John Colton's blog

Grand Canyon Trip pictures, part 6 – Willis Creek Slot Canyon

2011-08-28T20:28:00.007-06:00

Last set of pictures!

First, here's one I missed from Cottonwood Narrows. Should have been posted in part 5.

Close to the north end of Cottonwood Canyon Road we quickly stopped by Grosvenor Arch because it was not too far out of the way.

Then we made our way to Willis Creek Slot Canyon. The canyon sides weren't nearly as tall as Cottonwood Narrows, but they had some very cool shapes. And we got to hike most of the way in the creek. It was a very hot day, and hiking in the creek was pretty awesome. We walked for about an hour and a half downstream, then back to our starting point again. I think both girls said this was their favorite part of the entire trip. Not much commentary needed here.

After Willis Creek, it was straight on to home. We got back late Friday night, just in time for Leslie to go to a church youth group outdoor movie activity.

Final trip tally:

#Days = 5
#Birthdays = 1
#Nights in tent = 1
#Gall bladder attacks = 0 (my gall bladder had been removed exactly one week before we set out on the trip)
#Dirt roads = 3 or 4, depending on how you count
#Slot canyons = 4
#Grand Canyons = 1

One of the best family vacations in our family's history. A great time was had by all.

Grand Canyon Trip pictures, part 5 – Cottonwood Narrows

2011-08-28T19:28:00.006-06:00

Probably just one more batch of pictures after this one. Maybe one and a half.

Anyway, we drove home from Page via Cottonwood Canyon Road. That's a dirt road that goes from Bryce Canyon most of the way towards Page. Or, as we took it, it goes from close to Page to Bryce Canyon. We took it for three reasons: (a) so we could stop by Cottonwood Narrows, (b) so we could stop by Willis Creek Slot Canyon, and (c) because it was supposedly very scenic. Well, parts of it were scenic, but I can't say the whole drive was. But Cottonwood Narrows and Willis Creek certainly made the drive worthwhile. And Grosvenor Arch was kind of cool, as a bonus.

This set of pictures is from Cottonwood Narrows. It's a two hike, one way, starting and ending at the road. We parked at the upper end, hiked down, then I hiked back up the road by myself to get the car.

The trail had just about the coolest looking parking lot I have ever seen.

This is the entrance to the slot canyon.

We took this picture ourselves...

...but then ran into another hiker who offered to take a picture of the family.

The canyon was impressive from the large scale...

...to the small scale.

Some nice boulders (cue Shrek quote).

A nice flower.

Leslie had just taken a photography class in school, so she had fun taking pictures. I'm not actually sure who took most of the pictures that I've posted.

This gives you a little bit of a sense of the scale.

This was the narrowest part of the canyon.

I've already mentioned Emily's talent for being photogenic. It's really not fair.

Who doesn't like a nice man-made hoodoo? (Cue Cary Grant quote from The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer.)

Grand Canyon Trip pictures, part 4 – Antelope Canyon

2011-08-28T18:31:00.004-06:00

The reason time was so critical coming back from Wire Pass was because we had an appointment scheduled to go with a Navajo tour into Antelope Slot Canyon. Somewhat pricy, but this was my main birthday present to Pauline. I'll just let the photos speak for themselves as for why we wanted to go to Antelope Canyon.

Grand Canyon Trip pictures, part 3 - Navajo Bridge and Wire Pass Slot Canyon

2011-08-28T17:33:00.006-06:00

After our Wednesday morning hike, we drove to Page, Arizona. This is the Navajo Bridge, along the way. There are actually two bridges, side by side: a historic bridge built in 1929 (now for walking only), and a more modern bridge for car travel.

The view from the walking bridge.

The Visitor's Center had just about the most artistic bathrooms that I've ever seen.

We spent the night in Page, then started the "Slot Canyons" part of our trip. The next morning we tried to get tickets to be able to hike to "The Wave". We were unsuccessful in the daily lottery but got to do a couple of extra slot canyons instead, which made up for it. There were probably 60 people there all trying to get one of the 10 passes they hand out each day.

This was on the way to our first slot canyon, actually close to where The Wave is. It's the "Wire Pass" slot canyon. We unfortunately ended up being quite short on time because we didn't plan for it to take as long as it did to get to the trailhead (very badly washboarded dirt road for 5-10 miles), and because I led us the wrong direction for a ways once we got there.

The entrance to Wire Pass.

Inside the Wire Pass

Our friend, Mr. Lizard

On our way back out

Grand Canyon Trip pictures, part 2

2011-08-28T16:17:00.007-06:00

As mentioned, we camped Tuesday evening. Then Wednesday morning, bright and early, we decided to do our big hike: down into the Grand Canyon, as far as we felt like we could go. And back up again, obviously. We took the Kaibab Trail, the only available one for going into the canyon.

My youngest daughter, displaying her natural talent for being photogenic.

This was the view from close to the top of the trail.

Roughly a quarter of the way down the trail now (relative to how far we actually went).

If you enlarge the photo, you can see the trail way down below, just to the right of the cleft. We didn't go quite that far down.

Not too many pictures of yours truly, so here's one for the record.

Cool cliffs, no? This is looking left...

... and this is looking right.

Pauline didn't feel like hiking all the way down to the "Supai Tunnel", but Leslie and Emily were game. The tunnel is the point at which the mule trains stop, I believe. It took us about an hour and a half to hike down to it, and perhaps two hours and fifteen minutes to hike back up.

This is just uphill from the tunnel...

... and just downhill from the tunnel.

I was impressed at my camera's zoom ability. You can see this bridge in the previous two shots.

Back through the tunnel, and back on our way uphill to Pauline and the trailhead.

Grand Canyon Trip pictures, part 1

2011-08-28T15:59:00.005-06:00

Summer is just about over, school starts tomorrow (BYU), and I still haven't posted any pictures from our Grand Canyon Trip two and a half months ago. I decided it's time to remedy that.

We started our epic journey by driving to Kanab, Utah on Monday, June 6--the day before Pauline's 40th birthday. We stopped by a number of cemetaries (7?) along the way where various ancestors were buried. Snapped pictures and got GPS coordinates of headstones for family history information. On June 7, we drove from Kanab to the Grand Canyon North Rim, and celebrated Pauline's birthday by camping. (OK, we had a nice dinner at the Lodge, too. But that came later.)

We hiked from the campground to the Lodge; I think this was an overlook just behind the Lodge.

Pauline was jealous of this individual, but we didn't bring her painting supplies.

We then did a short hike from the Lodge going to Bright Angel Point.

We decided to do the driving tour of the Walhalla Plateau, just east of the North Rim campground & lodge. Along the road there are various overlooks and hikes. I believe these particular shots were taken from the highest overlook, Point Imperial. Notice how we are looking down on the South Rim plateau.

What a good looking family!

I think this was Roosevelt Point, one of the few places on the entire North Rim where we could actually see the Colorado River.

This is Cape Royal, the farthest point along the Walhalla Plateau. It was a 30 minute hike or so from the parking area to the overlooks.

Still at Cape Royal, that's "Angel's Window". Yes, we hiked to where you can see the people. A little nerve-wracking!

Leslie and I took a less-traveled hike from Cape Royal to a natural spring: the "Cliff Spring Trail". The spring wasn't as cool as we had hoped, but the hike there was neat.

Using blog less and less

2011-08-28T15:55:00.003-06:00

I joined Facebook almost exactly a year ago. Since then I've been using Facebook more and more, and my blog on blogspot.com less and less. If anyone who follows my blog isn't yet a Facebook friend of mine, please let me know. I'll still post here periodically,(*) but most of the shorter posts I'll just make through Facebook instead.

(*) Grand Canyon pictures hopefully coming later today!

For the ladies...

2011-07-01T17:26:00.001-06:00

Gotta love "Demotivational" posters. This one's for Pauline.

Free a capppella album by The Class Notes (Cornell)

2011-07-01T14:03:00.002-06:00

Cornell's a cappella group "The Class Notes" have made their album Hint of Lime available for free download. See here:
http://www.purevolume.com/TheClassNotes/albums/Hint+Of+Lime. There's no catch, no sign-up for anything... you can literally just click on and download the mp3 files. I'm not sure how long the free downloads will last; probably just a few days.

I just downloaded and listened to it. It's not the world's greatest collegiate a cappella album, but it's pretty good. Certainly worth a free download if you are interested in that type of music.

Cello video from Steven Sharp Nelson

2011-06-23T09:26:00.002-06:00

This cello video is worthy of a blog post. Kept me mesmerized.

in other news... No salt water in salt water taffy

2011-06-15T10:46:00.001-06:00

Who knew? --John

http://connect2utah.com/get-gephardt-story/?nxd_id=151267

Reported by: Matt Gephardt
Monday, June 13 2011

Alan wrote to 2News with a question; he wants to know how salt water taffy gets its name.

And when you ask a 'Good Question,' we give it to Matt Gephardt, who on Fridays, searches for the good answer.

At Taffy Town in Downtown Salt Lake City, they know a little something about salt water taffy.

Every day, they churn out hundreds of pounds of the goody-goodness. Well, an educated guess might have you assuming, that must take a lot of salt water.

But, Vice President Jason Glade says, there is no salt water in any salt water taffy.

Glade says, the name salt water taffy actually comes from the Atlantic City boardwalk on the east coast.

Legend is that more than 100 years ago, a massive wave crashed in from the ocean and flooded a taffy store, ruining all of the taffy.

When the owner re-opened, he jokingly called his product "salt water taffy."

And, like taffy to the roof of your mouth, it just stuck.

Glade says that when his great grandfather opened Taffy Town, proximity to the Great Salt Lake made calling his taffy "Salt Water Taffy," an obvious decision.

Generations later, the operation has expanded. Taffy Town now offers more than seventy flavors. Not one of them contains any salt water.

And, the sales gimmick seems to work pretty well. Taffy Town ships their product all over the world. There is a market for salt water taffy from the home of the Great Salt Lake.

In other news... Dad spends year embarrassing son

2011-06-14T15:11:00.001-06:00

This is pretty awesome. This dad should get an award. --John

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705373877/Teens-dad-spends-school-year-waving-at-bus-embarrassing-son.html

(also see the follow up story, here: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705374377/Embarrassing-waving-dad-has-gone-viral.html)

AMERICAN FORK — No matter how cool a teenager's mom and dad might be, few teens get through high school without feeling their parents embarrassed them.

And one teen has his dad to thank for embarrassing him the entire school year — well, 170 days of it.

When the high school's bus routes changed this year, 16-year-old Rain Price soon found out he'd be going right past his house every single morning. Much to his chagrin, he also found out his dad would be standing outside, waving.

"When he did it the first day, I was in shock," Rain said. "It's my first day of my sophomore year."

The embarrassment was a thrill for his father.

The second day of school, there he was again, only this time Dale Price was wearing a San Diego Chargers helmet and jersey. Day three, it was an Anakin Skywalker helmet, and the next day, swim trunks and a snorkel mask.

Other kids started to take note.

"Most of them like it, and we roll down our windows and wave. It's fun," Rain said.

His dad admits it took a lot of effort to keep it up, but said it was "a way of letting him know that we really care about him, but do something a little different." He described it as "a father's way" of saying I love you.

It ended up being a daily tradition for him, with a new costume each and every day.

"No recycling costumes, that's the rule," Price said. "I managed to adhere to that, and for better or for worse … we have some interesting costumes."

...

"I hope this lives with him for the rest of his life," Price said. "He can use it against his kids and tell them, 'If you think you are embarrassed by me, you should have seen your grandfather.'"

Some of my favorite costumes:

Video from today's concert

2011-06-11T21:23:00.001-06:00

Thanks Ken, for recording the Baroque Ensemble at our concert today at Orem Summerfest. He posted it to YouTube; here's the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTn-EBct8Jghttp://www2.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

Food pyramid replaced by plate

2011-06-03T08:26:00.003-06:00

Pauline and I always thought the last food pyramid was kind of stupid. At first glance this looks much better.

http://blogs.forbes.com/meghancasserly/2011/06/02/usda-food-pyramid-myplate-nutrition/

...

Today the U.S.D.A. announced that they’ve killed off the dietary guidelines outlined by previous food pyramids released in 1991 and 2005—and have replaced it with a new diagram in the shape of dinner plate in response to rising obesity rates in children.

Gone is the basement level of the pyramid—the heftiest slab—a foundation of breads, starches and other carbohydrates. Gone is the mid section of fruits and veggies narrowing to the tiniest peak of fats, sweets and oils built on Bush-era dietary research that all fats were bad fats.

“We’re working to make healthy choices easy choices,” said Surgeon General Regina Benjamin at this morning’s unveiling, who linked the new diagram to First Lady Obama’s Let’s Move campaign. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack followed by explaining the need for the tool, “My Pyramid was simply too complex,” he said, and is confident the new tool will be effective is a “simple visual research based icon about proportion sizes and what should be on the American plate.”

...

Glee rips off Divisi's arrangement

2011-05-19T23:10:00.002-06:00

I am somewhat a fan of Glee... not all of the plot lines, but the music at least. It's to some extent an extension of my "addiction" (as Pauline calls it) to modern a cappella music, even though Glee isn't all a cappella. The Warblers, for example, are voiced by the Tufts Beelzebubs. However, this time Glee has gone a little too far--they completely ripped off Divisi's classic version of "Yeah", one of the best collegiate a cappella numbers of 2006. See here:

http://popculturebrain.com/post/5645805309/for-comparison-above-is-uo-divisis-award-winning

Unfortunately, beyond publicizing this and hoping that public outcry gets Glee to make amends somehow, I'm not really sure there's much Divisi--and specifically the Divisi member who arranged the song--can do. As I understand things (which could very well be wrong as IANAL), since her version is a derivative work of the Usher original (I'm assuming Usher wrote the song), she & Divisi don't own any legal rights to it, only Usher does. Even if not legally wrong, however, copying someone's arrangement like this with no compensation or even acknowledgement is MORALLY wrong.

If you feel the same way please publicize this information, too.

Thank you, Stefanie Gordon!

2011-05-18T17:21:00.002-06:00

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110517/ap_on_sc/us_space_shuttle_photos

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – Groggy from a late night watching the Yankees, frigid from a chilled airplane cabin, Stefanie Gordon stirred to action after the pilot's announcement. Lifting her iPhone to the plane's window, she captured an otherworldly image that rocketed around the globe as fast as her subject: Space shuttle Endeavour soaring from a bank of clouds, its towering plume of white smoke lighting the azure sky.

(click link for rest of story)

In other news... Peter Vidmar blacklisted because of views on gay marriage

2011-05-15T19:26:00.002-06:00

In case you haven't heard this story yet, Peter Vidmar (olympic gold medalist and LDS church member) was forced out of his position with the U.S. olympic team due to his religious beliefs about gay marriage, and having contributed $2000 to the Prop 8 campaign. So basically if you disagree with homosexual marriages--which a majority of California voters did!--you get blacklisted. I find this to be unconscionable.

http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/tim-graham/2011/05/15/former-olympian-canadian-sports-anchor-blacklisted-gays

Peter Vidmar, a 1984 Olympic gold medalist, had to resign as chef de mission for the 2012 U.S. Olympic team because as a Mormon, he donated $2,000 for Proposition 8 in California supporting traditional marriage and appeared at two Prop 8 rallies.

Gay Olympic skater Johnny Weir explicitly tied Vidmar to racists in his opposition in a Chicago Tribune interview:

"Most people would have an issue if the chef (de mission) publicly was against Asian-Americans or African-Americans, so it should be dealt with if the chef is anti-gay...

"It's wrong,"' Weir said in a telephone interview. "I certainly wouldn't want to be represented by someone who is anti gay marriage. It isn't just about marriage, it is being allowed equal rights as Americans. The fact this man who is very publicly against something that may be represented on the American team is disgraceful.''

...
Vidmar resigned by saying he didn’t want his religious beliefs to distract from the U.S. Olympic effort. From USA Today:

"In a statement released Friday evening, Vidmar said, "I have dedicated my life to the Olympic movement and the ideals of excellence, friendship and respect. I wish that my personal religious beliefs would not have become a distraction from the amazing things that are happening in the Olympic movement in the United States. I simply cannot have my presence become a detriment to the U.S. Olympic family. I hope that by stepping aside, the athletes and their stories will rightly take center stage." "

Choral Music Archive

2011-04-29T15:24:00.003-06:00

If you can't make it to the UBE concert this Sunday, you can listen to some recordings of the concert from two weeks ago on my choral music archive. In addition to the songs from the recent concert, I also just put up recordings from two concerts in 2010.

Last chance to catch Utah Baroque Ensemble spring concert

2011-04-29T10:56:00.000-06:00

Sunday 1 May, 7:30 PM 1081 W 1060 N Provo (LDS Grandview East Stake Center)

The performance is free of charge. Audience members 8 years of age and older are welcome.

Program:

Good Christians All, Rejoice and Sing (David Schwoebel)
Jubilate Deo (Hans Leo Hassler)

Agnus Dei (Thomas Morley)
Alleluia, Christus Surrexit (Felice Anerico)

Ave Verum (Camille Saint-Saëns)
Selig Sind die Toten (Heinrich Schütz)
Geistliches Lied (Johannes Brahms)

Cantata BWV 196, Der Herr denket an uns (J.S. Bach)

At the Round Earth's Imagined Corners (Wilametta Spencer)
Ubi Caritas (René Clausen)

The Lord Bless You and Keep You (Martha Sullivan)
Jesus Christ the Apple Tree (Elizabeth Poston)
Soon Ah Will Be Done (William L. Dawson)

Information about the group: The Utah Baroque Ensemble, directed by Martha Sargent, is a ~35 singer auditioned choir that specializes in early sacred music from the Renaissance and Baroque eras, but which also sings modern classical-style choral music. Recent highlights include a 2008 concert tour of Italy and Switzerland which included a performance at St Peter’s Cathedral in Rome, and a 2010 television recording for a BYU project on the writings of John which will air on BYUTV sometime this year. See http://www.utahbaroque.org for more details about the ensemble.

More information about the concert: This concert features music from as early as the 16th century to music as recent as the last decade, with songs in English, Latin, and German. Ten of the thirteen pieces will be sung a cappella. The other three have organ and/or string accompaniment. The chapel may well fill up, so you may want to get there 10 minutes before the 7:30 pm start time to get a good seat. The performance will last just over an hour.

Tickling a penguin

2011-04-20T11:24:00.002-06:00

Made me smile!

Jerry Sloan = retired. End of an era.

2011-02-10T16:26:00.002-07:00

The subject line just about says it all. I have mixed feelings. Jerry Sloan's coaching style (along with John Stockton and Karl Malone, of course) is a dominant reason why I became an *NBA* fan, not to mention a Utah Jazz fan. On the other hand, a coach's main job (so it seems to me) is to get the most out of the player personnel that you have, and over the past few months it seems like that hasn't been happening.

In other news, assistant coach Phil Johnson decided to join Sloan in retirement, passing up literally millions of dollars by turning down the head coaching job.

And so the head coaching job gets passed on to Tyrone Corbin. Best of luck to the Milk Man! (I still remember those commercials he made when he was a player here in Utah.)

Have I gotten dumber?

2011-02-09T15:22:00.003-07:00

I'm teaching Physics 581 (Solid State Physics) this semester for the first time. I'm looking back a lot over the notes I took when I was a student and when I was a TA for the equivalent class at Berkeley. Twice now I've run across work that I did back then, that I don't think I'd be able to do now.

1) One of the problems I solved as a student involved integrating along a two-dimensional curve, as opposed to doing a regular integral which take place along a straight line. No way I'd be able to do that now without serious review! To add insult to injury, that wasn't even a required part of the problem... I just decided to do it for the heck of it, to double-check my previous answer.

2) One of the problems I solved as a TA involved solving a complicated (but more traditional) integral. In the homework solutions I handed out to the class, my notes said: "I could look up this integral in an integral table, but just for kicks, let me solve it by using Laplace transforms." I barely remember what Laplace transforms are now, and I certainly couldn't use any to solve integrals! Mathematica does all my integrals for me now.

On the plus side, I think I do know lots of OTHER things that I didn't know then. :-) But it does make me a little sad to know how much I've forgotten.

As a side note, my old textbook's introduction to the problem referred to in point #2 above, it said, "If you have access to a microcomputer...". Made me laugh!

Molly Swenson (American Idol)

2011-01-27T13:08:00.003-07:00

For all you Idol fans: I just found out that the White House intern girl from Harvard sang in their a cappella group, "The Opportunes". Consequently I will have to root for her. :-) Here's a video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hztYB7ukJ88

More "Slap the ..."

2010-12-31T18:51:00.002-07:00

Remember the "Slap the Dickens" people? (See these blog posts: StD 1 and StD 2 and 3.)

I tracked down a few more such videos:

StD 4: Slap the Oz

StD 5: Slap the Spielberg (the Goonies)

and StD 6: Slap the Rudolph

Pauline, the kids, and I had a good time this morning watching the three of them. :-)

What if Hollywood taught science classes?

2010-12-29T08:43:00.002-07:00

A student of mine from last semester just emailed me this link. It was a photo contest sponsored by cracked.com designed to poke fun at "Hollywood science". Some great stuff there.

http://www.cracked.com/photoplasty_82_if-hollywood-taught-science-class_p19

My personal favorite was the student's essay response about why a bus traveling horizontally at 50 mph can bridge a 20 yard gap in the highway: "From the moment the leading edge of the bus was over the gap, physics entered into slow motion rules, making it awesome."

The Starfleet Physics Technical Manual slide was pretty good, too, with topics such as "What Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle?", "Overcoming relativity", and "Using the words 'phase' and 'shift' to solve any problem".

Interview with Jazz Bear

2010-12-23T22:21:00.002-07:00

He's the main reason my kids will periodically go to Jazz games with me. What a class act.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u76d_BDCboo

The Scale of the Universe

2010-12-22T22:32:00.002-07:00

Thanks to Ben Stevens for pointing this out:
http://primaxstudio.com/stuff/scale_of_universe/

It's a lot like that old "Powers of 10" video that you might have seen in a high school science class, but with a user-controlled slider. Amazingly well done. I just spent the last 20 minutes looking at it.

I'm Yours cover by Del

2010-12-17T15:10:00.002-07:00

In honor of the Sing Off finale coming up on Monday, here's another sweet one-man multi-track a cappella cover that I just found.

Mormon missionaries from U.S. to be kicked out of Switzerland

2010-12-15T08:22:00.002-07:00

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700091651/No-more-US-Mormon-missionaries-to-be-allowed

My first reaction to this was, "It's got to be a joke, right?" Sadly, no joke.

The crux of the matter is this:

Earlier this year, a Swiss court ruled missionaries are subject to the foreigner-employment quotas, deeming them as "gainfully employed" and falling under worker quotas regarding individuals with particular work skills.

Gainfully employed?? Yeah, I got up at 5:30 am for 5 years to work as a paper-boy (with help from parents, thanks Mom & Dad!), worked full-time for three summers, saved 95% of all the money I made... so that I could be "employed" for 2 years as a missionary? Last time I checked, "employed" means that they pay you, not you pay them! I guess that's why I spent about $350/month to support myself while on a mission in Germany from 1989-1991.

Memo to the Swiss court: that's a pathetic interpretation of the LDS missionary program.

It's been a while...

2010-12-08T17:51:00.002-07:00

Our department colloquium was given by a person from Energy Solutions. In the question/answer section at the end, I asked him if his company hired any physicists (bachelor's or graduate degrees), because I figured many of the students in attendance might be curious.

He began his answer to me by saying, "Well, when you get your degree..."

I let him finish the sentence, then said, "Actually, I'm a faculty member." He turned bright red.

:-)

The Sing-Off starts tomorrow night!

2010-12-05T10:55:00.003-07:00

Here's your reminder, Deanna: The Sing-off starts tomorrow night on NBC.

Here are the groups that are competing:
* Committed (Huntsville, Alabama) - I don't know them, but they sure sounded good in the promo
* Eleventh Hour (Kettering, Ohio) - A high school group, I've actually reviewed two of their albums for RARB: http://rarb.org/reviews/932.html#john-colton, http://rarb.org/reviews/1019.html#john-colton. They are great for a high school group, but I expect them to be one of the first to be eliminated.
* Pitch Slapped (Boston, Massachusetts) - from the Berklee College of Music. I'm not 100% sure, but I think I listened to one of their albums for CARA award judging last year. If I recall correctly, the album was OK, but not one of the very best.
* Groove For Thought (Seattle, Washington) - Don't know them.
* Jerry Lawson & Talk of the Town (Oakland, California) - As mentioned previously, this group is the descendant of the Persuasions, one of the classic doo-wop groups that started in the 1960s. In fact, their most recent album is even listed on the Persuasions' wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Persuasions. I own six Persuasions albums, and am very excited to hear them. In the end, though, I suspect that at age 66, Jerry Lawson might not be as contemporary as today's viewers are going to like.
* Men of Note (Cherry Hill, New Jersey) - Don't know them.
* The Backbeats (Los Angeles, California) - As mentioned, this is a newly formed group with (among others) Courtney from last year's competitor Noteworthy.
* On The Rocks (Eugene, Oregon) - This is the group that sang the Lady Gaga "Bad Romance" version I posted about a month ago. It'll be fun to see them perform that on the Sing Off (it's on the promo).
* Street Corner Symphony (Nashville, Tennessee) - I don't know them, but they sure sounded good in the promo.
* The Whiffenpoofs (New Haven, Connecticut) - This is the oldest collegiate a cappella group in the country, having been founded in 1909. That's 101 years old, this year. I'm not sure what style they sing; quite possibly it's more traditional glee-club-type fare than contemporary a cappella. We'll see!

Three year old conducts Beethoven

2010-12-03T11:27:00.001-07:00

Thanks to my dad for sharing this with me. If this doesn't make you smile, nothing will. Be sure to watch the ending. :-)

P.S. The final movement of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony often makes me feel that way, too!

German? Or beatboxing?

2010-11-30T13:33:00.002-07:00

Got this from a post over at the RARB forum. Apparently if you type in consonants but no vowels into the German google translate site, you can make it beatbox for you.

For a demo, click on this link.

Then click on "listen", on the right hand side.

:-)

Made me laugh!

Free album by Overboard!

2010-11-24T23:23:00.003-07:00

Contemporary a cappella group Overboard is offering their album Help! for free download:
http://www.overboardvocals.com/

(They did this last year, too.)

In case you aren't familiar with it, Help! was one of the six albums nominated for the Best Pop/Rock CARA award last year. I was one of the CARA judges, and if I recall correctly voted for this album to win the category.

It's an amazing album. A cappella arrangements of Beatles' music, all done in "gapless" fashion. That is, one song merges into the next with no pause between tracks. It's pretty much like a 56 minute song. And the arranging of the songs is top-notch; very interesting to listen to for Beatles and/or a cappella fans. I would rate all of the tracks but one as 5/5 stars. (That one was kind of a strange concept... it's a combination of lots of different tunes, and I think last year Overboard ran a contest to see who could correctly identify all of the different parts.)

In short: this is one of the best albums in my collection. Oh, and did I mention-- it's free!! :-)

Utah Baroque Ensemble concerts

2010-11-20T13:17:00.002-07:00

For Utah residents out there...I forgot to post the info before our concert last Sunday, but here are the three concerts we still have upcoming:

Sunday November 21, 7PM Orem East Stake Center 600 N 800 E Orem
Monday December 6th 6:00 and 7:30 PM (two identical concerts), Orem Public Library

The Sing-Off v. 2 coming up soon!

2010-11-19T08:27:00.003-07:00

I'm excited, looks like it will be much better than the first go around (which I quite enjoyed). Here's the opening number. Less than three weeks away until it airs! Personally, I'm most excited about seeing Jerry Lawson, the older black gentleman in this clip. He was the lead singer of the amazing a cappella group, The Persuasions.

On the Rocks - Lady Gaga - Bad Romance

2010-11-03T12:15:00.003-06:00

Here's another one. I thought I had posted this before, but a quick search of my blog didn't find it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTFh8LCBZeQ

P.S. There will likely be more to come, because there's an ongoing thread on RARB (the a cappella review website I write for) about the best YouTube a cappella videos.
http://forums.casa.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=6382

Naturally 7 - Wall of Sound

2010-11-03T11:54:00.001-06:00

Why do I find videos like this so dang awesome?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5MkNOXSdkA

a cappella in airport (T Mobile commercial)

2010-10-30T11:36:00.001-06:00

Pure awesomeness!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NB3NPNM4xgo

Cosmetic facial surgery

2010-10-28T21:43:00.002-06:00

I learned on Tuesday that I should get cosmetic facial surgery as an investment in my own financial future, because it's been proven that men with above-average looks make more money. I heard it on the radio so it must be true!

Pres. Obama's Mormon ancestor

2010-10-13T11:18:00.002-06:00

I thought this was interesting:

http://www.suite101.com/content/president-barack-obamas-mormon-ancestry-a295278

President Obama is a great-great-grandson of Nancy Ann Childress Osburn Armour Turner, who was a member of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (RLDS).

Genealogical research reveals that the much-married Nancy Ann Childress (1848-1924) is President Barack Obama’s Mormon ancestor. She married 1) James Osburn in 1868, 2) George W. Armour (ca. 1849-1889) in 1871, and 3) James T. Turner who had previously married Nancy’s sister, Sarah Catharine. Nancy and James were wed in 1897.

Nancy was born in Clark County, Missouri, the daughter of John Milton and Nancy (Conyers) Childress. (In some records the surname is spelled Childers.) She died in St. Mary’s Township, Hancock Co., Illinois. Both of her parents had been born in Kentucky. Her three marriages all took place in Lewis, County, Missouri and there is no indication that any of them were bigamous.

Nancy joined the RLDS Church after the death of her second husband. In February of 1877, James and Sarah Turner – Nancy’s third husband and her sister – had became members of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and both of them remained true to their conviction of the gospel restored by Joseph Smith to the end of their lives.

(there are some more details at the link, if you're curious)

a weird wave

2010-10-12T17:42:00.002-06:00

I'm oddly pleased by this. It's an animation I created for my Physics 123 class, of a traveling wave whose peak (envelope) travels to the right, but whose individual frequency components travel to the left. Mesmerizing!
http://www.physics.byu.edu/faculty/colton/courses/phy123-fall10/weirdwave.gif

You snooze, you lose

2010-10-04T10:11:00.002-06:00

Apparently the Physics computer people pulled the Robot Unicorn Attack game off the website the same day I posted about it last week. It was going viral... someone not even connected to BYU even posted about it on jazzfanz.com on Friday.

Club For Five

2010-10-02T21:49:00.001-06:00

This song is on the album that was my 2nd or 3rd pick for A Cappella Pop/Rock album of the year last year. (I was a judge for that category for the CARAs.) Gotta love this Finnish group.

Physics Dept Website Easter Egg

2010-10-01T09:47:00.004-06:00

This is hilarious. A student showed it to me yesterday. Go to the BYU Physics Dept homepage: http://www.physics.byu.edu/

The press up-up-down-down-left-right-left-right-b-a, and all your dreams will come true!

(It's the Robot Unicorn Attack game!!)

xkcd comic

2010-09-27T09:33:00.001-06:00

Sometimes I feel this way. And wish I had a wall of ice to do my bidding. :-)

Now old, but "blessed with youth"

2010-09-27T09:31:00.003-06:00

Well, the 40th birthday came and went. Thanks to Pauline for the surprise party. And for providing just about the biggest birthday cake I have ever seen. :-)

My daughters are calling me "officially old", now. However at Baroque Ensemble practice last week I mentioned my upcoming birthday to one of the other choir members (a ~30 year old woman), and she said "No way! You can't be turning 40! You've certainly been blessed with youth!" :-)

Card on "faith vs knowledge"

2010-09-16T07:22:00.001-06:00

I thought this was an interesting essay about the nature of knowledge, and how it relates to faith. By author Orson Scott Card.

http://www.mormontimes.com/article/17178/Orson-Scott-Card-Exploring-faith-and-knowledge

Hiking Mt Timp - part 4

2010-08-26T22:36:00.005-06:00

This is the 4th and final part. If you haven't looked at the pictures from parts 1, 2, and 3, start below.

We had lunch at the top, but didn't stay too long (45 mins?) because it looks liked a storm might be rolling in. So, we started hiking back down. Up until the saddle, the trail down was the same as the trail up. Here are those steep switchbacks again.

Apparently a whole bunch of mountain goats live around here. They were cute, but much larger than I expected. (This guy probably weighed twice as much as me.)

This is where the trail down diverged from the trail up. The trail we came up on is off to the right (not in the picture). It would go back through the rock slide to the lake. This trail is the one that takes you down to the Timpanooke campground. It goes over the edge that you can see, and down.

This picture is looking back up, after we had gone down the trail in the previous picture a bit. You can see the saddle, the rock slide, etc. The trail that we were on is off to the right (not in view).

This trail went through what is called "The Meadow", where there were an amazing amount of wild flowers.

You can see we are starting now the descent in earnest.

We are almost at the bottom now. The part that we just came down is called the "Giant Staircase", because the series of ledges that you can see look like steps for a giant (if you use your imagination).

And who should be waiting for us at the bottom, but a friendly moose?

We had separated into to 2-3 groups by then. I was in the last group; the people in the earlier group(s) actually had to wait for the moose to get off of the trail ahead of them.

The End. It was an amazing experience, but a grueling one which I may or may not ever repeat again. We shall see.

P.S. For the originals of all of these pictures (these have all been shrunk to conserve megabytes), and many MANY more, go to this gallery on my BYU website: http://www.physics.byu.edu/faculty/colton/timp%20pictures/gallery.htm

Hiking Mt Timp - part 3

2010-08-26T22:21:00.003-06:00

If you haven't looked at the pictures from "part 1" and "part 2" yet, start below.

As seen in an earlier photo, the trail goes up and south (formerly left) from the saddle. This is what it looks like. I think the thing way up there in the distance is the shack at the top. To further orient yourself, the rock slide would be down and to the left, from this view. The lake is that direction too, although it wouldn't have been visible from here.

There was a whole series of switchbacks in this section. You can see how steep it is.

And when we got high enough, we could see the lake again! How's this for an angle?

The views were indeed spectacular. I think this is looking down over that Aspen Grove ridge again, the way that we hiked up.

Getting pretty close to the top now, this is looking backwards. Starting from where the camera is and going backwards, you can see a series of switchbacks, the smaller peak where the really sharp switchbacks were, and to the right of the smaller peak you can see the trail going back down to the saddle. Then, you can see the trail going steeply down from the saddle (what I referred to as "the switchback" in an earlier picture, when I was talking about the trail going up to the saddle).

If you look closely, you can see our house! Find the two green ovals just to the left of the middle of the picture. (The left oval isn't really oval, but that's OK.) Make a rectangle with the centers of those ovals on opposite corners, and our house is pretty close to the upper left corner of the rectangle.

I made it!!!!!! This is the top.

Have I mentioned the view was spectacular?

I shot some video from the shack at the top. Here you go!

Hiking Mt Timp - part 2

2010-08-26T22:05:00.003-06:00

If you haven't looked at the pictures from "part 1" yet, start below.

This is "The glacier", which basically climbs up the hill from "The lake", up to the very top. Some people climb down from the peak by sliding down the glacier, but one hears about serious accidents nearly every year from people doing that. So we didn't.

A couple of the students hiked a little ways up the glacier. Here's a cool shot looking back over the lake.

And a nice butterfly.

Here's my student Matt, still at the lake. He took several hundred pictures on the hike, I believe, but he hasn't gotten them to me yet so none of these are from him.

And here's Courtney.

Leaving the lake, it wasn't too far before we could see how we were going to get to the top. Namely, the trail went through this rock slide for a ways, then climbed abruptly. You can see the abrupt climb start if you start at the middle of the person's visible forearm, and go over to the right about 30% of way across the picture. The trail climbs up (to the right in this picture), switches back, then climbs some more (to the left) until it reaches "The saddle". The saddle is the lowest point on the ridge line on the left hand side of the picture. The saddle is the first point along the whole trail where you can look out over Utah Valley. The trail then keeps going left (in this picture), along the ridge line all the way to the edge of this picture, and beyond.

This is now looking back over the rock field (boy that was a pain to cross!). You can see the abrupt drop-off at what I described earlier as the Aspen Grove ridge line.

Here's a closer-up view of the saddle. Almost there, now!

Now we're at the saddle! Be sure to click on this picture to enlarge. (Or even download it, so you can zoom in with a jpg viewing program of your choice.) This is probably the best panorama shot I've ever created, done by stitching together 5 individual pictures. It represents pretty close to a 180 degree view facing westward at the saddle.

The sweaty hiker is enjoying a brief respite at the saddle.

Hiking Mt Timp - part 1

2010-08-26T21:45:00.004-06:00

For me, one of the Big Events of the summer was hiking Mt Timpanogos. I had two visiting students as part of BYU's "REU" (Research Experience for Undergraduates) that I was supervising, and as a standard part of the REU program our department chair (Ross Spencer) takes the students on a series of hikes, culminating with Mt Timp.

To prepare I biked to work nearly every day for a month or two, and went on three "training hikes" of several hours each. It wasn't enough... I barely made it, and was extremely sore for several days. (The hike was about 5.5 hours up and 3.5 hours down, if I recall correctly.) But it was worth it! The day was glorious.

I'll share pictures in four sets of ten or so. Most of the pictures were ones I took, but some were from students Courtney Klosterman, Ben Francis, and Jessica Morgan. (Thanks!)

We hiked up the Aspen Grove trail, and hiked down the Timpanooke Campground trail. We started in the dark (6 am), so didn't take very many pictures of the first section. Fortunately, I have some great pictures of the first section from this blog post from last year: http://johncolton.blogspot.com/2009/08/summer-pictures-part-2-hike-near-back.html. So go look at those pictures, first.

I think this is the second waterfall you come to along the trail, but it could be the third.

This is the large snowfield you can see from below (see my blog post from last year). It's much smaller in this picture than in the blog post from last year, because this was later in the season.

The dawn hit us after we had been hiking a while. The light was pretty.

This is what I'm calling the fourth waterfall. (The third waterfall was a little off the trail, so I'm not sure if it counts.) The trail actually goes in back of the waterfall. That was cool.

If you look at the blog pictures from last year, you can see a clear ridge line at the top. This was what things looked like right around there.

I honestly don't recall this section, but I took the picture so I must have been there! It looks way more dangerous than it seemed at the time.

This is right at that first ridge now, or possibly just past. From this point you could look back and see the city of Heber and a bit of the Deer Creek Reservoir in the distance.

After you make it up over the ridge (after hiking for several hours up a pretty steep incline), you are rewarded with a view of the destination! If you look closely, you can see a small shack on top of the highest part. I couldn't believe how much higher it was than we had already climbed.

I was impressed with my camera's zoom ability. I didn't expect this picture to turn out so nicely.

This is "The Lake", as people call it. (Emerald Lake, to be precise.) It was much smaller than I expected--about the only thing the entire hike I could say that of.

Double Rainbow

2010-08-26T14:56:00.003-06:00

You may have seen the original Double Rainbow youtube video,

...but have you heard the Double Rainbow *song*? (from the AutoTune the News people)

Made me smile! (The second video, not the first.)

Droid X

2010-07-26T12:19:00.003-06:00

I did the deed... ordered the Droid X today!

Background: my Palm Pilot died. No one makes PDAs like it any more, without bundling them with a cell phone. Since I'll be using it mostly for work-related stuff, like my old Palm Pilot, BYU will pay for the cell phone. Well, my supplies account at BYU will. Also, BYU gets substantial discounts, so the monthly cost for the Verizon plan will only be about $30/month, instead of about $100/month that a similar personal plan would cost.

I'm excited! What's really cool and a bit mind-boggling is the way it (and similar phones) are so many devices in one. You combine a high speed processor, an internet connection, cool sensors, and an open source operating system, and wonderful things result. It's a phone, a web browser, a PDA (appt calendar, etc), a camera, a video camera, a flashlight (using the camera flash LEDs), an MP3 player, a GPS, a calculator, a USB storage device, a bar code scanner, a movie player, a game player, a streaming audio player (Pandora), a speedometer for running/biking (via GPS), a remote control for a computer, a metal detector (of the stud finder variety, I think; probably not of the beach-combing variety), a guide to visible star constellations, etc.

BYU Library viral video

2010-07-26T09:25:00.000-06:00

1.7 million hits since July 15. Wow.

Mitch Romney and Ted Danson

2010-07-26T09:22:00.003-06:00

Mitch Romney and Ted Danson: twins? I thought this was funny.

http://dailycaller.com/2010/07/26/which-former-sitcom-star-is-mitt-romneys-tv-twin/

Shipping... from where?

2010-06-11T17:30:00.003-06:00

This cracked me up. A student of mine was shopping for beakers. He found this item listed at aliexpress.com:

Check out that shipping charge!! (You'll have to click on the picture.)

Emily's trip to Odyssey of the Mind World Finals

2010-06-05T08:57:00.005-06:00

My mom pointed out to me the other day that I hadn't posted anything to my blog for a while. Been busy, I guess. One of the things we've been busy with over the last month, has been fundraising for Emily's trip to Michigan for the Odyssey of the Mind World Finals. Her OM team won the state competition for their division ("Food Court" event, in the youngest age group). After much deliberation, we decided that she could go with Matt Linford as her guardian, since Pauline and I couldn't go on the trip. Matt's a neighbor, and the dad of two of the other kids on the team.

They had a successful trip! They finished 27th (I think), out of about 85 teams. Considering none of them had done OM before, and OM hadn't even existed in the state in the recent past until this year, I thought that was phenomenal.

Here are some photos Matt gave us:

Excited kids on the airplane on the way there.

Kids and Matt in the airport. This is one of the few pictures we got of Matt, since he took almost all of the other pictures.

There they are, arriving at Michigan State. Their rental car broke down between the airport and the university (~100 miles away), so Hertz paid for a $150 taxi ride. This doesn't look like a taxi, so I think that's the replacement rental car.

There's the whole team: 7 kids, their coach (Jonathan Sherrill), and two of the other parents.

Entering the arena for the opening ceremonies. Gives you a sense of how big an event this is.

Here's the team again. Emily said they went swimming every day. (They had a lot of down time in between the "long term" and the "spontaneous" events they were competing in.)

Setting up for their "long term" event.

Here's a video Matt took of (part of) the skit the group prepared for their long term event. You can get a pretty good sense as to what they were doing for the "Food Court".

In line for their "spontaneous" event. Spontaneous is where they dominated in the state competition, and they did nearly as well in the World Finals. Apparently they finished 2nd in the country (out of those ~85 teams), and got 99.5 points to the top team's 100 points.

Abbey Road, anyone?

Team getting a lecture from their coach. Or simply "Coach", as Emily started calling him.

Kids coming home. Contrast this with the photo of them on the outbound plane.

Happy people waiting for them at the airport!

Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir - 'Lux Aurumque'

2010-03-24T12:42:00.001-06:00

I thought about being in the choir myself, but decided I didn't have time. Now I wish I had done it.

At any rate, this is fantastic execution of a cool concept.

2010 APS March Meeting

2010-03-24T12:33:00.002-06:00

Last week was the APS March meeting conference. In Portland, this year. Thanks to Nathan and Jean for letting me stay with them!

If anyone is interested, here's the talk I gave:

Optically-Detected Electron Spin Resonance of Self-Assembled InAs Quantum Dots

in other news... BYU is "most popular" university

2010-03-10T17:06:00.001-07:00

I don't think "most popular" is quite the right phrase to describe this, but it's an interesting statistic and interesting article:

http://heraldextra.com/news/local/article_b7595199-5bc9-5828-9737-e44bcf3673ab.html

BYU named most popular college in nation

Brigham Young University has been named the most popular university in the country by a national magazine.

Rankings released last week by U.S. News and World Report put BYU at the top of the list with the highest percentage of students who are accepted to the school choosing to attend.

According to the report, 78 percent of the students accepted to BYU decide to attend the university. That's 2 percent more than Harvard, which came in second. The magazine ranks Harvard as the best college in the United States, while BYU is ranked 71 on that list.

BYU spokesman Todd Hollingshead said U.S. News and World Report has been ranking schools by popularity for three years, and BYU has been battling Harvard at the top of the list every year. The two schools tied the first year, while Harvard came in first last year. Hollingshead said it is an honor to be mentioned among the elite schools of the country like Harvard and Stanford, which came in third this year.

Hollingshead said the ranking is great news, though it was not a complete surprise. He said it was a surprise to come in first, but BYU has always had a very high yield. Even before U.S. News began ranking universities by popularity, BYU steadily had between 75 and 80 percent yield, he said.

"I think it says that the students that come to BYU want to be here," he said.

Hollingshead said students who apply to BYU want to be a part of the academics and school community there. Many students planned to go to the university their whole lives, so they applied only to BYU or a select few schools. He said to be recognized nationally is an honor and exciting for the students, who may feel their decision to go to BYU has been validated.

"Any time BYU is ranked high, the students welcome that and are excited to hear that," he said.

Slap the Dickens, parts 2 and 3

2010-03-10T09:44:00.002-07:00

For those who thought the original Slap the Dickens was a hilarious as Leslie and Emily did (OK, I'll admit it: and me, too), here are parts 2 and 3:

Darth Vader being a smart-alec

2010-03-05T17:43:00.002-07:00

OK, the video doesn't use the word "alec". Anyway, it's some creative editing of a Star Wars scene; made me laugh.

OK Go - This Too Shall Pass

2010-03-04T11:28:00.001-07:00

For those who like OK Go and/or Rube Goldberg contraptions:

And here's a news story about the filming: http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/03/03/ok.go.video/

"Moore's Law" for fusion

2010-03-03T17:50:00.003-07:00

In our departmental colloquium today, the speaker talked about calculations he's been doing on energy dissipation due to turbulence in controlled fusion experiments. Much of the talk was very dry, but I thought this figure from his introduction was really interesting. (I googled it.)

He acknowledged that sometimes fusion is considered to be a laughing stock because for the past 50 years, a working fusion reactor has always been "30 years away". But while the progress has not been as anticipated, one thing that I hadn't realized is how consistent the progress has been.

What the graph shows, is that in order to have self-sustaining fusion, the "triple product", the product of the density (n), temperature (T), and time of reaction (tau), needs to be above a certain threshold. The upper left line shows that progress towards that threshold has very consistently been increasing at an exponential rate. One can compare that to the "Moore's Law" progress in computer chips shown as the red line. The speaker was confident that since the trend of constant progress towards the required triple product has shown no sign of halting, self-sustaining fusion really would occur in the immediate future (10 years, he said). Functioning commercial power plants would of course be many years after that.

An apostle's introduction to Mormonism

2010-02-27T19:56:00.002-07:00

I found this talk very interesting. It was given by Elder Dallin Oaks to the Harvard Law School yesterday.
http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/news-releases-stories/fundamental-premises-of-our-faith-talk-given-by-elder-dallin-h-oaks-at-harvard-law-school

Here are the first two paragraphs:

I welcome this opportunity to speak in what our hosts have called “Mormonism 101.” In his fine lecture last year Judge Thomas Griffith said he was giving “an introduction to the Mormon faith.” I intend to do the same, speaking from my special responsibility as an apostle called to speak as a witness of the gospel plan and mission and Church of Jesus Christ.

It is challenging to speak to such a diverse audience—some thoroughly familiar with the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ, some unaware, and many between those extremes. I will address this diversity by speaking about some of the fundamental premises of our faith and how they affect our interaction with the rest of mankind. My object is to illuminate several premises and ways of thinking that are at the root of some misunderstandings about our doctrine and practice.

The bulk of his talk is about these three areas:

I have chosen three clusters of truths to present as fundamental premises of the faith of Latter-day Saints:

1. The nature of God, including the role of the three members of the Godhead, and the corollary truth that there are moral absolutes.

2. The purpose of life.

3. The three-fold sources of truth about man and the universe: science, the scriptures, and continuing revelation, and how we can know them.

It's a lengthy talk, but well worth the read.

Spelling Bee

2010-02-23T22:20:00.003-07:00

Emily won (tied) her class spelling bee a couple of weeks ago, so she was in the school-wide spelling bee today. They took the top two spellers from each class, plus a few extra for good measure. About forty kids in all.

Emily did very well in the bee, and ended up finishing tied for 3rd place. (There were three other kids who also tied for 3rd.)

Her most impressive word: aggrandizement

The word that took her out: cellulose (she hadn't heard that word before)

Not bad for a 4th grader competing against 5th and 6th graders! :-)

Go John Park!

2010-02-18T13:08:00.002-07:00

Like last year, there's is a collegiate acappella-ist in the American Idol finals, and like I rooted for Anoop Desai last year (among others), I've got to support John Park this year. Go John Park!

Anoop's rooting for him, too.
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2010/01/anoop-desai-rooting-for-john-park/1

Here's a video of his collegiate group singing "Coming Home", with John as the soloist.

Summer Pictures, part 11: Grand Teton

2010-02-06T22:50:00.004-07:00

(Same day as the final Yellowstone pictures.)

We drove out of Yellowstone towards the south, so we could go through Grand Teton National Park. We only stopped a couple of places, because (a) we needed to drive all the way back to Orem, and (b) it was kind of a cold and dreary day. But during the times we could see the Grand Tetons, they were impressive! This is at the northern end of the valley.The lake you can see in the distance is Jackson Lake, the major lake of the valley.
There is a prominent hill in the middle of the valley that one can drive a car up. Signal Mountain, it's called. This is the view looking east from the hilltop, a panorama sticked together from two photos. (Click on the picture to get a lot more detail.)
Emily, looking down on the valley.
Here are the Tetons as seen from that hill.
Leslie found two friends there; a caterpillar, and a boy who liked the caterpillar almost as much as she did.
Our final stop was at the shores of Jenny Lake, a small lake on the southern end of the valley. (Click on the picture to get a lot more detail. And if you want to it in full resolution, use this hyperlink.)

(P.S. I hope some people enjoyed some of the pictures! That's all for summer 2009!)

Summer Pictures, part 10: Yellowstone, day 4

2010-02-06T22:46:00.003-07:00

The day after our Grand Canyon of Yellowstone hike we drove home. And we finally saw some wildlife beyond rodents! A whole herd of bison crossed the road right in front of us.

Shortly after that, we saw a bear. He was far from the road, although I was able to zoom in and get a pretty good shot.

Summer Pictures, part 9: Yellowstone, day 3

2010-02-03T18:43:00.007-07:00

I think I only have two more sets of pictures left, after this one. Neither is as extensive as this, though. I did mentioned how I feel about waterfalls, right? Well, this was the day we hiked on a path along the Upper Falls and Lower Falls of the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone. Probably the highlight of the trip, for me.

It was a glorious day!

We parked our car, then walked along a an interesting path towards the trail head. It was an unused road, followed by a used road, followed by a hiking path.

And here are the Upper Falls!

In honor of the waterfalls' glory, I made my first ever YouTube videos. Here you go! If you go to YouTube, I think you can even see it in HD. (I used the same pocket-sized Canon video camera that I used to make all of the demo videos for my Physics 105 class.)

Then the trail led down the river away from the Upper Waterfall. Here we are looking back on it.

...and then, the Lower Waterfall!

We hiked down the famous "Uncle Tom's Trail", something like 328 metal steps down the side of the canyon. It takes you close to the base of the Lower Falls.

Here's my second YouTube video!

We continued walking past the second waterfall, towards Artist Point.

Getting farther away...

What a handsome family!

Isn't he cute?

This was taken from Artist Point. You can see why the artists love it!

This one looks totally fake, doesn't it? But, on my honor, there's been no editing of the picture.
I think this is the view looking downstream from Artist Point. Still looks fake.
Another thing we saw that day, was Artist's Paint Pots. To get to the "paint pots", we had to walk through an area that looked just like a Christmas tree farm. They had had a fire, and replanted trees all at the same time, so the trees were all the same height.
Here's one of the paint pots.
Finally, I really don't know where this picture was taken, but it's a nice one of the girls.

Third year review folder turned in!

2010-02-01T10:27:00.003-07:00

The last couple of weeks I've been working on materials for my third year review. This review is essentially a warmup for the official tenure review (which they call the "continuing faculty status" review here at BYU), a couple of years from now. Basically, I have to justify my existence as a faculty member. It's been a big pain, with probably about 30 hours of total work put into it. But, I got it turned in this morning. (...and there was much rejoicing!)

Anyway, if anyone is interested, here are two of the documents from my review binder:
My current CV
My Personal Statement/Self Assessment Summary (accomplishments and goals)

Summer Pictures, part 8: Yellowstone, day 2

2010-01-31T21:02:00.005-07:00

I'm making good progress on these summer pictures! :-)

We rented a cabin in the Grand Canyon area, but didn't actually visit the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone until day 3. On day 2, we drove around the northern loop, stopping at many places along the way.

The first stop was the Mammoth area, in the far northwest corner of the park. It was impressive, but not quite as cool as we expected because there wasn't much water. Pesky drought. You can recognize all the Mammoth pictures because of the chalky white rock formations.

A waterfall! Don't remember which one it was.

There are periodic scenic drives marked, which leave the main road and then rejoin it many miles down the road. We did a few, with varying degrees of success. This particular scenic drive went slowly.
Still on that scenic drive.

OK, back on the main road. This was the "Roaring Mountain" area.

Emily at Roaring Mountain. She's always photogenic.

Two happy campers!

Another waterfall! Did I mention that I like waterfalls? They were probably my favorite part of Yellowstone.

This was the Petrified Tree. Don't recall how old it is.

If you want to know where the Petrified Tree is, here's a map we found in one of the Visitors Centers.

I can't recall exactly where these basalt columns were. You see them across one the valley at one of the major stops along the road. Pauline thought they were really cool.
I think this is the same valley with the basalt columns, but I could be wrong.

And I'm not sure if this is the same valley as that. Serves me right for waiting so long to post these pictures. Nice picture, anyway.

Summer pictures, part 7: Yellowstone, day 1

2010-01-31T20:36:00.005-07:00

(This was actually still the same day as the Mesa Falls/Big Spring pictures.)

Yellowstone of course is home to tons of hot springs, pools, and geysers. What I hadn't realized before going there is that it is also home to tons of waterfalls. Over 40 waterfalls in the park! And I love waterfalls! :-) Anyway, here's the first pool we came to:
Here's the first geyser we came to.

...and here's the first waterfall! :-) Sadly, I forget its name.

This is the river going away from that waterfall.

We decided to see Old Faithful on the first day.

That was the most crowded part of our trip. I guess everyone feels like they can miss out on some of the other stuff, but they can't go to Yellowstone without going to Old Faithful.

Just uphill from Old Faithful, there's several paths you can take, walking around geysers. Some of the geysers are apparently more impressive than O.F., but they go off at rare intervals. This one, however, goes off every 20 minutes or so. It's only a couple of feet high, though. Kinda cute. I think it was called the Anemone Geyser. Before:

After:

We decided this geyser must have been named after Leslie's church Young Women's class.

Even Pauline had a geyser named after her! ;-)

Looking down on O.F. from above:

A random pool:

Another pool:

Emily likes to take pictures, too.

This one was called the Doublet Pool:

This next picture was at a different spot, away from the O.F. area. I think it was called the "Dragon's Mouth". If I recall correctly, Leslie and I took a short hike from here, and passed a pool that was so acidic that is was crystal clear because nothing could grow in it. We didn't fall in, thankfully.

Summer pictures, part 6: On the way to Yellowstone - Mesa Falls and Big Spring

2010-01-31T19:45:00.007-07:00

We spent the night near Idaho Falls and visited Pauline's Uncle Jeff. We also saw Vince Haley (formerly Elder Haley) in Rexburg, then were on our way. One of my research students (Mitch Jones) recommended that we stop by Mesa Falls between Rexburg and Yellowstone. It was cool! There is a really nice boardwalk path that takes you right to the brink of the falls. You can see the water just disappearing over the edge:

There was a sweet rainbow going on! Made us even happier. :-)

Then, we walked on the boardwalk around the edge of the waterfall, so we could see the fall itself:

Very pretty!

Here's the view looking downstream from the falls. I think there's another water fall lower down, but we didn't take the time to walk there.

Next, Pauline's uncle recommended we stop by "Big Spring". It's a fairly quiet, secluded place where a stream emerges from the ground. An interesting guy (Johnny Sack) had built a cabin here and lived on the property as a hunter/trapper back in the early 20th century. That's his house on the left, which is open to the public. The small house on the right ran a water wheel, which if I recall correctly powered his house.

Here is a cute little critter who popped up out of the ground and looked at us:

We originally walked the wrong way to get to the house, and came across this sign, saying "You're doing it wrong." So I took Leslie and Emily's picture.

...and Pauline took my picture as I took theirs.

We saw a rare blue heron!

Isn't that a nice pose he struck?
Here's a close up on the water wheel house, from the opposite angle.

Summer pictures, part 5: On the way to Yellowstone - Golden Spike National Historic Site

2010-01-31T19:30:00.004-07:00

Finally catching up on the summer 2009 pictures! We took a family trip to Yellowstone. My parents went with us part way; we stopped at the Golden Spike National Historic Site (near Tremonten, UT). It's where the two railroads coming from the coasts met in the middle of the country.

Here are my folks:

One of the two engines that met was the Union Pacific 119:

The other was the Central Pacific Jupiter:
Pauline, Emily, and Grandpa:

The engines are functioning reproductions. They get both of them running, smoke and everything. The Jupiter was a wood-powered steam engine and the 119 a coal-powered steam engine.

Leslie, doing what she does best:

And here is the famous Golden Spike! Or at least a reproduction thereof.

This is a natural formation that got named "Chinaman's Arch", in honor of the Asian railroad workers:

Pauline, displaying a bit more adventure than usual:
Meanwhile, back at the car...

Class assignment for next year

2010-01-27T10:10:00.003-07:00

Just got my class assignment for next year. I have:

Fall = the majors/minors section of Physics 123
Winter = the majors/minors section of Physics 123, plus Physics 581

Two new classes, so a lot of new preparation. But, they should be fairly small classes, which will be a nice break from the huge Physics 105 sections I've had in the past.

New recordings posted

2010-01-26T17:24:00.002-07:00

I finally got around to putting up some recordings from the UBE's November concert. Nine recordings, to be precise. See here:
http://www.physics.byu.edu/faculty/colton/personal/choral_music.html

Next up for the blog? I still need to finish posting family pictures from Summer 09.

Getting mp3 from a YouTube video

2010-01-23T12:58:00.002-07:00

I wanted to grab the audio from a YouTube video, so I did a websearch. There were about 6 websites I found that claimed to be able to do that. After trying all of them, only two worked for me. This was the easiest one:

http://vidtomp3.com

You just enter in the YouTube URL, wait for a couple of minutes, then it pops up with a downloadable mp3 file. Prety slick!

Jazz vs Cavs, part 2

2010-01-15T14:37:00.001-07:00

Someone with mad editing skills put together this video of the ending of the Jazz/Cavs game. Very nice!

Jazz vs Cavs

2010-01-15T10:04:00.003-07:00

Thanks, dad for the tickets! It was an amazing game, probably the most exciting game I've ever been to in person.

Check out Korver's shot, the second-to-last Jazz shot of the game. #2 play on ESPN, here:

And of course, Gaines' final shot was also an amazing thing... undrafted rookie hits falling away 3 pointer at the buzzer!

Voice Band for the iPhone

2010-01-13T17:28:00.000-07:00

Pretty dang impressive. Almost enough to get me to buy an iPhone!

Student comments

2009-12-30T14:13:00.002-07:00

I've been reading through student comments most of the day today, regarding the Physics 105 class that just got over. It seems like there are more positive comments and fewer negative comments than ever before, so I must be getting better. Better at maintaining student morale, at least, if nothing else. ;-)

Anyway, I decided I had to post this comment because it just made me smile:

Overall, I think the class was really great. Dr. Colton is a really great teacher who makes physics interesting and easy to understand. Dr. Colton explained the principles of physics really well and class lecture was always really good and helpful to clarify the principles and concepts we were learning. Dr. Colton should teach 105 all the time because he does it really well. Dr. Colton teaches 105 in a manner that is very easy to understand and also many of the principles that we learn are principles we have to use in the next thing we are learning. Dr. Colton is a great teacher which made 105 great class.

Are you tone deaf?

2009-12-26T15:09:00.003-07:00

Pauline found this test:
http://jakemandell.com/tonedeaf/

It plays a random sequence of tones, then pauses, then plays a second random sequence of tones. You have to say whether or not the second set was the same as the first. Repeat for something like 36 different sequences.

It was much more challenging than I expected. As the website says, "The test is purposefully made very hard, so excellent musicians rarely score above 80% correct." Here are the results from our family:

John - 88.9%
Leslie - 69.4%
Pauline - 63.9%
Emily - 61.1%
(We suspect that Emily's score is more of a reflection of her unfortunate habit of thinking that she already knows everything--and not taking the time to give serious consideration to something--rather than a reflection of her tone memory. In a lot of ways she's better at matching pitches than either Pauline or Leslie.)

Carol of the Bells = "Slap in the face"

2009-12-24T09:16:00.003-07:00

Christmas is tomorrow... that means you have just one day to Watch This Video. (I just watched it with Leslie and Emily and it made us all laugh. Said Leslie: "It caught me totally off guard. I did not expect that!"

That's an ad for this longer video...A Christmas Carol told by those four guys. Each one has a set of ten "Taboo" words, which if they say results in a face-slap. The catch is that they are not told their list of words beforehand...so they have to work out which words they aren't allowed to say by noticing when their slaps arrive. Funny stuff!

World's tiniest snowman

2009-12-22T13:37:00.003-07:00

I guess you can still call it a snowman even if it's not made of snow, can't you?
JSC

---

Tiniest Snowman: Hey guys, I'm ... OH MY *** WHAT AM I MADE OF?? National Physics Laboratory

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2009-12/great-moments-science-worlds-tiniest-snowman

Great Moments in Science: the World's Tiniest Snowman

Physicists use their nano-skills for the greater good, by creating a tiny bit of holiday cheer
By Jeremy Hsu Posted 12.04.2009 at 1:15 pm

What do tiny smiling snowmen mean for science? Not much; these physicists just decided to show off their ability to make really small things.

This little guy measures just 10 micrometers across, or just 1/5th the width of a human hair. Scientists at the National Physics Laboratory in the UK built the snowman body from two tin beads, and milled the eyes and smile in the top bead using a focused ion beam. The snowman also has a platinum nose deposited by said ion beam, which probably beats a silly carrot any day.

By comparison, the tiniest snowflakes might reach a size of 1 millimeter, or 1,000 micrometers. So building the snowman by conventional backyard means was out.

Instead, a system capable of nano-manipulation helped researchers assemble the snowman "by hand." Platinum deposition helped weld all the parts together.

This hardly represents the craziest science taking place on a small scale. Harvard University has used programmed DNA to create little gears, tubes and wireframe balls. Columbia University also created self-assembling nanogears for those future hordes of tiny robots.

Still, the miniature snowman might put a smile on your face despite its apparent lack of scientific value. Just don't accidentally step on him, or else Jack Frost might pay a visit with his sharp icicle knives.

Christmas caroling -- with llamas!

2009-12-21T13:37:00.004-07:00

One of my Physics 105 students (Tyler Clive) was the organizer. He gave me a copy of the article, presumably because he knows I'm a singer. If the idea of BYU students renting llamas from a Hare Krishna temple to do Christmas caroling in order to help the food bank doesn't make you smile, there's something wrong with you! :-)

http://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/central/provo/article_f2ee6128-be9a-5602-98b7-044f0826db0a.html
Heidi Toth - Daily Herald
Posted: Saturday, December 5, 2009 12:00 am

The toddler who opened the door at Marni Sanft's home in Provo on Friday night came face to face with a llama.

The 20 BYU students and four llamas that came caroling and asking for food for the Utah Food Bank sang a couple of songs to the family, including "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Llama," and to dozens of other families through Provo in the third Carollama event. Yes, that is caroling with llamas.

BYU student Tyler Clive said the idea for the Carollama came up because he noticed llama rental from the Hare Krishna temple in Spanish Fork was inexpensive, and the llamas combined with the Christmas caroling and asking for canned food seemed like a sure winner.

Judging by the reactions when Provo residents open the door to find a group of BYU students and a relative of the camel singing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas," Clive's early guess was correct. Children come running, the TV goes off and people come to enjoy the show.

"It's actually quite a surprise to find a llama at your door," Clive observed. "I think people welcome surprises like that at Christmas."

This year he's rented more llamas and they're going out for four nights; Friday night was the first. Clive said he expects a bigger haul for the food bank thanks to the larger scale of the project.

Brothers James and Joel Castleton braved the cold Friday night to sing; Christmas caroling is a tradition in their family, so this was an easy choice. The llamas were new, but the rest was familiar.

"It's probably the funnest thing ever," he said.

The other caroling nights are today, Monday and Thursday. The group meets in the parking lot east of the BYU law school at 5:30 p.m. to get a llama, split into smaller groups and start caroling.

• Heidi Toth can be reached at (801) 344-2556 or htoth@heraldextra.com.

Giving you a cuddle for Christmas - Suade

2009-12-20T11:53:00.001-07:00

I got to review these guys for RARB, and I loved their album Home Brew. It was clear that they were having a lot of fun. As it also is on this video:

Hacker's Holiday

2009-12-19T11:50:00.000-07:00

Mister Tim is one of the most original people in a cappella these days. You may remember him from the Star Wars tribute to John Williams video. Apparently McAfee picked him to do this web commercial. Enjoy!

Billy's Balloon

2009-12-16T14:28:00.001-07:00

Pauline and I saw this at an animated film festival we attended once when we lived in Berkeley (Spike & Mike's). It cracked us up then, and it cracked me up again just now when I ran across it.

Tonight Show: Song about Mormons

2009-12-16T11:12:00.003-07:00

This was fairly humorous. Practically the whole country has heard about Sen. Orrin Hatch's Hannukah song he wrote for Jewish people... to return the favor, the Tonight Show's Max Weinberg (Jewish) wrote a song about Mormons. Enjoy!

P.S. Here's the Hannukah song, if you haven't yet heard it. Pretty boring, I thought.

Eight Days of Hanukkah from Tablet Magazine on Vimeo.

Another Lakers picture

2009-12-12T16:43:00.002-07:00

I was just reminded of this picture, which I believe someone posted to jazzfanz for the 2008 playoffs. This one always cracks me up!

Jazz vs. Lakers tonight

2009-12-12T16:29:00.004-07:00

I'm going to the Jazz/Lakers game tonight. Thanks, Dad, for the tickets! Hopefully it will turn out better than the Jazz/Lakers game earlier this week--that one featured the worst fourth quarter collapse I have ever witnessed (only 6 points in the fourth by the Jazz).

In honor of the game, here's a picture someone posted to jazzfanz; it cracked me up.

The Sing-Off

2009-12-12T07:23:00.002-07:00

I can't remember if I've blogged about this before, but BYU's all-women a cappella group, Noteworthy, was one of just 8 groups nationwide (college & pro) to be selected for NBC's "The Sing-Off" competition that starts on Monday. It should be exciting! Basically an American Idol-like competition for a cappella groups, but the whole season condensed into just about a week and a half.

Here's a very good article about the competition and the groups.
http://www.expressnightout.com/content/2009/12/the-sing-off-a-cappella-nbc.php

...and here's a preview of the opening number!

Nice student comments

2009-12-10T08:35:00.002-07:00

Every class period I make the Physics 105 students fill out a pre-class quiz on the computer before coming to class. In addition to asking them questions about the reading assignment, I have a spot for open ended comments: "Any other comments?" Today, the last day of class, I was pleasantly surprised to see the majority of the comments, from students who had left comments, were unsolicited compliments about how the semester had gone in our class. Here they are, recorded now for posterity.

---

Go physics go physics go! Go physics go physics go!

Thanks for a great semester, Dr. Colton!

Thank you for being an amazing teacher! Go Lakers :)

Thanks for teaching a great class!!! I will miss you next semester!

Thanks for the semester!

Thanks for being such a great teacher. I have never loved Physics as much as I have in this class. Thank you.

Thanks for teaching us this semester Dr. Colton! You rock!

Thanks Dr. Colton! You're a great teacher. My only regret is that you're not teaching 106.

Thanks for all the answers and demos, they were a lot of fun.

:)

Great class, learned alot! Thanks Dr. Colton!

Dr. Colton thank you for being my best physics teacher ever. You are a great professor and I owe you everything that I know about physics. I feel you really care for the students and their success and you are awesome at explaining difficult concepts. Keep up the good work!

I really had a very hard time in this class and I believe I am not going to get the grade I was at least hoping for, but oddly enough, I feel I have a much better understanding of physics now. Thank you.

I'm excited for the final. :)

Thanks for the great semester, difficult class but has been rewarding! Thanks!

This class wasn't half as crappy as I thought it was going to be, thanks for not being a super anal teacher that treats his students like dirty gum that's stuck on the bottom of your shoe.

I liked your class. Thanks for everything this semester!

You have been a great professor this semseter. Thanks for your hard work. You make BYU a great place to learn.

Thanks for everything that you have done in this course! I honestly felt that this class was the most organized class that I have been in at BYU. The organization has helped me learn and love physics, so thank you!

THANK YOU FOR TEACHING US THIS SEMESTER! :)

This was my first physics class ever and i loved it, thanks for the semester!

Thanks you so much. I have enjoyed your class.

last class! thank you, Dr. Colton! it's been fun; i've learned a ton!!

I enjoyed your class and your teaching style. Thank you for your efforts.

This is hard Dr. Colton. I'm gonna miss you man.

Thanks for the class it has been enjoyable

Thank you so much for all your efforts in teaching, you were wonderful!

Thanks for the semester Dr. Colton! You rock!

I've really enjoyed this class. :)

Thanks for everything. You were a great Teacher!

great class!

Last warm-up! Yay! Thanks for being a great teacher. you were completely fair in all your grading and taught me alot! I wish you were teaching physics 106!

Thankyou!

thanks, dr. colton!

Thanks for all you do Dr. Colton! This has been a great, challenging class.

Thanks for a great class!!!!!

It's not just cold, it's Wisconsin cold!

2009-12-10T08:33:00.001-07:00

Brrr. I finally had to break out my Wisconsin winter coat for the first time since we moved here. I think we've been hitting single digits (deg F) the past 4 days.

I caught Cecil Adams in an error!

2009-11-30T16:52:00.003-07:00

Cecil Adams, of course, is the nearly omniscient author of the Straight Dope newspaper column. The Straight Dope is almost always worth reading.

An older column about "What would happen if you were swallowed by a black hole" popped up a week or two ago under the "classic columns" section of the website. However, it said that you would fall into the black hole forever. That's wrong, according to a discussion I had in ~1993 with a black hole expert. So, I emailed Cecil about it and told him that while it would appear to an outside observer that you would take forever to reach the hole, to you yourself it would happen very quickly. That's relativity for you.

I've (practically?) never seen this before, but in his column from last week Cecil admits an error:

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2909/what-would-happen-if-you-were-swallowed-by-a-black-hole-revisited

Don't worry about falling forever toward the black hole without ever actually getting there. I said that was one of the possibilities. I acknowledge with shame that I was wrong. The truth, insofar as this can be known about an event that's fundamentally unknowable, is that it might appear to an outside observer that you were falling indefinitely, for reasons I don't feel it's necessary to explore. However, you yourself would rocket through right on schedule, or at least we think you would.

He doesn't acknowledge my email, and there may well have been others who wrote in, but I'm taking credit! :-)

USA Today: get to know the Latter-day Saints

2009-11-30T12:09:00.004-07:00

An interesting recent USA Today opinion piece. They surveyed people's reactions about Mitt Romney, and found that those who (a) know a Mormon personally, or (b) know a lot about Mormonism (as proved via a quiz), are not affected by statements such as "Some people say Mormons are not Christians". But those who (c) *think* they know a lot about Mormonism but don't really (as proved via the quiz) were bothered most of all by claims about Mormons not being Christians.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/11/column-tolerance-we-have-a-ways-to-go-.html

Some were given a boilerplate biography [of Romney] that did not mention religion; others were told that he has been a local leader in his church; others were told he has been a leader in the Mormon church. Still others were told, "Some people say Mormons are not Christians." By comparing reactions to these various statements, we could see how each one affected a person's willingness to vote for Romney, and also how different kinds of people responded to the statements.

...

When respondents were told about the claim that Mormons are not Christians, nearly one-third said they were less likely to vote for him.

Interestingly, the claim that Mormons are not Christians had virtually no effect on those people who reported a close personal relationship with a Mormon. This news, though, is presumably small consolation for Romney's supporters. There is little they can do between now and 2012 to encourage closer friendships between Mormons and their non-Mormon neighbors.

Our results do, however, indicate that there is something Romney's supporters can do to assuage concerns about his Mormonism. People who objectively know a lot about Mormons — that is, those who scored 100% on a short quiz on facts about Mormonism — were much less likely to be bothered by the claim that Mormons are not Christians. In contrast, respondents who claimed they knew a lot about Mormons, but who actually did not, were bothered most of all by claims about Mormonism.

...

We take no position on whether Romney is right for the Republican Party or for the White House...We do take the position that the whole country will be better off if there is no "stained glass ceiling" in politics for members of any religion or no religion at all. A good way to break such a barrier is for all of us to really know the Latter-day Saints — as well as all the other kinds of "saints" among us.

Free Beatles-based a cappella album by Overboard

2009-11-27T10:38:00.003-07:00

This is amazing. Boston-based contemporary a cappella group Overboard is giving away their new album, Help!. It's Beatles-themed, with 23 covers of Beatles songs. I've only listened to five or six tracks so far, but already I'm blown away by the album--by their interpretations and the quality of the singing & recording. Easily worth purchasing for $15-20, but it's FREE. FREE I tell you!!

You can download the album here:
http://www.overboardvocals.com/

Click the "Download Help! for free" link. The free offer only lasts until Dec 23, 2009.

Bohemian Rhapsody - Muppet Style

2009-11-25T09:04:00.004-07:00

I LOL'ed out loud(*) when Beaker came in.

Also available in HD if you go to Youtube itself.

(*) nod to Mr. Monk