Sizing up the competition

Meet Baby Brooklyn Margo Epperson. . .
Elizabeth is going to have to work mighty hard to be adorable, now that she's got this beautiful baby to contend with!

The bad guy gets the Lone Ranger

Not long after we started dating, I learned a simple truth about Olson men: Old cars follow them home like a stray puppy following a schoolboy. So I wasn't too surprised when Jared came home one day with a dented and slightly swaybacked orange pickup. He had been doing some work for a neighbor in his old ward, and she had offered the truck to him--it belonged to her ex-husband who'd rolled it and left it to rust in the backyard when they broke up.

The Ranger actually ended up being a great little workhorse--ironically it needed less maintenance than either of our other cars and it was quite handy for the many, many trips to Home Depot and Lowe's we were making in those days. After it carried home the new engine for our Land Cruiser, though, we knew it was time to bid farewell to our trusty Ranger. Jared took out an ad in the classifieds last weekend, and Monday night we found a buyer. Jared drove the truck to its new owner, assuring me he'd just have the guy drive him back home. After some time went by, I started to wonder. . .Eventually Jared got home and explained what had happened: our buyer turned out to be an ex-convict, fresh from the slammer. He still had his ankle bracelet on and was effectively on house arrest--it was too late for him to be out of the house, so Jared had to call his brother for a ride.

Great, so now there's an ex-con out there who knows exactly where we live--but at least we know he's a good ex-con. . .After all, he didn't violate his parole to give Jared a ride home!

Big News

Elizabeth has been officially dethroned as the sole Epperson grandbaby. . .Brooklynn Margo arrived this morning--Brittiny delivered her this morning at their apartment, with a little help from paramedics. Brandon called and left a message on our machine early this morning, so we haven't gotten the full story yet, but we'll keep you posted. :)

Welcome to the world, baby Brooklynn!

Click me! Click me!

A slight departure from our family life because I *have* to tell you guys about this site:

Project Implicit

Alan Alda discussed this research project on an episode of Scientific American Frontiers. Last week I checked out an intriguing book--Blink--in which the author Malcolm Gladwell discussed the same project and included the above link to the very task researchers use to measure your automatic preference for religion vs. atheism, cats vs. dogs, women vs. men, and more. So go ahead and put your logical, unbiased mind and lightning-fast reflexes to the test. . .but be warned, it's a little addicting. :)

If you like the research project, you'll love Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. He details the phenomenon of "thin-slicing", discusses the implications of speed-dating, and puts to rest the ancient Coke vs. Pepsi debate. I'm reading his first book now--Tipping Point, a look at the phenomenon of the "social epidemic". Gonorrhea outbreaks, Paul Revere's famous ride, the popularity of Hush Puppies, and "Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon" are all explained in this fascinating book.

Update

Thanks to Caleb for reminding me the blog isn't totally up-to-date. . .Elizabeth now has TWO teeth, not one! And there seems to be one more (on the top) that she's working on. Further bulletins as events warrant.

Look, Ma. . . No knees!

Elizabeth is trying so very hard to learn to crawl. . .Might be easier if she'd bend her legs. . .

Elizabeth's busy day

This Sunday we got the chance to see TWO of our favorite babies blessed. . .For Elizabeth this meant the chance to see a whole bunch of new faces and do some serious flirting. First we headed up to the U for baby Jovin's blessing. Elizabeth wasn't so sure about the two weird guys sitting on the pew next to her, but she poured on the charm for Angela, Cory, and Makayla, who were sitting behind us. We were hoping to hang around after his blessing to chat with our friends, but we had to drive up to Ogden right away for the blessing of our new niece Sinead. After Sinead's blessing we had a luncheon at the Keogh (Clare's family) farm , complete with the freshest, sweetest corn I've ever had. Elizabeth didn't get any corn. . .but she did try to sneak a sip of Dad's root beer.