March Madness...

I don't watch basketball. I don't know who the final four are. But March was madness for me.

I'm back at work this week after taking some much needed time off last week to go to my kid's swimming lessons, read, watch movies, play guitar and just generally be around the house.

I honestly don't think it was enough time, but it will have to do for now.

I am now officially bored at 9:00pm and too lazy to do anything else. I think I'll go play Nintendo or something. Wouldn't that be productive?

In the meantime, here are a few $0.88 reviews for your reading pleasure:

Gone Baby Gone - Don't rent it if you don't like intense movies. The predicament that the main character finds himself in led to a fascinating discussion in our house that was well worth the rental price.

Martian Child - Decent, family movie. Somewhat funny and cute.

Death Sentence - How could I pass this up at $0.88? I am partly ashamed of myself, but mostly ashamed of Kevin Bacon for being in it.

August Rush - Ummm...the lead female character is named Lyla. Every time her name was said I would break out into a rendition of Eric Clapton's "Layla" with "Lyyyyyyllllaaaaaa...I'm begging darling please Lyla." Erin was not as amused as I was, but my humor stretches beyond many mere mortals. The movie? Not so much. The soundtrack? Excellent. In the same vein as an Erik Mongrain.

Of hockey and guitar...

The Habs are currently beating Ottawa 5-1. Pittsburgh is currently losing. I don't boast, but it does make me fell a little giddy. First place in the East is within reach. As long as we don't "pull a Detroit" and get beat out in the first round of the playoffs.

In other news I was able to finish off the Clapton autobiography today. I absolutely loved this book. The rise to fame, the fall into drugs and alcohol, the people he played with, the story behind the songs and the albums, and how he was able to escape the grips of addiction, it was riveting. But then again, I'm a fan of his.

I remember buying his MTV Unplugged album when it came out while I was in high school, and I was hooked. A few of his albums ended up in my collection over the years and I've always been impressed with his guitar skills. But last March when I had the chance to see him live, I was blown away.

Anyway, this just means I'm going to be listening to Clapton for the next couple of weeks. Sorry Erin.

No profound thoughts...

It's Good Friday, but I don't have anything spiritually significant that I want to post on.

It is,however, my first full day off in 2 weeks (and I'm not patting myself on the back for that one...I'm an idiot). I stayed up late watching an $0.88 movie (to be honest I slept through most of it). The kids are playing the Wii. My wife is out for coffee. I spent most of the morning at Improv Everywhere (some very funny stuff).

Funniest quote of the day will go to Matthew Good who was describing one of his teenage jobs at a fine dining establishement:

First, there was Bonanza, an interesting establishment that tried to cross fast-food with grilled steak, the result of which probably kept the local hospital busy with food poisoning cases.

Why does this strike me as funny? I loved Bonanza. I remember visiting Regina in years gone by where I would team-up with Brad to try and get our wives to join us for a meal at Bonanza. I believe somebody got sick one year from eating there, but I'm fuzzy on the details. Then again, it seems that most people who have ever eaten at Bonanza have gotten sick. Except for me.

Other random observations of the day:

• Bryan Adams is still making music
• GI Joe will be a movie. And this is Snake Eyes. Cool.
  
• This video cracked me up more than most.
• Yay for bubblewrap.
• I'm currently reading Clapton: The Autobiography
• I am now losing the reading contest...but my wife doesn't play by the rules.

Youth leaders...

I have a youth leader meeting tonight, but found out a few of them won't be able to make it. So I sent out an email asking for their input on four questions. And so far I've got three entirely different types of responses.

This is a healthy reminder to me that while we may all be working in student ministry, there is no way that we will all be clones of each other. We are all wired differently. We won't always see things the same way as someone else. We won't always be passionate about the same things. We will sometimes miss things that others won't. We will sometimes have ideas no one else will think of.

But that is why we need to do this as a team.

So, how's your team?

Talking to myself...

Sometimes it feels like I'm just talking to myself.

3 more down...

It's time for a reading contest update. I finished three more books out of my personal goal of 26 for the year.

(pause)

Yes, I just paused to pat myself on the back. Yes, I'm still ahead of my wife in this ocntest. Yes, this lead will soon disappear.

But here's what I've finished lately (please note no Dr Seuss):

The Testament by John Grisham
I hadn't read any of his stuff since high school and it was the only book I could find lying around the house that looked unread and mildly interesting. I thought the book started good, but I wasn't too thrilled with the ending.

Deep Ministry in a Shallow World by Chap Clark and Kara Powell
Good book. This ones going on the "read-it-again-and-spend-more-time-processing-it" list. It contains some great challenges and raises some great questions about the current status of any student ministry. I'm currently debating making this one a must-read for our leadership team next year.

The Midnight Club by James Patterson
I just plain like the way this guys writes. It could have something to do with the really short chapters that makes it possible to pick up at any time and read a few pages, but this was another good one.

Working with students...

Why is it that almost every book about student ministry seems to want to tell me that the way I am currently doing things in ministry is wrong and that I should strongly consider switching to their superior model of working with students?

The FA Cup...

I'm choked that United lost to Portsmouth this weekend which leaves them out of the FA Cup. But some relief comes from watching Chelsea (I refuse to link to them) get beat by Barnsley. For those of you who don't watch football, Chelsea is in 3rd place the Premier League and spends piles of money on their squad. Barnsley is in 19th place in the Championship and doesn't even have piles of money.

Their chairman Gordon Shepherd summed it up here with this little gem:

"It's wonderful, beating a squad worth £230million, while ours is worth under £2million."

A 24 prequel...

Stumbled on this today. Apparently a 24 prequel movie is in the works for this fall. Oh, please tell me it's true.

How I escaped the pudding shower...

s of Wednesday at 6:00pm I was worth approximately $206,000. Ryan was worth $226,000. That meant I needed one more person to buy me in order to tie Ryan. Two buyers and I would be the leader and winner.

The catch was that only one student appeared to have enough cash to buy either one of us. My only hope was that this particular student would walk in the door at youth and that she would be willing to pull a fast one on Ryan.

Well, she showed up and it just so happened that Ryan was on the other side of the building with the middle schoolers. So this student went along with the plan, found my computer and jumped online. My wife videotaped the whole Facebook transaction, while the rest of our evening unfolded. This high school girl called one of her friends and they quickly started buying me back and forth.

The middle schoolers came back to join us in the Youth Centre. We had our worship time and then got ready for the pudding dump. I got up to admit defeat and as I was about to speak my wife jumped in to state that there was a new development. And it was all on film.

So, we plugged in the camera and watched the madness unfold. I think Ryan may have yelled.

My worth? $629,289.

Ryan's worth? $142, 329.

Ah yes, I dodged a bullet. Unlike another time in my ministry career which Tammy was so kind to bring up.

Update: Here's the video for your viewing pleasure.

More tomorrow...

I'll give you the details tomorrow, but all you need to know is that it's not me in the picture.

And now it's 12:30am and I should probably not be on the computer.

Night of the pudding...

The challenge was put forth. The results are final as of tonight. I'm currently losing and will likely have pudding dumped on my head at youth tonight. I'm not sure how this will affect the flow of the evening. I'll admit that it would be easier (and funner) if Ryan lost. But I find that unlikely. He was able to rally the troops.

Apparently everyone wants to see me covered in pudding.

Remind me why I agreed to this?

Another weekend complete...

I traveled close to 800kms last weekend. I slept for about 11 hours. I ate a giant burrito. I drank an XL French Vanilla. No, that was not all the food that I could find, but it was the only food that was worthy of mentioning.

I prayed over one of my students as he prepared to hurl chunks in the bathroom. I heard students scream at 120db. I had my rental vehicle TP'd. I lost a game of Settlers. And everyone arrived home with all limbs attached.

It was a good weekend.

Don't ask me about the spiritual stuff. That will take longer to analyze and report on.

Relationally? The weekend was worth every penny.

But I'm glad to be home.