2013 Resolutions

And by that I mean my resolutions for 2013, not that I have 2,013 resolutions.

I enjoy writing out my resolutions along with some explanation each year.  Gives me a chance to reflect and think about what I want to accomplish and by sharing it with other people, I feel a higher level of commitment.  If it inspires someone else to set some goals for the coming year, all the better.  Without further ado.

• Physical

My goal for 2013 is to achieve my "best body ever."  I realize this is a purely vain and superficial goal, but...actually I don't even have a "but".  It is what it is.

I've never forgotten a comment my high school Physics teacher, Ms. Vickery, upon seeing a certain photo of me in our yearbook:  "Well, twenty years from now, you'll be able to show this to your kids and tell them this is what you used to look like."  I specifically remember deciding at that time I would look better in twenty years than I did then.

A few years ago, I was not anywhere close to achieving that goal, but I've lost some weight, I've got into the habit of exercising, and I've decided that this year is as good a year as any to try to achieve that goal (even though it's a couple of years shy of twenty years from the aforementioned conversation).

My plan for achieving this goal is to continue with my running as I have since 2010 and to add P90X to try to add some muscle/definition.  I also plan to watch what I eat more than I ever have in the past.  No soda, no sweets, and most-importantly, reasonable portions (both size and number).

And don't worry.  I won't be posting any pictures.

As far as running, I've kind of set in my mind to at some point achieve a 6 min/mile 5K, a 7 min/mile 10K, a 8 min/mile half marathon, and a 9 min/mile full marathon.  (I realize that the 6 min/mile 5K will likely be the hardest to achieve).  Doesn't have to be this year, but I figure it's not going to get any easier as I get older.  I'd also like to beat my brother-in-law Cam in a race at some point (last year he beat me in the Ray Barrus 5K and the Layton Half Marathon).

As far as running generally, Jeanell and I (and Cam and Collin) are signed up to run the Ogden Half Marathon in May.  We have another Mouritsen/Jefferies team for the Wasatch Back Ragnar in June.  Hope to be in Grantsville for the 5K on the 4th.  Jeanell and I have also talked about doing the Top of Utah Full Marathon next September.

• Mental

I fell off on my reading in 2012 so my goal for 2013 is just going to be to get back to that.  My goal this year is to spend a minimum of 30 minutes per day reading a book.  I typically read history/biography, current non-fiction, and classic fiction.  I've tried reading three books at a time and alternating after I complete each chapter, but I don't think that has worked that well.  I think I'll just read one book at a time and try to alternate genres after each book I complete.  I will first finish Battle Cry of Freedom, then The Long Walk, and then Pride and Prejudice.  After that, I'll reload.

I'll try to stay up on current affairs by reading the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, and the New York Times.

Finally, I'll continue to accept all Scramble challenges from my brother Scott.

• Spiritual

I plan to focus my gospel study on the Doctrine and Covenants this year.  Toward the end of last year, I had success in simply preparing a Gospel Doctrine lesson for my study each week so I think I will continue with that this year.  If I am able to finish preparing a lesson for that week, I will study the Teachings of Lorenzo Snow or talks from the most recent General Conference depending on the week.  I hope to spend 30 minutes per day on gospel study.

In addition, I plan to have a meaningful fast each month and say prayers each morning and night (I've always struggled with morning prayers).

• Family

With maybe a little bit of cross-over from "Spiritual", I'd like to have nightly family prayer and scripture study as a family (including completing the Book of Mormon as a family).

I need to do better at spending quality time with my kids.

Most importantly, I need to do a much better job of dating my wife and making sure we are able to spend time together.

• Social

Two simple goals here:

Write a weekly blog post (I've had this goal before).

Follow the lead of my fellow GHS Class of '95er Travis Tate and participate in an open mike night at Wiseguys.  I don't know that I have the desire to pursue this to the extent Travis has, but I do enjoy telling jokes and trying to be funny, and even though convenient, fast-and-testimony meeting probably isn't the best time to try out new material.  I need to build up more material and fine-tune some of what I already have in order to do this.  I expect it will be later in the year.

• Career

At the end of 2011, I left Vulcraft where I had been employed for 10+ years and went from becoming primarily a manager of developers to a developer.  I have learned a lot over the past year, but have also discovered that I still have a lot to learn.  A specific area of focus I'd like to have this year is improving my web-development skills.  I plan to spend 30 minutes each day on web development areas (html, css, javascript, jquery), starting with the tutorials from w3schools.

I think that should probably do it for 2013.  As per the usual, most of these will probably be forgotten by Friday, and the rest by Valentine's Day.

But it's still great to start out a new year full of optimism and hope of what can be accomplished.

A Few Thoughts on Sandy Hook and Guns

I've really tried to resist writing anything because I don't want to get into this highly controversial debate, but...well, here we are.  I don't have a coherent, well-thought-out argument, just some thoughts.  In no particular order...

• I support the rights of law-abiding citizens to bear arms, but I'm not sure the market is regulated enough.  I don't understand the point of requiring a background check if the purchase is made through a federally licensed gun dealer, but letting anything go if the purchase is made at a gun show or from a private seller.  I personally don't see a problem with every legal gun purchase having the same requirements.  I wouldn't be opposed to guns being registered similar to automobiles.  Is there really any reason for it to be easier to buy a gun than to buy a car?  I hear the argument that this will just increase costs for legal gun owners, but it costs me extra to legally own my car too.
• I cannot understand how people on both sides of the argument can't concede that exactly what is meant by the 2nd Amendment is open to interpretation. "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."  Do pro-gun individuals interpret this to mean that anyone and everyone is entitled to all the guns they want, with no questions asked?  Do current laws already overly infringe on an individual's rights to bear arms?  Do convicted violent criminals still have that right?  And are arms limited to guns?  Does the Constitution, if interpreted literally, actually grant the right to more advanced weaponry?  Where does the whole "well regulated militia" come in?  Do you need to be a registered member of an official state militia to actually have the right?  Does the regulation apply to the arms themselves or the individuals bearing the arms or neither?
• I don't like the NRA's proposed solution of an armed security guard in every school.  How do we guarantee that a nut job doesn't get hired as the security guard?  Assuming the answer is some type of careful screening process, why couldn't something similar be done for gun ownership in general?  Or at least for certain types of guns?  I don't understand the argument that we can't prevent someone who intends to do harm from getting a gun, but we can prevent someone who intends to do harm from being hired as a school security guard.  If it was always obvious who was going to commit these crimes, we wouldn't have this problem to begin with.
• I don't feel that having a concealed-weapon permit holder at any given shooting guarantees a better outcome.  What if there were multiple permit holders who tried to respond?  Can you always determine who are the "good" shooters and who are the "bad" shooters?  When police arrive, will they be able to distinguish the "good" shooter from the "bad" shooter?  Could the stress of the situation cause a "good" shooter to accidentally shoot an innocent?  Maybe it's just the way the arguments come across, but some seem to think that doing more to regulate gun ownership will do nothing but having a concealed-weapon permit holder present will solve everything.  I don't buy it.
• Like any complex problem, I don't think there is any one solution.  As I stated initially, people who wish to legally own guns for their own self defense may help.  I believe doing more to ensure weapons don't get into the wrong hands will help.  Unfortunately, in a free society such as the one we live in, we will always have these types of incidents to one degree or another.  We have before and sadly, I would guess we will again.
• There seems to be a narrative that the country is more violent now than ever.  Despite this tragic occurrence, the numbers don't indicate that.  Over the last thirty or so years there has been a steady decline in violence.  And to say times are more violent now than in the 18th and 19th century is simply not accurate either.  Our country's first Secretary of the Treasury was killed in a duel by the Vice-President.  Andrew Jackson shot and killed a man in a duel and was involved in several other duels and still went on to become President of the United States.  This is a reason I don't really buy into the theory that this is the fault of movies and video games.  If that were the case, wouldn't our society be much more violent now than in the past?  There could be some impact and for individuals who are already disturbed, maybe a scene in a movie or a video game plays a role, but to make the claim that we live in a more violent society than ever before and that this is because of movies and video games doesn't make sense to me.
• Good decisions rarely result from knee-jerk reactions to specific incidents.  Whatever action is taken needs to be carefully thought out and considered.
• I really don't like when I feel pro-gun activists refuse to even allow tighter gun control measures on the table for negotiation.  How do we know that there's isn't a law that could be enacted or that increased enforcement of existing laws couldn't help prevent another such incident?  What if requiring a mental health evaluation to purchase a gun would prevent one such incident every 5 years?  Would it be worth it? I don't know what will work and what won't work, but it seems anything that may help should at least be on the table for discussion.  Sometimes I feel the thinking is "well nothing we do is going to prevent all incidents so we might as well do nothing."
• Finally, for those that argue vehemently for gun rights, please use intelligent arguments and legitimate data.  I think as much as anything, what has pushed me more to the left on this issue are the trite, straw-man arguments in favor of gun ownership.  For example, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" or variations.  I've never heard anyone claim that guns, by themselves, anthropomorphize and kill individuals by themselves.  More often than not, when a person murders another person, it is with a gun and those who argue for tighter gun control simply feel that more could be done to keep guns out of the hands of those who intend to do harm to others.  Another I don't care for "Cars kill more people than guns do".  For one, I don't think comparing accidental deaths to intentional deaths is a valid comparison.  Secondly, cars are heavily regulated.  Annual inspections and registrations are required.  Everyone who operates a car has to be licensed.  We have all kinds of speeding and other traffic laws and law enforcement officers specifically dedicated to enforcing compliance with those laws.  I've seen a couple of variations of "drug laws works so well, let's have tighter gun laws" (I believe sarcasm is intended).  That logic could be extended to argue against any and all laws.  We have DUI laws but people still drive drunk.  We have speeding laws, but people still speed.  We have laws against robbery and murder and people still do those things.  I guess I just don't understand the argument.  So we just eliminate all laws, give everyone a gun, and see how things pan out?  Finally, several pro-gun arguments seem to be arguing against a ban on guns (with arguments such as "if we take away everyone's guns, only criminals will have guns"), which I don't see anyone calling for.

I don't claim to have any answers.  I know there are issues around mental health and treatment/help for those who are mentally ill that are being discussed as well which I've chosen not to get into.  This is really the first time I've thought seriously about gun issues.  I'm a little surprised that as I've thought about it, I've come down as much more of a moderate than I would have thought.

Ok, now tell me everything I've said that's wrong.

Not Everything You Read on the Internet Is True

Ever since, as a sophomore in college, I carefully forwarded that email chain-letter to twenty friends and didn't immediately become rich beyond my wildest dreams, I have been skeptical of information shared with me via the Internet.

Over the years, my BS-meter has become pretty finely-tuned and I can generally detect BS from a mile away.  When in doubt, snopes.com can be a valuable resource.  At this point, I pretty much know that the Nigerian prince doesn't really need my help, I didn't really win a $1,000 gift card from Wal-Mart, and perhaps a bit more obscurely, Dr. Benjamin Spock's son didn't really commit suicide.

So lately, I've seen this chart making the rounds on Facebook:

The numbers were questionable enough and the sources dubious or general enough that I decided to do a little research of my own.

Now let me preface by saying this has nothing to do with my politics.  While I do question whether current gun laws in this country are sufficient, I'm not trying to debate that issue.  What I do have a problem with is using made-up statistics to make an argument.

I also am not arguing that there are other causes of death that exceed those caused by guns, although I was not able to find figures that matched those claimed on the chart.  I also couldn't find anything that supported the claim that baseball bats are the number one weapon used in violent crimes.  But the claim that I really questioned was that there were more non-firearm homicides than firearm homicides.

Well, it would appear that according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics within the Department of Justice, that claim is false.  Note that the graph below separates handguns from other guns.  Here is the full report.

 Now I realize that this data is only through 2008 so I went to the FBI for some more current data.  The following is data for 2011.

By my count if 67% of murders are committed using guns, then there is no way that more murders are committed with weapons other than guns.

Again, I'm not debating the issue of gun control with this post.  Just making the point that using inaccurate facts to make your case only weakens your argument in my opinion.  Also, just in general, before spreading dubious information all over Facebook or your social network of choice, might not hurt to do a little research.

By the way, if anyone can find sources to support the claims of the original chart, I'd be interested in seeing them.