The Wilhelmsen Botanical Blog

So, as Latter Day Saints we have specific standards and guidelines for the clothes that we wear.  One that for the most part we don’t have to go out of our way to hunt down things to wear that match our standard.  Sure we need shorts, skirts & shirts that are little bit longer, and shirts that are not so low cut.  We also like swimsuits that cover our belly and are not low cut up top.  Well, as it gets harder to find clothes like these little niche shops are popping up that sell modest clothing.  Which would seem to be a wonderful blessing.  Well, for some reason they think that they can get away with charging an arm and a leg for things.  Why?  Because our other options are becoming more and more limited. 

Why am I on this little rant?  Well because the swimsuits this season (even the one piece) are more revealing then ever.  There are very few tankini tops that do not have the low v cut and the one piece suits have the low v cut with zero back on them.  As well as being cut out around the sides to show off ones waist.  Oi!  The cute ones that I have found are $40 for the top and $20 for the bottoms.  This is a problem when your swimsuit budget is $25 total.  Anyway, if anyone knows of any inexpensive swimsuit stores please let me know.  :o|

Last night, Erin and I went to see a production at Pioneer Theater. On our way there, we grabbed some food at the local grocery store.

We were walking out of the store and trying to cross to our car in the parking lot when a man in a car drove into the same lane as we were in. He stopped the car as we were walking, and for a second it was like a silly game of Red Light/Green Light. We couldn’t tell what his intention was because he had failed to use his turn signal. I was frustrated by this and opened and closed my fingers, as if to signal a light while yelling, “Use your turn signal!”

As we walked past, he rolled down his window on his way into a parking stall and shouted angrily, “You want to talk?! I’ll talk!!!” We found our car and I got Erin inside. I emptied my hands of groceries as he stomped toward me, yelling. I had a nice adrenaline dump as he did so because he looked ready to fight.

I can’t remember what he hollered at me, but it was something to the effect of me being a jerk (in quite a few more words). I told him that we had no idea where he was trying to park, because he didn’t signal. He screamed a few more obscenities at me, and deciding that a fight would be a bad idea, went to go shopping.

I am amazed that some people are wound so tight that they’d fight so quickly. He was clearly not interested in “talking.” I was glad I was not pressed to defend myself as we were trying to hurry to the show. Hopefully he was just having a bad day and it was not his normal temperament. Anyway, it turned out to be a good evening with my wife.

They say that it isn’t money that brings happiness. And they are right. But the last two weeks have taught me the top two things that do constitute happiness.

They are:

     1) progeny
             &
     2) sleep

The mysterious thing about this fact is that the items above are mutually exclusive, at least for the first 18 years, from what I’m told.  🙂

We love our little boy and have consigned ourselves to the idea that less is more when it comes to regularity in slumber. Though this trite little cliché might comfort some, it does nothing to placate the eight pounder when he is hungry at 2 am and then also at 4:30 am. Some might try to reassure with the empty promise that a baby’s biological clock will find some normalcy, and to that I’d say, “What Bio-clock?!” This cute-faced kid is merely a front for a bio-time-bomb that could go off at any second, releasing any number of bodily fluids in any combination imaginable! And babies have the amazing ability to rough you up like a mob enforcer without any teeth. You’d better listen carefully because his next request, if misunderstood, could result in another hour of confused crying. And then the little one would start wailing along with Dad.

But seriously, Aiden is adorable and is very sweet. We have had some ‘fun’ moments as well, but it is a tremendous blessing to be heading down the road of parenthood.

I’d like to mention one highlight of our last week. Erin and I stole away to watch August Rush. This film is tremendously acted and fantastically written. It is one we will commit to our library for sure. 

This just keeps coming back to my little brain.  I have spoken to many different people on the subject hearing a wide variety of good opinions and arguments both for and against illegal immigration.  I was encouraged to think about how Heavenly Father or Jesus would handle this particular situation and base my opinion on that and the following thoughts are a result of that.

First of all, I firmly believe that laws are created for the benefit and well being of us as American’s and those who come into America as guest workers, or on visa’s and passports.  They also protect those who have come in the country with the purpose of becoming a citizen of the United States.  When a person of any ethnicity or race, comes into our country from another country without following the proper proceedure they will be subjected to exploitation.  They are not covered by the laws that protect our own citizens from sub par wages, they have to sneak around, they can’t apply for a social security number, and I would imagine they aren’t protected under our laws if they were to become subject to theft, violence, etc. 

I feel that although we are all Heavenly Father’s children and are all equal in his eyes, and even though it seems like a brotherly thing to do to let these immigrants in and work for sub par wages because it is a better life then what they could get back home, if we just shift our view slightly, then we will see it is not.  If you consider that American companies like to hire these workers over American’s because they are willing to work for wages that are below minimum wage and that we do have a law such as having a minimum wage for a reason, then we can liken these employers unto slave owners with the immigrants being their slaves.  These illegal immigrants are being taken advantage of due to the fact that they have snuck into the country, they are willing to work for sub par wages, and because to them it is “better” then back home.  This seems corrupt to me. 

I feel that Christ would encourage those wanting to migrate to America to do so as the laws outline, because that way they will have the same freedoms, rights, and protections as the citizens.  They will be able to have an even better life because they too will be eligible to receive minimum wage and benefit from that law.  He would not have us giving them jobs and paying them poorly just because to them it is a better life.  This argument to me seems to provide an argument for big companies outsourcing and paying pennies on the dollar.  For instance, if we go into madagascar (I just randomly chose a country for example) and after researching that their average pay is $2.50 a week we offer jobs that pay $3.50 a week, because “it is a better life then what their own country can offer” even though here in America we are paying employees who are doing the same job $5.25 an hour, isn’t that exploitation?  Aren’t we taking advantage of them because of their circumstances?  This is not a brotherly thing to do, it is not a Christlike thing to do, it is for the gain of the American company and the United States and not to help better the lives of others.

Oi, I have gone on for quite long enough.  I hope that my points were made clearly.  Ta ta.

Is anyone else as concerned with the status of the world as I am?  It seems more and more that people are saying crazy things and we American’s just take them at face value no matter how insane the idea is.  Also, people are allowed to get away with more and more and more these days because the “rules” our politicians are making tie our hands from solving problems. 

Here are a few examples that I can think of.  A man comes into our country illegally and murders some people (I don’t remember minute details such as his name or what state this occured in) we catch him and proceed to try him for murder.  His country calls us, and says that because we didn’t contact that embassy (per our rule that we made) then we can’t try him and sentance him to death and we need to send him back to his country.  This man has already broken one law by entering our country illegally, he then broke a second very HUGE law by killing american citizens and we are not allowed to try him and punish him for breaking our laws.  How is this reasonable?

Next, there have been several unprovoked acts of violence recently and I imagine these will happen more and more frequently.  One happened while a lady was out walking her dog.  As she did so a man with two knives stabbed her repeatedly for no reason whatsoever after having stolen 4 knives from Texas Smokehouse and stabbing a restaurant worker.  Luckily there was an off duty cop eating at a restaurant nearby who was able to stabilize the situation.  The lady didn’t die and is in serious but stable condition in the hospital.  Another is that a few days ago in Holladay there were about  20 cars whose windows had been smashed in for no apparent reason other then the perpetuators wanting a few kicks.  Luckily the police were able to catch them when they pulled over a car who had run a stop sign.  Inside the car was alcohal, broken glass, and a metal bat.  Two are in the salt lake county jail while the third is in juvenile detention.  It makes me a little nervous to think that I could be the victim of some unprovoked violence.

I can’t think of much else to say except that it is becoming more and more clear to me that humans, even the smartest and most intelligent humans in the world, don’t even know a small part of what our father in Heaven knows.  One day we are told to drink orange juice because it fights cancer and several years later we are told it causes cancer.  Another day we are told not to eat fat and later we are told that our bodies need a little bit of fat.  In the 70’s we are told that we need to prepare for another ice age and here we are 30 year later being told to prepare for intense global warming (while ironically the meteorologists are predicting the coldest winter in Utah that we have had in several years).  Here is what I think about all of that, Heavenly Father commands all things, he regulates the weather and the climate changes, we here just need to go with the flow of the seasons and not predict one extreme or another.  We need to not do silly and extreme things to “balance” out the climate either like dump ash on the north pole or metal shavings into the ocean.  We just need to be smart and use our resources wisely.  Also, where food is concerned if we follow the teachings of the scriptures we can’t go wrong.  Heavenly Father made our bodies, he knows what is best for them, and no well-meaning scientist who sole focus is to study the body will ever know all the things that Heavenly Father knows.  So there you have it, my rant for today.

Ok, all you Utah voters. I have a bit of a plea for you. As you know there is an election coming up on Nov. 6th. I don’t know if it is too late to register to vote to be able to in this upcoming election but I very strongly encourage those who are not registered to vote to do so BEFORE the 2008 election when we will be voting for a new president. My motto is, if you didn’t vote then you can’t complain about the choices our leaders make. I will post another blog with voter registration information in it.

Now let me tell you about vouchers. I am strongly against them. Here is a brief and unbiased overview of exactly what they are. Vouchers (this info. is straight from the voter information pamphlet) will provide annual, state-funded scholarships for qualifying children to attend eligible private schools. Scholarships under the program range from $500-$3000 per student, depending on family size and income. Now at first glance this doesn’t seem too bad does it? Well, consider the fact that the money for those scholarships comes from our taxes. Do I want my tax money to send kids to a private school? Umm no. I believe it would be better used updating and improving public schools.

My next point is that the average tuition cost for a private school here in Utah ranges from $2,200 to nearly $15,000 a year. (info. received from http://www.sltrib.com/education/ci_5301412) This means that only those who can afford the cost of tuition above and beyond the voucher money that they receive will be able to take advantage of the voucher program. Which means that a child with a low income family will only be able to go to a private school if they are offered $3,000 in voucher money and only if they go to the lowest-cost parochial schools. It seems to me that the chances of this voucher program helping mid to low income families is very slim. The families most likely to receive “help” from vouchers are those who can already afford to send their kids to a private school and would like a bit of an income return for doing so. This doesn’t seem quite right to me.

My last point falls in what it takes to qualify for a scholarship (again this is taken right out of the voter information pamphlet)

Qualifying for a scholarship

To qualify for a scholarship under the Parent

Choice in Education Program, a student must meet

at least one of the following criteria:

• be born after September 1, 2001;

• be enrolled as a full-time student in a Utah public school on January 1, 2007;

• not be a Utah resident on January 1, 2007; or

• be in a lower income family.

May I draw your attention to the third bullet point. To be eligible they must not be a Utah resident on Jan. 1, 2007? Does this even make sense to you? It certainly doesn’t make sense to me that my tax money would go to pay private school tuition for a non-Utah resident.

Thank you to everyone who has taken time to read my opinion. I just want to mention one last thing. In a lot of the anti-voucher commercials it speaks of the NEA as “a liberal group on the east coast who wants to take away parent choice in Utah.” I would just like to let you know that the NEA is the National Association for Education. They are a union whose sole goal is the betterment of public education for our children. Don’t you think that they, if anyone, would know what is best in educating our children? I certainly do. They are not some evil group trying to de-bunk the voucher referendum. So there you go.