in my Mission!

This is an article in a newspaper in Arizona. It describe a dual amputee missionary serving the in the Arizona Tucson Mission (My mission). Make sure you check out the slide show. It's got some awesome pics including a hand-crank cycle.

Terorist Jack Rabbits

In a recent trip across Wyoming, I came upon a region infested with terrorist Jackrabbits. Jackrabbits, as you may know, are furry little creatures with big ears and really big back legs. Unlike their relatives, these are not cute bunnies. These are terrorist Jackrabbits bent on the destruction of America, even if is one car accident at a time.

The Terrorist JackRabbits (or TJRs) were not born terrorists. And might I add, not all jackrabbits are terrorists. In the course of their lives, though, some jackrabbits just go astray. No one is quite sure when it starts, but everyone is clear on the results. TJRs are a force to be reckoned with.

Some of you readers might be questioning at this point, “What is the mission of a TJR?” It’s a simple one: Disrupt American Travel! How are they going about this mission? By repeatedly attempting suicide missions.

In the course of just four miles of road, I counted over 50 dead successful TJRs. These initial slaughters seem to be trial runs. These are the TJRs that were chosen to be part of the first wave or the “experimental group.” Their mission was to see what times of the day work best to attack. Additionally, they were assigned to figure out if they should go it alone or in pacts when attacking. Lastly they were assigned the importance of figuring out what vehicles would give them the greatest reward.

Daylight showed the worst results. People in family vehicles often swerved or broke or even stopped. The worse were the families that not only didn’t hit the TJR, but instead got out of their Dodge Caravans to take pictures. Nothing gets a TJR teased more than being photographed while trying to express terror and destruction.

Another result was that big vehicles, or “tractor-trailers”, or “Semi’s” seemed to be the worse vehicles to attempt to destroy. They rarely slowed down and never was damaged caused. The TJR’s suicide was in vain.

Through this “experimental group” the TJRs came to the conclusion that nighttime attacks worked the best, especially if the intended target was a family size vehicle, preferably a small car with very little clearance in the undercarriage. This brought the TJR’s to the second phase or the “practice group.”

It’s not easy jumping in front of a moving car at the right time to cause sufficient damage. Three main TJRs are required. The first is the lookout. He is stationed ¾ of a miles up the road. His job is to look for potential victims to attack. When he sees a small car with a sleepy driver or a family full of young children that adore jackrabbits, the lookout stomps his foot three times on the ground signaling the second vital TJR to get ready. The second TJR is known as “The Sacrifice.” His family will be honored greatly by his willingness to die for this cause. They will be rewarded handsomely if “The Sacrifice” does an incredible amount of damage to the passenger car. The Sacrifice is by far, the most important TJR in these attacks.

The last TJR is the analysis rabbit. His job is to survey the results: see how many people died, see what damage was done to the car, see how far The Sacrifice had to jump to do the best amount of damage. This information is critical to the last phase of the mission.

The third, and final, phase is known as the “All ahead full group” This phase is coming soon. Soon the people of America will know what is like to have their travel plans altered. Soon America will know what the phrase “Road Closures” really means. Soon, very soon, the TJRs will know the taste of victory and asphalt better than they’ve ever known it before.

If it weren’t for the TJRs, we, as a people, would be left to think that those 50 carcasses on the roads of Wyoming were just really dumb animals that can’t navigate a simple two-lane road with out getting hit. And we all hope their not that dumb of creature. I mean jeez, some people hunt jackrabbits. I’d hate to thing the dumb hunters wasted all that time and ammunition for something I could do in a Honda Civic in Wyoming.

The Jackrabbits are terrorists

In a recent trip across Wyoming, I came upon a region infested with terrorist Jackrabbits. Jackrabbits, as you may know, are furry little creatures with big ears and really big back legs. Unlike their relatives, these are not cute bunnies. These are terrorist Jackrabbits bent on the destruction of America, even if is one car accident at a time.

The Terrorist JackRabbits (or TJRs) were not born terrorists. And might I add, not all jackrabbits are terrorists. In the course of their lives, though, some jackrabbits just go astray. No one is quite sure when it starts, but everyone is clear on the results. TJRs are a force to be reckoned with.

Some of you readers might be questioning at this point, “What is the mission of a TJR?” It’s a simple one: Disrupt American Travel! How are they going about this mission? By repeatedly attempting suicide missions.

In the course of just four miles of road, I counted over 50 dead successful TJRs. These initial slaughters seem to be trial runs. These are the TJRs that were chosen to be part of the first wave or the “experimental group.” Their mission was to see what times of the day work best to attack. Additionally, they were assigned to figure out if they should go it alone or in pacts when attacking. Lastly they were assigned the importance of figuring out what vehicles would give them the greatest reward.

Daylight showed the worst results. People in family vehicles often swerved or broke or even stopped. The worse were the families that not only didn’t hit the TJR, but instead got out of their Dodge Caravans to take pictures. Nothing gets a TJR teased more than being photographed while trying to express terror and destruction.

Another result was that big vehicles, or “tractor-trailers”, or “Semi’s” seemed to be the worse vehicles to attempt to destroy. They rarely slowed down and never was damaged caused. The TJR’s suicide was in vain.

Through this “experimental group” the TJRs came to the conclusion that nighttime attacks worked the best, especially if the intended target was a family size vehicle, preferably a small car with very little clearance in the undercarriage. This brought the TJR’s to the second phase or the “practice group.”

It’s not easy jumping in front of a moving car at the right time to cause sufficient damage. Three main TJRs are required. The first is the lookout. He is stationed ¾ of a miles up the road. His job is to look for potential victims to attack. When he sees a small car with a sleepy driver or a family full of young children that adore jackrabbits, the lookout stomps his foot three times on the ground signaling the second vital TJR to get ready. The second TJR is known as “The Sacrifice.” His family will be honored greatly by his willingness to die for this cause. They will be rewarded handsomely if “The Sacrifice” does an incredible amount of damage to the passenger car. The Sacrifice is by far, the most important TJR in these attacks.

The last TJR is the analyses rabbit. His job is to survey the results: see how many people died, see what damage was done to the car, see how far The Sacrifice had to jump to do the best amount of damage. This information is critical to the last phase of the mission.

The third, and final, phase is known as the “All ahead full group” This phase is coming soon. Soon the people of America will know what is like to have their travel plans altered. Soon America will know what the phrase “Road Closures” really means. Soon, very soon, the TJRs will know the taste of victory and asphalt better than they’ve ever known it before.

If it weren’t for the TJRs, we, as a people, would be left to think that those 50 carcasses on the roads of Wyoming were just really dumb animals that can’t navigate a simple two-lane road with out getting hit. And we all hope their not that dumb of creature. I mean jeez, some people hunt jackrabbits. I’d hate to thing the dumb hunters wasted all that time and ammunition for something I could do in a Honda Civic in Wyoming.

No, those jackrabbits aren’t dumb. They are Terrorist Jackrabbits.

Wish List

Occasionally people want to do something nice for me. If you ever have that happen in your life but you don't know what to do, here are some suggestions:

Charities
Cancer Society
Boy Scouts of America
LDS Church Missionary fund
BORP
Perpetual Education Fund
Any Soldier

Pipe Dreams
Wife
iTouch

Cameras
video camera


Gift Cards
iTunes/iPod
Target
Wal-Mart

Art
Fans Shed Light on the Game

Tools
Sawsall

Clothing
BYUI Sweatshirt
BYUI Jacket

Money
I would love a government bailout for my credit card or student loans.

Added 2009
A cowboy hat like my father's
Digital SLR
New Car stereo for the truck (so pretty much a gift card to Best Buy)

The United Fraternities and Soroieties of the Cast

Membership is simple: Break a castable bone.This of course leaves out toes, ears, and most face bones. Anything else is fair game. As long as the bone is fractured or broken and there is a predominate cast on it, you can join one of these Greek societies.

This Fraternity/Soroity comes with the same membership like applications that other Greek organizations come with. First is the initial application. This can be done in several ways as long as the end result is a broken bone with a cast on it. Some are victims, I mean applicants, of circumstance: They break their bones in car accidents. Some are heroic applicants: They break an arm by allowing the beam of a building to fall on them instead of the innocent child or puppy that the beam could have fallen on. There are double heroic points if the potential disaster involved both children and puppies. Others won't take much thought to their application process. In fact, not much thought is involved at all: These are the dare devils; the stunt doers; the adrenaline seekers. These are the people cwhose parents looked at them at birth and knew instantly the little cute child in their arms would, at some later date, mount some angry bull, fly through the air and land on a completed application to join the fraternity or soroiety of the Cast.

Folowing the application comes hell week. Real men and women take on hell week in the summer. Weak applicants do it in the spring. Hell week consists of having x-rays where the x-ray tech has you place your broken bone into positions that would have hurt, even if your bone wasn't broken, all in the name of getting the best shot. This is followed by a doc, usually of the Emergency Room variety, constantly pushing on your hurt area to confirm that it actually does hurt, before puting the cast on.

After this exchange, Hel week is ready to move into the second phase. If a leg is broken, you get to learn how to put only 15 pounds on that bone when in actuality you weigh 145 pounds. If it is a broken arm or WRIST or hand, you get to learn how to do the most mundane things, like tying your shoes or washing your hair, withonly one hand. These activities are further complicated by the increased energy required for these tasks thus making you sweat and making the skin under your cast itch.

As Hell week wraps up, the final test of Hell week is a patience test. Unless you're still in junior high school, most of your days aren't spent with people randomly coming up to you with a permanet marker in hand asking to write on your arm. However, as your last test of hell week, this is exactly what will happen. Like a collection of random tattoos by non-artistic people, your cast will soon be a mosiac of your patience.The patience test comes frrom people writing slowly, misspelling words and by them twisting your cast in ways not even the x-ray tech dared twist you. You must wait for these sadistic people to stop. After this, your Hell week is over.


Mebership does come with priveledges. For example, you are different than those who have never broken a bone before. You have that experience over them. Additionally, you have the right to seek out other people with casts and tell them embellished, exaserated stories of how you got your broken bone, what 8 million things went wrong while you had it on (including losing your job, losing your signifgant other, or you being convicted of a crime and being sent to prison because everyone assumed you were the one armed-man), and then finally being able to relate how long you were actually in the cast and then adding 2 months (or 2 years depending on how guilble your pledge is).

The best privledge is: Once a member, always a member. From now until the day you die you can look new Pledges in the eye, glance at their cast and proclaim "Oh that's nothing. I rescued 1,000 people from a burning building before the structure fell apart on mer, breaking my arm in 102 different places. I happened to live on the equator at the time and spent my summer down their recuperating. I'm a better person for it. You go that riding a handcrank cycle? That's nothing!"