Saturday, January 20, 2024
This morning Lamon texted me and asked if I’d like to go birding with him and his friends Bill and Joann and some of their friends. So we went down and hiked four miles of the Utah Lake Shoreline Trail. It was really, really cold, but we were rewarded with some beautiful birds -- especially a couple of bald eagles who were waiting for us at the Marina. When Betty asked why they both didn’t have white heads, I told her that the dirty looking one was an adolescent. We both laughed when we thought that even the great Bald Eagle, one of God’s most majestic creatures, looks kind of a mess when it’s a teenager. It gave us hope for our kids ;)
In the evening, we drove down to Ephraim to watch my niece Savannah perform in The Music Man, and to have a family dinner at the house of my brother Spencer.
On the drive down I listened to two really amazing podcasts. The first was an episode of Faith Matters, that featured a conversation with my friend George Handley -- one of the great Humanities professors at BYU. He’s a committed disciple and he speaks and writes beautifully about discipleship and the environment.
The other podcast was an amazing episode of Optimal Work about How to Get Energy from Tiredness. The host of Optimal Work, Dr. Kevin Majeres, spoke at Hillsdale College a couple of years ago, and his podcast has been hugely influential for me since then. It’s the best therapy I know of.
In this episode, Majeres introduces the idea of dynorphins, which are the thing in our brain that make us feel so uncomfortable when we are hot or cold or hungry or tired. They are the opposite of endorphins, which make us feel good. What scientists are recently finding out, however, is that when we do things that produce endorphins, we have a dynorphin rebound that makes us feel tired and sluggish for a significant time after. But when we do things that cause us to feel dynorphins -- the hard things -- we actually get a rebound of energy and good feelings (endorphins) that can last for days.
You should listen to the episode.
Well, the last part of the drive down I spent listening to the BYU vs Texas Tech basketball game. The first half was as good a half of basketball as BYU has ever played. I felt great about their chances to win the game.
Savannah’s play was awesome. She did such a great job playing the role of Marian the librarian. Her voice is beautiful, and she and the rest of cast just did awesome.
When we got out of the play, we realized that BYU had blown their huge lead, and that made us sad. But we’ll learn from this, I’m sure. And it didn’t really even bother me because we got to go to Spencer’s house and have an awesome family dinner. This is the one thing that I miss more than anything else in Michigan. Family dinner. I am so grateful for it.
Betty stayed home through the evening so that she could get the house put together and make granola for us to sell tomorrow.
Distance Hiked Today: 6.6km/4.1mi
Distance hiked on trip: 33.95km/21.09mi