A few days ago I found the promo video of me shooting my friend/coworker Brock Gill in the face.

This morning I actually found the full version. If you’ve got 10 minutes, it’s totally worth it.

This is from the DVD Standing Room Only. I’m pretty proud of it, because I wrote and co-directed it. It was a documentary of what we did at “Freedom Experience,” the city-wide outreach that I directed back in 2006. It’s a 3 night outreach that combines music, bmx, skateboarding and illusion. It’s pretty awesome.

Click here to download the free song. You can read below while you wait for the transfer to complete.

As you probably all know, I am and always have been a diehard fan of the band Switchfoot. I discovered them back in 2000 when I was a senior in High School and they released the album “Learning to Breathe.”

 More than any other album I’ve ever owned, this CD influenced (and still continues to influence) my life like no CD ever had (or has since). It is, front to back, an absolutely amazing album. 

My freshman year of college I attempted to convince my friends that Switchfoot, this little band they’d never heard of, was in fact the best music that they weren’t yet listening to. I did so by burning mix cd’s and passing them out to my new Samford friends at Christmas time. (I would feel bad about copyright law violation, but I over the years I’ve sold so many Switchfoot CD’s to people and bought so many as gifts for people that I really should be in some sort of affiliate program)

In the spirit of Christmas ‘01, I actually found a website that is giving away a download of a classic (and one of my all time favorite) Switchfoot songs. It’s called “Learning to Breathe” and (as you might guess) is the title track of my favorite CD. So click here to download it.

This free track giveaway is actually in connection with the fact that the band just put out a “Greatest Hits So Far” CD. Of course, I already own all of these songs several times over from almost a decade of ridiculous fanatiscism, but here’s the link so you can check it out.

Also check out this 3 CD for the price of 1 set, which features their first three CDs…two of which are my favorite two they’ve ever released. If you want more songs like this download…this would be the one to check out.

A while ago I blogged about Lyndsay’s dislike for feet and how little sense it made to me. Kaye, my friend from Samford pulled out some disgusting story from childhood about how she doesn’t like feet and wondered if it might be a traumatic childhood experience. Sara, my friend from high school pointed out that she personally doesn’t like toes and wondered if that might be the case with Lyndsay as well. When I asked Lyndsay about the issue shortly after getting all this feedback, she actually listed both of those reasons as the two reasons that she did not like feet.

In this, I learned two things. First, that I’m incapable of understanding and/or sympathizing with my wife on some issues. Second, that the internet/blog/facebook is actually a wonderful way to gain insight and perspective from friends when I need a little dose of it.

So. Here’s the new one. Today Lyndsay was putting out Christmas decorations (yes, I know it’s only November 16…but this is not even part of the question), which included 3 holiday soap dispensers, one in each of our bathrooms. She set each empty Christmas dispenser next to the usual soap dispenser on the sink. I asked her if she wanted me to dump the regular soap in, or if she had her own soap for these Christmas dispensers.

She replied, “No, I wouldn’t want to ruin them (the Christmas soap dispensers) by putting soap in them.”

This sentence makes no sense to me. What would the purpose be, if not to hold soap? One of us is crazy. Please advise.

I was surprised and a little excited to find out that Samford was playing Belmont right here in Nashville for their season opener this year. I don’t really keep up with Samford basketball since as long as I’ve been watching, they’ve been terrible. I had to go what seemed like a bazillion games while I was in Pep Band. They were occasionally entertaining, but mostly depressing. Especially the women. But the women seem to have turned it around, as they went something like 23-9 last year and made it to the conference semi-finals. They had their opener tonight too–except they won.

So back to tonight. We were excited to get to go cheer for our Bulldogs. We even saw Cortland Finnegan, the cornerback for the Titans who played at Samford while we were there.

I remembered that Belmont had been a perennial attendee of the NCAA Tournament the last few years. I did forget that they almost beat Duke last year. But I figured hey–we’ve had all off-season to practice, and maybe they had some seniors graduate…you know, all the things you tell yourself to try and avoid the fact that you’re about to get killed at a game of basketball.

One interesting side note…Belmont fans look just like Samford fans. They even wear the same colors. Without “Belmont” lettered across their shirt, I would think they were just Samford fans who cheered at the wrong times. But Lyndsay and I were able to find a small crowd of Samford fans, and we tried to sit near them.

Well Samford fans, I have bad news. You can expect another year of the same old mediocre Samford basketball. It’s a bunch of tall guys running around the three point line and staying out from being anywhere near the goal. They do have this one little short guy whose neck is about the size of everybody else’s foreams. He can make just about anything. Other than that, it’s all tall guys avoiding the key.

I really don’t know anything about basketball, but I’m 6′5″ so I feel qualified to talk about it. I watched Samford Basketball a lot in the 2001-2004 days…and I just watched it again tonight…and it hasn’t changed a bit. It’s kind of irritating. Knowing that the team used to be awesome back around ‘99-’00 and win a lot just before I got there makes it even more frustrating to see 8 years of not going anywhere.

It’s terribly boring to watch. Tall guys passing the ball around the three point line and nobody playing down low. I realize that as a fan and an ex-student, when it comes to basketball, it’s not really about me. But then again…I kinda feel like it is. I’m not going to pretend to know anything about the Samford Athletics department budget, but I can tell you this. If Samford basketball was more fun to watch, more people would go watch. If they would win, more people would go to that too. And if people will go, that program will make more money, athletics will make more, Samford will make more…everybody will win. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not expecting the Celtics vs. the Lakers or anything. But Belmont was enjoyable to watch. It wouldn’t take much more than a couple of physical guys down low to make Samford more enjoyable to watch.

In the end, we got beat by 18 points. We were down by 9 points immediately and held it around that through halftime. With about 12 minutes left it got painful and embarrassing. We left at about 5 minutes left when we were down by 20. At that point, I just couldn’t stomach it any longer. Belmont is a good team.

But even with my limited knowledge of basketball, I don’t think that was the only factor involved.

Unless I hear that something crazy has happened and the entire coaching/playing strategy of Samford has changed…or unless they actually start winning, I don’t think I’ll be back to a Samford Bulldogs Men’s Basketball Game any time soon. I don’t know if that would be considered “fair-weather” or “burned out,” but it is certain.

 
Some days you just feel like a bad friend. Maybe it was because you weren’t honest. Or you weren’t there to lend a hand. Or you couldn’t meet expectations. Or maybe because you shot your friend. Hey, it happened to Dick Cheney. It happened to me. And it could happen to you too. Check out the video.

Luckily, just like VP Cheney, my friend was fine. And our friendship continued.

(Sorry for the sensationalist blog title. I found this video while I was working today and I thought I’d share it)

On Monday nights Lyndsay has a Bible study with her friends. I used to have classes on this night, but since they have ended, I have been enjoying the monday nights as “me” time.

Tonight I was checking my mail and looking at various blogs on the internet when I noticed this:

A recipe to make my own chocolate cake out of hot coccoa mix, a mug, and common household cooking items.

Though I am certainly not much of a cook myself, I’m always up for a good science experiment…especially if I can eat it.

So I went through the instructions and voila! Less than 10 minutes later I am munching on cake while I type this. It’s not awesome, but it’s pretty good for what it is.

On the 1 to 10 scale of deserts, I give it about a 3.

On the 1 to 10 scale of food, I give it about a 6.

(Competition is tougher on the desserts scale because on the “food” scale, things like collard greens, cooked carrots, and cabbage go on the bottom end of the scale and being able to actually even swallow the food gets you at least a 4.

On the 1 to 10 scale of edible 10 minute or less science experiments. I give it a 9.5.

Go give it a shot and report back.

This past weekend Lyndsay and I trekked down to Wetumpka, AL to visit with some of Lyndsay’s extended family. We had a great time….lots of food (great bbq!) and good times catching up with (and for me, getting to know) family. I took a lot of pictures…and in fact, I even brought my old film camera that still had a few shots in it left over from this past summer.

I took a bunch of pictures and they all turned out pretty good. I determined that my problem with the old camera was indeed Wal-mart’s fault. They still don’t know how to develop film. This time I took it to Wolf Camera and they did a much better job. Strangely, though…I could still tell a big difference between the film shots and the digital shots. Maybe because I have this HUGE flash on my film camera that I haven’t figured out how to rein in yet. Check this out:

Film Camera:

Digital Camera

Kinda interesting, huh?

Anyway, it was a great day and a lot of fun. I put up a whole gallery of pictures here. You can play “Is it film or is it digital”?

BTW…in the event that anyone who knows anything about iphoto or photoshop elements happens along this set of pictures and see some obvious tweak that I need to make this all look good (white balance, maybe?)…please feel free to tell me what it is…

I just finished watching the TV version of the movie “40 Year Old Virgin.” I love “adapted for TV” movies. If there was a way to watch all movies that way for the same cost as watching them the normal way, I totally would. I think it’s because when the shock value of the language is removed that element of comedy is lost…but then the movie has to depend its message. Has anyone ever seen “Good Will Hunting” on TV? It’s inspiring. I watched it on TV and was captivated. I then saw the unedited version of it sometime thereafter and couldn’t even watch it. Not because of the language…at least I don’t think that was it. I just felt like the redemptive message was being suffocated by a bunch of people finding creative ways to swear at each other. 

In case you’re wondering, I expect to be in the minority of the world on this opinion. And I see the other side…free speech, artistic representation and all that jazz. That’s great. For y’all. 

So back to the movie at hand. “40 Year Old Virgin.” Since I think I’m about the last person on earth that intends to see this movie and I finally did see it, I’m going to have a SPOILER ALERT:  the main character is a 40 year old virgin. His friends at work are trying to “help” him lose his virginity.  He falls in love with a woman…and long story short, he saves sex for marriage. The movie ends with him getting married. Of course, this was the TV version. I suppose the unedited version could have had a completely different ending…but I don’t think that was the case (though I’m pretty sure that there were a few scenes missing at the beginning and the dialogue was really hard to follow in some parts because it was edited so heavily to get onto TV) But I really wasn’t expecting him to actually save sex for marriage. I guess my expectations are lower for fictitious TV movie characters, since it seems like everybody on TV is having sex outside of marriage…but I really admired the main character for waiting.

I guess I felt like I could relate. Saving sex for marriage was a commitment I made to myself and to Lyndsay, even though I didn’t know her when I made it. And I played my cards a good bit differently than the character in the movie. I tried to surround myself with people who agreed with me and held the same beliefs I did on sex and marriage and would encourage me to be stick to my commitment. It wasn’t always easy, but I’m glad that I waited. I sometimes couldn’t really completely figure out the “why” behind waiting a lot of the time. I just knew that it was “the right thing to do.” But I think God knew my desire to answer the “why” question and He did. Ironically, He chose to do so while I was standing at the altar on my wedding day, through some crazy awesome wisdom from Steve, one of the pastors that was marrying us. But that’s another story for another day. Ask me if you care, I’ll tell you all about it.

The thing that I really liked about this movie was that as I let it sink in, it really made me thankful for my wife. In the movie, as the couple is dating they start talking about the future, about hopes and dreams, etc. Over the course of the movie, the guy goes from being on the bottom of the ladder at Best Buy to being successful at his job to selling his collection of sci-fi memorabilia to get the upfront capital to follow his dreams of owning his own business. But if he’d never met this woman, he just would have sat at home collecting junk until he died. She inspired him to get up and move his life forward.

In my desire to “be a leader” and “focus on the future” and fulfill my role as the leader in our marriage, it’s easy for me to get so focused on what I need to be doing for Lyndsay that I begin to take for granted what she’s doing for me. I’m not even talking about the fantastic things she does intentionally, like make good food when she has the chance. I’m talking about the things she does for me unintentionally. For example, I get a lesson from her in faith in God…of asking Him and expecting it…not because you want it, but because you depend on it. And depending on it not for self-centered personal needs, but because those personal needs and that dependance come out of a desire to see God’s will done here on earth. Also, I see the complete trust she has in me when we’re not together. Her trusting me makes me realize just how crucial trust is for a functional relationship (on any level of relationship). Those are just two examples, but they’re darn good ones–I definitely would not have any kind of grasp on possessing the qualities of faith in God and trust in others if it weren’t for Lyndsay’s presence in my life. And I need to possess those qualities. Bad. 

…alright, it’s getting late and that’s about as much vulnerability as I can display without getting sarcastic, so I better quit now while I’m still doing well. Goodnight!

About two months ago I sent off my application to the Tennessee state board of CPA Examination, requesting that I be able to take the CPA Exam. It said to allow 8 weeks. I figured they were just saying that, and that I’d hear back from them in 4 or 5 weeks tops.

So about 3 or 4 weeks ago I began checking my mailbox daily, eagerly waiting to see if I got my approval letter. After a couple weeks of this I began to lose heart. I began to wonder if perhaps I was missing some hours, or some requirement that I never knew existed. I didn’t have to worry if they’d not gotten the application though…no sir. They’d deposited my check for the absurdly large registration fee less than 7 days after I mailed it.

So this internal emotional rollercoaster has gone on for about a month now. Of course since I have no emotions, my internal emotional rollercoaster is a pretty laid back ride. But still. Not fun.

This morning all of that came to an end in the most anti-climatic way possible…at 4:07 this morning I received an email from the Tennessee Board of Accountancy telling me I’m qualified, approved, and ready to go take the test.

Yes. An Email.

Where is the satisfaction in that? I want to run in from the mailbox and excitedly open the envelope! I don’t want to spend the first 2 minutes wondering if what I’m looking at is actually a spam message telling me there’s a dead person in Europe who left me 10 million dollars.

Anyway…I’m in.

So now I have to schedule the tests. I’m going to try to take two of them before Christmas, though that’s a much bigger undertaking now then it was two months ago when I initially dreamed up doing it. 

Goodbye social life. Goodbye football on my TV. Goodbye Xbox. It was nice to spend time with all of you. I’ll see you again in about 8 months, I hope.

This is an interview with my Grandpa that was filmed years ago. It was originally on VHS but I converted it to DVD for my family. And I thought it was pretty awesome, so I trimmed it down a small bit for youtube. Here it is.