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Time to say goodbye to a dear friend…

05/05/2006 / Blake

My first car was a 1979 Honda Accord (hatchback). It was a stick shift that had a forgiving clutch in it. I could shift fast and on the fly without much precision and I could get away with it. After I good rain I knew how to hit a curve just right, shift the gears and slam the accellerator and I could fishtail all over the place. My mom would have died. Now I know why the raised the driving age here in Mississippi. Not many 15 year old guys need to be driving like that!

It was a decent car, but one that never commanded many looks. Or at least not the good kinds. It had a loud stereo, but it was ALL treble. And don’t slam the door too hard or you’ll have to lean over and put the speaker back in the door. I used to daydream at the Crutchfield catalog thinking I wanted to put some bazookas in there to give that baby some BASS!
But my senior year in high school, mid November, I was pleasently surprised to get a new car. Or at least new to me. It was a 1988 Honda Accord. Gold. Nine years newer than my old (old old) car. It seemed to be just what the doctor ordered. And I lived lots of life behind the wheel of that car. Been lots of places. But as the years have moved on, so have it’s better days. And sadly, I’m giving her up. There’s a family down in Waveland that lost most of everything to Katrina. And The Wife and I decided to let Goldie take a trip down to the coast and belong to someone new. To be honest, Goldie was starting to get run down. No muffler, no AC or heater. Really hard to steer and some brakes issues (YES, we got those fixed before giving donating it). But after some power-steering juice, she’s almost back to her old self. And I’m going to miss her purrr coming out of her muffler-less back end.

But last night I tried to think of a few things that I first expereienced w/ Goldie:

My first cd player
My summers away working at CLS and Ozark.
My first listen to the Crash cd of Dave Matthews.
My first date with The Wife
I think we had our first kiss sitting on the trunk of the car (or was that her car?)
A car my mom was finally confident in my driving out of town.
We experienced Notheast, Southern Miss, and Miss State together.
And The Wife and I left the wedding reception in Goldie.
More tickets than I want to admit.
Late night pranks in college.
I could go on and on…

So as I say goodbye to Goldie, know that she was a good car. She’s older than most of the kids in my youth group now….but she’s still got HEART!

The Buzz Conference :: National Community Church

05/02/2006 / Blake

I’ll go ahead and admit that I’m jealous of those going to the Buzz Conference this weekend in D.C. I’d heard about it last year when I came across National Community Church and it’s pastor, Mark Batterson’s blog. It’s going to be a 2 day event where churches are instructed on how to market/package what they do and how the message of the GOSPEL can make such a difference in our lives. Ed Young, Mark Batterson, and Brad Abare will be the main presenters.
Some people disagree w/ this approach. An interview w/ Mark over on Church Marketing Sucks got quite a buzz as well. Check out the comments. But I think what NCC is doing is quite impressive and they’re meeting the needs of their community. A community that includes plenty of Capitol Hill suits and also those from the city’s largest homeless shelter.

So as the Buzz gets going this weekend, I hope to be able to keep up w/ it through blogs and maybe, just maybe get some cd’s or mp3’s after the conference.

Another reason to get Firefox?

05/02/2006 / Blake

I started using Firefox a couple of years ago. I think it is better than IE. And I’m noticing more and more people using Firefox as well. Looking at the webstats I see it increasing quite a bit in usage.

Here’s a pretty funny reason to use Firefox. Watch the video.

Last Night's Race: Clinton's Brickstreets Firefly 5K

04/29/2006 / Blake

I’ve not really been running that much, hadn’t run since the late night run last Tuesday. But felt pretty good going into the run last night.

But before the 5k, there was the One Mile Fun Run. Addie registered and ran it. The Wife ran it with her. I sat out. I wanted to save my energy for the 5k. In hindsight, it might not have been a bad idea to use that as a warmup. But she ran this one in 10:45. Over 30 improvement. Not bad for a 4 year old.
But when our race started, I was running w/ friends Cory and Alex. I thought it was probably about a 10 minute pace. My boss and pastor, Bob, was a bit behind us running with Mike Grove. Pretty soon they caught up to us and we were all running together. It became clear Bob was wanting to go on ahead, so Mike, Alex, Cory and I ran together having decent conversation along the way as Bob sped on ahead. The course was basically an out and back w/ a few loops through some neighborhoods. But there were no mile markers or people calling out times. I’m glad I had my watch w/ me. But even though I knew the time, I couldn’t tell how far.

But after a semi-dramatic finish I realized my time was somewhere around 27:40. So I took off about 5 whole minutes from two weeks ago. That’s not too bad of an improvement. But it was a fun night. We had a handful of people from the youth ministry and the church as a whole running. Even had around 10 or so people place I believe.

Running can be fun….sometimes.

I KNOW You Love Jesus!

04/29/2006 / Blake

Today, going through the mail, I seperated the keepers from the look at before throwing away from the rip up and throw away.

One in the rip up and throw away pile was a credit card application. One of those “you’ve already been approved” and telling me all these benefits on the envelope of why I’d want to be a part. But I have no need for it. So I ripped it up and asked my daughter to throw it away.

She did so, then came back saying, “I know you love Jesus. Why did you throw that away?” Turns out that this credit card was connected to Family Christian Bookstores. You can earn some credit or something by spending tons of money elsewhere. “That mail you ripped up had crosses on it. And I know you love Jesus. So why did you want to throw something about Jesus and crosses away?”

Sheesh…kids these days.

Hurry up and wait…

04/27/2006 / Blake

Late last night I signed up w/ my VPS. Then I went to bed. I was welcomed this morning by an email detailing all the stuff that was over my head. So I dove in. I think I’m getting the hang of it, but only because I am skimming the surface.

But I think I successfully transfered MissSportsTalk.com over to the new server and now I get to hurry up and wait. I am waiting on the DNS to propogate to the new servers. Hopefully all will be right in the world when I wake up in the morning (hopefully I get to sleep late too!). And hopefully there’s be no more annoying error messages that have plagued the site lately.

Night Run

04/25/2006 / Blake

I’m trying to upload a picture of a new site I just found. It’s called MapMyRun.com. It uses Google Maps where you plot the course of a run, then it will tell you the exact distance. Pretty cool.

I was through with food and tv for the night and realized I’d been putting off the run I meant to do yesterday. So I decided to go for a night run. Running at night is my favorite time to go running anyhow. But tonight was the best in a loooooong while. I actually had fun on this run instead of just trying to finish. Almost took me back to some summer night runs when working at Lake Stephens or Ozark. I was probably in the best shape of my life back then.

So there is my route. 2.54 miles. In just under 25 minutes. Not good, but not bad.

Get up and do it!

04/24/2006 / Blake

I’ve been lagging on a lot of things. General and specific things. But life things. I began to listen to Erwin McManus‘s last series from his church on his podcast. It is called Chasing Daylight, but is a re-release of a previous book of his I read entitled Seizing Your Divine Moment. Lots of truth in that book I need to digest.

But a couple of days ago Tony Morgan had this post where he was talking about DRIVE THE CAR. He likened our lives to a car and someone who loves his car and tinkers with it and puts time into trying to get it just right, but never taking it out of the garage. Never getting it on the open road. Sometimes I think that’s me.

So now that I’ve been slapped around in the face with it a little lately…what am I going to do with it?

Tom Cruise and Kaie Holmes' new baby

04/24/2006 / Blake

Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes baby thing. They named their little girl Suri because they apparently opened up a baby name book and it just leapt off the page at them. In their official release, Tom and Katie say the name means “red rose” in Persian and “princess” in Hebrew… Ummm… Er….. You guys were a little off the mark there. A Hebrew expert says Suri actually means “go away” when you use it toward a female, so it’s pretty fair to say that the new parents made a mistake here…By the way, Suri also means “pointy nose” in some Indian dialects and “pickpocket” in Japanese. So ultimately, Tom and Katie have named their kid “Go away, you little pointy-nosed pickpocket” Cruise. HI-larious.

Costa Rica Part II?

04/23/2006 / Blake

I’m really thinking of going back to Costa Rica this summer. Today is another meeting. But here is the cool part, I think The Wife is going to come along too! We’ve not worked out the details of where the girls will be yet, but looking to go late July/early August to Liberia, Costa Rica again on a mission trip.

Looking forward to the hot days, hard work, hot nights, great fellowship, interesting church services, and feeling exhausted knowing you did some work for God.

This is me and Pastor Carlos of the church where we work, eat, and sleep pretty much all day. Outstanding man of God.

For more pictures of our trip last year to Costa Rica you can check out this Flickr Set.