Grief

For Christians, when a person dies there is two or three things that come to mind. One, is that God has decided to bring that person home. Another, is a wonderment of why God decided to take that person away from you. Third, is the human side, the pain and the grief of losing someone.

Last night, I came home exhausted at 9pm and laid down on the couch to relax and watch the World Series. My mom has been in town for the last 3 weeks and will be here for another week. She's been such a blessing for Darryl and I, we've had home cooking for the past 3 weeks. You wouldn't believe how much money I've saved on food. Not to mention the food is just better. I wonder if 30 years from now my son or daughter will come visit Ina and I and be grateful for our cooking. I find that really hard to believe. Neither of us can cooking particularly well. And yet "great home cooked meal" seems to be a constant for all generations. I guess that means my cooking skills are going to improve drastically in the next 20 years... Anyway, about my mom, she was planning to take a trip to Syracuse for the weekend, to visit some old college friends that she hadn't seen in a few years.

Boston had just taken the lead on a two-out double by Mike Lowell and I was pumping my fist in celebration. The Leafs had just beaten my Penguins and I needed something to lift my spirits. Mom couldn't understand what I was celebrating about, and went back to her room to do whatever moms do. After a little while I heard her say "Oooh!". I called out to her "What happened?", and then I heard two words. "Jean died.". There was a crack in her voice.

Brian: "Oh." Brain: "OH!".

It took about 3 seconds to register and that's when I jumped to my feet and raced over to comfort my mom, who was sobbing by the time I got there.

I remember as far back as age 6 or 7, when our family used to go over to Uncle Albert and Auntie Jean's home for fellowship. My parents were in a cell group with a few other parents that I probably wouldn't be able to name, but all of whom are likely going to be at my wedding next spring. At that time their youngest daughter Ruth probably wasn't even born yet. Rachel was around my age and her older sister Lynn was around a year or two older.

My parents went to visit her when they were here back in March. I guess they had given Uncle Albert my phone number, because after the car accident in May, he called me up to see if I was okay. He knew all about it I guess through my parents, and also even asked about how Ina was doing. It really took me by surprise because the last time I had talked to Uncle Albert was probably about 7-8 years ago. Probably one of my fondest memories of Auntie Jean was just how she always remembered things about me. All of my parents' other friends would ask me the same old things like how's school, how's your brother, things like that. But Auntie Jean always picked out specific things to ask me and so you could tell she wasn't just talking to me because I was my parents kid, she actually cared about me and how I was doing. As we got older we saw that family less and less, but whenever we did visit she'd remember me, and talk about the old days, she was a very nice lady, very kind and very loving.

Auntie Jean was diagnosed with cancer about a year ago. But I guess because I hadn't seen them in so long, it didn't affect me the way it might have, had it been someone who was 'currently' close to me. I prayed for her off and on, but most of the time I just forgot. Sometimes you just forget, when there's so much in the world to pray for.

I don't know about you guys but when I see either of my parents cry, that is a real tear jerker right there. Nothing can really prepare you to see your parents cry. I guess we are just wired that way -- we're so close to our parents that, when they feel something you feel it too, even if you shouldn't. Seeing my mom devastated by the news made it a whole lot worse for me than it really was.

You just know that none of that is helping her emotionally, because you've also lost a loved one before and none of those statements helped you feel any better either.

After hugging my mom for about 5-10 minutes, she finally stopped crying. I never know what to say to people when they're crying and dealing with grief. Crying for physical pain is a little easier to comfort, or because you hurt their feelings, that's all about just saying sorry and hugging them. But for grief, a loss of a life, that's hard. There's always those token phrases that you know just doesn't help at all, like "She is in a better place.", or "She died peacefully.", or "Don't worry we will all see her again some day.."

Mom muttered something about how she had wanted to go see her but Jean had asked that no one come visit her because she wanted them to remember her as she was, and not as she is. Then she sobbed some more and then told me how they were expecting their first grandchild in 2 weeks. Damn.

When I got back to the couch and started to think about how close Jean and Albert were to her and what it might be like for me, how could I understand or wrap my head around how she was feeling. I really wanted to empathize with those affected by this huge loss. I thought about some of our (Ina and I) closer friends, like Stan and Yee Lee, Nancy and Duncan, and how it might be like if one of them died. We've known these people for on average 5-6 years, and have grown really close to them over the past year, but my parents had been friends with Jean and Albert for 25 years. Imagining the magnitude of friendship from that standpoint fast forwarded me to the reality my mom was dealing with.

It also made me think about Jean's 3 daughters and husband, and 2 son-in-laws, and how they were feeling at this particular moment. Jean was expecting her first grandchild, due in 2 weeks. She died peacefully, with her husband and youngest daughter by her side.

These emotions stirred inside me as I prayed the night away. Grief.

And now a word from our sponsor

Are you Stressed?

Are you tired of the same old thing??

Hi, my name is Brian and I am here to tell you that I have discovered the way to beat your stresses and your depression. As the joys of summer ended I was in dire straits and in need of a pick me up. And I found it.

A few weeks ago I discovered that cheering against the Toronto Maple Leafs brought great satisfaction. I'll tell you what: At first, it felt so unnatural. I had been an avid Leaf fan since the age of 7, so the idea of cheering against the team I loved so much was truly difficult. But boy has it been gratifying.

Satisfaction Guaranteed
The Leafs are not only a bad team, they will break your heart -- they will take a big lead in a game only to relingquish the lead and eventually lose. This makes for fantastic drama, because everyone around you is foolishing cheering FOR them, you are almost guaranteed a good laugh by the end of the game.

This does not mean I hate the team -- on the contrary, this team I love so much will only start to improve if they have a truly horrible season, whereupon a stupid, idiotic and moronic assclowns like General Manager John Ferguson gets fired. This is the only, only way. As a 22 year fan, I have been through some very dark times indeed and some good times, but one thing I have discovered is that signing players who are 3 and 4 years past their prime is not the way to win hockey games.

Laugh at your friends!
Why is Bryan McCabe making 6 million dollars? Why do they still have Mats Sundin? Darcy Tucker? Wow, they got Jason Blake? Too bad it wasn't 5 years ago! Did you know that Wade Belak was a 12th overall pick? Why is the team pretending to have two starting goalies, when both aren't even as good as most teams' backups?

These are questions you can use when you make fun of your friends as they cheer on this lowly team.

Testimonial 1
Two nights ago I came home late, exhausted after a night out. I walked in wanting to head straight to bed but, lo and behold I see my brother sitting at the television. He says "shoot-out!". If was my Atlanta Thrashers, the worst team in the league, playing against his beloved Leafs. As I stepped in and sat down, Ilya Kovalchuck went in and scored, the winning goal. As I wooted and cheered my brother looked down at his feet, dejected. Do you see how great that was?

Testimonial 2
About a week ago I was sitting in a restaurant in St. Catherines, and the game was on. The restaurant was rustling and bustling as the game was on, patrons were excited that the Leafs were up 3-1 against the Chicago Blackhawks. But I knew better. As an avid Chicago Blackhawks fan, it was only a matter of time before we came back. Next thing you knew it was 3-2. Then 3-3. As the groans mounted in the restaurant, I raised my arms in exhuberance. Oh baby, we are coming back! Minutes later it was 5-3 Chicago. I was elated!

No commitments
The greatest thing about this is, there are no commitments! I turned from a die-hard Chicago Blackhawk fan to an Atlanta Thrasher fan in less than a week! You just go from team to team and cheer for the team that is playing the Leafs. Even if your team loses, you can still laugh at your friends by pointing out that their last Stanley Cup win was in 1967.

Win-win
So as you can see, this is a win-win situation. I hate to hate the Leafs, but it has to be done. And you can have fun doing it.

Go Penguins!

Money not well spent; Crocs aren't all ugly

We went to Buffalo on Saturday to take advantage of the strong Canadian dollar and cheap US prices. I ended up spending a whopping $67.

The first place we went to was Target, where I made the bulk of my purchases. I bought a Nelly Furtado CD "Loose", which I can tell you, has 2 good songs on it and not much else. I got a great "deal" if you think about the price I paid compared to how much it would have costed buying in Toronto, but overall not a very good buy at all.

The second thing I bought, was kind of a double whammy. They had two David Crowder Band "Remedy" CDs left, so I grabbed them both and gave one to my friend who was with us. So we both bought it. Again, overall according to my calculations we saved $6 each on the disc. I opened his up so we could listen to it for the remainder of the trip. Boy did it suck.

What in the world has happened to David Crowder Band, after promising albums like "Can You Hear Us", and "Illuminate", this band has completely lost it. "A Collision" was a total disaster, and for a second I somehow thought maybe they would get back on track with this one. Never again will I waste money on DCB. Avoid this CD like the plague, if you haven't already made the same mistake as I did.

The other purchases I made were wedding cards. Both were bargains because I paid the US price.

We then headed over to the fashion outlet where I bought some "Crocs" slippers. Amazingly this was the best purchase I made. Crocs are super comfortable, even if they are ridiculous looking. I got the kind that look like slippers -- open-toed, slippers. These slippers are not ugly, they're just slippers. No silly looking plastic clunkers, just regular slippers with fantastical soles. They are easily the most comfortable pair of shoes/slippers I've ever worn.

Why the Pats are so good, or why the NFL salary cap sucks

Personally I've never been a fan of the New England Patriots. Cheering for them is like cheering for Tiger Woods or Roger Federer -- but none can deny that this is a franchise that has figured it all out. They have figured out the intricacies of the NFL Salary Cap, and built a team that has stood the test of time. Few franchises in professional sports have enjoyed the success that the Pats have attained, and their appears to be no end in sight. Watching last night's game was a great indication to me why the NFL salary system is flawed. The Pats completely dominated the game, in every facet of the game.

In most cases in any sport, you will have a team that dominates offense or defense, but rarely both. Last year's NFL champions were the Colts, a team that dominated offensively. They beat the Chicago Bears, who had the NFL's best defense that year. Even if you look at years past, what helped the Pats win championships in previous years was their stout defense. But this year, the Pats are dominating on both sides of the ball. Their defense is excellent, but now their offense is also excellent.

The analysts talked about how Tom Brady is having such a huge year, now having been surrounded by a cast of very talented receivers. Starting with Randy Moss who is one of the top 2-3 receivers in the league, Donte Stallworth who was the Eagles' #1 WR over the past 2-3 years, and Wes Welker, the all purpose wonder-boy from Miami last season. Adding to that they also have Laurence Maroney, a budding young superstar who's only flaw is probably his injury woes, and a top tight-end in Benjamin Watson.

The scary thing about the success of the Patriots over the past 5-6 years, is like I mentioned, the fact that this team was already loaded with superstars on the other side of the ball -- on defense. Guys like Tedy Bruschi, Rodney Harrison, Asante Samuel, Rosevelt Colvin, Ellis Hobbs, Mike Vrabel. Heck, they even have Junior Seau! It's a wonder how a team loaded with players like these could afford to load up on superstars on the offensive side too!

If there is one thing that the Pats' success over the years has shown, is the flaws in the NFL's salary cap and collective bargaining agreement. In no other league with a cap can you load up on the amount of talent that the Pats have on their roster.

The fact that you can go and front-load a players' salary with a gigantic signing bonus that can be pro-rated over the contract length so that it doesn't hurt the cap rating, and then structure the deal so that it is back-heavy. With non-guaranteed contracts teams can 'conveniently' say goodbye to awful contracts. This is something the New York Knicks (who are $75M over the NBA cap) can only dream of. The ability to restructure contracts, or the fact that contracts are not guaranteed would help Isiah Thomas not look like the buffoon that he is.

The NBA has minimum salary wages, based upon a players' experience in the league, his average pay and the league's average pay. You wouldn't be able to go out and get a Randy Moss and give him a substantial pay cut, because of the rules behind salaries in the NBA. And why wouldn't you take a cut if you could get yourself on a team full of all-stars and not worry about some kind of minimum salary sliding scale. If the NBA were built like the NFL, the Boston Celtics would have no problems adding a solid, if not very capable bench behind Garnett, Allen and Pierce. They'd even be able to restructure each of these superstar contracts and go pick up a Kobe Bryant, Steve Nash or Lebron James for added measure.

You also wouldn't be able to give up essentially nothing to trade in a guy like Moss, because there are trading limitations, based on percentages of salary cost on the players changing teams.

NFL teams also have the ability to create an entirely incentive-based contract, which allows the amount of money counted against the cap to be fairly minimal, depending of course on the types of incentives.

Simply put, there is no way that a team like the current 2007 New England Patriots -- a team that could likely represent the AFC in this years' Pro-Bowl -- could ever be assembled under the NBA Salary structure.

I used to think that the NFL was the great pro-sport league in the world. I still believe that. Yes, the cap system is seriously flawed, but if all teams could figure things out the way the Pats have, we wouldn't have to sit through these blowouts between teams that have the same record but are clearly in completely different leagues.

The NFL is a well-oiled machine that makes a ton of money. There is no league that has sustained its popularity the way the NFL has over the years. Everything about it, from the 16-week grind, to the 80,000+ seating domes, to the fact that at any given play you might break your neck. Football is just awesome, plain and simple.

Some might blame the system but I blame the GMs. Look at a team like the New York Jets. Why in the world do they even use Chad Pennington? After years of inconsistency. The Jets have stuck with Pennington for 5-6 years and he is hurt all the time and sucks. Why do you stick with a guy like that. Why did it take so many years until you drafted a new QB? What if Clemens sucks, will you wait another 5 years of mediocrity before drafting another? And there are teams like this all over the league, making horrible personnel decisions over and over again.

Change

I'm usually pretty good at calculating change. I like it when I have just the right amount such that when I pay, they give me a perfectly even amount with no pennies. Lately though, I've been noticing that I've been getting the wrong change. I have calculated it in my head, but when I look down I see a different amount that I was expecting. It's less. I hate being cheated.

Ever since the value of the Canadian dollar surpassed the US dollar, I have noticed that more and more of the change in my pocket is American currency. I feel like I'm being ripped off. What the heck --- that isn't the Queen! Why is there a White House on my nickel? What's this? An eagle?! Yo, that's not 25 cents. That's like... 24.6 cents.

I want Canadian change please. None of these American 'pesos', thankyouverymuch.

Is there a difference?

What's the difference between shows like Entertainment Tonight versus shows like Sportscentre?

Embezzlement

I've been reading this essay and found it really interesting. Basically what the guy is saying is that the early church gave nearly all of the offering and tithings it received to the poor. Not just to be nice, but as a principle.

I'm not about to say what's the right or wrong way to do things, I'm fully aware of the cost of running a church in terms of the building, rent, taxes, electricity.. all that stuff that comes even before paying the staff.

But I do find it interesting that the early church made it priority to give back to the community first, before worrying about their staff, whereas today's church makes it a priority to look after all its costs first, then whatever is left, may or may not go to the community. Today's tithings and offering benefit the church whereas before they benefited the non-church.

You can take one page out of the tribes of Israel's book. The Levites were assigned to take all the offerings and tithes and give them to those who needed it, ie the poor. The bible says that the clergy were to be entitled to a tithing of the the tithing, which is basically 1%. So we are looking at 9% for the poor and 1% to the church of the total 10% tithe.

If we were to pick a side without knowing the big picture and past history and how these early churches arrived to the decision to give back to the poor.. I mean if i were to just throw caution to the wind, I would tend to agree with the early church. It's really hard to argue against some of these historical leaders and clergy such as Tertullian, Justin Martyr, Augustine, Irenaeus, Basil the Great, Gregory of Nazianzus, Jerome, John Chrysostom, Aristides. Not that I know really who any of these people are, but I have heard of them and I do know that they did great things.

I'd arrive to the conclusion that indeed all that money *should* go to the poor. As Shane Claiborne once wrote "I'm convinced that God didn't mess up and make too many people and not enough stuff."

What I'm really talking about here is justice. We need to bring justice. As I mentioned I am fully aware of what it costs to run a church. But if there is no justice, then what's the point of church?

Here's what God has to say about church with no justice, from Amos 5:21-24:

"I hate, I despise your religious feasts;
I cannot stand your assemblies.
22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them.
Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,
I will have no regard for them.
23 Away with the noise of your songs!
I will not listen to the music of your harps.
24 But let justice roll on like a river,
righteousness like a never-failing stream!

I can't pretend that I have come up with a grand solution as to how our church could survive if all tithings and offerings were given to the poor. I can't and I won't. Back in the days, they used candles and maybe their sanctuary was outdoors, maybe they lived in countries where there weren't 6 months of winter.

So to sum up:

God is telling me that tithing should go to the poor, and God is also telling me I have to tithe to the church, and the church is spending the tithing on itself.

As Christians we must tithe, and if tithing was meant for the poor and isn't going there, then I must give 9 percent to the poor. If I give my money to the middle man, he or she may put it all into the electricity bill instead of giving it to the poor.

Therefore I need to skip the middle man and give it directly to the poor.

Dear Google,

Are you ever more forgiving of one thing over another? For example, maybe you have one sibling who has an annoying habit that you complain about every time he/she does it, but then someone else in your family has the exact same annoying habit but you look the other way? Another one I can think of is how I am ever-forgiving of Nintendo for not coming out with any good games for the Wii, and continuously tell people that the Wii is awesome even though I haven't played the thing for about 7 months.

What I've been finding is that we're a little like that with Google Mail. When Gmail came out it was the coolest thing ever. It was fast. It had conversations. It had chat. It had POP access. It had 2 gb (and counting) of disk space. It had auto-complete for emails. It had a chat log. The search tool was fantastic. It had great spam protection. It used Ajax so it was quick and functional, no annoying page to page screen loadings. I told everyone I knew about Google Mail and encouraged them to join.

3 years have passed and all the great features are still there. The unfortunate thing is, everyone has caught up to them and surpassed them. That's what happens when you sit around and twiddle your thumbs. Yahoo Mail has every single feature except for the conversations feature. It has chat, it has POP, auto-complete, Ajax. The search is there, and spam protection. It's all there. And it's fast, which is something that can no longer be said about Gmail, which seemingly has slowed down to a crawl. I dunno about you guys but I'm tired of clicking on something in Gmail and seeing that "Loading.." thing popup, and you can't even cancel it, you have no choice but to sit there and wait for it to load. On any other application, if you want to cancel, you press Esc or STOP. With Google mail, you wait. And you wait. And you wait.

Why is it taking so long? Is it wrong to assume that opening an email should be faster than the Google search tool which datamines the entire internet and comes up with a result in less than a second?

Did I mention Yahoo Mail has *unlimited* space? And the spam protection has been upped to a notch where I no longer receive as much spam as I do on Gmail. Did I mention Yahoo Mail has a built-in RSS reader? 1-button to erase all my spam?

3 years is an awfully long time for an application to sit in Beta testing. If any other company put out something that sat in Beta for 3 years, they would have gone out of business by now.

I'm ready for an upgrade, Google. I think we deserve one. Years of us telling people how great GMail is, but now I look back at Yahoo! Mail and see a far superior web-based email application. We need something to back us up on our claims that Gmail truly is the next best thing. I don't want to be called a liar.

Help me be honest.

Yours truly,
ebrian

Beli-cheat

Now that some of the dust has settled, I'd like to weigh in my opinion on this huge NFL scandal. Although the fines have been handed out and the Pats' success this season has proven that talented teams win (nothing new here), I believe this scandal has only reached the tip of a giant iceberg. Believe me when I say the NFL is literally reeling from this entire fiasco.

But that's a story for another day.. the jury is still out on that stuff.. about how the NFL "destroyed" all records of cheating material before even allowing us to hear about it. You can read all the conspiracy theories on the internet. To me there is only one thing that matters, because I love this game and I believe in this game. The question that most people have today is whether or not this cheating could have affected the New England's tremendous success over the past 4-5 years.

I have read all the theories about whether or not illegally taping opposing team signals can or cannot give a significant advantage to the perpetrating team. There appears to be a consensus, that, since you only play teams at most once or twice per year, taping their signals shouldn't help you all that much. And teams probably change their signals from game to game, you'd have to be stupid not to. You're standing across the field in plain sight of the other guys. Most teams have designated staff to keep an eye on their opponents' signals.

The fact is though, New England Patriots -- or "America's Team" did cheat. That much we do know. NFL rules forbid filming the opponents' sideline or recording opponents' signal calling. The question that I have for those who believe that Belichick's cheating brought them no decided advantage is this.

Why would you blatantly break the rules -- why go out of your way and risk suspensions, shame and fines, unless it gave you some kind of advantage? It's like a terrorist standing before a judge and saying "I wasn't actually planning to do anything on the plane.. I just wanted to see if I could pull it off...". Uh-huh. Let's think about this for a moment. Bill Belichick is no idiot. He knows about the above facts/arguments that I have pointed out. And he knows just as well the risks and consequences of cheating. So why then, if it brings the team no significant advantage, would you bother? Why throw away all the honor and respect you've gained over 5 seasons of *great* success if it doesn't even help you?

Why would a team with so much success over the past 5 seasons, a team that won 3 Superbowl Championships in 5 years, with stifling defense and a QB that some consider to be one of the best of all time -- why take such a huge risk of casting doubt over all the achievements and accolades this team has accomplished -- unless it didn't give you a considerable edge over your opponents?

--

My answer to this question is that if Bill Belichick believed that it'd be worth the risk, then you better believe it gave them a substantial, if not *MONUMENTAL* advantage.

I dream of mango

I love produce. Every Thursday they have Farmer's Market just outside work, at Metro Hall just outside in the courtyard. I love to just go out there and look at all the produce. Lots of potatoes, and I don't even like potatoes. They've got all kinds of stuff, and whenever I see something I've never seen before, I buy it. Especially fruit. Last year I discovered a kind of pear called "Flemish Beauty". These things, when ripe, literally melt in your mouth. It's like a poached pear only it's in its natural form. So juicy and delicious. The year before last I discovered the "Campari" tomato. To this day, have not found a tastier kind of tomato than the Campari. This year I discovered "Clapp" pears. They're okay. My brother likes them more than I do.

I few weeks ago I read about these special mangoes on Epicurious. The blogger described them as if they were so good, you'd see people stick their whole face right into the mango, and *wear* the peel on their face. The way he described it, had me dreaming about mangoes for the next while. Every time I'd hit a supermarket I'd look for these mangoes, ones that supposedly are only in season for 2-3 week per year.

As result, I had the strangest dream last night..

I was sitting in class. We were writing some kind of exam, and then I thought to myself, "Hey, why am I in class? I already have my degree!", so I told the teacher and he said we were in high school, and I hadn't completed grade 14 math. 14?! Since when were there 14 grades? So anyway, we all realized that there's only 12 grades (13 back in the day, but) definitely not 14.

Next thing I know I'm in a dark alley, with I believe it was Ken, Holly and Charita. We hear about some kind of mango sale at a supermarket so we go there but it's closing. But they're still letting a few people in. I see these mangoes. They're like huge mangoes, like 12 inches long, and they look kind of like big eggplants, only with mango colors. I thought to myself, these had to be those special mangoes that you wear on your face because they taste so good. The sign says 99 cents each and I'm thinking I'll grab the rest but I could only hold 2 of them, they were so heavy and big. By now they've grown even bigger, they feel like watermelons in my hands.

Anyway, I get into line and the lady says, the store closing time has elapsed and therefore it's no longer 99 cents. She tells me the mango is $5.79. I reach into my pocket and I find I've only got $6. So I reluctantly put 1 mango down and buy just the one. Then, this lady behind me says she'll take the one I couldn't take. And then, the cashier lady says "Okay, you can have it for 11 cents."

11 cents!! What the hell?!? I was pissed, I started yelling at her, and I went over and started telling all the customers how I had been cheated, but the cashier lady was sticking with it, she was totally screwing me over. I told everyone and then finally Charita came over and pulled me away. During all the ruckus, I lost my other mango.

As we left, I heard Ken say "Man, did you see that? That Brian is one crazy m-----f-----!".

(I've been watching this cop show on HBO called "The Wire". I'll talk more about this show later, but let's just say it has a lot of profane language and maybe it's starting to rub off on me.)

That's pretty much how the dream ended. I guess I'll never find those mangoes..

How are you doing, spiritually?

I was sitting with a friend yesterday, catching up and enjoying some ice cream when the proverbial question came. "So, how are you doing, spiritually?".

Not sure about the rest of you, but I've always had trouble with this question. Perhaps it's just the wording of the question that confuses me. Spiritually, how am I doing? How am I doing from a spiritual perspective, as opposed to a physical perspective, or emotional.. or vocationally?

What puzzles me is whether or not I'm capable of separating myself out into these categories. Other than Physical Brian, I'm not sure I can split Spiritual Brian, Vocational Brian and Emotional Brian. There is only one me. And is it even right for me to be able to do that, when God should be part of my entire being? If I am able to separate Vocation Brian and Spiritual Brian, does that make me a Sunday Christian?

Most of the time when I'm asked this question, I want to run away because deep down I am thinking to myself that I haven't spent enough time with God and that I am about to be exposed for not being a perfect Christian. I suppose from that I've discovered that I often feel a sense of guilt and duty when it comes to my walk with God. So when the question is asked, I often feel like a deer in headlights, and a sense of fear and guilt comes over me. What do I say? "Okay, okay. You got me. The truth is finally out there folks. Yes. I'm a bad Christian. I spend more time watching sports than reading the Bible. It's true and I am ashamed. Also, I often fall asleep when I'm praying at night, and I have passed up about a billion times to share my faith because I am scared to offend the other person." Cameras flash and tomorrow you see me, plastered on the front page of every newspaper, and the caption reads: "Guilty: Man claims to be a Christian".

Sometimes I find when I'm asked the question, I start making excuses in my head. As if I can some how justify myself. I'm thinking "Well.. I just did some missions, so I'm definitely half decent right now.." or "My devotions are almost non-existent, but I pray every night, and plus I'm serving on the worship team so that has to count for something right?"

I think generally it is difficult or people don't really want to think about that aspect of their life. Or maybe it's just me. We want to believe that things are A-OK, because as Christians we want to appear as if everything is fine and dandy, that life is perfect in an otherwise depressing and imperfect, world.

The first

People like to be first. They want to get things first. Like a new DVD, or a new gadget. Someone would say "Hey, that's a great phone, but I got it first." People line up for hours so that they can be the first to see a new movie, so that they can tell their friends "Nah, I saw that one already. I saw it first." Or to be first to get into the arena get a great seat.

Of course everyone wants to be first. They want to win, and get that coveted first prize. First in your class. First to graduate. In piano I would always strive to get that "First Class Honors" grade. In violin, you want to be first chair.

As I approached a red light on the road, I slowed my car down and this guy sped past me and cut me off. He wanted to be first. First in line baby. He sure showed me a thing or two.

Second is just no good. And heaven forbid you come in third. People want to be first so badly, that someone who came in second came up with a silly rhyme so they wouldn't feel bad about not coming in first.

A teacher asks a question and a bunch of little hands shoot right up into the air. "Me! Me! Pick me, I was first!". And what an honor it used to be, getting picked first during a game of kickball at recess time. It makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

"Let me be the first to congratulate you on.."

Jacob went to great lengths to fool his own father that he was first.

Parents gather around, patiently awaiting their child's first word. First step! The first 5000 people in the arena will receive a free bobble-head. Sorry, you don't get a bobble-head, you weren't first. I cried tears of joy last year when Toronto was awarded the first overall pick of the 2006 NBA Draft.


It's a wonder to me, after a life of wanting to be first, we don't strive to be better Christians, we don't strive to be first where it actually matters.

We rush through our entire lives, trying to achieve first place in all that we do, but when it comes to pleasing our God, we're satisfied with just being where we are. Myself included. Are we being too complacent?

You won't see me trying to cut in line to signup for Sunday School.

Here's a signup sheet for prayer ministry. Who wants to sign up? Who wants to be first on the list? No one's signing up. There isn't even a lineup.

Sunday Service ends, everyone rushes out of the sanctuary, trying to be first in line for snacks. Let me grab a cup so I can scoop more cheese sticks than you. Hey, what are you doing? I was first. Here it comes..

We really don't know what do with ourselves though, do we? God chose us. God picked us first. But how do we respond? God's God. I mean, we're just a bunch of human beings rush from one place to another. Let someone else be first. How can we pick God first anyway, amongst all the other important things in our lives? God's everywhere and around all the time, so He won't mind. He's God.

I'll catch you later, God.. I've got things to do in the meantime.

Booooring

My brother and I took a break from Rainbow 6 Las Vegas to catch a glimpse of what we hoped to be an exciting tennis match between Roger Federer and Andy Roddick. Instead, we ended up switching back and forth between Roger's total domination of Andy, and a movie called "Tenacious D: The Pick of Destiny". The movie itself was just awful, probably one of the worst movies I've seen in a long time, but far more entertaining than Federer's dismantling of yet another opponent. The movie kind of reminded me of those "boy becomes man" road trip type movies full of horny teenagers getting high, only instead of teenagers it was Jack Black and some other old fat guy.

I think what's boring about men's tennis these days is the lack of any kind of true rivalry. Federer is so good, he rarely looks tired or winded after a match, playing the other so-called best players in the world. I think for tennis to become any thing more than remotely interesting again, we need a second player who can actually put up a fight against Federer. And don't give me Nadal, that's only 1 tournament. Last night I felt like Roddick's only major accomplishment was the fact that Federer started to sweat a little bit. I mean, if you can get Federer to sweat, you must be playing pretty good tennis..

Some may argue that golf is the same way with Tiger Woods. No question, the fact that he dominates his sport is very much like the way Federer dominates tennis. But tennis is an exciting sport while golf has never been exciting. We are looking at opposite ends of the spectrum. Tiger makes golf barely worth watching, while Federer makes tennis predictable and boring. And to be honest who really watches golf other than for some ambiance noise while you take an afternoon nap?

Extra thin wallet

A few months ago I bought a wallet and reviewed it. I've been using this wallet for some time and I find it amazing that it's so thin. Sometimes I don't even have my wallet and I think I do because I've gotten used to its thinness.

This morning I found it extra thin.. to my chagrin, I had lost several pieces of my IDs. What a disaster. While I was in Vegas last week, I showed my dad this awesome wallet I had and all he had to say was "Look how loose it is, your cards are going to fall out!".

At the time, I only scoffed at him, but today my only response is: "Damn it.."

So, if you're looking to buy an ALL-ETT Billfold wallet.. watch out! One entire pocket emptied itself somewhere within the last 3 days. And I have no idea where I lost it.

:|

30-3!

I don't follow baseball so I didn't hear about this until today.. but apparently on Wednesday the Baltimore Orioles suffered one of the most overwhelming defeats in the history of Major League Baseball. They lost to the Texas Rangers, 30-3. They say that no team has scored this many runs in a game in 110 years!

I couldn't stop giggling to myself as I thought about this, a team losing by 27 runs, how demoralizing that must have been.. hmm.. what's wrong with me.. I'm evil!! Why am I revelling in other people's misery?

I was just asking my cousin about how a team could win like that without feeling bad about it. I mean when it's 24-3 going into the ninth inning, why are you thinking to yourself about the possibility of scoring 6 more runs? Your opponents are demoralized, beaten and battered, why rub salt into their wounds? That's just mean.

Losing like that is the worst. This totally reminds me of when I used to play in the Chinese Christian Softball Association (CCSA), man that I was probably some of the most demoralizing experiences in my teenage life (well, other than being a geek and having no friends). We would lose games just like the Orioles, only it would come EVERY week, not every 110 years. Game after game, slaughter after slaughter, it was awful.

Fried Rice

I made fried rice a couple days ago, it's the first time I've ever tried it since fried rice traditionally contains eggs. I had a craving for it and went ahead and tried it. The picture really doesn't do it justice, I just took a photo of the leftovers which isn't very much at all. I had to take it really close because there was so little left.

Anyway, I was scouring the newsgroups for a recipe that didn't contain egg, and the funny thing is all these white americans wrote in that egg was more of a garnish and unnecessary in fried rice! Most of them rarely used egg in fried rice, or had eggs in fried rice before! Can you believe that? I think it's sad that all these people who are supposedly good cooks have been poisoned by these North American chinese restaurants, of the Ho-Lee-Chow and Manchu Wok variety.

It's not just me

As I've mentioned many times before, I have this thing about bags. I *love* bags. I want to have that one bag that will have just the right number of pockets to fit the many little knick-knacks that I feel I need to carry or else I will die.

Today I discovered I'm not the only one. Lifehacker.com asked its readers to submit their "Go Bag", and a picture of all the items within. The gallery can be found here. It's not just me.

A few years ago I developed a fetish for a good bag. Me and this other guy from work would frequent MEC looking for the ultimate bag. I found it -- in the form of the MEC Pod Sling Pack, but shortly after that I found everyone was getting one, including friends I hung out with. It's important to find that unique look, if you know what I mean. So I had no choice but to move on.

That's when I discovered the MEC Transit 6 Shoulder Bag". I've been using this little guy for the past 2-3 years. It's not perfect, but the fact that it fits everything that went into the Sling Pack, plus a bible and notebook, is pretty decent. It's not exactly the coolest looking bag but it's functional.

There are a few bags out there that are kind of out of reach, such as TUMI bags, which simply aren't available here and well, they cost quite a pretty penny. There are also timbuk2 bags which are also very nice, but again, out of reach for me at this time.

A few months ago I found this bag called the slotBar. It's made by UrbanTool, and it is coming out on September 12, 2007. Due to my own selfish reasons, I've done my best to hide this bag from others because I know that everyone will copy me once they see it. I know how silly that sounds.. but it's true.

Here's a link to what I hope will be the ultimate bag for me.

Lifeline

Thanks to everyone who did wish me a happy birthday yesterday. For those who didn't, don't worry about it, it's not like I celebrate my birthday anyway.

Yesterday I had a conversation with one of my co-workers. He started working for the City a few months ago and is going to be a victim of the cutbacks in the City, he'll be laid off by this Friday. It was really sad to talk to him about it, pretty much anyone who becomes a temp with the City is almost guaranteed to eventually become permanent, and thus are set for life. That's pretty much the route I took with my career at the City.

But talking to this guy you really see how important a job is, especially when raising a family. I think it's something I really far too often take for granted. So we were sitting at the lunch table talking about it and asking him if he was able to find another job, which he wasn't. He mentioned something about doing some hard labor for $10/hour. Then I asked him about if his wife worked, he said yes, but that she didn't make enough to support the family. And then he joked about how he was glad he didn't buy a house. Wow, can you imagine if he had, talk about a family crisis. Then we talked about some of the other temps who are being laid off, most of them were either gone already or still had a couple of months left. Because he was the most junior of the lot, he was getting let go first.

That really sucks.

Edit: So today I was talking to this guy again, and he was telling me about how he brought his car in for service and they tried to rip him off again, it was all over about $50, but due to his financial/job situation, that's like a week of food for him and his family. Then he started talking about some fruit he bought the other day and how his lunch came out to $8, and that if he told his wife she'd probably kick him out.

That's pretty depressing..

It's just the way and manner in which he carries himself, you really feel for the guy, he's really great at lamenting. I feel so bad for the guy that if I had my cheque book I'd probably give him some money.

Rock

Rock, the executive chef, won Hell's Kitchen last night and order was restored to the universe. My brother and I were sitting there thinking, what would it be like if Bonnie had won. What a disaster that could have been. You walk into the Green Valley Ranch restaurant, and plop down $20 for a prawn fettuccine that even a nanny could have made.

Not to take anything away from Bonnie's signature dish, I'm sure it tastes great, but who would want to spend money on that when you can make it at home in less than 20 minutes? Where's the draw? What's compelling you to go to the restaurant at all?

Of course there was no way she could have won. I think Jenn was robbed a finals appearance and probably could have beaten Rock, but like last season, Ramsey put an obvious winner against a cutesy girl. Why does he do it? Is it for ratings? Me, I'd rather see the two best chefs go head-to-head. I don't need a "Cinderella" story in my book. Had Bonnie won the competition, Chef Ramsey would have lost all his credibility. It would have been a travesty and an embarrassment for the cooking world.

Dinner

Take a wild guess as to what this is.

Anyway, I've been doing some cooking lately, I think Darryl and I have now had home-made dinner for about 2 weeks now, still going strong. I haven't followed any recipes, just made stuff off the top of my head, whatever inspires me.

One thing I've been having fun with is cooking with tomatoes. The tricky thing about tomatoes is that it all just falls apart when you cook it. And that's not a bad thing -- it tastes quite good. I made tomatoe/onion/mushroom/chicken breast dish last week, and quite a bit of it to last, and it actually turned out great, it was the first time I'd ever cooked with tomatoes.

Last night I made a similar one, adding cauliflower and substituting the chicken with a marinated ground beef. I found marinating the beef a lot better than what I'd done with the chicken, which had absolutely no taste in my last dish. What's great is that it's simple to make and cheap too, and it's all you need to go with some rice.

The above picture is a "watermelon steak". It's made from watermelon, cooked at 350 degrees in the oven. It was dotted with butter and has sherry poured all over. I guess it's a dessert. Add salt and pepper to taste..

Spiritual Leadership

Before he left, Daniel encouraged me to step up more a spiritual leader after the first week at Longlac. For me, it was something I was already looking and trying to do, so getting some encouragement was nice. To me being responsible for the spiritual well-being of our team wasn't as hard as I thought it could be. The thing is you're on a missions trip so God is right there with you, it's impossible not to pray for something before you try it in that kind of scenario. If anything, you're even more in-tune with Him than ever. It's nearly impossible to forget about God while doing God's work.

With God working right there with us, almost hand-in-hand, I barely felt any kind of pressure or burden to lead, other than to lead by example.

Lately, I've been thinking more about spiritual leadership from a relationship standpoint. When I get married in May 2008, I'll have to take on a new responsibility, as head of the household. And more importantly, spiritual head of the family.

I feel a lot of pressure with this one, and rightly so.. to have the responsibility to ensure that we as a couple are living the life God intended us to live. I think about my brother and I, and how I encourage him to attend church and read the bible regularly, but when he doesn't there isn't a whole lot I can do on my end. Yes, it's somewhat my responsibility but not really. I advice will only take him so far.. in the end he needs to make his own adult decisions.

I talked to my dad about this and he didn't seem to have an answer. My parents don't pray together, nor study the bible together, although both do it avidly, they also do is separately. I suppose it is, once again, about living by example. Dom mentioned how he and his wife do devotions together every day, and they pray together too.

I was telling Daniel about how I'd read an article from Focus On The Family, about a woman's expectations, which basically said many Christian women are looking to marry the pastor-type or someone pastor-like. Daniel concurred, saying he was rather surprised even of his own wife's expectations on this subject, even though he IS a pastor. It's definitely a surprise, especially for oblivious men like myself to have an expectation like that upon us without any prior warning.

So what does it take? Are we talking about devotions and prayer time? Or setting ground rules like mandatory quiet times (like we had at Longlac)? Or is it more about leading by example (which doesn't always work)?

I'm looking for advice and/or ideas. What do you think it means to be a spiritual leader of the family? What does it take? Feel free to leave me your thoughts.. thanks!

I hate this book.

I really hate this book I've been reading. It's called "Irresistable Revolution". I think the title is misleading, because to me I think I've "resisted" this revolution my entire life. The gist of the book is his interpretation of how Christ has commanded us to live.. but I'd rather prefer not to believe his way of thinking because if I do, it will wreck my life.

And I don't want to wreck my life because I like it the way it is. In fact I love it. But reading the book makes me see that certain aspects of my life should be different, there are things.. comforts, that I don't want to nor have any intention of letting go of. And that's why I hate this book because I am a person who prides himself in working hard to do things the "right way" and this book proves that I am all talk and no action.

I would recommend this book to anyone is okay with messing up their life. But if you're happy and have no intention of heeding God's call, leave this book alone. Believe me, the old saying "ignorance is bliss" applies here 100%. It kind of reminds me of Perspectives, how you can go through life not really knowing what God's *really* called you to do.

"You guys are all into that born again thing, which is great. We do need to be born again, since Jesus said that to a guy named Nicodemus. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, I can tell you that you have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy too. But I guess that's why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest."

I think what really gets me about this book is that he's laid out a foundation on how to live, how to follow Jesus -- the way Christ meant it to be.. life that is. And that I'm not willing to accept it because I'm not ready to let go of everything.. It's me admitting that I can't.. or won't live the way God has commanded us to live. And being okay with it.

I'm convinced that God did not mess up and make too many people and not enough stuff.

Knocked Up

Been looking forward to seeing this one for a long time now, finally had a chance last night. Went to see it with Ina after we checked out a bunch of restaurants for the wedding reception.

If I were to use one single word to describe this movie, I would use the word "awful". It's just a really bad movie, in every sense of the word "bad". The acting was a total disaster, but this isn't a big deal normally in comedies so I'll lay off on it.

In terms of the story, it was just bad. The character Ben Stone seemed to go from not caring at all, to pretending to be caring, and then not caring again, and then moments later he's in love. And then there was the subplot between the husband and wife that made very little sense, and seemingly really had nothing to do with the main plot. The story was predictable, yet not because you just couldn't believe these people could be so stupid.

So was it funny? There were definitely moments that I thought was really funny, but then there were also moments of complete raunchiness and nudity that I cannot even describe. This movie was borderline soft-core pornography, and I honestly can't remember hearing people say the F word so unnecessarily (as if there was ever a necessary reason to use the F word) as often as in this movie.

I just don't get it -- what's with all the vulgar language, does a script containing over 120 F-words really add any value to the movie? And the nudity? Why?

Speaking of value, we saw it on a Monday evening, which is probably my fault, but still.. we paid $24 for 2 people, which is insane. Had I known more about this movie before going in, I'm not sure I'd have watched it if someone paid me.

Plot/Story - 5/10
Acting - 5/10
Script - 2/10
Entertainment - 6/10
Value - 0/10

Overall: 18/50

Sports

Something that's been running through my mind lately..

I'm disgusted by the way people glorify Hollywood. How, in the news you read about how some celebrity is in jail, or one's in rehab, or how another has gotten married for the 5th time, how A is having a feud with B. Why do we care so much?

But then that got me thinking, what about sports? I read about athletes and the big bucks they made in an endorsement deal and how much they make. I scour the internet for insider's information about trade rumors, dealings and signings. I spend countless hours looking at player stats, their personalities, tendencies..

Is it any different from people who follow their favorite actors and actresses? Am I just as bad, wasting my time obsessing over sports stars as those who do the same for movie celebrities, instead of devoting all my time towards a worthier being, Jesus Christ?

Mock Draft

Tonight is the NBA Entry Draft. As usual, I'm super excited about this entire process, even though Toronto doesn't even have a pick!

Here's my mock draft:

1. Portland: Greg Oden.
2. Seattle: Kevin Durant.
3. Atlanta: Barring a trade, Al Horford.
4. Memphis: Mike Conley Jr.
5. Boston: Yi Jianlian
6. Milwaukee: Jeff Green
7. Minnesota: Joakim Noah
8. Charlotte: Corey Brewer
9. Chicago: Brendan Wright
10. Sacramento: Spencer Hawes
11. Atlanta: Acie Law (Raptors: Julian Wright)
12. Philly: Al Thornton
13. NO/Okla: Julian Wright
14. LA Clippers: Javaris Critteton (Acie Law if Toronto traded in)
15. Detroit: Rodney Stuckney
16. Washington: Nick Young
17. New Jersey: Jason Smith
18. Golden State: Morris Almond
19. LA Lakers: Sean Williams
20. Miami: Tiago Splitter (Javaris Critteton)
21. Philly: Daequan Cook
22. Charlotte: Thaddeus Young
23. New York: Wilson Chandler
24. Phoenix: Marco Belinelli
25. Utah: Alando Tucker
26. Houston: Rudy Fernandez
27. Detroit: Taurean Green
28. San Antonio: Derrick Byars
29. Phoenix: Josh McRoberts
30. Philly: Jared Dudley

All weekend

Another fun filled weekend. Friday we had small group, then Saturday was Kevin and Anita's Jack & Jill party, and then Sunday was my church's annual English Congregation picnic.

Ina was out of town this weekend, so I spent the whole entire weekend answering #2 questions, over and over and over and over again.

"Congratulations! ...where's Ina?", and then followed by
"So.. how did you do it? Tell us the story!!"

And then people would gather around and I'd tell all about how I proposed to her and all that.. the embarrassing and silly parts. Ina and I had felt like we'd told everyone we needed to tell -- evening changing our "Status" on Facebook, but it seemed to me that there were still quite few people left. At the picnic, people really came out of the woodworks to congratulate me, some people I've rarely ever spoken to came up to say hi and ask about the story. That was really cool though.

One thing I found kind of neat, was how every time I told it, people would be hanging on my every word like it was some sort of cliffhanger to a movie. Plus I'd remember more things to add to the story, little details that I'd missed out in the past. And then everyone would be like "Awwww.." at the end, which was weird because I didn't think what I did was all that romantic..

Anyway I had this pretty funny conversation with one of our friends at the picnic. We were talking about how my parents were planning to move back to Toronto after my dad retired.

O: So are your parents moving back?
B: Yea, after my dad retires, the plan is to move back to Toronto.
O: Oh, I see.. is he retiring soon?
B: Yea, he was was telling me the other day he's planning to retire in 6-12 months.
O: Cool.. When they move back, where are you gonna live?
B: I'm going live at Ina's place.
O: (puzzled look) Okay.. and where's Ina gonna live?
B: Huh? We're gonna live together.
O: (incredulous look) Um.. okay.. but.. um.. shouldn't you get married first?

That's when I figured out she hadn't heard about our engagement, so I told her and the world made sense again.

Topics

Is there a way to refine the topics? Seems like I create a new topic name every time I create a post, so that in the end, I have about 2 post for all 80 topics because I come up with a new word to describe it each time. There's got to be a way to refine it, rename 3 to 1 and have it automatically switch for me..

Rod Stewart

I've been listening to a lot of rock music lately, classic rock. Ever since I started really getting into the game Guitar Hero, and Guitar Hero 2, I've been interested in learning all these rock songs. This morning I heard this song on the radio by Rod Stewart, I know I've heard it before, but it never really hit me before, the lyrics..

Have I told you lately that I love you
Have I told you theres no one else above you
Fill my heart with gladness
Take away all my sadness
Ease my troubles thats what you do

For the morning sun in all its glory
Greets the day with hope and comfort too
You fill my life with laughter
And somehow you make it better
Ease my troubles thats what you do
Theres a love thats divine
And its yours and its mine like the sun
And at the end of the day
We should give thanks and pray
To the One, to the One

I listen to Q107. It's just classic rock now, it's all the good stuff :)

Spurs in 4?

I haven't really watched too much of this series because the Spurs are a boring team to watch. They're methodical and effect, but just boring. Plus I never really thought Cleveland had a chance. I didn't think they were even the best team in the East, they just got lucky behind some pretty terrific play by Lebron James. In fact, I think any of the top 8 Western teams would have a pretty good shot of beating Cleveland in a 7 game series. You think of Dallas, Phoenix, Houston, Golden State, Utah, Los Angeles, Denver.. all these teams could probably beat Cleveland if they had made it to the finals. And since the Spurs beat all of them.. I mean it's not rocket science.

I'm not a fan of either team. However I can't help but cheer for the Spurs because of Matt Bonner, the former Raptor who was a fan favorite in Toronto. The Red Rocket, as he was nicknamed because he liked to take the TTC to work, was just a hard working forward who had a knack for hitting open 3s. In terms of basketball smarts, he never really had any but it was his hustle that got the fans behind him.

So the Red Rocket is going to win a championship ring. How great is that?

Another reason to love the Spurs is Eric Williams. This guy, supposedly the centerpiece of that ill-advised Vince Carter trade, this so-called great model role player who ended up whining and complaining about not getting enough playing time, when in all honesty got more playing time than he really deserved, *was* a San Antonio Spur at the start of this season. But the key is he's no longer. And you just have to laugh because somewhere out there he is sitting there watching this series and pondering what might have been.

Undeserving sequels

This might totally gross some of you out, but I thought of this great analogy for movies that should never have had a sequels. Mind you I'm not talking about bad sequels. Sometimes you had a good movie that had a really bad sequel to it, like Speed 2, or Ocean's 12, Dumb and Dumberer, etc.

But what I'm talking about are sequels to movies that were so unbelievably bad that there was absolutely no reason to make a sequel to it. I'm talking about movies like "Fast and the Furious" which was so bad and yet they made 2, yes TWO sequels to it. "Pirates of the Caribbean" which was just gawd-awful and they again made 2 of them. How about "Weekend at Bernie's", can you believe they had two of those? How dead can the guy be? Wouldn't the body start to rot after awhile? Unbelievable.

Or another example is the most recent 3 Star Wars movies.

One thing I always thought that maybe George Lucas could have done, was say after he made the first one, upon seeing what a disaster it turned out to be, could have just cut ties with the other two and just plead insanity on the first. Like he could have just come to the media and just "Hey you know what, this guy had a nuclear missile pointed at the country and said he'd blow us all up if I didn't make this movie. So I did but then I managed to disable the missile so I'm not making any more of them. Yea I know I said I'd make 3 but I don't really want to subject you to that again, besides I was under duress at the time because I love America and I couldn't let him do that to us." Something like that might make those Star Wars movies slightly more bearable. Then you'd kind of be like "Man, that was the worst movie I've ever seen.. but did you hear that he saved millions of lives by making that movie? Man that George Lucas, what a noble guy, dragging his reputation through a pile of crap just for us. You know, he's my hero."

Anyway back to my gross analogy. When I was little, sometimes I'd take this huge dump and you know it's like the dump is one long strand and it's so unbelievable because it's so long. Some of them would be wound right around several times like a really long snake of poo. Anyway, I'd tell my parents or my brother to come see this unbelievably long piece of crap.

But then the next time someone had a super long crap, they'd invite us to see it but then we'd be like "Umm.. that's okay. I think I'll pass this time." And they'd say "No but this one is really big, and it's got some corns stuck in it.. YOU GOTTA SEE IT, ITS BETTER!", and you'd still maintain your position of "That's okay man, I've seen a long piece of crap before. Even with the extra stuff in it, it's still a long piece of crap and I really don't feel like looking at that right now."

That's exactly like some of these terrible movies that are getting sequels made for them. Can you believe they're making an "Alien vs Predator 2"? And a second "Fantastic Four"? Someone was saying that they think the second installment of Fantastic Four might actually be better than the first. Well I'm thinking that it wouldn't take a whole lot..

Holding nothing back

This CD by Tim Hughes kind of fell through the cracks for me, probably because I spent so much time listening to the Hillsongs United studio album "All Of The Above", in preparation for the concert. In the end, they only played 2-3 songs from the album. The concert was amazing by the way. Check out Andrew's blog for details and a video.

What initially attracted me to this CD was the first track "Happy Day". I had been at Mitchell's with Ina to pick up some greeting cards when I saw the CD on the sample wall. You know, where you can sample the CDs. The first song was so great I had to have the album, so I waited til there was a sale and went and got it.

Unfortunately I've lost my hosting site and can no longer post MP3s as I used to. You'll just have to buy the CD yourself, unless someone's got any suggestions of where I can host my media.. or check out his website for some samples. (http://www.timhughesmusic.com/)

One thing I think that sets this album apart from his other stuff is that instrumentally it's just so much better. The music... fills the room better, if that makes sense. It's fuller, if that makes any sense at all. I'm not sure if I observed that in his previous albums. I mean, we've always known that Tim Hughes is a great songwriter. Lyrically he is solid, like Matt Redman. But musically I think this CD stands out because you can kind of get the sense that it was produced well and that they invested a fair amount of time into it.

Maybe he got better equipment, or his band has just gotten a whole better. Lyrically and musically the album is solid. I am just getting to know the other songs and discovering bit by bit how good these songs are.

Without breaking it all down, I give it 47/50. Go buy it.

Mess

When I look under my desk, I see a mess. There are wires and cables strewn all over the place, and dust bunnies settled in every nook and cranny down there. It's pretty gross.

With all my electronics and everything that I have under my desk, it's no wonder that there are so many wires and cables. I don't even have my computer covered up, the case is somewhere else in the room (probably underneath a pile of clothes) so there is even more dust in there. That's probably the only thing that reminds me to vacuum once in a while.. the fact that there's all that dust that is in danger of clogging up my hard disks.

That's just my desk too. Moving on to the living room, it's just another big old mess behind my television. Think of all the cables it must take. As I have a home theater, I have inputs and outputs coming out of every device and going in all different directions. On top of the TV, there is the digital cable box, Wii, XBox360, PS2. At one point I even had a DVD player and a Gamecube but fortunately these two became redundant when I got my 360 and Wii, respectively.

There's wires everywhere, and dust everywhere. The worst thing about them is that they're both up against a wall and the only way for me to get back there is to pull it out, and when I do that, things get unplugged.

Whether you're a gadget freak or not, you're bound to have some area in your home with wires strewn about. What do you do with all your cables? Are you organized or is it like my desk and living room, just a great big mess of wires underneath and behind?

Here is a neat way that shouldn't take a whole lot of work to produce. It's very creative. I'm convinced it doesn't have to necessarily be beneath a desk but also against a wall or side of a desk. All it takes is a big board with holes, and a bunch of plastic ties, a drill and a few nuts and bolts!

Pretty "neat" huh?

A night of food coma

Last night I had a steak that had to have been at least 1 pound of meat. It was quite easily the biggest steak I've ever eaten. The amazing thing is my brother had an even bigger steak, however, what's more amazing is that I out-ate him. I finished my steak while he only ate about half of his.

The thing about the steak was that it was pre-marinated from St. Lawrence Market, and it was supposedly Black Angus beef. Although I'm still not sure about that because it was really chewy with lots of tendons and fat.

Anyway, I ate about 2/3 of it at dinner time and then slowly finished it off and was finished by about 10:30. Then I immediately went to bed, and I guess I had food coma all night.

The thing about that is my stomach is hungry now, even though I had this humongous hunk of meat. The blood has been in my stomach working to digest it all night, and as a result I feel like I didn't sleep at all even though I planned to catch up on sleep by sleeping 9 hours!

...

Some of my friends, including my pastor, refer to food coma as "itis" or "the itis". I had always wondered where that came from. As it turns out, according to Wikipedia "the itis" is actually derived from a racialist connotation, "niggeritis", used by slave owners to describe why their slaves did not like to work immediately after lunch. This word was then shortened to "itis" after slavery was abolished.

You can read more about "the itis" here.

Canada's team

I read an article in the paper the other day that said Canada had embraced the Ottawa Senators (with 16 Canadian players) as Canada's team because they've made it to the Stanley Cup finals and have a chance to bring the Stanley Cup back to Canada.

The reception for this has been pretty bleak. In years past I have seen us cheer for the Canadiens, the Flames and then the Oilers. But Ottawa it seems, hasn't gained the same kind of support as those other teams did. I'm not exactly sure why this is, maybe because of all the past years of choking so much and failing to meet expectations. Or perhaps because the team is led by an arrogant moron named Daniel Alfredsson. Or maybe because one of their best scorers is Dany Heatley, the man who threw caution to the wind and drove his Ferrari 160 mph into a tree to kill his best friend and teammate.

Last night while lying in bed, I wondered who had won game 2. I heard cars drive past on Yonge Street, honking their horns repeatedly and I concluded that Ottawa must have won game 2 to even up the series at 1-1. I woke up this morning to check the score. Boy was I wrong.. Ottawa had lost 1-0.

Fans were driving down Yonge Street honking their horns to celebrate Ottawa's misfortune.

Canada's team my ass.

If you're trying to decide what team to pick, go with the team that has the most Canadians. That'd be the Anaheim Ducks with 21.

More USB

I know you're probably thinking -- oh great, another post about some silly looking USB keys. Well guess what -- they're not USB keys!

These are batteries, and in my opinion quite possibly the greatest things ever made. That's right -- they're USB rechargeable AA NiMH batteries. Plug it into your laptop, XBOX360, Wii, monitor -- whatever has a usb port, you can charge your batteries on. And apparently they can still be charged on a regular battery charger too!

A Wii Retrospective

It's hard to believe that I have owned a Wii for 7 months, because it feels like I haven't played it very much at all. In all honesty I haven't touched the thing in 2 weeks. I'm trying to think of the last time I played Wii by myself, as a form of entertainment (as opposed to a form of entertainING). I believe I haven't played it as a form of personal entertainment since.. well, February when I first got Wii Play.

Hard to believe that such a popular gaming system, one that continues to be difficult to obtain throughout the world, has completely lost its appeal to me. Although I do continue to look forward to Smash Brothers Brawl, my zeal for this gaming system has waned significantly. Yesterday in EB Games, I was lining up to pay for Guitar Hero for PS2. The guy in front of me had just picked up the last copy of Mario Party 8. Heck, I didn't even know it had come out. I could have easily lined up ahead of that guy if I had wanted one. (MP8 is probably one of the MOST sought after Wii games yet).

Now on one hand I'd fully admit that when it comes to entertainment, I am a person who loses interest in things rather easily, going from one thing to another, but to think that a few months ago I was trying to convince everyone how great and revolutionary it was and now, I barely even touch it. It's just a neat little white box on top of my speakers that collects dust.

The other day I spoke to Allan at church, he was explaining to me that the novelty has kind of worn off on him and he hadn't touched his Wii for a whole week.

Mind you, I think the Wii is a fantastic party system. But without company, I think this system is not nearly as great as everyone thinks. I haven't touched my XBOX360 in about 3 weeks either, so it's not like it's any more 'exciting' than the Wii. I have arguably the most popular game for it, Gears of War, and I haven't touched the system in 3 weeks. Think about that.

Meanwhile I haven't gone more than 48 hours without picking up the Guitar controller for the PS2. Guitar Hero games totally rock. All this talk about these next-gen consoles and here I am playing old-gen stuff. Just goes to show you how important graphics and cpu speed are -- not at all.

Just think, had I known all this today and not bought any of those systems, I'd be sitting at home, still playing Guitar Hero 2 (which I got for free), and be sitting pretty with an additional $1300 in my pocket. Such is the life of a gamer..

Sitting on an angle

If you're a guy and you're reading this, you know exactly what I'm talking about. You're sitting down into your car seat, office chair or couch and something doesn't feel right. You reach back and pull out your wallet and sit back down and aaaahhh.. what a relief. After years of sitting on an angle and trying every which way to eliminate the bulge in my right back pocket I found the perfect solution.

It's called the ALL-ETT™ Billfold. I was a little skeptical about the ability to reduce my 1.5-inch wallet thickness to nothingness. Last Friday I had the privilege to see a real spectacle. Frank from my small group had a wallet that was, no kidding, 3 inches thick. THREE INCHES. Thankfully Frank keeps that sucker in a front pocket. I can't even imagine what it might be like to attempt to sit on that beast..

I've tried everything, from switching from the tri-fold to the bi-fold, leather to cloth and then back to leather, and then removing all non-essential cards like the library card, the Optimum card, Air Miles, PEO card, the letters of the alphabet in sign-language card, Stamp Traveler's Club card, etc.

What ALL-ETT™ has done is, made the world's thinnest wallet with a revolutionary design made from a super thin material. The material actually comes from parachutes, it's super durable and ultra thin.



In this photo you see a regular wallet stuffed with 30 credit cards. Then there's the Billfold with the same number of credit cards. Simply amazing!

Review
I was surprised at how thin the wallet really was. It came in an envelope like any other regular mail. By itself, the thickness is comparable to maybe 3 sheets of paper. As I opened the wallet, I realized that this material is really quite cheap. It's very thin plastic paper, makes a crackling noise as you open. Not good. Next, I proceeded to empty out my regular lambskin wallet. I was able to stuff everything I had into the Billfold.

Sure enough, the Billfold with all my stuff in it was significantly thinner. In fact, with everything in the Billfold, it is actually thinner than my old wallet with nothing in it!

Who are you talking to?

This thought occurred to me yesterday as I was walking back to work after lunch with Ina. We had street-meat. And that is why Ina is the *best*.

Anyway, there was this guy talking to himself and I thought he was one of those people on the street who have conversations with themselves. I remember when I was little, sitting at the bus station in Buffalo and there was this African American woman talking to herself. She wasn't overly animated but just sitting two seats away from me, I sat there and listened to her entire spiel, and it was actually quite interesting. In her mind she was speaking to a judge, presenting her case and I remember it being very coherent, almost like she had rehearsed this a trillion times (which probably why she was in her state in the first place). I suspected she was probably very intelligent and just completely lost it after some legal trouble.

These are real people, who just happened to lose a few marbles here and there. But I just remember that time in Buffalo (or was it DC?) when I sat there for 10 minutes waiting for my mom or dad to get us some bus tickets. And when my parent came back they felt protective and pulled me away to keep me from this dangerous person who could lash out at me on any moment's notice.

I guess it's kind of sad the way people are treated just because they are having a conversation with no one around them. Nowadays you see people doing the exact same thing everywhere, only it's completely justified because they have this little piece of plastic stuck in their ear with a blinking blue light on it.

Jericho cancelled

Damn you all to hell, CBS. You canceled the only show I watch on your network, the only good show remaining out of a seriously pathetic lineup of crap shows. I mean come on, The Unit gets renewed? It's nothing more than militarized version of Alias with President David Palmer instead of Jennifer Garner! Isn't smoking pot illegal in the US? And how about these other crap shows like the Ghost Whisperer, Close To Home, The Class??? No one watches that shat! The New Adventures of Old Christine? I mean what the hell kind of name is that?!

If it weren't for NFL football I would block your channel altogether. Damn you, you stupid, stupid bastards! I spit on you.

blogging

Blogging used to be great because anywhere I'd go or see, anything interesting or funny I heard, or controversial, I'd tuck that away in the back of my mind and write about it whenever I had a chance to. And of course I'd always be thinking of what interesting things I could tell the blog world about. My eyes and ears were open and in tune for anything I could find that might be interesting for others to read about.

Nowadays my eyes and ears are closed. And whenever I do see something cool, I tell Ina about it and it ends there.

Speaking of Ina, she and I are gonna do some travelling this weekend, out to Boston and New York. I'm excited. Personally I don't recall ever going on a vacation for myself, aside from going places with family or visiting family. This is my first ever vacation.. kinda cool.

Ina's done most of the planning because she's been there before. But what I do know is that for Boston we're going on the "Duck Tour" (Saturday) and a Boston Red Sox game on Sunday. Personally I'm not a huge baseball fan but given the historical and prestige of the Boston Red Sox organization, I'm excited to go see this. Fenway Park, the Green Monster. The curse of the bambino, and fans that care. Should be fun..

For NYC, I don't think we'll be seeing that much at all, mostly visiting with Ina's friends.

Maybe I'll take some pictures and post them up, if I get a chance?

This is for people who talk during movies

Yay!

My girlfriend is coming home today. Yay! YAY!!

Encore?

Why do artists cut their concerts short only to have them come back after the audience claps and screams their heads off? I mean what's the point of it? Last night at the ACC we watched as John Mayer and his band stepped off the stage. The crowd was cheering (screaming) for more, people were clapping and waiting in anticipation for him to come back. I didn't make a peep. Of course he was coming back -- he hadn't sung fan-favorite songs like "Daughters" or even "Body is a Wonderland" yet, so there was no way he wasn't coming back for an encore.

Of course in the end I was right, he came back to sing one of my favorites "Stop This Train", followed by at least 3-4 more songs. You just kind of knew that he was coming back.

But seriously, why do artists do this? Is it simply for a break to get some water/alcohol, and maybe to take a short nap? Maybe they went back to the check scores? Why not perform all your good songs and then just leave it at that?

If he had just sung Daughters, I bet I wouldn't be half-deaf right now.

Obelisk

The good news is that this is for real and you can order it here. The bad news is, it's almost $9000.

But could furniture get any cooler than this?

If that doesn't impress you, check out the slinky chair:

Free?

One of my friends likes to say he's "free" when his wife is occupied with something else, or if she's gone away somewhere, allowing him to do whatever he wants. He gets all excited and invites us over to play video games as if he's been liberated or broken out of jail.

I dunno, Ina's been away for a few days and I don't feel "free" at all. I just miss her a lot.

---

We went to "Sushi on 7" last night, to celebrate my dad's 58th. I had a helluva time trying to find the place. First of all I loaded up Google Maps to get an approximate location before I left. Google maps was way, way off. I typed in the address and it gave me a location that was East of McCowan. Turns out the place is actually West of Kennedy! Secondly it was dark and snowing so we had a hard time looking through the car windows to see the addresses/storefronts. I missed our reservation time by about 20 minutes as a result, but fortunately the restaurant was only half full (we had to have a late dinner because my brother had a night class).

The food at Sushi on 7 is great. They have tons of variety -- over 190 different items are available on their menu. For dinner, it was $17.99 for Mon-Thurs. Food comes fairly quickly so that we're not sitting around letting our stomachs get full in between the waves of food. I've found that to be the case often in many AYCE sushi places. It's like some kind of ploy to get us full so we won't keep eating them out of their business. The service was not great, it's surprisingly difficult to get the attention of any waitress even though the place is really quite small.

Sushi on 7's specialty rolls are okay, not as flavorful as I've found in other places, but the fish is fresh enough to make up for it. Their seaweed salad is the best I've had so far. The beef ribs were cooked perfectly, very tender and tasty. They had one dish, fresh mussels that we kept ordering. Very yummy, very tenderly cooked and light tasting. My mom had some Udon which she said was good. They have coconut pudding -- one of my all-time favorite desserts, one which is fairly rare to find in any restaurant these days so that was a big bonus for me. Their tea sucked.. it was way too diluted.

I don't think they have sashimi for lunch which is a shame because otherwise I'd consider going back there for a lunch, just because they have so many other great choices.

I'd give the restaurant a solid 8/10 rating.

---

I want to buy the new Tim Hughes album. I sampled it at Mitchell's Family Bookstore last weekend, and it sounded GOOD. Well, at least Track 1 sounded good. Too bad it's so expensive at Mitchell's. I mean honestly who pays over $20 for a CD these days? Why are Christians trying to rip each other off? It doesn't make sense.

I guess it's the same as any culture ripping each other off. It's more about profit and greed than who the victim is.

---

The Leafs missed the NHL playoffs for the second straight year, but there are still a few Canadian teams to cheer for. Ottawa, Vancouver and Calgary. I don't like the Senators at all, but I feel we have to cheer for them because I'm just sick and tired of seeing American teams win our Stanley Cup. It ain't right. That being said, at least it's always Canadians who are hoisting the cup, even if they are playing for American teams. I can't help but cheer for the Penguins, at least for this series. I could see myself cheering for Ottawa in the next round, but for me, Sidney Crosby epitomizes the essence of Canadian Hockey -- not an idiot like Daniel Alfredsson.

Go Flames! Go Canucks! Go Canadians!

Liar

Does this look like a spring forecast to you? This author doesn't think so.

Several months ago, a lie of epic proportions was masterminded, that has affected millions of people around the world. Starting off as a joke, it has slowly turned into this year's biggest elaborate falsification that has forced this author to think 'enough is enough'.

"..one of the most heinous, deceptive hoaxes in the history of mankind.."

I am sick and tired of it, and I will not only expose this rodent for being the mastermind of this most heinous, deceptive hoax in the history of mankind, but prove that this liar is laughing all the way to the bank.

For those who do not know, this is Wiarton Willy, aka the despicable, low-life scumbag. And in my opinion, he deserves to be locked up behind bars.

Two months ago, Willy predicted that spring would come early. At the time, this made everyone excited, as you'd expect, the prospect of having an early spring meant more time to bask in the sun, to enjoy loved ones, to put away our winter clothing, etc, etc, etc. And for awhile, this prognostication seemed real. A week later there were record high temperatures, and Willy was lauded for being right.

Heck, even I'll admit that I was quite proud of our little Canadian hero, of not only being right but for being such a model citizen. Indeed, these were great times for Willy. We see here a statue, which was built in honor of Willy for these so-called "accurate" predictions. Just the other day, I predicted that it would be sunny outside, and a few hours later, it was. Was a statue erected for me? No sir!

Here we see this evil creature snacking on what is most likely some goodies, no doubt a result of another scam he pulled on some young unknowing innocent children.

I submit to you, the public, to stand up for yourselves and not allow this rodent to continue his string of lies without getting away with it. I encourage you to sign petition to make sure the evil does not continue to spread. Now the only question remains -- how will Willy respond to these accusations? Will he own up to this obvious trickery while the rest of us shiver in the cold with our toques and scarves in the middle of April?

More than meets the eye

I get a lot of comments about how I look a lot younger than I really am. I get carded at bars, and after they see my ID, they either apologize or say "WOW". Well folks, I'm here to tell you not to be fooled any longer. I am old or in the process of getting old.

We were talking at work about the Florida Gators, in particular we were talking about Joakim Noah's father Yannick Noah. Well the thing is the father once won a French Open Championship (tennis) back in his hey day. The funny part is that one of my co-workers remembered it. Turns out actually that a bunch of the Gators' players' fathers were famous professional athletes, although I hadn't heard of any of them. The Maryland Terrapins have a player named DJ Strawberry. I couldn't make the connection at first.. they kept showing Darryl Strawberry, the great baseball player and at first I couldn't figure out why they kept showing him on camera. Turns out they are father and son. The moral of the story: When you are watching sports, and you can remember cheering on the fathers of today's stars.. you are old.

Transformers and TMNT. When I watched the original Transformers, I was hitting the tail end of it. The cartoons I remember most fondly are the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Duck Tales and Talespin. So when I see a movie being made of a cartoon that was practically before my time, that's kind of scary. Of course even without Transformers, the fact that we were in grade 6-7 when the original live-action TMNT movies were released already says a lot.

Here's another one. Fashion. What's in and what's not in. I find more and more I am seeing people walking around in clothes that I saw people wearing when I was small. The fashion-cycle or loop or whatever you want to call it has made a full circle. I wonder if I can find my glasses from grade 1. Maybe they're back in..