The Friggin' Four (Mo Madness Round V)

Alright folks, it is nail biting time. Mo Madness started with sixty-four elements of Mormon culture, four remain.

How tough are the elements in the Friggin' Four? For me, looking at which elements that exited the tournament last round really puts things into perspective. Funeral Potatoes has gone the way of the Earth. We are only left to wonder if those putting on the services will actually have the gumption to serve funeral potatoes at its services. Church Basketball is finished and, as always, Church Basketball put up a good fight or at least a lot of petty gripes, cheap fouls, and a really bad attitude. Jell-o Salad is gone, which is going to make Sister Smith really happy as she takes her empty Jell-o dish for the washing. And, thankfully for those involved, Pioneer Trek has come to end. All that is left of it are the war stories we share next week at church and years from now in therapy.

For the Friggin' Four, we have two power match ups. We will see two badges of righteous apparel. Yes, that's right, it is White Dress Shirts versus CTR. We we also see two familiar but still strange phrases have it out. Yes again, it is Fiber of My Being versus Hands that Prepared This Meal.

To vote, click here.

* I will post the results of the last round in the comments section.

The Earnest Eight (Mo Madness Round IV)

We are now deep into the Mo Madness Tournament. (Mo Madness is similar to the NCAA brackets. But, rather than basketball teams, Mo Madness pits classic elements of Mormon culture against each other and allows you to vote and help choose which one will ultimately emerge victorious.) We started with sixty-four solid contestants, everyone of them able to set off the Mo-dar in their own right. We just finished the Sentimental Sixteen. In the last round, we had some strong contestants that found their way to the exit door--a few of which deserve our attention.

Donny Osmond is no longer with us. Many had speculated that his not too distant appearance in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat as well as his updated version of Onward Christian Soldier (i.e., Soldier of Love) would have secured him a spot in the next round. That did not happen, but he had a good run.

Next, to Napoleon Dynamite. Napoleon, it is reported that you have responded to the question, "What are you doing now that you have lost Mo Madness?" with, "Whatever I feel like I wanna. Gosh!" But even if you call me a "Freaking idiot" that will not be enough to get you into the Earnest Eight.

Star Wars Gospel Analogies, may the force be with you. And, yes, due to many references to you during church meetings, Mormons all know what that represents.

Seven-layered Dip, you might be surprised to be leaving the tournament, but with a bunch of Mormons around, I knew you would not be around forever. As lovely as you are, by the end of the tournament you were destined to be eaten--only a bean stain of your former self.

And Family Blog, you put up a good fight until the end. But rest assured, if you put up a pithy post about your challenges, you will get a lot of very supportive comments and you will be back to your old self and posting pictures of the kids in no time at all.

In the next round, you will see, among others, CTR take on Funeral Potatoes and Pioneer Trek versus Fiber of My Being.

To vote in Round IV, click here.

* As I have done in the past, I will post the results from the last round in the comments section. Feel free to give your take there too.

Some Mo' Mo Madness (Round III)

Hey, here a few thoughts about Mo Madness so far. (For those who do not know, Mo Madness is similar to the NCAA brackets. But, rather than basketball teams, Mo Madness pits classic elements of Mormon culture against each other and allows you to vote and help choose which one will ultimately emerge victorious.)

First, I am surprised to see Fry Sauce leave the tournament so early. While Fry Sauce is undeniably a mayonnaise miracle, it could not take the pressure of Fiber of My Being. Those who wanted to see a dip go far in the tournament, however, can console themselves that Seven-Layer Dip did advance to the next round.

I also would not have guessed that Napoleon Dynamite would have taken out Middle Initials. Sure, if it had been Napoleon L. Dynamite, I could have seen it, but I just did not see plain-old Napoleon Dynamite carrying the day. I was wrong.

One close contest from the last round was between Star Wars Gospel Analogies and J. Golden Kimball. And, [Bleep], J. Golden Kimball bit the dust.

As we enter Round III, remember that of the sixty-four elements of Mormon culture that started this tournament, only sixteen remain. So, each of these has a lot of MoMenteum.

In this round, you will see, among others, Canning vs. White Dress Shirts, Hands that Prepared This Meal vs. Darn It, and Pioneer Trek vs. Family Blog.

To vote in Round III, click here. As you vote, please carefully consider each match up. I do not think that this rises to the level of a duty--being that it is a waste of time--but in my mind, it is friggin' close.

* I will post the results from the last round in the comments section. Feel free to give your take there too.

Mo Madness (Round II)

We just finished the Round I of Mo Madness. Again, Mo Madness pits classic elements of Mormon culture against each other and allows you to vote to help choose which one will ultimately emerge victorious.

In Round I, there were some surprises. Amazingly, we had two ties. The website randomly ended up selecting John Bytheway over Mitt Romney and The Old Violin over The Cipher in the Snow. (I particularly feel bad for The Cipher in the Snow--more than any other element of Mormon culture, it feels unloved). I was also shocked to see Napoleon Dynamite to take down the mighty BYU Football. I also solute Glenn Beck for pulling an upset over his opponent in the first round (Dentists) despite the fact that I misspelled his name on the bracket. So, way to go Glenn/Glen. We will see how Glenn/Glen does this next round against another very formidable opponent--Pioneer Trek.

Let me highlight a few other exciting match ups we will see in Round II. We will see Refusing Coke pitted against Jell-o Salad, CTR against My Heck, and Scrapbooking against Funeral Potatoes. These are just to name a few. But, I think you get the point: as far as wasting time goes, this is very high stakes.

Over the comments, a couple of people voiced confusion about what criteria they use to guide their votes (i.e., what they liked most, hated most, or seemed the most Mo). Hey, it is a free country, so don't let me sway you too much, but if you most know, my criteria was based on which choice pinged my Mo-dar the loudest. A second piece of guidance that always seems useful: do what is right, let the consequence follow.

There are sixteen match ups in Round II, and you can find them and vote for them here. Game on!

* I will post the results to Round I in the comments section. While viewing them there, feel free to give your take about Round I or anything else.

Will Mormons Like Mo Madness?

While this is not the first time something like this has been done, I thought in the season of March Madness we should play Mo Madness. Mo Madness pits classic elements of Mormon culture against each other and only one will emerge victorious.

We will fill out the bracket in phases. In each phase, the top vote getter of each pairing will advance to the next round. That means that if you want to see, for example, seven-layer dip, one of the FaMos, or moisture in subsequent rounds, you need to vote. And, remember, if you don't vote, you can't complain. And, actually, if you do vote, you can't complain either.

I could not quite figure out how to set up the pairings into four sets of sixteen, so please for give me that. But, get out the mo-dar and start playing by clicking here.

Game on.

Mormons Are Liking Facebook

Mormons, like a lot of people, are increasingly spending time on Facebook. And, like a lot of people, Mormons post regular updates on Facebook about their lives in passive voice and refer to themselves in the third person. For example, a Mormon on Facebook would never update, "I find endless uses for cream of mushroom soup." Rather, in Facebook parlance, a Mormon might update, "Kyla is finding endless uses for cream of mushroom soup." In this example, Kyla might enthusiastically also add a second pithy thought: "Yummy!"

Some Mormon updates might overtly tout Mo-hood by mentioning going to church, preparing a primary lesson, going to EFY, or recovering from a pioneer trek. (By the way, does one ever really recover from a pioneer trek?) Still, even when Mormons don't put it out there explicitly, Mormon updates can sound the Mo-dar. Here a few examples actual entries I have seen on Facebook within the past couple of days (names have been changed to preserve friendships--even those that are purely digital in nature):

• "LaDonna is writing in her journal."
• "Ammon is getting excited to plant a garden."
• "Melody is rearranging the pantry. Gotta love caselot sales!"
• "Jaxon is lamenting his dead garden."
• "Kimball is getting old...shoveling snow wasn't the joy it used to be...his back is aching, that snow was dang heavy."
• "LeVarr is drinking Coke out of an orange soda can (never mind why). To some Mormons, this would be the equivalent of whiskey in a brown paper bag."

Other Mormons show their Mo-hood by becoming facebook "fans" of things like Thomas S. Monson or the LDS church. Others, again show a little more subtlety and becomes fans of things like Twilight, the bob haircut, or Fry Sauce.

Mormons love Facebook. It is like Friends in the News, a virtual scrapbook, a mission reunion, and a way to stalk that special somebody in Helaman Halls all rolled up in one.

* You might consider joining a Facebook group of fans of this blog by clicking here. Thanks to Jennifer for setting this up.