Refrigerator art

I've had nearly five years post-college to experience why family wards rule and singles wards drool.

Just a few examples:

- The callings. Goodbye hymn book organizer, hello Boy Scouts. More work? uh, yeah. More rewarding? uh, yeah.

- The lessons. It's so great when you can use the end of class to tie everything back to the Atonement rather than how to find your eternal companion.

- The social scene. Nothing wrong with a little catching up with friends between classes, talking about "the big game," etc., etc. But when catching up shifts to flirting, set-ups and DTRs (and you have no skillz with the lady folk), it's much harder to get you worship on.

- The noise. Most people think they'd really like complete and total silence during sacrament meeting. It's nice for a week or two, but then it gets weird. Church was meant for 16-year-olds to fumble their way through the sacrament prayers, babies to scream a little, kids to whisper a little too loud and primary music from the other ward to fill the air.

Speaking of primary and kids ...

One of my home teachers has an adorable little girl. Last week the Young Men and Young Women took over sharing time in primary, and this angel (who's never met me) points me out and says "You're my daddy's friend." So cute.

Yesterday after sacrament meeting, she comes over and hands me a piece of paper with a drawing on it. I take a quick look, tell her its beautiful and try and hand it back to her. She keeps her hands at her side, smiles, sways back and forth for a second and walks away without taking the picture. I take a closer look at the writing in yellow crayon to discover "Brother Rob Wiler" on top, realize this picture is for me, and get lost in awe.

Never before has being a complete and total sap felt so right.

I'm pretty sure this is a picture of me (in red) sharing my testimony at the pulpit (green) during sacrament meeting yesterday (which, BTW, I started with possibly one of the best opening-line, quick-wit jokes in fast and testimony meeting history that didn't interrupt the Spirit one iota). The faces and names at the bottom are her family, who typically sit in the front row.

For those of you who get 1,000 of these a day from your little ones and start to get a little tired of it, tell your kids to make them for the single losers in your ward. Trust me, they'll volunteer to babysit for free any night you need 'em.

Nice day for a Weiler wedding

WARNING: Contents of this post are entirely suitable for children and will likely put them and most of their parents to sleep due to an insanely large amount of writing. Please refrain from reading near sharp objects or while operating heavy machinery.

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What trumps Christmas, college football, reunions with friends and a weekend of pro sports in Phoenix?

A baby sister as a blushing bride.

It was kind of dumb of me to go to Utah for the holidays packing four dress shirts and one pair of dress pants. Thankfully in the male world it worked out okay. Still, when you're home for 10 days and wear the same pair of pants five of those days, it gets repetitive.

Don't have many shots from the temple to show off due to technical difficulties. On the bright side, I accidently stumbled upon a fun way to frustrate your friends and family members: Hand them a camera with a dying battery and ask them to take pictures (Sorry Catherine).

Michelle and Michael were sealed by Elder Hinckley, who sat beside me the day before at their luncheon. (That's right, HE sat beside ME. I'm the important one here.) Elder Hinckley made quite the first impression, Just before passing me the basket of rolls, his first words were "So brother Weiler, where's your date?" Only could one of the Lord's inspired servants be so bold.

However, there's a good chance these folks fed him that line ...

Three themes stand out about my sister's wedding day, the kind of things we'll be telling Michael and Michelle's children about 20 years from now.

1) The weather. Cliche? Sure. But how can you not discuss the weather when you're January wedding in UTAH features

• no snow

• no nasty inversion haze

• sunshine

• a somewhat chilly gym during the reception (not really "weather", but it qualifies)

2) Michelle's train, or rather the nine shortys grasping the train everywhere she went. Totally adorable, especially considering the number of times they came close to lifting it too high. For a girl who grew up with no sisters and few little cousins, inheriting a half-dozen sisters in-law and nine nieces is a fantasy come true.

3) "Okay, everybody do a big hug!" Wish I had some photo evidence to illustrate this. I know my sister was really excited about her photographer. But seriously, any formal group picture she did was followed by the group hug picture. Enough already.

Great wedding Michelle and Michael. Hope you had fun in Hawaii.

*****

Alrighty then. Let's talk Christmas.

First of all, a big round of applause for the men and women at the airlines and airports who work on Christmas Day so cheap-o customers like myself can still fly home instead of driving for 11 hours. Oversized carry on? Welcome aboard. Yuma to Phoenix? 35 minutes.

We asked Santa Claus to make our house one of his final deliveries of the night so we could celebrate Christmas on the 26th, and the big man came through.

Christmas is a million times more fun with kids around, so we have Kevin's girlfriend Natalie and her son Chandler to thank for bringing us something else to play with than Dad's brain teasers (eh Leslie?)

The kids hooked up Mom and Dad with a flatscreen TV. There may not be high-speed or wireless Internet, cable or satellite broadcasting, blu-ray, MP3, Blackberry or Wii technology at the Weiler home, but if it ever it comes, it'll be in HD baby.

******

It wouldn't be a trip to Salt Lake without getting together with some of the old 33rd ward crew. It's amazing how we can tell the some of the same stories over and over again and they never get old, but what's more amazing is there's usually one or two new stories that come out of the woodworks I've never heard before. Always good to find out new information that neglects to be shared, like the fact that one of them is now a firefighter (fairly new news, but still) and one of their wives is 7 MONTHS PREGNANT (C'mon Stir).

The other more unfortunate than amazing thing about hanging out with these guys: I'm just as bad at video games as I ever was. Mario Kart's a great game, but it gets old quickly when you're finishing 12th every time.

Also got to see a bunch of other friends from high school and college and play with their kids. Once again got schooled at the Wii (Jackson, age 4 1/2), learned the lyrics of a Black Eyed Peas song (Gavin, 2) received training in operating a circular saw (Carson, 2), dangerously ate peanuts at Five Guys restaurant (Everett, almost 1) and fell head over heels in love with a smiley-faced little girl (Kate, 1 1/2).

*****

Few other highlights from the vacation:

• Huge shout out to my cousin and fellow blogger Rebecca for notifying me that BYU Creamery chocolate milk is for sale at Deseret Book. If you don't understand the power of BYU Creamery chocolate milk, add it to the list of things you need to experience before you die and thank me later. Why I only bought one bottle while I was in Utah is a question with no acceptable answer.

• Finally, something to make me feel good about Max Hall.

We took a second picture where Doug acts like he's dreading losing our bet on the BYU-Utah football game, but that wouldn't be keeping it real. I wish it bothered my brother to wear BYU gear as much as it would have bothered me to be clad in Ute crimson, but it just doesn't. Curse his good nature.

• Speaking of Utah football, I spent my last day of pre-holiday vacation working at the Poinsettia Bowl. Trust me, my loyalties are just as blue as they ever were. And stay classy, San Diego.

*****

Last but not least, my first week back in Arizona was pretty darn enjoyable (hello 70-degree temperatures!!! You were sorely missed.) I went to my first Suns game (Thanks Athena!) and covered the Cardinals playoff game for work. Steve Nash, D-Wade, Larry Fitzgerald and the highest scoring playoff game in NFL history. It was ........ wait for it .......... awesome.

Bowl lotta work

What's this, you ask? Why it's the logo of one of the 2009 Mississippi Bowl, silly.

Why should you care, you ask?

You shouldn't. To even the most dedicated of sports fans, a junior college football bowl doesn't appear anywhere on the map. But I spent four days in beautiful Biloxi, Miss. covering the snot out of it, so you better believe I'm gonna blog about my time there.

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• Here's a little-known benefit about calling Utah your home state: you can spell it in four letters and say it in two syllables. Mississippi? Uh uh. Any guesses on how many times this reporter took the long journey that starts with an M and ends 4 S's, 4 I's and 2 P's later ? 57. Yep. Went back and counted. I have no life.

• With only a few hours away from all things football and bowl-related and no rental car, I didn't get to explore all there is to explore in the Biloxi-Gulfport area. I saw plenty of these ....

hoped to see more of these ....

hit up a few of these ....

(Sidenote: I was up 2 grand at the craps table, remembered I'm Mormon, and called it a night. No worries. It's all going to the ward missionary fund. :) )

got a real good look at the inside of this building ....

enjoyed an excellent game here ...

and chowed down any time they put one of these in front of me.

Didn't bring home any Southern belles as a souviner (sorry Mom). Just a couple T-shirts, foam footballs, and a stomach full of tasty shrimp and fried chicken.

Happy Elk-giving

For the past three years I've barged in on the Rowden family in Kingman, Ariz. for Thanksgiving, and they've treated me like one of their own.

The first year I got the traditional Thanksgiving Day. Turkey Bowl in the morning, Dallas Cowboys game in the afternoon, a fancy feast, pumpkin pie, scintillating conversation and board games galore.

What else could one want?

Last year they tossed in some wrinkles. The turkey bowl was moved indoors for a hoops game. We spent the afternoon working on a deep-fried turkey, and they took the idea of a "assortment" of desserts to the extreme.

In all, there were 23 different kinds of pies and cakes. I took home portions of 6. No problems there.

So it should have come to no surprise to me when I called to invite myself for Thanksgiving this year that they'd spring a whole new concept on me:

Camping and Elk hunting.

Different? Try revolutionary (to me).

A holiday? You betcha!!

The food was great. The games (Nerts, Hearts and Scrutineyes) were humbling. The hunt, sadly, came up empty (curse my luck). The company was fantastic.

Oh, and the scenic views roughly 10 miles up the road were, to say the least, Grand.

Thanks Tony, Vicki, Peggy, Norm, Brad, Corbyn, Emily and Bradley for all the fun.

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Some Thanksgiving week traditions, however, continue to live on.

"You're gonna eat lightning, and you're gonna crap thunder"

When keepin' it real goes wrong

Boys and girls, this is Max.

Max likes to play football, and he's pretty good at it too.

But one day, in an important game, Max did not play well. He made some mistakes (six to be exact), and his team lost.

People teased Max about his poor play and said hurtful things about his family.

Max was sad, and frustrated.

The next time Max got to play in this important game, he played a little better, and his team won the game.

But instead of being a good sport, Max lost control.

"I don't like Utah. In fact, I hate them. I hate everything about them."

"I hate their program. I hate their fans. I hate everything. So, it feels good to send those guys home. They didn't deserve it. It was our time, and it was our time to win. We deserved it. We played as hard as we could tonight, and it felt really good to send them home and to get them out of here, so it is a game I'll always remember."

"I think the whole university and their fans and organization is classless. They threw beer on my family and stuff last year and did a whole bunch of nasty things. I don't respect them, and they deserve to lose."

Max learned an important lesson that day: Nobody likes people who get even, and then get mad.

Thanks for the memories Max. We'll be talking about them for years to come.

26-23. What a George-ous ending.

Rivalry week

There are certain times I miss living in Utah more than others. This week is the toughest of them all, and it has little to do with turkey, stuffing, or pumpkin pie.

It's Rivalry Week.

Cougars vs. Utes. Blue vs. Red. Team Down South vs. Team Up North. Good vs. Evil. BYU vs. Utah.

In a perfect world, all I'd have to say next is "let the smack talk games begin" and off we'd go, but I'm no longer competent in that area. Apparently there are disadvantages to distancing one's self from Ute fans. (Burn.)

I can offer up the standard "Why doesn't the University of Utah place a nativity scene on campus during the holidays?" type jokes, but those belong with my high school diploma - stuffed away in a storage box. We all deserve better.

Bringing religion into the discussion is tired and lame too (unless you're a Ute fan). See? Is it part of what makes our rivalry great? Absolutely. But does either side want to rehash the false gospel of Austin over and over? I hope not. We all know Pres. Monson was a Utah Man in his heyday, and no self-respecting Rise and Shouter would ever describe their school as "the Lord's University," so let's file that line of thought away with the diploma.

What I'm hoping for is some creative, solid, concrete, get-my-competitive-juices-flowing, bulletin-board material from my audience. Got a haiku about how Jordan Wynn must lose? Let's hear it. Photoshop mockery of Max Hall and Dennis Pitta? I wanna see it. Stats and facts about K-Whitt and Bronco? Bring it on. Legendary quotes? Actually, I can start that one out with my all-time favorite.

"Typical Utah bull (expletive). All those (Utes) think that's all there is to life. But when I'm making $50,000- $60,000 a year, they'll be pumping my gas. They're low-class losers." -Lenny Gregory aka Lenny Gomes, 1994

Nothing would make me prouder this week than to sit down the Thanksgiving table and pronounce "I'm thankful for smack talk because I'm more excited about Saturday's game because of it."

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1. There are certain advantages that come with living in Yuma. My commute to finding shorts-approved temperatures, GREEN grass and open tee times in November is roughly 5 minutes.

When I figure out what the other advantages are, I'll be sure to let you know about them too.

2. For those who don't know the difference between smack talk and trash talk, Kelly Kapoor is here to help.

3. The answer to nativity joke: because the aren't three wise men and a virgin at the U.

Pure, Proud, Plaid

A few thoughts about my "Forever Plaid" experience:

- For those who are not familiar with this musical, you're missing out. The music is great. The characters are endearing. It's funny. It's innocent. It'll keep you reaching for your own dreams.

- I really had a lot of fun putting this together and doing something miles away from my comfort zone. I'm glad to have my Tuesday nights and Saturday mornings back, but I'll miss spending time with some great people.

- If I had a nickel for every time I heard the word "thespian" during the pastt two months, I'd have about $1.15

- Fear is an powerful motivational tool. Thank you Fear, for keeping me in the right place, on the right foot and in the right tune most of the time.

These are the faces of seven people who just realized their days of putting up with "Diva Rob" are over. Me? I'm smiling because someone said BYU beat TCU that night (not funny).

Welcome to Yuma, where outdoor dining in late October makes complete sense.

Backstage calm before the storm

Warning: Excessive use of falsetto may cause neck strains

My directions were to look nervous, scared and uncomfortable.

Check, check, and check.

Mercury Monterrey = chick magnet

Mickey Mouse doesn't hold a candle to Topo Gigio

I wish I had better pictures of our other album covers.

Photoshop is a fantastic toy.

We were also featured in a little publication some of you may have heard of called the Yuma Sun.

I won't be winning any awards for my work in Forever Plaid, but I prepared a little speech anyway:

First I want to recognize my family for their support and encouragement. As it turns out, those four years of piano lessons weren't a complete failure.

A big thanks to my three brothers in plaid, Troy, Ian and Richard. They are stalwart men loaded with talent. It's been a privilege to practice and perform with them.

I owe so much to our directors Amy and Kris and our accompanists Erika and Nate for taking a chance on a shy kid from Salt Lake and unleashing the inner Jinx from within me (orchestra music softly begins to play in the background). Oh no, wait! Our props helpers Angela and Melissa. Shawna Perkins, our executive director. Sally, oh Sally, you are my bellowed angel. Serenity now. Serenity now.

One more second Kanye. Please everyone, we need a college football playoff. WRITE YOUR CONGRESSMAN!