Our fourth anniversary just passed us. It has been a wonderful four years of marriage and a little over six years of friendship. We marked the occasion, as we always do, with a dinner at a local restaurant. This year, we were up in McMinnville visiting Laura’s family. Here is our list of locations where we have celebrated this wonderful occasion.

• Honeymoon meal: Bar Harbor, Maine – a wonderful meal of lobster
• Year 1: Yerevan, Armenia – a traditional Armenian meal at one of the local restaurants.
• Year 2: San Francisco, California – a dinner cruise around the San Francisco Bay
• Year 3: Eugene, Oregon – a delicious dinner downtown
• Year 4: McMinnville, Oregon – a dinner at McMenamins

So far, we have been in a different location each year and we look forward to where 2008 will take us. We have had an exciting and adventurous time together filled with romance, adventure, intellectual stimuli, and laughter, lots of laughter. We look forward to the next year, 25th, 50th, and more.

A couple weeks ago, I received the following unsolicited email. Usually I delete this emails because, well, they are junk mail. The subject heading was “who is saying the holocast did not happen?” It was forwarded to me which means this must have been really important to the sender. I opened it and read the following…(All subject and email spellings are as I received them).

another sign that then end times are nearing …
(NAME WITHHELD TO PROTECT THE MISINFORMED)

Subject: In Memorium
Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 09:42:00 +0000

Recently this week, the UK removed The Holocaust from its school curriculum because it “offended” the Moslem population which claims it never occurred. This is a frightening portent of the fear that is gripping the world and how easily each country is giving into it. It is now more than 60 years after the Second World War in Europe ended. This e-mail is being sent as a memorial chain, in memory of the six million Jews, 20 million Russians, 10 million Christians and 1,900 Catholic priests who were murdered, massacred, raped, burned, starved and humiliated with the German and Russia peoples looking the other way! Now, more than ever, with Iran , among others, claiming the Holocaust to be “a myth,” it is imperative to make sure the world never forgets.

This e-mail is intended to reach 40 million people worldwide! Join us and be a link in the memorial chain and help us distribute it around the world. Please send this e-mail to 10 people you know and ask them to continue the memorial chain.

Please don’t delete, it will only take you a minute to pass this on.

Wow! I am sure news like this would have been in the New York Times, Time Magazine, Newsweek, or the USA Today. Any word out there on it? I read the BBC website multiple times each day and never saw this headline. Of course, I could have missed it while sleeping so I thought I would do a little research.

With a key word search in Google and 2 minutes of my time, here is what I found at BBC. This email stated that the news occurred recently as “this week”, when in reality this was some chain email started last April. It also states the holocaust has already been removed from curriculum. False. Click here to read the report that this email is basing its claim on. Here is the Historical Association’s website, they wrote the report, and what they say about teaching historically controversial subjects. Anyways, the email is false and misinforming and ignorant people somehow believe this crap.

The point here is DO YOUR RESEARCH, and QUESTION, QUESTION ,QUESTION!!!! When individuals choose not to question, they forget to seek the truth in any manner. They begin to develop hatred based on lies, only slowing down humans ability to live in harmony. This email was a rather small matter and fairly easy to question. But, in the grander scheme of things, some important people forgot to question and now we have ourselves a little mess in Iraq.

I just watched the movie “Jesus Camp”. Talk about brainwashing the children. No questioning. Accept it all at face value. These adult evangelical extremists are as bad as any other extreme group out there. It is really sad when you have to create a lie so that others will hate with you.

How can any truth be sought without questioning?

It doesn’t take much time for people to respond to me with, “What is a planner?” after telling them why I am in graduate school. Specifically, my graduate program is Community and Regional Planning, with a focus on the environment and international development. It’s not something we grow up wanting to do, except for one individual I’ll keep nameless. Not only do we not want to do it, but we practically don’t know it exists. Of course, just about everything in our lives is directly affected by planning, as well as other factors.

I found this article in a recent issue of Planning to help explain what I am studying to do.

Born of architecture, engineering, and landscape architecture, planning has emerged over the last 100 years as the one, unique profession that takes a comprehensive view of the natural, built, and social environments. But to win support for helping to make great communities, we need to do a much better job of communicating the value and relevance of planning to the American people.

We can begin by asking and answering four basic questions….ready?

What is planning? Planning is the profession that helps communities make positive changes. Planning involves looking into the future and working with people to ensure that they are offered choices about where and how they will work and live. Planning determines a course of action for achieving a desired outcome.

What do planners do? Planners are “enablers” and change agents. We take the long view, the more comprehensive view, in addressing problems. Planners bring citizens and decision makers together, helping many different groups to play a meaningful role in the dialog. We help people to make informed decisions. We broker change.

Who are America’s planners? With our specialized education, skills, and experience, combined with our comprehensive perspective, we are uniquely qualified to help communities make better choices. America’s planners work for local jurisdictions, state and regional agencies, consulting forms, businesses of all kinds, and nonprofit organizations.

Thousands of volunteer planners are appointed or elected to various boards and commissions, where they are responsible for recommending a course of action or making decisions that affect a community’s future.

Planners are men and women of all backgrounds, with a common objective-facilitating change. They recognize that change must be compatible with what communities value-historic and natural resources, low-cost housing, and so on. That recognition makes the practice of planning a real balancing act.

How is planning relevant to me, my community, my country? Planning is relevant because change happens! You can either be affected by it or you can influence it. I believe that planning is relevant to all citizens who care about improving the places where they live and work.

Planning is about creating outcomes: a better commute, housing choice, clean water, historic preservation. It is about creating safe and interesting places people care about and use. Working to achieve these outcomes and sharing this information with others-locally, regionally, and internationally-is important and relevant to us all

Siegel, David M. 2007. “Viewpoint.” Planning (February), 78.

I added Maui photos from last summer to the Photos section.

I added a new photo in the Contact section.

That’s all.

I spent most of the day upgrading our wood box to a wooden storage chest. We had firewood up until last week when we finished it off. We didn’t plan on having it the whole winter though. So I took the wood box I made a couple of months ago and added a top with hinges, lined the inside with some sheets and made it into a linen storage box in our front room. We will add a pillow kind of top to it so people can sit on it, or some kids could sleep on it for a nap.

Cautious, careful people always casting about to preserve their reputation or social standards never can bring about reform. Those who are really in earnest are willing to be anything or nothing in the world’s estimation, and publicly and privately, in season and out, avow their sympathies with despised ideas and their advocates, and bear the consequences.

- Susan B. Anthony

My brother posted this on my My Space page and I thought it was a great photo.

Last week, a few friends and I went camping in Death Valley. For those who have not been there, you are missing out on a wonderful experience. This time of year offers the perfect climate, wildflowers, and scenary. We camped in Saline Valley near some hot springs. Our first day was spent in the hot springs and hiking around. The second day was spent at the hospital and then driving home. I ran into some trouble while removing the pit from an avocado. The knife slipped and caused a little laceration. I will have surgery on Monday to repair the nerve I cut. Good times, good times.

Just arriving, taking a pee break.

Saline Valley

Ooops! It’s just a flesh wound.

Cleaned up.

All better, well kind of.

Do many of you remember the last time you had a conversation that left you enlightened? exhausted? laughing? excited? upset? perhaps all of those emotions in one conversation? In the last few weeks, I have had these conversations that made me appreciate the art of conversing.

I remember having many of these conversations with my friends in the Peace Corps but they seemed to have dwindled since returning. Upon returning home I have noticed the number of people who have chosen to converse through an instant messaging program or email rather than through actual voice. Oh how I have missed the stimulation from the power of one’s choice of words, rational, ideas. It really is an art and one that is needed more than ever these days. As individuals turn to their computers for social interactions, we begin to forget how communicate with one another. And I mean how to communicate while thinking on your feet, no barriers in front of you, eye to eye so that not only your words but also your body speaks for you. It is such a powerful tool that I seem to long for more after such a experience.

I compare it to passionate love that leaves you exhausted, enlightened, lusting, wanting with such desire that you can no longer live without it.

It is truly a virtue for someone to possess such talent to be able to engage you in such an experience or for you to do the same. I wish to improve not only my ability to communicate but to be able to listen to what someone has to say to understand what they have to say. To understand someone comes from questioning them and their motives, rational. How can I learn from someone if I choose to only listen to myself? I can’t. I am striving to gain a better understanding of my friends, my community, and the world which I live in, but it starts with a converstation. It means I need to make a connection with another human. It means I need to step away from the computer. It means I need to begin to speak. I have yet to have a bad experience from a truly stimulating conversation and because of that, I desire more of it. Have you experienced such desire?

Check out this video. I won’t say what it’s about but spend the next 4 minutes or so and watch this guy perform. It is definitely entertaining.

Have a wonderful new year’s everybody! We just got off the phone with our friend Nellie. She lives in Armenia and their new year arrives in an hour. Armenians will have family come to their house and celebrate with a large feast and beverages. It’s a great tradition that we are sad to miss.

I hope spend to spend more time this year making a difference in people’s lives.

I look forward to the challenges of 2006. As I look back on 2005, we had many challenges that we faced head on and overcame.

I hope that people will continue to try to make themselves better people through education, volunteerism, lending a helping hand, and peace. The world is a lot different than when I was growing up. There are many more people in this world than in 1974 but it seems as it grows, we lose our virtues and our focus. We have lost touch with our community, the land, and the human population. We need to stop thinking about the individual and start thinking about the larger picture, such as the community, country, and world. A paradigm shift is needed!

And for the new year I recommend the following two movies:

Syriana

March of the Penguins

Found this short article on a seminar we taught while working with the Peace Corps in Armenia. It was a two day Environmental Education Workshop.

Schwarzenegger was wrong not to grant clemency for Tookie. Why would Tookie Williams be remorseful when he claimed innocence. We think that the dealth penalty needs to be abolished and this society needs to get out of the dark ages when it comes to these killings. Tookie should have stayed in jail for life rather than be killed. We aren’t saying that Tookie was a man we were going to invite for tea and crumpets, but we are saying he was better off alive in having an impact on society than being dead. We look forward to voting Schwarzenegger out of office!

Duff is entered in a “Cutest Pet Photo Contest”. Yeah, it’s a bit cheesy but you can win $1,000. Go to 1800PedMeds.com and give him a 10! The link will take you right to his photo to vote. Contest ends December 31, 2005.

New site I just found for those who want to use music for podcasting. Podsafeaudio.com offers music that is not going to get you sued. It has a variety, though small in numbers, of artists.

Still loving life. It’s raining pretty good but that signifies that winter has finally arrived.

I have finally found out about Podcasts. I heard my first one a few days ago after reading about them. I did some searching on the net and listend to a few. Then I read how to make my own. I have made a few samples but nothing that I want to post yet. I am in the process of getting a weekly podcast show together. Stay tuned.

I am still updating this journal. Thank goodness, otherwise what the hell would be the purpose of having a website. Though this is a website for Brett and Laura, don’t expect to much input from Laura. She isn’t one to sit down and type a way for a website. That’s ok though. I am using this not just as opportunity to say whatever I want but also to inform about current environmental and political issues, website that you don’t know about, and about our friends in the world.

We spent way too much time today trying to find JC Penny’s. I haven’t been in the area in awhile so we ended up going to three different malls trying to find JC Penny’s because they were having a great sale. Once we located the store and did our shopping, it seems that our coupons weren’t good until next Sunday. Well silly us. We put that stuff back and went to Jamba Juice. That was a lot better.

Addiction is selling stuff on Craigs List and Half.com. I love these two websites. We’re trying to slim down our collection of “stuff”. So we throw up it up on one of these websites and pretty much sale it. I’d say we have had a 70% success rate. Not bad. The money just goes to purchasing gifts for family this Christmas.

I am currently learning how to use HTML. I have usually passed the information to my brother. I am literally learning as I type. I didn’t originally set up this site. We just gave the information. Hopefully I will be able to clean it up over the next few months and make improvements since I will be able to dedicate some time to it. I am pretty much learning from reading websites that teach you. I am using Web Monkey and HTML Goodies. Excellent resources!

• Saw Capote this evening with Mark. A bit of a downer but a good movie. Check it out.
• Saw our friend Allie today at the crafts festival.
• I am watching the Dresdin Dolls DVD with Mark. It’s pretty good.
• A volunteer friend of ours in Armenia is keeping a blog at Jill.
• Have you been naughty or nice this year? Does anyone really care?