Kortrijk - part II

In 1302 the French were attacking the Flemish near Kortrijk. The poor Flemish farmers were way outnumbered and very over powered. The French were on horses and the Flemish had no weapons. There were at least three things that gave the Flemish the break that they needed.

First of all they had a hero named Jan Breydel. He was a very ferocious fighter and he rallied the Flemish. Jan was so ferocious in fact that he later came to be known as the Leeuw van Vlanderen, which translates to "The Lion of Flanders".

The second thing the Flemish had going for them was the "goedendagen". That translates to "good day" which just goes to show that the Flemish people have a real sense of humor. Let me explain. You see, the French soldiers had suits of armor and they were well protected by chain mail. To combat this the Flemish made a steel ball with spikes sticking out of it. They then tied this spiked ball to a wooden stick with a length of chain. They would swing this ball and hit the French driving the spikes through the armor into their bodies.

The third lucky break (or perhaps wise decision) was the Flemish meet the French soldiers in a very boggy area where the horses couldn't maneuver very well. The Flemish victory was very decisive. The French soldiers were all about show and they had flashy banners and armor and they all wore golden spurs. To celebrate their victory, the Flemish took all of the golden spurs off the dead soldiers and hung them from the roof of this old church. I suppose the church was new in 1302 but it was sure old when I was there. The battle came to be known as the battle of the golden spurs. I actually saw these spurs still hanging from the roof. I tried to find a picture of them on the internet but all I could find was a picture the spur itself, I couldn't find any pictures of them hanging from the roof. That is how the Flamse Leeuw came to be famous. The Flemish are a proud people and I'm kind of fond of the Lion myself.

Kortrijk - part I

Deerlijk is about five miles outside of Kortrijk. The branch met in Kortrijk and we would ride our bikes into Kortrijk for all our meetings. I arrived in Deerlijk just a little nervous about meeting Elder Mont Miller. Elder Davis had me quite worried. I'm a little apprehensive about writing about Elder Miller since this is a public forum and there is always a chance that Elder Miller will read this. So Mont, if you do read this please don't get mad at me and remember, this all happened thirty years ago. Let me start by saying that Elder Mont Miller (I say Mont to differentiate from my other companion Gene Miller) is one of the most sincere, intelligent and righteous people I've ever met. He also comes from rural Idaho and was home schooled and so had some odd peculiarities in his personality. Let's start with personal hygiene, Elder Miller would shower once a week on Sundays. When he did shower he never got his hair wet. I don't think he ever brushed his teeth the whole time I was his companion which was about three months. I slept every night with the window opened no matter how cold it was. In spite of all that, it was with Elder Miller that I had my most success. We met Chris and Claudine D'Hondt. They were a young couple and we became very close to them. They were eventually baptized and when they later had two boys, they named their oldest son Fredrick. I choose to believe he was named after me.

Mont loved to sing and if I have to be honest he was a pretty good singer. He would record himself on a tape singing the soprano part of a song and then he would play back what he sang and sing the alto part along with it. He recorded this on another tape using another tape recorder. He then played that back while he sang the tenor and then the bass. We had the Mont Miller choir. It became quite annoying after a while.

We became very good friends with an elderly Priest who lived in a Monastery in Kortrijk. He openly told us that he believed we taught the true gospel but he couldn't leave his church because; what would he do for a living? He was a wonderful old man and often showed us around his huge cathedral. One day we were way up in the top of this cathedral where the organ was and Mont asked if he could sing a song. Of course Pater Fidelis was happy to oblige. Mont belted out a heart rendering version of "Jerusalem" in his very loud and very deep bass voice. It didn't sound bad and as I was watching the people below I saw a Priest go around collecting money as Mont was singing. It was kind of funny. Pater Fidelis gave me a beautiful book on Belgium when I left Kortrijk and when Lisa and I got married he sent us a beautiful lace cloth that we put on a table.

Prom

Most of this week was rather mundane but things got a bit exciting beginning Thursday. The story I'm going to tell is all second and third hand but I found it fascinating and I'm going to tell it anyway. If I get some of the details wrong I'm sorry. So Prom is coming up and Alex has been putting off asking anyone to the dance. He finally decided he's going to ask Katrina Peterson. Interestingly, early this week The kids walk into the school and there on the wall written in black spray paint is "Katerina Peterson, Prom?" Poor Katrina gets hauled into the office and is very intensely interrogated by the police. I guess I understand that they need to do that but you'd think they would be a little more gentle. So they power wash off the paint and then when everyone shows up the next morning there it is again. "Katrina Peterson Prom?" If there was any hint of gentleness before it is gone now. They are accusing Katrina of covering up for some boy. I guess some kid had asked Katrina earlier (she turned him down) and they are grilling him too. Katrina's meeting with the cops was now a daily activity and she is certain that no one is going to dare ask her now. So when Alex decided to ask her it made her day and Alex knew he was going to be meeting with the cops too. He claims he's always wanted to be interrogated by the cops and actually I think it would be quite fun, as long as you know you're innocent.

To ask her to the dance Alex made a sign that said, "Katrina, it would "rock" if you would go to Prom with me. Return the rock that has your answer on it, Alex" (or something like that). He then got a cute little pebble and wrote "yes" on it and then him and Frank went into the canyon and dragged out a rock that was at least 90 pounds and wrote "NO" on it. They then put the two rocks and the sign on Katrina's door step, rang the door bell and ran.

It seems that Katrina's dad has a bit of a sense of humor because when he answered the door he calls out to Katrina, "Katrina, now they're painting on our house". Katrina burst into the tears which of course melted her Dad's heart. He assured her he was joking and that she needed to come and look. When she refused to go her mom went and looked and she convinced Katrina to go and look. I guess it made her day. She brought the "yes" rock to seminary the next morning with some balloons. It was a great ending to a horrible week for her. And yes, Alex got his interrogation by the cops. The "NO" rock is still on the doorstep.

This weekend was "Youth Conference" so Lisa and the kids were gone Friday night and most of Saturday. It was a bit strange being here alone. At 10:00 pm Lisa comes home with five girls who slept over. Alex and Sarah slept over at other houses. We fed the girls breakfast and they were gone the next morning by 8:00. I had volunteered for a service activity painting fences with graffiti on them. I guess some service organization does this but they were not used to having the church volunteer I guess. They had enough paint that they thought would last until noon but we had used it all by ten. They went to get more and we finished that off in less than an hour. We must have had nearly 100 people there. I spent the afternoon building shelves in the garage.

Cold Fusion - again

I dug a bit deeper and learned that the video I posted earlier was pulled because the American Physics Society complained about how they were portrayed. Here is the video from another source. I hope they don't pull this one as well.

Cold Fusion

Did I ever mention how much I love my job? While I enjoyed working at Kyocera I really did miss the research. I now get to work with cool things like Scanning Electron Microscopes, transmission electron microscopes, Ion implanters, Auger analyzers, diffusion pumps, cryopumps, focused ion beams, magnetron sputtering machines, molecular beam epitaxy platers and many other things that are almost as cool as they sound. The most exciting thing that we are working on is quantum well super lattice thermoelectric modules. We have made some major breakthroughs in the last couple of months and I expect that within the next year or two you will actually hear about quantum well thermoelectrics.

Perhaps the most exciting thing I've heard about lately (other than quantum wells) is cold fusion. Does anyone remember Pons and Fleischman? In 1989 they announced to the world that they'd actually been able to make cold fusion work. I clearly remember just how excited I was but unfortunately no one could replicate their work. Almost as fast as they became famous they were run out of the scientific community as a couple of crack pots. Now, twenty years later it appears that they may have been right after all. You really need to watch this episode of 60 minutes that aired on Sunday. As you watch this just remember that all cold fusion does is generate heat. If you ever get cold fusion in your laptop or car it will be quantum well thermoelectrics that converts that heat into electricity. We really do live in a very exciting time and I'm thrilled to be positioned right on the cutting edge.

**** how sad, they removed the video I wanted to show ****

Another beautiful day in Paradise

What wonderful weather we've been having for the last few days. It certainly feels like summer. As I write this the temperature is 93.4 degrees and I'm really enjoying it. We also had similar weather on Saturday and Sunday. Sunday during Sunday school I get a text message from Alex. Apparently he tired of having his foot all bandaged up so he took off the bandages. He has a huge bruise on the side of his foot. As bad as it looks however it is healing quickly and by the end of the day he was walking almost normal. It took some effort but I can see that he will be back to normal very soon. When I wrote my last post on Saturday I forgot to mention one very important event that took place that day. Alycia ran in a half-marathon that morning and in spite of some poor training during the last few weeks she came in with a decent time. Much less than her goal. I'm very proud of her and it is my goal to join her on the next run. She was really hurting Sunday so I'll give her a few days to recuperate before I talk to her about the next time.

injury number nine

So I've caught up on our trip to Utah but now I'm a week behind in my life. That's OK because I've not done much this week to talk about. Work all day and get home late and try and get caught up on mail, bills and taxes. April 15th came and went and as usual I didn't have my taxes ready to submit. That is so dumb too because I am expecting to get money in so why didn't I get them sent in on January 1st? Oh well, it is the same every year, I always file an extension. Thursday was the temple and Friday was a volleyball tournament for Alex. He was playing at Scripps Ranch which is close to where I work so I was going to go straight to the game from work. As I was getting ready to leave work Lisa calls and asks if I've left yet. She had just received a call to tell us that a friend had called her and told her to get to the school as soon as possible because Alex had just broken his ankle. I tell you, that boy should just quit sports. He has broken more bones, torn more ligaments and sprained more muscles than anyone I know.

Lisa and I got to the school about the same time and two hours later we finally get in to see a doctor. By this time we figured he probably hadn't broken anything because even though he was in extreme pain at first, by the time the doctor got to him he was much more relaxed. We've seen enough breaks and tears that we could tell this wasn't as bad. I began to have second thoughts when they pulled his shoe off. His ankle swelled up like a balloon. Luckily there is nothing broken and even though he is on crutches for a while I expect he will be spike the volleyball soon. The good news that he is quick to tell everyone though is that he got the "kill". He had jumped up to spike the ball and while he was in the air another player bumped into him and Alex came down sideways on his ankle and rolled it.

This morning we got up early to take Sarah to her track meet. It was an invitational and so she was competing against the best of the best. At her last invitational she came in seventh and today she came in sixth. That is progress but she is a little disappointed with her time. It was close to her best but she was really hoping for a new "PR".

Other than that I rewired a light switch, fixed two broken sprinkler heads, mowed the lawn, picked up dog poop and swept the patio. I also barbecued some steaks and we had a great dinner. Tomorrow is church, I always look forward to that.

Utah part III

Wednesday morning was more relaxed (at least for me). An Elder who used to serve in our area, Elder Lymon, now works in a rock climbing place in Orem. He gave us a good deal on rock climbing so Alex, Sarah and I spent the morning there while Lisa headed out shopping.We had a great time but it only took a couple of hours before our fingers and fore arms were very tired.

After we were done Sydney Hoopes came and picked up Alex. Sydney was a good friend of Alex's in San Diego before there family moved to American Fork. Lisa then came and picked up Sarah and I and we headed for lunch at the "Creamery on Ninth". We drank some of the best chocolate milk you will ever taste.

After lunch we picked Alex up and off we were to Alycia's second lacrosse game of the week. Once again her team dominated against another very good team. This was perhaps the most miserable day of the week for us. By the end of the game it was hailing and it was cold. If you double click on the picture after the game you can actually see the hail coming down.

After the game we warmed up in the car as we headed out to Georgina Baxters house for dinner. Some of my fondest memories are the Sundays in Rosemary when George and Karen Baxter would invite our family out to their house for Sunday dinner. We had a good time visiting and boy could she cook. Karen Baxter passed away from cancer a few years ago but Lisa has stayed in touch with most of the kids. On Wednesday four of the five kids were able to get together so we could visit with them all. What a great time that was reminiscing about the good old days. It was so fun to see them all grown up and many of them are married and have little children of their own. My kids on the other hand are now grown up much like they are. It was a lot of fun.

The reason we stayed in Utah for the whole week rather than head home after the weekend was because Kira had an appointment for Evan to see a specialist at the Primary Childrens Hospital to discuss an experimental drug that she is using for SMA kids. We had an appointment Thursday morning at 8:00 AM (groan) and another on Friday morning at 8:30 AM (another groan). Ben and Sharley arrived at Sanchez's around noon. As soon as they arrived we loaded them up in the car for another drive into Salt Lake to pick up Alycia. She didn't have classes on Friday so she spent the rest of the week with us.

When Lisa joined the church as a young teenager she thought she was the only member of her family to join the church. As it turned out she later learned that she had an ancestor who joined the church in Nauvoo and became a rather prominent member. Frederick Kesler (don't you like his name?) wrote his autobiography and kept a daily journal up until the day before he died. He was also a very sentimental fellow and in his old age he built a trunk and put some of his favorite possessions in it. He passed this trunk down to his children and told them they had to keep it in the family. In the 1970's a member of the family donated the trunk to the University of Utah's special collections library on the condition that any member of the Kesler family could come and view the contents anytime they wanted to. On Friday after Evans appointment we wanted to. In this picture you can see me with one of Frederick's canes and his Nauvoo sword. Pretty cool don't you think? He also has an original hand written page from the Book of Mormon that was recovered from the corner stone of the Nauvoo house, pebbles from the hill Cumora, Jordon river and other cool places. A first edition of the Doctrine and Covenants (called the book of Commandments at the time) and many other cool relics. He was a real pack rat. Saturday we slept in late and reluctantly packed up the van for our trip home. It was a good week and I'm really glad we were able to go but it is always nice to be able to come home again.

Utah part II

Sunday after conference we took the kids to a park near the Sanchez's. Evan and I had a lot of fun on the swings, slides and this horse. Do you see the snow on those mountains? I haven't worn this coat in a very long time and this was one of the best days we had in Utah. Brrrr.

One of the reasons for our trip to Utah was so Alex could tour the U of U campus. He has decided that he wants to attend the U and will be attending in August so this was a good opportunity for him to see where he will be spending at least four years of his life. The U really does have a beautiful campus and I enjoyed the tour but by the end of the day we were all tired. One of the last places we toured was the "on-campus" housing and Alex and Sarah found the couches in the building quite comfortable. Evan also found his stroller quite comfortable and he decided he was done as well.

Tuesday we went and toured the conference center. During conference we didn't have a chance to see much of the center what with tens of thousands of people all over the place but on Tuesday we got to go right up to the podium and we saw many original paintings and perhaps the best of all was the garden on the roof. One of the paintings we saw there was actually owned by Napoleons brother. Pretty cool eh? After the tour we went and had lunch at Brigham Youngs house. We actually sat in his root cellar. It was pretty cool and I had a picture taken but alas, it was on Kira's camera and we haven't exchanged pictures yet. After lunch we headed to Nielsons concrete place for desert. I was not particularly hungry and I was kicking myself when I got my huge cup of strawberry ice cream because I figured there was no way I was going to be able to eat it all but before I new it I was scraping the bottom of the cup. Those things are very good. After desert we went shopping for a few hours and then we dropped Alex and Alycia off so they could go to Alycia's lacrosse game. For those who may not know, Alycia coaches the Brighton High Schools girls JV Lacrosse team. They are all beginners and up until now they haven't won a single game. On Tuesday Alycia took Alex with her and with Alex standing on the sidelines next to the team I guess those girls decided to perform because they won their first game against a team that is better than some of the teams they have lost to.

While Alex and Alycia were at her game we took the opportunity to take Aunt Nola out for dinner. Aunt Nola married my mothers brother and we go way back. It was unfortunate that Alex and Alycia couldn't be there but you can only squeeze so much in a short week. We went to an all you can eat Chinese place and that is not what I needed after a full lunch and my strawberry concrete. I made sure I got my moneys worth and that was the problem.

In light of my promise not to let these postings get too long I'm going to cut this account off with Tuesday evening and a promise to finish the week soon. As you can tell we're having a great week.

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In a survey of US teens who watched R rated movies 20% of the teens who had watched four or less movies said they were willing to have premarital sex but of teens who had watched more than 50 R rated movies 93% were willing to have premarital sex.

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Utah - part I

What a great week we had but it is nice to be home again. Friday morning shortly after the kids got home from Seminary we headed down the highway and we followed the I-15 to Salt Lake City. I hadn't had a lot of sleep the last couple of nights so Alex took over driving at Los Vegas. I was sleeping in the back seat when all of the sudden it got very light, very cold and there was snow blowing in my face. We had run into a snow storm and just past the summit near Beaver the traffic had come to halt. Alex decided to entertain himself by rolling down all of the windows. It was actually a neat experience because I just pulled the blanket up to my kneck and it seemed like I was on a hay ride. My missionary reunion started at 7:00 and we were right on track for getting there on time but after sitting for an hour in the traffic we ended up being a bit late for the reunion.

The reunion was great and although I didn't know too many people there it was wonderful to see the people that I did know and getting to know some others. It was also great to President and Sister Allred. President Allred just turned 8o and they're looking great. It has been about fifteen years since I've been to a reunion. One cool thing was that President Allred had his original missionary records there and I found my page in one of his books. I had remembered many of my companions but there were some companions that I had forgotten. Now I have all of their names.

Saturday was General Conference and we had tickets for the afternoon session. We took the morning getting ready and then headed in to the conference center to get in line by noon. That is two hours before the session starts but we wanted to get a good seat. Kira flew in on Friday and Alycia's boyfriend Trevor also joined us. They opened the doors at 12:30 so we got into the conference center quite early which is a good thing because it was cold and miserable and alternating from snow to rain and back again. It was a far cry from the scenes I see on TV of pretty flowers and people sitting on the grass. I never saw any of that. Lisa figures the cold weather was the Lords way of keeping the Prop 8 protesters away. If that was the reason for the bad weather then it was very effective. There were very few protesters and the ones that were there were not protesting Prop 8. Conference was beautiful and we did get good seats. We were on the front row of the balcony. Following the session we quickly grabbed a picture of the family and then Alex, Trevor and I got back in another line to get into the Priesthood Session as standby's. In the picture from left to right is Kira, Trevor, Alycia, Alex, Sarah, Lisa and me. While we were in priesthood the women went shopping. Trevors family was also in town and his Dad, brother (Derrick) and brother-in-law (Eric) also joined us. Unfortunately, after hours of being in line they cut the line off eight people in front of us. I was so bummed but they sent us to a beautiful theater and we watch conference on a huge screen. The picture was obviously in high definition and it was pretty cool watching our prophet speak when his head was twenty feet high. The picture was so clear you could see every wrinkel on his face.

After the Priesthood session we met up with the women at a restaraunt called Bucca de Beppo. It is an Italian restaraunt and when they saw how large our group was they put us at the Popes table. As you can tell in the picture we had Pope Benedict's head right in the middle of our table. It was a bit disconcerting but we had a great time getting to know the Crowley's better and the food was good. In the picture I will attempt to name everyone. From left to right, Brenda Crowley, Lisle Crowley isn't in the picture, I think he is behind the camera, Kira Palmer, Lisa Leavitt, Fred Leavitt, Sarah Leavitt, Alex Leavitt, Derrick Crowley, Trevor Crowley (all you can see is the top of his head), Alycia Leavitt, Courtney Brinkerhoff and Eric Brinkerhoff.

Sunday was a much more relaxed day. We stayed with the Sanchez family who used to live in our ward but have moved to Utah. They are an amazing family and they allowed all of us to just move into their basement and take over. Not only that, they fed us good food for the whole time. We must have disrupted their lives tremendously but they made us feel very welcome. Sunday morning we slept in and then after a wonderful breakfast we watched the Sunday sessions of conference on TV in their basement. In an effort to prevent this blog from becoming excessively long I think I will continue the remainder of the week at a later date. We did have a great time.

Vilvoorde - part 2

This week I'm in Utah and so that is my excuse for not making regular posts. We are having very full days and so I have little time to update my blog. This week kind of evolved. At first we were just going to come up for conference and to go to my missionary reunion. Kira heard that we were coming and told us that she had an appointment for Evan at the Primary Childrens hospital and she asked if we would stay for her appointment. Of course we agreed. She decided to come down early and we all went to conference. Sharley's friend is getting married on Saturday and when Ben heard that we were going to be here in Utah he decided to come up with her. So today is Thursday and today Ben will get here and so five of our six kids are in Utah this week. I'll give you all a full update when we get home (Saturday) but for now you'll have to live with part two of Vilvoorde.

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The Delange family had one son who was around nineteen. He never was too interested in the church but we became quite good friends. One night Elder Reber and I were sitting on our bikes outside a local pub looking at a map trying to decided what we should do next. A drunk came out of the pub and started harassing us. It was getting to the point that we were about to leave in order to avoid an incident when quite suddenly out of the dark came the Delange boy and nailed this guy so hard he hit the deck like a rag doll. We politely thanked the boy and quickly left the scene before we got in trouble.

Another time we were walking through the park surrounding our house and suddenly out of the bushes came flying dozens of the paper cones all aimed at us. The darts were followed by a bunch of local kids and they were shooting darts at us through plastic tubing that is normally used for electrical conduit in brick walls. The tubing is very similar to what we use for underground sprinklers. The paper cones are simply wrapped out of paper strips that they cut out of magazines. The darts fly very well and we got to the point that we could hit the flies on the walls of our apartment. I still have one today (the tube, not the fly).

On preparation days we would travel around Brussels catching all of the tourist sights. Perhaps the most unusual sight is Mannekin Piss which translates to pretty much what you might think it does. "Little man that pee's". I have seen pictures of this statue before but I had no idea he was in Brussels. You imagine this fancy statue on this very elegant looking fountain but in reality it is stuck on the corner of a very plain building and you would never know it was famous. What is funny though is that he is often dressed for any occasion that comes along. In this picture (pulled from the web) he is dressed as Santa Clause. I have also shown some pictures of the Grote Markt (Grand Market) which is down town Brussels. It is quite grand looking when you stand in the middle of this Market and look at the buildings that surround you. While I was in Belgium, Brussels celebrated their Millennium. Isn't that crazy, a city that is a thousand years old. It is difficult for Americans to imagine something like that.

I had two companions while in Vilvoorde. I sent Elder Reber home and when my new companion showed up I was quite surprised. It was Elder Davis again. I had him in Turnhout and now he followed me to Vilvoorde.When I got him this time he was a changed man. In Turnhout he worked and all but he didn't seem too energized. This time around he was ready to work. We had a great time. We were teaching a young man who lived on his own. When we first went into his apartment I was a little surprised by a poster he had on his wall. Most single guys would have a picture of scantily clad woman but this guy had a poster of the statue of David. You know the one where he has no clothes on? I dismissed the poster and we taught the guy several lessons. One day a man stopped us on the street and asked us if we were aware that the kid was gay and that everyone was beginning to think that we kept going there for less than pure purposes. We didn't want to just dump him if he were truly sincere so we decided to challenge him to baptism and see if he was serious or not. First I wanted to confirm the rumors and I remembered that he wore a necklace with the greek letter lamda (λ) on it. I wondered if this might a symbol of homosexuality so the next time we were there I asked him about his necklace. He told us that it was indeed a symbol of homosexuality. Shortly after that we challenged him to get baptized. He actually accepted. I was transferred shortly afterward so I never did find out what happened.

When I got my transfer notice I was told that I was going to Deerlijk and my companion was to be Elder Mont Miller. Elder Davis was giving me all sorts of pity telling me he felt sorry for me and that I was probably one of the few Elders in the mission who could get along with this guy. He prepared me by telling me that Elder Miller was one month behind him so they overlapped a month in LTM. Elder Miller showed up to the LTM wearing white socks and he had no toothbrush, shampoo or deodorant with him. He was forced to get dark socks and before they left for Belgium the older district gave him a present that included a toothbrush, shampoo and deodorant. I wasn't quite sure what to expect after that.

Kneel before the King!!

Can you believe this? The president of the United States of America is bowing before the King of Saudi Arabia. Does this now mean that we are subjects of Saudi Arabia? This guy is a lunatic, he gives the Queen of England an ipod, the Prime Minister of England a set of DVD's that don't work in Europe and he bows before the King of Saudi Arabia. We're in big trouble.

Vilvoorde - part 1

Vilvoorde is a few miles north of Brussels and beneath the path the airplanes take as they leave the Brussels airport. I saw lots of planes. My first companion in Vilvoorde was Elder Reber. I liked Elder Reber a lot. He worked hard and he spoke Dutch to me and he called me Elder Leavitt. I also enjoyed our area a lot as well. The area had many very unusual places ranging from very urban to very rural. Mind you there isn't really such as thing as rural Belgium. A farm in Belgium is about ten acres and many of these farms have very old houses on them. We also had many castles in our area. It was quite strange, we would be going down the streets knocking on doors and then here was a castle. What do you do? Well, we walked across the moat into the the courtyard and then pulled this big handle beside the door that rang a bell inside. A butler came to the door and sat us on chairs in the middle of this huge central room and then the "master" of the house came and sat on chairs opposite us with his wife and we taught them. It was very strange and very cold and formal feeling but we taught them and they listened. When we were done we walked around their grounds for a bit. They had swans swimming in the moat and I went out on a rock and took pictures of the swans. One of them got mad at me and charged me. I stood my ground and took pictures of him right up until he was mere feet away. I have a box upstairs with several hundred slides in them and some day I will get them all scanned into my computer at which point I will post them but for now you will have to accept my description of this quite scary encounter with a "mad" swan. I have some really cool pictures of him.

In Vilvorde and area I also saw the grave of some famous Flemish artist, I can't remember his name but you would know him. I think it might be Van Gough. In Vilvoorde our apartment was actually a room in a huge building and we shared a bathroom with the other apartments on the floor. One day we came home late and there on the front step was our neighbour and she was completely drunk and passed out on the step in a large pile of vomit. It was a very cold night and we were worried that if we left her there she would freeze to death but she wasn't a small lady and we were scared to carry her. First we were worried we would drop her, second we were more than a little concerned about the barf that was all over her getting on our suits and third her shirt was sliding up and she was so close to exposing herself that one wrong move on our part and it would all be hanging out. As we were attempting to decide the best way of lifting her a taxi drove up and asked if we needed help. Apparently he knew the woman and he offered to take her in his car. That concerned us a bit too but he really did seem to know her so we loaded her into his car and off he went. I really hope he did know her and he wasn't just taking advantage of drunk women.

One day we got the message from the president that we needed to move out of that apartment and get a place with our own private bathroom. We found the coolest apartment that faced right onto the main canal that goes through Vilvoorde. If you check out the map you can see the canal next to the railway and our apartment was almost directly under the ringbaan (ring highway) that forms a circle around Brussels. If you look at the map you will see Vilvoorde Park just north of the highway. In the park there is a small section next to the canal that is surround by park on three sides. We lived in that small section. We lived in a three story house but it was only about twenty feet wide. We were only paying for the first floor but the entire house was empty and we had use of the whole thing.

We taught even more in Vilvoorde than we did in Turnhout and several of them eventually joined the church. The first was a single woman somewhere in her forties. When we first met Sister Van Campenhout she completely opened up and told us about her entire life. We found out that she had attempted suicide not too long before and when we pressed her she told us that she still had a bottle of Valium just for the day that she decided that she couldn't handle it anymore. We promised her that the gospel of Jesus Christ would give her the strength she needed to get through anything and eventually we talked her into giving us her bottle of Valium. We threw it into the canal. We also taught another very large family. The Delange family consisted of the parents and kids ranging from around eight up to twenty. There must have been at least six of them. Some of the teenage girls were very pretty and very forward. The mother and several of the daughters were eventually baptized but they all loved us. I know Sr Van Campenhout has since died but the Delanges are still around and I believe are still active to this day.

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If you touch another human being it is for one of two reasons. It is either to express affection for that person or to exert control over that person.

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Elton John and Billy Joel

Wow, what a great weekend. Actually, it was a great week. First let me tell you about Sarah's hurdles meet. Unfortunately, most of her meets are going to be on Thursdays so I will miss them because of the temple. I think I will have to look at the schedule a pick a couple to go to. Anyway, this week they competed against Valley Center. At the gun they were off and a Valley Center girls was ahead of Sarah. As they came into the finish line Sarah was gaining and as they went over the last hurdle they were neck and neck. Unfortunately because Sarah was pushing so hard she lost her rhythm and hit the last hurdle with her trailing knee. Down she went but being the athlete that she is she was immediately on her feet but because of her momentum she went down again. She immediately tried to get up again but down she went a third time. At this point she totally gave up on trying to get to her feet and she literally crawled across the finish line for a second place finish. The amazing thing is that she got 52.0 seconds and her PR is 51.9 seconds. I think it is safe to say that she would have beat her PR and she is convinced that she would have won if she'd only been able to stay on her feet.

Friday night Ben surprised his mother. Sharley had to come out to San Diego for a shower for her friend so Ben decided to come also. He showed up at the door with a rose and then he proceeded to make dinner for all of us. It was great. He made us Chili Relleno's. He learned how to make them on his mission and boy were they good. Yum.

So this weekend was the Elton John / Billy Joel concert that I got Lisa tickets for at Christmas. We decided to make it a weekend and go and visit Brandon and Serene. To make the weekend even better, we found out that this weekend Brandon had his Moot Appellate Court. That is a fancy way of saying that they pretended to defend an appeal in court. We got to watch him and he did a wonderful job. I can really see him in a trial room. We met one of his professors and she told us that all of the professors think Brandon will be a great trial lawyer. I think I agree. I could tell that she really likes him.

So it was time to head for our concert. Because we know LA traffic can be brutal we left two hours early. It wasn't enough. It took us a full hour to go the first twenty miles and it took us over half an hour to go the last two miles. We were a half hour late. Even after we got to the Honda Center I could tell that parking was going to be a long way off so I dropped Lisa off in the middle of the road and she ran between traffic and went to her seat. Don't worry, she was in no danger since traffic was not moving. I finally got parked about a mile away and the parking attendant told me not to worry, they concert was late getting started. We don't know how much we missed but I don't think it was too much. So packing my camera and a pair of binoculars I made my way to the center.

While I was still a long way off I could hear the band playing and it was loud even from where I was. I knew then I was in trouble, I don't like loud music. I finally got to the ticket booth and as they searched my camera case they told me that I couldn't take my camera in. I said "what?!?". They told me that camera's with detachable lenses aren't allowed. I was ticked. I could have had same very spectacular pictures but I guess that is the very reason it wasn't allowed. Darn. I didn't really want to go all the way back to my car so the guy took pity on me and told me where I could check the camera. I then made my way to our seats which were literal as far away from the stage as you could get but boy was it a spectacular view. The isle was the exact dead center of the building and if the stage was above the net on one end of the arena we were the very back row above the opposite net and Lisa was the 11th seat in. We had a great view of the entire building and with the binoculars we could see the people very clearly. Once I was inside of the building the atmosphere of the whole thing kind of took over and the loud music didn't bother me.

I don't know what I was expecting but Elton John is a fat old man and Billy Joel is a fat old bald man. They were both great to listen to however and listening to them took me back many years. I really do like a lot of their songs. Some of my favorites I put in the play list at the beginning of this blog. All in all it was a very fun evening and I think Lisa enjoyed it. I'm sure she would have more fun with someone who is into the music as much as she is but I had fun and it is just good to go out with my wife. I did take some pictures with my treo. You can't see much in them but I hope you can get a bit of an idea of the atmosphere that was present.

--------------------trivia--------------------

Studies show that your brain function drops off significantly when you are even just a little bit dehydrated.

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I can run again.... soon

Today I saw the doctor for a followup to my surgery. It made me feel read good. After waiting for an hour in the waiting room I finally got in to see him. He looked at my incisions and asked how I was doing. I told him that I was doing great. He asked if I was still using pain killers and I told him that I hadn't taken any pain killers. He then said that everything looked great and was about to leave. I said to myself, not a chance buddy. I asked him how it looked and if he took out much stuff. He told me that he took out all kinds of garbage. I asked him how the knee itself looked, if there was much damage to the face of the bone etc. He said there was minor damage but that it wouldn't give me a problem. He assured me that it was the shredded pieces of meniscus that had been hurting me. I then asked how the knee looked over all and if I would be able to run a marathon with my daughter. He said, I don't really remember, let me go look. He came back a bit later and said it all looked very clean and he didn't see any reason why I shouldn't be able to run a marathon. He said with my quick recovery and healthy knee it must be our clean living, healthy families lifestyle that must be doing it (this is the same doctor that worked with Alex's torn AC joint and broken thumb). I thanked him very much and he said come back in six weeks. OK, Kira, get ready, we're going to do a marathon. Sorry Peter, I won't be ready to go with you. Maybe we should start with a half marathon.

The picture is from Wednesday when I took the bandage off of my leg.

--------------------trivia--------------------

As teenage drivers mature their driving skills improve and the probability of them getting in an accident decreases. The probability of getting into an accident is lowest at age 55. An 80 year old driver has the same probability of getting in an accident as does a 16 year old.

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President Obama

Shortly after the election in November I said that I would give President Obama a chance to prove himself. He had made a lot of promises and before I condemned the man I would let him show that he would do what he promised. Well I think it is safe to say now that he is on a course that will destroy this wonderful nation and our freedoms and opportunities may be hurt for generations. He is printing money like it is going out of style and that can't help but lead to unprecedented inflation (at least unprecedented for the US). He promised he would only raise taxes on the "rich" (who ever they are) and now he is talking about eliminating the mortgage tax and reducing the charitable donation deduction for all of us. In a time of 10% unemployment he is also raising taxes on small businesses who happen to create the vast majority of all the new jobs.

He even threatened to charge the veterans for their health care. Can you imagine that? The odd thing is that after he saw the reaction he changed his mind and then took credit for saving the veterans. How does he get away with it? And then did you hear what he said to the Prime Minister of England? The prime minister came to America to see Obama and he turned him away. He told him that the Prime Minister of England shouldn't have any more special privileges than the leaders of the other countries do.

And then there is the whole economic melt down. They want to blame everything on the republicans (who certainly have a lot to account for) but then he continuously talks about how horrible the economy is and amidst all of his gloom and doom he wonders how the stock market can crash like it did. Every time he opened his mouth the market would go down even further.

I really like how he hires a tax dodger to head up the IRS. I only hope that he can't do too much damage in one term because I can't imagine that he will win a second term.

Surgery part II

I think today went well. I have a big fat knee and I can barely limp along but I'm not using crutches and so far I haven't taken any pain killers so I'll take that as a good sign. As we were leaving to go to the surgery center Lisa asked me why I was wearing pants. What kind of question is that? I don't really want to walk around in my underwear. She explained that she figured my knee would be so swollen and with the bandages and all I wouldn't be able to get my pants on so she figured I should wear a pair of sweats or something. I assured her that all they were doing were pocking two holes in my knee and all it would take is two band-aids to cover those up. Well after waiting for an hour the nurse finally called us in and the first thing he said was, "you wore pants?" I told him the same thing that I told Lisa about the band-aids and he informed me that my knee would be wrapped with so many bandages that I would never get my pants on. Oops. No one said anything to me about wearing sweats. I then had to go through the humiliating process of shaving my leg. I now have a naked leg. He then wrote all over my knee with a felt marker and then while wearing my gown with no back I kissed my wife good bye and went and crawled onto the most comfortable bed I've ever laid on. Actually the bed wasn't what was comfortable but they had a blanket on this bed that was hooked up to a machine that filled the blanket full of warm air. It was divine. The anesthesiologist then stuck this gross looking white stuff in my IV and I went to sleep. That bandage on my arm next to the ID band is from the IV. When I woke up the IV hurt worse than my knew did. While I was under Lisa headed to the nearby mall and bought me a pair of shorts to wear home. The doctor actually offered to let me wear a pair of the paper shorts that they use but I didn't really want to wear paper shorts.

The next thing I knew I was sort of semi-conscious and try as I might I couldn't clear my mind. I stretched and someone told me to put my arms down and I wanted to talk to him but I couldn't figure out how to speak. I formed the words in my mind and very carefully said something to the nurse. I don't remember what I said but I was really worried about saying something stupid so I wouldn't talk until I knew exactly what I wanted to say. I remember thinking this must be what it is like for stroke victims who's minds work fine but they can't get the words out. I then leaned over to check on the machine reading my vitals and I saw that my heart rate was 72, my blood pressure was 120/82 and my oxygen level was 96% so I figured I was still alive and ready to go home. When I told the nurse that he called Lisa in and lifted up the back of my bed and suddenly I was very light headed. That gradually passed and I got dressed and here I am. They insisted on giving me crutches but I refused to use them. On the way home we stopped for an In-n-out hamburger. It was very good and I was very hungary since I hadn't eaten breakfast. I was in no pain but my leg is very stiff. It is now time to go to bed and the pain killers have worn off and while my knee does hurt I don't think I will be using the Vicoden that they wanted me to get. I'm sure that tomorrow my knee will be even more stiff than it is today but I don't think it will hurt any more than it does now. I'm planning on going to work.

The coolest part about the whole thing are these neat pictures that he took. I haven't talked to the doctor yet (I have an appointment for Friday) but I think that shredded looking stuff is the torn part of the meniscus that he took out. I know I'll feel better about this whole operation if he actually found something wrong. I'll feel real stupid if he tells me that everything was fine.

I'm going to take a glass of water and a Vicoden to sit by my bed just in case I wake up in excruciating pain but I'm going to try going to bed tonight without anything. I really don't want to put that stuff in my body if I don't have to.

---------------------trivia--------------------

More babies were born in 2007 than in any year in the history of the United States. Good news, abortions are down, bad news, nearly half of the babies were born to single mothers, many of them teenagers.

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Surgery

I am now pretty much recovered from the crazy and hectic last few days and I have enjoyed a wonderful relaxing sabbath day. My back is starting to relax after hauling that 300 pound astro jump to the front of the house and lifting it into the truck. Today was our ward conference and it was very good. Our former bishop is now our stake president and it was good to hear from him. He actually talked about Kira and Justin. The topic was "True to the Faith" and it was about not losing faith during hard times. President Ellsworth actually told Kira's story and mentioned how through it all she was able to see the good that came from it and how she recognized Gods hand in the events that took place. I've always been very proud of her but I was even more proud as I sat there crying. I also had another surprise in Sacrament Meeting. An old missionary buddy was in church visiting and I saw him for the first time in thirty years. We both look just a little heavier and a little older than last time we were together.

Tonight I'm going to get a good nights sleep because tomorrow I have finally broken down and I will get my knee surgery. I'm not expecting it to be a big deal since it is only a meniscectomy. Wish me luck, I'll let you know tomorrow how it went.

Happy Birthday Alex

Today is the end of another very busy but very exciting week. So many things happened this week that I scarcely know where to begin. This week was spring break for most of the Universities. Alycia came down but had to go back early because she is coaching a High School Lacrosse team in Salt Lake. That was a bummer but that is what you do when you have a job. She went back Wednesday. Brandon had spring break also but apparently in law school, spring break is just and opportunity to assign a major project. He knew he was going to very busy all week long so we figured there was no reason Serene and Sydney couldn't have a break so we invited them down and left Brandon to work with no distractions.

Alex had a birthday a little while back but between sports and other activities we were only able to celebrate this week. Over the years some of our kids have developed some unusual requests for birthday cakes. Do you like Alex's cake? He got some very nice presents too. We had the family dinner and presents on Monday while Alycia, Serene and Sydney were here but we decided to throw him a party for his friends. In the spring of 1999 Lisa volunteered to be on the "Grad Night" committee at Kira's high school. She figured she would learn what she could so she'd be ready for the next year when Kira graduated. Most of the years since then she has been the grad night committee and every time she has been the entertainment chair. She has a budget of well over $10,000 that she uses to hire all kinds of entertainment for the night. Over the years she has developed a very good relationship with some of the companies so when she called them up and asked what they would charge us for an Astro Jump for Alex's party they were quite willing to give it to her for free. Not only did they give it to her for free but they gave us the "Jumbo" sized one. I was afraid it wouldn't fit in our yard. They told me that it was the largest Astro Jump in California. I believe it. We spent some time to figure the best place to put it in our yard and then when I turned on the blower it nearly dwarfed our house. I'm sure this thing was bigger than most of the houses in some countries. It just got larger and larger and larger. In addition to the jump we also had the X-Box (couple of kids played the "Lips" game), Alex's basket ball toss game and the ping pong table we got for Christmas. We then built a fire to go along with it all. We didn't have as many kids show up as we thought we might but we still probably had more than thirty all told. It was a bit of a strange party though. On the invites we had said that it would go until midnight but by 11:00 most of them were gone and the last straggler left at 11:15. Most of Alex's friends are into sports and there were a lot of things going on the next day so they all left in time to get a good nights sleep. The other funny thing is that Sarah is good friends with about half of Alex's friends. It really weirded Alex out at first when his friends all started saying hi to Sarah as they pass in the halls at school. He's used to it now and they all call her "Little Leavitt".






Heather Wilcox and Caitlan McConnell playing the basketball toss game.








Everybody singing Happy Birthday to Alex.










Alex blowing out his candles. Lisa put an illegal sparkler on it. The sparkler was smuggled in from Canada since they are illegal in California.



Sarah and some friends around the fire.











Alex pretty much dominates in Ping Pong.










Some of the guys just hanging out on the deck that looks out over our canyon.








Alex figured the jump was big enough it could be his dance floor. It looks like they all just tuckered out and layed down.





The next mornning I had to put that darned jump back in the truck. They used a fork lift to get it in and Alex and I managed to get it on a little dolly and maneuver it into the back yard. Getting back in the truck wasn't as easy. Between Alex, Sarah and myself we did finally manage but my back is killing me and Alex's groin is hurting. Hopefully we'll heal. Before we packed up the jump however I dragged Lisa, Serene and Sydney into it. Alex and Sarah required no coaxing. Sydney is not so sure she likes the jump.

Sarah looks like a bug splattered onto the wall.











Alex doing a somersault.












Sarah can looks like she can fly.












This is about the only trick I could manage.












After we got the jump all packed up Alex headed off to do his reffing for the day and the rest of us head for Sarah's track meet. This was an invitational meet where you had to actually qualify to go. Sarah really surprised herself this year. She had about given up on being good at anything. Last year she did the 300m hurdles and the mile (or was it the 2 mile?) but as you may know, if you know, if you try and be good at too many things you end up not being good at anything. This year she decided to focus on the 300m hurdles. Much to her surprise she ended up making the varsity team (and she is still a Sophomore). In her very first race she came in third but she was the first Westview girl to come in. She won her second race and then they had her run the 100m hurdles and she came in third on that one. Based on her time she qualified for this invitational meet and so she was competing with the best. She didn't quite make her personal best but she did end up getting third place and so you see her here showing off her medal. She is quite happy and I guess if I were to be honest, so am I.

We then rushed home from the meet and quickly got ready to head to Valley Center and watch Mackenzie compete for Miss Valley Center. She did beautifully and in my mind it came down to two girls. I still figured Mackenzie was better than the other girl but I admitted that I may be somewhat biased so I conceded that the other girl had a chance. You can imagine my excitement when in the end the other girl got first runner up. At this point I knew that Mackenzie had it. Much to my dismay they gave it to this other girl who wasn't as pretty as Mackenzie, she didn't have th grace and poise that Mackenzie had, her dress was ugly and her answer to the impromptu question was dumb. I figure the other girl won the simpathy vote because she was a fetal alcohol syndrome baby. Oh well, we all know who should have won.












Doesn't Mackenzie look absolutely beautiful? She definitely should have won.