Official Statement of Apology

I would like to officially apologize to anyone who has ever looked up to me . . . to anyone who ever looked at me and thought they saw greatness . . . to those who love me . . . to those who tolerate me . . . and to anyone who ever thought of me as “not lame.” I have let all of you down, and I am sorry.

Tonight, at approximately 6:00 PM, I did something that I swore I would never do, and that I hope I never have to do again. I hopped in my car, drove four miles down the street, parked my car, walked into the Edwards Grand Teton Cinema in Idaho Falls, and purchased one single movie ticket. I wish I could say that I was meeting a friend . . . that I had people saving a seat for me inside . . . that I was chased into the theatre by a flock of birds. I wish I could say all or any of those things, but I can’t. I’m afraid to say that I, Steven Hilton, went to the movie theatre to watch a movie all by myself.

I know that you’re all disappointed. I know that I have broken the trust of friends and loved ones and the heart of any girl who ever looked at me and said, “hey, he might be a good plan b.” I can’t change what happened tonight, and I know that it will haunt me for the rest of my life . . . maybe even longer. I don’t want to make excuses. I only ask that you can all find it in your hearts to blame Batman for what I’ve done. Not merely because I am the hero that Gotham needs, but because Batman was literally the movie that I saw.

I also would like to take this opportunity to say that John and Michael Smith were dead wrong. Dark Knight Rises was a fantastic ending to an epic trilogy and on par with the first two movies. Christopher Nolan is a genius and a mastermind and never disappoints. In fact, now that I think about it, I’m not really sorry at all. The movie was awesome, and I enjoyed every minute of it. How about you all just lay off me and stop being so judgmental?

People I Want to Punch in the Face Pt. I - Bruno Mars

If you know anything about me, you know that I love music. I listen to just about every genre outside of country and enjoy most of the songs that play on the radio. If you know me well, you also know that I harbor an undying hatred for Bruno Mars. In fact, if I could punch one person in the face with no consequences, I would probably punch Bruno Mars.

Now you may ask, “Steven, why so much hatred for a guy you’ve never met who is just trying to live out his dream?” Well, for starters, thank you for reading my blog. I could go on for days about my distaste for the man, but I think a breakdown of one of his most popular songs, “Grenade,” should be sufficient to justify it.

Let's get started. "You had your eyes wide open...why were they open?" Bruno asks at the beginning of the song. Now, this is a fair question if he’s referring to her behavior during opening prayer at a BYU basketball game, but what kind of self-respecting man whines about the way a girl kisses him? And one must wonder how much dating experience he even has when he's complaining about a girl who "takes, takes, takes...but [she] never give[s]." That sounds a lot like every girl in the world, Bruno...Besides, every man knows that a few simple mind games will cure any problems with the ladies.

Now let’s skip to the chorus. "I would catch a grenade for you" he begins. Yeah...because beautiful women are getting grenades thrown at them all the time in modern society. And why the heck would you catch the grenade? I’m assuming the grenade was thrown at the girl, and unless the assailant has terrible aim, catching the grenade just means you are both going to die in a fiery explosion. A smarter strategy would be to swat the grenade away, allowing both of you to escape to safety and work out your issues in a more productive manner.

"Throw my hand on the blade for you," he continues. Once again, how is this helping anyone?

"Jump in front of a train for you." Are you beginning to see the theme here? Unless he is Superman or Spiderman...or maybe even Harry Potter, jumping in front of the train does nothing to improve her predicament. And even if she does survive the train incident, she will now have to live out the rest of her life with the guilt of driving a psychotic man to his death. Maybe she wants a man who would choose to save her from dangerous situations rather than display his love in a selfish, suicidal, psychotic, self-defeating manner.

In short, I dislike this song, and Bruno Mars in general, because beneath his façade as a hopeless romantic, Bruno Mars is cheesy, uncreative, unrealistic, borderline-psychotic, and un-man-like in every way. Every lyric of every one of his songs insults my intelligence to a degree that I want to do him physical harm. If I had the choice of being locked in a room with either a hundred birds or Bruno Mars, I would probably choose Bruno Mars…but it would have less to do with my crippling fear of birds than with my desire to seize an opportunity to punch him in the face.

THE DECISION – OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE

The following is an excerpt from an unknown Provo newspaper.

For the past month, rumors have been swirling from Hawaii to Maryland about Steven Hilton’s status as a member of Team Frytime for the 2011 BYU intramural basketball season. Hilton, Frytime’s all-time leader in turnovers and technical fouls, confirmed today that he will not play a third season with the team.

“Man, this is tough,” said Hilton as he announced his controversial decision into a Gatorade bottle microphone at a press conference held in his apartment. “This winter semester, I will be taking my talents to Washington D.C.”

It is the opinion of this reporter that he was referring to his talents in the classroom rather than his talents on the hardwood. A source close to the situation maintains that Hilton has dropped his classes at BYU and accepted a prestigious winter internship position with Ernst and Young, one of four large multinational accounting firms commonly referred to as the Big Four. The source also says that Hilton will be leaving Provo for D.C within a week.

Ever since the announcement, pandemonium has taken over the streets of Provo. Videos are surfacing of angry fans burning intramural jerseys. Single women seem to be taking it especially hard.

“I can’t believe he’s leaving,” said one woman. “I really wish I would have taken advantage of the time I had with him in Provo. Guys like him just don’t come along every day…I almost feel a need to repent.”

The reaction of his teammates has been similar.

“Steven will be missed,” said John Smith, current team captain of Frytime, “not really on the basketball court but definitely by the ladies.”

Paul Smith, a former team captain for Frytime who was fired after the team failed to reach the second round of the playoffs last year, said the following. “Steven Hilton has been and always will be like a father to me. He taught me everything I know about the game of basketball, and for that I will always be grateful. On the other hand, I’m excited for the change because last time Steve left Provo I got a girlfriend. The ladies sure are going to miss him though. Even my girlfriend Jill is going to miss him.”

These reactions have not gone unnoticed by Mr. Hilton.

“I’ve enjoyed my time in Provo,” said Hilton in an ambiguously sarcastic voice, “but it’s time for me to go out and see the world…again. I will miss my roommates, my ward, my FHE family, my goober little brother, my flat-screen TV, and most importantly Jimmer Fredette. Peace out Provo. I’ll be back someday.”

Origins Pt. II – My Dad the Fun Killer

I like to think that I am an honest and upfront person. And in the interest of full disclosure, I would like to take the opportunity right now to apologize to my future wife (I don’t know who she is, but she sounds good looking). Sweetheart, you are marrying into a family of weirdos. And in this family of characters, it doesn’t get any weirder than Gordon Richard Hilton, Sr.

Let me just start by saying that my dad and I are not friends. I literally defriended him about a year ago because he was stalking my profile and trying to make assumptions about who I was dating. Since then, I have denied friend requests from my mother, two aunts, and even my own grandmother. I just don’t believe that old people should be on Facebook. Facebook is just one of many examples where my father has taken something fun and tried to ruin it for me.

Facebook is actually a sore spot in my family right now. You see, my dad suffers from an affliction known as obsessive-compulsive disorder, and his current obsession is Facebook. He feels that Facebook is a great tool to keep in contact with relatives and hometown friends. He has thus taken it upon himself to scan and upload every picture our family has ever taken onto his profile. This would be alright if he knew anything at all about the principle of moderation. Unfortunately, he doesn’t and often spends as many as six hours after he comes home from work in the evening uploading pictures.

He has also taken it upon himself to teach all of the old people in our extended family how to use Facebook so they can stalk their children and grandchildren more efficiently, effectively creating an army of elderly Facebook stalkers. If you have an old person stalking you on Facebook, it is more likely than not my dad’s fault.

Growing up, I knew that whenever my dad came home from work, the time for playing video games was over. I actually needed a little advance notice so I could run into my dad’s room and return the cords to their hiding place in one of my dad’s shoes. I was once grounded from video games for an entire year, during which time I enjoyed many hours of mind-numbing entertainment and false alarms that had me running back and forth from the television to my dad’s shoe.

One can sum up my dad’s parenting style in two words…mind games. I spent hours the other day trying to convince my little brother that my dad doesn’t have people following him around here at BYU. My dad once told me that he had people following me around at school and that he knew that I was using my lunch money to buy candy. I knew he was lying because I was actually using my money to buy Pokemon cards.

I learned from my dad that if you aren’t working hard you should feel guilty. And even if you are working hard, a little guilt is always healthy. And when guilt isn’t sufficiently motivating, there’s always humiliation. My dad once scheduled a meeting with all of my high school teachers, in which it was discovered that I was getting bad grades because I was lazy, a fact that was a surprise to no one. I guess my dad knew his boy, however, because I started getting test scores so high that students in my class began to complain that I was ruining the curve.

My dad’s real philosophy is “decide what you want to do and work your butt off.” When I told him I wanted to be a Major League pitcher, he had the gardeners build a pitcher’s mound in our backyard. Every night he would take me outside and have me throw pitches to him while he crouched behind home plate with nothing but a catcher’s mitt, bifocals, and a whole lot of arthritis. Eventually, we decided sitting on a paint bucket would be more comfortable for him.

Oftentimes, I used to wonder if my dad was a ninja. Even though he was a busy high-paid business executive, he always found time to attend my sporting events. I don’t know. It just seemed like something a ninja would do.

When I was a boy, neither of my parents was active in the church. My dad had been inactive since he was sixteen. My mom would attend sporadically; other times she would drop me and my sister off on Sundays. As my eighth birthday approached, I decided that I wanted to be baptized. The standard procedure when a child turned eight in my family was that my dad would attend church for a few weeks, and the Bishop would allow him to perform the baptism. This time, however, the bishop wasn’t having it. I told my dad that I still wanted him to baptize me, and he decided that it was time once and for all to investigate whether the church was true.

Over the next six months, my obsessive-compulsive father read the entire standard works (the Book of Mormon, the Bible, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price), had the missionaries over every Monday night, and attended church every Sunday. Over time he realized that he had known all along that the church was true, and on December 2, 1995, my father baptized me a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He and my mother have been active members ever since.

My father has always stood as a great example to me of how people can change. Though he does have a reputation as a fun killer, he can actually be pretty fun when he wants to be. However, I don’t think Thanksgiving dinner is going to be very fun this year because of another of his current obsessions…weight loss.

Origins Pt. I – My Mother the Dream Killer

One cannot get too far into writing a blog without throwing out a tribute to mother. As next week is my mother’s birthday, I thought this would be a good time for such a tribute. People have always said that I am a mama’s boy, and by people, I mean my mom used to always say that. She’s probably right. I tried being nice to my dad once, and he made me clean the loft.

For as long as I can remember, my mother has been a dream killer. Although she has on occasion killed me in my dreams, I am actually referring to her killing of my hopes, wishes, and aspirations. When I was a child, she told me that the chances of becoming a professional baseball player were slim, that the pink power ranger was too old for me, and that becoming a dinosaur was a physical impossibility.

My mother is also a liar. For example, whenever we passed by a train, she used to always say, “Look Steve, Dumbo’s on that train.” Imagine my disappointment as time and time again I somehow failed to see a cartoon baby elephant riding on the back of a train. To this day, I have very little trust in my eyes. Another time, I asked my mother what I should eat so that I could grow tall enough to grab the rim on the basketball hoop in our backyard. Her answer was, “vegetables.”

From my mother I learned that if you are a good boy, you gain your parents trust. And when your parents trust you, you get picked up from school two hours late every day.

When my mother finally did pick me up from school, she would engage in her favorite hobby…lecturing. You can pick just about any topic in the book, and she can lecture you on it for over an hour. Although we all got to hear all of the lectures in her arsenal, she definitely had her go to lectures for each child. Her favorites for me were “don’t put all your eggs in one basket;” “I don’t know why you like this music…I’ll yell at you and you don’t have to pay me;” and my personal favorite, “don’t be like your sister.”

The lecture that had the biggest impact on me growing up, however, was my mother’s testimony. Oftentimes, she would list to me all of the blessings we have as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. “Even if somebody could somehow prove to me that Mormonism isn’t true, I would still attend church because it makes us better people,” she would then tell me. I learned through my own experience that the church is true, and these blessings are just icing on the cake.

So, I suppose my own testimony is strong today because my mother taught me how to have faith and how to recognize blessings in my life. She may have killed a few dreams along the way, but she also opened up a whole new landscape of dreams by helping me gain a testimony. I guess what I’m trying to say is…my mom’s alright.

Irrational Animal Fear #1 - Birds

As the Halloween season dawns, I like to reflect on some of the things that scare me. Like thousands of BYU students, I am afraid to walk by the duck pond south of campus after 10 PM. Unlike these fellow students, a rape whistle isn’t going to do much to qualm my fears because I don’t think they have any effect on the ducks. You see, ever since I was a little boy, I have had an admittedly irrational fear of birds. I think it might go back to the time I visited the zoo with my family and a bird shot my father.

They say that many Americans list public speaking as their number one greatest fear, which means that they would rather be the guy in the casket than the guy giving the eulogy at a funeral. Well, I would love to give the eulogy at a bird’s funeral. The following are some of the traumatic experiences I’ve had with birds over the years:

- As a small boy I am riding my tricycle out by the pool while eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Suddenly, a bird swoops down and steals the sandwich right out of my hand. My innocent mind is so shocked by this act of theft that I lose control of my tricycle and fall in the pool.

- As a lad, I watch my mother scream and call animal services to come remove a bird that had flown in through her bedroom window. “This animal must surely be terrifying if my mother required the services of a professional to remove it from our home,” thought baby Steven.

- My older sister torments me by telling me a story about a bird that attacked her while she was walking home from school. This bird allegedly swooped down and started pecking at her head as she ran her fingers through her hair, apparently mistaking her fingers for worms.

- In elementary school, my best friend A.J Moore releases his pet bird from its cage and makes fun of me as I run away.

- During a missionary lesson in India, a terrifying little chick jumps up onto my knee. I leap up into the air and the chick scampers away before it can do any damage.

- My older sister continues to prey upon my “gull”-ibility by telling me a story about a flock of seagulls that swarmed over her and stocked her while at the beach.

- After a long day of tracting in India, my greenie companion and I come home to find a pigeon in our bedroom. I make him scare it away while I hide in the kitchen.

- While riding my bicycle alongside my companion in Rajahmundry, India, we stop to watch as a flock of birds jumps down from a nearby roof and run across the street. Suddenly we realize that these birds are being chased by another bird, soaking wet in its own drool and making crazy rabid animal noises. Naturally, I make eye contact with this bird and it chases me and my companion down the street.

Now, the birds in that last story were actually monkeys, but that doesn’t make it any less terrifying.

Scary stuff, right? As you can see, my bird-phobia is based on actual terrifying personal experiences, as well as reliable first-hand accounts from my sister, who may have hated me as a child.

Now, as stated above, I know that to be afraid of birds is irrational. When you think about it, they are just harmless little rats with wings. I don’t even mind being near a bird as long as it's facing the opposite direction. That way I know it’s not going to suddenly take off and fly into my face. The problem is . . . you don’t have a lot of time to think when you have a hummingbird staring you down with murder in its eyes.

Many people have tried to talk me through this, but I think it’s just something that I’m going to carry with me throughout the rest of my life...maybe even into the next.

This bird-phobia certainly has its limitations, but I like to think I live a pretty normal life. I mean, I do have to be a little more creative when planning dates because feeding the ducks is never an option; I’m unable to enjoy large European cities because I’m too busy running away from pigeons; and sometimes I get uncomfortable when at the beach or running my hands through my hair. Other than that, life is normal. On the plus side, I have a sixth sense when it comes to awareness of birds in a general area. I just hope that when I become a dinosaur, I get to be one that eats birds.

Hawaiian Surferboy or California Dreamboat?

Countless philosophers and literary figures have tried to define the concept of "home." I define home as the most convenient place to say you are from in order to justify rooting for a particular sports team or wanting to work in Washington D.C. I recently told a Big Four recruiter that I didn't have a home and wanted to move to the East Coast. I didn't get that internship, but I think he was impressed. Most commonly, I either tell people that I am from Hawaii or California.

On the one hand, I have photographic and testimonial evidence that proves I spent at least three years of high school in Hawaii. In most of these pictures, I will be either on the computer or playing video games, but if you look closely enough, you can just make out the ocean in the background.

While in Hawaii, I attended Mid-Pacific Institute, a private school for those who can’t get into Punahou or Iolani but still want to feel superior to the world. I was one of about ten or so haoles (white people) in my graduating class; as a result, I came to BYU thinking I was Asian.

I'm not gonna lie. I like the attention I get when I tell people I'm from Hawaii. However, even people I met on my mission to India intuitively knew that I wasn't a native of Hawaii. The truth is that I spent most of my childhood in sunny Southern California.

I was born in the O.C, which you might recognize from such shows as the O.C. Please refer to that show for more information about my childhood there. At the age of twelve, I moved to Moorpark, California where I attended high school with Dennis Pitta, star tight end at BYU and now with the Baltimore Ravens of the NFL. On a side note, Dennis Pitta would probably be unable to identify me from a group of strangers on the street.

My family still owns our home in Moorpark, a beautiful brick mansion sitting atop a hill and surrounded by twenty acres of avocado and lemon orchards. We initially sold it to a man who was later arrested for using his airline to smuggle drugs for the Mexican mafia. That transaction didn't go through, and we kept the home. Every Christmas my family meets up at our Moorpark house, and guess who doesn't get to go home to Hawaii . . . Steven Benjamin Hilton.

I actually haven’t even been to Hawaii for over a year, but I do love the place. I don't know of another place on Earth where a guy could move into a new high school during his sophomore year and feel so welcome. And on the rare occasion that I get to return, I love kicking it at home with my boys Kirk Fong, Frederick Rohlfing, and Jordan Berardy . . . provided they want to come visit me at my house, because it’s a long way down from the top of the ridge.

So, I’m going to have my cake and eat it on this one. I’m both a Hawaiian surferboy and a California dreamboat . . . ladies.