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19 miles

today was my long run for the week. it was supposed to be 20 miles but i was REALLY hungry by the time i reached home with still a mile to go (i usually go a half mile past our home and then come back). when i got inside the house i was a little curious if i hand lost any weight during the run and therefore i jumped on the scales. 10 minutes before my run i had tipped the scales at 191.6. after running 19 miles i had lost 2 pounds and 6 onces. i registered 189.0 on the scale. it doesn’t seem like as big a deal when i type it but at least it made me laugh when i saw it on the scale.

SIDE NOTE – i am presently reading a book by bill easum & pete theodore called “the nomadic church: growing your church congregation without owning the building and while i have only reached chapter six i have to say that thus far i am quite impressed. i can’t yet speak from experience whether all the recommendations and thoughts within the book work (because we have launched public services yet) but i figure we’ll be able to try these things out soon enough (hopefully by next week i will be able to tell everyone a launch date). if i had a short list of books to recommend to future church planters right now this book would be on the list. of course, that could change in the next chapter, though i doubt it. i’ll post more after i finish it.

my run for the day
distance – 19.0 miles
time – 3:25:30
pace – 10:49/mile
weather – 36º

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i would love to shake the hand

slow children
of whoever first came up with the idea of these signs.

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we are the champions!

it is over
last night was my final curling match for the 2007-08 season. it was the open tournament club championship and yes my team did win. woohoo! we had a great game where everything was clicking. it worked out even better when it turned out that the other team was having the exact opposite kind of night. it was sweet.

by the way, i thought i would also throw y’all another photo. this one is of the almost 20″ small mouth i caught yesterday.
almost over

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for people who can't stand church?

has anyone else noticed that most of the churches that say they are “the church for people who don’t like church” are typically doing the same churchy things as everyone else, but with a slightly more contemporary flare? i see this “church for people who don’t like church” catch phrase all over the place. i don’t really think that many churches can honestly use it. i don’t really think that we’ll (tapestry) use that slogan but i do hope we will truly be different from much of what’s around us. i love many of the churches around us but i don’t really want to merely replicate them.

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video church

i have to admit that i am not a very big fan of the multi site church concept. it may just be my own personal bias but watching a video for church simply doesn’t work for me. i would love to see some research on these things. i truly wonder how effective they are. are they bringing people to CHRIST? or are they just bringing people from other churches? i have my thoughts but they are just my thoughts. does anyone know of any research that may have been done on how effective they are?

for my friends who are not familiar with church culture and therefore probably not used to the term “multi site church” what it means is a church that does a video feed to several other locations that have their own worship team that may or may not have a different flavor of doing things. the sermon comes from one site and is piped to all the others. these other locations are part of the base church and somewhere in the church’s tag line is almost always something like “one church many congregations.”

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back home

chicago 2008
wednesday the family and i drove down to chicago for a few days. it was wonderful. we played tourists as much as we possibly could, going to a < href="http://blackhawks.nhl.com/">blackhawks game (which was awesome), hitting the art institute, watching the musical “suessical,” etc., etc. one of the most fun things for pam and i was getting visit with some of the people we know and love who live in and around chicago. it was great. a few years back when i stayed at the simple way some of the simple wayers talked about having homes everywhere (largely because they had no home of their own to limit them). i’m not sure i’m there yet but it does feel great when pretty much anywhere pam and i go we have people there whom we love. visiting new places is cool but connecting with friends is so much better.

of course, it feels wonderful to be back home.

SIDE NOTE – running along the lake michigan chicago lakefront during a snow storm was amazing. between the sights of downtown chicago and the docks the view was absolutely gorgeous. when you add the snow to this it was truly unforgettable.

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running in the snow

i love running when it’s snowing. we got a small amount of snow today (less than an inch) and i’m guessing this was either our last or second to last snow for the season. of course, some of the locals i’ve spoken with say that my guess may be far off from what finally happens. anyhow, i love running in the snow because no matter how slowly i run i still feel pretty hard core for having run in the snow. i used to feel the same way about running in the rain in baton rouge.

SIDE NOTE – we started the curling club playdown tonight. my team won. woohoo!

SIDE SIDE NOTE – wow. i’ve been posting very boring stuff recently.

my run for the day
distance – 5.0 miles
time – 52:49
pace – 10:33/mile
weather – 30º/snow

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tapestry needs

right now the launch team is praying over a date to begin the public services of tapestry. i can’t really say the date we think we are being led to until we’ve all reached that point. i can say that it is soon enough that i need to start buying some equipment over the next several months. since, many, if not most, of you are experts on some of the equipment i need to buy i thought i might look for some of your opinions. so here’s the list of what i will need to buy in the next several months and what i am thinking of spending.

  • a windows based laptop – i have never bought a windows based laptop and therefore i know next to nothing concerning what i should look for. i’m hoping to spend less than a grand on this. it’s primary purpose will be for projection (a.k.a. powerpoint and mediashout) but i would like to be able to use it for portable video editing. it needs to be rugged and easy to use. any thoughts?
  • a digital camcorder – i haven’t bought a digital camcorder in five years and many things have changed. i don’t need a professional level camera but video will be pretty important so a good quality camera would be nice.
  • powered pa speakers – my research thus far has lead me to qsc hpr 122i’s. i’m open to other ideas if anyone knows something better for the price (around $1,500).

of course, i also have the boring stuff to buy (i.e. tables, chairs, coffee makers, etc.) so if anyone has any suggestions on a place to get good stuff at inexpensive prices that would be cool.

btw, thanks to the many wonderful people who have contributed to the point that we have money to buy these things for tapestry.

my run for the day
distance – 5.0 miles
time – 52:15
pace – 10:27/mile
weather – 28º/weather

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who fartleked?

my favorite running term of all time is “fartlek.” i get to fartlek for 5 miles today. i wouldn’t want to be behind me. 😉

pam and i finished watching “into the wild” last night and i think it was a really good version of the book. thanks to my brother-n-law (hi jim) i absolutely love love krakauer’s writing. i was worried that penn would play around with the brilliant manner in which krakauer tells the story but thankfully he basically stuck with it in manner and tone.

SIDE NOTE – my mother, the stalker, is a wealth of great finds. of course, this is true because of the fact that she’s a stalker. 🙂 anyway, she found the website of a guy in the point area who takes pictures of the region with his camera suspended from a kite. his photos are cool. i’ve seen the camera attached to a kite thing done before but the most impressive thing on his site is the contraption he created to be able to take a stitched panoramic photo from his kite. that’s pretty impressive.