Personality Tests: INFP

Rachael has been reading a book about "doing what you are..." or something like that. The premise is to get into careers that allow you to use your natural personality strong points. And since its also just fun to take the tests I found some free tests online.

Here are results for one test:

INFP - "Questor". High capacity for caring. Emotional face to the world. High sense of honor derived from internal values. 4.4% of total population.

Free Jung Personality Test (similar to Myers-Briggs/MBTI)

Results from a second test: INFP
# distinctively expressed introvert
# moderately expressed intuitive personality
# moderately expressed feeling personality
# moderately expressed perceiving personality
http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp

One of the tests suggests careers, it suggests that I go into one of the following fields:
*Counseling
*Religious Education
*EDUCATION
*HUMANITIES
*LITERATURE/WRITER
*Musician, Archeology, Psychology, Web Design

I've capped the one's that I thought were particularly perfect because...oh, that's right, that's what I am doing.

Quote of the Day

“I envy paranoids: they actually feel people are paying attention to them.”
-Susan Sontag

(Quote sent by Brooke. Thank you brookie!)

I like how it's applicable to Blogs...are we paranoids, or are you really paying attention?

:)

Can Lights

The kitchen continues to be a work in progress, a little done here, a little there. This week we got one more little thing done. Niel came over and in two days we had can lights.


The "square" on the ceiling is where the florescent lights used to be framed in an ugly falling apart box. Once that came down we measured, cut holes, and put in the lights. One day later Niel came over we went up into the attic to run the electrical.
Let there be light without green hues or flicker.

Next: patch and paint the ceiling.

Picture of the week: the street and cars

Since the break-in we've been working on replacing our stolen stuff. One such item is a new camera. I've been playing around with the shutter speeds and aperture. These shots were taken the other night. Just thought I'd share. (Those streaks are car lights.)

Lanie has some big eyes.

There are no words.

Kay's Funeral

Sadie Kathleen "Kay" Smith Kirkham passed away on Monday 11 January 2010. Her Funeral was held in Chandler, AZ on that Wednesday 14 January 2010. She was Rachael's father's mother, her grandmother, and so we went down for the funeral.





With all the miles that Rachael has picked up in her job she was able to help get all her siblings to the funeral. It had been several years since they had all been together.



We stayed in town until Sunday so Rachael could visit with her cousins, aunts and uncles.

I don't want to say it was super fun, but I think everyone enjoyed being together and catching up. I think it was nice for Dave, Rachael's dad, to have his kids together. And really no one could complain about the weather.

The thing that I like about funerals is the opportunity to think about life and death. I like the quiet moments when there's time to reflect on life I'm living, and the people who have already passed away. It was nice to have time to think about Grandpa Kirk, and Grandma and Grandpa Ashton. It is surprising to me what comfort death offers, how close heaven seems. I appreciate knowing that there is life after death and having the comfort that brings.

Our Morning Walk

This morning Xyla and I dropped Rachael off at the airport and then, rather than just going home, we stopped at the SLC Airport Golf Course to take our morning walk along the golf cart paths. This morning was cold and smoggy. Such a heavy haze that settles on the valley during these winter months.




The Golf course is so beautiful during this time of year. All covered in snow and ice. Its nearly enough to forget the freeway traffic over the next bunker, or the airplanes crossing overhead.

Xyla enjoyed the opportunity to explore unleashed, and the cold was biting enough that she didn't protest about wearing her coat. Poor short-haired dog. She looks awfully "tough" in her coat but it was a good deal and the only coat that had any water resistance to keep out moisture. Besides I like the way it looks like a little black dress from the back side when she sits down.


While out and about I practiced taking pictures with our new camera. We decided to go with a DSLR which allows for a lot more control, but it also means more responsibility to figure out how to use it. It helps to have a willing subject to photograph as well.

Half way through our walk these geese came sweeping up from the north, just over the airport and passed overhead. I did my best to capture a few pictures of them. Watching them rise out of the smog on the north horizon and then sweep back into the haze was beautiful and amazing. As they headed south it made me realize that winter is not about over, but still in full swing. I guess the smog is to stay with us for a while. The geese also made me think of Mary Oliver's poem "Wild Geese". I thought I would share it with you and the pictures I took of the birds flying over our heads.


Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting--
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

© Mary Oliver. Online Source

An overdue update

First off, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Our Christmas and New Year have been busy and fun and spent well with most of you.

To the Left you will notice that Jens has made it to Chile safely and is serving safe and cold down on one of the islands off the South West Coast. (He is grateful for his Christmas slippers because that despite it being summer he feels very cold.) You can write to him at his new address. Hopefully we'll have some pictures of him to share soon.

In other news: just before Christmas we had our house broken into and my laptop along with a bunch of other stuff was stolen. This lack of computer accounts for my lack of updating over the past month or so. I am grateful that the night before the break in I listened to a little inspiration and backed up my computer. I am also grateful that despite the thief taking nearly every other electronic device in the home he (or she) left the backup hard drive that was chilling on my desk next to my computer. Its a great blessing because I didn't lose my thesis. Hallelujah. I am also grateful that Xyla was seemingly uninjured in the break in.
Due to the break in there have been few pictures taken as we are working to replace our cameras that were stolen. Hopefully pictures will return in the next post.

My final thought: It is surprising to me how events that seem horrible and overwhelming can afford us a moment of pause and reflection. Such moments can allow us to see that we can, and will, survive the challenges presented to us, and that such challenges can offer opportunities for small miracles. I also appreciate that though I didn't back up everything on my computer, I feel I got the most important parts and I feel that I can look forward without the burden of anything that was left behind. It turns out that the grinch who stole christmas at our house has left the behind some of the most useful presents of all.

Again, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. May 2010 be a better year than 2009.

The front door swings again!

This is our front door:Or was our front door...

Back in February, after accomplishing a lot of things that I needed to get done, I thought I'd take a peek at out front door. See we had this ugly front door that someone had attached a wooden "medallion" to, front and back, and then added shutters. The paint on the front was peeling. The stain on the back was unmatched. Our brushed nickle handle clashed with the brass knob plate. It was a mess. So one day while Rachael was out of town (because otherwise I suspect she would have stopped me) I pried off the wooden medallion on the inside of the door. I also pried off the shutters. Suddenly there was light and hope and the door didn't look too bad. There was obvious water damage being hidden by the ugly medallion but overall it looked better.



Encouraged by the inside of the door I thought I'd see what the outside of the door had hidden behind it. Here's my first real mistake. We could have lived with the back being open, a little ugly, but otherwise improved. The front of the door though-- the medallion on that side was covering a multitude of sins.

It probably would have been fine if I had stopped there, but I don't ever stop there. I had made a problem, and now I needed to fix it. So then I removed the trim around the front door, Inside and Out. Did I mention it was February? Have I mentioned this house was built before they believed in insulation? With the trim missing I suddenly had an ugly door and gaps all around the edges where the brick and the door frame don't quite meet. Wind blew into the house. Heat fled through the cracks...now I had a made enough mistakes. Now I stopped doing anything else.

And from there the transformation takes place. First I bought foam insulation and filled in all the gaps that I could. Wind and heat stopped traveling in and out so noticeably. Then I bought a new door. I bought a beautiful unfinished wooden door in a prairie/arts and crafts style. Rachael helped me stick it in the basement so I could finish it. Then nothing happened for several months.

Then I finished it. And nothing happened for several months.

And then Friday there was no reason to wait any longer. The summer has passed for another year, the cold was coming. "There's nothing to fear but fear itself" right? So Rachael helped carry the door up out of the basement. We removed the old door and did the classy thing around here-- left it on our front porch.

Then six hours later, and a little help from Brooke, we have a the new door in.




Isn't it beautiful?, especially compared to the super ugly missing medallions door? Now I just have to trim out the door and hide all the new yellow foam insulation.

Sound of Music

This video was made in the  Antwerp , Belgium Central (Train)
Station on the 23rd of March 2009.
. . .. with no warning to the passengers passing through the station,
at 08:00 am a recording of Julie Andrews singing 'Do, Re, Mi'
begins to play on the public address system.  
As the bemused passengers watch in amazement, some
200 dancers begin to appear from the crowd and station entrances.
They created this amazing stunt with just two rehearsals!
Enjoy!