One of the gifts I received for Christmas was a framed collection of pictures of myself and the kids from this past year. Madeline wrote a poem to go along with it, which for obvious reasons, I love:
Our daddy is nice
Our daddy is strong
Our daddy is fun
Our daddy is never wrong
He likes his kids
He plays with them too
We all love him
Merry Christmas to you!

I just posted the pictures from Christmas online here:
Lebbon Christmas
Kurt Christmas

These are probably only of interest to my family.

This is either:
a. My mom displaying her new Christmas present from her kids.
b. My Mom taunting PETA enthusiasts around the world to throw red paint on her.
c. My mom modeling a coat that we found in the back of her closet that was cool 20 years ago.

Every year at Christmas we do our family photos. At just about every family get together we do these grandparent/grandchildren picture, and every year they get a little more chaotic as the crew grows. Notice that out of nine grandkids (and grandparents) how many are actually looking at the camera. I'm just trying to figure out what words of wisdom my dad was about to say before this picture was snapped.

The picture in this frame was taken at Jason and Jess's wedding and given to me as a Christmas gift by them. They thought that if I didn't want it, my Mom surely would....and they were right. Probably the best Christmas gift she's ever received.

This is going to be a great week... Last week was crazy between trying to finish up everything for Christmas, wrapping things up at work before vacation and my computer dying. It took reloading my system 6 different times to finally get the issue resolved... resulting in me doing a complete reformat of my system. Luckily, no data was lost. Keeping the four systems in my home up and running is becoming a full-time job.

Santa visited us Thursday morning - Christmas Eve-Eve. We did it then to try and space things out and give us some more breathing room in a time that's typically pretty hectic. We woke up, opened presents and the kids had all day to play with their presents. In the evening we had our annual 'Birthday party for Jesus' and then our church had their Christmas eve-eve service (Not having a building makes doing a christmas eve service tough to schedule). It was a great day overall.

On Friday, we woke up, pulled things together and headed to my parent's house for Christmas #2. I love getting together with my family - but between my 3 siblings, spouses and eight nieces and nephews, it's so high energy the whole time. My mom cooks amazing meals for lunch, dinner and the following breakfast - each meal consisting of at least ten different things, not including dessert. We had something to eat, got dressed for church and took our annual family pictures -which are no small ordeal, especially with my brother jon antagonizing everyone possible. I made the mistake of giving Jon my camera to take picture during parts of it and I ended up with a collection of people's butts and crotches. Thanks Jon.

We went to church that night at my Mom's church, which is a traditional Lutheran church. We've been doing this since I can remember. We take up 3 rows between all of us and it's pretty comical watching all of the kids who range from age 1 - 9. We sing all of the great christmas hymns and have a candle light song at the end, which is awesome. It's so different from Crossroads, but I love it just the same. I have so many great memories of going to church, especially going and sitting with my Uncle Bill (deceased). We'd sing and laugh, all while trying to stay under the radar of my mom and grandma's watchful eyes.

We came home, had a huge meal and the opened some of the presents from the aunts and uncles to the kids, and to our parents. The girls had gone through all of our families pictures and put together a scrapbook chronicling our family all the way from my parent's childhood through now. My mom loved it. I mixed up some of the hurricane mix that I brought back from New Orleans, which threw Dan, Kevin and I for a loop. We hung out, played with the presents and laughed a lot. Dan, Kris and family headed home and the rest of us finally crashed sometime after midnight, ready for an early morning.

We woke up Christmas morning early, with Madeline and Gabe running around and signing some obnoxious Christmas song, but it beat them ringing the bells my Mom's given them in the past years. The kids and grandkids opened presents from my parents and played until about noon. I got to go pick up my Grandma from her aparentment in Haslett. She's old (not sure how old - she'll never tell, but I think it's in the mid 80's). She moves at a snail's pace and is really fragile, but she amazes me at how sharp she is. We had a great conversation on the car ride back about Christmas in the past, my grandpa, my uncle, my kids an my job. It was one of the best parts of my Christmas. Around noon, we loaded up and headed for Christmas #3.

We got to Cathie's parents in Dewitt in the afternoon and were able to exhale after a crazy 24 hours. It's such a different atmosphere than my parents and I really look forward to it. There are only our three kids, my brother-in-law Ed and his wife Stacy, and of course Cathie's Mom and Dad. We opened a ton of presents and had a huge meal with at least 10 desserts. It's such a nice, slow-paced time, We hang out, eat and eat some more. The kids have so much fun, just loving hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa and their Aunt and Uncle. By the end of the night, we were beat and headed home. Loading the van becomes an interesting exercise in packing, but I got it done.

I'm thrilled to see that it's looking like airlines will NOT allow cell phone usage on planes: Phones in flight

Top 10 Cheesiest Movie Lines Ever:
1. “Titanic”: Leonardo DiCaprio’s “I’m the king of the world!”
2. “Dirty Dancing”: Patrick Swayze’s “Nobody puts Baby in the corner.”
3. “Four Weddings And A Funeral”: Andie McDowell’s “Is it still raining? I hadn’t noticed.”
4. “Ghost”: Demi Moore’s “Ditto,” to Patrick Swayze’s “I love you.”
5. “Top Gun”: Val Kilmer to Tom Cruise: “You can be my wingman anytime”
6. “Notting Hill”: Julia Roberts’ “I’m just a girl... standing in front of a boy... asking him to love her.”
7. “Independence Day”: Bill Pullman’s “Today we celebrate our Independence Day!”
8. “Braveheart”: Mel Gibson’s “They may take our lives, but they will not take our freedom!”
9. “Jerry Maguire”: Renee Zellweger to Tom Cruise: “You had me at hello.”
10. “The Postman”: A blind woman says to Kevin Costner: “You’re a godsend, a savior.” He replies: “No, I’m a postman.”

Jon sent me this. Gotta love public speaking. Nice save by the news woman at the end... Check this video clip out.

If you haven't already, download MSN Messenger v7 Beta. It has a much improved interface and some great new interactive features.

I'm in my hotel room getting ready to go into a big presentation and noticed that I had about a three inch hole in my pants. Great news. Luckily the thread had come out on the seam, so I sewed it back up. I grabbed the sewing kit, sewed it up, and it looks pretty decent, not great, but decent.

Emily brought home an ornament from pre-school that she'd made as a gift in pre-school. She told Cathie "Ms. Barb told me to give these presents to you, but I'm only letting you hang it on the tree until I want it back - because it's so beautiful."

I flew in to Galveston, TX (just outside of Houston) yesterday and it's not quite what I expected. I think Texas, you think warm and dry. It's in the mid-40's and rainy - but I can see palm trees and the ocean from my hotel room window. I once read that there are more churches and more strip clubs per capita than any other city in America. Driving to Galveston through Houston I must have seen 50 strip clubs along the expressway. I saw an interesting example of this dichotemy (good word, eh?) as I drove by a huge billboard for a strip club called "Heartbreakers" and behind it was another billboard that read "Jesus Heals the broken hearted".

image001.jpg

Very interesting article entitled Eminem Is Right out of Policy Review that looks at music today and why it resonates with kids:

In a nutshell, the ongoing adult preoccupation with current music goes something like this: What is the overall influence of this deafening, foul, and often vicious-sounding stuff on children and teenagers? Nonetheless, this is not my focus here. Instead, I would like to turn that logic about influence upside down and ask this question: What is it about today’s music, violent and disgusting though it may be, that resonates with so many American kids?

As it turns out, such an exercise yields a fascinating and little understood fact about today’s adolescent scene. If yesterday’s rock was the music of abandon, today’s is that of abandonment. The odd truth about contemporary teenage music — the characteristic that most separates it from what has gone before — is its compulsive insistence on the damage wrought by broken homes, family dysfunction, checked-out parents, and (especially) absent fathers...........

Check this out. It's the entire It's a Wonderful a Life movie in 30 seconds re-enacted by rabbits. The next question is... Why?

I'm a huge Donkey Kong fan! This is fun.

Why Jesus Likes Kids:
I think I know what it takes to be socially acceptable, and for some reason I’ve tried to be like that in my relationship with God—prim and proper. Forgetting that before Him I really am just a kid (no matter how old I may dress), in need of His loving help and grace, to the point that maybe I should be quicker and more persistent to ask for it. I’m not pretending to really understand prayer or what it does, but I think it probably involves being more kid-like, even if it annoys me.

This is Elvis... and my nephew Matthew. They both have a lot in common. Except Matthew is not an honorary member of the FBI. And Matthew's not dead. Other than that, lots in common.

These are the masks I brought back from New Orleans for the kids. The tough party was explaining to Emily why she couldn't wear her mask to her pre-school Christmas party Thursday night.

I've been trying out a new photo service called Flickr. It's not your typical picture site, most of which center around selling you photos. This site is around the storage and tagging of pictures for sharing, especially for blogs and e-mail sharing. It integrates in with all of the blog services, hosts the pictures, organizes them and lets you upload them via e-mail - including from cell phones. You can create various style-sheet templates that allow for a very customized look and feel to your blog post.

Here's a good article in Wired Magazine about flickr..

2004_maddie_xmas_tree

2004_maddie_xmas_tree,
originally uploaded by fusionmonkey.

We worked on getting the tree up yesterday. Okay, Cathie worked on getting the tree up, I carried some boxes and a tree into the room. Once Cathie got the lights on, the kids all helped decorate it. Every year they pull out the ugly ornaments that I made when I was a kid and ask why we've got it on the tree. This year was no exception. Emily had a stool and put every ornament within a one foot radius.

Lesson for the day: Just because Nate's seven, doesn't mean he can't hurt me with boxing gloves. A blow to the head with 16oz gloves hurts. In order to make it fair, I get on my knees as we box. Mom's still "helping" us come up with the ground rules for when the guys can use their gloves.

Mike, my son Nate and I went to the Novi Expo Center for the annual computer show. Half the fun of this thing is people watching. You get all kinds at this thing. I needed to pick up some stuff for our home system that kept randomly locking up. I'd tried everything and I finally broke down and bought a new board and CPU. I got a great deal. Mike and I installed it this afternoon and it all worked... well almost... the power light on the front is on when the computer is off and vice versa. But the thing clocks in at 3.3 GHz, all for $99, including the onboard video.

Half of the show was wall to wall computer junk, in the most literal sense. The other half was typical flea market type stuff - fake purses, cheap shoes, stereo systems and more knives and swords than you can imagine. We spent more time messing around with all of the knives and swords than we did looking at computer gear. They had a great deal on boxing gloves, so Nate and I picked up a pair and we've been boxing around the house all day long. I've got a longer reach, but he's at the exact wrong height - so it's even in the end.

One of the people I was with this week had one of these 20 Q games in their car and I played with it non-stop. This thing was borderline creepy. You think of something and it proceeds to ask you 20 questions to which you answer "Yes, No, Sometimes or Unknown". It was almost always right. I guessed stuff like: Soccer Ball, Jaguar, Tree and it nailed it.

Alright, this is something my dad sent me. It's a little corny, but I like the point:

I CORINTHIANS 13 - A CHRISTMAS VERSION a
If I decorate my house perfectly with plaid bows, strands of twinkling lights and shiny balls, but do not show love to my family, I'm just another decorator.

If I slave away in the kitchen, baking dozens of Christmas cookies, preparing gourmet meals and arranging a beautifully adorned table at mealtime, but do not show love to my family, I'm just another
cook.

If I work at the soup kitchen, carol in the nursing home and give all
that I have to charity, but do not show love to my family, it profits me
nothing.

If I trim the spruce with shimmering angels and crocheted snowflakes,
attend a myriad of holiday parties and sing in the choir's cantata but do
not focus on Christ, I have missed the point.


Love stops the cooking to hug the child. Love sets aside the decorating to kiss the husband. Love is kind, though harried and tired. Love doesn't envy another's home that has coordinated Christmas china and table linens. Love doesn't yell at the kids to get out of the way, but is thankful they are there to be in the way. Love doesn't give only to those who are able to give in return but rejoices in giving to those who can't. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.

Video games will break, pearl necklaces will be lost, golf clubs will rust, but giving the gift of love will endure.

I thought this was a great quote:
"The truth is that wherever a man lies with a woman, there, whether they like it or not, a transcendental relation is set up between them which must be eternally enjoyed or eternally endured."
-C. S. Lewis

I'm in Baton Rogue and I'm still full. After our workshop yesterday, we took our customer out to dinner at Juban's, a famous Creole resturant out here. The people down here are very hospitable to us Yankees and wanted to make sure I tried all of their cuisine. I sat at dinner with my plate of food, surrounded by 8 other smaller plates from our customers who wanted to make sure I had a taste of what they'd ordered. Really tremendous people down here, not quite as laid back as New Orleans, not quite as much debauchery, but a great place. I'm flying back this afternoon.

I got up, worked out, had some meetings and then headed down to the French Market Area to go to Cafe Du Monde. It's a great area with some amazing architecture.

So I went to the original Emril's resturant tonight down here in New Orleans. The service was the best I've ever had and the food was phenomenal. Across the street, they were filming a movie - I can't remember which ones, but it was starring Kevin Spacey. I was with one of our local sales reps, Dee, who grew up in this area and knows everyone. She knows everyone down here, even spends Christmas with the Manning family (ie. Payton, Eli, Archie, etc). On the way out of the resturant, we ran into Wayne Huizenga, founder of Blockbuster video, who said hi to Dee by name. She used to date the guy.

Tomorrow, before we head to Baton Rouge for customer meetings, I'm going to stop by the infamous Cafe du Mond for a Beignets and Cafe o'lait. It's in every movie that takes place in New Orleans - I just can't remember which.

I'm in New Orleans today, Baton Rogue tomorrow. My hotel is right off of Bourbon Street. I had lunch today at one of the best oyster places around, Acme Oyster. I had a po-boy. Check out the menu. They actually have something called a poopa. We're heading to the original Emril's tonight for dinner. Should be good.

My brother Dan turned me on to a great new author, Lee Child. The books have the same character through out all of the - a really cool guy named Jack Reacher. I think there are seven books in all so far. These are books that you cannot put down once you pick them up. The guy reminds me of John Clark in Tom Clancy's novels, but a little more down-to-earth and a little less serious and less psycho. Anyways, very well worth checking them out.

My brother Jon and I were both amazed that Dan would actually reccomend a book, seeing how he barely reads. If you loan Dan a book, you'll get it back in 6 months - maybe. The only time he claims to read is if he's on a plane ride to Korea, and then he supposedly reads 9 books each way. I think he's getting the cliff notes to try and impress Jon and I.

We had our big Dodgeball playoffs tonight and we went from third place to last by losing all but one game! The last game, Will Brown and Jason Monstrola caught everything thrown our way so that we went out big! I think I've finally figured out how to throw the ball so that my arm is usable in the week that follows. Dodgeball starts up again in January, and the movie comes out on DVD tomorrow. Dodge, dip, duck, dive and dodge!

I just got a new Uniden TRU8885 cordless phone for about $20. About 10 years ago I bought my cordless phone at Sears for about $150. For some reason, I bought the product protection plan, which was about $25 and is good for 2 years. In my house, the average cordless phone is lucky to make it that long. I bring it back, get a full credit towards a new phone, pay another $20 for the new product protection plan and get the latest, greatest phone. It's one of the few times that the product protection plan has ever really worked for me.

Here are technologies I'm still using after a few weeks:
X1
DirectTV HD Tivo
Firefox
iTunes/iPod
allofmp3.com
Treo 600 (Although I now want a 650 with Bluetooth capabilities).

Great article about the need to know, which I think I suffer from. As I was reading this, I was thinking about all of the different information sources I digest regularly... I love the newspaper I subscribe to three: Wall Street Journal, Detroit News and the South Lyon Herald - and I try and read them cover-to-cover as often as possible. I subscribe to 7 different magazines (Mens Journal, Entertainment Weekly, Money and a few others I can't remember). On top of that, I my computer and my phone push headlines over to me constantly through various blogs and RSS Feeds.

Check out this video from Jeopardy. Ken Jenning's question to the answer is "What is a Ho, Alex?"

According to this article Jesus was spotted in this dental X-Ray.

I found this on Dan's blog regarding U2's new single Vertigo off of How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb:
According to this:

"The counting Bono does in the beginning is uno does tres catorce is spannish for one two three fourteen. According to several sources in the U2-Talk mailing list, the album is U2's 14:th album (including Wide Awake in America) and Lillywhite has been involved with U2's first, second, third and now fourteenth album. There have been some debate to which albums to include to get fourteen albums, if the "Best of" or "Wide Awake in America" should be included etc., but nobody knows for sure what Bono is referencing to yet. It might be so he just thought it sounded cool. "

Other sites list the lyrics as the numbers would be "en espanol" not in french. I wondered about the same thing myself and was just makng jokes to my roomie the other day about that.

I was dumping the pictures from the digital camera today and ran across this picture. Occasionally, Emily likes to grab the camera and take all sorts of crazy pictures. You can make up your own story on what Cathie's doing here.

Emily had been telling us about a boy in her pre-school class that she'd been playing with. Apparently the boy's name is cardboard. We got to class and she pointed out cardboard. Apparently, his name is Carter. Having a kid named cardboard seems funny to me.

As I lay sleeping on Saturday morning I heard the kids up and running around. I heard the door open and the kids proclaim "Hey, where did these come from? Let's play manger!" I heard the girls singing Away in a Manger as I faded in and out of conciousness. When I woke up, I found this collection of 2 foot tall figurines. I called the Niemi's and Girard's to find out which it had been. Turns out it was Dan Reynolds.

The three couples got babysitters at 9PM last night and exacted our revenge. It was really pretty elaborate. We decided to decorate Dan's house, in a bad way. We had pink christmas tree lights, huge strands of gaudy pearls and an entire nativity scene linked together by rope which we put up in their pine tree. The lights went over their doorway and bushes. I took part of the manger scene and used Liquid Nail to glue it to one of Dan's landscaping rocks. I'm just not sure that's ever coming off. The costumes? They just seemed funny at the time. Except the clown. The clown always seemed scary. Not funny. Can you guess who that is in the clown? One hint: It's not me.

Ya know, Justin looks pretty creepy here as well. Dan is probably the wrong person to start something like this with. I'm sure he'll have no problem escalating this out of control very quickly.

I went with a friend of mine in my neighborhood, Mark, to the Lions game yesterday. He has great seats. We were about 15 rows back from the field. It was interesting that at the beginning of the game they don't even announce a number of players to avoid the booing. Joey Harrington for one. John Navvarae (ex-U of M Quarterback) was in for Arizona. Did my heart good to see him fail miserably. How many U of M quarterbacks do we really need in the NFL right now anyways?

On Friday night, Brad, Ted and I took Will out for his birthday... At least that was the idea. For whatever reason, he ended up having to work until 9, which got him back to this area closer to 10. We ended up meetnig Will at Ted's house around 10 after the whaler's game and sat around watching Old School.

I just added a cool iTunes plugin that allows my blog to dynamically show what I've been listening to in iTunes. It's called Now Playing and it outputs my iTunes info to XML to which I've got a PHP script that puts both the song name, the image and a link to Amazon to buy the track. Heck, I'm just impressed that I was able to pull all of the pieces together to get this to work.

I've been messing with Audioscrobbler lately. It has plug-ins for both Mac and PC that work with every music player out there. The plug-in uploads a list of the tunes you listen to, compiles it with everyone elses and gives you some very good reccomendations.

A friend of mine, Kirk Vickers, was on the news on Monday night talking about the exercise aspect of the Dance, Dance revolution game. You can read more about it here. He was telling me that at one point during the kid's playing, his heart rate got up to 250/beats per minute... which is a lot.

I was listening to this message by Rob Bell of Mars Hill Church on Suffering. There was a part of 2 Corinthians 6 that he read that hit me between the eyes, particularly in light of the stuff my church has been going through for a while now. I sometimes get so discouraged about our church, about where we're at, the people that are being impacted - focused on everything we're not doing instead of what we are doing. This verse just resonated with my heart in such a huge way when I read it.

⁴Our work as God's servants gets validated--or not--in the details. People are watching us as we stay at our post, alertly, unswervingly . . . in hard times, tough times, bad times; ⁵when we're beaten up, jailed, and mobbed; working hard, working late, working without eating; ⁶with pure heart, clear head, steady hand; in gentleness, holiness, and honest love; ⁷when we're telling the truth, and when God's showing his power; when we're doing our best setting things right; ⁸when we're praised, and when we're blamed; slandered, and honored; true to our word, though distrusted; ⁹ignored by the world, but recognized by God; terrifically alive, though rumored to be dead; beaten within an inch of our lives, but refusing to die; ¹⁰immersed in tears, yet always filled with deep joy; living on handouts, yet enriching many; having nothing, having it all.

The second part reminded me of a conversation I'd had with a friend of mine on Sunday night. We were talking about how easy it is to get wrapped up in our own worlds, and the best way to get out of our funks can be to focus outside of ourselves. Paul continues on in 2 Corinthians 6:

12We didn't fence you in. The smallness you feel comes from within you. Your lives aren't small, but you're living them in a small way. ¹³I'm speaking as plainly as I can and with great affection. Open up your lives. Live openly and expansively!

Noel's message last week talked about the concept of Open Theism which is basically the. According to this, I'm a Freewill Theist. The first I'd heard of the idea of Open Theism was when I read the book, Letters from a Skeptic by Gregory Boyd
. Great book, but the part that didn't sit with me was the part where he explained his perspective on God's fore-knowledge of the future and free will.

This is a video of Yale punking Harvard. They get 1800 harvard fans to hose themselves. Check out the video and web site at www.harvardsucks.org

Had a pretty uneventful morning. The kids and I let Cathie sleep in for a while and then I went to the gym and then picked up Riley from Nicki's (Thanks Nik!). Nate and I went out to buy the gifts for the Angel Tree child we were helping out and then out to lunch. We had a great time, getting lots of unhealthy food, like milk shakes. We have great conversations when we go out, coming up with hypothetical questions for each other like "If you could choose between shooting a rocket laucher or a sniper rifle, which would you choose and why?" As we're driving, our favorite past-time is for me to pick random songs on my iPod and tell him the story behind the song. Today, we were talking about and listening to songs by Peter Gabriel, U2 and Yes.

We got back last night from our Thanksgiving extravaganza. On Thursday, we got together at my parent's house and had our annual Kurt Family Thanksgiving dinner. Between my mom, dad, grandma, brothers, sisters, spouses, nieces and nephews there are 19 1/2 of us. My mom cooked an amazing meal with 5 or 6 different desserts. We ate our fill as we watched the Lions lose miserably. That evening, we headed over to Cathie's parents house in Dewitt.

The next morning we got up and a bunch of us went on our annual Christmas Tree Farm expedition. We chopped down a tree as usual. We headed back to Cathie's parents where we began the annual Lebbon Thanksgiving extravaganza. Cathie's brother Ed and his wife Stacy were both there and we had a meal that could have easily fed twice the number of people there. Again, an awesome meal. We hung out there until about 7ish and most of us headed back. Madeline stuck around to spend the night.

I got back last night and met up with Matt, Will and Jason to play some Halo 2 at our church office on the big screen. What a game! I sucked, but not as bad as Will, so there's some solace in that for me.

We had our first big snow, so the kids and I went out first thing this morning to play while Cathie got things packed and ready to head out for Thanksgiving. Our dog Riley was having a great time until Emily tried to hook the sled up to her, convinced that she's a sled dog.

Reason #437 why you don't let a 3 year old maker her own hot choclate:

Couple of pictures from Monday Night Football:
This Ross, Matt and I - a couple of my good friends from work who I went to the game with:

This old gal is one of the die hard Cheifs fans I saw at the game. The cigarette completes the picture:

I've been listening to this message from Rob Bell at Mars Hills Church in Grand Rapids, part of the series 15 part on Mastering the Art of Living. Great series, but there are two messages on truth that have really caused me to think, which I guess is what a good sermon does. Part 11 deals with finding and claiming truth in the world around us as Christians. It was a concept I'd heard, but taken to a new point that I hadn't. Part 12 takes it quite a bit further, talking about God in terms of the definition of Ultimate Reality. I've been reading about this same idea in the book I just started called The Divine Conspiracy, by Dallas Willard.

In Rob's message, he makes a leap somewhere in the message iin how he interprets John 14:6 which is where Jesus states:

"I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him."

I'm just not sure I'm tracking with where he takes this. Rob seems to take the position that this is not about Jesus saying that he's the gatekeeper to heaven but that he's pointing to the ultimate reality that is God and himself. It seems to be such a fine line between Christianity and Universalism. It's caused me to do a lot of thinking and studying, which I guess is the goal of a great message. Take a listen and let me know what you think. I've had some great conversations with a friend of mine Mark who's been looking into Kaballah, about this verse and how it lines up with what he thinks, but I still can't follow how Rob Bell comes to the conclusions that he does with this.

As a family, we're participating in the Angel Tree program through church. Angel Tree helps prison inmates to provide Christmas gifts to their kids while their in prison. Cathie and Madeline, Nate and I each picked an family to help. I was talking with Nate tonight and he had a choice between getting the boy we chose one gift, or getting him two gifts at the expense of giving up one of his own christmas gifts. Being 7, I figured he'd go with giving the boy one gift and take the extra christmas gift. He didn't even hestitate to say that he wanted to get the boy the extra gifts. I'm a proud dad.

I just barely made it home from Kansas City this morning. For some reason, I woke up at about 3:30 AM and was wide awake. Since I had to leave the hotel in an hour and a half, I decided to stay up. When I looked out the window, they already had 6 inches of snow. There was none when I went to bed. I got the airport, and they'd closed it down to clear the runways. Our flight ended up taking off at 7:30 instead of 6. I'm not sure what I was thinking traveling today, the busiest travel day of the year. Rookie move on my part. Luckily, I made it home. I can't imagine the poor schmucks who travel later today with all of the weather problems going on around the country. I'm just glad we're driving for thanksgiving tomorrow.

In my message on sunday, I quoted from James 2, talking about the relationship between our faith and our actions. According to Jerry Fallwell and some of his buddies mentioned in this article, this shouldn't even be in the bible. I knew I should have checked with Jerry before using it. This is just one of those things you learn over time.

If you haven't already, check out the movies that Amazon.com's been showing. They're short features (<3 minutes) either starring or directed by big names, that have no product placement or amazon.com mention. They're very well done and worth watching.

Nothing like getting back form the gym to find that you didn't pack any changes of underwear.

I went to my first Monday Night Football game ever last night at Arrowhead stadium to wastch the Kansas City Chiefs play the New England Patriots. It was a great experience. When you first drive in, there is a huge haze over the stadium from all the barbecuing. Being Kansas City, people don't grill burgers or brats down here, there was the smell of steak in the air. People had some amazing tailgaiting setups. I've never seen a stadium so blanketed by the team's color. It was red everywhere you looked. I would guess that 98% of the fans there were wearing some kind of chiefs jacket, hat or shirt.

There was this really cool camera that was connected at four axis points over the stadium that could move three dimensionally to stay over the action. Seems like a fun job to have. My video games skills could truly be utilized there.

I thought my message today in church went well. I felt really good about the whole thing. The title of the message was "Duct Tape Christianity". It went longer than I thought, so I had to cut it on the fly to keep it to only 35 minutes. You can download it here.

I've been going back and forth with the nigerian royalty trying to figure out where he can send me the $15M. An exceprt of their e-mail to me:

IN ORDER TO FULLFIL THE WISHES OF HER LATE HUSBAND, SHE HAS DECIDED THAT SHE WILL ASSIST THE NEEDY AND THE LESS PRIVILEDGED PEOPLE IN OUR SOCIETY. BEFORE HER HUSBAND`S DEATH HE DEPOSITED SOME AMOUNT OF MONEY TO THE TUNE OF US$15.240,000(FIFTEEN MILLION TWO HUNDRED AND FORTY THOUSAND UNITED STATES DOLLARS) WITH A SECURITY COMPANY ,UNDER THE GUISE OF LOCAL GOODS TO BE PRODUCED IN EUROPE. THAT WAS WILLED TO HER AFTER HIS DEATH. WHAT SHE REQUIRES FROM YOU IS FOR YOU TO GO TO THE SECURITY COMPANY AND MAKE CLAIMS OF THE DEPOSIT , SEND 50% OF THE TOTAL SUM TO HER HERE IN AFRICA TO ASSIST THE LESS PRIVILEDGED,THEN YOU WILL DISBURSE 30% TO DO THE SAME ABROAD (SPECIFICALLY CHILDREN`S CHARITY) WHILE YOU WILL RETAIN THE REMAINDING 20%.

My latest communication with him:

My church and I would like to participate. We are in desparate need of money to feed the poor in our area. This money would be a huge help. Please advise on how we can be of assistance to you.

My son's cub scout pack collected 6,900 cans of food for our local food shelter. It's a great thing for hurting families, but it was a great thing for the kids. They got as much out of it as anyone!

I met a friend of mine for lunch yesterday. As we were leaving the resturant, my friend handed me something they'd printed out for me to read. Before heading outside, I told them I had to use the restroom. My friend then replied (rather loudly) "Can I hold it?" Of course they meant the document they'd just given me, but people turned around and stared as I laughed hysterically and my friend quickly added "....the document". We laughed very hard about this.

Like everyone else, I periodically get spam e-mails from people claiming they would like to deposit large amounts of money in my bank account in order to escape the tyranny of their country. I've started replying to the e-mails, telling them I'm all in and seeing how long I can string them along. I'm currently going back and forth with DR.EMMANUEL KUMAHLO. Occasionally I tell them I'm a pastor and my church would like to give him our bank account number in order to help them out. Suprisingly, this turns most of them off.

Madeline was sick and out of school last week three days. On his own, Nate made her a get well card. I have no idea what the picture is on the card, but the caption read "Get well soon. I miss you very much. You're the best sister a boy could ever have. I wish you good luck getting well. From Nathan."

Lots of you are probably wondering what to get me for Christmas. Okay, not lots, probably very few. As my good deed for Christmas, I'm putting my Amazon Wishlist out there for your amusement or shopping pleasure.

If you're not using it already, this is worth checking out: Firefox. Firefox is a free browser created by a consortium of programmers that works great, has better functionality that Internet Explorer and best of all IS NOT A MICROSOFT PRODUCT. One of the best features about it is the tabbed browsing feature, which lets you have multiple sessions going concurrently in the same window.

A9 is a search engine worth looking at. It's all about how it formats the output - allowing you to select various columns against your search criteria: Movies, Music, Books, Images, etc. If you use the toolbar, Amazon.com gives you a discount on your purchases. Not a bad deal.

This article about worship struck me this morning:

Jesus says I cannot worship two gods, that I will hate the one and love the other. Since I really do want God to be God in my life, I need to smash these singing and doing worlds together. I need to seriously look at where my love-caused action towards other things supplants my love-caused action toward God … and I probably need to break out in song a little more often.

On the list of annoying things: Watching a television show while Emily has the remote. She's learned how to use Tivo's pause function and she pauses it every few seconds to look at what's on TV or tell you about what she just saw or what the characters just said. Her favorite show right now is Zoboomafoo. She starts the show off by doing a crazy dance she's made up and then pauses it every few seconds for the rest of the show. Should I be proud that my three year old is proficient with the remote, or are we just letting her watch waaaay too much tv. I'm guessing the second.

Why you can't leave a three year old unattended for 30 seconds:

Nate's cub scout pack did the second part of a can drive today. Last week the kids left bags for people to fill up with canned food on people's doors and this week they were collecting them as people left them on their porch. Nate, his friend Trevor and I went out this morning to go collect the food. As we went around, we couldn't find any bags out there. Nate was in disbelief, asking "Dad, don't people care about the poor?" We began going door-to-door asking for cans. They would go up to the door, dressed in their cub scout uniforms and Nate would go through their spiel: "Hi we're with the cub scouts collecting cans of food for poor people. Would you like to help poor people?" How could you say no to that? It turned out that the reason no cans were out in our neighborhood is because another cub scout group came through our neighborhood accidently and picked up our cans.

Here's a picture of me almost, but not actually hang gliding. At least I have a picture of me not really doing it.

Great story on choosing life over convience.

Today is Spiro Agnew's birthday. Interestingly enough, you can rearrange the letters of his name to spell Grow a Penis

This is really cool. My friend (who happens to also be my trainer) Kirk Vickers was selected by Mens Journal Magazine as one of the top 100 trainers in the country, as stated in this article. He is one of the only two trainers in the state of Michigan who got this recognition. The votes came from other fitness professionals, Doctors, Physical Therapists and other trainers. If you don't know Kirk, he used to be the head trainer for the Detroit Red Wings and now owns his own gym, Triad Performance Training Center where he trains schmoes like me as well as professional athletes. I think it would be important for Kirk that everyone know that I can bench press more than him. Frankly, it probably should have made the article.

I went out to Torrey Pines to go hang gliding this afternoon. It's a world famous glideport (is that a real word?) by the Torrey Pines golf course. It's right on the ocean and is based at on a huge cliff hundreds of feet high. I was in the tandem harness, ready to go off the cliff when suddenly the wind died down. It never picked up, and I didn't get to go. Next time.

I was in a Starbucks today in San Diego that had a pay-for-use bathroom today. I had to borrow a quarter to use it. Just as I got ready to plop it in (the quarter), a starbucks Barista saved the day and handed me a quarter.

I got up at 4:30 this morning to try and keep my internal clock square, and I'm beat, it's only 5:30. I fly out tomorrow. First class both ways. Gotta love it. Additionally, I'm gold (almost diamond) in the Hilton chain. Gold gets me all sorts of perks when I check in, like a fruit basket waiting in my room, free room service breakfasts, etc. Diamond has the nice perk of being able to walk into any Hilton hotel anywhere and get a room, regardless of whether they're booked or not. They'll actually bump someone for you to get you a room.

I'm teaching in two weeks at Crossroads. I'm looking forward to it. We're doing a series based on the movie Saved, looking at some of the concepts from the movie.


I started reading the book Fearless Faith by John Fischer. A friend of mine, Ken Buck, had been harping on me to read this for a long time now, telling me it would help me articulate some my frustration towards the christian subculture out there. He reams out everything from Christian radio, music, books, movies - you name it. It's a good book for the most part, a few things I don't agree with so far, but I'm still processing what he's saying.

We lost pretty severely last night in Dodgeball. I think we only won a 2 or 3 games out of 9, butwe had a great time doing it. We've gotten to know the other teams pretty well, so the trash talking and sidline conversations keep things interesting, not to mention the side bets that go on to spice things up. We hung out at Ted's afterwards to watch Monday night football and complain about how bad our arms hurt us. I know I'm whining here, but my arm is pretty much numb by the end of the game. It's the equivalent of pitching a 9 inning game, I think (since i've never really played baseball in my life), but it hurts.... A lot. Our team is on average 10 years older than all of the other teams so we're hurting pretty bad by the third game.

For the past couple of weeks I've been using allofmp3.com to download music. It's very different from the other download services for a couple of reasons:
1. There's no copy protection on the music, so you can load it anywhere you want.
2. You can download it in any format and quality that you want.
3. It charges by the Mb for music. Where most music services charge $1 per song, songs here run from $.02 - $.05 depending on their size. You end up paying about $.50 per album as opposed to $10.
4. This site has every album or artist in the world on it.

I was a little skeptical to give my credit card to a russian site at first, but from everything I've read and experienced, it's trustyworthy. Apparetly, because of Russian Copyright laws, they can offer music from all artists and labels. They have an amazing collection of music out there. I haven't found anything they DON'T have yet.

Here's a review on the service that provides a good overview and other referenes. You can download the client software here.

I've got a delimma. I've always mocked the "My child was student of the month" bumper stickers. I'm not a big fan of bumper stickers in general, really. My daughter Madeline came running into my office this afteroon sharing with me that she was selected as her school's student of the month, showing me her certificate, the letter and what else, but a student of the month bumper sticker. She told me I could even put it on my car. Thinking quickly, I told her I wanted to put it some place EVEN MORE special than my car. Thankfully, she thought my office would be even better. I'm a bad parent, huh?

Nate and I went to see The Incredibles last night. It was phenomenal!
I've got to agree with Kevin Smith, who said it's the best Super Hero movie EVER MADE. Not only were the graphics, down to the last strand of hair amazing, but the plot was great and it was almost 2 hours long! There's a great article about the movie from a geek's perspective on Slashdot. Nate and I have been playing the video game on PS2, which is a lot of fun as well. Samuel L. Jackson is cool in just about any role he plays, let alone a super hero,

Two more reasons I love being a dad:
My three year old Emily fell asleep today on the couch while holding a large dill pickle in her hand. Cathie found her asleep and took the pickle form her. Emily woke up and told my wife "I'm going to fall back asleep with a pickle and see if it disappears again."

I came up to bed the other night and found that my 6 year old daughter Madeline had left a note by my bedside that read: "Keep this with you. I love you dad and I will never stop. Remember the fun times we have. Just a reminder. Madeline"

I voted. One successful approach I've had in past years is to vote for the most whacked out parties for University of Michigan's board of trustees. I picked the Natural Law party and the Green Party. Eventually, I hope their political ideology will trickle down into the football team.

We played Dodgeball last night. Had a couple guys from the neighborhood come to the game, which is ultimately how I was hoping it would go. We're not good, but we're not in last place. We're a bunch of old guy, relative to the other teams. We start off throwing strong, and by about the 4th game (we play a total of 12 or so), our arms are rubber while everyone else is still hurling the ball at us with full strength. My arm and shoulder was dying by the end of this. Wasn't there a time I could beat the snot out of my body and not suffer any ramifications?

Cathie and I watched a new show on MTV called You've got a friend. The basic premise is this:
A person agrees to be paired up with an actor for 48 hours who poses to be their friend. This "friend" can order you to do anything, and typically does. Anything from making them dump their girlfriend, quit their job or eat a booger. If the person refueses once during that time, they lose. If they successfully complete the 48 hours, they get $15,000. The guy they pick to be the friend has an amazing ability to know exactly which buttons to push on others, how to spot the weaknesses and go after them with gusto. I think I've found a great job. Pushing people's buttons and getting paid for it!

We had a fun Holloween weekend. The kids had a parade at their school on Friday and below you'll see a picture of a friend of ours, Sheri, who happens to be a teacher at the school as well.

On Saturday, Cathie and I got together with a bunch of friends (including Sheri, sans costume) to watch the MSU vs. UofM game. It was a heartbreaker. It was back and forth, up and down, and I was physically exhausted by the end.

On Sunday we had a bunch of friends and family over for trick-or-treating. Kevin, Will and I took Nate and my newphew Gabe out. The best house in our neighborhood had an area setup with a keg of beer, a fire and benches for the parents to hang out while the kids trick-or-treated the cul-de-sac. You can see more of our Holloween Pictures here.

I don't always agree with the things Tony Campolo says, but his stuff always challanges me to take a hard look at what I easily believe and why I belive it. This article 'Evangelical Christianity Has Been Hijacked': An Interview with Tony Campolo looks the religious right's blanket support of the republican party:

Evangelicals need to take a good look at what their issues are. Are they
really being faithful to Jesus? Are they being faithful to the Bible? Are they
adhering to the kinds of teachings that Christ made clear?

I walked into Office Depot with a pile of dirty laundry. Between my ripped pants and lack of clothes, I had to go shopping and I couldn't get everything into my suitcase. Rather than try and carry everything else in a plastic bag, I walked into the store asking to ship this stuff. They looked at me kind of strange and pointed me towards aisle four where the boxes are. I grabbed a big cardboard box, stuffed my dirty laundry in it and shipped it home, second day delivery, for $9. What a bargain.

I played at The National golf course in Kansas City yesterday as a part of an outing that my company sponsored. The course was designed by Tom Watson, and the private course is impossible to get onto (check out the 9th hole - it's about 100 foot drop from the tee down to the pin). The course was amazing. I've never played a course this nice. The golf carts had computer systems in them that mapped out the hole, the course, the distance to the pin - everything except the ability to call the beer cart. It was a beautiful day - 70 degrees and the colors are in full bloom down here. I played with three other co-workers, and we did a lot of laughing throughout it. We didn't win (8 under) in part because I played so horribly for the first 9 holes. I couldn't hit a ball more than 10 feet to save my life. Half way through, things clicked and I begin playing moderately well. I had had some great drives, great chips, but my putting never improved.

I was planning on flying out today, but ended up staying over and flying straight to Birmingham tomorrow. I need to get more underwear.....

I played at The National golf course in Kansas City yesterday as a part of an outing that my company sponsored. The course was designed by Tom Watson, and the private course is impossible to get onto (check out the 9th hole - it's about 100 foot drop from the tee down to the pin). The course was amazing. I've never played a course this nice. The golf carts had computer systems in them that mapped out the hole, the course, the distance to the pin - everything except the ability to call the beer cart. It was a beautiful day - 70 degrees and the colors are in full bloom down here. I played with three other co-workers, and we did a lot of laughing throughout it. We didn't win (8 under) in part because I played so horribly for the first 9 holes. I couldn't hit a ball more than 10 feet to save my life. Half way through, things clicked and I begin playing moderately well. I had had some great drives, great chips, but my putting never improved.

I was planning on flying out today, but ended up staying over and flying straight to Birmingham tomorrow. I need to get more underwear.....

Okay - here's one of the coolest applications for my Treo phone. Using the PDANet software, I can hook my phone to my laptop and have a wireless internet connection where ever I'm at, without having to pay ridiculous airport wireless internet access fees. The connection is slower (145Kbps as opposed to 10Mbps), but it sure beats nothing - or god forbid, being disconnected.

I'm sititng in the airport. It's sunday night. I hate flying on Sunday nights. It kills my whole Sunday for me. I'm heading to Kansas City for a customer golf outing at The National golf course. About half way to the airport, I noticed I'd forgotten to stop by Ted's to borrow his golf club travel case. I was too far out to head back and make it so I tried to stop at Wal-Mart and pick up a cheap one. When I asked the guys behind the desk (all dressed in hunting gear) for one, they looked at me like I had two heads. I get to the airport (leaving my clubs in the trunk) and get to my gate, finding out my flight's an hour delayed. Sad thing is, the notice about the delay was sent to my phone while I was on the way to the airport, but I ignored it, figuring it was just another notice telling me when my flight was departing, which I already knew. I'm back Tuesday night, flying back out on Wednesday afternoon to Birmingham, AL and then back on Thursday. I'm in New York next Monday/Tuesday and then home for the week.

So here's the downsides to owning an iPod (or any device that allows you to put 40GB/10,000 songs) in one place:
1. You have to keep the MP3's meticulously tagged and organized.
2. There's so much music there that it's tough to figure out what to listen to or what you have out there.

I love my church. I love that I could teach our congregation a portion of the lyrics to Ice, Ice Baby by Vanilla Ice:

To the extreme, I rock the mic like a vandal
Light up the stage and wax a chump like a candle

Before you brand me heritical, let me explain. I was talking about what we want our church to be known as in our community, and one suggestion I had was that we be known as a church that knows all of the lyrics to a great rap song. I proceeded to teach the song and had everyone recite it. I contrasted this with how much cooler it would be to be known as a church that loves really well and have learned how to really live life, based on what Jesus has taught us about living. The latter seems a little more compelling. But I still think my church is cool - because it loves well.

I just heard something that thrilled me from two people who don't go to my church. Both commented on how many people within our community had heard about all the crap (Pastor infidelity) that happened at Crossroads in the past however many months its been. Both people also commented on how we've been handling it as a church - one that we've handled it differently than any church he'd seen, the other that we handled it so well, he started coming to Crossroads.

When we started going down this road, one of our goals was that we be known for exactly these things - a church that loves well, even in the face of turmoil. We haven't done it perfectly, but I think we've done just that, handled it differently and loved well. This really offsets the angst I get from all of the giant crap-weasels who left as a result of this instead of sticking it out. (I even love giant crap-weasels).

As I walked up to the check-out at Circuit City yesterday, one cashier said to the other, "Our new UPS guy must be retarded." Not missing the chance, I told him that I was the new UPS guy. He replied that "I wasn't wearing my brown uniform". I told him that even though my mother used to tell me that I was retarded, I'd always thought that was because she didn't like me. It created a nice akward moment that I decided we both needed to stay in. He looked at me, not quite sure if I was serious or not. As I left, I told him I'd try and do a better job from now on.

Last night while watching Survivor, the topic of Jamie Lee Curtis came up and the rumor of her being born a hermaphrodite (odd conversation, I know). Like all good urban legends, we had all heard this one as fact. Turns out, it may not be true, per this.

I took the day off today and let Cathie sleep in while I got the kids ready for school. Cathie was telling me that as she lay in bed she overheard Madeline complaining about not being able to do her hair (because she knows I don't have a clue). Nathan came in and volunteered that he could do her hair. She asked him if he knew how, and he said he did.

Emily and I hung out the rest of the morning watching Dora and an animal show on the Discovery Channel-HD. She just digs animals in all shapes and sizes. Cathie, Emily and I are getting ready to head out to lunch in a little bit.

We had a big group of people over last night to watch Survivor. We ended up hanging out aftewards watching The Daily Show, which just kills me. If you haven't seen John Stewart on CNN's crossfire yet, you have to check this out, particularly the part where he calls one of the hosts a dick. (Thanks to Noel for the link)

A number of people have asked me my opinions on our church and one of the people we're looking at as a candidate. Here are my random thoughts on a what Crossroads needs in a pastor. I’ve spent the past six weeks really seeking God on this stuff and trying to really listen to what he has to say. This is a combination of what God’s been telling me and my own opinion, but I’m not sure how to differentiate the two. Disclaimer: This are my opinions in part, I don't know much and I could very well be completely wrong. There's nothing here that I haven't shared with people who've asked. My opinion is a work in progress, open to what God's telling me, open to feedback and this is my first pass at putting it all in one place. This isn't well written and probably not even well thought out.

To understand what I’m thinking about a pastor, I think I first need to understand who we’re called to reach and THEN how we plan on reaching them. If Crossroads is going to be like every other church in the community, I believe we might as well close up shop. It’s going to be too hard of a road ahead for us to be just another church that targets the 40 to 60 year olds of South Lyon in the same old way everyone else does it. I want to be a part of a church that understands the world around it and leverages that to create disciples of Jesus. I want to be a part of a church that focuses on young people (15 – 35) yet has an older generation with a mission mindset for the youth and as a church body is known for loving people well. If there’s an older generation that enjoys that, they are welcome to the community, but I believe too much of the Church as a whole focuses on the old and not the young. I don’t believe that we as a church can just focus on people as a whole and be extremely effective. It doesn’t work in business and it doesn’t work in churches. You have to pick a focus and do it well. I’ve always loved the fact that I could invite my neighbors and know that they wouldn’t feel awkward, but that they would see that the church is different than the stuffy, irrelevant church they may have experienced in the past.

In a pastor, I want someone with mindset for outreach, who values deep, authentic community and who can communicate with the target audience that I’ve referenced above. That’s way more than just speaking biblical messages. They need to understand how people with modern and post-modern mindsets process information, process their faith, and process Truth. They need to be a student of the culture and a student of the word – and have the ability to relate one to the other. We need to have someone who loves others well – no matter what they look like, what kind of sin they bring to the table or where they’re at in their spiritual journey. Beyond that, of course they need to fit into all of the biblical guidelines laid out for a pastor – that’s a given. Ideally, I’d like to see someone with a Youth Pastor background and all that brings to the table in terms of understanding the world, communicating that to our focal point, relating to tough to love people and possessing a relevance - all while not taking themselves too seriously.

I think the current candidate is a great person with a passion, a heart for the unlovable and the lost and an understanding of the world around him. He seems like he’d be a good traditional Shepard for this church and where it’s at, because of who's left. His teachings don’t seem relevant or effective at communicating in a way that post-moderns can hear them. I’ve talked to a number of people who’ve actually been offended at some of HOW he presents his perspectives and HOW he’s shared them; things about women, paraplegics and children. I’ve talked to probably 20 different people about their opinions of him and their seems to be a dividing line after age 40 or so on who connects with him and who doesn’t. When I hear a teaching, I like it to stick with me for the following week as I gnaw on it and process it. His’s teachings haven’t done that.

The gaps: To be fair to him, I haven't heard all of his teaching and I've only spent about 90 minutes with the guy.I haven't seen him in a leadership capacity or a sheparding capacity, I really have very little to go on in all of this.

Again, I could be way off base. These thoughts are a work in progress.

Nate and I stacked two face cords of firewood together. We had a great time doing it and had a great conversation about everything from how tall it would go if we stacked the wood one on top of the other to how much many pieces we could carry at a time.

The message from Mars Hill on Mastering the Art of living that I referenced earlier continues to be stirring inside of me in a way that things haven't in a while. It's causing me to look at how I talk to people in person and on the phone, how I spend time with my wife and kids and how I enjoy what I have and where I'm at today and in the moment. Probably not a big deal for other people, but I seem to be so focused on what's coming next or where i'm going that I have a tough time time just existing in the present moment - no matter what it is.

It really hit me yesterday when I tried a practical application. I was meeting with Mark, one of the guys on my team at a local coffee shop. Typically when I show up I'm armed with my cell phone and laptop delivering instant message conversations, e-mails and phone calls as we talk. This time, I sat there with my notebook and pen and talked and listened. I was amazed at how I processed where we were at and what we were talking about and was in that moment instead of de-focused on everything. Same thing when I travel, typically when I call home and talk to Cathie I've got the TV on in my hotel room and my laptop in front of me - checking e-mail, IMing all while talking to my wife. I've started just shutting down and listening and focusing.

I went to the prayer meeting last night. We prayed individually for about 30 minutes and then the five of us prayed together for a half hour. It was an amazing time that refreshed and reconnected me to God in a way that my quiet time in the morning hasn't.

I thought this was funny. Cathie went to the store today to go grocery shopping. It turns out today was Old People Flu Shot day (pobably not the official name for it). Cathie explained to me that old people were everywhere in the store, camped out in lawn chairs and office chairs that they'd brought. You couldn't get to the groceries on the shelves, because there were old people in chairs lining the aisles in front of the stuff. Maybe it's just me, but I laughed my head off when Cathie told me about this.

Apparently bad-mouthing the Apple comunity is the equivalent to bad-mouthing Pat Robertson - you're going to get lots of e-mail after Pat (Noel) sics them on you . I made some observations about Apple users, iPod people specifically to which Noel responded. As you'll see, I've received a number of responses, per Pat's - I mean Noel's request. Apparently, Apple users are very succeptible to suggestion.

Let me clarify my position. I believe the Mac OS is far superior to Windows XP. The Mach kernel that OS X uses has been around for a long time (I worked on it on the NeXT OS 15 years ago in college) and the interface that it uses is phenomenal. Their software integrates in very tightly and being tied to Unix, there are minimal security issues. The chipset that the Mac is designed around is better and the cases look cooler. I don't disagree with any of that.

I do believe that Mac users have a certain arrogance and self-righeousness about them. Kinda like University of Michigan grads. You don't have to ask them if they're one because they'll tell you. Over and over. Is there such a need to be counter cultural about something that they jump on to the Mac bandwagon? I'm okay if people want to use Mac's - just don't try and hold it over people's heads that it somehow defines who you are and makes you better than everyone else, or that you know more than everyone else (except for Noel, who really does know more than everyone else. <--Noel, that was put out there to appease your followers.)

Dodgeball was great last night, until about 9:15 PM. I was actually playing half-way decent, until about 9:15 PM. Part way through the first match my back started huritng a little bit, but i figured I play through it. During one of the games, I chucked a ball and had a nasty spasm go through my back that hurt really, really badly, to the point that I couldn't really stand up, sit down or move without a lot of pain. I called Kirk Vickers, he told me to ice it and come in in the morning.

Kirk is a good friend of mine who owns Triad Health and Fitness, a performance training center in Novi. He works with pro-athletes and guys like me. Kirk knew what the problem was (something to do with having twisted my spine weird and having my hips out of whack). He put me in some strange positions that I'm not sure they even do in prison, stretching and pushing my thighs in a way that hurt worse than the original back pain. I stood up and amazingly enough, most of the pain was gone.

I guess this means I'm getting old. I don't remember having back problems in 5th grade when I played dodge ball.

I'm now officially in last place in BOTH of my fantasy football leagues!

"The press has bravely and nobly eroded the public trust. What I'm advocating is the media come back and work for us again. ... The bias of the media is not liberal. It's lazy and sensationalist."

-- comedian JON STEWART, star Comedy Central's late-night sendup of television news, criticizing the mainstream media's coverage of politics.

Television Sends Out Distress Signal

This is a really interesting article from Howstuffworks.com on How Hangovers Work

I've been listening to messages from Rob Bell, the pastor of Mars Hills church in Grand Rapids, MI where my brother Jon goes to church. Rob and I both went to Okemos High School, he grew up right down the street from me. I saw him teach a couple of years ago at the Youth Specialties National Youth Workers Conference and was blown away by him. I've been listening to his stuff in my car and while exercising. I started listening to a series called Mastering the Art of Living. The first message deals with living in the present moment and I've come to realize how baldy I'm setup to do that. Between my treo with it's IM and E-Mail capabilities, my iPod, my car stereo, my TiVo, my cell phone I have a tough time taking 5 minutes of quiet in my day. Each morning, I take 15 - 30 minutes of quiet time, but even that, I have a tough time being in that moment and not thinking about the day before, the next day, or even my day that's going to start in another 30 minutes.

You can download mp3's of the last 12 weeks of messages here.

You can browse and download my personal collection of sermon MP3's from Mars Hill, Crossroads and Riverview here.

At the top of the list of blog's I will never read:
1. Barbara Streisand

I finally did it. I bought an iPod. In case you've been living in a cave, an iPod is a portable MP3 music player. Aside from playing music, it's also a social statement. Best I can tell, people who own iPod's are better than EVERYONE else in the world. The white headphones apparently are a statement in and of themselves that you are smarter, better, richer and have know more than the rest of the world. All very typical characteristics of an apple owner. I'm waiting to learn the secret handshake - and I've started giving the knowing head-nod to other iPod owners as I pass them in the airport. My Mac friend Noel believes that Jesus would own a Mac because they are both counter-cultural. On that note, so is smoking crack.

I was dancing with Emily (my 3-year old) this evening when she wrapped her arms around my legs and said, "Daddy, I want to dance like this." I got down on my knees and we danced around the family room. Her response with a giant smile: "Daddy, I'm dancing just like a princess." Made my night.

We had a pretty laid back weekend. On Friday night, we had a family night. We hung out in our hot tub for a while and then came in and played a few rounds of the game Caboodle.

On Saturday, I went to the MSU vs. Minnesota football game. Will, Brad, Jim (Brad's son) and I went to the game. The football was amazing (MSU scored 51 points) but the weather blew. 20mph winds coupled with rain and 39 degree weather make for great football weather - if you're in a dome. We ended up taking off before the half and heading over to watch the rest of the game in a nice warm bar.

Saturday evening we went out with the Niemi's and Girard's for dinner and to a comedy club. We went to Pronto! in Royal Oak for dinner - which was great, but had to many freaking options to feel like you're making the right choice. We went to the Comedy Castle (which Cathie's uncle used to own) where I laughed for 90 minutes straight, all while inhaling the same amount of second-hand smoke that you'd get over a 3 year period. We went back to Pronto! for dessert and then headed home.

Today after church, we did a whole lot of nothing. I laid on the couch and in moments of conciousness (napping) I watched the Lions game. For dinner, Madeline made up menus for everyone and we had a "Fancy Dinner". The menu consisted of appetizers (bacon), a main course (5 different types of pancakes), and beverages. Madeline dressed up in her holloween costume, which is a 50's soda-clerk outfit (that incidentally can easily be mistaken for a french maid outfit). She went around and took orders from everyone while I was the short-order cook. She served the orders and loved every minute of it

Nate continues to sell popcorn for his cub-scout pack. I'm not a big fan of the whole "sell crap for your organization" thing, unless it supports the boy scouts or girl scouts (and sometimes a youth group). I figure I pay tax dollars, so why supplement schools with my money for cheap crap? The best part is listening to him go through his sales pitch - as he describes the goremet (gourmet) popcorn with pek-ins (pecans).

Cathie and I watched the movie Saved tonight. It's a satire about Christians and it was painful to watch. It was a well done movie, but it hit close to home. It made painfull clear how we as Christians try and make our faith overly cool and shove it down others throats. I watched it from the inside out, but I wonder how someone who isn't a Christian would see this movie. I'm not sure I know. Some hilarious stuff in this movie, if you can step back far enough and watch it.

My little sister Susan is pregnant with her third baby! Congratulations Boom!

Dwight L. Moody said, "Of one hundred men, one will read the Bible; the ninety-nine will read the Christian."
Brennan Manning said, "The greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips then walk out the door and deny him by their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable."
Dave Burchett said, "Christians, like physicians, should vow to do no harm. But forgive us, Lord. Because we do."

Good article entitled I am a Christian, and I suck:

Let's face it—to paraphrase Relevant author Matthew P. Turner, we all suck. No way around it—we are all messed up in one way or another when it comes to our relationships with others and how we deal with them. We've all at one time said something utterly stupid, done something hurtful or thought something we know we shouldn't have about a fellow brother or sister in Christ

As I've said before, Kevin Smith is a genius! Click here to download and watch his latest Jay Leno Roadside Attraction. This one involves him going to a Vegas impersonator's convention. Click here to see more about them.

Cool site on building potato guns. This guy is nuts.

Humerous web-site full of found notes.

Emily, Madeline and I went to build-a-bear last week and she built a stuffed dog. Emily's either really good at naming things, or really bad - not quite sure which. Everytime I ask her what the dog's name is, she comes up with a really strange one - She-ri, Ki-da, Say-de, etc. Her latest name for the dog - so-gay.

Our meeting in D.C. finished early, so we had some time to kill walking around the the city. It's a cool place to sight see, but there's a LOT of walking invovled. Technology has fixed that. You can now take Segway tours of the Washington D.C. Segways are those motorized two-wheel stand up things. Look at me, using my legs like a sucker!

Some random observations about D.C.:
1. The squirrels there have no fear. They will gang up on you and beat you down if they get you alone. No kidding.
2. It's a dull palce to people watch. The people are very plain and dull looking.
3. The E section of the yellow pages is about an inch thick. (hint: Escort services is under E)
4. Lots of people wear suits and ties there. Almost no one in the rest of the world still wear suits and ties
5. They have monuments there built for EVERYTHING imaginable.
6. Washington Dulles airport security is horribly slow and inefficient.
7. You can get great shell-fish in D.C. Especially at Ebbit's Grill during happy hour (4 - 6, 11pm-1am)
8. You can no longer tour the white house.



I drove past the CIA today,which was a big thrill for me for some reason.

I ran across this verse in 1 Timothy 1 this morning, which speaks to the contrasting views of of what outreach looks like in churches today:

The whole point of what we're urging is simply love - love uncontaminated by self-interest and counterfeit faith, a life open to God. ....Those who fail to keep to this point soon wander off into cul-de-sacs of gossip. They set themselves up as experts on religious issues, but haven't the remotest idea of what they're holding forth with such imposing eloquence. It's true that moral guidance and counsel need to be given, but the way you say it and to whom you say it are as important as what you say.

I've been trying to figure out my own outreach philosophy. Here's what I've come up with so far:
1. I need to be understand what God's done in my life - what does my salvation really mean to me?
2. I need to pray hard and listen often to what God's telling me.
2. I need to be willing to build authentic, loving relationships irregardless of where the other person is at spiritually and is not dependant on whether they ever move from that spot.
3. I need to be humble with my beliefs - understanding where God's truth and my perspective intersect, but keeping in mind that I only see a part of God's Truth (1 Cor 13:12)
4. I need to be able to ask good questions
5. I need to be willing to listen well

I got into Washington D.C. last night around 8:30. The hotel conciegre pointed us to a great bar across from the treasury building. After getting lost a few times (it looked really easy to find on the map), we found the place. Happy hours starts again at 11:00 and includes 1 lb lobsters for $10. It made for a great dinner.

When I got off the plane, my phone's instant messenger blasted a bunch of messages that had come through while I was in the air, including this one from my son Nate:
Hi Dad it is nathan. Dad love you. You are the best dad. You shud have been there at basketball with me. Why did you have to leave dad?

My hotel is nice (staying at the Capital Hilton) but it has the oldest alarm clock known to man. It's called the Ameriphone Alertmaster with Bed Shaker AM-3000. I couldn't figure out to set it, let alone how to use the bed-shaker. What is a bed-shaker, anyways?

I went running this morning and I'm in all day meetings downtown with a customer. I fly back tonight out of Dulles.

The whole family (including Will) went to the Pumpkin Patch this afternoon to pick pumpkins and run the corn maze. We went to the one on Six Mile and Curtis. Don't bother. The pumpkins were nice, but it was expensive. They charged you $5 just to get out to the pumpkin patch and the corn maze, let alone $5 a head for the Corn Maze itself.

Every year we go to pick pumpkins and the kids want the biggest pumpkins possible and I get stuck trying to carry them. This year, I had the genius idea of telling the kids they could get the biggest pumpkin out there, as long as they could carry it back to the tractor. After about 30 minutes of searching, they finally found their pumpkins. Nate could of cared less about the quality of the pumpkin, just the size. He must of tried lifting 30 different pumpkins. He finally found a huge one and somehow carried it out on his own. He wanted it badly.


You can see the rest of the pictures here.

Afterwards, we hung around checking out the gords and the goats and then went for Ice Cream. Nate and I later went up to sell pop corn for his Cub Scout Den. Imagine 8 kids out in front of a video store and everytime someone comes through the doors, they're mobbed by all of the kids, kinda like little Hare Krishnas. I tried to teach them the art of the negative reversal, a great sales technique, by having them stand there looking dejected, saying "There's probably no way you could buy any popcorn from us, is there?". It was genius.

We finished the evening off by watching the movie Second Hand Lions, which was phenomenal. It stars Robert Duvall, Michael Caine and Haley Joel Osment. It was a fantastic movie about a boy growing up with his two uncles, their understanding of their identities and the larger story they live in. It's worth buying. I want to watch it with Nate.

When I got home last night, we hung out together for a while, and then Cathie and I went on a date together to try and catch up. We had such a crazy week and weekend last week, that this was the first chance for us to be together in a while and have some quality time. We went out for coffee, went out to a movie and came home. We went to see The Forgotten. Good movie, pretty suspensful, mediocre ending.

Here's Me, Mark, Newton and Chris on our final night at the Peter's farm. I posted the pictures here, but they're probably only interesting to the four of us. Except for the picture of the bull and the really, really big spider, and the picture of me using the tractor for barn demolition... ok, maybe not that one.

So one last story about Newton. It turns out that back in '91, Newton was one of the few white rappers in the world, going by the name Rooster Hayes. He had a billboard top 10 song called Country is Cool, which you can download here. He toured and opened up for bands like Run D.M.C. Ya gotta listen to the song.

Noel put this online, and it's dead-on talking about the accent of someone from Michigan. Probably not worth reading unless you're from Michigan, but it's amazing how accurate it is.

We hung out last with Newton's family, who by their own admission are Southern Folks. One of the guys I met was Newton's brother-in-law, Jimmy, who's was exactly what you'd expect. I thought Newton had a thick southern accent but Jimmy would talk sometimes and I we'd just look at each other to see if anyone else understood it. Kinda like Hank's buddy in the show King of the Hill. He brought over some moonshine which he explained was "The kind that makes you slap yo momma". It was good, pretty smooth, direct from their neighbor's still. We also checked out one of his cotton fields and went and picked some cotton. Pretty cool for us city boys. We stopped into the local country store where we talked and joked with the locals for a while about us Yankees.

Newton, who's last name is Peters was telling us about his High School football career, which is a religion down here. The paper got wind that he wasn't going to play and had a headline "Wildcats to play with out peters" (which beats the headline "Wildcats to play with Peters out".