fill in potholes on the church lawn! We learned a little bit about landscaping as we did it; it was interesting work to me. After we had finished our work everyone went to the cultural hall and played basketball and/or volleyball. We all had a pretty good time, I must say. Estie, one of the Beehives, brought along a friend whose name was Taylor who really enjoyed basketball. It was fun playing 3-on-3 basketball with Josh Haack, Bryce, and I on one team, and Estie, Taylor and Josh Smock on another team. Oh, by the way, our ward has four Joshes in our young men's group. Three of them are deacons! I like sports more than I realized; I should play more often.

Of course, as his own unofficial tradition, Bishop Wooley brought a lot of Little Caesars pizza to the kitchen for refreshments from the store down the road. I just love it; Sabrina could live off the stuff I am sure! I got to talk with Calvin and Alex Jarvis tonight as I ate my pizza. I was sharing with them a few ideas for Hatmen 4. I really want to make another video with those guys sometime; that was a really fun experience. Anyways, I told them that I had just bought a Phantom of the Opera mask online...

General Conference Morning Session

Wow! I love general conference!

Sigh, this morning has been so so good. I feel really peaceful inside. It's like my spirit has been recharged or something.

I got up early this morning with the fam to go help clean the stake center before general conference. I helped mostly by picking up trash around the parking lot. There was a lot more there than I realized! After that we drove some of our friends back to their houses. Sabrina and Henry had both invited friends to come over for movie night last night and both friends slept over and came with us to the stake center clean up!

The most moving talk in this morning session for me was President Uchdorf's talk. It's amazing how that talk seemed so directed to ME. I realize that I've been trying to busy-ify my life. But what I really need to do is to focus on the most important parts of my life; the fundamentals. Everything else should fall into place if I just simply focus on the basics of Christ's doctrine.