Update

Believe it or not I'm still around and kicking. It's been a busy couple of weeks (and weekends) around my house. The last few weekends I've spent catching up with friends, performing band concerts and generally trying to keep the house in some state of orderliness. It's a hard fought battle. So I'll get around to actually posting stuff of interest on here soon. I have a few things in the queue:

1. I'm working on the essay I've said I do for a while not detailing some of the reasons I gave up "being Baptist" and decided to "become Lutheran". This will probably be in essay form and I'll link to it from here and/or thorugh a new page on the main site. Speaking of which...

2. I'm working on a new section to the main site. It will center around religious themes and will contain most of the handouts I've used and created while teaching small group, sunday school and the youth group. Most of them are ok. I'm not really intending them as the final word on anything, they'll just be available for anyone who would like to download them to modify for their own use.

You'll notice on my blog that I now have a Library Thing account. Using this in conjunction with my Readerware software, my intention is that my friends will be able to browse my library in order to see if there is anything they'd like to borrow. Right now all I have in there is my downstairs bookshelf and a couple of boxes of books I have in the basement. I hope to have much more in there in the coming weeks.

Anyway. Much work to do. Talk to everyone later.

Ah-Ha!

If you know me, you knew I just couldn't let this pass when I saw it. I always knew it was something:

Redheads 'have more sex than blondes or brunettes'

Geek alert

Ok, so I said I was off. Quick alert to all geeks if you haven't seen it:

Doctor Who

Season 28

Sci-Fi Channel - September 29th

So What's New?

Another weekend here....whew. It's been a busy week. Not only did I have financial statement close, but we had issue exchange for union negotiations as well. I forgot how much "fun" that can be. This early in the process my main goal is to attempt to keep my mouth shut as some of the issues are brought forward. Some of the demands just get crazy. I personally think that the fact that I don't say "Are you guys out of your f'ing minds???" is a great step forward in personal growth....mainly because I don't say it.

I'm thinking it, just not saying it (we're still working on facial expressions).

Julie's been working quite a bit this week. We've just sort of passed in the night. She's had a lot going on with her research project and just long hours. This weekend she's working the night shifts. We just got in from breakfast....off to sleep she goes.

One thing that's been helping alot is that we've both been working out lately. Julie joined Curves and I joined a athletic club up by work. I just finally decided that I needed to make working out part of my regular work day. So every morning I wake up at 4:45, brush my teeth, throw on some clothes, grab my coffee and protein bar and hit the road. By 6:00 I'm working out and I'm usually at the office by 7:30/8:00. I've been doing it for a couple of weeks now, 5 days a week and I'm really liking the changes. I've had more energy during the day, it's really kept my stress levels down and I'm making friends with muscles that had gone away on vacation for a little while. I decided that I wasn't going to focus on weight anymore. It makes more sense to focus on health and fitness....weight will take care of itself. So I get with my personal trainer, watch my diet for reasonableness, hit the gym each weekday and I'm going to look damn good by the time we get to Bill's wedding next year. Ok, so it's a gym, not a house of miracles so I suppose we'll qualify that last statement by saying that I should be in significantly better shape by next year.

Alas, I have people to do and things to see this morning, so I must be off. A good weekend to all....

Go Tigers!!!

Ok, so here's my little bit of randomness for the weekend. Not only did the Tigers sweep Cleveland, two of those come from behind wins, but I also got to meet Joel Zumaya this evening. For those of you who's life doesn't revolve around baseball or the Tigers (until this year the two words have not been synonymous), this is one of our outstanding relief pitchers. Oh yeah, he also has a pretty wicked (and consistent) fastball that has been clocked around 102 mph and is, on average around 100 mph. The boy has an arm. So when I found out the sport card/comic book store by me had him coming by, I bought my ticket and made sure I was there. Poor Bill is in Tennessee with my folks, but I made sure to get his jersey signed as well. Ah well....random fun. Back to work tomorrow.

Daaaaaaaammmmmnnnn!!!!!

Here's the picture....

Bottom of the ninth. Tigers down 3-2 to Cleveland. Two outs. Polanco on first. Pudge at bat. Jim in recliner. Very tense.

Pudge hits first pitch foul.

Pitcher winds up again.....

throws beach ball down the center of the plate.

Pudge knocks the hell out of it. Two-run home run.

Tigers win!!!!

Much yelling and screaming in the Stadium.

Much yelling and screaming in the basement.

Cats come to investigate. Big cat dances around the basement with Boris in his arms. Boris gets annoyed. Big cat places Boris on ground. Continues happy winning dance!


God bless baseball!!!!!

Tomorrow night will be getting Joel Zumaya's autograph. This is a season!!!!

Blog-itis (and other things)

As I sit here taking a break from my busy and semi-(un)productive time alone, I got to thinking about how the internet has added a new level of stress to my life. Like most people, I created a website and a blog as a way of keeping in contact with my friends and family. Kind of a way of creating my own little slice of home in the grand wilderness of cyberspace. The funny thing is, though, that once you have something going you also gain an almost irresistable pull to maintain and update it. In alot of ways that feeling is good and productive. Imagine being a homeowner and not working at all to maintain any level of upkeep on your house. It doesn't take much when you're trying to keep the house neat to mess it up, how much worse when you let it go. But what about all of these other things? In my lifetime I've seen the invention of the mobile phone. It's gone from a briefcase sized gizmo that you carried in your car (literally a "car phone") to something that you can keep in a pocket or attached to your ear. Instant connection from anywhere. News, data, and infomation all at your immediate beck and call. And the internet. I remember in college when having a 32k modem connection at home was the big thing. Hell, a guy from the computer labs got me the software for the e-mail client (line editor, thank you very much) and the winsock connection on a few floppies. Nowadays I get my cable and my internet from the same line coming into my house. Times change and they move fast.

But is it progress?

Now I sit and ponder about things to write about on my blog. Can't get to half of them, real life keeps getting in my way. Lots of things I'd love to do with the website, just haven't had time to really sit and fiddle with the software to figure out what I need to do to get it done. I can't even leave the house now without feeling a bit of stress if I forget to grab my phone. Once upon a time you could go shopping and no one could get ahold of you. Now you can't even sit in a movie theatre without some idiot blathering on to someone who's not there, over the most trivial of subjects.

But I feel like it's not just an organizational problem. It's a stuff overload problem. Things, data, information. I'm allowing alot of it to dictate my life.

Ok, maybe I'm just cranky today. Julie's out of town for the weekend. My parents and Bill are out of town for the week. And despite the fact that I'm an introvert at heart and cherish my alone time, I'm just not feeling it this weekend. Maybe it's because Julie has been working nights for the past two weeks and we just haven't seen each other. But I was thinking about all the stuff I have around here and how I shouldn't be bored, or lonely....but I am. And at the same time I just feel like a million little things around here need to get done and I'm being pulled in by all of them. Then it got me thinking about an interaction someone once had with Jesus..

Luke 18:18-25
18 A certain ruler asked him, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"
19 "Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good-except God alone. 20 You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.'"
21 "All these I have kept since I was a boy," he said.
22 When Jesus heard this, he said to him, "You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."
23 When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was a man of great wealth. 24 Jesus looked at him and said, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! 25 Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." NIV

Woah. Could I give it all up?

In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit:

Lord, please help me to refocus my gaze on you. Don't allow me to be swayed and turned aside by what I have around me. Help me to reprioritize my life. Allow me to reconnect with what is important. Allow me to feel whole and completed in you and in your body. Let your grace pour over me and through me.
In Jesus name.
Amen.

Just when you thought it was safe to go to sleep

Just as I was planning on going to bed, Craig Monroe crushed a two run homer to put the Tigers up 7-6 over the Indians in the bottom of the 8th. My cheering caused Boris to jump off the recliner. Damn! I love baseball!!!!

p.s.- here comes Jones......hold on to your hats, boys and girls.

To be a Phillips

If you know me or Bill, you know that our typical family stance is to stand there with our arms folded and either an annoyed, or amused, look on our face. I would just like to point to this picture as a frame of reference as to where we got it from. Notice my Dad sitting next to my Uncle Harold at a ballgame in Johnson City. My first thought after Bill sent it to me was, "I am so my Father's son..."