Books Read in December (plus more)

 December was only a four-book month. That's because I started the month out reading two nonfiction books, and not just nonfiction, but SCIENCE nonfiction. Very interesting! But not my usual memoirs of people in the arts and humanities. Meatier reading, as it were.

1. Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman (1985) by Richard P. Feynman. That's Dr. Richard P. Feynman, a Nobel prize winner in Physics for 1965. There was actually quite a bit of physics in this biographical book that was also funny and warm and interesting. The copy of the book I checked out from the HBLL had five pages of date due slips in the back, covered with date due stamps. All this to say, many people have read the book. It was, in 1985, apparently, required reading in not a few classes at BYU (says my friend Linda, who was the book buyer for the bookstore back in the day) hence high use for the library copy. (And the bookstore sold many, many copies, too, back then.) A couple of my favorite parts: on page 204, he is describing living in Brazil while on sabbatical from Cornell--he was teaching in Brazil, and had arranged his classes to give himself the afternoons off to enjoy the beaches. He was living in a hotel and had made friends with some airline people who often stayed there, and had taken to going out for drinks and merriment with them. This particular day, he was walking down the street in the middle of the day, alone, and felt like he ought to just go into the bar and have a drink. But he thought "Why am I thinking that? Why do I feel like this is a good idea? It's the middle of the day!" It scared him, and he never ever drank alcohol again. He said that he likes to think, and derives so much joy from the thinking he does, he didn't want a substance to mess with his thoughts like that. Another incident was described on p. 236, when he was (while teaching at Caltech) getting offers from also Cornell and Chicago, and between the three institutions, they were upping and upping the offer, Chicago the most flagrantly. He finally responded to Chicago that he could not accept their offer--it was way too high!! With that much money he would be tempted to do all kinds of things that he shouldn't want to do, and so for his own good, he was declining their offer. 

I grew to really like Dr. Feynman as I read this book. He lost his first wife to tuberculosis as a young man--they were both in their twenties when she died; he should not have married his second wife, and if you read negative things about him, they often come from her because they were oil and water; and it was with his third wife that he had his children. I didn't always like his choices, but overall, he was a good man who contributed a great deal to his discipline of physics. (His lock-picking chapters are pretty fun, too!)

2. Microbes, Music, and Me (2013) by John Postgate. Dr. Postgate, a microbiologist, was 91 years old when he wrote this book. (He then died in 2014, exhausted. It was a loooong book!) I bought this book because a Music 203 student wanted to research any connection that might exist between music and microbes (seriously!) but this book, which arrived too late, would not have been helpful. Postgate was a microbiologist, and Postgate was a musician, but he did not ever mix the two. Postgate's research was, for many years, centered on sulphate-reducing bacteria, and then on microbial survival (will this kill them? Nope. Will that kill them? Nope. Etc.) and then on nitrogen fixation, before he finally left the lab to teach at the University of Sussex. Where he actually continued in the lab, but supervising students more than doing the groundbreaking research he had done as a full-time researcher. I learned so much about microbiology!! Holy doodle!! Microbes are so important. I had no clue. They are important in health, and agriculture, and industry, and etc. etc. etc. No wonder people want to study them. As for music, Postgate played cornet in jazz bands as a young man; continued to play his entire life, later picking up the guitar and saxophone, and he also wrote jazz criticism and was a jazz magazine editor. 

I also really grew to like Dr. Postgate through his book, too. He was so honest and humble -- like, he freely admits what a terrible writer he was, and how he leaned on his wife Mary for help with that; though he grew to be a good writer with practice. His love for his three daughters shows in his book; he clearly enjoyed his family very much, and cared for his wife in her decline from Alzheimer's as long as he could. Everone in the extended Lansbury-Postgate family seemed to be good at something! He is even first cousins with Angela Lansbury--her father and his mother were siblings. 

3. My third book of the month was also written by a PhD, though it was her first foray into fiction. Restrike: Coleman and Dinah Greene Mystery no. 1 (2013) by Reba White Williams. She was an art historian and her area of expertise was printmaking. She and her husband collected the largest collection of American prints, and then donated all of them and also their facilities to the National Gallery of Art in 2008. Which would be great but...kind of scary given the present national circumstances! Anyways, her mystery books are based on art crimes. I have to laugh at myself about this book's title! I was looking for books by Lauren Weisberger (The Devil Wears Prada, for example) and Williams was nearby on the shelf, and I liked the cover. But I could not figure out the title! At first I read it REST-RIKE. What does that even mean? No, it must be RES-TRIKE. Still doesn't make sense. Maybe Res-trick-ay--perhaps it is French? But no!! It is REE-STRIKE. I knew this to be true because of the definition page, given first thing in the book. A restrike is when a new print is made from an old frame. I still can't "see" the pronunciation when I look at the book's cover, even though I know what it is!

This reminds me of a joke or trick my sister Arlene would play on me. She would say:

 "How to you say M-A-C-D-O-N-A-L-D?" 

I would say "Mack Donald." 

"How do you say M-A-C-I-N-T-O-S-H?"

I would say "Mack Intosh."

"How do you say M-A-C-G-R-A-W?"

I would say "Mack Graw."

"How do you say "M-A-C-L-E-O-D?"

I would say "Mack Loud."

Etc. for as many MAC words as she could think of...then...

"How do you say "M-A-C-H-I-N-E?"

I would say "Mack Hine."

"No, Myrna! It's Machine! (Masheen)"

4. Last book of the month was an easy read, Moo (2016) by Sharon Creech. This is a kid's book, but was sitting on a return shelf in the Asian collection, and because I like cows, I picked it up. I recognized the author's name, since she is an award-winner (1995 Newbery) so thought it would be a fun read. I had not known of the breed of cattle called Belted Galloways before! My dad had Guernseys and Jerseys. This book was written kind of poetically--some prose, some visual poetry, kind of a mix. Cute story of a family moving from New York City to Maine, and the kids learning to care for animals. And learning to care for the scary old lady, Mrs. Falala (FaLAla). 

In other news, Josie made a beautiful gingerbread house while at a gingerbread-house-making night with Eliza and Lydia. (Gingerbread baked from scratch, too.)

This house looked lovely in our kitchen, and at least for a few days gave a nice gingery smell to the room.

Our living room looked like this:

Thank you to Josie for putting up all the lights. She helped me to be better at Christmas this year. Last year, I was not in the Christmas spirit at all. Except for playing Christmas music on the piano. This year, I decided to do better and be better, and I did succeed, I think. I even got a tree.

I don't know why the blue ligths show up the best in the photo but there are also geen and red lights. They aren't light bulbs. They are just these little places on the wire that light up. I am sure there are better words to describe what they are. 

At BYU, they are busy tearing down the Smoot Administration Building. This next photo shows some of the debris behind the trees, with what is left of the building on the left, and with this little rock and plant display that celebrates "BYU 150."

This gives an unhindered view of Mt. Timpanogos. (I am glad there is snow somewhere!)

On Sunday night Dec. 28, we had a family game night via Zoom. It was nice to have so many of us together for a few hours! More people were in and out, but by the time we took the picture, some people had gone to bed. Patrick desperately needed to go to bed--we started the call at 7 pm (for me) which is 3 am for him. He had stayed up to play with us--it was 5 am when we finally finished, and he could go to bed. The little children had all gone to bed sooner, as had Allen who had to get up early to drive the bus, and dad, who goes to bed early as a general habit. 

It was a good game night. It was a good Christmas. It was a good reading year.

Back to reading: some stats. 85 books read this year. 28 were nonfiction. 57 fiction. (I read 100 books last year, so this year was less, obviously.)

In extended family news, my sister Colleen and her husband have gone on their third mission (fourth for LeRon) to Cebu, Philippines. They just flew out from Calgary yesterday. I hope they have arrived there safely.

Meanwhile, my brother Bruce and his wife Sara are six months into their second mission, in Hawaii. (Third mission for Bruce.)

I am thankful for my family!

Merry Christmas 2025!

When I was growing up, I remember when Christmas letters became a thing--before then, it was just Christmas cards! I loved it when our family got Christmas cards, and then when people started writing letters, I loved that, too. So when I got married and started my own family, Christmas letters was a tradition that I wanted to invest in.

However...I just didn't. I mean, I tried for a few years, and then I kind of petered out...and then there were some really challenging years that I didn't really have it in me to write about...and then it was hard to start again. 

But this year, I feel like I can write a Christmas letter to recap our family somewhat. And I might not do it again for a long time, or I might. Who knows?

So, here goes...

Bruce retired from his work at the hotel (Hampton Inn - part of the Hilton chain) on Dec. 31, 2024, so started out the year retired. Only he was still working occasionally on call to cover for absences, until he had his first wrist and elbow surgeries on June 12. From then until December 17, when his last cast came off, he was literally in a cast on one hand or the other for six months (+5 days). You can read details and see x-rays here, if you want to. Somewhere in the middle of all that, he also had a colonoscopy. Fun times!! The dentist he goes to does free dental work for veterans one day each October, and this year they were particularly generous and shockingly gave him about $2000 worth of free dental care! Which was nice because he also spent about that much at the dentist earlier in the year.

Here is the most recent picture of Bruce, taken on Dec. 10. He is hiding his cast behind Nancy--his words.

Myrna (that is me!) stays busy at work in the BYU Library. I am the Performing Arts Librarian (so I cover the subjects of music, dance, and theatre) and am currently also acting as the film librarian while we have a vacancy. I am also the Department Chair of the Humanities Department in the library, with oversight of half the fourth floor and all of the fifth floor. I work with wonderful colleagues (they are covering other subjects--humanities, communications--to help cover for our vacancy).  As a part of university leadership I get to attend all kinds of meetings and write all kinds of reports! So fun! (Or not.) At church, I am the Relief Society pianist, and may I just say how delighted I am that we have music in Relief Society!!: VERY delighted. This year, because I was attending and presenting a poster at the IAML congress in Salzburg, Austria, I got to spend time with our son Patrick, which was wonderful. Kloster Neuberg was my favorite excursion. I did three blog posts about that wonderful day in Austria. I will link to the third one. If you read it, and want to go back and read the other two, you are welcome to do so. 

Our oldest daughter, Kelline Jones, and her husband Allen have deserted Utah, and now live in Arizona--as of the first weekend in December this year. They are both drivers--Kelli drives tour buses or whatever buses her employer contracts for her to drive. They fly her to places to drive people sometimes. She enjoys her occupation most of the time. Allen also drives buses. He drove for UTA in SLC, and now is driving for Sun Tran, the transit system in Tucson, AZ. Allen is a motorbike kind of dude, so he is looking forward to biking year long. (Although this year, with no snow in SLC, he could be riding...) We have gotten used to having them living only an hour or so away, and so we miss them.

It happened that Nancy came from Georgia for a short visit in early December, arriving the evening before K & A's move. Nancy's daughter Rachel, with my daughter Josie and I, picked up Nancy at the airport, then drove directly to the nearly empty home of Kelli and Allen, where we stopped to bid adieu to our loved ones. (And their dog.)

                    Allen, Kelli, me, Josie, Rachel, Nancy with K&A's dog, NotMe in front.

Kelli's kids: Amy, Rosie, Matthew, Andrew, Olivia, Jonah.

Amy is in Calgary, AB, happily raising her three kids, Scarlett, Arthur, and Rowan. (Rowan looks bigger than Arthur, but Arthur is older by one year. He is the blonde in the family.) Amy works with animals, grooming dogs and other such animal-centric work. Scarlett is attending a fine arts middle school and loves it. 

Rosie and her husband Austin live in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, with their two daughters Ireland and Oaklyn. Austin is starting his own dental practice there soon, and looking forward to being his own boss. Rosie is expecting baby number three near the end of January, beginning of February. She has really been "nesting" lately--painting and preparing!

Matthew works for the Utah DMV while continuing work on his degree through Western Governor's University. 

Andrew, who is an apprentice electrician, married Sidney in September. Here they are at their outdoor wedding:

L-R: James (son of their dad Dave and therefore brother), Matthew, Dave and his (wonderful) wife Alicia, Andrew and Sidney, Kelli and Allen, Rosie and Austin & their girlies.

Olivia is working for an airline, and her husband Isaiah's family runs a bakery (very yummy) in Tooele. Their son Shiloh just turned one year old this month. 

Jonah, Olivia's twin, graduated from high school in May. Seen below with Allen & Kelli.

Our son-in-law Allen has an adopted son, Stephen, who we count among our grandchildren, but who, due to circumstances, we do not have the opportunity to see very often. But we still love and pray for him.

Our second daughter, Abra, lives in Fort St. John, British Columbia, where this year they are getting a lot of snow! (Last year, they were pretty much on par with places in Alberta--not ghastly cold, and not inundated with snow.) Abra, like her dad, works for a hotel (also in the Hilton Chain, actually). Her boyfriend Brady is a computer programmer. 

Abra's children: Deklan, Piper, Kai - all of them live in Alberta. 

Deklan and his wife Holly live in High River, and are both employed in the food service industry. Their daughter Iah is a cute little ten year old. Here is a picture of Holly and Iah which I had to scrounge up. I need to ask them for a current family picture! This year,  Deklan had some issues with a quite intense insect allergy. And Holly spent way too long mending from a broken foot this summer. 

And so did Piper! She was going out dancing with friends, and fell down some steps just as they were arriving--so nobody got to dance, and Piper got to go to the hospital. It was a bad couple of breaks, actually, that required surgery. So her mending was long too. Piper lives in Calgary with her boyfriend, Anton. This picture is a couple of years old, but is really cute of the two of them. (I need to ask for recent pictures from them, too!)

Kai lives in Lethbridge, and also works in the food service industry. Another situation of no recent pictures. 

David, our oldest son and third child, lives in Airdrie, Alberta. He is the Copyright and Health Sciences Librarian at SAIT (the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology) in Calgary. His wife Ruth is studying accounting. They have two darling children, Millie (4) and Ethan (2). David is an avid boardgamer. Millie is enjoying dance lessons. I was so fortunate to be able to meet up with David and his children while I was in Alberta for a very quick trip at the end of August. If you want to see more pictures from that fun day, here is the link. 

Here is a picture including David's beautiful wife, Ruth. And appropriate for the season! (Incidentally, Ethan and I share a December birthday, so he just turned 2 and I just turned...somewhat older than that.)

Nancy, our fourth child, lives in Peachtree Corners, Georgia with her husband Andrew and their six children. Or now, truthfully, with five of their six children, since Rachel started school at BYU in September. (But she is in Georgia as I write this!) Andrew is a professor at Georgia State, and was just recently quoted/featured in Rolling Stone.  (This article is about AI and its research ramifications. And by recently, just this week, actually.) Nancy homeschools and is a PhD student at the University of Georgia. She also works (because so much free time! Haha!) as the coordinator of the Georgia Book Awards. (Her job is a part of her funding for her PhD so she kind of has to do it.)  The kids are Rachel (18), Miriam (16), Benjamin (13), Zoë (10), Alexander (8) and Phoebe (4). The younger ones all swim in the local swim team, except Phoebe, who will join them next summer. Ben is swimming year round, though. And Zoë is becoming a good musician. 

Here are all of Nancy's children, wearing their Christmas jammies, which they were excited to break out early because they were soooooo happy their big sister was home!

L-R: Rachel, Alexander, Phoebe, Benjamin, Miriam, Zoë

Rachel just completed her first semester at BYU, but she came to BYU with 52 college credits, so she isn't actually a freshman. She lives in Heritage Halls, and she works in the library, on the sixth floor, for my friend Janice in cataloguing. Rachel's youngest sibling, Phoebe, age 4, is delighted beyond measure to have Rachel home again.

Miriam is quite the organist. She started organ in the Organ First program at BYU at age 8. Now, at 16, she is quite accomplished. She is the TA for her organ teacher's piano and organ studios, which is a great help because music lessons for her and Zoë are a bit expensive, but her stipend helps with that. Miriam was chosen to be featured by the International Online Organ Forum on their organ advent calendar, for the 12th day. (Click on that link to listen/watch!) People ask if she is hoping to get into the organ major in the BYU School of Music, and the answer is...no. That was once her goal, but then Josie took Rachel and Miriam to Vienna in 2024, and now Miriam is hitting German hard, and planning to get into an organ program in Austria.

Our fifth child and second son, Patrick, lives in Vienna, Austria, where he is a PhD candidate in a program that is sponsored by two universities. He is just finishing up all the much writing he needs to do, and is hoping that funding comes through for a planned post doc. He is also applying for jobs and learning German in case the funding doesn't come through. He has been feeling rather up and down lately as he gets good news (publication accepted! Hurray!) and bad news (funding application denied! Nooooo!) You can read more about Patrick's work and things here. 

Patrick has a beautiful girlfriend, Hadis. Her name is pronounced like Hadees, our English word "had" then "ees" accent on the second syllable, and with an "s" sound at the end, not a "z" sound. She recently graduated with her master's in microbiology. You can read about that here.  Like Patrick, she is feeling rather up and down for the same reasons: she has a PhD advisor lined up, but they are also waiting for funding. It is very difficult--Patrick and Hadis are both from different countries (and their countries happen to be enemies) and they need to both have visas if they are to plan a life together in this country that they are not citizens of. They need our prayers, because the path is very rocky. 

Here they are:

Our youngest child is Josie. She is the Stacks Manager at Orem Public Library, where she feels grateful to work with a department full of really nice people in the Technical Services Division. OPL has been kind of a difficult place to work for the last five years, but Josie felt much better after she got a new boss, and enjoyed a few months of leave time during which she lived in Vienna with her brother and just got to relax. (She has made three trips to Vienna since Patrick has lived there--in 2023, 2024, and 2025. These two have always shared a special closeness since she was born when he was age 5. He adored baby her, and though they have had their ups and downs and disagreements, they are really close.) Josie is planning her fourth trip to Vienna, with Nancy this time, in 2026. (Plane tickets already purchased!) You can see her smiling face in the second picture, where we are saying so long to K & A. 

So that is our family! We are thankful for each person, and always pray for their health (physical, emotional, mental, spiritual) and well-being. We are grateful at Christmas time and always for our Savior, Jesus Christ, and for the light and life that he was and is. We are grateful for all the blessings that we receive from God our Heavenly Father. 

We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. We feel blessed to have you as friends! (And that includes family who are also friends!)

PS. You don't have to read this--it is really just for me. I thought it would be fun to list all of the people, because our generations are so mixed up! The kids in Georgia think Rosie is their aunt because she doesn't seem like their cousin. Josie and Amy don't feel much like they are an aunt and a niece. This mess-up of generations was a source of embarrassment for me for a long time, but I am coming to terms with it. It is what it is! So our children are in red, our grandchildren are in blue, and our greatgrands are in purple. 

Kelli 1977

Abra 1978

David 1983

Nancy 1985

Patrick 1989

Amy 1993

Josie 1994

Rosie 1997

Matthew 1998

Deklan 1999

Andrew 2000

Piper 2000

Stephen 2002

Malachi 2003

Olivia 2006 twin

Jonah 2006 twin

Rachel 2007

Miriam 2009

Scarlett 2011

Benjamin 2012

Zoë 2015

Iah 2015

Alexander 2017

Arthur 2019

Rowan 2020

Ireland 2021

Millie 2021

Phoebe 2021

Oaklyn 2023

Ethan 2023

Shiloh 2024

Baby Barker 2026

ASB Update

 At noon today, this is what the deconstruction of the ASB looked like:

And a bit closer. Well, QUITE a bit closer, actually.

And here is what it looked like just before 5 pm this evening.

The right side wings are about gone! And what a lovely view of the mountain the ASB has been blocking all this time!

I don't usually park in the parking lot on the west side of the ASB, but I did today. It made me sad to see the sacrifical trees, both deciduous and coniferous.

In other news, do you think I am losing the ability to read numerals? At least, the number 1, which admittedly can look just like a line, or like an l, can be a bit of trouble...but 7? and 2? Not so much.

So, Josie sent me a message asking me to pick up some printouts in the BYU Maker Space. And she said it would cost $17.48. (Printouts of D&D minis, not paper.) And I SAW $11.48. I checked my Cougar Cash (because that is how you have to pay there) and I only had $11 and some odd cents, but not quite 48 cents. So I added some money, and then I went to pick them up.

And he said $17.48. But I "knew" it was only $11.48 because that is what she told me. So he looked up the email they sent her and it said $17.48. So I paid, and when I got back to my computer, I looked at the message, and it did indeed say $17.48. I felt so stupid!! How did I turn that 7 into a 1 to make 11? Was my face red!

Then today, I was in our wonderful Christmas caroling activity in the library auditorium, and I guess that was distracting, because I was trying to read messages from Josie and also find the songs on my phone because I couldn't really see the screen because the print was too small for me. And I was sure she said "What if you pick me up at 12..." (because she was feeling ill) and so I said no, because I had a lunch meeting with my department, but I could come at 1:30. And she was arguing for 2, which would have been totally doable for me (even better probably) but I thought she was talking about 12. So we were both confused, and I had to leave my lunch at 1:00 (which was fine, actually) and she had to leave her meeting at 1:30 (which was its supposed ending time, but it was going over, so she had to miss part of it) and then it all came out that I had read the original thing WRONG and confused myself. I felt really bad, and also my face was red AGAIN.

I told Josie she is going to have to spell words for the numerals instead of the numerals themselves. Apparently, I had decoding issues!!

In my defense, I got up at 2 AM and couldn't get back to sleep and only had a little nap from 7 to 7:45. (It really was 2, and it really was 7:45. You are reading those numerals correctly.)

Doozers

 This disorganized post is brought to you by the letters B - Y - U.

Well, the HFAC on BYU campus has been gone for a year. And on Wednesday, they started to demolish the ASB. I took this picture as I was walking to my car. You can see the beginning of a gaping hole in the picture.

The west ASB parking lot is unavailable to park in, and they fenced off the path on the east side of the ASB. The first few days, there was a narrow trail, and all of us walkers wore out the lawn completely, and when it snowed, and melted, it turned into a muddy mess.

Yesterday, they made that way of walking completely inaccessible. 

When Nancy was still here visiting, on Tuesday, I was lucky enough to park on the south side of campus, as close to the library as possible, because we were meeting Janice there to walk to the devotional so we could listen to Rachel's choir sing. We just followed Janice on the roundabout way to get to the Marriott Centre, because the ASB deconstrution messes with so many normal ways of getting around.

And here is a picture that Nancy never posted so I will. It is Nancy and her high school friend, Cristina. They are sitting in my new office. Don't they look just like high school girls still? Maybe not! But pretty close. I had emailed two of Nancy's friends who work in the library to see if they wanted to come and see Nancy. (Liz emailed me today to say she was out sick all week, and is sad to have missed Nancy.)

Wow. I am apparently really tired, and this blog post is super disorganized But I do not feel like fixing it!

Because this reminded me that on Wednesday morning when Nancy was going to be leaving, I took a picture of her with her dad, because he was not in other pictures that Josie and I were in, which Nancy did post on her blog. 

Okay. Now back to the whole Doozers theme. All the construction on campus which has been going on for years! always makes me think of Fraggle Rock--all the doozers, always building things. We people are Doozers, but we have no Fraggles to eat the debris.

And we are so wasteful!!!!! Like, all that glass--couldn't they take it out carefully and recycle it somehow? They just bulldoze it. 

So this morning, I took another picture of the "progress" of the destruction.

Today I was at a campus leadership summit meeting all morning (how funny that little old me is a part of that, right?) and Sherry Dew was the guest speaker. One of her slides was a lovely picture looking north from somewhere near the library, and it was the ASB and the HFAC in the picture, kind of the east side of the ASB and the west side of the HFAC. And I thought--one of those is gone, and the other one is going!! In the future, people won't even recognize that picture as being a part of the BYU campus because it will be entirely different buildings. Like, today it didn't even look like that, because the new Fine Arts Building is already there. 

In other news, Happy Birthday to me and to Ethan. Josie organized Chinese food for us--I wanted Lemon Chicken, and the restaurant we have used for years no longer has it on their menu, so she found a new place. It was delicious. Bruce organized dessert of Cheesecake (strawberry topping) and little frozen creme puffs that I like. Also delicious. It was very nice. 

Ethan's family went to the mall for pictures (probably with Santa?) and then to Sky Castle (which Millie has talked about wanting to go to--an indoor playground) and then dinner at Costco. (Maybe hot dogs, but probably poutine-the Calgary Costco has excellent poutine!) and then he fell asleep in the car on the way home, so gets to extend his birthday celebration to tomorrow for cake and presents etc. The joy of being two years old!!

Here he is watching Blue's Clues this morning:

Isn't it so cool that I can know he did that this morning, and see it on the same day from a thousand miles away?