things i have learned in the last hour

1. my mom’s cat (the one that lives with my family…i refuse to claim it any longer) is stupid and mean. but i think i know why. it’s not that it is wired to be mean. it just resents us. tonight, i went outside for a bit to look at a meteor shower and i took the cat with me because it seemed interested in being outside for once. immediately the cat saw a rabbit in the next yard and started chasing it…and the cat seemed happy. i had to run it (cat) down to keep it from running away forever (and sending my mom into grief), and when i picked it up…it was angry at me. not because i was being mean, but because i was taking it away from what it was meant to do…chase other animals. this thing (cat) was not meant to sit inside and be petted and given gross canned fish products on special occasions…it is wired to chase rabbits and do quasi-predator-ish things. putting it in a house with people would be as naturally fulfilling as if you put me in the dress section of dillard’s and told me to be happy living there forever. so while i do not necessarily really like the cat…i think i get why it’s so mean all the time. he wasn’t meant for where he is at. but he (it) is a cat so he (it) doesn’t really have a choice. plus we have free food. moral of the story: i will get a dog someday.

2. there is a meteor shower tonight. i’ve been watching for about an hour, and now clouds have come through. i can still see a little bit, but its hard to make out much. alot of this summer i have spent trying to figure out my next steps in life on a few different levels. i have prayed quite a bit and had more than a few conversations with people wiser and smarter than me, trying to figure out what steps to take. and the answer is consistent. whatever i choose, it will be okay. almost all options seem okay, but a plan is not becoming clear to me. i keep wanting a plan when God merely wants to give me His presence. and i’ve gotten to a point where that is just fine. i have been looking for a map or list and all i’ve discovered is a goal and a calling. God has amazed me in spite of my anxiety and questioning and circumstances before…and He will continue to do that; i know this. even when its cloudy and you can’t quite see through to the other side (or maybe not at all) i know God is there and i get glimpses through the clouds enough to know that the other side (however i will get there, by the grace of God) is amazing. and more than that, the place i’m standing in now is amazing on its own…because God is here. and that is enough for a first step.

Sometimes it’s just good to go to bed early. It’s like a late nap that loses track of time.

this is hilarious. go go coco.

“quote”

“Christ may be in my heart, but He needs to make it out to my hands and feet”

- Anonymous 7 year old

7532

I have been breathing for 7532 days consecutively. That is good.

Winter

It is cold. But good.

when i was little, my family would go on vacation to colorado. all the time. we would pass through denver, and i always knew it as the city that came right before the mountains.

this weekend, i’ve been to wichita, ks and back to watch some good friends get married to each other. it was way good. anyways, trying to get from phoenix to wichita was hard. i got stuck in denver and lucky on a late standby flight into kansas. i spend a little under two hours running and missing a connecting flight and standing in line trying to find the next flight home. anyways, i was stressing out a mile above sea level for a while. i’m sitting a few gates down from where i was a few days ago and its much better. i’m sitting here, typing and happy. denver was always kind of a stop halfway to happiness. when i was a kid, it was the city right before you got to mountains, otherwise not really a big deal. and right now (and especially last thursday) it was a stop right before i got to be home and with some very important people. today…its just another airport.

so…here’s to micheal and alex and their life together. i heard they might be coming to colorado soon…stay away from denver.

back to the desert.

in the desert. week one.

so i’ve been here a week as of today. so far its good. i’m a little tired, but so far its been a great day off. a little exercise, a little swimming, a little shopping (for a vest…[kind of a long story]), and a little relaxing.

this first week has been pretty much dominated by hanging out and meeting new people and seeing friends (old people, meaning people that are not new to me, not necessarily people that have been alive for a time spanning long enough to be considered “old”) and observing/learning things.

***does anyone have a polaroid camera they would want to loan me?***

here are some of the highights of my first week. in a blurry/bad phone camera pictorial form.

so this weekend, i spent the services running around backstage and such.

this is the video control room. i sat here and watched all the cameras and buttons and such go crazy. it was like a tv station. completely awesome.

this is the view from what is front of house (hereforth called “FOH”). all the sound and lights are commanded from here. ridiculous. but awesome.

this is the view of the stage from backstage. granted, it was practice early on sunday morning…but pretty awesome no less.

this is the incredibly bad picture of the stage from the back of the room. from the “cheap seats”. i might be the only one to call it that…so, don’t get confused if when referring to the back as the “cheap seats” you get weird looks. it’ll just be our little club.

okay this picture deserves context. after church, my boss, andy the music pastor (hereforth referred to as “andy” or “ATMP”) asked me “do you want to go to the diamondbacks game? I replied with “yes, and when?”. he said “right now” and i thought “boy howdy!” so about 10 minutes later i’m in ATMP’s truck with duke, one of the vocalists from the weekend services, and we are handed tickets and are driving downtown to chase field, home of the arizona diamondbacks. these tickets are in the owner’s box. across the stairway aisle thing is sitting the freaking owner of the daimondbacks and his family. the tickets are worth more than i feel comfortable publishing on the internet. but…wow. to go from college dorm life to this…is quite the jump. ridiculous!

this is the tunnel that is located down a few stairs which is located about 10 feet from my seat at chase field the home of the arizona diamondbacks. down the tunnel behind me is the bathroom. the bathroom is on the left. to the right is a cop who asked me what i was doing. i said “bathroom?” and he pointed me to the left. to the right and past the armed cop was the diamondback’s clubhouse. awesome.

this is russel eating bannanas and apples babyfood. he said it’s good. i disagree. its like applesauce with less texture.

summertime…

right now, i’m sitting in my hebrews class. and it is sunny outside and it is warm and summer couldn’t come sooner. one reason is that spending the summer learning and working and being crazy busy actually sounds like a good time. and in phoenix, no less.

here is another.

so its not that i’m against twitter or facebook. i don’t preach their evils or really talk about how great they are. i like to think i keep it in perspective (i hope…) but…

first was xanga…where you type your thoughts in paragraphs and such that you hope people will think is cool, and in high school was soooo much fun. (eprops anyone?)

then(/still) is facebook…where things are more diverse. there are walls to write on, and all kinds of apps and its great, but its shorter and less work than the xanga.

now, twitter is growing. it is the fastest, easiest, smallest slice of self-reporting yet.

we’ve gone from xanga to facebook to twitter, and getting smaller and shorter, and more networked the whole time. but…what’s next?

can we get shorter than 140 characters? of course we can, but what comes next? binary code? emoticons? one word descriptions?

what’s next?