Another week has begun and another month as well. My entries continue to be brief, feeble, and infrequent.

I have renewed my attempts to be green. No, I am not dressing up as the female Yoda or a great big green bean. I also didn't slather my face with a mud mask and jump out at the cats. That may become a consideration to scare them away when they are trying to watch me utilize the bathroom. Anyway, to make a short story long, I trotted to work on my tiny little legs.

This walk is a thing of beauty. It takes me through the trees and up High Street. Luckily, High Street is much less bustling with disturbing images at 7am than it is in the evening. It is also lacking drunks and cars whizzing by at top speed. My short little legs do not enjoy all of the pumping that they have to do to get from point A to point B, but I think that over time they will just shut up and do what they are told with no twinge of complaint.

In other news, I am not amused by the way my skin reacts to the sun. It turns slightly pink for a while. Then my arms and feet develop what is my equivalent of a tan, but my legs remain shockingly white. I am not sure that will ever change. Even during my fabled visit to France, I managed to severely burn my shoulders while maintaining my ability to blind people by wearing a pair of shorts. In short, that is my superpower--blinding white legs. Can you top that???

The evening culminated with my attempts to recover from my long walk while washing dishes and chatting to the cats. I also read a little and prepared myself for the wonder that is Institute as I tried to dry off a little. (Walking in warm weather makes even a lady sweat.)

And to tie my Institute class into the title of this entry, I leave with you a quote from Brigham Young: "Education is the power to think clearly, to act well in a day's work and...to appreciate life."

Time and again, I am reminded that we live in a country where we are encouraged to not stand up for what we believe in because someone else might disagree with us. Everyone has been reading in the news about the Mormon support for Proposition 8. Of course, what the media keeps implying or outright asserting over and over again is that the church itself donated a vast majority of the money put out to support it. These people have obviously never sat in one of our congregations on an election year where we are reminded again and again to pray about any decisions we want to make and then act on the promptings we receive for our own lives. The same rule applies when voting about such an important topic as marriage. Individual members of the church have the right to donate their personal funds to support any cause they choose, but one individuals actions should not necessarily be considered the norm.

I did like this quote from Time magazine which is apparently going to come out next Monday: "Our Message for the World," says M. Russell Ballard Jr., one of the 14 apostles just under Monson, "is that we are His children, we lived with Him before we came here ... we're striving to keep His commandments so that when we die we can be entitled to receive all the blessings that the Heavenly Father has for His children." Ballard adds emphatically, "People like to make it complex. But it's really pretty simple."

"Faith is not only a feeling; it is a decision. [We] need to choose faith." This quote by Neil L. Anderson hits on another topic that is important. It applies, of course, to our belief in God and a grander meaning to all these moments we experience. It also applies to our our faith in ourselves and ability to accomplish anything we set our mind to doing. We also need to have faith in others and realize that someone who consistently comes through for us will continue to do so as long as we do our part.

In my ongoing efforts to know far more than I need to about a variety of topics, I have discovered yet another television show that is trying to rewrite the classics. It is as if they just took famous names like Merlin and Arthur and rewrote their stories. As long as I don't think about the original and how much effort the author put into penning it, I don't get too irritated. After all, I've been told before that I should be okay with someone wanting to change someone else's brain child just because they couldn't come up with something new. I'll probably keep watching it just to see what other details they change.

I have also found that people do that with real life. They say things such as, "This is never going to work. I always mess things up." or "S/he still loves me. If I do this, s/he'll realize it and save us both some heartache." or "S/he didn't do exactly what I would have done, s/he must be stupid." or "S/he didn't jump when I said to, s/he must hate me." It's sad when we hide behind such lies to ourselves. Just because things didn't work out the way we planned, it doesn't mean that people love us more or less than they do or that we can't make things work if we will stop telling ourselves we can't and try. This, however, is far too many depressing tales for this journal.

Instead, I would like to express my excitement that I finally did something every tree hugger is supposed to do on a regular basis. I have to thank Abby, Alex, and Whitney for their help. Help with what? Oh right, I made my very own tye-dye shirt. I hope it turns out okay. At this time, it is a little pinwheel of color, slowly steeping until the morning when I shall wash it. How exciting is that?

The last thing I saw before I opened my sleepy eyes was my sweetie leaning over to kiss me. Now this wasn't your ordinary kiss, of course. It was the kind that is so soft and tender that you wanted it to last forever--just lips, nothing more. Sadly, I woke up to find that I was not being kissed, I was being summoned by my demonic white child. After spending a busy evening shedding all over the couch, Rodney wanted loving and food. Ziggy also had needs. She needed to try to trip me down the stairs and to follow me to the shower. Do they have psychiatrists for cats?

As always, I survived all of this trauma. After showering and trying to remember what I wanted to take to work, I remembered the astonishing fact that I had a tye-dyed shirt to rinse, so I popped it into the washer with some vinegar. The water turned a slightly murky shade of purple that wasn't too reassuring, so I walked away to let it steep and swish. When that rinse cycle finished, I decided to rinse it again. While I waited, I went through the random vegetables I bought yesterday to keep my mind off of the potential disaster in my washing machine. Finally, it finished its second go at the rinse cycle, so I pulled out my masterpiece and hung it up. Maybe it will be dry by this evening and I can how it off. I do have some sexy bellbottoms I could wear it with. We'll see, but lunch is over and I must return to the envy of all--the library.

I have been educating myself on the 80s phenomenon known as Airwolf. Season four, however, has thrown me for a loop. They completely reworked the cast. All the new cast members seem to be from Canada. I make this judgement based on the many times I have heard people say "sorey". The basic premise of the show seems to have changed as well. It went from every episode including some steamy smooching with the male lead and a different sexy damsel in distress to more of the same four people rescuing each other over and over again. It's all very mind-boggling. Despite the fact that Dick Van Dyke's son, Barry, doesn't look like he is a pouty child whenever he is trying to look intense, I fear I may prefer the first three seasons. Besides Kate was a little more of a butt-kicker than Jo. Now that I have completely turned all of my readers off from ever reading this again, I shall move on to other topics.

My life continues to be filled with too much to do and too much to eat. It occurred to me agaon that I should organize my food and eat it before its expiration date when I got a hankering for black bean burgers and realized that I have three cans of black beans awaiting my consumption. Obviously, I am not going to eat that many burgers, but my sweetie committed me to helping him out by bringing home some buns, so it all works out.

In other news, I have some cookies in the fridge that I need to bake and feed to deserving coworkers. I also have more piles of fabric that demand attention. I think those piles will never fade away. I have about six baby quilts that still need homes if anyone is interested in purchasing them. Oh dear, time for work. Maybe I'll find time to rant between projects this evening.

The day began as most of my day begin. I commanded, "Shut up and let me sleep," to my fuzzy alarm clock and rolled over. Moments later I realized I now had to pee, so I tripped past the cats into the bathroom. After completing my duties there, I crawled back into bed for a little more rest. Around eight, I slipped back out of bed and cleaned myself before beginning my day.

I spent some time checking e-mail and then I sat down to my sewing machine. After completing what I had hoped to complete last night, I made my way to the church for a brief lesson in car maintenance. The high point of this was resolving my seven month problem with my windshield wiper fluid dispenser being uncooperative. No more stopping by the side of the road to dump water or snow on my windshield to clean it off. I also got to take home some leftover fruit, so healthy sweetness is in my future.

I am not the sort of person who likes to drop in unannounced, but as I was driving past a friend's house, she saw me and waved. Despited the fruit that threatened to become gross in the sun, I decided to stop in and visit. I find that during these visits, I get a lot of enjoyment out of helping her out. One time I got to help them assemble furniture. Today, I got to help her make a decorative ring of bricks around the tree in her back yard. Of course, other duties called, so I have been anxiously engaged in reading The DaVinci Code and sewing.

During my most recent period of reading relaxation, I found myself reminded that I am loved. I had draped myself across the loveseat which is leather and therefore tends to not have upholstery of white cat hair. It is at a ninety degree angle to couch. Rodney had decided to sit on the couch, and when I looked over, I realized that he had draped himself across the arm and was stretching his face toward me. Poor baby wanted his mommy. Isn't that cute?

We are the heirs, the recipients of that heavenly endowment, and we, like the early members, must make whatever sacrifice is necessary to take this message to the world. All the world is infected with a terminal spiritual disease which will unerringly lead to spiritual death. We have the only cure, delivered to us by Gods, angels, and the Spirit. How will the Father respond if we fail to make it available to as many of his children as we possibly can? ~Ted L. Gibbons