On the surface...

Aaaghh...rain, rain, rain, rain...

Started to do some much-needed yardwork today, but was rained out...again.

At least the rain is good for my lawn (and keeps it from being too hot outside).

Band practice was good last night. The mood of the band was a bit somber, but the time was productive. What, with everyone's busy schedules and rough days, I'm just glad they were all able to make it. Still, I sometimes wish rehearsal could be a time to 'escape' and worship rather than b**** and moan about our days or other things. On the bright side, at least we're that comfortable around one another.

Went to Logan's afterwards where they - once again - served Kyle a cold steak. Unfortunately (or, fortunately for us weight-conscious people), we didn't get hooked up with free desserts this time. Oh, well...

Came home, watched TV, went to bed.

KEY PHRASES: "Better get something to eat. Kailyn's fussy. Uh oh...so is J-mo." "Oh, look...all the volume's turned down...again." "Can we please try to look more hetero?"

Down with the 'blog' sickness...

Wow, look at me. I've slacked for 5 whole days. Supwifdat? Apparently, this contagion that impairs expedious blogging ability has somehow entered my home through my internet connection and almost turned me into another Baer or Davester. Whew! That was close. At least I have some Mountain Dew onhand to curb the laziness.

A lot to report, so here's the rundown of what's happened in the past 5 days:

- Lara is outtahere. Dave's daughter moved to NC on Friday.
- Big Dave and Dana are out of town this week (scuba diving), so Eli is house-sitting for them. Ahh...free use of their pool.
- Let's just say I hate spyware that hijacks your web browser. It took ALL day Friday to purge my system of some nasty web-redirecting, windows corrupting bug.
- Crowd was down at church Sunday, but the music was good. :-). So was Jack's message.
- J-mo went to Indy for the USGP (race). Apparently had a really good time, though he returned with some 'interesting' tanlines...(Note to self: Wearing glasses in the sun can give you racing stripes on your temples). Relax, J-mo...at least you don't have to worry about sunburn on bald spots on your head :-\.
- David, Eli, and the Root joined us for small group Sunday night. Had crab legs, burgers, and watched "Along Came Polly."
- Went to the Guad last night. Steven also joined us, which was pretty cool. Wandered around, then went home.
- Finally coughed (vomited) up the dough for an Xbox this week...just so I could play "Chronicles of Riddick." My geekdom knows no bounds. (Don't worry...I had permission from the missus).
- Our friend at EBgames hooked us up with free bling: Frisbees, key caribiners, cups, beach balls, can openers, etc. Now we can actually exhibit our geekdom to the general public.

Okay...that's it. For those of you pulling your hair out waiting for an update. There it is. The moral of this story?

1. Spyware sucks.
2. Gaming is good.
3. So is Mexican food.
4. And a pool in 90+ degree weather.

KEY PHRASES: A shirt J-mo saw at Indy referring to Formula 1 racing: "Too dumb for opera. Too smart for NASCAR." (ooh..better be careful quoting that...this IS Alabama). "But Stacey, it's FOR the ministry."

Is free dessert really a good thing?

Because of some kitchen snafu at Logan's, all our food arrived a full 30 minutes after we ordered it last night after band practice. Because of the delay and Kyle's ice cold steak, Logan's awarded us all free desserts. Not the small Chik-fil-a-down-it-in-2-bites desserts, but huge forgive-me-father-for-I-have-sinned desserts. And, like a bunch of goobs, we just dove in and started eating. Gluttony at its finest. Jeff Gilliam would be proud.

However, I must have no willpower. I'm eating better at home. I've reduced my calorie intake and my caffeine intake. But - BAM! - one night at Logan's and you could almost 'feel' the fat cells dividing and multiplying. Ewww... I guess I'm going to be fasting today to make up for it.

Band practice was pretty good. Jeremy and Derek both are playing this week, and it's a bit of an adjustment getting used to their styles. Their styles are very good...but when you play so long a certain way, it kinda 'woke me up' last night trying to make sure we were all playing together and sounding good.

In other news, I anxiously await the arrival of "The Simpsons: Season Four", which I ordered from bestbuy.com on Monday. Knowing that the first episode on the DVD is "Kamp Krusty" has me all giddy inside. As more seasons get released, we start getting into the 'golden' seasons of The Simpsons. My gut just hurts thinking about how much I'm going to laugh. Ow.

On an un-related note, we got to talking the other day about names of Greek Gods if we could make them up ourselves. Oh, of course the juvenile obvious one came out: The God of Sex - Testicles (test-i-cleese). I know...juvenile and a bit risque. But, I suddenly remembered a certain Mountaintop college/young career trip to Six Flags where the same conversation was taking place. I think it was Mark, John, me, and maybe Chad... But Mark...oh, Mark, you're going to burn...sheepishly comes up with the God of Slavery: "Mastaplese." All I remember was feeling incredible laughter and shame at the same moment. I'm laughing so hard I can't breathe - while at the same time, I keep trying to straighten up and say, "That's not funny."

Of course it's not funny. Slavery is one of the great evils of our history - or anyone else's history where slavery was/is a condoned thing.

What I want to know is - then - why does it make me laugh so hard? Honestly, it made us laugh because it was INDEED funny. No, we weren't making fun of the plight of those who were subject to slavery by any means. It was more like the laughter that happens when you're a kid and you learn a funny word for the first time. Like...Kumquat. Or...boobies. (oops...sorry, again). Mastaplese...it was creative and funny sounding at the same time, and it was uttered out of the mouth of one of the godliest people I know. The shock of that in and of itself was laugh-worthy.

Oh, Mark...look what you've done. Oh...look what I've done by repeating it. We're like that former youth minister who knocked the 4 year old kid down at a Rangers baseball game this week to catch a foul ball. When the mom confronted him about it, he just said "tough." Even the TV announcers were saying things like "There's the biggest jerk in the stadium." The kid was practically a hero by the end of the game, and the guy who knocked him down might as well have been Adolf Hitler, he was hated so much. However, people who know the man claim that he is indeed a good man who had a "bad" moment. Too bad a huge crowd was watching.

Okay, I'll just stick to the God of Winter: Icicles (Ice-ih-cleese) - and I'll pretend that's funnier.

KEY PHRASES: "That's either a piece of ice or a piece of glass. If it's glass, then bite into it so you can get a free car." "Oh...another friend of mine has purchased a Honda Element." "Why? Why? Because I wanted there to be 5 hard drives, all right????!!"

"Warrior has shot the food..."

Ah...the last time I actually played "Gauntlet" I was undergoing a voice change and discovering hair in unexpected places. To quote Ryan Stiles from "Whose Line is It, Anyway?" - "What's wrong with me!?"

Last night after the Guad, J-mo, Kyle, Stacey, and I all embarked upon a quest in Gauntlet via the Nintendo Gamecube. That was a LOT of fun. Though, I'm sure that Kailyn may be traumatized by the constant screaming: "Go left!" "No, up, up..." "Look out...it's Death! Death!" "Stop shooting me." "Who's got the key?" "Who's got a potion?"

Ah...of course, it was nice to play without having to scramble for tokens to 'continue game.'

Lately, the Gamecube has filled a big niche (normally filled with much boredom) in our lives. Whether it's Monkey Ball Golf, Mario Kart Double Dash, or Gauntlet, we be having fun. We played Sunday a week ago. We played Sunday night. Who knows, maybe we'll play again soon. All this gaming brings back a LOT of memories of - not just childhood - but also the gang at Mountaintop, where we'd drag the church's Nintendo 64 and projector around to play Mario Kart 64, FIFA soccer, or Goldeneye. (I still hate you, Odd Job). Those were the days...especially when we hooked up Michael's PS2 to the projector at our old house and projected it on a white sheet literally pinned to the ceiling. Nothing like playing SSX on an 8 foot screen.

In other news, I've been cutting back drastically on my soft drink and food consumption. Unfortunately, I've got a whopping headache to go with it. D'oh. Still, I've got to get through this headache phase this time without resorting back to the 'fix' of Mountain Dew.

On a sour note, Kailyn's thrown up twice today. Nothing like a spewing baby to put a damper in your day...still, it's worse on her than it is on me, so I can tough it out for her. (I'm such a jerk-dad, I guess).

KEY PHRASES: "You know how your cell phone can accidentally call someone..." "Warrior is about to die." "Death!" "I'm sorry, did you say something?" "Did Jordan just tell us to get out of her house? Where's the love?" "She's 12 months pregnant." (Funny, Jordan didn't get that joke...maybe that's a good thing).

If you can't go to the beach...

...the bring the beach to you.

At least, we tried. Had 2 yards of sand (that's a HUGE pile of sand) delivered to our house Tuesday so we could spread it in the dead/low-lying spots of our front lawn to try to get our sod to creep across it. By the time we got done, we had the major ingredients of a home-made beach going for us: Lots of sand (sadly, almost as much sand as there is grass) and sunburn. Too bad we didn't have the surf and actual 'cool factor' of being at a real beach going for us.

Hmmm...all this talk about the beach in Kyle's blog is making me REALLY want to find a way to make a beach trip. If I could talk my parents into coming out here and watching Kailyn, maybe I could make something happen.

Moved band practice to tonight...so my week feels a bit "thrown off." I like the songset, though J-mo feels the drum parts are a bit 'blah.' On the bright side, my next wireless mic and instrument transmitter arrived today. I guess I'll get it tonight at rehearsal. Kewl.

MEMORABLE QUOTES: "Do you think anyone else in the band 'really' practices their music?" "Well, yeah...I'm either naive or excessively optimistic."

RANDOM MOVIE QUOTE: "No milk will ever be OUR milk." (Billy Madison)

If National Lampoon made a movie about my life...

...then yesterday would've been the day to film.

Woke up yesterday with plans to go to B'ham. Got started a bit late, but we still made it down there. Our tenants are now out, so we were checking the house for anything still needed. Unfortunately, the house was still a bit of a grungy mess, mainly because of all the animals the tenants had. Dirt still coats the shelves, walls, and fan blades in the laundry room, where there was a pet door. The kitchen and one of the bedrooms still smell like a wet dog. On top of this, the neighbors down the hill told us that the rat problem in the basement of our house (somehow completely unknown to our tenants) had also become their problem...along with a huge mosquito problem because of the unkempt lawn. Oh, well...at least it's over...I'll never intentionally be a landlord again if I can help it.

So, we decided to vacate the frustra...er...the premises to join Chad at Jim N' Nick's for lunch. Mmmm...chicken fingers...onion rings...cheese biscuits. Was very good to get to see the Chadster and eat good food, too.

However, the "fun" continued on the ride back to the house...when - while I was stopped at a red light - a woman sideswiped my rear bumper while pulling out of a parking lot. So - BAM - dealing with that sucked an hour out of our lives. Fortunately, no injuries, and the Expedition has no discernible damage. However, the other woman's car was not so lucky, as it appears that it will need a new right front fender.

Went to Publix, picked up some air fresheners for the house, headed back to the house, did our cleaning thing (some of it), then packed up and headed for home. At least traffic heading back to Decatur was "jam-free" this time.

Once we got back, Dave and Dana were planting an inordinate number of shrubs and plants in their front planter. It was starting to look pretty good (so good, I see plants in my own future :-\). He was looking pretty tired, and was working on his last hole when...crack...he hit something and the hole started flooding with water. "Hello, water pipe." Fortunately, he, his brother, and Curtis' dad managed to get the thing repaired before too long. According to Dave, the pipes like that are supposed to be 18 inches underground. To me, this thing looked less than a foot down. No apparent "user-error" on Dave's part. In fact, Dave demonstrated some manly home-owner 'skilz' by using his garden hose to siphon water to a nearby storm drain. Simple, yes, but I wouldn't have thought of it.

After the weekly Guad meeting, J-mo, Stacey, and I played some Mario Kart: Double Dash on the GameCube. Not too shabby, but finding the best weapons/carts/etc. may take some getting used to.

KEY PHRASES: "Looks like Ben had enough rats to share with the neighborhood." "How much 'Oust' can you spray into the air before it becomes toxic to human life?" "Funny how we were just talking about Birmingham traffic..." "We just like using the extra dish of honey mustard as a center-piece for our table." "Oh, look...Dave's off again today."

Can I use the word "zany?"

That's how this past week has felt, anyway..."zany." (whatever that means). Maybe it's been more like getting caught in the undertow current at the beach. You get knocked off your feet only to get knocked down again by an incoming wave when you can finally stand again.

Last Tuesday, we went to B'ham to clean out the old house. Unfortunately, we were a bit shocked when we got there to find the house still in disarray. -sigh- We spent pretty much the whole day cleaning out the garage and cleaning up the backyard. We plan on going down again today to make sure things are now cleaned up better.

Spent a large part of the rest of the week prepping for the music at Lara's wedding. Props to Eli for hooking me up with some of Matthew's sheet music so I could stop scouring the slim selections at local music stores.

The wedding Saturday went pretty good. A big crowd showed up to see Dave's daughter get married. Funny, the whole experience reminded me a bit of my own wedding in a couple of ways: a lot of stress leading up to it, but pretty laid back and short once the event actually arrived.

Sunday went pretty well. However, I did have a technical glitch in the a.m. At first, I thought it was the newly-installed pickup in my 12-string, so I swapped out the 'generic' dry cell battery Kira installed in it. However, the "glitch" actually turned out to be a short in my tuner pedal. I hooked up both guitars to the pedal, and the pedal was just not receiving an audio signal from either one (at least not strong enough to resonate a note). I have to figure out what's causing that. Hopefully it's nothing a screwdriver and a little solder can't fix. The ony "user error" of the morning was not smacking the rest of the band around for uninformed comments ;-).

During the course of the morning, the whole band returned to the stage at cue...except for Derek. He was in a back corner with his head down (praying, I'm sure). Once we took the stage, I started picking on the strings quietly to "get his attention." He sprang to life and made it to the stage with time to spare.

Sunday afternoon Stacey, J-mo, and I headed to J-mo's friends' house on the river. Wow...that's a HUGE place. I've never been in a house with 36-foot ceilings in the living room (well, not a house that hadn't been turned into a museum of something). Hopefully, J-mo will get to house-sit one day so we can get a group to go and chill out on the deck overlooking the river one evening.

Sunday night, we did the small-group thing: Stacey, me, Eli, J-mo, Chuck, and David...we grilled burgers and played Super Monkey Ball 2 on the GameCube. It was fun to watch Chuck and Dave's 'skilz' in video-gaming come out of a long hibernation (apparently, neither has touched a game console since the days of Atari).

Phew...that's a lot to report.

KEY PHRASES: "The snow cone thingie threw me off." "Maybe Garrett has a conscience after all" (after playing "Thief" on the PC and a game-stopping bug wouldn't let me pick a lock). "I don't know what people in Japan are smoking that makes them design games where the main characters are monkeys living inside clear plastic balls and race around floating tracks in the sky." "Derek...wake up...the band's onstage."

"Engines, full reverse!"

"Aye, Captain. All engines, full reverse." The large starship's engines whined in protest as they attempted to slow the progress of the ship into the black hole.

"Sir, we've slowed, but the anomaly is still pulling us towards it."

"Divert power from life support if you have to, but get us stopped."

"Aye, Captain." Slowly the ship came to a stop.

"Captain, we've stopped, but we cannot maintain this power level for long before the impulse engines overload."

The captain gazed at his science officer, who only raised an eyebrow to affirm the seriousness of their predicament.

Fearing he may have finally met his own Kobiyashi Maru, the captain looked back at his ensign and said, "Understood."


(hehehe)

No, I'm not diving into the writing of science fiction (yet). Actually, this scenario serves as a good metaphor to describe how I feel financially right now. Our house in B'ham is finally on the market, but until it sells, we're paying 2 mortgages, 2 utility bills, and we no longer have the rent income to compensate. We can make it, but if the house does not sell quickly enough, we could drop into another financial "black hole."

But, alas...all I can do is have faith, so that's what I'll do. Until then, all we can do is divert our financial "power" to other areas (i.e., less spending, less driving the gas-hogging Expedition, etc.)

Last night, we hooked up with J-mo and Kyle at Pizza Hut. Food was good, though I ordered wings instead of pizza (I was bummed that they were no longer running the Buffalo Chicken Pizza promo).

Afterwards, we headed to the mall...ducking our heads as we passed Guadalajara, since we decided not to go there. Did the usual...walk around, pause as J-mo and Kyle's early warning radar indicate 'opportunity' (yeah, sure), play with Kailyn, browse clothes at Dillard's, browse games at EBgames, and look for friends working at Sears. Doesn't your heart just beat rapidly in your chest with excitement at reading about life here? Hehe... Came home, played on the computer, went to bed.

Today, Stacey's in Birmingham working for Walgreen's. I need to go down to the house in B'ham sometime so I can take care of a few things, but I don't know if I'll do that today or not.

KEY PHRASES: "Retreat!" "Stacey, that check should be made out to Jonathan, NOT Pizza Hut."