Back to boring old letters

 Oh hi Joe!

I sent you those emails about the trip but I haven’t really written to you about the day-to-day boring stuff since before we left.

Seems like there’s plenty going on, I’ll give you the highlights without being too boring.

There seems to be some interesting things going on with my job search/business inquiries. Last spring I went to a job fair and tried to meet as many people as I could from some of the bigger local companies. One of those companies is called Extra Space Storage. They are one of the bigger national companies based in Utah. I met a recruiter there and connected with her on LinkedIn. I was also able to connect with the VP over marketing through some additional networking. So when a job came up that fit my experience, I felt pretty hopeful. I applied Monday and sent both of those people messages on LinkedIn. Tuesday I noticed that the marketing lady had looked at my LinkedIn profile twice, so I was hopeful. Wednesday afternoon as I was turning off my phone to walk into the temple I saw that I had an email inviting me to an interview. I didn’t really read it, but I got this amazingly positive feeling inside, uniquely positive. I only tell you to record that for myself. The first interview is just a 30 minute phone interview with the recruiter on Tuesday morning, but I’m hopeful, keep me in your prayers kid.

As far as franchises go, I’ve been getting deeper into it. Im considering three. The first one I was interested in is a home inspection company. It seems to have the lowest investment, but maybe also the lowest returns. The second is a home restoration company. If a house has a flood, this company would help them come dry things out. Im interested in that because the really seem to have great training and support. But what they said was the initial investment is probably way lower that what is actually needed. Also, I don’t know how passionate I would be dealing with upset customers in the middle of the night with stinky equipment. The third option is a large format sign shop. They do the big signs you see in and on businesses, trade show and event signage, car wraps, and bill boards. It’s not really like a retail shop, it would be more working with other businesses. It’s more similar to my current experience than the others, my connections are much more relevant to this market, it’s more 9 to 5, and potentially requires the fewest employees. I told my friend Doug about it and he thought there’s a need for that here locally. I’m actually going out to Denver the September 9-10 to meet the the company and visit a couple of the franchises. If you were home I’d take you with me. I’m feeling more and more comfortable with this whole idea, though if I were to land a job, I’d probably take it instead.

The third thing is my freelance. I picked up another client, and they seem to have a bit of work. Not endless work, but several weeks or maybe a month or so. I enjoy the work mostly, but I’m always a little amazed when I get more work or even when I get paid. I’d be okay if this is what keeps me going, so I’m trying to make the most of it.

I guess I must feel somewhat confident in my situation. My old computer had been functioning well enough, but I could only have a couple of apps open at once before it would get laggy or crash or I would have to restart. So I went out and bought me a brand new MacBook Pro with an M4Pro chip, 24 gb of memory, and a 1tb hard drive. It’s a beast. Even though my old computer worked, this one is a drastic improvement.

Since we’ve been back mom has started her new job, she keeps coming home with new byu swag, ick. Jacob has started at the U, I’m not sure he doesn’t miss the small class sizes of Ensign. He’s also started institute classes, which I think he’s doing out of pure faith and obedience because he doesn’t seem to love it. Mom’s also started back up at the temple, now on Wednesday nights. Oh, and she’s taking another class, every other Tuesday night. 

Ive spent the last two Saturdays servicing mom’s car. Last week it was an oil change and tire rotation. I like to check brakes when I rotate the tires. I saw that mom’s rear brakes were pretty worn down. I also ripped her engine air filter while checking that. So yesterday I changed the rear brakes and air filter. Now the rear brakes presented a new challenge, her car has an electric parking brake. There’s a little electric motor on her brake piston that needs to release to release the brake pads. Anyway, the dealer has a computer to do that, I don’t. But thanks to good old YouTube I found a hack where you attach a 12 volt current to release it. Worked like a charm and I got the whole thing done in an hour. Not sure why, but I really enjoy working cars. I got the filter changed too.

As for my other projects, I printed out three of the helmets from the Bad batch. I got the smoothed and primed. I painted on a thick layer of Kilz primer that I have. If you remember the details of the cartoon, it has this really illustrative style, almost painterly where you can see brush strokes in the design of the characters. I want to try to replicate that with these masks. I’ll start hand painting the masks tomorrow. If they turn out, I’ll mount them to the movie wall. Jake took it upon himself to take down the old Star Wars posters. Next I’m planning on doing a bust from the movie The Iron Giant.

I guess the fun news is football season is on and the Utes look legit, even amazing. I sent you all those updates last night. Clary and everyone came over last night. I must say, on a night when the Utes look that good hanging out with that group is so super fun. BYU beat Portland state 69 to nothing. Last week, some little team beat Portland state 48 zip. But byu fans, as they will do, took to social media asking the question, “is this our year?” I would love to give them all a collective slap.

Today was Jared Carvers homecoming. It was really cool to see him. He gave a nice talk on repentance.

Tonight mom and I went to visit uncle Temmy and aunt Stella. Uncle Temmy is teaching me about his coin collection. It’s really interesting because he knows the history behind them all. She gave us some of her choke cherry jam and syrup. It is so good. I had some of the jam tonight on a Rhodes roll with peanut butter and a glass of milk. Heaven.

Tomorrow is Labor Day, this summer went fast. We may go get lunch with grandma, but I’m not sure what else we’ll do. Hopefully we’ll get to chat with you and Ben. Call anytime you can.

Love you my wonderful boy.