• It’s rare that I blog in the evening, much less that I assemble a list of bullet points in the evening, but I haven’t had a moment to slow down today.
• The economy may be slowing down, but business is heating up at work. We’ve had several really solid sales days. If we could keep that up — by getting the salesmen to actually be on the road selling things! — we’d be rolling in it. Part of our current success is several new contracts with Bombardier and Heroux Devtek. Our tooling is knocking them dead. Though not literally, I hope.
• Listening to Bloc Party’s Silent Alarm is an exercise in noticing they used to be fun and interesting to listen to but are no longer fun or interesting. Several big producers and big albums later and they’re just well-coordinated noise. Remember “Positive Tension”? Great song.
• Nathan was playing a Collective Soul song at work today. It reminded me of a more innocent time, when the Mix 99.9 played actual music, and I was dating Laura #1. Not a particularly great time in my life, but still, a more innocent time. I drove a blue Saturn! (Was it blue?) It had those seatbelts that automatically sealed you into your seat but annoyingly required the lap belt to be done up manually. In any case, the point of this point is: Collective Soul sucks. They always have, and they always will. They aren’t innovative. They’re bland. They aren’t interesting. They’re stale. If you like them, that’s fine; just don’t expect me to share your excitement.
• How I Met Your Mother is in the download queue! Yes!
• It strikes me that morality is, after all, innate. A priori. Arts and Letters is right on that count.
• Part of me wants the US government to bail out the banks. Another part of me wants the US government to nuke the banks from space. I’m torn.
• Cats can really smell up a place real quick. Especially younger cats.
• I’m reading “Dune” again right now. It’s a lot more interesting than I remember. But it’s still ruined by its surrounding novels, the prequels especially but also the sequels. Neither Herbert’s continuing vision or his son’s diving into its past have added anything to “Dune” but taken much away. It should be the only book in the canon.
• I got something like 4 hours of sleep last night. I rather hope some of my friends’ sleep problems aren’t catching or anything like that.
• People using the laptop on the toilet really freaks me out. What if, right now, you were talking to someone and you had no idea they were sitting on the can? That’s uncool!
• I’m making a main course for a thing our church does. It’s called “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” and it’s a basically a way for people to meet other people they might not know. It’s pretty much awesome, but I haven’t the foggiest clue what to make for it. Do you people have any good recipes I should make? Keep in mind I can do multiple dishes!

I figured I’d continue the art theme.

Someone paid me a little money for a sketch back in May at an event at the local comic shop, and it took me nearly 5 months to get to it. So I figured I should do it up right since they had to wait so long. It took a lot longer than I thought it would, it’s a complicated costume.

When I do these marker-rendered pieces the last step is applying white acrylic ink for highlights. Today I realized this is probably my favorite step because to me it’s the point where the drawing seems to pop to life.

I finished reading Richard Adams’ Watership Down last night and, when adding it to my reading list, found it rather difficult to describe. Figuring that few of you ever look at my reading list, (which is fine,) and knowing that my attempt amused me, I thought I’d post the description here, too.

This is a hard novel to describe, not because it’s nondescript, but because short descriptions would leave out so much. It’s a story about rabbits. Let’s try this on for size: if Tolkien were to have written a story the length of one of the LotR books, and set it in modern day, and narrowed the scope from “save the world” to “find a new place to live” and written it about rabbits instead of hobbits, you might get something like Watership Down. I enjoyed it.

Wow, it’s been a week since I’ve posted an update on The Coffee Experiment. I think it’s really time to stop calling it an experiment, and just call it a new normal part of my everyday life. I’ve consistently been setting the timer to have the coffee brewed for me in the morning, and it’s done a good job at keeping me going through the day. At the moment I’m still working through the bag of Starbucks dark roast that’s been in the freezer. I imagine it’ll take me another few weeks to get through it. After that, I’ll head down to Brewed Awakenings and decide what to try next.

Speaking of Brewed Awakenings, I hung out there for a while on Friday morning and tried a couple different drinks. First, Nate suggested a Don Correllejo, which is a double-shot espresso with Mexican chocolate added. Yummy. After that I had some of their daily light roast, which was also good, even drinking it black. I need a job where I can just spend mornings hanging out down at the coffeehouse. That would rock.

One funny thing I found out when visiting my folks this past weekend: it seems that my mother, a life-long coffee-disdainer, within a day or so of the start of my Coffee Experiment yet having not yet read about it on my blog, took up the coffee habit herself. Sounds like it’s so far, so good for her as well. I think everybody in our family now drinks the stuff.

So, wow. I’m now a coffee drinker. I feel so grown up.

Last night as I was grading exams, I came across this wonderful illustration:

Look at it. It’s me. I’m all there. The carefully unkempt hair, the sour pucker of disdain, the trapezoidal eyeglasses, and the eyes closed in contemplation of my life’s squandered possibilities. It was less like an essay explaining the effects of the Neolithic revolution and more like a mirror into the recesses of my own soul.

What does the dark, shadowy figure to the left of me represent? Some sort of dark doppelgänger? Is his scribbly presence an omen of impending death? His vague, half-formed lurking distresses me. I wish he would depart and leave me in peace.

This blog entry has darkened my spirits. I will end it now, before the gloom fully enshrouds me. I love you all very, very much.

Goodbye.

Just to prove how productive we have been. Since I didn’t take a lot of pictures before. And I’m waiting on things like rugs and blinds and pictures on the wall to take pictures now. You should go ahead and assume that most of the painting and dewallpapering was with assistance. Because it was.

Our bedroom:
-Painted it a lovely green to cover the icky light blue.
-Had a new fan installed.
-Put up curtain rods and curtains.
-Bought a TV so we can watch movies in our bedroom.

Our bathroom:
-Painted it a lovely green to cover the icky light blue.
-Put in a cabinet over the toilet since there was no actual cabinet space whatsoever.
-Bought a new mat.
-New toilet seat. (The one we had was cushy.)
-Put up new racks for our towels and bathrobes.

Hallway:
-Took down icky striped wallpaper (we had a lot of help).
-Painted a nice neutral beige (also had help here).
-Patched hole where weird humidity controller thing that no longer works was. (Though we haven’t actually painted over it yet. Stop judging us.)
-New light fixture to replace icky previous one.

Foyer:
-Same icky wallpaper removed, same new paint in its place.
-Another new light fixture!

Front room/library:
-Pulled up carpet.
-And staples.
-Painted a darker beige.
-Put up curtains and curtain rod.
-Had a fan installed.

Kitchen:
-Um, yeah.
-Do you want me to list all of those things?
-I mean, I can if you want.
-Okay, then.
-This is the room we had to pay people to help us with.
-We like to say that this room was sponsored by Lowe’s.
-Took down wallpaper.
-Took out cabinets and carpet and linoleum floor.
-New cabinets, new floor, new countertops.
-Painted fireplace.
-Painted laundry doors.
-Painted walls and trim.
-New stove and dishwasher.
-New light fixtures. In new places.
-Patched/painted ceiling.
-Put up shelves.

Sunroom:
-Painted brick wall.
-Painted paneling.
-Painted trim.
-These things took an insanely long amount of time.
-Changed fixture on ceiling fan to bring it into this century.

Miscellaneous:
-Lots of lists.
-Had locks changed.
-General unpacking.
-Smoke detectors.
-Fixed washing machine.
-BLINDS! Yay! Our blinds are in and soon they will be installed and I am so happy!

Things we still need to do:
-Rugs
-Take down wallpaper in one bedroom.
-Paint other bedroom.
-Finish that last bit of unpacking.
-Actually decorate.
-Work on things like window treatments now that we have blinds.
-New water saving toilet in hall bathroom.
-Actually do something to store our DVDs.
-Get the Big Chair back (it is being reupholstered).
-Deal with the brown doors.

Random things I cannot find:
-My brown belt. (I had to buy a new one. But I really want the old one to be found.)
-My vanilla body spray.
-Our heating pad.
-A box of Mike’s school stuff.

As you can see, we have been very busy. This is my “What I Did This Summer” essay. A little bit late. I kept thinking I would compile the list, but I never actually got around to doing it. And I feel like I have probably forgotten a few things. Perhaps Mike can clarify what they were. (I still have the actual master lists that I made right after we moved in. Would you like to see them? I can take a picture if you would like to see how my mind works.)

• Elsewhere in Dreams » Blog Archive » The trials of owning cats.
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This morning, despite my sore throat, I went to the Farmer’s Market to get our vegetables. Mike has a workshop, so I was alone. Somebody had to go, so I threw on a sweatshirt and went. And here’s the thing that struck me - our farmer knows who I am. He stopped what he was doing and asked how my week was, why I was alone today. When I told him that I am a librarian, he told me a story about how he used the library to do some history/genealogy research, and what that meant to his family. He told me that he taught middle school for one year. And he threw some extra grapes in my bag.

We switched to buying more things at the Farmer’s Market because we think it’s good for the environment not to have our food travel so far. We switched because we started thinking it was important to consider how the seasons can shape what we eat. I might have paid lip service to the idea that knowing the man who grew our food, of having a relationship with him was important. But the truth is that I have still been seeing it as a strictly business arrangement. I am not the kind of person who opens up very easily, and being recognized as a regular is, you know, good enough for me.

But buying food from the farmer is - or should be - about the relationship, too. About living in community, which is something that is not very easy for me. Mike does that very well, chatting up the neighbors, being open and friendly. I tend to keep myself to myself. If I want to eat locally because I want to be a little bit more connected to the world that is right around me, well, that probably ought to extend to the people as well as the land. It’s just taking me a little bit longer to figure that whole “people” part out. Which, I know, is making some of the right decisions for the wrong reasons. (And before I post this, I want to add - these are the right decisions for us, and I am certainly not trying to say they are the right decisions for everyone.) I don’t think that the way that I usually behave is actually what God wants from us. I don’t have to pour out my life story to people I don’t know, but there’s some middle ground between doing that and hiding behind comfortable walls.

I think that when I look back at how my life (and specifically my faith) have grown over the years, I see myself doing a lot of the right things for the wrong reasons. I do a lot of things because I think I am supposed to do them, not because I actually have a heart for them. But God can use the things we do even if we’re not doing them for the right reasons. I think that’s what Paul is talking about in the first chapter of Philippians. And it’s true in my own life. I can be convinced that we should take care of the world that God created for us and forget completely about the people I also need to care for. And yet there is redemption there, too, if I will allow God the space to move. This morning I was sweating and my brain felt like it was full of cotton and I hadn’t showered and I just wanted to go back home and lie down. But I took the time to listen to one man’s story instead, and I am glad I did.

Last year, I read a book called Easter Everywhere. It wasn’t exactly what I expected or wanted it to be. I wanted it to be about the ways we see God move every day, the ways we see that our lives have meaning and purpose. The glimpses that we get of God’s victory over sin and death. For me, learning how to take time for other people is part of seeing Easter everywhere. Even in an old National Guard Armory building on a rainy September morning.

today there was no carpool, so it was just me in the car on the way to work. i FINALLY broke out my FM transmitter for my Nano to use in the car. i’ve been struggling with the radio lately, even the classic rock radio, because it seems they play the same 50 or so songs. (a lot of AC/DC for some reason). yesterday i uploaded a lot of songs to my iPod and almost filled it, so i have about 600 songs. anyway, on the way to work this morning, i had the songs on shuffle and Yellow came on. in the serene morning on the bridge, it felt like the perfect song for that moment. i remembered the show i went to in Houston hearing Yellow and how everyone collectively smiled, how Yellow was the first Coldplay song i had ever heard, how at that concert i felt a part of something bigger than just me, blah blah blah.

(why oh why was Viva La Vida so bad?!? i really wanted to like it!)

after this past weekend’s college football games i don’t know what to believe anymore. i remember back in my Catechism days, we had a retreat and we played this game called Backpack Mess Up. it was something where everyone would be categorized as something normally found in a backpack. then the person leading the game would call out items and those people would have to move around. then if the person said backpack mess up, everyone had to move around. come to think of it the game wasn’t that much fun, and it doesn’t really make any sense as i described it. so this weekend in college football felt like backpack mess up. four top 10 teams lost, including UF on a blocked XP (wtf?). Clemson blew an easily winnable game that defies logic. everything i thought i knew was turned upside down. except LSU won, and that was the one thing all weekend that made sense.

the Saints game on Sunday made me feel great. it felt like 2006 again. hopefully it’s a sign of things to come for the season and not an aberration. welcome back Deuce!

This is actually the piece that originally brought me to the Faithwriters’ website.  I had originally written this for an essay promt for a book.   It was never published in the book, but it’s still one of my favorites.  It describes some of the struggles I’ve been through in life, and how God has brought me through them.  Enjoy.

Except God

The song “Cares Chorus” by Kelly Willard talks about how we can cast all of cares on God. It comes straight from scripture, in I Peter 5:7 where it says “Casting all your cares upon Him, because he cares for you.” The song has so much meaning in it, especially to a third grader going through a hard time.

Throughout my life, I have had various medical problems. Although the pregnancy and birth were mostly uneventful, shortly after I was born, I stopped eating. No one really knows why. Except God. I was tube fed for awhile, and finally I started eating on my own once again. I was far behind my peers in my physical development. Whether this and my eating habits were related, and whether any of my other medical problems are related, no one knows. Except God. Next, in kindergarten, I had eye muscle surgery. It really wasn’t a big deal, but as a kindergartner, I grew increasingly tired of explaining for what seemed like the thousandth time why I had a patch over one of my eyes. Next, I was placed on growth hormone therapy. I received injections of human growth hormone 3-7 times a week. This would continue until adolescence. I was never diagnosed with growth hormone deficiency, but they could find no other reason for my short stature. I was part of a research group to determine whether growth hormone was effective for those not diagnosed with growth hormone deficiency. Why I was so short with no apparent reason, no one knows. Except God.

The next big medical event in my life happened when I was in third grade. While checking for something completely unrelated, the doctors discovered that my hips were out of the sockets and had probably been that way for years. I never experienced pain, which surprised everyone. Except God. Shortly afterwards I was scheduled to have hip surgery. If I didn’t have it then, it would have likely caused major problems by the time I was a teenager. Why my hips were out of the sockets, no one knows. Except God.

On January 5, 1993, I had surgery to put both hips back in the sockets. For about six weeks after that, I was in a body cast. My legs were spread apart in a V shape. The cast went up both legs, then up past my hips, to the bottom of my rib cage. I could not walk, stand, or even sit upright for those 6 weeks. Those six weeks, and the time leading up to the surgery were hard for me. I drew some of my strength from the song “Cares Chorus.” The same God who knew then and knows now all the intricate parts of my body, the same God who knows exactly why I had those various medical problems, could give me strength. I could cast all of my worries, all of my fears, all of my anxieties on Him. I didn’t have to worry! This meant so much to me. This doesn’t mean I was never scared. Of course I was scared when the nurses wheeled me into the operating room. Of course I was scared when I first started to learn to walk again after the cast was taken off. Of course I was scared when I returned to school after 2 or 3 months of being away from my classmates. But I knew that God was in control. He would take care of all of my worries no matter what. If I didn’t know what to do, He did.

Since then, I have had no major medical problems. One doctor once told my parents that he wasn’t sure if I would live. I did. Some doctors said that if I did live, I would have multiple disabilities, including learning disabilities. I don’t. In fact, I graduated from high school with a 4.1 GPA. I was frequently sick as a child, yet I graduated from high school with perfect attendance for all four years. No one expected that. Except God. I don’t hear that song much lately; but when I do, I am reminded that the same God who made the universe cared enough to send a special song to a third grade girl who needed some comfort. No one expected that. Except God.

Author’s Notes:
This is a revised version of the original essay I wrote. The original essay included the song lyrics, but since I don’t have permission to use them, I can’t post them. I hope to post the original version if and when I get copyright permissions.

You are free to use this article anywhere, put please let me know you are using it. I like to know where my writing is being used.

Dear Doctor,

Were you just pretending you didn’t notice that I started crying when you told me you couldn’t do anything for me? How about a little sympathy? I spent $20 and an hour and a half of my life to hear you say that you couldn’t help me. And also, I felt really crummy. You could have handed me a kleenex, is what I am saying.

For the record, it was not especially helpful to hear you drone on and on about how OTC medications will prolong my suffering but make me feel better, so that choice was up to me. And how vitamin C and echinacea might or might not help. Depending on which studies you believe. Have you been reading Ecclesiastes? Is everything actually meaningless? It’s kind of a downer when I already feel bad and you’ve already told me you can’t really help me. Even if everything is meaningless, could you pretend for five minutes that it’s not? Lie, if necessary, okay?

These are just the ramblings of a curious mind. A mind addled by pain but fairly certain that your bedside manner left a lot to be desired.

All the crying has kind of got me congested again, could you do something about that?
-Kari

Today, I found out that two of my friends miscarried.

Friends who have tried for years to get pregnant.

I spent the weekend with one, talking about the nursery, offering to babysit.

I shared a flurry of emails with the other, first of congratulations, then of grief.

One can’t talk about it.

The other can’t stop crying.

They are beautiful women.

One day, they will be beautiful mothers.

But right now, their bodies are broken.

Their spirits are failing.

And I have nothing to offer them.

My words of comfort can’t penetrate their grief.

My words of comfort can’t penetrate MY grief.

They will mourn.

They will cry.

They will hope.

They will wait.

Some days getting up at 4am leaves me feeling worn down and unproductive for the rest of the day. Other days, I get a second wind and it’s like any other day. Today there was no second wind.

Instead, there’s just me trying to get through this afternoon and a sketch of a girl holding a book. Enjoy.

My cousin, Amanda, came to visit me last week. Which is part of the reason for the lack of blog updates. Plus, I’m lazy. But in honor of her visit, I thought I would share a story from our teenage years.

Okay, so, when I was in high school, I didn’t have my own car. I would use the family car. The Ford Aerostar Minivan. You know the one I’m talking about. I swear that every person in my community owned one at some point. And I was so cool driving that thing around town. It’s one reason I was as popular as I was in high school. You totally wish you were me right now, don’t you.

So one Saturday evening, I was headed to a youth event at church with Amanda. As usual, I was running late. And, I might have been driving a little too fast on the windy backroads near my house. I came flying around a sharp curve, only to realize that…we were only on two wheels. Yes, you heard me. I got a  minivan on two wheels. I’m sure the moment only lasted a second, but there was no mistaking the angle, then the thump as all four tires safely touched the ground again.

I slowed to a stop at the end of the road and glanced over at Amanda. She gripped the blue velour arm rests and her face was as white as the pages of her Bible that had slipped out of her lap.

“Amanda,” I said. She slowly turned her head toward me. “You must NEVER tell anybody that just happened.” She nodded, too afraid to speak. I eased the van forward, not topping 25 mph for the rest of the drive.

We didn’t speak of the incident for years.

Look, what an adorable puppy!

His eyes sparkle with mischief and his fur is as white as a divorcee’s wedding dress! He has made my dreams come true!

Come here, puppy. I will name you Marigold, and you will live with me forever in my dragonfly palace (i.e. single-bedroom apartment).

Oh Marigold, your whimpers and squeaks lift my spirits and tickle my emotions! You are the yin to Bill Maher’s yang!

Never leave me, Marigold! If a Ford F-150 were to ever crush your skull into the pavement, I would blow up said Ford with a car bomb faster than you can say, “the surge is working”. The lethal swiftness of my shift from meekly ineffectual puppy-lover to vigilante woodsman would make your head spin. I am literally capable of anything!

I love you, Marigold!

Is it egotistical to drink coffee from a mug that says “I (heart) my Music Minister” when, up until last week or so, I was the music minister?

It occurred to me that those who see this page might not realize that I’m now working at Redeemer Lynchburg, and have as one of my weekly responsibilities, writing Worship Notes to prepare the congregation for the service each week.

They are updated with more regularity than this little blog.

Whenever Phil says the following: “The world is waiting for you. Good luck. Travel safe,” I always tear up. Every time. I love the roadblocks and the detours and the fast forwards. And I love the end of the race, when Phil tells them how many miles they’ve gone and how many countries they visited. But more than that, I love when Phil tells them the world is waiting. And he does the eyebrow pop. I look forward to it whenever I hear the show is coming back. And I always have my kleenex handy. (Though I try to wipe my eyes unobtrusively so that Mike won’t laugh too much.)

(In case you don’t know, I’m talking about The Amazing Race. And if you don’t know, why is that? It’s my favorite show! It’s back!)

Here is a fun page to get at 0020 while on call.

Nurse (in a thick Indian accent, a la Apu): Doctor, the medical examiner called about one of Dr. M’s patients who passed away.

Me: OK. What patient?

Nurse: Um. I’m not familiar with the patient.

Me: Sure, but who was it?

Nurse: It was the medical examiner.

Me: No, what patient was the medical examiner calling about?

Nurse: Oh, I’m not familiar with the patient.

Me: I mean what is the patient’s name?

Nurse: I don’t know the patient’s name.

Me: So what I can do for you if neither of us know who the medical examiner is calling about?

Nurse: Ok doctor. Let me check on that and call you back.

Me: Ok. Thanks.

Maybe it’s because I’m a mere four months shy of 30. Maybe it’s because I’ve been reading melodramatic teenage novels. Or maybe it’s because I’ve gotten back in touch with a lot of people via Facebook over the past few months, but I’ve been thinking back on my high school years a lot lately. High school was a necessary evil to me. I knew I had to get through it in order to get to college, and that’s pretty much why I was there.

I was never cool or popular, nor did I really have any desire to be either of those things. I had a smallish group of close friends, and we were all pretty much those who didn’t quite fit into any of the usual groupings you see. Maybe that was the bond that held us together - we weren’t jocks, we weren’t goths, and we weren’t super-geeky. We all seemed to have class together, but our performance in those classes varied widely from those who always made straight A’s to those who really didn’t give a rat’s ass as to why they were there (I fell somewhere in the middle). We had pretty widely varying political and social ideas, and those led to some pretty heated disagreements on occasion, but we were friends, and we were there for each other.

I didn’t date much in high school, either. I only seriously dated two guys, the first of which was a SPECTACULAR failure and a cautionary tale about why you should listen to people if both your parents and your friends don’t like the guy (suffice it to say that having a rich daddy doesn’t mean you can buy yourself a personality). The second wasn’t so bad - it just wound up that we were better off as friends, and we’re still friends today. I went to prom with guys who were friends both my Junior and Senior years. I’d known most of the guys I went to high school with since elementary school, so I guess it was just hard for either me or them to see the other as anything other than an acquaintance. Plus, I had a bad habit of telling guys when they were acting stupid, and apparently they don’t like that. Oh, and there was that one time when I jokingly told a guy I was a lesbian and he believed me, heh.

As an only child (and a girl to boot), my parents were probably a little more overprotective than some of my friends’ parents were. I had the earliest curfew of any of my friends (10:30), and Mom and Dad refused to budge when I begged and pleaded to extend it to 11:00 (I believe my dad told me “Someone’s got to go home first. Might as well be you.”). Luckily, my friends were pretty accommodating and willing to take me home so I wouldn’t break curfew, and Mom and Dad were pretty cool about letting them hang out at my house until they had to go home if they wanted to (and on occasion, they let me stay out a little later if I called and told them I was just down the street). Of course I thought my early curfew was monstrously unfair back then, but now that I have daughters of my own, I’m sure I’ll be as strict as my parents were. Besides, I think I turned out okay.

There are a few things I wish I had do-overs on, of course. Those of you who didn’t know me back then may find this a little surprising, but I had a hard time sticking up for myself. I wish the backbone I grew in college had come in a few years earlier, I guess. I also wish I hadn’t been so willing to walk away from situations rather than confront them, especially with regards to friendship. I also wish I was a bit more willing to laugh at myself and not be so melodramatic back then (but what former teenage girl doesn’t?).

In all, though, I’m at the point now where I can look back at high school and see where my experiences there made me into the person I am today. I learned a LOT during those years, about myself, about friendship, and about God. I won’t say I’m willing to go back and do the whole thing over again, but I do have some fond memories of that time. I hope in another ten years, I can look back and say the same thing. Though I think I’ve had much more fun in my twenties than I did during my teen years.

So I am at work Friday afternoon and these three guys come in. When they put down their belongs on one of the tables In notice a notebook, and two bibles. On thinline black bible, and another big, bulky study bible. They come up to the counter to order, and after some banter about one of them being a partner at Starbucks I find out that they are all on staff at a baptist church in Lexington, KY. The conversation takes off from there. We talk about how I’m pretty much Reformed but I go to a “liberal” SBC college. They talk about how they consider themselves a “little b” baptist church since they are becoming more reformed, but have a big focus on community, discipleship and outreach. We talked about how Jesus and God are not concepts, and how UK needs some reformed people to reach the campus. It was such a refreshing conversation. I left with two business cards and promised to visit their church if I was ever in the area. That was the second time in the last week that a random conversation has come up with customers at work who were solid Christians. It was exciting to talk to other believers about ministry and life after college and new things. In case I havent mentioned it I am so ready to graduate. Im like a salvating congregant at a church potluck.
On a side note Ive been holed up in drive-thru at work for far so long that I forgot about the beauty of cafe service. I like working drive-thru on a morning shift, because all the regulars come through. There is a great sense of pleasure to make a personal connection with some one, because you know excatly what they are going to order. But these last few days Ive enjoyed the people walking through the front door, even if they do get pissy with me because we dont have free Wi-Fi. Yes, there is a Starbucks in existence that does not have Wi-Fi. That is the Starbuck’s trivia for the day.
In related news…we have internet and cable at our house. “Praise God from whom all blessings flow…” The house is almost in order. My room is more functional, and for the first time in years all my books are out in broad daylight. They are like my little children, all lined up against the wall for me to look gazingly at. Yeah, no bookshelf yet. Im still the lazy one in this roommate relationship, but I did clean the apartment on Friday. Mmmmm…..Pine-Sol.

I just did a big purge of my blogroll to weed out inactive blogs, or ones that are no longer there. So, if you see your name has disappeared, it’s not because I hate you. You either need to blog more or you need to tell me the address of your new blog.

Once again, I’ve managed to neglect this here little blog for a little longer than I intended to. What can I say? Stuff happens. Especially when you’re running after two nearly-walking twin girls all day.

Not too much has been going on in Holland Land lately, although we did recently celebrate Erin and Grace’s first birthday! It’s hard for me to believe I’m the mother of toddlers now, especially when I have moments where I forget I’m a mom in the first place. They’re doing new things every day, and I couldn’t be prouder of them. But I won’t gush about them here. That’s what this page is for.

As far as reading material, I’m once again delving into Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. And, as usual, I’m finding things I missed the first four times I read it. I’m also beginning to read The Children of Men, something I picked up about a year ago but never started. I’ve also got The Painted Veil to read. (Perhaps I should start reading books that aren’t already made into movies?) I also was one of the unfortunate folks to get thoroughly sucked into the Twilight saga. I know, I know. Melodramatic vampire romance novels do not exactly seem geared toward nearly 30-year-old women. But so help me, they were entertaining. And I’m kinda looking forward to the movie (Cedric Diggory as Edward Cullen? Yes, please.).

As if my transformation into a 15 year old wasn’t aided enough by my literary choices of late, I’m starting to look for new music, since, well, I haven’t really bought anything over the past year, and I miss listening to music. A few of my friends have suggested Paramore, and I’m liking what I hear from them. I’ll probably pick one of their CD’s up when I have play money again at the beginning of October. Jeff’s also made a big push for Mae as well, and I’m liking Singularity in particular. On a whim, I picked up Missy Higgins’ second CD, On a Clear Night, and I LOVE it. Love love it. I’m also open for suggestions, so if you have any, fire away.

That’s about it for me lately. What have you guys been up to?

Those of you who know me know I love Savage Chickens. Today’s comic had me laughing my face off.

_{Edit: Changed post so as not to use BBcode. Doh!}

Yesterday I couldn’t get very focused on work. Maybe it was the rain and wind, or the fact that my day began at 4 am. I tried to do some actual work, but only managed to do two sketch cards and then played around with watercolors, which will help me in the long run, but doesn’t leave me feeling like I accomplished anything at the time.

Laura and I have three cats. We can’t have children right now — or are actively preventing it, I should say, using methods uniformly more effective than those I have seen lead to some interesting child-rearing experiences — so we have cats instead.

I love our cats in an abstract way. They’re not people. They’re more like objects. They definitely have minds of their own, and do things that make even children seem logical and tame by comparison.

Nothing, however, prepared me for today. Today was The Great Dashboard Caper.

Laura was taking our second cat, Qubit — named after the quantum bit; and yes, she decodes 128-bit SSL in her spare time, if it’s covered in gravy — to the vet to have her claws yanked out and her uterus disposed of. Laura was carrying her in the usual cardboard carrying case, the same one we’ve had since we had the cats. Little did she know that Qubit had gnawed her way through the cardboard, planning an elaborate escape from the vet, an escape that eventually led to her wedging herself up in the car, behind the glove compartment, so far up that we could barely touch her when we reached in to see if she was still alive.

All attempts to extricate her failed. She seemed absolutely stuck. She didn’t want food, she didn’t want treats, and she most certainly seemed not to want her female bits tossed in the trash.

Ten hours later I was home from work, Qubit still stuck behind the glove compartment. I decided to do the inevitable and remove the glove compartment. Now, General Motors, in their infinite wisdom, decided to make our entire dashboard out of one gigantic piece of molded plastic, held in place with alternating Torx bolts and regular hex screws. I headed to Home Depot to buy some Torx drivers — I’ve never had to take a car apart before, you see — and an adjustable wrench.

Finally, I gave up. There was no way I was going to do it. So I took the car to Canadian Tire and they took out the airbag, revealing… balled-up cat. I performed the cattectomy the only way I knew how: By pulling really, really hard. She finally popped out of the hatch only to immediately dig her claws deep into my forearms. I crammed her into the new plastic case Laura had bought, and left to get myself some scotch.

She’s currently running around the house, a little jazzed from all the excitement, but seemingly in good spirits.

Now… she back to peeing in our plants. Way to go!

Those of you who know me know I don’t talk about politics much. That doesn’t mean I’m not interested, of course, and nothing interests me more than US politics. Mostly because Canada — my birth nation — sits right on top of the States and when they jump, we usually feel the impact.

I’m a little late to the game on Sarah Palin, yes. I’d like to get a word in edgewise anyhow.

I like Sarah Palin. I know I’m not supposed to, as a Canadian, like a Republican vice presidential candidate, especially one who so vocally opposes a lot of the values I hold dear. Still, I like her. She does, however, scare me.

She’s probably a great person. She looks like she’d be a lot of fun to be around. She seems to be vivacious and spunky, and if you’ve ever met my wife you’ll see I like to be around those kinds of people.

Yet for all the things I like about her personally — for all the things about her personality I admire — I can’t help but be scared by her. The policies she represents, the sort of religious Republican right-wing agenda she embodies, and the stunning lack of knowledge she displays all roll together to make me extremely leery of what she would do as a vice president.

Vice presidents for the longest time did absolutely nothing. They sat around and waited for the President to die. They were the guy in the wings who reads novels while the main actors perform the play. That era is clearly past, with the Vice President — along with the First Lady, should she be so inclined — filling a much more activist role. That is to say, VPs are the bully pulpit to the President’s political manoeuvrings. Vice Presidents use their position to nudge policy their way, even though their role in the Executive Branch is ill-defined and essentially powerless. Recent Vice Presidents, such as Dick Cheney, have had a great influence on the direction the government takes. They are spokespeople for their various causes, and have a great platform from which to raise awareness and money for whatever they put their minds to.

Sarah Palin looks ill-equipped to properly serve this function. Even if she were informed about issues other than oil and bridges to nowhere much, her agenda would probably be too right wing even for me.

Bear in mind that a hundred years ago I would have probably been a Republican. I’m pro-life — I despise abortion, but also execution and euthanasia — I hate big government, and I believe that history bears out the free market as the best solution for quite a few problems. Yet in the USA, the Democratic party seems to be the one leading, from FDR on, the charge for innovative policy that actually helps people. The Republicans have become a sort of big-government, military-industrial party, completely separated from their roots while every once in a while appointing or choosing or electing a politician who harkens back to the good old days, back when neo-Conservatism wasn’t more than a loosely grouped glimmer in that back of Leo Strauss’s head.

This person is Sarah Palin. She has been chosen as a Vice Presidential candidate in a stunningly crass bit of political cunning, at once appealing the Republican base — mixed up Christians who have somehow integrated politics and religion, much to the diminishing of Christ — and making the party seem fresh and young, despite being anything of the kind.

She is the veneer on the reality of the Republican party as it stands today. It’s a party speaking out of both sides of its mouth. Sarah Palin is pro-life. This is good. Yet the Republican party has said that it wants “the debate” about abortion to continue, which is to say that they would very much like for everyone to keep talking and no-one to do much about it. She is anti-homosexual. This is good, or bad depending on what you take that term to mean. Yet the parade — pardon the pun — of gay rights marches on unabated in the United States, and the Republican party wishes nothing more than to stop that march. Yet legislating lifestyle and denying genetics is just the sort of thing one might expect from Big Government. Or Big Brother, if you’re particularly pessimistic. Sarah Palin is pro-gun, despite the avalanche of evidence that guns are harmful to society at large. Sarah Palin is pro-oil, willing to spoil the last great reserve of American wildlife to drill for it, willing to sacrifice anything at any cost to feed the American oil habit. She shows no interests in alternatives, even though drilling can only satisfy this craving for so long. Drilling for more oil a a thumb in a dam full of holes. Sarah Palin is, in the last analysis, critically lacking in knowledge about things — the Bush Doctrine being a recent example — that even I, a humble Canadian, can elucidate with almost embarrassing ease. She is not a crash-course away from being knowledgeable. She is fully unprepared to fill any bully pulpit whatsoever.

I could go on. I won’t. I have a glass of scotch calling my name. Just let me say thing: I don’t dislike her as a person, but I disagree with her politics and thing she is a crass and irresponsible choice for a VP candidate. Biden, though I don’t particularly like his style, seems a much more wise and measured choice. The sort of choice one might expect from a man who seems to be fairly wise in his own right.

Last night my book club discussed Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth, and it was one of those discussions that transcended the book. We talked about dogmatism and redemption and grace. I will admit, I have not yet finished Sacred Hunger (a book about the middle passage is not exactly light reading that I can pick up at any moment, unfortunately), though I have enjoyed what I have read so far. But now, after the discussion, I can’t wait to finish it.

This is a passage that was quoted last night, one that I haven’t gotten to yet.

Nothing a man suffers will prevent him from inflicting suffering on others. Indeed, it will teach him the way . . . Was it always wrong then to believe that the experience of suffering would soften the heart? Those who were fond of declaring that they understood human nature would no doubt conclude so. But as the light strengthened slowly, enabling him to make out the bare furnishings of his cabin, it came to [Matthew] Paris that he did not want to be numbered among these knowing ones, that such understanding was worse than error, worse than hope endlessly defeated. If that is what it means to be wise, I choose folly, he told himself, and slept again and woke to daylight and a sweat of pain and the sign of Sullivan’s face above him.

My Favorite English Professor declared that this was a book that could change your life, if you would let it. (And with passages like that, it’s easy to see why.) I have been thinking a little bit lately about my favorite books, and about how long it’s been since I read a book that I would add to my favorites list. And then today I ran across an article about that very thing.

Let me put it another way: When was the last time a book changed your life? I don’t mean offered you new insights or ideas or moved you–I mean profoundly changed the way you see the world or shaped the kind of person you are? If you’re like me, it’s been longer than you’d like to admit.

The article goes on to say:

It’s not that children’s books are pure entertainment, innocent of any didactic goal–what grownups enviously call “Reading for Fun.” On the contrary, the reading we do as children may be more serious than any reading we’ll ever do again. Books for children and young people are unashamedly prescriptive: They’re written, at least in part, to teach us what the world is like, how people are, and how we should behave–as my colleague Megan Kelso (The Squirrel Mother) puts it, “How to be a human being.”

There is a level of moral instruction in these books underneath the incidentals of plot, character, and setting that we’re constantly absorbing: How would a decent person act in this situation? What would a bad person do? What’s the right thing to say to a friend when something terrible happens? The Lord of the Rings books are no more concerned with martial virtues such as loyalty and courage than they are with elaborate codes of courtesy and honorable conduct. Bridge to Terebithia makes this function of literature explicit when Leslie gives Jess The Chronicles of Narnia to read so that he can learn how a prince should behave.

A lot of you are probably thinking about Kathleen Kelly: “When you read a book as a child, it becomes a part of your identity in a way that no other reading in your whole life does.” The older I get (I am not saying I’m old, but the older I get) the more I agree with that. And it’s part of why I take my job so seriously.

Speaking of which! Next week is Banned Books Week. There are a lot of things that seem oh so very broken in our country right now. Next week, celebrate one of the things that we can be proud of: intellectual freedom. Read a Harry Potter book, some Judy Blume, or some Steinbeck. Heck, you can even read Gossip Girl (though I don’t actually recommend it). Read something that has been considered so offensive that someone asked for it to be taken off bookstore and library shelves. You can even read something that you find offensive! But please celebrate our freedom to read, to let these books change our lives.

Another head sketch.

After making the decision to leave Imago Christi at the end of the month, we find ourselves in an unfamiliar position: starting the church search. My church history is fairly short and doesn’t include much searching: while growing up we attended a C&MA church, a small Berean church, and then a small Bible church. When I went to college I floated around for my first semester until Becky invited me to her medium-sized Bible church, which we then attended for the next 3.5 years. When we moved to Iowa, we were recommended to a church up here, and after about three weeks of visiting other churches decided to stick there where we had been recommended, at Noelridge. We were at Noelridge for 8.5 years before leaving to plant Imago, and we were at Imago for the better part of a year. So my total church searching experience is a few months of aimless wandering in college and a few weeks after moving to Iowa. That ain’t much.

Church searching has changed a lot since 9 years ago when we were looking around here in Cedar Rapids. Back then your main resources were the yellow pages and the religion section of the newspaper. Today, though, it’s all about the websites. You can find out a lot about a church’s beliefs and ministries with just a few clicks of the mouse. You can even listen to recent sermons. I think I’ll have to be careful not to do too much pre-judging by the websites.

Several things I am anticipating will make this church search tough:

• Theological pickiness. I don’t expect that I’m gonna agree with everything at any church I attend, (heck, I didn’t at Noelridge or Imago, either), but I’d like it to be close. And I’ll need to have the freedom at a church to hold some views that don’t quite line up and not be ostracized for those. For example: one of the churches we’ve been considering has a rather long excursis in their doctrinal statement concerning the exact sequence of a premillenial end times. I’m OK with them believing that, but I won’t be able to handle it if they’re dogmatic about it.
• Leadership Expectations. Now, I have no desire to be in leadership again for a while. But I’m going to want to have the pastor and elders of a church I attend be men who enjoy reading and discussing theological topics. I almost feel sorry for the pastor and/or elders who will have the typical so-you’re-interested-in-our-church meeting with me. I have a feeling I’ll have far more questions for them than they will have for me. Bonus points for anybody that’s read any N. T. Wright.
• Limited Choices. Now, while some of my friends will step in and suggest a bigger denominational change, I just can’t see us moving to a more mainline denomination, even a conservative branch of one. We’re not gonna end up Catholic, Lutheran, or Methodist, and we don’t even have conservative Anglican or Presbyterian options in Cedar Rapids. Which pretty well leaves us Baptist, Bible, maybe E Free, and, well, not much else. Even in as big a town as Cedar Rapids.
• The Struggle for Contentment. I am acknowledging here up front that we may not find someplace that I’m completely happy with. And that will have to be OK. I would dearly love to have Steve McCoy’s church or Joe Thorn’s church or Rae Whitlock’s church nearby. I would totally go for an Acts29 church, and would take a very long hard look at one of the new breed of PCA churches. (We have one PCA church here about 30 minutes away, and it appears to be the old, stodgy flavor of the PCA.) But given that those aren’t available, we will have to be content with what we have available here. We’re praying that God will be clear in His leading.

We get a pass this weekend - we’re leaving in a couple of hours to head to Wisconsin to visit my folks. But next weekend we’ll have to bite the bullet, pick one of our options, and give it a try. I’m planning on blogging our adventures, so check back. If you’ve got any thoughts or suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments.

Twins win! Twins win!

They came back from a 6-1 deficeit to win it in the bottom of the 10th inning and sweep the White Sox, moving them into first place with only three games left in the season! Playoffs, here we come!

It’s going to be so awesome to get swept in the first round by Tampa Bay because of our crap bullpen! YES!

Sing with me, this ode to bloated 19th century plutocrats!

“Plutocrats!
They’re bouncing here and there and everywhere!
Busting labor unions with a folding chair
They are the Plutocrats!”

“Plutocrats!
To them the rest of us are merely ants
Competing business will have no chance
They are the Plutocrats!”

“Plutocrats!
They drink champagne out of a golden cup
Molest the workers without letting up
They are the Plutocrats!”

—

On a completely different note, here’s another song for for your aural enjoyment:
John Devlin: He’s So Nigh (From the Jack Von Trousner Show)

So, it was time for a little blog reorganization. I’d started chrishubbs.com about a year ago, with the intent of posting more regularly there on topics surrounding the church plant. Well, we’re no longer at the church plant, so that doesn’t really make sense. In addition, my old scheme of having a place where my various family members could blog never really came to fruition, because, well, I seem to be the only inveterate blogger of the bunch.

So, my conclusion: time to move things around. So, with the help of my intrepid hosting provider, those of you visiting thehubbs.net/chris or rmfo-blogs.com/cakeboy (yes, I know there is still at least one person with a bookmark to that original location… and I won’t name names, but I’m married to her!), you will now be seamlessly routed to the new chrishubbs.com. All the same content, just a new location.

If you notice anything acting weird, let me know.

I’ve been trying take some time during the week to work out some issues in my drawing. Working from old black and white photos is a good way to study lighting and form. Do it enough and you’ll begin to learn how shadows and light fall on the various planes of the face.

Do not wonder that he reasons ill just now; a fly is buzzing by his ear; it is quite enough to unfit him for giving good counsel.

- Blaise Pascal

On the days that work at the studio, I’ll go hang out and read for about an hour at the coffee shop downtown before heading in. Today I had the pleasure of sitting near a woman who was an open-mouth chewer.

This is one of the few things that make me keenly aware my shortcomings, since the noise of someone chewing immediately plunges me into a rage, unable to focus on whatever I happen to be doing at the moment. I sit and wait, as patiently as I can, for her to finish her bagel.

Once finished I think I’m home free. But our mediocre adventure is just beginning. She has change in her hand, and what’s more fun than dropping change repeatedly on the table in front of you in a public place? Nothing ,that’s what!

Fortunately this doesn’t last too long, because she needs to emphasize her point by slamming her hand on the table multiple times.

Also she had a deep laugh that was annoying only because of her previous offenses.

And she’s swearing.

last night i had a dream involving another celebrity…actually two celebrities. i dreamt i was in the Atlanta metro area (i think) and going to visit an old run down museum to Izzy, the mascot for the Atlanta Olympics. i’m pulling up to the museum at the top of this hill and i see a few other cars and trucks, and guys in black tracksuits. i park the car and realize the guys in black tracksuits are part of Alton Brown’s Feasting On Asphalt crew. AB is actually there as well, and talking to a group who looked like they were about to go tour the museum. i get out of the car and one of the tracksuit guys and i start talking, and he remembered me from the previous day from a cooking demonstration or something. i remember thinking AB would remember me from our somewhat awkward encounter at the bookstore in NOLA. as we walked over to join the tour group, i woke up. the reasoning for having this dream may be found below….

yesterday i had PT and then lifted weights at the gym (they are in the same location, so i really have no excuse) and got home about 7:30 (JUST in time for How I Met Your Mother!). i had plans to use the chicken i had bought that had an expiration date of 9/20, and had hopes of trying out the Macaroni Grill dinner stuff i had bought the last time i went to the store. i figured it was like one of those supper bake things, where you just lay everything out and put it in the oven. oh no, this process involved oil, a skillet, coating chicken in flour, and large BBQ tongs. i had never fried or used hot oil before, so it was going to be a night of firsts in the cooking department.

the box says prep time was 20 minutes, but whatever, when i saw everything i’d need and what i had to do, i knew it wasn’t going to only take 20 minutes. i was tired, i was getting a late start cooking, but i decided to do it anyway.

i cut and breaded the chicken according to the instructions and oiled the pan to cook them.

the box called for 1 lb, but i had bought 1.5 lbs, and stupid me didn’t use the big skillet, so i had to go to the skillet twice to make to cook all the chicken. since i don’t have regular sized tongs, i had to use my giant BBQ tongs which were ridiculously oversized for this endeavor. (sorry, no pictures of those)

i added the cooking wine and the seasoning to the chicken after they were browned on each side and let it simmer. then i got out my big pyrex dish thing and put the finished chicken in while i went to the 2nd batch.

meanwhile, the pasta’s cooking in its own pot ready to be served in time when all the chicken was done. the 2nd batch didn’t do as well, since there wasn’t as much chicken, the oil did some popping. it ended up being okay, and nothing caught on fire.

i needed to run the dishwasher, so i was down on plates and almost used a paper plate to serve. (what, it’s just me, i don’t care!) i ended up using a bowl and that worked out better anyway.

the final verdict was the taste, so around 9 pm i was finally able to eat, and it was fantastic. the box says there are 5 servings, but i think i’m only going to be getting 3 servings out of it. there’s not much pasta that comes in the box, so i guess they don’t plan on people eating a lot of the pasta. i might have to try to portion better next time though just to see if i can get the 5 servings.

Tonight I drove to UNCG for a class. Sign count!

Obama signs: 7
McCain signs: 0
Don Vaughn signs: 3 (he’s running for State Senate) (that link is not an endorsement)

In conclusion: UNCG is voting Obama.

There is one common theme in the classes that I take for licensure: They all make me want to use more profanity than I ever thought possible. Also, they make me want to stab myself in the eye with a pen. As I fiddled with my pen this evening, I seriously contemplated stabbing myself in the eye with it. Because then I would get to leave. Rather than being spoken to like a kindergartner. *stab stab stab*

I will admit that my attitude about these classes is not always the best. I always start with the idea of going with the flow. I don’t want to be the person who can’t learn from other people because she thinks she knows it all. I definitely do not know it all when it comes to teaching. But the classes! They are often busywork or playacting so as to meet some state requirement. And I do not find that helpful. *stab stab stab*

Last semester, I took a class with a professor who was kind of not my favorite. She spent a lot of time talking about how great she was. And grading our assignments in pithy ways. For our last assignment, part of our requirement was a reflective paper. In what was probably not my finest moment, I wrote reflectively about how lame I thought the assignment was, taking potshots at the part of the assignment I was supposed to be reflecting upon and its really specific (pointless) requirements. In my defense, I did not take potshots at her personally. At least I can say that. That, however, is not something that she can say, because in her response to my paper, she did take (completely untrue) potshots at me. I wrote back correcting her misinformation about me, and she told me that she did not like my tone. I then wished her well, because, thankfully, she was planning to retire over the summer. Did I mention that she was kind of not my favorite? *stab stab stab*

Anyway, I don’t know why I just told you that story. It does not exactly cover me in glory. But it does show you how frustratingly asinine I find these classes. They make me do things I would never normally do. Tune in next week to read about my huge crazy freakout in which I take too many behavioral meds at once, rip off my clothes, and jump into the fountain at the mall, yelling, “Blaaaaah! I’m a kraken from the sea!”

(To my mom: Do not be alarmed. That is a reference to Juno. Not something I actually plan on doing.)

This afternoon I made the mistake of wearing my Dunder Mifflin shirt. A mistake because I knew I was going to see my grandma, and I should have foreseen that while she was lumbering through the dentist office, teetering on the brink of falling to the floor and breaking a hip, she would fixate on trying to figure out on what was on my shirt.

As though this weren’t a big enough mistake itself, I opted to read a book on Christianity and Postmodernism while waiting. If explaining a t-shirt to your 92 year old grandmother is a task monumental enough, try explaining what that book’s about.

Instead of confusing her further I tried to change the subject, which worked, and then loaded her back into the car.

I haven’t really been up to anything exciting lately so I haven’t had much to post about. Lots went on this past weekend though.

Saturday, I headed down to Georgia Tech for the Tech vs. Mississippi State game. The weather was just about perfect for football. Maybe a little bit warm but I won’t complain at all. During the tailgate in the morning, there was a touch of autumn in the air and I’m starting to get the first few feelings I get every autumn. I love this time of year. The game was probably one of the best that I’ve seen Tech play in a long time and I had lots of fun with friends in the seats around me.

Some of the photos from the game turned out pretty well, too.

On Sunday, Adriene and I took the girls for their very first concert. Dave FM was sponsoring a free show by Matthew Perryman Jones at the Smyrna Village. Once again, the weather was beautiful and the early show time made it easy to take two one year-olds. Some of our friends joined us and brought their children also and we made it a fun outdoor picnic event.

The show was great. Katie Herzig opened and joined MPJ on a couple of songs. Both of their music is available for free or donation at NoiseTrade. I’m hopeful that there will be some more shows like this during the autumn. There are a couple of upcoming concerts that I’m looking forward to as we start to move out of the hermit stage of raising infant twins.

Photos of the show available on Flickr!

All is quiet on the Midwestern front. Well, I don’t know if quiet is the correct term, but nonetheless, not much has been happening around here these past few days.

Melissa’s knee is healing up okay, we’re really hoping that she won’t have to undergo surgery. It would be quite a relief on the mind and our pocketbook.

I caught something this weekend. It happens to me just about every year at this time. It’s something that can really ruin any good harvest season. It’s something that’s pretty rare, but can be quite contagious if it’s not contained to keep from spreading. While this disease isn’t deadly and can make others around you run for cover. There is no real medicine for this tragic disease, it just heals over time. Doctors aren’t quite sure where it comes from. Some believe it to be hereditery, some believe it to be created by your enviorment and lifestyle, some believe it to be a figment of your imagination. Sadly, I suffer from this disease.

You see, I suffer from PCSS. Yes, that’s right. The dreaded Premature Christmas Spirit Syndrom. Every year during this time, I begin to show the symptoms. Whistling a carol here or there, buying candy canes once in a while… leaving milk and cookies out over night.

In fact, this isn’t the first time I’ve been diagnosed with this unfortunate illness. It slowly developed out of CCMD (also known as “Childen’s Christmas Musical Disorder”) that I came down with as a kid - spending many Saturday mornings and afternoons at my local Baptist church practicing and rehearsing for the annual Christmas pagant. While other kids were at home watching football games with their dads and brothers, I was there, humming a Bing Crosby number, pretending to be Gaspar, The Third of the Wisemen.

As I grew older, I eventually grew out of CCMD and lived a normal life for several years. I’m not sure if us leaving the Baptist Church had anything to do with it, but that’s a different story for another day. As I was saying - I lived a normal life for most of my childhood and teenage years. Unfortunately, just as I thought I was healed of this disease all together, I caught a different strain.

When I was 17 years old, I ultimately came down with RWHSD. Yes, sadly, I developed Retail Workers Holiday Seasonal Disorder. The symptoms of this disorder are quiet noticable and can be widespread throught all retail establishments between September and January. It’s the sad disorder that causes a lose of holiday season scheduling, and ultimate leads to the uncomfortable disease I suffer from today. Where a normal person knows that Halloween is in October, Thanksgiving is in November and Christmas is in December, a person suffering with RWHSD is quiet thrown off. They come to believe that Halloween is in September, then Christmas lasts from October through January with blatant disregard that Thanksgiving even exists (however the Day After Thanksgiving does). Symptoms of this disorder include singing “Feliz Navidad” every hour on the hour, the inability to say “Merry Christmas” but “Happy Holiday” instead and a heightened ability to git wrap.

Luckily, with the help of the woman I would later marry, I was able to overcome this disorder as well. It wasn’t easy, it was expensive and meant changing my life around (such as moving out of state, leaving the retail world and enter the fascinating jungle of corporate America).

I thought I was over it all and on to living a normal life. I had begun to heal, celebrating such things as “Harvest Season”, doing yard work and watching football again. I had settled into my little house with my wife, our two cats and our dog. I was enjoying life. Then the unforunate happened.

It hits kind of like a cold. Just as a cold begins with what could be just seasonal allergies, a headache, a slight sniffle - then emerges into full fledged hacking and sneezing, so does PCSS. Instead of a sniffle, there’s the first taste of eggnog. Instead of a headache, there’s the first preview for a Christmas movie. Then comes the sneezing of buying Christmas lights. Unfortunately, before long you’re decorating your house like Clark Griswold, eating sugar cookies decorated like little elves and singing along with that 24/7 Christmas channel on the radio.

So just as I share my suffering with you, I ask that you keep my wife and I in your prayers. Since this disease is quite contagious my wife has sinced asked if I wouldn’t mind staying with all of our boxes in the garage for the time being.

Unfortunately for her, she failed to realize this is where I store our decorations.

My friends, in this life, some days are better than others.

In the case of Bridgette and I, Thursday through Monday more or less reeked of fetid goat drippings. Life has a funny way of rebounding, though. Little, unexpected blessings pop out of the woodwork, like delicious taffy from heaven.

Last night, I was chatting with a friend of mine, and they relayed a story to me. Apparently when this person was a child, they really wanted a goldfish. Their parents, however, were not sympathetic toward this child’s simple, beautiful wish. Undaunted, the child would clip their overgrown, dirty toenails and deposit them in a baggie filled with water. Then, with a pure, childlike exuberance, they would shake the baggie about and pretend that the inanimate toenail clippings were the goldfish they yearned for so desperately.

That, my friends, is the kind of messed-up tale of childhood emotional scarring this blog is built around. It’s the kind of story that heals your heart and strengthens your sternum. In the end, its power lies in its nature as an odd, disquieting microcosm of life’s unfulfilled wishes.

Enjoy your Tuesday, everybody!

After yesterday’s run-in with completely nasty office coffee, I decided I would try brewing some better coffee up at home. While Jason and Daniel both suggested a french press, I decided that I should first make sure this coffee thing is gonna stick before I make the investment. So I pulled our drop coffeemaker out of the basement (where it is stored awaiting visitors) and set it up to brew this morning.

We had coffee stored from the last time we’ve had visitors, too, which isn’t terrifically fresh, but at least has been stored in the freezer. It’s a Starbucks dark roast. I set it all up last night and set the timer for 0500 this morning, which is ten minutes before my alarm goes off. I was wondering if I’d smell the coffee all the way back in the bedroom. I didn’t, though I think that is mostly because we have all the windows open and the ceiling fans on. I did, though, hear the thing start brewing just before my alarm went off to officially wake me up.

I poured a cup, splashed in a little milk, sat down with my breakfast cereal and the newspaper. It was really pretty good. Once this bag of coffee is used up I might want to try something a little lighter, but still… not bad at all, and far better than yesterday’s office fare.

I had been thinking that I had an insulated cup that I could take along to the office with me, but I guess we must’ve gotten rid of it some time ago. So, only one cup for me this morning. I’ll find a mug today and be able to bring that second cup along to work tomorrow. I’m starting to think this experiment might just be a success.

I have been noticing a lot of meaningless polls in the news. Oh, McCain has the bump from the convention! Oh, Obama has pulled ahead by two points! Oh, the Palin effect! None of these polls actually mean anything, because no one really knows what is going to happen on November 4th. In that same spirit, I offer you my deeply unscientific poll of the yard signs I counted while on my two mile run today.

McCain yard signs: 4
Obama yard signs: 2

(Those numbers do seem low, I know. I should say that I ran along a lake and also beside a park, so well over half of my path had houses only on one side. Next time I will choose a more interesting path for my polling purposes.)

The results: Two thirds of the people who were in my running path and who also care enough to put up signs are voting McCain. Sorry, Obama. You should just hang it up now. Unless, of course, all those empty yards are undecided voters. In which case: both you guys better step it up!

It was almost enough to make me want to go for a longer run, because I have seen more of both signs on other paths. Almost. But not really. Also, counting signs sure made that run go faster. People of my neighborhood! Declare your political affiliations! Because it gives me something to do besides listen to The Hold Steady and pine for my run to be over!

Some other deeply unscientific observations:

-Most of the McCain voters are also voting Elizabeth Dole.

-The McCain houses were, uh, considerably larger than the Obama houses. hehehe.

-Except for one McCain house, which was in the smaller part of the neighborhood (read: the part of the neighborhood I live in). At that house, there were people in the yard. And both of them had white hair. It made me laugh, because it’s such a stereotype.

I am actually very interested to see if the signage increases in our neighborhood throughout October. My family isn’t much for joining things or believing in political parties, so we’ve never had signs in our own yard for political candidates. What does the sign do besides alienate your neighbors who feel just as strongly about the other guy (or gal)? Do those signs ever change anyone’s mind? (I do think that local signs can cause name recognition when you get to the polls, but . . . I am pretty sure McCain and Obama have enough name recognition. Just a hunch.) I have never believed in a political candidate strongly enough to want to put a sign up. And, frankly, that’s still how I feel. I am my father’s daughter, and therefore required to hold the position that, “They’re all a bunch of crooks.” I am married, however, to an Obama supporter, and he keeps threatening to cover up the dent on my car’s bumper (thank you, Mr. I-drive-a-giant-SUV-and-talk-on-my-phone-rather-than-looking-when-I-back-up) with an Obama magnet. Because we’re just too busy to actually get the car fixed. And, also, we’re just that classy.

When Zondervan offered up free early copies of Dr. Scot McKnight’s The Blue Parakeet for bloggers to review, I knew I wanted to get in on the action. I’ve enjoyed reading Scot’s (he won’t mind if I use his first name here, I think) blog for some time now, and while I knew he typically inhabits a spectrum of belief a little more emergent than I find myself, I looked forward to reading his thoughts on the Bible, or, as the subtitle of the book says, “Rethinking How You Read the Bible”. (Dr. McKnight is a professor of religious studies at North Park College in Chicago. He also wrote a volume on Galatians in the NIV Application Commentary series.)

Scot lays out his question in the first chapter: “how, then, are we to live the Bible today?” Sure, there are those folks who say that we follow all of it, but really, he says, we “pick and choose” what we live out. He knows that phrase will make us uncomfortable, but he does that to a purpose. We are so used to our denomination’s (or our own) interpretations of Scripture, which help us know which parts we follow and which parts we don’t, that we’ve often stopped thinking about how we go about that interpretation in the first place.

McKnight asks us to look at the Bible and first understand the whole sweep of history - from creation to the fall to redemption to the end. Within that sweep, then, we can start to see how the individual pieces fit. Just as we shouldn’t take a single verse out of context in a chapter, we shouldn’t take a single chapter (or a single book!) out of context of the greater whole. He also encourages us to distinguish between God and the Bible. The Bible is one way God has chosen to reveal Himself to us, but the Bible isn’t God. We don’t worship the Bible. We worship God. (This whole distinction is a useful reminder for those of us who have been in churches where precise, “literal” adherence to the Scripture (at least, the passages deemed “important”) has been given overly-high priority.)

I really enjoyed, appreciated, and agreed with the first two-thirds of The Blue Parakeet. Then Dr. McKnight, in a move he fully admits will not sit well with some, uses his principles of Biblical interpretation to argue for the acceptance of women in pastoral (teaching/leadership) roles in the church. And here is where I lose him. I know that this is one of his pet causes, but it just doesn’t work for me, I’m not convinced.

A few weeks ago on his blog, Dr. McKnight talked about his interpretation of 1 Timothy 3 (a passage that doesn’t get touched on in The Blue Parakeet), and argues it this way:

However, it is an inference to claim that only males can be elders or that all elders must be males. Why do I say this? Here’s why: Paul does not say “Elders must be males.” He assumes the elders to whom he writes are males, but he does not explicitly require that elders be males. Again: he assumes they are males, he says things that apply to males, but Paul does not explicitly say that elders must be males. [Emphasis in the original.]

And that just isn’t a convincing argument to me. You have to assume and read just as much into the passage to come up with his interpretation as you do to come up with the traditional interpretation, and, with McKnight’s position, you further have to ignore 2000 years of the church’s historical understanding of the passage. Furthermore, he argues that the list of qualifications in 1 Tim 3 shouldn’t be considered “rules for” or “qualifications of” elders - rather, that it should be considered “symptoms of virtues expected of leaders for Christians in the 1st Century”. And why? Because, first of all, the lists of 1 Tim 3 and Titus are different, and second, because “we know that many pastors/elders/deacons have children who don’t believe and who are rebellious, some are quarrelsome, some are not hospitable, and not all have a good reputation with outsiders”. In other words, because some who have held the role of elder in the church have failed to meet these standards, therefore they must not be “standards”. Begging your pardon, Dr. McKnight, but isn’t that like saying that since people break the speed limit that the speed limit must just be a “symptom of a virtue expected for drivers in the 21st century”? But I digress.

All in all, I’d recommend Dr. McKnight’s book for a good fresh look at how we interpret Scripture. The degree of “groundbreakingness” (surely that’s not a word, is it?) you feel when reading it will, in large measure, depend on what Biblical tradition you have grown up in and/or studied. Be cautious, though, when you reach the portion that’s interpretation; the quest for “rethinking” needs to continue to be guided by wisdom and historical perspective.

The Blue Parakeet will be released on November 1, 2008, and can be pre-ordered at Amazon.

I’m losing the battle of balance right now.  Work is completely overwhelming at times, which means the few moments I have in the evening are spent decompressing and reviewing the massive list of to-do’s before the wedding.  It’s not a good way to build up to a fun wedding day.

Holy crap… the wedding.  It’s like it somehow went undetected for the past few months only to decide that now is the moment to reappear and remind me that is it less than two weeks away.  There’s so much that has been accomplished (mostly by my wife-to-be and her mom), but the remaining list is frustrating.  I think we just need a solid 4 hour chunk of time to sit down and pick out gifts for our friends in the wedding and finalize the list of cheesy dance favorites for our DJ, but that is only a scratch on the surface.

Finding those four hours is quickly turning into a wild goose chase.  An elusive white whale comprised of ties that need to be picked out, seating charts that need to be assigned, and table centerpieces that have to be finished.  Oh, and tracking down a huge list of people that still haven’t submitted an RSVP either way.

…and I need to find a shiny new pair of black shoes… for my gigantic feet… that don’t require me to take out a loan.

Fun times, my friends.

But soon… soon, Sarah and I will be here:

(why is the “Business Time” song by Flight of the Conchords playing in my head…)

This afternoon I’m fighting to stay awake. I had a Dr. Pepper a few minutes ago and instead of perking me up the biggest impact from it has been a syrupy feeling in my mouth. So, I’m not too sure what was accomplished there.

I need to work out some layouts for commissions, but when the midday lethargy shows up I’m more productive if I’m coloring or inking. Working out poses and layouts require a function of mind that’s first to go when I’m tired. Unfortunately, I don’t have anything that’s sitting around waiting to be finished up.

I’ve got the next two days free to work in the studio, not counting the hour or so tomorrow afternoon helping grandma get to the dentist. My role will consist of making sure she doesn’t fall down on the way to the waiting room, and reminding her where she is when she asks…and then assuring her she’s been there before when she claims she hasn’t. I’ll also do my best to avoid making eye contact with her hygienist, since I defected from her to the other one in the office. She digs in your gums like a prospector in a gold rush, while the other one seems to understand that gums contain nerve endings and not precious metals.

Do you know what’s happening in this picture? (That’s me, third from the left.) It’s homecoming season around here. Yesterday I was talking to some of the girls about dress shopping and dates and football games. But one thing we did not talk about was the mum. If you didn’t grow up in Texas, you probably [...]

Somehow, Lynchburg became a stop-over for my family in the past 2 days.

My parents came though during the day on Sunday on their way back from North Carolina. They had a chance to see the church service and get a little taste of Lynchburg (courtesy of the Neighbor’s Place). I also got the chance to see some pics of my dad and his family when he was a kid. I’m pretty sure he looked more like my brother as a kid than me. His dad looked a LOT like my uncle, so it fits.

My brother and his wife and son came through town this morning. I got the chance to show them the office and a little bit of the Liberty amazingness that is Ward’s Road. Greg’s comment was that you could just go on that road and eat forever. Not too far off the mark, I’d say. It was very good to hear that their trip to Richmond was successful and some of their uncertainties have come to rest. After a quick lunch, they were retracing my parents steps off to Advance, NC.

And now I’m here, in this strange little town that’s not even on a major interstate, yet somehow has become a stopover I’m calling home.

It’s sorta like golf, but with a disc. I’ve played 3 times now. It has a definite learning curve. That’s a nice way of saying that I’m terrible at it.

On the plus side, it was an amazingly beautiful day at Peak’s View Park. It’s hard to beat Virginia in the Fall.

I’m not sure whether to call this Day 4 or Day 6 of The Coffee Experiment. Do I count the weekend where I didn’t drink coffee? I guess I’ll be conservative and call this Day 4.

The office coffee, to this point, has been palatable. While being Folgers, which Allie assured me Saturday night isn’t really coffee, it has been drinkable with a bit of powdered creamer added for good measure. This morning, though, is a different story. This morning the coffee is bitter and nasty. Glad I got some sleep last night because I’m not gonna be getting any caffeine assistance this morning.

Daniel noted that for this reason he takes his own coffee to work. While at the grocery store yesterday I was contemplating picking up some coffee to brew at home, but thought I might wait a few more days to see how The Experiment pans out. After this morning, I’m thinking I might accelerate that purchase schedule a bit.

I just wanted to highlight a new rule that the Department of Health and Human Services is considering implementing to protect the right of conscience for health care providers.

You can read more about it at The Center Blog, which my friend Isaac contributes to.

I think it is very important that the right of conscience, in general, and specifically in medicine, be preserved in the US. It is better to be free to live according to your conscience, and it would be nice to not have your medical license revoked simply because you are opposed to abortion or some other procedure.

Moving is in full swing. I took two car loads today to the house compared with the roommate’s, five loads? Clearly Im the slacker in this relationship. Im also the financial dependent one as well. She has…a career, and a sweet paycheck. I have $20 of gas in my car to last me until Friday, and that was made possible by a random donation to a friend who then gave it to me. (I mean Ill get tips tomorrow from work, but that will go to a little something called groceries.) God is awesome in His, but He sure does stress me out sometimes.
So, I forgot how totally stoked I am about our cute house. We have a good size yard with trees perfect for sitting underneath on cool fall evenings and for hanging a hammock in. We have a beautiful view of the mountains, and I cant wait to look out one of the two windows in my bedroom to see fall’s colorful desplay of change. Our living room and kitchen are just one big, open room and it feels so great. We have close neighbors that include goats, and cats roaming around. Rent is so affordable for a house and I have the best roommate. I really don’t know how I got so lucky.
Work is going well except for the occasional lack of hours. But tonight was one of those shifts where I left feeling engergized. A borrowed partner was my closing shift, and she totally knew Jesus. Her, her husband, myself, and a customer got into a frenzy of a conversation towards the end of the shift. The customer happened to be a professor at a colleg in VA and he was Christian as well. He talked about presenting at Oxford, and hearing Tony Campolo speak there as well. Lots of great energy, conversation and seeing how God beautiful orchestrates the many details of our lives. I got so excited just hearing all the connections and stories of school, places and areas of study. People and their stories energize me anyways, but this particular set of stories and people was especially refreshin