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Working When Work Isn’t Easy

This is an actual job "aid" from my STATS 747 class, Structural Equation Modeling. Man, These Times Are Hard Only fourteen days until the end of Spring semester, and I just realized I'm not going to be able to finish my school projects on time. [Deep exhale.] I can't seem to buckle down. I never want to work on them because, essentially, I have no idea what I'm doing. And as a PhD student, the feeling I get from my faculty is that they expect me to discover the resources I need on my own.  I am feeling crippled and alone. It's like I'm a blind wanderer. And I don't know how legs function. girl  by Tomiokajiro My Boy Scout training taught me to hug a tree in situations like these. But I'm afraid the tree  in this analogy  (aka: Netfilx) has done nothing but filled me with guilt and anxiety. I needed to figure out how to get my mind right. The Plan In an attempt to escape the hole I found myself in, I first identifie...

Bryan's GIFs of the month (June 2015)

How about a nice piledrive to the face... How 2 year olds experience the world. Sportsmanship. Sadistic predator torments cornered feline. Frog Dog. So cute! This girl JUST discovered she could raise her eyebrows. What I imagine happens in Crossfit gyms. Just two girls at the office. Bboy Flipty. Let's take this New Years party to the next level! When you discover you're on TV. How Europeans parents deal with their kids when they throw a tantrum. LL&P Inspirational Quote: "The problem is not the problem; the problem is your attitude about the problem." —Captain Jack Sparrow

How Not to Meet Girls on Facebook

Preface As many of you already know, I just ended an eight-month relationship, which I thought was going to last infinitely longer. Upon returning to the single's  dating pool,   I realized that my stay would be finite, and that I didn't have nearly enough funny dating stories to share with my posterity. This  #datingprobs  post is an attempt to remedy that. Enjoy. The FB Epiphany Three weeks into my return to Tinder dating, I came to another realization—that I wasn't dependent on a dating app to present me with suitable, online-dating prospects. I have a facebook account! Facebook already suggests friends that it thinks I'd be compatible with. So why not leverage this list for dating purposes?!  (Surprisingly, this was the first time the thought of using facebook to  find  friends had seriously occurred to me. Perhaps, I should have thought more about why that was before doing what I did next.)  With fresh eyes, I looked at the...

Summaries of the 5 Non-School-Related Things I Read This Week

1) Your Partner is the Secret to Career Success BY CINDI MAY, SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN Researchers have identified  conscientiousness  as the character trait in a significant other that allows you to excel in your profession. [The rest is sciencey stuff:  In their longitudinal study, Solomon and Jackson tracked responses from 4,544 heterosexual married people, roughly 75% of whom were in dual-income households. Participants first completed a personality assessment that measured five personality traits: extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and openness.] 2) Loving Others and Living with Differences BY ELDER DALLIN H. OAKS Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, LDS.ORG Here are some key quotes I enjoyed from Elder Oaks' address: "We are to live in the world but not be of the world."   (see  Luke 13:21 ;  Matthew 13:33 ; also  1 Corinthians 5:6–8 ). "Even as we seek to be meek and to avoid contention, we ...

NBA Basketball GIFs

In honor of the 2015 NBA Playoffs. Go Warriors! When I say something clever on Tinder. Handshakes (ft. Lebron James) I love how they both play it off cool. I had a roommate who subconsciously did this when he played video games.  Ever been so excited you punched a ref in the groin? Makin' it rain, nbd. Fashion Bros. Kobe is fearless. BONUS OVERTIME GIFs!!! How I think I can play after not playing Bball for 6 years. If I had a friend who could dunk, I would do this to him everyday.  Extra lift. Street skillz. No foul. This white kid should sell jump kits.

Film Review: Song of the Sea (2014)

Whoa! I Was Not Expecting That. You know you're in for an emotionally bumpy ride when you start crying 45 seconds into a film. Song of the Sea (see  IMDB ) is absolutely the best film I've seen all year. Period. I whole-heartedly recommend it to viewers of all ages, especially families. Here's the trailer: Rent it You should stream above in HD for $5. (It's best appreciated in HD on a big screen. Don't waste your time watching the YouTube bootleg .) Alternatively, you can rent it for $5 on Google Play , or $6 on VUDU , or Amazon . (Remember to place some tissues nearby. You have been warned.) Three Film Reviews 1. Review by Bryan Tanner Here's my one-sentence film synopsis: Song of the Sea is the epic tale of how a loving family is mystically intertwined with the fate of the entire Celtic civilization. Watch this movie if you: love visual and audial art have ever endured familial loss or pain appreciate tight and powerful story telling ...

Walking Through the Payson Temple Open House...With Ear Buds

Can I (Should I) Wear Ear Buds in a Mormon Temple? May 16th, 2015 —It was a Saturday, and I was dressed in my Sunday best. I had followed Google Map's directions down Utah's I-15 to participate in the final week the Payson Temple open house. When the Salt Lake mid-singles group failed to rendezvous at the appointed time at the meetinghouse (adjacent to the temple), I hopped in the "non-ticket holder" line and popped in my ear buds in an effort to feel like I was not a single dude standing in a huge line populated with families and couples. BYU VocalPoint's Lead Thou Me On  album was playing on shuffle.  It was working. After a short 15 minutes of waiting in line, I was wrangled into the cultural hall to watch the pre-walkthrough video. Before I knew it, smiling volunteers were slipping white booties over my black dress shoes just before the temple entrance.  I couldn't hear anything that was going on, and just kept moving along.  It was surreal; my life ...