A Family of Killers

I don’t usually add new goals to my list when January comes around, but this year I’m making an exception. I want to make an iPhone app. (Funnily enough, most people when they hear that assume it has something to do with cats. Nope. This one is decidedly cat-free.) It’s not an incredibly complicated app (at least, it doesn’t seem like it should be to me), but it fills a need I think exists, and…

Okay, folks. I’m working on finally setting up an online store where people can buy signed copies of my books directly from me. As I’m doing it, I have to decide all sorts of details like . . . how much to charge for shipping. You’d think this would be relatively easy, but I’ve been postponing the decision for weeks. Every time I decide I’m going to figure it out, I come up with something…

I just came across this post from director Steven Soderbergh detailing everything he saw and read in 2024, and I really liked the way he broke it out. I liked it so much that I decided to do the same thing this year with my year in review, detailing everything I consumed, and not just highlighting the best. I still want to highlight the best, however, so I’m going to put an asterisk in front…

Hiya everybody! Here we are in 2025, and I’m ready to get back into the swing of things. I want to start things off by a look back on my watching and reading in 2024, as I am wont to do. Before I go into that, though, I wanted to write for a bit about negative reviews. Often, a real panning of a book or a movie or a TV show can be a lot…

It’s that time of year. The time when I start really kicking things into gear for the holidays. I take time off from work, so you’d think I’d have tons of time for everything else I need or want to do, but . . . that’s not how it ends up, a lot of the time. Some of this is self-inflicted. Our family does homemade presents each year, where we each get a different family…

Last night we watched the Charlie Brown Christmas special, and I reflected back for a bit on how much things have changed since the times when I used to watch that as a kid. Not just the fact that it’s one of the few overtly religious kids Christmas specials out there, but how back in the day, you had very little in the way of options when it came to Christmas on television. Christmas specials…

These days, writing a talk that’s generally fine is easy. Any AI platform can do it in a matter of seconds. It can give you an outline, or write the whole thing for you. I asked ChatGPT to give me an outline for this talk, (Topic? Using the Priesthood to Bless the Lives of Others) and it helpfully rattled off what the main sections should be, including everything from making a personal connection with the…

I realize many of you weren’t able to make it out to my panel at the Boston Book Festival. I’m sure you were crushed, so you’ll no doubt be ecstatic to know the event was recorded, and you can listen to it right this very moment! It was a fun panel to be on, looking at the way imperfect families are portrayed in three recent releases. Of course, the other two panelists had written lovely…

Yesterday evening, BYU played a basketball game against Providence College in Rhode Island. I’m assuming pretty much everyone knows BYU is run by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but Providence is also a religious institution. Right on their home page, they describe themselves as follows: “Since 1917, PC has taken pride in being a Catholic and Dominican institution of higher education — one for those who seek truth, celebrate the relationship between…

It’s traditional for returned missionaries to give a talk in their home church when they come back from their missions. Back in the day, it was usually just a long talk about what they did on their mission, though these days it’s customary to have it be on some sort of a theme (probably to avoid long travelogues). This Sunday (12/8), Tomas will be giving his. Not only that, but I’ve been asked to speak…