thoughts

2008-11-18T10:20:00.003-05:00

i'm probably going to jumpstart this blog thing again sometime soon but for now i just had a thought stuck in my head. recently i came across our neighbors on facebook and while i was looking at their info i discovered that they are as passionate about their atheism as many are about their belief in God. now, i've got many thoughts that i've been having since reading some of their comments but one stuck out to me.

he has quotes from philosophers and scientists, and others, debunking religion, but one makes mention about how with all the evil in the world, if God allows it, then he is no god, and if he chooses not to stop it, than he isn't a god and doesn't exist.

the first thought that jumped out of my brain, soul and heart was :does that mean that we are not humans and we don't exist? because as i've always tried to answer the question when people say "if God exists, why does he allow war and famine?" to which i reply "well, we exist and what are WE doing to fix it?"

i know that there are deeper questions in the "GOD" debate but to me it shows a want to point the finger when we blame God for all the bad stuff and it takes the pressure off of us getting off of our asses and doing something outside of ourselves.
heck, there are many atheists that live a more christian lifestyle than some christians!

i don't know why bad things happen but i do know that God is not immune to it. imagine that all you want is to create children children that you can love, enjoy life with, and give all of the beauty of the world to. and then imagine that those children became so rotten, so evil, that it was better that they be washed away rather than live on in their evil.

and imagine that again you bore a child, knowing all along that that child would be murdered. A perfect child, murdered, murdered to save those who were less than perfect. God did these things. God has suffered loss and hurt and unimaginable pain and so the last person i plan on accusing of standing back and doing nothing would be Him.

wow i'm sure there are plenty more of discussions to be had about this, but i just really wanted to get these thoughts out there.

so maybe today, try to love somebody new and try to love somebody familiar in a new way, just to remind yourself that WE are able to affect lives.

battlestar galactica - new season intro

2008-10-22T19:02:00.001-05:00

arson at a church?

2008-10-14T22:09:00.001-05:00

there was a fire at ridge point community church in holland township. there are rumors that arson may be the cause. police are looking for this suspect:

2008-09-28T14:02:00.003-05:00

there's a certain amount of life that is required, demanded actually, when it comes to living. too often, too easily, we wear a groove into our days that becomes our autopilot.

have you ever been driving and all of a sudden you realize that you don't remember driving the last several miles?

IS YOUR LIFE LIKE THIS?

can you go days and not remember anything other than:

work?

your commute?

hours on the internet or watching tv?

where is the breath?

how is that living?

i suffer severely from this and it is killing me minute by minute, day by day, breath by breath.

i'm not sure what it is that i want from life, at all. i have no target career, no desire to have or not have kids, no urge to move across the country. so i don't know what i want, but i'm not finding it. and maybe that's because i haven't been looking, i've been waiting for it to be dropped into my lap. and that is embarassing to me, it's embarassing that i expect so much out of life and yet so little out of myself.

as my wife once told me:

YOU CAN'T STEER A PARKED CAR

and it is with that thought in mind that i am making a change. i am going to live, i am going to be. and i'm going to do it live and in person.

as the age old saying goes, life is in the journey, not the destination. and my journey has been an auto piloted, chauffeured, ride and there's no fun in that.

so i'm gonna hop behind the wheel and take control of this crazy thing.

i'm gonna go for now, but until then i'll be ............

What if Firefighters Ran the World?

2008-09-22T11:09:00.001-05:00

that movie preview voice guy

2008-09-02T12:41:00.002-05:00

don lafontaine has passed away, and whether you think you know who that is or not, your life will never be the same.
don was the voice behind thousands and thousands of movie trailers, most recently he was in a geico commercial where he poked fun at himself, starting the commercial with his catch phrase intro of "in a world where....."

thanks for all the excitement that your voice single handedly brought to movies that i otherwise would have had no interest in watching, you will be missed.

more from the inappropriate department

2008-08-31T00:01:00.003-05:00

this is loosely dedicated to Jeff Vander Kooi, not for it's direct content, but more for the fact that the last time i posted something inappropriate, he got quite the kick out of it.

this is what was written on a t-shirt that i saw a woman wearing today:

"i'm not a gynecologist, but i'll take a look"

..........please forgive me 'all.

question and answer

2008-08-28T10:18:00.002-05:00

please someone answer me this, in a world where i can download a picture of myself and morph in into a video game character, where we can transplant limbs on humans, where a tiny device in the palm of your hand can be a telephone, internet connection and gaming device, in a world like this, why WHY DEAR GOD, does it still take 6-8 weeks to get a magazine sent to my house once i ordered it online?!\

most miracles are found in hindsight...

2008-08-25T20:56:00.005-05:00

this was a quote that i heard in an episode of Joan of Arcadia and i couldn't help but think about how true that is.

they're out there, happening all the time, to us, around us, and through us. just like answered prayers, they happen but sometimes they don't appear the way we think they should.

i'm juvenile but you're a poopy head.

2008-08-23T17:34:00.002-05:00

best name in sports history.

a member of the Japanese Little League baseball teams' name is:

Yutaka Takeshita

warning, adult content!

2008-08-17T17:54:00.001-05:00

i don't think this needed the mastercard gimmick, it's funny enough without it.

2008-08-08T13:10:00.002-05:00

i've recently reinstated myself to the world of music. for nearly the past two months i have not listened to music, except for by accident. there wasn't any single reason that i stopped listening, i just woke up one morning and realized that it all sounded drab, there was no energy in it.

waking up all these weeks later with a similar, yet reverse, feeling, i decided to plug the ol' ipod into the car deck and see what happened.

what happened was a-ma-zing!

the strings in Viva la Vida soared higher than the cotton white clouds that tried to hide the bluest of skies that i had ever seen.

the hope pouring out of the lyrics in Call to Arms was enough to make me believe again.

the raw love and loss of Living in your Letters hurt as if it was my own pain.

so i've been reborn,
reborn in a world of emotion and thoughts and hopes and expectations.
there are some old friends and favorites that i need to get reaquainted with and oh so many new ones to discover.

it was a necessary absence for me, but i'm glad that it's over.

to baby or not to baby

2008-07-11T07:57:00.004-05:00

for those that are curious when we are going to have children the answer is......

we don't know

and

we don't know if ever will be.

i used to always want kids, and part of me still does, but not all of my parts. (there's got to be a better way to word that!)
rie and i tend to get jealous of our friends when ever any of them have a baby, but then we talk about it and agree that we aren't ready for one. it would be like if someone we know bought a new cadillac. we would be envious because they got a brand new car, but at the same time.......we don't want a cadillac!!!

don't misunderstand, if we turned out to be pregnant tomorrow, we would fully love our child. it would be an amazing change in our lives, but as i told my mom, as much as we would passionately love any child we were blessed with, we don't passionately want to have children.

it's funny how something that you want so badly at certain times of your life can become less of a priority at a different time. even in high school i would have told you that i didn't care what my career was, i just wanted to be a dad (not while i was in high school though!) but now, now i am so excited to look to a near future that has us out of debt and the ability to live lives that we thought we'd only have to dream of. it's not that we think kids would ruin those plans, they just don't seem to be apart of the equation.

i'm not naive enough to think that should we not have children ever, that there wouldn't be a time later where i would wonder what our kids would have been like, but at the same time, as i've said before, for marie and i, children wouldn't define us. we are content in our current decisions and are aware that there is obviously a passing window for us to decide if we did want kids.

how about you? have you always wanted kids? did you want more kids than you've had, less? what are your thoughts?

my gift to you

2008-07-06T09:09:00.000-05:00

www.stuckincustoms.com

3rd new post this week!!!!

2008-07-02T10:55:00.002-05:00

wow, so are you guys able to keep up with my sudden verbal/written overflow?!

this one is a quick one but i just wanted to know when the last time any of you listened to Counting Crows album August and Everything After? whatever your answer, it's not recent enough. now i know that music is subjective and some of you might hate Adam "dude are you still sportin' dreadlocks" Duritz and the band, but i would strongly encourage you to revisit this album, in fact, revisit your entire early 90's collection, Smashing Pumpkins/Siamese Dream, Pearl Jam/Ten, Black Crowes/Shake Your Money Maker and any other favorites that you will hopefully add to the list, please drop me your favorites!

p.s. i was reminded of the Crows album while reading the newest Harlan Coben book The Woods which i'm half way through and i will grab onto your leg and beg you to read, in fact give nearly anything of his a shot and you won't regret it!

dust & ashes

2008-07-01T13:23:00.004-05:00

in light of my aunt's recent funeral i have been thinking more about my "arrangements". from time to time i think about what kind of a funeral i would like, not that i'll be there!, and the other details.

actually, my uncle was just telling me that his wife asked him what songs he wanted played at his funeral and he said that unless they are putting a stereo in the box with him he didn't much care!

i more and more am thinking about being cremated. it grows in my mind every day. reently i heard a man on the radio say that he and his wife had decided to both be cremated and once they both had gone, they wanted their ashes mixed in the same urn. i thought that was very romantic. i can't seem to get rie on board with that one but hey you can't win them all!

the "ashes to ashes" phrase has been in my head since i found out my aunt was to be cremated. actually, the thought crossed my mind after my grandpa was cremated last year, but it's really been churning the wheels the last couple of weeks. what a beautiful thought, from ashes to ashes, dust to dust, from the earth you came and to the earth you shall return. and not just in a morbid sense of thinking, those phrases are making me think more and more about how i live my life. almost as if that phrase is constantly hanging in front of my face, guiding the way i spend my days, my nights, my life. i hope i can devote some serious time to meditating more about the meaning of where we came from.

as for the details of my funeral one thing that has remained a constant is that i would like bob marley's "three little birds" played and i DEFINITELY want it to be a layed back service/party/thingy. i don't want people in suits and ties unless that's how they are truley comfortable that way. i live my life in shorts and t-shirts, jeans and hoodies, and that's how i would want to end my life. not in a stuffy suit, in a somber mood. i plan on sharing more of the details of my funeral as i figure them out and i hope that you all will share any and all specialties that you want at your funeral.

share share share

summer bummers

2008-07-01T07:53:00.006-05:00

o summer where art thou?

i spent the better part of the crummy winter months waiting for sunshine and warmth, tennis and biking, rollerblading and golf. now that those days are here i seem to be passing them up for late days at work, an unmotivated spirit and a lack of appreciation for the moment.

i know that we've had alot of rain but rie and i can't stop thinking about how many opportunities have drifted by us like a butterfly in a breeze. it seems that whenever we have a sunny day either we can't find the energy to get out and do something, or we draw from our list of a million excuses. pretty soon it'll be fall/winter and we'll have all the cold months to bitch about how we can't go outside!!!

grrrr. well here's to makin' a change. tennis, walks, biking, rollerblading, golf and anything else that the summer wants to through at us i say bring it on!!! it's the 1st of july and that marks the beginning of summer for us. come rain or shine we're gonna get out there and do.......something! anything!

i hope you guys are making the most of your fun summer days.

by the way, would anybody be interested in a trip to cedar point? i'm thinking closer to the start of the school year so the park won't be quite so busy.
what'ya say? a caravan of fun leading to the happiest place on earth....or is that disney land? either way! plus i think i've lost enough weight to actually fit on the rides again!

i'll draft up a permission slip that you can get your parents to sign!

life is waiting for you.....

2008-06-20T07:36:00.005-05:00

sometimes i draw the comparison between life and traveling somewhere you've never been before. on just about every vacation or visit to a strange town, there comes at least one moment where i am looking for a specific address, off ramp, landmark or building. i know it's coming up, i don't know exactly what it will look like, or how many streets come before it, but i've got a descent idea about what's coming. and sure enough, the street i needed to turn on showed up when i was convinced it was further down, or i looked so long for that stupid landmark that i actually forgot what i was looking for and drove right past it. sometimes i'm looking for an address that should be right here, right where it should be, but it's not and it makes no sense.

life brings these same problems. i can remember wanting to hurry through my late teens so that i could drink (legally) at 21 but i forgot to tell life that it was ok to slow down and take it's time right after that and now i wake up and i'm 31 and all of that drinking that i so badly needed to do just seems like a waste of money. or i put off writing even one damn word in the novel i'm working on because in two days is my day off and then i can just sit at the computer all day and type uninterrupted. (i wish there was a keystroke that instead of italicizing words, it would denote sarcasm!) but when i get to that day off, i forgot about going to the grocery store, and the bank, and i haven't worked out in 3 days and then i'm done with those things and all i want to do is sit on the couch and not have to think or do anything.

so i wait for this magical day that's always coming and before i know it, it's been a year and i've got the same three pages i started with plus a paragraph of forced labor, when if i would have just sat down for a few minutes each night, a few simple paragraphs even, i would have thousands of words by now.

a friend of mine once wrote about how she was always waiting for the real her to arrive and how in high school she thought she would "arrive" in college, and then it was when she got married, and then it was when she had a baby. eventually we all have to discover that when we finally become the real us is when we are done living. that's the sick and twisted beauty of the whole thing, we never become who we are, we are always becoming that person, nothing is static. we are always aging, learning, growing, thinking and changing.

the off ramps are always coming, the turns will always need to be made, but we aren't going to see them coming if we're going 100 mph with our heads turned in the opposite direction waiting for them to tap us on the shoulder and tell us they are near. we have to be aware. and we have to know that life is going to happen whether we tell it to or not, so live life as each turn comes, be ready for it, and only hit the gas once you're on the right road.

“Life is all about timing... the unreachable becomes reachable, the unavailable become available, the unattainable... attainable. Have the patience, wait it out It's all about timing.”
Stacey Charter

"the only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once"
albert einstein

and to wrap this up:

once, on a family trip when i was young and we had our first family camcorder, there is actually video of my dad telling my mom to video tape our upcoming exit that would lead us to the great state of florida and to that giant creepy mouse. the funny part is, the video is of my dad's hand in the frame pointing at the exit and you hear him tell her to video tape it....as we drove right on by.

that memory sometimes sums up my whole life, being aware of what to do, making sure that people know that I know what to do, and then i don't worry enough about what i'm doing.

Mercedes "DeeDee" Mackenzie Stafford

2008-06-15T09:22:00.006-05:00

i lost my aunt this week.

she had a long, long battle with her health that culminated with her putting up more fight than anyone thought possible against vicious and emotionless leukemia.

she was a woman of amazing heart and peace. physically she had a weak heart but spiritually and emotionally i've never seen a bigger one. she gave birth to her only son Jabe in her 30's and he was to be followed by a baby sister a few years later, but unfortunately she lost the baby at 8 months. but baby Kendall was always remembered as a part of her family, not something that "almost was." it was a devastating blow and almost killed her spirit but it was the massive heart attack a few short years later that killed her body. a couple of time actually. the doctors reports said that they actually lost her on the table 3 separate times on the table before they were able to save her life. she lived around 17 years after that heart attack, many of those years in pain and discomfort, her ribs were never reset perfectly after the open heart surgery, so they would shift from time to time, and as she seemed to be more and more tired and without energy, that was when they discovered the hole in her heart that they refused to operate on because of the delicateness of her heart.

so she did what she could, she lived. she loved her family, she loved her life, this world and never took it for granted. her husband Jeff is a zoo keeper, which has moved them from florida, to indiana, to finally wisconsin. there were always random animals temporarily living with them and they loved to have family visit to get the inside tour. they just loved their family, no matter how many miles away they lived.

every christmas they would send big boxes to my grandma & grandpas filled with christmas presents for all of us, which i regret that we seldom sent anything in return, or even called them to thank them (regret will have its own post words later in this entry). but they were always wonderful off the wall different kinds of gifts but i loved them! every birthday i looked forward to the phone ringing, it always had a different sound when they called and so everyone in the house knew to let the birthday person answer the phone. you would answer and then DeeDee, Jeff and Jabe would sing happy birthday to you. it was wonderful, and i miss it.

my aunts battle took a turn this last year when she was diagnosed with leukemia. of course it broke everyones hearts, but we all secretly assumed that it would be a struggle, but she would persevere and we all would be there to cheer her on and welcome her back. well, right off the bat, she had issues with the kemo. she was allergic to something in it and it sent her heart into an insanely rapid beat pattern that almost killed her, once that started to happen another side effect was that it started to pour fluid into her lungs. it was not an optimistic time. they fought and fought to save her, at one point putting her basically into a coma and telling family that they were going to try and shock her heart back into rhythm but that if the risky procedure didn't work, that she would be gone. well, she wasn't ready to go and she fought back, and continued to fight through a tremendous up and down battle with highs coming out of low percentage chances of reducing the cancer count, to lows of finding out that her cells weren't reproducing any cells, healthy or sick.

we all knew she was going to leave us and it sucked. my mom told me of two conversations she had with her sister DeeDee, the oldest daughter, the 3rd of 7 kids, the "lucky 7" as they referred to themselves as my grandparents had lost 2 different children during pregnancy. the first conversation was how she told my mom that when she was having her heart attack she kept thinking "this isn't right, i'm not ready. God please just let me grow up to know that my son will be alright." that's all that she wanted. the second conversation was also right before they put her into a medically induced coma, which she would never return from. she told my mom that when she went, she wanted to be flying high on morphine and to be surrounded by her family laughing and telling stories.

fast forward a week to when her time had come. the family was surrounding her bed, watching her sleep, occasionally fidgiting from the pain. the docs continued to increase her morphine to her more comfortable, which ended up being a very strong amount. the family was holding each other and watching Deed, but she seemed restless, and her numbers fought to stay consistent. that's when my mom remembered my aunt's full request and turned to Jeff and asked him how he met DeeDee. he smiled and told the story which then he asked my grandma and grandpa how they met, which sparked stories of Jeff and Deed's dating and many stories of how my aunt loved to get naked and skinny dip.

just as my aunt had wanted, once she was "flyin' high" and the stories had been chased with laughter, her levels steadily decreased and she took her last breath.

a couple of days later as my mom and i talked we came to the realization together that DeeDee was given the gift that she asked for. when my mom fought her cancer she prayed that she would be able to see her kids get married and have grand babies. she reminded me that when DeeDee had her heart attack, all she asked God for was that she would be able to know that her son was alright. my cousin Jabe is engaged now to a wonderful girl named Brie & my mom remembered that DeeDee had said in conversation how when she saw Jabe and Brie together that she knew he would be ok. my mom never realized the truth of that statement, it was said so casually that my mom never realized that that was the fulfilling of her request. that was all she wanted to live to see.

when they returned to my aunt and uncles house, Jeff mentioned how Deed was always buying stuff for everyone that she would store away for the right occasion. they started going through some of the boxes (which there were many !!) and there were gifts for every brother, sister, niece and nephew, everyone! there were countless gifts for her daugher-in-law-to-be for the bridal showers that she would have, there were baby gifts in blue and pink for whichever child they might have. my aunt had already celebrated these occasions before she passed. it was so beautiful to realize that she had already taken part in the baby showers for her future grand baby before they have even been conceived, that she had already laughed and cried and shared with her future daughter in law at her bridal shower with touching gifts, with naughty gifts, well before the showers have even been planned. my aunt knew her future and she celebrated it with the time that she knew she had, not the time that she hoped to receive.

i think that is a gift she wants us all to have.

thinking back about visits i wished i had made to see her, phone calls i wished i had taken the time to make, basically as live tends to make empty promises through our lips sometimes, i made many more promises to come and visit them than i ever followed through on......aaahhh that's regret for you people. but what can you do? do i let it eat away at me for not seeing her more often? or do i learn from this feeling, and honor her life, by following through on my promises by going now, or soon? what's to stop me from celebrating her life by sharing it with her husband and son in the town they loved, in the places she lived? that's the funny thing when it comes to death and regrets, there are things we will of course we will have to live with that we regret saying or doing OR regret not saying or not doing, but many of those can be erased by finding another way to celebrate the spirit of the intention.

so you regret not spending more time with your grandparents as they aged, i can speak from hundreds of personal experiences that if you were to visit any senior community or "home" , the people that live there light up like a christmas tree when people come to visit and spend time with them, they don't need it to be a son or daughter or old friend, for them it's just knowing that someone thinks they are still valuable enough to sit down and say hello.

or if you regret the angry last words you shared with someone before they passed, there's no way to retract those words, but what about each and every one that comes out of your mouth from then on? honor that person by treating everyone with that love.

these thoughts might not look like the exact idea of redemption you were thinking for how to atone or retract words or actions, but that's how life is, that's how God is. to borrow from a common phrase, "the door might close, but he will open a window"

so last year when my aunts future was looking very bleak i wrote her a letter and in it i apologized for all the christmas gifts that i took for granted with no gift in return, no thank you call. and i told her how i looked forward to the birthday call every year, how we all did, but how i never thought to return the favor. so i made her a promise to return the favor in a unique way by combining those two things, but that she would have to hang on until christmas. she kept her end of the bargain and and survived and i kept my end and on christmas day as our enormous family gathered at my grandparents in kalamazoo, and Jeff and Jabe took care of DeeDee as she slept peacefully after a particularly brutal round of kemo, the phone rang in their home in Madison, Wisconsin and when they answered, 30 voices greeted them with song

"we wish you a merry christmas,
we wish you a merry chrismas,
we wish you a merry chrismas
and a happy new year"

a sweeter song, a more wonderful moment was never shared in our family.

so ironically, even in her dying, my aunt has given me one more gift. the gift of understanding that with regret is given the gift of atonement. many times we don't see it, more often we don't use it, but it's always there, it just might not look like what you think it should. but it's always there.

don't tell me it's "just sports"

2008-06-02T17:11:00.003-05:00

this is about 15 minutes long but if you don't watch it then you're not my friend any more.

Burn After Reading

2008-06-01T21:01:00.001-05:00

Sigur Ros - Glósóli

2008-05-26T21:43:00.001-05:00

a wise man once said......

2008-05-24T11:25:00.000-05:00

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense."
Ralph Waldo Emerson

your typical midnight panic attack

2008-05-08T14:30:00.000-05:00

I get scared a lot. Not by rustling noises or creepy strangers, but by the fact that way too often I become aware of the fact that I’m floating. I’m going about my day, doing exactly what I need to do to earn a paycheck, to pay the bills, to buy the groceries, so I can have some fun and then start all over. I get so panicked in my heart and head that I want to scream, I think I’m screaming. Bloody murder in fact. In all honestly it feels like I am completely and totally freaking out in my mind and my body is sitting there like Jack Nicholson in One Flew Over the Cukoos Nest. Numb. What happens is that I simultaneously realize that I have tons and tons of thoughts running through my head.
Should we have a baby, should I work more on that book I started writing last summer, don’t I have 3 books I’m reading right now that I can’t seem to finish, I should be at the gym. I’m not getting any younger. Why don’t we have more friends? Why don’t I want to spend more quality time with the ones that I have? I panic like this until I shut down and do nothing, and then it starts all over later.

What is it about doubt that has me wide awake in the middle of the night sitting at my dining room table with tears where sleep should be? I have the dimmer turned down so there is just a hush of light cast over me, like Sinatra on a barstool at the Sands singin’ One More For The Road. The soft glow of the yellow bulb enlightens me but begs me to forget that there is more to this room, which isn’t hard to do right now as I don’t need much convincing to imagine myself alone with nothing to anchor me. If you have never fully given doubt the respect that it deserves, please do, take it seriously. Not even nine hours ago I was filled with confidence in my writings, I knew what I was aiming for and I had a good start to get there. But now, just those few hours later I can’t bring myself to go to sleep because I’m afraid I’m not qualified to do that. What a deadly venom that doubt and uncertainty can be to a writer, to everyone really.

So I sit here, and I try to write these feelings down because I know that everything is subject matter, that any and everything can have a lesson buried under its skin. Even writing about feeling worthless as a writer has its redemptive quality. I can’t help but think about what my friend said when she described the calling to write as being an obedience issue. I believe that. God has lit a flame in my chest and no matter how much I might fight against myself to extinguish it, it burns, it burns brighter with every bucket of water I dowse on it. But it doesn’t burn like a normal flame, it flickers in odd colors, in greens and blues, dashing sideways instead of up as it knows it should. That’s what my writing feels like. When I finally stop fighting the urge to write and do it, it never looks or acts like I expect it to. but I write anyway. I write and I hope while already knowing that God is here, happy that I listened for once and was obedient. In a funny twist of fate, as I looked at the light bulb and debated which tropical color to use as its adjective Chris Martin began playing a solo version of his band Coldplays’ hit “Yellow.” Just another love letter in the lunchbox from God telling me that He’s here, He loves me, and He’s not leaving.

words and music are made of clay

2008-05-01T16:28:00.012-05:00

words need to be written here, partly out of my own need, partly out of demand from my friends and yet i can find nothing burning in my belly to share. so what now? should i make up a great story? or tell someone elses? i don't know. why do the few of you come here and read my words?

are you just being a good friend?

do i stir in you an emotion that you feel has rusted?

is there a reason you don't fully know, but it brings you here anyway from time to time?

i'll try to explain why i write (when i do) on this site.

there's an ember that has been glowing in my soul for many, many years. it begs me to write, it pleads with me to create. but that remnant of a mightier flame is buried deep beneath doubt, laze and an extensive training from this world that has me believing that the world has enough creators in it.

it's the thought that it doesn't matter if i write another word because there are plenty of other creators out there that will fill in my space with noone ever noticing the difference, like taking a scoop of sand off of the beach when the tide rolls in, by the time the water bends back to the sea, the eager grains of sand have filled in and there's no scar in the sand.

it's that thought and the countless others like it that i battle continually. but what i've come to accept in my heart is that these words come from a place that is distant. in fact, the only way to hear those words is to allow myself to fall down into the cracks and caves at the bottom of all things but when i fight to stay up on the surface, the noises drift away on the winds that blow elsewhere.

for me writing is still very hard, it's a struggle no matter how much i enjoy it. much like with my health, i don't want to be fat, lazy or out of shape, but it's such effort to eat right and exercise. we're conditioned to do whatever feels right and to stay away from governing ourselves. so i enjoy writing, and it's getting easier to do. believe me when i tell you that it becomes a lot easier to write, make music, art or whatever your creation might be, once you realize that no one else has your voice. you are the only one destined to create what will come from your heart. there might be millions of other musicians out there, but no one has written your songs. there are countless authors in the world, but none of them, none of them has ever written your words. that's your job and it's one that you were created for.

remember that we are made in God's image. God the creator.
so let the words that are created by you, grow and flourish under the sun that God birthed. and may you remember that you are the only one who can create the art that you make.

....ch ch ch ch changes

2008-04-11T21:59:00.005-05:00

there's alot going on in our lives right now it seems.

simplifying

complicating

cleaning up messes

starting new projects

the one thing that seems to be at the center of them all is a new found sense of purpose, of reason or reality. the reality that right now is the thing we have. the past has been taken away from us, the future isn't promised us, and now is all up to us. rie and i have been constantly changing our eating habits for the better and adding more and different exercises. we've also been getting rid of things that we used to think were parts of us but realized that they are just things.

i've been reading Eckhart Tolle's book A New Earth and have already found myself looking at every, little, single action and event of my daily life as it's own unique moment, deserving of my full attention. the focus of the book is that right now, in this moment is all that we have. appreciating every little thing for what it actually is, instead of it just being some kind of filler, or background, waiting for something bigger, or more important. simply put, it's about living in the "now".

things are changing and i am finally becoming appreciative to the God who made me, for everything else that he has made as well. i'm seeing his fingerprints in so many different ways. i have wonderful friends that i am making a more determined effort to spend time with because i realize how fast those moments pass us by, and before we know it it's been 3 weeks and we haven't seen each other.

and i have a "new friend" who is going through some tough, tough experiences right now. we just became friends so to speak and i can't help but think that whatever reason God had for letting her drop me a hello note, it has been good for both of us.

thinking about the positive of my friends pregnancy and the negative of my other friends heartache i think of a quote from A New Earth where he says that :

"life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. how do you know this is the experience you need? because this is the experience you are having at this moment."

i've always been fascinated with the horizon. the emotions that pour through me when i realize that there is countlessly more than what i know or what i've seen. it's at the heart of rie and i in every journey we take. no matter what type of change we are facing, it's almost like we live for the unknown and the hope it brings.

i hope this journey continues, that it continues strong, and that it is not a cruise control journey. i don't want to mail it it and relax. i want to be aware of every acceleration, every slow down, every twist, turn and change. i hope you all are having your own "awakening" so to speak, and i hope yours shakes you to your bones and never leaves you.

we are truly filled with a passion and a love to do great things. and i am excited to see what awaits us all.

one last quote for you from A New Earth
"Internal and external are ultimately one. When you no longer perceive the world as hostile, there is no more fear, and when there is no more fear, you think, speak and act differently. Love and compassion arise, and they affect the world."

something rie showed me

2008-03-29T14:34:00.001-05:00

I was packing for my business trip and my three year old daughter was
having a wonderful time playing on the bed. At one point she said,
'Daddy, look at this' , and stuck out two of her fingers.

Trying to keep her entertained, I reached out and stuck her tiny
fingers in my mouth and said,
'Daddy's gonna eat your fingers,'
pretending to eat them.

I went back to packing, looked up again and my daughter was standing
on the bed staring at her fingers with a devastated look on her face.

I said, 'What's wrong, honey?'

She replied,
'What happened to my booger?'

just for diane

2008-03-23T10:14:00.001-05:00

as i was getting ready to leave the house today i had a thought. do you put on both socks and then your shoes, or are you the kind of person who puts on a sock, then a shoe, followed by the other sock and the other shoe?

2008-03-23T09:13:00.002-05:00

He is risen...

my favorite prayer

2008-03-15T10:28:00.001-05:00

this is one of my all time favorite songs and recently it came across my ipod and i had completely forgotten what an amazing prayer it is. so if you've already heard it, maybe just sit back and follow the lyrics and if you haven't heard it before then please listen to the whole song, it's worth it.

my FOUR

2008-03-13T23:03:00.002-05:00

Four jobs I have had in my life:

1. eastowne 5 movie theatre -projectionist was my favorite
2. ups-everything under the part time umbrella
3. driving range golf ball picker upper
4. optician (eye doctor stuff)
4 b. caregiver for alzhiemers patients

Four movies I would watch over and over (or have watched over and over):

1. signs
2. serenity
3. snatch
4. band of brothers - mini series but i don't care!!!
(honerable mentions the family stone, love actually, family man)
and i will never ever again be limited to listing only my top 4 movies

Four places I have lived:

1. saginaw
2. kalamazoo
3. portage
4. grand rapids

Four TV shows that I watch:

1. battlestar galactica
2. how i met your mother
3. lost
4. the office (seriously, who DOESN'T love jim?!)
(4 b. terminator the sarah connor chronicles)

Four places I have been:

1. fenway park home of the red sox
2. neyland stadium home of the tennessee volunteers
3. notre dame stadium
4. grand canyon

Four people who email (or call) me regularly (in no particular order):

1.rie
2. mom
3. ike
4. my god, i have no friends.! the fourth would have to be circuit city thanks to their timely and bottomless ad-mails

Four of my favorite foods

1.faro's pizza
2.bd's mongolina bbq - chicken, baby corn, pineapple, buffalo sauce
3. whiskey river bbq burger Red Robin
4. boston's tropical chicken pizza-alfredo sauce,pineapple, bacon, chicken, mozzerella cheese

Four places I would like to be right now:

1. tennessee
2. muskegon's beautiful beaches
3. europe-anywhere!
4. boston (in a couple months anyway!)

Four things I am looking forward to this year:

1. losing weight/getting in shape
2. our first train ride
3. visiting the world war II museum
4. coming up with this years birthday surprise for Rie

Four people who should/will (must!) post 4 (four) things about them:

1. dwight
2. kate of the northern province of texas
3. jenny wade because i don't believe she exists
4. brad pitt just because i'm a kinda curious

who's gonna go see this with me?!

2008-03-12T19:48:00.001-05:00

gifts and curses

2008-03-01T22:24:00.004-05:00

i've always wanted to be a writer. i haven't always been a reader.
almost daily i change my mind as to which genre i will conquer. changes like the wind my friend. one day i want to write science fiction. somedays it's drama or thriller. some occassions bring forth romantic comedy and there have even been breezes of poetry or song lyrics.

i'm just now getting to where i have decided to get into a writing routine, sometimes forcing, sometimes willingly writing. i've even joined up with other writers through mars hill that are looking to make progress on their own journeys. it's not always pretty, it's not always consistent, but it's always there, that thought, that notion that i have stories to tell.

so i'm trying. i hope you'll check in once and a while and ask how it's going or if there's anything that you can sneak a read of. i need the accountability. if you can do me that favor then in turn i will try to not write complete rubbish and offer to share in anything you might be creating.

so that leads me to this thought:

what is it that's hiding in you?

i know that some of you are doing exactly what is lighting your fire but for those of you who aren't, what is it?
what do you find yourself struggling to dust off and use/be/have/do.

i might be off on this but i honestly believe that if we can open up our lanterns and reveal what's' lighting our fire, we will be more apt to pursue it. we as the others ( not the LOST kind ) want to be there to help, give ideas, make suggestions, pray, support and grow with each other on these journeys.

so how about it? i'd like to challenge/beg/plead/ask all of you to tell me/us what it is in you.

un-freakin' real

2008-02-28T19:28:00.001-05:00

i saw a better camera angle of this on ESPN but you get the idea. and the kid's only 6'2"

The Lonesome Kicker

2008-02-20T22:50:00.001-05:00

i forgot how much this makes me laugh

even better the second time

2008-02-13T13:53:00.001-05:00

ANI MA'AMIN

i believe in the sun even when it isn't shining.
i believe in love even when i am alone.
i believe in God even when He is silent.

(this was graffiti found in 1945 on the wall of a basement in Koln, Germany, where a Jewish believer is thought to have been hiding from the Gestapo)

so this was a quote that i had posted on my blog some time ago, but i have been running into it in random places lately and so i thought it only right to repost/revisit it.

interesting

2008-02-04T19:46:00.000-05:00

looking at the record books i find it interesting that in the patriots 3 super bowl wins and the loss this sunday, all were by 3 points. i have nothing more. just that. and i wanted to share

my one and only

2008-01-26T18:19:00.000-05:00

i'm in love with a girl.

she blows me away.

she loves me no matter what my problem is....

......or what i've done.

and although she has had many different hair styles......

......and many different looks......

.....she's always been my best friend.....

.....and i wouldn't want to live a day without her.

I Love You Rie.

Heath Ledger on Ellen

2008-01-23T20:52:00.001-05:00

this is really long, but my favorite part is the end, when ellen and heath ride a boblsed in front of a green screen. it's definately a lighter side of him that didn't seem to be seen enough. if you've got the time, watch. it.

the shark at the end made me pee a little

2008-01-20T13:25:00.001-05:00

i miss Lothar.

2008-01-19T12:55:00.001-05:00

well said

2008-01-16T21:50:00.000-05:00

as the T 101 in Terminator 3 so wisely said in regards to relationships "my database does not encompass the dynamics of human pair bonding."

....neither does mine Arnie, neither does mine!

he asked for it

2008-01-15T20:13:00.000-05:00

well in case you guys aren't familiar with who todd davis is let me tell you. you might know the man, just not by name. he is the man who is the founder of LIFELOCK, a company in the identity protection industry. in fact, he is so confident in his product that he gives out his own social security number on their tv commercial and drives a truck with his company logo and his social security number on it also, thus saying that he is THAT confident in their protection abilities that he would give out such important info.

well, he got hacked this week.

(great big smile)

although i admire his confidence, i just can't say that i didn't find some sick joy in hearing that he got his info stolen.

who's inspiring me lately

2008-01-05T23:23:00.000-05:00

Years ago on a tour in Australia, Joe Strummer from the Clash bought me a gift. He handed me a cartridge, meant for the use of rolling "smokable items", and said these words, "I used to walk around saying 'Fuck you, I'm in The Clash, Fuck you, I'm in The Clash!'..well now that I think about it, The Talking Heads were pretty fucking cool." Unbeknownst to me, he and his son were quite the big fans.

It was a small lesson that changed everything for me. As a kid I used to live and breathe only punk rock music, truthfully, and somewhat myopically. But the advice was simple, open your eyes, appreciate honest art, because honest art can change the world. So the very next day I flew back to the US, away from Mr. Strummer, and the conversation with the now late Clash front man was forever echoing in the back of my mind.

As a teenager, it was far too easy to judge music and rank bands unfairly against others. And most often it was done most ignorantly. But every once and awhile, someone comes along with a bit of well-oiled experience and hints of the ever changing temperature right at the step of our door. As when the great Pete Townsend once did, as he personally compared my band to his (The Who), in front of a crowd of thousands in San Diego. And as he quieted the large crowd to a ghostly whisper, he explained we represented a new and electrifying generation of youth, "to my son, Blink-182 is THE WHO...." Now that’s a bit of a line to swallow, but he said it, and I shall choose to brag about it.

I think as you get older you shed the burden of who is cooler, and the question is who is honest, because that's what in the end is truly cool.

Angels and Airwaves created "We Don't Need to Whisper" two years ago, amongst a lot of unanswered questions. To be searching for the new and correct path in life while I personally was losing my mind, well, it was quite a marathon to say the least, and also a drastic understatement.

The stress came in part from my decision to quit my band Blink-182, to start a new band, a new family and choosing to do it while being spun out on pain killers for a shattered disk in my back. All of which started as a young teenager, and exists in an even worse condition to this day. Many years of treatment have turned into quite a euphoric ride, one that almost killed me during the launch of the first Angels and Airwaves record. Well, truthfully, it ended up painting an odd picture to the world, and the press alike... even if we were getting the most incredible reviews I have ever gotten.

"It's potential is a force to be reckoned with... " Billboard

"The songs are every bit the anthems he wants them to be..." NY Post

"the results are some stunning moments of perfection...." Kerrang

These were all life changing events.....But it was the truth, the message behind this band, that inevitably made me practice what I was preaching...if you can just see yourself differently in the world around you, then the world around you will change, and possibly the world itself.

I- empire is the second half of our first album. It reflects an idea that the world is yours for the taking, and all that exists, exists inside you. It can be something as trivial as a personal struggle, or as grand as the inescapable idea of world peace.

To help the story along, the cover was commissioned and painted by the brilliant Drew Struzan, the artist best known for his work with Steven Spielberg and George Lucas. He can sum up a complicated story in a few beautifully planned brush strokes.

The drums are by Atom Willard, from the critically acclaimed Rocket From the Crypt. He has always felt to me like the single largest score in music. He is a loyal, honest and humble friend, but an even better showman.

Rhythm guitarist David Kennedy, is the one person I can always rely on to keep us doing what ever it is we believe in, regardless of the outside temperature. None of this would exist today without him, and none of this would feel quite as cool. I call him the James Dean of Punk Rock, as he is often spotted on his café-racer motorcycle unifying the coasts of the mainland US.

Matt Wachter, on bass guitar, is our last, but invaluable addition. He hails from the much-revered 30 Seconds to Mars, and was the final missing ingredient to our group. He naturally understands music can and should be communicated through multiple forms and shapes, like cinema, graphic arts, new-media etc...

Please take a short 55 minutes to enjoy the album. Listen to it blasting from your car, maybe on a hill over-looking a city...and all the while, pretend that the city, as it stretches far beyond the horizon, is all yours for the taking.

-Tom De Longe . Angels & Airwaves, an American rock band

watching daylight burn

2008-01-05T22:43:00.000-05:00

**footnote**
the post above this was a quote from tom de longe, lead singer from the band Angels & Airwaves. it fit exactly what i was thinking and feeling so i wanted to share it with you. also this post was strongly inspired by the new Angels & Airwaves album I-Empire. please check it out, read the lyrics and try to think how you feel when you are really, truly hopeful.
________

today has been one of those days.

i feel like a finely tuned race car parked in quick dry concrete.

i have a million ideas speeding thru my head. but i'm stuck in place.

things i want to do today, things i want to get started today, things i want to avoid today.

i've looked forward to this weekend because i wasn't scheduled to work and now i'm burning up the heels of my shoes, digging into the ground, trying to slow down time. i'm reaching back, clawing and grasping trying to get todays time back.

i need a do over.

i got the rest and relaxation that i craved but i haven't been able to do anything else.

no writing. no reading. no exercising.......

nothing,

i read this on a business sign today and i think they put it up just for me:

-time stays long enough for the person who knows how to use it-

i don't tend to create new year resolutions, for many reasons, but the biggest being that i hate saying, "well, this many more days of debauachery and gluttony and THEN i'll eat better, i'll exercise more, i'll write more today, i'll read more, i'll............

i believe if you want to make a change then you need to do it when it needs to be done, not on the 1st of the week, month, year, whatever. but i find myself this year already trying to make some changes and the first of the year just happened to coincide with my plans. what i'm discovering is that it's hard enough to accomplish most of my goals without sabotaging myself!

i wish i had this weekend to do over again.

but i know that i can't. but what i do get is a brand new chance right now. as i'm writing this. there's always a chance to make changes. i can't help but think about those far too few days when i've been privileged enough to watch a day start, whether it be at a beach, on a drive to work, a drive cross country, or sitting at a far too early breakfast. i can see the sun coming up over the mountains, peeking out from beyond the horizon, out from the clouds. i can smell the wetness of fresh dew on the grass and i refuse to brush down the goosebumps that i feel rising off my skin.

forgive me for not getting this exactly right, but i heard once that maybe God doesn't grow each flower out of some kind of necessity, but instead maybe he does it for the enjoyment and love of seeing each one grow.

i'll get the exact quote later and share it but you get the idea.

in case you're reading this wondering what exactly my point is, i'll bottom line it for ya:
i'm disappointed in myself and my lack of willingness to "try harder" but i am relieved and appreciative that i get a fresh day tomorrow to try again. like it says " Gods graces renew each day"

i hope that this new year finds you sitting on the roof of your car overlooking the city, watching the sun quietly making its way above us all, showing us that anything we want is out there, over the horizon, we just have to go get it.

everyone...the Mines

2007-12-29T19:03:00.001-05:00

while the writers are on strike.....

2007-12-28T22:53:00.000-05:00

.....i guess i'll just have to hunt up my favorite SNL moments until new episodes arrive.

Morgan Stanley - SNL

Add to My Profile | More Videos

have yourself a merry little christmas

2007-12-23T19:22:00.000-05:00

to everyone reading, i hope you have a wonderful christmas filled with special memories and new ones made this year. and don't forget:

"gifts and money are the reason for the season"

hmmmm, no, i don't think that's it. if anyone remembers what the real saying is......let me, and everyone else know. (wink)

thanks to mary bailey

2007-12-20T19:33:00.000-05:00

i apologize for this being a week after the fact but the holidays have kept me busy. last friday night marie and i made the long drive to the Rialto Square Theatre in Joliet, illinois to attend the radio production of It's a Wonderful Life. now, i own a cd that has jimmy stewart and donna reed performing a radio broadcast for I.A.W.L. and i listen to it on my commute to work every winter but this was something new for Rie and I.

first of all the theatre is just gorgeous, very elegant with an embrace of nostalgia to help fill the theatre with the days gone by vibe which totally helped with the mind set of going to watch an olden days radio play. the show itself was great. before the show went live on the air we sang christmas carols complete with a beautiful organ. we were also invited to help fill in the crowd noise. so when george bailey is a young boy and they are snow sledding, we are the voices that you hear in the background, sounding of other youngsters having fun. when old man potter is arguing with the board about the future of "that old building and loan" we are the "board members" grumbling against everything potter says and cheering along with everything george says back.

even the sound effects man, a man know as Freak was a great entertainment. from his excitement of getting to splash his fist into a bucket of water emulating the sounds of a drowning boy, to watching his disappointment when a sound effect didn't go quite right.

all in all it was a great night with a wonderful, warm and welcoming theatre filled with performers, workers and fans all coming together to relive and rejoice for a few hours, a wonderful play, and a wonderful life.

p.s. thanks again to mary bailey for inquiring about my thoughts and please keep in touch!

big ups to dwight for finding this

2007-12-19T23:11:00.001-05:00

SNL - People Getting Punched Just Before Eating (Andy Samber
Uploaded by nono_the_bean

yup....i still believe in God

2007-12-08T10:23:00.000-05:00

so rie and i went to see the golden compass. i really liked the movie and from everything rie said the books are even better, but i'm too slow of a reader to get it done before we went to see the show.

the crazy thing is, for all the negative press about the books/movie when i left the theatre i didn't really have a strong urge to worship satan. hmph.

all i can say for people who are protesting the content (and it is your God given right to do so) please read the books before commenting, or if that seems too dangerous, at least research what you are protesting. alot of people are making fools of themselves for attacking quotes and concepts that have already been misinterrpreted thru the grapevine.

merry christmas ( not sure if that's politically correct to say but i'm saying it anyway!)

now that's a veteran player

2007-11-30T19:08:00.003-05:00

holiday highlights

2007-11-17T20:27:00.001-05:00

so as we approach the christmas season (you may be approaching, i have been heavily entrenched in it for weeks!), i just felt like sharing a couple of holiday favorites of mine.

1) j.r.r. tolkien wrote letters in response to his children's letters to father christmas. in them he portrayed st. nick and sometimes would write as an elf, and even sometimes as a polar bear that worked for santa claus. it is a wonderful collection of these letters that lasted over 20 years. tolkiens' creativity is obvious but his warmth, and heart were an unexpected surprise. the book is called Letters from Father Christmas and i highly recommend checking it out.

2) one of my favorite songwriters released an album a couple of christmases ago and tours every holiday season playing the album live with all of his friends. it is the story of the coming of Christ done in a series of songs leading up to his birth.
his name is Andrew Peterson and the album is called Behold the Lamb of God. please give it a listen.

3) every year along with my many christmas traditions, i listen to this cd i have of a live radio broadcast of It's a Wonderful Life, featuring Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed. what a wonderful throwback. and in an added bonus, Rie and i are going to the Rialto theatre in Joliet, Illinois to see a live production of the radio show of I.A.W.L. tix are only $10 you should check it out. it will be done live on local radio but you can go to the theatre to see them perform it!

4) there was another favorite that actually prompted this list and now that i go to type it out, i find that i cannot remember what it was! oh well, that's my life thoughts come and go like leaves on trees! that's the beauty of blogs, when i DO remember it i can add it and delete the part where i mentioned that i forgot it!

happy holidays.

champs again!!!!!!

2007-10-28T23:15:00.000-05:00

part two

2007-10-19T19:48:00.003-05:00

Papelbon Riverdances part one

2007-10-19T19:48:00.001-05:00

i miss deep thoughts

2007-10-17T08:44:00.001-05:00

I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it.

– Jack Handey

ANI MA'AMIN

2007-10-10T21:27:00.000-05:00

this is written on the first page of a book i'm reading right now called God on Mute by pete greig that i thought you guys might appreciate.

ANI MA'AMIN

(originally written in hebrew)

i believe in the sun even when it isn't shining.
i believe in love even when i am alone.
i believe in God even when He is silent.

(this was graffiti found in 1945 on the wall of a basement in Koln, Germany, where a Jewish believer is thought to have been hiding from the Gestapo)

little wonders

2007-10-06T21:44:00.001-05:00

so i was just listening to Little Wonders by Rob Thomas and couldn't help but reflect on the truth of it.

he says: our lives are made in these small hours,
these little wonders, these twists and turns of fate,
time falls away, but these small hours still remain.

i couldn't help but be appreciative to that song right now. after reading Cold Tangerines by my friend Shauna Niequist
i've been really thirsting for motivation in the everyday. i have all these beautiful opportunities and gifts and i just find myself to weathered to lift a finger to enjoy them. the sad thing really is that it isn't so hard to sit down and read a little bit, or write a few chapters, or get to the gym, go for a walk, make love, clean the house or anything that you find yourself missing out on. it is just such a simple flip of a switch from "not" doing these things to "doing" them. unfortunately the switch is guarded by sniper qualified ninja trained kamikaze monkeys from hell.

i really find it amazing that i can have so many things that i am passionate about that i let sit on a proverbial shelf and gather dust while i just look out the window and watch the seasons change. it all goes by so fast, and all we really have to do is step out onto the tracks and let it run us over. the fun, the freshness, the beauty of talents, treasures and freedom. the freedom that God has given us to touch his hand every single day in every single thing that we do.

i want to. do you?

if so, maybe we can all hold hands together and experience a walk in the world with our father.

Buy It, Read It, Thank God, Thank Shauna

2007-10-03T13:20:00.000-05:00

boy he seems ungrateful !!!!!

2007-10-01T20:39:00.001-05:00

i love it!

2007-09-26T16:48:00.001-05:00

I LOVE THIS FREAKIN' MOVIE

2007-09-21T19:59:00.000-05:00

sports are so much more than sports

2007-09-03T22:38:00.001-05:00

here is the video i mentioned in the post before

Touching Gesture

2007-09-01T23:01:00.000-05:00

as soon as i can find video of this i will post it but until then....
USCs kicker Mario Danelo was found dead in january, believed to have fallen over the cliff where he was found.
to honor him, when USC scored their 1st touchdown of this season the team lined up for the extra point, complete with the place holder....but no kicker was brought out. USC let the play clock expire and took the 5 yard penalty and then brought out their new kicker to kick the extra point. it was an amazing video and it's really pointless to write about it, you have to see it and i am hunting for the video.

Fail Fail to Michigan !!!

2007-09-01T15:08:00.000-05:00

so a couple months ago, my friend dwight asked me if i wanted to go to Ann Arbor to watch the University of Michigan play their first football game of the year against Appalachian State. i kindly said no thank you. and in hindsight i still stand by that decision. i mean i know the big house is famous and one of those places that it's great to say you've been to, but i've already been there. so why would i want to go see a team that i don't care for play a team i've barely heard of, in a place i've already been to?
but the bottom line, whether i was there for it or not, history happened in Ann Arbor today, michigan became the first ranked division 1A team to ever lose to a division 1-AA team.
hey, i'm a notre dame fan and this year i don't have high expectations, it's a maturing year, but now, notre dame's record doesn't matter to me because of this score:

Appalachian State 34
Michigan 32

i wish you could see my smile

2007-08-19T09:46:00.001-05:00

what a difference a decade makes

2007-08-19T08:36:00.000-05:00

celebrating my 21st birthday: coming home at 8:30am after "closing the bar" then going to a house party and finishing it off with a greasy (but AMAZING) breakfast and a POT of coffee at Poor Richard's Cafe.

celebrating my 31st birthday: going to bed at 8:30pm after dinner and a movie and a quick trip to WalMart for some benadryl.

birthday thoughts part two

2007-08-18T08:35:00.001-05:00

i just found this picture of me with my grandpa and grandma dornan from the same birthday party mentioned in the last post. it was especially meaningful because i am alot like my grandpa in that i don't like to go out to alot of functions. grandma would always come to events but not grandpa, and that was ok i understood. but he showed up with grandma to my birthday party and the moment was never lost on me that he was there.

grandpa passed away a couple months ago. i never had the relationship with him where you wanted to go down there every weekend and play as a kid, and i didn't talk to him every 3 or 4 days but i always knew he loved me. he had a hard life and could be on the rough side sometimes but he came out pretty good for the life he had. raised a family, always supported them and for all time was by my grandmas side.

i don't think that grandpa had role models like athletes, musicians, actors or anything like that. he was a blue collar, hard working man that wasn't awed or wowed by people. he understood that everyone put their pants on one leg at a time in the morning and that he was no lower than someone else just because he didn't have alot of money or fancy things.

and when he got sick the last few years of his life i saw something amazing. he never claimed to be a religious man (although shortly before he passed my cousin asked if he believed in God, he smiled, chuckled and said yes, yes i do) but i saw this kind of a peace come over him that i don't know how many other people noticed. for all the times that i saw him , talked to him, or heard from other family, he wasn't a guy to say "why me?" or freak out in denial. he understood that we all are born, live a life and die. there is nothing wrong with it, it's all part of the deal.

what i really admire about the guy is even the way that he wanted his funeral and death handled. he was cremated and there was no visitation OR funeral. no fuss, just the way he wanted it. honestly i can't blame him and have often thought similar thoughts about my demise.

i probably can't explain my grandpa to you guys but just trust me, i loved him and learned alot more from him about life while he was dying then i ever realized.

my name is christopher delbert dornan
my grandpa is delbert dornan

for years i was embarrassed of that middle name.
but now i'm just embarassed at my shame of that name.

Happy Birthday to I

2007-08-18T08:12:00.000-05:00

so this picture was from my birthday a couple of years ago (which is today......my birthday, NOT a couple of years.
i looked and looked and couldn't find the original that inspired this. but if you look at the cake you will see two photos. the upper right wsa from our honeymoon at Universal Studios. there have been jokes that the biggest smile i had on my face the whole week of our wedding/honeymoon was when we were in line for the Spiderman ride and this employee dressed up as Spidey was taking pics with the patrons. yes i realize that "Spidey" was probably a zit faced scrawny teen in a cheap rental suit but i didn't give a damn.

the second picture on the cake was from my 3rd birthday party when i had a Spiderman ice cream cake, Spiderman b-day hats , Spiderman everything, and seeing as how i never grew out of that Spiderman thing, the last few years on my birthday, my mom would send me a copy of one of the pictures from that birthday party.
the party in this picture here was funny because i was turning....27 i believe? and all my gifts were Spidey coloring books, toys, web shooters....i loved it!!

who says you have to grow up?!
(other than my wife, my mom, my bosses, strangers and especially that nazi at Chuck E. Cheese that said i couldn't fit into the ball pit)

but anyway, i just wanted to take this forum to say happy birthday to the sweetest son of a bitch ( no offense mom) that i know, so, me, i hope you have a great birthday. i can't believe it's been almost 20 years since we first met, you were just turning 11, i was 12. you were the best friend i had growing up and i am so proud of the man that you have grown to become. i love you, i mean me.

my all time, absolute, favorite SNL skit

2007-08-13T20:02:00.001-05:00

ONCE

2007-08-09T22:52:00.001-05:00

this is one of Rie and my favorite movies. it is only playing at the theatre at woodland mall. it used to be a Cinemark but now it's a Celebration Cinema. but the cool thing is this theatre is going to show more limited releases and indie movies as well as all the big movies ....AND they dropped ticket prices to $3.50 all shows, all the time. so you have no excuses!

wow

2007-08-06T21:19:00.000-05:00

please, please, buy this book or go to your library and check it out. this guy is amazing and is making me feel silly for all the times i've said " i can't do it."

there's no one i can trust

2007-07-31T23:10:00.000-05:00

so, this is very frustrating but i need to let you guys know.
contrary to what i was told, gullible IS in the dictionary.

long but glorious

2007-07-28T00:02:00.001-05:00

Proud Uncle

2007-07-18T08:53:00.000-05:00

here is the first picture of a proud first time uncle.
this is my niece Keegan Sue Clarke.
thanks to Katie and Adam for procreating.

i think the best part of being an uncle won't come for about 13-16 years though. that will be when Keegan tells me how her mom won't let her do something and i can give her all the dirt on how her mom used to do the same things and then my sis will get mad at me and it will be just like we're kids again!!

officialy the funniest thing i have EVER heard

2007-07-17T20:00:00.001-05:00

i don't know how to paste audio to my blog so a link will have to do. hope you enjoy.

http://www.chumfm.com/MorningShow/bits/march24.swf

for the last time!!!!!

2007-07-08T12:39:00.000-05:00

JUST BECAUSE I LOVE THE RED SOX DOES NOT MEAN I HATE THE TIGERS!!!

pimp slap

2007-06-30T06:24:00.001-05:00

ya know, i've always said people trying to start fights with people they don't know is dangerous. ya never know who you'll get!!

how could they delete this scene?

2007-06-28T20:59:00.001-05:00

i knew it!!!

2007-06-24T10:07:00.001-05:00

this just in!!!!

2007-06-10T19:50:00.001-05:00

THE CAT HAS GONE HOME.......not to heaven but home!! the proper owner contacted us tonight. he had been out of town all weekend. it was a guy though, not a girl. we had the wrong apt. due to the downstairs guy with the pool pointing to the wrong unit.!! the kid told us he didn't want to get his hopes up because he had a couple different people call him and say they thought they had his cat and he'd get there and it wasn't it :-(

all in all a good day and a GREAT weekend despite how i complained earlier. and thank you to my wife marie and my friends that shared in my joy of getting baptised today at church. kinda a spur of the moment that i had been wrestling with for years!!!

crazy cat

2007-06-10T15:04:00.000-05:00

funny how just when you see a goal and decide to pick up the pace sometimes some jackass sticks out their foot and trips you up. well, there's no jack ass per se but still my weekend of complete freedom was CAT-astrophically changed. i was prepared to take my baby girl to see 1,2 even three movies friday night. it was just one of those cinematic feeling evenings. we had settled on one movie at 10ish.

well, around 6ish, i'm in the living room and i see a cat walk by our patio that looks suspiciously like a cat in a wanted poster on the front of our building. we remembered the cat was called Lucy and so Rie walked over to the door and called out her name. sure enough she stopped and turned and looked right at us. i went outside first which of course completed the objective of frightening her back into the woods next to us. i went to get the number off of the poster at the building enterance while rie tried to use her female pleasentness to get her to come out of the brush.

front of building......NO MORE POSTER.
I looked to the building next to us....NO MORE POSTER.
i run back around the outside of the building and scare the cat out of rie's arms, back into the woods. i tell her i'm gonna ride my bike to the clubhouse because i saw a poster in the gym 2 weeks ago.

NO MORE POSTER.

in fact as i looked around our community i noticed that ALL of the posters were gone.

i come back and rie has the cat so we figure out how to capture it under a laundry basket (with air holes!) because we got rid of our giant pet taxi !!!
i called our apartment office but they were closed. so i went riding around again on the street that i know the wanted poster listed and i stopped everyone i saw but noone knew anything. so i came back and rie went to the store to get a pet taxi. by 11:30 pm we realized we were going to have a house guest. one problem....PISCIN. our cat was not a big fan, nor was Lucy a big fan of Piscin. so we put the cat in our bathroom with food, water, litter box, blanket pillows. i slept on the floor in there with her for a couple of hours cuz she's just so damn cute and she was sooo skinny from having to find her own food for nearly 2 months we guessed that i just couldnt leave her alone.

so no movie. and rie didn't get much of her work done.

so we figured no problem, saturday morning came and we called the office to get the residents name and number only to find out that they have no idea who it is, they never came in to the office to leave contact info. so back on the bike i go. i stop and ask a few random people, lastly i guy filling up his kids inflatable pool on the grass. (i'm sure the office hasn't seen that one yet. if i can't have tiki torches sticking into the edge of our patio line, then i'm pretty sure you cannot have a pool. i ask him "a couple of months ago someone from pinemeadow dr. lost a cat. by any chance do you have any idea who it might belong to? we've found it."

he replies "yeah. she lives right up there." as he points to the apartment above him.
right then the complex calls me saying that the grounds keeper remembers the address number was 3305, which matches to the building this guy's pointing to. so i go around the front and buzz......of course, no answer, so i leave a note. i go to the office and have them look up the address and leave a message for the tennant.

ALL DAY SATURDAY, NO ANSWER NO NUTHIN'

so again, no movie, no real bike rides, no tennis, no nothing, we really didn't want to miss this girls call!!! which in hind sight was stupid because she had our cell numbers but whatever!
saturday evening and again sunday morning i rode my bike over there again and she still wasn't home, but i remembered the name on the mailbox so i went to www.smartpages.com and put in the last name and the address and in return i got a phone number. so i called, left a message and here it is, sunday 4 pm and still, we have a stranger cat holed up in our bathroom, being rude to the cat of residence and royaly screwing up my weekend of fun!

oh well, i just hope the girl hasn't gone out of the country for the summer or something because i might just toss the cat back up on her patio !!!! it is a sweet cat though and if the 2 cats got along and didn't have to be seperated it wouldn't be such a big deal. also i hope that the girl still wants the cat back!!! it's been almost 2 months, maybe she's moved on. ok, well now let's not even think like that. i know how much we love our cat and i hope that if she ever fled and was captured that someone would do everything they could to safely get her back to us.

so have fun, enjoy the weather, and if you want a nice childhood throwback that doesn't cost a fortune, go for a bike ride to mcdonalds and get an old fashioned ice cream cone. i love cold stone and their wacky creations but nothing tastes as sweet as that little 99cent cone from my child hood.

i like country and i don't care if you don't

2007-05-27T17:31:00.001-05:00

i heard the following from jeff foxworthy at this year's country music awards and i loved it. couldn't find the video to put up but oh well. it's lengthy, but it's great, they might still have the video up at CMT.com

I started thinking about why I like country music and doing this show so much, and here's what I came up with, y'all.

"I like country music because it's about the things in life that really matter. It ain't about braggin' about how you're gonna mess somebody up, or how somebody ain't respectin' ya. It's about love, family, friends -- with a few beers, a cheap woman and a two-timin' man thrown in for spice. It doesn't take political sides, even with things as ugly as war. Instead, it celebrates the brave men and women who go to fight 'em, the price they pay to do it and the longin' we have for them to return home to the ones that they love.

"It's about kids and how there ain't nothin' like 'em. I get tired of hearin' about how bad kids are today, because there are a lot of great kids out there that just need somebody to love 'em and believe in 'em. Country folks love their kids and they will jack you up if you try to mess with 'em!

"People in country music don't forget the people that allow them to do what they do for a livin'. They sign autographs and they take pictures with the fans because they know without 'em most of us entertainers would be gettin' a lot dirtier in the course of our workday. We are thankful that people want to hear the songs and the jokes that we write.

Country music doesn't have to be politically correct. We sing about God because we believe in Him. We are not trying to offend anybody, but the evidence that we have seen of Him in our small little lives trumps your opinion about whether or not He exists.

"We love country music because it touches us where we live. It's about mommas, and when they were hot, and when they are unappreciated, and when they were dyin'. It's about daddies and the difficulties they have sometimes at tellin' the people that they work so hard to protect and provide for how they feel about 'em.

"Country music is about new love and it's about old love. It's about gettin' drunk and gettin' sober. It's about leavin' and it's about comin' home. It's real music sung by real people for real people, the people that make up the backbone of this country. You can call us rednecks if you want. We're not offended, 'cause we know what we're all about. We get up and go to work, we get up and go to church, and we get up and go to war when necessary.

"All we ask for is a few songs to carry us along the way, and that's why I love this show, because it ain't some self-important Hollywood hype with the winners determined by somebody else. On this show, you decide who goes home with a trophy and you get to dance and sing along with the people that bring you the songs of your life."

Love

2007-05-12T06:32:00.000-05:00

as obi-wan would say.... hello there.

for the twos of you who have requested more words, i have heard my peoples cries.

so i am writing this from my new laptop (pics to follow) while sitting in our hotel room at cedar point. we got an amazing deal on a sweet room right inside the park, overlooking lake erie. it's rie's birthday present...no not lake erie!!! hey, i'm good but come on!

anyway, to hop right into it, it is amazing what God can get bored and decide to do. we were all settled in our room and were trying to figure out what to do next. we decided to go put the parking pass in our car, and to get fresh air, on our way back there was a group of (guessing) high school kids, both boys and girls. after we got past them, i glanced at rie and she was shaking her head and had a half grin as if in disbelief. it took me a minute to get it out of her, but appearantly when we approached them, they got quiet and rie distinctly heard one of them say something about "a dyke", clearly referring to her. and they weren't trying to be heard.

by this time the kids were gone and trust me we did look, not to kick their ass (probably not anyway) but to show them what their attempts to be cool in front of their friends did. it left my beautiful wife in tears and me right behind her.

(picture ironically taken of a boys&girls van on the way to cedar point)

we went to dinner and were talking about it. there were several points of interest that we discussed. among them were:

we joked that they were actually offending me not her. i tried convincing her that they must have thought we were a couple, which meant that they thought i was a big fat lesbian. so on the plus side, at least they thought rie was the "bitch"

then the thoughts shifted to how rare this passing exchange was. three days before the trip, i upgraded our room to a different hotel for just $2 more. different hotel, save $2, we don't see those kids. if i didn't want to put the parking pass in the car right then, we don't see those kids. any number of freak things and we don't have our night ruined by insensitive kids.

and then, somewhere in my attemepts to explain to rie that they were probably just being stupid, and how i knew that because i used to do stuff like that. just trying to make my friends laugh, trying to look tough, or basically just being stupid. and then i brought up how i have even done things like that recently, where someone walks by and you make an insinuation in your head, or to your friend you're with. then i remembered that rie just a few months ago was at panera with a friend and whatever the circumstances, found themselves laughing at a woman as she walked in. but this woman on her way out, approached them and even asked "im sorry, but were you laughing at me when i came in here?" to which they said no, even though they were.

at the time i remember talking to rie about how self conscious this woman must have been, but know i see that in reality, she wasn't self conscious, she wasn't stupid, she knew she was being made fun of and decided to confront it. i give her credit, that is a tough thing to do.

after more of these examples to each other of things we had done of the same type, to try to prove that these were just dumb kids, something amazing happened. we went from crying out to God about how we had been wronged, how we had been hurt and how we wanted these kids to know what hurt they had spilled by shooting words like arrows. and what God did was ask us if we had ever been those kids? and we had, too many times to count. i don't know if i ever keep my mouth shut when there's a chance to make fun of someone else, even if it's more to make my group laugh, than to hurt others feelings. i've probably made other peoples wives feel the way that i
watched my wife feel last night, and it made me sick.

so by the end of it all, we found the roles almost reversed. we forgave the kids, and asked God to do the same, instead of having him release their seatbelts on one of the rollercoasters for a good scare. and we found ourselves asking God to hold US accountable for all the painful arrows we have released in our lives at others expense.

and guess what people, it felt good to be offended last night, it felt good to have our feelings hurt. to remember that we do still care, we do feel, and that we need to open our love to every single person we see, not even ones we actually meet. we need to show the same love that we show to our spouses and families to that "funny looking" person that just walked by, or the gay couple holding hands, or whatever it may be, because guess what, they hear the words, God hears the words, and it hurts both of them deeply.

by the end of last night i found that the entire event had led me to refocus my love for my wife. i got a chance to remember what it was like to want to defend her with every bone in my body. i even told her how when thinking recently about our impending deaths, hopefully somewhere way down the line, that at first i had thought that if given the choice, i would want to die first, so that she could continue to live and enjoy life. but what i finally understood, was that i love my wife so much, that as funny as it sounds, i would want her to go first, so that she can go home and be with God, and it would be me stuck here to suffer withouth her. i explained that i never want her to have to feel the emptyness and heartache of having to loose her true love. i would shoulder that burden until the day i too finally die and am able to see her again.

i tend to struggle with pornography and all the evils that fester from it. i am in a great marriage, but i somehow continue to find myself being captivated by the wrong things. which as i've learned, demeans, degrades, and destroys everyone involved. and i didn't want to think of other women but it would happen and then i couldnt get the thoughts out of my head. all the while, i would do anything for my wife, but sometimes i just flat out forget how important she is to me, and how she is the only woman i want. i asked God to strengthen me more than ever so that i could hold onto the love, the caring, the willingness to die for my wife that she deserves. and i asked him to never let me forget that every lustful thought, every inappropriate action, whether my wife knows about it or not, breaks her heart every bit as much as a stupid kid calling her a dyke.

it might appear to be ramblings or two seperate issues but in my head, heart and soul, the two are inseperable. they all come down to love, pure true love that we ALL, ALL, ALL deserve. your spouse, your family, your roommate who you want to smother in their sleep, the stranger on the street who is different enough from you that you feel threatened enough to try to break them down verbally or worse to make yourself feel more dominant.

watch what you say, watch how you live and watch how you love.

Snow Patrol - Signal Fire

2007-05-10T03:02:00.001-05:00

damnit ! even with a trampoline we can't do it...

2007-05-03T20:01:00.001-05:00

Old Glory Insurance

2007-04-27T23:31:00.001-05:00

i am completely speechless

2007-04-24T20:22:00.000-05:00

this letter is rediculous enough but then the fact that she's also calling out the "government plot" cracks me up. you see, these are the people that are so hell bent on their beliefs that they would never stop to listen to reason. i am afraid, very afraid.

i think a little pee came out

2007-04-23T21:02:00.001-05:00

The Landlord

2007-04-17T20:54:00.001-05:00

good luck chuck

2007-04-12T18:35:00.001-05:00

he he he

2007-04-03T20:09:00.001-05:00

that has to hurt..,,,head and pride

2007-03-26T20:18:00.001-05:00

my heros true colors

2007-03-25T09:11:00.001-05:00

new day, new blog, same underwear

2007-03-12T09:57:00.000-05:00

so it seems that spring is upon us. grass can be seen, spring clothes are in stores, blog templates are being changed to warm and wonderful new schemes to represent all the sunshine and fun that we will all miss while we are stuck at work or sitting at home plugged into our computers like the matrix connection (ouch).

hopefully we all will get out and live a little more than in years past, i know that i need to. i've lost alot of weight recently (as has my red furred compatriot D to the wight) and rie and i have also joined the Y. her for the exercise and me for the chance to dress up as a construction worker, cop in chaps, or an indian and have anonymous encounters with strange men.

just kidding

rie didn't join.

just kidding

but anyway, i can tell that it's getting nice and ready for warm weather because I, mr. christmas is sick of snow, and i have begun again to listen to alot of country music. that is something that started about 6 years ago. during our first year of marriage my old buddy Bart turned me on to Kenny Chesney and it was as spring approached so the fun soul of the songs seemed to fit with my yearning to get out in the sun. and as winter comes every year, i drift for one reason or another from it, but every single spring, back it comes. complete with reminescent tales, beer toasting anthems and tons of hell to be raised and good times to be had.

so no matter what type of music gets you in that summer frame of mind, here's to you! love it and live it loud.

donald miller cracks me up

2007-03-04T15:36:00.000-05:00

The Anti-Christ Watch
Donald Miller, Jordan Green

(Editor’s Note: Yeah, we’re taking a week off from the General Article business. Please keep enjoying Don and Jordan’s thoughts on the next anti-Christ. And tell your friends!)

We’ve caught it, and we’ve got it bad.
Apocalyptic fever.
Speculating on the identity of the anti-Christ may have reached its peak a few years back with the Left Behind series and the blockbuster film, “The Omega Code”, but we’re still keeping a vigilant eye on political and cultural rising stars. We wait and watch for candidates to advocate marks on our forehead, or to launch nukes at Israel. Many theologians believe the visions John wrote of in Revelation pertain to the Roman Empire, but that’s no fun and doesn’t give us the satisfaction of knowing we’re right and everyone who’s wrong will pay. Dearly.
This is Burnside’s rundown of anti-Christ possibilities. The last thing we want is to be caught unawares. Or unaware.

The Front Runners: Armageddon is Upon Us
Barak Obama

Be afraid: Obama is handsome and the ladies love him. He appears intelligent, charismatic, friendly and is a dynamic speaker. And what is worse is he’s a Democrat. Obama went to Russia in 2005 to check out military bases where WMDs were being stored, and may have discovered a way to launch said weapons at Israel. This single trip connects the Senator to weapons that may be used against the country we evangelicals rub as a Biblical rabbit foot. Add to this that Slate.com’s Timothy Noah has a supposedly tongue-in-cheek blog about Obama entitled “Messiah Watch”, so now we have secular media referring to him as a kind of Christ. We would also like you to note Barak Obama’s middle name is Hussein. That name sounds a bit Arab, doesn’t it? Some of you may believe Obama is actually a Christian. He himself claims that he was baptized at Trinity United Church of Christ. That said, he talks about his faith in a non-“Jesus told me to kill these people” sort of way. This makes him suspect. The true anti-Christ will no doubt champion peace. It’s not the “Jesus told me to kill people” crowd we are worried about, it’s the leaders who can’t hear this obvious voice of God. And it bears repeating that he is handsome. He is very handsome.
Why you shouldn’t worry: He’s almost too obvious a pick, and Obama doesn’t have enough political experience to be the anti-Christ. He can only be the anti-Christ if he ends up being nominated by his party, and the chances of that are slim. But if he does get the nod, he is back atop the list, we assure you.
Bono
Be afraid: He owns a castle in Ireland. A castle, for pete’s sake! Bono is very adept at controlling large crowds, as he does it for a living. The most chilling evidence? Relevant Magazine is on to him.
Why you shouldn’t worry: Bono has done more than any other public personality to bring attention to the AIDS crisis in Africa. At one time, that would’ve put him atop the anti-Christ list, but lately evangelicals have been using that cause to make themselves look fashionable. We also believe if Bono were the anti-Christ, the quality of U2 albums would’ve gone up over time, and that has not been the case. Also, some see The Edge and Larry Mullen Jr. as angels sent to keep an eye on Bono. The anti-Christ would not have humble minstrels surrounding him.
We are a bit suspicious of that Adam Clayton character, though. He was arrested fifteen years ago for possession of the demon-weed.

Jerry Bruckheimer
Be afraid: Makes a lot of crappy movies, including a film titled “Armageddon”. He also lives and works in Hollywood, a region that espouses the supposed positive characteristics of the Democratic Party. That is the kind of influence the anti-Christ will certainly have whispering into his ear.
Why you shouldn’t worry: Bruckheimer produces “The Amazing Race”, which my parents love. He also has very little discernible talent.

Dr. House
Be afraid: House is almost superhumanly smart, and is very good at manipulating those around him. His cane could be a secret sword, like in that movie, “Blind Fury”. He also has no appreciation for rules and authority.
Why you shouldn’t worry: House is probably a fictional character.

The Second Tier: Check Your Banned Automatic Weapons Stash

Urban Meyer (Head Coach of the Florida Gators football team)
Be afraid: Meyer has turned every team he’s head coached into pure gold. Utah went undefeated and Florida won a national championship. He was also the wide receivers coach at Notre Dame from 1996 to 2000, which is certainly frightening because those people are Catholic.
Why you shouldn’t worry: He is coaching a team in the South. God would never have the anti-Christ come out of the Confederacy. Until Meyer starts coaching the New England Patriots or Seattle Seahawks, he’s okay. If he coaches the Dallas Cowboys, he becomes a saint.

Jon Stewart
Be afraid: All the liberals love him and he provides news to an entire generation of stoners and snooty intellectuals. Stewart is able to pick apart the absurdity of political spin, cutting to the supposed truth of any situation. This is not a bad thing, but he tends to use this ability against conservatives more than liberals. Some might say that the current administration is the equivalent of an uber-slow pitching machine launching beach balls at comedians who stand around with their bats smoking cigarettes, but this is absurd. Stewart and his team are working overtime to find anything funny about what our leaders do. There is absolutely nothing funny about accidentally shooting a man in the face because he looks like a bird. Nothing.
Why you shouldn’t worry: He is Jewish. That takes him out of the running. Case closed.

Dick Cheney
Be afraid: Cheney has a lesbian daughter.
Why you shouldn’t worry: While Cheney is a supposed black hole of hatred in which no light or joy can live, he is also the Vice President of the United States, which is the greatest and most Christian nation in the history of the world. He was the CEO of Halliburton who now provides the American military (read: God’s military) with food and guns and disposable toilet seat protectors. If that wasn’t enough, he had a cameo in the film “Die Hard with a Vengeance” which is a terrific spiritual allegory about what Jesus will look like in the End Times. He has a remarkable sixth sense for justice, even going so far as shooting an old man in the face that was wrongly pretending to be a bird. And lastly, he isn’t going to be around long enough to take over the world.
It’s Possible: Because No One Expects It

Katie Couric
Be afraid: She’s a woman. Women leaders usurp the natural pyramid of authority established by God in the Bible.
Why you shouldn’t worry: She’s a woman. The anti-Christ will rule with a scepter.
Chad Gibbs
Be afraid: Chad worked at a museum for medical supply history, giving him intimate knowledge of how to kill people. And a museum for medical supply history is certainly a front for something. (Stem cells, legalized marijuana, the whole bit.) We also saw him mention once that he enjoys hunting “the greatest prey of all”. When I asked him what that was, he jammed his finger against my lips and whispered, “Shhhhhhh…”
Why you shouldn’t worry: We are working on this.

Chris Martin of Coldplay
Be afraid: Martin is described as “Bono-lite”, and he talks a lot about “making trade fair” whatever that is. He also wrote a song called “The Scientist” which supports the dark art of science.
Why you shouldn’t worry: He’s still “Bono-lite”, had an awful haircut for his last album, and married Gwyneth Paltrow, which doesn’t seem like something the anti-Christ would do. Relevant Magazine remains suspiciously silent on the subject.

John Petroski
Be afraid: He wrote this article for the Central Connecticut State University newspaper. Petroski claims the piece was satirical, making it the least funny and most soulless bit of satire ever written.
Why you shouldn’t worry: After his disgusting article, Petroski has only a slim chance at a future in politics, journalism (except maybe in the No Spin Zone), and no chance at a job anywhere else.
It’s Not Likely, But Load Up On Canned Foods Anyway

George W. Bush
Be afraid: We couldn’t think of a single reason.
Why you shouldn’t worry: When 75% of the country disapproves of the job he’s done, we know that the other 25% are his evangelical base, who do not judge a President by his accomplishments, but by whether or not he holds a Bible Study in the White House. Bush still does. It fits between his morning session of watching television and his afternoon ritual of reading the comics.

Hillary Clinton
Be afraid: She’s running for President, is a Democrat like Barak Obama, and knows politics like the back of her machine-like hand. She wears pantsuits. She was once married to Bill Clinton, best known for manipulating and having a sexual affair with that innocent angel Monica Lewinsky, proving to the world that he has a scepter.
Why you shouldn’t be worried: We just can’t see an angry crowd of Arabs getting riled up against Israel with Hillary at the podium. We’re trying, but we can’t.

The cop that pulled Jordan over for expired tags
Be afraid: Granted, I’ve been driving with expired tags for the last three years, but he didn’t have to shine his car light right into my eyes. And $300 worth of tickets solely for expired tags? I mean, come on!
Why you shouldn’t worry: If I’m being honest with myself, I was the one in the wrong, driving around with expired tags for three years and whatnot. That’s kind of what happens when you’re broke and irresponsible. Also, the cop was reasonable. He told me I can get my registration done and the fines would be dropped. But still, you never know.

The Mines true Colors

2007-03-01T00:30:00.000-05:00

this one takes awhile, but i think it's worth it

2007-02-11T09:21:00.001-05:00

for those of you who don't know, i work in the family business. and that business is an assisted living home for seniors, more specifically, seniors with alzhiemers and/or dementia. not a day goes by that i don't get compliments from someone saying how i must be a special person to accept that calling, and i get alot of people who just sigh, smile and say " i could never do that." and although i do admit it is a special calling that not everyone is cut out for, i also want people to know that i am no saint. there are still those days when my patience isn't as strong as it needs to be.
there are times when a residents repetition for nearly an hour straight of the same word drives me up a wall.
spending each and every day with these people, there are plenty of times when i forget that they are in our home for a reason, and because maybe they had a good week, but i start to expect too much from them, only to get disappointed or frustrated when that moment has passed and they aren't helping to feed themselves, or their memory isn't quite as clear and i end up telling them the same thing dozens (literally) of times.

probably the toughest time i have had since starting this last year has come more recently with the addition of our newest resident. she is a wonderful woman, with a heart full of love for God and everyone around her, whether new friend or old.
she has been a challenge because the other residents either, are never actually "with it" OR they have cycles where they are "with it" or they aren'nt, whereas she is a blended personality. in the middle of a normal discussion, she will throw in something completely off key, whether it be about her parents and then she believes she's a teen or if its about a christmas tree that is lying on the bed that needs new white lights.

so it's already difficult because it's easy to lose her, but she also has a sharp wit and will remember something you promised her from two days earlier. it's more difficult because when they are having a clear day you sometimes give them more credit for comprehension then they should receive and then it's tough when they slip out of it and you know you've lost that window into the "real them."

so after the commercial break i'm going to let you in on the earth shattering lesson that i was taught by God and an elderly woman. we'll be right back after a word from our sponsors.

ok i realize that might be completely tasteless, but if you are reading this then you already know my sense of humor and i find it hard to apologize.

anyway, so this new lady came from her own home where she had private care duty. one of these knuckle heads told her that whenever she needed anything to just bang her hand on the arm of her chair, or table if she had a meal in front of her. basically just bang and make noise and we'll be right there.
1st off, that is just stupid.
2ndly, if it was one on one care....where in the hell was the caregiver that she wasn't around this lady so and needed to be summoned?
3rdly this became her way of getting attention for the better part of 3 years.

so now that she lives with us we are trying to break her of this habit because it leaves bruises on her, it hurts her hand, it's disruptive to the other residents and she can't control it, she had a stroke leaving her left side paralized and so her only good hand often ends up sore and swollen. also, now she has to share attention with 4 other residents and i think she is used to all the attention being focused on her, so sometimes she will bang and bang even when we tell her we are busy with someone else and will be there as soon as possible. the heartbreaking part about the banging,is that she hates doing it and wants to stop but she can't. this is where the teaching of chris comes in.

so basically, we can't just keep her restrained 24/7 so there are times after times when she will be beating the crap out of herself, and i will walk in and say "hey, hey , hey, you're gonna break your hand. you can't do that."
to which she will reply "oh, i know, it hurts so bad."
"well, ok bette then why don't you stop doing it ok?"
"yes i will promise i won't do it ever again. i know it's wrong"

mind you , this is an example, we have this identical conversation usually a few times each day. so my telling her what's good for her, her agreeing, her going against it and then my asking her why she does it and her not knowing, but knowing it's wrong. so you can imagine there are going to be times when patience is in short supply, and one day when i was really busy and she had been smacking her bare leg repetitively i rushed into her room and strongly told her "bette! why do you keep doing that when i tell you it's wrong, when i tell you it hurts you, and you even agree and know that it's wrong?! i'm trying to help you and you just keep doing it over and over and we both know how bad it is for you."

honestly, i don't even remember what her response was because the next thought that ran through my head was.......
"crap"
i immediately pictured God watching this scene unfold, knowing all the emotions involved in this womans care day in and day out and how hard it is for us to see her do this to her self. and then the instant that i speak those words it hits me, and i visualize God nodding his head, knowing that i get it, and then clasping his hands together behind his head, and putting his feet up on the desk and almost saying to himself, but more to me.....
"yep, now you know how i feel"

and i do. i struggle so hard with a teenage and college years addiction to pornography, with foul, foul, language, and with my temper. these are all burdens that i carry still today and fight every moment, some days i win the battle, and some days ...not so much. (and if there are things i struggle with that i failed to mention, please don't feel it necessary to point them out!!, i know there are more i was just touching on a few ;-) )

and i know they are wrong. almost everytime that i do something that i know is wrong, i will say to God and myself, that i know that was stupid, and it's not who i am or who i want to be and i will never let it happen again.
but we all know it happens again, that's the downside to a loving God's grace that offers forgiveness of all sins, the downside is that we continue to sin! but the upside far outweighs that, his forgiveness erases all those failures, but it still hurts Him, and it still hurts us.

so there is just another in the endless stories of God taking a point that we can't grasp for ourselves and putting it up on a stand so we walk face first right into it! but i'm glad he does. sometimes it's the only way i learn.

so everytime since then, when i have struggled with whatever it may be, or maybe i'm getting frustrated with someone else's struggles, i picture that conversation with that 80+ year old woman, with her left side paralized, with alzhiemers and this addiction to smacking her hand, and my arrogant thoughts of how it shouldn't be that hard to stop, and i wonder then......
who's really crippled?

Terry Tate Office Linebacker

2007-02-09T04:31:00.001-05:00

doesn't everybody need one of these?