a few more random tidbits...

My Mamaw Edelen was born on leap year day. Today is her birthday. She's turning 20. How cool is that?

My fingers and my wrist are really sore from practicing guitar again over the last couple of weeks. But it feels better than my eyes hurting from doing nothing but watching tv every night.

So, it looks like our choices in November 2008 are going to be an inexperienced Senator whose middle name is Hussein, who never shows up to vote on bills, and whose campaign is based primarily on rockin-the-hizzouse ....vs.... a guy in his 70's who has the cordial personality of an angry donkey, has almost spooky transparent skin, is anxious to exercise even more miliary strength, and who, frankly, wasn't even a good enough candidate to beat out George Bush in 2000. Bummer.

I'm currently infatuated with the Toyota Yaris.

I'm beginning to realize that, as I move forward in this vegetarian venture, that I need to bid a sad farewell to fast food. In general, here's what is offered at fast food places that I will actually be able to eat: baked potatos, french fries, apple pies, yogurt, bean burritos, ice cream, plain biscuits, and not much else. This is going to be tough. But I'll be better off for it.

Has anyone noticed that the NBA is back in full force? Remember 6 years ago when you sort of forgot it existed, and any mention of it made you cringe?

During the UT - Vanderbilt game, Bruce Pearl was so angry at one point he actually turned green. No kidding. Me and a few friends were watching the game at Spicy's and thought he might actually tear his clothes off and morph into the Incredible Hulk.

It's lunch time, so I gotta go. Today's menu - Ramen noodles. Hmmm, good.

experimenting with tofu

Just recently, I wrote this post about my interest in the vegetarian lifestyle. Although I have a hard time seeing myself becoming a "full fledged" vegetarian, there are many aspects about the lifestyle, the diet, and the motivation behind it that I find hard to ignore.

One thing that has peaked my interest is tofu. Never before had I eaten it. And...even though I had not eaten it...I possessed a mindset that said, "tofu is diguisting." Why would I think that without having tried it? Well, for the same reason you might believe that Jesus was a white man, that Ford builds better trucks that Chevy, or that Nike basketball shoes are actually worth spending $100.00 on ... ignorance, someone told you so you just believed it, preconceived notions, advertising, etc.

Sunday was a new day for me. After church, Erin, Eli and I went to lunch at Taste of Thai with friends from church. I ordered the "Rainbow Chicken" meal - but substituted with tofu, and ordered it at the number 3 spicy level (on a scale of 1-5). On Sunday evening, I marinated some tofu at home in soy sauce & honey, chopped up fresh peppers, zucchini, and carrots, and made a tofu stir-fry along with some white rice.

Here, now, after much reading, research, and actually EATING it, is what I can informatively say about tofu.

It's inexpensive. I bought a 16oz package for $2.00. It's full of protein and very low in calories, carbs, and fat. It is practically a "flavor sponge". It has almost no flavor on its own, but totally soaks up whatever flavors you marinate or cook it in. It has a little bit of a spongy texture, but that can be firmed up by freezing the tofu for a day or two, then thawing it before cooking. This is what I'm going to do next week. It's supposed to firm up the texture even more, to where it feels more like a meat substitute. It's incredibly easy to stir-fry it. It's already fully cooked when you buy it, so you only have to cook it for 3-5 minutes, just to heat it through and allow the flavor to really cook in well. You can marinate it in practically anything. It doesn't really taste good or bad. It's sort of like eating mushrooms on a pizza. You notice them in your mouth when you're chewing them, but they don't really add or take away any flavor from the pizza itself.

Say what you will. Call me a hippy. I can handle it. But the truth is, we all have notions about things that have no foundation in anything real whatsoever. I've finally overcome that notion with tofu. Now it's on to asparagus. I've never eaten asparagus, but I still think it's gross. Although it does make an awfully cute Veggie Tales character.

the distinction of a man

You may or may not have seen this recently popular You Tube video with the Baptist church preacher talking about "what makes a man...not a male." If you haven't seen it, it's definitely worth the next 5 minutes of your life.

In the Old Testament - only in the King James Version - the Bible signifies that which designates the "true men" from all others. Here it is:

1 Kings 16:11 (KJV)
11And it came to pass, when he (David) began to reign, as soon as he sat on his throne, that he slew all the house of Baasha: he left him not one that pisseth against a wall, neither of his kinsfolks, nor of his friends.

Well, think what you will. Maybe it's vulgar. Maybe it's euphamistic translation. But it only appears in the KJV and only on 6 occasions.

Regardless, you'll be glad to know that my small group from church has talked it over and we now proudly proclaim our stance....and we shall be known as true men.

you tube addiction

Have you given thought to what we would do....we, the blogging, internet dependent nation of clones...if You Tube had never come along?

What would we laugh about? Would our senses of humor have ceased to evolve? How many posts could we possibly come up with on our own? How would we watch things - like the slam dunk contest or a series of Tiger Wood's Top 10 shots - that we either don't have access to or are not able/willing to pay for? What would we do when we get bored at work? Have we forgotten that there was once a time when people truly worked at least 8 hours each day?

I love reading things like, "I was doing some research the other day, and I came across this video on You Tube." Isn't that at least a little like saying, "I needed some insight on America's unhealthly love of sports, so I spent the day playing basketball on my X-Box."

Don't get me wrong. I'm guilty too. But it almost feels like I took a nap and woke up and suddenly You Tube ruled the world. And we're all willing servants in its widespread rule.

a meat eating vegetarian?

Trevor - a friend from church, we're in a small group together - is a vegetarian. Has been for about a year or so. Which is pretty difficult when you're a Bible college student and the cafeteria serves mainly crap. I think he eats a lot of cereal.

A couple of weeks ago during small group, he explained to me his decision (along with his girlfriend) to become a vegetarian, why they did it, how it's changed him, what rules he follows, etc. Overall, he's definitely very "green" conscious, recycles, and has true concern for the health of the environment. I have to admit I was about as knowledgable as the next over-indulging meat-eater when it comes to the vegetarian lifestyle. Which is to say I knew almost nothing.

But I'm glad to admit that Trevor really opened my eyes in some positive ways. Although I don't yet have a desire to become a "true" vegetarian, I have decided to make a concerted effort to drastically reduce my meat consumption. Since I'm not much on seafood anyway, this would mainly apply to chicken and beef. This weekend, I bought tofu at the grocery store for the first time in my life. I've researched cooking and preservation methods for tofu and am anxious to start giving it a real effort.

To be honest, Super Size Me and Fast Food Nation had both served to peaked my interest over the last couple of years, I just never followed up on it. I've always eaten WAY too much fast food, have considered meat to be the main course of any good hearty meal, and quite frequently eaten myself into a slow and painful stomach ache. All of which is stupid and contrary to a healthy lifestyle.

Anyway. I'm gonna give this an honest effort. More vegetables and grains. Way less meat. Absolutely minimal fast food. It's healthier for me. It's healthier for the environment. And, as much as anything, I think it will simply make me feel better about myself.

if you could do anything ...

The other night I was talking to my friend Daniel. He and his wife run The Restoration House, a ministry that provides temporary housing and support for single mothers. I asked him how, exactly, they came to start this ministry.

Basically (not in his exact words), they were in a small group meeting, and a person in the small group asked everyone, "if you could do anything in life...with no concerns about money, time, difficulty, etc...what would you do?" Daniel's wife, Mandy, answered, "I would buy a big piece of property and provide housing for single mothers."

Within a few weeks, guess what happened? A big piece of property, with more than one living space, very near to where they currently were living, went up for sale. They bought it. They did a bunch of renovations and put together a ministry plan. And now Mandy's dream is being fleshed out in reality.

That's totally amazing. And as I think about it, I'm trying to answer that question for myself. If I could do anything in life, with no worries regarding money, time, difficulty, etc...what would I do? My answer? I'm not really sure. I have ideas. But no true sense of "calling" in a specific area. It's something I'm praying about. And once that answer becomes clear, I hope I'll have what it takes to pursue it. Give it some thought. What would you do?

"practice?"

Remember this? It's still hilarious 6 years later.

some blogging thoughts

Just a few things on my mind this morning....

At this moment, I've received 2,999 visits on this blog since starting it back in July. Not a totally impressive number in comparison to many, but definitely more than I would have imagined. That means about 14-15 people are checking this thing out each day on average. I hope it's been fun for those of you reading. Thank you.

In the last 3 days, I've received over 20 visits to the site as a result of this particular referral. The referral is from some type of "city-data" site for Knoxville, and one of the members on there - an individual from Kingsport - was inquiring about bounce houses. Another member - I do not know who this person is - referred them to this blog, and more specifically to a post I'd done a few months back about bounce houses. This is one of the things I find fascinating about blogging. Somehow, over time, you are connected to people you never knew existed.

And for those of you who may be reading this because you thought you were being linked to a well written and informative "bounce house mania" website, I welcome you and hope you'll enjoy your visit.

And finally....Crossings turned 1 year old yesterday. It was an excellent morning. It featured lots of excitement, cheesecake, great worship, a live broadcast video, living room stories, the kids city group providing music and scripture, a compelling message, and nearly 300 people there to be a part of it. The entire team, in all areas, did an awesome job making so many things happen yesterday, and it made for a truly incredibly anniversary.

jonah ... seriously?

Have you ever read the book of Jonah? Here it is in The Message version. It's 4 chapters in total. I totally recommend it.

It had been a while since I'd read it. We read it last night during the guys small group I'm in. Holy crap! What a weird, trippy, fascinating story. It's very difficult to distinguish whether it's literally true, or more of a parable. And though you may know that Jonah was sent to speak to Ninevah, you may not realize he only spoke ONE SENTENCE to them, and the entire city - 120,000 strong - turned to God.

And you may know that Jonah spent three days inside a whale. But did you know that Jonah very well may not have realized he was in a whale? At least not until he was vomited out. Well, there are too many amazing occurences to point out here. Check it out for yourself.

God's Word never ceases to amaze.

investigating my jesus poll

The last poll I loaded onto this blog - which, at this time, is still listed on the left hand side of the page - asked: "If Jesus were alive and ministering today - as opposed to 2000 years ago - is it possible that we wouldn't even know he was here?"

This is not meant to be a controversial questions, just one that caused me to think about our culture today. Imagine if Jesus were born 31 years ago. That for the last 2000 years, God's people were still anticipating the birth of the Messiah.

Now, let's think about a few things. There are over 6 billion people on the earth today. Billions more than were alive in Jesus' day. Could Jesus just get lost in the shuffle? Church as we know it now would not be what it is had Jesus not been born 2000 years ago. What would it be? We don't know.

Assuming Jesus were still born in Bethlehem, even if He performed miracles and did all the same things we know He did, would we recognize Him for who He is? Or would He just be dismissed as another religious figure, a "so called miracle worker", a "television evangelist", or a person who heals people who "obviously aren't really sick or in need of healing." Would we see Him as a fanatical middle eastern Benny Hinn, Joel Osteen, or Jimmy Swaggart? Would we, as a people, be so sick of waiting for the Messiah that we just didn't believe He would come....or would we be so excited for Him to finally come that anyone who did anything deemed as "miraculous" suddenly received our praise as "the one".

I don't know. It's totally hypothetical, really, but really tweaked my interest once I thought about it.

What do you think?

guitar separation blues

My guitar is pictured to the right. I bought it in the fall of 1999. It's a limited edition, Takamine Santa Fe model. Each year, Takamine makes a Santa Fe style that is exclusive to that year. Mine is a 1999 exclusive. If I remember right, it cost me about $1100.00. I got about $400.00 out of a Yamaha (my first guitar) that I sold to a friend of a friend, so my net expenditure was really only $700.00. Still. A lot of money.

This guitar is sweet. The design is beautiful, it's got a fully digital pick-up with a built in tuner, reverb, and pre-settable EQ levels. And it sounds awesome. All Takamine's do.

The problem is, over the last 5 years, I've BARELY touched my guitar. Seriously. I think I've played it about 4 times in 5 years. I used to play all the time when I was involved in the worship ministries at previous churches. That basically ended in 2002. And I've never enjoyed playing just for the sake of playing. The whole reason I taught myself to play back in the mid-90's was to play for youth groups, church camp, and in worship services within the church. Once that opportunity ended, so did my motivation to play music.

I toyed with selling it. This picture, taken back in May 2007, was one of several I took to put a flyer together to try and sell the guitar, case, cords, stand, and pedals as a package deal. I didn't really try that hard to advertise it, and it did not sell.

So now I'm struggling with whether or not to pick it back up again. I'll be extremely rusty. Any callouses my fingers ever developed are long gone. I wonder if I'll even have the time to devote to practicing again. Yet, somewhere deep down, I know I want to. I want to play all the great worship songs that have impacted me over the last few years. I want to play during my quiet times, even singing spontaneous songs of worship to God. I want to spike my hair, put on some cool glasses, and play while standing on my bed, imagining that I'm David Crowder, leading worship under disco strobe lights with some funky record scratching going on in the background. I'd like to think that if I devote myself again, that in a couple of years I could play better than I ever had before. We shall see. I just don't know. But I'll make sure and update you if I do.

bad mamma jamma punk a** pimpin for real

and these are phrases that I would like to use more often in every day life...except that I'm either too white, too dorky, too conversative, too thoughtful, too scared, or too lazy to do so...

• "dude, you's a bad mamma jamma!"
• "i kill the fool dat took my mountain dew"
• "come on wicha bad self"
• "homey don't play dat"
• "ooooohhhhh, yeaaahhh" (think Macho Man Randy Savage)
• "whacha gonna do, when jaybo-mania rains down, on youuu!!!" (think Hulk Hogan)
• "when the dogs are away, the cats will play"
• "you be illin"
• "i said a Big Mac with NO cheese, punk...should I repeat myself again?"
• "The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you."
• "Hamburgers. The cornerstone of any nutritious breakfast."
• anything else from Pulp Fiction that you can think of
• "stop looking at my butt"
• "you want some drama? believe me, you don't want no drama."
• "sike!"