Desultory Thoughts

I think my family is pretty cool - of course I’m biased. Heather gave a wonderful talk in church today on Easter Sunday. She’s a spiritual woman and I’m very proud of her. My kids sang with the primary and they both did so well, especially my mischievous Griff. Last week when they were practicing for the performance he was just clowning it up and making everyone laugh. Luckily today he just sang nice and loud like you would expect a cute 4-year-old to do. His favorite song is “I Am a Child of God” and he sang especially well during that song.

I also have a cousin (Kerstin Tenney) that recently made it into the Orchestra at Temple Square. She plays the violin. They recently performed with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir at the rededication of the Utah State Capitol building and Kerstin is featured at the 4:10 mark and the 7:00 mark. It was written by Kurt Bestor, a composer I’ve loved ever since the “Innovators” release.

I just want to warn anyone thinking about attending the new “more-than-just-lasers” U2 show at the Clark Planetarium that it sucked. Even the great music of U2 couldn’t save it, it just sucked. I wish I could say it was cool, but I nearly walked out. The only reason I didn’t was because of the danger of being zapped by one of the lasers. They tout the show as such:

Clark Planetarium launches a new, much-anticipated, music entertainment show featuring one of the greatest bands of the last two decades. “U2” is the first ever full-dome production featuring U2’s timeless classics and modern hits, set to lighting and animation effects using the latest in CGI and laser technology. Special effects performed live by our theater presenters make each show a one-of-a-kind experience.

The latest CGI technology? Really? Maybe I’ve been spoiled by HD content (which I don’t even enjoy in my own home) so I expect to see everything in vivid detail, but that’s what I expect when a show is touted as “using the latest in CGI and laser technology”. I’m really interested to know what part of that show involved anything that can be considered the “latest”. Judge for yourself. The graphics looks like something out of Doom, only these graphics were faded in color - the opposite of vivid. Maybe the lack of vivid color and clear details in graphics had something to do with the fact that we were viewing the dome through thick, latest-in-technology smoke that made it possible for us to view the latest-in-technology lasers. Then there was the “Star Operator” that kept begging for approval. “Do you like it? Come on!!! I gotta hear you! If you like it, let me hear you!” He just wouldn’t shut up and he even threatened not to show us the last song if we didn’t scream and cheer for more. By the way, the entire show only lasted 40 minutes! We were in line for 15 minutes (which resulted in us getting front row seats - not a good thing in a dome config) and then we sat there waiting for the show to start for 15 minutes.

Maybe I was only so disappointed because it’s how my wife and I chose to celebrate our 11 years of marriage. I would rather have seen U23D for a third time, which brings me to the second part of my opinion. U23D is awesome! If you’ve always wanted to go to a U2 concert but couldn’t get tickets in time or refused to pay $100 per ticket, this is your chance to get front row seats! I don’t know how much longer it will be in theaters, but I hope to make it at least one more time. My biggest desire would be to go with a theater full of die-hard U2 fans. I can’t help but to clap and cheer after each song because that’s what I’ve done at the three U2 concerts I’ve attended, and never did I have as good a seat at any of them as I did at this one. The only problem with that is some people come for the movie experience instead of the concert experience. They have a drink and popcorn and they watch it as if it were a movie, but it’s really not! That’s why it would be nice to attend with a bunch of fans that are there for the concert experience.

If you’re plan on seeing something U2 in the next little bit, see U23D and avoid the Planetarium at all costs!

As promised, here is some old video of another trip we took to Gooseberry Mesa, this time mostly shot and edited by me. It was really hard not to edit further as I was prepping it for upload to YouTube, since after so long I started to be overly critical of my work. And, since YouTube only allows submissions of 10 minutes or less, I had to break this into four parts. Don’t feel obligated to watch it all; the good stuff is in parts three and four. The first two videos will be good if you are curious about what we do when we’re not biking on our mountain bike trips.

The Gooseberry Mesa Adventure - Part I

The Gooseberry Mesa Adventure - Part II

The Gooseberry Mesa Adventure - Part III

The Gooseberry Mesa Adventure - Part IV

Another wonderful spring day makes me want it to be spring for real, all the more! Good news is that Matt called me today and told me we’re going biking this Saturday. Bad news is, the weather forecast for this weekend is predicting rain! Dang it! At least it’s not snow.

A few years ago my friends (John, Matt and Chan) went biking at Gooseberry Mesa in Southern Utah. John and I filmed the whole thing and John made this video that makes me wish it were spring already! I love this video! I’ll upload another Gooseberry trip video that I edited and share it, too.