The Warmth of the Sun

Disneyland 2011

2012-01-03T18:50:00.000-08:00

202 photos from a year's worth of visits to Disneyland. You can keep going back and getting all sorts of different pictures. This album has many things you might not expect to see.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR. Click here to go to the album's flickr page and to see a bigger slideshow.

The Cure 2011

2011-11-25T15:43:00.001-08:00

Got to see The Cure last Monday night. It was the first time I'd seen them in concert since 2004 and the first time I've seen them with my cousin Jason since 1992. They played at the small Pantages theater on Hollywood Blvd. and had several former members back in the band and played their first three albums (Three Imaginary Boys, Seventeen Seconds, Faith) in their entirety plus all the B-sides from those periods.

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Wildlife Encounters

2011-09-05T00:28:00.000-07:00

Here's a coyote I saw two days ago while walking along the San Diego Creek:He was just looking for a hiding place until the humans went away.

Two Guys Named Joe: Master Animation Storytellers Joe Grant & Joe Ranft

2011-06-10T11:18:00.000-07:00

Two Guys Named Joe: Master Animation Storytellers Joe Grant & Joe Ranft by John Canemaker

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This may seem like an obscure book among obscure books but read it and you will find out these two guys named Joe are responsible for some of the most memorable elements of Disney and Pixar films from 1933 to 2005 and possibly beyond. For instance, Dumbo and Lady and the Tramp may not have even been made if it weren't for Joe Grant. And that's just for starters.

View all my reviews

Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business

2011-06-10T11:03:00.001-07:00

Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business by Danny Meyer

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Excellent book which every business owner should read. Don't fool yourself into thinking that it's just for restaurants or that it'll show you some good tricks for tricking your customers into thinking you care about them. This shows how to practice genuine hospitality and shows how the benefits come from that.

View all my reviews

Trader Joe's: The Song

2011-03-02T22:48:00.000-08:00

When I went to Trader Joe's earlier tonight I was reminded of this ingenious video I found on YouTube a while back. This guy really nails the complete Trader Joe's experience with a clever, quick, catchy, observant song:

The part I related to earlier tonight was how you find this really cool item at Trader Joe's and you get it every time you go, then one time you go back and they don't have it anymore. Then you ask one of their team members about it and they confirm it's gone and then you ask if it was because of low sales and they say, "No, it's just gone."

It's not a baguette; it's a lightsaber

2011-02-25T15:41:00.000-08:00

George Lucas totally wishes HE had made this:

Old Spice Harold B. Lee

2011-01-20T18:37:00.000-08:00

Watch this:

Then watch this:

Random Flickr Photos

2011-01-15T10:42:00.000-08:00

Sometimes you can go to flickr and look around and find some super cool photos. And it doesn't take much looking. Here's a few I have recently found:

241 Lydia

2010-11-07T21:29:00.000-08:00

If you don't recognize this house I don't blame you. About a month ago I was in La Habra and went looking for Grandma and Grandpa Ziebarth's house. I found it but when I found it I didn't realize I had found it because, from the outside at least, it looked completely unfamiliar to me. I pulled alongside it to take a picture and right then one of the current residents came out so I took it quickly from behind the van parked in front of the house. If I had had more time I might've got out and told them I used to visit my grandparents there. Maybe they would've let me look inside. And maybe I'll try again another time. But even if I don't I'll still remember all the good times there.

Yo Gabba Gabba Vans

2010-11-01T20:06:00.000-07:00

Since all I do lately is express myself by posting other peoples' videos here's one of Muno from Yo Gabba Gabba skateboarding around to promote the new Yo Gabba Gabba Vans shoes:

Oh, and some more:

Shakespeare by the Sea

2010-08-24T08:31:00.000-07:00

I was actually going to write this blog entry last year. Now I'm finally writing it. In July of last year I was invited by some friends to see a "Shakespeare by the Sea" performance of The Bard's "As You Like It." I didn't know how exciting it would be since it's not all special effects and stuff, but I decided to go and it was actually quite enjoyable. The play was performed at a natural outdoor ampitheater at a park in Torrance. And it was actually the whole play; they didn't take any cheesy shortcuts. So it was great being out in nature and watching a very non-technological performance. This was all about human drama, comedy, hidden identities, performance ability and the like.

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

Then I thought I would never be doing it again until a couple weeks ago I was invited to see a performance of William Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night," this time at a park in San Pedro. Again it was just as enjoyable. Maybe I'll go next year. Thanks to Tara van Atta for letting me steal a few pictures.

"Slap me some tassel"

2010-05-26T19:04:00.001-07:00

When I wrote for Animated News I used to get all sorts of neato stuff sent to me. One of my favorite things was this Aladdin-themed mousepad that looks just like the magic carpet from the film, complete with real tassels:

Click here to see some bigger versions of the photo so you can catch all the detail.

Beaker breaks a wine glass

2010-03-22T22:44:00.000-07:00

And sets a violin on fire:

Avast Ye Scurvy Swabs!

2010-03-13T10:43:00.000-08:00

Nothing like a little Mormon-y pirate fun:

Will Jack Sparrow and Captain Barbossa be in the next one?

Dessert Nachos

2010-02-04T23:13:00.000-08:00

So far I have been to over 200 Mexican restaurants in Orange County and for a few years I had a list of my top three (though I like many things from many places). Recently my top three (Taco Rosa, Taleo, and Gabbi's) became my top four when Sol Cocina opened in Newport Beach in the spot formerly occupied by Mamma Gina's Italian Restaurant.

Sol Cocina serves Baja-style food with a hint of an upper class touch to it. In Baja they don't have nachos but the chef for Sol Cocina, Deb Schneider, was asked to add nachos to the menu so she invented some dessert-style nachos called Nachos Dulce and The Orange County Register just posted a video showing her how to make them yourself:

Conan, Oh Conan

2010-01-21T23:11:00.000-08:00

I've been a fan of Conan O'Brien for a long time. Ever since he was announced in 1993 as the host to take David Letterman's place on Late Night I thought it was awesome that they picked a veritable unknown to fill the slot when so many famous names had been bandied about as potential replacements. I just had to see what was going to happen. I loved how on the very first night of the show he came out and sang an a capella version of Edelweiss from The Sound of Music and leg wrestled with John Goodman (I think it was John Goodman). From that point I was hooked and I watched the show as much as I could. When it was announced in 2004 that Conan would take over The Tonight Show in 2009 I couldn't wait for it to happen.

Then when all the current late night talk show mess came up a couple weeks ago I hoped everything would sort itself out but unfortunately it all went from bad to worse. While I think NBC holds the lion's share of the blame for the mess they've got themselves in I can't help but wonder if Conan couldn't have handled things better. If he wanted The Tonight Show so bad maybe he could've tried the 12:05am time slot. But he didn't even give it a chance and now he has no Tonight Show. Maybe if he had tried it it would've eventually moved back to the 11:35 time slot, or, better yet, 11:30. But we'll never know because he didn't even give it a try and now we'll have to watch the last episode of The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien in early 2010, rather than in, say, 2029 when he probably would've retired otherwise. And his 200-person staff will be out of jobs much earlier than expected.

Hopefully Conan can thrive elsewhere at a place that appreciates him. But I still have him inextricably linked in my mind to NBC, not to the stupid execs per se, but to the concept of NBC, with the peacock emblem and the "Tonight Show" label and all that. Somehow David Letterman didn't seem quite the same when he left NBC and I'm afraid the same thing will happen with Conan. Please prove me wrong. I'm still with you, Coco; I just hope it's not downhill from here. I still think NBC should see what they can do to keep him on. I don't care about his big payout to leave. That doesn't mean they can't still fix things.

Certainly there's more important problems in this world (Haiti relief, anyone?), a fact which Conan himself acknowledged on the show, but does that mean all the little dreams have to end?

Everyone loves the Muppets

2009-12-16T22:34:00.000-08:00

(found at Disney, etc.)

The Muppets: Bohemian Rhapsody @ Yahoo! Video

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-26T12:36:00.001-08:00

Everybody wants to be a . . . LoveCat?

2009-11-21T11:49:00.000-08:00

In more cat news, here is a commercial for a television broadcast of Disney's The Aristocats set to the song "The LoveCats" by The Cure:

This is funny because I had a Cure bootleg one time where Robert was singing "Everybody . . . everybody . . . everybody wants to be a cat," in the middle of another song, and it might've been "The LoveCats." I'm just a little fuzzy on that last part.

Passing on Christian the Lion Hugs

2009-09-30T22:05:00.000-07:00

So, here's a clip of Christian the Lion hugging his human friends Ace and John:

And here's a clip of my friend Lisa Williams hugging Ace and John:

And here's a clip of me and Lisa hugging after we met in person at Disneyland a couple weeks ago (yes, it was dark):

So I can say I've hugged someone who's hugged the two guys who hugged Christian the Lion.

To show how popular the Christian the Lion clip is I just now saw it highlighted on a Yahoo! Video of the 100 Greatest YouTube clips ever:

100 GREATEST HITS OF YOUTUBE IN 4 MINUTES @ Yahoo! Video

Pride and Prejudice . . . and Zombies?

2009-08-30T23:17:00.000-07:00

From time to time I update on what books I am reading so here's some of the stuff I'm reading now:

The Illusion of Life
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
A Lively Hope
National Treasure: Midnight Ride
D-Day: 24 Hours That Saved The World
Tales of the Tikongs
The Federalist Papers

I also went to Borders recently and bought two books that I'll read after finishing some other books. The first is a Pride and Prejudice parody called "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies." (Another Pride and Prejudice parody that is free for all to read is Pride and Twitterverse.) The other one is "Common Sense" by Glenn Beck. Later on I realized that both these books have something in common: they are both books from a couple hundred years ago that have been revised by recent authors.

The Universal Christ

2009-08-16T22:26:00.000-07:00

I was trying to find a video recently that showed Elder Neal A. Maxwell of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles quoting anything by C. S. Lewis. I haven't found one yet (even though Maxwell quoted Lewis all the time) but I did find this nice video where he bears testimony of the universal Christ while at an astronomical observatory:

One of the things I liked about Elder Maxwell is that he wore so many hats so well. He was very specifically LDS while also being very generally Christian, being a great American (hence the red, white and blue frames on these YouTube videos presented here), and basically just a good friend to all mankind.

This next video was filmed before he was called as an apostle but still contains statements now known to be prophetic about religion in America:

This final video is a powerful testimony of Christ yet even mentions that God grants unto all nations as much light as they can bear and messengers of their own to teach them, which reminds us of the First Presidency statement that says, "The great religious leaders of the world such as Mohammed, Confucius, and the Reformers, as well as philosophers including Socrates, Plato, and others, received a portion of God's light. Moral truths were given to them by God to enlighten whole nations and to bring a higher level of understanding to individuals."

More Cereal . . . Seriously?

2009-08-05T23:58:00.000-07:00

Here's more pictures of my cereal boxes. Jerry Seinfeld would be proud.

Foot Ware

2009-07-28T00:26:00.000-07:00

After numerous aborted attempts I finally ordered a new custom-made pair of VANS tennis shoes. You can design these yourself online and I toyed with lots of options over a period of time before I settled on this design:

Don't ask me what it's supposed to be, it's just better than any of the other designs I came up with. Here's one from a different angle to show that there's a subtle olive green touch on the tongue:

So, maybe I can have a career as a shoe designer.

Sideways

2009-07-25T10:19:00.001-07:00

Is it just me or is something not quite right with this tree?

Don't Confuse the Snake

2009-07-14T22:58:00.000-07:00

Finally a maze adapted to my mental capacity:

On another note, do you want to go to a school that is in this zone?

see more Fail Blog

Happy Independence Day

2009-07-04T10:30:00.000-07:00

Every time the 4th of July comes around I intend to put something up on my blog about the greatness of America and fireworks and hot dogs and all that, but I never have . . . until now, when I present to you The Muppets performing The Stars and Stripes Forever:

On a more serious note here's a couple quotes about freedom, liberty, discipline, etc. that I've been finding in my 2009 Franklin Day Planner:

Rights that do not flow from duty well performed are not worth having.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi

Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable; procures success to the weak, and esteem to all.
—George Washington

Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.
—John Milton

America lives in the heart of every man everywhere who wishes to find a region where he will be free to work out his destiny as he chooses.
—Woodrow Wilson

And here's a couple books I've been reading lately to keep up on American history:

Okay, well, one of the pictures is not showing up but the first one is good on its own. And if you catch it today there's plenty of cool Independence Day-themed food items for viewing at Taste Spotting. I want a bite of every one of those things.

Sunday Will Come

2009-07-01T22:15:00.000-07:00

The Rumors Are True

2009-06-22T22:01:00.000-07:00

Parable of the Sewing Machine

2009-06-18T14:13:00.000-07:00

This has a good message:

The White Sheep of the Family

2009-06-16T08:38:00.000-07:00

Finally a coloring book adapted to my mental capacity:

see more Fail Blog

Gotta Keep 'em Separated

2009-06-09T16:46:00.000-07:00

Got to see The Offspring last Friday night, first time I'd seen them since the KROQ Weenie Roast and Luau in 1997.

Drummer Pete Parada

Dexter Holland and "Noodles" Wasserman

Apparently this was the first time Dexter has played the piano at a concert. He teased the audience with a little bit of the famous Linus and Lucy theme then played and sang his solo version of The Offspring's hit "Gone Away," their song that always sounded to me like a Def Leppard song minus the guitar solo.

I knew everything they played except for I think two songs. When they played "Why Don't You Get a Job?" I wondered how many out-of-work people in the audience felt like they were being lectured to. And when they finished "Pretty Fly for a White Guy" of course I had to say, "Pretty good, but needs more cowbell."

(Click any photo to be taken to the complete photo album. I was in the orchestra pit so I was in a good spot for taking pictures.)

Greg Kriesel and Andrew Freeman

They even had an intermission where one of their roadies led everyone in an exercise session while other roadies launched giant beach balls into the crowd, juggled bowling pins, and rode around the stage on unicycles.

The show went pretty quick, just over an hour, then they ended at 10:50pm to beat the curfew at Irvine Meadows. I'm used to going there and having bands start at that time. Anyways, a good fun show with some invigorating punk played for an appreciative working class crowd.

Old School Laker Pride

2009-06-05T18:05:00.000-07:00

Did anybody catch Kareem on Conan the other night?

I used to idolize this guy (and still do) and read a biography of him when I was in third or fourth grade and used to practice his sky hooks in the driveway at the old Fountain Valley house and when I was in a basketball league when I was 12 I used a jersey with the number 33 on it so I could be just like Kareem. Not that anybody would ever confuse me with him but it was great seeing him on The Tonight Show.

He Mele No Lilo

2009-05-30T23:07:00.000-07:00

Went to my nephew's wedding luau earlier tonight and the hula performers did a number set to this song from Lilo and Stitch.

Hope Ya Know, We Had a Hard Time

2009-05-27T15:35:00.001-07:00

Here's a message by Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles that I think everyone can benefit from. The video in the background seems to be about helping others even when you need help yourself.

My Up Adventure

2009-05-20T23:20:00.000-07:00

Just saw "Up" at the El Capitan and wrote about it on my Cartoon Corner blog.

Cashton James Ziebarth

2009-05-07T22:05:00.000-07:00

If the news hasn't already broke elsewhere on the Internet I'll mention it here. My new nephew Cashton James Ziebarth was born today at around 4:30pm at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica to brother David and sister-in-law Kristin and with their permission I can show you a photo I took of the little tyke being held by his maternal grandmother.

Infomercial?

2009-05-07T12:35:00.000-07:00

I mentioned recently helping out Francisco's Automotive with their website needs as part of what I've been doing lately. I actually filmed and edited something like an infomercial there earlier today. It's the first time I've done anything like that. Not the most exciting commercial ever but there's a couple nice transitions in there.

Grown Up Purplesaurus Rex

2009-04-30T00:26:00.000-07:00

No, it's not alcoholic but about a week ago I realized that I had randomly ended up with some Welch's grape soda and some limeade in my fridge. I also realized I hadn't had Kool-Aid's Purplesaurus Rex addictive grape/lemon flavor punch in years. I decided to make my own by blending about five parts grape soda with one part limeade. It didn't hurt that my roommate had some lime-flavored ice cubes in the fridge:

What I ended up with was a good drink to go with some tacos from Rubio's. Might try this again sometime.

My Temp Ride

2009-04-22T17:32:00.000-07:00

My Sportage is in the shop right now getting a couple things done like some detail work and getting the front passenger window to roll up and down again. While it's out of commission the shop owner is letting me borrow his Jeep. I'm trying to not drive it too much but I figured when I do have to drive it I'd listen to whatever radio station it happened to be tuned to so I've been listening to a lot of Power 106 lately. Plus this Jeep makes it look like I'm a student at Cal State Long Beach.

Hawaiian Style Magazine, RIP

2009-04-21T19:51:00.001-07:00

In 2005 I took a trip to the Hawaiian island of Maui. Shortly after returning to California I was at the Barnes and Noble at the Irvine Spectrum and noticed a magazine called Hawaiian Style that I had never seen before. Since I was on a lunch break I grabbed the magazine, paid for it, and perused it when I got back home after work. It turned out to be a great magazine focused primarily, but not solely, on luxury living in Hawaii, the type of thing that could make your coffee table look very presentable. It also turned out to have a number of spelling, punctuational, and typographical errors in it. Being the only person on the planet who is into all things Hawaiian while simultaneously being able to catch every single little typo I see I wrote to the editor and offered my services as a proofreader. I fully assumed I would either be ignored or told, "Thanks, we'll just try to do better the next time," but I actually got hired on as their proofreader, starting right away on the issue they were then working on. I did make some money doing this work but also got the psychic award of being able to read all about Hawaii, including places I'd been to before and places and things there I still hope to experience.

Two years later, in June 2007, I even met the editor, Doug King, and HSM chief writer, Mark Ward, at the amazing Grand Wailea Resort on Maui to discuss the business of the magazine in person. The proofreading work continued until a couple weeks ago when I received an e-mail containing the sad news that the magazine was going out of business due to the poor economy.

So, here's to a magazine that made me miss Hawaii even more than I already do but still kept me in touch with it. Let's cross our fingers that it can come back when the economy recovers.

Wolf and Pig

2009-04-18T01:08:00.000-07:00

This starts off slow but stick with it and it'll get really cool. Can't imagine the level of dedication it would take to pull this off:

Happy Easter!

2009-04-11T11:17:00.000-07:00

I like shrimp too, but this is going too far

2009-04-11T00:16:00.000-07:00

Apparently some people thinking not getting enough shrimp in their fried rice is an emergency worth calling 911 over. "A woman called 911 to report she didn't get as much shrimp as she wanted in her fried rice at a Texas restaurant." Surely this is a sign of the pending apocalypse. Full Story

Farrell's, We Hardly Knew You

2009-04-04T21:42:00.000-07:00

Growing up in the Fountain Valley/Huntington Beach area of Orange County I often went to Farrell's Ice Cream Parlour with the family or for friend's birthday parties and one time went with my karate group. Farrell's was themed like a late 1890's ice cream parlor and was Fun with a capital 'F.' I remember being fascinated by the player piano you would see as you entered and the commotion with sirens and everything the employees would create when they brought out their huge group-sized ice cream sundae that I think was called The Zoo.

The Huntington Beach location closed down I think in 1985 and all its fans mourned the huge loss. I thought Farrell's was dead in the water until I heard sometime in the 1990's about one being down in San Diego. I wanted to go there but never made it and now I think it is closed down.

About six or seven years ago (roughly) I started hearing rumours that Farrell's was set to make a comeback. Of course I got excited but nothing much seemed to come of these rumors.

Then a few months ago my food blogging colleague Nancy Luna started writing about the Farrell's comeback and restoring hope that it would actually take place. This struck my nostalgia chord again and I wanted to find the spot where the old Huntington Beach Farrell's had been on Beach Boulevard (Highway 39 for the old-timers) between Talbert and Slater. I found this building that is now closed down and prior to abandonment was called "Dog's Day Out:"

Going off of my old fuzzy childhood memory it seemed like it could've been the old Farrell's and it seemed to be in the spot I remember it being in but I still wasn't 100% sure. But when I checked the official Farrell's site later I found this picture which looks very much like the one above:

I don't know which Farrell's location this is supposed to be in their official photo. At the zenith of their success they had 130 locations so the likelihood that this is the old HB location is low. I don't even remember the HB location being powder blue but more like a dark maroon, but it's funny that my picture and the official picture still look so similar. Since this building is now abandoned and ~~hopefully~~ up for sale wouldn't it be great if Farrell's moved right back in? And if it wasn't the old Farrell's spot why don't they move in there anyway?

More Info at OC Then

UPDATE: I e-mailed this blog entry to some people at Farrell's and I got a very nice e-mail back from Paul Kramer who said they are going to announce the planned OC locations soon.

"A Gift to the World"

2009-04-01T00:30:00.000-07:00

I wrote before about sharing a name with Christian Bale but I also share a name with Christian the Lion. Christian the Lion became an Internet sensation about two years ago when a clip about him was placed on YouTube (3,852,836 views so far, and that's just for one of the versions of the video, seeing as how YouTube stuff tends to get cloned; the real count is more like 50 million). Here it is:

Well, the following video is a followup and features the girl who made the clip famous in the first place.

The reason I'm bringing this all up here is that I know the girl in the clip and she just contacted me to tell me about it. Awesome stuff. When she first initiated the chat all she did was send me a YouTube link. I glanced at it and was like, "Yeah, I know this clip. Good stuff." Then I started watching more and saw it was a newer thing and then I saw she was in it . . . to my complete surprise.

Here the Wild Things Trailer Is

2009-03-26T00:50:00.000-07:00

Coupon Crazy

2009-03-20T16:38:00.000-07:00

Just went to Ralphs for a couple quick things. They rung up my stuff and it came to $29.43. After they scanned in my Ralphs card and coupons it came down to $12.29. Woo hoo!

Forget Double Stuf

2009-03-19T23:36:00.000-07:00

Found here.

How I'm Spending My St. Patrick's Day

2009-03-17T12:26:00.000-07:00

Being a little bit Irish and having lived in Ireland for a while I'm trying to get in touch with my Irish side this St. Patrick's Day. What have I done so far? Well, first off a few days ago I had a minty Shamrock Shake from McDonald's. This somewhat mysterious item is sometimes advertised and sometimes not. I got mine from the location on PCH near Newport Imports where they made no mention whatsoever of having the item. But I asked if they had it and they did and it was actually as good as I remember. This old McDonald's commercial from YouTube shows "Uncle O'Grimacey" promoting Shamrock Shakes:

Yesterday I had lunch at a Mexican restaurant near me that had a special pumpkin seed mole sauce dish (yes, the sauce is green) for El Dia de San Patricio and I wrote about it on my Orange County Mexican food blog.

Today I went to a bakery and bought some Irish soda bread and I've been listening to the Dropkick Murphys and getting ready to go get lunch at probably Silky Sullivan's. If I had been truly Irish though I would've had a bowl of Lucky Charms for breakfast but instead I had more of that Golden Crisp stuff.

For lunch I went to Fitzgerald's Pub in Huntington Beach and got corned beef and cabbage:

They sure had a lot of Mexican items on their menu.

Eat Your Breakfast

2009-03-17T11:04:00.001-07:00

Was going to do another meaningless post on the types of cereal I have but figure this video with Flavor Flav wearing a Kellogg's jacket (and the Corn Flakes chicken) is strange and cereal-oriented enough:

Makes me hungry for some Pop-Tarts and Apple Jacks.

Temples

2009-03-12T18:29:00.000-07:00

So, the HBO cable television network has a show called Big Love that is supposed to be about an LDS splinter group who practice polygamy. I haven't seen the show because, one, I don't watch much TV, and, two, I don't have HBO. When the show started the producers said they were going to make it clear that the religious group they were profiling were not actually members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (nicknamed "Mormons" or "LDS"), but apparently they haven't maintained that distinction and are promulgating a number of misperceptions about the Church.

Now they are going to have an episode which shows purported LDS temple ceremonies. Some members have got in a huff about this and are calling for a boycott of HBO. The Church's official stance is surprisingly simple and may even surprise some members. It consists of two words: DO NOTHING, as in "don't bother with boycott efforts. It simply doesn't matter. The Gospel will roll forth regardless."

They did include a YouTube video about temples on their front page that people could embed in their blogs or Facebook pages if they wanted; it even has a Jewish rabbi and a Catholic priest on it; so here it is:

All this brings up another interesting point: the fact of the Church confronting new media. If only ten years ago you had told somebody, "The LDS Church has a YouTube video that you can embed in your blog or on your Facebook page," they would've thought you were speaking a different language. But the Church seems to be embracing it and even has their own YouTube channels so they can attempt to counter many of the misperceptions that are out there.

Even South Park gets mentioned on the Church's site:

When the comedy writers for South Park produced a gross portrayal of Church history, individual Church members no doubt felt uncomfortable. But once again it inflicted no perceptible or lasting damage to a church that is growing by at least a quarter of a million new members every year.

I actually saw the episode they are likely referring to and it got a lot of its historical facts correct but the one thing they got most incorrect was glaringly incorrect, and I didn't know how Matt and Trey could get so much right while getting one historical point so ridiculously wrong. Most of the episode was funny and not necessarily "anti-Mormon."

Shortly after the episode in question aired it was announced that the creators of South Park were going to create a musical making fun of Mormons. A Catholic e-mail penpal of mine let me know about it. I understood her concern and said, "That's fine. It's not going to do any lasting damage."

On a potentially less controversial note, this next video is by President Uchtdorf, who briefly sidesteps much of the uniqueness of LDS doctrine and even our commonalities with other Christian religions, and encourages people to just get out there and create something:

This final video humorously emphasizes how with our modern technology we can be tuned into our electronic devices while tuning out those in our immediate physical presence and encourages reversing that trend:

UP!

2009-03-07T15:46:00.000-08:00

Tag!

2009-03-06T15:28:00.000-08:00

Back in the "olden days" (before the Internet) playing tag meant a bunch of kids running around trying to get away from the "it" person who was physically trying to tag them. If you got tagged you became "it" and had to run after and try to tag the other kids. That was about the extent of the rules.

Nowadays getting tagged means that somewhere on the Internet somebody has selected ("tagged") you to write a little about yourself by responding to a couple questions. Usually the person that has tagged you is just passing the torch on to you after they had been tagged by someone else. Nobody knows how these things get started but I think they come from the same place as the mysterious east wind.

I've actually never been tagged before but have watched on Facebook and blogs before other people getting tagged and I would think, "Ha ha! Now they have to answer all those questions!" Now, after having read my brother's family's blog it looks like my sister-in-law has tagged me . . . unless she meant it for somebody else named Christian. Anyways, I will do my best to answer the questions.

8 Favorite TV Shows:

This is more like the first eight that come to mind:

The Office

Twilight Zone

Gilligan's Island

I Dream of Jeannie/Bewitched

The Andy Griffith Show

The Soup (especially Chat Stew)

Mad Money with Jim Cramer (this guy's entertaining even if you don't understand all the money stuff he's talking about; if you're not watching the show and you hear him in the background it just sounds like he's yelling a lot)

Can't wait for The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien

8 Things I did Yesterday:

Went to breakfast at Ostioneria Bahia and got huevos rancheros

Read a little from Without Reserve. I have a little bit of a Pride and Prejudice. Actually, I am sort of pushing myself to have one. It all started when I saw my brother David was reading it. I figured it'd be a good idea for me to read it too and try to keep familiar with classic English literature. So I've read the whole book and seen the famous BBC mini-series of it, the newer movie version of it with Keira Knightley, the slightly LDS version of it, and have read a couple of its spin-off books, one of which is Without Reserve, an imagined alternate Pride and Prejudice reality where Elizabeth actually gets engaged to a Mr. Covington and Darcy has to deal with that. I haven't got to the end yet but somehow I think Darcy and Elizabeth end up together. Sure it's chick lit, but it's classic English literature chick lit.

Worked on my online resume and portfolio

Went to Disneyland; rode Space Mountain (that ride never gets old for me) and Pirates of the Caribbean

Tried some good chili-lime flavored corn on the cob at Disneyland

Cleaned my bathroom somewhat; woo hoo!

Tried to watch an episode of Seinfeld from my Netflix DVD but my TV got all funky.

Got a voice mail from a friend but when I got it it was too late to call them back

8 Things To Which I'm Looking Forward:

Longer days when Daylight Savings Time begins again in a few days

An extra hour sleep when Daylight Savings Time ends

The California drought going away

The fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movie

The end of e-mail spam

The Green Lantern movie

Working through my backlog on my two food blogs

8 Favorite Restaurants:

I could list a lot. These are just the ones that come to mind first.

Taco Rosa

Crab Cooker

La Sirena Grill and Cantina

Kabuki

Gabbi's

Farrell's/Bob's Big Boy (mentioning these because they might be coming back to OC)

Taleo (best carnitas ever)

Anywhere with good pizza

8 Things on My Wish List:

Isn't this sort of like the 8 Things To Which I'm Looking Forward list? Some of these could happen and some may never happen.

World Peace

Seeing The Cure again live at least one more time in my life, and Social Distortion, and some others

A camera that takes better pictures in dim light

Meeting Emmy Rossum (why? because she's awesome)

Brian Wilson, Al Jardine, Mike Love, Bruce Johnston, and David Marks to reunite as The Beach Boys

Bathrooms that clean themselves

Sunburn-resistant skin

More wishes

Look at these Dinosaurs

2009-03-02T10:40:00.000-08:00

A lot of people think the Internet came into being in the early to mid-1990's. I used to pride myself on "knowing" that the Internet has been around since the early 1980's. That is, until I found this video on YouTube that was made in 1969:

Now, this wasn't actually showing the Internet working then. It was just "special effects" making it look like these people were checking the Internet from their home but it's interesting to see what their conceptualization was of how the newly created Internet could work for people.

My Exciting Breakfast

2009-02-28T17:50:00.000-08:00

After I stumbled across the funny picture seen above (click on it to see it bigger) I wanted to make a blog entry about some of the cereals I have. Why? Just because.

So, seen above is Kellogg's S'morz cereal, a box of Golden Crisp, which I remember being called Sugar Crisp when I was a kid, and a retro box of Cheerios that I think you can only get at Target. These aren't all the cereals I have right now. I might add in one more picture later of some other boxes.

Another Journey By Train

2009-02-26T11:12:00.000-08:00

Had my first train trip in quite a while yesterday. I took the train all the time when I was in Ireland and had some hair-raising experiences. It wasn't all bad, but a couple of the experiences make pretty good stories. I also took a fascinating cross-country train trip from Florida to California one time.

Yesterday I met up with Bill who wanted to show me some Mexican restaurants in Los Angeles that he liked. We took the train from the Santa Ana station to Union Station in Los Angeles. Saw some very interesting things along the way. It was good to see stuff that I never see in my normal "life in Irvine" daily routine. One thing you become aware of is all the shipping that goes on by train to bring goods to us; we tend to take it for granted that our needs are always instantly met but a lot of work goes into making that happen.

And here we are at Union Station getting ready to cross the street. As we got to the crosswalk we just barely missed a green walk light so we waited for the next one. When it turned green again we could hear police sirens blaring down the street and figured we'd better wait but a number of people started to cross anyways. They got about halfway across when they realized they were right in the path of the cop car.

We then went to Olvera St. which I've been to a number of times. A number of the shops and restaurants there were closed down and we were trying to figure out why. Bill looked around for the restaurant that he liked a lot that he'd been to a few months ago and we discovered it was closed. We ended up eating at Las Anitas which is on the north-west end and which I always wanted to go to but never had before. I'll be giving it a separate writeup on my LA Mexican food blog.

Once inside we realized it was Ash Wednesday and that Cardinal Mahoney was at a nearby mass and that explained why a bunch of the Olvera St. shops were closed down. One of the murals at Olvera St. depicts the Blessing of the Animals:

While a mural in a nearby subway station depicts . . . something:

Got back to the Santa Ana station and my faithful Sportage at about 9:30pm after my train adventure:

And here's a couple mementos from my ¼-day trip:

CLICK HERE for complete photo album.

The Best Smoothie Ever

2009-02-20T12:06:00.000-08:00

Was at Costco recently and one of those people that gives out food samples gave me a little cup of a smoothie he had just made using this Yoplait Smoothie mix stuff that has frozen raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, and yogurt chunks in it. It was super good so I actually took a second sample (I bet the Costco police are hunting me down). Later on I went back and bought the smoothie mix.

The big bag contains five individual servings that are supposed to be two servings. I guess it depends on how much you want. Just put it in a blender and add a cup of milk. I also add in a little scoop of Häagen-Dazs Reserve Hawaiian Lehua Honey & Sweet Cream ice cream then pour it all into my 3D Iron Man Slurpee cup from 7-Eleven. Good stuff!

Named After Me

2009-02-14T23:25:00.000-08:00

When you have a first name that's not totally unusual but still not-too-common you tend to be aware of all the celebrities who have the same name and you hope that they behave appropriately because people might kind of connect you to them (I especially think this when people used to call me "Christian Slater" all the time).

It has been all over the news recently that Batman star Christian Bale went on a huge rampaging tirade directed at a guy who made a little mistake on a movie set. I don't need to play it back here but it was pretty over-the-top and made me want to change my first name. His rant was played all over the Internet and Kevin and Bean on KROQ constantly made fun of it for about a week. Christian Bale heard about this and went on the show and basically confessed that he was being a complete idiot.

(Full Story Here)

So it seems like he gave a pretty full confession with no restraint. It had to take some type of fortitude to say, "Feel free to make fun of me at my expense, I deserve it completely." Hey, nobody's perfect, including yours truly, and I liked you in Batman and in The Prestige, Christian; just remember we share the same name and behave better in the future. And be nice to the crew members who are working on your movies.

Mini-Reunion

2009-02-11T17:05:00.000-08:00

Earlier today I got to meet up with a friend I knew when I went to school at BYU-Hawaii and haven't seen since. He grew up on the Big Island of Hawaii and we were buds at college for a couple semesters where we went body boarding from time to time (including the time we went to Pounders and the turtles were swimming with us) and a time we played a cataclysmic game of air hockey in the campus's game room.

This friend's name is Christian Ikaika Olsen but he just goes by his middle name. His full middle name is actually a big long Hawaiian name that starts with "Ikaika" and I could never remember how to spell the whole thing but if you translate it into English it means "Mighty Shark, King of the Sea." We met outside Pirates of the Caribbean and a Disneyland cast member took a picture of our little reunion. Man, I look awful in that picture. Got back and looked in the mirror and thought, "Why do pictures make me look so bad? Even the mirror isn't that mean to me."

So we went on Pirates and Star Tours and talked about old times and where are lives are now and I met his wife and three kids and it was just good to be able to catch up with somebody I hadn't seen in a while.

Doodle Defender

2009-02-07T11:45:00.000-08:00

Usually when I'm on the computer I'm slaving away working on a bunch of different websites but yesterday I took a break from work to play a game. I went to Yahoo! Games to see what they had and tried out one called Doodle Defender. It's kind of a cross between Asteroids, Space Invaders, and Defender and you actually draw your own ship. The cool thing about it is that it looks like you doodled an old school video game scene onto some notebook paper and then the scene magically came to life.

Hello, World!

2009-02-06T23:24:00.001-08:00

Okay, so here's my first blog entry. I wanted to call the blog "Sneaky Tiki" after a song by The Tiki Tones but that blog name was already taken. When I couldn't use that name I glanced at some of my CDs and saw the Beach Boys CD called The Warmth of the Sun, so that's the name I picked.

A story behind The Warmth of the Sun is that a couple years ago I received an e-mail survey from Capitol Records where I was asked if I would buy a Beach Boys CD if it had certain songs on it. They had recently released a CD called Sounds of Summer that had all their most hugely popular songs on it and Capitol was wondering if it'd make good business sense to release a followup CD that had songs that weren't as well-known.

I took the survey and kept basically answering, "Yes, I'd buy a CD with this song on it" every time it asked about a different song. I have to confess that a number of them didn't sound familiar to me at all. I wasn't even sure if such a CD would ever be released but it was in 2007 so I figured I'd better buy it since I said I would and I've actually listened to it more than I thought I would.

Now if I had called my blog "Sneaky Tiki" I might not have had a story to share about it.