Christmas Potporri

1. Cameron got a B in math. Hallelujah!

2. No joke, UNLV's registration website (the one to add classes, check semester grades, etc.) is only open certain hours. It closes nightly at 8pm.

3. I don't think I have a 'best records of the year' list this year, owing to the fact that I didn't buy many records this year that were also made this year. That said, I probably listened to these the most (in no order):

0. Hymns
1. Panda Bear - Person Pitch
2. Fleet Foxes - s/t & Sun Giant
3. Love - Forever Changes
4. Spoon - all their records
5. Animal Collective - et al.
6. Half-Handed Cloud - Halos & Lassos
7. Punch Brothers - Punch
8. The Essex Green - Everything is Green/The Long Goodbye
9. Kanye West - 808s & Heartbreak
10. Sufjan Stevens - Seven Swans/Illinoise
11. NPR & Classic Country radio

4. Yes, it snowed in Vegas. Either global warming is to blame or we should thanks Obama.


5. I'm gonna have some sweet white elephant gifts.

6. I started work this last week at UNLV (I know) at the Office of International Students & Scholars as an assistant database manager. I'll deal a lot with immigration issues, which are interesting. We have no idea how lucky we Americans are. These students pay thousands to attend an American school. Even UNLV can give 'em that.

7. Christmas has snuck upon us! We just read "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever", a Dixon family semi-tradition. Herod Herdman, ham as a gift for the newborn king, and "HEY! Unto you a child is born!" are a few of the hilarious things in store.

8. "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever" was made into a 80's made-for-TV movie. I found an abridged youtube version.



9. Merry Christmas.

"Heaven is a bit more musical this week, don't you think Gabriel?"

My great-uncle passed away this past Sunday. I don't ever recall meeting him, but Grandma Waite always had lots of good things to say about him. Also, not any schmoe directs the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

Info at the jump.

Salt Lake Tribune Obituary

The Missionary Journal Project

Besides Grandpa Dixon, Emily, and my parents, no one really knows about a passion I've developed this year: family history. While I don't spend as much time reading about it, expanding it, cataloging it, or creating it as I should and would like, I have begun an ambitious project. My great-great-grandfather, John Frederick Dixon, wrote four journal volumes over the course of his mission (1904-1906). He wrote a solid 200 pages of his testimony, recreation, misgivings, "journeyings...sufferings...sorrows...afflictions... and incomprehensible joy" (Alma 28:8, though the joy part has yet to be spotlighted by him; I remember the early months of missionary work all too well).

As apparent, Double G-Grandpa's handwriting can be confusticating. His t's look like l's with a hyphen after it, his f's and p's are only identified by word cues, and the writing in general, refined though it is, gives me a headache after half an hour. But what a treasure this is!: two years of a Mormon missionary's every-day; two years of a Christian preacher's struggles; two years of an ancestor's life documented, open to searching scrutiny and personality-recognizing for posterity.



I plan to make both the scans and the text available to family. If there is a desire, it would be an adventure to publish the thing in binded glory.

I would love to know whether family would prefer a readable, modernized journal over a true to life, misspelled, crazy capitalizationized, warts-and-all version.

4 times in one week...written by Emily (finally)

Cameron and I were at Kohl's for the second trip today and I said, "This is bloggable." He has been wanting me to write something so that someone will make comments (edited by the editor). I don't think it matters whether it is me or Cameron writing, but whatever. We went to Kohl's four times in the past week. I don't care for shopping because I get worn out quickly (I usually go already exhausted) and I can never find anything that works. However, Cameron and I decided to check out the deals on Black Friday as I was in dire need of some new things. The weather was beautiful so we walked to the Kohl's just up the street. (I enjoyed the walk more than the actual shopping.) I tried on two pairs of pants and when I couldn't get them up over my hips, I said "Let's go." I didn't find anything, and whatever I could find wasn't going to be worth the wait in a choice of two lines that wrapped around the store. We left empty handed. The week came and went and nearly knocked me down. I'm glad I have Cameron to help me stand. Friday meant a night of freedom. Somehow we found ourselves at Kohl's again. I tried on 12 or so shirts and nothing worked! but after some more searching I left with a few new tops. Another trip on Saturday brought home a shirt I had second thoughts about originally. Then we were visiting with my parents and my mom said she had some Kohl's cash that had to be spent today. Again we went and I had a hard time spending $20. (I could never spend a million dollars.) We were there much longer than I had wanted to be there. The whole reason to post was to please Cameron and to share what Cameron is like while on a long shopping trip. He is so patient. I take forever to decide anything. He is very good at entertaining himself. We got separated for a bit and the next time I saw him he had two long rolls of wrapping paper. We don't need wrapping paper...he was using them to drum on everything! and wacking them together. Then he busied himself for a while by making faces in the mirror. It was entertaining for me to see his quirky creativity. That's it. Sorry no update on life, just some silly story that isn't quite representative of the past few months, so if you would like to know how things are going, send us an email, or give us a call. Hope life is well for you...I'm glad Christmas is upon us. Merry Christmas to you...and sometime I will tell you about the fishes I caught.

Longform Potporri

Yeah, I lied about the other Christmas posts coming. Though maybe Santa will come a bit early. He actually showed up yesterday to deliver the final draft of the gay marriage paper I've been working on for 5 weeks. Glad it's done, though there was more I would've liked to have said. It turned out to be 21 pages (two pages were bibliographic). A decent read if you're interested.

Cameron is not good at math. That shouldn't news to you out there (Emily; who else reads this? Sometimes we conflate blog-reading for date night). But it turns out I'll need to take one more semester before that game ends.

My least favorite question has an answer: Cameron will major in Informatics, (probably minor in English), and is interested in an MBA/JD program if he can find one dumb enough for him. Yes, both.

So, the new Kanye West record is FANTASTIC. Not a fan of the Lil Wayne song, but everything else is worth checking out, especially if you avoid rap because of the sweary-swears. This one is clean. Check "Bad News" or "Street Lights".





In the router we got awhile back was attached a free eMusic 50 song trial. eMusic has some great stuff (this was my second trial; you just gotta know howto do it), and this time an audiobook was part of the deal. I started to read Moby Dick back in September, but life got crazy, so I stopped, but am glad to listen in again to the tale. I am completely stuck by its stark explicative narrative. Ishmael spends five pages on describing the a-bedding of the cannibal Queequeg and you're entranced. The book is hilarious. I love the biblical overtones thoughout.
Go read it.

I try to get Emily to write on this thing instead of just post pictures. She could use some motivation.

When not listening to MD/KW, I have been hooked to the AM "Country Classic" station in town- er, in Winchester. This leads me back to Christmas: Hayddawg, here's a list: Jim Reeves, Mr. Johnny Cash, Patsy Cline, Hank Williams, Emmylou Harris, or the album Will the Circle be Unbroken. Simple, honest, personal pop songs. Or a decent record cleaner like this one.