"This weekend there was a conversation or an e-mail which reminded of Elder Bednar's talk about being too easily offended. The talk is on pages 89-92 of the November 2006 Ensign, and I think it, like President Benson's talk on pride, is appropriate for each of us in this family to review regularly, like once every six months. Let me quote one paragraph:
I could quote the entire talk. It would probably be good for me to type it out, as I tend to learn things from words when I type them out, which I do not learn when I simply hear them. Maybe it is a psychological reaction to my mother. And just maybe that is an excuse psychologists have propagated because the only folks who who go into psychology are folks who never learned how to have reasonable relationships in their family of origin. And who am I to point a finger, and have four fingers pointing back at me?
Sunday was busy. I prepared my Primary lesson in the morning. Before class there was a practice for the entire Primary to go through the songs to be performed at the Ward Christmas Party on Saturday night. During the practice session I spent a little time talking to Brother Siebert about how the exploration idea we discussed earlier (../0537.html). I also asked permission to approach his wife about collaborating on putting some of my songs to a musical score and submitting them to the church. He told me I did not need to ask his permission to talk to his wife about this. The regulars were in attendance in Primary Class: Ashley, Dylan, Morgan, and Jonathan. I wonder why the others do not come? Is it my lessons? Is it my post cards? Brother Larson is back, and he was in the classroom with me. Again, it is fun to sing the Primary songs with him. I do not understand why he is not more involved in the ward. Sacrament meeting included a talk by a High Councilor. OK talks. After sacrament I gave a copy of the form I discovered the week before when preparing my Primary Lesson for submitting songs to the church, and a copy of my song "Nephi's Vision I Nephi 11:2-22" (../0317.html) to Sister Siebert. It will be interesting to see if this goes anyplace. After church Andrea and I had our annual tithing settlement. It always feels right and good to me to be able to declare we have paid a full tithe. Bishop Harlan is very organized, and has a very good spirit about him.
Sunday evening was the annual concert with Epiphany. There were a couple of solos I was afraid were going to fall flat. However, all of the music seemed to go well. Father Jack M. Dinkins was the most negative he has been in 13 years of concerts. Specifically he made a point to refer to us as Mormons twice in his comments. I was surprised, and yet it only makes sense this joint concert can not always go smoothly. The attendance was disappointing. I'm sure part of the reason there were so many empty seats was because of the rain. I expect a bigger issue is that after 13 years it has become somewhat 'routine,' and there was not the advertising and telling others about the concert which has happened in the past. Then maybe my comments about Father Dinkins are just because I am easily offended. I was surprised by our choir director's comments, Sister Linda Nuttall, when we got together before going into the sanctuary to sing. She said: 'Being able to conduct this concert is the highlight of my life.' This comment places this experience over the birth, blessing, baptism, or marriage of her children, over her own marriage and sealing for time and eternity, and over any other event in her life. It reminded me of the Chinese leader of a delegation to Landmark, whom we took to a baseball game at the Astrodome. We had seats behind home plate, and a foul ball was hit up into the stands and landed in her lap. Several young boys tried to take the baseball from her, and I would not let them. Later she told us 'This was the highlight of my life!' I thought then that her life must have been pretty limited for this to be said, and certainly for it to be true. Sister Nuttall's comment has led to me spending time all week thinking about what is the highlight of my life. There are so many, in so many different areas, I have no idea how to respond to this question. Certainly I could list lots and lots of events which I consider more of a highlight than conducting a choir or catching a baseball. And yet I truly believe these events were significant highlights for these individuals. Hopefully I have contributed to providing each of you a path where you will have multiple highlights of great significance in your individual lives.
Monday morning George Schultz called and said Mike Schoemann was taking a day of vacation. I found this news very frustrating, as Mike had shown me how to interpolate a velocity volume and I submitted it just before we left on Friday. Turns out the job wasn't finished yet. I called Mike and he wanted me to finish repicking velocities on the one line which was not done like the other 23, and resubmit the interpolation job on a faster computer. The bottom line is there was another day with no work for me to do, and memories of why I did not want to be a seismic processor early in my career. I used the day to do a couple of things that came up over the weekend. First I copied Bob Scott's history section from all of the old POPS (Pioneer Oil Producers Society) for Pat Heaney. He just got a new job as a radio announcer with a station that plays in Houston and Dallas, and the one common thread between the two cities is the oil industry. I imagined a regular radio show about these kinds of history stories, and imagined a book put out summarizing these stories every so often. I gave the copies to him on Saturday, and he was cordial with regards to the idea. I also worked on the Nauvoo powerpoint Andrea wanted presented to the seminary classes. I think the presentation turned out quite nice, and would make for a great family home evening lesson. If any of you are interested it is at http://www.walden3d.com/photos/Trips/061123-25_Nauvoo/061124_Trip_to_Nauvoo.ppt. The only issue is it is 455,131,648 bytes in size (read that 456 MB).
Monday evening was the second Empty Nester Family Home Evening we have been to at George and Becky Schultz' house. It was a fun evening. After a fabulous pot luck dinner, everyone went in the living room for a white elephant exchange. George gave a brief lesson, and then had everyone introduce themselves. I introduced myself as Howard, Howard Roice Nelson, or H.R. the Houston equivalent of the Dallas J.R. It got the evening moving on a very lighthearted keel. Bishop Feil jumped up and pointed out I forgot the Junior. Then someone tried to pick up one of the Schultz' decorations as a white elephant gift, and Becky quickly corrected them. I asked if it was the 'B.S. Grinder' I had brought to the previous Empty Nester's FHE, explaining that Becky thought B.S. stood for Becky Schultz (../0203.html). John McReynolds was there, and I gave him a bad time about not getting baptized yet. He told me he will never quit smoking. Maybe he is right, and maybe his heart will soften. I hope so. There is so much good accompanying active participation in the church. George asked me to give the closing prayer, which I found flattering, especially given my comments on his belief in the 9/11 conspiracy theories. We had picked up Sister Schmidt and given her a ride to the party. She seemed to have had a good time. I hope I'm doing as well if I live to be 85.
Tuesday I went to early morning seminar and gave the presentation on Nauvoo. All of the seminary classes met together. Andrea started off the presentation, and made some comments which I found very embarrassing. They were unnecessary comments about my boss taking the day off work and me spending the entire day working on the presentation. The implication I was sneaking around behind my bosses back, and implying to all the seminary teachers and youth that I was somehow being dishonest at work hurt. I don't think she meant to hurt, and it is another reason I thought about Elder Bednar's talk on those easily offended. I didn't say anything about it until Friday evening, and I'm sure the fact I was upset and didn't say anything Tuesday morning (embarrassed is probably the proper word), contributed to making it a hard week for Andrea. I'm sorry. However, I'm not sure Andrea will see this apology since she hasn't read the Thoughtlets since I quoted from Arthur Conan Doyle's first Sherlock Holmes book (../0444.html), showing she can also be easily offended. I went from seminary to an eye doctor exam. I haven't been to see Dr. Blair for over 2 years, even though I've had my left lens broken for over a year. I like him. My eyes seem very stable, and the only thing he requested was that I use the artificial tears eye drops every morning and every evening until my next visit.
I did not get back to the office until 10:00. It turns out Les Denham did not come in because he had a high temperature and was quite sick. I had attempted to coordinate with Maureen to get hold of Dr. Marfurt at the University of Houston to get him to change the day he visited with Les. Maureen had already left a message. Dr. Marfurt did not get the message, and when I got to the office the first thing Lee Bell said was that I was not there to meet with Kirt when Les was out. Oh well! In addition, the contact with the dGB consortium came by at 10:00 to deliver Geokinetics a new set consortium deliverables. I arrived at the office just in time for this meeting. dGB is the company with the "free" seismic interpretation software (../0441.html, ../0442.html, ../0444.html, and ../0516.html). Geokinetics and dGB formed a consortium to build velocity model building software, and have two oil companies sponsoring the consortium. It was an interesting meeting, and I ended up contributing quite a bit because of my experience. I guess this is why Lee Bell wants me to learn pre-stack depth migration, so I can be of benefit to the consortium design meetings. I suggested they look at Sketch-up, and Kristopher ended up spending an hour in my office looking at the tutorials and becoming introduced to the capabilities of this software. Then Tuesday afternoon I followed Mike Schoemann to I-45 and the Tollroad, across the freeway from Greenspoint, to visit Noble Oil. The objective was to learn details regarding the geology of the project I am working on. This project is so much more risky than any of the Dynamic Resources opportunities. If it is there and if a well can be put down 30,000+ feet, the opportunity is giant. However, it is still small compared to Dick Coons opportunities in Cabinda or Denmark. Oh well! Time will tell!
Tuesday evening Matt called to correct my comments in 0626.html, specifically to point out there was only one member of the Triple Duces decommissioned at Camp Gordon, where Matt was in Advanced Individual Training. Everyone else was at Camp Shelby. Marc came by and did a backup of all of the system in the evening. This was preparation for downloading a new version of the operating system on Thursday.
Wednesday through the rest of the week I re-picked the velocities at the base of the survey. When I picked the velocities the first pass through, it was done on a zoomed in window, and the velocities below this window were just interpolated. There was too much lateral variation in these interpolated velocities, and so the very bottom velocity needed to be repicked in order to smooth out the model. In addition, the velocities I picked on Wednesday were all wrong because I had the wrong velocity file in the background. Oh well! I think it was Wednesday night Melanie called and said we should watch a special CNN was doing about racism in America. They had a really slammed Vidor, Texas the night before as the home of the Klu Klux Klan. Melanie had written them an e-mail, and thought she was going to be quoted on the continuing Paula Zhan special that evening. So we watched it. Melanie was not quoted, and the CNN program was news sensationalism at it's worst. No wonder Melanie was easily offended by what they showed about her adopted home town. Later in the week she sent me this e-mail:
So I'm going to be controversial and write some of my thoughts about the Klu Klux Klan and Vidor, Texas. I vividly recall when I told Rick Zimmerman about Melanie marrying someone from Vidor and moving to Vidor how his immediate response was 'That's the home of the KKK in Texas.' I discretely asked Melanie about it, and in effect she said it has been a problem in the past and it is blown out of proportion by those who are easily offended. She also told me how her new brother-in-law, the Institute teacher in Austin, gets very angry whenever anyone talks about Vidor as the home of the KKK. Jared told me he remembers the KKK standing on the street corners of Vidor in their hoods collecting donations. The bottom line in my mind is where there is smoke there is usually fire, and there is definitely smoke relative to the KKK and Vidor, Texas.
So how does the KKK presence relate to the church and Vidor? The church has been in Vidor for many generations, going back to at least the late 1800's. During this time the KKK was as much against 'Mormons' as they were against 'Blacks.' This is best illustrated by a story. Quoting from Volume 1 of 'Golden Kimball Stories' by James Kimball pages 31-33:
As with many of the J. Golden Kimball stories it is very funny from our perspective. And yet during most of the time the Church has been in Vidor, Texas, there has been a prohibition against 'Blacks' holding the priesthood. I can see this 'doctrine' as a basis of tolerance by the KKK for the church. Sadly, I anticipate there could even have been some church members who were led astray and became involved in the KKK, using the priesthood prohibition as justification. This, even though history shows the Missouri persecutions were largely driven by members of the church voting as a block, and voting against slavery. Just as I see God's hand through history, I also see Satan's hand through history. The church's brave stand against slavery on the far western frontier in the 1830's and 1840's became a source of persecution, leading to being burned out of their homes and to many being killed in the middle of the winter. The church's policy of limiting blacks from holding the priesthood became a source of persecution during the Civil Rights movement 120 years later. I've previously written about blacks being given the priesthood (../0114.html), and this is a separate topic. In my mind, the key point relative to Vidor, Texas and the KKK, is the reality of Satan. Because Vidor and Gilmore, Texas were the first two firm footholds in Texas for the church, it is logical Satan would position his minions to denigrate the communities where the restored gospel was becoming firmly established. And it is logical this same type of perception will be promoted and 'shouted from the housetops' (D&C 1:3) by his minions today, including those who get caught up in the moment, which in my mind can include some of the 2006 liberal media types. Hopefully those who read these controversial thoughts are not going to be easily offended.
Thursday, 14 December 2006, I wrote a possible stanza for Prime Words based on an AudioTech Business Book Summary of a book called 'Shake that Brain,' by Joel Saltzman:
I figured out how to make velocity picking bearable. I turned my PC into an expensive radio, listening to on-line streaming of the classical music station, or an expensive CD player, listening to AudioTech Business Book Summaries. The music or the words kept me awake, and it doesn't seem to be so loud that it causes a problem for Lee Bell, whose office is next to mine. Thursday evening the missionaries came over for dinner. Nice guys. The new Elder, Elder Smith, has roots in Cedar City. Both of his parents are from Cedar City, and I went to school with his uncle, Brent Sorenson (../9904.html). Later Thursday evening Marc and I figured out that AT&T did not push the new IP address out, and we sent an e-mail to the group who did our IP address before. This resulted in having access to the walden3d.com website for the first time in a week on Friday. We still don't know if the e-mail is going to work or if the denial of services is still going to be affecting the system. We were on the phone with different technical support folks until about 11:30 PM on Thursday evening. Were I a different personality, I could have been easily offended.
Friday evening Andrea and I had a long discussion. She has been hurting inside all week, which seems to happen each Christmas. It didn't help that I was embarrassed on Tuesday morning and have waited until the emotions died down before I wanted to talk about it. She wanted to change the plane tickets to Utah, and to only go up for Michael's wedding reception on Saturday. However, Matt called after we had been talking for about an hour, had a very good conversation with her, and things seemed back on track again for our Christmas week in Zion Canyon (0653.html). Then we watched a video I ordered from ABC news called 'Last Days on Earth.' It summaries 7 scenarios which could end life as we know it:
Saturday morning I got up early to convert another Thoughtlet (0632.html) to html, and to work on this Thoughtlet. At 8:00 I was at the church to help set up for the Ward Christmas Party. Jeff Jurinak, Bill Hagen, and I ended up pulling the four Bethlehem panels we had in the garage out and taking them to the church with instructions from Andrea that they are not to come back to our house. Then we drove to Barker Cypress and almost I-290 to pick up 10 more of these panels. It was about 11:00 when I got back. I had a shower and took the POPS minutes over to Pat Haney, and then worked on this. The lights were blinking on the e-mail again, and so it looks like walden3d.com is still being hit by a netbot denial of services (0650.html). Marc came over and traffic is about 1/3rd less than it was before we got the new IP address. Hopefully the spammers have figured out they are not getting paid to not deliver e-mail to walden3d.com.
Saturday evening was the Ward Christmas party. It started right on time at 6:30 PM in the chapel, where there was Christmas carol singing. A Roman Centurion called us to go to Jerusalem (the cultural hall) and pay our taxes with coins given as we entered the chapel. In the cultural hall was a wonderful Mediterranean feast, with lamb, humus, flatbread, and all of the fixings. It was really good, and I ate way too much lamb. After the feast was a wonderful program by the Primary, and then a live silent nativity in the Relief Society Room on the way out. Then we put our costumes in the car, and went in and helped clean up the cultural hall. This wasn't just a good Christmas Party, this was a great Christmas Party. I hope each of you had at least one opportunity to reflect on the birth of Christ in an environment close to as special as this Ward Christmas Party was for me.
Sunday I worked on Thoughtlets most of the day. Because there was an extra week without a lesson from the lesson manual, I took a game and played the guitar for my Primary Class today. The kids are too used to me, and they were pretty much off the wall. I guess there is great wisdom in changing classes and teachers each year. I have one more lesson to give them next week, on Christmas, and then I will get a new class when we get back from Christmas in Zion (0653.html). Sacrament meeting was good. I wrote three possible stanzas for Prime Words on the 17th of December based on talks by (a) Michael Kennerson, (b) Jacque Heaney, and (c) Mark Warden:
Sunday after church Andrea and I wrote a letter to each of the 10 of you regarding what we are giving you for Christmas. I went and Home Taught the Minors. I read from Thomas S. Monson's talk, sang 'The First Prayer' (../0044.html), and ended up telling them about my conversion in Corvallis, Oregon (../9715.html). Hayden Hudson and Dong Liu were not home. Andrea went downtown to see The Messiah with Jana McClain. I also had a nice Home Teaching visit with Chris and Michelle Schmidt. The elders were there finishing dinner. They had a second meeting with the young man they told us about on Thursday, and he had several questions. While the Schmidts were doing the dishes, I helped them think through answers to the questions. Jonathan was very receptive to my lesson. At least none of these folks are easily offended."