You should skip church and watch this instead

I came across this awesome video and it reminded me of one of my favorite memories as a kid. First off, watch the video – but keep in mind that there are no CGI special effects used in the commercial. The entire thing was done with real flying robots that are swarming and dancing like a handful of synchronized swimmers. It’s really quite impressive.

Watching that fun little commercial reminded me of a particular Sunday in 1987, when my parents snuck my family out of church to go watch the movie, Batteries Not Included. See, my parents are pretty awesome, atypical Mormon parents. Most Mormons would frown upon spending money on Sundays, especially if it meant skipping church. But what my parents did that day created more of a memory than any other day of church ever would.

This is how it all went down: We woke up and got ready for church like we normally did. We piled into our Astro Van along with a change of clothes. My parents told us that we would be going to sacrament meeting and a few minutes of Sunday school and that they would come and take us out of class when it was time to leave. We were instructed to keep it a secret because Mormon’s just aren’t supposed to have fun on Sundays. I remember sitting in Sunday school with a huge grin on my face because, well – secrets make me smile. (To this day, you can tell when I’m keeping a secret because I look like Sylvester the cat after he eats Tweety Bird.) I waited and watched the door for ten minutes when my dad entered the classroom and said “Sorry, something came up. I’ve got to take Tyler home.” Hooray – it was time to escape. I wanted to yell out “see ya later, suckers” but instead I just ran out to the minivan while my parents gathered the rest of my siblings. We all changed into our fun clothes and drove off to Sandy Movies 9 to watch Batteries Not Included.