We're taking off in the morning for camp, be back another time.

Oh yeah, in addition to the most excellent Steven Delopoulos cd, I also bought Derek Webb's The House Show. Wow, such incredible music. I wish I still had my bug so I could ride with Delopoulos again, it would be just like old times. Derek is the new guy so he can squeeze in the back seat.

For real now, I'm gone.

I was digging thru some cds on Wednesday when I came across my old Burlap to Cashmere cd. Man, these guys were one of my favorite bands back in highschool and college. I wore the cd out. I read a while back that they broke up and weren't making music together anymore and I was pretty bummed because they are so incredible. For those who don't know, they are a folkish Greek guitar driven group, I mean blazing fast acoustic guitars. Totally unique. It was such a break from all the other crappy christian music out there. To even say it's christian music would almost be a stretch because it's nothing like the ccm mess. More like real music from a real guy who happens to be a believer. Because he's a believer, Christ is present in the music, but it's not beating you in the ears and trying to make life look like vacation Bible school. Almost like Bono's music, you know it's there. For some reason I decided to Google them as I loaded their cd back onto my computer and was completely elated to find their website. Not much on it, but they had concert dates last year and it almost appeared as if there was more to come. I signed up for their mailing list and am even going to email the webmaster to see what's in the works. Then I went to Steven Delopoulos' website, who was one of the guys in Burlap. Come to find out he's going to be touring with Derek Webb. He's got a cd out and I'm about to download it, it's gonna be a great day.

Getting loads of cool technology in the mail will do that to a guy. I'm not in my office. Nope, I'm down the hall in our youth room. How? WiFi baby, no strings attatched. This wireless-G is blazing fast, at least as fast as my direct DSL connection. Now I get to go back and open my 40GB Iomega external hard drive. The thing is about the size of a business card, about as thick as a deck of cards. I feel like a king. I have to go take a break "down the hall" if you catch what I'm saying, maybe I'll come up with something worth writing as I sit on my throne.

Our highschool baseball team is playing in the State tournament at this very moment. We have lots of people down there watching the game and the rest of St. Joe is listening on the radio. I couldn't go but I'm sitting here with a radio on my desk tuning in. Yeah, I'm sure I'll get a lot of work done today...

There are 4 teams playing in the tourney and ours is the only public school, meaning we are the best 2A public school in the state. Our football team won state the year before last because they(you know who they are as well as I do, the powers that be I guess) made a new public school championship. We won that and then got to go on and play for the overall championship. We didn't advance against the private schools but did still get the public school championship and they got their rings. I wish they would do that for baseball as well.

I use myway.com for my email and it has a button in each email you open that you can click to report spam. I've been very judicious in who I gave my email out to but somehow it's been leaked to the spammers, probably thru a virus that someone else got on their system. I don't get tons and most goes straight to my bulk mail, but occasionally get some in my inbox. I don't know if it does any good but in my mind, everytime I click that button, I hope their email gets wiped out or their refridgerator stops running or something terrible but not life threatening like that. Probably not, but it helps me feel better.

I've rented a golf cart for our stay at camp and I just got the rules and guidelines in the mail. #10 - "There is training available for anyone who feels that they are not familiar enough with the golf cart to operate them safely." What a relief, I was hoping I could get a training session. #13 is pretty good too, "All Alabama Traffic Laws apply." Right, I'll remember that when I'm running my errands in town.

Good thing they didn't pull my record, I flipped a cart one time, but in my defense the brake shouldn't have locked up like that...

As I cruise the blogs of many christians, I notice a common thread of discontent with their churches and with the other christians around them and with the state of the evangelical church as a whole. I understand that for the vocational ministers, it is part of our job to constantly try to bring the church closer to Christ and there will always be difficulty in that. We don't want our people to grumble and complain about the direction we are trying to lead them in, but we grumble and complain about them just as much as they do about us. Blogs are a place for people to write about whatever they want to and I don't hold that against anyone as long as they don't hold it against me that I pretty much skip all posts that are crying and complaining. Get over it and get happy people, the only person attending your pity party is you.

Oh man, now I'm the one complaining.

EDIT: I should have been more careful with my first sentence. Even though my sentence says "many", this is not directed at all christians, or even any who read this site on a regular basis. This is just something that I notice a lot out there. I would have just edited the post, but I didn't catch it until a while after I put it out there so some of you may have already seen it.

I better because this is the last chance I'll have for a bit. We leave for camp on Saturday but thankfully the hard part of preparation is over. Now I just have to answer all the questions that parents have, most of which can be answered by looking at the info I already mailed out or just by using common sense. I can't wait, we're taking 70 people total, 60 of which are students.

We bought a back-pack for JonMichael to ride around in and he loves it, I actually mowed my yard with him Saturday morning. The neighbors got a kick out of that.

Thanks to Lisa for this week's bad church sign. I had to change it a bit to get it to fit, but thanks.

We've got t-shirts ordered to take to camp. The students asked me to get hot pink and I tried at 2 different places but they say there is a universal shortage of pink. Go figure.

I've got some sort of eye infection in both of my eyes. I really was getting worried that I had picked up pink-eye from somewhere because they were so, well, pink. They were burning very badly and were all swollen up. Although doctor wasn't sure if it was pink-eye she knew it was definitely some sort of infection. She gave me some stuff yesterday afternoon and by last night I was feeling better and today has been the best day I've had all week as far as my eyes are concerned.

Remember that Aerosmith song that said "pink is my favorite color..."? Uhhh, not this week.

JonMichael had his little surgery this morning and everything is going great. We really thought he would be groggy or in some pain today but he is actually feeling better than ever. As soon as he woke up from the gas he was wired and hasn't slowed down yet.

A year ago my system was completely infested with viruses because at the time I was using Internet Explorer all day on a DSL connection. I was having literally hundreds of pop-ups a day and my computer nearly crashed. I bought the McAfee protection and XoftSpy, which is absolutely the best spyware program I've ever used. XoftSpy is basically a virus protection program in itself since it is so extensive, although it is not marketed as such. $40 gets you a subscription and free updates for life. I got it all cleaned up then formatted my hard drive on the advice of a web-developing friend. With it running like brand new, I downloaded Firefox and have used it exclusively ever since(except for the rare occasion when a website will only run properly in Explorer). Firefox is soooo much better than Explorer. So for the past year I've been running my computer with zero virus protection since I forgot to re-download after I formatted. Then I got an email today saying my McAfee Virus Protection had auto-renewed and charged the church's card. Hmmmm, maybe I should re-download that and the XoftSpy, since my payment to them included a lifetime membership. I just did that and after a year, I have zero viruses, zero tracking cookies, and zero spyware/adware bugs in my system. Amazing.

Fine - This is the word women use to end an arguement when they are right and you need to shut up.

Five Minutes - If she is getting dressed, this is really 30 minutes. If you are getting dressed it means 5. Five minutes becomes 30 seconds if you are watching the game and you are supposed to wash the dishes.

Nothing - This is the calm before the storm. This means "something" and you should be on your toes. Arguments that begin with "nothing" usually end in "fine".

Go Ahead - This is a dare, not permission, DON'T DO IT!!! Trickery!

Loud Sigh - Although not actually a word, the loud sigh is often misunderstood by men. A loud sigh means she thinks you are an idiot and wonders why she is wasting her time standing here and arguing with you over "nothing."

That's Okay - This is one of the most dangerous statements that women can make to men. That's okay means that she wants to think long and hard before deciding how and when you will pay for your mistake.

I'm Sorry - This is the least used of all words in the female vocabulary. If a woman is apologizing, do not question it. Just say that's okay and back out of the room slowly. Of course your "okay" and hers are different, but don't worry about it and never say I forgive you, that makes her offense too serious.

JonMichael is having surgery to have tubes put in his ears this Friday and we have to do all the pre-op stuff tomorrow. I always thought this tubes in the ears thing was a simple thing, and maybe it is, but I never knew it required the baby to be put completely to sleep. That scares me and I'm not quite sure why, but I don't like it.

Add to my nervousness the fact that the billing people are an aggrevation, and this adds up to one great ball of fun. They've repeatedly told us that we will need to pay our complete deductible, but that is ridiculous since we've already paid more than half of it. Then they doggedly tell us we will have to pay up front 20% of the doctor's fees, 20% of the hospital fees, and 20% of the anesthesiologist fees...but no one can tell us how much any of that is going to be! I understand that they can't know all of this until the surgery is over, but why make the fuss about the 20% when they don't even know how much it will be. You would think they could get this info together, maybe package it in a little brochure titled "So Your Kid Is Getting Tubes..."

I didn't break down while preaching to our graduates yesterday, actually turned out quite well. There were 2 slide shows in the early service and 1 during the later service when we did the graduate thing and I didn't watch any of them, so I know that helped me out. I'm so proud of those kids.

On a side note, I love this bad church sign so much I'll probably leave it for another week, which will be a record 3 weeks. I just can't bring myself to change it right now. Thanks Rick.

This was the subject heading of a bunch of emails I had in my inbox this morning, and our church secretary had the same thing as well. Must be one of those viruses that sends itself to everyone in your address book and it hit her first and passed itself along to me. I got one of those viruses back in college but didn't know it until I started getting all these emails from friends saying I had sent them a virus. The crazy thing was that it sent itself to addresses that I had deleted long ago...like this one ex-girlfriend of mine. That was awkward. I know I don't have any viruses now because I checked, but I also know I'm pretty safe because I use Mozilla Firefox. If you don't, you should. Aside from being so much better than Explorer, you'll get no pop-ups, unless your comp is already infected with spyware.

But according to this article stating that Revenge of the Sith takes pot shots at the Bush Administration, it's not in a good way.

Not really, but I've got to preach for our graduation service tomorrow and I don't know how I'm going to make it thru it. I get pretty emotional at times, I'm really a big softie. For example, Extreme Makeover Home Edition is about all it takes to moisten my tear ducts. We've got a lot of seniors this year, and we're very close to all of them. Usually when you have this service, you have kids come who you've never seen but their parents want them to do it, but not this year. All of them are active here. Some of them I'm happy and excited for, others I am scared for. We have some very strong leaders in the bunch. Most will be leaving in the fall for college, and that'll hit us hard. Welp, guess it's all part of it.

We've been teaching JonMichael some basic sign language. So far he says please, thank you, more, and all done. It's not exact, but good enough to start basic manners. He's really quick at picking up new stuff and it's so nice that we can be out in a crowd and he will ask for something nicely using his hands rather than reach out and cry to get what he wants.

Got to my office this morning and started working. Heard a loud crashing so I looked out the window and to my delight I got to see a building being destroyed! It was fantastic, literally 10 minutes from start to finish and this super-sized backhoe had the job finished. What a way to start my day.

In no particular order...

Batman Begins - That's right, I'm excited about it. Next to Spiderman, Batman is who I want to be. I think this one could salvage the franchise.

Crash - In highschool I had the hots for Sandra Bullock. I remember Larenz Tate as a bully on Family Matters, a.k.a. the Steve Urkel show. I like Terrence Howard and William Fichtner. I think Ryan Phillippe is going to be big someday. But it's Don Cheadle that's got my attention these days. In the movie he says, "It's the sense of touch...I think we miss that touch so much...that we crash into each other just so we can feel something." Interested yet?

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe - The trailer isn't out on the site till May 11, but Christie found a sneak peek. I just read these books within the past year so it's pretty fresh on my mind. Oddly enough, the witch in the trailer looked very similar to the way I had her pictured, spooky...

The Interpreter - Just saw it, it's fantastic.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - This just looks different, which is good. I'm interested.

The Longest Yard - Sandler, Rock, Nelly, and the man Burt Reynolds. Something good is bound to come from this.

You may have read about the hog, but this story is of a different nature. Audra handed me a couple packs of oatmeal on my way out the door this morning and I set them on what little bit of a dash I've got. As I was making my sharp left turn out onto the main highway they zipped across the dash and flew out onto the road, being that I've got no doors on right now. I had to take the dog to be groomed so I went ahead and got her here so by the time I got back, sadly, my packs of oatmeal had been nailed several times. Thankfully they were intact, nothin' says lovin' like instant oatmeal that has been run over on highway 71.

If you've been reading this for long you know that Audra and I live debt free, or at least we will be living debt free as soon as we get this last nagging bit of a school loan paid off(and mortgages don't count). She currently drives a minivan and, cool as it may be, it is nearly time to get rid of it. It is a 3 door Windstar and we're looking to step up into...get ready...a 4 door Windstar! We've got to have that other door by the time this new baby comes, so let that be a word of advise to those searching for a minivan - get a 4 door! We would like an SUV but the fuel economy and lower resale value of a minivan keep it in our best interest for right now. Did I say lower resale value as if it were a good thing? Indeed, and here's why...

Resale value ties into depreciation, the quicker the depreciation, the lower the resale value. Lower resale value for someone else translates into lower purchase price for me. Fords also tend to depreciate quicker as well since there are so many on the road these days, so we'll probably stick with a Ford, not to mention the fact that we like them. New vehicles lose over 60% of their value in the first 4 years, actually closer to 70%. This means if I buy a vehicle that is about 4 years old, I am paying for what it is worth and not for the inflated price of what it was when it was new. A vehicle that is 2-3 years old is also more reliable than a brand new one because the minor kinks are pretty much ironed out by then.

In a nutshell, here's the breakdown -

I save a couple thousand bucks...
I sell my current van and pocket the money, since it is paid for...
I pay around $6000 cash for a nicer used van that has already taken the hit of depreciation, as opposed to a $20000+ new or nearly new van...
I drive it for 3 or 4 years and sell it, probably for about $5000, losing $1000, but I keep the $5000 in my pocket. I hate to lose that money, but I could have lost $10-12000 from my nice brand new van. Remember, since I bought a vehicle that has already depreciated, I won't lose so much when I sell again. Since I'm smart and I've saved the money I would have used on vehicle payments, I've got several thousand in the bank to add to my $4500, so next time I'll pay about $12000 cash for a nicer newer vehicle than had before, and so on....

Sure, I can afford the payments on a brand new vehicle, but losing that much money does not make any sense, or cents. Not to mentioin the fact that I won't be shackled to some bank, forced to make payments each month. No loans. I win. We plan to save as much as we can now and make the trade in September, just in time for the new baby.

Does your church do the thing on Mother's Day where they give out flowers to the oldest mother, youngest mother, mother with most kids, mother with most kids present, and so on? That little competition always makes me nervous. I was once in a service where the youngest mother was an unmarried teenager, and then she also "won" for the youngest child. Singled out not once but twice in a Sunday televised service, I'm sure she was appreciative. Actually she was mortified, but still the contest must go on. Audra won the youngest mother boquet this morning, we were so proud. Since she's pregnant we figured we could have contested the youngest child as well, but we were gracious and gave it to the mother of the 3 month old since we're friends and everything. We're all figuring me to be the favorite to win youngest father, but unfortunately they don't do the competition on Father's Day.

Maybe it used to always be the craft that was made in Vacation Bible School. Whatever the case, what is it with Baptist churches and baskets? I could go in the Sunday School classrooms in this church and find 15-20 little woven baskets, usually filled with a couple of broken pencils or some thumb tacks. This morning was the first time I've ever seen a legitimate use for them(unless you count using them as frisbees, goals for a little basketball game, a hat, etc...) as we handed out the complimentary gifts to the mothers. It seems like every single class has them, many have several. I've wondered about this for a long time, just one of those random thoughts that crosses your mind as you're bored stiff during some lesson or sermon or something.

If I had one, then right now you would be seeing a pic of my 1 year old drinking like a dog from our dog's water bowl. Moments like that make me proud to be a dad.

I had some great material concerning the runaway bride, but I deleted it after realizing I was just being mean.

In other news, my bride and I are going to run away to Destin after church tomorrow night to play for a couple of days. We're leaving JonMichael with her parents and plan to hit the beach, the movies, do some shopping, and go to 1 or 2 nice restaurants.

Ahhhh, Gulf Coast weather. Nice breeze, mild temps, no doors or windows in the Jeep...

Funny how lately we've been talking about selling the Jeep, then I take the doors and windows out today at lunch and drive 2 mintues and I'm telling myself there's no way I can sell it. The only reason we've talked about it is because we may have the opportunity to buy a 4x4 F-150, extended cab with the 3rd door, automatic w/v8. I really miss having a truck and this would be something Audra could load the kids in and head to the beach by herself if she wanted. I would be getting the truck at a great price, about what I'll sell the Jeep for so I won't be losing any money, and that's the only real reason it came up in the first place. This is the same dillema I went thru when selling my mustang. I eventually had to tell myself that the mustang wasn't a collectors car just yet so I could get another one some day if I wanted, and it's the same with the Jeep. But now it doesn't look like the truck will be selling until probably next year so I've got plenty of time to decide, which is good.

Since I'm posting pics of my vehicles, here's the mustang as well, it was an '87.

to this...

Don't know if I've ever posted up pics of my first car, many of you remember it from college. She was a 1968 Beetle, restored and brand new from the ground up. Went from this...

meow, meoooow

Letting the cat out of the bag tonight, may as well go ahead and plaster it on the internet. Audra's about 4 months pregnant. Check your calendar, it's May 1st, not April and this is for real. It was quite a surprise, more of a punch in the gut. But once the shock passed we were able to start getting excited. This go around is completely different from the first. Odd how we don't really think about it every second of every day like the first time. We're not registered on baby.com and we don't know exactly what is happening during this week of development. Anyone who has had their first knows what I'm talking about. It has helped that we haven't told everyone yet, nice to not have everyone in baby-mode on us. But Audra's finally getting to where she's showing, but only if you know what to look for, so we figured we may as well tell.

Just to answer the most popular questions that everyone asks a pregnant couple...
1 - No, Audra isn't sick. She feels pretty good these days.
2 - I wouldn't mind a girl this time, but we're fine with whatever.
3 - No, we don't know if it's a boy or girl yet.
4 - No, we don't have names picked out.
5 - No, this wasn't planned but that's ok. At least now I've got a personal example to tell young people about how birth control isn't foolproof.