Toy Soldiers

The Launch

2006-10-13T17:44:00.000-04:00

Ok, I'm launching the new blog - check it out at:

Inestimable Variety

I'm not going to delete this page until the new blogger features come out of beta testing, to make sure I don't lose any posts, but I'm not going to post here anymore. I'm also not done copying over the older posts to the new site, so it doesn't go back as far in time as it should, yet.

So there ya go . . . I've moved.

-ALERT-

2006-10-04T16:27:00.000-04:00

I'm taking a knitting break, due to a hangnail and a blister, neither of which are knitting related - just annoying, and since that leaves me with little to do while passing time at work, I'm moving the blogger page. The Xanga will remain the same, though both will look different when I'm done.

More information to come.

Nuggets

2006-09-25T17:38:00.000-04:00

-The Shower Experiment-
The new Scrubbing Bubbles Automatic Shower cleaner is a wonderful invention. I know, I bought one . . . for an experiment. The plan was to use the two bottles of cleaning solution up and see what we thought. If we didn't think it worked, such is life. If we didn't like the solution, I had a substitute to try. Well, the device works pretty well, and though it doesn't cover every square inch of our rectangular tub/shower it does hit the toughest spots and help keep them clean, so I don't have to devote an hour and some serious sweat equity to cleaning the shower. However, the solution they made for it, sucks. That's not to say that it doesn't get rid of the mechanic's grime and mildew - it does. But I'm not sure I can say it leaves the shower clean. If I stood in the bathroom while it sprayed the shower, my face would burn for a good three hours afterwards. The cleaner built up on the boy's soap and got in his eyes - he wasn't happy. I'm not a fan of having to clean up after my cleaner. So, I rinsed out the bottle and filled it with white vinegar - shower's still clean, and nobody's getting burned. Do you think I could convince them to sell the sprayer with an empty bottle? Didn't think so.

-Cleaner Laundry-
On another vinegar related note - I'm also a big fan of the Downy Ball - for delivering the white vinegar to my laundry after the wash cycle is over. I own two downy balls (the apartment building has two washers) but I've never bought Downy in my life, and I probably never will.

-Spiders-
Spiders are great - so long as they are outside where they belong. The same goes for crickets, but roaches get to die anytime I see them.

-Protestants-
I have joined the ranks. As one who was "sprinkled" as an infant, one of the steps for me to join the church that the boy and I have grown so fond of was an adult baptism. So I got dunked Sunday - I'm a protestant now.

-Knitting-
I've been doing a good bit of it lately. Sorry there are no pictures, I should take some. However, since the vast majority of my work lately has been for Christmas presents I can't post some pics 'til later. I have been playing with Kool Aid dying - man if that isn't fun! The colors are great, and there's no wet wool smell. There was, however, the faint scent of cherries.

-Stairs-
Are not really my friends. I have trouble walking up and down them successfully. But, on the upside, I now have this stylish, sophisticated, sexy little black ankle brace that is making my left ankle feel so much better. How much talent does it take to twist both ankles but only sprain one of them? That's how much talent I've got right now.

-Health Food-
Yeah, so I'm not a fan of "Health Food." And those so called "healthy options" like artificial sweeteners, artificial butter etc . . . yeah, keyword: artificial. Artificial = Bad. It's funny though - I must be turning into an adult; I'm choosing to eat healthier and I actually like it. I've basically stopped drinking soda. I prefer coffee or iced tea. I've found that I like the taste of brown rice and whole wheat pasta over their bleached counterparts. I love vegetables, even ones I used to avoid. I've even craved salads - for me that's wierd. I'm still a fan of chocolate, cake, and cheese flavored potato chips, so I guess the world is not completely on it's ear.

-State of the World-
Speaking of which, what is up with the world lately? I mean really - three school shootings in less than two weeks? And this last sicko?? Guns, zip ties, KY?? Seriously! And while it amuses me greatly that tonights 90 minutes of news included a school shooting, adjustable breast implants, and the Illinois bathroom Jesus - I'm really tired of stories about school shootings. How about we just talk about the bathroom Jesus for a while.

So . . . that's what's been going on in my head . . . my apologies if you read all of it - take a tylenol.

A new neighbor

2006-09-22T15:18:00.000-04:00

We have a new neighbor. She took up residence in our kitchen window the other day, and I intend to leave her there, as long as she wishes to remain. She is a barn spider, araneas cavaticus, and since I was raised in this country as one of the last members of generation X, that means I am compelled to call her Charlotte A. Cavatica, so I do.

Meet Charlotte.

I took the picture, and then scoured the internet to find out what kind of spider she was, before I could decide on a name for her. Charlotte had come to mind at first, but I wanted to know what she was, in hopes of a less cliched name for her. No such luck, once I saw the latin name, I was stuck. But it suits her I think.

Isn't she pretty? I love the way her legs fade to a redder hue near her body. I wish I could get a picture of what she looks like with the light in the window behind her at night, but the camera wasn't doing so good at getting a good exposure with a shutter speed fast enough to fight my unsteady hand. But I still think she's pretty.

More Adventures in Baking

2006-09-21T15:37:00.000-04:00

To continue on the baking theme . . . I did bake a few loaves of sourdough the other day, I just didn't get a chance to post pics because I ran out of time.

After adding flour and water to the starter, I had a dough ball

This I kneaded, and let rise for one hour. Then I folded it like a letter twice, and let it rise for another hour. Another set of letter folds and it was left to rise for a couple hours. I then formed it into a round loaf and placed it upside down in a colander lined with a towel. After another three hours or so, I carefully turned this out onto a baking sheet and put it in the oven. This made a loaf of bread.

I'm not entirely satisfied with the process, neither it's length or how the bread turned out - I don't like my crust that dark - but the bread tastes just fine.

Next time I think I'm going to forego the round loaf and make the loaves in my bread pans, for easier sandwich construction. Also, I'm going to turn down the heat in the oven a bit, and bake a little longer, which will make a less burnt looking crust.

I ended up with four loaves of bread from that baking day and we already had one in the freezer from some I'd made earlier - so I won't need to bake again for a little while. Now I'm trying to decide what to make next.

Whatever I do, the next baking day needs to include some more ciabatta - or chewbacca bread (the boy "re-named" it) - for sandwich buns. It makes a great panini, and we're betting it would be good as texas toast and hamburger buns.

A surprise today . . .

2006-09-20T16:45:00.000-04:00

I decided, that while I was over at mom's doing laundry, I would take the camera and peruse the garden for interesting things to shoot.

Well, mom's surprise lilies were up - we're not positive what they are, or how they got there, but they're pretty so we don't complain. See?

Well, this particular surprise lily included an added surprise, you might have noticed it in the last picture, but I managed to snap a better one . . . the lily had a little friend!

And just for flavor, I just want to share . . . A warm, soft, fluffy towel that smells lightly of lavender just makes a day so much better, even if it's already good.

A small lesson learned . . .

2006-09-12T00:55:00.000-04:00

1Today we remember as a country. We remember a day when we all felt the pain of a now iconic tragedy that struck us from behind when we weren't looking.Yesterday we remembered as a family. We remembered a day when we felt the pain of a still somewhat fresh tragedy that struck us from behind when we least expected it.Today is the five year anniversary of the plane crashes on September 11th. Yesterday was the six month anniversary of my dad's death.

And I've been thinking today, about pain and tragedy, in an altogether not depressing or morose context. I'm feeling incredibly blessed to have not experienced the numbing pain of a major tragedy too early on in life. I feel like I was spared that depth of painful experience until I was mature enough to handle it. One never thinks oneself capable of handing the pain before it happens, I certainly never would have guessed I could. And yet, I think of all of the versions of me that I've been as I've grown up, and I'm glad it's the post-freshman-year-of-college me that's been faced both with the tragedy of 9/11 and with the loss of my dad. The other me's weren't ready for that. God is good.

After the towers fell I felt tired and numb for a few days. I didn't know what or how to think, and I felt like napping a lot. Now I can look back and see some of the good that has come out of it all, though I still don't know quite what to think about all of it.

After I found out dad had died, God and I had a very animated conversation in my truck, in the Home Depot parking lot. Then I had mom to look after, and there were certainly tears, but I had something to do, I had a "mission" of sorts. Now I look back, and 7 out of 10 times, I smile. Sometimes I still cry. Like today.

I can't even hazard a guess as to what would have happened to the pre-college me, in this type of situation . . . I'm just glad I'm the me I am now. Like I said, God is good.

___________________________________________________________________
1. I have yet to go to bed, so it is still today, despite the fact that it is past midnight.

Baking Day

2006-09-09T17:26:00.000-04:00

Not too much going on in the gardening arena, and nothing to photograph of the knitting projects right now . . . but I did bake today. I also cleaned the bathroom, but that's not half as exciting, even to me.

So I decided a couple days ago to make a Ciabatta (Italian for slipper, bakenese for crusty italian bread with lots of holes in it)

This process starts with a biga

Meet Biga:

After a day or so, that's what happens to a small amount of flour, water and yeast, left in an oiled bowl.

So I mixed that with some more flour, water, and a little more yeast. Then I put it back in the oiled bowl to rise. This is when I went and cleaned the bathroom, made the bed, put away the laundry, and finally got out of my pj's. After a couple hours, I poured the blob out on the bread board, and poked it and stretched it so it finally looked like this, when I put it on the cookie sheet:

After another hour and a half or so, it looked like this:

Then it went in to a very hot oven, and came out like this:

Meanwhile, I had to bring a fan into the kitchen, because it was getting quite warm. I let the loaf cool a bit, and then sliced into it:

After that I decided it was time for lunch:

Nevermind the fact that it was around four o'clock. I had breakfast around noonish, so it worked out nicely. So, I noshed on fresh bread dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, olives stuffed with garlic cloves, hardboiled eggs, and carrots while I put these pictures on the laptop. It was a good day.

Sourdough Saga . . . A Bread Adventure

2006-09-05T12:44:00.000-04:00

I'm making a new sourdough starter - so this time I thought I'd document its growth.

Day 1: 9/2

Added - 120g organic whole wheat flour, 120g water
Removed - nothing
Aroma - wet wheat
Consistency - a moistened and stiff dough

Day 2: 9/3

Directions - there will be no visible change in the color or texture of the starter. Do nothing.

This was the day we spent up on the Northern Neck helping my grandparents, I have no pictures, though I assume it looked much like it did day 1, maybe a little bigger.

Day 3: 9/4

Removed - 120g starter (approx half the original amount) before feeding
Aroma - slightly wheaty, with an unknown note
Consistencey - a moist dough
Added - 60g flour, 60g water

Day 4: 9/5

(no before picture, my apologies)

Removed - 120g starter (approx half the original amount) before feeding
Aroma - cheese, more specifically, white cheddar cheese puffs
Consistency - thick pancake batter
Added - 60g flour, 60g water

Day 5: 9/6

Removed - 120g starter (approx half the original amount) before feeding
Aroma - Cheese with a trace of fresh paint
Consistency - thick pancake batter
Added - 60g flour, 60g water

"You will now have about 1 cup of active starter. (You may feel the impulse to give it a name. Give in to it . . .)"

If anyone would like to suggest a good name for my starter, I'd appreciate it. I want to give it an interesting name. Now I must keep feeding it daily for two weeks.

For the record - I have been working from "The Bread Bible" by Rose Levy Beranbaum.

Ernesto

2006-09-05T12:41:00.000-04:00

Ernesto ploughed through Norfolk, the center of the storm passing right over our heads. Sounds scary right? Ernesto was back down to being a tropical depression when he hit us; I drove downtown to work just after he'd passed by - not because I needed to wait for him to leave, but because I didn't need to go to work that early. There was a little flooding, but we didn't even lose power. Well, there was a lot of flooding, but we didn't have much where we were.

Ernesto actually came at Hampton Roads from the best possible direction - over land. But as it continued up the bay, it had more water to push and hit a high pressure system, that compacted it, driving up the wind speeds. By the time he made it to my grandparents on the Norther Neck, he was dealing damage somewhat like Isabel.

We drove up Sunday to help my grandparents dig out of what Ernesto left behind.

We took around 100 bags of debris to the dump, and that still leaves half of the pile of sea grass in front of the cottage (another 50 bags or so). The boat losses were high, because Ernesto wasn't supposed to be so bad - but no one anticipated what he'd manage to do up in the northern bay - they had 90 mph winds in Baltimore. This was certainly not a Katrina - but I think we underestimated Ernie just a bit.

Cape Charles . . .

2006-08-28T09:53:00.000-04:00

Your 3 was on tour in Cape Charles last week . . . we had fun, see?

This is Nathan . . . he works at the station - he's working hard, can't ya tell?

Pretty things . . .

2006-08-22T17:49:00.000-04:00

It's time for something on the lighter side!

So, the S&S Gray 2.0 household has a new camera. Be warned, this means more pictures in upcoming posts, and probably posts solely for the purpose of posting pictures. Now, I firmly believe that it's not the camera, it's the operator that makes beautiful pictures . . . but there is a point when the limitations of a point-and-shoot camera limit the posibilities of a person's skills. Thus the Canon Digital Rebel XT - our first fully functional SLR that can be completely manual. We are (obviously) excited. Tomorrow I'm headed to the eastern shore for a remote newscast "Your 3 On Tour" - I'm taking the camera, so expect one of those aforementioned pictures only posts in the near future.

Anyway, on the theme of pretty things, I was playing with the camera today. I didn't wander much farther than the fire escape, but I found some fun stuff.

Now, those are all pictures of things that aren't mine. On the gardening front, I planted a little New Zealand Spinach in one of the pots on the fire escape just to see how it did, and while it's still small, it's coming along nicely. I had good luck with some lettuce, but now that we've reached the dog days of august, lettuce gets very bitter (inedible, trust me). NZ spinach, on the other hand, doesn't mind the heat.

Now, the gardening thing is not new news around here . . . most anyone who has been reading my ramblings knows I've been playing with green growing things this summer. But in an attempt to find a portable form of entertainment that I could take to work for when I had down time, or long meal breaks, I have turned to . . . Knitting! I'm sticking primarily to small projects that provide a little challenge - the first of which was a pair of socks. I think I'm hooked. My domestic adventures never end!

Now I'm working on socks for the boy (gray w/red heels and toes), and a bunch of possible christmas presents . . . pictures will come, but not until after they're given to the folks they're for.

So, that's what's up here, at least for now.

I feel a need to clarify . . .

2006-08-11T11:30:00.000-04:00

. . . but as to whether or not I have the ability, I'll leave that to you.

As long windedness is not my strong suit . . . I will try to sum up what I was getting at last time -

I think that the legal battles being fought by the homosexual community in terms of their rights reguarding civil marriage ceremonies and the subsequent ability to file jointly on their taxes or obtain "family" memberships at establishments like country clubs and pools . . . should be decided in their favor - they do have the right to all those things. I don't think they should be treated any differently than any other person.

In terms of their battles within the church, I don't think the church should adopt a homosexual marriage ceremony, and I don't think the church should be elevating active homosexuals to positions of authority (priests, bishops and the like). But I don't think the church should exclude them from the fellowship, or sacramental activities of the church.

It's really a tough issue to deal with. I still think homosexuality is a sin. But homosexuals suffer from a great deal of exclusion in the church, not because of their lifestyle, but because their lifestyle is more visible than other sins. The reason the church shouldn't decided who gets to take communion, or participate in other ways is simply because the church can only make that decision based on what it sees. But the visible isn't everything. It is really up to the individual to hash it out with God and decide if they should or shouldn't do something . . . but within a large body made up of people, what should happen and what does happen are often quite different . . . and perhaps it should be that way - this is our earthly existance; I'm not sure we're supposed to get it right much of the time.

Clear as mud, right?

To continue . . .

2006-08-10T22:30:00.000-04:00

In light of an article Curly suggested after reading my last post . . .

I would like to add something to my statements -

The church should not take it upon itself to allow or deny a person participation in the sacrament of Eucharist . . . it's not the job of the church to decide who can and cannot partake. Whether a person should or shouldn't take communion is between them and God, and if we were brutally honest more often . . . we wouldn't take communion half as often as we do (I too am guilty of that one).

Also - Wyman, glad to know I'm not alone on this one - it's one of the few issues on which I get all "separation of church and state" on folks.

Raising Controversy

2006-08-10T00:48:00.000-04:00

I'm really not trying to raise eyebrows, or give people frown wrinkles . . . really.

I've just been thinking about some stuff, and I'm fairly sure my conclusions are going to make some people angry . . . somewhere . . . if they find out about them. Unfortunately, I'm feeling a need to get some of these thoughts off my chest - so here goes.

I think homosexuality is a sin in the eyes of God.
Therefore:
- Homosexual unions should not be honored in the church.
- A homosexual marriage ceremony should not be canonized.
- Active homosexuals should not be placed in positions of high authority in
the church. Just as people who sodomize young boys, or embezzel money, or lie uncontrollably should not be placed in positions of high authority.
- I'm not particularly comfortable with calling a homosexual union a "marriage"

But . . .
- I see no reason not to allow homosexual unions in the civil and legal sense.
- I don't think the federal or state goverments should outlaw homosexual unions.

And . . .
- I see no reason to treat homosexuals as second class citizens, they are
people after all
- There is nothing especially wrong with someone living a homosexual lifestyle that isn't wrong with all of us (we're all sinners, it's in Romans), so they deserve the same respect and love that I'd give anyone else.
- And for that matter, I know a bunch of really cool people; some of them are gay. No.big.deal.

Have I offended you yet? Or at least confused you?

As a species we tend to fear what we do not understand, and while that's a fairly good survival instinct in the wild, in society it's not a habit we should be proud of or try to maintain.

Ok, I'm done being offensive now.

This looked pretty cool . . .

2006-08-10T00:47:00.000-04:00

Career Inventory Test Results

Extroversion	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	50%
Emotional Stability	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	90%
Orderliness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	66%
Altruism	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	63%
Inquisitiveness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	46%

You are a Guardian, possible professions include - counseling, ministry, library work, nursing , secretarial, curators, bookkeepers, dental hygienists, computer operator, personnel administrator, paralegal, real estate agent, artist, interior decorator, retail owner, musician, elementary school teacher, physical therapist, nurse, social worker, personnel counselor, alcohol/drug counselor.

Take Free Career Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Quizzes . . . internet crack

2006-08-05T05:22:00.000-04:00

1. One book that changed your life: they really all have in one way or another . . . I'm like a french lacquer finish . . . with every pass of the alcohol soaked cloth, my surface is refined.

2. One book that you’ve read more than once: Jeremy the Tale of an Honest Bunny by Jan Karon

3. One book you’d want on a desert island: Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder

4. One book that made you laugh: Corelli's Mandolin by Louis De Berniere . . . though I didn't get very far with it.

5. One book that made you cry: The Amber Spyglass by Phillip Pullman

6. One book that you wish had been written: I often find the library lacking in practical guides for my age/stage/lifestyle/budget . . . they're either too gung ho or not at all helpful. (see: The Encyclopedia of Country Living: An Old Fashioned Recipe Book by Carla Emery)

7. One book that you wish had never been written: Beloved . . . and really anything else by Toni Morrison. I know lots of people like her books, but I.just.can't.

8. One book you’re currently reading: Rebel Angels by Libba Bray

9. One book you've been meaning to read: oh . . . here is where I confess to having not read any of the Anne of Green Gables books . . . but I promise it's on my to-do list.

10. Tag five others: Anyone who hasn't been tagged yet, is officially tagged here.

Garden Update . . . it has pictures

2006-07-08T13:38:00.000-04:00

Let's see now . . .

It's getting warmer, and with the rain we've been getting, the backyard garden (at mom's) is really booming.

The tomato crop is starting to come in, especially the grape tomatoes:

We're about to have a second wave of beans, and the first wave were nice and sweet, so we're excited to have more.

There are lots of big green tomatoes on the vines:

On a side note, I've become very fond of lemon basil tea - it's really quite tasty. So I'm trying to multiply my lemon basil crop so I'll have more to dry for tea.

The chamomile is still flowering madly, I'm excited to have that to sip all winter.

We rescued mom's rose bush from being swallowed by the hedge and it's been thanking us with blossoms:

The daylilies have also been quite happy:

But, then again, mom has always been good and growing low maintenance plants - it's her specialty.

I'm hoping, when Seth get's further into the impending pond project in the back yard, maybe we can grow some more daylilies in different colors - like not orange.

That's what we've got in the garden these days . . . not much going on on the fire escape at present, I'm still experimenting with how much sunlight some of these plants really need. Oh, wait, there is news - the Jalapeno on the fire escape now has four peppers growing on it, for a total of 5 so far. We smoked the first one, in an attempt at home made chipotle. It's an adventure, what can I say?

I don't have the words . . .

2006-07-07T16:06:00.000-04:00

I really need a happier post after all this . . .

The Lindle family needs our prayers . . . their son Ben, a fixture at Asbury College and founder of the Lexington Kid's Choir has left this world.

Sweet, gentle, "Big Ben," you will be sorely missed.

Ok, so it doesn't have pictues, but I must accept the challenge!

2006-07-06T13:36:00.000-04:00

1. Grab the book nearest you, turn to page 18 and find line 4. The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns, Ann Budd "are placed back on waste yarn or holders."

2. Stretch out your left arm as far as you can. What can you touch? a wall, a window, a cup full of sharpies, a computer screen, a keyboard, a couple of books, my planner, my nalgene

3. What is the last thing you watched on TV? The noon news - but it's my job.

4. Without looking, guess what time it is. 2:33

5. Now look at the clock. What is the actual time? 2:33:27

6. With the exception of the computer, what can you hear? The fans in the switcher, the fan in the kalypso, which sounds like the little engine that could, not much else, it's quiet in here

7. When did you last step outside? What were you doing? Ran out to get lunch - it's a rainy day, but if I didn't have to come back to work, I'd be playing in the garden anyway.

8. Before you started this survey, what did you look at? The production wiki - to check and see if anyone left me a note.

9. What are you wearing? Jeans, my film nerd shirt, and a hoodie - AC's on high for the electronics

10. Did you dream last night? Yes, I think I did.

11. When did you last laugh? This morning, hanging out with Seth before I had to leave for work.

12. What is on the walls of the room you are in? Some windows, lots of small TV screens, a bulletin board, and some memo's

13. Seen anything weird lately? I just was a trash truck with a cardboard box wedged in the gap between the front bumper and the body of the truck.

14. What do you think of this quiz? I'm likin' it . . . it's different.

15. What is the last film you saw? In the theatre: Cars . . . on DVD: Bee Season

16. If you became a multi-millionaire overnight, what would you buy? Well, I'd give half of it away (a third of that being to the Media Comm or Theatre departments at Asbury, the other half I'd split between our church, a couple of missions organizations, and heifer international), then I'd do a couple little fun things, like a digital SLR and accessories, and invest the rest for our first house.

17. Tell me something about you that I don't know. Hmm . . . I want to have a cute little house on a decent plot of land where we can raise a few animals and I can have a huge vegetable garden, an herb garden, a knot garden, and a tea garden. And I want a really BIG dog - mastif perhaps.

18. If you could change one thing about the world, regardless of guilt and politics, what would you do? shift the global balance of money and power closer to an even keel, and take 10% of the top 25 nation's respective budgets and spread it among the quality relief organizations in the world

19. Do you like to dance? yeah, sometimes

20. George Bush: Not too sure. Sometimes I think his elevator isn't going to the top floor, but he means well, and tries hard. Other times, I think he's looking after the interests of the wrong people, and not serving the nation that elected him. I'm waiting for Haley to run for president; that will be the first time I know I want a particular candidate to win.

21. Imagine your first child is a girl. What do you call her? I'd like to call her George, but only if that suits her. As for what I'd name her, probably something like Anne George, though Leigh Harmon is also a favorite of mine, in which case I'd call her Harmo.

22. Imagine your first child is a boy. George? Just kidding. I'd like a Jack, not a full on John Preston, but a John something. It'll probably make mom cry, might even piss Bit off, we'll have to see.

23. Would you ever consider living abroad? In a heartbeat! But I'm a little particular about where.

24. What would you want God to say to you when you reach the pearly gate? Dude!

25. 3 people who should do this quiz in their blog: Hmm . . . Rosie (when she feels like it), Bookie, and Wyman (though he might feel he's above quizzes).

Ok . . .

2006-06-27T09:54:00.000-04:00

Sad mopey post out of my system . . . it's time for something with pictures . . . post haste!

A quiet drive home

2006-06-23T21:46:00.000-04:00

"Well I've never been the kind to ever let my feelings show
And I thought that bein' strong meant never losin' your self-control" 1

It's quiet in the truck, and traffic is light. Not many folks around, just me and the radio

"'Does it hurt?' asked the Rabbit.
'Sometimes,' said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. 2

The whole wedding was a bit of a blur, it was sweet, and fun, and great to see all those folks. Bit said she couldn't look at mom, too many tears.

"To hell with my pride
Let it fall like rain, from my eyes
Tonight I wanna cry."1

So apparently I have now run out of whatever's been keeping my mind on happier things.

"Would it help if i turned a sad song on
'All by Myself' would sure hit me hard, now that you're gone"1

It's been just over three months; mom's alone in the house for the first time since it happened. I wonder how she's doing?

"It's gonna hurt bad before it gets better
But I'll never get over you by hidin' this way" 1

I still walk into their bedroom and talk to him, tell him what's up . . . at least say "good morning."

"'When you are Real you don't mind being hurt.'" 2

Some details are fuzzy . . . did it happen before my quarterly review? Did I get to hear him say he was proud of me? Did he say "That's great gooz?" He would have. Who all came? So many people said so many sweet things. There was that stupid shopping cart - I need to get the dent in my door fixed.

"God has paid us the intolerable compliment of loving us, in the deepest, most tragic, most inexorable sense." 3

I miss my daddy.

"Let it fall like rain, from my eyes Tonight I wanna cry."

1 Tonight I Wanna Cry, Keith Urban
2 The Velvelteen Rabbit, Margery Williams
3 The Problem of Pain, C. S. Lewis

Back to my garden . . .

2006-06-20T17:12:00.000-04:00

Seth and I had a really good time in Chincoteague, aside from our sunburn episode at the beach - I need to get better at reapplying my sunscreen. We saw some pretty countryside, and some cute shops. We wandered the trails on Assateague island, and only did what we wanted to. It was relaxing.

The only think I actually missed while we were gone was my garden - I'm such a nerd. When we left we had a tomato that was getting ready to chance, our first big one, and I didnt' really want to miss it. Turns out I didn't . . .

Um . . . overboard?

2006-06-05T09:22:00.000-04:00

Ok, I realize my mother is prone to these kinds of things, but I guess I hadn't mentally prepared myself for this . . .

The forecast for the wedding day is looking more and more like it will be hot, though hopefully dry, and so my mother in her infinite momness made a stop at the dollar store yesterday and bought something like 150 BATTERY POWERED FANS!!!! I'm not saying it was a bad idea, it was in fact, a pretty good idea - but what are we going to do with all the leftover fans?

And besides, I think she just bought us karma insurance that it will definitely rain that day. Oh well . . .

[/off topicness]

Sad news

2006-05-25T22:11:00.000-04:00

Yeah, so those peas I was going to have a lot of here soon? Cut that number in half (I have no idea what number you'd imagined, but whatever that was, cut it in half). Something attacked my peas today - breaking three of the plants (vines) just at the top of the fence around them. On the upside I got to eat five snap peas today; on the downside, it was because they'd be worthless tomorrow.

Not particularly happy about that one. I may have to wage war in the backyard.

The Other Garden

2006-05-18T20:43:00.000-04:00

Yup, I have two! I'm a blessed kid, what can I say. Today's errands included a trip to the DMV to get Seth new licence plates, lunch out to make up for going to the DMV, and a stop by the house for a stamp and to put a letter in the mail.

Well, while we were there, we played in the garden for a bit, and I discovered that our labors are starting to pay off. You see, way back in January, dad turned over the care and keeping of the backyard vegetable garden to yours truly, as he had decided to retire from the home grown tomato business. So I have snap peas, pole beans, bush beans, fennel, herbs, and 16 tomatoes. It's going to be a fun summer!

The basil is loving being outside in real dirt

and it looks like we might have snap peas soon

the rosemary is ever expanding, despite my pruning efforts

I'm shaping up to have a lot of

these, fairly soon

Yup, that's right - I've got my first real tomato. The grape tomato actually won the fruit race, but I picked off all the flowering branches it had first put out, nearly a month ago, because the plant was still too small to bear them well. But since then the first fruit I've seen was on one of the Better Boys. I'm awaiting my Brandywines and Brandyboys - there will be a wealth of tasty pink tomatoes!

Sweet summer harvests, here I come!

An Aside

2006-05-04T14:53:00.000-04:00

Call me Sparky . . . it's catching on . . .

So a bunch of folks at the station, including a couple of anchors are calling my Sparky now . . . why, you ask?

Well, mainly because I was working on wiring the lighting in one of the dressing rooms, and just before I was going to turn off the power to run a new wire, I stopped to check something. In the process of that I brushed a wire that rubbed against the fixture housing thus making a connection between the hot current and the ground, making a spark, scorching the wall and burning my fingers.

So I ran them under cold water, called my mom, went to the emergency room, got treated and given a prescription (the vast majority of which is still in the bottle, I only took one of them), and went home. I went back for follow up today, and it looks like I accomplished an impressive but ultimately not too terribly serious set of second degree burns on the tops of three of my fingers and I get to wear these nifty white tuby things on them for a while. I promise nothing in the way of pictures.

So yeah, Sparky it is.

Here goes nothing . . .

2006-04-21T20:24:00.000-04:00

Well, I promised pictures, and I have some!

I realize that the last thing I should want to do is find a way to pull off a project without using power tools - but the logic goes as follows . . .

It's my day off, I want to enjoy it
If I need to use the power tools in the shop, I have to clean the shop to get to them
Cleaning the shop is not enjoyable
So . . . I'm going to get this project done without needing the power tools.

And I did!

Welcome to our fire escape herb and vegetable garden:

I had been hanging the pots off the railing of the fire escape with brass coat hangers, but they were sagging more than I would have liked. So I set out to find a way to support them. I had thought about hanging a board from the railing with chain or rope, but because the railing doesn't have vertical slats, that wasn't going to work. So I went to Home Depot with the idea to buy a prefab laminated shelf, and figure out how to hold it on the railing. Well . . . in the wonderful world of Oz, solutions just come to you . . .

So I bought two wire shelves - one 4' and one 3' (both 12" deep), two treated wooden balusters (like you'd use on a deck railing) conveniently already 3' long, and the supports for the wire shelves.

I came home and found the household collection of zip ties (everyone should have some in their utility drawer, or something) and used them to attach the shelves to the railings, using the balusters to fill in where the railing was lacking - it was that L shaped metal railing. So, it looked kinda like this:

And then I attached the support braces, to help hold up the weight of all my pots.

So, growing on the fire escape we have:

Lemon Basil
Sweet Basil
Cinnamon Basil
Thyme
Sage
Cilantro
Flat Leaf Parsley
Six kinds of Lavender
Chives
Oregano
Catnip
Spearmint
Peppermint
A roma tomato
a Jalapeno
Snap peas
morning glories
and Aloe

And I'm excited!

The times they are a changin . . .

2006-04-20T19:32:00.000-04:00

If anyone's wandered through in the past couple weeks . . . which I kinda doubt since I haven't posted anything in a while . . . you may have noticed the face of Toy Soldiers has changed a couple times. I was playing with some software, and testing out my attempts here. I'm done for now. I have gone back to a straight up template, which I'll probably get bored and tweak, eventually. But I picked this one, because I want to focus on something that has become a strong interest of late.

I'm gardening. So for now - Toy Soldiers (haha, littleGREENarmymen, get it??) will operate on a more growing-green-things kind of theme. I'll have pictures, and info on my attempts as well as what I plan to change next time around. I'll still post other random stuff too, y'all know I can't concentrate on one thing long enough to make my main blog have a true theme!

Also, on that note, a website to share, as it has helped alleviate my gardening jones when I have to do other things - You Grow Girl - they have great content, and forums. I haven't gone so far as to buy the book yet, but I might consider it eventually.

Anyhow . . . that's what's on my mind, at least for now.

He's moving out . . .

2006-03-23T11:38:00.000-05:00

Ok, backstory time! I signed the papers for the apartment on Feb. 1, and proceeded to clean the place, get the power and gas reconnected, and start working on shades for the windows. Well, the shades haven't moved an inch since I posted about them before, but plenty of other things have.

So far, we've

refinished a table
painted chairs

built a bookcase

and a buffet with a hutch

acquired a bed

and a small dresser

and a whole living room

covered parts of the kitchen in fabric

and added some storage

but let's not talk about this room...

I'm actually giddy happy right now - we went to a nearby thrift store and bought a couch, a chair, and a coffee table, for less than what some of the other couches at that same thrift store cost (hehe!). And the best part for me?? The chair is a really cushy chair and a half. I've always wanted one of those, to curl up and read in, and when the nice manager knocked the price back even farther for us, I got to have it. I told the boy on the ride back to the apartment with our truckload of furniture (my bed was full) that even if we move into a nice house and start thinking about nicer furniture, I'm keeping my chair. I may end up paying more to have it re-covered than we paid for it in the first place, but unless the frame gives out, I'm keeping my chair. I can see many afternoons curled up with a good book in that chair.

So now our living room is complete with two comfy chairs - one for me and one for the boy. He inherited my grandfather's easy chair. That was the other project for the weekend. My sweet grandmother is trying to divest herself of the furniture that she won't be moving into her apartment, so this weekend we took a small dresser, two ladderback chairs, a small apholstered chair, the recliner, a side table, an old black and white television (hehe, tv nerd-dom), a lamp, and a few odds and ends, including a brand new calculator that my grandfather must have never opened. It's a comfy recliner, though suffering from an overabundance of retro orange. He really likes it, especially since it's a free recliner, and she was just glad someone could take it out of the house for her.

So, things are coming along, it's starting to feel more like home, and less like a white walled cavern. The boy says he's moving in next weekend, now that there's enough furniture to make it livable for him. I think he'll be really happy to have a place of his own, and be out of my parent's house. They certainly haven't minded, and I know Mom's been glad to have two kids around the house again, but he's really tired of being a guest, and she just can't stop treating him like one. So he'll be out of the house in a week, and honestly, I'm jealous!! Oh well, I get to move out soon enough.

and it's really a shame he's leaving; he just reached the status of substitute lap!

Fun in the Garden

2006-03-21T09:59:00.000-05:00

Our last frost date around here is April 1 . . . so it's time to start dabbling in the garden, getting it ready for planting.

And we did, Sunday after church. We repaired and gassed up the roto-tiller and turned the soil in the backyard vegetable patch . . .

And yes, I did some too, but I need a lot more practice with the tiller before I do as good a job as he did.

We added several bags of humus and manure and two bags of sand and turned the soil again. Then it was time do decide on spaces. We pounded in a couple poles and strung them for snap peas and pole beans. We made a path and some raised areas in the bed from the last of the leftover bricks that we've had sitting back there since we built the house. We put the two Rosemary bushes back in the garden, in a new spot. I put in the tomato cages and marked which ones were for tomatoes and which were for peppers. I put bricks in the spots for tomatoes.

I sowed a little thyme seed around the path, and a collection of herbs in one of the raised sections. We sowed snap peas and pole beans, bush beans, new zealand spinach and lettuce. So now all I have to do is keep up with the weeds, hope the birds don't peck up my seeds, and get ready to plant tomatoes and peppers when we get them. Well, that and protect my sprouts from the rabbits - I see chicken wire in my future.

Of course, the day after we did all that, it got all wet and cold. But from what I've seen, the seeds shouldn't sprout if the dirt is too cold, and the rain is certainly appreciated.

I'm hoping this will be the beginning of a productive summer. My goal at this point, is to have healthy plants, and put up as many canning jars of Roma tomatoes as I can. I'll keep y'all posted. Garden on kids!

And everything was still beneath the moon

2006-03-13T15:04:00.000-05:00

Time is a funny thing . . .

Jack Harper left this earth around 10:15 am Friday March 10, 2006

My mother's husband died around 11 am.

Dot Harper lost her son around 11:30 am, two days before the anniversary of her husbands death, 7 years ago.

My dad died a little after noon.

Seth lost a father-in-law to be, that he'd only barely gotten to know, around 4:15.

Little sister lost her daddy at 8 pm.

Sweet Lisa Chandler lost her good friend Jack Saturday afternoon.

Dr. Conkling lost his patient and good friend Sunday afternoon.

I've already worried a fairly large number of folks, who've come by to see me smiling or (God forbid!) laughing.

We sat around the dinner table Saturday night and joked about how we should have green beans at the reception - Dad HATED green beans. And my Aunt Penny told stories on dad. I have a really hard time picturing my dad driving his sister and their two cousins around a city in Florida dropping Salvo tablets (laundry detergent tablets) in the fountains. By the time I came along, Dad was always responsible, always mature, always a little paranoid, and always a bit of a stick in the mud.

I've had to chuckle a couple of times, though not when she was around, because Mom's good friend Anne walked in Friday after noon and announced, at some point, "I'm pissed, so if anyone needs to be pissed about this, we can be pissed together." And sometime later told mom if she needed to strip down naked and run down Powhatan Ave, that would be ok too.

There are so many people who've come by because they loved my Daddy. And most of them have needed a hug. I think they wonder why I'm acting the way I'm acting. I get a hug every 5 minutes or so, from somebody who's come by, whether I like it or not, but I know that each of them needs that hug. I am basically done being highly emotional about all this - it's a quirk, but I just can't be emotional for very long, it wears me out. Yes, I'm sad and no I'm not crying.

I had my big moment. Mom called me, I was a Target. She didn't want to tell me over the phone, but I kinda made her. I almost made it out of target before the waterworks started. I made it to my truck before I really started to bawl. I sat in the parking lot and cried for a couple minutes, and then I wiped my eyes, and proceeded to drive home. Now, I cried the whole. way. home. And I'm sure I got some looks along the way. Ironically, I think it improved my driving, probably because the last thing I wanted to do was have to cry in front of a cop I'd never met before. By the time I got home, I was dried out. I've had some short moments since then, when there are enough fluids to make tears.

And Seth, bless his heart, has been the biggest help. He's answered phones, he's made the food fit in the fridge. He's sat and talked with folks he's never met before. He's been there for me, making me sit down when I've been pacing too much. He's been watching out for both me and mom since Friday. And last night he made both of us smile. He'd been talking to me about how the only way he could really relate to dad was fishing. The sad part of that being that he and dad were supposed to go fishing after work the day we lost dad. So, to give himself something to do, and some peace and quiet to think, he went out in the backyard with dad's fly rod and just started practice casting. It was just special to see him out there having his own "dad" time.

Well kids, that's as much as I can say right now, except to thank everyone who's left me sweet comments and e-mails. I will be answering them, and calling some of y'all here in the next couple weeks, I hope. At some point, I'm going to post about the wonderful man who was my dad, but for now this is all I've got. But just so you all know, I'm doing just fine, and we're all going to be fine.

Jack Harper 1947-2006

2006-03-10T13:39:00.000-05:00

I don't know if I'll be around much for a while. . . I might be around even more than usual, I just don't know.

We lost my dad today.

Your prayers would be appreciated. I'll fill in the huge gaps later, not really up to it right now.

Q

An overgrown comment

2006-03-09T11:13:00.000-05:00

Curly posted the other day concerning the modern, traditional family. I thought I might continue the discussion here, as my comment was about to grow into a novel.

My mom stayed home to raise me and my sister, at least in the sense that she didn't work. She did have a few commitments during the week: garden club, the gift shop at church, an exercise class. Now I started school at the ripe old age of 18 months (for two days a week), but starting the year or so before that up until the point when I was in school 5 days a week (4 yrs. old???) she would take me to one of two places while she went to whatever it was she had that day. Some days I would learn to paint with my Great Grandmother, or cook, we liked to make custard (yum!!). Other days I'd go play with my Grandmother, which occasionally included a trip to check on my Great Grandmother. All that to say, I had friends who had babysitters for most of their childhood, because their parents worked, but I spent quite a bit of mine with my mom, and I lost a lot of games of checkers until my sister got old enough to play with me.

Well, now I'm out of college and starting out in the working world. I work part time evenings and weekends, with the occasional noon news thrown in (that's where I am right now). What with the wedding in June, and the starting to be a grown up adult thing, I've begun to think about how I'd like to raise a family. I'm starting to think that I'm a fan of the "traditional model" if it could work for us. Perhaps modified a bit.

Like Curly said, when more and more household tasks are paid for, rather than done within the household, it requires more income to pay for those tasks. Scott was right, it's a vicious cycle kind of a thing. And it certainly plays into the apparent need of our society as a whole to buy everything rather than take responsibility for doing it ourselves.

Now, I'm not about to condemn that way of life, though I personally cannot find it within myself to live that way. My life goals are my life goals, and if your life goals are different, then perhaps that is as it should be, and we just might fit into two different spaces in the puzzle that need to be filled.

Personally, I want to stay home with my kids, for at least a large part of each day. And for that, my current work schedule would be a great fit. I could spend the earlier part of the day with the kids and taking care of household things, like paying bills, grocery shopping, tending to the garden, cleaning house and what have you, and then go to work in the early afternoon, only needing someone else to take care of them for a couple hours until Seth get's home from work. However, as we have spent the vast majority of our relationship long distance, and even if we hadn't, it sure would be nice to see my husband from time to time. Two hours around dinner time most nights just isn't going to cut it for too long.

So, perhaps I should stop working once we decide to start a family and in the mean time, work to change my work schedule significantly. The problem I see with that is that I greatly enjoy what I do, so I'm hesitant to stop. I really like working in television, though I'm not sure working in production is exactly where I want to be. But I'm really not sure I want normal regular hours, and I certainly don't want a desk and a need to wear "business attire."

The other complication is that despite the fact that the boy isn't really making a ton of money as a mechanic, he's making twice as much as I am - so right now we kinda have 75% of the income that we'd like to be earning jointly, in order to be able to build our savings and prepare for the possibility of someday owning a home.

Ok, so this started out as a comment and now it's grown beyond what I had intended, also I need to actually do my job, so I'm going to come back to this in a second. I'm only saying this to explain any break in the logic (or lack thereof) between the post thus far and what will come when I get back.

Well, I'm back at work again, with more time to kill . . . but I don't really have too much to add. I guess perhaps this is almost an example of the variables at play here. And I still haven't touched on much of the meat of Curly's original post.

Hmmm . . .

We had a three sermon series at church a few weeks ago, regarding Love and Marriage. One of the things the pastor talked about was the concept of the man being the head of the household. After a fairly large number of gasps in the congregation, he continued to explain where he was going. He cited several points in Scripture that pointed out that the man was the head of the household, and therefore responsible to make an account for not only himself, but his family before God. He also said that when it comes to roles in the home or the functioning of the family, that should depend on each member's gifts and talents.

I was really tired that day, I'd had a really late night at the station. But I really had to think about that sermon. I don't know that bad husbands/fathers necessarily go to "that special hell reserved for child molesters and people who talk in the theatre**," but I think I agree in general with the concept. As far as I see it, the man is responsible for looking after his family in an over-arching sense. He will have to stand before God and make an account for not only himself, but the rest of his family. But when it comes down to the nitty gritty, day to day details of the way life works in the household, he might very well be the best suited to stay home with the kids, for example. How the details play out should be totally personal.

Not that I think society as a whole can handle this concept yet, it's too nebulus, and it doesn't necessarly suit the tides that drive societies moods these days. But I think this is how we're going to operate. Now the trick is going to be to figure out the details.

Something tells me I'll be doing the taxes and balancing the bank books, as math is something I can do pretty well. But I would really like to raise my children myself, in the sense that I would be home at least enough to be a large part of their day to day lives. And I know that Seth really values being able to provide for the family, so something tells me that he won't be staying home, unless he turns into a freelance photographer.

I guess we'll just have to see.

I Done Been Taggded!

2006-03-05T17:43:00.000-05:00

Four jobs I've had in my life:
Babysitter
Lifeguard, Jewish Community Center
Lighting Director, Asbury College Theatre
Engineering Assistant, Asbury Media Comm Dept.

Four Movies I could watch over and over:
Ever After
Serenity
10 Things I Hate About You
Support Your Local Sherrif

Four Places I've lived:
Norfolk, Virginia
Wilmore, Kentucky
Los Angeles, California
Lexington, Indiana (but only for a week)

Four TV shows I love to watch (has officially been reinstated):
Good Eats
Gray's Anatomy
Any Obscure Olympic Coverage (curling, trap and skeet etc . . .)
Mythbusters

Four Authors I love to read (I wanted to keep this one too):
J. K. Rowling
Christopher Paolini
Donald Miller
Jostein Gaarder

Four places I've been on vacation:
Alderson, West Virginia
St. Georges, Bermuda
White Stone, Virginia
Williamsburg, Virginia

Four websites I visit daily:
Gmail
Blogger
Apple
Food Network

Four of my favorite foods:
Homemade bread with butter and honey
Shrimp and peppers in a garlic and white wine sauce, over pasta
Fried Chicken
Mashed Potatoes

Four places I'd rather be right now:
In my chair
Wilmore
Backpacking through Europe
Working on the garden

Four people I am tagging:
Bookie
Wyman
Rosie
Josh

Cool people at work, part two . . .

2006-02-17T13:13:00.000-05:00

Well, I talked about Calvin in a recent post, but he's not the only person that I'm glad to be working with. I think I might make this a recurring column here on Toy Soldiers.

So, onto another cool person at work - Sara.

She was one of the first people I got to work with, because she was the one first assigned to train me on the graphics board. (And Peracchio - if you think you love Maxine! you should give the Duet a try - it's the next step up in the Chyron line, and it's really a nifty system.) They call Sara the Queen of Chyron at the station, she's the one who knows the system the best, and she can make it do things that the rest of us (as of yet) cannot. She's got a pretty level head, although directing still gives her a bit of a rough time. She and her husband have been married for a few years now, and in talking to her from time to time, she's shared a few bits of advice, sometimes by accident, that I'm stowing away in case they come in handy. Sara's great to have around to push me to be better - she's a stickler for spelling, grammar, and formatting, so I try to catch and correct all the errors I can. She's also got a great sense of humor, as do so many of the folks I work with, so we all have a good time working together, even when the show gets stressful.

It sure is a blessing to have great co-workers. I hope I can live up to the tradition.

An Assertion

2006-02-11T22:53:00.000-05:00

Guess what world, I have opinions!!

Ok, you can stop laughing now.

Some folks who know me know full well that I have opinions, other's know me as the quiet indecisive one. And I have certainly been either one or the other, from time to time throughout my life, but the truth is, I really do have fairly strong opinions on a good number of things.

For starters . . . I'm not a fan of bondage. I don't want to be owned or controlled by something outside of myself. I will not be a slave to my cell phone - so sometimes, I don't answer. I will not be indentured to my car, so I won't make payments every month into the forseeable future, and I won't own a car I would worry too much about damaging. I refuse to be ruled by my furniture - so I don't want to own anything that is so nice I don't want to breathe around it. I won't be ruled by mob mentality, so if I go along with the group, it's because I genuinely agree, otherwise, I'll opt out. Sometimes that gets a little awkward, but I'm ok with that. To me most yuppy things fall into the mob mentality category, so most things I'm not really big on.

I'm not a fan of anything that is harmful to me, but in the line of reasoning I started above, I won't let that control me entirely. I don't want to clean my house with things that make me nervous about eating preparing food on the surface afterword, so I don't. I also hate the smell of ammonia, and I figure it can't be all that healthy, so I try not to use it. Perhaps suprisingly, I don't use any of that antibacterial stuff - pros and cons weighed out, I'd rather build up a tolerance than breed some super bug that'll knock me on my back later. I'm also not a fan of water filters - mostly because I've always lived in areas with good tap water, if that changed, I might too. I generally avoid artificial things, especially sweeteners, though that has more to do with taste than their chemical make up.

I don't enjoy interacting with people, especially in large numbers, and even more so if they're unfamiliar to me. And don't get me started on emotionally unstable people, especially if you are one, it'll hurt. I'm quiet; I avoid confrontation, and occasionally get a little passive agressive. If I can accomplish something without having to deal with a person, I will, in general. I'm a real home body, in case that wasn't obvious.

I like to do things - someone else actually pointed this one out to me, rather astutely. If I can do it myself, get my hands into the act, more's the better. I like to grow things, mostly edible things - I have a salad growing in my bedroom right now. I like to cook, bake, and prepare meals in general - and I love to experiment. I don't know that I'll ever tell my boss this, but I enjoy soldering cables. I like to poke around with circuit boards, play with wires. I love climbing around in attics and basements. It really makes my day when I can make something that didn't work before, function properly, and I love making better of a sketchy situation - Doddridge Holland comes to mind, it was great when it worked really well.

I have a great desire to share great memories, even if I have to recreate them or make them from scratch. Most obviously, I'd like to do that for my kids, but beyond that I like to do it for everyone I care about, at some time or another. The things that make memories for me might be a little different, but I'll never forget those special moments, and that's what counts, I figure.

I'm sure there's more, but I'm tired. I've been sitting on this post for a good couple weeks now. I'll let this be what it is, and perhaps continue at a later date.

Baby steps . . .

2006-02-11T16:45:00.000-05:00

So, we have an apartment. Thus far the progress goes as follows-

-Measured all the windows, in the production phase of the roman shades
(2 started so far)
-Measured the rooms, haven't started trying to lay them out yet
-Cleaned the place, top to bottom
-Got electricity, gas, and phone turned on
-Lined most of the kitchen cabinets (need more liner to finish)
-Unpacked some basic kitchen stuff
-Bought a mattress and box springs, sheets pillows etc . . . and made the bed
-Bought a bookshelf, assembled it
-Bought a buffet w/ hutch, assembled it
(Seth did most of that one, I had to go back to work)
-Bought basic stuff, tp, tissues, paper towels, trash bags (no cans yet . . .)

Somewhere in the middle of that we stopped and had Greek take out by candlelight . . . then proceeded to go back to my folks house and watch the opening ceremonies, because I came down with a raucous head cold. And I have to say, as much as I would sometimes rather have a nicer piece of furniture, the kind that comes with instructions and pieces labled throws both of us back to the days we played with legos, and we had a lot of fun putting those together today. Mom and Dad stopped by to day while we were working, to give us a housewarming gift - a plunger. My parents are funny, and I love them for it.

Things to like about the apartment -

- it has a dining room, a real dining room
- the kitchen has a coffee bar, and there was much rejoicing!
- there are plenty of windows and railings on the south facing side to keep my happily container gardening
- hardwood floors!!!
- old construction - well loved and sometimes a bit saggy, but way better than new construction any day of the week
- right now all the walls are white, which means a blank canvas for me to play with
- gas stove
- bathroom tile is blue, not some weird color I don't like
- we're on the ground floor, so we can't stomp on anyone's head
- we're going to have a decent amount of nice furniture**
- water and heat are included in the rent (and water here gets pricy)
- the stove is gas

Things not to like -
- the stove is gas (which means the oven is gas, I haven't tested it yet to see how it does on temperatures, but I will soon)
- The bathroom is in pretty bad shape, some of which not even elbow grease can fix
- I can't live there 'til june

**About that furniture - I've seen it, but Seth hasn't yet, so nothing's set in stone, but my grandmother is moving out of her house and into a condo in a retirement community. She doesn't like the idea of selling her extra furniture, especially by yard sale, so she's trying to give as much away as she can. Apparently it struck her recently that we would be the perfect target for her benevolence, so we may be aquiring a great deal of maple soon. Now, mind you, she spent at least half of the time I visited apologizing for it being maple, because she was afraid I wouldn't like it. I love my grandmother, she's really cute sometimes, and her furniture is very attractive. So, we shouldn't have to worry too much about desks, dressers, chairs and what have you - she'd be hurt if I didn't accept at least some from her.

I have a pretty long list of things to do to get this place up to snuff, but it's well on it's way. At least now we can make coffee over there - so the important needs are being met. And I finally have a legitimate excuse to nest . . . and I'm taking great advantage of it.

Of Moving and Homemaking

2006-02-08T13:09:00.000-05:00

Ok, I know this goes against most mental images of me covered in gray/brown dust and wielding a gerber at some stubborn light, or banging away on a set piece . . . but I'm really kind of proud of myself:

We have an apartment, and we've paid the first month's rent and gotten the keys. Queue's first step? Measure the windows and start making roman shades. After a plea from the boy for more colors than blue and white (can we say Duke fan??) and a quick trip around Walmart, I decided to paint the white shades with yellow and blue stripes. Any thoughts?? I will be making many of these in the next few days, as we have quite a few windows that need to be covered. Anyone who comes to visit is either going to be shocked at my domestic facility or completely non-plused. Either way, I will extend an invitation to come visit once we're settled.

I will be making and sending out cards with address and telephone info here soon, so if anyone wants one, e-mail me your addy @ 00queue at gmail.com.

Ruminations

2006-01-27T00:46:00.000-05:00

I promised Bookie a "cup of coffee post," and after the randomness of my last one, my brain needs to stretch. I suppose this is more of a cup of tea post - seeing as it's much too late for coffee.

I have a great job. I wake up in the morning or early afternoon refreshed, get a shower, take care of little things around the house, and head to work. I come home to have dinner with Seth and my parents and then go back for a couple more hours. I come home and either relax or go to bed. And this is only my training schedule, once training ends, my hours will decrease and I will have a good deal more free time. Now, I've put in an resume for a full time position, so this could all change, but for now the position is frozen, so it won't be changing too soon. So I may need to consider picking up a second job - I hear Starbucks offers full time benefits to it's part-timers.

But back to having a great job. I got something with this job that I wasn't expecting, and hadn't even really thought about - Calvin. He's around 20, I'm guessing, I didn't ask. He's a part-timer like me. He's working on an associates degree at TCC, after which he's moving on to Norfolk State, to study broadcasting. So he's about one step behind me on that road we call life. He's been working at WTKR for a good while now, and we work together on the floor during the 11 o'clock news. Ok, when I'm new to a situation, I'm really quiet - in fact the evening anchor started calling me "Quiet Susan" one day - but Calvin really didn't talk for my first two or three days of work. It was a good thing we weren't the only two floor crew, because with both of us not talking much, we'd have really screwed something up.

Well the other day, Calvin came in to work really happy. I mean, laughing a lot, chatty, having a grand old time. That broke the last of the ice for us, we're pretty comfortable now. It's cool working with Calvin. We're kinda at the same point in life, and we can both help each other out. So, there will be more, in coming posts as to what's going on there, but I think Calvin and I are going to have a grand time working together down in the "Beautiful Downtown Norfolk Studios" of WTKR. I don't have any plans or expectations for my time working with Calvin; it's just great to have someone I can have fun working with.

No, your eyes aren't blurry and blinking won't help; I posted this after work, so it was late at night.

So, I'm up

2006-01-25T08:11:00.000-05:00

Ok, it's 9 am. not so impressive by most standards, but the circumstances make it more impressive, I promise. And for that matter, I've been up since 5:45. I got up with the boy. I may make a habit of doing this, occasionally, if I can stay up through the end of work tonight . . . we'll see.

Anywho, life, stream of consciousness style:

We're going to see an apartment again on Saturday. We've seen this one before, but we need to fill out a new application and get serious this time. We liked it, and unless we find something crazy, I think we'll take it. I hope so, I'm tired of searching. I have to call a car dealer today, I need to take my truck in for a couple of recall checks (nothing serious) and a much overdue state inspection. Problem is the dealership I bought it from no longer sells Dodges, so I'm going to go make friends with a dealer much closer to home. My cat is bulimic. Mom just walked in, street sweepers are in the neighborhood, gotta go move George. Nevermind, mom took care of it, it's cold outside and I'm still in my PJ's. Work's going pretty well, and my schedule clears up after next week. I'll be down to 27ish hours a week, which doesn't make for great paychecks, but it means I won't go for days only seeing the boy or my rents except for a dinner break. And heck, I could pick up another job, especially if this morning thing works well. I'm not a big fan of stream of consciousness, come to think of it. I need to e-mail the head of engineering. I want to see if I can move to that department, and maybe to days. Full time would be nice. I'd rather have health insurance (which I don't have through work, I do have some . . .) than a 401k (which I do have, the packet came in the mail yeserday). If it wasn't for the NYTimes matching some of my 401k input, I wouldn't do it at all, I have better places to stash my acorns. I work for the NY Times, how random is that?

So anyway, trying to make sense of how this life thing is going to work out. It's overwhelming at times, and I'm seeking to end as many of the floating-unknown elements as possible, for my sanity. Speaking of sanity:

QUEUE'S GARDEN MOMENT:

I now have four trays of seedlings in my window, one rooting branch of rosemary, and one bonafide pot. I think I'll start another round of seeds soon. Why you may ask? Because (Trumpet fanfare) I get to take over the vegetable garden this year! Come March I'll be roto-tilling, amending, and planting the veggie patch! I'm really excited. I've got about 8 square yards of an L shaped patch to work with and the only part I can't move or remove is a Peony.

What I want to plant in the garden: Lots of Tomatoes (3 roma's and 6+ brandyboy's) and Basil, Snap Peas, Onions (red, yellow, and bunching), Lettuce, and Spinach. Plus the existing Peony and an existing Rosemary.

What I'm planning to pot (and keep at the apartment): Leaf lettuce/Mesclun mix (that's what I have in the pot already), Bachelor's Buttons, Marigolds, Morning Glories, Sweet Basil, Cinnamon Basil, Lemon Basil, Lime Basil, Rosemary, Catnip, Chamomile, Chives, Oregano, Sage, Cilantro, Peppermint, Spearmint. Depending on whether or not he wants to give it a go, I may get the boy seeds for a butterfly garden to go with his aloe plant.

I have visions of canning jars dancing in my head - how great would it be to put up cans of tomatoes and tomato juice for use all winter? I'm not so worried about keeping the rest of it, the variety of yellow onions I have is supposed to store pretty well, but we'll probably eat most of the other stuff all summer.

Ok, that's enough nerdy garden stuff. I'm liking the green growing stuff, it keeps me sane in the sea of getting life in order. Nevermind wedding stuff, it's more than I can handle to keep the normal balls in the air.

Time to go be productive. Later taters!

Not so much an original post

2006-01-16T12:08:00.000-05:00

1. Initials: SLH

2. Name someone with the same birthday as you? The only person I know with a birthday even close to mine is my pseudo-almost-fraternal twin to whom I'm not actually related - Corey (Dec. 9)

3. What color hair do you have? Medium Brown with a hint of henna

4. Where was your first kiss? in a driveway, under the moon

5. For or against same sex marriage? I don't want one. From a religious standpoint, I think it's wrong. My conservative side wants to be against it, but my consciencious side takes over and says that in this land of freedom it should be allowed.

6. Are you bisexual? Nope

7. Do you believe in God? yeah, dude

8. How many U.S states have you been to? 17

9. How many of the U.S states have you lived in? Two, and in a sense only one, because at one point they were both the same state

10. Have you ever lived outside the U.S? No

11. What is your normal bedtime? Midnight or later (I work the night shift)

12. What are your nicknames? Queue, Sue, Suzie (don't really like that one)

13. What is your mom's name? Anne

14. What type of car do you have? '05 Dodge Dakota - George

15. If you could go anywhere in the world where would you go? I want to backpack through Europe - all of Europe - I don't want to miss a single region (not country, region)

16. What do people think you are good at? Media and Video stuff and fixing things

18. If you could describe yourself in one word, what would it be? cautious

19. How many illegal things have you done? I jaywalked - does that count

20. Name an embarrassing moment: I got turned around coming back from the Penninsula, which wouldn't be so bad, but the boy was in the car . . . I really do have a good sense of direction, I swear

21. Can you speak in public? not so much

22. Has anyone ever sang or played for you personally? Yeah, my uncle, when I was really little

23. Ever been kissed under fireworks? No, but I think the Aurora Borealis should count

24. Do you like president Bush? Haven't met the man, but it would seem that his heart is in the right place, even if some of the decisions haven't been that great.

25. Have you ever bungee jumped? See no. 18

26. Have you ever white-water rafted? See no. 18

27. Have you ever done something crazy? See no. 18. . . but seriously, yeah, haven't we all?

29. Have you met a real redneck? I've been accused of it - but the accuser has a wierd sense of normality

30. Disappeared? Into my bed on many occasions - I don't handle people well

31. What song are you listening to right now? The vacuum cleaner and a podcast

32. What is your current favorite song? You're kidding right?? I guess I keep returning to a mashup called "Vertigo Tripper" it's pretty cool.

34. What was the last movie you watched? The Hunt for the Red October

35. Where was the last place you went besides your house? Trader Joe's

36. Have you ever seriously vandalized someone else's property? See no. 18

37. Have you ever hit someone of the opposite sex? Not hard

39. What is your greatest accomplishment? Dude! I'm 24 . . . I'm a work in progress

44. Say something totally random about yourself: Still in my PJ's at noon!

45. Do you have an iPod? Yeah, it's a 15g 3rd gen and I love it dearly - it's gotten me through some lengthy trips - great for fighting homesickness and crappy radio

46. Has anyone ever said you looked like a celebrity? People used to say I had eyebrows like Brooke Sheilds - eh?

47. Whats your dad's name? Jack

48. Do you have braces? Not anymore

49. Are you comfortable with your height? yeah - makes finding pants that are long enough a little tough, but I like the view

50. Do you love someone right now? I love a lot of people - but in terms of romantic love - yes, the boy

51. How tall are you? 5'10"and change

52. Do you speak any other languages besides english? I speak some French. I have a decent vocabulary, and I love language, but I lack the confidence to use it.

55. Have you ever ridden in a limo? I've ridden in a funeral limo, but four grandkids across the back seat was a little tight.

56. Has anyone you were really close to passed away? Two great-grandmothers, one grandfather.

57. Do you watch MTV? Nope

58. What's something that really annoys you? sheep - you know, the people who always do the cool thing, reguardless of how ridiculous or stupid it is

59. What are some things you really like? In no particular order: good music, a good book, a good movie, a walk with a friend, being outside in general, and at the top of the list - Pretty Pictures, taking them, and having them

61. Do you dance? In the kitchen when we make chilli

62. Have you ever surfed? See no. 18

65. What's the latest you have ever stayed out? 4am

66. Have you ever thought that you were honestly going to die? No, but I thought I might falsely die.

67. Were you ever rushed by an ambulance into the emergency room? nope . . . perhaps somewhat because of no. 18 (though obviously not entirely due to that habit)

68. What's your favorite state to live in? relaxation

69. Have you ever been dared to do something you didn't want to do? Who hasn't? come on!

70. And what was it? Not a chance bub

71. Are you hoping that this is the end? Questions are getting awfully dull . . . so that's a resounding yes!

In Lieu of a Letter . . .

2005-12-30T17:04:00.000-05:00

I had high hopes of producing my first Christmas (or rather, Post-Christmas) letter this year, and trying to make a habit of it . . . but seeing as we aren't quite a real "we" yet, I thought maybe a not quite real Christmas letter might be more up my alley. Besides, being fresh out of college and unemployed, it saves on postage this way (I know, I'm a schmuck).

Anywho, the soon to be **Gray 2.0's year in review:

Seth and Queue spent the first couple days of 2005 together, at Queue's parent's house in Norfolk. This was the first time Queue was able to introduce her folks to Seth. We all had a good time, took some pictures of little sister's New Year's Eve Eve party, had a relaxing, though a bit boring, New Year's Eve trying to keep our eyelids open, and we even got around to showing Seth some of the highlights of the Tidewater area, sort of. He headed back to Indiana afterwards and Queue soon followed.

After the holidays, we were soon back into the routine of classes and work. Seth was taking a new class each month at Lincoln Tech. in Indianapolis, and working third shift at the UPS hub nearby, coming home to be with his family on the weekends. Queue carried a full load of classes and continued to work as an Engineering Assistant for the Media Department. With February came the big film production of the semester, which meant few weekends to sneak up to Indiana. After that the semester rolled on fairly normally.

In March Seth and Queue joined Si and SJ for a dinner theatre date. Sometime over that weekend Queue agreed (officially) to marry "The Boy" but they decided not to break the news to anyone until both sets of parents could be gathered together into one room.

This happened at the end of April, with the first Annual Asbury College Film Festival. And just before the show started that Saturday night, they had both mothers in tears and got to sigh with relief that no one tried to strangle them. There was no wedding date, as there was much school to finish.

That semester ended, at least for Queue, and with the summer came work, weekends in Indiana, and a wedding set for June of '06. Seth's school schedule continued unbroken until October, as did work at UPS. Queue put many miles on George the truck, driving to Indiana on the weekends, driving home to deliver some of her possessions and finally, in August, driving west towards California. She spent her final semester in Los Angeles, with the Los Angeles Film Studies Center, movie-geeking and learning to survive in the urban jungle. Seth meanwhile, was left in Indiana, finishing up school. He finished his studies in October and moved back home. He spent most of his days working on Grandma Shirley's farm in Deputy, and taking care of the family cars.

Queue finished her film semester in early December, and Seth flew out to join her for the trip back. Much fun was had on the four day road trip - just don't ask about 'ar-kan-sess or 'mis-er-ry. The week following the trek was spent in Indiana having an early Christmas with much of Seth's family. Then it was time to hit the road for ol' Virginny.

Once the vehicles were packed (and man were they ever packed!) Seth and Queue set sail for the coast. What followed was more Christmas, and a good deal of Queue's family getting to meet Seth for the first time. Poor Seth was quite worn out after all of that.

That basically brings us to the now and the future. As of now Seth and Queue are in the process of finding an apartment (so far we've seen one we like, but we're not ready to commit yet, kinda still unemployed, you get the idea) and looking for work. Seth has had one interview thus far, with a new company about to start up. They spent this afternoon getting addresses and phone numbers for businesses around town that he would like to inquire about and labeling his area map so he can find them next week. Queue is going to schedule in interview just after New Year's with NewsChannel 3 - the local CBS affiliate station. With two Asbury Grads and John Bruner's excellent reference skills behind her, she hopes this will turn into a job; if it doesn't it's onto the other three stations, as well as a multitude of other options.

In the coming weeks there should be an address and local telephone number, and Queue will probably be more than glad to share tales of her nesting exploits with anyone who asks (so don't ask if you're not ready to be bombarded, the nesting bug has hit hard already).

We hope this finds all of our friends and loved ones in good health and spirits. We wish you all a belated Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year!

Love to all,
Seth and Queue

** S&S Gray has been taken, so I'm looking for an equally useful substitute, suggestions accepted gladly

Another Paper

2005-11-30T20:32:00.000-05:00

Just got this one back, and honestly, I'm pretty happy with it. Thoughts please. And as always, please excuse "inside joke" type language . . . I didn't edit the paper from it's original version.

In some basically anonymous junior or senior high school in Anytown, USA, a girl is talking to a male friend about this guy she likes. She wants his advice on how best to approach this “babe” that she just can’t live without. Meanwhile her friend is staring at her when she’s not looking, and this whole conversation is causing him great agony of the heart, though he won’t let her see it. Inside he is screaming and waving wildly, trying to get her to notice him – to see that he would be a great guy for her. On the outside he is trying to help her in her endeavor, because he can’t tell her how he really feels – that would be embarrassing! But she’s already written him off; he’s just a friend.
It’s a standard plotline, far from original. We’ve seen it before. It’s the very basis for stories like Cyrano de Bergerac and the subplot for 10 Things I Hate About You (and therefore, to an extent, The Taming of the Shrew). It rears its head in rank upon rank of television sitcoms and dramas. It’s been recycled, slightly adjusted, and reworked so many times it probably has a name, though I don’t know what that might be. And, coincidentally, it embodies the relationship I see between the Church and popular culture. The church is ignoring the potential of the prevailing culture, and film in particular, having already written it off as mere entertainment, trivial at best, occasionally going so far as to label it dangerous or evil. And culture, having had its feelings hurt rather deeply by the Church, grows bitter and resentful, giving up on any prospect of the Church ever realizing there’s even a problem.
I believe this to be a near fatal error on the part of the body of Christ. I cannot say fatal, as I cannot reduce God and His plans to something that we could ruin, but I think we’re on the wrong track, driving backwards up a mountain on a steam locomotive, towing a tank of diesel fuel (and no coal) in hopes of eventually cresting the summit and finding a new paradise, when we’ve really just come from the other side of this hill, and we know what is there. We’re bound to run out of steam eventually, and come crashing back into what we should have been doing all along . . . but for right now we’re busy being stubborn.
Let’s take a slight twist on the basic plotline: a woman, having lost her family turns her back on the music that is obviously her passion, and that music literally has to battle it’s way back into her life, to show her that it is truly what she seeks, that it is where her freedom lies. Bleu goes something like that. It is an beautifully artistic film dealing with the concept of freedom, a true example of the potential of film as an aesthetic medium. Beyond that, it could be said to show what could happen if culture let go of it’s bitterness towards the Church and began to battle for the Church to see it’s potential. Bleu even deals with God to an extent, because how could it deal truthfully with the concept of freedom and completely ignore the Truth. Oh, but it has sex in it, extra-marital sex at that, it’s not appropriate for the Church to associate with. We’re being stubborn, and closed-minded.
But culture has grown bitter. How could it not? The church has run hot and cold on it for most of its history; it sends mixed signals, changing it’s position on the slightest of whims. Culture is confused by the Church. So it reacts bitterly out of frustration and confusion. It often paints a picture of the world being a terribly corrupt place, in a sense illustrating that the Church has no place anymore, that it is irrelevant. In Wag the Dog, just such a world is portrayed. The President’s staff receives word that a scandalous bit of news will be revealed about the President very soon, so they embark on a grand scheme of lies to distract the American people in order to make sure the President is re-elected. But the sad part is, it works. Is the world truly this twisted? Could it even be construed that this might be a jab at the Church itself – implying that perhaps the church is holding the attention of its followers by spinning a web of lies? Culture is bitter about how the Church has treated it.
I’m not saying that Culture secretly loves the Church; I don’t think that could ever happen. But I think at some point in history, and still to this day buried deep in it’s collective psyche, Culture saw the potential for a great working relationship with the Church. After all, Culture tends to ultimately seek truth – and the Church has truth, but they’re both to busy being too immature to resolve their differences. It’s like in The Man Who Fell to Earth; the alien came seeking water and bringing great knowledge of technology, but because of the way the world treated him, both parties grew increasingly bitter and couldn’t work together to better either side. Beyond that, it could be said that the alien serves as a Christ figure, in a way, in which case it also illustrates that not only has the Church done this to culture, but we’ve done it to Christ as well. It’s as if we don’t know a better way to behave. I daresay it’s a good thing Christ hasn’t grown bitter towards the Church – we’d really be in trouble then.
American Beauty gives us another view of the cracks in the relationship between the Church and Culture. Perhaps culture is much like the ex-military (and secretly homosexual) father of the boy next door. Perhaps culture took the risk and revealed it’s feelings to the Church, only to be rejected, or at least not accepted in the way that it wanted to be. So now in its anger it’s trying every way it can find to kill the Church. Maybe culture didn’t like what the Church was doing it to it – watering it down, creating substandard work, trying to hide parts that made the Church uncomfortable. That theory would certainly explain all of the strong cultural hostility towards the Church.
Or maybe it’s more like Memento. Maybe the Church said something that culture didn’t like, so culture devised a way to get rid of the Church, only culture can’t see the whole story because its memory is faulty. Maybe culture is only living in the after effects of a past bitterness, much like Memento’s main character, somewhat unaware of why it is even pursuing the ending of the Church’s existence.
If the Church could let go of some of it’s “holier than thou” attitude, and realize that it is made up of people, some of the same people that make up what we call “popular culture,” it might realize its error and try to reconcile itself with culture. If all truth is God’s truth, then why are the truths put forth by culture, and there certainly are some, so repugnant to the Church? I wish I could give more definitive answers to the questions I myself pose here, but this is a topic that I will certainly have to ponder for a long time, if not a lifetime.
I should probably back off of the Church for at least a second. I’m not perfect either, so why should I expect the Church to be perfect? I speak in lofty words about seeing the truth in film and the potential in culture, but I am just as guilty of writing off culture as useless. For me this comes most strongly in the form of what I have dubbed the “highly disconnected, postmodern, awkwardly sad film.” Like the Church, I need to learn to see beyond my own biases, at least from time to time, in order to appreciate the truths around me. Just because a valuable and universal truth comes packaged in a film I don’t particularly care for, I shouldn’t write the whole thing off completely. If nothing else the antagonistic relationship between the Church and culture can serve as an example of why we cannot afford to give in to bitterness and resentment, it serves no greater end than more bitterness and resentment.
I’m not sure I can accurately say that my theological perspectives have been challenged in this class, or by these screenings. I do think, however, that they have been challenged in recent years, by various things, and this class and the screenings have brought that fact to my attention, causing me to think about my perspectives. I forget to think about a lot of important things; I usually need something to spark serious thought on a topic. So, while I don’t think this class has challenged my theological perspectives, it has caused me to think about the things that have.

I'm outta here . . .

2005-11-26T02:29:00.000-05:00

It's transition time again kids! Time for Queue to pack up her belongings and hit the open road. I have honestly been ready to leave LA since I arrived, and now that is quickly becoming a reality. I'm hitting the road with my truck, my stuff, and my fiance in just under two weeks.

Between now and then I have to pack up all my stuff, get rid of the things I won't need, help out (if I can) with the putting together of our final film, burn a few DVD's of my stuff to share, do a little Christmas Shopping, have a final banquet, pick the boy up from the airport, have a final screening, have a few more good times with the nice kids I've met here, load the truck and leave. Oy.

Soon, gone will be the days of 85 degree afternoons in November, darn. And gone will be the days of spending an hour on the road to drive 9 miles, drat. Gone will be the days of escorting the girls to and from the center, so they feel safe, darn. Gone will be the afternoons walking to the Farmer's Market for coffee with Sarah - now that I will miss.

I'm about to finish college. Kinda scary. I mean, I've spent the last 5 1/2 years in college - what else do I know how to do? Ah, but I'm ready to be done! I can't wait to earn more than minimum wage for the things I know how to do. And to be able, I hope, to leave work at work will be wonderful. Besides, I've got a wedding to plan, and a wonderful man to get to know even better.

Bring it on!

An in class debate

2005-10-25T14:33:00.000-04:00

We had a bit of a debate in class concerning the viewing of sex and violence - this is the initial position I defended. I apologize for any holes in the statements, I did leave some things out because I was talking to a bunch of people who had all seen and read the same material in preparation for class. But if it interests anyone, I'd be willing to discuss it further.

Watching Violence does not promote violence, but watching sex promotes sex. This is not an issue of whether or not watching something, anything, makes us do or want it. So the fact that watching someone eating pizza does not make you want to eat a pizza when you are not actually hungry is irrelevant, especially considering it works differently on different people. We are individuals, and therefore we do not react exactly the same way to anything put before us. And beyond that, we are inconsistent, so we do not act the same way each time the same thing is put before us.

There is a universal, and generally consistent thing that can be said, however. Anything put before us to view will drive us to think about that thing. Watching a political commercial is not designed to make you run from your living room and immediately vote for the candidate presented – they are designed to make you think about the candidate, so that you will remember them. Similarly, watching violence will cause us to think about violence, and watching sex will drive us to think about sex. It’s like saying “don’t think about pink elephants.” Short of a large amount of operant conditioning, we will think about pink elephants. I can fairly safely say that a good number of you are thinking about pink elephants right now – and considering the topics at hand, you may be thinking about pink elephants being violent, or pink elephants having sex. Anyway, the difference between sex and violence is what makes the outcome different. When we think about violence, we tend to ultimately end up thinking about it in a negative light, unless we are sociopaths. Whereas when we think about sex, because it is the beautiful wonderful thing that God made it to be, we end up thinking about it in a positive light, at least eventually. It doesn’t matter, necessarily that the images be arousing or not – our minds wander to positive thoughts about sex naturally, though there may be a long delay. Now, we are bound by societal rules and standards, so our actions are somewhat controlled. Most all of us here, for example do not believe that pre-marital sex is a good thing, so we won’t be going out and having sex anytime soon. But remove those standards and we might. Sex is a good thing – in the right context. I’m not saying we are controlled by our urges – otherwise those rules and standards would not work. But I would say that promoting sex does not necessarily mean that the subject matter causes one to engage in the sexual act – but it does bring it to mind, and in that way it does promote sex to a degree. I suppose it’s a matter of definition, but there is no need to jump to the conclusion that by promoting sex, a visual stimulus causes one to have sex.

As I said, this was my initial arguement - I had more to say as the discussion continued, but I didn't write it down, so I don't have it now. Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated.

In the land below Sodom and Gomorrah

2005-10-04T13:46:00.000-04:00

This is a paper . . . and it's far from the conclusion of my thought on the issue of approaching film from a standpoint of faith . . . more likely it's just the beginning . . . but I'd love feedback, because I'm still formulating on this issue and I need to get out of my own head for a bit to consider it more fully. So here goes . . . please, please, PLEASE let me know what you think on this issue. We were to reference Niebuhr's 5 approaches to culture, but I'm really reaching a point where I don't like them . . . if that helps.

Cinema, from the Greek verb kinema, is a two dollar word for an eight to twelve dollar idea: movies. What was a novelty only a century ago has become more than a cultural phenomenon today. Have I really exercised neurons analyzing the cultural and theological ramifications of this icon of postmodern culture? Not hardly enough considering the amount of movies I see. Perhaps I should start, now even.
Maybe I should start back at the beginning. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Okay, I should fast forward a bit. My introduction and exposure to cinema began with my parents, and even when I went to see a movie with my grandmother, it was ultimately up to my parents what we were allowed to see. My father will proudly tell you that his approach to movies, in general, is cautious, but my father is a consulting structural engineer: he approaches everything with caution (Harper). My mother is far less consistent. She avoids movies that highlight “man’s inhumanity to man,” which, coming from my mom, basically means violence. However, she is “a sucker for a schmaltzy romance,” and she has her favorite stars for whom she will give a film a great deal of grace in the areas of violence and indecent themes (Harper). Patrick Swayze is one of those men. By the time I was 12, I had probably seen Dirty Dancing and Ghost a good twenty times each, especially since we had them recorded back to back on a VHS tape.
Both of my parents agreed that when it comes to films, older is generally better. The list of favorite films included Captains Courageous, The Sting, Dr. Zivago, Hunt for Red October, The Fighting Seabees, King of Kings, Steal Magnolias, In Harm's Way, Disney's 'Aladdin', Star Wars (the first one), and Hunt for Red October (Harper). It should also be noted that my parents were both “Disney babies.” Both of my folks are over 50. Mom’s first film was either Sleeping Beauty or Cinderella; she was born in 1952. Dad’s first movie was Snow White; he was born in 1947 (Harper). I think I can safely tie my parents’ disappointment with newer films, at least in part, to the disappointing nature of the most recent Disney animated films prior to the introduction of Pixar. I am the generation X child of a pair of baby boomers, yet my first film was also Snow White, but it was a re-release.
I have realized, having asked my parents about their views of film in preparation for this paper, that my perception of their reactions was somewhat flawed. Of their two children, I was not the one who went and challenged their authority, or even their conception of how the world works, so the kind of realization that arises out of conflict never really happened to me. So, when I read their reaction to my asking what they thought about me participating in Hollywood, I was shocked. Neither of them are too happy I’m here. Dad doesn’t see it to be of much value aside from technical experience, a classic engineer’s perspective. Mom admitted she was glad it was temporary and that I’m leaving for Virginia at the end of December and not coming back. I had to laugh, though, when she said:
I think you can learn things (mostly how not to) out there, but it is not what I hope for you long term. Of course, I am a died-in-the-wool, East Coast, Southern woman who sees Hollywood as a step below Sodom and Gomorrah! (Harper)
Even I don’t think Hollywood is that bad, and I really don’t like it here.
Before I questioned them on the subject, I would have said my parents took the dialogue approach to the films they saw, as they are really fairly accepting in their movie choices, but now I know that they are much more cautious about movies than I had realized. I asked my mom how she approached movies and she summed up rather well the familial reaction to film: “I guess I mostly avoid any movie that I think would be a dramatic affront to my faith. Life is full of enough challenges without spending treasure on trash” (Harper). Ultimately, I believe they instilled a cautious but accepting approach to film in me. On the whole, we try to find out about a film before watching it. For them that means reading reviews in the newspaper; I prefer to watch trailers, usually on the apple website.
My experiences with my church growing up lend a distinct twist to this perspective. I am a Christian. I am not Catholic, but I most certainly am not Protestant. I was raised in the Episcopal Church. I have trouble understanding Protestant churches. I am far from a staunch traditionalist, but the historical and current trends in “the Church” that one finds in books or discussed in Christian College classes largely ignore non-Protestant churches. Beyond that, I think every congregation is different, and so despite what might be the official stance on a topic, what an individual might take away as their impression of the church’s stance could be vastly different, especially if that individual is a child.
That being said, cinema was largely absent from my church experience. Sure, we watched movies in the wee hours of the morning at a lock-in when we didn’t have the energy for much else. Services however, and sermons in particular, were times to discuss things of higher value. When I was eight, I’d heard of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Karl Barth. When a sermon required illustration, our priest would pull an anecdote from a thinker or theologian, or tell something from personal experience. Church events often involved speakers or a live auction, wine, and good food. Church was about high culture. Lower forms of culture, film included, were simply not addressed. I can only assume that this is the case in more churches than I may have thought, as websites such as The Episcopal Church and Visual Arts, which stem from the National Church, make no mention of film as a form of art, or mention it at all (Episcopal Church and Visual Arts). In general, as far as I can see, the church I’ve grown up in neither approves nor disapproves of film of any sort; it simply doesn’t bother to talk about it.
College, for me, was a whole different experience. I arrived at Asbury College just after the advent of The Matrix, which was a point of contention on campus for various reasons, as well as the topic of a few sermons during chapel. Historically speaking, Asbury prides itself in it’s strong sense of community from which stems it’s community standards (Handbook). These standards have loosened slowly over the years; during my time at the school, screen print t-shirts became allowed as classroom attire. The community stance on film has waffled during my time at the college. Movies that have received an R rating are not allowed to be shown in the dormitories. Some years there have been exceptions, usually Braveheart, The Matrix, and The Patriot. Other years even those films were banned. Oddly enough, a raunchy film with a PG-13 rating would be allowed over an R rated film that had a strong message. But at least at Asbury film was a legitimate topic of conversation. Films are often examples in speeches and chapel talks, and many different films are discussed. From this, I would say that Asbury has a dialogue approach to film, with a slight restriction.
All of these approaches have affected my views of film over the course of my life, though it is safe to say that the biggest influence to my views has been the effect of the more closed minded aspects of any of these groups on non-Christians who subsequently developed negative views of Christianity. In considering these approaches I can see that I have purposefully kept my views open to more possibilities in order to relate to more non-Christians.
I am not my parents. I do not see Hollywood or film as such an evil thing as they do. In the same vein, I am willing to see a greater number of films, and often find deep meaning in things that my parents would refuse to watch.
I am not the church of my childhood. I do not view films as below art or higher culture. Film is the art of my era, and I can embrace it as such, finding meaning in it’s intricate language.
I am not Asbury College. I have much less problem viewing an R rated movie than a low quality film of any rating. I pull examples from films when I’m trying to explain a point of theology, but the similarity ends there.
I honestly think I’m situated somewhere along the line between caution and dialogue, but closer to dialogue. I have a penchant for “thinky movies;” the kind you can watch with a couple close friends, and then go discuss at Waffle House until you’re too tired to form sentences. In my mind, all truth is God’s truth, and as an extension of that all joy is God’s joy. If a film expresses real truth or brings real joy, then I see it as having value. There are things I try not to watch, however. I really have trouble finding value in what I call “highly disconnected postmodern awkwardly sad” films. I’m so disappointed in the outcomes of these films that I generally just avoid watching them. I think that is what keeps me from full dialogue status. I will only dialogue with movies I like to watch, not all of them.
Hollywood as an industry intrigues me, as do many of the films it produces. The moments when a director who does not know Christ chooses to express real truth (not to be confused with “reality”) in a film, I have to sit back and wonder just how that can happen. It’s fascinating to me. The Holy Spirit is truly a mystery. As human beings, we are often acting based on our sin nature; so how is it that we do great good from time to time? I know that Hollywood is something that God can speak through and has in the past. I think film is a powerful medium both in reflecting the current situation and in enacting change, and the fact that a non-Christian can send out a message of truth and hope when they do not yet know the source of that truth or that hope is what gives me hope that we will be seeing great things from this medium in the near future.
As of right now I see Hollywood as much like Palestine in the first century AD. It was dangerous to be a Christian in Palestine in the first century, death was often the consequence. In Hollywood it’s also not cool to be a Christian, and while the death isn’t literal, the death of one’s career can have as much meaning in this world of reputation and financial success. But there are openings where Christians can sow the seeds of love. Hollywood is not so far gone as Sodom and Gomorrah; it simply needs to be loved back into a more healthy frame of mind. In my opinion, God can use Hollywood, and He has.

Who'da thunk it?

2005-09-11T21:15:00.000-04:00

Over a year ago I posted, probably on the Xanga site, about a band that I really like. It's four guys from the area near my hometown who play some kick butt Celtic rock.

Well, I was waiting in line to pick up my coffee yesterday at a place called "The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf" which is kinda like a Starbucks in concept, but they're smaller, have better options for beverages, and the COFFEE TASTES BETTER! I was standing in a crowd of people and a Carbon Leaf song came over the PA system - Carbon Leaf was on their in house music catalog!!!! I was so impressed! Somebody in the land of fruits and nuts has decent taste in music! Who knew?

Ladies and Gentlemen!!

2005-08-28T22:19:00.000-04:00

The only good picture I got from Graumann's Chinese Theatre:

I saw the GRAND CANYON!

2005-08-19T19:42:00.000-04:00

In order to make myself feel better, because I really don't like LA, at least not yet, I'm going to share the cool stuff I saw in Arizona yesterday.

It was fun, and very impressive. I didn't stay long because I knew I couldn't do it justice in just a few hours. So, here's what I saw:

The Secret Life of Corbitt Hall

2005-07-28T15:16:00.000-04:00

Yes ladies and gentlemen . . . I bring an inside report. I have been trapped inside my make shift office, but they can't take away my internet connection! I will be heard, someone will come to my rescue. If you read this and you can come to my aid - bring a sledge hammer or some fire and fend off my attackers.

To give you an idea of what I'm up against, I snuck around when they weren't looking and took some pictures . . .

Apparently, there was a little dissention in the ranks, because I found the lobby sofa leaned up against a wall, unable to move. At least this way I can answer the age old question "What's under the lobby sofa?"

At present, all of the furniture has gathered in the hallway and they seem to be having a rave. When I took this one, they had just noticed me sneaking around. Right afterward they rushed me and forced me back into my office. I don't know what had them all upset, they were just standing around talking, but in the event of an investigation I have proof!

This was my first picture. I witnessed the whole exchange. First the camera was yelling at the snack machine for spending so much time down the hall with the Pepsi machine . . . and the snack machine was making excuses, until finally he lashed back at the camera saying something to the effect of "The Pepsi Machine understands what it's like to be a vending machine, you'll never get that!" To which the Camera replied "Oh, so you're gonna make this a racial thing?!?" After that I couldn't understand a thing, the words were flying so fast. Anyway, I don't think they'll reconcile their differences any time soon.

So, that's what's going on in Corbitt . . . somebody please save me! Soon!

Well, they didn't flee the first time, let's try it again

2005-07-21T12:35:00.000-04:00

About two weeks ago there were major explosions in London - suspected terrorist bombings. Just this morning, there were explosions again . . . only this time smaller, and there seems to be but one injury, no deaths. This is not to say that the blasts had no effect. According to the BBC, "the Tube has been plunged into chaos and several stations evacuated after a minor blasts on two trains and a bus."

Let's assume, for the sake of arguement that these explosions are tied to the July 7 bombings that killed 56 people. Londoners are still mourning their previous loss, but they have basically returned to normal daily activities. They were not scared into submission. They didn't not dig great shelters and hide from the outside world. No, of course not, they're Londoners.

Those who don't read history are doomed to repeat it. The Blitzkreig still remains in the memory of many Londoners. Bombs dropping from the sky, delivered by German planes on a repeating basis. And what did the citizens of London do? They sent their children to safety and proceeded to engage in such crazy acts as to sweep bombs off the roof of St. Pauls Cathedral and rescue people from collapsing buildings - DURING THE BOMBING! These people are serious, they don't take crap off anybody.

So not only are these cowardly acts of terrorism, but in the case of this second attempt, their just stupid. The BBC reports that today's explosions may have only invovled detonators, resulting in moderately small blasts. What possessed these people to think that if the large blasts of two weeks ago did not bring about the desired result, that todays small blasts would bring London around? I do not wish to encourage any more major acts of terrorism, but simply to point out the irony of the situation. Sometimes people just don't make any sense.

On a related note - I'm looking at my scrolling BBC widget, and there are 9 articles concerning major violence and bombings of the total 28 listed. There is only one article involving the weather. As I recall, the summer months used to be a time of hurricane articles and talk of rain and drought. Now we are waiding through a sea of bombings and violent events. What has this world come to?

One life sentence down, two to go

2005-07-19T16:08:00.000-04:00

Ok, I was gearing up for my freshman year of high school when the bombing happened at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. Since then, this man has bombed a night club and two abortion clinics. Then he went into hiding in the woods of North Carolina. They found him in 2003, but only just now, that I'm past the expected graduation date for college, is he being charged. What the heck??

Ok, I realize that the court system is bogged down . . . that's just my point! What does it say about society today that our court system is bogged down this badly. We have been inventing new categories of crime just to keep up with the tendencies of the general population. I went looking at this because I wanted to include more current information in my blog, just in case anyone was reading. But this is a bit depressing.

I realize that the world is supposed to get worse and worse until Christ comes again, but if this isn't the beginning of the end, I don't think I want to see what the end looks like. Maturity shouldn't be inseperably linked to awareness of the increasing depravity of humanity and the increasing dangers in the world . . . responsibility is bad enough, really, it is.

Shameless Plug

2005-07-08T20:54:00.000-04:00

Ok, the picture above is a link for threadless.com. It's pretty cool, kinda like t-shirt democracy. Way too much fun for me. They take t-shirt design submissions, put them up to the visiting public for a vote and the highest voted in a batch get printed and sold. There are a few I would really like to buy, someday, when there is money for that - check out the shop section . . . there's a shirt that says "What would MacGuyver do?" very nice!

I apologize if my grammar is way off, I've been listening to podcasts for about 2 hours straight, and it affects my speech (typing) patterns.

ah summer

2005-06-24T19:40:00.000-04:00

As should be somewhat obvious from my new header . . . I'm about to "go all nature freak."

Of late I've been walking the cross country trails taking pictures, and picking berries . . . I'll post the pictures soon . . . the berries, I'm not sharing. I've caught myself staring out the windows of my truck as I drive . . . occasionally at times when I really should be watching the road, oops. I had a box of fresh blueberries for breakfast this morning . . . perhaps not the smartest thing, but that remains to be seen. Mmm, tasty.

Having spent the vast majority of the last couple weeks in Corbitt, usually in rooms without windows, I'm craving walks outside, or really anything outside. Seth mentioned that his dad would be doing straw on the farm on Saturday . . . so we're going to help, I think. Hey, it's outside! The only downside to my love of summer? It's HOT! I really hate being hot. If all the green growing things were so exciting and pretty when the weather was cooler, I'd be the happiest kid ever. Oh well, I'm sure there's a good reason why that wasn't in the plan.

If I was home it would be swim meets and sailboat regattas, but here in the midwest it's walks in the woods, and if I can ever find it open . . . trips to the indoor pool in the Luce Center. Oh well . . .

An Afternoon tale

2005-05-16T17:09:00.000-04:00

The scanner scans, and the twain acquires . . . and I listen to the singer of songs. Clicking keys and resonant guitar strings blend with male voices in close harmony . . . and the hammerers hammer with ever increasing fervor.

Da da da dum, thunk, click, thunk, clickety click click, thunk, da da da da da da da da da dum, clickety clicety clickety click, "one of us will die inside theses arms," thunk, thunk, bam, da da da da da da da dum, clickety clickety click, "eyes wide open, naked as we came" clickety click, thunk, bam, blam, thud, thud, clickety click.

The singers of songs and the hammerers blend with the typing of keys and the silent twain as he aquires. I'm in Corbitt.

We're just not that cool

2005-05-09T23:33:00.000-04:00

You know, I used to mourn for creation whenever I saw how man damaged it. To this day it hurts my heart to see how we take a beautifully perfect thing and proceed to chip away at its integrity in the name of progress or improvement. Don't get me wrong, I am totally a victim of my era, I cannot imagine life without some of the developments that have come from that attitude, but I still mourn the losses that come with them.

But I noticed something yesterday. I was driving down the river road from Carrolton and looking at the setting sun reflecting in the Ohio river. I've been told that this river has been so polluted at points that it actually caught fire. I was comparing it to the rivers I grew up knowing - the cold Greenbrier that could give me chills even in August, and the Rappahanock, with it's warm salty waves and good fishing. And I realized something . . .

The Ohio may be so polluted that you can't swim in it, but it's still beautiful with that streak of burning sunfire reflecting on it's little ripples. And big skyscrapers are generally not my favorite thing to see, but I know of a few tall buildings that are really very attractive in the sherbet colors of a rising sun. We as people aren't such an awesome force that we can totally ruin God's beautiful creation, or create something so horrid that he can't improve it. We just aren't that cool.

So while I still mourn periodically for the damage inflicted by mankind, I can look back now and see the sun set over the river and witness God winking and saying, "I'm still here, and I am greater than even this." It's really one of the sweeter things I've seen Him do, and all the more reason to try harder to preserve His creation.

Praise, not worship

2005-05-02T09:53:00.000-04:00

Most of those who know me know that I don't take compliments well. It's not that I dont' appreciate them, I just don't know how to handle them. I never know what to say, or how to properly thank the person who has spoken the kindness to me. It's kinda wierd. And awkward.

The other day I received a compliment that I truly wouldn't ever expect. I was getting the equipment ready to load in the van for Ichthus, and Kathy said something to the effect that it was a good thing that I was setting a strong technical example for other girls in the media department. I was floored. Kathy was giving me a genuine compliment - it's not that she's mean or anything, but she's very honest and that makes her compliments all the more valuable. To top that off, she was complimenting me on something that I really like doing and hope to be really good at some day - equipment and technical stuff. It made my week!

I have seen the light!

2005-04-26T19:22:00.000-04:00

Yes, ladies and gentlemen . . . I bought a Mac!

The Post Ichthus Post

2005-04-26T19:15:00.000-04:00

Wow! Brr! Okay, so Ichthus (Yuckthus, Muckthus, Mudthus, Snowthus??) was a blast! I was completely worn out after it was over, but it was awesome. I was in charge of POV and PTZ cameras for the weekend, which meant I monitored the kid running the robotic camera (that we mounted towards the upstage left side) and placed the POV cams. POV cams are cute little "lipstick cameras" that are about 4 inches long and 1 inch deep and high. We strap them to mic stands and tuck them in amongst the drum kit or near a keyboard for "cool looking static shots." So basically I had to run and gun it between acts and set them up without getting in the way of the stage crew. This worked pretty well. P.L., the stage manager, is a really cool guy who was a great help. I also ran hand-held camera for two shows - Reliant K, friday night just before the storm front came through (AWESOME!!!), and Michael W. Smith, saturday night during the snow. Saturday was a trip - it was nearly freezing and snowing out there and I was standing in the wind with a camera on my shoulder and nothing more on than jeans, two t-shirts, and a hat. BRRRR! It was really cool though. Now 'tis clean up time, nothing like the smell of gojo in the morning!

Pre "Post-Ichthus Post" Post

2005-04-19T12:38:00.001-04:00

I'm packing up Corbitt today, to get ready to relocate our broadcasting capabilities to the Ichthus grounds. It's going to be a fun weekend. Right now it's a little tense making sure everything makes it into the van, but it's going pretty well. I'm excited, it's going to be fun. When it's all over, I'll have stories (and pictures, I hope) to post and share.

Thankful

2005-04-10T23:23:00.000-04:00

I spent a good chunk of last weekend in Indiana . . . I spent a good chunk of this weekend in Indiana . . . I'm gonna spend a good chunk of next weekend in Indiana.

Last weekend we helped his folks transplant about a million daffodils to the front yard, and unload two bed-fuls of manure. In between we relaxed in a hammock. This weekend we went to the movies, and hung out around the house - and in hammocks again. Next weekend we're going on a real date, and I get to surprise him for his birthday (hehe).

For the next two weekends after that he's coming down, for Ichthus and for the Asbury Film Festival. Spring has sprung, and I'm finally a victim of it's narcotic effects - funny, I thought I'd be ashamed, but instead I'm high on life.

is this how your God works?!?

2005-04-01T18:36:00.000-05:00

In the recent film . . . King Arthur . . . there is a scene where Arthur, Lancelot, Gawain, and Dag decend into a crypt under the outer wall of a Roman man's estate. This crypt has just been sealed off with stone and mortar, but Arthur orders it opened, and they enter. There they find two "Priests" giving last rights to a collection of prisoners. Lancelot and Arthur have been somewhat at odds over Lancelot's great distate for Arthur's "God." This is a crux in that ongoing battle/debate. Upon seeing what the "Holy men" are doing in the name of their "God," Lancelot turns to Arthur and says, "Is this how your God works?!?" Arthur is left to shoulder the embarassment for the other "Christians" who never seem to understand that what they are doing is wrong.

How often do we shoot ourselves in the proverbial foot when trying to show someone the greatness of God's creation or the love of Christ. Even through the tumuluous events I've seen in the short time I've been a member of a church, I now hestitate to call myself a "Christian." There is such an immense wealth of embarrasing history for modern day Christians to cope with in dealing with non-believers, especially those who are highly educated. I'm not trying to sound like a tactician . . . and certainly not a hyper-agenda driven evanglist (which, as my record would attest, cannot possibly be true, but that's a whole other post idea, perhaps novel, certainly therapy session) . . . but seriously, we, as Christians, have a wrap sheet three miles long that we have no true connection with, and yet it hinders all of our efforts to share the Truth with others.

Take a look at the Crusades. Hundreds of the devout (and I daresay a fair few who just wanted to go to war) run off the Holy Land to secure it for the Church. Nevermind the fact that the area was inhabited by human beings who had families and lives. The Crusades were armed pilgrimages to Jerusalem under the banner of the cross, and this is at the most the mildest impression as seen through the eyes of the non-believer. Who would want to listen to some idiot trying to convince them to join a group that was guilty of the Crusades?? Whatever compunction might have been felt for the wanton slaying of Saracens by Christian armies in an attitude of aggression, the compunction was not felt when the Saracens placed themselves in the position of holding the sacred sites of Palestine. "Enthusiasm for Christ was the moving impulse, with which, however, were joined the lower motives of ambition, avarice, love of adventure, hope of earthly and heavenly reward. The whole chivalry of Europe, aroused by a pale-faced monk and encouraged by a Hildebrandian pope, threw itself steel-clad upon the Orient to execute the vengeance of heaven upon the insults and barbarities of Moslems heaped upon Christian pilgrims, and to rescue the grave of the Redeemer of mankind from the grasp of the followers of the False Prophet." (ccel.org) What kind of craziness is this?? We are comanded to love our neighbor and make disciples of all nations, and they run off and kill hundreds before they can even try to befriend or witness to them?? What the frick! One faction of the church burned Joan of Arc at the stake! And she was just trying to follow God's leading (supposedly anyway, I'm in the she's a saint camp).

Pope Pius VI went so far as to impose the following restrictions on Jews in 1775:

1. A Jew who passes a night outside of the ghetto is condemned to death. 2. The "yellow sign" must also be carried also within the town-walls of the ghetto (up to now the Jews only had to carry it when they left the ghetto). 3. The study of the Talmud is forbidden. 4. The funeral cortei are forbidden. 5. The sale is forbidden to the Christians of bread, meat and milk. 6. It is forbidden to hold stores outside of the ghetto. 7. It is forbidden to have domestic Christians, therefore also to that is use of the so-called "women of the fire" (the women that went in into Jewish homes to light fire on Shabbat). 8. Relations with the Christian neighbors are forbidden. 9. Christian silversmiths are forbidden to make lamps of seven arms (Menorah) for ritual use. 10. It is forbidden to invite the Christians in the synagogue. 11. It is forbidden to the Christians to enter in the synagogue. 12. It is forbidden to guide wagons to Rome or in the vicinities. 13. The rabbis are thought responsible of the frequency to the coattive prediche. 14. The income in the churches and the monasteries is not to be given to Jews. 15. It is forbidden to approach itself the "House of the Catecumeni." This stuff sounds way too close to some of the pre-Holocaust restrictions.

During the Inquisition sponsored by Popes Innocent III Gregory IX, they arrested Conversos and notable figures in Seville; in Seville more than 700 Conversos were burned at the stake and 5,000 repented. Tribunals were also opened in Aragon, Catalonia and Valencia. An Inquisition Tribunal was set up in Ciudad Real, where 100 Conversos were condemned, and it was moved to Toledo in 1485. Between 1486-1492, 25 auto-da-fes were held in Toledo, 467 people were burned at the stake and others were imprisoned. The Inquisition finally made its way to Barcelona, where it was resisted at first because of the important place of Spanish Conversos in the economy and society. And that it certainly the tip of the iceberg.

This is not to say that there weren't good and wonderful things brought about by the Church, but the Church is made up of people, and people do stupid and terrible things with alarming frequency. The more I read about this stuff the more I want to find a way to distance myself from the Church . . . but that is my loner nature coming through. Ultimately it is up to those of us sensitive to the nature of the Church's past mistakes to go about loving the Church back in the right direction. We must be both compassionate and shrewd. I look forward with much anticipation to the Millenial Kingdom. I would love to see what wonders can happen when Christ is physically the head of the Church and no one can or would want to deny his Truth. Until then, I'm not entirely sure how to deal . . . but voicing some of my guilt has certainly helped a bit.

I promise

2005-03-24T16:38:00.000-05:00

I do have a post in the works, one that I'm putting some serious thought into . . . no promises on how good it will be, but I need to take some time on it.

In the mean time, you'll just have to be patient.

paper

2005-03-09T09:36:00.000-05:00

wrote a paper for class last night . . . ordinarily I'd post it . . . but I don't like it, and I'm really not proud of it. So it's not going up.

a funny thing happened on the way to the forum . . .

2005-03-07T12:45:00.000-05:00

I've never had any luck with diaries or journals - I usually lost interest within a few weeks. Then again, no one ever HARPED on me for not writing in my diary (though my sister would tease when she read what I did write). But I would hate to leave my PUBLIC bored. Luckily, I have a funny story.

So, Bandy isn't having class this week, so we can shoot (I didn't schedule to need Jesus until Saturday, so we aren't). So Erin and I were up in the Grille at noon, calling churches to at least talk to/find time to meet with the Priest. It went down something like this:

Church #1

Nice Receptionist Lady: Hello, ABC Church, how may I help you?
Me: Hello, my name is Queue; I am a media communications major at Asbury College in Wilmore, and I was wondering if I might talk to someone about using your Sanctuary to film a project for one of my classes.
NRL: Well . . . um . . . you should probably talk to the Father about that, he'll be in tomorrow morning.
Me: Alrighty, what time would be good to call . . .etc.

Church #2

Nice Receptionist Lady: Hello, DEF Church, how may I help you?
Erin: Hello, my name is Erin; I am a media student at Asbury College, and I was wondering if I might talk to someone about using your Sanctuary to film a project for one of my classes.
NRL: I need to ask the Priest about that, can I call you back?
Erin: Sure. My number is . . .etc.

Church #3

Nice Receptionist Lady: Hello, GHI Church, how may I help you?
Me: Hello, my name is Queue; I am a media student at Asbury College in Wilmore, and I was wondering if I could talk to someone about using your Sanctuary to film a project for one of my classes.
NRL: That would be a good question for our office manager, but she's in a meeting right now. Can I have her call you?
Me: Absolutely, my number is . . . etc.

Church #4

Nice Receptionist Lady: Hello, JKL Church, how may I help you? (NO LIE, the must get this in training!)
Erin: Yes, hello, my name is Erin; I am a media communcation student at Asbury College in Wilmore, and I was wondering if I could talk to someone about using your Sanctuary to film a project for one of my classes.
NRL: (in your best Kentucky hick accent) You'd better talk to Sister Clara. She'll be in tomorrow around 9:30.
Erin: Alrighty then, I'll call back tomorrow.

**long moments of laughter and jokes that our questions can only be answered by those in direct communcation with God Himself**

Church #5

Nice Receptionist Lady(recorded): Hello, MNO Church, if you have an emergency and need a priest, call 123-4567. If you have an emergency and need another kind of assistance, call 234-5678. If you do not have an emergency, please leave a message at the beep.
Me: (stifled snicker) Hello, my name is Queue; I am a media student at Asbury College down in Wilmore, and I was wondering if I could talk to someone about using your Sanctuary to film a project. If someone would be so kind as to call me at 345-6789, I would greatly appreciate it, thank you.

Church #6

Nice Receptionist Lady: Hello, PQR Church, how may I help you?
Erin: Hello, my name is Erin; I am a media communication student at Asbury College, and I was wondering if I could talk to someone about using your Sanctuary to film a project.
NRL: What is the project about?
Erin: Well, It's about a pastor's wife . . .
NRL: I don't know if you realize dear, but in the catholic church our priests don't marry. If someone were to see PQR with a pastor's wife, it might confuse them.
Erin: You have a good point, thank you anyway.

That last one was the first to bring this up - AS IF WE DIDN'T KNOW THAT! Oh well, I guess we are just the rarely educated. Anyway, tomorrow is another day, and today was rather hilarious, at least to us!

2005-03-01T09:32:00.000-05:00

It was a cold morning, but the light was beautiful

I had fun chasing the cast and crew around.

This is from earlier in the Baseball shoot - just as the sun was rising.

Run AJ, run! For this take, he lost the game about as many times as he won it.

After that slide, he still had to steal home.

This one's from the theatre shoot. Becca was playing Janie playing Hamlet, complete with sword and cool buckle pants.

Mr. Bandy played the Director.

Networking

2005-02-25T20:40:00.000-05:00

"Everything for free, Everyone works for free"

Well, not exactly. As it is, DV tape will be $5, the steadicam $14. But my good friend the very talented artist is lending her aid for the small fee of a mention in the credits and the cost of her supplies. Any way you look at it, this is a promising project, and I'm really excited to be working with my talented partner on a serious work of quality film. (sure I'd love a better camera and better editing equipment, but this will have to do.)

High Definition

2005-02-24T22:48:00.000-05:00

The highlight of my day - I got to test out the new High Definition Final Cut suite in Corbitt!! I cut together most of the big wheel race sequence for the film as a test run. It was really kinda cool. I even liked it so much that I decided to dump it to tape so I could have it. It was a pretty cool day.

Odd

2005-02-18T14:48:00.000-05:00

We had the Collegium sing at the beginning of chapel today. They sang two beautifully composed acapella pieces. Then we launched into a praise and worship set. It just felt so empty after the beautiful worship we'd been hearing.

Marta

2005-02-18T14:35:00.000-05:00

Luke 10:40-42
But Marta was busy with all the work to be done; so, going up to him, she said, "Sir, don't you care that my sister has been leaving me to do all the work by myself?" However, the Lord answered her, "Marta, Marta, you are fretting and worrying about so many things! But there is only one thing that is essential. Miryam has chosen the right thing, and it won't be taken away from her."

Most folks take this as a passage on the importance of spiritual matters over earthly matters. They have a good point - it is good that Miryam (Mary) chose to sit at the feet of the Lord and listen to him teach. We should all spend more time at His feet, learning His ways, getting to know Him.

There are more aspects to life than just the spiritual, but if we base our priorities on the things stressed by many speakers and writers these days, the spiritual is the only one that matters. What does that leave for Mart(h)a?

I would argue that there is a place in the Kingdom for the Marta's of this world. Christ was not saying that what Marta was doing didn't matter. He didn't say that she shouldn't do it. Yes, there is only one thing that is eternally essential, and when we are living in the Eternal Kingdom that will be the only thing we need to do. It will be a great day when we can just sit at Christ's feet, or in his lap and just listen to Him and worship Him and spend time studying His beautiful face.

But for the time that we live on this earth, there are other concerns. Proverbs 31 says that the ideal wife "gathers her strength around her and throws herself into her work." Romans 12:11 says "Don't be lazy when hard work is needed, but serve the Lord with spiritual fervor." We mustn't downplay the eternal good done through even the most everyday work. The preacher preaches, the choir sings, and the congregation prays for spiritual concerns - but if we're going to continue to serve the poor and feed the hungry, somebody has to do the dishes. We shouldn't stand by saying "the Lord will provide" while the little "projects" pile up around us. If you can help, then maybe, just maybe, you are the solution God is sending for the situation.

But Christ reprimanded Marta (you know you were thinking it). Yes He did - because she overstepped her bounds. It was no more her place to say that Miryam should help her in the kitchen than it was for Miryam to tell her to come sit down. In every situation we have a role to play. It's not always glamorous, or an "experience." In order to make up the Body of Christ we all have to work together in our different roles. We cannot see the whole big picture as God does; it is not our place to decide where people belong.

So here's to the Marta's, the folks who work in the background to keep the parts of Christ's body in a position to function at their best. They don't need recognition, that's not the point. But every once in a while we should remember that what they are doing is legitimate spiritual work as well. It is an act of worship in and of itself, and it is very good.

. . . thoughts

2005-02-16T19:31:00.000-05:00

disconnect
I see beauty
a great terrible beauty
huge, formless
it at once terrifies and attracts
far
so very far
beyond the reach of hand
or eye
and yet near enough
to tempt, to play
the coy mistress to my desires
I can't
can't reach
can't feel
can't attain
so very far
beyond me
above me
around me
disconnect
break
I want to jump the chasm
so very far
full of fears
hurt, pain
I can't
disconnect

The Ragman

2005-02-15T16:50:00.000-05:00

**Disclaimer, I didn't write this. Of course, this is obvious even to the casual observer, as the caliber of prose is far to high to be attributed to me.**

I saw a strange sight. I stumbled upon a story most strange, like nothing my life, my street sense, my sly tongue had ever prepared me for. Hush, child. Hush, now, and I will tell it to you.

Even before the dawn one Friday morning I noticed a young man, handsome and strong, walking the alleys of our City. He was pulling an old cart filled with clothes both bright and new, and he was calling in a clear, tenor voice: "Rags!" Ah, the air was foul and the first light filthy to be crossed by such sweet music."Rags! New rags for old! I take your tired rags! Rags!" "Now, this is a wonder," I thought to myself, for the man stood six-feet-four, and his arms were like tree limbs, hard and muscular, and his eyes flashed intelligence. Could he find no better job than this, to be a ragman in the inner city?I followed him. My curiosity drove me. And I wasn't disappointed.Soon the Ragman saw a woman sitting on her back porch. She was sobbing into a handkerchief, sighing, and shedding a thousand tears. Her knees and elbows made a sad X. Her shoulders shook. Her heart was breaking.

The Ragman stopped his cart. Quietly, he walked to the woman, stepping round tin cans, dead toys, and Pampers. "Give me your rag," he said so gently, "and I'll give you another. He slipped the handkerchief from her eyes. She looked up, and he laid across her palm a linen cloth so clean and new that it shined. She blinked from the gift to the giver.

Then, as he began to pull his cart again, the Ragman did a strange thing: he put her stained handkerchief to his own face; and then he began to weep, to sob as grievously as she had done, his shoulders shaking. Yet she was left without a tear. "This is a wonder," I breathed to myself, and I followed the sobbing Ragman like a child who cannot turn away from mystery. "Rags! Rags! New rags for old!" In a little while, when the sky showed grey behind the rooftops and I could see the shredded curtains hanging out black windows, the Ragman came upon a girl whose head was wrapped in a bandage, whose eyes were empty. Blood soaked her bandage. A single line of blood ran down her cheek.

Now the tall Ragman looked upon this child with pity, and he drew a lovely yellow bonnet from his cart. "Give me your rag," he said, tracing his own line on her cheek, "and I'll give you mine." The child could only gaze at him while he loosened the bandage, removed it, and tied it to his own head. The bonnet he set on hers. And I gasped at what I saw: for with the bandage went the wound! Against his brow it, ran a darker, more substantial blood -- his own! "Rags! Rags! I take old rags!" cried the sobbing, bleeding, strong, intelligent Ragman.

The sun hurt both the sky, now, and my eyes; the Ragman seemed more and more to hurry. "Are you going to work?" he asked a man who leaned against a telephone pole. The man shook his head. The Ragman pressed him: "Do you have a job?" "Are you crazy?" sneered the other. He pulled away from the pole, revealing the right sleeve of his jacket -- flat, the cuff stuffed into the pocket. He had no arm. "So, " said the Ragman. "Give me your jacket, and I'll give you mine." Such quiet authority in his voice! The one-armed man took off his jacket. So did the Ragman -- and I trembled at what I saw: for the Ragman's arm stayed in its sleeve, and when the other put it on he had two good arms, thick as tree limbs; but the Ragman had only one.
"Go to work," he said.

After that he found a drunk, lying unconscious beneath an army blanket, an old man, hunched, wizened, and sick. He took that blanket and wrapped it round himself, but for the drunk he left new clothes. And now I had to run to keep up with the Ragman. Though he was weeping uncontrollably, and bleeding freely at the forehead, pulling his cart with one arm, stumbling for drunkenness, falling again and again, exhausted, old, old, and sick, yet he went with terrible speed. On spider's legs he skittered through the alleys of the City, this mile and the next, until he came to its limits, and then he rushed beyond.

I wept to see the change in this man. I hurt to see his sorrow. And yet I needed to see where he was going in such haste, perhaps to know what drove him so. The little old Ragman -- he came to a landfill. He came to the garbage pits. And then I wanted to help him in what he did, but I hung back, hiding. He climbed a hill. With tormented labor he cleared a little space on that hill. Then he sighed. He lay down. He pillowed his head on a handkerchief and a jacket. He covered his bones with an army blanket. And he died. Oh, how I cried to witness that death! I slumped in a junked car and wailed and mourned as one who has no hope -- because I had come to love the Ragman. Every other face had faded in the wonder of this man, and I cherished him; but he died. I sobbed myself to sleep.

I did not know -- how could I know? -- that I slept through Friday night and Saturday and its night, too. But then, on Sunday morning, I was wakened by a violence. Light -- pure, hard, demanding light -- slammed against my sour face, and I blinked, and I looked, and I saw the last and the first wonder of all. There was the Ragman, folding the blanket most carefully, a scar on his forehead, but alive! And, besides that, healthy! There was no sign of sorrow nor of age, and all the rags that he had gathered shined for cleanliness.

This story is an old favorite of mine. I hope you enjoy. Oh, it's by a man named Walter Wangerin, Jr.

Date Auction

2005-02-11T21:40:00.000-05:00

Ben Wyman, Ben Peracchio, Jeremy White - $12
Marshal Young - $3
Kyle Olney - $9
Dale Davis - $8
Steve Stockhauser - $31
Todd Zurin and Hans Gehman - $8
Robb Hess - $22
Ernie Wagoner and Richard Menear - $22
Emily Cross - $27
Greg Breiding - $13
DJ Casto and Adam Shearer - $40
Brandon Buell - $5
Dan Ball - $6
Dan Bracken - $8
Dave Greider -$14
Mike Toczyski - $21
UK tickets - $65
John Greenhoe - $25
Shane Smith - $15
Ben McLaughlin - $36
Becca Harvey and Heather Tatum - $21
Nancy Keller and Ashley Filges - $8
Daniel Browning - $11
Josh Irwin and Nathan White- $35
TJ Jackson - $5
AJ Stich and Brandon Bray - $38
Matt Tranthum - $16
Jon Beck - $5
Aaron Farnham - $24
Tim Johnston - $6
Katie Blair and Megan Kamm - $45
Tres Adames - $5
Timothy Parker Jr. - $17
Lucas and Mark Speakman - $6
Hanah Rohe and Beth Rogers - $13
Matt Luyk and Cam Faulkner - $30
Hannah and Yoonie - $20

The calm after the storm - Priceless!!

it's a girl

2005-02-09T14:11:00.000-05:00

I inherited two bubbly elementary schoolers monday afternoon. Insta-mom I am not, quite. I don't really reccomend making a habit of inheriting small children - inevitably one will be grounded and the other one sick. Well, not really. That's the exhausted me talking. The real me had a great time!

Denny and Tiffany left for the hospital Monday night around 5 . . . so we made dinner and watched a movie, and the girls went to bed. Erin came over and we worked on a project for class on Wednesday, then the fun began! Maddie fell asleep pretty quickly, though she woke up around 4, and had trouble falling back to sleep. Mo on the other hand had a hacking cough, and ended up coughing so hard she made herself sick, off and on until at least 11:30. I ended up having to slip her some cold medicine (which she had been refusing to take) in a cup of deflated coca-cola that I had been using to help settle her stomach. Well, eventually we fell asleep, on the couch in the living room, since I had to strip the sheets from her bed earlier. She slept pretty well after that, but she had missed about 4 hours of much needed sleep. I laid down on the other couch. Sleep didn't come too easy (see my last post). Seth called at 4 when he got off work - they had him loading a military trailer headed for South Carolina. We talked for a while, he was a bit shaken by what he'd been loading all night (yes, whatever that impossible thought you just had is probably right). Anyway, I eventually crashed. The girls had to rise at 6:15 to get ready and catch the bus. Once I got them off to school I went home, showered and crashed.

Tired doesn't even begin to describe it, but on the upside, it was really fun to hang with the girls for nigh on 2 days. The baby came Tuesday afternoon, so the tribe is now at 5. By all accounts she's a cutie. I'm a little sick at present, so I'm gonna stave off visiting for a week or so. College is so random sometimes, I'm amazed that all these events actually happened, and I was there, I didn't make it up. D, T, MA, MB, and MC all seem to be doing well. It should be an exiting house for a while.

modern technology at it's finest

2005-02-07T13:52:00.000-05:00

Ordinarily this would be a very, VERY cynical post involving the shortcomings of the items I am forced to trust out of necessity. Ordinarily. But today I am singing the praises of modern technology. It is a joy to live in an age when two pain pills last up to 12 hours and you can covertly slap on a heating pad where it hurts and it will keep the area toasty warm for 8-10 hours (and to top that off, it only says it lasts 8, but I've had them last close to 11). No one who sees me today will have any idea that something hurts, unless I'm moving a little slow. This is way to impressive. Three guesses as to what is up, but I'm feeling pretty good for the most part.

so normally . . .

2005-02-04T20:07:00.000-05:00

Ordinarily I post papers I write, after I turn them in. But, the last one was a script analysis for a script I don't feal like posting. However, I can post the beginnings of the next one. This is the proposed topic for my ethical dilemma paper, mass comm. theory.

Two years ago you landed a job you'd been hoping for for years. You finally got a low end production job, grip, electric grip etc. . . on a sitcom production crew. The show was one you really liked - it didn't shy away from tough issues or controversial topics, but it dealt with them in a moral and redemptive fashion (kinda like a much cooler 7th Heaven). Now, two years later, you've made some good friends on the crew and you feel that you're in the process of plating seeds with some of your co-workers. Plus, you really enjoy your job, you're challenged and you're learning things you need to move up in the field. But now the producers have decided to change the content of the show, they want to make it racier to improve the ratings. Now you're stuck with the decision to stay with the show, or go find one less objectionable.

I have to do a sizeable amount of research and interview three industry professionals.

This could be fun.

truth in advertising?

2005-02-02T13:27:00.000-05:00

Mass communication theory . . . what a world of crazed possibilities!

This month of classes (give or take a week) has been sponsored by Ethics.
Ethics! It does a body good.
Er . . . maybe it simply further confuses a mind.

I've seen a few of my cohorts get lost somewhere between the principle of utility and the veil of ignorance. This is not rocket science kids! Someone commented to me today that no normal person would employ the methods we're using to make a decision. Normal people are not exactly known for THOUGHT!!!! People, as a species, are pretty stupid. Pehaps if we actually tried to think, maybe more of life would make sense.
Thought . . . it does a world of good.

Ok, so I'm being a dork now, I'm gonna stop.

But, seriously, why do people complain about things being an absurd expectation of "normal people?" Normal people are not the high mark we are trying to achieve! Why is something bad if "normal people" don't do it??? People as individuals are often very reasonable and intelligent, but people as a species are often very disappointing and even depressing. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that I'm some sort of super genius. I do know a few really smart people, and I can't, in good conscience, count myself among them. But for me, at least, beyond the basic realities of my social anxiety problems, a flock of humans is one of the most frightening and stressful things to deal with. Run away!

We had a speaker in chapel last week who wanted to reach sage status, and have people seek him for knowledge. A sizable part of me wants to go find such a sage and sit at their feet for a year. I crave knowledge, and more importantly wisdom.

Random question - Why did the German expressionist movement in film draw it's influence from the work of Edvard Munch? He's not GERMAN!

time to pay attention

2005-01-28T21:31:00.000-05:00

In transferring my blog over here, I have discovered a few things . . . the most disturbing of which is that I haven't posted anything of substance in a REALLY LONG TIME! It's rather sad really, that I haven't had a reason to wax eloquent or even to simply reflect on how life is going in such a span of time.

And what have I missed in that span of time??? Well, apparently, as I have just found out, Dave Barry has gone on hiatus . . . leaving the world bereft of his side splitting columns. Apple has created a computer so small it would fit in a fanny pack. On a more impactful and positive note, Iraq is holding free elections. And where does that leave me?? Floating, devoid of information, removed from current events and certainly not pondering the cosmos. Go figure.

I should be working on a paper for my Television Directing class. Yet, here I sit, surfing the web and composing this entry. I suppose it's not really so out of the ordinary or terrible even. Tomorrow is the last big shoot of the week, and considering that the first three wore me out, I may go home and take a nap. I will probably spend Sunday afternoon doing homework and baking bread. If I'm lucky, I'll get some reading done tomorrow after the shoot. I can't concentrate tonight, despite my best efforts.

Thus begins the hectic month of February (which for me, officially started this past Tuesday). Once this movie shoot is over, I'll be back to my normally relaxed schedule. As it is, I can't really afford to procrastinate during the hours when I actually can get work done. Oh well, I can't afford to write a half-assed paper for John Bruner either, and that's the best I could hope to achieve today.

Yesterday was our second shoot of the production, and when we finished we found out that we got no good footage out of the whole night. When the director and production manager said that officially, we were a bit disappointed. Personally, I was just upset that I'd spend 4+ hours out in 22 degree weather with no result. I know that getting a crew up and working takes time, and there's always hope that the reshoot will be warmer. They launched into a long speech on how we shouldn't let it get to us, because it wasn't that bad, and it was to be expected. I guess I didn't gauge the room well, I didn't think we are quite that upset as a whole. But we're back at it again tomorrow. Big wheel race. Which means one thing - the Grip dept. is gonna be tired tomorrow night.

I am the Grip dept. in it's entirety, at least for now. Dr. Owens and I are looking for a couple of vollunteer grips, because I'm responsible for more equipment than I can handle. I have the big dolly, it's track, the pocket dolly, the portable jib, the steadicam rig, and anything else that becomes deemed specialty camera equipment. It's not really that bad, it's just more heavy stuff than I can lug by myself in any semblence of a short period of time. The first night I was finally loading all the gear back into Corbitt an hour after most of the rest of the crew was gone. I think I may eat through my bottle of ibuprofen before this is all over.

I promise it's not all "boo hoo, poor me." I'm having a blast! Over all the hard part is greatly outweighed by the fact that I'm doing something that I want to do for the rest of my life! We're running this shoot by the book, and I'm on the production crew. I load up my truck, load in at the location, set up what I need for the night, troubleshoot what I can, and when it's all over I pack it in, and put it all away. During the majority of the shoot I can hang out with other members of the crew. Hurry up and wait is our motto. I don't have much to do in the middle of the shoot, because once I'm set up, I get to sit tight until I pack up. And we have a good crew, and a good cast. It's going to be a blast. I have a feeling that tomorrow's shoot is going to be the most fun we've had in a while. Hopefully the impending freezing rain will stay away until we're done. I mean, how much fun will it be to shoot guys racing down the hill on Big Wheels? They can reach speeds of 20 mph! I'm pumped!

time marches on

2005-01-24T14:28:00.000-05:00

I am officially making an attempt to transfer my blog from Xanga to Blogger. I have finally decided that I perfer the interface and control I can have here. I am going to maintain both sites for a while (probably until I finish school), but over time I'm going to copy some posts from my xanga site into this one, and eventually, I will stop updating the xanga blog. So, thus begins a new chapter . . .

youth

2004-12-16T23:34:00.000-05:00

Warning ** I've had this post brewing for a good hour or so now, be prepared to watch me wax eloquent, and in a british accent too!

I shall proceed to steal the pleasure of pondering my inspiration from you: I just came from seeing "Finding Neverland" with Brooke and Judy. It was a brilliant portrayal of the life of J.M. Barrie, and wether or not it is truth matters precious little. For what could have been an indulgent trip through the land of cheese cinema, was, in fact, a touching and true to life tale of what real genuine love can look like.

Youth is a wonderful blessing, one that is not necessarily grown out of. For a person to lose his youth or innocence requires two things: an impotice and a concious choice. Provided with the appropriate impotice one is forced to chose between maturity and fancy, adulthood and childhood. Even then, realistically, one's youth is not lost; it is possible to simply move it to one side only to have it reemerge later. It is, however, so very easy in this day and age to become highly jaded by lifes circumstances and the people with whom we interact, that many mistake cynicism for maturity. They are far from the same thing. Where has our sense of wonder gone when we find more entertainment in a box with moving pictures than in a work of literary fiction? Have we become so lazy as to allow someone else to provide our fantasies? And what about those people? Their fantasies are provided by someone else. If that trend continues, there will be few fantasies left. We must strive to deepen the colors of our own dreams. And by dreams I don't mean future plans for accomplishment. Sure, we should share these fantasies with others, but the difference comes when they share theirs with us as well. How rich would life be if we could all just free our collective inner children. I have gotten to know in my brief life a few friends who had to grow up very young. Often their accomplishments in life are revered by many who encounter them, but I cannot help but grieve for what they have lost in life, what is missing. It is a shame that no one was around to rekindle their dreams before it was too late.

Watch a child, sometime, encounter something new and fascinating. Try and remember what that was like.

athens aftermath

2004-09-09T22:12:00.000-04:00

I'm still not quite ready to truly reflect on "the Athens Experience" so I thought I'd enlist a little help in the attempt to fill in the big holes I've left in previous entries. Warning - quotations taken from Dave Barry . . .

"the world has come here for the Olympic Games, which were first held here around 776 B.C., which is also when they built the current plumbing system. I say this because we have been firmly instructed, a number of times, that we cannot throw toilet paper (Greek name: ''tipiyotki'') into the toilet, because this will cause serious problems."
     -yeah, about that . . . one would think that in place as warm as Athens is in the summer, that anything that could get warm and smell would be addressed quickly. Well, Greeks don't really address anything quickly, but that's another issue entirely. I must say I was wholly impressed that the bathrooms didn't smell at all like latrines, considering every toilette had a dutifully placed miniature trash can for the sole purpose of disposing of used toilette paper. But, as long as the lid was left closed on the trash can while not in use, the smell wasn't in the least bit noticable. I can safely say I only forgot and flushed my toilette paper twice, but it was a relief to return to the US where I could flush at will.

"But let us not harp on minor details (or, as the Greeks say, ''tipiyotki''). The point is that the Games are about to begin, and Greece is pretty much ready, and the world is here, and we are going to have a fine and festive time until we die of heat stroke, which could be any minute now because the average daytime high temperature in Athens is 25 degrees euro, or 18,500 degrees regular."
     - like I said, hot. Truthfully it was 35-43 at the highest during our month in Athens . . . roughly 102 to 118. But it was dry, so as long as we guzzled water by the gallon, we were ok for the most part. I even got a tan (from my fingertips to my elbows and from my hairline down to the collar of my shirt).

"The most visible symbol of the glory that was ancient Greece is the Acropolis, a great big rocky hill that looms above downtown like -- in the words of the poet Byron -- ''a great big rocky hill or something.'' Atop this hill are some ruins, which were already ruined when I got here, so don't blame me."
     - I did make it to the Acropolis, I wandered the hilltop and took pictures. One of the greatest benefits of our credentials for the games were free public transport and free admission to the Acropolis (regularly 12 euro). We even went back on our last day there, so Keara could see it, and we found Mars Hill. It seemed a little odd that I was sitting drinking a frozen strawberry thing (technical term) and staring at the place where Paul introduced God to the Greeks. That is a pretty accurate overall image of the nature of modern Greece - right next to a huge Samsung billboard is the crumbling column of an ancient temple and no one finds this odd

"You go to a bus stop. There will be people standing there. There will also be several schedules, consisting of a long list of numbers, such as each followed by a word you don't recognize, such as ''Tipiyokti.'' What there will NOT be at the bus stop is a place to buy bus tickets. In Europe you almost never buy tickets to anything anywhere near the thing you are buying tickets for. You're always supposed to buy the tickets someplace else, such as the post office, or a tobacconist, or One rumor is that you can buy bus tickets at ''kiosks,'' which are these little sidewalk huts that appear to be made entirely out of magazines, with a little hole through which you give money to the man inside (at least I think there's a man in there). But even if the kiosk man does sell tickets, he will not want to sell YOU one, because all you have is a 100-euro bill."
     -Some of this frustration was eliminated by the free public transport, but I did quickly come to the conclusion that I preferred the subway system to the buses, when possible. Even now, if prompted, I can recite much of the subway route for any of the three lines in Athens. Epomini stasi . . . Tipiyotki . . .

shy

2004-03-31T16:40:00.000-05:00

I'm still very shy in unfamiliar situations, and new people make me very nervous. People overload is sort of my motto for bad days. . . but I can't really let them know me. But now the same God who made me the way I am has given me two really good friends, people I can just sit around and do nothing with, or go and do everything with. And they know me--really know me--and for once, that doesn't scare me. -The Queue I was in January

I was reading back over an old blog entry today. Many things have changed since I wrote this.

It's funny - the two friends I was referring to in the entry both made the same odd comment to me yesterday - they had noticed I've been acting more like a girl lately. A girl! A girl? I don't know. It's possible. One was suspicious of the influence of a certain someone. The other was oblivious, but he had an aneurism when I told him about that someone.

I'm floating around in a bit of a fog these days. That I know is due to a certain someone - and I like it. I'm not really clear on where I stand right now, but I figure God and I can get that sorted out soon. Oh what a world this is, I do not understand it! -Q

melancholy ridden, whiny, cheezy crap!

2004-03-02T01:43:00.000-05:00

There's a kind of emptyness that can fill you . . .

   How is it I've managed to fill my life, yet again, with a bunch of activities and responsibilities? I know better. I am so drained. I can't quit now, despite what my inner child tells me, there are dozens of people depending on me. I've got the cast and crew of two, count them, two shows (in the end that's about 50 people). Then there's my parents who are counting on me to do well in school - even when I don't care anymore. I'm counting on me, and believe you me that's a lot of pressure.

There's a kind of hunger that can eat you up . . .

     It's funny. I volunteered to assistant stage manage the spring play because it wouldn't require much more time from me than I was already going to spend, and it would mean I could be backstage. Then the stage manager had to quit, and all the sudden I'm superQ, I've got to get and keep everything organized for that show, while juggling a flaling attempt and childrens' theatre (where I am also stage managing, oops), and 17 credit hours that include 4 video projects, a dozen writing assignments, and a theatre tech and design class that is just shy of random. I wanted this, I did . . .

There 's a cold and darker side of the moonlight . . .

     I know moonlight all too well, seeing as I see more of it than sunlight. After the allure has worn thin, it does get a bit cold, when you're alone because all your friends have bedded down for the night, and you're still plugging away . . . all too familiar.

There's a lonely side of love.

     I'm not sure how I feel on this front - never been in love. God's love is never lonely, except when I forget it's there, and unfortunately that happens.

With you here, baby, I am strong, no sign of weakness . . .

With you gone, baby, I am hanging by a thread.

     Exactly, when I am all I care about, I hang . . . when I remember God and others, I am superQ, so long as God sees fit to empower me for this.

There's a certain kind of pain, that can numb you . . .

There's a type of freedom that can tie you down . . .

Sometimes the unexplained can define you . . .

Sometimes silence is the only sound.

    I have to leave those to stand alone, they work so well together. That's kinda what I'm feeling now. I love being the strong one - the one everyone comes to when they have a problem; and I HATE being seen as a weakling. But always being the shoulder and never the cryer gets very tiring. That's what gets me about not having anything more than a strong friendship - and by that I mean a "romantic relationship." I'm always the strong one. I've been told more than once that guys like to feel needed. I should know, I understand them in that. It's a catch 22 . . .

With you here, baby, I am strong, no sign of weakness . . .

With you gone, baby, I am hanging by a thread.

With you here, baby, I am strong, no sign of weakness . . .

With you gone, baby, I am hanging by a thread.

     I want to be vulnerable. When the lack of sleep, the overcommittment, and the stresses of classes and projects get to be more than I can bare, I want someone to wrap their arms around me and tell me it'll be ok, even though I'm shaking with anxiety, or even crying (though that's pretty rare). I want someone that I feel safe sharing that kind of weakness with, because the rest of the world doesn't exactly instill confidence that I'll be accepted. I've got all kinds of places to escape to; I feel as if I need a person to escape to. This isn't like me either, I'm generally fairly self reliant - and I try to be very God reliant. So what's with this? God give me strength!!

Ok, enough whining for one day. Just getting all of that out makes me feel a ton better.

On another note, I am reeling a bit from seeing The Passion. Wow! I've been milling around in Media stuff for nearly a year now, and I am wholly impressed and Gibsons mastery of the medium. I know there are many who will disagree with me, but I think he did a great job of confining that which defies definition into an experience that shouldn't be missed. I don't cry much, but the way he told the story of Christ's sacrifice I was forced to bawl my eyes out. Someday, when I've processed a little more (and probably seen it again) I'll go into detail, but that's all I've got tonight.

Yeah, so I just read back over what I wrote, and wow, I think I'm a bit manic depressive tonight. May God help me GET A GRIP!!

and with all your . . .

2004-02-16T13:38:00.000-05:00

". . . Jesus says in Matthew 22:37, Mark 12:30, and Luke 10:27: " `YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.' "

I read this in a comment on another site.

Mark 12:30 is in fact my class verse.

I've been giving it some thought, and I think there is something to the order of it. Jesus said we are to love God with our whole HEART first. This means letting him fill us, and reshape us. There is a french praise song we have sung in class, it has a verse that, roughly translated, goes "Oh, give to my heart the rhythm of your joy, O Lord with me, Oh give to my joy the rhythm of your heart, O Lord". That's what I mean, that we might resonate with the heartbeat of God.

Jesus then said we should love Him with our whole SOUL. I think this has to come second, because as many philosophers and theologians have undoubtedly found, the soul is a hard thing to define. Now, we don't have to define what a soul is to love God with it, I think He facilitates that love for us, when we're ready. Anyone who has had a close friend knows that even heartfelt love has a rather transient nature - it fades in and out, at least a little. I think God enables us to love Him with our souls in order to further cement our love. Loving with the Soul is more constant than loving with the heart, but what is gains in constancy it loses in fervor, thus the two must act together.

He goes on to say we should love God with our MIND. And think about it (haha, no pun intended), if we started with the mind, we might never reach the soul. Intellectual love has it's advantages, but it works best with the other two, rather than alone. Intellectual love lacks both the fervor of heartfelt love, and the increased constancy of soulful love. But what it lacks in these areas it makes up for in reason and sound defense.

Lastly, he says we should love God with our STRENGTH. We are constantly reminded not to rely on our own strength, and for good reason. Strength is egotisical; it is prideful. We must love God with our heart, soul, and mind first, letting Him master them, in order to be able to love Him with our strength, that we would know to let him master that as well.

In the end it boils down to letting God love us - and by loving Him in return, giving him mastery over our heart, soul, mind, and strength. We can never love God as much as He loves us, but through Him we can love as much as we possibly can, and that is more than we could imagine. -Q

eyes

2004-02-04T01:15:00.000-05:00

Disarming. Soulful. Piercing. Innocent. Mystical. Entrancing.

Eyes . . . Fascinating.

The liquid spherical windows upon the human soul. With every change in light the colors dance, forming new patterns, changing the view.

I can be, but fascinated at the beauty of God's creation. I could swim the sea of a pair of blue eyes for days. Those soulful, brown puppy-dog peepers hold me in a sort of spell. And green, well, words don't begin to describe the effect of green eyes.

I'm not sure if I'm more afraid of them, or in love with them. To have someone look directly into my hazel/green-blue pair makes me uncomfortable, yet I can explore a pair that aren't looking back my way for an eternity. Why do they torture me so? What's the draw?

I'm starting to think that this is something I will only understand when I can look into God's and ask. It figures . . .

philosophy of media ministry

2004-02-02T03:04:00.000-05:00

To some the term “media ministry” pertains solely to the arguments for and against projecting hymn lyrics onto a screen during church services.I was once a member of that small segment of Christians.I have since seen the light.I now see media ministry from a new angle; one that I believe is better informed.This is the purpose for which I write, to explore that which media ministry has come to mean in my experience.

In the span of three and a half years of collegiate education in an institution dedicated to studying and proclaiming the good news of the Gospel, I have had my eyes opened to a vast multitude of ideas.I have come to see that true ministry is the act of using our God-given talents and tools to reach those who have yet to know Him, and to encourage those who walk beside us on His way.It is a small logical step to add media and amend statement.Thus, true media ministry is the act of using technology and media talent given by God to reach those who have yet to know Him, and to encourage those who already know and love Him.There are, however, some criteria I should mention that clarify my definition.

It has been my experience that God’s own word can be the best guide for even the most practical situations.Christ said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” and I see this as a wonderful outline for ministry, perhaps regardless of the means.In doing the work of Christ’s Kingdom, we are called to be Christ to others.Thus, it follows that we should strive to show them these three facets of Christ in our lives and in our ministry. The way of Christ is hard and confusing to those who have long lived in the way of the world, but that doesn’t lessen the need to show it to them.Often, the best way to illustrate the way of Christ is to build upon the way of the world, showing how the two paths differ.C. S. Lewis, in his essay “Lillies that Fester,” explains better than I how the truth of Christ breaks upon an open heart,

Suppose you had spent an evening among very young and very transparent snobs who were feigning a discriminating enjoyment of a great port, though anyone who knew could see very well that, if they had ever drunk port in their lives before, it came from a grocer’s.And then suppose that on your journey home you went into a grubby little tea-shop and there heard an old body in a feather boa say to another old body, with a smack of her lips, ‘That was a nice cup o’ tea, dearie, that was.Did me good.’Would you not, at that moment, feel that this was like fresh mountain air?

Though they resist absolute truth, many in the world inwardly crave it.Also, those in ministry are called to bring the life of Christ to the world.It is through the real lives of those who are in the world, but not of it, that ministry can bring this ever refreshing water. So, each of these has a twofold meaning for media ministry.Media ministry must make use of some ways of the world to show the world Christ’s way; it must build upon truth as the world sees it to show them the truth of Christ; and it must use lives in the world to show the world the true life. “See not read is the word for this generation,” says Michael Slaughter in his article, “Out on The Edge.”The world must see the life changing difference Christ brings to those who love Him.Media is in a prime position, as an experiential form of communication, to bring sight to the blind, as it were.

Beyond content brought forth in media ministry, and often despite it, those intended recipients of ministry can be its harshest critics.Thus, a media ministry that intends to make the greatest impact for the Kingdom must keep in mind certain criteria on which the world is sure to judge it.C. S. Lewis in “Good Work and Good Works,” again, states plainly, “let choirs sing well or not at all,” emphasizing that very few people willingly sit through a poor performance.Any attempt at media ministry must be made with a keen eye for quality and workmanship.All too often Christian media is poorly made.This extends to quality of writing, production, performance, and promotion.Media ministry is, in a sense, a blending of culture and religion, a making of Christ centered culture.Let it not be said of a media ministry that, “all this ‘culture’ and all this ‘religion’ (horrid words both) are essentially marginal, amateurish, and rather effeminate activities,” as Lewis so eloquently puts it.Also, media ministry should not go the way of current art, alienating those which it intends to reach.By speaking in a language only insiders can understand, a ministry negates its purpose.What is a ministry without purpose?Entertainment.A media ministry does not exist solely to entertain.A ministry should, however, use the best approach for its given audience, and for many that is entertainment.

For media ministry to be effective in this post MTV culture, it must combine as many good things into one package as possible.Media ministry should educate, edify, and entertain, leaving the intended audience filled instead of empty.No single aspect of media ministry can gain primary focus over all else.Media ministry must balance its approach, making the most of Christ’s message, production quality, communication with the world, the attitudes of the world and the current culture to provide an avenue to reach those unreachable by any other means.Just as foreign missions and bible translation have been deemed the best way to minister to isolated people groups, so media ministry should be deemed the best way to minister to those isolated fromChrist’s message in a sea of popular culture.

classes

2004-01-30T01:13:00.000-05:00

We didn't like it did we?
um . . .
yes
yes, precious
we likes it
we should play with the nasty wraithses this time, precious, yes, play with them
and we should play with the precious...
the precious will protect us from the nasty wraithses...
yes, precious,
we should likes that

(Bein' random with a friend, now onto more serious thoughts)

It is important students bring a certain ragamuffin, barefoot, irreverence to their studies; they are not here to worship what is known, but to question it.

-Matt Mourfield

Ok, don't tell Matt, but I've been thinking about this lately. Why is it that we take a different stance towards each class. If we don't like the professor we are hostile towards the material, if we don't find it challenging we don't work hard, etc... What makes us the final word on the worth of a subject area. Isn't all truth God's truth? Isn't all knowledge of at least some value? There is a two fold quandry I find in my mind. I used to think that certain areas were not worthy of academic study -- they weren't really of a high enough academic calibre. Media was one of those areas to me, I didn't think it was something you learned at school. I have since learned that it is quite challenging, sometimes more so that what I would have considered a typical academic subject area. I am coming to see many things in that light. Basically, studied to enough of a depth, anything is worthy of belonging to academia. The second side of that is, despite my preference for media and theatre, aren't all my classes equally valid? The two years I spend in Education classes, though I have since changed my major, were not wasted were they? My mind says, "Indeed not!" Though my heart has trouble accepting that. Why do I feel like certain things are a waste of my time? I"m not saying I don't value my liberal arts education -- on the contrary, I value it highly. Most of my classes, major or not, I enjoy, but there are a small few that simply shred my last nerves. I cannot fathom this. I need an explanation and I don't have all the answers this time. God, why? (Wow, that's a question I ask a WHOLE LOT!)

Friends

2004-01-28T01:48:00.000-05:00

"Be courteous to all, but intimate with few, and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence. True friendship is a plant of slow grow, and must undergo and withstand the shocks of adversity before it is entitled to the appellation." -George Washington

There's a place we hide true selves
Shine them into golden awe
Clandestine, I. Charade, shadow the midnight
Hide, muddle the meaning. Hide, muddle the meaning
The Plan: Clan and Hide. (show the way...)
Motes protect honed purity
Storm the heartened masquerade

-Clannanhide (Carbon Leaf)

I haven't always kept to myself, but as most of my aquaintences will attest, I am a bit of a recluse. Despite the limited success I've had at being sociable, in the end I just end up hurting someone else, or myself, more often both. Sure, I had friends in highschool, some of which I'd grown up with, but I didn't know them, not really. We hung out, did stuff together, but I always felt like I had an outside perspective, like I wasn't really there. I had this constant nagging feeling that I had to earn belonging, and that I never quite did. It never really bothered me, I sort of took it as normal. After highschool, or rather, sometime during sophomore year of college, I sort of inadvertantly broke off communication with most of them, I just forgot to write, or call, or hang out, and even the ones I talk too occasionally, I just don't feel very close to. I don't know.

I came to the conclusion sometime in the last year and a half or so, that I'd never had a best friend until college. Sure, I had friends that I played with, or that I even knew pretty well, but none of them knew me, not really. It was at a low point that I found a real friend. God gave me a wonderful person to both give and recieve support. At first, they could do no wrong in my eyes, I saw no faults, but over time I've seen plenty; it just doesn't bother me. I am accepted for who I am, regardless of how many times that shifts; I can do and say anything, and while offense is taken sometimes, the act is usually quickly forgiven. It's a little odd, our friendship, and it keeps the Asbury rumor mill hopping, but it has brought me to a place where I can be comfortable with people, at least, more than I was.

But something struck me tonight-- I finally really belong, or at least I feel like I really belong. I think I've made another good friend. We spent 2 or3 hours last night just talking on the phone, about nothing and about everything, good, bad, ugly, whatever. They even came by tonight while I was building sitting, and brought me food, and we hung out and talked a little more. I didn't initiate this, and it wasn't really all that normal before, but I like it.

I'm still very shy in unfamiliar situations, and new people make me very nervous. People overload is sort of my motto for bad days. I have many people that I enjoy spending time with, even in ways that would outwardly seem the identical to that which I spend with these friends, but I can't really let them know me. But now the same God who made me the way I am has given me two really good friends, people I can just sit around and do nothing with, or go and do everything with. And they know me--really know me--and for once, that doesn't scare me. I don't know if I'll ever even want to share me with anyone else, but if I do, I sincerely hope that that(those) person(s) is(are) as great as my two friends.

There is one important thing I need to stress- there are many people that I have become friends with along my road through college, people that I love dearly, people that I don't want to hurt (perhaps don't want to hurt again). Please know that I mean to show no lack of love here. For any lack of trust or closeness I am to blame I can't explain it very well, how typical of me. Everyone has people they are especially close to, and people they aren't. This doesn't justify me, or even excuse me, it certainly doesn't explain me. I guess I see my close friendships as I see dating relationships: it's different, I only find it extremely rarely. Look at it this way, I've never dated, at least I'm making some kind of progress in the friendship category.

The point is, I made this blog entry to celebrate a couple of great friends, not to disappoint or injure my other great friends, if I have done so, please let me know, cuz we should talk about it, in person, perhaps over coffee and cheesecake.

-Q

Ah, Valentine's Day

2004-01-13T01:19:00.000-05:00

I had to hit the Luce today, and do 20 minutes of laps to make up for the fact that we weren't having class. And I was thinking . . . my favorite thing growing up was to lie in the bath tub, or the pool, on my back, just floating (well not exactly floating in the bathtub, but we all know how that works). I'd let the water flow into my ears until all I could hear was the same undulating rhythm that kept me bobbing around. All of life was unity afloat, simple.

I bought a poster today, of a painting I saw at the Tate Gallery in London. I had the worst shin splints that day, but I really liked the painting . . . It's John Everett Millais' Opheila. She's lying on her back, floating in a stream, surrounded by floating flowers and some picturesque stream bank real estate. She kinda looks dead - probably is. But from another perspective, she looks like the comfort of lazily floating just has her caught, and she doesn't want to get out.

I can relate to that second perspective. And life kinda feels like that right now. I've finally got it where I like it, and life is working together well. I don't want to "rock the boat" as it is. But, you know what? It's a little boring. If I stay like this too long I'll fall asleep, and most of us are familiar with what can happen when we fall asleep in the water - drowning. I want a change, but I'm too comfortable to make it myself.

In case this extended metaphorical exploration is confusing, let me be a little plainer - I'm 22 and I've never even really been on a date! Up 'til now I've liked it this way, and I am really starting to settle in and get comfortable, except for this restless desire for a change. Hmm, well, that's where I am. I'm just going to have to wait and see what God wants to do with me now - He's not a tame Lion! Funny how that used to mean little to me. -Q