I mispell things!
two days ago some hit my blog from yahoo by typing in the following search
irs sends out 8 billion pages of forms and instructions every year, laid end to end these forms would stretch around the earth 28 times
i doesn’t seem that funny now that i have typed it out but it made me laugh pretty hard when i first saw it on the site’s statistical report.
my left wrist hate watches.
i like watches. i enjoy having one around for purposes of knowing what time it is and timing things. it’s a good thing to be able to time how long it takes a waiter to bring our food or to be able to bother people who are stuck up about time, because i make sure my watch is set to the time on the atomic clock.
yet my wrist hates watches.
i know this because ever since i first started wearing a watch (which is another story about a fascinating, humid august day when i was 16 but this isn’t the place for that story) my wrist has been slowly destroying them. i’m convinced that my wrist is able to release some watch dissolving acid that was developed through the genetic combinations of my dad drinking cheap beer, my mother reading too many cooking books, and my inherent dna-linked love for pork rinds. of course, modern science doesn’t have a test for “watching dissolving acids” yet so i will have to wait to prove this theory.
all i know for sure is that up until recently i have never been able to keep a watch working for more than six months. it doesn’t seem to matter of what quality the watch is. my wrist is an equal opportunity watch destroyer. it has killed watches ranging from seiko’s to dime store digitals. it doesn’t matter if the watch is gold or plastic my wrist hates it and will destroy it. the expensive, cheap, pretty, ugly, sturdy, and fragile all end up as trophies of destruction to my left wrist’s hatred of time devices.
this was all true until i acquired my present watch. it’s a timex expedition and it has lasted for one and a half years. this is remarkable. i was so please because tuesday i actually had to go and get another battery placed in the watch. that’s never happened before. my wrist always kills the watch before it ever makes it to needing a battery replacement. i don’t know what is so special about this timex because my wrist has demolished many other timex’s before this one. all i do know is that i am very thankful to have found a superhero watch that can stand up to the watch destroying acid that my wrist releases and put my wrist in it’s place. long live the timex expedition watch!
today was a fun day for youth ministry. i was paid to setup and play halo and risk in the student center for 8 hours. not a bad life.
since, i was hanging out with teens most of the day i wasn’t in my study that often. i checked in every now and then just to make sure that i hadn’t missed anything important. during one of those check in’s i found a message from from someone i didn’t recognized. it was a long distance number so i thought i probably should call it back soon. i took a few minutes away form the youth and placed the long distance call. the second the guy answered the phone and i mentioned my name, he kicked into a sales routine for a video casting program that is geared towards ministries. i was dumbfounded. i could not believe that this guy had asked me to call him back on my church’s dime do that he could make a sales call. i had to make sure that he had actually done this so i asked him “let me get this straight. you asked me to call you back long distance so you could try and sell me something?” he said “yes” but then told me that if it was a problem he could call me right back on their line. “nope,” i answered “you pretty much just told me all i ever need to hear about your company. please don’t ever call here again. good bye.”
i don’t know what it is like in the real world but in the church world this crap goes on all the time. i probably get a message each week with a saleperson getting me to call them back so they can give me their sales pitch. it would be one thing if this was a salesperson that i had a relationship with – those phone calls are a good thing. i know who they are and they have built up my trust by following through on what they say and actually carrying on conversations with me passed just selling me something. but these messages are from “cold calls.” why should i use my time to do your job for you?
i was raised by a salesman. i know how hard “cold calls” are. yet i also know that if you build up enough relationships after awhile you don’t have to make that many “cold calls.” i wish more ministry-based businesses care more about relationships than just making sales.
i leave by bragging on one company that i love – uthstuph. i love them because not only do they do things right but we actually know who they are. we weren’t friends before we started buying t-shirts from them but from our first phone call we could tell that they were concerned with more than just making a one time sell to us. jessica, my assistant, and i both know several of the people at uthstuph and it is not uncommon for our “order” calls to go on for quite awhile talking about allot of things that don’t seem related to the sell. it’s because of the fact that they care about our relationship that we have ordered everything we need printed from them over the past 5 years. in fact, sometimes we look for other things we can send their way. those of you who know me know that it is no small thing when i give a business (rather than individuals) glowing reviews in public. i wish more companies were like uthstuph.
the past week i have been basically writing a grant for income in stevens point. the north american mission board wants to help church plants and i have gone through everything they asked over the past 5 months. this week we reached the point of writing out what was actually needed. in order to do that i had to present a ton of demographic information showing whether there is a reason to plant a new church in stevens point or not. the above image is part of what i finished. it doesn’t look like much but i spent many a late night researching to be able to say the little that is on the photo and the ton that is in the 25 pages of supporting information. at one time in my life i actually thought that late night studying would stop after i finished school. HA!
on the movie front i was able to watch “north by northwest” last night when i couldn’t sleep and i was finished with my demographic research. it is amazing film. i love alfred hitchcock.
over the next several weeks we are going to be doing some things before “the view” each week. these will be goof off moments for us to enjoy each other.
I’ll have more details for you at church on sundays & wednesdays
i called my parents today for the holiday phone call and my mom asked why i haven’t blogged in awhile. it’s only been three days but according to my mom she has a blog fix that needs to be met (i’m assuming that admitting there is a problem is the first step to recovery – only 11 more now mom). anyhow, pam and i have been working on the house all day and therefore i’m kind of tired but i will blog anyway.
after hoping and praying for 20 years that i would have the joy of jury duty the day has finally arrived. i know this sounds odd to many of you because you think of jury duty as a chore but that’s not the case with pam and i. we both want to serve on a jury. pam actually was called for jury duty a few years ago but she was never actually chosen. it was a sad time for her but she was at least able to say that she had been on jury duty. that is until yesterday when i received my jury summons. i have officially been called to jury duty … starting in september.
since we are moving to wisconsin at the end of august i don’t really think i’ll be able to make the court date. sometimes it sucks to me.
“lost” was great last night. we had just the perfect number of people over to our house last night to watch the show and it was allot of fun when everyone cheered at the good points of the show. the only problem is having to wait until next season to see how all this stuff turns out.
yesterday as i went to my front door to enter my home i was greeted with a package from terminix. the package was information concerning the incomplete termite inspection they had done on my house earlier in the day while i wasn’t home. two things were funny about this:
the dogs being scrary would actually make sense if they had been hidden within the house. if you can’t see my dogs they sound terrifying. roux has a deep bass bark that sounds like he is a 100 pound mauler. when i’m out of town it’s nice to know that bark is inside my house with my family. of course, once anyone sees my two clowns all fear dissipates.
kottke posted an interesting article on the advantage of the “beginner’s mind” that young entrepreneurs have over older ones. the basic idea is that the lack of experience that a noob suffers from when things are normal suddenly becomes an asset when things are no longer normal (there is nothing to unlearn). the older more experienced person understands “the way things are” and that works well until things no longer are that way. it takes the more experienced person longer to realize that things are not the same, while the noob just assumes that the way things are is the way they are supposed to be. it was an interesting article on entrepreneurial behavior. now i am wondering how we can have the best of both worlds within the church. how do you constantly encourage a “beginner’s mind” within our older churches. how do we give a strong voice to the noobs among us? of course, i’m not really going to have to worry about this because come september i’m a noob and i will be a part of a church of noobs. our problem will be trying to find experience.
WOOHOO – the “24” season finale is going on right now!
j.t has an interesting post on some of the marketing for the next batman movie (the dark knight) and a first look at heath ledger as the joker (he looks pretty freaky – reminds me of a thin, deformed, john wayne gacy).
my neighbors made me laugh earlier this month. one of our friends down the street hopped into the shower only to receive a slithery surprise. when she shut the shower door she saw what looked like a piece of loose of foam. she reached over to put it back in place and was shocked when the foam suddenly struck at her. when she shut the door she had accidentally caught a garter snake in the shower door. she responded in the only manner she could think of – she screamed VERY LOUDLY. her husband came running to the rescue and when he saw the problem he immediately left. she thought he had gone to get something to catch the snake with but instead it turned out he had gotten his phone and was calling friends and telling them to listen to her scream. she kept screaming until her daughter came in. when the teenage daughter came in she immediately left again only to return with a video camera. the daughter began to video the whole scene – mom screaming and dad calling friends. unfortunately the video is rated “r” and therefore you will not be seeing it any time soon. after making all his phone calls the husband came in and killed the snake. the whole thing made for a great story to share around a soccer party. i love my neighbors.
here’s a statistical analysis of the world’s religions.
anyone interested in coming over to our house for the season finale of “lost“? we would love to have anyone over who would be interested in watching the show (i.e. actually focusing on the show when it is on and limiting your talking to commercials). the show starts at 8 p.m. and lasts till 10 p.m. the price of admission is an item of food – bring enough for everyone and together we will all be well fed. please realize that some of us (a.k.a. debbie, pam, and i) take “lost” very seriously and therefore will not tolerate disruptions. remember debbie was a marine and therefore i am sure she could kill you with only a couple of fingers.
austins, if y’all can make it we would love for y’all to be here.
SIDE NOTE – i can’t wait for “evan almighty” to hit the theaters. i was thrilled by the ark almighty kit i received a couple of weeks ago. i’m not the biggest fan of movies marketing to churches – actually that’s not correct. really i’m not the biggest fan of churches marketing for movies. i figure that’s not really the church’s job. i’ve received marketing kits from quite a few movies. these kits are usually pretty funny. the one i got the biggest chuckle out of was the one for “rocky balboa.” besides an interview with slyvester stalone saying that if we wanted more movies made like “rocky balboa” then we needed encourage our church members to go see the movie (since i didn’t really like the movie i am hoping that the reverse is also true) i also received one boxing glove (just one).
with the above said i need to say two things about the “evan almighty/ark almighty” kit:
btw, youth specialties – the kit was awesome. i still don’t plan on hanging up the banner in our church but i will be giving everything away to kids within the student ministry and trying to connect with people in our community through the ark almighty website.
my run for the day
distance – 2.0 miles
time – 21:28
pace – 10:44/mile
[tags]lost, ark almighty, evan almighty, movie marketing[/tags]
