Category: Stuff (Page 35 of 65)

Last night we all went out to eat after I screwed up our house’s electricity. We were supposed to go to a wedding, but couldn’t get ready because I was trying to be Mr. Fix It and replace some old electrical plugs around the house. I ran into an interesting outlet that didn’t look right. I’d been working with white/black wires…but ran into a red one. But I figured I’d better hook it up the same way…and it somehow turned all the electricity off to the whole house. More on that later.

After supper we ran to LifeWay and then to BooksAMillion. We looked at books (duh) around the store. The Kid ended up finding me in the magazine section. I was looking at an XBox magazine on one of the benches. There were two guys on a bench next to me looking at mags as well. The Kid goes over and gets her a Reptile magazine. I figured she’d not have liked it, but she did. She cozies up next to me. Then she exchanges it for a Puppy magazine. Then gets quiet.

I’m reading about Halo2 and other stuff in the XBox mag. Then she says, quite loudly, “Boys don’t wear earings!” I asked her what in the world she was saying. So she said it again, “Boys don’t wear earrings!” I looked to my right and noticed the guy there had his ear pierced.

I wasn’t sure how to handle it, so I just laughed out loud. I think the guy did too. But it’s funny to see her associate earrings with girls only. I guess that’s the general norm here where I live. But I see nothing wrong w/ a guy and a pierced ear. I probably will never do it. But I think it looks cool on some guys. My wife wanted me to get my ear pierced once….way back. Maybe I wasn’t cool enough for her back then or something?

I later asked my daughter if I should get my ear pierced. She just giggled and shook her head.

Lots of stuff been on my mind lately.

Not sure I can post it all right now.

But expect some news soon.

Appetizer
How are you today?
I feel really stressed for some reason, but I couldn’t really tell you why. Pray for me.

Soup
Name 3 television shows you watch on a regular basis.
Survivor, The Complex :: Malibu, ER

Salad
What’s the scariest weather situation you’ve experienced?
Weather doesn’t really scrare me. That might not be a great quality though. But probably when I was about 11 or so maybe and got caught in a hugh thunder/lightning storm while in a cove up at Pick Wick. I was in a ski boat. Sail boats were having their masts struck by lightning. And other boats were sinking around me. Even though it was a scary situation, I still wasn’t that bothered. I think at this point in my life, I’d be more concerened about the safety of my family than my own.

Main Course
If you could wake up tomorrow morning in another country, where would you want to be?
New Zealand or Australia probably…though England is calling my name too.

Dessert
What do you usually wear to sleep?
When it’s warm, just boxers. When it’s cold, tshirt and boxers.

I had to leave town yesterday for the day. Thankfully I was able to leave town before it got messy here and return after it cleared up. Seems Ivan spit some nasty rain and wind our way. Lots of limbs and debris down all over the place. But nothing at all in comparison to what hit the AL coast and FL panhandle.

We have vacationed in Gulf Shores where Ivan hit shore. And we went to Destin earlier this summer too. Both of those places were hit very hard. I’ve not seen any Destin pictures, but the pictures of Gulf Shore and neighboring Orange Beach are horrendous. Entire condos smashed. Literally smashed. Trees ripped up. Lumber scattered everywhere. Amazing.

As I said, I was on the road yesterday. I stopped for some gas and Coke/M&M’s once. The lady behind the counter was talking loudly about the storm with a customer. The area I was in had only received a slight drizzle, but the forecast had been uncertain a few days before. This lady was proclaiming, “I knew nothing was going to happen here with this storm to us. I knew the good Lord was going to take care of us. He wasn’t going to let no Hurricane bother us.” And the customer was just nodding and saying, “Right…right.”

But I wonder what the folks who don’t have a home now are saying. Or the people who can’t get to their house to check on it in order to see if it’s even still there. I wonder why people who dodge danger always thank God and seem to boast, “I knew He wouldn’t let nothing happen to us.” But the folks who get hammered just have to cry out for restoration. Of course they prayed for safety before the storm hit.

Did God hear those prayers too? Sure He did. It’s just a mystery to me how everything works out.

Last night I was at church w/ the youth. We played a game then I introduced the topic of the night. While talking a bit, I thought I noticed some flashes out of the window behind me out of the corner of my eye. Popped in the video. It was a pretty good one. Towards the end I noticed the lightning again. Remembered my windows were rolled down.

So I slip out and go roll them back up, come back and the video’s almost over. Turn on the lights and start the discussion. Someone says, “Is that lightning?” I tell them that it is, but it’s barely thundering and no rain at all. So then it starts flashing a lot as we’re trying to have a discussion. Then the lights go out. Everyone pulls out their cell phone to light the room. I think the lights will come on again shortly maybe. But then I see flashlights bobbing down the hall.

Some dads were outside because we were about done for the night and saw the lights go out. They come up and tell us that they’re not coming on anytime soon. So we all go downstairs and look out the front door. It’s raining now….big time! Like sideways rain, and tons of lightning and tons of booming thunder by this time.

Roads are flooding because it can’t drain fast enough. Some parents come get their kids, but the drivers are staying at the church to wait it out a bit. It passes pretty quickly, lights come back on, people slowly leave. But there are limbs down everywhere. People across the street from us had a tree in their roof. We got sticks everywhere. But it came all of a sudden and left all of a sudden.

Strange weather we’re having. More on the way.

I am taking two classes sememster online. Asbury has a pretty cool little setup with it all. But taking two classes is going to be a load for me. I think it’s definatly doable, but I’m going to have to budget my time well to make sure I do better than decent with the classes.

One class sent me a box full of video tapes. I’m supposed to watch all these lectures of our teacher. This will go on for the first half of the class. Thing is, he is very Chinese. He’s not very easy to understand at first, but once you get into his speech rhythm it’s not so bad. But he seems to say a lot of words in order to communicate a shorter idea. Makes me wish I’d chosen someone else for this class. I had the choice of three different teachers, but I knew nothing about any of them.

The other class looks to have lots of reading involved. But some small group stuff set up too with some pretty specific accountability questions to be tackled. At first I was thinking that football season is a bad time to be taking two seminary classes, but seems that I’m not going to have lots to cheer about or obsess about with State. They got spanked by Auburn this weekend. We’ll spank Maine next weekend, then each game after that we’ll have to play really well for a win. I mean really well. Croom’s going to make a winner out of this team, but it’s going to take time. No quick fixes.

Not sure why that is the title of this entry, other than that song is in my head right now.

Right now is one of those times where maybe I should be sleeping. I actually dozed off while reading natural birthing books. Turned the light off and everything. But couldn’t get to sleep. Hop up and mean to spend a few min online.

There were things I just had to check, of course. Read email, check the slogan contest I opened up on my forums, see who’s online. I find out that the Hattiesburg American newspaper did a story on my forums. Last week a member of the forums, who is a high school football player, typed something he didn’t think through first. He said he hoped someone at a rival school got shot to see how tough his team was. It drew some flack. I suspended him for a few days, his Athletic Director and I talked about it some, he came back and said he was sorry.

But the article made the paper. It could be taken either a positive or negative piece of pub for the site. We’ll see. Some folks say any publicity is good publicity.

Went to the funeral home tonight. A guy who used to go to our church committed suicide early Monday morning. His stepdaughter is in the youth group. She wasn’t close to him lately, but he’d been the only daddy she’d really known. Rough situation with the guy. He was a great guy when not on the drugs. But they had their hooks in him and he couldn’t get loose. Left two little boys too. Second and sixth grade. Sad.

Started a study of James w/ the Jr High tonight. It went okay. Started The Case For Christ with the Sr. High Guys. I think it will be good. Might be too light, actually. It’s the student edition. We’ll see about that one too.

Time for the 2nd round of bed. I’ll go snuggle w/ my pregnant wife. Snuggling is much harder these days with her big belly. It’s cool though. The baby moves around tons at night. I think we’re about 9 weeks away. A new baby is going to rock our world.

I’ll talk more about it later. G’night.

We made it to the game yesterday and decided not to sit where our tickets were supposed to be. They were in a pretty crowded section of the stadium, we only had 2 seats, and The Kid needed a seat. So we headed to the top where there is usually more room. Turns out it was more crowded than I’d ever seen it up there. But we still found a few seats. But we’d walked up and up and up for so long The pregant Wife was about to burst into flames. Then we sit in the direct sunlight with the heat and humidity. So she goes down to the upper concession area. Comes back up, sits for a bit, then says she can’t handle it.

Before we left home, the first people that’d called us yesterday morning about the ticket tip said they’d have space around them. So I looked across the way w/ my binocs and saw that there was still space, called them on the cell, then made our way over to the shady sice. Much cooler. Much closer. And with backs on the seats! Score!

The game was unimpressive the first half other than State didn’t do anything really stupid. They didn’t show a whole lot either. But I was satisfied to a degree. They had some whacked out rule bent around them that could have backfired on them after a play. But they held their composure and didn’t get burned.

Second half was better. We scored our first two possessions. Omarr Conner started rolling out to pass and found his targets. We scored three rushing touchdowns. Coach Croom got his first win. I’m glad he’s our coach. I don’t give a rip if he’s black or not. But he seems to be a man of brilliant character. He will be a winner for us. Mark it down.

Next week we have Auburn. They’re much better than Tulane. Tulane’s DL started three TRUE freshmen and a sophomore. That’s pittiful. And they flushed us a few times. But Tulane was just what the doctor ordered. It boosted our confidence. It showed us where a few of our strengths are. And it showed us what we need to do to improve. Hopefully we’ll work like mad dogs all week long.

The Wife and I met up with a friend from way back. After we fought the on campus traffic forever we got away and ate supper together at Abner’s restaurant. It was great to catch up for a bit.

The Kid loved the night. She got to eat a bunch of different stuff and got to see Bully from a distance. Up close with Bully makes her scream.

Been on the lookout for tickets to tonights game in Starkville. I know there will be tickets available at the game, but they’ll cost money. I like free tickets. They’re my favorite.

But we’d resigned ourselves to going to the game and trying to get some “discounted” tickets just before kickoff. But got a call this morning about a friend who was selling two tickets for another friend. So we call one of the friends to see how much the other friend was selling them for. They didn’t know. They had to call the other friend to find out. So they call me back and tell me that the other friend won’t sell them to me. They just want to give them to me. So I go pick them up PLUS a parking pass. Sweetness. Hopefully The Kid won’t need a ticket and I’ll just carry her in. We may try to sit where the tickets actually are located, but might go up top where there is room for her to move around and all.

::The Game::

I think we’ll win. I think it will be a close first half, but we’ll put up a few scores on them in the second half of the game. Much emphasis will be made of it being the first SEC game coached by a black man. While I agree it is a big deal, it’s becoming a tired subject. But if it wins us some recruiting battles, them I’m all for it.

Croom has been down talking us a bit. At first I wondered if he was taking cues from his old mentor, Paul Bear Bryant, of if were were that bad. To be honest, I think it is a little of both. I think we’re still a work in progress, but I think we will surprise a few folks. I think that Croom will have us on the right track. Don’t expect a quick fix, but don’t expect to suck for much longer either.

Too bad that our cable is only the stingy basic kind. No ESPN or ESPN2 or Fox Sports South. But I still have football to watch. Bout to come on actually. But somewhere in between all that I gotta work in a shower.

I blogged like crazy last weekend, and then took an extended break.

What’s happened since then?

*Olympics are over. And just in time for college football too. NBC knew that college football would kick the Olympics tail all over the place. Even though I know there’d be some overlap of viewing groups, I think they target different people anyhow.
*MSU opens the Croom era this weekend. Hopefully I’ll keep up some sort of commentary regarding my thoughts on the state of State athletics. I know it won’t be of interest to anyone but me and maybe my wife, but hey, it’s a free country (so they tell us.)
* Three Ole Miss students died in a horrible frat house fire. Sad stuff.
*The Dave Matthews Band gets sued for dumping 800 pounds of crap (human crap) into the Chicago River and onto a tourist boat.
*Amory lost it’s first football game….barely. But they still have some maturing to do before district games get here. They’ll be okay.
*Activity is back up on MissSportsTalk.com. That’s a good thing. But I’m still waiting on it to be redesigned and all. Seems I’ve been waiting on it for eh-ver. But that’s life. Would like to get some advertisements and whatnot up on it. Make some money off of it.