Hey everybody. I've got a little time on my hands and I thought I'd sit down and write some words for them of y'all what still reads this thing.
We're back from yet another weekend. This one crept up a little quicker what with the labor dabor and all. But I'm all for a weekend that comes early and leaves late. I like my weekends as early and often as I can get them. I find I do most of my living after 5:00 Friday evening and before 6:00 Monday morning. I might as well be a zombie for the rest of the time.
Of course that isn't completely true. I have the pleasure of taking institute classes again, which is always fun. I take institute classes so I can park for free, but I also get the benefit of the classes themselves, so it's a win-win-win situation.
On Friday Megan and I had our minds made up to go to the movies, but because we're trying not to spend our money unwisely, we ended up paying for everything with change. Of course we counted and rolled it all, so we didn't look like total jerks. So we dropped some quarters at the door and went to see Get Smart. Now here's the thing about the movie: all of its best jokes were taken from the original series. The humor of the movie is a little more lowbrow than the series, and the whole thing doesn't bind together as well as the series did. Now don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the movie. But I have to admit that the movie just made me want to watch the series. It's a good thing I have the first season on my ipod. So if this was a movie review, I'd give Get Smart a solid 3.5 stars. It was entertaining and I enjoyed it, but it wasn't the best movie I've ever seen.
On Saturday Megan and I slept in for a while. I slept longer than she did, but I was glad to get more than my daily amount of shuteye. When I got up, there was only one thing I really needed to do: fix the controller on the Vectrex. I don't know how much you know about Vectrex, but it was a mail-order only system. When you bought a Vectrex, you only got one controller and the only way to get another one was to order it through the mail. That's one of the things that makes it such a rare system (the other being the fact that it came out right before the video game crash of 1983). So Vectrex consoles are fairly rare, but spare controllers are unbelievably rare. There are forums and faqs devoted to turning old Atari or Sega controllers into Vectrex controllers because when your Vectrex controller dies, there isn't much chance you'll ever get your hands on another one. Also, taking the vectrex controller apart is a bit of a leap of faith because it requires you to peel back the faceplate to get to the screws that allow you to take it apart. There are a number of ways to break your controller or ruin its aesthetic appeal just by taking it apart. So I wasn't excited about doing it, but it had to be done. I had to peek inside and see what was wrong before I could think of the alternatives.
Before I got up the gumption to take the thing apart, Megan and I went on our usual weekend rounds. We hit up the Costco and had free samples for lunch, and picked up a case of the granola bars I like to have for my lunches. Then we dropped by Bookman's where I didn't find anything worth having (except for an Intellivision that I really really wanted to get, but we don't have enough credit for). Then we hit up DI where I saw lots of things that would've been fun to buy, but nothing we really needed. Then we went to the Arizona Reptile Center where we looked at all the fun and interesting pets they have. Let me state for the record right here and now that Megan and I intend to buy two African Spurred tortoises sometime in the future and to name them Gamera (my tortoise, named after the big tortoise from the Godzilla movies) and Morla (Megan's tortoise, named after the big tortoise oracle in Neverending Story). So don't any of you go buying a tortoise and naming it Gamera or Morla. Megan and I thought of it first. Anyway, we spent a lot of time looking at the tortoises in the reptile store. Turbo is in a funk again (not eating or drinking or moving around much, and he's still abnormally small for his age) and I can't help but worry about him. He'll always be my favorite tortoise, but Megan and I can't help but wonder what it would be like to own healthy tortoises. Those African Spurred tortoises are about as healthy and active as you could ever expect any tortoise to look.
After making our rounds, Megan got a call from Shannon to go to one of Megan's favorite clothing shoppes, so she offered to let me stay home and work on the Vectrex. So I got up the gumption to actually take that controller apart. I used Megan's hair dryer to heat the glue on the face plate, which I carefully peeled back. Then I took all 5 screws out and found that the controller came apart quite nicely. As soon as I got it apart, I could see why so many people have broken controllers. There are so many fragile plastic pieces in this 25 year old device that it's a wonder mine is still working. I noticed right away what the problem was, and I laughed out loud when I realized how simple it would be to fix. The joystick is connected to two self-centering spring-loaded potentiometers, one controlling the vertical axis and one controlling the horizontal. These potentiometers are connected to three wires each that send the signal to the Vectrex when the controller is moved. It's actually a fairly simple system. I noticed right away that the three wires that should've been connected to the horizontal pot had broken off at the solder joints. So all I had to do was melt the solder, pull the broken bits of wire out, strip the three wires, and solder them back where they were supposed to go. There was no color chart included, but it was pretty easy to see which wire went where (longest to the outside terminal and the shortest to the inside). I soldered them back and voila! I had just fixed it. It actually took more time to get the controller apart and put it back together than it did to actually fix it. But I felt like a champion for being able to fix it, even though it was really an easy job. So that was my big accomplishment for Saturday.
On Sunday Megan and I went to church as we are wont to do. I did some clerkly duties during Sunday School and joined Megan for the special combined priesthood and relief society meeting. It was an interesting meeting and ther were definitely a lot of things to think about. Megan finally got set apart for her calling and the bishop stayed and talked to me for a bit about how great it is to be a clerk and what great training it is to be a bishop. I wish people wouldn't say things like that. It makes me nervous. Not that I think I'll be a bishop anytime soon, but I read the church handbook of instructions from cover to cover as a missionary and I know a little of what is expected of bishops (and certainly, there's more expected now than there was in 1999). So I have to say I don't have any desire to be more than what I am. I don't even want to be a full-on clerk rather than just an assistant. I see how much work the clerk has to do and how much he has to keep track of. Let me state right here and now that my favorite calling in the church was and probably will always be sunday school teacher. But yeah, it makes me nervous when people talk about the calling of clerk as a great training ground for higher callings. I'll be happy to stay where I am for a while.
After church we came home and I accidentally fell asleep for a few hours. I say accidentally because as we were changing out of our church clothes, Megan laid down on the bed. I laid down next to her intending to get right back up, but she woke me up a few hours later when dinner was ready. I guess fast Sunday will do that to you. We had our dinner, which was delicious, and then went and watched the last episodes of season 6 of Monk. So Megan and I have officially seen all the Monk we own. Season 7 can't come fast enough.
I should also mention before I close this up that I just barely finished the last book in The Chronicles of Narnia. I read from The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe to The Last Battle (which is the order I prefer to read the books: chronologically from publication dates of the books not chronologically as the story runs) in a little over a week. It has been really nice to revisit those stories now that I'm old enough to read a little more into them than I did when I was a kid. I've got Megan started on them now and she'll probably have time to get through them pretty quickly as well.
I find it interesting that as I finished the books and was looking for a few commentaries online that so many people could take so much offense from the overarching Christian themes in the books. It strikes me as odd because even when I was a kid I was told that the books were full of images and symbols of Christ and Christianity. But it seems as if people have a love/hate relationship with the books because the story is so good in and of itself but their own feelings about Christianity interfere with their ability to really enjoy the stories. It's a strange thing to see. It's also strange to see C.S. Lewis accused of blatant racism, sexism, and fear of human sexuality. People have theorized that the reason Susan doesn't come back as one of the "Narnia 7" is because she has found an interest in sex. In the book is says her mind is more caught up with "lipstick, nylons, and invitations" and the goes on to say that she has wanted to long to reach adulthood and now seems determined to stay there. I don't think C.S. Lewis was trying to say that Susan was discovering her own sexuality as much as he was trying to say that she had gotten older and couldn't bring herself to believe in Narnia like she had before. Her mind was on more material and social things and she couldn't be bothered with the frivolity of youth. That's how I read it anyway. I suppose it's open to any interpretation you could wish to throw on it, but I think I know what C.S. Lewis was driving at.
Well, I'd better go. Those are all the words I have for now.