Trojan Basketball...

I have never been a huge basketball fan. I suppose it is partly because I'm no good at it, but it's also possible that the foul system bothers me. It makes it very hard to defend someone when the slightest contact trying to prevent a basket results in a foul.

Last night however, I found it remarkably easy to dismiss my belief that the game is fundamentally flawed. Last night, the USC Trojans came from about 15 points behind to put on the fiercest defense I recall watching. Further impressing me was the fact this was the third game this week they have played, and they don't have a deep bench to allow for resting talented players. The men of Troy were exhausted, but you would never have been able to tell by the amount of effort that they exerted running up and down the court to harrass any effort Arizona State made to shoot, pass, or advance down court. Their offense was able to make just enough plays and sink just enough free throws to not only overftake a 15 point deficit, but to earn the first PAC-10 tournament victory, and earn USC a place in the NCAA tournament.

I shouted with excitement; I jumped around with anticipation as the end of the game drew near; and I played "Conquest" on my PC to commemorate this amazing show that proved the Men of Troy know how to Fight On!

Good luck in the tournament Trojans!

15000 Words Too Many

I have been working on my favorite project, and managed to chop about 15000 words out of my screenplay.  It was really difficult to part with scenes that I had spent so long working on.  Also, after evaluating the script, I realized this is not the type of story that can be made into three separate movies.  There is plenty of material to market this as two movies however.  I'm thinking of a two part movie, kind of like how Kill Bill was made, or how they will do the last Harry Potter.  This obviously requires a lot more risk for whoever will end up producing the film, but I am confident it will pay off.  

My other problem is that I still have to take out another 15,000 words to make it into two really long .  I am really struggling to try and figure out how to combine events and consolidate the plot without losing too many character-defining moments.

Since getting into such a Zelda mood, I've also started replaying Twilight Princess on the Wii, trading off with my wife.  It may not be the most plot-impressive of the Zelda franchise, but the gameplay is just fantastic!

January is over at last!

 Some people enjoy the coming of a new year.  For many, it is a time to reflect on life, and to resolve to improve.  

I am not one of these people.  For me, January is like the Monday of the year.  It means the holidays are over, and it's back to the grindstone.  In my profession, this means a larger and more impatient group of people are seeking help with a variety of technical questions.

Don't get me wrong, I find it extremely rewarding after spending some time on a computer issue to discover the real problem and deliver a solution.  I do not enjoy listening to people complain about how they have to wait forever and all of the techs they talk to are idiots.  

To make this January even worse, we exchanged one President that did not keep his promises to adhere to conservative principals for a President that made so many promises it is not humanly possible to keep them all.  Barack Obama has started his tenure as commander in chief by trying to persuade America that in order to get out of recession, we should spend our children's money.  

I can't help but wonder where are all the Democrats are that told President Bush it was irresponsible to spend a lot of money on war when the deficit was so large.  Can't they tell President Obama that it's irresponsible to spend a lot of money on banks and businesses when the deficit is so large?

I was also underwhelmed when Obama showed his willingness to reach across the aisle and work in a bipartisan effort to fix problems by meeting with Republicans and telling them they need to stop listening to Rush.  Don't get me wrong, I don't subscribe to everything the EIB network endorses, but it seems like the only reason Obama reaches across the aisle is to slap conservatives.  Not quite the bipartisan effort I expected.

I have also been repeatedly shocked by the dissent among members of my own faith concerning the role of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in supporting California's Proposition 8.  Some of these individuals were also firm believers in Barack Obama, who said the following in his famous interview with Rev. Warren "I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman. Now, for me as a Christian, it's also a sacred union. You know, God's in the mix."

It seems like it shouldn't be too outrageous for a Church leader to promote this view if it is not too extreme for the President of the United States.  I fear that even among conservatives, the number of people that define their political views based on good and evil is waning.  Is it so hard to see that God gave men freedom so that they could choose good over evil, not so that they could have civil liberties?

To top off January, the check engine light in my car came on, and my wife and I have struggled dealing with transportation in nasty weather while hauling our surprisingly cheerful one year old boy all over Utah County.

Now that January is over, all my problems will be solved.  The weather will warm up to a comfortable 75 degrees, I will finish my screenplay, my son will potty-train himself, Barack Obama will stop spending government money on worthless leftist programs, homosexuals will realize that homosexuality is evil, and all the terrorists that are trying to kill Americans will catch the bird flu and die.

Probably not.

But perhaps January being over helps me remember that it wasn't all gloom and misery...  My son had his first birthday, USC won in an amazing Rose Bowl performance, Taylor Mays is staying for next season, I realized that Boston wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be, I read some of the most awesome Naruto chapters ever, I still have a job, we learned we will be getting a 2-bedroom apartment for a great rate, and Barack Obama has not pulled a Palpatine and eliminated congress... yet... :)

One way or the other, I am looking forward with cautious optimism to the rest of February!

A Typical Christmas Post

I know that 'true meaning of Christmas' posts are prevalent this time of year, but I don't care. It's my blog, and I'll get religious if I want to :)

I love Christmas. Almost everything about this season makes me happy. It was especially the case in California when I could go out in 75 degree whether on Christmas day. Unfortunately, here in Utah, I have suffered through awful traffic, poor gas mileage, and the eye-sore of dirty slush everywhere. While the snowy weather is not my idea of a winter wonderland, I have still found many things that put a smile on my face.

Perhaps seeing my little baby have his first Christmas has brought on my reflection on the significance of the season... perhaps it is anticipating my wife open up what I purchased for her this year... but whatever it is, I have really enjoyed the month of December leading up to the celebration of the birth of the most important man that ever lived.

I can only imagine what people thought when they discovered that new star the night he was born. Wise men of the east recognized its significance and travelled a great distance to find the King. Faithful in the west must have felt the mercy of the most high when the sign that they risked their lives to believe in appeared shortly before they were to have been killed... but while people afar recognized what this meant, the majority of people right in the land where Christ was born had no idea. Mary and Joseph were forced to find shelter with beasts of the earth when the King of Kings was delivered. No royal robes adorned the master, and his was not the crib of a monarch, but he was wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid in a manger.

In reflection, I would describe all of the good fortune I have enjoyed in my life as blessings from God. I have felt happiness in participating in his church, and pleasure when serving those in his kingdom. I would say that at times of need, God has been near to me. I would hope that I am more like those that risked their lives for the want of starlight in the pages of the Book of Mormon, or like the wise men that would go to any length to see the King of Kings, and not like the innkeeper that could find no room in the inn for the master.

With Jesus Christ in mind, who gave everything for the sons of men... I hope that each of you are met with his peace, happiness, and mercy especially in this Christmas season. Merry Christmas to all!

Looking forward to the Grandaddy of them All!

As a huge fan of the University of Southern California, I watched in pure bliss as the Trojans came into the Rose Bowl wearing their home cardinal and gold to take on the UCLA Bruins in the last regular season game.

Playing UCLA at the Rose Bowl has been challenging the past few years, even with Heisman Trophy winners like Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush on the roster. Two seasons ago, with the likelihood of facing Ohio State in the National Championship game, we were stunned by the Bruins 13-9. It was such a painful loss that only hours of playing The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess could ease. The big win over Michigan in the Rose Bowl seemed like something of a consolation prize at the time.

This season was different for me. Although we had a similar loss to Oregon State, and there was still some hope of Missouri pulling an upset and potentially creating an opening for the Men of Troy in the title game, I was happy with the end result. The Trojans are now set to play Big 10 champ Penn State in the Rose Bowl. Some might view this as a consolation prize, but with how many high quality teams in the Big 12 south division were denied a chance to play in the game, and with Penn State being in a similar situation, I believe that this is a great match up that will bring prestige to USC. We aren't playing some 3 loss Big 10 runner up, we're matched up against their champion. A win in the Rose Bowl cannot give USC the crystal BCS trophy, but it can establish that the Trojans are a great team that can compete with anyone in the country.

Seeing our offensive coordinator Steve Sarkisian leave our offensive coordinator spot is bittersweet. He has been a great asset and helped our talent improve this season, but seeing him go to Washington will hopefully be planting the seeds of improving the conference. Winning a stronger conference is better for USC in the long run. I also hope that fresh offensive perspective will help our talent. Mark Sanchez is an extremely impressive quarterback. I look forward to seeing him play when our offensive line is a bit more experienced and can buy him a bit more time, as well as open better holes for the stable of running backs at USC.

Overall, this looks to be an exciting bowl season. I am hopeful that the conference does well. While I am certainly looking forward to the Florida-Oklahoma game, I anticipate raising my voice much more for the contest between Big 10 and Pac 10 in Pasadena on New Years Day.

My eternal projects

I am currently working on two projects that have been on and off for quite some time. The first is a relatively recent ambition to create my own graphic novel. I actually have a sizable chunk of story written for it, but the artwork is much more tedious. My wife is working on that at the same time she is trying to keep our little son Mark from chewing on every book or technological device in our home; naturally, the art portion is not nearly as quick as the writing. I am still enthusiastic about the characters, the fantasy world they live in, and the general themes of the story. When we have enough complete... we will be posting them online and providing links here.

My second project is something that I have been working on since 2003. It began as a short story based in the world of the greatest video game franchise ever, the Legend of Zelda. After writing twenty pages and realizing I was nowhere near the end of where I wanted this story to go, I knew that my project would require much more work. In the summer of 2006, I finally wrote the words THE END at the end of my work. After assigning it the title The Secret of Ganon, I began the lengthy and unfinished process of editing. It was amazing to me how many errors went unnoticed by the otherwise thorough spell checker. It probably didn't help that I was adding terms like hookshots, moblins, Gorons, Zora, Gerudo, Hylians, and other assorted terms to my spell checking dictionary.

After dozens of times going through and revising my book, I feel like it is a great story. Ignoring probability, I thought to myself how amazing it would be to have my book become the basis of a full-length motion picture. Zelda fans have longed to see their Hylian hero on the silver screen for ages, and Nintendo, apparently protective of their lucrative franchise, has not shown the slightest inclination to make this dream a reality. Ambitious beyond the status quo, I have spent the last several months converting my novel into a screenplay. This has been no small challenge, but isolating the dialogue is helping me to identify places that need improvement.

I don't know how many more years my Secret of Ganon project will last, but hopefully, one day, people will be able to enjoy my hard work before their eyes in the comfort of a movie theater. Maybe my chances are slim to none... but I like to think that those are the odds Link overcame when he gripped the blade of evil's bane and struck down the King of evil!

Trojan Football

For the second week in a row, I have been wrongfully robbed of the opportunity to see the Southern California Trojans beat Washington and Cal. The first week, it was due to the foxsports cable package wanting to make sure nothing interfered with their coverage of the Utah Jazz basketball game. I am definitely understanding of preserving local interest, but what makes this frustrating is the fact that the first three quarters of the game did not overlap with the Jazz game at all.

This last Saturday, USC football was only regional coverage; most regions were covering the Texas Tech Oklahoma state game. Certainly there is a lot more national interest in the Big XII south region, and had Cal beat Maryland and USC beat Oregon state, they could have helped themselves to a larger audience. The problem again is that several weeks ago, USC coverage was dropped because the Trojans were doing well in the 3rd quarter to watch a closer out of region game. Last Saturday as Texas Tech ran up the score on Oklahoma state, I was afforded no courtesy to go to the closer out of region USC vs Cal.

Certainly I should be happy that the Men of Troy won. My brother and I were anxiously watching the flash ESPN gamecast to get the "live" play by play. In the end, we turned up the volume on my computer and raised the Trojan Victory sign to the sound of the Spirit of Troy playing "Conquest." Still, there is an unpleasantness about the whole affair. I can only hope that in lieu of missing these games, Florida loses to South Carolina, Auburn loses to Florida, Texas Tech loses to Oklahoma, Oklahoma loses to Missouri, and the Trojans of Southern California head to the championship game that they have narrowly missed since the heartbraking rosebowl loss to Texas.