Meeting my Favorite Author with Charly

About two weeks ago Charly and I were in Barnes and Noble (surprise right?) and we notice that they had a sign up announcing a book signing with Brandon Sanderson.

Both Charly and I LOVE Brandon Sanderson and pretty much all of his books. We were bound and determined to go to the signing and meet him.

Unfortunately the night of the signing I had classes, a pretty hard assignment, and a meeting with the Dean of UVU sooooooo.... yeah. I figured that at least Charly could go and get the books signed for me. I was pretty down about it though.

That night, after my meeting with the Dean, and during my last class Charly messaged me and told me that she was still in line at the store and that she needed me to come pick her up. After reading the message I looked up at my teacher, who was going on about assembly language, and I decided that I was going to leave class early so that I could meet Brandon Sanderson.

It was pretty awesome for me actually because by the time I got there Charly was like the 8th person in line. We had gotten special bands earlier marking our spot in line so I was able to walk right up and start the line where Charly was! The first thing I noticed is that Brandon Sanderson was very polite and kind to everyone in line. The thanked them for waiting and always took time to talk with them. He would even ask them if they had any questions about any of his books. Needless to say, I was impressed.


When Charly and I got to him he signed the book that we were buying that day, and all of the other books that we had by him. He let us take a picture with him and thanked us for coming. Yeah, I know his eyes are closed. Of course he managed to blink... oh well..  Both Charly and I were super excited. It was a great night and I'm so glad I skipped class to go!

The Day We Met Brandon Sanderson (Our Favorite Author)

Once, about a month ago, Ben and I were (of course) at Barnes and Noble. While there, we saw a poster announcing a book signing with Brandon Sanderson for his newest release, Steelheart. Now, in case you don't know, Benjamin and I love Brandon Sanderson. 

We. Love. Brandon. Sanderson. 

We've read all his books.

We own almost all of his books. 

We've watched his lecture series on YouTube. 

When we were dating, his books were one of the many things that brought us together. 

We really, really love Brandon Sanderson. 

While we were at it, we had to buy a nice, hard copy of 

The Way of Kings for Brandon Sanderson to sign. 

So, we marked the day on our calendar and decided that even if we had to take work off or miss class (at the time, both our schedules were up in the air), that we would make sure we were there. 

The day approached. It was on Tuesday from 5:00 to 8:00. Sure enough, with how busy our schedules are, we both had conflicts. I had class until 5:30 and then I had work until 6:00. I was already planning on asking for work off because the SFLSA opening social was that same day from 6:00 to 7:30, which I wanted to attend. Ben had a class from 7:00-8:30. 

When I looked online to double check the time, hoping maybe we could work it out with our schedules, I saw that they were handing out wristbands on Monday morning starting at 9 AM. That was just awful timing for us, because Ben would be at work all day and I would be in class. 

We decided that night to stop by just to see if they had any wristbands left. They had plenty. We were 132 and 133 in line and we got the 94th copy of the book. 

We had decided it would be worth it to just to skip out on our other obligations to meet Brandon Sanderson. Then Ben remembered that he had a meeting with the Dean of the school as part of his responsibilities as the student rep for UVU's computer science department. It was at 6:00. Of course. 

I didn't want to miss it but I definitely did not want to go alone. I dragged my friend Janessa with me. It was crazy. There were quite a few people there and we had to wait for our number to be called out to pick up our copy of the book. Then we got to stand in line. For, practically forever. 

At 7:00, Janessa had to leave for a class. I waited in line for about an hour by myself. I made friends with the two girls in front of me--one of them is leaving in December to Charlotte, North Carolina! Ben and I were talking back and forth the whole time on Facebook and I convinced him to leave his class early to try to get to the store before I reached Brandon Sanderson. 

It was so close. I had probably five people in front of me when Ben arrived. It was close enough to make me sweat. Ben got there in time though, and we were even able to get a picture with our favorite author! 

Here we are, with Brandon Sanderson! 

Pear Picking Pair! (I'm the best at pear jokes)

Oooooh boy am I cutting this blog post close. It's 11:33 pm and I'm just starting. Luckily for you guys this one should be short and pear sweet.

Charly and I went to got pick some pears last Saturday because Charly wants to make fruit leather out of them... can you even make fruit leather out of pairs?

Anywho, it was pretty fun adventure. When we got there most of the pears near the ground were small and not very ripe so I volunteered to climb the tree and try to grab some of the better one higher up. Have you ever climbed a pear tree? DON'T. Anyway, after getting attacked by evil branches and giant spiders I managed to escape with a few pears.

I did manage to make a funny joke though. While I was up in the tree I grabbed a two pears and handed them to Charly.

"Here is a pair," I said in my silly voice.

Charly just rolled her eyes at me but she clearly thought it was funny. I can always tell.

A Pear Picking Pair

When my grandpa first moved to Utah years and years ago, he built his house on a half acre lot. This lot is now filled with fruit trees and grape vines and berry bushes. My uncle lives there now, but he doesn't pick all of the fruit. This means that all of the relatives are welcome to pick any of the fruit they want. 

That is how Ben and I, as relatives of my uncle, ended up picking pears all of Saturday afternoon. 

I wanted to make fruit leather out of it. Ben wasn't so sure about that. This made him a little hesitant to put homework time towards picking pears. He was a good husband, though, and good-naturedly came along to help. 

Between the rotten fruit splattered on the ground, the spiders we found living on more than one pear, and the number of times Ben inadvertently dropped a pear on my head, we made out okay. We left with two bags full of pears, four peaches, and quite a few walnuts (these we gathered straight off the ground and cracked open using the inside edge of our can opener). Before we left, we found a few small handfuls of the remaining blackberries from the blackberry bush. 

It was a fun, productive day. I cannot wait until we have our own little house with a yard full of fresh produce!

Charly in One Word

Charly is determined.

"having made a firm decision and being resolved not to change it." - Google

I chose this word to describe Charly because it is the word that stands out to me most. Charly doesn't give up. She stands strong for what she believes. If there is something that needs to be done she will work until it gets done. If something isn't working out for her she will try multiple different ways of trying to get it to work. I see this as a glimpse of her faith.

One time on my mission I asked an investigator what the word "faith" meant to them. The investigator said, "faith was never giving up."

Charly is determined and she has that kind of faith.

Benjamin in Only 1 Word

Patient.

If you know Benjamin at all, you will understand why I chose this word. For Ben, being patient is more than something he simply does; patience is something he is. When he drives, when he talks, when he helps me with my math homework--Ben is patient. This is one of the biggest differences in our personalities and I am constantly striving to be more like him in this area. It's one of the first things I noticed about him and continues to be one of my favorite things about my husband.

The Things Charly Does to Keep Our Relationship Strong

I think the title explains this post pretty well. These aren't in any specific order. I just wrote each one as I thought of it.

1. Charly loves me.

I know because she tells me and  because she serves me and puts up with me.

2. She works hard.

She is always doing something whether it's school, cleaning the house, or working her part time job. She is a hard worker and she is always busy.

3. She spends as much time with me as she can.

Sometimes it's hard with school and work and all of the things we are doing but she always makes time for me. Even if all we do is watch a doctor who episode during lunch, we make sure to spend time together every day.

4. She listens to me.

Let's be honest... I talk a lot. Sometimes I talk about things that I know that Charly really isn't interested in, like math or programming, but she still listens.

5. She shares her feelings with me.

I'm very grateful that she tells me how she is feeling. I know I'm not the best yet when it comes to validating and empathizing but it makes me feel like I'm part of Charly's life when she shares her frustrations, joys, and other feelings with me.

6. She feeds me.

Yup. I'm a guy. I need food. I try to help with preparing the food, even if I just get out the dishes or clean them after but lets be honest, she is a much better cook.

7. She lets me hold her hand almost all of the time.

8. Sometimes she kisses me first.

Let me tell you. I'm pretty lucky. Sometimes I get kisses when I'm not expecting them and I love that about Charly.

9. She helps me make sure that we read our scriptures and say our prayers together every night.

10. She goes on dates with me every week.

I think this one is one of the most important ones. It's up there with spending time together. We always have fun on our dates even when they only consist of buying a couple books at Barnes and Noble.

I remember every day how lucky I am to have Charly as my wife. I'm so glad that I chose to ask her to marry me and that she chose to say yes.

How to Make a Marriage Work

My Grandma Pat died when I was very young. At her funeral, they read a few excerpts from her journal. My Grandma Sue, the woman my Grandpa ended up remarrying, was at the funeral and heard as they read the words, "Arno knew how to make a marriage work," straight from my grandmother's everyday journal.

That is my Grandpa Sue's favorite lessons for the  grandchildren--that my grandfather knows how to make a marriage work and why.

Benjamin, too, knows how to make a marriage work. This is a list of some of those ways.

1. Ben is patient with me. Even when I am grumpy or talkative or irritated or excited.

2. Ben does all the little things still--things like opening the door or putting his arm around me in church.

3. Ben does the dishes while I'm at work and offers to help with dinner.

4. Ben will do things for me even when it isn't necessarily the thing he wants to be doing. He goes grocery shopping and helps me with math homework late at night and drives me to dance.

5. Ben never treats me poorly. He never says anything to me or about me that would indicate a poor opinion of me. Ben lets me know that he thinks I am wonderful and that I can be wonderful.

6. Ben snuggles with me in the mornings when we wake up. I don't know if every healthy marriage needs this, but it sure helps ours.

7. Ben is thoughtful enough to think of my needs. He will carry heavy things, unload the car, and give up his jacket in the cold for me. I never even have to ask.

8. Ben makes me laugh. It is my personal opinion that not every person in the world needs to marry someone funny. What I think they do all need is to marry someone they can laugh with. Our marriage is so much the better for the daily laughter Benjamin brings into it.

9. Ben never lets me wonder if he loves me or misses me or thinks I am beautiful. He will text me, call me, message me on Facebook, leave me notes. It's the last thing he tells me before we fall asleep at night and often the first thing he says when he wakes up.

10. Ben loves the Lord. He makes sure we make it to church every week. He leads me in scripture study and remembers to pray more often than I do. He holds my hand every night as we kneel in couple prayer. Benjamin has a wonderful, strong testimony and that testimony makes our marriage so much the better.

I'm a Genius Math Teacher

I'm sure my family will relate well with this post... Especially Donovan. Too bad he is on his mission and won't get to read this post for a while, oh well.

Thursday I had my Computer Architecture class. During class the teacher taught us about binary math, different bases, and twos compliment.

The entire class was review for me. It was boring. So boring in fact that when I got home from class I started to rant to Charly.

Now you should know that Charly doesn't like math. She doesn't hate it, but she doesn't love it either.

I love math.

When I told Charly about binary math and the different base system she was a little curious; at least, she seemed curious to me. Our conversation went something like this:

"Do you remember place value?" I asked.

"Not really," She answered.

"It's like, you have the ones place, and the tens place, and the one hundreds place, and..."

"Oh yeah, I remember now," She added quickly.

"Well our number system is in a base TEN. If you notice when we get to the number ten we actually don't have a symbol for it. We write a ONE in the tens place and then put a ZERO in the ones place. That represents TEN," I said excitedly. I'm telling you, this is going to sound very familiar to most my family.

"Wow," Charly said, "That is so cool! You should show me what it would be like if our number system was base FOUR!"

Okay, lets be honest... That's not actually what Charly said. That just must be what it sounded like to me... because I started explaining how base four worked. What she actually said was:

"Imagine if we used base four."

Anyway, to make a long story short. Charly got a very thorough math lesson on bases and binary even if she might not have actually wanted it. She will be grateful later though if she needs help in the college math class she is taking this semester.

Math for Breakfast

Thursday morning, I was minding my own business and eating waffles for breakfast. Waffles are my new favorite thing to eat. I was sitting at the counter and Ben was at the table on his computer. Ben is a computer science major and was working on homework.

He was talking out loud about what he was working on. My knowledge of computer science being basically nonexistent, I had no clue what he was talking about. I told Benjamin as much and he explained in simpler terms. I accepted his explanation without further question. Ben, however, didn't seem content with the simple fix to my ignorance on the subject.

"Do you know anything about bases?" Ben asked me, walking to join me at the counter. 

"Mmm ... I don't know," I said. 

"Do you know what place values are?" He asked. 

"Maybe," I said with a shrug. "I don't remember." 

Ben grabbed the nearest piece of paper and started writing out 1, 10, 100, 1000. "So this," he said, pointing to his paper, "would be the ones place, the tens place, the--" 

"Oh!" I said, cutting him off and feeling a little silly for not knowing what he had been talking about before. "Yeah, yeah, I know. I just didn't realize that's what you were talking about when you said it." 

Ben nodded. "So we use a base ten." He then explained what using a base ten meant. It seemed pretty familiar to me; I think we probably learned about it in math when I was in high school. After he'd finished his explanation to me, I felt very content with the extent of my math lesson. 

"Can you imagine if we had to use a base four?" I asked rhetorically. I thought it was a good comment to end with. 

"Let's try it," Ben said. Without waiting for my inevitable protest, he grabbed the piece of paper again. He wrote it out and explained how to figure everything out. We then spent a few minutes writing out different numbers with a base of four. 

Then Ben said, "Now, what if we had a base 2?" 

I groaned. Ben smiled. He wrote it all out and we figured out how you would write different numbers in this base too. 

"This is binary math," he explained excitedly. "It's what computers use." 

At the end of my math lesson, Ben said reassuringly, "Don't worry, I've done this to lots of people--my mom, Melissa, Dalin ..." The list went on and on. 

I suppose that's what I get for marrying a nerd. At least he'll be rich, right?