Day of Days

I've always been interested in learning about military conflicts (both past and present) and tactics, though I've never really thought of myself as one who would do well in the armed forces, or even survive for that matter. This past weekend a group of friends and I got together to go paintballing, as I figured that this would be the closest I'd ever be willing to get to the "real deal".

I can't remember a time when I didn't want to go paintballing, so naturally I was really excited, and boy oh boy, I wasn't disappointed!


We found a cool forested area in American Fork to play and "went to war" for a few hours on Saturday. It was so much fun, it's practically all that I've been able to think about since! I found this sweet army jacket second-hand so I'd "blend" into my surroundings and look the part. I can hardly wait to get back out there again and would highly recommend paintball to everybody! It can hurt a bit, so don't think that it's a pansy game by any means (not wearing a mask is extremely dangerous) but if you've got a decent pain threshold, you'll be fine.

Meghan had some fun shooting one of the paintball guns in our backyard too... of course she didn't get shot at, so she only got half the experience. :)


After paintballing, the Wife and I went to DéLeon Spa to get a couples massage (Megs' treat!). It was a little weird at first, since I knew that the "girl hands" that were rubbing my back didn't belong to my wife, but the masseuse was really good and soon enough we were both on cloud nine. It was kinda pricey, but we had so much fun, as soon as we can afford it again, we're going!

To round out the day, we drove up to Syracuse for a surprise birthday party for my best friend Craig. We got home SUPER late and were SUPER tired, but a day that starts with paintball, ends with birthday cake and has a massage in between has to be worth it, right?

Calvin & Hobbes for the Soul

The Wife and I have truly never had a "real" fight. We seem to always get along and rarely even have disagreements of any kind of serious nature. There is one thing however, that threatens the peace and calm in our home on a daily basis.... the thermostat.

You see, since we are not well-off financially, I am more than happy to live in a house that is a tad chilly in order to save some "benjamins" on our gas bill. The wife on the other hand, is more adept for warmer temperatures, thus prompting verbal jousts as the following...

wife- "Did you turn down the heater?"

me- "No."

wife- "Yes you did, it's freezing in here..."

me- "No I didn't. Our house is just old."

wife- "Nuh uh. I turned it up past 70 a couple minutes ago. What's it at now?"

me- (looking at the thermostat) "Just past 70."

wife- "No it's not, you're lying."

me- "I am not lying. It IS just past 70."

wife- (after getting up to come look at the thermostat) "Yes you DID turn it down! It's at 58 degrees you liar!"

me- "I didn't turn it down."

wife- "Oh yeah? Well then who did?"

me- "Well if I had to guess... I'd say our future childrens' college funds must've snuck in and turned down the heat. It was either them or next month's groceries."

wife- "You're such a bum."

And thus goes our daily battle between warmth and utter bankruptcy. I'd been wondering as to what methods we might employ to contend with this crisis, and lo and behold... Calvin never fails me. :)

Happy Love Day!

Wow... so before Megs came into my life, Valentine's Day used to be a pretty ho-hum event.

Now...


It's one of the best days of the year! Megs woke me up early Saturday morning and brought me into the kitchen where I found this waiting for me...


Hand-made love signs and cards, along with freshly baked herman for breakfast! Oh how I love my wife. Since I had to work Saturday morning and Megs took a test, we used Friday night to eat out at T.G.I. Friday's (overrated, clap-clap-clap-clap-clap) and then saw Pink Panther 2 (Steve Martin rules!). Saturday night, we went to our stake Valentine's Dance where we were in charge of photos, prizes and a few things, and thanks to my rockin' dance moves, we had a great time. ;)

To my beloved wife: I love you! Thanks for being my b-e-a-utiful "Valentime"!


For more details about our awesome day, check this out.

Movie Review: Mall Cop

Megs and I attended a party put on by my work last week, and despite my low expectations, we had a really good time. We had a great meal at Magelby's restaurant and then went across the street where my company rented out a theater and we all watched Paul Blart: Mall Cop. Now I can spot a cheesy, stupid, wannabe-funny movie from a mile away, so naturally, my expectations for the movie were exceedingly low. The only hope this movie had, I thought, was that the main character Kevin James was pretty funny in other shows such as Hitch, or I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry... That said, I wasn't expecting to be pleasantly surprised.

But, pleasantly surprised I was indeed! Let's breakdown the movie and see how it fared when critiqued by the great movie-critic duo of.... Emerson & Kody. :)

Premise-Plot 4/5: The film is about a lowly mall security guard who is feared by none and respected by even fewer. During his shift one day, the mall gets held up by a band of crooks, looking to rob the mall, and it's up to Paul Blart, said mall cop, to save the day.

The plot didn't seem to grasp me all that much (although I was taken back a couple of times with unforeseen twists), but the premise of a mall security guard seemed to be inately funny and have widespread possibilities.

Post script: Actually I'm going to change this to a 3 out of 5 instead. This has nothing to do with Kevin James, who was phenomenal as Paul Blart, but rather the bad guys, who stunk. The main bad guy won't win any awards for sure, but really, it was his evil cohorts that really bothered me. Instead of just normal bad dudes with guns and outfitted in black-ops gear, the mall was taken over by a bunch of X-Games criminals who spent half the movie skateboarding, bmx-ing and freestyle walking their way around the mall. They got real annoying, real fast.

Acting: 4/5 Kevin James was straight-up hilarious in this flick and he made me want to re-watch his movies that I've already seen. The supporting cast was ok, some more entertaining than others (the bad guy wasn't very good), but the actors that had to be good were, and that's what matters most.

Kid-friendly: 5/5 I don't remember a single swear word nor inappropriate remark or scene, so the kiddies should enjoy this one too. Although just to cover my bases, if you see it and there are bad words or anything of the like, I disavow all knowledge of said "despicability" (despicable thing) and hereby abslove myself from any responsibility thereof. ... but really, you should be good. :)

Funniness: 4/5 I really, really wanted to give this one a 5, but because a lot of the humor is "stupid humor", I just couldn't bring myself to give it the full score. In its truest form though, funniness according to the dictionary "causes amusment or laughter", and there was plenty of both in that theater.

Overall: 4/5 Again, I'm not going to add this to my list of all-time favorites, but it's a really fun show that's certainly worth seeing once.

Here's a trailer for the movie:

New Year, New Haircut, New Blog

So I overheard someone saying that it's 2009... Well, with new beginnings come new hairdos!

This means no more of this...

Or even this...

And lots more (or less, depending how you wanna look at it) of this...

I hope your happy Mum ;). Yep, I done-got me a haircut. And actually, I dig the new do'... We'll see how long it lasts. In other news since my last post, Christmas was good, I didn't flunk any classes, Megs and I learned how to make sushi, Obama is President, the Packers are switching to a 3-4 defense AND... I've made a few New Year's resolutions. (Additional details found here)

"Now Kody, it's already February... isn't it a little late for New Year's resolutions?"

Ah ha. Oh the err of your ways.

Sure, maybe it's been over a month since everyone started on this whole "2009" kick, but what is a year really? No my dear friends and family, the "New Year" officially begins after the Super Bowl. Besides, the next 7 months feel like at least 12 without football anyways.

Thus I give you, Kody's Abbreviated-yet-Comprehensive-though-in-no-particular-order-New-Year's-Resolutions-that-will-likely-end-up-as-regrets... List.

Numero Uno- Blog fortnightly. Hence me typing, and you reading this.

Number Deux- Attend the temple monthly. Do I really need to explain this one?

numer trzy- Get an Internship this summer. Real-life punched me in the mouth when I realized that I'm graduating next year.

เลขสี- Exercise by playing sports more often. It's not that I'm getting fat per se... it's just that Meghan has been watching a lot of The Biggest Loser recently.

число п'ять- Don't miss class for any reason. (unless that reason is really good) I would guess that class attendance and good grades are postively related.

anim na numero ng- Attend a Packer game. Megs took me to a pre-season game in San Fran last August and it was pretty much The Funnest Thing Ever. I think The Funnest Thing Ever II would be pretty sweet too.

العدد سبعة- Figure out what we're doing after I graduate. Obviously, this one is related to numer trzy, but involves thinking/planning that's a bit more long-term. Recently I've found an interest studying health economics, and perhaps pursuing an MHA or MHSA degree might be just the thing I'm looking for. That said, I lost one of my slippers about 45 minutes ago... so maybe that's just the thing I'm looking for. Conundrum.

號- Be nice to Meghan you jerk! To be honest, I don't think that I treat Megs all-that-bad. I mean, I get stuff off the top shelf for her and let her drink the Dr. Pepper when there's only a little left. The problem is rather that she treats me so well. Really the only way to equate the situation is for me to sprinkle her path with rose petals where 'ere she goes. Anybody have a gift card to 1-800-flowers?

The-Last-But-Not-Least-Number-Nine- Share the Gospel with someone. This might sound pretty easy, but to you who question the difficulty of this resolution I give you two addendums. 1) There aren't many people in Provo who don't know about the LDS Church... especially on BYU Campus and 2) When I say "Share the Gospel" I don't just mean mentioning something off-the-cuff like "Hey there was this guy Joseph Smith who did something cool... ok bye." No, I'm implying that the act of "sharing" the Gospel would in fact have a non-trivial impact on said person's life and soul. Sounds exciting.

For personal reasons, I left some of my resolutions off this list (mainly because I've forgotten some of them already...). But nevertheless, this menu of goals, acheivements and events are wide-spread enough to give you an idea of what I hope this coming year to be. What are some of your New Year's resolutions?

This is somewhat of a trial-by-fire as I've never been big into New Year's resolutions before, but hey... I got a haircut, and that's a good start. :)