I have not disappeared. Please stay tuned. Something will be here soon.
Had some good snow recently. The kids absolutely love it. We were able to make a snow gorilla and throws some snow balls and shovel. It was good stuff. The most recent snow is still here (quite a bit this past weekend), so we may have some for a while. Shirley is getting excited for Christmas...but as much for getting presents for others as she is for getting presents herself. She is such a thoughtful kid. She has been spending a lot of time hanging out with B,T and 3J to help and hold the babies, as well as spending time hanging out with Sherri (our neighbor) and helping her with odds and ends around the house. She is always willing to help out and spend time with people...it is great to see. The boys continue growing and being boys. They are getting better with potty training and I am sure that they will one day just surprise us and have it down. They have loved Christmas lights and playing in the snow. Juan now thinks it is hilarious to ask if we can go to the farm because he knows that we won't be going while there is wet snow out there. He asks all the time. Funny guy.
Janine is now done with tutoring, a decision that she spent much thought and prayer in making. She will now be able to spend more focused time with the kids without the responsibilities of leading and tutoring in the tutoring program. I know that it is not an easy decision to come to, but we both feel that it is best for the kids. We just wrapped up our Kids Club Christmas party, too, which was a booming success. It was quite a bit of fun for everyone and we were extremely grateful for the generosity in gifts and the volunteers to help out. It was a lot of fun for all involved. Now that it is past, we are going to enjoy the month long break before we start again.
Josh, Josiah, Zack and I went to Iron & Wine on Friday night. It was a unanimous "show of the year." We were treated to a night of great musicianship and great songs, as well as some laughs and just a good show, in spite of Sam Beam feeling slightly under the weather. I would recommend to anyone to go to a show if given a chance. It was awesome. And it was probably the last show I will make it to in 2007. We've got Built to Spill (again) lined up for February, but we know little beyond that.
In a late decision, I have decided to go to Mexico with our church once again this summer. We will be heading down to most likely build a house somewhere in the vicinity of Tijuana. I am looking forward to the trip, but also to the preparation alongside our fearless leaders (Josh and Becky) and the rest of the ridiculously crazy Mexico crew (including Josiah and Jill, Tom and Erica). It should be fun. Mom Clemens...if you are reading this you should come stay with Janine July 12-19.
In job news, I got extended at my current job site for at least two more months. I was very pleased with the decision and thought it was a good choice by the company who is contracting me right now. It will keep me inside for the worst of the winter, too, which is nice, although the boots I bought three years ago for winter work are not getting the use I had anticipated:)) Oh well.
I want to get a banjo. I have been wanting one for some time now and have recently been pricing them online and playing one when I can get out to Guitar Center here in SLC. Does anyone have any suggestions or know of available banjos that might be of interest to me? Any insight on it at all? Let me know.
Anyhow, I am on my lunch break and should probably get going. I just wanted to drop a line quickly to let everyone know that I am still here and still planning on writing more. Hope all is well.
S.
Monday, December 10, 2007
Saturday, November 17, 2007
where have all the Noah's gone?
Last weekend we were able to go on a retreat up to the mountains. Janine had put together a weekend of discussion and reflection for the Kid's Club leaders, and offered us a time to get away together and discuss and strengthen our relationships with each other. It was a great time, to say the least. We had a lot of fun playing different games and challenged each other by sharing out hearts with each other. I found it to be a very encouraging time, a time that was put together well, and that allowed for freedom to pour ourselves out and soak in the goodness of Jesus Christ. I was glad that so many were able to make it up there and can't wait for another opportunity to do it again. The cabin was huge, too. Many rooms, many places to sleep, although the coffee maker was kind of lame...I guess I can live with that, though.
I think the last time I wrote we were still waiting for Brad, Traci and Joel to get home with the new additions to their family. Well, they are back with beautiful Jason and Jessica. We were able to go to the airport and meet them there, after a flight that was quite good considering that they were not able to all sit together and that they were traveling with three young children. It has been great to be able to see them adjusting as a family, to be a part of something similar to what we went through several months ago. Shirley has really taken to the babies quite well, always offering to go to B&T's house to help out. In fact, she was over there more than here for a few days. She has really enjoyed holding the babies and helping out. The boys have been a little more unaware, which is normal for kids of the age of Andres, Juan and Joel. They are certainly more interested in playing, and since Jason and Jessica cannot run back and forth, they are only peripherally interested right now. J & J have grown quite a bit already, and it has been fun to hear their little noises and see projectile spit-up and just to be around them. We are very glad to be a part of it and to have them all back.
So it sounds as if my time at IMFlash is coming to an end. At least my full time part of it all. I know that I will be back in limited form and function, but the ball is now rolling to figure out a system in which I will only be a visitor there instead of a regular. I have mixed feelings, to say the least. I have worked there roughly 19 months straight now, and have grown very accustomed to basically running my own show. As I set tools yesterday I was reminiscing about the days of running three crews and working 65 hours a week and how crazy it was. Now it is much slower, but in a good way. I have enjoyed the extra time with my family, being able to spend time with them, bonding more with the kids...it has been good. I am afraid that will come to an end when I go back to what I used to do. That bugs me. It is wintertime, however, and that usually leads to shorter hours in the field, but I am not really sure how that will all pan out. I am not even really sure when I will be taken out of full time work at IM at this point. I guess I will just keep going until they kick me out. It is odd to think that my 19 months there make up the majority of time that I have worked for Stantec. I have worked 19 of 31 months at IM. Crazy.
I have been thinking about holiness again recently. I can't help but to think that we often think of holiness as some sort of personal piety, some sort of inner thing that we strive for, that we are only responsible for on a singular, inward level. I can't help but to think that we strive for being "good" in our holiness, that we should attain certain levels of doing the right thing, of meeting a code of regulations or something. Even if we don't say that this is the way we think of things, I think that this is often how we live it out, and even more so, this is the bar that we set for others that we view and judge. I just don't think that this is a right idea of holiness at all. Holiness is not personal, it is not overtly concerned with "right" and "wrong" as we see it. It is not a level that we achieve by adhering to codes or creeds or by law. Holiness is a life that is wholly dependent upon Christ, a life that is concerned with otherness. The idea that we can do right or do wrong is something that is strong in our minds, but to simplify things to this level is creating a Pharisaical way of looking at holiness, as if we only need to avoid certain things and do other certain things to be what we should be. Our holiness does not evolve from an understanding of right and wrong, but from our understanding of love, forgiveness, grace, mercy. It comes from being wholly God's people, from our ability to interact with others as Christ would. Love, forgiveness, grace, mercy....can these be real if we are not able to exercise them in our interactions with others? Can they be a part of our inner being without being challenged by the ridiculous behavior and actions of others around us? Can we achieve wholeness in our personal piety? No. No. No.
The reality is that holiness has to be honed and made perfect in our interactions with others, not in doing "right" or "wrong" or by following tenets, but in our daily communion with the body of Christ, where it is made self evident whether or not we love our neighbors as ourselves. We can forever make up arbitrary rules according to our own likes and dislikes (in essence, our own likeness, replacing God with ourselves), but this only achieves established borders in which we boldly proclaim who is "in" and who is "out." But what if we didn't strive for our arbitrarily chosen "right" and "wrong"? What if we got past that to an actual striving for holiness, for wholeness among God's creation, including other people? What if we got past the idea of achievement or failure and simply rested wholly on Christ? Where would our inhibitions lie then? Would we be pressed into competitiveness with our friends? Our church members? Our co-workers? Ourselves? Or would we then be free to follow Christ?
I can hear responses now: we already do this...do we really need to forget right and wrong...I do lean wholly on Christ...
But I don't believe it. I believe we are inhibited by our fears of not being in control, of being somehow cast aside by a society (and, yes, I do mean our church(es), too) that proclaims a "right" and "wrong" way and that encourages us to simply be "good" in our actions, while not challenging us to live a life wholly given to Christ. We should work our jobs and pay our taxes practice our apologetics and go to another Bible study...which is all nice, unless the call of Christ is something different. We can live well, drive the speed limit, cast our votes based on one issue, go to church every Sunday, give money to the food bank...which is all nice, unless the call of Christ is something different. We can serve on the church board, make a cake for fellowship, sweep differences under the rug (ignore instead of confront our own inadequacies and prejudices), mow our lawns, save monies for retirement...which is all nice, unless the call of Christ is something different. And we may teach that holiness is wholly leaning on Christ, that it is obedience, faithfulness, of giving up ourselves...but what does it matter if we teach this when we live as thought holiness is a scale of "rights and wrongs" that can be easily read and we can quickly grade ourselves or others accordingly. Yes, read your Bible and pray every day, just like I learned when I was young, is something that is good, but if it leads to nothing then it is just ridiculous, it is just wasted time. That scale of holiness of church, bible study, service...is nothing if we are not changed, if we do not find ourselves being drawn to being made complete in Christ, that we are wholly relying upon Him for all things, that we are giving up our tendencies toward safety and the boundaries that we place that ensure that we are going to continue to feel safe. That is NOT HOLINESS! When we rest on ourselves and our comforts, we make ourselves God, which, if I am not mistaken, was a problem that troubled Lucifer and Adam and people constructing the tower of Babel. Where has Noah gone? Where is craziness? Where is the complete reliance upon God? Where is our obedience? Has it gone the way of the co-opted church that functions so much as an operative of this world that it has forgotten that it is supposed to be loyal to Christ and not to the things of this world?
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Let your mind be renewed. This is not a discourse on sin as a singular action or mistake we make in our lives. This is not, as we often think, a call that we should not live in the way that we have dictated by the imposing of our own will and likes and dislikes of how we should live (rights and wrongs), but a call to be in constant evaluation of the world, society, as it is. This is not "don't do this, do this," but rather a call to be obedient, a call to listen to Christ and to act accordingly! Are we called to disconnected lives that are deconstructed to a list of right and wrong or lives that are wholly dependent upon Christ? If you are wholly dependent, you will build an ark, you will be crazy. Don't be conformed. Be transformed.
I enjoy weekends.
I think the last time I wrote we were still waiting for Brad, Traci and Joel to get home with the new additions to their family. Well, they are back with beautiful Jason and Jessica. We were able to go to the airport and meet them there, after a flight that was quite good considering that they were not able to all sit together and that they were traveling with three young children. It has been great to be able to see them adjusting as a family, to be a part of something similar to what we went through several months ago. Shirley has really taken to the babies quite well, always offering to go to B&T's house to help out. In fact, she was over there more than here for a few days. She has really enjoyed holding the babies and helping out. The boys have been a little more unaware, which is normal for kids of the age of Andres, Juan and Joel. They are certainly more interested in playing, and since Jason and Jessica cannot run back and forth, they are only peripherally interested right now. J & J have grown quite a bit already, and it has been fun to hear their little noises and see projectile spit-up and just to be around them. We are very glad to be a part of it and to have them all back.
So it sounds as if my time at IMFlash is coming to an end. At least my full time part of it all. I know that I will be back in limited form and function, but the ball is now rolling to figure out a system in which I will only be a visitor there instead of a regular. I have mixed feelings, to say the least. I have worked there roughly 19 months straight now, and have grown very accustomed to basically running my own show. As I set tools yesterday I was reminiscing about the days of running three crews and working 65 hours a week and how crazy it was. Now it is much slower, but in a good way. I have enjoyed the extra time with my family, being able to spend time with them, bonding more with the kids...it has been good. I am afraid that will come to an end when I go back to what I used to do. That bugs me. It is wintertime, however, and that usually leads to shorter hours in the field, but I am not really sure how that will all pan out. I am not even really sure when I will be taken out of full time work at IM at this point. I guess I will just keep going until they kick me out. It is odd to think that my 19 months there make up the majority of time that I have worked for Stantec. I have worked 19 of 31 months at IM. Crazy.
I have been thinking about holiness again recently. I can't help but to think that we often think of holiness as some sort of personal piety, some sort of inner thing that we strive for, that we are only responsible for on a singular, inward level. I can't help but to think that we strive for being "good" in our holiness, that we should attain certain levels of doing the right thing, of meeting a code of regulations or something. Even if we don't say that this is the way we think of things, I think that this is often how we live it out, and even more so, this is the bar that we set for others that we view and judge. I just don't think that this is a right idea of holiness at all. Holiness is not personal, it is not overtly concerned with "right" and "wrong" as we see it. It is not a level that we achieve by adhering to codes or creeds or by law. Holiness is a life that is wholly dependent upon Christ, a life that is concerned with otherness. The idea that we can do right or do wrong is something that is strong in our minds, but to simplify things to this level is creating a Pharisaical way of looking at holiness, as if we only need to avoid certain things and do other certain things to be what we should be. Our holiness does not evolve from an understanding of right and wrong, but from our understanding of love, forgiveness, grace, mercy. It comes from being wholly God's people, from our ability to interact with others as Christ would. Love, forgiveness, grace, mercy....can these be real if we are not able to exercise them in our interactions with others? Can they be a part of our inner being without being challenged by the ridiculous behavior and actions of others around us? Can we achieve wholeness in our personal piety? No. No. No.
The reality is that holiness has to be honed and made perfect in our interactions with others, not in doing "right" or "wrong" or by following tenets, but in our daily communion with the body of Christ, where it is made self evident whether or not we love our neighbors as ourselves. We can forever make up arbitrary rules according to our own likes and dislikes (in essence, our own likeness, replacing God with ourselves), but this only achieves established borders in which we boldly proclaim who is "in" and who is "out." But what if we didn't strive for our arbitrarily chosen "right" and "wrong"? What if we got past that to an actual striving for holiness, for wholeness among God's creation, including other people? What if we got past the idea of achievement or failure and simply rested wholly on Christ? Where would our inhibitions lie then? Would we be pressed into competitiveness with our friends? Our church members? Our co-workers? Ourselves? Or would we then be free to follow Christ?
I can hear responses now: we already do this...do we really need to forget right and wrong...I do lean wholly on Christ...
But I don't believe it. I believe we are inhibited by our fears of not being in control, of being somehow cast aside by a society (and, yes, I do mean our church(es), too) that proclaims a "right" and "wrong" way and that encourages us to simply be "good" in our actions, while not challenging us to live a life wholly given to Christ. We should work our jobs and pay our taxes practice our apologetics and go to another Bible study...which is all nice, unless the call of Christ is something different. We can live well, drive the speed limit, cast our votes based on one issue, go to church every Sunday, give money to the food bank...which is all nice, unless the call of Christ is something different. We can serve on the church board, make a cake for fellowship, sweep differences under the rug (ignore instead of confront our own inadequacies and prejudices), mow our lawns, save monies for retirement...which is all nice, unless the call of Christ is something different. And we may teach that holiness is wholly leaning on Christ, that it is obedience, faithfulness, of giving up ourselves...but what does it matter if we teach this when we live as thought holiness is a scale of "rights and wrongs" that can be easily read and we can quickly grade ourselves or others accordingly. Yes, read your Bible and pray every day, just like I learned when I was young, is something that is good, but if it leads to nothing then it is just ridiculous, it is just wasted time. That scale of holiness of church, bible study, service...is nothing if we are not changed, if we do not find ourselves being drawn to being made complete in Christ, that we are wholly relying upon Him for all things, that we are giving up our tendencies toward safety and the boundaries that we place that ensure that we are going to continue to feel safe. That is NOT HOLINESS! When we rest on ourselves and our comforts, we make ourselves God, which, if I am not mistaken, was a problem that troubled Lucifer and Adam and people constructing the tower of Babel. Where has Noah gone? Where is craziness? Where is the complete reliance upon God? Where is our obedience? Has it gone the way of the co-opted church that functions so much as an operative of this world that it has forgotten that it is supposed to be loyal to Christ and not to the things of this world?
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Let your mind be renewed. This is not a discourse on sin as a singular action or mistake we make in our lives. This is not, as we often think, a call that we should not live in the way that we have dictated by the imposing of our own will and likes and dislikes of how we should live (rights and wrongs), but a call to be in constant evaluation of the world, society, as it is. This is not "don't do this, do this," but rather a call to be obedient, a call to listen to Christ and to act accordingly! Are we called to disconnected lives that are deconstructed to a list of right and wrong or lives that are wholly dependent upon Christ? If you are wholly dependent, you will build an ark, you will be crazy. Don't be conformed. Be transformed.
I enjoy weekends.
Saturday, November 3, 2007
catching up
So this week has been pretty good. I would have to say that it started off when our friends Josh and Becky came over to watch the kids last Saturday so Janine and I could get out and watch a movie. We had long been wanting to watch "Into the Wild" but really don't have the opportunity to just run out and do so like we used to. So on this occasion we were able to go. It was a really good movie, with amazing cinematography and an interesting commentary on the subject. I thought Sean Penn did a really good job with the film, and Emile Hursch did an amazing job as Chris McCandless. I would highly recommend watching the movie. It was also interesting to see my uncle Ken's name in the credits, and I heard that my cousin Travis' name was also involved, but I didn't see that. Travis did go to the premier in LA, though. Ahh, the life of a star...
On Monday we were able to get out and go to Wheeler Farm in the evening. We packed up the family, including our insane dog, and went over in the early evening for walking and hanging out. It was a great time, getting to see the kids get excited over the animals and to see them having fun just walking around and enjoying nature. Juancho had an "incident" with a bantam rooster there not too long ago. This rooster apparently got upset at Juancho and puffed himself up and went after Juan, pecking and intimidating. Andres suggested that Juan get in a tree where the "mean gallo" couldn't get him. This night, the suggestions were for Pakak to eat the mean gallo. We found it while walking around, but the bird retreated into a tree for the evening, so the boys were a little disappointed that Pakak did not feast on the bull bird of Wheeler Farm. It was a great night, though, very relaxing, very fun, and a nice time to get out of the house before winter comes in.
I took the next day off from work, trying to take advantage of Shirley's days off from school, and we decided to go to Antelope Island. We took the 45 minute drive to the stench covered State Park (there are dead brine shrimp that create quite an odor) and began our quest for wildlife. The boys are completely enamored with the idea of buffalo, partly because it is a magnificent beast, partly because of my tattoo (they always make the connection of Papi liking buffalo), and partly because they can stand next to the buffalo statue at the visitor's center. So we were able to spot about six buffalo right away, but that was about all we would see. We spent some time at the visitor's center and then drove to the ranch hoping to see more animals. We did see a coyote at the ranch, along with the usual ranch animals (chickens, horses), and Janine had a great spot of an owl sleeping in a tree. It was pretty cool (weather) there, so our snack time outside was somewhat limited by the chilly breeze. After a while on the ranch we decided it was time to start heading back. We were hungry for lunch and knew the boys needed to sleep. So we began our trek home, stopping at an IHOP for lunch. The kids all fell asleep on the way home, although they didn't stay asleep. The day was quite fun, and it was a wonderful break from our usual routines.
Right now we are awaiting the return/arrival of Brad, Traci, Joel and the new additions, twins Jason and Jessica. They have been in Indianapolis for the past 11 days in the process of adopting the twins. Things have gone well for them in their time there, as they have benefited from groups in the area who have helped them with meals and things. They got clearance yesterday to be able to return home to UT, so there is a chance they will come in today. We are excited and anxious to see them and to meet Jason and Jessica. Our kids love looking at the pictures that B&T have sent and will probably be doing backflips when they come home.
well, the kids are up and most likely getting hungry. I should probably go make pancakes before they riot. I hope all is well and that you all are enjoying the autumn days (my favorite).
Saturday, October 13, 2007
cream cheese on my toast
Still here, kids, not to worry.
It is funny how I have felt pretty stinkin' busy even though I have been working fewer hours. It has been a bittersweet thing, as the hours were cut down for budgetary purposes, but also in that, I am now working solo.
Good: I watch out for myself without having to "babysit" other people. I don't have to find work for other worker while I do computer updates, information bidding, and liaison duties.
Bad: I do it all by myself.
It has been okay, just busy. This past week was especially busy for some reason. It didn't help that there were three surprise tools to set and that one of them involved a completely different environment while another involved a missing control point. Trouble. I was slightly irritated. I am glad it is Saturday.
Today we had the Prayer Pal luncheon. I know it was a ton of work for Janine, but it was done really well and I believe that everyone involved had a lot of fun. My guy didn't show so I filled in with some other kids who were missing their prayer pal. All the groups had a good time playing games, enjoying food, and spending time getting to know one another. I know that Janine is glad that it is done, and I don't blame her, but it was a good time.
Kids Club itself has been great. We have had such a strong showing of leaders, which alleviates some of the duties. The kids have been great, too, with probably an average showing of 40-45 kids. They all love the new format of small groups, as do I. It has been fun to stay with the same kids throughout, and although I had some reservations about the first and second grade boys at first, I truly have enjoyed having them. They are fun every week.
Janine has also been planning a retreat for the leaders, which will take place during the second week of November. There is a ton of excitement in the air as the time draws near. All the leaders are excited, as are Janine and me. It should be a great time to get away and spend time hanging out with those people with whom we serve.
The kids have been doing well, too. They are growing up so quickly. It is funny to write that, as we have only had them for only 8 1/2 months now, but they all amaze me with their ability to learn and how quickly they have become acclimated to life here. The boys constantly are saying funny things and picking up new things to say. They charm everyone they meet, as does Shirley. They have all made such good friends here and are great at making everyone smile. I marvel at how wonderful a match we are for each other as we continue to learn and continue to grow together.
School seems to be good for Shirley. She is clearly settled in as we hear about her getting into trouble (not major trouble, just normal 9 year old mischief) from time to time. She has made several friends and is pretty diligent in doing her school work. Today she is out with Christie (her prayer pal) watching a football game. We bundled her up and got her ready for a cold day outside, but it has turned out pretty nice. I hope that she has fun with Christie, and we are happy that she has a prayer pal who likes to be involved like this with her.
My brother in law and his wife, Brad and Traci, are in the middle of pursuing an adoption. Things have moved amazingly quickly for them, and right now they are planning on adopting a set of boy/girl twins. They were contacted about 11 days ago regarding the twins and have been waiting for a green light to go get them. It seems that that time is coming close, so we are trying to help them prepare for this major event in their lives. It has all happened so quickly that it seems that we really have not had a whole lot of time to even think about the whole thing, and I am sure that their heads are just spinning taking it all in. There is still much to do, but we celebrate with them and hope to help them in big and small ways as they move in this direction.
Ugh. I am a part of the facebook.com phenomenon now. I guess that is where some of my time has been spent, as opposed to blogging, but hopefully I won't push this off fully. This is a much easier place to let my mind free.
Speaking of, I have really been wrestling with the functionality of the church lately. In particular, the vocation of pastor has been something that has been going under some scrutiny in my mind. I am beginning to wonder if the role of pastor as vocation as we know it is actually conducive to building a strong, outwardly focused church. I ask myself this thinking that because pastorship as vocation lends itself to a quick and easy "out" for those who might be tempted to say that they don't participate in certain activities because it is the "pastor's job." I don't believe that the pressures that pastors face are necessarily fair, either, as the burdens of a church body is something that should be taken on by all the members of the church. In such a manner, the church then begins to think of the "other" instead of the "self," which I believe to be more in line with what Christ teaches anyway. The vocation of pastor allows responsibility to be shunned, whether one agrees with that or not, it is very much the practiced folk-religion that underlies most churches. It propagates a level of comfort among the church in which they can relax, not bearing the burdens of the other, not considering the other, not carrying out the statement that "greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for another." So the greatest part of the churches problems are taken on by the pastor, or maybe the elders and deacons, but for the most part not by the church itself. It is anti-communal in my mind, it is the opposite of what we learned as children, to love God with all our heart, soul and mind and to love others as ourselves. Instead we practice an opposite version of the gospel in which we love our own pursuits with all our heart, soul and mind and we love ourselves above others. We relegate our own responsibilities to an "other" who can either fix it for us or who can at least make me feel vindicated in my self-pity/self-love paradox in which we find ourselves. So how does the vocation of pastor fit into this? It fits in that we compartmentalize the sacred to those who are sacred (those who are "trained, called, gifted") and fail to challenge the profane (I choose to say as opposed to secular). So the compartmentalization adds to the dichotomy of Sunday morning vis'-a-vis' rest of the week. The conflict of worship as an act vs. worship as being. It compartmentalizes and draws up easy boundaries of "right" and "wrong" while ignoring the command to love one another. It compartmentalizes and belittles the work of the followers of Christ as not important enough for the actual church to do, but only for those who are trained/called/gifted. And when it all goes wrong...well, I didn't do it...it wasn't my responsibility. So turning away from such conventions we begin to actually allow others to be challenged to do the work of the church, the things that are so plainly laid out in the Bible, and holding each other accountable to do so. The accountability also means that we are responsible, not just to chastise, but to disciple and be discipled, and also demands humility and love...something that we could all use more in an outward focus. It does not, in my mind, take away from those who feel called in such a direction, but allows them to be a part of a church whose focus is more clearly based upon loving God and loving the "other" and in such a way that necessitates a move toward the model of a reproducing church. In a sense, the church of the non-vocational or bi-vocational pastor must look at itself as temporal, not just in a broad spectrum, but in smaller bits of time as well. An outwardly focused church must realize that it will not stay in one place with the same people, necessarily, but will prone to reproduction, re-evaluation, re-structuring as it is moved by the Spirit. The non-vocational/bi-vocational aspect allows for this to happen in that a church is not itself tied to a building or bound by as many monetary needs and is therefore able to be a little more transient in nature. Now I know of warnings that may come, the questions of how a church becomes part of a people or a community in light of this, but I believe that it is altogether possible and probable that any church that focuses on the "other" will find itself in the heart of a community regardless of physical building or a pastor by vocation. Of course it calls for logistics to be worked out, and it calls for some amount of living within a closer proximity, but these questions and issues need to be worked out by individual churches.
So the non/bi-vocational pastorship opens up a world of opportunities, for the church to be challenged, for the the church to deepen its spirituality, its dependence upon God, its ability to be a reproductive church, and to function as a true light in a community, not just a Sunday stop off for do-gooders. Certainly there are things that I have not thought of, but these are just some of the things that have crossed my mind as I work by myself these days.
Iron & Wine will be here in December. I should go.
The Flyers are 2-1. Much better than last year. They can actually put the puck in the net, which is amazing.
The more I think about it, the more I believe that no one should ever buy a product marketed to them using a bee.
I once mistakenly put Philadelphia Cream Cheese on my toast thinking it was butter (I was eight). It was so disgusting that I have yet to ever eat cream cheese again.
I have a guitar for sale; anyone passing through UT who wants to get rid of $325 for a good guitar, a hard shell locking case, and a tuner should let me know.
I love autumn.
And cheese steaks.
It is funny how I have felt pretty stinkin' busy even though I have been working fewer hours. It has been a bittersweet thing, as the hours were cut down for budgetary purposes, but also in that, I am now working solo.
Good: I watch out for myself without having to "babysit" other people. I don't have to find work for other worker while I do computer updates, information bidding, and liaison duties.
Bad: I do it all by myself.
It has been okay, just busy. This past week was especially busy for some reason. It didn't help that there were three surprise tools to set and that one of them involved a completely different environment while another involved a missing control point. Trouble. I was slightly irritated. I am glad it is Saturday.
Today we had the Prayer Pal luncheon. I know it was a ton of work for Janine, but it was done really well and I believe that everyone involved had a lot of fun. My guy didn't show so I filled in with some other kids who were missing their prayer pal. All the groups had a good time playing games, enjoying food, and spending time getting to know one another. I know that Janine is glad that it is done, and I don't blame her, but it was a good time.
Kids Club itself has been great. We have had such a strong showing of leaders, which alleviates some of the duties. The kids have been great, too, with probably an average showing of 40-45 kids. They all love the new format of small groups, as do I. It has been fun to stay with the same kids throughout, and although I had some reservations about the first and second grade boys at first, I truly have enjoyed having them. They are fun every week.
Janine has also been planning a retreat for the leaders, which will take place during the second week of November. There is a ton of excitement in the air as the time draws near. All the leaders are excited, as are Janine and me. It should be a great time to get away and spend time hanging out with those people with whom we serve.
The kids have been doing well, too. They are growing up so quickly. It is funny to write that, as we have only had them for only 8 1/2 months now, but they all amaze me with their ability to learn and how quickly they have become acclimated to life here. The boys constantly are saying funny things and picking up new things to say. They charm everyone they meet, as does Shirley. They have all made such good friends here and are great at making everyone smile. I marvel at how wonderful a match we are for each other as we continue to learn and continue to grow together.
School seems to be good for Shirley. She is clearly settled in as we hear about her getting into trouble (not major trouble, just normal 9 year old mischief) from time to time. She has made several friends and is pretty diligent in doing her school work. Today she is out with Christie (her prayer pal) watching a football game. We bundled her up and got her ready for a cold day outside, but it has turned out pretty nice. I hope that she has fun with Christie, and we are happy that she has a prayer pal who likes to be involved like this with her.
My brother in law and his wife, Brad and Traci, are in the middle of pursuing an adoption. Things have moved amazingly quickly for them, and right now they are planning on adopting a set of boy/girl twins. They were contacted about 11 days ago regarding the twins and have been waiting for a green light to go get them. It seems that that time is coming close, so we are trying to help them prepare for this major event in their lives. It has all happened so quickly that it seems that we really have not had a whole lot of time to even think about the whole thing, and I am sure that their heads are just spinning taking it all in. There is still much to do, but we celebrate with them and hope to help them in big and small ways as they move in this direction.
Ugh. I am a part of the facebook.com phenomenon now. I guess that is where some of my time has been spent, as opposed to blogging, but hopefully I won't push this off fully. This is a much easier place to let my mind free.
Speaking of, I have really been wrestling with the functionality of the church lately. In particular, the vocation of pastor has been something that has been going under some scrutiny in my mind. I am beginning to wonder if the role of pastor as vocation as we know it is actually conducive to building a strong, outwardly focused church. I ask myself this thinking that because pastorship as vocation lends itself to a quick and easy "out" for those who might be tempted to say that they don't participate in certain activities because it is the "pastor's job." I don't believe that the pressures that pastors face are necessarily fair, either, as the burdens of a church body is something that should be taken on by all the members of the church. In such a manner, the church then begins to think of the "other" instead of the "self," which I believe to be more in line with what Christ teaches anyway. The vocation of pastor allows responsibility to be shunned, whether one agrees with that or not, it is very much the practiced folk-religion that underlies most churches. It propagates a level of comfort among the church in which they can relax, not bearing the burdens of the other, not considering the other, not carrying out the statement that "greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for another." So the greatest part of the churches problems are taken on by the pastor, or maybe the elders and deacons, but for the most part not by the church itself. It is anti-communal in my mind, it is the opposite of what we learned as children, to love God with all our heart, soul and mind and to love others as ourselves. Instead we practice an opposite version of the gospel in which we love our own pursuits with all our heart, soul and mind and we love ourselves above others. We relegate our own responsibilities to an "other" who can either fix it for us or who can at least make me feel vindicated in my self-pity/self-love paradox in which we find ourselves. So how does the vocation of pastor fit into this? It fits in that we compartmentalize the sacred to those who are sacred (those who are "trained, called, gifted") and fail to challenge the profane (I choose to say as opposed to secular). So the compartmentalization adds to the dichotomy of Sunday morning vis'-a-vis' rest of the week. The conflict of worship as an act vs. worship as being. It compartmentalizes and draws up easy boundaries of "right" and "wrong" while ignoring the command to love one another. It compartmentalizes and belittles the work of the followers of Christ as not important enough for the actual church to do, but only for those who are trained/called/gifted. And when it all goes wrong...well, I didn't do it...it wasn't my responsibility. So turning away from such conventions we begin to actually allow others to be challenged to do the work of the church, the things that are so plainly laid out in the Bible, and holding each other accountable to do so. The accountability also means that we are responsible, not just to chastise, but to disciple and be discipled, and also demands humility and love...something that we could all use more in an outward focus. It does not, in my mind, take away from those who feel called in such a direction, but allows them to be a part of a church whose focus is more clearly based upon loving God and loving the "other" and in such a way that necessitates a move toward the model of a reproducing church. In a sense, the church of the non-vocational or bi-vocational pastor must look at itself as temporal, not just in a broad spectrum, but in smaller bits of time as well. An outwardly focused church must realize that it will not stay in one place with the same people, necessarily, but will prone to reproduction, re-evaluation, re-structuring as it is moved by the Spirit. The non-vocational/bi-vocational aspect allows for this to happen in that a church is not itself tied to a building or bound by as many monetary needs and is therefore able to be a little more transient in nature. Now I know of warnings that may come, the questions of how a church becomes part of a people or a community in light of this, but I believe that it is altogether possible and probable that any church that focuses on the "other" will find itself in the heart of a community regardless of physical building or a pastor by vocation. Of course it calls for logistics to be worked out, and it calls for some amount of living within a closer proximity, but these questions and issues need to be worked out by individual churches.
So the non/bi-vocational pastorship opens up a world of opportunities, for the church to be challenged, for the the church to deepen its spirituality, its dependence upon God, its ability to be a reproductive church, and to function as a true light in a community, not just a Sunday stop off for do-gooders. Certainly there are things that I have not thought of, but these are just some of the things that have crossed my mind as I work by myself these days.
Iron & Wine will be here in December. I should go.
The Flyers are 2-1. Much better than last year. They can actually put the puck in the net, which is amazing.
The more I think about it, the more I believe that no one should ever buy a product marketed to them using a bee.
I once mistakenly put Philadelphia Cream Cheese on my toast thinking it was butter (I was eight). It was so disgusting that I have yet to ever eat cream cheese again.
I have a guitar for sale; anyone passing through UT who wants to get rid of $325 for a good guitar, a hard shell locking case, and a tuner should let me know.
I love autumn.
And cheese steaks.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
lame stories from some lame guy in a storage unit in downtown SLC
I apologize to my loyal readers for my lack of posts lately. I would say that I have been busy, which I have, but I actually have been working less lately. Not too long ago the company that has contracted us to work decided it was time to start looking at saving money on the 2.2+ billion dollar project, and one of the ways in which they can do that is by limiting our hours. I did not argue one bit when I was told by my tool supervisor. It has been so nice to have a little extra time these days. It has amounted to about two hours more per day with my family, which has been extremely nice. I catch some crap from some of my other co-workers who are now working 55+ hours, but I remind them nicely that when they were getting 35-40 in December-February, I was getting 65 or so. It is my time to rest. And I am thankful.
So the time at home has been great. The kids never cease to amaze me in their antics, actions, and in how much they have grown (in numerous ways) since we have had them. Janine often tells me of the boys interacting with each other, but today I watched them eating breakfast and just was amazed at the way that they talked to each other and interacted with a Diego video that happened to be on. It was quite hilarious, to be sure. They are all great kids. I was able to go to the library with the boys today, which was pretty fun. They are so much more independent than they were even just a couple of months ago. They look around at the books and videos and play with the toys in the kids area with hardly any notice of me as I collect the books and videos for the week. Juan, especially, walks around like he is a little man. Not just any man, but the one who owns whatever building we happen to be in. Little man. I think that they like talking about the prospect of going somewhere as much as actually going, too. They are like running commentators of everything that happens during a day. If I could broadcast it, you would all know exactly what was happening at any given moment of the day because they are always talking about it. Well, as long as people can understand their Spanglish.
Shirley has been an incredible help around the house, too. She seems to relish in the responsibilities we give her, and has really taken to doing dishes. She has such a helpful attitude in so many ways...it is refreshing. Even tonight she volunteered to read to the boys, which freed us up to watch The Office. She has been enjoying school as well. She was telling me today that she thinks that she has five friends, and then she proceeded to list them all. She is always cracking us up. She was messing around with the portable dvd player, executing anything she wanted to do with ease, so I told her she was smart. "I know," was her response. And she is very smart and very funny. I like to brag about our kids.
So I am irritated with the O.J. nonsense. At work there is a break room that we frequent when we are waiting for particular tools to be ready for us to work on, so we had major downtime the other day. Well, in this break room are three big, flat-screen tvs that are always blaring Fox News. Okay, right away it is not my favorite news channel, but I have disdain for all news channels anyway, so it wouldn't matter if it was msnbc or cnn either. Anyway, this particular day, for three hours straight, they had news on O.J. I am revolted. He is celebrity, and that is the only reason why his ridiculous life is even news. Apparently it sells, though, as I look at the people who stare at the tvs for their whole break or lunch. They watch looped news (sort of news, anyway) as if their very lives hang on the balance. I am disgusted. Can we hear something real? I know that no corporate news channel is going to put on any real news, but do we have to listen to ridiculous lawyers on retainer with Fox News tell us about the implications of O.J.s actions? AND THE PEOPLE WATCH IT. THEY LOVE IT. THEY ARE ADDICTED TO CELEBRITY. Look at the tag lines on your email when you sign out; what does it say? Who is on it? Celebrity. It sells. People want a vicarious life or a voyeuristic life or a life at all, so they hang on the threads of celebrity. I despise it. I want real life. Not celebrity. Not reality tv (could there ever be more of a misnomer?). I want original thought, original opinion, not to be told what is newsworthy by some corporate goon who knows that the general public is full of idiots who believe that O.J. Simpson is news. Get out of my face.
NHL preseason started. I am excited, to say the least. I have hope for the Flyers after their busy summer. The thought has crossed my mind many times to travel across the continent just to watch some Flyers games this year, but I am not sure how much of a reality that thought is. I have been checking into their game in Denver this year, as that might be more of a possibility, but we'll have to wait and see. What I do know is that I really miss watching the sport, and again the corporate goons tell us that we don't want to watch it, so it gets stuck on some half-baked sports/outdoor cable station that I don't get. Makes me want to drop the gloves. Go Flyers.
Sixplex. The idea lives. Inquire within. Communal living. There has to be a better way than the way it is done. We need to find ways to make less of an impact, to live in a way that we feel God calling us to live. I know that the comfortable regular lifestyle is not it. I admit, I love the perks: computers, digital recorders, driving places. But there has to be ways to do that stuff and be less of a nuisance to the planet. There has to be a way to tell the world that this stuff, really, means nothing. So we continue to search for the best way to say it. So communal living still lingers, hanging on, surprising us by being a topic of conversation and a thought of specific direction that seems to be an underlying prompt to us since the discussion first began two years ago. How long do some ideas hang on before they fall to the wayside? If this has not fallen away yet, is it just an idea? What is God calling us to do? We wrestle all the time. But we know that we do not feel comfortable just being status quo, just going along as if our actions have no repercussions elsewhere that we cannot see, that we cannot touch. I am challenged every day by my conscience, by the Holy Spirit, and I know that it might not be conventional, the direction that we go, that we lean, and we might be called crazy or idealists, but why not? Who's to say that we shouldn't live alternate lifestyles? Who's to tell us that we are wrong? I am not Noah, but I know that people laughed and mocked him...
I am going to go eat cereal now.
Damien Jurado. Saw him for the fourth time recently. That guy is amazing. I recommend anyone who reads this to get an album. Check out his music online. I told him a story that my sister Jo told me about seeing him in Portland. He just looked at me like I was an idiot. I'm sure that he wants to hear lame stories from some lame guy in a storage unit in downtown SLC. I know that's why he comes here. I am such a nerd.
I am really going to go eat cereal now.
So the time at home has been great. The kids never cease to amaze me in their antics, actions, and in how much they have grown (in numerous ways) since we have had them. Janine often tells me of the boys interacting with each other, but today I watched them eating breakfast and just was amazed at the way that they talked to each other and interacted with a Diego video that happened to be on. It was quite hilarious, to be sure. They are all great kids. I was able to go to the library with the boys today, which was pretty fun. They are so much more independent than they were even just a couple of months ago. They look around at the books and videos and play with the toys in the kids area with hardly any notice of me as I collect the books and videos for the week. Juan, especially, walks around like he is a little man. Not just any man, but the one who owns whatever building we happen to be in. Little man. I think that they like talking about the prospect of going somewhere as much as actually going, too. They are like running commentators of everything that happens during a day. If I could broadcast it, you would all know exactly what was happening at any given moment of the day because they are always talking about it. Well, as long as people can understand their Spanglish.
Shirley has been an incredible help around the house, too. She seems to relish in the responsibilities we give her, and has really taken to doing dishes. She has such a helpful attitude in so many ways...it is refreshing. Even tonight she volunteered to read to the boys, which freed us up to watch The Office. She has been enjoying school as well. She was telling me today that she thinks that she has five friends, and then she proceeded to list them all. She is always cracking us up. She was messing around with the portable dvd player, executing anything she wanted to do with ease, so I told her she was smart. "I know," was her response. And she is very smart and very funny. I like to brag about our kids.
So I am irritated with the O.J. nonsense. At work there is a break room that we frequent when we are waiting for particular tools to be ready for us to work on, so we had major downtime the other day. Well, in this break room are three big, flat-screen tvs that are always blaring Fox News. Okay, right away it is not my favorite news channel, but I have disdain for all news channels anyway, so it wouldn't matter if it was msnbc or cnn either. Anyway, this particular day, for three hours straight, they had news on O.J. I am revolted. He is celebrity, and that is the only reason why his ridiculous life is even news. Apparently it sells, though, as I look at the people who stare at the tvs for their whole break or lunch. They watch looped news (sort of news, anyway) as if their very lives hang on the balance. I am disgusted. Can we hear something real? I know that no corporate news channel is going to put on any real news, but do we have to listen to ridiculous lawyers on retainer with Fox News tell us about the implications of O.J.s actions? AND THE PEOPLE WATCH IT. THEY LOVE IT. THEY ARE ADDICTED TO CELEBRITY. Look at the tag lines on your email when you sign out; what does it say? Who is on it? Celebrity. It sells. People want a vicarious life or a voyeuristic life or a life at all, so they hang on the threads of celebrity. I despise it. I want real life. Not celebrity. Not reality tv (could there ever be more of a misnomer?). I want original thought, original opinion, not to be told what is newsworthy by some corporate goon who knows that the general public is full of idiots who believe that O.J. Simpson is news. Get out of my face.
NHL preseason started. I am excited, to say the least. I have hope for the Flyers after their busy summer. The thought has crossed my mind many times to travel across the continent just to watch some Flyers games this year, but I am not sure how much of a reality that thought is. I have been checking into their game in Denver this year, as that might be more of a possibility, but we'll have to wait and see. What I do know is that I really miss watching the sport, and again the corporate goons tell us that we don't want to watch it, so it gets stuck on some half-baked sports/outdoor cable station that I don't get. Makes me want to drop the gloves. Go Flyers.
Sixplex. The idea lives. Inquire within. Communal living. There has to be a better way than the way it is done. We need to find ways to make less of an impact, to live in a way that we feel God calling us to live. I know that the comfortable regular lifestyle is not it. I admit, I love the perks: computers, digital recorders, driving places. But there has to be ways to do that stuff and be less of a nuisance to the planet. There has to be a way to tell the world that this stuff, really, means nothing. So we continue to search for the best way to say it. So communal living still lingers, hanging on, surprising us by being a topic of conversation and a thought of specific direction that seems to be an underlying prompt to us since the discussion first began two years ago. How long do some ideas hang on before they fall to the wayside? If this has not fallen away yet, is it just an idea? What is God calling us to do? We wrestle all the time. But we know that we do not feel comfortable just being status quo, just going along as if our actions have no repercussions elsewhere that we cannot see, that we cannot touch. I am challenged every day by my conscience, by the Holy Spirit, and I know that it might not be conventional, the direction that we go, that we lean, and we might be called crazy or idealists, but why not? Who's to say that we shouldn't live alternate lifestyles? Who's to tell us that we are wrong? I am not Noah, but I know that people laughed and mocked him...
I am going to go eat cereal now.
Damien Jurado. Saw him for the fourth time recently. That guy is amazing. I recommend anyone who reads this to get an album. Check out his music online. I told him a story that my sister Jo told me about seeing him in Portland. He just looked at me like I was an idiot. I'm sure that he wants to hear lame stories from some lame guy in a storage unit in downtown SLC. I know that's why he comes here. I am such a nerd.
I am really going to go eat cereal now.
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
buying tents
So tonight was the first Kids Club of the year. I have to say that it went very well. We had 55 kids who showed up, and could have had more had we let in the five or so latecomers (they need to get there before 7 or else they would just show up whenever). It was a lot of fun to see all the kids brimming with excitement as they stood outside the door. Janine had installed a new format for running it, and I thought it was a great success. We were able to break up into small groups and spend time with the kids asking questions in their respective age categories. It was a lot of fun. I was with the 1-2 grades, which wouldn't have been my first choice, but I really enjoyed spending time with them. So much so that I signed up for the same group next week. It is just so nice to get back into the swing of things with Kids Club and with our small group meetings (which will start this Friday). I am often times frustrated by church and church related things, but when I see the kids who are just thirsting for attention and who are so excited to spend time at Kids Club, I am always refreshed. It was a good night. Thanks to Traci for watching the boys so I could go.
I ran the other day. Not to the fridge. Not to my favorite chair. No, I ran on the Jordan Parkway with my buddy Josh. I am realizing that if I don't put some sort of exercise into my life now, it will be very likely that I never will. So I told him that I would be interested in running with him when he goes out (he runs the SLC half-marathon every year). We started with the goal of a short distance of 2-3 miles...which is not my idea of a short distance. Short distance to me is more like the 50 yard dash that I ran in third grade...quick and to the point. His idea: 2-3 miles. So we ran. And ran. And ran. He let me set the pace, in his gracious nature, and I have no idea how to set a pace so I ran too fast. And became tired quickly. So we walked some and ran some more. It seemed very warm out, older folks were speeding by me, kids on tricycles, crawling babies, snails...everything. But in the end I ran about 3 miles and walked one. Josh's memory of the mile markers (they are different in every "city" that we enter and we were actually in two different cities) was a little off, so we ran a little more than he anticipated. It was good, though, even though I paid for it for the last day and a half; I was pretty sore. I will go again, but was "rescued" this week by my boss "needing" me to work. But I ran.
Work continues to roll along with me staying at the same place that I have been for the last 17 months. I am not complaining at all, though, as I continue to enjoy my time down there. It has been busier in the last couple of weeks, which has been very nice. There was some talk of us leaving at the end of August, but the end of August came and went and we remain there, biding our time, enjoying the autonomy that this job has offered. I certainly would love to stay in some aspect down there, but I am not sure how realistic that option is right now. We'll see what happens.
As Janine noted in her blog, we feel like we are settling in more and more as a family. I have truly felt recently that we have been able to hang out with people like we did pre-adoption again. I am not really sure how it has all worked out, if it is just my perception, or if it is a natural progression and adjustment that we have gone through, but it has just been very nice to hang out with people again as much as we have. Brad, Traci, Janine and I used to do so much together, and we did after Joel was born and when we came home from Colombia with our three kids, but recently we seem to have found our groove again, and some of that is very much attributed to the kids being able to play with each other, to go off to basements and monkey around while the 30 somethings discuss all sorts of things. As Kids Club has been refreshing, so has this, what I see as rejuvenated, hanging out time.
The Ducks won. So did Penn State. Other than that, I chuckle that Michigan lost and hope that all Utah teams lose this upcoming week. NFL starts this week, and like Jimmy cracking corn, I don't care.
There are times that I get really frustrated with lifestyle choices, that I think that our form of Christianity is so intertwined with western culture, with the idea of capitalism, consumerism, that I feel like the only true answer to it is to rebel against it. But in what form does this rebellion really make itself manifest? It is a question that we wrestle with daily, in all the choices we make, and it is not easy. I am often a romantic in my ideals, dreaming big of things that we could do, ways in which we could live that would be counter to the things that we feel are damaging to humanity and to the natural world, which in turn we feel that God is entrusting to the very humanity that pillages itself and the natural world. So we dream of alternate living. Some sort of off-the-grid thing. I still think about it a lot, think about in what ways we could live the life that we feel we are supposed to live, how to make that transition, where it will be, what it will look like. I am often confused and always tempted to just stay in comfort, to get cable and just watch sports or music, to ignore God's call to live in a certain way. It would be so much easier, but I just can't shake the feeling that we are supposed to somehow be different. To look different. To live differently. In that case, I guess this blog might just end abruptly someday when we move into our canvas tent...
...maybe I should go buy that tent...
I ran the other day. Not to the fridge. Not to my favorite chair. No, I ran on the Jordan Parkway with my buddy Josh. I am realizing that if I don't put some sort of exercise into my life now, it will be very likely that I never will. So I told him that I would be interested in running with him when he goes out (he runs the SLC half-marathon every year). We started with the goal of a short distance of 2-3 miles...which is not my idea of a short distance. Short distance to me is more like the 50 yard dash that I ran in third grade...quick and to the point. His idea: 2-3 miles. So we ran. And ran. And ran. He let me set the pace, in his gracious nature, and I have no idea how to set a pace so I ran too fast. And became tired quickly. So we walked some and ran some more. It seemed very warm out, older folks were speeding by me, kids on tricycles, crawling babies, snails...everything. But in the end I ran about 3 miles and walked one. Josh's memory of the mile markers (they are different in every "city" that we enter and we were actually in two different cities) was a little off, so we ran a little more than he anticipated. It was good, though, even though I paid for it for the last day and a half; I was pretty sore. I will go again, but was "rescued" this week by my boss "needing" me to work. But I ran.
Work continues to roll along with me staying at the same place that I have been for the last 17 months. I am not complaining at all, though, as I continue to enjoy my time down there. It has been busier in the last couple of weeks, which has been very nice. There was some talk of us leaving at the end of August, but the end of August came and went and we remain there, biding our time, enjoying the autonomy that this job has offered. I certainly would love to stay in some aspect down there, but I am not sure how realistic that option is right now. We'll see what happens.
As Janine noted in her blog, we feel like we are settling in more and more as a family. I have truly felt recently that we have been able to hang out with people like we did pre-adoption again. I am not really sure how it has all worked out, if it is just my perception, or if it is a natural progression and adjustment that we have gone through, but it has just been very nice to hang out with people again as much as we have. Brad, Traci, Janine and I used to do so much together, and we did after Joel was born and when we came home from Colombia with our three kids, but recently we seem to have found our groove again, and some of that is very much attributed to the kids being able to play with each other, to go off to basements and monkey around while the 30 somethings discuss all sorts of things. As Kids Club has been refreshing, so has this, what I see as rejuvenated, hanging out time.
The Ducks won. So did Penn State. Other than that, I chuckle that Michigan lost and hope that all Utah teams lose this upcoming week. NFL starts this week, and like Jimmy cracking corn, I don't care.
There are times that I get really frustrated with lifestyle choices, that I think that our form of Christianity is so intertwined with western culture, with the idea of capitalism, consumerism, that I feel like the only true answer to it is to rebel against it. But in what form does this rebellion really make itself manifest? It is a question that we wrestle with daily, in all the choices we make, and it is not easy. I am often a romantic in my ideals, dreaming big of things that we could do, ways in which we could live that would be counter to the things that we feel are damaging to humanity and to the natural world, which in turn we feel that God is entrusting to the very humanity that pillages itself and the natural world. So we dream of alternate living. Some sort of off-the-grid thing. I still think about it a lot, think about in what ways we could live the life that we feel we are supposed to live, how to make that transition, where it will be, what it will look like. I am often confused and always tempted to just stay in comfort, to get cable and just watch sports or music, to ignore God's call to live in a certain way. It would be so much easier, but I just can't shake the feeling that we are supposed to somehow be different. To look different. To live differently. In that case, I guess this blog might just end abruptly someday when we move into our canvas tent...
...maybe I should go buy that tent...
Thursday, August 30, 2007
THE FIBA CHAMPIONSHIPS ARE ON TOO LATE
I really can't believe that the end of August is coming. That it is here, really. We had our six month social worker meeting last Sunday, and to think that it had been that long already really blew me away. It was crazy to reflect on where we were three months ago, too, as the evolution of la familia Shinn is difficult to see while it is happening, but when we hear from someone who has only visited a couple of time, we realize just how much we have grown as a family. It is really very amazing. It was also good to reflect on how much joy the kids bring us. It's not as if we don't realize it during the mundane, day to day living, but it is so much more clear and much bigger when I take a step back and look at it all. The meeting went well, as our social worker was pleased with how things are going. All the post-adoption stuff seems to now be falling into place a little bit, which is nice. I am just so glad that Janine is so organized and on top of it all. I know that if I were in charge I would be floundering.
So tonight we ate dinner at our friend Josh's house. He invited us over and cooked up a delicious meal for us and had some ice cream for dessert. We had fun watching the kids play afterward, wrestling, goofing off, etc. They had a good time playing in a different environment and showing off, as they often do. Becky was not there as she has been out of town working more lately. Hopefully we will get a chance to do that again with both Josh and Becky soon. Thanks again for the fun and food, 7-Up.
Last night we had our Kids Club leader meeting. It was well attended and went well. I think that the changes that Janine is trying out are things that will be positive for the kids and the leaders, too. We will be trying to do more small group stuff, which will give us opportunities to connect better with a smaller group of kids rather than being so spread out with such a large group. I am excited about it and for being able to participate again this year, as Traci has volunteered to watch the boys that night. It will hopefully be a good year. We will see many new faces and we will miss some mainstays of recent years (Nohemi, Daniel, Jaylee, Arleth, Roberto, Lizbeth, Julianne, Junior...all moved). It is always hard to see the kids go, but that is part of the package that comes with ministering in this highly transient neighborhood. On the flip side, Johnny and his siblings came back after being gone for almost a year. I think we all had just about given up hope on seeing him again, then all of a sudden he shows up at church one day...crazy. It was good to see him, though.
Shirley started school this week. She is just like most kids in that she was not looking forward to it starting up, but it seems that she has taken to it well. She has plenty of kids in her class that she already knows, which is nice, and hopefully starting out with everyone will help her as she continues her transition into the system. I am really hoping that she likes her teacher (the kids will not meet their actual teacher until the upcoming week...they have a fill in until then) and that she is able to understand more of what is going on in classes and such. She has improved in her English so much this summer, so hopefully that will give her more confidence in class. She is such a social kid, so I can't picture her not enjoying school, I just hope that she doesn't feel out of place, especially after last year's debacle of placing her 1 3/4 grade levels above what she had last studied/finished. And I hope she makes good friends.
I went to Alejandro Escoveda/Son Volt at Red Butte Gardens (last show of the summer series) last Sunday. I have to say that it was the best show of the summer. Both bands wowed the crowd and basically were hitting on all cylinders. Josh, Josiah, Richard and Brad went with, and we all had a good time hanging out, relaxing, enjoying the music. We had some trouble with some knuckleheads who didn't realize that there were 100 people sitting behind them trying to watch a show. They decided they should stand for half the show. We were all getting a little upset, but eventually they sat down or at least got out of the way enough for us to see what was happening. I just don't get fools who have no perception of anything but themselves. They bug me.
The Tigers are tanking. And I don't really want to talk about it.
It is still in the mid to high nineties here. It is ridiculous. I hate the heat and I was looking forward to it cooling down a bit, but it really hasn't. We are about 6" low on our rain measurements this year and it doesn't look like we will catch up in the next month. I really can't wait for fall and winter. Summertime is not good for anyone.
My movie making friend has asked me to try to put together a soundtrack for the movie based on the script that I have read. I had started by picking songs that I thought would fit, ranging from Blue Mountain to Bruce Cockburn, but he wanted me to write the music and songs. I have never thought in that mode, but I told him I would give it a try. I am interested to see what I might come up with...is that strange, that I am curious to see what I do? It sounded odd when I wrote it. Anyhow, it should be interesting.
I could use some sleep.
Oh. T-shirts. We are in the midst of choosing designs and finalizing some drawings. We have priced things out and are getting close to ordering. I am hoping to plant some pictures (advertisements) on here and on my lame facebook page before too long. Josiah's artwork is going to be featured, with some things that I have done every once in a while. Stay tuned for more news. And get your cash ready for the deal of a lifetime...or of the decade...or of the day...
...and I still dream of coffee, but it is still on the back burner.
Anyhow, I hope all is well. Don't get punched in the face.
So tonight we ate dinner at our friend Josh's house. He invited us over and cooked up a delicious meal for us and had some ice cream for dessert. We had fun watching the kids play afterward, wrestling, goofing off, etc. They had a good time playing in a different environment and showing off, as they often do. Becky was not there as she has been out of town working more lately. Hopefully we will get a chance to do that again with both Josh and Becky soon. Thanks again for the fun and food, 7-Up.
Last night we had our Kids Club leader meeting. It was well attended and went well. I think that the changes that Janine is trying out are things that will be positive for the kids and the leaders, too. We will be trying to do more small group stuff, which will give us opportunities to connect better with a smaller group of kids rather than being so spread out with such a large group. I am excited about it and for being able to participate again this year, as Traci has volunteered to watch the boys that night. It will hopefully be a good year. We will see many new faces and we will miss some mainstays of recent years (Nohemi, Daniel, Jaylee, Arleth, Roberto, Lizbeth, Julianne, Junior...all moved). It is always hard to see the kids go, but that is part of the package that comes with ministering in this highly transient neighborhood. On the flip side, Johnny and his siblings came back after being gone for almost a year. I think we all had just about given up hope on seeing him again, then all of a sudden he shows up at church one day...crazy. It was good to see him, though.
Shirley started school this week. She is just like most kids in that she was not looking forward to it starting up, but it seems that she has taken to it well. She has plenty of kids in her class that she already knows, which is nice, and hopefully starting out with everyone will help her as she continues her transition into the system. I am really hoping that she likes her teacher (the kids will not meet their actual teacher until the upcoming week...they have a fill in until then) and that she is able to understand more of what is going on in classes and such. She has improved in her English so much this summer, so hopefully that will give her more confidence in class. She is such a social kid, so I can't picture her not enjoying school, I just hope that she doesn't feel out of place, especially after last year's debacle of placing her 1 3/4 grade levels above what she had last studied/finished. And I hope she makes good friends.
I went to Alejandro Escoveda/Son Volt at Red Butte Gardens (last show of the summer series) last Sunday. I have to say that it was the best show of the summer. Both bands wowed the crowd and basically were hitting on all cylinders. Josh, Josiah, Richard and Brad went with, and we all had a good time hanging out, relaxing, enjoying the music. We had some trouble with some knuckleheads who didn't realize that there were 100 people sitting behind them trying to watch a show. They decided they should stand for half the show. We were all getting a little upset, but eventually they sat down or at least got out of the way enough for us to see what was happening. I just don't get fools who have no perception of anything but themselves. They bug me.
The Tigers are tanking. And I don't really want to talk about it.
It is still in the mid to high nineties here. It is ridiculous. I hate the heat and I was looking forward to it cooling down a bit, but it really hasn't. We are about 6" low on our rain measurements this year and it doesn't look like we will catch up in the next month. I really can't wait for fall and winter. Summertime is not good for anyone.
My movie making friend has asked me to try to put together a soundtrack for the movie based on the script that I have read. I had started by picking songs that I thought would fit, ranging from Blue Mountain to Bruce Cockburn, but he wanted me to write the music and songs. I have never thought in that mode, but I told him I would give it a try. I am interested to see what I might come up with...is that strange, that I am curious to see what I do? It sounded odd when I wrote it. Anyhow, it should be interesting.
I could use some sleep.
Oh. T-shirts. We are in the midst of choosing designs and finalizing some drawings. We have priced things out and are getting close to ordering. I am hoping to plant some pictures (advertisements) on here and on my lame facebook page before too long. Josiah's artwork is going to be featured, with some things that I have done every once in a while. Stay tuned for more news. And get your cash ready for the deal of a lifetime...or of the decade...or of the day...
...and I still dream of coffee, but it is still on the back burner.
Anyhow, I hope all is well. Don't get punched in the face.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Kip Dynamite: A Presidential Candidate for the Everyman
Well, things are getting back to normal now. After traveling around for a while (PA, then house sitting) we are finally back into our own house, busy getting the kids (and ourselves) back into routine. While we had fun traveling east and staying at our friends house, we always love coming back to our house. I really think that the kids missed their room and their toys and such. They have been playing a lot and sleeping better since our return.
The boys turned three yesterday, so we had a little party for them. It was quite a bit of fun, as we went out to eat with some friends and then returned home for some cake and ice cream and presents. It was really low key, as we only had a couple of gifts for the boys, but I have to say that I have never seen kids so excited about getting clothes. The boys were literally jumping around, doing somersaults, dancing, and showing off each item of clothing as they themselves discovered them among the shards of torn paper and cardboard. We all got a good laugh out of watching them and just enjoyed a good night of relaxing with friends. We were so happy that the boys had a good time and got to eat their cake and ice cream. Juancho had been anticipating this for quite some time, bringing up the party any time he could. I don't think he was disappointed. Shirley even got a little surprise when our friend Christie brought over a new "Troy" (from High School Musical) backpack full of supplies for the upcoming school year. Gifts for everyone!
Another highlight is having Brad, Traci and Joel back from Costa Rica. I picked them up a little after midnight on Monday night/Tuesday morning. It has been great to have them back and to hear of their adventures down there. It certainly brings back memories for us and our trip to Colombia earlier this year. We were happy to hear that they had a great time and that they were able to see sooooo many birds (I think over 200 different varieties!!!), which is something they truly love. Now I have my dog walking buddy back, too, which is nice. Having them back is all part of us getting into our "routine", too. Good stuff.
Tonight we had another night of company, as B, T, and J came over for lasagna. We were also joined by Josh and then by Sherri, who both could make it in spite of late invitations. We had a good time sitting at the dinner table sharing stories, discussing economics/politics/social issues. And the lasagna was delicious. It has just been nice to have our little community back after the summer months in which we seemed to be going this way and that way all the time. Winter schedules (school, kids club, etc.) will soon be in full effect, too, and we will be even more settled in. I am looking forward to it, for sure.
Josiah and I met with a t-shirt distributor/printer the other day and began our quest to make t-shirts. We were able to get quite a bit of information and have been going over the drawings and prices and such to get an idea of what we might/what we are able to do. It has been very exciting, to say the least, and has been another outlet for my creative side. Hopefully we will be able to get going on that and have pictures of designs here before too long. The coffee is kind of on the back burner now, but still rests in my head as something I would really like to do. One step at a time, though. Or one project at at time, anyway.
Work has been slowing down a bit as of late. We are getting close to wrapping up our full time stage of being there, as our tool install list continues to get lower. I am not looking forward to leaving that workplace, though, and I have been curious to know if there were openings in that particular work environment. That is not to say that I would go if offered, but I would be a fool to not listen. I am really not looking forward to the unexpected and extremely variable work of land surveying outside of IMFT's clean room environment. We'll see what happens. In the meantime, I hope that they forget about us and just keep us on full time down there...yeah, that would be cool.
Anyhow, I should probably get some sleep soon. I came home and fell asleep on my recliner this afternoon and I have a show to go to tomorrow (Calexico). I don't want to fall asleep during the concert...that could be embarrassing.
In the immortal words of Kip Dynamite: Peace out.
The boys turned three yesterday, so we had a little party for them. It was quite a bit of fun, as we went out to eat with some friends and then returned home for some cake and ice cream and presents. It was really low key, as we only had a couple of gifts for the boys, but I have to say that I have never seen kids so excited about getting clothes. The boys were literally jumping around, doing somersaults, dancing, and showing off each item of clothing as they themselves discovered them among the shards of torn paper and cardboard. We all got a good laugh out of watching them and just enjoyed a good night of relaxing with friends. We were so happy that the boys had a good time and got to eat their cake and ice cream. Juancho had been anticipating this for quite some time, bringing up the party any time he could. I don't think he was disappointed. Shirley even got a little surprise when our friend Christie brought over a new "Troy" (from High School Musical) backpack full of supplies for the upcoming school year. Gifts for everyone!
Another highlight is having Brad, Traci and Joel back from Costa Rica. I picked them up a little after midnight on Monday night/Tuesday morning. It has been great to have them back and to hear of their adventures down there. It certainly brings back memories for us and our trip to Colombia earlier this year. We were happy to hear that they had a great time and that they were able to see sooooo many birds (I think over 200 different varieties!!!), which is something they truly love. Now I have my dog walking buddy back, too, which is nice. Having them back is all part of us getting into our "routine", too. Good stuff.
Tonight we had another night of company, as B, T, and J came over for lasagna. We were also joined by Josh and then by Sherri, who both could make it in spite of late invitations. We had a good time sitting at the dinner table sharing stories, discussing economics/politics/social issues. And the lasagna was delicious. It has just been nice to have our little community back after the summer months in which we seemed to be going this way and that way all the time. Winter schedules (school, kids club, etc.) will soon be in full effect, too, and we will be even more settled in. I am looking forward to it, for sure.
Josiah and I met with a t-shirt distributor/printer the other day and began our quest to make t-shirts. We were able to get quite a bit of information and have been going over the drawings and prices and such to get an idea of what we might/what we are able to do. It has been very exciting, to say the least, and has been another outlet for my creative side. Hopefully we will be able to get going on that and have pictures of designs here before too long. The coffee is kind of on the back burner now, but still rests in my head as something I would really like to do. One step at a time, though. Or one project at at time, anyway.
Work has been slowing down a bit as of late. We are getting close to wrapping up our full time stage of being there, as our tool install list continues to get lower. I am not looking forward to leaving that workplace, though, and I have been curious to know if there were openings in that particular work environment. That is not to say that I would go if offered, but I would be a fool to not listen. I am really not looking forward to the unexpected and extremely variable work of land surveying outside of IMFT's clean room environment. We'll see what happens. In the meantime, I hope that they forget about us and just keep us on full time down there...yeah, that would be cool.
Anyhow, I should probably get some sleep soon. I came home and fell asleep on my recliner this afternoon and I have a show to go to tomorrow (Calexico). I don't want to fall asleep during the concert...that could be embarrassing.
In the immortal words of Kip Dynamite: Peace out.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
back to the high desert
Who cares about Barry Bonds? I don't, really. I read somewhere that people are most impressed with baseball records, the numbers that seem to stand out, or at least did at some point. I cared when I was 13, but at some point lost that. What I care more about is the pitcher. Living in my limited television watching household, we still have not see the new 'shot heard 'round the world', nor have we see any of the fanfare that followed. Not even on nightly news. It just isn't something that we are overly interested in. But I did see the pitcher who gave up the record tying home run. Babyface. Looked like he thought immediately, "It could be me." And it could have been, but it wasn't. So I wonder about the record giving pitcher, how he feels about ending up as a footnote, a trivia answer in the history of the game. I could imagine someone even being proud of such a feat. But to be that guy. I am not too sure I would want to be that guy. As the ball sails into the stands. As time freezes and millions of people see his follow through...footnote. History. In the encyclopedia for more than a couple of years as a journeyman. Footnote. That Guy.
So, yes, we are back in Utah. I, like Janine, have trouble with calling it home. I feel that I have not really had a home in several years, last feeling connected to the wilds of Alaska. My affinities now pull me toward Oregon, though, as I find myself drawn to the rains, the lush greens, and the familiarity of west coast living. So anyhow, we are back in Utah, back to work today after a one day adjustment for the Shinn family. The trip home was not to eventful, which is nice. We did have to crowd into four seats, with either Janine or me always with a 2 year old on our laps. It was good, though, and I am so glad that our kids travel so well. Juan (whom I now call Ponch) seems to have overcome his fear of flying. It all happened about the time that he started his new career as a non-stop color commentator to everything that is going on. It is actually quite funny, as his mind is continually working and ingesting/digesting massive amounts of information. He has to verbalize most parts of it, too. Andres is a little less talkative, but no less of learner. His recall is quite good and has improved dramatically in the six months we have had with all of them. Shirley continues to grow in her ability to speak English (rapidly, I think) and is always such a good help with the boys. They were all excited to come back home, even after such a good trip and good time for them back east. I think the familiarity of their own beds and toys has been very welcoming and calming for them. It will all get flipped over again, though, as we head to our friends house to house sit (Rich and Corina, Traci's parents) as they go to meet up with the Clemens folk in Costa Rica. It will be like a mini-vacation right here in Utah, as we will have access to a backyard and digital tv. The digital tv means more Miami Ink for me, and maybe actually being able to find Barney on tv for the boys. Anyhow, we are really looking forward to the backyard to let the kids run and play in for a week. It should be a good time. And we really hope that Rich, Corina and Sandy have a great time in Costa Rica. They will be coming back on the same flight as Brad, Traci and Joel, so we eagerly anticipate their return. I am sure that it will go quickly.
Mike Baksic...recognize that name? He is that guy.
www.organicconsumers.org
www.coopamerica.org
These are two websites that I have recently been spending time looking at. I have found them to be informative on a few different levels, specifically being sparked after Janine and I have been trying to be more conscious of where we shop and what we buy. I would recommend that any readers at least check it out. It is, at the very least, interesting, and hopefully challenging to our shopping habits and patterns. It has been a process for us, to become aware of where we shop, where our products are made, etc., and honestly it can be overwhelming. But I believe that we need to be informed of the things that we ignorantly support through the strongest vote: our money. When we look at atrocities and unfair practices that are supported directly or indirectly through our choices, we must consider what we can do to change things. We may say that it is simple economics that encourages to shop at big-box outlets such as Wal*Mart or lack of selection that forces us to purchase items that are not fair trade or organic. However, the likelihood that we can not avert our purchasing from being intoxicated by convenience or low prices is something that I believe to be a fallacy. There are alternatives, even though they might not be readily available or easily accessible. But we need to investigate, to learn about our options to progress in such a direction of being more conscious of what our purchasing power really does. It is easy to criticize the obvious: wars, natural disasters, caste systems, maybe certain political ideologies, certainly certain world leaders. But is it as easy to criticize the corporate machine that has no conscience, no real arbiter to judge, no real non-influenced policing system? Maybe it is, but the real policing comes when we decide to speak economically to such things, the countless atrocities and human rights violations that continue to happen by the power of our dollar. So we need to become aware. And from there we need to become concerned. And from there we need to become involved. Again, it is overwhelming. We are not going to solve the world's problems, but that does not mean that we should continue to add to it blindly, ignorantly, or even willingly, out of concern for only ourselves. My mind races as I try to ingest these things, wondering in how many ways I am so deeply entrenched, so deeply rooted in those things which I am now realizing I despise. It is heavy. And we will not be able always be consistent in every purchase. But we do hope that we are consistent in moving in the direction in which we continually consider the "other", as we believe that is what Christ meant with the second greatest commandment of loving others as we love ourselves. May our love for Christ lead us that way.
This
is me
getting
off of
my
soapbox
;)
I hope all is well.
And Matt...I did eat a couple of soft pretzels. And yes, I did tell you to get all that stuff before you got married, but rest assured, there is ink after matrimony...I know a good artist in SLC...
So, yes, we are back in Utah. I, like Janine, have trouble with calling it home. I feel that I have not really had a home in several years, last feeling connected to the wilds of Alaska. My affinities now pull me toward Oregon, though, as I find myself drawn to the rains, the lush greens, and the familiarity of west coast living. So anyhow, we are back in Utah, back to work today after a one day adjustment for the Shinn family. The trip home was not to eventful, which is nice. We did have to crowd into four seats, with either Janine or me always with a 2 year old on our laps. It was good, though, and I am so glad that our kids travel so well. Juan (whom I now call Ponch) seems to have overcome his fear of flying. It all happened about the time that he started his new career as a non-stop color commentator to everything that is going on. It is actually quite funny, as his mind is continually working and ingesting/digesting massive amounts of information. He has to verbalize most parts of it, too. Andres is a little less talkative, but no less of learner. His recall is quite good and has improved dramatically in the six months we have had with all of them. Shirley continues to grow in her ability to speak English (rapidly, I think) and is always such a good help with the boys. They were all excited to come back home, even after such a good trip and good time for them back east. I think the familiarity of their own beds and toys has been very welcoming and calming for them. It will all get flipped over again, though, as we head to our friends house to house sit (Rich and Corina, Traci's parents) as they go to meet up with the Clemens folk in Costa Rica. It will be like a mini-vacation right here in Utah, as we will have access to a backyard and digital tv. The digital tv means more Miami Ink for me, and maybe actually being able to find Barney on tv for the boys. Anyhow, we are really looking forward to the backyard to let the kids run and play in for a week. It should be a good time. And we really hope that Rich, Corina and Sandy have a great time in Costa Rica. They will be coming back on the same flight as Brad, Traci and Joel, so we eagerly anticipate their return. I am sure that it will go quickly.
Mike Baksic...recognize that name? He is that guy.
www.organicconsumers.org
www.coopamerica.org
These are two websites that I have recently been spending time looking at. I have found them to be informative on a few different levels, specifically being sparked after Janine and I have been trying to be more conscious of where we shop and what we buy. I would recommend that any readers at least check it out. It is, at the very least, interesting, and hopefully challenging to our shopping habits and patterns. It has been a process for us, to become aware of where we shop, where our products are made, etc., and honestly it can be overwhelming. But I believe that we need to be informed of the things that we ignorantly support through the strongest vote: our money. When we look at atrocities and unfair practices that are supported directly or indirectly through our choices, we must consider what we can do to change things. We may say that it is simple economics that encourages to shop at big-box outlets such as Wal*Mart or lack of selection that forces us to purchase items that are not fair trade or organic. However, the likelihood that we can not avert our purchasing from being intoxicated by convenience or low prices is something that I believe to be a fallacy. There are alternatives, even though they might not be readily available or easily accessible. But we need to investigate, to learn about our options to progress in such a direction of being more conscious of what our purchasing power really does. It is easy to criticize the obvious: wars, natural disasters, caste systems, maybe certain political ideologies, certainly certain world leaders. But is it as easy to criticize the corporate machine that has no conscience, no real arbiter to judge, no real non-influenced policing system? Maybe it is, but the real policing comes when we decide to speak economically to such things, the countless atrocities and human rights violations that continue to happen by the power of our dollar. So we need to become aware. And from there we need to become concerned. And from there we need to become involved. Again, it is overwhelming. We are not going to solve the world's problems, but that does not mean that we should continue to add to it blindly, ignorantly, or even willingly, out of concern for only ourselves. My mind races as I try to ingest these things, wondering in how many ways I am so deeply entrenched, so deeply rooted in those things which I am now realizing I despise. It is heavy. And we will not be able always be consistent in every purchase. But we do hope that we are consistent in moving in the direction in which we continually consider the "other", as we believe that is what Christ meant with the second greatest commandment of loving others as we love ourselves. May our love for Christ lead us that way.
This
is me
getting
off of
my
soapbox
;)
I hope all is well.
And Matt...I did eat a couple of soft pretzels. And yes, I did tell you to get all that stuff before you got married, but rest assured, there is ink after matrimony...I know a good artist in SLC...
Monday, August 6, 2007
traveling plans
It has been a whirlwind of a weekend trip for me. I arrived here on Thursday night after a flight with unruly children and an unruly older gentleman sitting behind me (do you really need to put your knees in the back of my chair? Really?). I was glad that I didn't check any luggage and that I was able to skip the usual idiotic jockeying for position around the baggage carousal. Fools sometimes amuse me, but that is one place where fools only have one purpose: to annoy me. I was glad we avoided that particular annoying aspect of traveling. Anyhow, we have eaten well, hitting most of my favorite places, including my favorite breakfast place, my favorite cheese steak place, and my favorite local Chinese place. We have had a ton of fun, and have had nary a dull moment since I have been here.
Our party for our kids went extremely well, with a spectacular turnout of friends and family. It was absolutely wonderful to see so many people whose desire it was to see our beautiful children. We were able to share at least part of our lives with those whose relationships we cherish, and it was wonderful to introduce our kids to the different people. Mom and Dad Clemens (along with Karla, Janine's sister) put a lot of time and effort into getting things prepared for the event, so we are extremely grateful for their help in getting it all together. I was just glad that everything turned out so well and that it was just a great celebratory time. The kids did very well, too, especially considering how it intruded on their nap time. Good stuff.
So we are actually supposed to be on our way to SLC right now. We went out to the airport today, believing that all was well (it was at my last check online). However, after we are dropped off, we run into problems at curbside check-in. We are told that we need to go to the ticket counter inside. So we trudge our bags inside (I am carrying probably 130 pounds of luggage at this point, while Janine tries to manage one of the boys in a stroller while maneuvering two rolling carry-ons at the same time...it was quite the scene, I am sure) and make our way to the line. We found an open place where Janine could wait with the kids and the luggage while I waited in line. The line was not really moving, which gave me plenty of time to notice on the board that our flight has been delayed an hour and twenty minutes. We realize that this will not allow us to catch our connecting flight from Cincinnati and that we are not going to make it back to SLC tonight. . .until I see a flight to SLC leaving in about an hour. I foolishly thought we might be able to get on that. But time rolls on and I am not moving very quickly. I moved much quicker when they started having to cart people off who looked like they had been there since Ford was president...seriously...it was a long time. Moses was the first to drop out...then Abe Lincoln ( I thought they would have flown him on Air Force One or something), eventually I get to the front only to be told the obvious; we're not going to make it to SLC tonight. So we book a flight for tomorrow, with an expected arrival about 20 hours later than we had originally planned, but better than their suggestion (we are staying at Janine's parents house) of flying through and getting put up in Cincinnati (I have never been there, but I really don't want to stay there tonight). We actually ended up calling MaryAnne (Janine's mom) while she and Jerry were attending a benefit dinner and auction just a few miles down the road at Citizen's Bank Ballpark. She volunteered to come get us and drive us back to the house. We were so glad that she could come so soon. The kids did wonderfully, in spite of circumstances, and are out playing at a park right now. I am amazed at their resiliency as they overcome all sorts of obstacles and changes that are put in front of them. Each one of them possesses such a great sense of humor, too, that it puts all the rest of us "mature" adults at ease when they make us laugh at any given time. We are always so grateful for our kids.
Anyhow, all this to say that our time here has been wonderful. It was great to fly in and get bombarded by my kids and to see extended family here again. Really, it was a little shorter than I would have liked it to be, but it has been great none-the-less. We will be home soon, Pak, so hang tight. The kids miss you. The kids miss many of you back home in SLC. We will see you soon.
anybody want to go get some tattoos?
Our party for our kids went extremely well, with a spectacular turnout of friends and family. It was absolutely wonderful to see so many people whose desire it was to see our beautiful children. We were able to share at least part of our lives with those whose relationships we cherish, and it was wonderful to introduce our kids to the different people. Mom and Dad Clemens (along with Karla, Janine's sister) put a lot of time and effort into getting things prepared for the event, so we are extremely grateful for their help in getting it all together. I was just glad that everything turned out so well and that it was just a great celebratory time. The kids did very well, too, especially considering how it intruded on their nap time. Good stuff.
So we are actually supposed to be on our way to SLC right now. We went out to the airport today, believing that all was well (it was at my last check online). However, after we are dropped off, we run into problems at curbside check-in. We are told that we need to go to the ticket counter inside. So we trudge our bags inside (I am carrying probably 130 pounds of luggage at this point, while Janine tries to manage one of the boys in a stroller while maneuvering two rolling carry-ons at the same time...it was quite the scene, I am sure) and make our way to the line. We found an open place where Janine could wait with the kids and the luggage while I waited in line. The line was not really moving, which gave me plenty of time to notice on the board that our flight has been delayed an hour and twenty minutes. We realize that this will not allow us to catch our connecting flight from Cincinnati and that we are not going to make it back to SLC tonight. . .until I see a flight to SLC leaving in about an hour. I foolishly thought we might be able to get on that. But time rolls on and I am not moving very quickly. I moved much quicker when they started having to cart people off who looked like they had been there since Ford was president...seriously...it was a long time. Moses was the first to drop out...then Abe Lincoln ( I thought they would have flown him on Air Force One or something), eventually I get to the front only to be told the obvious; we're not going to make it to SLC tonight. So we book a flight for tomorrow, with an expected arrival about 20 hours later than we had originally planned, but better than their suggestion (we are staying at Janine's parents house) of flying through and getting put up in Cincinnati (I have never been there, but I really don't want to stay there tonight). We actually ended up calling MaryAnne (Janine's mom) while she and Jerry were attending a benefit dinner and auction just a few miles down the road at Citizen's Bank Ballpark. She volunteered to come get us and drive us back to the house. We were so glad that she could come so soon. The kids did wonderfully, in spite of circumstances, and are out playing at a park right now. I am amazed at their resiliency as they overcome all sorts of obstacles and changes that are put in front of them. Each one of them possesses such a great sense of humor, too, that it puts all the rest of us "mature" adults at ease when they make us laugh at any given time. We are always so grateful for our kids.
Anyhow, all this to say that our time here has been wonderful. It was great to fly in and get bombarded by my kids and to see extended family here again. Really, it was a little shorter than I would have liked it to be, but it has been great none-the-less. We will be home soon, Pak, so hang tight. The kids miss you. The kids miss many of you back home in SLC. We will see you soon.
anybody want to go get some tattoos?
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
good show
I honestly cannot believe that it is August already. I am amazed at how quickly time has gone by, specifically since our return home from Colombia in February. Janine has found others who have been in the process or have adopted from Colombia, so we periodically check their blogs. It is always a reminder to me of our own time, our own process, and how it all seems so recent and at the same time so distant from where we are now. We have had our kids now for a little over six months and it is difficult to imagine a time without them. The surreal moments now are the moments, like this past week, that I spend without the kids. They are such a part of my reality that I feel quite empty without my family around. I am very anxious to go see them tomorrow, to hold their little hands, to hear their voices saying "Papi" and to have our family completely together again. Six months has gone by so quickly and has deeply rooted itself in reality in such a way that it almost seems as if we have had these kids from the beginning (although Shirley is two years older than our marriage:)). All that to say, I am absolutely blessed to have such a beautiful and wonderful family, my wife and kids, and I am excited to see them tomorrow.
So I did go to Ryan Adams last night, arriving at the venue four hours before the show started and still finding that my buddy and I were behind over 150 other people in line. There was very much anticipation in the air to see him, so wanting good seats (in the outdoor amphitheatre with open seating) people arrived early. I had packed sandwiches for dinner, so we just relaxed and talked about work (we both work at Stantec) until the gates opened at 6 PM. We rushed down the grassy hill to get good seats and ended up about 100 feet from the stage with no big-heads in front of us. We were happy with our seats. We had nice people around us, not too many loud talkers, which was nice. They were actually there to see Ryan Adams and not to socialize, as is often the case. The show started late, and while thunder clouds threatened us, they never really followed through, so we got a dry show. The band played for about an hour and forty-five minutes, mostly stuff off his last four albums, and had some Grateful Dead-ish moments of jamming out. It was quite fun, and I would certainly go see him again, although we were all disappointed that he didn't encore. The crowd was left standing (they were pretty lame with their cheering at the end) for about 15 minutes as we screamed and waited for his return. Soon, though, the stagehands began dismantling gear, and we knew that it was over. Next up: Calexico.
Today should be busy for me. I will be wrapping up some cleaning around the house before I go, making sure that I have mail, dog, and rides to and from the airport covered for the trip. I will drop a couple of things off at the library and some stuff at Savers, as well, so the day should go pretty quickly. I also will be going out to eat with our friends Josh and Becky and Jill and Josiah, so that will be good. We are going to go downtown to a pizza joint, which actually sounds good right now even though it is not yet 9 AM. I am pretty sure that I could eat a couple slices right now. I'd like to find time to do a little recording today, too, but whenever I get wrapped up in that I lose many hours on end just staring at my recorder with headphones on. We'll see what happens.
Pak will be going over to Rich and Corina's house for the time while we are gone, and I am pretty sure that she will like that. It is funny how she misses her buddy Rufus when he is gone. She has been trying to turn to Brad and Traci's house to get Rufus every time we go for a walk. She is so used to having him around. So the walks have been solo, much quieter than normal. It is odd to not have the Clemens family here, although we get good reports from Costa Rica. They really seem to be enjoying themselves, which is good for them. Everybody needs a break now and then, and I hope that they are getting theirs. But we miss them a lot.
We finally got rain here the other day. It stormed like crazy, actually. Thursday night. It was right after I ate with Josh and Becky, I was leaving their house (had Pakak with me, so she could play with Jack) and we saw the dark clouds hanging over the west side of the SL Valley. The fat drops of rain peppered my windshield as I drove off in the direction of home. I had forgotten that I was supposed to pick up a crate of produce in Taylorsville that day, so I knew that I had to drive the 30 extra blocks to go get it that night (it was already 9:30). As we drove in that direction, the wind was incredible. I could feel it picking up underneath the van as I drove. Pak was freaked out by the lightning, and her usual hyper self was put on hold as she simply laid down on the front seat and looked around at every flash of lightning. Anyhow, we finally made it to get the food and I got soaked getting it. It was quite an adventure. To top it off, the onions were really pungent and smelled up the car on the way home. Crazy. But we all made it.
Anyhow, I need to go eat breakfast. I slept in a little this morning, actually making it to 7 AM. Usually, me sleeping in means that I wake up around 6 AM. People think it is crazy that I consider that sleeping in, but it is about an hour after I usually get up. So 7 AM today was a nice solid sleep for me. It felt pretty good and probably would have been even longer if a certain heeler mix didn't come nosing me to get out of bed. Crazy dog.
Tomorrow I fly out. I see Janine and the kids. Maybe eat a cheese steak. I am excited. It will be good. I miss them a lot. Tomorrow.
So I did go to Ryan Adams last night, arriving at the venue four hours before the show started and still finding that my buddy and I were behind over 150 other people in line. There was very much anticipation in the air to see him, so wanting good seats (in the outdoor amphitheatre with open seating) people arrived early. I had packed sandwiches for dinner, so we just relaxed and talked about work (we both work at Stantec) until the gates opened at 6 PM. We rushed down the grassy hill to get good seats and ended up about 100 feet from the stage with no big-heads in front of us. We were happy with our seats. We had nice people around us, not too many loud talkers, which was nice. They were actually there to see Ryan Adams and not to socialize, as is often the case. The show started late, and while thunder clouds threatened us, they never really followed through, so we got a dry show. The band played for about an hour and forty-five minutes, mostly stuff off his last four albums, and had some Grateful Dead-ish moments of jamming out. It was quite fun, and I would certainly go see him again, although we were all disappointed that he didn't encore. The crowd was left standing (they were pretty lame with their cheering at the end) for about 15 minutes as we screamed and waited for his return. Soon, though, the stagehands began dismantling gear, and we knew that it was over. Next up: Calexico.
Today should be busy for me. I will be wrapping up some cleaning around the house before I go, making sure that I have mail, dog, and rides to and from the airport covered for the trip. I will drop a couple of things off at the library and some stuff at Savers, as well, so the day should go pretty quickly. I also will be going out to eat with our friends Josh and Becky and Jill and Josiah, so that will be good. We are going to go downtown to a pizza joint, which actually sounds good right now even though it is not yet 9 AM. I am pretty sure that I could eat a couple slices right now. I'd like to find time to do a little recording today, too, but whenever I get wrapped up in that I lose many hours on end just staring at my recorder with headphones on. We'll see what happens.
Pak will be going over to Rich and Corina's house for the time while we are gone, and I am pretty sure that she will like that. It is funny how she misses her buddy Rufus when he is gone. She has been trying to turn to Brad and Traci's house to get Rufus every time we go for a walk. She is so used to having him around. So the walks have been solo, much quieter than normal. It is odd to not have the Clemens family here, although we get good reports from Costa Rica. They really seem to be enjoying themselves, which is good for them. Everybody needs a break now and then, and I hope that they are getting theirs. But we miss them a lot.
We finally got rain here the other day. It stormed like crazy, actually. Thursday night. It was right after I ate with Josh and Becky, I was leaving their house (had Pakak with me, so she could play with Jack) and we saw the dark clouds hanging over the west side of the SL Valley. The fat drops of rain peppered my windshield as I drove off in the direction of home. I had forgotten that I was supposed to pick up a crate of produce in Taylorsville that day, so I knew that I had to drive the 30 extra blocks to go get it that night (it was already 9:30). As we drove in that direction, the wind was incredible. I could feel it picking up underneath the van as I drove. Pak was freaked out by the lightning, and her usual hyper self was put on hold as she simply laid down on the front seat and looked around at every flash of lightning. Anyhow, we finally made it to get the food and I got soaked getting it. It was quite an adventure. To top it off, the onions were really pungent and smelled up the car on the way home. Crazy. But we all made it.
Anyhow, I need to go eat breakfast. I slept in a little this morning, actually making it to 7 AM. Usually, me sleeping in means that I wake up around 6 AM. People think it is crazy that I consider that sleeping in, but it is about an hour after I usually get up. So 7 AM today was a nice solid sleep for me. It felt pretty good and probably would have been even longer if a certain heeler mix didn't come nosing me to get out of bed. Crazy dog.
Tomorrow I fly out. I see Janine and the kids. Maybe eat a cheese steak. I am excited. It will be good. I miss them a lot. Tomorrow.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
some place green
My family has been gone for a week now. And what I always think are going to be laid-back times turn into busy times. I have to say that our house seemed incredibly empty when they all left, and very lonely. I feel that when we discuss bonding with our children and how they bond to us is really measured well by how much I miss them all when they leave. Shirley has called and left a couple of messages, which I saved and listened to them again later on. Her messages are always so cute. I discussed this with our friends Josh and Becky when they had me over for dinner last Thursday; Josh recalling trying to decipher Shirley's lengthy message to them in Spanglish inviting them to Brad, Traci and Joel's house for dinner. So I miss them terribly, finding that filling my time with movies and video games are not what they used to be. I will see them soon, though, leaving Thursday morning and spending a long weekend in PA. I am looking forward to it and thought about trying to extend the days there for three days longer, but I don't know what the reality of that would be...
So I have been busier than I thought I would be. There have been plenty of invitations to do things, so many that I have had to turn some down just so I could do my own thing here. And my own thing has consisted of a variety of movies, vids, recording music and reading screenplays for movies. My favorite, by far, has been recording music. I got in the zone last week and recorded four songs (not all complete) and have been dabbling with them since then. One completely drives me crazy, and Josiah asked why I don't just get rid of it, but I always like to hold on to them for the chance that they evolve into something else later. My favorite is a song that I recorded 10 years ago over Thanksgiving break while in my first year of Bible college. I have long since lost the tape (recorded on a borrowed analog four track) and had difficulties remembering the parts in my head. But memory prevailed and I was able to lay down the tracks and roughly master the song in about 3 1/2 hours. I plan on doing more today, perhaps even helping Josiah with three tracks that he has wanted to record. We'll see. We tried to do another Frog Brother recording yesterday, but it just wasn't working out, so we scrapped our ideas. We'll see.
I did end up going to Built to Spill last Saturday night. Josiah came through and met me at the venue. The Boggs opened up for BTS and were entertaining, but overall not that great. They had two drummers and a keyboard/singer who really did very little either. One of the drummers looked like he was about 6'10", which was really accentuated when he stood next to the other shorter, more portly drummer. Interesting. I am not going to buy their album. BTS arrived late due to their van breaking down on the way to the venue. It seemed that they were already in a bad mood when they started, so when Doug Martsch's equipment began malfunctioning it was a recipe for disaster. He was not pleased and displayed his frustrations by flailing his arms and kicking his equipment. I thought we were going to get completely ripped off because of his attitude, but it got better after about 6 songs. They played for about an hour and forty minutes, which was very nice. I had hoped for a couple of songs that they didn't play (The Plan, Goin' Against Your Mind), but was extremely pumped up when they played "You Were Right" as the finale of their set. They encored with a fifteen minute jam session which left the crowd in a frenzy. It was a good show, for sure. Late night, though.
This week will be a short one for me. I will only work two days, even taking off early on Tuesday to get good positioning for seats at RYAN ADAMS! I am excited. My buddy Turner is going to pick me up around 3 and we will go stake our claim in line in anticipation for the show. I have heard terrible things about Ryan Adams shows, that he is ________(fill in whatever derogatory term you would like), and that he shows up drunk half the time. I read recently, though, that he is sober, so I am hoping that we are not disappointed. They are calling for afternoon storms that day, so it might be a damp show. Regardless, we are going to push through and hopefully have a great time.
So one of the movies I watched this past week was Fast Food Nation. I found it to be utterly disturbing. I would not recommend it for everyone, mostly because of some of the material within the film, but for the presentation of the peripheral implications of the fast food industry, I would recommend it. I have eaten Chick fil'a since then, but I don't think that I will eat at other fast food places, nor will I make CFil'a a common stop anymore. I can't even begin to describe the film, other than to say that the impact of our convenience and ease at getting what we want when we want it has more ripple effect than we might possibly consider. Sometimes you receive information and you don't really know how to react, what to do, or necessarily even want the information, but with this, there are really few options if you believe the artist's picture: a stand must be taken. Most people that I have talked to who have watched the film have not eaten fast food since. Maybe it is worth your time.
The screenplay I read was one that was given to me by a friend at work. He loves film and has filmed two shorts that he submitted to Sundance and other film festivals. I watched one of them recently and was impressed what he did with a budget of $1000 (which he filmed both for under that price). He gave me the script hoping I would know someone who might be interested in investing in his next film. He has worked on several movies already and has connections in the industry with actors/actresses. He already has some b-list actors who have accepted his invitation to take part in this film. . .if he gets funding. I read the script and found it to be good. I would recommend re-writes in a couple of places, and he seems very willing to do that, which is good. Overall he is looking for $300,000. Any investors out there? It doesn't have to be the full amount. He does have a good eye for directing. Just checking.
So I have been busier than I thought I would be. There have been plenty of invitations to do things, so many that I have had to turn some down just so I could do my own thing here. And my own thing has consisted of a variety of movies, vids, recording music and reading screenplays for movies. My favorite, by far, has been recording music. I got in the zone last week and recorded four songs (not all complete) and have been dabbling with them since then. One completely drives me crazy, and Josiah asked why I don't just get rid of it, but I always like to hold on to them for the chance that they evolve into something else later. My favorite is a song that I recorded 10 years ago over Thanksgiving break while in my first year of Bible college. I have long since lost the tape (recorded on a borrowed analog four track) and had difficulties remembering the parts in my head. But memory prevailed and I was able to lay down the tracks and roughly master the song in about 3 1/2 hours. I plan on doing more today, perhaps even helping Josiah with three tracks that he has wanted to record. We'll see. We tried to do another Frog Brother recording yesterday, but it just wasn't working out, so we scrapped our ideas. We'll see.
I did end up going to Built to Spill last Saturday night. Josiah came through and met me at the venue. The Boggs opened up for BTS and were entertaining, but overall not that great. They had two drummers and a keyboard/singer who really did very little either. One of the drummers looked like he was about 6'10", which was really accentuated when he stood next to the other shorter, more portly drummer. Interesting. I am not going to buy their album. BTS arrived late due to their van breaking down on the way to the venue. It seemed that they were already in a bad mood when they started, so when Doug Martsch's equipment began malfunctioning it was a recipe for disaster. He was not pleased and displayed his frustrations by flailing his arms and kicking his equipment. I thought we were going to get completely ripped off because of his attitude, but it got better after about 6 songs. They played for about an hour and forty minutes, which was very nice. I had hoped for a couple of songs that they didn't play (The Plan, Goin' Against Your Mind), but was extremely pumped up when they played "You Were Right" as the finale of their set. They encored with a fifteen minute jam session which left the crowd in a frenzy. It was a good show, for sure. Late night, though.
This week will be a short one for me. I will only work two days, even taking off early on Tuesday to get good positioning for seats at RYAN ADAMS! I am excited. My buddy Turner is going to pick me up around 3 and we will go stake our claim in line in anticipation for the show. I have heard terrible things about Ryan Adams shows, that he is ________(fill in whatever derogatory term you would like), and that he shows up drunk half the time. I read recently, though, that he is sober, so I am hoping that we are not disappointed. They are calling for afternoon storms that day, so it might be a damp show. Regardless, we are going to push through and hopefully have a great time.
So one of the movies I watched this past week was Fast Food Nation. I found it to be utterly disturbing. I would not recommend it for everyone, mostly because of some of the material within the film, but for the presentation of the peripheral implications of the fast food industry, I would recommend it. I have eaten Chick fil'a since then, but I don't think that I will eat at other fast food places, nor will I make CFil'a a common stop anymore. I can't even begin to describe the film, other than to say that the impact of our convenience and ease at getting what we want when we want it has more ripple effect than we might possibly consider. Sometimes you receive information and you don't really know how to react, what to do, or necessarily even want the information, but with this, there are really few options if you believe the artist's picture: a stand must be taken. Most people that I have talked to who have watched the film have not eaten fast food since. Maybe it is worth your time.
The screenplay I read was one that was given to me by a friend at work. He loves film and has filmed two shorts that he submitted to Sundance and other film festivals. I watched one of them recently and was impressed what he did with a budget of $1000 (which he filmed both for under that price). He gave me the script hoping I would know someone who might be interested in investing in his next film. He has worked on several movies already and has connections in the industry with actors/actresses. He already has some b-list actors who have accepted his invitation to take part in this film. . .if he gets funding. I read the script and found it to be good. I would recommend re-writes in a couple of places, and he seems very willing to do that, which is good. Overall he is looking for $300,000. Any investors out there? It doesn't have to be the full amount. He does have a good eye for directing. Just checking.
Anyhow, I hope all is well with you all. I hope it is cooler than the weather here, too. We need to move to some place green...
Saturday, July 21, 2007
be cool
I saw Yo La Tengo on Thursday night. It was a free show in downtown SLC, which was pretty nice. The Fiery Furnaces opened, which was okay. I really didn't dig on them too much. It was easily in the high 90's early on, and possibly in the 100's, but before too long my buddy Josiah and I were in the shade. The place pretty much packed out before too long, with many, many people showing up just for the scene. I always find them to be quite annoying, as I am there for the music. They talk. I listen to the band. Anyhow, Yo La Tengo, from the moment they hit the stage, absolutely rocked. They played very hard and very well for a mostly indifferent crowd. I enjoyed it thoroughly, though, and would gladly go see them again. Especially if it was free.
So Janine's mom and sister and her two kids have been here for about a week now. It has been good to have them all here, as they have been able to get out and do things and the kids have all been getting to know each other. It really looks as though they have been having fun together. They have filled their week up with things to do, most of which has involved small trips to outdoor places in the morning while it is still cool. Last Sunday we went to the zoo, which was quite fun. All the kids seemed to enjoy seeing the animals, and Juancho Panco (as he now insists on calling himself) wasn't afraid of the elephants this time. Now we only have to tackle the fear of the primates, then they will have conquered Hogle Zoo. It is always fun to take the kids out and let them be outside. We are very fortunate to have kids who absolutely LOVE to get out and do things. Anyhow, it has been a good week with family here.
Brad, Traci and Joel left early last Saturday (5 AM flight) to go to Costa Rica for five weeks. It has been odd to not have them here. The boys are constantly asking about them, wondering where they are at, and when we answer "Costa Rica" I am sure they are wondering where the heck that is. Every time I walk Pakak now, she always wants to turn toward their house before heading out around the block. She obviously misses her buddy Rufus. We miss them, for sure, but I am pretty sure that the five weeks will go by quickly. And I hope that they are having a blast with language school and the birds of central America.
So Janine and the kids will be leaving to go to PA when her family leaves tomorrow. It will be very odd to not be around her and the kids for the ten or eleven days that we will be apart. I realize my attachment to the kids is strong when I don't see them for a day (like Thursday when I went from work to the show downtown and got home at 10:45, well after the kids went to sleep) and it seems like forever since I have seen them. I know that I will be anxious to be with them when I fly over in early August. We will be having a little reception for the kids when I get there, so that should be pretty nice. It will be boring around here without my family, though. I know that Janine will be busy with many things, and I am hoping that the kids get to do a lot of fun stuff while they are there. I also hope that Juan flies a little better this time than he did in February. I don't know how many readers remember that blog, but he is not the avid airman. We'll see what happens. There will be three adults and five kids flying, so hopefully it will be fine, even if there are some apprehensions regarding flying for Juancho Pancho. It will also be a gauge to see how things will be on the way home when it just Janine and me and we have a layover in Cincinnati. Layovers + five travelers = possible trouble. We'll see.
The Rocky Mountain Revue just finished up here in SLC. It is the summer league for rookies and players trying to improve or lesser players trying to land contracts with NBA teams. I didn't go to any games, but watched a little bit on TV. I found it ridiculous that there were actually people heartily boo-ing the referees in a stinkin' summer league game! Utah fans, of course. Can we act a little more spoiled? These games don't count for anything at all! I am pretty sure that the coaches don't care about winning or losing, and any player who says he cares is lying, so why should a crowd care about summer league? I am at a loss for a reason, but there they were, boo-ing the game, boo-ing the refs, and I just shook my head in disgust. Get real. I can't stand Utah fans. Their team has never done anything wrong. Ever. Get real.
So tonight I am supposed to go see Built to Spill. I have been planning this concert in numerous ways with friends for quite some time now, but it all fell apart yesterday as anyone I was planning on going with cancelled on me. It was disheartening, but I understood all their reasons. Regardless, I am now stuck with ticket to a show that I really want to see, but have no one to go with. I feel kind of lame going by myself, but I would be extremely disappointed to not go, as I missed the band each of the last two years, and you never know when they will be back. The thing that makes it somewhat difficult is that it is downtown and starts at 8 or 9. So I wonder if I should drive or take Trax (public transport) and how that will all work out. I think I am pretty much determined to go (I already bought my ticket) so I need to figure the details out soon. That's what I get. It was bound to happen in the summer of the shows...Ryan Adams still to come on July 31...Calexico August 23....Son Volt August 26...Def Leppard Sep. 8....just kidding about that one...
I have enjoyed a couple of documentaries lately. "Our Brand Is Crisis" focuses on a campaign by twice former president of Bolivia, Goni. It is interesting to see McCarthy-ism in action in a campaign and to make the transition from another place and another culture to see how that makes itself manifest here. The other was "You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train" which was an historical account of Howard Zinn's journey from beginning to present. Certainly a good film to watch, and one that will entice one's desire to at least begin to read his writings. I would recommend this one to all.
Anyhow, I should get going. I feel the coffee drawing me in. So I better drink a cup or two.
Be cool.
So Janine's mom and sister and her two kids have been here for about a week now. It has been good to have them all here, as they have been able to get out and do things and the kids have all been getting to know each other. It really looks as though they have been having fun together. They have filled their week up with things to do, most of which has involved small trips to outdoor places in the morning while it is still cool. Last Sunday we went to the zoo, which was quite fun. All the kids seemed to enjoy seeing the animals, and Juancho Panco (as he now insists on calling himself) wasn't afraid of the elephants this time. Now we only have to tackle the fear of the primates, then they will have conquered Hogle Zoo. It is always fun to take the kids out and let them be outside. We are very fortunate to have kids who absolutely LOVE to get out and do things. Anyhow, it has been a good week with family here.
Brad, Traci and Joel left early last Saturday (5 AM flight) to go to Costa Rica for five weeks. It has been odd to not have them here. The boys are constantly asking about them, wondering where they are at, and when we answer "Costa Rica" I am sure they are wondering where the heck that is. Every time I walk Pakak now, she always wants to turn toward their house before heading out around the block. She obviously misses her buddy Rufus. We miss them, for sure, but I am pretty sure that the five weeks will go by quickly. And I hope that they are having a blast with language school and the birds of central America.
So Janine and the kids will be leaving to go to PA when her family leaves tomorrow. It will be very odd to not be around her and the kids for the ten or eleven days that we will be apart. I realize my attachment to the kids is strong when I don't see them for a day (like Thursday when I went from work to the show downtown and got home at 10:45, well after the kids went to sleep) and it seems like forever since I have seen them. I know that I will be anxious to be with them when I fly over in early August. We will be having a little reception for the kids when I get there, so that should be pretty nice. It will be boring around here without my family, though. I know that Janine will be busy with many things, and I am hoping that the kids get to do a lot of fun stuff while they are there. I also hope that Juan flies a little better this time than he did in February. I don't know how many readers remember that blog, but he is not the avid airman. We'll see what happens. There will be three adults and five kids flying, so hopefully it will be fine, even if there are some apprehensions regarding flying for Juancho Pancho. It will also be a gauge to see how things will be on the way home when it just Janine and me and we have a layover in Cincinnati. Layovers + five travelers = possible trouble. We'll see.
The Rocky Mountain Revue just finished up here in SLC. It is the summer league for rookies and players trying to improve or lesser players trying to land contracts with NBA teams. I didn't go to any games, but watched a little bit on TV. I found it ridiculous that there were actually people heartily boo-ing the referees in a stinkin' summer league game! Utah fans, of course. Can we act a little more spoiled? These games don't count for anything at all! I am pretty sure that the coaches don't care about winning or losing, and any player who says he cares is lying, so why should a crowd care about summer league? I am at a loss for a reason, but there they were, boo-ing the game, boo-ing the refs, and I just shook my head in disgust. Get real. I can't stand Utah fans. Their team has never done anything wrong. Ever. Get real.
So tonight I am supposed to go see Built to Spill. I have been planning this concert in numerous ways with friends for quite some time now, but it all fell apart yesterday as anyone I was planning on going with cancelled on me. It was disheartening, but I understood all their reasons. Regardless, I am now stuck with ticket to a show that I really want to see, but have no one to go with. I feel kind of lame going by myself, but I would be extremely disappointed to not go, as I missed the band each of the last two years, and you never know when they will be back. The thing that makes it somewhat difficult is that it is downtown and starts at 8 or 9. So I wonder if I should drive or take Trax (public transport) and how that will all work out. I think I am pretty much determined to go (I already bought my ticket) so I need to figure the details out soon. That's what I get. It was bound to happen in the summer of the shows...Ryan Adams still to come on July 31...Calexico August 23....Son Volt August 26...Def Leppard Sep. 8....just kidding about that one...
I have enjoyed a couple of documentaries lately. "Our Brand Is Crisis" focuses on a campaign by twice former president of Bolivia, Goni. It is interesting to see McCarthy-ism in action in a campaign and to make the transition from another place and another culture to see how that makes itself manifest here. The other was "You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train" which was an historical account of Howard Zinn's journey from beginning to present. Certainly a good film to watch, and one that will entice one's desire to at least begin to read his writings. I would recommend this one to all.
Anyhow, I should get going. I feel the coffee drawing me in. So I better drink a cup or two.
Be cool.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
mercy, mercy
What day is this? Seriously. These days have been running together, as I have worked too much and have felt as though I am running this way and that way. Oh well. A good thing that happened is that we determined in a meeting yesterday at work that Saturday work will no longer be required where I am contracted to work, except for on special occasions, which should only happen once or twice more in the calender year. The bummer part is that I will most likely not be full time in my current environment of work at the end of August. Too bad. I enjoyed it and will miss the steadiness of the work. What can you do, though?
So July has started, and really a third of it has passed already. It is amazing. It has been a strange July here, hot, to be sure, and very smoky. There are some big fires around the area that has added to the usual pollution of the SLC/Utah County valleys. The skies are very thick with various particles and microns in the air. The air levels, as far as health risks, have been pretty high. It is gross. It is thick enough to change the color of the sunlight from the clear to a yellow-ish tint. We await a front or two to come in and move this junk out, but there seems to be no end in sight. 100 degree days for the better part of 10 day forecasts, every time I check. I miss cool weather.
I also shaved my head again. After growing my hair without a trim since January 25, the heat became to much for me to take. It is kind of a bummer, as I was going to see how long I could go, but the temperatures as of late pushed me to the edge. So I am bald again. It is much easier.
The kids have been doing pretty well. During the heat we have been sleeping in the basement, which has had its ups and downs, for sure. It is always nice to sleep in a cooler place (often times 17 degrees cooler than our rooms upstairs), but it really took the kids out of their element. It was much more difficult to put them to bed, as they felt that because their bed was on the floor that they pretty much had free reign to the basement. There were nights that they were falling asleep at the same time we were (10-11 PM)! Needless to say, it kind of made for interesting times when they weren't getting enough sleep. There were moments of crankiness, crabbiness, and all around mayhem, but it worked as far as being cooler. Tonight will be the first night that we try being back up in the upstairs. I slept there last night, as the air mattress that we have been using has not been kind to my sleeping patterns or my back. So I finally got some amount of good rest last night when I slept on our own bed. I used no covers, though, as it was warm.
We bought our own little inflatable pool the other day. The kids have so much fun when they are able to play around in the pool of our friends Rich and Corina, so on these hot days in which there is little relief, we thought it would be nice for them to have one at their disposal. We tried it out pretty quick and the kids love it. They have so much fun jumping in and out and splashing around; it is also quite fun to watch them. It gives them something to do other than hanging out in the basement, too, which has been a refuge lately. I have to say that when we shuffled stuff around down here to accommodate the sleeping, it really cramped the computer room. We put a table in the room which really made me feel claustrophobic . . . part of the reason I didn't write. I didn't feel comfortable being in the room for too long, and it always takes me a little bit to write all this stuff down. So I obviously didn't write much.
Last night we participated in a welcome of two youth groups from outside of our area. The welcome was a barbecue, so we packed the kids up and hit the library on the way to our fun time with others. It was a beautiful evening and another chance to let the kids get out and be outside in a different environment than the usual places we go. It is always fun to watch them interact (or not interact) with others as they overcome their unfamiliarity with our church family. I really think that the members of our church get a kick out of it, too, to see the shy eyes and smiles of Shirley, Andres and Juancho Pancho (a name he often calls himself now). So it was a good time and a good chance to visit with some of the church folks in an environment in which we don't always interact. It was good.
So I don't usually celebrate "Independence Day" in any particular fashion. I am, at best, indifferent on the holiday because of what the drawn out implications are for such a day for the indigenous people of this country. My buddy called me up and declared it "interdependence day", which really sounded much better to me, so my celebratory acts of the day (including charring burgers and lighting fireworks that the kids absolutely loved--thanks Sherri!) were in support of interdependence day: a day in which we recognize our interdependence with each other. "Independence Day" certainly feeds a certain characteristic that is blatantly propagated by many Americans: That we are self-made, autonomous, and the holders and keepers of our destiny (sometimes backed up by Manifest Destiny). While some may scoff at such a notion, I would offer that such an idea is not only truly encouraged but is at the very root of much of our economy, politics, and social structures. And in that it certainly has invaded our theology and our ability to actually be formed by community or even in our consideration of communitarian acts (...that's not my problem). Indeed, "Independence Day" is simply a day off for me, not something in which I participate in such a way as to continue the overarching goal of social Darwinism (of which free-market capitalism is a large part, by the way). Anyhow.
So has anyone here ever heard Gillian Welch's cover of Radiohead's "Black Star"? It is incredible. It is available on iTunes, if anyone is interested. Did I mention that it is incredible? Well, it is.
T-Shirts and Coffee: Still in the works. I have been busier than I have wanted to be lately and have not had the chance to investigate as much as I have wanted to, but I continue on in thinking in such a direction. Who knows, though. Designs are in the works, though, and a phone call needs to be made to discuss economics with the coffee supplier. Any web designers out there? I need a domain.
AND THE FLYERS! They signed a few key players for the upcoming season (October 4). First of all, they landed a smallish, but outstanding player in Daniel Briere. Briere spend last year with Buffalo and was pivotal in their appearance in the Eastern Conference Finals. He is an incredible center who should be paired on the first line with Simon Gagne to form quite an imposing scoring line. Also acquired were a pair of defensemen: Jason Smith and Kimmo Timonen. Smith, who is a career +33, and Timonen (+20 last year) should help to shore up a blue line that was porous and imobile this past year. Joining them will be James van Riemsdyk, who was the second pick in the recent NHL draft. Obviously being picked this high, they are expecting good things from JVR. Also joining the forwards is Scott Hartnell (+16 career) who was the sixth pick in the 2001 draft. While he has not yet lived up to expectations it is far too soon to write him off, and the Flyers are hoping to catch him as he elevates his game. Centers Jeff Carter and Mike Richards now have another year under their belts, which should prove valuable as the team presses on this year for improvement and hopefully moves in the direction of the playoffs. It should be noted that the Flyers also acquired Joffrey Lopul, a seventh pick a couple of years ago. He is a skilled offensive player who needs to improve his defense. Needless to say, I am excited for the new year. I was disappointed that they didn't try very hard to re-acquire Michael Handzus (my favorite player) as he ended up signing with Los Angeles. Could that be any farther from Philly? Go Flyers.
anyhow, enough rambling. I won't even get into my thoughts on the Portland Trailblazers. I still miss the days of mercy, mercy Jerome Kersey, though.
Keep on rockin'.
So July has started, and really a third of it has passed already. It is amazing. It has been a strange July here, hot, to be sure, and very smoky. There are some big fires around the area that has added to the usual pollution of the SLC/Utah County valleys. The skies are very thick with various particles and microns in the air. The air levels, as far as health risks, have been pretty high. It is gross. It is thick enough to change the color of the sunlight from the clear to a yellow-ish tint. We await a front or two to come in and move this junk out, but there seems to be no end in sight. 100 degree days for the better part of 10 day forecasts, every time I check. I miss cool weather.
I also shaved my head again. After growing my hair without a trim since January 25, the heat became to much for me to take. It is kind of a bummer, as I was going to see how long I could go, but the temperatures as of late pushed me to the edge. So I am bald again. It is much easier.
The kids have been doing pretty well. During the heat we have been sleeping in the basement, which has had its ups and downs, for sure. It is always nice to sleep in a cooler place (often times 17 degrees cooler than our rooms upstairs), but it really took the kids out of their element. It was much more difficult to put them to bed, as they felt that because their bed was on the floor that they pretty much had free reign to the basement. There were nights that they were falling asleep at the same time we were (10-11 PM)! Needless to say, it kind of made for interesting times when they weren't getting enough sleep. There were moments of crankiness, crabbiness, and all around mayhem, but it worked as far as being cooler. Tonight will be the first night that we try being back up in the upstairs. I slept there last night, as the air mattress that we have been using has not been kind to my sleeping patterns or my back. So I finally got some amount of good rest last night when I slept on our own bed. I used no covers, though, as it was warm.
We bought our own little inflatable pool the other day. The kids have so much fun when they are able to play around in the pool of our friends Rich and Corina, so on these hot days in which there is little relief, we thought it would be nice for them to have one at their disposal. We tried it out pretty quick and the kids love it. They have so much fun jumping in and out and splashing around; it is also quite fun to watch them. It gives them something to do other than hanging out in the basement, too, which has been a refuge lately. I have to say that when we shuffled stuff around down here to accommodate the sleeping, it really cramped the computer room. We put a table in the room which really made me feel claustrophobic . . . part of the reason I didn't write. I didn't feel comfortable being in the room for too long, and it always takes me a little bit to write all this stuff down. So I obviously didn't write much.
Last night we participated in a welcome of two youth groups from outside of our area. The welcome was a barbecue, so we packed the kids up and hit the library on the way to our fun time with others. It was a beautiful evening and another chance to let the kids get out and be outside in a different environment than the usual places we go. It is always fun to watch them interact (or not interact) with others as they overcome their unfamiliarity with our church family. I really think that the members of our church get a kick out of it, too, to see the shy eyes and smiles of Shirley, Andres and Juancho Pancho (a name he often calls himself now). So it was a good time and a good chance to visit with some of the church folks in an environment in which we don't always interact. It was good.
So I don't usually celebrate "Independence Day" in any particular fashion. I am, at best, indifferent on the holiday because of what the drawn out implications are for such a day for the indigenous people of this country. My buddy called me up and declared it "interdependence day", which really sounded much better to me, so my celebratory acts of the day (including charring burgers and lighting fireworks that the kids absolutely loved--thanks Sherri!) were in support of interdependence day: a day in which we recognize our interdependence with each other. "Independence Day" certainly feeds a certain characteristic that is blatantly propagated by many Americans: That we are self-made, autonomous, and the holders and keepers of our destiny (sometimes backed up by Manifest Destiny). While some may scoff at such a notion, I would offer that such an idea is not only truly encouraged but is at the very root of much of our economy, politics, and social structures. And in that it certainly has invaded our theology and our ability to actually be formed by community or even in our consideration of communitarian acts (...that's not my problem). Indeed, "Independence Day" is simply a day off for me, not something in which I participate in such a way as to continue the overarching goal of social Darwinism (of which free-market capitalism is a large part, by the way). Anyhow.
So has anyone here ever heard Gillian Welch's cover of Radiohead's "Black Star"? It is incredible. It is available on iTunes, if anyone is interested. Did I mention that it is incredible? Well, it is.
T-Shirts and Coffee: Still in the works. I have been busier than I have wanted to be lately and have not had the chance to investigate as much as I have wanted to, but I continue on in thinking in such a direction. Who knows, though. Designs are in the works, though, and a phone call needs to be made to discuss economics with the coffee supplier. Any web designers out there? I need a domain.
AND THE FLYERS! They signed a few key players for the upcoming season (October 4). First of all, they landed a smallish, but outstanding player in Daniel Briere. Briere spend last year with Buffalo and was pivotal in their appearance in the Eastern Conference Finals. He is an incredible center who should be paired on the first line with Simon Gagne to form quite an imposing scoring line. Also acquired were a pair of defensemen: Jason Smith and Kimmo Timonen. Smith, who is a career +33, and Timonen (+20 last year) should help to shore up a blue line that was porous and imobile this past year. Joining them will be James van Riemsdyk, who was the second pick in the recent NHL draft. Obviously being picked this high, they are expecting good things from JVR. Also joining the forwards is Scott Hartnell (+16 career) who was the sixth pick in the 2001 draft. While he has not yet lived up to expectations it is far too soon to write him off, and the Flyers are hoping to catch him as he elevates his game. Centers Jeff Carter and Mike Richards now have another year under their belts, which should prove valuable as the team presses on this year for improvement and hopefully moves in the direction of the playoffs. It should be noted that the Flyers also acquired Joffrey Lopul, a seventh pick a couple of years ago. He is a skilled offensive player who needs to improve his defense. Needless to say, I am excited for the new year. I was disappointed that they didn't try very hard to re-acquire Michael Handzus (my favorite player) as he ended up signing with Los Angeles. Could that be any farther from Philly? Go Flyers.
anyhow, enough rambling. I won't even get into my thoughts on the Portland Trailblazers. I still miss the days of mercy, mercy Jerome Kersey, though.
Keep on rockin'.
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