Eerie similarities

Halloween is less than a week away! Like many of my favorite shows, I plan to use the holiday as a crutch for one episode/post per year. Since the bulk of my posts are BASOTRUSSLs (Blog About Something Only Tangentially Related to the Upcoming Sunday School Lesson), that means I get to shoehorn some spooky into the scriptures every October.

This Sunday we're covering 3 Nephi, chapters 17 through 19. Here's the link to the study guide material. Without further ado, here are the top 10 Halloween connections I could force from that scripture block, listed from most tenuous to least (though the level of irreverence/sacrilege varies widely):

10) Frequent use of the word "which" (see 3 Ne. 17:15; 18:10-11, 27-28; 19:32-34, etc.--about once every six verses on average). Remember, I said we're starting with the least tenuous.

9) Spooky imagery such as the gates of hell (see 3 Ne. 18:13), referring to people as "souls" (see 3 Ne. 17:25), and frequent mentions of the Spirit or the Holy "Ghost."

8) Bobbing for apples is almost like a secular version of baptism by immersion (see 3 Ne. 19:10-13).

7) Halloween is awesome for both adults and children (see all of 3 Nephi 17).

6) Hordes of maimed and leprous and withered people (see 3 Ne. 17:7-9)...sounds like one of those zombie marathons.

5) Speaking of zombies--Nephi's brother Timothy rose from the dead! (See 3 Ne. 19:4.)

4) Starting "before it was yet dark" and continuing throughout the night, many people basically went house to house, giving the same message over and over (see 3 Ne. 19:2-3).

3) The leaders of the community distributed small pieces of free food, and the people ate until they were full (see 3 Ne. 18:3-5).

2) At one point it seemed like the Nephites were all dressed like ghosts--their "whiteness...did exceed all the whiteness...there could be nothing on earth so white as the whiteness thereof" (3 Ne. 19:25). The study guide page linked to above suggests reading chapter 17 aloud. After you've done that, do the same with this verse too--I've long thought it's one of the strangest sounding passages to read out loud. And finally...

1) Many people sacrificed throughout the night in order to be in the right spot when Jesus appeared--just like Linus's devotion to the Great Pumpkin (see 3 Ne. 19:3). When you wait on the Lord, though, you get much more than a bag of rocks.

Happy Halloween from Tales of Hofmann!

Yours sincerely, wasting away

I'm pretty sure my first experiences with mortality came from playing Oregon Trail in my elementary school computer lab. I loved firing up the old Apple IIe, choosing which of my friends would be traveling the trail with me, and hoping we would make it to Oregon but not caring if we didn't. Because if we didn't, that would mean I'd get to laugh at the thought of my pals dying of cholera or snake bite or because they didn't like the wild fruit I found, plus I got to write silly things on the tombstones.

By the time I attended my first funeral, just before I turned 11, death was not a fearful or even a particularly sad thing for me. My faith in my religion's teachings about the afterlife played a major role in this attitude, but Oregon Trail may have played just as big a part. On the Trail, death just meant a chance to write a funny epitaph, then immediately start a new game. Life goes on.

(By the way, I made the above tombstone at this cool site. I love the Internet!)

Although I don't fear death, over the last week or two a number of things have happeend that have made me feel old.

--For months, my mom has told me my deodorant makes me smell like an old man. It never bothered me. But when the same criticism comes from Schmidt...well, that hurts.

--I've been growing my beard out for Halloween. It's been a little over three months since my last shave, the longest my facial hair has ever been. It's also coming in with better thickness and consistency than past beard attempts...but there are also a few white hairs scattered throughout. (My costume will end up being mustache-only, but I'll post some beard pics here before I shave it off.)

--I went to a YSA dance on Monday night. I certainly wasn't the only emeritus YSA in attendance, and I still had fun, but I did stop dancing for a while and talked to a fellow "oldie" about how there was too much Black Eyed Peas, Ke$ha, etc., being played and not nearly enough Spice Girls or Third Eye Blind. I also needed the break because my stamina isn't nearly what it was during my dancing days in high school and college, but I'm pretty sure that has much more to do with me being in terrible shape than my age.

--The other day at dinner group, the girl who was hosting said "You've got to listen to this weird song that just came on my Halloween Pandora station!" The song in question turned out to be the "funny farm" song. (Was this the first mainstream example of autotuning? Hmm...) Now, that song is much older than me, but since none of the girls at dinner (average age around 27) had heard it, I felt like it must be a tune from "my" era.

--Finally, Saturday is my half-birthday. I am now 32.5 years old. Exactly halfway to the standard retirement age. And if my retirement savings in the next 32.5 years equal what I saved in the first 32.5...I'm pretty much screwed.

Luckily, just when I needed it most, Oregon Trail came through for me again. In case you didn't know, I Tweet for JetBlue Airways (and in case I haven't made it clear before, my personal blog/Twitter feed/Facebook page are just that--personal, as in, not affiliated with JetBlue). A few days ago a customer Tweeted about us and made an OT reference that my "old" coworkers didn't get. Fortunately, I was around to reply. Here's the exchange:

If you don't get my joke, then you're either old, or missed out on an important part of childhood. One of my favorite games has once again made me feel young, and helped me stave off worrying about death or even retirement, at least for another week.

The scriptures have helped, too. This week's Sunday School lesson covers the version of the Sermon on the Mount that Jesus gave to the Nephites after resurrection. The Lord knows, age is just a number--"Old things are done away, and all things have become new" (3 Ne. 12:47). He also knew that saving for retirement isn't really a big deal, teaching that we should lay up treasures in heaven rather than on earth, and to take no thought about food or clothing (see 3 Ne. 13:19-32). So I guess I'm doing all right.

Ok, I'm being slightly facetious. It is important to be prepared and responsible in temporal matters. But whether I die "young" or live to retirement age, and whether my retirement home is in the Willamette Valley, or on the funny farm, or even just livin' on a prayer (you know, because I'm halfway there), it doesn't matter. I know I will die someday, and I'm all right with that. Because there is life after death. And because it will give me one last chance to say something funny.

Na-na na-na na-na nuh, Batpod!

One of my very first posts on this blog was dedicated to how awful Joel Schumacher's Batman & Robin is. If a couple of paragraphs didn't convince you then, maybe this will--I recently made a guest appearance on the "Good Word From Bad Movies" podcast (the reason for this post's title; sorry if you were looking for info on the Caped Crusader's cool motorcycle), where my friends Billy and Andrew watch terrible movies, then make fun of them while simultaneously relating them to gospel principles. It's kind of like an aural version of my BASOTRUSSL posts.

There was so much stuff to mock in B&R that the podcast has been broken up into three parts. The link for part 1 is here, part 2 here, and part 3 here. Altogether it's 117 minutes of comedy gold. (That's just 8 minutes shorter than the movie itself.) We review the plot in the first two parts (can't really call it a "summary" when it's that long), then get more into the "Good Word" in the final installment.

There are plenty of jokes peppered throughout, the most common themes being pizza, bad Arnold impressions and even worse Mr. Freeze puns, and (surprisingly) Hitler. We recorded in early September but the episodes were just posted over the last week, so there are some dated references to the Olympics and such, but if you think I'm funny then you'll probably really enjoy these. At any rate, they hopefully won't leave you as bored as the supervillain pictured below.

I had a ton of fun recording these (thanks Andrew and Billy!) and hope to use podcasts more in the future as a way to entertain the masses and show off my wit. In the meantime, now that I've ripped on Batman &Robin in writing and with audio, I need to decide which medium to use next. Maybe a diorama...

Gone baptizin'

[The title of this post comes from a classic "Simpsons" moment. As with many of these classic moments, it's nowhere to be found online except on weird Eastern European websites. However, there's an even more classic moment that comes right after which I was able to find on a known site.]

Last week I attended a baptismal service, the first one I'd been to in a couple of years. Javier, a man who lives in my complex, was the one who was baptized. His wife is LDS and is in my ward, attending with their toddler-aged daughter. Javier has been attending with his family the last several months and is a great guy. It was a sweet experience to see him accept the gospel and begin on the path which will see him sealed to his wife and child in the near future.

It was interesting to me to note the contrast between the brevity of the baptismal ordinance and its importance. In a meeting that lasted nearly an hour, the actual baptism lasted about a minute, including the time it took Javier and the man who did the dunking to walk down into the font. In a flash, one of the most important events of Javier's life was over. I remember when I was baptized, when I was 8 years old, as soon as I came up out of the water, I asked if I could do it again. I don't swim and am not a fan of being in water generally; my eagerness to repeat the ceremony was due mainly to the good feeling it created within me, but there may have also been a small part of me that felt I was being shortchanged, that something so important should last longer.

I'm old enough now to know that time is not necessarily equal to importance. I assume that most who read my blog share my view of the importance of baptism, but in case there are any who doubt, consider what happened when Jesus made His long-prophesied post-resurrection appearance in the Americas (which we'll be discussing in this week's Sunday School lesson). Once the people fully understood who He was, He began to teach them. His first topic? Baptism (see 3 Ne. 11:21-29). That's a pretty strong endorsement.

And time is a relative concept, anyway. When Christ was crucified, the people in America endured terrible catastrophes and destruction (also covered in this week's reading block). The earthquakes and other disasters lasted about three hours, but many felt it was actually much longer (see 3 Ne. 8:19). When you're talking about cities catching fire and other cities falling into the sea and thousands of people dying, even one hour would seem like an eternity.

By contrast, take a look at the second bullet point from the link above. When the Savior appeared, before He began teaching, He invited the multitude of 2500 (see 3 Ne. 17:25) to come up one by one to feel the wounds in His hands and feet and side and gain a testimony that He was actually the promised Messiah (see 3 Ne. 11:13-15). If each person was allowed 10 seconds each for this amazing experience, the entire process would've lasted about seven hours! It's quite likely it took even longer. This lasted much longer than the destructive forces did, but I bet the time flew by for these blessed people.

I hope we won't judge an event's importance strictly by how long it lasts. After all, what's a minute, or 3 hours, or 7 hours, or even the 1000 years of history covered in The Book of Mormon when viewed through the lens of eternity?

Hoffmann of the Month: October

Last October, BYU's stud wide receiver Cody Hoffman was named the "Hoffmann of the Month," and it worked out nicely for both parties. That post has been viewed more times than any other on this blog, by a wide margin. The effect on Cody was even more noticeable: to that point in the season, Hoffman had played 5 games, but only netting over 100 receiving yards once and catching one touchdown (he also had a special teams TD). After he won this blog's highest honor, he had 100+ yards in 4 of the last 8 games and scored 9 touchdowns.

Whether the October 2012 Hoffmann of the Month will have the same impact on me or on the honoree remains to be seen, but regardless, Hoffman's Chocolate is worthy of the distinction.

Hoffman's began decades ago as a small, family-run chocolate shop in Florida, but they seem to be growing pretty rapidly, and you can get their chocolate shipped to you anywhere in the United States. All of their stuff (such as the chocolate covered strawberries pictured above) looks amazing, though I'm admittedly not hard to impress when it comes to chocolate. (The only time I remember ever not liking chocolate was when I dipped some orange chicken in fondue.) They're also smart marketers--who wouldn't want to try something called a "Wheel of Treats?"

I chose to honor HC now because it's the month of Halloween, my favorite candy holiday. My rankings may not match up with the general public--Hoffman's Halloween selection is pretty limited, they have videos online touting their popularity at Christmas and Valentine's (their busiest time of the year), and at one time had the millennium's best Easter basket, according to one prominent publication.

(My rankings of the major candy holidays:

1. Halloween
2. Easter
3. Christmas
4. Valentine's Day

All four are roughly equal in terms of chocolate; the products are basically the same, just with variations to shapes and packaging depending on the holiday. I'm not a big fan of candy corn or jelly beans, but they're both tons better than those V-Day conversation hearts. Christmas doesn't have a nasty candy to ding its ranking, but there's so much other stuff, food and otherwise, associated with it that candy gets a little lost in the shuffle. Ultimately, my fondness for Halloween generally gives it the nod over Easter. I'm sure you're all fascinated by this.)

Whether they emphasize Halloween or not, I feel confident in my prediction that their chocolate is excellent. Congratulations, Hoffman's Chocolate! Welcome to the elite ranks of the Hoffmann of the Month club!