Roogles... Just Roogles

a good day

2010-07-11T22:15:00.000-05:00

Next weekend Ellie will turn six. She’s incredibly excited about being six, about going to first grade, about “growing up”, and (of course) about getting birthday presents.

Since we’re going to be out of town on her actual birthday, we opted to have her birthday party on Saturday for friends and family here at the ranch.

The day started pretty early. I think Jenn were awake (thanks Lilly) before 7am, and knowing that the afternoon would be filled with visitors, celebrating, and hopefully relaxation we started out early on the the frantic “clean this place up” routine that happens around here prior to most of our gatherings.

By 11am we had cleaned the kitchen, living room, toy room, kids bedroom. Not just “straightening up”... I’m talking about really cleaning up. All surfaces dusted, floors vacuumed, kitchen and bathroom tackled with Jenn’s new Shark steam mop thing, cleaned up lots of odds and ends that were sitting around the driveway and yard, and generally whipped the place into shape. I even cleaned off my coffee table, which if you know us at all or have ever visited us is a rare thing indeed.

I think we all dread the these massive house cleanups when we know they are coming up. I even tried to get out of this time by running to Columbus with some buddies on Saturday morning before the party. But once we get underway it feels good to be tidying up, and we always bask a little in how nice, neat, and shiny everything is for a few days after the fact.

By noon or noon-thirty, we were in pretty good shape for the party. Jenn had a last-minute Wal-mart run to make, and we set out the snacks, made lemonade and tea, whipped some quick “cowboy” foods (chuckwagon beans and cornbread) before falling into relax mode and waiting for the guests to arrive.

Over the course of several hours we had about 25 or 30 people swing by the ranch and hang out anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours. My mom and brother made it down, so did Jenn’s parents, and lots of our friends from church, including most of Ellie’s “peer group” of teens and college students. (Yeah, she’s six going on fifteen).

The afternoon was about as perfect as you could hope for.

Hanging out with friends and family.

Eating, laughing, talking, telling stories, grown-ups playing pre-school games.

Jenn will probably blog about the party in detail (mabye?).

She uploaded photos to facebook here if you care to take a gander.

When everyone had gone, and the kids were exhausted and settled in bed, Jenn and I tidied up the kitchen a bit and then sat to watch some TV and talk for a little bit. We got sucked into watching Titanic on one of the movie channels (which wasn’t as bad as I remembered).

Jenn and Lilly headed to bed just before ten, and the movie 21 came on. It’s about MIT students who count cards and win at blackjack. I intended to head to bed myself shortly after Jenn and Lilly turned in, but couldn’t stop watching 21 after I got started. Good flick.

Shortly after midnight I turned off the lights, killed the TV, locked the door, checked on the Elli & Slias and took myself to bed. Crawling into bed with Jenn and Lil, who were already snoozing, I let my mind wander back over the day and reflected...

I felt so relaxed and content. Tired... but a good tired.

It’s not often I go to bed without being stressed about something or other, or worried about things I need to tomorrow, but last as I lay in the dark and gazed at the ceiling I breathed deeply, I listened to Jenn and Lilly asleep next to me, smiled at how blessed I am, and drifted into deep and peaceful sleep.

Nights like that are good.

Very good.

I should have them more often.

The Morning Routine

2010-06-30T11:52:00.000-05:00

My friend Wes Molebash (Legendary Cartoonish of Legend) has a web comic which is most excellent, and a blog on said web comic that I find very worthwhile of my RSS feed.

So yesterday Wes posted a blog entitled "The Morning Routine" (which you can go and read by clicking the linky-thing there) and not only was the blog post entertaining and thought provoking, but the responses (22 at present) were also great fun to read.

I started to respond, and whilst typing in that general direction realized two things…
1. that my response was getting terribly out of hand, and
2. that I haven't blogged in a really really long time.

Thus I decided to take my long-winded reply and turn it into a blog-post of my own, which I will refer to in the comments of Wes's blog for anyone who cares to read my rambling.

if you've read this far and not lost interest…

1. I commend you

2. Here is the good stuff

The Morning Routine

I used to be a morning person… I don't recall exactly at what point in my life this changed, but I suspect that my discovery of alarm clocks with snooze buttons during while at college had something to do with it…

I (like many people, I think) use my cell phone (read iPhone) as an alarm clock. I set three alarms, beginning at least 30 minutes before I need to get up, just so I can smack the snooze button a few times. The times these alarms need to go off depends on whether school is in session, because I have to get up earlier and leave earlier if I have to drop Ellie off at school before getting to work.

The times pictured here are for summer, they are all 30 minutes earlier when school's happening.

I have different ring-tones set for each of these too… the first one is a very soothing, subtle, water trickling kind of noise, that if I'm sleeping really hard I don't even hear.
The second one is a little less subtle, and the third is, well… kind of like the alarm sound you think of if you're being warned of a bomb about to off in your general area.

This third alarm (the one that means business) prompts me to actually pick my phone up off of my night-stand, turn the ringer off, and reset all three alarms for the next day…

So now with phone in hand, and alarms silenced, I can proceed to the checking of email and twitter before I ever toss the covers aside.

At this point I now have approximately 50 minutes before I need to be out the door…

I grab my towel and head for the bathroom in the other end of the house where I go to the bathroom, and get in the shower.

Now, unlike Wes, I don't subscribe to any particular shower routine… I can typically wash my body, face, and hair in a about 10 minutes and that happens in whichever order I happen to grab the soap, shampoo, and face-wash out of the little cubby thing… I typically take about 5 minutes also to just stand and let the water run on me because I just like those few minutes for waking up.

Following the shower I dry off, wrap the towel around me and head back to the bathroom attached to our bedroom (which has two sinks and is where we get ready, but no shower).I get out my clothes as a pass through the bedroom and put them on the bed, then finish drying off, brush teeth, apply deodorant, etc and then back into the bedroom to get dressed.

at this point, mostly because it factored highly into Wes's blog (especially the comments) I feel like I need to have an interlude to discuss shaving…

I don't do it much. My beard (go ahead, laugh) doesn't grow very fast, and grows in mostly blonde… I usually shave once a week on Saturday evening so that I don't look scruffy for church on Sunday, and I always shave my face when I shave my head (which is about every two weeks). When I do shave I use a Gillette Mach 3 Power and shave cream in a tube from C.O. Bigelow for both my head and face.

Anyway… back to the morning thing…

Once dressed I head out to the living room and my recliner which is the central location for the deposition of "stuff" when I come home in the evenings…

My wallet, pocket knife, rings, and fountain pen all get picked up from my coffee table and put back in/on the appropriate pockets and fingers. My laptop, iPad, any cables, drives, etc I had out the night before go in my backpack, glasses go on my face and Silas usually brings me my shoes from by the door. (Which sometimes lead to funny comments).

Shoes on feet, backpack over shoulder, I grab the keys from the hutch by the door and head out.

My morning commute is 35-40 minutes on non-school days. I always stop at Tim Horton's in Waverly for an XL coffee with 2 cream, and an everything bagel double-toasted with butter.

I always listen to WOUB (our local NPR station) while I drive to work.

This puts me at my desk around 8:15-8:30 in the mornings where I unpack, finish my coffee, and begin tackling the day at hand…

So, what is your morning like? Leave comments here, or on Wes's blog, or if you blog about it yourself let us know!

hello? is this thing still on?

2010-06-30T11:34:00.001-05:00

wow... has it really been over a year?

It seems fitting...

2009-03-17T13:11:00.005-05:00

I have been slacking a lot lately when it comes to blogging... Life has just been so busy, and so many other things have been happening that blogging took a quick trip to the very bottom of the priority list.

Things haven't necessarily slowed down any today, but I've had this post in the drafts folder for a while and today (St. Patrick's Day) seemed like a fitting day to post it for reasons which will soon become obvious...

All of that intro out of the way here we go...

On December 18 I got a tattoo.

Much thought, prayer, and discussion went into it before I had it done with a very close circle of friends and confidants including Jenn.

I sent an email out to those close friends and family the day I had the work done, and since then have sent it out and shared it with over 100 other people who've expressed interest in the ink or wondered what the heck I was thinking.

The rest of this post is word-for-word the contents of that email I sent out on December 18, 2009.

__________

December 18, 2008 - 11:50 AM

Samuel took a large stone and placed it between the towns of Mizpah and Jeshanah. He named it Ebenezer — "the stone of help" — for he said, "Up to this point the Lord has helped us!" — 1 Samuel 7:12, NLT

After a long period of sadness and trouble, a consequence of Israel's disobedience, Israel repented under the leadership of a new priest and judge, Samuel. God restored their political security, and the people, for their part, re-committed their hearts and minds to their Lord.

Samuel placed a large stone at the place where this restoration began. He publicly dedicated it as a monument to God's help, God's faithfulness, God's eternal covenant. And as the people got on with their lives, the stone stood there, visible to all who passed that way, a reminder of judgment and repentance, mercy and restoration.

The Ebenezer stone represented a fresh beginning, a reversal of course for God's people. It also said something important about God: his mercies are everlasting; his covenant is forever.

Members of AA can tell you how long they have been sober. They keep alive the memory of the last drink they took, and with each new day, one day at a time, they move farther down the road of sobriety. AA is on to something important. Do they ask their members to count the number of years spent in drunken waste? No. They count the days spent walking in a new direction. All that went before is water over the dam.

Samuel was a wise man with a good idea. He recognized something that's true about human nature — we're forgetful.

At Ebenezer, Israel could stand next to that big old rock and remind themselves, "Yes, we serve a living and faithful God, whose mercies are everlasting."

__________

Today, I am raising an ebenezer...

It will be a constant, visible, physical reminder to me of God's work in my life, especially relating to...

the changes in my personal theology and understanding of what it means to be a "Christ Follower" over the course of this past year
the spiritual awakening I am experiencing and how that is leading me to spiritual formation stuff
the community of RVCC and the ministries there I am able to take part in
the friendships I have cherished this year
Jenn, Ellie, and Silas who love me unconditionally, even though I make it difficult
being the lay director of boy's chrysalis #24 (the process, the weekend, the team, the flight, the memories)
turning 30, which was a much bigger/harder deal for me than I expected
that God's mercy is everlasting and forever
that regardless of how insignificant I feel that He will use me, if I will just get out of His way and let Him

My appointment is today from 4pm to 7pm at Wicked Sensations in Chillicothe...

I have a small suspicion that this is going to hurt... so, if you think to say a prayer during that time I'd appreciate it.

__________

A Prayer of St. Patrick

Christ be with me, Christ within me,
Christ behind me, Christ before me,
Christ beside me, Christ to win me,
Christ to comfort and restore me.

Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ in quiet, Christ in danger,
Christ in hearts of all that love me,
Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.

so... yeah

2009-02-22T11:34:00.002-05:00

Ellie & Silas were all excited to wear their new t-shirts to church this morning.

so... yeah.

:)

defined by function

2009-01-27T09:09:00.003-05:00

I was sitting in my chair this morning when my nose started to run and itch.

Silas was playing on the floor in the living room so I said "Quick Silas, get me a tissue!"

Silas seems to have a runny/snotty nose all the time, so we have him pretty well trained to find and fetch the tissue box, and he's pretty good about letting us wipe his nose and will even blow it himself when he's really snotty.

Well, he jumped up and ran into the kitchen (passing the tissue box, which was on the couch) and brought me back a cloth napkin from the napkin basket.

I said "No no Silas, get me a tissue buddy".

He looked at me quizzically for a second, unfolded the cloth napkin and honked his nose into it quite loudly as if to demonstrate the point that it would serve the same function and I should stop being picky.

Then he patted me on the leg, stuffed the snotty napkin into my hand and went back to playing on the floor.

That's my boy.

Where does it go?

2008-12-29T11:55:00.004-05:00

Where has the time gone?

Two years ago today our little guy was born.

Happy Birthday Silas.

I love you buddy.

Random - Manscaping

2008-12-12T10:08:00.003-05:00

I couldn't resist playing with Schick's Manscaping tool this morning after seeing Marko's post about it.

Considering my long frustration of having no mustache growing ability what-so-ever, I found this fun and pretty funny.

Oh, and the animation is not only "intriguing and a bit weird"... but also completely freaky.

With that, I give you... Roogles - The biker.

(again, HT to Marko at his blog)

NYWC Nashville - Kick Off

2008-11-20T19:38:00.005-05:00

Well... The NYWC Nashville is officially underway. It is nice to be at the conference this time around as a participant and not an exhibitor. I've felt very lazy today, just loafing around Nashville, connecting with old and new friends, and being generally lazy.

This morning Jenn and I wandered down to the convention center after a great breakfast at our hotel. We discovered that we were much to early to officially check in, so we found the LiveWorship booth, and then just went wandering aimlessly down broad street to second street.

There are a scad of great looking restaurants and bars down that way that we would love to pop into for lunch, dinner, or just because while we're here in town. We picked a local place that Jenn's been wanting to visit and had lunch there. It was pretty good. We packed up the left overs and Jenn found someone on the street to give them to on her way back to the convention center. She has a big heart for the homeless, and really wants to find other ways to make connections and do some local outreach while we are here. I admire her compassion, and although I don't see the opportunities as often as she does I'm going to help her do her thing as much as I can while we're here.

The rest of the day Jenn has been in the HERStory pre-conference, and I've been wandering around the area, drinking coffee, reading, writing in my moleskine, and meeting up with old and new friends.

I helped the LiveWorship crew setup the booth while Jenn was in HERStory. We grabbed some dinner at Panera and then some coffee at Starbuck's and now Jenn is back in HERStory and I'm chillin down at the YS Store waiting for the RVCC contingent to arrive.

Tonight we're going to take the exhibit hall by storm, and then catch the late night concert action.

slow lazy day today for me. I'm sure tomorrow will be much more exciting.

For tonight, roogles out.

NYWC - Randomness

2008-11-01T23:52:00.008-05:00

Day three of the NYWC - Pittsburgh is winding down now... I'm too tired to put down comprehensive thoughts about the whole day so here's the summary...

Francis Chan's general session was simply amazing. I was so challenged and humbled by his talk that I'm still trying to cope with it.

The exhibit hall was busier today than yesterday, but still not what I would consider swamped.

I did manage to have some really good conversations about LiveWorship with some folks, and also got myself into several other conversations that had nothing to do with Youth ministry.

I met Matthew McNutt and William Hartz both in person today, where-as I had not previously known them outside of blogs and twitter.

Alan and I had lunch at Primanti Brothers and dinner at The Lemon Grass Cafe'.

I missed most of the session tonight with Phyllis Tickle, but by all accounts she nailed it.

The Comedy late night act was very funny.

Here are an assortment of random photos from today...

The booth (with slightly better lighting)

Lunch from Primanti Brothers... Yes, the sandwich has fries and slaw on it.

The sign for a Korean restaurant and sushi bar.. (See next photo)

A close up of the "Warning" sticker in the window of the sushi bar...

Alan and I were unable to determine which of the following might be true...

Warning, these premises protected by a cat AND a burglar/fire alarm
Warning, these premises protected by a cat burglar AND a fire alarm
Warning, these premises protected by a cat AND a burglar AND a fire alarm
Warning, these premises protected by a cat alarm, a burglar alarm, and a fire alarm

Either way... Cats, burglars, and fires beware.

Uh... yeah... Authorized pensonel only.

This one has no relevance... I just thought it was a cute name for a restaurant.

That's it for me. I'm very tired. Looking forward to seeing what tomorrow brings.

NYWC Pittsburgh - Here we go.

2008-10-30T22:46:00.004-05:00

Today was the first day of the National Youthworkers Convention here in Pittsburgh, PA.

I am working the show this time around, helping to run the booth for LiveWorship Software, which a few cool guys I know came up with back in the day...

Alan and I started the morning bright and early by attending some company mandated identity theft training, which we had both previously missed and had to have by law.

It was interesting and informative...

We then proceeded with some crazy gathering up of things, packing (read cramming) the van and split Chillicothe for the great state of Pennsylvania.

Two Sam's Club's, one Olive Garden, one gas station, and a few hours later we were pulling into the David L. Lawrence Convention Center here in Pittsburgh.

It took us a couple of hours to setup the booth, then Alan and I grabbed some dinner at August Henry's across the street from the hotel. I had an amazing pepperoni and cheese stromboli. Amazing I tell you.

The show floor was open from 8:30 - 10:30 pm. Traffic for us was pretty slow, but we did have some good conversations. I love it when avid LiveWorship fans stop by the booth just to tell us they like our product.

Here is a (bad) photo of our booth this year. It looks much better in person, I promise. I will attempt to get better photos tomorrow.

We are right across the aisle from Ugly Mug coffee, who has free samples of great available in their booth... This is either going to be very good for me, or very bad for me before the weekend is out.

While Marko was making his rounds on the show floor he stopped to say "Hey". Always great to run into him.

Looking forward to tracking down and catching up with quite a few more of my twitter friends tomorrow.

Hopefully more to come.

Roogles out.

Called out...

2008-10-15T12:32:00.009-05:00

This morning as I was getting ready to pull out of the driveway for work I twittered (tweeted?) as I often do...

This afternoon Corrine (a fellow twitterer, blogger, and Third Day fan) fired this at me...

Love it!

Here was the rest of our exchange...

I wonder if something gave me away... (see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.)

Thanks for calling me out Corrine! Made my day!

(ht to Corrine and Twitter)

Look what the boy found...

2008-10-14T19:50:00.003-05:00

Jenn left for water aerobics this evening, and I was in the kitchen fixing some dinner...

Ellie was in the living room in my chair, and Silas was wondering around the house playing with toys, talking to me, and trying to sneak snacks out of the pantry...

Silas started to make a commotion in the kitchen right in front of the sink and when I turned to him he had a lethargic field mouse cornered up against the counter.

Not sure why a mouse would be wandering around in plain sight in the kitchen I grabbed it with a dish towel.

My best guess is that the mouse had been into some D-CON mouse goodies which were stashed back underneath the kitchen sink and was so far gone that he wandered out into the kitchen...

I let Ellie & Silas get a good look at him and then took him outside for a boost up to mouse heaven.

Interesting evening.

For what it's worth...

2008-10-03T08:30:00.003-05:00

I have no idea what this actually means...

Fellow tweeps. What is your tweet worth?

Post-It Mayhem

2008-09-26T09:39:00.004-05:00

Knowing my love for all things Post-It note, Marty sent me this link yesterday via IM.

Awesome stuff.

EepyBird's Sticky Note experiment from Eepybird on Vimeo.

I can see this...

2008-09-25T13:31:00.002-05:00

Well... That's a relief... I was afraid I might find out I was Stanley.

What NBC "The Office" character are you? Your Result: Jim Halpert You are the kind of person that everyone likes. You are funny, laid back, and not bad looking. You love practical jokes and having a fun time with your friends. However, because you are so laid back you often let the things that are most important to you get away. I miss Dwight. Congratulations Universe, you win.
Toby Flenderson
Ryan Howard
Pam Beesly
Dwight Kurt Schrute
Kelly Kapoor
Angela Martin
Michael Scott
What NBC "The Office" character are you? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

"Because right now, this is a job. If I advance any higher, this would be my career. And if this were my career, I'd have to throw myself in front of a train."

~ Jim Halpert

(ht to Evan Courtney on his blog)

Arrr! With the Pirates again!

2008-09-19T12:56:00.005-05:00

Yarrr!* So if was a pirate, this is what ye'd be callin' me!

Take yerself over yonder and meet ma' brother... Captain Harry Rackham.

( Again, I be hat tippin' ta the Marko and Marty )

* - I actually prefer "yarr" to "arr"... Personal preference only.

Yarrr!

2008-09-19T10:30:00.003-05:00

Just want to jump on the bandwagon to remind everyone that today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

erm... I mean.

Yar me hearties! Just wanted ta be lettin' ya know that we be talking like pirates terday!

Get yerself over ta be lookin at the TLAPD website if ya be havin any questions.

Be lookin' at this here instructional video if ye needs ta learn some pirate speak!

Ummm.... Thanks to Marko for pointing out that the video is possibly rated PG-13.

(ht to Marko's blog, and all the tweeps who have mentioned TLAPD this morning).

Plank... Just Plank.

2008-09-17T09:55:00.002-05:00

Marty pointed me over to the Sarah Palin Baby Name Generator this morning.

So here's the scoop.

Eli Jenin, if you were born to Sarah Palin, your name would be:

Plank Castle Palin

Who knows, Plank Castle Palin you just might be president one day!

That's right... Plank.

(ht to Marko and Marty).

Monday Morning Update

2008-09-15T09:15:00.006-05:00

Monday* Morning Update - September 15, 2008

Where did the weekend go?

My crazy long weekend started on Thursday evening. I took Jenn to P.F. Chang's for her birthday, where the Chang's Spicy Chicken was most excellent! Then we stopped at Graeters in the mall for ice cream, wandered around Easton for a bit, made a stop in Target and headed back for the ranch.

By the time we got home it was well after midnight. Jenn baked cookies for college care packages, and I fished out some laundry and re-organized my backpack for the road trip. I think Jenn made it to bed around 1:15, and after getting all of my stuff together I ended up sitting up and reading until sometime after 2 AM.

Friday and Saturday were completely filled with a quick road trip to Wheaton College outside of Chicago. Marty typed up an excellent play-by-play post of the road trip here so if you want to know more I suggest scoping it out.

Getting back late on Saturday night made for a short night before a long day on Sunday at RVCC. I had the privelege of playing bass for Marty as he led worship at both services, which I thought went really well. Steve's message was an amazing start to what is sure to be a great series on the beatitudes.

On Sunday afternoon I stayed at RVCC for our Discover River Valley class, which is our version of a "new members" class... It is basically a crash course in RVCC history, and why we do things the way we do.

Youth on Sunday night was small group and we chatted and played a few games which was very uncomplicated, but a good time.

Where I am right now -

I obviously failed at getting this posted yesterday morning... When I started putting my thoughts down though, I was my desk, at the office... There was no electricity at work most of the day yesterday due to the high winds and storms of the weekend, so most of the day was spent in the dark with no AC and no coffee maker.

I am at work again now, taking a few minutes to finish this up before lunch.

This week at a glance -

Tonight Jenn and I are going to see the Lion King on broadway at the Ohio Theatre in Columbus. It should be fun.

We also have a home football game on Friday night, followed by a Fifth Quarter which we need to get plans nailed down for early this week.

Other than those two big ticket items I suspect this week will be fairly "normal".

Procrastination report -

I have notes from a meeting last Wednesday that I need to type up and get mailed out to our Youth team. I also have blogs to work on, and a lot of personal reading I would like to accomplish.

Book(s) I'm reading -

I started reading The Shack on Sunday afternoon last week and finished it on Thursday night after we got back from Jenn's birthday dinner. It is an incredible book, and I'm still not finished mulling it over. I am hoping to start Rob Bell's new book today if I can get my hands on it.

How I feel about the week ahead -

I have a lot of things to do, but this early in the week I haven't started to stress yet. I'm excited for The Lion King this evening, and looking forward to seeing how the rest of the week unfolds...

* by Monday, in this case, I obviously mean "Tuesday" or whenever I can get this thing posted...

Happy Birthday Jenn!

2008-09-11T09:40:00.007-05:00

Twenty-nine* years ago today my wonderful wife made her entrance into the world.

You can text Jenn birthday wishes by sender her an email HERE.

(These will go as texts straight to her phone, so remember to keep them brief).

You can also follow Jenn's birthday going's on on Twitter.

Happy birthday my love!

* - what? you thought I would actually provide a foot-note on that?

Monday Morning Update

2008-09-08T09:59:00.011-05:00

Monday Morning* Update - September 8, 2008

Where did the weekend go?

Except for a few sprinkles, Friday night was excellent Football weather. We didn't think Silas should be out in the rain so after heading home with Jenn and the kids I returned to the Waverly -v- Wellston football game. The band did great! I think the football team did a good job as well, but who has time to pay attention to such things...

Friday after the game we had another very successful Fifth Quarter with the cooperation of some of the other Waverly churches. It is great to having churches working together in the community for the good of the students!

Getting home late on Friday, I slept in some on Saturday morning and then spent a whole day of supreme laziness at home with the kids while Jenn attended an Emmaus team meeting and did some shopping. We were so lazy that I didn't even make the kids change out of their PJ's.

We had a great day of just loafing around the house though, watching TV, movies, playing on the floor, etc. I need days like that more often.

Sunday was a full day at River Valley. I found Steve's message about measuring the day to be one of the best one's in this current series, and worship with Marty Ford is one of the best parts of my week.

We did some relaxing on Sunday afternoon and grilled burgers for lunch, just in time to make it back to the church for a massive photo-scavenger hunt at Youth. Great stuff! Look for the photos on facebook (and later on this blog!).

Where I am right now -

Well... I have now officially worked on this post from five different locations, and am now back where I started... the recliner in my living room.

This week at a glance -

Well... I have a crazy busy week at work with 101 projects to work on.

Jenn has "water aerobics" (hehe) on Tuesday, we have a Youth planning meeting on Wednesday (to plan activities, etc for all quarter), and Jenn's birthday is Thursday for which we are going out to dinner. I may be going out of town this weekend, which would mean leaving Friday morning and coming back Saturday evening.

This coming weekend is also the Men's Emmaus Walk in Chillicothe, which means I have all the little pre-Emmaus weekend things to wrap up before Thursday.

So yeah... it is pretty much crazy...

Procrastination report -

Wow... where did all that lack of procrastination go from last week? I really need to work out babysitting for Thursday, Friday, and Saturday this week so that someone can watch the kids while Jenn and I go out for her birthday, and so that she doesn't have to worry about them on Saturday while she is doing Emmaus stuff. (If you are interested in the babysitting gig(s), call me)

I also have two other half-finished blog posts that I need to wrap up.

Book(s) I'm reading -

I started reading The Shack on Sunday afternoon and am completely sucked in... The book was a recommendation from the friend of a friend who said it is a must read. I'm hoping to knock it out this week and then get back to some non-fiction.

How I feel about the week ahead -

Stressed.

* oh... I almost forgot the footnote... by the phrase "Monday Morning" I, of course, meant that I intended to post this on Monday morning, and am just now getting around to it... on Monday evening... when I should probably be going to bed...

I never leave home without...

2008-09-06T21:29:00.004-05:00

I'm totally swiping this idea from Terrace Crawford's blog.

Here is the entirety of his post from July 17.

What do you NEVER leave home without?

"Ever since I was 18, I've read a chapter of Proverbs every day. I carry a real small bible-The New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs. I'm a nut for organization."

Mike Huckabee in People Magazine earlier this year.

John Edwards- "My ipod. I love Dave Matthews and Bruce Springsteen. It's nice to have a little time to yourself."
Mitt Romney- "A gallon-size bag of his wife's homeade oats-and-almond granola," and a Dora the Explorer bowl to remind him of this grandkids.
Barack Obama- "A webcam" to keep in contact with his family.
Hilary Clinton- "My blackberry."

For me its definitely my cell phone, money for lunch and most recently my man bag.

If you know me well, you already know what my answers to the question will be (don't worry, I'm going to hit you with them anyway) but it was something at the very end of Terrace's post that made me want to follow up on this...

He said "man bag."

Anyway... more on that later.

Here's the deal... I never go anywhere without my iPhone. Period. I'm completely addicted to being connected. Sometimes this is a problem (more on that later as well).

In addition to the iPhone I also (nearly*) always have on or near me the following:

There is one more thing, and this is where Terrace's comment struck me. I never go anywhere without my backpack**. Now, if you know me or see me around you know about the backpack already. It is huge, and I take it everywhere.

I have post in the works explaining the backpack.

Maybe I will get it posted tomorrow.

- Footnotes -

I've always wanted to do a post that needed footnotes.
This is them.

* - that list of five items (plus my phone) are what I have on my person anytime that I'm wearing blue jeans and a pocket t-shirt, which is my normal M-F 7:30 am-6:30 pm attire. If I am in weekend or evening attire (which means I've traded my jeans in for shorts) then I typically put the moleskine, the pocket-knife, and the tooney in my backpack.

** - I felt the need to explain the comment "never go anywhere without my backpack". For reasons which may become apparent later, the backpack can't go with me everywhere. It obviously goes to work with me, stays at home when I'm there, and rides in vehicles that I ride in. I can typically access the backpack within a few minutes from wherever I am.

Anyway... What do you never leave home without?

My Birthday - a meme

2008-09-04T20:16:00.003-05:00

Unlike Alan Creech, I actually enjoy the word meme, and am determined to use it in conversation now that he has recalled my attention to it.

Alan posted this meme on his blog with an open invitation for anyone who wanted to take part, so I am partaking in the fun, and encourage you to do the same.

Here is what you do...

1) Go to Wikipedia

2) In the search box, type your birth month and day but not the year.

3) List three events that happened on your birthday

4) List two important birthdays and one death

5) One holiday or observance (if any)

Here are my answers for December 5.

Events

1484 - Pope Innocent VIII issues the Summis desiderantes, a papal bull that deputizes Heinrich Kramer and James Sprenger as inquisitors to root out alleged witchcraft in Germany and leads to one of the severest witch hunts in European history.

1932 - German-born Swiss physicist Albert Einstein is granted an American visa.

1933 - Prohibition in the United States ends: Utah becomes the 36th U.S. state to ratify the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution, thus establishing the required 75% of states needed to enact the amendment (this overturned the 18th Amendment which had outlawed alcohol in the United States).

Birthdays

1839 - George Armstrong Custer, American general (d. 1876)

1901 - Walt Disney, American animated film producer (d. 1966)

Death

1870 - Alexandre Dumas, père, French writer (b. 1802)

(he wrote The Count of Monte Cristo, published 1894... awesome book)

Holiday

Belgium, Czech Republic, Slovakia, the Netherlands and the UK - Saint Nicholas Eve (whom Dutch speakers call Sinterklaas, which became in other languages Santa Claus)

Executive Summary

So... based on the items I've picked, here is the executive summary of December 5 (according to Wikipedia and (liberally) edited by me)

Witches, bad. Booze, good.
Mr Einstein, welcome to the United States.
Happy birthday General Custer & Walt Disney
Farewell to Alexander Dum(b)as(s) - Thank you Shawshank Redemption.
Happy Christmas!

What does the W reveal about your birthday? Post links to your posts about this in the comments!

(once again, ht to Alan Creech)

Sweet Relief

2008-09-03T21:05:00.005-05:00

So... if you didn't already know, Silas broke his leg.

Jenn blogged it here and here.

Today (day three of the broken leg) he is adjusting to the cast, but still very grumpy about his loss of mobility. His unhappiness definitely expresses itself the most when he is trying to get to sleep in the evenings. He just can't seem to get comfortable with the cast on and is very whiny and grouchy when it is time to call it a night.

Anyway, that is just the background for this particular story...

I was sitting in the recliner last night, holding Silas and chillin' when Jenn got home from water aerobics (*cough-cough).

Jenn went to the bathroom and rushed back out into the living room to inform me that the bathroom floor was flooding, the toilet was running, and she couldn't tell where the water was coming from.

I handed off Silas, turned off the water to the throne, and started feeling around to discover that the two bolts which hold the toilet tank onto the base had almost completely rusted through and water was running out one of those holes.

Jenn did some quick internet research to determine that those bolts, along with an entire toilet tank repair kit could be picked up at Lowe's fairly cheap, so planning to do that this morning I went ahead and completely disassembled the can.

Who knew that completely gutting a toilet could be so easy. A few bolts here, and little twist there and pretty soon you're left with an empty porcelain box with a few holes in the bottom.

Anyway, Jenn picked up the all inclusive kit from Lowe's this morning and this evening (with almost no leftover parts) I demonstrated my mad plumbing skillz...

and TaDa!

The toilet is working again!

Sweet Relief!

Monday Morning Update

2008-09-01T09:43:00.003-05:00

Monday Morning Update - September 1, 2008

Where did the weekend go?

I took Friday off from work to create a four-day weekend between two four-day work weeks. Friday we didn't do much except bum around the house all day. Some friends stopped out on and off through-out the day, and I stayed here with the kids while Jenn went and did the major grocery run for the month.

Friday evening we went to the Waverly home football game against Jackson. It was very hot, humid, and crowded at the game. The football team lost to Jackson, but the band did a great job! After the football game we had a Fifth Quarter event at Grace UMC here in Waverly. The 5Q was a joint effort between three of our area churches, and was a great success! The Luke Francis Experience did a great job with the worship and Zack Pfiefer did a great job with the devotion.

After getting home and to bed really late on Friday night, we all slept in on Saturday and then had another day filled with mostly just hanging out around the house. I made chicken fried rice and crab wontons for lunch on Saturday. The wontons were good, but the chicken fried rice is the best batch I have ever made here at the house.

We went to the Waverly soccer game on Saturday evening, and after the game a couple of the Youth guys came out to play some Mario Kart and hang out.

Sunday morning we were at RVCC for both services and then came home for a lunch of left-overs and a nap before going back into town for Youth. For Youth we went down to Walnut Street Park in Waverly and grilled hamburgers and hotdogs and played on the playground. It was a great evening, perfect weather for a cook-out in the park, and the evening was filled with great conversations, fun fellowship, and building relationships with our kids.

While we were at the park Silas bumped his leg coming down the sliding board and hasn't wanted to put weight on it since then. He doesn't act like he is in pain at all when he is sitting or laying down, and played on the floor last night quite happily. However, whenever he puts weight on his leg he whimpers holds onto his calf. He doesn't have any swelling or bruising, so we decided to wait overnight to see how he treated it this morning. Since it still hurt him this morning, Jenn packed him up and took him to Adena.

Where I am right now -

Since it is a holiday weekend I don't have to work today. I'm hanging out at the house with Ellie while Jenn is taking Silas to the hospital. At this moment I'm sitting in my recliner with my laptop and we are watching a movie. I've promised Ellie that I will make her a chocolate milk when this post is done.

This week at a glance -

Because of the holiday weekend, I have a short week at work this week... Fabulous!

Other than the normal work type things, Jenn is starting water aerobics this week on Tuesday and Thursday so I will be at home with the kids on those evenings.

We're fixing brinner tonight for one of the Youth who is moving off to college this week. Looking forward to hanging out with Caitlin and hoping that the good-bye won't be awkward.

Procrastination report -

I can't think of anything that I am particularly procrastinaing about this morning. There are a couple of books I would like to read, which I haven't managed to break into yet. Maybe I will have time to get on those this week.

Book(s) I'm reading -

I am still trying to make it through Jesus for President, and I started reading Blue Like Jazz by Don Miller this week. I have to admit that I picked BLJ back up as a result of Don Miller's prayer at the DNC last week. I have read BLJ once before, and it really didn't excite me or keep my interest. Only two chapters in this time I wonder what I was thinking. This is great stuff!

How I feel about the week ahead -

Excited for the short work week. Hopeful that the weather will stay cool, and that fall will actually get here and stay.

Dear Tim... A rant about customer service

2008-08-27T07:45:00.004-05:00

It is no secret that I'm basically a whore when it comes to a good cup of coffee.

It is also no secret that I put Tim Hortons at the top of my list when it comes to getting a good cup of good coffee.

If you don't know me well, or are doubting the accuracy of those first two statements, please see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

So, Tim... Why is it that when I walk into your restaurant (and can watch the nice lady behind the counter) and order a bagel double-toasted that you put it through the toaster 2 times, just like I ordered.

BUT, when I go through the drive thru and order a bagel double-toasted that you invariable hand to me out the window a bagel which is not only not double-toasted, but that obviously hasn't been in the toaster long enough to get warm?

Why?

Does it have to do with getting my order out to me quickly? If so, I'm not in a hurry. I am aware when I order said double-toasted bagel that it take twice as long to run it through the toaster twice. I'm happy to wait.

Does it have to do with keeping me from slowing up the line and making other customers wait? I typically go through the drive-through well after the "morning rush", and doubt this is the case... but if that is the reason, please just tell me that if I want my bagel torched I need to come inside.

Or does it have to do with the fact that I'm going through the drive thru and you know that it doesn't really matter what you hand me out the window because I'm not going to go to the trouble to turn around and complain about a bagel which only cost me a buck twenty-five.

I have a deep seated irritation that this might be the case.

Now... before you go accusing me of having "one bad experience" or "just hitting you on a morning that you were off", let me just go ahead and say that this happens to me almost every time I go through the drive-thru and order a bagel at ALL of the Tim Hortons in a 20 mile radius of my house.

IF I

Walk in. AND
Order a double-toasted bagel.

THEN I

Receive a bagel which is crunchy and slightly charred
(just how I like it)

BUT, IF I

Go through drive-thru. AND
Order a double-toasted bagel.

THEN I

Receive a bagel which is chewy, and possibly warm.
(still very edible... just not what I ordered).

Am I going to stop going to Tim Hortons? No, obviously not... Despite the bagel fiasco, they still make the best cup-of-coffee on the block.

Am I going to stop ordering bagels through the drive through? No, probably not. There is nothing wrong with a slightly warm, chewy bagel... It just isn't as good as a slightly charred, crunchy bagel.

Am I actually going to complain to Tim Hortons? Call the manager? Send a nasty email? No, probably not. My frustrations are pretty much worked out now that I've vented.

The coffee was great this morning. The slightly warm, yet chewy bagel will hold me off until lunch.

Rant over.

Back to shaving the yak.

Link Love

2008-08-26T21:01:00.003-05:00

While reading blogs this evening I came across two that were just too good not to share.

I am a regular reader (if seldom commenter) of both of these blogs.

Travis Spencer had some weird animal issues.

I literally laughed out loud when I read this one, and the poll at the end is great!
Terrace Crawford made an observation about the difference between men and women.

Although I don't shop at GAP, I still found this observation fairly accurate (and funny).

Great stuff guys!

On shaving the yak.

2008-08-25T22:52:00.000-05:00

There is a chapter in one of my favorite books... I won't mention the name of the book here out of the simple desire to not have my solar plexus caved in by an atomic elbow...

Anyway, there is a chapter in one of my favorite books in which the two main characters, Joshua and Levi, are living in a monastery, and the abbot is giving them instructions and the following occurs...

"Monk Number Twenty-two," Gaspar said to Joshua, "you shall begin by learning how to sit."
"I can sit," I said.
"And you, Number Twenty-one, will shave the yak."
"That's just an expression, right?"
It wasn't.

A yak is an extremely large, extremely hairy, buffalolike animal with dangerous-looking black horns. If you've ever seen a water buffalo, imagine it wearing a full-body wig that drags the ground. Now sprinkle it with musk, manure, and sour milk: you've got yourself a yak...

The yak provided just enough milk and cheese to remind the monks that they didn't get enough milk and cheese from one yak for twenty-two monks. The animal also provided a long, course wool which needed to be harvested twice a year. This venerated duty, along with combing all the crap and grass and burrs out of the wool, fell to me. There's not much to know about yaks beyond that, except for one important fact that Gaspar felt I needed to learn through practice: yaks hate to be shaved."

So, that is where this whole thing started (for me at least)...

The dismissive to "shave the yak" became sort of inside joke among my close friends (especially the ones who are also fans of this book).

Conversations would end with telling one another to shave the yak, emails and notes would bear yak shaving dismissive, and more than one time I have advised someone to shave the yak when what I really meant was that I wanted to be left alone.

How was I to know that the phrase "to shave the yak" was not only in common use among computer geeks and technophiles, but that the phrase actually describes an activity in which I am almost a daily participant.

During a random google search a few weeks ago I discovered that The Urban Dictionary offers the following definition for yak shaving.

Any seemingly pointless activity which is actually necessary to solve a problem which solves a problem which, several levels of recursion later, solves the real problem you're working on.

origin: MIT AI Lab, after 2000: orig. probably from a Ren & Stimpy episode

Seth Godin on his blog, expounded on the concept of yak shaving with this post...

Don't Shave That Yak!

The single best term I've learned this year.

Apparently turned into a computer term by the MIT media lab five years ago, yak shaving was recently referenced by my pal Joi Ito. (Link: Joi Ito's Web: Yak Shaving)

I want to give you the non-technical definition, and as is my wont, broaden it a bit.

Yak Shaving is the last step of a series of steps that occurs when you find something you need to do. "I want to wax the car today."

"Oops, the hose is still broken from the winter. I'll need to buy a new one at Home Depot."

"But Home Depot is on the other side of the Tappan Zee bridge and getting there without my EZPass is miserable because of the tolls."

"But, wait! I could borrow my neighbor's EZPass..."

"Bob won't lend me his EZPass until I return the mooshi pillow my son borrowed, though."

"And we haven't returned it because some of the stuffing fell out and we need to get some yak hair to restuff it."

And the next thing you know, you're at the zoo, shaving a yak, all so you can wax your car.

This yak shaving phenomenon tends to hit some people more than others, but what makes it particularly perverse is when groups of people get involved. It's bad enough when one person gets all up in arms yak shaving, but when you try to get a group of people together, you're just as likely to end up giving the yak a manicure.

Which is why solo entrepreneurs and small organizations are so much more likely to get stuff done. They have fewer yaks to shave.

So, what to do?

Don't go to Home Depot for the hose.

The minute you start walking down a path toward a yak shaving party, it's worth making a compromise. Doing it well now is much better than doing it perfectly later.

Hah! Who knew?

Where I work we tend to refer to yak shaving as "putting out fires", but regardless of the phrase I spend an incredible amount of time solving little problems in order to find solutions to the big ones. Often times we will intentionally break a large problem up into smaller ones just so that we can tackle it little bits at a time without getting overwhelmed by all the things that need done at any given time.

So, any other yak shavers out there?

If so, give a shout. I'd love to hear your yak shaving tales.

Monday Morning Update - August 25, 2008

2008-08-25T09:45:00.006-05:00

With his permission, I've decided to swipe a concept from Marko and try to get back into blogging.

The plan is to post a new one of these at the top of every week. If you aren't interested or don't care then I'm not offended. This is mostly for me, so here we go...

Monday Morning Update - August 25, 2008

Where did the weekend go -

Jenn posted an excellent blog about how busy our weekend was. I won't repeat all that she had to say (you should go read it) but I will add that I also had a fantastic weekend!

Church was amazing on Sunday morning. The special music (go watch it here) along with Steve's message about the Liturgical Year made for one of the best services I can remember in recent months.

Also the entire weekend (football Friday night, through-out the day on Saturday, church on Sunday, lunch on Sunday afternoon, and the church's pool part/baptism celebration on Sunday night) were all filled with great conversations and great conversations (and the relationship building, which invariably follows) being two of my favorite things, I would have to rate the weekend as fantastic!

Where I am right now -

Unfortunately, this Monday morning like many others, finds me sitting at my desk, in my office at Horizon Chillicothe Telephone. This morning has been busy with phone calls, emails, meetings, and finding time to read blogs and news from the weekend. (as well as work on this one)

This week at a glance -

As far as I know we have no out of the ordinary plans this week. (Which means work during the day, and hang out at home with the fam in the evenings...)

For the past several weeks we've been having teens over for dinner and to hang out almost every evening, but with school starting and folks moving off to college that trend is slowing down.

This coming Friday night is our first home football game of the year, which means our first Fifth Quarter of the season as well. I also need to get into the church one night this week to update the MacPro.

Procrastination report -

I have been procrastinating about blogging for far far too long.

I am also quite the slacker in getting the church's podcast up to date. Hopefully admitting that here, will elicit some nagging and I will make time to do that today!

Book(s) I'm reading -

I have a horrible habit of picking up and re-reading books that I really like... I guess with that kind of habit, it is good that I'm a fast reader. Anyway... Now that you know about that habit, I have to admit that I picked up and read Lamb by Chris Moore again on Saturday (finished it last night).

What?!?! It's a great book!

I'm also reading Jesus for President by Shane Claiborne, which I'm sad to say is struggling to keep my attention... Also, I finished The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs while on vacation a couple of weeks ago, and I haven't gotten over it, or stopped leafing through it on an almost daily basis.

How I feel about the week ahead -

Relaxed about the week in general. A little stressed about getting the plan for Fifth Quarter in place soon enough to make it work.

----------

Well, that wraps up my first Monday morning update. I have lots of blogs in the hopper, which I'm hoping to get published soon. For those of you who have been bugging me to get them done, please don't stop. It really is working.

Wordle

2008-06-27T14:58:00.004-05:00

Several people have recommended to try this thing called Wordle, which basically takes a big block of text and creates a word cloud out of it, based on the occurances of the words in the block of text.

After seeing it recommended so many times, I thought I'd give it a whirl, and it is pretty neat...

Here is the wordle, created from the text of my last blog post.

(ht to Marko, Gavin, and others all via blogs).

Mission Trip Redux - St. Francis Table

2008-06-24T15:05:00.013-05:00

While in Toronto with Youthworks, my work crew spent three of our four days on site at a ministry in Parkdale called St. Francis Table.

From their website:

St. Francis Table is a restaurant dedicated to providing meals and a welcoming environment for the needy of our community. Patrons receive full restaurant service while seated at tables. For one dollar, they are presented with a meal, a hot and cold beverage, and a desert.

St. Francis Table is run by Brother John Frampton, a Franciscan Monk of the Capucin Order, and also has two employees, Dominic and Sam, who are both cooks at the restaurant. All of the other "staff" are volunteers who come in to help prepare the meals, wait tables, carry dishes, work in the kitchen, and clean up afterwards.

It takes at least twelve people to make one meal service possible, and Brother John keeps a running list of volunteers who come in to make sure the restaurant is able to maintain the nine meals per week served at St. Francis Table.

In the event that there aren't enough volunteers to make a meal service possible, then the food is prepared and passed out at the door ("to go" style) for $1.

Brother John explained to us, that the one dollar donation for the meal is not only to help the restaurant recoup some of it's expenses, but also to give the patrons a sense of dignity in that they have come to the restaurant and are purchasing their lunch as opposed to going to a soup kitchen or shelter and begging for lunch.

While my group was at St. Francis as part of our Youthworks trip, we arrived every day around 10 AM to help prepare, serve, and clean up after lunch.

Our day typically started by helping Sam and Dominic sort and prep the food for lunch, which typically included making a salad (in large quantity), making french fries, preparing the main dish (Italian sausage, pork chops, baked chicken, roasted pork loin, tuna fish sandwiches, etc), and prepping coffee and tea stations so that we could get hot drinks out to the patrons quickly.

While Sarah mastered the art of making fresh cut french fries en-mass, the rest of us became experts at chopping carrots, celery, onions, and lettuce for salads.

One day we packaged pork chops, pork loin, and chicken legs for going it the freezer, which turned out to be lots of fun. (Hey! Some folks just don't get to play with raw meat very often).

After lunch was prepped and ready, we divided up into group to either wait tables, bus dirty dishes, or prepare plates (to be taken out to the patrons). Brother John rotated us through these duties on a daily basis, so that everyone would get the experience of working in a certain place.

Just before noon, Brother John would gather us together for a group prayer after which he would give us the following pre-lunch pep talk...

May the Lord bless you for your service. Any problems, I'm the problem solver. You're here for a good time, I'm here for a long time. This is a recording. Beep.

Sometimes he would also throw out a word of caution about giving the patrons too much salt, pepper, cream, or sugar...

If the patrons ask for 16 packets of salt, just give them two... Sam does know CPR, but we would rather he not resort to using it.

Then he would walk to the front door of the restaurant, ring the bell to announce lunch service had started, and then the craziness ensued.

Having never waited on tables or worked in a restaurant before, the confusion of keeping track of what 8 (or 12) people wanted to eat and drink, how they took their coffee or tea, whether or not they wanted desert, and how many salt, pepper, and ketchup packets they were allowed to have was a little daunting to me (and, I think, to some of the students).

That being said... all of the kids did a great job of greeting people warmly, remembering their orders, keeping their smiles on (even when they were flustered), and taking the time to make real conversation with the patrons anytime the opportunity presented itself...

The one hour lunch rush seemed to move by so fast that it was a blur, and yet through the chaos we somehow managed to learn the names of many of the patrons, we learned who the regulars were, how they liked their coffee, and whether or not they could be trusted to stay out of the kitchen. Through all of the craziness, a handful of high school students from the states made real life connections with the homeless, the poor, the broken, and the marginalized people living in the Parkdale area of Toronto.

And let me tell you.... It might be one of the coolest things I have ever witnessed!

When brother John rang the bell to end lunch service at 1 PM, the volunteers were encouraged to go ahead and fix ourselves plates and eat before we began the clean up process to make the restaurant ready for the dinner crew. Often there were still patrons (typically the ones who had straggled in right before 1) finishing their meals and having quiet conversations. It was really cool to see the students pull up a chair to share a meal and conversation with these (often) gruff, ragged, old guys.

When the last patrons had moved out the door, we were left to wipe down the tables, get the dishes done and put away, and make our way back to the housing site.

It's hard to believe that three days serving lunch at St. Francis Table could make a deep and impacting change in someones life, yet as my own days return to "normal" and I sit through meetings, answer emails, and go about my day I've caught myself wondering in the mornings what Dominic has decided to fix for lunch today...

Whether the new Youthworks kids managed to cut the carrots up correctly on the first try, or had to do it again...

Will there be enough volunteers at St. Francis to serve dinner tonight, or will Brother John have to resort to take-out?

Did Mr. Kato manage to sneak an extra portion at lunch today after all the other patrons had gone, or did Sam chase him away?

Did Thomas and Louis eat together at table nine again today? Did they talk about American politics again, or have a more exciting conversation?

Will the guy from table eight on Thursday ever actually get to see the top of the CN tower, or will he continue to look for someone who will take him dancing on Friday nights at the top of the world?

Mother Theresa once said that "In this life we cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love".

Our church's motto is that "Small things done with great love, will change the world"

I was blessed this week to watch God make a difference in the world.

One french fry, one pork chop, one plate, one conversation, one smile, one small thing at a time... small things, done with great love...

Five high school students, one sixty-three year old weight lifter from Springfield Illinois, and one youth pastor from Southern Ohio will never be the same.

Mission Trip Redux - Returning to Real Life...

2008-06-23T14:29:00.003-05:00

I have so much to say, and so many stories to tell about our Youth mission trip to Toronto last week that as I predicted in an earlier post, things are already slipping away from me...

I've been struggling with how to best describe the week, and tell the story here and have decided that the best way is probably in little bits...

This post will be the executive summary... All the important details with as little story as I can bear to tell.

Want to know the facts, and just the facts? This is them from my vantage point.

Sunday

We left RVCC at 5:00 AM, and made great time.
We stopped in Columbus for breakfast, random exits in Northern Ohio and Pennyslvania for gas and bathrooms, and Niagara, Ontario for lunch.
We arrived at the Youthworks site at almost exactly 4 PM.
We settled in, had dinner, had some student and adult orientation, were given our assignments on work teams for the week, had some time to worship, a devotion, and time to sit and talk in our church group, and then called it a night
We met John Reside and the rest of his crew from Springfield, Illinois
The other church (from Northern Ohio) had van trouble, and didn't arrive until the middle of the night.

Monday

First day on work crews.
My group went to the Ina Grafton Gage Home for the Aged.
We spent the morning hanging out with residents, and potting flowers.
In the afternoon, Mason and I powerwashed the back patio while Sarah & Sarah played bingo and socialized with the residents.
Some of our students and leaders went to Booth Industries.
Some of our other students and leaders went to St. Judes Academy for the Arts.
In the evening, we took a Street Walk starting at the Salvation Army Gateway Shelter and visiting both moderately poor and very wealthy areas of Toronto.
During the walk, we got to hear from Anthony, an ex-drug addict and resident of the streets of Toronto.
At the end of the walk Anthony was open to questions about life on the streets, drug addiction, getting clean, and shared a bit more of his life story with us.
We returned to the church for church group time and bed.

Tuesday

My work crew changed sites from Ina Grafton to St. Francis Table, where we met Brother John, Sam, and Dominic.
We, again, had one crew travel to Booth Industries and one crew travel to St. Judes.
On the way home from the work sites for the day the big church van broke down.
Chris Moore did an awesome job (with the help of Reed Nutt) of getting the kids back safe, and the van in for repair.
In the evening we played kick-ball at the playground behind the church where we were staying.
We rounded out the night with worship, devotions, prayer, and church group time.

Wednesday

Transportation was tricky today because we were short one large van.
The work crew from Booth was transferred to St. Judes, and the St. Francis crew was dropped off enroute.
This placed 12 of the 16 members of the RVCC team at St. Judes and 4 of us at St. Francis.
Due to transportation issues, we had to split getting the crew "home" from St. Francis into two groups. The girls went first and Mason and I waited for the return trip. Had a good time talking to random folks at St. Francis while we waited.
Van was fixed by mid-afternoon. Reed, again, assisted us in picking it up.
Went to China-town after dinner for some random shopping and wandering around. Our time there was very short, but fun.
Worship, devotions, prayer, and church group time rounded out the night before bed.

Thursday

Two RVCC crews to St. Judes
One crew back to St. Francis Table.
St. Judes crew had a very moving day, and it sounded like many tear-filled good-byes.
Myron volunteered at St. Francis today. He made our day!
After showers (and before dinner) I managed to squeeze a walk and talk in with a couple of our students, was a great time.
After dinner, our evening activity took us to a local park to play games (frisbee, red rover, freeze tag) and watch a local Christian artist play music (Jason Moon).
Had great conversations at the park.
Back at the church for the evening. Worship was followed by a foot washing service. This was very moving for many of our leaders and students.
Church group time was very emotional as well, with some really cool thoughts and revelations by members of our group.
After church group time there was pizza, ice cream, and crazy fellowship in the midst of sad good-byes. (Thanks to CMoore and Reed for the snacks!)

Friday

Eric tried to wake the guys up two hours early because he misread the clock.
We got up, packed, cleaned the church, filled out evaluation forms, took some photos, and loaded our vehicles all before 9 AM.
We said good-bye to the Youthworks staff, and the other churches and headed for Casa Loma, via Tim Hortons.
Got a little lost looking for a Tim's, which wasn't where the GPS said it should be.
Made it to Casa Loma by 10.
Sight seeing and exploring at Casa Loma till noon.
Went to the Eaton Centre Mall downtown for lunch in the food court, and walking, talking, and shopping.
Headed to SkyDome (a.k.a Rogers Center) by 4 PM.
Took a large group up into the CN Tower.
Had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, in Skydome.
On the road by 9PM headed for Niagra Falls.
Arrived at the hotel a little after midnight due to bad road construction and traffic.
Crashed.

Saturday

Did breakfast "on our own" and met to leave the hotel by 10.
Did sight-seeing (Maid of the Mist, Journey Behind the Falls, and walking around) till noon-thirty.
Crossed the Rainbow Bridge back into the US at 1 PM.
Chris had an interesting discussion with the border crossing gaurds. This will be the source of much laughter for years to come.
Drove home pretty much straight through from Niagara Falls to Waverly Ohio.
Stopped for dinner and gas a couple of times along the way.
Drove through crazy rain between Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio.
HUGE thank you to Sarah for talking with me and keeping me awake for 6+ hours.
Started having transmission (??) trouble with the white van on 71 south of Cleveland.
Chris did a great job of getting the van and all of the occupants home safe.
Arrived at RVCC around 9:30, unpacked, said good-bye, and headed home to crash.

-------------

Once again, this is the bare-bones version of what happened during the week. If you read this blog and you have any access at all to one of the kids that went on the trip, please take the time to sit down with them and hear their stories.

My plan from this point on is to blog some of my own stories, and encourage the kids (and other leaders) to find an outlet to tell their own.

I honestly believe that people were changed this week. I know that I was.

Can't wait to keep hearing more stories.

Praying that everyone is adjusting to "real life" without letting go of the things that impacted you while we were away.

That's it for now.

- Roogles out

And so it ends...

2008-06-19T23:57:00.002-05:00

I am so overwhelmed that I don't even know where to start...

This has been an absolutely amazing week. Twenty-six teens, eight youth leaders, and five Youthworks staff came together this week to create an experience of worship, fellowship, and service that I will never forget.

There is not a single person in our group who hasn't undergone change this week.

New friendhips were made. Old friendhips were renewed. The hands and feet of Jesus were made alive a the kids fixed meals for the homeless, made convesation with the elderly, and befriended those who struggle because of mental and emotional disorders.

I am so very proud of our kids, for stepping out on faith into new and sometimes very uncomfortable situations on order to show love and compassion to the marginalized people of Toronto.

There are so many stories to tell, and so many memories to look back on that I will never be able to record them all before they start slipping away.

To all of you parents, River Vallians, and friends, who have been thinking about us, praying for us, or wondering how we are doing....

Your kids are safe and happy, and maybe a little worn out.

We had an awesome week. All of us.

We are getting up in 5 hours to pack up, clean up, and head out for some sight seeing and touristy stuff. We are anxious to be home and will see you all on Saturday.

Blogged from my iPhone

Going great...

2008-06-16T22:53:00.002-05:00

Hey all... Sorry I've not updated. Things here are, as you might expect, crazy busy. (and while the iPhone is indeed a great device, it takes a long time to type on this thing.)

Things in Toronto are going very, very well. We are settled in to the church, making new friends, and being the hands and feet of Jesus in both big and small ways.

There are way too many things going on, and too many stories to tell to type them all on here.

I will share one thing though, and then I have to crash...

The last thing we did as a church group this evening (which means it was just us RVCC-ers in the room) was go around and (with no explanation or supporting statements) rate the day on scale of 1 to ten.

16 responses were 7 or higher.

To quote Eric Tiu when we had all gone... "Not the best day ever, but deffinitely a good day"

I am very very proud to be here with all of these kids, and can't wait to see God continue to move in them this week.

Good night.

Blogged from my iPhone

Still movin'

2008-06-15T11:51:00.002-05:00

Well. We are now in New York State. Breakfast at McDonalds went very well. The manager seemed a liitle shocked to see the 16 of us wander onto his otherwise deserted restaurant at 6:30 on Sunday morning, but he took pretty good care of us.

We were back on the road and made it around Cleveland with no mishaps and in pretty good time. Northwest of the big C we ran into a pretty bad auto accident that had traffic at a stand still for about 30 minutes.

Once traffic got flowing again, we made a pit stop just outside of Painsville for snacks and bathrooms.

On the road again from Painsville, we pressed on and made a stop in Pennsylvania to get gas and let Mason use the bathroom.

We're mking pretty good time still at this point, although the 30 minutes we lost sitting still outside of Cleveland is going to make our lunch stop pretty tight.

Should be in Buffalo in about 20 minutes. Planning to grab lunch, stretch, and make preparations to leave the country.

Until next time.

Here we go.

2008-06-15T05:23:00.002-05:00

Well... The RVCC summer mission trip to Toronto is underway.

What a crazy short night. Jenn and I made of back home about 10pm after packing vans, eating dinner with some of the Youth, and gassing up. We had a few things to do (some last minute laundry, run the dishwasher, take out the trash) and we managed to get to bed about midnight.

3:30 came way too early. We rolled into the church about 4:35 and were pleasantly surprised to find that more than half of the kids were there and ready to roll!

Steve and Mike Diener prayed for us and we snapped some group photos before a 4:55 roll out. Awesome!

While I can't speak for the occupants of the other van, most the passengers in the Roogle wagon either slept or feigned sleep from Chillicothe to Columbus.

The sunrise at 6:00 (6:03 according to the Nuvi) was beautiful. All of the fog has burned off now and we're getting to stop for breakfast at Mickey D's just north of Columbus.

I'll try to update when I can from my phone. Spell check and typing on here are sketchy, so please bear with me.

Blogged from my iPhone

The Adventures of Friday the 13.

2008-06-14T07:08:00.009-05:00

First of all some back story... Who would have dreamed that it would be so difficult to get American currency changed into Canadian currency in Southern Ohio??

In preparation for the RVCC Summer mission trip, the Youthworks staff has suggested that we get as much of our money changed to Canadian before we head into the great North. Local banks gave us very mixed responses about changing currency, which mostly went along the lines of "It is too much hassle, so we'd rather not".

After a failed run to the Columbus International Airport on Thursday... ( "I'm sorry, we just ran out of Canadian Currency"... doh! ) I called the 5/3 Bank currency exchange center at the Cincinnati Airport on Friday morning and was told that changing US currency to CN would be "no problem" even in large amounts.

I was at work on Friday morning, because things at work always tend to be a bit crazy when I'm going to be out of touch for any extended period of time. By the time I touched base with Cincinnati and decided they would be our best bet for currency exchange, it was already 11 AM.

Jenn was pretty tied up in Chillicothe for the afternoon, so I decided to make the trek to Cinci solo, despite it being a crazy boring drive and at the minimum a four hour round trip.

Twitter to the rescue!

I wrapped up at work, managed to split by 12:45 and met up with Luke at RVCC.

That's when the real adventure began...

The drive across The App was relatively uneventful as far as drives go. Luke and I haven't had a lot of opportunity to hang out prior to yesterday, so the round trip to Cinci gave us an opportunity for epic conversation.

Down 32, around 275, enter Kentucky, nearing the air port.... no problems! Then BOOM! Crazy pouring rain started pounding on us, causing some quick brake application and the engaging of the windshield wipers. Well, that worked OK, until the passenger windshield wiper pealed off of the arm and started flopping around in a very dramatic way.

Thankfully the downpour was quick, and we made it into the airport parking garage safely.

Quick park, quick walk, right up to the counter at the 5/3 Bank.

"Hi, we would like to change some currency to Canadian."

"No problem, are you the guy who has been calling all day?"

Reassuring smile to persuade that I'm not a crazy person... "Yep that would be me".

Ten minutes later Luke and I were standing back at the van packing a large envelope of Canadian currency... It struck me as amazing that several days of stress had culminated in a less than 10 minute extremely painless experience, that was obviously no big deal at all for the girl behind the counter.

The exchange rate was $1.05 US to $1.00 Canadian. We started with almost $1200.00 American ( almost entirely collected from Youth going on the trip, who wanted their spending money changed ahead of time) and ended up with $1140.00 in pastel pink and blue bills.

Anyway, where was I...

Oh yeah, we managed to re-affix the errant windshield wiper and pull back onto the highway.

We had pre-decided that it would make no sense at all to visit Cinci without having Skyline Chilli. ( An obvious conclusion, I think anyone could agree ). Now that our main objective for the trip had concluded, our secondary objective [Destination SkyLine] was in high order.

No problem.
Punch up the NUVI.
Nearest Skyline, 3.2 miles.
Go there!

The NUVI, I've noticed since we've had it, really doesn't care how crazy or indirect the route is to get your from point A to point B. It has never really failed in getting me where I was headed though, so I tend to just trust it and move on.

An immediate turn off of the highway, and a crazy, curvy, steep, road through the woods brought us to a stop sign.

The NUVI says "Turn right".
No problem.

The NUVI says "Turn left".
No problem.

The NUVI says "Proceed 300 feet and board ferry".

WHAT??

Who knew that you could cross the Ohio River on a ferry? Luke and I certainly didn't know it was an option until yesterday.

Here are some other iPhone shots of our experience...

Although extremely cool, the ferry crossing was pretty uneventful. The lady in the car next to us was obviously a regular ferry rider and looked quite bored as she relaxed during the crossing. We surmised that she was probably on her way home from work.

Quick gas station stop. Skyline was right where the NUVI predicted it would be.

Half-a-dozen conies, a large three-way, an order of fries, and a few sweat teas later we were both quite content and ready to head back home.

The entire ride was filled with great conversation, and trying to get from the out of the way Skyline back onto the NUVI's recommended route home proved a little distracting to me. I missed several of our turns heading out of Cincinnati, but we eventually found our way back to route 32.

Traffic leaving Cinci was crazy around 5:30 on Friday afternoon, but great conversation prevailed as we made it back into familiar territory.

We tried stopping at the Starbucks in Batavia, but lack of electricity stopped them from being able to serve anything. A few miles later we tried a McDonalds to get a couple of coffees, but brewing a small, black, decaf proved too much for them and after having us "pull up to the curb", so they could bring it out, Luke finally had to go inside to track his coffee down.

We pulled back into RVCC a little after 8PM.

It was a great day, a grand adventure, phenomenal conversation, and a fantastic way to spend a Friday afternoon.

Luke, thanks dude for keeping me company, for the conversation, and going along for the ride.

Another hair post.

2008-06-11T23:12:00.008-05:00

Hopefully blog posts about my hair will not become a normal feature on this blog.

It seems to be generating lots of discussion and commentary lately though, so why not roll with it.

It was suggested earlier this week, that when the humidity gets to me, and the product has worn off, that my hair (which is very bushy and wavy ) makes me look like Syndrome, the villain from The Incredibles.

I'm not sure I see it... I mean, the man has great hair, but it is
definitely going to take me a few more weeks (months?)

What do you think?

Once I've given the hair a few more weeks, does anyone know where I can get a black and white spandex suit?

Yes, I was bald (expounded)...

2008-06-03T15:59:00.006-05:00

I made a quick post over on my tumbl blog today, about the weirdness of people noticing that I am letting my hair grow out. You can go there and read the quick version, but I wanted to expound on those thoughts a little here...

First, some background... When I was in fourth grade dad was getting his hair cut at Weaver's Barber shop on Water street in Chillicothe. I guess Josh and I must have been getting our hair cut there as well.

One time we were in there, and I really wanted to get my head shaved (bald). I don't remember what the motivation was, or why I wanted to get it done but mom and dad said they didn't care, so when it was my turn to hop up in the chair that day and Mr. Weaver said, "What'll it be" my response was "shave it off".

I seem to recall that he chuckled, got the clippers out, attached the number four guard, and gave me a "buzz". After that he spun me around to the mirror and said "How's that?"

"Can you make it shorter?"

Glance at mom. She nodded. Number 2 guard.

"Can you make it shorter?"

Longer glance at mom. Grin and nod. No guard.

"Ummm.... Can you make it any shorter?"

Question to mom. "Is it really ok with you if I shave his head?".

Smile. Nod. Head shaved. Spin to mirror. Tentative feel.

Satisfaction!

If I recall, Mr. Weaver didn't even charge us for the cut because he was so taken back by having a fourth grader wanting all of his hair cut off.

After that, Dad bought some clippers and from then on he just shaved our heads at home with the clippers as short as they would go. Once a week or so, the whole time we grew up dad cut our hair.

When I got in college, I bought my own clippers and every Saturday morning I went down to the bathroom and just clipped my hair (again, as short as the clippers would go) right into the trash can.

Sometimes, in order to make it more neat, I would use shave cream and and a razor to actually "shave" my head after the clippers had done their job.

Ok... Enough background. I'm bored and I'm sure you are.

Sometime back in late February or early March, someone in the Youth group challenged me to see if I could grow my hair long enough to put it in dreds before our summer mission trip in mid-June.

I don't remember if it turned into a bet, a wager, a dare, or exactly how it panned out, but by the time the discussion was over I had agreed that until July 1 there would be no cutting of the hair.

This coming Saturday (June 7) will be 12 weeks since I've cut the hair.

About two weeks ago Jenn got me some stuff to make my hair stand up. Now it doesn't look like a shag carpet is stuck to my head.

Here I am pre-hair, and currently.

Some interesting observations I've made since the hair started to grow, and people started to notice.

Many people tend to assume that if you shave your head, you must be naturally bald and/or unable to grow hair... They seem to be shocked to discover this is not the case.
Many of my friends claim that I look friendlier, am more approachable, am not as intimidating, blah, blah, blah, since I've let my hair grow out.
Jenn prefers the me with hair, as opposed to the bald me.

I guess the hair is growing on me, pardon the pun.

I've decided not to get it cut after the mission trip, and just to let it keep going until I simply can't stand it anymore.

I think it would be really cool to let it get long enough to pull back in a short pony-tail.

Anyhoo... This post has gone on far too long.

Does anyone have any thoughts on the hair, no hair issue?

Memorial Day Fun

2008-05-27T16:20:00.009-05:00

For Memorial Day we had a cook-out at the house.

My PF's, and my brother and sister-in-law came down and spent the whole afternoon.

We grilled, played some games, and had a great afternoon hanging out.

We also taught Mom & Dad to play Mario Kart on the Wii.

It was great!

Dad also played some Little Mermaid Checkers with Ellie.

Mom got really into the Wii Bowling.

Silas decided he was finished with us.

It was a great day. Loving it when we can all get together and hang out.

I think it's really cool too...

2008-05-20T22:21:00.005-05:00

Mark Lee had an amazing blog post last week...

I asked his permission before I used his concept, and...

I think it's really cool that he took the time to respond to me...

I think it's really cool that even though I haven't really spent much time with him or her since High School, that I still know what is happening in their lives...

I think it is really cool that the reason I know him, him, her, and her is because of a video game...

I think it's really cool that she and I could meet each other, bump into him and him, and that he could capture the moment, even though I hadn't met him or her before that weekend...

I think it's really cool that he made it a point to remember her name, and that she could share it here...

I think it's really cool that he and I are friends, and can keep up with each other here...

I think it is really cool that he and I can have these kind of conversations...

I think it is soo cool that she did this while they did this, and she wrote this...

And I too, think it's really cool that you are where you are and I am where I am and we are both, well, here.

(Thanks Mark!)

My Other (Other) blog...

2008-05-16T10:35:00.007-05:00

Ok. So you already know about my other blog, right ?

http://eli.roogles.com is where I post those things that just don't really go on a "real" blog, whatever that means. You know, web surveys (What kind of fish are you? What is your super-power? How many three year olds could you take in a fight?) That sort of thing...

It is also the site where I test concepts, toss around blog design ideas, and don't worry about how it looks, how it feels, or who looks at it. Nothing that goes there is really important. If you 're not already reading it, you're not missing anything.

BUT...

Now I have another blog...

I know, I know.. I don't post often enough on this one to warrant one more, but hear me out.

A couple of weeks ago, Mark Lee introduced me to the concept of a Tumblelog.

The W defines a tumblelog like this :

A tumblelog (or tlog) is a variation of a blog that favors short-form, mixed-media posts over the longer editorial posts frequently associated with blogging. Common post formats found on tumblelogs include links, photos, quotes, dialogues, and video. Unlike blogs, tumblelogs are frequently used to share the author's creations, discoveries, or experiences while providing little or no commentary.

See full article here - Tumbleblog on the W

There are a variety of sites (like http://www.tumblr.com) for setting up tumbl blogs.

Mark Lee's tumbl blog (which again, is the first one that I ever saw ) is located here - http://markleerocks.com/

-----

Now, I really like this idea for a couple of reasons.

I love blogging. I like reading them, writing them, commenting on them, and getting comments on mine.
I don't have the time to write great blog posts, and I'm obsessive about them when I do write them. This particular post, which was meant to be a quick ad for my tumblr site, has been in process for 30 minutes...
Numbers 1 and 2 on this list are in HUGE conflict with one another.

So... without further ado, let me point you over to my very own tumbl blog.

This is where I (s)tumbl(e)... http://tumbl.roogles.com/

If you do the whole RSS reader (or Google reader) thing, then you can simply add the RSS link to your reader, and you'll know when I post to it.

They will likely be short, random, and possibly silly.

Looking forward to the journey,

-E

Bite Back!

2008-05-02T09:18:00.002-05:00

On April 25, 2008 students from the Jr. High and Sr. High youth groups from River Valley Community Church came together for a one evening event to Bite Back, and help stop malaria from killing thousands in Africa.

We met out at the Milestone Lodge for an evening of fellowship, games, discussion, worship, and of course food.

Following hot dogs around the fire, the youth jumped in a played some crazy mosquioto and African themed games before we settled down to hear Wayne Beam share about his trip to Africa with Wes in 2006, and about the effect malaria has there on so many people.

At the end of the evening we were blessed by worship with The [All New] Marty Ford Experience, and even more blessed to have Sarah, one of our seniors, express her worship by painting during the worship set.

The event was a great success, and I'm pleased to say that thanks to the amazing support of our church we are sending $2380 dollars to Compassion International for the purchase of 238 mosquito nets to help Bite Back and put an end to malaria in Africa!

BiteBack.net is the official website of Compassion's Bite Back campaign.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

My Tweet Cloud

2008-04-24T16:54:00.003-05:00

Just thought this was interesting.

Click for larger image.

See it online HERE.

See all of my tweet stats HERE.

A Good Morning

2008-04-24T13:22:00.001-05:00

This has been a really tough week at work.

Things like a hot cup-o-Tims keep me going though.

Thanks Jenn!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

When brinner meets my panini press...

2008-04-16T21:54:00.003-05:00

We decided to have panini sandwiches for dinner this evening.

While Jenn opted for the more traditional ham and cheese panini,
I chose to make brinner again on my sandwiches...

So, what does happen when brinner meets my panini press?

Behold!

Sausage, fried eggs, colby-jack cheese, and three cheese
italian bread from the Kroger bakery... all slapped together
and mashed in my panini press.

Good stuff!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Brinner Time.

2008-04-14T21:36:00.005-05:00

For as long as there has been breakfast, there have been those of us who like to eat it at times which do not fall before 10 AM.

If you so happen to have your breakfast in the late morning, or early afternoon it shall be called "brunch".

Thus it seems only appropriate, that if you choose to have breakfast (or breakfast foods, as it were) in the evening, or for the evening meal it shall be known as "brinner".

Who it was, that once upon a time, decided which foods would be designated as "breakfast foods" I do not know... But traditionally things like bacon, eggs, toast, biscuits, and so forth fall into that breakfast food category.

Not tonight my friends! Behold, I give you our brinner.

Tonight at El Rancho Roogles I cooked up french toast, egg-in-a-baskets (eggs-in-a-basket?), and sausage gravy with biscuits.

It was yummy.

The Princess even got in on the brinner fun, with a slice of cinnamon toast and scrambled eggs.

Side Note (foot note?) - Although we have been eating breakfast foods for dinner at the Roogles Ranch for some time, the term "brinner" was only just introduced to our family compliments of the TV show Scrubs. Brinner was a major theme in the episode "My bad too" (season 7, episode 7) which aired on April 10. (detailed synopsis here).

Anyhoo. Just a light-hearted post to wind down the evening.

Almost Time...

2008-03-25T16:16:00.005-05:00

Getting very close... Possibly this week or early next...

Confused?

See here and here.

That book thing...

2008-03-20T15:02:00.003-05:00

This one really should have gone on the other blog, but I found Marty's result of this quiz really interesting, and then was even more surprised by mine...

You're A Prayer for Owen Meany!

by John Irving

Despite humble and perhaps literally small beginnings, you inspire
faith in almost everyone you know. You are an agent of higher powers, and you manifest
this fact in mysterious and loud ways. A sense of destiny pervades your every waking
moment, and you prepare with great detail for destiny fulfilled. When you speak, IT
SOUNDS LIKE THIS!

Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

( ht to Marty for posting this first )

Happy Pi Day!

2008-03-14T09:13:00.004-05:00

Here is a screen shot from my laptop around 2-o-clock this morning...

I'm planning to grab another screen shot of my menu-bar clock at almost 2-o-clock this afternoon if I can remember.

UPDATE : I got the screen shot this afternoon!

Happy Pi Day everyone!

Some assorted links to help you cope with this little-known holiday.

What the heck is pi ?

Pi Day ? You're joking, right ?

The official Pi Day Website

A movie called Pi ( W's page on same movie )

No Comment

2008-03-06T13:18:00.008-05:00

So I have one of those tracking things that is supposed to tell me how many people are reading my blog, and how many hits I'm getting and all that good stuff...

The truth is though that I'm such a procrastinator when I do have good ideas, and so busy all the rest of the time that I don't ever go to look at it...

So, I often post blogs, and then wonder ( sometimes for days ) if anyone read it, what people thought, how it came across, should I give up this hobby, etc, etc, etc... ( Yeah, I could go look at the tracking thing, but I've already pointed out that I'm too lazy, and I'm not sure I trust it anyway... )

And then earlier this week something hit me... I was reading one of the many blogs I follow in my RSS reader, and came across a FANTASTIC post! I thought to myself, that I must go on over to the page and see what comments people have made and no one had posted anything!

As I sighed and went back to my RSS reader, I realized something fairly profound
( for me at least ).

I SUCK at leaving comments!

So! ( You were waiting for the point, weren't you?? ) I have decided to be a better commenter. I am making a concerted effort, in the midst of all my blog reading, to leave comments for the other writers who pour themselves into their blogs.

Be it a "Great Post", "Very interesting", "What the heck?!?", or a quick but heart felt response... I want to let the folks who's blogs I'm reading that someone is reading them.

I guess the point to all of this ( does there really have to be a point ) is that if something someone posts on their blog strikes you... ( good, bad, warm fuzzy, what the heck?, whatever ). Let them know!

Last thing.

Marko posted this a while back, and it seems to fit along with this rant so well that I couldn't help but borrow it.

(click for larger)

[ht to lee's things, via marko ]

Roogles out.

On the bandwagon...

2008-03-04T15:40:00.005-05:00

I want to take a minute this afternoon to jump on the bandwagon with my friend Marty...

He just posted this post, which inspired me to jump in and say something...

I am not enjoying the politics at all. Bigger than the issue that I am sick of political TV commercials, sick of being bombarded on all sides by scare tactics and trash talk, and completely sick of people asking me "Who do you support"... I am really just at a point where I'm really thinking that NONE of the candidates are good candidates.

and this is why....

WHAT THE HECK WOULD CAUSE A PERSON TO WANT TO BE THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES?

Bear in mind that as the POTUS, no matter how hard you work, how sincere you are, and how passionately you pursue your political agenda that people are going to be angry with you, bad mouth you, make fun of you, threaten you, and that you will be in the spotlight 24x7!

It's not that I don't like some of the candidates, or even respect some of their ideas... I think I'm just waaaayyyy to cynical to believe that ANY of them REALLY have what is best for someone other than themselves at the center of why they are running for president.

If you've spent any time around me at all, you've heard me quoting this chapter over and over in the past few months... If you haven't spent any time around me, then this is for you.

"The major problem - one of the major problems, for there are several - one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them.

To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem.

And so this is the situation we find: a succession of Galactic Presidents who so much enjoy the fun and palaver of being in power that they very rarely notice that they're not.

And somewhere in the shadows behind them - who?

Who can possibly rule if no one who wants to do it can be allowed to?"

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe by Douglas Adams
Chapter 28 - 1995

--------

Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President
should on no account be allowed to do the job!

Amen to that.

Happy Leap Day!

2008-02-29T11:50:00.003-05:00

Happy Leap Day everyone!

I know the blog as been a bit stale as of late... I'd like to put forth the excuse that I've just been too busy to take the time to put my thoughts down...

Although I do have several blog posts in the hopper ( thoughts on LOST, the Post-It Pike is getting full, I got stuck in an elevator the other day, and so on... ) I've just been too tired and rushed to form them into readable posts that I'm ok with sticking out there...

So anyway, here is a short blog to say Happy Leap Day!

You might be asking yourself... What is Leap Day?

Why do we have leap years anyway?

A survey about books.

2008-01-31T10:39:00.000-05:00

This has been going around, and although I wasn't actually tagged on this post, I saw it over on pomomusings and have been meaning to post my own answers for a couple of days.

I am a voracious reader. In general I read seven to ten books a month.

That being said, I just couldn't pass this one up.

1. One book that changed your life

I think that most of the people who know me well won't be surprised by this answer, even though it is a little odd...

I'd say that the book that most changed my life is probably The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

I became fanatical ( obsessed, even ) with this book early in high school and probably read it cover to cover hundreds of times between my freshman year and graduation. It was defining for my sense of humour, my vocabulary, my interests, and many of my friendships.

My original copy of Hitchiker's, I gave to a great friend in 1996 knowing that I would never see him again, and wanting to have something to remember me by. I had basically taken the book everywhere with me for three years, and knowing what it meant to me, he was very reluctant to take it, but did in the end. My replacement copy ( shown below ) has been on my shelf since 1997, and I still read it cover to cover about twice a year.

If I had to answer this question twice my next answer would be Velvit Elvis by Rob Bell.

2. One book you’ve read more than once

I almost always re-read books that I liked the on the first read. There are certain books though that I make a point to re-read at least once a year ( or so ).

Just a couple of these include Hitchiker's ( of course ) and The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien.

3. One book you’d want on a desert island

I so want to say The Bible... and ( like Adam ) I would say The Bible if I KNEW I'd be getting off the island at some point... the forced reading would be good for me...

However, if I were stuck on the island permanently I'd rather have something distracting to read than something I'd have to think about...

Maybe the complete works of Chris Moore ?

4. Two books that made you laugh

Lamb by Chris Moore. One of my new favorite books.

The Areas of My Expertise by John Hodgman.

5. One book that made you cry

When we were kids, instead of watching TV in the evenings, Dad would read out loud to my brother and sister and I while we sat around on the floor. Dad collects books about Robin Hood, and one of his favorites is Robin Hood by Henry Gilbert, published in 1912.

Every time he read it out loud to us, and even when I went back and read it myself in later years, I always cried at the end when Robin Hood dies.

6. One book you wish had been written

How do you answer this question? I guess I'm not sure what the book would be about, but I feel strongly that the following people should write books. I would buy one.

Steve Good ( No, this blog doesn't actually get updated )
Marty Ford

7. One book you wish had never been written

Again, I find this question horribly unfair... I'm no where close to having read all the books in the world and am therefore unqualified to say that some books should never have been written...

Also, I'm having a hard time thinking of any books I've read that I absolutely just hated...

I'm pretty open to the freedom of thinking and freedom of expression thing too... So even if I don't like a book, or don't agree with the content there-in I'm not sure I would go so far as to say that it should never have been written...

8. One book you’re currently reading

I am currently reading I, Strahd - The Memoirs of a Vampire by P.N. Elrod and They Like Jesus but Not the Church by Dan Kimball.

9. One book you’ve been meaning to read

I have several friends and blog-quaintances who have written or published books that I've been meaning to order and read, but not gotten around to yet.

My friend Kevin Pettway writes a web comic called Heros of Lesser Earth. He published a book of his comics in the fall of last year, that I wish I had grabbed a copy of.

Gordon Atkinson of RealLivePreacher.com also has a book published that I would like to pick up and read.

Well, that's it for me...

As for the customary tagging, I am interested in seeing the following folks respond:
Marty, Steve, Sarah, Jenn, Anna, Julie P and Tersie

a haiku

2008-01-28T11:08:00.002-05:00

So... I was feeling artistic and wrote a haiku this morning... actually, after some research it appears that I actually wrote a senryū.

How fascinating....

Anyway. Here is it is for your enjoyment.

good for taking notes
reminders, to-do's, doodles
my thanks to 3M

To be truly appreciated, this particular haiku must be presented on the medium to which it refers... So I give you a photo.

Almost time to clean off the pike again...

As Dangerous as the Law Allows!

2008-01-15T02:17:00.000-05:00

Well, I'm in San Francisco for Macworld. ( more on that later, probably ).

Today after we got our booth setup, we had basically the whole day to wander around and be tourists in San Francisco.

Whilst we were out wandering around, we scoped out Pier 39 down at Fisherman's Wharf.
( Think medium sized, sprawling, tourist trap mall on a pier... )

Snapped a photo of this sign while we were there, which brings up some of the following questions...

Just how "intense" does the law allow an amusement ride/attraction to be?

4D ?? What the heck ? Please read this... Wikipedia : Fourth Dimension

Needless to say we passed on that one...

More later...

Quote of the day

2007-12-31T16:49:00.001-05:00

Jenn called me earlier on her way into town.

In mid sentence she stopped and said "I think the Blue's Brothers are walking towards me on the side of the road... " [ long pause ] "Oh, never mind.... It was just a couple of Jehovah's Witnesses".

Although I suspect it was a couple of the local boys from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and not, in fact, Jehovah's witnesses, the phone call still made my day.

Lost & Found.

2007-12-31T16:12:00.000-05:00

I took a walk today instead of going to lunch.

On my return walk I stopped at the little coffee joint just down from the office to get a hot drink, and when I left to come back this way I noticed a cell phone laying in the road.

There were no vehicles in the immediate vicinity and no one on the street, so I grabbed the phone and pocketed it for the walk back to the office.

When I got back to my desk I tried the "Home" number in the contact list and got no answer, and was in the process of trying to determine who the phone belonged to and how to return it, when it rang... The number on the caller ID said "Mom". I let that call go to VoiceMail, waited a few minutes, and then called the Mom number from my own phone.

A girl named Alex picked up and said she was trying to call her phone from her Mom's phone because she couldn't figure out where she had put hers. She seemed pretty relieved when I told her I had found it and would be happy to return it to her.

Since I work at a large building downtown, it was no big deal to drop the phone in a padded envelope and leave it at the front desk with her name on it. I told her we were open till five, and that she could stop by and get it anytime. I put a note in the envelope saying

"Hey, I'm glad I found this and was able to get ahold of you... Happy New Year, -Eli"

Much to my surprise, the receptionist called me just a few minutes ago and asked me to come down to the desk.

When I got down there, she handed me back my envelope.

It has $15 in it.

I was just doing what I hope someone would do if they found my iPhone laying in the street. I know I've dropped it enough times that it's only a matter of time until I leave it laying somewhere.

Thanks for the gift Alex. It wasn't necessary, but Thank You and Happy New Year.

Dad's boots.

2007-12-31T15:23:00.000-05:00

Silas turned one on Saturday.

We had a small get together at the house. Mostly family and really close friends just getting together to eat cake and ice cream. Although Ellie was excited for the birthday party, Silas doesn't quite "get it" yet.

He was just happy to have cake, and seemed to think it was weird that everyone crowded in the kitchen to watch him eat.

Anyhoo... Although Silas got waaaayyyy too much for Christmas, and his birthday get together was specifically advertised as "no gifts please"... He got some anyway...

One gift in particular though needs to be mentioned...

From his Great-Papaw Ruggles ( my Dad's dad ) Silas got a pair of black cowboy boots.

Here they are...

Some pretty snazzy kicks for a guy who can't even walk on his own yet... They're a little big for him, but at the rate he is growing he'll be running around in them in no time...

The boots themselves are a nice gift, but what makes these boots special is that Papaw Ruggles gave them to me, more than twenty-five years ago.

This is me, wearing them. I would guess myself to be between two and three in this photo.

After I outgrew the boots, Papaw made sure they got passed on to my brother. Then he made sure they got passed on to our cousins Kristopher and Matthew who each wore them until they wouldn't fit anymore.

I probably hadn't given the boots a second thought from the time I was two, until Silas pulled them out of the bag on Saturday, and here Papaw had re-claimed them when Matthew grew out of them and polished them up, and put them away, and waited until he had a great-grandson to pass them on to... And now, more than twenty five years after his daddy wore them Silas will be stomping around the house in them.

How cool is that.

Oh... in that photo of me I had just received a fancy new farm tractor to peddle around on. My brother and sister and I played on that tractor inside and out until we were all too big for it, and then it dissapeared.

Well... Here is a photo of Ellie playing on the tractor at Papaw's house when she was about a year-and-a-half old...

It won't be much longer and I suspect that Silas will be inheriting another one of Dad's old toys.

I just hope that we can take as good care of them as my my Papaw did, so that one of these days when I'm Papaw-Ruggles I can pass on to my Ellie & Silas's kids and grand-kids toys that belonged to their mom and dad when they were that age.

Jesus Junk

2007-12-31T15:12:00.000-05:00

Dan Kimball's book, They Like Jesus but not the Church, has a great chapter on Jesus in pop culture, and even touches on Marko's oft posted topic of "Jesus Junk".

Was out Christmas shopping on Dec 23, and ran across a rack of these guys at Border's in Parkersburg.

I really wanted one, but Jenn wouldn't let me.

If you read the fine print you'll even see that he has "poseable arms, and gliding action!"

Oh... and the best bit.... Jesus is not recommended for children under three years.

Long Overdue Post...

2007-11-27T13:19:00.000-05:00

Well... Tersie was kind enough to remind me today that my blog is getting stale...

I've been meaning for a week now to write a follow-up ("this is how it went, and what I learned") type of post about the NYWC... but as the days stretched on, and I got busier and busier with real life I just didn't feel like putting the pen to the paper, as it were....

Well anyhoo... Tersie reminded me that it is better to post late than never, which is great advice.

So here goes....

NYWC Atlanta - Day 5 in review

I was right about the short night... Knowing that we would need to be packed up and out of the hotel before we headed over to make 8 AM sessions, and not having packed, organized, or made a plan for the morning, we fell into bed about 2 with our alarms set for 5:15...

I'm not quite sure how... but we somehow managed to get up, get showered, get packed, cart everything to the car, and be checked out of our luxury accommodations by 7:15 AM... This left us plenty of time to drag ourselves to the convention center, detour by Starbucks ( There is nothing that says "Good Morning!" like a half-quart of vanilla-bean frappuccino with a quad shot of espresso ) and get Jenn settled into a session when it started by 8.

While Jenn was in her session I went ahead and picked up our DVD's ( Shane Claiborne's and Phyllis Tickle's general sessions were must have on my DVD list ) and some of those cards for downloading MP3's of the sessions we really liked or didn't make it to... I was lazy and just sat around in the YS store, slurping my frappuccino and making new friends until they opened the gates for us to take seats in the general session.

Since the Monday morning general session always feels sparsely populated after the others of the weekend, it was nothing to just wander in and grab a seat right up against the center stage. I will never get tired of the Skit Guys and Lost & Found... Great stuff that...

This shot is from one of the skit guys skits before the general session...

And this one is the guys giving the sign language interpreters ( who were amazing, throughout the weekend ) a hard time by saying "dog poop" over and over again...

I felt bad for Marko... The technical glitches in his presentation obviously frustrated him, but I don't think they took away from his message. The way we do Youth ministry is changing. It has to change, and we can either be on board with the change or get left behind... ( Sorry for no more recollection than that... It was a week ago and I haven't re-listened to the mp3 yet... )

Jenn and I made some last minute grabs from the YS store after the session, and then headed back to the van for the long trek back home... Oh, and after their prompting on the night before we went through Centenial Park on the way back to the hotel and found the brick donated by Lost & Found.

Long story short on the drive... We left Atlanta about 3:30 in the afternoon, made a stop in Knoxville to switch from me driving to Jenn driving, and then stopped again in Louisville to trade back... We made it home safely ( jamming to Lost & Found most of the way ) at about 12:30 AM... grabbed our laptops out of the van and went straight to bed.

Now that we've been back for a week and had time to re acclimate to "real life" I think that a Highlights/What I learned blog is in order... Since this one is getting long though, I'll adjourn to a new post... See you there.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 4 - wrap up

2007-11-19T01:37:00.000-05:00

Well... the rest of the day was a crazy blur, pretty much like I predicted...

At 3 (ish) Jenn took off from the convention center to find us some milk and take more bags of our "stuff" back to the hotel. I feel like we could start a Youth Ministry library with all the books we've carted back from the convention. To make that funnier, I procrastinated in buying some books today until there were none left, so I was able to order them at the show price and have them shipped to me... At least we won't have to find room for them in the car.

I helped Alan & Ed pack up the LW booth, and get it loaded up into Ed's van. By the time we were done with that we were all thinking dinner, so Jenn met us over at Ted's again for a sit down meal ( probably the last one in Atlanta ).

We shared the shrimp appetizer again, and I had a cup of the bison chilli. I also had a bison burger, and onion rings. All tasted good, sweet tea got an A+ again.

Because of the crazy downtown crowd this afternoon ( Falcons at the Georgia Dome, 5000 Youth Workers in town, and a Police concert at the Tabernacle ) we had to wait about 45 minutes for a table at Ted's. So by the time we ate, it was time to book it back down to the convention center for the 8PM General Session.

On the way in to find seats we bumped into Carol again, and got the great opportunity to hang out with her the rest of the evening.

Lost & Found, Bob Stromberg, and Skit Guys all got to play a "warm up" act in the general session. A teaser for the Late Night, if you will.

Worship with Leland was good. I think they might be growing on me.

The speaker at the general session was Marquis Laughlin.

Marquis recites the Bible, from memory, as performance art. Tonight he shared with us Genesis chapter 12 through chapter 22. The story of Abraham. It was awesome!

As Marquis was getting ready to go on, Jenn and Alan slipped up to the Thomas Merton theatre to get some seats for the Late Night. The Skit Guys are some of Jenn's favorite people, and she is being totally honest when she says that the Skit Guys and Lost & Found tonight at the Late night were the highlight of her weekend.

The show was fantastic! Afterward we got to hang out with Tommy & Eddie for a little bit. I absolutely love these guys! Not only are they hilarious, but they are genuinely great guys who really love God and love what they do.

It's now 10 till 2. Jenn really wants to attend an 8 AM Seminar, and among the other things happening in the morning we need to pack up and move out of the hotel, buy our CD's and DVD's from the conference, buy the last couple materials we wanted from the YS Store, attend the closing general session, and prep for the 10 1/2 hour drive home.

Going to be a short night I'm afraid.

I suspect no more blogging until we get back home to Ohio... I will post a Monday wrap up and an overall take on the weekend once we are settled safely back at home.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 4

2007-11-18T13:59:00.000-05:00

Got up early again this morning so that we could be up front and personal with the David Crowder Band in the morning general session. We stopped in the CNN center on the way over here for Arby's and Starbucks. Weird breakfast combo, huh?

Jenn's mad dashing skillz were in full effect this morning, and we sat in "the cheap seats" just to the left of the stage. The morning general session was really good overall. Taylor Mason is great. David Crowder Band rocked, as expected.

I really appreciated Doug Field's talk more than I expected that I would. Not that I had low expectations for Doug, I just have heard him speak before and was worried I wouldn't connect...

His message was fantastic, and something I really needed to hear.

After the general session, David Crowder Band was kind enough to be signing autographs and getting photos with people. Jenn got her picture taken with Bwack, Hogan, and Crowder. She's very excited. I will let her post them though.

We wandered around the exhibit hall for a while after the session, and now I'm doing a quick blog update before the day gets all crazy again.

Our plan from this point out is that at 3, I need to help Alan and Ed tear down the LW booth...

Then we're going to run some things back to the hotel, and get some lunch. I'm craving Chinese, so maybe we'll try to find something of that sort...

We're hitting the general session again then at 8 PM, and definitly seeing the Skit Guys and Lost & Found at the late night tonight...

It's sure to be after midnight when we get back to the hotel. I will update again later if we have downtime, but I suspect we will be on the run the rest of the day.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 3 - In Review

2007-11-18T08:12:00.000-05:00

Well... After two hours of constant typing to get the blogs up to speed, the battery finally died...
I headed over to the LW booth to check the score and plug up for some power. With the Buck's ahead 14-3 I decided it was safe to leave my laptop on the charger in the booth and look for some lunch.

Alan joined Jenn and I for a walk over to HSUS chinese restaurant, which came highly recommended... A short snafu on the way over ( wild goose chase, by someone we wouldn't give cash to ) caused us to get a little lost, but we did end up finding it only about a block away from the HRC where we ate last night...

Unfortunately, despite our intel to the contrary, Hsus wasn't open for lunch... Bearing that in mind we decided to do Mexican at Mama Ninfa's, across the street from Hsus, in the Peachtree Center. It was good. Great tortilla chips and salsa, and Jenn and I split a monster nachos for lunch.

After lunch Alan had to head back to the booth, so Jenn and I took a couple of hours to wander around the city. We checked out the PeachTree Center, the MARTA, and the Atlanta Underground. Interesting sights... I've never seen anything quite like the Underground.

Check out Jenn's take on the MARTA and the Underground here.

Going down the escalator at the MARTA station at PeachTree Center reminded us both of descending to the subway's in Budapest and brought back happy memories... Except, of course, these escalators weren't moving at 20 miles-per-hour... Still, happy memories...

We headed back over to the Conference around six and set up camp in the "line" waiting to get seats for the evening general session.

Thanks to Jenn's mad running skillz, we got some excellent seats right near the center square stage. A prime location to see the talent, and Loui Giglio. Brent Longnecker is a really talented guy.

Family Force 5 was... well... wow... they weren't quite describable...

One amazing thing though... The lady who signing during the Family Force 5 concert was absolutely amazing. We hadn't been sitting where we could see the ASL interpreters up until this session, so I'm not sure if this particular lady had been there all weekend or not, but she was incredible! (side note: watching her, was also the only way I could understand the words to the songs...)

Then we had some stand up comedy. I think that Bill Arnold is hilarious. Subtle, but very funny. A new comedian I've never seen by the name of Jeff Allen was really funny as well... Jenn laughed very hard as his sketch, which was a little edgy I thought, but indeed very funny.

There was a really excellent presentation next about Compassion International, which included a (now grown up) Compassion girl sharing the story of how Compassion impacted her life. Marko got all choked up as she was sharing. We ( as a family ) have two Compassion kids... We decided right after Ellie was born that we would sponsor a child who's birthday was the same day as Ellie's, and then did the same thing again when Silas was born... Currently we send our money and Jenn sends them letters, but our hope is that when they are old enough Ellie & Silas will want to contribute to the communication for our "other kids" who share their birthdays...

I gotta say this about Louie Giglio... I have really really liked Louie when I've seem him in the past. I still remember, have notes, and use some of the teaching he shared at Icthus clear back in 1998 or 99 when I was there with a crowd from Rio...

[edit] I had a really long thing typed up about why I didn't like Louie's message, and why it really didn't connect with me, but before I posted this blog I actually got to talk to someone this morning who thought my issues were just me, being grouchy and argumentative...

So... I'll leave it to say that I really didn't like Louie's message. If you want to talk about why, or know any more than that email me or let's get together... From where I was sitting it was obviously very powerful for some people, and that it what's really important...

Anyhoo... Enough of that sort of thing... If you would like to share what you thought of Louie's session, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

The Comedy Late night with Jeff Allen, Bill Arnold, and Dave & Brian was hilarious!

We picked up a couple of Dave & Brian Cd's before heading back over to the hotel...

By the time we headed back we decided it was too late to find something to eat... so I worked on this and then crashed about 2 AM.

Sunday updates coming today as I get time...

NYWC Atlanta - Day 3 - crashing

2007-11-18T01:37:00.000-05:00

It's almost 2 AM... I have a reaaaaalllly long blog almost ready to go to wrap up the day, but I need to review, edit, and add photos before it will be ready for prime time, and I'm just too tired to deal with all of that tonight....

I will try to wrap up and post first thing in the morning.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 3

2007-11-17T14:10:00.000-05:00

We were so tired this morning that when the alarm clock went off I just killed it onto the floor and went back to sleep. As such, we missed the 8:00 seminars this morning. I was really hoping to go hear Dave Ambrose share the seminar 'What Monks Can Teach Us'... I'll be picking it up on MP3 before we split.

Since we were running a tad behind, Jenn made a break for general session and got seats with Marty & Alan in the "cheap seats" area while I waited in line at Starbucks for vanilla bean frappuccinos and scones.

Shane & Shane are really talented guys and Chris Tomlin was really good.

The speaker at the general session was Phyllis Tickle, and she was amazing!

Her session had to do with the huge change that the church is undergoing as denominational lines among Christians are blurring and ermgent patterns are developing all across Christianity as we know it...

She was very very deep, but I really connected with her message... I texted Steve during the session and his reply was something like "Fiesty old grandma' ain't she".

I'm definitely picking up her session on DVD. Steve needs to see it, and I want to watch it again.

Jenn went to the Women in Youth ministry luncheon at 12:15, and I came down here to the tables near the exhibit hall to blog, which I have now been doing for two hours non-stop...

My battery is about to die, I need to go check the score of the Buckeye's game, and I really need to look up some lunch after Jenn gets back from scoping out the show floor.

More updates later.

-E

NYWC Atlanta - Day 2 - In Review (Continued)

2007-11-17T13:14:00.000-05:00

When Jenn was done taking the show floor by storm, we were able to grab some relatively close seats for the opening General Session.

Marquis Laughlin and Joe Castillo are both amazing, and I have decided that from a distance I like the music of Flatfoot 56. Because we needed to gain some distance to enjoy them, we sort of lost of our seats to listen to Andy Stanley and Jenn and I ended up sitting together at the tables near the exhibit hall to just relax until the general session ended and our afternoon seminars began.

Unbeknownst to us, Gavin busted us skipping the speaker. I found this in his Flikr set this morning.

I went to a session called 'The Expectations that Killed the Youth Worker' by Marko & Mark Riddle.

There was a large segment of the session on conflict resolution, and developing realistic expectations for the Youth workers role in the church. Along with some great stories by both Marks... The most striking moment of the seminar though, was probably this...

Marko had everyone in the room who was a PAID Youth worker stand up. Due to the nature of the seminar ( let's face it, if you're a volunteer and you don't like the expectations the church is putting on you, you go somewhere else ) most of the people in the room stood up... 80 percent or so I would guess...

THEN he asked everyone who as standing this... "If your church stopped paying you to do youth ministry and you would CONTINUE to go to that church, stay standing"

Marko seemed optimistic about the number of people who didn't sit down... but WOW, a lot of people sat down...

I really feel for all of the people who sat down because I have SO been where they are... Going to a church only because you get paid to do youth ministry there is a hard place to be in... Honestly, it just sucks both for the Youth worker and for the church, and the kids in the youth ministry. It ends up with people getting hurt. I so wish I had been able to hear this seminar three years ago.

I am so blessed to be part of an awesome church where I can honestly say I would continue to attend and get plugged in even if they asked me to step away from the Youth there. It would be hard, don't get me wrong... but I honestly believe that Jenn and I have found our home at RVCC... I've told Steve a couple of times that the only way to get rid of us at this point is to straight up tell us to not come back, because outside of that RVCC is stuck with us.

----------

We felt like we really didn't have time to go to dinner because Jenn really wanted good seats to see Third Day at the general session. So after our afternoon seminars Jenn and I scoped out two more rows of the exhibit hall floor and then went to get near the front of the line for the gates to open and and the seat claiming to begin.

Joe Castillo is just amazing. I'm hoping that Jenn and I can stop by his booth today to get a caricature drawn and buy a couple of his DVD's.

Third Day is great. Jenn loves Mac Powell so while I kept and eye on the seats ( which were a safe distance from the stage ) she went and took up a spot near the front from whence she got some amazing photos. Here's one... We'll have to upload a flickr set of all of our photos from the show later...

The speaker at the general session was Shane Claiborne. He game up on stage, made very brief small talk, breathed fire, did a back flip, put out his torch with his mouth and then prepped the crowd by saying "I'm not going to share the greatest sermon ever given".

He then read the Sermon on the Mount. The whole thing.

I wasn't sitting where I could see Shane right on, but getting to watch his face on the screens while he read was an awesome experience in and of itself... He wasn't just reading. He loved it! He was excited, enthusiastic, he grinned at Jesus' sarcasm, spat out Jesus warnings, preached Jesus' sermon with passion.

When he finished reading ( it took 10 or 15 minutes ) he took a deep breath... paused for a minute, and said "I've just shared the greatest sermon ever given, may God grant us the courage to put it into practice"

And he stepped down off the stage!

Just getting to watch his face and listen to the excitement in his voice while he read gave me chills, but add to that the obvious discomfort in the room while everyone sat in shocked silence, not really sure what to say, or how to react was freaking amazing! I was SO pumped!

Tic came up afterwards to pray and close the session and it was such a relief to hear him say out loud what it was obvious the majority of the room was thinking... "As I sat there listening to him read, I caught myself thinking... Is this all he's going to do?"

The other awesome thing about Shane's choice of message is how uncomfortable it seemed to make the crowd... There is deep truth there! Truth that every single one of us fail to live up to, and choose to ignore ( or only believe selectively ) as we live out our faith in the day to day...

I know we've all heard the sermon on the mount before, and we've all heard bits and pieces of it picked apart and analyzed... but that's the first time in my life I've ever just heard it "preached".

It was awesome!

After the general session Marty, Alan, Jenn and I had a later dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe.

By the time we were done eating the lack of sleep, and all the day's acitivity just caught up with me and I mentally shut down...

Fell into bed exhausted at 12:30 this morning.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 2 - In Review

2007-11-17T12:41:00.001-05:00

By the time we made it back to the hotel last night we had been going for nineteen hours on six hours of sleep... I was beyond the point of coherence...

Thankfully I took notes to myself on and off throughout the day yesterday because it was too good of a day to not cover in detail.

Jenn's HerStory session went until noonish yesterday, and I was able to spend most of that time just relaxing and lying low at the convention... I walked around the show floor for a little bit, read more in detail about some of the sessions I was planning to attend, and did email and read blogs until about 11:30.

Around 11:45 I had an awesome opportunity to sit down and have lunch with Marko. I've said many times, here on the blog, and in person how much I appreciate Youth Specialties and the work they do to encourage, empower, and equip youth pastors to be more effective in their ministries. And even though I'm a volunteer youth leader in a small church in a small town and may never be a "heavy hitter" in the world of Youth Ministry... it is really cool to be able to come to the conventions and make connections with folks who do wield the big guns in our field...

I really tried to not have an agenda when Marko and we got together because I really just wanted to chat and hang out with him. I know he's been checking blogs on and off throughout the weekend, so if he pops over here hopefully he can confirm that I wasn't a blithering idiot... ( or if I was a blithering idiot, maybe he'll cut me a break since he's famous and probably has to deal with blithering idiots all the time ).

Anyhoo... Had a great lunch just talking and sharing and hanging out. Thanks dude!

Oh... Also as we were wrapping up, I snapped this shot of Marko across the table. I didn't put him up to this, I promise.

Also as we were breaking up Gavin wandered by with his camera handy and snapped a photo of Marko and I with Carol, another youth worker blogging from the convention.

To make this whole situation funnier, when I did meet back up with Jenn on the show floor later she had stopped at some booth where they were custom carving those rubber bracelet things. I have a couple on my keychain for GeoCaching and other things, and she had thoughtfully had one made for me to add to my collection.

I feel like this post is getting long, so I'm going to break it up... More next coming soon...

NYWC Atlanta - Day 2 - crashing

2007-11-17T00:21:00.000-05:00

Today was a very very full day. I have so much to post about, and photos as well... but I'm too tired to put something coherent together tonight...

I have notes, I will attempt to post the day in review first thing in the morning.

Good night.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 2 - early

2007-11-16T08:02:00.000-05:00

It is funny to me how a persons definition of the word "famous" differs so greatly based on the circles they tend to run in...

Let me back up... I slept so good last night. Being tired does that to you.

Hrm... Let me back up some more...

While we were in Ted's last night, just as we stepped in the door Jenn nudged me and said "Hey, that guy looks like Jeremy Bush, the drummer for David Crowder Band".

I looked up, and it was Gavin! ( I mentioned him last night ).

I wasn't stalking you dude, really...

Also in the spirit of shamelessly plugging my new friend you can read Gavin's initial post about NYWC here, and follow his Flickr stream of the conference here.

Also, as promised, here is the photo he snapped last night compliments of his Flickr feed.

Anyhoo... where was I...

Oh yeah... I slept really good last night. Jenn's HerStory conference resumed at 8 this morning, so we set our alarm for extra early. I'm sure that by the end of the night tonight, I will be wishing that six hours of sleep had been 10, but what can you do...

We bundled up better today than yesterday, and even though it was crisp outside the wind wasn't blowing so I didn't get cold at all on the walk over. We went back to the amazing wraps joint in the CNN foodcourt for breakfast, which we paired with Starbucks coffee. It was excellent.

Jenn made it back to her session and I returned to the range of LiveWorship's wifi to blog, check email, and chill out. Which brings me back to how this post got started.... In case you forgot, let me remind you...

"It is funny to me how a persons definition of the word "famous" differs so greatly based on the circles they tend to run in..."

I'm sitting here, in kind of an out-of-the-way area next to the main walkway in building B of the Georia World Congress Center... Just a minute ago Duffy Robbins walked by going one way, and then back the other way toting a suitcase ( I'm guessing his materials for his morning session ). Tic Long just walked by, in conversation with someone... and, although I haven't seen him yet this morning, I suspect that Marko is also wandering around here somewhere... Oh! and I just spotted Jarred Hall on his way to the show floor...

Although most of my family, the vast majority of my co-workers, and even many of church friends wouldn't have a clue who these guys are... They are big names. Celebrities, if you will, in this field of Youth Ministry. How cool is it that we get an opportunity to be here and hang out with these guys, learn from them, hear what they have to say, and maybe even pick their brains.

Very cool indeed.

Not sure what the plan for the remainder of the day is... Several sessions I'm planning to hit, Jenn is wrapping up the HerStory conference ( which she says is awesome ). I also forsee more coffee in my immediate future.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 1 - wrap up

2007-11-15T23:17:00.000-05:00

Ok... For those of you who were not aware of my general level of nerd-ness, I'm about to fill you in.

Marko ( remember him ) keeps a list of people who are blogging from the NYWC.

At the urging of a few folks on said list, he was kind enough to also list the links for those of us who are tweeting from the conference. ( If you aren't familiar with Twitter, look here first, then here, and then go get an account here ).

IF you are already familiar with Twitter skip ahead some....

The act of posting to twitter is referred to as "tweeting".

Well, for me part of the fun of having Twitter is following other people who are doing the same sort of thing that I am doing... I update my twitter and "follow" the people I'm following all from my iPhone using SMS messages. So basically when I want to update mine, I send a text that says something like "is eating pizza". And then everyone who is following me gets a text message that says "Eli is eating pizza".

Likewise, anytime someone who I am following updates their twitter from their phone I get a text message telling me what they are doing...

You can also view my twitter updates online here.

SKIP TO HERE! ( for the folks who skipped ahead... if you've been reading this whole time, just keep going )

Anyway... In addition to blogging from the convention, and updating my twitter I'm also following several other folks who are twittering as well. Some of the guys I'm following are also following me, some are probably not...

As I was wrapping up my last blog, and the battery on my laptop was dying a guy happened to walk up near where I was sitting and said "Hey, here's someone blogging from the convention." A quick name-tag glance later and he realized that it was me, who he was following on twitter.

And that is how I met Gavin, who is blogging here and twittering here.

Neat huh!

Gavin, having the presence of mind to have a camera with him, took a photo of the two us of standing with our backs to the exhibit hall, which I hope he will pass on to me so I can share it with all of you thus completing this geek moment.

This update on geeks at the NYWC brought to you by Twitter.

To wind up the rest of the evening.... I met up with Jenn when the HerStory conference was done for the day, bumped into Marty's fam for a couple of minutes, said "Good Night" to the whole gang and slipped off to dinner at Ted's Montana Grill, which was excellent.

We split the jumbo shrimp appetizer, which was amazing, and then had some bison chili and shared a burger, which was pretty good. The sweet tea was an A+.

Now, we're back at the hotel. Jenn and I are both tired and stiff from doing all the walking which neither one of us are accustomed to. We're both slinging blog updates now, and will be crashing shortly. Tomorrow will be here very very soon.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 1 - part 2

2007-11-15T20:29:00.000-05:00

While I was waiting for Jenn's session to be over I succumbed to the need for caffeine and went to Starbucks here in the convention center...

Grande Yukon blend, hot with room for cream...

Mmmmm.....

We met back up and rather than go to dinner we decided to take the YS Store by storm during the Thursday night madness sale... picked up a few books, Jenn got a sweatshirt.

Jenn had to be back at the HerStory Conference at 7:30, so we spent a little time walking around the show floor together, and then she headed back and I walked around the show floor for another 45 minutes or so on my own... There are TONS of summer missions organizations here... I'm kind of glad that we already have a great relationship with Youthworks, b/c it just makes it easier to choose them again and again... If it weren't for that connection already, it would be really hard to decide who to go with...

I was also a little taken aback by the huge number of summer camps that are here based in North Carolina & Tennesee... I know that it shouldn't surprise me, since Atlanta is a prime place to recruit for summer campers... Being so far away from most of the camps though, the people working the booth just assume that I'm a lost cause ( small church in Southern Ohio, bringing a dozen teens 10+ hours for a week of summer camp... ) I hope that it is a good show for them... I wonder what the ratio of Youth Workers who are native to this general area ( within a couple hours of here ) is compared to those of us who came from pretty far away...

Anyhoo....

I'm really tired, and not really looking forward to the walk back to the hotel... People keep coming up to me and asking where my coat is, or if I know how cold it is outside...

Maybe I should wear long sleeves tomorrow. I'm still wearing shorts though.

Maybe one more post before bed... I'm not really sure what our plans are after Jenn gets out of her session.

NYWC Atlanta - Day 1

2007-11-15T15:33:00.000-05:00

Well, we're here!

The hotel definitely isn't the Mariott, but the room was clean and the shower was hot, and we both got a good nights sleep after a long day of driving.

The Women in Youth Ministry pre-conference didn't start this morning as early as we thought, so Jenn and I didn't really rush to get ready and make our way over to the convention center. The wind here is blowing hard and is really cold, but if it weren't for the breeze it would be perfect weather!

This convention center is HUGE! NYWC is in the B-Hall. We got registered, got our bags, books, nametags, etc and grabbed breakfast at convention center and ate while we poured over the schedule to decide what seminars, sessions, and late nights we are going to hit for the whole weekend, and what we're not going to make it to and will have to buy on CD.

With all that decided ( tentatively, of course... plans are always subject to change based on the rockage or suckage of the speaker, comedian, presenter, etc ) anyway... with all that decided, we took ourselves on a grand tour of the conference center to find all of the appropriate rooms, halls, and boys bathrooms where our sessions would be.

Don't we sound crazy organized... hahahaha

We grabbed a quick lunch at the food court in the CNN center. Grabbed some amazing wraps from a place (aptly) named 'Amazing Wraps'.

By early afternoon Jenn needed to get to the HerStory opening session, so I went to track down Ed & Alan for the setting up of LW booth. Even though I'm not working in the booth this weekend, it made the trips fewer and setup easier to have another set of hands involved.

The booth looks good. Different than St. Louis, but still good I think. ( photos of the booth coming later )

I've found a great little spot in the convention center where I anticipate being perched on and off throughout the weekend. Jenn and I ate breakfast here this morning, and I'm back here now, updating the blog and checking email. It is a little cafe area with a big window overlooking the exhibit hall. Here's the view from where I'm perched at the moment.

This will be a good place to sit, decompress, relax, catch a snack maybe, and definitely update the blog when I have time.

Oh... I guess it wouldn't be right of me to not point out the LW booth. Click to see the bigger version.

Well... That's it for now. I'm meeting Jenn at 5 to see about dinner. Then hitting the exhibit hall and maybe the Worship Together concert tonight.

More later...

NYWC Atlanta - The Journey

2007-11-14T23:53:00.001-05:00

Jenn and I managed to get out of Chillicothe around 12:15, after dropping off the kids to Tom & Billie.

The nuvi ( thanks Steve! ) took us south on 23 to 32, and then down 41 through West Union to Maysville and then down 68 to Lexington. From Lexington it was 75 South alllllll the way.

That first let isn't what me, or Google Maps would have picked out but it was a good drive.

It poured the rain all the way across Kentucky and Tennessee... We took a quick stop at Lexington and again at Knoxville to stretch and trade off driving.

Arrival in Atlanta at 10:30, checked in and settling into the hotel... Tomorrow morning we're going to scope the terrain, figure out how long it will take us to walk from here to the conference center, and look for a good place for lunch.

More updates to come.

Making the afternoon bearable.

2007-11-13T14:54:00.001-05:00

2:55 PM.

unanswered email. desk is a disaster. projects to work on. retreat to plan. trip to pack for. iphone that needs hacked. blogs to read. blogs to write. phone ringing. stressed because I write at a junior high reading level...

*deep breath...

*sigh of contentment.

the coffee is good though.

*sigh

2007-11-13T14:50:00.000-05:00

Jenn's blog scored a Genius reading level...

This blog is for all the rest'a'ya'll who don' reed so guud tho...

Buzz & Woody - The sad goodbye

2007-11-12T13:27:00.001-05:00

Been meaning to post this for several days, but a combination of being a procrastinator and just waaay to busy and preoccupied to sit and blog has kept me from updating...

You may recall that a while back we got some hamsters... Details can be found here.

Well... We got home from work on Thursday of last week to find that Woody hadn't made it through the day... Both Buzz and Woody have been looking haggard for a couple of weeks. I honestly think that our house is/was probably too cold for them to live comfortably in. We had also switched them to cedar shavings instead of pine shavings for bedding and they didn't seem to like that at all...

[ PETA DISCLAIMER : now before anyone goes and calls PETA on us for hamster cruelty, yes they were fed and watered with fresh food and water regularly, and yes I was cleaning the habitat completely out and washing the whole thing down with warm (non-soapy) water weekly... Yes, we have had pets before... and yes, I can assure you the hamsters did not die of neglect... ]

Anyway... Woody was dead when we got home, and Buzz was having a lot of difficulty moving around and didn't act like he was able to see or hear me that well when I attempted to interact with him.

I quickly moved the habitat up out of Ellie's range of vision and reach so that I could check the situation out, and after determining that Buzz was obviously not going to make it I gave him a little boost up to hamster heaven.

I fashioned a hamster coffin out of a paper towel tube (biodegradable) and after placing both deceased rodents inside, stapled the ends shut and went to have "the talk" with Ellie...

Jenn laughs at me now... I guess I was naive enough to think that Ellie would be very sad and need comforting...

I picked Ellie up and sat her down in my chair to tell her that her little pets were no longer with us and the whole process got me all choked up...

Me : "Ellie sweety, Buz and Woody got very sick and they died today"

Her: "Oh yeah?" ( At this point she did look a little sad, but I think it was b/c I was crying and she couldn't figure out why... I did my best to regain my composure... )

Me: "Aren't you sad sweety?"

Her: "I guess so."

Me: "Do you want to talk about it?"

Her: "Not really"

Me: "Do you want to go with me while I bury them?"

Her: "No Dad, can I get down and play with my princesses now?"

*sigh... Great life lesson there Dad.

So... since there was apparently no reason for me to be sitting around sniffling I took the hamsters out back and Ellie got down for some playing with princesses grief therapy...

So we are now hamster-less... Maybe we will try again after the new year... Maybe Ellie will persist in not-caring and we won't get anymore at all... Time will tell I guess.

St Louis Arch

2007-11-09T17:01:00.000-05:00

Monday morning in St. Louis, Alan and I checked out of the hotel and decided to visit the Gateway Arch before we headed back to Ohio.

If you are ever in St. Louis, and have the chance to visit the arch, do it! Very very neat.

Here are some photos from our quick visit.

The view of the arch walking in from the park... It was so tall, that I had to take two photos and stitch them together with photoshop.

Me, standing at the top of the observation deck in the middle of the arch.

The shadow of the arch in the park, taken from the observation deck.

The windows are tilted so that you can look straight down at the ground below the top of the arch. Here is another stitched together view of the legs coming up to meet in the middle.

This last one is a self-created panorama of the city of St. Louis from the observation deck...

I didn't take the time or care to stitch this one together very well, but it is neat anyway.

Good show and a fun week in St. Louis. We got back home pretty late on Monday night, and it has been a very busy week at work this week.

Looking forward to the weekend, even though it will be busy.

Happy Birthday Marty!

2007-11-08T17:12:00.000-05:00

Today is Marty's birthday. He generally likes to keep that sort of thing on the down-low...

So, being his friend and all, I just wanted to let everyone know.

Happy Birthday Marty! Thanks for letting us take you to lunch!

Ole!

NYWC St. Louis - Last Post Part 2

2007-11-05T02:01:00.001-05:00

I just had to tack a post on here to say that the Late Night with Lost & Found, Skit Guys and Bob Stromberg was the funniest thing I have ever seen.

I laughed so hard I might be injured. Lost and Found are awesome... Bob Stromberg is a great storyteller, and the Skit Guys are two amazing and talented folks.

I stayed to talk to Tommy & Eddie briefly after the show just to tell them how much I appreciate their stuff, and say Thanks for their kind emails and comments back to me and Jenn after I blogged about the Skits that Teach thing this past year.

I know that all of these artists are bombarded with people wanting to be their friends, and share with them, and make connections with them and ( even as badly as I want to sit down with Marko and Tommy & Eddie even for a half an hour just to drink coffee and talk ) I always feel terribly guilty about being one of "those people"... because really, in the grand scheme of things, there is no reason that any of them should remember who I am, and it would be silly to expect them to take time out of their ( already ) crazy schedules just to make a connection with every Youth Worker who wanted their time/advice/etc.

Wow... This post is turning out way longer than I intended...

Anyhoo... I guess my point is that I don't want to be one of "those people" who are constantly hovering around the famous people and trying to pretend like we are friends, and that for me, it is really really cool when ( even after a year ) there is a hint of recognition when we make even a momentary connection...

I really need to shake this "marko stalker" label that the kids have on me too... haha

Wow again... I have no idea what any of this has to do with anything...

Just part of "My Story" I guess.

NYWC St. Louis - Last Post

2007-11-04T20:04:00.001-05:00

This will probably be my last post from the NYWC here in St. Louis. We had a good afternoon on the show floor today. Lots of people came by the booth, and were excited about LiveWorship.

The last 45 minutes or so seemed to take a long long time, as the crowd had pretty much thinned out and we were basically just sitting and waiting for the official pack up time to arrive

Tear down was very quick and efficient for us. We had the whole booth torn down, packed up and back in the van in just over an hour.

With the van packed, we said good bye to the guys who had been stuck next to us all weekend and drove down to Lacede's Landing to look up some dinner. We found a little bar on the landing called the Feisty Bulldog which had good sandwiches and a great appetizer of home made chips with bleu cheese and tabasco on them.

Not much else to tell since then... With the van packed up we returned to the hotel to chill for a while before we head back to the show for the evening. General session starts at 8, followed by the Late Night with Bob Stromberg, Skit Guys, and Lost & Found.

That should put us back here in the room around midnight (or later).

Tomorrow morning we are hoping to check out by 8, and head down to the St. Louis arch for a tour and ride up to the observation deck. Then we're planning to hit Marko's session at 11, and be on the road back to Ohio by 1:30.

See my twitter for minute by minute details if you're curious as to more specific where-abouts until we get home.

If you've been reading the blogs while I'm down here, hope you've enjoyed them.

See you back in Ohio late tomorrow night.

NYWC St. Louis - Sunday Morning Update

2007-11-04T12:36:00.001-05:00

The comedy show last night was just plain fantastic! All four of the comedy acts were hilarious, but Bill Arnold was my favorite by far. His humor is a little dry, but he is one funny dude.

Before the comedy show Alan and I had dinner at an little Italian place down around the corner on Broadway. J.F. Sanfillipo's I think was the name. It was awesome! The hot fresh sesame rolls rocked, and there was no way I could finish the huge plate of fettucini alfredo they set in front of me.

I was up really late again last night, even after we got back to the room from the comedy show. I ended up talking on IM and doing email until almost 2 in the morning. Thankfully the time change gave us an extra hour of sleep to go on, so I don't feel all that bad this morning.

We opened the booth for a quick morning session from 8:45 till 11 AM. Had a couple of great conversations, but especially one with a guy who was a very happy MS3 user and not about to give us the time of day when I talked him into looking a demo... I think he was genuinely impressed by our ease of use.

The morning General Session this morning was started by Jeff Johnson who I really really needed at Cinci last year. The slowing down and resting and breathing in God is a pretty powerful experience. This morning I just couldn't get into it though, and ended up sitting in the lobby with Alan researching options for visiting the arch while we are here in town.

We caught the skit guys bit after Jeff and loved it. I stopped and talked to Eddie briefly before the session started ( just to see if he would remember who I was, and to say Hi ).

Now the speaker is on stage, but I've slipped out again. I'm munching on some nachos and getting in a blog update before the booth opens again from noon till 3:30.

Oh... The cheerleaders are back in force this morning. Seemed to be mostly older girls this morning and less 3-8 year olds... Makes the fact they they aren't wearing hardly anything and are made-up like hookers even worse. I told Alan on the way in that there are only a few groups I can think of who could have been more awkward sharing the convention center with 3500 youth pastors... A stripper convention maybe, or the adult film industry...

Ok Ok maybe it isn't really all that bad. BUT... cheerleading is quickly being ruled out of Ellie's future. No way I am letting her get into anything like this. She'll be a band geek, and she'll like it.

Band kids are more spiritual anyway ( see previous post ).

Ah well... back to work.

Edit - Nov 06 - A response

Wanted to take a few minutes to respond to this comment by Daisy, and was afraid my response might go longer than a comment permitted, so I decided to do an addendum instead.

daisy said on November 5, 2007 11:07 AM...

"I have read a bunch of blogs from the people in attendance of the NYWC in STL. Let me ask you this; if so many Christians are "disgusted" by the cheerleaders and find it sad and like you stated, won't let your kids take part in it, then where are all the cheerleaders going to find Christian influence? By just letting them be segregated from the Christians, are you showing Christ's love here?"

First... I have no idea who Daisy is or how to respond to her other than by posting again here... I hope that she comes back to see my response, and that if more dialogue is needed she will continue to comment.

I guess I want to start my response by saying that my feelings toward the cheerleading competition in St. Louis has NOTHING to with the girls here at the convention being cheerleaders... There are a several cheerleaders who attend my own church and youth group and at least one of them is a "core kid" in our youth ministry.

What saddened me about the cheerleading convention ( which I saw very very little of, by the way ) is that these girls are being put on display in a way that is totally inappropriate for girls of any age group no matter how old they are. If our high school cheerleaders dressed in some of the outfits I saw walking through the lobby, they wouldn't even be permitted on the school grounds, let alone into a football or basketball game.

I guess I have no idea what is actually taking place on the stage in the competition either, so I can only assume that the "dancing" that was taking place all over the lobby were girls practicing for their routines and not just imitating the latest Brittany Spears music video...

On the way out of the convention center on Saturday afternoon, I actually walked by a group of six to ten girls ( who I would guess to have been age five or six ) all clustered around a mother who was kneeling in their midst... The girls were all wearing disturbingly short tops and short skirts with far more skin exposed than not. They all had heavy eye-makeup and bright red lipstick on. The mother (parent/coach) was saying as I walked by... "Now girls... the team from [some name I didn't catch] really put you guys to shame earlier so I want you to get back in there and kick their little asses this time!"

I'll paraphrase Marko and say, I wanted to smack the lady.

Let me try to wrap this up by saying that I totally agree with you, Daisy, that segregation from cheerleaders in general ( or any group for that matter ) is the wrong approach. And I agree that someone really needs to be "in there" sharing the love of Christ with the girls, their parents, their coaches, etc... I just have a sneaky suspicion that getting that sort of attention from me, or any one else wearing a "Youth Pastor Badge" wouldn't have gone over so well this weekend... I'm afraid it would have come across a lot like the bullhorn Jesus guy.

Also, I don't think I would honestly prevent my three year old daughter from being a high school cheerleader if she really wants to... I just hope she doesn't feel the kind of pressure to be put on display by anyone as she grows up and decides what she wants to be in life.

My biggest problem here is that I can't imagine that these (little) girls would really be doing this to themselves ( the skimpy dress, the "dancing", the kick-their-little-asses competitiveness ) unless they were pushed into it by parents, coaches, society, etc... and that they have that pressure put on them by anyone really does make me sad.

Thank you for making me clarify. I'm open to more comments and/or discussion.

-Eli

NYWC St. Louis - Day 2 in full swing.

2007-11-03T16:22:00.001-05:00

First of all let me say that I am really bummed because I waited in the second floor guys bathroom this morning for an hour waiting to catch the seminar "Teaching Teenage boys how to kick the crap out of Non-Christians" by Winfield H. Tutte.

Must have been the wrong bathroom.

Secondly, how is this for irony... The America Center which is housing the NYWC this weekend is also playing host to some sort of crazy cheerleading competition out on the other end of the building... What this comes down to is that in order to get to and from the General Sessions and the exhibit hall all of these youth workers and staff have to walk through a mob of little girls ( some as young as three or four ) dancing provocatively (practicing, I guess??) and wearing things that little girls should never ever wear.

If it didn't make me sad, I would laugh.

We had a great crowd in our booth this morning for the show floor hours, and had some great conversations with folks about using our software in their ministries... Can't imagine what would have been drawing them our way...

Had lunch during our break at The Soup Man a couple blocks away. Great bowl of crab chowder and a grilled cheese sandwich.

The show floor opens back up in about five minutes, so I'd better get back over there...

NYWC St. Louis - The Day in Review

2007-11-02T23:48:00.001-05:00

Well, it's almost midnight again in St. Louis and we are just getting settled in after a very busy day at the National Youth Worker's convention.

This hotel is really really nice, much nicer than anything I could afford to stay in if I weren't here on "business" and I'm sure waaaaayyyy nicer than the room Jenn and I will be sharing in Atlanta. That is just to say that I slept great last night after finally turning in at 1:30 AM. The alarm went off too soon this morning, so we grabbed a quick breakfast before heading back to the show floor to start this marathon Friday.

At no point today would I call the show floor crowded. We were busy in the booth several times, but nothing compared to what I've experienced working the booth at Macworld. We had a lot of MediaShout "haters" come through today, as well as some Mac fanatics who were excited to see LiveWorship running great on my MBP. Sometime around noon Garfield called in with a Leopard update, so I was able to demo LW on 10.5 for most of the afternoon, which went great!

What makes Friday at YW so busy is that if you are working the show, and plan to attend the general sessions there is simply no time at all to stop and smell the roses. We ran the booth from 9 till 12:30, caught the first Gen Session from 1-3:30, reopened the booth from 3-7, and then hit the final general session from 7:30-10, by which point we were both hungry so grabbed some quick dinner at a restaurant down the block.

Gen Session number 1 was really really good. FlatFoot 56 (an "old school punk band with celtic overtones" ) did nothing for me, but Duffy Robbins and David Crowder Band were simply amazing. Duffy was funny, and powerful and really drove home a great message about letting God be God and not trying to screw it up for Him. I heard DCB do Remedy for the first time live and it left me in awe... What a great song, what a great band.

Gen Session number 2 featured DCB again, which was fantastic. There was also this guy at both general sessions who did performance art by moving sand around on a table. It's hard to explain, but it was really really cool. The speaker at Gen Session # 2 was a guy named Chris Hill. We probably missed a great talk, but he didn't catch my attention right off the bat so we split to come in search of dinner about 10 minutes into his lesson.

Marko's pre session pep talk was very good and I hope that in Atlanta I can take his advice to heart and use my time at YW to "get away" with God and with Jenn for some much needed rejuvenation.

The only other huge highlight of the day that I can think of off-hand is that I had a great conversation with a few of the ladies from YouthWorks over by their booth on the show floor today. What a great group of folks! I'm so excited for our HS mission trip next summer! Can't wait to be able to tell the kids where we are headed and get the ball rolling on plans.

Well, it's been a good day. Busy, but good. I'm tired, and tomorrow is bound to be long again.

More later, Roogles out.

Live from St. Louis

2007-11-02T10:23:00.000-05:00

This is post number one, live from National Youth Workers Convention in St. Loius.

We made good time on the drive, got a killer deal on fabric at a going out of business fabric store to use for table cloths, and got our booth setup without any real snafu's.

Yesterday made for a long day with the travel, booth setup, and the mixer in the evening. Made longer by grabbing a really late dinner (which I will blog about later).

Highlight of the day yesterday was definitly dinner, but highlight number two was running into Marko on the show floor and getting to chat with him for a minute. Poor guy... someone had thrown up on his shirt.

It is almost 11:00 AM now in St. Louis, and we've had a steady stream of people coming into the booth.

Here are two photos of our booth. Huge thanks to the girl in the Compassion booth (on the corner from us ) for letting me stand in her booth to get this first one.

And here are the guys from the Noah's Ark booth across the aisle from us. I had to give them a shout out because they are stuck looking at Alan and I all weekend long.

That's all I have time for now. It is sure to be a long day.

Roogles out.

Late. Random.

2007-10-30T23:04:00.001-05:00

11:10 PM. I'm sitting in the recliner. Woody is running on the hamster wheel. Buzz is sleeping in the dome. Jenn, Ellie, and Silas are all in bed. The dryer is running. My suitcase is packed, except for two pair of shorts, which are in the dryer. I cleaned the hamster cage tonight. Woody & Buzz seem much happier. Halloween starts in 48 minutes. It hasn't even felt like October yet. We have had frost two mornings in a row. I like frost. I like cold mornings. I like walking in frost covered grass in my bare feet. On Thursday it will be November. The leaves have been changing. The weather today was perfect. I wonder how the weather in St. Louis compares to here? I want to go tent camping. Tent camping in the fall is the best. I like to sit around the fire when it is cold enough that you need the fire to keep you warm. I shaved my head this evening. I hate my hair. I'm so tired, but not sleepy. I am very stressed. If my days had 25 hours in them, and I didn't need sleep, I might feel more organized. I'd love a cup of coffee. Coffee is also better when it is cold. The weather, not the coffee. The coffee is much better when it is very very hot. Hot coffee. Cold weather. 11:25 PM. Surprising how noisy hamsters can be when the house is quiet. Dryer is still running. I think woody is on crack. He's the mean one. 39 degrees outside. Wonder if it will frost again tonight. Did I mention that I like frost? 11:36 PM. Distracted. Should be asleep. I don't get enough sleep. Lots of people on IM at this hour. Strange. Maybe not strange. Who am I to say. My toes are getting cold. 67 degrees in the house. May need to turn on the heater. Been very cold in the mornings. In the house I mean. I'm Too stubborn to turn the furnace on. Maybe in November. Silas is crying. Probably afraid of the dark. Or cold. Ellie is afraid of the dark. Sleeps with a light on. He stopped now. Must have found his binky or been rescued by Jenn. 11:52 PM. Headache. Took my glasses off when I shaved my head. Didn't put them back on. Eyes are tired. I'm grouchy. I Let too many small things get to me. It is dumb. I need to take a deep breath. Maybe get away. Maybe move away. Maybe just take a break. 12:01 AM. Happy Halloween. Alarm will go off in five-and-a-half hours. *Sigh. Still a lot of people online. Definitively will be wanting a good cup of coffee in the morning. I should go to bed. Dryer is still running. Should go check on it. I think I will. 12:04 AM. Roogles out.

Freak Out!

2007-10-25T09:31:00.000-05:00

This is just too good to post on the other blog.

The #1 Billboard song from December 5, 1978 ( my birthday ).

"Le Freak" by Chic

Find your own on this site!

ht to Marko for posting this.

( totally unrelated, but I want to be just like this bass player when I grow up )

Making the morning bearable.

2007-10-09T09:44:00.001-05:00

Yes, of course I'm working...

A cup-o-Tims, NetNewsWireLite, 135 RSS feeds, with 517 unread messages... *sigh

What more does the morning really need?

Go Band

2007-10-05T14:50:00.001-05:00

Another short post while I'm unpacking my brain and clearing the photos off of my iPhone...

I snapped this at the football game on Friday night during the pre-game show.

Lots of our youth from RVCC are in the marching band. There are probably scientific theories as to why the ratio of band kids in a youth group always seems to be much higher than that of the of football players and cheerleaders... I know that it was true in my high school youth group, and it seems to be the norm for youth groups I've encountered...

Maybe band kids are just more spiritual ?? Who knows...

Anyhoo... I played the tuba ( well, sousaphone... but you know ) in marching band in jr. high and high school. In a small county school marching band, I was the only tuba player in the band a couple of those years but normally I was one of a pair.

Laureen ( who was a senior, when I was a lowly seventh grader ) was a great mentor friend, and then Bobby ( who became my apprentice during my sophomore or junior year ) was a great accomplice and partner in all sorts of tuba-centric antics... We had lots of fun.

The band always joked at Adena about performing the incomparable script "A" during our pre-game show. It makes me smile, and brings back memories to see Waverly's band perform the incomparable script "W" on Friday nights...

It actually wouldn't be a stretch for me to say that marching band was probably the best thing about Jr. High and high school... ( I'm sure it would crack Steve up to know that I never missed an Adena high school football game for six years in a row, and still have little clue as to what is happening on the field ).

Anyway... Go band!

I'm proud of you guys.

Great show this past Friday night.

It sucks that you aren't at the away games.

oh... and tuba players rule!

That's my boy.

2007-10-05T14:18:00.001-05:00

Something short and sweet after that last bit of rambling...

Took this photo on Saturday morning at Bob's in Waverly...

After devouring five pancakes of his own and two of Ellie's we resorted to giving Silas ( aka Hoover ) biscuits to inhale until he acted like he wasn't hungry anymore... He stopped after two.

Organization, Lists, and Getting Things Done.

2007-10-05T13:53:00.001-05:00

For over a year now I have been toying with the idea jumping into the Getting Things Done system. If you're not familiar with it, or haven't heard of it, follow the link to get the gist... Basically though, if you're not interested in the link it is a system of organizing your thoughts, time, and activities into manageable lists and projects in order to keep yourself organized... Followers of GTD are almost as fanatical as mac users when it comes to loving the system and being "pushers" for the cause.

I went so far as to buy the book but never really got around to reading it. ( How's that for irony ) My cursory glances made me think it was just too complicated, and would take too much time to setup the processes, so I just kept putting it off and putting it off.

Steve, being aware of my affinity for moleskine notebooks ( link1 , link2 ), recently sent me a link in which one of the bloggers we both follow had created for himself a moleskine pda following the advice he had seen on some other blogs.

Since this long story is already too long, I'll just get to the point and say that based on some of the links that Adam pointed out in his blog I took the time to create a simplified GTD system, using a moleskine ruled pocket notebook, and have employed a simplified system to "get things done" myself.

These two pages [ Hacking a GTD Moleskine and PigPogPDA ] were the two posts that most inspired me to put the system I'm using together... I am mostly using the hyalineskies method form the first link, with small borrowed elements from the PigPog system.

If you really want to understand the systems in detail - go read their sites... The basics go something like this though...

1. You put everything you can possibly think of that you should be spending any time on at all down in an annotated "to-do" list.

2. The notations on the list show ( at a glance ) tell how long each item has been on the list, how many times you've put it off, and if there is something preventing you from actually being able to do it right now.

3. If an item is too big to actually be done in one fell swoop, then it spawns a project. A project is a collection of action items ( to-do's ) that all go together.

4. At least once a day, you start at the top of the list and take some action on every item! The action can either be to "Get-R-Done" ( Sorry Jenn! ) in which case you do it, or or to put it off in which case you move it down on the list and alter the notation.

With my OCD, I'm hoping that as the iteration number ( how many times have I put this off ) gets higher and higher it will drive me nuts and I'll have to do it...

Anyhoo... I actually started using the system last Saturday, and this has been a really productive week at work... We'll see how it goes from here on out.

Here are two photos of my current system ( Yes, I included my pen... more on that in a minute ).

The Hyalineskies GTD Moleskine

My current inbox/next action page

And now a notes on the pens... You already know ( you do know this right ) that I am such a huge pen nerd that I occasionally obsess about my writing impliment... One of the greatest thing about reading all of the blogs I surfed about moleskine organization systems, and from people who just have and love moleskines in general is that EVERYONE who writes about them mentions their preferred pen. It is great to see other ink pen fanatics posting about their weapons of choice. Love it.

Enough on this topic. I am interested to hear thoughts/comments.

-Roogles Out

( thanks to Steve for sending me the link, Adam for his original post, Eston Bond for the hyalineskies system, Tersie for this post (which motiviated to blog about this), and Jenn for tracking down some moleskine ruled pocket notebooks for me on the cheap )

Computer Environment

2007-09-26T14:46:00.002-05:00

I love it when Tersie has posts like this...
Blogs like this one are fun to read, and fun to participate in.

"Name five things laying around your computer"

Haha! Have you seen this mess! Let me show you...

Now... How do I narrow this down...

1. Empties - Yes, the Tim Hortons cups are empty. Yes, they are trash. No, I haven't thrown them away even though they are both several days old... I actually made a mobile out of a few empties here a while back. I should probably add these to the chain...

Oh, and Yes, that is a Marty Ford Experience Poster hanging on cube wall. I should get him to autograph it for me.

2. Storage - In the photo above there are seven hard drives (not counting the one in my laptop, which technically makes it eight). Five of them are in external disk enclosures where I keep my digital "stuff". One of them is still in the wrapper, destined for my sister's iBook. And the last one has been disassembled so that I can use it for a mirror on the rare occasion that I want to see myself.

3. Hand Santizer - I seriously think that I am addicted to this stuff. I keep a pump bottle on my desk, and at least one squeeze bottle in my backpack, and a few more little bottles on my coffee table at home, in the van, etc. I probably go through a pump bottle at my desk every four to six weeks. The first thing I do when I take my seat (every time I sit down) is squeeze the pump. Does it really protect me from germs? I have no clue, but it does make my hands feel soft and smell good.

4. Post-Its! - I've explained my Post-It Note obsession in a previous post. With that being said, I currently have six "active" post-its on my desk with lists, to-dos, scribbles, and notes on them. You can barely see in the far right of the photo the Post-It Pike (also mentioned in said earlier post).

5. The Pen - How could I post about the things adorning my desktop without mentioning my trusty writing utensil. I've also blogged about my pen obsession before. To that end, my current writing stick is a Pilot Varsity Disposable fountain pen. My Aunt Marilyn gave me this pen at Kayla's wedding when we got to discussing fountain pens.

I've not taken the time to blog about it yet, but on Labor Day weekend I happened to be in Tuttle Mall and stopped into the Paradise Pen store, where I was "fitted" for a fountain pen. It was an amazing experience (not to mention I got to write with some really really expensive ink pens). It was there that I also discovered my new dream pen, the Cross Apogee in Frosty Steel.

Wow...

Well, that is quite enough rambling from me for the time being. If you are at all curious about the rest of this mess, I'd be happy to explain any of it.

Roogles out.

SYATP - Thoughts About a Rant.

2007-09-21T15:21:00.001-05:00

After some great discussion at Bible study a couple weeks ago about the the upcoming See You At the Pole on Sept 26, I ran across a blog today that had two articles worth re-posting.

The general consensus at Bible Study that night was that SYATP was a pretty ridiculous excuse for a "Christian" activity ( quotes on purpose there )... And one of the students even made the comment that she had already made a commitment to "NOT see anyone at the pole."

Here's the initial blog post. Read it.

See You at the Pole ( A Rant ) on Z Life

In my experience (both as a youth and a youth pastor) I have 1) not been really really excited about or really "good" at prayer at any time in my life and 2) dont't think SYATP does anything to help out with that.

I will admit openly that prayer doesn't appear anywhere on the top ten list of my spiritual gifts, and I am in awe of those people I meet who can commit to prayer and be faithful to it.

Dino (the guy from Z Life) got enough comments about the above listed rant, that he posted a new blog this time with a challenge.

SYATP Counter-Cultural Challenge on Z Life

I think it's a great idea! I'm also curios to know what you think.

-Roogles

( Thanks to Dino from Z Life ).

Avast! More Pirate Stuff!

2007-09-19T10:43:00.001-05:00

The salty sea dogs over at TUAW pointed out that I can now turn all me hearties inta Pirates with me trusty iPhone!

Yarrr!

Here's the first of what'll likely be a few shots from the day!

Also! I reckon ya'll oughta be watchin' this here YouTube video which has a good bit ta say about talkin' like a pirate!

(ht to TUAW for the Pirate.app and Huss for the YouTube Link).

Yarr!

2007-09-19T08:55:00.001-05:00

Behold me hearties! Me mad photoshoppin' skillz!

And don't be forgettin' that today is Talk Like a Pirate Day!

http://www.talklikeapirate.com is where ya be lookin' for more info.

Avast ye Lubbers! There's piratin' ta do!

Hitched

2007-09-17T14:37:00.001-05:00

On Saturday my baby sister got married. Dan is a great guy and I am excited to include him and his wonderful kids in the family.

The weather on Saturday was perfect, the wedding and reception were wonderful.

Hopefully Dan & Kayla are off now, enjoying their honeymoon without any snafus.

Congrats guys! Love you!

Great Article

2007-09-11T09:11:00.001-05:00

My intention is not to steal Jenn's thunder by posting about this also, but this is one that I can't just let slip by...

Jenn turned me onto this blog a couple of weeks back, and Josh has some great insight and some of his thoughts are just fantastic!

If you didn't take Jenn's advice already, go read this post now!

"Worship" vs Worship

My favorite quote is "Sometimes I like Christians more before they know how to act like Christians."

Yes! Amen! This is what I LOVE about Youth ministry. Teenagers are sometimes so bent on "doing their own thing" that they live out their faith in ways that go against the rut we are so often stuck in as Christians. Love it!

Great stuff!

Happy Birthday Jenn!

2007-09-11T08:34:00.001-05:00

This photo was taken on September 11, 1975... way before we had to look back on this day and remember every year the events of September 11, 2001.

Happy Birthday my dear.

I love you.

Irritation

2007-09-04T10:14:00.000-05:00

Geek warning. If you aren't a geek, or don't care about geek things skip this post.

Back in February, I decided to take the plunge and switch from Safari to Firefox as my primary web browser. You probably already know that I am a mac user ( read "fanatic" ). If you didn't already know that, who are you and why are you reading my blog?

My main reason for switching to FireFox, although the reasons became many more over time is that when I started blogging ( on a regular basis ) using blogger, it just didn't work in Safari. It's been long enough ago now that I don't even remember what didn't work, only that it didn't. I had been frustrated with Safari for a couple of other reasons so I took the plunge and went Firefox hard core.

Well... Now, six months down the line, I'm finding myself more than a little frustrated about how flakey FireFox has been working for me. The browser takes a long time to load, crashes frequently, and ( way more frustrating than any of the above! ) it has recently stopped working well with blogger!

Aaaauggghhhhh!

The menus don't display right, the browser crashes when I try to leave comments, etc, etc, etc.

I've looked on Google, and the other "normal" places but can't seem to find anything that has a resolution to the problems I'm seeing.

So, what do to now... I'm posting this blog from Safri 3.03 and it seems to be liking blogger just fine. I don't have any of my bookmarks saved in Safari ( which should be trivial to port over ) or any of my password stuff cached in Safari ( more painful, but not really difficult to remedy ).

I'm just frustrated. Or maybe I'm grouchy. Or quite possibly all of the above.

*sigh.

Maybe I will just go back to lynx.

...

( ht to this post on NoHeat.com, which is where I borrowed the image for this post. )