A Family of Killers

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…

So, strangely enough, tomorrow marks 25 years since I was released as a missionary, and it’ll be the day Tomas is released as a missionary himself. So naturally I’m looking both back and ahead. Back when I was released, my parents came to pick me up in Germany. It was a bizarre feeling, going from being a missionary one moment to being a son the next. (Not that I’d stopped being a son ever, but…

We have a fridge in our garage that I’m pretty sure is magical. Anytime we run out of milk in our main fridge, if I go out there and check the garage fridge, a new gallon of milk has somehow appeared out of the ether, ready for me to grab it and bring it inside. The only realistic explanation I can come up with is that house elves keep that fridge stocked, ready at all…

Man. Speaking as someone who’s been on Bluesky for over a year (I joined 9/29/2023), things have really heated up on the platform for the first time in . . . ever. I have been steadily, faithfully posting into what’s felt like the void for almost the entire time. There were many times when I wondered why I was even bothering. Honestly, it was mostly my OCD tendencies that kept me doing it. I was…

It’s still early days yet, but the plan at the moment is to finally head down to Disney World again this summer. This would be the first time we’ve been since . . . 2017? Ever since our 2020 trip was canceled for 2020 reasons, I just haven’t had the chance to go back. I would like to go to Universal and Disney, and I’d ideally like to not break the bank doing it, though…

First off, the good: any time I’m still watching a show in its fifth season, that’s a sign that I’m a pretty big fan of what they’ve been producing. And Only Murders in the Building is a genuinely good show. The first season was fantastic. Steve Martin and Martin Short and Selena Gomez play off each other wonderfully, and I had a blast watching it. The concept (that a trio accidentally fall into making a…