Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: cold, dry, fast and touche, hail mary, hyperbole, last ditch effort, uncreative
I don’t even know if that a word.
I’m just here to say that’s it. I have nothing for you. I’m dry. I have been exposed as an uncreative hack.
I wouldn’t even bother you with a post, except if I don’t post then the two people who actually have me in their blogroll (John, Allison, and a couple from Andrew) will promptly remove me and all hope will truly be lost. So all of you Internet searchers out there: search “last ditch effort” or “hail mary” instead of how you normally find me with searches like:
“jeremy scott fast and touche” and
“its a very cold day hyperbole example”
For the record, I am neither fast nor the French word for touched.
But how about this… It was so cold that the tears, frozen and falling from her face, shattered into hundreds of pieces as they hit the ground; much like her hopes and dreams.
Or a little more to the point… It was colder than a witch’s… Well, that’s probably not appropriate, but it would be in January and probably in Michigan or Alaska. Like the Eskimos and snow, Michiganders have a lot of sayings for cold.
Filed under: Uncategorized
So here I am, 6 rows back at C3. C3 (Creative Church Conference) is loaded with great speakers with great things to say. In fact I have a notebook full of notes that I will refer back to and study for long time to come. I can already feel the inspiration pulsating through my core from being in this auditorium and its showcase of creativity.
A month from now, I’ll still refer back to my notes, but the magnitude of the event won’t be what I remember.
What I will remember, and what I will tell stories about for a long time to come happened completely outside the walls of this conference. I will remember the dinner where half the staff tried to pour sugar on our friends without them being cognoscente. I will remember Larry Hubatka inventing the WORST game ever. Most of all, I will remember Candice Lanning going into and using the men’s bathroom, and still having no idea that she had until we caught her exiting.
But more important than my stories is that I’ll still be reaping the gains from the inspiration.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: broken records, broken windows, details, excellence, storm door
If you’ve been around Elevation much you may have heard the term broken window. Its a theory that by focusing on the little things that are in our grasp, we end up fixing the big things that are completely out of our grasp. For example, if you want a better marriage, start by coming home and doing a load of laundry. Want to foster your own creativity? Start a Blog.
This is very much the way of Elevation Church… This is why we push for excellence in even the littlest detail.
So, I of course took this philosophy and brought it home with me. Its what reminds me to put away the dishes when I just really just want to flop on the couch and stop thinking for an hour or two. As the incredible husband that I am, I’ve also been explaining this to my wife.
Its great isn’t it? When you’re speaking truth into another person and you feel like the sage on top of the mountain. You have this jem on knowledge and every time you share it, that mountain feels all the bigger. Even more so when you are talking with your wife. You feel like the incredible spiritual leader you are supposed to be. And just maybe if Solomon were around today he’d give you a call and ask you to write a few proverbs for him. (Theory… Proverbs: The ancient Israelites version of a blog).
Anyway, it’s all great until she mentions that stupid storm door one more time and throws your own newly found wisdom back in your face. Like a broken record I hear about that storm door all of the time, its got some water damage and doesn’t look the best at the bottom. My mind: Storm door works, storm door good. Her mind: Rough spot on storm door, our neighbors think we’re trailer trash, our house is falling apart, and the world is ending.
Now, I try all of the time to talk my way out of lots of things that my wife tries to make me do. I’m pretty good at it. But when she throws my own words back at me, it makes me proud and I can’t help but admit defeat. I may be completely guilty of not following my own “wisdom” but it means that she gets it and that she is growing, even in my failures. So here’s to you honey, we’re getting a new storm door.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: coersion, force, loving, sarcasm, tyranny
Just want to state for the record, my wife is attempting to guilt, mentally and physically force me to write something sweet and awesome about her. Well, my wife is sweet and awesome… But that ain’t the way I roll, baby! I will stand strong my friends, I will not cave under the pressure of her tyranny! This very moment she is insisting that I edit my entries to make me sound more loving. I refuse to lower my standards of sarcasm, humor and hyperbole. I am a truth teller, and the truth I shall tell!
But, this next one is for you honey… Its being blogged about because its true and it just happened.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Brawl, bullet, character, Elevation, Loyalty, man card
Loyalty is something I take seriously.
If I call someone my leader or friend I will stand by them and I expect the same. But loyalty is often hard to find. I once thought I had it but a dingy basement proved otherwise.
We were about to move down to NC and we needed to sell our house. There had been some water damage to the basement but I had cleaned all of that up… We had 2 weeks to sell and all I needed was help white washing the walls. What I got was piss-poor effort for about 45 minutes. These were guys I lived with for years, guys that were in my wedding, guys that I probably would have taken a bullet for. I’m glad no one tried to shoot them.
What I’ve found at Elevation is quite different. I work with a group of people, any one of which I would probably take a bullet for (maybe not John… or Wade, Jessie, Spencer or Candice. Just kidding… sorta.) And I’m sure they would do the same for me… Well maybe a BB after half a pump. At the very least an office staple from 6ft.
Not only that, but there is a large group of volunteers that I believe to have the same kind of character.
And there is the beauty: they wouldn’t be involved with Elevation if they didn’t have that kind of character.
Is it wrong that every time I am out to lunch with a group of staff or volunteers that I’m just hoping someone will pick a fight? Seriously, I would love to see the look on there face after the production team stood up behind me. It’s not that I am a violent man, I just know that we would crush anyone in brawl, for the furtherment of the Kingdom of course.
Now, you also need to consider that these are the same people who would poor water on your pants while pointing and laughing. The same group that would take away your man card for ordering steamed veggies at a BBQ reastaurant. But thats just one more reason why I love them all.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: coffee, friday night, husband, quality time, work
I believe in creative problem solving.
Problem: It’s Friday night, Judy and I Both have a lot of work (also I need to update the blog) and tonight is the only time we have together all weekend.
Normally we just sit next to each-other on the couch and do our work, but then that’s just work not time spent with each-other.
Solution: Head out to a local coffee place sit side by side, listening to music (South Union) while I work on my laptop and she corrects papers. And I’ve just created quality time, I’m awesome.
Filed under: Uncategorized
Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not about to open a can of worms with the whole Mac/PC debate. I simply am sharing my experiences and my recent conversion. Frankly I think all of the vocal people from both sides of the fence can start to sound like a bunch of whiny babies. I should know as a former baby myself.
Right now, at this moment (that is at the moment I was writing this) I am writing this in Windows on a Mac. Why? Because I can, what are you gonna do about it?
But before I get ahead of myself, lets stroll down memory lane. Anyone remember the Commodore 64? Before there was a debate, I was writing 10 pages of code just so I could print a one page document to a crappy dot-matrix.
My formative years were spent on a Macintosh… No kiddies not the pretty little ones everyone so enjoys these days, I’m talking oops I dropped my 5 1/2″ floppy and accidentally erased the 100 or so words that it could encapsulate. It would be years later before I touched my first PC, I quickly became a DOS master. Then of course the amazing Point and Shoot came out, otherwise known as a menu list. And then we bought an IBM. Wow, a graphical interface, what is that, why is that a picture? On a computer screen? We were actually quite advanced, we used Juno to send electronic mail over the inter-web.
That’s when I first fell in love with the PC. Its a love/hate relationship really, I loved what it would do for me, I hated that I had to constantly fix it. But the more I fixed it the more it became like a drug to me. I had to push its limits so it would do more for me, but also break more. And so the love affair went for 15 years. Oh I had the occasional fling with a Mac, the college video editing suite, newspaper computers, even in the professional world (I hate you OS 9). But I swear PC they didn’t mean anything, I always came back to you, at the end of the day I wouldn’t dare to even let one of those filthy Macs into my household.
But at Elevation, like greatness, the Mac was forced upon me. “Whats that,” It would taunt me, “you want to backspace? I’m sorry you’ll be using delete from now on. Ctrl-C, I don’t think so, its Apple-C around here, oh and how do you like my one buttoned touch pad?” Just when I thought I would break, I fell in love. Your beautiful crisp screen, your simple user interface. But I still need a PC, you’re beautiful, but you just don’t have all of the software I need, besides so much of our equipment won’t even give you the time of day. Then I was reminded of a little thing called Boot Camp. You opened my world, everything I could desire, everything I needed, all on one beautiful MacBook Pro.
That is why the final gauntlet in my world has been thrown. I get everything I want and all I have to do is restart. I love you MacBook Pro. PC still lingers at home, I haven’t broken the news yet. I’m not sure how I’ll do it, I’ll probably slowly pull away. I’ll let Judy do whatever she does that seems to magically crash it in 10 seconds, or less. I’ll make promises to fix it, to upgrade it, but by then, it will be too late my PC will be obsolete, I won’t even bother stripping it for parts like its many fathers before it. I’ll wipe its hard drive, and It won’t even remember the beautiful days we had while it is sitting on a shelf at Goodwill.
Goodbye PC.
Have you ever seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding? Whatever, I know you have. $370 million box office yield anyone? Yes, a chick flick (see previous entry). Probably about four out of five brass ones. It might have scored better, but with “wedding” in the title, there is not much possibility for any higher. Anyway the father believes can cure any injury that you’ve sustained.
This reminds me very much of my wife. She believes whole heartedly that cold relief medicine taken early enough will actually cure her cold. I’m not talking vitamins, I’m talking about the likes of NyQuil and Tylenol Cold & Sinus. And along with half of our hypochondriac generation, every sickness, disease, ailment or injury she hears about she also coincidentally suffers from, i.e. restless leg syndrome. I’d about lose my mind if it weren’t for the fact that she’s so cute (yes I said cute) about it.
Lately its been all about Airborne. My wife is a teacher, the creator was a teacher, therefore it MUST be a miracle medicine sent from God. The truth is this: If I take it and don’t get sick, it doesn’t prove anything; If I take it and do get sick, it doesn’t work, both of which have happened plenty with me. Judy, however, likes to see by faith and views it as this: If I take it and don’t get sick, the touch of Heaven worked, If I take it and I get sick, well, that’s my fault, I either should have taken it early or I would have been sick enough to die had I not taken it.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not judging her… Every little tickle in my throat turns into a puppy dog face asking Judy to make me an Airborne. Does it work, I don’t know, but she’s going to buy it regardless of my opinion and hey, if there’s even the slightest of chance of not catching the plague of viruses she brings home from school every day, I’ll take it.
