Utah County Census Form

1. _____________________ (Given name)

2. _____________________ (SURNAME)

3. Descendant of
A. Brigham Young _____
B. Heber C. Kimball _____
C. Laman and Lemuel _____
D. Cain _____

4. Tribe of Israel : _____________________

5. Number of occupants residing in home in each category:
(Listed in chronological order)
A. Nursery _____
B. Junior Primary _____
C. Senior Primary _____
D. Young Women's _____
E. Young Men's _____
F. Relief Society _____
G. Elder _____
H. Dearly Departed _____
I. High Priest _____

6. Occupation [Please select all that apply]:
A. Amway dealer _____
B. Shaklee dealer _____
C. Nonie juice dealer _____
D. NuSkin dealer _____
E. Melaleuca dealer _____

7. Automobile:
A. Station Wagon _____
B. Van _____
C. Suburban _____
D. School Bus _____
E. Double Decker _____
F. BMW (Big Mormon Wagon) ________

8. Favorite place to eat the night before Fast Sunday:
A. Chuck-A-Rama _____
B. Hometown Buffet _____
C. Sumo Sam's All You Can Eat Feeding Trough _____

9. Favorite Hero:
A. Nephi _____
B. Abinadi _____
C. Samuel the Lamanite_____
D. Steve Young _____
E. Johnny Lingo _____

10. Which of the following do you bring to church [check all that apply]:
A. Scriptures _____
B. Franklin Planner/ Daytimer _____
C. Pen/Pencil _____
D. Lifesavers/ Cheerios _____
E. Tic Tacs _____
F. Game Boy _____
G. Big Gulp _____
H. Cooler _____
I. I-pod _____
J. Cell Phone _____
K. All of the above _____

11. Do you prepare your church lessons:
A. A month in advance _____
B. A week in advance _____
C. During Sacrament Meeting _____
D. During the closing prayer of Sacrament Meeting _____
E. During the opening prayer of the class you're teaching ___
F. Just wing it [according to the promptings of the Spirit]

12. Do you think pews should be permanently equipped with Big Gulp holders?:
yes___ no ___

13. How many years has your family sat in the same place for Sacrament Meeting:
A. 10-20 years _____
B. 20-30 years _____
C. 30-40 years _____
D. Over 3 generations _____

14. How much time does it take for you to fall asleep during a high council talk:
A. 1/1,000,000,000th of a second _____
B. 1/999,999,999th of a second _____
C. 1/999,999,998th of a second _____

15. Which day of the month do you go home/visiting teaching:
A. 31st ______
B. 31st ______
C. 31st ______
D. 31st ______

16. How many church basketball fights were you in last year:
A. 1-10 _____
B. 10-20 _____
C. 20-30 _____
D. You'll have to ask my lawyer _____

17. Which of the following has been your most effective Family Home Evening:
A. Arguing about getting along
B. Having an opening and closing prayer with dinner
C. Gathering around the television to watch "Dancing with the Stars"?

18. How many times a year do you make:
A. Green Jell-O salad _____
B. Funeral potatoes _____
C. Cabbage and Top Ramen salad ____
D. Turkey,cashews and grape-stuffed croissants_____

19. How many water-filled two-liter bottles do you own:
A. 1-2 thousand _____
B. 2-3 thousand _____
C. 3-4 thousand _____
D. Enough to fill the Great Salt Lake _____

20. How many pounds of wheat do you own that is more than 10 years past the expiration date?
A. 10,000
B. 20,000
C. 30,000
D. Don't know but likely enough to feed Egypt for 7 years of famine

21. Which of the following do you feel is the most secure facility in the
nation:
A. Alcatraz
B. Fort Knox
C. Ward Libraries

22. How many structural engineers do you hire annually to insure you'll win the pinewood derby: _________

23. Keeping the Word of Wisdom in mind, how much of the following do you consume:
A. Chocolate: ___ pounds daily X 365 days annually = ____
B. Cola: ____gallons daily X 365 days annually = ____

24. True or True (circle one), Watching the Super Bowl is acceptable as a "Keep the Sabbath" activity.

Life is to be Enjoyed

"Life is to be enjoyed not just endured."

--President Hinckley

Exercise for People over 40

Begin by standing on a comfortable surface, where you have plenty of
room at each side.

With a 5-lb potato bag in each hand, extend your arms straight out from
your sides and hold them there as long as you can.

Try to reach a full minute, and then relax.

Each day you'll find that you can hold this position for just a bit
longer. After a couple of weeks, move up to 10-lb potato bags.

Next, try 50-lb potato bags and then eventually try to get to where you
can lift a 100-lb potato bag in each hand and hold your arms straight
for more than a full minute. (I'm at this level.)

After you feel confident at that level, put a potato in each bag.

Personal Goals

• Succeed at home first.
• Be anxiously engaged in good causes.
• Cheerfully fill the stapler when it’s empty.
• Seek and merit divine help.
• Never compromise with honesty.
• Remember the people involved.
• Give 10% of your time and money to your church and 10% to your community.
• Hear both sides before judging.
• Obtain counsel of others.
• Defend those who are absent.
• Hustle while you wait.
• Listen twice as much as you speak.

You Get What You Attract

"What you perceive in this world is largely a reflection of your own attitudes and beliefs. Life will give you what you attract with your thoughts; think, act and talk negatively and your world will be negative. Think and act and talk with enthusiasm and you will attract positive results."

--Michael LeBeuf

Clean Stand-up Comedy

Do you enjoy stand-up comedy as much as I do?

I just read a great article about Mormon stand-up comedians who keep their humor clean.

See the comments at the end of the link for names of other clean comedians.

Sorrow and Happiness

"We have no right to ask when sorrow comes, 'Why did this happen to me?' unless we ask the same question for every moment of happiness that comes our way."

--Author Unknown

E-book of Learning Through Life's Trials

Two weeks ago, I wrote an article about e-reader devices for reading books after attending the Publishing Business Conference in New York City about e-readers and the future of publishing.

So, last night I experimented in creating an e-book version of my booklet Learning Through Life’s Trials, which is an expanded version of the article that appears in this month’s Ensign magazine.

To make a long story short, my e-book is now available at Amazon Kindle, Smashwords, LearningThroughTrials, and within a few weeks will show up at places like the Sony Reader Store.

Read more details about how I created the e-books.

Kai Tak Airport in Hong Kong

Watch this great video about the Kai Tak Airport in Hong Kong.

For any of you who ever lived in or visited Hong Kong before 1997 and were fortunate to land at the old Kai Tak Airport you will love this. For any of you who missed this experience you may still get an idea of what a high skill level pilots needed to land a large plane on a narrow strip of land that ran out into the Hong Kong harbor. Often we joked that we could look in the window of apartment 39 B and see what they were having for their supper upon our approach. Someone did a fantastic job of compiling different shots of many flights at various times of the day. Good memories.

This approach was my introduction to commercial aviation. I was based in Hong Kong with Pan Am on the DC-6 from 1966 to 1968. We did not have the modern approach aids pictured on the approach plate but we followed approximately the same route. We flew a heading off of the Cheung Chow NDB (non-directional beacon) and descended to our minimum altitude, 1000 feet. If we were lucky we would see the spotlighted checkerboard painted on an 800 foot cliff directly ahead. We watched the runway out of the copilot's side window (and the checkerboard ahead) to know when to initiate our turn to final approach. Once the turn was started, we could no longer see the runway until we rolled out on the runway heading. This explains the undershoots and overshoots you will see in this short film. It really was an adventure. A short time after we left Hong Kong, JAL landed long and put a Convair 880 into the water off the end of this runway.

God is Our Pilot

God Promises Safe Landing

Healing from Depression Through Jesus Christ

This is an inspiring video about depression that was 6 months in the making. Please share it with your friends and family.



This video is based on a 55-minute talk by Carrie Wrigley from the 2005 BYU Education Week. The full talk, Christ-Centered Healing from Depression and Low Self-Worth is available in video and mp3 format from BYU Broadcasting. A transcript of the full talk is available from Morning Light Counseling.

Achievement

It's not what you achieve in life that matters--it's what you overcome.

Where Would We Be?

"Where would we be if we all just sat there and said ‘where would we be now’, but nobody was prepared to go and find out where we would be if we actually went?"

--English translation of quote by Kurt Marti

Because You Can

Just because you can doesn't mean that you should.

Publishing Business Conference: Future of Publishing

I've posted online my set of notes from the Publishing Business Conference.

The Future of Publishing

At the Publishing Business Conference in New York City, I attended keynote addresses by two leaders in the publishing industry about the future of magazine and book publishing:

Cathie Black, President of Hearst Magazines (Cosmopolitan, Esquire, O, Good Housekeeping, Popular Mechanics, Harpers Bazar, etc.) talked about the future of magazine publishing. She believes that magazines have a strong future. She doesn’t believe that the decline in newspapers has to bleed over to magazines, as long as they continue to provide value. It’s not digital vs. print, but digital + print. They are launching a major advertising campaign in their magazines to promote magazines. Strong growth internationally—they sell 1 million copies of Cosmo in Russia. Every one of their magazines has a Web site. A consortium of magazines (Next Issue Media) is trying to develop a subscription/advertising model for magazines on reader devices.

Jane Friedman (CEO OpenRoad Integrated Media, former CEO HarperCollins) talked about the future of book publishing. She said that the book business is not evolving—it is in a revolution. Publishing used to be about editors selecting titles, publishers publishing them, and then distributing them to see what sold. They didn’t know much about their audiences. Today, it is critical to provide exactly the right content, delivered when and how the audience wants it. Jane founded OpenRoad Interactive Media to publish (1) the full breadth of an author—their full backlist), (2) partnerships to market for other publishing companies, (3) e-riginals (books born digitally) that will be e-books and also printed on demand, and (4) discovery—they provide marketing for self-published books. (There were 700,000 self-published books last year.) She believes that in 5 years, 40% of revenue for publishing houses will come from e-books.

Difficulty or Opportunity?

"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."

-- Winston Churchill

Know Your Congressmen

"We will all be better citizens when voting records of our Congressmen are followed as carefully as scores of pro-football games."

--Lou Erickson (1914 - )

Steve Forbes Keynote Address

I’m at the Publishing Business Conference in New York City, and just attended the keynote address by Steve Forbes, one of the nation’s foremost economic prognosticators (and also the chairman and CEO of Forbes Media and editor-in-chief of Forbes magazine).

Current and future economy

Forbes believes there are huge economic problems. Government spending is at an all-time high. Massive national debt. However, America in not in decline. We will grow 3-4% in real terms this year. Watch the US dollar—not against other currencies—just look at the price of gold. You need a strong dollar to have a strong recovery. Also look for tax cuts. Bailouts and spending has to stop. These will be signs of a recovery.

Timetable for a full recovery

Forbes is an optimist. He believes there are solutions to the above. We can’t compete with other countries on commodities and manufacturing. We need to take the game to the next level, like we did with the information age and technological innovation. He believes that governments need to reign in spending and allow the economy to grow. Given a benign environment, he believes that the economy can grow more quickly than we think.

Shifting publishing and media landscape

The Web is fundamentally changing the publishing industry—and the bad economy is accelerating the timeframe that we have to adjust to these changes. “Creative destruction” is Forbe’s term for how capitalism will save us. Get over worrying about platforms and delivery and determine the “value added.” Consumers are evaluating the value added by their purchase. People want useful, unique, and specialized content. Aggregators are doing well because people value the convenience. Break down your content in a way that people can access/consume it.

E-readers will not be the salvation of the publishing industry. However, people are willing to pay for the convenience (large library, immediate access, variable type size, lower price point). People are coming to expect the price point of $9.99.

The circulation of Forbes magazine as never been stronger. [Interesting note: Forbes has a circulation of nearly a million—about the same circulation as the Ensign magazine.]

Internationally, there is a huge market waiting. The combination of entertainment and the Web have huge potential. There will be a lot of experimentation to determine the right combination that people want.

Printed publications will remain. In fact, they lend a level of credibility to the digital offerings.

Wisdom

The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.

Avoid the evils of pornography!

Isn't it strange that pornography still flourishes virtually unhindered in today's society inspite of testimonies such as these?

Serial Killer Ted Bundy shares his last interview before being executed.

Trust

"God has entrusted me with myself."

--Epictetus

Protecting Families from Pornography Conference

The Utah Coalition Against Pornography will hold its 9th Annual Conference on Protecting Children and Families from Pornography and Other Harmful Material on Saturday, March 27, 2010, 9:00am – 1:00pm, at the Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City, Utah.

This conference has become recognized nationally for its efforts to protect children and families from pornography and other harmful material. Each year, UCAP unites various agencies and organizations who seek to establish and maintain standards of decency in our communities and promote safety for children and families. The focus of the vast array of presentations in this conference will address the issues of pornography and other harmful material that threatens the foundation of stable life for individuals, families, and communities. The purpose of this conference is to educate the citizens about problems related to obscenity, provide resources and help, and teach people what they can do to promote community standards that will safeguard children and families.

Learn more about the conference on the UCAP site.