NFL Fantasy Files: The Best Players

A little hype for the most overhyped game is sports, the Super Bowl. These are some amazing things and there are some amazing athletes in the NFL. Now I will watch the game tomorrow and I hope its good. Enjoy.

Little bit of a problem

For the past 3 nights I have woken up around the 2 am point of the day, the night before that it was around 3-3:30 that I woke up basically rip roarin' ready to go. Now the first night could be explained because of the impending winter storm coming in and wondering how much we were going to get, I understand that but what about the other 3 nights. Could it be hunger, yes I got up on 2 of those nights and one night had a bannana and the other a cup cake. Could it be because of a nap? No. Haven't taken a nap for days. Could it be because of Tammy's snoring? Possibly. There have been a few nights where those weren't normal logs she was sawing on, I know those were redwoods. She seems to think its God telling me I'm gonna be getting a job working the night shift, who knows. All I know is that for the past few nights there has been a hour or two hour block of sleep that I'm missing out on. On a side note I have sharpened my Mahjong Titans skills on the old computer as well as Spider Solitaire. Hopefully tonight will be different but that remains to be seen. I would just like a normal nights sleep again.

Starfield I Will Go Video

I borrowed this cd from Pink over the weekend and have been listening to it quite a bit and I must say it has been messing me up. I have heard of few of Starfields songs before and enjoyed them so I thought I'd give their new cd "I Will Go" a shot, and I'm glad I did. There is not a bad song on here and it has just been hitting me over and over again, I dig it when songs do that to me I just weird like that. Check it out. This song is one of the first to hit me, it could be used at church for a mission trip because that is what the song is about. So if you've been on one or are going on the next one or if your like me and know that you will be going on one in the future check this out.

The second verse is the one that hits me the hardest:

Let me not be blind with privilege
Give me eyes to see the pain
Let the blessing You've poured out in me
NOT BE SPENT ON ME IN VAIN
Let this life be used for change
I WILL GO

A milestone of posts, #500 wow.

This is my 500th post, wow thats pretty cool I guess. I celebrate my 500th post by listening to a cd I borrowed from Pink and after listening to it I wonder why I haven't either bought it or borrowed it sooner. It is from a band called Esterlyn and the cd is called "Lamps." I have seen their first video on the Gospel Music Channel and thought it was alright then they put out another one for a song that escapes me but I really dug that song. So now after listening to the cd I highly recomend it. Its just a good cd mixed with some rocking songs and some poppier songs and then some that are almost ballady. Good stuff you should check it out. I also checked out a cd online this weekend twice from a newsletter I get every week from New Release Tuesday, it is the latest from Paul Coleman. You might be saying who is Paul Coleman. He played guitar for the Newsboys for the last 5 years and now is back to being a solo artist. You might have heard "Fill My Cup" or "Gloria" on Joy FM before but he is back with a cd called "History" which is a greatest hits kind of package with a few new songs thrown in like a cover of Delirious' "History Maker" and a song that I thought was his but later found out that it was actually done by, get this, *gasp* a country artist, Toby Keith. Oh ick. No really its a cool little song called "If I Were Jesus" kind of a funny little song but with a powerful chorus. And yes I like Paul's version way better.

Yesterday was a cool church service how it was all laid back and it was really cool to hear all the stories from the team that just got back from Jamacia. And wasn't it cool to see all the baby dedications, especially since they were all from the same fertal small group. I guess if you want to have a baby just join that small group, just kidding. Youth was fun and I'm ready to watch the video that Cari shot of the game that they played, blind-folded musical chairs. It got real interesting when the 12 dwindled down to around 4 or 5 then it got a bit physical and interesting. Not for the faint of heart.

Sunday Song List:
Not To Us - Chris Tomlin (fun little diddy to play, did it a bit different with the guitar intro which rocked not because I played it but because how everyone started clapping)
Holy Is The Lord - Chris Tomlin
Blessed Be Your Name - Matt Redman (Another favorite of mine, once again it rocked with the clapping at the begining and pretty much throught the whole song)
Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus - Not sure who wrote it but it was cool
Draw Me Close/You Are My All In All - Rick Founds and Dennis Jernnigan
You Alone - David Crowder*Band

I think Nate and the rest of the team did a fantastic job yesterday and it was fun to have Brent up there with us on the mandolin. I even got a kick out of a carry over from practice Thursday when Brent started taking the side of his pick and bouncing it off the strings which makes a pretty cool sound. Kind of made me chuckle.

That was fun.

I was on the radio again today and hopefully you were able to catch a little bit of it. It has been awhile since I've been over there and that made up for time spent away. I filled in for Joel who does the Workday Wrap-Up from 3 to 7 and it was a blast. Had the normal "I forgot what I was going to say" moments but made it through them just fine. During the all request drive at 5 I got enough requests to almost fill the entire hour, that has never happened to me before, I think I ended up with 8 requests, 2 from Farmland, 2 from Lynn, 3 from Winchester and 1 from Portland, way to represent Randolph County. One of the requests from Lynn was from the guy who is promoting the Building 429 show in Richmond on Feb. 6th, if you get a chance you should go check them out, and he was telling me they have quite a few more shows in the works and I hope they can pull them off. We need to get the word out there about good christian bands that are coming to our neck of the woods and support them so we can get more and get alot more people introduced to these bands.

Also got the schedule for Solid Rock Friday Nights and I'll be over there on March 6th for my kick-off, I'll be there on Feb. 6th after the basketball game as a tune up. Come March we will be back on for 3 solid hours rockin your socks off, each night there will be two of us taking 90 minute shifts, I will be sure and keep you updated.

What happened?

I remember when I was young playing sports how fun it was and how no matter what the outcome was life still went on. We could get beat 13-1 in baseball and still be able to laugh and have fun, yeah it sucked getting beat but it wasn't the end of the world and we still went over and gave the other team high fives or shake hands. Last night I noticed something that for the past few weeks or times I've went to either Tyson's ball games or to watch the games Taylor is cheering at that attitudes are becoming a big issue and that sportsmanship is lacking in some of the participants. Now I've played sports long enough to know its a competition and that the other team is the "enemy" for 24 to 32 minutes of action but when its all said and done its still just a game that is meant to be fun.

I know that in the past when playing that there was always one, either on my team or the other team, who had a chip on their shoulder, thought that the whole game revolved around them, or that they were the best thing since the other side of the pillow. There are always those who I call a deep black hole, which by that I mean when they get the ball in basketball the other 4 teammates might as well head back down to the other end of the floor because they aren't going to see it again until the next possession. They are the kind that no matter if they are guarded by 1,2 or more of the other team they take it upon themselves to make the shot wherever and whenever they can. Case in point, last night at one of the games a player scored like 28 of the teams 32 points or something to that effect. You might say they were on fire, yes they hit alot of shots but there was times where a break was happening and it was a 3 on 1 break and the defender was on them and they still shot the ball. Its called a team. You win as a team and you lose as a team.

The sportsmanship side real quick, at Tyson's game they got beat by 1, they had the lead and was trying to hold the ball and lost it and they went down and scored with like 10 seconds left and we had a chance but couldn't hit so tough loss. We were sitting on the top row of bleachers which was actually the 4th row and one of the kids on Tyson's team said he wasn't shaking hands with them and he didn't and I saw that the coach noticed and hopefully the coach let him know about it. Do they see this from pro athletes? Is our sports world so caught up in individual play now instead of team play? I do remember once as a young baseball player that we got beat and I was mad for whatever reason and while shaking the other teams hand I thought it was a good idea to punch one of the kids in the stomach, just a random kid who was actually older than me and probably could have beat me up but didn't. Dad caught wind of it and let me have it on the way home and I can say that I have never done anything like that again. I hope that both of my kids when ever they are competing in sports or whatever always show good sportsmanship and lead by example.

Are you kidding me?

Don't you just love cars? Cars are like insurance, they are a necessary evil. Got in the old green car last Friday went to Muncie then back home and over to Winchester, no biggie. Go to get in it Saturday to go get some gas in it and notice a nice size stain underneath the front of the car, pop the hood and see that there is no coolant in the overflow, so I put some in it to get it to the full cold area and thought I'll wait and see. Got in there yesterday and nothing had leaked out, that's good, start it up to warm it up before taking Taylor to youth and go back out and the "Service Engine Soon" light is on, that's not supposed to be on. So to make a long story short I'll be taking it to AutoZone so they can hook up the little gizmo they have that reads what the code is that is causing that to be on. I hope its nothing big or major but we will see.

Yesterdays service was good and Pink did an excellent job filling the pulpit. Music was fun playing the bass and all, it's always nice to play that everyonce in awhile, every 3 weeks now, to keep my chops up well what there are of them. Good to see my brother-in-law and his family at church again. He and his wife and youngest son came a few months ago for a series that escapes me right now and they really enjoyed it and talked about coming back. Well they did yesterday and brought Tyler their oldest son and his girlfriend, it was really cool to see them there. Gave Tyler and Mariah a tour of the new youth room aka THE 3:7, and they dug it and I extended a invite for them to come join us some Sunday evening, I hope they take me up on it sometime.

Anywho back to the music portion of yesterday, once again something unplanned just absolutely floored me, we were doing the second set and we were to end with Mighty To Save, finished it up and Pink came back up to make another quick point which was cool then I thought they'd turn the lights back on and people would head out as we played another song again, WRONG. When he left the stage and we went back into Everlasting God someone (God) turned up the energy, volume, and presence as not a single person left and that song was off the hook with everyone singing and celebrating and just all out worship. That was one of those WOW moments.

Set list:
Come, Now Is The Time To Worship - Brian Doerkson
Everlasting God - Brenton Brown wrote it, Lincoln Brewster and Chris Tomlin made it a hit.
I Will Not Be Silent - David Crowder*Band
Break Me - Nate and Nate
All Who Are Thirsty - Vinyard, Kutless version is what I'm used to.
Breathe - Vinyard, Micheal W. Smith's version is the one most people know.
Mighty To Save - Hillsong, this is one of those songs that never gets old.

Question

The picture above is out our kitchen window this evening. I noticed this morning that these icicles were only about an inch long or so. This evening I noticed that they had grown which makes me wonder, can it melt and freezze at the same time. It didn't get above zero today so it wasn't warm enough to melt but they were not this big this morning. Makes you wonder.

Also real quick next Friday the 23rd from 3-7 pm I will be doing the Workday Wrap-Up once again on 88.9 Joy Fm. For those of you not in the area but still want to listen you can go here and listen live. Tune in and have some fun with me as it has been awhile since I've filled during the afternoon, who knows maybe I'll even get to do some Solid Rock Friday Night later that evening.

It has been a little over a week now and I'm ready to venture out into the working world again looking around. If you know of any where that needs warehouse help, quality assurance help, or a DJ opening feel free to let me know so I can go check it out.

Isn't blogging amazing

I noticed a day or so ago on one of the comments on a post I had that a fellow mentioned that I didn't know him but he was praying for me and my situation, which is cool. I had noticed his profile pic before on Nathan's blog so I figured he was a friend of Nathans. I then saw that he posted on PK's blog about tv shows and saw that he was from Austrailia. Now I was overwhelmed that someone from another country would be following this little blog from a small town in the middle of America. So I looked at David's profile and found out that he too is a worship team member/leader down in OZ. I have linked both of his blogs on the sidebar now so I can see whats happening down under its the David from OZ and Worship + links if you'd like to check them out as well and say hey. I have a little connection with the land down under, as many of you know my brother and his family spent 2 years at Hillsong college and got me hooked on Hillsong United which is a whole other blog. I have always wanted to visit Austrailia even the flying over the big pond, flying doesn't bother me-big bodies of water does however, and see what it is like there. And one side note, you all know that it is summer there now don't you, just thought I'd throw that out there. And speaking of weather what another bummer, I was all pumped after seeing we could get a couple of inches of snow and winds and we got pretty much nothing, maybe next time.

Mr. Mom

Well for the past few days I keep having flashbacks to the Micheal Keaton movie Mr. Mom, if you've ever seen it you'll understand where I'm comin from. Since the lay off I've been doing stuff here at the house you know cleaning, laundry, dishes, getting the kids where they need to be, even cooking. So when Tammy heads off to work I become MR. MOM. It has been kind of enjoyable but I don't think I want to do this for an extended period of time.

Little bummed that we didn't get alot of the snow that was predicted this weekend, I know I'm messed up. I could do without the ice and would rather have just all snow, it is easier to drive on snow than ice. There is still time this season for a couple of big snows. Youth was fun last night, both jr. high and high school had quite a few new faces and I have a feeling that each week there will be more new faces. That new room is cool, you really need to check it out if you haven't yet.

Sunday set list:
How Awesome Is The Lord Most High - Chris Tomlin (started out Thursday being a new song, then changed to another then yesterday morning changed to this)
Forever - Chris Tomlin
I Stand Amazed - Charles Gabriel (I always heard you can't trust people with two first names or two last names)
Holy, Holy, Holy - Unknown
We Fall Down - Chris Tomlin
I Exhalt Thee - Pete Sanchez

A few days of relaxation

After what went down Tuesday I have enjoyed a few days of relaxation and really tried not to think a whole lot about what happened. Monday I will get out and start looking around so I thought I'd take a couple days easy. I did go to the unemployment office on Wednesday to sign up for unemployment, I got there at 7:45 and was about 12th in line and to my surprise it went pretty quick, however if I knew it was going to be like it was, I filed all the info online there, I would have just stayed home and done it online here. Didn't know that but I have that taken care of for now. Enjoyed my first M & O meeting as the clerk and to be honest I was not nervous and just let the meeting happen. We enjoyed the new youth room for the meeting, I really like to see people's reaction to the new room. Speaking of the new room I enjoyed a strawberry Frap after worship team practice last night and I think I have a new favorite. I am excited for Sunday because during practice last night you could feel God's presence there. That doesn't always happen every practice, sometimes its just going through the motions, but if you just open up it is amazing.

Now after coming home from that great experience when I got home everyone was in bed so I was the only one left up and just sat there thinking and alot of the thoughts were ones of anger towards the job and playing scenarios in my mind like "man if this happens then I'd say ...." stuff that I really wish I wouldn't have thought. I am trying to stay positive during all this and I must say we appriciate all the prayers that everyone is doing and I know that there is something that I am supposed to do. I get frustrated knowing that then going and doing or thinking things that I should not. I'm glad that God is not like me and is very forgiving and loving and even when I go from a spiritial high to an awful low He still loves me no matter what and is ready to pick me up and help me even though I feel so undeserving. Thank you God.

Didn't see that coming.

Yesterday started out like any normal day, getting up getting ready and head to work early cause I saw the radar and didn't want to get stuck driving in the freezing rain, made it there a half hour early and settled in getting things ready for the new year, all my reports and things I track and keep watch of. Around 10 the president of the company comes down and goes in my bosses office and shuts the door for a little meeting. A little bit later he leaves and the door is still shut so I don't think much about it. Had a little conversation with a couple of the other people in the office and word was getting around that they were going to lay off 22 people today. Still not thinking much about it, see my boss leave with one of the other guys in our office who was in charge of the quality lab so I think one of the guys from the lab, who misses quite a bit of work, is probably going to get it in our area. He did and so did the guy who runs the lab, didn't see that coming.

Fast forward to after lunch my boss gets called up to the office and about 10 minutes later he gave me a call asking me to come up there. Now I'm starting to think about it, get up there and he pulls me to the side and says that he wanted me to know that he had no say in this and it is out of his hands and apologizes to me. We go in and I have also been selected to be one of the people that is getting laid off, didn't see that coming at all. So we have the little meeting and I think that the lady doing the talking and my boss actually took it harder than I did. I just had this calming sense that when one door closes another one is going to open and that God does not leave us and that he provides for us so I know He has something out there that He would rather me do. I just pray for obedience and that I can plainly see where and what He is leading me towards. Yes its a bit scary right now to think of not having my income coming in after next Friday but I just know that we are gonna be o.k.

Back in the routine?

Well the new year has started and we are back into the routine or work, practices, soon to be games, and all the extra little things that life throws at us. Had a curveball thrown Sunday evening, Taylor decided to come down with a little something. She came up to me at the 3:7 and said she wasn't feeling good, achey and tired so I brought her home and when I got home a little after 8 she was already out. Woke up yesterday morning with her in the bathroom which she spent most of her time yesterday between the bathroom and the couch. Woke up this morning and she is still not feeling well so another day home, I guess 18 days away from school wasn't enough so she needed 19. Tammy is getting to hang out at the house with her and I hope she doesn't catch it, I would gladly take it away from her so that I would be the only one in the house that gets sick. Its kinda of funny in a way to see how each of us at the house handles sickness. Taylor and Tyson both spend most of the time on the couch and Tammy and I both try to keep on going like nothing is different but sometimes that doesn't always happen.

Get to face a new challenge tomorrow, it marks my first official duties as clerk of Ministry and Oversight which means I get to run the meeting. Kind of nervous in a way and in a way I'm excited for it to engage in some discussion on some of the items that are on our docket. Got a report from one of the pastors yesterday and after reading it, it got me all fired up ready to take on the world, hopefully I can convey all that tomorrow at the meeting.

Good weekend

What a cool weekend that just took place, the only downfall of the whole weekend was the fact that it was the last two days of my vacation, oh well the real world is calling again. Enjoyed having 14 days off but alas I must go back. Was at the grand opening of the new youth room last night and let me say the room was well worth the wait. There are a few minor tweaks to get it going full bore which from what Pink said should be done this week. We are now entering a new phase of the youth I think and its gonna be cool. Played a little ping pong, basketball, a little X-box 360 and messed around with the touch screen computers. Still need to get to the pool table some time and hit up the Wii and PS3 again. You need to check the room out sometime. Yesterdays song list:

Famous One - Chris Tomlin
In The Secret - Sonicflood
Be Thou My Vision - Eleanor Hull
Your Love Oh Lord - Third Day
Here Is Our King - David Crowder*Band
Oh Praise Him - David Crowder*Band

Just a little tidbit from last year the worship team did 110 different songs over the 52 weeks with How Awesome Is The Lord Most High being done the most. What a fun year it was now looking forward to what this year holds.

Down stairs Kayak

Tell me that wouldn't be fun especially into a big pile of snow.

Welcome to twenty oh nine.

Well its been 2009 for almost 3 hrs now and it has been a pretty interesting new year already. Spent New Years Eve at the McAllisters with a few other families and had a blast playing cards and a few games and even broke out our Atari to show the kids how to play video games old school. Had a blast and had lots of good food and just a good time. Came home everyone beat so the kids went to bed and Tammy set up shop on the couch, she is allergic to cats and even though she and Tyson took some medicine before heading out there they both are feeling it as I type. Tyson was blowing his nose every 30 seconds a bit ago but now has fallen asleep sitting up next to Tammy. I hope they get a good nights sleep which is where I'm heading.

Here's to a glorious and productive and just flat out awesome time in 2009.