Apples Apples Everywhere

Today was apple picking day. Oh the joy of climbing up in a tree. Pushing your way past the twisted branches. Seeing how high up the branches will hold you. Although, climbing the tree probably means that I didn't trim the tree correctly while it was still cold.

To be fair, I have never trimmed this tree. It is not our tree. We picked apples from the trees in the backyard of Hannah's employers. They have been overly busy preparing for a gluten-free expo, and the trees had already lost almost half of their fruit. We still pulled in nine buckets of apples.

The good news about picking apples is that it means fresh apples, apple pie, and hopefully applesauce. The bad news is I can't think of any good bad news to report. That is right. No good bad news to report.

Sure, there is plenty of bad bad news to report. For example, I took my socks off when I got home, and I don't know if I put them in the dirty clothes. As you can see that was bad bad news. In fact, it wasn't even worth reporting. I am not even sure why I mentioned it. However, there it stands. I am not even sure how to take it back. Once you type something into a blog, you can't delete it. I am sure that is true, and not made up.

Hannah and I enjoyed picking apples today. It was fun. I would say it was reminiscent of being in Washington, visiting my parents, working on their six apple and three pear trees.

Word of the day:
Apple: the usually round, red or yellow, edible fruit of a small tree, Malus sylvestris,  of the rose family.

Post script. Hannah found my socks. They are now put away.

Why We Fish... The First Part

My father has always enjoyed fishing. Since I was of a young age, I remember him talking of owning a boat. He made plans through out my childhood of boating, and greatly enjoyed going out on Lake Powell when Grandpa Caldwell had a boat there. After we moved to Washington, my father began his goal of owning a boat. We started out small. He began with a row boat.

Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah (2-Month Anniversary!)

{blah blah blah blah blah (Ryan is cutting spices while he dictates to me.)

So you may be well aware that Thursday was our 2 month anniversary.  Now that isn’t quite right.  Although the date says we’ve only been married 2 months, Hannah and I are sure that it’s been more like 6 months-2 yrs.  We have made way too many adult decisions for it to be merely 2 mos.  We bought a microwave last night.  Then we made the adult decision to put all of our wedding pictures into a wedding album while I read The Hobbit to Hannah.  That is completely an adult decision, and couldn’t possibly be made on the experience of only 2 months.  In fact, just last week Hannah made the adult decision that we needed to eat more vegetables and I made the adult decision to agree with her. (To be fair that isn't true. Although it is funnier to say it that way.)  Clearly we should be credited with extra time.  Therefore, Thursday might have been our 2 month anniversary, but Friday was our triple-awesome anniversary.

            I asked Hannah what to write next, and she said “Mr. Ryan, this is your blog.”  So I have made the decision to follow her advice and tell you about our 2-month anniversary date. 

Our latest grown up decision was to buy an ironing board.

Now on Friday night Hannah and I decided to skip the BYU-Hawaii game (we don’t have a TV and didn’t know it was happening until we were partway up the mountain [by the way BYU trounced University of Hawaii]) I don’t know if you’ve ever hiked the Y.  It is a nice, pleasant stroll up.  It’s only a mile and a half.  Straight up the mountain.  With a ten-degree temp difference.  And less air than you could keep a bird alive on.  Most of the way up you’re not sure if you left your lungs behind.  And your legs keep attempting mutiny, and you feel like you’re going to fall on your face, but the mountain keeps catching you every time.  The great thing about hiking the Y is that after you get to the top, and have been up there a while, you promptly forget the trek up and think to yourself  “Wow!  That was a great hike!  I want to do that again.”  It’s probably the lack of oxygen.  We enjoyed ourselves a love, so we’re planning on doing it again in the Spring, when the weather turns warm again.

            Hannah is calling me Mr. Dictator.  She probably doesn’t want me to mention that I’m dictating to her, while I’m off lollygagging {doing the dishes}.  I just asked Hannah if she’s adding stuff.  She won’t tell me. 

However, I digress.  The hike up was pleasant.  We took up with us an entire Little Ceasar’s pizza, wrapped in tinfoil.  Divided and lovingly placed in our daypacks.  At the top, we tenderly laid a blanket just above the foot of the Y and watched people below leave the massacre that was the BYU-Hawaii game.  It was pleasant sitting up there, seeing the unending line of red brake lights and white headlights, with the distant peal of victory bells far below.  I am unsure of how long we were up there (2 hours), however I enjoyed myself immensely, for I got to sit far away from the world with my wife in my arms, eating lukewarm pizza and ignoring our cherry turnovers. 

To be short in writing {too late!}, let me conclude with the story of the Englishman who went up a hill, but came down a mountain.  Or something like that. Hannah tells me it’s a great movie and I need to see it. 

As I sit here trying to decide how to conclude this, Hannah has reminded me that I need to include the word of the day.

Orphan: A person who has lost his parents

Often: Frequently

When you said “orphan”, did you mean “orphan” – a person who has lost his parents, or “often”, frequently? –Major General Stanley

So the moral of the story is Hannah and I are doing well. We love each other, and are glad to be here.

Inspired Organization

 Here is a graphic of the lay leadership of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.



That is all.

Yep, I have nothing else to add.

Well, I did forget to cite the reference. You can find out more information at www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/mormon-lay-leadership or at www.mormon.org.

How many ways can you define "run"?

The move went great! We are safe, our stuff is safe. However our safe is not safe. When we unloaded the safe was not there. It is heart breaking that we lost all of those items that we had stored inside the safe. Now I think the safe didn't survive the move due to a tragic design flaw. Unfortunately, we were aware of the flaw when we chose this particular brand. Nevertheless, we only have ourselves to blame for getting an imaginary safe. Let us all have a virtual moment of silence for our imaginary safe.
...
....
...

We are liking our apartment. It is small, and cozy. Our neighbors are friendly. Our landlords are great.

Word of the day: Run.

5 millions 5 hundred 29 thousand 6 hundred

Today's post is brought to you by the the letter B, the number 5,529,600, and Hannah, who appears as lavender lettering

 As of this post, there are 64 days until our nuptials. How about blessed nuptials. Blissful, gleeful. Nuptial works. Gleeful nuptials sounds weird. This is according to Target.com. Below is a timer of the seconds left until 64 days are expired.

This is a dynamic timer that show how many seconds until 64 days are expired. Let the record show that this is  NOT a dynamic timer and Ryan is terrible. It is a dynamic timer, it is constantly and accurately showing the precise number of seconds left until 64 days are expired. 



Word of the day:
hymeneal: Archaic A wedding; nuptials

Editor's note. This post was not posted the day it was written. It is now 4 weeks. That is four, f-o-u-r-e, weeks after the wedding date of Hannah and Ryan Lee. However, we the management and editing team (that is I, Ryan Lee) felt it best to post this even if it is late.

.

Politics in the Public Sphere

I have been reviewing my blogs from the past, and realized, that while awesome, they do not reflect the serious nature of the world in which we reside. This past year has been informative in my views on life, and the struggles we all face. Here are two things about me. I got engaged last week, and this is our temple.

Photo courtesy of www.lds.org/church/temples/seattle-washington.

As I have been reflecting on the lessons learned this last year, I have realized that people like to get letters. I think letter writing is the wave of the future. IMs, texting, vlogs, Skyping, video chats, American Idol, tweeting, Facebook posting, emoticons, emailing, and even telegraphing have served us well thus far. However there is something missing from all of these.

It is easy to confuse virtual communication to a pretend audience of accidental listeners with sincere and honest expressions of personal narrative. It is easy to see that when I am out of practice in my writing, that I quickly go nowhere. In times past I would quickly get to a point that I thought was funny, but would ultimately confuse listeners. However, as I grow apart from my practice, I quickly lose the train of irrational reasoning that i was trying to build.

Now we come to the point, so let me recap.
1. I have not written in over a year.
 2. I got engaged to Hannah this last week, and we will marry in the Seattle Temple. (See picture above).
3. Random ramblings on different forms of communication in order to make this post longer
4. Here is a picture of a duck.

5. Next is picture of two real ducks; not a duck representation of Hannah and I. Nor is it a silly rendering of a duck engagement photo.

Reflections on Family, Part 1

My grandfather is a collector. He does not collect items, or wealth. He is a collector of knowledge.

Quote of the day: Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.

Blonde Moments of the Day

I apologize for my last post. I never fully explained why I cheese is better than fruit. I will rectify this deficiency.

Now we are all aware that cheese is the fifth alchemical element. In fact, it has consistently been voted "Most Popular Basic Element," as well as "Basic Element Most Likely to be Confused for a Side Celestial Body." (Side note: Speaking of basic elements, I loved singing along to the "Captain Planet" theme song when I was younger. It was with great excitement that joined the shout out: "Earth, fire, wind, water, heart, cheese." Although, I am disappointed at how often the other Planeteers had to rely on Suchi, the Planeteer of cheese, to rescue Captian Planet. I know cheese is important. But, the writers really took it too far in this series. It is transparent how much influence the cheese-ists had during the early Nineties. I am surprised they didn't name the show "Cheese Planet," although that does sound tasty.) Fruit, on the other hand, was only voted "Most Likely to Come from a Flowering Plant." And that vote has been grossly tainted by Tomatogate. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the vote is overturned in the ballot recount. I mean, look at what the Charon controversy did to Pluto. (That really was Pluto's fault. In matters of planetary politics, you have to keep your distance. If you get to close to controversy, then you are going to get sucked in, burned, or torn apart. That is why I like Earth's positioning. Earth has been able to keep itself in hidden between the planetary giants, and the center. Get too close to the center, and Earth would get burned.)

Next weeks topic: Why green should be removed as a basic food group.

Portrait of my Sis.

"This story begins with Erica, because a good story begins with an intriguing introduction. However, this is not the end of Erica's role. She is also the subject of this story."

This is an introduction to a story never told. It would be a great story. That is all.