John Colton's blog

We've listed our La Crosse house. In case you never visited us here, you can check out the "Virtual tour" to see what our house looked like.

We'll be going out to Utah in a couple of weeks to do some house-hunting.

Debbie Talford got baptized yesterday! (Yes, this Debbie.) Thomas baptized her:



Debbie asked Pauline and me to give talks, so I spoke about baptism, and Pauline spoke about the gift of the Holy Ghost. Pauline made her famous "Grandma Olson's fudge sauce" and we got some ice cream for the refreshments afterwards.

I finally added some pieces from our April concert (of the La Crosse Chamber Chorale) to my website for downloading. A whopping 9 new pieces! So click over to here, download, and enjoy!

http://www.uwlax.edu/faculty/colton/chamber%20chorale%20music.htm


Also, last week was the Chamber Chorale's "May Feaste" performance. It's kind of like a dinner theater combined with an auction fundraiser (both "silent auction" and "live auction" items). We did a "American Musicals" theme, singing a lot of Rodgers & Hammerstein and the like. I was in a barbershop quartet that sang along with the ladies doing "Pick-a-little Talk-a-little" from The Music Man. We also wanted to do Lida Rose and/or Sincere, but disappointingly got canceled by the director a few days before the performance because he felt like we just didn't have things together well enough.

Pauline donated a watercolor painting of Granddad's Bluff that she had done, and it was the highest-selling and most-fought-over item from the silent auction section, selling in the end for $190.

Leslie and Emily might appreciate this one, because we've been doing a lot of cleaning recently to prepare for selling the house.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070522/od_nm/germany_girl_dc;_ylt=AraOw06qjveHHJG7QDTDM.XMWM0F

Girl calls for police help over messy room

Tue May 22, 12:13 PM ET

BERLIN (Reuters) - A nine-year-old German girl was so upset about having to
tidy her room she put up a sign in her window urging passers-by to call police
for help.

Pedestrians in the central city of Braunschweig saw the girl crying in the
window, holding up a sign up saying "Help! Please call the police!" Next to her
sat a small boy. Quickly alerted, officers rushed to the scene to discover the
girl had argued with her mother about tidying her room and enlisted her
two-year-old brother's aid to attract attention.

"The room looked like a battlefield," said a spokesman for local police on
Monday. "Officers told the girl to tidy her room. When they came back two hours
later to check, it was all cleaned up. And the mother and daughter had made up
too."

In a previous blog entry, I quoted some They Might Be Giants lyrics. Well, I just got a new album (Mink Car) and there are a few songs worth quoting. I'll live with quoting just one for now, "Bangs":

Bangs
Above your eyes your hair hangs
Blow my mind your royal flyness I dig your bangs

Bangs
To drape across your forehead
To swing concordant angles as you incline your head
Once with a girl I fell in love sometime ago now she had...

Bangs
Are that on which the world hangs
I'm only holding your hand so I can look at your bangs

Bangs
Are like a pocket T-shirt
As casual as that while fully intentional
And in case you think I'm here cause I like making chit chat
Just remember what I said the money's under your hat

Bangs
Are that on which the world hangs
I'm only holding your hand so I can look at your bangs

Bangs
Above your eyes your hair hangs
Blow my mind your royal flyness I dig your bangs

Bangs
To drape across your forehead
To swing concordant angles as you incline your head
And although I like you anyway, check out your haircut
A proscenium to stage a face that needs no makeup

Bangs
Are that on which the world hangs
I'm only holding your hand so I can look at your bangs
I'm only holding your hand so I can look at your bangs

:-) They make me laugh.

There are some very good songs on the album (and a few that are obnoxiously raucous).

___


In other news, Go Jazz! Congrats on advancing to the Western Conference Finals!

I went to the UWL Awards Banquet tonight; my student Lee Wienkes was the winner of the "Murphy Award" given to the top graduating senior, and I got to present him with the award.

One of the other award recipients (an award for distinguished alumni) told this joke:

Two disillusioned university professors were chatting one evening, trying to decide what they would change if they were able to live their lives differently.

"I think I'd run an orphanage," said one, "No parents to deal with!"

"Sounds like a good plan," said the other, "but I think I'd become a prison warden, myself."

"Really? Why is that?"

"No alumni pressure groups."

Looks like we're moving to Utah! I just got an official job offer from BYU. Here's what's been happening:

Last November a guy I know in the BYU Physics Department emailed me and invited me to apply for a faculty job opening they had. After thinking about whether there were circumstances where I'd consider moving to BYU (and deciding there were), I decided, "Why not apply?", so quickly got an application together.

They brought me in Feb to give a seminar/interview for the job. Then, a bit over a month ago the Dept Chair told me that they would likely make me an offer, but that it would take a while to clear all of the administrative channels. We talked about salary ranges, though, and he had me write up a proposal for equipment, so we'd be on the same page when my hire was approved.

Anyway, the official offer finally came today and we plan to accept. Pauline and I have been thinking and praying about this for quite a while now, and feel that this is the right decision for our family.

The move will take place sometime in August, barring any last second unforeseen events.

Even though Pauline and I had our 15th anniversary a week and a half ago, apparently I'm still looking young. I went to the campus bookstore today to pick up the graduation robes that I had ordered. I went up to the service counter, informed them that I needed to pick up said robes. The guy at the counter looked at me like I was an idiot, and pointed to the large table about 4 feet away--where the student robes were being displayed! :-) I had to clarify that I needed the specially-ordered *faculty* robes.

Two news stories I heard on the radio yesterday:

1. Two men bent on vandalizing an elevator started kicking the **** out of its door... and then were stuck between floors when the elevator stopped working. They had vandalized it while it was moving.
http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2007/05/psa_dont_lock_y.html?csp=34
http://asia.news.yahoo.com/070507/ap/d8ovh4jg0.html
http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070508/NEWS/705080383
http://www.fftimes.com/index.php/3/2007-05-07/30683

2. A man is suing a hospital because he was incorrectly diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Instead of being grateful that he apparently is not in imminent danger of dying, he's ticked because after thinking he was going to die in a year or two, he blew all of his savings and racked up large amounts of debt. (There is no evidence the hospital acted irresponsibly, just the man. ;-) )
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/070508/koddities/britain_misdiagnosed_man_2
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Quirks/2007/05/07/formerly_dying_man_faces_debts/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/cornwall/6615351.stm


Reminds me of the early 90's song, Things that Make You Go Hmm.

How about the Utah Jazz?!! Congrats on beating the Houston Rockets in the first round of the NBA playoffs, and on beating the Golden State Warriors in game 1 of the second round. In the last 2 weeks I've watched all eight playoff games; most of them I watched with Paul Robinson, some with Todd Ebbert, and one with Matt Baker--friends from church.