Poker

My husband went down to Arizona last weekend for an Ultimate Frisbee tournament.  I usually go with him, but my mom was coming into town, so I just stayed in Provo and hung out with her and my sisters.  To make a long story short, the tournament ended up being canceled due to rain after they drove 10+ hours down there.  So, Saturday night I called my husband and asked what he did all day since their tournament got canceled.  His response: "We played poker for like 6 hours" (he and his teammates at the persons house they were staying at.)

I didn't know he had ever played poker before!  My thoughts on that later... I was in total shock because this is what I was envisioning (plus a few more bottles of beer and those funny visors):

This is what the media shows us a Poker-Night-With the Guys looks like.  In reality last weekend, there was no smoking, drinking, betting of actual money... and these were all LDS RM guys!  But because I had seen this on TV, I just assumed that they were doing all of this bad stuff because they were playing poker.

I must admit though, when he got back from his trip I had him teach me how to play poker.  We used the little white and red pieces from the game Battleship as our "chips".  It is such a fun game!  I am disappointed that the media portrays poker as something dark you do in the basement, because it can be an enjoyable game that you can play.  This is just an example of how the media can turn a fun card game (assuming you don't do the betting part) into something that I'm not proud to say I know how to play.

Bedtime Reads

The story that I read my daughter tonight before bed was called 5 Busy Ducklings.

Readings to baby's is so important for helping their vocabulary to grow, plus they love to be read too!  Summing up the book would be...odd... considering their are only a few words in the actual book.  So, here are the words in the book:

1 busy duckling walks all around (turn page)
2 busy ducklings peck at the ground (turn page)
3 busy ducklings look right at you <quack> (turn page)
4 busy ducklings see the color blue (turn page)
5 busy ducklings kick their feet. Mommy quacks, "It's time to eat!" (turn page)
5 busy ducklings are on the go. 5 busy ducklings all in a row.

Even though the words are few and simple, it is the perfect length of a book for a baby to have before they get bored of the book for the night.  This book is great because it helps with learning numbers, has rhyming, and has simple pictures.  On each page there is usually just green grass and a picture of the number of ducks listed.  We talked in class about how busy the spider-man show was, and I think this book is the exact opposite.  It is so simple and easy for young children to follow along with.

The Sum of All Fears

My husband is usually the one that picks the movies we watch, so on Netflix last week we watched The Sum of All Fears.

It is an action/political thriller movie about a nuclear bomb and attacks on the US from Russia.  Basically, the US originally tried to bomb a place in the Middle East back in the 1970s, but the plane carrying it got shot down, and the bomb was never detonated.  30 years later someone discovers it, then sells it to an Austrian neo-nazi who bombs the US with it.  His goal was to have the US think that Russia bombed them, so then that would start a war between Russia and the US.  However, with the smart thinking of CIA analyst Jack Ryan, the US concludes that Russia didn't plant and detonate the bomb, and therefore eliminating the need for war between them.  And, as typical of most movies, the bad guy is killed at the end.

I felt like the movie did a good job portraying that not everyone in the world is out to get you.  The US thought their "friends", the Russians, did something horrible to them, but it was just a giant misunderstanding.  We can learn from this that we need to get all of the facts straight before we can judge someone or punish them.  This reminded me of the West Wing a little bit because the President was having to make decisions fairly quickly with deciding to attack or not.  I know that this movie had a negative affect on me because I had a nightmare that night after watching it.  However, I do think of other countries in higher light now, and know that not everyone is bad or trying to hurt us.  So, basically it did a good job at trying to eliminate the Bad World Syndrome that we might have.

Billboards

Only in Utah would you find a billboard that says "Your Body is a Temple.  Hydrate it."  It was advertising vitamin water and can be seen off of the freeway driving to Salt Lake.  I think it is interesting how companies target groups that are going to see their product.  If they were to have put that slogan up on a billboard in LA, I don't think people would remember it very much because they wouldn't get it.  Billboards seem like media to me because they can be used for advertisement, which is media.

The content on the billboard was very good because it was clean and humorous at the same time.  I wonder if the Church had anything to say about it because it touches on religion, and makes it seem like we sponsor the company.  I have always remembered this billboard more than anything mainly because it just seemed ridiculously funny to see that off of the freeway.  What other funny billboards have you seen?

Blogs

I love to read blogs and I have my own personal blog for my little family.  I would say I'm slightly addicted to reading blogs because I do it several times a day.  I feel like blogs are a great way for people to stay connected with other family members and friends that they no longer live close to.  BYU did a study on blogs and new mothers a while ago and I feel like their findings really held true for me.  I am more confident as a mother because I was able to read about the experiences of others and really connect with them.  The only bad things about blogs for me is that I read them too much!  Here's a video of my daughter that I posted on my family blog so my parents and in-laws could see it: