Memorial Day Weekend

29 May 2018

I tweeted a cycling story last week, and I have two more. They are both similar because a cyclist passes me, and I sit on them. Since I have a fixed gear bicycle, I feel my competitive capacity is limited. I don't want to pass these people just to be passed back and die.

The first story involves a guy decked out in odd spandex. I tend to poke fun at cycle wear. I let him pass me, but he didn't leave me quick enough. I sped up to cycle with him because he is apparently faster than me. The chase was easy. We biked for a long time together. He even went on a shortcut that Google showed me. After the shortcut, we went our separate ways; however, as I cycled up a hill toward Multnomah Village, stopping before the left turn, I saw the guy that I was sitting on behind me. We may have biked together longer than I realize.

The second story involves a gal decked out in odd spandex. She passed me heading down towards Cook Park. I chased after her, cycling through the lush half mile trail. There was a stop sign, and two in a row are practically useless; plus, there was a third one before the street. I stopped at all three, and the lady did not. Seeing that she was cycling on my path, I chased again, being about 100 yards behind her. I caught up pretty quickly. (On the Friday that I was inspired to write about the life of a cyclist, this lady actually waved at me at the stoplight, having a déjà vu race in Cook Park.)

30 May 2018

I actually have a third story similar to the previous two. I am not a fast cyclist. I only have one gear, and I don't feel that racing with my bike is natural for me. My cycling form was painful before I cycled to Portland. I choose only to push the torque on my leg by a downward motion. Doing my thing, I was cycling up the hills of Terwilliger. Practically all my stories come from this road. My form is slow especially biking up hill. An old lady passed me. I sat on her pathetically for a while; then, a gorgeously competitive girl passed me with a couple other fast guys, surpassing all three of us. I was tired of being pathetic, sitting on an old lady, so I chased after the girl. When I saw that she was cycling with a fixed gear too, I continued to feel pathetic.

I seem to have been so busy last week, having plenty of time given to watch YouTube, that I did not start writing this entry until yesterday.

Jessica has taken me to and taken out food from a local Mexican place three times already, including today. The place is called "Muchos Gracias.'' My first experience was spicy. I tried all four of their salsas, and they were all very spicy. I liked them though because they all had good flavor. I don't like spicy food that doesn't have flavor. One thing, which was confusing, was that my burrito was very spicy too. The flavor was like cup of noodles with shrimp. I ate cabaza there the second time. The meat's texture felt seedy occasionally, which was a little disturbing. Jessica bought us vegetarian burritos today. She likes using the one dollar off coupons from Safeway.

I tried to video my Multnomah Village Apartment featuring the bicycle lounge film, but my videographer didn't feel like it. Jessica said that I should just make a blog post. One thing that I realized is that a YouTube channel is better than a website because a website has millions of competitors while Youtubers just compete against themselves. YouTube is the second most used search engine. I believe in going down paths with less traffic, meaning less competition. I did write a blog post though. I also reorganized my website, posting my many restaurant reviews with my Multnomah Village Apartments post for more Multnomah Village content.

I took my first PTO hours off; leaving for Capitola, California on Friday. The drive down was so-so. Driving would be so much less stressful, if its culture drove the speed limit strictly. It is nice that Jessica and I are united in this. One experience made the road trip miserable for a long time. We were driving in the right lane. When I saw two semi-trucks that were merging, I turned into the left lane. A guy was driving behind me. If he was driving the speed limit, he would not have had an issue, but he was speeding. According to them, I cut them off. Most people would think that I am stupid; I assume. Jessica and I complain of the "crazy" people that tailgate us, driving over the speed limit, all day long. Even I drive over the speed limit by five miles an hour, but most people drive passed me like I am a slowpoke. Jessica and I did have some good times; although, the guy that I "cut off" passed me in a rage splashed mud all over the car. We were lucky that it was raining.

We ate at Elmers in Eugene for breakfast. I knew that they burnt their food from the pictures of their German Pancakes, so I didn't choose it; however, the hash browns of my meal were too crispy.

Although the road trip was stressful, one good thing that resulted was that we helped a couple who needed some money for gas at a gas station, asking Jessica for help. This is one fruit of taking our road trip budget out with cash.

31 May 2018

Jessica and I were happy that we arrived in Capitola, California exactly at 6 pm. We planned to arrive in the 5 o' clock hour.

Mom prepared finger food for dinner including sticky rice and sausage. There were some vegetable stir fry, but it was not finger food.

Thomas' sister-in-law was staying with my family for the evening, and she goes by Ashley. My little brother got a Google Home Max. When I said that Ashley can have it to play any song that she likes, she asked it to play BTS, a Korean boy band. She loves the band so much that she went off talking about it for the rest of the night. Jessica was good at showing interest, but I left after dinner. Dad came to talk with me to catch up.

Trevor watched the Han Solo movie on the evening that we arrived. Jessica and I did not budget for it neither were we interested. Trevor arrived late wanting to start playing a game at 10:30 pm. Jessica & I went to sleep without the game; although, eleven at night is already late. We were going to drive home Monday. We were planning to play a game the next day with dad, but he went shopping.

Trevor, Jessica, and I played Machi Koro. Jessica won because Trevor and I were distracted by Youtube.

4 June 2018

On Saturday of Memorial Day weekend my parents took Jessica and I out for lunch at Taqueria Vallarta. I had a vegetarian burrito because we had been eating way too much meat. We went to Pop Eye's for lunch the previous day, and I felt like a savage, eating only fried chicken with their five dollar meal.

Afterward we walked to the end of pleasure point. It was about a mile and a half walk out. Walks are a family tradition. We walked to the Capitola beach on Sunday.

I asked my mom for a haircut. No one complimented me or my mom on my haircut until yesterday, when we were having dinner with my in-laws.

5 June 2018

I tend to be a DJ, when I am visiting my parents, playing their favorite music. I did this, and Trevor was out again, coming home late. We basically hung out all that evening on Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend.

On Sunday, I went to church with the Capitola Ward. It was good to see everyone. Even Craig Muirhead spoke to me. I don't think that I ever spoke to him my entire life. Ray Pike wanted to catch up, but he is serving in the young single adult branch.

Jessica & I walked to the Capitola beach as Trevor attended the Ocean YSA Branch. I wanted to nap because I had stayed up late the previous two nights. Sitting on a bench before the beach, my mother actually fell asleep on my father's shoulder as I was complaining about wanting to nap.

Many young single adults tried to sneak by us as I woke up. I could not fit in with them until after dinner we played Apples to Apples. I almost won, but Trevor won two times in a row, winning eight rounds easily.

After most of the young single adults left, Trevor asked Jessica and I whether we wanted to play Machi Koro at 10 PM with Racer and Isaiah. Trevor likes to explore bold risky strategies, getting two mines early in the game. I countered his strategy by having a tax office. I don't know how to explain how I won, but I did with many other people close to winning.

We decided to leave about 6 AM the next day, planning to arrive late in the evening in Oregon. I had little sleep, so I slept in as much as I can. I also had to take a nap on the road.

Emma is from Eugene, and she married Wesley Ledesma recently. I had Jessica contact Wesley, her cousin for tips on where we should eat for dinner. He recommended BJ’s, and I didn't realize until we arrived that I already ate at one in Hillsboro for my Apollo Mechanical Internship Review. The one in Eugene had a very different feel. Hillsboro's felt a lot more intimate. Eugene's was a lot larger, feeling like a gigantic sports bar. I got a legume & ancient grain soup in a bread bowl. When I received the dish. I was delighted to see the bread bowl top buttered & baked. I wished that it was garlic bread. After consuming that quickly, I ate the soup in less than a minute, feeling like they did not use the volume of the bread bowl well; then, I cut the bread bowl up like a pizza, and ate that. I wasn't full after, so Jessica and I shared a Pizookie. They are not as creative or original as they sound. It is just ice cream and a freshly baked cookie.

We arrived home later than we expected. By the way the Buick Century 2005 model is incredibly uncomfortable in any position. I am waiting for my wife in the car as she is at Cub Scouts, wearing a white church shirt. I wish that I can lay on the grass outside, but I don't want to stain my shirt.

The following week was highlighted by cycling behind people because I was afraid to pass people since I only have one gear. This week I am more willing to pass people. I tended to sit on girl cyclists because they don't pass as powerfully. I kind of felt like I wronged a girl. She was an avid cyclist, but she was not decked out in cycling gear. She wore soft clothing, and I could see her bony spine. People could probably see my bony spine if all I wore as a top was a soft clothed T shirt. It reminded me of running on my distance running team behind shirtless guys. I could see their spine moving like a wave. I was surprised the young woman's spine didn't. The wave motion of the spine seemed natural. After sitting on her for a while she showed fear by looking back at me a couple times. I turned up the Google's "shortcut," letting her relax.

On Friday I biked to Tualatin, and a couple young deer was trying to make their way through the town of Tigard. One almost jumped in front of me. A similar situation happened driving on Highway 17 on our way to Oregon, but these two deer in were majestic. The people in their cars at the traffic light were mesmerized, a sight that I could proudly look back to admire.

This past weekend the Maplewood Ward commemorated the restoration of the Priesthood with a barbeque. I volunteered to buy all the food. I shared the responsibility with Milo Nimori. We bought lettuce & tomatoes, which required more work than I realized. I could not assume that other people were going to wash and cut them, which was good judgment. I cut and washed the lettuce on the morning of the barbeque. We wondered if anyone else was assigned to wash and prepare everything. We almost did not bring knives and a cutting board to prepare the tomatoes. No one came with utensils, so we cut the tomatoes at the park.

After bringing all the food and preparing the vegetables, I saw that there were plenty of leaders around. I wanted to go enjoy the barbeque. I mainly wanted to swing with Jessica at the park. The swings were popular, and we were unable to get to them until after eating the food. We did go to the park before the meal. McKella, a Valiant 8 student in my class, called me Brother Hicken, which is rare for me. After walking back to the barbeque, I was approached by Mckella with another girl, asking if I would like to run a foot-race around a loop. I won of course. The path was not marked will. One of McKella's sister told me to run down a shortcut with her. She enjoyed the thrill of the race, running down the path. McKella claimed the race ended at the third corner of the loop. McKella's sister blocked me from the finish as the other girl, finished "second" exhausted. Walking back to the barbeque with them, I revealed to them that I won BYU-Idaho's cross country championship race at one time.

The barbeque was set up well, when I returned. We had prepared a good amount of vegetables. Milo ate with us, and we met another couple.

When Jessica and I were finally able to use the swings, Jessica thought how we started swinging was hilarious because we raced to see who can get to swing the highest. Starting without momentum made her laugh.

They had a pie eating contest after. Some rounds were done in like five seconds, which blew my mind. There was a couples round, which I did not want to do because I was too full. I am not a dessert person anyways. I walked away because I did not want to be pressured into it, but Jessica gave in. The bishop said that Jessica wanted to do it, and I did not have to eat any; therefore, I joined her. I sat next to her as she participated, but I did not eat any.

After the barbeque, I prepared my primary lesson for the Valiant 8 students. I taught about the birth and calling of Moses. The manual wanted the purpose of the lesson to teach them that God has a life mission that he has prepared for them. I wanted to continue emphasizing that Moses' life is in similitude of the mortal life of Jesus Christ.

Moses 1:6 "And I have a work for thee, Moses, my son; and thou art in the similitude of mine Only Begotten; and mine Only Begotten is and shall be the Savior, for he is full of grace and truth; but there is no God beside me, and all things are present with me, for I know them all."  

I taught the mandate to drown all the Hebrews male children was similar Jesus Christ. The Romans killed all of the children his age, seeking to kill Christ.

I read the following Brigham Young quote: “There is neither man nor woman in this Church who is not on a mission. That mission will last as long as they live, and it is to do good, to promote righteousness, to teach the principles of truth, and to prevail upon themselves and everybody around them to live those principles that they may obtain eternal life” (Discourses of Brigham Young, sel. John A. Widtsoe [1941], p. 322).  

I wanted to review Article of Faith 5. "We believe that a man must be called of God, by prophecy, and by the laying on of hands by those who are in authority, to preach the Gospel and administer in the ordinances thereof."

One activity that the lesson recommended me to do is have a child try to hold a loop of yarn in a shape impossible to do alone; then, other children are allowed to help make the shape. This activity showed that the church can't be led by one person. I didn't have yarn, so I had drew a dot on the board; one for each person. I instructed the children to connect the dots with chalk, restricting them from moving around by walking, jumping, or transportation. I taught that each person comes from various situations, and one person cannot connect all the dots alone. The shape represents the Kingdom of God. Everyone has a mission to fulfill within the church.

Tuesday June 12, 2018

I seem to always be a week behind. I want to catch up and publish this.

Last Monday, not yesterday, considering my budget, I realized that I could not afford to pay the year's GoDaddy service all at once. Somehow I got the idea that I could have my website hosted for free at blogger. I think that it is interesting how I could not find any free website hosting options while I research previously. I was hoping to transfer the website to Blogger, but GoDaddy said that I need to own it for more than sixty days according to the rules of the "Internet." This got me stuck with GoDaddy for another month. I called their customer service to switch my payment method to monthly rather than yearly. There is a free website hosting with Blogger, and GoDaddy will supposedly make the transfer for me.

We are running out of rice, and our budget is not ready to buy a whole twenty-five pound bag. Jessica also wants to make sandwiches for herself. I have a thing against modern loaves of bread. Jessica bought one loaf of bread, and I made myself lunch with it. One slice of bread is only one hundred calories; therefore, I had to have at least three sandwiches to have a good meal. We had sandwiches for dinner, and I finished the loaf. If we ate bread as the main source of sustenance, we would have to buy one loaf a day. Bread would become the highest expense in the food budget; however, I do believe in a high carb diet as grains are the staff of life. Doctrine and Covenants 89:14 says "All grain is ordained for the use of man and of beasts, to be the staff of life,'' I will say that brown rice’s energy count lasts a lot longer than wheat flour.

When I lived with my grandparents to work between semesters at BYUI, I learned that my grandpa was experimenting with a bread machine. A roommate of mine was actually making bread for himself as his main source of food without a machine. I have had a bread machine ever since. If one buys the ingredients for the bread in bulk, one can have bread for weeks. One thing about making bread that is nice is that an individual is not subjected to 100 calorie slices. A slice of bread can be 300 calories. The bread machine that I use is produced by Hamilton Beach.

13 June 2018

Last week I got over my fear of passing someone with a gear bike. I was sitting on a guy, and he was coming up on a slow cyclist. I didn't want to get stuck behind both of them, so I passed the two of them. One thing that I recall about a Friday is that I wanted to write about the life of a cyclist. I want to write a quote that was written on a custom shirt that my cross country team used. "Beware of x country Spartans. They tend to stampede, chase, and sit on cyclists, runners, and pedestrians."

As I have biked in Oregon, I have come to believe that cycling keeps us sane. What is the life of a cyclist like? It is more human. Fellow cyclists actually wave at you as though you are part of the community. One might want to hold a pleasant conversation with you. There is practically no traffic. There is no road rage, honking and yelling at each other, or annoying tailgating. Cycling helps relieve stress. Budgets for car gasoline are lower; and car insurance too. I use Metromile. A cyclist can bike as fast as they want, ignoring car speed limits.

On Saturday Jessica and I got around to putting the house together because we were having company over. We invited Lucas and Jasmine over to eat with the missionaries, who were our company.  I cleaned up the kitchen and bathroom as Jessica worked on the laundry and apartment reorganization. We drove up from California with a lot of stuff that we had in storage. The house was a mess.

At dinner the sister missionaries revealed to us that stake conference had a session on Saturday evening; however, we invited Lucas and Jasmine to play games. It felt rude to change plans on them.

We played Settlers of Catan. Since I was the oldest, I was able to choose the region of most probable success. My strategy's success was slow as probability did not favor me, but I got the longest road and largest army, almost having a monopoly on brick.

The challenge of the stake conference the next day was humbling. We were committed to have a gospel centered conversation with someone who is not a member of our church weekly. The member of the quorum of the seventy said that seeking to have a gospel centered conversation weekly evolved into a goal of daily talks for him personally. One week he was lead to speak to a less active return missionary at a line of a fast food restaurant, seeking to have his seventh daily conversation for the week. His palpable joy of life was an instant testament of his faith. His straight forward inquiry of religion led to a lifelong relationship that did not bear fruit immediately. This reminded me of my final day as a missionary. I flew home early because my visa ended before the transfer ended. On the flights, I engaged in conversation with everyone around me. I did not preach to a group as I have done previously. Most conversations were wholesome. One asked me for my contact information, but I was too dumb to give it. I didn't give my contact information to anyone on my mission; however, I had more than ten conversations on my flights home. I even had lunch with a missionary finishing her mission with the Jehovah Witness Church. Being a shameless missionary is wonderful, but it is hard to regain that attribute. I feel weak. I want to be a mighty disciple of Christ, but I need to work at it.

One pretty cool thing that Jessica's mother did is bake a bowl of chocolate beneath a layer of marshmallows. It turns out that one doesn't need fire to roast marshmallows.

16 June 2018

This week was a little stressful at work. I will not go into the details. I was ignoring general contractor correspondence emails, letting my project manager deal with it; however, my project manager quit, and my new project manager is figuring out my position. I also asked my operations manager whether I should I be looking into GC correspondence. I have started.

General Contractor correspondence is formal, but subcontractor correspondence is informal. A couple times issues have come up, and they are not fully explained until the last moment or after the fact. This creates unnecessary drama.

I learned that when issues are informally introduced to not consult every party and their engineers. Engineers only are consulted through the contractor.

The general contractor also said that I am not qualified to do Quality Control. That messed with my head for a couple days. They want a foreman to do it. I know that he won't, so I still need to do my Quality Control work. My role was only questioned because we are having a transition of project management.

One passive income that I have started doing is Foap. It is like the Uber of stock images. They say that a user will be paid five dollars for each of their photos that they sell. One interesting things is that each user doesn't have to have a unique portfolio. Users can add other people's pictures into their collections for more complete portfolios. If people sell photos that they don't own, they are paid 25 cents while the owner is paid 5 dollars. I don't know how much people pay for the photograph in total. I have great reviews of my pictures, but no sales.

On Thursday evening Jessica went to the Portland temple for an interview to be a volunteer. I told an apartment manager about it, since she asked about my evening plans. Maybe that counts as a gospel conversation. I also talked to someone else about BYUI if that counts. I need to raise my standard more, but it is a start.

Since Jessica was in the interview, I went to do work for a distant relative. FamilySearch recommends me to do ordinance work for people that they find as an opportunity for me in my family tree. This is my first time printing out my own relative's worksheet. I feel a special connection with this person; although, he is my fourth cousin three times removed. It is better than doing ordinance work for a random person.

I will expand ordinance work at this time. There are two Christian beliefs that are seemly contradictory without the fullness of the gospel restored.

"We believe that through the [A]tonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel. We believe that these ordinances¹ [the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel]¹ are: 1st [first], Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; 2d[second], Repentance; 3d [third], Baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; 4th[fourth], Laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost."

Christ is mighty to save all man through his atonement, but everyone must receive these ordinances. The Catholic Church baptizes children at birth to help with this. Their records are great, but what about all the people that are not part of the covenants/ordinances of the gospel who have died without any relationship with the church and Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is seeking to connect every child of Heavenly Father, which is all mankind, in the history of the earth to the family tree; for Eve is the mother of all man. These records will allow us to connect the two seemingly contradictory doctrines by performing ordinances for the dead in temples. This will be man's main work in the millennium. It may seem impossible, but the millennium is a thousand years, and it is prophesied that angels will help. We can surely figure this out in one thousand years.

Last night, which was a Friday, Jessica & I went to Scappoose, OR to see the Incredibles 2 with Jasmine and Lucas. My review is this. It is a great movie, but the story is illogical. I didn't leave feeling inspired. Simple.

This morning Trevor, my little brother, called me, and we spoke for a couple hours. Last time my little brother got into a relationship. I documented it controversially in my blog, but I won't this time. I met his girlfriend in California during our Memorial Day weekend trip.

When Mickey left, the game night crew fell apart, and Hannah revived the game night crew with Kayla. I knew that Hannah had to have an intention, showing interest in Trevor, doing so. Many times girls don't hang out just for fun. I told my dad this on the first night that I visited California. About a week ago I told Trevor this, saying if you don't act boldly you will lose a great friend.

I finally caught up.

I have one last cycling story. Most of them are on Terwilliger Boulevard. I passed a cyclist early in the path. Cycling a good pace for a while, I thought that I left him in the dust, giving into the fatigue. An interesting thing happened when I slowed down. Three cyclists passed me including the slow guy that I passed early on; so much for passing gear cyclists sufficiently. I might have let them pass because I learned not to look back in a race. It shows fear. Steve Prefontaine is famous for this.

Another reason that I may not have heard the three cyclists behind me is because I like to wear my Titanium Flare Earplugs. They are a safety personal protective equipment at work on the construction site that I purchased for my last birthday. I like to wear them, biking, on the road to muffle the street noises and to events like loud dances and movies. The earplugs are also a zero waste product because most earplugs are worn once and thrown away; however, my single pair has worked for me for about six months.

17 June 2018

Speaking of my earplugs, I forgot them on Friday in a shirt that I wore the previous day. I use free Wi-Fi calling and texting with Google Voice to save on my phone bill. The three dollar a month prepaid plan with T-mobile doesn't make much sense to me currently. I only had to pay one dollar to fulfill the minimum service balance on my last bill, but they require a minimum payment of ten dollars. It is not a big deal, but I have to figure this out. Will I have to pay ten dollars once every few months or every month? That was a recent hassle with T-mobile; however, Google Voice has been giving me a hassle too.

Google Voice thought that I was abusing their service. I am assuming this because they did not tell me why they blocked me from texting and calling Jessica, my wife. I saw in an article that Google Voice has an algorithm to monitor abuse. This has been the situation for a few months. I was all packed nearly ready to start my bike ride to work, when I realized that I forgot my earplugs. I tried my luck, calling Jessica; although, it has not been working. It worked! I tried the next day to text her, and that worked to. It seems Google Voice is giving me a second chance.

Today is Father's day and Sunday. I just got done talking to my parents. Pie was served to the patriarchs at our ward. The choice for me was easy, when I saw strawberry cheesecake. Strawberries are my favorite food and has been for my entire life.

On Monday we continued to put together our Ikea dresser. We realized that we assembled the drawers wrong, when they were missing holes, so we had to make a lot of noise, disassembling them with our hammer and mallet. We were able to reassemble the three drawers.