April showers

When I was a kid, I loved rainy days. They were my favorite. But now that I have a hobby that is best enjoyed during dry weather, I don't look forward to it as much. But if I have lots of things I have to get done inside, it can go ahead and rain, I won't mind.

On Monday, my stake and adjoining stakes did a concert/fireside with Gentri, a "gentleman's trio" that is signed with Deseret Book. I'd heard of them but never heard them. Now I understand why. They are talented singers, but I just found their style of music boring. I've been to a number of concerts by local musicians (including Cherie Call, the National Parks, Mideau, Vocal Point, Debra Fotheringham, Utah Symphony, and the Lower Lights), and this was probably the most boring. Even more boring than the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Maybe it's because it was a fireside rather than an actual concert. This paragraph makes it sound terrible. It wasn't, it was just forgettable.

Friday was Arbor Day, a holiday that is becoming increasingly obsolete. (Sorry, Nebraska, I'm going to guess that our state holiday is more exciting than yours.) Maybe it's becoming swallowed by Earth Day (which is becoming more popular), but we certainly need a day like Arbor Day even today. Climate change wasn't even an issue when J. Sterling Morton invented the holiday.

Anyway, on Arbor Day two years ago I first discovered the beauty of North Canyon, which has since become my favorite place in Bountiful. I went there again last year. But this year was snowy! Nevertheless, I still had to spend time in the trees on Arbor Day, so I thought it would be a good time to explore a little side road near the beginning of the dirt road/trailhead. I had been there once last year, but I wanted to see where it went.

 I felt a little bad going on such a wet day, because just a few days earlier I had heard a news article about people damaging local trails by using them when they're muddy. Well, I'm going to justify myself: (1) The road has lots of rocks, so most parts of it don't change shape when I step on it; (2) I'm less damaging than a wheel; (3) I do stay off of muddy trails, except this one day.

I'm not accustomed to seeing arrowleaf balsamroot covered in snow.

It was beautiful, even though it was lightly snowing.

 Alack, I didn't expect this road to end in a gate to "private property." I had thought it might go to the road and then I wouldn't have to go back through the mud to get to my car, but I was obedient and obeyed the signs. This gate was anticlimactic. But there are lots of steep side trails I might have to explore sometime.

There were lots of giant puddles.

Yesterday, I went to Thanksgiving Point's Tulip Festival, as I did two years ago. It's nice to get out of the house and out of Davis and Salt Lake Counties (barely...), but I can see lots of tulips on a smaller--but no less beautiful--scale for free at Temple Square.

I only included this because it seemed a shame to leave the tulip festival without any pictures of tulips. We were literally walking out.

They told us this is the largest man-made waterfall in the northwestern hemisphere. That's a lot of caveats. I wondered how they defined biggest. Tallest? Most volume of water? Most square feet?

Then yesterday, my friend Shane showed me a little trail head in North Salt Lake that I hadn't heard of. Three years ago, there was a famous landslide in NSL that destroyed a home and some tennis courts. That one garnered a lot of attention, but there was an older, less dramatic landslide in NSL that destroyed the foundations of several homes. They built this new trail near where they used to be, called Springhill Geologic Park. I had to visit it because (1) it's a trail, (2) "geologic" is the name, and (3) I thought I'd been to every park in NSL. Due to the tulip festival and taking my niece bowling, I didn't have time for a long run, so I just ran up this little trail. For just a tiny (less than one mile, with a 230-foot climb) trail in the middle of a neighborhood, I was impressed.

This I guess is the most "geologic" part of the trail. I was hoping for interpretive signs, but no. I didn't even stop to analyze the rock, though it's probably conglomerate.

I first saw tufted evening primrose last year on the Wild Rose Trail and fell in love with it, but I might have only seen it that one time. I was delighted to see this cluster. They only bloom in the evening. My book says they are also very fragrant, but I didn't stop to smell them. Next time I see them, I will.

At the top of the trail was a monument dedicated to Art Gregerson, a prominent developer of North Salt Lake. He's also notorious for shoddily built homes. What can I do to get a monument for me?

Good and bad hippies

It's only been a week, and I already miss Easter. I had a very realistic, detailed dream about going to the Walmart in Orem and buying Little Debbie carrot cakes (which don't exist, but I wish they did) and bunny-shaped crackers and cereals. I also learned in real life that there was Peeps eggnog at the store, but I didn't see it in time. I'm feeling unreasonably sad that I missed out on it. I also felt unreasonably sad about the dead cat I saw on the side of the road. :(

I also had a dream with a Bewitched episode with a funny joke about King Henry VIII and a leg of lamb. When I woke up, I realized it wasn't really funny.

Yesterday was Earth Day, and I've decided you can't have Earth Day without hitting the trails. So I decided to run to the last radio tower again, like I did a few weeks ago, but I decided to run from my house. Once I got there, I decided to keep going, rather than simply turning around. I was glad I did--I found trails where I've been before but haven't spent as much time on. There was only a small portion of trail that was new to me, but that was still more than what I had planned on.

This is a brief portion of the trail where I had never been. It's out in the open, so my face got a little sunburned, but not too bad. It was a beautiful day.

I saw a rotting deer head. This was the first picture I had, but Facebook doesn't let me choose the thumbnail anymore, and I didn't think I should have a rotting head as the preview.

Parts of this trail get surprisingly swampy.

There were lots of blue and red ribbons attached to signs and trees all over. I found it obnoxious.

In the distance are some dirt bikers, even though motorized vehicles are not allowed. What entitled jerks!

One of my favorite parts is this little ravine that has a meadow in it. I think I've only been there once before. But this part got a little awkward, because another trail runner was following me.

 I also had to spend Earth Day making a meal that is good for the earth, so I made veggie burgers. Of the five kinds I've made, this is the least tasty but the easiest. They have onions, oats, almonds, egg, and seasonings.

Earth Day is a hippie holiday (though not one I formally celebrate), but it's a good hippie holiday. However, there was a bad hippie holiday on 4/20. People say that marijuana isn't as bad as cigarettes or alcohol. I don't know whether that's true, but even if it is, it's still not good. I hate to play the "My hobby is better than yours" game, but if your hobby is smoking weed, then yeah, my hobby is better than yours. I'm so grateful that I don't need harmful and addicting substances to feel amazing. And I find it frustratingly ironic that while there are increasing crusades against cigarettes and soda--which I don't disagree with--there is a push for acceptance of recreational cannabis. We need instead to foster a culture where people decide they don't want that. Let's put those dealers out of business! (Please note: this is not a commentary on legalization or medicinal uses, which are multifaceted issues.)

Making Easter happen

If I didn't go out of my way to make it seem Eastery, Easter would have hopped by without making much of an appearance.

In Mormondom, Easter's sadly not that big of a deal. There's always a new Easter video, but beyond that, it's pretty small. I was pretty annoyed that my stake conference was this weekend, which meant not only the main session but also the Saturday night and Sunday morning leadership sessions. They would never dare have such meetings on Christmas Eve or early Christmas morning. I'm feeling pretty unrighteously annoyed with early meetings, because what's the point of having a meeting if you'll be falling asleep the entire time? And in all the sessions, only one talk was actually about Easter, with a few other passing references. We didn't even sing any Easter songs, with the exception of a couple of choir numbers.

You will recall that I made a holiday bucket list this year, and one of the items for Easter was to attend an Easter concert. I found out there was a Mormon Tabernacle Choir Easter concert, but all the tickets were distributed, so I didn't know if I would get in. So I looked at other options.

I found out there was an oratorio called "The Passion of Our Lord" at the local Catholic church on Palm Sunday (last week). In theory I'm very ecumenical, but in practice I'm not, so off I went. I'd never been to a Catholic church before, so I was a bit nervous, and I went by myself. When I went in, I saw a state representative from our neighborhood, whose husband was my orthopedist when I was 9. They are from my home stake and know my mom, so I introduced myself, feeling more comfortable that I wasn't the only Mormon there. (The next night I went on a short run and happened to pass them walking, and they remembered my name!)

The performance was what you'd expect of a volunteer choir of members of a minority religion. But I enjoyed being in a new place and seeing the Catholics do their ritual genuflecting and crossing before they sat down. I also had holy envy for the beautiful decorations of the church.

We have rituals and beautiful decorations in our Mormon temples but not so much in our public spaces, so I liked the experience. Since I love holidays and seasons, I have a bit of holy envy for the whole liturgical calendar. (Tomorrow I'm starting a sort of reverse Lent, about forty days of no candy, since that's how long it is before Memorial Day weekend and the beginning of patriotic candy season.)

At work, they always have a "Peep show" before Easter, dedicated to showing the pop culture surrounding Peeps. People say you either love Peeps or hate them. I don't think that's true, I think there's a large number of us whose general apathy toward the candy makes us not be very vocal about them. For me, I love them for their iconic, traditional status, not for their own merits as candy. They had Peeps sugar cookies, Peeps "sushi," and Peeps Oreos (which I had already had). 

 I had to tell the presenter about the Peeps frozen yogurt I got from Menchie's.

Even though I went to a concert at the Catholic church, I did try for standby tickets for the MoTab concert and got in. They performed Beethoven's Christ on the Mount of Olives, which was very operatic. I've said this before: No one likes opera except those who are trained to like it. People are afraid to say anything bad about it because they will seem plebeian, but it's really an Emperor's New Clothes situation. The opera is not wearing any clothes!

 Nevertheless, I recognize the immense talent of the soloists, even though it's not my style. After the intermission, they played a new piece by Mack Wilberg, A Cloud of Witnesses. It was pleasant enough, though I don't think it's going to become a wildly popular work. I say that like I know anything about music.

I found a charming Easter children's album from the 1960s and bought it for my Easter playlist, which is the worst of all my holiday playlists. (Most modern kids' music is horrendously painful, but this one was decent.)

And I thought it would be fun to spend the day before Easter running up Mueller Park Canyon. I ran about .75 miles past Elephant Rock, making it about 8 miles round trip. I hadn't been there since September I think, and it was easier than I remember, which makes me happy. Maybe it's because it was a cool day, whereas I usually run it in the height of summer, but I think I've gotten more stamina. It was lovely, and it was charming to see colored eggshells on the trail (though I usually detest litter).

I had to get my car fixed because it was leaking gas, and I think the repairman said he legally couldn't let me drive with such a problem.

Then with my family we colored eggs and had an egg hunt, and I had asked my mom to hide my basket. My niece had the idea to put it in the oven, because when I was three years old I put pillows in the oven, pretending I was baking. (Then my mom turned the oven on...) I also got a patriotic outdoor blanket, which will be perfect for the Fourth of July, even though it's too early to be thinking about that.

These were mine. The grapes are my favorite. The hearts and carrots didn't turn out so well.

Then today, after attending stake conference, having dinner at my grandparents' house, and eating lots of candy, the last thing on my bucket list was to roll (plastic) Easter eggs down a hill. So off I went with my sister and niece.

So far in 2017, Easter has been my favorite holiday season. But only because I made it that way.

Fun but uneventful

Everyone's out there freaking out about the snow. But I've never seen an April where it didn't snow, at least a little. Complaining about snow in April is like complaining about heat in May. It's normal, even if it's not what you usually think about.

Also, it's not a Utah thing. Weather is "bipolar" in most places that have four seasons. I saw April snow in Nashville in 2007, and snow is even rarer there than it is here.

(You see, I keep track of these things because I'm still holding out for a year when I see it snow in nine out of twelve months. In 2010 and 2011, I saw it in eight, but more recently it's only been six.)

When it wasn't raining or snowing this week, I was able to get some good runs in. I ran to the Bountiful Temple from my house, eleven miles round trip. It started sprinkling and getting windy, so I worried I would be drenched, but I was fine.

However, I was more excited about a 5.27-mile run. Off of the Bonneville Shoreline Trail are a bunch of radio towers (I think five), which you can see from various places in Salt Lake. I have been by most of them, but the last one is a little farther away, so I never made it there. But I did this week, and it was fun! Mostly fun to have it off my bucket list. Also, it fascinates me that I kind of feel isolated, yet there's an entire building that's rarely accessed.

I was right by the third and fourth towers when I took the picture. You can faintly see the fifth one on the hill on the right to the trail. I think it was about .75 miles away.

I wasn't worried about snakes on an April evening, but I am concerned if I go there in the future.

I took a moment to eat Easter-themed trail mix here. I'm so glad Easter is late-ish this year.

This sign prohibited motor vehicles, but I'm sure radio workers use them to get to the tower.

Last week I blogged about my mission reunion and how I didn't think my mission president really remembered me. When I was coming back from lunch on Wednesday, I just happened to see him at the crosswalk, and he remembered my name, when I wasn't even wearing a nametag! Though I don't know if he would have remembered if I hadn't just seen him a few days earlier.

I have also had fun reading a Mormon immigrating (or emigrating) journal of a ship from Australia in 1856. It's almost humorous to read of all the troubles they had. It's like the mission president had to babysit the Saints with all the squabbles they were having. Some of them were particularly troublesome, and one of them was particularly bad when he got drunk, and they had to threaten that they would put him in irons. There was a fight because someone was keeping a goat in the passenger area. There was a terribly offensive smell, and they found dirty clothes in someone's quarters. And there was a quarrel between two women because one called the other a whore, and then a few weeks later there was a fight between them again. The journalist noted that the one sister "was the aggressor, as usual." It makes me want to be one of those people who's reliably good, instead of one who's reliably aggressive. 

It was a fun but relatively uneventful week. 

Another six months

It's been a week of feeling old.

Well, actually, it hasn't for the most part. That was just a convenient way to start this post.

But it was actually my half birthday. I'm 28.5. You likely know that I only eat seasonal treats, but there are three times a year I can have whatever I want: (1) my half birthday, (2) the week of my birthday, and (3) New Year's week. Every year for my birthday, I have Mexican chocolate cake. And it just so happened that on my half birthday this week, my niece was making it for Young Women's. So the timing was perfect!

This picture has nothing to do with my post, except it's a run I did on Saturday. But Facebook no longer lets me choose the preview picture, and I didn't want food to show up.

Half birthdays aren't that big of a deal. Well, they're more of a big deal if I feel like I haven't done much, but I do feel like I've had some good accomplishments in the past six months, and I have plans to accomplish more in the coming six months. I've heard that being 29 is harder than being 30, and I've heard people make bucket lists to accomplish while they're 29, so I'm thinking whether I want to do one.

On Friday night, I attended a mission reunion. It's not like I had anything better to do, and it has been several years since I attended one with that mission president, and he recently became a General Authority, and he was speaking in conference, so I thought I'd say hi.

I attended my first mission reunion seven years ago. Seven! In those days, I wouldn't have missed it for the world. I feel like it took me two years after I was home to adjust to "You're not a missionary anymore and it's OK." I never feel totally comfortable at reunions with this president. I only had him the last five months of my mission, during which time I was in one of the farther areas. When I talk to him at reunions, I know he barely remembers me, for the reasons I just mentioned, and because I'm frankly not that memorable. Also, I look considerably different than I did when I came home from my mission, and even then I looked considerably different than I did in my transfer board picture.

I also don't know many of the people there. I situated myself at a table with people I knew somewhat but not very well. To my knowledge, I was the oldest missionary there. (And by oldest, I mean the first to enter the mission; there were others there who were older in age.) It's always weird to meet up with various people you've unfriended through the years and see them with their multiple children...and I'm over here without even a girlfriend. I don't really mind being single, just that others think I'm deficient for being so. And let's be honest, I'd rather be single than several times divorced.

Um...I meant to make this post more thoughtful, but it's late and I'm tired. Between conference sessions yesterday and today, I made parsnip wheat berry pie,

(It was much better when it had mushrooms and asparagus instead of parsnips and wheat berries)

 carrot celery soup, and carrot cake.

Not a traditional carrot cake. Traditional carrot cake is my very favorite, though I only eat it at Easter. This version was good but underwhelming. But the quality of the cake is better than the quality of the picture!

Therefore, with all that cooking and conference watching, I'm writing this late. Maybe next week's post will be better.