* Who is your audience?
* What primary action do you want visitors to take?
* Does your design and text communicate effectively?
* Are your systems integrated and compliant?
* How do you measure success?

[snip]

These are the 5 questions we ask potential clients when initiating a new project in the discovery phase to build a website.  Simply put, a website is a tool and these are the questions we ask to determine that tool’s effectiveness and impact.

If we are God’s instruments for His purposes, what do these questions look like when we pose them to ourselves through the lens of spiritual application?

1.) Who is my audience?
What is my vocation?  Where has God put me to be a light?  Who are the people that God has targeted and is specifically pointing me toward?

2.) What primary action does God want others to take when he puts them in my path?
Note that the question we ask is “what primary action do you want visitors to take?”  It’s not “what primary action do you want your website to fill.”  This question is focused on the people the tool impacts, not the tool itself.

We design websites to guide users toward a single primary action when they encounter that tool.  What has God designed me through my standing stones to guide people to do, see or better understand?

3.) Does my person and speech exhibit Christ effectively?
I’m loaded with conviction just thinking about it.

4.) Am I actively performing my designed function in the body of Christ?
Recently, as I’ve watched the church, I’ve seen our function in the body of Christ more and more similar to a game of chess.

In the proper setting, there are several individuals on the board doing the will of a single mind that has  a plan and insight of the end-goal.  No piece by itself can achieve the goal and without the cooperation of each other, the goal is not attainable.  At all times, the pieces are in motion, working toward the goal, each performing their specific and critical function and most vulnerable when they try to perform the function of another or when they find themselves misplaced (outside of the will of the master).

The best chess players use the pieces to protect one-another and always has a specific purpose for every move.  None are wasted.

The illustration shows the critical nature of timely and absolute obedience.  One can imagine how frustrated a player would become if a piece became disobedient and decided not to move or moved before it was supposed to… or to the wrong location.  What if a piece refused to give up a place where another needed to be?

The consequence could be:  1.)  that piece put itself in danger  2.)  that piece put another in danger  3.)  the master would have to use another piece to complete his will, taking up precious time to get it to that position.

5.) How do I measure success?
Because each person is designed so wonderfully differently, the measure of success will differ from person to person as to how effective a vessel they are being.

We aspire to hear the words from Matthew 25, “well done, good and faithful servant,” as illustrated in the parable of the talents.

Should we not also aspire to be like Christ in his final hours, standing boldly before God, saying, “I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do”? – John 17

At 5Q, we individually review our 5 questions to ourselves weekly because we believe that “creating an effective web site starts with asking the right questions.”

Maybe being an effective Christian does too.

…and by “boss,” I mean wife.

Happy Birthday, Natalie!  Thanks for sharing this last 1/3 of your life with me!

May this year be filled with purple, blessing and dark chocolate for you!

Phase 1

You are listening to jazz — Your first day at work is great. Your coworkers are wonderful, your cubicle is cute, and your boss is the best!

Phase 2

You are listening to pop music — After a while you are so busy that you are not sure if you’re coming or going anymore.

Phase 3

You are listening to heavy metal — This is what you feel like at month end.

Phase 4

You are listening to hip hop — You become bloated due to stress, feel sluggish and suffer from constipation. Your coworkers are too cheerful for your liking and the walls of your cubicle are closing in. You have started thinking ‘WHATEVER’ about your boss.

Phase 5

You are listening to GANGSTA RAP — After more time passes, your eyes start to twitch, you forget what a ‘good hair day’ feels like as you just fall out of bed and load up on caffeine.

Phase 6

You are listening to the voices in your head — You have build a makeshift door on your cubicle to keep people out, You have a dartboard with your bosses picture on it in your cube, You wonder why you are even here in the first place.

The employee began to scan my purchases and asked, casually, “Is your mom here with you?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Your mom… or your dad.  Are your parents here with you today?”

“No.  Why would my parents be here with me?”

“…because you have some war games here that are rated ‘Mature’ and you have to be with someone at least 18 years old to buy them.”

I know I look a little young… but really?

When I told him I was 31 and showed him my ID, he said, “man… they are gonna give me so much crap for this!”

So am I, man…. so am I.

If you’re interested in going to the conference this year, get your early-bird registration in!

June 3, 2008 the cost for the 2008 IMC will go from $450 to the regular price of $499.

http://www.internetministryconference.org/

I guess the rest of that time was spent waiting, filling out paperwork, verifying insurance, taking samples and tests, asking questions, etc.

They admitted him around 8:30 and we all went down to the cafeteria to get breakfast.

Fortunately, the Toledo Hospital has wifi so I spent the rest of the time at the hospital working in the cafeteria. It was one of those really good productive mornings where everyone disappears around me and I can’t hear anything going on around me because I’m so focused on my work.

Before I knew it, the surgery was over and we had another 2 hours to wait for him to recuperate from the anesthesia.

The girls went to walk around the hospital and look for a coffee shop. I worked… and worked and worked.

12:00 rolled around quickly and we were on our way home, dad bundled up tight and ready to relax at home.

The rest of the day has been a blur of me working, dad sleeping and the rest of the family napping, reading books and playing various card games on the computer.

Thanks to those of you who supported us in prayer this past week. As stated in James, “The prayers of the righteous are powerful and effective.”

Dad is doing well and is dozing happily in front of the TV, waking up only when someone dares to change the channel long enough to say, “hey, I was watching that.”

Some things never change.

It’s everything we designers hate having to put up with. Bravo, guys.

His cancer came back…
We all just found out today.
Happy birthday, dad.

So I’ve been shopping the market and, like most expensive things I shop, I start getting depressed about what is available within my price range and how much I have to spend to get the right thing I want.

Considering all of these factors, I started researching the differences between electric pianos vs acoustic. There’s really no comparison. Firstly, you can’t get the richness from an electric that you get out of an acoustic. Secondly, the action on an electric always makes it feel like a toy in contrast to the real thing.

A year or so ago, I was in a music store and the salesman there was trying to push me in the direction of a Casio Privia. Man, they were inexpensive. I was really tempted, just because they’re so inexpensive, but the name and reputation of Casio had me at bay. I’d really rather get something with a name like Yamaha, Korg, Kawai or Roland if I were to go into the electric market. All I could think of was Casio from the 80′s… cheap little white keyboards with tinny sounds and campy drum beats every time you accidentally pushed a button… and always targeted to children. They were toys. I don’t want a toy. I want an instrument. I want a full 88-key piano with rich, full piano sound. I don’t care if it only has one sound on the whole keyboard if it’s the piano sound and it sounds GREAT… but I want a really good piano sound and feel.

My biggest fear about buying a piano has been that I don’t know enough about the technicals of a piano to know whether I’m looking at a good one or a bad one. I don’t know what to look for on the soundboard to know if it’s in good shape or not. I don’t know how to tell if the pins will hold their tune or not. …and I REALLY don’t trust sales people at a piano store to give me a straight answer about it.

Everything I read online about buying a baby grand points to buying one used. Pianos are like cars. The minute you write the check, it loses a good deal of its value. Now, different from cars, they drop in value and then over time, they begin to increase again. …but the consensus is still that it’s best to buy used. It does mean that every time I am serious about buying a piano, I have to hire a piano repair person to go look at it with me so they can tell me if it’s a good one to buy or not and then pay him around $100 just for looking.

I have to say that buying an electric piano is attractive from the perspective that I would never have to have it tuned and if I got one that was small enough, it would be nice to travel with it.

Last Friday, I went to Firehouse Guitars to see what kind of digital pianos they had.  They always seem to have good stock and the sales people there are all musicians with an intimate knowledge about the instruments that are available.

To my surprise, I saw the Casio Privia again.  As the salesman and I talked, I told him my reasons for staying away from Casio and he sympathized with me but said that Casio has been doing a lot of work to change their branding perception.  This includes re-building the Privias with new sound sourcing, integrating 128-note polyphony in a keyboard under $500 and focusing their attention on making a digital piano with unsurpassed piano tonal quality and weight-action.

I gave him my best skeptical look and gave it a try.

…I’ve never heard a digital piano that sounded better and the key action is excellent.  I compared it to the Yamaha and Rolands available and the Casio not only holds its own, it’s sound quality and DSP effects outclass the pianos that were 2 and 3 times the price-point.

As I played the Casio, swallowing my pride and trying to decide if it would look too bad bad to play a digital piano with a piece of electrical tape over the logo, the salesman said, “if you think it sounds good like that, try it with head phones.”

He was right.  As good as it sounded through the built-in speakers, it was even better with headphones.  I compared and contrasted the sound qualities of all of the other keyboards and pianos and it was clear that the Casio was as good if not better than all of the competition.

There were keyboards and pianos that were priced at 6 and 7 times the Privia but their tonal quality and action was either equal to or worse than the Casio.

I now have a Casio PX 120 digital piano sitting in my living room.  I still wince as my eye glances the name, “CASIO” on the top, but as soon as I start playing it, I melt at the sound quality.

I wanted a digital piano that wanted nothing more than to be a GREAT-sounding piano and was small and light enough to travel easily and Casio answered the call.

I’m still going to go to look at grand pianos on Saturday but even if I don’t find what I’m looking for, I know that waiting for me at home is a great instrument that I got for less than the price of a delivery charge for the real thing.

My hat’s off to Casio for producing a great, affordable digital piano and to Christian at Firehouse Guitars in Muskegon for curbing my perception of Casio enough to give it a try.

I remember watching these videos online, laughing with tears streaming down my face. The videos portray Robert Tilton, a TV evangelist in the 80′s that was caught in several scandals and been one of prime operators to give television evangelism a bad reputation of big-hair preachers convincing little old ladies to donate their last dime. It’s his kind of activity that would get Jesus overthrowing money tables.

Recently, these videos have surfaced again as I was watching them with a friend at dinner this week. To my surprise, my reaction to them has not changed. I was literally doubled-over laughing; the kind of laughing where there’s no sound coming out, I can’t breathe and my shoulders just shake.

Most people probably won’t enjoy this kind of base humor as much as I do, but I have to share anyway. Enjoy.

A couple of weeks ago, when this weather first started, I was in the office when I noticed that I had received a phone call on my phone that I had apparently missed.

As it turns out, it was from my supervisor, calling to advise we all stay home that day due to weather conditions.

Evidentally, he’d called while I was in the shower and left a message, but since I missed the call I was the only one to come in to work that day.

I worked until about 3:00pm and decided I’d better get back home and work the rest of the day from home.

About that time, anyone and everyone who had gone to work that day had been sent home, so there was a lot of traffic.

As I pulled up to one of the lights, it became obvious that my car wasn’t going to stop. Rather than hit the car directly in front of me, I tried for the lane next to it. The slight turn of the wheel sent my car into a very slow 360 degree spin and that sick feeling in my stomach that you know you’re going to hit something, followed by the even worse sound of it actually happening.

I ended up hitting an oncoming van that was also struggling to stop at the light and had her nose out in the middle of the intersection on collision. The impact wasn’t bad and neither of us were going very fast. In fact, neither of our airbags blew, an impressive feat for a head-on collision.

We drove our cars out of the intersection and got them out of the way so traffic could continue as we swapped information and waited for the police for about 15 minutes.

Eventually, they showed up and, to add literal insult to injury, the cop cited me by saying, “I know the roads are really bad and it’s really icy but this is a citation,” and he handed me a slip of paper.

I’ve requested a court date be scheduled to get him to stop his sentence at, “…it’s really icy.”

I drove my dented car to my mechanic who promptly said, “oh, we don’t do body work.”

He then took me across the street to the body shop they work with.

The next day, they called to tell me that it would take 5 days to get my car repaired. From there, I proceeded to answer questions, fill out forms and make phone calls to my insurance and make preparations for a temporary car rental.

It’s now been 11 days that I’ve been renting a car and my car is still in the shop waiting for parts. I’m less than enthusiastic about the outcome of this. Call me impatient.

The worst part? I left my garage door opener in my car at the shop. Every day I call and they say it’ll be ready tomorrow so I don’t go over and pick up the remote… and every day I have to get in and out of the car to park it in the garage.

Bottom line: Inconvenience on top of impatience on top of insult to injury. Anybody got some Menthos?

The moral of the story: check your messages before leaving the house.

I ran into a funny little bug between Vista Home and iTunes, recently.  My iTunes program requested an automatic update, which I performed.

After performing the update and restarting my computer, I found that iTunes would try to install  itself each time I started it up as though the installation never quite finished.  A box that said, “please wait while Windows configures iTunes” would pop up each time, take several seconds to complete its task, put new icons on my Desktop and in my Start Menu, annoy me, taunt me and then finally begin iTunes.

I’d like to view this as a well-deserved poke to Microsoft from Apple.  Microsoft, as inept as they are, still seems to be able to get between me and my work.  More and more I believe this is mostly because I allow it to do so.  I haven’t switched to a Mac yet because I have too much software for PC and don’t want to have to make such a huge investment to switch over.  Microsoft, I suspect, knows this and does everything in its power to punish me for staying with them.

I have a Dell Vostro with every conceivable bell and whistle on it.  Recently, as I was preparing to give a presentation, it took a good 30 minutes to try to connect my laptop to a projector.  That’s fine unless you only anticipate needing 15 minutes to set up.

The issue was that I had Dell hardware with nVidia software running on a Windows platform.  I plugged in the projector and Dell said to nVidia, “hey, there’s a projector plugged in.  Do something.”

nVidia said, “yeah, I should switch to that projector.”

Windows said, “I should ask a bunch of  security questions and make sure they want to use that projector before allowing it.”

The result was that nVidia shut off my monitor, and Windows wouldn’t send the signals to the projector until I clicked “allow” on all of the security questions… which I couldn’t see.

Finally, and this is quickly becoming my default answer to any computer problems, I cut Microsoft out of the loop.  Dell and nVidia gave Windows a ball and said, “go play in the corner while we work.”

…So back to my iTunes problem.

Turns out the solution is not simple.  It’s related to some user access permissions garbage that I don’t understand and has done nothing but make my life miserable since switching to Vista.  I can’t just uninstall and reinstall the software.  The problem persists.  I can’t install it as an administrator to solve the issue, either.  Reinstalling with UAC (User Annoyed Constantly) switched on or off doesn’t help.

I found the solution on Apple’s support forum (http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5440570) after trolling through several other forums posing the same question with no answer.

It involves messing with my registry, which I don’t recommend unless you know the risks involved, but I was desperate and it seems to have worked and this method was successful for several others with the same problem:

THE SOLUTION:

1.) go to start menu –> run
2.) type “regedit”
3.) press enter
4.) go to computer/hkey_classes_root/
5.) find pcast and right click it
6.) click permissions
7.) during the course of this you may get a message saying you cant change anything, but you can change who can change things. click ok on it.
8.) click advanced, then owner tab
9.) change the owner from administrator to whatever name you are using
10.) click ok twice to get out of the pop-ups completely
11.) right click pcast again
12.) click permissions
13.) click OWNER RIGHTS
14.) by full control and read click the allow boxes.
15.) click ok

I’m pretty sure that by the time I finished this involved process, iTunes has a new version out and society has advanced to the point that we now have flying cars (hopefully not running on any Microsoft software).

If not, at least I can listen to my music without having to watch Windows reinstall iTunes each time.

It’s an advertisement for an old Sega Genesis game called, “Alien Storm.”

Strom… Storm… we know what they meant.

It’s ok, Nintendo. It’s a Friday afternoon on the weekend before Christmas. We still love you.

5 stars – The site’s awesome and I’m awesome too.

4 stars – It’s a great site that does what it sets out to do and I shower 3 days a week.

3 stars – It could be better and every so often, I put my head in my cat’s litter box.

2 stars – Why did you even bother coming up with this site? I eat poop.

1 star – This site is the worst site in the world and I’m a stupid moron with an ugly face and a big butt and my butt smells and I like to kiss my own butt.

When we went to Kansas for Thanksgiving, I forgot to take my pills with me so I was without for better than a week. This week, I started taking them again, but with all the late nighs and sleep-deprived days, I think it’s catching up to me.

Around 3:00 this morning, I woke up with a burning throat. My first impulse was to take some medicine… but I thought better of it. The medicine makes me sleepy for about 6 hours….

Today is my BNI day. Every Thursday, I get up and go to a 7:00 meeting to network with area professionals grow yuEnvision. Every week someone from the group gives a 10-minute presentation. Today was my day. It would be bad if I slept through my meeting today because I couldn’t wake up after taking medicine.

So here I am with a sore throat. Boo.

At least the presentation went well.

Much of the work I do for Gospel.com is video production. One of the most frustrating things I’ve run into is trying to digitize video from our mini-DV cameras to my laptops via Firewire. I’ve looked on forums, tried messing around with various firewall and security settings, bought and tested new cables, tried different cameras, tried different computers but the problem still persists: when I try to digitize the video from a my camcorder to my laptop, the DV-IN connection drops. I connect the camcorder, it is recognized by the computer and suddenly drops the connection. Sometimes it drops it immediately, sometimes it drops it a few seconds after it’s connected.

I use a Dell Vostro 1700 with Vista and a Canon ZR500 with Adobe Premiere to capture and edit. Prior to my Vostro, I used a Dell Inspiron 5500 running XP with the same problems. I figured out a trick on the Inspiron that would make it work every time: if I disabled my bluetooth adapter, the camera would stay connected and I could continue my work, as needed. It’s frustrating to have to disable a feature in order to enable another one, but rarely do I need both firewire and bluetooth at the same time. If it had been my WiFi adapter, that would have been much worse.

Today, as I was trying to digitize video with my Vostro 1700, I ran into the same problem as I had with my old laptop, but this time disabling the bluetooth adapter didn’t fix the problem.

Again, I messed with firewall settings, tried to find better firewire drivers, looked up answers in forums and Google but to no avail.

I tested the camera on my desktop and it seemed to work ok with the same cable set… camera and cable are ok. It must be the laptop.

Surprisingly, there don’t seem to be many issues of the same kind out there… or at least no answers.

Then I remembered an incident a few months ago that I ran into with some audio recording: we were hearing a strange buzz in the recording that we were having a hard time isolating. We unplugged the laptop that we were using to record the audio and the buzzing stopped. As it turns out, there was an electrical feedback loop as a result of the recording equipment and computer being plugged into the same circuit and then connected via cable to one another. When the circuit was broken by unplugging the laptop’s power adapter, the feedback stopped.

As I looked at my current situation, I was doing the same thing. The laptop and camcorder were both plugged into the same power strip. I unplugged the camcorder, using the battery for power and suddenly my connection was solid and I could continue my work.

For anyone else out there banging your head against the wall trying to figure out why your firewire connection won’t stay connected, try unplugging your laptop or your camcorder’s power supply and see if it’s an electrical feedback loop that’s killing the connection.

This post has two purposes: 1.) to serve as a beacon on Google for others experiencing similar problems and 2.) to remind me how to fix this stupid thing the next time it or anything like it happens again.

This year was pretty much the same, but 1.) it was an extended visit and 2.) we did a few things we’ve never done there before.

The trip is about a 13-hour drive from our front door to theirs. Normally, that drive is grueling. We’ve found that a great way to make the trip more enjoyable is to stay at a hotel half-way there. This year, we decided to try to make the trip in one day so we wouldn’t lose so much time in traveling. To help pass the time, I downloaded an audio book from Audible.com to my iPod and we listened to it the whole trip, taking 2-hour driving shifts. That proved to be the best way to make the trip. We arrived refreshed, excited and well-entertained by our story the whole way.

Our first day in town was much like any other visit. We met Gramma and Aunt Gail for lunch and spent the rest of the day visiting with mom and dad, catching up on what’s new and simply relaxing. I have been in need of a hairs cut for a really long time… what. That’s what they call it out here. I’m just trying to fit in.

I went to the Coffeyville barber shop that evening and proceeded to get the worst hairs cut I have ever had in my entire life. It is truly awful. I opened the door next to the spinning pole, walked in and saw Hotdog and Hamburger cutting hairs. It was like stepping back in time.

When my turn was up, I sat in the chair and said to Hotdog, “I usually do kind of a European look. ‘Gimme a number 2 on the back and sides. Leave a little on the top so I can spike it.”

It was the roughest hairs cut ever and I loved every second of it… literally. He was done in under 3 minutes after jerking my head all over the place with his comb, trimming and clipping as fast as lightning and spinning me around in the old, worn, leather “uppy-downy chair.”

There’s a term for it. Clearly, I don’t know it.

The best part was yet to come: I got the hot shaving cream and straight razor treatment, complete with zip-zop sharpening. I’ve never been so scared in my life. It was great.

In the end, my hairs were shorter… and that’s really all I was after. …So I have a few horrible looking spots on my head for a while. Big deal. Bumble & Bumble hair gel covers a multitude of sins… as do hats. The good news is I have that box checked off my chore-list. That bad news was they were a cash-only shop and I live in a cashless society.

“Really? Don’t take a card, huh? No checks? Uh… ok… hang on.”

I had to get cash from my mom in-law… a bit of a humiliating experience.

I have a great idea: let’s never bring that up ever.

The second day we decided to do something a little different. We took on a house-project for mom and dad and ripped out all of the outdated living room carpet to expose the hard-wood floors underneath. Of course, that requires quite a bit of furniture-moving and grunt-work. Here’s a tip: Carpet is heavy. Cut it in small pieces when you remove it. Oh. Everyone in the world already knows that except Paul Yuen? Not surprising.

My main job was to pull up all the old tack-strip around the perimeter. I’m pretty good at it and it keeps me out of everyone else’s way. Unfortunately, I’m not very smart about it and I left my jewelry on while I banged away with a pry bar and hammer. I guess I’ll be sending my onyx ring in to be repaired again for the second time in as many years. I totally shattered the stone… again.

The following day, we made a trip to the big Coffeyville city attraction: WalMart. I kid you not. Where else ya gonna get yer diapers and ammo?

While I was there, there was a display for the new Die Hard summer-release DVD. I remembered liking the original 10-year-old trilogy and heard good things about this year’s release. I bought the multi-pack that had all four movies and that night we had a Die Hard marathon… well, ok… we watched the first two. I forgot how much swearing was in those movies. It was an auditory assault. New item on my Christmas list: a standalone TV Guardian. Even so, I loved the movies; good action and dialogue.

The next day was Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, Natalie’s sisters, Susan and Beth weren’t there with us. They were missed. Gramma came over for turkey with the rest of the fam. GOOD eatin’! Those folks know how to cook a traditional meal: Turkey, green bean casserole, stuffing, mashed potatoes with gravy (sorry Angelene), corn (Susan wasn’t home), and our choice of 4 different pies (cherry, apple, pumpkin and pecan) for dessert. For those of you who know me, you won’t be surprised to hear that I had an extra helping of salad for dessert. For those of you who don’t… I’m not really much of a dessert or bread guy.

Friday, we relaxed and watched another Die Hard movie. We skipped number 3 (Die Hard with a Vengeance) and went right on to number 4 (Live Free or Die Hard). I have to say I was quite pleased. It had less swearing than the first two we’d previously seen and more action than I could have possibly hoped for. Four words accurately describe the movie: they blew it up.

Speaking of “we gonna blow shum shtuff up,” that’s what we did today.

My dad, Dwight, made arrangements for us to go shooting with his buddy, Don, on some private property early this morning. I haven’t shot a real gun since I was about 8.

I learned a lot today: 1.) dad has a helluva lotta guns. He has a couple pistols under his mattress, a few rifles and shotguns propped up by where he sleeps, several in the closet, a few in Matt’s closet and I didn’t realize it, but I’ve been sleeping on a loaded .45 all week long… explains my sore back knots in the shape of a SIG SAUER just under my left shoulder blade. 2.) Had I known how many guns he had, I don’t know that I would have dated Natalie. 3.) I’m a damn good shot.

For having not shot a gun in some 22 years and having the eye-sight of a…. I can’t think of anything that has bad vision….. something with poor eye-sight, I did quite well at about 80 yards.

We shot the .45 pistol, a .22 German Luger, two varieties of .22 rifles and an SKS, complete with bayonet, scope and grenade-launcher (WalMart was just out of grenades, so we didn’t have any… must have been all the Black Friday sales sold ‘em out).

First, I shot the .45. We had a little white bucket out at about 30 yards. By the time I was done, it wasn’t suitable for holding water anymore.

Later, we set up targets at distance and shot at ‘em with the SKS.

Now, folks, I’m a little guy. That gun splits trees. Needless to say, there were several Paul-sized butt-prints in the dirt by the time I had unloaded the clip.

At first, we couldn’t hit anything with it. The scope had just recently been added and “professionally sighted.”

I decided not to trust the scope and use the iron sights. That’s when we discovered how badly off the scope was. We were missing our target by 6-8 feet. Using the iron sights, I was hitting closer to the target by 4 inches. By the end of the day, I had long given up on trying to shoot it. I guess I was just tired of having to be brought back to consciousness after each shot with it.

I had much better luck with the .22 rifles. Sure, they’re wimpy guns and everyone laughs at ‘em because they’re puny… but no one was laughing when we went to go investigate the target and saw all .22 holes in it. Granted, the SKS had taken down the forest surrounding the target.

Good times. Not to worry, I planted acorns.

After shooting, we went back to Don’s house and I learned that they had a couple of .22 pistols for sale (his dad is a licensed dealer): a Ruger MKII target-shooter and a Walther P22. I’ll be honest: I’m really tempted. We have ranges at home where I could shoot and .22 ammo is cheap. I’d have a lot of fun. I have to find out what all the logistics and legalities are of owning/maintaining a pistol before I decide to invest in one. They’re not cheap but they hold and increase in value.

Tonight, we sat around the TV and watched the KU vs Mizzou game. We rooted for KU, but they got stomped. I’m pretty sure they got sacked a few times too (that was for you, Morgan).

Sunday we come back home… and honestly, I’m great with that. I’m starting to feel a little homesick for my friends; specifically for McKeel, Shelby and Lenny. I guess in my mind, they represent church, home and the band.

I’ll be happy to see you guys again… and Kansas, let’s do this again sometime.

One of the projects they are showcasing is a project they did for BMW called, “Relearn to drive.”

As is common to their caliber of work, it’s a fabulous piece.  I was immediately sucked in by the little videos they produced at the introduction.

After watching (and enjoying) each one, I hit the “Undo the damage” link which took me to what they are selling:

BMW has a performance driving school (with multiple locations around the country) where they teach people how to take full control of a car and push its performance to the limit.  In the process of learning to drive like a pro, you get to roast the tires and swing the car around wildly… every teenage male’s dream.

How much does this dream cost?  Welll, it depends on how many days you want to attend, but to enjoy the full experience, you’ll be looking at dropping around 3 G’s.

That tag comes attached to knowledge: the knowledge of how to shorten your response time, handle the car in dangerous situations and squeeze every bit of performance out of the HP the car can give.  In the process, you’ll have an immeasurable amount of fun.

Here’s the great news:  they let you drive brand new top-class BMW cars the entire time and roast as many tires as you can.

Sounds like a dream come true.  It’s an incredible product with some ingenious marketing.  Bravo, BMW & Juxt.

Full Episode

I got up, showered, dressed and went out to my car to find the battery dead. C’mon!

I figured I must have left the lights on or something… but to my surprise, they were off. I usually leave the GPS on because it has never proven to be a drain on the battery and if I just leave it on, I don’t have to wait for it to get a signal lock.

“No big deal,” I think to myself. “Natalie’s car is next to mine in the garage. I’ll just pull my jumper cables out of my trunk, jump my car and go to my BNI meeting.”

So I try the trunk release, but, naturally, it doesn’t work because the battery’s dead. I guess the internal trunk release is an electrical switch in the 2000 VW Jetta. No biggie. I have my keys. I’ll just open it with the key.

I walk around back and pop the key in, give it a turn…. nothing. Try again and again and again… nothing. I guess the key lock is an electrical switch too. LAME.

So, I think to myself, “alright… I bought two pairs of high-quality $50 jumper cables… one for my car and one for Natalie’s. I just grab hers.”

I get into her trunk and root around for a few minutes only to find that her jumper cables aren’t in her trunk.

Frustrated, I walk in, resolved not to speak in an angry voice as I ask her if she knows where her jumper cables are.

Her response is, “we gave ‘em to Morgan.”

Some time ago, Morgan needed some jumper cables and since we had two sets, and only one car at the time, I loaned him one.

When I finally ended up getting a second car, I got ‘em back.

Not wanting to explain all of that to her because I knew it would evoke “angry voice,” I said, “no… I got ‘em back… where are yours?”

She thought for a moment and said, “I don’t know.”

I went back outside thinking, “well, I know I have jumper cables in MY trunk, but I can’t get into it… ” I decided I was going to have to do what I was hoping not to: I would have to climb into my trunk from the back seats.

A few moments later, my legs were sticking out of the sides, flailing around as I bumped around in my dark trunk, trying to find my jumper cables.

Turns out, I had put them in with the spare tire so they wouldn’t be in the way. That would normally be no problem if I were coming at them from the back of the car, but since I was laying in the trunk, trying to get to them from the front, i was actually laying on the panel I needed to get under to access the jumper cables.

How do you get your arm under the thing you’re laying on, manage to grab the thing that’s under it and not break your arm?

You break the thing you’re laying on.

I snapped a corner of the trunk’s platform so it would bend up and give me access to the jumper cables which I then proceeded to use to jump my car.

After starting up the car, however, I started looking for clues as to why the battery would have died. I wasn’t convinced that a GPS system pulled enough juice from the battery to completely kill it. I then noticed that the brake lights were on… though I wasn’t stepping on the brake… ok… if the brake lights won’t turn off, that means two things:

1.) I have to get it fixed… immediately.

2.) I won’t be making my meeting.

I thought about my 7:30am options. Who will be open at 7:30? Who can take my car today? Who isn’t going to charge me an arm and a leg?

A thought entered my mind: “You can have two, but you can’t have all three.”

It seemed to me that time was the essential element. The cost would be high, but for that we have a credit card… a painful thought since I just paid it all off.

I headed off to the VW dealership. They open at 7am and have always been able to accommodate me. Additionally, they have wireless access in their lobby which means I could work there if I needed to.

Wincing at the thought of dollar bills flying out of my wallet, I drove to the dealership.

I met the office manager at the VW desk and explained my situation and why I was leaving the engine running. After what seemed like an eternity of tapping on the computer keyboard, he looked up at me with a smile and said, “I have good news. This won’t cost you a cent. The brake light relay is on recall. Just give us a great review when the VW warranty people call you to follow up.”

With a smile, I said, “will do.”

I asked the question on my Facebook account and have received several interesting answers….

…but it begs the next question: what is it that you WANT to do that you AREN’T, due to fear?

Fear is crippling and can render us ineffective. What do you fear? Failure? Ridicule? Getting caught? Loss?

From where does fear come? What is it? Is fear not simply a response to potential danger not unlike pain?

Fear merely is a natural defense from things that we perceive can harm us… in most cases, the unknown. Or… perhaps fear is the absence of something else. Love? Wisdom? Faith?

Maybe fear is an over-abundance of something else. Assumptions? Bad history?

I’m reminded of Phillipians 4:13 – “I can do everything through Him who gives me strength.”

…which leads to the next question: where is your heart rooted?

I have the answers to my questions for myself:

If I knew I couldn’t fail, I would awaken the Church to action and revival. It grieves me that we live in a culture that sees the image of Christ as a sleeping, impotent, powerless myth; foolish, ignorant, irrational, reactive and tired; a cheap imitation; a fraud; a crutch; an excuse; a hypocrite. Our culture can only assess Him by the image His bride portrays… and if Christ truly were equal to the portrait the Church paints, culture would not be wrong.

Please understand that when I say, “Church,” I mean the Body as a whole… not necessarily my specific home-town church where I attend, though we too struggle with some of the same issues.

What do I fear? The thing I fear most is being stabbed in the back by the same Church that I would be attempting to awaken. Our track-record is to tear at ourselves and criticize our own, rendering us all ineffective and powerless to act. I fear it because I’ve seen it; I’ve heard it; I’ve done it.

Where is my heart rooted? I’m rooted in my own self-absorption. How do I know? If I was truly rooted in Christ, there would be no door that could close out truth; no chain that could bind; no ear that could not hear; no eye that could not see His power.

Alas, I remain just one more member of a silent, sleeping giant… trembling, weak and ineffective.

…but with a fire in my belly, a spark of hope in my eye and a prayer in my heart to galvanize me to action and to someday soon root me in Christ.

God is in the silence. …and when He chooses to reveal himself, even hell will step aside as the rocks cry out.

“Gimme a break, Gimme a break…break me off a piece of that Apple Sauce.”

I thought I was gonna die.

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Recently, I lost them both.  My wife found one of them in the yard the other day.  I have no idea how it got there.  That’s the one I had when I left this morning.

Getting into my car, I found the other missing one and put it in my pocket.

While both of them were missing Woot was selling two of them for $19.99.  I decided that was a pretty good price, so I bought them.  Today, with two of them in my pocket, I get to my desk to find that Woot had delivered them.  I now have four Bluetooth headsets jammed in my pocket.

Even better: After I’d paired my phone with all four of them and turned them off, my phone rang.  One of the headsets had pushed up against the others and turned itself on.  Like and idiot, I had to listen to each one, one-by-one to find the caller.

“Hello?  Nope.  Hello?  Nope.  Hello?  Nope.”

How do you explain that to the person on the other end?

Want more?  Both the new headsets and the phone vibrate when I get a call.  I had to pick myself up off the ground after that first call.  I’m going to have to buy a strap or something just to keep myself in the chair.

Technology.  Good times.

How does the whole “generation” thing work?  I’ve always understood that I was third-generation: ie. my grandparents came over from China (gen 1), my parents were born in the US (gen 2), as was I (gen 3).

It has recently come to my attention that I am only second-generation in that the first-generation folks were my parents, since they were the first ones born in the US.

Which is it?

(Make your response good.  I’ve got $20 riding on this.  If you say ’3rd gen,’ I’ll cut you in.)

For me, being a child of the 80′s, my hero was Bo Duke, from the Dukes of Hazard.  He was big, strong, good-looking and could manage to jump into a big orange car through the window without scraping his back.

When I was in pre-school, Bo was my hero.  I wanted to be just like my all-American boy.  He could “Ye-ha” like nobody’s business.  …and he always seemed to have the good plans to get Boss Hog off their tails.

I remember going to pre-school and hearing a couple of my friends talking about our favorite show, The Dukes of Hazard.  I went over to see if they had seen last night’s episode when one of my friends said, to my utter astonishment and horror, “Bo’s fat.”

I remember seeing red, feeling hot tears stream down my face and running toward them, screaming, “NO HE’S NOT!!!”

Of course, even pre-school kids, once they know they can get a reaction out of you, will push the button to see how far they can go.

Both of my friends, upon seeing my outrage, began to laugh and proceed to tell me about how obese my hero was.

You know how little kids are. They’re pushing their little bellies out as big as they can, pooching out their lips and puffing their cheeks up while walking in a circle, saying, “look!  Who am I?  I’m fat!”

That’s the first (and if memory serves me well, the last) time I punched somebody squarely in the face.

Even as the adults were dragging me away by my arms, I recall screaming, “NO HE’S NOT!!!!!  TAKE IT BACK!!! HE’S NOT!!!”

Of course, you can imagine an adult trying to figure out from a 4-year old what happened.  I’m sure the conversation went something like this:

adult:  “What was that all about?”

me:  “He’s not fat!”

adult:  “What?  Who’s fat?  Why did you hit Jonny?”

me:  “He said Bo was fat!”

adult:  “Bo?  Who’s Bo?”

me:  “Luke’s brother!”

adult:  “Who’s Luke?”

me:  *eyeroll*  “Daisy’s brother.”

Adult #2 steps in:  “What’s going on?  Why are these two boys crying?”

Adult #1:  “I’m not sure.  I saw this one hit Jonny in the face over someone’s brother.”

In the end, I’m sure there was confusion, resulting in Jonny and I not getting animal crackers at snack-time.

In retrospect, I’ve seen Dukes of Hazard since I was in preschool.

I have to say: maybe Jonny knew what he was talkin’ about.  Bo’s got a little bit of a gut.

They had croissants in wax paper bags, chocolate and I hired a local baker (Sweet Beginnings) to bake up little aqua boxes with white bows in keeping with Tiffany & Co’s branding. They made 16 chocolate fondant cakes with Andes mints melted in the center.

Ruth and Angelene were in charge of decorations and putting it all together. I designed the invitations and oversaw cake/made sure we guys had something to do while all the wives were together.

Please take a look at the images from the party.

Sweet Beginnings:  (231) 683-4987

Let me first introduce you to the cast: Josh & Shelby with small son, Noah; McKeel & Angelene with small daughter, Aletheia (or “Theia” for short); Natalie and myself.  The point was to go, relax and celebrate Josh, McKeel and Natalie’s October birthdays.

Riding the coat-tails of the GCI annual conference and my laptop crashing twice, this week, yuEnvision launched a new site for Medical Management Specialists. The process went well, but because there were so many people involved with the launch itself, things were a little bumpy at the end. By the end of the week, I was really feeling ready for a relaxing weekend.

…and relax I did.

Ever have one of those weekends where things just melt away?  …the kind where you just forget yourself and let the stresses of the world drift into the back of your mind, refreshing your mind, soul and body?  Me neither.

…but this weekend was pretty darn close to that.

The night we got there, Kell, Jocko and I walked down to the pier and indulged ourselves in a good smoke.  They brought pipes.  I brought cigars made from pipe tobacco.  We sat, enjoyed the smells, listened to the water and vented about rough stuff we’ve had on our minds concerning work, politics, etc.

The stars that night were bright and beautiful.  Not quite bright enough to light the death-trap stairs we had to traverse up and down to the pier, but my handy-dandy mobile phone/flash light served us well in that no one broke their necks to or from our smokin’ spot.

The next day, we all woke up and had an amazing breakfast casserole, courtesy of Shelby, followed by birthday cake and presents.

The plan was to visit Traverse City too, but we were enjoying ourselves too much in the quiet secluded “cabin.” I say “cabin,” because it was a 5-bedroom/two bathroom house with a dining room, full-kitchen, living room, enclosed porch/family room, and partially finished basement.  The square footage was easily twice our house and its probably worth a good 15-20 times our home’s value.  I think we’re all getting a pretty good idea of what I’m talking about.  Some people call that a cabin… I call it a lodge resort.

After breakfast and presents, we all retreated to the living room to sit and encourage one another in a couple hours of sharing scripture with one another and praying over one another while sipping gourmet coffee.

Later that afternoon, a few of us wanted to swim in the lake.  I opted to cat-nap on the pier while listening to an audiobook.

That evening, the Bytwerks left early so they could make a couple of previous engagements.  We had pizza with the Bowdens and watched movies on my laptop.

Q :  Why on earth did you bring a LAPTOP to a weekend getaway?

A:  To watch movies.

Sunday, we took a walk in Traverse City to look at houses, ate some lunch and headed back home.

Now, as relaxing as all of that was, I was exhausted when I got back.  What the heck?  I spent the whole time relaxing and enjoying my time.  I expected to feel GREAT when I got back.

Having relaxed fun is exhausting, apparently.

Check out the pictures:

http://pics.yuenvision.com/

When I was in college, my roommate had gotten on my nerves one day and I thought one way to get him back would be to play a prank on him. Trolling through ideas in my brain, I settled on one: One of the joys of being a college student is when you receive an unexpected package in the mail. Usually, it’s from loved ones and contains all kinds of goodies. They’re typically referred to as, “care packages.”

At Cedarville college, where we attended, the current policy was that when you received a package from the Post Office (or PO), you’d receive an automatic email stating that there was a delivery waiting for you. A normal response would be to drop everything you were currently doing and rush out to the PO in whatever state you were in to go get it. It was not unusual to see students in pajamas at the PO, picking up whatever exciting package was waiting for them.

My idea was to pose as the post office and send my roommate an email, telling him he’d received a package. Then, my mind twisted the idea a bit.

I asked myself, “what if I sent the email to the ENTIRE CAMPUS?”

After all, my class had not pulled a class prank yet and it was about time someone did something about it. It was certainly feasible, but I’d have to be smart about it. I wouldn’t want to jam up the email servers and it would be too obvious if I sent an email to 3000 people all at once. Normally, the email only had a couple hundred recipients on it per day.

Also, their computer services people were pretty savvy. I’d have to be a step ahead of them if I didn’t want to get caught.

That morning, as I was working at the library, I hatched a plan.

One of my duties, as a library technician, was to unlock the computer labs and start up all the computers at 7am. Back in 1999, Netscape Communicator 4.0 was a hot Internet browser. It was free and came with a local POP3 email client.

That morning before work, I logged on to a computer and copied the campus address book into an MS Excel file and saved it to a disk. In those days, everyone at Cedarville had a student ID number.

I then globally added “@cedarville.edu;” to each student number and merged the cells. Lastly, I broke up the 3000 files into 15 separate files, each containing 200 student email addresses.

While I was on my rounds that morning, I installed Netscape Communicator on a computer in one of the labs. That was stage one: get the software on a machine and log out.

About 3 hours later, I came back to that machine and, without logging into the network, opened Netscape Communicator and set the email settings to send and receive using my parents’ POP server 2 states away. That way, I’d be assured not to kill the campus servers and I knew it would take some time for the email to send… giving me time to clear my tracks. I also set up the account email address as “postmaster@cedarville.edu.”

I set up 15 emails, imported the addresses into them and copied the text from a “you’ve received a package” email that I’d gotten months prior into the body and subject.

I saved the emails as drafts and closed the program.

2 hours later, I got back on the computer, again without logging into the network, and sent all 15 emails. After they had been sent, I quickly deleted the software and all associated files, reset the computer, went to another computer lab and logged into a PC to wait for my “you’ve recived a package” email to arrive.

The lab was full of people.

I waited…

Nothing…

I kept waiting…

Nothing…

Finally, I heard someone say, “Hey, dude! Sweet! I got a package!”

The person next to him said, “no way! Me too! Let’s go to the PO together.”

More and more, I heard commotion about packages and visits to the PO.

Payoff.

I waited a few more minutes and then left the lab to go to the PO to see the fruits of my labor. It had been roughly 15 minutes from the time I had initially sent the email.

The next sight I saw gave me only what I could call “emotional confusion.” It was somewhat a mixture of horror, surprise and delight.

You have to understand that the dorms at Cedarville were completely on the other side of campus from the PO. What I saw were throngs of people hording out of the dorms headed toward the PO. Hundreds and hundreds of students in pajamas, wearing whatever they could find to throw on quickly making their way to the post office.

Stunned and calculating the potential consequences of my actions, I made my way to the PO. The next sight was even more incredible.

Apparently, off-campus students had gotten the message as well and had driven in to collect their package. The streets in Cedarville are 2-lane and in some places very narrow 2-lane. The streets were grid-locked with cars all in-coming toward the post office and there was a line of people wrapped around the building and extending about 3 blocks.

As I approached the line, I saw people walking away from the PO who had evidentially discovered the prank once they’d gotten inside. They were laughing and saying, “man… that’s awesome!”

I stood in line with the others and finally got inside where there was a very frenzied looking woman standing behind a desk. She looked like she was having a very bad day.

Apparently, they were short-staffed that day and she was working the shift alone… with 1500+ students responding to an email that she had not sent out.

I expressed my sympathies to her and told her to go home early and soak her feet and that I was sure this was just a computer glitch.  She smiled weakly and was on to the next sucker in line.

Despite the innocent casualty, I was proud of my prank and still have the email in my inbox to this day.

*sigh*

After this week’s fiasco with my laptop, I had everything back up and running and to my liking, except I still had to install Flash and Photoshop.

This morning as I booted my machine, I began installing software, but the installations were going WAAY too fast.  Usually, installing Photoshop takes about 10-15 minutes.  My computer was saying it was done after about 2 or 3 seconds.

Long story short… I have another virus and am restoring my computer again.

I hate my life.

This year’s been our biggest one yet with about 300 attendees, including GCI staff, sponsors, speakers, contractors and Gospelcom Alliance members.

My role for this week has been to prepare the graphics and creative direction for the digital conference materials: website, digital DVD schedule on the HD monitors, nametag designs, logos for the giveaway swag, slide templates for the speakers, etc.  Additionally, I’ve been playing my part in working with members to help them understand where they’re supposed to be, network with them, take pictures of people interacting at the conference and answer any questions.

As a staff member, my usual duties at conference are to host sessions (introduce the speakers, collect the evaluation sheets at the end, etc) and video tape all of the keynote presentations for later editing and publication.  I am also conducting video interviews for the Alliance member ministries to edit and publish to promote their activities, increase awareness and hopefully drive traffic to their sites.   Lastly, I’m listed as a contractor which means I’m available for people with questions to sign up for time with me and get a little free consultation.

That’s the busy news.

Here’s the bad news:  Wednesday was the first day of conference.  Tuesday night, my laptop got a virus and crashed.  That makes for a difficult rest of the week at “The Internet Ministry Conference.”  It means I can’t upload photography, can’t participate in any online activity going on with the blogging, can’t get any additional work done in my “free” time and am having a hard time fully enjoying the conference.  Additionally, I have side-jobs that are stacking up and I can’t answer email, respond to requests or get much done.

My laptop, as much as I hate to admit it, is an extension of myself.  When it gets sick, I feel sick.  When it is unhappy, I’m mad about it.

I figured maybe I could get by this week using my phone, since it’s a Smart Phone and has a mini-copy of Windows and all of the productivity software that typically comes with a Smart Phone.  Friday, my phone started acting up.  Slow response time, unable to connect to the network, frequent reboots, software errors.  As the week went on, my hair started getting more and more frazzled.  I was becoming short with people and irritable.

Thursday night, I had decided that if I was going to have any sanity this week, I would need to conduct a system restore on my laptop, a fairly painless process with Dell.  I happened to have my huge external hard drive with me, so I backed everything up while I was attending sessions and that evening, I performed the “intensive surgery” on my machine.  Since I don’t have any of my software with me, I had to make do with what I could find online in the Open Source free software communities.

I figured I’d be much happier with Open Source software anyway.  At the point of this post, I find myself with a freshly-installed XP operating system and the following software packages:

Firefox:  Internet Browser

Thunderbird:  POP3 email client

Lightning:  Plugin for Thunderbird that extends it to calendar and task manager

Birdiesync:  Plugin for Microsoft Activesync that allows me to sync my Smart Phone to Thunderbird and Lightning sans MS Outlook

Audacity:  Multitrack audio recording

GIMP:  Graphics software (nowhere near as robust as Photoshop, but it’ll do in a pinch)

 Pidgin:  Instant Messenger software

Open Office:  MS Office suite alternative

So I’m not 100% back to full productivity, but I’m about 95% there and will be fully up and running once I re-install my commercial software (Photoshop, Flash, Premiere, Homesite and Encore)

What have I learned from this experience?  1.)  Bluetooth Activesync support for PC is terrible;  2.)  Open Source is the way to go if I can find the right tools;  3.)  I owe Google for preserving my sanity;  4.)  I kinda wish I was a farmer with a straw hat, an old goat as my plow a dog and 12 kids.

Things I’m thankful for:  1.)  the Summit at church last week.  Having been washed in truth and scripture over the past 2 weeks from the Summit helped keep my head above water this week.  2.)  The Summit helped give me good grounding and some technique in spending time in prayer and scripture this week  3.)  my wife.  surprisingly, even though she wasn’t here with me and we didn’t speak on the phone much while I was attending conference, the thought of being back home with her grounded me.

Confessions:  1.)  Every day, even though spending time with people this week was great and I enjoyed connecting and networking with more people this year than I ever have at previous conferences, I wanted this conference to be over so badly every day.   2.)  I have to admit that as much as I struggle with anger, events this week were no small catalyst in keeping my temper hot and my thoughts impure.  There were several times as I was working on my computer this week that I’m pretty sure if you walked by my hotel room, it would be pretty clear there was someone not having a good day inside.

Things I look forward to:  1.)  Lunch in about 3 hours with my buddies at my favorite restaurant, BD’s Mongolian BBQ on GCI’s bill.  2.)  Going home and unplugging  3.)  Having Monday off.  4.)  Playing with the band on Sunday Morning and seeing everyone’s faces.

With that, I’ve aired my grievances (vented), made my peace and will be ready to hit the ground running on Monday.  The one thing still unsettling in my mind are the open side-work projects that I didn’t get to finish this week since my machine was down.  Frustrating.  It means my Monday will be filled with client work, but at least I have a day on which to to fall back.

3 more hours of conference… can I go home now?

In it, was the following text:

 After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund of $109.30. Please submit the tax refund request and allow us 3 days in order to process it.

A refund can be delayed for a variety of reasons. For example submitting invalid records or applying after the deadline.

To access the form for your tax refund, please click here :

[Link removed]

Regards,
Internal Revenue Service

© Copyright 2007, Internal Revenue Service U.S.A.

Clicking on the link will take you to a site that is designed to look like the IRS website, complete with government branding.  Generally, I don’t fall prey to these kinds of emails, but having had a recent tax bill, I thought this could be a legit communication from them.  Fortunately, because I use Firefox as my browser, it detected the scam, and warned me that the site was potentially dangerous.

The form that was on the site was a secured form that requested all the regular information, plus my social security number as well as an option to receive my refund as a direct deposit.

Had I not been warned by Firefox and filled the form out, a third party could have potentially gotten my social security number and banking information.  Upon further consideration, it didn’t make sense to me that the IRS would have sent me an email and then request information online.  It would make more sense that they would have mailed something to me.  Even so, I’m usually a pretty savvy guy who isn’t easily fooled.  This one was a near miss.

Stay sharp out there, people.

Me: “Hey, how’re you doing?”

Them: “Ok. At least I’m horizontal.”

*slight pause*

Me: “What?”

Them: “Horizontal… you know, standing up. I dunno, maybe it’s the other one. I always get them confused.”

Me: “You mean lateral?”

Them: “Yeah, that. Whatever. I’m lateral.”

Me. “Mhm. Sure, you are.”

It was almost too easy.

Apparently, this woman has 6 kids that she had to take to the grocery store. Each time is an adventure, but this last time, she got more than she bargained for (I know, I know… never end a sentence with a preposition… but “more for which she had bargained” sounded stupid).

The original auction is located at this location.

However, Ebay only hosts their auctions for up to 90 days after the auction expires and I felt this gem needed to be immortalized so I have cloned it at this location.

Keep your eyes open for the new up and coming author, dawnm5723.

Enjoy.

I decided to write something new for the team to play, hoping to tap into the creativity of each member of the team to make something great.

One of the trends in recent worship music that I’ve really been enjoying has been the updating of classic hymns.

For weeks, our worship band has been enjoying a little diddy that I came up with to play with. Originally, it started with just a jazzy bass-line that I’d play on the keyboard and one by one, each musician would join in and contribute something to it.

My hope was to build something around that little diddy, but wasn’t sure how to start.

One night after practice, I stayed late and rifled through an old hymnal, reliving my childhood in our small Bethany Baptist church in Toledo, Ohio.

One hymn that caught my eye was Great Is Thy Faithfulness; one of my favorites. I tried to retro-fit it into our little diddy, but it didn’t seem to work so I went on looking.

After a while and a few moments of prayer for direction, guidance and thanksgiving, I gave up and decided to scrap the whole “diddy” idea and start something new.

Again, my eyes fell on Great Is Thy Faithfulness. At first, I dismissed it because it was in a 3:4 time, but decided to try to fit it into a 4:4 time and slap it into a minor key.

Happy with how that seemed to work, I reworked the refrain, pulling my favorite phrases out. I also decided to integrate several of the names of God into the song since the curriculum I’ve been teaching Junior High Sunday School has been revolving around God’s greatness and the significance of each of His Hebrew names.

As I was writing the chorus and integrating the names of God into it, I was overwhelmed by His goodness and love.

When it was done, I realized that based on the new chord progression, I could re-integrate the team’s little diddy we’d been playing with.

This Sunday, our church worship team performed the song for the first time.

Here is the result:

If you decide to use the song at your church, please send me a recording of the performance.

Copyright Paul Yuen 2007

Later, we found ourselves too tired to actually make the trip.  There’s something about Menard’s that just drains our energy when we’re there.  It’s one of those stores where we’re pumped when we get there, but then we spend so much time trying to find what we’re looking for and getting interested in other things that before we realize it, we’ve blown an hour or more there and are exhausted.

Being already in a state of low-energy, we decided to forgo the trip.

As I was sitting in the kitchen with Natalie and looking out the window, I noticed that her car was not parked in the garage.

“Why didn’t you park your car in the garage,” I asked.

“I thought we were going to go out, but then we decided to stay home,” she replied.

“Do I have enough room to get out tomorrow morning,” I asked again.

“I parked on my side of the driveway,” she answered.

…so you can see where this is going…

Thursday mornings, I have a business networking meeting at 7am for which I am habitually 5-10 minutes late.  For those of you not in-the-know, mornings and me don’t quite see eye-to-eye.

This morning was no exception as I dashed out the door to get to my meeting.  We have an unattached garage, which means I go out the back door, enter the garage from its side-door and hit the garage door opener on the wall.  Normally, I go back outside and walk around to my car because Natalie’s car is also parked in there and rather than squeeze by the two cars, it’s easier to just go around… but this morning, I dashed straight for my car, uninhibited by any vehicular obstructions.

I stepped in my car, checked to make sure the car was in neutral (another story for another time) and backed out, watching my driver-side mirror to make sure I didn’t wipe it off on the side of the garage.

I heard it before I felt it: the crinkling/crunching/cracking/breaking sound of something that was sure to be expensive later.

The thing about running into one of your own cars with your own car is that you have to get both of them fixed.  If you run into someone else’s car, you feel like a dumb-ass, but you only have one car to deal with since Michigan is a no-fault state.

If you run into your own car, you feel even more dumb-asser.

That was me this morning at 7:04am.

Frustrated, I stormed into the house to get Natalie’s keys and move her car so I could get to my meeting.  Of course, all the commotion woke her from bed and she came out to see what had happened and why I was storming around.

By the time she made it outside, I was already coming back in to put her keys back.  Seeing her outside and since I was already running late, I decided to toss the keys to her.

Quick tip:  when angry, never toss keys to your spouse.  You might toss them harder than you expected and hit her square in the face with them.

“I’m going to pay for that later,” I thought to myself as I quickly apologized in even more frustration on my way back to my car to squeal out of the driveway and be on my way to my meeting.

Interestingly enough, I couldn’t concentrate at the meeting this morning as we were voting on new officers and deciding on a move of location.  I was a little rattled.  Figures, since it was a day we needed to make all kinds of important decisions.  I think I ended up volunteering to be the Event Coordinator and on the Member’s Committee.  I couldn’t tell you for sure, though.  Maybe I’m the President, I dunno.  I vaguely remember hearing someone say, “ok, Paul will serve as our next president.”

Anyway, it turns out the damage to the cars wasn’t horrible.  My rear passenger-side fender is scratched up and will need some paint and Natalie’s front driver’s-side parking light is busted.  We have a guy at our shop who is going to try to find the parts we need at a junkyard.  All-in-all, it probably won’t be a shockingly horrible expense.  Hopefully, I’ll get away with a few hundred bucks in repairs/paint cover-up for both cars.

As for smacking my wife in the face with her own keys, last night I told her she could spend $100 on some new Pampered Chef things.  She asked, “why are you being so nice to me?”

There really was no reason but I should have gazed into my crystal ball and responded with, “because tomorrow I’m going to whip your keys at your face after smashing your car.”

We thought there must be a hive up inside the roof somewhere, but weren’t sure how big it was.  The bees also seemed to be rather docile, so I didn’t really give them another thought.

…until Friday.

I was putting out some trash and as I was going back inside the house, I felt a sharp pain in my left calf.  It caused me to stumble as I was going up the stairs and I tripped my way into the sun room and landed on all-fours.  My sandal had fallen off in the clumsy display and wasn’t in the room with me, so I reasoned that it must have fallen on the steps outside the screen door.

Being the coordinated individual that I am, I went to open the screen door, but kinda missed the  latch, so the door didn’t open.  This revelation didn’t reach my brain until my already flat nose was flat up against the glass and I could see my breath steaming up the window.

You may be asking, “what was going through your mind as this was happening?”

We don’t have to talk about that right now.

I managed to open the door, retrieved my sandal and then noticed a dull pain that quickly became a sharp pain in my left calf.

I remembered, as a kid, being stung and that experience seemed to closely resemble what I was currently feeling.

I went back inside the house and looked out the window to see that where there had once been a few bees that rarely moved, I now saw four or five buzzing around.

I recalled that the previous owners had left some hornet/wasp spray in the basement, so I went down to find it.

I’ve also heard that when you mess around with bees, you have to be ready to 1.) run yer butt off and 2.) have a secured place to hide for cover.

I donned my “run yer butt off” shoes and made sure the back door was unlocked.  It would not do to spray the bees, get them mad and chasing me and then find myself locked out of the house.  That would be Sucksville.

Once outside, I took a deep breath, pointed the bottle and let fly, expecting a spray of magic chemical death to spray out of the can.  Instead, a stream of white foam shot straight in the air.  I watched it go up and stepped aside as I watched it come down and land where I had been standing not 3 seconds prior.

“Cool!”  I said aloud.

I calculated that I could stand roughly 15 feet away from my target, shoot a stream of instant death on my tiny foes and head for the hills.

I took another deep breath, re-adjusted my aim per my previous experience, and thought to myself, “FIRE IN THE HOLE!”

To say that the clump of bees fell on the ground would be an understatement… more like they… exploded.

They landed on the ground, DOA.  A twinge of guilt struck my heart as I imagined what my Biologist friend, Erin, would think of my insecticidal activity.

Then I thought of what it would be like if a million mad bees came pouring out of that tiny crack… so I emptied the bottle into it.

Nothing happened.

“I guess that’s it,” I thought, as I went back inside.

Lenny the cat greeted me at the door with a look on his face that said, “do you have any idea what you just did?”

I patted his little head and said, “daddy’s a big strong conquerer, isn’t he?”

Lenny didn’t reply… he just kept looking at where I had just sprayed, whimpering.

As I went to throw away the empty can, I thought “I wonder if he knows something I don’t?”

Moments later, I glanced out the window to see 3 or 4 bees buzzing around the window.  I went to the window to take a look and saw a few more… well, hundreds more.

They were EVERYWHERE… and mad.

I made two phone calls:  one to Orkin and one to Natalie to tell her I did a dumb thing and to be careful when she comes home.

When she got back, it was like trying to time the search lights in a war zone.  She pulled into the unattached garage, lowered the big door and waited at the side door until we both felt the coast was clear.  I motioned for her to make a run for it and held the door open as she sprinted into the house and I shut the door behind her.

The bees calmed down after about 40 minutes but since the issue hasn’t yet been resolved, this story is incomplete.

To be continued…

http://pics.yuenvision.com/

We recently swapped out all of the electrical outlets and switches in the house.  In the midst of doing that, the electricity in the bathroom stopped working.

I had McKeel come over with Kirby and they put their heads together to try to figure it all out.

Their digging brought up some pretty scary results:  the office and the hallway had a couple of outlets that were running on two circuits.  Essentially, they were hot with 220v.  Anything that we would have plugged into them would have been fried.   It also meant that in swapping those outlets out, we were messing around with a lot more power than we thought.

After a few feeble attempts, we all decided that it would be best if I just hired an electrician to look over the damage and try to assess the problem.

Kirby knew a guy and hooked me up with a really good group of electricians: Deiter’s & Helmer’s.   I wasn’t sure how long it would take or what kind of trouble we were in, but was pretty sure it was going to be expensive.

The guy came, assessed the situation, probed a few outlets, gave me a good tongue-lashing for trying to do things myself and then got to the bottom of the problem within about 10 minutes.  He traced the lines through the attic and down into the adjacent bedroom where the problem resided:  there was an outlet there that had been cross-wired and hadn’t had the tabs popped out to put it on separate circuits… at least, I think it was something like that.  The wiring had also been reversed in the attic and the hotwire had been switched so what we thought was white was actually black.

The bottom line:  he said that if the house burned down due to electrical fire and the insurance company investigated, they would have found that the wiring had not been done by a licensed, insured electrician and they would not reimburse me a dime.

At the end of the day, for $100 and a scolding, he straightened out my electrical, got the bathroom working and got us up to code.  He then probed and prodded around the rest of the house to make sure the readings everywhere else looked good.  It was a lot cheaper than I thought it would be and we ended up with some peace of mind knowing that the work was done right and we would be covered by insurance.

For some reason, I’m willing to hire out things like gas and water because of the potential dangers of working with those two utilities… but electrical, I feel like it’d be ok for me to do the work myself even though I really don’t know what I’m doing.  I figured if I matched up the wiring and put the same wires where I saw them on the old stuff, I’d be ok.  I didn’t know enough to check the tabs and trace the circuits first.

The insurance angle alone was enough to wise me up to the fact that this kind of work should be left to the professionals.

Eh… I can’t really blame them. I’m sure I just didn’t read the fine print closely enough when I used the Tax software to do my taxes two years ago.

ok… I admit I owe taxes and I’m willing to pay them. Do they really have to charge me an additional 10% interest on the taxes I owe?

I’ll even concede to pay it because if someone had owed me money for 2 years, I’d appreciate a little extra for having to wait around. At least they didn’t charge me any penalties.

Here’s the thing: I do all the paperwork, fill out my check, kiss my cash goodbye (hoping my tax dollars will go directly toward something useful like development of the fuel cell or the jet fuel that will be used to bring our boys home) and am reading all of the final requirements for submitting this payment. One of them reads: Ensure that the return address shows through the window on the return-envelope.

Conveniently, they provide an envelope.

Inconveniently, they make the return address window too small and too low so that the return address doesn’t fit the way the paper is folded when they sent it to me. Now I have to try to origami it using double-angle and pie-folds to make the thing fit and show the proper info through the window in the 1.) already too small and 2.) poorly designed envelope that they insist I use. I got it to just barely fit in the window.

As it is, the mailman will probably have to hit the bottom of the envelope to make the paper bounce to the bottom so he can read the whole thing.

Not only that, the glue doesn’t stick, so I had to tape it shut.

I’d like to say, “that’s our hard-earned tax-dollars at work,” but clearly it’s not.  They really didn’t spend much on those envelopes.

“Let’s tax ‘em hard, then make ‘em try to stuff it all in the cheap-ass envelope we provide.”

Nice.

We launched this one last week for a couple of wonderful people that I had dinner with back in April. They have designed and developed a product called TideMinders, a device that is placed on your boat lines so that as the tide changes and your lines go up and down on the pilings, they don’t wear out. Ingenious!

Go check it out at www.tideminders.com

We’re really excited about it and are glad to be home-owners again. Granted, it’s a lot of work, but we are incredibly blessed with very good friends who are extremely loving and talented.

Here’s what I mean: We closed on the house on a Friday. The following Saturday, several friends came to help us get the house ready for work.

We decided to completely gut, redesign and have the kitchen rebuilt before we move in. So, on Saturday morning ten people showed up to help demo the kitchen (that’s “demolish” not “demonstrate”) and assist us with various surgeries that were required around the house: tearing up carpet, running grounded electrical, putting electric outlets into the sunroom, pick up fallen branches, dig up scrubby shrubs, edge, mow and basically turn the place inside out in a day.

For the kitchen, we ended up going with dark cherry cabinets with chrome hardware all around (lighting, faucet, sink, handles, etc). The counter-tops and flooring are a textured light-beige. The jewel of the kitchen will be the glass-tiled back-splash that reflects the under-cabinetry lighting.

The following week, my dear friend, McKeel, began work on rebuilding the kitchen and installing the new materials while a couple other dear friends, Matt and Ben, began tearing down doors and sanding all of the trim throughout the house to prepare everything for priming and painting.

Why, you may ask, are my friends doing all this work and I am doing nothing? If you’ve not read the stories about Me and My Yard, then you don’t know how completely inept I am when it comes to things that aren’t computer or graphics-related. I have the propensity to mess up the simplest of tasks.

When we began planning the work for this house, Natalie said to me, “ok, here’s how this is going to work: we will hire our friends, who are GOOD at doing these things, to do the work. While they are working, you will sit on the porch with your laptop and make money so we can pay them.”

That’s not to say my wife doesn’t support me or believe in my ability to succeed… that is a testimony to the fact that we have both seen me in action. When I work on the house, it qualifies as entertainment for the neighborhood.

That’s also not to say that watching everyone work on my house before me doesn’t conjure up the emotional need in me as a male to swing a hammer and build something tangible… so I found a project for myself…

I’m told that when you buy a house, you should change the locks on the doors. How hard could that possibly be? I mean, really… what could possibly go wrong?

Another dear friend, Adam, had been so excited to work with me on a project on my new house that we were both giddy at the opportunity to work on something together. One evening, we grabbed his tools (for I have none of my own) and ran over to the house to start putting in new locks.

The house was built in 1955 and the front door, we suspect, is original to the house. it’s a very cool design and we really like how the windows are laid out… it just needs some updated hardware to bring it up-to-date. Unfortunately, hardware standards change over time and the holes that were bored into the door for the original handles were only about 1.5 inches, vs today’s standard of 2 1/8 inches. That means you have to use a hole saw to bore a bigger hole. I had to ask McKeel because I didn’t know.

“How do I make the hole bigger for the new knob?”

“Use a hole saw.”

“They make those?”

“Yeah. I have one you can borrow, if you want.”

“Is it hard to use?”

“It’s a drill bit.”

“Oh.”

He was very kind. I am very ignorant.

To drill a bigger hole into a door, you have to cut a wooden shim to fill the existing hole so you can start a pilot hole. Here’s the part we missed: you have to measure correctly where the pilot hole starts so you get the bigger hole in the right place.

At one point in the operation, Adam looked at me with big eyes and a big goofy grin on his face and said, “I think we just ruined your door… yup. It’s ruined.”

I now have two 2 1/8″ holes cut right next to each other in the form of what most people would call an oval. I call it a peep-hole for spotting Hobbits and small children.

I have never seen a door with a hole cut in it that was too wide for the doorknob.

Neither had McKeel.

He was very kind: “It’s not that bad. I can probably come over sometime and fill it with wood putty or cut a patch and match it to the grain. No one will ever see it.” Note that he did not say, “no one will ever know.” I expect he’ll be telling people about this for years to come.

Stupid oval hole.

5/24    Pirates: At World’s End
6/8      Oceans 13
6/17    F4: Silver Surfer
6/22    Evan Almighty
6/27    Live Free or Die Hard
6/29    Ratatouille
7/4      Transformers
7/13    Harry Potter
7/27     Simpsons Movie
8/03    Borne Ultimatum
8/10    Rush Hour 3

That’s just about one good one a week, starting this Thursday.  I think it should also be noted that this is a summer for sequels.  With the exception of Ratatouille, Transformers and Simpsons, every one of those movies is a sequel.  I guess Hollywood isn’t getting any bonus points for original and fresh concepts from me this year.

You may be asking yourself, “are you going to go see every one of those movies?  That’s pretty expensive, isn’t it?”  Yes and no.  Yes, I think we’re planning on going to see every one of those movies but no, it’s not all that expensive.

For Natalie and I to go see matinée showings of all of those movies at the theater all summer long will run us a grand total of $132.  That’s about the price of going out to eat 3 or 4 times.  I think we’ll set aside some cash and make this our date night activity for the summer.

See you at the movies!

Back when I was in college, my roommate, Stephen Brown, and I would occasionally borrow clothes from one another. He had a few shirts I liked and I had a few pairs of pants he liked.

The one rule we had about sharing clothes was that it had to be returned clean and folded. He once told me with great pride that his mom bought him a “special” kind of fabric softener. When I asked what kind it was, he didn’t know the name, but thought it was particularly cool that this particular kind came on a white paper and dissolved in the washing machine.

I didn’t have the heart to tell him what you are now probably thinking: “dryer sheet.”

Anyway, he had borrowed a pair of brown corduroys from me and was wearing them around campus. I found him at the cafeteria with some of our friends, hamming it up, as usual, and making everyone laugh. He was parading around, acting extremely effeminate and talking in a high, whiney voice with his hands cocked at the wrists and walking very flamboyantly.

I set my tray down and watched him with this smirk on my face and then noticed he was wearing my pants.

It was at that moment that my mouth did the talking before consulting with my brain; a built-in feature that I’d like to have uninstalled someday.

I said in a loud and very masculine voice, “IF YOU’RE GAY, I WANT YOU TO TAKE MY PANTS OFF RIGHT NOW!”

The jukebox skipped, the cafeteria went silent, parents took kids off the street, a cat someplace arched its back and every eye in the building was on me in muted astonishment. It was no small awkward silence.

I, with a very red face and in a tiny little voice said, “he’s… wearing…. my pants.”

I don’t remember, but I think I ate alone that day.

Finding a quality item that focuses on convergence is rare, but when you stumble upon one, it gives you a good feeling:

…I think that says it all.

Him:  “I don’t know how?”

Me:  “You don’t know how to read?”

Him:  “No, I don’t know how to get to your blog.”

Me:  “What’s my name?”

Him:  “Paul”

Me:  “Paul what?”

Him:  “Yuen”

Me:  “…dot com.  There.  Now you can get to my blog.”

Him:  *looking sheepish* “… that was easy.”

paulyuen.com… there.  Now you can get to my blog.

*looking sheepish* …now that you can get to my blog, I suppose I’ll need to write in it.

Last night, we had dinner with a couple of lovely people: Larry and Judy. They’re clients of mine. Since meeting them a few months ago, we’ve become increasingly more interested in one another and finally decided to put work aside for an evening and have dinner together.

At first, it was like having a meal with anyone: the majority of the interest was on the food, introductions and finding things we had in common. They’re better than twice our age, and yet, connecting with them was no laborious task. It was as though we’d been old friends for years.

The real experience began when we followed them home. I really didn’t know what to expect. The evening could have gone a number of ways. I anticipated we’d sit down in the living room or kitchen and small talk for a while, then play games for the rest of the night… but things went quite differently.

We pulled into their driveway behind them and to my astonishment, before the garage door had closed all the way, Judy was already standing at the front door, with her big friendly grin, beckoning us to enter.

I thought to myself, “what kind of jets does she have strapped to her feet to get her to the door from the garage so quickly?” In most houses, to get from the garage to the front door, you have to cross through the kitchen, then maybe a dining room, then the living room.

I should have guessed from her apparent rocket-shoes this would be no ordinary visit to a customary home.

I stepped over the threshold and noticed immediately how dark everything was. Man, their house was dark. I suddenly became aware that I was still wearing my sunglasses and had to run back to the car to switch out my glasses. What an embarrassing way to start a tour.

“Hey… hold all that anticipation you have boiled up inside to share with me this amazing house! I have to go get my glasses out of my car so I can see it.”

They must have been thinking, “young people sure are absent-minded these days.”

Stepping through the front door, I was greeted by an unexpected area of the home: a courtyard. The front door to the house was apparently a faux front door. Most houses, you’d find the deck and outdoor eating area in the back. Here, before we even got inside, we were met with a garden, a deck that was designed and built by Larry and an outdoor relaxation area. What a charming and unusual entryway!

Inside and off to the right, I found myself standing in the living room.

Now before I go on, you have to understand what working with Judy is like. She’s one of the most meticulous clients I’ve encountered. She writes down everything I say and then goes back home and researches it so she can bring more to the table the next time we meet. It’s surprising and a little intimidating. I really have to watch what I say around her because I never know what she’s going to quote at our next meeting.

If working with Judy was like a puzzle piece, standing in their living room was like standing in the middle of the hole where the piece fit that completed the rest of the picture. I stood there overwhelmed and overstimulated by art and beauty. Everything in the room had been meticulously chosen and placed to complete the composition of the room and work toward the experience of being there.

Have you ever visited someone and said, “you have a beautiful home?”

Sometimes you mean it and sometimes you’re just paying a compliment. I couldn’t even get it all out.

“You have a b–” …and the rest of the time, my brain worked hard to take it all in.

By the baby-grand piano (which Larry had stripped and refinished) was a lush indoor garden. Against the wall was a built-in bookcase (no doubt built by Larry), filled with literature, books on art, music and history. The sofas were chromed support-structures with soft, overstuffed cushions. In the corner was what looked like a tall, twisted, square paper lantern, illuminated from floor to ceiling. It resembled the kind I’ve seen in Ikea, but it was clear that the ones at Ikea are cheap imitations of the one I was looking at.

Everything had place and purpose.

There wasn’t a single thing in that room that wasn’t a conversation piece. Everything from the basket on the floor that was carved from a root to the coffee table, which I find difficult to describe, was unusual, beautiful and came with an intriguing story.

I tell young designers who struggle with their layouts to envision the goal of the piece and then create something that works toward that goal. Everything in the composition must have purpose and a place and work in unison to achieve the goal. The designer must be able to defend every element of the design, whether it be shape, color, line or hue. If they can’t defend it, it has no business being there. …and the magic is in the subtlety. Don’t go crazy on effects. Pull it back and let the user digest its purpose and its message.

Clearly, Larry and Judy apply those same principles to their home. Everything in their home was of high quality, distinct beauty and had purpose. It was overwhelming, but not from the perspective that it was busy. Honestly, I’d say they only had a few things, but the things they had were pieces of art. Even the telephone was unusual!

The thing that was overwhelming to me was the quality of the room; the house; the experience. Contrary to mainstream culture, they were not collectors of junk.

Touring the rest of the house told a story of love, friendship, peace and an appreciation for learning. We talked about music and art; jazz and architecture; life experiences, joys and disappointments; God and religion.

These two love and appreciate fine art and music. They read and laugh together. Soon, they’ll find themselves traveling; seeing places and visiting people, sharing more of their love for goodness, beauty and truth.

As we wrapped things up for the evening, this 29-year old thought, “when I grow up, I want to be like them.”

I remember a close friend of mine named, Larry Venable gave me an external CD-ROM drive.  I was in need of one to help my business along because I was a poor college student who couldn’t pay for it myself.  In those days, external CD drives ran around $350… clearly above my means.  It was a necessity for building computers, however since most of my software was on CD and most of the computers I was dealing with were not pre-installed with optical drives yet.

I remember clearly the lump in my throat when he gave it to me.  I was floored by his generosity.  He said to me, “Paul, this is a significant gift and a sacrifice but you need it.  I don’t want you to keep it, however.  When you come across someone else who needs it, give it to them.  With this comes a lesson of generosity and love.”

I promised to do so.

Today, the drive sits in my basement in a box of used and obsolete items.  I’ve had opportunities to give it away, but never did because my pride and greed got in the way.

… but I never forgot Larry’s generosity nor the lesson he tried to teach me.

Larry, recently I gave away my laptop to a friend who needed one to build his business.  I’ve honored your request and fulfilled my promise.

I love you and the lessons that Christ taught me through you.

To my friend with a new laptop:   this is a significant gift and a sacrifice but you need it.  I don’t want you to keep it, however.  When you come across someone else who needs it, give it to them.  With this comes a lesson of generosity and love.

Pass it on.

I mean, c’mon! How many little brothers actually get their older sister MARRIED? I just put the two of ‘em in the same room 18 months ago and said, “hey, let’s see what happens.”

I didn’t really see this comin’.

They seemed like two custom puzzle pieces that were made to fit. The next thing I know, Warren’s passing her notes that basically say, “do you like me? Circle yes or no.”

I think it’s reasonable to assume she circled “yes.”

Rumor has it that’s how the proposal went too.

Ruth: anyone who has ever spent 5 minutes with us in the same room knows that, in spite of our difference in years, we’ve had a strong bond since childhood. We’ve laughed and cried together… probably more laughing than crying. We’ve been confidants and encouragers to one another and as we grow older, our laugh lines grow deep.

You were there to pray with me and sing me to sleep when the storms were bad and the thunder was loud. I was there to hold you up and carry you to the finish line when your knees buckled under the weight… but you need a protector and you need a friend.

Warren: You’re an artist and a musician… but you’re also a painting and a song. When I met you, I saw a grey image of a great man with strong character and a heart of kings.

I heard a song that harmonized with Ruth’s, but more importantly, it harmonized with God.

Today, I stand as a witness that joined with Ruth, you’re a man bursting with color and vibrant with life. The song you sing with Ruth and with God will tell a story of great blessing and of life-giving power.

I want to bring you this from Colossians 3:16-17:

And now… Ruth and Warren: may the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

I got up today and thought, “look how nice it is out there! Maybe I ought to open the blinds and let in some of that glorious sunlight. Upon doing so, I was immediately aware of how dirty my house is.

Ever notice that? Sunlight exposes things that you wish you never saw. Suddenly I’m aware of cat hair on the couches; tiny dust particles floating in the room that I’m now certain that I’m breathing in; every speck on a glass surface is now glowing.

As I sat, staring at this phenomena, marveling at how incredible the sunlight is, three thoughts came to mind:

1.) No matter how much man tries to reproduce the power and potency of the sun, we will never be able to come close to reproducing its effects. Every feeble attempt merely illustrates how woefully inadequate and pathetic we are. Our efforts will always pale in comparison. This humbling experience slightly resembles our existence to God’s.

2.) Every speck of dust, no matter how small, not only is visible, but shines in the glory of the sun… but the sunlight is constantly moving across the room. Even as I sit here writing, it’s now in a completely different part of the room. Only those things that are within the center of the light shine. As the light moves, whatever doesn’t move with it or is left outside of its path is no longer visible and returns to insignificance.

3.) I’m disgusted with the condition of my surroundings when I let the light in. My first inclination is to shut out the light and remain in darkness so I don’t have to see the filth around me. I didn’t see it before and I was comfortable with that, but now that I’m aware of it, can I really shut out the light and pretend that it doesn’t exist? The light makes me uncomfortable and aware of things that I now either have to deal with or continually lie to myself in an attempt to convince myself they don’t exist or that there’s nothing wrong with it. I suppose the third option might be to run from the light, seeking another room that doesn’t look as dirty and just spend time there, living my life avoiding places where light is present.
Focusing on my third thought, I’m now saddled with a choice: do I shut it out and continue my life as I see fit or do I make the decision to accept the light and the things it has revealed as well as the responsibility to do something about it?

Now, in all fairness, it should be said that Natalie always keeps the house in marvelous shape and that the couches were JUST vacuumed a day ago and the house dusted.  In fact, I could wash down the table right now and the sun would still show that it was dusty.  Does that mean that I would not bother trying?  I think Paul responds to that question best in Romans 6 when he says, “by no means!”

But for real… I gotta wipe this thing down.

Like any science fiction show, Battlestar assumes you have some prior knowledge about science fiction. They assume you’ve seen Star Wars and Star Trek and know about light-speed. They assume you know about artificial intelligence in robots and cybornetic beings. They assume you know something about weaponry and the effect it has in outer space or on the human physiology.

Battlestar is no exception. They use a technology called “jumping,” which has something to do with “firing up the FTL drives” which enables their ships to create and hop through worm-holes in space (another assumed element of science fiction).

The first couple of times I heard the term “FTL drive” it took my brain a moment or two to figure out what they were talking about. While I love science fiction, I’m not such an avid fanboy that those kinds of terms automatically register. I actually have to figure them out. Today I realized that I was mistaken in my assumption of what FTL stood for.

Sometimes things come to you at the most odd times. As I was sittin’ on the pot, pinchin’ one off, I noticed the elastic band around my ankles with three little letters printed all around it …and it suddenly came to me: “Fire up the Fruit of the Loom drive.” THAT’S what they’ve been talking about all this time. I should have known.

Not too long afterward, I noticed Natalie’s face looked a little sour as she spoke up and asked, “can’t we just talk?”

Not unlike an Indiana Jones moment, I turned off the music and said, “ok, sure… what do you want to talk about?”

After a long pause, she said in a disappointed voice, “I can’t think of anything.”

Fortunately, I had enough wit about me to know better than to turn the music back on, as we rode in silence to the theater… but it brought to mind the difference in how I spend time with my male friends vs how I spend time with my wife and how I observe that she spends time with her friends.

This is not the first time my wife has asked me to turn off the [electrical device] and spend some time talking with her, only to find that she has nothing to say; simply that she wanted to plug in and spend some quality time together.

Now, take a step back and let’s look at how men and women spend time together differently:

I’m going to my friend’s house for a visit. It’s embarrassing to say, “going over to play,” but in reality, that’s really what it is. I’ve got my Xbox in a bag or maybe my laptop with me… if we’re really planning to have some fun, I’m packin’ both. I get there, we greet one another, maybe grab a quick drink and within minutes, we’re hooked up and shooting at each other on his TV, giggling and yelling at the screen. That goes on for maybe four hours or more. When I leave, we feel connected and excited to see one another again.

Now, observe the women: she goes to a friend’s house for a visit. Now, unless I come with, you can be pretty sure there will be little or no “playing” involved. It’s going to be the kind of visit that I, as a kid, used to run to my room to hide from. People, sitting in the living room, drinking coffee and talking.

Ever see a cross-over? Good times. Put a man in the middle of women talking. I’ve been there. I can adapt, but it feels slow… there’s nothing to fix, nothing to analyze and sarcastic humor is most likely unwelcome.

Put a woman in the middle of men playing a game. She can most likely adapt as well, but for her, it feels… male. Yelling, loud laughter, jumping around, animated gestures and probably swearing. Put her in the middle of men talking and she’ll probably be bored to tears by all of the details. We’re fixing and analyzing problems in a flurry of solutions and suggestions.

Of course there are exceptions to all of these. My sister is one of them. Frequently, you’ll find her with the men, telling them how to refill their headlamp fluid and elbow grease… and every so often, you’ll find me running away from sports-talk with the men, in the kitchen with the women talking about color palettes or discussing theology. It’s rare, but it happens… especially if the men start talking sports.

All that to say this: I’ve observed that our culture continually moves away from community and revolves around self. Men tend to be the ones who are quick to embrace this shift in culture. Think about what’s popular: cell phones, iPods, video games, movies, SUV’s, laptops… it seems that the smaller the gadget and the more it requires you to disconnect from community, the more popular it is. SUV’s are the exception. They’re BIG… and getting bigger. I usually see them on the road with one person in them, if I can even see the person at all through the tinted windows. Even my little VW has tinted windows. So I guess, what we’re saying is, “if I have to be out, I want to be alone and I don’t want to be seen.”

Taking a step back to just observe, it doesn’t seem like that’s what God had in mind when He made people. We’re made for relationship; with Him and with one another. That’s our purpose. Of course, I say all of this with a bluetooth headset plugged directly into my skull so I can quickly disconnect from whomever I’m with as quickly and conveniently as possible, making myself available to anyone else except the person who is with me and wants my attention the most, namely my wife and my family… hang on one sec… it’s ringing… I have to take this.

I’ve gotta go. I have a 12:30. Maybe we can pick this up later.

I got an electric piano, a video iPod and some really nice sets of cuff-links, along with various articles of clothing and fun little toys, including a Dwight bobble-head from “The Office” and a cape-wearing Curious George that screams when you fling him across the room.

Leave comments and let me know how your holiday went and what kind of fun toys y’all got.

Would you rather have regret for something you did or something you didn’t do?

Please comment.

Conveniently, I’ve taken the opportunity to replace my phone and PDA at the same time with the Samsung SCH i720 SmartPhone. It’s been a great phone for me and has all the nice features that I’ve come to love and expect from a PDA. The nice thing about this one is that it has Bluetooth and Wifi built-in… and, contrary to several Verizon phones, they work! The great thing is that it’s a phone and PDA combined so I don’t have to carry two devices. I also like that the phone has actual buttons I can use to dial… though the wireless voice-activated headset makes it a moot point anyway.

The other thing that I had to get in order to replace Sheila was a GPS device. I decided to get an in-car mounted system this time around. As aforementioned in my previous post, I got a Magellan Roadmate 300. I’ve found that a system that’s dedicated to one thing, like GPS, tends to do it a lot better. This one finds and holds a satellite signal much faster and has a much more precise set of directions that Sheila did. It even tells me which side of the road exits and destinations are located so I know which lane I need to be in… very helpful. The nicest thing about the new device is the distance bar that shows up as I near a turn. The bar shrinks as I get closer so I can visually approximate which road I need to slow down for. This method is very helpful and a welcome feature that I wasn’t used to.

Lastly, I got a new digital camera. The previous one I had was a 3 MegaPixel, which was definitely good enough for web projects, but woefully inadequate for any print work. Recent projects have demanded a little higher-quality imagery and it’ll be nice to have the ability to deliver. Another feature is full-motion video and audio capture. It’ll hold about a half-hour of video in Quicktime format.. I might try storyboarding something out and shooting a little video short to quick-edit in Quicktime Pro. Who knows? Maybe my days of importing video into Premier real-time via firewire DV are over. The nice thing about my new Nikon Coolpix P2 is the built-in wireless card. It’s a little clunky to get it set up, but once it’s connected to the network and paired to a computer, it’s really nice to be able to wirelessly upload the photos to my computer without having to use a card/card-reader. It can batch-upload and upload per shot, depending on the job.

I wasn’t really prepared to have to go out and buy new toys… but since they’re mostly all for business and I needed to replace broken devices, this year’s write-off/Christmas list has some nice toys checked off.

Now I just have to keep my butt off my phone so I don’t crack the screen again. At least this time around, it’s insured.

Frequently, I feel like it’s a good thing when electronics die because it gives me an excuse to buy new ones… but not Sheila.  She was special.  I bought her on an anline clearance… She got me from place to place, played some of my favorite movies and songs, played special proprietary programs that I had developed for her and even knew the sound of my voice-commands…
I figured that with all the “Black Friday” sales this morning, I’d force myself to go out and fight the crowds to get a new GPS device since Meijer had them on sale for $99.  I now have a new Magellan device on my dash and intend to go to a Verizon store to get a smartphone to replace my Pocket PC, now that our contract is done with Alltel.  …but it won’t be the same.  Nothing can replace Sheila.

1.)  They’re afraid their enemies will kill all their friends and loved ones

2.)  Table manners.

I mean, think about it.  Have you ever seen a super hero with good table manners?  I haven’t.

They say imitation is the highest form of flattery.  The little guy’s got glasses, wears a black ribbed turtle-neck sweater with jeans on the weekends (the Yuen-iform) with the rest of us and loves just about everything I do.

That being said, I constantly have to be careful of my attitudes and the words I speak because he is always right there to be a facsimile of me.  I’ve been increasingly conscious of this so I’ve been praying with him more regularly, telling him truths about who he is in God’s eyes and how proud of him I am.

Sure, his eight-ness grinds on me from time to time… walking around the house, leaving his Matthew-trails around everywhere he’s been: toys, trading cards, clothes, fingerprints, paper, messes, etc.  It’s a constant.  So I’m always in the spot of deciding whether to try to help him learn to take care of his things himself or just pick up after him for my own sanity.
…then there’s that fine line of hypocracy.   The moment I tell him that he’s going to start losing things he leaves out, he’ll point to my hat that’s been lying on the floor in the corner for three weeks, reminding me that I am more like an eight-year-old than I’d like to sometimes admit.

That being said, we ARE a lot alike, he and I.  So, to hear him ask my wife if he looks like me was both flattering and endearing.  Her response to him was something like, “well, you both wear glasses, have dark hair, enjoy similar things (80′s GI Joe figures, Tom & Jerry, drawing, robot video games, etc)…”

To which he responded with, “no, I mean like this…”

From there, he proceeded to get out of his chair and do the most ridiculous walk you’ve ever seen through the kitchen.  It put John Clease’s “Ministry of Silly Walks” to shame.

Essentially, he was asking, “does this ridiculous action remind you of anyone we both know?”

Shh.  Did you hear that?  That’s the sound of me getting ripped on by someone so young, he still has to pee in the short urinal.

Paul tells us in 1 Thessalonians to “be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”

Pray continually?  Without ceasing?  Ok, so I’ve heard that before… but what’s it look like in real practical living?

I couldn’t really put my finger on it until I was thinking about networking the other day and it struck me:  I’m on still on dial-up when it comes to the discipline of prayer.  I connect when I feel like it, give and get a minimum requirement, jump back off-line and go on my merry way.

What are the arguments for transferring someone from dial-up Internet to broadband?

1.)  Faster connection for the purpose of a more effective experience.

2.)  Maintaining an always-on connection to receive updates and security/protection as needed.

3.)  Enabled connectivity and correspondence to peers and others within the network.

Online capability is somewhat like the life’s-blood to a computer.  The fatter the pipe (bandwidth), the better the experience for the user and the more that individual is enabled to function.
If my prayer-life is still on dial-up, what effect has that got on my spirit?  How well-connected am I?  What is my effectiveness?

Over the next few weeks, I’ll be praying through the Psalms in an effort to “upgrade to broadband.”  If this post has resonated with anyone, I encourage you to join me in an effort to get connected.

Things I’ve said:

“Let me show you how it’s done.” – Something disastrous always follows.

“What could possibly happen?” – ditto.

“I don’t need a nut-cracker” – Never try to open a walnut with a pair of pliars. I was picking nut shrapnel off the kitchen floor for weeks.

“Oh… did you want some?” – Usually follows the last sip taken from our “shared” can of Coke.

“…you with your Godzilla fingers…” – She was teaching friends to play a civilizations game and accidentally knocked over the little peices and tore through the tiles with her fingernail… I’ve never lived it down.

“Are you going to go out with your hair like that?” – this was said right as she came out from primping in the bathroom and thinking that her hair looked very cute.

“You want me to get the door?” – If I have to ask, it means her arms are full and mine aren’t.

“Oh yeah… didn’t I tell you?” – Normally said as we discover that I’ve double-booked us for things that are upcoming in fifteen minutes.

“Is the car alright?”" – This question should never should be asked under any circumstance.

“Is this your PMS week?” – ditto.

“That just goes to show you can’t be pretty AND smart.” – This was said to my wife at the mall as a bunch of stereo-typical ditzy, blonde, dolled-up high-schoolers giggled their way through the mall. My wife responded with, “Oh? Which am I?” I think we all know.

And the mother of all things to never say:

“I wish you knew everything that was in my mind so you wouldn’t have to talk…” – This was the worst possible response to a classic married couple dispute over directions but does require some explanation. We were going to some friends’ house for dinner, I was not using GPS and she was telling me each and every turn from the time we got out of the driveway… even the turns she knew that I already knew, to which I would respond, “I KNOW!” The very last turn, she decided she didn’t need to tell me anymore directions so she kept silent and I missed the turn. It was at that time I made my statement. There was more afterwards that went something like, “…you could just tell me the things I don’t already know,” but she pretty much didn’t hear anything after, “so you wouldn’t have to talk.” Granted, it was said and received in jest but, Gentlemen, never say it. You’ll never live it down.

The following are statements contributed by friends:

“I don’t have to say ‘excuse me.’ I’m already in the bathroom.” – to which the wife responded with, “just because you say, ‘excuse me’ doesn’t give you permission to do that anytime you want.”

“I like big butts and I cannot lie…” – this was said to a friends wife as he pulled up from work and saw her bent over in the front yard attending the garden. She replied with, “do you like MY big butt?” At that point, he was caught in the classic trap of not being able to say “yes” or “no.”

“No, your face does.” – this was the worst possible reply a friend of mine gave his wife when she posed the classic question, “do these pants make me look fat?”

Ephesians says, “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church.” That being said, I’m pretty sure when Christ accepted the task of becoming a man for the sake of the church, He never asked the Father, “what could possibly happen?” …though in more ways than one, He has said to the church, “let me show you how it’s done.” As aforementioned, both resulted in Him taking one for the team.

After giving it a little thought, he looked at me and said, “no, not really. When you grow up, you still have to follow all the laws and rules. There are actually a lot more rules and things you have to follow because life gets so much more complicated. Taxes, fees, dues, meetings, responsibilities… I wish I could say that life gets simpler, but it really doesn’t.”

My face fell and I dreaded growing up and becoming an adult because of all of the horrible things that lay in wait for me.

Now that I’m twenty-nine, there are those responsibilities that everyone has to put up with and reasonable laws by which everyone has to abide, but the answer to my original question is now apparent: yes, you can do anything you want when you grow up.

I wasn’t interested in driving on the sidewalks or burning down cities as a kid… that’s not what I was asking about. I pretty much just wanted to know if I could stay up late, eat popcorn for dinner and drink pop at lunch. I’m allowed to play video games and watch cartoons whenever I want… that’s about all I needed to know.

Sure, there’s that whole other non-frosted shredded wheat side of me that has to be a good example for younger generations, maintain a balance between work, family and spiritual growth and manage my money, abilities, relationships and time…. but so long as I can eat ice cream or potatoe chips for dinner at 10:30pm every now and again, I’m good.

A couple years ago, she was visiting and had come up with a phrase that embraced/mocked the Kansas-accent. I took great delight in consistently hearing her ask her brother, “what smails? Matt, you smail.”

My wife and I have come to love that phrase and have used it ever since.

Me: “What do you want for dinner tonight?”

Natalie: “Let’s get some Taco Smails.”

Me: “What smails? Matt, you smail.”

…and we giggle as we turn into Taco Bell/Hell/Smell/Smails.

The other day, I walked into the house from the garage and smelled something subtly awful in the house. I couldn’t figure out what it was or where it was coming from, but it seemed to permeate the whole upper floor. It wasn’t powerful, but it was sour and seemed to be noticeable for the first 15 seconds until my nasal passages got used to it.

I walked into the family room where Natalie was sitting and asked, “ew! What smails?”

My wife sniffed the air and said, “I don’t smell anything.”

My response was, “I don’t smell it as bad now, but I did when I came in… something smails!”

Now, a typical response would be to go find the smell, eradicate it and move on with life, but this is where the story takes a turn: Natalie turned to me and said, “You know what that is? It’s boogers. You probably have boogers in your nose and they stink. When you have stinky boogers, everything smells bad.”

I knew she was kidding. I knew that in that snap of a moment, she came up with that on the fly as a humorous little comment to throw out there for a quick laugh, which we did. The embarrassing thing is, for a split-second, I took her seriously.

It’s times like those that the left side of my brain (the sensible, logical, thinking side) reaches over and smacks the right side (the creative, emotional and utterly gullible side).

Upon hearing that the only possible solution to the smells I smelled had to be my own boogers, I grabbed a tissue and blew my already clean nose.

By now, I’d been in the house for probably a good two minutes. I couldn’t smell the stench any longer. I took a sniff, didn’t smell it anymore and figured, “problem solved. It must have been boogers after all.”

Hours later that night, as I was taking my shoes out to the garage, I smelled the smell again. This time it was overpowering and nauseating.

“For the love of all that is good and holy, WHAT IS THAT SMELL?”

Tied to the garage door handle was a plastic bag full of chicken guts from a previous meal.

My wife had hung it there three days prior, assuming I would see it and take it out to the trash… which I did, once I knew it was there.

You gotta understand: just thinking about that smell initiates my gag reflex. It was that bad.

That night, we were snuggled into bed, falling asleep, when I sat bolt-up, and yelled, “BOOGERS?!?!?!?”

…which is now our new response to, “what smails?”

One of the things I love about working where I work is that they provide us with free cans of soda. I’m a Coke-drinker… pretty much exclusively. One mid-afternoon in January, I was enjoying a nice cold can of Coke, snuggled into my comfy Papasan chair in my office, working on my laptop. I put the Coke on my rug, next to me and would take a swig every so often.

You know how it is: when you first crack the can open and that glorious mist pops up… you take that first sip and it’s like you’ve stolen a drink from the nectar of the gods. From that point on, if you don’t finish it all in one sitting, the fizz starts to go flat and each sip over time becomes less and less satisfying. Finally, by the time you’re to the bottom of the can, you’re pretty much just chugging it to be finished with the experience and get it over with.
Such is the case with any soda. We’ve all just come to accept it and live with it.

This particular afternoon was different. It started out like any ordinary delightful Coke experience does, but over the course of the afternoon, the TASTE of the Coke seemed to change, not just the lack of fizz. By the end of the work-day, I figured, “let’s just chug the rest of this thing and go home.” By the weight of it, it felt like there was maybe a good quarter of the can left.

When I went for the last chug, the experience was unlike any other: It sort of felt like I was dumping a handful of delicious cupcake sprinkles into my mouth, but rather than accept their fate, THESE cupcake sprinkles decided to make a break for it and crawl desperately out of my mouth.

Ok… firstly, you’re probably wondering why there were sprinkles in my Coke. Secondly, you’re thinking, “how are they crawling out of your mouth? That sounds disgusting.” Both thoughts were running through my brain as the “sprinkles” proceeded to run out of my mouth and down my shirt.

As it turned out, they were ants… hundreds of them. Apparently, in a matter of two hours and in the dead of winter, an entire colony of ants had managed to find my can of Coke on the floor, tell all their friends in the county and crawl into my can, drowning themselves and unable to crawl back out. I never saw them crawl in, but as surely as you just threw up a little in your mouth, I saw them trying to get out.

I jumped up and down a few times, spit as many of them as I could into the trash and immediately began trying to condition myself psychologically that I wasn’t going to disown Coke as a result.

…I told you that story to tell you this one:

This evening I spent some time on the front patio, talking with my wife in-between her numerous daily phone calls, enjoying the nice weather and, naturally, a delicious Coke.

We came inside to watch some TV and I remembered that my Coke was still outside, sitting in its cup-holder on my chair. Two episodes of Arrested Development and one episode of Battlestar Galactica later, as I was taking my final swig, something smooth, about the size of a cigarette butt slipped into my mouth.

I spit the thing out and it started to vibrate in desperation. Once again, I had poured an insect into my mouth. This time, it was a poor, unsuspecting moth, drawn to the sweet smells emanating from the nectar of the gods.

That being said, if you mess around with their drink, don’t turn your back on it or you’re sure to find yourself prey to one of their practical jokes.

I’m sure Zeus and Hades are yuckin’ it up.

I flopped myself out of bed about 10 minutes after the alarm went off, tripped over Lenny The Cat on my way to the bathroom and proceeded to perform my morning ritual.

Normally, that means turning on the shower and shaving while the water heats up.

This morning’s activities were no different:

1.) Walk in bathroom with today’s clothes in hand

2.) Drop clothes on floor, scaring Lenny out of the bathroom

3.) Turn on shower to mid-heat

4.) Pull cordless razor out of cupboard

5.) Take cap off razor, being careful not to drop cap or razor into toilet.

6.) Begin shaving with razor

The difference in today’s ritual is the addition of steps 7 and 8:

7.) Notice that chin feels moist

8.) Look down to realize that I am shaving with my deoderant… not my razor

What’s it all mean? It means that the sweatier my chin gets, the better I’m going to smell today.

…Sure. Laugh it up. You laugh now, but when I walk past you with those fine smells comin’ off my sweaty chin, you’ll thank me.

This, in and of itself, is no big deal… it’s the comment that comes afterwards that always makes me smirk just a little:

“I dunno why, but I seem to be able to tell when a TV is on in the room. I can hear it.”

…to which I usually have to stifle a comment like, “so where’s your mask and cape?”

Ok. So you think you have super-human hearing because you can hear the high-pitch whine of a TV? Even if that was a super-power, what kind of a lame super-power would that be?

“On a mission to stop electricity-wasting everywhere, Captain Cochlea, lacking the ability to fly, runs door to door, listening for TV’s that may be carelessly left on, but not receiving a signal.”

I got news for ya: just about any male under age 50 can hear that… including myself. I just choose not to brag about it.

Don’t get me wrong… I do have super-human abilities… I just don’t consider the ability to determine when my TV has been left on to be among them.

I have three super-powers: 1.) the ability to embarrass myself. I can do this amazing feat faster and more effectively than anyone I know. 2.) the ability to be completely absent-minded and seemingly forget everything…

Fortunately, my abilities manage to complement one-another frequently.

Let me give you an example: I have a glasses-holder in my car because I have two pairs of glasses. One of them is a pair of RX sunglasses. Normally, I get in the car, put on the sunglasses and swap my regular glasses into the glasses-holder. I drive around for a while, get to my destination and my super-powers kick in.

I park, walk into the building, wonder why the hell everything is so dark and about a half-hour later, I can be found wandering back to my car to get my regular glasses.

The ratio I manage to screw this up is about 1:1. It happens frequently enough that my 8-year old nephew went out with me to get ice cream one time and brought his sunglasses along specifically so he could forget them in the car like me.

What can I say? I’m a super-hero.

Well, here’s the skinny: we had been attending Nortonville Chapel. The Lord had led us to the church about a year and a half ago. It didn’t really seem like a good fit at first, but it did seem to be where God had directed and wanted us to stay. God reveals His Will to us in prayer, circumstance and by his Word. All three seemed to be lining up at the time to indicate that this was, indeed, where he wanted us to attend.

…so we jumped in with both feet. We plugged in wherever there seemed to be a need that we felt the Lord was directing us to serve and it was a great experience.

The fit never really felt right, though and over time, we prayed for direction as to whether we should stay or go. In recent months, it felt as though the Lord was beginning to close doors and prepare our hearts to find another church. Once again, through prayer, circumstance and scripture, his Will was revealed that it was time to move on and go on the search.
The first church that we decided we’d visit is called New Life Community Church and is located about a mile away. Now, being the avid technology person that I am, when I begin a venture like church-shopping, the first place I start is not likely going to be the phone book. It’s usually much easier and faster for me to find information online… so my fingers danced and danced on the keyboard as I Googled the web (when did that become a verb?) for more information.

Twenty minutes into my search, I was still coming up empty-handed. In the course of my research, I discovered several other churches in the area, each website looking seemingly worse than the one before. I have to believe that at some point, the pastor or a board member says, “the Inner-nest is the wave of the future. My grandson tells me they’re making it for computers now! We need a website.” At that point, they assign the task of building a website to either a high-school student or some poor goon who wasn’t paying attention during the meeting.

From this we get truly awful results. We’ve all seen it: Church websites with nearly every other word spelled correctly, a picture of a cross and/or dove, complete with awful colors, pictures of people sitting at a picnic or on a canoe trip and an events calendar that’s out of season and two years old, along with a list of prayer requests for 9-11 victims. Usually the images are all shifted out of proportion, nothing lines up, the type-treatment is bright red, in as many fonts as Windows comes with, flashing and so large that you’re not certain as to whether you’ve found a church website or a monster truck rally advertisement… in either case, the words, “Sunday Sunday Sunday” both seem appropriate.

I did manage to find a church’s website that had clean lines, was up-to-date and looked like their beliefs lined up with my own. Trying to find out WHERE they were and WHAT TIME to show up was another matter and apparently a huge secret.

More than once, these words escaped my lips: “church websites suck.”

Now why is that?

1.) lack of funding

2.) lack of competency within the local church’s body

3.) lack of anyone taking the initiative to do something about it

Let’s look at this strictly from a business perspective. If you were running a business, the cardinal rule of business is, “if you’re not growing, you’re dying.” I think that can also be said of churches. If you were a small business and you wanted to encourage people to come through your door, there are a number of initiatives you would launch to advertise and increase customer awareness: Radio spots, TV commercials, fliers, billboards, etc. Eventually, word of mouth becomes the small business’s best friend, but they have to do a lot of work up front before that becomes a reality.

Again, the reasons we don’t see a lot of these same kinds of initiatives from the church is lack of funding and knowledgeable personnel. Generally, when a church writes out their budget at the beginning of the fiscal year, the advertising department gets a pretty slim cut… but a business would never do that.

The reason the web has had the explosive impact that it has is because it’s cheap and easy to create a presence and pump out relevant information to your target audience… you just need someone with know-how and ability to make it happen.

I decided I could do something about this dilemma. I called up a few friends I have who share my love for the Internet industry and www.churchwebsitessuck.com was born.

More or less, it works like this: we will give local churches in our area then benefit of our design and development skills free of charge, as long as they are willing to host their website with me for at least one year.

They’ll get the same treatment any paying client would get and the same quality of work, but they don’t pay a dime for it.

Problem solved. It’s like pushing the big red un-suck button.

We’re just doing our part.

Two days ago, I was finishing up at work and had just finished installing the new Windows update on my laptop and shut down. As it usually happens, as soon as I shut down, I remembered one more thing I needed to do, so when it was completely off, I pushed the power button again to boot back up so I could call up my files and run some prints before I left for the day.

When the computer came up, it froze on the boot… not something that happens often, but it happens occasionally. Generally, I shrug, hold down the power button, let the computer turn off, wait a few seconds and reboot.

After following those steps, I noticed that Windows was taking an extraordinary long time to boot up.

I decided the best course of action would be to try to use my laptop in the condition that it was in until the weekend, back-up my data and refresh the computer back to factory standards over the weekend so that it’d be fresh for Monday.

That’s where the problems started. Now let me set the stage:

1.) Thursdays are typically my telecommute days from work, so I work from home.

2.) Thursday mornings at 7:00am, I go to a business networking meeting with local business-owners to generate local freelance work.

3.) Matthew had requested to stay home from camp one day this week so he could hang out at the house with me. We had decided that Thursday would be that day and made arrangements, accordingly.

4.) Natalie was leaving for Chicago Wednesday night for a conference, not to return until Sunday.

5.) Thursday morning at 9:00, my car was scheduled to be taken in to the dealersihp so they could replace the handbrake handle because when I got the car, it didn’t have a button cover on it. It was a relatively easy job that would take 30 minutes. In addition, they have wireless Internet in their coffee bar/waiting room, which means that I can work from there.

The stage is set.

Wednesday night, I decided to skip my networking meeting and send someone in my place, which meant I had to meet with him that night to prep him for the next morning. Before I left, I started my laptop on some diagnostics and system repair routines to try to get it to run a little smoother to get me through the next couple of days. I went to bed around 3am.

Thursday morning, I slept through my alarm and woke up at 8:30. The computer had been running diagnostics from the night before and was still running the same routine when I woke up… it had now been trying to repair itself for 12 hours… not a good sign, but it was almost done. I got Matthew up, took a quick shower, grabbed some breakfast bars for us and scooted us out the door to get us to the 9:00 appointment for my car.

45 minutes after being in the lobby, burning time because I was without my computer, one of the people from the service department came up to me and said that they had hit a complication with trying to replace the handbrake and it was now going to take several hours to get it done because they had to rip out the entire center console to get to it. They said they’d shuttle Matthew and me wherever we wanted to go. All this, just to put a button on the lever because I’d asked for one when I bought the car.

I decided to have them shuttle me back home so I could at least try to get a little work done, since all my most recent work was on the laptop at home.

Halfway home, I decided I’d better start anticipating my strategy as to how to manage the rest of the day… part of that strategy included how we would get back into the house, since Natalie was out of town and I had just given my keys to the service department so they could work on my car.

40 minutes later, after they shuttled me back to the shop to get my keys and then back home, we finally got in and I noticed my laptop had managed to finish its diagnostics, tests and repairs and had successfully booted into Windows.

I was ready to work.

Turns out, all network capabilities, firewall and USB ports had been deactivated and could not be reactivated. This meant I could not go online to get support and I could not hook up an external drive to dump off my data. Without boring you to death with technical jargon and a multitude of symptoms, let’s just say that it was FUBAR.

I jumped online on our desktop computer and began a chat with Dell Support. After about an hour into our conversation, going through all the typical technical support idiot-hoops they make you jump through (verifying that indeed my computer is plugged in, the lid is open so I can see my keyboard, I have tried rebooting and washing the screen with a damp cloth, thereby removing all smudges that might look like error-messages), the support person revealed to me the great and mystical secret of refreshing my laptop back to factory standards. I wouldn’t have to ask for help from support, except that the new Dell machines don’t ship with disks anymore. They partition the hard drive with all that data right on the local drive so you can restore your machine to factory standards IF you know the secret key combination, when to press it and what color socks to wear while doing it. In order to receive this information, you must tell their support staff no less than six times that you understand and are willing to wipe all data from your hard drive in order to do this procedure and fully intend not to hold Dell liable for any data lost.

As I balanced my laptop on my lap precariously while chatting with Support, answering inane questions and describing in detail each memory address for each error message I was receiving, our cat, Lenny was in the window sill and began wheezing and coughing, thrashing around until he knocked over my computer speakers, pulling every wired device off the desk with it and scaring Lenny right out of his fur.

At the same time, Matthew, who had been playing video games for about 10 minutes, turned off the game and walked over to me to complain about how hungry, thirsty and bored he was.

As the words, “what ELSE could happen,” and a sigh of exasperation exited my mouth, the telephone rang, which, incidentally, is also set up to simultaneously ring to my mobile phone, which set on vibrate in my pocket.

My brain began to shut down from the overload of stimulus and stress before I finally snapped into “take care of all this crap” mode.

I had Matthew answer the phone, pulled off the collar that was wrapped around Lenny’s neck and lower jaw, popped my laptop into safe mode in attempts to make the USB ports work so I could dump the data to my external drive which was still at work, wrapped up my conversation with Dell and accepted a lunch invitation for Matthew and me over IM from from my buddy, Warren.

After lunch, we stopped at work to pick up the drive, went home, the dealership picked me up to get my car and then we all went to the beach to relax.

…unfortunately, the story doesn’t quite end there. While we were at the beach, Warren and I were throwing around a fairly expensive little frisby-like toy I had bought a few weeks ago. This was the first time I was actually playing with it. I threw it to Warren, the wind caught it and took it right into the water, about 200 feet out. It sunk to the bottom and I never found it.

As for today, I’ve been dumping the data back to my computer, reinstalling software, installing updates and restoring settings all day. I have my laptop back up and running pretty much at about 95%. It’s almost 5:00 and my work day is about to begin on a Friday night. I know my boss would probably tell me to call it a wash and just go enjoy my weekend, but I’ve completely lost the past two days and I want to have SOMETHING productive to show for it.

I dunno.

Maybe I should go drown my sorrows in chocolate chp cookies again.

It’s weird. Our friends, Peter and Jessica, used to live here… and now all our stuff is where their stuff used to be. Yesterday, I tied a rope to the garbage can lid in the garage so I could open it without having to go down the stairs… a trick I learned from Peter.

It’s just kinda strange moving into a place where we’ve spent so many hours playing games, talking and building relationships and memories… and now we’re LIVING there.

I’m putting my TV where Peter’s TV used to be, setting up my couch and our computers in the same room where theirs were… I even gave them my recliner several months ago because we didn’t have room for it and it matched their furniture. As it turned out, they wanted to let me have it back when we moved into the place because I loved my recliner and would now have space for it.

Now they’ve moved out and we’ve moved in.

Interestingly enough, Pete and Jess left the recliner for us and when the cleaning people came into the place to “un-Pete and Jess” the place, they saw the recliner and thought, “hey! Free chair!”

We got there and didn’t see the recliner anywhere so the rental office made the cleaning people bring it back.

Now, the recliner’s sittin’ there thinking, “what the? YOU again? I thought I got rid of you the last time! Awwww, man! You gotta be kiddin me! That CAT’S back? Great! That’s all I need. A cat that wigs out over it’s own shadow, jumpin’ off me and leaving its stupid hair all over my arms. Nice.”

Don’t worry, though. The recliner didn’t have too long to complain. We bought a new futon to put in the basement next to it. It’s one of those micro-suede ones with nice, firm cushions. It’s all sleek and cool-lookin.

Recliner: “How YOU doin’?”

Futon: “Um. Hi. It’s frickin’ cold down here, ya know that?”

Recliner: “Tell me about it. Not to worry, though. Sooner or later, they’ll drape a blanket over those fine shoulders of yours. Wanna see something impressive? Check these over-stuffed arms out.”

Futon: “Ew!! Is your stuffing falling out?”

Recliner: “Er… no. That’s cat hair. Hey… I’m a rocker! You wanna rock this place, baby?”

Futon: “What’s that squeaking noise? Is that comeing from you? How OLD are you, anyway?”

Recliner: “Maturity comes with age, honey. There’s a red fur blanket in that box over there that I bet would look just stunning on you!”

Futon: “Ooh! I look great in red!”

Recliner: “I bet you do! You and I make quite an item, ya know?”

Futon: “Sure. My grey micro-suede, your aqua courdoroy with blue speckles, covered it cat hair and pop-corn crumbs… we could really hit it off… not. …Your arm is touching me. The courdoroy is leaving lines in my suede. Back off, or I’ll come down so hard on that lever of yours, you will never recline again.”

Ok… so it’s not a match made in heaven, but I look forward to some good nappin’ ahead.

I still remember the phone call. I’d just gotten home from a grueling day at the factory, putting toys in cereal boxes. I was tired, dirty and smelled like Cheerios.

There had been several phone messages waiting for me from his uncle.
I called back and heard the unforgettable news from a quivering voice on the other end: “Your college roommate, Stephen Brown was killed by a drunk driver in a car accident.”

My best friend was dead. Stolen.

Stephen was driving home from a church picnic with his little sister in the passenger seat and three friends in the back seat. They came upon a four-way stop, waited to cross, and proceeded forward.

A drunk driver behind the wheel of a pickup truck T-boned them from the left side. His death was instantaneous.

A moment later, Stephen’s sister, the sole survivor, woke up with him slumped over in her lap.

I remember the funeral… it was so surreal. It looked like a cheap facsimile of him in the box; a stranger.

I carried him out of the church into the hearse and our processional floated to the grave site. We buried him with his favorite hats… one of them I had given him. I was just going through the motions. Nothing was real. I didn’t feel anything.

It wasn’t real until I got back to campus that fall. My first day back, I walked around the college, went to all our favorite spots, played pool and walked by the lake… alone.

I went back to my room and wept, looking forward to when I’d see him again.

I’ve thought about him nearly every single day since that night… perhaps afraid that if I don’t pay him my daily homage I’ll be dishonoring his memory somehow.

He and I used to joke around all the time about what we’d do if the other one died:

“If you die, can I have your CD’s and your stereo?”

…and after you’ve lost your roommate, jokes like that just aren’t funny anymore… and it’s not true that if your roommate dies, you get a 4.0.

The only thing I got was a bunch of memories and landmarks that reminded me of him daily.

Over the years, it’s gotten easier. I can barely remember his face.

The last shadow I can remember is the sound of his laughter.

I never check my messages at work. Mostly, this is due to the fact that my phone rings about once every 2 months. If people at work want to get a hold of me, they usually email or IM me. Because of this, messages can sit in my voice mail box for weeks before I’ll ever notice them. A buddy of mine at work likes to tease me about how my voice mail light is always on. Today I happened to notice it and thought, “oh, a message. I don’t remember the last time I had one of those. Maybe this is a new one.”

Since I rarely check my messages, I had to re-learn how to use the system. Eventually, I waded through the detestable audio menus and heard my message:

“you have…. one…. new… message….. recorded on…. February… second…..”

I laughed and hung up.

1.) Car

Natalie and I have been down to one car for the past 18 months. At first, that arrangement was fine. She’d get up early in the morning and take me to work, run her errands during the day and come pick me up afterwards.

Recently, however, with all the new changes in our lives, that has been more and more cumbersome. Her business has been taking off, which means she’s been more busy in the evenings. We both belong to a gym now, which means we both want to go, but with one car, it means we have to try to coordinate our schedules to get there at a convenient time. On top of that, we both belong to seperate business networking groups now that meet at 7am on different mornings. Overall, it means that one vehicle between the two of us has become, to say the least, tedius and inconvenient.

The reason I’ve waited so long to buy another car is because I’ve been so mad about how I lost the old one. I had a Saturn that we’d financed when we were first married. I had about 6 months left to pay on it and we had the cash on hand, so we decided to go ahead and pay it off, removing the extra monthly payment from our radar.

5 days after I sent the check in, the engine “threw a rod.” In Paul-land, that means very little, but to people who know cars, upon hearing that, they look at their feet, shake their heads and moan. Apparently, a part popped, penetrated the engine block and essentially, in terms I can understand, the car was broken.

They told me it would take $4500 to repair, and that was with a used engine that had over 100,000 miles on it. The car’s value was right around $2000, now having about 180,000 miles on it.

So I’d JUST paid it off and less than a week later, it dies.

You can understand why I’ve been upset and unwilling to put myself in another car right away.

As it turns out, we decided last week that we’d had enough of this goofy one-car business, so Thursday I went to the dealerships and found a Volkswagon Jetta. It had under 100,000 miles and was under $10,000… my requirements were met.

When I saw it, I knew I wanted it. I made the sales guy drive in it with me. I figured, if I was going to give this guy my money, I wanted to know him and know that he was going to take good care of me and give me a square deal.

He turned out to be a really great guy, but I think I scared him crapless by my driving. The car is a 5-speed manual. When you step on the gas, it GOES. It’ll spin the tires on any gearshift, if you want it to…. and I wasn’t prepared for that kind of power when I sat in it.

The first thing I did when I started it up was stall it out in the parking lot transitioning into first gear.

The roads were wet and I haven’t driven a stick in almost 10 years. He took me out to the exit ramp for the highway during the test drive. I saw a car coming, but it was a pretty safe distance, so I decided to go. Had I been in our Camry, there would have been no problem. I’m used to how that car handles. But the Jetta handles quite differently. It’s tight… and as my father says, when you step on the gas, the engine gets mad.

Those tires squealed and yelled and the car went nowhere as an oncoming car approached on wet roads. The tires weren’t the only thing squealing and yelling.

We cleared the traffic and made it to the onramp and the salesman turned to me with eyes, wide as dinner-plates.

He smiled a nervous smile and said, “you-you’re doing fine.”

Well, his professional manner and charm was well-spent. I bought the car.

It’s white, has tons of poewr under the hood and purs when you drive it. I like. It gets an alleged 33 mpg, but that still remains to be seen. Tinted windows, keyless entry, alarm, power everything… the only thing it doesn’t have is a sunroof. I even bought the additional 2-year bumper to bumper warranty. It was a little pricey, but they sold me on it by saying, “if you don’t use it in 2 years, you get a full refund.” Done.

Now I’m having buyer’s remorse. For another $2000, I could have gotten the 2006 Toyota Yaris that I’ve been drooling over for the past two months. It would be brand new, get 44 mpg and would have come with a 10 year warranty. Granted, they’re not in stock ANYWHERE and I’d probably have to wait a minimum of 6-8 weeks before it would be delivered. On top of that, the Yaris doesn’t even come with a sunroof option. Boo.

Ok, so maybe in a few years I’ll trade in the Jetta and get the Yaris I’ve been wanting… in the meantime, I’ll drive this little bad boy around.

2.) Laptop

You get what you pay for. Natalie and I have been developing a philosophy of, “pay the extra money up front and buy the right thing the first time.”

I bought a Toshiba laptop 4 years ago. It was on sale at Circuit City and I had just spilled milk all over my old laptop. The problem with the Toshiba was that it was had an Intel Celeron processor. For those of you who don’t know what that means, it means that somebody put a cubic zrcon where the diamond was supposed to go.

A Celeron processor is mostly fine for people who need a computer to surf the web and compose email… but for someone like me who does animation, graphics and video production, a Celeron processor just doesn’t cut it. I got what I paid for.

This time around, I decided to “buy the right thing” the second time. I ordered a Dell with a dual-processor, a Truebright wide-screen and cranked up the memory and hard drive on it. I even bought the little leather top for it so it would have a nice black leather top on a silver and white chassis.

When I walk through the room with this laptop, the other computers in the room bow in respect.

3.) VCR

Who buys VCR’s anymore? Apparently, I do. When it comes to electronics (computers excluded), the “pay the extra money and buy the right thing” policy has different rules and regulations. I buy “bang for the buck” electronics which means that I often buy off-brand. The reason for this is because electronics evolve so quickly. Why buy a state of the art Sony for twice the price of the cheap model? Some people will say, “because Sony will last longer.”

In most cases, that’s true. But for me, I don’t WANT it to last longer. I want it to break in 3-5 years so I can buy another one with more features.

How many 1.2 mega-pixel cameras do we still have out there because they haven’t broken yet?

You don’t buy electronics to last, you buy ‘em to serve a temporary purpose. You want them to last for about 2-3 generations and then break so you can buy a new one.

Our VCR wigged out on us about 8 months ago. It still would play VHS tapes, but it played them back in black and white. I haven’t really had any urgency to buy a new VCR except that next week, Natalie is hosting a ladies’ Bible study and the course material is all on VHS.

So this weekend, I was out at the electronics stores looking for VCR’s. It’s actually pretty hard to find one. I decided that if I was going to buy a VCR, I was going to get one with an attached DVD recorder so I could roll off a bunch of those old tapes to DVD… that way, when this new DVD/VCR breaks, I’ll have all my media already moved over to DVD and won’t care.

Good thinking.

…until I hit a snag The first video I put in has what’s called Macrovision encoding on the tape. That means that it’s designed so that you can’t make illegal copies of it.

I imagine that many of the tapes I want to copy have this protection on them as well, but I’ve managed to roll off a couple so far that I really wanted to save.

The other cool thing about this new toy is that I’ll be able to capture off stuff that we’ve recorded from our DVR. I highly doubt I’ll ever do it, since we’ve had the DVR for 3 years and have never really wanted to watch anything twice but having the ability to do it does give me some archiving options. It might be nice to have a few DVD’s packed with 8 hours of Star Trek or Twighlight Zone episodes.

4.) Duplex

We’re moving! Our youth pastor and his family had a great place in Spring Lake. They’ve recently been called to move out to Colorado. We’re going to be moving into the place they’re vacating.

We live in a really great apartment right now, but with 4 people, it can get a little tight. Granted, it’s the largest apartment I’ve ever seen, but it’s still a little tight.

Our current place is a new construction 3 bedroom, 2 full bath flat with 1100 sq ft and raised 20 ft ceilings.

We love it. It’s less than a mile from the highway and about 3 blocks from the mall and all the good resturants in town.

The new place, if you can even believe it, is even better. It’s still relatively new construction, 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath, 2 floors, attached garage, front and back patios with living room and family room, plus storage room. It’s about 2000+ sq ft and is right near the beach. I’ll finally have a place to bike and rollerblade and we’re about a mile from the highway. It’ll had about 5 miles to my commute to work, but I think that overall, it’ll be worth it.
–
So what’s it all mean? 8 hours of Twighlight Zone on my new laptop in the new car, sitting in our attached garage. The possibilities are endless.

Saturday, we planned on going to see Over the Hedge (which was great) but decided to first go over to my firend’s house so Matthew could jump around on the trampoline.

Matthew and I jumped around and played trampoline tag and rodeo (where he rides on my back as I jump around on all fours and thoroughly wear myself out). Generally, games like that are followed by one of Matthew’s favorite phrases: “let’s do that again!”

Eventually, we stopped wearing me out and went inside. I had been wearing my RX Oakley sunglasses outside and had my regular inside glasses in my jacket pocket in a protective glasses bag.

Unfortunately, the bag isn’t quite enough to protect the glasses from an hour of jumping and tumbling on a trampoline.

As I pulled the peices of my Ray Ban glasses out of the “protective bag,” I thought to myself, “how am I going to watch the movie without glasses?”

I remembered that I still had my old pair of glasses back at home, so we stopped there to get them on our way to the theater. I planned on stopping at the Glasses Shop on the way in to work this morning, but discovered that the store wasn’t open until 9:30, which didn’t fit very well into my schedule… hence, I still haven’t had them fixed.
On top of that, I wore my RX sunglasses to drive in to work today, but Natalie needed the car, so once she dropped me off, she took off with it. So, all day today, I’ve had my RX sunglasses and my broken everyday glasses in my pocket… not a very good mix for working in a dark office with no windows.

Try getting someone to let you borrow their car to get your glasses fixed when you say, “hey, my glasses are broken and I”m blind today. Can I borrow your car to drive to the Glasses Shop and get them fixed?”

Designing blind is a difficult task. I suppose you can expect a few things from today’s product: 1.) the text on my designs is going to be huge 2.) the colors are going to be vibrant and bright 3.) the images i choose will all be close-ups 4.) the fonts will be all mis-matched.

Who knows? Maybe it’ll be great and I’ll break some ground in design that no one has explored… more likely, however is that I’ll get my glasses fixed and look back on my work from today, wishing I could just press the “unsuck” button.

Just cut me some slack if you see me walk into the ladies’ room and wander around, feeling the walls for a urinal.

It says to the client that they (you) envision their goals or their needs and I will help them acheive them. It also plays off my last name and reinforces my design and visual capabilities.
I registered my domain and secured some hosting space four years ago with the intent that I would eventually put up an online portfolio of my work. Unfortunately, when you’re busy building sites for everyone else, there isn’t any time to focus on your own work.
As the old joke goes: Who would you trust to cut your hair? The barber with the nice looking hair or the neighboring barber with a terrible haircut?

For four years, I’ve been the barber with the terrible haircut because generally, you don’t cut your own hair… or have time to build your own website.
My friend and old college roommate bugged me for months about it, asking when my new site was going to go live… it never did. The furthest I got was to design a logo… which I have always received very nice compliments over.
Two years ago, I got a phone call for a job interview, so I rushed an online portfolio together really quickly. It’s been an eye-sore these past two years and I’ve been embarrassed to point anyone to my address.

Until today.

My freelancing work has slowed down enough that I got a free weekend in. Normally, when I get some free time, the last thing I want to do is spend it working on the computer but last Thursday I woke up at 5:30am with a design in my head that I just couldn’t shake.

I waited all day and finally at 7pm, after all the dishes were washed, we sat down for a nice quiet evening to watch a movie. I opened my computer and decided to compose the thought that had come to me that morning.

The creative process flowed like water as I composed on my laptop.
Normally, I design on paper first, then pull it over, but I’d been mulling over it all day and there was no need for preliminary sketches.

Now, nearly one full week later and four years overdue yuEnvision has been launched.

It launched this morning at 1am.

It’s still in it’s beta stage and there’s a lot of work that needs to be done, but I’m a proud daddy…

…I’m going to bed now.

www.yuenvision.com

We used it as idea starters when we were conceptualizing the Gospelcon Trailers last year.

It’s a collection of 738 things that suck on a day to day basis; one of which is probably, “when you try to write a book with 740 things that suck and you get stuck at 738.”

I have fifteen more to add to their list that have recently happened to me:

1. Being sick on a highly-anticipated date
2. Your close friend at church moves away
3. Still being sick on the last day that your friend is going to be at church
4. A chocolate chip melts under your butt
5. Your spoon mysteriously disappears into your huge bowl of soup between the kitchen and your desk
6. Going to take a drink from a can of Coke and discovering that half of the can is full of ants that are now desperately crawling out of your mouth
7. Buying a $6 bar of gourmet dark chocolate only to find that you’ve forgotten it in the car over the winter and now it’s all grey and hard
8. Being pleasantly surprised that the digital video recorder captured a classic episode of Battlestar Galactica in a two-part series only to find out that it didn’t capture the second episode
9. Getting to the gym and finding that the cat knocked a cat-toy into the toe of your gym-shoe
10. Going to a business networking meeting and discovering that you’re fresh out of business cards
11. Finding a coffee shop punch card in your wallet that’s completely full of punches from a coffee shop that just closed
12. Buying upgrades for your hobby toys and having to send them back because they don’t fit
13. Talking on the phone when your mobile phone rings
14. Trying to come up with a list of fifteen items and only coming up with fourteen

I’m not makin’ this stuff up… and yeah, I’m a whiner.

I took Natalie out with some friends for a night on the town in Grand Rapids. We started the evening with dinner at The 1913 Room at the Grand Plaza Hotel.

Talk about classy! We had two waiters, two waiter-assistants and a butler. Frankly, I’m just not used to that kind of service. It’s been a while since Natalie and I were at a restaurant of that caliber.

Saturday was also prom night. Anyone else feel like prom is getting out of hand? I went to high school… we did the whole formal thing. There were limos and tuxedos involved, but that place was packed with prom kids. Fortunately we couldn’t hear them. …but what is with extra-stretch Hummers and taking their dates out for a $250 dinner? When I was in high-school, washing dad’s car, buying a flower for my girl and taking her out to Olive Garden was top-of-the-line. Times are a-changin’.

Anyway, Natalie got the Beef au Poivre and I got the New York Sirloin. Natalie and I have pretty much written off sirloin steak from any restaurant because it usually just comes out a pretty crappy steak… but I figured at the 1913 room, anything on the menu was a safe bet. I’m sure it was delicious, but I caught a nasty cold earlier in the week and by Saturday, I could barely breathe. Food just doesn’t taste the same when you are sans-sense of smell.

They brought us our choice of several different kinds of bread and water, along with a champagne-topped sorbet to cleanse the pallette between the starter and main course. We followed it up with dessert, where I got some more champagne-sorbet (the alchohol from the first helping cleared my sinuses and made me feel better so I went for some more) and Natalie ordered… some chocolate cone thingy with a Frenchy name. I think it was filled with chocolate. I dunno. It looked like one of those kids’ clown sundaes you used to get that had the ice cream cone as a hat, only it had melted and now all you had left was the hat, some saucey cold stuff at the bottom with some chocolate things floating in it. Natalie said it was delicious.

Following our extra-ordinary meal and experience, we headed outside into the rain for phase 2 of our date-night. I’d arranged with my friend to reserve a horse and carriage ride through downtown Grand Rapids at night so we could see the lights.

What a beautiful time! We rode the clip-clop and snuggled with our dates under the big furry blanket, under the covered carriage as we listened to the rain fall softly. We could hear the trot of the horse, along with an occasional whinney, and the subtle creaking of the carriage over the city sounds and drizzling rain. We crossed over some stone bridges and passed fountains and rivers, saw the lights of the city and the traffic and enjoyed the magical moment and the cool breeze.

Both prom and anti-prom members looked and pointed in awe as we trotted by. Limos and extra-stretch hummers impatiently followed our 4 mph carriage on the main roads… but we didn’t care. We just liked watching the girls in their dresses, turn to their dates and ask, “why didn’t we do a carriage-ride like THEM?”

One thing to note: taking an hour-long ride in a bouncy carriage with a full bladder is a poor combination.

Here’s how to play: you sit down with a group of people at a table, about to eat. Everyone looks around the table with the common thought running through their minds: “who is going to pray?”

Generally, the person who really doesn’t want to pray starts the game by sticking their thumb up. Others who know how to play the game quickly follow suit. The object is to stick some poor sucker who wasn’t paying attention or doesn’t know how to play the game with praying before the meal. Basically, whoever the last person is who doesn’t have their thumb up has to pray. The group knows who that person is.
That’s the game in a nutshell. It has been a fun little tradition that we practice in the Yuen household ever since, frequently suckering poor, unsuspecting visitors in to praying before the meal… just my way of getting even for having been stuck to pray before meals over the years.

We introduced this game to my nephew, Matthew… and as seven-year-olds will do, he’s inventing his own rules:

The Do-Over: Sometimes, in life, we all need a “Do-Over.” Critical “Do-Over” events are typically just after a tragic event like a car accident, falling down the stairs, losing big in the stock market or maybe just after picking a chocolate with coconut in the middle. For Matthew, a critical “Do-Over” event in life is when he gets picked to pray as a result of poor reflexes in the Thumbs-up game. When he loses, he says, “let’s do it again!” Then, when he loses again, he says, “one more time!” This goes on until someone puts him out of our misery and prays.

Come to the table prepared: No one ever said Matthew wasn’t a smart kid. He wakes up in the morning now with his thumbs up and doesn’t put them down until dinner-time, after someone else has prayed.

Start the game while Uncle Paul’s in the bathroom: He likes to start the thumbs-up game before everyone is at the table, sticking someone who hasn’t even gotten to their chair yet… usually me.

That being said, in order to keep things fair, I’ve come up with eight easy rules to keep the playing-field level:

Rule #1: Remember that prayer is a priviledge, not a punishment.
I think that initially the game was developed so that people who weren’t comfortable praying in a mixed group or in front of people had a way to excuse themselves from praying for the blessing of the food.Since no one in our household is uncomfortable praying, the game has simply evolved into a a competitive way to start meals.

We still recognize that prayer is a priviledge… especially for people with slow thumbs.

Rule #2: The game doesn’t start until everyone is seated or at least waiting to pray.
A Jump-Starter is someone who starts the game before everyone is ready. This includes those who come to the table with their thumbs already up. You know who you are. Nobody likes a Jump-Starter. By default, the Jump-Starter will have to pray.

Rule #3: The game doesn’t start until whoever cooked is ready.
This goes hand-in-hand with waiting until everyone’s ready. How fair is it to the cook, who’s slaved over the meal all day and is still serving food to everyone to get stuck because their hands are full of food and serving tools? C’mon!

Rule #4: In the case of a tie, a vote is cast.
Sometimes, with more experienced players, the results can be incredibly close. Without the ability to slo-mo a replay at the dinner-table, everyone at the table votes until a decision is made. The individuals involved in the tie have no voice in the vote.

Rule #5: The first to volunteer to pray renders the results void.
Regardless of who wins or loses at the Thumbs-up game, if someone at the table simply volunteers to pray, the game is void and that person prays.

Rule #6: The host or hostess reserves the right to assign someone to pray.
Regardless of the game’s results, if the host or hostess asks someone specific to pray, that person prays. Penalties for ignoring this rule are severe.This is especially true if you’ve just been asked to pray by the host or hostess. The person who is asked to pray and then sticks their thumb up to try to initiate a “Thumbs-up” game receives “The Scourge:” they still have to pray, get no food, have to wash dishes and serve dessert, followed by 39 lashes.

If it was good enough for the Romans, it’s good enough for me.

Rule #7: No contesting the group vote.
If, after the Thumbs-Up game is played, the loser has been picked by the group, that person cannot contest that they lost… even if they don’t know the rules of the game… everyone learns…

…everyone learns.

Rule #8: Your thumb must be clearly visible to everyone.
If the group decides that you are the loser and you pull your thumb out from under the table and say, “but I had it up the whole time,” don’t expect any sympathy. You’re going to end up praying.

Here are some tips to help you win at the “Thumbs-Up” game:

Pay attention! This is a “ya snooze, ya lose” game that preys on the unaware.

Practice! Practice! Practice! You want the motion of the thumb to be smooth as butter, especially if you’re the initiator of the game. The more discreet, the better. Those who are aware will pick up on your clue… remember, the object is to stick the one who is most unaware. Practice in front of a mirror!

Develop the speed of your thumb-flick. Speed and agility seperate the men from the boys in this game. When you can flip a man-hole cover as effortlessly as a quarter, you’re ready for the pro’s.Start slow. Try tying a full can of coke to your thumb and spinnnig it around, simply by flicking. Work your way up to soup cans, then car batteries. Keep at it! Eventually you’ll get there.

Don’t let yourself be intimidated by experienced players. Even the most experienced and aware players still have to pray at meals every once in a while… but they never forget Rule #1: it’s a priviledge.

Misdirection is a wise tactic. It’s just like cheating at cards: you want peoples’ attention anywhere but on your hands.Good techniques are asking, “what time is it?” and putting your thumb up while all eyes go to the clock. The same technique can be utilized by pointing at a dish on the table and saying, “boy, that looks good!”

Keeping these rules and tips in mind, you too can be a master at the “Thumbs-up” game.

I bought a new Gateway computer last year. It has about half the memory in it that I want/need, so I went online and found some memory for it on Ebay about a month ago.

I have four available slots, two of which are used up with 512 megs. I’d like to have a gig of memory, so I bought a gig stick on Ebay… hey, if a gig is good, then 1.5 gigs is better, right?

I got it home and tried to install it, only to discover that my computer requires that memory be installed in pairs… thes means that the one stick that I bought is no good by itself and I have to have another one like it.

I found that the same seller on Ebay was selling more of the same stuff, so I bought another one. Ok… so if 1.5 gigs of memory is better, 2.5 gigs of memory will be spectacular!

I got my other stick of memory only to find out that my computer is set only to allow Dual Channel memory, which means both sticks have to be exactly identical… same manufacturer, same model, same configuration… I had two gig sticks, but they weren’t by the same manufacturer, and they weren’t identical in any way.

So, I threw myself upon the mercy of the seller and asked him if I sent back my memory, would he send me back a matched pair of memory.

It’s against their policy, but he consented.

Yesterday, I got my matched pair of memory and anxiously looked forward to installing them to watch my computer become a super-hefty beast of a machine, able to leap tall buildings and conquer entire continents.

What I discovered instead was that my computer does require a matched pair of memory, but also there is one specific configuration of memory that it doesn’t support… guess what kind I got.

I thought maybe I’d try to switch it out with my computer at work, beefing up my work computer to 2 gigs and at least getting a gig of memory out of the deal for my home computer. My work computer is a Dell, and Dells seem to be able to do anything you ask them to. Turns out, my work computer takes PC4200 memory and my home computer takes PC3200 memory. They’re incompatible. You can’t fit a round peg in a square hole without a bigger hammer.

So, it looks like I’m either stuck with this memory and have to sell it on Ebay or find someone who can trade.

Frustrated over my predicament, I helped myself to some chocolate chip cookies that I brought from home…

…only to discover about an hour later that I dropped a chocolate chip on my lap which fell onto my chair and melted under my butt.

I hate today.

It started on Sunday when I got a phone call between church services from a frantic, frustrated sister telling me that she needed a ride to the second service because her green 1995 Grand Am wouldn’t start.

“Apparently, something seems to be wrong with the fuel pump… on top of a leaking radiator, leaking hoses, suspension problems, misalignment and several other miscellaneous and asundary problems.”

From there, it was all about trying to decide whether to get her old 95 Grand Am with a troublesome quad-thinger fixed or simply go find her a new car.

So what to do? She can either fix an eleven-year-old car that has multiple problems or get something that is likely to have fewer problems.

We decided to opt for the latter… so yesterday evening, we all went out car-shopping.

First, we went to the local Auto Imports dealer to see what they had. While there, I wanted to go check out the new Toyota Yaris Liftback that I’ve recently fallen in love with. It’s kinda like Toyota’s answer to the Mini Cooper; complete with MP3 player and socket for you to plug in your own audio sources. She gets 40-42 miles to the gallon and looks like just a plain-ol’ fun car.

My skepticism was mostly that it would have terrible visibility. That happened to me when I fell in love with the PT Cruiser six years ago. Turns out, the visibility is just right… and come November, I’m gonna try to snag myself one in black, full options, with a few little extras to boot.

The one they had in the showroom was the only one they had, so it was their display model. Incidentally, it was also sold. So while I was making a mess on someone else’s dashboard, drooling all over it, kicking someone else’s tires, slamming their doors and trunk, and generally envying some other person I don’t even know, my cell phone rang.

Apparently, the rest of my party was done looking at their used cars and were all stuffed in the car, calling for me to come out.

I wiped the drool from my mouth, slammed the driver-side door in envy one last time, got in my car and we proceeded to caravan around a few scary parts of town, looking for another auto dealership.

Finally, we found one that looked promising and we all piled out. The dealership was closed, but that’s ok. We weren’t really wanting a pushy checkered-suit salesperson to bug us too much during our preliminary search.

Ruth found a 98 Honda Civic, a 96 Infinity G20, and an 02 Nissan Sentry. They were all comparably priced within her range, so we wrote down their features, mileage and VIN numbers to do some more indepth comparison research for later at home.

While we were out there looking around, a salesman, who happened to be passing by, drove up and began talking to us.

…and talking and talking and talking to us.

About a half-hour later, as we pulled away, glad to have been helped, but even more glad to have escaped the ever-talking salesman, we compared notes and began processing the evening’s find.

We got back and immediately began looking up the three models of cars that we found, looking for information that would help us limit down to a single and best-choice.

We found that all three had stellar reliability ratings, were fairly priced at their age/mileage/feature ratios and all got about the same mile-per-gallon rating. Great. Now what?

I decided to look up the vehicle histories on Carfax, so we bought an account and began looking stuff up… that really helped to bring things into perspective. The Honda had been in 5 previous accidents, one of which was rated a “moderate” collision that impeded its functionality. The other two had been in minor dings or scrapes, but otherwise looked like healthy picks.

So this morning, we went to the car dealer to test drive our favorite picks and see if we could get the ball rolling on getting Ruth a car.

We got there around 9:30, but no one was there, even though the sign said they opened at 9:00… not a good sign since both Ruth and I took the morning off to get this done.

Fortunately, the guy we spoke with… er… listened to from the night before gave us a business card with phone numbers on it.

Unfortunately, one of the numbers seemed to be out of service.

Fortunately, the other one was in service.

Unfortunately, no one answered.

Fortunately, around 9:45, someone finally rolled into the lot to give us some help.

He pulled in, wearing a bathrobe, yawning and scratching himself and asked if anyone had helped us yet… this was just adding insult to injury to our already great day.

Ok, it wasn’t *quite* that bad with the bathrobe and everything, but in Paul-land, some things get exaggerated.

9:45 is not an exaggeration.

Moving on… we test drove the Nissan, followed by the Infiniti.

After a bit of deliberation, weighing pro’s and con’s, Ruth decided the Nissan was probably the best fit.

We had the guy draw up the paper-work, noted a couple of things we wanted them to take a look at on the Nissan and headed off to get some lunch, while we waited for everything to get approved and fixed.

After a satisfying lunch, we headed out to the parking lot, only to discover that keys had been locked in the car.

Fortunately, we owned a set of spare keys.

Unfortunately, the spares were left in a laptop bag.

Fortunately, we happened to bring the laptop bag with us that day.

Unfortunately, the laptop bag was locked in the car.

So, as we peered in through the windows, hands spread out on the glass, earnestly willing the keys to NOT BE IN THE INGITION, I called my roadside assist guys and had them come rescue us.

I was supposed to be to work by 1:30 that afternoon for a meeting, but since the keys had been locked in the car and the paper work was still not finished being prepared, that was not going to happen. Embarrassed, I called in to work to have them move the meeting time for me and we went on about our day of signing more papers seeing to it that repairs were made to our satisfaction and getting me to my rescheduled 2:30 meeting.

All that to say this: we now have a 1995 Grand Am tape deck for sale in front of our apartment, if anyone’s interested. Incidentally, a green 1995 Grand Am comes pre-attached… $1 or free.

Natalie and I put down the garden hose in the back yard, according to her drawings and began digging up the grass. My neighbor had a compost bin and graciously agreed to allow us to put the pulled-up grass in the bin.

Digging up grass with shovels is HARD WORK. I was sad to see some of the best parts of my lawn being dug up, but I knew in the end that it would be a really great end-result.

Friends and family members helped along the way until finally after about a week of labor, we had all of the grass pulled up that we needed to. The next steps were putting down the ground cover and hauling in the stone for the 3 patches of walkway areas that we had planned to create.

We found that stone is a magical thing. No matter how big the areas were that we needed to lay down stone, it always seemed to require exactly 10 bags of stone. 10 bags of stone is also a magical thing. 11 bags of stone will make a Saturn economy car’s rear bumper drag on the ground, but with 10, you’re golden.

About two weeks into the project, we had the stone in place, the borders dug and the restraining walls installed.

Having little experience in these kinds of projects, I wasn’t sure whether the next step would be to plant all of the bushes and flowers next or to put down the mulch. I decided to let fate decide. I’d schedule the tree service to come make mulch out of the tree in the front yard and send Natalie out with some money to the nursery to buy her plants at the same time. Whichever worked out first, we’d go with that.

Natalie bought all kinds of plants and flowers, two rose bushes and my personal favorite: a Japanese Maple tree.

Frequently, as Natalie and I would go on walks through our neighborhood, we always stopped and admired the homes that had Japanese Maple trees. They’re just classy lookin’ plants, in my opinion. We bought a beautiful red Japanese Maple and planted it.

Fortunately, we had a close friend who was a grower for local nurseries and flower shops. He knows quite a bit about planting and advised us to build a little stone wall around the base of the tree so that the mulch didn’t touch it. If the mulch touched the tree, it could disease it… a blunder that I was destined to make if I’d not had some sound advice from a professional.

As aforementioned, I scheduled the tree service as well. I called several services in the area and priced them all against one another until I found a reputable service that I felt would charge me a fair price. I scheduled an appointment and had the tree service guys come and cut down the ash tree in the front yard. That was an exciting day!

That tree had caused us nothing but trouble over the few years that we’d had the house. In the spring, it dropped piles of tiny yellow flowers about the size of Grape Nuts that totally covered the lawn and driveway. It was so thick that the front lawn would be be recovering from it throughout the entire summer.

Being a soft-wood tree, during the summer, it dropped hundreds of 3-4″ twigs every week.

Naturally, in the fall, we’d get leaves… but ash tree leaves aren’t the kind you can just rake. Ash tree leaves are shaped like footballs and are about the size of a quarter; small enough to slip through the rungs on a rake, but big enough to get trapped on your shoes when they’re wet as you walk in the house and get spread all over the place. Ash leaves also clog up your drainpipes quicker than most leaves.

Ever blow into a cup with flour or powdered sugar in it? No? Oh. A very similar phenomenon happens when you try to use a blower on ash tree leaves: you end up wearing most of it.

That said, I was sick of the tree and ready to see it come down.

The morning the tree service came was to me like the day Mr. Wilson saw the moving truck in Dennis the Meanace’ driveway. I stood outside, wringing my hands with a devilish smile on my face, anxiously awaiting good riddance to bad rubbish.

The tree service came on a weekday and I made arrangements to go into work late that day to oversee progress of the tree-cutting to make sure they picked the right tree, and to give them specific instructions to mulch it and leave the mulch on my driveway when they were done so we could immediately begin hauling the mulch to the back yard. Once they had their instructions and the cutting on the right tree began, I left for work, anxiously anticipating the big pile of mulch in the driveway so I could finish our project and enjoy our new back yard.
That evening, I raced home from work, ready to jump into my work-clothes and begin hauling wheel-barrows of mulch to the back. What I found on my driveway was not what I had expected.

Apparently, when I said, “mulch the tree and leave it on my driveway,” they heard, “leave the wood in his driveway.”

I had about 2 tons of firewood, cut into 1-2 foot lengths. The only mulch that was there was from the tree stump that they’d ground up.

Immediately, I got them on the phone and explained the situation. The response I got was, “Ohhhhh! We were wondering why you wanted so much firewood! Your house doesn’t even look like it has a fireplace!”

I must say, however, they were quick to remedy the situation. The next evening, we had a full truck-load of mulch where the firewood had been. They brought two trucks to the house, loaded one empty one with firewood and unloaded one full of mulch. Once they knew what we were planning to do with the mulch, they were even kind enough to give us the right kind. Apparently pine mulch is very acidic and will kill off plants if you use it in a garden. They swept out all the pine mulch from their truck and loaded it with… some other kind.

…and so we had our mulch.

This concludes part 4.

Within the first year of owning the house, Natalie decided to take advantage of the blank canvas and spruce up the landscaping.

We first attended to the front yard: we dug up the ground in front of the house, put down the black ground-covering, shaped the terrain with a garden-hose, put in the border, planted a few bushes and flowers and mulched everything into place.

Having had very little experience in landscaping, we were both very proud of what we’d done. I even went so far as to go out and purchase some yard lights, bury the cable stake the lights and set it up on a timer.

We were sooo excited. Every evening when we’d come back, we’d see the house from afar, all lit up in the front garden. It was very inviting and made the house look beautiful.

A couple of years later, Natalie was drawing on some graph paper. I walked over and looked over her shoulder to see several organic looking shapes that she was sketching out with what looked like several bushes within the organic shapes. She was planning.

Now, when we first got married, I would flip out everytime she began doing that because I’d get all concerned about how much these little projects were going to end up costing. Over time, I came to understand that it was ok for my wife to dream and that when she was drawing out things on paper, it didn’t necessarily mean that she was really ready to do something about it.

As I looked at her drawing, I really began liking what I was seeing. She’d carved out a quarter of the back yard into a garden-spa, complete with stone walkways and a special little place for me to put my grill.

Over the next couple of days, her drawings became more and more sophisticated and she began adding color to them. She was dreaming big.

One Saturday, as she was in the kitchen sketching, I came downstairs dressed in grubbies and said, “honey, go get on some work-clothes. Let’s go to the store and pick up some yard equipment and materials and start building that backyard you’ve been planning.”

If you’ve never seen a woman’s eyes sparkle, tell her that her dreams are about to come true.

My plan was to spend some of the money that we’d been saving up to have a tree service come cut down the awful ash tree in our front yard and turn it into mulch for our backyard project. That would be like killing two birds with one stone. I’d be getting rid of a tree that was tearing up my front yard and dropping seeds/leaves all over the place while getting the mulch we needed for the back yard.

Natalie and I went to the store and purchased several rolls of ground cover, several rolls of border, picked the stone we would purchase, picked the plants that we’d put in when the project was into its final stages and planned out a schedule as to when each portion of the project would be completed so that we could schedule the tree service to come mulch the tree in the front yard.

We were off to a great start!

This concludes part 3.

At first, he just liked it because it’s Lego, but then he started playing it and has gotten really good over time.

This past Saturday, he was playing it and I was sitting on his bed, watching him, amazed at his proficiency. As he played, I told him how much it reminded me of game that was popular when I was in college: Warcraft.

My sophmore year, the guys in the dorms were all playing Warcraft. I didn’t really see what the attraction was at first, but one Saturday morning, I sat down at my computer and decided to try it out and see what all the fuss was about.

I downloaded a shareware trial copy of the game and installed it. Fifteen hours later, having had no food, no interaction with people, still in my pajamas, now with sores on my butt from sitting on a hard-wood chair all day, I decided that if I was going to graduate, I needed to uninstall this game and never play it again.

I told Matthew about my experience with it, mindful that it was nearing the afternoon and he was still in his pajamas.

The girls were busy that morning doing their Bible study together and we had planned to go to the mall afterward, so I needed him to shut down and get himself ready for the day.

As he was shutting down, he accidentally clicked on one of the little lego people who was busy at work at whatever menial task Matthew had assigned him. The little character squeaked, which reminded me of a feature in Warcraft: when you clicked on the idle soldiers, the programmers of the game thought it would be funny to make the soldiers respond to meaningless clicks, so they would say things like, *click* “Yes, master?” *click* “What do you want?” *click* “Why are you touching me?” *click* “Stop touching me!”

The more you clicked the soldiers, the more irate they became; a funny little feature.

Matthew thought it was funny too and giggled about it for quite a while… so much so that it was inhibiting him from getting ready to go to the mall, so I prodded him along and got him back on task.

An hour or so later, we were walking around in the mall. His mom had gone off to look at childrens’ shoes and Matthew was still giggling about the game feature… only now, to my horror, he was quoting the lines in a low, muted voice as he walked around with me in a public place:

“Stop touching me!”

“Why are you touching me?”

“Stop touching me!”

Awkward. Thanks, Warcraft. His mom and I put a stop to his quoting the lines and explained that people wouldn’t understand what he was quoting.

I’ve heard that violent video games can have adverse affects on people and families… but who knew humorous features could potentially get you in so much trouble?

Since the last time I posted, my sister got divorced and she and Matthew have moved in with us. You might think that would make for a pretty difficult time, but truthfully, Ruth and I get along fabulously and she and Natalie are terrific friends. There seems to be enough room for everyone, so we don’t tend to get too stir-crazy.

We have Matthew through a good portion of the week and every-other weekend, so it works out well. He is a constant joy and blessing in our home.

I’ve started playing drums at our church, at which Natalie and I recently became members. I even bought a little electric trap set so I could practice with headphones in the apartment or hook up to our surround-sound. They sound pretty good, have enough equipment to lay down some pretty good rhythms and are compact enough to quickly and easily store when not in use.

I haven’t had a lot of time to play them until recently, however. My schedule has been pretty booked for the past three months with freelance work.

I also purchased some online hosting space and have been hosting the websites for my clients as an additional little side-practice. That seems to be going pretty well… makes it easy to set up and host my own blog.

Originally, I named the blog “Ramblings of a Lazy Guy” so that if I ever got away from blogging for a while, people would naturally think, “well, he’s lazy” and cut me some slack. I thought it was a stroke of genius… the problem is, the reason I haven’t been blogging is actually the exact opposite: I’ve been too blasted busy!

For those of you who have stayed with me through the long stretch, thank you. I’ll be resuming my blogging and you can look forward to some more adventures shortly about me and my yard.

For those just joining us… it’s gonna be a wild ride!

The next thing on my list of yard chores that day was the trimming.

Previously that week, I had gone online and researched string-trimmers. I found that one of the best electric string trimmers was a fairly inexpensive model that I could get at my local Kmart. This unit had a rotating head that could swivel and perform both trimming and edging tasks.

It also had a nice wide 18″ cutting path. As most string trimmers go, it had the standard “bump ‘n feed” feature, as well as an auto-length trimmer, which was simply a small blade fastened onto the safety guard at 9″ from the base of the string. This blade would ensure that the string wouldn’t go beyond the safety guard and pose a potential threat to unsuspecting/unprotected ankles and shins; a neat little feature. The “string” is not actually string at all, but a spool of thin plastic polymer-based compound that is supposed to be stronger and more durable than string.

After the mishap and frustration in the back yard, I decided it would be better to just mow the front yard, sans-aeratoin shoes. I took the shoes off, threw them back in the shed where they landed with a satisfying “thump,” and took a quick break to get a glass of lemonade and calm down my temper. It was a hot afternoon and heat doesn’t help one’s composure.

After mowing the front yard and putting the mower away, I pulled out my new shiney string trimmer, along with my new 100′ extension cord.

I plugged in the cord and powered up the trimmer, checking first to make sure there was enough string to do the job adequately.

There was that moment of anticipation; the excitement of trying a new power tool for the first time… I pulled the trigger and the motor did nothing.

A bright yellow question mark popped up over my head as I inspected the trimmer, the cord and the outlet. Apparently, in the commotion of managing the cord, it had inadvertantly unplugged itself from the outlet.

I popped the cord back in, pulled the trigger and the motor whirred to life. It was a nice, high-pitch whine, similar to a high-performance speed-bike. I felt the glorious vibration in my hands as the tool shook with power. An involuntary grin crossed my face as I walked over to the side of the house where the grass was long and out of reach from the mower. As I lowered the trimmer to the long grass, the string-trimmer went to work and easily chopped the bothersome fringe grass to bits.

The aeration shoes had been a disaster, but this experience more than made up for that pathetic disappointment!

Then, suddenly, the trimmer’s motor-whine went high and the vibration stopped. The grass stopped being chopped to bits and the grin on my face disappeared as another glowing question mark appeared over my head.

Upon unplugging the trimmer and turning it over, I discovered that the problem was nothing more than the string having broken. I plugged the trimmer back in, pulled the trigger and bumped the bottom of the trimmer on the ground to feed out more string. …that’s what the instructions said to do, anyway.

Those of you with string trimmers know that this “bump ‘n feed” feature works with mixed results. Sometimes the string feeds, and sometimes it’s wound up around the spool so tightly that it won’t allow itself to feed properly.

I unplugged the device, pulled off the spool, refed the string through the hole, (a task much like trying to thread a needle) and I was back in business.

A few moments later, the string broke AGAIN. Again, bumping the trimmer on the ground would not initiate a feed. Unplug; pull off the spool; loosen the string; thread the feed; reattach.

2 or 3 feet down the line, the string broke again.

This process repeated itself 4 or 5 times across the back stretch of the house, a distance of only maybe 30-40 feet. I had only been trimming along the perimeter of the house and hadn’t even gotten to the chain-link fences yet.

When I DID get to the fences, the breakage happened more frequently and within shorter distances. By the 6th or 7th time, my patience was exhausted. I was holding the trimmer up over my head, ready to bring it smashing down on the pavement. The adult in me spoke up and said, “you’re an adult. You can handle this. Take it easy. Maybe you’re not pulling enough string out. Try one more time, but this time be sure to pull out plenty of string and see if it works any better for you.”

What I believed to be the adult in me turned out to be that little devil that pops up on your shoulder and tries to convince you to do foolish things that will result in horrible consequences.

I pulled out a good amount of string (roughly 12 inches or more), took a deep breath and pulled the trigger, full throttle.

Remember the little auto-length feature I’d mentioned? This feature makes sure that if I take out too much string, it’ll cut the string to a safe length. The problem with this feature is that it actually flings whatever peice of excess string that gets cut off direclty at the user.

Since I’d listened to the little voice tell me to pull extra string out, I now had a thin, 4 inch-long peice of polymer-based durable compound hurling at my left shin at roughly 550 feet per second.

Think of it sorta like being snapped at point-blank range with a rubber band that’s been pulled back about 3 feet. That ever happen to you? …say, in Jr. High during study hall, third seat from the left and three rows back?

No?

…Oh.

…Uh… yeah, me neither, I was just askin’. Hypothetically, it would be enough to make you cry.

…or give you a 4-inch blood-blister on your left shin.

If the neighbors who had been out watching me since the aeration shoe-incident had fallen asleep, they were quickly woken-up by my howling as they nudged one another and asked, “ooh, what’d I miss?”

Needless to say, the tall grass by the house in the backyard was the only portion of the house that was trimmed that day. The front and sides would just have to wait until my morse-coded-dotted-and-slashed shins had time to heal.

This concludes part 2.

…however, the stories of my yard are quite good and worthy of mentioning in my ramblings.

So I give you, “Me and my Yard.”

My neighbors must have really enjoyed their time living next to me when we had our house in Toledo. I was a source of constant entertainment as I tried to come up with new and inventive ways to groom my yard using both conventional and “innovative” techniques of increasing efficiency (being lazy) and lowering costs.

As many of you may know, when you buy a house for the first time, there’s an emotional progression. At first, you feel as though “you’ve arrived” and you’re so proud of the investment in the home in which you and your spouse are so sure that you’ll grow old together. There’s that whole satisfying feeling of coming “home” after a long day’s work and settling in to YOUR couch in YOUR living room for the first time.

There’s also the yard.

You dream of having BBQ’s and imagining all the children in your life playing in the lawn; running around as the adults beam at you in your apron, grilling their steaks proudly at your shiney gas grill, professional grilling tools in hand and a freshly-squeezed lemonade on the side-table on a beautiful sunny day.

I had such a house with such a yard.

My neighbor was an older gentleman with a perfect yard. His yard had nicely squared edges and every blade of grass was neatly trimmed within 1/32″ of one another. To the naked eye, it looked perfectly flat, like a green, plush carpet. There were no bare spots, uneven terrain, or variations in grass-type.

His yard and the two next to his were the same: meticulously manicured, watered, and perfect.

Then there was my yard.

Mine had a tree in the front yard that had roots that were sticking out of the ground, making the ground uneven and difficult to traverse with a lawn-mower. Moles also made my yard difficult terrain. I had chickweed, dandilions, broadleaf of every kind, and multiple variations of grass-type when I bought the house.

In the back yard, someone had evidently tried to extend the driveway into the back yard, but didn’t bother framing the cement; they just poured it, saw that it wasn’t working out well, didn’t pour ENOUGH cement, and then gave up and started parking their leaky cars there anyway.

The first thing I did when we bought the house was spend a fortune on rakes, shovels, hand-tools, a self-propelled 6 horse-power mower with a mulcher, rear-bagger and a 21″ wide cutting path. This was a sweet machine.

I also bought various chemicals, lawn-treatment mixes and the tools with which to spread them.

Naturally, a tough lawn like mine would also require aeration, so I purchased a pair of strap-on aeration shoes– the kind that look like sandals that strap on over your shoes and have long metal spikes on the bottom.

In addition to those, I purchased an electric trimmer with self-feeding/cutting line and a rotating head that could do both trimming and edging.

Surely, with all of these state-of-the-art tools, I was well on my way to making my house look up to par with my neighbors’ and feeling mighty proud when our friends came over for that imagined cookout (once we recovered from the expenses of the yard tools and could afford a grill).

Now, first, a note about aeration: Aerating your lawn is the process of putting holes in the ground, allowing the nitrogen in the air to penetrate deeper into the soil, allowing the roots to get more water and air to grow healthily. Using the aeration shoes requires nothing more than the simple process of strapping on the shoes and walking around your lawn, feeling like a moron as you walk circles around your yard for no apparent reason.

When I used the aeration shoes, I prefer to try to “kill two birds with one stone.” The first time I used them, I took my spreader out there and applied fertilizer, mixed with a pesticide agent. That seemed to work well, but the aeration shoes need to be used freqently because they aren’t as effective in a one-time-application as the type of aeration device that the professional companies use that drills holes in the ground and pulls out plugs.

One particular afternoon, as I was preparing to mow the lawn, I had a thought:

“I’m going to be mowing, which requires walking around the yard in circles. Why not mow and aerate at the same time? If this works out, I could aerate EVERY time I mow, enriching the soil and increasing grass-seed germination.”

So, I strapped on the aeration shoes, waddled over to the shed, gassed-up the mower, checked the oil and began my two-in-one adventure. I wouldn’t be surprised if I was even trying to conjure up a song in my tiny brain about “a-mowin’ and a-aeratin’.”

The plan worked for the first couple of strips that I mowed, until the left aeration shoe started to come loose. Apprently, I’d not tied the strap down tightly enough. Easy enough to fix! I stopped the mower, bent over and tied the shoe on, this time with a bit more force than before, just to make sure that everything was secure. Then I continued on my adventure of “mowin’ and aeratin’.”

Two more passes later, the right shoe began to loosen. A deep sigh, a chuckle, and a few moments later, I was bent over, mower stopped, securing the right shoe. Surely now there would be no further interruptions.

Two passes later, the left shoe became loose again. In frustration, I stopped the mower, bent over and TIED the straps to my feet in square knots, ignoring the buckles and their apparent engineering flaws.

Two passes later, the identical situation took place with the right shoe.

Another two passes. The left shoe actually embed itself into the ground as I walked out of it because it was so loose. This time, I tied it SO TIGHTLY that I swear my toes were turning purple. To save time, I tied BOTH shoes down in this manner, just in case the right shoe had any thoughts of getting away from me.

By now, the neighbors were probably sitting outside in their lawn chairs, sipping sweet tea and enjoying another exciting episode of “Lawn Adventures with Paul,” calling up their friends to invite them over to witness the festivities.

I was almost done mowing the back yard when the right shoe slipped off, but it failed to come all the way off. One strap clung loosely to my sneaker as the spiked sandal dragged uselessly along the ground, causing my right leg to slow. Self-propelled mowers don’t bother to wait for you in a situation like this, which means that my mower was now beginning to get away from me as my right leg dangled behind with me, hopping on my left leg. Unfortunately, hopping with 3″ spikes on the bottom of your foot doesn’t allow for much actual “hopping” action. Instead, it buries the spikes in the ground, as your body hops up and down on the shoe, driving the spikes in deeper.

At last, I nailed myself to the ground and the mower got far enough away from me that my hand could no longer hold down the lever and the emergency release switch shut itself off, the mower now a foot out of reach.

With one leg firmly planted, the other flailing with a spiked shoe dangling off of it, and my “support walker” now out of reach, I was not going to be able to maintain my vertical position.

I went down, facing forward, and landed on my palms. When I managed to get back up, seeds and fertlizer granuals were stuck to my palms. I looked down to see that my whole body was covered with little tiny granuals of seed, pesticide, and fertilizer.

The right shoe was still dangling helplessly from my foot.

In sheer rage, I shrieked, “FINE! GET OFF MY FOOT!” and utilized some of my karate skills to perform a very forceful (and impressive) front-roundhouse kick to fling the shoe from my foot.

One thing you have to know about roundhouse kicks. …their sweep patterns are….round. Things that are attached by a strap tend to mimic and follow through with a round sweeping pattern.

The spiked shoe, still hanging on by a strap, followed through with the kick’s smooth motion and flipped the shoe up and around, deadly spikes now facing toward me. They embedded themselves in my shin and once again, more out of surprise than lack of balance, I fell down.

The event left in its wake a pattern of small red holes in three neat rows on my right shin and a very frustrated little Paul, stamping around in his back yard.

…the years following, I hired the aeration of my lawn out to the guys with the plug-drilling tools.

This concludes part 1. Continue to part 2.

Saturday evening we showed up at the restaurant; the first ones there. I hate being the first ones to show up at an event. Ever since we moved from Toledo, I’ve been working on trying to be on time to things. So, naturally, I managed to get us to the event on time. What I forgot is that there is a definite strategic advantage to arriving fashionably late to an event like this.

If you arrive too early, you have to pick a spot to sit, which inevitably means you’ll end up sitting by yourself. If you arrive too late, the others will have picked their seats and there won’t be room, which means you’ll once again be sitting by yourself. The key is to arrive about 10-15 minutes late; just enough time for a few people to arrive, find a place, giving you options and providing you with the optimal seat: near people you want to be by and far away enough from less-desirable seats like traffic-heavy areas or end spots that make it difficult to engage in conversation. The other (and more preferable) option is to walk in with a group.

Over time, Natalie has also been made aware of this strategy and we make a good team, trying to strategize for the best seats. Of course, I forgot about the strategy and we showed up “on time.”

There were a few there already; mostly the ones who had arranged the event.

Not wanting to make it too obvious that I was trying to strategically place us, I introduced Natalie to a few people and instructed her not to pick a seat. I placed a few of my things down at a “tentative seat” and shuffled off to the restroom to wash up and buy time so we could choose a seat later.

Caleb and Erin, very close friends of ours, were also coming to the reunion. We hoped to be able to sit with them, but I didn’t want to make them feel like they HAD to. Caleb and I weren’t friends when we were in high school but have come to be very close in recent years. I knew he had a lot of people with whom he would probably want to catch up.

As it turned out, when they arrived, we all snagged a square 4-person table and sat together in the middle of the room, which made it easy to lean in any direction to talk to anyone we wanted to. Mission accomplished.

As we sat down, I was relieved to know that Caleb and Erin chose to sit with us and that we could enjoy the dinner with close friends. A voice asked in my sub-conscience, “didn’t you know they would?”

High school was, as it is for many, a very awkward time for me. I was insecure and lacked a lot of social skills.

I attended public school until the 9th grade and started attending Emmanuel in 10th grade. It was my own choice.

As a freshman in public school, I saw that many of my friends’ life-choices were beginning to go in directions that I didn’t want to be a part of. My family had just begun attending Emmanuel Baptist Church and I was an active member in the church’s youth group. I noticed that the kids in youth group who were students at the school all seemed to be close with one another and very accepting of me. Another thing I noticed was that the guys and girls were friends with each other. That just wasn’t something I saw much of in public school. Most of the time, guys and girls who were together were making out in the hallways between classes. As I considered my future with my public-school friends, I considered the possibilities of being with a group of people who were Christ-centered. The wise choice seemed clear.

I asked my parents to enroll me in Emmanuel Baptist school my sophomore year.

Fall of 1992, I started at Emmanuel Baptist as a new student in a class of 29 people. I was excited about the prospect of starting from a clean slate with a fresh, blank reputation. However, from there, things became quite different from the expectations I’d had, based off of my observations from youth group.

I had no history with these people like they’d had with one another. They had 9 years of relationships and experience with one another that I didn’t share. This made me an outsider. School was much different from youth group and there were far more variables.

Quickly, I found myself being pushed to the outside and wondering how to connect. My lack of social skills and perception didn’t help. I found myself hanging around some of the “fringe” people in my class the first year.

Later, I felt that to be an unwise choice in comrades, since their behavior and speech didn’t seem to be much better than the people I’d left in public school and I found myself falling back into old habits.

Trying to connect back with the others in my class was nearly impossible by this time because I’d already associated myself with the fringe group.

By the end of my sophomore year, I’d written everyone in my class off as either a snob or an idiot… I didn’t keep this opinion a secret.

I was depressed and lonely. My music and art reflected my melancholy emotion: songs in minor key, dark pictures of angry faces and tormented bodies…

I was not content with my condition, so I created my own group of friends at Emmanuel across other classes and fostered relationships with them over the next couple of years; people who enjoyed doing things that were safe, enjoyed life, enjoyed one another and were open to accepting anyone who needed a friend.

I found these people in the corners of the rooms, wishing they could jump into a conversation or had the skills to communicate. I found them sitting by themselves at lunch. I found them at basketball games, alone on the bleachers.

Those were the people without a voice who were experiencing what I had felt like in my own class. I gave them a voice and a place to belong and by the end of my senior year, we had a group of 15-20 people in our tightly-knit group.

We were not fringe anymore. We were becoming a majority… and I was at the center, training the younger ones to be leaders so they could keep the group alive after I graduated. I tried to teach them to seek hurting and lonely people and how to make them feel welcome and loved.

As for the people in my own class, I hated all of them. Being with them was…. strangely uncomfortable.

Ten years changes a person.

I still have a heart for the lonely but I wondered why God put me in a position like he did at Emmanuel.

Natalie had the answer that question: it was to prepare me for ministry with teens. Because of my experience, I can see the signs and recognize the behavior of people who are lonely and hurting. Better yet, my wife says I know how to integrate them into the group, cultivate them into leaders, seek God’s heart and find purpose.

When I got my invitation to go to my ten-year class reunion, I was excited.

I had to stop and wonder what was to be excited about… with the recent exception of Caleb, I didn’t like anyone in my class. Why would I be so excited to go back and see everyone?

Why do most people go to high-school reunions? They want to see who got fatter; see who was married and with how many kids; see who was doing well, etc… but mostly to brag. Mostly, people go to a reunion to brag about how well they’re doing.

That wasn’t why I was excited. True, God has blessed me in my career and in my life, but that’s not what it was about for me.

For me, I wanted to go back to 1.) show everyone that I wasn’t the same cynical person who hated them for not accepting me and 2.) be excited about what God was doing in their lives and how they were growing in their spiritual walk. I wanted to forgive them, love them, and celebrate their successes.

So there we were, Caleb, Erin, Natalie, and me, all sitting at a table together in the center of the room. On one side the rowdy, loud single people sat, causing a lot of commotion. On the other, the people with families sat, quietly eating their meals, enjoying one another.

It was interesting to see what had changed and what had not.

Upon talking with everyone, it was clear that they had all accomplished the goals that they’d set out for themselves in high school.

I applaud them for doing well and doing what they’d all set out to do. One was a musician with a pressed CD being manufactured, another had a successful career in computers and had done well in the military, another in finance, another in graphic design, another was a doctor in residency, another was a manager at a shed-building company, another was a contractor in construction. Several of the girls were stay-at-home moms, living a comfortable life with men who apparently loved them and took very good care of them.

I also found that my experience of the reunion was bringing up several repressed emotions. Essentially, that meal represented much of what had happened during my high school career: I was in the middle, huddled tightly with my closest friends, and everything else was just noise around me.

I also felt the all-too-familiar, strange, uncomfortable feeling settling in.

As our food was delivered, table by table, it struck me that for a bunch of Christians sitting in a room, it was odd that no one had taken the lead in praying for the food. It then dawned on me that the strange uncomfortable feeling I’d always had with my class was the lack of the bond of Christ among us that I’d always come to expect. There is supposed to be a familiar bond among Christians; something that we all have in common; something we all value; a gift that we all share and treasure. In my class of 29, we don’t have that bond.

In fact, much of the language and behavior that I was observing was embarrassing. Frequently, I hoped that no one knew that we were from “Emmanuel Baptist.” I was hoping that no one knew that we wore the banner of Christ. I didn’t want the reputation of Christ destroyed or the School’s name publicly humiliated. I hoped that no one would say, “do all graduates from Emmanuel behave like that?”

The pinnacle of the embarrassment arrived as I heard, “AMY! How the F—K are you???” … followed by laughter and more swearing.

…and instantly, I was ashamed of my class.

I hoped to celebrate our common bond and our maturity in Christ. I hoped to see how far everyone had come in their walk. I hoped to see men and women of God from the “snobs and idiots” I’d perceived in my earlier youth. If God had the grace to change my heart, I felt confident that He’d changed theirs… but it was evident that they’d turned their hearts from Him.

At the end of the night, after all of the “fun,” the chatter, the catching up, the drinking, the smoking, the swearing, and the dirty jokes, I was disappointed. For the most part, the majority of my class was indistinguishable from the rest of the world. It was evident that some had continued their walk with their Savior and made life-choices that had eternal significance… But it broke my heart to see that the majority had left their First Love.

My only consolation is knowing that their First Love has not left them.

Morgan and I concepted it. He’s the one in the driver’s seat in the video.

View it here.

I’m going to be really sad when the conference is over and I have to stop making trailers.

Virginia and I planned on having them come to visit us back in February.

Friday night, around 9pm, I get a call.

“I think I just passed the place I was supopsed to get off… but the exit number didn’t match up.”

Turns out she had most likely misread one of the signs and was still coming the right way. About another hour later, she called again.

“Ok, I’m on the road that runs in front of your apartments, where do I turn?”

So, I go outside with a flashlight to guide them in. As I open the door, a little wet frog jumps in, bouncing off my leg. Did you know it’s hard to continue a conversation with a wet, cold, slimey frog jumping around at your ankles?

“Uhhh… you wanna… yuck…. uhhh…. turn at the….. uhhhh….ummm…..uhhhhh… at the……uhhh…..”

As bad as I am with directions, that’s pretty much what it would sound like anyway, even without the frog.

She managed to find the place and Lucia, now eight years old and looking much bigger to me than the last time I saw her, climbed out of their SUV and said, “I think I’m ready to go to bed.”

No kidding. After five or six hours of riding in the back seat, I would be too…. sleepy and having to pee like a race horse. (What does that phrase really mean, anyway?)

After about an hour of catching up, we all went to bed and looked forward to a day of fun in the sun. We were all smiles… all but one of us: Lenny, our cat. He was hiding under our bed because a child had entered our home.

Saturday came and fun we had. Natalie packed some super-yummy sandwiches and fresh mixed fruit consisting of grapes, apples, pineapple and watermelon.

It was an incredible day: warm with a slight breeze, bright and oh-so sunny!

We stopped at the local Toys R Us for some sand toys and headed off to the beach with our cooler, filled with wonderful eats.

Once there, we found a spot, parked ourselves and watched Lucia as she skipped around in the water. I’ve found that kids lack the ability to sense temperature when water is involved. 65-degree water is not something that I am willing to subject myself to, but Lucia jumped in and swam around like it was a relaxing hot-tub. Her actions were compelling, so I kicked off my sandals and stepped in.

Upon stepping into the water, my body, which was sufficiently toasty and warm, was immediately shocked into the reality that this water was not fit for human enjoyment. It was evident by a number of things:

My already-skinny body became even skinnier; my back arched; and my toes, which are normally all facing forward, shot out like a starfish as if they were trying to evacuate the foot, controlled by a mind that was obviously not fit to be in control.

I stiffly walked back to our beach towels and sat down as the warm sun beat down on my body, returning my feet, now with opposable thumbs, back to normal.

A few moments later, we broke out the food and enjoyed the lunch that Natalie had packed. I had gone back to the vending area to purchase some bottles of lemonade for everyone. Generally, a bottle of lemonade runs around 75 cents… maybe even a dollar. At the beach, they know you’re going to be thirsty and charge you accordingly. I paid $6 for four bottles of lemonade that day.

$6 for four little drinks sounds a bit steep, but in light of things, $6 for four people and a day in the sun isn’t all that bad.

After eating, we grabbed our sand-toys and ran to the water ledge to begin our sand-castle masterpeice.

Minutes into it, it was clear that I had no idea what I was doing. My laziness took over as I analyzed the situation. I saw the others digging up wet sand to build the castle. In my mind, Water + Sand = wet sand. However, Digging = work. There’s got to be an easier way.

Idea: I’ll fill the bucket with about a quarter of water from the beach, risking the cold water actually touching my body, and then just fill the top of the bucket with dry sand, which is easily skimmed off the surface of the beach. No digging necessary, but I still get wet sand. I’m a genius.

Well, as most of you know by now, whenever I say, “I’m a genius,” it means that somewhere, my plan fails miserably and once again I am taught a lesson in humility. Such was the case with my wet-sand effort.

I took my pail of mud and dumped it right in the middle of our sand castle in an attempt to create a huge center-column. The end-result resembled more of a…. well, “disaster” is probably the best word to describe it.

After much chastizing and glares from the others, including Lucia, I began digging and we ended up building a pretty respectable sand-castle.

As soon as we were done, we adults went back to the comfort of our warm beach towels and let Lucia continue to play in the sand/water.

People would walk by and see our impressive-looking monument and then look at Lucia, eyebrows raised.

It was pretty entertaining.

What was not entertaining was realizing at the end of the day that I, being of Chinese descent and having never sun-burned in my life, probably SHOULD have worn sun-tan lotion like everyone else.

Normally, when I’m out in the sun too long, my skin turns a little pink, then the pink becomes a nice brown tan, and everyone envies me and my genes.

In this case, my pink became red, then my red became painful and I envied everyone else’s forethought for having put sun-tan lotion on.

Eventually, the weekend came to a close, and Virginia and Lucia were packed and ready to go home. Predictably (and understandably), Lucia was sulky about having to leave after having such a good time playing games, enjoying the beach and Natalie’s famous cooking all weekend.

To add insult to injury, Lucia’s stuffed rabbit, Limey, went missing. We all spent an additional 15 or 20 minutes to go through the house and find him, but alas, Limey was nowhere to be found.

We hugged and promised to send Limey when/if we found him and watched as Lucia and Virginia pulled away. Everyone had such a good time. I believe, if you had seen us all, you’d be able to see in our sad expressions that we’d all had a wonderful time together. Four frowny sad faces….

…and one happy smile. Lenny’s…. as he watched through the window as the company drove away. His weekend was finally about to begin.

Here’s a quick summary:

1.) Booted computer up on original install.
2.) Tried to install new video card – video card was AGP… motherboard only has PCI and PCIE slots
3.) Installed old Hard Drive into existing IDE ribbon to migrate data files from old computer – computer didn’t boot
4.) Bought new video card, installed card into open slot, removed old Hard Drive – computer didn’t boot
5.) Swapped video card and modem – computer didn’t boot
6.) Removed modem – computer didn’t boot
7.) Removed new video card (back to original configuration) – computer booted fine
8.) loaded software, updates and settings… didn’t know how I was going to migrate data
9.) Tried video card again – computer didn’t boot
10.) Put video card in modem’s slot – computer didn’t boot
11.) Took video card back out (back to original configuration) – computer didn’t boot
12.) Wiped drive and installed from Recover Disk with new video card in slot – computer BOOTED
13.) Gleefully installed video card drivers and updates
14.) Restarted computer several times to ensure that things were working properly
15.) Decided to install GoBack so I could mark this position in the installation process and come back to it – after installing GoBack, computer wouldn’t boot
16.) Disabled GoBack – computer booted, but Explorer crashed every time I tried to enter Control Panel
17.) Couldn’t uninstall GoBack… Installed Recovery Disk… clean wipe – Explorer still crashed when I tried to enter Control Panel
18.) Another clean wipe and Recovery – Explorer still crashed when entering Control Panel
19.) Complete HD long format
20.) Installed Windows XP from official XP disc
21.) Network/Sound drivers were not installed
22.) Installed second NetGear PCI Network card

Finally things are starting to look like they’re going to work properly. The only way I could think to effectively migrate the data was to plug in a cross-over cable from my old computer to my new one and copy the data directly to the new computer via network. I still have several hardware items in my system profile that are “unknown,” but they don’t appear to be breaking anything, I have the sound working and all the other components that I want to work appear to be working fine… I’m not going to bother with them. It always bugs me a little bit to have unkown hardware components loaded, but not enough this time to fool around with it and jeapardize the whole process again. There were a couple of other clean-wipes and OS installs in there, but I forgot when in the process they happened. In all, I installed XP 9 times over the weekend. I used up all of my license uses on a couple of my software packages which means in order to install them, I’ll probably have to call the software companies and wait on the phone to let them grace my installation activation and free up my license so I can install the software.

Another source of irritation is that my Gateway box doesn’t seem to have a valid Serial Number on it anywhere… this makes it extremely difficult to get adequate Gateway support. With a serial number, they can pinpoint my machine, create a profile, and give me all the drivers I need to get my machine working properly. Without it, I’m pretty much on my own.

In my first Silicon Blues post, I mentioned the whole dilemna of what to do with obsolete technology. Gateway has a trade-in/recycle program where you can get cash for your old stuff. Turns out, my old Pentium III 800 with 512 megs of RAM, DVD ROM and CDRW are worth $18. Whee.

Oh yeah. I got the Silicon Blues.

With as quickly as technology turns over, and me being in a technology field, my computer is well-overdue for a replacement.

I decided to find something that was really going to do the job, so I searched around online. Originally, I was going to get us a Dell. Quality parts; good customer service; the ones I’ve used in the past just last and last and last.

But I wound up with a Gateway. The computer I have now is a Gateway and while I’ve had to replace a couple of things on it that have gone bad, it’s been a really good computer over the past few years.

Here’s what I got:

Gateway 420GR Intel Pentium 4 2.93GHz / 512MB DDR / 160GB SATA HDD / DVD±RW Dual-Layer / CD-ROM / Flash Media Reader / 10/100Mbps LAN / Windows XP Home

To many of you, the above is nothing but a bunch of techno-geek-speak. Others of you are reading the above, nodding respectfully with satisfied frowns on your faces while thinking to yourself, “not bad. I wonder if he’ll install Linux on it in place of XP Home?”

I won’t.

For the rest of you who read the above and have no idea what any of it means, here’s a breakdown:
I bought a Gateway [pretty fast] / [half the memory I want, but still decent] / [enough storage space for games, movies and lots of music... also enough space for projects] / [a box with a drawer that will write DVD's] / [a sad little box with a drawer that will only read and play CD's but will probably be replaced] / [a number of little slots for downloading pictures from my digital camera] / [a hole where I'll plug in a cable to let me surf the Internet] / [a pathetic program we've all come to hate]

Essentially, it was lacking two things that I really wanted in my computer: capabilities for dual monitor support and a gig or more of RAM. All the other specs met what I was looking for at a price just over $400. Sweet.

So, I went ahead and purchased a seperate video card (128 meg GeForce with dual VGA) and will probably upgrade the RAM later.

Buying a new computer is somewhat like buying a car. Everyone is pretty much on the same playing field. No matter how much you know about what you’re buying, there’s plenty that you still don’t know and a lot of potential for it to go wrong… that’s where warranties come in. It’s also why a lot of guys build their own from scratch.

I considered building mine, but I think I’ve had my fill of building computers. I used to build them when I was in college to earn money for books, food, and ‘going out’ money. Personally, I’m bored of it. If I can get one that’s already set up, configured, will work well and comes with the necessary software to re-install the OS and drivers without me having to do very much, I’m happy with it.

Computers are big, expensive toys. They play games, music, movies, view pictures, allow you to connect to other computers and other people. Getting a new computer is typically a pretty exciting thing… but not to me.

I’m looking at the prospect of opening the computer, turning it on to make sure it works, turning it off, unplugging everything, installing the new video card, downloading the new drivers, installing the drivers, checking everything out to make sure it all works and THEN I can begin the process of installing all my software packages (Office, Photosohp, Flash, Premier, audio and video conversion tools, codecs, capture software, mp3 device companions, media rippers, coding editors, Firefox, all the extensions for all the programs, the updates, and all the little programs like WinAmp, GAIM, ActiveSync, etc.), migrating over the data from the old computer and the tedious process of getting all the settings the way I like ‘em for each program.

Yuck.

I’d love it if I could just copy everything from my old hard drive to the new one while I slept and it was done in the morning… no such luck.

Configuring a computer is sorta like trying to jog someone’s memory who is suffering from amnesia.

“Remember how I like my explorers to look? No? Remember how I like it to give me all the details, support double-click, show me the status, show all the files, and remember every folder’s settings seperately? No? *sigh*”

What we really need is a computer for lazy people.

What would that look like? I need a computer that I can buy that will have all the specs I want, need little or no installation and will autoamatically pull over all my settings, programs and data from my old system. It wouldn’t hurt if it did all my work for me too.

The computer for the lazy guy would be more like a pet. You bring home a new one and the old one gets jealous and starts trying to bug you for affection. Then, the new one sees what the old one is doing, mimics it, and tries to do all the same things to get you to love it more. They fight and the smartest/fastest/strongest one wins.

Instead, I’ll be stuck with an amnesia-stricken machine, requiring hours of attention to train into submission.

Why do they keep advancing technology? How many of us are REALLY all that excited about the newest and biggest? C’mon. Think about it. Every time you get get a new phone, you have to reprogram all the numbers into it (unless you get one of the ones that syncs all the data off your computer… and then you have to install the software, buy the right cable because it didn’t come with the one you needed, get more memory for the device so it’ll store all your records, figure out how to synchronize the data using a quick-start guide written in broken Engrish and then do it all again because a game you installed locks up the system and requires you to wipe the memory back to factory-issued standard… yes I’ve had those).

If you buy a new VCR, you have to figure out how to set the clock/channels or wait 48 hours for it to set itself.

A new tv? Have fun programming the remote to work with all your existing devices. There always seem to be 40 codes I have to program into the remote for my brand equipment, none of which work.

New DVD player? Where are you going to plug it in? All your A/V slots are taken up in your current configuration. Looks like you’ll have to go out and buy an A/V router switch to manage all your devices… then, several months later you’ll find it’s really inconvenient to have to get up off the couch to switch between DVD and DVR (another device that takes a good 4+ hours to get set up and learn). To solve that problem, you’ll have to go buy yet another router with intelligent switching capabilities that will auto-detect which device you want to use.

In the old days, people bought a tv, brought it in their home, plugged it in, and Jr. had to hold the rabbit ears while the family enjoyed Dick Van Dyke. No muss/no fuss.

It’s a vicious cycle.

We purchase these electronics, researching the best ones, reading the reviews to see which ones are ultimately the most robust/feature-rich/reliable… then, three or four years later, we’re wishing the one we bought would break, giving us the excuse to go buy the newest, sleekest model.

Many people think, “I’ll find out what’s the best, then back it off a notch or two and get something that’s middle-of-the-road.”

How many digital cameras have you been through? How much was the first one you bought and how many mega-pixels was it? I bet it was more expensive than the second one that had twice the resolution or more.

What do we do with the old ones? You certainly can’t get your money back out of ‘em. Some of ‘em get handed down to siblings or children while others simply get put in a box. Most people have a hard time just throwing them away because either they cost so much to begin with or there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the old one, it’s just not as good as the new one. It’s hard to justify pitching a perfectly good 35mm zoom camera with red-eye reduction just because you bought a 5 MegaPixel Digital one for this summer’s vacation.

I can’t tell you how many obsolete CD players, cameras, cell phones, routers, computer parts, computer speakers, keyboards and answering machines I have. We dumped a bunch of it in the last move, but it always feels like such a waste. For every one obsolete device, there’s always two or three cables and power adaptors to go with it. That makes for a pretty unsightly mess.

I wonder if Hollywood would be willing to buy ‘em for props?

They oughtta come up some kind of deal where each item you drop off, working or not, you get few bucks off the next movie you go see.

“I got a new cell phone that has a PDA and GPS receiver built into it. It even plays MP3′s. I turned in 4 or 5 of my old devices that it replaced and it got my wife and me in to see Batman Bewildered for free on opening night.”

Maybe at Christmas, they could put a bin out next to the Toys for Tots: “Electronics for Elderly.”

I dunno.

Fear says, “I am in control and won’t be able to handle it.”
Faith says, “God is in control and will take care of it.”

My cat, Lenny, is like a kid:

Always begging for a goodie
Behaving badly in front of company
Always wanting the attention
Self-centered about his toys

He even likes to be held like a baby.

Cats are just funny little creatures. Our cat is an inside cat. He’s only been outside one time in the 2 years we’ve owned him. He is the best inside cat I could ask for. He’s cuddly, comes when you call him, more loyal than most cats, enjoys spending time with us and doesn’t do a lot of the territorial or destructive stuff that male cats are known to do. We haven’t had many problems with hairballs with him, either. I think he hairballs maybe once every 3 or 4 months.

He does make a mess of our couches with his hair, but that’s why we have a Dyson.

A friend of mine, Max, just blogged about a his cat and the little treat his cat left for him. Apparently, his cat went out, killed a mouse, brought it back in, and left it on Max’s pillow. Anyway, it woke Max up pretty quick when he discovered it… probably something like the horror of finding a dead horse’ head in your bed… only on a much smaller scale.

So, this morning, I wake up to his whining, which is not an uncommon thing. Generally, he sits on the floor by our bed and either waits for me to get up, or cuddles up with me and falls asleep. This ritual happens anytime between 5:30-7:30 am.

This morning was different. He wasn’t in our room at all… and he wouldn’t come when I called him. Once my alarm went off, I got out of bed, went in the living room, and found him whining on the couch. It was really odd behavior for him, so I went over to pick him up and see what was the matter.

At first, he was just cuddly and loving, as always, but then I started to detect an odor… it smelled like a dirty diaper.

I thought, “oh no! Are you sick? Did you get into something bad? Why do you smell like this? Did you leave a poo somewhere?”

It would be very unusual for me to find a poo somewhere in our home, other than the cat box. Lenny has NEVER done his business anywhere but in his box.

So, I start talking to him, and he just keeps on lovin’ on me… and then I see it:

A huge 4-inch turd is stuck to his butt, hanging on by a hair. Upon more investigation, I notice there’s a mess of litter all over the utility room.

Apparently, he’d tried to do his business in the box, but his poo got stuck to him and was following him around, probably dangling and banging him in the butt as he walked around. Cursed by the lack of opposable thumbs, he was unable to do anything about it.

I like to entertain the notion that he must have known about it, been embarrassed and was trying to hide it from me. Further evidence of this is that once I found it and took care of it, he wouldn’t look at me for a little while.

Needless to say, since we don’t know when this happened or where he’s been since, we’ll be washing everything.

I’m just thankful that I didn’t have an experience like Max and find him in one of his other normal morning positions: sleeping on my pillow, just above my head, with a huge poo stuck to his butt.

I took Friday off and Natalie and I traveled to Bluffton, Ohio to attend my buddy, Nathan’s, wedding.

We left Thursday night and stayed at Ruth’s place for the night. It was hot-hot-hot.

When we got there, it didn’t seem so bad, but when we tried to go to sleep, it was really hot. We had a couple of fans blowing down on us, but it was still really hot.

To get to sleep, I got a wash-rag wet and did a rub-down so I would be wet enough to let the fans cool me down.

Natalie, who had been eyeing a gilded book in Ruth’s collection, Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer, opened it and began reading aloud.

Artemis Fowl is a fantasy story about a wealthy 12-year old boy with a special-ops-type body guard/butler who figures out a way to separate Fairies from their gold.

It’s a great story that mixes Fantasy with Military-type Action. The main struggle is between Artemis and the Leprechauns, which turn out to actually turn out to be the Lower Element Police (LEP) Recon unit.

It’s hysterical. Imagine a SWAT team, using advanced weaponry that mixes high-end technology with magic and you’ve got the LEP Recons.

Immediately, we were both sucked into the story. When she was done with the first chapter or so, we turned out the lights and I was asleep before my head hit the pillow.

Natalie, was still uncomfortably hot and didn’t sleep well all night.

Friday morning, when we woke, Natalie had moved to the living room to try to cool down and I was still in the TV room with the covers on. Apparently, somehow I’d gotten cold in the middle of the night.

We let Ruth go to work and we decided it would be fun to take a few more moments with Matthew and take him to daycare.

From there, we began our long 5-hour drive to Bluffton, Ohio.

We borrowed Ruth’s Artemis Fowl book and Natalie began reading aloud again as we rode.

Three hours into the story, around lunchtime, we hit Toledo and met up with my mom at Panerra Bread. We stayed a little longer than we’d expected, but it was nice to see Mom and enjoy some uninterrupted time with her.

After lunch, we hit the road again and Natalie continued to read. My mind was completely enveloped within the story… enough so, that I missed my exit for Bluffton, an hour or so later.

When we got to the hotel, my friend, Nathan, was waiting there to meet us and spend his afternoon with us.

We checked-in, settled our things and headed off to the mall to get my tux and shop around for a while before the rehearsal.

We did the rehearsal, where it was good to see the guys from the bachelor party again and went to the rehearsal dinner afterwards. The dinner was at a nice little resturant in the middle of downtown Findlay… apparently without air conditioning. Again, it was hot-hot-hot.

After the dinner, Nathan dropped us off at the hotel and Natalie and I immediately jumped into our suits and headed for the pool and hot-tub to finish the evening.

The next morning, we woke up around 9-ish and went down to have our breakfast. It was a standard complementary breakfast: toast, cold-cereal, muffins, bagels, fruit, etc.

I brought my laptop down to type out my best-man speech. Originally, I knew what I was going to say and was just going to wing it, but decided it would be better if I had something to look at, just in case I lost my nerve in front of 300 people.

We finished things up and left the hotel around 11, got to the church and waited around for people to show up so we could take pictures at noon-ish. Around 12:30, we finally started taking pictures and finished up around 3.

At 3:30, the guests started rolling in and we groomsmen took our positions by the door to escort them in.

The wedding and processional took about a half-hour or so and then there was the receiving line afterwards, while the bride and groom dismissed everyone, row by row.

So by now, it was about 4:30 or so, and I’d been on my flat feet for about 5 hours or more. My lower back was aching and my hands felt disgusting from shaking 300 guests’ sweaty hands.

I was exhausted, hot and my whole body ached… and I hadn’t even gotten to the speech part yet… I had a page and a half-worth of stuff typed up.

We watched the bride and groom drive off in the short bus (imagine a limo’s interior in a vehicle that looks like a physical/mental-handicap school bus… the irony wasn’t lost on any of us).

A few minutes later, they came back and we took MORE pictures, got hotter, and eventually piled into the short bus to go to the reception and meet the guests there.

The bus was air-conditioned and cool, but the sudden relief was almost more than anyone could take and we all got suddenly very sleepy.

This is supposed to be an exciting ride. There was Kareoke, lights, mood lighting, the works… it even had mirrors on the ceiling and walls. Cool bus… filled with a bunch of people all dressed up and about to fall asleep.

Eventually, we ended up at the reception, piled out, waited even longer for the DJ there to announce us so we could come in. We sat at the head table, dinged the glasses to make the new couple kiss, yadda yadda yadda.

Finally, it was time for the speech.

I’m tired, mildly warm and my head is spinning from lack of nourishment… you’ll notice I didn’t mention anything about food since breakfast… ah.

They hand the wireless mic to me, and the DJ announces, “and now, the best man, Paul Yuen, will give the toast.”

Toast? What toast? I was supposed to give a speech. Hm. No one said anything to me about a toast. Oh, well, maybe he meant “speech.”

So I begin my page and a half speech… as all the guests have their glasses held up.

I imagine they must all have a notion of what Moses (Noah?) felt like when he had to hold his staff up to keep the Red Sea waters parted… probably something like:

“Could this take any longer? How long am I supposed to be doing this? I wonder if anyone will notice if I start to lower my arm?”

…and loewr their arms they did. As I droned on about how I knew Nathan, what a super guy he is and how happy a marriage the two of them will enjoy as a result of building their lives on Christ, the glasses got lower and lower, until finally, I tihnk they were all back on the tables.

At the end of my “toast,” I was supposed to hand my mic to another groomsman so he could pray and we could all eat. I handed the mic over, and the other groomsmen are whispering to me, “toast… toast… toast!”

…to which I said quickly into the mic, “drink to that.”

There was dancing at the reception. I’ve never been to a wedding with dancing. Most of the weddings I’ve been to were Baptist, so there was little more than an evangelical puppet show for entertainment… but here, there was dancing.

At one point, later in the evening, they did some big band music, and Natalie and I, eager to finally have a real occasion to swing dance, rushed to the dance floor.

Turns out, no one else knew how to swing dance… and since we hadn’t done it in over a year, neither did we.

Did you know that swing music is about 8 minutes long? It’s longer if the DJ tacks two songs together. So, for about 15 minutes, we were the only two on the dance floor, bumping into each other, spinning the wrong way, and getting tangled up in our miscommunicated/misunderstood dance gestures.

Finally, I gestured to do a two-armed outside spin, did the gesture wrong, Natalie read it as a one-handed inside spin and we collided again… we were both laughing, and decided to quit while we were still standing.

The awkwardness would have been worse, if it hadn’t been 9:00, with most of the guests being gone… but by that time, only the people who didn’t care about image were left.

We had originally planned to stay in a hotel in Findlay, but decided to save the expense and try to make it home.

So, at 9:30, we began our 5-hour trip back to Muskegon, and we got in Sunday night at 2am. Natalie finished the Artemis Fowl book on our re-entry.

Good thing we did, too. Our little cat, Lenny, was crying because his bowl was empty. Apparently, I’d not left enough food out for him before we left.

He was bounding with joy when he saw us, after he’d had something to eat.

We fell into bed and enjoyed the next day resting, taking it easy and going to the bookstore to pick up a copy of the second Artemis Fowl book.

Let’s see… three weeks ago, I was getting slammed with side-work.

The day after I finished my project, I left for my buddy’s bachelor party, which, being the best-man, I had to plan. That went well. We did the dinner thing, embarrassed him in public, played some airsoft in the evening, rode jet-ski’s on the lake (Sand Lake), and threw a football around.

Being around men for a weekend reminds me how awkward it feels. I just don’t naturally go in for the bathroom jokes, the bare-butts, and all the noise and grunting.

I’m not good with a football and generally find it difficult to relate to those that are.

I planned, led the evening time of prayer, encouragement and edification of the bachelor, cooked breakfast for the boys, and cleaned up after their mess.

…but we had a great time. …and I got to shoot them with an MP5-A4, command a squad, use my night-vision, and managed to gain tactical advantage on a couple of trained guys who were an ex-marine and a state trooper a couple of times. Good challenge. These guys were good.

The day I got back from the party, Natalie’s parents showed up to stay for a week. Ruth and Matthew were also visiting for the weekend.

It was a full house and our time together was precious.

Mini-golf, games, eating out, lots of great food by Natalie’s hands, and plenty of laughter. It’s the best time I’ve spent with her parents.

Thursday night, we went to Grand Rapids to see the Petra exhibit. I decided to treat everyone to the exhibit and also decided I’d take in as much as I possibly could.

Well… that didn’t go as well as I’d hoped.

Here’s what I got:

Petra was a city….someplace. It was built out of rock. They etched the buildings into the side of the rock… most of which I think were tombs. The people rode camels cuz horses die in the desert…I guess. Their main industry was spice-trading… sorta like Han Solo, except they didn’t use space ships, they used camels. Each camel, loaded with spice, was worth, in todays currency, $4000. They caravanned the spice on 2500 camels. They dealt primarily with Frankenscence (an embalming spice for dead people), the same kind of stuff that was given to Christ as a baby. Somewhere along the course of history, there was an earthquake. The date was May 19th, some year. (I only know the date because it’s my birthday.) The rise of Christianity, along with the expansion of trade routes, brought Petra to an economic decline (Christianity influenced people to stop ancestor worship, which negated the need for the spice). When the earthquake hit on May 19th, some year, Petra was too poor to rebuild… and so their city fell into ruin. I think there were 3 major earthquakes on that day. There was also a fire that caused some big white pot to shatter. A bunch of people found the peices and put the pot back together so they could put it in a museum so I could walk by and look at it centuries later. The white pot is big and has panthers on either side. It’s neat. The end.

Basically, that’s what I got out of 3 hours of reading plaques, looking at big white pots, and watching their little movies on huge screens. I gotta say, it was $12 well-spent. I want to go again, but bring someone with more knowledge to paste together the missing peices in my mind, since I have very little frame of reference to hang any of this stuff on.

History/Social studies is really not my bag. I have a terrible memory for dates, names, events, and chronology of events. Ironically, I can, however, tell you that Moses and Noah look the same. I don’t know why.

Following the Petra exhibit, I took “the folks” out to BD Mongolian BBQ in Grand Rapids. Good times for all. I love how I can mix together anything I want and it ends up tasting fabulous. I swear those guys at the grill throwing away what I bring up to them and swapping it out for a chopped-up gourmet hamburger when I’m not looking… cuz man, it always tastes so good. Who woulda thought that Itallian sauce with Cajun powder, beet juice, raw egg, avacado, vinegar, and mustard powder, all sprinkled over squid bits, steak, and lamb liver would taste so dang good?

So this week, I’ve already picked up and finished another side job, and yesterday afternoon, our youth pastor asked me to work on a video with him for VBS.

I gotta say, I’m happy with how it turned out on a day’s notice:

Click here to view the VBS video

Tonight we have dinner with some people I don’t know and tomorrow I believe we’re going to be going to a co-worker’s for dinner.

This weekend is my buddy’s wedding, at which I will be the best man. I still have to figure out what I’m going to say at his reception.

The following weekend, we have friends coming to visit, after that, we’re visiting my parents in Toledo, and after that, more friends coming to visit.

Busy? Yes. Complaining? No.

Live life. Invest in people. Praise God.

The dark side is described as being, “quicker, easier, more seductive.”

With so many video games out there that allow you to choose which side best suits your personality, we were trying to decide which would be the best for us. In the Xbox game, “Knights of the Old Republic,” we tend to gravitate toward the light side, just because we’re softies at heart and can’t stomach the heartless actions that must be taken in order to pursue the dark side.

For example, in one scenario, an old man is being beaten by a bunch of street thugs. You intervene and have the following choice, “kill the attackers and help the old man by giving him some money to pay his debts,” or “kill the attackers and then slay the old man and take the buck-fitty he’s got on him.”

Some of you out there are like, “hey, a buck-fitty is a buck-fitty… that’s a King-size upgrade at BK.”

…but for me, I just can’t do it. Every time I sit down to play the game, I think to myself, “this time I’m really going to do it. I’m going to choose the dark side.” Fifteen minutes into the game, I’m almost to tears, overwhelmed with guilt, because I knocked a robot over and took all his parts.

…so for me, the dark side is NOT “quicker, easier, and more seductive.” Though, in truth, the light side isn’t really for me, either. That’s a whole lotta work.

“A Jedi has the most serious mind.”

…and as we all know, I’m a lazy guy. The following lines fit me a little better:

“…never your mind on where you were; what you were doing.”

So if, “quicker, easier, more seductive” and “serious mind” don’t really fit me, which would be best suited for a guy like me?

Introducing: the Dim side of the Force… designed for the lazy guy. “lazier, lamer, more mediocre.”

It’s a 3-hour self-study course, advertised by a carnival barker located somewhere between the Jedi Academy and the Sith Palace:

“Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! Become a Jedi slob in just 3 easy steps. Bad Credit? No Credit? Republic Credits? No problem! Looking for a way to make the Force fight all your battles for you? Join today!”

What if Yoda had attended that school instead? Imagine a short little green guy, sitting on a ledge, wearing sun-glasses and getting a tan while sipping a nice cool glass of blue milk, while 50 yards or so away, a short, green lightsaber, completely controlled by the Force, fights an onslaught of attackers.

“Kicking much butt, am I. Have done this a long time ago, I should. 850 years wasted, I did… Another drink, bring me.”

You gotta admit, that sounds pretty good.

The funny thing that happened was that evening as I was getting ready for the next day. As I was folding my clothes, a thought went through my head, “why should I bother putting together a new outfit? No one from work has seen me wearing THIS one… I should just wear this again tomorrow.”

That’s what I call, “The Smunday logic.” The thing is: that wasn’t the first time I’ve pulled that trick. In fact, that’s a pretty regular habit of mine, provided I don’t have any of my work buddies over to visit on a Sunday night.

I’ve recently found that I’m not the ONLY one who performs this little ruise. In fact, to my surprise, there are a good number of people I know who do that.

The funny thing is how I come to know which people pull that little game. The conversation goes something like this:

“I like that shirt.”
“This? Oh. Thanks.”
“Did you wear it recently?”
“Uh. n-no… wait, yes. Why? Do I have a smudge?”
“No.”
*puzzled look*
“I know the trick…. that’s your Smunday outfit.”

That’s one way the conversation goes. The other way is like this:

“I like that shirt.”
“This? Oh. Thanks.”
“Did you wear it recently?”
“No.”
“Oh.”
*puzzled look*
“Nothing.”

It’s a risky business, trying to determine the Smunday outfitters. A lot has to go on the line in the name of research.

Fortunately, I don’t apply the logic of the Smunday outfit to other areas in my life… say, for example, socks, undershirts, underpants, kleenex, toilet paper, motor oil, napkins, etc.

The Smunday logic is really a trait of a lazy guy… much like my blogging patterns.

Imagine me, someday as a father, applying Smunday logic to my kids:

“Hm… why should I change his diaper? He doesn’t seem to mind. The wife hasn’t seen that diaper on him yet, nor has anyone else. The box says, ‘up to 35 pounds.’ I bet he hasn’t even filled that thing up with 24 ounces yet. That one’s still got some life left in it.”

How about dishes?

“Why am I bothering to wash these? The wife’s out with the girls tonight… I ate dinner alone… these dishes didn’t get TOO dirty… it was just cold cereal. I bet I could wipe this out with my napkin, which also didn’t get much use. Ta da! Good as new! No washing, no drying, skip straight to the last step of putting away! I’m a genious!”

Laundry?

*Sniff* *Sniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiffffffffff*
“I don’t think this stinks too bad to wear again. Sure, I wore it Sunday night and Monday to work, but Thursday’s Thanksgiving, and Friday we’ll be at my folk’s house. I’m packin’ it.”

You see, some things in life are meant to be consumed only once.

Some are completely repulsed by the scenarios I’ve just described, while others are now noticing that people standing near them are looking at them, to which they look back blankly and ask, “what?”

You know who you are.

Yesterday, I got commissioned to do a job for GM. I got the necessary files last night at 8:30. Turn-around time 8am this morning. Full animation, heavy custom text effects, and a new music score. So let’s put it all out on the table: I love tight deadlines. I love creative freedom working from someone else’s design with just enough to spring-board me into some great ideas. The final product came out fantastic. I have to say animation and sound-wise, it’s probably one of my best peices. I finished up last night at 3:30am and dragged myself out of bed and into work today.

Fortunately, today’s not a very tough day. I’m doing some new mock-ups for this year’s upcoming conference website. No biggie. After that, it’ll be smooth sailing with some simple mind-numbing HTML stuff here at GCI. Ahhhhh.

but……

…as most freelance projects go, this one had a couple hiccups. My client is presenting proof-of-concept this afternoon and got some “great” ideas that he wanted me to implement quickly.

Ok, 1.) I don’t like touching freelance stuff at work. He knows that. 2.) I really hate when clients get half-baked ideas that aren’t well thought-out and want me to “quickly implement” them.

The guy’s team has to leave at 11 to present. His team’s idea wasn’t going to make or break the project and really wasn’t adding anything good to the overall layout. In fact, it was distracting. I hated it.

…but the customer’s always right. So I whipped it up in 10 minutes, shipped it off within deadline, and off he went to his meeting, dumb idea and all.

Eh… it’s a work in progress.

I have a different project due Friday that I haven’t started yet and on top of that, I just got an RFQ on something else.

The extra green is good… a while back, I figured I’d start raising my prices to let some of the bottom-feeders detatch and give me some more breathing room… but instead, I’ve just been getting busier.

*shrug* Praise God for the extra income. He always knows when we need/will be needing it.

…now if I can just get my clients to consistently pay me.